Independent Fire- thank you so much for the review!
Here's a little more. I'm just testing the waters, so to speak. Shall we see how far this plot bunny will hop? Looks like the Romy will be creeping in sooner than I thought, most likely in the next chapter. Reviews always help of course. (hinthint XD)
Every man alive knows it is not a good thing when your girlfriend says they need to talk.
"What time is it?" Bobby asked, now fully awake and trying to recover from several embarrassing thoughts.
"Three thirty two AM." Rogue replied, giving a cursory glance at the digital clock sitting on the night table.
"Don't you think it's kind of late to talk?" He resisted the urge to sink back under the covers and pretend that this was all a bad dream.
"Or early, depending on how you look at it." She replied absently, twisting a lock of dark brown hair around her finger.
"Can we talk in the morning?" He asked hopefully, hoping procrastinating would make her forget the need to talk entirely.
"Bobby…" Rogue knew he usually tried to avoid serious conversations like the plague. She wasn't particularly looking forward to this either, but some things had to be said.
"I can think of a few things we could do instead of talking." Of course Bobby being the typical male, could always be counted upon…
"Bobby!" Rogue was having none of it.
"Mmmmfwhat?" He garbled out, rubbing his hands over his face.
"Ah'm serious." Her southern twang was particularly noticeable in her aggregation.
She decisively gave him 'the look', which would have sent most men running for their lives with their tails between their legs. But Bobby, always the optimistic one, continued on with his current train of thought.
"Me too babe. You know, I always wanted to try- hey Rogue, where are you going?" Bobby sat bolt upright, throwing the covers to the floor when she started to head for the door.
"Our relationship isn't working Bobby." She blurted out as quickly as she dared before turning around and regarding him with what could only be described as pity.
"Are you breaking up with me?" His voice broke halfway through the question, more from surprise than anything else.
"No! Yes." Rogue walked back over to the bed and sat down next to him. She took his hand and contemplated how to say the next sentence without making him think she was mad at him. "Bobby, you don't want me."
She winced at the sound of her own voice. Well then, that hadn't exactly come out the way she meant it too.
"I do Rogue, I do. I swear, I only kissed Kitty once, and I didn't mean anything by it. I mean she was there, she leaned in, and it just happened. But I swear I was thinking about-"
"John." She finished the sentence for him, cutting him off mid ramble.
"Huh?" It was the second time Rogue had shocked him in thirty seconds, and he was not amused.
"You were thinking about John." She stated matter of fatly.
"I'm running after two girls and you think I'm gay?" His voice rose nearly as high as his eyebrows, which looked as though they might have jumped off of his face of their own violation.
"Ah was thinking' bi actually." Just as Rogue thought she had gotten the worst part of the conversation out of the way…
"This is because of that Cajun, isn't it?" Jealousy could be counted upon to rear its ugly head. The guy had showed up a couple of weeks ago, and flirted with anything that would flirt back. As if that wasn't bad enough, he seemed to put a special effort into impressing his girlfriend. Bobby didn't care if Storm had put in a good word for Gambit. As far as he was concerned, the guy had no redeeming features whatsoever.
"Remy has nothing to do with this." Rogue did admit that the new boy was certainly not painful to look at, but there was no way she had feelings for him. No matter how much he flirted with her.
"It has everything to do with this! He put that idea into your head because he wants you. He's trying to break us up!" Suddenly Rogue's accusation made sense. It didn't matter if it was true. How could she have possibly known otherwise?
"Bobby, no-" Rogue didn't think he'd react well to this, but how far would he go to get someone back?
"I swear I'll kill that shrimp-" He had lovely visions of revenge floating through his head.
"Bobby-" This was not good.
"Freeze his nuts off" He'd done that to John once. He recovered. Eventually.
"Bobby!"
"Who does he think he-" His eyes were glinting, and his grin was slightly deranged.
Rogue thought momentarily about kissing him to make him shut up, but since she had decided not to do than more than three times in a twenty-four hour period, she decided to let him in on his little habit.
"Bobby! You know you talk in your sleep?"
"Oh." He spoke to the comforter more than anything else, suddenly finding it's solid black stitching fascinating.
"It's ok. Ah mean Ah never thought we were gonna last forever." She propped her legs up on the bed again. Giving up on finding a dry spot to relax on, she finally gave in and leaned back.
"Yeah, but that's not exactly how I wanted you to find out." Bobby was blushing again, as he looked up to sheepishly meet her eyes.
"Ah dunno, it was sorta cute." She grinned at him.
"Cute?" He was disbelieving for some reason.
"Yeah. You had this little grin, and it was sweet in a way. Until ya froze mah pillow this last time." She poked the wet pillow under her elbow for emphasis.
"Oh." And back he went to inspecting the comforter.
"So, did ya ever cool John down?" She asked with a mischievous grin.
"Shut up." He grinned despite himself.
"Bobby! That is no way to talk to a girl." She attempted to sound stern, but ended up laughing out the last few words.
"So you're not gonna mention this to anyone, are you?" Bobby had finally seemed to come to the conclusion that he could no longer deny his feelings about John towards Rogue. However, it didn't mean he had to be happy about it.
Rogue rolled her eyes at him. She may have gotten him to admit his feelings to her, but getting him to admit them to anyone else would prove more difficult. "You still want to pretend we're a couple?"
"Rogue, I care about you!"
"As a friend Bobby, and you know it."
"Friend with benefits." He wiggled his eyebrows at her.
Rogue picked up the now soggy but still quite cold pillow and whacked him with it.
"Okay, so maybe I deserved that." He laughed, having taken the hit straight in the face. Holding the offending object over the side of the bed, he dropped it on the floor.
"Uh huh." She leaned over him and shook her head at the poor abused pillow.
"Can't I like you and John?"
"Ya can, but ya don't." 'And Ah don't do threesomes.' She added to herself.
"Rogue? There's one problem."
"What's that?" She knew what the problem was of course. She had even gone as far as to start plotting to solve it. She just wanted to hear Bobby say it.
"John is still missing."
"Ah know that. He's been missing for a while, remember?"
"How could I forget?" He added almost wistfully.
"You didn't kill him, did you?" She asked, raising an eyebrow.
"I kicked his ass." Bobby seemed proud and regretful at the same time.
"Fire an' Ice epic battle, Ah know. You bragged about it for weeks. You were obsessed. Kinda made people wonder why you were thinking so much about him."
"We were best friends for years, then he ran off and joined Magneto. Everyone was thinking about him." He was defensive. Surely his behavior hadn't been that obvious.
"Not like you were." Rogue replied pointedly.
"It doesn't change the fact that he's gone." He said quietly.
"We just need to find him." She said innocently. Too innocently.
"No one has any idea where he is." Or what had happened to him after Alcatraz, but that much went unsaid between everyone.
"So Ah'll recruit some help." Of course she was two steps ahead of him, and had been plotting this for a few weeks now.
"No. Absolutely not. Rogue, what are you thinking?" Oh, he was scared. Rogue was a force of nature when she got like this. Nothing would stand her way.
A Cheshire cat grin spread across her face. "Feel like goin' on a road trip?"