Title: The Not-Quite-Broken Hearted
Author: Karen
Email: If anyone wants me, I'll be in the Witness Protection Program.
Rating: PG-13
Category: Drama
Summary: Marie faces the prospect of Valentine's Day without a true love…or will she?
Author's notes: This story is set after the first movie, but conveniently ignores the events in X2, so Jean's not at the bottom of Alkali Lake. I'm borrowing a comment Brittany Murphy made about her ex-boyfriend Ashton Kutcher, when she was asked about his relationship with Demi Moore.
The Not-Quite-Broken Hearted
Wanting to avoid her well-meaning, but nosy roommates, Marie had taken off for the quiet solitude of the lake when she'd discovered Bobby's betrayal. She wasn't alone for long.
"Wow, whatever it is, it must be really bad if you're in your Winnie-the-Pooh thinking spot."
Marie let out a hiccupy laugh even as the tears continued rolling down her cheeks.
The crunching sound his boots made on the hard-packed snow told her he wasn't waiting for an invitation to join her on the piece of driftwood she was perched on.
"Here, put this on." She felt his leather jacket drop onto her shoulders.
"Thanks," she said, her voice barely a whisper, shrugging into the jacket as Logan dropped down beside her. The worn leather overwhelmed her small frame, but it was warm from his body heat and that comforted her as much as it did to stop the shivering.
"What'd he do this time?" he asked with a sigh.
"What makes you think Bobby did something?"
"'Cause me polishing off the last of the fresh-baked chocolate chip cookies couldn't possibly be the problem, so I figured it had to be the icepick," he said, producing a tissue from the pocket of his jeans and dabbing at her moist cheeks.
"Ice prick is more like it," Marie huffed.
"Uh huh," he said knowingly as he wadded up the tissue and then littered by tossing it on the ground, "So, are you gonna tell me what he did? Not that I need a reason to remove his appendix the hard way."
"What's your view on cheating?"
Well at least Logan knew what the little jerk had done. Now he just had to find out the details. Strictly for information-gathering purposes, of course.
"Most of the time they conveniently forget to mention they're married," he said with a naughty grin.
Marie rolled her eyes and shook her head.
"That's my story…and I'm sticking with it."
"So you have no problem with the whole cheating aspect, just so long as you're the recipient of the…fun. Is that it?
"Okay, you want a serious answer? You make a commitment to someone, you see it through or end it first before moving on."
Marie let out a 'humph'. "How can you say that with a straight face, when you've made chasing after Jean a sporting event? She may not have autographed her name on a marriage certificate yet, but her engagement ring should still be considered a sign that reads – 'hands off, property of somebody who's not you'."
Logan shrugged his shoulders. "I flirted with Jean when I first got here because I do that with a lot of attractive women. Now I keep doing it just because it irritates Scott so much. Now there's a sporting event."
"Scott's a great guy, you really should find a new hobby."
"And I thought Kitty was the president of his fan club," Logan said with a smirk.
"That obvious, huh?"
Logan tapped the side of his nose, "I know that her scent changes whenever he's around."
Marie scrunched up her nose, "Oooh, too much information."
"Back to the original subject. Bobby's been playing hide-the-cocktail-weenie with another girl and you found out. That about cover it?"
Marie nodded affirmatively.
"Hmmm, hard to believe there's someone else around here with the same bad taste as you," Logan said, then added, "We are talking about a real live girl, right – not a blow-up doll?"
"Logan!"
"Just checking."
"And it was a woman, not a girl," she corrected.
"Which means he probably found her through a 1-900 number, and that doesn't count as cheating." He paused. "It's a technicality."
"He didn't call Rent-A-Pussy. But even if he did, it still counts," Marie said indignantly.
So it had been someone from the mansion. Logan began a mental checklist of the available women. Jubilee was trying to capture the Cajun's attention, which eliminated her. Jean was engaged to Scott, who was starring in Kitty's fantasies and she wouldn't settle for a pale imitation, so that disqualified both of them. That left Ororo, Betsy, Emma, Alison, the assorted cleaning staff and cooks, but none of them had shown a predilection for wimpy little boys – although he thought Jean came pretty close with Scott.
"How'd you find out?" Logan asked, hoping her answer would give him some clue as to the identity of Bobby's Mrs. Robinson.
"I heard about it on the six o'clock news," Marie replied, "How do you think I found out? I caught him with his pants down…literally."
"Ugh, thanks a lot for that visual," Logan said with an exaggerated shudder.
"How could he do this to me two days before Valentine's?" Marie asked rhetorically.
"Yeah, that was really inconsiderate of him to get caught now instead of after the holiday. Bastard," Logan replied in mock indignation.
"I'm so glad my train wreck of a love life is so amusing to you, Logan."
"Come on, kiddo, I'm just trying to lighten the mood," he said as he playfully nudged her arm with his, then realizing he still didn't know the identify of the mystery woman, he casually added, "So who was the twerp boning?"
"Jean," Marie replied bluntly.
Logan was stunned into momentary silence. That certainly wasn't the answer he'd been expecting.
"Just when I thought Red couldn't possibly do any worse than Scott, she sinks to a new low."
"Well, at least now I know why he bought me the same perfume she wears. That rat bastard."
Logan let out an amused snort. "He made sure you smelled alike so you wouldn't realize he'd been rubbing up against another woman? I underestimated the little shit, that's pretty clever."
"Maybe if you ask nicely, he can give you some more pointers," Marie said flippantly.
"Lighten up, it's just Iceboy. It's not like it's a big loss," Logan said fighting to keep the amusement out of his voice and not succeeding.
"I know you thought dating Bobby was a bad idea, but you don't have to be so happy that you were right."
"Marie, I'm not happy to see you upset," he said as he put his arm around her and pulled her toward him, "Which appendage would you like me to slice offa him?"
Marie gave him a devilish grin.
"Oh really?" Logan said in understanding and then with a grin added, "Hacking off that particular body part is gonna ruin Jeannie's week too."
That did it. They both laughed, which lightened the mood considerably.
Logan finally stopped laughing long enough to say, "Jean and Bobby. That's something I woulda bet money against."
"It proves that to him age doesn't matter and to her, size doesn't matter."
And that made them erupt in laughter again.
"At least now that you two are history, I won't have to worry you'll be distracted on missions 'cause you're busy making goo-goo eyes at him."
"Goo-goo eyes?" Marie repeated, "I don't believe that phrase just came out of your mouth."
"Oh yeah. How about this one? I love you, Marie."
Marie shifted enough to swing onto his lap. Placing her arms around his neck, she leaned forward and in a whispery voice said, "I love you, too – ya big lug." Then she giggled.
"I'm not joking," Logan said quietly.
Marie's giggling ground to an immediate halt.
"Logan, it's Valentine's in two days, not April Fool's – quit kidding around."
"I'm serious," he replied with as much conviction as he could muster.
"Serious as in 'Jubilee at a clearance sale' serious?" she asked, needing absolute assurance he hadn't gotten his national holidays mixed up.
"Even as serious as Scott is when he's…well, when's he doing anything actually."
Marie fixed him with a look.
With a sigh, Logan said, "Look, first thing tomorrow I'll apply for membership in Scott's fan club. Okay?"
"I wonder if we can find an 'I heart Scott' t-shirt in your size," Marie joked.
"Screw Scott." Pause "Not literally…if you're gonna be leaping inta anyone's bed, I'm your man," he said thumbing at himself.
At that precise moment Bobby stepped from the treeline, interrupting them. At first he visibly paled to find Marie perched on Logan's lap and then his blood pressure elevated.
"You don't waste any time, do you?" he snapped hotly.
Logan and Marie exchanged puzzled looks, not knowing precisely which one of them he was addressing.
"That's rich coming from someone who was 'double dipping' in the dating pool," Logan answered.
Marie climbed off of Logan's lap and walked over to Bobby.
"How dare you cop that attitude with me when you've just finished screwing someone else," she said, her anger barely restrained.
"I was failing biology, so we cut a deal," Bobby explained weakly, "It was just this one time."
"Liar," Marie said bluntly.
"Rogue, I swear on my grandmother's grave…" Bobby began.
"Your grandmother isn't dead!"
"Yeah, but you're gonna be," Logan announced as he walked up to them, stood next to Marie and pierced Bobby with a glare that would've made a Marine run away in tears.
Bobby gulped, but bravely forged ahead.
"Let's just put this behind us…" he started to say when Logan interrupted him.
"Your days of putting it anywhere with her are over."
Marie had to bite her lip to stop herself from laughing.
"Do you mind? Shouldn't you be at an anger management class or something?" Bobby asked testily.
"Hmm, apparently stupid and suicidal," Logan said with a roll of his eyes.
"I'm not afraid of you," Bobby declared, squaring his shoulders in attempted defiance.
"You oughta be," Logan said low and menacingly.
Bobby winced as he suddenly remembered Logan's fuse was so dangerously short it was practically non-existent.
"Bobby, there's nothing to discuss. I don't care if you did…it with Jean once or a hundred times, you still cheated and that's number one on my list of things I don't forgive my boyfriend for," Marie informed him, surprising herself that she was able to keep her tone calm and even, despite wanting to haul off and deck him.
"What's number two on that list?" Logan inquired curiously.
Marie and Bobby both turned and glared at him. Logan, looking amused, simply shrugged.
"Do we have to have this conversation in front of him?" Bobby asked with a nod of his head towards Logan.
"I ain't going anywhere, bub."
"Logan, I can handle this. Why don't you go back to the house and I'll catch up with you later, okay?" Marie suggested.
"You sure?"
Marie nodded affirmatively, "Yeah, I'll be fine."
Bobby waved and mouthed 'buh-bye'. Logan released one claw, pantomimed slicing off his dick, then pointed at Bobby and mouthed back, 'you', before turning to leave.
Walking away from the lake he glanced over his shoulder and noted that Marie had her arms folded and was glaring at Bobby. Good, it appeared the little worm wasn't going to be able to slither out of the pile of shit he'd fallen into and Logan was delighted. When he'd first returned and discovered that Bobby had poached on his 'territory', he'd been sorely tempted to teach him a lesson about other people's property. Then deciding Marie needed a practice boyfriend, he'd changed his tactics, sat back and waited for the inevitable breakup. Never being a patient man, Logan had quickly grown tired of waiting and had been trying to concoct a plan to move things along a little faster – never figuring Jean's wandering eyes would find their way to Bobby and solve his problem for him.
As Marie apparently wasn't going to let him beat the snot out of Bobby, he decided he'd take out his frustrations on a holographic version and headed downstairs to the Danger Room. He opened the door to the men's locker room and collided with an exiting Kitty – sending her sprawling onto the floor.
"Sorry, Kitty," Logan said as he reached down and pulled her to her feet, "What happened, you take a wrong turn on the way to the women's locker room?"
Kitty looked decidedly stuck for an explanation and that's when Logan noticed a couple of things about her. She was slightly disheveled and flushed. Pretending to have an itch, he rubbed his nose and surreptitiously sniffed the air. Bingo. Ms. Pryde had just experienced an orgasm and from the familiar cologne lingering on her skin he wasn't particularly shocked a few seconds later when Scott emerged from the locker room.
"You da man," is all Logan said with an amused smirk as he brushed past Scott and continued into the locker room.
An hour later, his thirst for tearing Bobby limb from limb suitably quenched, Logan – not wanting to run the risk of finding anyone else trysting in the men's locker room – headed upstairs to shower in the privacy of his own bathroom. He found Marie sitting on his bed.
"Just so you know, that area's a clothes-free zone," he informed her with a lift of one eyebrow.
"Okay, if you insist," Marie replied and started to unbutton her dark-green cashmere sweater.
She undid the last button and pulled the garment apart, revealing a black bra, then started to slide the sweater off of her shoulders.
"You're not gonna stop me, are you?" she asked in genuine astonishment.
"Do I look stupid?"
Marie stopped disrobing.
"Tease."
"Me? You're the one who roams around the place without a shirt on, sending half the women running for a cold shower and the other half in search of their vibrators," Marie blurted out.
"Oh really? And which group are you in – the one responsible for the huge water bill or the disappearance of all the C batteries?"
"Oh God," Marie moaned as she dropped her head into her hands.
Logan walked over to the bed and knelt down in front of her.
Tipping her chin up, he said, "Give me a chance and you won't have to rely on a shower massager or a battery-operated substitute anymore."
"What?"
"Come on, do ya need me to spell it out? Logan asked. Then realizing she did need to hear it, he added, "I want you. I have for a long time. It's a good thing you dumped Iceboy before he had an unfortunate 'accident'."
"How long?" she asked.
"How long? What, you got some sort of minimum requirement? 'Cause I think I'd measure up," he said with an exaggerated wink.
"Not that!" Marie replied and swatted at his arm, "I meant how long have you wanted me?"
"Let's put it this way – if that dump in Laughlin City had had a pool table …" he trailed off, letting her imagination fill in the rest.
Marie's eyes went wide. She'd honestly had no clue Logan thought of her in that way for quite that long.
"What about you – when was the first time you wanted to jump me?"
"Duh. The first time I laid eyes on you, you were half naked."
"Guess we've got some 'making up for lost time' to do," he said with a mischievous smile.
"Will you do something for me before we make love?"
"Set up a video camera?" Logan asked hopefully.
Marie laughed as she shook her head.
"Kiss me," she requested softly.
So he did.
Their coming together proved to have been worth the wait.
Two days later on Valentine's they managed to get out of bed long enough to get married.