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Every Year 4: Now & Forever
Posted:
04.15.2006
Summary: Last in the ‘Every Year’ series.
This wraps everything up.
Its that time again…but not of the year, but of
life.
Its that time again…..for a new life.
For a new life to come into this world and start a
journey that all undertake.
A journey that he has been walking and now trudging
along for so long…alone for so long.
So long that he almost forgot how it felt to be
happy.
Just as he’d forgotten how it felt to hold, to
cradle a new life in his arms.
----
PAST
----
“There,” he sighed as he flopped down on the
reinforced bed. “Happy now?”
“Yes,” she grinned as she settled down next to him,
and leaned her head against his shoulder.
“You had to have it yer way, didntcha?” He patted
her cotton clad thigh, the haze clouding his mind
momentarily clearing up as he remembered and smiled
at the familiar setting.
Even now, after all these years, in his mind she was
still the lively, chubby cheeked kid he used to
ferry about on his shoulders, her unruly white mane
a perfect copy of his midnight black one, her
laughter and her cries of ‘faster dada faster,’
ringing in his ears, as did the honey sweet sound of
another laugh….HER laughter.
Even now, with her hair still white, but now
indicative of her seniority and not just of her
genes, the wrinkles of age only adding to her regal
demeanor, she was still her dada’s little girl, just
as, in her mind eyes, he was still the brave monster
slayer who made a goddess fall in love and marry
him.
“Yes,” she nodded softly, pushing down the tears
threatening to escape from their confines. It had
been so hard to make him give up his cabin Canada
and come here. “But its not my fault. That habit, I
got it from my dad.”
“Hmm,” it was another of their father-daughter
banter. “Must be a real fu…screw up.” She smiled at
his correcting himself, all for her ears, and the
tears finally broke free.
“No,” she wrapped her arm around his. “The best.
He’s the best….”
‘….at what he does.’ The unspoken words sounded loud
in the room.
----
PRESENT
-----
“Dad….dad….” a gentle tap and tug at his shoulders
roused him. “Daddy?”
“Hmm, yeah?” slowly his eyes opened to take in the
gathering around him. “Wh…(coughs)….what happened?”
He watched as she turned her head and gestured over
her shoulder.
He watched as a couple, one he knew was from his
family, just couldn’t or didn’t recall which
generation, stepped forward and towards him.
He watched as the small wrapped in white bundle came
into view, his eyes widening as the newest addition
of the Logan/Howlett clan was lowered to his
level….into his arms.
--
Earlier,
“Are you sure?” She asked just for confirmation, her
heart already filled with happiness and love,
swelling even more at the request that the couple
standing in front of her had made to her.
“Yes Grandma,” her human granddaughter and her
mutant husband nodded in confirmation. “I….” the
younger woman looked up to her husband, his happy
proud smile threatening to crack his face. “We are
sure.”
Lifting a hand to caress the midnight black hair of
her second and youngest daughter, Kendall, the
matriarch of the family, blessed the newborn
parents.
“I’ll tell everyone,” her voice was throaty with
emotion. “We’ll do it after…no, we’ll do it now.”
She knew that time was of the essence and she did
not want to waste it at all.
---
Lying on his bed, with over two dozen people, adults
and children surrounding him, he gently parted his
hands to hold the newborn.
Also present was one old woman, not just as his
caretaker, but as family. Not family by birth but by
choice….by love. Her tiny bony nubs had grown
longer, stronger years ago, yet her most cherished
memory of her orphaned childhood was the time when
Mr. Logan, with a barely audible -snikt-
turned her from the butt of other’s jokes into
someone they imitated…just because of the way she
reminded them of him.
‘Someone cool,’ she smiled as she remembers
the one word that meant so much then, her own age
wizened cheeks wet with tears.
Everyone present watched as he took in every sight,
smell and sound of the child and committed it to
memory. They knew it because for more than half of
them, they too had gone through the same
imprinting ceremony.
“Hey,” his wrinkled lips curved up at the soft tuft
of snow white hair on the child’s head. “She’s got
yer hair.”
“Just like mom,” she knew he would notice it, just
as he would notice the one thing that the child has
that even she doesn’t have of her mother’s.
“….” And there, he noticed it as almost by magic,
closed one instant, two large eyes opened up to him,
their stare caring an intensity that was reminiscent
of his, but a sort of eerie peace was all HERS’. Two
large blue eyes….just like HER.
“Dad,” he looked up at his daughter and then towards
the couple she gestured towards. “They…the kids have
something they want to ask you.”
“Hn,” his hands automatically spread around to
protect the baby from moving and possibly falling
away from his hold.
“Big-Grand pa,” it was his pet name, the one that
Kendall’s grandchildren coined as a short option to
Great Grand Pa. “We…we want you to name her.”
Not knowing what to say in such a situation, his
limited personal skills rusted even further from
decades of solitary living, he glanced at his own
child, his Kendall in question…..and as if she were
able to read his mind, the century plus Kendall just
nodded. ‘Yes’.
“Ororo,” his eyes lit up as the name left his lips.
“Name her Ororo.”
----
FUTURE
----
She had been watching…waiting for him, waiting for
so long.
She watched him cry…cry out for her.
She watched him go off in the wilderness….both
trying to forget her and keep her just for himself.
She watched it all…..Just as she now watches
him…watch him watch the child, the child that is her
namesake
--
“You didn’t have to do that,” she draws up beside
him.
“I didn’t?” He smirks as he looks up at her. “It was
destiny darlin’….it was meant to be.”
“Hmm,” she turns her gaze towards the child, the
child who is now a teenager. “How fast they grow.”
“Yeah,” he nods, his arm going around her midsection
to draw her closer, flush against him.
“You know what…” he starts seconds later, turning
her until they are facing each other.
“What?” She lifts a hand to run her fingers through
his lush black mane, just like she loved to do then,
just as she loves to do now.
“Her name might be Ororo, but…” he draws her still
closer, their lips just caressing, soft against each
other.
“But?” She whispers, her smile telling him that she
already knows what he is about to say.
“But…” within a blink of an eye, he bends down and
picks her up in his strong arms. “She ain’t ‘Ro.
Know why?”
“Why?” She nuzzles at his neck as he starts up the
pathway to their cabin, their cabin up high in the
sky.
“’Cause there is only one ‘Ro…” he firms his grip.
“….and that ‘Ro is mine.”
“Yes, my Logan….” Her proclamation is just as
soft, just as meaningful. “…Yes my
Wolverine.”
“For now and forever.”
Note: This is the last in
what was essentially meant to be a oneshot. I would
like to thank everyone who had read and reviewed the
first three (and my other work) and hope they will
do the same with this one.
Although, all previous three could be read
independently, this one I wrote as a wrap up
everything up, both for this series and for my work
in the Marvel mainline/616 universe.
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