SECRET GARDEN

By Diana
Webpage: http://viscerate.com/fanfic/index.html
E-mail: dee@viscerate.com

Part One: Moonlight and Memories
My first thought upon awakening is that it was all a dream. The sawdust feel in the back of my throat and the heaviness of my head tells me the alcohol part at least was entirely truthful. I give up sitting as a bad idea, and fall back onto the pillow. I have never drunk that much before. I usually have more control. But as soon as Scott removed his shirt...

The thought sends a tremour through me even now. Such a small thing, his bare torso, bathed in the warm glow of the firelight. A chest I had seen half a hundred times before, perfectly innocently. But my own reaction rendered this innocent no longer. Your stomach doesn't twist that way when a friend strips in front of you. I prayed no one would see my blush in the firelight. I was so nervous Logan could smell it.

Goddess, what a mess. I thought at the time that this was completely unworkable - thinking about a close colleague like that. I should never have let it start. Except it started so gradually, I do not think I could have stopped it. Sometimes, when I try to trace my feelings back to their source, I wonder if maybe it has been building since the first time I met him, so long ago. But he was with Jean, and that was that.

All of us had been shocked when Scott and Jean gathered us to make their announcement. It was a perfectly amicable separation, Jean declared, but no one looking at the ticking muscle in Scott's jaw believed that. The entire mansion was treading on eggshells from that moment, every second expecting Scott to explode. Except, of course, he never did. It did not surprise me. He has always been so cautious, so careful, so controlled. The perfect leader.

I admire control and restraint. I told him that. I wished the words back as soon as they were out of my mouth, and yet I also rejoiced at the thought that maybe, just maybe, he would see what I was saying. I admire you, Scott. You are everything I admire.

A dream, I decide. The memories are shot through with silvered moonlight. They seem unreal. A beautiful dream, one I will treasure, but a dream nonetheless. It's better that way, I tell myself. Less problems all around.
With a groan, I roll out of bed, one hand pressed to my forehead. The sky outside, thankfully, is clouded over, a flat sheen of dark grey. It mirrors my mood perfectly, and I wonder if my emotions have been meddling again. At this point, though, I honestly do not care. Gingerly, I dress, moving slowly. A glance in the mirror before I go downstairs for breakfast tells me I look as awful as I feel.
I am not first in the kitchen. Jean is half-slumped over a cloudy glass of aspirin, her usually glorious hair as limp as she is. Across the table, Rogue watches her closely. She looks up as I enter, looking faintly startled that I too appear hungover. She does not say anything, though.
Jean groans slightly, lifting her head from her hand and opening her eyes a fraction. "Mornin' Ororo," she whispers. She clears her throat, and winces a little. "Whose idea was this anyway?"
"Logan's," I remind her, and take a glass out of the cupboard. Water is what I need. Rehydrate myself. Then I might begin to feel human again.
I am half-way through my first glass of water when Scott enters. I cannot see his eyes behind his glasses, but he looks paler than usual. He greets Jean and Rogue, his voice a little rough, and turns to me. "Water," he notes. "What an excellent idea." And he reaches past me to take a glass.
In that moment I know. It is in the way he leans closer than he usually would. His breath is so warm on the back of my neck. His hip brushes my buttock. Then he moves back, leaning away to fill his glass. But I still know.
It was not a dream.

The knowledge is like a jolt of electricity through my system. Suddenly my fingers are trembling so much I have to put the glass down on the bench before I drop it. I close my eyes and take a deep, skaky breath. But that does not work, because playing across my closed eyelids is the image of him, shirtless in the liquid moonlight. Not a dream. A memory.

A sudden gust of wind rattles the windows. Scott pauses in his drinking, quirks an eyebrow. "Interesting weather today," he says blandly. But I can hear the joking tone, so subtle in his voice. I can hear it and I love it. He is teasing me. Laughing at my lack of control and feeling smug, no doubt, in the knowledge that he caused it.
I admit, it is a small shock to realise this sort of behaviour is coming from Scott, our stone-faced leader. All the time I have worked and lived alongside him, I never saw this other side to him, except for the barest hints now and then. A smile given in something other than grim satisfaction. A line a little more flippant. I knew his lighter side had to exist. It is just that while you are on the job is no time to be joking around. And Scott is always on the job. Always business-like, always apparently emotionless. Apparently. I, of all people, know that how much emotion you show bears no relation to how much you feel.
Still waters run deep. Trite, but true.

I wonder what other surprises Scott holds, hidden away from all but Jean. Until now. I feel like he is my very own secret garden, and I have been handed a key. I almost do not want to unlock the gate, worried that he may not live up to my anticipation in the flesh.

In the flesh. Moonlight-rimmed memories spring into my mind, and I have to hold tight to my emotions to stop the weather betraying me yet again.
Do not get melodramatic, Ororo. You know you want to peel him like an onion. Physically and mentally. Find out if the rest of that body is as fantasy-inducing as his chest. If the rest of his personality is as emotionally erogenous.
The thought brings a smile to my face - how could it not? I know he sees it as I empty my glass and place it on the draining board. I wonder how I could tease him in return. Mentally? The idea of teasing him physically is almost enough to scatter my carefully husbanded control to the wind. I wonder if he has this difficulty. Gripping hard to his self-control, that most precious commodity. Relishing how close it comes to slipping out of his grasp.

I turn and step back to lean against the cabinets to watch him drain his water. His poise is perfect, as always. Despite the hungover tinges, he is still Scott. Still implacable and inpenetrable.

Jean groans from the table, setting down her half-drunk glass of aspirin with a thunk. One hand is over her eyes; the only thing holding her head up is her elbow braced against the table. "God, I feel awful," she whimpers.
"Finish your aspirin and go back to bed," I suggest calmly. "You will feel better if you sleep a little. Take some water, though. And drink it. You are dehydrated. That is why you have a headache."

Jean nods slightly, and tilts her head back to drain the glass, grimacing slightly as she sets it back on the table.

"Ah'll take her upstairs." Rogue jumps up, her eyes still a little wide. Three hungover teachers is obviously more than she can manage in one morning. Besides, it is the chance to do something unselfishly nice for Jean. Not one of us would baulk at that opportunity.

Unless the thought of being alone in the kitchen with Scott made us irrationally weak at the knees. I open the fridge beside me, pulling out one of the chilled bottles of water there. Scott passes me a clean glass, and I pass both to Rogue, who takes them with one hand as she helps Jean up with the other. Walking carefully, and a little unsteadily, Jean totters out of the room on Rogue's arm.

The door swings shut behind them, and silence descends on the kitchen. I lean on the fridge, the white surface cool against my back even through my shirt. Scott leans back against the sink, crossing his arms over his chest. I am watching him watching me. There are perhaps three steps separating us. I count them.
"Do you regret last night?" he suddenly asks.

Does he honestly think -? I replay my behaviour this morning; I have not been precisely encouraging. Though not discouraging. Is he feeling insecure? My smile returns. "I regret not being sober enough to remember it as well as I wish I could," I reply honestly. The alcohol-fragmented memories are tantalising. The taste of him, layered with scotch and gin. His sweat-slicked shoulder briefly under my fingers.
"Perhaps a repeat performance could be arranged," Scott murmurs, his voice low. His answering smile is quick and somehow intimate. He is still poised, however, and that brief perhaps-moment of uncertainty has disappeared behind his usual wall of confident calm.

I realise in that moment that I want to make his composure slip. And I wonder if I could do it. Interrupt that regular breathing, make it ragged. Illicit a gasp from those lips. Make that body shudder involuntarily.
Oh Goddess, could I make him scream?

I clamp down on my own self-control, containing the tremour that threatens to run through my own limbs. I want to do it. I want to shred his self-control. I want to do all those things. And I want him to do it all to me, too. A tussle of wills, perhaps? A wrestle for self-control...
Breathe, Ororo.
"That could be pleasant," I reply, equally quietly. "But there was something vaguely... unsatisfying about last night." A lie; it was perfection. But it is time for a little of that teasing.
Scott raises his eyebrows. "Unsatisfying?" he repeats.

"Hmmm," I indicate agreement, not attempting to hide the smirk that seems to find its own way onto my face. "Yes. Maybe it is just my faulty memory, but everything seemed to stop before... well, before it got good." Part of me gapes at this, like I am behaving wantonly. It feels unnatural, but it also feels good, especially as, watching closely, I see his grip on his folded arms tighten. A minor sign, but one nonetheless, and it heartens me. "I was a little disappointed," I finish.
"That's no good," Scott answers mildly. For all his casual stance, however, there is a new tightness in his posture that was not there before. His voice is a little more rough as he continues, "I would apologise, but I don't regret a single thing about last night."

Even through his glasses, his gaze is direct, stapling me against the fridge. The heat of that gaze and the lines of tension in his body give me the strength of will to stretch a little, press my hips back against the fridge. "Well," I almost whisper, "actions speak louder than words, anyway."

His arms drop from their folded position and he leans forward slightly. A surge of something akin to exultation ripples through me as I realise he is going to do it. He is going to cross the few steps between us. And then my imagination takes over, a thousand flights of fancy taking me in an instant. He could cross the space and lean against the fridge behind my shoulder, a repetition of last night. He could pin me to the fridge with his body, rather than his eyes, a glorious weight and heat. He could grab me by the hips, like he did when we were dancing, and pull me against him. All my fantasies end the same way, though; his mouth descends on mine, and I shatter.

I am not to discover which is correct, however, as at that moment the kitchen door opens and Logan swaggers in. Quick as lightning, Scott leans back against the sink, his face empty of expression and his posture all casual calm once more. I push off from the fridge, though, doubting my ability to simply stand there any more. Not when I do not want Logan to know what is happening between Scott and I before we know ourselves. Not when Logan probably wants to gloat about his lack of hangover and all I want is to feel Scott's hands and breath hot on my skin. The situation constitutes a cruel and unusual form of torture.
"I am going to go and have a shower," I declare. Hot water and steam might clear up this hangover. On the other hand, maybe a cold shower is called for.
Logan steps aside to let me out the door, a smirk on his face. "Not feeling too well, 'Ro?" he asks smugly.
"On the contrary," I reply, smiling at him, though my words are all for the man over my shoulder, "I have never felt better."

Part Two: Imaginings and Intimacy
I tilt my head back to let the spray drum against my closed eyelids, my hands braced against the wall. I decided on hot in the end, and although the steady pounding of water is relieving my body's aches, it is doing nothing for the tempest that rages in my mind. A welter of images and emotions threatens to overwhelm me. There are less pleasant things to drown in, but one day I must do something about reining in my overactive imagination. Then again, until last night, I had no idea it could be so... creative.

I am bombarded by what might have been in the kitchen just now, but for Logan's intervention, variations on the theme and continuations. I doubt anyone would eat on that table ever again had my subconscious had its way. Finally, my skittish mind veers away from that topic, to what had been, last night in the warm, firelit den. That first twist of alcohol in my system as I imperiously demanded that he take off his shirt, barely believing it even as the words left my mouth. My difficulty in maintaining composure when his business-like removal of the shirt left me with the heady sensation he was performing a strip-tease. I dared Logan to dance, but all I wanted was to see Scott. More of Scott.

But despite all my feverish imaginings during that game, he'd seemed so calm, collected, completely at ease. My heart had sunk. I didn't think he was interested. I could almost hear his reply, feel his breath on my cheek; 'I'm very interested.'
Goddess. I reach out and shut off the water quickly, raising my hands to wipe the excess water from my eyes, wring it from my hair. Stepping out of the shower, I reach for a towel. I need to find him, before my mind drives me entirely mad.
I dress for comfort, still not feeling entirely well, in track pants and a T-shirt. I am hurriedly towelling my hair when a thought occurs to me; a thought I can scarcely believe is crossing my mind. Though why it should surprise me given my current tendencies, I don't know. Slinging my towel over one shoulder, I open the drawer of my bedside table, reaching to the back to retrieve the package Jean and I had bought once in a flurry of unwarranted girlish excitement about a date I went on. It had been a waste, the man an idiot, and the package had sat, unneeded, ever since.

Feeling almost guilty, I reach into the package and pull out one of the small, foil-wrapped circles. It sits on my palm, almost burning, like the blush I can feel creeping up my neck. It is as good as a declaration of intent, taking this with me. Hello world; I, Ororo Munroe, am going to find Scott Summers and have sex with him. But honestly, who do I think I am fooling? Myself, with that contraction of my stomach and a tingle on my skin? So I take one, slip it into my pocket. As a just-in-case, nothing more.

After hanging up the towel, I pull out the package again, and take another one. Definitely just in case. My cheeks burning up, with bare feet and damp hair, I leave my room.

Scott is not in his room. I step as quietly as possible past the door of Jean's room, hearing Logan's rumbling voice in low tones as I pass. Scott is nowhere downstairs either, not in the kitchen, or the den, or the library that it causes a flutter in my stomach just to enter. So I head downstairs again, descending into the metallic corridors of the business-side of the school. Past the med-lab, further along, and I know where he is now. The Danger Room.

There are the sounds of the room in use, muffled considerably by the padding on the walls. It is not the sort of place you just walk into unannounced on the best of days, and I am feeling more than a little nervous now. I raise a hand, take a deep breath, and knock.

A last muffled thud from inside, then his voice, calling: "Come in."
I open the door just enough to slip inside, and lean back against it, pushing it closed. Only then do I allow myself to look at Scott, standing in the centre of the room. His physical appearance is like a punch to the stomach, forcing the breath out of my lungs. His hair is sweat-darkened around his face and his lips are slightly parted as he breathes heavily. His chest - bare, as it usually is while he is training - heaves with each breath. He is wearing track pants, his feet planted in a firm, unshakable stance. He looks like he has been working hard, sweat-slicked, but business-like, calm.
My thoughts are anything but. I want him. Badly.
"Ororo," he greets me, my name expelled on an exhalation.
"Scott," I return. Part of my mind is screaming at me not to waste my breath in talking, just to throw myself on him. But I do not consider it. Well, not seriously, anyway. While such actions have their good points - their very many good points - it would be too much of an admission, too much a loss of control. He is going to have to work harder than that to break me. And I, in turn, will work to break him. Fair is, after all, fair. "Mind if I join you? A little exercise might help clear my head." I step away from the door, but towards the empty floor, not him. He watches me, completely calm, as I take up position a few metres away from him. I raise an eyebrow at him. "Are you going to turn the program back on?"
Now one corner of his mouth quirks up, and he shakes his head. "The training programs are good, but there's nothing quite like a little one-on-one."
Wonderful. We have not even begun and already my heart is racing. But the teasing is good; it lightens an atmosphere I had not even noticed was so tense, and I laugh and flip my damp hair over my shoulder. "Well then, come on."
As he leaps in on the offensive, I wonder briefly if he expects me to be lenient, make this just a little love-fight, a play tussle. Not on his life. Besides, Logan has been teaching me a little, and I have a few surprises up my sleeve. Scott does not seem disconcerted as he is forced back step by step. Only a few steps, though, and then he seizes the initiative once more, and this time I am the one to retreat.
Scott is right; there is nothing like a little one-on-one. Adrenaline surges through my veins, and it does clear my head, blowing the hangover-cobwebs away. It is warm in the Danger Room, and soon my skin is prickled with sweat as well. Back and forth we trade blows, neither really having an advantage. He fights with precision and economy, every movement using just as much energy as it needs. Nothing flashy, just compact grace. He is magnificent, I allow myself to concede, somewhere in the back of my mind. I had watched him in action before, of course, but never through eyes veiled in desire.

Then it comes, just a tiny over-extension, and I pounce, moving all-out on the offensive. Scott backs away, barely managing to defend. But somehow, just a pace from the wall, he dodges my final blow, catching my wrist and swinging me around with the force of my own momentum. My breath rushes out in a gasp as my back hits the wall.

I have no chance to regain it, either. His body presses me back against the wall, every glorious inch along the length of me, and his mouth captures mine. My beautiful, delicate memories of last night are incinerated in the heat of this embrace. There is nothing delicate here. His tongue is ravaging, his lips hard and demanding, and so is his body, pushing against mine.

I have died and gone to heaven. I swallow the moan that wells up in my throat and concentrate on giving as good as I am getting. My tongue slithers against his, my mouth as hungry, and I splay my fingers on his back, desperate to touch as much of him as possible.

When he breaks the kiss, leaning back a fraction, we are both breathing heavily. I run my hands up over his chest, because he is there and I want to and I can.
"That was an unorthodox move," I say, somewhat surprised to note that my voice is a little breathless and husky, but otherwise steady. "Not that I am complaining, of course."

Scott smiles. "It seemed appropriate." His voice is steady as well, even as he leans back towards me, whispering, "You're a drug, Ororo. The more I have, the more I need..."

This kiss lingers somewhere between our previous two. I slide one hand up the nape of his neck, curling my fingers in his hair as the work of his lips and tongue surpasses the fantastic and enters the realms of 'knee-weakening'. His hands sit, warm and heavy, on my hips. My other hand drifts down his back, fingertips skimming the flesh, over the waistband of his trackpants to grip one of those muscular buttocks. I pull him to me, quick and hard.

Scott's sharp inhalation is as intoxicating as the feeling of him against me. His teeth nip my bottom lip even as his hands sweep up from their resting places, sliding underneath my T-shirt to smooth up my back and press my torso against his. I am left, open-mouthed and breathing heavily, as his lips leave mine to trail a hot, wet line along my jaw to the hollow just under my ear. His hands on my back are maddening, sliding over my skin until his fingers find the clasp of my bra. And just as all my attention is focused on the anticipation of him unfastening it, his thigh slips between mine, pressing hard against me. The sigh is torn from me, my lips shaping his name. "Oh, Scott..."

"Yes," he rasps, his voice low and husky in my ear. My bra unfastens with a sudden snap; one of Scott's hands presses against my back, holding me to him, while the other slides around my ribs. "Say my name again," he demands, nibbling on my ear lobe.

"Scott." I love his name; I love saying it here, now. My voice is still steady, though low. Steady, that is, until his fingers move up, brushing over my nipple, already over-sensitised. I gasp. "Oh Goddess... Scott -" I am cut off as his mouth covers mine, swallowing my faint moan as he takes my nipple between his thumb and finger, cupping my breast. I am left helpless, writhing against him. I arch forward, squeezing his thigh between mine, and he breaks the kiss with a gasp of his own.
Both hands tug at the bottom of my shirt now, and I raise my arms so Scott can pull it off over my head. It is tossed into the corner, and a moment later my bra follows it. I lean back against the wall as his hot gaze, hidden behind those glasses now as always, travels over my naked torso. "Ororo," he says, my name sounding somewhere between a groan and a prayer. His hands run down my sides, over my waist, down my hips as he leans closer again. "You are so beautiful..."

That, of course, is when he finds them. Those incriminating foil packages that I had forgotten until his hand brushes over the lump in my pocket. He pulls them out, and with one look he knows it all; he reads their statement, gleans my intent, and not just one, but two.

The growl that wells up in his throat would have done Logan proud, and he yanks me towards him. One hand stays low, in the small of my back, pressing me against him even as the other hand tangles in my hair, holding me still as his tongue plunders my mouth.

It is the end of restraint, as we sink to the floor. Our remaining clothes are an unwelcome impediment, to be shed as quickly as possible. So much of his skin against mine is dizzying, and I no longer bother to censor my sighs and gasps of pleasure. I feel my control slip out of my grasp, and know that my eyes have whited over, and outside the weather will be more than tumultuous. I am beyond caring, though. Nor does Scott bother about his moans, and when he whispers my name his voice breaks and I exult. His control, as mine, is shattered.

When he finally takes me, however, it is with a rhythm slow and measured, increasingly hard and insistent. It leaves me speechless, inarticulate, clawing at his back and tilting back my head as he nips at my exposed throat, taking away the sting with a swirl of his tongue. Release cannot come soon enough, and I half-scream as explosive pleasure claims me. As I descend from the spiralling heights, he sags against me with a juddering groan that becomes my name.

He rests his head on my shoulder as we lie together in silence, sweat making our limbs stick to each other. His fingers trace lightly over my stomach. "What're you thinking?" he murmurs.

I smile lazily and run a finger down his spine. "I am wondering how my world managed to change so much in the last 24 hours, that I could go from distant wonderings to lying replete in your arms."

Another slip, and he picks up on it, propping himself up on one elbow to look down at me, his face serious. "Distant wonderings? Ororo, how long have you... ah..."

"Been interested in you?" He nods and I sigh. Now that it is out there, I may as well tell the truth. "I do not know when it began, to be honest. I have asked myself that as well. I do, however, know when I realised. About two months ago, after we returned from that mission where we attempted to capture Sabretooth. I was thinking that we all have our rituals to calm down after missions. I go off into my greenhouse, and you and Jean used to closet yourselves together. Then, I realised that you couldn't do that any longer, you weren't together."

I take a deep breath, and smile as his attention is distracted by the rise of my chest. I tap him on the cheek. "Pay attention. Anyway, if I was thinking, I would have been suspicious right then, because I wasn't worried about how Jean was coping with her solitary post-mission stress, just about you. I went looking for you. You were down here, and I could hear the program running, it sounded like you had it turned way up. Then it finished, and I was about to knock when... when I heard you crying." I cannot look up at his face, so I look at the hand on my stomach instead. It slides further around my waist. "They were huge, heart-rending sobs. It sounded... as if your heart was breaking. I was an inch away from coming in when I realised I didn't want to comfort you purely as a friend. It was startling, and confusing, and the more I watched you over the next while, the more I wanted things not to be purely friends. But it was stupid, I told myself, and it would disrupt the team, and when you get right down to it I didn't have the courage to say or do anything."
There is silence, and I manage now to gather the courage to look up into his face. Not that that tells me much, since it is back to his usual composure.

"I thought my heart was going to break," he says quietly, so I can barely hear him.

"That night after the mission. It had finally really and truly struck home to me that I didn't have Jean any more. I felt so overwhelmed with the energy of the mission, and frustration and hurt. So I came down here and ripped through the program, fueled by pure emotion." You would not guess it from his dispassionate words now, but I believe him. I know him, this stone-faced man. "And after I cried so long and hard I thought I would never recover, I did. It was the beginning. Once I'd completely accepted that she was gone, I could start to move on." The hand around my waist pulls me closer to him, and he smiles down at me. "But the final part didn't come until you did get the courage to do something," he murmurs in my ear. "You followed me out of a dinner and told me to face my ghosts and you made me dance." His hand slides down to my hip, so warm on my skin, like his breath on my neck. "You put my hands on your hips and you told me I was in control. I dreamed about you after that, you know. The dreams I told you I only ever had about Jean. They're a hundred times better when you're the star."

I wonder if this is a beautiful dream of my own, that some time very soon I am going to wake up from. And decide that if that is the case, I had better make the most of it while it lasts. So I roll against him, throwing a leg over his. With a swirl of my tongue in his ear, I purr: "Where did you put that second condom?"