Exhausted after a long night of shopping with Wolvie and Darcy, Jubilee ended up sleeping in on Black Friday. She and a few others were going to go out shopping again at the mall this time, but that wouldn't be until the evening. Until then, she had the whole afternoon to herself to enjoy her Thanksgiving Break as she pleased.

When she looked outside, the landscape was still iced with snow, crisp and clean. Additionally, all of Bobby's snowmen from yesterday were still perfectly formed, too. As the cliché goes, the land around the Institute was as picture perfect as a Christmas postcard. Itching to get out there and enjoy it, Jubilee leapt out of bed and quickly changed out of her pajamas to go outside comfortably warm to play.

In her eagerness, Jubilee ended up throwing on her yellow coat over randomly grabbed clothes and hurried downstairs. She slid down the bannister of the staircase, ignoring the calls of warning from Storm. As Jubilee dashed through the kitchen, she belatedly also heard Darcy call to her, "Jubilation Lee, don't you dare run through my kitchen!" Of course, it was too late, and Jubilee was already outside when Darcy also added, "Put on gloves or your fingers will fall off!" Needless to say, Jubilee didn't hear that part.

No matter, though, because as soon as Jubilee felt the cold nip at her nose and fingertips, she cupped her hand and set off a pink firework for warmth, the glow of it catching on her dark eyes. She felt breathless in the breathtaking beauty of the snow around her, but as her eyes stared in wonder of the glory of winter, she saw her breath hang in small puffs in front of her face. Jubilee laughed, and then brought her fingertips to her lips, pretending to take a drag from an imaginary cigarette. Maybe it was a cigar, though, like the kind Logan was fond of smoking, because he was her favorite professor and her favorite X-Men, not to mention her mentor. Besides, the space between her fingers was a bit too splayed out to just be an imaginary cigarette.

After blowing more smoke out like a dragon, Jubilee wandered aimlessly through the snowmen. This was her first year at the Xavier's Institute for Gifted Youngsters, and this was also her first winter where there was snow. Real snow, too, not the light powder dustings that melted after an afternoon or just ice. Bending over, she scooped up the snow in her hands and easily molded it into a ball. This was good, thick snow.

She smiled as made another firework in her hand, watching the snowball hiss and pop before melting away. Rubbing her hands together, Jubilee looked around her at the perfect snowmen – sans carrot noses and coal eyes – and decided to make her first ever snowman. She ran back inside, yellow coat flapping behind her like bat wings.

Jubilee blew through the kitchen like the gust of cold air she let in, startling Darcy from making the Thanksgiving leftovers into another dish. "Jubilee, you need to put on more clothes or you'll have a cold during your final exams!"

Once again, Darcy was ignored, as Jubilee waved her hand dismissively. "Yeah, yeah, do we have any carrots?"

Surprised, Darcy blinked and cocked her head at the young Asian girl. "Yes, I didn't braise all the carrots yesterday. I wanted to make sure we still had a few left for a carrot cake."

"Screw the carrot cake, make a chocolate cake instead. People like that more anyway." Jubilee started rummaging through the fridge, looking for the carrots.

Not stopping Jubilee in her search, Darcy casually leaned back against the counter. "No, we have brownies if people want a chocolate dessert. Besides, people will like the cake for the icing anyway. It's super sweet." Tilting her head forward, she narrowed her eyes at the troublesome girl, using her telepathy to lightly read her mind. "You only need one carrot for the nose, Jubilee; and I'm not sure we have coal. We didn't go shopping for those kind of Christmas presents yet, and Logan's grill runs off of propane." She pushed herself off the counter, and returned to looking up new recipes.

"Well, what do you suggest then, Professor Darcy?" Jubilee grabbed a water bottle from the fridge along with her carrot.

"I suggested to you earlier to run and put on more layers, but you ignored me." Darcy looked back over her shoulder at Jubilee, "Since you're already in the fridge, grab me the eggs, cream, milk, and butter."

Sighing her frustration, Jubilee rolled her eyes and cracked the seal of her water bottle instead. "Come on, Professor Darcy, don't be this way." She took a sip of her water.

Darcy laughed, "You sound just like Logan when you say that."

At that Jubilee first choked on her water before she spat it out, coughing and sputtering at the mental images Darcy put in her head. "Ugh, yuck."

"Jubilee, it's like you forget that I teach Sex Education," Darcy continued to laugh. "Now come on and get the ingredients for me, please. And the rest of the carrots while you're at it."

This time Jubilee did as Darcy asked, though now her cheeks were red and ruddy not from the cold of the outside but embarrassment this time. "Okay, I did as you asked. Now help me."

"Not yet I won't after how difficult you've been with me." Darcy gathered the dry ingredients and started measuring them all to the correct amounts. "I want you to go upstairs and put on a hat, scarf, and gloves. It's not going to be fun playing out there without them."

Groaning, Jubilee dashed up the stairs back to her room, looking for the items. As she pulled them on, she stared at the extra hats and gloves and scarves she had for a minute. Then she smiled.

This time when Jubilee slid down the bannister, it was Darcy who told her not to, already mixing the cake batter. Again, though, Jubilee paid her no mind and just grabbed a carrot before running back outside. Her arms were full of clothing accessories, and the door slammed shut behind her firmly. Once Jubilee was gone, Darcy smiled, "Pretty bright kid."

Outside again, Jubilee grudgingly admitted to herself that she was warmer than before, but soon she started digging in the snow and the feeling went away. It took her a couple of tries to roll a snowball without it being lopsided, but eventually she got the hang of it, forming three balls of snow in different sizes. The tricky part was when she had to lift the snowballs and stack them on top of each other. The balls broke apart twice before she finally packed a sturdy enough snowball. Then it was too heavy for her to lift, though. Jubilee huffed and puffed, working hard and sweating under her hat, but she was having fun.

"Frosty the Snowman was a jolly happy soul," she sang as she patted down her snowman's figure, making smoothing him down. As she started adding the extra stuff, she changed the song a bit, "With a drawn-on smile," she dragged her fingertip across his face, "and a carrot nose," she jammed it in, "and two eyes made out of buttons!" Lastly, she added the buttons she had ripped off of a pair of old jeans that didn't fit her anymore.

As she added the last finishing touches, she reverted back to the traditional lyrics. Skipping to the tree line, she found some sticks and skipped back, carefully sticking the turquoise mittens on the end and tying them there. Then she stabbed his sides with the sticks, adding his arms. "Frosty the Snowman, is a fairy tale they saw. He was made out of snow, but the children know how he came to life one day."

With care this time, she wrapped her old fuzzy black scarf around the neck area, arranging the ends so that it draped down the front. "There must have been some magic in that old silk hat they found, for when they placed it on his head, he began to dance around."

Finally, she gently pulled the purple knit cap with the fuzzy ball over his head, smiling so wide that her already stinging cheeks hurt a little more, but it was a good pain. It was worth the cold to make a cute little snowman all by herself. "Frosty the Snowman was alive as he could be, and the children say he could laugh and play just as good as you and me."

Taking a step back to admire her handiwork, Jubilee continued to sing and sung a little louder this time, "Frosty the snowman knew the sun was hot that day, so he said let's run and have some fun before I melt away. Down to the village with a broomstick in his hand, running here and there all around the square, saying catch me if you can." Proud of her snowman, Jubilee skipped around him. In her opinion her snowman was better than the perfect ones Bobby had made if only because she put so much effort into this. And her snowman was cuter with all the accessories she added.

Unbeknownst to Jubilee, Negasonic had been watching her make the snowman before she finally decided to come down and see her. Negasonic took her time getting bundled up before she came outside. As she approached, she heard Jubilee singing, and slowed down so as to not make too much noise crunching the icy snow underfoot. "He lead them down to the streets of town right to the traffic cop, and he only paused a moment when he heard him holler stop!"

Instead of prancing as she once was, Jubilee was full on dancing now. She shot her fireworks from her fingertips up into the air, happy with her work, and feeling joyous from the season and her break from school. Fascinated and smirking, Negasonic silently observed Jubilee's exhibition of releasing her inhibitions. "Frosty the Snowman had to hurry on his way, but he waved goodbye, saying please don't cry, I'll be back to life one day!"

At the end of the song where Jubilee finished with a flare of sparkles as per her typical style, Negasonic finally spoke up. "Isn't that the part where he dies?"

Jumping at the sound of Negasonic's voice, Jubilee squeaked and whirled around, directing her fireworks at the source of the noise. Negasonic rolled out of the way before she could get hurt, but since their powers were so similar, it was doubtful that Jubilee's fireworks could hurt her. Still, she liked this coat, and she didn't want it to get singed. "Oh, Negasonic! Sorry, I didn't see you there."

"Well, I can see that," Negasonic replied with the usual amount of teenaged sarcasm. She lightly dusted off the snow.

Jubilee was blushing, embarrassed that Negasonic watched her make a fool of herself with her bad dancing and terrible singing. Secretly, Jubilee thought that Negasonic was pretty cute. They had both came to the Xavier's Institute around the same time, and were both fifteen years old. Maybe Jubilee wouldn't have developed these romantic feelings, though, if only one of them was joining the X-Men. Since they both were undergoing training together, though, that meant they were practically always together.

Thankfully they had separate X-Men mentors, though. Jubilee was assigned to Logan whereas Colossus – or Peter, as he told them to call him – chose Negasonic Teenaged Warhead. Negasonic was sullen, her background a bit of a mystery to Jubilee, but Peter had seen something in her. He was probably one of the best mentors to have. Jubilee saw something in Negasonic, too: girlfriend material. She wasn't jealous that Peter was Negasonic's mentor, either, because the Wolverine was the most badass of the X-Men anyway.

"Hey Firecracker, did you not hear anything I just said?"

Snapping out of her daydreaming, Jubilee ducked her head, wishing she was wearing her shades. "Oh yeah, yeah, totally heard you."

"Then what did I just say?"

"Um," Jubilee smiled apologetically, "Okay you got me. Sorry, Negasonic, I wasn't paying attention. I was off somewhere else."

"It's fine." Negasonic shoved her gloved hands into her coat pockets, casually chewing her gum. "I just asked if you wanted to go back inside and warm up. It's too cold out here."

"Yeah, sounds good. I just finished up here anyway." Jubilee hoped she wasn't coming off too eager. With a hopeful note in her voice, she asked Negasonic, "You wanna make some hot chocolate together? That'll warm us up for sure, Negasonic."

"Yeah, whatever." Negasonic shrugged apathetically like a cool albeit sullen teenager would do. "Professor Darcy is still cooking, though."

"Don't worry, I'll handle her." Jubilee waved the concern off. She was smiling widely again, and had to stop herself from skipping beside Negasonic as they headed inside. The only thing that would make this night even more perfect would be if she could just take Negasonic's hand and tell her how she feels.