xp_logs | Manuel and Kitty - Dance Hall Days

Kitty comes to visit Manuel in his room and takes him down to the Dance Studio to discover if he still has his Happy Feet or not.

Well, she'd have to find out if he knew her eventually. Steeling herself with the knowledge that, from what she'd been hearing, the answer would be 'no', Kitty knocked on Manuel's door.

Manuel was sitting in his room, doing a whole lot of thinking and not much else. The knock on his door came as a complete surprise, and he called out "Just a moment!" in his new old-money New England accent while he scrambled out of bed and into something presentable. Finally he opened the door, staring at the slender brunette at his door. "Umm, hi." he said nervously. "Can I help you?"

The accent took Kitty entirely by surprise and she just blinked at him for a second before processing the tone of voice. Well, that sounded like an answer to that question. "Hi," she said softly. "I'm Kitty Pryde, a... a friend of yours." It occured to her, briefly, that even if he did remember her it wouldn't be as Kitty. "Well, Kathrine, but I prefer Kitty. I just thought I'd come by and see how you were doing."

Manuel blinked. "Oh." he said. "I don't remember, but that's not surprising. Come in, then." he said with a grin as he moved to allow her passage. His room was a disaster, with clothes and papers and whatnot strewn all over the place. "Sorry about the mess - I had a rough night last night, and I haven't had the energy to clean up much." he said apologetically.

"Don't worry about it - either of them. We weren't terribly close - just hung out occasionally. Well, and the dancing." That was said with a grin. Stepping into the room Kitty smiled at Manuel reassuringly. "I hope things are OK on the whole."

"As OK as they can be, all things considered." he said ruefully. Judging by his terrible complexion and rumpled clothes, he'd Not Had A Good Day At All. "Wait - dancing? I'm a dancer now as well?" he said. "Great. Musician, dancer - next thing you know, I'll also be a poet or something." he grumbled.

"Well, I don't know about poetry, but you do fence and are a great wooer of women." Kitty grinned, doing her best to be as genial and non-threatening as she could be. "The dancing was more of a social thing than an artistic thing - unlike my dancing. I take it you
don't remember? Well, at least, not with your head?" She knew full well that muscle memory was hard to erase and even if he didn't remember mentaly he might remember physically.

Manuel shrugged. "Not a thing, really." he said with frustration etched all over his features."Guess we should go find out if this is like me swimming - I don't remember, but my body does." he said with a sigh. "A wooer of women? Me?" he said after a second, blushing furiously. "If you say so..." he said dubiously.

Kitty grinned at the blush, so very unlike the Manuel of old. "No worries, you weren't a wooer of me." Jamie doesn't have problems for you because of that, she added in her mind, but definitely didn't say aloud. "And sure, let's go see if you've still got those 'happy feet'. We'll go down to the dance studio."

Manuel looked oddly relieved by that. "OK." he said, grabbing his keys, his phone, and his now-battered Map of the Mansion before stepping into the hall and closing his door behind him. "I don't know where the dance studio is - can you put it on my map here so I can find it on my own later?" he asked her, holding the map out for her to mark up.

"Yeah, sure," Kitty said, vaguely curious why he would need his phone for a trip downstairs but figuring the boy had his reasons. "Here, it's not far from the music room." She marked the room down, writing as neatly as she could. "Here you go," she said, handing the map back and then starting off down the hallway.

Manuel glanced at his map, nodded, and then stuck it in his back pocket. "So - what kind of dance did I enjoy doing?" he asked her nervously. "Because I don't remember any of it." he grumbled. 'You'd think I'd be used to that by now. Anyway, would you mind answering some questions for me?" he asked her.

"Social dances," Kitty answered. "Waltzes and the like. Unlike me, you weren't a performative dancer. And no, of course I don't mind. Ask away."

Manuel nodded, and even mustered a bit of a grin. "Did you know me? Before, I mean? I'm guessing yes, since you knocked on my door. Can you tell me anything about who I was Before?"

"Well, I knew you after you came to the Mansion," Kitty said, hedging slightly. "I can't really tell you about anything before that..." She shrugged slightly. "I mean, what do you want to know? Amanda'd probably be a better source, but I can try and answer any questions."

Manuel's face twisted at the mention of Amanda. "Of course." he said graciously. He walked the rest of the way to the Dance Studio in silence, thinking deep thoughts by the abstracted look on his face.

Aware that she had walked into something, but unable to think what or how she could get out of it, Kitty did the only thing she could do - walked with him in what she hopped was a companionable silence. Opening the door to the dance studio, however, brought a big smile to her face - one of 'her' spaces in the mansion, it always felt like home, sometimes more than her room. "Here we are," she said. "I'll put on some music and we'll see what is to see."

Manuel nodded. "Sure." he agreed as he stretched a bit, waiting for her to pick the music. Despite the butterflies with jackboots in his stomach, he was actually fairly excited to see if he could do this or not. He couldn't remember, but that was no surprise. Dwelling on it
would just make him miserable.

Walking over to the boom box Kitty flipped through the CDs next to it, finally settling on a disk of standard waltzes they'd used in class earlier in the year. Waltzes were easy and the old Manuel could waltz as easily as he could breathe, so if the memory was there to be gotten he'd have no trouble getting it. Popping the disk in she turned with a smile and walked back to Manuel as the music started up. "Shall we?" she asked, offering him her hand. She assumed he didn't know how to follow, at least not as well as he knew how to
lead, but if necessary Kitty knew how to 'lead' from from the women's role.

Manuel took her hand with a nervous smile. "Sure." he said. His hand was warm and flushed, as if he'd been sweating. "So - show me what to do here?" he told Kitty with a somewhat nervously cocky grin. "Because I can't remember a thing."

"Not a problem," Kitty said, smiling back. "Your right hand goes here, on my waist. Then, just do the opposite of what I do. When I step back with my left, you step
forward with your right." Suiting action to words, Kitty stepped back on the down beat, moving slowly and carefully telegraphing her moves.

Manuel tenatively stepped through the first few moves - then he just stopped thinking entirely and effortlessly slid into the rhythms of the dance. When it was over, he blinked a few times and then refocused on Kitty. "How'd I do?" he said with a nervous grin. "Have to admit I wasn't paying attention."

Kitty smiled brightly. "Really, really well – there must be at least some muscle memory. But what do you mean you weren't paying attention?"

"Just what I said. If I try, if I pay attention, then I can't do it. Something gets in the way. If I distract myself, if I don't think about it, then my body remembers and I just do it." he said with a shrug. "I can't explain it, but apparently it's not uncommon in traumatic amnesia cases." he said diffidently. "So tell me about yourself, Kitty." he said with a smile, clearly changing the topic.

Kitty could accept that, and at least she knew when not to push. "Um, well, I'm here, so I'm a mutant. My power is the ability to phase and walk through basically anything. I can also phase other things and people with me, most of the time. I've been here at Xavier's for about three years, and I mainly study a large conglomeration of assorted sciences and math. I don't know, what do you want to know?"

Manuel grinned as Kitty rattled off her bio. "Phasing? Can you show me? I - I don't know if I ever knew anything about that." he said. "I'm curious. I'm just trying to meet new people, get adjusted as quickly as possible to my new life here. Since I don't remember much of my old one, it's no great loss." he said with a grin more imagined than real.

"Yeah, I can," Kitty said, not knowing how to respond to what he'd said. As the next song started Kitty tugged Manuel's hand back up so it was between them. "I promise this won't hurt," she said, reassuringly. She phased herself out, then flicked the tips of her fingers through Manuel's palm.

Manuel stared at the fingertips that were bisecting his palm without any pain or discomfort. "That's amazing." he said reverentially. "I used to be a mutant. I'm not anymore." he said with only a hint of pain. His eyes unfocused for a second as he brought a hand to his forehead. "Ow." he said.

"You can't use your power anymore?" Kitty asked, eyes widening as she phased back in. "Do you remember Shiro?" she asked, continuing before he could answer. "He burned out his power but it came back recently. Have... have the doctors said anything about that?"

Manuel nodded. "That's right. I'm completely mundane. Does that surprise you? Was I normally prone to using my power all the time?" he asked her with curiousity. "What can you tell me about my old power? And Xavier tells me that my power's been damaged and is healing itself. It may come back all of a sudden, or gradually, or not at all."

Kitty's eyes widened slightly - if he was asking that meant that no one had told him anything about his powers yet, including the Professor. That had her wondering. "Well," she said, "I wouldn't say you used it all the time, really, but there are aspects... My power is like a switch - either I'm phased or I'm not, there's no middle ground, and it's not a constant state, thank God. But some powers, like, oh, a healing factor or telepathy, are sort of always on, whether or not your using them at the moment. Your power is, was
like that."

"It was like that, anyway." he said after a moment. "Now, it's not there at all. Do - do you want to try another dance? His body, always ready to betray him, was screaming at him to do ... what, he wasn't sure. Another blank spot in his memory. But judging by how he felt, it had something to do with her and what made her a her. "The last one was kind of fun."

If Kitty knew what he was thinking she would probably have said no, but she almost never turned down a dance, and who knew if maybe dancing might not trigger something in Manuel's memory. "Sure," she said. "This song's almost over but... Yep, there it goes." The waltz which had been playing in the background switched to a more up-tempo piece in four-four time. "Ready?" she asked, moving back into position in his arms.

Manuel smiled and nodded. "After you..." he said, and then tried a little experiment. He concentrated just on the feel of the girl in his arms, how she looked and how she made him feel without concentrating on remembering the steps or his dance technique or any of that. To do the latter would just bring on another headache, possibly to the point of throwing up. And he was _tired_ of throwing up.

Kitty had started them again, but had relaxed when Manuel's training had kicked in. She let him steer her about the room, smiling.

Manuel kept his mind off of his movements, and thus was a fairly passable dancer. Not like his previous skill on the floor, but he was passable enough. He was enjoying himself, for the first time since his accident. Once the dance ended, he smiled tenderly at Kitty. "Thank you." he said to her quietly. "That's the first real fun I've had in ... well, for as far back as I can remember." he said with a sheepish grin.

"No problem," Kitty said, grinning back. "Any time you want, just ask. I'm always up for dancing. Although," she said, glancing at the clock, "I ought to be finishing a final paper about now. Mind if I cut this short?"

"No, that's fine." he said, although the disappointment on his face was fairly plain to see. "Oh, and hey, did you get my message?" he asked. "I'm pretty sure I left it on your machine. About finding a way to unlock my computer and the journals?"

Kitty caught the look and said quickly, "Hey, soon as finals are up I'll have more time and we can definitely dance again." She thought back. "Um, no, I don't think I did, but I can get you the password to the journals, no problem. You need help getting into your computer, too?"

Manuel nodded. "Yeah. I don't remember them at _all_." he whined. "And I hear that there's lots of stuff on the journals - maybe some of it will jog my memory!" he said excitedly. "And I hate going visiting people and have them not be there when I knock. Either that or I was knocking on the door to a closet. Again." he said with an embarrassed
grin.

"Kay," Kitty said. "I'll get you a new password for your journal today, and if you let me borrow your laptop I ought to be able to get into it in a couple of days, at the most. Who were you trying to visit and getting no answer?"

"Amanda." he said with a twist of his lips. "Turns out that I was one door down too far, which is a broom closet. Also, I went to visit Kyle, and he wasn't there. No big deal, I just wanted to see if he wanted to do cannonballs again." he said with a laugh. "They're fun!"

"Oh, I think they were both gone this week - there was some sort of trip. I don't know what it was about, but a dozen or so people were gone. I agree, though, that cannonballs are fun. Have you heard about the beach in the basement, yet?"

"We have a beach? In the _basement_?" Manuel said with amazement. "No, this is a new one on me. Have we always had a beach in the basement? Nobody tells me _anything_..." he groused.

Kitty shook her head. "No, we haven't always had it. Jamie made it and only just opened it this week as a sort of winter blahs' medication. I'm surprised you haven't just heard about it, even if no one's specifically said anything to you - everyone's been talking about it, it seems."

"I don't get out much." he said in the Understatement of the Year. "And I can't get to the journals, so that would be why I missed the announcement. That makes sense." he said, thinking it through for a few moments. "Want to go?" he asked impishly.

"To the beach?" Kitty asked, startled. "I really do have work, Manuel." But the lure of the sun lamps was still really, really strong. "Well, I can at least show you where it is..."

Manuel ahhed. "Of course, of course. Sorry. If you could just mark where on my map it is, I can make my own way down there. I'll bring my phone in case I get lost." he promised.

"Oh, see, that's not fair," Kitty said, pouting slightly. "Only one of us is allowed to be all
responsible. If you start doing it then I really will cave and if I spend much more time down there I'm going to end up burnt to a crisp. But, it will be a very nice way to go." She grinned. "So, none of that. I'll walk you down, make sure I didn't leave anything down there, and then do my best to be responsible and leave."

Manuel blushed faintly and nodded. "You're too kind to me." he said pleasantly. "After you?" he said, gesturing extravagantly towards the door.