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*
Erik hates Charles Xavier. It’s not an active kind of dark loathing that cripples the soul – that kind is firmly reserved for bastards like Shaw. Shaw and Xavier have nothing in common, thank God for small mercies. Xavier might be a lot of things, but he doesn’t get off on humiliating others, especially those weaker in some sense than him, like Erik’s old schoolyard tormentor used to do. It’s not much, but it’s something.
But Xavier still embodies every single trait that Erik quietly despises – he’s arrogant and entitled as only a trust fund kid with not a care in the world could be, he meddles in other people’s affairs under the guise of helping them, his ego weighs more than he does, and, to cap it all, he’s a goddamn idealist and a general do-gooder.
Erik doesn’t hate him, perhaps, but he certainly resents him, can’t stop the viscous crawl of irritation under his skin every time Xavier opens his mouth to sprout some bullshit about world peace or science being the answer to everything.
It’s that unyielding, unrelenting resentment that drives Erik as he slams his hips between Xavier’s legs, splayed obscenely wide, tender skin bruising quickly under Erik’s fingers. Erik has no idea whose room this is and only a vague recollection of how they got here, definitely not the first during this mess of a party, and Jesus, the sheets must be disgusting, and Erik sneers as he holds Xavier down, watching him writhe and pant beneath him. Xavier looks desperate and ruined by pleasure as Erik fucks him hard, with no restraint whatsoever, and who knew that prim proper upper-class pretty boys could sound like this?
“Harder – you – bastard,” Xavier pants through gritted teeth. “That all – you’ve got?”
He’s drunk, Erik thinks even as he rams into the soft body ruthlessly. He’s drunk, they both are, otherwise Erik would have kept his mouth shut when he heard Xavier preach on the importance of research for Medicare. As if the fruit of scientific labor would be automatically handed to those who couldn’t pay for it. As if.
Erik tries to stay away from Xavier most of the time, which should be easy, considering Erik is enrolled in the civil engineering program, and Xavier is studying genetics. But apparently 25 thousand students make for a fucking small campus, and even a hermit like Erik can’t help but stumble over the man several times a week.
Erik tries to stay away for fear of punching the arrogant asshole one of these days.
Apparently, fucking him works, too.
*
Sometime during the hangover haze of the next day, Erik thinks that the whole thing must have been a drunken hallucination. He couldn’t possibly have lost his head so completely as to fuck Charles Xavier of all people. Erik almost feels offended on behalf of his dick, because to add insult to injury, Xavier is a pretty face on top of everything else, and the last thing Erik needs is for any part of him to acknowledge that.
He almost manages to convince himself and even freak out a bit about the unexpected turn of his fantasy life, when he runs into Xavier in his favorite coffeeshop.
Xavier catches his eye and blushes to the roots of his hair. The collar of his shirt is askew, a bright mark visible at the base of his delicate, milky white throat. He turns away quickly and hurries off. His gait has none of its usual liquidity.
Erik closes his eyes.
He’s so very fucked.
*
It will never happen again, Erik swears. It was a drunken one night stand, nothing more.
*
Apparently, Xavier doesn’t know what a ‘one night stand’ means, and that’s completely unfair, considering the majority of the student population lovingly refer to him as the university bicycle, though, personally, Erik refuses to offend a perfectly innocent mechanism that he has every respect for by comparing it with the likes of Xavier.
Who shows at Erik’s workplace with a Tupperware filled with serniki, of all things, that he’s holding in front of himself like a shield, looking around the small metal workshop as though questioning the sanitary conditions and babbling something about getting off on the wrong foot.
Erik stares at him. Xavier babbles some more about God knows what.
Then he makes the mistake of patting Erik’s arm.
Erik hauls him into the claustrophobic cell of a backroom, and the light is lousy but it’s enough to appreciate how good Xavier looks on his knees, his sinfully red mouth forming a perfect ‘O’ as Erik thrusts between his lips.
This is bad. This is really, really bad, because it feels amazing, and Erik could live forever in this precise moment if it wasn’t for the hazy sense of shame.
It’s even worse, because after he spills himself down that tight throat, Erik sinks to his knees and kisses the bruised lips, sucking on them hungrily, and letting Xavier rut against him until he sighs his orgasm into Erik’s mouth as if granting a wish.
Erik leaves him there. He ends up feeding the serniki to the obese shop cat, who shreds Erik’s shoes in gratitude.
Erik hates his life a lot.
*
Erik doesn’t know how they end up supervising the same high school tour. He suspects foul play, and he’s angry, but Xavier looks lost and almost freaked out, and it’s hard to imagine him being the mastermind behind all this when he’s silently broadcasting his dire need for a hug.
Erik buys him a donut from a street vendor, shoving it gruffly into his hands.
Xavier looks at it like he’s never seen one before, and then eats it carefully, and snuggles to Erik a little bit on the sidewalk, because it’s cold, until he evidently catches himself and stalks off, blushing furiously.
Erik really wants to kill himself at this point.
They get into an argument about Operation Paperclip. Erik chooses his words very carefully, which is why the worst he calls Xavier is naïve fool. Xavier calls him a cynic and says that killing those who deserve to die solves nothing since one can’t bring back to life those who didn’t, which is a quote from fucking Tolkien, and Erik wants to strangle the clueless brat.
Little idiot idealists like Xavier are the ones who start wars, not pragmatic people like Erik who end up dealing with the aftermath and getting all the blame.
Erik fumes for the rest of the day, infuriated. Xavier throws concerned looks at him throughout the excursion, completely failing to notice that the school teacher is flirting with him, which makes Erik think that at least half the rumors about him are complete bull. The teacher is hot, and there’s no way Xavier would be ignoring her rather obvious attempts at seduction if he really was everything they call him.
He is ignoring her, though, which makes the entire thing pretty fucking awkward.
Erik doesn’t find any of this satisfactory in the slightest.
It’s dark in the bus, and most kids are sleeping. Erik drifts toward the end of the bus with a sense of tired resignation.
Xavier doesn’t look up as Erik slumps into a seat next to him. This time, though, it’s Xavier who starts it, his ridiculously soft hand worming under Erik’s belt and into his briefs, wrapping around him, certain with familiarity, and Erik’s body shudders in welcome before Erik even knows what’s happening.
There’s nothing to it but to drape his jacket over both their laps and return the favor. They’re tired, and it’s a little frustrating, but also strangely comforting, and Erik is only a tiny bit surprised when he enjoys Xavier’s climax more than his own.
Xavier falls asleep soon after, his head lolling onto Erik’s shoulder.
Erik doesn’t dislodge him.
*
Xavier jogs in the evening. Erik jogs in the morning. The one time their routines overlap, Erik fucks him in the deserted locker room and then again in the showers.
This is like a bad prison movie, Xavier says, and Erik fucks him harder and then pushes two fingers alongside his cock to shut him up.
It works like a charm.
*
They aren’t friends, but they have mutual ones.
Erik takes perverse pleasure in defacing the backseat of Emma’s white Jaguar, but he will think about it later, when he’s not drunk on the sounds Xavier is making as Erik sucks him off while fingering him stupid. The man is ridiculously responsive, and Erik is becoming concerned, because having him like this is a dangerous addiction, and he doesn’t even like Xavier, but he can’t have enough of him, either.
The sounds of the barbecue party drift from the distance as Erik drags Xavier out, pliant as he is now, and bends him over the hood, white on white. It’s probably uncomfortable, but Erik won’t last anyway, not tonight, and, in any case, Xavier isn’t complaining. He actually wriggles his ass at Erik, sweet fucking Jesus. Erik slaps him, and they end up on all fours behind the car, the grass soft and forgiving.
*
There’s the time in the public toilets near the shop where Erik works. There’s the one in the supply closet. The one under the stairs in the science building. At the deep end of the lecture hall at night. In the movie theater.
They still fight in public, but it’s different now. Charles looks like he wants to find common ground and doesn’t understand why Erik is being so stubborn and ignoring his overtures and concessions. He’s not used to not getting his way, and it makes him grumpy.
Erik is… busy figuring out when he started calling Xavier – Charles. Or, for that matter, when he began disagreeing with him for the single reason that the guy looks almost adorable when glaring daggers at Erik.
This is what madness must feel like.
*
And then there’s the time when they don’t fuck.
Erik has long conditioned himself to turn deaf when someone has a go about Jews, but this time someone goes too far, and patience has never been his virtue. Erik’s knuckles are bruised, but the joker’s nose is broken, which is the only thing that keeps Erik going while words like ‘suspension’ and ‘revoke your scholarship’ are thrown around, and at the end of the day Erik is the one who has to apologize.
He turns up at Charles’s dorm, shaking with rage, and kicks his door open.
Charles isn’t alone; there’s a small party of people who may or may not be his study group. The room is filled with pretentious intellectual chatter and laughter. It’s disturbing that Erik knows most of their names.
Erik just stands there as all of them stare at him, the intruder, the stray dog, someone who doesn’t belong as others have already told Erik once today. Erik grits his teeth and holds his ground, even though it’s pointless. It’s all pointless.
Charles takes one look at him and stands up. Erik doesn’t catch his words, but suddenly everyone is clearing out, brushing past Erik in their haste to get out.
Erik steps inside and closes the door. He doesn’t say a word, they’re still stuck in his throat, strangling him. If Charles dares to offer him pity…
Charles doesn’t say anything. He turns his back to Erik and promptly clears his bed of books and notes. Then he strips, unhurried but efficient, folding his clothes, which isn’t something he’s normally in the habit of doing.
Then he stands there, stark naked, just looking at Erik, and something in Erik’s chest eases.
Charles stretches on the bed on top of the comforter, his body a softly glowing lure in the evening light. It’s easy to focus on as Erik starts to talk, halting and groping for words at first, but then Charles would shift ever so slightly, and Erik’s breath would hitch, words flowing freely while he’s being distracted, and Charles is hard, but he doesn’t touch himself, and Erik doesn’t, either.
It’s painful, reassuring, and strangely compelling the way they’re both so vulnerable at that moment, completely defenseless and stripped to the bone, even if Erik keeps all his clothes on, and nobody can make Charles do anything against his will.
They talk through the night, and Erik falls asleep where he sits in the uncomfortable chair, with his head resting against Charles’s desk.
*
In the morning, they go to Erik’s dorm, and Charles helps him pack his things. Erik doesn’t know what strings Charles will have to pull to make it all work, but for the first time ever he doesn’t care.
Charles is still an arrogant, entitled trust fund kid, but the damnedest thing is – he’s also Erik’s more than he is anything else, more than anything he ever could be. He’s Erik’s and Erik is, apparently, very much his. Erik has no idea how or when it happened, but he doesn’t deny it, and doesn’t even want to.
For the first time when he kisses Charles, it’s sweet, gentle, and careful, like Charles is some precious thing that needs to be preserved and protected. Erik would be embarrassed, but Charles is smiling at him, like he knows, like he’d known all along or at the very least suspected, but was too afraid to believe.
Somehow it makes the panic abate.
*
There are less pleasant things to deal with, of course, like Emma sending him the bill for dry cleaning the upholstery of her car, or Charles’s little sister developing an unfortunate teen crush on Erik and cockblocking the hell out of them.
He argues with Charles a lot, but they both listen now, unless Erik is in the mood for some really angry sex. Charles is onboard with that surprisingly often, and then they get dirty looks and a pile of complaints the next morning, but the way Charles looks when he wakes after a night like that is ten times worth it all and more.
Months later, they meet some new people at a faculty event. The introductions go on and on, and then, out of the left field, Charles says, relaxed and casual, like he’s done it a thousand times before, This is my partner, Erik.
Erik blinks and thinks, Oh.
Then he wraps his arm around Charles’s waist and shakes someone’s hand, neither caring for nor noticing the other person.
Charles doesn’t say anything, but the way he molds his body into Erik’s that night means that yes, he probably knows how it felt. Erik kisses him for what seems like hours, and, come hell or high water, this is the rest of their lives now, and when the fuck did that happen?
Charles purrs, curled up against him in their narrow bed, and Erik smiles as he drifts off to sleep.
It feels every bit as right in the morning.