Thanks for Dinner
      
      Author: candy 


DISCLAIMER: none of the x-men are mine, so don't sue me, I don't have any money 
anyway.

DEDICATED TO MILES, THANKS FOR DINNER, I STILL MISS YA.

PLOT: What's a girl to do when her friends won't admit they love each other? You 
make them, even if it kills her.



Amandra Collins loved it here; Xavier's Institute had it all. A 17th century 
mansion with beautiful vistas and architecture, the hottest guys on the planet, 
killer weight room, and a problem she'd been trying to solve for three and a 
half years now... how to get Logan and Jubilee together? 

"Hey, Mandy," Bobby said with a wink.

"Give it up Vanilla Ice, you're not my type," she returned in a frustrated 
voice. Bobby looked her over one good time. Legs that went on forever made even 
sexier by those skin tight leather pants she wore, curves that were illegal in 
all fifty states and Canada, her flawless golden brown complexion reminded him 
of chocolate and her face, angelic. Right now, that angelic face was telling him 
volumes, she was up to something!

"Mandy, you okay," he asked trying to sound humble?

"Yeah," she returned,"just uhh... worried about my finals."

*Finals, righhht,* he thought her answer was at best, suspicious. She was too 
talented of a designer to be worrying about her finals. 

"Why worry, your a great designer," he spoke gingerly to her in hopes she'd 
respond positively to him.

"Drake," nope, no positive response today.

"I know you're up to something," he whispered playfully in her ear. She smiled 
trying to hold down a laugh, because he was right.

"Look Drake, if I plan on locking the Cajun in the deep freezer again, you'll be 
the first person I call. Now go away, I'm plottin' here," she whispered back 
seductively. Bobby's smile was ear to ear. He bounced away with the image of 
Gambit in the basement freezer. She shock her head and resumed looking out the 
window.

It was Christmas break, her last Christmas break ever, the thought gave her a 
chill. Graduation would be in May, all she had do was finish her student 
collection and find cheap models to walk the runway. Easy.

Upon hearing a light giggle she turned her head in it's direction, Jubilee 
walked in ,Logan in tow. She was giggling like she'd done something. *Could it 
be she finally told him?* Her eyebrow rose, her face glowed with hope.

"Hey Mandy, tell ol' Chucklehead here we graduate May first, he don't believe 
me," Jubilee giggled her way through the sentence, Logan looked at Mandy 
dumbfounded.

*Nope she didn't tell him.*

Sighing heavily, she streched out like she was yawning, but it was only to hide 
her disgust,"May first, Logan," she slurred. Again a chill went up her spin at 
the thought of graduating. 

Logan hung his head in disbelief, "You graduatin' for real Kid," he asked almost 
mournfully?

Jubilee looked at him ,confusion heavy on her face, he should have been happy 
for her. She sure as hell was proud of herself; three and a half years at New 
York's prestigious International University of Art and Design was about to make 
her snap. She'd earned a 3.7 GPA and the teachers helped her to fully develop 
her usual style from loud, bright California mallrat to ultra modern, high tech 
21st century, 20-something chic. Damn him if he wasn't proud of her.

Mandy watched as Logan excused himself and went out the front door. She peered 
out the reinforced glass from her perch atop a window bench as he passed taking 
the long way to garage. A moment later, a red jeep roarded down the driveway. 
Jubilee flopped down on the leather sofa opposite her best friend and pouted 
like she was thirteen again.
Mandy shock her head somewhat amused by all of this, "He loves ya, ya know," she 
said monotonely while drawing her knees against her chest.
"Yeah," Jubilee said. "Like his little sister, I know."
"No stupid, her LOVVVVES you," there she'd said it. After three years of locking 
them in rooms, sending faked notes to get them to meet at romanitic spots and a 
laundry list of other tricks she'd pulled, finally she said it.
"Wha'cha say," Jubilee said in a low timid voice?
"You know, 'God created woman for a man' kind of love," she returned with 
attitude .
"Right," at that Jubilee stormed out. Amandra buried her head into her knees and 
faked like she was crying, her frustration was building.
*Amandra please come to my Ready Room.* Charles Xavier's sweet voice broke her 
"sobbing".
*Sure thing Sir..uhg...Charles.* He'd gotten on her once today about that Sir 
thing.
A minute later Amandra pushed opened the door to his office and closed it behind 
her. With out looking up Charles spoke a soft hello to her. She came over and 
kissed him on his cheek , somewhat surprising him. 
An hour passed, the two talked about everything from school to personal issues. 
Charles liked the young woman, she'd come in to his home a guest and now was 
part of his family. She was human, no powers, no x-factor gene, she wasn't even 
a mutant gene carrier, but Charles' heart went out to her. 
Jubilee had gone off to college, she came home one weekend and could not stop 
talking about her orphaned roommate. Charles could feel how it weighted on the 
child's heart that she could not tell Amandra everything about her life. There 
was also a fear that radiated off of Jubilee. 
Jubilee's affiliation with the X-men had made her a target for many a psycho; 
she was terrorified that Amandra would be hurt because of her. At first Jubilee 
had decided to move out, but Charles came up with a solution that would be less 
painful. He decided to invite her to a special dinner, it was sneaky, but while 
there he and Jean could 'test' her to see if it was safe to tell her about them. 
If it was safe, they would tell her leaving it up to her what she wanted to do 
from that point on. If not, they'd tell Amandra nothing and Jubilee would move 
out. Simple enough plan.
Upon her arrival, the girl charmed the pants off Bobby, they flirted shamelessly 
all night. She was an excellent storyteller; her life in New York had given her 
plenty of material. The dinner had been going well, Charles and Jean were trying 
to scan her mind for ill or malice feelings about mutant when it happenned... 
Logan's head snapped when he caught Hank's scent, a moment later the big blue 
scientist walked in with a cheerful hello. Amandra's head spun around to see the 
new arrival and could not stop looking at him. For a long second no one in the 
room even breathed and her mind was completely unreadable, she continued to 
stare at Hank. Finally she smiled, muttered something about Cookie Monster and 
asked Jean to pass her the salt. From that day on she had come to be loved by 
everyone of the X-Men.
In the middle of telling Charles about how well her finals really went, she 
heard a thousand giggles coming from the window behind him. Both of them moved 
to the window, glancing out, Amandra glowed with a smile. Jubilee was running 
for life as Logan pitched a snowball towards her. *All was well again in the 
land of starcrossed lovers too stubborn to.... tell.... each ....other....OPPS!*
She looked, nervously, over at the Professor who still gazed out the window with 
a troubled look on his face,"Amandra I know what your thinking and I.."
"They belong together Charles," she said respectfully but crossed her arms 
defensively. They had this discussion before, Charles thought Logan only loved 
Jubilee as a sister. Amandra knew what she saw and no mind reader, not even 
Charles, could tell her different.
"You are correct my dear Amandra, they do belong together," he said calmly.
"I don't care if you think Logan ....They do," Amandra had won, she was confused 
about how she'd won but she had. Celebrations would be held later in her room.
"Logan doesn't want her to get hurt, neither do I for that matter, but .."he 
stopped speaking . Jubilee had fallen into the snow face first, Logan reached 
down with one hand and scooped her up by her waist. As she was pulled up, she 
started giggling again. He spun her around looking for any injuries. Taking his 
index finger, he brushed some snow off her nose. His animal like eyes softened, 
his crinkled forehead relaxed. He'd messed up and looked the object of his 
deepest dire in her Nile deep, sapphire blue eyes. They seemed frozen in time 
for a moment, Amandra crossed her fingers, whispering a prayer. Charles 
continued to look out the window in silence.
Logan couldn't break his stare, he wanted to kiss those soft pink lips so badly. 
What had happened to his calm, his reserve. He had managed to hide his feelings 
for all these years, managed to runaway from her and those damned blue eyes. 
Suddenly, he pulled away from her and stormed into house. Jubilee stood there 
for a long moment, in a blink of an eye, she collapsed to her knees in tears on 
the snow covered front lawn.
Amandra had enough, she marched past Xavier running a comforting finger over his 
shoulder and muttered something about a shot gun wedding. He smiled returning to 
his desk; it was then that he felt something wrong. She ran down the stairs 
catching sight of Logan and Jean talking in the foyer.
"Logan are you okay, you like..." Jean started?
"I'm fine..." he barked roughly. Waves of whisky assaulted her nose the closer 
she got to the pair. For a second Jean felt Amandra's rage, not really from hate 
but frustration. Amandra had half a mind to punch him and Jean knew she would 
have until Jubilee came in the door. 
"Wha's gonin' on," Jubilee asked no one directly and searched their faces for 
answers?
Something outside caught Amandra's eye, someone running across the lawn toward 
the house. He was bulky like Beast but not blue,.... gold. Logan caught a 
familiar scent in his nose, Sabertooth. Logan had gone to Harry's to blow off 
some steam; little did he know that Sabertooth had seen him and followed him 
home.
"Ohmygod," Amandra yelled, while reaching for Jubilee! Yanking her friend into 
the foyer, Amandra slammed the door shut with her body and tried to lock it. She 
heard a growl and a crash, the beautiful young woman tried to push off the door 
and run but something was wrong. She heard Jubilee screaming and on the floor 
there was a pool of blood forming. Sabertooth had punched a hole in the door and 
started slashing at her. Amandra's chest took most of the hits. 
She fell back into Logan's arms. She was muttering, trying to talk. A rage 
filled Logan, a hate he'd not felt in a long time. Amandra was a friend and 
Logan had lost enough friends to this bastard.
"Get her to Medlab," he looked down at the three shocked women,"NOW!" The ruckus 
brought Bobby, Remy, and Hank down the stairs.
"Oh my stars and garters," Hank said no more, the girl's wounds said it all. 
Bobby couldn't move he'd lapsed into shock at the sight of his bleeding friend. 
Sabertooth broke down the door , "Merry Christmas Runt," the golden demon licked 
Amandra's blood from his claws and began laughing. Logan rushed forward and 
before Sabertooth could react, Logan slammed three adamantium claws into the 
monster's heart, he rotated them 360 degrees then withdrew. Sabertooth raised a 
weakened claw over Wolverine, Remy threw a charged card into the invader's face. 
Sabertooth brushed it off and growled; there was an electric humming sound, then 
the monster dropped to the floor with a howl. Behind him was Scott Summers, he 
had been driving up when the attack started. Logan walked over to the dazed but 
breathing Sabertooth. He raised his claws, these wounds would heal, a 
decapitation would not. 
Having finally shook off the image of amandra, Bobby froze Logan's hand in 
place. In anger Logan growled at him. Bobby only looked at him, his face read 
*we don't kill*. Exhailing, Logan broke through the ice and walked away.
It had been ten minutes since Amandra had saved Jubilee. Hank knew was she was 
dying, her internal injuries were too serious, she'd lost too much blood.
Logan entered finding Jubilee holding Amandra's hand. Jean looked over at 
Wolverine, he nodded, she shock her head. Logan exhailed heavily and walked over 
to the observation bed, he put a comforting hand on Jubilee's shoulder.
"She'll be okay Darlin'..."
"Stop... stop lying to her..." Mandy's voice was weak, but angry," You th...ink 
I saved her so you could keep....lying to her."
"Don't talk, Mandy..."Jubilee's eyes filled with tears.
"Logan you love her...really lov'her. LeeLee, you love'em too. After, 
ahh...three years ....
Damn it ....." Her voice trailed off, a sad little tear ran the length of her 
face, the light in her big hazel eyes dimmed. Her body went limp, she was gone.
Jubilee deteriated into tears, Logan took her into his arms. His heart broken, 
but his mind clear for the first time. 


It may seem like this had no ending, but it did. Some people come into our lives 
serve a purpose and leave.

candy