Playdates and Permission Slips
Chapter 8
Make New Friends
Ororo glared at her answering machine. How dare it actually work? Didn’t she screw around with it enough to break it? No. Dammit! She put that deed higher on her priority list while she listened to her two messages left from her ex-husband.
Message One: “Hello Ororo. This is Prince T’Challa, Lucas‘s father. (“No shit Sherlock. Tell me something I don’t know,” Ororo thought.) I wanted to know if you were still going to accompany Lucas to his Orientation? Please let me know soon if you cannot. I will send a car for him. (“Oh noes, not even the idea of picking him up yourself is going anywhere near that inflated head of yours, is it?”)
Message Two: “Ororo, I do not know where you are or where my grandson are, (“Oh shit. It’s the old one-two punch.”) and frankly I just do not like it. (Hellooo I have a job, and, dare I say, a life of my own!) Seriously, where are you? At work? Oh please. We all know you do not need that business of yours. It’s simply a farce. A teenaged way of getting back at your dead parents. Grow up Ororo! Not only that, if you’re there, does that mean my grandson is with those insolent American nannies. I will not tolerate--- BEEEEP
Message deleted.
She couldn’t believe it. T’Challa couldn’t get his way so he told his Mommy! Ororo looked up at herself in her foyer mirror. Ahuh, you married him, and his mother. Was it worth it? Outside of Lucas, hell no. Would you do anything like that again, she asked her silent reflection.
Absolutely not. Nope! Not in any way shape or form. Marriage was what other people were for. Clients, in fact. Which reminded her, to work on those sketches of wedding gowns to premier next year at Fashion Week. She groaned at the thought. Talk about a slap in the face. Ororo Monroe, allergic to relationships and marriage, promoting the pomp and ceremony that became the bane of her existence.
Life was just grand.
It seemed as if the karma in her life was always on the move. One minute all the things in her life were making her feel content and loved, the next moment everything caved in on itself. She would be left bereft, alone, and suddenly found her self starting over empty handed.
It wouldn’t be so alarming if this hadn’t happened over and over.
First living with her parents. Fine and dandy. Daddy always had his camera. Ororo had fond memories of turning her father’s camera this way and that trying to get it to take the beautiful pictures of the Savanna she saw her Father develop. Off course her pictures were usually of her own stubby fingers because they kept getting in the way. She and her father would sit on the grasses for hours waiting for just the right moment. The sun would turn pick and orange and the trees would look almost black. Then her father would magically produce a soccer ball. She and some of the local kids would play until it got to dark to see. Her father would always make fair calls too. It was Ororo’s favorite place and time.
Then she would go home, and everything changed. Her mother was the polar opposite of her father. Everything had a preordained path. Everything and everyone had a place. Ororo was supposed to be just like her. A cultural leader, a lady, well respected, pristine. A pure combination of old fashioned western ideas layered on top of and intertwined with traditional Kenyan roles. So when Ororo came home with bumps, bruises, and dirt stains from a rousing soccer game, her mother was not very pleased.
Her mother wasn’t pleased when she brought home good grades in algebra. Nor was she elated when those grades sent her to a mix-sex school because it was the top elementary school in Kenya.
N’dare was excited when Ororo finally picked up a Barbie and wouldn’t put it down. Ororo remembered how her Father groaned. She promised him that they would always go on walk-abouts together and play ball. David watched his wife mingle at a party they were hosting when he took Ororo outside to show her a secret present.
There in a long box with a bow on it, was a shiny aluminum softball bat and a buttery soft leather glove. Ororo squeed throughout the rest of the night.
N’Dare found out, and the fight that ensued was on for the books. David defended his actions valiantly. He wanted her to grow up fearless and be able to rescue herself and not have to wait on anyone, or have anyone wait on her. N’Dare wanted Ororo to be a lady. Some who could secure a home and run it efficiently. Ororo never forgot her father’s response to that.
“Ororo will be able to build her own home, single handily.”
Back then, Ororo didn’t know what any of that meant. She sat at her little child’s sewing machine and made Barbie her very own softball uniform. She was surprised when it finished that all the seams were in the right places and it fit! Not bad, she thought to herself. Not bad at all.
Then it her.
When Ororo told her mother about her fanfriggintastic idea about making the best clothes in the world, she really didn’t expect her mother’s panic stricken expression. The next thing that happened was very unexpected for Ororo. N’Dare had made a few phone calls, and a few days later she had noticed that her mother’s friend Ramonda, that she really didn’t like being around, started to come by a lot with her husband, some king guy that Ororo ignored just as much as he ignored her, and their son who did nothing more than boss Ororo around and literally made her cheer on the sidelines.
Even as a boy T’Challa wanted nothing more than to be a bigger better more improved version of his father, T’Chaka. So he went around with his chest puffed out, standing up straighter than was natural, and made sure that everyone knew what was his.
He hadn’t changed a bit even as an adult.
A couple of years had gone by, and the majority of Ororo’s free time had been spent with T’Challa. Ororo would pout when T’Challa would get on her nerves and her mother, and his, would laugh it off in high pitched giggles commenting on how well they were getting along. David would pick Ororo up and swing her around telling her in her ear that he was sorry and that he tried as hard as he could. Ororo remembered laying her head on his shoulder and calling him silly. Back then, she knew he had nothing to be sorry about. She still believed that today.
It wasn’t too soon after that, Ororo had her seventh birthday. N’Dare had suggested that they go to Ororo’s favorite place in the world. Egypt. There both husband and daughter would marvel at the ancient monuments while the mother took in the luxuries and rights of being a princess, herself. She would often wish she could be closer to her daughter, but if the price of raising a real princess and future world leader was the cost of her relationship, then N’Dare reluctantly paid it every day. But tonight they were going to be a family.
N’Dare had arrange for everyone’s favorite food to be brought for room service along with a delicious Ethiopian honey wine. That would make the bombshell she was going to drop much easier to take. Or so she hoped.
That night as everyone sat down to down. Everyone was a bit nervous at the light airy mood. It wasn’t the norm.
N’Dare seized the moment. She told Ororo that when she turned twenty-one that she would be marrying T’Challa.
That was it. No if’s and’s or but’s.
Ororo wanted to laugh. She…she was just a second year student at a primary school. Marriage? And was it just her or did twenty-one sound like there was something wrong with it. She looked at her father with so many questions on her scrunched up face. He looked like he was going to burst into sad little pieces, but then he looked at her and smiled gently.
N’Dare didn’t understand what she had done until that very moment.
Unfortunately by then, it was too late.
The very foundation of the hotel shook like a jello mold. The steel beams and wooden studs couldn’t keep up with the movement and began to buckle uncontrollably. The walls cracked like ice breaking and dust fell from the ceiling. The Monroe family stood up panicked. Ororo clung to her mother’s side while David opened the door to see what was happening. Someone came running down the hall with an automatic rifle screaming the name of the local dictator trying to amass power. David saw bleeding bodies riddled with holes being smashed by debris.
Another violent explosion rocked the hall. It threw apart mother and daughter. David went to save at least one of his girls but a support beam caught him in the legs. The humongous piece of steal separating all three family members from each other.
N’Dare watched in horror as her lover, best friend, and husband grimaced in anguish but tried and succeeded in looking at her as if she had bigger problems. Ororo watched in terrifying horror as her mother clasped on to her father’s graying hands.
It was only moments before he dropped his head and stopped breathing.
Ororo shook her head as more dust shook down from the ceiling and fell on her. She looked up, just in time, to see the ceiling rip apart. Another support beam dropped.
N’Dare ran towards her daughter and pushed her hard enough to give her enough momentum to break through the window behind her as the hotel collapsed in on itself killing all those who remained inside.
As she cleared her head of the horrific memory, Ororo shed the few tears that were threatening her eyes.
After being caught by Egyptian authorities and placed in an orphanage Ororo had became a perpetual runaway. She smiled ruefully. It seemed as if Lucas had her ability to never hold still most of the time. It felt so free to focus on her son rather than herself. It reminded her of an old song lyric.
Keep on Truckin’.
No wait. That wasn’t it.
Keep on keeping on.
Well, either way, that was how she lived her life. If things started to suck, leave and find a better place, or let karma do it for you.
Ororo remembered a few months in Cairo before being adopted by an American family. After social services came to take her after charges of abuse, she came across the Xaviers.
Apparently they had a habit of taking in former runaways and abused children. That’s where a twelve year old Ororo met a thirteen year old Scott Summers. Sure they clashed a lot…ok, constantly. But Lilan and Charles were always there to remind them that they were now related and would never be free from each other. So they had better learn to get along.
Ororo giggled at her initial reaction. Boooooo….
It wasn’t until Charles’s near ancient family mansion that housed they’re ever expanding family, caught on fire that Ororo caught a glimpse of the man Scott was to become.
He was just like her father.
Afterwards they had become the best of friends.
She was there for him when through those pizza face stages. He helped her fit in when she was the awkward quiet token black girl.
She introduced him to Jean.
Scott introduced her to his mechanic friend.
Ororo bought Scott his first box of condoms and taught him about pinching the tip and how to take them off without anything dripping, getting all over everywhere, and making a complete mess.
He often covered for her party girl times with kleptomaniac best friend Remy Lebeau and musian/artist/dancer friend Alison Blaire.
In return she would shower him with mix taped of the greatest pop hits or the next fad in underground music. Ororo kept his affinity for hip-hop a secret. One of the many they shared.
Ororo thought about how out of all the times she had held Scott’s advice sacred, she didn’t know why she didn’t listen to him about the second time T’Challa came into her life.
He told her that T’Challa was in “love” with her for himself and his family. His feelings had nothing to do with Ororo, herself.
Did she listen? Nope.
Good thing Scott wasn’t one for gloating. Her self confidence was extinct when T’Challa put her through the ringer during the pricey humiliating divorce. The only thing Ororo was able to keep was sole custody of Lucas.
That wasn’t even an original condition for the divorce. Ororo grunted at that memory. T’Challa had gotten everything! Every*bloody*thing. He had sole custody of Lucas. It was just too bad that within that year, father and son had seen each other for about three days. A slew of nannies and nursemaids had taken on parental duties. The year after that Ramonda had taken on Lucas herself.
Lucas was so confused and lonely. He had fallen into a deep depression and hadn’t spoken a word since he had been separated from his mother in the first place. Ramonda thought her self made remedies would cure him up. The courts promptly took Lucas away and placed him back with his mother.
Ororo thanked her lucky stars that Lucas was born stateside. She looked down at her boy and said a silently thank you to those who were still looking out for her.
She looked at the clock. She might as well make an attempt at those garments she was supposed to have done already. She wouldn’t get them done tomorrow night because of Orientation.
She sat down and began to rip threw her own carefully sewn seam only having to remake it in a different spot. Ahh…art imitating life, once again.
After about an hour of that, Ororo felt her mind wonder again. This time to the fairly recent present times. She smiled at how much fun she had recently. Who would have thought that yet another mechanic but gruff papa would peek her interest?
Thinking about Logan let a couple of other things peek as well.
She quickly crossed her arms over her chest and scolded herself mentally. That was the last thing she needed. She had only had sex with three people in her life, and the worst karma ever followed her around afterwards. It so wasn’t worth it. Besides she has yet to have…oh what do you call it?
A thing of myth and legend?
She tapped her head repeatedly to get her thoughts straight.
Duh! That’s what it was called.
An orgasm.
Ororo looked at the phone that was a few inches away from her machine. Would Logan be up…err awake at this time at night, for a lonely phone call from a practical stranger?
She picked up the cordless and began to dial.
~*-*~
Scott groaned as he watched more children butcher the hell out of some 70’s classics rearranged for the piano.
Damn, he thought, maybe he should walk Rachel and Nate out and take them to a teacher not a butcher.
The “student” hit another sour note and that when Scott heard the heel of a high heel hit the hardwood floor as hard as it could. Apparently the teacher had enough. He and the two children dared to peek around the corner into the classroom and sighed in defeat when they couldn’t see anything. The children sat back in their seats while Scott did a double take at the long leg that peeked out of the navy blue skirt. The bottom of that ankle had about an inch of colorful and insightful tattoos wrapped around it. The design lead into a black classic mary-jane. (Hmm, that shoe looked familiar?) It almost looked like the owner of that delectable limb once lived wild and now was tweaked into a civilian life.
Scott looked up at the clock when the sagging student came out to his waiting parent. He had finished eighteen minutes early.
He lead the children back to their classroom and he had a strange feeling wrap itself around him. He shrugged it off and blamed it on the upcoming debate.
He walked the children in and was taken aback when the woman with the apple bottom and the tight princess cut blouse turned around.
“Ali?!!”
“Scott,” Ali shrieked. “My god, I haven’t seen you in ages.”
Scott raised a brow and couldn’t help but stare at this totally unrecognizable woman before him.
“Yea, you look…look ah…totally different.”
“I’m actually surprised you recognized me. No one from back in the day does.”
Scott awkwardly scratched the back of his hand and laughed nervously.
“It was the shoes. You and Ro single-hand brought them into style again, I think.”
Ali threw her head back for a heartfelt laugh and that’s when Scott got a real good look at her.
Alison had been the preppy blonde cheerleader with an eclectic taste in music. She had seemed far away from blue collar musicians or high class opera and musical score sound. Scott hated to think of her this way, but she had the outward appearance and attitude of a pop tart while in high school.
But she had some drastic changes to her now. First and foremost was the hair. The blond was gone. Completely. In it’s place was a kitten forties style black as night straight sheet of silk. It was fringed with a messy uneven but extremely short bangs and the legnth in the back was pulled in a side ponytail. Making her look like Betty Page who took on a teaching job. But that wasn’t her most startlingly new feature.
It was her face. She had a beautiful starry pattern that gradually faded and got smaller tattooed on the right side of her face that hovered around her eye. The black ink against her porcelain skin gave it that night sky look. Scott didn’t even want to imagine how much that had hurt.
Then he crunched some mental numbers. That had to be at least four tattoos. His curiosity was up in arms, as were some other things. Which was extremely unusual. He had always wanted the June Cleaver stable safe kind of woman.
Like Jean.
This oddly comfortable brand spankin’ (:D) new Alison was so far from his norm.
She bad the children to take their usual sits and they gladly did.
“Scott, why don’t you sit in this session. It would be nice to catch up with you afterwards. I’m going to have a few extra minutes.” Ali lifted her hand gracefully to point to some leather seat in the back of the studio room.
Scott watched the curve of her hand and noticed the intricate burn-sienna colored design on her palm that stretched out to her fingers. There wasn’t a single part of her that wasn’t interesting, over exposed, or desperate.
Just artfully designed. And he knew from experience that each piece of body art had a story to tell. He wanted to hear them all from her. He doubted those eighteen minutes would cover it.
Scott looked at his kids warming up. “Hey you kids keep up at it for minute, I want to talk to Ms. Blaire outside for a second.”
They nodded halfheartedly at him. Of course they followed him right up to the threshold to hear every word of the conversation.
Rachel sighed at the two adults. “I wonder if he’s gonna ask her out?”
Nate looked at her as if she had three heads. “You can’t be serious. Or did you forget about Mom.”
Rachel kept her eyes on her father and looked at him whistfully. As much as she loved her parents. Papa was her favorite and she wanted him to smile and laugh and stuff. He hasn’t done that in a long long time. He sure was smiling now.
Nate softened up. He knew his sister has yet to forget about being angry at her mother for those overnight hang-outs with Laura’s dad. He was sure that Rachel didn’t mention it, and his Mom didn’t think that anyone else knew.
He really didn’t want to be around when that came out. He’d be sure to find himself over Lucas’s house then. And he would definitely make sure that his mother was home. He may need a hug or two or five.
Nate looked up when he saw that his teacher had shifted her attention wholly to their father.
“So, Ali, um how long have you been around.”
“Don’t you talk to your sister? I’ve been here for a while. Poor you. You’re the one who’s been busy. Plus you got NOSY little buggers and a wife following you around.”
Scott looked away for a minute. Jean hasn’t been around him and only him in far too long. Even when he was home often there was excuses with her. But this had nothing to do with her. All he wanted to do was genuinely catch up with a friend.
Really.
“Are you going to be free anytime soon. We could get some…”
“I don’t drink coffee and I‘m not free this month either. I‘m sorry.” She wanted to pet him when she saw his crestfallen face. “Aw, are you going to give up so easily?”
“Huh?”
“And so eloquent for a lawyer too. I have another job at night, and a different job on the weekends too. Come to Oreintation and we’ll see.”
“Oh damn. I really have to go to that then, don’t I?”
She walked back to the classroom and threw him a sexy smile before disappearing back inside.
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