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“For the last time Erik, I’m fine,” Charles growls.
For a man with a fever of 101 who can’t seem to stop coughing for longer than sixty seconds, it’s quite a task, but he still manages to pull off furious, striped pajamas and all. He’s so pale his lips have lost their color, gone from their crimson glory to a soft pink, and a fine sheen of sweat has broken out all across his gooseflesh. Raven had flinched under the receiving end of that glare only minutes before. She took his temp and ordered him to the hospital. He said no, so caring sister got the only the person she knew who could put up with a bed-ridden, stubborn telepath.
And that person is making the brass bedposts shake.
“Alright. If you’re fine, then I suppose you won’t mind getting out of bed and leading Beast and Havoc through the obstacle course in thirty minutes.”
“Not a problem,” the telepath says, throwing off the covers with a cringe. He sways as he sits up, and when he tries to place his bare feet on the hardwood floor his body simple isn’t having any of it. The moment he puts any weight on his limbs they simply fall out from under him. Erik’s arm beneath his shoulders is the only thing that saves him from a rough meet and greet with the maple floor.
Even in this state, the feeling of Charles Xavier under his touch is intoxicating. Erik grits his teeth and tries to think of anything but. The fact that he has kept his feelings from the telepath for this long is a remarkable fucking feat in and of itself. One that the student body finds to be the funniest thing in their screwed up lives.
“Clearly,” Erik sneers. The metalbender steers him back to bed, and pulls a bottle of vile looking cough syrup from his trouser pocket. The sight of this makes Professor Xavier suddenly transform into a five year old, wide eyes accompanied by a look of disgust and disbelief.
“No.”
“Charles, you’re sick.”
“I am not taking that. It’s fucking awful and tastes like rubbing alcohol and slow gin. I am not that sick.”
“And I am not leaving this room till you take it,” he smirks, snaking the brass bed posts around his limbs to pin him into place, “and neither are you.” The door slammed shut just to make the damn point. Charles cringed when he heard the tumblers of the lock click firmly into place.
Erik’s first thought is to tackle the problem by force, which is of no shock to the telepath lying before him. Violence is always his answer first and foremost for every problem in life. But somehow Charles is the only person he hasn’t frightened off, yet. And for once, Erik finds himself not wanting to scare him away, he wants the exact opposite of scaring him away. And so Erik Lehnsherr takes a deep breath, counts slowly to ten, and sit down on the edge of the expensive bed as he reaches zehn.
“Charles,” and fuck if the telepath didn’t love the way the german rolled those damn ‘r’s, “you need to take care of yourself.” Erik can think of only one way to get him to take the damn medicine, to reason with him. And only one thing could possibly make him reasonable. “Your students need you.” Erik’s stare seems to pin him in place, like a fucking predator waiting to make its move, patient and deadly, levitating a spoon as he pours the filth that might as well be poison.
Charles should find this all very endearing. And he does. A little. In the little place in his mind that somehow finds all of the ludicrous things this madman does as adorable as kittens cuddling. But at this current moment in time Charles Xavier does not have the patience for Erik’s shit. Because there is another goddamn reason Charles should take care of himself. It is the reason that has had Charles Francis I Don’t Take No For An Answer Xavier hovering over Erik I Think Feelings Are Weak And Useless Lehnsherr for the past month. And despite what his students may think, Charles is not a saint. His patience does in fact have a limit, and illness only brings him to it faster.
“Is that the only reason, Erik?” and god damnit Charles wishes he could roll his ‘r’s or go to the gym or something remotely sexy. He’s the bloke who quotes lectures on evolution to pick up dates for fuck’s sake.
Erik does this thing, where he almost smiles, just for a second. Maybe he’s just feeling it with his mind, but there’s something there. Amusement, and it makes him almost smile back, except for the fact that the asshole has him tied down to a bed and is determined to force feed him awful medical grade cough syrup that tastes like rotten fruit. “Of course not. There are your studies of course, and I’m sure Raven will miss you.”
By miss you Erik of course means she will beat them both with a blunt instrument if Charles doesn’t grow the fuck up and take his goddamn medicine. Charles knows this, he’s the only person in the house who even gets when the german is being sarcastic. He can’t blame the kids, only his telepathy allows him to pick up on it. Charles short laugh quickly turns into a barking cough that seems to last for minutes, and Erik isn’t almost-smiling anymore.
“That’s not what I meant Erik.”
His lips are pressed into a thin line, and all Charles can feel is the man’s frustration. He’s too out of it from his damn head cold to feel the underlying concern.
“It doesn’t matter.”
Charles pushes himself upright, ignoring the feeling of the world spinning around him without the support of the pillows. As if sitting with his back straight will somehow make Erik take him more seriously. As if he isn’t taking him seriously already.
“Yes, it does. It matters to me, Erik.”
The fever is spiking again. Erik notices, Charles doesn’t. Erik notices because he can feel a peculiar sensation that he has never felt before, but he recognizes it for what it is in an instant—Charles’ shields beginning to fall. He knows because it is the reason Raven screamed at him to be exactly where he is now. It feels like a lovers touch, and then its frustration, and then its Erik’s name. A radio frequency pushing at him to be heard, mostly static, with channels changing so frequently that it is almost impossible to hear any of it clearly.
But some of them play in an endless loop, coming back to be heard over and over again. Erik’s suddenly very focused on the gaping collar of Charles pajama shirt, and he realizes that it has been several minutes since either of them have spoken. But Charles doesn’t mind. When he looks into those omnipotent blue eyes there isn’t any frustration. There is only wonder, and Erik Lehnsherr can’t tell if that’s heat, or if he’s simply imagining it.
You aren’t imagining anything, my friend.
“If there’s anyone whose seeing things that aren’t, it’s me.”
Erik’s confused expression is one of the few that is obvious, brow furrowed in frustration beneath the short brown hair he keeps pushing his hands through. He opens his mouth to tell the telepath to stay the hell out of his head, and thinks better of it, thin lips snapping shut before a single sound can come out. It’s a pointless demand to make, he can’t control himself when he’s like this.
“Charles,” he says instead, trying to keep calm and not get upset, “I didn’t say anything.”
The young professor’s pallor goes from ghastly to scarlet, and it has nothing to do with the fever.
“Erik, I didn’t mean—”
Erik’s hand stops him in his tracks, fingers barely ghosting over those lips. Even sickly, they’re unbelievably soft, and Erik is sure that kissing them is not at all the type of healing Raven sent him in here to do. Then again, knowing that teenage girl, he could be wrong.
“It’s fine Charles,” which it isn’t, at all. But pathological lying is what emotionally crippled Erik’s do best. “It’s not your fault. You’re not well. That’s why you need to take this damn medicine.” The german is giving him his best ‘do as I say’ glare, hovering the spoonful of translucent brown gloop ever closer.
And just as the confused Erik is gone, so is the shy Charles.
“No! I am an adult Erik, and if I don’t want to take that awful sludge, I don’t have to! That is my decision to make. Not yours, not Raven’s, mine!”
“It’s a damn foolish decision is what! It was my decision to leave, but you coerced me into staying. And why was that Charles?”
“Because it was what you needed! And it still is!”
“Because I needed you! And I still do!”
Charles’ fury is a funny thing when he’s so pissed off, trying not to cough, and oh by the way Erik has wanted you the whole damn time. He’d kiss him, but he can barely stop coughing long enough to take a single breath and bugger it all it wasn’t supposed to happen like this. They were supposed to have dinner alone while the kids were in bed and watching a movie. And Charles would order something delicious because Erik knows he can’t cook to save his life and Erik would tell him he could cook better and Charles would challenge him to prove it. There would be delicious desert followed by sexual activities involving said desert and they would live happily ever after. The fucking end.
It was not supposed to happen while Charles is delirious with a fever and oh god he has to stop coughing because Erik looks so concerned he might cry, and if Erik Lehnsherr sheds a single tear over Charles’ well-being the telepath will spill everything and it will not be pretty or flirty or neat at all.
Finally, it stops, Charles gasping for breath and forcing his body to just breathe. His mouth is gaping, he doesn’t know this, but Erik’s been watching the whole damn time as he inches closer. And oh God, Charles thinks, he’s going to kiss me.
Erik doesn’t kiss him.
He forces the spoon into his mouth, and uses his free hands to clamp the man’s mouth shut.
“Swallow. Now”
And Charles does. Erik can feel it as the younger man’s throat bobs up and down with the effort. He coughs as he does, but Erik’s grip is firm, keeping his mouth firmly closed until he’s sure he’s gotten it all down. He lets go of Charles entirely, hands easing gently off of him as the bed posts loosen their grip and go back to being simply brass décor, and not tools for metal bondage. Though perhaps, Erik thinks, they could try that again later. Sometime when Charles isn’t feverish, and can be bedridden for a different reason entirely.
The thought makes the man smile even while Charles screams that he’s a son of a bitch, and damn him for ever being born.
Erik just smiles like the fucking shark whose won, and he swoops in to take his prize, taking Charles firmly in hand again and kissing him like he’s fighting for his life. His hands tangle in the absolute mess of brown curls. Even in his anger and shock and oh God it’s still Erik—it doesn’t take long for Charles to forget the cough syrup entirely and kiss the asshole back like it’s the last time he’ll get to do so. Eventually it’s not so much kissing as two men trying to devour each other, and Erik has to pull back so Charles can breathe.
“You asshole,” he hacks, “Why didn’t you say something!?”
Erik blinks.
“Would you have taken it if I asked?”
Charles gapes.
“I’m not talking about the damn cough syrup!”
Oh.
“I…I thought you knew. We live together for Christ’s sake, and you’ve been inside my mind. You told me that night you knew everything.”
“Of your past, Erik, I would never pry into your private thoughts. Not ever.”
“Not even if I asked?”
The medicine’s working now, because Charles right eyebrow is quirking into his hairline, as it often does when he’s intrigued by anything, especially Erik related. And this isn’t just anything; this is Erik’s heart and soul, locked away in the deepest caverns of a scarred and wounded mind.
“Are you asking, Erik?”
Erik doesn’t garner a reply. Not out loud. He simply stops pushing Charles away, ceases denying the gentle caress on the edge of his thoughts that is begging to be invited in. He greets it kindly like a welcome houseguest, and even though it’s painful, he nods.
When Charles enters a mind, it isn’t always a secret. If he can he will try for discretion, but not now. Erik can feel him everywhere, in every thought, every touch. Sex will never come close to this. Fucking will never be as close, as pure as this. Erik Lehnsherr has no idea why he denied this for so long, but he swears to whatever power that exists above he never will again. Then he realizes they could fuck like this and suddenly he needs Charles to have a speedy recovery like never before.
Somewhere in the physical world, he can hear Charles laughter.
All things in good time, my friend.
But Charles isn’t laughing anymore. Because he’s found the thing he was looking for, and the term friend is no longer acceptable. Because Erik doesn’t see him as a friend, the word doesn’t even begin to convey the depth and gravity of what Erik Lehnsherr feels for Charles Xavier.
To Erik, Charles is his savior. Through Charles he has learned laughter and companionship, been shown kindness and understanding. Of course Erik needs Charles, without him he would be only the hollow, vengeance fueled thing that Charles pulled from the cold waters of the Pacific. Erik needs Charles just like a fish needs water, it’s a fact the metalbender thought to be plainly obvious, which it plainly is not. Not if Charles wide eyes and brighter lips in a perfect ‘o’ are anything to go by.
Erik, how long?
From the moment you begged me to stay.
I did not beg!
Practically. If you had crawled on your knees, I might not have been able to restrain yourself.
I’ll be sure to remember that.
But as much as Erik is comforted, he’s terrified. Charles is looking at the deepest parts of him, and the man still has no idea how the telepath felt in return.
Not until Charles shows it to him.
How he’s been practically throwing himself at Erik for the past month, how hilariously awkward Charles can be when it comes to flirting, and how Erik has been completely fucking oblivious to every last second of it. From the way Erik cooks breakfast to the way the man takes his martinis. Charles has even begun to memorize his chess strategy. There’s the deeper stuff too, the things Erik even vaguely notices. The way Erik pushes Sean to stop being afraid, to the fact that Raven accepts her blue form as beautiful, and it’s all thanks to this man, and that makes him a pretty damn good man in the Charles’ eyes.
Halfway through a memory of the two of them running, it begins to cut out, like a television with a poor antenna. Erik comes back to his physical self to see Charles, sweat gone, fever, burned out, looking like he could fall asleep in the lab, something the members of the Xavier Academy have deemed impossible, on threat of the world coming to an end.
“Charles,” Erik speaks, and his name grabs his attention from the edge of unconscious.
“You make the letter 'r' sound deliciously sexy, did you know that?” Charles mumbles, speech slurring. Erik is dimly recalling Raven mentioning that the medicine should knock him out for a few hours, necessary rest. Necessary, Erik reminded himself.
“I did not,” he smiles, standing up from his seat on the edge of the bed to tuck Charles in. The last thing Erik wants to do is leave his side. But Charles thinks Erik is a good man, and though the metalbender has never once made an effort to live up to anyone’s expectations in his life, he wants to be that man. That means letting Charles sleep, and taking care of the kids in his absence.
“Erik, where are you going?”
“You are going to sleep,” he smiles, leaning over to take the glass bottle of what Charles is currently calling liquid evil for depriving him of time with Erik. The telepaths cold hand on his neck keeps him from moving away this time.
“Kiss me goodnight?”
He does. And the hunger isn’t there now, the lust that drives them has abated to something greater, something more. Neither of them is willing to analyze it, put it under a microscope and call it what it is, what neither man has the courage to say, but Erik feels it in Charles kiss. A gentle moving of lips, pulling him in for a brief hug. Erik can’t hold on for too long. If he doesn’t back away, he’ll never make it back to Raven.
And so he does, with another rare smile, and a kiss on Charles still too-warm forehead, smoothing down the mess of his bedhead. He pulls the covers up to his ears and leans down to whisper there.
“Don’t worry libeling, I won’t be far. Call for me the moment you’re awake, and I’ll be right here.”
Charles simply nods, so Erik turns to leave. He’s not surprised when Charles calls his name the moment he reaches the door.
“Erik?”
“Yes Charles?”
“You’re still an asshole.”
Erik laughs.
“But you’re my asshole.”
Erik laughs harder, grinning from ear to ear, beautiful and terrifying in its brilliance.
“I think I can live with that.”