1963-12-04 - The Interview 01
Summary: Jean-Paul offers to be interviewed, St. John isn't doing anything else at the time. It's enlightening.
Related: None
Theme Song: None
jean-paul sinjin 


It is a quiet Sunday afternoon in the village, or as quiet as it ever gets at the Albert Chambers. Nothing so loud or alarming that it would interrupt a day's writing. Right up until there is a crisp knock at John's door.

Outside, dressed all in black is Jean-Paul Beaubier, who is casting a very judgmental look down the hallway as he waits for the door to open. «My God, the poor man lives in squalor,» he murmurs to himself in French, sounding almost concerned. Almost.

*

There's a pause, then the sound of deadbolts being pulled back. Sinjin answers the door in a rather notable state of disarray, wearing a pair of disreputable jeans and an unfastened thin silk bathrobe sliding off one shoulder. The green suits his colouration, at least. That is the only thing the entire ensemble has to recommend it. The state of undress reveals bite and claw scars down his throat and shoulders, as well as a truly alarming trio of barely-healed deep wounds sweeping from his right hip to high on the left side of his chest.

"Come in," he says, without hesitation. He doesn't seem bothered by his apparel or the quality of his accommodations. "Everything alright?" He digs a rubber band out of his jeans pocket, which he uses to twist his hair back into some kind of haphazard bundle at the nape of his neck.

*

The door opens and Jean-Paul turns back, and for a moment, everything but his eyes is just still. His eyes, though, dart over Sinjin's form as if cataloguing things until, finally, he just flashes a smile and moves to come inside.

"I should be asking you that, I think, after the rally yesterday," Jean-Paul notes in a warm voice, hands clasped loosely behind his back. "You look as though you either had a very poor night after we parted ways or a very, very good one."

*

"Working," Sinjin says, gesturing at a listing stack of paper by the typewriter. "So, both, I suppose. I'm fine, I've had worse." He picks up one of the packs of cigarettes scattered around the apartment, this one on the coffee table, and takes one out before offering Paul the pack. "What can I do for you?"

The scrutiny doesn't go unnoticed, it makes him tense — more tense. There's something wary about him right now. The loose cheerfulness he showed at La Caravelle is missing.

*

Jean-Paul is not one to turn down a gift, it would be rude. He reaches over to delicately pluck a cigarette from the offered pack, favoring Sinjin with another smile as he tucks it between his lips. He doesn't bother asking for a light. He just waits, patient.

"I owe you an interview," he replies simply. "But if this is a bad time…"

*

Sinjin flicks the lighter and steals the flame from it all in the same movement. The little sphere of flame lights Jean-Paul's cigarette first, then Sinjin's, before popping out of existence with a little shower of sparks that — whether Jean-Paul knows it or not — marks a flicker in his usually flawless control. It's having someone in his space. No one, aside from a single visit from Kitty, has been in here since the attempts on his life. He wasn't expecting to feel this way, wasn't remotely prepared for how anxious he is to have a relative stranger in here with him.

"No, it's fine. Let me get the reel to reel out, if you're okay with being recorded. Otherwise, I'll just take notes by hand — which I do anyway. Should probably put a shirt on," he mutters, headed toward the screen that separates his sleeping area from the rest of the apartment. He sheds the dressing gown as he goes, revealing worse damage on his back than the front even hinted at. The scars are older and, all together, cover nearly everything from shoulders to hips. "If I'd known you were coming, I'd have bothered to get dressed."

*

Sadly, Jean-Paul is oblivious to this being a sign of discomfort. If he realized, there's actually a good chance he would take steps to address it — he likes Sinjin, and with people he decides are worth his time, Jean-Paul actually makes an effort. But since he's unaware…

"Don't cover up on my account," Jean-Paul says playfully, the warmth never leaving his voice even as he gets a look at the scars marring Sinjin's back. His eyes catalogue them just as they did the others before, without comment, he finally turns to seek out a place to sit and make himself comfortable. "I do not mind being recorded, no."

*

"Wouldn't want you distracted," Sinjin says dryly. Whether that's a positive or negative type of distraction, he doesn't bother to distinguish, though he rather suspects the latter. At one point, some men found him rather appealing, with the pale skin and the freckles. Now, people don't react so well to what they see. Lights off is the general rule. He comes back, tugging a loose black sweater on — it's slightly less execrable than the jeans but it does set off his pallor.

"Tea?" he asks while he's pulling the reel-to-reel recorder out from under the desk. "I'll put the kettle on once this is set up. I might have some coffee around. No alcohol, sorry."

*

"Wouldn't want me distracted? But however else are you going to get me to let my guard down and tell the truth?" Especially without any alcohol. Jean-Paul is still smiling playfully when Sinjin returns to view and he waves lightly with his cigarette. "If you are making some for yourself, I would be happy to split it. But you don't need to go out of your way."

*

"I don't want you with your guard down," Sinjin says honestly. He gives the reel-to-reel its own chair by the couch, then plugs it in. "Honestly." He straightens, slightly flushed from bending and lifting, and puts his hands on his hips. He meets Jean-Paul's gaze and gives him a half-smile. "This idea that people are only honest if you break them somehow offends me. If I can't make you feel safe enough not to waste both our time with untruths and veneer, then I'm bad at my job. And you're not a man who's hidden the truth recently." He crosses the room and retrieves his cigarette from the ashtray on the desk.

"But I'm good at my job. You'll give me whatever truth you can scrape up out of your pockets by the time I'm done, and want to do it." When he looks at Jean-Paul, the wariness is still there but there's a bit of steel as well. "People want to be known. They want their truth known. I want to do that for you. This isn't you against me in some sparring match. This is us. You'll figure that out before we're done."

*

"I knew I liked you." Jean-Paul's smile is absolutely massive now, and unmistakably approving. That playfulness is still there in his gaze, but there's something else there now, something far weightier and difficult to pin down. It might be respect.

With the cigarette still perched between his lips, Jean-Paul slouches artfully in his seat and stretches out his legs, a twinkle in his eye as he watches Sinjin from across the way. "I am an open book, M'sieur Allerdyce," he virtually purrs, splaying his hands. "What would you like to know?"

*

Sinjin gets the tape started on the reel-to-reel before he answers with a question of his own. He leans on the back of the chair where he's settled the recorder, arms crossed. The smoke spirals up from ths cigarette between his fingers and his gaze is calmer now that he's sliding into professional mode.

"Well, first," he says neutrally. "Are you flirting with me?"

*

"Would you like me to be?" There is barely even time for a heartbeat to pass before Jean-Paul has replied, and despite the lightness of his tone, his gaze is most definitely attentive now. "If you would prefer that I not, I shall endeavor not to. I would hate to offend your sensibilities."

*

"It's not helpful for the purposes of interviewing you," Sinjin says, and this time he genuinely smiles. "It's not a matter of my sensibilities. This is about you, not me. I'm not the subject here, just the catalyst for whatever emerges from our interaction. All other things being equal, I don't get involved with my subjects." He straightens, then heads for the kitchen to put the kettle on for tea.

"That aside, I can't imagine anyone being offended by your attentions," he adds, as he runs water into the kettle.

*

"And Mademoiselle Walker is not a subject, but a…" He needs a second to find the right word. Jean-Paul snaps his fingers. "Yes, a collaborator." Immediately, he's waving that entire line of thought off. "But you are right, you are not the subject here. My apologies."

Whether the apology is genuine or not, Jean-Paul smoothly allows that last comment to serve as a segue. "Oh, plenty of people have been offended by my attentions before," he says with a laugh. "It is my winning personality."

*

"Trish is the lead in a movie based on one of my novels, so you're correct. I don't think I ever would interview her." Sinjin leaves the kettle to heat up and comes back, collapsing gracefully in a corner of the couch, watching Jean-Paul. "Where does that come from? That winning personality?" There's a little smile when he says it. "Why do you think you are the way you are?"

*

"It has simply never occurred to me to try and be any other way." Jean-Paul says it as though the answer should be patently obvious, and it comes with a helpless shrug of his shoulders. Even so, something in his tone suggests that he has given this some thought. But when? "As you saw yesterday — or perhaps you did not, it was quite chaotic — I am… fast. Not just out here," he explains, with a wiggling of his fingers that is so fast that they blur into near-invisibility, before he lightly taps himself on the temple. "But here. All. The. Time."

*

"What does that feel like?" Sinjin is physically relaxed but it's obvious that Jean-Paul has his complete attention. These aren't some kind of rote questions someone wrote down to ask Jean-Paul because that's what the public wants. This is genuine interest. "Is it hard?"

*

<Oh my God it is agonizing!> That's probably a good way to tell if an outburst is genuine — whether it comes out in English or Quebecois. Jean-Paul doesn't even seem to have noticed the slip, laughing with his head lolled back and a hand pressed against his forehead.

"It is terrible!" he repeats. "It makes everyone else seem so slow. I know, intellectually, that I am the one who is… that I am exceptional," Jean-Paul says, and his tone is actually a touch sheepish, not arrogant or haughty. "So perhaps that is why I seem so brusque."

*

"I can only imagine." The sympathy is genuine. "You're miles ahead of all of us, literally and figuratively. So, would you say that you feel as fast as you think and act? Your emotions keep up with you?" Sinjin leans forward to tap the ash off of his cigarette in one of the multitude of ashtrays available.

*

Jean-Paul hums thoughtfully, running his fingers back through his hair. "In some ways? That is more difficult for me to gauge," he admits, leaning forward so that he can reach out and tap the ash from his cigarette into the tray. He is civilized. "It is not as though I never feel fear, though I can think my way out of it, most times. And it is not as if I can let go of silly grudges in less time than you might, I do not think."

*

"That makes sense. Emotions are not necessarily a thing you can have in a vacuum. Thoughts and actions are easier to enact unilaterally. But what you feel, you need something — or someone — to feel it about. Same as any of us." Sinjin rests his elbows on his knees, his cool eyes studying Jean-Paul's face. "Though that might mean you act before you fully appreciate how you feel. It's only later that your feelings catch up to you, when you stay still long enough. Did you feel that way about the press conference? About exposing yourself as a homosexual?"

*

"Not really," Jean-Paul admits, and he smiles broadly enough to bring out his dimples. "Is that strange? I feel like that is probably strange. I can't really tell." He tucks the cigarette between his lips again but remains leant forward, resting his elbows against his knees. "My community had already decided that they were rejecting me. It seemed only fair that they have all of me to reject and not only one part."

*

"You don't strike me as a man who regrets too many things — whether he thinks them through or not." The kettle starts to make some noise about considering coming to a boil so Sinjin gets up to get the pot warmed. "Do you think you'd have told anyone, about any of it, if you hadn't been found out?"

*

"Define 'anyone.'" Jean-Paul is still smiling, though it has softened somewhat. "I imagine I would have eventually. After Innsbruck, perhaps, I might have decided to retire and dedicate myself full-time to my activism," he muses with a thoughtful glance up towards the ceiling. "I would still have lost my medals, I am sure. And I do not know how effective an activist I can be, now." His eyes drop to John and, before he can ask, he adds, "Yes, that troubles me."

*

"I understand that completely." Sinjin pours steaming hot tap water into the pot and sets it aside while he gets out the tea. "You want to be effective, if you're anything like me. At a certain point, things can't be about you, if you're going to be an activist. You have to be someone who can open doors for others and the world makes it hard to do that. Why would you want to be an activist, though? Where does that come from?"

*

"Because the world treats people like shit and it should not," John-Paul replies without any hesitation at all, shifting to prop his chin up in one hand, elbow still resting on his knee. He gestures airily with his other hand as she speaks, watching him from his seat. "Noone is born deserving to be treated like shit. Let us make a decision that hurts others, earn the right to be treated like shit. Then, fine."

*

"So tell me about that." Sinjin flips the whistle up so that the kettle noise doesn't interfere with the recording. "Being treated like shit." He looks over his shoulder, his expression calm. He's not one to be overly sympathetic about these things. Life is hard. He's not callous, either, though.

*

No hesitation. "My parents died before I was a year old so I grew up in foster care, in Montreal," Jean-Paul muses, his tone of voice thoughtful. He gestures up at his ears. "I was moved around a lot. I did not spend very much time in school, it was boring. Too slow. So I spent my time on the streets until I found sports." A shrug, and he smiles again. "I have been treated like shit before. But it has been a long time. As long as I was winning, nothing else seemed to bother people."

*

Sinjin laughs at that, a little bitterly, maybe. "Winning will cure a world of ills. It's almost unfair, the distortion it causes. Is that some of why you wanted to pursue an activist course? To make things easier for people like you? It must have been hard — most people with mutants don't exhibit them until they hit puberty. You never had that luxury, it seems. Not even a little grace period before it all fell in on you."

*

"The ears, I've always had," Jean-Paul confirms with a nod. "At least, as far as I can recall. But I could not always fly, or any of the rest of it." After a pause, he adds, "But they were still a part of me before I began to ski. I simply never used them while I was working. How boring would that have made competitions?"

With a sigh, Jean-Paul sits up straight again in anticipation of John's inevitable return with tea. "But, your question. Yes. I have seen what it is to live both with privilege and acceptance, and without. I can say with some authority that the former is a much better way to live," he says in a very dry voice. "We should all be so fortunate."

*

"Tell me about skiing. Why? How? It's not a cheap sport and it sounds like you had a hard life. Sport seems out of your reach." Sinjin assembles the tea in the pot and finishes putting the tea tray together. He puts it down on the coffee table, then lights another cigarette while he waits for Jean-Paul to answer.

*

"It is not out of reach if you steal your first pair of skis because it looks like fun," Jean-Paul says with a roguish smile. Once there is tea within reach, what's left of his cigarette is discarded into the ash tray in favor of the beverage. "It was a lark that I kept up for, mmm… a week, maybe two?" He waves a hand. Unimportant. "Until my coach approached me. He saw something, I suppose." He purses his lips and tilts his head slightly. "Wasn't wrong."

*

"You're usually not wrong, is that it?" Sinjin's laugh is tolerant, almost affectionate.

*

And Jean-Paul actually laughs into his tea, sputtering as he reaches up to wipe his chin. He doesn't seem bothered by this. "I meant my coach! My coach was not wrong!" he laughs, setting his cup down long enough to pat himself down for a napkin or something similar. "Merde. No, I am frequently wrong."

*

"That's good to know. It hardly seems fair for you to be that attractive and infallible. I was about to get jealous." Sinjin tosses Jean-Paul a clean handkerchief from some folded laundry in a basket by the chair. He takes his own tea and settles back. "Do you still talk to that coach? Has anyone contacted you since the scandal broke?"

*

"Are you flirting with me?" Jean-Paul asks playfully, practically beaming at Sinjin as he reaches up to catch the handkerchief. Immediately, he goes about dabbing his face and drying his fingers. "Merci. Some have, but I do not want to get them into trouble by naming them," he admits, sounding genuinely apologetic.

*

"No, I'm not." Sinjin's smile is almost melancholy. "I'm just stating the obvious. Flirtation would require exaggeration and intent. I'm glad people have contact you — I don't need anything more than that. What are you going to do now? Do you think much about the future?"

*

"Mmm. Shame." Jean-Paul neatly folds the handkerchief and sets it down on the coffee table, then reclaims his mug. Does he think about the future? "Not if I can help it. No, I haven't the foggiest idea," he admits with a lopsided smile, leaning back in his seat. "Which is exciting, in its own way. We shall just have to see what happens."

*

"You said you didn't use your power when you competing. How do you not use it? Mine needs a trigger. Something to work with. But yours…it seems inherent?" Sinjin hates that he needs a lighter or a match to make his power work.

*

"The same way that you are not dropping your mug," Jean-Paul replies with a warm smile. "Intent. It took a great deal of practice," he admits, and for a split-second, he looks almost embarrassed. Almost. "But I have not accidently put myself though a building in positively weeks, now."

*

"I'm sure New York City thanks you. It's taken enough of a beating lately. That must have been a shock the first time it happened, though," Sinjin says, thinking back to his own manifesting.

*

"It did not feel very good," Jean-Paul confirms, laughing. "The speed was a nightmare to get a handle on. You know, I am still not entirely sure how fast I can go?"

*

"Ever scare yourself? I mean, outside the first time." Sinjin gets up to check on the recorder and the amount of tape they've gone through. He glances over at Jean-Paul, then makes a face as a heavy lock of hair escapes the terrible job he's done pulling it back and falls into his eyes. Graceful. He undoes the rubber band and tries again while he's waiting for an answer.

*

"Oh, frequently," Jean-Paul says without an ounce of self-consciousness, watching Sinjin in much the same way. It doesn't count as flirting if all he does is look, right? He is guiltless. "I know that I can go so fast that I cannot breathe, that was a fun one. I accidentally blinded a friend, once," he adds with a grimace, but also a laugh. "It wore off, but we did not know if it would. It took days."

*

Of course looking isn't flirting. Sinjin accepts the scrutiny with a little smile. "That sounds incredibly inconvenient, especially the not breathing. Not too dangerous, though. Do you think of yourself as dangerous?" He pauses before he pours another cup of tea. "And if you say 'dangerously handsome', I'm throwing you out."

*

Jean-Paul sits up straighter and places a hand to his chest, allowing his jaw to drop in feigned, astonished revulsion. "I would never." Sinjin would not have to throw him out — he'd do it for him. He sniffs and sips his tea. "I used to, when I could not control myself. Now… mmh, not really. Capable of being dangerous, if I have to be," he allows. "As with the rally. But not recklessly so, not without cause."

*

Sinjin laughs at the play-acting. He sprawls back on the couch with his cup of tea. "One more question for now, because I don't want to burn you out. The rally. Did you enjoy that? What you did, you were very good. You knew what you were doing. Not everyone does. But did you like it?"

*

"I don't know that anyone likes getting into a scrap," Jean-Paul murmurs thoughtfully, but he pauses and glances off to the side, his expression flickering slightly. No, Logan does. Okay, one person enjoys it. "I prefer to avoid it when I can. Not that I do not enjoy getting to show off a little bit, mind you." He pauses again, his brow furrowing slightly as he chews on his lip. This one, of all the questions, is the difficult one.

"I like it when it works," Jean-Paul finally decides, sounding resigned. "When I am able to help, and noone is seriously hurt. The rest of the time, I think I would prefer to ski."

*

"Fair enough. That's the afternoon of December third, 1963, at my Albert Chambers apartment in New York City, with the ineffably attractive Jean-Paul Beaubier — part one." Sinjin stretches out one leg, uses his toes to flick the recording device to OFF. "Thank you," he says, quite sincerely. "I look forward to talking to you again, if you're willing." Now, he looks much more relaxed than when Jean-Paul came in, as though someone cut his strings.

*

Jean-Paul is polite enough to wait for Sinjin to turn off the recorder before he replies, and that playfulness is right back on his face as though it had never left. "But of course. I did not offer you part of an interview," he notes reasonably, setting his empty mug down on the table. "But if you continue to compliment me…" he says slowly, squinting across at Sinjin as he brings his thumb and index finger together, nearly touching. "…are you quite certain you are not flirting? Not even a little?"

*

"There's no way to record your image," Sinjin says, gesturing at the machine. "I've very much wanted to use film but haven't yet had the time to arrange it. I thought you'd want that clarified." He is joking, at least a little. His eyes flash with amusement, but then it dims.

"It would be incredibly foolish for me to flirt with you," he points out, then sits up to locate his cigarette, or what remains of it, in an ashtray. Still, he meets Jean-Paul's gaze. "I don't think I have your taste for it. Your character. Whatever it is that separates us. If people hadn't started listening to what I say — whether it amused them or not — perhaps you and I would be more alike. But they did, even though it was never my intention."

*

"Bah. You may take a few photos to print alongside the interview, mere words cannot possibly do me justice," Jean-Paul says with a dismissive wave of his hand and a far too exaggerated waggling of his eyebrows. When Sinjin's expression dims, though, his brow immediately furrows in concern.

Ahhhhh. He hums softly in understanding and, although he's still smiling, it's far gentler now. "Too many eyes upon you for comfort, mm?" Jean-Paul asks, and he doesn't sound the least bit judgmental. "Not everyone thrives under a spotlight."

*

"There are consequences for everything. For whatever it's cost me, I've managed to do some good." Sinjin shrugs one shoulder. "I may think of my self less sometimes for making this choice but it seems foolish to squander that good, don't you think? I don't care about the spotlight or the personal consequences." He tugs the sweater up enough to reveal the ugly gashes across his belly, then pulls it back down with a soft snort of derision.

"But some of the things I've been entrusted with — if no one listened, because I indulged myself? Then I would think nothing of myself at all. I regret not sticking to romance novels." He glances over at the windows — which are all heavily barred behind the translucent curtains. "But it seemed like the right thing to do at the time."

*

"See, that is a place where we are already alike," Jean-Paul says with a small smile, gesturing between the pair of them with one hand. "How many things have I done because they seemed like the right thing to do at the time..? The only difference, I think, is that I am fortunate enough to be fast." Now, his smile goes rather sympathetic. "If I was not, I guarantee, my stomach would look more like yours."

*

"I'm running out of places to put the scars from people who want to kill me," Sinjin says with a short laugh. "I'll be retired by twenty-five if I live that long. I wish I had your skill. I could have run, instead of doing the things I did." He realizes he actually said that out loud and gives himself a shake.

"But. Even if I'm not recording right now, this isn't about me, you didn't come here for that." He sets down his tea cup to get out another cigarette. "I'll get you a list of potential markets so you can tell me where you don't want me to pitch this — then I'll let you know who's thinking of taking it. That's if I survive next week. I have an article coming out Monday. It may go poorly. It's already gone poorly, it may go worse. If it does, it'll make the papers and you'll know not to show up." He winks at Jean-Paul as he gets to his feet to get his notebook. "I'd hate to waste your time."

*

For a moment — a long one for him, certainly — Jean-Paul stays put with a thoughtful crease to his brow, watching Sinjin as he goes to fetch his notebook. But then he smoothly rises to his feet as well with a soft sigh. "Well. If you are concerned about what is going to press tomorrow, you should be able to call for help," he decides, immediately making his way over to John's desk to find himself a pen and scrap of paper. "I do not leave things half-done, so I shall simply have to ensure your safety until we have completed our interview, yes?"

*

"It'd be rude not to accept. I know you can take care of yourself and, if we're being honest, I'm not in a hurry to die." Sinjin comes over to accept the paper once Jean-Paul is finished writing on it. "Less and less all the time. So thank you."

*

Unless otherwise stated, the content of this page is licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 License