It wasn't the life that Jubilee had ever expected for herself. Go back five years and tell her younger self where she'd end up and she'd get laughed out of the timeline. Which would probably be kinda funny before she ceased to exist. She was a vampire with a baby and a roommate that made Jubilee's heart squish in all the ways that an undead heart really shouldn't squish. It was funny, in a tragic sort of way.
She perched on the edge of the kitchen table, watching Laura and Shogo through the partition to the living room floor. The boy tugged at Laura's hair while she read to him, and Jubilee felt that squish again.
This was her family. Ever since she'd become this monster, she'd longed for it. To have a family again. Shogo had been a gift, unexpected but very welcome. Laura coming back into her life had been much the same. She was just terrified of losing it all over again.
Something crunched in her ear, and she turned her head to see Gabby perched next to her with a bag of chips. "So when are you gonna tell her?"
"What?"
Gabby rolled her eyes and nudged Jubilee with her shoulder. "Come on, you stare at her like a lost puppy, it's cute and also pathetic."
"Have I told you lately you're annoying?"
"You love me," Gabby replied, wriggling her shoulders before tossing another chip in her mouth. "And you think I'm awesome."
"Yeah, you're totally awesome and totally annoying." Jubilee shoved Gabby before returning her attention to her son and friend. "There's nothing to tell her."
"You forget, I read minds. That's actually my super power."
Jubilee turned her head towards Gabby. "What am I thinking right now, Gabs?"
"Things that I never want to think about my sister doing with anyone in the history of ever." Grinning at her, Gabby shoved her back. "What if she felt the same?"
"I'm a vampire."
"And? Some people are into that. I mean the biting thing might be kind of-"
"Gabby!"
"You're blushing."
"That's physically impossible, yo."
Gabby sighed dramatically, "Obviously I gotta do something about this or you'll just make Jonathan sad. He's really invested in you two, you know."
She slipped off the table and walked into the other room. "Okay Shogo! You're all done listening to that boring story, Aunty Gabby to the rescue!"
Laura looked incredibly offended. "Matilda is not boring."
Shogo giggled as Gabby lifted him up. She spun him around like an airplane. "Go zoom, Shogo. Zoom!"
Jubilee had to admit that Zoom was more entertaining than a book. "She almost had him asleep."
"Nah, I'll wear him out." Gabby lifted Shogo over her head, "Come on, lets go zoom and let the adults talk!"
She zoomed him out of the room. Jonathan the Wolverine got up and plodded after her and Jubilee was almost certain he gave her a look on his way out. Really? Even the animal was conspiring against her?
Jubilee looked over at Laura, who watched her sister leave the room with a content expression on her face. Laura really loved her sister, and Jubilee wondered what it would be like to suddenly find family she didn't know she had.
If she stopped and thought about it, she'd realize that family could be a vampire, a pair of clones, a baby, and a real life wolverine.
"Let the adults talk?" Laura asked, getting to her feet and stretching her legs. She gave Jubilee a dubious look. "What do we need to talk about?"
Leaning against the couch, Jubilee just shrugged. "I don't know, I think Gabby is just being Gabby. Was I ever like that? No wonder Logan always looked like he was sucking a lemon."
"You're deflecting." Laura came over, putting her hand on Jubilee's arm.
"I don't have a pulse for you to read," she pointed out.
"You have your own tells." Laura's smile made Jubilee's cold, dead heart beat. It was a beautiful smile, and while it occurred frequently these days, Jubilee still cherished it every time. Laura tilted her head, studying her friend. She'd been trained to read people, to tell when they were lying or deflecting. It was interpersonal cues and socializing that she'd always had a problem with. Even after all this time it still tripped her up sometimes and her experience with Warren hadn't really helped that. But Jubilee was fidgety, more so than usual. She had her tells, and they'd been telling Laura that Jubilee was interested. She just wanted to hear it from her directly.
"... Do you want to go out tonight? Just us. Gabby can babysit and we can... " Jubilee waved her hands in circles. "Y'know, do something fun."
"We can do something fun here," Laura replied. She wanted Jubilee to just say it, whatever it was. She had some idea of what it might be, a thought that made her chest do this squishy, sucking chest wound thing, but didn't want to mess things up by assuming.
"Yeah but then we won't be alone." Jubilee blurted.
From the other room came a sound not unlike a forehead smack and Jubilee grabbed Laura's hand. "Come on."
Laura let herself be dragged out of the apartment. Jubilee wrapped an arm around her and jumped up to the roof. She settled down on the edge, and Laura sat down next to her, letting her legs dangle over it. "We're always looking at things from above."
"Yeah." Jubilee smiled, watching Laura out of the corner of her eyes. This wasn't exactly what she'd had in mind but it would work. Here, the only pulse she could feel was Laura's. "View is a bit different."
They looked out over a little park in the center of the complex, a much less impressive sight than Paris. Laura shook her head, and put her hand over Jubilee's. "I like this view better. Shogo playing in the grass, Gabby chasing the kids around like Godzilla."
It was a scene Jubilee was familiar with. She couldn't go out in the sunlight, but in the shade of the balcony she could watch. "I like when the sun starts to go down. Because I can join you guys. It almost feels a real family."
"That's because it is." Laura put her arm around Jubilee, guiding her head to her shoulder. She leaned her head against the top of Jubilee's. "A real family. You and me, Shogo and Gabby."
"And Jonathan," Jubilee added, wistfully.
"And Jonathan." Laura sounded a little less wistful on the subject and it made Jubilee laugh.
She closed her eyes, listening to the rush of Laura's blood in her ear. If she concentrated, she could hear Shogo's heart, and Gabby's. It was something that used to drive her crazy. Not just how maddening it could be to hear everyone's pulse, or smell their blood, but the complete silence in her own chest. But not now,not here. Shogo's was a constant comfort, and she'd learned when he was distressed and when he was happy. Laura's was a typically steady comfort, and Gabby's had become welcome too. She realized she didn't want this to end.
"Jubilee?"
Startled out of her thoughts, Jubilee lifted her head and looked at Laura. They were so close that she was momentarily distracted by her lips. "What?"
"You can tell me anything. What's bothering you?"
Jubilee laughed, rubbing the back of her neck. "Who said something was bothering me? I'm perfectly fine!"
"You're deflecting again." Irritation edged into Laura's voice and she wondered if she was somehow wrong. It wouldn't surprise her. "Just tell me. Whatever it is, just tell me."
"I like you, okay? I mean like like you." Jubilee threw up her hands. "Happy?"
Even without their super hearing, they could both hear Gabby shout "Finally" below them. Laura rolled her eyes, grabbing Jubilee's arm to keep her from standing. "I 'like' like you too."
"And I know you just got out of a messy thing with Warren and honestly Laura, I coulda told you that wasn't gonna-wait what?"
Laura laid her head on Jubilee's shoulder. "Not many people really get me. Warren didn't. But one of them is under this roof and the other is right next to me. Besides, you're apparently not the only one staring like a lost and pathetic puppy."
Of course she'd heard that. Jubilee swore her stomach was running a decathalon. "And we're totally supposed to be the observant ones. The hunters, y'know."
A sly smirk spread across Laura's face. "I've been waiting for you to say something since we moved in. I just wasn't entirely sure until tonight."
"I'm so dumb." Jubilee slid an arm around Laura and squeezed. "... so what now?"
"I don't know. I don't want to rush things." Not like how she had with Warren. Sometimes she felt like she'd been a different person around him. And she didn't like that person very much.
"Me neither. But you gotta tell me if you get all uncomfy. We've got this… great little family going and I don't wanna ruin it. That's kinda why it took me so long to say anything." And the whole being undead thing was also a downer.
Seeming to pick up on the mood, Laura whispered. "You're who you are, and I like who you are. Being a vampire is a part of that. Just like my past is a part of me. We can't change it, but we can move on from it. We support each other."
She leaned over, pressing her lips to the corner of Jubilee's mouth. "That's what family does. What was that thing you told me, about living?"
"It's beautiful and ugly and crazy?"
"And we can do anything, and be anyone." Laura's smile was slow and soft. Her lips felt like they were buzzing and it was a pleasant feeling. "And I want the same thing you do. The four of us and our wolverine."
"Which is still beautiful and ugly and crazy," Jubilee pointed out, returning Laura's smile with a toothy grin of her own. "So, is our messed up little family Lees or Kinneys?"
Messed up was a good turn of phrase. The fridge had bottled-laura-blood for Jubilee. Wolvie-Cola 2.0. A normal family they weren't.
Laura thought about that for a moment. Really, there was someone missing from their family. Someone who could never be replaced. "What about Howletts?"