January 4
Dear Mom,
Back at the Academy today. Patrick drove me this time, he hadn't seen the school before. We were greeted by the site of an army of snow people! Turns out Little X decided to have fun in all the snow, but didn't have anyone to play with, so he made snowmen and women of everyone at the mansion. I'm still not sure what to think of that, except that he sure has some talent.
Doctor Grey and Scott arrived just after we did, while Patrick was getting my things out of the trunk. I introduced everyone, and all Patrick could mouth at me for minutes was "She looks like Mom!" We didn't really talk about it though. Yuki showed up, and after seeing my room Patrick had to go.
Very few students were back yet, and Little X wanted to play (seems to me like he had too few people to play with over the break) so Thad and Yuki and I agreed to go sledding with him, because it sounded like a lot of fun without a lot of effort. And it was! Though... it was... freaky?... no, just plain out there, when Little X's Teddy bear, um, came to life. I THINK it has something to do with Little X's telepathic powers. I really hope it does.... Teddy was pleasant enough though. Just a very odd experience. I didn't join in the snow attack on Tyler. And so didn't get caught in the retaliation. All fun for me. But it looked like the others had fun too.
I went in finally to find Bart. Veronica had shown up just as we were all going out sledding. She didn't want to come with us. I looked and looked for Bart, but couldn't find him. So I decided to see if Diedre was in yet and to see if Veronica was back to her old self or not. Bart answered the door. Turns out Veronica had a BAD vacation. Bart was trying to help her, and by the time I got there she just wanted to be alone. So we left.
The Professors has left notes around the mansion for us all to come out back for a surprise, and there were a bunch of sticks in the main room, one for each of us. Before we went out, I went and sent Veronica an e-mail saying if she wanted to talk at all with me, I'm here and willing to listen or do whatever she needed a friend to do.
When we got outside, Tyler was building a framework for a very big bonfire. Professor X said that the school does a bonfire "cleansing" ritual type thing where everyone throws in something they want to be rid of in their lives, and if it's not something physical that's what the sticks are for, to tie on a piece of paper with the thing written on it and burn the paper and stick.
Then(!) the Professors brought out all the school training uniforms. I had forgotten Professor Rogue told me Professor X was replacing the uniforms after break! We gleefully got to burn our old ones. The new ones are still black and yellow, but the yellow is softer and Very few, only the belt, the gloves, and a bit on each shoulder. Otherwise the whole suit is black.
I think Doctor Grey caught my passing thought of throwing Scott in, but I didn't Really mean it. A person can't control Everything they think. That's why we get to think before we speak! She seemed cool about it.
Veronica ended up coming down eventually, but kept to the sidelines. When I saw her, I asked if she was okay. She wanted to take me up on my offer in the e-mail, so we went off walking. We walked, she talked, for a long time. Seems her Dad is in serious trouble over some jerk who forced Veronica to put him into a wall. I offered to have Shawn see if Shalyn could help out. Veronica said part of the problem is her Dad doesn't want anything about Mutant coming into it, and so he wouldn't let Veronica say she had even so much as hit the guy. Her dad is taking all the blame. She's hating it 'cause he might go to jail. And, she's not physically back to normal. I offered her access to my closet whenever she wanted. It was about all I could do besides just being there.
It's late now. School starts in the morning.
Love You,
Angel
January 5