Project X [18+] [Fanfiction]

Chapter XXV: Feeling Brand New

  I had come to the decision that I rather enjoyed being lazy. It was not something that I had ever expected to say of myself, nor was it something that I ever would have admitted, but when the opportunity presented itself I typically threw myself into it with reckless abandon.

  As a member of the X-Men and a resident of the mansion I was very rarely given the chance, which only increased my desire to take advantage of it when I could. Moments of peace and quiet were few and far between, and to ignore them would be a tragic loss.

  I did not use to think like that. There was a time when idleness was a bane to me; something I couldn’t fathom or cope with. When there wasn’t a mission for me to throw myself into or a crisis I was needed to help prevent, the boredom often drove my mind to dark places. There was a time in my life when I used my claws to cut gently over my flesh and watch the scratch marks heal within seconds; a physically harmless trick given my regenerative capabilities, but hardly an appropriate hobby for a young woman to spend hours doing. Those moments were now replaced with things that normal girls typically did; listening to music, watching television, or trying to learn new hobbies. Instead of brooding in my room I was trying to learn how to cook, and instead of training myself into exhaustion and far past the point of benefit I was starting to read old books suggested to me by some of the more educated members of the X-Men.

  When I asked Dr. McCoy for suggestions on what to read, he gave me so many books that I had to take two trips to get them all.

  I was still performing my duties, and I was still in peak physical condition, but something had certainly changed in my life. I didn’t merely push aside my old impulses to focus on new ones; the older ones simply weren’t there anymore. There was never any temptation to return to my old ways, and never once did I ponder that I would be happier or more entertained if I somehow regressed a year to the woman I was before. When I woke up in the morning I did so with a smile, and when I was given the random few hours to spend on my own I rushed to my room to flip open the pages of an old masterpiece, rather than carve at my own flesh and bone with my claws.

  Things had changed, and I was relishing in it, truly feeling like a new woman altogether. I was, beyond a doubt, the happiest I had been in my life. There were several reasons for it, but ultimately all the changes that had occurred could be traced back to the relationship that I had formed with Shifter.

  Christian... my dear classmate turned lover that had been patient with me while I learned, that had celebrated with me in my victories and mourned with me after my setbacks. The man that had found a way to balance my primal fury with the woman I had developed into, the man that accepted that I could exist as both even at the same time. I had come to learn that I was complex, and beyond that knowledge that I was lucky to have a lover that accepted that about me.

  My romance with Shifter was going well, and even after words of love were first shared between us our relationship continued to grow. It had been weeks since the first admission of our feelings at the nightclub and the subsequent “party” with Jubilee and Pixie, and though we hadn’t found ourselves naked with them since, the four of us had continued to build our friendships together.

  Pixie and Shifter seemed to make natural partners in pushing myself and Jubilee into things, and most of the time when we were politely asked to leave an establishment it was because of an idea that one of them had that the other was all too eager to encourage.

  Together, they were trouble. But thankfully, it was the sort of trouble that Jubilee and myself were able to endure with a groan, and a hesitant smile. Though Jubilee and I never openly discussed it; I suspected we both secretly liked it when our group was ushered out of a restaurant for being too disruptive, or when Jubilee and Pixie would play “lookout” while Shifter and I enjoyed each other in a mall dressing room.