xp_logs | Lunchtime at Xavier's starring Terry, Bobby, Marius, Jennie, Forge

Bobby and Terry are minding their own business when the Three Amigos decide to join them. Marius has overheard something interesting and wants to extend his congratulations. Terry is less than amused.

Terry and Bobby usually missed lunch together, he tended to work through it and she was often at school. So Thursdays were something of a treasured time. When the weather was nice, they'd have lunch on the dock or the back patio. On gray days like this one, they took advantage of Lorna's cooking and joined the kids for lunchtime. Today Lorna had apparently lost her mind because mini pizzas were on the menu for no good reason at all. Not that Terry was complaining. Her goat cheese, pesto, pine nut pizza was plenty tasty. "I rescheduled that meeting. Can you get off a little early next Wednesday?" she asked Bobby, swiping his soda for a sip. Her throat was still sore and the bubbles didn't feel very good but she was getting sick of honeyed tea.

Bobby sighed, thinking for a minute as he picked at his far more boring sausage and pepperoni. "Yeah, I should be able to. I might have to do some make-up type work after we get back, but that's not a problem."

"Busy, busy," Marius grinned as he drew up beside the table, tray in hand. He nodded at Jennie, standing behind him, and Forge, who was trailing cautiously to balance a somewhat over-exuberantly filled drink. "Afternoon, you two. Mind the sharing of space, or will we be transgressing upon the exchange of sweet nothings?"

"And if we are, by all means, continue with said sweet nothings. Pretend like we are not even here," Jennie added cheerily. "It's just that we see so little of you two lovebirds we decided to inflict our presence on you." She punctuated her statement by decisively setting her tray down on the table.

"You know," Forge added, sitting down across from Jennie and Marius, "technically 99.9% of the volume of all solid matter is really just the empty space between subatomic particles. So, from a pure physics point of view, we're barely here at all."

Terry set down Bobby's soda slowly, her blue eyes flicking from one teen to the next, settling finally on Marius as the ringleader and cause of the commotion (which was usually a safe bet even if it wasn't his fault. Calamity just followed him around.) "Sure you're welcome," she said finally, edging away from Bobby slightly even as she felt him move his hand into his pocket to thumb off the gold ring on his finger. "There's plenty of room."

"Brilliant," Marius said cheerfully, sliding down into the empty bench across from them. "So how goes things? I'm a bit behind in my affairs, obviously, so I'm runnin' behind in the congratulations department. Get the flowers an' that all sorted, then?" He prodded the limited contents of his plate and gave Jennie an aggrieved look. "The recovery regiment doesn't half suck. Wasn't I supposed to have done with this a year ago?"

Bobby froze (ha!) and gave Marius a slightly panicked look. "Congratulations?" he asked weakly, reaching for Terry's hand beneath the table. He glanced around to see if anyone else was listening, not that the three of them knowing wasn't bad enough, if Marius meant what Bobby feared he meant.

"Yeah, congrats, felicitations, and whatnot," Jennie took a bite of her own meal. "Marriage is an important step in the path to adulthood and I am glad to see you two on that journey." She turned to Marius. "I've been on it for two months, feel my pain."

Forge nodded and laughed, then paused with his pizza half to his mouth. "Wait. You guys got... I mean, you're..." He dropped the pizza back onto his plate and turned to face Bobby and Terry directly. "Ha! You are! You totally are!"

Marius raised a concerned eyebrow at the couple across from him. "I didn't do somethin' so embarrassing as to overshoot the wedding entire, did I?" he asked, letting his fork drop down to tap against the plate. "I was not so much what you'd call at a personal best when news of the blessed nuptials reached me. I am rarely at my sharpest in Medlab. The vital details, they take a bit to percolate. Gestate, if you will. Like a small, kicking infant of social awareness lodged in the womb of my mind, waiting for a chance at eventful birth." Marius smiled brightly at them as he began to rake at his salad. "Speakin' of blessed events, how entire is the white-picket-fence? Shall there be another boathouse built?"

Terry's jaw had at some point fallen open in abject shock and dawning horror. She'd felt the blood drain out of her face when Marius had started talking and it only got worse as his words fell into one of those special moments that sometimes happened when everyone goes quiet at the same time. As a performer, she was used to having everyone staring. She just didn't usually have them staring for quite this reason. "We're not married," she said weakly, entirely conscious of the hypocrisy. It hadn't been too long ago that she'd told Bobby that she had no interest in hiding their marriage from people. Except, it seemed, when it meant that people would therefore then know.

"Ah, good, then I have not yet missed that happy occasion," Marius went on as he cheerfully sawed his minipizza into neat, proportionate slices. "I am inclined to encourage the small, private ceremony. One imagines the odds of spontaneous ninja attack would be significantly lowered, as would the possibility of bleeding headtrauma to those guests fortunate enough to warrant an invite. Can't speak from personal experience, but from the way Clarice went on about it a souvenir of that sort quite ruins the experience." He speared a piece and gave Forge a speculative glance. "Oi, we should make use of our resources here. You're the expert, suppose it would be feasible to create some sort of automated register through the journal system? Guessin' is such the chore, an' a growing household need not be burdened by thirteen different sets of commemorative Star Trek plates if there is any possible means of avoidance."

"Easy enough," Forge mused. "Although traditionally aren't wedding gifts supposed to be for the new couple's home? Hey, are you guys moving out? Apartments are way too expensive around here if you ask me. But I mean, it's not like there isn't room for married couples here, you guys are what, the fourth now? Hey, does Angelo know?" he asked suddenly, "Because if he doesn't, oh man, he's going to totally flip. So when did you guys actually do it?"

Jennie finally finished chewing (being a big believer in not talking with one's mouth full) and added, "Now Forge, if they haven't told us already perhaps it is something they wish to keep to themselves. But it is terribly romantic," she put a hand to her chest for emphasis, "being secretly married and that. Did you wisk her away in the dead of night, Bobby? Catching first her suitcases then her? Ah, to be young and full of romantic idealism," the girl lifted one dark eyebrow. "Or am I getting ahead of myself?"

Bobby shot a look at Terry, at a complete loss as to how to respond. They were in a bit too deep to get out without some serious backpedalling--and lying. "Look, can you guys keep it down?" he hissed, too little too late. "We--I mean it's kind of complicated." He slipped an arm around Terry, pulling her closer.

Keep it down? As loud as they'd been trumpeting it around so far? Was that a joke? Terry gave Bobby an incredulous look that she then transferred back to the three smug faces across from her. The moment where she'd wanted to slide under the table and die a quiet death was passing. "Sure and you all should be careful as to your words. There's nothing to joke about in it. The two of you," she nodded, indicating Marius and Jennie, "got to that joke first anyway. There'll be no registries or ninjas or stupid jokes about babies."

Marius pffed. "I'll have you know the love shared by Jen and I is pure and true. An' yours should be enjoyed as such, especially as neither participant is prohibited by the conditions of a mysteriously unnamed religion." He rubbed his chin thoughtfully. "An' come to think of it, perhaps sneaking off to happy elopement isn't the brilliant idea it appears. The headmaster had a go at the preserving secrecy an' no one can contest that ended well."

Forge gulped down half a slice of pizza in one bite and pointed at Marius with a glare. "Low blow, even for you. Besides, no bringing down the happy couple. So, really," he asked as he turned his attention back to Bobby and Terry, "Why the secrecy? Doesn't seem that complicated to me. You guys love each other, you got married. That's kind of how these things go, right? Neither one of you's possessed or crazy or anything, right?"

With a wince, Bobby admitted in a mumble, "It was kinda...sudden. When we were in Vegas." Why the hell was Terry letting him talk? Bobby wasn't a good liar, they both knew that.

Jennie erupted into giggles. "Oh man, that is so cliché. Seriously, I would know." She set down her fork and propped her chin in her hands. "Which one was it? The Star Wars one? Or your run-of-the-mill Elvis impersonator? I was always fond of the one in the gold lamé suit."

Marius tsked. "Jen! Don't sully this!"

"What? At least I didn't ask if they were drunk."

Terry covered her face with her hands and reconsidered the dying under the table thing. "No. We weren't drunk. Why the heck do yeh even know about this anyway? No one who knew would tell you. Any of you!" Her accent wavered as she spoke, a sure sign of distress. "And why are you bothering us about it? What business is it of yours what we do or when we do it?"

"Whoa, whoa," Forge held his hands up, leaning forward between the two sides of the table. "Terry, simmer down. What's the big deal, anyway? Why all the secrecy? I'd have thought you guys would be shouting it from the rooftops or something."

The Australian's brow furrowed slightly, his fork halted in mid-raise. "Even I begin to sense a wrongness here. My jaded family background to the contrary, no assault upon the institution of holy matrimony was intended. Whichever stage you happen to be in, as I confess was not altogether clear on that detail goin' in. Stacking the three mutations had be in a bit of an odd place attention-wise." Something was bothering him about Terry. She sounded hoarse and was paler than usual, but having the flu was hardly noteworthy. There was something else, and whatever it was, it was tensing him up.

Terry reached down again and gripped Bobby's hand, possessively. "Sure and yeh're the first ones other than Sean and Clarice to see it as a fine thing. Mr Summers all but threw us out. Ms Munroe barely'd say two words about it. There's nothing but people telling us that we're making a mistake and we're going to be regretting it in a month. I'm tired of it! Laugh if yeh like but we'd not change a damn thing."

The dark-haired girl leaned forward on her elbows. "Terry, honey? Like we're ones to judge. This is on the lower end of 'things done in the heat of the moment meriting disapproval.'" Jennie held up her hands, "Not that I'm disapproving or anything. Far from it. I say screw it to those that do, you're young, you're in love, who gives a flying...fig about whether or not anyone approves? " She pointed to herself and the boys. "We've never let that stop us."

Bobby was somehow remaining much calmer than Terry. Maybe it was because he wasn't a redhead. "We were going to keep it quiet until we could plan a 'real' wedding, with a reception and a priest and stuff." He smiled at Terry and added, "It may not have been planned, but we're both happy with it. I just wish everyone else could be."

Putting aside the indefinable unease, Marius raised a finger to wag at Bobby. "Ah, but did we actually criticise? For example, Jen's got the legs of a snowbeast, Maker Boy oftentimes cannot be bothered to distinguish between mechanical lubricant an' his daily beverage, and though the act was hygienically necessary my skull does not, shall we say, lend itself to this particular hairstyle. Dubious lifestyles all, and yet for all the jokes is that held against us?" Marius beamed at Jennie's look. "No worries, I quite like your hairy legs. I always did fancy the legwarmer look."

That warranted being smacked with one of Jennie's textbooks. She looked back at Terry and Bobby. "My spouse here is a bit like Samson. Loss of hair equals loss of IQ. Not that he was exceptionally brilliant to begin with, but at least he now remembers how to tie his shoes. Anyway," she set the textbook back down on the table. "Again, we are not suitable to cast stones. We may be pretty, but our judgment sometimes," she gestured with one hand, "lacks?"

Terry took a deep breath, trying to gain some kind of calm because it was embarrassing being the only one at the table having a fit. "Don't misunderstand. We don't think we're wrong. We've no regrets at all. We're just tired of having to listen to everyone tell us that we are and we should be. Surely we started in Vegas as having a bit of a joke but that's not what it is." It was very hard to have a sense of humor about things these days. She didn't know why but she couldn't shake the mood. "So you all should be good or I'll not put you on the guest list."

"Hey, if it means there's going to be those little tiny pastries like Moira and Mr. D. had at their wedding?" Forge said, polishing off the last of his pizza, "You can count on us. So," he said with a suddenly wicked grin, "Mister and Mrs. Theresa Cassidy. It's got a ring to it. Eh? Eh?"

"Oh, ha very ha," Bobby muttered, kicking at Forge weakly under the table. He glanced at Terry and added in a stage whisper, "Let's sit him at the kids' table." Now that the secret was out, it was almost a relief. No more hiding, discussing it in whispers and removing rings around everyone.

Terry seemed to have the same idea because she reached around him and pulled the ring he'd taken off earlier from his pocket and without comment or ostentation, slid it back into place. Then she stole his soda again. "So, new topic. Ms Munroe has run off to join a biker gang and will come back with a mohawk and tattoos. Discuss."