The Longest Day:
Remember

On Love and Lust at Mutant High #29

by jenn (jenn@igg-tx.net)

Author Notes:
I'm gonna pretend EVERYONE understands the strange fascination humankind has with bad fast food. And that everyone has microwaved a Taco Bell taco at least once and mindlessly eaten it despite the taste.
Archiving: List and by permission

*****

From the roof of the old apartment building, he could see the Statue of Liberty.

Not particularly significant, except it was a nice view. The new torch was up, as if nothing untoward had ever happened there. He stared at it for a moment, trying to imagine what Rogue had never quite described--a machine, Eric Lensherr, Rogue, and pure power.

Bobby had told him, but he'd watched that power roll toward New York personally. It wasn't quite the same.

Bobby had taken him up there sometime after his fourteen birthday--not for any occasion, just one of those restless moments where there was nothing to do and free time to do nothing with. They'd walked up the many stairs, joking how PE was definitely keeping them in shape. Bobby had dropped ice cream on his shirt (where it remained frozen) and St. John had twisted his ankle on the way down and had to be carried out.

Probably should have suspected then that Bobby would always want to catch him when he stumbled. If the silence he'd been treated to when he emerged from his Carol-baiting was any indication, it might be awhile before Bobby forgot.

"Where's the salsa, babe? Never mind." Taco Bell. Jubilee's idea of good Mexican food. Strangely addictive in it's own bastardization-of-actual-food way. Greasy and never quite enough cheese, and the shell was always soggy on the bottom, but like McDonald's hamburgers, it was that part of pop culture you just couldn't avoid. And it helped. Weird but true, there was nothing quite like having fluorescent orange grease trickling down your chin and slicking the roof of your mouth to put life in perspective.

"Great view, Jubes." Chew, chew, chew--chew a little more. Soggy shell sometimes acted like a cross between gum and latex gloves. St. John remembered when he and Bobby and Rasputin would go stock up on junk food and save leftover tacos in the fridge. Bobby liked to zap his in the microwave--St. John did his the mutant way, just heated it up. Reheated day-old post-refrigeration tacos were even worse--but still, comfort food. Orange grease and hot wilted imitation lettuce and red lumps that vaguely resembled tomatoes or the product of nuclear warfare. Comfort.

"I like it." She was picking over her quesadillas. "It's pretty quiet up here." From her easy familiarity with getting up here, she must have come by before. She leaned over, short dark hair covering her cheekbones briefly as she rummaged for the hot sauce. Found it with a small grunt of triumph and he watched her put the packet between her teeth to tear off a corner.

"Tops of apartments tend to be relatively deserted, babe." Couldn't help the sarcasm, and he felt a firm cuff to his arm as she shifted to find the sour cream they'd picked up at the grocery store. St. John reached down, absently pulling off his boots and socks, bringing his bare feet down on the rough weave of the blanket Jubilee had spread. The night was cool, but not uncomfortably so. One of those rare, perfect nights

She didn't ask him anything and that had to mean something. Let him eat his soggy tacos and onion-stuffed burritos and drink his coke without hindrance. Fine, long fingers splayed inches from his.

It could have been any night in his life, any dark roof, any time. Eyes fixed on the glowing torch, he heard himself speak.

"Do you miss your parents?" he asked softly, and her head jerked around, searching his face. Then her eyes widened, dark in the pale almost-blur of her face. She understood.

"Sometimes. A lot." The barest tremble of soft lips before her eyes went down to stare into her lap, at the wrappers spread across one leg and trailing onto the blanket. She'd never been the neatest person he'd ever met. "Not something I think about every day." Or, like, ever. He knew the history, but in the same way any of them knew--rumor, whispers, small, insignificant comments dropped into conversation. "Carol was your family, wasn't she?"

It would never stop touching him, how truly good Jubilee was at this. How she knew. And how very badly he wanted to tell her this--just this, so she'd understand.

"Close as they come." He hoped his voice was casual. "My parents didn't want me--at least she did." He breathed out sharply. "I hated her, Jubes."

"Yeah." Her hand on his shoulder, and he lifted his arm to let her lay down against him. Dark hair brushing under his chin, the light scent of apple and vanilla clinging to the strands.

"Tell me about her, Johnny."

It was still there, all of it--old memories, things he didn't like to believe could still be so vivid.

"She gave me my name. Pyro."

--in an alley, she'd startled him and he'd thrown fire--invulnerability though, kept her safe, and she'd started, frowning, then a slow smile. {--"Hey little pyro. Whatcha doin' here?"--}

It wasn't as hard as he'd thought.

"She handled all that stuff--job stuff--I just stayed at the apartment and slept and refueled--we did two or three jobs a week, but I wasn't very focused. I was--" he traced a random pattern in the air, frowning a little--"undisciplined. So I spent a lot of time trying to use it at all. When I got emotional--well, it wasn't a good idea to be around me." He felt rather than saw Jubilee's smile. "She fireproofed the place early on. To make it less likely I'd combust something."

--glancing around the tiny two room apartment she'd somehow rented despite her age and no credit history while she told him in no uncertain terms what would happen to him if he burned anything she liked.

--breaking his arm once when he lit her bed on fire. Compound fracture. Set by a backstreet doctor who'd lost his license. Dr. McCoy had noted the slight imperfection of the bone there. Only a long look but never a comment. He liked him for that.

Six weeks to heal. Six years to remember.

"Surprised you didn't take the place out with no control." Edges of amusement.

"Not very focused." he sighed, trying to think about a way to phrase it. "Just--it wasn't I could look at something and it'd go boom. Something well to the left but in my general line of sight would go firey on me." She laughed softly, as she was supposed to. "So big things were okay--nice large target. Little things were not."

A soft nod, brushing silky hair on his neck. He slid an arm around her, lightly stroking the dark head as she shifted closer.

"For about a year, we lived like that--she gave me food and clothes and I never left the apartment unless she took me herself. Showed me early on what would happen if I did--not a pleasant lesson." Not one he had any intention of sharing--even Bobby hadn't seen those scars. "But--it was home, you know? And--"

--he'd never been more alone in his life. Carol coming home brought him to the door, to be petted like a--like a fucking pet. With dinner, or a movie to watch, and he'd fall asleep curled all around her, needing the human contact he couldn't have otherwise, that he got when he pleased her--invulnerability made her safe from him if he lost control.

"It wasn't easy." A statement, not a question. He shook his head quickly.

"We did little crap, stuff that didn't get noticed too much. A fire there for insurance, a backstreet assassination--nothing really professional yet, she didn't have the skills or the contacts or the reputation and I didn't have the control. Mostly bully-work or running drugs, stuff where flying and strength were assets. And she was--well, you saw her. Small, blonde, looks like an advertisement for Young America, you know? You don't suspect her until she's already broken your neck. And I was barely twelve and scared to death--so anyone seeing me wouldn't think much of a kid in the corner. Get me too scared, unlike other kids, I might fricassee you."

Almost happened once. Carol had found him crying in a corner of their apartment and asked why he didn't finish the job and get rid of the fucker. What made him stop. Why the man only had second degree burns. {--"What the hell is you problem, Pyro? Anti-mutant bastard. Make the world a better place without him."--}

"Yeah." Soft.

"The last time--she said we got a big one. An abandoned apartment building downtown--nothing weird, just insurance money. It wasn't--it was clean, you know? Clean money, no one got hurt unless they came too close. And it wasn't a great part of town anyway."

He breathed out, the cooling night air even chillier against his skin and he felt Jubilee shift even closer--probably for the body heat factor. Or for the comfort. He wasn't sure which.

A night remarkably like this one, come to think of it.

"It was a clear night--working in rain is just suspicious on principle, and in general, being wet doesn't contribute toward good burning and--well, my control wasn't great. I'd drain myself out trying to keep it going. So she took me close enough to see what I was supposed to do and far enough away so we wouldn't be in any danger." Carol was sixteen and beautiful and those long fingers were wrapped around his shoulder, lips close to his ear. {--"Good, Pyro, baby. Light her up."--} "She told me and I did it."

He wondered how he'd explain how it felt--unlike those little fires he'd played with, shaped, changed, his little toys, this had been unbelievable--a rush of pure and unadulterated heat and pleasure that threw itself out of him with a longing so sharp it was almost pain. Consuming the roof of the building and he'd been utterly fascinated to watch it work, beginning the manipulations that would bring it down faster--then the sheer pleasure of shaping, making it into something. A dragon eating one window, a bird soaring before plummeting toward the back door. Circling it, running up and down in fine, straight lines as if he was drawing a tic-tac-toe board.

Into another window, out another, and something distracted him, something--

"Johnny?" Jubilee's voice was far away.

And *why* was he hearing something? Like screams, and he frowned when he pulled up the fire, saw something in a window--

A hot white flame had exploded upward and Pyro had almost collapsed from the rush of it--

"There were screams." His voice was hoarse, bitter. "I was too into playing with my little fire to hear them. Or care if I did hear."

"Oh Johnny."

--collapsed back into Carol, who supported him as if he weighed nothing.

{--"That's my boy. That's my little boy. You did good, baby. So good."--} Long, elegant fingers stroking back his hair, flying them home, sliding him into her bed and curling up against him, that first kiss, tasting of liquor and smoke and some secret Carol-taste that made him dizzy. Wrapped up in her arms, he fell asleep. Exhausted, so happy he'd finally pleased her.

"I saw it on the news when I woke up. The bodies--five of them, a homeless family shacked up on the third floor." Jubilee's hand closed over his and he shut his eyes. "Carol said not to worry 'bout it. They were saying it was suspicious, that mutants could be involved--and Carol said she found somewhere for us to go. Somewhere safe. She was in contact with the Brotherhood then, I guess. Had it ready."

"How much?"

"For the building? Ten grande of a two point five million dollar insurance claim. Carol was gypped." Sort of a bitter satisfaction in that.

"No." Softer. More careful. "How much to bring you to the Brotherhood?"

St. John stiffened, knew she felt it.

"Market value of one pyrokinetic is fifteen grande or so. Alive, healthy, ready for some serious indoctrination. I was all of those things."

She was sitting on her bed with the phone clutched in one hand and he'd felt her gaze across the room, grinning. He'd tried to breathe through the sudden fear. {"--We got someplace to go, baby. You're gonna like them.--"} Pulling him in to sleep beside her, fingers running down his arms and back. {--"My little Pyro, we got ourselves a hell of a meal ticket, you know. You're good, baby. So good."--}

"I'm sorry, Johnny. But--you were just a kid. What the hell makes you think you--"

"It wasn't about being a kid, Jubes. It was--was about--about how good it was. That I--" he stopped, taking a breath. "I can't, Jubes."

Couldn't talk about how little he'd cared about those deaths. How very, desperately little.

"You don't have to."

She shifted higher and he felt the stroke of her fingers across his cheek, knowing she felt the streaks of dampness that her thumb wiped away.

He didn't want to believe he'd cry for Carol.

"It's okay to love her too, Johnny. It's natural, normal."

You weren't supposed to love those who hurt you. There was nothing natural about that.

St. John shook his head and cradled Jubilee a little closer. Around them the night had grown a little cooler and he pulled up the edge of the blanket over her bare legs, tucking it around them, knocking over the bags to spill crumpled wrappers around them.

"I'm sorry, Jubes." He body was warm against him and somehow, they switched positions and his head was pressed against her shoulder, delicate fingers stroking his cheek. He shut his eyes tight, taking a long, deep breath.

"S'okay, babe." Delicate touches--long fingers sliding down his back and he felt his body shake. Like Carol. "I understand."