With it edging closer to Christmas, classes were winding down for the semester. We still had exams to get through, but after that it was smooth sailing. No more school, and those students with family to go home to for the break would be setting out soon thereafter.
That, of course, meant that regular activities for my team of student body X-Men would be on temporary hold. But it wasn't like any of us had problems with that. After a tumultuous few months, we could have done with some time away from the rigors of being private superheroes. The difficulty of it all had come as a shock to more than a few of my teammates.
One of those students had seemed to be Laurie Collins – Wallflower. I'd been keeping an eye on here since the thing in Limbo, talking to her more when we ran into each other and asking her friends on the team how she was doing. We weren't really close, but it was to the point that she trusted me enough to pull me aside to talk about something. Good. The last time we'd had a serious talk, it had been me getting ahold of her first.
"What's up?" I asked.
"I want to ask you for some advice."
Uh-oh. To ask me for any kind of advice? Red flags of desperation were flying all around her.
"I... sure," I relented on turning her down outright. If someone was coming to me for any kind of advice, they'd probably thought about the merits of asking my opinion on something in the first place.
Besides, Laurie was on the team, and the team was my responsibility. Thus, she was my responsibility.
Laurie rocked uncomfortably in place, trying to think of how she wanted to frame her question. She eventually decided to do so in the form of a hypothetical, "Imagine you lived your whole life being told that someone important to you was a bad person, but you never met them. And then you do."
"Okay," I replied, uncertain if I was quite picking up what she was putting down, "Is this a family thing?" I ventured to guess.
"My... dad," Laurie admitted with a sigh, eyes cast down to the ground, "My mom told me terrible things about him, for as long as I can remember. She kept me away from him, never told him about me. But he found me, and he wants to get to know me."
That sounded... way above my pay grade. My relationship with my family was great, so I had no way to relate, "You sure you want to talk about this with me and not Josh?"
Josh; her actual boyfriend... who also had family problems, seeing as how they'd disowned him once his powers manifested.
Laurie shrugged noncommittally, "You're kind of detached. That makes it a little easier to tell you stuff," She said, a tiny grin forming, "It'd be easier if you had office hours, but what can you do?"
I gave her a dry look, "Fucking office hours... ha. Funny," So that was a thing now. Fantastic. At least she felt good enough to make jokes, "So, okay. You never met your dad. Your mom says he's a dick. How bad are we talking here?"
Getting back to serious business, Laurie's mood sobered, "He has powers like mine," She mumbled, "You know what I can do. My pheromones? Imagine if I used them to get whatever I want."
The scary thought that we had already visited in the past? Yes, that would suck having someone manipulate people's thoughts and actions in such a way. It was why there was such close tabs kept on telepaths worldwide. The same idea went for Laurie's powers.
"That's what he did?" I asked.
Laurie nodded, "Anything he wanted, he'd just use his powers to get. Money, fame, women."
The way she trailed off and seemed remarkably uncomfortable on that last point snapped together a few puzzle pieces in my head, "Oh shit," I said quietly.
I didn't ask out loud, but then, I didn't have to. Laurie went into detail for me, "My mom married him, and when she got pregnant with me, she became immune to his pheromones. Then she got out of there. Sixteen years later, he found me, and here we are."
Seriously, was I the only person at this school who didn't have some shitty aspect to their life before showing up?
"Indeed," I said, not knowing where else to go with that information. It was a succinct way to wrap up something that seemingly terrifying, "Well, there are some people who you would ask about this, and they might suggest you turn the other cheek – maybe see if things have changed. Family is important, blah-blah-blah."
"-I think I see where you're going with this," Laurie interjected, seemingly amused, despite the conversation at hand.
"I am not one of those people," I continued, getting in a ranting groove, "I hold grudges, and certain levels of shit-housery are not to be washed away. Apologize for your fuck-ups if you mean it, but you don't get to expect forgiveness when you hurt people."
By the time I'd finished, I could feel the warmth in my hands. Somewhere along the line, I'd clenched my fists hard enough to start channeling light energy.
Somehow though, Laurie was able to find a thread to follow in my diatribe, "So, tell him to hit the bricks?"
I took a deep breath and let my hands relax, "That's the nicest way to describe what I would do," What I would do would likely involve considerably more violence. But she had the general idea, "Jeez, this guy really had the balls to reach out to you?"
You really had to make a lot of assumptions about the kind of person you were dealing with to try something like that.
"He says he's different now," Laurie said, sounding very unconvinced, "That he wants to make up for lost time."
My response rolled right out of my mouth, no filter, "Sounds like a line straight out of the 'Scumbag 101' playbook."
If he'd really changed, he would know to fuck off and disappear. From the sounds of things, he still seemed like the kind of person that would use what he could to go after what he wanted. I wanted to stomp a mudhole in the guy, and I wasn't even involved.
No wonder she always seemed to have issues with using her powers wrong. Given what had happened to her mom, she probably had none of that once she realized that Laurie could do the exact same thing to others that her father had.
Man, people were a mistake. Either way, I'd said all I could say that I had the right to on the matter.
"He hasn't pushed about it," Laurie said, "It's been a few weeks since it last came up at all."
I pursed my lips but didn't pursue the issue any further. It was her life, after all, "Well, you have my opinion," I said, giving Laurie a pat on the arm to signify that our talk was concluding, "And if it turns out you need someone to blast this guy in the face, you have my number. If the rest of your friends don't beat me to it, that is."
I was pretty sure that between the rest of the former New Mutants, she wouldn't have any shortage of people who had her back.
Laurie sighed in what I hoped was relief and smiled, "Thanks, Bellamy."
"It's literally my job," I replied, "Just remember, you're not saddled with someone forever because you share genes. Family can be a choice too."
Not for me. My mom and dad fucking rule, and I was hyped to go home and spend a few weeks with them over the break. But for people with crappy families, in my head, it was fair for the option to exist. I had never been a fan of circumstances beyond one's own control.
I was just trying to sound profound, and I hoped I'd sounded as wise as I'd wanted to. As the team leader, I had to try and be insightful from time-to-time for the sake of my minions' confidence in me. Maybe then, it would seem like I knew more what I was doing.