Teddy and Jubilee | End of year party
Jun. 2nd, 2018 10:30 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
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ax_mainTeddy and Jubilee chat about families - old and found.
Dancing with Billy was close to the best thing in the world, even if it did leave Teddy mentally kicking himself for his dumb choices at the beginning-of-school party back in September. It was long over and done with, of course, and if that was his biggest regret in life he was doing okay, but still. He'd probably never entirely get over that one. At the moment, though, he needed a bit of a break from the noise and the crush on the dance floor, and he'd slipped away to the fringes of the group to grab some juice and a breath of cooler evening air.
Jubilee was standing near the lake eyeing the sky appraisingly - not quite dark enough, yet - and turned back towards the party just in time to see a familiar figure step away from the main group. Grinning, she waved her arms over her head. "Yo, Royal Green Dude! Over here!"
Teddy sighed, and shook his head at her even as he obeyed and headed in Jubilee's direction. "You know, I'm starting to miss the days when you were only giving me grief about algebra."
"Aww, but this way more fun!" Jubilee protested. "I can combine the two if you want, though." She paused for a moment to consider that, before volunteering, "Royal mathematician dude, maybe? It's a work in progress." She grinned brightly. "Anyway, I called you over to tell you that Ms. Frost grudgingly admitted I totally passed Algebra with a D+!"
In other circumstances, from someone else, the D+ would have been crushing, but considering how hard Jubilee had been working to even get that far- Teddy beamed at her, his introspective mood vanishing as he held up his hand to offer a high-five. "Nice going, Jubes! All that work paid off."
"Right? No summer school for me! And next year's Geometry, which means there are built in pictures and no letters pretending to be numbers, am I right?" Jubilee high fived Teddy, then grew serious. "But for real, dude. How're you doing?" Because yeah, she could be serious when it was warranted. And Teddy' had it really hard lately.
"You're going to hate me when you hit geometry proofs," Teddy slid in there, but he gave her something of a tired smile and an honest answer when she asked. He owed her that. "Doing okay, I guess? I've been avoiding dealing with a lot of it because of finals, but after this week I've run out of distractions." He made a face. "It's probably not a good sign that I'm already missing working on term papers."
"Missing working on term papers is a sign of some lifethreatening medical condition," Jubilee agreed. "So, what you need is a totally new distraction, right?" She grinned. "And like, I'm the Queen of totally new distractions. We just gotta come up with something cool."
He laughed, shaking his head at her. "Why does that suggestion strike terror into my heart? Are we talking, like, starting a Pokemon league, or occupying the White House?"
"Well, we could go hunt Pokemon at the White House, but seriously, I'm really not big on having Secret Service agents in my face?" Jubilee grinned. "Though dude, you should seriously have diplomatic immunity, right? I mean, visiting royal extraterrestrial? That should totally rank higher than like, an ambassador from Canada or something." Even if Lil would be annoyed at her for saying so.
"The Skrulls haven't announced their existence yet, so it's not like they -- we -- have an embassy," he pointed out, his grin wry. "And given that I was smuggled in to the USA as a baby, I'm actually more of an illegal alien."
"Oh man, can you picture the look on the person's face who had to process that application for a green card?" Jubilee grinned back. "Assuming they didn't just figure it was a total prank, because yeah. The place of birth being in another galaxy proooooobably wouldn't be believed."
"Yeah, I'm pretty sure Mom didn't apply for anything legally," Teddy pointed out. He'd thought the joke was funny, anyway. "She's a shapeshifter too, remember? Turn into a file clerk, notarize the fakes herself, put the documentation in the right in-box, walk out and no-one's the wiser. Next week, birth certificate shows up in the mail. That's how I'd do it, anyway. I haven't actually asked her yet."
"How come?" Jubilee asked. "I mean, I'd've asked like, a million questions already. Because yeah, I'm sure that's a surprise, right? But seriously, don't you wanta know how she did it all?"
Teddy chewed on his lip, curling the ring in and holding it between his teeth. "I don't know if I want to know," he confessed. "She's the only parent I've ever known, and if I sit down and talk to her about it, then it makes everything real. That she’s not actually my mother. That she’s only here because her boss forced her to. That I’m not her son at all, but a work project.” He shrugged, ignoring the lump that was growing in his throat.
"Puh-leease. My dad was a work-a-holic? And I can't picture him taking on a sixteen year work project, dude. Besides," Jubilee pointed out, "she's totally your mother. Just, y'know, not your birth mother, but loads of people are adopted. Though I get that it kinda sucks that she didn't tell you that before," she acknowledged. "It'd be hard to talk about that."
"That's not-" Teddy started to argue, then paused. Because it was basically the same thing, wasn't it? And there was nothing wrong with adoption at all. The exact opposite -- and he'd always figured that if he was going to have kids one day (and he kind of liked that idea), he'd probably end up adopting. "It's different, though," he did finish, a little more thoughtful and subdued. "You heard her on the ship. She 'serves the Imperial family,'" he finished with a curl to his lip.
Was it so wrong to wish that he'd been wanted?
"Yeah, but - I mean, if she didn't wanta do it? She coulda dumped you off at a hospital or something, right? And no one'd know what happened, because they didn't even know where she'd gone." Jubilee shrugged. "I don't know her, but...you seem like you had way too good a thing going with your mom for her not to be a Mom, y'know?"
Jubilee had run away from home -- Teddy knew that much, even if he'd never pried into why. It made sense that she'd have Opinions about the whole thing. But that didn't make her wrong. "We did," he admitted. "Or I thought we did. We always got along really well."
"And what happened after that doesn't change that, right? I mean, when you think mom, you still think her, not some alien Empress lady. But the mom who was there when you were sick and when you needed help with your homework and whatever." Jubilee shrugged. "I mean, I don't know anything about it really, I guess? But it seems to me like that's what made her a mom. Not whether or not she was doing it as a job."
Jubilee made a lot of sense, but something inside him resisted the idea. It was easier to stay mad rather than admit that he'd freaked out. Because he'd said some things to her on the ship - stuff that was okay if she were the one to blame. But if he admited that she wasn't, then he'd been a jerk, and... yeah. And he'd have to talk to her, which came right back around to making everything too real.
"Why did you leave?" he asked her impulsively.
"Why'd I leave where?" Jubilee asked, her forehead furrowing in confusion.
"Your parents," Teddy clarified. "Why the mall?"
"Oh!" Jubilee shrugged and offered a crooked half smile. "That didn't have anything to do with my parents - they were seriously awesome. Just, they died in an accident a coupla years ago, and then I was doing the whole foster care system and, y'know, I wasn't a huge fan. So, mall. I mean, I spent all my time there anyway, it was just figuring out where to hide from the time it closed to when everyone cleared out."
"Ohh," Teddy cringed, embarrassed. "I'm sorry. I didn't know. I mean, obviously, or I wouldn't have stuck my foot in my mouth like that."
"Dude, it's cool." Jubilee shrugged. "I mean, yeah okay, it's not cool it happened, but it happened, y'know? I'm just not into the whole 'oh woe is me' thing, or listening to people get all awkward. Which I'm not saying to make you feel bad," she amended. "Cuz you honestly didn't know, and like, there's no way to avoid awkward then? But why make people feel like that if I can help it?"
"No, I get it," Teddy ducked his head and sighed ruefully. "It's why I never really talked about my dad much. Before when I didn't know that he... wasn't real?" He groaned and laughed at the same time. "How are these our lives, Jubes? I mean, seriously."
"Welllll," Jubilee pretended to muse, "we're seriously awesome people, right? Which means we couldn't possibly have same old, same old everyday boring lives. It's just the hazard of being us." She grinned a little and shrugged. Granted, she was pretty sure Teddy's agree that having a little less weirdness in their pasts would've been okay, but if nothing else, it was definitely true that they wouldn't be who they were without it.
"I don't have a better answer, so I guess I'll have to accept that you know what you're talking about," Teddy teased. "I'm hoping for a little bit of boring this summer, to be honest. I'm looking forward to some beach reading time without spaceships or kidnappings or riots getting in the way."
"Uggh. I want not boring," Jubilee countered, then grinned. "I mean, I'd be totally cool with going as your ambassador or something if the spaceships came back. Or your personal assistant. Princes need those, right? I'd be an awesome personal assistant." She paused. "I could do without the riots, though. I mean, I want to go on a mission? But I'd seriously prefer something not riot-y."
"Yeah, I'm not going to hold out for the ships coming back any time soon." Teddy briefly considered the incredible levels of 'screw all of you' it would be to put Jubilee in the middle of an alien spaceship (not alien - me... no, still alien.) and let her run loose. "But if they did I'm ninety percent sure you'd have them all whipped into shape and be roller-blading down the engine core in about five minutes flat."
"Damn right I would," Jubilee agreed with a smug grin. "I'm definitely applying for that PA job once you need one, so don't hire anyone else." Besides, introducing rollerblading to aliens would be awesome. It had to be done.
Hoo boy. Between Lil joking around about bodyguarding for him and now this, Teddy was going to end up with an entire court made up of Xaviers' students before he'd even gotten up the guts to find out what being a Skrull Prince even meant. At least he was pretty sure Lil had been joking. Or trying to cheer him up, which amounted to the same thing. Neither of them really got what any of this meant. He probably didn't either. "I have no idea what I'm going to need, or if I'm ever going to hear from any of them again, so don't go thinking you can drop out of math," he teased, because that was easier than thinking.
"Pfft, as if. I mean, it's not like Frosty would let me, anyway." Jubilee grinned. Teddy hadn't said yes - but he hadn't said no, either. That totally counted as a win in her books. "Anyway, no math for the summer, and I've got a firework display to put on. Go find your boyfriend and get ready to Oooh and Aaaah."
"I'm going to pretend you phrased that differently," Teddy replied, laughing. "And I'm going."
Laughing, Jubilee waved him off, then rubbed her hands together and grinned. This was gonna be awesome.
Dancing with Billy was close to the best thing in the world, even if it did leave Teddy mentally kicking himself for his dumb choices at the beginning-of-school party back in September. It was long over and done with, of course, and if that was his biggest regret in life he was doing okay, but still. He'd probably never entirely get over that one. At the moment, though, he needed a bit of a break from the noise and the crush on the dance floor, and he'd slipped away to the fringes of the group to grab some juice and a breath of cooler evening air.
Jubilee was standing near the lake eyeing the sky appraisingly - not quite dark enough, yet - and turned back towards the party just in time to see a familiar figure step away from the main group. Grinning, she waved her arms over her head. "Yo, Royal Green Dude! Over here!"
Teddy sighed, and shook his head at her even as he obeyed and headed in Jubilee's direction. "You know, I'm starting to miss the days when you were only giving me grief about algebra."
"Aww, but this way more fun!" Jubilee protested. "I can combine the two if you want, though." She paused for a moment to consider that, before volunteering, "Royal mathematician dude, maybe? It's a work in progress." She grinned brightly. "Anyway, I called you over to tell you that Ms. Frost grudgingly admitted I totally passed Algebra with a D+!"
In other circumstances, from someone else, the D+ would have been crushing, but considering how hard Jubilee had been working to even get that far- Teddy beamed at her, his introspective mood vanishing as he held up his hand to offer a high-five. "Nice going, Jubes! All that work paid off."
"Right? No summer school for me! And next year's Geometry, which means there are built in pictures and no letters pretending to be numbers, am I right?" Jubilee high fived Teddy, then grew serious. "But for real, dude. How're you doing?" Because yeah, she could be serious when it was warranted. And Teddy' had it really hard lately.
"You're going to hate me when you hit geometry proofs," Teddy slid in there, but he gave her something of a tired smile and an honest answer when she asked. He owed her that. "Doing okay, I guess? I've been avoiding dealing with a lot of it because of finals, but after this week I've run out of distractions." He made a face. "It's probably not a good sign that I'm already missing working on term papers."
"Missing working on term papers is a sign of some lifethreatening medical condition," Jubilee agreed. "So, what you need is a totally new distraction, right?" She grinned. "And like, I'm the Queen of totally new distractions. We just gotta come up with something cool."
He laughed, shaking his head at her. "Why does that suggestion strike terror into my heart? Are we talking, like, starting a Pokemon league, or occupying the White House?"
"Well, we could go hunt Pokemon at the White House, but seriously, I'm really not big on having Secret Service agents in my face?" Jubilee grinned. "Though dude, you should seriously have diplomatic immunity, right? I mean, visiting royal extraterrestrial? That should totally rank higher than like, an ambassador from Canada or something." Even if Lil would be annoyed at her for saying so.
"The Skrulls haven't announced their existence yet, so it's not like they -- we -- have an embassy," he pointed out, his grin wry. "And given that I was smuggled in to the USA as a baby, I'm actually more of an illegal alien."
"Oh man, can you picture the look on the person's face who had to process that application for a green card?" Jubilee grinned back. "Assuming they didn't just figure it was a total prank, because yeah. The place of birth being in another galaxy proooooobably wouldn't be believed."
"Yeah, I'm pretty sure Mom didn't apply for anything legally," Teddy pointed out. He'd thought the joke was funny, anyway. "She's a shapeshifter too, remember? Turn into a file clerk, notarize the fakes herself, put the documentation in the right in-box, walk out and no-one's the wiser. Next week, birth certificate shows up in the mail. That's how I'd do it, anyway. I haven't actually asked her yet."
"How come?" Jubilee asked. "I mean, I'd've asked like, a million questions already. Because yeah, I'm sure that's a surprise, right? But seriously, don't you wanta know how she did it all?"
Teddy chewed on his lip, curling the ring in and holding it between his teeth. "I don't know if I want to know," he confessed. "She's the only parent I've ever known, and if I sit down and talk to her about it, then it makes everything real. That she’s not actually my mother. That she’s only here because her boss forced her to. That I’m not her son at all, but a work project.” He shrugged, ignoring the lump that was growing in his throat.
"Puh-leease. My dad was a work-a-holic? And I can't picture him taking on a sixteen year work project, dude. Besides," Jubilee pointed out, "she's totally your mother. Just, y'know, not your birth mother, but loads of people are adopted. Though I get that it kinda sucks that she didn't tell you that before," she acknowledged. "It'd be hard to talk about that."
"That's not-" Teddy started to argue, then paused. Because it was basically the same thing, wasn't it? And there was nothing wrong with adoption at all. The exact opposite -- and he'd always figured that if he was going to have kids one day (and he kind of liked that idea), he'd probably end up adopting. "It's different, though," he did finish, a little more thoughtful and subdued. "You heard her on the ship. She 'serves the Imperial family,'" he finished with a curl to his lip.
Was it so wrong to wish that he'd been wanted?
"Yeah, but - I mean, if she didn't wanta do it? She coulda dumped you off at a hospital or something, right? And no one'd know what happened, because they didn't even know where she'd gone." Jubilee shrugged. "I don't know her, but...you seem like you had way too good a thing going with your mom for her not to be a Mom, y'know?"
Jubilee had run away from home -- Teddy knew that much, even if he'd never pried into why. It made sense that she'd have Opinions about the whole thing. But that didn't make her wrong. "We did," he admitted. "Or I thought we did. We always got along really well."
"And what happened after that doesn't change that, right? I mean, when you think mom, you still think her, not some alien Empress lady. But the mom who was there when you were sick and when you needed help with your homework and whatever." Jubilee shrugged. "I mean, I don't know anything about it really, I guess? But it seems to me like that's what made her a mom. Not whether or not she was doing it as a job."
Jubilee made a lot of sense, but something inside him resisted the idea. It was easier to stay mad rather than admit that he'd freaked out. Because he'd said some things to her on the ship - stuff that was okay if she were the one to blame. But if he admited that she wasn't, then he'd been a jerk, and... yeah. And he'd have to talk to her, which came right back around to making everything too real.
"Why did you leave?" he asked her impulsively.
"Why'd I leave where?" Jubilee asked, her forehead furrowing in confusion.
"Your parents," Teddy clarified. "Why the mall?"
"Oh!" Jubilee shrugged and offered a crooked half smile. "That didn't have anything to do with my parents - they were seriously awesome. Just, they died in an accident a coupla years ago, and then I was doing the whole foster care system and, y'know, I wasn't a huge fan. So, mall. I mean, I spent all my time there anyway, it was just figuring out where to hide from the time it closed to when everyone cleared out."
"Ohh," Teddy cringed, embarrassed. "I'm sorry. I didn't know. I mean, obviously, or I wouldn't have stuck my foot in my mouth like that."
"Dude, it's cool." Jubilee shrugged. "I mean, yeah okay, it's not cool it happened, but it happened, y'know? I'm just not into the whole 'oh woe is me' thing, or listening to people get all awkward. Which I'm not saying to make you feel bad," she amended. "Cuz you honestly didn't know, and like, there's no way to avoid awkward then? But why make people feel like that if I can help it?"
"No, I get it," Teddy ducked his head and sighed ruefully. "It's why I never really talked about my dad much. Before when I didn't know that he... wasn't real?" He groaned and laughed at the same time. "How are these our lives, Jubes? I mean, seriously."
"Welllll," Jubilee pretended to muse, "we're seriously awesome people, right? Which means we couldn't possibly have same old, same old everyday boring lives. It's just the hazard of being us." She grinned a little and shrugged. Granted, she was pretty sure Teddy's agree that having a little less weirdness in their pasts would've been okay, but if nothing else, it was definitely true that they wouldn't be who they were without it.
"I don't have a better answer, so I guess I'll have to accept that you know what you're talking about," Teddy teased. "I'm hoping for a little bit of boring this summer, to be honest. I'm looking forward to some beach reading time without spaceships or kidnappings or riots getting in the way."
"Uggh. I want not boring," Jubilee countered, then grinned. "I mean, I'd be totally cool with going as your ambassador or something if the spaceships came back. Or your personal assistant. Princes need those, right? I'd be an awesome personal assistant." She paused. "I could do without the riots, though. I mean, I want to go on a mission? But I'd seriously prefer something not riot-y."
"Yeah, I'm not going to hold out for the ships coming back any time soon." Teddy briefly considered the incredible levels of 'screw all of you' it would be to put Jubilee in the middle of an alien spaceship (not alien - me... no, still alien.) and let her run loose. "But if they did I'm ninety percent sure you'd have them all whipped into shape and be roller-blading down the engine core in about five minutes flat."
"Damn right I would," Jubilee agreed with a smug grin. "I'm definitely applying for that PA job once you need one, so don't hire anyone else." Besides, introducing rollerblading to aliens would be awesome. It had to be done.
Hoo boy. Between Lil joking around about bodyguarding for him and now this, Teddy was going to end up with an entire court made up of Xaviers' students before he'd even gotten up the guts to find out what being a Skrull Prince even meant. At least he was pretty sure Lil had been joking. Or trying to cheer him up, which amounted to the same thing. Neither of them really got what any of this meant. He probably didn't either. "I have no idea what I'm going to need, or if I'm ever going to hear from any of them again, so don't go thinking you can drop out of math," he teased, because that was easier than thinking.
"Pfft, as if. I mean, it's not like Frosty would let me, anyway." Jubilee grinned. Teddy hadn't said yes - but he hadn't said no, either. That totally counted as a win in her books. "Anyway, no math for the summer, and I've got a firework display to put on. Go find your boyfriend and get ready to Oooh and Aaaah."
"I'm going to pretend you phrased that differently," Teddy replied, laughing. "And I'm going."
Laughing, Jubilee waved him off, then rubbed her hands together and grinned. This was gonna be awesome.
