A/N: And if anyone is still actually following this after about a two month break, you have my utmost respect. But, after exams, writer's block, cats, thunderstorms, vacations and other things, I've picked up the story again. Hopefully, I'll be able to update more regularly now. I wanted to start the action plot this chapter, but my muses had other ideas. I promise they'll start being more interesting soon!
Nova Scotia may have been where they were going, but they were certainly taking their own sweet time to get there. Admittedly, it was half her fault, her hip joint cramping up at frequent intervals and necessitating poking Logan's shoulder and asking for a rest stop. He was surprisingly cooperative about it, even though she could sense his desire to drive straight through, fast as possible and losing himself in the road and the sensation of speed.
She'd long ago calculated just what forces were being applied thanks to the contortionism it took to keep her on the bike, and while the medical analysis no longer did all that much to amuse her over the hours on the road -- I am not going to give in and start a conversation out of sheer boredom. We are ignoring him, Jean, and we don't want to be here, with him, going to Halifax, no matter how much of a craving for lobster and conversation we get. Remember that, girl. -- it occurred to her that, from the simplicity of the break, the time already spent healing, and the fact that she could keep herself balanced with her telekinesis, she could probably safely trade in the plaster cast and crutches for a more mobile plastic brace and cane.
Mobility, and the ability to rent some nice automatic car and drive the heck away from Logan, Scott's motorcycle, and... everything. If she could get far enough away, maybe she really could forget it all.
Poke, poke, poke. "Logan? Can I ask you something?"
A snort. "So we're speaking to me again? Sure, Red, whaddya want to know?"
"Nothing about your mysterious past, don't worry." she replied, snorting herself, and then snorting a few more times at the sensation of some small insect hitting her face uncomfortably close to her nose. Stupid motocycle. "I just wanted to know if the route you're planning will take us through Montreal... assuming we ever leave the wilds of Ontario." she tacked on, attempting to recover a little dignity lost by her reaction to the bug. That smirk was hanging in the air again, she could feel it.
The smirk disappeared and there was a touch of irritation in Logan's voice as he replied that "I don't have to take the back roads, Red. I was taking them to make it easier on you." He shifted gears upwards and sent them careening around a corner at a speed that, for once, Jean didn't squeak at.
What? "Because I oh-so-desperately find it relaxing and easy to spend extra hours on the road, my leg stiffening to the point where I'm going to end up an arthritis patient by the time I'm 30...? What are you on?" she snapped back, meeting the irritation with some of her own as she tried to puzzle things out for herself. Logan said nothing, his shoulders tightening and the bike going still faster. They blazed past an RV pulled over so that the middle-aged couple within could coo over a few deer beside a small river, and she caught identical thoughts of Damn inconsiderate bikers! as the deer scattered. She winced at the force of them, or rather her new sensitivity to them, and then... Lock. Key. Click. "Oh."
"That's right, Lady Grey, 'Oh'." Logan snorted again, the irritation changed to exasperation, but the motorcycle shedding a little speed "Don't you think I don't notice how you have to fight a headache whenever we stop for lunch or gas, or how you have me pull in at the most deserted motels for the night? S'your telepathy, isn't it?"
"Oh." said Jean again, caught at a loss and all of a sudden stuck with feelings of guilt which triggered feelings of irritation again, right behind them. Dammit, Logan wasn't supposed to actually have a sensitive side. The constant sidelong glances at her were supposed to be just because he was a lecherous bad boy who couldn't resist staring at her. She'd had him very neatly categorized, thank you very much, and the fact that she was focusing what remained of her mental barriers on not overhearing his thoughts was only because she didn't want to stumble across what lurid fantasies he might have of her. And yet it's all right to have that little one of yours about cut-off shorts, no shirt, and a tropical island...? that irritating mental counterpoint prodded at her. Oh, Shut up.
Guilt. Wonderful. And of course she was acting like a spoiled brat, but she was grieving, in pain, strapped to a motorcycle with an infuriating Wolverine, and surely wasn't she entitled to a little brattiness? No? Oh, great. "Sorry...?" she offered at last, sheepishly. Silence. "I mean, I'm just not used to people noticing, really. The Professor and I have been working for eighteen years to teach me how to keep it concealed, keep it under wraps. People are so afraid of telepaths, so--"
"Red." he interrupted, pulling the bike to the side of the road and turning around to face her, brown eyes so intent that she had to drop her gaze to the toe of the slipper covering the cast. "Jean," he tried again, reaching over to tip her chin upwards and make her look at him, touch a contract of gentle with the roughness of his leather gloves. "Look at me, babe. I noticed. I don't mind. But hell, girl, I'm not going to let you hurt yourself if I can help it. Backwoods it is. I don't know what you think of me, I'm sure as hell it ain't flattering, but I'm not going to hurt you. Got it?" And before she could reply, he was turned around again, and the bike was back on the road.
"But you're hurting me by just being here, don't you get it?" she whispered against the back of his leather jacket, suddenly feeling too old and too tired to be doing this. Although he could no doubt hear her, there was no reply, the road just continuing to whip by, with the occasional distance sign appearing briefly on the right before being left far behind. She drooped her head forwards, pressing it between a pair of shoulderblades that simply belonged to another person for a moment in time, and let tears of frustration trail silently down her cheeks, shoulders shaking, but not permitting herself any sobs.
Logan simply drove on.
By the time they stopped at a roadside fish and chips stand in the heart of cottage country a few hours later, she was back under control again. Painted a cheerful reddish brown and with a trio of picnic tables beside the parking lot, the place was alive with cottagers and their children up for the weekend and closing up for the winter. The sort of spot the locals and the long-timers knew about, but the tourists were never clued in to.
Accordingly, there were a few stares as Logan got into line behind a white haired matriarch of Scots heritage who was leaning on the arm of a willowy granddaughter in her early twenties , the younger woman reading her the prices for her to complain at the state of inflation over. The grandaughter got a break while her grandmother was placing her order, and, smilingly, looked around. Logan got himself a frankly approving glance and the question of "You one of the resort people?"
"Naw," smirked the Wolverine. "Just passing through... I'm with her," A nod of his head over at Jean, who found herself half-blushing and half-infuriated by the assumption. And half, even if the fractions don't add up, possessive of Logan getting that sort of look from that girl. God, I'm messed up.
"So, you wouldn't happen to know the straightest route to Ottawa, would you?"
"Not sure if it's the straightest, but if you take the 35 towards Lindsay, then head to Peterborough, you can get the highway to Ottawa from there. It'll save you dealing with Toronto traffic." A knowing groan exchanged between the pair, and then she was gone, called back to help her grandmother get back to their car with the grease spotted white boxes holding their lunch.
A few minutes later, installed at a picnic table, Jean gravely shook a french fry at Logan and noted that "I may be a dumb American, but Ottawa is not in Nova Scotia, 'nor on the way to it. Give."
Logan shifted a little in his seat, and muttered a non-commital "...Things. Some stuff I need to check in on. Nothing you need to worry about... although maybe we can let you poke through a mall and get something a little less tourist for you?" A nod at her current maple leaf infested hoodie, and a further mutter about "Retail therapy. Whatever." with his fingers wiggled to bracket the words. "Anyways, won't take long, then we'll be on the road again. Didn't you ask something about Montreal?"
Jean, however, wasn't listening. She'd caught an underlying thought to that explanation of... "This is something for the Professor!" she pronounced, sitting up suddenly and turning a glare on Logan. "I told you, I don't want anything more to do with him, with the Team, with saving the fucking world, or any of it." she added quietly hissing the words in the face of a collection of cottagers all giving her strange looks. "I'm out, Logan, I mean it. You go to Ottawa, but I want you to drop me at the next Greyhound station we see. I'm out."
Logan shifted still more, then placatingly nudged his container of poutine towards Jean, as if the addition of gravy and cheese curds to french fries could perhaps soothe the savage beast. She ignored it. He sighed, and then nodded the admittance that "Yeah, it's for the Professor. But I ain't expecting you or even asking you to get involved, Red. Just come along for the ride, I'll leave you out of it."
All at once he was sitting at attention, one hand pressed flat against his heart and his eyebrows waggling enticingly. "Scout's honour?"
"Since when were you in Scouts?"
"Never. But c'mon to Ottawa with me anyways. What?" The smirk had returned, and this time she could see it. "Afraid you might like it?"
"Oh... shut up."