He didn't drink? "What a shame. Here I thought I was gonna rope you into being my wingman." She was being sarcastic, though she wasn't sure if he would get it.

"Thanks, i'm rather proud that you had me pegged as a city first upon first impression. It took a while to get all the mud scrubbed off."

She blinked as she listened to him explain himself. "You have a naked Tuesday? What a coincidence, I have a naked monday through Saturday. I only wear clothes on Sundays." She was wearing clothes literally right now, but whatever.

Had she gotten in from the balcony? Was she crazy fast? "Nope. I don't do balconies in the dead of winter." Setting her own cup down, reluctantly, she wiggled her fingers in the air. "It was Magic! I'm a wizard."

She reclaimed her cup; explanation over.

The tall man tilted his head back and forth. "I mean, I'm not old enough to go into bars, so I can't say I'd be a great wing-man in that regard, but I'd help you score if you wanted." He didn't feel the need to question how she might get into places that served alcohol openly. She probable had a fake ID. No biggie.

"Didn't say that I didn't know you weren't from here, just that I felt like you belong here." He stated nonchalantly in response to her saying she was happy he couldn't tell. 

He chuckled and shook his head at her mention of Naken everythingbutsundays. "That's not surprising." He didn't doubt it. It was a bit cold in her apartment, though. She had other ways of keeping warm. When she stated she was a wizard he smooshed his face a bit, and looked to the glass door again. He believed her, but if that wasn't how she got in... How did she do it? Something to do with her ability.

Unless... She really was... A wizard? "Dont... Don't they call them witches... Like, in the books, I guess. I don't really read a lot of fiction that doesn't involve Super Heroes."

He was struck by a spark of inspiration, and suddenly opted to lean forward, catching his weight with his outstretched arms on the way down and starting to do clapping Push-ups at a fairly rapid pace. 

"Actually, I change my mind. You'd scare off all the competition."

Holy crap, he was crazy strong. If she tried to catch herself on her arms while falling she'd be eating her own teeth for a week.

She plopped her cup back down on the table. Getting her legs under her so she could stand, she sprang from the couch with more elegance than she usually let on being capable of. She'd land on his back with both feet, but, even with as slim as she was, mot of her weight would seemingly be missing.

Without much thought for it he cared or not, she plopped down in a crisscross on him and gradually unphased her body. Her weight slowly returned.

"I don't mind witch. Though I'm sadly lacking in pointy hats and warts." She wondered how many push ups he could do with added weight. Had he ever tried that before? He didn't seem like the type who had many friends being so... straight edge as he was.

"Don't they do this in Kung-fu movies?" Whatever the case, she had resettled herself quite nicely.

She did miss her cup of coffee, though.

He grinned at that statement, a look of calm confidence on his face. "You're not wrong."

He could really crank out pushups. His morning routine included one hundred or more. The claps made it more explosive, as he had to generate more force more quickly to elevate himself to clap safely. He wasn't looking when she sprung from the couch, though he did pause for a second when he felt a light weight on his back. A knee met the ground so he could look back a bit. There she was... She weighed so little... Part of her power? She slowly started to weigh as much as a normal person of her size. 

A smile slowly grew as he brought the knee up again, and started doing push-ups again. 

It was harder, for sure, but he'd done such things before, and he was fit enough to still move pretty well with her on him. about 15 in He paused for a second as she commented on Kung Fu Movies. "I think they do-" He did another push up. "Handstand push-ups, mostly." He did another, and then ten more before he started to sense some exhaustion setting it, and opted to save face rather than go all wiggle armed.

"Alright, this ride is at the station." He slowly lowered himself so that she could get off. After a second, he pulled himself into a handstand and started working his shoulders with them Kung-Fu type Push-ups.

It'd been a while, but he did a lot of  incline press and shoulder presses at the gym, so it wasn't so bad. He was, however, definitely breaking from routine at this point. Maybe, just maybe, he was inclined to show off a little.

"That was the best ride ever." She chuckled, phasing her upper body again as she slid off to lessen the awkwardness of it all. "10 outta 10. Would ride again."

Plopping herself back on his couch after a yawn and a stretch of her own, she attempted to guzzle what was left of her coffee real quick. After setting her empty cup down, she whistled lowly at his display of balance and power.

"Bruce Lee would be proud."

While he was distracted being all awesome and junk, she decided that it was time to haul herself back over to her place to get dressed and feed her cat. The big lump was probably pissed at her by now.

Waiting for the big lug to look away, she hopped up and rolled herself over the back of his couch, through the wall, and landed in a pile of blanket on her own floor.

Yeah... she was gonna have to visit more often, if the grin on her face was anything to go by.

"MEROW!"

"Yeah, yeah.. I know, I know. I'll feed you, you fatass."

~~

A few days after that, Juniper found herself wandering around her floor's hall, knocking on doors and shaking a little pouch of dry treats while she looked for her cat. At some point it during the day he had gotten out, and if she was honest with herself she was a little worried.

"Goddamn dumbass feline."

She wasn't good at showing it on the outside though.

It was currently turning 6 o'clock pm, and she had dinner plans with some hottie she'd met at a store, but she was more than likely going to have to cancel. "Clyde?" She was currently stationed at a very old laundry shoot, precariously tipped in to shout down it on the off chance her cat was dumb enough to end up in the basement.

"I'm gonna give away all your wet food to homeless cats if you don't get your furry ass home ASAP!"

It was... sorta nice to show off. He knew that pride was unbecoming to a certain degree, but he'd worked hard to attain this physical shape; he figured things like this were just his reward for doing so. He pulled himself to a standing position finally, and spoke with a grin. "You know, with enough work we can get you doing the same. All you have to do is-" 

She was gone. 

"Ask."

Man, she was good.

__

He had another letter from his dad! Just like the last one, this one had a small letter, and a signed Super Hero collector's card! This one was was DarkMoth, and it was his rookie card, too! That completed his whole DarkMoth set, actually! Xavier grinned widely as he slid the card into its protector on his way to his room. He paused when he heard a familiar voice yelling out about... Cat Food?

"Hey Juniper! Everything okay?"

She seemed, well, sorta chill, actually, but he was beginning to think that was just a constant outer shell he would have to learn to peer past in order to get an idea what she was really thinking. The yelling tipped him off that something was up, though.

"Anything I can help with?' He'd just finished up class and a short patrol, so he was free for a bit, until night patrols, that is. Oh, and homework. Mr.S was brutal.

Startled, she thumped her head on the inside of the laundry shoot when he spoke, hissing and flailing herself back out so she could glare at whoever had surprised her.

Oh. It was Adonis.

Her glare softened to a degree, just making her look grumpy as she rubbed away the lingering pain from the bump. "Oh, Hey Xavier." She lifted the little crinkly bag of treats and shook them slightly. "Clyde got out. I'm trying to find him before he gets run over or.. I don't know, carried off by city rats or something." Friggen things were monstrous. Wouldn't be surprised in the least if they dragged off hapless dumb animals as easy meals.

"You can help, if you wanna. Didn't you just get back though?" Her head tilted slightly. Wasn't he tired? She would be, spending all day with classes and whatever else it was he did as a hero during the day.

"No that i'm complaining if you wanna find my p--" For the first time in her life, probably, a dirty joke died on her lips. It just felt... weird when it was Xavier. "...cat. My cat."

She turned suddenly on her heel, looking particularly cross again and a touch confused.

 His eyebrows furrowed when he heard that her cat got out. "Oh, no! What is a Bonnie without her Clyde!"

He peered about the immediate area... No sign, but looked back at her when she mentioned he'd just gotten home. "Huh? What about it?" He seemed honestly confused as to why she was bringing that up. It didn't even dawn on him that he could be too tired to help someone. What a concept!

The cat statement drew a head tilt from him. "Of course I'll help, Juniper! Where should we start? Does he have any places he likes to hide?" He walked over to the end of the hall, peeking around the corner. Nothing.

He, of course, totally missed her being a little cross and confused. Why would he notice? There was a cat to save!

"Is he a good climber? He didn't look like one, uh, to be honest."

"He doesn't really hide, per-say." He was too old and lazy. Heck, she hardly got him to play with toys these days. "He usually just wanders around looking for some poor sap to feed him. That's how I ended up with him."

Stupid cat had to be all adorable and look just about as broken as she felt. Now she was stuck with his fat fluffy butt for as long as she could keep him alive. He'd better not have gotten himself run over!

"A good climber?" She laughed outright, pausing to peer through the dusty foliage of a very fake shrub. "Have you seen him? He couldn't climb anything to save his life. The dumb cat practically lives on the floor." She resumed shaking her bag of treats.

"I had to save him from the counter when he manged to get stuck on it. He was too fat to jump back down."

Really, truly, she was trying to get his weight down. Short of buying him a kitty treadmill and putting him on a strict diet... which would probably lead to him starving himself.

"He does really like sleeping under blankets if he can get to them, and in clothes drawers."

They'd reached the end of the hall where the stairs were. She stared at the door leading to them with trepidation. Some lazy ass had propped it open with a rock.

"You ever had a pet?" She started toward the stairs with a dramatic sigh, betraying how she felt about the situation. It was going to be a long night, wasn't it?

Oh boy. "Huh, you sure it's a cat and not a convincing sloth?" He then paused. "Oh, wait, Sloths are good climbers. Slow, but good." He spotted the propped open door before she did, and froze in place, turning to her as she noticed as well.

"Yeahhh, that was probably frank. Always stepping out to smoke. Bad habit." She asked about his pets. "Uhh, yeah, I mean, when my mom was alive we had a dog. Heh, His name was frank too. My dad loved him, but he passed soon after..." He kinda trailed off a second. He was facing away when he said this, so his expression was, sadly, unreadable. "It was a rough month."

He snapped out of it quickly, turning to look back with a reassuring smile. "Well, we'd better hurry. How long ago was the last time you saw him?"

He was turned away and missed the side eye she shot him. It was a bad habit, yes, but also one she occasionally partook in if the mood struck her. The apartments were smoke free though, so she was't often caught doing it.

Course all of the other things she dabbled in occasionally could also be considered bad habits. She rubbed the back of her neck while glancing off innocently in a different direction.

She stopped when he started talking about his dog, and also his mom. Ah, @#$%. Losing a parent probably sucked. She could empathize with it on certain levels, even if she hated her life givers most of the time. Occasionally a fond memory would surface from when she had been really young and naive.

Juniper, for lack of better words, sucked entirely at cheering people up. She knew how to cheer herself up and it usually involved a bottle or some pills. Other people though? Yeeesh.

Instead of offering any words of encouragement or a lackluster, awkward apology, she just reached out to lightly give his forearm a squeeze, and offered a neutral smile. She was literally the last person on earth to who was gonna try and get anyone talking about personal demons. Absolutely the last.

She moved on quickly, heading off down the hall shaking that stupid bag of treats still.

"I dunno. Sometime in the last like, five hours? I went out for groceries and someone broke in, I think. Left the door open so i'm pretty sure that's when he got out."

She paused a moment after the words left her lips.

Would someone also steal her overweight, one eyed cat?

...Was anyone weird enough to do that? Probably.

She didn't seem the least bit concerned that her apartment had been broken into.

He started a bit when he felt her hand on his arm. Wow... She... really wasn't what she tried so hard to be, was she? Like, she put on this air of almost nonchalant aloofness, but all of the evidence he'd seen up to this point lead him to believe that it was a surprisingly thin wall that hid something else entirely.

It was at that moment he decided he liked her. As a human being, he liked her. He smiled a bit to her, and then let her change gears quickly, as she was clearly uncomfortable comforting. 

He was thrown off again, however ,when she casually stated that her apartment had been broken into. What.

"Someone... Broke in? Like, someone burgled you?" He looked like that meme guy with the 'really?' face as he asked her to run that one by him again. 

"Oh @#$^, someone stole your one eyed, overweight sloth-I mean cat!" He dug into to pocket to grab out his phone. "We have to call the cops, right? To report the break in? They can search your apartment for clues!"

"Probably? I don't know. Maybe I forgot to lock the door or something." She shrugged, pausing by a box labeled 'FREE' to poke at it with the toe of her shoe, should her cat be hiding among the clothes.

She whirled on him, pointing a finger accusingly. "You swore!" That was the first time anything even remotely not-perfect had popped out of his mouth in her presence.

And then the second thing he said hit her and she lunged for his phone a second later.

Juniper snatched the old flip phone right out of his hand by phasing it as she danced past, stopping a bit away to flip it closed again.

"Oooh, no. No police. I don't wanna make this a big thing and have a bunch of people scouring my place." Was she sweating just a little? Maybe.

"Besides, I don't think anything was taken i'd care about. Clyde is probably just whoring around for food. No biggie, really!"

She wasn't gonna give him his phone back. She eyed him, and then it for a second, before squinting.

Yup. It went straight down her shirt. Safe and sound. "No coppers."

Again, she shrugged off being potentially robbed with baffling coolheadedness. A person's home was THEIR space. It was a place that they had naked days and kept their most precious belongings. How did she not feel... Violated?

He froze when she called him out for swearing. "Uh, Well, yeah, I'm a human bei-" She grabbed his phone.

His PHONE. "Hey Give that-" She explained a bit, and he gave her a sharply raised eyebrow. "You... Don't want the police scouring your place, but a random stranger is perfectly fine?" His head tilted. She was weird. Was it a Utah thing?

He stepped forward and started to reach for his stolen phone, which she'd magically somehow removed from his grip. Wait, how had she done that? He had one heckuva grip strength, but it was gone just like that! He couldn't think on that, however, because shortly the phone disappeared down her shirt. His face turned red as his hand jerked back, and he stood tall, hanging his head. 

He wasn't going there. If he did she might actually call the police. "Okay, okay! No police." He stared at her for a second, and then up, and then down, and then back at her, shifting uncomfortably. "So what now, then?" He shifted again, looking back sheepishly. "Can I have my phone back?"

"I didn't have a choice in the matter of the first, I definitely have a choice in the matter of a second. I don't like people in my space."

After a few moments of scrutinizing him silently and mulling over her options, which only partly included a flat out 'no' and just keeping the damn thing for a bit, she relented. Rolling her shoulders back, his phone popped out the bottom of her shirt and into a waiting palm. She tossed it to him and shrugged.

"I dunno. I can always put up signs or something." Though that was a little daunting in a city this big.

"Maybe I should just get another cat?" God, she wouldn't survive another cat after this one. "...Nah."

So, what next then. Really what next.

"If the treats aren't working maybe a can of wet food will. That fatass can probably hear one of those from a few miles away."

She turned on a heel and started for the stairs again.

Eventually she was back at her door, and this time she had locked it for sure. She set about unlocking it, stepped inside ans tossed her keys onto the outdated vinyl counter that separated her entry way from her small kitchen. The apartments in this complex were well... er... loved, and had once been condos before current management had moved on in. Her place was a pretty faded blue, and unlike her neighbor she has left her walls up. The space probably felt small for him, but for her it was just right. 

She had minimal, bring furniture in comparison to her apparent taste in clothing. It was clear that if she had guests they weren't expected to stay long, or even be very comfortable for the duration of their visit. Heck, it might not have even looked like she spent a whole lot of time in the place.

There were no pictures on the walls, or on the few shelves and small tables. No books. Nothing really that could point to what her particular interests were. 

The drawers in her kitchen were open from whoever had let themselves in, and the only thing she had noticed missing was her small laptop. It was whatever though, it had been a cheap model and she could always buy another one.

As she passed by a little round rice filled hacksac on the floor, she scooped it with a foot and bounced it across the room back in the direction it belonged. She also shut the drawer of her desk, which was positioned over by her window and the fire escape. Had she left that window open? She shut it.

Heading back over to the small kitchen, she fished out a can of cat food Clyde favored quite a bit and popped it open. It reeked of tuna. Perfect. 

"Well, now we play the waiting ga--"

"MEROW"

Juniper blinked. That had worked surprisingly well, and he sounded close? 

"MEEEROOOOW"

There it was again! It sound like....

Like it was coming from the other side of the wall, over in Xavier's place.

She shot him a bewildered look and shrugged slightly.