Chapter Text
Steve was trying not to be annoyed when Rhodes showed up a few days later, because it meant that his Tony-time got interrupted.
He felt a bit improper thinking that. He knew Rhodes was Tony’s friend since long before Steve was even beginning to thaw, and he knew also that his job didn’t really allow him and Tony to catch up all that often, but he couldn’t help but feel a tad protective over the time that he and Tony had begun to carve out for one another.
It was probably due to the fact that he hadn’t really had the chance to speak to Rhodes much before. He supposed there hadn’t really been much reason—last time Rhodes was around, Steve and Tony were still barely speaking to each other, awkward and frigid, peace still being negotiated. Hardly meet my best friend material.
This time around, things were different.
“Colonel,” Steve greeted with a handshake once Rhodes was brought before him by an overexcited Tony, who seemed peachy keen for two worlds to meet properly. “I hope you’re enjoying your time off.”
“Captain,” Rhodes greeted back, and his handshake was firm and proper. They both ignored Tony yapping at them to take the sticks out of their asses. “You know folks like us never really get time off.”
Despite himself, Steve smiled. “No, we don’t,” he confirmed. “You staying with us long?”
“Just a couple of days,” Rhodes said with a small smile. “And please, call me Jim.”
“Call me Steve, then,” Steve said, and Jim nodded to him.
“It blows me away,” Tony spoke up again from the sidelines. “How boring you two can be sometimes. I just knew the two of you would get on like a house not on fire. Like a house that’s strictly abiding by WHS laws.”
“Normal people make small talk, Tones,” Jim rolled his eyes, without much heat. “I’m sorry not all of us talk to Captain America on the daily. You’ll have to give me some time to adjust.”
“Tonight’s our boardgame night,” Steve said without thinking about it too hard, keen at the very least to engage in Tony’s world. “You could join us if you’re okay with seeing grown adults take Monopoly too seriously.”
“I’ll gladly watch,” Jim said with a small wince. “Me and Monopoly don’t get along. I’d rather you didn’t have to see that side of me so soon.”
“He’s not joking,” Tony jumped in helpfully. “I learned that the hard way.”
Jim did show up to boardgame night, and Steve was surprised to see he was quite friendly with Bruce already, and everyone else warmed to him quickly too.
“Don't embarrass me in front of the Colonel,” Clint said at some point as Nat was preparing to once again metaphorically hold them all up by their ankles and shake every last coin out of their pockets. “I wanted to make a good impression.”
“That's gone out the window,” Tony quipped, walking back into the room after grabbing a drink. He flicked the back of Clint's head as he walked by, ignoring the man's protesting.
Actually, Steve thought the drink was for Tony, but he actually walked past his own seat and handed it to Natasha with the fake flourish of a well trained butler.
“Madame,” he drawled. “One extra dry vodka martini with not one, not two—but three olives.”
“Thank you, kindly,” Nat played into it, sipping in satisfaction, which, really, she had lots of things to be satisfied about in that moment. “You never skimp out on the olives.”
Steve hadn't really thought Tony was the kind to memorise preferred drinks, not like Steve was anyway, but he was once again proven extremely wrong. There was something about witnessing this that made Steve's stomach kick over and he briefly had a fantasy of grabbing Tony and kissing him silly in front of everybody. Thor’s voice broke him out of his quite frankly excellent daydream.
“She cheats!” He was yelling and pointing at an extremely self-satisfied looking Natasha. And thus, Steve knew Monopoly was over. “I do not know how, but her victory is not honourable!”
“Let’s pack it up,” Steve prompted, and nobody really protested. “You’ll get her next time, Thor.”
“Yeah, this isn’t as much fun as last time,” Bruce said and assisted in putting the little pieces back into the scuffed box.
“That’s because last time we got to see that photo of Tony,” Clint said cheerily, and Tony’s glare fell on him with fiery abandon, which Clint ignored. “You know, the twinky one.”
“The what now?” Jim jumped in with a laugh, and Tony startled as though just remembering that Rhodes was there. “The twinky one?”
“Oh no,” Tony was saying, but everyone was ignoring him, having caught on to the fact that Jim was leaning forward with interest. “No, no, no. We are not doing this again. Once was enough.”
Clint was already running with it. “Tony showed us this photo of him in ‘88 where—”
“Barton—”
“—he’s sitting on top of this dude’s car wearing jorts.”
“Oh, I know the one!” Jim jumped in, bringing Clint to a surprised pause. “I have a copy of that.”
Even Tony seemed surprised at this. “Really? You kept it?”
“I don’t think I’ve gotten rid of any of our MIT photos,” Jim said fondly, and Steve felt a moment of irrational jealousy. Jim knew Tony so well, and for so long. “Saving that gold mine for my best man speech.”
Tony rolled his eyes. “You’ll be holding on to it for a while, then, Rhodey.”
Jim appeared to do Tony the favour of ignoring the statement while amongst so much company. He turned to the others instead, incredulous. “Tony actually showed you that photo? Voluntarily? Nobody threatened my friend at gun-point, right?”
“Nothing so severe,” Nat joked, clearly enjoying the conversation. Perhaps the martini was helping with that. “Clint goaded him a little.”
“I can’t in good conscience deny that.” Clint admitted.
“What does that word mean, ‘twinky’? The confectionery?” Thor asked Bruce quietly, and Bruce’s answer was lost amongst the cackles in the room.
Tony appeared to be slightly regretting bringing Jim along, based on the frown he was sporting. Steve felt much too affected by the sight to continue looking at him, so he turned curiously to Jim.
“It’s a nice picture,” he said slowly, not wanting to ask for more details too pointedly. Jim shot a look at Tony briefly, one that spoke of insider knowledge, and then responded.
“It sure is,” Jim said with a sigh. “I took it. In case you’re curious.”
Steve nodded, having figured. The image of a young Jim holding up a camera to capture that youthful summer moment left Steve feeling another pang of irrational jealousy.
“Okay, truly, if you say one more word I’m kicking you out, Platypus,” Tony finally decided he’d had enough and broke up their party. “Or worse yet, I’m showing them photos of you as revenge.”
“I’m shaking in my boots,” Jim said, not shaking. “I wasn’t the twinky one.”
The room exploded with laughter and conversation rolled onward, once again feeling like it was leaving Steve behind. There was something suddenly overwhelming about this situation. He supposed that he had liked living in this illusion of being the person in the tower most privy to Tony’s secrets and emotions—his confidante. Because, perhaps, he had presumed he would never get to be more, so being trusted by Tony and allowed into his inner world was the next best thing.
Now, with Jim in front of him joking along and seemingly having such a core understanding of each of Tony’s eccentricities, Steve was made aware of how little space he truly held. It was a pathetic realisation to have—it made him feel alone. Out of time again. He briefly pondered what it would have been like in a fantasy world where he was taken off the ice earlier and met Tony before he was Iron Man. When he was just a boy on the roof of a car, legs swinging over the side of it. The thought suffocated him. He needed air.
Excusing himself, he made his way to the balcony, letting the sounds of traffic wash over him from so many floors below. The air was whipping around him wildly. This was too high a floor to comfortably have a balcony.
He was out there for a little while, staring at the starless sky on his own, brain blank, before the door opened behind him. He turned, surprised to see Tony coming out to join him.
“Hey,” he said, and it was clear in his voice he hadn’t expected company.
“Hey, Rogers,” Tony said plainly, leaning against the bannister next to Steve. “Aren’t you freezing out here?”
It was true that it was cold. Steve could see Tony trembling already. He resisted the urge to bundle him up in his arms. “Super-serum.”
“Ah,” Tony said with a tone of duh. “Silly me and my working nerve endings.”
“My nerves are working,” Steve said, and his voice didn’t have as much humour in it as he’d hoped. “They’re just not as weak as yours.”
“Oh, it’s about weakness now, huh?” Tony’s voice was also somehow lacking in humour. It sounded like they were both going through the motions of something they’d done many times before. “Bragging isn’t a good look for you.”
“You’re right,” Steve said, and looked at Tony’s profile in the half light of the balcony. “I’ll leave that to you. You’re much better at it.”
Tony looked back at him, and there was a moment where Steve held his gaze before it became too difficult to do so, and he averted his eyes to the sky once more.
When Tony spoke, his voice sounded slightly awkward. Out of its element. “You doing okay, Rogers?”
Steve shrugged, feeling a petulant sort of urge to shut off. “You know me,” he said plainly. “I’m always okay.”
When he flicked a glance towards Tony to see how his statement was received, Tony’s lips were pressed together in a face of uncertainty. Perhaps he was considering just how much to push Steve for a proper answer.
“Of course,” he said easily. “Captain America is always okay,” Steve felt him edge a bit closer. “I was more so asking about Steve Rogers.”
Steve startled at the statement. Something about it, about remembering how such a personal admission had tumbled out of his lips at the pizza shop with Tony, made him feel somehow cheated. As though he had given more than he was getting back. Rationally, he knew this wasn’t the case. Rationality didn’t ease the sting. He felt see-through. Tony probably knew him better than he would ever know Tony.
“Go hang out with Jim, Tony,” he said in a sharp tone, removed. “You haven’t seen him in a while.”
There were a few seconds of silence, where Steve didn’t dare to turn over and look at the expression on Tony’s face. Eventually, however, Tony sighed.
“Okay,” he said simply, but there was an undercurrent of annoyance in his voice that made something inside Steve shrivel up. “Enjoy your brooding, Cap.”
And Steve heard Tony’s footsteps, and then the sound of the door opening and closing behind him. He covered his face with his palms, taking a deep breath and trying not to berate himself. This was why it would never work—Steve had to hope to God that love was real, otherwise what was he even really doing here, but hoping that it’s real and getting to live it are two different things. Steve can believe in love, he can see it all around him every single day. But getting to live it is different, and perhaps Steve just wasn’t really made for that, exactly. He was made for war—for fighting so that others can live the love that Steve so desperately believed existed but had never really felt.
And Tony—Steve had thought, before all this, that Tony didn’t feel enough. He had been wrong. The memory of Tony’s open, vulnerable face haunted him with that realisation. Tony gave too much of himself away. Enough so that when things end in disaster, that part of himself is lost forever. People who had known Tony longer, understood him better than Steve could ever hope to, had still failed to hold on to him, failed to stay. Steve’s hands weren’t made to hold gentle things.
His own words echoed back to him. Someone who doesn’t believe in anything. Someone who doesn’t even try. He felt like a fraud. The self-pity spiral was easy to fall into at that point.
He didn’t realise time had passed until he finally decided he needed to go to bed and walked back in to see that the others had packed it in already. The sight of the empty living room made him feel worse. But, he noticed a second later, it was not entirely empty.
Jim was seated at the nearby kitchen bench, his back to Steve. He appeared to be holding something.
“Hey, there you are,” he said upon hearing the sliding door of the balcony shut. “Thought you’d jumped off or something.”
Steve stayed still for a moment, recalculating. He had expected to be able to sulk back to his room in silence.
“It really is a great photo,” Jim said, and Steve realised he was holding the ‘88 picture. He came closer, feet moving unbidden.
When he got close enough to just about be able to peek over Jim’s back, the man turned around and offered him the photo, in a mirror of what Tony had done recently. Steve, once again, was the very image of reluctance.
“Don’t worry, Tones let me take it out,” Jim explained with a wink. “Take it.”
Steve did, eyes raking hungrily over the details of the photo that he’d been unable to look at last time. The expression on Tony’s face carved itself even deeper in his memory. He observed the pose of Tony’s body, the cant of his shoulders that was slightly too expressive, the beat-up sneakers that seemed unusual for the child of a billionaire to be wearing. His arms were tanned. Steve wished this was one of those digital photos he could zoom into and look more closely at Tony’s eyes.
He realised, after seconds of being lost in his own mind, that Jim had been scanning him with a calculating look the whole time. Steve got the distinct sense that he was being tested.
“Guy’s name was Daniel,” Jim revealed, turning back around and motioning for Steve to take a seat next to him.
Steve had barely spared the guy—Daniel—another look, too focused on Tony, but his eyes raked over him now. He was scruffy in a way Tony wasn’t. A bit older. A bit more reserved.
“Tony was so in love with him,” Jim said fondly, “don’t tell him I told you that, though.”
Steve didn’t say that he already knew. Because he appreciated Jim telling him all the same. Though the reasoning to why he thought it’d be a good thing for Steve to know was lost on him. A pain bit through his chest again, unwanted. He swallowed it down.
“I think Tony’s always been doomed to latch on to people who don’t really feel as fiercely as he does,” when Jim said this, he was looking into the distance absently. “Sometimes, when I look at him, I wonder if anyone even exists who feels as intensely as him.”
Suddenly, Jim’s eyes were on Steve, his expression calm and even but biting underneath. “You see that about him, don’t you Steve?”
Steve’s mouth felt dry. For the first time since coming out of the ice, he felt his age. His young age. There was something almost wise in Jim’s face that he felt out of his depth to even begin to name.
“Yes,” he croaked out, and then cleared his throat and reasserted more confidently. “Yes. I see that.” And he wasn’t lying.
Jim looked at him for a bit longer. It felt like a conversation was happening in his head that Steve wasn’t privy to.
“Hold on to the picture,” he said with finality, standing up. “You can tell Tony I gave it to you.”
Steve blinked, surprised. “He, uh. Won’t he be mad at you?”
Jim smiled at him, eyes crinkling in a way that made Steve feel a sudden fondness for the man. There was a love beset in his gaze that Steve knew belonged to Tony. It was the first time that night where the realisation didn’t cause outright jealousy.
“I can handle him,” Jim said, which wasn’t altogether an answer. “I’ve been handling him, Captain. And trust me, he was harder to handle at fourteen,” he nodded his head to Steve and walked towards the elevator. “Goodnight, Steve.”
Once the elevator doors closed and Steve was left alone again, he spared one more glance to the photograph held in his grip. Now with no company, he took a second to self-indulgently run a finger over Tony’s face, heart pounding in his chest.
He decided to apologise to Tony tomorrow for giving him the cold shoulder. He made his way to his room, intending to sleep off the petulance of the day and wake up prepared to face Tony once again.
___
Unfortunately, he woke up only a few hours later to the sound of the alarm.
“—Shit—!” He mumbled as he tumbled out of his bed, throwing on the suit as quickly as such a tight piece of clothing could be thrown on.
On his way out of his room, he joined up with Thor and Clint’s gait.
“What do we have?” Clint asked him, as though he would know.
“I just rolled out of bed same as you,” Steve said, aware that he was being a bit of a snappy dickhead but he really didn’t need this emergency right now.
In the elevator, heading upwards, Nat and Bruce were there.
“Tony?” Steve asked upon seeing them, and Nat was so preoccupied with being half asleep that she didn’t even send a teasing glance his way.
“Prepping the jet,” Bruce supplied. It was clear nobody really knew what was going on.
It became evident by the time they were on the roof. Steve’s eyes magnetised to a figure in the distance what could only be described as a giant of some sort. It figured that the one night where he really wanted to get some rest and be alone a giant would show up and stomp through the dark streets of New York.
“A…hairless King Kong,” Clint stated dumbly, in a tone that showed he was about as done with this as Steve felt he was.
“Jet,” Nat called and pointed them to the helipad, where the quinjet was waiting to get them where they needed to be (closer to the hairless giant).
As they came closer, the quinjet peeled open and allowed them access, at which point Steve walked determinately to the front, where Tony was strapped into the pilot’s seat, sounding off preparation checks with Jarvis as his copilot.
“What have we got?” Steve asked, wanting to know who called the alarm.
“Giant hairless alien baby, perhaps? Do I look like I know what that thing is, Rogers?” Tony snarked with too much snap, and, yep, he was still annoyed. “SHIELD called it.”
Steve nodded and took the information he could get. “Can we get Maria on the comms?”
“On it,” Tony called, never once turning away from what he was doing to meet Steve’s eyes.
Steve turned to his team and spat out instructions. At least in the interim, while SHIELD got themselves in a position to assist, he would need to make sure everyone knew what they were doing. In seconds, the team was in the air and travelling towards the thing wreaking havoc downtown. Bruce and Nat had sat near the pilot’s chair, ready to take over from Tony at a moment's notice.
Maria’s voice floated into his ear-piece soon after.
“Yep. Giant, uh. Giant hairless. Thing?” She supplied helpfully. “Does this feel surreal for anyone else?”
“Been there, done that,” Clint sighed.
“Hill, what’s our go?” Steve refocused the conversation.
Hill prattled off into the team’s ears as the size of the thing became more obvious the closer to it they got. The civilian screams of panic also bled in the closer they got.
“—some sort of portal? We’ve got a team on it and they seem to have closed—” Hill’s voice was continuing over the undercurrent of chaos.
The thing, whatever it was, appeared to be as confused about the situation as they were. As they got close enough to it for Steve to be able to study its face, nothing that he found there gave any sort of indication of ill intent so much as utter befuddlement.
“Well, if I had just walked through a portal and ended up on another planet, I’d be confused too. Talking from experience.” Tony japed. Thor nodded his own understanding.
“Can we, maybe, I don’t know. Talk to it?” Bruce suggested, swapping seats with Tony so that he could suit up.
Steve half nodded, half shrugged. May as well talk to the giant hairless alien. May as well have that be their lives. Seeing his agreement, Nat grabbed the transmission mic.
“Unknown entity,” she appeared nonplussed by speaking to an alien. “You are in a populated civilian area. We are a response team, but we are not engaging with lethal force.”
The creature shifted, a low sound rumbling from deep in its chest.
“If you are able to understand me,” she continued, “stand down. Remain where you are and limit your movement. We will attempt to resolve your displacement.”
There was a moment of pause where it almost appeared as though the thing was understanding her, before it simply continued on its rampage of stumbling through the streets cluelessly. It wouldn’t have been such an issue, if it weren’t the size of the empire state building.
“I don’t think it got that,” Tony hummed dryly, suited up sans the helmet. “Do you speak any alien languages? Aside from Russian.”
“Ha, ha,” Nat concealed a smirk. “You speak Russian too, Tony.”
“Это правда?” Tony faked surprise. “Извините.”
“I’m glad you two communicated,” Steve rolled his eyes. “Now, the alien?”
“Sure, Captain,” Tony snatched the mic from Nat and spoke into it. “инопланетное существо, успокойся—”
“Not what I meant.” Steve cut in. “Good to know nothing shakes your sense of humour.”
“Yep, you know me, Cap,” Tony bit back, and halfway through his helmet engaged and covered his face, voice coming out modulated. “Nothing shakes me.”
Steve briefly entertained the idea of challenging that statement right there, in front of the team (and the giant alien). Nat was speaking with Hill. Steve turned his attention to that conversation instead, until he noticed Tony moving towards the back of the jet. Steve caught on to his thinking in a flash of abject horror and annoyance.
“What are you doing?” He asked, voice steady. “Do you have any sort of plan?”
“Sure I do,” Tony shrugged, as much as the suit would let him. Then he asked Jarvis to patch him through to Hill. “Hill, get your sciency guys to open that portal again. We’re returning the package to sender.”
“What?” Steve startled. “You don’t know what else could come out of there!”
“Well you better get on the ground and make sure nothing does, then. Hold on to your seats!” Tony said simply, and then with little preamble he opened the back of the quinjet and flew out, gone in a flash of red and gold. Thor joined him after a few seconds.
“I hate him,” Steve muttered under his breath, turning back to where Nat, Bruce and Clint were strapped into their seats. “Bring us down, Bruce. You’re on aerial support unless we call a code green. Clint, Nat, you’re with me.”
And that’s how Steve ended up evacuating civilians from their homes at four in the morning while a giant was stumbling around them, at any time one wrong move away from creating Avengers paste all over the ground.
“C’mon, Hill. Portal time was ten minutes ago!” Tony was sounding off on comms, flying circles around the thing with Thor to distract its attention so that it didn’t start grabbing at buildings or something.
“It’s an alien portal, give us a second,” Hill levelled dryly.
The streets were just about becoming empty of civilians through Steve, Clint and Nat’s efforts when a strange sound like a high pitched whoosh sounded off around them. Steve turned and came face to face with a gaping portal, flat along the road, showing nothing visible though the other end but blue light and aether.
“Is it meant to be flat to the ground, Hill?” He asked into his comm, tilting his head sideways to look at it.
“I’m assuming not,” Hill admitted. “But I think it’s probably the best you’re going to get.”
“Incoming!” Nat called, as the head of something small peaked through the portal, followed by another and then another.
They were small things, almost dog-like, dark and scruffy by comparison to the hairless, massive thing that hovered over them still, distracted by the flashes of Tony and Thor flying around it in circles.
“Hostile?” Clint asked, and just as he said that one of the dogs lunged at them with a quite frankly rabid look in its eyes and they had their answer.
Steve, who wasn’t particularly interested in finding out if alien dogs got rabies, prompted his team to attack.
“We just have to hold them long enough for Iron Man and Thor to get that thing back through the portal!” He called, seeing more of those things spilling through the portal as though driven forth by rage alone.
“Hill, be on standby to close the portal,” Tony called, and Steve could hear the strain in his voice. He’d been flying flat out for a little while now. A pang of worry rang through him.
“Hurry it up, Iron Man,” his concern poured out of him in the form of a barked order. “I thought you said you’d return the package to sender!” He continued pounding against the wall of alien-dog around him with his shield, hearing the grunts and whimpers of the creatures as he, Nat and Clint pushed them back through the portal.
“Yeah, the mail slot is a bit misplaced, if you didn’t notice!” Tony called back, his voice strung high in his stress. That thing was batting at him like it was trying to wave away a fly. Steve could barely pay attention through the relentless assault of space-dog. “I’m working on it!”
“How are we to goad this massive creature to lie on the ground?” Thor questioned, and it seemed that nobody really had a response, too preoccupied with ensuring they don’t die the world’s most embarrassing death to the universe’s most ridiculous array of aliens.
“I think,” Tony was huffing now, “that we’re going to have to push it over. Thor, can you—”
He was cut off as Steve saw one of the blows from the creature’s massive hand land against Tony and send him spiralling out in a trail of red and gold, falling into a nearby building.
“Iron Man!” Steve called into his comms. “Tony! Sound off!”
Thor was too preoccupied with the creature on his own now for Steve to demand that he fly in and check on Tony. The rational part of his brain told him that Tony had survived much, much worse falls and batterings. His hind brain was inconsolable and did not answer to logic. There were a few tense seconds of silence that felt like a lifetime, to the backdrop of alien dog snarling all around him. Finally, finally, Tony’s voice rang through the comms again.
“Ugh,” he groaned, voice thin. “I either suddenly have the worst hangover ever or I have a concussion,” there was a moment of pause where his breathing was too hearable through the comms, “Wait, scratch that—Jarvis confirmed I have a concussion.”
Steve’s relief at the sound of his voice was palpable. He muted his comms to exhale loudly, breath rattling past his teeth, feeling the pounding of his heart in the base of his throat. The rest of the team, and Hill, were sounding off to Tony, but he could hardly hear a thing through the pounding of his blood in his ears. He unmuted his comms.
“Iron Man, engage only from a distance,” he called, and actually had the gall for a second to believe that Tony would listen to him.
“Thor, bring that thing fifty feet to the left. No, not—your left, not my left!” He spoke, a red dot emerging from the gaping hole at the side of the building he was knocked into. He ignored Steve entirely.
Thor, the traitor, followed Tony’s instructions and began to goad the creature into stepping fifty feet to his left. Steve groaned and then spat off more instructions into his comms.
“Watch for where it’s stepping!” He called out to Nat and Clint. “Keep it up!”
“How many of these fucking things are there!” Clint yelled in exasperation. “Does the portal lead to a magical pet shop?!”
Steve, too distracted by his efforts of keeping the rabid things back, did not grace that with a response. The ground shook with the reverberations of the footsteps of the giant as it was positioned by Thor, using himself as the proverbial carrot on a stick.
“Iron Man!” Thor called, air whooshing around him as he flew to avert the creature’s massive, grasping fists. “The creature is in position!”
“Great,” Tony said into the comms, quiet in his concentration. “Time to put a postage stamp on this bitch.”
“Tony…” Despite himself, Steve called out warningly into his comms, and looked up just in time to witness the Iron Man suit boost to what must have been maximum capacity and shoot off like a bolt of lightning to land in the middle of the thing’s chest.
A loud roar sounded off around them as the creature cried out in pain and surprise. It stumbled back from the impact, and Steve realised Tony had gotten Thor to move the thing so that it was between Tony’s position and the portal. Because as soon as the creature stumbled back, it lost its footing on the edge of the portal and fell backwards, tumbling into it with a roar and taking the alien dogs with it.
“Cover!” Steve called as he saw the thing begin to fall. “Take cover!”
There was no impact, as the thing fell right through the portal and presumably landed on the other side.
“Shut the portal!” Steve called urgently into his comms. “Hill, shut the portal down!”
“On it, on it!” Hill called, and within seconds the portal before them got smaller and smaller until it winked out of existence and left behind it a perfectly unassuming stretch of New York cement.
Steve didn’t dare breathe out yet.
“Iron Man?” He called into the comms again, looking around for any flash of familiar colour. “Tony? Where are you?”
This time, it took less time for a response to sound off.
“I’m fine,” Tony sounded worn out. “I landed near you, on the ground. Maybe 200 feet.”
Steve’s feet were moving before Tony finished speaking. He muted his comms. Nat and Clint were finishing off a few stragglers from the dogs that had ended up on the wrong side of the portal, and he paid them no mind as he looked around in search of Tony.
In the distance, a metallic figure was stumbling, barely upright. Steve sprinted towards Tony, feeling as though he wasn’t breathing at all. He made it closer just in time to see Tony crumble to one knee, one hand placed on the ground to secure himself.
Steve ran to his side and placed a hand on Tony’s back, the metal of the suit warm in its energy exertion under his palm. Tony was breathing heavily, head hanging down. He had the helmet off.
“Tony?” Steve spoke, softly.
“Yeah, yeah,” Tony reassured, though it didn’t particularly work. “I’m fine. Need a lie down. And a coffee. And sleep.” Steve saw him sway slightly.
“Lie down here,” He suggested manically, and before Tony could protest he was gently leading him with steady hands to lie down on his back.
“What are—?” Tony was looking at him, bewildered, as Steve deposited him onto the ground.
“Just shush,” Steve said, frustration simmering like a current under his words. “Lie down and shut up, Tony.”
“There’s no way you’re mad at me now,” Tony grumbled, wincing through his headache (concussion). “I’m the one who’s mad at you!”
“I’m not mad at you,” Steve clarified, and promptly lay down next to Tony on the cold cement. Hesitantly, he continued. “And you’re right. To be mad at me. I mean.”
“Damn right, I am,” Tony said, but didn’t sound particularly impassioned. When Steve looked over to him, he was side eyeing Steve with a look of curiosity. “What are you doing?”
“Lying down,” Steve said plainly, and then shut his eyes and breathed deeply.
There was a moment of silence. Steve presumed he had caught Tony off guard enough for his anger to be momentarily forgotten.
“Well,” Tony said, recovering, and he sounded slightly amused. “Don’t fall asleep out here.”
“Why not?” Steve said, and pretended to get more comfortable as though he truly intended to make a street his bed.
“Because,” he could hear Tony’s smile in his words. “You’ll get a stampede of New Yorkers trampling you on their way to work in a few hours.”
“It’s fine, I’ll survive.”
“Oh, it’s not you I’m worried about. What if people trip over your rock-solid calves and hurt themselves?”
Steve opened his eyes. “You’re right. We should go back and sleep in our beds.”
“Each in our own beds?” Tony asked with something mirthful in his voice.
“Where else?” He got up and helped Tony stand up too. “Well, actually. You’re going to get checked out by Dr Cho.”
“Boo,” Tony pretended to whine, and allowed himself to be assisted upright.
They came face to face. When Tony was in the suit, they were the same height. Steve noticed blood trailing its way down the side of Tony’s face from where he hit his head. His eyes followed the blood and then shifted to the side to meet Tony’s eyes.
They were warm, dark. Tony met his gaze, unblinking. Steve had thought to himself in the workshop that he wasn’t susceptible to Tony’s ‘big brown eyes’ schtick, but for a split second there where Tony was looking at him he thought that he wouldn’t be able to deny him anything, if Tony asked.
“I’m sorry,” he said instead, referring to the balcony. “I was having a moment.”
“I could tell,” Tony said, and his eyes crinkled with his smile. “That’s why I came out to talk to you.”
“I thought you were allergic to emotion,” Steve joked, the corner of his lip tugged upward.
“Oh, I am,” Tony’s smile was somewhat boyishly charming. “But I guess I thought breaking out in hives wouldn’t be that bad to return the favour.”
Steve blinked. “You don’t owe me anything, Tony.”
“No, I know,” Tony looked down, abashed, and Steve immediately missed the sight of his eyes. “I know that. I just,” he paused and then looked back to meet Steve’s gaze. “The workshop stuff. You got Tony Stark the director’s cut. Which wasn’t exactly my intention.”
“No, Tony, I—” Steve stepped closer without realising. “If anything, I appreciated… I guess, seeing you that way. I mean—not sad, that’s not what I meant. Just,” he crossed his arms over his chest. “I hadn’t seen you that way before, that’s all. It’s…nice.”
“Nice,” Tony repeated, and he smiled brightly, unguarded. “I don’t think anyone’s ever called my emotional baggage ‘nice’ before.”
Steve’s heart pounded in his throat. The sight of Tony’s hopeful smile felt like a slash across his chest. A vision of Tony’s tear-stained face floated to the front of his mind. It’s always better in my head than it is in real life. Steve knew, with sudden, staggering clarity, that he could never allow himself to be the reason why Tony drank himself into a stupor, or the reason why Tony stopped believing. If Tony handed Steve a part of himself, there was a very real chance that Steve’s super-soldier hands, clumsy and unaware in their own strength, would squeeze too hard. Soldiers were made for war. Steve was Captain America, the world’s best soldier.
Tony was looking at him curiously. Steve’s heart gave another squeeze at the sight. His fingers twitched at his side. He wondered what the side of Tony’s face would feel like beneath his palm. Just then, Hill engaged the comms and called them all back for debrief.
“I guess we gotta head back,” Steve said, voice thin, and Tony nodded his head, wincing. “And get you to Dr Cho.” Steve added upon seeing the wince.
___
Steve spent an embarrassing amount of time secretly staring at the photo from when Tony was eighteen.
He kept it in his bedside table and would take it out and gaze at it every few days. It felt bittersweet, feeling connected to some part of Tony that he would never really get to know. A part that he couldn’t touch, and therefore couldn’t ruin.
To a degree, Steve had to accept it. Tony Stark’s mind was like a black hole of brilliance and catching even a glimpse meant you wanted to get sucked in. But wanting didn’t mean allowing yourself to.
The glimpses he had caught, Tony had revealed by accident. Drunken mumbling in a workshop. A moment of vulnerability revealed at a TV screen. A photograph that Clint pushed Tony into showing them. Steve wouldn’t get to know more than that—accidental glimpses would have to be enough.
He had to be okay with it. It was better that way. Only some months ago, he had been completely okay to have an amicable friendship slash professional partnership with Tony—that had been enough. But Steve had always been drawn to hopeless romantics, so it only made sense for something else to have grown inside him at the realisation that Tony, like him, longed hopelessly and entirely to know and be known by another person, inside and out.
Steve couldn’t be that person. The sight of Tony’s hopeful smile had only confirmed it. Whatever Tony had handed him of himself, whether accidentally or on purpose, Steve had to hand it back before he fumbled it.
He cancelled their next two movie nights. It felt ridiculous to not be able to watch a movie, but there was a very real fear that Tony would once again pick a movie that left him staring at the screen in earnest yearning, and make it so that Steve would be unable to tear his eyes away from Tony’s face.
Steve made excuses for lunches, dinners, drinks. He didn’t realise how often he had been seeing Tony, how much he had latched onto their routine, until suddenly it felt like his weeks were mostly empty. Empty without Tony’s comments and needling conversation. His psychologist abruptly had new material.
“Okay, so,” Dr Green pushed her glasses up her nose, and Steve internally groaned. “Explain it to me again; you don’t think that you’re capable of loving?”
“It sounds stupid when you put it that way,” Steve said, shifting in his seat. “I don’t think I’m incapable. Just…not very good at it.”
She blinked at him. “And because of that, you think it’s your job to protect Tony?”
Steve wondered if it ever felt surreal to her to be Captain America’s psychologist. “Yes.”
“From yourself?” She rehashed again, as though wanting to make sure that she was understanding him properly.
In lieu of answering, Steve asked a question of his own. “You don’t sound convinced. Can you tell me what you’re thinking?”
The corner of her lip twitched. “I’m afraid there’s ethical guidelines that advise against me saying exactly what I’m thinking right now.”
“Ah,” Steve nodded, clearing his throat. “Right. So. Prognosis?”
She placed her notebook away, making that sort of knowing eye contact with him that he hated.
“Well,” she began. “Not so much a prognosis. More so food for thought,” she said plainly. “Everyone is capable of loving. And there’s always a degree of risk associated with that. But there’s risk in everything. It’s up to you to decide what risk is worth taking. But you can’t decide that for another person.”
Steve considered her words. “You’re saying I can’t decide for Tony?”
“I’m saying that if I were Tony, I would want to be given the choice,” she said, and once again Steve left the session more conflicted than when he came in.
Bruce said that that was the sign of a good psychologist.
“They’re supposed to challenge you,” his face was warped through a glass beaker. Steve had met him in his lab. “That’s the whole point of therapy. They poke holes into everything you think you know for certain.”
Steve hummed. Bruce stood upright, face pulling away from the beaker, and looked at him curiously.
“Steve, uh,” he began, lips pressed into a tight line. “Is something the matter? You’ve been…uh…”
“Different?” Steve supplied, voice flat.
“More introspective,” Bruce said, and winced a little as though he understood those words to be very hurtful.
“Plenty to be introspective about,” Steve said cryptically. “It’ll be fine, Bruce.”
He hadn’t convinced Bruce with that statement, and he hadn’t convinced himself either.
Tony had obviously noticed the change. The first two weeks or so, he would attempt to corner Steve in the kitchen or in the gym, but Steve always managed to weasel himself away before any sort of uncomfortable conversation could be had. He didn’t trust himself not to cave if he took long enough to stare into Tony’s eyes.
“Hey, Cap,” Tony called after him once, catching him as he was walking out of the kitchen. “There you are! I haven’t seen you in so long I thought maybe they’d put you back on ice.”
“Not so much,” Steve had said, continuing to walk, fists clenching when Tony followed. “Just busy.”
“Busy,” Tony’s voice had been light and airy, but Steve knew him well enough to read the undertone of bullshit that had been emanating from it. “Busy…drawing? Or perhaps running? Mostly running, from what I can tell.”
“Fury’s got me on report writing,” Steve had said, sparing a tight-lipped smile as he walked into the elevator in the hallway. “Sorry, Tony. We’ll catch up soon.”
“Right,” Tony had said, voice tight. “Right. Yeah, I’m busy too,” a beat of silence followed. “Catch up soon.”
The elevator doors closed between them and Steve had breathed out all his guilt into the four walls that pressed around him. He would catch up with Tony soon. As soon as he got this all out of his system, things would go back to normal, and he would be Tony’s friend. The friend he needed, who could listen to his problems, watch movies with him, shoot the shit, and not be thinking about potentially breaking his heart while doing it.
However, distance and time only seemed to make things worse. After a few weeks of brushing off Tony’s attempts at reconnection, it appeared that Tony somewhat gave up, because Steve didn’t really run into him in the Tower anymore, not unless there was something specific happening. They would still talk during boardgame nights, but Tony always had an unaffected, removed air about him that felt to Steve like an impenetrable wall.
The realisation provided both relief and deep, overwhelming despair that hit Steve in waves and prompted him to open his bedside drawer and look at the photo again. Warm, summer sunlight on bronzed skin. The line of Tony’s shoulders, expressive and relaxed. A Tony that existed only in the past, and Steve would never—could never—know. Somehow less threatening than the current Tony, a few walls away. Yet all the more painful.
Making this all the more difficult was the fact that, multiple times, Steve was sure he caught Tony looking at him with a look that spoke of intense dejection, out of the corner of his eye. Mostly, he tried to ignore it. Once or twice, when his brain couldn’t help but cave to the want of direct confirmation, Tony looked away as soon as Steve turned his head to see him clearly.
Thinking about what could possibly be going through Tony’s head simultaneously reminded Steve that he was doing the right thing, pulling away while they still could, and also amplified the pain Steve himself felt to the next degree.
Nat, of course, couldn’t keep her nose out of it.
“I hope you’re telling your therapist about this,” she said when it was just the two of them in the kitchen one early morning. She was seated at the island, while Steve stood by the counter with his back to her. “Because otherwise you’re going to have to tell me. And I’m not going to be as nice as her.”
“She wasn’t that nice,” Steve said plainly, in the process of making a protein-shake. “Some niceness from someone would be appreciated.”
“I gotta tell you, Steve,” Nat clicked her tongue. “I’m not feeling particularly capable of being nice right now.”
Steve sighed. “I don’t know what to do, Nat.”
“Not what you’ve been doing so far, is my hint.”
“No, I don’t know how to make it go away,” a frustration bled into his voice that he’d been keeping carefully controlled so far. “I need to wait all of this out. I need to just wait it out.”
“And what will happen then?” Nat asked, her eyes burning holes into his back.
“I can just let things go back to normal.” Steve placed his hands down onto the kitchen counter, leaning against it and letting his head hang down. He kind of wished everyone would just leave him alone.
Nat got up, walked around the kitchen island and stood behind him. After a second, the palm of her hand came up to rest just between his shoulder blades. He relaxed a little, subconsciously.
“I know it’d be easier that way,” her voice was quiet. “But sometimes the brain doesn’t care about easy.”
Steve didn’t turn around to look at her, only hearing her footsteps as she walked further and further away, until the sound receded into the hallway. He drank down his protein shake and made his way towards the door, intending to go for a run.
Under the doorway, there was a rustle from the vent. This was one of the ones that it was okay to talk through, so Steve spoke up.
“Don’t want company on the run today, Clint,” he said apologetically. “Tomorrow, if you want.”
Clint’s voice was echoey and muted through the vent. “No way, dude. I don’t know exactly what you’ve got on your mind, but I don’t wanna be within ten feet of it. No offence.”
Steve sighed. “Figures.”
Two weeks turned into three, which turned into four, and the energy between him and Tony was just about stifling. If anyone aside from Nat had noticed exactly what was going on, they didn’t mention it.
It was possible they simply thought that Steve and Tony were going through another fit of theirs. God knows it had been common enough when they’d first met. It was only natural that someone would assume they would relapse in that way. Steve wanted them to assume that. It was already enough to know his emotions himself. He didn’t need more witnesses.
He kept looking at the photo at night, sometimes. During missions and briefings, Tony’s shoulders were a straight, stiff line, and he would respond to Steve’s commands with a carefully neutral voice and face. Steve needed to remind himself that the version of Tony with the soft shoulders existed; he just didn’t get to see it in person anymore. Which, he had to remember, was a good thing. It didn’t feel like one, but it was.
On the fourth week, as he was busy lying on top of his made bed with the photo in his hand, there was a knock at the door. His eyes tilted upwards to meet the sight of the door, blinking as though shaken out of a stupor. He hadn’t been expecting anyone. He haphazardly shoved the picture back into the bedside drawer and made his way to the door.
On the other side was Tony, with a look on his face that spoke of very delicate and careful modulation.
“Tony—” Steve started, but Tony was already past him. “What, uh. What’re you doing here?”
“I just realised—” Tony said, his voice floating casually, looking around the room. “I’ve never actually seen the inside of your room since you moved in. I was wondering what sort of decor Captain America keeps,” he feigned another interested look around. “Turns out, not very much. I have an interior designer contact, if you need. This is a touch too minimalist. A bit barracks-like.”
Steve’s brain was trying to reconcile the sight of Tony within his bedroom, and so he neglected to protest Tony’s invasion of his privacy. He had missed being able to look at him. Now that he was here, his eyes felt like they couldn’t drink the sight of him enough. This was bad. This was dangerous.
“Big fan of beige, clearly,” Tony continued at Steve’s silence. “I think I’ve seen this exact bed spread on one of those telemarketing shows.”
Steve attempted to cut straight to the point. The sooner he could get Tony out of here, the better for everyone. “Tony, I—”
“Do you have a personal assistant or something that I haven’t met yet?” Tony cut in. “It just seems like your schedule has really filled up and I’m not sure how to get myself an appointment.”
Steve’s hands felt clammy. “It’s been a busy time.”
“Too busy for a movie?” Tony needled, and there was a crack in his casual tone, voice slightly too thin. His eyes were still flickering between looking at Steve and looking at his room. “And here I thought we were becoming friends.”
“We are friends,” Steve protested, his heart thumping rapidly in his chest. “Nothing’s changed.” It was a poor attempt at lying.
Tony’s eyes finally landed on him properly, and Steve saw quiet, simmering anger buried there. He had forgotten how cleanly those eyes showed Tony’s thoughts sometimes, how penetrating and difficult they were to look at. How much sway they held over Steve’s own emotions. He abruptly turned away, turning his back to Tony. After a second, he heard a rustle of the bedspread. Tony must have sat down on the corner of Steve’s bed.
“Nothing’s changed,” Steve reiterated, arms crossed over his chest. “It’s just been… a tough time. I needed some space— I still do. It doesn’t mean we’re not—” Steve cut himself off and sighed. Tony was eerily silent. “Things will go back to normal.”
Tony didn’t respond. Steve didn’t turn to face him, afraid of what he would see. He pushed onward, trying to salvage whatever he could.
“We can go back to movie nights, soon,” he said softly. “You can pick, like you always do.”
“Steve,” Tony cut him off, and Steve wasn’t sure Tony had ever called him by his first name before.
He turned, and saw Tony looking down at his hands, where the ‘88 photo was held. Steve’s eyes shot to his bedside drawer—a flash of panic. He’d left it slightly open.
“Tony—”
“You know,” Tony’s voice was oddly quiet, and his hands were gripping the photo too tightly. “After the balcony, I thought maybe I had imagined things, or something. Rhodey used to tell me that I can be really stupid about this kind of thing. Misreading things that aren’t really there, out of hope, or something.”
When he looked back up to Steve, his eyes glimmered angrily. A searing, undeniable hurt. Steve’s hands clenched into fists at his sides. His throat bobbed with the force of his swallow.
“But I think, probably, no,” Tony continued simply, and then gently placed the photo next to him on the bed without looking at it. “I wasn’t wrong.”
Steve swallowed thickly. He could think of nothing to say. Nothing to do, but watch Tony’s face unravel. He felt caught in something much too revealing.
“So, what—you get to see past the curtain,” Tony began, standing and walking towards him. Steve’s eyes magnetised to the frowning line of his mouth. “You get to help me to bed, and keep the photo, and feed me these lines about love being enough.”
Tony was close enough that Steve had to look down at him. That he could hear the sound of Tony’s breaths, in and out, see the rise and fall of his chest with them. He clenched his fists harder so they wouldn’t tremble.
“What do I get, Steve?” Tony said, all soft intensity.
“Tony,” Steve began, though he wasn’t sure exactly how to even begin explaining. A sudden embarrassment welled up inside him, a mouse caught with the cheese. “It’s not really a good idea—this isn’t…”
“I’ll tell you what I get,” Tony cut him off, voice raising. “I get Captain America!”
A pinch of annoyance pulled at Steve. “What are you talking about?”
“The sanctimonious, untouchable, self-sacrificial patriot, and so on and so forth,” Tony said, and then pointed to the photo on the bed. “Why was that in your drawer?”
“Jim gave it to me,” Steve answered, crossing his arms over his chest. “He said you’d be fine with it.”
“Fine, whatever, but why did he think you’d want it?”
Steve opened his mouth to respond, but quickly let it shut again. The answer was too difficult to put into words. Steve had spent too many nights caught in his own head to be able to encapsulate it all into one sentence. And he knew what Tony was searching for, but that admission was too fragile. If he tried to put it to words, it would crumble as soon as it came out past his lips.
Tony quivered at Steve’s silence, in anger or maybe just in plain hurt.
Tony scoffed. “Right. Okay.”
“Tony…”
“You can’t even admit it?”
“It’s not what you think,” Steve rushed in to add, as though anything about this was salvageable at this point.
“Okay,” Tony nodded. “Tell me what I think, then.”
“You think it means something. I just—”
“Oh, it doesn’t mean something?” Tony pressed, stepping closer again. “You keep a photo of all your buddies in your bedside drawer? Didn’t see one of Nat, or Clint or anyone else in there. Just me.”
Steve’s jaw tightened. “It’s not like that, Tony.”
“Then what is it like?” Tony shot back. “Seriously, Steve. Explain it to me like I’m five, what am I missing here?”
“It—Tony, it’s more of a me thing,” Steve winced at the responding look he got. “You don’t understand—”
“No, I don’t,” Tony cut in. “That’s kind of the problem, Steve. I don’t understand, because you’re saying one thing, but I’m seeing another,” he threw up his hands in frustration. “I don’t know who I’m talking to right now, am I talking to Steve or Captain America?”
“Stop saying that,” The words burst out of Steve, chest tightening painfully. “I’m trying to do the right thing.”
Tony blinked at him. “The right thing,” he said slowly. “The right thing is ignoring me?”
Steve ran a hand over his face in exasperation. “Tony, in the workshop…” He stopped there, searching for more words that weren’t coming.
Seeing that he wasn’t going to continue, Tony spoke up. “You told me you would forget about that.”
“It’s not exactly forgettable,” Steve said. “I can’t forget it, Tony. I can’t forget what it looked like. That’s sort of the whole problem, that I can’t seem to forget it.”
It was the closest he’d come to implicitly admitting something this whole conversation, and of course, that wasn’t lost on Tony. His eyes flickered with a momentary satisfaction, as though Steve had given him something he was looking for, if only partly.
“Well, that’s a step in the right direction,” Tony said, pulling back a little. “Now you just have to explain what you meant by ‘the right thing’.”
“I meant,” Steve doubled down. “That I have a responsibility—”
“Over me?” Tony responded incredulously. “That’s—there is no way you don’t understand how crazy that sounds.”
“Yes, over you, over the team, over everyone,” Steve shot back. “That’s—that’s kind of the whole point of me, Tony.”
“And what about you?” Tony asked, beginning to step closer again. “Who has responsibility over you?”
Steve’s lips pursed. “Nobody needs to. That’s the point. That might not be what you want, but it’s what I can give. I know how to give this. This other part that you’re asking for, I don’t know how to give it.”
A look of distress made its way onto Tony’s face. There was a pleading quality to him, and it made Steve feel the overwhelming need to push him out of the room and shut the door on him.
“God, it’s like pulling teeth with you,” Tony stepped closer. “So, what, your whole life now, since coming out of the ice, is gonna be a prolonged posturing like you’re on a promotional video, or a poster or something? Just pretending there’s nothing going on underneath, never letting anything touch you?”
Steve looked down at the carpeted floor of his room.
“I don’t want the poster, Steve,” Tony continued, desperately, eyebrows pulled together in an image of anguish. “I already had the poster. I grew up with it, remember? I know what Captain America looks like.”
Steve’s breath caught as Tony stepped even closer, close enough to count each eyelash that framed his eyes.
“I want the real thing—Steve Rogers.”
Steve’s heart clenched, and he could feel the expression on his face match Tony’s.
“You said,” Tony spoke again, softly, and Steve felt the touch of his breath ghost across his face. “That you had to keep making sure Steve Rogers is still there.”
Steve looked down at his hands. Thought of the tear-tracks on Tony’s face. It would ruin him. It would probably ruin them both.
“It just—It can’t end well,” Steve said, and it felt too heavy to speak. “It can’t end well, Tony.”
“Oh, you’ve already decided that, have you?” Tony said, voice thick with vitriol. “I seem to remember a conversation where you had a lot to say about people not even trying.”
Steve paused, breathing heavily. Tony inched closer, impossibly close, eyes locked onto his.
“You remember that?” Tony continued, voice low, nearing whisper. “Or was that just another Captain America speech?”
“That’s not fair, I do believe that, I just—” Steve said, voice equally low. “I just know what it looks like when things go wrong.” The bottle in Tony’s hand. Wet eyelashes. He would think it’s his fault, if Steve wasn’t good enough.
“Well, you know, I don’t,” Tony said, and Steve could feel the heat of his body so close to his. “I don’t know what it looks like when things go wrong, or when they go right, for that matter, because you know they can go right too. I don’t know because you’re not letting me see it for myself.”
Steve swallowed thickly, eyes flicking down Tony’s face.
“Just. Let me see,” Tony said, and then his lips were on Steve’s and Steve was powerless to stop the want that welled up inside him like a burst of fire.
His arms wrapped around Tony and pulled him closer, impossibly closer. Tony pressed himself into the touch and Steve felt the heat of his body against his front. Steve’s hands were trembling around Tony’s waist. Tony’s own were steady, sure, wrapped around Steve’s neck.
It felt like every nerve was singing. Steve wasn’t sure he’d felt the force of a kiss so vividly, not since a long, long time ago. It was as though Tony’s breathing was his own. His eyes were shut to the world, and all he could feel was Tony’s lips against his own, soft and warm and hot, impossibly hot. And the feeling was only building, searing hot and threatening to set him alight.
Steve pulled back frantically. Tony’s eyes stared back at him, wide, warm, full of promise. For a few seconds, there was only heavy, panting breathing. Tony’s arms were around his neck still, and his own on Tony’s waist. He swallowed hard, staring at Tony’s blown pupils and reddened lips.
“Tony,” he spoke into the silence. “I don’t want to hurt you.”
“That’s what you’re doing, Steve,” Tony said. “That’s what you’re doing right now. It’s already too late,” his palm rested against the side of Steve’s face. “Too late for it not to hurt.”
Steve stood still. Tony’s hand felt smooth and soft against the side of his face. With a brief glance down, he saw the line of Tony’s shoulders, relaxed and open. It really was too late. It was inevitable and, he realised with a brief moment of shock, it had been inevitable for a while now. There was a denial, a strong pull that yelled at him to throw Tony out of the room and pretend that he’d never seen this side of him at all. But he’d already been doing that, and it hadn’t worked in his favour exactly.
He’d thought to himself before that if Tony asked for something while looking at him with those warm brown eyes, he would not be able to deny him anything. He was asking now, wasn’t he? This was Tony asking, or maybe even pleading, which Steve didn’t know Tony was capable of doing.
Was Steve strong enough to say no? Tony’s lips pressed against his again, gently, with reverence, and Steve fell into the kiss with the abandon of the distinct realisation that he was never going to be perfect enough to say no to this. No soldier’s instinct and no serum and no amount of mythologising was ever going to make it possible for Steve to say no. If anything, he had been stupid to believe he could keep saying no. Steve’s life was one long line of feeling stupid over and over again.
The thought, which should have brought forward despair, instead made him grunt the fervour of his longing against Tony’s lips. Tony responded with his own sound, muffled against Steve’s lips. Steve’s heart picked up pace at the sound, the reverberation of Tony’s voice against his mouth. He wanted to keep eating up every sound until Tony was unable to make another.
Steve’s hands stroked along the sides of Tony’s body, the strong wiry muscle that thrummed in its heat beneath his touch. Steve did believe in love. Steve did believe love was enough. True enough, he had never applied that to himself, and his hands that were made for killing rather than holding. But now, with Tony held within his grip, he couldn’t imagine his hands handling anything more delicately. Perhaps he really was a stupid hypocrite, but somehow, Tony seemed to like that for some reason so it can’t all be entirely bad.
“Is that a yes?” Tony’s voice was only half-coherent against Steve’s mouth.
In lieu of an answer, Steve held Tony tighter and kissed him harder.
It felt like they stayed there, lips locked and moving against each other, for an eternity. Finally, with a draw of air, they pulled away from each other. Their bodies stayed close.
“No, seriously, is that a yes, Cap?” Tony repeated, and in his eyes Steve could see that he already knew the answer.
Steve’s thumbs rubbed circles into Tony’s sides. He nodded slightly, his response to Tony’s question.
“I’m not sure I know how to…” he left the thought unfinished.
Tony smiled at him. “Cap, no offence, but sometimes I think that you think about things too hard.”
“So, what, am I supposed to take after your example?” Steve faked a scoff. “Not likely.”
Tony ignored him, which was fair. Steve didn’t think it’d be possible to be mad at Tony for a while now, with how elated he felt. Sure, it would fade and he would go back to finding it very easy to be annoyed at Tony, but he could think of worse fates. Tony dragged them both to the bed and sat them down on the edge, picking up the photo again.
“Did Platypus really give you this?” he gestured.
“Yeah, he did.”
Tony scoffed fondly. “God, nothing gets past him,” he looked down at the photo, grimacing through an embarrassed sort of wince. “I can’t believe I’m about to say this, but Clint was right. It’s very twinky. My shoulders are pansy galore."
“I like your pansy shoulders,” Steve said, shoving his nose into the crook of Tony’s neck and revelling in the surprised sound Tony made. “And if anything, I don’t think it’s your shoulders that make you a pansy.”
“Oh yeah?” Tony asked, and put the photo down to hold Steve closer. “Did something else give me away?”
“You kissing me,” Steve pointed out, and his heart was beating impossibly fast. “And, now that I think about it, the Captain America posters in your bedroom as a kid.”
Tony shrugged. “You got me. I like blondes. Buff ones.”
Steve laughed, passively aware of the sweetness of Tony’s scent, his soft skin. Then, suddenly, Tony’s words from the workshop entered his mind again.
“Tony,” he asked, and his voice sounded abruptly somber. “Aren’t you, uh. I don’t know. Worried? About… it not being as good as it is in your head, I suppose? Or—”
“Are you—? Oh, God, I knew I’d said something stupid that night,” Tony mumbled. “Is that what’s been eating at you, these last few weeks?”
Months, Steve thought, though he didn’t bother saying that, wanting to hear an actual answer. Tony pulled back so that he could meet Steve’s eyes.
“I don’t know yet,” he said, honestly. “Right now, it’s pretty damn good,” his eyes searched Steve’s. “It’s going to be hard, sure. Isn’t everything, with us? I mean—not just you and me, this kinda life in general. It might even, I don’t know, end, and hurt a damned lot,” he paused for a second. “I’m a bit of a masochist though, and also, uh, I think when it’s good, it’s gonna be pretty great, right?”
Steve placed a hand at his cheek and ran his thumb over Tony’s bottom lip, because he’d wanted to for a while now. Right now, with the force of Tony’s kiss still feeling like a tingling on his lips, it was really easy to believe him.
“Wow,” he deadpanned. “That almost made sense.”
“I make sense,” Tony moved his head around to kiss Steve’s palm. “Don’t sound so surprised. Wanna make out again, just to really lock it in?”
Steve’s lips were already on Tony’s before he’d finished talking.
___
Steve went out to the kitchen the next day and didn’t really realise he was smiling until Nat slow clapped.
“It’s a miracle, really,” she pretended to wipe away a tear. “Never thought I’d see the day.”
A thought popped into Steve’s head. “Did you tell him to come talk to me?”
Nat tapped the side of her nose, and Steve rolled his eyes fondly. “You’re such a meddler.”
“Tell who to talk to you?” Clint asked, head popping out of a vent.
“Are you serious, Clint?” Steve asked while grabbing himself a coffee.
“I couldn’t hear properly, who did Tasha tell to talk to you?”
Nat looked at him to see if he was going to answer.
Steve took a sip from his coffee. “Tony.”
Clint stepped out of the vent fully and took a seat next to Nat at the kitchen bench.
“Oh,” Clint said as though connecting the pieces. “Oh, okay, you were both pissy because of each other.”
“You just put that together?” Nat snarked, her arm around his shoulders affectionately. “You thought they were just pissy independently? Noted for your next performance review.”
“Don’t tell Nick,” Clint said, though his attention was still mostly on Steve. “So, Tony talked to you and you’re not pissy anymore?”
Steve smiled against his coffee cup and then put it down on the counter. He hadn’t really discussed with Tony about how they were going to tell the others, but Nat already knew and to be honest keeping secrets when living together was already hard, much less secrets like kissing and other stuff.
“Yeah, not pissy anymore,” he confirmed, and just then Tony walked into the kitchen with Bruce. “Oh hey, we were just talking about you.”
“Of course you were, you’re like obsessed with me,” Tony asked, and he casually sauntered over to Steve, reaching across him to use the coffee machine. “Which—I’m not saying I blame you.”
“Much to be obsessed with,” Steve hummed casually and when Tony smiled his heart did the cardiac equivalent of a swan dive. “But no, we were just saying how Nat told you to talk to me.”
Tony sipped from his own, freshly acquired coffee, and stood next to Steve, hip bumping against his own. He looked over the counter to Nat.
“Yeah, that’s—that’s true, actually, she did do that,” he mimed contemplation. “Does that mean that, if things go really well we have to let her baptise our firstborn?”
“I believe that was an implicit part of the deal,” Nat deadpanned. “And it also has to be named after me.”
“What if it’s a boy?” Steve asked.
“Natasho,” Tony proposed.
“Natron,” Natasha countered. “Middle name ‘The Destroyer’.”
“You know what, weirdly, I’m not against that.”
Steve’s mind thought back to the blue suit he thought he might wear to Tony’s wedding, which, okay, it was probably a tiny bit early to think about that, but goddamn it he’d been pining for a while and he deserved to have just a little bit of a daydream, especially when Tony was just making jokes about them having kids. So, anyway, he had kissed that dream of the blue suit at the wedding goodbye, so he promptly unkissed it and allowed his hand to fall to Tony’s side, grasping just above his hipbone.
Clint’s eyes landed on the motion. “What,” he blinked twice. “Is going on.”
Bruce clapped him on the back, knowingly. “Performance review is going to be tough for you, buddy.”
“Okay, has Nick told you guys something?” Clint waved his hands around. “It’s startling that this has come up twice in the last five minutes.”
Thor sauntered through the door, shirtless. “Good morning,” he said simply, then his eyes drifted over Tony and Steve and he added. “Congratulations, my friends.”
Clint threw his arms up again. “Was I seriously the only one here who didn’t know about this?”
“Thanks,” Tony ignored Clint and faced Thor. “Jane stayed over?”
“Yes, I have left her only to quench my thirst.” Thor sighed dreamily, grabbing a cup to fill with water. “She sleeps still, like that beautiful woman with the fragile forefingers.”
“Sleeping Beauty,” Nat supplied, and turned to Clint. “To answer your question, yes, you were the only one who didn’t know.”
Clint made a noise of indignation, but Steve chose this moment to turn to face Tony and tune out the others’ conversation.
“Just so you know,” he levelled. “I’m not okay with Natron. Or Natasho.”
“We can workshop it,” Tony shrugged, and he pushed closer into Steve’s side. “You, uh. Doing good?”
Steve thought about it. There was a pressing fear in the back of his head that spoke words to the effect of this is wrong and unhelpfully supplied images of Tony’s heartbreak that Steve had previously been privy to. It was a lot easier to make those images quieten when Tony’s actual, real life face was in front of him, so close to his own, and he had that look in his big, brown eyes that spoke of a just barely suppressed glee.
“Yeah,” Steve said, and he leaned down to press a comparatively chaste kiss to Tony’s lips. Someone around them made a noise of fake disgust. “Not perfect. But good. You?”
“Perfect is boring,” Tony reminded him with a shrug. “I’m great. Maybe even amazing.”
Steve hummed his acknowledgement and squeezed Tony’s hip. “Wanna come running with me today?”
“Who do you think you’re talking to?” Tony all but ripped himself from Steve’s grip. “Bruce and I are going to commit crimes against science in his lab.”
“Not actual crimes,” Bruce meekly added.
“Actual crimes,” Tony pressed another kiss to Steve’s lips and then dragged Bruce out of the kitchen.
Steve watched them leave and barely held back a sigh that would have been a touch too on the nose of cheesy and romantic, even for him. He must not have schooled his features well enough, however, because his remaining teammates were looking at him knowingly when he turned back to them.
“That’s disgusting,” Clint scrunched up his face. “I didn’t know your face could make that expression.”
Steve picked up his coffee cup and took a sip. “And just for that, you’re definitely coming running with me.”
Clint resigned himself to his fate with a groan and went to change into his running clothes. Thor smiled at Steve, in that much-too-earnest way of his. He drank the last of his water down before speaking.
“I am glad to see you and Stark have sorted out your differences,” he said pleasantly. “It is good for a warrior to have another to share in their fears.”
Steve, actually weirdly quite touched by that, was about to express his gratitude when Thor spoke again. “Which reminds me; my Jane awaits.”
“Don’t wanna hang out with us anymore?” Nat asked jokingly.
On his way out, Thor turned back and responded, unnecessarily. “If I ever choose your company over that of my Jane you must immediately incapacitate me, because a clone wears my face,” and with that, he was promptly gone.
“Noted,” Steve said to the space where Thor used to be, and then turned back to Nat. “You really are a meddler.”
“You love it,” she said, and Steve didn’t disagree. “Nothing would get done around here without me.”
“I didn’t say I disagreed,” Steve said softly, and he hoped his eyes were conveying the amount of thankfulness that he could never really put into words.
Nat scrunched up her nose jokingly. “Okay, don’t look at me like that, it’s disconcerting.”
While on his run, Clint spoke through a few huffs of exertion. “Just so you know,” he nudged Steve with his elbow. “It’s nice. It’s good. It’s a good thing.”
Steve smiled. “I know.”
“Yeah,” Clint cleared his throat. “Just—I was just joking, earlier.”
“Yeah, I know, Clint,” Steve said neutrally, but there was something warm in the way Clint felt the need to make sure.
When he met up with Tony again, it was for a movie, that night.
Instead of sitting across the couch from him, Tony tentatively slid closer until their sides were meeting. Steve raised an arm in wordless invite, and Tony nestled himself beneath it and sighed once it wrapped across his shoulders.
“You know what,” Tony said, smiling. “I think it’s your turn to choose the movie.”