It's 4 am… I shouldn't be writing. Oh well. Anyway um… I thought I should let you all know that this isn't close to being over (x.x) and that's not the last we've seen of Logan even though it kinda seems like that in this chapter. Yeah… I'm going to bed now.


Chapter 11: Fires and butterflies

Charles opened the door of the taxi and scooted to the edge of the seat with his belongings before paying the man. He quietly got out and shut the car door behind him. Staring up at the Xavier's second estate he was reminded of all the times Sharon would throw a dinner party that he had to attend when he was younger. He just saw them as what they had been now that he was older, an excuse for her to get drunk. Feeling considerably number than he had during the cab ride he started walking toward the double doors.

Thankfully Sharon hadn't come back since it was rebuilt after the fire back when he was still in high school. It had destroyed the house and cost Kurt Marko, Charles' stepfather, his life. As much as Charles had hated the man he owed him his own life. Sharon had used Kurt's death as another excuse to drink herself to an early death, even though she never really loved the man in the first place, and Cain still hadn't forgiven Charles for being the death of his father.

He closed his eyes and hoped to God or whoever might be listening in on his thoughts that Cain wasn't staying here because his gambling problem left him in so much debt he got kicked out of his place, again.

"Hang on. You paid me double." The taxi driver called out to him pulling him from his thoughts.

Charles just glanced back at the man from over his shoulder. He had ended up crying again in the taxi which he assumed would have been every uncomfortable for the driver. "Keep it." He said with a small, forced smile.

The man grinned and nodded. "Thank you and have a nice night."

Charles waved slightly and watched the man go before turning back to the house. It wasn't anything special, just a slightly larger than normal house, unlike the estate in New York which was huge beyond compare and which he had vowed never to visit again, not since the last time when he had taken Logan to meet Sharon.

When he entered the house he could still smell the smoke from that night and instead of alarming it was somehow comforting. Making his way through the house the layout slowly started to come back to him and he headed toward the back of the house. The large cherry wood door stood dark against the off-white walls and he smiled faintly before entering.

Charles set his things down on the great cherry wood desk in what once was his real father's study. Yes, the house had been burned down but Sharon had it rebuild and decorated exactly how it had been before. Anything that had survived the fire had been fixed up and placed back in its original place in the house. His father's desk was one of the few things that survived.

Sitting down in the plush chair Charles ran his fingers along one of the burn marks. Everything suddenly began feeling heavy; he had cried enough tonight and it had left him drowsy. Sleep was calling to him, pulling him in with the faint smell of smoke to remind him of a warm fire place and make him feel safe enough to give in. His fingers continued to slide over the intricate wooden designs even as his eyes slowly slipped shut.


He had been staying at his family's place for a week and Logan hadn't shown up or called or anything at all really. Part of him was heartbroken that Logan seemed to not care at all that he had left but the other part of him was beyond glad because he didn't trust himself not to run back to him if he had tried to get him back.

Getting to and from the university was harder without Logan and his car but Charles decided he'd just have to deal with it for the rest of this semester and he would sign up for a dorm for the spring semester.

At the moment he was sitting in the courtyard staring at one of the old buildings that was part of the university. He had been sitting there for close to half an hour just staring at that same spot, in the middle of a mental war with himself on all the issues he was deeply divided on.

"Charles?"

He blinked, his eyes stung when he did and began to water making him wonder when the last time he blinked had been. He looked around until he saw who had called him. The blonde woman from the Halloween party was walking toward him and he quickly tried to remember her name; it had been some type of bird name hadn't it?

"I'm sorry it's, um, Robin, right?"

She smiled and shook her head. "Raven," She happily corrected.

"Sorry. I recognized you but I couldn't think of your name… Sorry."

"You apologize too much."

"You're not the first person to say that."

She laughed quietly and sat down next to him on the grass. Silence fell between them until both of them looked at each other and then both tried to speak at the same time which ended up sounding like a garble of words. "You go first," Raven offered after they had both stopped in the middle of their questions.

"What are you doing here? Are you a student or professor or…?"

"I teach acting in the Drama school here."

"Ah." He nodded, his gaze slowly shifting back to the building.

"And I was asking you why don't you just go in?"

He furrowed his brow and looked over at her again, head cocked slightly to the side. "What do you mean?"

"You keep staring at the foreign language building. Why don't you just go in?"

"Why would I-"

"Because you know Erik works in there." She smiled. "He'd be happy to see you."

Charles frowned. He had been trying to ignore the fact that whenever he wasn't at war with himself over Logan or studying that he was thinking about the Professor. He was trying to ignore it because he knew he liked the man a lot but he'd just gotten out of a long relationship with someone and he was still trying to convince himself he broke up with Logan because it was the best thing for him and not because he had a thing for Erik.

But that didn't stop him from each day he had classes this week hoping he'd run into the professor so he wouldn't be directly seeking him out. He stayed a little later at the library working each day for the same reason, in fact he spent more time looking around to see if Erik had come in than he did on his thesis.

"Come on. I was heading over to meet him for lunch, come with us." Raven said with a smile as she got up and offered him her hand. He stared up at her then looked at her hand before he nodded and grabbed his books. Taking her hand he stood then brushed himself off.

It would be okay to go to lunch with him if Raven was there, because if Raven was there then it really would only be lunch. If it was only lunch then feelings really wouldn't be involved because he wouldn't be having a one on one conversation with Erik. Raven turned away from him and started walking toward the build he'd been staring at. While she was turned away he took the time to fix his hair, which had grown out far too much and needed a serious cutting sometime soon.

She looked back at him and smiled seeing him messing with his hair and straightening his clothes. "Hurry up, you look fine."

His gaze shot to her as a red tint spread from the bridge of his nose to the tips of his ears. Lowering his head to attempt to hide the blush he started to follow her.


It turned out Erik was in the middle of teaching a class so Raven pulled him in through the back way and forced him into a seat in the middle row, right in the line of sight for when Erik turned around to face the large class. Raven watched both of their reactions to each other, Charles had taken a sharp breath and the blush had returned, darker than before while Erik had stopped speaking a moment and smiled slightly then glanced over at her before returning to his lesson.

Charles felt like a schoolgirl with a crush on her teacher and he probably looked the part too but he didn't care. He couldn't help but watch Erik's every movement in front of the class with a dopy grin on his face while leaning forward in his seat so that he could hear that amazing accent just a little better.

He'd been paying so much attention to Erik that he hadn't noticed that Raven had slipped out of the classroom until Erik dismissed the class a bit early. He looked around for her but she was nowhere to be found. His attention was drawn to Erik as the man made his way over closer to him.

"Hallo there." Erik smiled looking down at a wide eyed Charles who remained sitting in the desk.

"H-Hi." He managed a faint smile. He fidgeted with his hands on the desk, trying to calm the nerves that were making his stomach to flips and fill with butterflies. Yes, he was getting butterflies like he wasn't already school girlish enough at the moment. "Raven invited me for lunch with you both but she seems to have disappeared…" He laughed nervously.

Why was he acting like this? He hadn't been this nervous around Erik before, before he had played it pretty cool most of the time. Maybe because before he was taken and he knew nothing was supposed come of spending time with Erik, now something could.

"Well Raven has seemed to vanish but do you still want to go get lunch?" Erik asked, setting a hand over top of Charles' to stop his fidgeting.

Another blush spread over Charles' cheeks at the light contact and he was rendered completely speechless. Erik was watching him though, waiting for him to answer so he just nodded which earned him a slight smile from the older man.

Charles happily started to gather his things so they could go when he caught sight of the time. He had one of his more important classed in less than twenty minutes. Realizing he wasn't able to go out with Erik he felt his heart start to sink. He stood up, unable to look at Erik when he delivered the disappointing news. "I-It turns out I actually can't, I have class soon. I'm sorry…"

"Rain-check then?"

Charles' gaze immediately locked with Erik's as a brilliant smile formed on his lips and he nodded. "That would be wonderful."

Erik smiled at the way Charles' deep blue eyes seemed to sparkle with as much joy as his smile held. "Then how about tonight at eight o'clock, dinner, my treat?"

"A-alright… Let me give you my number." Charles set is bag down and took out a pen before he took Erik's hand and scribbled his number down on his palm. He looked up at Erik, biting his lower lip but still smiling once he had finished. In response Erik pressed a sudden, quick kiss to his cheek before whispering in his ear that he'd see him tonight.

A dark blush spread over his entire face as butterflies swarmed in his stomach and made him weak in the knees. Quickly, he exited the classroom before he could collapsed or fainted or embarrassing himself at all in front of Erik.

Once he fully collected himself he headed to his class, unable to wipe the grin off his face.