Who: Josh Foley (& a handful of NPC's) When: Backdated about a year. Where: Josh's apartment What: Josh wants to be alone... or, does he?
"I'm not sad, and I'm not depressed. And yes, I do know the difference. Look, I just wanna be alone right now," Josh said into his cel phone, annoyed. "Why is that so scary to people?" He rolled his eyes at the next response. "No, I don't think going to that rave tonight will be like being alone in a crowd. What do I think? I think it'll totally be like being IN a crowd. Jeez!"
"Listen, I know you think you're trying to help. So don't. I'm fine." There was another pause, and more eyerolling. "Well, maybe I am an old man. I'm almost twenty-six, you know. Raves stopped being fun right around the time I stopped needing a fake ID to get into them, to be honest. So go, have fun. Tell me all about it later."
"Yeah, mmhmm. Bye." Josh hung up with a long-suffering sigh.
It was like being sixteen all over again. That was around the time he had hurt someone with his power for the first time, which had led to finding out how little of the scope of his mutation he had been using. It had been an overwhelming time. Josh, who had never been anything but an extrovert, found himself seeking solitude for the first time in his life. The more he discovered about his biological ability, the more isolated he had felt in the beginning.
The sense of responsibility of being able to affect a body down to the genetic level was heady stuff. If his ego hadn't already been tempered by adversity and humbled by the fact that he had become everything he hated, he might have easily ended up suffering from megalomania and having to be put down. Thankfully, life had beaten him down enough to give him a semblance of humility, and chaos had been averted. He had turned to different alternative philosophies to center himself, and found much that was useful in them. He found Tantric teachings particularly healing, as they removed a lot of the morally negative weight from his actions. It was much easier to come to terms with his power when he thought he was merely being one with the flow of the life-force, and when he saw things in terms of polarity rather than life and death.
A knock on his door snapped him out of his reverie. He looked at his phone's display and smiled. His Tantric session partners seemed to be right on time. He had left word with the doorman to let them in. Joshua was barefoot and wearing the softest heather lounge pants he owned with a matching vest hoodie. They hugged his figure in all the right places because, why not flaunt a little?
He padded over and opened the door. "Hello, Anna. Jillian. Come on in." He stepped aside to let them in and asked, "Did Penny not make it?"
"She's coming. We brought a fourth, I hope that's okay," Anna said brightly. She was a little clueless that one. She was also cute as could be, with her powder blue skin and hair that she dyed pink, making it a soft shade of violet. Jill was a rare beauty, with bold features and skin that couldn't decide whether to be cinnamon or chocolate. Joshua's prudish, racist parents would have been appalled. Then again, they were appalled anyway at their pretty golden boy being a filthy mutant, like it was his fault or something.
"Oh?" Joshua said calmly. He was about to say the more the merrier when Penny appeared at the door with a guy. This wasn't what he was expecting at all. He blinked past pale, freckled, multi-colored haired Penny at the tall, blood red mutant with the semi-translucent scales all over his brow under a shock of sable black hair. Somehow, he made them work. Even more striking were the huge slitted purple eyes under them. He was broad of shoulder, and his torso tapered down to a tight little waist. Then it was long legs all the way to the floor. His t-shirt was well stretched across a deep chest. Well, hello, dragon boy.
"Hi Josh! This is Emre," Penny said in her sultry whiskey and cigarettes voice. "I asked him to join us, if that's okay with you. I can vouch for him." The way she pursed her lips made Joshua's eyebrow cock up.
A light baritone voice wafter over from the hallway. "If it's not cool, I can dig it, man. I'll find something else to do," the red-skinned male said. Josh eyed the girls, who were looking entirely too innocent for this not to have been a setup. He snorted and grinned at them first, then at the newcomer. He reached out to offer his hand to the guy.
"It's no problem at all," Josh said securely in his friendly tenor. "Always room for one more, so long as the energy's right. Please, come in."
Penny beamed at him and squeezed his buns on the way in, whispering, "Thank you, love. You won't be sorry."
Josh snorted again. It was impossible to be mad at the woman. "I guess we'll see," he said noncommittally.
Emre smiled a gentle, pleased smile. "Thank you. Sorry to impose," he rumbled in his chest as he walked past Joshua into the apartment.
Joshua closed the door and turned around with a pleasant smile on his face. Surprise or not, he had a good feeling about this. This was going to be an interesting afternoon. He grinned, feeling ever so slightly guilty that he hadn't exactly been forthcoming about the real reason he didn't want to go and party with his other friends. He knew they wouldn't understand, anyway. To them, Tantric sex was nothing but an excuse to be promiscuous, and to stage orgies. Nothing could be further from the truth, although he was aware that some people used it as such. They all were missing out on the spiritual connection available through this most natural of bodily functions. Not Josh. He wouldn't miss out on this for the world.
He just knew that tomorrow he'd be refreshed, centered and focused, and the feeling would last him likely until the next little session, unless something truly disastrous came along before then. Life-affirming was of the essence, especially when sometimes they brought him those who were beyond anybody's help to be healed. He had a good mind to suspect that it was Magneto's way of keeping him humble. It was hard to feel like a god when some of his patients still managed to slip through his fingers and die, or took so much out of him to heal that he was left comatose for a few days. Not very godlike. Not in the least. But now here was a chance to forget about all the ugliness he had to face at work and simply revel in the beauty of a completely different kind of healing touch.