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Rainy Days
by Allure
It's raining today, harsh, heavy rain, the kind that soaks you within seconds of stepping outside. Ororo's way of crying, people say, and I guess it's true, except I kind of like rain. It comforts me, to see the awesome skies miserable, to know it has off-days too. Some of my favourite memories with Pete are in the rain ö but I'm not going to go there. Not today.
I stood at my closet this morning for a full ten minutes trying to decide what to wear. The irony of it! I actually smiled, too.
Smiling. When last did smiling become such a sin in our house? We smiled bravely through so many tragedies ö Thunderbird, 'Yana, Doug, Piotr . . .
But no one can smile now.
I don't know who I'm more sad for, really. I'll cry for Scott, God, of course I will, he led the X-Men when I first joined, he was my first role model, my first idol. I was so in awe of him.
I'll cry for Nathan too, and perhaps equally. I didn't know him as well as the others, but I liked him, I liked him a lot. He was Rachel's brother. Madelyne's son.
I remember when he was born, when he was just a cute baby with big blue eyes that were filled with trust. I remember Maddy and Scott's overwhelming love for him ö we all loved him. Nathan was like . . . like this tiny, innocent figure in our prejudiced, hate-filled world. I really think he inspired a lot of the X-Men to fight for a brighter future. More than anything else, we fight for future generations.
It's kinda ironic that he was the one who gave us all hope and motivated us to fight for him, if you think about it. When Nathan came back, he was so different, so hard and cold and tough. It shocked us, and we didn't really handle it well. I guess there was no good way to handle it, but . . . he was just a baby, the most trusting little thing most of us had ever seen, and then this huge, battle-hardened war veteran came back.
And Maddy . . . most people remember Maddy only as the demonic Jean-clone that tried to sacrifice her baby son. She was so much more than that. She was a person before a clone, a mother before a sorceress, and a victim before an enemy. Sometimes ö especially now ö I wonder how life for her and Nathan would have turned out if Jean had stayed dead.
That's wrong, I guess. Jean's alive, and what-ifs never lead to good. I have to keep telling myself that.
We never just cry for the dead, do we? Most of all we cry for the ones they left behind, the ones who can be hysterical or unnervingly calm.
I won't cry for Jean.
Not this Jean. Not this strange woman who shuts herself up in the boathouse and plays a destructive blaze of memories over and over, day after day. Not the Jean who Professor Xavier has to shield us from to escape those images. Not the Jean who Logan and Ororo had to hold back from tearing us all apart after . . . after Akkaba.
I won't cry for the Jean who selfishly sacrificed her son, and everything the X-Men stood for, so someone she loved would remain in this world. Not the Jean who causes Bobby, Hank and Warren so much anguish, and the Professor . . .
How were we to know he meant more to her than EVERYTHING? That she'd give up her friends, her morals, her Dream, her *goddamn son* . . .
She was meant to be more than that, so much more. The first X-Woman. The one who sacrificed herself for the world, the one that got through to Scott, perfect, beautiful, talented Jean Grey.
She still is.
With anyone else, they'd accept that he or she was selfish, bitter, furious, and maybe justly so, but not *that* justly. But with her, with her . . .
They whisper, only ever whisper, about love. About pain. Maybe I'm really cruel in not understanding this love. Or maybe I'm the only one not seeing through rose-coloured glasses.
They say she snapped, when we all know she is very sane. She knew exactly what she was doing when she killed Nathan.
I'm glad Domino won't come today, because she'd see the REAL Jean. And tell the others too, I guess. They're not ready to hear this ö will they ever be?
So today we'll cry. We'll cry for Nathan and we'll cry for Scott.
But I won't cry for Jean.
Because everyone else will cry for her the most.