Scott left Jean's room without a word as their other teammates bombarded her with questions about Stanford. She gave him a concerned glance before he shut the door behind him. He felt horrible, but he'd mustered up as much happiness as he could to let Jean know he loved her. He couldn't dredge up any more without being facetious. It would only make her upset.
That was the challenging thing about dating a telepath. It was like being in love with a very kind, tender, well calibrated lie detector.
After a shower and a shave, he felt slightly less awful. He changed into his favorite old gym shirt and black denim jeans. He went from the boy's corridor down the wraparound staircase, past gaggles of high school kids in the lavish foyer, and into the mansion's garage.
It was cavernous, full of rare, vintage, or just ridiculously expensive cars. It was air conditioned or heated, depending on the season. An enormous dehumidifier chugged away on muggy days, which Scott thought was overkill even for the oldest vehicles in the collection. He had a feeling the Professor only allowed him to touch anything in here because he knew how to repair quite a few of them. Scott had taken the liberty of setting up his own workbench in the corner. He didn't seem to mind.
He wondered why the Professor even had any of these cars, since he was wheelchair bound and couldn't drive the majority of them anyway.
Must be a rich person thing, he thought, to keep something expensive you can't use and then buy more of them.
Whatever the reason, he was happy to have the place to himself. It had become his own nearly private den since he started living at the mansion. It was where he came to think, or not think, whatever the case may be.
He told himself he was there to fix the noisy muffler of his favorite classic car, a pale yellow 1949 Oldsmobile Rocket convertible, but he knew better. Nonetheless, he needed a distraction from Jean's imminent departure, badly. He took out his toolbox, jacked up the solid steel behemoth, slid under on an old skateboard, and got to work.
After a few minutes of attempting to remove the exhaust pipe from the muffler, he heard the garage door open and close. He didn't need to look to know who it was.
"Hey, Scott," said Jean. Upside down, he watched her high tops timidly walk towards him. "What are you up to?" she asked.
Scott tried to make his mind as blank as possible while keeping a cheery tone. "Hey Jean," he said, "just working on Old Daisy here." He tapped the Oldsmobile's undercarriage with his wrench. The clang echoed throughout the garage.
"How are you feeling?"
"You already know," he muttered, and regretted it immediately.
Jeans telekinetic power slid the skateboard out from under the car. She had changed into high waisted shorts and a button down blouse that engulfed her slender frame, her hair in a ponytail to show her round, freckled face. He put away his tools and wiped most of the grease from his hands.
"It would make you feel better if we talked about it," she said.
He grumbled something affirmative and went to his workbench. He began fiddling with some loose nuts and bolts, putting the nuts on top of each other and fitting the bolts through the little tower he'd created.
Finally, he spoke. "You're going to be thousands of miles away for four years and I'm going to be here alone." He flicked a tower of nuts, sending a few tinkling onto the floor.
"That didn't make me feel better." He sat on a chair and spun around to face the wall.
"You're not going to be alone. You'll have the X-Men, and the Professor."
"There's nothing they can do to replace you."
Jean sat down next to him and put her head on his shoulder. "I'll come back during the summers, and spring breaks, and Christmas breaks," she said hopefully. "My whole family lives in New York, it's not like I'm just going to disappear forever. In fact, I'm going to move back to the mansion once I earn my Psych degree. Maybe be a school counselor."
Scott chuckled bitterly, "No, you're not."
Jean took her head off his shoulder and looked at him as if he'd insulted her. "Did you become a precog, too?" she asked. "You know what I'm going to do with my life?"
"No, it's just..." he steeled himself and took a deep breath. "People don't move across the country to a prestigious private school just to come right back home like they never left.
"I might not be a telepath, but I know you. You're ambitious. You need a challenge. Being a school counselor isn't going to do it for you. You're going to want to get a Master's, then a PhD, and then, I don't know, maybe a few more Bachelor's degrees, and you're going to meet people a million times smarter and cooler and richer than me in California and you're going to wonder, 'What the hell did I ever see in that idiot gearhead from high school?'"
Jean looked shocked. "Scott, you really think that's what's going to happen?" She twisted around to face him. "First of all, I don't want to spend the rest of my life in college. I want..." she paused and smiled to herself, as if she was trying not to reveal a secret, "I want more than that, someday."
He shrugged. "I just thought, since you liked school so much, you'd want to stay there."
"Well, this is a school too, silly," she joked affectionately. He couldn't make himself smile back at her.
Her grin disappeared, and she put her hands on both sides of his head. He felt a tiny chill of excitement as she ran her fingers through his light brown hair.
"Can I?" she asked.
He nodded, goosebumps forming on his arms with anticipation. Then came a soft, numbing comfort, like a very small dose of morphine.
She was reading his mind. There was nothing he could do to stop her, and once she was in, he never seemed to want her to leave, no matter what she did.
She probed deeply, holding his rapt attention with her gaze, like a hypnotist lulling her patient. Scenes of worst case scenarios flashed through his mind:
Watching Jean leave him.
Watching her die from some freak accident, something he should have been able to save her from.
Being alone forever.
She glided past his conscious fears to a memory. He saw his brother, Alex, as he looked a year ago when he'd first introduced Scott to Professor Xavier and his friend and fellow X-Man, Hank McCoy. Alex was skinny, but with strong facial features and a broad smile. He had long hair the same shade as Scott's and wore an oversized yellow coat.
It was last time he saw him before he died.
He felt her go deeper, into the memories of his many foster parents, some wonderful and loving, others who passed out on the couch after shooting up heroin or drinking themselves into a stupor.
Then she went even farther, past conscious thoughts, worries, memories, even nightmares, into something instinctual. Some primal, reptilian fear in the far reaches of his mind came foaming to the surface like a terrifying, formless monster.
He felt his stomach turn, like he'd reached the top of a roller coaster about to descend. His arms and face went numb, his mouth went dry, and he began to hyperventilate. "Jean," he whimpered, despite his best efforts to keep calm.
She gasped as she realized what was happening. "Shh, I'm sorry, it's okay," she whispered, and he felt another soothing dose of telepathic morphine. His heartbeat slowed, and his panic attack subsided as quickly as it'd surfaced. "I guess I went a little too deep," she said as she lowered her hands from his temples and released him from her telepathic grip.
"It's all right," said Scott, relieved. He felt a little sting as the numbness wore off, like an arm that had fallen asleep suddenly waking up again. "I guess now I don't have to tell you what I'm afraid of."
She took his hand and gently played with his fingers, still a little greasy. "I already knew what you were afraid of. I wanted to see when your abandonment issues started." She looked at him apologetically, like she thought even mentioning it might trigger another panic attack.
He smiled at her. "You don't even need a Psych degree."
"I know how to get to people's fears, but I have no idea what to do about them," she said.
He held her hands firmly in his. They were slender, and always a little cold. He felt the need to keep her warm every time he touched them. "You did a lot for me right after Alex died, after we defeated Apocalypse." He paused a moment. "Well, after you defeated Apocalypse."
"You helped."
He laughed. "Not much." His smile faded. "You were always there when I needed to talk, when I felt too angry and depressed to even function..." he trailed off and looked away. She'd done more than be there for him. The first time he'd had the courage to say, 'I love you,' to her, he felt as if part of his soul had come back from the grave, the part that was buried with his brother.
She laid her head on his chest, and he kissed her hair, catching a whiff of her flowery shampoo. He hoped she couldn't hear his heart skip a few beats.
"I'm going to miss you so much," she said. "I'm never going to meet anyone more wonderful than you in California. I'm coming back. I promise. And when I do, then maybe..." Her cheeks flushed bright red as she stumbled over her secret. "Maybe, we could... if we're still, you know... and if you want to..."
"Get married?" The words flew out of Scott's mouth before he could stop them. He let go of her hands and blushed. He felt another panic attack rising in his stomach.
What the hell is wrong with you?! He inwardly screamed at himself. He would have felt less terrified if he'd suddenly had a gun pointed at his head.
Jean's blush expanded to her neck and forehead. She swallowed, taking a few excruciating moments to finally say, "Yeah."
Scott stared at her, stunned. His panic turned to confused excitement, then joy. He put his hand on her face, brushed his thumb across her soft cheek, and kissed her deeply.
"I love you, Jean," he whispered.
"I love you, too," she replied.
He looked into her beautiful emerald eyes, committing this moment to his memory forever, then noticed a streak of something on her face. "Oh," he said, as he drew back his hand from her cheek. His laugh turned more embarrassed than joyful.
"What is it?" she asked.
"I got a little grease on you, sorry." He tried to wipe the smudge away with his other hand, but only succeeded in smearing it around. He caught a glimpse of her hands and realized, to his dismay, he'd gotten grease all over them, too. "Hold on," he said, as he began frantically searching for a shop rag. He wanted to kick himself in the head for ruining what was supposed to be one of the most wonderful moments of his life.
She stopped him, locking her arms behind his head to bring her face next to his. "I don't mind getting a little dirty," she said seductively.
Perhaps he hadn't ruined everything yet.
They kissed again, then stood together, lips still locked in passion. Scott led them over to Old Daisy. He jacked the car back down with one foot and opened the door to the backseat.
The minute hand of the clock on the shop wall marched past 12:30. As far as Jean and Scott were concerned, time could go take a flying leap.