Amanda, Angelo - Friday night

[xp_daytripper]

Following this thread in Terry's journal, Angelo turns up at the brownstone to find out just why his girlfriend is so freaked about his new trick.



The Mustang parked outside the brownstone wasn't an uncommon sight, but it didn't usually screech to a halt into the parking spot that way. Angelo was out and up the steps inside a minute later, not running but definitely hurrying. When he got upstairs and into the apartment... Amanda was nowhere in sight.

"...Amanda?"

His reply was a cough, and the cigarette smoke wafting in through the open kitchen window. There was a fire escape out there, and that was where Amanda was perched, knees pulled up to her chest and the ashtray beside her half-full of butts. She was lighting a new cigarette from the butt of the old when Angelo stuck his head through the window. Never a good sign - she only chain-smoked when she was upset, and even then not very often. She looked up at him, a mixture of residual anger and guilt in her expression. "Hey."

He crawled the rest of the way through the window, to sit beside her on the fire escape. His own expression was leaning more to the guilt and worry. "Hey."

"Hope you didn't get a ticket, tearing over here like that." The joke fell flat, however, with the slight tremble of her voice. "You must think I'm a complete nutter. I'm sorry."

"No tickets", he promised her. "An' I don't think that. You okay?"

The question made her hunch a little more, trying to keep some kind of calm. "Not really?" she said in a small voice, taking another drag of her cigarette and coughing out the smoke in three sharp bursts. "But I shouldn't have freaked out like that. Not in public."

"If it set you off, it set you off", he said firmly, shifting a little closer. "You want to tell me about it?"

"There's not a lot more to say - I think it all came through pretty loud and clear." She sounded miserable. "When I saw about you gliding off the roof, all I could think was what would have happened if something had gone wrong. After the whole thing with Margali... I couldn't handle it." She wasn't leaning into him, but neither was she shifting away, huddling on the fire escape with her arms wrapped around her knees. The scars on her back were visible where her t-shirt had ridden up at the bottom. "I don't want to lose you."

"...I'd say you're not gonna", he said quietly, "but you know what our lives are. I don't want you to, an' I don't want to lose you either."

"It was just so... dumb!" she burst out. "Fucking around on the roof with John, getting knocked off... You've got no idea how glad I am you've learned something new about your powers, but you could've died. Or been crippled or something. And you're acting like it's no big deal!" Her voice cracked a bit. "Last week, when I was trapped in Margali's body... I nearly died. She wore herself out so much the whole body swap spell was pretty much a last-ditch thing, and the state she left her body in... there was nothing I could do, but wait for them to come back, and I felt so fucking helpless, like I did reading Terry's journal."

"It's not like I planned on John shovin' me an' me fallin'", he retorted, talking over the second part of her words. "An' as it stands, it is no big deal." He finally stopped, hearing what she'd said. "Would you ever've told me you nearly died, if this hadn't happened?"

"Would you have told me about the roof if Terry hadn't posted about it?" It was a half-hearted retort, however. "And I was going to, just... later. When it was the right time. I'm tired of making you worry, and the last couple of months have been pretty much nothing but, ever since Candra."

"I'd've showed you what I could do an' told you how I figured it out, if you hadn't heard an' freaked out about it first", he told her. "An'... jeez, Amanda. Everythin' we said about no secrets, an' you don't even tell me that? It's not quite the same level as fallin' when I didn't even hit the ground hard, 'specially when you found out the next day."

"I've only been back three days!" she replied defensively. "With everything going on, I didn't want to think about it any more. Bad enough my mother wanted to steal my body, but she knew it'd probably kill her old one and she didn't care. And yeah, her brain was turning into tapioca, but what kind of mother does that, huh?" The cigarette was burning her fingers and she stubbed it out angrily. "I'm sorry. I know I promised not to keep secrets but I just wanted to be normal for a change. I'm tired of being so fucked up and everything being life and death, when all I want to do is spend the rest of my life with you."

"We could quit", Angelo suggested, and his tone was as light as he could make it. "Pack it all in an' stick to desk work. Or just disappear - you know if we told them we were goin', they'd let us. If we don't, then normal ain't happenin'."

"I know." She remembered a limosine, Manuel telling her he was giving up the Hellfire Club, even if it meant the loss of his identity. For her. And now Angelo was saying the same thing - give up the lives they'd built, make something new. Because she couldn't handle it. And the thing was, it was tempting. Deeply so.

But then she thought of those migrant workers in Arizona, prey to some old experiment and no-one giving a shit. Of the mutant kids plucked off the streets and stuffed in cargo containers, to be sent who knew where. Of Sarah, lying on that bloody exam table having her organs removed and no-one knowing a thing. Sure there were plenty of people who could do her job, but could she step back and let them do it? They did what they did so someone else didn't have to, so the bastards got what was coming to them and they couldn't do it again. And Angelo was an X-Man - from the minute he'd gotten his tags, it had become part of who he was. Who she loved. Asking him to give that up... she'd be killing off a part of him.

Amanda shook her head. "No," she said at last. "I don't want to quit. And neither do you. All this... it's part of the deal, and I'll just have to suck it up and stop being such a baby."

"No, I don't", he said quietly. He didn't even know if he could, despite what he'd said, and wouldn't until it came to the real crunch. "If you're sure... then we'll figure somethin' out."

"I'll try not to get so... crazy, over you." She looked over at him, made an attempt at a smile. "Go see Sof more often - looks like I'm not as over everything as I thought I was."

"It was kind of an overreaction to what actually happened", was the gently-spoken answer. "But hey, it... makes me crazy when stuff happens to you, too." He hadn't missed the 'I want to spend the rest of my life with you', he was just assimilating and trying to figure out a response to it.

"I'm sorry?" It came out automatically, and she grimaced. "Not that I do it on purpose. I used to say I had the mystical equivalent of a 'Kick Me' sign on me - looks like it's still there." She uncurled a bit, and leaned her head against his shoulder. "So, tell me about this new trick?"

"There's not much to tell", he said honestly. "I just... catch the wind, or somethin', and off I go until my feet hit the ground. It'll be better if I show you... but later." He turned his head to kiss her temple.

Incredibly, Amanda giggled. Like a little girl. "You mean, like those squirrels on the Discovery Channel?" she asked. "The flying ones?"

"...yeah", he said after a moment's thought, a grin starting to appear. "Pretty much exactly like."

It might have been the whole relief after an incredibly stressful couple of hours, but it was the funniest thing she'd ever heard. "That's adorable!" she managed to blurt out through the giggles.

Angelo just laughed and reached for her hand to pull her up as he stood, turning for the window. "It's cold out here. You done smokin'?"

She let him pull her up, glancing down at the ashtray, half-full. "Um, yeah. Probably for a couple of days, the way my lungs feel right now." She paused, however, to twine her free arm around his neck. "You don't deserve me being such a plonker, love. I'm sorry."

"I can take it", he assured her, free arm sliding around her waist, and leaned in to kiss her with no regard for the previous chainsmoking.

A soft noise escaped her as she returned the kiss, and when they pulled apart, her cheeks were slightly flushed, lips parted. "Do you have to go back tonight?" she asked, stroking the back of his neck with her fingers, playing with the short fuzz of his buzzcut.

"Don't see why I need to", Angelo answered, tilting his head into her hand. "You know I'll stay."

She leaned into to kiss his throat, exposed by the head tilt. "Inside works then. Too cold to have my way with you out here," she murmured into his skin.

That got something that he would forever deny sounding like a purr, and he scooped her off her feet to get them both through the window and back inside.

***

Her head pillowed on Angelo's bare shoulder, Amanda made a sleepy, contented noise as she cuddled up to his side. "And we even made it to the bed this time," she murmured, running her hand lazily over his stomach and chest.

"Makes a change", he said, voice lazily amused. He was resting against the headboard, looking down at her. "More comfortable than the couch." At least for the afterglow.

"And less rug burn than the floor." Especially when she had still-fading bruises on her back and on her knees. She tilted her chin up, pressing a kiss to the side of his neck. "Small compensation for the whole racing over here thing, yeah?"

"Ah, it's what the car's made for" he said easily, then paused, looking down at her face. "...there's somethin' you said earlier, querida. I wanted to ask..."

"Hmm?" She stopped nuzzling his neck to look up at him, shifting a little so she could without going cross-eyed. "Is it the squirrel thing? 'Cause it is adorable, even if your manly manliness is all embarrassed."

"You're not allowed to say that where other people can hear. But no, not that. I meant..." Oddly, he seemed more awkward saying this than - indirectly - admitting the squirrel thing was adorable. "You said... you wanted to spend the rest of your life with me."

Her hand stopped its stroking, resting on his chest and her fingers tensing, just a little. "Ah." That'd slipped out when she was upset and angry, and while she'd meant every word, she hadn't meant to tell him this soon. They hadn't even been together a year yet. He loved her, she knew that, but he'd also had that awful scene with Paige. "Maybe? I mean, I do, but if it's gunna freak you out we can pretend I never said anything, yeah?"

"No. I mean, it's not... I mean, this on its own is a commitment, I wouldn't be with you if I didn't... it doesn't freak me out." His hand moved to curl over the one on his chest. "I just didn't think you... wanted to put it like that." He'd never thought she didn't love him, but there was a difference.

It was hard, not hiding her face despite the urge to do so. Especially when he was looking at her like that. "I don't mean I want to get married," she said slowly, trying to think it out, rather than just blurting out the first words that came to mind. "But, when I got back this last time, and there you were, and all the shite didn't matter any more because you were there... I realised I want that always. I want you." She was blushing now, the one ear visible bright red and her cheeks not much better. "I know it hasn't been even a year yet, but... it's been longer, too. I've known you since I turned up at the school, and we've always been there for each other. That's what I want." By now the embarrassment was excruciating, and she did hide her face, pressing her hot cheeks against his neck. "Gah," she said, sounding muffled.

He bent his head to kiss what he could reach of skin, then murmured in her ear, "I want always too. An' if you do want to get married... we'll do it. In a heartbeat."

She nearly head butted him in the nose, jerking herself up so she was half-sitting. "You do?" she asked, and then made a face. "Of course you do, you wouldn't have said it otherwise. But... really?" It didn't mean she was about to drag him out then and there for dress fittings, but the fact he'd said it at all...

He'd snapped his head back hastily to avoid getting his nose broken, but relaxed again now, smiling slightly. "Really. I mean, the way my life was before the mansion... I'd've got married young." To Alejandra, went unspoken. "A lot's changed, but that... that's not a new idea. So, yeah. Really. 21's not even that young." And it was her.

"I never thought I'd even make it to twenty..." She twisted around, pulling her legs up so she was sitting facing him, the sheet tangled around her waist. "Getting married... I don't think I'm quite that ready, but one day?" She gave him an almost-shy smile. "Like, I dunno, an understanding we will, when we're both ready?"

"That's why most of us did it", he said quietly, smiling back and reaching to lay hands on her skin. "An'... engaged to be engaged, huh? Sure."

She didn't add that she'd never thought back then anyone would want her like that, instead shifting so she was straddling his lap, his hands running over her back. "That works for me," she said, laying her hands on his shoulders and leaning forward to kiss him. "But... keep it between just us for now? There's enough drama out there and I don't want to be gossip fodder, least not any more than I already am."

"Agreed." He trailed kisses from temple to jaw, finding her too close to resist. "'s not like it's anybody else's business. Even Mom doesn't need to know yet."

Juanita definitely didn't need to know yet. Not at this stage. "Mmm." She tilted her head up a little so he could kiss her neck, always a weak spot. "You know that name you called me before? What's it mean?"

He moved down her neck willingly, lips against her skin as he spoke. "'s just a pet name. Literally... it means 'wanted'."

The shiver that went through her was only partly caused by the feel of his mouth on her neck. "Call me that again?"

His teeth grazed her neck lightly as he chuckled. "As often as you want. Querida."