Vanessa & Wade | Saturday Afternoon

[x-deadpool.livejournal.com]

Vanessa stops by to make sure Wade's not dead and to feed him. They talk.


In an attempt to put her general weirdness over Wade possibly-but-probably-not dying and her quandry over how to actually be his friend in a strictly friend kind of way aside, Vanessa decided she should try to check in on him again. She’d been out wandering District X so she’d gone to one of her favorite hole in the wall diners and had ordered an array of food, mostly on the insistence of the old waitress. It meant the food would be cold by time she drove over to Salem but they had microwaves for a reason, right?

When she got up to Wade’s suite she again knocked lightly before trying the handle. It was unlocked so she peered inside and spotted a familiar head of short, brown hair on the couch. “Hey, love, you alive today?”

Wade was feeling mostly human. It was Saturday, which he guessed meant the immunotherapy was wearing off or something, since he didn’t feel like attempting to disgorge his stomach every time he turned over. Tipping his head back so he could see Vanessa in her pretty little alt, Wade tugged the blanket covering his legs up a little higher. “Alive’s a relative term, right?”

Smiling softly, Vanessa slipped through the door, the plastic handles of the bag straining in her hands to keep the paper bag inside it from falling to the floor. Aoife was short enough that the bottom of the bag didn’t have very much clearance from the floor. “I brought you food. Suppose it means you feel better if you’re out here with the light, aye?”

“If that’s what you say, I’ll go with it,” Wade said, grinning. “Mostly, I just got kinda tired of my bed. And the blinds are only half drawn back.” But that was because he’d been watching ridiculous movies on Netflix, not because the light was bothering him as much as it’d been when he’d last seen Vanessa. Reaching over the back of the couch with both arms, though, he made grabby hands at the food. He’d been eating when he wasn’t horribly nauseated, which was more in the last few days than Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday, but that looked like a massive amount of food.

The bag was hefted up and deposited in his insistent hands as Vanessa laughed quietly. “None of it’s warm anymore, I brought it from the city.” She knew there was chicken soup, eggs of some sort along with hashbrowns, bacon and sausage. Vanessa was also pretty sure there was chicken, steak and a bunch of veggies in there. After all, she was feeding someone who was sick and had a healing factor with that stupid metabolism to go along with them. “But you can prioritize and I can reheat in order for you.” Vanessa leaned down, laying her arms across the top of the couch and perching her chin atop them while she watched Wade dig through the bag.

Wade opened one of the containers and found some sausage links - he didn’t even bother handing those off to Vanessa, just picked one up and ate it whole. “Mm... good.” Another sausage link followed the first a moment later and then he closed the container so he could root through. “Soup!” Soup was delicious. “Want some?” He rooted around through the bag until he found some vegetables. “Look, healthy stuff. For you.” Holding the vegetables out to Vanessa like an offering, Wade gave her a slightly pitiful look.

An arm unfolded and a delicate finger poked him right in the ribs. “You need to eat healthy stuff. It’s a terrible side effect of sickness. You need the nutrients. I will feed them to you if I have to.” Vanessa took the vegetables, but she had every intent of heating them up and making him eat them with her most severe school marm charm. Aoife likely didn’t pull of anything even remotely severe looking in terms of expression, but Vanessa would at least try.

“But, but,” Wade said, having found the bacon now. It was cold, like the sausage, but it was bacon and bacon was amazing no matter how you cooked it. Unless it was soggy in quiche. Quiche sort of ruined bacon, which should have been a crime with severe consequences. Only he was too busy eating the bacon to think of any at the moment. “Mm... okay. Wait. If you’re feeding me the vegetables, I might be able to handle eating some healthy stuff. As long as it’s not carrots. I kind of don’t like carrots when they’re cooked. They’re all... mushy. And kind of gross. Unless they’re in chicken soup. For some reason, chicken soup makes everything taste better.”

“I will eat the carrots if you eat everything else.” She was pretty sure she’d spotted corn and broccoli in there, but she wasn’t sure what else. Since Wade seemed intent on eating every bit of meat he found cold she snagged the container of soup along with the carton of veggies and padded off to the kitchen to reheat them both. At least he’d been excited about the soup.

There were eggs in there, too, and some hashbrowns. They were never as good reheated, so Wade didn’t bother harassing Vanessa about that, he just ate them cold, too. He was about halfway finished with them when she came back with the vegetables and the soup. Holding up one hand, his fingers greasy, he said, “I do solemnly swear I will eat the healthy stuff, except for the cooked carrots. Promise. Cross my heart and stuff.”

She slapped a papertowel into his greasy paw. “And should you break your solemn vow I will forcibly feed you the carrots,” she threatened in Aoife’s demure Irish accent. She had ditched her shoes in the kitchen so she could fold her feet under her when she sat down in the corner of the couch. The long skirt she wore hid her legs and feet entirely.

Balancing the container of vegetables on her lap, Vanessa handed Wade a spoon handle first. She also plucked the bag from him before handing over the container with the soup in it. “Eat, you can sort through the rest after.”

His lower lip pouting out as she stole the bag of food from him, Wade looked down at the soup, then up at her again and said, “But you’re pocket sized. How can you be pocket sized and mean at the same time? Taking away the sausage and making me eat carrots...” He actually let his lower lip tremble a bit, though it was more like a shake and less than a wibble, since he wasn’t anywhere near actually being upset.

Vanessa went fishing through the bag until she got the Styrofoam box of sausage out. She dumped the rest of the bacon into it and set it on the couch next to him. She slid the carton of half-eaten eggs into his lap. “Better? But you should eat the soup before it gets cold. And I’m not being mean. It’s for your own good. You’d live off grease and more grease and it’s no bloody surprise your healing factor’s gimpy if that’s all you feed yourself.” She did a remarkable impersonation of a scolding mother.

Wade considered that, then picked up the soup and drank most of the broth in one go. He grinned as he started picking out the pieces of chicken and the noodles to eat. “It’s not the only thing I eat. I mean. I put salad on my burgers.” He made good progress through the rest of the soup, then finished off the eggs, sausage, and bacon.

Sitting all the containers aside, the mercenary considered Vanessa and how she was sitting at the other end of the couch in all her pocket sized glory, then leaned forward, picked her up, and deposited her in his lap. “And now, for the vegetables.”

Aoife’s nose wrinkled up and a small, high-pitched meep sounded when she was plucked from her spot. She didn’t put up much of a fight, though, or really any fight at all. Once he deposited her in his lap she slid her feet out from under her so they braced against the edge of one thigh as her knees drew up to her chest. She set the box of veggies on her knees and stabbed a bit of broccoli with a fork to hold up for Wade to eat. “Lettuce and tomato doesn’t constitute ‘salad,’ Mister Wilson,” she told him very reasonably. “Those are both mostly water anyhow. You use more calories digesting them than anything. Lettuce is useless. Tomato may have some sort of vitamins, though. You need leafy stuff and stuff with fiber and the like. Broccoli and asparagus and spinach and red peppers and the lot.”

“Lettuce is leafy,” Wade said just before taking the broccoli off the tines of the fork. After chewing, he waggled his eyebrows a bit. “Is it Mister Wilson now? I’d say that was kinky, but the way you say it, it kinda makes me feel like I should be wearing a sweater vest or something...”

A corner of Aoife’s mouth turned upward into a smirk. She carefully held up a forkful of corn kernels. “I don’t suspect you’re the sweater vest sort.” Vanessa lowered her voice and purred, “Mm...Mister Wilson, the only reason for you to be wearing such a thing is to have it removed for you.” His name sounded nothing like he was a seventy year old man this time. Or a fifty year old one, for that matter.

Eating the corn, Wade shook his head. “None of that.” Then he shook a finger at her almost in admonishment. “If you keep on purring like that, I’m gonna have to pet you.”

She frowned at the shaking finger, but a moment later Aoife’s face was nuzzling into the side of Wade’s neck playfully. The vibration from her purring could be felt against his skin. Her face lifted, the tip of Aoife’s nose running up his neck until she was purring against his ear. Even as she did that she held up the fork with another piece of broccoli on it.’

Wade snagged the piece of broccoli even as one hand slid up Vanessa’s back and teased at the nape of her neck before he began carding his fingers through her hair. It was long and very pretty, he had to admit. And he was pretty sure this was one of those things they weren’t supposed to be doing, what with it being suspiciously similar to an increment, but he was sick, so he figured he could have a free pass.

Vanessa had full intentions toward straightening when the purr faded out but then his fingers were on her neck and her head simply fell forward as the shiver ran down her spine from that. She wound up laying her head on his shoulder while his fingers ran through her hair. Aoife’s hair was almost the color Vanessa’s had been before she’d manifested. Once she saw him swallow she skewered an asparagus spear. “I hope you’ve been keeping your sheep company,” she murmured, Aoife’s voice dropping down so quietly most people would have put it at a loud whisper. “Rhiamon crocheted one of those specific for me for you. Da said if you didn’t appreciate it he’d need to be having a talkin’ to with you.” While he couldn’t see the smile on her face from the memory of Thom quite seriously stating that, Wade could certainly hear it in her voice.

“Your Da lives in Wales? How come?” Wade ate the asparagus even though he knew it’d make his pee smell weird for a couple days because it was tasty and she was talking, which he’d like to keep her doing.

“Aye. That’s where his lady is. He didn’t have much of anyone worth going back to Ireland for when he retired so he went to Wales. He’s got some nieces and nephews but none of them really know him anyway. He worked too much for them to know him.” She offered up another piece of asparagus. “So, the only person worth going back to was Rhiamon.”

“So... he what? Moved to the States with your mom and then... moved to Wales to... be with a lady named Rhiamon?” Wade was a little confused.

“Huh?” Vanessa sat up straight, gave him a confused look and then realized what was going on. She set her head back on his shoulder before explaining. “No. Da, he’s not my father. He’s the closest thing I’ve had to one for the last half of my life, though. Da, he’s that bloke Thom that Fitzpatrick knew from my mercenary crew. My dad...” she went quiet and set the fork down in the carton of vegetables. It remained carefully balanced on her knees but her arms wrapped around her legs. “He died. I was fourteen. He was shot accidentally, stray bullet from a gang thing. That’s why I manifested, you know. The stress, I guess, from him dying. I really was a daddy’s girl as a kid. I wanted to grow up and be a butcher like him and everything.”

Pointing out that becoming a mercenary had, in a way, fulfilled her childhood wish to be a butcher like her dad... wasn’t tactful. And Wade, despite appearances to the contrary sometimes, could actually be tactful. So he just kept sifting his fingers through Vanessa’s hair and nodded his cheek against the top of her head. “Gotcha. So Da’s the merc Crazy Frank respects. Which means I’d probably like to avoid having to have talkin’ tos from him. Which means I really, really like that sheep Rhiamon made for me.”

Laughing a bit, Vanessa nodded. “Yes, you really do. Everyone’s managed to avoid meeting Da thus far aside from Laurie. He criticized her corned beef and cabbage. He’s got cute nicknames for my exes, though. One is The Pansy and the other is The Hillbilly. I’ve tried to dissuade him from the names but he won’t be deterred. But dealing with him is no doubt leagues better than ever meeting my mother.”

“Duly noted,” Wade said, nodding. Then he considered what he knew of her and what he didn’t. “So... how’d you go from manifesting after your dad passed to having a merc Da and being a merc yourself?”

“Ah, so you want the happy part of the story.” The word happy was said so dryly the irony was unmistakable. “I manifested the first time during the reception after my dad’s funeral. It was just the physical part of my mutation first. Mom saw me and like any other god-fearing Irish American bigot declared me a demon. I’ve always assumed it was the eyes. She claimed I’d taken her daughter, replaced her and I wasn’t welcome. I was fourteen, I wasn’t very good at trying to talk reason to her. I got kicked out. I wound up on the streets. I manifested the shapeshifting while I was with my first john, which was less traumatic than the part of the situation that involved the john. I worked the streets for a while before Madame found me. You can guess her profession.

“I was seventeen when Aleister found me. I was Madame’s prized position, the girl who could be anyone you wanted me to be if I could get close enough to touch them. I think people told themselves I wasn’t a kid because I didn’t usually look like one when they fucked me. If you can think of it I probably did it with clients. Every kinky, sick and depraved thing you can think of. Aleister bought me from Madame, literally. I never found out how much he paid and Thom doesn’t know either, but he assumed it was considerable.

“Aleister saved my life. He and the guys trained me and I became a mercenary. I was never in the field in my own body because I was young and slender and too much of a target. So I’d take mimics on and wear them for weeks or months at a time. Aleister had a healing factor so if I got badly injured I’d copy him and heal. Until he died on a job. He knew a shapeshifter could be useful on jobs where they needed information that was too risky to go in for, information only the real person could get. That’s why he’d bought me, or that’s what he says. Da says he saw potential in me and buying me was better than burning down the brothel with Madame locked in it. She’s still in Boston for all I know.” Her voice had remained even as she spoke, something Vanessa gave herself a great deal of credit for. She didn’t detail the traumatic parts for him, but she was sure Wade was already filling them in himself. “I guess you’ve got the summary version of my life now.”

“Guess so,” Wade said, his hand leaving Vanessa’s hair so he could smooth his palm down her spine. He was very calmly considering the fact that it was so, so lucky for that Madame in Boston that he refused to hurt women. The coldly logical, entirely detached part of his mind had woken up and started calculating, ticking off points at him about how he couldn’t do anything about her mother or the Madame... and it seemed like the guys in her life were alright, generally.

Still, that didn’t change the fact that he wanted nothing more than to go kill somebody for her because that was how he fixed things. He wasn’t good with words when it came to emotions - hell, he didn’t even really acknowledge that he had emotions. So he wanted to do the one thing for her that he was pretty sure he could do well. Only there was nobody for him to kill. At least, nobody that his teeny, tiny, itty, bitty conscience would let him kill, anyway.

Picking up the fork, he speared a carrot and offered it to Vanessa.

Wade was so quiet that if it weren’t for the fact that the tension in his body was still there she would have suspected a sudden, narcoleptic fit. When the carrot was offered to her Aoife’s eyes flicked up to look at Wade. His expression was largely unreadable. There was a tension to his jaw and around his eyes, though, that suggested he wasn’t exactly blank. If she had to guess, Vanessa would say Wade had that sort of righteous anger going on right now that most people got when they heard about stuff like that.

She leaned in to pull the carrot off the fork, watching the muscles in his arm as she did. Vanessa was suddenly acutely aware of the way the muscles of Wade’s neck had tensed. As she chewed her fingertips trailed along his jaw, her silent way of drawing attention to the tension without having to bring it up more obviously.

Forcing the slight tells out of his jaw, his neck, his muscles in general, Wade offered Vanessa a tired sort of smile. There was nothing he could do for her so far as her past was concerned, but she’d shared it with him and damn, but it made her make a hell of a lot more sense than she had before. Straight into merc work after three years of basically forced prostitution and being rejected by your mother? After losing your father?

It explained a lot.

What’d he have to offer her, then, except for maybe the truth? Or some of it, at least. “I wasn’t honorably discharged from the military.”

Brow furrowing, Vanessa’s head tilted a bit so she could look at him better from her place on his shoulder. Wade had never told her that he had been honorably discharged, but it had been her assumption. It would have been anyone’s assumption if someone said they’d served. “Why not?”

“There was a diplomat,” Wade said, keeping his voice level, his body relaxed even as he got another carrot on the fork for Vanessa. “Shady bastard. I was meant to be protecting him. Black ops were all well and good, but they said they wanted the best on his protection detail while he was in the country. Only then... then I found some tapes. Didn’t really think much of it - not my place to snoop around. I was just following orders. But one of the other guys, he stuck a tape in the player and bam - there it was. Some girl. Couldn’t have been more than fifteen. Shackled up in a basement somewhere. The things the guy did to her - all on video. Proof, right there. But he was a diplomat. Untouchable. Fucking diplomatic immunity. He’d’ve got off scott free.”

Shrugging, Wade speared himself a piece of broccoli. “So. I killed him. They took me in. I got free while they were transporting me.”

Teenage girls shackled and abused in a basement? That was disgusting. Given her own memories that had come floating up to the surface from her overview of her history Vanessa’s reaction to that image was more severe than it normally would have been. Without thinking about it she found herself leaning in closer to Wade as she curled more tightly in on herself. She’d never figure out what it was that made men want to hurt girls. She’d never figure out what made them look at underage girls and immediately want to fuck them. “Men are fucking disgusting,” she whispered, not realizing she’d said it aloud.

At Aoife’s usual volume Vanessa said, “So you weren’t dishonorably discharged either? You weren’t discharged at all. Technically you’re AWOL. What would ever happen if the military found you?”

“Question now would end up being how long it’d take for them to figure out who I was,” Wade said. “If they remembered me, if they could figure out why I didn’t look much older than I did when I left...” He shrugged. “Court marshal, at the least. Likely they’d hand me over to a non military body for processing. I did kill a diplomat. I’d done shadier things, all government sanctioned. Might be able to bargain with that. Chances are, though, they’d try and stick me somewhere, a hole in the ground, for the rest of my life. Bury me literally and figuratively.”

“Shouldn’t you not be hanging out somewhere that the military could find you then? Like in a different country? Someone here was remanded into Xavier’s custody by the military, actually. I assume they check up every once in a while. If they found you here, figured it out somehow...” she frowned. “I really like you not being buried in a hole, in case you were fuzzy on that at all.”

“Different military,” Wade said, quirking a smile. “And anyway, different name. The guy who killed the diplomat? He’s turning fifty-one this year. Me? I’m thirty-two. But I really appreciate the fact that you don’t want me buried in a hole.”

“You’re only thirty-two on the outside,” Vanessa argued and poked him in the nose lightly. “So did you sign up for military service illegally or has my assumption that you’re American just been misplaced this whole time?” She manged to say it as if it had been a terribly long time. Yeah, those whole two months she had known Wade for thus far.

“Your assumption that I’m American is incorrect, but I’d really like that to not be public knowledge,” Wade said, grinning a little. “And now you’re gonna have to figure out which accent I’m covering up with my really awesome fake American one.”

“I’ve got no plans to tell anyone just like I haven’t told anyone how old you are.” Vanessa understood keeping certain parts of yourself private. She didn’t need to know why he didn’t want people to know he wasn’t American or why he wanted people to believe he was as young as he looked. She was interested, of course, but she could accept that he had reasons and leave it at that as well. “Have I got a time limit on figuring out what accent you’re covering up?”

“Nah,” Wade said, shaking his head. “It took me twenty years to get rid of it.” He grinned. “I figure you can have that long to try and figure out which one it is.”

Vanessa grinned. “Planning to keep me around for the next twenty years, then?”

“Yeah, I figure you can feed me vegetables I wouldn’t eat otherwise and I can appease your Da and, y’know. It’ll work out.”

His mention of vegetables had her taking back the fork and stabbing another piece of broccoli and holding it up to him just to be annoying. She’d actually gotten him to eat most of the vegetables already. “I think appeasing Da involves someone making an honest woman out of me and keeping me blissfully happy. Maybe you should aim more for keeping him happy enough to not try to kill you.”

“Right,” Wade said. “That. I can hopefully do that. Cause I like not being dead. Being dead? It’s kind of worse than being stuck in a hole.”

“At least if you’re dead you wouldn’t be sitting about miserable and suffering. Technically that’s loads better than being stuck in a hole. Da would at least kill you quickly. Large caliber to the head, probably. It’s practically merciful, really.” Vanessa pressed a kiss to the tip of Wade’s nose.

Wade wasn’t entirely sure that’d kill him, necessarily. But he wasn’t entirely sure it wouldn’t, either. He’d never been shot in the head before. He kinda wanted to keep it that way. Of course, his healing factor wasn’t normal, so maybe a large caliber bullet to the brain would off him just as easy as the next person. He’d never really thought about it. “Well, thanks to your Da for that, at least?” He ate another few bites of vegetables, mostly corn from the very bottom of the container, and then let himself rest back against the cushions.

She shrugged a shoulder and snagged the last carrot from the box. “He worked with a bloke with a very powerful healing factor for a long time. He probably has more ideas on how to kill someone like that than the average person.” Though he probably had more ideas about how to kill someone with a healing factor slowly. Information gathering could be so messy.

Peering into the carton, it was basically empty. Vanessa set it on the table, having to strain to reach far enough without moving from her spot. Those damn short arms were so inconvenient. She nearly toppled off Wade’s lap in the process but a hand grabbing the back of the couch saved her. Re-settling in his lap with her head on his shoulder, her eyes glanced over to the TV for the first time. There were old ladies bantering on the screen. “Still hungry?”

“Mm... no, not really. Thanks for all the food. It was great.” Wade settled his limbs comfortably, legs extended and under the blanket, arms mostly wrapped around his pocket-sized Vanessa, and then tipped his head to the side so he could watch the Golden Girls a little. “You gonna stick around for a bit?”

“There’s more for later. Loads of protein.” She looked up at him. He looked far better than he had earlier in the week. Maybe he really wouldn’t die. “I could if you want. I’ve no plans. But...I’ve told you I tend to fall asleep trying to watch TV or movies, aye? So you might end up with me asleep on top of you.”

“I’m alright with that,” Wade said, quirking a smile. “Or you could put it on something you find interesting. That’d work, too.”

“It’s not an interesting thing, it’s an attention span thing. The history channel and documentaries are about all I can manage to stay awake through for some reason.” She shifted a bit, feet sliding off the edge of his leg and her arms wrapping around his waist rather than her legs. Aoife was a petite girl and it was much easier to cuddle into Wade than it would have been for Vanessa in her natural form. And, really, she was pretty damn comfy there all curled up against him.

Flipping the channel until he came across something that looked like it was a documentary, Wade tipped his head to the side. “Hey, Planet Earth. I’ve seen bits and pieces of this before, but never a whole segment.”

Vanessa blinked. “Did the preview just mention that the female ass is a mysterious creature?” She couldn’t possibly have heard that correctly, could she?

“Yes. Yes, it did,” Wade said, grinning. “And really, I can only agree with them on that.”

Vanessa poked him in the small of his back. “It’s not nearly so mysterious if you get better acquainted. Maybe you should be introduced to more female ass.”

“I’ve met many a female ass,” Wade said, somehow keeping his expression straight. “I’m well acquainted with them. And they’re still mysterious.”

“Perhaps it’s a language barrier,” Vanessa suggested thoughtfully. “I find the female ass while erratic is fairly predictable once you understand their patterns. Proper translation is vital to this process, however.”

“That could be my problem,” Wade said, nodding slowly. “I mean. If I can’t understand them... then yeah. It’s no wonder they’re all mysterious and whatnot. But pretty.”

“Well, as long as they’re still pretty.” Vanessa smiled. “Mysterious and pretty, what more could you really want?”

“Mmhm,” Wade agreed, eyes on the television now even as his cheek rested against the top of Vanessa’s head. “Not a whole lot, I guess. Just so long as they’re not mad at me, I’m counting myself lucky.”

“Mad Ass,” Vanessa mused. “That could be terrible. I hear Ass is quite dangerous when angered. All those years surviving as a mercenary only to be taken out by a scorned Ass. it would be tragic.”

“Yeah, it really, really would be,” Wade agreed.