Angel and Julian

[x-firestar.livejournal.com]

Angel finally gets around to talking to Julian about the X-Men.



In the living room of Julian's suit, Angel lay sprawled on the couch with her legs hanging over one side. She'd come by to talk to him but hadn't quite realized how tired she was until she'd laid down on his couch. One minute she was talking to him as he came over, the next she was out like a light. Despite her desire to join the X-Men, she was still training with the firefighters and it had been a draining morning before her classes. She didn't realize it but as she started to stir again, she had been out for about an hour.

"Ngggh."

His first thought after Angel zonked out, was that she was simply taking a long pause to collect her thoughts. He quickly realized she was sleeping and covered her with the blanket they kept draped over the back of the couch- with the windows open it was a little chilly in the living room. Not wanting to wake her, Julian headed for his room, asking Fred to keep his music down. After grabbing a book and plopping into the sofa chair, Keller started to read, enjoying the quiet. Unfortunately the quiet was broken when Angel started to lightly snore, which was actually cute in its own way.

After a while, she began to stir and Julian moved to her side, taking her hand as she woke up. "Did you have a nice nap?" Julian teased.

"I totally didn't mean to do that," she groaned as she shimmied up into a sitting position as she squeezed Julian's hand. "Sorry - I didn't sleep well last night and then Paul ran me ragged this morning. And then there were classes." Angel rubbed at her eyes and shook her head, trying to completely wake up. "You should have thrown things at me or something."

"You've been exhausted lately, thought you could use the rest," Julian shrugged. With a wink he smoothly moved up onto the couch, sitting intimately close to Angel as she stretched and worked the sleep out of her system. "Not that I didn't think about it when you started snoring," he said dramatically, giving her a quick tickle along her side.

Angel gave a slight shriek as she curled herself up in defense of being tickled, an automatic move in an attempt to save her ribs. When he stopped, she grumbled and snuggled under his arm. "I do not snore," Angel said, indignantly. "And if I do, it's the cutest sound evar, thank you very much. But you're right, I've been screwing around at night and not getting much sleep on top of a full day."

Which reminded her that she needed to talk to him about the thing that would make her days even fuller.

"Yes, it was adorable, sorta like," Julian did his best to imitate the sound in a comedic way. After a pillow hit his face, he stopped.

After a brief chuckle he remembered that she'd been in mid sentence before she'd zonked out. "Do you remember what you were saying before you developed a sudden and unfortunate case of narcolepsy? It sounded important."

Stretching again, she maneuvered her legs so that they hung over Julian's knees. "I realized before I made any big decisions, I should talk to you about it," Angel said, craning her neck backwards a little so she could look up at his face. "I've already talked to Mr. Summers and my dad, but I need to talk to the Professor after you and I talk. I'm thinkin' about joining the X-Men, becoming a trainee. I don't know what I'll do about the firefighting stuff but I think that's another worry for another day."

A slight pang of jealousy hit Julian in the gut, knowing that he would never get his parents to sign off on training. "Oh, cool," was all he could think to say as he mulled things over, looking toward the window as he processed.

That was ... not quite the reaction she'd been expecting. Angel tugged on the front of his shirt as she frowned. "Are you okay with that?" To be honest, she hadn't even thought of what she would do if he wasn't okay with it. It was something she really wanted, more than the firefighting, maybe more than her photography.

Julian turned his blue eyes back to hers and smiled, giving her a slight nod. "Of course I'm okay with it- honestly, I'm planning on doing it too." One of his hands absently started to stroke her leg, "I'm just a little jealous you got your parents permission. My mom and dad wouldn't even take that call."

Leaning up, Angel gave him a lingering kiss on his cheek. "I'm sorry," she said quietly, intertwining her fingers with his more tightly. "I can't even imagine what that's like but I feel for you." Parents were supposed to be there for their kids, powers or no, and it twisted her up to think that anyone she cared for had to deal with that. She was really, really lucky that both of her parents loved her as much as they did, before and after she'd discovered she had powers.

With a shake of the head and a squeeze back, Julian dismissed the pain that resurfaced for a moment with her sympathy. "It's okay- it sucked back in Beverly Hills. Things are much, much better here and I turn eighteen in October." He left out the fact that Scott said he needed a lot more powers training for the sake of not embarrassing himself.

She beamed at him. "That's not long at all - then we can do it together. And, hey, there's still the New Mutants thing, right? It's not X-Men training but the team work stuff is pretty awesome." By the time October came, she might still be a trainee even.

"Yeah, it's coming up pretty quickly- but yours is definitely sooner.... When is it again?" A slightly guilty expression crossed his face, this wasn't the first time he'd needed to ask this question.

A second later and there was an elbow in his ribs as Angel showed off the fact that growing up with a baseball team's worth of male cousins certainly had rubbed off. "It was in December, you doof," she sighed, though she really wasn't mad. "You got me a gift, though I don't think it was that long after you'd moved to the mansion so it was really sweet, actually."

He remembered the gift, but it had been for Christmas- Julian wasn't about to let her know that though, not if it bought him a way out of the mistake. "Oh, duh," he slapped his palm to his face, "where am I today?" Her elbow had left an impression on Keller's ribs, but he resisted an urge to rub the spot she'd struck- best to maintain his toughness.

With that over, she flopped back down on the couch and looked as innocent as could be. "But it does mean I'll be eighteen only a little bit after you hit it," Angel mused. "Man, I can't believe we're getting up to eighteen, you know? It seems like only yesterday I set my mom's car on fire and ended up here..."

"And I levitated every car in the neighborhood upside down- both on the street and in the garages." He smiled and continued, "Did you know the cops blamed it on vandals. Like a group of vandals could break into every garage on the block and flip the car upside down without waking up the house. Come on." Looking proud of himself, he gave her hand a squeeze, "There was only one vandal that night and he slept through the whole thing."

She smirked at him. "They were really gung-ho vandals?" Angel snickered and snuggled under his shoulder so she could use his chest as a pillow. "You know, no matter how we ended up here or what, I'm glad we all did. I never would have met you or Kyle and Julio or Yvette ... never would have flown..." Angel grinned into his shirt. "You never would have a girlfriend who'll eventually get to have her own leather outfit..."

Julian smirked, "That could be fun." He chuckled, getting another playful jab, "And you'll have a boyfriend who'll hopefully match."