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Jennifer drops the divorce papers down onto his coffee table.
“Are you sure about this?” she asks, careful and weighty.
Tony rubs his aching sternum, over the raised skin marking the edge of a vibranium shield.
“Yeah,” he says, solemn as the grave. “I’m sure.”
He leans down and signs his name in sprawling cursive.
He looks up at Jennifer, her eyes needle-sharp, but soft. “Give it to T’Challa. He’ll make sure it gets to him,” he says, flatly. “I’ve got parent-teacher interviews to get to.”
Peter decides to stay that night at Ned’s for a sleepover, after the interviews.
Tony doesn’t know if he’s just a shitty dad, or if Peter feels that heavy, tragic absence of someone who should’ve been there but isn’t, just as Tony does.
Peter came down with a fever a couple of weeks ago, and Tony had sat by his bedside, day and night; Stark Industries, the Avengers, the fucking planet, all of it, could have gone to hell and he wouldn’t have been able to be dragged from Peter. But Tony didn’t know how to make soup, not good soup at least; all he knows is to sing, to wipe the sweat from his forehead, to keep him comfortable, and he felt like a fucking failure.
Tony Stark is intelligent, curious, hungry; he wants everything and more than everything, but failure is not something he understands well, not when it considers his son, his only boy, the only boy he’ll ever have, the boy he used to sling around in his arms and sing to sleep.
He won’t fail Peter, not like Howard failed him.
He’d set himself on fire first.
The lift opens with a dull beep, and Tony sighs, padding forwards.
Steve Rogers is sitting on the couch.
Tony stills.
Bile rises in his throat, sour and bitter.
“What are you doing here?” he asks, roughly.
Steve reaches into his jacket.
For a fleeting second, Tony thinks he’s making for a gun and is completely exhausted by the idea that he might have to fight for his life, to fight his way away from his husband one more fucking time.
Instead, Steve pulls folded-up sheets of paper, laying them out onto the table.
“You’re divorcing me,” Steve rasps.
Tony licks his dry mouth.
“I am,” he says, flatly.
Steve stares down at the sheets, where Tony’s signature is black against the paper, and his composure crumples, fingers clutching at his hair.
“Shit, Tony,” he whispers, wet.
Tony squares his shoulders, grim uncertainty creeping up on him. “What are you doing here, Steve?” he asks.
He braces himself for pity, for anger, for some righteous, sanctimonious admonishment: what are you doing, Tony? Do you really think this is a good idea, Tony? What are you going to do without me, Tony? Is this really what’s best for Peter, Tony? Why are you being so stubborn, Tony? Doesn’t Peter deserve both of his dads, Tony?
It’s all the things that Ty would’ve clucked at him, to make him feel weak and stupid and incapable of making a decision for himself.
He decides, then and there, if Steve decides to act like that, if Steve thinks to demean him, he’ll throw the nearest heavy object at him and keeping throwing heavy objects at him until those super soldier reflexes fail and one actually hits the bastard.
Steve squares his shoulders, lifts his chin, defiantly (ever the fighter, Tony thinks, bitterly).
“I came here for my family,” he says, a pinched, thin look to his stupid, gorgeous face.
Amusement floods up like lava and stupidity. “What family?” he asks, dryly. “What did you think was waiting here for you, Steve?”
“My husband,” Steve says, fiercely. “And my son.”
Tony snorts. “Fucking great father you are, you’ve been gone for months. Plus,” his sharp smile is all threat. “I don’t think war criminals are an appropriate role model for growing teenage boys.”
Steve flinches. “That’s not fair,” he says, lowly.
“Oh, I’d say that’s exactly fair,” Tony says, ugly.
“And who fucking made me a war criminal, huh?” Steve demands, turning red.
“Yourself,” Tony says, flatly.
“You put our friends in prison-”
“That was Ross.”
“You hunted us across the world-”
“Again, Ross.”
“You locked up Wanda-”
“Because she was indirectly involved in the deaths of numerous civilians and eleven relief aid workers from Wakanda,” Tony sneers. “Spare me your subjective morality. What do you think happens when a police officer screws up and kills a bunch of people in a firefight? This is how the world fucking works.”
Steve lifts an eyebrow, almost scornful. “And you would know that, would you? When have you ever experienced consequences for the many mistakes you’ve made?”
Tony touches his new, shining arc reactor, the last gift he ever got from his beautiful husband, the clink of metal against nail making all the righteous anger, the obstinacy, the emotion die in Steve’s face.
“Constantly, since 2009,” Tony replies, thinly. “Now, get the fuck out.”
He’s still here once Tony’s done having a shower and comes down the elevator.
“I’m going to call the police,” he laughs, brittle.
Steve shrugs, staring down at his upturned palms, splayed out across his broad thighs. “That’s your prerogative,” he says, dully.
That won’t end well, Tony decides, for the police, anyway.
He drags a hand through his hair. “What do you want from me, huh?” he asks, heavily.
Steve’s hands fist in the divorce papers. “I want these gone,” he says, gruffly. “I want to come home. I want to crawl into our bed with you. I want to watch movies with Peter. I want my family back.”
Tony shakes from head to foot. He remembers the dark, vicious look in Steve’s eyes when he raised that shield of his, ready to bring it down on Tony’s head, on his neck, on his heart, to kill him, whatever need be. He laughs again, almost helplessly, halfway to tears.
“You tried to kill me, Steve. There is no coming back from that,” he says, voice thick with grief.
“And you tried to kill Bucky,” Steve points out.
“I don’t-” Tony catches it, cages it, behind his teeth before he says something he may regret later. He grinds his teeth. “I don’t care about Bucky,” he flings. “I don’t want to see him, to hear about him, to think about him. He doesn’t exist for me.” Only in my nightmares. “You were my husband, you were the one I loved, the one I trusted, and you failed me. That’s all I know.”
“Were?” Steve asks, quietly. “Loved?”
Tony’s grin is sharp, a lethal thing. “I’ve always been good at putting things that were bad for me in the past tense,” he says, thinly.
Steve’s face crumples so quickly and so painfully that Tony jolts on his feet, hand clenching and unclenching around air just to reach out to grip him, to ground him, to kiss him soft and kind.
No, Tony berates himself. I can’t be weak, not for him, not in front of him. He’s lost that right. All he gets is this, cold and empty.
One long, pale finger runs over the papers. “You’re suing me for full custody,” Steve says, flatly.
Tony lifts his chin. “I am.”
Steve flashes a smile at him, sharp and sudden and taut. “You really think you’re gonna win that battle?”
Tony crosses his arms over his chest. “You got something you want to say?” he demands.
Steve shrugs. “I dunno. Ex-war profiteer, drunk, drug addict, playboy, you think those are the makings of a successful single father?”
Tony’s face is as hard and white as stone, as he shakes. “You have some fucking nerve,” he hisses. “You think a war criminal is better. Any court, every court would give me custody, considering Peter’s other father can’t step on American soil without getting fucking arrested. What money do you have to support him? An army pension frozen, and everything else you had in this fucking time is what I gave you. You lived in my house, you ate my food, and you wore the clothes you bought with a credit card linked to my bank account. So, fuck off, Steve, I’ve had enough of your sanctimonious shit.”
He turns around to flee, when the wind moves around him, and a hand grips his forearm. Tony goes taut, unsure of how to react, and before he knows anything else, his repulsor is crawling around his hand and whirring.
“Tony,” Steve whispers, stricken, pulling away.
“What, Steve? What?” Tony asks, cold and clean and clear.
He has no more fucks to give.
“I’m sorry, I’m sorry, okay,” Steve blathers, fisting big, deft hands in his long hair. “I don’t… I don’t know what to do anymore. I don’t know how to fix this.”
Tony’s hand falls to his side, the desperate, wild look in his husband’s eyes twisting a rusty knife in his gut.
“Maybe you can’t,” he says, quietly.
Steve shakes his head. “No,” he says, stubbornly. “I refuse… I refuse to believe it’s just over. That’s not… I can’t… No. I mean, it’s you,” his own words draw an ugly, wracked sob from him. “It’s you, Tony. How could I let you go?”
Tony wraps his arms around him, a filthy chill fisting in his ribs. “Maybe there’s no other option.”
Steve grips his shoulders, his hands enormous on Tony’s lithe, slender body. “Do you really believe that?” he asks, with a passion that borders on madness.
Tony drags in air through his teeth. “Steve, you tried to kill me,” he whispers.
“I didn’t… I didn’t!”
“You did!”
“I didn’t, I was just trying to stop you from hurting Bucky, and I-”
“-was willing to kill me in the process, if it meant saving him,” Tony grits out.
It’s not every day he’s willing to put it out into the world the miserable shame of having his own husband choose his not-dead best friend over him, but it had to be said; Steve had to hear it.
“I wouldn’t have killed you,” Steve continues to argue.
“Oh, Steve,” Tony’s mouth twists into a gargoyle smile; he is quite wrung dry of tears. “Of course, you would have.”
Steve’s hands shake. “I love you.”
Tony doesn’t believe him, but he grips his hand, tangles their fingers together to give him comfort, nonetheless; he still loves Steve, after all.
“I know, honey, but I have to end this.” Tony looks away. “I’m sorry, you should leave.”
That night, he sits in his workshop, and when FRIDAY tells him that Steve is still sitting on that same couch with the unsigned divorce papers, he shakes like a vat of wildfire.
He grips the edge of the table and begs FRIDAY to play the tape again.
“Boss, are you sure?” she asks, quietly, ever loyal, ever careful.
“Yeah, FRI,” he says, faintly.
He watches the video, again and again, until it stops hurting.
It doesn’t stop hurting.
The next morning, he climbs up the stairs, only to find Steve, with his legs kicked up, sleeping. Tony glares at the sight, before faltering at the sickly-looking flush on his cheeks.
No, he scolds himself. Don’t you dare feel sorry for him.
He storms over, shaking his wayward (soon-to-be-ex) husband by the shoulder.
“Get up!” he snarls.
Steve startles awake, his eyes veined with red. “Huh, wha’s goin’ on?”
“You need to go,” Tony insists.
“Tony,” Steve reaches for him.
Tony bats his hand away. “No. For God’s sake, Steve, just sign the fucking papers and leave. I don’t want to do this with you,” he snaps.
“Tony,” Steve’s face folds in torment. “I love you, Tony.”
Tony laughs, unkindly. “No, no, you don’t. You don’t,” he whispers. “Or Siberia would never have happened.”
“Tony, I’m sorry for not telling you about Bucky-”
Tony shakes his head. “It doesn’t matter anymore,” he says, thin and taut. It doesn’t, it doesn’t. “I just need you gone.”
Steve’s face caves horribly, and his broad, big, deft hands settle around Tony’s waist, who’s too slow to move out of his reach, surging to his feet.
“Tony, Tony, wait, let’s just-” his throat works. “Let’s just work through this, huh? Let’s just talk. I need to talk to you.”
“About what?” Tony exclaims, voice edged thick with tears. “What could possibly make a difference now? You should’ve talked to me two years ago when you found out your brainwashed assassin of a best friend murdered my parents,” he spits like acid. His shoulders set in a defensive slant. “But you didn’t.”
“That’s not-that’s not what happened,” Steve says, weakly.
“It is. It is, because you decided that your best friend was more important than your fucking husband and kid.” Tony eyes him, evenly, eyes cold and clean and clear. “That’s the choice you made, and now, you have to live with it.”
Steve grits his teeth and looks away. “I can’t lose you, I can’t lose Peter,” he says, desperately.
Tony shrugs. “You already have.”
Tony tries to slip past him, take sanctuary in the kitchen, but Steve’s fingers lock like a vice around his wrist.
“I want to see Peter,” Steve says, his voice now stern, edged.
“He’s at a sleepover,” Tony waves off. “And I’m not quite sure if he wants to see you.”
“He’s my son, Tony,” Steve reproaches, eyes red.
Shame prickles against the nape of his neck, and for a moment, Tony wonders if he should crumble; then, he thinks, no, this is not my fault, I am allowed to walk away from him, from us, if he’s bad for me, he is bad for me.
“He’s our son,” Tony barks. “And you abandoned him.”
“I didn’t abandon him,” Steve scorns.
“You had multiple opportunities to stay; you chose the life of a criminal, Steve.”
“To protect Bucky!”
Tony sneers. “Yeah, to protect Bucky. But obligations around child-rearing don’t just fucking stop when something new and shiny comes along.”
All that’s hard and ugly in Steve’s face stares back at him, and Tony thinks, fuck, I’ve married my father, haven’t I? I’ve become my mother.
Tony clenches his fist. He loved his mother, he loved her like he loves nothing else in this world (it’s a different love he has for Peter, more consuming, more righteous; if it had been Peter in that video, he would have walked out of that facility covered in blood, and Steve and Barnes would have been corpses left to rot and be fed on by wild dogs).
And now, he’s become her, with all of her resentment, her bile, her hunger and the savage look she took for herself to protect her son.
Tony lifts his chin. “I’ll talk to him, and if he wants to see you, you can see him.”
Steve shakes his head. “You abandoned him too, Tony,” he flings. “Don’t make the only villain in your perpetual victim narrative. You left him here, with Happy and Pepper to babysit, while you went gallivanting all over the world.”
Tony reels back, squaring his shoulders. “Yeah, to get you to come home, you fucking moron. I wasn’t exactly going to Milan Fashion Week, now, was I?”
“Still, you were gone, and you left Peter behind.” Steve crosses his giant arms over his barrel of a chest, as if that in itself is a decision of its finality, as if he’s judged Tony and found him wanting and there’s no appeal process.
“If you keep talking, I’m going to hit you in your stupid, gorgeous face,” Tony says, pleasantly, hand clenching and unclenching around air. “Now, get the fuck out of my house, Rogers.”
He storms off in the direction of the kitchen, only faltering when he hears Steve say, half-amused, half-defiant, “So, you still think my face is gorgeous, then?”
Tony curses himself for the slip of a tongue.
Beautiful men can be monsters too, he reminds himself. Ty was beautiful, and he hurt me too.
“Like I said, keep talking and it won’t be so gorgeous anymore,” he says, darkly.
Peter almost drops his phone when he answers it.
Tony knows this, because he hears the muffled curse, which makes him grin, honestly, kindly, not the gargoyle smile that’s been painted on his face since Lagos.
“I heard that,” he sing-songs.
“Dad!” Peter exclaims. “I was just-”
“Look, I’m not gonna pretend that you probably don’t say worse when I’m not around, but language, okay.”
“Yeah, sorry.”
Tony can practically hear his son’s face flooding red.
“Is MJ there?” Tony teases.
“No!” Peter insists.
“She totally is, isn’t she?”
“She is not. Dad, everyone can totally hear you and you’re-”
“Is the door closed? I ask, because I have to be a responsible parent and I feel like letting you canoodle with your girlfriend-not-girlfriend is not being a-”
“DAD. OH, MY GOD. I’m putting the phone down now, I swear.”
“And you know, I’ve been concerned about that incomplete in calculus, kid. So, if you’d rather be grounded-”
“I CAN’T BE CONTAINED BY BOUNDARIES IN TIME OR SPACE, DAD. I LOVE HER.”
“Okay, okay, Lord Byron,” Tony laughs. “Look, I know you’re probably having fun at Ned’s place, it’s just-”
“Is something wrong?” Peter asks, immediately, his voice thin with concern.
Bless him, Tony thinks, fondly.
“No, well, maybe, it’s just…” Tony licks his lips. “Well, your dad’s here, Peter.”
There’s silence on the other end.
“Oh,” Peter says, flatly.
“I’m not gonna force you to come here, and I’m not gonna insist you stay away, either,” Tony says, carefully. “It’s totally your choice to make, I promise.”
“I…” Peter’s voice falters. “I don’t know. Is that bad?” he asks, and for a moment, Tony imagines Peter as a four-year-old boy staring at the shards of a broken glass and thinking Tony would hate him for it.
“No,” he says, firmly. “Not at all. Kid, if you don’t want to be here, if you don’t want to see him, you don’t have to. I won’t force you.”
“But what about you?” Peter asks, quietly.
Tony feels that golden swell of pride. He imagines most parents think their kid is the greatest kid in this universe, but Peter, Peter is the only good thing in this universe, as far as Tony’s concerned. Peter might save the world one day, and frankly, Tony would just be glad to be there to see it.
“I’ll be just fine,” he says, solemn as the grave.
The right to food is enshrined in Article 25 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, and Article 11 of the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, which is the only reason why Tony decides to drop a plate of pasta onto the coffee table, since Steve has refused to leave his seat.
“I called Peter,” he says, flatly.
Steve looks up at him, his bright eyes enormous. “Really?” he asks, hopefully. “Is he… is he…” he clears his throat, so he doesn’t seem quite so pathetically earnest. “Is he going to come here? Does he… does he want to see me?”
“He hasn’t decided,” Tony tells him, not unkindly. “If he comes home, you’ll know.”
His words drag another ugly, wracked sob out of Steve. He wants nothing more than to ease himself into his husband’s lap, throw his arms around Steve and huddle into his unwavering warmth until he stops shaking.
No.
“I’ve missed him,” Steve says, a pinched, thin look to his face. He looks up, eyes red. “I’ve missed you.”
“I’ve missed you too,” Tony says, honestly.
The hope that blooms on his face shouldn’t hurt him as much as it does.
“Then, why can’t we just-” Steve reaches for his hand, finds it cold and tangles their fingers together. “Tony, I love you, I miss you, I want to work this out.”
Steve slides to his feet, looming over him, and leans in, nudging his nose against Tony’s. Tony sighs against the careful press of his mouth to his, and for a long, laden moment, he thinks to resist, to push him away, but a punched-out groan escapes him instead, and he grips at his broad shoulders.
“Tony, Tony,” Steve gasps. “Tony, I love you.”
Shut up, shut up, SHUT UP.
His mouth moves under Steve’s, as his arms come to circle him, pulling him against his barrel of a chest, until they’re tumbling onto the couch. Steve’s hands slide under his cotton shirt, fingers spanning against the edge of his ribs, thumbs finding the dip under his pectoral.
It’s foolish, he knows, the dumbest thing he might have ever done, and he once jumped off a cliff on a dare and somehow didn’t manage to crack his skull on the rocks below. But all he knows is Steve’s mouth, his taste, the taste he wants to lick out of his mouth, and his hands touching him like he’s a work of art.
No one’s touched him like this since the night that Steve left for Lagos. He’d been tempted, of course, a night in a dimly-lit bar, stinking of beer and cigarettes, and a handsome man with a hard-cut face and dirty blond curls, with a hungry, intrigued gleam, looking at him over the edge of the glass. He’d thought about it, and for a long, terrible second, he imagined dragging the man into a bathroom and letting him fuck him until all the grief turned to dust.
It wouldn’t, and he didn’t.
Instead, he’d dropped crumpled bills onto the bar table and stormed out.
His vibrator had been enough that night and when he came like a seventy-car pileup to the thought of blue eyes and hair the colour of beaten gold and a huge cock, it turned him cold as stone and he turned his face into the pillow to hide the tears edging his eyes, grief drying up in rage in a moment.
Now, Steve stares at him, dark eyes under his eyes as if he’d punched twice over, face hollowed out, less a monument to human perfect and more a corpse come alive, with his hands on him, and he hates how all of that pales before this, before the impossible, dangerous way he looks at him, like Tony is the star that Steve wishes upon at night.
Steve tugs on the hem of his shirt. “Can I… can I take this off?” he pants against the hollow of Tony’s throat.
“Yeah, yeah, take it off,” Tony breathes.
Steve skins them from their clothes until Tony’s olive, sinewy skin is pressing up against Steve’s bare chest.
“I’ve missed you,” Steve moans, pulling him down for a deep, filthy kiss.
Tony doesn’t answer him. He simply reaches between them, finding Steve’s cock and fisting him until he swells up in his grip, all the while tugging at an ear with his teeth. Steve thrusts up, voice strained, his cock scraping against the dip between Tony’s thighs. He has enough presence of mind to slip his fingers between Tony’s legs, part him like a ripe peach and stretch him. He’s dry so it’s a little more uncomfortable than usual, but Tony leans into the burn and stretch after a while, the sensation, the slow-building ache grounding him.
Finally, Steve thrusts, testing the waters.
Tony chokes.
The stretch burns fierce at first, but then Steve slips inside so easily, as if he were coming home finally, and as sad as it is, that’s all Tony thinks, he’s home, he’s home now, this is where he’s meant to be. Steve’s hips stutter and snap forward, Tony’s hole grasping at the length of him until the base of Steve’s cock is flush with Tony’s thighs.
He breathes and claws at Steve’s back, knowing the marks will heal but viciously wanting something of him to be etched into Steve; if it can’t be his soul, it might as well be his body. He’s so full, so stretched around the girth of his cock and he tightens up around him, as Steve fucks him onto his cock with slow, easy rolls.
“I’m almost there,” he whispers against Steve’s throat. “Hurry up, fuck me, Steve.”
Steve groans and all but topples him onto the couch, pounding him like he’s on a mission. He grips Tony’s soft arms, clamping down, and he sees something change in Steve’s eyes, a shadow of anger, and his own rage floods up like bile. Steve fucks him hard and thorough, and Tony doesn’t hesitate to pitch his hips against Steve’s, crying out with the sensation.
“You’re not leaving me,” Steve gasps. “You’re not, you’re not, Tony. I’m not losing you. I won’t. I won’t lose you, you or Peter. You’re all, you’re all I have, Tony, please.”
Tony’s whole body shudders and goes taut. He grips whatever of the couch he can. “You’ve got no choice,” he says, high and breathy.
Steve growls and his hold tightens and he fucks him, as if fucking out all his anger, and Tony fights, breathing and clawing as he always does, the stretch and burn dragging the air out of his lungs
“I’m coming, I’m coming, oh, shit,” Tony cries out and crashes over that edge. “Fuck,” he pants, collapsing against the cushions.
It doesn’t take Steve much longer, Tony clenching around him, and comes with Tony’s name behind his teeth. When he pulls out of him, Tony’s left with a thick, wet mess of come between his thighs and a mottled canvas of bruises to show up on his body the next morning.
Tony closes his thighs and gives him a sharp look, like flinders. “This doesn’t change anything.”
Steve fists a hand in already tousled hair. “Tony,” he begins, a disgruntled expression taking over his face.
“Come on, Steve,” Tony scoffs. “Plenty of exes have spontaneous, accidental sex. Don’t read too much into it.”
Steve jumps to his feet, a vision, naked and gleaming with sweat and limp cock swinging between his legs.
“You can’t keep doing this,” he snaps.
“Doing what?” Tony asks, blankly.
“Pushing me away like this. You love me, I know you do. You wouldn’t have slept with me otherwise.”
Tony waves a hand in his direction. “You’re beautiful and you’ve got a big cock that you know how to use, with my tutelage, of course. Fucking you wasn’t some great adversity.”
Steve’s eyes narrow. “You’re not half the slut the media makes you out to be, Tony.”
“You can try to make more of a virgin if you’d like, if it offends you so greatly that your soon to be ex-husband has fucked a civilisation and more, but it won’t work and it won’t change what happened here.”
“You are impossible!” Steve hisses down at him.
Tony stands. “I’m protecting myself from you. I’ve had to do that a lot recently.” He gathers his clothes. “Take a shower in one of the guest rooms, if you want. Peter will be here soon.”
“So,” Peter says, flatly, dropping his backpack down on the ground beside the elevator door. “Dad was telling the truth. You are here.”
Steve gives their son a faint smile. “Hi, Peter.”
“Hi, Dad. Long time, no see,” Peter replies, coldly.
Steve’s face falls. “Peter, I… I’m sorry I haven’t been there, I know you-”
“It’s okay, Dad.”
Peter’s face twists and he looks like Tony at fourteen so much, facing off against his father just before one of his trips to the Arctic to fish a dead super soldier out of the ice, all that bitter, seething hatred, that Tony flinches too.
He never wanted that for his son, he never wanted anything of him and Howard to ever touch his son.
“I mean,” Peter says, casually. “There was clearly something more important.”
Steve winces. “Pete, it’s not that simple-”
“Bucky, right? Your best buddy growing up,” Peter continues. “You used to tell me stories about him and you while tucking me in.”
Steve nods, almost desperately. “Yeah, I told him about you. He, uh, he’s really excited to meet you, kid.”
He shoots Tony a furtive, concerned look, as if Tony’s spent this whole time badmouthing Steve’s assassin best friend, because he has nothing fucking better to do (it’s not like he’s suddenly become a single parent, it’s not like he’s the owner, CTO and Head of R&D of a multi-billion dollar company, it’s not like he has responsibilities, people to support, a life to lead, but no, Steve Rogers thinks his life begins and ends with Steve Rogers).
“I’m sure.” Peter inhales. His smile has such an edge to it that Tony holds his breath. “I didn’t think you’d come back.”
Steve takes on the guarded look of a wild beast crossing a cage. “Peter, it’s not that easy-”
“I mean,” Peter continues, as if he hadn’t spoken. “You got Bucky back, didn’t you? I thought that was all that mattered to you.”
Steve takes a step forward, shaking his head. “No, Peter, that’s not true,” he argues, thinly. “Peter, you, you and your dad, you’re the most important people-”
“Obviously not,” Peter interjects, coldly. “Or you’d have been here earlier, you’d have been here the whole time. You weren’t, so we aren’t.”
Steve glowers at Tony like this is his fault, and he simply lifts an eyebrow.
“Peter, it’s more complicated than that,” Steve mumbles, thickly.
Peter snorts. “I’m sure, but guess what? I don’t care. I don’t care about you, I don’t care about your Manchurian Candidate best friend, I don’t care about your excuses, all I care about is the fact that you left us, you left me, you left Dad and you proved you don’t really give a shit about us.”
Steve’s eyes burn. “That’s not true,” he says, fiercely.
Peter throws his hands in the air, twisting from side to side. “Nothing you’ve done in the last couple of months tells me differently,” he says, dryly.
“I’m your father, Peter. There is nothing more important in my life than you,” He glances at Tony. “than you and your dad.”
Tony shakes his head. Stop trying so hard.
Peter shrugs and picks up his bag, slinging it over a shoulder. “You literally trashed an airport and a helicopter trying to save your best friend. And then you walked away.” His mouth twists. “You had a kid, I was here, I needed you, I needed my dad, and you walked away. To me, I feel like that means all your big, grand gestures of devotion are for one person and one person only, and that’s Bucky Barnes.”
Steve clenches his fists, so tight that Tony fears he’ll split his knuckles open. “That’s not true,” he repeats.
Peter’s lips quirk in a half-smile. “When you’re ready to acknowledge that it is, when you love us as much as you love Bucky Barnes, then, we’ll talk.” He turns to Tony and those brandy-brown eyes, so like his, turn soft. “How about pizza for dinner?”
Tony’s lip curls. “Nice try, kid. Vegetables and more vegetables, it is.”
Peter groans. “Mean,” he declares.
Tony laughs. “Go and change your clothes, kid. I’ll get the stove running for some lasagne.”
Peter nods and rushes back the way of the elevator, without another glance back at Steve, which makes his face fall.
“Did you tell him-” Steve clears his throat, once the doors have shut. “Did you tell him…?”
“I didn’t teach him that, if you’re wondering,” Tony snaps.
Steve shakes his head. “That’s not… that’s not what I was going to say.”
“Wasn’t it?” Tony asks, belligerently.
Steve half-grins. “Yeah, okay, maybe it was.” He sinks down onto the couch. “I’ve really fucked things up, haven’t I?” he asks, mournfully, hands splaying out on his thighs.
Tony shrugs. “If it looks like a duck, swims like a duck, and quacks like a duck, it’s a duck, Steve.”
Steve rubs a hand over his hair, his thick, golden beard. “He’s not going to forgive me, is he?”
“He’s fourteen,” Tony sighs. “And you hurt him.”
“And you still let me see him.”
Tony catches his eyes like a lion. “If I thought, for a second, that he really didn’t want to see you, I’d have bodily thrown you out on your ass. If you’d have pushed your way in, I would’ve carved your lungs out of your chest.” he snarls. “Got it?”
Steve swallows thickly. “Yeah, got it.”
The Rogue Avengers return with some fanfare. Tony does everything quietly and cleanly, and no one knows, no one should know, what he’s done here, what he’s done for these people who called him friend and thought him vermin.
With friends like these, who needs enemies? Tony thinks, amused.
They stumble off the plane, one of T’Challa’s beasts, and for a moment, they stare at him, and he just waits.
“Stark,” finally, Clint says.
“Barton.”
Clint’s mouth twists, unpleasantly. “Didn’t think you’d see us again, did you?”
“Well, I was hoping,” Tony replies, dryly.
“Smug bastard,” Clint mutters under his breath.
“Man,” Sam sighs. “Don’t start that now.”
“Barton,” Steve scolds, and Tony glowers at him.
“I don’t need you defending my honour,” he says, scathingly.
“I wasn’t! I was just-”
“See, Steve,” Clint taunts. “Stark’s the same bitch he always was.”
“Yeah, you’re right,” Tony says, flatly. “which is why I’ve arranged a car for you to get your ass in and go and see your family. That’s the sort of bitch I am. Now, kindly, fuck off, Barton.”
“Are we welcome here?” Wanda asks, quietly, scuffing her foot against the floor.
Tony lifts an eyebrow. “Do you have anywhere else to go?” Wanda gives him a vicious warning look. “Do any of us?”
He’s so fucking tired of having to treat her with kid gloves.
Wanda quells.
Tony shrugs. “Stay, don’t stay. I don’t think we have any other option.” He pauses. “But if you try to go up to the penthouse floor, well, you may never leave the elevator, fair warning.”
That night, Tony wakes up amidst sweat-damp sheets, a shout cutting through the air, like ice splitting. His bed is cold, empty, as it has for weeks, for months, and he still reaches for someone who isn’t there anymore.
He touches the silvery, raised scar on his bare chest, and his hand shakes.
“I really fucked up, didn’t I?”
Tony’s eyes snap to the dark doorway. A shadow lingers there, over the threshold, and he eyes the paperweight on his bedside table, wondering if he should throw it.
Instead, he simply sighs, rubbing a hand over his face.
“What are you doing?”
“FRI told me you were having a nightmare,” Steve says, awkwardly. “I don’t think you removed that protocol.”
No, he hadn’t.
“What was it about, your nightmare?” Steve asks, softly.
You, about you, about you slamming that shield down on me again and again and not stopping, even when you’re hitting skin and flesh and brittle bone and suddenly, my head rolls off my neck.
“Siberia,” Tony clears his throat. “I was dreaming about Siberia. I dream about Siberia a lot.”
“Yeah,” Steve exhales. “Me too.”
Tony looks at him with surprise.
“What?” Steve smiles, sour. “You think Siberia wouldn’t haunt me too. Tony, you have no idea.”
Tony abruptly feels like sobbing, but he just buries his face in his knees. He feels the bed dip soon after under Steve’s weight, a hand reaching out for his.
“I’m sorry,” Steve says, heavily.
Tony looks up.
“I’m sorry I fucked up,” he says, voice thick and wet. “I’m sorry I ruined us. I’m sorry you had to send me divorce papers. But I do love you, I do love you more than anything in this world, you and Peter.”
“I know,” Tony breathes, turning his head to rest his cheek on the bone of his kneecap.
“Is there any hope?” Steve asks, dully. “For us, for our family? Or is it really done?”
Tony threads their fingers together, squeezing, remembers the day he and Steve got married, remembers the day they brought Peter home, remembers birthdays and holidays and soccer matches and recitals and weekend movie marathon nights, and Steve making love to him in their bed and thinks, let me have this, let me be weak, please, let me have him and Peter and my family, aren’t I owed that?
Steve’s eyes solemn as the grave.
He would’ve killed me if it meant saving Bucky. He would’ve lied to me every day and every night and fucked me like he loved me and kissed me like I was everything in the world to me, and he would’ve thought nothing of it. He happily destroyed me for Bucky Barnes. What do I matter to him?
He wants to weep and rage in equal measure.
He untangles their fingers.
“You can sleep here if you like,” he says, thinly, half-heartedly, the words blistering his tongue. “I mean, if you’re having nightmares-”
Steve’s eyes gleam with grief and understanding. His hand covers the nape of Tony’s neck, dragging him forward to press his mouth against her hairline.
“I’ll sleep on the floor, hm?”
Tony nods, grateful for those blue eyes that miss nothing at all.
He shuffles down, resting his head on the pillow, and turns his back. Steve settles against the edge of the bed, and Tony feels his warmth settle against his spine.
His heart swells, and he laughs, almost helplessly.
Grief has made him slow and soft.
Steve stirs. “What’s so funny?”
“Nothing, nothing at all.”
Tony closes his eyes.
I love, I have loved, and I will love, and maybe, when the sun rises, I will want him again.