They'd finally made him clean up John's half of the room. He hated to. He didn't want to. He almost asked Rogue to do it, but ... that wasn't fair. He pulled all the clothes from the closet, all of John's things. From dresser drawers, he removed shirts and pants, boxers and socks. He held one of the shirts against his face, inhaling the smell of it. It had been washed, but even detergent couldn't do away with the smoke-smell that was John.
He wasn't sure why he was crying, now, why his hands were trembling, why he felt tight bands around his chest that made him feel like he couldn't breathe.
It had been a month.
Shaking on the outside
Because of what I'm feeling inside
My chest is fucking hurting
And my stomach's fucking burning
** ** **
I laugh when you are crying,
You say inside you're dying,
Because you gave up way too early,
Your fucking pain is so deserving...
John was laying on his bed, flicking open and igniting his lighter. Click-fwoosh-snap. Over and over. The sound was comforting. The fire was comforting. It gave him something to focus on, something other than his traitorous thoughts.
He'd walked away. He'd left them. But they'd driven him to it. Bobby had driven him to it. So...fucking naive Bobby.
Agitated, he swung his legs over the edge of the bed, pacing his room. He was restless, edgy, always so full of energy, and not always a place to put it. Click-fwoosh-snap.
He gazed out the window, and he wondered. He wondered what Bobby was doing now. He hoped he was suffering.
** ** **
Don't wanna take it
Because I fucking hate it
Why do we talk when
All we do is argue
He stared at the boxes. The taped up boxes, neatly labelled with John's name. They were going up to the attic, later. Bobby had kept a few things out. A lighter he'd found - one of the cheap ones, forgotten under a bed. A shirt that Bobby tucked into his pillow case. One of John's notebooks, though he didn't know why he kept that out. It was safely nestled in his bookbag, between his biology book and his math book.
"Bobby?"
Rogue's voice startled him a little. "Yeah." His response was distracted.
"You were late again. I've been waiting out there for almost half an hour."
He thought he should care. He just... didn't. Couldn't she just leave him alone with his pain? "Sorry."
Her lips pulled into a thin line, and she eased into the room. "He was my friend, too."
He shook his head. "Not like he was mine." He looked over to Rogue, feeling a strange urge to shove her, to push her away, to bully her out of the room, out of John's space. Not that it was John's anymore.
"I know." And she did know, better than either of them perhaps did. John was in her head. Bobby was in her head. They were together up there. They were happier up there. She shook her head, turning away, giving up on him for now.
Let him sulk.
** ** **
This time I'm breaking off for good
I never felt this way before
Open chest, heart on the floor
I never wished that I was dead
Until I met you
It was done. It was over. It had to be. He couldn't go on this way, clinging to ... to what? To phantoms of the past? He'd made his decision. He didn't regret it.
At least, that's what he kept telling himself.
But why did it hurt so fucking much? Why did he find himself looking for Bobby in the darkness of his room, even though he knew the other male was never there, was never going to be there.
It had to end, and there was only one way it could.
** ** **
I fucking hate the way I'm feeling
Because my fucking life's not changing
The meeting was inevitable. When you were on one side, and your friend was on the other, you were bound to bump into each other in the battlefield.
He wasn't looking for him. Not really. He didn't want to find him, didn't want to have to fight him. If he never saw him, then he'd never have to raise his hands against his friend.
But out on the field, there was smoke. Where there was smoke, there was fire. Where there was fire, there was John. Cyclops ordered him to put the fire out. The others went another direction, leaving him alone, to face his demons, real or imagined.
I never wished that I was dead
Until I met you
He saw him, throwing balls of fire at an already flaming building. He saw the light in Pyro's eyes, the gleeful gleam as he destroyed the building, as he took the lives of innocents.
He'd rather die than fight him. He knew if he hesitated much longer, he would. He closed his eyes against the sight of his former friend. "I'm sorry." He lifted his hands, unleashing blasts of ice that froze the flames, and he was brought back to Rogue's first day, when - to impress her - he'd frozen John's fireball.
That was somehow the defining moment of them. What could have been, what might have been.
It had been her fault.
She'd done it.
Rogue had driven him away.
He dropped his hands.
For a long moment, they regarded each other. In the chaos, it was only them. No one else existed in that single moment, except them. Their eyes met, fire and ice, the age-old enemies. Ice blue eyes searched flame-reflecting hazels, and he took a slow step forward. Then another.
They met, in the middle of the chaos, live flames melting frozen ones behind him, but it didn't matter. Nothing mattered. "I can't let you go." Words that were a barely heard whisper above distant explosions, screeching metal.
Words that could be taken a number of ways.
"So don't. Don't let me go."
But it was an impossibility, a never-to-be. They were fire and ice, forever at odds, never able to settle comfortably with each other, without overshadowing each other. Fire melted ice that froze fire.
"I never saw you." Xavier would know otherwise. It didn't matter. Lips pressed together, teeth bumping as they kissed too hard, tongues sliding together before they parted breathlessly. Bobby turned away, his back to John, but he wasn't afraid.
John would rather die than hurt him again.