Regina: I'm alive! I'm alive! I'm alive! I am sorry to worry any of you (ha ha ha) but I am still alive! And look! I'm even over my writer's block!
Must be something to do with the purple hair... yes, I have purple hair. It was supposed to be blue, but at least it isn't green, I suppose. Not that I have anything against Polaris, of course.
But anyway, life has been busy, I've been working on an original novel, and I've been working on a few websites (including a Beast one – and have contemplated making an Amyro fanfiction fanlisting), and have been trying to get the groundwork for an X-Men Movieverse student-centric RPG going. Perhaps you could let me know (the review button is your friend!) so I can get an idea of numbers, if anyone wants to play.
But I shall no longer delay! Let the fourth chapter of A Way With Words begin!
A Way With Words
Chapter Four: Words That Burn
"Amara? Are you all right?"
"Huh? I'm fine. Why?"
"You just seem a little distracted, that's all," Jean said. "Scott said you were quiet all the way home, too."
Amara looked down at her dinner plate. Somehow she had managed to get home after her creative writing class, but everything that had happened that day seemed a blur.
Except for the kiss.
Amara swore that the others at the dinner table could see the blush rising up her neck, heading towards her face. She tried to ignore the sensation of her cheeks burning, but found she couldn't concentrate.
"She really enjoys her class," Ororo said, drawing attention away from Amara, even if it was only briefly. The other adults smiled, pleased for her. Even Logan was, and if Amara had not been in such a dream, she would have found that shocking.
Amara poked at the peas with her fork, not really noticing the way they rolled around her plate. Her mind was consumed by thoughts of him. The sound of his voice. The light brush of his fingers against her cheek. The exquisite heat and pressure of his lips against hers...
Oh, dear.
She really was blushing now.
"Amara?"
She dropped the fork; the sound it made when it hit the table rang around the large dining room.
Amara did not look up. "Sorry," she said quietly.
"Are you all right?" asked Bobby.
"I -" she began, but she fell silent when she felt Ororo's hand on her forehead.
"Just a mild fever," she told everyone. To Amara she added, "Go to bed. I'll clear up for you."
"But... I..." Amara sighed. "All right." She pushed her chair backwards, and nearly knocked it over. "Sorry," she whispered.
"Go to bed, Amara," Xavier told her gently.
"'Night," she said softly to the residents of the Institute. "See you in the morning."
X X X
Amara forced herself to obey the adults' wishes, and go to bed, but as she opened her dresser draw to get her pyjamas, she caught a glance of herself in the mirror. For all her good intentions, Amara paused, leaving the draw half open, and stared in the mirror, and at the girl staring back at her.
Was it her imagination, or did her eyes seem brighter? Was it a trick, or were her lips really that combination of pale brown and red, standing out against her skin? And had her skin always been that colour, soft and inviting to the touch?
Ignoring the draw and pyjamas for the moment, Amara stared at the reflection in the mirror.
It definitely was not her. At least, not as she knew herself.
After all, she did not have a faint flush to her cheeks, and a sparkle to her eyes. She did not have hair that shone under the artificial light, and skin that practically glowed.
Then who was this girl in the mirror?
She looked like Amara, but she was not her. She moved when Amara did, but she was not her.
So who was she?
With a start, Amara remembered the Kitty looked when she and Lance were having a good patch. She practically glowed with happiness and love.
Was the same thing happening to her?
Experimentally, she thought about John. It was not hard: her mind wanted to remember him. It was keeping him out of her thoughts that was the hard part.
She thought of his smile – the one, she knew instinctively, that he reserved only for her – and leapt back from the mirror in shock.
What was going on?
For a moment, Amara had been reminded of Jean.
For a moment, Amara could have sworn she looked... beautiful.
What had he done to her?
X X X
Amara was not the only one to notice what had happened. Everywhere she went – the Institute, school, the mall – people who knew her (and some who did not) commented it on it.
"You look nice today, Amara."
"That's just what every pretty girl needs."
"Did you get a new shirt? Oh, I know! Haircut!"
"Looking good, Aquilla!"
Even people at her writing class took notice, with Amara receiving even more compliments.
She was starting to enjoy the nice floaty feeling that came with everything that had happened.
But with the floaty feeling came a dark shadow. It was hovering just outside the door, making her tremble slightly. It would come in when John did... and she had no idea what would happen then.
Instead of dwelling on the negative possibilities, Amara concentrated on the short story she had started to write the night before. She did not know why she wanted to write all the time now, but she supposed it had something to do with the class. She had never liked writing before then, so it came as a surprise that she enjoyed it now.
Not that she was any good of course...
The sound of a chair being scraped along the floor caused her to look up.
"John..."
"Miss me?" the teen in question asked as he sat down beside her.
"I-"
"What are you working on?" he asked, noticing the notepad she had been scribbling on.
She automatically shielded her work. "It's nothing."
"What do you mean, 'it's nothing'? Let me have a look..." John reached for it, but Amara blocked it with her arm.
"No, leave it."
"Come on..."
And suddenly, he was there, trying to reach over her arm, his face right up in hers.
Amara searched his eyes, but could not find anything there. "Joh-"
His kiss kept her from finishing.
After a moment, he pulled away, triumph all over his face. "Gotcha!" he whispered.
Amara frowned. "What?"
Then she saw that he had her notepad in hands. "Give that back!" she demanded.
"No."
And then he turned so that his back was towards her, and started to read.
Started to read her private writing!
"Give that back, now, John!"
"I'm trying to read, here!"
"I said give that back!"
"Shh! I'm nearly finished!"
"John!"
"Done!" He turned back around, and handed it back to her. "I thought it was really good."
Amara nearly dropped it as she took the pad from his hands. "You – what?"
"I really liked it," John said. "There was just one thing wrong with it."
Amara's heart sank, but she had to know. "And that thing was?"
John looked serious for a moment, as if considering the best way to break the news to her.
Then his face split into a broad grin. "Something that good shouldn't be written on something like that." He gestured to the notepad. "You should have something nice to write in." He pulled something from his backpack, and placed it on the desk. "Something like this."
Amara's eyes widened. "For me?"
"No, for Dot." When Amara looked at him, confusion all over her face, John rolled his eyes. "Of course it's for you!"
"Oh."
It was a slender notebook, very simple, but with a dark red colour that reminded her of, well, fire.
Amara looked up at John, and smiled a sweet smile. "Thank you."
He smiled back. "You are very welcome."
Just then the teacher came in, "All right everyone, get ready," and Amara slipped the book into her own backpack.
Just knowing that it was John's knee against her own, and the book he had given her was in her bag, waiting to be used, made her day all the more brighter.
John's words made it burn.
"You look beautiful today."
