He may have been a few months out of practice, but Claire was years out of practice. Most of her social engagements for over ten years had been political related parties for senators and the like, charity balls, fund raisers, and that sort of thing. There wasn't much opportunity for flirting, nor had there been any need. She had been married, after all.

>>>"Well if you're middle name happens to be trouble then I don't think I mind having it come my way."

Though she was out of practice, even their slightly corny lines were kind of fun. It was kind of like a bad pun, where you knew the punchline was coming, but couldln't help but groan and laugh anyway. She was fairly certain they both knew where this conversation was headed, but they both tiptoed at the edge of the water, neither quite ready to plunge in just yet.

>>>"If you don't mind my asking, how does a woman that can cause such a... fatal attraction get away with not having a boyfriend?"

They were really getting their feet wet, now, weren't they? Claire couldn't remember if she'd already implied that she didn't have any love interests. She hadn't corrected him earlier when he'd said they were both single. And she wasn't going to correct him now. Two failures to correct his statements should give him enough of a hint that he was correct in his assumptions.

“I wouldn't call it fatal. No one has died because of me,” she smiled, wanting to keep the statement light. With his background he very well might have killed in the past, it was to be expected. She didn't want him to feel bad for it. Now, to answer his question. It was a difficult one to respond to without either making herself sound stuck up, uninterested, or emo. She could use the no one has been good enough excuse, the I'm too busy excuse, or the no one wants me because I'm flawed excuse. None of them were really appropriate in this situation, though. Nor was bringing up the fact that she was on the rebound. Ugh, what a way to spoil a conversation that would be.

“To answer your question, I suppose that destiny is the one deciding things. If she wants me and Katrina on our own, so be it. If she brings the right person along, then that would be wonderful, too.” There. Perhaps not a perfect answer, but it had been an odd question.

"You and your daughter must be close." Jacen observed immediately. After Claire's statement about someone special coming into both her and her daughter's lives he was slightly concerned about whether he should really proceed to asking her out. Obviously he wasn't looking for long term commitement... not in a first date. If anything he was just looking for a nice evening out and about but was Claire open for something like that or would she be judging every word he said on whether he could make a good father or not?

"So many questions but I gotta decide something..."

"It's nice to see that. A lot of parents let their kids run rampant without really being concerned about their lives."

That was about all of the serious talking Jacen wanted to offer at the moment. He didn't it to seem like he was trying to fulfill her dreams for a man or anything along those lines but he was curious about what opportunities there might be between the two of them.

"You must stay pretty busy at the school since you're in charge of the food." Jacen changed the subject as smoothly as he could, "Do you ever get a chance to go out and have some adult fun?"

He was close... very close but he still had committed yet. There was still an opportunity on both their parts to begin to pull away from the subject but if she didn't, he wasn't going to either. An invitation to dinner or drinks was right around the corner if she kept playing along.

>>>"You and your daughter must be close" ... "It's nice to see that. A lot of parents let their kids run rampant without really being concerned about their lives."

The conversation turned back to her daughter, with Jacen seeming to praise every aspect of them being close. He was either trying to prove that he wasn't scared off by her having a child... or she had inadvertantly implied that he somehow would be dating both her and Katrina. She hadn't meant it that way. She'd meant to contrast being alone to dating someone, then changed the alone part to include her daughter, since she was never really alone... ugh, how embarrassing. At least he was taking it fairly well. He hadn't made a break for it down the condiments aisle while hopping flats of soups cans ready to be stocked and dodging old ladies who drove shopping carts like they drove their cars: slowly down the middle of the lane. At least, he hadn't yet.

“Mm hmm,” a nondescript answer, so she didn't have to throw more fuel on the awkward fire. It was small enough that it might burn out on its own.

>>>"You must stay pretty busy at the school since you're in charge of the food" ... "Do you ever get a chance to go out and have some adult fun?"

The subject change smoothly suffocated the dying embers of awkward. They were back on the right track.

“Well, sometimes I go out with one or two of the other teachers, but I haven't made a lot of other friends in the city yet. It would be fun to get to know some people other than just coworkers and students, though.” Her hinting ended with a charming smile. Their feet were wet. She was ready to jump if he was. He was charming to talk to, but if they were going to talk any more than this, they should be sitting somewhere more comfortable. Plus, Katrina was bound to be back soon, which would quickly put a damper on the conversation.

"Wonder if any of those teachers are guys..." Jacen wondered to himself as soon as Claire made her comments. He had to admit to himself that it would be nice to know if there was competition or not, but at the same time he didn't care. She seemed interested in getting together with him at a later time so that had to mean there wasn't anybody to important in her life at the moment.

"Well, maybe you'd let me take you out for dinner or drinks." Jacen offered, trying to making his tone seem like the idea had just popped into his mind even though he had been thinking about it for quite a while now, "I might even be able to show you some of the New York night life that you haven't seen yet."

It was the same every time any guy asking a woman out... there was the small feeling of dread down in the pit of your stomach just on the off chance the she said know. How should you react if that happened? Be offended? Just let it roll of your back? Pretend to be understanding even though you really didn't get it?

"Just say yes..." Jacen found himself mentally begging, "Please say yes."

It had taken forever to find a decent batch of tomatoes. They had been picked over the first time Katrina and Claire had searched through them, and now that all those good ones had been smooshed on the floor of aisle twelve, finding replacements was even more difficult. Even the ones Katrina had eventually ended up with were not as good as she would have liked. Eggs had been easy in comparison, and she was now carefully headed back to the scene of the accidental collision, going slowly as to avoid reckless shoppers, moving hurriedly about on their ways.

She could hear the deep voice of Mr. King even before she rounded the corner of aisle thirteen. It seemed that the mess had already been cleaned up and they were just waiting for her to return with the squishy foods.

>>>"Well, maybe you'd let me take you out for dinner or drinks." ... "I might even be able to show you some of the New York night life that you haven't seen yet."

Katrina froze, then ducked into aisle thirteen, the one right next to Mr. King and her mother. Had she heard that right? Was he asking her mother out on a date? Her mother couldn't date. It had only been a year since splitting up with her father. That wasn't a long enough time. She should wait at least five years. Yup five years would be more appropriate. Or possibly even never. Mr. King had seemed nice at first, but this was unthinkable!

Just say no.. Katrina mentally begged. Just say no. She held her breath, listening for her mother's response and trying not to nervously squeeze the life out of a second set of tomatoes.

In the next aisle over, Claire was smiling. “I would like that, yes. Do you have plans for this weekend? I'm free all day Saturday, so whenever you are free would be fine by me.” Claire dug in her purse and pulled out a pen. “Here, let me give you my number.” She scribbled the number on the bottom of her grocery list, then flipped open her phone to double check that it was correct. It was a relatively new cell phone and a new number she didn't quite have memorized yet. He might even be the first person she had given the number to aside from Katrina.

In aisle thirteen, a teenage daughter was standing stiff in shock and wide eyed, not entirely certain what to do. For the first time ever her mother had a date with someone that wasn't her father. And it was most likely going to be this weekend. That wasn't nearly enough time to be mentally prepared for such a shock. Some weird guy crashed a cart into them, and now her mom was going to go on a date with him? This weekend?

“I would like that, yes. Do you have plans for this weekend? I'm free all day Saturday, so whenever you are free would be fine by me. Here, let me give you my number.”

Jacen felt like pumping his fist in success. Anytime he had ever asked out a woman out his heart always lept to his throat as he waited for their response. Those few seconds always felt like an eternity but now he was able to breathe once again.

"Saturday would be perfect." The man replied as he reached out and accepted the number that Claire was offering him, "Would you rather get together for dinner or just for drinks? Whichever you're more comfortable with will be just fine by me. Maybe about 7:00?"

Pausing a moment to let Claire give him an answer, Jacen suddenly had a thought. Reaching into his pocket Jacen fished out an old gas receipt from his pocket and quickly scribbled down his own cell phone number.

"If anything comes up, or you need to reschedule just give me a call. Maybe... um... well... nevermind." Jacen began before quickly stopping. He had been about to offer the idea of taking both Claire and Katrina to a movie sometime, but that was to much to fast. He didn't even know whether he and Claire would really connect at all so that was an invitation that would just have to wait until a later time.

When her mother replied, “Seven sounds great!” Katrina couldn't take it anymore. As nonchalantly as she could, she walked around the corner from thirteen to twelve just in time to see her mother folding up a piece of paper and sticking it inside the flip shut cell phone.

>>>"If anything comes up, or you need to reschedule just give me a call. Maybe... um... well... never mind."

Never mind is right. “Sorry it took so long,” Katrina set the breakable groceries carefully on top of the cart in the least precarious place she could find as if she had heard nothing, “there weren't any good tomatoes left.” Oops. It probably would have been more tactful to not complain about the quality of the replacement groceries, but she had been trying so hard to avoid other even more awkward subjects. Like her mother going on a date with the tomato squasher on Saturday at seven.

Her mother was giving her an odd look with one eyebrow slightly raised. Was she trying to tell her that she had been rude or was that a guilty look? Katrina had no idea, she was too busy rearranging the groceries to make sure the eggs wouldn't fall to look either of the adults in the face.

Claire stopped trying to analyze her daughter's strange response and just shrugged at Jacen, admitting that she didn't understand the teenage brain whatsoever, “Anyway, you should call so we can arrange a meeting place, too.”

Katrina was fairly certain her ears were looking more and more like the tomatoes. Why was her mom still talking about it? She was right here, now. How was Mr. King feeling about that? Katrina didn't dare look at him. She just stood by the cart, ready to push it toward the checkout whenever her mother was ready to stop talking to the random guy from aisle twelve. Whom she was planning to go out with on Saturday. Saturday!

Normally Jacen would have felt bad about the tomatoes all over again when Katrina happened to mention them but the excitement of getting a chance to go out with Claire completely overroad those negative feelings.

“Anyway, you should call so we can arrange a meeting place, too.” Claire spoke up as Katrina set about rearranging the groceries in their cart so that they would be a little more secure.

"Sounds great." Jacen replied with a grin, "I'll give you a call tonight or tomorrow then. But here, let me help you with your groceries. It's the least I can do for the trouble I caused."

He was doing his best to remain pilot and after smiling at Claire again, Jacen turned his gaze toward the younger girl and offered her a smile as well. Who would have thought that a little accident in the grocery store could lead to a date? If this ended up going into any type of relationship it would be one of the funniest stories in history.

"I never would have thought that my day at the grocery store would end up with my actually crashing into you two ladies." Jacen said with a chuckle as he took control of the women's heavy cart, leaving his much lighter cart for one of them to take care of, "Did you get everything you needed or do you need to pick up another item or two?"

He was clueless... clueless about kids, clueless about teenagers, and even more clueless about how those teens might feel about their Mom accepting a date with a stranger. Yep... he was clueless.

>>>"I'll give you a call tonight or tomorrow then. But here, let me help you with your groceries. It's the least I can do for the trouble I caused."

He was helping her. Smiling at her even. Katrina couldn't help but look up at his kind looking smile and give a small smile back, before realizing what an awkward thing it was to smile at your mother's date for Saturday. Unless maybe it wasn't so awkward. Katrina dropped her gaze again. She was so confused. How was she supposed to feel about her mother dating? How was she supposed to feel about the guy her mother was dating? He seemed so genuinely nice, it was hard to dislike him. At least, she had certainly thought he was nice before she had gone to get the eggs and tomatoes.

>>>"I never would have thought that my day at the grocery store would end up with my actually crashing into you two ladies."

He even kind of had a sense of humor. That was a good thing right? Katrina's lip twitched to the side just a little.

Claire couldn't figure out why her daughter was suddenly acting so shy suddenly. She was usually so friendly towards people. She tilted her head, but didn't say anything to her young offspring. She did laugh lightly at Jacen's comment about crashing into them.

“It does make a good story,” she admitted with a smile, then checked her rather long grocery list. She had been crossing thing off as they went, “I think that soup was the last thing on our list, so we should be ready to check out.”

Katrina let Mr. King take the heavy cart, and followed up behind with the lighter one as they all traipsed toward the check out. Jacen's cart probably had few enough items that he could make it through the express lane if the check out person didn't count too carefully.

She followed along quietly, trying to sort out the situation in her head. She hadn't heard from her father in slightly over a year, and at that time he hadn't been exactly happy to hear that she was a mutant. Deep down, she wanted to believe that he still could still change his mind. She didn't think that even in the most idealist of worlds that her parents would ever get back together. So maybe dating someone else was a good thing for her mother. It would give her something to do besides hovering all the time, as if she was constantly afraid Katrina would be snatched out from under her nose. Not a likely scenario. Katrina just wished she could find out more about this Jacen King fellow.

Jacen was feeling exceptionally pleased with himself though he tried to keep his emotions from showing to much. Obviously he wanted to look happy and relaxed but he didn't want Claire to know exactly how excited he was to be going out with her. Honestly, most of the girls he had gone out with were the attractive but not so brightly girls that were just as interested in being physical as he was. This was one of the few times he met a woman that actually intrigued him intelletually instead of just physically.

"Interesting woman... very interesting woman." He thought to himself as the three of them took their places in the check out line.

Steeling a glanced at Katrina out of the corner of his eyes Jacen wondered why she was being so quiet. He didn't knwo her so it was quite possible that she was just shy and this was her normal way of acting.

"So Katrina, how's school going? Got any big plans for your upcoming Spring Break?" Jacen asked easily, doing his best to make conversation that would include the young woman. He didn't mind talking to Katrina at the moment, just so long as he get Claire to himself on the date. After all, kids were fine, but adults needed some alone time on occasion.

Katrina pushed the light cart into line behind the heavy one, even though it wasn't the shortest line. It would simplify things if they all stuck together in the lines.

>>>"So Katrina, how's school going? Got any big plans for your upcoming Spring Break?"

“Spring break?” Katrina shrugged, “ I don't have any plans yet. Just hanging out with friends, I guess. It seems so far away, I must have a million tests and projects between now and then.”

There was a quiz on genetics tomorrow, for example. She had already been studying for several days and was pretty sure she had the concept of punnett squares down, so it should be a pretty easy quiz. It was the accompanying project that had her more concerned: a poster based on the genetic differences between humans and mutants and then a class debate on whether mutation made them a different species, a different breed, a different race, or just a different version of the same thing. Katrina had looked at so many sources on the subject and heard so many different opinions she wasn't even sure she knew which side of the debate she would be supporting.

The thought about supporting a side made Katrina wonder what Mister Mysterious Marketplace Man thought about the topic. It never hurt to hear other opinions on the subject, and so far the only opinions she had heard were from people who lived at the mansion, which was a very narrow sampling of opinions. I t would also be good to know, both for her and for her mother, what this man thought about mutants. Not that Katrina wanted to test him or anything.

Katrina looked her mother's date in the face, pushing her hair out of her face and discarding her shy demeanor. “So, we have a class debate coming up. It's about whether humans and mutants are the same species or not. What do you think?”

Claire looked up at her daughter with an eyebrow raised from the other side of the overloaded cart she was emptying onto the conveyor belt. It seemed like a random subject to be bringing up at the grocery store, unless there was some ulterior motive. Was her daughter testing Jacen, or was she really curious because of some class project? She wasn't really sure. A year and a half ago, she never would have thought her daughter capable of duplicity, but she was growing up and had been forced to live in the adult world for an entire nine months without the protection of parents, in the mutant resistance against the Registration Act. Who knew what kinds of things she had picked up while she was there?

Claire didn't respond out loud to her daughter's query, though. She simply waited to hear what Jacen would say. Whether or not her daughter had carefully planted that question, she too was interested to hear his response.

Jacen had to laugh slightly at the question that Katrina had thrown him out of the blue. He supposed that he shouldn't be that surprised since the mutant/human debate was such a common subject. It just made sense that it would be something that they would talk about in schools.

"I'm afraid you're asking someone with absolutely no experience in genetics." Jacen replied with a smile at Kat before glancing up at the line ahead of him and then turning his gaze back to the younger girl. "To me... I don't know that I'd call them a ifferent species any more than I'd call an African American or Oriental a different species from a Caucasion. Are mutant different? Sure, but I'm not sure it makes them a different species."

Jacen knew that quite a few of his buddies at the department would want to argue that poing with him. He'd heard so many endless debates about whether mutants were humans or just some type of animal that he had gotten sick of it. Sure there were bad mutants, but that didn't make them all bad...

"When someone does try to classify mutants as a different species simply because of attrocities performed by certain individuals, they ignore our very own human history. Just because Hitler or Mussolini were monsters didn't mean they weren't human and it doesn't mean that all humans are evil. The same has to apply to mutants. Just because some abuse their abilities doesn't mean that all mutants are our to murder us in our beds."

Raising an eyebrow questioningly Jacen decided to put his own question to the young woman. "What do your teachers say at school? What's their oppinion?" Teachers were supposed to be objective, willing to see both sides of an arguments but all to often they weren't. Many times teachers would allow their own personal beliefs to cloud a debate when they were supposed to be letting the students learn and grow through the classroom debates. If Katrina had a prejudiced teacher, then it was quite possible she would disagree with everything that he had just said.

Jacen had chuckled at her question. Okay, so it had been a little random, she supposed. Or rather, it was concretely connected in her own thought process, but she hadn't bothered to explain how her train of thought had been running. He did answer the question, though, after he got over his surprise at the sudden subject change.

>>>"I'm afraid you're asking someone with absolutely no experience in genetics."

“This is the first time I've ever learned about it,” Katrina replied with an honest nod. She was no expert either.

>>>"To me... I don't know that I'd call them a different species any more than I'd call an African American or Oriental a different species from a Caucasian. Are mutant different? Sure, but I'm not sure it makes them a different species."

“Hmm,” Katrina pondered while Jacen gave his view on the subject. Claire listened attentively as well, but with fewer sound effects and more unloading onto the conveyor belt. His explanation about some humans being evil not making every human evil was quite logical.

>>>"What do your teachers say at school? What's their opinion?"

“Well,” Katrina started, “everyone at school seems to have different opinions. So far the teacher hasn't said what she believes, because I think she wants us to figure it out for ourselves first. I still don't know. I think it is kind of like the difference between wolves and dogs. They are technically the same species, because otherwise they couldn't have puppies, but they each have their different sub species. But there are a lot of kids at school who say humans and mutants are completely different,” Katrina shrugged.

She wanted to believe that there were ties between the two groups, because it seemed like if they were all the same deep down inside there would be hope for everyone getting along eventually. If they were really so different as some of her classmates claimed, it seemed like it would be easier to just separate everyone to their own hemispheres. The teen illusionist didn't want to be influenced by everyone else's way of thinking, but aside from the technical biological differences, some of the other students were pretty convincing when they claimed that they were definitely not human. After all, could humans turn invisible, or shoot flames from their hands, or send out weird sonar rays? No. They were just humans.

"Well just remember that mutants and humans can have offspring together. You won't find one place in nature where different species can intermingle." Jacen said with a firm nod, "And it sounds like you have pretty good teacher. Most are to quick to try and push their own opinion on the students but it sounds like you've got some good ones."

Turning back around to Claire, he suddenly realized that she had taken care of almost all the work of loading up the conveyor belt with groceries. From the look of things it was still all from their overloaded cart and his own groceries hadn't yet made it out of the cart.

"Can I at least assume you'll be able to get some of the students to help you unload all of this food when you get back to the school?" He asked with a smile toward the elder of the two women, "This seems like an awful lot for you two ladies to be lugging around by yourself."

Within the course of only a few more minutes both batches of groceries were paid for and the three were on their way out the door. Remaining the gentleman, Jacen graciously pushed the ladies cart to their vehicle, figuring he would take his own cart over to his truck after they were in a position to be loading.

"So... I'll call you later then. Ok, Claire?"

Except zorses, mules, and ligers, but although they cross species lines, they are generally infertile due to mismatched chromosome numbers. Katrina nodded as they finished paying for the groceries.

“We'll be fine,” Claire responded, “There are a lot of helpers back at the school to help us unload. There had better be or supper is going to be cold cereal.” Katrina was still thinking about what would happen if a dalmation and a chihuahua got mixed together.

“Talk to you soon!” Claire waved as she shut the trunk with all the groceries stashed safely inside. Katrina snapped to attention once more, shaking cobwebs and giraffaroos out of her head. She added her own wave to her mother's. Jacen seemed like a nice enough guy, for a random person they ran into at the grocery store.