Chapter 20
It’s two hundred and fifty-five miles from Washington to Westchester, give or take. It takes almost five hours of non-stop driving to complete the route and find yourself in a different state. Some spent that much in a traffic jam on their way from work to home even though if one looks at the map and marks these two destinations there, often times the road between them isn’t long enough to drive it even an hour.
That’s why Maria wanted to leave early - before the sun was bathing the streets in its hot light. That’s why she drank two cups of strong black coffee at six o’clock in the morning, put together a small bag of snacks, and dragged Lora out of her bed at the beginning of eight. If they moved out now, by lunchtime they would be eating burgers with Peter and Wanda, and wouldn’t be stuck in a line of nervous drivers, stewing in the Ford’s and Chevrolet’s cans.
“What’s in your backpack?” Maria asked, surprised to find her daughter’s backpack quite heavy as she settled it between them on the leather seat.
The girl yawned and rested her head on the door panel while her sleepy fingers worked on the seat belt. “Just stuff.”
Maria buckled up too, put the keys into the ignition, and started her Ford Ltd. “Are you ready for a road trip?” she asked Lora in a cheerful tone, edging them out into the street.
“Mm-hmm,” the girl hummed in reply, her eyes closed.
A soft smile twisted the woman’s mouth. “Excited to see your siblings?”
“Yeah,” Lora got out and smacked her lips, drawing her backpack close to her chest as if it were a pillow or her favorite plush rabbit.
A lifetime ago, as it seemed, sitting behind a steering wheel and driving toward the rising sun to the sounds of the radio was a big part of Maria’s life. It never really descended into the category of something ordinary, yet it didn’t make her nerves buzz the way they were buzzing now. It’s been years since she traveled to another state. Nine, to be precise.
The woman cast a glance at her daughter who was fast asleep with her mouth slightly open. They joined the flow of cars on the highway, shortening the miles between the two halves of their little bizarre family.
How did she manage to live on the go with two kids to care about? It felt like a made-up story now. Like it was somebody else who was sharing the memories of raising the twins with superhuman powers and trying to make a home for them out of every town and city, and motel room they stayed in.
Even though she became a mother at a young age with no partner by her side or bright prospects for the future, Maria had the time of her life back then, working in the numerous diners that merged into one and eating a bucket of ice cream for dinner, sitting with her little ones on the floor in front of the black-and-white TV. No, she wouldn’t trade her today’s life for the world but sometimes she felt like she cooped herself up in stability. Her single-parent life lacked spontaneity and romance, and shaking moments. Though Peter provided her with one not a long time ago, venturing to go looking for his father and nearly dying. That was definitely not the type of shaking moments she desired to experience.
The day seemed to decide to turn on the lights because the white fluffy clouds gave way to the sun, letting its rays scatter around. Without taking her eyes off the road, the woman reached for the glove compartment and groped for the sunglasses. She thought those chunky plastic frames and yellow lenses ridiculous but her kids proclaimed in one voice that she was ‘definitely zero cool’ in those shades and insisted that she bought them. Maria got to hand it to them, those square things she perched on her nose protected her well both from the sun and unwanted glances as she moved into the oncoming lane, trying to pass a particularly slow Ford Pinto.
Sometimes Maria thought that she was jinked. At least when it came down to men. She was born in Poland to Eta and Julian Maximoff but didn’t get to spend much time with both of them. The war took away her father and her homeland, pushing her mother to hop on a steamer ship and flee to the US. There were a couple of images of Julian in a family photo book but no memories left in his daughter’s mind. He was a man she didn’t know. Practically a stranger. Growing up without a father, Maria never really dreamed of finding a prince and getting married. She couldn’t imagine herself living in a full family, least – creating one of her own.
Maybe she should’ve been more compliant with the people around so they would’ve stayedaround but she was too much of a free spirit, unable to tolerate the rules so many lived by. Erik was just the same. 214782. She still remembered those numbers tattooed vertically on his lower arm. Another Jewish kid with a ruined childhood, though his story was gory and thus more tragic. They fit together like two puzzles of a big picture. Maria resisted his charms for a long time, but in the end, she chose to give in, this guy that this guy with light blue eyes and a German accent was her key to a happy life. She fell in love and he did too, the woman was sure of it, yet his hunt meant more to him, and although it was she who left, slamming the door, he left her first. There were others after him, but it was just a series of distractions from a broken heart, nothing more.
Then came Lonnie. A white-collar. Not her type, as Wanda once said. And he really wasn’t. From Monday to Friday, he went to his work, sat in his office with a ton of papers, and held meetings with the big shots of the financial world. He wore expensive suits, colognes, and even more expensive watches, loved to play golf, and read a newspaper every morning. It wasn’t the same as with Erik, but with Lonnie, she could give Peter and Wanda a real home, a good education, and a future. When she found out she was pregnant with Lora, well…Here it is, a full family, she thought, not without a tinge of excitement. She didn’t want a diamond ring and a magnificent wedding, only that he would treat her and her children right. Lonnie gave Wanda driving lessons on his Ferrari 365 GTC/4, he took Peter to the golf club to socialize him, and did a lot of things that a father would do, and somewhere along the way, perhaps when she was snowed under nappies and diapers, he must have felt like it was too much for him. He fled, leaving them a note and his property, except for the car.
This time, Maria’s heart wasn’t broken, but her world was so shaken that she couldn’t stand a day without a glass of scotch at hand. In the beginning. When the scotch ran out, anything that had alcohol in it could suffice. Some days she couldn’t bring herself to get out of bed at all. That year went by in a blur. She was still ashamed for it before her children, before her gifted babies who had to grow up quickly and take care of so many things because she couldn’t. Maria still got a cautious look from Peter or Wanda whenever they spotted her with a bottle of beer or a glass of wine in hand.
Now, by the will of fate, and even more by the will of her children, the circle sort of went around, bringing her back to Erik. She didn’t know how she felt about it. Disappointed, angry, resentful, frustrated, guilty, accepting. It was difficult to choose just one. But the mere thought of meeting him after two decades of walking different life paths made Maria’s palms clammy.
Without using her blinker, the woman turned her steering wheel to the left, veering toward the exit. This, she reminded herself, was exactly the issue. Erik had a way to influence people even when he was miles away. Even when he didn’t even know she was coming to the school. He had got into her head retroactively and she had almost missed the gas station.
Awakened by the abrupt maneuver, Lora mumbled, rubbing her eyes, “Are we there yet?”
“I’m sorry, honey,” Maria replied, curling her lips. “We are halfway there.”
She guided her car under a yellow and red canopy with a Shell sign and stopped by a pump, yanking up the parking brake. “Do you need to use a washroom?” she asked, turning her head to the girl. When she got a sleepy shake of the head in return, she added, “Stay in the car. I’ll be right back, okay?”
Her daughter nodded.
The woman unbuckled her seat belt, took her purse, and got out of the car. A curly teenage boy ran over to her Ford, too enthusiastic for the morning that promised to grow into a hot day.
“Regular, please,” she said to him with a small smile, handing him a tip.
“Yes, ma’am,” the boy replied, stuffing the money in the front pocket of his uniform trousers.
He rounded the hood to access the gas tank and while he was busy with the nozzle, Maria headed inside the convenience store to pay for the gas and pop into the washroom. She put her purse on the sink ledge, turned on the faucet, and put her hands under the stream of cold water, loosing a sigh. That was not a big deal. She was driving to see her kids. Erik wouldn’t even be there. If they could get there before noon. The woman turned the water off, shook her hands, and looked in the mirror. The light in the room illuminated her glowing skin from the heat, giving it a green tint.
“Great, a mermaid in her very late 30s,” she muttered to her reflection on an exhale.
Having reached the purse, Maria opened it and fished out her lipstick. She put some on her lips and some on her cheeks, giving them a light blush. Then, she fixed her wavy hair that was half up, half down, adjusted her sleeves floral dress, picked up her stuff, and went out of the washroom. It felt like the temperature grew 50 degrees since she was last outside.
“Oof, it’s a living hell, isn’t it?” Maria said, getting back in her car. When she looked at Lora, the girl was fluttering herself fan she must have thoughtfully packed in her backpack. “That’s cheating!” the woman exclaimed in feigned indignation, pointing her finger at the girl. “Will you fan me too?”
“What’s in it for me?” her daughter asked, cocking her brow.
Maria pulled several Zots of different flavors out of the outside pocket of her purse.
“Deal!” Lora blasted out, snatching a watermelon candy out of her mom’s hand.
They set off, driving out on the highway again. Soon they were zooming past nice neighborhoods with one-floor houses, painted in pastel colors. Blue and grey prevailed but here and there muffled burgundy and peach popped up, catching the eye. The greenery was sparse there and when the wind cut in through the open windows of the car and fluttered their hair, it brought a great deal of dust as well as coolness.
Somewhere around Trenton, Lora got tired of the blubbering radio and the industrial sights passing by in a blur, so she rambled in the glove compartment and found the Queen’s News of the World. Wanda brought that cassette straight from London when she came home for the winter break in her freshman year of Oxford. Peter even shed a tear back then. Not because the girl bought a freshly released album of a British band, but because of how much he missed his sister, with whom he was practically inseparable from birth. He would deny it now but the moment printed in Maria’s heart, drawing a soft smile and a couple of tears out of her every time the memory rose in her mind.
Stomp, stomp, clap beat filled the car and thirty seconds later Maria found herself playing along with it, her fingers tapping on the steering wheel. She wasn't a fan of rock, if anything she’d rather pretend that she was doing a duet with Aretha Franklin, but something about how confidently Freddie Mercury and his bandmates were chanting We Will, We Will Rock You without any supporting music resonated with her. When the next track came on – We Are The Champions – she turned up the volume and feeling the soaring, triumphant melody, sang the empowering lyrics. Lora kept pace with her mom and together they belted out this song for half an hour before finally letting Sheer Heart Attack take over. All Dead, All Dead felt like a downgrade of the chaotic vibe so they jumped to its total opposite Spread Your Wings where all the masculine pronouns were replaced by feminine ones, and coming from Maria’s lips it was almost autobiographical. Fly away, far away had already been tinged with some hoarseness thus Fight From The Inside went without backing vocals but with energetic head bobbing. Get Down, Make Love was where the woman drew the line, fast-forwarding to a blues excursion Sleeping on the Sidewalk that instantly became the favorite track on the album until My Melancholy Blues began to play. Maria was no longer sitting behind a steering wheel, trying not to lean back in her seat so the fabric of her dress wouldn’t stick to her slightly sweaty skin. No, she was in New York in 1958, in one of those restaurants with live music, swaying to the beautiful piano sounds in Erik’s arms. His left hand rested on her lower back, keeping their bodies close, while the right gently squeezed her fingers. He pressed his clean-shaven cheek to her temple and they circled the dark hall, knowing nothing in this world but each other.
The song stopped, concluding the album, and the silence fell, so suddenly it felt like somebody woke Maria up in the middle of a pleasant dream. Overwhelmed, she drew in a sharp breath, staring out the window at the dull highway. She felt her daughter’s eyes on her face but couldn’t bring herself to look in return.
“Do you want me to rewind the cassette?” Lora asked quietly, even though she was not a fan of ballads.
The woman shook her head, forcing a smile on her face. “Music on the road hits differently, doesn’t it?” From the corner of her eye, she saw the girl nod. She added, “I think it’s a perfect time for breakfast. Look over, there is a bag with snacks I packed for the trip.”
Lora obeyed, twisting over the back of her seat to pull out a KitKat bar from a small linen bag.
The rest forty minutes they drove to Westchester went to the rustle of the foil and the roadway noise but when they finally reached the county, it hit them with the tranquility and beauty of a suburban area. The place had a classic provincial profile of square storefronts facing each other across a relatively wide main drag, people greeting each other with polite and genuine smiles, and if one perked up their ears, they would be able to hear the birds sing.
Maria didn’t risk wandering around the area, losing precious time in search of the school, so she turned to an elderly couple walking their Shiu Tzu for a direction. She was pleasantly surprised when there was no change in the tone of the man before and after he heard the word “mutants” as it stayed cheerful. Either this Mr. Xavier bought their politeness or the local community got used to the fact that the only known mutant school in the world was located in their area. As the woman drove up to the gate with an oval sign Xavier’s School For Gifted Youngsters plastered on the stone post, she began to lean toward the first guess. Everything was so clean and neat – the perfect road framed by flower beds in bloom, the vast land stretching out behind the fence, and the very atmosphere – it screamed wealth. Who would have thought looking at a drunken hippie on her doorstep seven years ago, huh?
There was a debate going in Maria’s head about whether she should drive in through the gates or leave her Ford somewhere around so together with Lora they would travel on their own feet from this point on. After all, how vast could this territory be? By the sight of an unending fence, quite vast.
She cast a glance at Lora whose expression plainly said: don’t be a chicken.
“That’s not how you treat your mother,” Maria said, furrowing her brows. “No more sweets today.”
The girl splayed her arms, indignation twisting her face.
Of course, her daughter was right. If she miscalculated and Erik was there, with the car or without it wouldn’t be easy to run away. Not that it would be the right thing to do, to begin with.
A hopeless sigh escaped the woman’s lips. She shook her head like she couldn’t believe she was truly doing it and leaned out the window to press a button on the intercom. A soft melody began to play but was soon interrupted by intense rustling and a thwack.
“Hello?” Maria said hesitantly.
“Hey!” a woman’s overly cheerful voice replied from the speaker. “Are you a parent? Do you have a meeting scheduled with the Professor?”
“Erm…Not exactly. I sort of decided to surprise my kids? Peter and Wanda. They are twins. Not identical but still. One has silver hair and the other, well, you won’t confuse her with anyone else either. Maybe you know them? You probably know them.”
No reply followed but the intercom beeped and the gates began to open.
Lora’s brows were raised, she eyed her mom as if she were the biggest weirdo around. “You know you could just say ‘yes’ and she would let us in?”
“Right,” Maria muttered under her breath and pushed the gas pedal, gravel scrunching beneath the tires.
When the mansion appeared in their line of view, mother and daughter involuntarily leaned forward, gaping. They circled the fountain, stopping not far from the porch, and got out of the car.
“That’s definitely not a summer camp,” Lora drawled, putting on her backpack.
“I was just going to say that,” Maria drawled back.
They rounded the hood and entered the school building holding hands. Huge stained glass letting light onto the double-sided staircase, a massive glass chandelier hanging from the ceiling, marble and dark wood everywhere – there was a lot to see. However, Maria didn’t feel comfortable here, it seemed to her that this place looked more like a museum than a house where children could grow up. Speaking of children.
The woman stopped a boy running past her, grabbing him gently by the shoulder. “Hey. Do you happen to know where we can find Peter and Wanda?”
“They are outside with their team,” he blasted out without hesitation and took off before Maria could ask for the specifics.
“Maybe we should take the hallway?” Lora suggested, looking up at her mom.
There wasn’t anyone in the foyer to ask for a direction so Maria shrugged and decided to give it a try.
They walked down the hallway, examining the pictures on the walls and peeking in the open rooms. In the end, it brought them to the patio. Lora let go of her mom’s hand and ran down the stairs to the lawn before the woman spotted her son’s silver head. Together with Wanda, Kurt, and two more young people, he was sitting under a tree, hiding from the sun. It caused quite a stir in that company when the little girl threw herself on Peter from behind and he almost collapsed into the grass from the impact. In a moment Wanda swiveled her head back, her eyes searching for, and stumbling upon Maria.
“Mom?” the girl asked, getting to her feet, her arms slightly splayed. The utter astonishment written on her face was unmatched. Well, if one didn’t compare it to her brother’s expression.
“Hi, sweetheart,” Maria said with a big smile, coming over to the children.
She wrapped Wanda in her arms, her fingers burrowing in those dark curls that smelled sweet like marshmallow, and even though the hug was reciprocated, the woman heard her daughter draw in a sharp breath. She pulled away to get a good look at the girl and there, between the brows and in the tightly clamped jaw pain was lingering. Wanda tried to sweep it away under the mask of affection that wasn’t entirely forced but it was too late, the collar of her shirt pulled back, and her mom’s gaze caught a glimpse of the red line of a healing skin under her collarbone.
Worry washed over Maria’s features. She pulled the colorful fabric back once more, inspecting the scar. “Is this the cut that needed a few stitches?”
“It’s more like a glass wound that needed seven interrupted stitches,” Peter supplied matter-of-factly.
His twin shot him a glare. “You and Erik seriously need to stop fussing over it.”
“Were you stabbed with glass?” Lora asked, horrified.
“Seven stitches?” Maria reiterated, turning her face back to her daughter. She still held her by the elbows as she looked the girl up and down, her mind frantically drawing ugly pictures that made her blanch. “How-How did it happen? I remember you said something –” she shook her head, frowning “– something about a failed experiment…Where was Erik at that moment?”
“Mom, Erik is not at fault here,” Wanda replied but the statement merely lived up to her firm tone because she and her brother glanced sideways at each other. For Maria, it was an instant giveaway of the fact that Erik was somehow connected with the incident, regardless of her–their children’s attempts to justify him. The girl then added, “We should take this conversation somewhere else.”
Maria was not sure if she wanted to. Of course, she was worried about her girl being injured and that it happened in the school that was supposed to be safe, that neither Wanda nor Peter wouldn’t have been hurt if it weren’t for Erik in the first place. But she also began to realize that she felt so much more than just resentment toward the man. A protective mother-bear in her didn’t want to share her babies with anyone. She was the one who cared about them, cried when they cried, laughed when they laughed, and did everything she could to provide for them. But as a girl who grew up without a father, Maria also knew that no effort could replace such an important figure in a child’s life. It would’ve been nice if this figure didn’t flash in the news captioned as “terrorist” though.
Her daughter’s words, however, made a good point. It indeed wasn’t the best place to discuss family matters. After all, there were three young people sitting on the ground almost at her feet, and by the look on their faces, they felt uncomfortable hearing this conversation.
“So, are you that “team” that helped my kids steal my car from the impound lot?” Maria asked, meaning it as a banter but she might have as well glared at them to plant even more unease.
Lora slapped her forehead, then turned to her siblings’ friends. “She meant that it’s nice to finally meet you. Except for Kurt. Because we already know you, not because you’re unpleasant to meet.”
Kurt cast a confused glance at Peter, but the speedster flicked his wrist as if saying, “Don’t sweat it.”
“That’s right,” the woman assented, nodding, even though it didn’t feel right. “And you must be Scott and Ororo,” she said to the young man in the glasses and the girl with the white Mohawk. “I heard so much about you.”
“Probably about everything you did in a week before Peter called home,” Wanda muttered out of the corner of her mouth.
Her brother mimicked her in mockery and got an impish grin in return.
“Oh, God. Sorry. It slipped out of my mind completely,” the girl said, covering her face with her hand for a second. “Guys, this is my mom, Ms. Maximoff and this is –” she put her hand over Lora’s shoulders “– my sister Lora.”
“Consequently, my mom and my sister,” Peter said, deciding it was worth noting.
It brought a smile to Maria’s face. She reached her son out and brushed his long bangs back from his face while Scott and Ororo exchanged a few words of greeting with her youngest.
“I’m sorry about your car, Ms. Maximoff,” Ororo said, the words that seemed genuine came out adorned with a heavy accent. “We didn’t want to get you in trouble.”
“Yeah, New York policies are wild,” Scott added with a grimace barely discernible behind the silver stripe covering half of his face. If it weren’t for Peter’s stories Maria would have hardly guessed glasses in it. Does he even see anything through that red slit?
Realizing that she was staring at the vision device on the young man’s face for longer than was appropriate, the woman shook off her curiosity and said, “Well, at least the situation was resolved without any serious consequences.” A meaningful look went in the twins’ direction.
“Water under the bridge,” Peter waved it off, buzzing with enthusiasm for a much more significant idea that had come to his mind. “We have to give you a tour of the mansion! Prof has a bunker! And there is like an underground laboratory! I bet Wan still has access to some cool stuff.”
Lora’s eyes sparked with excitement. She was shifting from one foot to another, eager to ramble through the unexplored territory. Impatient like her brother.
However “cool” a bunker and an underground lab sounded, Maria’s attention fixed on another piece of information she got from her son’s blubbering. “Still? Don’t you work at the lab anymore?” she asked her daughter.
The girl turned to her friends to say, “See you later,” with a brief wave of her hand, then looped her arm through her mom’s, a gesture that let her siblings loose like a pair of hound dogs. As they walked toward the stairs to the patio, she drawled, “Hank and I parted our ways due to…irreconcilable differences.”
The woman raised her brows but the chances of getting a more elaborate answer were slim so instead she went for a different question, “What are you going to do now?”
“Actually, we are doing this project that should restore the team’s image. Fingers crossed.” Wanda did cross her fingers with a funny grimace.
“You sound like their manager.”
“Nah. I’m more like Peter’s plus one in this.”
They were slowly crossing the lawn, the grass tickling their ankles.
“You are not going to take part in their supposed missions?” Maria asked, rather surprised.
The girl posed a counter question, “Are you fine with these missions?”
There were a couple of times that the topic of a team comprised of mutants-lifeguards slipped into Maria’s conversations with her son. She didn’t fully grasp that idea, but she caught on his desire to become a part of this team even through a telephone receiver. Wanda, on the other, had never said a word about it.
“I don’t have an answer for that,” the woman said on an exhale as she and her daughter were climbing the stone stairs.
“Neither do I,” the girl echoed, frowning either because of the bright sun above or because the thought of Peter being involved in anything risky nagged at her. “For both of these questions, honestly.”
Wanda let go of her mom to open a French door in front of her, letting her go inside the mansion first. Once the woman crossed the threshold, goosebumps scattered across her skin from the coolness the stone walls were able to preserve in that hot late morning. She took off her sunglasses, gladly saying goodbye to the yellow hues its lenses added to the world around.
“Did I miss something or Jean was not among the team members?” Maria asked, suddenly remembering that the “team” consisted of six youngsters, not five.
“Oh, yeah. She is out in town with Mr. Xavier and Erik,” her daughter replied to the click of the door she just closed.
It was surprisingly quiet in the school, there was no hum of the voices or children rushing through the hallway, playing tag, or just fooling around. Except for one silver-haired kid who appeared out of the blue, holding his younger sister in his arms.
“Mom, this place is sick!” Lora exclaimed, and once her feet touched the carpeted floor, she grabbed Maria’s hand, dragging her forward. “Come on! You should see it!”
“Hon, you’re going to rip my arm out,” Maria noted, chuckling at her daughter’s ardor, but following her obediently.
Thinking they were being discreet, the twins began to whisper behind her back. If only they knew that having three kids gave their mom the ability to hear each of them even when they were talking simultaneously and pick on the key points. Now, she was listening to Lora’s blubbering about an aquarium some boy had in his room upstairs and was a passive participant in the discussion the two trouble-makers held, as they were processing the fact that their mom came to visit them right in the time when Erik was not around.
“Did you give her a heads up?” Wanda attacked her brother.
“No!” Peter fenced vigorously.
In fact, he did. Not on purpose, though. Peter called his mom on Thursday with the weekly report on life in school, and while he was talking about a treehouse and how the whole team worked on it for a week, and how Wanda got her stitches removed and that she threw an Ivy League guy in the pond, it slipped his tongue that Erik would drive “Prof” to the town on Saturday morning. It had something to do with the broken window in the latter’s office but the point was that Maria couldn’t miss the opportunity to see her children without having to deal with her ex.
And it seemed like something along these lines came to Peter’s mind because a moment later he whispered, no doubt with his face scrunched up guiltily, “I might’ve mentioned the trip to the town.”
“For God’s sake, Peter!” his sister gritted out, trying to keep her voice low.
“That’s not, like, one hundred percent accurate information! I might’ve not said anything!”
“Of course, you did! Your filter is broken!”
“Call her yourself next time!”
“I would love to, but you literally exhaust all the conversation topics!”
Becoming the cause of an argument between her children was the last thing Maria wanted. Her walk began to slow down much to Lora’s dissatisfaction, and when they entered the main foyer, the woman stopped at the round table right under the chandelier, turning around to face the twins. Big smiles were plastered on their faces as if they weren’t at each other’s throats just thirty seconds ago.
Maria opened her mouth to say what she didn’t really know but Wanda had already turned on a guide mode. “Right behind you is Mr. Xavier’s office,” she crooned, gesturing to the closed wooden doors on Maria’s left. “Usually it’s open, and I would say that it’s kind of symbolic since he often says, “You can always come to me,” and he truly means it, staying open to whatever his students are ready to share.”
“And on your right is one of the best rooms in the building. The haven of sin. The treasure trove. The sanctuary,” Peter put in, building the tension before the reveal like a skillful seller. “The Kitchen.”
“Yeah, yeah, yeah. And this is the floor and that is the ceiling,” Lora mocked them. “Show us your rooms!”
The twins swapped a glance and took off running up the stairs at the same time, with Wanda shouting, “Give us a minute!” and Peter giving a more honest, “We didn’t expect an inspection!”
Lora, of course, couldn’t miss the chance to see the older siblings’ rooms in chaos so she let go of her mom’s hand, and rushed after the twins, snickering.
Maria shook her head, smirking, but didn’t follow her little flock just yet, lingering in the foyer. She took a proper look around. This was the floor Erik walked, this was the ceiling he must have glanced up at from time to time when her–their kids did something troublesome. He stayed here for them. He chose to get to know them, and judging by Peter’s and Wanda’s glowing faces, the bonding process was going well. With her hand held to her heart, the woman could say she wasn’t really surprised. Family always mattered a lot to Erik.
Unlike the twins, Maria lacked the courage, or, to be more accurate, desire to meet face to face with the Master of Magnetism. Her time was ticking thus she trotted upstairs and reached Wanda’s quarter. Lora had already climbed up the armchair at the window, Peter perched on its arm, his left elbow propped on the back cushion while their sister was smoothing out the bedspread. Maria took a minute to examine the space her older daughter occupied. It was something of a classic British interior – slightly austere for a youngster in the woman’s opinion – with dark wood furniture, the same that partially adorned the emerald-papered walls. Conventionally, the room could be divided into two areas. The left to the door side comprised of a bed large enough to accommodate two people and a nightstand with a lamp atop. The rest of the space could be used as a living room, to just sit and chill or to study: two plush armchairs matched in color with the walls, a coffee table got in between them.
“You even have your own TV,” Maria noted, her tone a touch surprised.
“What’s more important in a place like this is that I have my own bathroom,” Wanda bantered though it was true.
Her mom took a peek at the green-tiled room with a nice shower cabin.
“No wonder you’re in no hurry to get back home,” she muttered.
“You know the real reason,” Peter said. “They’re feeding us with cooked meals.”
“Wait, don’t all meals come out of a microwave?” Lora asked in feigned shock.
Playing along, Wanda pursed her lips, sympathetic.
“Unpopular opinion here: you are a square. All of you,” Maria said flatly. She came over to the empty armchair and plopped onto it, the pleated skirt of her chiffon dress slowly descended around her like a cloud. Her purse went to sit on the coffee table. “So, what’s the plan?” she asked, her eyes going back and forth between the twins. Lora copied her, eager to know the answers too. “Are you going to stay here for the whole summer? What did you and Erik settle on? What does he think of it? Walk me through it.”
“We–we didn’t broach this topic,” Wanda replied, exchanging a reassuring glance with her brother. She was leaning against the dresser, the nose of her sunflowers-embroidered Converse pointed down into the floor.
Her mom pushed further. “What’s he up to anyway? Does Xavier just let him live here?”
“They’re good friends,” Peter replied, his fingers picking at the soft material of the armchair. “I’m pretty sure Prof insists that he lives here.”
“He worked with me in the lab,” the girl put in rather defensively, “so it’s not like he’s dilly-dallying around.”
Astonishment made Maria’s lips part. Erik worked in the lab? It was something more unforeseen than witnessing him holding the President at a gunpoint on national television. She only knew an outline of his days in Auschwitz, yet the way he sometimes woke up in the middle of the night covered in cold sweat and trembling was enough to get a more horrifying picture words would have ever been able to draw. The fact that he was able to cross the threshold of a laboratory and work there for hours in Maria’s eyes proved once more that control over metal was not his greatest strength. His iron will was.
“Did he–Did he quit too?” she asked.
Her daughter bite on her lower lip as she took a moment to consider a simple on the first sight question. Well, when it came to Lehnsherr nothing was simple – something that seemed to pass on to his children as well. “Well, he hasn’t been in the lab for as long as I have, so I think it’s safe to say that he did quit this job. I wouldn’t want for him and Hank to stay alone in the same room anyway.”
“Why is that?” Maria puzzled. She glanced at Peter but his expression was suspiciously restrained.
“Oh, oh, wait! Is there a love triangle involved here?” Lora exclaimed, thrilled. “Did Hank fall in love with our Wanda and Mystique was jealous, and your dad decided to, like, knock some sense into that dude?”
With her brows pretty much close to her hairline, Maria whipped her head to Wanda.
“What? No!” the girl blasted out in high dudgeon, drawing a disappointed “aww” out of her little sister. “How do you even know about Hank and Raven? Mystique, I mean.”
“Peter told me,” Lora replied with a nonchalant shrug.
“Right. How could I not guess it,” Wanda muttered under her breath.
The silver-haired young man splayed his arms, scandalized. “What is your problem with me today?”
At this point, their mom ceased to understand anything at all, which she immediately and rather loudly declared, asking, “What the hell is going on here?”
Suddenly, a female, slightly husky voice cut in the family chaos from somewhere from behind, “I ask myself this question every day.”
The twins’ gazes snapped to the doorway, Lora craned her neck like a giraffe, trying to look over the armchair Maria occupied. The woman herself leaned over the plush arm to take a look at the intruder, her dark hair falling to the right side. There, at the door that had been mistakenly left open, stood a tall young woman with a mop of blonde wavy hair and grey eyes. Dressed in a plain white T-shirt and blue jeans, she looked nowhere close to plain. The two women eyed each other in complete silence, minus the birds’ songs and children’s screams floating in the room from the open window.
“Did you want something or it’s just a friendly check-up?” Wanda drawled and from that rather cool tone of hers, her mom figured that the girl didn’t favor whomever the blonde was. Somewhere in the back of Maria’s mind, a quiet voice whispered that this pretty face actually seemed familiar.
The intruder’s gaze drifted to Wanda, then took in the sight of Peter and Lora, and went back to Maria, making a full circle. Her lips slightly parted as she probably guessed the familial resemblance between the four of the Maximoffs.
“I was looking for Kurt,” the woman finally responded, addressing Wanda rather than Peter. “He missed two training sessions in a row.”
“I didn’t know that shaking fists in the air is a mandatory activity,” the girl quipped.
“It is if he doesn’t want to be caged again,” the blonde said matter-of-factly.
Wanda snorted in her stubbornness but Maria reiterated something that made her back stiffen, “Caged?”
The woman’s mind ran chaotically through the file folders on each of her kids’ friends. Kurt Wagner’s record said he was from Germany, and in addition to his memorable appearance and the power of teleportation, his life differed from that of his peers. She remembered that he grew up in a circus, but she had always assumed that it just meant that his parents were involved in the show business, having taken him on rehearsals and performances with them. It never really occurred to her that a circus wasn’t all about gymnasts stretching their bodies in sparkling costumes high in the air and mustached men breathing fire. There were other types of shows as well.
In a flash, Peter was on his feet, pushing the stranger out of the room, blubbering, “I heard something about using the farthest pond as a pool. I think it’s worth checking it out. But you didn’t hear it from me, okay? Bye.” He closed the door and propped it up with his shoulder, pulling a face. “Raven.”
Maria raised her brows. “That was Raven? The one that is Mystique? But the hair and –” she made a sweeping motion over her face.
“She is a shape-shifter,” Wanda replied, coming over to Lora’s armchair to take up the seat their brother had previously occupied. “Life is practically a masquerade for her. This –” she jerked her chin toward the spot where the blonde had been standing a moment ago “– is just one of her masks.”
“Did she transform into someone in front of you?” Lora asked, looking up at her older sister, eyes twinkling.
“She tried to replicate me,” the girl replied, not sharing the enthusiasm, “and Mr. Xavier.”
“And our old man,” Peter added with a lopsided smirk. “She was wearing pink fluffy slippers so it was a sight.”
“Does she do full impressions? Like the voice and all?”
“Yep,” the speedster confirmed.
“Well, she can’t replicate a mutation if it’s not physical,” Wanda amended. “Also, she doesn’t have the memories of the person she does an impression of.”
“So, it’s impossible to know if the person is real or they’re a dupe at first sight?” Maria asked and her daughter gave her a short nod. She leaned back in her armchair, digesting. “That’s fascinating. And a tad terrifying.”
And it was definitely not a summer camp here. Life on these grounds in Westchester seemed to be something else entirely, as if peace and acceptance were cooped up and stored in the core of the mansion, spreading its healing power, within a small radius though. Mutants were encouraged to use their gifts here but also taught to be independent in case one would have to act an old-fashioned, human way, which in Maria’s eyes was the best approach to the matter.
Those thoughts spiraling through the woman’s head prompted a question she posed carefully, addressing her oldest daughter, “Do you use your powers here?” Openly, she wanted to add, but let it slide.
The girl lifted her shoulder in a half-shrug. “If the occasion calls for it. As usual.”
“The occasion always calls for it because you are so slow,” Peter intervened with a complaint. He whizzed to the armchair and swopped Lora up in his arms, tossing her over his shoulder causing an outburst of squealing and giggling, and harmless kicking. “If we keep this up, we’ll spend the whole day in this room.”
Before anyone besides the silver-haired boy was able to express their opinion, there was a significant shift in the atmosphere around. It felt like a strong gust of wind tore into Maria’s face but it was only an impact without coolness. Everything went dark for a second and as her body suddenly realized that it was no longer sprawled on the armchair, she swayed on her legs.
It was never forbidden in the Maximoffs’ house to use the powers given by mutation. However, there was still a set of rules set. Among them was that Wanda shouldn’t use her telepathy on the family members – there was always a way to articulate things and when someone was not ready to share their thoughts or worries that meant they were not ready. Peter, for the reasons of safety and unpleasant physical aftermaths, was strongly advised against using his supersonic speed on Maria and Lora (in Wanda’s case, there were extenuating circumstances, although she had the right to give her brother a good thrashing for unauthorized movement of herself in space). Being in the school, he had neglected this rule several times already.
Nauseous, Maria leaned slightly forward, pressing her hand to her chest where her heart was beating confusedly like after a ride on a rollercoaster where she passed out.
“He just got overly excited about you being finally here,” Wanda said, her tone amused but soft.
Her mom cracked her eyes open to give her as long and shrewd look as she was capable to muster.
“Now that’s an insult to my deductive skills,” the girl bantered. “I’m quite capable of making a solid observation without my ‘superhuman’” – she drew quotes in the air “– powers.”
They were standing on the neatly trimmed lawn that asked for a “Do Not Walk On The Grass” sign, and the heavy crowns of century-old oak trees were taking care of the sun, letting only muffled rays touch their skin. They were alone there with Peter and Lora long hopping along a wooden walkway that was winding somewhere Maria couldn’t see behind all the greenery.
“I hate it when he does this,” she whined.
“Hightails you to somewhere you didn’t ask and walks away, whistling under his nose?” Wanda asked with her brows impishly raised. “Yeah, I bet a lot of people here are not enthusiastic about it either.” She placed her hand between the woman’s shoulder blades, nudging her gently toward the walkway, “Come on now, you’ll feel better if you’re distracted.”
Maria let herself be led, trying to focus on the less bright colors around. A task much harder than she could have imagined because of how well cared that place seemed to be - the flowers were bringing a splash of red, pink, or white here and there, exuding a subtle pleasant smell and attracting the buzzing bees and the fluttering Painted Ladies, the bushes were trimmed and all the trees were towering over the path, having no dead brunches or dry leaves.
“It’s like a forest,” Maria said after a while, picking on a note of awe in her own voice.
Her daughter nodded. “There is something to see indeed.”
“Seems like that boy over there thinks so too,” the woman said in a conspiratorial tone, inclining her head slightly to the left where a dark-haired young man was sitting among the shadows of the nearby greenery. He didn’t take his eyes off Wanda since the moment she and Maria stepped on the walkway. The girl didn’t even look in his direction so her mom nudged her, smiling like a fox. “Aw, who’s this cute little thing?”
“He is not cute,” Wanda said flatly. “He is Namor-the-Asshole.”
The woman burst out chuckling. “What did he do?”
“I’m sure my brother mentioned that.”
“Oh, is it the Ivy League guy?”
Maria was about to turn her head and properly eye the young man but her daughter checked her, pulling at her arm. “What are you doing?” she hissed. “I don’t want him to think we’re whispering about him right here.”
“Isn’t it what we are doing?” her mom asked, amused.
“No! You’re whispering and I’m just enjoying the walk in the park!”
“Mm-hmm.”
Maria had already forgotten what a joy it was to have these girlish conversations with her older daughter. It wasn’t like Wanda didn’t talk with her about her British suitors or all the other things not related to the university when they called each other. Yet the time zone difference, which seemed greater because of the work/study schedules and the fact that she was absent at home for the better part of the year took away the intimacy of their conversations.
“What are you whispering about?” The question came at the same time as Peter put his arms over his mom’s and sister’s shoulders, making them flinch.
Maria held her hand to her heart and looked heavenward.
“You’re going to give our mom a heart attack,” Wanda said to the silver-haired boy, pinching his arm.
Lora’s excited, “Look what I’ve got!” made the three of them look ahead, at the wooden walkway that was shaking beneath the girl’s sandals as she was running toward her family with her arms held up, each holding a badminton racket.
At that moment, Maria realized that a calm conversation somewhere on the couch with a cup of coffee was doomed to be only a wish. Although what else did she expect from her kids?
The whole thing turned into a two-hour tournament where Lora outplayed Wanda and Peter snatched a win from their mom’s hands for them to meet in the grand finale after a break which wasn’t a boring sit-down too. While the Maximoffs were scattered across the green lawn like four flowers, all red-faced and sweaty, sipping on the Coca-Cola the speedster brought right from the fridge, Raven caught Kurt. Well, almost. It wasn’t like she threw herself at him or set a trap that worked but she was literally chasing him. Turned out that Peter’s tip on where to find his friend wasn’t fabricated and the shape-shifter indeed found Kurt swimming in the pond with Scott and Ororo. Shirtless, he went on the run, leaving wet footprints on the heated stones of the walkway leading away from the pond into the forest-like part of the arboretum. Raven’s vigorous run after her student made Maria a bit envious, especially when she learned that they were practically the same age.
Genes, the woman said to herself soothingly.
It looked like the shape-shifter even enjoyed the catch-up to some extent, ironically yelling, “This is childish!” into the teleport’s back, but her ardor was put down by a splash of pond water dashed suddenly into her face. The race was put on hold for Kurt’s advantage. He swiveled his head left and right, looking for his savor, and when his eyes found Wanda who winked at him playfully, his face took on such an expression, Maria’s lips twisted in a warm smile. The next second the young man vanished into a ripple of blue.
“What–How–Where did he go?” she stumbled out, her widened eyes going back and forth between the twins. “Is he alright?”
Peter waved her worries off. “Probably chilling in his room.”
Wanda inclined her head, aligning with her brother.
“This is, like, the coolest power ever,” Lora drawled, peering at the disappearing smoke.
“How about flying?” her older sister asked, lifting her brows.
“I can literally outrun time,” the speedster noted, obviously unable to process how anything could beat that.
Time. Holy Jesus Christ…
“What time is it?” Maria blasted out. Before anyone could answer, she reached out her son’s wrist and twisted it to look at his watch.
“Oi,” Peter yelped, indignant.
The arrows converged on 2.
Shit.
Considering that Erik had left for the town in the morning, the chances that he could have been driving back through the gates of the mansion were pretty high.
The woman rose to her feet, dusting off her dress. “As much as I hate to say it, I think it’s time for us to head home.”
“Now?” Wanda asked with undisguised surprise tinged with disappointment.
“But we didn’t finish the game!” Lora protested, furrowing her brows.
“You can finish it another time,” Maria replied, holding out her hand to the little girl.
Peter got up too, his big dark eyes emanating hope when he asked, “Can’t you stay for lunch?”
“We really have to go, hon,” his mom said in a quiet soft voice. “If we set off later, we risk getting in a traffic jam and I have to wake up early tomorrow for work.” She wasn’t lying but it felt like a deceit anyway.
The path to the mansion felt both long because of the dejected silence and short as Maria had already begun to miss her older kids. At the French doors of the patio, Lora pulled at her hand, and when she looked down at the girl, she saw her eyes glisten.
“Mom, can I stay here?” her youngest asked imploringly. “Please? Just for a couple of days.”
Guilt was slowly but steadily building in the woman’s chest, making her heart heavy. “I can’t just leave you here without asking Xavier’s permission,” she replied, glancing up at the twins for support.
But Wanda jumped up at that loophole. “You can stay for lunch and wait for him. I think he’ll be here any minute.” She exchanged a look with her little sister and they gave each other a subtle nod as if silently agreeing on something.
Maria’s palms went clammy.
“I think Prof wouldn’t mind it,” Peter weighed in on with a nonchalant shrug. “He had asked me about our little monkey a few times already and I think he would love to have another Maximoff in the building. Right?”
He turned his face to his twin but got a somewhat withering look in return. Arching his brow in confusion, he glanced down at Lora who was shaking her head disappointedly.
“But you don’t have your clothes with you,” Maria said to her youngest.
The girl let out a heavy sigh. “What do you think I have in my backpack?”
A smirk that came out of her mom and siblings was almost involuntary.
Maria looked over her shoulder at the endless lawns and tall trees, at the ponds, stuffed somewhere farther, at the kids fooling around in flocks, laughing and screaming. Back home, in Washington, her workday started at 8 a.m. and finished at 6 p.m. and this whole time her little daughter was cooped up in the house of their eighty-years old neighbor Florence. Florence was only interested in her cat, Ted, whom she carried around like a toy so sometimes Maria wasn’t sure that the animal was still alive, and in her flower beds, which she protected from the street hooligans also known as kids who were just passing by her house, minding their business. It was not something Lora could write in her “How I spent my summer” essay with pride when she would be back to school. But this place was. Here, she could spend time both with her peers and her siblings. And it was a tiebreaker.
“If anything goes wrong, the three of you take a bus and go back home,” Maria said, turning her head back to her kids.
Lora pumped her fists with a voiceless “yes”. She then threw herself at her mom, wrapping her arms around her lower waist. “Thank you, thank, thank you,” she chanted joyfully into the chiffon pleats.
“But that’s only for a few days,” the woman noted, trying to sound authoritative as she ruffled her daughter’s hair. Her gaze drifted to the twins. “I hope you can take care of each other without any accidents.”
“We’ll try our best,” Wanda said with a nod at the same time as Peter drawled a lighthearted, “Sure.”
Maria felt a squeeze in her throat like she might cry. “Well, I’ll come upstairs to pick up my purse and I guess this is it,” she said, trying so hard to sound casual that she sounded strangled instead.
With her lips pursed as if suppressing her emotions too, Wanda stepped closer and pulled her mom into a hug.
“Fine, you talked me into it,” Peter drawled indulgently and folded his arms around his sister and Maria, pressing his cheek against the top of the latter’s head.
“Hey! I can’t breathe out here!” came in Lora’s muffled voice soon after. She was practically piled under her siblings.
The older Maximoffs laughed before letting go of each other.
“Don’t follow me out or I might cry,” Maria said to her children, her eyes already pricked with tears. When was the last time she spent more than one day completely alone in her house? She couldn’t remember it, let alone imagine it.
“I’ll call you in the evening so we would know that you got home safely,” Peter said to her, a bit too serious for his usual self.
On that note, she gave them a smile, opened the glass door, and slipped inside the mansion. Her heart ached as she was going up the stairs, scolding herself for being so emotional over something she could only call an extended sleepover. Already in Wanda’s room, Maria picked up her purse but didn’t leave before she took a peek inside Lora’s backpack, shaking her head at how well that little monkey packed for “a day-long” trip.
When she was walking down the hallway, much more reserved now, Kurt appeared on her way. He changed his clothes, but his midnight blue hair was still wet from swimming in the pond.
“Are you already leaving?” he asked, seeming genuinely upset.
Maria gave him a small smile. “I have to. It’s a four-hour drive to Washington.”
“Lora is not coming back home with you?” The young man’s gaze scanned the stairs and the foyer ahead.
“No, she asked me to leave her here for a couple of days so…” The woman lifted her shoulder in a half-shrug.
Kurt nodded and for a second there they stood in awkward silence, his tail slightly swishing behind his back.
“I would get you there in a couple of minutes but I can’t promise that it would be an entirely safe trip. I’m still learning.”
“That’s okay. Maybe next time.”
God, it felt like one of those conversations she had with Wanda’s “friends” that came by to pick her up but had to wait for the girl in the foyer.
“I still owe you dinner,” Maria said, remembering the day she found herself in a police station for a car “theft”. “Next time my kids decide to come home, don’t be shy to stop by too. All of you, actually. My kids’ friends are always welcomed in my house.”
A full-fledged smile bloomed on Kurt’s face. “Thank you.”
“Well,” the woman drawled, slowly stepping past the young man, “I better go now.”
But when she was one staircase down, she cast a glance over her shoulder and called up to the teleport, “Kurt?” He turned around and descended a few steps. “I know it is selfish of me to ask but can you keep an eye on Peter, Wanda, and Lora? I would feel better if I knew there is someone around who would say, “Are you sure it’s a good idea?” before they get in trouble.”
“Of course,” he replied and it sounded like a wholehearted promise.
Maria gave him a nod of gratitude and they parted their ways, heading in opposite directions. Ahead was a four-hour ride back to Washington and the woman was planning to belt out every emotion in the human repertoire, her dark blue Ford shimmering readily at her through the open main door. Her foot had already poised to step over the threshold when someone called her up from behind, “Mrs. Maximoff?”
She paused and turned her head to find a tall man catching up to her. Actually, he was so tall, Maria had to throw her head back to look at his face when he stopped in front of her.
“I’m Hank McCoy,” the man introduced himself and stuck out his hand to shake. Maria’s brows slowly went up but she took it nonetheless, giving it a gentle squeeze rather than a shake. “I’m one of the teachers here.”
As if that brown linen suit of his didn’t give him away at a single glance.
The woman couldn’t tell if she was drunk from bourbon or her postpartum plus dumped-mom-of-three depression when she first met him seven years ago but she had a foggy memory of this guy. No facial features, only that he was tall and wore glasses. And she was almost sure he was dressed in a striped T-shirt that didn’t suit him at all. Now Maria noticed those eyes behind the lenses, they were magnificent, almost ultramarine in the muffled but colorful light coming from the large stained-glass window in the foyer. Though his brows looked weird. As if he cut them.
“You probably don’t remember me, but we had already met. Several years ago,” Hank said as the woman’s gaze went over his dark hair, brushed to the left side and the stubble shadowing the lower part of his face, and found a surprising similarity with Kurt. It wasn’t physical but more about the expression of their faces. They were like an open book with no pages ripped out and stored away from everybody’s gaze. They emanated awkwardness and soft-heartedness that made one want to trust them.
“Was it around that time when my son broke into the Pentagon?” Maria quipped.
The man pursed his lips, pleading guilty.
“So, what’s the matter? I guess finally introducing yourself isn’t the only goal you pursue.”
“Will you give me a moment?”
She glanced down at his watch. If she didn’t want to run into Erik, she needed to go now. Yet, the way the man didn’t know what to do with his hands and a few cautious glances behind her back, the woman assumed it wasn’t just some small talk he tried to get started there.
“But only a brief,” she said on a defeated exhale. “I really have to go.”
“Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. Sure,” Hank blubbered, nodding, then pushed his glasses up his nose. “I–Erm–Well, actually it’s about Peter and Wanda.” Well, duh. “I don’t know if they mentioned it to you but they got very close with Erik Lehnsherr. You may know him as Magneto.”
Maria didn’t know what she expected to hear but it definitely wasn’t it. First of all, did she know about Erik Lehnsherr? Really? He was the father of two of her kids, for God’s sake! She refused to call him Magneto. A weird suit with a cape and a helmet didn’t make him a different person. He had always been and will be Erik for her. Driven and loyal, he could be as tender as he could be ruthless. In a way, he reminded her of a hurt animal who didn’t let people close, getting into a fight stance before anyone could approach him. Understandably so, considering his circumstance. But what truly caught her off guard was the way Hank framed Erik’s relationship with the twins. It felt like he was not aware of the familial ties that ran between them.
The woman tilted her head, eyes slightly narrowed.
“They spend a lot of time together. Especially since, well,” he stumbled, pursing his lips apologetically for a moment, “since Wanda got injured in our failed experiment. Which I’m really sorry about, by the way.”
“She never told me what exactly happened,” Maria noted, fishing for the missing piece of the puzzle.
Hank scratched his head. “That’s kind of difficult. I–I’m still not sure.”
“You think Erik had a hand in this?” she asked, frowning at the conclusion that suggested itself.
“What? Oh, no,” the man shook it off with confidence. “He doesn’t have access to the lab.”
Which was rather strange, considering the fact that according to Peter Erik was more than welcome here. Well, it seemed like not everyone saw him as a friend or at least as someone they could trust and Maria felt like these two had their own history.
“Then I don’t quite get your point,” she admitted, anxiety tickling the blood in her veins. Worse than running into Erik would be him running into this weird conversation about him.
Hank furrowed his uneven brows, looking confused. “Aren’t you worried that your children are so invested in a relationship with a world-famous…activist?”
“Terrorist, you meant to say?” Maria said flatly, her face a polite mask. There were only so few things men often waged wars for. Money, power, the love of a woman. It dawned on her that maybe her youngest was right and there was a love triangle. What if it weren’t about Wanda getting in Mystique’s way but Erik getting in Hank’s? He had just lost his wife and child but everyone’s grieving process was different, so, she assumed, it wouldn’t be unheard of if he wanted to forget his pain in someone’s arms. And Raven’s seemed quite nice to find yourself in. “What’s your problem with him, anyway? Why does my kids’ affinity for him bothers you so much?” She didn’t mean to be rude, but if this almost stranger was trying to emborder her in some jealousy-based equation, she wasn’t going to waste her time listening to any of that.
A heavy sight escaped the man’s lips but the reply didn’t follow right away. He looked down as if he was surprised to find that he was shifting from one foot to another. “He’s just the type of guy who is always in some serious trouble and–and the people who care about him get dragged into it too.” He lifted his gaze back to Maria, pain and anger lurking in the blue hues of his eyes. “I’ve seen this before and I don’t want the same for Peter and Wanda. I don’t want them to get hurt because of him.”
She didn’t want it either. She wanted them to live a long, happy life more than anything.
“It was you and your friends who pushed Peter down this path,” Maria said matter-of-factly. “And as much as you and I would like for him and Wanda to take a different one, they’re adults.” Even if it doesn’t always feel like it. “They make their own decisions. They make mistakes and they learn from them. And the only thing we can do is to be there for them.”
She was fighting her kids’ desire to meet Erik for seven years but at the end of the day, she knew that finding their dad was the right thing to do. Even if it sometimes made her want to have a glass of cold wine before going to bed. Maybe she wasn’t ready to meet this part of her past yet but she was definitely not going to step in between the twins and Erik anymore. She wished the same for Hank: to accept the truth and solve problems as they come instead of making them himself.
The woman unfolded her yellow sunglasses and before she put them on, she said to the man, her voice gentle, “Don’t waste your time on something that isn’t there. If I were you, I would rather talk heart to heart with someone who’s important to you while these feelings inside still matter.”
With no further ado, she tipped Hank a goodbye and got into her car. This trip was so much more than she expected it to be.