Fic: Hello
E-mail: violet147@yahoo.com
Rating: PG-13, for language, mostly.
Warnings: As Trowa said, this contains angst!John. Be forewarned.
Feedback: Always appreciated.
Pairings: John/Marie, implied Bobby/John
Summary: She's his mind giving him someone to talk to.
NOTE: Lyrics from Hello by Evanescence. Special thanks to Sister Ray for reading over the first paragraph and giving me her opinion, and then Trowa for picking up where she left off. Mwah to you both!


Playground school bell rings again
Rain clouds come to play again
Has no one told you she's not breathing?
Hello I'm your mind giving you someone to talk to
Hello

The bell is loud and shrill as it rings, brrring, brrring. John puts his hands over his ears, but it still echoes, no matter how hard he tries to drown it out. He laughs to himself, a humorless, brittle laugh. He doesn’t know why he laughs, it just seems strangely funny, trying to drown out everything even though it’s futile, and the laughing is turning into wheezing. He puts his hand around his throat and tries to take in deep breaths, but he can feel his diaphragm tensing, closing in, impaling on itself. Shit. He can’t breathe.

The familiar wave of panic rushes over him, and he wills himself to breathe, relax, just breathe. He looks up at the other kids, who are running inside, laughing, being rowdy, running past the kid who’s not breathing. He’d laugh if he weren’t gasping for air, and he closes his eyes, the air in his lungs thinning out and his head starting to spin. Fuck.

John opens his eyes and looks up at the sky, as if waiting for a miracle. He doesn’t need a miracle, just for his air pipe to open up again. Suddenly there’s shadows, and John looks down, sees Bobby standing in front of him. He looks panicked and he’s screaming something, but John can’t hear him. As each minute passes, Bobby’s face contorts in fear or panic, and John has to shut his eyes. He can’t bear to look at Bobby’s pale, ashen face.

There’s a hand on his back and his eyes shoot open. Small circles are being traced into his sweater, and as each circle is completed and another one begins, he feels his diaphragm follow its lead. Breathe, relax, just breathe, he hears in his head, but he doesn’t know whose voice it is, his or Bobby’s or someone else’s. It starts to rain, starts to pour something fierce, but the harder the rain comes down, the air seeps in, and he or someone keeps telling him, just relax, relax, it’ll be okay, I’m here, and finally he’s breathing again. Thank the fucking Lord.

Bobby’s got his hands on his shoulders in a death grip, blubbering on about is John okay, does he need to go to the infirmary, he scared Bobby half to death. John hears him but doesn’t, he closes his eyes and tries to regain his composure. When he opens his eyes he sees a girl standing behind Bobby, long dark hair plastered to her skull, long black gloves tight around her elbows, jaded eyes that are on him. It’s silent for a few moments, save the rain drops, then finally she smiles.

“Hello,” she says.

The rain drops cling to his eyelashes, but it can’t wipe away the slight smile on his face. “Hello,” he says back.


If I smile and don't believe
Soon I know I'll wake from this dream
Don't try to fix me I'm not broken
Hello I'm the lie living for you so you can hide
Don't cry

Faith. It’s a strange, little word. John looks at it one day and decides this, decides it’s small and weird and really has no merit whatsoever. Faith. What is faith? John doesn’t know, and he doesn’t care.

Everyone else does, though. The Professor looks at him with those unnerving eyes and tells him that faith takes time.

Logan looks at him with those cat-like eyes and tells him faith’s an acquired taste.

Bobby looks at him with those hurt eyes and tells him that faith is sitting right in front of him.

She looks at him with those dark, abyss-like eyes and tells him that faith is something that you lose from time to time but you seem to find it in the last place you’d ever think to look.

He doesn’t remember when he lost his. He’s not sure if he ever had it to begin with, but he does remember that life used to not be so bleak in his eyes when he was younger, so he must have had at least a little. He suspects that there’s a correlation between that and the panic attacks, which also have something to do with his mutation. He had his first panic attack when he was thirteen, after he accidentally blew up the toaster. And all three, the panic attacks, lack of faith, his mutation, are all such a part of him, he can’t remember when they began or where they start and end.

It’s alright, because while he had no faith, he could smile and pretend. He’s been doing it since he was little, and he became really good at it once he got to the school. He became a pro at it; he used to smile and say okay every time Storm or Mr. Summers told him to stop showing off. He smiled and shrank back every time someone tried to punk on him. He used to smile and say, “Me too.” every time Bobby told him he loved him. But even though they believe the smiles, he doesn’t. Or can’t.

Neither does she, and while that’s not enough, it’s at least something.

But she knows that, too, and she does what she can without overextending herself or insulting him. He doesn’t know how she does it, but she always knows just what to do. She’s always there with a hand on his back, rubbing away the panic and bringing back the air. She’s always there with a quick smile and an excuse for the others, always there when he needs to go into himself and be alone, always there in his head, telling him to relax, it’s okay, just breathe, sweet boy, I’m here, you can go away for a bit, breathe.

When they got back from the museum, John had known he was going to get a lecture from SOMEONE; he admits, it sort of threw him off guard that it had been Bobby. John had walked in from the kitchen to find her sitting on his bed and Bobby pacing, and it had reminded John of Mr. Summers so much that he couldn’t help but laugh. It had broken Bobby from his trance and John had immediately known he was in for it. He remembers reaching up and massaging his cheeks, warming himself up for the smile and the inevitable, “Of course, Bobby.” That was going to come.

John doesn’t remember the beginning of the conversation. He remembers Bobby sounding an awful lot like the Professor, and he remembers wondering when Bobby stopped being himself and started being everyone else. He remembers hearing Bobby preach and rant about how John had to calm down, how John had to hold back, how John had to learn to let go, how John had learn to have a little fucking faith in people (Bobby actually hadn’t said fuck, John just throws that in for the hell of it), and a lot of other things Bobby said John had to do. Why John had to do it, Bobby never said, but John knows it was all things he had to do in order to be happy, to better himself, to have a good life. Or so everyone says.

John had said nothing. He let Bobby talk and talk to his heart’s content, and after he was done, all John had done was smile. It wasn’t even a malicious smile, or a sardonic smile. It wasn’t even a smile at all. It was just up turnings of the corners of his mouth, and that had been the time that Bobby had screamed, “What is wrong with you, John?!”

The smile had fallen and John could only look on as Bobby started to REALLY lose it. “I try so hard, to be there for you and to understand you and I just don’t! I don’t know what to do with you, John! I don’t know what to do!”

“You don’t have to do anything,” he remembers saying. “I’m fine, Bobby. You don’t need to fix me.”

Bobby had ended up crying, and that was when she stepped in. She stood up and walked over to Bobby, her hand brushing against John’s on her way over.

She ended up standing behind Bobby and rubbing his shoulders, squeezing and looking over at John. It’s okay, I’ve got him, you can go now, her eyes had said, and he left the room and walked for about an hour and a half.

When he went back he didn’t go back to his room, but to hers. Her door was always open, the covers on her bed always pulled back, and he ended up crawling into bed with her, laying his head on her breast, throwing an arm over her waist. She ran her fingers through his hair, combing through the tangles.

“I’m sorry,” he had said.

“Sssh,” she had murmured, and her breath made the strands of his hair sway a bit. The beat of her heart thumped against his, thump, thump, in a steady rhythm that reminded him of her hand on his back. “It’s okay, I took care of him.”

“I always-“

“He doesn’t get it,” she had said. She glances down underneath the covers, to check to see if he’s wearing pants, then she rolls on top of him, her hair a halo splayed out across his chest as she presses her ear against the fabric of his shirt, listening to his heart. “I love Bobby to death, but he just doesn’t see behind the smile, you know?”

“Like you,” John remembers saying.

“Like us,” she had told him, and she had leaned up, looked at him with those eyes that just KNEW, and she leaned in and kissed him. It was only three seconds long, but that lone kiss lasts forever for John. “I’m here, sweet boy. For whatever you need,” she had told him, and she rolled off him and laid next to him, letting him curl up into her like she always did, every time he needed to hide from anything and everything.

He went to sleep that night knowing he had finally found his faith in the most unlikely of places.


Suddenly I know I'm not sleeping
Hello I'm still here
All that's left of yesterday

Even though the bed’s a queen size, it doesn’t feel right to John. The sheets are white, the covers are a plain starch blue, and it’s nothing like his bed, which had flannel covers, or like hers, which had silk purple covers. Both their beds had been small, but for some reason it’s not right to sleep in such a large bed with no one to share it with.

It just hit John tonight that he hasn’t slept in the past three days. He’s been laying here for the past two hours, staring at the wall, recalling the events that led to his departure, and he just realized, I haven’t slept in days.

He ends up getting dressed and leaving the compound, hands shoved deep into his pockets. He walks without purpose, counting each step he takes, something he started doing ever since he walked out of that jet. He tries not to think about her words, “I’m always here,” and tries not to ask himself where she was when he walked away, and most of all, he tries not to tell himself that he was wrong to put faith in something that he could never touch.

Except he’s not doing a good job of keeping his mind quiet, and here it comes again. Here it comes, his diaphragm turning into a wall, the air trapping itself inside him. He puts his hand on his throat, as if he can pull his throat apart to let the air circulate, but it doesn’t work, he can’t breathe. People are walking by him but they do nothing, just walk on by the man who can’t breathe.

He closes his eyes for a moment, and he tells himself to relax, calm down, breathe, breathe. Suddenly there’s a hand on his back and his eyes shoot open, and he sees the rain clouds ahead, threatening to pour. Circles are being rubbed into his coat, and he feels the air start to return and regulate. Breathe, relax, just breathe, I’m here, he hears in his head, but he doesn’t know whose voice it is. After a few moments, the panic fades, and he can feel the air in him, as it should be. He’s breathing again. Thank God.

He closes his eyes to steady himself, and when he opens them, the rain starts to come down. They stick to his eyelashes, but he still sees her, standing in front of him, the white stripe in her hair plastered to her forehead, her arms white and bare without gloves, knowing eyes that bore straight into his. For a few moments all he can hear are the rain drops, then finally she smiles, full of hope and his faith.

“Hello, sweet boy,” she says.

He smiles back. “Hello.” He closes his eyes for a moment, and when he opens them, she fades away then. He merely stands there and stares at the empty space, watching the rain as it hits the ground.

Just like his faith.


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