Mmm... Coke-a-cola... goooood...

What was I doing? Ah yes.

######-#####

"Stopstopstopstopstop!" Jess threw her arms up. "STO- ARGHHHHHH!"

Pietro slammed on the breaks, sending the car spinning around. He grinned at her terrified scream and waited patiently when the car finally rested back on all four wheels, facing the wrong way outside the football field.

Several minutes later, when Pietro had returned with a can of coke (couldn't resist), Jess lowered her hands and blinked, shaking hard. A few minutes later she turned and looked at him, still shaking.

"WHAT THE HELL WERE YOU-"

Pietro waited for the onslaught to end. At the two-minute mark, while she was trying to find a breath, Pietro pointed.

"hey, look, Duncan!"

Jess turned. "Really?"

"Yeah, see? Oh, check it out, Lance!" Pietro blurred to his team leader. "Heya buddy, come over here."

"Wha-at? Uh, Toad and I were just going-"

"Is Freddy here too?" interrupted Pietro.

"Uh, yeah, we-"

"Where?"

He frowned. "Pietro, shuddup. What are you doing here?"

"Just a little fun with Jess the amazing empath! See Summers the immovable fall for the incredibly annoying chick, see Matthews the jock fall for the immovable! But we need you!"

Lance cocked his head as Toad and Freddy ambled up slowly. "What d'you mean?"

Pietro grinned. "Uh uh uh, Alvers, that would be telling."

Jess finally ran up, moved to clutch at Pietro, then changed her mind and grabbed Lance, trying to keep herself up. "Sa-ave me! He should never, ever, ever, EVER drive!"

"You let him drive?"

She collapsed on the ground, still tugging on Lance's vest. She closed her eyes and groped in their minds, still talking. "I can't drive yet, he can, and I needed to find Duncan. Oh my god, Lance, it was horrible!"

She was going through them all at the same time, so the affection-drive (she had recently named everything after her computer, it was getting ridiculous) was already confusing. However, it seemed semi-reasonable to her.

More reasonable than Duncan's anyway, She was doing him so many favours today...

When it was finally finished, she considered her copied emotion silently.

"Dude, I think she's gone into shock." Whispered Lance, staring at her.

"Uh, aren't you meant to do CPR or something when they're in shock?" asked Freddy.

"She's breathing, you idiot." Snapped Todd. He was obviously still hung up on Kitty.

"I don't think she's in shock, just thinking. Y'know what she's like when she's thinking." Said Pietro.

Jess stood up determinedly. "Right. Okay."

She smiled and nodded to the four boys, who glanced at each other, and marched onto the field.

######-#####

Duncan waved and walked off the field. He just needed a drink.

He found himself face to face with Jessica Simmins, that weird chick who kept trying to play matchmaker with those freshman girls. Ugh. How could someone as hot as that be so into freshmen?

Not that he'd noticed, or anything.

Oh man, imagine how Scott would react if he knew Duncan had just called a girl hot?

Shit. She was holding him by the shoulders. "Hold still a second."

There was that weird, not-quite-there feeling again.

"Jesus, man, do you think about anything other than Scott these days? For the love of Mike..." She had her eyes closed and was muttering non-stop. "Oh, that's just disgusting. Okay... one, two, three, rip! Thankyou very much! Okay... one, two, three, in you go!" She opened her eyes and grinned at him. "Well?"

He stared at her for a second, then remembered what he'd been doing the last few days. He swore. "I gotta shower."

He left behind an incredibly smug-looking girl.

######-#####

Kurt was absently flipping a coin, a new habit he'd found mildly entertaining. He thought it was funny that he was better at it with three thick fingers than Evan with five thin and agile fingers. Besides, he knew just when to catch it to get tails.

He'd never lose a gamble again!

He looked up, Kitty was leaning on the doorframe, watching him.

"Oh, um, like, sorry, I just kinda spaced out." She blushed.

He grinned. "Nah, it's okay. Just practicing. What's up?"

Kitty sighed. "It's nothing."

She turned around the corner, heading towards the front door. Kurt frowned and stood up. He needed to do something about this.

######-#####

Todd and Lance were in the park still, watching the footballers hit each other.

They couldn't really understand the fascination with touching another guy's butt and calling it cool.

Lance looked around, starting to get bored. He saw Kitty walking toward the school. Studying was one thing, but this was ridiculous!

"hey, Toad, check it."

Todd glanced up. "Kitty."

"Yeah."

"She doesn't look so good."

"Maybe you should talk to her."

"No way, you do it."

They fell silent. Slowly, Todd stood up. "I... I'm hungry. I'll see you tonight, yo?"

"Yeah, I've gotta go too. Better actually at least start that stupid assignment."

"Yeah, guess so."

"See ya."

"Mmm."

######-#####

Kitty looked up. "Oh, hey."

"Hi."

He looked different. Everything was weird about him. He was standing just outside her circle of light, leaning on a tree. His voice, the way he stood, it was wrong, but she could understand why.

He cleared his throat. "You alright?"

"Not really, but you know about that." She tried to smile, but it came out as a grimace.

"Actually, not really." He shifted to his other leg. "Wanna tell me?"

She sighed. "I thought I had all this figured out. I thought if I ignored the feeling, if I concentrated on the fact it wasn't real... I thought I'd stop... stop caring about it." She looked away. "But, but it hasn't. And I don't know how to get rid of it."

"I figured that."

"I bet you think this is some huge joke."

"No. Did I ever say it was a joke?"

"The way you acted, I thought you liked what was happening."

"Not since I figured stuff out for myself. That was a while ago now."

She smiled slightly. "So you're on my side?"

"I'm always on your side, Kitty."

"I know. I gotta admit, there were a lot of times I didn't think you cared in the slightest-"

"No, oh no, I might not show it, but I do have a few feelings in here, y'know." He grinned and she laughed slightly. "Sometimes we all have to lie to get along, right?"

"Yeah. I just never thought about it really. I never think about you having more feelings than the ones that you show everyday..."

"Jerkiness?"

She laughed, louder now. "Yeah, I guess. You are such a jerk to me, sometimes."

"I make up for it though."

"Not enough."

He smiled as he sat down next to her. "Wouldn't want you figuring me out."

"You don't want anyone figuring you out." She replied, poking him.

He narrowed his eyes and poked her back. "And you can talk?"

"Not really." She stood up and turned to face him, walking backwards. "I just don't want you to figure me out."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

Suddenly she ran at him and wrapped her arms around his neck. She kissed his cheek roughly and jumped back to her feet. "Thanks for the talk. I knew I could count on you."

He stared after her, touching his cheek. "Hey, anytime." He closed his eyes, a small smile playing on his lips. "I'm always here. Anytime..."

######-#####

Things were back to normal pretty quick, considering, thought Kurt, sitting in the back row of a bad movie with Tabitha. She was leaning on his arm, actually watching the movie. Surprisingly enough, this happened a lot. They would act like they weren't going to be paying attention to the movie, then end up just sitting, enjoying each other's company. He absently felt his tail wrap around her waist and she kissed his chin before looking back at the screen.

He smiled. He'd never imagined anything could feel like this. It wasn't... it wasn't what a relationship should be. But it was the best thing he'd ever felt. Sometimes, he thought, he was luckier than even Lance and Kitty. At least he knew where he stood in the world when he was with his girlfriend.

Macbeth had been canceled. Shortly after Jess had gotten irritated with the script and the cast and everything else. No mutant in the drama club had talked to her for a week.

Jean and Scott were happily arguing again. Little smiles over the dinner table had been noticed, but everything was reasonable. Nothing out of the (for the X-men) ordinary. Kitty had asked Lance out again and they were once again madly in love, for the next two weeks.

He rolled his eyes. Kitty would never see anything other than what she always had. But at times like these... he looked down at Tabitha. He didn't really mind. Let Kitty try to be normal. She'd realise normal was what you made it one day.

Duncan had not been seen the week after he 'recovered', but when he did return, he was hot after Jean all over again.

He noticed something and smiled. He elbowed Tabitha and pointed. Bobby and Amara were trying to sneak into the theatre down the front. They hadn't even chosen a good movie.

Tabitha winked at Kurt and made a little energy bomb, holding it out to him. He took it and teleported behind the two would-be rogues. He slipped the bomb in the belt of Bobby's pants and disappeared. There were so few people and it was so dark that no one would notice.

A small bang towards the front, followed by a yelp, then a burst of laughter from the very back, disturbed the movie's worst scene.

Tabitha pulled Kurt from the cinema, laughing, and he let himself be pulled into a series of prank-runs.

They screwed up one of Pietro's dates, ruined Kitty's latest attempts to get Lance to buy her something and blew a sundae up in Duncan's face.

It was a very good weekend.

######-##### ######-#####

Just a nice little ending. I'll let you figure out who Kitty's therapist was, and I'm not sure this is going to keep going. I'm starting something else, don't worry 'me'. Just, I need to think about what it is, first... But this MAY keep going. Not the mid-summer story, but something to continue this.

Hope you liked this one. I liked some of it, myself, but not all. Oh well, since when do I ever like it? Ooh, Coke... bye guys!