That seemed to be the worst thing Bobby could have said. John shot him a flat look, lips thinning to a hard line, and firmly took his hand back. God, things had been going so well and then Bobby had to act like John didn't know what he was doing.

"The best way to fight a bigot is to educate people, but I can't do that as much as I used because we don't exist any more," he replied acidly. And while his thesis was looking at some aspects of homophobia, it didn't quite ring true to John the way his mutant tutorials had. "Of course I just lashed out,, lashing out is all I've got left. Not that you'd know, you just dumped me in a jail cell or walked out or whatever. I get it. You play fair and you play nice and you don't like trouble. Everyone gets good guy hugs, in your world. But me? Trouble follows me, and I have never accepted the idiocy of my fellow human beings as something I have to tolerate. Between that and the girlfriend from another dimension it was kind of a shit day."

John took a breath and stood, crossing his arms defensively as he paced a little in front of the couch. "I love you, and I thank you for the good intentions, but you don't know what's driven me to be the person I am now. A lot happened to me since Alcatraz. You know almost nothing about it. I'm sure I'd be more reasonable as a person if I had a nice family and nice friends and built houses for charity and just accepted everything."