Sometimes Kurt makes this little grunt sound in the back of his throat when others get too close, watches them with half lidded eyes from his perch, like a weary cat just out of reach. Sleeping only in the daylight when he thinks no one is watching, spending nights awake in the darkness... locked indoors where it's safe.
He follows Logan around like a shadow, maybe because the man feels like an alpha to him, holds an invulnerable air of dominance that makes him feel safe. Lingers close but never close enough to touch.
And sometimes Kurt speaks to him in that soft German... sprawled across the back of the couch while Logan sits and reads magazines, nothing he can quite understand, but he never interrupts, just listens... paying more attention to the lulling tone than the pages he flips through. He finds himself opening issues of Popular Science, pretending to read while the young mutant murmurs quietly, tail twitching back and forth like it has a mind of its own.
On some days Logan finds himself whispering back, low tone rough with years of smoking... soothing because he tries, and Kurt falls silent, bright eyes slipping closed. He talks of everything and nothing, comments on the weather or something he saw on television that morning, it doesn't really matter because Kurt doesn't understand him past the gentle tones.
Eventually he speaks about his past, events that he can't bring himself to share with the others, because perhaps they won't quite understand ... and he doesn't want their half-hearted sympathies. He already sees the pity in their eyes and it only angers him.
Sooner or later his tone must betray the aching in his heart or the hitch in his throat because suddenly Kurt has worked his way down beside him, moving so carefully that Logan hadn't noticed him until warm fur brushed against his arm; golden gaze wide and sad... and so understanding that it's heartbreaking. He's almost weightless as he lowers himself against the couch cushions, arms folding across the well worn denim against Logan's thigh, lowering his head to rest there with slender body curled up in an angle that would seem painful, if he wasn't so damn flexible.
Logan knows it's okay when he lets his hand sink into tousled strands of blue-black, petting down to the nape of Kurt's long neck, letting his own head fall to rest against the still warm cushion behind him, the sound of gentle breathing and the soft flutter of a heartbeat against his hip.
Sometimes the silence is just as comfortable.