ax_main | Illyana and Kitty

Illyana helps Kitty pick out an outfit for the party and Kitty finds out who Illyana's date is.

Kitty had at least three outfits on her bed. No wait, four. She stared at them forlornly. There was a party tonight. Her first real party. Not like that pizza thing when she'd first gotten there. A party party. And she had NO IDEA what to wear. Which seemed like a stupid problem at first until you realized that oh right, she'd just started dating a guy, and what did you wear to a party when you're dating a guy???

Illyana came in from the bathroom, wearing a towel wrapped around her and another around her hair like a turban. She needed to get ready yet, but it wouldn't take that long - and if it did, she could always tack on a half hour in Limbo before going to corral Inu-Yasha.

She paused just inside the door, though, and looked at Kitty's bed, then at her roommate. "Did your closet explode?"

"Yes," Kitty answered, then threw her hands in the air. "No! Ugh. Help! I need help. I need so much help."

"Well, I know that. You've got me for a friend. Clearly, there's something wrong with you," Illyana joked. She came over to look at the clothes. "What do you need help with?"

"Clothes. Clearly! Keep up!" Kitty waved a hand at the bed. "What am I supposed to wear tonight??"

"Clothes." Illyana grinned impishly, then sighed and let the grin fade. Right. Not the time. She gestured towards the clothes. "Well, what do you feel like wearing? I mean, what are you trying to say?"

"I'm trying to say that I'm not a freak who doesn't know how to dress for a party?" Kitty offered, frowning.

"Well, that rules out this, I think," Illyana observed, picking up the pinkish dress and returning it to the closet. "What else?"

"Uh. Well, so Bobby and I are kind of dating now?" Kitty chewed her lip. "Does that make a difference?"

"It makes a difference." Illyana mulled that over for a moment, then picked up the long sleeved shirt and jeggings and returned those to the closet as well. "When did that happen?" she asked as she went back to examine the other two choices.

"You know, uh, we've just been keeping it... uh." Kitty made a face. Why hadn't she told anyone about this? It was kind of important! "Anyway, are you and Tommy going?"

"Well, I'm going," Illyana replied, shrugging as if it was no big deal. Which it wasn't, really, despite some lingering hurt. Which didn't matter, so whatever. "No clue if Tommy's going or not."

"Wait what?" Kitty turned toward Illyana with a frown. "What happened?"

Illyana wrinkled her nose. "It's not important. I thought we were looking at outfits?"

Kitty put her hands on her hips. "Now I want to know what's going on with you and Tommy."

"There's nothing going on with me and Tommy. Mostly because I'm not talking to him." Illyana let out a sigh and plopped down on the newly available space on Kitty's bed, removing her hair towel so she could start drying her hair with it.

Her roommate just dropped down to sit on the floor between their beds, cross-legged, and frowned. "Why?"

"Because -" Illyana sighed and dropped the towel into her lap. "Well, mostly because during the mission? He pretty much ordered me to teleport him out, just because he didn't want to stand there and talk to Phantazia. And when I called him out on it after, seeing as he was the one who'd said that we were just going to have to make sure I didn't have to teleport anyone if I didn't want to, all he'd say was that no one made me do it." She made a face. "Plus I'm still kinda pissed about the American Horror Story comment."

"Did he...did he see Limbo?" Kitty asked quietly.

"Yeah." Illyana shrugged. "Whatever. I probably should've just told him straight off. Saved everyone the hassle." She got to her feet, feeling restless, and headed for her own closet. "I like the outfit with the ripped jeans," she remembered belatedly.

Kitty frowned at her back and stood. "Wait. Did he actually judge you about it? About Limbo?"

"It seemed like it. In as much as he acknowledged what I was saying at all," Illyana admitted. "I'm not even sure how much he was really listening, other than that he turned pale for no good reason." She flipped through her closet until she found the crocheted red crop top she'd picked up at the mall when she'd run into Terry. "I offered to take Billy there the following week, after he whammyed Inu-Yasha with magic. Find out what had happened, because Billy didn't know. Tommy told me no magic, and made some comment about American Horror Story. I haven't talked to him since." She turned around and held the top up against her. "You like?"

Kitty was scowling. "The top, sure. Tommy's idiocy? Not so much."

"Yeah, not a fan either. But whatever." Illyana shrugged, only a brief flash of expression suggesting she wasn't as "whatever" about it as she might pretend. She pushed that aside, though, and grinned as she went over to get a bra from her dresser. "I found someone better, anyway."

"Wow, really?" Kitty grinned and started to change, phasing out of her clothes and tossing on the outfit that Yana had picked. "Now you gotta tell me. One of the new kids?"

"Nope. And I don't have to tell you." Illyana glanced over her shoulder and wrinkled her nose, though her grin made a lie of her reluctance. "You didn't tell me you were dating the ice dork."

Kitty grinned and shrugged a little, not even bothering to defend the 'ice dork' comment. (He totally wasn't, but she knew Yana's feelings about Bobby.) "All of it's pretty new, and weird. I kissed him the night Billy got here. Took your advice. Well. My advice, but my advice that you took and then told me about. Anyway! Yeah."

"Al-right!" Illyana tugged her top on over her head and turned towards Kitty,very obviously proud of her roommate. "It was good advice, I told you that. So things are good with you guys, now?"

"Yeah," Kitty blushed. "I mean, he gets me, you know?"

"Which is the best," Yana acknowledged. She grinned in support, hoping Kitty'd continue, and turned back to decide what to wear with the top. She'd thought jeans, but then she couldn't wear the new boots she'd gotten the last time she'd popped in at the mall. She'd also, she reflected absently, thought that Tommy might get her, but apparently, he wasn't interested in trying. Luckily she had better taste choosing clothes than guys.

Kitty's flopped down in front of her mirror to figure out what to do with her hair. "So I told you! Now you gotta fess up. Who are you bringing?"

Illyana grinned as she pulled out a black mini-skirt, figuring she'd tortured her roommate enough. "Pyro."

Pyro. Kitty's hand slowly loosened on her hairbrush. Her hand dropped into her lap and she turned, her eyes widening. "Pyro. Pyro, Pyro? Evil flame throwing jerk Pyro?!"

"Well, flame throwing Pyro, anyway." Illyana turned towards Kitty, looking confused. "I'm not sure what's evil about him. And he hasn't been a jerk. He's been really cool."

"Besides trapping us in a burning building," Kitty frowned.

"Well, it was already burning when we went in," Illyana pointed out. "So actually, we kinda went into a building he was already burning. He did ask if everyone got out okay."

Kitty frowned even more deeply. "Wait. You're bringing him here?"

Illyana shrugged. "Why not? He's a mutant; it's not like it's giving anything away. Besides, I'm giving him a lift, it's not like he'll know where he is."

"If you're bringing him here, that means you're taking him through Limbo," Kitty pointed out, getting a little bit more frowny with each answer. What was Illyana even thinking?

"Yeah, well, I did that already." Illyana shrugged and turned to get her boots out of her closet. "Unlike some people," meaning Tommy, not Kitty, though she was pretty sure her roommate would have been cool with a closer look than the one she'd had on the mission, which had literally been pop in/pop out thanks to the fact she'd already been there to manipulate the disks, "he was okay with it."

Kitty's frown lessened a little, but she still didn't look happy. "Okay, maybe he isn't evil, but seriously, here?"

"Why not? It's supposed to be a school for mutants, right?" Illyana turned back to Kitty and grinned a little, sensing her roommate was wavering a little. She carried her boots over to her bed and started putting them on. "He's a mutant, and he's the right age to be in school Maybe the Professor will recruit him or something."

That got Illyana an eyeball. Kitty didn't know if she was being played or not, because that was just about the only reason she might go along with this stupid, stupid plan. "Who is he anyway? Who were those kids?"

"He's Pyro. He doesn't use his old name anymore - he's got a pretty shitty past from the sounds of it. I think he just kinda wants to forget it." She finished putting on her boots and leaned back on her arms. "The other kids were his teammates, he said. We really didn't talk about them much." She grinned a little. "He made these little flames dance around us. It was really cool. And he kissed me."

Oh god, Kitty realized suddenly, a huge pit opening up in her stomach. This wasn't just Yana being rebellious or getting back at Tommy. She really liked this guy. And since when? Why hadn't she heard about it? Oh, maybe because she hadn't told Yana about Bobby either and oh my god, she really LIKED him.

Kitty just stared at Illyana, sort of like she was trying how to tell her best friend that there was a huge monster behind her back, or that the world was going to end in three days. Did you just say something about this terrible horrible thing, or did you just let them have their innocence and happiness while it lasted?

"Y'know, I hate when you stare at me like that," Illyana observed with a grimace. "I don't know what you're thinking, but it makes me want to squirm anyway."

"I just...didn't know you liked him that much," Kitty chewed at her lip.

Illyana gave her roommate a skeptical look, then shrugged. If Kitty had a problem with it, she'd tell her eventually. "I like him, yeah. I don't know if I really like him or not, yet." She grinned a little. "Hence the reason I asked him to the party. Or one of the reasons, anyway. What do you think?" she asked of her ensemble as she stood back up and did a turn.

"Looks good," Kitty nodded, though not as enthusiastically as she might have usually. She'd wait and see what happened at the party, but she wasn't sold on this going down. Especially not Yana bringing someone strange in without the Professor's permission.

Illyana paused for a moment, considering whether or not she wanted to ask Kitty what was wrong, then decided it was entirely possible she didn't want to know and went to plug in her hair dryer. If Kitty wanted her to know, she'd tell her.

Kitty knew there was that awkwardness - that tension between them. She didn't want it to be there either, not before her first real party. She spent the next ten minutes attempting to put some beachy waves in her hair, then when the hair dryer turned off and the room was quiet again, she took a deep breath. "I don't think it's a good idea. But...you've never had someone really have your back, and I don't want you to think that I don't. Whatever happens tonight, I'm still right here, okay?"

Illyana turned to Kitty and offered a crooked smile. "You're the best. And it'll all be fine. You'll see."