xp_logs | Yvett & Jono | Friday Afternoon

Yvette meets Jono in the music room.

Jono was standing by the upstairs window, watching a game of basketball between two kids in the courtyard. It was summer. Time for fun in the sun. He would have liked to spend some time out there but the thought of wearing his bandages in the hot sun didn't sound too appealing, and he didn't want to take them off. He felt a hell of a lot more insecure without it. He pressed his forehead against the window, and felt the warmth from the glass spread across his skin. Well, at least he could still feel. If someday he were to lose that... His grip on the pencil in his hand tightened and it broke into two with a loud snap.

Oops?

Having managed to convince her mother she needed to stay at the school over the summer vacation to do various remedial classes to improve her English, plus work with Elpis, Yvette was enjoying a certain sense of liberation. She loved her mother, but she'd realised over her time at the school that she was rather controlling. And the prospect of spending the summer hiding her mutation from all and sundry had not appealed at all. So it was she was wandering back from the library, a series of books tucked under her arm with the intention of reading in the treehouse for a few hours, humming a song from one of her Albanian pop CDs she'd brought back after her last visit home. A glimpse of movement in the music room as she passed caught her eye and she paused, a smile crossing her face as she realised who it was.

"Hello, Mr. Starsmore!" she chirped from the open door.

He heard the cheerful greeting and stepped away from the window. "'ey, sunshine." He dropped the broken pencil into the trash can and slipped his jacket on. "Ye done with classes for the day?"

She nodded. "Yes! And there is the summer vacation coming up, which means there is not so much of the homework." She beamed at that idea, eyes echoing the smile with a flare of brightness. "And how are you today, Mr. Starsmore?" She'd been practicing correct verb tenses and wanted to show off.

Perched on the edge of his desk, he rested a hand on his knee. "I'm doin' alright, thanks. And how're you?" He was smiling through his eyes. Yvette was one of his favourite students. She was a quick learner and he always liked her enthusiasm.

"Good." She shrugged a little. "There has been the, how do you say? Excitement? With the bad person coming to kidnap the people." Her eyes dimmed a bit. "I was worried about my friends."

Jono nodded. He'd heard about the kidnappings but he had not been present at Xavier's during the lock down. The timing of the incident couldn't have been worse though as he'd been considering moving back into the mansion to live with Paige. He'd moved some of his things in yesterday but he still had the key to his flat, and he was planning on holding onto it until he was sure he'd made the right decision.

"Good thing the X-Men got them back safe and sound then, eh? Are ye goin' away for summer vacation or are ye stayin' 'ere?"

"I am to stay here. It is not so good in Kosovo for the mutants and my mother, she is still not so good about letting me go out without the big coat covering me." Where Yvette's tone might have been aggrieved a year ago, now she was actually sounding wry. "I have told her I need to do the summer school for my English, and the Elpis." She smiled a little. "And it is not such the bad thing, to stay with my friends for the summer."

"Right." Jono had no plans for the summer but he was thinking he could take the time to just relax and work on some music. "If you want, Yvette, maybe ye could help me out with a music workshop I've got planned. I'm thinkin' of roundin' up the kids who are stuck at Xavier's. We'll do a full day workshop; work on some music durin' the daytime, and maybe set up camp by the lake to watch the group performances."

Yvette's eyes shone. Literally. "Oh, that is sounding fun!" she exclaimed. "We could have the campfire and toast the marshmallows and enjoy the music! Yes, I would very much like to help!" Especially since her musical ability was limited to percussion, given the length of her fingers made most other things awkward and she was too shy to sing. "Perhaps the teachers also could be putting on the act, yes?" she added, slightly mischievously.

Jono let out a nod. "With a bit of gentle persuasion, I'm sure we could 'ave them agreein' to participate." He thought it would be good to give the students something else to focus after all that's happened last week.

"Or Angel will have the funny pictures to make them want to join in?" came the innocent response, although Yvette's eyes were glowing like welder's sparks.

Jono sent out what passed as a telepathic chuckle to Yvette. "I knew ye'd be full of ideas, luv." He reached out for a paper and a pen and stood up from the table. "If ye've got some time to spare, we could work out the rough details and I can 'ave a talk with Ms. Monroe to decide on a good date for this." He was sure Ororo and Scott would agree to giving the kids something to do during the summer holidays.

Setting her books down on a nearby chair, Yvette came forward eagerly. "I have plenty of the time for helping, Mr. Starsmore!" she chirped.