Prologue

The few remaining weeks before returning to campus could not pass quickly enough for Loki Odinson. At first, the summer vacation was a much needed break from the stress of taking 18 credit hours and keeping an almost full-time job waiting tables. After the first month, however, the break from classes lost its appeal and Loki wished for nothing more than to return to the college dorms where he made some close friends and lasting memories.

It wasn't that the summer was all bad for the younger Odinson brother; he spoke with his friends on a frequent basis, kept up with his restaurant job, and spent his free time reading and teaching himself piano. He helped his mother, Frigga, with her gardening and threw a football around the yard with his brother, Thor. No, it wasn't bad, but the constant disapproval from his father, Odin (yes, Odin Odinson, his parents must've wanted him to be picked on as a child), was enough to weigh heavily on his mind most of the time.

The object of Odin's displeasure with his youngest son was Loki's relationship. His past relationship, that is. Within the first month of his senior year in high school, Loki came out to his friends and family when he started dating Clint Barton, center snare of the drum line in the school's marching band. Later, he would admit that it was Clint's muscular drummer arms that first caught his attention, but as the two started talking during their study hall he noticed Clint's witty sarcasm. The more he learned of Clint's unique interests (bird watching, archery, and playing drum set for a ska-punk band for example), the more he felt himself falling for the other man.

At first, Odin was happy to hear that Loki, in a relationship again, seemed to have finally broken out of the funk his first girlfriend left him in. But, when Loki invited Clint over for dinner and to meet his family for the first time, the happy feeling Odin felt quickly vanished. Nobody had been expecting it. Loki didn't talk to his family much about his newfound relationship, but they had all been thinking it was at least with a girl. Frigga smiled, Thor looked confused, and Odin… the color fled from his face and he didn't speak a word through the entire evening.

This didn't change much through the beginning of Loki and Clint's relationship; Frigga always welcomed Clint with open arms and a smile, and Thor never knew what to say and always averted his gaze when the couple was doing even as little as holding hands. Odin pretended nothing was happening. He ignored the pair whenever Clint was around, and when he saw Loki without his boyfriend, he didn't know what to say, so he usually didn't say anything at all.

Around the beginning of winter, Odin decided he couldn't sit around and let his son be corrupted anymore and kept dropping hints about how Loki should start speaking to a psychiatrist or a pastor about his "condition." Loki, of course, wasn't having anything to do with that. There was nothing wrong with him and he could date whoever he damn well pleased. That was as far as Odin took it until Loki's first year in college. Clint was attending the same university as Loki (and Thor too for that matter), about half an hour away from their hometown.

Clint ended up meeting a girl who played trumpet in the marching band with him, Natasha Romanoff. They hit it off immediately and became close friends before Clint realized it wasn't only friendship he wanted with her. That conversation had been painful to both of the young men, but they parted as friends and have been ever since.

Once Odin heard about Loki's failed relationship, he took it as his duty to redouble his efforts in making his son straight. If Clint saw the error of his ways, there was no reason his son couldn't do the same. With this mindset, he recruited Thor's help in trying to set Loki up with various girls ranging from friends of Thor's girlfriend, Jane, to Thor's cheerleading friends. When this failed to work, Odin decided to pay Loki a visit to convince him to see a shrink at least. Loki's roommate was in class when Odin arrived at his dorm, and nobody paid any mind to the arguing that took place behind the closed door. Nobody questioned the purple, finger shaped bruises on Loki's wrists during the following week, or the way Loki seemed more on-edge than anyone (besides Thor) on campus had seen him before. Nobody except for Tony Stark, that is, and even then Loki avoided the topic whenever Tony tried to bring it up.

Tony and Loki met on a Monday, during their very first class of fall semester freshman year. Loki took Intro to Modern Astronomy because he'd always been interested in stars and what else was beyond Earth's atmosphere. Tony took it because he hoped he could take a girl out to look at stars and she'd think it romantic and one thing would lead to another and he'd end up getting lucky. Class had already started when Tony sauntered in and his eyes immediately fell on a figure near the door with beautiful shoulder length black hair. A pale arm was draped on the chair's arm rest and Tony noticed that it was slender, the muscle had nice definition to it, and though he couldn't see a face, he figured that since he was already 2 minutes late he could deal with this girl for a 50 minute class period even if she was a butterface.

"Hey sweet thing, what's a beautiful girl like you doing sitting on your own. Tell you what- let me keep you company now and you can keep me company later over drinks, what do you say," he drawled with a smirk on his face. This smirk was wiped off his face when Loki whipped his head around and glared, hissing "ex-cuse me…?" Tony gaped like a fish.

"But… the hair… I thought… ohmygodi'msosorry," he mumbled awkwardly, cheeks slightly red, but rooted to the spot.

"Young man... Class began at 9:30. It is now… 9:37. Sit down, shut up, and we'll get on with the syllabus, shall we?" It took Tony only a second to realize the teacher was talking to him. He flashed a grin and offered an enthusiastic salute before looking back at Loki, who nodded and gestured to the seat next to him. Tony sat and looked at the young man next to him through his peripherals. When he opened his mouth again, it took Loki completely by surprise.

"For the record… you're still pretty hot… for a guy anyway…" There was silence for a moment or two where Loki looked into his lap for a moment, his eyes wide and mouth slightly open. Then Loki turned to him, looked him right in the eye, flashed a crooked grin and replied:

"Well thanks; I wish I could say the same about you. There aren't a whole lot of men like me." A quick wink after this statement threw Tony off but he recovered quickly and grinned back and they both knew this was the start to an amazing friendship.