Of Cakes And Longing
Jean is gone. Nothing can change that fact.
Logan's stalking the halls. That can't bring back Jean. Scott is staring endlessly out the window. Stare as he might, he still can't bring her back.
I'm not okay with this. I should be. Everyone I've ever known has left in some way. Alright, the X-Men, they're there, yes, but they aren't there. Logan left and he came back, so why not Jean? Why not Jean?
I ask myself that every day. I guess I took it for granted that Jean was always there. She and Storm and everyone else at the school. But especially those two. They were my friends. I'd come strolling in the kitchen at a quarter to ten, sometimes when I couldn't sleep. It's hard to sleep. There's just so many voices.
So we'd make pancakes. And Logan..Logan, he laughed at us. He laughed at us making pancakes in the middle of the huge kitchen. Once I hit him with a handful of flour, and it felt good. Because I had touched it, and it touched him, and that was when I came back after the Liberty Island incident. And it was hard to get close to people after kissing Logan because god knows I don't want to kill them. So at least I could pelt him with a handful of flour that I had held in my palm.
And after Logan left muttering about "the misery of girls and baking", Jean started it. She threw the flour first, and then Storm had to get into the act. She created a little mini tornado on the counter. Right there in the kitchen and I watched it whirl repeatedly until it faded into nothing. After it ended, I had flour on my nose and in my eyes. Jean was smirking at me when we walked towards our rooms and she reached over and blew it off my nose. Her breath was cool and I shook a little, because nobody had been that intimately close to me for awhile, and certainly never a girl.
But Jean was different. She was just magical. I'd watch her walk down the halls and ache to touch her skin, to caress her hair. Let her hold me in her arms. I'd wish she'd touch me just for a minute, because then I'd have her powers for a little while.
I'd have a piece of her.
But she took to staying with Scott in his room the whole night long, and I'd leave a box of brownie mix, or cake mix on the counter, hoping she'd get the hint. For a couple months there, she didn't and I went to bed alone feeling distant from Jean despite having Bobby there making me ice roses and telling me how much he wished he could kiss me.
Then I guess she read my mind. When you're around Jean, you're transparent. And one night she came to me with a little plate of pancakes. Scott was away with Logan bringing a new mutant to the fold - some girl from Albany. Jean reached into the oak drawers and pulled out a pair of my gloves. Then putting them on she removed mine and stroked my face gently. I was surprised. To say the least. I've never been touched that way before. And she kissed her fingertips softly and slid her fingers across my stomach, and down my spine. She came back a couple more times, always the same thing. Sometimes she'd bring cookies instead of pancakes. Once she found out my weakness for truffles and brought me a whole box. We ate the whole thing laughing at what pigs we must seem.
But after Logan came back, it was over. She didn't come by anymore, and I wish she had. So I could have a little more memory. And I can't remember her touch, nor hear her voice and that kills me the most.
Logan looks at me sadly, as if he knows what I'm thinking and I thank god that he doesn't have telepathy like Jean. Scott's staring vacantly out the window as if he's searching the barren sea and I'm making pancakes alone.