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Charles was truly beginning to wish that he could read minds. It likely would have become annoying at some point, but right now the need to know what Erik would think of Charles' bisexuality - and if, hope against hope, Erik might share Charles' orientation - was overwhelming. He knew the chances were slim; he hated to fall back on stereotypes, but Erik just didn't seem the type. He was a man who was comfortable with cooking and shopping and braiding his littlest sister's hair, but that seemed to fall into this entire gestalt of Erik's life that demanded he serve double duty as father and brother to his siblings. No, if anything Erik felt like a certain type of stereotypical straight guy, confident, a bit rough, yet compellingly attractive. It wasn't his fault if Erik's charisma knew no gender boundaries when it came to attracting attention.
More than anything, it was Erik's easy way that he managed to see Charles as a person, and never treat him like something less than, but also didn't look through the chair and take for granted that there was nothing different. Charles only needed to ask once, and sometimes not even once. Erik seemed to be constantly trying to think ahead and anticipate. He wasn't used to it, at least not from someone new. From Tony he'd long since gotten used to the easy way his friend understood the silent rules he'd put together over the last half-dozen years; Tony was there when Charles had been learning how to re-navigate the world for the first time, every little life motion had Tony somewhere in it, but Erik... Erik seemed to have made this proactive decision to jump into Charles' world and learn all of the rules.
If he hadn't been cute, personable, and incredibly well built, Charles might have become smitten with him just for that.
Tony carefully picked up Charles' ankle and stretched his leg, knee pressed close to Charles' chest. It would have been hilariously sexual if not for the fact that it was just a sadly necessary part of staving off future injury. "Charles, are you thinking of another man while I have you like this?" Tony teased with him.
"Maybe..." He sighed and grabbed his knee, hugging it close to his chest while Tony helped stretch the various ligaments, hands pressed against his thigh to check that the muscles were stretched, but not too far.
"I see how it is. You've grown bored of me; we're an old married couple now, you need an affair, a little excitement."
Charles snorted, but then realized with a bit of horror that Tony's sarcasm was hiding a bone deep insecurity that perhaps what Tony had said was true, that Erik was threatening to replace Tony's place in Charles' heart. "Hey..." He pressed his fingers into Tony's hands and looked Tony in the eyes. "I need you, Tony. You're... the only person who's always been there for me."
Not his father, not his mother, certainly not his step father, no one else in the world was there for him the way Tony was. He didn't like to think of it as a desperate need, but Tony had been his friend for years, and had filled in so many places in his life that he couldn't imagine finding anyone to replace him.
"You're all I have," Tony said, softly, and Charles knew Tony meant it even if it wasn't true at all. Maybe he was the only family Tony had left, but he certainly wasn't all Tony had.
"I know." He put out his hand and Tony helped him up, Charles slid his arms around Tony and the two of them hugged like that, on the floor, Tony's fingers pressed against the back of his neck and Charles' hands clinging to Tony's back. "It's a bit premature to be worrying that Erik and I will work out, you know. No matter how he ends up fitting, he's not going to replace you."
Tony nodded, but there was enough anxiety there that Charles knew the doubt wasn't so easy to put aside. Charles settled back down onto the ground and Tony grabbed his other leg, stretching it.
"I could skip out on exercise, today," Charles offered, "We could go get dinner, just the two of us. I'll steal your french fries and we'll talk about girls."
"Nah, you have an exercise date. I'd hate to rob you of the opportunity to see Mr. Lehnsherr hot and sweaty just for you."
In spite of himself, Charles blushed. He couldn't deny there was something very appealing to seeing Erik, hot and panting, with sweat running down his spine or stomach, drawing his eyes down. It made Charles think of certain physical impossibilities, the two of them rutting up against each other in the shower stall, Charles' legs wrapped around Erik's waist, Erik's fingers digging into Charles' hips and pinning him close, or even the less physical impossibility of Erik sliding behind him on one of the weight machines, his body pressed tight against Charles' back while long fingers sprawled across his stomach and tugged them even closer.
Never had Charles been so glad it was nearly impossible for him to get a hard on from thoughts alone.
He came back to the present to find Tony stretching his ankle back and forth, eyes rolling. "Little pervert," Tony said, all fondness.
The two of them devolved into a fit of giggles while Charles hugged both of his knees to his chest and Tony sat in front of him, fingers brushing against unfeeling ankles. This was easy - he had no idea how Tony thought that anyone could replace this. They stayed like that for a little while, Tony awkwardly looking down at Charles' knees, probably trying to put together words.
Before he collected himself, though, the door pressed open and Erik walked in, staring at the two of them for a moment before blushing bright scarlet and turning around, as though he'd seen something horribly embarrassing. Charles looked down... he supposed it did look a bit acrobatically sexy at a brief glance.
"I'll... come back..." Erik started to back away.
"Erik, get back here you dolt!" Charles called. "We're just stretching."
He watched Erik's eyes go over the scene again, probably taking in their completely clothed state and a decided lack of - sexy - groaning. Tony helped him get his legs back down and got him sitting up again and Charles started to work his way back up into his chair. When he was settled again, Tony patted his knee slightly before getting up onto his feet. "Dinner tomorrow, maybe," Tony said before heading out of Charles' room, eyes watching Erik carefully.
"Sorry..." Erik said, sitting down on Charles' bed and looking over to where Charles was sitting. He turned enough to look Erik in the eyes. "It just was... a little..."
Charles arched his eyebrow, unwilling to let Erik get away with not finishing that sentence.
"Intimate."
"Tony and I have long since gotten passed the point where that sort of thing is embarrassing." Charles shrugged and wheeled over to where his gym bag was, and then pulled it onto his lap. "You sort of have to be. We're all of us bundles of embarrassing functions, some of us more than others. I think we don't even realize how intimate it seems from the outside."
Erik was looking particularly thoughtful as they headed out of Charles' room and into the hallway. "You don't... have to spare me the details, you know, if you don't want to."
"It's just trivia, nothing important." He ached to not pretend that, though. Charles had to admit he was reluctant to open up to Erik the full scope of his injuries, and all of the consequences, all at once for fear of making this lovely, lovely man run the other way and decide that friendship, much less something more, was completely not worth it.
"When were the twins born?"
"May 27th," Charles answered instantly. "They'll be eleven next year."
"So why am I not expected to know about your embarrassing looking stretching routine?"
Charles looked away. "If you want to join me for my embarrassing looking stretching routine, you're welcome to, Erik." God he was blushing like an idiot right now, and he was glad that Erik didn't seem to be trying to meet him in the eyes.
"Maybe I will," Erik finally answered. "Why do you... Why do you stretch your legs if they don't work?"
"Well, to keep range of motion, keep my legs as toned as possible under the circumstances, helps with bone density to prevent breaks... and helps prevent muscle spasms." Charles shrugged. "I work the arms and abs so I can move around, but the rest is just to make sure I don't have all those lovely health issues that are made worse or harder to combat because of the chair."
"I had no idea. I guess I just figured you wouldn't need to." Erik flushed again. "Sorry."
"No, that's quite alright. If you're interested I could send you some websites. It's very boring, to be honest."
"I'd like to," Erik said, no hesitation. Charles felt terrified for reasons he couldn't even put into words.
"Would you mind us hitting the track today, Erik? It's lovely out and I'm in danger of relying on the electric chair too much, I'm afraid." The electric chair was an absolute necessity for navigating some of the campus areas, especially the sloping sidewalks, but Charles had to admit he'd been spending less time wheeling around campus under his own power.
"Just a walk?" Erik asked.
"I'd like to think I could at least force you into a jog!"
Erik grinned at him as they headed into the University Center. "Sure. I don't know how to get down to the field in a chair, though."
"There's a ramp, just go ahead and get changed and we'll head out." He wheeled into the locker room after Erik, dropping off his things into one of the lockers and closing it up.
Erik stripped out of his street clothes, completely unconcerned with his nakedness. Of course, if Charles looked like that he wouldn't be concerned with running around naked either. It would be a feature! He tried to surreptitiously take in the view; long, lean legs, tight butt, slim waist, and broad shoulders were all on display, and Charles enjoyed the forbidden nature of the display. God, he was such an idiot. He wheeled himself around so he wouldn't be tempted to stare - to give Erik his privacy - but Tony wasn't wrong that his and Erik's little 'exercise dates' had a few perks for Charles.
The two of them headed out to the track and Charles started to stretch his arms, behind his back, over his head, just stretching to make certain he was ready for the exercise. Erik took his cue from Charles and started to bend and move as well. Charles felt his brain get a bit fuzzy, but he managed to focus back on the task at hand after a few moments.
"Is this good exercise?"
"Tony always thought so. Back when we were kids we'd do wheelchair races. I'd even let him cheat and use the racing chair and I still kicked his ass." Charles laughed at the memory. "You should try it sometime!"
"I will!"
Charles stretched his back one final time before he wheeled out onto the track proper. There was no football practice, and no one else on the track, so they had the field to themselves. A few students were sitting in the bleachers, but really, the best attended football game in recent CMU memory was the one where the athletics department had handed out floppy disks to all attendants - back when floppy disks were the height of external storage - so it wasn't like there was a big demand for the field.
"I can set the pace, if you'd like," Charles offered. "I'll be keeping more to the outside, so you can run more to the inside. First quarter mile will just be warm up, let me know if you need to slow down."
Erik grinned back at him, all teeth. "You too."
He started out easy on himself, getting used to the more powerful motions to get the chair going faster, Erik jogging along to his side. After their first circuit, Charles started to push harder, and Erik continued to run along side him, he knew Erik was a fairly good runner, so he didn't feel bad pushing him. Three miles later, however, when Charles wheeled them to a stop, Erik took a long, shuddering breath before he sat on the hard-spongy surface of the track, elbows resting on his knees.
"Shit."
Charles chuckled and rolled up to park just next to Erik, looking out over the track. "You didn't think I'd go easy on you, did you, my friend?"
"You make me feel out of shape!"
He reached out, hesitant, and pressed a hand to Erik's shoulder, only to have the man all but collapse against the side of the wheelchair, head resting against a wheel and the arm rest. Charles shivered from the cool fall air against the sweat on his neck, his back, and down his chest, but he felt particularly warm for completely different reasons. Charles gently pressed a thumb into the tense line at Erik's neck and he heard the man groan under him, pure pleasure. It was a very nice noise. Erik stretched out his legs after that, hamstrings and calves, leaning forward and running his hand down the muscles there.
"Are you going to make me go inside and get on a machine now?" He asked, almost a whine.
"Only if you would like, Erik. You've only used half your body! Come on."
Erik groaned at him again, helping himself up to his feet and stretching more. Charles stretched his arms over his head again, and across his chest, letting his shoulder unwind a bit. He felt more than a little beat as well, but it was amusing to see Erik looking similarly winded. "We should go running more, clearly, get ourselves back into shape."
The two of them slowly wheeled back into the UC, and Erik took one look at the stairs up to the weight room before he fell in beside Charles as he went to the elevator. Erik punched the button and they waited, his cool grey-green eyes lazily fixed on Charles.
"You're very... fit, Charles."
That just wasn't fair. Why was Erik allowed to say things like that while he was looking all sweaty and delicious? "Well... I try." He nervously ran his tongue along his lower lip, trying to think of something that didn't sound ridiculous. "You too. It's... lovely to have someone to work out with more frequently. I love Tony dearly but he's never really taken to it."
Erik twitched slightly as he walked into the elevator, and Charles considered what he'd said... love. Perhaps Erik wasn't particularly thrilled with the turn of phrase. The idea settled like a lead weight in his stomach. He considered qualifying, saying it was brotherly love, but he couldn't do that, he wasn't going to pretend to be something he wasn't just to make Erik comfortable, as hard as it would be to possibly lose him as a friend for it. He found himself wishing he had a girlfriend.
"Well, I'm happy to be here for you." It was a weird, sort of hollow thing the way Erik said it. "I mean, you two are obviously close, and it's good to have someone you... um..."
Charles frowned, trying to figure out what the hell Erik was trying to say.
"Love."
He took a deep, sort of tangled up breath, apparently they were going to have this conversation here, in the elevator, with no way for Charles to get out and it was not a comfortable experience. It was actually a bit worrisome. "Tony and I aren't together," he ventured, because that was completely true.
"Oh." Erik exhaled a deep, relieved sort of breath that made Charles ache because it was all based on this horrible sort of lie. "Then you aren't... gay?"
The elevator door opened and Charles felt his heart racing. Erik wasn't in his way, he could make a break for it. "No. I'm bi." And then he was sprinting out the door and into the more populated parts of the upper level because he could deal with that, he was here, out in the open, and there were enough people around that Charles felt mostly safe.
Erik caught up with him a moment later, he just felt in beside Charles easily, face still contemplative. Charles waited for him to say something. "That's fine, you know," Erik said. "I mean, obviously you know. I just meant I don't mind."
Oh thank god. Charles let out the breath he'd been holding and slowly wheeled closer to the gym.
"Are you seeing someone?"
He debated a few answers... he wanted Erik to think he was safe, non-threatening. "Not at the moment, maybe soon, there's this girl in my Psych class..." Ok there were a few girls in his psychology class, but none that Charles found particularly interesting. There wasn't anything wrong with them, he was just a bit hung up at the moment, and he didn't want Erik to notice, god he didn't want Erik to notice. "So I might ask her out soon."
"Why are you even taking a psych class?" Erik asked, as though the psychology class had personally offended him by Charles taking it.
"Just... expanding my knowledge. I like it." He took a deep breath, going for broke. "And there's cute girls there. More than the engineering classes, anyway."
"Yeah." Erik headed into the gym and held open the door for Charles while he wheeled in. "Do you need help setting up on anything?"
"Pull downs, I guess."
After that the two of them awkwardly circled around each other. Erik seemed like he didn't know how to relate to Charles anymore, but he hadn't fled, just seemed to be processing, taking it in. Charles was immediately regretting the distance. He tried to look at the positive, Erik hadn't freaked out or tried to hurt him, Erik had said he was alright with it, Erik hadn't left, and Erik had asked him a bit about his personal life. Maybe his mythical fake potential girlfriend could ease the temporary friction, let Erik see his straighter side and ease into the rest.
Still, that brilliant little hope in the back of his mind where Erik would respond to him coming out by saying: 'Me too! Let's go out for dinner and make out on the Cut!' hadn't come to pass. That had been a fool's hope anyway.
He glanced over to where Erik was on the leg press, and the other man caught his eye. Erik smiled - shy but very genuine - and Charles felt quite a bit better after that. He could do this. If he got to keep Erik as a friend he could most certainly manage. He returned Erik's smile, just an embarrassed sort of quirk of his lips, but now Erik was grinning at him.
It was alright. Really. Everything was going to be fine.