Ruth had all of two hours before she was dragged downstairs to eat. In a bag. It didn't end well.
"Who's fucking idea was it to stuff me in a fucking bag after I thought I was gonna be fucking murdered last night?" she shrieked, falling to the ground, pulling her knees to her chest.
"Jeez, I didn't think she'd react like this," a voice said, "You okay, girl?"
"What do you think?" she screeched, trying to stand only to fall back down, pulling her knees to her chest.
"I'm sorry, Mystique told me you needed to get here and she said you'd fight back so I thought this would be easier. You wouldn't have been in there long, but she said not to use my speed because it wouldn't freaked you out."
She tugged at her hair, a habit she had when she was upset. "And you thought stuffing me in a bag wouldn't have freaked me out?"
She couldn't stop crying. She was slowly going hysterical, her sobs slowly turning into screams, her entire body overheating. She kept tugging at her hair, as if she needed to pull it out.
She wasn't angry and she wasn't afraid anymore. She was just...upset. She didn't know.
"What happened?" a new voice demanded. Charles.
"Peter stuffed her in a bag." This voice was more feminine, sounding as nearly upset as Charles.
"I didn't mean to scare her, Mystique just—"
"Raven!" Charles nearly shouted, "We talked about this, she is a child, why must you go and terrorize her—"
"That wasn't my intention," Raven argued, running into the room, "I just wanted to bring her down to eat lunch, she hasn't been eating. Peter was the one who—"
"No! Nuh-uh, girlfriend, you are not sticking this one on me, this is all you! I—"
"Shut up!"
Ruth's scream echoed slightly as everyone in the room froze, staring at the tiny figure on the floor.
She was having a panic attack. She had one that night and she was having one now and all those bullshit exercises her shrink tried teaching her didn't do anything. First step was to know what was happening, so what the fuck was next?
"Ruth," the girl said, reaching into her mind the way Charles did, "Just focus on my voice. Try to relax. Breathe with my counts, okay?"
Ruth took a deep breath and nodded, following the girl as she counted in her head, telling her when to inhale and exhale.
Ruth didn't know when she calmed down, but soon enough she was standing, albeit a bit shakily, and glaring up at the silver-haired boy standing in front of her. "We better have muffins or I'm going to kill someone." Raven opened her mouth, but Ruth held up her hand. "It's a figure of speech. Do we have muffins?"
Charles eyed her warily. "Y-yes. Ruth...are you alright? You've, um, recovered quite well and, um, quickly."
She took a deep breath and sighed. "Yeah, that's kind of my thing. I don't like dwelling on shitty things too long or else they bother me more. So. Muffins?"
She watched as the girl—"my name is Jean"—lift her hand, a single muffin floating down from the cabinet. Telepathic and telekinetic. Ruth plucked the muffin from the air and nodded in silent gratitude, turning to head back up to her room and never come out.
She made it all the way up the stairs,trying to ignore the feeling that everyone was looking at her. Her shrink told her that it was all in her head and she should just ignore it, but it was hard to ignore it when it was, you know, in her head.
"Hey."
She stopped and turned around to see the silver haired boy standing a few feet behind her, his hands in his pockets. She wanted to punch him. Just like she'd wanted to punch all those stupid skater boys that always hung around in her neighborhood, calling her names, throwing rocks at Lionel. She hated them so much.
She wanted to say he was no different. But if she said that, if she thought that, she might as well be spitting on Lionel's entire family. Then setting them on fire.
"Were you the one who did it?" she asked. She couldn't help herself. "Last night. Were you the one who moved the tables around?"
He shook his head. "No. She asked me to, though. I don't know how she did it. But I didn't do it, I'm not that big of an asshole." He laughed self-deprecatingly and Ruth felt a pang of guilt rush through her.
"Well, thanks. For not agreeing to scare me," she said, not sure what to say, feeling extremely awkward in her nightclothes.
"No problem." He looked up, then appeared right in front of her. "I'm Peter."
She jumped, startled, but took his outstretched hand. "Ruth. Nice to meet you."
He winked, then sped off. It was probably for the best. She stared at the spot where he had been standing before retreating back to her room. She'd had enough social interaction for one day.
º º º º º
The rest of the world thought differently.
It was well into the evening when there was a knock on her door. Ruth sat up and tried to guess who it was.
It could be Alex or Hank, trying to convince her to come downstairs and interact with society, or for Hank, run some tests. It could be Charles wanting to know how she was doing and basically ask the same questions she shrink would ask, but in a nicer, more English voice. It could be Raven, trying to apologize, but that was a stretch.
The knock came again and she sighed, making the short trek to the door. She opened it, expecting to see an adult, only to find Peter standing there, chips in his hands. "What up?"
She blinked and let him pass, watching as he zipped to her bed, dropping the large pile onto her covers. "I'm sorry, what?"
He looked up at her and shrugged. "Thought you might want some cheering up. And this is sort of an apology? For the whole bag incident, you know? Also, the Professor's kinda wigged out at how not-freaked you were. Any reason why you booked right away, you coulda eaten your muffin in the kitchen." He looked at the uneaten muffin on her desk. "Or, like. At all."
She sighed, leaning against her doorframe. "You know that stupid saying parents use about tearing the bandaid right off so it stops hurting? Well, that's bullshit because it still stings as much as it does if you take it off slowly. The only difference is if you can take the pain when it comes off slowly.
"It's the same thing with emotions with me. I get really pissed one second, then I'm skipping down the hall. I can be sobbing on the floor, then I can laugh it off and ask for some muffins. That's the way I'm wired. You should also be glad I don't hold grudges because with power like mine, say goodbye to your eyebrows."
He blinked quickly. "So...you're okay?"
She nodded. "Yeah. Give me a day or two and I won't be, but for now...are those Cheeto Puffs?" He nodded, grinning, and she squealed, skipping over to her bed and opening up the bag. "New favorite person."
They sat on her bed, munching on the junk food, talking about who-knows-what when there was a knock on the doorframe. "Chips?"
Ruth looked up to see Jean standing in the doorway, three other people hovering behind her. She started to fidget, pulling her legs up onto the bed, looking at Peter who motioned for them to come inside. Wasn't this her room?
Jean didn't move. "Ruth, are you alright with us coming in?" Ruth winced; she forgot about the telepathy, she must have sounded so rude. She nodded and Jean walked inside, the others following.
"Hey, I know you," Ruth said before she could stop herself. She was looking at the girl with the pigtails. "You're the girl from the mall. You bumped into Lionel a couple of times. He had such a big crush on you."
The girl tilted her head. "You're from L.A.?"
Ruth nodded. "Yeah! So you probably don't know who I am...but I guess that doesn't really matter now. I'm Ruth."
The girl smiled. "Jubilee. Is there any chance I could meet this Lionel, I'd be down to meet anyone who has a crush on me."
Ruth's smile wavered, but she tried not to show it. "Um...I don't think so he, uh, he moved away. I lost contact with him when I moved here, so..." she trailed off, not sure how to end. If Jean, or anyone else, saw through her lie, they didn't show it.
"I'm Kurt," a voice said, breaking her out of her thoughts. She looked at a boy with blue skin and a thick accent. She smiled, remembering the cute boy in biology who left her flowers one time; he had the same accent.
"Nice to meet you," she said because he wasn't the boy from biology class. He was Kurt with blue skin and a tail. And a Michael Jackson jacket.
She looked at the person sitting at her desk chair, recognizing the red glasses perched on his nose. "Hi, again."
The boy just nodded, not saying anything. Jean nudged him and he sighed. "Hi." After another pause, he added, "I'm Scott."
Ruth didn't say anything, remembering what Alex had said. She held out her Cheeto bag to Jubilee who smiled and reached in and grabbed a few, looking over at Kurt and Jean who were working on a bag of Doritos.
"I'm not trying to be rude or anything," Scott started around a mouthful of chips, "But why are we here?"
Ruth shrugged. "I was kind of wondering the same thing, but I didn't wanna say anything." He motioned at her appreciatively and she wondered if that was the right thing to do.
"We are here, Scott," Jean said, kicking him, "Because we are trying to make friends. And Peter stole all our chips."
"Guilty," said boy sang, popping a Cheeto in his mouth.
Ruth laughed, looking at Kurt who was studying the chip he had in his hand. "What do you guys do for fun?"
Scott pointed at Jubilee who said, also around a mouthful of chips, "Mall! Whenever Mystique isn't training us."
Ruth made a face. "I heard about the training. You guys like it?"
Jean shrugged. "It's necessary."
"But do you like it?" Ruth had a feeling she was pushing some boundaries, but she didn't care. Not at the moment.
Jean shrugged again. "I'm not so sure."
That was good enough for Ruth and they dropped the subject. Peter started talking about a new arcade opening up in the mall and Kurt immediately asked what an arcade was, prompting Peter to gasp loudly and for Scott to start making plans, ranting about civic duty.
Ruth laughed as she watched them and it dawned on her that she could get used to this. Hanging out in her room with a group of people, talking about everything or nothing. She didn't always have to isolate herself.
Then she remembered why she had to. Remembered that she brought it upon herself; she wasn't allowed to have luxuries, not after what she did. It was her own little purgatory and she had to live with it.
Jean looked at her, worried. Ruth pretended not to see her.
There was another knock on the doorframe. Ruth looked up and saw Alex standing there, smiling slightly. "Hey, kids."
Scott groaned loudly. "God, why are you here."
Alex grabbed the boy—his little brother—by the neck and ruffled his hair. "Because I live here too and I wanted to see my baby brother and his friends. How're you kids doing?" He got a chorus of 'good's and 'fine's. "Great. Listen, I hate to cut this little party short, but Charles needs us in his office."
They all stood at once and Ruth had the sudden urge to take a picture; they looked so staged, so heroic. She would have laughed if not for the circumstances.
"Bye," she said, waving, dropping her hand when Alex shook his head. "What?"
"You're coming too, Ruth Dakin Bailey."
A/N ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED JUNE 16, 2016 BUT UPDATED TO CHANGE THE GIF UP TOP
I refuse to believe that Peter is canonically 27 years old. I won't believe it, I won't. Anyways, I will just reiterate that this story is veering off from canon. Obviously. To clear things up, Alex didn't die in that explosion because Peter got to him in time.
I apologize if Ruth's character is kind of all over the place, that's sort of my intention. This story is big on handling emotions and, as you can see, she has an extremely long way to go. That being said, her inconsistency is a big part of her, so yeah!
I apologize for my terrible writing, I rewrote this chapter multiple times because it just wasn't working out the way I wanted. This was as close as I could get.