Jan and Matt - Out for Chinese (Sunday)
Apr. 3rd, 2011 12:15 pm![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
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xp_logsAs promised, Jan takes the new kid out for Chinese food. Matt's convinced it's only a matter of time before he winds up kicked out of the school, and Jan tries to convince him otherwise.
"We're here!" Jan announced as she parked her car. She'd chosen a place in Westchester rather than opting for something in the city. It took just about forever to drive into the city and mess around with things like finding a place to park, and while the city was great, there were also places to eat not too far from the mansion and parking was a lot better around here.
Matt had assumed that they were staying closer to the mansion because while nothing beat Chinese food from China Town in New York City, they were no where near there and he wanted to eat now, not in a couple hours. Plus, learning the town was a good idea and the only way for him to do that was by walking around, not by driving from a car and having things pointed out to him. That meant nothing. "Awesome," Matt agreed, waiting for the tell-tale shift in the car that meant it was stopped and parked before he undid his seat belt and got out, unfolding his cane as he did so. It was automatic habit by now and something he consciously thought about. "Nice place."
"Just wait until you taste the food," Jan told him, coming around the car to the passenger side. She looked at the boy for a moment, trying to figure out what to say or do. She didn't want to just assume that the kid couldn't get into the building by himself; he had enhanced senses, maybe he could follow the sound of her voice? But maybe that was stupid, and she certainly didn't want to wander off and leave him standing there alone. There wasn't exactly a handbook for this sort of thing, and she didn't want Matt to think she was a jerk. "You need any help getting into the restaurant?"
"I'll follow you," Matt suggested, "Lemme take your shoulder," he reached out for her, one hand brushing against her wings and he paused, hand in mid-air. "Jan..." he began, unsure what he had just touched. It had definitely not been clothing though. Or shoulder. That was more than a little weird.
"Yeah? Oh, that's a wing. I have those, remember? I used to always hide them by making sure I wore something that would cover them, but now I don't. Here." Jan moved a bit so that one shoulder brushed his hand. "That's a shoulder. Try again now?"
The good news what that he hadn't touched somewhere inappropriately. The bad news was that he hadn't touched somewhere inappropriately. He'd pulled the 'blind guy accidentally touching boobs' a couple times. He had never gotten too far with it, but he had at least touched boob briefly. Wing though was different. "Oh yeah, I forgot," he replied, a little weirded out by wings, but she had said that the other day. He'd just hadn't thought much about it. Gripping her shoulder firmly, but not painfully, Matt nodded, "Okay. Lead on MacDuff," he quoted from Shakespeare. "Just walk normally and tell me if there's a step or something, but I'll probably find it with my cane."
"We'll get to a step in a minute," Jan told him. "I'll bet you've never touched a giant insect wing before, have you? Luckily, they're pretty strong, and it doesn't hurt when they're touched." It wasn't the most comfortable feeling in the world, but it didn't involve actual pain. " Megan, another one of the students, has wings similar to mine. And we've had people with bird wings living at the mansion. There are all sorts of wings mutants can have."
"Uh, well...no," Matt had to admit. It wasn't like he made a habit of touching insects at all. Or their wings. "I'm glad though. 'Cause I'd be really sorry and embarrassed otherwise," it wasn't like he had meant to! "That is...really bizarre. Like...first, because you talk about it like it's no big deal and secondly because that's just creepy. I can't even imagine it I don't think," his cane found the step leading inside and he negotiated it without pause. Even when following someone like this he tended to use his cane to help guide himself so that he would better know the layout again.
"No need to be sorry or embarrassed, that's why I wanted to let you know it was OK. Opening the door, in we go." Once inside, Jan requested a table for two. "Having wings used to be a big deal me, but yeah, you're right, now it isn't. I mean, I've had the wings for years now. They're a part of me, and I so don't think of myself as bizarre or creepy. Some mutants have pink skin, some have purple hair, some have wings, some have tails... it's not like we got to choose any of that, you know?"
"True," but still! It was weird. Matt couldn't even imagine looking like that, but then, he could be green and wouldn't know it. He doubted it though, someone would have figured out that he was a mutant well before now if that was the case. "Still not what more people consider normal. 'Course, neither is being blind, too," he added, taking the back of the seat and sitting down, folding his cane up and securing it with the band once he was seated.
Not that Matt could see it, but Jan shrugged. It was an automatic gesture, really. "I kind of got over other people's versions of 'normal' a while ago. OK, so most people don't have wings, they're always the same height, and they can't zap people with their hands. Most people aren't mutants, and yeah, most people aren't blind. But there's nothing wrong with us. I mean, you know, not in the sense that we're bad or have done something wrong or deserve to be treated like crap. Are we different from most people? Sure we are. But there's nothing wrong with being a mutant, even if a lot of people think there is. And then you've got being blind tacked onto that. So some people are going to be idiots. They see my wings, they figure out you're blind, and they have issues." She shrugged again. "I say it's their problem and they should just got over themselves already and let people live their lives."
"Yeah, but no one can look at me and tell I'm a mutant. I've had migraines and issues with hypersensitivity since I was 12 and it took an intern fresh out of college at the rehab place I was in before anyone thought outside the box to think that maybe there was something else going on," he'd had several diagnosis's over the years which included a traumatic brain injury, neurological imbalance caused by chemicals, all sorts of things, up to and including that he was making it all up and was just wanting the drugs. What it had amounted to was that no one had known and no one had thought it was a genetic mutation. It was actually sort of nice to have a definitive answer after all this time. "Anyways...yes. People are idiots. And it's their issues, not mine. So they can go deal with themselves without bothering us."
"Yep. The wings growing out of my back sort of gave it away for me," Jan commented. "I got that part first, and there wasn't any way to mistake what that meant. Sorry it took so long for people to figure out what was going on with you; that had to have sucked. But now you know what's going on, and you're living in the right place for it. A lot of people at the mansion have had hardships in life one way or the other, so usually the people there won't be jerks about stuff whether it's related to mutations or something else. I was Can't-Touch-Anyone Girl for a few years until I came to the school and learned how to control my zaps. So, do you know what you want to eat?"
Oh, good, she hadn't commented on him being in rehab. He didn't know if that meant she had read his file or if she was just being polite, but he appreciated it regardless. "Yeah, I know," he replied, the hostess had given them both menus, but his had remained unopened for obvious reasons. It was embossed with an Asian-style design though, which one finger was tracing randomly. "What are you getting?"
"Won ton soup and sweet and sour pork." Jan had figured that the menu wasn't going to do him any good, but also figured he'd had Chinese food before and most places served the same variation of dishes. She hadn't even bothered to open her own menu, knowing what she was going to order before they stepped through the door. Was it even possible to walk into an American-Chinese restaurant and not find things like Kung Pao Chicken and Hunan Beef on the menu? "They've got the standard stuff here. You want me to check if they have something specific, or maybe tell you the Chef's Specials or something?" She was so going to mess up here at some point, wasn't she?
"Nah," Matt pushed his glasses up on his nose when they began to slip a little. He always wore cheap pieces of crap that were usually purchased either from a street vendor or a convenience store, so it was no big deal if they broke or got lost or whatever. This current pair was plastic because they hadn't wanted to give him something potentially sharp at the rehab place even though he had never been suicidal, "I always get won ton soup, egg rolls and mongolian beef. It's good." He tended to have something that he 'always ordered' wherever he went so he didn't have to fool with a menu. He had heard that some fancy places had braille menus, but...he'd never been to a place like that.
"We're good to go, then! I order other stuff sometimes, but today I felt like having pork." It was a relief to know that she hadn't been wrong, and she wasn't the sort to go messing around with places that had fancy-pants names for all of their sauces and food. Once in a while, sure, but she wasn't at all a bad cook and would just as soon try to make that sort of stuff herself. When Lorna was around Jan stayed out of the kitchen for the most part, but when she wasn't Jan was more than happy to make food for people. When the waitress came over to their table, Jan placed her order, adding in a cola to drink.
Ordering for himself, Matt stuck with water. He did drink soda from time to time, but the carbonation tended to bother his throat and coke was just nasty! If he got anything it was usually Dr. Pepper because the taste wasn't as harsh to him. "So...where are you from then?" he asked, "You don't talk like you're from the city," because as far as Matt was concerned, Westchester county was not 'the city.' That would be New York with its five boroughs and that was it.
"I was born in Cresskill, New Jersey," Jan replied. "My mom died when I was a kid, and not long after that my dad and I moved to Salem Center. I guess he wanted a change of scenery or something, and he had a good job offer. So we got a house, and I wound up with wings growing out of my back right before I started high school. I managed to make it through all four years OK, although I did go to Xavier's for a few weeks while I was stuck tiny. I did wonder if I might be like that forever, but it was also a lot of fun. I got to ride around on people's heads and hats and jump around on a keyboard and live in a dollhouse."
Okay, that started out normal and ended up really weird, "That sounds...really strange," he replied, trying to imagine being so tiny and all that. "Not the first part, but the living in a dollhouse bit," it never even occurred to him to offer sympathy to Jan for her mother, with his own mother unknown and his father dead, it was just something that he lived with and since he hated people offering him false platitudes, why would he offer them to others? "I guess that works though. Your dad is still in Salem?"
Jan shook her head. "Nope. I guess he put up with his only child being a mutant long enough and then sold the house and went off somewhere else without telling me that he was even leaving. I could probably find him if I really wanted to, but why bother? He can't accept me for me, fine, I don't need that sort of person in my life."
"That sucks," Matt commented. He couldn't imagine that. Well...he could, sort of, since his mother had disappeared when he was just a baby, but that hadn't been because he was a mutant or because he was blind or anything, it was just because she wasn't ready to be a mom. That's what his father had said anyways. He'd never had a mean word for his mother, even at his drunkest, which was pretty impressive to Matt. "I guess though, you don't miss him or anything since he's acted so badly."
Jan had to think about what to reply to that. "I guess I just try not to think about it," she admitted. "I think I do sort of miss him, or at least the him that was there for me for all those years. He didn't run off when the wings showed up or when I started zapping people or when I started being able to do a really great Tinkerbell impersonation. But I think maybe he wasn't OK with the fact that I wound up being OK with me being a mutant. He was never the world's biggest fan of mutants, but he didn't run off until I was an adult and in college, so I guess maybe that at least counts for something. Plus he left money for my tuition before he vanished."
"I guess that's pretty decent of him, in a way," Matt agreed. Not bailing on your kid when they're a minor and leaving them college money was definitely a decent thing, even if you ended up leaving later. "My dad never knew I was, but he was all upset, like everyone when New York was attacked a few years ago. Ended up being okay though since he got a lot of construction jobs from it so that was good, we were making bank for a little bit," he'd lost his sight earlier that year so he hadn't been paying all that much attention to the news or anything, but there was no way to miss a big part of New York being destroyed by mutants.
"Yeah, well, those of us at the mansion weren't exactly jumping up and down for joy when that happened, you know," Jan pointed out. She sure hadn't been too pleased getting bits of meatspores all over her nice new full-team uniform during the attack. "When mutants do things like that, it makes the rest of us look bad. A few rotten apples spoil the barrel, right? You get a few mutants pulling crazy stunts like that, and people act like all of us think that way or want to do stuff like that, and that sure as hell isn't true. Some of us actually want to help people, and we do."
"Hey, calm down!" Matt hissed, jeez! "I hadn't said anything about hating mutants or all of them being batshit or anything like that, okay! No one likes it when their city is partially destroyed, that's all, regardless of how it happens," and that was the truth. At the time, Matt had just stayed in the apartment with his father, the TV on for what news there was. Afterward, as bad as things had been, his dad had been able to get some extra work, which helped make it...not good or alright, but at least there had been something sort of positive. In a way. "Don't get so defensive!"
Jan had been wondering if Matt was sort of anti-mutant even though he was one. Some people just didn't like mutants, and what if you thought mutants were evil or something and then you discovered that you were one? Would that change your mind or not? And maybe the kid just needed time to come to terms with the fact that he, too, was a mutant, but at the moment he'd just referred to mutants as 'them' and not 'us'. Might not have meant anything, but Jan reminded herself to remember that while she'd had years to come to terms with the fact that she had mutant powers and because of that she belonged to a group some people were going to hate just because of that one simple fact, Matt was brand-new to all of it. He needed to feel welcomed, not attacked.
"I guess I did get carried away there, sorry," Jan said, and she was. "I'm just used to all sorts of reactions to mutants by now. I went to what was basically We-Hate-Mutants High. Not that everyone there was against mutants, but there were enough of them to make it obvious that it really wasn't the best idea to be a mutant there. Xavier's wound up with two students transferring from that place because of the way they were treated." That was putting it lightly, but Jan figured she didn't need to get into all of the alarming details unless Matt really wanted to know what had happened. "One was one of my exes, and one's Laurie Collins, she's still at the mansion. I never let anyone at that school know I was a mutant until after I graduated, not even my best friends. It was just too risky, and my dad forbid it, too. So, yeah, sorry. I hated my powers for a few years because of all of that, and it wasn't really comfortable or easy to hide the wings, but now I really like my powers and it's hard to imagine life without them."
Matt wasn't anti-mutant, but he wasn't pro-mutant either. Really, he had never much thought about it or cared really. He'd had too many other more important things to think about. Things that were much more immediate too. And anyways, while he might be one, it wasn't as if he felt some sort of kinship or connection to other mutants. He hadn't met anyone bad at Xavier's, but it wasn't as if he were jumping into bed with them either and declaring kumbayah. That was not how Matt worked. "I had other things to worry about at my high school," Matt replied, "Who was or wasn't a mutant wasn't really on my life of things I gave a damn about. Hell, I got more important things to worry about now, too. Ain't that I dislike mutants, I just don't much care at all. I ain't gonna be here all that long anyways."
"You're not?" Jan asked after taking a sip of soda, a bit confused. Wasn't Matt a freshman? Were things really so bad that he wanted to get away already? Was there some place else he'd rather be?
If rolling his eyes would matter, Matt would have. As it was, it his body language was something akin to that regardless, "I've never been at a placement for more than 6 months before fucking it up," he explained, "So it's only a matter of time before I fuck up here. Just a question of how I do it really. Ain't too many ways I haven't tried unless I sleep with a teacher or something. That'd be something new."
Jan just about snorted at that. "I don't think that would get you kicked out, I think it would get the teacher fired. Arrested, too, I'd guess. But I don't think you'd have much luck there, anyway. There aren't that many teachers at the school, half of them are taken, and just... no." That was all sorts of creepy and ew in Jan's book. Anybody under 18... bleh. "Probably better off trying something else if you really want to be asked to leave the school, but even then, you'd have to try really hard to come up with something amazingly awful, and would you really want to do that?"
"Probably for the best," Matt agreed, turning as he smelled their food. A moment later, the waitress was setting plates of food down with a bowl of white rice and asking if they needed chopsticks. Matt shook his head, he most definitely did not need chopsticks! "Dunno what else there is to do," Matt mused, half joking. As it was, he had already hit two pretty big ways. "I'll have to think on it. Most likely though, it'll happen on it's own. Always does. They'll send me back to juvie or whatever."
"I doubt that," Jan said with a laugh. Mmm, the food looked amazing! "Xavier's is, like, the place for second chances. And third chances, and fourth chances... People leave, and generally on their own because like I said, it is really hard to get yourself kicked out of there. You'd have to, I dunno, burn down the mansion on purpose or something, and I really don't think you'd want to do that. Yeah, you've gotten into trouble before, but you really do have the chance for a new start at the school. Sounds cliche, I know, but it's true. No one there is out to get you, no one wants to send you away, honest. And if for some reason that changes, if someone starts giving you crap for whatever reason, tell someone about it, OK? Me, an RA, the student counsellor, Professor Xavier, anyone you feel comfortable talking to. The school's your home now if you want it to be. You've got as much right to be there as anyone else."
Matt snorted, he was on chance number...what? Five? Ten? Something outrageous. "I've been kicked out of two placements already Jan," he pointed out with a forkful of beef on it, "I've been arrested twice. Done time in juvie. Even been to rehab. I'm 15. Seriously? Where else am I going to go? I'm telling you, it ain't gonna last. I'll get arrested again for something and that'll be it." because as much as Matt wanted more, wanted a future, he was also just as certain he was headed down the same path as his father. Even if he did finish high school and was smart like his dad wanted, then what? Nothing. Not a damn thing. "Jared can talk all he wants, that's all he is, is talk. I ain't worried about Jared. Anyways, I can defend myself just fine."
"So don't do anything that will get you arrested." Poor kid. He'd had a hard life, of that there was no question. But it wasn't going to do either of them any good to just sit around feeling sorry for him. It wasn't as though Matt was the first one to show up at he mansion under less than pleasant circumstances, and he probably wouldn't be the last. "If you get arrested and you didn't do anything wrong, we'll figure it out."
Oh yeah, like he'd been bored so he thought a trip to the precinct in metal bracelets would be an entertaining way to pass the afternoon! "Yeah, okay, good advice," Matt agreed, unable to quite keep the sarcasm out of his voice, but he didn't argue her point either. There was no need to when he knew that time would tell. Instead, he reached out carefully for the rice and spooned some more onto his plate to keep eating. Jan was definitely an interesting person. She was so damn...perky. Briefly, he wondered if she was on something, but decided to keep his suspicions to himself for now. Just in case.
"We're here!" Jan announced as she parked her car. She'd chosen a place in Westchester rather than opting for something in the city. It took just about forever to drive into the city and mess around with things like finding a place to park, and while the city was great, there were also places to eat not too far from the mansion and parking was a lot better around here.
Matt had assumed that they were staying closer to the mansion because while nothing beat Chinese food from China Town in New York City, they were no where near there and he wanted to eat now, not in a couple hours. Plus, learning the town was a good idea and the only way for him to do that was by walking around, not by driving from a car and having things pointed out to him. That meant nothing. "Awesome," Matt agreed, waiting for the tell-tale shift in the car that meant it was stopped and parked before he undid his seat belt and got out, unfolding his cane as he did so. It was automatic habit by now and something he consciously thought about. "Nice place."
"Just wait until you taste the food," Jan told him, coming around the car to the passenger side. She looked at the boy for a moment, trying to figure out what to say or do. She didn't want to just assume that the kid couldn't get into the building by himself; he had enhanced senses, maybe he could follow the sound of her voice? But maybe that was stupid, and she certainly didn't want to wander off and leave him standing there alone. There wasn't exactly a handbook for this sort of thing, and she didn't want Matt to think she was a jerk. "You need any help getting into the restaurant?"
"I'll follow you," Matt suggested, "Lemme take your shoulder," he reached out for her, one hand brushing against her wings and he paused, hand in mid-air. "Jan..." he began, unsure what he had just touched. It had definitely not been clothing though. Or shoulder. That was more than a little weird.
"Yeah? Oh, that's a wing. I have those, remember? I used to always hide them by making sure I wore something that would cover them, but now I don't. Here." Jan moved a bit so that one shoulder brushed his hand. "That's a shoulder. Try again now?"
The good news what that he hadn't touched somewhere inappropriately. The bad news was that he hadn't touched somewhere inappropriately. He'd pulled the 'blind guy accidentally touching boobs' a couple times. He had never gotten too far with it, but he had at least touched boob briefly. Wing though was different. "Oh yeah, I forgot," he replied, a little weirded out by wings, but she had said that the other day. He'd just hadn't thought much about it. Gripping her shoulder firmly, but not painfully, Matt nodded, "Okay. Lead on MacDuff," he quoted from Shakespeare. "Just walk normally and tell me if there's a step or something, but I'll probably find it with my cane."
"We'll get to a step in a minute," Jan told him. "I'll bet you've never touched a giant insect wing before, have you? Luckily, they're pretty strong, and it doesn't hurt when they're touched." It wasn't the most comfortable feeling in the world, but it didn't involve actual pain. " Megan, another one of the students, has wings similar to mine. And we've had people with bird wings living at the mansion. There are all sorts of wings mutants can have."
"Uh, well...no," Matt had to admit. It wasn't like he made a habit of touching insects at all. Or their wings. "I'm glad though. 'Cause I'd be really sorry and embarrassed otherwise," it wasn't like he had meant to! "That is...really bizarre. Like...first, because you talk about it like it's no big deal and secondly because that's just creepy. I can't even imagine it I don't think," his cane found the step leading inside and he negotiated it without pause. Even when following someone like this he tended to use his cane to help guide himself so that he would better know the layout again.
"No need to be sorry or embarrassed, that's why I wanted to let you know it was OK. Opening the door, in we go." Once inside, Jan requested a table for two. "Having wings used to be a big deal me, but yeah, you're right, now it isn't. I mean, I've had the wings for years now. They're a part of me, and I so don't think of myself as bizarre or creepy. Some mutants have pink skin, some have purple hair, some have wings, some have tails... it's not like we got to choose any of that, you know?"
"True," but still! It was weird. Matt couldn't even imagine looking like that, but then, he could be green and wouldn't know it. He doubted it though, someone would have figured out that he was a mutant well before now if that was the case. "Still not what more people consider normal. 'Course, neither is being blind, too," he added, taking the back of the seat and sitting down, folding his cane up and securing it with the band once he was seated.
Not that Matt could see it, but Jan shrugged. It was an automatic gesture, really. "I kind of got over other people's versions of 'normal' a while ago. OK, so most people don't have wings, they're always the same height, and they can't zap people with their hands. Most people aren't mutants, and yeah, most people aren't blind. But there's nothing wrong with us. I mean, you know, not in the sense that we're bad or have done something wrong or deserve to be treated like crap. Are we different from most people? Sure we are. But there's nothing wrong with being a mutant, even if a lot of people think there is. And then you've got being blind tacked onto that. So some people are going to be idiots. They see my wings, they figure out you're blind, and they have issues." She shrugged again. "I say it's their problem and they should just got over themselves already and let people live their lives."
"Yeah, but no one can look at me and tell I'm a mutant. I've had migraines and issues with hypersensitivity since I was 12 and it took an intern fresh out of college at the rehab place I was in before anyone thought outside the box to think that maybe there was something else going on," he'd had several diagnosis's over the years which included a traumatic brain injury, neurological imbalance caused by chemicals, all sorts of things, up to and including that he was making it all up and was just wanting the drugs. What it had amounted to was that no one had known and no one had thought it was a genetic mutation. It was actually sort of nice to have a definitive answer after all this time. "Anyways...yes. People are idiots. And it's their issues, not mine. So they can go deal with themselves without bothering us."
"Yep. The wings growing out of my back sort of gave it away for me," Jan commented. "I got that part first, and there wasn't any way to mistake what that meant. Sorry it took so long for people to figure out what was going on with you; that had to have sucked. But now you know what's going on, and you're living in the right place for it. A lot of people at the mansion have had hardships in life one way or the other, so usually the people there won't be jerks about stuff whether it's related to mutations or something else. I was Can't-Touch-Anyone Girl for a few years until I came to the school and learned how to control my zaps. So, do you know what you want to eat?"
Oh, good, she hadn't commented on him being in rehab. He didn't know if that meant she had read his file or if she was just being polite, but he appreciated it regardless. "Yeah, I know," he replied, the hostess had given them both menus, but his had remained unopened for obvious reasons. It was embossed with an Asian-style design though, which one finger was tracing randomly. "What are you getting?"
"Won ton soup and sweet and sour pork." Jan had figured that the menu wasn't going to do him any good, but also figured he'd had Chinese food before and most places served the same variation of dishes. She hadn't even bothered to open her own menu, knowing what she was going to order before they stepped through the door. Was it even possible to walk into an American-Chinese restaurant and not find things like Kung Pao Chicken and Hunan Beef on the menu? "They've got the standard stuff here. You want me to check if they have something specific, or maybe tell you the Chef's Specials or something?" She was so going to mess up here at some point, wasn't she?
"Nah," Matt pushed his glasses up on his nose when they began to slip a little. He always wore cheap pieces of crap that were usually purchased either from a street vendor or a convenience store, so it was no big deal if they broke or got lost or whatever. This current pair was plastic because they hadn't wanted to give him something potentially sharp at the rehab place even though he had never been suicidal, "I always get won ton soup, egg rolls and mongolian beef. It's good." He tended to have something that he 'always ordered' wherever he went so he didn't have to fool with a menu. He had heard that some fancy places had braille menus, but...he'd never been to a place like that.
"We're good to go, then! I order other stuff sometimes, but today I felt like having pork." It was a relief to know that she hadn't been wrong, and she wasn't the sort to go messing around with places that had fancy-pants names for all of their sauces and food. Once in a while, sure, but she wasn't at all a bad cook and would just as soon try to make that sort of stuff herself. When Lorna was around Jan stayed out of the kitchen for the most part, but when she wasn't Jan was more than happy to make food for people. When the waitress came over to their table, Jan placed her order, adding in a cola to drink.
Ordering for himself, Matt stuck with water. He did drink soda from time to time, but the carbonation tended to bother his throat and coke was just nasty! If he got anything it was usually Dr. Pepper because the taste wasn't as harsh to him. "So...where are you from then?" he asked, "You don't talk like you're from the city," because as far as Matt was concerned, Westchester county was not 'the city.' That would be New York with its five boroughs and that was it.
"I was born in Cresskill, New Jersey," Jan replied. "My mom died when I was a kid, and not long after that my dad and I moved to Salem Center. I guess he wanted a change of scenery or something, and he had a good job offer. So we got a house, and I wound up with wings growing out of my back right before I started high school. I managed to make it through all four years OK, although I did go to Xavier's for a few weeks while I was stuck tiny. I did wonder if I might be like that forever, but it was also a lot of fun. I got to ride around on people's heads and hats and jump around on a keyboard and live in a dollhouse."
Okay, that started out normal and ended up really weird, "That sounds...really strange," he replied, trying to imagine being so tiny and all that. "Not the first part, but the living in a dollhouse bit," it never even occurred to him to offer sympathy to Jan for her mother, with his own mother unknown and his father dead, it was just something that he lived with and since he hated people offering him false platitudes, why would he offer them to others? "I guess that works though. Your dad is still in Salem?"
Jan shook her head. "Nope. I guess he put up with his only child being a mutant long enough and then sold the house and went off somewhere else without telling me that he was even leaving. I could probably find him if I really wanted to, but why bother? He can't accept me for me, fine, I don't need that sort of person in my life."
"That sucks," Matt commented. He couldn't imagine that. Well...he could, sort of, since his mother had disappeared when he was just a baby, but that hadn't been because he was a mutant or because he was blind or anything, it was just because she wasn't ready to be a mom. That's what his father had said anyways. He'd never had a mean word for his mother, even at his drunkest, which was pretty impressive to Matt. "I guess though, you don't miss him or anything since he's acted so badly."
Jan had to think about what to reply to that. "I guess I just try not to think about it," she admitted. "I think I do sort of miss him, or at least the him that was there for me for all those years. He didn't run off when the wings showed up or when I started zapping people or when I started being able to do a really great Tinkerbell impersonation. But I think maybe he wasn't OK with the fact that I wound up being OK with me being a mutant. He was never the world's biggest fan of mutants, but he didn't run off until I was an adult and in college, so I guess maybe that at least counts for something. Plus he left money for my tuition before he vanished."
"I guess that's pretty decent of him, in a way," Matt agreed. Not bailing on your kid when they're a minor and leaving them college money was definitely a decent thing, even if you ended up leaving later. "My dad never knew I was, but he was all upset, like everyone when New York was attacked a few years ago. Ended up being okay though since he got a lot of construction jobs from it so that was good, we were making bank for a little bit," he'd lost his sight earlier that year so he hadn't been paying all that much attention to the news or anything, but there was no way to miss a big part of New York being destroyed by mutants.
"Yeah, well, those of us at the mansion weren't exactly jumping up and down for joy when that happened, you know," Jan pointed out. She sure hadn't been too pleased getting bits of meatspores all over her nice new full-team uniform during the attack. "When mutants do things like that, it makes the rest of us look bad. A few rotten apples spoil the barrel, right? You get a few mutants pulling crazy stunts like that, and people act like all of us think that way or want to do stuff like that, and that sure as hell isn't true. Some of us actually want to help people, and we do."
"Hey, calm down!" Matt hissed, jeez! "I hadn't said anything about hating mutants or all of them being batshit or anything like that, okay! No one likes it when their city is partially destroyed, that's all, regardless of how it happens," and that was the truth. At the time, Matt had just stayed in the apartment with his father, the TV on for what news there was. Afterward, as bad as things had been, his dad had been able to get some extra work, which helped make it...not good or alright, but at least there had been something sort of positive. In a way. "Don't get so defensive!"
Jan had been wondering if Matt was sort of anti-mutant even though he was one. Some people just didn't like mutants, and what if you thought mutants were evil or something and then you discovered that you were one? Would that change your mind or not? And maybe the kid just needed time to come to terms with the fact that he, too, was a mutant, but at the moment he'd just referred to mutants as 'them' and not 'us'. Might not have meant anything, but Jan reminded herself to remember that while she'd had years to come to terms with the fact that she had mutant powers and because of that she belonged to a group some people were going to hate just because of that one simple fact, Matt was brand-new to all of it. He needed to feel welcomed, not attacked.
"I guess I did get carried away there, sorry," Jan said, and she was. "I'm just used to all sorts of reactions to mutants by now. I went to what was basically We-Hate-Mutants High. Not that everyone there was against mutants, but there were enough of them to make it obvious that it really wasn't the best idea to be a mutant there. Xavier's wound up with two students transferring from that place because of the way they were treated." That was putting it lightly, but Jan figured she didn't need to get into all of the alarming details unless Matt really wanted to know what had happened. "One was one of my exes, and one's Laurie Collins, she's still at the mansion. I never let anyone at that school know I was a mutant until after I graduated, not even my best friends. It was just too risky, and my dad forbid it, too. So, yeah, sorry. I hated my powers for a few years because of all of that, and it wasn't really comfortable or easy to hide the wings, but now I really like my powers and it's hard to imagine life without them."
Matt wasn't anti-mutant, but he wasn't pro-mutant either. Really, he had never much thought about it or cared really. He'd had too many other more important things to think about. Things that were much more immediate too. And anyways, while he might be one, it wasn't as if he felt some sort of kinship or connection to other mutants. He hadn't met anyone bad at Xavier's, but it wasn't as if he were jumping into bed with them either and declaring kumbayah. That was not how Matt worked. "I had other things to worry about at my high school," Matt replied, "Who was or wasn't a mutant wasn't really on my life of things I gave a damn about. Hell, I got more important things to worry about now, too. Ain't that I dislike mutants, I just don't much care at all. I ain't gonna be here all that long anyways."
"You're not?" Jan asked after taking a sip of soda, a bit confused. Wasn't Matt a freshman? Were things really so bad that he wanted to get away already? Was there some place else he'd rather be?
If rolling his eyes would matter, Matt would have. As it was, it his body language was something akin to that regardless, "I've never been at a placement for more than 6 months before fucking it up," he explained, "So it's only a matter of time before I fuck up here. Just a question of how I do it really. Ain't too many ways I haven't tried unless I sleep with a teacher or something. That'd be something new."
Jan just about snorted at that. "I don't think that would get you kicked out, I think it would get the teacher fired. Arrested, too, I'd guess. But I don't think you'd have much luck there, anyway. There aren't that many teachers at the school, half of them are taken, and just... no." That was all sorts of creepy and ew in Jan's book. Anybody under 18... bleh. "Probably better off trying something else if you really want to be asked to leave the school, but even then, you'd have to try really hard to come up with something amazingly awful, and would you really want to do that?"
"Probably for the best," Matt agreed, turning as he smelled their food. A moment later, the waitress was setting plates of food down with a bowl of white rice and asking if they needed chopsticks. Matt shook his head, he most definitely did not need chopsticks! "Dunno what else there is to do," Matt mused, half joking. As it was, he had already hit two pretty big ways. "I'll have to think on it. Most likely though, it'll happen on it's own. Always does. They'll send me back to juvie or whatever."
"I doubt that," Jan said with a laugh. Mmm, the food looked amazing! "Xavier's is, like, the place for second chances. And third chances, and fourth chances... People leave, and generally on their own because like I said, it is really hard to get yourself kicked out of there. You'd have to, I dunno, burn down the mansion on purpose or something, and I really don't think you'd want to do that. Yeah, you've gotten into trouble before, but you really do have the chance for a new start at the school. Sounds cliche, I know, but it's true. No one there is out to get you, no one wants to send you away, honest. And if for some reason that changes, if someone starts giving you crap for whatever reason, tell someone about it, OK? Me, an RA, the student counsellor, Professor Xavier, anyone you feel comfortable talking to. The school's your home now if you want it to be. You've got as much right to be there as anyone else."
Matt snorted, he was on chance number...what? Five? Ten? Something outrageous. "I've been kicked out of two placements already Jan," he pointed out with a forkful of beef on it, "I've been arrested twice. Done time in juvie. Even been to rehab. I'm 15. Seriously? Where else am I going to go? I'm telling you, it ain't gonna last. I'll get arrested again for something and that'll be it." because as much as Matt wanted more, wanted a future, he was also just as certain he was headed down the same path as his father. Even if he did finish high school and was smart like his dad wanted, then what? Nothing. Not a damn thing. "Jared can talk all he wants, that's all he is, is talk. I ain't worried about Jared. Anyways, I can defend myself just fine."
"So don't do anything that will get you arrested." Poor kid. He'd had a hard life, of that there was no question. But it wasn't going to do either of them any good to just sit around feeling sorry for him. It wasn't as though Matt was the first one to show up at he mansion under less than pleasant circumstances, and he probably wouldn't be the last. "If you get arrested and you didn't do anything wrong, we'll figure it out."
Oh yeah, like he'd been bored so he thought a trip to the precinct in metal bracelets would be an entertaining way to pass the afternoon! "Yeah, okay, good advice," Matt agreed, unable to quite keep the sarcasm out of his voice, but he didn't argue her point either. There was no need to when he knew that time would tell. Instead, he reached out carefully for the rice and spooned some more onto his plate to keep eating. Jan was definitely an interesting person. She was so damn...perky. Briefly, he wondered if she was on something, but decided to keep his suspicions to himself for now. Just in case.
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