AN: Alas, I've had to drop the planned PietroXWanda on this one. Wanda is just determined to be normal, and so who am I to deny her? Anyway, thank you all for reading, and I hope you continue to enjoy! FYI, I have named Rogue "Anna-Marie Adler" for purposes of this fic, as "Anna-Marie" is her most common first name in the comics (and as a tribute to Miss Information's fic, "Inappropriate Conduct", which I just love) and Adler is Destiny's (Irene) last name, and Destiny raised Rogue.

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Chapter 13

"Ms. Adler, I do hope whatever it is you are staring at out of the window is relevant to our discussion of The Lottery?"

Wanda shot an anxious look at her friend as Rogue turned around, flushing at their English teacher's rebuke. "Ah…no ma'am," she mumbled, slinking lower in her seat, picking her book up hastily.

"Try and pay attention," the teacher said a bit stiffly, and Rogue nodded, covering her face with the white sweep of her hair.

Wanda heard Jacob Morrow, who sat behind her, muttering beneath his breath. "She'd get detention if you all weren't afraid just cause she's a freak." Ms. Rowe pretended not to hear him, but Wanda knew that Rogue—and likely the rest of the class—had heard.

All of the bolts holding Jacob's desk together suddenly came undone, and the young man crashed to the floor with a loud yelp. Wanda smirked, looking over at Rogue, who gave her a small smile and a mouthed thanks.

Wanda shrugged. What use was having hex powers if she couldn't use them on occasion? Besides, it was nice to see her friend smile for a change. Rogue had been in a weird mood for the last few weeks.

After class, Wanda waited with her brother as Rogue endured a lecture about her schoolwork from Ms. Rowe, her arms crossed over her chest and her head bowed. She looked as uninterested in the lecture as she had in class.

"Looks like Stripes is getting in trouble," Pietro drawled, leaning back against the door. "Think she figures it was Rogue that made that kid's desk self-destruct?"

"That's not Rogue's power," Wanda said irritably, glaring at her brother.

"Like they keep them straight? What, do you think they have a chart in the staff room?" Pietro laughed. "We're all freaks to them, sis, and you know it as well as I do. They hate the fact we're even here."

"I'm starting to share that sentiment, Pietro. Go away, would you?" Wanda wanted to find out what was the matter with Rogue, who certainly wouldn't volunteer that information in front of her brother.

"Why, afraid your little friend doesn't like me? Then why was she staring at me?"

Wanda rolled her eyes. "Not every girl on the planet wants to sleep with you, you know."

Pietro snorted. "Whatever, I don't want to sleep with every girl on the planet. Only the cute mutant ones." He removed himself from the wall and shouldered his backpack. "She was staring at me, sis, but you don't have to take my word for it." Pietro examined Rogue's approaching form critically. "If she'd loose the skunk hair, she might be cute."

"Pietro, I am seriously—" she growled in annoyance, though of course he took off before she could finish.

"Somethin' the matter?" Rogue looked at her curiously.

"Just my brother being an ass. Today he thinks you were staring at him."

Rogue blushed; Wanda gave her friend a wide-eyed stare as they walked down the hallway. "Uh…were you?"

"Well…no. I mean, for a minute," Rogue said hastily. She shook her head, obviously flustered. "It's just…he looks a lot like your father."

"Yeah, he hears that a lot," Wanda muttered as they reached their lockers. Her eyes narrowed as they approached; someone had scrawled Scarlet Bitch on hers with a red marker.

"Oh, how clever," Wanda said loudly, struggling to keep her powers from flaring. "Like no one's ever thought of that before."

Rogue leaned against the lockers as Wanda yanked hers open, shoving books inside furiously. "Aw, now, Wan. Prolly just Jacob tryin' to be clever after ya' made him take a tumble in front of the entire senior English class." She giggled. "Thanks for that, by the way."

"Yeah, well, what are friends for?" Wanda slammed her locker shut, ignoring the crudely written phrase, and took off down the hall. "Wanna get out of here? I stole Lance's keys. If we're back by the end of the day, he'll never know."

Rogue shrugged. "Why not? I didn't do any homework so I'll just get another lecture 'bout my sad lack of academic standards anyway."

The two girls walked side by side down the hallway, towards the doors leading to the parking lot. "You think anyone's gonna see us?" Rogue asked, peeking nervously around the corners.

Wanda grinned. "Nope. Scarlet Bitch and her hex powers, remember? Every now and then, things work out in my favor." She pushed the door open triumphantly, gesturing for Rogue to precede her out of the building.

Rogue laughed at that. "Nice. God, I'm glad to get to get out of here," she said, throwing her bag in the back of the jeep and climbing in as Wanda slid into the driver's seat.

Wanda looked over at Rogue as they waited at a stoplight on their way to the mall. "So…are you interested in my brother?" It wasn't that Wanda thought Rogue wasn't good enough for her brother—it was probably the other way around—but the thought of it made her feel sort of weird.

Rogue wouldn't look at her. "Um…no, Wan. I mean, he's cute and all, but not…not really my type."

"Oh. Okay. Cause if you were…it wouldn't really be that big of a deal." Wanda grimaced. "Better you than like, Tabitha. Ugh."

Rogue snickered. "Tabby's not so much into boys," she said with a grin. "Don't think you gotta worry about that."

Wanda grinned. "Oh, right. I forgot about that. So if you're not hiding a deep love for my stupid brother, what's got you all mopey? I mean, you don't gotta play the disaffected Goth for my benefit. I shop at Hot Topic, too," Wanda said seriously, and Rogue gave a small laugh.

"It's…can we just not talk about it?" Rogue stared down at her gloved hands; Wanda was surprised to see they were shaking.

"Sure. But Rogue, you'd—you'd tell me if something was wrong, right? Like, if someone was hurting you or something? I mean, I know I'm kind of unpredictable, but I—I'd hope you'd tell me." Wanda looked over at her quickly, uncomfortable with such conversations but determined that Rogue knew she wasn't going to fly off the handle and do anything rash. At least, not on purpose.

Rogue looked over, appearing surprised. "Oh. Oh! Of course I would. You'd be the first person I'd tell, Wan. Promise. It's nothin' I can't handle."

Wanda nodded, parking the Jeep and switching off the ignition. "I know. It's just that…I know how I am. You're like, the only person who isn't afraid of me. Not that that's the reason we're friends," she said quickly.

"No, but it'd be a good reason to like someone, wouldn't it?" Rogue had a far-away look in her grayish-green eyes. "If they wanted to be around you even though you were dangerous?"

Wanda thought about that. "Maybe it is. But it doesn't matter. I like you for other reasons."

"Cause I skip class with you and go to Hot Topic?" Rogue grinned, looking a little more relaxed as they headed towards the mall's entrance.

Wanda laughed. "Yeah. Something like that, anyway." As they entered the mall, Wanda saw the elevators and the fountain and winced visibly.

Rogue grinned at her. "C'mon," she said, hooking Wanda's arm in her own. "We'll go the long way."

"Appreciate that," Wanda said with a laugh, her feeling of unease abating as they moved away from the site of her earlier destructive episode. Maybe things were really going to be okay, after all.

ooooooooOOOOoooooooo

Lance had given her a speculative look when they'd all met up to ride home after school—"I could have sworn I parked two spaces over—" but didn't say anything else as he drove them back home. Wanda settled back in her seat, shivering a little; the autumn air was beginning to turn cool, and it was starting to get dark earlier as well.

"What should we do for dinner?" Fred rumbled from the back, making her roll her eyes. It was only three forty-five, how could he be thinking about dinner already?

"Don't care what you do. I'm going out with Kitty," Lance said, slamming the breaks to avoid running a red light. Wanda winced as Fred's bulk was thrown forward against the back of her seat.

"Hey, where's Todd?" she asked suddenly, horrified. Had they left him at school? Again? They'd done that once and he'd whined about it for days.

"Detention. He stole someone's lunch again." Lance sighed. "Idiot. You'd think he learn by now to be a bit more sneaky."

"Maybe he likes detention," Pietro said from the back, sounding unconcerned.

"He'd only like it if Wanda was there," Lance said slyly, winking at her. She scowled at him, but there really wasn't anything to say, because he was probably right.

"Shut up," Pietro muttered from the back, causing her to grit her teeth in annoyance.

Wanda turned around and glared at him. "You know, I can handle myself, Pietro."

Her brother smiled at her, and it their father's smile, sharp and unkind. His pale eyes narrowed. "Yeah? Like you did with the kid that marked up your locker?"

"Who marked up your locker?" Fred asked ominously. "I can beat them up."

Wanda ignored that. "What'd you do?" she asked, her voice low. "Pietro, you don't even know who it was. Do you want us to get kicked out of school again?"

"Nothing," her brother said innocently, his eyes wide. "And I do so. It was that Morrow kid. The one you made fall out of his desk."

"Don't suppose you could have used all that energy doing whatever you did to him to, oh, clean the marker off my locker?" She rolled her eyes, discomforted by what he'd said. "So what'd you do?"

"Just wait and see," Pietro said smugly, laughing. Wanda felt a stirring of unease at that, but she turned around and stared straight ahead as they drove home. She wasn't responsible for the stupid things her brother did. He had a temper, but that wasn't what worried her, because really—hers was worse. Still, he had this irritating habit that if he felt he was right in doing something he usually did it, consequences be damned.

Just like father.

Wanda spent the evening trying to do her assignments, but she gave up when her math homework began resembling a foreign language and went downstairs to the kitchen. She peered in the fridge, a frown creasing her brow, worried at the lack of nutritional sustenance to be found therein.

"Yeah, see why Toad got detention? We've got shit for groceries," Lance muttered, walking into the kitchen. "This is why I'm going out for dinner."

"How are you going to pay for it?" Wanda looked anxiously at him. "Lance, we have to do something. That bank account Mystique set up is running out of money, fast. What do we do when it's gone?"

Lance stared at her as if she were crazy. "Isn't there, like, a lot of money in there?"

Annoyed, Wanda crossed her arms over her chest and glared at him. "No, that's what I just said. There's not. My father sends us some money, but it's not enough for all of us to live here—do you know how much the bills cost?"

"We pay bills?" He looked momentarily bewildered.

Wanda closed her eyes and counted to ten, slowly. "Yes," she said carefully, wondering why everyone here was so clueless. "Hello, who do you think pays the utility bills? Mystique did it, but she's gone, so I started doing it because someone had to."

"You have a checkbook?" His eyes brightened. "Can I borrow it?"

"Are you listening to me?" Wanda asked, incredulous. Honestly, what did Kitty Pryde see in him? "We're nearly broke, Lance. We need to get jobs or something."

"Just ask your dad for more money. I bet he feels guilty enough—" Lance stopped cold, his dark eyes wide, appearing suddenly nervous.

The light fixture above the sink flickered on and off. "What?"

"'Cause, um…you know. Of him running off." Lance began backing up, his hands up. "Chill, Wanda. I'm just…you know me. Look, we'll do that. Jobs. We'll get jobs. After school and stuff."

She watched him curiously. "You know, Lance, I'm not going to make the house collapse just because you mentioned my father ran off to fight Apocalypse."

"Oh, I know. It's just…you know. Didn't want to, um…upset you." Lance still looked a bit worried, glancing around as if he were waiting for someone to suddenly appear.

Wanda waved away his concern with one hand, not liking the fact everyone thought she was a ticking time bomb. Especially not when it seemed to her like she was the only one with any sort of common sense around this place. "Maybe Fred's parents can send some money."

Lance shrugged. "I guess. Still think you should work the guilt card with Daddy dearest."

"Where do you think my father is getting money from, Lance?" Wanda rolled her eyes. "The Mutant Supervillain Pension Fund?"

"Ha, ha," Lance drawled, leaning against the counter. "Isn't Xavier paying him to teach?"

"Not enough to support the five of us and this stupid house," Wanda snapped. "Do you know what our water bill was last month? Do you?"

Pietro walked into the kitchen, his eyes narrowed as he looked between the two of them. "Something the matter?"

"Yeah. We're kinda broke, or something." Lance shrugged and grabbed his jacket. "Scarlet'll be happy to tell you all about it in excruciating detail. I'm outta here. Guess I'll have to distract Kitty at the last minute and drag her out of the restaurant before we get the bill."

"Classy," Wanda muttered, shaking her head. The floor of the house shook, and she became genuinely angry. "Stop doing that, Lance! We can't afford food, much less someone to fix the house from your—" she stopped as she heard the door slam, making a small sound of anger and smacking her palm on the counter.

Sometimes I hate living with boys.

"Sis, calm down. We'll just ask dad to send us some more money." Pietro hopped up on the counter, his white hair falling into his face. "It isn't like he doesn't owe us."

"That's not the point." She opened the fridge again, but her options hadn't magically changed and there was still only a block of cheese and half a carton of milk left. Luckily, the milk hadn't expired yet and the mold on the cheese could probably be cut off.

Wanda pulled out a pan, found some elbow pasta in the cabinet, and went about making macaroni and cheese. She had no idea how to make it if it wasn't Kraft and from a box, but she was hungry and this was all they had. She'd figure it out.

Pietro didn't help her, merely watched her fix the pasta with a guarded expression. "What did Lance say to you?"

She looked up, surprised. "Uh…that father owed us some guilt money for what he did and we should exploit it so that Lance could take Kitty out to dinner," she said, rolling her eyes. "That was basically the gist of it."

"Because father did what?"

Wanda emptied the box of pasta into the boiling water. "Um…remember that scary, evil mutant who had the pyramids? The one we all fought? The one our father left to fight without saying a word?"

"No need to be a bitch, sis, just wondering." Pietro left his perch on the counter and stood next to her, his head bowed, his hands in his pockets.

"Pietro, are you going to help me or just be annoying?" She looked up at him, then sucked in a breath at the predatory look on his face. Why was he looking at her like that?

"You know, we could leave here. Just you and me. If you wanted." His voice was very quiet; soft, coaxing, in a way she'd never heard him use with her before. She was so used to her brother being a whiny little bitch, that this was—different. Strange.

"Um…where would we go? Besides, this—this is home, Pietro, as near to one as we have, anyway. You want to go run off and live with father at Xavier's?" She swallowed nervously. "You don't…I mean, you don't want that, do you?"

Pietro was staring down at her with a glittering look in his pale eyes that made her suddenly…uncomfortable. "Um…is something the matter?" Wanda spoke very clearly, wanting him to back up and stop invading her space.

He shook his head, as if he'd been far away, stepping away from her and running a hand through his hair. "Nothing. The pasta—it's about to boil over." With that, he turned on his heel and left her alone in the kitchen.

The macaroni and cheese ended up a disaster; sticky, too thick, and the cheese wouldn't melt. The pasta was overcooked and she added too much milk. Wanda called and ordered a pizza, and Pietro gave her a twenty dollar bill to pay for it. She didn't ask him where he'd gotten it. She was too tired to care.

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Miss Information: Hee, yes, I think it's in Magnetic North storyline where Charles mentions to Wolverine his cat is named Mystique since he dumped her for Emma. HA! Glad you liked the chapter, and that you thought it worked well! I love the idea of the two of them just forgetting everything in their desperation to be together, all the while thinking it's just about sex. Well, it is, for now...mwahahah. And mmm, do write that one-shot! Looking forward to your new project, as well! Thanks, as always, for reading!

Munchlette Belle: Thank you! I'm glad you like the 'ship and the fun dominance and submission aspects. It's certainly a blast to write! Thanks for your review!

IvyZoe: Hee, thanks! I admit to liking Rogue and Remy in the comics, but not so much in Evolution. Of course, this could be my MagnetoXRogue OTP thing, who knows, haha! As for all our various characters and their reactions, stay tuned! Thanks so much and I'm so glad you're enjoying the story!

Nercia Genesis: Yes, Jean and Charles are being Very Good Telepaths (TM) and keeping themselves out of Magneto's mind. At least, Jean is. As for Charles...who knows...mwahaha! And as for Wolverine, he definitely has a few suspicions, but all that is fun for a later day. Thanks for the review!