In all his years, this was the first time that Bobby Drake had ever truly felt sorrow. Sure he'd been sad before, like the day Emma threw (literally) the divorce packet at his face, like every time he had to pack Michael up to head back to Boston, but standing here in this place was a sorrow so overwhelming it seeped into his very marrow and made him quake. Children's Hospital wasn't exactly a "sad" place. In fact it was so bright and cheery and airy that if you ignored the wheelchairs, the IVs, the look of strain on the parents faces as they milled about the reception area you could almost forget you were in a hospital. No, the sorrow came from the lies seething under the surface, this was not a bright, cheery place at all. This was a hospital. Worse it wasn't a hospital you brought your child to if they had an earache at three am. No, this was a hospital where children came when there was a good chance they were going to die. Worse still, this was a hospital where his son was a patient because there was a chance, however slim and unlikely Bobby's mind would allow it to be, that his son was going to die.
He stepped up to the receptionist now that it was his turn, opened his mouth, but the words could not come out. He could not force himself to ask what room his child was in because then it would be true, he would be a real patient. A hand made its way to his shoulder and gave a reassuring squeeze. "We here t'see Michael Drake, could y' tell us what room he's in please?" Once again the Cajun was there to save his sorry, deluded ass. One day he'd have to thank him.
"Are you a relation of Michael's?" The Hispanic woman behind the counter asked as she typed away on her keyboard. She was wearing an awful chartreuse sweater, and for the moment that was all Bobby could focus on. He was afraid if he answered he'd tell her that her sweater was ugly, but he didn't want to insult the woman who held the secret of his son's whereabouts. Instead he looked at Remy. Remy understood.
"Dis here," he said, slapping Bobby on the shoulder, "is his Pere, I'm his Uncle."
"I see." The woman smiled what should have been a sympathetic smile, but instead was just condescending. "Do you have any ID?"
What was this, maximum security prison? Bobby wanted to scream. I just want to see my fucking kid before you people put him in a pine box! The thought brought his mind to a screeching halt and tears started to form behind his eyes as he handed the woman in the awful sweater his driver's license. I did not just think that, I did not just think that. Mikey's gonna be fine, he's a fighter, he's a bruiser, he's not gonna end up dead. Please God, don't let my child end up dead. The woman took their IDs and looked them over. "Uncle hmm, Mister LeBew?" Bobby could feel Remy cringe from the way the woman butchered his name.
"LeBow," he corrected patiently, if a bit snidely. "I'm his sister's husb'nd." The lie came easily to the Cajun and in a way it was almost true, after all Rogue might as well be his sister the way they acted together sometimes.
"Of course." Ugly sweater stated, handing the IDs back along with two tags, each printed with their names. "Please keep these with you at all times, this is how our staff identifies family members who are exempt from visiting hours. Michael's room is on the third floor, number 326. Take the elevators on the left to the third floor, go right and his room should be on your right about six doors down. Please check in at the nursing station so they know who you're visiting. Best wishes."
The way she said it, it should have been 'my condolences,' but Bobby, now that he had a goal, was heading for the elevators so fast that he almost didn't realize when he reached them. "Y'okay popsicle?" Remy asked him once they were in the elevator with the doors shut. "Y'been quiet."
Bobby shook his head no. "That woman had on a hideous sweater." Someday it might be a funny statement, but today it was Bobby's way of saying that he was still taking it all in. "Remy, deal with Emma for me. She's gonna want somebody to hold her and tell her its all okay." Gambit's face looked doubtful. "Trust me, if there's one person I know it's Em. I just....I can't be..that for her right now. I need to save it for Michael."
"Sure t'ing, Bobby. Sure t'ing."
Today was quickly shaping up to be the longest day of Rogue's life. It was normal in every kind of way. Laurel threw a temper tantrum after Remy left. She did a load of laundry. She made macaroni and cheese for lunch, which as usual Laurel refused to eat. Now that she thought of it, her two-year old hardly ever ate what was put in front of her, rather she ate everything on her parent's plates and then some. It was life as usual, but it felt like some surreal dream because she knew that it wasn't life as usual. Her friend's child had leukemia. That was certainly NOT usual. Her daughter's best friend was in the hospital, and somehow Rogue was going to have to break the news to her. She thought briefly about what Remy would say. "Petite," he'd say, putting an arm around her shoulder. "Papa's gotta tell you somet'ing sad, okay? But you gotta be a brave big girl. Michael's really sick, an' Papa don' know if he gonna get better." In her mind it sounded perfect, coming from Remy in his mellow voice, so warm and comforting. From her it sounded callous and condescending, like she was mocking how Celeste felt about Michael. She thought, just for a moment, about taking Remy up on his offer and waiting until he got home to tell her, but threw the idea away. Being a parent wasn't supposed to be easy, and if one of the hard parts was explaining to your nine-year old what cancer was then in a way Rogue counted herself lucky. After all, she was explaining it to her beautiful, healthy, cancer free daughter. The thought didn't make it any easier when the front door opened and a little girl in purple sneakers and a blue coat came marching through the door.
"Hi Mama!" Celeste shouted, running over to her with a paper half crumpled in her hand. "Look what I got, you'll never guess!"
Rogue snatched the paper out of her daughter's hand and a temporary distraction turned into an even longer one. "Lestey, sugah, this is YOAH spellin' test?" Celeste smiled, no she beamed. "Honey, y' got an A in spellin'?" Spelling had always been Celeste's worst subject, she spelled things like they sounded, and God knew in her household things didn't always even sound the way things sounded. At nine she could do math in her head like it was cake. In fact Remy was starting to work on probability with her through poker. But her reading had always lagged a little behind, and both her and Remy knew that it was, in part, due to her atrocious spelling. "Sugah, Ah'm so proud of you! Look, y' even spelled doubt right, 'n that's a tough one."
"I know." She stated proudly, "Where's Daddy, Mama? I wanna show him too. He probly won't even believe it." The temporary distraction was now officially over.
"About that, Lestey baby, why don'cha sit down here," She patted one of the stools by the island. "Mama's got somethin' she's gotta talk to you about." She watched Celeste carefully make her way over the seat, as if whatever Rogue was about to say would reach out and bite her.
"You an' Daddy have a fight?" Celeste asked quietly, looking at the floor.
"No, baby, Daddy 'n Ah didn' have a fight. Yoah Daddy had ta go take yoah Uncle Bobby ta Boston ta see Michael."
"Oh," Celeste perked back up. "Why didn' he wait for me, I wanna see Mike too."
Rogue took a big gulp of air, this was beyond difficult, and the look in her daughter's blue, blue eyes was making it practically impossible. "Ah know yah do baby doll, but you can't go where Daddy took Uncle Bobby."
"Why not?"
"Cause Uncle Bobby had ta go visit Michael in the hospital cause he's real sick, he's got a type of cancer called leukemia, and he's gonna be sick for a long time."
"But he's gonna be okay, right Mama?"
Rogue couldn't look into those blue, blue eyes anymore. "Ah wish Ah could tell ya that, baby doll, Ah wish Ah could." Finally Rogue mustered the courage to look into those eyes once more, and she saw something she had never thought she would see in her own daughter's eyes. Those baby blues screamed betrayal, and they were looking right at her, and there was nothing Rogue could do.
"I wanna talk to Daddy." Celeste said firmly, sliding off the stool.
"He doesn't have his phone on right now, baby doll. You cain't."
"I wanna talk to Daddy." And the tears started, each one stabbing Rogue in her very soul. "Daddy makes everything better, I wanna talk to Daddy!"
"Ah told ya, baby doll," Rogue said, reaching out to hug her, "you cain't right now."
"No!" Celeste shouted, running to her room. "Don't touch me! I want my Daddy! I want Daddy now!" With that, the door slammed and Rogue's fragile heart shattered.
She sat on the floor where she stood and just let the tears come. After a couple minutes a tiny voice came from behind her. "No cry Mama. Laur Laur kiss ouchy make it all gone!"
"Sweetie," Rogue said, her voice husky from crying. "This isn't an ouchy you can kiss and make go away."
The little two-year old tilted her head and looked at Rogue as if considering what her mother had just said in some profound way. "Mama," she finally said, plopping down in Rogue's lap and putting one chubby hand on each of her cheeks. "Laur Laur kiss ouchy make it all gone." That said she kissed Rogue in her little two-year old smacking kind of way right on the nose and Rogue had to admit that the "ouchy" might not have been all gone, but it certainly hurt less.
Bobby was at least right about one thing, Emma certainly was looking for something to cling to. When they got to the door of the room it had been Michael's old ratty bear he had officially named "Woovy" at fourteen months after his Uncle Logan. Everybody knew the story. Michael had been the first child born at the mansion (not that Scott and Jean hadn't tried their damndest) and from about one on he simply worshipped two people in that house besides his mother and father, his Uncle Logan and his Uncle Remy. One day he was sitting in front of Sesame Street in the Rec room and Logan had come wandering in and said something like "Hey kid, whatcha watchin?" Now Michael wasn't exactly developmentally delayed but he was a somewhat slow kid at that age in terms of speaking, meaning he hadn't yet said his first word. But something about Logan must've sparked that need for communication because Michael stood up, turned away from the TV, held out his bear for his uncle to see and proudly shouted "Woovy" at the top of his lungs. Emma was pissed, Bobby thought it was hysterical, Logan couldn't walk into a room with Michael in it for a whole month without the boy starting up shouts of "Woovy, woovy." Emma hated it, which showed just how uncertain she was that she was sitting there, hugging the poor lumpy "Woovy" as if her life depended on it. Celeste had a "Woowoo" (a cat, not a bear) that had gotten its name in a very similar way, and Remy could easily see himself in Emma's position, "Woowoo" scrunched in his arms if it was his little girl in that hospital bed. Bobby was talking to Michael, he was putting on a strong brave front, and Remy was proud of him for it. He didn't know that he'd be able to do the same. He took the opportunity to sidle up to Emma. "Why don' you an' I go get somethin' t'eat while de boys here talk, hmm petite?" She nodded, and he helped her up by the arm and out the door. He doubted she'd eaten anything in more than a day, and some time out of that room would do her and Bobby both some good. Heck, it'd probably even do Michael some good to have her away for a half-hour.
"Thank you, Gambit, for bringing Bobby I mean." She looked at the floor. It was disconcerting in a way. Emma Frost NEVER looked at the floor, she looked you right in the eyes, into your very soul and didn't give a damn if it made you uncomfortable. If things didn't turn out well, Remy was afraid this would break her in a way that couldn't be fixed. "After I got off the phone with him I was afraid he'd drive his fool self up here like a maniac. I was....worried."
"S'no problem Em, y'know Mikey means as much t'me as one'a my own." Inwardly he cringed. One did not remind the mother of a sick child that he had two beautiful healthy children at home waiting for him, while she did not.
"How are the girls?" Emma asked, cautiously but casually as if Children's Hospital was where most old friends met to catch up.
"'M sorry Em, dat was pretty tactless o' me. I jus'....."
"No, please Remy," Her eyes pleaded, even if her voice didn't. "Give me some normalcy, I need it. Show me that much respect."
"'Kay, well Lestey's doin' good. She's gettin' good grades in school, cept spellin'. Fact I t'ink she had a spellin' test today..." So the normalcy began, and in deference to her request Remy just kept talking as he filled their two trays in the cafeteria line. He fed her every boring mundane fact he could about his two girls, about Rogue, life at the mansion, Wolverine, Storm, Kurt. He avoided Kristen. And Emma soaked it all in because it was boring, because it was mundane, and because it had no relation to a little boy who might just be dying of cancer.
Bobby felt like he had just stepped into an episode of the Twilight Zone. There was his little boy, in a hospital bed, the bracelet on his wrist declaring for all those that doubted that yes, he was a patient. He just didn't look sick. Bobby was expecting tubes, and sweating, and pale skin, but Michael looked perfectly normal. It was eerie, mentally he knew his son was extraordinarily sick, but visually he just couldn't see it. "Take a picture, ice cube, it'll last longer."
Bobby didn't realize he'd been staring. "Bud, I got more pictures of you than I can stand to look at. And since when is it okay to call your father Ice Cube? I mean isn't he that lame rapper who's on Law and Order now?"
Michael laughed, and it sounded good. Bobby wanted to catch it and put it in a box to have forever. "No, that's Ice T, Dad. Ice Cube's the not so lame one."
"It's still no way to talk to your father." Bobby pointed out. "At least call me Freeze-whiz or something."
"Okay, Cheeze-whiz, whatever you say."
Bobby smiled. "So, Mikester, long time no see."
"It's been six weeks, Dad."
"Six weeks is a long time when you're a Dad, I'm not getting any younger over here you know. Someday when you're old like me you'll get it."
"Right, Uncle Wolvie is so way older than you."
"Hey, I said old, not ancient!" Bobby said in mock horror. "Anyway, what's been goin' on since I saw you last."
Michael shrunk back onto the bed. "I got sick, Dad. I think the doctors think I might die."