Title: Figuring It Out - Part Two
Author: White Witch
Email: whitewitch@poetic.com
Rating: R
Summary: It takes more than just pencil and paper to figure things out.
Feedback: Yes, please. Flames included. I just love having those bad ones. Really perk me! NOT! Just give it to me. I can handle ‘em.
Archives Rights: Fanfiction.net. You want just ask.
Disclaimers: Own nothing. Except the plot. If there’s actually one here. Hehehe... Any new characters are mine. Fox and Marvel take credit for the characters.
Author’s Notes: My first attempt at UST. Hehehe…Don’t say I didn’t warn you! I recommend you to listen to the song: Talk Show Host by Radiohead while reading this fic. It plainly sets the mood, I think. Especially when things get hot! Hehehe...I was listening to it while writing. Also, THANK YOU, MARISA, for beta-ing me!!!! Doing a series ain't easy without making lots of mistakes - grammar, spelling, etc. Glad I found her!!!;)

---

PART TWO

--------

Radiohead - Talk Show Host lyrics

I want to, I want to be someone else or I'll explode
Floating upon the surface for
The birds, the birds, the birds

You want me, well fucking well come and find me
I'll be waiting with a gun and a pack of sandwiches
And nothing, nothing, nothing, nothing

You want me, well, come on and break the door down
You want me, fucking come on and break the door down
I'm ready, I'm ready, I'm ready, I'm ready, I'm ready...

--------

 

It was horrible. The worst drawing ever. It was a sketch of Logan's body all out of proportions. Her hands kept shaking. Her pencils kept breaking. It was irrational for her to be so--tense! She was just sketching. She wasn't doing anything to him. She had drawn people before. The task shouldn’t be difficult. Yet it was horrible. 

She shoved her sketchpad into her bag. "Later, J!" She didn't care if her friend would follow. 

Rogue left in a hurry.

“She’s still mad at me?” Logan watched her scurry off as he slipped back into his clothes. Jubilee came up next to him, obviously still focused on studying his body.

It wasn’t that he wanted to start on the wrong foot with Rogue. She was new to the mansion and he didn’t make much of a welcoming committee for new additions. He simply couldn’t be bothered with them. Thus, he shouldn't be bothered with her.

Yet here he was, possibly chilled to the bones, if it hadn't been for his healing powers. He had just posed naked FOR HER to make up for that painting he clawed. 

Why in the world did he even care?

If it hadn't been for the Wolverine in him, he would have actually felt hurt that she had just went off like that. If it hadn't been for the Wolverine, he would be so 'Scott' now--going after her, getting down on his knees and begging her for forgiveness.

A shiver ran down his spine. It wasn't his style to be so distracted by a woman. It should be the other way around. Even his instincts were shouting at him, "Look the other way, bub. She's bad news. Bad news." 

It wasn't as though he was checking her out. Jean would be more worthwhile for that. All curves. All sexy, all red, despite being ALL TAKEN. Rogue was just…black. There was nothing interesting about the color black. Was black even a color? 

Yet he kept noticing her more often whenever the two were in the same room. And that really frustrated him. It wasn't as though he wanted it. 

One moment he was with Jean--

"So you wanna go for a ride with me?" Obviously, his flirting mode was fully activated.  

"No, I'm meeting Scott! It's our anniversary." Obviously, hers was only meant for her husband. 

"Ditch the dick. You ride with me and we can--"

And then, he just forgot to finish his sentence. 

Forgot the color red. 

Because in the next moment, his ears would twitch sharply. It was automatic. He didn't want it, it just happened. They twitched rapidly as the sound drew nearer. Sometimes it sounded like the soft rustling of hair brushing against something soft. Sometimes it sounded like the scrunching of a soft plastic wrapper. 

But the one he recognized most went, "Squeak, thud, thud, squeak, thud, thud." Over and over until finally she appeared. White bangs against black leather in steel-toed boots--Rogue. 

He didn't understand it then. He didn't understand it now. But he just kept noticing her--black and white. Once he saw her, he just kept seeing things in black and white.

But the point was, by whatever logic there existed, he wasn't checking her out. No fucking way! What was there to see? Her name was Rogue, for goodness sake! Didn't that say something? It meant she was different, wasn't it? It meant she didn't dress like the rest of the women. She was all covered up. Thus, there was nothing much for him to see.

But being covered up, it shouldn't give her every right, every liberty, every--Damn!--to wear those clothes so tightly. Those clothes of hers--Fuck!--seemed like a second skin on her. It was pure sin whenever she moved. A sin he had been too willing to indulge in these past months. He often found himself having to force himself to tear his eyes away from those jiggling breasts of hers.

Too many times, he felt his throat go dry at that. Too many times. And he knew it wasn’t the many gulps of Jack Daniels, Jim Beam, and whatever other hard liquor that was making him giddy and more than just warm.

Yeah, she WAS sexy. He could never deny anything that obvious. She was a babe who had a body to kill, both figuratively and literally. It actually made him puff up his chest to know he was the only one who noticed. The other men were still grappling away with her nasty attitude. But he had a nastier one so that didn't distract him. All the other parts of her did. 

Distracted him so much so that he wasn't aware he actually asked Charles about her. He didn't even remember the question.

“Yes, I believe she is still single. 24 years old, if I remember correctly. She’s old enough to join our team, Logan. To have her is an asset for--” Charles told him then but he didn’t really hear him. And it wasn't because he didn't need to, since Wheels was giving his typical "valuable member of the team" speech. 

He had heard the squeak-thud-thud again. 

Seriously, could a man help it? With those hips swinging, breasts bouncing, she was making it so obvious. He wasn't checking her out. He just happened to notice. The Wolverine would never gawk. Nothing wrong with enjoying the view, bub. Instincts, he always listened to his instincts.  

But they forgot to tell him good things didn't usually last. They forgot to remind him that she had an attitude. So he never saw it coming. Never anticipated it as she turned sharply, gave him a hard glare and then…the Finger. 

He didn't like the smile Xavier gave him afterwards.  

She had one hell of an attitude problem. So obviously he didn't like her. How could he? She made him so distracted, didn't she? He couldn't afford distractions. Distractions never make good for an X-Man.

So he should be appalled by her. No woman should behave so foully, swearing colorful vulgarities that he didn't even know. 

Thus, it only made sense for him not to like her. No woman could be liked if they made him feel all queasy with that kind of attitude. Only his nightmares made him feel queasy, not her. He didn't like the sick feeling. A sick feeling that worsened, ever since she’d been ignoring him for two whole weeks after that painting accident.   Just. Don't. Like. Her. 

“Yeah, she’s still mad at you.” And he didn't need Jubilee to remind him now that the sick feeling was still there. He zipped up his jeans roughly, then swore when the buckle refused to lock in place.

“Hello? Earth to Wolvie? I’ve been talking for the last 10 minutes!” Jubilee poked his chest with her pencil.

“What?! Oh, uhm, sorry. Was thinking about some repairs I needed to do.”

“Like fixing Rogue?” She eyed him suspiciously.

“Yeah--I mean no! I mean--fuck, got no time for this.” Gathering up his jacket, he walked away from her. Walked away a little too briskly for his liking.

But Jubilee knew a defensive gesture when she saw one.

“Hey, wait up!” She panted hard when she finally caught up.

“What?!” 

But the snarl wasn’t scary enough to deter the young woman. “Whatever it is between the two of you…”

“There’s nothing between us!” He thought he should be clear on that.

“Like, hello! One word, Wolvie, and it begins with a capital D."

“What are you talking about? She’s loud, weird, and she talks funny. Eats like a pig. Has no decency to turn down that damn music when I’m meditating. She’s hardly my type.”

“Yeah, right. So what’s with the two of you checking each other out?”

He froze in his steps too suddenly. 

“Ow! Hey! You bumbling--mind warning me first when you do that?!” Poor Jubilee had slammed hard against his back. She rubbed her small, round nose but the bruise was already starting to show. 

“She checks me out?” Astonishment clearly laced his features at the revelation.

He shouldn’t be finding it surprising since he knew most of the women did that. But he had always thought Rogue was different. Well, made sense, didn't it, since they were often too busy trying to rub each other the wrong way. All that anger should have been enough to occupy her. No time to check him out.

But to learn this new piece of information, he suddenly found it difficult to breathe. And that was simply ridiculous. 

He fought hundreds of mutant haters without breaking a sweat, faced thousands of bullets from those shit-faced government people without breaking a sweat. Not one droplet of moisture when he was held paralyzed, groaning in pain as his insides were twisted and turned by Magneto. 

He was the WOLVERINE! Cold-blooded, adamantium killer with heightened senses and one hell of a berserker rage. Nothing could take him by surprise. Nothing.

 “Dude, pay attention!” Jubilee slapped his arm with her sketchpad. “If you want her-–“

“She checks me out?” Apparently he still wasn’t convinced.

"Yeah! If you call staring at you sweating over your bikes in the garage as that. I mean I don’t get her. How can all that sweat, oil, and engines be such a turn on?”

This time his eyebrow was raised to its highest. Even more revelations about Rogue that caught him unaware.

“Turn on?”

“Did you take out your brain when you took off your clothes just now? Yeah, ‘turn on’ as in, ‘oh-more-oh-don’t-stop-I’m-coming’. That kinda thing. I even caught her once.” She actually grinned too widely and proudly. 

His eyes grew very wide at that. Thinking about it, he did notice a tinge of arousal in the air when he passed her room last night. He had been busy with his truck. Some parts hadn't been easy to remove. He had grunted, roared and cussed non-stop for them to budge, waking up the entire mansion, not that he cared.

But to realize that he had such an effect on Rogue. She must have seen the whole thing. Her window was directly facing the garage. She had full view of him every time he worked in there. Constantly shirtless, with jeans riding low on his hips. How long had it been going on?

“Too long, dude. The two of you are getting on everybody’s nerves. EVERYBODY! Do something about it already! Figure something out! You’re an X-Man aren’t you? Just get on her good side!”

It didn’t make any sense. She couldn’t possibly like him. No way. Not when he saw how angry she could be, lashing out at him all in that sexy Southern twang. One moment they despised each other and suddenly they were supposed to get into each other’s pants? It was absurd.

Two people who were in love should be like Scott and Jean. All gushing at each other, making everyone sick most of the time with their affection. But then again, what did love have to do with him and Rogue? Especially when the only three words out of her mouth that had any close context to love were “Go fuck yerself!”

But Jubilee wasn’t finished. “You want her to stop being mad at you, talk. Simple as that. Not scream at each other! Just talk. Nicely. No growling and all that dickhead crap! ”

Then she turned the other way, back to her room. But she didn't go without giving him one last bit of advice. 

“FYI, she didn’t draw well today. If you catch my drift." A mischievous wink from her.

Logan rubbed his stubbly chin with a strange look in his eyes.