Title: Friday Night
Author: SmuttyKitty
Rating: R- swearing, drinking, pubescent themes
Disclaimers: Characters herein belong to Marvel.
Author's Notes: I just wanted to write about people sitting around interacting, I am still working out how you can have a conversation with several people in it. It isn't really a story. Though I firmly believe that the X-men hang around and drink beer on Friday nights, and that Bobby really did love "Fast Times." Smirk.
Alex, Warren, Bobby and Kurt had been hoping for a relaxing boy's night in, sipping beers, catching up on the usual bullshit. However Logan had completely blown that out of the water, and the other men were not entirely sure they were going to forgive him for it. For some perverse reason that was utterly beyond them, Logan had decided they ought to get to know their teammate- one annoying, arrogant, foreign, handsome and queer Jean-Paul. He had announced his intentions in a way that brooked no room for dissent.
As the older man walked away he winked at the quartet around the table and said "I swear he ain't so bad once you know him."
It seemed that Logan might be on to something, as the Jean-Paul who came to the table was quite a bit different than the one who was typically around the school. This one didn't seem imperious, over-dressed, or too cool. As matter of fact this one was wearing jeans (quelle horror!), a tight, faded rock band t-shirt, and a somewhat ratty Adidas zip-up. And no shoes. It occurred to Kurt there might be trouble when he brought his own case of beer and a bottle of whiskey.
The appropriate pleasantries were made and an awkward silence descended with all "the boys" sipping their beers, waiting for something.
"You know," Jean-Paul announced. "I am going to share something with you." All eyes turned to him. "I'm gay, not from another planet. Jesus Christ. Can you guys lighten up?"
Logan snorted beer back into the mug. The silence had been broken. Kurt gave a laugh, and everyone seemed more at ease.
"And is there a radio here or something? You can't sit around and drink without music or hockey. Seriously!" He made a face at the skeptical eyes that had turned to him. Alex hadn't actually ever exchanged this many words with the speedster. And the rest of the team hadn't really seen or talked to him since he had gone to exclusively teaching.
Logan flipped on the kitchen radio. It played Friday night dance music.
"Better than nothing. Thanks." A beer salute replied.
"Can I invite anyone to partake in the finest Canadian export there is?" Jean-Paul waved a bottle of Crown Royale around. "It's good for what ails you."
Everyone but Warren agreed, and shots were poured. One apiece was set up for Alex, Bobby, and Kurt. Five were set up for Jean-Paul and five more were set up for Logan.
"Ah, guys this isn't really what we're aiming for.." Two scathing glares shut the birdman up.
"The little boys drink first." Jean-Paul said with a wry look on his face. The three obliged.
"Now the big boys drink."
The two Canadians picked up their first shots.
"Ready, kiddo?"
"Anytime, old man."
They clinked their glasses together, guzzled the liquid, then forcefully set the shot glasses upside down on the table. The other four followed in quick succession.
"That better?" Logan asked in good humor.
"Yeah... mmmm." The younger man slid down limply into the kitchen chair. He rummaged in his pockets and produce a cigarette and a lighter.
"I can't fucking believe you smoke, man!" Bobby said heatedly.
"Pourquoi?" JP retorted.
"Because you are a fucking Olympic athlete. You aren't supposed to be smoking. Or binge drinking for that matter."
"So because of a certain aptitude I possess, I am supposed to be of superior "morality" according to your book of "virtues?" He punctuated the air with his fingers but didn't really seem angry though. "You realize that makes no sense? Right? Because being a good skiier doesn't inure me from the addictive or dangerous qualities of nicotine or keep me from wanting to get smashed. I am a person, Bobby. Not a Wheaties box."
Bobby sat quietly, uncertain of whether he was feeling angry or simply stood corrected.
"I'm not trying to fuck with you, just think first."
JP being amenable? Bobby was forced to ask the inevitable. "Are you a clone, or have been brainwashed in any way, shape, or form?"
"Non, this is me being happy about not having to see horrible children for the next 7-9 days. Having to put with Keller actually makes me wish I had been a better child."
"It's not too difficult to imagine you were a very trying youth." Kurt offered charitably.
"I was a little shit, no two ways about it." With a wicked grin, Jean-Paul turned to Bobby. "What kind of kid were you? You strike me as the quiet, hanging out in the basement, masterbating to Phoebe Cates in "Fast Times at Ridgemont High" kind of kid."
If Bobby were still capable of blushing he would have at the burst of laughter around the table at his expense. Warren could very distinctly remember the conversations he had with Bobby concerning Pheobe Cates back in the day.
Jean-Paul lightly punched Bobby in the upper arm. "Now, now, don't sulk. I firmly believe that everyone in this room probably did the same thing a few times. It was a coming of age thing, seeing Phoebe Cates' tits in that movie. That and "Flashdance" with Jennifer Beal's jiggling ass."
"You're a fucking dick." Bobby said sourly.
"And you are wet blanket. Americans need a better sense of humor about themselves. Canada was invented so people who like derogatory jokes about themselves could have a place to live."
"Yeah, cause you totally have a great sense of humor about yourself." Warren said nastily.
"I do. How would you know? You would have to talk to me first to find that out."
"Boys, boys. Let's play a little nicer. You too, JP." Logan interjected.
"I'm so nice right now, Logan. I couldn't possibly be nicer." JP cooed at the grizzly man.
"Try."
JP blew a raspberry. "Fine then. Everyone, what's your favorite food, color, and movie? How's that for nice?"
There was some mild confusion around the table as everyone tried to figure out whether or not they were supposed to answer the "nice" question, and if so what is the answer? These are not things adults think about frequently.
"Does anyone want pizza? I am about to start losing muscle mass here." JP gesticulated with his nice-ass cell phone. "My treat?"
Everyone perked up at the suggestion of food and they sorted out the ordering many, many pizzas. However, JP decreed he couldn't possibly wait 30 minutes or less and proceeded to eat a pound of imitation crab meat.
"That's the grossest thing I have ever seen." Warren said with a princessy look on his face. It was sort of gross, as Jean-Paul seemed to feel the need to pick each stick into strings of meat, then eat the strings in a highly fussy manner.
"This from a guy who gets nasty bird diseases in his wings. Having to eat 15,000+ kcal a day is positively mundane compared to that."
"So, Kurt? How's...God?" JP turned to the fuzzy man in a valiant effort to refrain from getting into a verbal match with Worthington.
"God?" Kurt asked with a suprized look on his face.
"I'm just trying to make small talk."
Bobby looked at the elfin man inhaling processed fish meat. "You are pretty fucking weird when you start talking, you know that? First you never say anything nice or you just sit silently and scowl like a jerk. Then when you start talking and it's...dirty and bizarre."
"Because I said tits?"
"The whole fucking thing!"
"I thought it was humorous."
"Well, it wasn't."
"Because you really did compulsively jack off to "Fast Times" or simply the joke in general?' 'Cause I'm leaning towards the former." Jean-Paul leered a little.
"That's it, I am so out of here." Bobby got up from the table and walked to the sink to pour his beer out.
"Aww, wittle boys can't take any teasing. I was wrong, you aren't even old enough to have seen that movie. You probably are a virgin, too."
Warren was stifling a grin, even though he thoroughly disliked Jean-Paul. Alex also would have to say he really didn't mind watching Bobby go down after being such a brat lately. Kurt sort of wished everyone could just get along.
"I am not a virgin. And I have seen fucking "Fast Times at Ridgemont High."
"That's not what I have heard."
Bobby gave his tormentor an icy look.
"Look," JP said and put his hands up in a supplicating manner. "I won't tease you anymore about adult topics, d'accord? Have a whiskey and sit down."
"Why?"
"Because I am genuinely penitent."
Kurt laughed out loud. Even as a priest he had never seen a less sorry looking creature.
"What, fuzzy britches?"
"You don't look very sorry, what can I say?" Kurt replied amusedly.
"I never was a very good Catholic. The only thing I did on my knees in church wouldn't constitute appropriate "dinner table" talk." JP gave a very Gallic shrug.
Kurt shot him a shocked look.
"I guess you can't get along with anyone, hmm?" Warren chimed in.
"Not that asshole." A wave upwards. "Everyone else I give a sporting chance."
"What could you possibly have to hate God for?" Bobby asked with a nasty tone. "You fucking have everything, in case you didn't notice. You're rich, you're famous, you did some worthwhile shit, you are good looking. So you are gay? So fucking what! Cry me a goddamn river." The vehemence was bordering on overwhelming.
"Bobby, are you really so pathetically naive as to believe money and fame make a life worthwhile? Calisse! Do you have shit for brains, boy?"
"What is that supposed to mean?"
"It means, I can't believe you think that some stupid money and pointless tennis trophies equal a life worthwhile. I had attributed some further depth of character to you."
"I don't believe you. You are practically a tycoon, driving over the backs of the common man with your Porsche. You snap your fingers and get what you want."
"You know what, Bobby? I will trade you. I'll be the dorky but amiable kid from Long Island, and you can my life. How does that strike you? Equitable enough?" Blue eyes flashed seriously.
"Why would you want to be me?" Bobby asked, wary of where he was being herded in this conversation.
"I ask you the same thing. All of it is bullshit. " JP took a throaty swig of his beer and slumped back in his chair, perching it precariously on two legs.
"Forget I even brought it up." Bobby sniffed and cautiously sipped at the whiskey and ice.
"I'm just saying there is more to life than that. If that was all it took to be happy, life would be easy."
Alex looked at the man across the table from him in a new light. There was a weariness in him he had never noticed, and a hardness that wasn't his jerky demeanor. For the first time, Alex realized that maybe he had fought for everything he had ever gotten, and he had paid for it in a way that Alex and Bobby and Warren could never understand. Alex thought about all the things so many of them just took for granted, and felt a pang.
"You know what your problem is?" Bobby seemed to get a second wind. Kurt really didn't understand why Bobby felt the need to continue. It seemed quite evident the other man could keep it up all night, but Kurt wasn't sure if he could keep listening to it.
"You just think you are so much better than everyone else, with your faux Europeaness, and your bi-lingualness, and your Armani suits..."
"You have never seen me wear an Armani suit." Jean-Paul interjected.
"That isn't the point, you just think you know better." Bobby hammered on.
"Know better than what? Than you? At what? I am sure there are a variety of things you know more about or are better at, I really don't see. And you don't know anything about me, so just stop."
"Okay, then enlighten me, what is your deal? But condense it, I don't have time to read a self-indulgent memoir." Bobby looked pleased with himself now that he had achieved a whole new level of nasty with the Canadian.
"Where is that fucking pizza?"
"You're dodging!" Warren almost squealed with a rather malevolent smirk.
"I'm not. What is the answer? There isn't one. He wasn't looking for one, he simply wanted to needle me. Oh yes, and congratulations, X-men. Once again you have managed to wreck one of the rare positive moods I have experienced since I moved here. With that I am declaring Logan's experiment failed and I am going to get wasted in peace. Good night." He retrieved his bottle from the center of the table and grabbed a bag of potato chips sitting on the counter.
"Johnny, sit down."
"STOP FUCKING CALLING ME THAT! I'm not nineteen anymore, Logan. It wasn't charming then, and it isn't now. Thank you for your efforts tonight, but I think it merely confirmed what we both have known for years, I am simply not capable of this. I am well aware that there is something wrong with me. Is everyone satisfied now?" A hand clutching chips gesticulated at the table of now confused mutants. Warren felt a brief flash of guilt, he just wanted to pick at the man, not provoke whatever this was.
"Come back." Logan said. His manner seemed to indicate that he thought this was sufficient to cause the desired action.
"No. You aren't my dad, now stop doing an impression of one."
"I said sit down, and I fucking meant it. I didn't arrange this simply to have you and the kids bicker. It's time you made an effort to act like a normal person. I don't know what has you bent so goddamn outta shape you don't know which way to spit, but acting like this isn't going to help.
"Acting like what? This is how I have always acted. We have never been friends. You dicking my sister doesn't change that. Us being in Alpha Flight together doesn't change that, us... I think my point is made." He shut his eyes wearily, and suddenly looked much older than his years.
"Sit the fuck down."
"Or what?"
"Or else."
"Fucking bring it." He made the universal "let's rumble" gesture.
Lightening fast Logan was up and had the pointed face in his grasp, hard. Even faster, Jean-Paul was out of the grip, a few steps back. Sharp blue eyes locked with older, more tempered ones.
"There is nothing you could do to me that hasn't already been done." The younger man hissed.
"Sit down." Logan said levelly.
"Why?"
"Because there is pizza coming and beer on the table." He sat down, and lit a stogie.
Ambivalence was etched in the fine features, and for a beat Jean-Paul weighed what he was going to do. He sat down and poured three fingers of the whiskey into the glass he had left behind.
"You need to get laid, kiddo. You're too high strung." Logan said with a half smile and blew smoke out of his nose.
"And fucking how." JP smiled back cautiously and leaned his chin into his hand. Bobby exhaled discreetly, as he felt the tension evaporate.
The front door chimed. Warren, Alex, Kurt, and Bobby all stood up and said in unison "I'll get it!" and bolted.
"You gonna make it?"
"I don't know, but I'm here aren't I?" Jean-Paul rubbed his face with his eyes closed.
"It's a start." The short man clapped him on the back. "Let's eat, eh?"
The pizza had finally arrived.
