It was Christmas Eve. Remy hadn't realised that. After being on another planet for so long, Earth time had pretty much lost all meaning. But this still meant something special, more than ever as Xav sat on his knee, telling him all the things she hoped she would get the next day. He resolved to get her each and every one of them the second the shops opened again.
"An' the pokemon..." Xav's eyes lit up. "You know pokemon, Daddy?"
Remy shook his head, bewildered at all these things she wanted that he'd never even heard of. Xavia jumped off his knee, and pulled him upstairs. Following willingly if a little bewilderedly, she pulled him into her room. Remy stared. The room obviously belonged to a little girl, with pink wallpaper, teddy bears -several of them hand-me-downs from Rogue - and he felt a lump in his throat as he realised this was the room of his little girl. A photograph of himself in a frame by her bed magnified these, and the guilt he felt for not being there for her magnified a thousand times. Sitting on her bed, she stood on it and pointed at a poster filled with over a hundred bizarre little creatures.
"These are pokemon!" She said, and pointed at them, reciting the names of her twenty favourites, even more amazing since Remy was sure she wouldn't be able to read them.
"Dey're great, Xavia," he told her, and she nodded.
"They're on TV and games - but Mommy says I can't have them until I'm four and that's long long away 'cause I'm just 3-" she held up 3 chubby fingers "-and a little weeks." She sat next to Remy and pointed at her teddys, naming each of them for him. A blue one - a battered one Rogue had had for years - was her favourite, and called, simply, Bear.
Picking her up in his arms, Remy was about to take her back downstairs, but saw Rogue in the doorway.
"Momma!"
Rogue walked over, smiling softly, taking Xav into her arms. "Ya tryin' ta fool ya Da inta lettin' ya stay up past ya bedtime?"
Xav pouted prettily, "Its not bedtime!"
"It is, sugah," she told her, and took her nightshirt - also, Remy noticed, covered in teddys, and helped her into it, resisting all the way. "Now, which book do ya wanna start?"
"Harry Potter!" She exclaimed, and Rogue picked up a book from the shelf and handed it to Remy. Taking it with a look of surprise, he sat on the animal-print seat next to Rogue and opened the book. "It's my favourite, Daddy. It's for older kids but I'm smart," she exclaimed with childish egotism, and Remy smoothed her hair back.
"Oui, I noticed," he told her, and smiled. "Y' been read this before?"
"This is th' second one, sugah," Rogue told him, and Xav gave him a brief synopsis of the plot of the first book, Hogwarts and all.
"I like Hermione, she'd be my friend," Xav informed him, and Remy opened the book and started reading.
"Not f' de first time, an argument had broken out o'er breakfast..."
************
Remy walked silently out of the room, shut the door to his daughters room just as quietly. He'd read two chapters before she'd finally fallen asleep, and Rogue beckoned him down the corridor, indicating for him to be quiet so as not to wake either of the kids up. He followed her with an interest as to where she was taking him, and what she would say. The first was instantly obvious. Her room. Less teddy bears, as they were now living in Xav's room, the walls decorated with brightly coloured cloth, patterned delicatly, and Remy gave silent approval. The room showed as much as her personality how much she had grown up while he'd been away. Sitting on a futon that was one of the few items of the furniture in the room, he watched as Rogue wandered around the room, and eventually did the same. When she sat next to him, he noticed what she had in her hand and stared. The Queen of Hearts, carefully repaired and looked after. His heart ached looking at it, realising everything it meant. Like that card, their love had been through so much, yet it too seemed to have survived against all the odds. He looked at her, into those emerald eyes of hers, and knew it had. The look in those eyes suggested she felt the same. Leaning forward, she kissed him gently, a touching of her top lip to his lower, so chaste, so gentle, yet it meant so much.
"Remy," she whispered, his name little more than a sigh. "Ah wish-"
"Don't wish. We have everythin' we need. There's nothin' we need to wish for." He touched his forehead to hers, the ghost of her feelings comforting and brought a feeling of companionship, the like of which he had never felt before, and was glad. The intimacy was incredible, something he'd only want to share with her.
"An' what do ya need?"
"You an' Xavia are all I need," he told her, wrapped his arms around her. "An' you?"
"Ah need Xav, an' you," she admitted, then looked up, biting her lip anxiously. "But ah need you as her daddy, as... somethin' serious ta me."
"Rogue, I'd marry y' in an instant." She stared at him, eyes wide, almost disbeleiving. "Maybe y' didn't beleive it, but I'd felt that way a long time b'fore Antarctica." She flinched at the word, and he didn't blame her. "Y' know dat. An' I feel it even more so now. We need t' get t' know each other - three years is a long time, cherie." Smiling, he sat forward. "Soon as everythin's open 'gain, I'm takin' de two a y' shoppin', den I'm takin' y' out for a meal - wherever y' wanna go."
"An' where y' gettin' the money from?"
"Y' really wanna know?"
She shook her head, smiling a little. "Ah guess not." She paused, then looked at Remy. "What are ya gonna do know? Stay here, with the X-Men, or...?"
"For now," he nodded. "I..." He wondered how to tell her of his plans for the future, so at odds with what he'd done with his life before. "I'm t'inkin' o' goin' t' school." Rogue blinked. "Hank suggested it, an' I t'ink I could do it. Not t' mention de fact it'd give me more control o'er m' powers."
"But ya can control yoah powers!"
"Oui, but not as well as I could do. What Hank was talkin' 'bout was a whole diff'rent level, a molecular level. I'd need to really un'stand de physics an' chemistry t' control it, an' I think it'd be a good idea." Rogue looked shocked, and Remy was surprised. He'd have thought she'd be thrilled he wanted to make something of himself. "I could do it, chere. An' afterwards, I could be an X-Men, or even a teacher o' somethin'. I could have a proper job, Roguie."
"An'... An' ya want this?"
"Oui." She wrapped her arms around him, tightly.
"Ya have changed," she told him. "Ya are mah Prince Charmin' now - an' more than ah evah dreamed ah'd have. More'n I deserve." She kissed him again, and he stood.
"Y' have no idea how happy I am y' just said dat, chere." Bringing her into his arms, he kissed her deeply, and pulled back, eyes sparkling. "I t'ink I should prob'ly go t' bed now, I t'ink tomorrow's gonna be a long, exhaustin' day?"
"You bet, sugah."
As he turned to leave, she grabbed his hand, and whispered, her voice husky with emotion. "Don't go, Remy."
He stared at her, wanting to take it slowly, not wanting to be burned again. But looking at her, his one true, the mother of his child, an absolutely beautiful creature... He felt passion rise within him, he wasn't sure he could say no. She grinned wickedly at him, and pulled him to her, and he realised he could never say no to this woman, who was his heart, his soul, his everything. She pushed him onto the bed, and Remy laughed, gently.
"Y' know, I never dreamed y'd be like dis."
"Come on, sugah," she laughed as she climbed on top of him, unbuttoning his shirt. "Ah ain't been touched foah ten years, an' ah know how good ya are, how amazin' ya made me feel." Her eyes were dark with desire and Remy's breath caught in his thraot. He'd never wanted anyone more. "Ah want ya." She breathed.
All he could do was nod and do every little thing she wanted.