When was anything ever simple? He shouldn't be at all surprised that Evelyn could think of multiple factors for the mysterious avoidances by her coworkers.

An anti-mutant family... would make things awkward in general, especially if they were, you know, actively anti-mutant and not just the normal ew-mutant-cross-the-road sort. Or, well, the can't-disown-them-so-send-them-to-boarding-school-in-March sort. Seriously mutant-unfriendly relatives would be very very unpleasant. Evelyn's relatives seemed to be attached to her nonetheless, though, if they were pulling strings to get her a job or keep it or whatever. Unless they just wanted her to be able to support herself so she wouldn't bother them? That could be the adult version of the can't-disown-them system.

Not being good with customers was hardly reason to avoid even trying to get along with someone, though. Think about it - he was getting on reasonably well with her, considering that they had nothing more in common than currently sleeping in a mansion for mutants and watching Howl's Moving Castle. Reasonably well for him, at least. There weren't exactly a lot of people he had ever felt anything less than uncomfortable around, so this moderate level of discomfort might even be significant.

More significant than the grounds Evelyn's self-blame was built on, at any rate. Aiden quirked an eyebrow at her, glancing at her sidelong though he didn't turn his head from the T.V. "Blaming yourself for things other people do usually doesn't turn out very well," he commented drily, voice soft enough that it could almost be considered an absentminded murmur. "So long as you didn't walk up to them and insult them and their brothers to their faces or something, if anyone's blaming you for being good at what you do or something, it's on them. You don't have to flaunt it, but you don't have to hide it to make them happy."

Evelyn found herself visibly surprised when Aiden spoke next. Somehow, the teen hadn't struck her as the sort to give advice, but maybe something their conversation had struck a cord he could relate to. She didn't know a lot about him, and she had been trying her best to keep the echoes from filling in information he might not want her to know. But he seemed genuinely uncomfortable the whole time. Maybe, in a way, she assumed it was just the general discomfort with other mutants she seemed to encounter recently. She wasn't quite sure what it was now. Maybe a little bit of that was just directed towards himself.

"I guess..." She was somewhat at a loss for words. She watched the t.v. for a short while, and tucked her sketchbook to the side. She pulled her knees up and rested her chin on them and frowned somewhat thoughtfully as she watched the colorful characters on the screen. The little flame in the fireplace was talking, but her thoughts were somewhere else.

"Do you ever wish you hadn't been a mutant? Sometimes...Sometimes I like my mutation, and sometimes I don't. I keep meeting lots of people who are really proud of what they can do though, but I just...I've never felt that way..." She remarked. Even the echoes didn't feel so loud with the sounds of her own thoughts interrupting them.

What? Why was she looking surprised now? He was the awkward and out of place one. She was the notice absolutely everything one. People who noticed everything shouldn't get surprised, should they?

Now he was quietly curious about what it was that had surprised her. What had occurred shortly before he had noticed her surprise? Um... something had happened on the T.V. He didn't really remember what. Evidently it hadn't been that surprising, so it probably wasn't it. Maybe it was -

Maybe it was foresight at how he was dying inside right now. That would about do it. He was definitely doing a lot of that inside at this particular span of moments. Too many moments. Too many moments of hideously awkward internally-rotting silence. "I... haven't really been one long enough to get around to another side of it," Aiden admitted in a flat tone. Please let her leave it at that. Please. Please. He didn't want to think about, much less talk about, how he had come to discover he was a mutant or what he so-called did or how the least the unwelcome protection could have done would have been to save other people or - no. He was just going to watch the T.V. That was all.

Evelyn glanced at her companion, and his visible change of demeanor stopped most of the questions that had come to the surface of her thoughts. There were so many things to read there, so many things she was fairly certain he didn't want her to see. Guilt, sadness, frustration, denial. He was saying one thing, but his actions were saying something completely different. Her mutation continued to listen, taking note of what he said and what he didn't. Then she looked back at the television and watched the illogical movement of the magical house.

"Well, maybe it's just me then." She said quietly and focused on the movie. She wondered what it would have been like, growing up normal then suddenly becoming a mutant. She never felt normal, not really. She had always been different. But perhaps it would have been worse if she had a normal life and had it taken away. She couldn't really loose what she didn't have at this point.