Notes: Prompt this time was a picture of a vase shattered on the floor. Thanks to my lovely reviewers and all of their suggestions! For those of you who are looking forward to it…this is the last chapter before the dance.
Reviews make for happy Sprites!
Kitty woke up some time later and sat upright, looking about for John.
"Oh, Laura, you're back!" she exclaimed once she spotted the girl.
"John is in his room if you would like to see him," she growled.
"…Okay…"
"He was here when I arrived. I forced him to leave."
"Well, I'm going to go apologize for falling asleep. I'll be back, okay?"
Laura simply glared at the wall.
Kitty made her way to John's room but he didn't answer when she knocked. Hesitantly, she phased through the door, but the room was empty. She then checked the library before making her way downstairs.
The sounds of people shouting drew her to the kitchen and she walked in to find Bobby and Rogue standing about ten feet away from each other, having a heated argument. Someone grabbed her wrist and she phased automatically before looking over to see that it was John. He was hidden in the shadows and, pressing a finger to his lips, waved her over.
She moved to stand in front of him and he pulled her close to his body, leaning down to whisper in her ear, "Rogue walked in to find Bobby and Lorna Dane making out hot and heavy against the refrigerator."
"Oh," she breathed, near silently.
"Rogue started screaming like a mad woman and Lorna ran away. Bobby, however, didn't have the good sense to."
She turned in his arms and rose on tiptoes. He leaned down and she whispered in his ear, "Rogue already knew that Bobby and Lorna were sleeping together. I guess seeing them together was the last straw."
He nodded in agreement and she looked over her shoulder to see that Rogue now had a pretty cream colored vase with a few blue stripes clutched in her hand.
"I DON'T CARE! YOU LIED TO ME!" she screeched, hurling the vase at his head. He lurched to the side and it hit the dinner table, skidding across it and falling to the floor where it scattered to a million pieces.
"Rogue! What the…" Bobby yelled.
"Don't you Rogue me, Bobby Drake! You just better be glad I still don't have my power or I'd suck your soul out right this minute!" she shrieked, advancing on him menacingly.
"Maybe we should intervene?" Kitty whispered as Rogue took up another vase and hurled it at the unfaithful boy.
"I'm finding this quite entertaining, Kitten," John murmured, a mischievous glint in his eyes.
"You would," she grumbled, as Rogue seized yet another vase. This one struck Bobby in the shoulder and he grunted in pain.
"Would you stop?" he shouted.
"Why should I?" she screeched, hurling the last one within her reach at him. This one glanced off the side of his head, causing blood to well up and drip down the side of his face. The sight of it seemed to jar her and she turned and ran from the room, sobbing now.
Cursing under his breath and clutching a towel grabbed from the counter to his head, Bobby stormed out after her.
"Well… that was…interesting…" Kitty remarked, stepping away from John.
"Extremely," he replied dryly.
"Want to help me clean up the mess Rogue made? Unless you want to go ask her to clean it up herself? But I'd hate to see what she could find for ammo the next time," Kitty voiced, smiling up at John.
"I think I'll just help you."
She grabbed the trash can and made her way toward the debris. "Get the broom and dustpan for me."
John returned to find her picking up the largest pieces and dumping them in the trash.
"Storm's going to be furious - she loved those vases," Kitty remarked as she crawled under the table to reach some of the pieces that had scattered there.. "Especially that first one Rogue threw. You know, the pretty cream one with the blue rings around it?"
"Eh, she'll get over it. It's just stuff."
"Oh, John," she sighed, taking the broom and dustpan from him and sweeping the floor. "Get a rag and wipe down the table, please."
"Why?"
"In case there are shards of glass on it."
He snorted. "There's not any glass on the table."
"Fine," she grumbled and, once she had finished sweeping, she wiped the table down herself.
Once she finished cleaning up the mess with John watching idly, she pulled the trash bag out and tied it before putting a fresh one in.
"I'll take this out if you want to go check on Rogue," John offered.
She smiled brightly at him. "All right!"
He took the bag from her and she ran upstairs and burst into Rogue's room to find the girl lying face down on her bed sobbing.
"Oh, Rogue," she murmured sympathetically, moving to sit beside her.
"I knew it was going on, but to see it…" she sobbed. "That just made it so much worse! And then he tried to stand there and deny it!"
"He didn't!" she gasped.
"He did! And so I just snapped. And I broke all of Storm's pottery."
"I know. I cleaned it up."
"Thanks," Rogue sniffled. "I think I want to be alone now."
"Okay, sweetie," Kitty replied, exiting the room.
Kitty hesitated in the hallway - she wanted to see John, she also wanted to make sure she had all the proper accessories for the dance tomorrow laid out but Les Miserables was still waiting for her in the library…
In the end she decided to take some time to read and therefore made her way to the library. She phased through the stacks of tomes, grabbing her book as she went, and popped out of a shelf to find John occupying her chair, a book open in one hand.
"Hey, Kitten," he greeted her, marking his place with one finger. "How's Rogue?"
"Do you care?" she asked lightly.
"Nope."
She laughed a bit.
"Come on, the chair's plenty big enough for two," he voiced, patting the arm of it as he scooted over.
Kitty pulled her bottom lip in between her teeth and shifted from foot to foot for a moment before moving forward and perching on the arm of the chair. She leaned against the chair back and draped one arm along it before finally throwing her legs across John's lap.
"See?"
"Yep, plenty big enough," she replied softly, opening her book.
They read for a while before a loud bang sounded from above. Kitty squeaked in fear and jumped, sliding accidentally off the chair arm, phasing as she went. When she recovered and solidified she found herself on John's lap.
"Oh!" she exclaimed, cheeks flaring into a brilliant blush. "I'm sorry…I…"
But John snaked one arm around her waist, hand resting on her hip. She stiffened a moment, looking at him with wide eyes.
"You okay?" he asked, eyes narrowing as he studied her.
"Yes…I-I…" she stuttered a bit and fell into silence.
The hand that rested on her hip slid up to her side and he pulled gently until she leaned against him, body still stiff with tension.
"Maybe we should go see what that was…"
"Probably Rogue throwing a chair at Bobby. We wouldn't want to get in the way of that, Kitten."
"No…"
"What's wrong?" he asked.
"I'm just…this…I'm being silly."
"I'm not going to hurt you. And you must trust me, or else you would have phased five times over by now."
"I'm trying to trust you," she replied.
"If you want up, I can't stop you."
"Would you try? To stop me?"
He stared at her a moment. "No, I wouldn't."
Some of the tension immediately rushed from her body and she relaxed a bit against him.
"That matters a lot to you," he said matter-of-factly.
"It does," she replied.
"Someone's forced you to do something before," he murmured, gazing intently at her.
"One theory the scientists that study Mutants have is that you have the gene to be a mutant, but the gene doesn't contain what your mutation is. That theory says that your personality and your fears shape your mutation. Bobby is afraid of heat, so his mutation would be ice. Storm is afraid of the unpredictability of storms so she can control them. Wolverine and Laura are afraid of being helpless so they have built in weapons. It makes sense, in a way."
"And you're afraid of being touched, of being trapped and forced and coerced. So your mutation gives you a way out."
She nodded, looking past him to avoid meeting his eyes with her own.
"Some fears are unfounded, unexplainable, stemming from no outward cause. Yours isn't like that, though, is it?"
"I don't want to talk about this," Kitty replied.
"And that in and of itself was an answer."
"John, don't…"
"Don't what, Kitten? I'm just reading my book," he replied with a grin, opening the volume once more and turning his attention to it.
Kitty leaned her head on his shoulder and clutched Les Miserables to her chest, closing her eyes and counting in French to dispel the bad memories that were vying for attention.