On days like these, the kind with a soft blanket of snow and more falling from above it's easy to remember. Remember the times before their own hair turned to snow, or nothing at all (Erik can almost hear Charles scoffing at that) There's something particularly sweet about today though, about them in Charles office curled together on a sofa watching the snowdrops fall as though dancing.
If they focused they could hear the children laughing as they threw snowballs, and the sounds below of dinner being made. But here, together, warm and happy they hear only each other, feel only the gentle rise and fall of their chests. It's idealic, beautifully so, Charles had brought a book, abandoned now on the table as he just rested. Erik was humming something familiar, hand stroking Charles shoulder.
Hours could pass like this, in quiet, muted warmth a direct opposite to the weather. And now they were older they let it, no more hard as ice, no more storm clouds with rain. Just soft gentle snow, floating together, joining up together to make something so beautiful. As they got older, wiser (some would argue) they got softer too. Past pains dulled, the icy touch turned warm. They'd healed both together and apart, part of a school, part of a family.
Tomorrow would come, and with it would come the complications they are forgetting. The tense tender way Erik would celebrate Hunnaka, the cold and flu season, the snow to be moved so Charles could go outside again. Tomorrow would come, but they'd be okay. They'd been okay so far, and blanketed by snow, or blanketed in woolen blankets they'd survive.