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This was his punishment for trusting Jean with anything ever, wasn’t it? He honestly should’ve known. Don’t let the sweaters and the innocent girl-next-door vibe fool you; Jean Grey was an evil mastermind when she wanted to be. Normally, he would’ve seen the evil in her eyes long before her scheme could start and promptly gotten the fuck out of there, but, well—who actively questions their friends’ morals during the holiday season?
He really couldn’t be blamed.
Christmas was a… somewhat unconventional time with the X-Men, but he’d always enjoyed it. They’d go home for the actual day itself, so they couldn’t quite celebrate Christmas day-of, but everyone knew the month leading up to Christmas was the best bit anyway. They usually engaged in some innocent holiday fun together before being shipped off to their respective families to sit through awkward small talk and dry chicken. However, instead of innocent holiday fun, Jean Grey had schemed up a war plan. Because, and he couldn’t state this enough, she was literally evil.
It'd started like this: they’d been sitting in the living room when Jean decided they really ought to decorate the tree. Bobby—the naïve, unknowing fool he was—had taken to this idea with no small amount of enthusiasm. He loved Christmas. He liked the winter in general (what better time to be completely in control of all things ice and snow than winter?), but he’d always gotten ridiculously hyped over Christmas.
And so there he was, defenseless, elbow-deep in a box of Christmas ornaments when Jean suddenly whipped out the mistletoe. Warren oohed appreciatively from where he was hovering above the Christmas tree, pausing his efforts to place the corny angel-shaped tree topper Bobby had bought him last year.
“Is that…necessary?” Scott asked, looking at the mistletoe like a tiny, very murderous Magneto might jump out of it any second. Honestly, Bobby agreed with the sentiment. He’d finally noticed the first signs of Jean’s evil master plan, but he couldn’t tell where it was going yet. Still, let the record show he was so onto her. That mistletoe was evil, and he knew it.
“It’s a fun tradition!” Jean argued, looking at Scott through her eyelashes, and Bobby immediately realized he was about to lose his one true ally in the anti-mistletoe debate. Jean floated the mistletoe above herself and Scott and kissed him on the cheek sweetly. Well, fuck. He'd never lost a fight this quickly. He could actually see all Scott’s objections melt away.
“Not to worry, Scott. If you really wish not to participate, you don’t have to.” Hank said, statement punctuated by the sound of a shattering ornament.
“One, yes, he absolutely does; don’t be a wet blanket,” Warren countered. “Two, I told you it wouldn’t be a good idea to try and hang those while hanging upside down from the roof.”
“Oh please, you’ll just buy new ones.” Bobby argued, briefly distracted from Jean’s villainy because watching Hank trying to decorate a Christmas tree upside down was a hilarious sight he wasn’t giving up on yet.
“Secretly you people only want me for my money.” Warren joked, landing beside Bobby to stock up on more ornaments. From the corner of his eye he saw Jean grin (evilly), moving the mistletoe towards them, and that’s when he realized exactly what she was planning.
He was on his feet in seconds, scrambling backwards. He vaguely heard himself giving some half-baked excuse about looking for more ornaments upstairs before dashing out of the room, keeping one eye on the mistletoe all the while.
He regretted everything, he decided. He shouldn’t have told her anything. See, Jean was the only person who knew about the fact he may or may not have a teeny-tiny crush on a certain winged teammate. A small, insignificant thing, really. Nothing to worry about. Totally.
Anyway, he’d told her about it in a moment of weakness, thinking he could trust one of his closest and most trusted friends not to do anything evil with it, and look where that’d gotten him. Running from his own living room in disgrace because Jean was actually evil, and one day she’d rule the world like the conniving villainess she was.
☃︎
It did not end there. Oh no, he should only be so lucky. For his many gifts and talents, being lucky had never really been in the cards for him.
He’d been innocently minding his business when Jean struck again. Okay, maybe ‘innocently’ wasn’t the right word; he and Warren were on a mission to steal as many of Scott’s freshly baked Christmas cookies as they could get their hands on without anyone the wiser. Still, did he really deserve to be attacked by flying Christmas plants for his trouble?
“Did you see that?” He asked, suspiciously glaring at the spot where he was sure he’d seen a flash of some leaves. Warren did not pause his cookie theft to look, clearly not understanding the severity of the situation.
“Don’t get paranoid on me now, iceboy.” Warren hummed. “I really don’t want to find another Bonnie to my Clyde.”
“Why am I Bonnie? I’m more of a Clyde, you can be Bonnie.” He argued, turning to look at Warren. Before Warren could make a retort, however, a small bell tinkled somewhere behind them. The type you might find on, say, some mistletoe. Warren froze, tilting his head in an almost bird-like manner as if to hear better. Bobby quickly looked around the room, but the offending piece of foliage was nowhere in sight. Perhaps that was more terrifying: to know it was there but not being able to see it.
“You’re sure we woke no one up?” Warren whispered skeptically, scanning the room thoroughly.
“You’re the one with the bird senses. You tell me.” He hissed back, not daring to look at Warren. If he looked away, even if only for a moment, the mistletoe would surely be upon them.
“Run like hell on three?” Warren asked, slowly closing the bag to secure their loot.
“One.” Their only hope was to catch Jean off guard enough that they could somehow outrun her telepathy.
“Two.” He shifted around the counter slightly so he could have a more direct path.
“Three!” Warren ran past him almost immediately, and Bobby honestly expected him to save himself. That didn’t happen. Instead, Warren grabbed Bobby’s hand and tugged him forward, and his brain short-circuited immediately. He stumbled slightly, but Warren immediately pulled him upright again as they dashed through the hall and up the stairs. Were they being pursued? Was the mistletoe keeping pace with them? He honestly couldn’t tell.
Warren only let go of his hand when they were standing in front of his bedroom, not taking the time to wave before bolting around the corner to his own room. It was only when he was standing in his bedroom, leaning against the door to catch his breath, that he remembered Warren had been carrying their prize. That double-crossing bastard.
“Bonnie never would’ve done Clyde like this.” He muttered under his breath, deciding to ignore how his hand was still tingling.
☃︎
That morning, he woke up to a sticky note with a smiley face and his share of the cookies, which almost made up for Jean’s (evil) knowing smirk during breakfast. Almost.
☃︎
He was not moping. Really, he wasn’t! He was an X-Man; X-Men didn’t mope. He was just sitting outside thinking. He was simply sitting there, pondering his last conversation with Jean.
Jean was being so weird this month, he genuinely couldn’t stand it. She’d been sneakily floating the mistletoe towards him and Warren constantly, like she didn’t even care about how uncomfortable Warren would obviously feel about that, and it was pissing him off. Every time he turned a corner, he had to check for any sign of mistletoe.
He was being haunted by a stick. This was pathetic.
And as if that wasn’t bad enough, she’d had the audacity to give a whole spiel about ‘confessing his feelings’ when he tried to confront her about it! She’d been all ‘oh, I wouldn’t be so sure he doesn’t like you back’, and ‘well maybe he’d like to know’, and ‘you guys do have a lot in common’, and ‘you should see the way he looks at you’.
And sure, Warren and Jean were close. On his worse days, the way they were with each other made him kind of jealous, even if Jean was dating Scott now. Besides himself, Jean probably knew Warren best out of anyone, but Jean clearly had no idea what she was talking about now. ‘I wouldn’t be so sure he doesn’t like you back’, yeah right. As if someone like Warren would ever even consider looking in his direction.
He wasn’t moping, though. Obviously.
“This seat taken?” Warren asked, kicking up snow where he landed. Sometimes he wondered if Warren magically appeared every time someone thought about him three times in a row. If so, Bobby was totally screwed.
“Depends on whether or not you’re gonna sweep me off the bench with your wings again.” He said, but he still moved over to make room.
“I know you’ll never believe me, but that really was an accident.” Warren replied. True to his word, he carefully spread out his wings behind Bobby, not knocking him off the bench. Honestly, he hadn’t even minded it the first time it happened. The brief moment of contact with his wings immediately followed by Warren’s startled look when Bobby was suddenly sprawled on the floor was a cherished memory.
He recognized that was an inside thought, though, so instead he said, “You’re right, I don’t believe you. That was malicious intent if I’ve ever seen it.”
It’s a joke he wouldn’t have dreamed of making with his other teammates. Even though the school was really nice, mutants still weren’t exactly treated well in the real world. Their mutations could be a sensitive subject; any joke or comment could come across as mean at best and discriminatory at worst. He didn’t have to worry about that with Warren, though. His dynamic with Warren had always been different. They got each other in a way the others didn’t. He didn’t want to brag or anything, but he was pretty sure he knew Warren better than he knew himself. He knew the kinds of jokes they could both laugh about, and he knew the kinds of jokes that would be way out of line.
Warren rolled his eyes, a fond smile on his face, just as Bobby knew he would. “What are you doing out here anyway? I’ve been flying for a while, and you've barely moved since I started.”
“Thinking, I guess.” He shrugged, kicking at some snow with the nose of his shoe. He could faintly feel Warren’s wing graze his back and shivered.
“Be careful with that; wouldn’t want you to hurt yourself,” Warren teased lightly, holding up a placating hand when Bobby turned to glare at him. “Joking, joking. Thinking about what?”
Well, shit. What was he supposed to say to that? 'Oh, just thinking about how I’m, like, totally in love with you! No biggie!'
“Stuff.” He replied, because he still hadn’t quite figured out how to lie under pressure despite the years he spent as a secret queer mutant/superhero. Warren shot him a skeptical look, and Bobby kind of wanted to melt into the ground right there. He could do it, too. Probably. Was that part of his power set?
“Stuff.” Warren repeated dubiously.
“Yeah, y’know. Stuff.” Bobby said for a third time, because apparently he wasn’t being weird enough yet. Thankfully, he was saved from further digging himself into a hole by a by-now familiar sound. The rustling of mistletoe. He waited with bated breath, ignoring whatever Warren was saying, and when he finally saw the first glimpse of green leaves drifting through a window, he promptly froze it, watching it crumble and fall out of the sky.
Take that, stupid Christmas tradition.
☃︎
Unfortunately, even Warren Worthington III couldn’t remain oblivious forever. Jean kept the mistletoe aimlessly floating around occasionally, just so no one could accuse her of any targeted attacks, and—up until that point—Warren had seemed pretty convinced that all their almost-kisses had been a mere coincidence. Your typical wrong place, wrong time kind of situation.
That was significantly harder to believe when the mistletoe started following them around during training, though.
“Jean! Keep your little bundle of Christmas joy out of my way!” Warren yelled, maneuvering to the right to avoid the mistletoe currently shooting towards his face. It missed by a hair’s breadth, and he could hear Warren’s annoyed cursing from the other side of the Danger Room.
“Angel!” Scott scolded, shooting a beam at whatever construct they were supposed to be fighting (honestly, Bobby had gotten a bit distracted the second Jean whipped out the mistletoe again).
“Marvel Girl! Keep your little bundle of Christmas joy out of my way!” Warren repeated, managing to sound just as annoyed as the first time around. Bobby shot forward, stopping just short of Jean, out of earshot of their teammates.
“Do we really have to do this now?” He whispered furiously. Jean didn’t falter, looking as determined as ever. Because Jean wasn’t just evil, she was evil and stubborn and had never backed down a day in her life.
“Just. Trust. Me.” She said through gritted teeth, just like she’d said every single other time he’d tried to convince her to just stop already.
Before he could say anything like ‘No, you’ve clearly been replaced by an evil clone hellbent on breaking the X-Men apart from the inside by exploiting my pathetic gay crush on my best friend/teammate/etc.’, the Professor spoke in his head.
Bobby. Look out.
That was about all the warning he got before he was forcefully reminded of the fact they were training. This reminder came in the form of him being grabbed by something (he still hadn’t remembered what exactly they were fighting) and tossed into the air like a ragdoll. Normally, he didn’t really mind that. Being thrown into the air meant being caught by Warren and gently placed on the ground, like his very own guardian angel. He minded it a lot more when he remembered that close proximity with Warren meant close proximity to that stupid fucking plant.
He physically felt the pang of disappointment in his chest when he had to shove himself out of Warren’s embrace roughly, forming his own ice bridge to catch him before he hit the ground. Stupid Christmas plant, ruining his favorite part of training. Jean probably meant well, but, for the first time, he wanted the Christmas season to end already. He could almost convince himself he saw his own disappointment and hurt reflected back on Warren’s face, but that was probably a trick of the light or something. He had better things to do than wishful thinking, anyway.
He'd never been a particularly great multitasker. He’d honestly lost track of the amount of times he’d start one thing, get distracted by another, and then forget about what he had been doing in the first place. Give him two tasks meant to be handled simultaneously, and odds were he’d somehow manage to screw up both, plus a secret third task you didn’t even know he could screw up. So, rather than trying to focus on both the fight and avoiding Warren, he focused on the most important bit.
Avoiding Warren, of course.
For the rest of the session, he made sure that he wasn’t even close to anywhere Warren was, keeping a healthy distance of as-many-feet-as-humanly-possible between them. He was pretty sure the others noticed he wasn’t contributing much to the fight by that point, so he was forced to make a few ice picks and the like, just so he wouldn’t look like he was slacking off too bad.
Eventually, the construct (listen, you can’t judge him for still not knowing what he was fighting; he just told you how bad he is at multitasking) fell under the combined might of the X-Men, and the simulation stopped. He checked on the progress of the mistletoe, only to see it floating above Warren and… him?
“Oh.” Warren breathed, vaguely pink from exertion as he looked between the floating plant and Bobby’s unmoving face and—oh, right, ice construct. Duh. With a flick of his wrist, the fake Iceman crumbled to the ground. The frustrated look on Jean’s face would’ve been incredibly funny if Warren hadn’t randomly disappeared before he got the chance to point it out to him. What the hell was his problem? Bobby had done him a great service, dedicating this much time to playing mistletoe-ghostbuster, and this was his reward?
Warren didn’t talk to him for the rest of the day, and Bobby felt his Christmas spirit dim further and further. At least it would all be over in a few days, he supposed.
☃︎
It was the day before they were supposed to go back to their parents that it all went wrong. Of course it was. He’d let his guard down for one second. One, singular, itty-bitty second, just because he wanted to spend some time with Warren before they’d be sent on holiday. They weren’t even in a public space where Jean could see them! They were sitting in his bedroom for fuck’s sake!
They’d just been sitting there, arguing over present ideas for Scott, when they heard a dull thud against the door. Immediately, they both quieted down. Just when he’d thought he’d perhaps imagined it—
Thud. Fuck.
Thud. That wouldn’t be someone innocently knocking on his door, would it?
Thud.
“Uhm. Hold on.” He said, getting up and moving towards the door carefully, dreading what he’d find on the other side. He felt a bit like the plucky cheerleader in a horror movie who was about to open the door to a serial killer after suggesting they all split up. The door creaked dramatically as he looked through it, glancing both sides and finding the hall empty. Until he looked up and saw the mistletoe trying to ram its way through his door.
“Is that—” Warren started, but Bobby quickly slammed the door shut before he could finish the sentence. He was pretty sure he got it, if the rustling on the other side of the door was anything to go by, but he’d long since realized the damn plant was pretty much unstoppable. The one enemy the X-Men could never defeat: mistletoe.
“Just Jean’s stupid plant again. Don’t worry, I got it.” He said grimly, glancing behind him at the door just in case the mistletoe actually managed to slam straight through his door.
“Right, because having to kiss me would be so awful, wouldn’t it?” Warren spat coldly, and—Bobby didn’t know what it was. Honest! Maybe he was still distracted by the mistletoe in the hallway. Maybe he was tired from all the stress dreams he’d been having about mistletoe chasing him around calling him gay. Maybe his brain-to-mouth filter was just doing what it always did: being damn near nonexistent.
Whatever the case, instead of replying literally anything appropriate to that, he said, “I should only be so lucky.”
Not that he had much time to stress about that, though, because Warren said, at the exact same time, “I promise I won’t jump your bones just because I have a crush on you, Bobby. You don’t have to make it all weird.”
For a second, neither of them said anything. Then,
“What.” He was yelling, wasn’t he? He probably shouldn’t yell; Jean might still be in the hallway. It would be kinda embarrassing if she heard.
“No, you what? What do you mean ‘I should only be so lucky’?” Warren yelled back. Ah, so they were both yelling; this was a yelling type of conversation. Fun.
“You don’t have a crush on me!” He said desperately, instead of responding to that.
“What do you mean I don’t have a crush on you? You know I have a crush on you! That’s why you’re being weird about this!”
“You don’t have a crush on me.” He repeated dumbly, because what.
“Yes! I do!” Warren actually rolled his eyes at that, like Bobby was the one being stupid here.
“But I’m,” he started, before stopping. There were so many reasons Warren wouldn’t—couldn’t—have a crush on him. But, well, it had always boiled down to one main reason, hadn’t it? “…a boy.”
Instead of doing what he'd been expecting him to do (realizing he didn't like guys and running away or something), Warren laughed.
“Dude, have you met me? I made out with that tentacled alien girl once, you seriously think gender is a factor for me?” Warren asked incredulously, and Bobby actually felt his brain melt because what? Warren liked guys. Warren liked him.
Holy shit.
“You like me. Like, like-like me.” He said, wide-eyed. He hadn’t been this speechless in—well, ever, actually. He always had something to say, some stupid joke to make or corny one-liner to try out. He saw Warren mouth the words ‘like-like’ incredulously, but he couldn’t find it in himself to care because Warren Worthington III actually liked him.
“Wait, if you didn’t know, then why were you being so weird about the mistletoe?” Warren asked suddenly, eyes narrowed. He almost looked the way Hank did when running complicated calculations in his head, which was a ridiculously endearing sight on his face that he did not have the mental strength to process right now.
“Because I thought you’d be uncomfortable with it considering my, uh, feelings. For you.” He said, twisting his bedsheet between his hands awkwardly, not ready to see the expression on Warren’s face. For a moment, everything was silent. Then,
“Do you think Jean’s still in the hallway?” Warren asked suddenly, unprompted. His eyes snapped up, if only to try and decipher what Warren was thinking.
“I don’t know? Probably not?” He offered hesitantly.
“Good.” Warren said, moving closer, and oh. Oh god, okay, they were doing this. He wasn't freaking out. 'Course not.
"Before we start, I want you to know I have, like, no experience. At all. Never kissed a guy or anything, not even any alien girls—not that that would make much sense, I don't actually like girls, I—" He rambled before his brain screeched to a halt.
"Bobby?" Warren said, placing a hand on his neck.
"Yeah?"
"Shut up."
"Yeah."
Bobby had a second to think, 'Wow, Jean is going to be unbearably smug about this, isn't she?' before their lips met and he stopped doing any thinking at all.