Chapter Text
"Ah… do you want a drink or anything," a voice from the door asks, peering in with glowing yellow eyes and a tail swishing almost nervously behind him.
Daken looks behind him, moving his hair out of his eyes. He really should have pulled it up. "I'm fine," he sighs, scrubbing away furiously at the grime near the edge of the tub. How can people be this disgusting in a shared space?
"Are you sure? I made a fresh pot of coffee…" Kurt tilts his head, making the… older man in front of him sigh again. "You've been at that for a while, mein freund, I thought maybe you could use a break."
"Perhaps," He concedes, coming to the sink to wash the chemicals and germs off his hands. He's scrubbed the bowl til it shines, and fully intends to do the same with the rest of the room, but the lack of ventilation is making the work hot. He's going to need a shower after this, but he supposes a cup of coffee and pulling back his hair will help as much as anything.
In the kitchen, Kurt is already pouring him a cup, but pauses. "Do you take anything? Cream? Sugar?"
"There's… there's some creamer in the fridge door. It's almond milk."
"Almond milk," Kurt questions, opening the fridge to find the container. "Lactose intolerance?"
"I'm half Asian; it happens," Daken shrugs.
Kurt chuckles a little when he sees the bottle. "Sweet cream? How unexpected."
Daken feels his nose twitch a little. What does he mean "unexpected"? He huffs a little, pulling his hair into a bun out of his face to distract himself. Best not to think about it too much .
Kurt sits the cup down at the adjacent seat to his and sips on his own, black and dark and bitter. He smiles, reminded of his mother and how she would let him sneak drinks from her cup when he had late nights.
Daken raises an eyebrow, taking a drink of his. Even with the sweetness of the creamer, it leaves a bitter taste in his mouth--however metaphorically. All the time his old mentor tried to slice or kick or beat the childishness out of him… he still can't bring himself to drink his coffee black.
"You know, with how effective you are at cleaning, I'm tempted to ask how much I'd have to pay for you to help me organize my books," Kurt smiles at him, trying to make conversation.
"Hmm? Well, I suppose that depends on how you organize them."
"How do you organize yours ?"
"Genre," he answers before stopping to ask himself why. It's an innocent question, sure, but Daken has learned not to trust even those.
"That seems reasonable… my system is decidedly not organized.. sometimes it's by title, sometimes it's by author… I have all of my Agatha Christie novels in one section, but all of my classic titles are in another," Kurt laments. He didn't have space or money for a luxury like books growing up. He still has the first book he was ever given--a worn-out copy of the Bible that Father Wagner had given him. It's ragged and dog-eared and marked, but he cherishes it more than almost any of his possessions. He's never replaced it.
"Hm. Sounds like a bit of a task," Daken remarks, sipping some more of his coffee.
"It would be, kid, don't try it," drawls a gruff-sounding, gruff-looking man entering the room. "He probably couldn't pay you enough for it." The man snorts softly, play-punching the blue mutant in the chair.
Kurt lets out an indignant huff, crossing his arms and smirking. "You're saying I'm broke?"
"I'm saying you have too many books," Logan grins, pouring himself a cup of coffee as well.
Kurt scoffs, mocking offence as he dramatically turns his head away from his old friend. "One can never have too many books, mein freund! That's like saying that you can have too much air!"
Daken watches as their conversation continues, at least until he finishes this cup of coffee… When he's done, he stands, rinsing the cup and sitting it on the counter to be washed. He sighs, looking at the bathroom--at all the work that still needs doing--and gets his cleaning toothbrush back out.
Minutes pass and Kurt stands back in the doorway, peeking in like a child spying on a brother. Not that Daken would know… "I'm sorry if I was rude earlier. I hadn't meant to abandon our conversation."
Steel blue eyes raise from the floor, where his slender hands are bundled in cloth, mopping the floor. "Why on earth would you care about that?" But Daken already knows; he knows why this man maintains such an open posture, why he forces smiles even when he doesn't agree with a statement, why he tries so hard to seem approachable, and why despite all of it he smells so nervous.
"Because that's not what I intended… I don't want you to think I don't want your company--you're actually quite knowledgeable." He frowns softly, almost a pout.
Daken chuckles darkly, looking back down and continuing to scrub the floor. "Nice try.'
"You don't believe me?"
"No." He states plainly, the memories of all of the people with so-called good intentions who betrayed and hurt him in his mind like a rope hanging from gallows.
"Then why do you think I'm here," Kurt tilts his head, stepping out a little from behind the door frame.
"Not sure. But people are rarely unreservedly kind to a known killer without some sort of self-gratifying end. You're probably trying to crack my brain to tell my old man, since I won't let him in," he frowns, focusing on a spot beside the toilet.
"Hmm… well, I wish I would have thought of that first; that's actually a good idea," the man laughs softly, thinking of how ridiculous it would be--Logan's son opening up to him and then him spilling everything to Logan. "But no. I'm not after that. I do think you're interesting, though; I know a little bit about you from what your father has told me. But I also know the importance some people put on privacy, and I wouldn't want to violate yours."
Daken looks at him with focus, reading his smell, his expression, his body language, his heartbeat .
Nothing says he's lying.