Jubilee and Angelo log

[x-jubilee.livejournal.com]

When: Thursday 7th April 2005 Time: 2pm
Who: Jubilee, Angelo. What Happens?:

Jubilee and Angelo pass each other in the hall and Jubilee decides that he needs some cheering up. Sparring and then interesting food choices are discussed.




Jubilee pulled the bag higher over her shoulder. She'd accumulated an interesting amount of dirty laundry that she'd have to lug down to the laundry later on. For the moment though, she was just going to dump them on her side of the room.

With Madelyn now safely away on her trip, Jubilee could move back into her own room. Since Paige was also away, she'd have to think of something to do when her roomie got back. Right now though, she'd be happy to just dump this bag.

At the same moment, Angelo happened to leave his room, on his way down to the gym for some sword practice. He didn't see Jubilee at first, turning in the other direction to start towards the stairs.

Jubilee noticed Angelo and hesitated a moment, they hadn't talked at all recently but she supposed if she could change Amanda's opinion on her, Angelo shouldn't be that hard.

"Yo, Angelo!"

He jumped slightly and turned, nodding a greeting when he saw her. "Hey, Jubilee."

Jubilee shifted the bag onto one hip and grinned at him. "Hey. You headed to the gym?" she asked, her gaze noting the gloves.

"Yep. Some time on the bags, some sword practice maybe. How 'bout you?"

"Movin' back from Mads to my old room. Since she's gonna be on vacation an all, she doesn't need me to look after her." Jubilee replied, hesitating for a second. "You doin' okay? Saw your journal post, you seemed kinda upset."

Angelo and Amanda had been close, hadn't they? And with Paige gone as well. It couldn't be easy having to deal with everything that went down.

He turned to look at her, trying to be casual since he and Jubilee weren't exactly confidants. But then, he'd always been a lousy liar. "Survivin'", he allowed eventually.

"Bad as that, hey?" she asked, her tone soft. She shifted the bag over to her other shoulder and gave him an examining look. "Give me a sec, an I'll come down with you. Just gotta dump this in the room."

He shifted a little uncomfortably. "Hey, you don't have to - but if you wanted to anyway..."

Jubilee laughed, shaking her head. "Dude, somethin' you'll learn. I only ever do what I want to do. God help anyone who ever tried ta make me do somethin' I didn't. So yeah, I'd like to come down to the gym with you. Got to do some trainin' myself, so it's all good."

Having said that, Jubilee turned and walked down the hall, pausing at her door to look back. "Don't go anywhere. I'll be right back."

He chuckled, watching her go with some bemusement, but waited dutifully for her to come back.

Jubilee dumped the bag on her bed, and looked around for her gym gear. There! She picked up the shorts and top from where she'd dumped them on her desk. She reached down and wiggled a finger through the cage she kept Georgina in, patting the bunny softly on the head before quickly changing.

Tying her hair up in a quick braid, she headed back to where Angelo was patiently waiting for her. "There! All done. You up for some sparing? Totally need to practice for Self defence finals." she said, allowing herself to babble.

Angelo looked like he could use some easy company - nothing requiring any real commitment to a discussion topic. Jubilee had always been good at filling up a silence.

"Sure. Hand to hand?" he asked easily, putting aside any thoughts of sword practice. He could do that another time.

"Yep. Don't need any practice on the weapons. Although, we might wanna wear the gloves an stuff. People'd probably frown at us if we came out all busted up." Jubilee replied, heading down the stairs.

He grinned ironically at that. "Jubes, I used to spar with Sarah. People've seen me busted up before. But, your call. Gloves it is."

Jubilee expression was unreadable for a second before she smiled to hopefully take the sting out of what she was about to say. "Dude, I may be what others might call 'delicate' but I'm not exactly a push over. I don't need bone spurs to hurt someone badly. But I don't give someone bruises for no good reason. So we wear gloves, an if you feel like ya can't continue at any stage, you tell me. Same as I'll do for you."

He nodded, face back to blankness as he pulled his gloves on. "Understood."

Jubilee pulled her gloves on and launched herself into the bout, putting out a lightning series of punches in order to give herself time to study him. She'd never sparred with Angelo before but she knew his powers. It meant holding herself back wouldn't do any good. So, blinding him with speed in order to give herself time to find an advantage was the only choice.

'Find the weakness. Think you're invulnerable? You don't know shit. Everyone's got a weakness, even the best fighter. Be smart, kid. Don't let them intimidate you because you're smaller, an always go for the dirty trick when you can get away with it. This kinda fighting ain't about honor, time enough for that when they're dead.

Logan's voice ran through her head as she moved, Pete's following it up as she tried to find her centre. She needed to be calm for a bout, or she'd make mistakes.

Angelo parried several of the shots, letting others through both accidentally and by design. His main advantage, he knew, was that he'd been taught to fight much earlier than Jubilee. Apart from the size imbalance, of course.

Jubilee ducked under a punch to her head only to meet the follow up punch to her chin. She blinked back stars for a second before moving out of the way and going for a hit to the Angelo's kidneys.

'Don't get arrogant. Know what the other word for arrogant is, kid? Stupid. You're wonderin' how I set you on your ass, ain't ya? It's cause you think you know somethin'. Think I'm old an slow? Get the pre-conceptions outta ya head, an maybe I'll be able ta make some kinda fighter out of you. Keep thinkin' like you're back in California and some time on the street makes you hot shit, you'll never get anywhere.'

Logan had knocked her down that first day. She'd thought she knew how to fight. How to take care of herself. She'd been shown she was nothing against a trained fighter. She'd never forgotten that first lesson. She still had a long way to go but she had a thought Logan might think her at least capable of not getting herself killed now.

"You're good." Jubilee said, grinning as she felt the sweat standing out on her forehead.

Angelo definitely had the reach on her, which meant she had to constantly keep moving in order to avoid getting grabbed. She had to admit, it was fun.

Angelo grinned back at her, feeling the usual rush of a good fight rising, and matched her step for step. "Thanks. So're you."

Jubilee dropped suddenly, going for a quick leg sweep but stopping herself as she was about to go for a punch to the groin. This wasn't a real fight, and she wasn't looking to take Angelo down.

"So, what's got you so worked up? Anythin' to do with our friendly neighbourhood witch leavin'? Or Paige headin' out?"

"Bit of both", he answered, circling her. "Paige needed the holiday, I know that, an' she couldn't've known, but... not great timin'."

"Sometimes people can't choose when they have to go." Jubilee replied, feinting to one side before coming in hard on the other.

She backed off when Angelo met her attack hit for hit, looking for an opening. She rarely got a chance to actually spar with anyone outside self-defence class. It was different then the structured bouts, more chaotic. She found she liked it that way.

"They'll be back though."

"Paige will", he agreed. "Amanda... no guarantees."

Jubilee stepped back, bowing to indicate an end to the bout and then gestured to the floor before sitting down herself. "Dude, Amanda will be back. Trust me on this one."

He dropped casually to the floor next to her, answering simply, "I hope so. I know she'll keep in touch, whatever happens."

Jubilee grinned suddenly, humour evident in her eyes. "Well, Dude. You can hope. Me? If she's not back in a month I'm goin' lookin' for her. Havin' me sittin' outside her door for a few days buggin' her should do the trick. She needs time right now, s'why I didn't try an talk her out of goin'. Not that I think I could have, considerin' everythin'. But, sometimes you need ta know that people are willin' to come lookin' for you too."

"I could've stopped her goin'", Angelo said quietly. "She made me a promise, once, that she wouldn't go. An' it was a bindin' one. But she asked me to release her from it, an' how could I say no?"

"You couldn't, not an still have her be your friend. She needed to go, an holdin' her here would've made her hate you in the end. When she comes back, it'll be cause she wants to. Her choice, ya know? Although, like I said, remindin' her that there's people here that care ain't a bad thing." Jubilee replied.

She wasn't usually the person who offered advice, more often then not needing advice herself. But Angelo looked like he needed to talk it out and she understood a fair bit about choices. She could still only say what she thought, whether that was right or wrong, she didn't entirely know.

He nodded. "Yeah, exactly. I would've let her go just for the askin'."

"Say, would this be us like, havin' an actual agreeable conversation? Cause Dude, I gotta get Lorna in here ta take a picture of it. Otherwise, no one will believe it happened." Jubilee said, grinning widely.

He pulled a face at her. "No pictures. I got enough of that when Shinobi was here."

"Obiwan... You know, sometimes I wonder how they're doin'. Him and Sarah. I hope they're okay." Jubilee replied, looking around at the gym.

She'd spent a lot of time here and each feature of it she knew almost as well as she knew the back of her hand. She'd been wondering lately what it might be like to leave. She was 18 now, an adult. Yet she still didn't know what that really meant.

Maybe one of the reasons, one of the things she hadn't thought to tell Scott, that she wanted X-men training was to find out exactly that. What it meant to be an adult. What it meant to take responsibility for something and see it through to the end.

"I hear from them sometimes. I'm sure they'll make it back to America before too long, if only for a visit. But you know Sarah an' planes."

"Yeah. You wanna get some lunch with me? Trainin' always gives me a huge appetite." Jubilee replied.

It was a bridge of sorts, an offer for friendship maybe. Jubilee wasn't quite sure yet. She did know that lately she'd been revaluating her opinions of people. Although, she didn't think she'd ever change her stance on Marie-Ange being a stuck up so and so. Still, others might be different.

He considered, but then... well, why not? Most of his problem with Jubilee had been about her problem with Amanda, and since that seemed to be resolved... "Sure. You headin' up now?"

Jubilee grinned and stood, holding out a hand to help him to his feet. "Of course. I'll even show you the 'guess which foods taste good together' game Hank and I play. You can get some really weird combinations outta that one."

He eyed her a little warily at that suggestion, letting her pull him up. "Like what?"

"Well, there's always Fried peanut butter and banana sandwiches but that's usually for the advanced player. We could probably start you off with Tang sandwiches and work on from there." Jubilee replied, trying on her 'I'm terribly, terribly innocent, you should trust me' look.

It usually only worked on people who didn't know her but she wasn't particularly serious about it right now anyhow.

She appeared to have forgotten that Angelo was a California boy himself. "What's wrong with peanut butter an' banana?" he asked, apparently seriously. "Tang sandwiches, though... that's just wrong?"

Jubilee snickered, closing the gym doors behind them. "Nothin' wrong with 'em. Just gettin' other people ta eat them is usually a struggle. Should've known a Cali native would like 'em. As ta Tang sandwiches, well, I don't mind 'em too much and they're cheap ta make. Not that I've gotta worry much about money here. Breakin' the habit is hard though."

"I hear that. You get a taste for food that doesn't cost too much, if you eat it long enough."

"Well, we'll see what we've got down there. I was totally gonna see what ham and mustard pickles taste like." Jubilee replied as they walked.

He grinned at her. "That sounds almost normal."

"Well, considerin' some of the combos the Hankster and I came up with, I was wantin' ta try somethin' fairly tame today. Still, that day is young. It could be liquorice and honey next." Jubilee replied.

"Could work", Angelo answered thoughtfully. "Sounds kinda nice, actually."

"Knew there was something about you I liked." Jubilee replied, grinning widely as she held the door to the kitchen open. "Come on, before Lorna finds us committing food crime in her kitchen."

He grinned back and followed her in. "Right behind you."