Saturday nights. What did any man or woman, dead or alive, do to deserve saturday nights? They were the most irritatingly intangible things in the universe and he couldn't do anything to stop them, mainly because of the intangible part. Saturday nights, alone with Pizza.
Nothing was on the TV, not even really the TV was on the TV because only a few hours earlier he may have had a little incident involving a few wires and a little drop of wine. More like the whole bottle really but who's counting? The sparks were coincidental, the fact that in went up in flames was pretty cool, but completely not his fault. So he sat on a somewhat singed sofa, in front of a melted wreck of a TV with a fresh Hawaiian on his denim wrapped lap.
He really should stop trying to do this.
Drowning his troubles in alcohol had never really worked before, so why should it now?
God, this pizza was putting him well on the way to heart disease. With his next bite, a delicious glob of hot, almost yellow grease dropped, splashing onto, and darkening the cardboard box in which the rest lay.
That smell should be illegal for minors.
He swallows, and his head hits the back of the couch. He breathes out, relaxing.
How fun the past month had been. Yes, month. His life had gone from high to hell in a month. 30 days. One twelfth of a year. Four 52s of a year.
In that month he'd been arrested twice, beaten up more times than he dare count, and generally shunned by his once friendly community.
He'd had eighteen and a half press conferences, the half of a nineteenth ending prematurely, and quite spectacularly, and somehow fireworks had got involved.
He'd been put on lock down three times, warned so many more, and just generally been more and more hated as the days went on.
No one really hated him, not in the typical sense. He in himself hadn't changed. He hadn't robbed a bank, nor killed a child or blown up a building. (That one time was an accident; it doesn't count)
His crime, for which he was hung, drawn and quartered, was simply falling the tiniest amount in love.
Now love's a bit of a soppy word. If you can fall in 'lust' then that was a more apt description. The squidgy, cooeyey stuff had come later.
It only just occurred to him that he'd finished his pizza, the box was cold, and the clock indicated he'd been staring into space for a good half an hour. He wiped the grease from his fingers onto the couch, then rubbed his palm that still smelt of ham down his face, willing the strain to leave his muscles.
He'd done a few bad things in his time, played a few dodgy cards and made some royal cock-ups. Getting intimately involved with a certain Asgardian man on the run was however turning out to be his worst. And he really had had some shockers.
But the one thing that made him smile on grease filled TV-less Saturdays like this was that he knew, no matter what, and however gross and school boyish it may sound, that he wouldn't change it for the world. Guilty or not, doesn't change the man, does it?
He could have so little inhibitions with the man who despises them.
It was just something about Loki. Something in the sly and seductive smirk that hides the family trauma and general insanity. They way Loki pretends he doesn't care too much, having learnt his lessons in the past, but then when their eyes meet when the lights are low and the cheesy 'sex music' is loud, it's like they're the same person.
Now, he's not going to go into all the pain and past they share or how both secretly and ashamedly need each other, because he doesn't want to chuck up the pizza he just ate, but the similarities are quite striking, if you dare look into them for yourself.
Tony stands and moves to the wide windows which take the view out to the balcony and the violet horizon beyond that. The balcony, one that used to be clean 24/7, but now with the protest attacks and that little thing with a little 'Doctor Doom' it's rarely free of dirt and debris, and when it isn't, all the view is of is Paparazzi and fans.
He never should've given out his address and then rebuilt his mansion in the same place. He was begging for trouble.
But again, given the circumstances, he couldn't exactly be accused from running away from it.
Loki wasn't a good guy, and damn if Tony didn't know that.
He was insane, homicidal, shockingly jealous and an all-round arrogant, assholish Pig.
But Tony himself wasn't exactly a saint.
From the moment he'd turned up bloody and beaten and ready to attempt taking the mighty Iron Man down, all Tony wanted to do was take him home. He'd seen the look of defeat shining through the cracks in his bravdo deep in the pores of his sweat smothered skin.
And Loki didn't necessarily do what he had to do all those months ago in the battle of New York, nor what anyone else wanted him to do, but he did what he thought he had to do. And in a way that's the same thing really. Tony knows how if things had gone differently and he'd taken the whole hole thing as bad as he could've, he'd have been fighting on Loki's team from the get go.
So he's not saying he can relate, but he kinda can.
And as he rests his hands on the railings and looks into the star speckled night sky, he breathes out, almost methodically, watching the white smoke fly up into the air, tumbling and turning through the currents of blue and silver until it disappeared forever.
He chuckled softly, head bowing to the indigo lit paving stones of his land, thinking to himself that he rather needed some champagne.
Loki picks at his hand, watching the foreign sun rise with a slight downturn of his lips.
A woman, a human sat down on the light wood bench beside him, opening a noisy newspaper, the crisp turning of pages now irritating him as he tried to think.
He tried to think about the past month, those early days, the ambitious game of cat and mouse.
His mood was sour anyway. The ascension of Thor to the throne was ripping at his nerve endings, but while he was moping, he might as well mope properly.
"Excuse me." He speaks, jolting the woman from her morning read. She looks at him, kindness in her eyes. "The water." He starts, looking out into the landscape he was inquiring about. "It is still. It is clear. Is it not beautiful?"
"I suppose it is." She smiles, and nods, joining him as he looks out. The bright early orange sun is reflected in the slight waves, and on the bark of tall trees and their leaves as they flutter in the soft warm breeze. It's an idle comment, meant without malice or hidden intent. Something that was once rare, but in recent times had occurred more and more. He stood from the bench, and brushing down his leathered thighs he walked off, face still in the form of another. The Earth's media had been less than grateful towards him as of late. Affairs with billionaires when you're the top of the most wanted list wasn't the best situation to be in, but let's face it, he'd been in worse.
Tony, however had not. And he did feel guilty about that. Whenever his mood was south and his thoughts deep, he'd allow time to reflect. He was a naturally shallow, proud and confident person, and there was nothing wrong with that. That he would never change.
But he had become more accepting than he, and too Asgardian nature would usually allow.
A man walked him without bowing or greeting him. Something back in the early days when he was nought but a teenager he might consider punishing. All for fun and games.
He would no longer lash out at the bumped shoulders in busy places, or have no mercy on those who shouted at him for no good reason in bustling markets. God help him, he was becoming a native.
He of course couldn't go home. Not now, and he doubted ever.
Now Tony didn't know that. Didn't know the true extent of the outrage he caused back home. Didn't know of the cell with his name on it, and the shackles fit to his wrists.
Tony didn't know a many number of things, only what he desired him to. Didn't know his history, feigned heritage or his hopes. He knew the contours of his body and the shallow water of his mind, but beyond that Loki was still withdrawn. That was his problem. The one vice he couldn't overcome, and truly had no desire to. Why would he open a peep hole into that mess of a broken, presumed missing soul he had claim to? Who would willingly pick at the heart of some runt Jotun whose birth right was to die of the very thing he was born of out in the wastelands of the world he only called home in his nightmares.
But willingly or not, Loki didn't love the weak mortal who would die in a blink of Loki's eye.
He didn't love the arrogance of the inventor or the cockiness of the once, now former, superhero.
He didn't love him, but he always would.
And then Loki thinks of the compassion his Stark had shown him. Not normal compassion. Not chocolate boxes, and red ribbon wrapped presents but in the moments.
And he wishes Tony never mocked him when he had come, foolishly wishing to end the metal man's Midgardian reign. He wished Tony had never offered him that drink, or smiled that way in that lighting.
It had of course all started out as one of his jokes, a simple way to pass the time. Seduction had been the first step which led to the domino chain. He had led the Stark to his bed, and in so also lost himself without his realising it?
He wished as he had pushed and Tony had pulled that the band had snapped. That Tony had realised how he had been simply playing a lure, or had seen the error of the move he was unwittingly making.
For when he had practically reduced Tony to begging for his harsh touch, Loki had given, and Tony remained naive to the smile that played on his face when Stark was screaming his name
It was a joke, a ploy, and scheme - an all too serious one. Why hadn't Tony seen that? Why hadn't he himself seen he too was getting dragged in by the ankle into the fiction he formed himself.
He wished all eyes were open.
Wished Tony had let things stay as they were - Loki as the bad guy, Tony Stark, the dashing hero.
Yes, Tony says he is happy, but he couldn't be. His friends, his ex-lover, his team mates all gone.
He hasn't even got his old enemies anymore.
For through the openings of a conscience that were spilling from through his fingers to the floor, he decided that he was no good for Tony.
How he wished that Tony had got away.