Work Text:
“Tony, we need to talk.”
Steve is sitting in the center of workshop’s ragged couch, the bulk of his body taking up nearly the entire surface of faded vinyl. Tony looks at him briefly over his shoulder before he returns to fidgeting with the arc reactor in his hands.
“I have nothing to say to you. And if I did, I damn well wouldn’t have this conversation in person. Remember the last time we were in the same room together? Or, should I say, in the Hydra death base where childhood heros go to rip your heart out?”
“Then pick up the phone and call me.”
“No. Get out.” Tony unbuttons his dress shirt and discards the crumpled blue Brioni on the bench next to him. He pushes the reactor into the ready made metal hole in the center of his undershirt and grabs for the open-faced watch in front of him. Strapping the prototype on his wrist, Tony reaches for the right screwdriver, but another hand beats him there and covers the tool.
“I gave you that phone to use when you needed help. Use it.”
“You also gave me a shit-excuse for a letter with a bunch of BS saying ‘sorry, not sorry’ in so many words. Excuse me for making nothing of it, Mr. Righteous Captain Jackass.”
Rather than trying to move Steve’s hand, Tony turns and pulls open the drawer on the other side of his workbench and grabs another screwdriver (close enough). He doesn’t bother shutting the drawer as he starts to work on his watch.
“Besides, I am fine. Already back in action and in the makings of a suit not even you can beat me out of. Won’t make that mistake again.”
After several moments of silence only interrupted by mechanical squeaks and moans, Tony drops his tool and slaps the watchface shut and taps at the small screen. A swarm of nanobots spill out of the reactor and watch and cover his bare arms. It wasn’t until the smell of his skin burning from behind the half-formed faceplace does Tony realize the searing pain he is in.
“Friday--fuck, take it off!” The metal covering his body falls to the floor in tiny metal bits. Tony sees that both of his arms are now bright red with white splotches. Rushing to the adjoined bathroom, he turns on the sink and crowds his arms under the facet. Vision blurring, Tony closes his eyes and clenches his teeth, swallowing his sobs as pressure builds in his ears. He feels a hand land on his shoulder soon after, and he flings his soaking arms around through empty air.
“You are not fine. Tony, please. If not me, then Pepper, or Rhodey. Just call someon-”
“SHUT UP! You’re not fucking here, so shut up!”
Tony opens his eyes to Steve’s creased features. He ignores the large hands reaching out to him and stumbles back to his stool. He rests his stinging arms on the surface of his work bench and folds over, unable to stop the sobs that follow. He ignores the arms he feels wrap around his chest from behind. He ignores the warm body he feels pressed to his back. He ignores the fingers he feels making small circles against the arc reactor on his shirt and he ignores the soft murmurs of apologies echoing in his ears until he’s asleep.
“-oss? Boss? Incoming call from Ms. Potts. Should I tell her to call back?”
Tony pushes himself up straight, ignoring the heat radiating from his burned arms and the rest of the empty workshop.
“Put her through, Fry.”
***
“Maybe you should listen to what the kid has to say.”
“Not in the mood, Cap.”
“If he’s right about those weapons-” Tony rounds on Steve who’s following his down the enclosed staircase.
“Then what? Let this fifteen year old wanna-be superhero hack back into the suit I built for him and let him nearly kill another ferry full of civilians? ”
“Then mentor him. Show him how to use the suit, teach him to call for backup when he needs it. If he’s going to be an Avenger, then he has to learn.”
“He’s not going to be an Avenger! You made sure of that when you gathered the whole team and left!” Tony gestures with his arms to reference the empty space around him.
“They were in prison.”
“After they broke the law! And I was working to get them out! The legal way! But no, because it’s the Accords, because I agree with those awful rules that take away your ability to do whatever the hell you want, you had to come and fix everything yourself! And in doing so, you left me alone. ‘Avengers are as much mine as they are yours,’ hah.” Staring at the broad chest level with his gaze, Tony takes a few deep breaths as practiced before closing his eyes.
“You’re not here, Steve. You can’t help me with this.”
“Then call me. Tell me. I’ll listen. I can help. You know this.”
When Tony meets the other’s eyes, they scream of promises and forgiveness he knows he’ll never find. Spinning on his heel, Tony goes down rest of the stairs, tapping his access code into the terminal with a wavering hand.
“You know I’m never going to call you, Cap. Not even when I’ll really need you.”
He disappears into the workshop, knowing he’ll be alone for the rest of the night.
***
Tony will not admit how much Peter’s refusal to join the Avengers affects him. Instead, he is quick with his smile as he takes a knee and proposes to his CEO in front of dozens of reporters. Dear sweet Pep just returns his smile with a roll of her eyes and says yes. Tony sees Steve in the herd of press workers and decidedly ignores him as he answers a few easy questions from the crowd before leaving the way he came with his fiance.
“You know you didn’t have to do that.” Pepper pulls Tony up the stairs to his room and leaves him next to the bed as she reaches for the glass decanter on the dresser.
“Of course I had to, Mrs. Stark. Now we never have to change the name of the company. Win-win. Plus, you’re fantastic.”
“Not going to argue there. But Tony...is this actually what you want?” She hands him a tumbler with three fingers of scotch, bringing her own glass to her lips.
“No, it’s not what he wants. Why did you propose?” Tony certainly does not look at the door where Steve is standing, arms folded. He takes a gulp from his glass, pushing a grin against his lips.
“Pep, love of my life, why wouldn’t I want this? You’re gorgeous, famous, brilliant--let’s not forget CEO of my favorite company. Did I mention gorgeous? Besides, Rhodey-bear already turned me down, so you’re my next best bet.” He expects the elbow he gets to his gut, and he fakes the hurt rather than letting the real stuff show.
“Jerk. Should’ve known I was only second choice. But, seriously, you’re giving me your camera smile. What do you really want, Tony?” She puts down her glass and wraps her arms around his center, pushing her cheek against his repaired hole in his chest.
“Tell her the truth, Tony. You’ll regret this when you end up breaking her heart.”
He allows himself to stare down Steve as he wraps his free arm around the woman in front of him as he downs the rest of his drink.
“I want you to never leave.”
***
The Avengers’ compound is dark. Tony sits in the common area, nursing his now-warm can of beer. American pale ale, seriously, what was he thinking.
Vision is still gone. Pepper is across the continent, taking care of his business. He is waiting for Happy to return with the kid so that he can talk the boy through some of new features of his suit. Just an excuse to not be alone, come on now.
“You shouldn’t be sitting in the dark. Turn on a light, open the blinds.” Steve is sitting in the chair next to him, sharing an unguarded smile as he reaches for his own beer.
“Or we could put on a movie? Never got around to seeing...how did you describe it again? ‘Idiots bring back dinosaurs and are surprised when they turn into breakfast.’ Cretaceous Park? Bet Peter will say it’s another one of those really old movies.” Chuckling, Steve stands and points to the remote on the coffee table.
“Go ahead and line up the film. I’ll go check see if we have any popcorn. Do we have any pop? Kid’s not old enough for beer, though back in my day no one really cared much.”
Tony watches as Steve rummages through the cabinets of the kitchen and peers into the fridge before returning to his seat with a frown.
“No popcorn, let alone anything edible besides Clint’s expired Wheaties. No soda either. What have you been eating?”
Tony exchanges the flat beer for the tablet next to him. He starts sifting through his backed-up work emails, blatantly ignoring the judgy sigh and stare across from him.
“Now you won’t even look at me. Look, if you would just call me, we could sort this whole mess out and then you wouldn’t be alone anymore. I warned you about Ms. Potts reacting poorly to you lying to her. You never should’ve proposed.”
He looks up at that and gives Steve his best glare.
“I am never going to call you. Leave me alone. And leave Pepper out of this.”
“No, Tony. You’ve been sulking for too long. You need to snap out of this haze you’re in and come back to reality and pick up the phone and call me, because you know how you really feel, and I know how much you l-.”
“Do not lecture me about dealing with reality, Rogers. Not when your head is so far up your own ass that you think some damn phone and letter are going to fix things between us.”
Tony does not hear the front door of the compound open. He watches as the supersoldier slams his beer on the table and stands again to tower over Tony.
“I can’t fix anything if you won’t talk to me. Olive branch, Shellhead. Just take it.”
“Why don’t you call me, then? If it is so damn important for us to chat, why the hell don’t you make that first call?” Tony stands himself, crowding Steve’s space as he juts his chin towards the discarded block phone still on the armchair. He cannot hear his name being called from the kitchen.
“Because I don’t know if there’s anything wrong with you! It’s been over a year and you have yet to share what you’re dealing with!”
“Because I told you everything that would happen, and you still left! Why would I think you would trust me now when you couldn’t even trust me then?”
Tony doesn’t fight the arms that wrap around his shoulders. He pushes his forehead down into a warm shoulder and fights back the upset returning to the forefront of his mind.
“Why didn’t you tell me...?”
A light tap on his back makes Tony turn out of Steve’s hold until he’s semi-focused on the teen behind him. Tony watches as Peter’s mouth moves, but his words don’t reach his ears.
“Kid?” He nods at Tony, mouthing some more before helping Tony down to sit back on the couch.
“-ark? Mr. Stark, can you hear me? I am going to go get Happy, I’ll be right back-” Before Peter can retreat, Tony grabs his wrist and feels his head shaking.
“I’m okay, kid. All good.” He hesitates before flashing his routine smile, lips failing to hold the happy expression for long.
“Sorry you had to see that.”
“Are you sure you’re okay, Mr. Stark?” Peter’s hand pauses before resting on Tony’s forearm. His palm is cool and sweaty, but he leaves his hand there as Tony turns and looks up to Steve’s creased forehead and heavy frown.
“Yes. No. Does it matter?” Standing, Tony makes his way out of the common room, Peter at his heels. He hears Steve make more demands, but he ignores him and pats the lanky teen on the back with a shit-eating grin.
“I’ll be fine once we’re down in the shop. You’re going to start drooling once I show you all of the new settings for your web shooter. Karen mentioned you used to bitch about there being too many choices, so I updated her to be bustier and better and ready to please so she can help you default to the best--what, webbing?--based on your situation.”
“T-that’s great, Mr. Stark Did you say bustier? How does that even work?”
Tony spends the rest of the day wowing the kid and ignoring the overbearing supersoldier. He doesn’t notice Steve leave as he’s helping Peter cycle through the different A.I. settings, now with a real smile.
***
The call ends and Friday’s voice crackles into silence. Tony retracts his armor, stare roaming the alien spaceship until he sees a familiar figure. He huffs and turns, walking down the narrow metal stairs, not looking back to see if Steve is following him.
“Seriously not the time to mess with me. Not if we’re going to make it out of this one alive.”
“You were about to call.”
“Yeah, but I didn’t. Now I am stuck in this shit hole in space so I really couldn’t call you even if I still had that ridiculous paperweight. So, since you can’t stick with your usual mantra, how about you crawl back to whatever deluded part of my mind still has me hallucinating that you ever gave a shit.”
“I do care about you, Tony.”
Tony snarls but continues forward, first running into Strange’s floating cloak and then calling out his nanobots and nearly vaporizing the kid taking shelter in one of the higher levels of the main deck, still wearing his new gold-highlighted suit.
“I don’t want to hear it!” Steve tries to put a hand on Tony’s shoulder, but he rolls it off and shoots him a glare as the kid rambles his excuse, sounding more desperate with each word.
“This is a one-way ticket! Do you hear me? Don’t pretend you thought this through.”
“Did you? When you boarded this ship, did you really think you wouldn’t make it out of this one? Once you save the doctor, then you can turn around and come back home. We can regroup, and we will take Thanos on together.”
Tony allows himself to stare hard at Steve now hovering behind the kid. That face, now covered in facial hair and much older than those years ago that they last met, looks hopeful and eager. Tony remembers that face as he makes a show and sucks the alien out of the ship, replacing the damaged ship with nanobots. He remembers that face as he shares his plan and takes in Strange’s heavy words. He remembers that face when he first meets the Guardians (sans Gamora), when he’s struggling to get the gauntlet off of Thanos’s fist, and when he has a dagger of his own making through his belly.
He forgets that face when his arms are full of dust.