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They stood beneath the soft, filtered light of the mansion's gardens, the sun beginning to sink beneath the horizon. Evening warmth lingered in the air and soft wind brushed the perfumes of various flora across the area, but it was the heat between the institute's two headmasters, unspoken and fierce, that cast the shadows of a fire not yet fully kindled. Scott shifted his stance, the slight creak of his shoes breaking the silence. His ruby quartz glasses, always an ever-present shield, hid the depths of his gaze, but Emma did not need to see his eyes to know the intensity of those irises upon her. She felt it, in every measured breath, every trembling hand, every shuddering thought running on the edge of something more.
"Emma," he said softly, her name falling from his lips in the way it always did, as though he were tasting something incredibly sweet yet terribly forbidden. "Do you ever think about what things would have been like, if you'd been here from the start? With us, with me?"
She took a breath in, slow, almost distant, weighing the query delicately in her mind. Her glacier blue eyes, so often cold and calculating, softened in the glow of twilight. Then her gaze shifted up to him and there was a moment; a brief flutter of her eyelashes, a glimpse of vulnerability where doubt tugged at her, but she did not indulge it. After all, what was doubt to her?
But she could indulge him; as she so often did.
"Sometimes," she admitted. "But only sometimes, darling. The rest of the time... Everything has unfolded as it should." A smirk played across her lips then, a glint of humor in her as she pressed against him. "But do continue your thought. Do you find this hypothetical so endlessly fascinating, my love?"
Scott broke into a sheepish grin at both the question and the contact, one of those rare smiles that seemed to light him from within, purer than fire and accompanied by a cloying pull of warmth that Emma couldn’t help but sink further into. "I don't know, Em. It's like a brainteaser, sometimes I just think about it to keep myself busy," he confessed, and his voice had that overly proper boyish, bashfully apologetic tone she had first found ridiculous and could no longer live without. "Sometimes I just like thinking about it. Thinking about you, here with me, all those years ago. What it would be like if we had been on the same team from the start. I like to think that we would catch each other's attention. That we would be…us sooner."
Emma chuckled then, a rich, silvery sound that curled into the space between them. "You think you would’ve had me then? Just like that, Scott Summers? I doubt it would have been as simple as you imagine. I do have a reputation you know; lovely but cold. Oh dearest, you would've had yourself in knots before orientation." Though her tone was as light as spun silk, the truth of it; of him, wove its way into her jest.
“And besides, a boy like you and a girl like me?" She continued with incredulous bemusement. "Even as we are now, we're skirting on quite the cliche; but to imagine such an adolescent infatuation." Her words dissolved into more laughter but there was a tenderness beneath them; just as there always was and they both knew it. He in note of her closeness wrapped an arm loose around her waist, but his eyes remained fixed on her face like she was a puzzle only he could solve.
"I can see it." He intoned, his voice threading with an intensity that tugged at her very center. "You and I, together. Cliche as it might seem on the outside, we work, we compliment each other; always have." His free hand found hers, fingers brushing lightly and Emma did not pull away.
"It would have been torture for me, I'm sure. You're good at that, keeping me looking; wanting. All that time...All that time, I would have been obsessed with you, wooed you for years in every way possible. And when we graduated from Xavier’s, I would have been on my knees begging you to marry me that same day. Hell, maybe the same hour. Depends on how brave I'm feeling and how stupid I plan to look."
Something girlish buried deep within her stirred and though she rolled her eyes playfully, she couldn’t quite shake the electric thrum of delight that had spread through her at his declaration. "Is that so, Scott dear? You would have rushed me down the aisle?"
"Absolutely," he replied, his gaze unwavering. He leaned in, their foreheads nearly touching, as though the contact between them would spark an explosion, a wildfire they might never contain. "You know what I'm like when I want something. You know how much I would have wanted you. How much I would’ve chased you. Every day, those little glimpses of you across the halls, during missions, training sessions. God, It wouldn't have been enough. We could dance around each other all day, but at the end of it all I would be yours and I would have followed you anywhere, Emma."
Her breath caught at his ardor, the intensity of his conviction, and she gazed into those dark eyes that reflected so much more than she ever thought she deserved. Emma found herself softened by the fondness in his stance, the absolute belief in his words. And he did believe it, didn't he? With all that noble and infuriatingly tender heart of his. Scott Summers believed that they would have been highschool sweethearts; fated lovers, whether in this life or another, for better or for worse. The thought swept over her like a tidal wave, wild and intoxicating yet terrifying and disarming all the same.
"And I suppose you imagine this version of me would have found your chivalrous acts charming, hmm?" she asked, her tone coy but cleaving, dancing on the edge of mockery but never quite dipping into it. "You would be the golden boy, my daring leader, always doing the right thing. And I? Your devilish damsel, defying your orders and out to entertain myself." Her lips crested into a wicked smile. "I like to think I’d have played with you, just a little. Just to keep you on your toes, darling.
Scott’s smile deepened, a slow burn of realization flickering across his face. "God Em, you would have driven me insane," he admitted, his voice a rough whisper filled with something breathless and yearning. "And I would’ve adored every second of it." He kissed the corner of her lips, barely brushing their mouths together before pulling away just enough to look into her eyes.
She let out a soft sound, a light sigh somewhere between amusement and want as she fought the need to chase his mouth with her own. "I know you would have," she agreed, fingers tracing up the broad planes of his chest as she spoke. "But even then, Scott. My darling Scott, I would have tested you; every ounce of your discipline. I wasn’t the obedient type and I doubt I would have changed that for you. I’d push, provoke; challenge you."
Scott nodded, his head dipping so that the tip of his nose brushed hers. “I would’ve loved it," he insisted, flush spreading across his cheeks like a secret between only them. "You would've kept me sharp. Kept me balanced. I would have called you my 'Danger Girl,' with how you were always pushing my buttons; making me work for every moment with you."
She narrowed her eyes, scrutinizing him with a cloying impish gleam. "Danger Girl, huh?"
Scott chuckled, and the sound set her mind alight in colors she didn’t often acknowledge. "Yeah,” he breathed. “That's exactly what you would’ve been and you know it. Just like you are now. Always daring me to keep up, always ahead of the curve, always a little smarter, a little colder, but everything I need. And I would have loved you for it. Even if you were distant sometimes. Even when you might vanish into yourself. I’d love it all.”
"You’re more hopeless than I thought," Emma mused, charmed despite herself. "Was your impulse for sentimentality always this strong, or has this inquiry brought out an even more saccharine side in you?"
"Maybe it has." Scott’s voice had lowered, dipping into that intimate rasp that always made her want to close her eyes, if just to let it wash over her more fully. "Maybe it doesn't matter at all, all that matters is I know you would’ve seen the depth of what I feel. I know I wouldn't have tried to hide it. And I know when you finally said yes, when you finally let yourself feel it too, I would be waiting and I wouldn’t have let you go. Not for anything." He squeezed her hand, warm, steady. “You would have been my girl."
His words hit Emma square in the heart, a place she had long protected, long built barriers around, no matter what anyone said. But Scott had this way. A way of breaking through, of rendering her diamond shields into fragile glass and getting through to her not with shattering force; but with unrelenting, inexhaustible devotion, and earnestness.
Emma let the silence stretch; not uncomfortable, but rich with the thrill of possibility, like a page waiting to be turned, hearts waiting to beat. "I would’ve said yes, you know," she whispered, the soft confession drifting through the quiet. "Eventually. Maybe not the first time. I was never that easy, not back then, not now. You could have asked me ten or ten-thousand times, and I would have made you chase me that many more."
"But you would have said yes," Scott pressed glee lacing his voice and his eyes shining with triumph under his Ruby quartz glasses as his face split into that foolish grin she adored.
"I would have said yes," Emma conceded with a smile of her own, exhaling softly, her hand turning in his, fingers tangling together. She looked back up to him, a smile curving her perfectly kissable lips, but her eyes…it was always her eyes that told him the most important truths. Her achingly blue eyes filled with coy amusement and pleasure but deeper in those ice cold azur pools was honest affection; something pure and exposed and his. "Now tell me more," she whispered, just as softly, "Tell me how else it would have been? This version of us. The one I missed."
“You’d be the enemy of my focus, always taunting and toying with me. You would’ve made me chase you all over the Mansion.” he said, his hands trailing her hips; drawing patterns along her skin as they swayed. “We’d sneak kisses behind the library shelves, in empty classrooms, or in the middle of drills. You have no idea how much restraint it would've taken not to keep you close to me during missions. I’d have found every excuse to steal moments with you. Hell, I probably would fail some of my courses, just trying not to get distracted by you."
Emma hummed softly; low and pleased, a sensual sound thrumming deep in her chest as she nuzzled into his neck. "So disciplined, but so easily corrupted. I would have enjoyed our little games, Summers."
His responding grin was a glowing thing, heating her from the inside out, and for a moment, just for a blissful, ardent moment, they were lost in that imaginary past. A world where she was young and reckless with him, where they shared stolen moments and daring romance. Summers and Frost running wild together in the sprawling estate of Xavier’s School under moon and sun alike.
"You would have loved it."