It earns him a snort and a sidelong glance, but Charles doesn’t look annoyed. “Some new clothes,” he says, “which I must admit were sorely needed by now, and a haircut, courtesy of Raven. You do understand that the idea is generally to pick things out yourself?”
It’s the most content Erik’s been in months. Warm and with a full stomach, drink in hand in his own kitchen - and Charles, poking gentle fun at him, elbow propped on the table and pen marks on his face where he must have forgotten it was in his hand.
“I’d have sent you something suitably Brazilian, but I didn’t know what you’d like. And explaining it to Azazel would have been an interesting exercise.” Erik reaches out to tug at a lock of Charles’ hair where it lies against his forehead. “Perhaps next time I should cut your hair, if you prefer a straight line.”
Charles laughs, eyes crinkling up at the corners, and leans a little into the touch before reaching for their emptied plates. His hands are brisk and efficient when he stacks them with the cutlery on top, standing to take them over to the sink. “For a girl so obsessed with appearances, she makes a terrible stylist.”
“She’s not really a girl any more, Charles,” Erik says, and picks up the abandoned textbook, eyes roaming over the highlighted passages and finding them incomprehensible, full of words he understands and meanings he doesn’t. “Leave the dishes, you cooked. What’s this?” He slides a finger into the open page and turns the book over to read the title, Principles of Human Genetics.
“I don’t mind,” Charles says, but he leaves them in the dry sink anyway and comes to look at the textbook, taking it carefully from Erik’s hands as though it is a treasure. “I teach from this. Well. Taught.” His eyes are sad as he reopens it to the page he had left it on, runs a thumb across the last section of highlighted text. “I don’t suppose I still have a position any more after such a long absence. And I was on tenure track, too.”
“That’s good?”
“That’s a very good thing. It would have meant a permanent position, eventually. Assuming I didn’t get caught shagging a student or knifing someone.”
Erik smiles. “Were they hard habits to break?”
“What - oh, no, of course not,” Charles says, and closes the book, lays it back down on the table face down, like an ostrich with its head buried in the sand.
It reminds him, painfully, that while he is content with the way things are, it does not mean Charles is.
Trying to decide whether to ask another question leaves Erik unusually torn, because on the one hand he wants to know everything about Charles, every tiny scrap of information or opinion or history, but on the other he doesn’t want Charles to start thinking about his life outside and make things difficult between them again. He hesitates, but before he can make up his mind the point is made moot by Charles saying, “Enough of that, what did you do today?”
And Erik finds himself recounting his various conversations back to Charles over a sink full of washing up, his hands immersed in the soapy water and Charles laughing helplessly at the story about Azazel and the KKK, leaning against Erik’s shoulder wiping away tears from the corners of his eyes with his free hand and a tea towel clasped in the other.
XVI
He doesn’t tell Charles about the spies Emma has sent into the human resistance, or that Raven was until recently one of them; nor does he tell Charles about the quiet teams they are putting together to deal with the problem discreetly should it get more centralised, more organised. It would only upset him.
XVII
Besides, Charles has left him before on moral grounds, and just because he hadn’t gone through with it last time doesn’t mean he wouldn’t.
FILL: Everyday Love in Stockholm 121/?
It’s the most content Erik’s been in months. Warm and with a full stomach, drink in hand in his own kitchen - and Charles, poking gentle fun at him, elbow propped on the table and pen marks on his face where he must have forgotten it was in his hand.
“I’d have sent you something suitably Brazilian, but I didn’t know what you’d like. And explaining it to Azazel would have been an interesting exercise.” Erik reaches out to tug at a lock of Charles’ hair where it lies against his forehead. “Perhaps next time I should cut your hair, if you prefer a straight line.”
Charles laughs, eyes crinkling up at the corners, and leans a little into the touch before reaching for their emptied plates. His hands are brisk and efficient when he stacks them with the cutlery on top, standing to take them over to the sink. “For a girl so obsessed with appearances, she makes a terrible stylist.”
“She’s not really a girl any more, Charles,” Erik says, and picks up the abandoned textbook, eyes roaming over the highlighted passages and finding them incomprehensible, full of words he understands and meanings he doesn’t. “Leave the dishes, you cooked. What’s this?” He slides a finger into the open page and turns the book over to read the title, Principles of Human Genetics.
“I don’t mind,” Charles says, but he leaves them in the dry sink anyway and comes to look at the textbook, taking it carefully from Erik’s hands as though it is a treasure. “I teach from this. Well. Taught.” His eyes are sad as he reopens it to the page he had left it on, runs a thumb across the last section of highlighted text. “I don’t suppose I still have a position any more after such a long absence. And I was on tenure track, too.”
“That’s good?”
“That’s a very good thing. It would have meant a permanent position, eventually. Assuming I didn’t get caught shagging a student or knifing someone.”
Erik smiles. “Were they hard habits to break?”
“What - oh, no, of course not,” Charles says, and closes the book, lays it back down on the table face down, like an ostrich with its head buried in the sand.
It reminds him, painfully, that while he is content with the way things are, it does not mean Charles is.
Trying to decide whether to ask another question leaves Erik unusually torn, because on the one hand he wants to know everything about Charles, every tiny scrap of information or opinion or history, but on the other he doesn’t want Charles to start thinking about his life outside and make things difficult between them again. He hesitates, but before he can make up his mind the point is made moot by Charles saying, “Enough of that, what did you do today?”
And Erik finds himself recounting his various conversations back to Charles over a sink full of washing up, his hands immersed in the soapy water and Charles laughing helplessly at the story about Azazel and the KKK, leaning against Erik’s shoulder wiping away tears from the corners of his eyes with his free hand and a tea towel clasped in the other.
He doesn’t tell Charles about the spies Emma has sent into the human resistance, or that Raven was until recently one of them; nor does he tell Charles about the quiet teams they are putting together to deal with the problem discreetly should it get more centralised, more organised. It would only upset him.
Besides, Charles has left him before on moral grounds, and just because he hadn’t gone through with it last time doesn’t mean he wouldn’t.