Notice how I keep skipping around on the POV? I'm doing it on purpose. I just finished a 19-chapter story from one POV. One. Me. Blech. So this whole story is almost pure comedy as a sort of recovery method. Everything is Marvel's. No surprise there.
Okay, the plan, Jean told Jamie telepathically over breakfast a few mornings later, is for you to get her into my van somehow, I'll telepathically pin her down, and we'll go to the mall.
But I don't want to go shopping, Jamie thought back resentfully. Jean ignored him.
I haven't quite worked out how exactly we're going to get her to stay calm, let alone get her to try things on, but I'll worry about that in a little bit. Perhaps if I bring a stunner from the Danger Room?
Jamie rolled his eyes and took another bite of his toast. "Why don't you just ask her to go along so I can get some alone time?"
"That wouldn't work, she'd never willingly go along with that. I'd have to bribe her- hey, wait a minute…." Jean smiled confidently. "Jamie, you're a genius. Oh, and you're still coming, I refuse to let you wear clothes that don't fit you right anymore. So gather up your Gameboy or whatever it is you're playing these days and get in my van."
She stood up from the kitchen table and walked into the hall. Jamie sighed and went back to his toast, rubbing sleep from his eyes.
Jean popped her head back in the door. "By the way, when we're talking telepathically, that implies secrecy. Starting to talk out loud in the middle of the conversation ruins the whole point."
She left again. Jamie stared thoughtfully at the ceiling for a few minutes, and then casually got up and put a bag of popcorn in the microwave. This was going to be a good show.
Laura was hiding in the bathroom, figuring that since Jean had morals and a respect for privacy she wouldn't enter without permission. The conversation had been going well until Jean had said the s- word: shopping. Once she had heard that word she bolted down the hall, and although Jean had chased her Laura had lost her pretty quickly. There's something that a lifetime of intensive physical training has over a couple years of moderately difficult but spaced out to healthy intervals training.
"Come on," Jean said through the door. They'd been negotiating for nearly fifteen minutes, and Jean's voice, which was coming through the door below the doorknob, indicated that she had sat down. Laura was crouched on the lid of the toilet, listening out of sheer boredom. "It won't take that long, that's why Kitty doesn't know about this. It's only going to be you and me and Jamie, and since I'm good at eyeballing sizes you won't have to try a billion things on, and we'll get lunch while we're out. It'll be fun. And then we'll come home and I won't bug you about clothes again until you need new ones."
In the bathroom, Laura considered. She was starting to get tired of scavenging for clothes, and the professor and Logan had mentioned several times how it would be easier on everyone, especially herself, if everyone just wore their own clothes. And if Jamie was going it likely wasn't life-threatening, just slightly scary. But one thing had to be absolutely clear.
"What's in it for me?" she asked, moving off the toilet seat and crouching on the floor by the door, opposite Jean.
"A new wardrobe and lunch." Jean said hopefully. Laura was silent.
"And a Halloween-sized bag of candy." She added.
"Deal," Laura agreed, and unlocked the door.
A few feet down the hall, Kitty cheered. "Finally!" she said, and bolted into the bathroom past Jean and Laura, slamming the door. A few seconds later the shower could be heard, and Kitty's mostly in tune singing could be heard not long after that.
"If I ever turn into that, rewrite my brain," Laura muttered as she and Jean started walking towards the car where Jamie was waiting.
The mall was big. That was the first thing Laura had noticed, size being important to a short girl regardless of the expression concerning the value of it. The next thing she noticed was all the colors everywhere. There were giant yellow 'M's, blue circles with words concerning aged fabrics, pink lacy things, boring black and white letters that stood out due to their complete lack of interesting colors or designs, and more. Smells were overwhelming as well. Coffee and fried food was the most prominent, since they had entered near the food court, but the smell of large public places and large amounts of people of varying degrees of hygiene was also present.
Jean looked like she was in heaven. Jamie looked like he…wasn't. He kept his eyes resolutely on the ground in front of him, willing it to stay still so he didn't mysteriously develop six identical twins in the middle of the city mall. Laura tried to hide her growing fear that martial arts skill and child assassin extraordinaire or not, she wouldn't last five minutes in this place without an ambassador of some sort- namely Jean. She tried to move closer without actually moving any of her muscles at all and ended up tripping slightly.
Her redheaded mall guide looked at her funnily. "Are you okay?"
"No," she growled.
"Hey, I wasn't the first to trip," Jamie celebrated absently, staring at the floor in defiance, daring it to move from underneath his feet. So far it was busy cowering in fear.
"Our first stop is for necessities," Jean said, placing a surprisingly unmanicured hand on Laura's back and guided her forward, "which means we're going somewhere that might scare you at first, but I'll be right there. It'll all be okay if you trust me."
"Where are we going?" Laura asked warily, trying to resist and run away while she could. Jean guided her until only her photographic memory could tell her where they'd come from. Many dozens of stores were passed right by that had everything from paint easels to leather chaps in the window, but the one they stopped at was almost entirely pink. The most daring variety seemed to be pink with white poca dots.
Jamie, noticing the pinkish glare reflecting off the floor, which was sure to rebel as soon as he blinked, slowly looked up with an expression of pure horror on his face that matched Laura's perfectly. Jean stood between them, smiling serenely, one hand on each of their shoulders like a savior in disguise and a hungry look in her eyes.
"Is this hell?" Laura whispered, eyes wide with shock from the window display.
"No, silly," Jean said happily, "it's Victoria's Secret."
"Why are you doing this to me?"
"Revenge mostly."
"My eyes are burning out of their sockets," Jamie stated calmly, rooted to the spot. Jean began pulling Laura towards the doorway.
"Wait, we're going in there?" she asked.
"Yes, Laura. Just trust me. It'll be okay. If you cooperate this won't take long and then we can do fun things."
"I don't wanna," Laura whined, but followed Jean with a minimal amount of being dragged by Jean and pushed by Jamie, whose pre-teen enthusiastic curiosity had taken over disgust.
Jean rolled her eyes as from the other side of the stall as Laura calmly stated that the lady was touching her again.
"Deal with it, it's easy past this part."
She really had tried to think of other ways to figure out exactly what Laura's sizes were, but some things, even if you have the talent, shouldn't be eyeballed. And if the credit card in your wallet isn't yours, it's okay to splurge on higher quality goods, so against her better judgment, Jean had decided on Victoria's Secret.
As Laura whined out loud on the other side of the wooden door and Jamie wandered around studying the mannequins with a critical eye, Jean plotted- planned, sorry- the rest of the mission- trip, sorry again. She didn't have the heart, after this, to take the girl in Abercrombie even if it was her favorite store. She'd stick to Old Navy, the Gap, and whatever caught Laura's interest if anything did.
"Hey, why is this see-through?" Jamie called from the other end of the room, fingering something with a rabbit fur trim that cost around $6 per square inch.
Jean rubbed her temples, beginning to regret bringing him along. Especially since she considered Jamie the annoying little brother she never had. What had she been thinking?
Laura emerged grumpily from the stall, the harassed-looking sales lady following slowly.
"It's okay, I can take it from here," Jean said reassuringly. The lady looked relieved and scurried off. She turned to Laura.
"I don't really see you needing much other than sports bras, considering your lifestyle, but I'd rather play it safe. So…"
The next half hour was disheartening. Jean was throwing things over her shoulder for Laura to carry around while analyzing every minute detail of each one at the same time, and Jamie was running around taking pictures of some of the mannequins with Jean's camera phone.
Finally, finally Jean guided Laura to the checkout, where the sales lady (a different one with no visible conscience) eyeballed everything she scanned as if to say "Oh, yeah. This will definitely look good on you. In a million years." And then they got to go to the light, Jean dragging Jamie by the back of his shirt as he desperately took some last pictures as Laura ran ahead into the main hall and fell to her knees, raising her shopping bag-laden arms to the sky and glorying in the freedom and lack of artificial pink hues and translucent lace. Passerby stopped and stared.
"Okay, I can take a hint. You can get up now." Jean grumbled, succeeding in pulling her phone out of Jamie's hands and stuffing it back in her pocket.
"I went into a pink hell and survived!" Laura was crying out.
"Oh, shut up. You're short enough I could get you into something from Limited Too." Jean said, her patience fraying. Jamie and Laura smirked as spontaneous but identical plans appeared in their minds.