Disclaimer: "It was his friend's guitar That he played When he plays No one speaks"
(An: Wanna know a secret? I honestly didn't intend this to be so angsty. This is a rare story. It's coming out better on the page than it did in my head. Yay me. Random babbling done. Story now. And Toddfan, I SO have dibs. Just for you, though, there's a Tenth Kingdom reference in here... -wink-)
A day out of Bayville and nearly to New Orleans, Kurt stopped at the first payphone he saw. Best call home... don't want anyone thinking I bought it myself... He dug around in his pockets for change and dialed the institute's number.
"Hello?" Kitty answered.
Kurt grinned. "Kitty!"
"Kurt?" she asked.
"Who else?"
"Where are you, anyway? I haven't seen you since the funerals yesterday."
"I'm on a bit of a personal mission."
"...What did you do?"
"Well... um..."
"Oh, man," said Kitty. "Remy's urn was missing at the ceremony. The one on the pedestal was fake. You didn't!"
"I did," Kurt admitted.
Kitty burst out laughing. "Oh man, Kurt," she gasped. "What is this, some kind of personal vendetta?"
"You could call it that," he replied, lounging against the side of the phonebooth. "Remy was my best friend."
"So you stole his urn? Very smooth, Kurt."
"Well... you know... nobody showed up at the funeral for him. He and his family weren't really close."
"And Remy liked it that way."
"It still doesn't seem right."
"Oh, Kurt," Kitty sighed. "Just don't do anything too stupid while you're down there, ok? Remy's dad's a total jerk."
"I know, I know," Kurt replied. "Look, Katzchen, I'm almost out of quarters-"
"So you're gonna have to hang up and get on with it," said Kitty. "Get back up here soon, huh?"
"'Course, Kitty-cat. See you soon." He hung up.
&&&
Kitty smiled as the phone as she replaced it on the charger. Talking with Kurt always cheered her up. The two were best friends, after all.
Again, as she hung up, she heard the sound of steady thumping.
Inside the kitchen, John was muttering to himself and banging his head against the wall again. Kitty leaned in the doorway and inspected him. He actually was kind of cute, in an odd way- his orange hair was long enough to be shaggy, but too short to be pulled back. She'd never really thought about John much, now that she considered it. When the Acolytes had come to the mansion, he had been the only one who seemed happy with himself, firmly ensconsed as Wanda's fiance and Remy's best friend. The other Acolytes had been a lot less friendly and thus a lot more interesting to Kitty.
Now, as he sat there, deepening the bruise on his forehead and generally acting as crazy as Kitty'd ever seen him, he seemed a lot more appealing than he had then. Kitty caught herself. What am I thinking? His fiancee is dead and I'm thinking like that? Get a grip!
After a minute, she blurted, "Doesn't that hurt?"
"Not really, no," said John. "Only, I do it whenever I get writer's block and I get it a lot..."
"I meant the bruise."
"There's a bruise?" John reached up and felt his forehead. "Huh. So there is." He tilted his head and gave Kitty a scrutinizing look. "Why are you talking to me, anyway? We're not friends."
Kitty shrugged, taking the chair across from him.
"Yeah, well, it seems like every time I come down here, you're doing that," Kitty replied. "And besides, I don't really have anyone else to talk to. Everyone else I would has their own problems."
The scrunity deepened. "I know what you mean," he said after a moment. "Everyone I would talk to now is... well." He shrugged. John leaned his seat on its back legs, crossing his legs and putting his hands behind his head. He wanted to cry now. Kitty could see that in the overly blank expression on his face. "It's just... sometimes you catch yourself thinking they're still here, things like I should tell her about this... and then you realize you can't."
Kitty nodded. How would it be if she lost everyone she confided in in one fell swoop? The thought was unimaginable. She propped her chin on her fist. "You can talk to me," she said. "I'll listen."
John let the chair fall back into its proper way of standing, frowning. After a moment, he spoke. And Kitty listened.
&&&
Piotr found Rogue going through his closet. It had been his and Remy's closet, but now... well, it was his alone. She was digging through it, looking for something.
Since she'd been his best friend's love interest and then girlfriend for all his stay at the institute, Piotr and Rogue knew each other fairly while. Not as well, though, as Piotr would like. They were each other's closest link to Remy, and besides, she was fascinating.
She didn't do anything to acknowledge him, so Piotr just quietly sat down and watched her. As an artist, Piotr knew that the way someone stood or moved often expressed more of what they were thinking or feeling than what they were saying. And on no one was this more true than Rogue.
Watching her now, he saw several things in just her posture. She was desperate to find whatever she was looking for, but she was trying to hide it. She'd been holding back tears since that day in the Danger Room, and was desperate to let them out, but wasn't about to do that when there were other people who needed her help. All of her usual affectations had been pushed aside in favor of those.
Rogue suddenly stopped, leaning back on her heels and cradling a battered guitar case. "There you are," she murmured. She brushed some nonexistent dust off the gleaming leather and turned. A little gasp escaped her when she spotted Piotr. "I didn't hear you come in," she stammered.
Piotr just smiled.
Rogue stood up, brushing a strand of hair behind her ear. She sat down on Remy's bed and opened the case. Inside was a beautiful acoustic guitar. "Remy's baby," she whispered, taking off a glove and gently brushing her hand across the strings. He could see the coda to that statement in her pained expression. She adjusted the guitar and started to tune it, her eyes closed.
"I didn't know you played," Piotr said after a moment.
"I haven't," said Rogue. "Not since I left the South. When I came up with Mystique, I left my guitar behind." She still had the skill in her fingers, though, Piotr thought, as she strummed the guitar. She frowned and fiddled with the strings a bit more, then played the chord again. Apparently satisfied, she began to play, a soft, short, sad song that Piotr didn't recognize.
After finishing, she rested her head on the smooth wood of the guitar, inhaling deeply. "Told myself I shouldn't trust him," she said quietly. "Warned myself a thousand times. I knew it would all end in pain. Always does, always will. But I never listen to me." She took several deep breaths, attempting to calm herself.
"There's no one else in here," said Piotr. "You don't have to be strong all the time."
"I should be," said Rogue, her voice laced with tears.
"But you can't," Piotr replied.
Rogue wiped at her leaking eyes, a fierce expression on her face. "It would make life a lot easier," she said, "if I just cut myself off from people. Maybe I should go back to Caldecott. You can make a pretty good living as a bitch-hermit there."
"If you don't trust," said Piotr, "then you won't get hurt... but you won't get loved, either."
Rogue frowned at him for a moment, then ducked her head back over the guitar again. She wasn't fast enough for Piotr to miss her blush, though.
She closed her eyes and started to play again. She seemed lost in her own world, so Piotr found his sketchbook and started to draw, just so he'd have an excuse to stare at her.
&&&
"Dammit, Amara, I'm sorry," said Tabitha, chasing after her.
Amara just tossed her hair and slammed the door in her face.
"That's my room too, you know! I have a key!" But when Tabitha opened the door, Amara was gone. An oddly cold breeze was blowing through the open balcony doors. Tabitha sighed and went over and shut them. She sat down on her bed, pressing her hands to her temples. "Oh, Amara" she whispered, "how am I supposed to get through this without you?"
&&&
Pietro didn't show until the next day. He wasn't in the same clothes he'd been in then, but somehow this just made him look more disheveled. Lance scowled, both at Pietro's apparent one-night stand and at his own annoyance with it. It wasn't any of his business what he did with his spare time, but whenever Pietro pulled something like this, Lance always felt like throttling him.
More than usual, anyway.
Lance's scowl deepened as Pietro collapsed on the couch next to him. "Before you say anything," he murmured, his eyes closed, "I didn't do anything last night. Just walked around, feeling sorry for myself."
"Walked?"
Pietro opened one annoyed blue eye and nodded. "Yes, walked. I have never felt less like running in my life." He let his head fall back on the couch, closing the eye and grimacing. "I haven't felt less like doing anything in my life, for that matter."
Lance shifted uncomfortably. Most of him was protesting that he hated Pietro, but a part of him wanted to encourage Pietro to talk, because seeing him so depressed made Lance depressed himself.
"Why am I even talking to you?" Pietro asked, apparently of himself. "You probably want me to leave and stop raining on your parade." He groaned and pressed his palms against his face. "And there I go again, feeling sorry for myself." The next breath Pietro took was a little too deep, and his next word were a little too thick. "I think I'm gonna go jump off a bridge." He stood, and the scary thing was that Lance couldn't tell if he was serious or not.
"Sit down, you jackass," said Lance. "Don't be stupid."
"It's what I do," was Pietro's response.
"Do I have to go over there and grab you?"
Pietro glanced at him sharply, a weird expression on his face. After a moment, he perched on the arm of the couch, eyeing Lance with equal parts suspicion and longing. "Yesterday," he murmured, "you said I didn't know who I was. And that's true. The only one who ever did, I think, was Wanda. She never liked me, but she understood me. And no one else ever has."
"Mainly because of the way you treat people," said Lance. Pietro's expression was making his nervous. "You're a jerk."
Pietro snorted. It wasn't a cheerful sound. "It doesn't take much to understand a jerk, does it?"
Lance didn't answer. He wasn't stupid.
"Do you know why I'm always so rude to you?" Pietro asked. "Wanda did." Pietro was turning to face him. And that made Lance want nothing more than to run, fast and far. "Wanna know the one thing she knew that others didn't?"
"What?" said Lance, both curious and seriously getting the feeling that he wouldn't like the answer.
Pietro's face was only about an inch from his now. "I'm bi," he whispered.
That explains a lot, Lance thought. That was all he had time to before Pietro closed the gap completely.
&&&
Sitting alone in his otherwise empty room made Sam feel even more alone than he had at the funeral. The room was far too quiet, and no book or CD could drown out the silence. Sam sighed and walked out, wishing that someone would talk to him as opposed to shooting him sympathetic looks or avoiding his eyes altogether.
Sam stopped outside of Rahne's room. The door was wide open. He just stood there a moment. Rahne and Jubilee were both sitting on the latter's bed. Rahne had her arm around her roomate and was talking to her in a quiet voice. Jubilee was crying softly.
The crack in Sam's heart deepened a little as he walked off.
(For the record, I -heart- Lietro. It's just so dumb. Believe it or not, the next chapter is the last. Don't give me that look. Short stories are better.)