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DISCLAIMER: The universe belongs to Marvel. The characters are mine. The concept was thought
up by Kielle and Phil Foster. TCP deals with the life of normal people in the X-Men universe.

RATING: PG

SUMMARY: Two friends learn that it's not nice to spy on people.

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Lessons Learned

By: Chameleon

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"Thank you for dinner, Mrs. Robertson." Jason Benson smiled politely at his host.

She smiled back and said, "You're welcome, Jason. You seem to eat dinner over here often.
Not that I mind, of course, you're much more polite than most of Shawn's friends." She
cast a glance at her son.

Shawn rolled his eyes and said, "Me and Jase will be upstairs."

"That is," Jason said with a pointed look at Shawn, "If you don't need any help."

"Oh, no, go on ahead. Karrie's offered to help," Mrs. Robertson said. "We can handle it."

"Well...if you're *sure*."

"Absolutely."

Shawn grabbed his friend by the shirt. "Good, great, let's *go*." He drug Jason up the stairs
to his bedroom and shut the door. "Um, dude, why are you over my house all the time?...And why
are you sucking up to my mom?"

"Dude, have you seen you're mom's new tenant? She's *hot*." Jason flopped down on a chair and
started flipping through a magazine.

"You mean Karrie? Oh, yeah she is hot. But what are you going to do, live at my house until
she leaves?"

Jason grinned. "Actually, I had something else in mind."

Shawn eyed him. "You've got that look in your eyes... That's the same look that me suspended
for dropping water balloons on the Principal."

"Hey, he disserved it. And it was funny. But this is different. And we won't get in trouble,
I swear."

"Yeah, right!" Shawn threw his bookbag on his bed and started rummaging through it. "Well,
what do you have in mind?"

"Your, uh, your dad never cut down that tree, did he? The big Oak on the other side of the
house?"

"No..."

"And isn't that tree right next to her room?"

"Yes... No! We are not going to spy on her!"

"Why not?"

"Because...it's just wrong. Besides, do you know what my mom would do if she found out?"

"Shawn, think about it. You could go back to school tomorrow and tell everyone that you spied
on a *college* girl."

Shawn shoved his bookbag out of the way and flopped down on the bed. "You're going to get me
arrested one of these days."

"So you won't do it?"

"Of course I'll do it." He got up. "Come on, let's go watch TV. I want to get as much of it
in before my mom grounds me and takes it away."

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"Will you get your foot out of my face?!"

"Well stop crowding me! I can't even see where I'm going. I told you we should have brought a
flashlight."

"Then someone would see us, dummy. Now hurry up."

"I'm hurrying, I'm hurrying."

Shawn scrambled onto one of the higher branches and was followed by Jason.

"We're here," Jason said. "Now what?"

"Now," Shawn said, "We peek." He dug a pair of binoculars out and started focusing in on the
window across from them. "Dude! She's taking her clothes off!"

"What?! Lemmie see."

"Hold on. Dude, she is *so* hot... Oh crap!"

"What? Did she see you?"

"I can't believe this!"

"I gotta see!" Shawn grabbed the binoculars out of Jason's hand. "She's got gills!!"

"I know that, now gimmie those back." Jason made a grab for the binoculars, but Shawn pulled
away. In doing so, he lost his balance and started to fall. He grabbed onto Jason, but only
managed to pull him down with him.

The pair landed on the ground with a ::THUMP:: and they lay there for several minutes catching
their breath.

Jason was the first to recover. "Dude, you're living with a mutant."

"I noticed."

"Think you should tell your mom?"

"And have her find out about what we did. Um, no."

"Oh. Want to go look some more? I mean, even with the gills, she's still hot."

"You're insane. You know that, Jase?"

"Is that a no?"

"Dude, I'm already climbing the tree."

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END