Disclaimer: I own no rights to Marvel. It's a short(er) chapter today because I'm going to see Bo Bice in concert tonight and I don't have a lot of typing time. But I do get to stand out in the near freezing cold for about three hours, so go me! Please enjoy!

Sometime around midnight, after Logan and I had finished off my box of chocolates and had watched too very boring boxing matches, he suggested going out and getting something to eat.

"Nothing's open this late," I said.

"Waffle House."

"Yes and the only people there this late at night are stoners."

"You know, most people don't argue when someone offers to buy them dinner," he said, standing. "We can celebrate that Valentine's Day is officially over until next year."

"I can do that," I said, standing and following him from the den. We quietly went upstairs where I got ready in my bedroom to go out into the cold. Before we left, I grabbed a piece of paper and an ink pen.

"What are you doin'?" Logan asked.

"I'm writing a note for Uncle Scott."

"Why?"

"Well, in case something happens and he gets up looking for me, he'll know where I am and that I'm alright."

"No you're not."

"I'm not?"

"No," he said, walking over to me and snatching the pen and paper from my hands. "You're gonna' go somewhere and do something without tellin' anyone where you are."

"Why?" It was my turn to ask the question.

"'Cause you spend all your time worrin' about other people, let them worry about you for a while."

"I can't do that," I protested.

"Yes you can."

"All right, fine, I won't write a note but if I get in trouble, it's your fault."

"That's the thing, kid; you're twenty-five, you can't get in trouble for doin' something like goin' out at night. Scooter might get mad about it, but what's he gonna' do? Ground you. We ain't breakin' any rules, so we can't get into any trouble."

"Why is it that I don't believe you when you say we won't get into any trouble? Oh, wait, I remember; it's because it's you saying it," I said sarcastically.

He tugged at my ski-cap, pulling it down over my eyes. "Careful darlin' or I might make you buy my dinner."

"You're well aware of the fact that I'm a poor little girl, right?" I asked, fixing my hat back properly. "If I were buying, you would get water and ketchup." I heard a gruff laugh break from his body. "And besides, it's not as if you've ever given me a reason to believe that you know how to go out in public without getting into a fight, so don't even pretend to take offence to that."

After sneaking from the house as quietly as possible, we took a car from the garage and drove to the Waffle House. It was only about a fifteen or twenty minute drive from the school and so we got there a little before one in the morning. As I had suspected, the restaurant was full of people who were high or drunk, or both.

Oncewe were seated, we ordered the same thing; pancakes, sausage, bacon and a side order of hash browns. After about ten minutes, they brought the food out to us and our already slow conversation ebbed even slower as we ate.

I had always felt uncomfortable in silence. I felt as though if it were quiet, it meant you couldn't think of anything to say, you didn't know how to carry a conversation. But since I had met Logan, he had taught me that this is so much more that can be said in silence. That you don't have to speak to be heard. I was aware that I had only known him for a month, but the importance of being quiet seemed to be a lesson that he was secretly trying to teach me. And although I understood that I didn't have to talk with him, I had a hard time not doing it. Silence wasn't really part of my genes.

"Okay, there's something that's been on my mind for a while that I have to ask you. I heard it in passing and to be quite honest with you, I don't even remember who said it-"

"Yeah, what did you wanna' ask?" he said, trying to speed me up.

"Oh, right," I said, sitting up straight in the booth and tucking a loose strand of hair behind my ear. "Did you used to have the hots for my aunt Jean?"

He blinked at me and a small smirk threatened to spread across his mouth. "Yeah."

"Before or after she got married."

"Both."

I shook my head. "That is so weird."

"She's not really your aunt, kid."

"Not by blood, no, but Uncle Scott's known her since I was three, and I've known her nearly as long as I've known him, so she's just like family to me." I shook my head again. "That's just weird."

"Are you done?" he asked with a slightly cocked eyebrow.

"What? With my food or talking about how weird it is for you to find Jean hot?"

"Both," he answered again.

I pushed around what was left of my hash browns on my plate with my fork and let out a sigh. "Yeah, I suppose so," I said.

"Good, let's get out of here, then."

That was another thing that I was learning about Logan; he was all about right now. Can't sleep? Get up and do something. Time to work out? Go straight to the gym. Done eating? Get up and leave. I, however, enjoyed just sitting and relaxing at times. He was all about getting things done.

He paid and then we left, but once we got home, we decided to take a small detour.

"You tired yet?" he asked as we pulled up to the gates of the school.

"Not really. Are you?"

"No."

And that was all he needed to know. He turned around and then we drove. We drove to a small hillside section, away from the city. There were a few picnic tables here and there and so we got out and sat on top of one.

"You can actually see the sky up here," I said in amazement, shifting so that I was sitting closer to Logan. Although the weather wasn't quite as cold as it had been upon my arrival, it was still around thirty or thirty-five degrees outside at nearly four that morning and I wanted to stay as warm as possible. "Would you rather die by freezing to death or from heat exhauster?" I asked, looking up at the moon.

He made a low grunting sound as he lit a cigar. "I'd freeze."

"Really? Why?"

"In the heat you dry up, get sick, thirsty. I don't mind the cold, so it wouldn't be that bad." He let out a long string of smoke rings. "What about you?"

"You bring up good points so I think I would have to agree with you on that one."

"That's a first."

"Hey, I agree with you on quite a bit, I just don't like to admit it." We both laughed and then quieted back down again. But my mind was reeling with a thousand thoughts that the open space we were in seemed to let roam freely and grow. I couldn't quite contain them and so one finally escaped and found its way to my lips. "What do you think death is like?" I almost whispered.

"I think it's different for everyone."

"But do you think people are scared when they die or are they peaceful?"

He didn't say anything for a moment as he thought. Finally, he let out a sigh and ran his hand back through his hair. "I wanna' tell you that everyone's alright with it when they die, but I've been there a few times and I didn't like it, kid. Maybe other people are ready and they're fine with it, I don't know." He shook his head and let out a long, deep sigh. "I don't know what you want me to tell you, darlin'."

"I wanted you to tell me that. I want to hear your opinion on it, that's what I asked. I like knowing what you think, not what you think I want to hear."

"Really?"

"No, I'm just saying that to make you feel better about yourself, I know you have a bad ego." I laughed.

"Well, thanks for bein' so thoughtful," he said sarcastically. "You cold?"

I was shivering slightly. "A little bit, yeah."

"Scoot over here." I did as he said and he draped his arm around me, pulling me close to him. "Better?"

"Yep," I said, snuggling up to him, inhaling his cologne. "Much better."

He laughed. "Good."

We fell into a long silence again. I didn't know what he was thinking, probably something dark and complex, but being the dork that I am; all I could think about was that I had never been that close to him before. Despite the cold weather, he was quite warm and I found myself getting comfortable beside him.

It was beautiful outside that night. All of the stars were out and I couldn't see a cloud in the sky. The moon was nearly full and shining, making the snow that covered the ground seem to glow from the light of it. I hadn't been outside long enough to appreciate the scenery in far too long. When I was younger, my daddy would take me outside right as the sun was setting and we would sit on the porch swing of our old house as he told me stories until I fell asleep. After he died, I couldn't go out there anymore and eventually stopped paying attention to how beautiful everything was. Not even just the outside, but everything in general.

Instead of seeing the beauty in a child with their parent, I envied them for having something I didn't.

I no longer saw the beauty in believing in a faith when that had been the very source of so many of my problems.

How could I find something like life beautiful when people had been taken away from me too early in theirs and I had never been able to live mine?

'Beautiful' was rarely a word I used in my vocabulary because to me, it had lost all of its meaning. That morning, however, I remembered what it meant. Logan and I sat, not talking, until the sun came up. It reminded me of the day I first met him and had gone to the woods to see it rise. But out there, without any of the trees in the way, it was amazing.

"Isn't it funny that a sunrise is something so natural, it happens every day, but it's always beautiful?" I said, though neither of us was laughing. My voice cracked some from being in the cold and not speaking for a few hours. "It's just the sun, it's what keeps us from freezing over and it's always the same, but it's always amazing."

"Yeah. We better start back home," he said, standing. He gave me his hand and helped me down from the picnic table. I tripped coming down and fell against his chest as he caught me.

I looked up at him and laughed. "I suppose the only downside to being as fit as you is that you're not too squishy to land on," I joked.

"No one's ever complained before," he said, helping me to stand upright.

"Oh trust me; I'm not complaining in the least bit. I'm just saying that you're not squishy."

"Which is good?" he asked with a cocked eyebrow. Why was it that he could do that so well that it nearly took my breath away every time he did?

"It's definitely not bad." I was sleepy and getting reckless with my words. "I think you're hot." Wait, stop, rewind…did I just tell him that I thought he was hot? "I don't mean that…well, actually I do, but I didn't actually mean to say it."

He laughed. "Don't worry about it."

I let out a sigh. "I need a nap."

"A nap? I'm gonna' need more than a nap."

"I would like some hot chocolate, cold pizza and then to sleep until one."

"Hot chocolate and cold pizza?" he asked with a disgusted look on his face, looking at me across the top of his car.

"Don't knock it until you try it."

"I don't have to try 'Ro's tofu, rabbit food stuff she eats to know it tastes like crap. So obviously that doesn't hold up too well."

I let out a small laugh as I got into the car. "That's true, you win that one."

He got into the car and started it up. "I never lose, darlin', I just let you think you're winnin' one once in a while," he said with a wink and a smile.

I think I lost a bit of my heart to him that day.

It was nearly eight o'clock when we got home that morning. We assumed that everyone would be in the dining hall eating, so we went upstairs assuming that we wouldn't run into anyone or that they would notice the two of us missing from breakfast. But assuming is a dangerous thing and should never be relied upon.

We assume that our cars will work when we get into them. However, someone may have snuck out and rewired it to make tasty, fruity, mixed drinks instead.

We assume that our bed is where we left it when we wake up and get out of it in the morning. But someone may have taken it and placed it in a tank full of sharks while we were sleeping.

We assume that we know how to retie our shoes should they come untied, when in actual fact we could have been hypnotized to trip the next person we see whenever our shoes do come untied and don't remember how to retie them at all.

Although tasty, fruity drinks are not dangerous, it's never safe to assume, as we had going into the house.

We had made it upstairs and passed the student hall when we assumed that we wouldn't have to see anyone until we had gotten some sleep first. We were wrong. We made our way down the stag hall as quietly as possible. I was quite surprised at how silent Logan could be, considering all of the metal on his body. I was about to comment on this as we drew closer to our rooms. Only seven more doors until mine. Six. Five. Creak.

"Sshh," I warned.

"Where in the world have you been?" a voice boomed from behind me. I spun around to see Uncle Scott standing in the doorway of his room.

"Oh snap."

"Oh snap's right," he said, walking up to and stopping in front of us. "When you didn't show up for breakfast, either of you," he said with a furious glare in Logan's direction, "I came up to check on you. When neither of you were in your rooms, I looked all of this school, searching for you. Where were you?"

"We went out to get something to eat," Logan answered.

"At what time?"

"Uh, this morning, sometime," I stammered.

"What time Delia?" Scott demanded.

"Midnight," I said quietly.

"When?"

"I said around midnight, a little after."

"Midnight?" he yelled.

"I brought her back in one piece Scooter, it's fine."

"No, it's not fine Logan to take my niece out at midnight and not tell anyone where you're going. That's irresponsible."

"I told you I should have left a note," I muttered to Logan. He let out a low growl in my direction.

"And it's almost eight in the morning. What took so long?"

"The traffic was the devil this mornin'."

I let out a small laugh and attempted to hide it with my hand. It didn't work.

He turned his glare to me. "What took so long?" he asked again.

"Well, we went to eat, like we said, but when we were done, neither of us were tired. So we drove up to a hillside picnic area and waited for morning so we could watch the sun come up. Then we came back."

He looked at me for a little longer before turning to look at Logan, and then back to me. "Really?"

"Yeah, we didn't go anywhere or do anything else. I promise Uncle Scott."

"Look, I'm not happy about this in the least bit, but you both look dead on your feet so get some sleep and I'll talk to you after work."

"Alright, thank you," I said, watching him turn to leave. Logan shot me a smirk and turned in the opposite direction, towards his room. "I'm going to get in so much trouble hanging out with you. He was right; you are a bad influence on me," I said, following him.

"Go to bed, kid, you look like crap," he joked, pausing at his door, curiously straight across the hall from mine.

I opened the door to my own room and stood with half of my body inside and half out in the hallway. "Oh shut up. Just because you somehow manage to look incredibly gorgeous when most people look like crap, like me, it doesn't mean you get to pick on me."

He let out a small laugh and shook his head. "'Night, Delia."

"Shouldn't it be morning?"

"Mornin' then."

I smiled. "Goodnight Logan."

Uncle Scott gave us both a 'good talking to' when we woke up later that day, but Jean told him to go easy, we were just having fun. That only threw him into a speech about knowing the difference between having fun and being irresponsible. He and Logan spat back sarcastic and rude comments and remarks to one another through the whole thing. Scott threw in that he was the team captain and my uncle, so he had some say in what Logan did.

Logan growled out that he didn't care if the 'freakin' Queen of England was captain' of the X-men, he didn't have to take orders from anyone. He also said that the only time Scott ever acknowledged that he was my uncle was when he (Logan) and I were hanging around with each other. This caused another battle of comebacks and retorts that I didn't feel like hearing, so I left.

After the meeting, I decided to do the 'mature' thing and give them both the silent treatment for a few days. However, since Logan didn't mind my not talking so much, I left the room every time he came in, so he would know that I was mad. A few days turned into a few more and after two weeks of ignoring them both, I had been shopping more times with Rogue, Jean and Storm that I ever needed. My closet, which was too full to begin with, was overflowing. But most importantly, I was bored. I missed being around them both. Awkwardly, I missed Logan more. I had somehow gotten closer to him than I ever had been with Scott. Perhaps the whole point of having the fight with them was to realize how good of a friend Logan had become to me. He had become the person to whom I poured out my heart and thoughts. He was something different altogether and I missed him…a lot.

It was a dark and stormy night. (I've always wanted to write that!) Well, it was dark and it was stormy, but I suppose it was dark because it was night. Anyway, I was awake at nearly one o'clock that morning, which I suppose was because of the storm. Everything all tied in somewhere, somehow. Except for one thing; my fear of storms. I didn't mind snow, ice, rain even, but the sound of thunder and the sight of lightening stirred up a fear inside of me that I wasn't quite sure of where it came. I had been scared of them for years, and as I lay in bed, trying to remember if there was reasoning behind it until a clap of thunder, closely followed by a flash of lightening, caused me to jump in my bed and jarred me from my thinking.

That was it; I couldn't take it. I got up, grabbed one of my pillows, left my room and went straight across the hall. I knocked on the door lightly, but there was no answer. Have you ever had one of those times that's just awkward and you're not sure what to do? I needed to knock on the door louder in order for Logan to hear me, but if I knocked any louder, I risked the possibility of waking up other people. I did a semi-pace/dance outside the front of his door, wondering what to do when another loud BOOM of thunder came ringing through the air.

"Screw this," I muttered, opening Logan's door and walking in.

A bolt of lightening flashed outside of his window and lit up the room with a pale, dim light. It didn't last long, but it was enough to allow me to see him. He was lying in his bed, on his stomach, stretched out in his tangled covers. I approached him timidly, wanting both to let him sleep and wake him at the same time. I placed a hand on the shoulder of the arm that lay slack by his face and shook it lightly.

"Logan…Logan…"

He lifted his head sleepily and looked up at me. "What's wrong? You alright?" he questioned, sounding worried.

Another clap of thunder sounded off above us. The storm was right over the school. I jumped slightly. At the next flash of lightening, I was sure that he could see the fear on my face.

"I was wondering, if maybe, if you don't mind, I might perhaps…stay in here with you until the storm passes?" I asked, clinging to my pillow.

He rolled over and sat up. He looked at me with a sleepy, yet quizzical look that was all Logan as he cocked an eyebrow. "What's wrong?"

My bangs swished in front of my face as I shook my head, slightly embarrassed. "Nothing."

"You're really this scared 'cause of the storm?" I felt my cheeks flush hot as I nodded my head 'yes'. "All right then, yeah, I don't mind if you stay in here," he said, rearranging his bed so that I could have room to lie down. I placed my pillow where he had just had his and crawled in, facing him where he lay on his side.

"Thank you," I whispered.

"Don't worry about it, darlin'."

"But you didn't have to do this. I haven't even spoken to you in over two weeks, you could have told me to go back to my room."

"No, I don't blame you for ignorin' me. You still mad at me, though?"

I shook my head. "No, you and Uncle Scott are allowed to argue, I guess. I shouldn't have gotten mad at either one of you to begin with. I'm sorry."

"Don't be. We were both bein' jackasses, you just got caught in the middle of it."

"So we're good?"

"Yeah, we're good."

More thunder and I jumped again. He placed his hand on my arm. "It's only thunder, it's not gonna' hurt you."

"I know, I know," I said as the flashing of lightening filled the room once again. I let out a small whimper.

He smiled at me. "Why are you scared of 'em?"

"I…I don't know, I don't remember."

"Well let's not think about it, alright?"

"Yeah, okay."

"All right, uh…what've you been up to?"

I laughed. "This so isn't going to work."

"I'm tryin', you got a better idea?"

"No, I know you are. I uh…I've been shopping, and that's about it…" My laughing stopped. "I've really missed you," I admitted.

He stared at me and removed his hand from my arm. "Yeah, me too."

"Better not let Uncle Scott hear you say that," I teased.

"Why do you care about what he thinks?" he asked seriously.

"He's the only family I have up here. And aside from mother, he's all I have."

"What about your grandparents?"

"They died a few years ago. I wasn't really close to them anyway, though. They thought mother was a hippie and Uncle Scott was a freak. They hated him."

"What about you?"

"They didn't know about me. My mother doesn't either."

"Why?"

"Because, like I just said; they all hated Uncle Scott, mother still does. I can't let her hate me for that."

"What can you let her hate you for, then?"

"I don't let her, she just does."

"Why?"

"I was the reason she moved back to Connecticut, even though she hated it there. She thinks that I interfere in her life by trying to get her help. Truth is, she doesn't think she needs it, that's why she never tries. I just get so tired sometimes, worrying about her and I think about just giving up on her. But then I think about her and know that I can't," I said, pausing for a moment to keep myself from crying. "She hates me for not being the one to die instead of daddy. She never wanted to have me in the first place, I ruined her freedom and tied her to a place that she had tried to run away from. That's why she left me so much; she didn't want to have to look at me and be reminded that I was the one still alive."

I couldn't hold back the tears and he pulled me to him, allowing me to sob into his bare chest. "Sshh," he whispered. "It's alright." He rubbed circles on my back with his hand and he gently soothed me, continuing to whisper to me that it was all right.

I forgot about the storm after that.