So I read through this and found a whole bunch of mistakes - I don't know how I allowed myself to publish it, I must have been reeeaaaallly tired. This is a slightly edited version. Not much has changed, I just changed a few grammar and spelling mistakes. I might just take it down later, I'm not very happy with this one.
He was sick of feeling this way.
Sick of remembering, which almost always lead to him about to cry.
It shouldn't hurt this much.
He shouldn't be missing him.
He'd left, too afraid of hurting someone to stay. It was for the greater good, that's what he'd said.
And he couldn't stop him from leaving. He'd gotten to the airport too late, running through the building only to see him get onto the plane.
He was too late.
And he didn't know what to do.
Everything he looked at only caused him to do one thing - remember. Remember his curly hair, his brown eyes, his awkward smile. Everywhere he looked, that's all he saw.
He hated it. He hated feeling this way. There was a hole in his chest, an empty cavern where his heart should be.
He felt so numb, yet at the same moment all he ever wanted to do was cry.
He'd wake up in the middle of the night, forgetting that he was gone. And then he would remember, and he wouldn't be able to stop the tears.
He'd been gone for two months now. He should be fine. He should've gotten over it a long time ago.
But he hadn't.
He couldn't.
Everything reminded him of his friend.
He couldn't go to his lab anymore. Every time he did, he broke a little more.
Why did it hurt so much?
He tried to forget. He tried so, so hard. But he never could.
He kept himself busy during the day, distracting himself from thoughts of him for a while.
But when the night came, he couldn't keep the feelings at bay again.
He'd sit on his bed, staring at the wall, wishing he could just forget. He didn't want to remember, it hurt too much.
Eventually, he'd fall asleep, succumbing to the dreams; the dreams of them together. And then he'd wake up, and remember that he was gone, and it would hurt so much more.
His friends had noticed something was wrong with him - that much was obvious - but they never said anything. They allowed him to stay silent, knowing he wouldn't tell them unless he wanted to.
They all knew why he was acting like he was though.
They all felt the loss of him; their scientist, their teammate, their friend.
But they never felt it as much as he did.
A part of him was missing without the man, and he couldn't understand why.
Until he could.
One day it clicked in his mind, why he was so fucking sad.
He loved him, and now he was gone.
And it made it so much worse.
He'd never been good with feelings. Being able to recognize that he was in love was hard, but it was too late.
His friend was gone. Hiding away in some distant country, probably finding a way to help other people.
That's all he ever did. All he ever thought about.
He helped people.
When he left, he thought he was helping. He thought they were better off without him.
He was wrong. He was so, so wrong.
They were not better off without him.
Quite the opposite.
They needed him.
He sat on his bed, staring at the wall once again, thinking about his friend - his love.
He wanted him back.
It was only six pm, but he was exhausted.
Missing his friend had turned into something far worse.
He was broken. He forget to eat, to sleep. He would just stare at nothing for hours, imagining him. Remembering the way he looked, the way he talked.
And he cried. He cried more than he'd ever admit.
The tears were just starting to build up, remembering a particularly sad moment in their friendship. They were about to spill over his eyes and down his cheeks, when a voice sounded from the doorway.
"Tony?"
He flipped around, and his jaw dropped.
There he was, right there in front of him. His curly black hair was disheveled, glasses slightly crooked on his nose.
He had to be dreaming.
He blinked, unable to comprehend what was happening.
"B-Bruce?" he whispered, disbelief layering his voice.
The man in front of him nodded, and smiled. "I'm home."
At those words, he broke. He ran to Bruce, tackling him to the floor in a flurry of limbs and tears.
Tony ended up on top of him, his arms wrapped around his shoulders, sobbing into his neck.
Bruce was frozen, not having expected Tony to react that way.
He brought his arms up and rubbed his friend's back. "Tony? What's wrong?"
Tony just looked up and smiled through his tears. The man he loved was back. It was all he'd been hoping for for the past two months.
"I missed you."
So, I wrote this story to vent a little. A friend of mine moved away a couple months ago, and recently I've been missing her a lot. Tonight was especially bad, and I honestly feel exactly like Tony does in this story right now. Thanks for reading this, if you did. I just wrote it on a whim. It didn't make me feel any better, but I'm not going to cry anymore at least.