Title: Father of the Year
Paring: platonic Father!Logan Howlett (Wolverine) X Child!Reader
Warnings: heavy angst, sadness, father/daughter fluffy happiness too.
Spoilers: not really, just know a bit about Wolverine first
Author's Note: I based Young!Wolverine in this from the age of Troye Sivan when he was in the movie (14). Also, thank you for the 5K!
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When most parents find out they are about to become one, they usually cry. Logan Howlett, the amazing Wolverine, a teacher at Xavier's School for Gifted Youngsters (who even came up with that dumb name?), a tough man, cried. He cried hard, and within the brief window of ten minutes, he had wiped the salty remains from his cheeks, and got on with the day. It's what he got for having a three month stand with the busty redhead from upstate, and it was probably the worst thing he could think of.
Ten years later, and Logan hadn't had any sleep. You tend not to when every second you are living in a nightmare. From the first days his little ________ arrived in a bundle in her bassinet from the agency officials (a couple of men who looked like they had BB guns up their asses), Logan was undoubtedly terrified. Not of the prospect that he would be a terrible father (he would), or that he knew nothing of parenting (true), but that maybe all those lectures Charles "Wheels" Xavier gave about mutant genetics were true.
And his little girl would be something like him.
He watched her grow; from those first steps, first day at school (the kindergarten teacher insisted if he did not leave, he would be forced to call security on him); the first time you brought a friend over, and ended up playing Jenga on carpet until their parent came. All the while, he never really told you much about what you were.
You knew what everyone else was; there was no explanation as to why else Christmas cards arrived from the impressive lecturer Professor Xavier. You knew Ororoe could make any sort of weather happen, and that poor Scott had to always wear glasses because his eyes were so powerful. The students who you'd run into (sneaking in on slow afternoons at your own school to hang out with your father) became the brothers and sisters you'd never had.
Logan liked it. You were sheltered, comfortable, but not too sheltered, and there was nothing wrong. Hell, half the mutants in the world got their genetics unlocked before puberty, and his little girl ... the only thing you'd unlocked had been his liquor cabinet to try Jim Beam and Johnny Walker.
Logan was convinced. You had to be normal; a civilian, genetically human being produced by the most notorious mutant and the most scrumptious fling seventeen years ago.
Until now.
"Dad...!"
Logan sat upright in the bed. It hadn't been a long time since you had called out in the night for him; those days passed when you were nine, and finally managed to stay the night in your own bed through a storm. But, your voice; it didn't sound right. What if it was a nightmare? It could be a nightmare. He'd check in a m-
"Dad, what's happening to me?"
He was at your doorway, breaking through in seconds. A good thing he insisted in living in a small apartment, not the big house Xavier proposed to pay for. But as Logan entered, his breath was held, his nose was catching a scent he hadn't smelt this much of since his last mission, his eyes -
"Dad, what's happening to me?" you repeat.
You hold your hands to your face, seeing them at both angles. From the knuckles of your fists, are three protuberances that Logan has not seen since his trip back in time to funky old 1973. You have claws, just like his own, his natural, mutated claws. Bone claws. And they've torn your duvet and the first breakthrough to the surface has left blood spotted all over, like a poorly executed murder.
His face pales. "_______, baby," he whispers. He still sounds half-asleep, but there's something you notice about him that you catch onto. Fear. Sadness? "It's okay, it's going to be okay."
You sob. "It hurts, Dad. I thought -,"
Logan shakes his head. "You're special - special, ________. It will hurt for the first few times," his eyes are sad, and hands reach for yours. "But that's how it is, baby." His fingers graze your claws, and eyes wide and frightened, you move them from his reach.
"Don't touch me, Dad! I'm - I'm a freak," your whisper sounds like a spooked animal, frightened and hysterical. "I could hurt you."
Hearing those words coming from your mouth, the same mouth he watched learn the alphabet and the names of all the presidents of the united states, an innocent mouth, Logan whimpers. Like a wounded animal. "______, let me help you. It's okay, I've had worse injuries than this. Now, can you retract them?"
You look at your father with a confused air. "Retract? I - I don't," you take a deep breath, and focus on the three bone protuberances that extent from both of your hands. Tears form around your pretty eyes again, "I don't know how."
Slowly, Logan settles himself on the bed. It dips under his weight, and that of the goddamn adamantium inside. Equally as paced, he reaches for his daughter's hands, your hands. They are so small compared to his; he has hands of a fighter, toughened by the years he has spent dedicating his life to his passions and his team, toughened by his existence in a cruel, unforgiving world. Your hands are smooth under his touch; there are no callouses (unless he includes the toughened skin of your fingers from years of guitar practice), no scars and scratches, no marks but a smattering of freckles that decorate like half-formed constellations. The claws are small, too; Logan knows you will grow into them, or them to you, and you will be trained to control them in your everyday life.
"Remember the lake cabin?" he asks you. Carefully, his hands massage around the tips of your knuckles. "The one in Canada I'd take you to every summer holiday."
You tremble, taking a deep breath. "It would still be cold overnight, and we'd fall asleep reading, Dad." you nod. "I miss that place. Why don't we go there anymore?"
"Haven't had enough time, I guess," he replies. "Want to go back this year?"
"Hell yeah," you whisper.
Logan smiles. "There's my girl," he leans forward, and plants a kiss to your forehead. He releases your hands, and places them back on the duvet. "See? No need to panic."
You glance from your father, to your claw-less hands. "They're gone," you breathe. "How - thank you, Dad." A beat passes between the two of you, and then, "How old were you when you got your claws, Dad?" you wonder.
He frowns. It was a long time ago; years and years, that spanned longer than he'd ever recalled in recent time. "I was a young fellow, ______. I couldn't have been much older than fourteen." he replied. Logan didn't like to think about back then, especially back when his brother had been his brother, and he hadn't been drunk on adrenaline and cheap whiskey.
You nod, and gesture to the bed. "Well, I'll have to throw these sheets away ..." you whisper.
He shrugs. "Sheets are sheets. I'll take you out for more in the morning." he promises, and patting your shoulder, Logan rises from the bed. "Take a shower, and feel better, and by the time you get back, it'll be okay. Okay, bub?" he asks you.
"You're the best dad ever," you grin, and rising for your shower, you kiss his cheek. "Thanks for everything, Dad."
Logan nods. "Right back at you, kid," he smirks.
Once you're out of the room, Logan strips the bed, gathering the torn the sheets into a ball and pitches it into the bin by the desk. For a moment, he takes a breath, and turns to the hallway, where the laundry cupboard hoards the spare bedding. From here, he can hear the shower door close in the bathroom down the hall, and the water cascade onto the tiles he needs to re-grout this weekend. Grabbing what he needs, Logan makes it back into your room, and begins making the bed look as good as new.
Upon the end of his job, Logan takes a deep breath. His mind tracks back to your mother, and the way her eyes sparkled just the same as yours do. He thinks of how you're just as stubborn as his brother, even if you don't know it and have only met Uncle Vic three times in the last five years. He thinks of you driving his truck, getting better and better at it, how you're nearly off a provisional licence.
And just like seventeen years ago, when he heard he was a father, when he first held you, tiny in his arms, when he watched you through the glass in the ICU after a bad bout of pneumonia - Logan Howlett cried.
The tears rolled from his eyes like a monsoon out of season, a gutter cluttered with gunk and pouring over the balcony in torrents. He cried until he couldn't breathe, until his head swam. He cried until he heard the water switch off in the shower, and that's when Logan wiped his eyes.
Other times in his life, he'd cried because he lost his freedom to roam. He'd lost his ability to care about roaming around. He felt like he could loose the one thing that meant the world and more to him.
He let himself out from your room, and covering himself in his sheets, Logan's mind raced as why he had broken down into tears like a princess refused a new tiara. He thought maybe it was because he had seen a revulsion in your eyes, at your own body. Or that there was no way to explain to the nosy neighbors about the bloody and torn sheets in next week's trash.
But as much as he wanted to believe they were why he cried, he couldn't quite convince himself.
You see, Logan Howlett, the impressive and terrifying Wolverine, cried for one reason, and one reason only: that you were not like all the other kids in America. That his DNA had ruined your chances at blending in with society. From his bed, Logan heard you settle in to your new sheets, and slowly, as time ticked by after a while, he heard you finally fall asleep.
His mind raced. You were a mutant. His precious daughter. Like him.
And maybe, just maybe, if he could protect you from all the hatred in the world, it would be okay.