Lie to Me (Denial) (2/3)
Fandom: X-Men: First Class
Rating: PG-13/T (overall R/M)
Word Count: just over 3k
Category: Slash, Pairing(s): Erik Lehnsherr/Charles Xavier
Characters: Erik Lehnsherr, Charles Xavier, briefly Sebastian Shaw, Emma Frost (overall: also briefly Angel Salvadore, Raven, Alex Summers)
Genre: Angst, Hurt without comfort, Unrequited love
Warnings: none (overall: sex as a topic, nudity, mentions of violence, nothing serious)
Disclaimer: Don't own anything, don't make money from this, you know the drill.
Summary: There's a lie in believe, an over in lover, an end in friend, an us in trust and an if in life.
...or: 1) Five Times Charles Wished He Didn't Have Telepathy and the One Time He Chose Not to Trust It, 2) Five Lies Erik Regrets and the One Truth He Can't Deny, and 3) Five Times Erik Visited and the One Time He Stayed.
Also on AO3.
first chapter - Five Times Charles Wished He Didn't Have Telepathy and the One Time He Chose Not to Trust It
A/N: Right, so here's the first of two unplanned chapters I'm adding to this xD It's different from the previous one based on the flawed logic of different character - different style of writing. I'm not entirely happy with it, but I'm too lazy to write an entirely new one, so here you go, have this.
Anyway. Lyrics are from the song Life 705 by The Rasmus.
Feedback is always appreciated ^^
Lie to Me (Denial)
or
5 Lies Erik Regrets
and the One Truth He Can't Deny
It doesn't matter what you feel,
it's harder than steel.
One day we'll find the reason why
I'm not sorry.
It doesn't matter what you feel.
(I'm not sorry.)
One day we'll find the reason why.
(I'm not sorry.)
1
Now, Erik wonders if he ever truly believed it, or if he knew it was a lie from the start. But then, he latched onto the words like they were a lifeline and he was a drowning man. He needed the comfort and reassurance, so he took it and held onto it tight. Hope, strength, love: that's what he thought he'd found in just those two sentences. He was wrong to ever even think of them seriously.
You can do it.
But he couldn't, could he? The coin didn't move, and the gun did fire. He couldn't do it. And he still can't. He can't do it, he knows that now as the submarine slips from underneath his fingers. He can't do it.
Everything is all right.
It was a stupid thing to say, Erik knows now that he should have seen right through it. War outside, people dying, no end in sight. How could anything have been all right? It was a stupid thing to say, but it was even more stupid to believe it.
Now, Erik knows those were lies, and he's certain his mother knew that as she said them. But then, he trusted her that she wasn't mad or scared, that he was strong enough, that she'd live and the war would end and they would be free and happy again; he spent days after that (in shock, he now realizes) wondering why his mother wasn't by his side, why they couldn't go home, waiting for someone to tell him that it's okay, you can go now; you're free. Somehow, losing hope was worse than living without it from the start.
Now, he wishes she'd never said that. Now, he wants to erase the words from his memory, because she lied, and he believed her. Now, he dreams of not having heard her words. Now, he wishes the last thing his mother gave him hadn't been a lie.
Later, he will wonder if knowing that it was a lie would have led to a different outcome. Later yet, he will wonder if he would even want a different outcome.
2
There was something Shaw always said to him - you and me. He'd say that they'd conquer the world, you and me. He'd say that they'd change everything, you and me. He'd say that they were the most powerful men on the whole planet, you and me.
As stupid as it seems to him now, he believed it, every time. He trusted the man who killed his mother, who tortured him, who lied to everyone; but Erik thought he was special, Shaw told him he was special. Now he sees it was all a part of Shaw's game, but back then he believed that Shaw was the only one who cared, the only one different, like him, the only who would protect him; and that need for someone, just anyone, who would be there for him, with him, was strong enough to keep him at Shaw's side for long years, overshadowing all the hurt and pain that Shaw caused him.
Erik curses Shaw for lying to him like that, but in reality, he hates himself for not seeing right through it.
3
It dawns on Erik one day, when he's out drinking with Charles no less, that he had a chance to escape. One little opening in years upon years of prison. And the best part? He blew it.
At first, it had been just the two of them, him and Shaw. Erik hates to admit it, but that was the period in his life when he learnt most things he knows about himself and his power, about how to draw it from rage and pain, and how to nurture it. And then came others. Shaw's associates, underlings, partners-in-crime. And Erik watched them come and go, not with hope or a plan, but with jealousy. Shaw was the devil he knew, the only devil he knew, and Erik didn't want to lose him, to lose his only protection and connection with this world. So he watched as men and women came into their lives and went, and he fantasized about killing them all with his power and making Shaw proud.
At the time, Erik assumed they were all humans. Now he knows that at least some of them were mutants and he was just blind to their powers, blind to the proof that Shaw was lying to him. There was a woman once (and then twice and then many more times) blonde and beautiful and wearing white. He hated her with a special passion. Shaw would talk to her in private, behind closed doors, and Erik would never be allowed in. It felt like she was stealing Shaw from him, and Erik couldn't, wouldn't, lose the only thing he had.
One day, she caught him sitting outside of Shaw's study and approached him. “You must be Erik,” she said. “Klaus talks about you.”
He defiantly stuck his chin out and kept quiet. Whatever she had to say, he didn't want to listen; she was an intruder, trying to steal away what was his, he didn't care about her.
“Well, if that's what you'll be like,” she told him as she stood up from where she'd sat down next to him. “I was going to offer that you come with me instead of living here, with Klaus. But, maybe you're right. You belong here.”
He kept his face cool, but on the inside he was happy that somebody else recognized where he was meant to be.
Now he knows that her name is Emma Frost and that she's a telepath. Now he knows that she was trying to offer him a way out because she knew he was powerful, because she knew that Shaw would use him, because she wanted him on her side. Whatever her reasons were, and Erik can't blame her for playing the same game Shaw was, she was his way out. And he didn't take his chance.
He wishes she had told him that she was special, wishes she had told him that he didn't belong with Shaw, that Shaw didn't deserve him. He wishes she had told him the truth. He's not sure if it would have been enough to drag him away, make him break free sooner, but it would have been a start. Maybe nothing would be different now, or maybe everything. All he knows is that her lie kept him in that place for a good few years more, kept him a prisoner of his own naivety - you belong here.
4
Erik doesn't blame Raven for hiding. She grew up in a society that judged her on things much less obvious and more trivial than blue skin, with a brother who gave her protection, curiosity, love, but not acceptance and understanding that she needed. Erik knows she hardly could have run around a high school scaly and blue, but he curses Charles for not teaching her that she's perfect, it's the other people who are wrong, deficient.
So he tries to show her instead. He uses his powers as much as he can, for everyday things, just because he can. He doesn't understand how they don't all see that they're perfect just the way they are - powerful, young, special, with such potential and no need to hide. So he tells them. He tells them that they should be proud of who they are, that they should show it off and never change for someone else.
And then he goes to Charles and tries to hide the deepest, darkest, most vital parts of himself. He doesn't believe that Charles knows everything about him, because if he did, he'd be long gone by now. So Erik shields his worst memories - the worst he's done and the worst he's been through, from Charles' physical and mental eyes. To keep his allies, to up his chances, to not be alone, he changes himself for them, buries what they wouldn't want to know anyway.
It's a different kind of hiding, not the same sense of shame, but it's enough to make him feel like a hypocrite.
5
When Charles kisses him one morning, uninhibited and unapologetic, dirty and demanding, Erik kisses back mostly on instinct. He would (maybe) consider what he's doing if Charles' hands weren't restless and deft all over his body, urgent on his clothes, and if Erik had gotten laid in the past wow, several years and weren't so horny now. But as it is, Charles has him hard in minutes and on the bed soon after. It's hurried and heated and there's an odd sense of desperation in Charles' movement, but it's mind-blowing and earth-shattering and so much better than Erik's own hand. Charles is warm and soft, he's vocal and unashamed, he knows what he wants, takes it and gives it back double; Erik's never had such amazing sex in his life and he finds himself wanting more of it.
He doesn't say anything. In his experience, an offer of more usually also refers to more than sex, and he's not quite willing to go for that. Maybe some day, when Shaw is dead. Erik is not the type for kids or people in general, really, but maybe a hut in the mountains somewhere, acres of land, sheep and a dog. Maybe even a partner, someone unobtrusive and quiet, someone who doesn't have blue eyes and red lips, who doesn't remind him of everything he's always wanted and never had, of how broken he truly is inside. He carefully disentangles himself from Charles' limbs, goes to take a shower and prepare for the rest of their day.
It turns out, Charles didn't mean it as a fluke, a one-off, when he tugs on Erik's wrist that evening and kisses him again. Erik is three parts glad it's not over, and one part apprehensive of what is expected of him. Charles doesn't push him, however, and Erik indulges himself, enjoys the colleagues-by-day, shagging-like-rabbits-on-Viagra-by-night arrangement for what it is - a pragmatical solution to resolve sexual tension when they're too tired and listless to go picking up someone else.
Until the night Charles asks him to stay.
He panics, lists all the reasons why it's a bad idea in his head and it's a true testament to how attached he's grown to the tentative bond Charles is building between them that he even goes to that much trouble, but it also makes him remember the promises he's made to himself since he started the mad chase after Shaw - no attachment, no loss, and no distraction. Charles is becoming two of those, and is bound to be the third in the end as well. Erik should stop this before it gets out of control.
But he stays. Because he owes Charles. Charles saved his life, gave him a home and allies, offered him help. Erik is grateful for it and hopeful about the future for the first time in a long time, and he is forever indebted because of it. Perhaps giving Charles someone to wake up to will be enough to pay off his dues. And while he feels it as a duty, it's also not really a hardship.
In the morning, as he watches Charles' eyes flutter open sleepily, Charles' fingers twitch on Erik's bare chest, Charles' lips part slightly on a tired but pleased sigh, Erik has a fleeting thought of I'll learn to love him. It's an idea that almost, almost makes him feel better, like a good person, until he realizes that it's a lie and it just ends up reminding him why he's not a good man and that he can't love anyone - he lost that ability long ago, replaced it with rage, focus and determination.
He knows that Charles caught the thought because his eyes go wide before they mist over and Charles hides his head in Erik's shoulder. Erik wants to offer comfort, but he can't bring himself to lie more to Charles, who hardly deserves such treatment, because he knows what it's like to console yourself with dishonesty and how much it hurts when you find out what it is.
1
Erik values truth highly. In the life he's chosen, truth is a rare delicacy. The people he deals with, the layer of the world he belongs to, they lie. They lie to others about their names and ages, where they come from and how they spent the War; they lie to themselves about their guilt and involvement. Erik doesn't need to be a telepath to know that.
Over the years, he's been so many people, he doesn't think he can remember all his aliases, and he certainly can't think of all the personality traits he faked with more or else success. He's convinced so many others of who and how he's like, that sometimes he wonders if he's something different from what he thinks, if he's somehow convinced himself of his own different identity. This is why he makes a point of always being honest with himself. If he thinks he did something wrong, he doesn't pretend he had an excuse for it, he accepts it as part of who he is and moves on. Sometimes it's difficult for him to face the monster that he is; other times it's easier to accept the honesty than to think of a lie. Either way, Erik never lies to himself; it's the only way he knows how to keep his (admittedly relative) sanity.
So he doesn't pretend that he loves Charles or that Charles is somehow more important than his life goal. He's used to Charles' presence, charmed by the man's easy and eager openness to the new and yet unexplored, awed by his power, grateful for the help and embarrassingly fond of Charles' confident and strong presence. In a different world, where Erik would be a better person, he would even go so far as to call Charles a friend. For all that, however, his feelings hardly go past occasional bursts of warm affection and strong waves of thankfulness.
Erik sees the love that Charles tries to hide in his eyes; during sex particularly, Charles' control slips so much more than Charles is aware and Erik can feel the tremendous ocean of Charles' emotions for him - all good, all warm, all pleasant. But he can't reciprocate in kind. It makes him feel even more inadequate for where he is and what he's doing. He knows that Charles is trying to help, that he wants to gather a group of allies to assist Erik on his path, but Erik can't help the feeling that he's sitting around, doing nothing as Shaw slips further away from him. He blames Charles, gets irrationally angry, adds the rage at Charles to the iceberg already in his soul. He resents Charles for his soft hands and fancy clothes and the big mansion, for the education Erik didn't even have an opportunity to get, for the money and luxury and everything Erik's parents tried so hard to give him just a glimpse of, and Charles had since birth without even lifting a finger.
It's unfair, he knows, to blame Charles for what is not really his fault - he didn't choose his parents or his social status, but Erik can't help it. It's unfair to take everything Charles offers and counter it with no more than impersonal nights and cold, insincere affection, but it's all he has. It probably makes him a terrible person, but lord knows Erik's so bad already, he could hardly get worse. So he does what he does best - rationalizes, justifies, accepts and moves on. It's surprisingly difficult when Charles looks at him with those open and honest blue eyes, when Charles kisses him like it would kill him if he didn't, when Charles gently touches his scars like they're the most exquisite works of art, when Charles cares for him like he's something immensely valuable and very breakable. It makes Erik angry, that Charles has such an effect on him at all, that Erik lets him. It just enhances the gap between them, makes Erik even more contemptuous of Charles and drives them further apart. Erik is not sorry. The casual almost-friendship was getting to be too much for him anyway, the prospect of feeling again too close for comfort, the distraction from his one true fate too big. It's better to distance himself, better to let Charles know exactly where they stand - nowhere.
Erik wonders if Charles can tell that there's no hope for them, no joint future, nothing to look forward to. If he can, he doesn't show it; if anything, he pushes more, with more urgency and more desperation. It's almost funny how hard Charles is trying to win him over. It's too bad that Erik is only getting more and more tired of Charles' pathetic promises and too-big dreams.
Erik may lie to everyone else, but he doesn't lie to himself. He cares for Charles more than he does for most of the planet, but he doesn't love Charles. He can't, not with the way Charles reminds him of just about everything that is wrong with his life. Not with the way Charles enrages him with his stupidly naïve faith in good, in Erik. No, Charles makes every single horrible thing that has ever happened in Erik's existence stand out and Erik can't live with that. So he doesn't love Charles, he loathes Charles. And he's not even sorry for that - it's Charles' fault anyway, Charles was the one who started all this, saved him from the water and offered help and kissed him. There's nothing for Erik to feel sorry about, he can't control his feelings. And in that jumbled mess of them (anger, rage, desire for revenge, impatience, regret, pain to name but a few), there's no room for love.
Or so he tells himself.
Rating: PG-13/T (overall R/M)
Word Count: just over 3k
Category: Slash, Pairing(s): Erik Lehnsherr/Charles Xavier
Characters: Erik Lehnsherr, Charles Xavier, briefly Sebastian Shaw, Emma Frost (overall: also briefly Angel Salvadore, Raven, Alex Summers)
Genre: Angst, Hurt without comfort, Unrequited love
Warnings: none (overall: sex as a topic, nudity, mentions of violence, nothing serious)
Disclaimer: Don't own anything, don't make money from this, you know the drill.
Summary: There's a lie in believe, an over in lover, an end in friend, an us in trust and an if in life.
...or: 1) Five Times Charles Wished He Didn't Have Telepathy and the One Time He Chose Not to Trust It, 2) Five Lies Erik Regrets and the One Truth He Can't Deny, and 3) Five Times Erik Visited and the One Time He Stayed.
Also on AO3.
first chapter - Five Times Charles Wished He Didn't Have Telepathy and the One Time He Chose Not to Trust It
A/N: Right, so here's the first of two unplanned chapters I'm adding to this xD It's different from the previous one based on the flawed logic of different character - different style of writing. I'm not entirely happy with it, but I'm too lazy to write an entirely new one, so here you go, have this.
Anyway. Lyrics are from the song Life 705 by The Rasmus.
Feedback is always appreciated ^^
Lie to Me (Denial)
or
5 Lies Erik Regrets
and the One Truth He Can't Deny
It doesn't matter what you feel,
it's harder than steel.
One day we'll find the reason why
I'm not sorry.
It doesn't matter what you feel.
(I'm not sorry.)
One day we'll find the reason why.
(I'm not sorry.)
1
Now, Erik wonders if he ever truly believed it, or if he knew it was a lie from the start. But then, he latched onto the words like they were a lifeline and he was a drowning man. He needed the comfort and reassurance, so he took it and held onto it tight. Hope, strength, love: that's what he thought he'd found in just those two sentences. He was wrong to ever even think of them seriously.
You can do it.
But he couldn't, could he? The coin didn't move, and the gun did fire. He couldn't do it. And he still can't. He can't do it, he knows that now as the submarine slips from underneath his fingers. He can't do it.
Everything is all right.
It was a stupid thing to say, Erik knows now that he should have seen right through it. War outside, people dying, no end in sight. How could anything have been all right? It was a stupid thing to say, but it was even more stupid to believe it.
Now, Erik knows those were lies, and he's certain his mother knew that as she said them. But then, he trusted her that she wasn't mad or scared, that he was strong enough, that she'd live and the war would end and they would be free and happy again; he spent days after that (in shock, he now realizes) wondering why his mother wasn't by his side, why they couldn't go home, waiting for someone to tell him that it's okay, you can go now; you're free. Somehow, losing hope was worse than living without it from the start.
Now, he wishes she'd never said that. Now, he wants to erase the words from his memory, because she lied, and he believed her. Now, he dreams of not having heard her words. Now, he wishes the last thing his mother gave him hadn't been a lie.
Later, he will wonder if knowing that it was a lie would have led to a different outcome. Later yet, he will wonder if he would even want a different outcome.
2
There was something Shaw always said to him - you and me. He'd say that they'd conquer the world, you and me. He'd say that they'd change everything, you and me. He'd say that they were the most powerful men on the whole planet, you and me.
As stupid as it seems to him now, he believed it, every time. He trusted the man who killed his mother, who tortured him, who lied to everyone; but Erik thought he was special, Shaw told him he was special. Now he sees it was all a part of Shaw's game, but back then he believed that Shaw was the only one who cared, the only one different, like him, the only who would protect him; and that need for someone, just anyone, who would be there for him, with him, was strong enough to keep him at Shaw's side for long years, overshadowing all the hurt and pain that Shaw caused him.
Erik curses Shaw for lying to him like that, but in reality, he hates himself for not seeing right through it.
3
It dawns on Erik one day, when he's out drinking with Charles no less, that he had a chance to escape. One little opening in years upon years of prison. And the best part? He blew it.
At first, it had been just the two of them, him and Shaw. Erik hates to admit it, but that was the period in his life when he learnt most things he knows about himself and his power, about how to draw it from rage and pain, and how to nurture it. And then came others. Shaw's associates, underlings, partners-in-crime. And Erik watched them come and go, not with hope or a plan, but with jealousy. Shaw was the devil he knew, the only devil he knew, and Erik didn't want to lose him, to lose his only protection and connection with this world. So he watched as men and women came into their lives and went, and he fantasized about killing them all with his power and making Shaw proud.
At the time, Erik assumed they were all humans. Now he knows that at least some of them were mutants and he was just blind to their powers, blind to the proof that Shaw was lying to him. There was a woman once (and then twice and then many more times) blonde and beautiful and wearing white. He hated her with a special passion. Shaw would talk to her in private, behind closed doors, and Erik would never be allowed in. It felt like she was stealing Shaw from him, and Erik couldn't, wouldn't, lose the only thing he had.
One day, she caught him sitting outside of Shaw's study and approached him. “You must be Erik,” she said. “Klaus talks about you.”
He defiantly stuck his chin out and kept quiet. Whatever she had to say, he didn't want to listen; she was an intruder, trying to steal away what was his, he didn't care about her.
“Well, if that's what you'll be like,” she told him as she stood up from where she'd sat down next to him. “I was going to offer that you come with me instead of living here, with Klaus. But, maybe you're right. You belong here.”
He kept his face cool, but on the inside he was happy that somebody else recognized where he was meant to be.
Now he knows that her name is Emma Frost and that she's a telepath. Now he knows that she was trying to offer him a way out because she knew he was powerful, because she knew that Shaw would use him, because she wanted him on her side. Whatever her reasons were, and Erik can't blame her for playing the same game Shaw was, she was his way out. And he didn't take his chance.
He wishes she had told him that she was special, wishes she had told him that he didn't belong with Shaw, that Shaw didn't deserve him. He wishes she had told him the truth. He's not sure if it would have been enough to drag him away, make him break free sooner, but it would have been a start. Maybe nothing would be different now, or maybe everything. All he knows is that her lie kept him in that place for a good few years more, kept him a prisoner of his own naivety - you belong here.
4
Erik doesn't blame Raven for hiding. She grew up in a society that judged her on things much less obvious and more trivial than blue skin, with a brother who gave her protection, curiosity, love, but not acceptance and understanding that she needed. Erik knows she hardly could have run around a high school scaly and blue, but he curses Charles for not teaching her that she's perfect, it's the other people who are wrong, deficient.
So he tries to show her instead. He uses his powers as much as he can, for everyday things, just because he can. He doesn't understand how they don't all see that they're perfect just the way they are - powerful, young, special, with such potential and no need to hide. So he tells them. He tells them that they should be proud of who they are, that they should show it off and never change for someone else.
And then he goes to Charles and tries to hide the deepest, darkest, most vital parts of himself. He doesn't believe that Charles knows everything about him, because if he did, he'd be long gone by now. So Erik shields his worst memories - the worst he's done and the worst he's been through, from Charles' physical and mental eyes. To keep his allies, to up his chances, to not be alone, he changes himself for them, buries what they wouldn't want to know anyway.
It's a different kind of hiding, not the same sense of shame, but it's enough to make him feel like a hypocrite.
5
When Charles kisses him one morning, uninhibited and unapologetic, dirty and demanding, Erik kisses back mostly on instinct. He would (maybe) consider what he's doing if Charles' hands weren't restless and deft all over his body, urgent on his clothes, and if Erik had gotten laid in the past wow, several years and weren't so horny now. But as it is, Charles has him hard in minutes and on the bed soon after. It's hurried and heated and there's an odd sense of desperation in Charles' movement, but it's mind-blowing and earth-shattering and so much better than Erik's own hand. Charles is warm and soft, he's vocal and unashamed, he knows what he wants, takes it and gives it back double; Erik's never had such amazing sex in his life and he finds himself wanting more of it.
He doesn't say anything. In his experience, an offer of more usually also refers to more than sex, and he's not quite willing to go for that. Maybe some day, when Shaw is dead. Erik is not the type for kids or people in general, really, but maybe a hut in the mountains somewhere, acres of land, sheep and a dog. Maybe even a partner, someone unobtrusive and quiet, someone who doesn't have blue eyes and red lips, who doesn't remind him of everything he's always wanted and never had, of how broken he truly is inside. He carefully disentangles himself from Charles' limbs, goes to take a shower and prepare for the rest of their day.
It turns out, Charles didn't mean it as a fluke, a one-off, when he tugs on Erik's wrist that evening and kisses him again. Erik is three parts glad it's not over, and one part apprehensive of what is expected of him. Charles doesn't push him, however, and Erik indulges himself, enjoys the colleagues-by-day, shagging-like-rabbits-on-Viagra-by-night arrangement for what it is - a pragmatical solution to resolve sexual tension when they're too tired and listless to go picking up someone else.
Until the night Charles asks him to stay.
He panics, lists all the reasons why it's a bad idea in his head and it's a true testament to how attached he's grown to the tentative bond Charles is building between them that he even goes to that much trouble, but it also makes him remember the promises he's made to himself since he started the mad chase after Shaw - no attachment, no loss, and no distraction. Charles is becoming two of those, and is bound to be the third in the end as well. Erik should stop this before it gets out of control.
But he stays. Because he owes Charles. Charles saved his life, gave him a home and allies, offered him help. Erik is grateful for it and hopeful about the future for the first time in a long time, and he is forever indebted because of it. Perhaps giving Charles someone to wake up to will be enough to pay off his dues. And while he feels it as a duty, it's also not really a hardship.
In the morning, as he watches Charles' eyes flutter open sleepily, Charles' fingers twitch on Erik's bare chest, Charles' lips part slightly on a tired but pleased sigh, Erik has a fleeting thought of I'll learn to love him. It's an idea that almost, almost makes him feel better, like a good person, until he realizes that it's a lie and it just ends up reminding him why he's not a good man and that he can't love anyone - he lost that ability long ago, replaced it with rage, focus and determination.
He knows that Charles caught the thought because his eyes go wide before they mist over and Charles hides his head in Erik's shoulder. Erik wants to offer comfort, but he can't bring himself to lie more to Charles, who hardly deserves such treatment, because he knows what it's like to console yourself with dishonesty and how much it hurts when you find out what it is.
1
Erik values truth highly. In the life he's chosen, truth is a rare delicacy. The people he deals with, the layer of the world he belongs to, they lie. They lie to others about their names and ages, where they come from and how they spent the War; they lie to themselves about their guilt and involvement. Erik doesn't need to be a telepath to know that.
Over the years, he's been so many people, he doesn't think he can remember all his aliases, and he certainly can't think of all the personality traits he faked with more or else success. He's convinced so many others of who and how he's like, that sometimes he wonders if he's something different from what he thinks, if he's somehow convinced himself of his own different identity. This is why he makes a point of always being honest with himself. If he thinks he did something wrong, he doesn't pretend he had an excuse for it, he accepts it as part of who he is and moves on. Sometimes it's difficult for him to face the monster that he is; other times it's easier to accept the honesty than to think of a lie. Either way, Erik never lies to himself; it's the only way he knows how to keep his (admittedly relative) sanity.
So he doesn't pretend that he loves Charles or that Charles is somehow more important than his life goal. He's used to Charles' presence, charmed by the man's easy and eager openness to the new and yet unexplored, awed by his power, grateful for the help and embarrassingly fond of Charles' confident and strong presence. In a different world, where Erik would be a better person, he would even go so far as to call Charles a friend. For all that, however, his feelings hardly go past occasional bursts of warm affection and strong waves of thankfulness.
Erik sees the love that Charles tries to hide in his eyes; during sex particularly, Charles' control slips so much more than Charles is aware and Erik can feel the tremendous ocean of Charles' emotions for him - all good, all warm, all pleasant. But he can't reciprocate in kind. It makes him feel even more inadequate for where he is and what he's doing. He knows that Charles is trying to help, that he wants to gather a group of allies to assist Erik on his path, but Erik can't help the feeling that he's sitting around, doing nothing as Shaw slips further away from him. He blames Charles, gets irrationally angry, adds the rage at Charles to the iceberg already in his soul. He resents Charles for his soft hands and fancy clothes and the big mansion, for the education Erik didn't even have an opportunity to get, for the money and luxury and everything Erik's parents tried so hard to give him just a glimpse of, and Charles had since birth without even lifting a finger.
It's unfair, he knows, to blame Charles for what is not really his fault - he didn't choose his parents or his social status, but Erik can't help it. It's unfair to take everything Charles offers and counter it with no more than impersonal nights and cold, insincere affection, but it's all he has. It probably makes him a terrible person, but lord knows Erik's so bad already, he could hardly get worse. So he does what he does best - rationalizes, justifies, accepts and moves on. It's surprisingly difficult when Charles looks at him with those open and honest blue eyes, when Charles kisses him like it would kill him if he didn't, when Charles gently touches his scars like they're the most exquisite works of art, when Charles cares for him like he's something immensely valuable and very breakable. It makes Erik angry, that Charles has such an effect on him at all, that Erik lets him. It just enhances the gap between them, makes Erik even more contemptuous of Charles and drives them further apart. Erik is not sorry. The casual almost-friendship was getting to be too much for him anyway, the prospect of feeling again too close for comfort, the distraction from his one true fate too big. It's better to distance himself, better to let Charles know exactly where they stand - nowhere.
Erik wonders if Charles can tell that there's no hope for them, no joint future, nothing to look forward to. If he can, he doesn't show it; if anything, he pushes more, with more urgency and more desperation. It's almost funny how hard Charles is trying to win him over. It's too bad that Erik is only getting more and more tired of Charles' pathetic promises and too-big dreams.
Erik may lie to everyone else, but he doesn't lie to himself. He cares for Charles more than he does for most of the planet, but he doesn't love Charles. He can't, not with the way Charles reminds him of just about everything that is wrong with his life. Not with the way Charles enrages him with his stupidly naïve faith in good, in Erik. No, Charles makes every single horrible thing that has ever happened in Erik's existence stand out and Erik can't live with that. So he doesn't love Charles, he loathes Charles. And he's not even sorry for that - it's Charles' fault anyway, Charles was the one who started all this, saved him from the water and offered help and kissed him. There's nothing for Erik to feel sorry about, he can't control his feelings. And in that jumbled mess of them (anger, rage, desire for revenge, impatience, regret, pain to name but a few), there's no room for love.
Or so he tells himself.