Playing with Fire

Still haven't figure out how to make bold and italics work here. Yes, I am computer illiterate.

Still don't own the X-men, sucks don't it? Oh, and I'm a stay home Mom w/3 kids and vast amounts of student loan debt. Go ahead, ask me why I got a graduate degree and then stayed home to take care of rug rats, I dare ya. Read as we don't have enough money for it to be worth youile ile to sue me.

If you like this, if you hate this, please review it. I'm actually curious about what people think. It's hard to tell whether I'm doing a good job or not w/o feedback. (Doesn't mean I'll change a damn thing, but I'd still like to hear).

Hope you enjoy.

PICKING UP THE PIECES

Thank goodness there had been time for Kitty to have that bath. She was much more relaxed and in a much better mood when she finally emerged from the steaming bathroom and trotted down the hall to the small metal cubicle she and Rogue were currently calling home. She reached into the metal cabinet that now housed her entire wardrobe and pulled out fresh clothes - jeans and a light sweater now that the warm afternoon had given way to a cool spring evening. Her half of the cabinet wasn’t much bigger than her gym locker at school, but this wasn’t as much of a problem as it might have been three months ago.

Her entire wardrobe now consisted of the few things she’d left at home when she moved here and a couple of things she’d managed to acquire since Mystique had blown the mansion to hell - along with her closet and every stitch in it. She knew it was silly, when so much more important things had been lost, but it still irked her intensely that she’d lost her two favorite pair of shoes and all the nice satin bras and panties she’d saved up for to replace the flowery cotton ‘little girl’ things her mom had always insisted on getting her.

When she’d finished changing she threw her towel into the hamper in the corner and flopped down on her cot, elbows on knees and her head in her hands. She couldn’t avoid thinking about the events of the afternoon any longer.

Kurt’s words from earlier drifted, unbidden, into her mind, “you will regret this later…” and her own response, “I could never regret this.” She’d meant it then, it had felt so true at the time, but it seemed that all she had left now was regret. Regret that she had started it, regret that he had ended it. Regret, like a bitter, ashy taste in her mouth. That, and a burning feeling of shame.

Why, why had she suddenly taken leave of her senses and thrown herself at one of her best friends? She’d gone to him for comfort, for someone to confide in and had come off like some desperate nympho. God, I’m only seventeen,, he probably thinks I’m some kind of bimbo. It was so humiliating. She’d never – well, not really - thought of Kurt that way before. She did love him, that had been nothing but simple truth, but not as anything other than a very good friend - that was it...really. In fact, if anyone had suggested to her that something like this afternoon could ever happen she would have laughed. Her? With Kurt? Get real! And now, now what must he think of her, begging for it and to hell with the consequences? At least one of them had had the self control to be responsible, unfortunately for her self-respect it hadn’t been her.

Oh God, how could she face him? Especially on top of her tantrum over wanting to be 'normal' again. How could she have been so amazingly callous and stupid as to say that to someone who had never in his life been anything but a total, visible 'freak'?

She ran her fingers through her damp hair and realized that it was probably about time to head to dinner. She considered skipping the meal and just sneaking out for leftovers later, but hell, she’d have to face Nightcrawler, no Kurt, sooner or later anyway, and the way everyone around here ate there was no guarantee there’d be any leftovers.

Her stomach clenched at the thought of sitting at the same table as him, having to make conversation and act like nothing had happened. Could she do it, could he - continue as if nothing had changed? Or had things changed so drastically that nothing could be the same between them again? More importantly, did she want it to be?

She thought about the look in his eyes before she’d left, a burning she’d never seen before. She thought of the feel of his body against hers, hard muscles sliding beneath soft velvet fur, the musky sweet taste of his mouth crushing hers and the room seemed suddenly smaller and much too warm.

Where do you go from here Kitty Pryde? she thought, with something close to despair. Other than back to the bathroom for that cold shower, anyway.

With a sigh she forced herself up from the bed and headed for the door. Sitting here’s not solving my problems or getting me fed, so I might as well go on and start picking up the pieces, she thought. Somber with resignation as she headed down the cold, echoing metal hallway to the cavernous chamber they were using as a dining hall. I can’t put it off forever, I’ve gotta face Fuzzy sometime.

By the time she arrived, everyone but Kurt was already seated at the huge, rectangular metal table and Ororo and Scott were busy distributing the results of their afternoon’s culinary labors. That was one of the things they all missed most about life in the mansion – staff. The luxury of not having to take it in turns to cook and clean everything. Sure, they’d always been responsible for their own rooms and laundry and had taken turns at the communal bathrooms, but all the weekday meals had been cooked and all the other vast spaces of the mansion proper had been cleaned and maintained by a very small, dedicated and discreet staff. A staff which could no more be allowed into the secret spaces of this underground bunker than they ever had been into the secret sub-basements of the mansion complex.

Sitting down across the table from Jean and between Bobby and Evan she filled her plate and forced herself to follow the conversation – all the time glancing anxiously at the door for any sign of Kurt.

“Yo’ Cyke,” Evan called to Scott, who was returning to the table with the final bowl of salad. “You actually burned the pasta. How is it even possible to burn pasta, man? Auntie O’,” he turned to Ms. Munroe with a grin, “haven’t you learned yet not to let this dude near anything that actually has to be cooked?”

Ms. Munroe just gave him a withering look and took her place with the grown-ups at the other end of the table. Scott, meanwhile, smiled disarmingly at Evan while simultaneously whipping a handful of very sticky spaghetti directly into the younger teen’s face. Evan was preparing to retaliate, the younger students all looking on eagerly and waiting for an excuse to join in, when the Professor cleared his throat quietly while Logan directed a quelling glare around the table. The joint effort quickly restored decorum, or what passed for it at a table full of teenage mutants.

Kitty just let the resuming flow of conversation wash over her as she concentrated on her meal (to be fair, the spaghetti wasn’t actually burned, it was just overcooked and more than a little sticky) and kept a surreptitious watch on the door to the room. No one else seemed to have noticed Kurt’s absence, but as the meal progressed Kitty became increasingly worried and her watch on the door became less covert and more frequent. He’d said that he’d be fine, that he’d be along shortly, and if there was one thing you could usually count on around here it was that the Elf wouldn't miss a meal.

Kitty was reasonably sure that no one had ever died from sexual frustration before – heck, the way Lance used to talk, if that were possible she would’ve put him in his grave ages ago – but remembering how Kurt had looked as she walked away, she was pretty sure his problem had been a bit more than just general horniness. She wasn’t sure what it was, but she knew that, somehow, she’d managed to push him over the edge into someplace that had frightened him, probably even more than it had frightened her.

“Hey, K-man!” Startled, Kitty looked up, wide-eyed and blushing scarlet, as Evan called out to Kurt. “You don’t get on this stuff quick dude, you’re gonna be stuck with the veggie sauce! Where you been man?”

“Yeah,” Scott called jokingly from down the table. “I thought the signs of the Apocalypse went War, Famine, Plague and the ‘fuzzy dude’ being late for a meal. You’re bumping the order around Kurt. Should we take your temperature or something?”

Kurt shot the two one of his trademark hundred megawatt grins and answered with a wry, “what can I say mein Freund? I went swimming at the lake and forgot to put my watch back on after. But you will notice that even without a watch my stomach would never let me miss the meal entirely.”

Kitty tried to watch him closely without seeming to, but he very carefully never even looked her way – difficult since he was talking to Evan, who was sitting right next to her – and took a seat down at the opposite end of the table next to Mr. Logan and Ms. Munroe. He might not be avoiding her, though. He did kind of stay a bit aloof from the New Mutants, and she was surrounded by them.

As she watched him take his seat and start filling his plate, she noticed Mr. Logan give him a long, appraising look and then raise his eyes to look down the table at her. Her stomach tightened and she hurriedly dropped her eyes to her plate and busied herself with finishing off her salad. As she did so, she remembered the look that Mr. Logan had given her as she’d passed him outside on the way to the elevator. She wondered just how much the feral X-man knew or could guess about what had gone on that afternoon. With his hyper acute senses, you could never be quite sure what he knew, but Kitty was fairly certain that the answer was a heck of a lot more than he ever let on.

She still remembered the first time she had come back to the mansion after a ‘date’ with Lance Alvers, and Logan’s quietly fierce comment as she had passed him on her way up the stairs. “Ya smell like Earthquake Boy and his cheap cigs, Half Pint. Ya know you can do better than him, dontcha?” He had given her an enigmatic look from beneath dark, furrowed brows and then continued down the stairs, an unlit stogie clenched between his teeth.

She had told Lance about the incident later – not the ‘you can do better’ part, but the rest of it. It had had the rather welcome effect of slowing down Lance’s advances - he lived in fear that the X-Men’s resident over-protective sociopath might decide that he’d gone too far with the ‘little girl’ of the team and give his lungs more direct access to the outside air. On the occasions when he’d gotten carried away and tried to pressure her into going farther than she wanted she’d only had to remind him of the ‘Logan factor’ and he’d backed off at once. At the time she had always professed to be as frustrated by the limits as Lance had been. In retrospect, though, she couldn’t actually remember a single time she’d been tempted to let Lance get past some fairly heavy kissing and a little bit of groping through her clothes.

“Hey Kitty, pass the garlic bread, willya?” But, before she could pull herself back to the here and now, Evan had reached across her, grabbed a slice and launched it across the table to Roberto, who caught it with a grin and began to munch contentedly.

She risked another glance down the table to where Kurt sat staring at his plate and poking at his food. Usually he would have been on his second plate by now and maybe threatening to arm wrestle someone for the last piece of garlic bread. He looked tired, and he was making little effort to follow the conversation at his end of the table, where Logan, Scott and Dr. McCoy were talking with the Professor about some plans for improving the Danger Room during its refitting. Kitty knew she should have been paying attention to that conversation, as she was supposed to be helping with the wiring and programming, but she just couldn't be bothered.

Kurt had either not had the time or the inclination to clean up before dinner, because he was still wearing the rumpled jeans and shirt that she had seen discarded by the boathouse this afternoon. His hair was sticking up in odd little tufts where it had dried in the sun and he looked kind of …fluffy…from letting his fur dry without bothering to smooth it down. He didn’t look really bad or anything, he just didn’t look quite there, like he just couldn’t be bothered, and usually everyone made the effort to show up neat and clean for their 'family' dinner.

Kitty jumped as Evan elbowed her in the ribs and she realized that she had missed out on part of a conversation between he and Jean as he said, “yeah, the ‘Crawler does look kind of like something the cat dragged in Jean. Hey, Kurt!” Jean was now hissing at Evan with a look of intense irritation on her face as he yelled down the table to Kurt, who looked up slowly at Evan’s hail. “You think maybe you could take the time to neat yourself up a bit before dinner in future dude? You’re ruining Jean’s appetite down here.”

Kurt’s good-natured smile was, perhaps, a bit strained as he leaned past Ms. Munroe to look at Jean, while making his best effort at a rude gesture at Evan behind her back. Jean was alternating glaring at Evan with staring at her plate in embarrassment.

“Entschuldigen Sie mich,” he said, after swallowing the bite of garlic bread he had been chewing on. “I was afraid that if I took the time to stop and change on the way in the ravening mutant hordes down there,” he gestured to the end of the table, “might have polished off Frau Munroe’s delectable bolognese,” and he grinned impishly at Ororo. The smile disappeared rapidly from his face, however, as Ororo reached out and took his chin firmly in one slim hand.

“Kurt,” she said, her slightly accented voice taking on an exasperated tone, “you’re bleeding child. What on earth have you done to yourself this time?”

Kitty saw his eyes widen slightly and looked quickly down at her plate as he reached up with a somewhat befuddled look to touch hesitantly at the spot on his lip that she’d indicated. “Ah, um,” he sounded a bit flustered now, “something startled me when I was out by the lake and I, ah, bit myself? I didn’t realize it was more than a scratch.” He sounded apologetic and slightly embarrassed as he tried to turn his head away and resume eating.

“Bit yourself? A scratch?” Ororo repeated in a tone of disbelief. “Child, you’ve bitten entirely through your lip, what could possibly startle you that badly? Henry,” she ignored his efforts to move his head away as she glanced across the table at Dr. McCoy, who had been following the conversation along with almost everyone else at the table, “I think you should take a look at this after dinner - it might require stitches.”

Kurt’s face fell almost comically at the mention of stitches. He had an absolute loathing of needles and yet he seemed to manage to collect more stitches than the rest of the team put together. At least in his case the fur did a good job of hiding any scars.

“Now,” and Ororo raised one elegant eyebrow, “how on earth did you manage to do this to yourself Kurt?” Her tone was a cross between amusement and exasperation as she eyed him affectionately, still ignoring his attempts to evade her hand on his chin.

“I told you, Ms. Munroe,” Kurt said with a half smile and a slight shrug, “I bit myself when something startled me.” His voice had gone somewhat cold and his eyes were flat, but Ms. Monroe didn't take the hint and her eyebrow crept slightly higher. In response Kurt let his mouth gape open to reveal his razor sharp incisors and explained, with a look of slight exasperation, “they are quite sharp, you know. It doesn’t take much if I’m not careful.”

Kitty felt a slow flush creep up her cheeks at his words. ‘They are sharp you know.’ The words echoed in her mind and brought back a flood of sensation as she flashed back to when she’d last heard him say almost the exact same thing.

Evan and Ray were giving Kurt, who was looking rather harassed, a hard time about being a bigger danger to himself than he was to anyone else. No one paid much attention to Kitty when she excused herself and, placing her plate and flatware on the service cart, hurriedly left the room. No one, that is, except Kurt, who had a slightly sickened look as he watched her leave, and Logan, who looked speculatively between the two of them, an expression of concern passing briefly across his face before it was replaced by his customary taciturn expression.


Kurt made an effort to respond to the good-natured ribbing he was being subjected to, but as Ororo finally released his jaw, with a firm injunction to see Dr. McCoy immediately after dinner, all he could really think about was the look on Kitty’s face as she’d left the table.

He’d spent a long time at the lakeshore, persuading himself that the events of the afternoon really weren’t that catastrophic. Just the result of a lot of stress, a little emotional catharsis and a ton of overactive teenage hormones for both of them. By the time he came in for dinner he’d more than half convinced himself that a sufficiently sincere apology and some light-hearted gallantry would be enough to smooth things over between them.

He’d even dared to hope that they could completely avoid the whole tail issue. She hadn’t done it on purpose, and just thinking about it brought him intense discomfort, in fact he had to force his mind not to skitter frantically away from the subject. He hated the response that kind of touch could inspire in him, hated the control it gave a person over him once they found it. So, yes, now she knew it was pretty much the most sensitive spot on his anatomy, but it wasn’t like she was really going to be interested in that information now that the…moment…had passed.

He’d been sure they could probably gloss over the whole self control issue, or lack thereof, associated with it. And besides, he’d thought with some relief, he had actually retained some self control or the current situation would be a whole lot different. Hell, he should probably be grateful for what she’d done, considering it had stopped things before they’d done anything irrevocable.

We’re friends, after all, he had thought with a glimmer of optimism as he entered the dining hall, friends can recover from mistakes and misunderstandings, can’t they?

That thought, and the accompanying optimism, had been pretty thoroughly squashed by his first sight of Kitty as he entered the room. Her eyes had gone wide when she’d seen him, with what he could only interpret as fear. She had then immediately looked down at her plate and spent the remainder of the meal trying not to be seen shooting nervous looks his way, her face alternately flushing and then going pale. Her response when Frau Munroe had noticed his bitten lip had sent a chill of ice flowing into his gut and he had had to fight an almost overwhelming wave of actual, physical sickness as he had watched her face flush again at mention of his teeth, followed by her rapid departure from the table.

Right Wagner, he thought with biting self-derision, no big deal. Just emotions and hormones. Fix it all with an apology. Sure! Probably scared the shit out of her with that little display back there. Now she knows what kind of animal you are, the only real question is how much of her reaction is fear and how much is disgust. He really wasn’t sure which of the two was worse, but he was quite sure he deserved them both. He knew all too well exactly what he was like when his control snapped, or came that close to it, and it wasn’t something a…normal…person was likely to understand or accept. Hell, it even disgusted him, so how could it not disgust, even frighten, someone like Kitty. Gott, he’d been deluding himself.

Oh Katzchen, he thought with remorse so intense it was almost a physical pain, what have I done?

He forced himself to smile and laugh at the good natured jokes still being directed his way and worked mechanically through the rest of the food on his plate, not really noticing what he ate, nor caring. It all tasted like ash anyway.

The table was rapidly clearing now, as everyone finished eating and headed out. No one tended to linger much over Saturday night dinner, they always had that evening and the next morning free – a rare combination – and the teens were usually determined to put their freedom to good use. Of course these days that tended to mean nothing more exotic than staying up late and watching movies or playing games while inhaling popcorn and soda. They weren’t exactly welcome much of anywhere outside the Institute’s grounds. But it was the principal of the thing - it was their free night and they sure as hell weren’t going to waste it sitting at the dinner table with the grown-ups. That wasn’t much of an issue tonight anyway, as the Professor left with Dr. McCoy and Frau Munroe, still discussing modifications for the new danger room, leaving Logan the only adult lingering at the rapidly clearing table.

Kurt sat staring silently at his empty plate as the room cleared, letting the chatter of the departing teens wash over him as he tried to find the energy to drag himself up from his chair.

He caught a fragment of conversation between Bobby and Ray as they neared the doors, discussing their continuing search for Logan’s elusive beer stash. They were determined to find it one of these days, though what they’d do with it if they did was an interesting question. No one could really imagine the two were willing to face ‘the wrath of Logan’ if they actually raided his supply, so it was really something of an academic exercise.

Kurt couldn’t muster his usual amusement at their fruitless search tonight. Usually it was all he could do to keep a straight face when the two went off on one of their hunts. He did vaguely wonder how they could have spent so much time at the Institute, though, and still not have the sense to save the conversation for later. If he could hear them with only a little effort, then they might as well have just held the entire conversation right at the Wolverine’s elbow.

He raised his gaze from the remnants of his meal long enough to exchange a wry look with the man beside him. Logan was utterly complacent about their ‘mission’ and Kurt imagined they could probably search ‘til Hell froze and never find where the man stored his brews. He’d known where Logan’s hiding place in the mansion was since not long after he first arrived at the Institute when, upon seeing the man chugging down a Molson, he’d commented on his shitty taste in beer. Kurt had spent his formative years among a people for whom drinking was an art form and (at least occasional) drunkenness something of a moral obligation. It had left him more than a little opinionated on the subject of drinking in general and beer in particular.

The ensuing argument over the virtues of Canadian versus German beer had led to Logan, not known for his excessive respect for the law, offering the fifteen year old a beer from his stash in an effort to prove his point. He’d failed, Kurt still had little respect for Canadian beer and they had eventually agreed to disagree about their differing tastes. Kurt had occasionally toyed with the idea of telling Bobby and Ray exactly where the surly Canadian kept his stash, but he didn’t really want to be responsible for the potential loss of life if they actually were stupid enough to raid it.

Kurt shook his head absently, annoyed at how his mind was wandering, trying to avoid thinking about his current predicament. Amara and Roberto were starting to clear the table around him as he pushed himself to his feet with a sigh, prompting Logan to look questioningly up from the wreckage of his meal.

Mein Gott, he thought with some asperity, it’s hard to believe that someone around here actually eats as much as I do. Out loud he said, “I can’t put off my ‘date’ with Herr McCoy forever, now can I?”
“Not if you know what’s good for you anyway,” the older man replied, giving Kurt a speculative look. “Y’okay Elf?” He finally asked gruffly, surprising the younger man.

“Fine, Logan, I’m…just fine,” he answered quickly with a false smile, turning to leave the room. Kurt was one of the few kids at the school to thoroughly understand and accept the impossibility of lying to or even misdirecting him, and Logan knew it, so it wasn’t a lie so much as a request for privacy and he recognized it as such. The only problem was, Logan wasn’t sure that it was a request he was going to be able to honor.

He watched the boy all the way to the door, noting the tension in his shoulders and the restless lashing of his tail and wondered just what the hell was going on between Half Pint and the Elf. He absolutely reeked of her and, even though she’d bathed, Kitty still had his smell on her strong enough that he could catch it from halfway down the table. That in itself didn’t bother him. Whatever Charles and Ororo might think, he didn’t give a flying fuck what the kids did in private, so long as they were responsible and no one got hurt. He had little doubt that if there was a teenage boy in the place he could trust to be responsible it was Kurt. No, what bothered him was the body language combined with the fact that they both reeked of guilt, and the Elf had serious undertones of sickness, pain and fear.

Much as he hated to stick his nose in anyone else’s business, Logan was starting to think that he might need to find out just what the hell was going on. He let a noise halfway between a snarl and a sigh escape him as he surged up from the table, startling Amara as she came in for the last load of dishes. He stuffed an unlit cigar between his teeth and headed for the elevator. He needed to go topside for some fresh air and time to think.


Kurt had been surprised, not by the fact that Logan had noticed his distress, but that he had commented on it. He was perfectly aware of Logan’s extraordinary senses and had no illusions about hiding much of anything from him. He was also, however, just as aware of the older mutant’s almost fanatical respect for personal privacy and so had been startled by his inquiry.

It occurred to him that, depending on how much distress Kitty was radiating, Logan might have been fishing for a confession of wrongdoing and an abject apology in order to avoid having to beat one out of him. It could be hard to tell with Logan – his expression didn’t change all that much between an ostensibly friendly “hello” and an offer to rip you a new asshole.

He suppressed a moment’s panic at the thought as he headed rapidly down the echoing corridor to Dr. McCoy’s temporary office. If Logan wanted to give him a good ass-whipping on Kitty’s behalf then he really couldn’t object. Neither, however, was he about to talk about what had happened that afternoon with anyone – with the possible exception of the injured party herself. After her reaction at dinner tonight, though, he was thinking that it might be best to give her a wide berth for a while. She apparently didn’t need his presence reminding her of what had occurred between them and Kurt had no intention of causing her any more pain than he already had. How on earth was he ever going to manage to pick up the pieces of this mess? With that cheerful thought in mind, he headed off to face Dr. McCoy and his dreaded needle.




Kurt lay on his bed, eyes glowing like coals in the dark of the small room. It wasn't late, really, but he had no desire to be social. He didn’t really want to face any of his friends, but the possibility of running into Kitty made him feel physically ill. He rubbed absently at his lip in agitation, it hurt more from Herr McCoy's stitches than it had from his teeth.

He shifted restlessly as he tried not to let himself think of how good it had felt to be touched, and not just sexually. He would gladly relinquish every heavenly and erotic sensation he’d experienced that afternoon in exchange for the innocent intimacy of Kitty’s head on his shoulder, seeking nothing more than the comfort of friendship.

He was an incredibly tactile creature, and he craved the comfort of touch with an intensity that he would never let his team mates see. He missed the casual intimacy and physical affection he had shared with his closest friends during his circus days. He had had a somewhat deserved reputation among those he was truly comfortable with for appropriating any available lap, male or female, young or old. The close quarters and intense physical demands of circus life had created many opportunities for touch.

Hell, he'd shared a room, and often a bed, with at least one other person at all times until he was almost thirteen years old, a little detail he hadn't bothered to share with his new team mates. When he'd first come to the Institute and discovered that his room was larger than the entire caravan he had shared with two room-mates for almost three years he had been amazed. He was so lonely at night the first few weeks that he’d almost had panic attacks.

He supposed that was part of the reason that he couldn't ever manage to stay away from Tabby for very long. Why he stayed with Amanda even as it became more and more apparent that what she found attractive was his mutation rather than him. He knew how pathetic that was - he'd been there before - but she and Tabby were two of the only people who'd ever really touched him since he'd come to America, and he couldn't bring himself to walk away from it, even when he knew he should.

He understood his current team-mates’ hesitancy to touch him – he was, after all, alien. A freak. The worst case scenario of the mutant they were all glad as hell they'd never have to be. Some of them probably even had nightmares of turning into something like him, their mutation evolving until they were a monster. Especially since they all knew it could conceivably happen - they'd seen it happen to Herr McCoy.

He also knew that most people didn’t have his need for physical closeness, but he still keenly felt the lack. This afternoon he had been so close to establishing a relationship with Kitty that would have filled some of that vacuum, if he hadn’t completely destroyed his chances by taking things too far.

Not much chance she’ll feel comfortable enough to get that close to me again, or close to me at all, he thought with some bitterness. He buried his face in his pillow and tried to banish the memories and sensations of that afternoon from his mind. It was a long time before he finally managed to get to sleep.