Chapter Text
How Charles’s Morning Began
“When was the last time you had sex?”
It was official, Charles would never have a peaceful morning. All he wanted was to sit in his sunroom, drink some tea, do a crossword and enjoy his morning without anything breaking, smashing, blowing up or being questioned by rebellious teenagers or nosey sisters. But that hadn’t happened in the last four years, so it was silly to get his hopes up now.
“You asked me the same question last week and my answer still hasn’t changed.” He hoped that would put an end to Raven’s continuous questioning but all it did was antagonize her. She took a moment to take a large bite out of her tea biscuit, crumbs flying everywhere and the contents peeking out from her lips as she puffed them out like a chipmunk. Raven wasn’t known for her graceful eating habits.
“And I’m pretty sure you avoided the question last week. So tell me darling brother, when was the last time you bonked anyone!” Raven continued. Charles let out a sigh; he flipped the page of his newspaper scanning through the contents of the political articles discussing the current state of national affairs.
“When did I take in my first foster child?” he asked flipping to the next page. Raven took a moment to think, her fingers coming out to count. He caught some slicing of the invisible numbers to indicate she was subtracting.
“Dear heavens Raven, must I acquire a tutor for you as well?” he asked chuckling as he flipped the page falling into the entertainment section.
“Shut up, I’m counting,” she answered with an intense look. Charles arched a brow and watched her closely for about five more seconds before she came up with her answer.
“2008!”
“There’s your answer,” and with that Charles flipped to the back page where the comics and the sought after crossword lay. Charles sat up straight in his seat eager to begin fishing for words. However the moment his pen touched the paper the table below him jumped. Charles heart stopped for a minute as his pen scribbled across the small boxes.
“Shut the fuck up,” she screeched with a tight grin across her lips, he could already hear the giggles building her throat attempting to escape those red lips and mock him for all he was worth. He had heard it all before.
“Language Raven, just because you’re not one of my charges doesn’t mean I will tolerate that kind of vulgarity in this household.”
Plus even though most of his kids had passed the age of parroting, they still jumped on the chance to toss vulgar words left right and center. It wasn’t until Charles had actually taken soap to Alex’s mouth one time did he stop dropping the f-bomb everywhere he liked. Needless to say whenever the urge arised to swear, Alex discussed the faint taste of dove soap at the back of his throat.
“You mean you haven’t bumped uglies since Moira found your man-porn stash?”
“Where in gods name do you pick up this sort of language Raven? I’m fairly certain we attended the same schooling and there they did teach us basic vocabulary skills,” he said attempting to ignore her previous comment.
“What can I say. I Americanized,” she said with a devilish grin. True, both Charles and Raven had emigrated from Great Britain to the Americas some-time ago. Charles held onto his English roots were as Raven drowned herself in the United States culture.
“Stop skirting around the issue Charles, what’s been keeping you from getting naked and sweaty?” she asked prodding his knee with her foot. Charles felt heat rise in his face. She always did this, questioning him and pushing for the intimate details of his sexual life, but like hell he was going to tell her. Time to divert.
“So Raven, how goes the acting business mmh? I trust you’ve landed a part in which you will be clothed?”
Raven’s eyes shot open and her lips contorted in embarrassment. Bullseye. Charles couldn’t help the smirk that grew from his lips as his pen danced across the crossword, filling in words as they came to him.
“Low blow Xavier. You know I didn’t know it was an audition for a damned porno,” she yelled kicking him in the shin just for good measure. Charles laughed rubbing bruising pain that blossomed across his shin.
“Darling, the fact that they required medical documentation of any recent vaginal infections should have clearly demonstrated what type of position or positions you were auditioning for.”
Raven booted him under the table yet again for good measure. He flinched and blocked his shins with his hands this time, laughing at how red his sister was growing over the recent discussion of her near dance with the porn industry. Oddly enough they loved her soft-core work of simple acting and touching so they used it and incorporated a body double for the intimate scenes. Needless to say when Raven brought home the DVD and asked both Charles and his-then-girlfriend-Moira to sit in and watch, they were not expecting to see so much of Raven.
Before Raven could snap the conversation back on Charles’ lack of sex, a loud screeched echoed down the hallway. Both adults froze eyes wide and minds’ racing to figure out what was going on.
“THIS IS WHY BIRTH CONTROL WAS INVENTED!”
Both Raven and Charles were out of their seats and running for the door to the run room. Charles gave a playful hip check knocking Raven into the glass window and out of his way as he made it out the door first. Raven made a grab for that damned blue cardigan of his but he ducked out just in time.
Moving from the sunroom to the kitchen and out into the hallway that lead to the main lobby, Charles caught sight of Ms. Coulter franticly packing her papers in her brief case screeching about how she understands now why parents smother their children.
Charles was then taken aback by the profanity she screeched up the staircase towards a young Alex who sat there smugly leaning against the banister. At least until he caught sight of Charles glaring in his direction. He’d only seen Alex run and hide that fast when he brought out the soap.
Raven halted behind Charles raced up the stairs after Charles gave her the go ahead to check up on the children.
Charles carefully edged towards the angry woman. Her hair was in disarray and her glasses were crooked, emphasis her distress.
“Melanie?” calling her by her first name snapped her from her rant but immediately drew her attention Charles.
“YOU!” she snapped. Charles instinctively flinched and drew back protecting areas of great interest preferably his genital region. Her perfectly manicured nails were pointed in his direction, the index finger fully extended and threatening to poke his eye clear out of its socket. She advanced on Charles backing him up against one of standing antique lamps that illuminated the lobby. He was stuck between a lamp and a vicious woman who looked like she was going to eat him alive.
Her pupils were dilated and her chest heaving as she shook her hand vigorously.
“You left me alone with those-those THINGS! Those aren’t children! Those are mutant little creatures that live to torment good women like me!” she screeched again stabbing her finger into Charles chest. He thanked god for layers right now because he could feel the sharp point begin to bruise with each jab.
“Please Melanie, you are a excellent tutor and the children love you-”
“LOVE TO TORTURE ME!” she interjected. Charles raised his hands in peace not wanting to argue.
“Nevertheless! Maybe if I talked to them and discussed the important of your lessons and disciplinary actions involving disobedience-”
“NO!” she screeched again. “Lose my number Charles Xavier! I will never again teach those delinquents! I’m quitting, leaving Westchester and moving back to Texas where I can properly arm myself incase those little devils ever come looking for ME!”
And with that Melanie Coulter, the children’s tutor for the last week and third of this month, grabbed her belongings, tossed her brief case back against her rear and stormed out cracking her heels across the marble floor. If he didn’t already know that Melanie barely weighed over 120lbs he could have sworn she did in fact crack the marble. She turned grabbing the door handle and slammed it with all her might. The door kicked closed and shook everything around him, the chandelier above quivered along with the decorate suits of armor.
Charles suddenly felt the distinctive urge to wet himself.
With a trembling sigh Charles collected himself and put on the best yourintonsofshit face he could manage and headed up the stairs. He took a sharp right and headed towards the study that he had sectioned off for the after school tutoring sessions. He caught the distinctive laugh of Raven and sped up bursting in through the open door with conviction.
“What in gods name did you children do to that poor woman!” he yelled. He had confronted the four male charges were in all states of emotions. Sean, the curly red head was sprawled across the couch; his feet kicked up on the arm rests appearing to be calm, cool and collected. Darwin, the olive skinned boy was sitting in his desk with his head in his hand shaking in back and forth. Hank, the lanky awkward one, looked like he was going to piss his pants the second Charles made it into the room and Alex, the blond defiant boy was leaned against the tutor’s desk with a smug look of satisfaction. Before he could question them again, Raven’s distinctive snort shot through the room as she struggled to hold herself up from laughing so hard. Charles gave her a quizzical look mouthing ‘what?’ to her.
Raven continued to belly laugh stumbling behind the desk and pulling with her the large leather chair. The chair provided her with support as she nearly dropped to her knees pulling the chair with her twice before she turned it towards Charles.
His eyebrows hit his hairline as he looked down towards the leather chair, the antique leather chair.
“They glued her ass to the chair!” and with that Raven lost all composure and dropped to her knees laughing hysterically. At one point she was on her back rolling back and forth.
Charles just continued to stare at the chair which had the remainders of a cream colored pencil skirt, a perfect heart shape at been ripped from the fabric. He reached over and tested the material and found that it wouldn’t budge.
It had been super glued.
No wonder she stormed out in a huff.
Charles stifled the temptation to laugh because that would only encourage Alex to do it again to the next tutor.
Oh god, the next tutor. Charles rubbed his face and let out a defeated sigh with Raven still rolling on the ground laughing.
“Let me get my date book…” he mumbled. Time to search for the fourth tutor of the month of November for his evil charges.
Four hours alter and over fifty phone calls, Charles still hadn’t received a call back from anyone.
How Erik’s Morning Began
“Erik, I want a divorce.”
Erik nearly slopped his soup all over his turtle neck when those words escaped his wife’s lips. He lifted his head, eyes wide in shock, spoon inches from his lips and a death grip on the bowl of his Chunky Beef Stew.
“Pardon?”
“You heard me!” Magda’s arms cross over her chest as her hip cocked out in that irritating manner. It always meant Erik was on the shit list that night, “I want a divorce!”
Erik felt the tension in the air build as everyone in the staff room froze. Magda always had a flare for the dramatics so of course she decided to discuss this while the staff was in the lounge on lunch. The silence throughout the room was deafening. Last year the janitorial staff made the staff lounge sound proof so that the students screeching and walking wouldn’t disrupt the teacher’s lunch or breaks. Unfortunately it had grown so quiet in this longue that the echoing of the student voices and footsteps were pulled to the forefront.
Erik turned his head to see how everyone was reacting to this, a few people turned their heads the second Erik’s eyes caught theirs, were as some just stared dumbfounded at Magda for the ballsy move she had completed. In fact Stan was inches away from burning his hand on scolding coffee before Erik snapped at him. Stan stopped pouring but not staring; he actually missed his mouth and dumped the coffee down his front.
“Magda, please Liebling let’s talk about this. Maybe somewhere private?” Erik clenched his jaw, words seething through his teeth as he struggled to keep his composure. Where the fuck had this come from?
Magda’s eyes narrowed and her foot stomped, “I’m done talking Erik, I want out of this marriage,” she demanded.
“Done talking?! We haven’t even started – what in hells name brought this on!” Erik yelled back. Magda stood her ground as she clenched her hands around her biceps, the rage and hate seeping out from her pores. Erik noticed a few staff member backing up against the wall in attempts to get away.
“We have talked Erik! You were just too busy to listen! You never come home! You’re always locked away in that damned Büro of yours! Where were you when I needed you?!” she screeched. Erik wasn’t going to take this sitting down. With a crash he dropped his spoon and slammed his bowl.
“Where was I?! I was working, making some money for us and our family so that we wouldn’t have to live in a hole like we had to before!”
“We have enough money Erik! You were just trying to get away from me! From my needs!”
“Bullshit!” Erik bellowed, “I’ve bent over backwards for you are your needs!”
“When was the last time we had sex?” Erik heard everyone in the room inhale and hold on for dear life. A few people ducked out of the room fast and slammed the door on their way out. At least some people had the decency to leave.
Erik felt his jaw pop as he struggled to keep from lunging at her. His fist curled and knuckles went white, the distinct red coiled around his throat and made its way across his face.
“You’re bringing this up now?” he said quietly. His jaw was clenched so tight he thought he was going to shatter his teeth.
“Now is as good of time as any! Seriously Erik, you haven’t touched me since the kids got separate rooms!”
“NOT FOR LACK OF TRYING!” he yelled moving away from the table and advancing on his wife.
“It’s always, ‘Oh I’m too tired’, or ‘Oh the kids might hear us’!” he said in his best impersonation of his wife which caused her own face to burn with rage.
“Calling the kettle black, aren’t we Erik! How many times did I have to go out and buy those damned videos you like just to get you stiff enough!”
“Enough!” Erik roared. Magda flinched, but only for a moment. Erik felt his rage bubble and boil in his blood. He wanted to throttle her, and he could feel his hands uncoil to do so. She had come to his place of work, embarrassed him in front of his colleagues and now was parading their sex life in front of everyone. It took every ounce of willpower not to snap. He continued to stare Magda down, her own eyes faltering for only a moment to allow for tears to build up. His heart cracked at the sight of it all. He never liked it when Magda cried, but he couldn’t ignore what she had just done.
“No Erik, I won’t shut my mouth any longer. I want a divorce, I need someone who will take care of me, who will love me,” he could hear the quivering in her voice as she spoke. The predator inside of him told him to attack now while he had the upper hand, while she was weak. The husband told him to let it be.
“Who was he?” Magda looked genuinely stunned.
“Pardon?”
“The man you were having an affair with and that brought this all on. Who. Is. He?” Erik leaned in and annunciated each word at the end driving home his suspicions that his wife had been unfaithful. Magda lips clamped in a firm line as she turned her gaze away from Erik. He couldn’t help but give a toothy grin as his wife was the first to flinch and gave away her position.
“This isn’t about him Erik, this is about you and me and how I can’t be married to you anymore-”
“Who. Is. He.” Erik pressed again getting into Magda’s bubble as he spoke. She backed up momentarily before hardening.
“Mike.”
“Mike?”
“Mike Carter.”
“Gay Mike?!” Erik screeched. Magda immediately went on the defensive shoving Erik back away from her, her face flared in rage at his accusation.
“He’s not gay, he’s eccentric,” she yelled back at him.
“No Magda, he’s gay!”
“Is not!”
“Is to, him and Stan were caught fucking in the janitors closet at the last year’s Christmas party!”
“Hey! You swore-”
“Shut up Stan!” Erik screamed at his colleague. Stan clamped his mouth shut and tried to hide his face behind his coffee mug as other staff members turned their gazes towards him. Erik didn’t care that he might have just ousted a fellow teacher. He wanted to kill Mike, rip him limb from limb and make him suffer for touching his wife. Sure things were rocky, but that was marriage. You fixed it. Or at least Erik thought you could.
Magda’s face dropped. He could see the exhaustion cracking through the mask she had built. His wife was tired of him, and couldn’t take it anymore. Guilt flooded his body as his chest ached. Her eyes began to fill with unshed tears and Erik made a move to hug her.
Magda’s arm snapped out and caught his wrist.
“No Erik, you had your chance to do something about this and you missed it. I’m moving back into my parents and I’m taking Wanda and Pietro. I’m not heartless, you can see your children but I can’t go home to you anymore…” she said holding back the sobs that threatened to break out of her chest. Erik’s eyes softened and pulled his hand back. Dropping him into his pockets Erik gave his wife space as she re-composed herself. She brushed her hair away from her eyes and inhaled deeply settling the tears. She gave Erik a curt nod and headed towards the door which opened before she got a chance to touch it.
In walked Mike Carter completely unaware of what had just happened.
“Hey guys. Oh! Hi Magda, how have you been? – Why is Erik looking at me like that?”
Before anyone could scream at Mike to run, Erik had launched himself over the staff table and latched onto Mike. Mike screeched the girliest screech as he flung the door open toppling out and was then slammed into the opposing lockers by over 200lbs of muscle and Erik Lehnsherr. His hands found their way around Mike’s throat as he began to squeeze bashing his head off the lockers and causing the students to run screaming. The staff piled out of the lounge grabbing and pulling at Erik to get him off Mike, but whenever they managed to get a hand off of Mike, Erik just took the opportunity to punch Mike in the face. This went on for about five minutes until one of the students managed to get the physical education and wood working teacher, along with the janitors to come and pry Erik off of Mike.
And even then they strained to do so.
Mike had a broken cheek bone, bruised larynx, busted eye socket and a bruised kidney. Erik wasn’t fired, but was asked to take some time off to deal with his “anger issues” as the Principal had put it. Magda had collected the children, packed an overnight kit and headed to her parents for the week, leaving Erik in an empty house with a sledge hammer and a stocked liquor cabinet.
How Erik and Charles Met
Charles hated chain stores. He felt that there was no soul to the big corporate buildings, were as a local grocer or store owner took pride and care in their business. Unfortunately, the only places that were open at 11 o’clock at night on Sunday were the big chain-stores that could afford to be open.
Charles originally came just to grab a bag of 2% milk and some cream for his tea. Now he was stuck on the phone with Raven who was relaying demands from the children about snacks and movies they wanted him to pick up.
“Tell Alex there is no way on god’s green earth he is getting red bull. Not after what happened the last time he and Sean drank a twenty-four case…” Both boys had managed to hang most of the laundry from the chandelier in the lobby, pull everything from the cupboards and set it on the counter and overfill the bathtub with bubblegum scented bubble bath. You can still see the pink stain in the boy’s bathroom from the amount they poured in.
He could hear Alex and Sean arguing about what substitutions they wanted for the energy drinks but none of the options sounded appealing.
“How about I just grab what I left the house to grab and then head home so we can finish watching the movie?”
“Oh that? We turned it off, it was lame,” Raven said dryly.
“Lame!” Charles stopped in the middle of the isle and turned to glare at his phone, “I have you know that film won a dozen academy awards!”
“Charles, I don’t care how perfect you think it is, but Chicago is lame and boring. You’re the only one in this household who enjoys Broadway musicals,”
“You’re all just a bunch of uncultured hooligans…” he mumbled.
“All I hear is bitchbitchbitch. Now, go to the movie aisle and grab us Wanted, jiffy pop and a couple bottles of coke before we all die of boredom.”
Charles made a face and mimicked Ravens voice to himself, who immediately snapped back at him to stop whinnying and to hurry up. Charles never felt so childish in his life.
After getting lost, then finding, the losing the movie aisle, Charles managed to grab the last few items on his list and then proceeded to head to the check out. There were only three women standing at the cash, two had costumers they were attending to while the other scrubbed her station. Her light was still lit signaling that she was open but Charles was always wary of interrupting people when they were working.
Charles made his way slowly towards the cash clearing his throat so that the woman would look up.
“Uhm, are you open?” he asked.
“Oh yes, of course,” she said wiping her hands on her pants. She straightened her blouse and name tag, brushing her brown hair from her face. She turned towards her cash punching some numbers in as Charles settled his purchases on the counter. Standing with his hands in his pockets he watched as the woman rang through his items. It was awfully quiet and although Charles enjoyed silence – he hated awkward silence. Taking a quick peek at her name tag he decided to make some small talk.
“So… Magda, how has your evening been?”
The woman gave a soft smile. Charles immediately frowned at the sight because he knew that look; something was troubling the poor woman deeply.
“Oh you know it has had its ups and downs...” she said softly.
“Really care to share?” The woman gave a soft shake and a chuckle.
“Oh please, no one wants to listen to my problems,”
“On the contrary, listening to people is what I do for a living darling. I’m a therapist and I’m willing to provide a free session,” he said with a comforting smile. Charles had originally gone into school for genetics and he still had a true passion for the science, but after hard years of bullying he decided he could help people in the best possible way by giving them someone to talk to about their problems.
Magda turned to look up at Charles with disbelieving eyes. He reached out and touched her shoulder, his thumb rubbing her muscle to ease the tension. It was by all means platonic, nothing sexual about it.
“If you don’t have the time now, here is my card and feel free to call me anytime.”
Charles retrieved a plain white business card from his sweater-vest (he’d heard it all before thanks to Raven, he knew just how tacky his sweater-vests were) and handed it off to Magda who took it with a smile.
“Thank you.” She then proceeded to ring through the rest of Charles purchase which he paid cash for.
Charles headed out the automatic doors double-checking his receipt for miscalculations. He didn’t want to seem like a technophobe, but he never trusted those damned machines what ever happened to intellect.
That was when he heard the distinct sound of metal against metal. Or rather metal smashing into metal. Charles looked up and nearly died of cardiac arrest at the sight.
A man was on top of Charles' silver ford focus, bashing it apart with a sledge hammer. He watched him pull back the hammer and slam it with all his might into the windshield of his poor little car. The man had already gone to town on the rest of his car. The driver’s side door was dented in and missing its window. The hood was dented and bent up; the latch long gone and flopping open in the wind. His right signals and lights were all bashed it; the plastic coating gone and the bulb exposed or rather what was left of the bulbs. His back window was none existence and he caught the sight of his trunk door lying on the ground. All the while he did this he cursed and swore using every vulgar dirty word in the English language and a few in some other languages too.
Charles thought he might have to take a shower after listening to this man, who was now bouncing on the roof before he screamed four and pulled the sledge hammer back down punched a hole through it. Charles didn’t dare look at the other side of his car.
“WHAT THE BLOODY HELL ARE YOU DOING!” Charles screeched. He didn’t think his voice could go that high, but it did and it stopped the man from making the hole in his roof into a sunroof.
“Bashing in my ex-wife’s car,” he said casually before pulling the sledge hammer back to have another go at roof.
“Stop! That’s my car you dolt!” Charles yelled back running up to his car in an attempt to grab the sledge hammer from the crazed man. Unfortunately Charles a good few feet shorter than the giant that stood atop his car. Charles would have admired the view, he was tall, strong, broad and his body was coated with a thin layer of sweat from the havoc he wreaked on the vehicle, but instead he was trying not to climb up there and throttle him.
“No I’m pretty sure this is my ex-wife’s car,” he said with certainty. It wasn’t until Charles was yanking on his pant leg did he notice that the man was swaying and the distinct smell of scotch wafted from him.
Oh god the moron was drunk as a skunk.
“I beg to differ, the insurance papers and ownership in my glove compartment clearly state that I own what is left of this ford focus, no thanks to you.” Charles voice snapped with venom, spitting the last few words out to try and get the man’s attention.
He crouched down for a moment, his knees bending and arm coming to prop up on his knee while the other gripped the sledge hammer. He came so close to Charles he could almost tell you the year of Scotch he binged on which caused Charles’s face to flush. The man was extremely attractive, bright blue-green eyes, some soft stubble, strong jaw and cheek bones, oh yes. This was Charles’ type of man, the one he sought out at clubs and bars and then took home to have his way with (when the children were asleep or away of course). The man opened his lips to say something but he was interrupted by the vilest of screams that shook Charles’s very skeletal structure. He feared that the noise would disrupt the natural rhythm of his heart and kill him.
“ERIK!!!”
Charles hand went to his heart as the man stood tall again, his lips pulling back to show off the rows of white teeth.
“Speak of the bitch!” he called out which caused Charles to turn and see who had let out that shrill cry. It was Magda, the cashier who had rang Charles through and if looks could kill Charles would have been vaporized immediately.
“What the fick are you doing du spast!” she screamed. The man (now known as Erik) gave her a shrug before swinging the sledge hammer from side to side.
“Beating the fuck out of your stupid car, what does it look like I’m doing?”
Magda struggled to keep herself composed but she was failing brilliantly as the veins in her throat threatened to burst.
“You-you-du arschgefickter hurensohn! That’s not my car!”
Erik looked genuinely confused.
“No, this is your car.” To prove a point Magda pulled her keys from pockets and hit the alarm on her automatic start.
A loud horn boomed through the parking lot causing both Charles and Erik to turn towards the noise. Sure enough across the parking lot in the ‘employee only’ parking was a replica of the silver ford focus Erik was standing on, except the license plate was a different number and it had a sticker from the elementary school both Erik’s children went to.
“Scheiße.”
Charles watched as Magda struggled to keep herself from jumping off the deep end and stabbing her husband in the throat with her keys.
“I thought we could handle this like adults Erik, but this-this is just it. You will never see your children again! if you’re going to continue to act like this!” she said her entire body shaking with anger and rage.
Erik had dismounted from the car and tossed the sledge hammer. He stormed towards Magda, the scent of booze filtering off of him and the rage present in his eyes.
“Don’t you dare threaten to take my children from me you die schlampe-”
“That’s enough!” Charles snapped. He had seen Erik’s anger grow and the signals of violence were hard to miss especially when he curled his fist back into a ball. Charles put himself between Magda and Erik, pressing his hands firmly on Erik’s chest and pushing Magda back.
“I don’t give a damn what this woman has done to you, and I’ve put up with both your vulgar comments for so long but if you touch her, so help me god I will have to take matters into my own hands,” it was Charles’s best bluff because if this man really wanted to throttle his wife Charles would be a bug in his way. But he had witness too many clients of his walk out of his office and come back with a broken face or a busted lip. He would not let this woman be a victim.
Erik glared at the man who stood between his wife and him. Who was he to challenge him! It took standing there for a few minutes to allow everything to click in. He almost hit Magda. Correction he was going to hit Magda, at least until this man stood between them and was willing to defend his wife. When had they come to this, to Erik bashing in his wife’s car in a fit of drunken fury and nearly bringing himself to attack her.
“I’m sorry…” he mumbled softly.
“Sorry doesn’t cut it Erik!” Magda snapped.
“Please, let’s all calm down and try and reach a suitable solution.” Charles pleaded. Magda was still high off the rush of confronting Erik.
“I’ll give you a suitable solution; you’ll be receiving a call from my lawyers in the morning Erik!” With that Magda turned and stormed off heading back into the department store leaving Erik and Charles.
“Oh yes, I’m fine as well – no need to worry it’s just a vehicle and my only ride back home…” he said to particularly no-one. It was just the thought that counted. After all, it was her crazed husband who smashed in his vehicle. Charles let out a deep sigh, turning to back to the wreckage.
Sitting propped up next to his car was Erik who had currently stuck his head in between his legs. His entire body was tense but Charles caught sight of the dead stare he had. Charles couldn’t help reach out and pat Erik on the shoulder. The man had been in a blind rage, from what Charles had deduced from the encounter this man was obliviously going through a messy divorce in which the children were being used as leverage. He could see both points of view, but with the wife having stormed off, Charles was left with the grieving husband.
Even with Charles rubbing his shoulder, Erik made no noise and no movement. Charles just let out another deep sigh.
“This day couldn’t get any worse,” and with that he bumped his head off the side door… which then proceeded to activate the side-air bags and sound off the ghastly alarm system that failed to sound while Erik was beating on it.
Charles just closed his eyes and cursed to himself.