Log: Scott and MJ Who; Scott Summers and Mary Jane Watson When; Backdated slightly to Feb. 17th, afternoon Where; On the grounds somewhere What; Scott and MJ ... fight, actually, over MJ being mopey and stuff. So MJ's mopey and Scott's a dick.
MJ was outside. It was cold, and cloudy, and not really good weather for being out and about, but she was, wandering the grounds and carrying May on her hip. Thankfully they were both properly bundled up and it didn't exactly look like May was going to freeze----but given the circumstances of MJ's mother's death, being out in the cold was an unpleasant thought.
She was sitting on a bench in a brown, dead garden, May sitting and fiddling with her hands in their mittens. Her mother was dead. Her mother had starved and then frozen. Freezing to death had to be the worst way to die----Jack Dawson said so in Titanic so it had to be true. Her mom... and MJ hadn't even gone after her until it was too late. Was she thought thoughtless? That selfish? Was she so sure that her mom would be fine? She knew her mother wasn't invincible. What the hell was she thinking?
Scott still visited Jean's memorial all the time. It was easier than driving all the way to Alkali Lake every time he felt the need to ... talk to her or something. Even if she was obviously dead, it felt good to have something concrete to go talk to, even if it wasn't a grave. He couldn't stand to look at photographs for too long; she always looked happy. Dead people probably weren't happy.
He was walking back to the building when he saw MJ and May. Odd. It was freezing outside, and considering how Mary Jane's mother had just died, it seemed strange for her to be out like that. He normally left well enough alone, but ... hn. They had something in common that day. Dead people were crappy things to have in common but they existed nonetheless.
"Isn't it a bit cold to be out here?"
"What?" MJ looked up sharply. "Oh. Scott.. hi. Hi----um. I..." She looked over her shoulder, blinking, like there was someone else that he was talking to instead of her. "It's a little cold, but it's... not that bad." May's cheeks were looking a little red but she wasn't whining.
"It's freezing," he said bluntly. He looked at her for a moment, seeming expressionless behind his glasses, before he added, "There are easier ways to mourn people than sitting on a bench with some dead flowers, MJ."
MJ blinked, pulling May a little closer and cradling her against her chest. "I'm sorry, but I don't think that's any of your business."
"That doesn't make me any less right."
"I could just be enjoying the weather," she said, tossing her hair behind her shoulder to keep May from chewing on it.
Scott didn't even deign that with a response. He just ... stared at her. Or seemed to, anyway, it was hard to tell exactly where he was looking.
MJ frowned, staring at him. "...What."
"You're a bad liar."
She laughed helplessly, kissing the top of her daughter's head. "Scott, I spend all my time mourning my mother right now. I could be in the kitchen making a snack and I'd be mourning her, so... look, I just needed the time alone and it's quiet out here."
"There are ways that don't involve frostbite." Like Scott was one to talk, standing out in the snow and talking to a stone the way he had been. Tch. "Do yourself a favor and at least be warm. Come on. I'll walk you in." The last thing any of them needed was May or MJ getting sick and Peter getting spazzy about it. ....More spazzy.
MJ frowned, but after a few seconds she stood and cradled May close. She was probably getting cold, and that wasn't fair to her. "Fine," she mumbled, before looking back to him. "I take it you're out here 'talking a walk and enjoying the weather' too."
"You could call it that." If anyone knew how unhealthy it was, it was Scott Summers, after all. Scott walked to catch up with her, hardly in a hurry but not feeling comfortable leaving MJ outside. If she'd been alone, that was one thing, but May's parents tended to overreact when she got a sniffle. Best to avoid that problem before it came.
"You going to open up and talk? No? Don't expect me to if you're not going to," said MJ, glancing back at him with a sad smile. "You know, it's stupid. I just want to be alone----or alone with my daughter----and everyone's all up in my case, asking me questions about my mom or still hating me for what I said about mutants. I can't get any peace... and when I'm alone I wish I had someone to talk to and... then I do and I don't want them there. Like I wish Peter would stop looking at me the way he looks at me."
"There's nothing to talk about that isn't already all over the school," he reminded her. Scott's thing with Jean was no secret, but the more new people showed up, the less known it was, just because nobody talked about it. Only people who'd been around four or five years, maybe, would really remember Jean, anyway. She'd died before Peter had gotten his webs, if the timing was right. "Though I notice you're opening up and talking, anyway." He didn't offer any advice or solace. There wasn't much to give.
"Yeah, because I can't freaking shut up," said MJ, rubbing at her temples with her free hand. "God."
"You save me the trouble of asking." It came out before he'd really realized it.
May squirmed in her arms and it took all of her effort to keep holding her. "That's all I really have to say about it, Scott. I ... it's my mom, it's really raw right now, it hasn't totally hit me and yet I can't stop thinking about it, so I... I'm just in a messed-up place right now. That's all. You know how it is to lose someone..."
"I'd tell you it doesn't get any easier, but I've heard otherwise. ...Do you want me to...?" Scott offered a hand, motioning for May, who seemed to be giving her mother a hard time MJ didn't need.
"I don't----I really don't want to let go of her," said MJ, shushing May to no avail. Soon, May was whining, and within seconds she was wailing and sobbing and MJ closed her eyes tightly to keep from crying herself. "Shh... okay... okay, May----May, baby, it's okay... come on, now, what's the matter..." She shifted May, just in case she was crying just because she was uncomfortable. "Fuck..." A frustrated curse and she didn't bother censoring herself.
Scott's first reaction was to suggest getting Peter -- but that would just make MJ more upset, wouldn't it? "She might just be cold." Pulling off his own scarf, Scott offered it to Mary Jane. "Here."
MJ looked at Scott and took the scarf, trying to juggle both May and the scarf at the same time. "I----I can't do this," she mumbled to herself. "I can't do this on my own. I need my mom..." Whenever she had a parenting question she went to her mother. Her mother had been there with her through her pregnancy, had been there when May was born, had helped take care of her in the early months, and now she was gone and MJ was upset over losing the woman who raised her and scared about failing as a mother... She was lucky she wasn't heading for a complete breakdown. "I----god, Scott, I'm sorry, I----"
Scott moved in front of her, keeping MJ from walking forward and taking the scarf again. Settling it around May with stifling her, he spoke, bundling up the baby as he said, "People have an extraordinary ability to survive. Most of us here have lost parents and been lost because of it. But we managed. We survived. Mourn if you want to, I'm not saying you shouldn't. If anything, feel lucky you knew your mother for twenty-three years. That's longer than a lot of people around here. You're not as different from us as you think."
MJ wiped her eyes with her arm, sniffing. "You think I don't have the right to be upset?" She squinted at him, trying to decide whether or not she was offended----and leaning toward being pretty fucking offended.
"Don't put words in my mouth. I---hn." Scott sighed, a little aggravated. "Take strength in the fact that you're not the only one who's lost people. I happen to know that Xi'an lost her mother at thirteen in a much worse way than you did yours, and look at where she is now. Be upset, but at least feel ... comfort in knowing that life goes on and things get better."
"Much worse..." MJ scowled, her anger replacing her sorrow for the time being. "You know, that's----this is what I hate. People think they have the right to judge something and say it's better or worse or that you can feel better because you didn't lose your mom in such a horrible way----you know what? Screw that. My mom lived out the last months of her life in fear. She was alone, she was sick, and she was so cold that it killed her. You have no right to tell me that someone had a more horrible death so it somehow makes that okay. You have no right to ... to compare. I don't care what happened to Xi'an's mother! You know why? Because she wasn't my mother. Don't tell me I should feel better because her mom died in a worser way. I don't tell you to get the hell over this Jean woman because she died nobly and wasn't raped and murdered, do I?"
"To start with, Xi'an's mother was raped and murdered," Scott said mildly -- letting her get angry because it was better than being sad. "It's not okay. Your mother dying isn't okay, but you're so wrapped up in feeling alone here that you don't realize that you're not. People keep shoving their woes in your face because they're afraid you won't see that you're not alone otherwise. You're alone because you put yourself there. Mourn. Cry and scream and be livid; you deserve to be. But even I had someone I went to to deal with Jean's death. You isolate yourself from everyone, and then you complain because no one understands. Pick one, because people can't give you what you want if you keep changing it." It was probably the most Scott had ever talked to her, and perhaps he was baiting her. Maybe he was, letting himself be her soundboard. People needed to scream and rage, and MJ had yet to do that, to his knowledge, and Peter certainly wasn't going to provoke her. But a part of him ... a part of him was fed up with her attitude. Part of him agreed with Sally. Part of him genuinely wanted to get her to realize she wasn't alone and to stop acting like it because, damn it, it was getting on everyone's nerves.
MJ glowered at him, but something with the way he spoke to her really hit home as much as she didn't want to say it. She did isolate herself. She did feel like she was alone at the school because she was the only human and she had every reason to feel alone... while also ignoring the many ways where she was similar. Maybe she was desperate for the attention, or maybe she was in need of something to make her feel special instead of just one in a crowd, but ... well, hell, she didn't want everyone thinking she was a whiny bitch, either. And that made her want to cry, too.
God, she sucked. She sucked so hard.
May was still whining but she wasn't out and out sobbing, and MJ turned her attention to her daughter because it meant she didn't have to look at Scott. "I really wish people would quit making me feel like shit," she mumbled. "You're all really good at that." There was just enough humor in it that it was clear she was almost being friendly and pleasantly self-deprecating.
"Just open your eyes sometime. Even I manage that, and I see all in red." Shaking his head, Scott shoved his hands into his pockets, more affected by the conversation than he felt comfortable with. He sighed, turning and walking ahead of her. "Don't worry about the scarf. I'll remind you to give it back when I remember you have it." It was as good as a sign that the conversation was over as any. The last thing he needed was to go on a Jean tirade, and he was too close to that for comfort.
MJ blinked a little, startled that Scott was deeming the conversation over and walking off. People didn't do that, and she was feeling pretty raw and unsettled. She hated being told that her situation wasn't a big deal, then that she was allowed to feel like it was a big deal, then told to quit whining, then told ... God! No matter what she did, it was messed up in some way. She couldn't win.
"...Thanks?" She responded to the scarf comment, but she was really torn between apologizing to him and ripping him a new one. Honestly, he'd left her so confused that she didn't know what to do.
Scott didn't give advice. He had the answers (or, rather, people had told him the right once), and then he had his way of living, which was, unfortunately, completely the opposite of what the right way to do this was at worse. He wasn't sociable, he wasn't good with people. Scott was the Good Guy (or had been, forever ago), but that didn't make him more able to cope or comfort. Fights he could handle, but Mary Jane wasn't going to fight him. And what was the point, really?