Aesthetics
St. John isn't hot. Not in the Details/Maxim/ GQ sense.
Of course he's got those flammable mutant powers, but that's not what Bobby's been thinking about. He's been doing some comparing - Jubilee buys a lot of magazines - and Johnny isn't really that attractive in comparison to The American Ideal. Not that anybody is, but Johnny, he's not gorgeous or mind-numbingly beautiful. He's just Johnny.
He's got nice eyes, they're not crossed or anything, and he's got nice skin, no horrid teen acne there, but St. John's nothing special in the looks department. He's not too tall or too muscular. He doesn't have cheekbones like that guy on the WB. Johnny certainly wouldn't do well on a reality show, like 'Are You Hot?'
He's just not that impressive to look at.
But when Bobby walks in on Johnny shaving in his pajama bottoms, he has to reconsider. Maybe there's more to Johnny than Bobby's giving him credit for.
Johnny doesn't sleep well. He tosses and turns a lot, and it's only when Bobby slips into bed beside him that the sheets stop rustling. It's been this way for years, and there's absolutely no reason for Bobby to think of it as anything more than it is: one friend comforting another.
However.
Bobby doesn't comfort Johnny every night, and it's not every night that the light from the moon is strong enough to illuminate the entire room. It's certainly not every night that Bobby is close enough to notice how long St. John's eyelashes are or how innocent he appears when his face isn't wrapped in a smirk or a grin. There are little worry lines marching across St. John's forehead, and a little scar on his jaw that Bobby has never noticed before.
St. John sleeps with his lips slightly parted, and Bobby got over how warm Johnny's breath felt on his chest a long time ago. It was the only way the kill his infuriatingly persistent erection, which never seemed to want to wait until the morning.
Johnny's appeal has nothing to do with his mouth.
Everybody notices Johnny's mouth.
Johnny's lighter signals his approach, his departure, his location. Bobby used to have a safety blanket like that, but his mother said no one would want a boy who had buckteeth because he'd sucked his thumb after his tenth birthday.
Click Fwoosh. Click Fwoosh. Click. *Slam.*
The slam is generally someone else getting fed up and leaving whatever room St. John happens to be occupying, but Bobby doesn't mind. He's grown accustomed to the lighter's presence, or to what it represents.
Sometimes he finds himself watching Johnny play with his lighter: the thick fingers rubbing the slick surface, sliding it along a lined palm, slipping it into fitted jean pockets only to extract it seconds later.
St. John's hands are never still, and Bobby's not really sure how much of that has to do with his lighter. If it's not the Zippo then it's pencils and balled up paper and rubber bands. Johnny likes to fidget with his clothing, too, and he worries his bottom lip with his teeth.
Johnny seems to have tons of excess energy. Sometimes when Bobby's really close he thinks he can see Johnny vibrating. He never stops moving.
Except when he's sleeping. When he's with Bobby.
Bobby is completely besotted with St. John, and it's not about the lighter or the mouth.
Or it's not just about those things. It's about more. A lot more.
Bobby attraction is about the look Johnny gives him before walking away, or the way he can convince Bobby to skip classes before he's even gotten out of bed in the morning. St. John's appeal is in his voice and his actions and every tilt of his head.
He isn't the smartest one in their class or even the most mysterious. He's not the funniest, even though he'd like to think he is, and the more Bobby looks it's quite clear to him that St. John will never attract the girls and boys the way Piotr and Marie do.
But Johnny has attitude and self-confidence. He's got the smirks and the cockiness and the sarcastic mouth, which are all a facade for the things he's trying to hide.
Johnny's not perfect.
And that's his appeal -- he isn't like the bronzed men and cover girls. He's real.
To Bobby, it doesn't get much better than that.