Doug and Jean (backdated)

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Backdated to March. Doug and Jean run into each other while out shopping, and strike up a conversation, followed by lunch out.


It had taken some getting used to, the 'cooking for one' aspect of being single. Even if he and Jubilee had ordered delivery or takeout as often as not, Doug had still gotten used to having someone around to share dinner with. And now he didn't. Grocery shopping for just himself was an adjustment, the same way it had been when Marie-Ange had left for New Orleans. Just like then, he still found himself spotting something that 'she' (in this case, Jubilee rather than Marie-Ange) might like, and then had to remind himself that he just needed to buy for himself again.

Doug's shopping tended toward local ethnic shops - a carniceria for the Central American dishes he liked, an open air market in Chinatown, and the like. But he also liked shopping at the Whole Foods that lay on the outskirts of the city for staples, and that was where he found himself on this particular day, pushing a cart around and lost in thought as he deposited items in it.

Down one of the aisles Jean stared at one of dozens of varieties of salad dressings with a blank expression. When did they come out with so many? Sure, variety was "the spice of life" as some would say but this was like pouring an entire truck full of pepper on said life.

Another woman stepped beside Jean and perused the items for a only a moment before reaching up to try to grab one of the dressings on the top shelf. She was about a foot and a half shorter than the shelf would allow, however, so Jean plucked a bottle of the dressing the woman very nearly had her hand on and handed it to her.

"Thanks," the woman said blandly, crossing her arms as she glanced Jean over with narrowed eyebrows. As she walked away she seemed to raise a few inches by standing on her tip toes in an attempt to be taller.

Jean blinked at the woman before hiding a smile. She turned and started to head down another aisle before suddenly stopping her cart to keep from running into Doug's.

Her smile widened. "Hi," she said, giving him a bit of a nod

Doug blinked in surprise. The grocery store wasn't really very high on his list of places to happen to run into someone he knew. Harry's or Finnegan's, sure, but this was unusual. "Hi," he said brightly, nodding in return, while trying to figure out how to address her. After all, 'doctor' was so formal, but he couldn't quite bring himself to call someone who'd taught him as a teenager by her first name. He pivoted his cart in a tight U-turn so he could walk and talk with Jean.

"Going a bit far afield for your groceries?" he asked with a smile. Really, it was a bit of a trip for either of them, but definitely farther from the mansion.

Jean smiled back, grabbing a honey vinaigrette from one of the shelves to put in her cart.

"They have a few things that the Salem Center grocery store doesn't have. I like to swing by to restock sometimes when I'm in the neighborhood," she said.

She studied him a moment before her smile widened warmly. He seemed slightly nervous. It showed in how he smiled just a bit too much, in the rigidness of his shoulders, and the busy, buzzy waves of nervous energy wafting off him.

"Promise I don't bite, by the way."

Doug blinked, then realized that Jean would have picked up on the confusion he was feeling. After all, he wasn't the only person ever who could read body language. And even though he had very good shielding for a non-psi, he likely was still radiating some of that. Psychic shielding was an active thing, after all, and it wasn't like he had any reason to try to keep her out of his mind. "I was just trying to figure out how to address you," he admitted. "Calling you 'Jean' just feels a bit weird?" He shrugged. "It's easier with my coworkers, because there's that relationship, but I still sometimes think of you as my teacher, you know?"

Jean laughed, nodding. "I know. It's okay. I understand," she said. And she did. She felt the way he did sometimes when it came to her former students. She saw them start off as teenagers, staring at the world through wide eyes. But they quickly grew into adults, most X-Men, or whatever they wanted to be. But whatever they chose to be, whatever they became, it was usually something great. It made her proud. But still, there were days when she saw them as she once saw them, when they were younger. Not because she wanted to; it just happened.

"I still get 'Doc Jean' from a lot of the other graduates. I don't mind. It can take some getting used to. You can call me whatever you want," she said, then smirked.

"Within reason."

Doug snickered. "So no ridiculous nicknames, check." They continued down the aisle for a while before he spoke again. "I suppose that whole 'flashback to sixteen' thing kind of had it on my mind a bit already." He'd had a harder time dealing with the aftereffects of the events, and the dissonance between his sixteen year old self and the person he had become.

Jean idly searched the shelves as they walked, then glanced over with a smile.

"I remember those days. You were so quiet at first. So much hair, glasses permanently perched at the tip of your nose. I thought about setting up a cot for you in the library. And now you've come so far. Makes me proud..." she paused, eyebrow quirking before she settled into a laugh and a groan. She covered a defeatist grin with her hands.

"This is probably not helping you in the quest to distance yourself from still seeing me as your teacher, is it? God, I sound like Charles."

"I think you would need a lot more tea for that," Doug observed. It was a strange cognitive dissonance for him. In some ways he had still thought of her as 'Dr. Grey-Summers'. But with all that he had gone through, and the fact that he was maturing, combined with the casual happenstance of their encounter, he was actually thinking of her as 'Jean' and not her string of titles and hyphenated last name.

Jean laughed. "I've always been more of a coffee person. Though I have caught myself more than once reaching for the Earl Grey rather than the Espresso. I blame him," she mused, her eyes bright, then studied him after a moment.

"Say, would you like to have lunch? There's a deli next door that serves really good avocado turkey sandwiches. They also make their own potato chips."

"Ooh." Doug's expression brightened. "I'm always interested in finding new local places that make interesting things. Homemade potato chips sounds really neat." As they picked up their pace, a goal in mind driving them to finish their shopping now, he chuckled. "Coffee is a 'only when I need the boost' kind of thing for me. The baristas at the shop by the office keep asking me when Pete's going to come back." Kill a dinosaur and you were set for life with whoever you killed it for, even if you were a cranky British superspy, he supposed.

"They have three or four flavors, like cayenne pepper or rosemary basil," Jean said, with a nod of agreement and a grin. "I'm a big fan of local eateries as well."

She grabbed a few random things on her list long the way as they headed toward the check out.

"Alas my coffee obsession started off as a desire for said boost but then I became an addict," she said, letting out a resentful sigh.

"Never believe them when they say you can't...you can. And it becomes a spiral of deliciousness. I was hooked...hooked."

She tilted her head and smiled, wagging her eyebrows. "Did you tell the baristas if you told them when he was coming back you'd have to kill them?"

Doug shook his head. "I think if I did that, then Pete would kill -me-. And I'm kind of a fan of still breathing," he pointed out. As they made their way to the checkout, Doug noticed that once the ice had broken, and he'd figured out that he could call her Jean and the world wouldn't end, their conversation was quite comfortable.

"Breathing does have its merits," Jean considered with a smirk as they got in line. Luckily said line was relatively short. The checkout guy was relatively quick.

"It certainly makes my job easier."

The pair got through the checkout, stashed their groceries in their respective vehicles, and found a table at the deli. "So, how has your job been, anyway?" Doug asked as he and Jean settled in. He was fairly aware that some things had changed around the mansion, even if things tended to be kept kind of quiet. After all, there was a reason he'd included Jean and Scott in his secret Valentine's gift giving. It seemed like long relationships falling apart had been a bit of a theme.

"Which one?" Jean mused curiously, with a light grin. Luckily their food choices in the grocery had seemed to have been mostly non-refrigerated. She caught a flutter, a hint of the memory of the aroma of coffee, the weight of the bag in Doug's hand. She glanced up at him as her smile turned gracious but she left it at that, plucking a menu out from behind the salt and pepper holders.

"Oh, either," Doug replied with a wave of his hand. He knew they could speak in generalities about the work they both did that might not be fit for public consumption. And he found it comforting now and again to spend some time with someone from outside the office, to take a break from the sometimes insular nature of his team. Not that it was a bad thing, because they had to be able to trust each other. But it was nice to be able to set that weight aside and not feel it pushing down on him. "I mean, you already know about the latest craziness from mine, so..."

Jean ran her fingers along the edge of the table. Some of the linoleum had been peeled off and she could feel the layers of plywood underneath.

"It's been fairly quiet..." she said, shrugging as she stared at the menu for a few moments.

"And sometimes that worries me," she added softly. Too much quiet was never good. It gave her a nagging feeling in the pit of her stomach.

Doug blinked, struck by a sense of deja vu. He had to think for a moment to realize that he wasn't out to eat with Marie-Ange. Jean's worry for the future sounded very much like something his ex-girlfriend might have said. "You're not the only one," he admitted. It said something about his approach to the world these days that he expected bad things to happen, and got worried when they didn't.

"I can't decide if that makes us paranoid...or proactive," Jean said, flipping the pages on the menu with a shake of her head and a faint smile.

"Maybe a little of both."

She wanted to ignore the feeling, shove it down. And for today, she was going to. Glancing up to Doug, she smiled again.

"Sorry. Still not helping, am I?" She let out a breath, then nodded to his menu.

"What are you thinking of getting?"

"Paranoia's kind of become a way of life for me," Doug said, looking off into the distance with a complex expression on his face - a melange of guilt, anger, and helplessness. Because he couldn't really imagine making any decisions differently than he had, despite where they had led him. It was certainly lonely at times, though.

He visibly shook off his morose reverie and looked at the menu. "Well, the cayenne potato chips seem like a requirement, since I'm always 'waging savage war' on my tastebuds," he replied with a smile that almost looked natural. "As for sandwiches...hm. I'm intrigued by the idea of an omelet sub, I might have to try that."

Staring at him a moment, Jean reached over and squeezed his hand but said nothing, save for the hint of recognition in her eyes. She felt the same way too sometimes. But sometimes she had to stop, stop and remember what good was left. Otherwise the rest would consume her.

She took his change in topic as the end of that and smirked. "War? Why's that? The omelet does sound pretty good, though."

Doug's eyes actually twinkled at the question. "I have a long-standing love of the ridiculously spicy. Besides, spicy food has medical benefits! It helps boost endorphins." He leaned forward conspiratorially. "It are fact. I know because of my learnings. On the internets."

Jean peered at him quizzically before bursting into an amused smirk of a grin.

"That it does. The capsaicin in the spice is also used in a lot of topical creams to help relieve muscle and joint pain."

Their containers of chips came out fairly rapidly for them to snack on while their sandwiches were being made, and Doug ate his with gusto. "Let's hear it for endorphins!" he proclaimed.

Grabbing a chip, Jean laughed before taking a bite. All in all it had been a pretty good day.

"And how."