Summary: Now that you've completed Charles' assignment, life at the mansion is the best it's ever been, but there's something bothering you...

Warnings: None!

A/N: Here's Part Three and the end of this little series, unless y'all want more. I have no current ideas for Erik right now so leave a request if you'd like! I'm so glad you guys enjoy these one-shots, reading your comments makes my day! Lastly, (y/f/f) is (your/favorite/flavor) and it refers to the ice cream that the reader may or may not share with Erik...*wink*

2792

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You no longer have to hide in your shell. Sometimes it's nice to duck inside it for a while, but on average, you're out there with the others, training, having a good time, making friends. Everyone is really sweet, and you wish you'd made more of an effort earlier. At first you felt guilty. Like you were mean for being uncomfortable at the mansion and with the other mutants Charles has gathered. This doubt strengthened your insecurity and made you ten times more awkward when interacting. Thankfully, Erik stayed true to his word. More often than not, he was at your side; under the sun and the moon. The moment you left your room for breakfast, Erik would take his place beside you, and hover there throughout the day. Sometimes, if you were getting a little flustered in a conversation, or if one of the boys was being too rowdy, Erik would put a hand on your lower back and glare at the person across from you. He's very 'glarey,' if that's a word.

It's certainly his word.

You don't like how he can scare people by just looking at them.

As if he's setting them on fire with his eyes.

He sets you on fire with his eyes too.

But it feels nice. Like a little lantern in your tummy. Erik never looks at you like he does at the guys. Occasionally, he'll give Charles that look, which puzzles you.

They're friends. Good friends — practically brothers at this point.

So why the glares?

Whether you're with Erik or not, you're usually working on your powers or helping around the mansion. As soon as everyone was free, Charles hosted a meeting in the library where he explained your powers in depth and had you demonstrate them. Since no one was brave enough to let you operate on them, Charles took it upon himself. He sat on a table and let you pull a nasty looking nightmare out of his nostril. Erik handed you a fat jar and you crammed the black goop inside. The mutants let out exclamations of horror. Some of them, like Hank, made a beeline for the jar, staring at it in awe and asking if they could hold it. You let them pass the nightmare around, examining the slimy substance as it tried to flatten itself at the bottom of the container. How odd, you thought. Most nightmares that old are like wizened warriors.

This one is shy.

Huh.

Ever since the demonstration, mutants left and right have been showing up outside your door, wanting a nightmare removed. Naturally, they'd come in the middle of the night, when a bad dream woke them. You'd hear a knock and startle awake, opening the door expecting to see Erik, but lock eyes with some uneasy mutant looking for relief. A small part of you wanted to shut the door, crawl back into bed and sleep, but your sappy old heart couldn't do that. Clinically selfless, you'd invite the mutant in, sit them on your bed like you used to do with Erik, and you'd take their nightmare away.

For a week, this system worked.

After a fortnight of little to no sleep, Erik was getting angry.

"Leave her alone for Christ's sake, she needs sleep like any other person."

His sharp tongue and glarey-face would send them packing.

You hurried to calm him, but secretly thanked him for being so straightforward. You couldn't do that. Yell at someone. Get angry and tell someone off. You'd sooner collapse from exhaustion by freeing the world of bad dreams than speak up for yourself. It'd only come out in a slur of stuttering nonsense anyways. Erik hates when you stutter, so you save it for when he isn't around. Everytime your tongue gets tied, people give you this look. A dopey eyed pout. The 'I'm sorry' face. They pity you. The way some people wear it makes it clear that they're annoyed. Raven is like that. She seems so nice, but so abrasive. She's your opposite. Impulsive, loud, brazen, and extremely put together.

When Charles gives you the look, it's kind.

Still, it's like lemon on a wound.

But you take it.

You suck that lemon until your gums cry.

Erik doesn't give me that look.

Stuttering is a rare occurrence around him. You aren't sure why to be honest. Maybe it's because he insists on you talking clearly, so you've subconsciously stopped doing it for his sake. Or you have no cause to stutter. It is a nervous habit afterall. One you picked up in foster care and never could let go. Maybe, just maybe, Erik is the safest space you've had since early childhood. Maybe you trust him with your thoughts; your jokes; your stories; and when you utter a word, it can ring true without fear of judgment or repeal.

You are allies.

That requires trust.

As does friendship.

That word has tormented you for weeks now.

It follows you to bed and haunts your sleep. For the first time in years, you've had a routine nightmare. Unlike everyone else, who can have theirs removed, you're forced to live with them. You can't operate on yourself, something you discovered early on, when the nightmare of losing your parents kept you awake at night. You felt that itch in your head, just as you felt it in others, drawing you to pluck the little monsters out, but this was an itch you couldn't scratch. No matter how hard you tried, you couldn't reach into your mind and pull the bad dreams out. So you learned to manage them like normals do.

Getting up.

Tonight is one of those nights.

Thankfully, Charles made a rule that no one can have nightmares removed past curfew. They have to wait until morning for an extraction. That gives you a full night's rest and a day job.

Charles instated the rule to help you catch up on much needed sleep.

If it weren't for this fear sitting on your chest...you might be doing just that.

Instead, you're biting your nails and tip toeing barefoot to the kitchen where a tub of ice cream is waiting. The light over the stove is on. A dull, ice blue glow that guides you to the fridge. You steal a spoon from the dry wrack and a half eaten (y/f/f) ice cream from the freezer and sit at the island. As you shove large spoonfuls of (y/f/f) down your throat, your legs swing beneath the countertop, barely touching the ground at this height. The chill of the ice cream goes straight to your toes, so you clench them around the rungs of the bar stool. Friendship, you lick some ice cream from the webbing between your thumb and pointer. Why is such a sweet word so toxic?

Why is it that you want him to say it so badly?

You're allies, like he said.

What more do you want?

He hangs out with you.

He shows you how to fight, even if you're horrible at it, and end up pinned under him half of the time.

Erik makes you smile; he makes you laugh. He'll steal your sticker sheets and stick one on your forehead. You love it when he does that. One time, you wore a sprinkled donut the whole day and each weird look was worth it. You made Erik a pair of wacky socks (that don't match) and he'll never let anyone know, but he totally wears them in his boots. All the mutants are nice. They're all welcoming and supportive, Charles most of all, but they're not Erik.

No one else blows bubbles with you.

No one else can tug on your braids and make you happy.

If that's not what friends are...then what is?

"So it's you who's been eating all the ice cream."

You shriek.

A shadow passes through the kitchen doorway. The stove light billows around his shoulders —

"Erik," You hang your head in relief, unaware of your hair dipping into the ice cream tub.

"(Y/N)," He grins. So pleased with himself.

That's another thing.

He loves to scare you.

One time, he scared you so badly, you fell out of a tree and scraped your knee.

And he took the time to clean it up. Not only that, he dug through an entire cabinet of bandages for the most colorful Band-aid to cover the cut. The pink and yellow stripes were too cute, so you cut a hole in your jeans for the Band-aid to be seen.

"You've ruined them," He remarked, flicking the fraying stitching at your knee.

"How else could I see the Band-aid?"

"And when the cut heals?"

"I'll just patch it up with something pretty."

"What are you doing up?"

"I could ask you the same thing," Erik muses as he crosses the kitchen, grabbing himself a spoon and then stealing the seat to your left. Without asking, he takes a bite of the (y/f/f/) ice cream. You giggle and push the half empty tub between the two of you, letting him help himself. When you reach for a scoop at the same time, your spoons cling together like the clashing of tiny swords. Erik nudges your spoon out of the way, so you catch it in your mouth the second it's high enough. A growl rumbles in the back of his throat as you suck the ice cream clean off. "Dirty little thief."

You bat your eyelashes.

Erik rolls his eyes and goes for another dip. "So. Why are we here, eating ice cream when we should be asleep?"

"Because ice cream is better?"

The spoon stops halfway to your mouth. You open your eyes. The silverware is shaking in your hand, as if an invisible force is blocking it from entering your open mouth. Ice Cream drips over the side. You peek at Erik, who smirks.

"Metal," He taps his temple once.

"Oh."

Erik sticks his spoon in the ice cream carton and leans forwards, both hands folded on top of the marble counter. "What's keeping you up?"

"Nightmares."

He raises a brow. "The ones on your dresser?"

A laugh slips from your lips. "The ones in my head."

"Take them out."

"I can't."

The spoon relaxes.

Erik does the opposite.

"What do you mean?" He inquires, his voice tilting two octaves lower.

"I...I can't take my own nightmares away. I've tried. It doesn't work. It's ok though," You lift the ice cream coated spoon in a toast. "I get to eat ice cream."

Erik isn't so easily convinced. His brows dip together as he grinds his lips into a thin cord, wound so tight it might snap at any given second. You roll the cream around your tongue and watch him out of the corner of your eye. Is he going to get glarey again? He's about two steps away from angry. This face, it's not grumpy. Grumpy Erik is funny to look at. This Erik is...upset. You've only seen him like this once before. A month ago, when he opened up about his past, telling the story of how his family was captured by the Nazis and brought to a concentration camp. His mother shot before his eyes. Everything he loved, torn away from him. The Chief Nightmare on your dresser is that memory's evil twin. He's a beast, and he used to haunt Erik.

The nightmare is gone, but the expression remains.

"So...it won't go away?"

Pursing your lips, you shake your head.

Erik lets out a breath. "You can tell me the dream, if you want."

That's sweet.

But...

"It's silly," You mumble, suddenly very warm everywhere but your bare feet.

"If it's keeping you awake, it isn't silly. I won't laugh."

He promises with such passion, that you can't help but spill the beans.

"It's the same dream, every night. Since...nevermind. It's been here a while now, and it really is stupid, I mean...I don't know why it bugs me so much that we're allies. That's good. I like it. I like us, not that we are an us...because that's like...a couple thing, I guess. Anyways, I see you, in the nightmare, and I say you're my friend, but you won't say it back. And you build this huge wall of metal, and I try and get through. You won't say it back. You...you won't say the word, so...so I'm trying to get in and these nightmares crawl out and chase me away and I wake up covered in them."

"Covered in them?"

"In the dream I mean...before I wake up. I wake up covered in sweat though."

The joke flops.

You cork your nervous laugh with ice cream.

Erik uses his powers to pull the spoon from your hand. It lands, handle up, beside his.

You can feel his eyes. They're setting you on fire again.

"Why does it bother you that we're allies?"

"Because I want us to be friends," You blurt.

Silence.

Tension.

You picking at your nails and popping your cold lips.

And then –

"What if I don't want us to be friends?"

Ouch.

That's worse than lemon. That's pure rubbing alcohol on your wound. You can feel the nightmare itch swelling across the surface of your subconscious.

"That's ok," You lie. A tear tickles your eye. "I'll j-just go then—"

You start to slide off the stool but Erik grabs you by the elbow.

"I want us to be more than friends."

More than?

"I've wanted it for the longest time. I should have said something sooner, but I was the one being silly. I was afraid to tell you. The thing is, I'm not very good at this. You know what you're feeling, and you can wear it so easily. As easily as you wear those ridiculous stickers on your forehead..." Erik breaks off chuckling, "But I'm not like you. You're perfect, (Y/N). The others don't see it. I do. I love your colorful tape and mismatched socks. I love that you can't sleep with them on. I love that you keep bubbles stocked for sunny days...

"I love you."

He loves your socks.

You knew it.

He loves you?

That, you're surprised to hear.

You wanted him to say you were his friend.

What you didn't know was how badly you needed to hear him say those three words; confess them to you over ice cream in the kitchen at midnight, with a voice hoarse with emotion.

His hand squeezes your arm.

"Look at me," He begs.

You tug your lower lip between your teeth and turn to face him.

He looks raw.

He's the wound now.

Desperate eyes search your face for reciprocation, but you just stare at him, savoring every detail. The firm line of his jaw. The curve of his nose, the angle of his cheekbones. The amount of times you've held his face astounds you. How didn't you notice this before? Or did you? There were moments, like the time where he pulled you between his legs as you removed a nightmare, when you felt a wanting in your stomach. You mistook it for nerves. You misunderstood, all this time.

And all this time, Erik knew what he wanted, but he was too afraid to speak up. He's more like you than he thinks.

"Say something."

"I thought you hated the tape?"

Erik laughs.

Genuinely.

His desperation melts.

It brings a smile to your face. "I love you, Erik."

He lifts his head and beckons you with his eyes. You let him pull you between his legs again, only this time, he goes all the way, and kisses you. You've never been kissed before tonight, and you don't ever want to kiss anyone the way you kissed Erik. His mouth is softer than your fluffiest pair of socks and chases the frost that the ice cream left behind. He tastes just like (y/f/f). You must taste the same. Erik's tongue swipes your lips, weakening your knees. His strong arms hold you up, as he takes you to places you couldn't have imagined in your dizziest daydreams.

"Come to bed with me..." His hands follow the curve of your hips. "I'll keep the nightmares away..."

Charles has a policy against inappropriate behavior.

Mostly for the teens.

But you climb into bed with Erik anyways, believing he'll shield you from the bad dreams you can't put in jars. He rips off his shirt and slides in beside you. Every inch of his skin is hot. You seek his heat like a cat seeks sunspots and curl into his arms, trusting him to be your dream catcher...