Work Text:
The sound of his footsteps wakes her from her slumber. They are slow, deliberate, cautious of her and her comfortability. He was always like that now.
Since she came back from death. Since Phoenix.
"I'm sorry I woke you." His gravelly voice calls from the dark, she turns and opens her eyes, the small streams of moonlight entering their room illuminating his ruby lenses.
"It's alright." She smiles, "Is everything okay?"
"Just a bad dream."
"Scott-" She moves to sit up, but a gentle hand on her shoulder stops her.
"It's alright, I just needed a moment." He squeezes his eyes shut and takes a deep breath.
"You should've woken me up." She says quietly.
"I didn't want to wake you. You need your sleep."
"I want you to." She places her hand on his cheek and feels the tenseness in his jaw dissipate under her fingers. "Tell me what's wrong."
He shifts beside her and lays down. He props himself up on his arm and grabs her hand with his free one.
"It sounds... it doesn't matter." He shakes his head.
"It does to me."
He gazes out into the dark recesses of their room, flashes of faces appearing before his eyes.
"Ever since Phoenix, I always dream about you. Of losing you, of not knowing where you are." He laughs bitterly, "I see you with... them, my family. I see you burning as the plane goes down and I can't-"
He takes a deep breath and wills the tears back into his shielded eyes as Jean slowly strokes his knuckles with her thumb.
"I can't do anything to save you." He says, his voice as unsteady as his mind. "From Phoenix- I couldn't do anything to save you, Jean."
"But you did." She says, giving his hand a gentle squeeze. "You gave me a part of yourself to bring me back. Without you I wouldn't be here."
"Wolverine would've saved you."
"I'm not married to Logan, am I?"
He lets out a wet laugh.
"It's our anniversary." He says, staring at their entwined fingers.
"Is there anything in particular you want to do?"
"No." He shakes his head, "I just want to do it with you."
He looks up to see an elegant smile on his wife's face. Her hair frames her every move so beautifully, so wonderfully, so right. She blinks, her every movement so full of life.
It had worked, she was alive. She didn't leave him on the very moon illuminating the world outside- instead she is lying in their bed and watching him with the same eyes that followed his every move his first day at Xavier's. The same eyes that watched him without judgement when he told her of his biggest failures, the eyes that saw nothing but ugliness in the world and yet still decided to see its beauty.
"I love you." He says, she smiles.
She lifts up their clasped hands and kisses his knuckles. She smiles at the blush she knows is forming, even if she can't see it. She drops his hand and watches as he fiddles with his wedding band, twisting it this way and that.
"A lot has happened this year." She says, sitting up all the way.
"It has."
"I don't feel like the same person I was a year ago."
"I don't either." He sits up and links their hands together again.
"I don't think my parents would mind leaving this all in the past. I frightened them."
"Phoenix frightened them."
She is silent at that.
"I don't feel like the same woman I was." She repeats, "But I still love you. I don't think that will ever change."
He nods.
Silence fills the room, the broken moonlight illuminating what she pleases. But it doesn't matter; they know the other is there, listening, watching, waiting to help at a moment's notice.
The two lovers lock eyes in their companionable silence. They both smile, and she says,
"Happy anniversary, Scott."
And he says,
"Happy anniversary, Jean."