FicWad

Jean had felt a surge of annoyance when Betsy had run away from the situation and the responsibility that afternoon. Jean was not perfect, and she knew it; however she did try to make up for her short comings. She knew that she had an awful temper, so she hid it carefully in the name of kindness and a nice smile. Jean was not smart. She knew that. After all, she did share the same house as many other geniuses, and knew them for what they were. She was not one of them. However, she did do something that most of them didn’t, mainly because they didn’t have to, she applied herself. This generally made up for her lack of natural intelligence.

So, when Betsy had left the room in a hurry, Jean was annoyed, but she quickly shoved that emotion under the carpet. She wanted to yell at the Goth for not being there where Kitty needed her, but yelling was not the answer, and probably Betsy would only get in the way, anyway. So, Jean grit her teeth, and reminded herself that yelling at a person who wasn’t there would be counter-productive.

Instead she turned her attention to the more productive task of getting Kitty cleaned up, and not-so-incidentally grilling her about what had happened. The story involving an aggressive piece of ground did not sit any better with Jean than it did with Betsy, and Jean heard more things over the course of the day than Betsy did. The soccer star had an idea about what might have happened, and so now the inquisition must begin.

Of course, while Jean was not genius material, she wasn’t stupid, either. Well, she wasn’t precisely stupid. She might not know Puff Daddy from Eminem, but she was fairly good at knowing when someone was lying to her, when stories did not mesh with one another, and most importantly, she knew that Kitty wasn’t going to spill the beans to her. While they may live in the same house, most of the Academy students were barely on nodding terms with each other.

So, Jean knew better than to grill Kitty directly. She resorted to an indirect means. It was the popular girls’ secret weapon. Jean started “chatting” with the preppy sophomore. The red head was very adept at the fine art of interrogation via chatting.

“Ooh, I think there’s a piece of gravel in that scratch, hold still. Yike, what did you trip over that made you hit the ground so hard?”

“Uh, like, my feet,” Kitty blushed as she rolled her eyes, “I was running in the totally vain hope that I could catch a ride back to the Academy before Scott, like, did his total Pietro impression and took off. Maybe Mr. Russovitch is right. I am hopeless at co-ordination. I managed not only to hit the ground at fifty miles an hour, but I still missed getting a ride.”
Jean shivered at the mention of the rabid gym teacher. She felt very glad that her gym teacher was Mr. McCoy.

“I know what trying to bum a ride off a guy can be like,” Jean rolled her eyes in sympathy, “Duncan almost never waits for me, and my last class of the day is Spanish. I have to run from one end of the school to the other to catch my ride.”

“Uhhg, I feel for you. I have computer apps. last. Lucky for me it’s right by the entrance, but about fifty of my friends are in that class, so I never get out until, like, after last bell.” Kitty pushed her hair out of her eyes.

“Computer apps, huh? That’s the one your friend Doug’s from, right?” Jean asked, picking up the tube of antiseptic from the bed.

“Yeah,” Kitty grinned, “He’s such a nice guy. I keep on trying to hook him up with my friends, but it never lasts. He’s gotten totally obsessed with an e-mail pen-pal. She lives in Scotland, apparently. The way he talks about her you would think she had just come out of class with him.”

“So that’s what he was going on about,” Jean laughed nicely, “We have gym together, and he was just going on and on about this girl who actually got his Dungeons and Dragons jokes and wasn’t you.”

“Even I don’t get all of his weird RP world jokes. That does sound like her alright. Of course, anyone with the screen name Wolfsbane-Werewolf-Lass has got to have a few eccentricities.”

“What’s Doug’s screen name?” Jean asked in a Do-I-even-want-to-know? tone of voice.

“CypherWorlock42, the only part I get is the 42, and that’s only because of the book that Kurt forced down my throat. He seems to sic it anybody who walks onto the Academy grounds.” Kitty laughed, feeling more at ease now that the subject was off gym, arguably her worst subject, and that wasn’t just because she had the athletic ability of a tomato.

“I know, Riley caught me reading it one day, I was the biggest dork in the universe for three days straight after that.” Jean said, keeping careful track of the emotions on Kitty’s face. “She and Amy wouldn’t shut up about it. Sometimes I wonder why they even hang around with us when they always seem to be trying to catch the soccer players at everything.”

“Yeah,” Kitty rolled her eyes, “I totally never want to get caught in all that backstabbing. How do you stand it?”

“I wouldn’t call it back stabbing.” Jean said, a little hurt by that unkind assumption, “Some people just want to be popular so badly they become a little too gossipy. I feel sorry for them.”

Kitty was really glad that Jean couldn’t read thoughts as hers were not what anybody outside her head should hear. Somebody woke up with the rose tinted glasses on too tight today. Yeesh, there is such a thing as being too kind. She actually believes in all that drivel she spouts? However she didn’t enlighten Jean about the thoughts she was having.

The two girls chatted some more, but Jean had found out all she needed within the first half hour. Plus, the conversation was getting awkward. Kitty soon discovered that she had about as much in common with the impossibly perfect red head as she did with that funny gothic girl John and Kurt had been discussing a few days ago. Jean put a halt to the conversation by grabbing a book that had become entangled in the covers.

“Ouch, Annabelle Lee? Funny, I wouldn’t have pegged you for a “depress your pants off” type of reader. I read that one two years ago because a friend told me to, I couldn’t get through it. I’ll lend you the cliff notes, if you like. I think I still have them somewhere. That way if the teacher asks you about what is going on you can come up with a pretty good answer.” Jean smiled reassuringly.

“No thanks, I want to nail this.” Kitty smiled back, “Why do you have cliff notes to a book that you don’t like anyway?”

“Because the friend who wanted me to read this wanted to discuss it after I had read it. I couldn’t exactly tell her that I found it so depressing that I almost ripped my copy to smithereens, could I? Well, I’ll see you at dinner, then.”

Jean left the room, closing the door behind her. She went to the library where she had dumped her bags, and she got out her cell phone. Dialing four on speed dial got her Mr. Fujiyoka’s neat clipped voice, and she asked to be put on with Taryn. Now was the time to compare notes with her best friend.