Most of the students didn't get mail, which made it an even bigger deal when the letters started coming.

She was with Storm when the first one came, just a thin little piece of paper taped up with her name scrawled across the front in a nearly illegible hand.

Her name. Marie.

She looked at it, looked at Storm, and shoved the letter in her pocket without saying a word.

She didn't open it until later--far later--locked in the bathroom of the small suite she shared with Jubilee and Kitty. Her fingers trembled so badly she ripped the paper twice before she managed to get it open.

A small, dried out flower drifted to the ground as she stared down at the paper, wrinkled and stained from where the flower had been pressed. There wasn't much there, a few lines and a scrawl that could have been a signature.

It didn't matter. She read the words over and over, not even noticing when tears spilled over her eyes to fall on the paper, blurring the ink.

One trembling hand lifted to her mouth, and she grabbed her glove in her teeth and pulled it off, clutching the letter in one hand, feeling the grainy paper against her skin.

He'd written.

And all she could do as she sat trembling, ignoring the pounding on the door as Kitty demanded to know if she was alright--all she could do was sit and hope.

Let him write again.

And he did. The second and third were like the first, scraps of paper with a two or three sentences scrawled on them, always some strange little flower pressed between the paper and always the closing line, 'Miss you, darling. L'

She started waiting for the mail as the letters got longer and the flowers pressed inside more exotic. It seemed he was traveling the world, and it hurt sometimes to know he was running so far to get away--but not enough to make her forget that he was writing.

A few months later, the first package arrived.