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“I didn’t steal it!” Lance found himself getting into Scott’s face. The leader of the Brotherhood was beyond pissed, yet in the back of his mind, he wasn’t surprised that Scott had even suggested that the nice gift he’d gotten Kitty was, in fact, stolen rather than something he’d saved up money for.
“Oh, really? Did you really save up money for that?”
“I saved up for my jeep,” Lance said.
“Doesn’t mean you didn’t steal the money to get your jeep,” Scott said.
Lance tensed up, his fists clenching. “You know what. I don’t need this. You’re not the one who has to believe me.”
“Or you could just have the professor look into that dirty mind of yours and say you didn’t steal it,” Scott said.
Lance tensed, his mind flickering to the abuse he ’d suffered at the hands of certain foster parents. His facial features faltered, and he swallowed.
“See. You don’t want him to see how dirty your mind actually is because then Kitty would find out.”
“Scott, that’s enough,” the professor said. “Lance?”
“I’m leaving,” Lance said.
“Before you leave,” Xavier said. “Let’s talk in my office.”
Lance flinched.
“And I’ll start by saying in front of Scott that I believe you. And also note that there are things that people don’t want others to know, things other than personal porn habits, but next time, please refrain from making such arguments,” Xavier said before heading to the office.
“What did you want to see me for?”
“About what Scott said.”
“Excuse me?”
“About rooting around in your head.”
“Don’t you dare,” Lance said.
“I wouldn’t do that without your permission,” Xavier said. “But if you ever get to the point you need me to, I’m here.”
“What?” Lance said.
“We’d probably start with techniques that would allow you to block out certain things while allowing other parts of a memory surface while focusing on memories that aren’t as strong,” Xavier said. There came silence, to which he followed up with, “You’ve actually done quite well for yourself, dealing with those memories.”
Lance looked at the ground. “Could you?” His eyes closed. “Would you be able to erase them?”
“No, but I won’t, as I feel erasing memories more often than not does more harm than good. It’s like losing a piece of what makes us who we are, but the mind is such a thing that it is good at suppressing memories on its own, although suppressing them is different from erasing them.”
“How did you know?”
“From the way you reacted to what Scott said. About having a dirty mind. It wasn’t a look of you having been caught, but you being horrified at having to be reminded of those memories stuck in your head as they are,” the professor said. “And Scott was out of line. The problem is, that’s as far as I could go without revealing things I know you didn’t want him to know.”
“Thank you, I guess?” Lance said.
“Come and see me, even if it’s midnight,” the man said.
“I’ll definitely think about it,” Lance said, getting up to leave.