The Biography of the Man Left by Time
As the war continues and leaves the skeleton of towns crumbling and hollowed people in its wake, they know and do not say that they go to war to die. So, they fight for a future that will not be theirs, but one where children know not of war, poverty, hate, or genocide. It is easier to die for a dream. There is no hope when they open the doors to concentration camps, and death is the only reprieve for people. There is no god among the battlefield only humanity fallen to a darkness that no redemption will cleanse. The future is the only thing that they can hold. It will be worth it, and he will die for it.
As ice starts to line his lungs and cold curls around each of his cells, he does not fight. There will be a better world, so it's okay to let himself submerge in the darkness. It's okay.
He wakes in the 21st century. Alone. The people are happy, children are healthy, technology is dream-like—unusual, constantly changing, and marvelous. There is prosperity, and the people dream. Tony Stark asks him once what he thought the future would be like. He watches the sun rise on the skyline bathe the skyscrapers in gold. Tony is on one of his manic inventing periods that leave him awake for days, surviving on coffee and body reserves. The inventor is grease‒stained fingers and kinetic energy that switches from the tap of his leg to the drumming of his fingers; sitting still is not something Tony Stark knows how to do. Tony sprawls over the white marble counter like a house cat, as he waits for his coffee maker. Steve takes a sip of his tea, and says I thought it would be easier to breath. He expects Tony to make a joke or snort, but Tony looks at him and asks if it is.
It is. It is now that there aren't segregated places; it is now that he can see all types of people on the streets; it is now that when he looks around there aren't people starving on the streets. He can hear laughter and see smiles. It is.
Sometimes, it isn't. The 21st century is not built from the dreams of children sowed in poverty and despair that felt the bleakness of the world erode and tear the hearts around them. It is not built from the talk of the insomniac soldiers who were afraid of what their unconscious held over the threshold of sleep. There is poverty clinging to the frames of the American dream; racism is hidden but there. There are people that fight for the basic rights of human life and are denied. There are people who take the name of the Christian faith and fill their preaches with hate. War has shifted further into the Middle East and Asia where children suffocate from chemical attacks and parents cry over the bodies of their children, and what was once a country flourishing with life and people is now the skeletal remains of what once was. Sometimes, he wonders if what they fought for was worth it.
Tony stares and waits. Instead, he asks Tony what he thinks the future will be.
The coffee machine chimes in completion, and Tony gets up, sniffing the rising steam. The sun touches his cheek gold. "Humanity is going to eat itself till the point of annihilation, and we're going to have to save them. There is going to be aliens that Thor or Loki are going to piss off and start an inter-galactic war with. We're going to be humanity's only, and that is going to make a difference." There are times when Tony Stark makes his fingers itch for charcoal. He doesn't think too close about that. Tony gives him a half smile before heading back to his laboratory.
He surprises the people at S.H.I.E.L.D. with how he adapts to the world once he finds out the truth. They expect him to break down and never recover. He tells no one that he cries in the shower where the water hides his tears, and his bites his lip until he tastes blood. Everyone he has known is dead, and he is alone. They do not know that the sorrow is always clogging up in his lungs. He is a solider, and survival is engrained. He learns of a history that has passed since his 70-year slumber, of a world that thrived after a war, of the promises made after and not kept. S.H.I.E.L.D. keeps him locked up behind cement where he cannot look at the outside world. He does as he is told, spends his days in the gym, damaging equipment, and catching up with a world that didn't wait for him.
He meets his first teammate Natasha Romanoff in the gym, as he destroys another sandbag, splattering sand granules across the floor, one month into his quarantine where the S.H.I.E.L.D. scientists and psychiatrist work out whether he's going to crack and try to decode the super solider serum. He's not stupid; he knows S.H.I.E.L.D. has taken DNA and blood samples during his stasis.
"Would you like to spar?"
Natasha stands politician straight behind him. Her eyes meeting his. The people of S.H.I.E.L.D. do not look him in the eye; they stare at his feet or to the side, but then how do you stare at a ghost of the past?
His mother taught him never to hit a lady. The woman in front of him is different. She is a solider. He agrees, and when she punches him in the kidney with the intent to kill and dodges his fist, he grins. In the end he wins, and even with his super solider healing his body hurts.
After she introduces herself put together, a slight sweat on her skin.
"I am Natasha Romanoff."
He offers his hand.
"Steven Rogers."
Natasha is silent. Ordinary S.H.I.E.L.D. employees tense before her and skitter out of the room. She makes people uneasy. Black Widow: the resident assassin for S.H.I.E.L.D. For him she is calming, she does not idealize him or treat him with care. She comes to visit him in the gym and aims for his vital organs when they spar. She disappears for weeks and comes back smelling of blood and gun powder. Sometimes, she comes to visit him in his room not to talk just to read a book while sitting on the window ledge. He makes her tea and goes back to reading up on world history. She is his first companion.
...
Natasha comes in a pair with Clint Barton who he meets in the commissary. Clint sits down in front of him, as he spoons up soup.
"People are betting on when you're going to crack and punch out of here."
He sips his soup. The psychiatrists are frustrated because he does not talk of war trauma or the survival guilt. He refuses, spends his sessions silent and immobile. His mind is his, and he will not allow S.H.I.E.L.D. to violate that.
"And?"
"I think they should be betting on the number of sandbags you're going to destroy before you leave. I personally think it's going to 245," Clint says. He leans back in his chair, balancing on the back two legs.
Steve scrapes the last of the soup.
"Well you lose. I'm currently at 298."
Clint pushes his weight back onto four legs and curses. Clint Barton turns out to be the menace of S.H.I.E.L.D. who in his boredom likes to jump off from support beams and scare new hires. Hawkeye is the second assassin employed by S.H.I.E.L.D. Clint is graceful. He absently juggles clementine's as he talks, and likes to throw spit balls to see if Steve has the reflexes that are told in myth. Clint pokes at him for no other reason than just because he can. Natasha and Clint become fleeting stability in S.H.I.E.L.D.
Bruce Banner is introduced to him by Fury. Bruce wrings out the bottom hem of his shirt, and does not make eye contact. He hates being in S.H.I.E.L.D. more than Steve does. The attention on him shifts to Banner who is deemed more unstable. Bruce does not venture out his room unless necessary. Terror spreads when Bruce walks by, which is why he stays in his room.
Before he meets Tony Stark, Natasha tells him not to mention Howard Stark. "The Howard Stark you knew, and the one Tony Stark knew are different." For a man who does not talk about his father, Tony mirrors him quite a bit. Just as Howard Stark was the man of the future in the 40s, in the 21st century Tony Stark is futuristic innovation and a genius of the 21st century. He is twice as cocky as Howard though. Stark is hostile, perhaps he disappoints Stark because whatever stories he grew up with are war myths, and Steve Rogers isn't sure he can be the Captain America from then. The fact they do not get along is not surprising. What is though, is that eventually they do. Respect is earned through blood and battle between them. Stark becomes Tony, and Captain America becomes Steve. He stops looking for Howard in Tony, and Tony stops looking for Captain America in Steve.
The final avenger he meets is a pagan god. Thor has a vibrance to him. The world to Thor is filled with something that awakes a child's curiosity. He is fascinated by humanity in a way that Steve isn't. They are walking down Kissena Boulevard in Queens where the air smells salty sweet when Thor says, "Places become home faster than you think, Captain." Thor smiles; his eyes crinkling at the girl waving to him from the other side of the street underneath the red awning of a convenience store. Steve watches the way the wind threads through her short bob, and the windchime strings tangle with each other, struggling to make a sound. What of places lost to time?
Adapting or accumulating to the world is easier once he leaves S.H.I.E.L.D.'s HQ and starts to live in the Avengers Tower.
It is easier to live when he isn't living under the microscope of S.H.I.E.L.D. doctors and scientists. No one asks how he is feeling or whether he slept. No one tries to psychoanalyze him. Tony gives each of them a floor that they can hide in and opens up a communal living room. The tower is engrained with technology from Jarvis to Tony's collection of robots. The world isn't hidden away behind cement; it is seen through the glass windows. No one filters the world for him. He doesn't add much to the apartment at the tower lets it be the way it is. Sterile. Tony comes by sometimes, peers over Steve's shoulder, and his mouth goes tight. He isn't trying to be difficult or ungrateful. He just doesn't know how to make a home anymore. So, he keeps the room the way it came even when Tony starts to come by less and less to check up on him.
He goes to Brooklyn once maybe looking for ghosts.
There are no fragments that his memory can cling to. He stands on the sidewalks of childhood and feels nothing. He spends two days there walks through all of Brooklyn and hears no echoes. There is one moment where it seems like a veil rips, and he can see into the Brooklyn of his childhood. Blake Ave from East 98th St. toward Union St. Brooklyn before him with its muddy unpaved roads and new apartment complexes. The smell of hay and manure entangling with the heavy vapour of gasoline. The road slick in the rain. The puddles that formed cocoa‒coloured along the road. A flock of children, girls in knee‒length dresses and boys in newsboy caps running by him. His mother had gotten one for him too, a little worn. She'd stitched his name in golden thread along the back rim. The thread taunt as she pulled it through. He'd leaned his face against the table watched her in the candle light. How the holes in her stockings always frayed even though she stitched then back again and again. He sees himself on the corner where East 98th starts: sickly, skinny, skin clinging to bone, and eyes too large on his emaciated face. He remembers the way his lungs would feel fragile in the rain. The way it hurt his chest. How the wet cough that never went away got worse. It didn't stop him from being there with the other children, stubborn and angry with a world that didn't make him right. His mother would come looking. He would see her red umbrella, floating in among the grey and brown of coats and dresses, as she searched. He blinks, and turns his head to where his school used to be. It is an empty lot with a single rusted basketball net. The weeds winding through the cracks in a shock of green amongst the ugly grey. He sees a ten-year-old Bucky, leaning on the graffitied wall of purples and blacks backpack held loose in his grip. The wall behind him is a hybrid of a white rabbit with the smile of the Cheshire cat all of the ends of the teeth sharpened to a nightmarish point.
"Where have you been?" Bucky asks. How are you supposed to answer to the ghosts of remorse?
He goes back to New York that night. He doesn't know how Tony finds out, but when he comes back there is a tablet waiting on his bed. The Brooklyn of his childhood digitizes before him in a hologram that grows and changes. The old buildings join together brick by brick and fall away living pixel dust, as they rejoin to form new ones. He has the chance to see the world that left him.
He finds Tony a few weeks later, sleep soft and slow in the morning.
"Thank you." Tony squints at him, as he yawns into the back of his hand. "Thank you for the hologram."
Tony looks away instead busies himself with making coffee. "Glad you liked something here, but it's nothing. I made the program when I was kid. It isn't worth anything—"
"It is though, and you thought I needed it."
Tony shrugs, shoulder touching his ear. He looks over his shoulder and says, "you need a lot of things, Cap."
"Maybe so, but thank you for knowing what I needed today."
He doesn't turn to acknowledge it, so Steve leaves the words in the air and hopes that it's enough.
He goes to church sometimes. Not often enough and he hopes no one minds. He listens to the sermons and the testaments that he has memorized, watching the way the light filters through the stain glass windows. There are three behind the priest: one in the colours of a fire warmed autumn, one in the colours of the evergreen of spring, and the last the blue cold of winter. He prays every night out of habit, sits on the edge of his bed, hands folded on his knees, with his head bowed. He does not ask for forgiveness just that those he left had good lives, that his mother was happy, that Peggy lived a life to fullness, that Bucky did not suffer, and the men he led had no regrets. When he was younger his prayers were different. In his tiny room where the wind touched his skin and bone that the small radiator could not defeat, he wished for health. When he was a young man, and he felt desire deep inside that pulled and craved he wished for normality.
During the few excursions allowed by S.H.I.E.L.D. by "himself" to acclimate to the world, he wanders the streets just walks with the crowds. There are days he stares down at the sidewalk, as he walks and gets lost in the repetitive rhythm. One day as he waits for the crosswalk to change on Madison Avenue, where the air smells of suffocating car exhaust, and there's an orange stray cat that likes to sit on the branches of those scattered oak trees along Manhattan that look artificial in the city; he watches the people across the street, letting his eyes float from person to person until he notices two girls by the Starbucks. They aren't doing anything. They are standing in front of the window display stenciled with snowflakes and misted with snow. Perhaps, it's the way that the snow falls onto the taller one's hair like snow on a still beating hearth, something familiar. Or, it's in the way they link their forefingers together. Their rings scraping each other's, coy and secretive among the changing crowed. The 1920s were his home; there is no other time he ever wanted to grow up in, but they were not good times.
There had been a man built of sticks, tall and thin. William Byrne. He'd throw toffees at all the kids in the apartment, drop them down the staircase, and let it bounce off their heads. He'd smile, waving to them when they looked up. The sun would filter through his like light being filtered through amber. William starts to bring clothes for Steve. His mother frowns the first time not taking the old gray wool cloth.
"Mrs. Rogers, this isn't charity. These are all old things that I was going to throw," William looks down at the scarf, smoothing down the strands, "but throwing anything away in this time feels like waste. I thought they'd be better used here."
His mother smooths a hand over Steve's hair. The winter's are the worst for him. His mother worries, tries to find anyway to keep him warm. She piles blankets on him at night, blocks the drafts from the windows as best as she can with newspaper, layers him as much as she can if he has to go outside. She hugs him, rubbing warmth into his cold flesh. His mother is proud, but for him though she would bow to anyone. She takes the scarf and whatever William brings for them.
As a child he doesn't understand why one day some of the tenants stop William outside, push him until he falls, and scrape his face into the road until he bleeds. He doesn't understand why, but it's wrong. So, he picks up a rock and starts war he can't win. Even when they hold him back, he bites and scratches, trying to protect William from the kicks.
It does stop. They leave a bloody mess of broken human flesh. It is his mother who treats William. He isn't allowed in the room. He hides beside the door, wedged into the radiator that burns his flesh as he presses his eye against the space between frame and door. The water basin on the floor is pink with blood, and the gaze has unrolled onto the floor. His mother sits on the bed as William lies. He digs his palms into his eyes.
"I'm a good catholic man. I help people. I stay away from vices. I am good to my fellow man. I go to church even though it hates me because I love God," his is thick and it takes him awhile to get the words out. "So why did he make me wrong?"
His mother circles one of his wrist's. "He didn't make you wrong. The only thing that is wrong is the world that won't accept you."
William takes a breath. "No, Mrs. Rogers. It's not. This world isn't made for me, and it never will be."
...
The girls smile. Steve looks away, when he hears the changing screech of the crosswalk. Maybe this is the world William would have found happiness in.
"What were you like in the 1930s?"
Steve stops, and looks over his shoulder, hand hovering over the sink with his cup.
Tony leans on the marbled kitchen counter, glasses slipping down his nose. He's got oil stains on the side of his neck. His Rolling Stones shirt is torn at the collar.
"Sick," he answers, putting his mug into the sink. He turns on the tap and starts to rinse the dishes, smoothing his hand over the surface of plates and swirling water into cups.
"No, that's not what I meant." Steve smiles at the slight annoyance. "I mean what were you like as a child?"
He turns off the water, squeezing the Sunlight soap bottle, watching the soap soak into the sponge. "Difficult. I used to get into a lot of fights dragged Bucky down into them. I was the kid no one wanted to play with. It was understandable. Everyone was afraid something would happen. I just didn't like it. I tried hard to be normal everyday. I had Bucky. He made things easier, less lonely." He starts to scrub the dishes, circling the inside of a mug. "But lonely children find things suited for lonely children and mine was drawing."
"Were you happy?"
Steve puts the mug in the other sink. "Yes, I was. Most children are, aren't they?"
"Not all children," Tony says. It's a misstep in conversation. For a man who is honest to the point of being abrasive, there are certain things that Tony doesn't talk about. Howard Stark and anything related to what happened in Afghanistan. "People are built from trauma," Tony whispers. Steve turns. Tony stares at him blanked faced. "Are you happy here?"
He could lie like he had to the S.H.I.E.L.D. psychologists. It is very easy to lie to people because very few have ever wanted the truth from him. That is the thing about being the hope for people. It makes it harder for them to see the flaws—to see the human. He could lie. "No, I'm not." It is his truth; the one he has never allowed himself to admit.
Tony nods a little sad and is quiet. In silences, there are moments he can observe Tony. The lines of face, the curves of his lips, the veins in his arms, and the way his skin and muscle molds to bone. "What would make you happy?" Tony Stark would give everything to the people he loves, and Steve has never understood why that included him. That when Tony asks now, he would find a way no matter how impossible to make it true.
Steve smiles, tired and broken. "I don't know anymore."
Steve doesn't know how to want. As a child, things were limited. Scarcity was second nature to them. People did not thrive in his time. They were all like dried plants looking for a source of water. Brittle and tired. Haggard and ravaged by hunger for life—for more.
Once he had stood in front of a toy store on East 98 Ave. Nestled in the display surrounded by garlands and red bows were sleek trains, vibrant primary painted bird whistles, spinning magic lanterns, and oil slick marbles. There was a bear on a tiny arm chair with its chestnut fur‒fluffed and white bow tied taunt. He had stood there and not wanted any of it. Want is a dangerous thing during the Depression.
...
He's waiting under an awning for the rain to let up on 286 3rd Ave, watching the parade of taxi cabs, and the monochrome bobbing of black umbrellas sprinkled with a splash of colour sometimes. His wet socks, squelching. It's uncomfortable in the way it brings the memories of the flooded trenches and clothes sticking to skin. Across the street is a store called the Vintage Thrift Store, in the display window is an old drafting table. The wood two-toned brown like wet and dry sand with a drawer in the centre with a brass handle etched with vines. Drafting tables were long gone in the 30s, however for some reason Howard Stark had one with designs and dreams sprawled across it that seemed unfathomable and strange. Howard would toss his suit jacket on the floor, roll up his sleeves, sit down in a chair in front of the table, and sketch away into the smoke from his cigar with his whiskey glass by his elbow. Steve buys the drawing table for 200 dollars and carries it all the way back to the Avengers tower. He puts it under the bay window where the light is the best. Everything looks artificial, the bare bone white walls and dark bark floors around the table. A clash of styles, he runs his fingers over the shellacked surface, and it fits in just fine.
When he can't sleep, he goes up to the roof of the Tower. Sits on the edge of the ledge with the sharp points of city before him in the night. The first time Tony Stark had come up with welders googles on his forehead, soot stained, and stood behind him. "Jarvis told me you were up here." His gaze is penetrating in the laze of the evening dusk. "Are you planning to jump?"
"No." Heights like these won't kill him. Then again, he doesn't know what will. The super serum changed the limits of his body, and now no one is left to tell whether those limits have ends.
Steve takes a breath and runs his thumb against his index finger.
"Then what are you doing?"
The setting sun is clementine orange in the sky; the clouds thick and white on the skyline.
"I don't know couldn't sleep."
Tony sighs and comes to sit next to him. They look over the city together watch the soft glow from the apartment buildings flicker off. The thing about the 21st century is that it does not sleep. There is always something open, something lit—something alive even in the deepest night.
It becomes routine and sometimes Tony comes up to sit with him.
In the fall when the leaves start to change into autumn hued oranges, reds, and yellows before decaying, he tells Tony that there are days where he isn't sure if the world is real.
In the winter, as fat fluffed snow starts to cloak the city and he can't leave the tower without layering up. Steve makes hot chocolate for the days he and Tony sit up on the roof. They take turns, sipping from the thermos. Tony says, "I was the son of Howard Stark, and that meant something to a lot of people. It meant a lot to my dad, and I never lived up to it. I wasn't what Howard Stark wanted, and that never changed. I tried, and I think I still do to be what he wanted. Don't get me wrong; I am amazing, and no one will tell you any different. It just takes a lot to believe."
When the robins herald the spring and life comes back once more in blooming bursts where the baby buds start to emerge, he admits that Bucky is dead because of him and that never stops hurting. That he will never know how his mother or Peggy lived after him. He hopes they were happy everyday.
When the air becomes weighted with humidity, and cicadas scream in the night. Tony turns up the AC in the tower so high that Steve has to wear sweaters, and can't sleep without a blanket. Tony doesn't come out of his lab and goes up to the roof less and less. The one time he does come up Tony is hollowed out, bruises purple-blue under the well of his eyes, and gaunt. He sits down next to Steve, and the sweat is starting to pool down Tony's shirt. "I don't do well in the summer, Cap." Tony lies down and crosses his hands over his stomach, closing his eyes. "The heat is similar to Afghanistan. There are days I wake up to the grit of sand in my mouth." Tony opens his eyes. The stars here are faint. In his childhood, the stars were like frozen crystals. It was magic those shards blinking down from the dark. He wants to show that to Tony.
His mother holds his face, gentle and soft, as she leans down, so he can see her eyes. "Cushlamachree, you live with truth, and that is a beautiful and dangerous way to live," her eyes are the blue of a clear winter sky. "I want you to always live that way," she whispers. He swallows saliva. His eyes blur the image of his mother. His vision wavers. He can't do that. He can't.
...
When they are boys as their bones ache and skin stretches, and they are on the verge of becoming, Steve hasn't learned how to conceal his soul yet. He will one day in the way that adults learn to push and hide truths until they forget. However, that is later but then in his youth he hasn't. It happens at the speed of shutter shots; a series of images that happen slow in his head because he keeps fading in and out. He's on the ground creating plumes of pale-yellow dust. There are lines of ants, solider marching into an ant hill, endless in sync. There are shoes on the edge of his sight that step in a chaotic waltz. He rolls on his side. Bucky spits blood, wipes his mouth with his raw hand, as he watches Wilkserson run home. Bucky pulls him, holds his neck, and forces their eyes to meet. "I don't care; we're brothers." Even as the blood drips, staining the dirt wet Bucky doesn't let go. "This will never change anything." He's wrong because Steve has seen what has happened to people who do not hide what they are. Steve has heard what the church says. He might have Bucky and his mother, but it is not enough for the world. He clutches Bucky's arm. The tears are hot, as they slide down his face, weighted in sinned guilt. "No one can know what happened here, Bucky no one can know."
The secrets of children are small harmless things; it is when they start to grow and consume become laden and drag down your soul that they become that of adults. They make theirs that day, seal it in tears and brotherly blood.
...
In Europe, as they start to liberate Paris, Bucky and him are staying in Riquewihr. The town is beautiful with its cobblestone streets and history, lining and weathering each stone. There are houses built out of storybooks all packed together with large windows facing out into the streets, and old gas lamps standing sentry in front of houses. The children are somber, unsmiling. The people broken. It is a town of tattered people on the edges of the holocaust. There are many towns that they walk through that know the same and much worse. Riquewihr is spared compared to the other cities and towns they will go through, as they get closer to Germany. They push back the Germans and burn the lingering traces of occupation in the centre square. In between planning to more inward to Paris, he and Bucky rest in the hotel. Bucky is on bed next to the wall, bandaged arm across his chest, the other thrown over his eyes, drunk on the wine given to him by the locals. Steve draws the castle of Riquewihr in charcoal. The radio plays over the sound of his sketching.
You always take the sweetest rose
And crush it till the petals fall
"It's different here."
He strokes the stick across the white page in sharp crescents. "Hm?" His fingers are stained black at the tips.
"Steve." Bucky stares at him, eyes weighted in stone. "There are clubs here that we can go to, Steve. It's different. No one knows you here," Bucky whispers.
The radio continues,
So, if I broke your heart last night
It's because I love you most of all
He rolls the charcoal across his palm, leaving a splotchy night sky on his skin.
"Steve," it's desperate.
A vase of narcissus's sits by the window, some of the yellow petals are starting to tear, and the edges are starting wilt into a brittle brown. He's never liked cut flowers because their fragility gives them days before their decay. Why then do people keep them, when in the wild they are part of cycle of renew and rebirth? Steve rubs a velvet petal between his fingers and it tears. He says nothing.
...
He meets Peggy Carter, and she is beautiful fiercer than any solider. She saves them multiple times. In battle Peggy is dirt smeared, skirt torn, yet somehow her red lipstick is untouched. A warrior. Once in between moving inward in Europe they rest in Wales, they sit in the evening light on the cliffs with emerald tuffs of moss, clinging to the rocks that almost glow in the night. The waves batter against the edge never ending. Peggy in a shawl wrapped around her shoulders, as the wind blew the smell of the salted sea, she had turned, and smiled at him. He falls in love with Peggy. He does. There is a part of him, small so very small that is glad that he's normal—that he can love a woman. That maybe it had been a mistake for him to ever think otherwise. He loves Peggy, he does, and he's relieved.
Steve floats on the surface like a leaf in a pond. The water in the pool is heated to a soothing point, and he lulls in the gentle buoyancy of the waves. For a moment. Just a moment. He thinks about just letting the water swallow him and falling into a soundless and sightless oblivion, opening his mouth, letting the water fall in and fill his lungs.
"Having fun Cap?"
Steve opens his eyes. "Hey, Tony." Tony gives him a small smile. He drifts to the edge of the pool and hoists himself up, sitting on the ledge of the pool. Tony's eyes linger, not invasive, a bit warm like lukewarm water on tired skin. For once Tony isn't in a t-shirt. He's wearing a dress shirt with the vest unbuttoned. His bare feet poking out from his black trousers. "Tony?"
Tony looks up. "It's not everyday you get a man chiselled like a Hellenic statue in front of you, so you left me a little speechless there." Flirting is a native language to Tony, it comes out without thought, and he knows Tony doesn't mean much when he says it. He doesn't mean much, but that doesn't stop something like steam from curling, soft and gentle, in his stomach. Tony shoves his hands into his pockets. "I just wanted to tell you that I'm going to be on an overseas business trip for a few weeks maybe a month."
"Oh."
Tony nods.
"Sir," Jarvis interrupts as crisp as always, even though Steve understands that Jarvis is an AI he still looks up at the ceiling when he talks. It's polite. "Chickens hatch in 21 days, sir."
"I should have just scraped you and made a hi-tech RCV. At least it would respect me," Tony mutters. He pulls something out from his pocket and hands it to Steve. Water splatters against the metal case, and Steve leans back trying not get it wet. "I don't make things to feed capitalism. I make them to withstand life." It's a black flip phone. Tony pulls out another one made of silver. "I've made them out of spare parts. Since I'm going to be gone, I thought it was a good idea that you had one in case you wanted to talk." Steve closes his hand around it; the S.T.A.R.K. Industries logo imprinting itself into his skin.
Tony gives him a half of a smile. "I thought it would suit an old man like you."
What is he to do with the kindness that it is given to him without thought? Steve squeezes the phone and says, "thank you."
"Sir, Ms. Potts has arrived and is waiting for you on the helipad."
"The perks of being wanted by everyone," Tony shoves his hands into his pocket. "I'll be seeing you, Cap." He waits until Tony is gone before putting the phone on the floor and slipping into the water. He swims to the deep end and dives. There is quiet and stillness in the water; the world does not change there nor does it move. There is a familiarity to it. When his lungs chafe against his ribcage, he comes up for air drawing long starved breaths.
...
He does not call Tony even when one month goes and turns into two. He does not call even when he goes to the rooftop and aches. He does not call even when he sits on the breakfast island and turns every time someone comes into the kitchen. He does not call even when he goes down to the labs by accident looking for Tony, and it is Bruce who greets him confused. He does not call.
"Jarvis?" Steve tugs on his leather jacket, fixing the collar.
"Yes, Captain Rogers?"
"What are the closest art stores to the tower?"
"That would be the League's Art Supply Store on 215 W and 57th St. and DaVinci Artist Supply on 132 W and 21 St. Would you like me to send you the locations?"
"No, thank you. I'll find them."
...
League's Art Supply is small, contained by a black iron gate outside and inside built like a walk-in closet. The inside of the store is packed with tubes of paint: acrylic, watercolour, oil, ink, and gouache. The tables lined with rows of metallic cases filled with: pastels, graphite pencils, pencil crayons, and charcoal. There are various canvasses, sketchbooks, and art books shoved onto bookshelves. The availability and magnitude of art supplies is astounding.
As a child, he would use broken branches blown from wind storms, snap them into pointed sticks that he used to draw into the dry dirt, sitting cross legged scratching in the passing cars and carriages. His notebooks were filled with absent minded drawings of the robins, doves, and crows outside of the classroom windows. Art supplies were rare, the little bit of charcoal he'd managed to get during the war had come from Howard. It was before being deployed; there had been a brief moment of reprieve for him and the rest of the soldiers. He'd grabbed scraps of paper and a pencil from one of the labs, and sat on the hood of a Dodge WC; the engine still warm from a trip to the city. Some of the soldiers completed laps around the base, their footfalls like down pour. He draws the soldiers in motion not too detailed just rough sketches of a life. He glances up, watches Bucky strikeout with the nurses, and then draws Bucky's frown and confusion in lead.
"I figured you were good when you gave me your uniform design never knew how good you were though."
Bucky's hair is filled in with quick strokes. Howard leans over, tracking the movement of the pencil. He smells of smoldered iron and gasoline. "I do alright," he says, which is true the year of art school helped to refine the roughness of his drawing, but a little bit more would have helped to smooth out the finer details of human movement and expression.
"I call that pretty damn good."
Steve shrugs, moving on to the nurses the way their hair curls and holds against their hats. "Practice helps."
Howard presses his weight against the side of the truck, turning to the field. His dress shirt speckled with splatters of red paint and suspenders off his shoulders. "You have to own what you can do, Rogers. There isn't room for modesty in this world."
"Is that because your ego leaves no room for it?"
Howard laughs, a snort of a sound. There isn't much time left until they start shipping soldiers to Europe. Howard hasn't left the lab in weeks, spent sleepless days trying to mold combinations of metal into resilience and iron plating cars to withstand machine gun fire, while soldiers write their final testaments and give them to the priests and sisters stationed on the base. Steve starts to draw Howard in profile; in the rare moments of serious somber and sleep deprivation, as he watches boys prepare for a war. He finishes a few days later and leaves it on Howard's desk.
...
The night before it is time to board the planes bound for Europe, as Bucky and Steve start to collect the little bits of life they have in the barracking into suitcases, Howard stops by. Howard is the epitome of refined wealth. His dress shirt bleached into the white of bone china, and suit jacket pressed into a smooth fabric. Howard Stark has always been an odd thing in a base of dirt stained soldiers that still aren't used to the way their muscles pull from firing guns. "There is a party for the boys down in the mess hall courtesy of Stark Industries." Bucky pauses. "Catered and supplied with the finest alcohol and the nurses have worn their best dresses."
Bucky raises his eyebrows and tips his head to the exit.
Steve smiles. "Go, I'll join you after I finish." He goes back to folding the few shirts he owns. There is an emptiness—a lingering loneliness to the base now even though no one has left. The walls have witnessed Private Haynes look at the picture of his little brother and mother every night before bed; Sergeant McCartney lie in his cot with his wife's ring on the centre of his chest; he tells Steve that he took the ring because no one would know what would happen during the war and that couldn't let her cling to that ring waiting from him, if he did come he'd put back the ring on her finger, or Sergeant Rook who'd pull out a blue stone and rub it with his thumb, "my kid loves the ocean. She isn't one to sit still and be clean, you know she'll be out there in the waves in her new dress looking for sea glass. This one was her favourite. She would sleep with it clutched in her fist while she sucked her thumb. She said that it would help me sleep. It doesn't."
...
Howard sits down on a bed in front of Steve. He pulls out a pocket-sized sketchbook, a tin of Dixon's solid crayons, and a box charcoal. "You've gotta learn to live with a little indulgence." Howard places the items next to his suitcase. "The world gets ugly, so so ugly that you've gotta learn to find ways to escape."
Howard was right then because the horrors that wait lurking behind the doors of concentration camps will never leave them, and he is right now‒in the 21st century in a different way. The world isn't ugly. Steve hasn't learned how to make the beauty of the world his own, yet. He buys the basics: sketching pencils, pastels, pencil crayons, pens and ink, charcoal, watercolour paints and pencils, tubes of acrylic paint, brushes, a mixed media sketchbook, and a few canvasses. It is as he's holding the reusable bags from the store that he thinks getting home is going to be a problem that Happy pulls up. "I heard you could use a ride."
Steve ducks down to get closer to the window and stop blocking the foot traffic. "From?"
"From me, Sir," Jarvis replies from inside the car. "I assumed that you would do quite a bit of shopping."
"Thank you, Jarvis and Happy, I appreciate it."
"You're welcome, Captain."
Happy opens the backdoor to help. Steve shakes his head and puts the bags in the back before walking to the side and getting into the passenger's seat. Happy signals, checks his blind spot, and merges into the traffic.
"You really shouldn't go out unaccompanied, Mr. Rogers."
Steve watches the blur of buildings. "I don't need watching, Happy. I'm a trained soldier and not as mouthy as Tony." Happy doesn't laugh, but his lips twitch. The car slows, miles and miles of cars stalled like someone cut a conveyor belt and everything has stopped. "How is Tony?"
Happy touches the radio. A hologram digitizes, bringing up a traffic grind. "You could call him on the phone he built you." He squints at the map. Oh. "It doesn't take a lot to make people happy, Mr. Rogers, which is why I'm going to tell you this." He turns his head to look at Steve. "Tony is an inventor who builds things for the world, and in it he forgets about his own, so when he builds something for you it means something, doesn't it?" The cars in front start to move and Happy turns back to the road. He doesn't talk again the ride back to the tower.
Steve sits cross-legged on the floor of the roof, watching the sun leech and take its brilliant yellows, oranges, pinks, and purples with it and leave a stain of navy in its departure. The moon is a soft sliver in the sky, luminous and bright. At least the moon has stayed the same even if the night it accompanies has changed. He places the phone next to his ear. The metal is sharp cold. It rings and rings and rings then it clicks.
"Cap?" It's a little breathless. "Is everything alright?"
"Yeah, it's fine. I just wanted to call."
"Mr. Stark –Sorry, let's take an early lunch." There is the static of rustling, doors opening and closing.
"I didn't mean to interrupt. I can call back–"
"My time is important and because of that they can wait. I'd rather talk to you, what made you want to call?"
Steve lies down. The cool cement chills his spine. "Somebody told me that it doesn't take a lot to make people happy, and I want you to be happy."
Tony laughs. "Cap, aren't you a man with words. Is that how you wined and dined the women in your time?"
"Maybe, but compared to you I know very little."
"That is true, I can teach you everything if like," Tony says soft like a whisper in his ear. Steve doesn't know what do with the words bubbling up inside his stomach that rise into his throat. "I'm kidding, Cap; I didn't mean to offend your old prudish wartime sentiments."
"You didn't and my sentiments aren't old Tony; you're just very loose with yours."
"Did you just call me a loose man?"
"What, no–"
The laugh on the other end is airy. "I've been called worse. Don't worry about it."
"No, Tony I didn't mean it like that. You're free with your words and your language in a way that I'm not, and that's because of where I grew up. I like that you are like that, outspoken but abrasive." Steve covers his eyes this isn't what he wanted. "I just wanted to call you to talk you." He can be a little honest. "Because I miss you." He can hear Tony breath on the other end. Maybe he screwed up said something he shouldn't have.
"I can see why you do; I'm pretty great." He can imagine Tony wink over the phone. Steve shakes his head. "I miss you too, though," Tony says quiet and gentle. Tony doesn't say anything for a moment. "I don't know if anybody has ever asked you this. Cap are you interested in men?"
His stomach avalanches down into his pelvis, and there is a gapping hole filled with anxiety in its wake. It's a different world, not without its prejudice, but it is a better world. It is not like the 40s where shame would cleave his intestines in two, where Bucky would smile, sad and small in their room, as they got ready to go a bar with some girls, and say it was okay; they didn't have to go. It is a different world, where he has seen magazine covers and TV reports of Tony Stark out on dates with men, and Tony is never ashamed. He smiles, dares the world come after him. There had been a day where the Avengers had watched an interview with Tony. The morning had a laze to it. A softness that left everyone warm and sleepy, no one bothered to change out of their nightwear. The smelled heavy of coffee and sugar sweet milk. Bruce's face still lined with lines of his mattress. He sat in the armchair with a tablet in hand, as he read. His mug perched on the armrest, steaming. Thor in just a pair of sweatpants, hair the colour of trainshed gold in the light, grinning as he drank his morning coffee, asking Bruce how to search up food places on the Internet. Clint on the floor with a box of Lucky Charms hair flattened on one side of his head. Natasha on the armrest near Steve; her feet shoved under his thigh for warmth; the bruise on the corner of her mouth turning to a green in its healing. The companionable moments were always soothing and left a pleasant peace in him.
"Tony Stark, would you like to address the comments made by Republican Rader where she stated 'can we trust a man whose social life is riddled with frivolous behaviour?' and has once said 'I won't buy any products from Stark Industries'."
Clint clicked his tongue, thrusting a milky spoon at the screen. "I was assigned to bodyguard Rader in D.C. once and she's a homophobic asshole. The things she said to people are horrible. It's no wonder she's going after Tony."
Steve frowned, watching as Tony's smile strained.
Thor turned to the TV. "This Republican wishes to slander Stark? For what reason?"
Natasha leaned her chin on her fist. "Tony doesn't hide his sexuality. That he is attracted to both men and women, and she doesn't like that. A lot of people don't like that." Steve clenched his fist, bunching the fabric on his sleep pants. Natasha wiggled her toes. "Not everyone is like that, but there are some stuck in old ways, stuck in ways that were never right."
"Midgardians have a problem with that?" Thor is puzzled by humanity almost everyday, but there are few were there is anger under them like a thunderstorm on the edge of bursting. It is there now.
Bruce pushes up his glasses, closing his tablet, leaning back into the couch. "Humans can be cruel, Thor." Bruce knows that best of all. It is why he excludes himself from publicity events because the days after there news reports of the Avengers putting citizens at risk by letting Bruce be free–that perhaps they should consider locking him up or put an end to him. Bruce is never angry; he just shrugs and smiles, says that you can't change their minds, and that's okay. I have you guys. There is an underlying sadness to it, a slight defeat.
Tony scoffs. "We all know the reason why she's saying that. Instead, how about we question whether we can trust a senator that is endorsed by big corporate oils to push legislations to drill for oil on First Nations lands or nature reserves. How can we trust a woman who has taken bribes and runs on greed?" Tony looks at the camera. "My social life may be frivolous, but I've never sold myself for profit, have I? Even I have standards."
Clint whistles, spooning more cereal into his mouth. "Daaaaamn, Stark went for the jugular."
"You've heard it here America, and Mr. Stark does rise points of authenticity that need to be answered, regardless we thank Tony Stark for taking the time to talk to us on This is America. If you missed this interview you can find it on our webpage this is Mai Kyo signing off."
Thor crosses his arms. "It is a fitting response for such slander. It is a shame Midgardians do not challenge each other to battle for such disrespect." There is a this look that Thor gets sometimes, serious and solemn where the millenniums set into his eyes and dulls them. "It is sad to think that Midgard is filled with people of such low thinking. In Asgard, love is a beautiful thing blessed by Freyja whether between those of the same gender or opposite genders."
Clint turns his head to look at Thor. "I bet you're saying that because of Loki's sexual past."
"What?"
Clint tips the cereal box into his grey milk. "Bruce show the guy his family's dark history."
Bruce types on his tablet and holds it up to Thor, sipping his tea to conceal his amusement. Thor's eyes track the words. "By Odin who wrote this? Who has written these lies?" He grimaces. "With a horse?"
Clint laughs, spilling milk and cereal on the hardwood floor. "What you gonna shun your horse nephew, Thor?"
"I do not have a horse nephew…I think I do not." Thor strokes his beard. "I will have to talk to Loki about this."
Natasha hides her smile into her fist, and he grips her ankle, pressing warmth into her cold flesh, as laughter bounces in his chest.
"Cap?" The memory recedes and the sting of the night creeps back in. The stars are muted in the night sky like dim bulbs on the verge of burnout.
He swallows. The emptiness will eat him, consume everything that he is. "I can't answer that."
"Okay," there is nothing in the word to gauge what Tony feels.
"I'm sorry."
"Don't do that. You don't have to be sorry." Tony sighs. "I can look at people and know what they want whether its my money, my tech, or me, and I don't know what you want. It is just confusing, Cap."
Steve closes his eyes. He can say nothing more than sorry.
"Stop doing that–just stop. Let's just talk, okay? I'm in Japan right now. You once told me that you thought technology was dream-like, right? Well here I always feel like that about technology, it isn't better than mine of course nothing is. I come here, and I always want to invent. I'll bring you next time to show you want I mean."
Steve smiles. "That would be good. When are you going to come back?"
"…Not for a month or more. There is a delay with the parts that were supposed to be shipped overseas, so I'm cleaning that up and looking into other suppliers for Stark Industries."
They say nothing for a bit.
"Are you going to miss me, Cap?"
"A little."
"Good, I am a man to be missed. I'll call you tomorrow, goodnight."
"Goodnight, Tony."
He sits at his drafting table tin of graphite pencils open by his side. The sun warming the table. He starts by drawing Bucky in graphite sharp streaks in his sketchbook. He draws him as a child mischievous, cheek dirt-stained, dress shirt splattered with mud, and smiling. Steve can hear Bucky calling him along. He draws Bucky as a teen stronger, confident in his stance, his smile is less board with more cock to it. He draws Bucky as a man weathered at the edges from war; his eyes are sunken, and he does not smile anymore. When he is finished, his hand is stained grey, and there are clumps of erase shavings all over his desk. He runs his fingers over his last drawing and says goodbye.
...
He sits on the floor, his back against his bed, and a cup of peppermint tea steaming next to him, as he draws a portrait of Peggy in pen. The smell of ink heady in the air, intoxicating. Everything about her immaculate: her hair pinned away from her face, the arch of her cheek bones, and the curves of her lips. Peggy does not smile. She is serious and every smile that he made bloom is precious. He fills her lips in with red ink and dusts her cheeks in with it. She was the first he loved, and he's sorry he couldn't give her everything of him.
Howard's study is ostentatious. There are just as many bottles of alcohol as there are books. Steve is sure the crystal figurines of men scattered around are really just Howard's miniatures. Above the fireplace is a portrait of Howard with Maria and a young Tony by his knee. Tony does not come down to the study has one of the robots come and dust once a week, so it looks the way his father left it. In front of the fire place is a desk made of red mahogany and on it is a map of the Atlantic Ocean floor scribbled with notes and x's. There is an insanity to it‒in the way that the writing becomes illegible and shaky. There are stains on the map of something. He opens the curtains of the study and watches the dust particles dance in the air. He sits down at the desk and opens his box of pastels. Howard would take cigar breaks to get away from everything, nurturing a flame when Howard noticed Steve staring, he'd grin and blow rings of smoke toward him. There is an elegance and beauty in the moment where Howard slouches to light it that he wants to capture that–that brief moment of euphoria. There are days when he lies in bed, staring up at his ceiling wondering why he is here; that he's angry at Howard for bringing him into this world that isn't his. He's angry at Howard for not showing his son love. There days he wakes up and looks at the world and is thankful to Howard because he can see the world they helped save, and live another life with a little more freedom.
...
Tony calls him in the morning, as he is making a cup of tea. "Cap have you ever had sake? I never remember how much I like it until I get to have some here. Rhodey won't drink anything because he's the government's boytoy and is on 'duty'. If I had known he'd be such a bore, I would have brought anyone else."
Steve hums and dips his earl grey teabag into the water, watching the water swirl with orange. It's like watching an orange mist bleed through the water.
In the background he can hear Rhodes.
"Tony who did you drunk dial?"
"First of all, this is a booty call, and second it's the star-spangled Captain America." Steve snorts, cradling the phone between his shoulder and ear he reaches for the sugar.
"You didn't." There is the static of rustling. "Give me the phone damn it, Tony. Hi this is James Rhodes, who is this?"
"Steve Rogers."
There is silence. "Jesus, you actually drunk dialed Captain America. Hi Captain America, I am so sorry about this Tony usually just drunk dials media outlets. He once asked Fox if they dreamed in stupid and then made it a reality on national TV. Pepper usual has to deal with the blowout after and she's never happy." He tips in a teaspoon of sugar and laughs. "Anyway, I'm sorry about Tony bothering you."
"He isn't a bother. When you be coming back Colonel Rhodes?"
"Probably in two-three months."
Steve frowns. "This has been a long trip."
"There has been a lot of setbacks. It is a sensitive matter, so Tony can't leave-God damn it Tony don't order more Sake-sorry, Captain I've got to go."
"Goodbye, Colonel Rhodes."
...
Natasha and Clint exist together, so they must be drawn together. Steve sets up a small studio in the living room. He lays his box of charcoal sticks and pencils in white and black, a kneaded eraser, and chalk pastels on the coffee table. He leans his back against the sofa and balances his sketchbook on his knees. The sun is pleasant and warm on his skin. They like to sit on the couch after missions from S.H.I.E.L.D. where they come back worn and wounded. Natasha wraps a shawl around her shoulders. It is beautiful thing, made of different patterns so intricate that they bleed into each other; it is like staring at a Rosch test. The longer you stare more patterns become noticeable. The centre of it is a flora mandala that blooms coloured in different shades of purple from lavender to plum, and different ranges of blue from baby, cyan and sapphire. It is the only thing she brought over from Russia. She doesn't know where it came from only that it is the only thing that belongs to her. When she goes on missions that she isn't sure she'll come back from, she gives the shawl to Clint. Natasha folds into a square and holds it like an offering. Clint grips it, creasing the ironed fabric. They don't look away from each other, silent and somber. They have built a world in their silence. He looks at them; his heart is constricted by thorns that pierce the muscles of his heart, and thinks of Bucky. When they come back from missions though they are like cats, sunbathing. Natasha's feet in Clint's lap, and he wraps his raw hands around them, as his head tips over the back of the couch. The left side of Natasha's face scraped, starting to heal in purples and blues, and lip torn like a page dyed in red ink. He draws the couch and their bodies in black. Their bruises in red, healing purple-blues, and their scabs in rusted red. Together they are what help him survive S.H.I.E.L.D. During the time that therapy is mandatory and so is his refusal to talk, it is Clint who helps him avoid his appointments. Once as they walk down the metallic halls in the lab where behind bulletproof glass blowtorches flare and hammers pound. Clint says, "they make their weapons and then are afraid of them nicking their skin." His eyes are dun and dull. "They think that weapons do not weather in a life of war."
"We chose to be weapons of war for our own purposes."
Clint's skin is cream white under the basement lights. "Then what do you do with broken things?"
"Smelt them into something else." Time will temper the jagged edges of souls that tear into you. It will temper the pain, longing, fear, anger, and sorrow until it becomes a part of you smoothed down into the cervices left behind by life.
...
It takes a while for him to figure out how to draw Thor. He looks at all of his supplies and nothing feels right. Though child-like, there is an aged air around Thor that does not come out often. It is in his eyes, as he gazes at humanity. "Your lives are very short, you age and grow so fast." Thor stares at him. His eyes are like a galaxy long formed and beautiful; they have seen all, seen lives end and begin, has witnessed the end and rise of civilizations. "In a breeze a tree will stand still, but its branches will move." Thor smiles innocent and free. "Nothing stands, still not even for Gods." There are days, dark and few, when there is a numbness that eats at his heart that he goes and finds Thor to spar with. They fight until they split their knuckles and lips, create dents in the training rooms walls and floors. They fight until they can't get up. Steve coughs up blood that splatters against the grey metal floor like thin paint drops on a canvas. Thor rolls over onto his back, hair stuck to his forehead, face covered in blood, as he pants. He can feel the slow warmth; the slight pull of his skin knitting together to heal. They lie on the ground, let the sweat, and blood dry. His body hurts, the cords of his muscles pull painful under his skin, and his ribs ache. He feels okay. He meets Thor's eye and Thor laughs, curling a hand around his bruised ribs.
It comes to him as Clint juggles eggs in the kitchen criss-crossing them in the air while waiting for the butter in the pan to melt. Tempera.
Tempera paint is what will age the painting in the way he wants.
He paints Thor in the mornings, gentle and soft. His hair in a bun, sleep-messed with strands falling out, eyes closed as he takes a sip still steaming coffee. An old God in a modern world. The painting has the touch of age to it, so he adds a bit of a brightness with acrylic to make his hair gold. He adds starbursts of lightning in blue around Thor. Steve leans back on his stool, his fingers crusted with dried paint, and lets the paint dry. The sun is at its peak. It streaks through the windows and the dust glides in the light, delicate and fragile.
...
He opens his sketchbook, smooths a hand over the thick blank page. Steve sets his tin of prismacolors on his desk and starts to sketch Bruce in black, not too precise just rough and full of streaks. Dr. Banner is muted colours, subdued yet still vibrant. Sometimes, they spend their evenings in the Tower's library, reading. Bruce sits in the red upholstered armchair with a fuzzy blanket draped over his knees, glasses slipping, as he reads science papers or works from the romantic period. Steve likes to sit on the window seat with his back against the side panel, as the sun trails his skin. His shoes on the hardwood floor next to his mug of tea. When Tony notices, he adds more books to the library for them. He orders subscriptions to Scientific American, Sky & Telescope, Popular Science, Physics Today, New Scientist and updates the science section. He adds books from Steve's childhood, and the books that came after. He enjoys the serenity of their time together.
That does not change that Bruce has terrible days. He runs down to Tony's smoldering lab and finds Tony standing in the middle, rubbing a hand over his mouth and another on top of Dum-E's claw. The lab is gutted, the wiring exposed and sparking, there are shards of glass from the shatterproof walls around Tony's testing space, there are parts of metal strewn everywhere and plaster and cement still rain down like dust storm.
"Tony?" It is as he walks closer, and his shoes break the splintered glass that Tony turns.
"Oh, Cap what are you doing here?"
Steve grips his shoulder and pulls him away from the mess, checking him over for injuries. "Are you okay?" He touches the still bleeding cut under Tony's and hisses when it overflows onto his finger.
Tony waves his hand. "I'm fine, I can handle it. I wanted to redecorate anyway."
There is a rush of steps behind them. Clint, Natasha, and Thor come in with their weapons drawn and stop at the entrance of the lab. Clint slips his bow over his arm and puts his arrow back in his quiver. He squats, picking up an in-progress faceplate for a new suit. He whistles "Oh, this is gonna be expensive even for your rich ass."
Thor hefts Mjölnir over his shoulder in disappointment and goes over to sit down on a large portion of ceiling that collapsed, sulking. Natasha glances around. "What happened?"
"Nothing."
Natasha turns her gaze to Tony. "What. Happened." She repeats slow.
Dum-E whirs over to his creator, and lets out a string of beeps. Tony pats him. "Nothing."
"If Bruce lost contro-"
"Look, it's Bruce. He has the most control out of any of us here. I piss people off; I'm good at it, and not once have I ever bothered him." Tony runs a hand through his hair, dislodging plastered and dust. "What do you think Fury is going to do if he finds out?"
No one says anything.
"Right, so let it go." Tony turns his back and walks further into his lab. "Thor can you help with the exposed wires?"
He leaves the rest of the Avengers to help Tony clean up. His feet are steady. The halls blur from his pace, becoming streaks of metal.
"Jarvis?"
"Doctor Banner is in his room. Would you like for me to open the door?"
Steve goes to the elevator and presses the button to Bruce's floor. "No."
He knocks on Bruce's door when nothing happens, he asks Jarvis to patch him through the intercom. "Bruce, I need to talk to you ,and I rather we do it on your terms."
Steve picks up the rustle of sheets. A few moments later he hears hesitant footsteps toward the door. When the door opens the room is in darkness, his eyes adjusts, and he sees Bruce on his bed arms curled around his knees. Steve steps in, turns on the light, as Bruce flinches curling tighter around himself. Steve drags a chair over and sets it down in front of Bruce.
He lets the silence fill in the room. Bruce has a tank setup by the window for a Veiltail goldfish. The colour of molten orange and gold. Its opaque tailfins sway in the water like a curtain in a delicate breeze.
"Aren't you going to ask what happened?"
The goldfish opens its mouth and snatches up a pellet.
"No." Steve says. "Whatever you want to share is up to you."
Bruce looks up. His eyes shift from green to brown. "S.H.I.E.L.D. has been trying to figure out how to make him." Bruce's skin starts to turn green. He rubs his arms, and he rock's back and forth. "They've been trying to replicate the super soldier serum too." Bruce swallows looking down at his feet. "There can't be anymore of him out there."
They are the only two of their kind. They are cursed with the loneliness of that and cursed with guarding the knowledge of their creation. Steve feels the thick denim of his thighs. The solid ground beneath his legs. "There won't be." There won't be. "We will destroy the records, and the samples they have on both of us. We can't reason with them, so we'll make them listen, okay?"
It takes a awhile, but Bruce nods slow never taking his eyes off Steven.
Steve reaches out and grips Bruce's hands in his own. "You are our friend, and we will protect you, but you will never put Tony in danger like that again, Bruce do you understand me?"
"I didn't mean-"
He squeezes Bruce's hand. "Never again."
"Never." Bruce agrees.
He draws Bruce in the armchair a quilt pulled up to his stomach, glasses hanging on the end of his nose, his book forgotten on his chest, as he dozes in the library. Steve makes the outlines thicker lets the wax of the pencil crayon buildup and then shades them in with light strokes.
...
He goes up to the roof, sets up an easel, so it faces the city, drops his acrylic paint tubes and mixing palette onto the floor next to a glass of water. The glass casts rainbow diamonds on the cement that shimmer like scales under the noon sky. The rough sketch he does in pencil, forming the body and the finer details like the creases of the shirt, the smudges of grease, the A.C.D.C. graphic of his favourite work shirt, and the lines around Tony's eyes. He takes his flat brush and dips it in the black to start on the shirt. Once he is done, he switches a filbert to fill in the arc reactor in a mix of blue and white and the lettering of his shirt. The sun tiptoes down the sky, and Jarvis turns on the landscape lighting when it becomes harder to see. He takes a rounded paintbrush to go over the lines in long waves of black paint, switching to a rigger brush for the intricacies of the face. Steve dips the brush in water and watches the paint swirl like black vapour spreading. The Tony Stark of the world is a performer: loud, abrasive, confident, and charming. He takes red and starts to fill in the outline of the Iron Man faceplate. The Tony that builds for a future is who he paints. He paints the moment of stillness when Tony is at work serious and quiet, oil stained fingertips that leave traces all around, as he works on an Iron Man faceplate. He wipes his paint tinted fingers across his cheek and leaves streaks of red and yellow on his skin. His paintbrush dangles in his fingers, raining drops of paint unto cement.
...
The dew drops become crystals outside his window. There is no cloud in the sky to obscure the sun, yet it rains. He is dipped in gold, as if he has been touched by Midas. He tears the pages from his sketchbook and puts them up on the wall by his bed along with the canvas paintings. Steve sits on the royal blue carpet by his bed and looks up at his gallery. He presses his palm against the soft fibers of the carpet.
Grief is an ugly thing, and all beings are made from grief; sometimes, it is like a smooth pebble that sits in the stomach. Other times, it is a jagged sharp piece of rock that cuts the lining of your stomach. Grief will erode in time and with it the pain will disappear. The problem is that sometimes people curl around their grief, sheltering it from the wear down of time. His is guilty of that.
Steven looks up at his collection. His drawings are not perfect; there are sharp angles that should have been softer, some of the lines have smudged, and some of the colours have bled into each other. He can see all the mistakes that he hadn't felt his hand make now. His eyes trace over the lines, take in the colours, and faces of everyone. This world isn't the one he wanted to be in; where nothing is familiar and everything feels distorted, but it is time that learns to live in it. Steve smiles.
This world is home.