A/N: theonionistheonewhocries from Tumblr again, haha. This time, the prompt was:
"Erik you can't be serious! You've never ridden bike before? Did you never learn?" Erik looked at him with a hurt expression, "How could I Charles? My parents were never around to teach me."
...Except, well. THIS CAME OUT SO FLUFFY. I, LIKE, TOTALLY IGNORED THE "HURT EXPRESSION" PART. WHATEVER, I WANTED SOME CUTENESS.
So here's this little AU oneshot. Enjoy. C:
"…What the Hell is this, Charles?" Erik deadpans as he stares at the contraption leaning on a kickstand and about waist-high on him between him and his friend.
"It's a bicycle," the shorter brunet replies fluidly, stepping around it and standing back as he watches his friend's brow crowd together, hands touching the handlebars and down to the seat. "You said you never learned to ride one because your parents couldn't teach you, so I thought I would do the nonors. Everyone should know how to ride a bike; it's a necessity of life."
"I would disagree; what, am I supposed to haul one around in the back of my truck in case it breaks down, and then whip out my bike to ride off and find help? That's what cell phones are for," Erik retorts, glancing up with a scowl on his face. He shoves himself away from the bicycle. "Get the receipt. Take it back. I don't want one or need one."
"What if I want to go biking with you through the state park? Come on, Erik, they can be for pleasurable times and not just emergencies from immobile vehicles. Please, Erik, just humor me and learn to ride. We can get this done in two shakes, and then I will never pester you about it again."
"In that case, why'd you buy me a bike if you're just going to make me learn and then leave it be? I could have used yours." Erik shakes his head, but doesn't protest further, because, really, his question was already answered: Charles might want to go out for a ride with him sometime. Still… this is almost embarrassing, one grown man teaching the other to ride a bicycle.
"You might want to change your clothes for this, my friend," Charles remarks when Erik start to try to straddle the thing while the kickstand is still in place. "And you can't begin like that. So please, go inside, change into something like sweats and sneakers, and then we'll start."
Erik grunts something incoherent, but he's nodding curtly and walking away, back to the house, which is enough for Charles.
Erik didn't have anywhere to go from his college dorm after graduation, so Charles invited his friend to live with him in his rather large house. It's two stories high, but it also has a basement and attic, and it's very Victorian-styled with a wrap-around porch in the front, and it's in New York, sure, but it's very far away from any cities per se. And it's been very empty since Charles' siblings, Raven and Hank, moved out.
When Erik returns, he's in Charles' favorite pair of sweats, because Erik's own were all dirty. They're a bit short on him, and it's endearing. Charles smiles. "Here," he says, and he kicks the stands and wheels the bike over from the rocky gravel to the smooth blacktop flowing like a black river from the garage.
Erik follows suit, and soon, Charles is to the left of the bike, gripping the handles to balance it, and Erik is on the right.
"Swing your leg over and barely touch your toes to the blacktop. Don't sit on the seat; hover over it. Lean most of your weight on your left foot; you're right-handed, so we'll be using your right leg as the starting one," Charles instructs, and Erik nods deftly.
Erik follows the instructions to the letter, because he's always been good at following direct when he needs it. The pedals are at a diagonal position, one of them at a 45-degree angle in front of his right foot.
"All right, now, this part is crucial: you must push off on this pedal with your right foot while simultaneously sitting and bringing up your left foot to rest on the other pedal, and then you must start wheeling your legs in circles to churn the pedals and, in turn, the gears along the chain that moves the wheels."
"Okay. Right. Okay," Erik grinds out, looking over the machine and calculating the mechanics of it in his head, envisioning how it should go. "And what if I want to stop?"
Charles smiles. "I was just getting to that. See, there are two brakes: one on the left handle, and one on the right. Never use the left one; it stops the front wheel and might fling you forward to kiss the pavement. Instead, slowly grip the right one to ease the back wheel's brake into effect. Understood?"
"Perfectly," Erik grunts. "I think I'm ready to try."
"Fantastic!" Charles claps. he steps away and gestures outward. "When you're ready, then. I'll be running alongside you just in case. Note that I am only dressed in jeans and a shirt today."
"Yeah, I noticed. I knew something was up this morning when I saw how casually dressed you were," Erik grumbles tartly before he exhales steadily, preparing his nerves.
With a burst of energy, Erik pushes down hard on the pedal and wobbles, the bike pitching forward and coasting for a second before his grip on the handlebars goes out of whack and he forgets to bring up his other leg and his shoes scuff the driveway and he teeters to the side, about to fall.
Charles, jogging along, catches Erik just in time, Erik's leg along the length of Charles' body and his shoulder fitting perfectly against Charles' chest. Erik tries not to think about the odd tingling sensation in his gut, flipping minutely and catching his breath in his lungs. He associates it with the fear of falling and the shock of the lack of control and not anything more.
"Try, try again," Charles remarks offhandedly, chucking a bit as he rolls Erik backward to the starting point, Erik still on the bike with a taunt-muscled expression on his face akin to panic.
"I hate you for this," Erik mutters vehemently. Charles simply smiles.
"All right, let's go again, and this time, try to think only about your movements and not the bike. Think of your own will, not the bike's." Charles starts to let go, and Erik's foot on the pedal darts out and touches ground. "Ready?"
"The pedals are on the wrong side," Erik comments quietly.
"Then try pushing off with your left. Maybe it will earn a better result. And besides, sooner or later you will be able to lift off with either leg, so it doesn't matter."
Erik makes a scoffing sound, but he continues anyhow. This time, he purposely plans his movements in his head, step by step, and then carries them out.
The result is more or less the same; he wobbles and teeters to one side, movements on the handlebars jerky and unsure, but he is at least able to make it a yard farther, and he got a few churns in with both pedals pumping before he lost his confidence, thought of the bike and not his body, and started to run into a bush lining the driveway.
Charles snatches Erik when only the first wheel is sandwiched into the bushes instead of the entire bike, and thankfully before Erik can fall to his doom.
"Okay, okay, better start, Erik, better start," Charles nods, and Erik hates that grin on Charles' face. A few options come to mind how to wipe it off; a punch, a slap, a kick, a kiss.
Wait, a kiss? Where did that option come from?
Erik shrugs it off and this time hops off the bicycle himself and walks it back, leaves fluttering to the blacktop from the spokes in the wheel.
"You want to do it yourself this time?" Charles asks as he walks quickly alongside Erik.
"Yes. So stand back. And if I fall, I fall; don't rescue me," Erik remarks sternly. He sends a look Charles' way, and the shorter man swallows and nods.
"Fine, fine. It might be better this way. Go right ahead."
Finding balance and keeping it going is the tricky part. Stability ever Erik's foe, coming and going in different forms in his life and never quite there. The stablest thing he has ever attained is his relationship with Charles.
Erik pushes off and wonders if gaining speed will make him flow at a steadier rate, like when a jet is in the air. He attempts it, his legs racing the pedals, and his knuckles going white, hands cramping, from gripping the handles so fiercely.
He looks up, then down, then up, and a sharky grin starts to take over his features as he laughs, feeling the wind in his hair and billowing his clothes. He's doing it, he's doing it! Riding a bicycle, after all these years, and—
He runs into the gravel, bike spasming, bumping his crotch with the front of the seat, making him wince and cry out, and just like that, he can hear Charles calling out his name, shoes slapping on pavement in an echo distantly heard.
And then Erik is on the ground, hands flying from the handles, palms getting dusty and cut up from the rocky gravel, and his knees bruising on contact with the uneven ground.
His face briefly touches grass nearby, and he's at an awkward angle, one leg pinned beneath the bike, the back wheel of it in the air slightly, enough to keep it rotating.
Erik curses loud profanities as Charles rushes to his side.
"Erik, Erik! Are you all right? Erik!"
"Oh shitty fucking cocksucker!" Erik growls and hisses at the same time. He flings the bike off of himself in a rage, and scrambles to his feet, limping lightly as Charles reaches him.
"…Erik?"
"Get out of my fucking way!" Erik roars, grabbing the bicycle up and starting to walk it back to the start of the driveway.
"…Are you giving up? Putting it away?" Charles wants to know, concern on his features for the blood leaking from Erik's palms and soaking into the grey sweatshirt.
"Fuck no! I'm going to fucking whip this bitch to my will!" Erik shouts, and just like that, before Charles can protest, Erik is starting off and riding hard, aiming to move from the driveway to the street, and Charles has to leap out of the way to keep from being hit.
His anger at getting hurt does it. Erik can now ride a bike.
After twenty minutes, Charles left staring out at the scenery, arm folded over his chest, hand to his mouth, teeth nibbling on his cuticles in worry, Erik returns.
Erik looks smugly triumphant, but there is a wince around the edges of his eyes and he's slowing to a stop with the brakes. He increasingly gets off the bike, and Charles realizes that Erik already learned how to stand from the seat to pedal.
"All I needed was a little incentive," Erik says as he puts the bike away in the garage and allows Charles to examine his hand and lead him by the wrist into the kitchen for some first aid. "And revenge on the bike for hurting me is one way."
"A slightly childish way in my opinion," Charles snorts, "But effective, yes. Still, next time, try to think of something better to focus on. Between rage and serenity —"
"I know, I know: lies true focus. I got that the first time you said it in college during mid-terms," Erik says with a roll of his eyes, and he thinks lowly to himself that he enjoys Charles' hands working over his far too much. "But what is there to think about that's just between those two things?"
"Trust, fondness, bond," Charles says casually as he dabs hydrogen peroxide over the cuts and scrapes, making the protein form the blood and torn skin bubble and sizzle, the germs and dirt dying and wahsing away as Charles guides Erik's hand to the sink.
Erik is sitting on the countertop like a child might, Charles between his legs, and then stepping off to the side of them to yank up his pants and examine his knee. There is a large bruise there, and a scrape along the side of his shin.
Charles cleans those wounds, too, and puts bandages on them. He smiles, peering up at Erik for a moment. "I can't decide if I feel more like I'm treating a soldier's battle wounds or a child's boo-boos," he laughs, standing to full height without breaking eye contact. "Considering that you got these from a bicycle, I'm leaning toward the latter."
"Don't mock me, Charles. I won't hesitate to punch you square in the face."
"Mmn," Charles grimaces, touching his jaw. "I remember." He thinks quickly to a moment they had in a bar when they were twenty-four. That was three years ago, but he can remember it crisply, because Charles hadn't even been buzzed yet when he said the wrong thing and Erik hit him for it.
Erik smiles a bit. "But no, you're right. I do feel a bit childish, being a grown man learning to ride a bicycle for the first time. However, I've grateful to you; thanks for teaching me, and patching me up."
Without thinking, Erik jumps down form the counter, but Charles hadn't moved from between his legs, so they wind up flush against one another, breaths mingling and chests grazing.
They both tense up, not accustomed to the proximity, and too shocked from the suddenness of it to move.
"Erik," Charles whispers first, and he doesn't even have a reason for saying his best friend's name, it just sort of slips out.
Erik snaps back to himself at the sound, and reaches up, grabbing Charles' shoulders lightly, and uses them to guide Charles out of his path as he brushes past him. "Sorry," he mumbles, since it has been his fault.
Erik tries to shake off the oddest feeling of attraction and again that option to kiss Charles as he walks away, headed for the bathroom to shower off his sweat.
Charles, however, remains where he is in the kitchen, unconsciously moving a hand up to dust off where Erik's chest had touched his, and his shoulders feel numb from the other touch when they never had before whenever he and Erik made casual contact.
Swallowing and turning his head, Charles moves through a fog to get himself something to drink. His mouth feels dry. And he can't quite place why.
All he knows are two things: one, that his place between rage and serenity had always been thinking of Erik and their bond, and two, that he really shouldn't be having this sensation akin to a crush flowing through him at the moment regarding the same person.