1. When I leave you

She closed the door with a small slam and leaned against it. Her parents voices travelled up the stairs and she shut her eyes hard. The arguing had gone from loud to shouting and all she wanted right now was for it to stop - just STOP!

She slid down the inside of the door and landed softly on the floor, her knees by her jaw and her eyes still closed hard. She was trying to escape, trying to go to that soft place she normally went. Slowly she slipped away from reality and landed as softly as she had on her rug in her pretend world, this was where she had gone to escape her real life for years.

"Cecilia Wagner?" a new, soft and pleasant voice asked her. She looked around her mind for the interruption. And the person who had caused it.

"Yes?" she finally said.

"I'm downstairs on the street. Nowhere near your mind," the voice said.

"Who are you?" she asked hesitantly.

"My name is Charles Xavier, and I run a school for gifted youngsters. Such as yourself," he added.

She could almost feel his smile in her mind, the essence of him was warm and sweet, like honey and sunshine. She hesitated for another moment before she opened her eyes.

"I'll be right down," she said before she shut herself off. She slid up the door and turned to open it. The voices from downstairs had gone silent, to Cecilia's great relief.

She bounced down the stairs and opened the front door.

Out there, on the street, stood a van, a man in a wheelchair, and a woman. She saw the bald man smile at her, and she felt as warm as she had just moments earlier. He was kind, what more did she want from him? Nothing, she answered herself, from someone who was apparently a teacher. She smiled at him as she closed the door behind her, and started down the street.

"Cecilia," he said, a little louder than normal. She suddenly felt the urge to hurry, to get away from the house and get to him as soon as she could. When he reached out to shake her hand she took his hand and was stunned by the connection.

"How did you know?" she asked, still smiling like an idiot.

"It's my job to know. Now, will you listen to my offer?"

Cecilia sat down on the dry asphalt right in front of him. "Yes," she said, looking up at him and then at the woman behind him. Charles looked over his shoulder at the woman, who was smiling. He returned the smile, to both the woman and to Cecilia.

"Good."

**

"'Ey!"

John hit Bobby over the shoulder with the palm of his hand and laughed, jumping over the bench and sitting down next to him.

"Hi to you too," Bobby answered a little gingerly. "What's up?"

"Did you hear the professor left to go get a new girl?" John asked, his voice fast with excitement and his eyebrows wagging.

"Nope, didn't hear that," Bobby answered, still not sure if he was interested. He was still too tired to want to talk, five am and John was as awake as could be. All Bobby wanted to do was cool him and hit hot-head-self down.

"Yeah, he left yesterday morning with Jean-"

"Miss Grey," Bobby corrected him, still a little grumpy.

John looked at him, pointing the bottle he had on his hand at him. "Two shoes," he said plainly, taking a swig from the bottle.

Bobby shook his head, laughing. "That's what you think," he smiled.

"Oh, yeah?" John challenged.

"Yeah."

After a long silence Bobby snatched the bottle from John's hand, cooled it down with a simple breath and took a swig from it.

"So, do you know who this supposed new girl is?" he asked, handing John the bottle.

"Storm said her name was Cecilia Wagner."

Bobby looked at John, finally cracking a smile. "And-"

"-what Storm says, goes!" both boys said loudly, their laugh echoing against the buildings as they laughed to the point of almost falling of the bench.

**

"-and, I would really like to go," Cecilia concluded, looking into her dimwitted mother's eyes. She looked for her mother to her father, who was staring at her like she was an alien with green tentacles. This is the moment, she realized, when they say they have no daughter. This is the moment they tell me that if I leave, I better not bother coming back. This is it...

And for the first time in her long teen-dom, she realized she didn't want them to give up on her. She needed them, even if they sucked as parents and argued all the time, she loved them and needed them. She knew her mother needed her too, in various ways around the house but most of all, she needed her to talk to about her sisters.

But to her surprise, it wasn't her mother that spoke first.

"Celie," her father rumbled. "If this is what you want, then we won't stand in your way."

"If you ever need to come home," her mother said. "Then you are welcome. We don't want to lose the only daughter we have left," she said, her hand reaching out for her husband's. Again, her father surprised Cecilia as he took her mother's hand and held it tight.

"Your mom's right, you still our girl and no matter what, we'll love you. If this school is what you feel like you need to do, do it."

Cecilia got up from her seat, as Charles Xavier nodded. She surprised herself as she went around the table and planted a kiss each on her parents cheeks. "Thank you," she whispered to each of them. She made her way to the stairs, grabbing the banister.

"Cecilia," her father said.

"Yeah?" She turned around to look at her parents, finally united again.

"Thank you for being honest with us," he said; her old man moved almost to tears. For the first time since her parents became cat and dog, she could feel their single personalities as well as who they were as a couple. The smell of whiskey and strawberries, the essence of their relationship. She smiled.

"You're welcome," she said.

Charles Xavier and Jean Grey stayed with her parents, filled them in on the school and all the details, as Cecilia began packing.

**

Meanwhile, somewhere far from Cecilia Wagner and her few problems, Marie D'Ancanto wasn't living her quiet life any more. Her problems had gone from few and unimportant to many and filled with pain.

It had been a day like any other when she'd kissed her boyfriend, feeling overwhelmed with love and want for him. It was then that she felt him go limp under her, blue in the face and lifeless.

Marie had flown out of the bed, screaming her head off.

His parents had burst through the door and looked at him, then at her. Marie had started crying, and as someone tried to touch her she shouted at them not to.

That one little kiss turned Marie D'Ancanto into a run away in a matter of days. She became a homeless teenage girl on the run from herself as well as from her family. The family of her boyfriend, too, as they blamed her for his vegetated state. She didn't know what to do with herself, so she kept moving, kept going, kept hitch-hiking.

And that's how she ended up getting off a truck at that rest-stop, went into that bar, where he boxed.

That's how she ended up on the back of his trailer sneaking a lift, and how she ended up in the front seat of his rolling home.

That's how she ended up getting stuck as they crashed, and how she watched Logan fight with some long haired man.

That's how she got rescued by a man in sunglasses, and that how she finally ended up at the Charles Xavier school for gifted youngsters.

All because of that kiss, weeks earlier, Rogue reached the place that would be her home on the same day that Cecilia Wagner ended up there.

Sometimes life can be funny, don't you think?

**

Bobby hit John over the head as he gawked at the two girls, sitting on opposite sides of the room.

"What?" John turned and hissed at him under his breath.

"Stop staring, it's impolite," Bobby hissed back. "And they're not today's entertainment."

"They sure look like they could be," John said, wagging his eyebrows at Bobby. He hated when he did that, made people into object to be argued and fought over.

"Bobby," Jean said, standing in the doorway. She'd been talking too the new girl, the one without the gloves and the polo shirts, the one with the Wonder woman t-shirt and the kind eyes. bobby got up, looking over his shoulder as John and then over at the other girl. Her dark hair, her scared eyes, her completely covered body. He wondered what made her so scared...

"Yes, miss Grey?"

"This is Cecilia Wagner," Jean said, making a small gesture to the girl next to her. "I'd like you to show her around, if you have the time?"

"Of course, no problem."

"Thank you Bobby. You'll be okay with him," Jean said in a reassuring way to the girl. She smiled and nodded.

"Thanks, miss Grey," she said sweetly. Jean nodded and went over to the other girl, sitting down by her side.

"So," Bobby started. Articulate as always, he thought to himself. "I'm Bobby Drake," he smiled. Only fair she knew his last name since he knew hers, he justified to himself.

"I know," she nodded, smiling at him.

"How?"

She shrugged. "We'll see."

Bobby nodded slowly and then decided which way to go. "This way," he said, pointing his arm out the doorway and into the big hallway.

One thing Bobby was sure of as he showed Cecilia around, and it was that things was about to get real interesting around the house with the two new girls and the guy.

Cecilia looked over her shoulder at him. "I think you might be right," she said and smiled as his jaw dropped.