Dialog in italics is in Mandarin, which I don't speak at all, but Warren does.
Ch 3: Christmas Eve
"Warren spill on table two!" Mr. Yang called into the kitchen in Mandarin.
Warren left off washing the endless pile of dishes and snapped up a towel on his way out. Table two had been a problem all night, from the newly-weds who couldn't keep their hands off each other long enough to order, to the current occupants, a couple with out-of-town relatives visiting, who were letting their three bratty children run amuck.
"Can't you scare them into behaving?" Mrs. Yang asked as he walked by. "Just a few sparks?"
"Not unless you want to add a lawsuit to your Christmas list," Warren replied dryly.
"Maybe next year," Mrs. Yang deadpanned.
One of the kids had knocked over a pot of tea, and Ushi, the table's very frazzled waitress, was trying to mop it up with napkins, while the mother yelled at the boy who had spilt it, and he proceeded to look not very sorry at all and an awful lot like he would do it again if given a chance.
"I've got it," Warren touched Ushi's shoulder gently. "Why don't you go get them more napkins and silverware."
"Thanks," Ushi smiled gratefully and made a hasty retreat to the kitchen.
"You speak Chinese?" the father asked, not having understood a word of what Warren had just said.
"Yeah," Warren made quick work of wiping down the table.
"Are you taking it in school?" the mother asked.
"No," Warren collected the soggy napkins and dripping silverware.
Everyone at the table waited for an explanation of why the tattooed white kid with the red streaked hair spoke Mandarin, but Warren didn't give them one. It was sort of funny to have someone stare at him like he was an abnormality of nature for something as mundane as speaking a foreign language. Usually, stares like that were connected with people knowing who his parents were.
Warren left the table to speculate and returned to the kitchen and the never ending pile of dishes. Christmas Eve at the Paper Lantern was always a mad house, but Warren would rather be there, then sitting at home alone with his mother out of town or being aggravated at the Stronghold Christmas party.
Warren had moved to China with his parents at the age of three and moved back to the States with his mother at the age of thirteen. In China, he had attended an English speaking school, and they had mostly spoken English at home, but they hadn't lived in an English speaking neighborhood, and none of Warren's friends outside of school had spoken English. The culture shock of moving back to the States had not been kind to him. The Yangs, who owned the Paper Lantern, had been a welcome piece of home.
Almost everyone who worked at the Paper Lantern was related somehow to the Yangs. Even before he had been old enough to actually work there, he used to sit in the kitchen, munching on bowls of rice pressed on him by Mrs. Yang's sister, who was the cook, and entertaining the Yang's oldest son, who was six years younger than him. He liked being around a family who liked him, even if it wasn't his own family.
Warren didn't have to work. His mother easily made enough with her consulting business for both of them to live comfortably, but being there kept him sane.
"Warren table two again!"
Even in the midst of madness.
"So, is that Boomer's fourth or fifth cocktail?" Magenta asked from her seat to Will's right.
"I think it's his sixth," Ethan said from Will's left.
"And like the eighth time he's told that story about saving Pokipsy," Zack added from Magenta's far side.
"Maybe it's the only town he ever saved," Magenta speculated.
The four teenagers were silent for a moment, then burst out laughing. In the noisy crowded room, no one noticed.
As far a Christmas parties went, this one was turning out to be pretty bearable. Layla had abandoned Will like she did every year to help her mother raise the environmental awareness of the guests, but the rest of his friends had stuck with him, and they were managing to entertain each other fairly well, usually at the expense of the adults, quite a few of whom were becoming a little tipsy.
Will was still missing Warren though. He just knew Warren would have had something fascinating, or maybe facetious, to say about how the size of the meteor and the number of people Boomer had saved kept changing. Plus, Warren had great stories about Boomer and Medulla, since the Paper Lantern was one of their favorite spots to bring dates.
He couldn't really blame him though. Warren didn't like being around people who didn't like him, and in the superhero community, the adults could be just as bad, if not worse, than the kids when it came to thinking they knew everything about a person at a glance. Unfortunately, they all knew who Warren's father was. It bothered Warren to have everyone staring at him and whispering about him behind his back.
It was probably a good thing that he wasn't there. If he had been, he would have retreated to the kitchen to help Will's mom with the food, or been hiding up in Will's room reading. Will still missed him though.
"Some people are just so unaware of the impact they have on the delicate balance of nature," Layla stopped in front of them, slightly miffed, then she shrugged and smiled. "Come dance with me," she said to her boyfriend, indicating the room across the hall, where the furniture had been pushed out of the way and people were dancing to loud Christmas music.
Will tugged Layla forward and kissed her. "I don't dance," he said, as if she hadn't known that since they were two.
"I know, but I just keep hoping one day you'll learn," Layla smiled.
And Will missed Warren twice over, because Layla really liked dancing, and Will really hated it, but Warren would have danced with Layla if they had both asked him.
"I'll dance with you Layla," Ethan offered shyly, even though he couldn't really dance.
"That would be wonderful Ethan," Layla grinned at him, and they abandoned the group for the dance floor.
Warren hesitated at Will's front door. It was nearly 11:45, and while it was obvious there were people still awake in the house, Warren wasn't sure any of them except Will were going to want him underfoot while they were cleaning up.
He knocked anyway. It was nothing new to him being where he wasn't wanted, and despite the fact that he had never actually said he would come, Will was expecting him.
"You missed Boomer drunk off his ass," Will said in way of greeting when he opened the door.
Warren snorted and was instantly glad to be there.
"Warren!" Layla appeared from somewhere down the hall and flung herself at Warren, hugging him hard. "Happy Holidays!"
Will grabbed Warren's arm, stopping him from slipping on the icy front step.
"Merry Christmas, Layla," Warren returned the hug one armed, and stepped out of the snowy night so Will could shut the door.
"You have to meet my mom," Layla informed him as he unlaced his wet boots and hung his jacket on the rack near the door.
Warren raised an eyebrow at Will, who shrugged in return, having no more idea than him why he had to meet Layla's mom.
After Warren had his boots off, Layla dragged him into the living room where her mother was helping to clean up. Will followed, looking highly amused, because Layla was quite possibly the only person Warren allowed to drag him around by the hand.
"Mom, this is Warren Peace," Layla gave Warren a little push towards her. "Warren, this is my mom Natalie."
Natalie had been a friend of Josie Stronghold's long before her last name had been Stronghold, and she had seen as much of Will growing up as the Strongholds had seen of Layla, and she certainly knew who Warren Peace was.
"It's wonderful to meet you Warren," Natalie put down the bag she had been collecting trash in, and held her hand out to him. "Layla's told me so much about you."
Usually, when people said that to Warren there was an undercurrent to it, the implication that what they had heard hadn't been good, and even if it was so subtle that they themselves didn't pick up on it, Warren always did. But it just wasn't there with Natalie.
"It's nice to meet you," Warren shook her hand.
"Do you want a dog?" Natalie asked.
"Mom," Layla laughed and rolled her eyes.
Her mother was forever bringing home animals from the shelters she volunteered at, then trying to foist them off on other people, not so much because she didn't want them, as that she believed everyone needed more animals in their lives.
"A dog?" Warren wasn't sure he had heard her right.
"Yes, a dog," Natalie confirmed. "I just took the sweetest dog home from the shelter yesterday. He's not much to look at, but he'll make a wonderful companion, and you look like a dog person."
"I do like dogs," Warren nodded. "But I don't have time to take care of one."
"Which tells me you'll be a wonderfully responsible owner if you ever get one," Natalie smiled, and despite the fact that she and Layla didn't look much alike, her smile reminded Warren of Layla's. "How about a cat?"
Layla giggled and Will laughed, because that was exactly how his mother had gotten her cat.
"I don't care much for cats," Warren shook his head. "I like birds, but I don't have time for that either."
"Birds," Natalie said thoughtfully. "I'll have to think about that."
"Now you're in trouble," said Layla softly.
"Warren is that you?" Josie called from the kitchen. "You better not be in there cleaning. Come into the kitchen. There's cake left and the cider is still hot."
Will pushed Warren towards the kitchen, then went back to helping Layla and her mother clean up. Josie was in the kitchen working on a stack of dishes that rivaled the one at the Paper Lantern.
"You just spent all night cleaning up after other people. Sit down and eat," Josie paused in her dish washing to ladle up a cup of cider and set a large piece of cake on the table for him.
"They do feed me down at the Lantern you know," Warren sat down, taking a sip of the cider without any fear of burning his tongue, which was something he had never done in his life.
"I kind of got that impression," Josie went back to washing dishes. "But you still don't eat enough."
"You and Zan ought to get together," Warren grumbled. "You'd get along really well."
"Who's Zan?" Josie asked without turning.
"She's the cook at the Lantern," Warren debated scraping the icing off the cake. He didn't have much of a sweet tooth, and there was a lot of icing. "She's always trying to feed me too."
"Well, then we probably would get along," Josie agreed. "You'll have to introduce me."
"Just tell her you try to feed me," he decided to leave the icing on. "She'll be sympathetic. She's been trying to make me eat my weight daily for years."
"Years, huh?" Josie glanced at him over her shoulder. "How exactly does that work? Last time I checked you were only sixteen. Legally, you really should have only been working there five or six months," Josie didn't know when Warren's birthday was, but she was guessing he was closer to fifteen then seventeen.
"More like two months," Warren took a bite of the cake and was surprised to find it not overwhelmingly sweet. "But I've been hanging out there after school since jr. high, so it's definitely years."
"Huh," Josie turned back to the dishes. "Most kids at that age are playing video games after school."
"Video games are boring," Warren replied. "And kids who play them incessantly turn out like Zack. This is really good cake."
"Thank you. It's my grandmother's recipe," Josie said. "So to avoid turning out like Zack, you decided to hang out at a Chinese restaurant?"
Warren briefly contemplated having a grandmother who baked. He had one grandmother who was dead and another who treated him like Satan's spawn. Actually, she treated him the way she wanted to treat his father. Luckily, Barry Battle was locked safely out of her reach in a maximum security jail. Warren didn't think either of his grandmothers had ever baked though.
"It's a culture thing," Warren said, licking frosting off his fork.
"As in wanting more of, or being familiar with?" Josie knew Warren had lived in China for a while, but she didn't know how old he had been or for how long he had lived there.
"Being familiar with," Warren finished off the last of his cider. "We lived there until I was thirteen."
"So you moved back to the states just in time for junior high," Josie frowned. "That sounds like an unpleasant time to move."
"It sucked," Warren said shortly, and dumped his dishes in the sink.
Josie was intensely curious about just what Warren meant by that statement, but she also sensed it was time to change the subject. Warren rarely talked about himself, and she had already learned better than to push. He told what he wanted, to who he wanted, when he was ready, and not before.
"Magenta said you don't dye your hair," Warren was almost as tall as she was, which put the red streaks at right about her eye level and made it an easy change of subject.
"Yeah," Warren snorted. "She's very bitter over it."