What's Left of Me

Tracy watched Logan sleep, quietly sketching the planes and hollows of his face with her fingertip. It's in the defenselessness of slumber that she sees the real him, the man beneath the polite mask he keeps the world at bay. She knows he thinks she's ignorant, but the heart of a loving woman knows when something is off in the way she knows things are different.

He would play it off as nerves on her part to think he changed his mind about the wedding, but so far only she's done any work in planning their big day. Every time she asked for his assistance, he merely waved her off and told her "whatever you think is best, dear," using the exasperated but loving tone she'd heard her dad use a hundred times with her mother; does it sound as fake to him as it does to her?

It's only when the subject of the flowers came up that he empathetically made it clear he only wanted white roses (roses were safe because they were the one flower not associated with Lily, Veronica, or funerals, of which he'd attended far too many, but of course Tracy can't know what she's never been told).

She thinks back to his proposal, the gorgeous man on bended knee on the veranda of their favorite restaurant, the moon high in the sky, and violin concerto softly serenading them, satisfying all the girlish dreams she never quite left behind. It is her innocence and joy that attracted and held Logan's attention, a reminder of what he and the loves of his life weren't and couldn't be for so long. It also helps she was tall and brunette, tanned from an ancestral dip into Italian love, a far cry from the dainty pale wintery goddesses he'd spent over half his life worshipping.

It's been two years since that day, two years of lace and chiffon fittings, wedding planners who came and went, and flowers that never quite made it from garden to bouquet. She asked Dick for advice, and he could only shrug, muttering something about sacrifices to the water gods, but she didn't understand and he couldn't explain. How could he tell this love-sick dark-eyed beauty she was only the butterfly bandage keeping the edges of a soul-sucking wound from finally ripping apart and swallowing Logan whole?

Veronica lived in every deep breath, averted gaze, and uncertain pause. Dick had hated her with all the passion in his loyal heart when Logan had commanded, then accepted her with open arms when Logan changed his mind. The third time Logan demanded another attitude, Dick stepped back from the minefield of their romance, realizing he was only cannon fodder in the endless war they couldn't help but fight. It didn't matter if they were together or apart, their compasses, North Stars, only pointed to each other, and heaven help anyone (Caitlyn, Leo, Hannah, Kendall, Duncan, Beav-Cassidy, Parker, Piz) who got in their way.

The finality of Veronica's death hit Dick nearly as hard as Logan, simply because he knew his friend would never be the same. Oh sure, Logan breathed, ate, and aged, but the spark, the life, the boy he loved, was dead, had died in the split second of a car wavering over the white line into unforgiving concrete.

No, there was no advice for this child bride standing next to him with brimming eyes and trembling lips; she was the antithesis of the warrior maiden who made the world fear her wrath, and secretly he preferred the fiery terror of Veronica to the gentle freshwater rains of Tracy. He too was a son of Neptune, as cracked and jagged as Logan, though in different ways, and he no longer understood the normality of a slightly spoiled girl used to her dreams coming true.

It is in the hush of a darkened room (Logan had never quite asked her to move in, merely ignored the girly crap currently residing in his bedroom and bathroom) that Tracy finally finds a little bit of steel infused backbone and tries to set the world on fire, a blaze she starts with a small leak to prominent entertainment outlets about a certain infamous murderer's son's upcoming summer plans (even though they've yet to set a date, but maybe the publicity will push him).