xp_logs | Kyle and Yvette, physical therapy

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Kyle and Yvette at the pool for physical therapy. Kyle has a bad reaction to Yvette asking for help with hand to hand training, and some of his concerns about her being on the team come out - and as Kyle does, he puts his foot in his mouth and is kind of a butthead.

Kyle had to admit that with his knee sprained, and the weights on both ankles adding extra resistance, the physical therapy was more like lifting weights and nothing like the stuff his grandparents had talked about. It probably helped that he was in a tank top and the loudest pair of brand-new swim trunks he could find at Target. Last year's had grown a hole in the butt, possibly from foot-through-pants-syndrome. And no one else was in the pool area except Yvette, so no one was witness to his absolutely lame he looked.

"How is the knee?" asked his diminutive trainer. Yvette was wearing shorts and t-shirt over her body suit, the t-shirt one of her favourite cute ones with kittens on the front, and she was walking along the side of the pool as Kyle made his progress. "Is there any sharp pain?" Since dull pain would be par for the course for a while.

"Not unless you poke me." Not that she had, or would without serious provocation, but even though this didn't suck as much as he'd thought it would, it still kinda sucked, and Kyle was feeling pretty much like a jerk on top of everything else. "It's a knee. It bends, it's hairy, right now it's considering leaving The Republic of Kyle and going to start it's own Republic of Broken Knee."

"Which is why you are in the pool - it is good not to put too much weight on it at the moment." If Yvette was being a little smug, it was mostly because she didn't get to boss people around that much and she was actually enjoying it. "One more lap should be enough and then we can be doing the stretches, yes?"

"Oh -boy-. Can I get a lollipop if I'm good?" It was just so -boring- and even if his knee ached, and he had regained a little bit of movement in the joint already, Kyle wasn't entirely sure the boredom was worth it. If he'd been in a better mood, he probably would've done zombie walks or the Thriller Dance or something funny to pass the time, but he was grumpy. And sulking just a little.

"No, but you can have the hamburger when we are done. Protein is good for building the muscles and you have many you need to build again." Yvette's voice was maddeningly sweet and serene, although there was a slightly wicked edge to her grin. "You pout as much as the little girl, did you realise that?"

Kyle pouted in an exaggerated fashion, and with his elongated canines, it gave him a distinctly snaggletoothed look. "I totally don't. This just sucks and I suck at it, and it's boring." He stopped in mid-lap and flicked some water in Yvette's direction. "I'm not having fun here, and my knee hurts and I don't like being in pain, so okay, maybe I'm kinda pouting but it's totally justified." Not that he thought Yvette would believe him, Kyle didn't much believe it himself, but he couldn't just take being called a girl without some kind of defense.

A foam swimming aid bounced off his head, thrown with surprising aim by his tiny coach. "Therapy is not supposed to be fun," she told him, mock-sternly, but there was a grin on her face. "How about the deal? You let me help you here, and you can help me with the hand-to-hand when you are fit, yes?"

"Hey! Flag on the play, illegal use of pool noodles!" Kyle waved one end of the noodle at Yvette, and pulled a face. "And yeah, I guess. I mean, if you're gonna be on the team and all." He couldn't keep his displeasure at the idea entirely out of his voice, even if he was trying. Kyle's idea of a poker face was that damn catchy song, not any kind of blank expression.

Also against him was the fact that Yvette was rather perceptive - she made a habit of studying people, after all. She came over to sit on the edge of the pool, dangling her socked feet in the water. "You do not have to teach me, if you do not want to," she offered a little hesitantly, unsure why he wasn't keen on the idea. "I was just thinking, since it is something I need to be better at, that you could help me."

"It's not you I don't wanna teach, it's just... " Kyle shook his head, frowning. "When Marius and Jennie and me joined, it was to help so nobody else would end up getting kidnapped or hurt or turned into dog-things. And now all you guys are joining and... I mean, dammit, you're way too nice to go having to kick somebody's ass. You and Angel and Christ, they gave Laurie full team and it's not like she's not qualified, but she wants to sew people up, not kick them in the eyes!" Obviously, he'd been thinking about it for a while, and it was really bugging him. "I'm just not a fan of every nice girl I know ending up with a set of leathers and all."

"But it is all right for Julian and Lex?" Yvette asked, perhaps a little too nicely.

Kyle scowled. That wasn't the point. "Lex used to be in the Army, and Julian's not nice. Look how much he got Angel mad at him. Nice guys don't think about kissing other girls when they've got a girlfriend!" Kyle put himself firmly in the "not nice" category, although most of it was more because he was gleefully happy to punch people in the eyes, and a very little was because he thought about other women a lot. "It's like, I can teach you because I don't want any of you getting hurt but geez, I don't want you guys turning into ... you know, all not nice and crap."

"So Miss Ororo and Tabitha and Jan are 'not nice' because they are full X-Men?" Yvette didn't wait for the reply, using her foot to flick water into Kyle's face. "I think you are being the sexist person, Kyle. Being a girl and being an X-Man does not mean we cannot be nice people."

"It's not the same, it's... " If Kyle hadn't been up to his chest in water, he'd have sat down, frustrated. "If I knew nice guys I'd be upset about them too. I just ..." He struggled for a few moments to try to think of someone that fit into his definition of nice and who happened to be male. Artie! It couldn't be about sexism, because there was Artie! "... okay, like, Artie, I don't want Artie to join the team either, he's a nice kid, and his power is totally not about fighting."

She splashed him again. "Look at me, Kyle. I am made to fight. Are you saying that because I can use my powers to fight I will not be a nice person?"

This was not going nearly as well as he'd hoped. "No, I just.. ." He was seriously considering sitting down anyway, despite the water. It could just go up his nose. It'd probably suck less than this argument. "Dammit, now I'm all mixed up. I just don't want any of you getting all... you know. Blown up. Hang on, I can't think and tread water at the same time." Kyle waded over to the shallow end of the pool and pulled himself up on to the edge. "Yeah, I mean, maybe you're right and I'm being a jerk. I just don't know how I feel about you guys all joining up, and I'm pretty pissed off that everybody keeps quitting and making it so we need you guys too." He was definitely still holding a couple of grudges about certain people bailing to go off do whatever. Dance school. Anti-social hermitting in California.

"I do not want to be blown up either. I have, how you say? Been there and have done that?" Yvette gave him a small, wry smile at her own joke. "But no-one is making me choose to be an X-Man, Kyle. I made the choice myself. I want to be able to use my powers to protect those people who cannot be saving themselves, the same as you. Just because I am the girl and very short does not make it any different for me than it is for you."

"Okay, but I don't like it any." Maybe he was being stubborn but he just didn't like thinking about his friends getting hurt, or learning how to break someone's arm, or poke their eye out, or put them into a coma. "But I guess if I want less chance of you guys getting hurt I should probably be less of a Whiner McWhinenstien when somebody asks me for help, right?"

"It would be the start, yes," Yvette told him with a small grin. "But since you are such the big baby about the therapy, I suppose I can be expecting some of the whining, yes?"

"If I complain about the calling me a baby, you're just gonna throw more swimmies at me, aren't you?" The sentence wasn't even out of Kyle's mouth before the next pool toy bounced off the top of his head. "Right. Shutting up now."

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Hee! I adore this log, you two. So much awesome. And I love that Kyle is worried about his friends, and how Yvette was very understanding but firm with him about how he was being an idiot.