Work Text:
Down and Out, But Not In Vegas (I Feel It All Remix)
by danniisupernova
Like the buddy system…
She knew she was going. She knew all it was was a matter of time. She could feel the seconds slipping by her while her control was eroded bit by bit, like land being eaten by a greedy sea. Scott hadn’t noticed. She had wanted to beg him to see what was happening. She was less and less Jean everyday. She could feel this face behind her own. And it laughed at her, laughed at her attempts to stay human, laughed at the dreams in her head, laughed at her entire idea of life.
“Our own special place, where we can find each other.” She thought of An Affair to Remember. All of her memories were slowly melting into others, memories of things she couldn’t possibly have seen. But there could be an anchor.
Scott.
His thoughts were invasive all of a sudden. She could hear his not-understanding buzzing in her head like radio static. Nothing was clear.
Shutupshutupshutupshutupshutupshutupshutup!
Her face didn’t even twitch. She knew she looked completely calm and collected, sitting with her textbook. The laughing face pressed against the surface. It burned.
Scott acquiesced to her odd request for haven nonchalantly. She was almost irritated by his inability to notice how she wasn’t herself anymore, how she was imploding. In that moment, she felt the face recede, slightly cowed by her reaction. She continued to stare at her textbook, while the fading laugh echoed in her head.
****
Her memories started to flicker now. She felt like she was being hollowed out as she fought whatever it was that was pushing through her every molecule, getting ready for her to lose control.
“We should have a signal.” She said it off-handedly, hoping it didn’t sound as desperate as it felt.
“What? Why would we need a signal?”
She looked down at her hands. She could see light pulsing through her veins. She clenched her fists to hide it.
“What if…”
“What if what?”
“What if you don’t remember me?”
She wanted to cry. She could feel the tears welling up in her eyes and that laughing face chuckling at her pathetic display.
Scott sighed, exasperated. It made her want to tear him in half. Do it, the laughing face whispered jovially. Jump it urged. Jump.
“Well what if you don’t remember me?” Scott said irritably. Jean felt like she shouldn’t have brought it up at all.
But I have to. Time…it’s almost time…
She looked at him, holding back her tears. “Now how could I forget a handsome guy like you?” She grinned at him. The laughing face pushed at the corners of her eyes. Scott smiled back at her and leaned in to kiss her.
“We can see our house from here,” she whispered afterwards. Scott nodded. He knew what it meant.
As the laughing face burbled it’s own humorous observations of her, Jean held back screams.
****
She thought he’d forgotten about it when he finally said “What about the CN Tower?”
“The CN Tower?”
“In Toronto.”
Jean shrugged, unsure. “Well it needs to be a specific day.”
“Guy Fawkes Night.”
“The CN Tower on Guy Fawkes Night?”
Scott looked at her, a bit perplexed. He just thought he was giving her what she wanted and his confusion was like an itch on the inside of her skull. She forced a smile at him. “They don’t even celebrate that in Canada.”
His smile was slightly goofy when he said, “Well that’s what makes it special for us. We’ll know.”
Jean felt a burst of warmth towards him, after a long stretch of trying not to feel anything at all. At that moment she heard the voice again. Jump it teased. Jump.
She felt herself get light headed and the room began to swirl with colors.
“Special for us,” she repeated dreamily.
She watched Scott turn back to his grading and felt as though she could almost see the whole world dissolving around her.
Jump
****
She hadn’t slept in three weeks. People’s thoughts leapt through her mind like spinning dandelion fuzz. She walked in a daze. Every time Scott or the Professor would question her about her sleeping habits, Jean would grease their thoughts so the questions and words would slide right out of their heads.
Afterwards, Scott would meander off, forgetting why he was where he was in the first place. Xavier just looked at her with sad eyes, as if he could sense her there, in his head, but didn’t quite know what had happened. She didn’t care.
The laughing face was everywhere now. She almost felt as if someone was wearing her skin as a suit. Some one would call her name and she would wonder at it for a few moments. Jean? Jean who?
Then she would robotically move towards the person, feigning a smile, as if she were the same Jean she had always been.
****
When she felt the wave coming on, she knew what she needed to do. She blinked back tears as the laughing face reached an almost deafening crescendo of hilarity. She thought how dying would be worth it, if only to never have to hear that jagged, teasing sound in her head again.
Jump the face said coyly. Jump.
She jumped.
****
November 4th.
I am beyond all of this.
Jean wasn’t Jean anymore. She had gone past it. But today. Something about today. She could see the shadowplay in thoughts belowabovearound her.
Scott…
The signal. A signal? Something today. Somewhere cold. Somewhere Scott had taken her. He had pressed his face into her hair in the fierce wind. The tower was dark then.
we can see our house from here…
House? She didn’t need a house. She was Phoenix. She was forever.
Now the CN tower was lit, shining in the dark. There were no bonfires in Canada. Just Scott, racing to their meeting place. She felt herself slide against him, almost humming through his molecules. He couldn’t find her.
Below, the city, like her, was burning.
Scott…
He turned, almost as if he heard her. But he shook it off. He left the tower. It belongs to the dead… he whispered in his thoughts.
Jean wept.
end