my loathsome lover (cherik fanfic)

chapter 7

"You've thought through it all
How we loved and loved
And how we fought each other,
Pushing one another to be somebody else...."  (for king and country, love's to blame)

Charles was looking for Hank, who normally spent his days in the lab. He wanted to ask him about a solution to the sleeping-problem. He was certain that Hank could figure something out that wasn't as massive as the helmet. But he was a bit afraid of his reaction to their relationship, especially since Hank wasn't fond of Erik at all. He dreaded going there for a few days, but ultimately forced himself to go through with it, because he couldn't stay away from Erik any longer. And spending time with him meant dealing with the helmet.

When he entered, the young scientist ran over to him immediately, shaking his hand. "It's good to see you here, Professor. How can I help you?" Hank was working on many innovative technologies that were helping a lot of students, and he started to build a war plane again just in case. Raven convinced Charles to take safety matters more seriously and he acted accordingly.

"I need a favour. One you might not particularly like."

Charles wasn't sure how to explain the whole situation to him. No one except Raven knew about his relationship with Erik and he didn't even know if he could call it that. They still hadn't talked about it and kept their encounters very private. "It's about Erik," he said and made a long pause. "And me,..." he started off, but he had always been pretty awkward about these things and this time it was even worse.

"I'm not exactly following, Professor." Never in a million years would Hank imagine those two being a thing, so obviously he wasn't taking the hint - much to Charles' discontent. "Does Erik have some kind of problem, again? Because I'm sorry, but I don't think anyone can truly help this man. He complains about everything all the time."

Charles forced himself not to react too harshly to Hank's very obvious distaste towards Erik, since he relied on his help. "No- well yes. But it's not just about him. He has terrible nightmares and I happen to experience them, which is quite inconvenient as you probably can imagine," he explained quite quickly. Maybe he didn't have to mention their close relationship at all? "I hoped you might figure something out that is a little more practical than the helmet." Especially something that won't remind him of Cuba.

"I'm sorry, but I just have to ask a few questions - for research purposes and out of curiosity. How is that even possible? Erik's room is on the other side of the school. That's quite a long distance.Shouldn't you experience everyone's dreams and nightmares then? Although it's never been an issue before, as far as I know, right?"

"Oh- yeah. It's not exactly like that. I've never slept wi- next to someone like Erik before... bloody hell..." It was going just as terribly as Charles had expected. And the look on Hank's face was priceless - he never had seen him so surprised and horrified all at once. The telepath quickly answered his questions before he could say them out loud. "Yes, we are together in some capacity and I would very much appreciate it if this info could remain between us."

"Uhm- of course. But Professor, you're talking about dating a terrorist and mass murderer. Not to mention the man who paralyzed you. I don't think that's a wise decision. What is everyone going to think about this, especially the parents? It might cause a scandal. Some people were already very vocal when you let him live here. Besides, students and teachers look up to you. You inspire them. Someone like Erik Lehnsherr shouldn't have an influence on anyone and he's inevitably going to."

"My love life is no one else's business and I'm going to keep it that way. Besides, I wasn't asking for your opinion, Hank. I'm perfectly capable of making decisions on my own and I'm simply asking whether you can help me out or not." Charles was trying very hard not to turn this into a big discussion, that was going to result in nothing anyway. He felt no need to listen to Hank's rude comments about Erik. His response made Hank calm down a bit.