Xaviers!

Melissa occasionally finds it helpful to sit among the student body and get impressions of how things were going. She started doing it while she was a school counselor. Of course here, she reeks of "professor" and no one buys her blind act, so the read is more difficult. So she contents herself with a decent cup of tea from the coffee bar, sitting at one of the bistro tables and people 'watching'.

((Open))

Shari comes out of the Arcade, counting a handful of change as she wanders over to the coffee bar. Hedging for a moment she orders the biggest cup available and proceeds to dump a whole bunch of sugar packages into it. Once she's finished with her concoction she puts the lid back and on uses the little plastic-stir thingie as a straw to sip on it as she zig-zags back through the tables towards the Arcade. Spotting Melissa and her blindfold and cane she slows down a tad to make a bunch of honestly pretty impressive grimaces at her, assuming she can't see her.

"My mother always told me my face would stick like that if I didn't stop making faces," Melissa says with a self-satisfied smile.

For a moment Shari looks mortified, but she manages to recover quickly. "Mine did." she says while making her face freeze into the latest grimace that no regular person would manage to retain while also talking. And taking a sip of coffee from her 'straw'.

"How awful for you," Melissa says, "It's Shari, right?"

"How the..." her face rubberbands back into it's normal configuration. "How'd you know that?"

"I believe I had tea with you in Maldon, though you looked different at the time. I imagine you've been so busy meeting people here though that you've forgotten."

"Oh crap!" she laughs. "Yeah, it's me. Still impressive though... Most people can't tell."

"You have a unique mental presence. It takes a lot of training to hide that."

"That sounds like a lot of effort to fool, like, a handful of people out of billions." she chuckles.

"There are some who want that kind of training I would wager. I would also wager they're usually up to no good."

"So you're reading my mind right now?" she asks, taking a slurp of sugar-coffee and thinking real hard about a dancing bunny.

"Not really. I try not to read people's minds unless they ask me to." She sips at her tea, "Adjusting well to university?"

"It'd be great if it wasn't for the classes."

"Spoken like a true student. You fit right in," she teases.

"For reals?" she asks, apparently taking Melissa's joke at at face value.

"Most students have a class or two they don't like but which is somehow necessary. And there are a few who just don't like any of the classes."

"Huh..." she says, because she doesn't really feel like telling a Professor that she's questioning why anybody would do this on their own then. Especially since she suspects it's because of the access to all the cool stuff it provides with the learning aspect just being a necessary evil. "What class do you teach?"

"Quite a few of the psychology classes. I'm trying to get up to speed enough that I can teach the Mutant Psychology class. I also pull duty as a counselor for the university when it's necessary."

"Like, what, you go into peoples' heads and figure out their shit for them?" Shari doesn't seem to have a good grasp of what a counselor is to begin with, much less how a telepathic one would work.

"If it's necessary, I can do that. More often it starts like any therapist. I talk through their problems with them and give them a safe place to express things that are bothering them. Then I work with them to figure out how best to help them. That could involve my telepathy, but only when they're okay with it."

"What about stuff like... people who forgot things? Big chunks, I mean, not just where they left their wallet or whatever." she asks maybe a bit too off-handedly.

"That would likely be a situation where telepathy could help, even if only to figure out whether the memories are there or not."

"Hmm, cool, cool. Thanks, Melissa! I should get going. Space Invaders need shooting at." she jerks a thumb towards the arcade as she takes a big sip of coffee from her straw. "Good talking to ya though!"

"Enjoy defending the Earth from the invaders. And if you ever decide you want help with your memories, you let me know. I would be happy to help."

"Haha, yeah, good one!" she jokes over her shoulder as she heads off. As nice as Melissa seems, she's still very much The Authority from Shari's point of view and thus she's not exactly happy with the idea of letting her into her head. Especially since her being here is still kind of a sham.

Melissa actually turns to watch her go, a totally unnecessary gesture of course, but occasionally she does these things. She sighs and goes back to her tea, making a mental note to look into this when she has some time.