thoughtformed | [Open Log]

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[Open Log]

What: A Cajun cookout.
Who: Gambit, Rogue, Jubilee, X-23, and anyone who smells Cajun food and comes to check it out?
Where: The roof of the East apartment building.
When: Shortly before sunset on Thursday the 18th.

Earlier in the day, Remy had spent a great deal of time moving outdoor cooking equipment to the roof and getting it plugged in.

Some of it even belonged to him.

Cajun hush puppies, potato salad, seafood gumbo, chicken fricassee, dirty rice, scallop etouffee, stuffed jalapenos, and a wide arrangement of grilled meats wrapped in pepper bacon were arranged in a half-circle around him, kept in warming dishes or heated occasionally by the brush of a finger. This was going to be a perfect meal. A nice relaxing get-together. He'd make sure of it.

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More eye rolling. Why do they keep bringing up parties? Oh, right because they're at one. As for the food, it looks good, smells good and more than likely will taste good too. But, she has yet to take a bite out of anything. Not yet anyway.

"I'd say good by the way some of your guests are eating."

No response except a long-suffering sigh, slightly exaggerated for her benefit.

Is he trying to annoy her? She wasn't hungry yet, geesh!

"Somethin' wrong?"

"Wrong would be putting it too strongly. Never mind. If there's a life to the party, I never want to be the one damping it. People start to think I was replaced by an evil twin."

That earns Gambit a light chuckle from her. If anyone would be the life of the party it would be him, but dampening it? That was usually her, Scott or Jean's job.

"So then how are ya feelin'?"

"How you think, chere? Beautiful weather, perfect food, good company, and the promise of fireworks later... I feel the way anyone does on a holiday. You?"

Then why did he sigh or look perturbed? Maybe she was reading too much into something that's not even there.

"Good, I guess. Tryin' ta get my mind off things." Like figuring out how to get home or get used to being in a room with X-Men that she's never met before.

More likely, Remy LeBeau is mercurial, and not the most reliable reporter about his own thoughts and actions. Or alternately, just that changeable in mood.

"Then you come to the right place. Laura, she's slow to make friends, but you never find a better one, Jubilee's a handful, but the friendliest girl I know. The woman's Cpatain Marvel, she leads the Avengers here in town. And the man with the white hair is Dante. He's a no-account rogue. You'd like him.

Or, you don't feel like talking so much, maybe I just break out a deck of cards. Remy ever teach you to play? Tell your fortune for you?"

Rogue takes a mental note of each name, committing it to memory. Though the woman, Captain Marvel, she knows her name is Carol. They had an interesting conversation earlier. As for Remy...

"No, didn't teach me anything..." But he did leave her with his Queen of hearts card. Something she has tucked away in her wallet, but no one needs to know that.

"But fortune telling? You're supposed to use a different set of cards for that."

"You mean Tarot. Only if you want to get fancy, chere. The decks were all the same in the beginning. Look."

Lacking a pen and paper, he slides an empty plate forward on the table and pours a measure of hot sauce on it, then draws in it with his finger, demonstrating.

"Four suits in both decks. In Tarot, you have Swords, Cups, Pentacles, and Wands. In playing cards, that's Spades, Hearts, Diamonds, and Clubs. A Club and a Wand, they the same. A Diamond or a Pentacle, they're both money. Look at the shape of the Cup... and Spade, that comes from the spanish word for Sword. You can see the shape of the blade.

"There are other cards in Tarot, Major Arcana. Special cards. But they about things that are bigger than us. Fate. The forces of the world. Not things you want to fool around with, and not anything it does you any good to know."

He licks his finger clean.

"These cards, they got everything in them ordinary people need. They tell you about your troubles, about your heart, about your money, and about your mind. That's all there is to it. You fancy a look, chere?"

Edited 2013-07-31 19:22 (UTC)

Rogue had heard of Tarot before, she had seen some of the psychic booths back in her home town and in New Orleans when Remy took her there. While she never had a reading done before or even had a closer look at the cards herself, she thought each set was different. She stays quiet as Gambit explains the differences, internally smirking at his use of a paper plate and hot sauce to get his point across.

Part of her wants to say no, she doesn't want a reading. She knows she has troubles, who doesn't? Money wasn't an issue for the moment and her mind was focused on trying to get out. Her heart? Considering she was talking to a man to is a version of Remy that she knows, but never really got to know. the logical side of her is telling her no, but what the hell, it can't do much harm, can it?

"Sure, why not. It would be nice to see what you can do aside from playin' solitaire or throwing cards."

"Or cooking. Or thieving. Cards may not help with that, but you shouldn't forget it."

There's a deck in his hands at the word thieving, and he shuffles it briefly, cards all but flying between his hands.

"We keep it simple to begin with. Three cards. Past, present, future. If that's interesting, we keep going, if not, then only a moment wasted. Cut the deck."

He waits for her to do so, and then plays one-two-three cards off the top with a flourish. Eight of Spades, Six of Diamonds, Jack of Clubs. Looking down at them, he laughs.

His comments make her let out a soft chuckle. How could she ever forget that he's good a thieving? Though cooking...she had yet to see, but maybe after a few more minutes she'll get up to grab a plate herself and try it out.

She watches him suddenly has a deck in his hands, shuffling the cards like they were nothing and cuts the deck. After that she picks three cards; Queen of Spades, Six of Clubs and King of Hearts. She reveals one of them at a time before looking at his cards.

"What's so funny?" What? Does he have an entertaining future ahead of him?

"The cards try to get me in trouble, I think. I tell you what I see here, you be angry at me."

Rogue raised an eyebrow at him, leaning forward to proper her elbow on the table and place her chin in her hand.

"According to some of the X-Men I'm angry all the time, it wouldn't change anythin'." She's not angry just very off putting. Her bark is worse than her bite.

"Well, we give it a try, then. I must have been distracted, because both our cards are talking about you."

He slid his trio across the table next to hers and tapped the first two.

"The past, I think we both know. The Eight of Spades, that's troubles on all sides. Feeling trapped. You know you've got to move, but any direction you go, people be hurt. And one of them is always you.

Queen of Spades. La Femme Noire, the Dark Woman, source of all troubles. Her, I don't need to say much more about."

Edited 2013-07-31 20:31 (UTC)

"About me?" Why in the world would the cards incorporate more of her than anything else?

The past...it's the past, something she doesn't want to think about unless she has trouble sleeping at night. Thankfully that hasn't been the case since the Professor helped her erase a lot of the personalities that were trapped in her mind. Trouble on all sides, well that's easy enough to interpret. X-Men versus the Brotherhood and X-Men versus the normal people who hate them.

She keeps reviewing the possibilities of each card, taking in what Gambit is telling her and incorporating how she views it. Then again how can she take anything he says for what it is? Her guard starts to come up again, leaning back into her chair to put some distance between her and the Cajun.

"I think you're readin' way too into this. It's not telling me anything I don't know already."

"The past doesn't hold many surprises, chere. The present, now... Sixes are tricky cards. Halfway along the path. A chance for everything, but nothing yet. Clubs and Diamonds mean you're safe, body and mind. Got a chance to get comfortable and make good. Everything's ready, if you go get it."

He doesn't add, but that's not what you want to hear. Then again, it's not the cards that tell him that.

Make good on what though? How can she do any good in a place that's holding them hostage in a way? Or is he referring to the two of them? They do have a history, but it's not the same history they share with each other. She can appreciate him trying to bring her out of her shell, but it's not what she wants. She wants to go home, where things make sense. Not be with someone who brings up old feelings that are better off being left alone.

Or is he trying to encourage her to be more trusting with strangers? To let her guard down a little more and let others in? Fat chance there.

"What exactly am I supposed to go for?" a rhetorical question spoken with a dry tone of voice.

"The cards not that specific about it. Anything else I say, that would just be Remy, guessing."

He looked at the remaining two cards, and hesitated again.

"This the part that really mean trouble for me," he said after a moment. "If it was just one, then I could say it's just an idea, a representation. But it's a person who's important to your future, here. You got king and jack, red and black... a man who still acts like a boy, with hair not too light or too dark. Someone with a sense of adventure, but tricky, too. Someone who thinks they got lessons to teach you. A smooth talker."

He shrugged, sheepishly.

"That's what the cards say."

Trouble for him or trouble for her? Rogue's heart drops to her stomach hearing him continue on. A man important to her future. Someone who, based off of Remy's description, sounds a lot like him. They came up from similar backgrounds, knew the sting of betrayal and found themselves wandering around. She felt a connection to him back in her world, but they didn't spend enough time together for that bond to form.

Now there's a chance, but she can't take it. They were different and who's to say neither of them won't be gone by tomorrow? It was easy for people to appear then disappear. She stays quiet, thinking over his words and going over her own thoughts before speaking.

"Seems in this instance they're not about me, but you." A beat of silence passes until she speaks again.

"You never told me the relationship you had with your Rogue."

"I admit, I noticed who the description fit."

He shook his head ruefully.

"I told you it's been a long road with us. Didn't say more, because we have to be who we are to each other, not who we remember someone with the same face being. Still, I think you have a pretty good idea, whether I said it or not."

Gambit really needs to stop messing with her head. They weren't anything to one another in her world. They were enemies at first, kidnapper with their second meeting and third they fought against the same enemy. They worked well together and the times they were alone with one another it felt...nice. But nothing developed between them. She hadn't seen any trace of him until she showed up on New Moore.

"Don't have an idea at all. Only met you three times in my life. You came and left as you pleased." Was there supposed to be more like he's implying? She's really over thinking, over analyzing everything to the point where it's starting to make her head hurt. She knows he's a good guy, she knows that, but can't bring herself to say she maybe likes him in a different way.

"The Rogue I know, chere..." There really wasn't an easy way to say it, but not saying it when they;d already agreed to being open and honest, that was worse. "We've been friends, partners, lovers... on and off for seven years. Sometimes we're the closest two people on the planet to each other, and sometimes we need to get away from each other, because it's too much."

That would do, for a summary.

Rogue bows head head and takes in a slow deep breath. She knew there was something between them, but lovers? How was that even possible with her power? It was hard maintaining relationships with others without romance getting in the way. Is it difficult by nature or are you making it difficult yourself? The thought crawled through her mind as she looked back up at him in a calm, but distant manner. She can appreciate him being honest with her, but it doesn't ease the confusion or headache she feels.

"She's lucky, then." she murmurs, pushing her chair back to stand up.

"Thanks for the hospitality, Gambit, but I'm gonna go."

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notinthecards - 2013-07-31 23:35 (UTC) - Expand

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