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The club was too loud.
Rogue had known that the moment they walked through the doors, but Remy had only grinned, slipped an arm around her waist, and told her he had survived worse.
She had smiled because she knew he was trying.
That was the thing about Remy lately. He was always trying.
Trying to prove he was fine.
Trying to prove he could still laugh.
Trying to prove that the things that had happened to him had not changed him into someone she needed to handle carefully.
Sometimes, Rogue wished he would stop trying so hard.
Tonight, though, she had let him have it.
The team had needed a night out, something that felt normal after weeks of missions and doctors and too many conversations that ended with somebody looking at Remy like they were afraid he might break. Or break them.
So they had come here.
Music pulsed through the floor beneath their feet. The air smelled like cheap perfume, cheaper alcohol, and too many bodies packed into one room. Colored lights swept across the walls, changing from red to blue to green, until suddenly the entire room was washed in purple.
Rogue was laughing at something Jubilee had said when she felt Remy’s hand tighten around hers.
She looked over.
He wasn’t laughing anymore.
His eyes were fixed on the lights.
Purple.
Deep purple.
The color moved across his face, and for one terrifying second, Rogue thought she saw the same expression she had seen on him in the bayou.
Not Remy. Something behind him.
“Remy?”
He didn’t answer.
The music seemed to swallow her voice. It was so loud, she could only feel the vibrations traveling from her throat.
He was staring at the lights as if they were something alive.
“Remy,” she tried again, practically screaming.
His breathing changed.
One breath.
Then another.
Coming too fast.
Rogue turned toward him fully. “Hey. Look at me.”
He didn’t move.
She touched his arm.
He flinched so violently that her hand fell away.
Rogue’s stomach dropped.
“Okay. Okay, Sugah.”
She kept her voice low, even though the music was pounding around them.
“You with me?”
His chest rose and fell too quickly. His face had gone pale.
“Can’t.”
The word barely made it past his lips. She senses them, more than heard them.
“Can’t what?”
“Breathe.”
Rogue looked around.
The room was crowded, the ceiling low, bodies pressed shoulder to shoulder around them. The purple lights kept moving across the walls.
“Come on.” She didn’t grab him. Instead, she held out her hand. “You want to get outside?”
His eyes flicked toward her hand.
Then toward the door.
Despite the heavy music, he seemed to be able to understand what she was offering, and nodded, taking her hand loosely in his.
Rogue stayed beside him as they pushed through the crowd. She kept close enough that he could find her if he needed her, but she didn’t touch him again until they were through the doors.
Cold air hit them.
Remy bent forward, hands braced against his knees.
Rogue stood beside him.
She could hear him trying to breathe. Slow. In. Out. Except he couldn’t seem to make his body listen.
“You’re outside,” she said quietly. “You’re with me.”
His eyes squeezed shut.
“Purple.”
Rogue looked back through the glass doors. The lights were still pulsing inside.
“Yeah.”
“Was there.” His voice broke.
“Where?” she asked, more to keep him talking than asking for an explanation. If he could talk to her, he wouldn’t shut it all up inside. Wouldn’t shut down.
He swallowed.
“With ‘im.”
Rogue’s heart tightened. She didn’t need him to say Apocalypse’s name.
“You’re not there now.”
His hands curled into fists.
“I know dat.” The words came out frustrated, almost angry.
Rogue stayed quiet.
Because knowing and believing were two different things.
Remy straightened slowly. His breathing was still too fast.
“I could hear ‘im.”
Rogue’s chest tightened. She had heard him say that before. At night, in the dark.
When he woke from nightmares and stared at his hands as if they belonged to somebody else.
But this was different.
He was awake.
He was standing in the world around her.
And somehow part of him was still somewhere else.
“Could hear ‘im tellin’ me what to do.” His eyes were fixed on nothing. “Could feel it all over again.”
Rogue stepped closer. “Remy.”
He didn’t respond.
She raised her hand, then stopped.
“Can I touch you?”
His eyes found hers and he nodded.
She placed her palm against his forearm. His skin was cold. He was shaking.
“That’s me,” she whispered. “That’s Rogue.”
His eyes closed. “I know.”
“Then breathe with me.”
She breathed slowly, deliberately.
He tried to follow.
The first try failed.
The second was better.
By the third, his shoulders had begun to loosen.
Rogue kept her hand where it was.
She wouldn’t tell him he was safe. She didn’t know if he believed that word anymore.
Instead, she would only ever him what she knew. Facts even Apocalypse’s ghost could not argue with.
“You’re here.”
His eyes opened.
“You’re outside the club.”
He nodded.
“You’re with me.”
Another nod.
“The lights aren’t Apocalypse.”
His mouth tightened. “No.” He said, grimly.
“They’re just lights.”
He looked back toward the club. The purple glow spilled through the windows.
Remy echoed her words in a hoarse whisper.“Just lights.”
Rogue waited.
His breathing slowly returned to something closer to normal. After several minutes, he looked at her.
“Sorry.”
Her heart sank.
“For what?”
“This.” He gestured vaguely toward himself “Ruinin’ the night.”
She scoffed, letting her hand drop away from him. “You didn’t ruin anything.”
“I did.”
“You had a bad moment.”
“Same thing.”
“No, it ain’t.”
He gave her a tired look.
“You don’t gotta make it sound better than it is.”
“I’m not.” She stepped closer, hands on her hips. “You had a flashback.”
He looked away. “I know.”
“And you got through it.”
His jaw tightened. “With your help.”
“Yeah.”
He looked at her.
Something vulnerable passed across his face.
“That’s the problem.”
Rogue frowned. “What?”
“You keep havin’ to help me.”
There it was. That familiar shame. The one she had seen in his eyes since he came back.
Rogue sighed softly. “Remy.”
He shook his head. “You shouldn’t have to.”
“Maybe I don’t.”
“What?” His eyebrows lifted.
“Maybe I want to.”
He stared at her.
Rogue folded her arms.
“You think I don’t know you’re having a hard time?”
“I don’t want you havin’ to deal with it.”
“I ain’t dealing with you.” She softened. “I’m with you. Always. Dummy.”
He looked away.
The silence between them stretched.
Then he said, very quietly, “I feel like the walls are closin’ in.”
Rogue glanced at the club.
“You want to go somewhere else?”
He nodded.
“Somewhere open.”
She looked up.
The night sky stretched above them, dark and endless.
An idea came to her.
“How about we get out of here?”
He looked at her. “How?”
He was probably thinking about the others they’d left in the club, and the shared car they’d taken to get there. Rogue smiled faintly.
“You know how.”
Rogue held out her arms.
For the first time since the lights had changed, something almost like amusement touched his face.
“Can I carry you?”
His eyes dropped to her hands. For a moment she thought he might say no. Then he nodded.
“Yeah.”
She stepped closer.
“Tell me if you want me to stop.”
“I will.”
She slipped one arm behind his back and the other beneath his knees.
He tensed when she lifted him.
Rogue waited.
His hands settled uncertainly against her shoulders. She’d carried him many times, both into and out of danger, but none had been this intimate, with skin touching skin.
“You okay?” she asked, softly.
“Yeah. You?”
“Yeah.” She meant it.
She rose into the air. The ground fell away. The noise of the club disappeared beneath the, and the city opened around them.
For several seconds, Remy said nothing.
Then Rogue felt his body slowly relax against hers.
She kept flying.
Higher.
The cold night air moved around them, and the city lights stretched beneath them like stars scattered across the earth.
Remy’s breathing steadied.
Rogue glanced down.
His eyes were closed.
“Better?”
“Much.”
She smiled.
“Good.”
They flew until the club was nothing more than another collection of lights below them.
Rogue eventually landed on the roof of an old building overlooking the city.
There was no one around. No music. No crowd. No walls pressing in. No stupid purple lights.
Just open sky.
She lowered Remy carefully to the ground.
He sat with his back against a low wall, looking out over the city.
Rogue sat beside him.
Their shoulders touched.
He didn’t move away.
For a while, neither of them spoke.
Then Remy said, “You know, I ain’t used to this.”
“What?”
“Someone lookin’ after me.”
Rogue looked at him. “You had people looking after you before.”
“Not like this.”
She understood. He meant her.
She bumped him gently with her shoulders. “You don’t have to make it a debt.”
“I know.”
“No, you don’t.”
Her voice was sharp and he looked at her, incredulous.
Rogue smiled sadly. “You keep saying you know things you don’t believe.”
He laughed quietly.
“Maybe.”
She looked out over the city.
“I waited a long time to touch you.”
Remy went still.
Rogue felt her cheeks warm. “I mean, not just touch.”
His eyes turned toward her and she laughed softly.
“Lord, Remy.”
“What?”
“You know what I mean.”
His mouth curved. “I might.”
She looked at him. If he was teasing her, then he must be feeling better.
“I wanted to kiss you.” Her voice dropped, suddenly quiet. “For years. I wanted to kiss you.”
He wouldn’t meet her eyes. But she pressed on. “I didn’t know if you’d want that now.”
His fingers curled against the concrete. “I do.”
Rogue’s heart stumbled. She didn’t move.
“Are you sure?”
He looked at her.
For once, there was no shame in his expression. Only an uncharacteristic nervousness that made her cheeks warm.
“Yeah.”
She lifted her hand. “Can I?”
He nodded.
Rogue touched his cheek.
He closed his eyes, as if to steady himself.
He was warm. His stubble pricked her palm.
She’d waited so, so long to feel someone. Anyone. But the wait was worth it, because it was him. She would have waited for this man for centuries if she had to.
She waited just a second more.
When he opened them again, he leaned toward her.
The kiss was gentle.
Careful.
Nothing like the kisses she had imagined during the years he’d spent riling her up or teasing her, or the years she’d spent mourning him.
There was no desperation in it. No grief.
There was only warmth and love.
Remy pulled back first.
Their foreheads rested together.
Neither of them spoke.
Then he whispered, “Been wantin’ that a long time, chère.”
Rogue smiled through the tears gathering in her eyes.
“Me too.”
He laughed softly. The sound was small, but it was his.
Rogue took his hand. He squeezed hers.
They sat together beneath the open sky, looking out over a city that had no idea what they had survived.
For tonight, that was enough.
Remy leaned against her shoulder.
Rogue rested her cheek against his hair.
Neither of them needed to say anything else.
He was here.
She was here.
And for the first time, being together did not feel like something they had to earn back from the tragedy they had been born of.
They stayed until the dawn gilded the city, and then flew home.