Archive of Our Own

Chapter Text

Tony spent the first hours after breakfast planning; then he spent the other half of the day planning out how to enact his plan. He wasted most of the day as a dog and had to begrudgingly get Jarvis to help him figure out how he would be able to get everything he would need ready in time for nighttime. Steve and the Avengers were out on patrol again; this time they were helping Doom get control of some of his most precious robots who had decided to mutiny against him and were attempting to take out half of his in-town laboratory while still carrying out part of their initial mission to destroy the baking district. Apparently someone had made a less than perfect scone, and Doom wasn’t having any of that shit. Tony had found that amusing; Steve hadn’t, and he’d taken the EMP generator with him in secret, not wanting Doom to see it unless it was necessary. Steve would be gone for the rest of the day he had said. With clean up, it might be even longer.

Tony hoped that his transformation into human would last longer this time; he prayed that he might be able to stick around as himself this time too. He didn’t want to turn back into a dog at some strange moment – he didn’t know if he could live with himself if he ended up traumatizing Steve somehow. If things worked out properly, he’d be having a very good night.

He felt giddy and chased his tail around in circles for fifteen minutes until he could get control of his brain again. Jarvis found this particularly amusing and sent Dummy after him, causing him to run around with the concerned robot hooting plaintively at him as he chased him through the workshop with his fire extinguisher held out in front of him.

Tony had been bad. He’d found what he needed in one of his dresser drawers from months ago – probably from the days of Pepper or maybe from some of his seedier days before that. It hadn’t really mattered; most of that stuff didn’t exactly expire. He was glad that he hadn’t had to go to the store because if Steve had caught him wandering around outside the mansion there would have been hell to pay, even if it was for a good cause; he’d also probably have to explain why he was down that certain aisle of the drug store and wouldn’t that be a fun conversation. He’d had to pull the dresser drawer out with his paws and teeth, which had been yet another lesson in ‘why fingers and hands are awesome’. It had taken him almost twenty terrifying minutes to get the drawer open wide enough to get his head in and he’d had to be very delicate when he pulled the items in question out to make sure that he didn’t puncture anything with his sharp teeth.

Getting it all into Steve’s dresser had been quite another matter entirely. He’d had to do it quickly, knowing that Steve could come back at any moment and even though he had gotten Jarvis to act as his eyes, he wasn’t sure if he would be able to get in and out in time without being caught and suspiciously stared at. He was pretty sure that Natasha suspected something was going on, because she’d given him a concerned look earlier at breakfast and told him to be careful. Steve had been standing beside her, adjusting his cowl, and had been oblivious to the double meaning she’d attached to the words. Tony was glad that Steve was a little slow on the uptake. He’d have been mortified if Steve had left the mansion knowing.

Tony was sure that things would turn out well. Steve liked him. Tony liked Steve. Steve liked him – it would be fine. That didn’t keep Tony from worrying about it for the next four hours though. He had put everything back in its rightful place and had made sure to pick a drawer that Steve didn’t use normally, so it would be unlikely that Steve would stumble upon anything by accident before Tony could enact his plan to begin with. Even so… it was going to take luck. He hated having to count on luck – it felt too much like dealing with magic.

When dinner rolled around, Tony was still in his dog form, and the Avengers were back. He was beginning to get nervous, but he knew that he’d have to turn back eventually – he’d been paying close attention to the records Jarvis had been keeping for him, and he was close to getting thirteen hours of human time if things went as he calculated. Jarvis had reassured him of this several times already – he had kept asking, and his frayed nerves must have shown, because Jarvis had been giving him hour by hour updates just to keep him from eating his tail in frustration.

Tony ate dinner on Steve’s lap, trying to ignore the fact that what he had planned would probably result in him being in a somewhat similar position later on, and made pleasant conversation with everyone. He excused himself from the table when Steve did and shadowed him as he went up the stairs. The plan wasn’t going exactly as he’d hoped that it would. He’d been hoping to get a few minutes alone with his human body before things went down, and it was likely that this wasn’t going to happen.

Steve noticed his frustration and tried to reassure him by offering to take him to the sparring room so that they could throw around a ball; Steve, the sweet thing, assumed that Tony’s twitchiness was because he hadn’t been able to go outside for the past week and a half. Tony had noticed in turn that Steve seemed to be just as nervous, as if he was suspecting that something was going to happen, but didn’t know exactly what to expect.

Tony debated on asking Natasha for advice about the jitters he was feeling – he wondered if she knew some kind of secret body language in Steve-ese that might give him some kind of inside information, but one look in his direction from her had left him running out of the room to keep from making a wet spot on the carpet.

When bed time finally rolled around, there had been no transformation. He was disappointed, and Steve had seen that, but there wasn’t anything either of them could do about it. Tony crawled into bed with Steve, spooned against Steve’s belly with his furry head resting against Steve’s arm, and stayed up listening to Steve snoring away, unaware of Tony’s inner turmoil.

He’d have to try for another day – the plan was still good. He’d just have to wait and see. Steve snuggled into him in his sleep, body curling around Tony’s.

The transformation happened before Tony could breathe out a sigh of pleasure. He was suddenly naked, wrapped in Steve’s strong arms, feeling the heat of Steve’s breath on the back of his neck. He rolled over, pressing his chest against Steve’s and slid one hand carefully under the back of Steve’s shirt, tracing lazy circles with his thumb on Steve’s back.

The moan was unexpected. Steve let out a sound of pure lust, something Tony had only thought was possible in bad pornos and his eye fluttered open; He was already hard, his arousal rubbing through his thin boxers against the warmth of Tony’s bare thigh.

Tony smiled at Steve, moving forward to nuzzle against Steve’s cheek.

“Hey.” He whispered, moving his hand again in a slow circle that traveled higher up between Steve’s shoulder blades this time. Steve’s eyes took a moment to focus, filled with a mixture of hazed lust and sleep. He flushed, the pink spreading from his hairline down to his neck, vanishing underneath the shirt he was wearing as it carried on downward.

“Tony –“

Tony covered Steve’s mouth with his; it was less than perfect, his lips were chapped and his beard scratched against Steve’s face, making Steve wince, but it was a kiss nonetheless. Tony moved his hand against Steve’s back again and Steve involuntarily moaned into his mouth; Tony took his chance and kissed him again, this time smoother and with more tongue. Steve’s arms wrapped around him; one arm circled around Tony’s waist and the other settled to hold Tony in position, Steve’s fingers tangling in his hair.

When they finally broke apart, Tony was hard, gasping for breath, and pressed against Steve’s own hard cock. He smiled at Steve, hands pushing at Steve’s shirt, wanting it off so that they could be pressed together, skin on skin, and Steve obliged, twisting to let Tony pull the fabric up and over his head.

Tony pulled the blanket down and ran his hands over the well-defined muscles of Steve’s chest; He traced his fingers along Steve’s abs, hearing a groan come from his own throat unbidden. Steve’s pupils were blown, more black than blue, and he seemed pleasantly confused.

“Tony… Is this a dream?” He asked as Tony gingerly traced his way down to the sharp cut of his hip, stopping at the band of his boxers. Tony paused there, hesitant, not wanting to move lower until Steve had given some kind of permission.

“If it is, it’s a damn good one and I’m having it.” Tony purred back. He pushed Steve flat against the mattress, straddling Steve’s hips; Tony looked down at him through dark lashes, taking in the beauty that was Steve. Steve reached up, stroking the side of Tony’s face and then shivered as Tony rubbed against him, eyes half closed with longing.

“Tony.”

The word was his name and also a warning. Steve was unsure. Tony leaned down, kissing Steve, taking Steve’s hand in his own, intertwining their fingers. He’d have to reassure him.

“Steve… I really want you.” Tony whispered. He felt Steve’s hand move to his thigh, fingers digging into the flesh there so hard that he was sure he was going to bruise later, bruises he would remember. His cock rubbed against the fabric of Steve’s boxers and he stifled a loud groan.

“Tony… I don’t…” Steve stuttered. He felt Tony’s hardness against him and flushed an even deeper shade of red, eyes wide and amazed.

“Do you want to? You… you can have me if you want me Steve.” Tony asked. He took Steve’s hand and slipped it lower, onto his ass. Steve squeezed him and Tony almost came undone with just that one firm touch. He looked down at Steve, breathing heavy.

“I can have… you?” Steve asked, surprised.

“I uh… I’m not really all that experienced with how this works, but I’ve um… I watched a few videos and I’ve got the gist of it.” Tony blurted, flushing his own shade of pink. Steve’s eyes narrowed. He pushed Tony up but didn’t shove him completely off of him. Tony was left straddling Steve’s thighs, Steve’s large hands on his midsection.

“Tony.”

“Steve.”

Steve stared at him, eyes hungry and confused.

“I don’t know what to do.” Steve whispered, stroking his way up Tony’s side, hand resting on Tony’s shoulder. He looked down and saw Tony’s cock lying full and hard against his boxers beside his own straining member and grasped Tony’s face, kissing him passionately, hands roaming over Tony’s shoulders and ass. He squeezed again and Tony moaned into his mouth, grinding forwards by accident when his hips jerked of their own accord. Tony looked embarrassedly at Steve, fluttering his eyelashes and cleared his throat.

“Need to get those shorts off.” Tony murmured, fingers reaching down to slip under the waistband. Steve stiffened and then relaxed as Tony rubbed circles with his thumb against the skin there.

“I trust you Steve. You trust me?” Tony asked. He locked eyes with Steve, not moving his hand any further.

Steve nodded vigorously, slipping his own hand in with Tony’s. Their hands moved together down under the fabric towards Steve’s cock and when hands met cock, Steve’s eyes widened in astonishment. Steve was warm in Tony’s hand; warm and throbbing. Tony stroked him with a finger and Steve choked on his own moan, his hand grabbing Tony’s, stilling it.

“Wait – I…”

Steve swallowed loudly. He pushed Tony back off of him, settling him on the bed and then pulled his boxers down and off in one movement, throwing them onto the floor. He stared at his own nakedness, eyes wide at the way his cock had gotten so hard and rigid from Tony’s touch. Tony did his own looking as well; he smiled softly when he caught Steve’s gaze and moved forwards to straddle Steve’s waist again, feeling the hot press of Steve’s cock against his ass as he sat on him.

“Fuck… Steve…” Tony groaned, capturing his face and kissing him again. He kissed his way down to Steve’s neck, sucking at his earlobe on his way and heard Steve moan in response; Steve’s cock jerked up against his belly as Tony’s tongue licked its way down Steve’s neck to his collar bone. He sucked a red mark there too, nibbling. Steve’s hand grabbed him by the back of the neck and suddenly Tony was upside down and lying on his back underneath Steve, who was kissing his way down Tony’s front, not pausing to even breathe, nipping whatever skin found its way near his lips. Tony felt the air stick to each wet kiss on his skin. He spread his legs invitingly and Steve slid between them, hands moving all over, not knowing where to touch next, touching everything. Steve looked down at Tony, gasping for breath and grasped Tony’s shaft in his hand, pumping gently. Tony leaned back against the pillows, eyes closing as he reveled in Steve’s touch.

“Fuck… Steve… I…”

Tony’s eyes snapped open as he felt Steve’s neglected cock rub a wet streak across his thigh, resting against his hip. His own cock twitched in response.

“The drawer – open it up. I want you inside me.” Tony said sharply. He smiled as Steve’s eyes widened in the darkness, hands finally stumbling to a halt. Steve released Tony’s cock and moved mechanically to the drawer Tony gestured at, fingers fumbling with the knobs to pull it open. He looked inside and saw what Tony had put there earlier.

A bottle of sealed lube and a handful of condoms dropped onto the pillow beside Tony’s head. Steve cleared his throat.

“I don’t remember putting those there.” He said softly, eyes narrowing, but not in an angry way. He leaned over Tony, capturing his face in his hands and stroked Tony’s chin, thumb rubbing against the bristles of his beard.

“I’ve been a naughty boy.” Tony said, smirking. He reached out and took the lube from the pillow, breaking the plastic seal. He tossed the little plastic seal away and sat up a little, pushing a pillow down under his hips. This was as far as he’d gotten in his plan. He was playing it blind from here on out.

“You can put your fingers in me if you want.” Tony moaned, spreading his legs and pushing his knees against his chest. He looked down between his legs at his cock and grinned as Steve slipped into place, kneeling in front of him so that Tony’s lower back and hips were on his lap. Tony handed him the lube and Steve stared blankly at it, not sure what to do.

Tony reached out and took the lube back from his unresisting hands; he squeezed a generous amount in his hand and coated his fingers, watching Steve’s face as he did so. Steve’s eyes never left his hands, mesmerized. Tony angled himself carefully and then rubbed a lubed up thumb against his hole. He’d never touched himself like this before. He took pleasure in the sensation and felt Steve tense underneath the back of his thighs as he slipped one finger inside, testing his body. Tony panted, feeling a slight burn from the intrusion; he wasn’t bothered by it, it was a satisfying burn. He continued to probe himself for a moment before he put the bottle in Steve’s hand.

“Go ahead – god you’re going to feel amazing.” Tony groaned, pulling his own finger out, feeling empty without its presence. Steve watched him, jaw dropping, and then reached for the lube. Steve slowly lubed up his finger and mimicked what Tony had done. He pushed his finger inside without prompting and Tony couldn’t help the sound he made when Steve was knuckle deep inside him. Steve’s finger moved, wiggling and Tony’s legs spread wider.

“Another. Give me… another…”

Steve obliged, slipping a second lubed finger into his hole. The stretch was immense. Steve’s fingers were so much bigger than Tony’s and he’d never had anything inside him before. It was almost too much. Tony let out a gasp of pain and Steve froze.

“Are you – “

“I’m fine, just go slowly. Have to go slowly – I’ve never… I’ve never done this before.” Tony whimpered. He captured Steve’s wrist when Steve tried to pull his fingers out and squeezed his wrist gently, trying to reassure him. Steve looked concerned, lustful expression morphing into a frown.

“It’s ok Steve.” Tony assured him. He pushed Steve’s half withdrawn fingers back inside of himself and relished the burn this time, feeling fuller than he’d ever felt before; he arched his back. He pushed against Steve’s fingers, moaning and finally, Steve relaxed and began to move his fingers again.

“You have to… scissor them – god yes. Just like that. Do that again – please – god -” Tony choked out. Steve followed instructions as Tony moaned them out to him, intent on doing things slowly and carefully as to not hurt him. Tony pulled Steve into a kiss, trying to kiss away the frown lines on his face.

“You still with me big guy?” He asked Steve, whispering into his ear. Steve’s cock nudged against his hip, hot and hard, saying more than his words ever could.

“Jesus –“ Steve gasped into his mouth.

“Give me another one then – and be slower this time.” Tony instructed. Steve pulled his fingers out entirely and then squirted some more lube on his fingers without being asked. Tony smiled at him, arching his back to give Steve more access. He inched higher up Steve’s legs, feeling Steve’s cock rubbing against his ass when he lifted his legs and settled them on either side of Steve’s shoulders, framing Steve’s head with his heels. Steve looked down at him from between his legs. He stared at Tony’s face, watching the pleasure light up there as he slid his fingers in one and a time, slowly sliding the third in to join the other two. Tony winced and he stopped, frowning again.

“Are you – “

“Just give me a second to get used to it.” Tony grumbled, reaching out to stroke his cock. He needed to relax – the video had said that he would need to be relaxed. He strained to remember the instructions; even with his eidetic memory, the pleasure of Steve’s hands made it hard to recall everything in detail. Steve’s fingers moved within him and he moaned again, calling out Steve’s name. Steve’s cock rubbed harder against the back of his thigh. When the burning sensation inside him lessened, Tony began to push down on Steve’s fingers, burying them deep inside himself. Steve looked dumbfounded.

“Tony…”

“God Steve… you feel great.” Tony whispered, grinding his hips down, his hole stretching further. “I think you can fuck me now if you want to.”

Steve pulled his fingers out slowly. His back stiffened as he looked down at his glistening digits. Tony pulled himself up, seeing the problem before Steve did. Steve had never had sex; he’d probably never even put a condom on himself before. He turned, taking one of the condoms from the pillow and ripped the wrapper, pulling it out. He slid the condom down over Steve’s cock and stroked him gently, pinching the base to make him harder; he could feel the veins in Steve’s cock and stroked the base fondly, having dreamed about Steve’s cock so many times before. He’d learn how to give Steve a proper blowjob someday. He knew Steve would appreciate that. Steve’s leaned forwards and rested his head on Tony’s shoulder.

“Tony…” Steve moaned softly. He kissed the skin where Tony’s shoulder met his neck, biting lightly, sucking at the reddened flesh. Tony rubbed lube on Steve’s shaft, using way more than was necessary. He liked the way it made Steve’s cock glisten in the blue light of the arc reactor. He turned around to give Steve access to him from behind and closed the lube bottle, dropping it onto the pillow beside them. Tony spread his legs, straddling Steve’s thighs and kneeled, holding himself up with his hands. He felt the warmth of Steve’s cock pressing against the skin beneath his hole.

“Your turn. Slid on in – nice and slow.” Tony said.

Steve didn’t move.

Tony turned, looking up at Steve’s face, concerned. Steve’s eyes were closed and he was biting his lip. Tony reached out and grabbed his hand, squeezing it.

“Hey… You alright?” He asked.

Steve opened his eyes a crack, peering down at Tony.

“I don’t know.” Steve responded, voice thick and rough. He looked down at Tony, perched on his lap with his ass pressed against Steve’s cock, and bit his lip harder.

“Hey – we… we don’t have to – if you don’t feel comfortable – “

Steve’s hand clamped down on Tony’s hip, silencing him.

“Fuck yourself.”

“Excuse me?”

“Push onto my dick and fuck yourself.”

Tony felt his face flush at the command; Steve’s tone made him almost unbearably hard. He raised himself up and used one of his hands to guide himself onto Steve’s cock, pushing back against him. The blunt head of Steve’s cock pressed in, opening Tony up and he gasped, stopping. It didn’t hurt, just burned with a mixture of pleasure and pain, an unfamiliar fire. He slid down slowly, inch by inch, feeling Steve’s heat slipping inside, filling himself with Steve. When his ass was flush with Steve’s hip, he moved forwards, letting Steve’s cock slide out slowly, learning how much pressure to exert to push in and pull out.

Tony dug his fingers into the blanket in front of him as Steve’s cock twitched inside him and he moaned for all he was worth, clenching down on Steve. Steve groaned in response, resting his head against Tony’s back; Tony began to push himself back down on Steve’s cock, riding slowly. He increased speed after he knew his body wanted more and leaned back against Steve, fisting his own cock. He felt Steve’s hands join his and then one hand slipped free to grasp Tony’s hip, holding him in place.

“Is this good for you – is this what you want?” Steve grunted into Tony’s back. Tony wanted to kiss him, but the angle wasn’t right so he slipped Steve’s hand off his cock and kissed it instead despite ache he felt at the loss of contact.

“It’s good Steve – but I want you to fuck me – please?” Tony begged, pushing down and pulling up again and again. Steve didn’t move behind him, panting against Tony, his hot breath blowing against Tony’s neck. Tony continued to ride Steve’s cock, feeling close – he squeezed Steve’s hand and gasped again, reaching for his own neglected cock, finding it with fumbling fingers.

Steve began to thrust – the movement caught him off guard. It was slow and lazy, as if Steve had forgotten what he was doing, and then he moved faster, building in speed until Tony felt the top of his head bump against Steve’s chin as Steve leaned forwards. Tony blinked back stars and then found himself coming with Steve’s name on his lips; he came harder than ever before. Steve wrapped his arms around him, holding him in place and continued to thrust, bumping against a spot inside Tony that had him seeing white; he moaned, body screaming out pleasure with each meeting of flesh, calling out for Steve, crying out for more.

Steve came with a shuddering gasp. His arms held Tony tightly against him; Tony’s legs framed his. Steve panted against Tony’s neck. He kissed Tony’s shoulder again, kissed his cheek and then slowly slid out from inside, pulling his wilting cock free. Tony groaned at the loss and went boneless in Steve’s grasp, allowing himself to be slid off of Steve and onto his side on the bed. Steve looked down at him, hands clutching at the used condom. He managed to get it tied and then dropped it into the garbage can beside the bed. Tony smiled up at him through his eyelashes, drained of all energy.

“Hey… come here, you.” Tony murmured, reaching up to grab at Steve. Steve pulled away and swallowed hard, moving to the edge of the bed.

“I have to – “ Steve picked up his clothing from the floor and staggered into the bathroom, closing the door behind him. Tony heard the water running and blinked away sleep, trying to figure out what had just happened. He’d had sex – remarkably good sex for a first time – why was Steve gone then?

Tony sat upright, body not wanting to agree with him, and winced as his lower back protested at the move. He grabbed a Kleenex from Steve’s bedside table and wiped at himself weakly, fingers not wanting to cooperate. He stared at the bathroom door, wanting to yank it open to find Steve so that he could bury himself in Steve’s warm chest.

“Hey – you ok in there?” Tony called out, stumbling from the bed to knock lightly on the door.

He heard no sound from inside of acknowledgement and tried the door handle. The door opened easily and he was blinded by the bathroom lights; Tony lifted one hand to shield his eyes and saw Steve leaning against the counter, hands planted firmly on either sides of the sink. The tap was on, pouring water down into the basin. Steve was looking down the drain, he was pale and agitated.

“Steve?”

Steve jerked out of his reverie, looking up from the drain. He swallowed roughly, wiping at his wet face with the back of his hand before he could meet Tony’s gaze.

“Can you go? Please?” Steve asked meekly.

“From the bathroom or from the room?” Tony asked back, feeling something cold and heavy coil up in the pit of his stomach.

“From the room. Please. I can’t do this right now – I can’t…”

Steve turned away from Tony and turned to the shower, not facing him.

“Steve – I“ Tony started. His voice was drowned out by the sound of the shower turning on. Steve stepped inside and closed the curtains, pulling them tight around the stall as if using them as a forcefield to keep Tony out.

“Just go Tony. Please.”

“Steve – “

“Just GO!” Steve shouted.

Tony looked down at his feet. He felt smaller than small. He wrapped his arms around himself and walked out of the bathroom, stumbling on the carpet. He’d been rejected by lovers before; somehow this felt different. He picked up the pair of pants Steve had given him and pulled them on quickly, confused and upset. He’d thought things had gone well – Steve had been there with him, he’d been enjoying himself and he hadn’t told Tony to stop – he’d been happy!

Tony looked at the bathroom behind him, squinting into the light. Steve didn’t emerge from the shower. Tony turned and left the room, realizing only later that he was crying.

Tony woke up the next morning in his own bed wrapped in a blanket he hadn’t used in over two months. Everything smelled like faded laundry detergent and it all had a faintly stale odor to it, like it had been in a house that hadn’t seen visitors in years. He felt his lower back twinge as he rolled over and the previous night’s events came flooding back. His pillow was wet where he had been lying. He’d been crying – had cried himself to sleep for the first time since he’d been a child in boarding school. He was pretty sure that he’d kept the all-out sobbing to a minimum – or at least he’d muffled it with the pillow; he didn’t feel any less of a man for doing it. Anyone would sob if Captain America had kicked them out of his bed. Tony, however, had been sobbing because Steve Rogers had been the one to kick him out of his bed. Somehow that seemed like a bigger rejection, something worse even.

Tony had made a big mistake. He’d pushed and Steve hadn’t been ready. He hadn’t been ready and Tony had pushed anyways because he was Tony and he had thought he knew what he was doing. He’d thought that he knew Steve. He’d thought that he had known what Steve wanted.

Tony pulled the red down-filled blanket up over his head, trying to drown out the sunlight that was sneaking in through the blinds. He closed his eyes and burrowed into the pillow. He’d have to get up sometime, although he could probably draw it out for a few hours if he played his cards right. He needed to speak with Steve – to explain himself – to talk about what they’d done; he needed to wrap his head around what had happened first though.

“Jarvis?” He croaked.

“Yes sir?”

“Where’s Steve?”

“Master Rogers left the house this morning at five thirty. He was carrying a duffle bag with him and has not returned, nor has he made me aware of his return time. Would you like me to get in contact with him?” Jarvis asked.

Tony threw the blanket off his head and sat up; he regretted it instantly. His body protested and his lower back screamed bloody vengeance against him. He had to lay back and catch his breath, wincing through each laboured gasp.

“Are you alright sir? May I call someone to assist you?” Jarvis asked, worried.

“No Jarvis – don’t call anyone – “

“I have alerted Master Barton to your predicament. He is on his way.”

Tony’s face drained of colour. He tried to sit up again, struggling to yank himself up using the sheet by the headboard as leverage.

“Jarvis you bastard – “ He shouted, managing to right himself.

The bedroom door snapped open and Clint strode in rubbing his eyes. He caught sight of Tony, shirtless and propped up against the headboard with the sheets clenched in one hand and blanket draped across his legs. Clint snorted with laughter as Tony glared at him. He cocked his head to the side and walked closer to the bed.

“Go away Clint. Jarvis was just fooling around – “ Tony hissed. Clint ignored him and jumped onto the bed. The movement of the mattress sent Tony sliding down the headboard with an undignified whimper. He settled on his side, hugging his stomach, pressed up against the headboard with his pillows bracketing his side.

“Wow. So… First time huh?” Clint asked, sitting beside Tony with crossed legs. Tony glared wearily up at him, not sure how to respond. Clint rolled his shoulders, yawning as he stretched. He was wearing Thomas the Tank Engine pajamas and didn’t look at all disturbed by the way they stretched across his chest.

“Coulson got them for me as a joke.” Clint explained, looking down at the pajamas with mild amusement. He smiled at Tony after and rested his elbows on his knees, surveying the twitching in Tony’s lower back and the way his body was sprawled.

“So. I take it you had your first time with Steve and it didn’t work out the way you had planned.”

“How did you – no, never mind. I’ve seen the way you and Natasha go all hush hush buddy buddy with each other. Does she know everything in this place? Has she got it bugged or – oh god. She has access to the security cameras doesn’t she? She does!” Tony rambled, hugging one of the pillows against his middle.

“Nah, she just listens through doors with a cup like a normal person– you didn’t close Steve’s door last night by the way, so she didn’t even need to do that. Nice job.” Clint said, examining his nails. Tony stared at him with wide eyed horror.

“Oh god – I didn’t – but – “ He cried out.

Clint waved him to silence, seemingly finished with his nail gazing.

“It’s fine. Nat and I made sure everyone else’s doors were closed, so they didn’t hear jack shit. Nice moaning by the way – I take it you’ve had practice? With the moaning I mean.” Clint gestured at Tony’s position. “I don’t think you’ve had practice with the whole anal sex thing.”

“Why should I even answer – “ Tony sputtered, going red.

“First times are hard. I remember I spent the morning after mine hugging a very nice pillow while curled up on the floor. I think I may have been there all day until my roommate found me and propped me up on the couch. I had a very unpleasant conversation after that, very unpleasant.” Clint said softly. He patted his lap and gestured at Tony.

“Come, lie in Clint’s lap.”

Tony eyed Clint nervously; when it seemed like Clint wasn’t likely to hurt him, he inchwormed forwards and half crawled into Clint’s lap, his head resting on one of Clint’s muscled thighs. Clint’s hands began to stroke his hair, smoothing out his bed head. His other hand moved down to Tony’s lower back and began to poke gently. Tony hissed at him but didn’t struggle, feeling too raw and sore to move away. Clint suddenly seized him by the back of the pants and hauled him up over his lap. Tony lay, half hanging, across Clint’s knees, his head and shoulders bumping against Clint’s muscled stomach. Clint’s fingers began to knead the tightened muscles of Tony’s back, smoothing them out with a twist of his thumbs and index fingers.

Tony’s stiff back relaxed, melting under Clint’s touch.

“Better?” Clint asked, still rubbing.

“Yes.” Tony said sullenly, closing his eyes. He was a few inches shorter than Clint but didn’t often feel like it. Draped across Clint’s lap, he felt like a child being cradled in his mother’s arms.

“Heat pack might help. I can go wrangle one for you after we talk.” Clint said.

“What’s to talk about? Steve kicked me out and he’s mad at me.”

Clint slapped Tony’s back lightly, the sound echoing across the room. Tony’s back cramped up and he whimpered again, eyes watering.

“He panicked and ran off to SHIELD. He’s not mad at you – at least, Nat and I don’t think he is. I think he’s just confused, that’s all.”

“Confused? What’s there to be confused about? We were fine – we had great sex – not that you need to know that, but it all turned out fantastically. Then he just got up and went into the bathroom and closed the door on me! I went in and he asked me to leave and told me that he didn’t want to talk to me. I’m not even sure how long the whole not talking to him thing is supposed to last, because he’s gone – oh god. He’s gone to SHIELD? He’d rather be with Fury in SHIELD then be here with me?” Tony wailed. Clint patted him on the head again, the motion reminiscent of Tony’s earlier days as a dog.

“Now, now. He’s not going to be there forever, just until he’s worked out what he wants from the strange hanky panky you had last night. I’m sure he’s just absolutely mortified that he’s left you all covered in hickeys and bruises, so he needs to have some time to himself to reflect. Nat says that she saw him sneak into your room this morning before he left and he ran out all in a huff about something – She didn’t say though.“ Clint dug his thumb into Tony’s sore back again, eliciting a groan of agony.

“Who knows what’s going through his head. Nat offered to go keep tabs on him, so I’m here to watch out for you, and it’s all fine. Don’t worry your pretty little head.”

“My head is not pretty.” Tony grumbled.

“Uh huh. You keep telling yourself that.”

Clint rolled Tony off his lap and arranged him on top of the blankets, sticking a pillow on either side of his back and front so that he had something to lean against. He slid off the bed and went to the bathroom, digging around in Tony’s things until he found what he was looking for. He returned with a heat pack and cracked it with both hands, clambering back up onto the bed. He rolled an unhappy Tony onto his stomach and slapped the heat pack onto Tony’s lower back, patting it affectionately.

“There. Once you feel a little better we’ll get you dressed and go down for breakfast.”

“Go downstairs – I can’t even stand up! “

“You can’t sit around with a sore back. You have to exercise the muscles so they don’t get all stiff – unless you enjoy pain, then of course I can leave you here alone to wallow in a nice pool of self-pity so you can get a stiffer back and really learn to appreciate the next few days of immobility. We can stick you in a corner somewhere and use you as a book shelf when you’ve turned stiff as a board. Would you like that?” Clint said, cheerfully. There was a malevolence in his voice that Tony was afraid of – Clint meant what he said.

Tony sighed, scowling into the pillow tucked under his chin.

“Fine. But no oatmeal.”

“I said we’re going to eat breakfast Stark, not that I was going to make you breakfast.” Clint snorted. He poked at Tony’s back again, this time just above the heat pack, making Tony wince once more.

“Correction – you’re going to take a shower after this and then I’m going to drag you downstairs for breakfast – I don’t want to have to touch you anymore than necessary. You smell and you’re sticky.”

“I am not!”

“Uh huh. And you’re putting on real boy clothes, no more of this wandering around with no shirt and no underwear bullshit. Your collar can come off I guess, because I’m guessing by the fact that Jarvis hasn’t had to update your little list of times that this is the final change back. Thor said something about having asked his mother about what it would look like when it was fully charged and he said that it would be solid like the strongest of colours – whatever the hell that means.”

Tony fingered the collar around his neck. He hadn’t even thought about it. He’d been wearing it when he and Steve had had sex. Looking back on it now, it was a whole lot less kinky than it had seemed at the time. He found the clasp with numb fingers and pulled it free, looking at it warily as if he expected it to flash and turn him back into a dog at any second. The crystal embedded in the collar was a deep shade of blue and was completely solid looking – there was no opacity to it now, just a strange blue glow that matched his arc reactor. He stared into it, trying to glean some kind of understanding from it, but found that as expected, there was nothing there to be learned. Clint took the collar away from him and twirled it around in between his fingers. He tapped on the glass covering the crystal, eyeballing it shiftily and then stuffed it into his pocket, removing it from sight.

“Is there a reason why you’re busy stealing it?” Tony asked casually, trying to talk Clint into possibly returning it to him without having to exert any more effort than necessary. He gave up when Clint refused to produce it again from his pocket and closed his eyes, enjoying the warmth of the heat pack on his lower back. He hadn’t been expecting it to hurt like this after being with Steve. He’d been under the impression that Steve would be gentle – he wasn’t sure if he should be disappointed or not by the fact that Steve had just gone at it without worrying about hurting him towards the end. Thinking about it though, he remembered the way that Steve had kept frowning whenever he showed any sign of discomfort. He drummed his fingers on the blanket squashed under him, thinking more on the previous night. Steve hadn’t been unhappy, but he’d also been very… careful, not rough, but careful. He’d followed instruction and moved the way Tony had wanted him to, but the last few moments – when Steve had been inside him, leaving him full and whole feeling – Steve hadn’t moved. He’d been still, oh so still, and Tony had been doing all the work essentially. Steve had come around later, enjoying himself, Tony hoped, but he really hadn’t seen Steve’s face; he’d been facing the other way the entire time. He felt Clint’s hand on his back and the heat pack was pulled away. He whined in protest, turning to reach weakly for it; Clint’s hands began to massage his lower back again, moving in rough but smooth motions. He was begrudgingly grateful for Clint’s presence.

“I’m not giving the collar back to you because you’ll spend all of your time dwelling on the damn thing and you won’t be listening to any of my useful advice – well half of it is Nat’s advice, but I’m claiming the good stuff as my own.” Clint said cheerfully. He slapped Tony across the flat of his back again and chuckled gleefully when Tony flinched.

“Up.”

Tony rolled on his side and then rolled back onto his stomach.

“Nope. Not happening anytime soon.”

Clint raised an eyebrow.

“Up.”

Tony took in a deep breath and rolled over again. Pain slashed its way through his lower back, making him blink back tears; red splotches floated in his vision, making it hard to see. He lay still for a moment, willing the pain to go away and then tried to sit up again. The attempt was well meant, but wasn’t nearly as effective as it should have been had he been in perfect health to begin with. He ended up being braced by Clint, who’s warm hands were on his back and stomach, half hugging him into a somewhat upright position.

“My everything hurts.” Tony complained, trying to steady himself with shaking hands and arms.

Clint slipped off the bed and hefted Tony upright; Tony bit back a scream as the world swam around him, his body trying to wobble its way back to the ground. Clint was now the only thing keeping him from face planting into the carpet; at this point he would have welcomed the face plant if it would have gotten the world to stop its goddamned spinning for a few seconds. His legs shook so hard that he couldn’t stay upright for more than a second at a time and he could feel the muscles in his lower back and thighs twitching in desperation – it felt disgusting, and no matter how hard he pressed his hands against the offending muscles, they remained trembling beneath his fingers. Clint slung Tony’s arm over his shoulder and slipped his other arm around Tony’s waist; they began to shuffle across the carpet towards the open bathroom door, Tony barely hanging on. Clint didn’t seem to have any problems carrying the brunt of Tony’s weight; he seemed more than comfortable with having Tony hanging off of him like a baby sloth. Tony sulked. He was impressed – not that he’d tell Clint this to his face.

Clint helped him across the bathroom and dropped the toilet lid down with his foot so that it was easier to sit on. He set Tony down on the seat, propping him up against the tank and then set about getting the shower ready; he spent a few minutes testing the heat of the spray with one hand, whistling to himself and rearranging the towels with the other. Tony tried his hardest to remain upright on the toilet; he really did, but soon found that his back just wasn’t in it for the long haul anymore. He had to lean against the wall, grasping the towel bar just to keep from sliding down and off the toilet entirely.

Clint frowned at him, pulling his hand out from the shower spray when he was finally satisfied with the temperature.

“That bad?” He asked.

Tony groaned squeezing his eyes shut as he slid further down the wall. Clint lifted him up gradually, slipping his hand under Tony’s ass, tucking Tony against his chest. Tony scowled; the pain wasn’t any less, and at least he wasn’t going to end up on the floor now.

“Well… You need a shower, and I’m guessing that you can’t stand up straight for that, can you?”

Tony shook his head, clinging to Clint as he was easily heaved closer to the shower; his cheek smooshed into Clint’s shoulder.

“Ok. We’re going to do this and you’re going to keep an open mind here and not attempt to claw out your eyes. Or my eyes for that matter.” Clint said with a sigh.

Tony frowned as Clint pulled him out of his pants. His body pitched forwards as Clint’s grip changed, his bare hips pressing snugly against the cotton of Clint’s pajamas.

“Clint… What are you – “

Clint shifted Tony to one side, leaning him up against the wall. He pulled his pajama top up and over his head and threw it onto the floor behind him; he kicked off his socks and pants, dumping them in a pile on the floor with the shirt. Tony was now slumped against the wall of his bathroom with a very naked Clint holding on to him. Clint wrapped his arms around delicately Tony’s waist as Tony protested weakly and muscled them both into the shower.

Water hit Tony in the face; it was such a shock that he almost forgot that he was being held up by Clint. He blinked and sputtered, spitting out water as it splashed down his nose and dripped off of his chin. The steam made it hard to concentrate. He tried to ignore the fact that Clint’s naked body was pressed up against his and focused on the fact that the water was warm and pleasant; he could feel his muscles relaxing just as they had when he’d been using the heat pack.

“So uh… I’m only standing here until your back warms up and you can stand again– then I’m going to sit on the counter and wait for you to finish. No funny business – I promise.” Clint grinned, spinning Tony around so that the water was now running down his shoulders and onto his back. He flushed as he felt his body squish into Clint’s bare chest and then rested his head on Clint’s shoulder; Tony’s shoulders bumping just below the top of Clint’s.

“Natasha is going to kill you if she finds out you did this.” Tony commented dryly, closing his eyes to keep out the stray water droplets. Clint shrugged, shifting the both a little so that Tony was directly underneath the spray; the heat was intense and the water pressure was like a thousand miniature hands rubbing at his screaming muscles.

“We’re friends – she’d do this too if she had to, although she’d probably kick you in the nuts first so that you couldn’t do anything unseemly. It’s Coulson who’s going to really kill me, but that’s beside the point, I have absolutely no intention of hitting on you – you’re Steve’s.” Clint said primly. Tony laughed against him, shoulders shaking. Steve being his was ludicrous. He felt like crying, and really, what was a better place to cry then the shower where tears could be easily mistaken for water, so he did. He could feel Clint squeeze him a little in the most slight of hugs and buried his nose in Clint’s damp neck, sniffling.

“I won’t say anything if you won’t.” Clint said softly.

“Stupid Steve and his stupid forties brain.” Tony spluttered, feeling not at all thirty five years old; all the emotions he had felt the night before came rushing back.

Clint patted him on the head gently, slopping water down Tony’s back; Tony’s hair plastered pitifully against the top of his head.

“He just needs to loosen his girdle. He’ll get over it.”

Tony couldn’t help but laugh through his tears at that.

Once Tony was able to stand up by himself Clint vacated the shower and dried himself off with one of Tony’s plush maroon towels, pulling his pajamas back on. He took up a position on the counter and began to read the labels on Tony’s expensive body butter and hand lotions, ignoring Tony completely. Tony washed himself with soapy hands, having to move so slowly that he feared that the hot water would eat the entire bar of soap by the time he finally got himself cleaned up. He had to stop and have another cry after that thought. He leaned against the wall, pressing his face against his forearm while the water ran down his back, washing off the soap and shampoo trailing its way down his hips.

Clint didn’t ask him why it took so long; he sat and read, (probably reread half the bottles in the amount of time it took) while he waited. When Tony was finished, he helped him out of the shower and went back to reading a particularly engrossing face wash bottle while Tony laboriously dried himself off, wrapping the towel around his waist. He limped into the bedroom with Clint following behind him at a safe distance, attempting to give some kind of privacy to him; although to Tony there wasn’t much of a point to it seeing as how they’d seen each other naked.

He stooped to grab at the top dresser’s drawer handle and let out an audible gasp as pain ripped through his lower back again. Clint was at his side in an instant, helping him backwards to the bed so that he could sit down; Tony focused on breathing slowly in and out, trying to push the pain away. Clint gathered some clothing for him while Tony calmed himself, wheezing as the pain lessened. He pulled on the clothing Clint had picked out with a lot of help from Clint, who had to physically pull both of his legs into a pair of boxers and sweat pants when Tony realized that his lower half didn’t want to cooperate with him anymore. Clint pulled Tony’s socks onto his feet and then helped him put on a loose red and gold Iron Man t-shirt before heaving him up and dragging him out the room.

The trip down the hall went a lot faster than Tony had expected it would; he had expected Clint to force him to at least attempt to walk. Clint surprised him by carrying him all the way; Tony’s feet were a good two inches off the ground as Clint’s arm dug into his hip, holding him up. They made their way to the kitchen, slinking through the living room where, thankfully, no one was watching television. They sat down in the soft kitchen chairs – well, Clint sat him down. Tony had to be wedged into his chair with a pillow stolen from the living room couch so that he wouldn’t fall off. He sulked in silence until Clint put a bowl of cereal in front of him and a cup of coffee; both were just the way he liked them. He eyed Clint suspiciously until the archer rolled his eyes and went back to preparing his own breakfast, wondering when Clint had picked up on his preferences.

“You have the same thing every day Stark. You think it’s that hard to remember?” Clint laughed.

“Stalker.” Tony grumbled.

They ate together in silence, Tony sipping at the sweet milk left behind when he finished his cereal, neither really sure what to say. Tony hadn’t been drinking coffee recently. He’d stopped entirely when he was a dog, and since the transformations had started he’d been avoiding caffeine entirely, not wanting to see what would happen if he became a caffeine high dog – he suspected that he’d probably run into something or have a seizure. Seeing as how he seemed to be back to normal now, he’d never know for certain. It was strange to drink coffee again, strange, but not wholly unpleasant. He could feel himself waking up slowly, his brain fog clearing with each sip.

Clint kept an eye on him the whole time Tony ate. He finished devouring five pieces of grape jam slathered toast and three bananas in the time it took for Tony to finish the milk from his cereal and the cup of now lukewarm coffee. Clint wandered off to get dressed after he finished eating and left Tony unattended. Those minutes were the longest minutes Tony had spent alone in a month. He found himself edgily looking around the kitchen, searching hopefully for Steve as if he might pop out from one of the cupboards; it hurt more then he thought it would when he remembered that Steve wasn’t around anymore and that he was gone. He stared into his empty coffee cup, feeling as if he were a teenager again, pining after Steve. He hadn’t thought he felt this strongly about Steve – It had been lust, the last time he’d checked with himself he’d found love too; how it had gotten from lust to feelings he didn’t know. All he did know was that he wanted Steve back – he’d apologize and beg if he had to. He’d crawl over broken glass if Steve wanted him to. He just wanted Steve back in the house.

Clint came back to a determined Tony; a Tony who was trying to compose an email through Jarvis that would get Steve to come back home. Clint placed Tony’s phone down on the table in front of him and then sat back, stretching out in the chair opposite Tony like a cat, a book clutched in his hand.

“He’s not going to be checking email – you’d better just text him. It’s faster, and at least you’ll know he got it. Nat’s with him so she’ll be able to teach him how to read it if he gets lost.” Clint said, flipping open the book to the title page, licking his finger as he skipped to the next page. He read leisurely while Tony struggled to compose a decent text message.

The first text message Tony sent took him sixty seven minutes to compose. It was merely a ‘Steve, are you alright?’ message. He’d tried phrasing it seventy eight different ways, and nothing had seemed right, it had all felt wrong. He put the phone down on the table after checking the battery power and then proceeded to stare blankly at it for the next half hour. Clint’s phone buzzed after the half hour mark hit; he begrudgingly put his book down and pulled his phone out of his pocket and read his new message, lips pursed. Tony looked at him, shamelessly eager, and Clint sighed and read out the message he had just received.

“Nat says that Steve is thinking about what to say. He seems confused and keeps asking her why you would be asking him if he’s alright.”

“Why wouldn’t I? He left with a duffle bag for god’s sake – “ Tony snapped, glaring at the cellphone on the table that remained defiantly silent and textless.

“I have no idea. Just wait for his response – don’t go all crazy sending him text messages with Nat’s information or you’ll lose your inside source.”

Tony begrudgingly knew that Clint was right. He stared sullenly at the phone, willing it to give him Steve’s response.

By the time lunch rolled around Tony was biting his nails in between sips of coffee and bites of ordered in pizza. His fingers were stained with pizza grease and ink from the pen he’d been using to scrawl various responses on scrap piece of paper, afraid to intrust the information to Jarvis, who seemed to be in the habit of assisting when he didn’t want to be assisted lately. He had witty responses, snappy come backs, angry retorts, you name it, he’d written it down; what he didn’t have was an actual message to respond to. His phone had remained silent, mocking him. He debated on texting Pepper or Rhodey to ask their opinion and then decided against it – he didn’t want them to know yet another of his fuck ups, and it wouldn’t be fair to tell them about what had happened with Steve if Steve didn’t want anyone to know about it; not that Steve had specifically told him not to speak about it with anyone. He knew that both Rhodey and Pepper would be fine – they kept secrets much more deadly than things like the names of Tony’s bedfellows. Somehow it felt like a betrayal of Steve to talk about it with people outside the mansion – it’d be like bragging to other people, and he knew that Steve would see it that way. Then things would get so much worse and he’d lose his chance at fixing it.

“Still nothing from Steve?” Bruce asked as he made his way through the kitchen to snag a few slices of room temperature pizza. Tony wasn’t surprised that Bruce knew something was going on. Closed doors or not, it was a small house, and Steve leaving couldn’t really be mistaken for anything else seeing as how well they had been getting on the night previous. Tony got up for his twenty minute required pacing (Clint’s orders – he wasn’t allowed to sit for more than an hour without having to walk around so that his back didn’t tense up) and then found himself continuing the pace past his normal stopping point all through the house, leaving the phone behind. He walked past Steve’s bedroom and then walked back to it and stared through the closed door, hand raised to grab the door knob, wanting to go inside to see just what Steve had taken with him.

He faltered; his fingers not willing to twist the knob when he dropped his hand to cover the handle and he pulled his hand back as if it had burned his skin. It wouldn’t be right to snoop in Steve’s things. Not that it had stopped him before, but now somehow it felt wrong. He stared at the door, wishing that it would take pity on him and open all on its own. When it didn’t, he reluctantly walked away and paced back through the living room and into the kitchen. He took up his abandoned place at the table across from Clint and saw that Clint had moved on from his book and was now playing with the cutlery, making a pyramid of forks and spoons that towered up above the table; each piece precariously balanced. Tony didn’t bother looking at his phone. There wouldn’t be anything there. He could just feel it in his gut. Clint placed a new spoon in the tower’s left half and looked up at Tony with a raised eyebrow.

“Your phone buzzed.”

Tony grabbed for the phone so hard and fast that the table wobbled beneath his hands; the tower of cutlery swayed but remained upright. Clint gave him a dirty look before going back to his work, fitting a new spoon in between a network of forks shaped like a feather duster.

The text wasn’t from Steve, it was from Pepper. It read: ‘Are you alright? Natasha said that you are back to normal, and that you’re sulking. Something happened between you and Steve?’

He sighed, shoulders slumping.

“Not Steve?” Clint asked, eyes still on the forks. Bruce snatched a fork from of the side tower and it swayed precariously, but didn’t fall. Clint sent him an even dirtier look.

“It’s from Pepper. How much did Natasha tell her exactly about all this?” Tony asked.

“I’ll ask.”

Clint pulled out his phone and sent off a reply, fingers flying on the tiny keyboard. The response was almost instantaneous.

“Nat says that she told Pepper that you two had had a disagreement – nothing about the whole – thing.” Clint said quickly, noting the look of displeasure on Tony’s face. Bruce looked confusedly from Tony to Clint.

“I thought Steve went off on a special SHIELD training mission. Natasha said he was working on integration or was it interpersonal skills… He was supposed to be working on using the phone and learning how to text – am I missing something here?” Bruce asked, perplexed.

“Yes – that’s exactly what he’s doing. Nothing to worry about.” Tony grumbled, eyes still on the phone as he responded to Pepper with a: ‘Yes, all fine here. Steve’s just at SHIELD doing a training thing.’ Pepper texted him back thirty seconds later with an: ‘oh, ok. I’ll see you tomorrow morning for the board meeting.’

‘What board meeting?’ he texted back, confused.

‘The one you have to attend to get your power as CEO back.’ Pepper replied.

Tony groaned and banged his head on the kitchen table. Clint’s tower wobbled dangerously yet again.

“Hey! Watch it Stark!” Clint growled, glaring at him.

“I have to go to a board meeting tomorrow…” Tony grumbled, forehead pressed against the table, phone buzzing away with received messages by his ear.

“Ouch. You sure you’re going to be able to survive that? You might not be able to stand…” Clint said. Bruce sent him another confused but concerned look.

“What happened to him?” Bruce asked, cutting up the piece of pizza that was too covered in cheese to bite cleanly through.

“He threw out his back.” Clint supplied, disassembling his tower one piece at a time as Tony poignantly ignored his phone.

“Pepper’s going to be pissed if you don’t respond.” Clint said, gesturing to the phone.

“Good, maybe she’ll come over here and kill me so I won’t have to go to the meeting. God… It’s probably going to be at six am too.” Tony mumbled into the tabletop. When he finally raised his head he saw that he had six text messages. The first five were from Pepper, who had obviously guessed Tony’s displeasure at the idea of attending a board meeting at six in the morning and had given him a barraged tirade of messages in order to get him to show up. The messages read: ‘Be prepared to sit in a chair for three hours. You’ll be expected to show up at seven thirty – I talked them down from a six thirty meeting because I told them that you were still recovering from a hellish flu. You can play on your phone while they talk – just remember to sign the papers when I give them to you at the end. Are you listening to me Tony? Tony!’

The last message, blinking at the bottom of the list of messages, was from Steve. He scrolled down to it and clicked, opening it up. Tony stared at the message, mouth drying out as if he had just taken a mouthful of dust and fuzz from the dryer vent. He choked on the response, dropping the phone onto the tabletop with a clatter. The phone skittered away as it began to vibrate again, signaling another text message. The phone made its way across the table to Clint, who picked it up and scrolled through after seeing the look on Tony’s face.

“Ouch. That’s a bad one. Did you read the second one?” Clint asked, knowing damn well that Tony hadn’t.

“I highly doubt it’s going to make the first one any better.” Tony whispered, dropping his head back onto the table, face draining of blood.

“He says that he’d prefer to continue the discussion in person.” Clint read out, mindful of Bruce’s ears. Bruce didn’t seem to care; he was content eating his pizza, smearing sauce on his sleeve. Clint handed him a napkin and slipped the phone back across the table to Tony. It bounced off of Tony’s head and slid to a stop in the middle of the table.

‘It wasn’t right. What we did was wrong.’ Tony saw the words over and over again in his head, mind reeling through the images of the previous night. What kind of a message was that to send to someone? All Tony had asked was if he was alright! He swallowed hard, choking on his own tongue. A glass of water materialized in front of him and he lifted his head weakly and took a sip, swirling the water around in his mouth to clear away the imaginary dust.

“Thanks.” He said. Bruce gave him a thumbs up and stalked out of the room, snagging another piece of cold pizza from the box as he went. Clint watched Bruce leave, waiting until he was sure that Bruce was out of earshot and not likely to return before speaking.

“He’s still freaking out. Don’t let it get to you.” Clint said softly. His phone buzzed again and he scrolled through, sighing.

“Nat says that you should tell him that you trust him and respect his decisions, but that you don’t agree with this one - about it being wrong.”

“She’s good with words. Can I use those?” Tony commented, holding the phone out in front of him with his head barely raised, fingers poised to type.

“She’s always been good with words. Maybe, “ Clint said, seeing Tony’s struggling, “ You should just tell him that you don’t think what you did was wrong and start from there?” He suggested.

“Ok. Why not.”

Tony typed slowly, trying to make the text as error free as possible, suddenly afraid of being auto corrected into some kind of absolutely ghastly response.

‘What we did wasn’t wrong. I don’t believe that at all.’ Appeared on the screen. He looked up at Clint and then passed the phone shakily over to him, not wanting to hit send. Clint rolled his eyes, read over the text and then pressed send for him. He set the phone down in the middle of the table and joined Tony in staring at it, waiting for the response.

This time, it only took Steve five minutes to respond. The message was much shorter and unfulfilling. It read simply ‘It was wrong.’

Clint scowled at it.

“You know, I’m tempted to just phone him and yell in his ear until he gets over himself.” Clint grumbled. His phone buzzed again. He scowled when he read the message on it and put it back in his pocket.

“Nat says I can’t do that. That woman is psychic or something.”

Tony spun his phone around with one finger, watching the message spin around and around in brilliant white and black LED. What could he respond with that would change Steve’s mind? He’d told Steve that he trusted him so many times already and apparently that meant nothing to Steve – or was that the problem maybe? Steve felt that he’d done something that had broken his trust?

He typed slowly again, taking time to carve out his words.

‘Steve – I like you. You didn’t do anything wrong – We didn’t do anything wrong.’ He wrote. Again, he handed the phone to Clint, who read the message and pressed send for Tony, handing the phone back.

Steve’s response didn’t come that night and there was nothing by the time he woke up the next morning. Tony got dressed at daybreak with Clint’s help again and ate a modest breakfast of coffee and more coffee before being shooed out the door by Happy. He was whisked off to Stark Tower for the board meeting in a low riding car. The ride there was a nightmare; his back almost gave out on him when he had to step out from the door to reach the curb; he debated on asking Happy to just carry him the rest of the way. He didn’t do it though, knowing that it would probably look more than a little foolish to be carried into a board meeting, even if he was Tony Stark. He had to show that he wasn’t an invalid; that he was strong and capable of dealing with company matters despite any disadvantages thrown his way. He was used to this kind of board room, with its love for rumor and gossip. The other members of the board would start whispering amongst themselves if they saw any sign of weakness; they were like sharks in chum filled waters, just waiting for a good time to strike at the bait.

He sat gingerly on the edge of the puffy chair Pepper motioned him to and then sank completely into it while he waited for the meeting to begin. A few of the board members came up and gave him the customary handshakes which he begrudgingly rose for; once they finished waddling in to the board room, he settled into his chair permanently. One of Pepper’s personal assistants brought him coffee that was too black and too sweet – perfect in other words. He thanked the woman, gave her a flirty wink and then busied himself with catching up on the business reports Pepper had graciously left in a manila folder for him. The folder wasn’t too thick and only held about a hundred pages, probably condensed for his reading pleasure, so he soldiered through it while taking delicate little sips of coffee, savouring the flavor of the brew. They’d picked up some new kind of coffee apparently. He made a mental note to ask Pepper what it was so that he could order some; it reminded him of Easter mornings, half nutty and chocolaty like the eggs Jarvis used to hide for him. They reminded him of those little hazelnut chocolates he’d brought back from Paris on his last trip outside the country. Steve would have liked those chocolates. He frowned as the Steve thought slipped in between his others, burrowing into his business reports ideas and research and development paper comments. He rubbed the bridge of his nose and took another sip of coffee, distracting himself by listening to the board blather on about how they thought the secretaries were overpaid and how they wanted to get the newest version of the Stark Phone into production some time before Christmas. He locked eyes with Pepper briefly as she made her rounds, telling some of the board members off for their flippant comments (she’d practically stomped on some of their feet at the overpaid secretaries comment) and tried to reassure himself that things would be getting better.

He was getting his life back – he had control again. He could deal with this. He was an Avenger – he was Iron Man. He was Tony Stark. Somehow being Tony Stark didn’t seem all that important anymore. He checked his phone for the seventeenth time that hour and saw that, as expected, there was nothing from Steve.

He listened patiently to the Board for three hours, munching on the Danish the P.A had smuggled in for him and sipping the overly sweet coffee that kept being refilled by the same P.A; he watched the way the board looked at him with a certain sense of satisfaction. He could see the fear in them again – he’d always prided himself in being able to put the fear in them and it paid off when they never really knew just how annoyed he was with their bullshit. Sure, he blew up and told them to go to hell if they did something overtly bad, but they could just as easily be tormented with delayed projects or cancelled release dates, which was so much more satisfying and involved slightly less yelling. He never let them lay anyone off in retaliation either, so every time they tried to strike back at him for his project delays (all of them having been necessary and required if they had wanted to keep things from exploding or melting in their customer’s pockets) by firing some of the lower level workers, he would just dip into his own pockets and pay out the salaries to keep them all on. He knew Pepper approved of this; he knew his father wouldn’t have, but screw his father – on second thought, no. No thinking about someone screwing his father – that just made things worse, and he didn’t really need the mental imagery that came with that.

He sighed, loudly. The board fell silent around him, all eyes locked on Tony and his half eaten Danish held aloft in his hand like some kind of royal scepter.

“Are we done here? Seems to me like we’re done. Everything was handled impeccably by the wonderful Pepper Potts, and I don’t see any real problems lurking from what I’ve read.” He said, gesturing with the Danish, trying to keep the strain of the day out of his voice. The board members looked at one another and then back at him, putting on a unified face of pleasure. It always creeped him out when they did that – like they were some kind of hive mind just waiting to devour one another for thoughts going against the collective’s.

Pepper slipped the papers she had promised in front of him and he skimmed them quickly, signing his name at the bottom where she had left a happy little red smiley face tag with an x beside it. She’d drawn up the papers herself. He trusted her to have all the legalese tied up correctly. If she’d wanted the company she’d have taken it from him years ago after the first time he’d put her in charge.

She smiled softly at him and squeezed his shoulder when she whisked the papers away, leaving him to sit alone with the board as they filed out, shaking hands with each one as they made their way out of the room looking smugly satisfied with their day. He sagged in the chair for a few minutes when they were out of sight and then carefully heaved himself slowly upright, bracing himself against the polished wooden table, stretching his sore muscles.

“Hard day at the office?” Pepper said, stalking back into the room. She put an arm around his lower back and led him carefully towards her office, keeping her pace slow and smooth with a gentle canter despite her high heels.

“You could say that.” Tony said, wincing when he tripped on the barely raised carpet in front of her door. She raised an eyebrow but didn’t comment about it until she’d forced him to sit in the chair across from hers and closed the door to keep prying eyes and ears away.

“Did you have some kind of…” She paused, trying to find the words. “Sexual escapade that I should be doing damage control for? Or is this really just some kind of injury from the Avengers that you didn’t tell me or Fury about, because Natasha wasn’t all that clear on what was wrong and I thought that was funny because she doesn’t normally keep anything from me.”

Tony shrugged, not feeling like giving her information; he found himself telling her everything a few seconds later, blurting it all out before she could even sit down properly in her chair.

She stared at him, eyes wide and shocked, hands still resting by her sides slack and relaxed; if she’d been holding something it would have been on the floor now.

“YOU WHAT?!” She shouted, wincing when Tony flinched and huddled lower in his chair. She let out a long breath, clasping her hands in front of her face, eyes half closed while she centred herself.

“So what happens now?” She asked finally, lowering herself into her chair.

“You tell me. You’ve as much luck guessing what’s going to happen as I do at this point. Steve hasn’t responded to my last text and I’m pretty sure that I’ve traumatized him for life somehow.” Tony grumbled, not looking at her.

“Oh Tony…” Pepper said, shaking her head.

“Pep, tell me – am I … is it wrong to sleep with me? I mean – you already did, and I’m pretty sure you don’t want to kill me for it, but I mean, seriously – is this something I should have been worried about years ago? Because if it is I wish someone had given me that memo so I could have saved myself some of this – “ he flapped his hands around the room vaguely, “ whatever this is – confession? Mental trauma? Suicidal lust?”

“It’s not wrong to sleep with you Tony; it’s incredibly stupid, no matter who you are, but it’s not wrong.” Pepper said softly.

“Gee thanks – you should put that on a card or something. Tony Stark – not wrong to sleep with, but you’d have to be stupid to do it.” Tony snapped, tensing in the chair. His back began to throb again; it was familiar now, a dull slow burning ache, and he didn’t like it at all. The Advil Clint had force fed him before he’d left the house was no longer cutting it.

“I don’t mean it in a bad way – I mean, it’s just that you’re not the best at making decisions about sex and what happens afterwards. Did you even let him know that you liked him before you jumped him? That might have been a better way to go about it you know.” Pepper said dryly, digging out a peppermint candy from a bowl on the corner of her desk. She offered one to Tony and he took it from her, unwrapping it and popping it into his mouth. It tasted cool and fresh; he had forgotten that she always kept candies on her desk.

“Tony?”

Tony stared at her, blinking.

“I…”

“You didn’t, did you?” Pepper said, horrified. “Oh god Tony – you didn’t even tell him that you liked him and you just… mounted him like some horny – “

“Hey – HE did the mounting – I was just – “ Tony protested, flushing.

Pepper stared at him aghast.

“You didn’t tell him that you liked him in a more than friends way, did you.” It was a statement this time and not a question. Tony knew that he was screwed.

“Not really outright… no.”

Pepper pressed her palms into her eyes, letting out a strangely strangled cry.

“Oh Tony… you didn’t!”

Tony looked down at his feet, ashamed. She was right. He should have talked to Steve first before he’d thought out his plan – before he’d acted on it probably. He’d missed the first part of any real relationship, the part that was the most important of all. He’d jumped so fast and hard into bed that he’d completely forgotten about the whole dating aspect– he’d neglected to give Steve that kind of a chance to get to know his intentions.

“Tony…” Pepper said, snapping her fingers at him. He looked up. His eyes must have showed some of his dismay because her expression softened and she stood up, circling the table to sit on the edge of the desk in front of him, holding his hands in between her own. She rubbed her fingers against his knuckles.

“Tony. It’s fine – it’s fixable, just like most of the crazy things you do. You need to give him time to think things over. He’s probably handling it with all the grace he can muster, but really, did you think that he’d be the kind of person to just jump into bed without strings?”

“I didn’t think about it that way. I… I just saw that he wanted me and I went for it…” He mumbled.

“You found this out how exactly?”

“I don’t think you want to hear that story – although it’s been a rather vivid piece of my wet dreams lately – “

“Tony!”

“Sorry.”

Pepper squeezed his hand gently. He was glad for the smile on her face. She always looked better when she was smiling, and she didn’t smile nearly enough for his liking. She’d always been smiling during those first few months they’d been together… and then she’d stopped and it had been awful.

“Look. Maybe you should try explaining all of this to him? Tell him that you want a real relationship with him and that you’d like another shot at starting it out properly this time. Take him to dinner – to the movies – to a soda shop or something for god’s sake, but get the dialogue going. It’s not going to help if you leave him to fester in his own head. He’s probably having a panic attack in his sad little room in SHIELD because he doesn’t know what the hell happened between you two.”

Tony nodded feebly. Pepper always had such good advice. He should have talked to her about it in the first place. Maybe he could have headed off the disaster in the first place.

“Did you talk to Rhodey about this? What did he say?” Pepper asked suddenly, brow furrowing.

“I uh… didn’t talk to anyone about it. Only you and Clint know – and Natasha of course – she knows everything.” Tony sighed. Pepper dropped his hands and smacked him in the forehead with her palm, shaking her head.

“You idiot. God, he’s going to burst that vein in his forehead when he finds out about this – “

“You can’t!” Tony blurted, grabbing Pepper’s hand in a grasp that must have been much too hard, because she grimaced.

“Please Pep – don’t tell him. He’ll kill me and he’ll… I don’t want Steve to – “

Pepper pried her hand out from Tony’s and took him by the wrists, pulling his chair closer as it wheeled towards the desk.

“Tony. Rhodey’s not going to kill you. He loves and trusts you just like I do. He’d probably take his rage out on Steve, not you, but if you’re that concerned about Rhodey knowing I won’t mention it. Just… Think about talking to him too, alright? You don’t have to be alone in this.” She said softly, smiling again with the weary smile she used when she was trying to talk him off the ledge of insanity.

“Alright… I’ll think about it.” Tony promised.

“Good. Happy’s waiting downstairs for you. He’s planning to take you out for a congratulatory burger so he can clog up all your arteries. Promise me you’ll keep the bacon and cheese to a minimum, alright? I don’t want to have to take over again if you die from a stroke.” Pepper said, sighing as she dropped Tony’s hands and made her way back to her desk and chair.

“I promise nothing.” Tony said, a fleeting grin spreading across his face. She smiled at him again, rolling her eyes and went back to work.

Tony enjoyed the burger so much more than he had when he had eaten them as a human. He’d been eating leftovers all the time when Steve was feeling wiling and Clint always slipped him things when no one was looking. Being a dog had been harder on his stomach and taste buds than he would have liked to admit. He still remembered the dry taste of the kibbles and gagged when he thought about it. Happy passed him his soda and Tony took a thankful swig, passing it back. They were sitting at a picnic table in the park, having taken their food out into the open so that Tony could get some fresh air. Happy had insisted on it – he’d almost dragged Tony out from the car so that they could have this moment together, and Tony felt a little guilty for not having felt up to it initially.

He hadn’t seen Happy in a long time, not since the last time they’d come back from SHIELD, and clearly Happy had been worried about Tony’s wellbeing. He tried to make small talk to make up for all the missed chats, mentioning the strange upgrades he’d been doing on the Avengers’ weapons. He tried to talk Happy into letting him drive one of his favourite cars from his collection for the week, but Happy hadn’t seemed interested. He’d just smiled at Tony and gone back to eating his burger, content to just sit and listen to his boss ramble away like an excited fourth grader. Tony only checked his phone three times during their lunch. He let Happy take him out for gelato afterwards and made obscenely blissful noises when eating it despite not being all that hungry as they drove back home. Happy had snorted with laughter when he noticed that Tony had some of it smeared in his beard and had handed Tony a napkin, smirking. Tony had grinned back at him, feeling a little more like himself and a lot less like someone’s invalid grandfather.

He limped his way up the driveway and collapsed onto the paisley couch beside a dozing Clint, who growled at him for waking him up and then went back to sleep with the television blaring. The television was turned to some home and garden channel program. A crazy man was demolishing a house with a sledge hammer on the television at max volume. Tony stripped off his suit jacket and tossed it on the arm of the couch, pulling his phone out to do another obligatory Steve check.

There was a message.

He scrolled to it nervously, a bead of sweat dripping down the back of his neck, disappearing under his starched collar. He loosened his tie.

‘Please leave me alone.’

Tony gaped at the message, unable to contain his shock. He grabbed Clint by the arm, so frustrated by Steve that he couldn’t contain his frustration; the archer bobbled in his grasp, blinking at him sleepily.

“Whazza…”

“Look! Look at what it took him nineteen hours to write!” Tony crowed, furious with Steve.

Clint took the phone from his hand, having to pry it free because Tony was already trying to throw it across the room, and looked at it with a bland expression on his face.

“You’re surprised by this? Wasn’t this kind of what he already told you?” Clint asked. He kept the phone away as Tony reached out to snatch at it back from him and shook a finger in Tony’s face, making him to temporarily cross eyed.

“I’m not giving this back to you – you’re going to write something hurtful!” Clint growled. Tony continued to make grabby hands at the phone; he wilted finally after Clint stood up and walked away from the couch, watching him from the other side.

“But – I talked to Pepper and – “ Tony started.

Clint waved him into silence.

“Are you still mad at him?”

Tony looked down at his lap, pouting, and hunched his shoulders.

“No.”

“Liar.”

Tony looked up, eyes flashing and made an ill-advised dive for the phone. All he ended up doing was wrenching his back out further and curling up in a ball on the cushion, gasping in pain. Clint looked down at him from above, sighing to himself.

“You’re pretty stupid for a smart guy, you know that?”

“I hear that a lot.” Tony gasped, wincing as his back muscles gave a violent twinge before trembling uncontrollably.

“I’m not surprised.” Clint said, scrolling casually through the line of texts between Tony and Steve. He paused, re-reading them and then sat down on the arm of the couch, casually draping himself across it with the phone held just out of Tony’s reach.

“And just what did you intend on saying to him then? Something romantic this time, or are you planning to threaten him somehow?” Clint gestured at Tony. “Love me or die? Something nice and thoughtful like that?”

Tony scowled up at him and then looked away gaze dropping into the couch cushions.

“I wasn’t going to say something like that.”

“Then what were you going to say?” Clint asked, not taking his eyes off the phone.

“I was going to tell him that I wanted to start over- I know that this is probably because of the fact that I didn’t actually tell him that I liked him before we slept together and I want to start over – I want to ask him out and take him someplace nice.” Tony grumbled.

He looked up when he heard the sound of a text message being sent and stared at Clint with open horror.

“You didn’t.”

“Well you weren’t going to write it properly so I took the liberty of refining your babbling.” Clint shrugged. He tossed the phone to Tony so that he could read it. Tony caught it with shaking hands.

‘I want to start over and do this right. I like you and I want to have a relationship – can we meet up and talk in person?’

He had to admit that Clint had done a good job. He cursed the archer for having a better way with words than he did and lay the phone on the cushion in front of his face, staring at it with the hope that it would buzz and tell him that Steve had forgiven him for being an idiot. The phone remained silent. He glared at it harder.

“You do realize that staring at it isn’t going to make him think or type any faster, right?” Clint laughed. He snatched the phone up and slid into its place, sitting beside Tony’s sprawled body. Tony groaned as the cushion moved from the addition of Clint’s weight. Clint slapped him across the back and he shrieked, biting his lip.

“Oh grow up. You brought that one on yourself. You’re lucky I’m not going to take the phone away and put it up somewhere high so you can’t reach it.” Clint chided. He set the phone on the small of Tony’s back and went back to watching the television, changing the channel to the news.

The next day was better for Tony’s back. He found that he could get up from bed without Clint physically wrestling him out from under his blanket, and he only almost blacked out once while putting on his socks. He retreated to the workshop after sucking back three cups of coffee and eating half of a bagel he stole out of Clint’s hands. He locked himself in the workshop, devoting his attention to the Iron Man, feeling that he’d been neglecting it. The suit was his second home after all; it deserved some love too. He hunched over the workbench, fixing the wiring in one of the improved gauntlets and when his muscles began to hurt had Dummy come over and rub his back for him. Dummy hadn’t exactly been built to rub backs, so it was a little awkward and more than a little painful, but once the robot had finished he found that he had more mobility, so he called it a win and told Jarvis to make a note to give Dummy a new fire extinguisher – one of Dummy’s favourite toys as of late. He’d used up two already putting out the fires Tony had made when he was still trapped as a dog. He also made Jarvis take a note about back rubbing robots and then told him to strike that one out – it would probably just turn into something creepy with his luck.

When he looked at the clock later he realized that he’d been sequestered in his workshop for a whole ten hours without any interruptions. He stretched, back hurting and stalked to the fridge to see if there was anything edible in there. There wasn’t, unless he wanted to eat the crumbs and mold living in the crisper, so he decided to stop working for the moment and headed back upstairs. He dropped painfully into his seat in the kitchen with a piece of day old pizza half hanging out of his mouth as he wiped his greasy hands on a paper napkin.

His phone dropped into his lap from above. He looked up at Clint, confused and then remembered with a start that he’d been waiting for Steve to respond. He swallowed the bite of pizza in his mouth and picked up the phone, smearing sauce across the screen in his haste to look at it. He cursed and wiped the phone on his shirt, not caring about ruining the grease stained wife beater and then stared at the phone reading three new texts.

He clicked through and saw that all of them were from Steve. The first of them was time stamped six hours previous. He glared at Clint, who reached out and took the pizza from his mouth and put it on the table so he wouldn’t choke while trying to yell.

“You locked yourself up and told Jarvis to not let anyone in. You didn’t say anything about telling you if Steve texted.” Clint grinned.

Steve’s messages were short as always. He’d probably never learned how to type, and so it had likely taken him a long time to get it all out one letter at a time.

‘I don’t think that’s a good idea.’

The next message read: ‘Tony? Did you get that last message?’

The final message read: ‘Tony. Are you alright?’

The last message had been time stamped at fifteen minutes previous. Tony read the three messages over and over again, cycling through them as he would lines of code in a particularly stubborn program.

Steve didn’t want to have a relationship. Steve didn’t want to have a relationship but he was still asking if Tony was alright.

Steve didn’t want to have a relationship.

He set the phone down carefully on the table and went back to eating his piece of pizza, concentrating on chewing instead of thinking. He felt numb inside, as if someone had poured a bucket of ice water down his throat. He shuddered at the thought of that and swallowed hard, standing up to go get another piece of pizza from the fridge while his eyes watered. He chewed this one carefully as well, ignoring the strange look Clint was giving him. Clint picked the phone up off the table and read through the messages. His expression went from blank to annoyance and then back to an almost neutral expression of displeasure.

“He’s an idiot.”

Tony shrugged, finishing the slice of pizza. He opened the fridge and pulled out a can of root beer – he cringed; Steve’s favourite – He cracked it open and took a sip from it, letting the sweet flavor wash away the tomato zing on his tongue and lips; he wiped his face with the back of his hand.

“Some would say that he’s the smartest person they know. He’s probably right – I’m not a very good choice.”

Clint’s eyes narrowed.

“What are you talking about?”

“It’s fine. He doesn’t want me. I’m used to not being wanted. I’ll live. I’ll be in the workshop if you need anything.” Tony said. He walked off without another word, leaving the phone lying on the table where he had left it and the can of root beer on the counter beside the sink.

Tony stared at the pile of destroyed armor lying on the ground in front of him. He’d systematically dismantled the Iron Dog one piece at a time, ripping the metal apart with his bare hands. His fingers and hands were bleeding; he didn’t really care. It wasn’t as if he had to worry about anyone worrying about a few new scars on his calloused hands and he could barely feel the sting of pain from them anymore. No one had bothered to come down to the workshop to check up on him except for Clint, who visited only rarely. It didn’t surprise him, but somewhere in his chest hurt because no one had come – Steve had used to come –

He shoved that thought away and kicked at the Iron Dog remnants, wincing when a piece of metal lodged itself in his big toe. He cursed, hopping on one foot as he pulled the ragged chunk out and threw it across the room with a scream of rage. Dummy hooted unhappily beside him. The robot was holding the first aid kit and gesturing wildly with it, bumping against Tony’s shin to get his attention. Tony looked down at the blood dripping from his toe and let out a long suffering sigh, wanting to tear out his hair. He wanted to cry but it felt like he’d used up all of his tears; it was like retching with nothing to throw up. He’d known that Steve didn’t want him – somewhere inside, he’d known. He’d been dreading the knowledge, and he’d known it was coming regardless yet it had still come as a shock to see it written out in plain text.

Steve didn’t want a relationship. Simple and concise– it was just like Steve, who solved every problem with a dash of severe politeness. It was probably the nicest almost-relationship ender that Tony had ever gotten as an adult. At least he hadn’t had a brick thrown at him or a drink splashed in his face, although at this point he’d have preferred it if Steve had picked either of those options. At least then he’d have known that Steve had cared enough to think he deserved it – at least then he’d have known that Steve cared enough to actually feel something for Tony at all, even if it was hate.

Dummy pushed the first aid kit into his hands with a chirp. Tony’s blood smeared across the plastic cover leaving a red streak over the white as he took it, smiling sadly down at Dummy. He hopped one legged towards the couch with Dummy’s help and dropped into the couch, opening the kit up to pull out a piece of gauze. He pressed it against his toe, staunching the bleeding as he applied pressure.

“At least you still love me buddy. I can always count on you.” He sighed to Dummy. Dummy nudged him in the knee, hooting again.

“Yeah yeah. I’m fine. Don’t worry about it, it isn’t that deep. I’ll just tape it up and it’ll be fine… I think.”

“Would you like me to call someone for assistance sir?” Jarvis asked.

Tony looked up sharply, eyes narrowed.

“No. I do not need assistance Mr. Smarty Pants. If you call someone I am personally going to rewrite your program and give it to a daycare centre.” He threatened.

“I believe that I am already running a daycare centre sir.” Jarvis said, snarky and annoyed sounding.

“Yeah, yeah. Leave me alone – I’m fine. It’s just a little bleeding. Nothing to worry about.” Tony grumbled, gesturing to his toe. The bleeding had already stopped and although the gauze was bright red, it wasn’t getting any worse he thought. He pulled the gauze back to look at the wound and saw that there was a thick red line running from the tip of his toe to the base of it. He took a packet of disinfectant from the first aid kit and wiped at the cut, wincing through the burn, and then wrapped his toe up in more gauze and went to town with surgical tape, winding it around and around. The bandage began to go red again, much faster than last time and he cursed aloud, glaring at it for its insolence. Some of the blood was from his fingers, he realized after a moment of staring blankly at his toe; he may have blacked out there for a second, he wasn’t sure. The cut was soon bleeding so heavily that blood began to drip from his toe once more, drops falling onto the cement floor.

Perfect. Just perfect. He hated getting stitches.

“Hey Jarvis, can you uh… call an ambulance or something. I think I need stitches.” He grumbled, annoyed by his body’s weakness. He wiped at his face and smeared a red streak from his nose to his lower lip.

“Shall I inform Master Barton that you require assistance sir?” Jarvis asked.

“Why not. He can ride with me and Happy to the emergency room. He’ll get a kick out of this at least. Maybe we can go get ice cream after.”

“Very good sir. In the meantime please try to keep pressure on the wound.”

“Yeah, yeah.” Tony grunted and tested his foot out finding that he couldn’t put any weight on the foot anymore. Who knew that injuring a toe could hurt so much? He managed to hop his way to the door with Dummy’s help as it snapped open and found himself standing face to face with a very irritated looking Clint who was talking on his cell. Clint frowned when he saw the blood all over Tony’s face and hands.

“Hold on Steve, I have to take Tony to the emergency room. I’ll call you back later.”

Clint managed to hang up and stuff the phone in his pocket before he had to grab Tony around the waist to keep him from falling to the ground as he passed out.

Tony woke up in a hospital room with a sweet looking lady sewing up his toe. She smiled at him and explained kindly that he’d passed out from shock and blood loss but that there wasn’t any real damage and he didn’t even need a blood transfusion, lucky him! He grinned meekly at her and then looked away while she continued to stitch up his toe, not particularly font of watching a needle go in and out of his toe-skin. It took seven stitches in total and the nurse was even nice enough to give him a tetanus shot afterwards. She’d already bandaged up his hands when he had been unconscious, which had indeed been bleeding more than he had thought they had been. She warned him about keeping an eye on metal fragments lying around and chidingly suggested that he should wear steel toe boots and gloves in his garage from now on if he was going to be working on anything dangerous. He thanked her, resolving to wear some kind of foot protection so that he didn’t have to embarrass himself like this again and was then allowed to hop on crutches back out into the waiting room where a semi-bored looking Clint was waiting for him; Clint’s clothing was a little blood stained from where Tony’s hands had brushed against him. He matched the rest of the emergency room décor; most of the other people waiting around were blood stained and tired looking too.

“Enjoy getting your stitches Princess?” Clint asked with a yawn, grinning when Tony shot him a dirty look. “Of course you did. You can tell Steve all about it when we get home.” Clint commented, standing up.

“Yeah, I’m sure that’s happening.” Tony grunted, trying to focus on staying upright instead of on the thought of Steve being at home. Tony hobbled towards the door and then half turned to look back at Clint, who hadn’t moved and was now standing with his arms crossed in front of his chest.

“You do remember who I was talking to before you unceremoniously passed out in my arms, right?” Clint grunted.

“Not really. Why? Was it someone important like the pizza delivery guy or Pepper?” Tony joked, wanting to do nothing more than get the hell out of the emergency room; he’d long since gotten tired of the smell of blood and antiseptic.

“I was talking with Steve. He phoned your cell seven times after you didn’t answer that last text of his. He thought something was wrong.”

“Well nothing was wrong and nothing’s wrong now – I’m all stitched up and fancy free. Take me home Jeeves. I wish to go to sleep.” Tony grumbled, hopping towards the door again.

“Steve’s waiting at the mansion. He freaked out when I hung up on him and I had to practically scream at him when he called back in the car to get him to calm down go back to the mansion instead of rushing over here. He thought you’d done something to yourself because of him.” Clint said quietly; he was suddenly completely serious, a strange thing for Clint. Tony frowned, stopping in mid hop.

“He what? He thought I’d hurt myself?”

“Yeah. Apparently he had a friend who tried to kill himself once after some really traumatic event. Some guy called Bucky. He was really upset and wouldn’t believe me when I told him that it was because you’d fucked up your toe and hands while going bat shit crazy on the Iron Dog. He seemed to think that I was covering for you or something. Like I was lying about what had happened because you didn’t want me to tell him what had happened.” Clint growled, drumming his fingers on his arm.

Tony sighed.

“And he’s at the mansion now, is he? Got all worried about me after he thought I tried to what, kill myself because of him?”

“That’s what I got from it, yes.”

“Give me my phone.” Tony grunted.

Clint pulled Tony’s phone from his pocket and handed it to Tony, who scrolled through Steve’s texts and began to type, balancing himself on the crutches to keep from putting too much weight on his injured toe. When he finished, he handed the phone back to Clint and hobbled out the door to Happy, who gingerly hefted him up and carried him to the car with Tony’s crutches tucked under his arm. Clint caught up just as Tony was being seat belted in by an overenthusiastic Happy; he kept giving Tony a strangely sad look whenever he caught his eye and Tony was starting to suspect that Happy had suspected the same thing Steve had.

“You texted him that he shouldn’t worry about because – and I quote here because it’s just so precious – you don’t intend on causing any problems for him and are fine with him not wanting a relationship because you didn’t think he liked you that much anyways?” Clint climbed in the car, clambering over top of Tony and settled in the seat next to him. Happy gave him a look for climbing over the upholstery and closed the door behind him, getting into the driver’s seat with a grumble.

“What the hell is wrong with you?” Clint said, flicking Tony in the ear. Tony winced, rubbing the sting from the shell of his ear.

“Well it’s not like it’s a lie, is it? I’m not saying anything rude. He doesn’t even like me.”

“You don’t know that – he was worried about you!”

“Being worried about a teammate doesn’t mean they care about you or that they like you – it means that you’re being a good team leader and you’re concerned about your troops.” Tony said, turning away from Clint to look out the window as Happy pulled out and started driving them home.

“Since when did you play petty? I mean ok – you can be petty most of the time, but come on. This is Steve. You like Steve. He’s not just your team leader.” Clint said.

The phone buzzed. Tony and Clint both looked at it; neither wanted to be the one to read what had arrived.

“Well?” Clint said, gesturing to the phone.

“You do it. You’re the one who’s so worried about Steve’s sensibilities.” Tony snapped, turning to look back at the window. He didn’t want to know what Steve had said – it wouldn’t change anything between them, and it certainly wouldn’t take away how much Tony had begun to love Steve. God, he thought to himself, feeling his eyes well with tears, he’d started to love Steve even! How unfair was that! The one time he actually found something good too and it was gone before it had started – what a pain in the ass! He was glad that Steve had returned, but it would be painful to see him there after that last message. He’d have to spend most of his time in the workshop to keep from mooning about where people could see him. Maybe it would all pass and he’d get over Steve. After a few seconds of thought, Tony highly doubted it.

Clint pursed his lips, reading the text message. He looked up at Tony, looking embarrassed, and held the phone out to him.

“You should read this.”

“I don’t want to. It changes nothing.”

“Stop being a child and read it.” Clint said, thrusting the phone into Tony’s face. Tony caught it with a squawk and scowled at Clint, who had turned away. Tony caught sight of Clint’s reflection in the window; the archer looked gloomy and somewhat tired, as if he’d spent too much time down in the workshop like Tony often did.

Tony looked at the text message, knowing that he had to get it over with; better to rip off the band aid in one shot then to slowly drag it out.

‘Tony – please don’t hurt yourself. I care about you and I don’t want to see you hurt. I’d like to still be friends if that is possible. Can we please talk when you come home? I want to do this face to face.’

Tony scowled at the text.

“Great. Now, after I’ve had stitches and a tetanus shot he wants to rip my heart out and step on it in front of me and witnesses. This is the perfect end to a perfect day. I can’t wait to get back home!” He said, groaning. He dropped the phone onto the seat in between himself and Clint and wiped his suddenly sweaty palms on his blood stained jeans. The bandages on his fingers itched; he moved to scratch them and was blocked by Clint. Clint’s hand covered his for a moment, trying to offer sympathy. Tony pushed his hand away, stuffing his hands in his pockets out of sight despite the itch; Clint flicked him in the ear again and he winced, but smiled despite the brief pain.

He’d be alright. He could get over this. He was sure of it. He’d done it before after all.

They arrived home twenty minutes later. Tony allowed himself to once more be carried by Happy into the house where they were greeted by a hassled looking Natasha and a semi-confused looking Bruce. Natasha hit Tony in the head with the palm of her hand when he was put down; Happy seemed to approve of this. Tony grumbled to himself about the fact that everyone loved beating on him and then allowed himself to be manhandled by both Clint and Natasha into the living room where Steve sat waiting, looking uncomfortable. Steve looked as if he was in the room for the first time of his life again; it was as if he’d been stripped of all his ease. Tony winced internally; he hadn’t meant for Steve to be so unhappy about everything. He attached himself to the arm rest, not trusting himself to sit directly beside Steve on the couch itself and sat with his toes dangling above the carpet.

Steve cleared his throat and looked at the others, who reluctantly left them to let them have some privacy. Tony had no doubt that Natasha would be listening to them the whole time anyways, probably while standing on Clint’s back with her ear pressed up against the wall. He smiled at the thought and then shrugged at Steve, who was frowning at him.

“So. You wanted to talk?” Tony said, feeling the need to start the conversation off in a somewhat less uncomfortable manner than Steve probably would have. He’d already had one ‘so you tried to kill yourself’ conversation in his life, and didn’t relish the thought of having another.

“I was worried about you. Clint told me you locked yourself in the workshop and that you hadn’t been eating. And then Clint said that he had to take you to the emergency room.” Steve said softly, eyes locking with Tony’s. Tony looked away after a while, not feeling up to keeping such a steady gaze.

“That’s pretty par for the course, really. Nothing to be concerned about. I was destroying the Iron Dog and I got a little carried away. Next time I’ll remember to wear boots and gloves when I do it.” Tony shrugged. Steve slid closer to him, slipping across the cushions like a cat. He reached up and took one of Tony’s bandaged hands in between his own, frowning at the fabric wrapped around Tony’s fingers.

“You should be more careful.” Steve frowned, lips pursing.

“It’s fine Steve. It was only a few stitches and some scrapes on my hands. Let it go already.”

“Tony – “

“Look, if you need anything just let Jarvis know. I’ll keep out of your hair and you don’t have to worry about me being some kind of freak and stalking you around all over the place. I can take a no when I get one – it’s fine, really.” Tony blurted. He pulled his hand away from Steve and tried to stand up, balancing unsteadily on one leg.

“Tony. I want you to know that it’s not going to happen again. I’m not going to… fall into that again. I don’t want to lose you as a friend. I respect you. You’re a good person -”

“It’s fine Steve. I understand completely. I’d like to stay friends with you too – I missed having you around.” Tony flashed Steve a shaky smile despite how it hurt; he felt like someone had put fish hooks in his cheeks and attached wires so that he could smile on cue.

Steve looked relieved.

“Really? I thought you’d be… angry with me for what I did.”

“Why should I be angry with you Steve? I’m the one who messed things up. It’s not your fault that I’m crazy.” Tony sighed. He started to hop towards the door; he spied Natasha and Clint standing with their backs to the wall just down the hall from the living room and gave them a tired nod, continuing out of the room.

“You’re not crazy – “ Steve protested; his words fell on deaf ears. Tony slunk away, knowing that he wouldn’t push Steve into anything ever again. His life felt a little emptier when he tore the thoughts of Steve out of them. He could live with it. He could. He’d have to.

Clint sat with Tony on his bed while he recovered. It was strangely quiet in the room despite there being two occupants; Clint had a new book to read and Tony was busy sulking and trying to get some quality sleep in. He learned through Clint that Steve had decided to stay in the mansion and that he’d moved back into his room. It was a nice start over for Steve. Tony vowed to keep out of his way so that he’d be able to feel comfortable again; Steve deserved good things and nice places. It wouldn’t be fair for Steve to have to look at him every time he walked into a room. Tony would have felt uncomfortable with that kind of threat hanging over his head, so he tried to stick to his room and only crept out of it when he needed to get something to eat; Clint trailed behind him wherever he went now.

Tony felt that he had grown up a little. He usually did things that suited his needs, and now he was making sure that Steve was comfortable and able to get on with his life. It didn’t matter that this meant that Tony was going to have to sulk his way through yet another wave of rage educed depression alone. At least Steve would be happy again – eventually. He only wanted Steve to be happy.

Tony rolled over and poked Clint in the side, the blankets covering his legs. Clint raised an eyebrow to acknowledge the touch but didn’t turn away from his reading.

“Do you think I’m doing this right? Or is this just going to make things worse?” Tony asked quietly.

“Worse for whom?” Clint asked, reluctantly closing his book.

“I don’t know. For Steve I guess.”

Clint tapped his index finger on his lower lip, thinking about Tony’s question.

“I don’t think it could get any worse for Steve. He’s busy hiding in the workout room and according to Nat he hasn’t been doing anything while in there. He just keeps staring at the punching bags as if he doesn’t know what to do with them.” Clint said finally.

“Oh god. I’m the worst person ever – I broke Captain America.” Tony squeaked, pulling a pillow over his head.

“Smoother me – please. Put me out of my misery.”

“Too easy. You have to suffer through just like the rest of us. He’ll get over it eventually; just give him some space and time. He came back, didn’t he? That’s got to be a good sign if there is one.”

“You think?” Tony asked, moving the pillow a fraction of an inch away from his eye so that he could see Clint’s face. Clint had turned his attention back to the book; Tony scowled and pulled the pillow back over his eyes.

“Of course it’s a good sign. He didn’t ask to have himself taken off the Avengers roster, and he hasn’t dropped off the face of the earth to go hide in some strange foreign country to hide his shame. He’s sulking in the workout room a few doors down – that’s definitely a good thing.”

Clint closed the book and marked his page with a piece of scrap paper he slipped out from behind his ear.

“You know, I wasn’t so sure that you’d be so adult about this but I’m impressed Stark. You’re handling this with a lot more class than I thought you capable of.”

“You’ve been talking to Coulson, haven’t you?” Tony grumbled, rolling onto his side, turning away from Clint.

“Kinda hard not to, seeing as how we’ve been dating for the past three months. He told me some very colourful stories of his first week knowing you by the way.”

Tony rolled over, eyebrows attempting to leap off his forehead in their shock.

“What?!”

“Hey, keep it down. He’s not as open with things as I am and I’d appreciate it if you kept this to yourself.” Clint growled.

“Alright. I can do that.”

Tony’s eyes narrowed suddenly.

“Does Natasha know about this? I thought you guys were – you know.”

Clint laughed loudly, dropping the book from his hand.

“God, what are you, crazy? She’d rip my balls off if I tried to touch her again – we broke up a long time ago man. We’re history.”

“Huh.”

“We were lucky. We became friends again after it happened, but it took a while – thus why I have firsthand experience with your problem with Steve.” Clint said, stretching out. He lay down next to Tony, looking up at the ceiling.

“It’s tricky but it can be done if you both mean to make it work.”

“I want it to work.”

“I’m sure you do, but you’re miles ahead of Steve right now. He’s still jogging in place at the starting line trying to figure out the route. Give him time.”

“You’ve been talking to Pepper too.”

“Maybe.”

“Asshole.”

“Baby.”

Clint and Tony laughed together. Somehow things didn’t feel so empty anymore. Tony could see a future – maybe not the one he wanted, but it would be the one he would be getting regardless. He could be friends with Steve. It was the best he could hope for – and at least he’d become closer with Clint and Natasha at the same time too. Maybe it wasn’t all bad. His mind drifted back to Steve that night they had slept together. He shuddered as he remembered the look on Steve’s face when he had told Tony to get out.

Maybe not. He’d have to wait and see what the future had in store for him.

Tony snuck down to his workshop two days after he’d come back from emergency room and locked himself in. It was nice to be alone in the workshop again; despite Clint’s company, he had become restless, too many things floating around in his head. He’d been working off of a tablet for most of the time, but really, there was only so much time he could spend poking at schematics with a stylus while Clint snored beside him.

He was pleased to see that Jarvis had had the place cleaned up since his last escapade. A pair of steel-toed boots were sitting in front of the door when he got in and he pulled them on carefully, making sure not to jostle his toe too much lest it start throbbing uncomfortably again. He was pleased to find that Jarvis had gotten him some boots without laces – they were some kind of specialized Velcro contraptions that he could yank off quickly if necessary – a handy addition, as he’d want to be able to get them off if he dumped, say, molten metal on himself. Not that he planned to do that. He looked around guiltily, feeling as if he’d just terrorized Steve again with the thought of accidental injury and then set about calling up his various projects, papering the walls and windows with the blueprints; he threw most things up haphazardly, but kept his eye out for Steve’s files. He set all of Steve’s things in their own section of the room and then went about making improvements to Clint’s bow and armor, knowing that he owed the archer one – more than one, but again, he’d never admit it to Clint’s face. He also toyed with improvements for the Widow’s Bite and then put those files away, not sure whether Natasha would want him screwing around with her stuff. He decided to improve her boots instead, not wanting to touch her body armor, and was pleasantly surprised when Jarvis informed him seventeen hours later that it was ‘getting late’ and that he should go to sleep.

He debated on following Jarvis’s orders – he did. Yet his mind drifted back to Steve and then he had to drown himself in work again just so that he could get Steve out of his head. He tried compartmentalized the Captain America files so that they had absolutely no attachment to Steve Rogers but of course they somehow ended up having that attachment anyways; he eventually had to close them all down and push them away after he’d finished making more improvements to Steve’s armor. He hid the files inside a folder and decided to poke at the Iron Man’s temperature controls, ignoring the rumbling coming from his stomach.

“Tony?”

Steve’s voice cut through the fog of work. Tony froze, half inside the Iron Man’s torso; he had been cleaning out bits of thread that had gotten trapped in it from when he’d got his bandages frustratingly stuck in between the panels ten minutes prior.

“I brought you some dinner. Clint said that you hadn’t been up from the workshop in a while and that I should go check on you.” Steve said. He was clutching a plate of spaghetti in front of him, watching Tony carefully. Tony sighed and untangled himself from the insides of the Iron Man torso, limping towards Steve, who set the plate down on his table and backed off.

Tony looked at the food. He looked at the way Steve was slowly inching his way out of the room backwards. He felt his stomach twist and bunch inside of him. He managed a painful smile in Steve’s direction before he sat down at the table and started eating. He heard Steve leave the room and wasn’t surprised that he was alone again so quickly.

At least Steve had come downstairs to look for him. That was something.

He finished the spaghetti and made his way to the couch feeling full and bloated. He asked Jarvis to dim the lights and went to sleep sprawled out with his feet hanging off the side of the couch and his head pillowed in the crook of his elbow.

He awoke the next morning with his boots off and a blanket draped over his body. He wasn’t sure who had done it, but the fact that the plate had disappeared as well led him to think that it may have been Steve. He closed his eyes again and went back to sleep, not wanting to think about what that meant to him.

Tony continued to spend his time in the workshop; he didn’t feel like going upstairs where he might inadvertently run into Steve. He’d made one mandatory trip up to the kitchen when Clint had physically come down and dragged him up, but after that he’d remained hidden away, buried in his work. Clint had commented that it was childish; Tony had responded that it was completely necessary and that he had two months’ worth of work to catch up on. Clint had then pointed out that Tony had gotten that done the first week he’d started working again and Tony had just had to shrug at him and take it for what it was. He started ordering in takeout again to appease the vengeful archer and paid slightly more attention to his sleeping habits, although he didn’t stop working for hours on end. He found himself preferring the company of his robots to the company of the others – he liked Clint’s jokes and Natasha’s death glares (although he wasn’t quite sure why in Natasha’s case, as she scared him) and he even put up with Bruce’s mouth reading, but it felt too raw still. Being upstairs with the others only reminded him that he would be depriving Steve of his Tony-free-time.

Tony wiped sweat off of his forehead and laid his wrench down on the table. He looked up at the clock again and numbly realized that yet another twenty hours gone by while he was working. How long had it been since he’d slept in his own bed? He usually slept on the couch now in the workshop, too lazy and exhausted to climb the stairs to his own room. He would have had to walk by Steve’s room to get to his own, and he’d been trying to give Steve space – he couldn’t do that if he was constantly under Steve’s feet and in his way.

The door to his workshop slid open with a chirp; Tony looked up from his work, knowing that he looked more than a little bit like a racoon, and squinted with beady eyes at the visitor. Steve walked confidently towards him holding out a plate with a peanut butter sandwich and a mug of steaming tea. Tony waited for him to put his offering down; he expected Steve to make a break for the door as soon as the plate touched the table. This time however, Steve dragged a stool from the kitchen and sat down across the table from Tony. He had his sketchpad tucked under one arm and a very determined expression on his face that could have been used to convince someone to throw themselves in front of a car to please him.

“I figured you could use some company.” Steve said, trying to put on his best smile. Tony blinked blearily at him; he rubbed at his eyes, looking down at the plate and then up at Steve again feeling very muddled; he didn’t know what to do. Steve caught his expression and paled, fingers clenching on the sketchbook so tightly that he knuckles went white from the pressure.

“Unless you didn’t – “

“It’s fine. I don’t mind.” Tony yawned, picking up a piece of the sandwich. Steve had cut it up in quarters, taking the crusts off of it too. He had the sneaking suspicion that those crusts had been fed someone, possibly Clint or the pigeons outside, as Steve had always been pretty adamant about not wasting food. He chewed thoughtfully on the first bite and then took a sip of tea, letting the warm flavor of peach ginger melt away the residual peanut butter. Steve watched him carefully, still poised for flight on the edge of the stool. Tony leans forwards and allows himself a break, resting against the flatness of the table. The sandwich quarter remained held loosely in his hand, only a small chunk of it left. He let out another yawn and then tried to cover it by stuffing the rest of the square into his mouth.

Steve smiled softly and began to arrange his drawing supplies on the table beside Tony, picking out his first pencil; it was from the pack Tony had bought him when he’d first come to the mansion as a sort of home warming gift. Most of the pencils were worn down to little stubs that wouldn’t really be useful to a normal person, but Steve being Steve didn’t appear hampered by this at all. He grasped the longest pencil stub in between his fingers, fingers that Tony was intimately familiar with, and then began to sketch, eyes on the paper and nothing else.

Tony picked up another sandwich quarter with shaking hands. He blamed the shaking on the lack of sleep and excess caffeine and refused to admit to himself that it was because Steve was sitting only a foot away and that he could smell the shampoo in his hair – he’d switched from the one he used to use when Tony had been a dog. It smelled fruity; maybe he’d gotten it from Natasha, who had a penchant for using the expensive herbal shampoos that he bought for Bruce because they were supposed to be ‘calming’, or so the label read. He hadn’t really cared enough to test it out for himself to be sure. Being calm wasn’t usually his thing. He took in a slow, deep breath, tasting Steve’s shampoo on his tongue and then almost choked on the next bite when he realized that Steve was looking at him again.

“Tony?”

“Mhogwh?” Tony managed, trying to speak around the mouthful. He took another swallow of tea and cleared his throat. He kept the mug close to his face, hands wrapped around it for the warmth, steadying himself.

“Yes?”

Steve smiled a little at the way Tony held the mug up against his lips as a shield.

“How are things going down here? You seem tired.”

“Things are… going. I’m not too sure at the moment. Give me a couple minutes so the caffeine kicks in and I’ll let you know.” Tony groaned, letting his eyes close for a moment. He jerked awake when Steve’s hand took the mug away from him, setting it down on the table. He blinked at Steve again, confused.

“You fell asleep.” Steve explained softly. The sketchbook was lying ignored beside his hand, the stub of a pencil tucked against the elastic band holding the pencil case together; the case had broken the first week and Steve hadn’t let anyone throw it out or buy him a new one.

“Mhm… bound to happen when you fly on … three hours sleep?” Tony guessed, shrugging his shoulders in an attempt at humor. Steve’s smile turned into a deep set frown.

“You’re working down here on three hours’ worth of sleep?” Steve asked. He moved his arms, starting to cross them over his chest and Tony waved at him, trying to calm him down.

“I’ll just take a nap on the couch, relax.” He said, yawning.

Steve watched him as he slipped from his seat and staggered over to the couch, collapsing onto it with his feet kicked up on the armrest.

“You’re going to sleep with your boots on?” Steve asked tone only slightly judgemental.

Tony wiggled his feet.

“Too lazy. No point in taking them off if I’m just going to have to put them back on after I wake up.”

He closed his eyes, crossing his arms over his stomach, leaning just slightly so that the light wouldn’t go directly into his eyes. He dozed for a moment before he felt Steve taking his boots off and tensed.

“What are you doing?” Tony asked carefully.

“Taking your boots off so that your legs don’t fall asleep.” Steve said, leaning over Tony’s leg to get at his other foot to pry the boot off. He set Tony’s boots down beside the couch and then went back to the stool, his back turned to Tony on the couch. Tony could hear the sound of pencil scratching against paper; his eyelids drooped, the sound hypnotic, and slowly drifted off as he listened to Steve work in the distance.

He woke up again when a blanket was being tucked around his shoulders. He blinked sleepily up at Steve, eyes not quite focusing, and drifted off again when Steve’s hand brushed his matted bangs out of his eyes.

Tony awoke to the smell of French toast. He sniffed, poking his head out from under the blanket and looked around, rubbing his eyes with the back of his hands. Steve was sitting at the table Tony had left him at the night before. Two plates of French toast with powdered sugar sat on the table, one in front of Steve and one on the opposite side of the table. Tony could smell the scent of coffee percolating as well; he stretched, confused and sleep addled.

“Come eat.” Steve commanded, his back still turned to Tony.

Tony struggled out of the blanket he had cocooned himself in, dumping it on the cushion beside him and then stood up, cracking his back. The muscles in his back felt better this morning too – it was morning, he assumed, judging by the French toast, which meant that he’d probably been asleep for several hours longer than he had intended to be.

“And put on your shoes.”

Tony grumbled to himself and slipped his sore foot into the first boot, balancing against the arm of the chair. He snapped the Velcro in place and then grabbed for the other boot, hoping that things would make sense by the time he managed to trudge over to where Steve was. He sat down in his chair and stared at Steve through half lidded eyes, brain still not completely functioning at optimum levels.

Steve smiled shyly and pushed the second plate closer Tony. He stood up as Tony stared down at the French toast in confusion, fork raised up above the dish held in a slightly off kilter way. Steve went to the coffee maker, pouring two cups of coffee into red mugs; he stirred in four spoonfuls of sugar into one of the mugs and then put some cream and sugar in the other one. He carried them both back to the table, setting the mug with just sugar in front of Tony. He paused to lower Tony’s fork arm towards the actual plate and then gave him a light pat on the head as Tony began to cut up the toast.

Tony ate the French toast with relish. He hadn’t eaten a lot of breakfast in his life; he usually just choked down a doughnut or some kind of pastry with several cups of coffee when he remembered to eat breakfast at all. He swallowed a sweet bite and then cut another. His mind wandered to Steve without his informed consent. It was strange to be this close to Steve again after all this time. He still hadn’t gotten used to the way Steve looked at him, and it had only been a few hours of conscious wakefulness in Steve’s presence, mind you, so he wasn’t entirely sure he wasn’t still dreaming. He took a quick sip of his coffee and found that, as he had expected, Steve had made it perfectly, although how Tony didn’t know, because Steve had never really made him coffee before; maybe he had taken lessons from Clint. He looked questioningly at Steve, who sipped from his own cup, feigning innocence and ignored him, focusing on his own breakfast instead.

“So, “ Steve began, cutting the rest of Tony’s French toast up for him when Tony began to doze off in mid sip. “What are you planning to do today?”

Tony took another long sip of coffee, trying to phrase a coherent sentence that would satisfy Steve.

“Work… maybe?” Tony managed, unsure of what else to say.

“Do you mind if I stay down here and sketch? Clint’s been bouncing off the walls and it’s distracting trying to sketch with him constantly moving from room to room.” Steve asked cautiously.

“Sure. Feel free.” Tony mumbled, finishing his coffee with an appreciative sigh. He set the cup down and began to eat a few more pieces of toast, not looking at Steve. He started when his coffee cup materialized beside him again, full to the brim with coffee that was just as sweet as before. He nodded his thanks to Steve, smiling softly and finished eating. He cradled the coffee in between his hands, watching Steve work on another sketch out of the corner of his eye and then put the cup down to shuffle off to the bathroom to take a shower.

He returned later and Steve was still sitting at the table sketching away. The plates had vanished somewhere and the coffee pot was on again, making more coffee that smelled strongly of Easter – he stared at the pot suspiciously. Steve grinned sheepishly at him.

“Pepper said that you liked this kind when you were at your meeting.” Steve offered.

Tony smiled and went back to work; it felt nice to have someone in the workshop with him again. He felt more calm than normal, and didn’t even turn his music up to deafening when he worked, knowing that Steve wouldn’t like it. God, he knew, he would have cut off his own hand if it would have made Steve happy. He banged his head against the Iron Man as he worked beside it; the thunk that came from it caused Steve’s head to jerk up. Steve stared at him, concern written on every line of his face. Tony grinned weakly at him and went back to work, trying to forget the way Steve’s lips had curled into a smile when he’d seen that Tony was alright.

“Hey Tony?”

Steve’s voice pierced the musical fog Tony had been working in. He paused, looking up from his holographic projection of the latest Stark Phone, and turned to face Steve. Steve was sitting at the table where he usually sat and had sat for the past three weeks. He had ink stains on his chin from the set of pens that Tony had bought for him to use after he’d run out of his pencils. Tony wanted to grab him by the face and kiss the ink away; he’d had to struggle with himself to keep from letting this show and often had to turn away whenever Steve did something particularly cute so that Steve wouldn’t see him blatantly staring.

“Tony?” Steve repeated.

“Yes? Sorry I got distracted there for a second. What’s up?” Tony asked, pushing the hologram away so that Steve would have his full attention. He rubbed at his eyes and then rested his chin on his clasped hands, elbows resting on the table.

“Do you ever think about that night…” Steve asked; he went pink all of a sudden, cheeks flushing and turned away as if he’d suddenly seen Tony standing naked in front of him.

“That night?” Tony asked, pretending not to know what Steve was talking about. He stared at Steve through half closed eyes, trying to keep all expression from his face in case it stopped Steve from talking. He didn’t have to worry – Steve seemed intent on continuing the discussion even though he was obviously embarrassed by it.

“The night we slept together.” Steve said voice barely above a whisper. He clutched the pen in his hands as if it were some kind of soft and fluffy object that he could cling to – maybe to Steve’s super soldier strength it was. The pen bent to the left, snapping in half, spraying him with ink. He stared aghast at Tony, ink dripping down his shirt and cheek.

Tony laughed. He couldn’t help it. It came out as a deep and warm sound; he was soon laughing so hard that he almost fell clean off of his chair, clutching the edge of the table to keep from dropping to the ground. His brain only picked up on Steve’s question again after a few minutes of floundering in complete oxygen deprivation.

He wiped his eyes and saw that Steve looked hurt and mortified at the same time.

“Oh god – sorry. It’s just. The ink – jesus.” Tony gestured at Steve, who blinked and then realized just what it was that Tony was laughing about. Relief flooded his face and he began to wipe at his cheeks with the back of his hand, hopelessly smearing his cheek with black. Tony started laughing again. This time, he managed to rein the amusement in faster and stalked to the kitchen to get a paper towel which he wetted and brought to Steve. He wanted to wipe at Steve’s face; he handed him the paper towel instead. Steve looked almost… disappointed. If Tony hadn’t known any better he would have been certain that Steve looked unhappy that he hadn’t touched him like Tony had wanted to.

“So do you… do you think about it?” Steve asked again, after scrubbing at his cheek with the paper towel. Tony stood nearby, ready to take the dirty paper towel away when he was done with it. He shrugged his shoulders, not sure how to respond to Steve’s question. Steve’s eyes were on him still and he felt his face go red as he thought about it.

“Yeah… I think about it.” He said, trying to appear noncommittal.

“How often?” Steve asked, serious looking. He had his Captain America voice on – it was disturbingly distracting. Tony found himself swallowing hard, not wanting to meet Steve’s eyes. Should he tell him the truth? The Voice was telling him that he should be – but would it really do either of them any good to know that Tony thought about that night every waking hour when he wasn’t distracting himself with his work?

“Tony.”

Tony looked up from his feet and cleared his throat.

“Uh… often?” Tony said, scratching the back of his head. He smiled weakly at Steve, who didn’t smile back and then sighed, looking back down at his feet. “I uh… hope that doesn’t… make you uncomfortable.”

Steve wiped at his face again, smearing the ink across his cheek bone and onto his lip. Tony couldn’t help it. He reached out and cupped Steve’s chin in his hand, taking the damp paper towel from his un-protesting hands and wiped at the streak, gently washing it away. He lingered a little longer than was strictly necessary and let Steve’s chin drop when he saw the way Steve was staring at him with a look akin to sternness.

“Sorry.” Tony said, taking the dirty paper towel into the kitchen. He took a moment to collect himself, trying to slow his breathing so that it wouldn’t be too obvious that he was terrified. When he turned back, Steve’s eyes were still on him, the serious expression turning to something softer and less threatening; as if Tony were a child that didn’t understand what he’d done was insulting.

“What about you?” Tony asked, going on the offensive out of impulse.

Steve shook his head.

“No. I don’t really think about it often.”

Then why, Tony thought, had Steve even asked? Tony cleared his throat again and pushed away from the counter. He flashed a grin at Steve and then went back to work, aware that Steve was watching him the entire time.

Tony started sleeping in his own bed again after the last conversation with Steve. There didn’t seem to be much point in avoiding him; Steve spent a lot of time in the workshop now, and they were almost always together at some point. Tony decided that he could at least have the decency to go upstairs and follow Steve’s instructions for once. He liked the idea of being able to curl up in his bed again, even if it meant that he would be alone and cold the next morning. He could dream in peace about Steve, and continue to live in his fantasy world where they hadn’t broken away from one another when he was in his bed; Steve seemed to act as if nothing had happened most of the time, and Tony wasn’t surprised. He’d only talked about the night they had been together once, and then he’d been unsurprisingly quiet about it.

He divided his mornings between sitting in the kitchen drinking coffee, watching Clint and Thor argue about the merits of the cartoon network, and slinking back into the workshop so that he was out of everyone’s hair. Clint had cornered him in the hallway a few times already so that he could ask how things were going on the Steve front, and Tony had been fairly truthful with him about it. Things were… going. He wasn’t unhappy – sure, Steve didn’t want anything to do with him other than friendship and he was perpetually aboard the friend-ship as it were, but it didn’t make him unhappy. He liked having Steve around and Steve’s presence genuinely brightened up his days. Steve would bring him coffee and sometimes he’d bring him down bagels if he found out that Tony had skipped breakfast again. He brought Tony lunch and sometimes even dinner when Tony didn’t emerge from the cocoon that was his workshop. It was nice. It was… routine; familiar in a way that he hadn’t had before. Sure, sometimes when he looked at Steve, he found himself wanting to push the man down so that he could cover his face and neck with scratchy kisses, but he’d never act on it again – not without Steve’s consent and possibly not even if he’d had Steve’s written permission signed in blood with a thumb print and two witnesses.

He was down in the workshop fiddling with one of his cars when Steve caught him and dragged him away to sit down at the table again, force feeding him cake this time. Something Steve had made with Natasha’s instructions, Steve had said. He’d looked mighty proud of the concoction, and so Tony had eaten it. It had tasted awful – most of Steve’s cooking was wonderful, but the cake seemed like it had been made with kitty litter instead of flour. He grimaced and choked his way through it until he found he couldn’t choke down anymore and then, unhappily, told Steve what he thought of the cake, trying to be as kind as possible.

“This cake tastes like ass, Steve.” He coughed, taking a deep draught from the glass of milk Steve had given him. Steve watched him carefully, his own fork halfway to his mouth.

“I know. I was wondering when you were going to point it out.” Steve admitted, a smile breaking out across his face like wildfire.

Tony coughed, almost inhaling the milk.

“You’re a crafty man Rogers – I’d have never thought you capable of evil.” He joked, wiping the milk off of his mouth and lips. Steve picked up a napkin and wiped milk and cake crumbs off of Tony’s chin, the smile never leaving his lips.

“I don’t get you sometimes.” Tony said with a sigh. He put the fork down and then pushed the plate away, not moving, but certainly not pushing Steve’s hand away. Steve faltered, looking startled; he looked at the hand he was using to wipe Tony’s chin and then jerked it away, scowling at something. Tony wasn’t sure what had displeased him, but whatever it was had been something big because Steve was soon picking up both their plates and vanishing out the door without another word.

Tony stared at his hands, confused and then mopped up the crumbs on the table, sweeping them into a pile before depositing them into the trash can. When he was finished, he went back to work, getting Jarvis to pull up the files for the Stark Phone. He’d almost finished working out the bugs in its UI and he’d been neglecting it anyways.

“Tony?”

Steve had appeared back in the lab, probably when Tony was busy calculating things in his head, and he’d been so silent that Tony hadn’t even noticed him returning. He turned halfway, pushing the schematics away, saving them.

“Yes?”

Steve approached carefully. He’d changed out of his clothing from earlier and was wearing sweat pants and a white t-shirt – the t-shirt, in fact, which he’d worn the night they had slept together. Tony knew because he remembered the way the fabric frayed at the collar, strings hanging loose against the back of Steve’s neck. Tony stared at him, baffled. Steve closed the distance between them in what seemed like the blink of an eye. Tony looked up from his chair, neck craned, into Steve’s intensely blue eyes, unable to comprehend what was going on. Steve reached out and lifted him up by the front of his shirt; Tony was suddenly standing. Steve kicked the chair out of the way and leaned Tony against the table; the edge dug into Tony’s back, but he didn’t care. Steve’s mouth was pressed against his, hot and heavy and open. Steve licked his way into Tony’s mouth and Tony stood there confused, participating but nonetheless confused.

When they broke apart, Steve stared deeply into his eyes again, and Tony was lifted up onto the table. Steve’s hands moved all over his torso underneath his shirt, stroking and squeezing his flesh. He managed to break free after a moment of abject breathlessness and grabbed Steve by the wrists, panting.

“Steve. What are you doing?” He asked, hating himself for asking but needing to ask anyways.

Steve slipped his body in between Tony’s knees, pushing his legs apart and leaned forwards, pressing their bodies together. Tony scooted closer to the edge of the table, wanting to be closer; he lingered there on the edge, hoping that he wasn’t dreaming. Steve kissed him again, slow and sweet and then pulled back slightly as if to admire his work, eyes more black than blue. He looked Tony over once, smiling wickedly and then leaned in again, pressing his face against Tony’s neck, nibbling the skin there.

“You should know – you started it last time.” Steve breathed into his ear.

Tony’s grasp on Steve’s hands loosened. He allowed himself to be pushed flat against the table and suddenly Steve was pushing his shirt up over his head; Steve threw the shirt onto the floor and promptly forgot about it. Tony found his chest traced by Steve’s gentle fingers, moving their way down to the waistband of his sweats where they paused, hovering precariously. Tony’s breath was shaky now; he remembered doing something like this before. He swallowed hard, not sure if he could control himself; he wanted Steve so badly. He moved to slip his hand up under Steve’s shirt and found his hand pushed away; he was surprised when Steve seized him by the wrist, pinning him flat on his back against the table.

“I have one condition if we do this. You don’t get to touch, talk or lead. I want… I want you to feel how I did that night. I want you to lose control completely.” Steve whispered. The words weren’t hurtful, they were said calm and firmly, spilling from Steve’s lips like some kind of love song. Tony nodded, silent agreeing; he would have agreed with anything that came out of Steve’s lips at that point. He could feel his cock swelling against his thigh and smiled shyly up at Steve. Steve faltered, taking in a deep breath, and then began to move again, kissing Tony’s lips relentlessly. His hand slipped down into Tony’s pants, slipping right into his boxers to cup him and Tony let out a gasp into Steve’s mouth. Steve bit Tony’s lower lip and pulled back, shaking his head.

“No sounds either, remember?”

“Pushy, Rogers.”

“Hush.”

Steve kissed his way down Tony’s chest, moving his way down to Tony’s thighs. He pressed kisses to the fabric covering Tony’s inner thigh as he worked his way down lower; his hands slipping down to undo the Velcro of Tony’s boots, dropping them to the ground. He pulled Tony out of the rest of his clothing, leaving him bare and exposed on the table, his arc reactor glimmering blue in the fluorescent light. Tony’s clothing lay scattered around the work table. Tony shivered, skin covered in goose bumps, nipples rigid. His cock was unbearably hard; he kept silent, eyes never leaving Steve as he moved. Steve made short work of his own clothing, struggling out of his socks and shoes before he slipped his hand into the pocket of his sweat pants. Tony watched Steve dig a bottle of lube and a condom out of his pockets – it was the same bottle of lube they’d used the first time and his breath hitched in his chest at the memory, leaving him shivering from more than just the cold. Steve had kept it. He hadn’t thrown it out.

Tony stared unabashedly at Steve, eyes drinking every detail in. Steve was just as gorgeous as he’d been the first time. His muscles looked as if they’d been carved out of stone; he belonged in a fancy museum where people see how close to the gods he was. No. He belonged in someone’s private collection – his, perhaps. Tony looked down at himself and felt a bit ashamed; he was stocky and short in comparison, not at all muscled enough to match the splendor of Steve Rogers. He was small in comparison; Steve was massive. Steve didn’t seem to notice or care about the size difference. Steve reached out and pushed Tony down onto his back, kissing Tony’s throat, biting and sucking at the flesh that met between collar bone and neck. He dropped his hands onto Tony’s chest, pinning him down without pressing and Tony lay still, waiting to see what Steve wanted to do. Steve’s eyelashes were long – so much longer than they had been before and Tony had to stifle a moan, biting his lip painfully hard, as Steve leaned forwards and sucked long and hard on his nipples, moving from one to the other, tongue circling the reddened flesh. He could feel Steve’s cock rubbing against his inner thigh, wet and slick with pre-cum, just like before.

Steve leaned back, looking down at Tony from high above, eyes wild and dark.

“I want to fuck you.” Steve whispered, all throaty and low.

Tony spread his legs coyly, without even stopping to think about anything more than having Steve inside him. Steve reached for the lube and grabbed it, popping the lid open to drip a generous amount onto his thumb. He rubbed that thumb against Tony’s hole, tracing a circle around the entrance. Tony had to bite his lip even harder to keep from moaning as Steve pushed his finger in.

Tony gasped, breathing through his nose as Steve set to work, slipping wet fingers inside of him one at a time, scissoring and rubbing gently. He leaned back, watching Steve work from between his legs again; he flashed back to that first time and shivered, wanting to reach and grab Steve, to make him look in his eyes. He waited, pleasure almost overloading his senses, lifted his legs up to rest his heels on Steve’s shoulders as Steve stroked him inside; his cock remained neglected, swollen and painfully hard. He groaned and gasped when Steve pushed a finger deeper inside him, stroking a place inside him that felt the best of all. Steve looked him in the eye and signaled no, no noise from Tony. Tony nodded fanatically, trying to focus on breathing in and out, feeling the hot throb of his cock rubbing against his body; it had become trapped against his chest when Steve bent him in half. He watched in wonder as Steve slipped three fingers inside him up to the knuckle and bit his lip, tasting blood as Steve worked his fingers inside him again, slightly harder this time. He wanted to moan aloud, to tell Steve that he was doing everything right and struggled to hold the sounds and praises in. Steve slid his fingers out, fumbling with the condom wrapper as he tore it with his teeth. He slid the condom onto his cock with a few shaky unpracticed rolls and looked down at Tony, panting; he held the lube so tightly in his hand that some oozed down the sides of the bottle. Steve breathed hard, staring at the tube as if having just noticed it for the first time. He wiped the oozing lube onto his hand, smearing his cock, rubbing at the base and head with rough fingers. He looked down at Tony, questioning without speaking and Tony nodded feverishly, pushing his legs even further apart than before to give Steve better access.

The tip of Steve’s cock breached him and Tony threw back his head as the sensation overwhelmed his senses. He could feel the warmth of Steve’s shaft, the slick slide as Steve slowly filled him up; he forced himself to remain silent, feeling utterly full once more after feeling so empty for so long. Steve began to thrust in short aborted movements, Tony’s body open to him more so than it had been before. Tony was completely relaxed despite his position on the hard table; he let his ankles bump against Steve’s shoulders with each thrust, eyes half lidded, desperately drawing in breath to cover his moans. He struggled to keep his eyes open. He wanted to see Steve like this – enjoying himself. He’d missed out the first time and he was damned if he was going to miss it again; this might be the last time they’d be doing this, he hoped not but it might be regardless of his wishes. Steve increased speed, thrusting harder and harder. Tony winced as his back slid with a squeak against the table and Steve stopped, leaving him still, silent and full.

“Tony?”

Tony let out a shaky breath, still not moving, trying to keep from protesting aloud about the halted movements.

“Tony.” Steve said sharply. Tony lifted his head, looking Steve in the eye, utterly wrung out. Steve kissed him and then tasted the blood on his lips, pulling back in surprise.

“Oh my god – are you alright?” Steve gasped, wiping the flat of his thumb across Tony’s lower lip. Tony sucked on his thumb, planting a kiss on it after. Steve slipped his finger out from between Tony’s lips, cupping Tony’s jaw to better look into his eyes.

“I’m fine. Just bit my lip a little too hard. It’s hard to not make noise when you’re being pounded by you, you know.” Tony grinned coyly.

Steve leaned forwards, cock half slipping out of Tony; Tony groaned at the loss in sensation and tried to push Steve back in.

“Hey, don’t stop.”

“Tony…”

“Sorry… I wasn’t supposed to speak, was I? I’ll shut up– “

“No. I want to hear you now.” Steve said, smiling.

Steve pulled out gently, adjusting their positions. He lifted Tony up, holding him just above his hip, leaving Tony’s ass to press only slightly against the cold tabletop.

“Wrap your legs around me.” Steve said huskily. Tony nodded, following his instructions. Steve lined himself back up with Tony’s hole and pushed in slowly, letting out a shaky gasp as Tony surrounded him once more.

“God Tony… You feel so good.” He groaned.

Tony kissed his shoulder gently, burying his head against Steve’s shoulder; he wrapped his arms around Steve’s neck, holding on tightly. He wasn’t afraid that Steve would drop him – he was afraid that Steve would push him away again.

“So do you. Fuck me already Rogers or I’m going to come all over you – well… let’s be fair, that’s going to happen anyways, but - “

Steve began a slower rhythm this time; Tony pushed down as Steve slid in and together they worked until Steve was moaning Tony’s name in his ear, coming inside him, Steve’s fingers digging in to Tony’s hips. Tony followed shortly after, rubbing to completion against Steve’s stomach. He hadn’t needed to be touched. All he had needed was the warm feeling of Steve’s skin pressed up against his; he wanted that moment to last forever, and basked in the glow of Steve being utterly satisfied. They remained entwined together, Tony’s ass pressed against the sharp edge of the table with Steve’s arms wrapped tightly around him, holding him in place. Steve kissed Tony’s neck, nuzzling against his ear.

“I’m so sorry.” Steve whispered, squeezing Tony tightly. He pulled out and fiddled blindly with the condom, tying it without looking, eyes still on Tony’s face. He threw the used condom into the waste paper basket a few feet away and then wiped at the cum on Tony’s stomach with his shirt, which had fallen onto the desk beside them, cleaning Tony up; Steve dropped the shirt and stroked the side of Tony’s face again.

“For what?” Tony asked, surprised. He shifted in his position, rubbing his hands down Steve’s strong back and leaned up to press his forehead against Steve’s, kissing him lightly on the lips.

“I’m sorry that I panicked before. I thought that I’d corrupted you – turned you…” Steve said softly.

“You were worried that you’d turned me gay?” Tony laughed, kissing Steve again, lips kiss bitten and swollen. He ran his hands up Steve’s back and settled them against the back of Steve’s neck, stroking the short hairs there.

“Steve, I hate to break it to you, but you didn’t make fall in love with you. I came to that conclusion all on my own.”

Steve’s eyes widened.

“Tony…”

Tony sighed, burying his face in Steve’s neck, not wanting to meet his eyes. He’d fucked it up again -

“I know, I know. I’m being stupid again and making things uncomfortable – “

“You’re not. Really. I…”

Steve lifted him up and settled Tony against his hips. He carried him over to the couch, sitting down with Tony straddling his lap. He ran his fingers down the side of Tony’s face, stroking his beard and then rested his forehead against Tony’s cheek, speaking into his chest, his body hunched over.

“I got scared and I’m the one who was stupid. I… I wasn’t thinking and I kicked you out and it wasn’t fair to you – it wasn’t wrong and it wasn’t fair – “

“Steve – “

“No – let me finish,” Steve said, kissing Tony’s neck. “I was afraid that I’d corrupted you and ruined both our lives because I was in love with you and… God, Tony, I wanted to touch you so badly the day in the workshop after I hurt you by accident but when I… when I said all those hurtful things about how I didn’t want you to look at me anymore... I was stupid – I thought that if I just told you I didn’t want you to come after me that the feelings would just go away…”

Steve let out a sigh, stroking Tony’s hip absentmindedly.

“I was wrong. Nothing went away – the moment I talked to you I kind of realized that it was real and I panicked again. I thought you’d hate me for it and when you didn’t look me in the eye after I thought for sure that I’d ruined it already before I’d even started and – Oh Tony, I just… I missed you so much when I was gone and then you were so damned accommodating when I came back and you just left me alone to think it all out and I thought that maybe you’d given up.” Steve rambled.

“I’d never give up on you Steve. I was worried that you’d be the one to give up on me.” Tony whispered into Steve’s ear. Steve’s eyes were wet. He wiped them with one hand and smiled at Tony, the expression radiant.

“And then I talked to Natasha about all of this and… well… she told me that you knew what you wanted and that you’d tell me if you didn’t like something and I… well I made that awful cake to see if it was true and it was and… and you ate it and told me it was bad and…”

“Steve. You’re rambling sweetheart.”

“You told me what you thought about the cake. You told me it was awful and that’s what I needed – I needed to know that you would tell me if it was bad and you hated it and… I really wanted you back.”

“You didn’t lose me you know…” Tony said softly, smiling.

“I know, and I do want to have a relationship with you – if you’ll still have me. I wanted to say yes to you before so badly – but I just… All those years with Bucky and the others telling me it was wrong. All those little comments and looks they gave me. I just felt like some kind of monster and it wasn’t fair to you. I should have wrapped my arms around you the first night and held you like I wanted, but when I looked in the mirror in the bathroom after all I could see was that old me from back then who was… flawed and weak. I didn’t want you to see that – and then…”

Steve leaned sideways, pulling Tony on top of him so that he could lie more comfortably between Steve’s legs with his head resting under Steve’s chin.

“And then I saw you the next morning when I was going to tell you good bye and… You were just lying there and I could see all the bruises on your neck and the tears in your eyes and I… I guess I just listened to the voices in my head telling me I was a monster and I ran for the first time.”

Tony curled closer against Steve, eyes half closing as Steve began to stroke his lower back, his body blazing hot in the cold of the workshop.

“And then of course I got all those text messages from you and I didn’t know how to deal with that – I’ve never met someone so damn stubborn and tactless.”

“Gee. Thanks honey.”

“Oh hush you.” Steve kissed Tony atop the head, sighing.

“I got scared again when you said you wanted a relationship. I could just hear Bucky’s voice whispering in my ear – fag – you’re a fag Steve – you’re a fuck up and a fag and I… I’ll admit that I’m not as brave as you. I ran when I should have stayed and I… Tony, I was so scared for you. I was afraid that I’d ruined your life.”

“And yet you came back.” Tony whispered, intertwining their fingers. Steve smiled again at that.

“And then I came back. I couldn’t leave you behind – I just had to make sure you were alright. I nearly had a heart attack when you didn’t respond to that text and I… I may have screamed in Clint’s ear over the phone a half dozen times when I found out you were in the emergency room. I thought you’d done something awful – something that you couldn’t take back. I thought you might be gone.” Steve said, voice cracking.

“I’m sorry about that. I didn’t mean to scare you. I was just angry and I took out my frustrations on the damned Iron Dog. I wasn’t thinking straight.” Tony admitted quietly.

“We were both stupid then.”

“Yeah, I guess we were.”

Steve fell silent, composing his thoughts again. He continued to stroke Tony, fingers trailing down to the curve of his ass, squeezing gingerly. Tony groaned and bit him on the shoulder in retaliation, laughing. Steve joined in, the tension leaving his body.

“And then, you go and tell me that you think about that night all the time and I just… I … I didn’t know how to admit that I did – do, too. Constantly.” Steve grumbled, ruffling Tony’s hair.

“I guessed as much when you were fucking me into that table. You seemed like a man with a plan.”

“Yes, well. I just… I wanted to be sure that you wanted me – that I wasn’t just taking advantage of you in a vulnerable state…”

“That’s funny – I thought that it was the other way around. Me taking advantage of you.” Tony laughed.

“Yes well… That’s just what I was hearing in my head. Whispers of things I’d rather not hear again. Things I’ll never listen to again now that I have you.”

Steve looked down at Tony, lifting his chin so that he could look into his eyes.

“I do have you, right? You’re not going to just vanish and become part of a dream, right? The daydream of a hopeless idiot?”

Tony kissed him, cupping Steve’s face in his hands. He could feel their hearts beating in unison beneath him, his arc reactor pressed against the smooth muscles of Steve’s chest.

“Nope. You’re not dreaming. I’m yours – I have to warn you though, I’m not the best person. I’m cranky, and I irritate people and – “

“And you’re stubborn and a pain in the ass. And I love you anyways.” Steve chuckled, kissing Tony back. They lay together, half drifting to sleep, before Tony realized that they had missed one important topic.

“Steve?”

“Yes Tony?”

“Are we telling people about this? Or is this just a you-and-me thing?” Tony asked carefully. Steve paled a little and Tony kissed him again, pushing the terror away. Steve hadn’t thought about it clearly, and Tony needed to know this – needed to know what he could say to the others. He wanted Steve to feel comfortable about it; he knew that he did, but it wasn’t up to him to just holler to everyone before Steve was ready. Natasha would beat him to death if he did anyways, and he really didn’t have any intention of being beaten to death while he had a nice, warm, beautiful Steve.

“Because I’m fine with this just being between us for now – until you’re ready that is. I’ll be screaming it off the rooftops when you’re ready, but I’ll keep my mouth shut if that’s what you need right now.” Tony said.

Steve smiled into the next kiss. He closed his eyes, resting his cheek against Tony’s head; his arms wrapped around Tony, hugging him closer.

“I think… I think I’d feel better if we just keep it between us for now. I want to get used to it first… I don’t mean to be unkind but I’m… I’m just not ready yet – I’m still a little scared of what people will say. I know you’ll just say, fuck it, to how other people feel, but I… I’m just…”

“I’ll wait with you Steve. Don’t worry. I’ll wait. You’re worth the wait.” Tony said, smiling into Steve’s chest.

Tony had never felt so contented before in his entire life. For all his thirty five years, he’d felt like he was missing something important. Laying there with Steve beneath him, warmth in the cold, he felt as if he could do anything. He could see a future with Steve – a future that he’d been dreaming of hidden in between nightmares. He had almost given up hope; Steve had almost given up hope too. And yet they were here, together at last, safe and sound from their nervous compulsions and self-hatred. He was right – Steve was worth the wait. Steve would always be worth the wait; even if he had had to wait a hundred years, he would have waited for him. Steve was the light in the darkness of his life. They could do this – things would be alright now.

Jarvis dimmed the lights, locking the workshop and left them in privacy. Tony smiled as Dummy wheeled tentatively closer and roughly covered them with a blanket; the robot’s aim was a little off and he ended up getting the blanket over top of Tony’s head, but the robot had meant well so Tony didn’t chide him for it.

Steve smiled, patting Dummy on the head as he wheeled away; for the first time since Steve had been in the workshop, Dummy cooed at him, rubbing against Steve’s hand, showing affection. Steve seemed pleased by this and Tony could feel his smile against his head and laughed aloud. It really was all about the little things in life.

“Ok buddy – leave us alone now. Thank you for the blanket, but I want to go to sleep and I don’t need you staring at us like a creeper.” Tony grumbled from under the blanket. Steve pushed the blanket down off his head and smiled harder; Tony would never be able to get enough of that smile. He definitely owed Dummy some new toys – and maybe an upgrade for helping put that smile on Steve’s face. Dummy wheeled away back across the room to his charging station and fell silent. Everything was in its place, and despite the long and somewhat disheartening journey, Tony had Steve. Tony had Steve!

Steve loved Tony! Tony played the words over and over in his head, snuggling closer to Steve. Steve loved Tony! Tony loved Steve! They drifted off to sleep together, dreaming of the future and the past. Tony buried himself under Steve’s arms as he slept, grinning shamelessly in his sleep. Things would be better now. He was sure of it.

Somewhere up above them, the Crystal of Change disappeared in Clint’s bedroom dresser. They never saw it again, but Tony never forgot about it.