It was Christmas Eve at Xavier's Institute for Gifted Youngsters, and it showed. The entire building was decorated with glowing lights, tinsel, and mistletoes. Even the resident scary guy, Logan, was wearing a santa hat. Of course, he was wearing it against his will, and punched anyone who looked at it. However, the thought was still there, and that was what really mattered.
"Did you look at my hat!?" Logan demanded as he saw Amara looking in his direction.
"Yes," she smiled nicely, "It's very festive." Logan replied by punching her in the face and storming away. It took her a moment to gather her thoughts, "Professor! Wolverine just punched me!"
"Amara, please leave Logan alone," Professor Xavier said, not looking away from the window display he was putting up.
At that moment, Kitty was looking up at a mistletoe that had been placed over the door to the kitchen. Then she moved her attention to the mistletoe that was a few feet to the left, and the one that was hanging from the ceiling fan, and the one that was over the window, and the one that was . She sighed in annoyance, "Kurt, don't you think you're overdoing the mistletoes?"
Kurt stopped in the middle of hanging another one and turned to her, "I find that very offensive. It's tradition in Germany to hang as many mistletoes as possible."
"It is not!" she rolled her eyes, "You're probably just doing it so somebody will kiss you."
"No, seriously. It's what the baby Jesus would have wanted," he said as he rifled through his giant bag of mistletoes for another to hang.
"Really?" she asked sarcastically, "Baby Jesus wanted twenty-five mistletoes in the living room?"
"Twenty-eight!" Kurt corrected. He grinned down at Kitty, "Hey look, we're under a mistletoe right now! That means you have to kiss me!"
"Ew, no!" Kitty shouted, "Do you honestly think girls will fall for that stupid old trick?"
Just then, Scott and Jean walked into the room. "Look, Jean, we're under a mistletoe! You know what that means." He leaned over and kissed Jean, who started giggling.
"Scott, that is SO romantic!" she sighed dreamily and they both exited the room, hand in hand.
Kurt looked smugly at Kitty, "See? She said it was romantic."
"Well, it's totally NOT!" she muttered, "And anyway, don't you have a girlfriend?"
"It doesn't count if we're under the mistletoe!" He explained, to which Kitty rolled her eyes and walked out of the room. Kurt frowned as he watched her leave. Could it be that mistletoes really were only for saps like Jean and Scott? No, he thought, perhaps he just need to hang more mistletoes. With that, he got back to work.
Yes, everyone at the institute was jolly. Even Rogue. It was hard to imagine anyone not being jolly at such a jolly time. But exceptions can always be made.
At the Brotherhood of Mutant's boarding house, there were considerably less Christmas decorations. In fact, there weren't any. There had been a bell ringer nearby, but he vanished under mysterious circumstances.
On the inside, the boarding house was just as gloomy. At that moment, most of the brotherhood was conjugated in the living room. Todd was watching an infomercial, Lance and Pietro were playing checkers, and Wanda was reading a book. All looked significantly un-jolly.
This is the particular moment that Freddy chose to burst into the room with a plate of gingerbread cookies and a glass of milk, "Merry Christmas, everyone!"
Nobody bothered to look at him, though he could have sworn he heard somebody mutter, "Bite me." Fred frowned at the very un-Christmas-like display. But he did really like Christmas so he wouldn't let it bother him. He sat himself next to Todd on the couch and began munching his cookies. For a brief moment, he watched the infomercial. He wondered why Todd would want to watch it, besides the fact that it was about ladies' underwear.
"So, are you excited about Christmas?" he asked Todd enthusiastically.
Todd looked away from the television, but his indifferent expression remained, "Why should I be? It's not like there's anything for us to look forward to."
"But it's the most wonderful time of the year," Fred's jolliness wavered slightly.
Todd snorted, "Yeah right. Christmas sucks. It's not like any of us is going to get any presents."
"Not any from each other, anyway," Pietro piped up.
Lance raised an eyebrow at him from his side of the checkerboard, "Yeah? And who are you expecting to get presents from."
Pietro looked at him as if he were stupid, "Duh, from Santa."
The entire room grew silent. Even the infomercial seemed to become quiet. They watched Pietro as he silently wondered if Santa got his letter.
"Um, Pietro..." Todd started slowly, "Even if Santa were real, it's not like he'd give you anything, yo."
"What's that supposed to mean!?" Pietro snapped.
"Santa only gives presents to good boys and girls," Freddy said through a mouth full of cookies.
In a fit of anger, Pietro smashed the checkerboard to the floor, "He will TOO give me presents! In fact, I've been EXTRA good this past week."
Wanda finally looked up from her book, "Pietro, do you remember on Tuesday when those orphans came to our door?"
"Well..."
flashback
"Please, sir, can you spare some canned food for our orphanage?" asked a sweet, but very sickly looking little boy.
"If you don't have any, that's okay," said an equally sweet looking orphan girl.
Pietro glowered out at them, "You have some nerve bothering me while I'm in the middle of watching Wheel of Fortune! Now you expect me to give you food!? I bet you're just going to go sell it to buy crack!" He looked over at their rusty red wagon full of canned goods, "Just look at how many people you suckered out of their food! How dare you!" He snatched several cans off of the wagon, "I'll put these to better use than you ever could! Now get out of my site!" He glared as they ran away, then yelled as an afterthought, "And take a bath or something! You smell like an outhouse!" With that, he slammed the door and turned to find the other brotherhood members staring at him, "What!? They had it coming, the little punks!" He glanced down at the cans he was holding, "Ooh, creamed corn!"
End Flashback
"Oh, so what! They were just orphans!" Pietro rolled his eyes.
Lance started, "What about yesterday in the McDonald's parking lot when you..."
flashback
They were all walking to Lance's jeep, when suddenly a man ran into Pietro, and dropped a purse onto the ground. Nearby an old woman was yelling, "Help! That man just stole my purse with my heart pills in it!" She then fell to the ground, having a heart attack.
Pietro grabbed the purse and the man looked as though he was going to run away without it.
"Oh, here you go," Pietro said casually and handed the purse to the man. Everyone else stared in shock as the burglar made his get-away. Just then Pietro burst out laughing and pointed at the old woman, "Hey, that chick's having a heart attack!" He noticed his friends glaring at him, "Geez, it's not like I let him get the wallet, see?" He showed them the wallet, then pulled out the money and shoved it in his pocket. As he was walking to the jeep, he glanced over at the poor old woman, and started laughing some more.
end flashback
Pietro groaned in annoyance, "So, maybe that wasn't the nicest thing I've ever done but that doesn't mean-"
Fred cut in, "But what about this morning when you-"
"Okay, I get it!" Pietro shouted, "I do bad things without feeling any remorse for them. That still doesn't make me a bad person!"
"Actually, it does," Wanda threw in.
"Fine," Pietro said crossly, "I'm a bad person. But I promise I won't do any more bad things until Christmas."
Two hours later...
"Hey guys!" Pietro ran into the room excitedly, "There's some hobos outside! Anyone wanna come with me to eat sandwiches in front of them?"
To be continued...