Songs: Poor Little Rich Boy, Regina Spektor / Hey Ya, Matt Weddle.
Monday is the second day, and that's really kind of a shame because Tony hates Monday more than any day of the week, and he hates it more than any day of the week because that means he has to pick the pieces of himself that are scattered all over his condo and stitch them back together enough to go back to work. It's not like work is particularly shitty or anything, not when he's his own boss and he chose to be for the beautiful reason we like to call 'independence', but sometimes – a lot of times – it's more than bothersome to be a human being, especially on the day after the film strip of his life suddenly became tangled and knotted with the return of who he used to be able to call his best friend.
Pepper doesn't come to work and he doesn't know how he feels about that, because some part of him is thankful in the most awful way that he doesn't have to deal with her disappointment and her questions about 'Why didn't you call me yesterday?' and 'Are you sure you're okay, Tony?', and another part of him – the part of him he got from his father – feels wronged and irritated and disappointed, because just because Pepper's his girlfriend doesn't mean she can skip out on work whenever she damn well pleases, and you know what? That makes his mood a nasty one in general, because Lord knows if he wants to be like anybody, it's his fucking father.
Sarcasm is sweet, isn't it?
His third does come in though, which is pretty typical on a stressful day like Monday, and it's kind of funny that it's typical because Steve doesn't even work for him – he just likes the 'fruity drinks' (normal people call them piña coladas) Tony makes him for free and the fact that the tavern is named something as nerdy as 'Jarvis' and that Tony will let him talk to him for hours even though he has to be running a business and that a visit to the bar will often turn into a walk on the way home, and a walk on the way home will often turn into spending the night, and they both like/want/need that on Mondays, especially when Pepper doesn't show up for work and Loki's just shown his lovely face this side of Mason Dixon for the first time in forever and a few years.
And wouldn't you know that this walk on the way home turns into a scavenger hunt for such a lovely face the second Steve says, "Thor didn't want to tell me where Loki went last night."
"He didn't stay with his parents?" Tony asks in a dragonlike plume of smoke, his eyes focused on the rosy skyline and not on the side of Steve's head, his hand in the pocket of his jacket where it won't brush against Steve's, because nobody can see that kind of contact when they're all the eyes of his parents or Pepper or even worse – Loki.
"Nope," Steve replies in that let-down tone his voice is so used to wearing nowadays. Tony knows the man is looking at him when he says, "I think Thor and their dad were too mad at him to let him stay there."
"It isn't even Thor's house," Tony grumbles a bit lamely, because even though yeah, it isn't Thor's house, their dad means what he says and says what he means, and he doesn't really doubt the fact that both father and son were unhappy with Loki yesterday, what with their penchant for familial disappointment. And Thor isn't even a bad guy, really – at least, not the Thor they knew before Loki ripped the sunshine right out of them and dragged it across the continental United States.
"Yeah, I guess," is Steve's equally lame response. They're silent for a few minutes after that, just walking down the sidewalk on a suburban street like they do at least three times every week, and some little man in the back of Tony's head is telling him that Steve's coming up with an idea, that Steve's considering telling him this idea, that Steve is telling him this idea, and yes – "Do you want to go find him?"
In Lafayette?, Tony thinks so skeptically it's disgusting, and it isn't until Steve goes, "Yeah, in Lafayette," that he realizes he didn't just think it, he said it, and fucking hell, this is why he needs to take his medicine, why he needs to call Pepper so she can remind him to take his medicine.
"He could be anywhere, though," Tony argues. He doesn't know why he's contradicting Steve like he is, except he really does and just finds it very hard to admit that he's still terrified of seeing Loki and feeling like he's drowning again, wanting to touch him all over and unwrap him like he's a late birthday present, needing to peel his face off and see what's behind that shiny New York mask.
"There are about three motels and two hotels here, Tony," Steve points out, and Tony feels a little uncomfortable with the fact that he can detect just how eager Steve is to see Loki again, with the fact that he hasn't felt jealousy of this brand creep up on him since before Loki left and he and Steve fought over him like dogs, with the fact that before, he had the advantage of charisma and money and passion over Steve's puppylike demeanor and the metaphorical flowers he'd pick, but now? Neither of them can hold a candle to Loki's new frame of mind, and how could they even think about fighting for him after what he's seen and heard in that damned city – New York, New York.
"He could have stayed with one of his old friends–" Tony starts to spout, but he knows it's bullshit and he knows Steve's going to tell him it's bullshit, so he just stops himself and lets Steve do his self-righteous little thing.
"We're Loki's old friends," Steve sighs, kicking a stone across the cement. Tony watches the rock bounce into the street with something like empathy in his chest as Steve goes on with, "And did he stay with one of us last night?"
"I don't know, he wasn't at my house," Tony replies. He shoves his cigarette between his lips to shut himself up, because fuck, he never would have said something like that before yesterday. Really, that was a bad thing to say to someone like Steve, who is basically a butterfly antenna in the way he's sensitive to anything and everything, in the way he reads into things like they're novels.
Day two and things are already so different.
"I'm surprised," Steve huffs, and it's not genuine, the way he says it. It's wounded and the tiniest bit raw. It's sarcastic and knowing, knowing of the fact that Tony wins ninety percent of the time when it comes to Loki. It's not Steve.
Tony's cigarette is gone too fast, but that's the way life likes to treat him, and he doesn't really complain, internally or externally, when he throws the butt to the ground and stops to stomp it out. Steve keeps walking independently of him, and even though Tony knows the man is still going to spend the night with him, he's also aware of the fact that he's not above walking into his condo without its owner like the stubborn little bitch he is.
So he catches up with Steve, lets his hand fall out of his pocket, and says, "We can go look for Loki." He can't have another person he loves angry at him for his own stupidity.
They find him at the motel Tony's dad used to have affairs in, and Tony can't help but feel humbled in the worst of ways when Loki opens the door and he's just as gorgeous and alien as he was yesterday, with his black hair and green eyes and pale skin and pink lips, with the Regina Spektor concert t-shirt Tony's never seen before stretched over his chest, with the dampness pooling in his collarbones. Tony knows he just took a shower, and is it weird that he feels comfort in the fact that the scent of Loki's shampoo is the same as it was before he left?
Before he left and after he left. Like two completely distinct and incredibly descriptive periods of time, like the difference between Before Christ and Anno Domini.
"Hello," Loki says once he sees Steve and Tony waiting for him like two penguins in the middle of the fucking Sahara on the opposite side of his doorway, and the smile on his face is both beautiful and foreign, and it almost looks like it's scared to show itself, and Tony wonders if New York taught him to hide himself, and that makes him want to murder.
"Hey!" Steve eventually replies, and excuse the fuck out of him, but Tony kind of wants to punch him in the face for that, because he's suddenly ten years old again, going Steeeeve, you know I'm the leading man, and the leading man always speaks first. Dear Lord, why must he have a heart that beats with emotions like anger and envy and wanting, all three of which are sins according to that huge book his mom liked to dictate to him when he'd tell her things like 'I want to go out with Steve, Thor, and Loki after school today instead of doing my homework' and 'I think I'd like to move out of this hellhole'.
"Come on in," Loki says, stepping away from the doorway, and his statement is southern enough to soothe Tony back into humanity. Just to be an asshole, he goes in before Steve and ponders the existence of the phenomenon that is 'his friends'.
And then Loki hugs him, and even though he did that twice yesterday, it still feels like something fantastic and overwhelming and incapacitating, and that's probably because Tony's missed these embraces so much it's awful, probably because he's been thinking about this every time he's hugged Pepper or Steve for the last five years, probably because Loki smells like soap and the galaxy he just returned from, probably because Tony's filled with the desire to just drag Loki into himself and kiss the breath right out of his lungs, probably because that desire means he's unfaithful (fuck, wasn't he already halfway there with the clusterfuck of a relationship he has with Steve?), probably because being unfaithful means he's just like his father, having imaginary affairs in the same goddamned motel his old man had real ones.
He hugs Loki back really carefully, knowing that if he doesn't keep himself in check he might just cross the borderline between imaginary and real in terms of affairs, between missing you and needing you desperately in terms of Loki, and between best friend and selfish asshole in terms of Steve. Tony knows Loki notices his caution by the way the man lets his hands linger on his shoulders a few seconds after he pulls away, and through his fear that Loki is a completely different animal after being exposed to the glamour of the Big Apple, a ray of hope/dread shines through and says 'He can still read you like a damn book, Tony' and 'Even though he changed, you didn't, you idiot'.
Tony watches Loki hug Steve and feels sick at the way Steve tightens his arms around Loki's slim, lean little torso, so he looks away, looks at Loki's rented-out bed and studies the mess there, of which consists of a paperback novel, a pile of clothes (probably the ones Loki shed before he got in the shower, oh Lord), a sliced-open journal, and a few Sharpies – red, blue, green, and yellow. The man's suitcase lies open on the floor beside his bed, and suddenly, Tony's got his eyes all over the room, taking in the brand-new clothes in Loki's luggage (only one case and a battered old messenger bag, damn), the journals stacked on top of the TV and the Styrofoam take-out container that sits in the trashcan and the cellphone he's never seen before on the nightstand, and even though it doesn't tell him much just from looking at it, Tony is intrigued and greedy for knowledge, wanting to know everything about this new Loki, wanting to read his journals cover-to-cover and browse the text messages on his phone and smell his clothes just to see how their scent might make him feel.
"Thor told you where to find me, I'm assuming," Loki says, and that's when Tony tears his eyes away from the home Loki's just barely crafted for himself to look at the man, standing there with one hand in his hair and the other hanging limply at his side, and shit – there goes his breath for the millionth time.
"He didn't, actually," Steve admits with a sheepish little smile Loki's got to love (fuck), stuffing his hands in his pockets. "I tried to get it out of him, but he wouldn't give."
Loki frowns, asks, "So you walked all over town to find me?"
Tony knows that if he answered that question, he'd go, 'Of course' and smirk like the little boy he used to be, so debonair and superficial and everything everyone wants to hear and see. But he doesn't answer, because Steve's the one with the floor and he's pretty sure it'd be kind of rude for him to, and it's pretty obvious to him how different he and Steve truly are when the man says, "We only went to the other two motels in town before here. It's no big deal."
How could a person so vain and a person so modest stay friends their entire lives? Easy – a long time ago, it wasn't a dissimilarity in pride that set Steve and Tony apart, it was simply the fact that Tony was bold and Steve was meek, and there's nothing proud in anything when you're five and six years-old and you share the same playground at school, nothing wrong with the fact that your best friend is kind of an asshole when he's been that way since you knew him way back when, nothing wrong with the fact that he's a better, humbler person than you, even when he makes you look worse in comparison, because you've been having sleepovers for the longest time.
"How sweet," Loki coos, and Tony can't really tell if he's being authentic or a jackass, if that's New Yorker for condescension or an actual compliment he should accept. Steve makes that choice for him and laughs, shrugs, and says, "It's nothing."
And then they're awkward again for just a moment, and Tony's almost got to force himself to smile when Loki gives him a real good once-over and notes, "You're quiet, Tony."
'He can still read you like a damn book.'
"Sorry," he manages, and oh God, he's so fucking dumb he needs to be shot or something. He adds, "Today hasn't been great," almost as if to explain himself, but he just ends up looking more vulnerable and stupid than he already does.
Steve shoots him a worried look from behind Loki as Loki himself frowns again, opens his mouth and pauses for a moment, and Tony knows the reason for his hesitation when he says, "That's a shame," because how weirdly customary is that to say when they haven't seen each other in five years? And really, Tony knows he needs to stop dwelling on that, but it's kind of hard to do that when it's day two and Loki's got black hair and a northern accent.
"I'll live," Tony chuckles. He wishes he could talk like he used to, endlessly and without fear of retribution.
"Good," Loki replies, his face softening into another one of those half-hiding smiles, "I don't want you dying on me."
And Tony feels a jolt of warmth at that, because that's something the Loki he knew would say to him, vaguely flirtatious and bashful and reserved in a way that's not coy or intentionally maddening to Tony's heart even though it succeeds at being so. He thinks to himself that maybe Loki isn't as different as he thought he was. He thinks to himself that maybe things can go back to the way they used to be. He thinks to himself that he really is just a pessimist, not a realist, and that his assumptions aren't to be taken too seriously in the future.
Those thoughts are dashed to the wind by the time the three of them are settled in front of a Hallmark movie, however, and that's all because when Steve insists that Loki tell them about New Fucking York, all the man can talk about is the great music he got introduced to and the classy cafés he'd spent his days at and the outrageous clubs he'd spend his nights at, and this novel he read the second year he was there and how the sky looks so different and how you can't even see the stars at night, and how thrilling it is to ride on the subway and how sometimes he'd go at least two days without sleeping and how the quality of the education was so much better than it is here, and how weird it was to not have Mardi Gras and how nice it was when it rained and how the streets were dirty but beautiful, and everything he says sounds so fucking dreamy it makes Tony sick, makes Tony hate himself for not being able to keep Loki from this paradise.
He was supposed to show this kind of stuff to Loki. He was supposed to take him to his first nightclub and buy him novels from Barnes and Novel and vintage records like he always did. He was supposed to buy Loki their first crappy apartment and split the rent with him. He was supposed to kiss him to sleep because he's supposedly the only one that knows that Loki has a thing about being alone at night, because he has a thing about being alone, too, and because Loki made him promise he would. He was supposed to show Loki the world. That was Tony's job. Not New Fucking York's.
But Tony just listens to Loki and doesn't let it show how very fucking wounded he feels, and something inside him is starting to understand why Thor couldn't even look at Loki yesterday, couldn't even say his name without wincing. He listens to Loki and flips through his journals, which turn out to be more like sketchbooks than diaries, with pages upon pages of doodles of waterfalls and cobblestones and emaciated, raccoon-eyed young men and lipstuck young women, taped-in photographs of people Tony's never seen with their arms draped about Loki and their lips plastered to his cheeks, bottles of beer and vodka and orange juice, the occasional phrase – 'carbon monoxide' and 'an addiction to hands and feet' and 'it was the coldest it's ever been today' – and only one of those is something straight from Loki's heart, and Tony can tell because he's heard those songs before when Loki would play them on YouTube and pick apart their lyrics for his own entertainment.
Tony and Steve stay until a few minutes before nine-thirty. They hug a sleepy, starry-eyed Loki goodnight on their way out, and Tony almost wants to scream in physical pain when he and Loki pull away, when he watches the man close the door behind them, when he hears the latch click. He feels like a bastard for leaving Loki in a motel room for the night. He's probably going to come get him tomorrow and – I don't know, let him stay at his place or something. He's probably not going to tell anybody when he does.
Steve gets into bed before Tony even though Tony's more tired than he is, probably because he has nothing better to do and Tony would snap at him for lurking around or helping him while he tries to clean up his house a bit. After he's too aggravated with himself and too exhausted with the world, Tony peels his pants off and crawls into his bed with his cellphone. He lets Steve listen to the broken, fatigue-laced conversation he has with Pepper, and is it unusual or wrong that they've done this before, these after-hours phone calls and Steve is there hearing them like an FBI agent or a nosy child?
"I'm worried about you."
"I know."
"You're not worried about you."
"I know."
"Tony, talk to me. We were friends before we started this."
"What's this?"
"You asshole."
"Pep–"
"Something happened, didn't it? You sound different."
" "
"You sound hurt."
Steve prods Tony's side with his thumb, raises his head to stare at him with his wide, knowing gray eyes. Tony stares back and doesn't say anything.
"I did something, didn't I? Is it because I didn't come in today?"
"Pep–"
"I called you yesterday to tell you that I wouldn't be. If you'd answer your phone, you'd know that."
"It's not you."
"Oh? What is it, then? Your parents still bothering you?"
"That's not unusual."
"Right."
" "
"So?"
" "
"What happened?"
Tony watches Steve mouth, 'tell her,' to him and ignores him, just lets his mouth fall open and breathes into the mouthpiece as if to let Pepper know that he's still there – he's just not going to answer her.
"I'm hanging up, Tony. Goodni–"
"Loki came back."
Pepper is quiet for awhile, and Tony knows he's basically said 'goodbye' to her with those three words, because she knows he's in love with Loki even if she doesn't know Loki himself, and she knows that even though Loki did Tony a terrible awful by leaving, Tony still wants him more than the blood in his veins, more than her, and she knows that she was his Band-Aid, his trusty little pain medication, good for him only until Loki came back to cure the disease that has been rooted inside Tony since the day he left. And that's dreadful, because Tony does love Pepper, he really fucking does, but not enough to make him stop breathing and not enough for him to look at the sun and think of her and not enough to kiss her breathless or fuck her until she's sore like she wants him to.
"When?"
"Yesterday."
"Ah."
She means 'that makes sense'. Tony slides a hand over his eyes, pinches the bridge of his nose.
"I'm sorry, Pep."
"Don't be. I knew you weren't going to marry me."
"I might've done it, you know?"
"If he'd stayed gone long enough, you mean?"
She's bitter. Of course she is. Even angels like Pepper are capable of that. How dare Tony be the demon to make her that way.
"I don't know."
"Yeah, you do. If he'd stayed gone five more years, would you have married me?"
Tony's never had a conversation like this with her in front of Steve. They've yelled at each other until their throats were raw and told each other the sweetest, stupidest things like 'I'd love you even if you had a wonky eye and a snaggletooth' and 'Her name would be Ginger, because you're a spice, so she has to be, too – what do you say, Pepper?' and 'Sleep well, moon of my life', but they haven't ever told each other anything like this when Steve could hear.
"Yeah. I think I would have."
Pepper doesn't say anything to that. Tony gulps.
"I love you."
"That makes it worse, Tony."
"I know. I love you, though."
Pepper sighs.
"I really do. You're my best friend."
He's saying all the wrong things and he knows it. Tony can feel Steve's eyes on him, knows he's somehow hurt the man with his words, and he really isn't even sure if he's telling the truth or not, because on some days, Pepper is his best friend, the one he can talk to about anything and everything, the one who'll take care of him when he's sick of soul, but other days, days when she's distant and unavailable and bothersome (like yesterday and today), Steve is his best friend and Steve shares his bed and Steve reminds him of that time when they did this and when they did that forever ago and Steve is really warm and soft when he's holding Tony, when Tony wakes up in the middle of the night, coming out of a dream that's horrifying in its beauty and in its lack of reality, and other days, days when Tony takes train rides back into himself and back in time, Loki is his best friend, with his ginger hair and the way he smiles for Tony and Tony alone and the whisper of breath against his ear when he's telling him a secret and the way he'll let Tony touch him like no one else can, brushes of fingers down his abdomen and pokes in the belly button and tickles down his spine, with the way Tony hovers over Loki the night before he leaves, presses kisses down his backbone and swallows the sounds Loki's making because they're full of pain and because Loki's muffled Tony's own moans of pain in his chest and with his lips before, and goddammit – Tony should just not have any friends, because they float away or he pushes them away, and honestly, he can't tell the difference between them sometimes, and he only knows that he needs to kiss Pepper like he kissed Loki that night and that he needs Pepper to hold him like Steve does and that he needs Steve to criticize him as harshly as he possibly can just like Pepper does and that he needs Loki to be in his bed again, holding him, kissing him, criticizing him.
"Shut up, Tony."
He does.
"You're my best friend, too. You're also the man I'm in love with, but I guess that doesn't matter, does it?"
"It does."
"Yeah."
Steve whispers for him to, 'end it, Tony,' and when Tony aims a hurt, affronted look his way, Steve frowns and adds, 'you're tired'. But Pepper's talking again.
"I'm sorry I wasn't good enough for you."
"Pepper, no."
"Don't lie to me, Tony. I'm not as good as Loki. I never was."
"But… you're asking me to compare birds to fish."
Pepper laughs.
"You're two completely different people."
"Is Loki the bird?"
Tony scowls.
"Why do you ask that?"
"He flew away from you. And you were always more interested in things that fly than things that swim."
He doesn't know what to say to that.
"You swim through my veins."
"Like a tranquilizer?"
Pepper, stop, he thinks, but he's not going to say that. Don't ever tell Pepper to stop, because she's going to do it and you're going to hate yourself.
"Like blood."
"Oh."
"I love you, Pep."
"I love you too, Tony. And I'm gonna go to sleep now, before it actually hits me."
"Are you coming to work tomorrow?"
What a dick question.
"I'll try."
He can't help but smile, even though he knows that he's a terrible person and that he probably made tomorrow that much harder for both himself and Pepper.
"I love you."
"Goodnight, honey bear."
Yeah, she's still allowed to call him that.
Steve lets Tony lay his head against his chest and listen to his heart and talk to him about bullshit until he falls asleep, because believe it or not, they aren't fucking. They haven't even kissed before. They just sleep together, because everybody has a thing about being alone at night, whether they want to admit it or not.