Thanks for all the reviews. I found aloophole to update and so here it is. I'm working on then next chapter, I swear I'm going to start doing recommendations or dedications to whatever I was thinking of when I wrote the chapter. Today it was.........

MP3's Movie Recommendation: Rollerball. Good movie that didn't get good reviews. Remake of the 1975 version, not quite as sci-fi as the original but still very good. Major Stars= Chris Klein, LL Cool J. Fav. Character(s)= Jester of the Golden Horde. "Oh, look! A mine monkey on skates!" Denekin of the Horsemen. "They're killing him for the ratings!"

(A/N- Ironically, Denekin was the mine monkey. )

Rules as usual.........

Narrator gets bored

Still later on that night......

## The Xavier Institute ##

Anastacia Marko bundled up her wet uniform and threw it into her laundry pile. She slid quickly into a dry blue sports bra, button up silky blue pj top, and Mr. Bubble pj pants. Pulling on a new pair of white gloves, she pushed her hair out of her eyes and fell back on her bed. A sharp knock on the door made her sit up, but when Nathaniel peeked his head in, she fell back down again.

"Hey," he said softly, sliding through the door. As always, Anastacia was acutely aware of how much skin anyone had exposed and Nathaniel was no different. Dressed simply in black boxers and a grey T- shirt, she was not only aware of that, but also how sweet and simple he looked.

"Hey," she responded. "So you put Cassidy down?" "Yeah. But only after I promised on my honor that you were alright." She smiled and beckoned him forward, sitting up against her wall with her legs folded under her. He sat on the edge of the bed, leaving ample space between them. Anastacia rested her head against the wall and looked up at the bookshelves that surrounded her room. She laughed when she spoke.

"She's gonna hate me, but I had to do it. I wouldn't be able to stand myself if she got hurt."

Nathaniel felt his throat catch as he looked at her. His voice was less silly. "I wouldn't be able to stand myself if you got hurt. You took a big risk."

She flashed him a superior look. "Paid off, didn't it?"

Nathaniel didn't change his tone. "But you didn't know it would. How could you just do that?"

She shrugged and smoothed her hair compulsively. "Just have a bit of faith, that's all."

Nathaniel laughed at the simplicity. "You are unlike any other person I've met in my life."

Anastacia laughed as well. "Well, it'd be a pretty boring world if everyone were the same," she answered.

They laughed together for a minute, Nathaniel stopping short to watch her for a moment. He reached out and clasped her gloved hand, leaning against his elbow on the bed. "Go out with me," he said sincerely.

Anastacia stopped laughing and stared down at him dumbly. "What?"

He wasn't deterred. "Go out with me. Be my girlfriend."

She sighed, her face contorting sadly. "I can't."

Nathaniel narrowed his eyes and asked in a much harsher tone, "Why?"

Anastacia freed her hand and folded them in her lap, looking down to avoid the question. He slid forward until he was nearly in her lap, meeting her eyes. She glanced away but did not force him out of her lap. "It's a long story."

He wasn't moving an inch. "I have all the time in the world."

She scowled and leaned forward as she berated him. "No you don't. I hate that saying. I don't understand why people say that."

He sighed as she sat back against the wall, still scowling. His voice was slightly patronizing. "It's a good excuse to spend time with someone. Now tell me."

She tangled her gloved hand in his dreadlocks. When she looked back down, her voice was sad. "How am I supposed to tell you if I don't even know where to start?"

Nathaniel smiled up at her, his voice soft but probing. "At the beginning, Selena. That's always the best place."

Anastacia shrugged and began the long story, playing with his hair all the while. "When I was 14, I was a part of the student exchange program. I went to Russia, where my mother was born and I stayed with a family there for a year and a half. It wasn't actually near any big cities though. It was a collective farm called Ust-Ordynski, near Lake Baikal, in Siberia. I stayed with the Rasputin family and was home-schooled like their children. Their middle child was a mutant and he became my first boyfriend. My only boyfriend. Because of his mutation, his skin changed and I could touch him. It's silly to think that you can fall in love at such a young age, but I did, we did. We were only 15 but there it was. I loved him, for who he was and because he could touch me."

Nathaniel held up a hand and she stopped. 'That's where she got the necklace,' he pieced together. He felt so stupid just having to ask her this. "Stop. I don't understand your mutation to understand to know why that's important to you."

She sighed and looked off in the distance. "That is an entirely different long and complicated story. The short version is that I can't have bare skin contact with anyone because it triggers something in my mutation that hurts me. I have heart attacks, seizures, asthma attacks, everything. And when I touch him, I don't. None of it happens. It just helped so much more that I loved him."

Nathaniel ignored the twinge of jealousy, holding back a wince, and asked innocently, "Loved?"

She met his eyes and muttered sourly, "You keep interrupting me."

Now he did wince. "Sorry. Continue."

She did, without the necessary command. "Anyway, when the year was up, I went home. We wrote letters everyday but my mom realized how sad I was without him. For my seventeenth birthday, I got a lap top, 2 new sweaters, a Polaroid camera, and my boyfriend flown in from Siberia. He had a sign around his neck that said 'From Russia with love.' He spent two weeks with me and my mom before he went home. I was so happy. My mom and I spent that summer in Russia and I thought I was in heaven. About two years ago over my birthday, he and my mom did the same thing. Except he spent two months with me, because he had graduated early. I thought it was going to be wonderful but it just wasn't. Near the end, we got in a fight. He said he wouldn't be able to keep coming, he had other priorities. We went riding on our motorcycles to calm our heads and got in a crash. I was hurt worse and when he saw me in the hospital, all I wanted to do was kiss him but he just started the argument again." She stopped, tears flowing slightly, and wiped her eyes with her left hand, the right still tangled in his hair. "Said he didn't think it was right, that I would have to kiss what he became. I said it didn't matter, I love you anyway. He just started babbling and all I can remember is kissing him, skin-to-skin. I blacked out. When I woke up, my nurse said he had been in another accident. He was dead before I could say I'm sorry."

He sat up this time, her gloved hand falling out of his hair to rest on the back of his neck. He peered at her damp eyes and hated that he had made her cry. Nathaniel reached out and placed his right hand under the collar of her nightshirt, about where her hand was on him. She tensed a little but relaxed when he spoke. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to drag up old memories."

Anastacia shrugged, rolling her eyes and giggling. "No it's OK."

"He gave you that necklace?" He nodded towards the jewelry that was peeking out from under her shirt.

She smiled and preened proudly. "On my 15th birthday."

Nathaniel whistled, thinking, 'He must have loved her, to have given her that at 15. How can I even compete?' "And you haven't stopped grieving?"

Anastacia looked like she'd been struck. "No, I guess I haven't," she replied amazedly. He cocked his head to one side thinking.

"I could start a whole speech about moving on and him wanting you to be happy. But I bet you've heard it before. It's your choice." He shrugged but didn't move his hand.

"You know you are a gem. You are unlike any person I've ever met in my life." She flashed him a dazzling smile, relishing in the joke.

He laughed and leaned his head back. "Well then we're just two of a kind."

She squinted at him in good humor. "Doesn't that defy the point?"

Now he laughed whole-heartedly as he berated her playfully. "Why do you have to look for logic when I'm flirting with you?"

She waggled her head at him, laughing as he did. "Can't you just take a hint?"

"You're not being very clear!"

She laughed again, moving closer, her expression playful. "One date. I can't guarantee anything."

Nathaniel held back his whoop of joy and replied nonchalantly, "That's OK. I'm a gambler."

Anastacia smiled crookedly. "Alright. Now get out."

Nathaniel felt like he had been punched in the stomach. "Huh?"

She laughed at the expression on his face and slid her hand away from his neck. "It's like two in the morning and I'm tired. I'm so far behind I think I'm ahead. I'll talk to you tomorrow."

He nodded agreement and reluctantly removed his hand from her neck. He rolled off the bed in a very ungainly manner, his shirt flying up to reveal well-defined abs and tanned skin. He shrugged comically. "If you say so. Sleep well, my queen."

Her smile grew wider and she fell to lay on the bed fully. "Pleasant dreams, my king." He smiled at the banter and nodded. He slid out of her door and closed it behind him. Nathaniel walked back to his room, smiling like a fool.

Well? What do you think? Reviews are always welcome, tell me what you think. ReadReview!