He's fallen—again—and his back is aching something awful and his head is throbbing where he smacked it on something and the end table that his great-grandfather hand carved is in pieces (so naturally he's also bleeding on the rug) and Charles is positively wallowing in self pity. All he wanted was to eat a stupid orange while he graded book reports and tried to ignore the effect that the weather was having on his back, so of course he promptly fumbled it, and then when he tried to use the end table to transfer himself to the floor to retrieve it the end table collapsed, and just to literally add insult to injury his crash landing caused his chair to scoot halfway across the room.
Could he drag himself over there? Yes. Is he feeling like it? No. He is not feeling like acting the calm and collected professor that his students are allowed to see. He's feeling like lying right there and having a bloody good sulk.
A knock. He can feel that it's Hank, and can feel the mixture of concern and curiosity characteristic of someone who's just heard a loud crash from a colleague's study. Particularly a colleague that that someone has long since labeled a "fall risk" and "bad at asking for help".
"Charles? Everything alright?"
He really wants to ignore him and have his pity party in privacy.
…He also knows that the other man knows perfectly well that he's in there and is going to come check on him if he doesn't respond. He could go into Hank's head and make him go away, but he's promised not to do that and if he's being honest with himself Hank is the only person still in his life that he's willing to let see him vulnerable (seeing as he already has, many times, to greatly understate it).
Fuck. Fine. I may have chosen the wrong object to brace myself on. He admits telepathically.
A wave of concern, because Hank is obnoxiously good at reading between the lines by now, and then the sound of the doorknob turning. Charles hastily pushes himself up on his elbows in an attempt to make his predicament look less bad.
"Hey Hank. Come to rescue me?"
The forced casualness doesn't seem to be fooling him. "You could have called for help instead of waiting for someone to come along. We both know you're more than capable of it." He drops to his knees next to Charles, scanning him for injuries because damnit, of course Beast could smell the blood. Probably before he even walked into the room. "Let's see that arm."
Charles obediently shifts his weight to the other side and holds out his bleeding forearm for examination. "I didn't particularly want help."
Hank doesn't overtly roll his eyes, but Charles can feel that he's doing it mentally. "Well, luckily you're not going to need stitches for this. Any other injuries I need to know about before I go fetch bandages?"
"Minor egg on my head." He admits. "Superficial, I promise. Just smarts a bit. And I've got a med kit in the cabinet to the right of the mini fridge."
"Of course you do." He can hear the mixture of amusement, relief, and resignation in Hank's voice as much as feel it, and doesn't need to go into his mind to know that he's drawn the (accurate) conclusion that Charles hurts himself more than he lets on. To be fair, it's usually minor cuts, scrapes, and burns on his legs because he wasn't paying attention and didn't feel it happening.
They don't talk while Hank cleans and bandages his arm, then shifts into full Beast to scoop him up like he's weightless. He should hate it, yet another reminder of how fucking helpless he is, but the affection radiating off of the only person he can be vulnerable around makes it…tolerable. At this particular moment, anyway.
"Alright, up you get, back on your wheels."
Oh. No. Charles doesn't want that. He doesn't really want to sit up and act like a rational adult right now. He'd quite like to rest his aching back and sulk about how his afternoon is going, thank you very much.
He's not sure whether the whine of disapproval is audible or psychic (or under his breath and Beast's hearing is just too good) but Hank has definitely heard it because he halts.
"No? Uh. Okay. Windowseat?"
That works. It has plenty of pillows to nest in and support his back. He nods wordlessly against Hank's shoulder.
There's a pause, and Charles realizes belatedly that Hank had tried to start to set him down and he hadn't loosened his grip to allow it, but Hank has already changed tacks and is now climbing into the windowseat himself and settling Charles in his lap.
Well then.
Okay.
Actually, he…doesn't mind this. A bit of squirming and he's got the full length of his back pressed against a warm Beast, who is radiating affection stronger than ever, and he just melts.
"Comfortable?" Hank asks with a note of amusement, handing him an ice pack which Charles gratefully presses to the bump on his head.
"The weather is making my back ache." He informs him with what little dignity he can muster at this point. "You make an excellent hot water bottle."
"You're having a pretty rotten afternoon, huh?" Claws gently comb through his long hair and Charles vows to keep it long forever.
"Yeah." His voice cracks a little. It's getting to him today, the chronic pain and the helplessness and how complicated everything is and the isolation of projecting the image of being okay when he's definitely not okay.
"Any other issues to suggest the implants need tweaking?" A rush of uncertainty.
"The implants are working as well as they ever have." He reassures Hank firmly, making himself as heavy as possible against the other man's chest in a silent signal of don't you dare try to get up. "We knew they would only ever be an aid not a solution by themselves."
"….As much as you desperately wish they could stand alone." Hank finishes for him.
"Well, yeah." He pauses. "But yes, this is normal. Pressure changes still make my back tetchy, but it's now a pain level where I'm able to function and go about my day." And he can tell Hank is about to say something, so he hurriedly preempts "and if you ask me a question about my bathroom habits, so help me god I will go back on my promise not to fuck with your brain and you will spend the rest of your days on four legs wearing a dorky service dog vest and thinking you're a Labrador."
Hank seems amused rather than threatened by the threat, which is good because he'd never actually do it. "Just promise me you'll say something if adjustments need to be made."
"I promise." Charles closes his eyes. He's probably pushing his luck, but he feels so…raw, he supposes. The affection radiating from Hank, and the warmth against his back, and the, well, cuddling, is sort of intoxicating. When was the last time he cuddled with someone? Not being steadied or manipulated or otherwise touched in a clinical way, not being cradled on a beach thinking he might be dying, not sex with a revolving door of co-eds, cuddling. Raven, probably? His sister nestling into his side on a couch, more years ago than he cares to think about? Evidently he's starved for it, because he never wants to move from this spot.
A fruity smell gets his attention. (Did he doze, briefly? The light coming in the window doesn't seem to have changed.) Hank's claws have made quick work of peeling the orange that caused the whole mess, and he's waving a slice under his nose. Charles reaches up to accept it, and Hank pulls it away, teasing him.
Charles narrows his eyes. Hank brings it back in, close enough that Charles barely has to move to pounce and grab it in his mouth straight out of Hank's hand. Which seems to be exactly what he was hoping would happen, judging by the flare of emotions.
He hand feeds Charles two more slices, without any games, before Charles gets bold and takes the fourth in his mouth slowly, just lightly flicking the tip of one of Hank's fingers with his tongue in the process.
Hank gulps. Charles smirks through his mouthful of orange. Game on.
He may not be able to physically feel the effect it's having on Hank when he grabs his wrist and puts his mouth to use cleaning the fruit juices from his claws, but he's a telepath. He knows.
Author's Note:
The implants mentioned are fully (enough) fleshed out in my head and will be described in more detail in another story I'm writing, there just wasn't a way to smoothly insert that exposition into this story since both characters are already intimately familiar with how they work. The short version is they're based on real life implanted neural stimulators but modified by the combined genius of Charles and Hank, and they lessen/provide somewhat clunky workarounds to some of the issues that come with the type of spinal cord injury that he's supposed to have. It was my way of getting around some of the inaccuracy in the way his paralysis is portrayed, and once I came up with it I really liked it and some of the possibilities it opened up to me for plot devices in the other story.
Also. Now that I have the attention of the X-Men fandom, I could use help with some of my other WIPs! Specifically writing Erik, who has gone rogue and informed me that his faith is more important to the stories involving him than I initially thought. I was raised an atheist with a purely academic understanding of religion, so I'd love some sort of consultant/beta/co-writer helping me make sure I don't make stupid mistakes when writing a character whose Jewish identity and faith is important to him (but is often shy about showing it due to his background).