Erik snorts a breath-stripped ripple of laughter at that, palming the back of Charles' neck and curling fingers into the v where his hair hits; it feels impossibly daring for as light a touch as it is. "As if it were so easy."

He smooths a hand down Charles' spine as if he's counting his vertebrae like someone else would count pearls, each more precious than their own weight. "I couldn't lose you. And before you're moved to call me anything so unflattering as 'idiot,' may I point out that only the one of us can read minds."

Which is only a little unfair, Erik has kept this as far under his skin as possible, as if desire lived in his marrow. He ducks his head again to kiss Charles on the mouth, not tentative, but still testing, tongue tracing the seam of Charles' lips in a wet, voltiac thrill that shoots a bolt of liquid heat into the pit of his stomach and kindles there like slick flames racing along a spill of oil. That combined with Charles' new and bravely tried nearness alone could shake him apart, he thinks, and he's nearly self-mocking at his own poetry. He's rarely had time for sex; with rare exceptions he has expressed it as a biological need, something to be dealt with, fed like hunger and forgotten.

But Charles knows him, down to the clutch of anger that filters his blood like so much iron, knows him and still wants; it doesn't belittle anyone who came before him, but he is the first person Erik has never had to lie to, and that means something. He can't seem to decide where to put his hands, so he settles on just completing the shift that hooks them together from shoulder to thigh, palm back at Charles' neck as Erik buries his cheek in the crown of his hair, some dark and incomprehensible noise muffled there. "I refuse to keep carrying on like teenagers in the goddamn kitchen," he mutters, "I do have some dignity left."

Blasphemy. What you hath wrought, Charles.