Actions

Work Header

Rating:
Archive Warning:
Category:
Fandom:
Relationship:
Language:
English
Series:
Part 2 of The King of Hearts
Collections:
Peja's Wonderful World of Makebelieve Import
Stats:
Published:
2020-11-05
Words:
2,360
Chapters:
1/1
Kudos:
15
Hits:
1,439

King Of Hearts - Moonlight and Shadows

Summary:

Summary: Remy is having a few problems as of late. Will he run again?

Work Text:


Moonlight and Shadows
by Kyrri
kyrrissean@hotmail.com
 

 
I raced down the corridor, my heart beating frantically in my chest – each leaping bound taking me further away from Wolverine’s searching gaze. Each frenzied emotion blazing through my mind with renewed force as I race away – desperately trying to escape. Anxiously wishing that the world would go away and leave me be – that reality would crumble and set me free of this torturous adventure called life.
 
My mind refuses to remain still, continuing its frenzied rush into chaos and my body follows suite, forcing me into physical action as I launch away into the darkness of the corridor, having kept my straining being in reign until I turned the corner. Until Logan’s eyes could no longer follow my passing form.
 
This wasn’t right – nothing was right! The world seemed dark and endless, stretching out before me in all its vastness – still, silent and utterly empty. Nothing… Nothingness stretched before my minds eye and I swallowed deeply, trying to separate the truth from the vision – fighting to see the stairway stretch before me instead of that frighteningly vacant hole that now filled my gaze. That now filled my future…
 
The stairs swam before me as I lurched forwards, grabbing onto the railing to save myself from ending face first against the bottom step, as fresh tears began to streak down my cheeks. I hated it… For God’s sake, get a grip of yourself, LeBeau! This isn’t like you… fight back. Why is Remy running like a coward?
 
Oh, but I am a coward. I might as well run like one. To afraid to face them, to afraid to face Logan – what would he think of me now after I had broken down right in front of him? My throat constricted as I let out a sob, the stairs still seeming far too rickety for me to ascend as I hold onto the railing for dear life. Like a drowning man I clutched at it and I was drowning – drowning in my own guilt and self-loathing.
 
It was no wonder Rogue couldn’t love me – couldn’t want me – not with the skeletons I had in my closet, not with the iron chains that bound me to drag those ghosts of memories along with me forever. I’m broken, damaged, unworthy – how could she or anyone else ever want me?
 
More tears broke free, leaving me feeling empty and disgusted with myself – I had had enough of tears – I wanted no more – I could take no more. The stairs swam before me as I opened my eyes and I blinked them shut again, before trying once more. Focussing on a point just two-steps above my feet and climbing slowly. The headache behind my eyes almost unbearable – throbbing madly.
 
I grimaced in pain, but the irony of it crossed my mind as well, wrestling some sort of grim humour from my thoughts – weren’t you suppose to get the killer headache and vertigo the morning after you imbibed a large amount of alcohol?
 
I managed to reach the top of the stairs without incident and let out a sigh of relief, before turning round to look back down – I immediately regretted it and my hand tightened on the railing as the world spun round – slowly grinding to an agonizing halt as I let my gaze fall to the floor. And who’d ever said too much alcohol was a bad thing? Perhaps not on its own, I thought wryly, but mixed in with an emotional brake-down makes for a lethal combination.
 
Emotional brake-down - what a lovely turn of phrase – why not just say I’m fucked in the head and get it over with? It was a turn of phrase the Professor would use – when he was in a mood to lecture, which he always was. Something you’d hear walking out of a psychiatrist’s office. “Yes, Mam, its nothing to worry about really – he just had an emotional break-down and will have to see the doctor again next week. Truly nothing to worry about – happens all the time…”
 
I shook my head – the imaginings of the phantom whispers of the receptionist echoing through my mind – nothing to worry about… happens all the time… It doesn’t happen to me! I don’t want this! What on Earth did I do to deserve this?
 
But I can answer that question only to readily – it was all my fault – everything… the massacre – all those people and now Rogue. I deserved whatever hand fate dealt me – I deserved it all… the rejection, the hatred, everything…
 
My gaze dropped to the floor again, eyes trailing over the carpeted landing of the stairs – I couldn’t deal with this – it was too much, simply too much! I needed… I didn’t even know what I needed anymore, but I wouldn’t find it here, of that I was certain.
 
I turned away from the stairs and glanced on into darkness – the only light coming from the window at the far end of the hallway. Moonlight and shadows playing across the floor as I watched – marvelling at the simplicity of it all. Just black and white – no grey… just light and darkness. Now if only my life could be like that…
 
Things would be perfect.
 
“Yo, Cajun!” A gruff voice pulled me from my thoughts and made my heart beat more quickly, I would have been surprised if Logan couldn’t hear it – thrashing wildly in my chest like some mad beast, frantically wishing for release.
 
Slowly I raised my head, turning my gaze away from the moonlight playing across the floor and quickly rubbing at my eyes with the back of my hand, pushing back locks of auburn hair – something was missing… but I could not think what at the time – Logan was waiting. Just as slowly as my prior movements had been, I turned around to glance down the stairs at the figure standing there – half encased in shadow; half enfolded in light.
 
Logan was looking up at me, with my trench coat casually draped over his arm – so that’s what had been missing. I must have been in a real state to have forgotten it and I felt my cheeks start to burn at my forgetfulness or more correctly the reason for my forgetfulness. Sure that Wolverine would see my discomfort I tried to conceal it by leaning against the railing and appraising him thoughtfully. “Yes, mon ami?”
 
He looked at me questioningly for a moment and I found myself drawn to his gaze – to the silvery eyes hidden in the shadows as the moonlight played over his face, making him appear mysterious and in some little way almost mystic. I could imagine the storm clouds rolling within those eyes, the mist clearing away the silver to present the clear blue skies when he is amused and clouding over again in anger, literally within the blink of an eye.
 
I cocked my head to the side, to better study him, letting stray locks of hair fall over my eyes as I lean back against the railing, neatly tucking one ankle behind the other. This new perspective playing havoc with the shadows falling across his face, making them shift and dance as I now see the light fall from a new angle, tenderly caressing his strong features. The rugged appearance and the wild black hair, that simply beckons you to run your fingers through it to try and sort out the mess, gently illuminated, but pocketed with darker patches.
 
I wanted to touch him – the shadows seeming to whisper upon his skin – soft and silken, enticingly magical in the pale light, but somehow I knew that if I were to lay a hand upon him the spell would be lost. Shattered and broken, gone forever. It would be far better to remember him this way and never give fate a chance to destroy this image with the reality of crushed dreams. With the starkness of the simple truth – no one could ever love me. No matter how I would yearn for it – they would not. It would be better to lose myself in this moment and treasure it, than pursuing anything. I have had enough of heartache and tears – better not to feel at all, better to end it before it can even begin.
 
He held out his arm to me, lifting the trench coat for me to see more clearly as I watched. “I think you forgot this, kid.” I can distinguish no true tone in that voice, nothing – I don’t know what he wants – whether he has judged me or not. All I can see is his hand and arm uplifted towards me, reaching out – begging me to come closer. And for a moment I almost imagine that he’s offering me more than the simple return of my coat – that perhaps the outstretched arm can be likened to the hand that is offered to a drowning man as anchor to help pull him from the torrent. For a second I almost let myself believe that Wolverine was offering to be my anchor, to save my soul from the rushing maelstrom. For a fraction of a second I wanted him to be just that, I wanted him to be different from the others – I wanted him to want me.
 
Here’s to wishful thinking.
 
It’s better to be alone, Remy, I think to myself. You can’t get hurt that way. If you lock away your heart no one will ever find it. No one will ever hurt you again. My thoughts are desperate, chaotic – thrashing about in darkness. I wasn’t built to be alone – I need someone to be there. I need to be loved! But I will not find that here – not in this place. Soon this place will become just another memory, with nothing to hold me to it – they rejected me after all. I was not worthy to be a part of them.
 
I can practically hear the lock click shut as I turn the key. Never again, I would never allow anyone to get close enough to hurt me again. But something in the way Logan looks at me makes me pause – my coat is still extended towards me in entreaty as he waits for me to reply, as those cloudy eyes strips my soul bare for the world to see. I felt an old stirring brake through the shield of my determination as I watched him waiting and just for that moment I wanted him to unlock the door again for me… just for that moment.
 
Brutally I force my thoughts away from such errant pathways and nod my head towards him, straightening up and taking one quick step down the stairs, reaching out with my hand to take what is mine from him. “Thanks, mon ami. Remy doesn’t know what came over him. He’s glad you would think to bring it to him.”
 
 I’m not the only one that moves; he starts up the stairs, shortening the distance between us – his sudden movement making the shadows conform around his body and play over his features. Black on white and hiding something beneath its simplicity. Black on white and somehow no less complicated than if it were to contain every shade of grey in the universe.
 
My hand brushes against his, sending thrills travelling along my spine as I take the coat from him, nodding my thanks again and inclining my head towards him. He just smiled and turned to descend the stairs again, not saying a single word and I’m loath to watch him go. Loath to watch the shadows cover him in its enfolding embrace as he moves back down the stairs and out of the moonlight – leaving the world surrounding him the purest black – the simplest colour. The only colour that is in truth of fact the lack of anything else – devoid, empty, pure.
 
Black could be far purer than white if you ask me. But the two extremities are both at heart perfect, untouched. Neither of them truly exist, for darkness is the lack of light and light the lack of darkness. But I’ve always felt save in the shadows – a thief until the end.
 
As I watched Logan move away – gliding into those shadows I realised that I really did not want him to go, I knew it and still I watched him travel down the stairs, never turning back to look at me, simply focussing on some nameless destination. I stared as he left, raising the hand that wasn’t clutching my trench coat to my chest in silent entreaty towards his broad back, my mouth opening to say words that never came out. But he was gone before I could force my unwilling body into action, before I could climb the last few steps and head back to my room again…
 
I turned on the landing, moving off into distant darkness towards the pool of light caused by the window and paused on its very edge, for some reason reluctant to step into it. Reluctant to reveal myself to the cruel world. Even as I locked my heart further away in that distant corner of my being, where I wouldn’t feel its aching so badly – I had cried enough, I had nothing left to give and there was nothing at the mansion that could bind me to it.
 
The wind shifted outside the manor, playing with the branches of the trees, making them dance and sway in the night – their shadows following suite in the pool of light, reminding me – making me think of stormy grey opening up onto clear skies. There was nothing to keep me at the mansion, nothing at all. But it left a wondering in my heart none the less as I watched the pale light on the floor, shadows flickering through it.
 
I shook myself – nothing would keep me, nothing at all…
 
It was after all only moonlight and shadows.
 
 
 
TBC
 
 
A/N: What do you think? E-mail me!

Series this work belongs to: