The two couples sat in Sam’s living room, much to the shapeshifter’s displeasure. Xavier could feel the unhappiness radiating off of Sam so The Eternal couldn’t help but indulge in the guy’s misery.
Xavier had long since learned to welcome small victories, especially when in relationships.
Still, as much as Xavier and Sam disliked having each other near, their previously tense bodies had relaxed a small fraction in each other’s presence.
Though they would never admit it – just knowing The Cullens were within a few miles of their location brought both men discomfort.
Vegetarians vampire?
Xavier knew better than Sam how seriously The Cullens took their diet and still – now that he was a part of the story – The Eternal constantly found himself ill at ease.
A vampire – regardless of their diet – still simmered with the threat that a vampire should bring.
“So, what brings you guys here?” Emily inquired after serving tea.
Xavier took the tea gingerly, knowing that traditional teas served in the Quileute Tribe always had a hint of something that would take your head into the cloud.
That was a part of the reason The Eternal visits often.
Prior to serving tea, Emily and Angela had been chatting for nearly an hour, ignoring Sam and Xavier the entire time, but suddenly, like a bolt from the blue, Xavier was addressed and his mind blanked in response.
There had been a thousand reasons to visit Emily and Sam, but now that he was here, Xavier didn’t feel the need to worry the couple with something that may never come to pass.
There was a fine line between knowing the plot and paranoia – Xavier didn’t want to divulge more than he should for the simple fact that doing so would lessen his advantages.
That is why he had waited.
That was the reason he had yet to visit The Cullen’s Residence.
That was the reason he moved Angela and Jessie into the house.
The Eternal was keeping all of his vulnerabilities close to his chest.
“Didn’t you say you wanted to see if Emily would be available for Homecoming?” Angela wisely suggested to her boyfriend. “He was telling me that you do catering.”
“Oh… yeah,” Xavier finally recalled the least important reason and raised it on his list to become the most important reason. “Homecoming is a developing situation, and I am basically running things so I wanted you to cater for the event.”
“I thought you wouldn’t be having Homecoming,” Sam interrupted.
“We wouldn’t have,” Angela explained. “But Xavier proposed a plan where we can monetize a music video as a form of fundraising. We are still working out the details, but we kind of want to inform our options.”
Emily frowned. “You know my specialties,” She raised a brow. “I don’t think a bunch of horny teenagers will appreciate my cooking much.”
‘Your cooking is the best to hide the traces of drugs…’ Xavier’s mind whispered, but his mouth continued. “This will, of course, be voted on, and you’d be surprised how many students request you by name. Your cooking is making an impact since it's so different from what they are used to.”
“Well…” Emily pondered for a couple of seconds. “If you have something more solid for me, then I’ll be happy to do it. Sam and I need the cash anyway, and I know some girls who would make good assistants.”
“Consider it done,” Xavier’s promise was as quick and half-formed as a politician.
Angela felt the need to laugh – she could practically see Xavier’s otherworldly intentions oozing off of his desperate expression. She had little doubt that Emily would do a precise catering job just for that reason.
It had turned into a learning experience.
--------------
When the discussions were finished, Paul and Jared exited the forest, started a fire outside the house, and soon, Angela, Sam, Xavier, and Emily joined the two boys.
As eager as he was, Sam opened the bottle of wine that Xavier had brought a couple of days prior; though, he only dared to do this with Emily’s permission.
As soon as the cork was twisted away, Angela and Emily could feel profound dizziness, and it was only with Xavier's quick reaction – placing them at the end of the seats – was a disaster avoided.
After all, Asgardian Wine could kill – a drunken death, but a death nonetheless.
Paul and Jared managed three sips of the wine before shapeshifting into their werewolves form and prancing around the perimeter.
Xavier would have stopped the teenagers from so blatantly revealing a secret kept in their families for generations, but a quick glance at Angela’s unstoppable grinning face told The Eternal she would remember little to nothing come tomorrow.
Xavier and Sam took small sips.
Sam was not the Alpha for nothing – his body could process the liquor almost as quickly as it was consumed, but his metabolism was still nothing compared to The Cullens.
Xavier had diluted the bottle of wine many times over compared to the raw bottle he had provided The Cullens with.
The duo managed to complete the bottle before the world started to spin – actually, the world had started to spin long before, but their pride wouldn’t let the bottle of wine be.
This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience.
It was their mission to finish the bottle.
By the time Xavier had the presence of mind to scoop the sleeping Angela into his arms, Sam had already passed out on the ground.
Emily, showing amazing fortitude, somehow made it into her home, falling asleep on the couch.
In the end, only Paul and Jared were not accounted for, but through his superhuman sense of hearing, Xavier heard growl-like snoring from across the river.
۞۞۞
XAVIER’S HOME
An hour later, Xavier and Angela managed to make it home, and Jessie’s usefulness was immediately shown when she aided The Eternal in getting Angela into the shower.
“I didn’t know Angela could get this fucked up,” Jessie commented, removing Angela’s clothes to place her in the bubble bath. “I mean – I expected this from you, but not from her.”
“Are you saying I am a bad influence?” Xavier questioned.
“Is that even a question?” Jessie rolled her eyes, sliding Angela into the tub.
“He…” Xavier chucked.
The Eternal immediately slipped out of his own clothing, allowing his naked figure to be broadcasted into Jessie’s retinas.
The lesbian turned her head away.
“What?” Xavier rolled his eyes. “Nothing you haven’t seen before.”
“And experienced,” Jessie turned back her head and scanned Xavier from head to toe. “And to this very day, I wonder how I survived those encounters.”
“You were desperate for money,” He answered. “You would have been able to survive much worse.”
“Okay… okay!” Jessie pushed The Eternal toward the bubble bath. “Get in the tub before I kick you in the balls for showing me that dangling thing after all the trauma it has caused me.”
Xavier slid into the tub, taking a semi-wake Angela into his arms. The Eternal diligently washed his girlfriend under the scrutinizing gaze of Jessie – who was mainly there to ensure he didn’t drown Angela.
STEP
Xavier’s eyes narrowed and a heaviness descended.
“Someone is here…” The Eternal voiced.
“Wait!” Jessie immediately panicked, instantly regretting that she hadn’t mentioned it before. “Brittney is staying in my room with me.”
“Oh…” Xavier sighed. “You should be more careful – that could have ended badly.”
And it almost did.
Xavier was seconds away from channeling Cosmic Energy into his eyes, directing a beam through the house that would have instantly vaporized anything in its path.
KNOCK
“Come in…” Jessie replied.
Brittney entered the bathroom and paused for a couple of seconds when she noticed Angle and Xavier hugging in the bubble-filled tub, then she shrugged her shoulder and found purchase on Jessie’s lap.
“We have school tomorrow, you know?” Brittney mentioned.
“She says in the house of the number one and number two delinquents,” Jessie joked and added. “To me and Xavier, it would be a blessing if we wake up late enough not to go to school.”
“But, there is you and Angela,” Xavier groaned, running his finger through Angela’s silky hair. “If we miss school, you’ll call and text and then take away sex for a week… so, now we just go to school every day and miss classes.”
“Well…” Brittney pecked Jessie on the cheek. “Now, I’ll have to check with your teachers if you actually show up to their classes.”
Jessie and Xavier groaned.
“I am satisfied if you just join me for lunch every day,” Angela added, finally stable enough in her spinning world to speak. “But if you miss lunch, then I am reporting you guys to the school.”
“Yes, your highness,” Xavier drawled.
The Eternal then wore a perverted smile as his head sunk beneath the bubble-cloaked water.
“Nope… nuhuh… haha…”
Angela slid to the opposite side of the tub, her arms submerged in the water as she desperately tried to push away the head from between her legs.
“No, Xavier… we have guests…”
“I mean… I don’t mind watching,” Jessie shrugged her shoulders. “You wouldn’t imagine how many girls Xavier and I have—”
COUGH
Jessie’s mouth zipped shut with a single cough from Brittney.
“We should leave the couple to their kinkiness,” She suggested.
Jessie mechanically nodded, shot a regretful look at the bubbling tub, and departed with Brittney.
As soon as the viewers were gone, Angela had no more reason to resist – she spread her legs and shuddered the moment something wetter than the water ran along her slit.
“FUCK!” She moaned.
An intense bout of sex followed – the bathroom was covered in bubbles within five minutes, and by the thirty-minute mark, bubbles were floating out of the bathroom and down the corridor.
۞۞۞
JANUARY 24th 2005 - MONDAY
XAVIER’S HOUSE
That morning, Xavier awakened with an intense headache unlike what he had felt in both of his lives.
It was more excruciating that an airplane's crash and thumped louder than an Eternal’s slow, powerful heartbeat.
UGH
Xavier dug his fingers into his head, genuinely contemplating if he could heal from an injury as dire as tearing his own skull open.
He was unable to reach a conclusion since the headache was just that intense.
The Eternal gritted his teeth and floated out of the bed, uncaring if such a significant movement would awaken his girlfriend – now was not the time for such considerations.
URGH
He dashed to the bathroom and shut the door behind him, tossing himself into the clear water of the tub with an urgency that mirrored addiction.
SPLASH
Sensory deprivation – it had worked once, and there was no need to try again, but now, there was a need.
As soon as the water drowned out all other senses, Xavier felt the throbbing clearer than before – it was the type of pain that got worse with focus, but less with knowing.
The headache was still just as bad, but with the isolation from all other senses, Xavier was able to bear the pain much better.
One minute…
Two minutes…
At the third minute, the pain dulled…
Xavier rose from the water as if a mummy resurrected from a grave, and his eyes were met with the concerned faces of Angela and Jessie.
“You okay?” Jessie asked.
She was smart – Jessie had placed herself between Angela and Xavier… that was something Xavier admired about this little sister of his – she was always able to understand the situation with little hints.
Angela, for her part, seemed only concerned, and not fearful as she should be.
Jessie had probably noticed the headaches before because Xavier had never tried to hide them, but Angela – it should be her first time witnessing it.
“What is that?” Angela rushed to Xavier’s side, kneeling and embracing him. “What the heck was that?”
“I am not sure?” He replied.
And Xavier was indeed not sure – it had happened a few times, but that headache was intense enough to be in a category of its own.
“We still heading to school?” Jessie inquired.
Xavier liked that also – she kept the questions short and direct.
The Eternal mused for a couple of seconds, searching his Cosmically Enhanced body to see if everything remained intact – and it did.
There was no need to fret.
“Yeah…” Xavier replied. “Just a normal headache.”
“For fucks that’s normal,” Angela was rapidly angering. “We need to get you to a doctor or something…”
“I will be fine…”
And that was the end of the conversation, but Angela ensured she clung closely to Xavier as they made their way to the cars.
There was no way she would leave him alone considering the clear migraine that he had brushed off as if it was nothing.
Jessie mused in contemplative silence, and Brittney – who joined them later – didn’t ask about the incident. She knew that Jessie would relay the information when they were on their own.
Angela and Xavier boarded the hummer.
Jessie and Brittney boarded the Bugatti.
They departed for school – one car after the next.
-------------
On the way to school, Xavier noted the snow was particularly intense today.
Then, he got a call from Tyler that would prove significant in the coming events.
“Tyler is calling,” Angela reported since she always held onto his phone. “Do you want to take it or?”
Xavier was nursing his head, unwilling to answer any calls at the moment, but if someone could take his mind off of things, it would be Tyler.
“Hello?” He took the phone and answered.
“You did what? No – that’s a total waste of our money. Take it back. If you don’t take it back then you’re going to owe me money – do you want to owe me money?”
By the end of the conversation, Angela was regretful since it seemed answering the call only added to Xavier’s existing headache.