Disclaimer: I own nothing, so there.

Later that afternoon, we went out for breakfast. There was some small, weird Canadian restaurant that had a massive lumberjack statue posing outside with his axe, looking as if he was about to swing into the building with it.

"Are you serious, we're eating here?" I asked, staring up at the giant lumberjack, whose paint was peeling and fading. It was disconcerting to say the least.

"You got a better idea?"

"Yeah, let's go somewhere that doesn't have some fake, creepy guy trying to break through the roof with an axe. Just a thought, though."

"They've got good food."

"They would have to; look at the place!"

He looked over at me with his usual scowl. "I'm payin', I decide where we eat. You got a problem with it, then don't eat anything."

"That shouldn't count; you won't let me pay for anything."

"Too bad, I guess you don't get to make any decisions, then," he said. "Besides, you're gonna' need that money later."

I stared at the restaurant for a moment longer, listening to the ever-present rain pound against the hood of the truck. "Does it really have good food?"

"I don't lie about stuff like that, kid," he said with a bit of a smirk.

I smiled. "All right, if I don't have a choice."

"You don't."

"Then let's go eat."

We left the truck and ran through the rain to the entrance of the diner. Once we got in and I had shaken the rain from me, I looked around and realized that the decor on the inside wasn't much better. It was covered in cheesy and outdated looking photos of obviously fake lumberjacks, posing as if they were in the middle of chopping down a tree, and the camera caught them by surprise, but giving big, fake, grins. Also, there were various maple syrup bottles everywhere. It was the stereotypical Canadian diner.

"How did you even stand this place long enough to find out that it has good food?" I whispered to him as we were being seated.

"You'll put up with a lot when you're hungry."

"I think I would have starved," I said, sliding into a booth.

"Yeah, look, I gotta' make a phone call. If I don't get back before the waitress gets here, order me a beer."

"I'm not old enough."

"Then lie."

"What if they need to see I.D.?"

"Tell 'em you don't have it with you, I don't care."

"Well what if they don't believe me and make me leave?"

"I guess you'll have to sit in the truck while I eat," he said with a smirk and a wink, walking off towards the payphone back by the bathrooms.

I moved to grab a menu and caught my own reflection on the side of the napkin dispenser. I looked so different than I had just a month before. As I said earlier, I had been raised in a fairly well off family and I had gone to an all girls prep school; my fashion sense was greatly influenced by those around me. I would dress like them to fit in so that my parents would be happy. But once I left home, I exchanged all of my dresses and high-heels for old sweaters, blue jeans and boots. The shift in my wardrobe made me realize how silly it had been of me before to try to be like everyone else. I wasn't them, I never would be, nor would I be like them. I was a mutant. I'm not saying that because I'm a mutant I can't wear a dress and high-heels, I'm just saying that no matter what I wear on the outside in an attempt to look like everyone else, I'm never going to fit in. I'm always going to see myself as the girl with her hair down in her eyes, in blue jeans with holes and a pullover sweater that serves its purpose by keeping me warm under my green army jacket.

I let out a sigh and grabbed a menu before glancing up to see Logan standing at the phone talking. Then my sight shifted, everything went blurry and when my sight focused once again, I was no longer in the diner; I was in a bedroom.

I couldn't tell right away who it was, but someone was asleep in the bed, tossing and turning, muttering out words. It was Logan. He was having a nightmare.

The door to his bedroom opened and someone crept in, hovering over him in his bed. "Logan," she paused. "Logan- Logan wake up." It was Marie, only she didn't have the white in her hair. "Logan-"

He sat bolt right up, letting out an angry yell. Marie screamed in surprise. I heard the 'snikt' sound of his claws popping before I saw him stab them through her chest. Both of their eyes widen, in shock and pain. She gasped, trying to breathe, and he retracted his claws.

"Help me! Somebody help!" he yelled. His eyes were sad; looking scared and near crying. She continued to gasp. "No, no," he said quietly, shaking his head slightly as she reached her hand out, touching his cheek.

Immediately her powers began to work as she drained the energy from him, the wounds in her chest and back healing from the use of his powers. When she moved her hand, he fell, his body convulsing on the floor.

"Scott, grab a pillow," I heard someone say.

"It was an accident," Marie said, leaving the room.

Then everything went blurry again, my vision shifted and when my eyes slid back into focus, I was back in the diner.

I looked around, trying to see if anyone had noticed that I had been out of it. When I looked to the payphone, I saw Logan staring at me. I tapped the side of my head with my finger and shrugged, offering him a small, weak smile. He cocked an eyebrow at me before going back to his conversation. After only a few minutes of talking, he hung up and came back to the table.

"What happened to you?" he asked.

"I was having a vision," I said, trying to down play it.

"Was it as bad as the one yesterday?"

I shook my head. "No."

"You've not had one during the day since you've been with me. What's wrong?"

"I don't know," I said as the waitress came to over to us. She took our orders and then left. I was quiet for a moment. "Has Marie always had those white streaks in her hair?"

"No, why?"

"I saw her, both of you, actually. She didn't have the white in her hair and I was just wondering if what I saw had already happened or not."

"What'd you see?"

"You stabbing her."

"That happened right after we met."

"You were scared that you had killed her."

"Yes, I was."

"I've never seen you look that scared before."

"That's 'cause I'm usually not."

"Is that why you're close to her?"

He cocked an eyebrow at me and gave me a sideways glace. "'Cause I almost killed her?"

"No, because you saved her life. If she hadn't have touched you, she would've died."

"Yeah, but I stabbed her."

"But she wasn't mad at you for it, though. She thought it was her fault."

"You heard what she was thinkin'?"

I looked away. "It's complicated," I said, fidgeting with my hands on the table.

He took his hands and held mine down. I looked up at him and he was staring at me. I was slightly taken aback by his gesture; he had avoided all unnecessary contact with me by any means possible, and for him to just hold my hands the way he had, made me feel at odds with myself. I wanted him to care about me like he did Marie, I was jealous of a girl that I had never met and yet I didn't know why. I didn't know why I cared about him, but to have him holding my hands, and staring at me the way that he was, I felt my want grow deeper and my confusion grow stronger.

"How complicated?"

"I don't really hear thoughts, I sort of feel them, or just know them. I don't really know how to explain it. I don't really understand it myself."

"What was she thinkin'?"

"Well, when she came in she was worried about you because you were having a bad dream. Then when you woke up and you stabbed her it was…odd," I said and then paused.

"How?"

"She was scared and there was pain but…you were touching her and there was something that…made her happy?" I said, slightly confused by the thought of it.

"Happy?" he asked, showing that he shared my confusion.

"Yeah, kind of. She was happy to have someone touch her, even if it meant that they were killing her. I mean, it could've been something else, but that's what it felt like."

"Why'd she feel like it was her fault, though? She didn't do anything."

"I don't know, it had something to do with her feeling like she shouldn't have touched you afterwards, or something. Like I said, though; I don't really hear it, I just feel it and between the two of you, there was just too much going on for me to really understand it." He let go of my hands and moved his over to his side of the table. "You were on the phone with her just now, weren't you?"

"Yeah."

"You were on the phone with her yesterday when I had my really bad one."

"You think that has something to do with it?" he asked.

"I don't know. Maybe it's just a coincidence, but it's something for me to pay attention to."

"Why should she affect what you see?"

I shook my head, hair falling into my eyes and I pushed it away. "I don't know; I really don't. Although admittedly I don't know much about my powers, what all I can do, what they mean, how to control them, what has or hasn't happened yet. I just know that they're real, that's it."

"You're still a kid, you got time to learn."

"I hope I do anyway."

He cocked and eyebrow at me. "You plan on dyin' on me soon?"

I laughed. "No, I'm not planning on it, but you never know. Either way, I was actually referring to hoping that I could learn about them."

"Don't worry about it, you will."

I gave him a small smile and nodded. "I hope you're right." And I did. More than anything at that point.

There are times in our life where everything seems to fit together and others where we scramble to keep things from constantly falling apart. I always found that in my life, there had never been a transition period where things were only 'okay'. Everything was either great or terrible. But with Logan, it wasn't the same. It was never one thing with him. I could be happy and miserable at the same time. Not care about him, but want him to care about me. My visions were getting better and worse with him. Nothing made sense and yet I knew for one hundred percent certain that there was a reason, unbeknownst to me at the time, for why I had to be with him. I wasn't used to living this way. If life was good or bad, I adapted and dealt with it on my own. But I wasn't used to feeling confused. I wasn't used to needing people. And so with Logan, I hated him while finding myself slowly beginning to love him. This was a time in my life where I wasn't scrambling to keep things from falling apart, but to put them together.

"Miss Rivers, this is all very well and interesting, however, I don't see how it has anything to do with what we originally started talking about. You said that he was someone that you needed, but to me it only seems as if you had a crush on him," Dr. Lewis said.

I let out a loud laugh from where I was standing by the window. "I'm afraid that was the furthest thing from my mind, doctor. Like I said earlier, he was a good looking guy, gorgeous actually, but…" I shook my head. "No, no crush. You would be wrong about that as well."

"But you said that you were starting to love him, is that not true?"

"Yes, but not in that way. There's more than one way to love a person, I would think you would know that. I may just be a teenager, but that doesn't mean that I don't know how to appreciate someone's company or mutual interests. Even though I was jealous of Marie through what I was seeing of the two of them together, seeing him with her made me realize how different he was."

"Different how?"

"Different in the sense that with her, he let his guard down. He felt attached to her and cared about her. I saw that how he reacted to her, was how I reacted to him. When you put up a big enough wall, it's hard for someone to find away around. But she did it for him, he did it for me, and I…admired him for it. Seeing him with her made me begin to love him because he wasn't the same when I was with him."

"Why not?"

"A lot of things had happened to him at that point, but when I found him, Jean had just died and there was something changed about him. He was colder and more distant than I had ever seen him. He tried to drink her away, but he healed too quickly for the alcohol to ever take affect on him. I had never felt so much sympathy for a total stranger. I had never really ever felt any emotions for strangers. I didn't care about them."

"Then would you say he was more of a father figure?"

"I guess you could say that."

"But if you already have a father then why did you need a father figure?"

"I didn't."

"I'm confused," he admitted.

I turned to look at him. "By what?"

"By why he was someone you said you needed."

I shook my head. "Not someone I need, something."

"I still don't understand."

"I told you that it was complicated."

"Why?"

"Why's anything complicated?" I asked, turning back to the window. "You don't like this because you don't understand what I'm saying and you're supposed to understand all of your patients, aren't you? You're getting frustrated because when I said that it was complicated you thought that I was lying in order to not have to explain myself, or that I was exaggerating. What you have to understand Dr. Lewis, is that I myself am still confused by it all. It's not all going to make sense; you just have to believe me. Can you do that? Without delving too much into why I did what I did and analyzing all of my actions, can you just listen to what I'm saying? I don't want to be here, I don't feel I need to explain myself or what I've done, but I promised my parents that I would and so here I am. I just need you to listen to me. Then I'll go away and you can go on with the rest of your day and deal with the real crazy people."

He was quiet for a moment as I heard him flip back through his notebook. I then heard him let out a sigh. "Miss Rivers, you mentioned wanting to find your birth mother and he said that he knew someone who could help find her. Did anything become of that?"

I closed my eyes, momentarily shutting out the rain and let out a deep breath. "Yeah."

Four days after having my vision of Logan when Jean had died, I had another strong one.

I saw some sort of sadistic looking lab with a makeshift tank in the middle. On the wall, there were X-Rays tacked up to a board that was illuminating them. I had been to this room before, quite a few times actually, but it was different this time. They weren't cutting him open, they weren't electrocuting him, they weren't beating him. At first, I wasn't even sure that he was there.

I could see men in white coats, holding clipboards and staring at the water anxiously. After only a few moments, I felt a burning start in my chest. My lungs felt as if they were on fire and soon I was fighting for breath. I fought and struggled against the pain for at least five minutes. At which point I saw one of the men standing behind the tank pull a lever, causing a metal platform to rise out of it, with Logan strapped to it. He coughed and sputtered, trying to get out the water he had ingested while being held under. The rush of air to my lungs that I felt as he breathed in stung, but that didn't stop him from letting out a loud growl. He panted, trying to make up for his lost breath.

"Drop him down again, and let's try ten minutes," one of the men said.

Logan bared his teeth and let out one last angry yell before the dropped him in the water once more. I followed him that time; I could see him as he yanked at his restraints. I could see his eyes wide, filled with terror and rage, and when he opened his mouth to scream from under the water, I woke up screaming.

Once again, my head was filled with an immense pain. Once my screaming stopped, I could do no more than let out whimpers through my gritted teeth. There were small echoes of Logan's yells in my mind, but mostly I felt the physical pain the vision left behind. Along with the pressure in my head, my chest and lungs burned, and my arms were sore from how hard he had been struggling.

I held my hands to my head, shutting my eyes closed tight. Then the tears came. I gasped for breath, unable to catch my own. My body shook from the pain and crying. I wanted to stop it, but I didn't know how. I rocked back and forth on my bed, trying to somehow ease the pain, and find a way to breathe when I felt Logan's hands cover mine, and then lift them away. I opened my eyes and gave him a pleading look.

"Come on kid, you gotta' breathe," he said. I tried to force air into my lungs, but I could. I tried hard, but all I could manage were tiny gasps. I closed my eyes again. "Look at me!" he demanded. "Jayden!" My eyes snapped open and the pain in my head stopped. But I still couldn't breathe. "What's wrong?"

I was light headed, dizzy, and felt myself falling. Then everything went black.

When I regained consciousness, I was lying on the bed and I felt Logan's mouth on mine, forcing air into my lungs as he gave me mouth to mouth. I coughed and he moved away. I rolled to my side and continued coughing until I spit out mouthfuls of water onto the floor.

"What the?" he said as I took in big gulps of air, finally able to breathe. "How'd you choke on water?"

"Oh no! No, no, no!" I said, covering my moth with my hand. "Oh please, no!"

"What?"

"I saw you, they-they were trying to drown you and you couldn't breath, but you-you couldn't die. You kept screaming and swallowing water. I could feel it. My lungs were burning, and my arms hurt from where you were trying to get lose. I could feel it."

"So what you saw happenin' to me happened to you?"

"I think so."

"Has that ever happened before?"

"No," I said, shaking my head. "This is the first time." Tears came back to my eyes. "What if they're always going to be like this? What if you leave me and I don't have anyone to help me?"

He put his hand on my shoulder. "I'm not gonna' leave you 'til you get this figured out."

"But what if you do?"

"Hey, I'm not goin' to, alright?"

I was scared and still shaken. Tears welled up in my eyes and I fought to keep from losing what control I had left. The visions that I had like that took so much out of me. Emotionally, mentally, physically. Even though I could no longer seem them or feel the pain, my body was haunted by what it had seen and felt. I could still feel the sting in my chest from coughing up the water and I still felt the fear of choking on it. I was scared that from then on, everything I saw would be painful or harmful.

But on the other hand, I felt at odds with myself. Even though I was feeling all of these crazy emotions from my vision, Logan's gestures toward me made me feel protected. From one so large as giving me mouth to mouth to save me, to one so small as keeping his hand on my shoulder to try to comfort me, and in between by promising not to leave me.

I was exhausted from it all and collapsed right into his arms. He must have been in the shower when he heard me, because he was wearing only his blue jeans and the rest of his body was still wet. He held me to him as I sobbed into his shoulder. I was so tired that I don't even know how I found the strength to cry. But I did, and soon I was back to sleep.

When I woke next, two hours had passed and I found myself lying on Logan's chest. He had fallen asleep as well. I thought of getting up, but the feeling of him holding me to him overpowered any such idea. There was something so different about him, about how he was holding me. There was such an overwhelming feeling of protectiveness that rolled off him. Overwhelming being an understatement. It's not to say that I didn't feel safe with my parents, but with him, protection was such an instinctual thing. He took care of and protected what was his. I don't know when he had assumed me as his, but I didn't hate the idea. I only hated the idea of allowing myself to be caught up in him to only have him leave me. During those few minutes that I was awake, I wondered and thought about the possibility that he might let me stay with him even after I had my situation figured out. But I wasn't allowed much time to think, as I soon drifted back to sleep, relishing in his safety.

I woke slowly, my vision leaving me drained and feeling as if I had a hangover, or at least what I imaged one would feel like. My head was pounding and I was thankful that it was dark, the only light coming from the open bathroom door. I sat up and carefully stood from the bed, only to find out that despite his constant nagging of me cleaning up my own messes, Logan had cleaned up the water that I had choked on and spit out. I slowly made my way over to the refrigerator, once again finding a note tacked to it.

'Went out for a fight. Should be back around two or three. If you leave before I get back, take care of yourself.

L'

It was pretty much the same as before, so I threw it into the garbage before continuing my search for food. It wasn't until I was half way through eating my peanut butter sandwich that I realized it was a quarter till four in the morning, and he wasn't back yet.

I finished eating and cleaned up after myself, all the while keeping an eye on the clock. At four thirty, I began to get worried. I knew that he could take care of himself, but I didn't know why he was so late.

A little after six, I had watched more infomercials about cooking utensils then I hoped I ever would again. That's when I heard the tuck pull up and I let out a sigh of relief.

He pushed his way through the door once he had unlocked it and stood at the entrance, staring at me, soaking wet.

"Are you okay?" I asked.

"Yeah, I'm fine. I'm getting' in the shower. Get your stuff together, 'cause we're leavin' when I get out."

"Okay," I said, sliding off the bed as I began to gather my things. I didn't want to ask what was wrong because I didn't want to know. I stuffed all of my sweaters but one into my bag, pulling the one I left out on over my T-shirt. I grabbed my boots, sat down, and began pulling them on and lacing them up. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Logan paused in the doorway of the bathroom. I looked up at him.

"Are you scared of me?" he asked quietly, his back to me.

"No," I said. "You've never given me a reason to be."

"Even after all the stuff you've seen me do to other people?"

"From what I can tell, they screwed you over. All of them knew what you were capable of and when you started doing what they had been trying to train you to do; they got paid back for what they had taken from you."

"But you don't know me; you don't know when I might snap. Doesn't that scare you at all?"

"Do you want it to?"

Suddenly he turned around and stormed over to me. He grabbed me by my upper arms and shook me. "I'm an animal, kid, don't you get that?" he growled. "This ain't no freakin' pettin' zoo. You can't just come in, not knowin' me, thinkin' that you're gonna' be safe. Didn't your parents teach you not to trust strangers? I'm who they were talkin' about. I'm who they were tellin' you to stay away from. I hurt people, what makes you think I won't hurt you?"

I was slightly taken aback by his sudden anger, but wasn't totally surprised by it. I had seen him snap in my visions before, and that night at the bar, but never at me. I wasn't quite sure of what he wanted me to say. I didn't know why he was so upset. And I didn't know what to do.

"Because I trust you," I said quietly.

He let out a loud growl. "How can you trust me, I don't trust myself!" He shook me again and for the first time since I had been with him, I was scared. I didn't know what was wrong with him, but something obviously was. He stared at me and sniffed the air. "So, now you're scared of me?" I shrunk back some, trying to pull away from him as far as he would let me, but he pulled me back to him and lowered his mouth to my ear. "Maybe you should stay that way." Then he let go of me, turned back around and went into the bathroom, slamming the door shut behind him.

I sat there for a moment, feeling shaken. There had been a one-eighty, a complete turn around in his personality since the day before when he held me while I cried and slept, to right then, when he was yelling at me. I was too shocked to do anything but numbly lace up my boots and finish packing the rest of my things. By the time he was getting out of the shower, I was pulling on one of my hoodies and my army jacket over it.

"You ready?" he asked, pulling on his own jacket.

"Yeah," I said quietly from where I was sitting on the edge of my bed.

"Let's go," he said, picking up his bag. He had been planning on leaving; he had already packed his bag and was ready to go. It made me wonder if he had been planning to leave before I woke up and was mad that he had to take me with him.

I followed behind him as he walked to the truck and threw his bag in. I climbed in and strapped on my seatbelt. He walked away from the truck and over to the main building to check out.

I closed my eyes and leaned my head against the window. I sat there, listening to the rain and worried about what was going to happen. I didn't know whether to let my fear show through or try to get over it somehow. He was in a terrible mood and I didn't know which would appease him more. He seemed to have liked it when he realized that I was scared of him, and so I decided that would be the safest way to go. Even though at that point I wasn't exactly sure what was safe with him.

In a few minutes, Logan was back, in the truck and pulling out of the parking lot. I kept to myself and hoped that at the very least I could keep from pissing him off even further. After three hours of straight driving, with no talking between the two of us, I had a lot of time to think. Mostly about my reasons for still being gone. To begin with, being with him had helped to curb and slow my visions, but over that week, they had come back with an intensity that they had never known before our meeting.

I was sure that there was a reason for why I was seeing him so much. But after over a month of being gone, I was no closer to understand any of it then I had been while I was at home.

Then there was one other thing. I was sure that if I could go through with it, then I could somehow figure out some of my problems. The thing was; I still needed Logan's help to pull it off.

"That psychic professor you know, would he be willing to help me find my real mother? I think if I could talk to her, I could get a lot of things solved and get out of your way," I said, speaking for the first time since we had left.

He let out a grunted laugh. "You still goin' on about that? He's not gonna' help you 'cause it's a waste of time. She gave you away; she doesn't care about you. She sure ain't gonna' start now," he said, he voice harsh and bitter.

"My mother gave me away because she did care about me. She wanted me to have a good life and she knew she couldn't give that to me. She loved me."

He glanced over at me. "You sure about that darlin', 'cause I didn't think you just gave people away when you loved 'em. I could be wrong, but I think that if she really wanted to keep you, she could've found a way to do it. So before you start defendin' someone, make sure you know why you're doin' it."

He turned his head, giving his attention back to the road. I was quiet for a moment and did the best I could to bite back the comment in my mind, but before I could help it, it was spewing from my mouth. "At least my mother did what she could to keep me alive. I seem to recall that you, on the other hand, stood by and let the person you love die. My mother tied, but you just let Jean drown."

He stomped on the breaks, causing the truck to slide on the wet and empty road before coming to a complete halt.

"Get out!" he growled.

"What?"

"Get your bag and get out of my tuck right now."

I looked at him and there was rage clear and apparent written on his face. He wasn't joking in the slightest.

I unbuckled myself and grabbed my bag from behind my seat before getting out. No sooner than when I had the door shut was he laying on the gas and speeding down the long stretch of road.

I stood there in the pouring down rain, watching him drive away. I wasn't expecting to see him turn around to come back to get me, but I was hoping that at the very least, he would slow down and stop. I stood there, hopelessly waiting to see the red glow of his break lights until I was soaking wet and could no longer see his truck. That's when I sat on the side of the road and cried. It hurt to see him leave, but it broke my heart to realize he didn't care. I was nothing more than a speck in his rear view and the further he drove, the more apparent that became.

Being without him for the first time in three weeks, I cried knowing that I needed him and there was nothing I could do to make him feel the same about me. He promised he wouldn't leave me, but there I was, all alone.