Diamond Bright

Jack didn't use the Skype function on his phone often, but he made exceptions once in a while for Emma. (Sometimes it was even for calls he intended to spend clothed.) He squinted at the phone and answered it. His hair was faintly messy and he was wearing a t-shirt and jeans; he hadn't planned to do much of anything today.

"Hi there," he said, then registered Candy was there as well "-- and hello to you too, Miss Southern."

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"Jaaaaaaaaaaaaack!" Candy waved at him over Emma's shoulder, ignoring the other girl attempting to shoo her away. "Guess what? Your favorite over-achiever is a master!"

"...wait, that sounded terrible."

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"Master and without Baiter after it?," Jack said, with an eyebrow waggle. He liked Candy's cheerful and not always intentional dirtiness; it encouraged his own. "Congratulations to you both."

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"Isn't that what she has you for?" Candy asked, returning the eyebrow waggle. "Not that she doesn't have a truly impressive selection of toys in her nightstand for personal use, but I'm sure she prefers hands-on."

"Is it true she worked in a sex store on that island of yours? She swears she did, but I don't know if I believe it."

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"Candace. Shut. Up," Emma groaned, grabbing a pillow off her futon to try and hit her giggling best friend with. "Hello, darling. Yes, we both have our tentative MBA diplomas, provided we pay our library fines and such."

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"She did!" Jack confirmed. "It even had a giant cock outside, as in the rooster."

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"I'll bring you back a picture, Candy, next time I go visit Jack," Emma promised, reaching slightly off-screen to pick up a shot glass and down the contents. "Now do me a favor and get me some more shots so I can have a moment to make kissy-faces at my boyfriend without you being a total voyeur?"

Candy blew Jack a kiss and flounced off to the kitchen, leaving them 'alone' (ish) for the moment.

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"Alone at last," Jack said, through a little chuckle. "Hi. Congratulations, Madame Master."

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"I'm done," Emma said, sounding slightly dazed by the fact. "Well, done with the big things. I have one last two-hundred level class for psych, and I'm taking two phys-ed classes and a bio so I stay qualified for the fencing team for spring. But those won't be any work. I'm done."

"We're both done with undergrad, and the world hasn't ended yet. I think I'm in shock."

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"I am too," Jack admitted. "It really hasn't sunk in yet, to be honest. Growing up I never imagined college was a thing I wanted to do, and now ..."

He shook his head. "Further proof we're amazing, I suppose."

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"Utterly astonishing, that's us," she preened happily.

--only to be interrupted by a voice yelling from the kitchen, "Show him the newspaper, you dork!"

"Harpy!" Emma yelled back, but she was grinning as she reached to the side to pick up a newspaper. "So, every year, the Times business section does a profile on the top three grads from the ESU program? It's the closest they get to running an out-and-out gossip session for anything not the downfall of some titan."

She flipped a few pages before holding it up for Jack to see. Or, see as best he could on phone-Skype. There was a picture of Candy and Emma standing back-to-back, and looking utterly fabulous and fierce. "The hideous title of the article is 'Hail to the Queens: Girls Rule and Boys Drool,' and the interviewer kept trying to get us to say horrible things about each other, but the article itself actually turned out quite decent. I'm thinking of laminating it and sending a copy to Winston. It doesn't mention him once."

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"I hate that they did that," Jack noted. "Trying to turn it into a catfight, not the article. The article's brilliant and Winston absolutely needs a copy. Who was the third student?"

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"Ryan Choi. Sweet guy, more interested in his SCIENCE! than his business homework, but he got the MBA to make sure he could understand and control how his work was traded and where his financing was coming from," Emma said happily. "Proof that nice guys don't always finish last."

"Maybe I should arrange to have, like, a copy sent to Winston at work, too..." Emma was practically vibrating with happiness. "And now I get to take a break, while you dive into the soul-devouring world of law school!"

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"I have a month before they start chomping bits out of my soul!" Jack protested. "But are you actually going to take a break? I can't imagine that."

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"I even took two whole weeks off work," Emma informed him proudly. "...I don't suppose I can seduce you away for a long weekend? Possibly involving a trip somewhere with sunshine, room service, and no internet so I can't check my email?"

Emma loved New York. Emma also loved occasionally going on very sexy vacations with other people.

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"Say yes, Jack," Candy encouraged, popping back into view to plop down on Emma's lap and grab a shot glass off the tray she was carrying to shove into Emma's hand. "She's got this tall, dark, and brooding one making eyes at her, and you need to save her before she succumbs to his attempts at wooing."

"Which, have been hilariously ineffective so far, since Emma doesn't flirt back any more than she flirts with anyone else, which is to say he's mostly the recipient of scathing sarcasm. But, well, men." Candy saluted Jack with her own shot glass. "You're all weird."

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"Funny, I was thinking we should take a trip before you even said that," Jack said with a little chuckle. "Great minds and such. Pick the place and I'll pay for the hotel, if you get the portal fees."

There was real eagerness in his tone. He loved the idea of a few days on a beach with Emma, with nothing to think about but each other.

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"Everyone does Mexico... how does Italy sound?" she asked, clinking her shot glass against Candy's before downing it.

They'd done Greece - Greece had seers that foretold shit things. Russia was out. France had been her last trip with Christian.

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"I haven't had to speak Italian since I was 12," Jack admitted with a little laugh. "It sounds divine. We'll be completely away from anything familiar."

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furnaceface

Jono hadn't quite made his way back to Glacia, no. Soon, maybe. Probably. Probably soon. Tonight, though, he was sitting in the Groovy Tunes, listening to his favourite brooding music (at the moment), and bored.

'Bored.'

Dialing Emma's number, anyway, which wasn't quite the same thing at all, was it?

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"You've reached the telephone of Emma Grace Frost, who is busy doing a line of tequila shots because I'm a bitch. This is Candy, and you're on speaker-phone! Who is this?"

We are so, so sorry, Jono. Meet Emma's Candy.

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furnaceface

"Erm..." Jono's voice carried through the phone loud and clear, sounding both very confused and very British. "It's Jonothon-- friend of Emma's from high school. Is this a bad time?"

Because Emma drunk on tequila shots had the potential for hilarity, but if he was interrupting...

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"Best time! Hi Jono!" Emma was well on her way to drunk, yes, and enjoying every moment of it. "Jon! I graduated! Mostly! Come over and drink with us!"

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furnaceface

Jono was blinking so much, now.

"I wouldn't want to be a downer on the party, luv. Though it sounds as though there's not much chance of that, is there? Congratulations on the mostly-a-graduation, though. Sounds... exciting?"

He had no idea, here.

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"Oh my god, your accent is hot. Emma, is he cute?" Candy asked. "You could totally crash our party. It's just us, in Emma's apartment, because she hates people. And our classmates, but especially people in general."

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furnaceface

"Well, people in general have a tendency to be irritating," Jono pointed out logically, once he wrapped his head around the 'hot' bit. That one still tended to catch him off-guard. "If you two don't mind my stopping by, ah..."

He sort of hedged at that for a moment before just coming out with it, "It's alright, Emma? My being there wouldn't cause any trouble?"

For any one of the various reasons that someone like Jonothon showing up there might?

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"Yes, Candy, he's cute. No, Jono, you being here won't cause any trouble, so long as you don't mind crashing on the futon with us or grabbing one of the sleeping bags," Emma said, pausing long enough only to finish her last shot, and Candy cheered. "You'll be, like, the fourth person ever to be inside my apartment. I'll text you the address."

"Candy, no trying to sleep with Jon." There was a disappointed 'boo' in the background, but Emma kept talking. "This is not a No Pants party."

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furnaceface

"I have a very strict policy about when I'll sleep with a person, anyhow. They have to be sober enough to get me out of my trousers."

Which didn't seem like that big a deal, but would probably make more sense once the tight leather pants walked into the room with Jono wearing them.

"I could probably be ready to be over there in... twenty minutes? I have to feed Joni before I go, or she'll be crawling up my leg yowling when I get back again."

Again, context probably helped with that one, Jon.

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"That sounds filthy. Where's my purse? I'm gonna go get more booze and kool-aide and Sugar Bombs!" Candy yelled, and a moment later, Jono could probably hear the door slam.

"As to your unspoken question," Emma continued, "--Candy knows I'm a mutant. I told her last week because I was sick of waiting for Worthington to come out of the closet. Which, it'll probably look bad for him that her best friend was willing to trust her enough to confess to being a mutant and her boyfriend wouldn't, but that's not my problem."

"I can tell her before you get here, you can tell her, or we can go with the burn-victim story, but it's your choice."

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furnaceface

"Worthingtons will be Worthingtons," Jono muttered, shaking his head as he made his way up the stairs to his kitchen, pulling out some cat food with Joni hot on his heels. And mostly underfoot, as well. "Ruddy plonkers, th'lot of them."

He had yet to meet a Warren he actually liked. It didn't matter that he hadn't met Emma's, yet.

"If she took you being a mutant well enough that she's still drinking and laughing with you, I suppose there's little harm in her knowing about me. She already knows I can speak-- it'd be hard to pull off the burn victim story after this call, at any rate. If she gets back before I get there, would you mind filling her in? Otherwise, I will. It's my mutation, anyway."

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"He's terrified she'd reject him, because Xavier has them all convinced that all humans will always fear them unless they prove their worth." Yes, that was disgust in Emma's voice. "I'll tell her, and try to convince her to keep the hideously intrusive questions to a minimum, but Candy's rather like a kitten in that regard; her claws are sharp, but she doesn't mean any harm."

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furnaceface

Emma was welcome to sound as disgusted as she liked. Jono was no fan of Xavier, himself.

"Depending on how much drinking she's planning on doing, I can't imagine she'll be able to bite them all down. No matter, Emma... I don't mind fielding a few 'how do you eat' or 'how are you not dead's if it puts her mind at ease."

He was apparently mellowing some in his old age.

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"It'll probably be 'how do you eat/drink?', and then she'll offer to drink for you," Emma replied fondly. "Which, if you want anything, tell me now so I can text her."

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furnaceface

"If either of you can tolerate import lagers, you know that's my drink of choice. If not, it's fine. I'll take whatever either of you are up for. I'm not too proud to get drunk on something sweet and pink, if it comes to that, but I'm certain heard something about tequila..."

He could handle tequila.

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"My tequila," Emma replied cheerfully. "But I'll share, and I'm sure Candy will get us more, since my bottle is running low."

The girls had already been drinking for awhile, obviously.

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furnaceface

"I appreciate that, Emma, luv. Especially since sharing with me doesn't actually leave any less for you. I'm an inexpensive houseguest to have around, that way."

And he was about as amused as she was, really. Something about cheerful Emma was a bit contagious.

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