Chapter two
It had been quiet again for a while, and Erik knew he should have suspected something would happen. He liked it when it was quiet, when it's just him and Charles and they don't need to talk- perhaps in a few years they would enjoy talking; when they actually had things to talk about- but silence had been such a rare commodity for so long that they wanted to enjoy it. The days rolled around as regularly as a clock counting out the hours, the meals were finally starting to become something they could recognize as real food- vegetable stew most days- and nothing to do but sleep or sit outside in the sun, or lately even walk around a little, his legs no longer felt as though they were about to collapse under him.
He should have realized, how Charles always said he ate his share of bread outside when he went alone to get their meals, the way he now seemed to get tired more quickly than Erik did, so many little clues that he had ignored as stalwartly as he had ignored the signs of his own illness. The quiet was dangerous because he wanted it to go on badly enough to ignore their problems until they were right on top of them.
Erik sighs and glares at Charles for the hundredth time. He can't believe that his friend would be so foolish as to cheat himself here. As much as he hated Charles for doing it in Belsen, he might have been able to understand why, but here…
"Why didn't you just ask them for more?" He whispers, too exasperated to put any strength in his voice.
Charles smiles up at his, a touch of irony in the expression, "Would you?" He asks, with a slight challenge in his voice. Erik ignores it, Charles knows the answer to that. He coughs, then continues in a more even voice "There are too many people here for them to give out any more than they already are." Another cough, and Charles pulls the blankets closer around him. Erik would have left his coat as extra bedcovering for his sick friend, but Charles wouldn't hear of it, and after he had threatened to throw it on the floor, Erik had taken it back.
They have already had breakfast, and Erik had braved the hospital to demand something for Charles, who was feverish and had found it hard to eat.
The fears are fading, Erik realizes. Two months ago, finding Charles like this would have terrified him beyond any nightmares, but while he does worry, the fears have been muted, fading under the curtain of security the hospital has thrown over them. It might not be the paradise Charles- and yes, he- had once dreamed of, but it is a safe place. A place where he could go to the nurse for medicine for a sick friend, and not be afraid of being shot or beaten or given poison in the guise of healing.
They had seen many such cases, working in the hospital in Auschwitz. A fellow worker forced into giving a patient arsenic by an SS doctor, or perhaps a fatal does of painkillers, just so the sadistic creature could observe what the effects would be. They had never been put in such a position, thank heavens, because if the hospital worker refused, the SS took it that he was volunteering to take the patient's place and would poison him instead.
The medicine had helped, although Erik isn't sure how much Charles was exaggerating when he said he was fine. He stands up nevertheless, and steels himself to walk out of the tent alone. Since he's started to walk again he's always tried to go with Charles to fetch their meals, although most mornings his friend lets him sleep and gets them himself; probably to give Erik as excuse as to where his share of the bread had gone.
They'd been eating supper last night, when half the bread he was using to wipe up the last of the soup fell away. Two pieces pressed together as one. A clever trick. He'd looked at Charles, shocked and furious that Charles would trick him into betraying him.
"How long have you been doing this?"
How long have I been eating your share?
How long have you been going without for my sake?
The day is colder than usual, cloudy and grey which matches Erik's mood perfectly. He had promised himself, in a promise that had nothing to do with empty words but everything with true intent, that he would never hurt Charles either willingly or unwillingly. His friend was the one he refused to betray, the last boundary before the end of the world, and Charles had tricked him into crossing it. He hadn't spoken to Charles for the rest of that evening, only had only started again when his friend had woken with a fever.
The morning dew has already soaked through the holes in Erik's boots, and the relief of walking again is not so great that he can tolerate his feet getting wet. The hem of his coat is trailing along the long grass, and it too is getting sodden, the greyish fabric turning black along the edges.
The hospital has very little running water, apparently many of the pipes burst the last winter and haven't been replaced. Those staying in the tents who need water have to draw it from the well and Erik and Charles are no exception. The hospital staff warm some once a week to use for bathing.
By the time Erik reaches the large drum from which the hot water is being ladled out, he's wet and shivering and impatient with the world. The orderly hands him a tin bucket as he passes, and for a moment Erik pauses, turning the metal in his hands. It's poor quality, and rusty in several places, but he feels an odd surge of gratitude towards the man for giving it to him.
He'd always loved metal for some reason, and one of his earliest memories involves playing with a heavy iron candlestick and being subsequently scolded for it by his mother. He'd collected scraps of metal when he was younger, even during their time at the ghetto.
Erik ran a finger along the metal rim of the pail. Familiar. Comforting in a strange way.
The hard, jagged edge of the spade.
"Wo ist Charles?"A German voice breaks though Erik's thoughts and he starts, almost dropping the pail. The nurse in charge of sharing out the hot water is looking at him inquisitively. She's smiling, and it's all Erik can do not to grit his teeth. The woman- he's never bothered learning their names- is almost as tall as he is, with her blond hair pulled back in a severe bun, stretching the lined skin of her face. She makes it a policy to learn everyone's name, something Erik finds even more threatening than her language.
In the camps, anonymity had been their ally, to be just another face in the crowd a protection. Erik remembered reading, long ago when he'd still been allowed inside a library, about how some animals protected themselves from predators by vanishing into a crowd of their fellows. Charles had found the analogy particularly fitting. To stand out was to make yourself a target for people who didn't need a reason to kill you.
"Charles nie jest tutaj." Erik snaps back, deliberately in Polish- Charles isn't here. He sees the woman's smile fade and her face close as she fills his bucket and hands it back to him. She probably believes he hates with her for what her people did to him. Good. Let her think that. It's nothing but the truth and he knows he's not the only one who feels that way.
The handle of the bucket has a round wooden grip, but this is cracked and covered in splinters, and Erik starts off carrying it by the metal. The weight feels enormous and keeps pulling him off balance. The metal cuts painfully into his hands and before long he has to stop and hold it by the wooden grip. Even using two hands, it's too heavy, and Erik can feel the weight drag on his shoulders, the old pain coming back from where they never had a change to heal.
After his parents had been shot, Erik had crawled out of the grave, only to be caught almost immediately by the thunderstruck German soldiers. He had twisted out of their hands and escaped, only to run straight into another SS guard. He had screamed himself hoarse and kicked and bitten and Erik suspects that if they hadn't been as bewildered as to how he'd managed to survive, they would have shot him again on the spot.
They didn't. Instead they dragged him into the truck and drove to the station. The train he had initially believed they would be taking had left long ago- en route for Belzec, he heard the SS say- but another would be coming from France to take on fuel on its way to Auschwitz. They'd put him on that, and let the guards at the camp do what they liked with him when he got there. They did not want him as their problem.
But there were several hours before the train would arrive, and many of the soldiers had received scratches and bruises from Erik's wild flailing, as well as a few unpleasant remarks about their marksmanship from their superior, and were quite happy to take it out on the cause of their misfortune.
They had found the rope in one of the cabinets, and lashed one end to a hook on the wall. They'd thrown the other end over a ceiling beam, and used it to tie Erik's hands behind his back. He'd believed he was only being restrained, and didn't fight- his struggles earlier had already brought him a cuff around the head. It was only when the rope was pulled up and he was lifted off the ground that he started screaming again. The strain pulled his arms painfully up against the joints and it took all of Erik's strength to keep his joints locked, fighting against the weight of his own body, pulling him down.
He couldn't keep that position for long, and he now knew that the Nazis would be perfectly willing to leave him there until his arms were torn off completely. He'd held out for as long as possible, but after the horrors and strain of the day, his strength had eventually flagged and his body had fallen, the strain falling on his shoulder, the pain heightening unbearably. He'd tried to pull himself up again, and again he'd fallen. He tried again, but by then his strength, already badly taxed by the horrific day, had finally failed.
He couldn't pull himself up and had to just hang there, with no company but the muffled Wagner from the German radio and his own ragged breathing. The pain in his shoulders increased until he was screaming again. Next door, he had heard the German soldiers turning up the volume of the radio to drown out his voice.
Even these years later, he still had nightmares on how it had felt to hang there, feeling his muscles slowly twist and tear like raw meat, and listening to the creaking of his joints as the bones were pulled apart.
He didn't know if he could have heard the sound his shoulders made when they finally dislocated, because that pain, combined with the agony of having his full body weight put on his already torn muscles, had caused him to black out completely.
He'd woken on the floor, when the Germans had come to cut him down and thrown a bucket of cold water on him to wake him up. Woken to freezing cold and unbearable pain and the sight of his own dislocated arms. It was nothing short of a miracle that the heavy work in Auschwitz hadn't pulled the bones apart again- either that, or Charles was a far better doctor than he let on- but his shoulders had never felt quite the same way again, and when he carried heavy loads- as he did now- the old pain came back, a stabbing ache starting in the small of his back and quickly deepening into the intolerable.
Erik puts down the pail and stretches, rolling his shoulders and flexing his back, trying to work out the insistent, nagging pain. It fades a little, and Erik picks up the bucket again, trying to hold the metal against his chest in an effort not to aggravate the stabbing in his joints.
Charles looks up when Erik walks in, carrying the pail. They haven't been out here for a week yet, and he'd been hoping they would share carrying the water. Judging by how he's holding himself, Erik's shoulders are hurting him horribly. He doesn't say anything, but Charles knows that he's blaming him for the pain. Erik never blames him aloud, but Charles knows him well enough to guess what he's thinking.
Erik hadn't said 'I told you so' when Charles had woken up sweating and sick that morning, he hadn't needed to. He'd sent him a look that was part accusing, part exasperated and part worried, and that had said more than words ever could.
"I'm sorry." Charles sits up, and pulls the blankets more closely around him. He feels dizzy and slightly nauseous but ignores it. His throat hurts when he speaks above a whisper.
Erik doesn't turn around, only shrugging stiffly in response as he busies himself with the pail.
Charles sighs, "Come here."
Erik looks at him, and he moves away from the side of the bed, inviting him to sit down. Erik growls something indistinct in his mother tongue and drags the bucket beside the bed before sitting down on the edge. He gives a soft groan when Charles starts kneading his shoulders.
Erik's shoulders are like the rest of him, bone covered with paper, tied together with string. He digs between the planes of bone with his thumbs, rubbing up and down and Erik's indrawn hiss of pain is exhaled in a groan. There are tight knots of muscle in his shoulder joints, scar tissue from where the muscles had healed badly.
They hadn't worked the first few weeks that had spent in Birkenau. Quarantine. They had stayed in their barrack and only come out for roll-call, which could take hours when everyone had to be counted, living and dead. Once they had had to stand for more than a full day and night while the Kapos searched for one elusive prisoner. He and Erik had taken turns to lean against each other and sleep, his head resting on his friend's chest, Erik's on his shoulder. Eventually the man had been found hanging off the electric fence, and Charles suspected there wasn't a man among them that didn't curse his memory for the ordeal he had made them go through.
But as gruelling as the roll-calls were, it was better than working, and if Erik had been made to work immediately after arriving, his shoulders would have dislocated again. Even afterwards, when Erik had healed as much as he was going to and they were put to work, Charles tried not to imagine what it must have been like to work with his arms in that state.
Erik finally pulls away from his hands, "The water is getting cold." he explains shortly, but there's no bite to his words and Charles can tell when Erik reaches over his shoulder to squeeze his wrist that he's been forgiven.
Charles doesn't particularly want to get himself wet in his condition, but hot water is just too good to miss. He leans over the side of the bed, lying on his stomach to splash his arms up to the elbows. He cups his hands, pouring the water over his bare head to wash away the dirt of the last few days, then again, rubbing over his face. It's a surprise when his fingers touch the stubble on his cheeks and chin.
He has never had to shave before, although he remembers looking forward to learning how to back in his parents' house. It was a mark of adulthood, and he recalls how he used to watch his father shave, when the man was still alive. Looking forwards to the day when he would do this himself.
And now when the long-awaited moment had finally come, it was more of a nuisance than a point of pride. Charles runs a thumb along his jaw line, trying to get used to the feeling; he's going to have to, since they don't have a razor, mirror or even soap.
He sees Erik watching and smiles, "You?"
Erik shrugs- the motion seems easier than it had earlier- and shakes his head before sitting down next to the bucket. Charles vaguely remembers something he learnt back at university, that starvation or long sickness could delay the body's development.
Charles sits back up and dries himself as best he can on one of the blankets- he feels too hot to have them all on, and they may as well be used.
Erik does the same, washing his face and hands, then cupping them and pouring water over his head, it's the first chance he's had to wash his hair since it's started to grow back, and he runs his hands through it thoroughly before taking of his coat and using the lining to rub it dry. Even partly clean, his hair is an odd colour, not at all like the dark brown Charles remembers.
"You've gone grey," He remarks, reaching out to touch the wet spikes.
Erik looks up at him in surprise, and runs his hand through his hair again, as though he could tell the colour by touching it. Then he shrugs a third time and continues washing his forearms, "And you've gone bald." He replies simply in the tone of someone who can't be surprised by anything any more. "And if it was because of something they to us while we were in the camps, we wouldn't be the only ones."
Charles closed his eyes, it's not the first time they've had this conversation.
The first time was the day after Charles' dream. He was sick and shaking and very glad to be awake, and Erik was trying to understand what had happened. He tried to explain.
"I had a dream-" He stopped, it was no dream.
"A nightmare-" It was no nightmare either, and to pass it off as such was an insult to those who had died. He couldn't stand to look anywhere near the crematorium that morning.
"I felt-" Better.
"They gassed people last night," He blurted out at last, too loud. He lowered his voice, "The people from the transport. I felt them die." He put his hands to his head, he could still hear them screaming in there. "I felt was it was like to die." He felt sick, so sick that he wondered how he was going to be able to eat anything.
Erik touched his arm gently, Charles was half expecting his friend to pull away in disgust and tell him he was crazy, but strangely, Erik almost looked relieved.
"When they shot my parents," Erik said, his lips thinning at the memory, "I was there. I was to die with them. They lined us up and shot us, and none of the bullets hit me." He looked down at his hands, as though he couldn't believe it even now, "They were standing right behind me, and they couldn't hit me, it was as though the bullets bent away from me." Then back up, at Charles, "Is that any less impossible than what you just told me?"
When Charles had shaken his head, Erik turned and looked over at the hospital block. "Do you think they did something to us?" He asked, "In the ghettos, and here? To make us do these things?"
They hadn't continued the conversation there, because the bell had rung for roll-call and besides Charles wasn't sure how well they could talk about medical experimentation with a shared vocabulary of rough German, bad English and a few scraps of Polish. They had come back to it again though, when they had been able to understand each other better.
"You know what I think." He says firmly. He doesn't believe that Erik's experience and his dreams were a product of some mad Nazi doctor's experiments, for all that Erik does.
After all, the first time he had seen it work was long before the Nazis could have done anything to him. The dogs, snarling and howling as they tore into his family, then turning to him, cowering away from them. He can remember the terror, the knowledge that he would soon end up like his family, a torn rag-doll in those jaws. He remembers screaming almost instinctively at them to get back, throwing out his arm as if that could stop them.
And, astonishingly, it had. The dogs had stopped in mid stride, their growls turning to whines. The SS had looked thunderstruck when their dogs had started to back away, no more amazed than Charles was himself.
He'd told Erik this, but his friend had just shrugged, asking him if he had a better explanation.
"And you know what I believe." Erik throws his coat over on the other bed, washing his upper arms and the back of his neck. "You saw what they were doing in there, how else can you explain what happened?"
His suspicions are well placed, Charles admits, they've both been in Mengele's laboratory, they've both seen what he was trying to do.
A young girl, her eyelids pulled back so far that she was crying constantly, a needle in the muscle of her eye to inject dye into the iris…
Cutting and knotting veins and muscles, binding two twins together in a grotesque experiment…
The living vivisection of a creature unlike anything Charles had ever seen before…
Charles tries not to shudder, this time it has nothing to do with his illness. He turns his head to the side, watching Erik, "Why would they do that? We were Jews to them, filth of the earth, why were they trying to give us this…" he pauses, unable to think up the right word either in English or any other language.
Erik runs his hands in the water again- it's looking noticeably dingy now, Charles notices. "To avoid testing it on their own precious people," He sneers, "Even if they knew what it would do. They probably didn't, and just thought it would kill us."
Charles rolls over on his back, he's tired and his head is starting to pound, and he doesn't feel like re-hashing this old argument again. The main reason he disagrees with Erik, the reason he thinks his friend- who is rightfully fond of the powers that saved his life, wherever they might have come from- might not like, is that Charles can't imagine who would want to have the power to find out what it feels like to die.
The second time it had happened he had been awake and if anything, that had made it worse. It had been morning, the faint pre-dawn light brightening into a beautiful sunrise that neither of them was in any state to appreciate. It was late summer, but the mornings were still cold and Charles felt a creeping dread whenever he thought about how it would feel to be here in a few months.
He felt strange that morning, slightly dizzy and hoped to God that he wasn't getting ill- although God didn't seem to have been listening lately. They'd swallowed their breakfast hurriedly, for once eager to get to work. Their command had been ordered to clear out a section of wild ground some miles from the main camp, which had been overrun with brambles. It was relatively easy work, and which would hopefully give them the chance to snatch some of the berries when the guards weren't looking.
'Better than working at the Sonderkommando,' Erik had remarked while they'd quickly wolfed down their pitiful breakfast, out of the wind behind one of the barracks. 'Two transports this morning, one after the other.'
He'd nodded, it was nothing they hadn't already known, since the noise of the trains arriving had woken them each time.
After his first attack, he'd felt terrified whenever he heard a train pass, wondering if it would happen again. But each time, nothing had happened until he had started to hope that what had happened was a one off - certainly, it hadn't occurred to him at the time to feel anything then but helpless pity for the people who were about to die. And feeling glad that they weren't in the Sonderkommando, who would have to work very fast that morning.
It had happened when they'd marched out, he'd felt groggy that morning, but hadn't paid it any attention, with the amount of sleep they usually got, combined with having been woken up twice by the trains, it was nothing unusual. What was strange was that instead of clearing away as he woke up, the grogginess just increased. Still, he hadn't realized what was happening until they were marching past the SS and the crematorium lit up.
It wasn't minds he felt, but pain. Pure, unrelenting, unbearable pain. He couldn't see, couldn't hear. He was cut off from the world by a wall of such pain that he couldn't even hold it in his mind, it was too huge. Then the heat, burning heat like the bowels of hell, searing. He could feel his skin peeling back, blackening and crumbling under the flames like burnt paper, he could feel his bones cracking under the heat, marrow dripping and drying and cracking again.
It stopped, and he was shivering and trembling and Erik was dragging at his shoulder trying to get him to move before someone noticed. Then it came again a wave of devouring flames, and at the crest of it the realization of what was happening.
Two transports. One after the other. Not enough time. The Sonderkommando had had to work too fast, and most of those they'd thought dead from the gas were only unconscious. They were still alive when they went to the ovens.
Then the pain returned, he couldn't move, he couldn't see anything but the hungry flicker of the flames and hear nothing but the muffled screams of those they were devouring. Charles choked, and opened his mouth to give voice to his own screams.
A hand clamped itself over his mouth. The touch was like sandpaper on raw nerves, and he tried to twist away, only to be caught by the scruff of the neck by another hand and forced forwards.
For a moment Charles had thought he was about to fall over, and bit down on the offending hand out of sheer reflex. Then the pain returned and he bit down harder, the taste of blood flooding his mouth a sharp counterpart to the smoke and charred flesh. The screams, the pain, endlessly loud until he wanted nothing more than to cry out in turn. His legs buckled under him, barely holding him up as he staggered forwards. The grip on his neck was like a vice, forcing his head down even as it pulled him forwards. He'd focused on that, the contrast of real pain; even as his mind screamed at him that he was being burnt alive. It had been the only constant thing he had to hang on to as the pain came again and again.
He never knew how long the pain had lasted, only that if it had lasted much longer it would have driven him mad, and as it was he had bitten Erik's hand almost to the bone. The pain had started to die the further they went from the camp, and when they were far enough away that there was nothing left but echoes, he'd dared to look back and watch the ashes blow away.
Erik strips off his clothes quickly, sitting down on his haunches next to the pail and washing as quickly as he can, trying to stay out of the cold breeze that pulls on the closed flaps of the tent. The water might still be warm, but the moment it touches his skin it seems to turn to ice. Shivering, he runs his hands quickly over his chest, wishing he had been able to find some soap. It's the first time he'd been able to wash himself properly since they'd arrived here.
He'd wanted to even when they'd arrived, but after seeing his condition, they had only deloused him, stripped off his clothes and put him to bed immediately. At least, that was what Charles had told him. He only remembered waking up sticky and filthy in the hospital bed, and while he had been able to clean himself off somewhat, he was still sick enough that they didn't want to risk getting his whole body wet.
He hadn't felt too understanding at the time, but he's grateful now. Even as it is, when it's relatively warm and he feels stronger than he has for a long time, the cold's enough that he's still shivering hard enough for his teeth to chatter. The water is starting to turn opaque by the time he's started on his legs, and it take Erik a minute to realize that the prickling on the back of his neck is not due to the chill.
He turns around and looks at Charles questioningly. His friend has an odd expression on his face, one Erik can't quite place. "What is it?"
"Nothing." The word comes out a little quickly, and Erik sighs and turned back, feeling slightly embarrassed at being naked in front of his friend- which is absurd, of course. They have no secrets from each other where that is concerned.
It hadn't even been that embarrassing the first time, although that was because they'd had more to worry about than being naked in front of each other and a dozen other men. After that, they had grown used to it, barely feeling human enough to pay any attention to modesty or shame.
"You're looking better," Charles added, his voice straining a little and breaking into a brief cough.
Or perhaps once, when Charles had kissed him back and he'd felt… not exactly uncomfortable, but certainly strange, not sure what to do or say.
Erik does look better, the razor edges of the bones beneath his skin are beginning to look less prominent, the hollows between his ribcage and hips less obvious. His limbs are still more bone that flesh though, the joints seeming swollen in comparison; and now clean, his skin seemed almost translucently pale.
Charles doesn't realize he's staring until Erik turns around, looking quizzical. "What is it?"
He feels a brief bolt of shame at having been caught staring, followed by an even swifter bolt of confusion as to why he should feel ashamed. It's nothing he hasn't seen before and it's the first time- well, almost the first, but that doesn't count- that he's felt as though he should turn away.
The morning after he'd kissed Erik, waking up and finding himself sprawled across his friend, suddenly acutely aware of Erik's naked body under him. He'd felt absurdly mortified and wondered if he should move away quickly or stay where he was so as not to wake him. Such an alien fear, compared to that which they lived with every day, so petty and small. He'd welcomed it, remembering how to feel human for a brief while, a normal person with normal worries, before the bell had rung and his mind slid back into the old pattern of survival. He'd pushed himself off Erik without a second thought, feeling nothing but his own exhaustion and pain and fear.
"Nothing." He says quickly- too quickly. Erik raises an eyebrow, of course he'd know- Charles sometimes wonders why they bother to speak sometimes- and he doesn't understand why Charles would be bothered either. "You're looking better," He tries to continue, but the strain of speaking catches up with him and something lodges in his throat. He coughs.
Erik shakes his head, as though wondering which God landed him with a friend like this, and dries himself with a blanket before he picks up his clothes from the floor. For a moment Charles can see him debate whether or not to put them on, then he shrugs, and tosses them over on top of his coat- Charles suspects it's more to prove a point than anything else. He drags the pail to one side, and climbs into the bed, lying on his back under the pile of blankets and clothes. Charles watches him for long moments, just studying his face.
Thin even when they met, only emphasized by the strong chin and nose, and broad cheekbones. Eyes already hollow from the ghettos, the muscles in his cheeks twitching as he ground his teeth against the pain.
Skin paling in winter, even under the grime and dirt which they'd had to live with as a matter of course, eyes like blue watch fires under the pale frozen sun, shrouded and seeming too big for his face.
Lying in the bunk, smiling when Charles kissed him that first time, the skull-face melted by human joy.
The thin lines of pain and exhaustion in those last few weeks, slack in sickness, taut in delirium.
The edges of his face have filled out a little, the eyes less sunken, cheeks less hollow. He sees Charles watching and again raises an eyebrow, 'Now what?'
Considering the circumstances, Charles decides the best response is to lean over to Erik's side of the bed and kiss him. It's the best response he can think of. It still feels strange to kiss, but then this always feels strange in a wonderful way Charles simply can't describe even to himself.
Often, when they had touched in the camps it had been cold, impersonal. Helping each other when they fell, holding the other up during the interminable roll calls, even when they were crushed close together for warmth in winter it still felt somehow detached, as though the numbness in themselves had come out to infect everything around them. It felt strange to kiss then, to feel that numbness melt like ice pressed to hot metal.
Erik's lips are warm and damp from the water, and his are cold. He can feel Erik smile against his lips, one hand coming up to close over his bare scalp, gently pushing him away. Charles lies down facing him, and Erik rolls on to his side, face to face.
"How do you feel?" Erik's speaking English, it's stilted and unemotional, but he appreciates the effort, he could never manage Polish, and speaking German is always unpleasant.
"Better." It's true; he knows he should worry about Erik getting sick too, but after this long in each other's company a kiss isn't going to hurt.
Erik had wanted him to stay away when he was sick with typhus, the disease was carried by lice and he hadn't wanted Charles to become infected too. In another world, Charles might have laughed at the absurdity. His clothes were so covered in lice that some nights he couldn't sleep from scratching. Erik hadn't heard the phrase, 'closing the door after the horses have bolted' and he didn't know if it had an equivalent in Polish, so he'd simply answered that he wasn't going anywhere, and anyway those were their lice, or had Erik forgotten their promise to share everything?
In that another world, Erik might have laughed back, but as it was he'd felt gratified to see a ghost of a smile on his friend's face.