Princess_alex24@hotmail.com
A/N: I'll admit I hit the pairing button a few times to avoid characters I didn't know, but the setting was so perfect I had to keep it. Here is a Winter challenge entry featuring Annie Ghazikhanian (the human nurse) and Stacy X who appeared in Uncanny Xmen a few times and I thought she really would have been an interesting character to keep… but they didn't.
Annie stared at the large farmhouse on the hill as she closed the car door behind her. It was two stories and would have been able to house a very large family if it really were a home. It wasn't though.
She felt a blush cover her cheeks and she had to will it away. She wasn't going to embarrass herself by acting like she was uncomfortable. Stacy wouldn't appreciate it. Of course she would probably be surprised that Annie had bothered to hunt her down after she'd left the way she did. A mansion full of mutants, some that were telepaths, and they didn't even realize that letting Stacy just walk out the door was a bad idea. Annie was the only one that seemed to care that the woman had disappeared, and Warren hadn't been very forthcoming in helping Annie find this place, but she did find it. Ms. Frost may be as cold as her name, but she had connections and was willing to use them to ease Annie's mind.
Annie didn't always used to work in that place she'd found Alex. She used to be an ER nurse among other things, and she'd seen hookers come in rather beat up after a bad client. She'd talked to them briefly about their lives and tried not to judge. Those women needed a friendly ear. Stacy reminded Annie of them. Didn't anyone else hear Stacy slip up and mention being abused by her stepfather? The medlab was hardly empty at the time, but it seemed that Annie was the only one that was listening. Stacy claimed to take pride in her work, but Annie had seen that before as well. The few prostitutes she'd met had all started off trying to shock her, and after that didn't work they'd give it up.
The door was a bit large. Annie stared at it a moment wondering if she was supposed to knock like it was a house or walk right in like it was a business. The Christmas wreath on the door had various small foiled condoms and decorations that looked like women's breasts in it. That was so inappropriate she giggled. The sign inside the wreath was an invitation to come inside, so she took a deep breath and walked right in. The woman at the desk looked up and Annie could see surprise on her features.
"Ma'am." The young brunette looked nervous. Annie realized that it was probably because she assumed Annie was someone's wife come to cause a scene.
"I'm here to see Stacy." Annie stepped up to the desk. She could almost believe it was an office, with the paperwork she could see the woman had been filling out and the bills she'd been paying.
"Uh…" The woman glanced at the doorway behind them and Annie turned to see an older woman standing there.
"This is work time." The woman walked with a strong confidence. "She's on the clock, so unless you're a paying customer, she has clients, paying clients."
Annie couldn't stop a small cringe as she noticed the waiting room for the first time, and the three men in there. None of them look even halfway respectable. Not the type of clientele that Bobby had mentioned seeing at the X Ranch that Stacy used to work at. "I have money." She finally spoke. One of the men gave her the creeps. He reminded her of Carter's father and she wasn't going to let him anywhere near Stacy if she could.
"Really?" The woman looked a bit amused. "Stacy's rather popular with the men around here." Annie just reached into her purse and pulled out her wallet. Working for the Professor paid better than she had been making and she could start saving up for a new car stereo again. Listening to the same CD stuck in the player wouldn't kill her.
"How much." Annie's voice was flat with her irritation. The woman was just playing with her and she knew it, but she… God she was about to buy Stacy's time.
After the little matter of money was dealt with the woman, who had introduced herself as Madame Sybil, escorted her to a bedroom rather than make her wait with the men. For that Annie was grateful. The leers made her uncomfortable.
She was left alone in the surprisingly well decorated room. She wandered to the window and stared out at the fields behind the house while she tried to figure out how she was going to explain her presence to Stacy.
When the door opened Annie looked at Stacy through the reflection in the window and could see the tension in the woman's frame. "I should let you know… my powers don't work on women the way they do on men." Annie didn't know what made her stay facing the window to watch Stacy squirm, probably some anger at the woman she'd started to consider a friend having just left without even saying goodbye. "I'm sure that I can please you." Stacy sounded downright flirtatious, "but if you heard about my powers and that's why you're here…"
"Stacy." Annie sighed and turned around. Stacy's eyes widened a bit before that protective mask she wore slid into place. The one that tried to pretend that nothing bothered her.
"Well, Annie… I didn't know you swung that way. I thought you were all hung up on comaboy."
Annie grimaced before stepping away from the window. "I've been looking for you for months." She didn't want to talk about Alex right away. It wasn't why she came here. Stacy crossed her arms in front of her, clearly expecting to be yelled at. Annie had intended to do that, but… she just stopped. Her voice got softer. "I was worried about you. You just disappeared, no letters… nothing."
Stacy still looked guarded, but she did step further into the room. Annie stared into the woman's eyes, took in the scaled skin. It looked fresh and shiny, Stacy must have shed recently. Annie was a bit more comfortable around mutants now. Living with a mansion full of them and treating their wounds helped her get over some of her fears, but amazingly she'd never felt that fear with Stacy even though Stacy was so obviously a mutant. It was because there was just something familiar about this woman.
"Things didn't work out with Warren and you just ran." Annie's voice couldn't disguise her anger over that. Stacy and her had gotten closer while the woman was recovering from one of her skin sheddings that didn't go too well. They'd talked, gotten to know each other, became friends.
"I'm surprised you had time to notice, what with comaboy walking around." Stacy seemed to hiss that out. "How are you and Sleeping Beauty anyhow? I heard he cancelled his wedding to be with you."
Annie looked away and pulled her arms around her. "Turned out that we don't mesh as well as we did in my dreams." And she was ashamed at how hard she'd fallen for a patient. She'd fallen for him based solely on his looks, because he couldn't talk or move when she'd met him. When she'd started her fantasies about him waking up and saving her from her own life.
"Prince Charming turned into a toad?" Stacy moved a bit closer and Annie could hear some concern in her voice.
"He was still a prince, just not my prince." Annie sighed and looked up. "Stacy…" Annie didn't know what to say now. The time apart seemed to make talking with her friend awkward.
"I would have written." Stacy sighed and moved to sit on the bed. "I started to a few times…" Stacy's eyes traveled over the room and Annie could see it. Shame.
Annie had been upset to hear Stacy had jumped right back into prostitution, even though she'd expected it. As far as Annie knew, she was the only person that Stacy admitted that she was glad she was an Xmen. That she was glad she didn't have to cater to men anymore. When that… job… didn't pan out it hurt Stacy. She'd been so proud of being hero, but things with Warren didn't go the way she wanted them too any more than things with Alex had for Annie, and Stacy had run when her dreams crumbled.
The bed cover was soft and inviting when Annie sat on it. She tried not to think of what happened in that bed on a regular basis and moved to take Stacy's hand. The scales felt warm and dry. Smooth. She almost wanted to caresses the hand to ensure that it was really there. She could continue to complain about how worried Stacy made her, but she just looked into her friend's eyes and smiled. "I found you." It had been hard following the leads, and this was the third visit to a whorehouse she'd done in the past three months looking for this woman.
"Yeah, you found me." Stacy pulled her hand back, clearly uncomfortable with the gesture. "So now what?" The defensive walls were up. Her body seemed to lean away from Annie.
"Come home with me." Annie heard the pleading tone in her own voice. She didn't want to leave Stacy here. "The mansion is huge, and Warren's team isn't there all the time. It seems like they're never there lately."
"Warren still with the little girl?" Stacy's eyes darted around the room behind Annie rather than meet her gaze.
"Yeah, he's still with Paige." Annie hadn't been too thrilled to find out the Professor didn't put his foot down on his teachers dating people too young to vote. If it were another man Annie would think he was sleazy, but Warren wasn't.
"Oh." Stacy stood up quickly and took a few steps towards the window. Annie could see her hopes of bringing Stacy home crumbling.
"Just come for Christmas at least." Annie tried yet again. Once she got Stacy away from here maybe she could talk her into staying.
"This job isn't union Annie." Stacy turned to grin at her with a bit of condescension. "I don't have vacation pay."
Annie gritted her teeth for a moment and resisted the urge to comment on the job. "Just a few days." She added with authority. She had no intention of taking no for an answer, no intention of leaving Stacy to this. She wanted to take the woman away with her when she left the house.
"Look." Stacy sighed and Annie didn't like the way the woman stood up and crossed her arms in front of her. Stacy looked resigned to something. "This is where I belong. This is home. Go back to the mansion and forget about all this Annie. You don't belong in a place like this."
Annie sat rigidly and stared at Stacy's back. "Well, I'm getting used to it. I've been in a lot of places like this looking for you." She remembered the nervousness she felt at the last one. "That last one I went to offered to hire me even though I wasn't a mutant."
"What? You've been going to places like this alone?" Stacy turned around so quickly it made Annie sit back. Stacy didn't look happy. "You don't have any backup do you?" Stacy's words were an accusation. "Dammit Annie, don't you know how dangerous that is? Some creep could decide to keep you. Some of the places aren't so nice."
"People know where I am." Annie stood up and took a step closer to Stacy. "Unlike you, I let my friends know I'm alive and where I am." Everyone always acted like she couldn't possibly defend herself since she was only human and Annie was tired of it.
"Maybe I had a reason for not telling you." Stacy's voice rose. "Ya ever think about that?"
Annie knew what that reason was, and it wasn't good enough. "Why are you back to doing this? Stacy…" Annie let out a frustrated breath while she tried to calm down. "Stacy, you were out… you were free. The Professor would have helped you out. If you didn't want to be on Warren's team, maybe one of the others…"
"No." Stacy's head moved from side to side angrily. "I heard what some of them were saying behind my back. That I was a whore and didn't belong there. That I shouldn't be taking up the space a real hero should take. That my power was hardly useful in a fight, I couldn't seduce ALL the badguys."
Annie felt a wave of anger at the snowball. Bobby was probably the one Stacy had overheard, because Annie had overheard him talking like that once as well. She'd given him a piece of her mind, but at the time it was too late. Stacy was already gone.
Stacy's anger was growing as she spoke and Annie knew pity wasn't going to get her anywhere. "What, so it got a little tough and you ran like a baby? Since when did what Bobby say matter? He's a jerk. I WANTED you there. I needed a friend and you left me."
The knock on the door startled them both. Annie recognized the voice of the woman she'd paid for Stacy's time come through the door. "Is everything alright in there?"
"Yeah, Sybil… everything's fine." Stacy answered with a hint of her irritation.
"If you aren't working… we can't afford to have…"
"I KNOW." Stacy growled out. "This is foreplay. Don't worry about it." Her voice got quieter as she addressed Annie's confused look and slight blush. "They don't like people that aren't customers in here. It could be a detective."
"I guess we were rather loud and hardly sound passionate." Annie blushed after she said that, wishing she could take that back.
"Sybil's got enhanced senses." Stacy glanced at the door again. "No one else would have heard us through these thick walls. Some of my clients…" Stacy blushed a little and didn't finish what she was saying but Annie knew enough. More than she really wanted to know anyhow.
"Come home with me." Annie glanced around the room, obviously taking it's measure. "You don't belong in a place like this Stacy. I don't care what you think, you don't. You deserve better."
That just got silence. Stacy walked towards the window and stared out at the snow dusted field behind the house. Annie could almost see the thoughts flickering through Stacy's body by the tension in her shoulders. Stacy whispered. "How long were you looking?" Stacy turned to look at her and Annie felt some hope that this was working.
"I gave you two weeks before I started to look. I was waiting for a letter." Annie took a step closer to the woman. "I've gone on several short vacations following leads. I've…" She sighed. "I never knew how hard it could be to find someone." If Stacy realized how hard she'd worked maybe she'd give in. "I've been looking for months."
"Why?"
The short softly spoken words gave Annie pause. Why? Of course she would go after Stacy when she left. It had never occurred to Annie to just leave it be. She had to make sure her friend was alright.
"I was worried." She started to say but Stacy's stare told her that the woman wasn't buying it. Annie sighed heavily and just stared into Stacy's eyes; eyes so full of intelligence and deeply hidden pain. "You're my friend and I…" Annie just stared. She'd had friends before. Not a lot, but if they'd left like Stacy had she would have just respected their decision and let them go. She wasn't able to let Stacy go. Maybe it was because she knew Stacy would self destruct.
"No, tell me Florence Nightingale… why is a nurse from a middle class family looking for me?" Stacy's voice didn't give away her thoughts. It sounded like a challenge. "Why are you taking a tour of all the mutant whorehouses in America for me?" Stacy glanced around the room with the same measuring stare Annie had earlier, clearly copying it. "This is hardly your scene."
"I was worried about you."
"That would be a phone call." Stacy stared at her and Annie felt like she'd lost the power in this conversation. She hadn't even realized that she had it until it was gone and the questions were being directed at her. "Not a one woman rescue party."
"I needed to SEE you were okay." Annie felt a bit frustrated and she didn't know why. These were just questions, but she didn't like something about the direction they were taking. Not that she could identify what it was that made her nervous. "I just needed to see you."
"How much of me did you want to see." Stacy gave her that flirtatious grin again. "You did pay for the whole hour." Annie noticed Stacy's hand caressing her own stomach lightly before looking up to see Stacy watching her with interest as she did that.
"Look." Annie's voice held steel. "You aren't going to push me away with your sex games… You can't get rid of me that easily."
"Oh, so you like the sex games?" Stacy smirked as Annie blushed, realizing how else that comment could have been taken. "I know lots of them. There's the catholic school girl… the evil seductress… the superhero gone bad… I've played them all. Which one do you want to play?"
"How about the one where you come home with me for Christmas."
"Did you want me to wear a red bow, or a little tiny elf costume?" Stacy was still playing at seduction. It was her self defense mechanism and Annie knew it, but it didn't help keep her from being embarrassed.
"I don't want to play these games." Annie glared at Stacy and crossed her arms in front of her. The teasing stance Stacy had faded away and a more serious expression crossed her face.
"Neither do I. Why are you here? Give me a real answer or I'm not going anywhere." Stacy's voice was firm. Annie could tell it all came down to what she said now, and the thought of leaving this place without Stacy… it just wasn't an option.
"I missed you." Annie's arms moved to hug herself a bit more firmly. "I was worried…" Stacy wasn't budging, just staring at her impassively. Annie felt like she was losing her and didn't think she'd get another chance. It didn't feel like she'd get another chance. "Please, Stacy… just come home." She pleaded.
"Why?"
"You don't need to work here. You could stay at the mansion and I'm sure the Professor…"
"Why?" Stacy repeated emotionlessly.
Annie felt stumped. It wasn't supposed to be this hard to get Stacy back. "I can't leave you here…" Her mind raced to try and come up with a reason Stacy would accept, but it felt like she couldn't think. The pressure of knowing it was now or never, that Stacy would shut the door behind her and lock it…
"Why?"
"I love you." Annie blurted out and then her eyes went wide in shock. She hadn't intended to say that. It took her a moment to recover. "I care about you and don't want you getting hurt. This job is dangerous." Her voice was a hint calmer. "You are my friend."
"Friend." Stacy sighed as she stared at Annie. It made Annie uncomfortable. "Yeah, friend." It didn't sound like Stacy fully believed that when she turned away to stare back out at the field. "I ever tell you about my mutation Annie?"
Annie was surprised by the change in subject. They'd talked about it of course, but Stacy seemed to want to talk about it some more.
"My skin peels off on a regular basis, and it looks like hell when it does that." Stacy gave Annie a brief glance and a grin. "But you know that, you were there for one of the worst ones." Stacy sighed. "My pheromones attract men like no one would believe. Makes them ignore my exotic good looks." A slight self depreciating smirk didn't sit well with Annie.
"You are pretty." Annie interrupted.
"Thanks." Stacy turned to face her fully. So far there was nothing new. She'd heard about this all within the first five minutes of meeting Stacy. "I can also sense arousal, in men or women it doesn't matter like with the pheromones that only work on men." Annie nodded. She'd seen Stacy use that power in a less than nice way when she tried to embarrass Paige.
Stacy stared at her quietly, making Annie feel like she wasn't catching something. "I just thought that as my FRIEND you should know that." Stacy sounded a little bitter. "I usually know before anyone else when someone has the hots for someone else. I can usually pick out potential couples easily, know when a man or woman is thinking about cheating on their lover. I can sometimes even guess how long it will take for a couple to see it themselves. I also know that without my pheromones there aren't a lot of men that would think twice about me, but with them I'm the most popular woman here."
"I'm sure that once someone gets to know you…" Annie felt bad for Stacy and her apparent insecurities. "If someone got to know you, the real you, I'm sure you could find someone."
"So now you're giving me relationship advice?" The underlying bitterness in Stacy's tone just didn't make sense to Annie. "Help me find a man then will you? How will we sell that… more than slightly used reptilian mutant seeking meaningful relationship." Stacy mocked a singles ad. "I'm more than slightly used Annie. It's a hard selling point."
"If someone really cares about you, they'd learn to get over it." Annie spoke softly.
"Really?" Stacy's word came out in a drawl. "Could you ever get over that? Do you know of anyone that could?"
"It may take time…" Annie was puzzled at the wording of the question. "I'd get over it, but that really isn't the issue. Men may have a problem with the…" her words trailed off a moment, "Male ego may take a while, but if someone really cared they'd see that was just something you did… and it isn't who you are."
"That's how you see it?" Stacy spoke rather softly and seemed to lean a little closer.
"Yeah." Annie was surprised at the vulnerability that shown out of Stacy's eyes for just a moment. "You'll have love someday." She whispered and reached out to gently touch Stacy's arm. Annie remembered thinking that as a single parent she'd be a hard sell as well, but Stacy was right. Ex-prostitutes would have harder time finding someone to understand.
When Stacy leaned in a bit more Annie felt a wave of heat, an embarrassed flush, and strong but gentle arms surround her. Stacy leaned in and kissed her, softly, tenderly. Not at all like Annie would have imagined Stacy would kiss. Annie found herself following the lead of softly seductive lips while her mind seemed to freeze and run nonstop all at once. Annie would have thought Stacy would be a hard frantic kisser… or one that sought to dominate with teeth and tongue… Wait a minute! Why was she letting this happen?
As soon as she was about to pull away Stacy stopped and leaned back. She seemed to be looking at her rather intensely and then let her go. "Thanks for trying to find me." Stacy spoke gently and then stepped out of Annie's personal space. "A week. I can give it a week."
"What are you talking about?" Annie felt the flush of her skin hotly and had to take a few deep breaths to calm her heart. Stacy just love to embarrass her with sex, but Annie wasn't quite together enough to get angry yet. She was still a little stunned. For a moment there, she hadn't wanted to stop the gentle kisses and she didn't know if she would have. That was… strange.
"Nothing." Stacy smiled, finally a real smile. "I'll get Sybil to give me time off. I'll go home with you for Christmas."