Chapter 9: Monday through Thursday, October 6th-9th: Around and About the Academy
Life had been pretty hectic over the weeks since. Every once in a while, the two would find time for a quick tryst to an unused classroom or supply closet, but between Remy's classes scaling up in necessary preparations and Pietro being forcibly pulled into drama for his speedy stage assistance, the two found their priorities lying with actual work over illicit relationships.
It was with this expectation in mind that Remy looked with confusion at the white haired boy running towards him, a blur of hyperactive teen and piles of cloth.
"HeyMrLebeauIwaslookingfor...I was looking for you," he said, remembering the chastisement he had gotten not long ago for his overly rapid curses to most existent religious figures. "They can't hear you if you talk so fast," Remy had said, laughing as Pietro had started whimpering just as fast for him to put his face back where it had just been.
"You ain't busy right now?" Remy asked, looking over Pietro's armfuls of material. "Sorry, cher, but I don't have time free for 'tutorials' right now."
Pietro's head shook rapidly enough that Remy swore the boy had three faces.
"Nonono, I just wanted to ask you a question." His face was suddenly serious. "Halloween. You have plans?"
"Well, I normally just go out to-"
"Not this year. Party. My place. Connecticut, not New York, of course. Can't fit everyone in Mom's place."
Remy hesitated, looking at Pietro quizzically.
"I'm not sure you know what you're asking me," he said, glancing at the kitchen down the hall. "Look, I'm late for all dem precious little kids at baking club, but I have to know you understand this right now. Think how it would look if I showed up at some party you threw."
"Like you're the most happening cat around? Know where a good jive is?"
"You're mocking me."
"Me? No, I don't mock people." Pietro shifted the pile in his arms. He was nervous, Remy could tell.
"It would ruin everything if I suddenly show up at your student party, you have to understand that. If I could, I would, trust me. Not to encourage bad behavior," he said, lowering his voice, "but if you could get your hands on a fake id, theoretically, I'd happily even take you out for All Hallow's Eve. But no, I can't go hang out around your friends. I'm sorry."
Pietro looked hurt, but just for a moment. He quickly blinked his face back into a neutral expression and shrugged.
"Ok, suit yourself," he said, maneuvering around Remy. "This party is going to be amazing, though."
"Of course it'll be. Have a good rehearsal."
"Have fun with cooks that are worse than me," Pietro said, zipping down the hall.
"Oi, Remy!"
Remy turned around at the voice to see none other than one Mr. Charles Xavier wheeling down the hallway towards him. The professor was some sort of champion at wheeling at high speeds, and Remy honestly thought the stubbled, wig-wearing man was secretly in some sort of middle-aged murderball league.
"To what do I owe the pleasure, Charles?" Remy asked, secretly amazed as the man's chair came to a sudden stop next to him without the slightest sign of whiplash on the man in it. A fleeting thought of That's where Pietro gets it from fluttered through his mind before he realized how illogical the concept was.
Charles leaned back on his wheels, rolling in place with a cheesy grin.
"I have been missing you all day, I swear," he said, his voice tinged with a light Glaswegian accent. He dropped the chair back down, pointing at the man in front of him. "You were not in the teacher's lounge this morning. Such a pity, my friend, you missed out on the announcement."
"Announcement?" Remy could already feel his stomach sinking. Something was off about this.
"Don't look like someone ran over your cat, Remy. It's nothing to worry about. I'm not laying people off or anything. Hell, we're still easily living off last year's grants."
"Considerin' the results of last year's Teacher Auction fundraiser, I'd sure as hell hope that we're still in the black."
"So many people will never live last spring down," Charles chuckled. "But anyway. I'm sure your class needs you about as much as I need to get my one-o-clock with Mr. Trask over with, so I'll get this out for you quickly. Erik and I decided in the name of staff bonding that we are holding a team building party on the thirty-first." His face was expectant of Remy's reaction, of which it seemed a blanched face was not the intended response. "Now what's that face about? Come now, it's been ages since everyone got out of the office. We just got a new hot tub in, hm? It'll be a blast."
"I don't suppose this..." Remy paused and shook his head. "I'm guessing you won't have Erik's children around then."
"Actually, we decided to let the kids have a party as well. If kids are going to drink, they should do it at home, my mother would always say." He clapped Remy's forearm. "You'll enjoy it. I'll see you then."
Mr. Lebeau was late. The higher culinary class whispered nervously among each other. He just wasn't the sort of person who came out late like this. Someone swore he once came in hung over a couple of years ago, mumbling about an incident involving a nun and having the class just watch DVDs of Good Eats. It was the middle of the week though, he couldn't be hung over. Maybe he was in the hospital. Maybe he died.
As the door clicked open everyone gasped, followed by a sigh of relief at the appearance of the teacher. So they weren't being informed of their professor's death. Good. The look on his face, however, was deadly. Remy walked to the demonstration table, slapped a pile of papers down, and looked at the class.
"Theory day, kids. I want you all to pair up and go over these worksheets on food proteins. I'll be back to go through it in a minute." He pointed an accusatory finger at Pietro in the back of the room. "Maximoff. I need to speak with you privately outside."
The class quietly oooed as the boy got out of his seat, his face aching from the grin stretching across his face.
«Och, enjoy your spanking,» Kurt called after them with a laugh, and Pietro flipped him off as the door shut behind them.
"What seems to be the problem, officer?" Pietro asked calmly, leaning against the door. Remy rubbed his temples. The boy was smirking. He was definitely aware.
"You know your stepfather just 'invited' me to a mandatory party for staff this Halloween at his house?" he asked, and Pietro's eyes went wide with false surprise.
"Heavens. Who would have thought that Charles would be so fond of Halloween and showing off his expensive real estate."
"I know you put him up to it. I've taught you four years, I know you don't even like those two. What are you playing at?"
Pietro shifted, chewing slightly at the inside of his lip. His eyes darted to the floor, not really wanting to explain himself, but he returned eye contact. Avoidance would just look weak.
"I really did want you around, you know. It's a holiday, it might not be the biggest family-love-kumbaya holiday on earth, but I really want to spend it with people I care about, you know?" Pietro shrugged. "And now you can show up and no one will think it's weird or anything. Hell, some of the guys' parents might be more likely to send them over to ours, thinking that we'll be well supervised since they don't know what lushes they trust their kids to."
"That's almost touching," Remy said, folding his arms over his chest. His shirt pulled tight along his shoulders, and Pietro couldn't help but stare at the now-clear deltoids staring back at him. "I suppose there's no getting out of it for me, anyway. I suppose you've won this time."
"Mm, what did I win?" Pietro asked. A quick glance around, and Remy dipped down to kiss the boy. He lightly ran his knuckles over the boy's cheek before pulling back.
"LBV proteins. Go in, it's on the exam." He popped the boy's ass as the blonde turned for the door. "I'll see you at the party."
Chapter 10: Friday, October 31st: House Magnus
The heavy thoom thoom thoom of music had been filling the house for a couple of hours now, and Pietro was getting impatient. He had to grudgingly admit that for what a "great" father Erik had been all those years, his relative unattached nature meant he was still pretty damn good at throwing a party. Good enough, in fact, that he and his stepdad were currently two sheets to the wind, wearing half of their king/queen costumes whilst lounging in a bubbling hot tub, arms around professors the boy would rather not think about having to invite to Thanksgiving if things went any further. Granted, it meant that the good third of the student body crammed into the estate would remember tonight as a beer-filled haze that would memorialize the Maximoff-Dane triad for years to come among tristate mutant teens, but as far as Pietro was concerned it was pointless if his guest of honor couldn't be there .
Halloween was a night to scream at, after all.
He sighed, walking over to the corner of the backyard to sit with African Princess Ororo, who was currently wiggling her fingers at the sky, amusing herself by making the clouds form bats and pumpkins. He scratched a little at the flowerpot near him, plucking a little white stick from the dirt.
"Lightning bolt?" He asked the girl next to him, and she sent a little electric spark to light it up with an eye roll.
Let's make the best of this, I guess.
The gaudy purple Challenger almost hit the car in front of it with the speed in which its driver zoomed into a parallel park.
Connecticut. Connecticut. Why did they have to live all the way the hell out here.
Remy pressed the button on his keys, the car letting out a little blip as it locked. Not that it was audible; the mini-mansion sounded like a goddamned frat party was going on inside. He rolled his eyes, slipping his keys into the pocket of his black slacks and readjusting the Foree Electric tag on his chest before walking up to the door.
He thought about ringing the bell, but like hell would anyone hear. Instead, he just pushed inside, not terribly shocked at the fact that the pressure on the door was caused by two inebriated teens making out in the most inconvenient place possible. Ridiculous.
It took a bit of pushing to get through the crowd of students. A few of them let out little cheers of hellos, and he was relatively sure that he heard a kid dressed as a crawfish scream something about how she was dressed up as him. He'd have to remember to find her and give her detention come Monday.
The place smelled a little like home. There wasn't the smell of vomit and urine of Bourbon Street, at least not yet, but he found his own teenage delinquency flooding back into his mind. Sometimes he had to admit he missed the thrills of his less up-and-up lifestyle. Sometimes he wondered if things would be less stressful if he had stayed in the game of committing crimes for a living instead of for unfortunate pleasure.
"Pete's been looking for you."
Remy snapped out of his trance. He turned around to see the witch dressed all in red, bursts of curly brown hair pouring from under her wide-brimmed hat. She was smiling knowingly, as was the odd little anime character on the handheld game system she had cradled in her arms.
"Oh, hi Wanda."
"Hey, Mr. Lebeau."
{Is this the one that your brother is always bemoaning?} the character said, causing Remy to be a bit taken aback.
"Did...is that…"
"Oh, sorry. Mr. Lebeau, Vision. He's my cat this evening." She grinned, and the cat ears on the avatar's head blinked a couple of times.
{Meow. Charmed.}
"...Pleased to meet you too." This wasn't the oddest thing he'd seen in his employ at the Academy.
"Did you happen to see where my brother went?" Wanda asked, looking down at her game, and the avatar nodded.
{I last saw Pietro lurking outside, as far from the hot tub as he could manage.} Remy wondered why girl and avatar both seemed to grimace slightly, but he didn't question.
"Thank you, I'll go find him then. I'm pretty sure he's the reason I'm here in the first place," he said, chuckling until he noticed that the other two had joined him with far more sincerity.
{A relationship flag?}
"I would say so," Wanda said. A shout across the room grabbed her attention and she waved over to it. "Love to help you find him, but Angelica seems to have a red solo cup with my name on it." She wiggled her fingers and pushed through the crowds, leaving Remy to wander through in the other direction. Someone shoved a cup in his hand at some point before he managed to get to the back door, an assault of fresh breeze hitting his face.
He looked around at the crowd. So this is where most of the teachers had run off to apparently. He could see why; while the place was still loud and crowded, but between the palm lined pool, the amazingly starry sky, and of course the lack of breakable objects, it seemed like a far better place to be. A quick scan of the crowd didn't show Pietro. Great. This quick appearance was getting far too long.
Scott was in the corner chatting up some blonde woman in a Dallas Cowboys uniform, and he contemplating cockblocking the poor guy for a laugh until he realized that the ridiculous (and somewhat inappropriate) Indian Prince costume would probably do quite enough of that for him by itself.
"Spying on Mr. Summers? That's not nice at all," a tattered corpse said, sliding up to Remy. Her dirty blonde wig was a bit askew, some green hair hanging out from the side. Erik's other daughter.
"Nice zombie, Lorna," he said, and she scoffed.
"Not a single person so far has noticed I'm not just a zombie. You'd think people would know the corpse of Kurt Cobain when they saw him."
"Ah, right, right. Nice stubble."
"Nice save."
"Were you even born when Cobain was alive?" He winked and Lorna pursed her lips, torn between being offended and amused.
"...Well, whatever. While you're staring at Mr. Summers making illegal moves on a student, you should be making yours."
"Student?"
"It's not that our head cheerleader is unoriginal in her costume choice; Scottieboy has boring fantasies. Emma is a psychic," she said, gesturing at the couple again. "Look, Pietro's practically despondent thinking that you skipped his party after he did all this for you. You are going to go talk to him by the firepit, and I am going to take out some lingering aggression on the wrong Summers by ruining his chances at ever hitting that when it is legal. The magic of parties." She turned the man by the shoulder towards her brother's direction before using the patio grill to slowly hover up behind them as the haunting ghoul of Seattle grunge.
A metal orb housed the fire lighting the far corner of the yard, red and orange flames flickering around a carved forest. The little steel animals cast long shadows, mottling the warm light that was cast over the boy lying on a nearby wicker chaise lounge. Remy cleared his throat as he came closer, and the boy looked up, head moving strangely slow. The realization seemed to dawn on his face, and he almost tripped over the firepit in excitement to rush to him.
"Oh my god I was thinking you were going to just disappear on me," Pietro said, involuntarily vibrating with excitement. Remy couldn't help but smile at the utter light filling him, overpowering the flickering flames over his...his…
"Where on earth did your costume go?" he said, a laugh choking his words. Pietro looked at him with confusion, snapping the elastic waistband of his tiny red and yellow microshorts.
"Sexy Flash, obviously," he said. "Can't you see the lightning bolt on the crop top? Made it myself."
"I have to say, you pull it off surprisingly well. It looks almost like a movie costume."
"I'm assuming you put together this…" Pietro looked over Remy's outfit, before nodding and tapping a little red stain on the man's shirt. " 've got red on you. Nice."
"I didn't know where I'd be going after this, so I didn't want anything too bulk-why the sudden long face, cher?"
"I guess I could have expected that you'd just consider this a stop along the road." He took a step back and shrugged. "I guess you should go wave at Charles to prove you showed up before you drive off to...wherever. It's not like you have any reason to stay around with me or anything."
The cool tone made Remy cringe internally. He did plan on making this a relatively quick in-and-out, assumed both of his pushy hosts would have likely been a little too inebriated and social to notice when he slipped away.
"I did have this ambiguous brown substance shoved in my hands," he said, wiggling the red plastic in the air. "I can't go driving under the influence in this neighborhood."
Pietro eyed him as he chugged the contents of the glass, trying and failing to keep a smile from playing on his lips. As soon as Remy lowered the glass, grimacing, Pietro shifted and crossed his arms.
"Well, I sure as hell hope no one slipped anything in there," he said, placing his hand on his chin. "You'll have to stay with me so I can keep an eye on you, make sure none of these unethical people take advantage of a poor southern boy."
"If you're watchin' me, you're watchin' me move my ass back inside. I need vodka to wipe that out of my face."
"I could get rid of it just as well," Pietro said, pulling Remy into a kiss. Nerves danced between both of them-shadows and tree cover aside, anyone could have seen-but they both still let themselves dive into the kiss, tongues tangling and soft groans falling.
Pietro wrinkled his nose as they pulled apart. "Shit, what the hell did they give you to drink? I've drank some shitty beer before, but that tastes like hell."
"You certainly tasted interesting yourself," Remy said, raising his brows. "Do you have..."
"Do I...? Oh, yeah. Shit, don't tell Erik. I'll be locked in the house for a week."
"And I don't doubt Charles would 'confiscate' it." Pietro laughed at Remy's knowing grin. He gestured with his head back to the flowerpot.
"I mean, if you want to share, I'll share," he said, and Remy shook his head.
"Maybe later. I still want my vodka."
Perhaps two hours later, Remy was sitting on a couch in the living room, surrounded by a gaggle of students who were all far to preoccupied in their own individual worlds. Pietro was lounging across both him and an uncomfortable pair of freshmen, the two of whom were looking like they had never so much as looked at a can of Budweiser before this day. Pietro was mindlessly flirting with them, making the girls blush every time he would say something crude. Remy had to admit that the entire display amused him to the point of wanting to take bets on which girl would run off in embarrassment first. Maybe he had allowed himself a few too many cups of vodka cola that night. He seemed to remember possibly being goaded by a gaggle of his students into kissing another professor, but for the life of him he couldn't remember who. Someone with wings. Hopefully, she'd be as forgetful as he was come Monday.
One of the freshmen suddenly ran off, girlish cry turning to a nervous bark as she shifted into a chihuahua feet away from the sofa. Her friend followed after her, nervously apologizing to Pietro before calling her friend back. The boy could do nothing but laugh, clinging to his teacher's shirt as he swung his legs in front of him.
"Oh no, there go my footrests," he said with a laugh that shook his whole body. Remy was uncomfortably aware that the boy was now fully sitting in his lap. It wasn't a bad sort of uncomfortable; he had honestly almost forgotten any risk of consequences from touching his student, but it was just. The touching. Too much.
He couldn't see the knowing grin on Pietro's face as the boy pressed his head into his chest, so it took him a moment to notice how deliberate the rotation of Pietro's hips seemed to be.
Gently, he pushed Pietro off of him and onto the sofa. Pietro just stared at him, expression some mix of anger and amusement.
"Something wrong, Mis-ter Le-beau?" he said, practically purred. Remy leaned back, crossing his legs quickly. He swore he saw the boy's eyes move down for a millisecond, yet they seemed locked on his own.
"Don't suppose you could get me another drink, Maximoff?" he said, trying to keep his voice professional. It came out sounding like fake pompousness.
"I could, my lord Lebeau, but methinks you should mix your own beverages," he said. Still, he stood up, brushing off his bare thighs. "I can go get you something anyway. The question is, do you want it here?"
"Where on earth else would I want it, at school?"
"I could deliver it to my room, right above our heads." He leaned forward, whispering, "The one with the lock on its door."
There was only a moment's hesitation as Remy felt a sharp pang of pain radiate between his legs.
"Upstairs. Now."