He had to bite back a 'told you so' because she was skittish and she was volatile. That would have helped no one. Jude breathed in; breathed out. "Okay then. Be casual but... shy. Head down until we're inside."

Only then did Jude bother to look around. Nobody was obviously looking at them, but Lucy had just been waving her arms. Well. If someone noticed them there was nothing they could do about it now.

Jude walked next to Lucy now and escorted her to the pedestrian gate. "Did I ever tell you about the time I stole a limo?" Of course he hadn't but walking in silence would just be weird. He punched in his code. "It was during the riots so nobody seemed to mind. It had a hot tub."

Yep. Just a casual stroll down the gravel path until they got to the large front door. Jude put in his code there as well while he chatted about driving the behemoth vehicle and how it sloshed around turns. Fewer people took the front door.

Inside was a grand hallway. Library and girl's hall to the left. Administration and boy's to the right. Straight on through would have taken them to some of the busiest areas of the Mansion like the kitchen and the room with the TV and consoles.

"Up the stairs on the right hand side. So anyway- 8 out of 10, would not recommend. Hot tubs are nice and all, but they're just not meant to be mobile." He slid his key into the lock on his door and flipped on the light before pulling Lucy inside. You know, before she found something else to take issue with and started waving her arms again.

Gwen raised an eyebrow at him trying to tell her how to be inconspicuous. She had made an art of the practice and it was acutally kind of funny that this silly little French boy though he could teach her a few things.

She pulled her red hood over her head and shoved her hands in her pockets. Tilting her head down she walked with Jude.

“A hot tub?” She most certainly did not believe him. He didn’t look like he could steal a loaf of bread if he were hungry let alone a limo.

Thouhg, she couldn’t help but shutter little at the thought of the riots. That had been a really scary time for her and the other homeless. She had almost died twice and she really didn’t want to go back or think about it.

Gwen really couldn’t help herself as they walked inside. She looked up making sure that the hood was still shadowing her face. She had never set foot in such a beautiful place before. Yeah it wasn’t anything grand but it had this nice homy feel to it. It was like they had gone out of their way to make these kids know that someone was there.

As they passed student after student she made sure to dip her head and act like she belonged. She even pretended to chuckle at Judes ridiculous story. Who did he really think he was fooling with this?

Once they were in the room however she pulled down the hood to get a real good look at the place. There were two beds, two desks, two everything. It was a little messy but not so bad. More like he hadn’t picked it up in a little bit.

She moved further into the room noting the serious lack of stuff on the other side and taking a second to chuckle at the few things in the room that showed he was a boy. Like a rather large poster of a girl in nothing but her bikini.

”Do you mind if I shower first?” Without really giving him any time to answer she started taking off her layers leaving them on the floor till she was in nothing but her undergarments and retreating into the bathroom.

Did he mind? "Not uh-" He turned away from the rapidly increasing amount of skin he was seeing and looked really, really hard at the wall. "You know. I'll go get food."

That was unexpected. "Don't use all my shampoo." Geez. Didn't she know how to be a proper guest?

Jude retreated back out to the hall and took a second to rethink his life choices.

Svetty would kill him. Ghost would kill him. Sam would give him a high five and detention/punishment that was impossible and would kill him. But none of that would matter since he would be dead from Svetty.

Then again. Naked girl. Naked spitfire, angry, never-done-a-nice-thing-for-him girl.

Yeah. He was a dumb, dumb kid.

Jude went to go make some grilled cheese. He could do that without burning anything down. Also grapes. Grapes were good. Two chocolate milk cartons... maybe just one. Two was a bit obvious. Aaaaaand some gummy snacks. Yes. Jude was apparently assembling a meal for a toddler, but he didn't know what she liked so he figured the basics were safe.

Despite having the temptation, he did not knock before he entered his room.

As soon as she heard the door close behind Jude she leaned onto the counter for support. From the second she had set foot within the radius of the school hear head had been pounding. The pain was sharper and more intence then usual. She was trying very very hard to not let it get to her but it wasn’t easy.

She closed her eyes and took a few deep breaths to try and clear her mind. Not that doing that ever really helped but it was better then doing nothing.

As she climbed into the shower and the warm water came over her there was a calm that seemed ot come with it. She let herself get lost in it. This was the first shower she had taken in weeks and the first one she had realized was helping with her brain problem in years. This was not going to be easy. It was going ot be one of the hardest things she has ever had to do but it was a good idea.

She took her sweet time in the shower wanting to make sure that every piece of grime and dirt was removed before getting out. Though once she got out she was presented wiith a different problem. She had just taken a lot of time to clean herself off and now she was gong to have to put back on all of those dirty clothes.

Wrapping her towel around he body she bit her lip and pushed open the door relieved Jude wasn’t there. She was going to have to live with her dirty underwear sadly but maybe just maybe Jude had something she could wear. He was a little guy but he had to own something right.

As she opened the door it was as if a great light came out at her and she hit the motherload. Jude not only had clothes fit for a kid his size, but some of the stuff she assumed he wore when he was an adult. This was going to work just fine.

She pulled on her underwear and threw a tee-shirt from Jude’s closet over the rest of her. She was a little tiny girl but the shirt was still only long enough to come down to her hips. She was going to need to cover her legs in some way. Her jeans were likely the dirtiest part of her clothes and should probably have been burned instead of just thrown away. She couldn’t put those back on.

Gwen didn’t really know what proper manners were anymore so without a second thought she started riffling through Jude’s drawers.

He paused briefly at the sight.

Yes. He was a dead man.

She looked better cleaned up. More like somebody he might actually have a conversation with. Only, usually conversations happened while both parties were wearing pants.

Jude pushed into his room and tried to keep his cool. He slid all his food goodies onto his desk and went straight for the middle drawer, right hand side of his dresser. Lucy would have found them eventually, but... expediency was a good thing in this case.

Basketball shorts. He was a little shorter than she was, but boy's clothing fit long in the legs. Jude tossed a pair at Lucy so that even if she didn't catch it, the cloth would land on her shoulder.

Yep. He'd lived with a girl for somewhere around a year. He could just... pretend this one was his sister. Jude stole a glance at Lucy and swallowed compulsively.

Sister. Yeah. Right.

"Hungry?" A distraction was very much called for right now.

Gwen really honestly could care less how much Jude was seeing of her and how it made him feel. She really wasn’t bothered by the idea of him seeing her in her underwear that covered her. It was no less than if she was wearing t-shirt over a bathing suit. The worlds need to make it weird to be seen in one’s underwear had never really made sense to the girl because of things like bikinis. Seriously they were the same damn thing.

“Hey Jude.” She sang it. It was silly and childish but she enjoyed The Beatles and loved that song. So she was going to sing his name as such all the while smirking to herself. It was all rather fun in her opinion.

She smiled catching the basketball short. “Perfect.” They were exactly what she had been looking for by riffling through his drawers. Well that and anything else interesting she could find. Once again it is important to know that she didn’t’ really understand boundaries. She had been on her own on the streets for literally years. She had never really had the time in her short life to learn to understand, nor did she really care to learn to understand, social graces and decorum.

Gwen slipped on the shorts that fell to just below her knee thanks to the fact that they were hanging rather low on her very slender hips. Jude may have been small for a boy his age but Gwen was still really tiny despite being taller. The whole not really eating thing will do that too you. She was a bit skinnier then usual after all.

“Starving.” Literally. She turned and walked over to were the food was looking at the selection. For once in a long time Gwen smiled looking at the simple grilled cheese. She remembered a time when she was younger and such a thing had brought her comfort. She used to love the stuff. She picked it up and pulled up a chair sitting down with the plate trying to make as little mess as possible.

She sang his name.

One one hand, unexpected. Lucy seemed to miss some of the most basic social and cultural cues. That she knew the Beatles seemed nothing short of a miracle. On the other hand, "Never heard that one before." Jude muttered to himself and went to check the bathroom for damage. Women were horrible people to share a bathroom with. At least this one didn't come with copious amounts of cosmetics and bits and bobs and bottle and tubes...

>“Starving.”

Not too bad. Jude cleaned some stray hairs off the shower wall. "Food's on my desk." He pulled a few more hairs out of the drain and tossed it all into the trash. "Look left." He added. Just in case she hadn't seen and couldn't smell.

Jude peeked out from the restroom to see Lucy had already started in on the food. The Frenchman went back into his drawers and got some clean clothes and a clean towel since Lucy'd grabbed his old one.

"Don't eat too much too fast." He'd read about Holocaust survivors— not that Lucy was that skinny, but still... Jude really didn't want to clean up puke later.

He ducked into the bathroom and started about his business of getting ready for bed. First a shower. He wrapped his towel around his waist and went to flex in front of the mirror as he brushed his teeth. Then he washed his face and threw on a pair of grey sweatpants and a tee. Pretty standard stuff.

Gwen most certainly did not eat fast. She savored every bite of food as she put it in her mouth. It had been so long since she ate real food. It was glorious. Not to mention unknowingly Jude had given her something that actually made her happy.

She sat in silence listening to the sounds of Jude showering and what was going on in the hall. This place was so quiet. It was odd to not hear the sounds of the city when you were on the island of Manhattan. Though she never really did come this far north and stay here.

She couldn’t help but feel her eyes drooping. She hadn’t realized until just this moment just how tired she was. She had been running on adrenalin for days now. She had been so worried about the next thing that was coming for her. Some how though. Being here behind these tall walls in this secure building full of people like her it was far less scary worrying about people coming for her and people like her.

She climbed up into the bed and curled up in a ball. She didn’t even get to put a blanket over herself as the second her head hit the pillow she was out. She was into one of the best sleeps she was going to have in a year. One of the best and the longest. She would be out for over a day skipping the next day all together.

Jude stood in front of his bed. His occupied bed.

Why? Why did he put the food on his desk? Jude pulled his towel off of his shoulders and tossed it over the back of the chair as he debated his options. He could carry her. He knew he could because he'd done it before. As an adult.

Crud.

That meant it was iffy now, even with all his "special training." So his other options was... Jude looked at the other bed. It had sheets on it, but it wasn't cozy like his was. Not his comforter or his smell or easy access to his stuff.

But his other, other option... Jude looked back at his bed and the woman laying in it.

Yeah.

Not an option if he valued his life.

Jude grumbled the whole way over to Lucy's bed.

And out of it the next morning to fly across the room and slam the alarm clock before he woke the bear from his bed. Whew. He almost never got out of bed before the second snooze. Maybe he should put his clock across the room every day.

He went to breakfast and smuggled some fruit and a water bottle back before class. He left it on his desk.

No. On second thought, he left it on the spare desk. Just in case she ate it and fell back into her food coma in the nearest bed.