At Seventeen
by
Jenn


Author Notes: Kat and Sare for betaing. I forgive Kat for not telling me how hot Logan looks in leather. And honestly, this is as close as I've ever gotten to being funny. Sad, huh?

---

"What was it like?"

It's the first thing that pops out of my mouth--I could have just slapped myself. But I ask anyone out there to come up with a better topic to discuss with someone that isn't noted as a conversationalist of any kind. Logan is a doer--our most bonding moments are fighting, meandering about on a motorcycle, and eating. Talk is secondary. It works for him. Works for me, too--any way I can get it works.

So I'm easy. Sue me.

He glances at me five feet away, crouched on the ground with my arms around my knees because sitting in the snow is fucking *cold*--shit, now I'm channeling him again.

Damn.

"What was what like?" He's back at the bike again--the endless male fascination for things that go zoom that mutants and humans share--maybe the secret to world peace is to let all of them get together with a car and hash it out after all. Though more than once I've caught myself giving some damned outlandish instructions on repair of a carburetor--and what the hell does a carburetor do anyway?--that just gives everyone the willies, because they damn well know I've just skipped personalities again. Then the patient look, from the Professor, who reminds me to practice my mental disciplines regularly.

Then he looks amused. He would.

*Then* there's Jean's snickering that she tries not to let me overhear. But I won't go into that--the last time I had a personality episode I was hitting on her and damn--

"The world." Maybe he hears it in my voice or something--it's another thing I can't do yet. I'm restricted to campus until I'm twenty-two and old enough to join the team, or until I have enough control over myself that the likelihood of me picking up a few more foreign memories dims. If I need to get anywhere, Storm or Scott or Jean will take me--and to tell the truth, I just don't go that many places. Places, for the most part, mean people, and people mean unpredictable, and unpredictable when you can suck the life out of a person by touch is not so great.

"Hmm"

Ah, I got his attention--sort of. This is a Question That Requires More Than Five Words. And it doesn't involve combat. This takes him a few minutes--he has to pull out vocabulary that lacks profanity.

"Yeah." I shift my feet and pull the sweater lower--there are compensations for having every inch of your skin covered. You are *rarely* really cold--unless you're crouched in the snow, of course, like I am. "What did you do?"

I wonder just how oblivious he is--to be honest, I really think he believes it's normal for me to be following him around like a homeless puppy. After all, he's my *friend* and he's my *father* and he's the first person I trusted when I got away from home. If he is oblivious, he's the only person on the entire fu--darned campus--or maybe he knows and assumes it's a crush and it will pass and all that psych crap that someone doubtless feeds him if he ever notices my little shadow game.

It ain't a crush anymore. It's on the edge of obsession, getting uncomfortably close to stalking, and if I could access a few more of his skills I'd be hunting him for all I'm worth.

He should *notice*, damn it.

He turns around, giving me that small smile that I've never seen him turn on anyone else-- a smile that's half a gift, because Logan doesn't just smile, it's an effort--that brotherly/fatherly/uncley/friendly smile. You know the one--you like it on one hand and hate it on another.

I'm not sister/daughter/niece. I'll keep friend, though. For now.

"What I do." He's definitely grinning and trying to hide it because God knows what would happen to his reputation if someone saw *that*. "Just move around."

Look for his past. Sometimes, if I catch him in the right mood, he even tells me some of the stuff he's seen.

And that's six words, folks. Nice.

"You were in Canada again?"

"Yeah."

Canada. I remember that--the double perspective is sometimes confusing, but especially at the beginning, when I'd wake up from one of his nightmares with my fists clenched, wondering why I didn't have nine inches of sharp metal on either hand. There was the fighting and the sheer pleasure of it that I can share, the taste of winning and the smell of fear.

Which everyone kind of understands, which is probably why they don't ask about my rather bloodthirsty interest in hockey.

His answer, by the way, wasn't descriptive. I frown, staring down at my knees.

"What was it like?"

He pauses again and this time I think he's actually considering his answer, head slightly cocked as he studies the engine. And what the hell is wrong with the engine, anyway?

"Uninformative, Marie."

This time. He makes a report to the Professor and Jean every time he comes back. He doesn't just search for his past, you see--he took a little private mission along with him, and I sometimes think its because of me. When the students start to arrive in odd bunches, still shell-shocked from the sudden change in their lives, to be welcomed into their new home, I can track where he is by where they came from. In my room, there's a map with pushpins that I mark the trail with, each dated, and I follow the line first north, then west, then east and I know when he's coming back to the month.

This time it was across Canada from Calgary to Vancouver, down into Michigan and some time on the east coast. Last time it was Mexico straight down into Panama. I use the encyclopedia and the internet to see what he sees.

Well, not the bars. Obviously.

And I'm always *Marie*. Eternally seventeen, little-sister Marie, to be protected and cherished and watched--oooh, that sounded bitter. Damn, damn, damn.

He wanders in and out of the school on his own terms, which is, oddly enough, extremely convenient. Evil Mutants come forth to wreck havoc--and sometimes you gotta wonder if he picked up some prescience along the way--and he's suddenly at breakfast wearing a uniform, looking for all the world as if he'd been there all along. By his third return, he left most of his clothes, and by the fifth, he had a few momentos--if you can imagine Logan of all people being sentimental--scattered about the room.

Then he's gone again.

We got used to it with disturbing speed. I got used to using the word 'we' to describe this place, consider myself a part of it. It happens--you adapt.

Shrugging into the sweater, I sigh. The carburetor--is that a carburetor?--is better company than me. Or more interesting. Or something.

God, I sound like a fifteen year old with my first crush. This is pathetic. I still have the dogtags and I still wear them under my clothes and right now the metal is warm because I have them against my skin where they won't move and betray me beneath the bodysuit

I sigh and maybe he hears it or maybe whatever he's trying to do works, because he stands up, brushing his hands off on his jeans and pulling on his gloves. While on campus, he almost always wears gloves. Then he walks over, looking down at me.

"Nothing to do right now?"

Actually, watching you is something to do, Logan. But thanks for asking--I'm feeling really fu--darn welcome.

"Not really." I could be doing homework or trying to practice piano again, or even meander down to see what the other students are doing, but I can do that anytime. This is my own personal treat to myself and I don't give a damn whose smiling behind their hands at the cuteness of it all.

He extends a hand. He's one of the few who don't flinch at the concept of touching me, even through two layers of cloth and a bodysuit under that--and he has double physical, intimate knowledge just what the hell can happen if you *do* brush against unprotected skin. And I take it and he pulls me up and puts a companionably arm around my shoulders and turns me so I face the school.

Companionably. For him. I concentrate on snow--he's the last person that's touched my bare skin, and virgin or not, just this touch reminds me of all the touching that could happen and--being this close has its effect, especially since his hand is dangling over my shoulder like that and if I twitch, it will brush right up against--

And Logan would be gone so fast I'd see tracks in the snow. Rein it in, Rogue, take a breath and think about snow. Cold, wet, snow.

Cold, wet, *uninviting* snow. Snow doesn't make you want to find out how much touch you can feel through a bodysuit. Usually.

There's a difference who I was when he left me here and who I am now, being a kid and verging on being a grownup, but he's not seeing it. He never leaves long enough to get some perspective. I have a bad feeling about being fifty and him still calling me kid.

I can see this. It isn't pleasant.

I could move on, you know. I could--and there are willing guys who would be more than happy to see exactly what can be accomplished when you gotta keep your fingers off the skin. But that'd be too easy and I've never liked it easy and anyway--they aren't him. They aren't bumping around in my head twenty-four seven and I'll never know them the way I know him. They'll never stand in a cage fight with that chill exultation--never know what winning really tastes like, when every instinct in you is jacked up to an intensity that's so damned close to sexual--and they don't have a clue how it feels to be alone on the road with nothing between you and the sky.

They don't know what it's like to hunt, and Scott gives me the oddest looks when I want those free hours to wander around the compound at night and watch the animals run with a little predatory interest they seem to sense, or sneak out a cigar and sit in the snow at night and stare at the sky and wanting to just go--somewhere. Go so much it hurts.

That's him in me.

Scott also gave me a look when he and Jean took me shopping and I was looking at red hair dye--but that's beside the point.

So I'm hopeless. Sue me.

"You up for a little workout?"

Maybe somewhere in the back of his mind, he guesses I remember, though he's never acknowledged it. I almost sigh. But he does this--when he's gone, he sometimes sends me letters or little things he's picked up and when he's here he gives me lessons on things that, apparently, I have to know to be a well-rounded superhero. Fighting in the non-Scott Summers school of kicking ass. Go for the crotch, go for the eyes, attack from behind, and get out in one piece.

Combat training. That's romance for you.

"Sure."

And believe me, I'm a hell of a lot more enthusiastic than I sound, because the last of the villains have been temporarily defeated and its almost time for him to leave.

He ruffles my hair--suddenly I feel seven years old and if he's going to treat me like his daughter, well then--

We're inside the gym and I strip my jacket and sit down on the floor, pulling my legs up under my chin and trying to look as innocent as possible because if this is how he wants it to be--far be it from me not to let him enjoy all the privileges of fatherhood.

"Logan, can I ask you a question?"

He's hugged me and let me cry on him and watched me play soccer in the backyard. He's sat beside me when I've been ill and taught me to fight and shared his memories with me. He was willing to die for me.

This is gratitude, folks. I actually get a thrill out of it.

He stops and I can almost see every inch of skin on his body twitch. But I make my eyes wide and dark and curious and look as seventeen as I can, even if I have the memories of three highly sexually active people still lingering in my mind.

"What?" Every instinct in him is just screaming that this means Bad Things.

I clasp my hands and wait with that liquid look of trust that every girl learns at birth.

What could be more natural than I ask my mentor, my friend, the man I trust most, my damned *father-figure*--

"There's this guy--" I let it trail off and he doesn't flush but only because he's Logan and I think he'd die if he actually did do something as non-macho, non-masculine as that. And I hold the giggle for everything I'm worth.

Hey, Logan, you wanted it this way--enjoy every damned second of it.

He sits down and I can see the plans for escape running through his eyes--but he can't just leave me here, because he doesn't want to hurt my feelings and he's twitching like a junkie trying to figure out how to get out of this with his masculinity and his pride intact. Because never in a million years will he admit that he's scared to talk to a little girl--his little girl--about something perfectly normal like boys. Because he knows where that will lead but he may not know that I'm feeling just a bit malicious and want to push him just a little.

Maybe more than a little.

I'll bet he wishes Magneto would suddenly escape prison right now.

"Hey."

I twist around and there she is, red hair in a pony tail, looking as delicious as a spring morning--

God, Logan, do you have to think in cliches? Sometimes, when they are both in the room, I pull up the memories of their first meeting--I know how she smells, how she feels against my skin, and how everything in him moves when he looks at her.

How everything moves in her, because she's skittered around in his mind too, and I have that as well.

I could hate her if she gave me the chance--but she's Jean and hating Jean would be kind of like hating the sky for being blue or hating Logan for persisting to look at me like an overgrown child.

{--red hair, soft skin, big eyes, God I wonder if she tastes as good as she looks her mind her voice damn Cyke anyway won't do it can't do it but I want her--}

I take a breath because that wanting comes off him even from where I'm seated.

It comes off her too.

He's on his feet before I can blink and what do you want to bet he'll hand over this disagreeable task to Jean the second he gets the chance?

"Jean."

The relief is enough to raise both her eyebrows and I keep my innocent expression for as long as possible.

She smiles and moves with that easy grace that you don't get when you're seventeen and still in the awkward stage. She always makes me feel short, dark, and as clumsy, and there are moments I'm not particularly proud of where I want to get her one day for personal combat training and show her a few things I picked up in Canada from Logan's memories.

But I'm not exactly ashamed of those thoughts either.

It's obvious to anyone that's looking that there's something, and because I'm one sick adolescent I do get some weird satisfaction watching them, because she's with Scott and nothing will change that, but when they look at each other--well, you gotta wonder what would have happened if she'd seen Logan first. I do wonder--I know Scott wonders--and when all four of us are in the same room together me and Scott both watch them and probably have identical expressions on our faces.

And if Scott ever had a reason for making sure I have lots of free time when Logan's home, I'll bet this is it, even if that's something he won't admit to himself. He weighed the pros and cons, considered the risk, and decided that maybe getting Logan packed off with an untouchable lover isn't such a bad idea. Even if she's only a kid--he's a superhero and he's a man both--when they conflict over the love of his life, who do you think is going to win?

That makes me grin, and I realize that Jean and Logan are talking about something and she does something I can't do--she touches him with a bare hand and then gives me a grin--

"Rogue, why don't you come by my office when you and Logan get finished?"

--and leaves--and that grin says he just told her when I wasn't listening and I'll get to discuss with Jean a mythical boy--and I go through my memory to find one to talk about. She has ethics, so she won't creep into my mind to find out I'm doing some de facto lying--though there is one persistent guy that's been pursuing me--

That off his mind, he looks at me. Then drops his jacket on the chair--he never thinks to hang it up--and gives me a long look, slightly amused, the traces of relief still in evidence. I watch his fingers flex in the gloves.

"Get up, kid. Let's do it."

And that, ladies and gentleman, is my life to date.

Great, huh?



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