The X-Project

Cessily wants to go to the prom but doesn't want to go alone. Easy solution, right?

Kevin desperately needed a distraction and he couldn't turn to the metal shop for it for once. He had blocks of wood in there for powers training but he was starting to become really wary of it. He didn't get why his doom cloud grew exponentially when he didn't train and when he did it was like the best feeling he'd ever had in his life. It was weird and he wasn't sure what to do about it, hadn't for a while now. He'd played the ignore it and it'll go away game for about a month. Now he was onto the avoid it and it'll go away again. It meant he had to avoid, though, and that meant his distractions were at an all time low.

His feet carried him around the mansion in seemingly endless circles around the building. He didn't pay much attention to where he was going, just cycled through all the things he could do to distract himself that he wasn't doing. The urge to reach out and graze bare fingers over the walls wasn't helping. By time a silver gleam caught his eye through a doorway Kevin was tensed with fists shoved so far into his pockets they may have punched holes through the other end. Despite that he stopped because it was truly beautiful to see light reflect off of Cessily, living art. "Hey you," he greeted from the doorway. "How's resident technophobe adjustin'?"

The History Channel had so much of her attention that Kevin's voice nearly startled her into puddleness. Her hands flew to her face to make sure everything was still in place before she turned to smile at him. "Kevin! Haven't seen you in a while. I'm managing all right, what about you?"

He shrugged from where he was leaning against the door frame. It was temptation in and of itself knowing he could reach out and he'd feel it decay under his fingertips. His hood managed to protect the wood from his cheek but he considered he should likely move away from it. Fists clenched tighter in his pockets. "Ah'm alright. Nathan keeps floatin' bigger files onto mah desk outta amusement fer watchin' mah head consider 'sploding Ah think, but it's cool otherwise. Haven't been getting lost, walking into rooms ain't yours er nothin', right?"

Cess laughed. "No, no missteps, just a few melting incidents, but I think my suite-mates are getting over the surprise. At least they don't step in me any more." She looked slightly away at that, embarrassed. "I haven't met many people outside of the teachers and other students, but I see all sorts of other people around. Which one is Nathan?"

Stepped in, now there was a downside Kevin was never going to be able to relate to and he had no problems with lacking that shared experience. "Nathan's tall, adult-like, runs Elpis, lives in tha boathouse, has a sorta crooked smile, kinda grey," he rattled off softly but quickly as he tried to think of more descriptors. "If Ah ever see 'im when Ah'm with ya Ah'll point 'im out." Kevin decided to wander further into the room considering the doorframe and wall were the hanging bait it was in front of a starving cat at the moment. Normally he would have stayed put but he wandered over a few feet from the couch. "Roommates not bein' obnoxious? Ah couldn't stand mine when Ah first moved in."

"I don't have a roommate," she said. "I guess I'm just the odd man out." Then Cessily perked up. "I have heard rumors about some sort of formal dance though." Cessily did love to dance, and get dressed up, if she could manage to stay solid...

"Well, technically neither do Ah but a suitemate's pretty much the same thing, only sounds lame." Kevin managed to even crack the barest of smiles when he said it. Cessily, and likely just interaction in general, was starting to take the edge off his brain and concentrating on things other than what he could destroy with his touch was becoming possible. Sort of. If he could stop from getting distracted by the glint of light off her neck or her jaw or her cheekbone. "Oh? Formal? Ah wasn't 'round here for no formals last time Ah was here. Kinda accidentally exploded someone an' all." Though Cessily looked about ready to radiate from her reaction. Girls and dances...the word "frightening" came to mind.

Cess jumped up from the couch. "The theatre junkies always went all out. Last year I let them talk me into doing a burlesque thing with them." She laughed as she twirled into something resembling a pirouette. "My mother was so horrified. I think I was grounded the entire summer."

"Burlesque?" Kevin's eyebrows shot upward. Maybe there was more than one thing called burlesque but Kevin was definitely thinking of the kind that involved a striptease. Of course, the mere inkling of that thought brought abundantly vivid images to his head. Luckily the view of Cessily as art and not as an actual girl also made her less sexual than a Barbie doll so the mental images weren't half as bad as they could have been. "Ain't the point of a formal to dress up in clothes, not pasties?"

She dropped back to the couch in giggles. "We didn't do any stripping, our dresses were just a bit... abbreviated." She sighed as she stretched out. "I don't have anything to wear and I don't think I have the courage to go by myself in a new school."

That was almost disappointing. The mental images Kevin had fizzled away. "So find someone to drag with ya. Can't be that hard." After all, she seemed social enough to pull it off to him. And with the infectious smile she wore so often when he saw her it should have been easy.

Cess turned around sharply to look at him. "You should do it."

Kevin blanched. Pink quickly moved up his neck and over his cheeks to fill in the white. Awkwardly Kevin shifted. On the one hand he figured it could be fun, on the other hand it could cause more drama. He didn't need drama. "Uh...ya realize Ah got a boyfriend right?"

"Are you going with him?" She asked with a head tilt. "Because if you are, you obviously can't go with me."

"Well...no." And now he felt slightly more awkward as he tried to figure out how to put his thoughts into verbal words that made sense. "It's just...y'know, it's one o' them things that can lead to awkward when people find out sometimes, especially if ya didn't know and Ah went with you and Ah've had enough awkward an' odd with people finding out 'bout us 'round here anyway."

Cess crossed her arms over her chest. "Well, I can just ask his permission. If I can't find him I can try one of those email thingies. It can't be that hard," she finished with determination, nose upturned stubbornly.

Kevin tried to bite back his laugh but a snickering escaped his efforts. She was so determined that it was kind of funny. "Nah, Cess, ya don't hafta ask his permission. Be sorta stupid if ya did." For a moment he wondered however if he should ask Jay's permission. But it really was stupid, wasn't it? Cessily was his friend, or at least she was becoming his friend, and he should be allowed to take his friend to the prom if she wanted to go. He'd been in Scotland when he technically graduated so it wasn't like he'd ever gotten one anyway. "Ah'll take ya."

She jumped to her feet with a triumphant laugh. "Thank you!" She started to lunge toward him for a hug, but pulled back quickly. "Sorry," she said quickly with a step back. "I forget." She bunched her hands in her dress. "Thank you, Kevin," she said with a small smile.

Kevin tensed instantly when she started to come at him but when she caught herself and stopped he relaxed, at least as much as he could. His relief was obvious as his shoulders slumped back down and he blew out the breath he hadn't realized he'd been holding. "S'ok, other people've known forever and still forget." One of them was his boyfriend. "You're welcome. S'no problem, really. Never got to go to my prom anyway." He shrugged, hands relaxing in his pockets finally