Happy Birthday, Mr. President

Fate Brought Us Together Again... Or Was It the Secret Service?

Erik spent the next three days trying not to think about Charles Xavier. It was much harder than one would expect.

And for Erik it was even more difficult because he had no one to actually talk to about his feelings. Over the years Erik had learned to keep his emotions to himself, even when he really needed someone to open up to. He was good at it too. Unfortunately, not good enough to hide from his son Peter. Peter was one of the very few people who did not see the president in him and treated him as he'd always have - like the stubborn dad that he was.

"What's wrong, dad? You can tell me. What's wrong, what's wrong, what's wrong?" Peter kept bugging him one evening.

"Peter, stop this, please. Nothing's wrong. I'm just tired." Erik said, putting aside the papers he had to go through and lifting his legs up on the couch.

"I know your tired face. This is your tired face." Peter said and made a horrible impression of his father which was annoyingly accurate nevertheless. "But the face you're doing now means that there's something wrong and we both know you have to tell me. So talk."

Erik rolled his eyes with a fond chuckle.

"Peter, I'm really sorry, but this isn't something I can talk about with you." he said honestly.

Peter frowned. "Is it about work? Politics? Some top secret secret?"

"No, nothing like that." Erik sighed, shaking his head. "If it were entirely work related I wouldn't have been so confused now."

"Oh."

Erik let out another loud breath and rubbed his tired eyes with his hands.

"I'm sorry." he said. "Let's play cards or watch a movie or... you just go hang out with your friends."

Peter shook his head. He had no friends. Not real ones anyway. He lost the last of them the moment he became the President's son. He was fine with it. Besides, who'd want to hang out with fake friends when his dad was obviously in a pickle!?

"So..." the boy said, sitting on the carpeted floor and looking up at his father, "you're confused about it but it's not work and you can't talk to me about it... Is it about sex?"

Erik almost choked on air. "Peter!"

Peter grinned. "It is about sex, isn't it?"

Erik was visibly unsettled by the direction this conversation was heading to. "It's not-- Just go to bed. It's bed time! Why aren't you in bed yet?"

Peter laughed. "It's 8:15. How old do you think I am, 5?" he said amused.

Erik gave no reply.

"You can talk to me about sex, dad. Y'know? I mean, you've talked to me about it before, when you gave me 'the talk'. We both survived that so what's the problem now?"

"That was different. We had to go through that. We don't need to go through this." Erik said, covering his tired eyes with the palm of his hand.

"Oh! I see how it is. It was different then because it was about my sex life. But the moment I ask about yours, you shut me out."

It was a nasty strategy to guilt his dad in order to make him talk about his problems but Peter was prepared to go through with it. Peter was prepared to go through many things to make his father happier. Peter was possibly the only person on this planet who knew exactly how hurt Erik really was about losing his wife, about the hardships he went through in his life, about everything, really. Ever since Magda died, Peter did all he could to take care of Erik. It was a two-way thing - Erik took care of him and Peter took care of Erik. And now Peter knew Erik needed to talk about whatever was upsetting him; if guilting him into opening up was the only way to make him talk, so be it! Peter was ready!