The Companion Picture - REVIEW THIS STORY

Written by Dandelion
Last updated: 12/03/2009 06:26:08 PM

Chapter 26

Bermuda Triangle: Entry 14

So I've been doing this for a while now. Writing things down. It's nice to be able to talk about everything, even if it's a pad of paper. Brett had the idea of my writing down what I remembered but it's since turned into more of a diary.

We've been here for a few weeks now. My dreams are tortured at best. The blond child who Remy has said is dead seems to haunt me. I have not asked for her name and Remy has not supplied it. I wonder, though. The temple has a great deal to do with the visions I'm having, I know. I just haven't figured out how. I haven't seen her in the mirror since the first day.

It continues to be a mystery.

Lorna Dane, our mystery guest, has yet to surface from her room. She had ousted Brett from her room for several days while we made a new one for her. Brett and Lee took the few items Ms. Dane had with her and unpacked them for her. From what I understand the room is still very sparse. I still haven't met this woman. While the other three seem to share duties as to watching her, keeping her company, taking her meals to her, etc., I have been left out of the rotation.

I am certain that Remy is at the bottom of it. He's figured out that Ms. Dane's magnetic powers are clashing with mine and until she has regained strength of both body and mind, Remy figures it best if we don't have anything to do with each other.

He can be exceptionally bright when he wants to be.

On that front, Remy and Brett can often be found cooing at each other. I had the lack of class to ask to what extent their relationship had gone several days ago. Remy shrugged and said that it was between himself and Brett and if they had wanted it to be my business they would have made me an offer. Remy slaps on his poker face and even I can't read him. It's just as well, then, that Brett seems to have no difficulties in doing so, because then I don't have to be the one to wonder.

They are two people that are very dear to me and I have to admit to a great deal of curiosity in regards to them.

They are happy though, that much is plain to see. There is love there. Every night, they watch the sunset together, alone. No matter what they are in the middle of, they stop and spend that time together. 'Sunsets are for Brett,' Remy told me. How sweet.

Lee and I considered them a while back. She thinks they have slept together and I think they haven't. I suppose it's a gut feeling, though I would be surprised if I were right. Remy had become so morose at times during our trek to Miami that I had to wonder if he wouldn't just leap on her in a fit of lust if she ever showed up. Perhaps Remy feels he is making up for things he should have done before. I think he is just thrilled to have Brett with him again.

Lee is a beautiful woman, an intelligent woman, and an interesting woman. I know that at one time of my life I loved her very much. I am a very different man now. Something she does not hesitate to inform me of. I care for her dearly as a friend but beyond that I don't feel anything. It's sad, really. I was expecting more.

I'm not sure how she feels about it. I haven't told her how I feel. I'm not sure how to go about it. From what I remember, I've had atrocious luck with women, hurting them unintentionally and such. I wonder if it's ingrained in me or if there's hope. I'll wait and see how this plays out.

Lee came into Lorna's room with a book, "Do you mind if I sit?"

Lorna shook her head slowly and hunkered down under the covers some more.

Lee stared at the pile of blankets and took a deep breath. Brett had told her that she shouldn't expect too much from Lorna. Every day it got harder and harder for Lee to accept that. No one wanted to leave Lorna alone, but she never seemed to care one way or the other whether or not anyone was there. Sometimes all she did was cry. Most of the time, she just stared at the walls. Lee looked down at the book in her hands, "I don't know if it'll help, but this always helped me get through some difficult times." She held it up. Lorna looked at it disinterestedly. It was old and well-worn. The lettering on the faded leather jacket was stylized gothic and read: "The Secret Garden."

Lorna looked at Lee again, "A children's book? Are you joking?"

Lee's hesitant smile froze. For a moment, all she wanted to do was turn and run out of the room, but Brett had warned her of Lorna's edginess, after all. She sighed slightly and looked at the book herself, laughing slightly. "I suppose it is silly, but this is all I really have left of my mother. I remember she read it to me before she died. I've kept it all these years, and reading it makes me feel better. It makes me feel closer to her. If you didn't mind, I thought perhaps.." she looked at the chair.

Lorna regretted her biting comment and nodded, "Sure, I guess that would be okay." Lee sat down and opened the book, "Have you ever read it?"

Lorna shook her head.

Lee opened the book and began to read, "The Secret Garden, by Francis Hogsdon Burnett. Chapter one. There is no one left. When Mary Lennox was sent to Misselthwaite Manor to live with her uncle everybody said she was the most disagreeable-looking child ever seen. It was true, too."

Brett and Lee have taken to flying to Europe to see films every now and again. Courtesy of Brett Express as Remy puts it. Both of them are picking up French. Even more so now that it has been revealed that Remy is quite fluent in the language. Apparantly, he had kept up the charade of having a minimal grasp on the language when in fact he's quite the master of it.

Brett didn't appear to be very surprised at that revelation though she did question him about it. Remy admitted that it wasn't something he bothered bragging about. 'Millions of people speak French,' he said at the time. 'What makes me so special?'

Perhaps it's the fact that Remy speaks German quite fluently, too. Another 'accident', I suppose. I dropped a board on my foot and swore in German and he asked me, in German, what had happened.

I know my friend very well. Perhaps too well. I know that he doesn't slip. He is purposely letting these things come out of him. I know he speaks more than German and French. I have found him listening to the radio at times, in languages I didn't recognize and he seemed to understand every word.

What Remy has a problem with is speaking frankly about these things. He's telling us about himself the only way he knows how.

Remy and Brett stood on one of the open air balconies watching the sun set.

"Ah understand you, you know," Brett looked up at him.

He didn't answer.

"Since Israel, Ah've realized how much of you Ah saw. Ah *was* you for a while."

"Not too nice, was it?"

"No, you know what happened." She touched her lips lightly to his. "You know you don't have t'hide from me, right?"

He smiled at her, "I know dat."

"Ah know you meant for us to find out that you *do* speak French," she ran her hands up his arms.

"How you figure dat, chere?"

"Ah know that no one can find anything about you that you don't want found out," she looked almost proud of him.

He didn't answer, only bending his neck a bit to nibble on her ear lobe.

"Ah understand you, Remy," she whispered. "You know what that means? Ah'm not afraid of you."

He pulled away from her, "What you have to be afraid of, cherie? No one can hurt you."

"You'd like t'think that, wouldn't you?" she tossed back at him. "Then maybe you don't feel so bad for bein' such a jerk b'fore?"

"Touche," he replied.

"Ah feel so for Lorna. Sometimes Ah forget that everything can be taken away so quickly. It's so easy to use that to push people away. Ah can push you away and say it's because Ah don't want t'be hurt. But Ah've hurt mahself so much more for not takin' the risk."

"When you gon' stop beatin' yourself up, Brett?" Remy asked.

She laced her fingers with his, "Who says Ah'm beatin' mahself up? You're the one who done me wrong."

He sucked in his breath.

She watched him as he blanched, knowing that he continued to hate what he had done to her at the beginning. She stroked his cheek softly and lay her head against his chest, "Take yourself off the hook, Remy," she told him gently. "Ah have."

My buddy. Remy. I remember the surprise of everyone at Westchester when they discovered that we were becoming friends. I remember that grating on me. I wasn't sure how to read the rest of the X-Men and I'm still not certain how to interpret their reactions. Were they surprised that Remy had made friends with a former villain? Or were they surprised that I enjoyed his company? It wasn't hard to figure out through the course of our journey that Remy had intentionally left a great deal of his life out of X-men knowledge. Knowing what I know of Charles, Remy's dubious past wouldn't particularly endear him to the others and it was quite obvious he stood on shaky ground as it was. There was only one that looked on him with genuine affection. The same one that Remy said good-bye to. I know for a fact that Remy said nothing to the others. Which is odd, considering his fierce protective nature in regards to them. As usual, they overlook what is right in front of them. Their ideals blind them to what is there.

Since our arrival here, Remy has all of a sudden shown a side that I would never have thought existed if I hadn't already been aware of the fortune he painstakingly acquired and managed for himself.

He's blindingly quick-witted, staggeringly intelligent, and meticulously organized. It takes a great deal of planning to appear as nonchalant as he. Plus, there is that stubborn streak of his. The same streak that I imagine was exploited by the likes of Sinister. The stubbornness that instigated his disdain for those who insisted on taking him at face value and not digging a little deeper to find what was really there. The stubbornness that would not allow him to do the same to me.

Lorna was alone again. Lee had read two chapters and then excused herself, as it was getting late. Lorna looked out of her window. She could see the stars. She sighed deeply. For the first time since she had arrived the bed felt uncomfortable. She looked at the door that led out to her balcony. Without being able to explain it fully, she found she was sitting up. Lorna looked out the window again and swung her feet over the edge of the bed. Slowly, she let herself slide off until she was standing again. She opened the door to the outside and stepped onto the balcony. She stood as if stunned, staring up into the sky. The stars twinkled as if diamonds against the indigo sky. The wind, tinged with the salty taste of the sea kissed her cheeks. The full moon had not yet reached the peak of its ascent. It hung there, casting a silvery blue light over everything. It's reflection broken up into a thousand lustrous shards on the waves and ripples of the ocean. She heard the rustling of the leaves around her and the smell of exotic flowers filled her nostrils until she was nearly heady from the perfume.

She closed her eyes and steeled herself. She felt something stirring within her that had ceased to exist since New Mexico.

Lorna Dane opened her eyes again and whispered her revelation to the silent night, "I'm alive!"

"Once again, Ah have to say, Ah've had a lovely evenin'" Brett smiled at Remy, her eyes sparkling.

He only smiled.

She leaned against the door to her room, "Ah kinda forgot what it was like to have a life there for awhile. Fightin' this baddie, savin' this life, watchin' the world come to an end."

Remy chuckled, "To busy savin' lives to have any of our own, right, Brett honey?"

"You said a mouthful, Cajun," she looked at the floor shyly. "Ah want you t'know, Ah haven't once regretted comin' t'find you."

The look on Remy's face, Brett decided, was priceless. He looked so happy, and proud. She wanted to grab him and kiss him until he couldn't breathe he looked so adorable right then.

"I'm glad, chere. I'm glad you're happy."

She smiled up at him, "Ah *am* happy. But you could make me happier."

"Whatever I can do, Brett."

She didn't reply, she only took his hand, opened her door and led him slowly into the darkness within.

Lee traced the gold-script on the book cover with her fingertips. She smiled as she set it on her shelf. <Maybe it was nothing,> she thought. <But I just know something clicked in Lorna tonight. It was like a piece of her coming back.>

Lee sat at her vanity and brushed her hair idly, thinking of the woman in the other room.

<Her eyes followed me as I left the room,> she recalled. <There was light in her. Light that has been missing all this time.>

Lee grinned at herself in the mirror, then reached one arm across her body and patted herself on the back. "Yay me," she said to herself. "That poor woman has been drowning in her misery, and today she finally, finally started fighting again. And I helped."

She stood up and opened the door, tying the sash of her robe tightly around her waist before heading to the kitchen to get a drink before she turned in for the night.

As she strolled by Brett's room she paused as she heard a high-pitched giggle waft through the doorway. She stared at the door for a moment and just as she made to continue to the stairs she heard it again paired with a husky one.

Lee knew she should keep going. Her friends affairs were their own business. <Affairs being the operative word,> she thought as she leaned closer to the door. <Screw it,> she decided, leaning closer. Within she heard Brett's muffled voice as well as Remy's combined with heavy breathing and moans of different pitch and intensity.

Lee stepped away then and continued down the hallway, a small smile playing at her lips, <I knew it.>

And this is where I have trouble. How do I wrap up my thoughts for the day? Tomorrow's coming and I'll have more of them and then the next day and the next. There will always be things I want to remember. There will always be things I want to learn. I imagine this is what everyone faces. I just figure I have to make every entry into this journal like a novel. It needs a beginning, a middle and an ending. And I have no ending. I will leave it at this, there will always be something I want to know.

Magnus finished writing just as there came a knock on his door. "Come in."

Lee opened it and peeked in, she had a leer on her face that Magnus thought was decidedly smug.

He looked at her questioningly.

"You owe me twenty bucks," she grinned and then shut the door after her.

Magnus sat there not certain for a moment as to what she meant. He thought for a moment and realized what she had been talking about. They had only made one bet, after all. He knew what she was referring to.

"Damn."