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ring in the witching hour
spells that I'm singing
rain come and drown me out
sinking deep below
It’s a week before Halloween. Erik’s never celebrated the holiday, before. This year, he’s apparently being forced to commemorate it with an argument.
Charles likes Halloween. Charles likes everything, even when he shouldn’t. Charles is perfectly happy to let the children babble about costumes and whether they can go out in public, for one night, with or without them, a discussion brought on by Raven wondering out loud whether anyone would notice if she did the grocery shopping in her normal blue-hued state. Charles had suggested that if she tried it, she ought to do so this week, when no one would care; Erik had stared at him, wondered how anyone who could hear another person’s thoughts can be so tactless, and then indignantly stalked Charles back to his study, where they’re now glaring at each other over a disaster of half-written papers and open books and partially-consumed mugs of tea.
The window is open, and the sky looms over them, the color of slate; the wind taps on the glass, making skittering little skeletal sounds, like spider’s legs scurrying along the glass. It’s not much warmer inside, even though Charles has turned on all the lamps. They make small pools of amber light around the room; not enough.
“—and I think they’re young, and they just see it as an excuse to relax. To be themselves.”
“Exactly. You’re telling them that they can only be themselves one night of the year. The night on which other people wear masks.”
“I’m not—”
“Costumes cease to be fun when you have to wear them every day, Charles.”
“Would it make you happy if I told them not to celebrate Halloween? Have you talked to them lately? They’re excited, Erik, they’re enjoying themselves—do you want me to tell them not to have fun?”
“I want you to tell them that they don’t need to pretend to be monsters to be happy.”
“You do realize that people can want to be things that are not monsters.”
Charles does know how to use words as weapons, even when he hasn’t meant to. Or maybe he has; Erik can’t tell. He doesn’t flinch, though. Just finds his own. “Don’t change the subject. You’re more comfortable being hidden, aren’t you? Staying indoors, except for the night on which we’ll all be hidden, anyway. You’re ashamed of us, Charles. You want us to be normal.”
“I—No. I don’t. Honestly, I think you’re overreacting—”
“And you’re deliberately being obtuse. You do know what I’m trying to say.” He wants to grab Charles and shake him, to provoke him, to say or do the right thing to make him lose all that optimistic naïveté, all that bright-eyed hopefulness about the world, that vision that Erik knows isn’t true and shouldn’t find attractive, shouldn’t want, shouldn’t need.
Maybe he should kiss Charles, right now. In the gilded antique space of the study, in front of all the disapproving ancestral furniture. Should reach out and use that helpful metal belt buckle—Charles really should be more careful, choosing his clothing—to hold Charles in place, and then claim those luxurious lips as his, the way he’s been imagining, his beyond any doubt, unyielding and dark and possessive and not gentle or bright, not at all. Maybe then Charles would learn.
Charles, obviously, is still clinging to his morality, keeping his virtuous word and not eavesdropping, because he clearly hasn’t heard any of those thoughts. And Erik shouldn’t find that attractive, either; he knows better than to believe in anyone’s promises. But Charles makes him want to. And now he’s exasperated with himself, for admitting that fact.
And Charles has continued, naturally, trying to argue with him. “Yes, I do know what you’re trying to say, but I’m sorry, I still think you’re wrong!”
At which the chrome-plated pen on top of all the scattered papers decisively snaps itself in two, out of sheer emotional frustration.
“Erik,” Charles says, “I was using that.”
“Not anymore,” Erik retorts, and leaves the study before he can lose the last vestiges of his control and start damaging any more irreplaceable occupants of the room.
The Halloween preparations go on, of course, inexorably, without his involvement. Raven and Hank cover the front of the mansion with fake spiderwebs and glowing lights in shades of purple and orange, and the interior design appears to have been taken over by a decorator with frightening affection for skulls and crossbones. Erik returns from a morning run, through swirling drifts of leaves, to discover jack-o’-lanterns grinning at him from the doorstep, and thinks, briefly, about turning around and running away again.
He doesn’t, though. He jogs up the stairs, instead, and takes refuge in his shower, hot water and steam conspiring with him to block out the sounds of “The Monster Mash” being played, torturously, downstairs. If he showers, and goes back downstairs, maybe Charles will be there, and they can have a conversation about whether Erik using his powers to subtly unscrew all the purple-hued lightbulbs around the mansion counts as training.
Strangely, though, despite all the flurry of excitement among the children, Charles doesn’t seem to be encouraging the festivities. He’s certainly not unhappy, and he says yes to anything they ask, even when Hank wants to use the kitchen for experiments with liquid nitrogen and smoke effects. But he doesn’t offer suggestions, or jump into the center of the plans, laughing with pleasure.
And that’s not right. Erik knows Charles, or is beginning to; he knows that Charles thinks Halloween is fun, and harmless, and exciting. They’ve just had that argument. And if one of them is going to be reluctant and unexcited about the night, that someone should be Erik, not Charles.
The world feels unbalanced, unfamiliar, and he doesn’t like it at all.
Charles smiles at him, quietly, wordlessly, every time they see each other. There might be a message there, but Erik doesn’t know what it is. He’s not used to anyone smiling at him, and meaning it, in any case, and much less when there are hidden layers to decipher.
The morning of Halloween, the day dawns bright and crisp and cold and windy, swooping breezes that race around the mansion walls and yelp ominously at random intervals. They’re not having a complicated party—too isolated for trick-or-treaters, a custom that Erik’s horrified by anyway—and the CIA has issued dire warnings about attention-drawing activities, but there is radioactively green punch with fake floating eyeballs, and also candy, and plans for watching thematically appropriate horror films late into the night.
Charles smiles at him again, over breakfast, but still doesn’t say anything, in their heads or out loud.
Maybe Charles just hasn’t wanted to talk to him, since their argument. Or maybe Charles is waiting for Erik to be the first one to talk. But he’s not convinced he’s wrong, or that Charles is right, and he doesn’t know what to say. So he doesn’t say anything, and Charles goes back to gazing at and not eating his eggs.
At which point a distraction appears, in the form of Raven, who wanders up holding a shoebox and grinning wickedly. “Guess what I found?”
“No,” Charles says. “You are not showing him those.”
“Showing me what?” Erik asks, because now he very much wants to know.
“I did notice you haven’t done anything about a costume this year, Charles,” Raven says, to her brother, “and I thought you just needed some inspiration, what about…”
“I do not,” Charles mutters, into his tea, “need inspiration from you.”
“Then I’ll just share all the best pictures with Erik. I’m sure he’ll appreciate them.”
“You are a horrible human being,” Charles says, presumably to Raven and not the tea. “Please don’t.”
Raven looks at Erik, who says, immediately, “Please do.”
“I,” Charles says, “am leaving,” and does so, promptly.
Raven holds out the shoebox, gleefully. And Erik takes it, because he can’t resist. He probably ought to, but he’s never claimed to be a good person, and he’s not about to start trying now, when embarrassing pictures of Charles are his reward.
“They’re mostly from Oxford. Charles always knew where the best parties were, of course. Not just on Halloween, but I thought the Halloween ones would be appropriate. My favorite is this one,” Raven says helpfully. Erik stares. And then stares some more.
“He’s being a faun, I think. Specifically, Mr Tumnus. From the book?”
“The…book?” Charles is shirtless, except for a red scarf. And has what seem to be goat legs. And is laughing. Erik is mesmerized, not really against his will. He has no fucking clue what a Mr Tumnus is, but Charles is shirtless and laughing and Erik wants to find that red scarf and use it in new and inventive ways, all night, until Charles is exhausted and happy and laughing like that again, with him.
“C.S. Lewis?” Raven tries. “The Lion, The Witch, And The Wardrobe? No? Charles used to love that book.”
“I…see.”
“I like this one, too.” This one proves to be Charles in some sort of old-fashioned suit, like a character out of a Jane Austen novel, not that Erik will ever admit to having read any Jane Austen, not even under torture. Nor does he have any kind of hidden fondness for Mr Darcy.
Charles looks fantastic, he has to admit. All that hair is tumbling into his eyes, making him look Romantic with the capital letter, like Byron or Shelley, and the elegant lines of the suit fit that graceful form in a way that Erik, used to seeing Charles in stuffy academic cardigans or training attire, has never even thought to imagine. He’s imagining it now.
Of course, the effect is rather spoiled by the enormous fuchsia-hued drink in Charles’s left hand, but then, Erik figures, no one’s perfect. And the incongruity is somehow endearing; whatever Charles does, he commits to entirely. Whether it’s a university party or the chance to save the world, Charles will meet it with wholehearted enthusiasm.
“He had friends in the theatre department. Of course, he had friends everywhere. But that’s how he always ended up with the best costumes; he’d just smile at people, and they’d let him walk out with anything he liked. Oh, hey! I forgot about this one.”
Erik forgets how to talk, at that one. Literally. Speechless. Charles in black leather, dressed like an assassin, possibly one undercover as a prostitute, from the way everything clings to each curve. Staring at the camera, obviously trying to look serious and epically tortured and dangerous, and, somewhat to Erik’s surprise, succeeding.
It’s the eyes, he thinks distantly. Of course they sparkle like ocean waves in sunshine, or not like ocean waves because Erik has seen the ocean in sunshine and the water just can’t compare, and those eyes laugh all the time, even if not out loud, but the sparkle is, he thinks now, partly deflection, and the laughter is a defense. And of course Charles is putting on a dramatic expression, a pose, for the camera, but Erik knows falsehood when he sees it, and the intensity isn’t fake, here.
Of course Charles would use his own secrets as a disguise. And no one would ever believe it.
“I don’t remember what he was trying to be, that year. Then again, I’m not sure he remembers, either. It was an impressive party. There was a lot of vodka. I think.”
Raven’s still talking. He’s not listening. The eyes are watching him. They’re captivating, and he doesn’t want to look away.
Annoyed at his own weakness, he flips through the shoebox of scattered photos. Some petulant and irritable part of him wants to shuffle them around and ruin whatever order Raven’s gotten them into, just because he can. But he doesn’t, because he does like Raven—even when she’s showing him those damn pictures of Charles, photos that prompt persistent thoughts about black leather and pale skin and glowing freckles to circle uninvited through his mind—and also because, fundamentally, he just likes things to be tidy. He’s always liked neatness. Order. Precise plans that he can carry out, step by step. Like the lines on a chessboard.
Charles isn’t tidy. He eats candied pineapple with his bare fingers and licks them afterwards, and his hair leaps up merrily in every direction in the wind, and he leaves books and papers like a trail of breadcrumbs, a progression through whichever rooms of the mansion he’s been in that day, and Erik can always find him, following that familiar academic whirlwind, every time.
Always.
He works his way down to the very bottom of Raven’s collection, and stops.
This one is much older than the others, slightly faded, a little tattered around the edges, a ragged memory. It’s Charles and Raven, together, very young, and smiling, standing in front of a backdrop that Erik doesn’t recognize. They’re both dressed as cats, apparently, or sort of, because Raven’s not so much wearing her costume as inhabiting it, much more convincingly so than Charles, who has evidently drawn crooked whiskers on his own face and acquired a handmade pair of fuzzy black kitten ears.
“What—”
“Oh,” Raven says, looking guilty. “I probably shouldn’t—he won’t want me to show you that one.”
“What? Why not?”
Raven, in the photograph, is grinning, obviously gleeful; Charles isn’t, quite, having looked up just in time for the flash, all unruly hair and wide eyes that look too old for that youthful face. Raven studies her younger self, for a minute, and sighs, a sound that might be amusement, or something else; regret, perhaps, or wistfulness. Erik’s not good enough with interpreting emotions—interpreting those emotions, at least—to know for sure.
“How much has he told you? About growing up here?”
“He…hasn’t.” And suddenly that statement feels like an admission of failure. He’s never asked. He could’ve asked. But he hasn’t.
None of them have. They’ve all moved in and taken over Charles’s home, his life, Charles himself, who offered all of those things so freely. No one’s ever asked why Charles Xavier wants so badly to save the world, or why, when Charles knows everything worth knowing about all of them, he’s never felt close enough, or safe enough, with any of them, to share anything about his past in return.
All at once Erik wants to know. Wants to go find Charles, somewhere, in the maze of antique rooms and heirloom furnishings, and ask him something. Anything. Whatever words might fill the silence of the things that Charles doesn’t say, that they’ve all been taking for granted.
“Oh.” Raven glances from the picture to Erik’s face, and bites her lip. “I thought he might—I mean, he talks to you. But…” She hesitates. Eyes his expression again, and he doesn’t know what she’s seeing there, but she comes to some sort of decision, and goes on.
“This was the first year after I got here. And the only year we ever went—you know his stepfather wasn’t—Charles wasn’t supposed to leave the mansion. They were afraid of—he was young, you know? And sometimes he had a hard time controlling what he could do; he’d say things he shouldn’t, or know things he wasn’t supposed to know—anyway, he wasn’t allowed to go anywhere. So he’d never really done Halloween before, but he knew how it was supposed to go, you know Charles and books…”
“Yes…”
“So he’d always enjoyed the idea, I think, of getting to be someone else, for a night. And then I was there, and I’d never done Halloween, either, and then some community youth group was having a party, and they dropped off flyers, and of course they got thrown in the trash, but…”
“He thought you should both go.” Of course. He can imagine that as clearly as if he’d been there. Charles, all endless blue eyes and eagerness, gazing at new experiences with optimism, wanting everyone to enjoy all that life had to offer, always.
“And we did. And it was fantastic; we snuck out of the house, ate all the chocolate in the world, got sick, lost those stupid cat ears in a bush on the way back here...I think it was the best night we’d ever had.”
“But?” He’d heard her voice change, on those last few words. The wind, outside, howls eerily again, with what has to be the most vicious sense of narrative timing in the universe.
“But…well, if he’d thought about it, he probably could have kept anyone from noticing that we were gone. But he was having fun. So he forgot. And…” She hesitates, again. “The thing about Charles is…he made them forget that I was there too. So I could hide. And he never let them find me. Even when I heard—look, he really won’t want me to tell you. Not if he hasn’t. Can we just say there were consequences, and they didn’t happen to me, and you’re going to pretend I didn’t say any of this?”
And Erik wants, violently, to disagree. Wants to snap, of course we cannot just say that, consequences might mean any number of things, what happened to Charles, was he all right, IS he all right? The flare of unaccustomed protectiveness hits him like a thunderclap, and leaves him just as shaken, and dizzy, and blinking in its wake, and he can’t say anything at all, which Raven apparently takes as consent.
“All right, then. You didn’t hear any of that from me. I have to go help Hank with the decorations, we wanted blacklights for around the television, and sorry about that, I know you won’t—”
“I can help.” Was that his voice? Sounded like it. Apparently his brain has been busily making decisions without him. But he’s not going to argue with it, because he’s starting to come up with a plan. And he’s good at plans. Usually.
“You can?”
“If you can help me. With something. It’s important.” It is.
“Okay…”
“I think I perhaps need a…do you have suggestions for…what do people usually…”
“Oh, my god, are you asking me for Halloween costume ideas?”
“You are not allowed to mention this to anyone!” It’s probably a futile attempt to sound threatening, at this point, but he has to try. Raven’s eyes have gone all wide and she looks hugely entertained and Erik is already regretting this decision, but he’s said it out loud, now. He’s going to go through with it.
He’s done worse things, in his life. A little humiliation won’t hurt him. And it might make Charles talk to him again. Charles, who loves possibilities and obviously adores Halloween and costumes and make-believe, who does believe, in the world, in imagination, in fun, despite quite clearly knowing more about the monsters in the dark than Erik’s ever dreamed he could.
“Okay,” Raven says, “okay, wow, um, okay. Is there anything you had in mind? Or—”
“I…really don’t know.”
“Hmm.” She puts her head on one side, the same way Charles does when he’s thinking. Siblings, Erik thinks, even if not by blood. He’s never had anyone who would care about him, that way, who would protect his secrets.
Except Charles has. Charles knows all his secrets, has spun his long-forgotten memories back up into the light like strands of gold, and has never betrayed Erik’s momentary tears to a soul.
It crosses his mind to wonder, then, about the last time Charles cried. Not out of emotional empathy for another person, not on someone else’s behalf, but for his own sake. Has it been years? Decades, even? He doesn’t know. And that lack of knowledge creeps into his chest and sits there poking pointy claws into his heart, slyly, through all the rusted barricades. The holes feel surprisingly painful.
“I think we should go look in the attic,” Raven says, decisively. “Or your closet.”
“Didn’t you need help with the…some sort of lighting?”
“This is more important. Besides, Hank doesn’t really need me for that. I just wanted to—never mind. Come on, we should get started!”
And Erik takes a deep breath, and mentally crosses his fingers that they’ll find something quickly, that it won’t be too appalling, that he can tolerate all of Raven’s truly alarming enthusiasm for this project. That Charles will understand what he means, everything he means, when he turns up dressed as whatever Raven settles on. Charles is good at understanding. Most of the time.
Several hours later, standing in the middle of his room, surrounded by clothing, he’s starting to rethink his plan. Nothing seems…right. Raven has vetoed anything simple, such as wearing all his normal all-black clothing and pretending to be a vampire, on the grounds that he can’t use anything too cliché. Charles likes elaborate costumes, after all, as evidenced by the photographs, and it is, as Raven points out, Erik’s first costume ever.
“It’s your Halloween devirginization! It should be memorable!”
“Isn’t anything, by that logic, going to be memorable?”
“More memorable than usual!”
“I can’t just carry assorted weaponry and claim to be James Bond?”
“No!”
“But—”
“Not that Charles might not appreciate that one, but no.”
“Please?” Also, Charles might appreciate that? Erik files that idea away for future reference. Does Charles like dangerous and charming men? If so, he can probably manage the dangerous, if not the charming. He’s not sure how to be charming. He can, however, make a decent martini. He’ll happily make martinis for Charles, if Charles would like that.
He pictures those tantalizing lips on the rim of a martini glass. Closing around an olive. Being licked by a pink tongue, after. Abruptly it’s very warm in his room, despite the intermittently grumbling icy wind outside.
“No.”
“Then I am out of ideas.”
Raven sighs. “You know what I think? I think we need help.” At which, as if on cue, there’s a knock at the door.
“Guys? Hank wants to know if Raven has a preference for the first movie of the night. Dracula, or Frankenstein?”
“You can come in,” Raven says, “and also Dracula. Much more creepy.”
Angel pokes her head in the door, and Erik wants to protest, because since when has his room turned into a gathering place for uninvited guests, but they could probably use the help, and it’s a measure of how desperate he is that he doesn’t kick her out.
“So…” Angel glances around. “Costume ideas? Seriously?”
“Seriously,” Raven mutters. “Any good ones?”
And Angel starts to grin. “Oh, yeah.”
A very dramatic few hours later, Erik finds himself standing outside the living room, around a corner festooned with glow-in-the-dark skeletons, and wondering when he’d gone completely insane, in the past day or so. Insanity must’ve happened; he can’t think of any other good explanation for what he’s currently wearing.
Angel had looked at him, critically, and said, “Not quite right, wait here a second,” and had run upstairs, a moment ago, and he’d almost panicked and fled to the safety of his own room, but he couldn’t. He’s doing this for Charles.
Who apparently has a very detailed mental image of Erik in feminine clothing, one that he’s shared with Angel, of all people. Fascinating, that. No wonder Charles had blushed and changed the subject, when Erik’d asked him about that encounter, after.
He doesn’t mind, exactly. He can’t say he’s excited about the outfit—for one thing, the wig is a bit itchy, and the artificial hair keeps falling into his face—but it’ll be worth it. It has to be.
He hovers there, hearing the children talk at each other, carefree and young and unworried, except maybe about their costumes. They seem to be having an enjoyable night, so far.
“Are those prosthetic feet? What are you supposed to be, a sasquatch?”
“No! I’m Hank!”
“Not cool, Alex.”
“I thought it was awesome. Anyway, Sean’s wearing a bedsheet.”
“I forgot, okay? So I’m a ghost.”
“A ghost covered in pink flowers?”
“Ghosts can like roses,” Sean mutters defensively from under his sheet, and Hank says meditatively, “Actually, the mythological bean sidhe were most usually female; I assumed you were attempting a modernized interpretation of your code name,” and Sean stares at him for a minute and says, “Yeah, okay, I’m that.”
“So what’s Hank, then? A mouse with pointy ears?”
Hank, a little shyly but determined, says, “I’m Batman,” and Raven looks at him, grins, and promptly shimmers all over and comes out looking like Catwoman, complete with skintight and gleaming suit, too-tall boots, and whip. Hank now looks like he wants to faint; Raven says, brightly, “Help me with the punch, Batman?” and takes his arm and starts to tow him off toward the kitchen.
And Erik, lurking on the other side of the doorway and gazing around the corner and listening, thinks that, perhaps, this is what Charles had meant, about costumes and Halloween. That this is what family, maybe, or happiness, might sound like. Pink flowers and all.
He hasn’t heard Charles speak up yet, which is odd; but then, Charles has been strangely absent, all day. He’s been here, of course; at lunch, and after, walking over to the lab with Hank, neither of them in costume but both of them chattering away, Charles carving animated shapes out of the chilly autumn air with those expressive hands. But he hasn’t seen Charles since then. And hasn’t really spoken to him in what suddenly feels like far too long.
While he’s still processing that realization, along with the increased rate of his own heartbeat at the thought, Angel has reappeared. She says, “They were boots, not heels, I knew we forgot something, here,” and pushes him into new footwear, last-minute. The boots are too small, but at least they’re easier to walk in.
“Ready?”
“Define the term ready, again…”
But she’s already taken a step forward, tugging him through the doorway and into view, and is saying, “Guys? Anything we can help with, before the movie?” and all the heads turn in their direction, and it’s abruptly too late for him to run away or have second thoughts or sink through the aged wood of the mansion floor.
Absolute silence. No words. Not from anyone.
After an eternity, from Alex: “Holy fuck…”
And then more silence.
Sean ventures, carefully, “Is that…?”
Erik sighs. “Yes, it is still me. I can assure you of that. I can also think of at least three ways to strangle you with this wig, if you would like me to prove it to you.”
At which Sean whispers to Alex, “Okay, yeah, definitely still him…” And Alex whispers back, “Somehow it’s even more frightening in fishnets,” and Erik finds himself wanting to laugh, for no real reason. Because he’s standing there wearing the stupid stockings and the glittering dress and the damnable wig and the world hasn’t imploded. Because the stares, and the theatricality, are, actually, kind of fun. Because he is, as Sean has put it, still himself, and the costume is a costume, after all.
But he can’t just admit that, so easily, to all those curious eyes, so he doesn’t laugh, though it’s difficult. Just glances around the room, and registers a very specific, very important, Charles-shaped absence.
“Have you seen…”
“Charles?” Raven reappears, Hank firmly attached to one arm; she looks Erik up and down, smirks, mutters, under her breath, something that sounds like, “perfect,” and then adds, “He’s in his study. He said he needed to get some work done, but he was planning to come down for the movie.”
“Thank you.”
“You should go get him. He’d appreciate it.” She’s grinning; it’s worrying.
“I was planning on it,” Erik says, with as much dignity as he can manage, even though he now wants to ask several questions, very emphatically. She’d said Charles would appreciate it. The pronoun is indefinite: does it mean the simple summons downstairs? The outfit? Erik in the outfit? Erik being the one to go request Charles’s presence? Might Charles appreciate him?
He wants Charles to appreciate him. He wants to see Charles smile, because of him. But that wasn’t the pronoun in question.
English is a terrible language, he decides, not for the first time. And then makes his escape, in the direction of the stairs.
As it turns out, he doesn’t have enough time to figure out what he wants to say to Charles, after all. He picks his way past the glow-in-the-dark skeleton decorations, out of the hallway and in the direction of the lengthy front staircase, aging wood sprawling heavily upwards in the darkness of the evening, gleaming with fake cobwebs and plastic spiders because Raven has been busy here as well. The wind, determined to make its presence known too, rattles the solid front door on antique hinges, and Erik takes a few steps upwards and then realizes that Charles is already there, heading down.
They meet in the middle of the staircase and stop and Charles stares at him, incredulously. “…Erik?”
“Yes?”
“Erik.”
“Yes.” At least Charles doesn’t seem to have a roadmap for this conversation, either. So the undiscovered territory isn’t only one-sided.
“You…”
“Angel suggested it. You have a diabolical sense of humor, Charles. Also, you aren’t wearing…that’s this morning’s sweater. Why are you still wearing this morning’s sweater?”
“I like this sweater…and at the time I was trying to get her to relax and not think of us as intimidating…why did you…you don’t even like Halloween…”
A gust of wind screeches into the gap between words, from outside, and makes them both jump; Charles says, after a second, “There must be a window open. Somewhere. Maybe I should—”
“It’s atmospheric. You’re not—why are you not dressing up, again?”
“Oh…I just didn’t…It’s probably best if I don’t. I’m supposed to be the voice of authority, after all.”
“Charles, they’ve probably all seen most of Raven’s photo collection by now.” Also, that’s a lie, or at least not the whole truth. Charles is surprisingly good at evasive maneuvers, but no match for the years Erik has spent learning to hunt down the world.
Charles winces. “Yes, well…maybe we can all have a laugh and then pretend I’ve grown out of that?”
“You told me that Halloween should be fun.” Charles?
“And you seem to have embraced that idea.” Erik? In their heads, Charles sounds hesitant, as if he’s not sure that Erik truly meant for him to hear the invitation.
You can come in. “I thought you’d appreciate the attempt.”
Erik, I—thank you. “Mmm…I do apologize for the fishnet stockings. I’m not sure they suit you.”
Charles, why aren’t you in costume? “Not for the dress? Because I’m not convinced that electric blue sequins are really me, Charles.”
I thought—well, it was because of you, to be honest. “And—”
“Because of me?”
“I did think about what you said. About masks. And hiding. And you were right. I was being obtuse. The night, whatever night it is, shouldn’t matter. We shouldn’t only embrace who we are on Halloween, when it doesn’t matter; we should be proud when it does. I’m sorry I haven’t been seeing that.” Which is why the lack of costume, to answer your question. I’m just…being me.
The wind murmurs, around the edges of the door, in the pause. Picks up little drifts of leaves, and tosses them against the windows, and then carelessly lets them slide to the ground. Charles glances at the fallen heaps, faded red and gold whispers of the ending of the year, and then back at Erik, and doesn’t move.
“Well,” Charles says, out loud, as if he needs something to fill in the autumnal spaces, and one bone-dry branch, nudged by the wind, taps on the windowpane like encouraging fingertips, attempting to help them with all the quiet.
Charles touches people all the time, Erik thinks. A hand on a shoulder, an encouraging squeeze, an arm around anyone who needs one. He, Erik, doesn’t touch people; or when he does, it’s because he’s about to inflict some sort of pain upon them.
Charles, standing one step up from him on the staircase, is almost, but still not quite, his own height. The wind shrieks, around the weathered corners of the mansion, outside, and the old bones of the house creak in response.
Halloween, Erik thinks. It is a night when ghosts come out, after all.
Very carefully, he puts out a hand. Rests it on one shoulder, where today’s defensive woolen barricade happily caresses his fingertips in response. Charles looks up at him, surprised. Erik?
You were right, also. You should—if costumes and imagination and possibilities make you happy, if they make the children happy—then you shouldn’t have to hide that, either. No one should ever be afraid to be happy, Charles. Out loud, he says, “I’m sorry, too,” and watches Charles smile, slowly, in the shadowy space of the staircase, neither of them taking a step, not up or down.
“You don’t need to apologize. You weren’t wrong. Or if you were, so was I. And I think the fishnets and the wig have probably made up for it, don’t you?”
“For that. Maybe. But you…” He wants to say something else, then. The children shouldn’t be afraid to be happy, of course. What he wants to add is: And neither should you. But he doesn’t have the right to say that. Charles hasn’t let him in.
That’s a new feeling, too: this is information that he wants to know, that he needs to know, that’s somehow absolutely vital to his continued existence, but he can’t force it out with any of his well-honed skills, can’t coerce or intimidate it into the open. He can’t do any of that, and he doesn’t know how to try anything else, and he doesn’t know, for the first time in the sharp-edged clarity of his life so far, what to do.
But he can’t help the flicker of an image, tiny Charles in fluffy kitten ears and those hand-drawn whiskers, across his thoughts.
Ah. Charles looks away. But doesn’t move away, at least, and Erik’s hand is still resting on his shoulder. It’s warm there. I didn’t realize she’d show you that. Not that it matters, of course; it was a long time ago.
“She said that you weren’t allowed to leave—that there were consequences.” What happened?
“I wasn’t, and there were.” Nothing that hadn’t happened before. Or again, later, after. Well…no, actually, that’s not entirely true. I think that was probably the first time I…broke my arm.
YOU broke your arm?!
“The lights—!”
“Sorry!” He stares at Charles for a minute, trying to keep everything, the lamps, the door handles, his heart, from shaking with anger. Charles, you—
Sorry! Sorry, it’s just habit, that phrasing, I didn’t mean it to sound that way—
That’s worse!
It was ages ago!
“Still not helping!” The FIRST time, you said! Charles swallows, at that, and doesn’t answer. You—why didn’t you say anything, ever, when we came here, you could have said—you could have told me. It hurts, almost physically, to think that Charles didn’t. That Charles didn’t want him, Erik, to know.
“Oh—no, that’s not why! It’s not—listen, Erik, it isn’t anything like that, I promise!” It’s not you. If I’d told anyone it would’ve been you.
“You—”
“I do trust you, you know.” I just didn’t think—it’s not important, not compared to what others—well, you, for example, or Alex, in prison for most of his life—have had to go through. And if this place can be a—a sanctuary, somehow, for the children, for us—I can be all right, with that, with being here. If it can do some good. I AM all right; it’s been years. Honestly.
I’m sorry.
You don’t have to—
“Charles,” Erik says, out loud, into the night. The wind chooses that moment to fall silent, and the word echoes in the stillness. You said if you’d told anyone, it would have been me. Did you mean that?
Yes.
Then please tell me. I want to know. And if I can—He’s not sure how to say those words. He’s never said them before. And they’re the most important words of his life. You try to help everyone. You rescued me. And then you saved me. And I want—I would like to help you. This time. If I can. If you want that.
Erik…Charles reaches up. Finds Erik’s fingers, still curled, probably too tightly, into the shabby brown wool over his shoulder. Laces them into his own. Thank you. And I can tell you, if you’d like to know. I would like that, I think.
You can tell me anything, Erik says voicelessly, truthfully, in the void left by the quiescent wind.
Thank you again. Not just for that. Charles actually smiles then, crookedly, eyes gemstone-bright in the dimness, long hidden labyrinths slowly untangling themselves into clear straight paths, when they meet his. “Also thank you for this. For all of it. The argument, really; I did need that. You know, you’re the only one who ever argues with me, when I’m being idiotic.” And, silently, something Erik’s not sure he’s meant to overhear: I need you.
“Charles,” he says, “I’m happy to argue with you always.” And I need you, too.
He can feel Charles’s startlement, then, and the warm pink wave of embarrassment. Sorry, I didn’t mean to—that wasn’t—
“You aren’t actually listening to me, are you?” I meant that. For the same reasons you mean it. I want you to tell me when I’m wrong and I’m happy to dress up in horrible costumes if you ask me to and you can tell me anything you’d like me to know and I think you’re beautiful and I love you.
Charles blinks. Then blinks again. “Well…now I’m certainly listening to you…”
And Erik isn’t sure what to do, or to say, at that. The wind has started billowing again, great thumps of air against the door, and he’s just let that thought escape, out into the space between the two of them, the emotion he’s never named, because he’d never thought he could remember, or could know, what love means, except he does know, he knows it with incontrovertible surety, and he can’t and won’t take it back, neither’s possible, because it’s just simply there, and real, and true.
“Ah,” he says, eloquently.
And Charles starts laughing, though it’s a painful sound. Sorry, sorry, your expression—Erik, of course I love you, you KNOW I love you, I’ve been saying that all along—here, look—
And all at once it’s there, sweeping up from every direction, pulling him in, irresistible and natural as the tug of the moon at the tide. Charles smiling. Warm wool sweaters on chilly mornings. The scent of tea and the taste of sugary-tart pineapple as Charles licks graceful fingers just in case Erik might be watching. Brilliant and exasperating conversations like kaleidoscopes, the two of them striking sparks from each other, across chessboards, over late-night drinks, in Charles’s study. Black ocean water and shining moonlight and sheer astonishing delight, the unquestionable knowledge that neither of them would ever have to be alone, not ever again.
I just never thought you wanted—I’m not exactly perfect, you know. I always want to have the last word and I’m absolutely lazy in the mornings and I—Charles hesitates, then. You were right, about me. About hiding. I was always afraid of—I never wanted to be myself. Not in this house.
Charles—
I do love you, you know.
I know. He does. He can feel it, like the faint brush of the branch on the glass of the windowpane outside, except this shared offering reaches out and sends tendrils of warmth into his heart, little offshoots of new life in winter, tiny and bright. He can feel Charles smiling, hesitantly, in response, not believing his own joy even though he so clearly wants to feel it, as tentative and hopeful as the ancient moonlight sneaking through the bare grey bark-covered arms of the trees.
Well, then…you know. But you shouldn’t—you don’t want me, I’m not—Charles gives up on sentences. Images, instead. Dull bruises, like worn-out mementoes, rusted memories. Tears like blood, or maybe that’s the other way around. Words—a freak, a burden, unnatural—that cut even deeper than that. Faded and omnipresent scars. Those might be metaphorical, but they’re not, or at least not entirely; Erik knows that with pure certainty, too. If you’re looking for something that’s beautiful—and you did say beautiful—to love, you won’t find that here, I’m afraid.
Charles, Erik says, and tightens his grip on the elegant fingers, in his, not letting go, I do not think that, in English, beautiful means flawless.
I—
You are beautiful. And I love you. All of the pieces that are you. Even if you would like to be lazy in the mornings. I promise to try not to mind, if you are. Though we may have to have discussions over who gets that last word, from time to time.
You…mean that. You want me. “You like mornings,” Charles says, out loud, but the eyes are beginning to sparkle, now, glinting blue like the idea of a promise, or distant stars, or hope. “You get up and go running at ungodly hours, and half the time you come back before I’ve even woken up, and you’ll get tired of me still lounging about in bed—”
“But do I get to kiss you awake, when I come back?” Of course I mean that. Of course I want you. You, and your scars, and all your idiotic and brilliant optimism. I love you.
And I love you! “I think…yes. You do. Or…if you want to…you could kiss me now.”
“Can I?” Erik says, very softly, and Charles nods, and they both lean forward, at the same instant, and their lips touch, at the center of the world.
After an eternity, he pulls back, to look into Charles’s face. And the eyes are smiling. Erik, I love you.
“Yes.” The agreement settles into the night around them, sinking in. Those words, that thought, are part of the world now. Part of their world. Forever. And I love you.
“I know you do. You put on fishnet stockings for me.”
“And a wig.”
“And a wig.” There’s a pause, but not an empty one; the air practically crackles with anticipation, filling up the space. And those eyes are still smiling. “You could take off the wig. And the stockings. And the—”
“Charles?”
“Yes?”
“Upstairs. Now.”
And Charles laughs. And then, several eventful minutes later, laughs again, at that moment, at the moment, Erik poised there above him, inside him, skin against skin, old scars meeting new exploring fingertips without shame, thoughts tangling with thoughts, friction and heat and delight like the birth of new galaxies, exploding into life, all made up of beautiful and I love you and yes.
They do finally make it back downstairs, rumpled and exhilarated and touching each other just because they can. The children turn around to stare, of course, in the darkened coziness of the room. On the television screen, Dracula is menacing a young woman, who screams unconvincingly; outdoors, the wind purrs, comfortably nestling down around the walls for the night.
Alex grumbles, “Okay, we’re not starting the movie over for you, you know,” and Sean says, “Wait, what happened to the costume, I thought he was wearing a—” and Angel whispers, “I don’t think you want to know where that dress is now,” and Sean says, “Oh, god, my brain.”
Raven pops up to look at them over the back of the sofa, where she’s cuddled up in what seems to be Hank’s Batman cape, and smiles; Erik’s holding Charles’s hand, because he can’t seem to stop touching, and Charles squeezes his fingers, slightly, and smiles back at the world, unreservedly happy.
“Professor,” Hank inquires, also sitting up, because Hank has no concept of tactfulness whatsoever, “no costume?”
“Hmm.” Charles glances down at his fuzzy professorial sweater, which is missing a button—Erik has no clue where that’d ended up, and doesn’t regret it in the least—and then up, at Erik’s expression. Curls those fingers a bit more closely around Erik’s hand. Then says, thoughtfully, but definitively, “No, it’s certainly a costume. Raven, you’ll appreciate this one; I know perfectly well that you kept that horrible Mr Tumnus picture, you know, and you’ve always said I dress like the definition of academia anyway…”
“But you aren’t—” Raven starts, and Charles grins and says, “Oh, come on, I’m C.S. Lewis.”
can you go another round
I will follow you down and out
let’s go another round
I will follow you down