Lucky Me
Chapter 048
When I finally decided to leave the big comfy feather bed, (and yeah, I asked Mr. Warren if it was his old feathers—he didn't answer, but gave me a look that told me to stop being dumb) it was around ten o'clock on the lovely of lovely Thursday mornings (lovely 'cause I didn't have to go to school!). It was snowing outside, but Mr. Boy Billionaire had the heater up high, he's such a smart guy, no wonder he's so rich.
But if that ever fell through, he could always try his hand at modeling.
"Kookie! Get down here!" Mr. Warren's oh so happy chirp (scream) came and I stumbled my way over my things I had sort of dumped in the middle of his guest bedroom and ran to the top of the stair case.
You could see the entire apartment from the top floor (very open penthouse) including him, and he did not look happy.
It didn't take me long to learn what was wrong: I heard several highly upset voices coming through this television thing on the wall. It must have been connected back to the mansion because it was showing the faces of Chris, D-M, Adrian, Bobby-Jerk, and I could hear several other people's voices coming through.
"I am going to kill that," I was not say that word; I would have blushed, "what the hell did she do with my things?"
That was the basic idea, anyway. Bobby-Jerk wasn't yelling, he was laughing. At least until Mr. Jean-Paul apparently came down with a pair of boxer shorts with Bobby-Jerk's signature and a 'with love' remark on them.
They'd somehow been placed in the Canadian's room.
Putting them on hold, Mr. Warren gave me a very stern look (as stern as one could be, I supposed, while trying not to laugh after Bobby-Jerk's very colorful denial of the boxers), "What exactly did you do?"
"To who?" I asked with a nervous laugh. "You'll, uh, have to be a bit more specific."
He face-palmed, then grumbled something about 'Jubilee Jr', and started to list off the names. I pretty much told him everything without telling him all I did. When he got to the Professor though, he had this sort of please-say-you-didn't edge to his voice.
"I didn't do anything to the Professor's bedroom," I confessed. In actuality I'd done it to his office. He'd find a very interesting something of my Grandmother's in his desk drawer in exchange for a piece of paper I took from the same drawer.
Not to mention a little something else I was surprised to find.
After he got back on to the tele-cast and managed to say a few words, he hung up.
"Whatever you did, it was enough that Scott and Jean are coming to pick you up."
Oh man, I didn't want to die!
"B-but we had a deal! You said you'd take me Christmas shopping!" Now I was starting to feel like a bratty four-year-old. Of course, knowing what was waiting for me back at the mansion, I was not past throwing myself (shot wing and all) on the floor, kicking and screaming until I got my way. "What kind of business man would you be to go back on our deal?"
He groaned, and rubbed his eyes with one of his hands.
"I guess I can't send you to your death yet. Maybe if you did return bearing gifts they'd let you live a bit longer."
Yeah, at least until they opened them.
I did have an ace up my sleeve, if they messed with me, then I'd sic Arty on them. She had every male in the mansion playing ninja, with the way they moved and hid to avoid her.
For Mr. Warren being so clever, he sure was true to his roots sometimes.
As in his blonde roots.
Imagine a man who was silly enough not only to give me a credit card and his car with chauffeur to use to get Christmas gifts, but get this, he wouldn't be coming with me (and to save the receipts). As in I was all by myself and able to do whatever I wanted with this little bit of freedom known as his gold card.
The driver who probably considered me a "girl toy" to Mr. Warren or as a bumpkin tourist sighed heavily as his boss stepped out of limo and told him to take me wherever I wanted. I waited until the door was shut, we pulled away from the curb before I told him where I wanted to go, and then pressed for the partition to go up between us.
Then I busted out laughing.
This was too good!
Of course, after the first couple of common stores, I went to some of the stuck up rich stores. They looked down their noses at me, and I gritted my teeth as they asked if I was his 'niece' or 'cousin' (a.k.a. bed or bath toy). I felt like screaming at them 'does my chest look big enough for that?' but it was really more irritating that they thought Mr. Warren would ever have to pay for a girl to go out with him!
I was halfway through my shopping list when I finally realized why the rich and snobby stores weren't so nice to a rich and snobby credit card. Half the people probably thought I had lost my mind when I busted out laughing in the middle of the lingerie department, right behind this large woman who turned around and looked as if she was either going to threaten to sit on me, or have me for a snack (remember, chicken wings-but they were hidden).
The one drawback to this discovery was that I realized there was probably going to be a limit on it, had it been Mr. Warren's, there would be no limit.
I smirked as I thought of several things I could do with this image inducer of mine and a credit card that was someone else's.
Requesting to go to the mall, the driver rolled his eyes but did as he was told. There was a store I accidentally stumbled into that old, "18 Yum Yum" or something like that. It was the perfect place to get something for Grandma (and who or what she does with the things was up to her and I just did not want to know) and had some payback along with Mr. Warren.
Fiddling with my image inducer, I found the perfect blonde setting to have.
I might have been going around as Kookie Summers thinking I was toting Mr. Warren's credit card, but now I looked like Emma Frost with a credit card with "Robert W. Drake" printed on it.
This was going to be fun….and hopefully on camera.
After sticking around with a team that basically wore bull-eyes in the middle of their foreheads, you start to pick up some stuff from them.
Like when someone was following you.
I didn't mean one of the wacky ladies or men who chases everyone down with a perfume bottle in their hands swearing up and down that it will turn whoever your after 'on' (most likely 'on' means they will be easy to ignite since I think the main ingredient in those bottles were gasoline), no this was someone else. I was getting creeped out majorly at this point. I was grateful to be in a crowded place and still looking like Emma.
It's funny, in some morbid way, that I could hear Scott's voice telling me about what to do when you were being followed. And that was always to find some way to confront the person without making a scene.
Mr. Logan jokingly (I think) called it the Summers Sixth Sense.
I took off into one of the bathroom halls, and sure enough, without looking back I knew someone was behind me. The clicks of the shoes gave it away. There was no way I was in any condition to fight and whoever it was probably was after Emma, not Kookie. I quickly walked into the bathroom, locked it (freaked out the Kit Kat Club of young teenagers that I would have been friends with if Barbie was my role model), found a stall and began to revert the image into my 'normal without wings' state.
As I left the girls looked down their noses at me, but I was used to it. I guess because I wasn't a Bieber or Devito clone want to be. Anyway, when I got out of the bathroom the person who had been following Emma wasn't following me anymore, in fact, they were nowhere to be seen.
Let me tell you, that no matter what, it'd still freak you out enough to want to leave the establishment you were being watched and followed. It was like getting a hug from Bobby-Jerk in his ice form or having one of Adrian's metal finger knives slowly going down the back of your neck.
Just deciding to jump ship, I was glad to have a cell phone to call the driver. It was a little bit before I was supposed to be at Mr. Warren's other office building to have dinner with him (I was thinking pizza).
"Can I help you?" Came this little snotty voice from behind a computer screen when I stepped off the elevator. I think there was a woman behind there, but who could tell?
"Uh, I'm here to see Mr. War-thington?" Oh yeah, that's not obvious.
"Do you have an appointment?" The lady poked her head from around her monitor. She gave me this total 'where's-your-parents-little-girl' look. "We already bought from the Girl
Scouts."
I glared at her, "Mr. Worthington is expecting me."
"I'm sure," she shot back, her nose stuck up so far in the air I was surprised she hadn't inhaled the ceiling.
Fine, if she wanted to play hard ball, I'd simply cheat. Image inducers allowed you to do that you know. So I stomped my foot, turned and marched out of the office, found a secluded spot to 'change' (I was feeling like Superman-sheesh). And viola! Emma Frost was present.
I smirked when I walked in where the annoying lady was still sitting. She saw 'Emma' and about lost her cool.
"M-Miss Frost!" She stuttered like a female Porky Pig. "I-I'll tell Mr. Worthington you are here."
I crossed my arms and smirked, I could get used to the power of the image inducer. I guessed this was what the Professor had been talking about when he mentioned 'misuse' of it. But how the heck else was I going to see my 'babysitter' if the guard at the desk wasn't going to let me in? Judo-flip her? Riiight, that'd sit right with everyone.
When Mr. Warren came out the door, he had the cutest 'huh' expression about him but showed me into his office nonetheless. After he shut the door, and I was past the whole whoa-was-this-a-big-office' phase, I turned to him; he had one blonde eyebrow raised.
"You have any idea how degrading it is for me to do this?" I asked, flicking off the image inducer and sighing heavily.
He too seemed to breathe a sigh of relief, "Kookie, you're back earlier than I thought." Mr. Warren said matter-of-factly.
"Yeah, well, it wasn't as much fun as I thought when I found out I had a card with a credit limit."
He grinned at me.
Once a boy, always a boy.
The closer we got to the mansion, the more nails I chewed. When I was done with all ten, I started to braid my hair. By the time we pulled up to the door, I had a zillion braids and a puddle of sweat (not really) in the seat. I was so going to die.
"Please don't make me go in," I whined and Mr. Warren only shook his head and dragged me out of his car. I was about ready to bolt but his grip was very firm and I gave him my best puppy dog expression, "Will you come to my funeral?"
"Don't worry about it Kookie, Bobby has done much worse in his lifetime." He tried to be encouraging. I felt my stomach drop. One of the main things I hadn't told him was about was what I did to the heater…
"If it isn't the little fugitive come to reap what she sowed." Chris cracked his knuckles in mock intimidation ( come on, once you'd seen a guy drooling on his pillow in a pair of ick Pepe LePew boxers, he lost all my respect -not that he had it to begin with). I was about to go at him with a smart aleck reply when the last person I thought I'd see came shouting (happily) down the staircase and grabbed me up in a bear hug as others started to come out of wood work (mostly from the danger room area).
"My protégé!" Bobby-Jerk was the one who had me in a hug; I became like a statue and didn't budge, every muscle tense. "I'm so proud of you! You're finally starting to learn something from me!" I saw Scott and Jean come from the kitchen area, and my eyebrows rose quickly. Before letting me go, Bobby-Jerk whispered quickly in my ear, "Don't worry, I'll get you back." Hit me on my shoulder and went into the large family room.
"There she is!" Paige came storming down the stairs and I hid behind Mr. Warren, usually when she saw him, she went to jelly. "What'd ya do to my room?"
Oh-kay, anytime when she wasn't about to breathe fire from her nose she went to jelly.
"O-uh, uh" That was my wisecrack. Wasn't it wise? You could just feel my eyes roll.
Paige was about to tear into me again when Mr. Warren came to my rescue by distracting her with a laugh about it. This had her going 'oh well' and paying attention to the boy billionaire. As I moved to the family room, I paused in front of the door. Not because of anything other than every known mutant on the face of the planet seemed to be stuffed into there.
"What's going on?" I asked one of the faces I knew (Adrian), and he shrugged saying something about a Christmas party and a need to share body heat.
I acted like I didn't know a thing when I heard accusations about a 'broken' heater.
But, when no one else was looking, I smirked. Sure I would be made to suffer this by freezing, but heck, at least in this type of torture I wouldn't have to suffer alone.
About an hour or so, I bumped into this mountain of a guy (besides Mount Mr. Bishop), he looked down at me, and no matter how tall I was, I shrunk. He had white hair and this whole glowing eye thing going on, while I, I was having heart failure.
"Hello, Kookie." Correction, I was a speck on the ground formally known as Kookie. Then he reached out a metal arm and I must have jumped back from it (okay DUH, I still had very clear memories of a big shiny gun
shooting at me from my first "adventure" in the Danger room). "It doesn't bite."
So I did my laugh nervously and shake the big metal arm. It was just as strong as I thought it would be but the freaky thing was that it was warm. Like a car hood after the engine had been running under it for a while.
"I'm Nate" I was impressed? "Nate Summers, I heard that you were now part of the 'clan'." Clan? I never heard it put that way. I hoped it didn't require any animal sacrifices. "I take it you haven't heard about me?"
If it was any consolation to the hulking guy, I "haven't heard" about a lot of these people. Some of the ones who were flying around, pinning up reindeer cut outs and such, I had never seen in my life, and if I did it was no wonder why I blocked them out. Apparently they didn't know the whole song of the 12 days of Christmas and began to make up their own variation.
He smiled at me, "I'm Scott's son."
..?
How the heck? Who was Scott's plastic surgeon if this guy who was older than Scott was his freaking son! Wait, did he adopt him, too? But why would a thirty-something-year-old adopt a much-older-something-year-old?
Before I was able to ask anything, Scott walked over and said I was going with him and Jean to get the tree.
I was about to say I didn't want to when I figured at least the truck had a heater.
You know my luck. Why must I even say that out of all the multiple vehicles jammed and parked every which way in the large garage, we took an old clunker that I think was probably the Professor's first vehicle (it was that old) and we were lucky the engine didn't drop out from underneath us, much less have poor Scott.
Jean insisted she drive and I silently insisted on being by the door (to be away from Jean) and that left mighty-leader-man-father figure in my life jammed in the middle. If anyone had ever seen a cartoon when their anger showed by a type of 'glow' then I was sure we looked like the sun on wheels. Apparently saving the world didn't ebb her anger, and having a good time in New York didn't help mine! It was temporarily forgotten, but one look at Jean and bam! Here all that anger came again.
"So, Kookie, did you like it in New York?" Scott tried to start up a conversation but it was always quickly shot down. I went back into my 'fine' mode.
"It was fine."
"Get all your Christmas shopping done?" Okay, that one you couldn't answer with 'fine' or anything short so I crossed my arms and must have been one of those telepathic talks happening between the two of them because Scott snorted and looked over at me. At least I think he looked over at me, I was not really sure. Who the heck could tell with those glasses? Suddenly I got a mental image of Scott giving orders with his eyes crossed.
I didn't know why I thought it was so funny. But I just got the picture of him being all in "large and in charge" sounding strict and behind those glasses his eyes were crossed and looking goofy."What's so funny?" Scott asked, probably worried I had inhaled too much of the exhaust or something.
I kept on giggling; this was just as bad as picturing Wolverine in a tutu or Dr. Hank as a skinny, boney bear if ever he got shaved. I had odd thoughts, and I hadn't learned to keep them completely quiet because Jean started to laugh when I had Mr. Bishop frolicking through a meadow with a crown of flowers on his head.
Scott looked over at Jean, back to me and then to Jean again.
"Could someone please tell me what is going on?"
She must have decided to share my little mental dress up (and no I didn't mind because for once I thought it was funny enough to share) and he tried not to laugh, honestly you could see it in his face he tried to hold it in, but before long he was cracking up with us.
Odd way to break the tension, but you didn't see Scott's little 'dress up' of Jean-Paul playing "house" and Bobby-Jerk screaming his head off, tied up to a chair. Or when Jean had Adam in his reptile form singing 'Tip Toe Through the Tulips'.
It was just too great.
One good thing about having a lot of people at the mansion was that when you get back from shopping there were a lot of people willing (and unwilling but had to do it anyway) to help. When I got back inside with a bag of groceries (the Professor actually was going to allow all kinds of sweets to be made-except gingerbread men, this I didn't understand-but Chris was rolling with laughter) it almost felt like -Jerk was making ice sculptures on the front lawn.
Chris was stuck in the middle of a mess of lights, going through and trying to separate the ones that didn't work from the ones that did, and everyone knew how long that took. Professor was trying to shoo Jubilee (I think) away from him. She'd decorated his chair to look like a sled with tiny reindeer in front. Mr. Logan was all dark and brooding until he had to help, uh, 'trim' the tree in certain areas to help it fit. The tree was about twenty feet high for anyone who was interested; we must have looked like an undercover truck driving through the city because all you saw was pine everywhere. I was actually kind of freaked out about how Jean would see, but then all mysterious were solved when the tree suddenly had a slight blur to the air around it."Kookie, your Grandmother is back." I turned around and saw an unhappy looking man. I didn't even think he knew me, much less Arty. "She's upstairs."
"Uh, thanks…?" I looked at him and waited for him to give me a name, but instead he nodded and walked toward the secret downstairs part of the house (also known as Death Room Central-the Danger Room). He looked interesting, long ponytail of red-blonde hair and a star tattoo. Sheesh, what a buncha odd people.
Deciding not to 'mingle' until I had my relative 'under control' I made my way up to my room (after shoving the bag in Adrian's hands) and about died.
No, I didn't trip over anything, but my whole room was done up in Christmas lights and even Stitch had a Santa hat on that seemed to be personalized for him alone (since it had ear holes for him). There were more bags, I guess that's what Arty forgot to bring from the 'other state', and there were presents everywhere. Not for me of course, but for other people at the it to Arty to make friends and want to spend money. I was just amazed by the lights. I didn't even hear him sneak up behind me.
"Boo." I nearly jumped out of my skin (which with me can be literally). Turning, he just smiled. For some reason, seeing him standing there smiling, I went on a serious guilt trip. All I did was look at this other guy, Donovan, and I turned to jelly, and then there was him who was a friend (?) and I felt guilty about looking at this other guy. But it wasn't like we were official or anything, heck I didn't know what you'd term this 'thing' he and I have.
We hadn't even kissed because of Mr. Kurt!
"Wrong holiday," I remarked, and he came closer with a smirk.
"Like the decorating, let me guess, Vegas?"
"Arty," I corrected. "Have you seen her?"
"Have you heard me scream?" I glared at him. "She went back downstairs, something about a gift for you and so on. But she did say something interesting," I raised my eyebrow in question as I plucked up Stitch (how cute!). They even made him a little coat! "Something about being alone with romantic lighting and no chance of being disturbed."
"I don't have a clue what she could be…" And then I saw it or them. They were hanging from the ceiling and in between each light bulb on the strings of lights. At least a hundred of these little plants dangling from .
