Family Ties

Family Ties Chapter Sixteen (NC-17)




Family Ties Chapter Sixteen (NC-17)

Disclaimers Apply

 

A/N Goddess Foxfeather, Queen of Mad Plotbunnies, BUSIEST
WOMAN ALIVE ™ and Prophetic Muse, it’s never too early for Halloween
decorations! InterNutter, TC and
Maxwell Pink are extra lovely for archiving.
J ProPhile, have the belly dancing muses
arrived yet? Jubilee, Ramsey and Tex
are also lovely for being helpful and all…more duck hugs for you! (The ducks are weird…don’t ask…) Readers/Reviewers: Mille grazie! J The platypi do a happy shuffle in your
honor…

 

 

 

Jean
blinked slowly in the dawning light, at first confused as to her surroundings
but quickly coming to reality when she spotted a picture of Kitty and Kurt on
the dock to the lake, position so that the sleeper would see it when they first
awoke. Typical Kitty, Jean
sighed inwardly, but forced glum thoughts to the back of her mind as she
struggled from beneath the all-too-comfortable sheets and blanket and trudged
to the shower. Kitty’s half-bath was
painfully neat but bore the marks of a packrat all the same—stacked bags of
cotton balls, several boxes of feminine hygiene products (“just in case,” she
could hear Kitty intoning mentally), and all sorts of scented things that Jean
did not even want to guess at the cost of—all neatly organized in the cabinets
under the sink and the narrow cupboard next to the shower, which also bore a
stack of towels and washcloths in Kitty’s favorite pink and purple. She felt a momentary pang of pity for Kurt
and Logan’s acute senses, seeing the array of perfumes and bath products
stretched across the counter, a veritable rainbow of hues and tones that made
Jean feel as if Kitty probably selected items for their attractive packaging
rather than their actual scent. An
additional cringe worked it’s way across her shoulders when she saw that many
of the items were very expensive, organic and, as most proclaimed “cruelty
free” things. I have got to explain
to Kitty she doesn’t have to get these high end things, that she can get stuff
just as safe in town…eh. It’s her
money. If she wants to spend it like
that, so be it… Jean allowed her mind to become a near blank for the half
hour she spent under the hot stream of the shower, almost but not quite
admitting that maybe Kitty did know what she was doing when she bought
cranberry vanilla scented body wash.

Once dry
and relatively cooled off, Jean finally allowed herself to think on Scott. He didn’t come for me last night…he
didn’t even try to stop me leaving the house… It became a litany in her mind for several minutes, a repeating
loop that drove her to the brink of tears, wishing that he had even tried to
stop her, just said her name or even “hey,” but, as he did not, it made the
litany sting and burn, made her eyes water in unshed tears. She found herself wishing for one insane
moment that she had told Scott no, she would quit her job before she even
really started it, just so he would not feel so bad about staying in
school. With a heavy sigh, she pushed
her damp hair back from her face and closed her eyes, seeking someone to talk
to, someone to maybe help her a little.
She skipped over the Professor, Beast and Forge, skimmed over Rahne and
Jame and most of the others in the mansion.
Finally, she settled on one, a somewhat dubious choice but she had a strong
feeling that they would be the best person to talk to just then.

 

“Still got
a shadow, I see.” Scott nodded in the
direction of Lilly, who stood a discreet distance away, still well within
eavesdropping range but doing her best to blend in to the wall.

“Shadow,
stalker, whatever,” Jubilee sighed. She
peered at the unidentified piece of car that Scott was wiping oil from and
quirked a brow. “What’s that?”

“Carburetor
.”

“What’s it
do?”

“Makes you
ask questions…” He set it down and
leaned against the work bench with a wary glance at Lilly. “What’s the matter?”
“Other than the obvious?” Jubilee did Scott one better. Rather than a wary glance, she offered Lilly
a universally rude gesture, which the other girl ignored with littlee the than
a twitch of her eyebrow. “Long story,
but do you know what Remy’s up to lately?”

“Uh…” He glanced around desperately as if
expecting someone to swoop down and save him from this line of
questioning. Finding no savior, he
sighed. “Jubilee, it’s not my place to
say…”

“Scott
Summers, tell me the truth…Is Remy screwing around on me?”

Scott
blinked at this sudden show of mistrust.
He noted Lilly smirking faintly, as if pleased her new-found cousin was
undergoing some personal crisis. “No,
he isn’t.”

“How do you
know?” Jubilee demanded, leaning close enough for him to smell her usual
lemon-orange-vanilla scent that defied explanation since she never wore
perfume. “Tell me!” she said hotly.

“Well, he
told me he wasn’t. I asked him the
other day when he started….started. And
he said he wasn’t.”

“Started
what?” Jubilee asked in a low voice, obviously tense and not a little scared.

“I can’t
say,” Scott sighed, shooting Lilly another glance. “Jubilee, don’t be so worried.
Remy isn’t up to anything bad…”

She slammed
her hand down, open-palmed, against the bench to one side of Scott, making the
tools jump with her anger. “You can’t
tell me that for sure!” she said, on the verge of shouting. “You have no idea! Remy could’ve been lying to you, too!”

“Jubilee!”
he called after her in exasperation as she stalked from the garage. “Damn it…”

“Is she
always so hot tempered?” Lilly asked blandly.


Scott very
nearly jumped in surprise. He had
forgotten, one one moment, that she was standing there. Looks like she did her job after all… “Jubilee’s under a lot of stress right now,”
he said, evading a true answer.

“Hmm. And this Remy…who is he to her?”
Scott felt pinned. Lilly was flaying him with eyes far too old
for her alleged age of eighteen, peeling away layers of secrets that he did not
want to divulge. She shifted closer,
obviously impatient for an answer that Scott was not ready to give. “Remy’s her boyfriend,” he said, feeling the
inadequacy of the word to explain the relationship between the Cajun and the
Chinese girl. “They’ve been together a
while now.”

“I
see. And do they engage in sexual
intercourse?”

“None of
your damned business,” Scott said sharply, turning his back to her and picking
up the carburetor again. “If you want
to know about Jubilee, ask her yourself.”

Lilly’s
laugh was like silver bells on a cold morning.
The sound ran down Scott’s spine like cold fingers as it faded in the
warm garage. “I have one more question
for you… What did your Professor Xavier
mean when he said Tabby had not used her powers yet?”

Scott
nearly dropped the carburetor. “What?”

“When we
were all assembled in the library upstairs, he said that Tabby had not used her
powers yet so he could not use Cerebro to find her. What did he mean by that?”

Scott took
a long, shaky breath, stories spinning and unraveling in his head in an
instant. Seizing on one and praying the
Professor would add this to the list of things to forgive him for, he said,
“Well, Professor Xavier sometimes has these…moments…” He shrugged. “He’s
getting up there in years and sometimes he slips into his own reality.”

“So you
mean to tell me that a mental defective runs this school?” she asked
sternly. “My grandmother will be most
interested to know this, as will her lawyer.”

“No,” he
said hastily, leaping in front of her before she could exit the garage. “He’s the figurehead, the one who fronts the
money. Logan and Ororo and…a few other
teachers who’re off for summer break right now…they’re the ones who run the
school!” Lilly merely smiled and nodded
faintly, the manner of someone hearing a lie and knowing it for what it
was. She slid past him and disappeared
around the side of the garage, in the direction that Jubilee had vanished. “Shit,” Scott hissed under his breath, throwing
his oily rag down and stalking into the house, heading straight for one of the
last people he wanted to see right now, praying the Professor was in his study.

 

“Jean,
Scott ain’t tinkin’ right, chere,” Remy sighed, stuffing a binder into an
already overstuffed backpack. “Look, I
really wanna help ya mais I got an appointmen’ in town in half an hour…”

Jean
nodded. “I know…Scott told me before…”

Remy
sighed, not exactly surprised but somewhat embarrassed. “Jubilee still don’ know, right?”

“Not as far
as I know.” Jean brightened
slightly. “Let me come with you. We can talk in the car and while you’re
doing your thing, I’ll wander around the shopping street and we can meet when
you’re done.”

Remy closed
his eyes briefly, llinlling to let anyone any closer to his near secret than he
had to, but in the end he nodded, smiling weakly. “D’accord. Cynthia be de
one in charge aujourd’huis. She know
better ‘n ta call me here.”

Jean smiled
briefly. “Jubilee’s just about come
undone about whoever that girl was…Mandy?”

Remy
shrugged, not offering any more information about his mysterious caller. “Jubilee, I love her, mais sometime she get
a bit immature…”

“Remy,
she’s seventeen. It’s in her job
description. Besides, it’s not like you’re a model of maturity either, mister!”

“Jus’
whaddya mean by dat, Red?”

“Red?” Jean arched a brow and followed him out of
the room towards the stairs. “Let me
see…how about the time you froze Todd’s underwear because he drank your beer? Was that mature?”

“It weren’t
my beer. It were Logan’s. I just had
dibs on it since Logan seemed ta forget ‘bout it…” He grinned at the memory.
“Todd jus’ bout flipped, eh?”

They passed
through the seemingly empty foyer and into the rec room, still going over
Remy’s recent list of immature actions, according to Jean at any rate, not even
noticing their shadow.



“Jubilation,”
Lilly said softly but with venom in her tone.

“Shhh!” She leaned the the balcony, trying to hear
Jean and Remy as they moved towards the kitchen. “Damn it!” She pushed
past Lilly and skipped down the stairs almost silently, only to draw up with a
faint yelp when her ersatz cousin grabbed her elbow in passing. “Leggo!”

“We need to
have a discussion about your behaviors here…”

Jubilee
rolled her eyes. “Fuck off, Lilly. I don’t know you from Adam’s ox I’m I’m not
gonna start spilling secrets now.” She
wrenched free from the grasp which held her and headed towards the rec room,
Lilly hot on her heels. “If you’re
going to follow me, you have to learn to be more quiet. Your shoes made noise.”

“My intent
is not to be your shadow. I am your
watcher.”

“How
Buffy-esque.” Jubilee turned and rocked
back on her heels, regarding Lilly with clear dislike. “Tell you what, I’ll tell you one thing…one…if
you promise to shut the fuck up while I run my little errand.”

“I do not
make deals.”

Jubilee
grinned ferally. “Sorry I gotta do this
then…” Lilly barely had time to cry out
in surprise as a brilliant flash of light blinded her temporarily. Jubilee was already running before the
sparks even cleared from the air. She reached the garage as Jean and Remy
cleared the driveway. Shit…which
car…ah! Scott’s little red
convertible sat, veritably begging her to take it for a spin. She made quick work of the wireneatneath the
dash, hotwiring it before the gate to the grounds slid closed. This had better be worth the fuckin’
trouble, Remy…