Author's Note: The dialogue is Brian K. Vaughan's. I claim no ownership of it, or the characters or the setting. You know the drill.
Pain and Pleasure
She took a bizarre kind of pleasure in this… this self-mutilation. That's what it was, wasn't it? She hacked away repeatedly at her hair, finding herself inexplicably entranced by the glint of the scissors in the darkened room. "Stainless Steel," the little label at its base read. She'd take its word for it.
She tugged hard at each lock, stretching it as tightly as she could before slicing right across it. The tugging was painful, but it made her feel good. The half-ripping, half-tearing, half-snipping sounds of the strands breaking made her feel even better. (Yes, she realized that there was no such thing as three-halves. She really didn't give a shit.)
The white tufts of hair fell to the floor, looking like clouds or feathers.
Feathers and clouds. Warren.
Did Henry really leave because of him? Did he actually believe she could be so goddamned fickle?
I loved you, you stupid bastard.
She yanked harder at her hair. She wanted to yank hard enough to rip it out.
She loved him. She never kept that from him. He had to have known. She took him back, didn't she? She told him she'd never stopped loving him.
But he left anyway. She could have hated him for it, but there was no one left to hate. No one but a memory.
She was cutting more frantically now. The air was thick with flying hair. She wanted to get it all off her. Everything they never said. Everything they never did. Everything they shared and laughed and dreamed about. Everything they could have had.
She laid down the scissors and felt her hair with her hands. It was jagged and uneven in several places. For a reason she couldn't quite put into words, that gave her a bitter sense of satisfaction.
Hank always loved her hair. He'd never let her cut it, even though she protested that it was a lot of trouble to maintain. He loved to bury his nose in it. He always said one of the upsides to Weapon X screwing with his genes was that he could smell her more deeply. He could practically drink her scent in. She laughed whenever he said this, though she never really understood what he meant.
Kitty's voice suddenly broke through her thoughts, sounding unusually harsh and strident. Her roommate phased through the door, and for the briefest of moments Ororo wanted to hurt her for her intrusion. It wouldn't be too hard. When she'd called down a bolt of lighting on the Sentinels, it had been surprisingly easy.
Kitty looked around at the thoroughly wrecked room and hesitantly picked up the framed photo of Ororo and Hank that was lying on the floor. It was the first thing Ororo had smashed that day.
"Hank," Kitty said softly.
Ororo's chest hitched sharply. The sound of his name hurt her, made it harder to breathe somehow.
"Get out," she said in a low voice.
Kitty turned and stared at her with an expression resembling horror.
"Storm? Are… are you okay?"
Ororo almost smiled. She found the question funny, though she couldn't say why. Was she okay?
"What do you think?" she answered.
Kitty slowly backed out of the room, phasing through the door. Ororo stared at it blankly for a moment, then picked up the scissors and started cutting again.