A/N: still don't own a thing...
Sketches
~2~
~*A naive man*~
...
"Well, sounds like an opinion I have here." Stark mused in the heavy silence that had fallen for a few seconds.
"Yes, yes you do, but where'd we be if the great Tony Stark didn't have an opinion like this? So – outrageous, if I may."
"I definitely like your words, Chris." Stark beamed at the man, and the stressed atmosphere was gone in the blink of an eye.
"Lucky me, you have a thing for extravagancy. However, there is still one more thing I want to ask you. You've mentioned a – how did you put it? – a naive man with mesmerizing blue eyes."
"Yes"
The surprising thing was, that all of a sudden, Stark's body language, and even his voice changed – even though it was just in that single syllable word, Steve swore he could hear it drop to a velvety deep tone that rippled softly like cool water. His over-confident posture closed up, he became more guarded, and interwove his fingers in his lap.
And there was no gainsaying it, Steve locked his eyes on the screen, his eyes so intense as if he could get his will through to the man on screen to take off those damn glasses, so that he could see – he could try to read his eyes.
"Who is he? We haven't heard of anything about such mystery-man. Of course you've always been enigmatic, despite appearing weekly in the tabloids, but I'm sure this story would find its way to the papers."
"I have no doubt about it." A small lazy shadow quirked on the edge of his lips. And even the taunt was off his voice this time. "I wonder if he even remembers me."
"Is there someone who doesn't remember you?"
"Well, I wasn't really someone worth to spare precious memory-space for."
"Tony, you really can't leave us on such a cliff-hanger now!"
"I'm pretty sure, I can. Though we seem close to the end of the show and since I don't really wanna come back – no offense, Chris – but 'm no good regular guest and have a lot of things to invent, and surely Pepper scheduled even my sleeping hours so –
"Well, I have a thing for blue eyes – obviously, for beautiful ones – since mines are plain boring – only as boring as anything with me goes boring. Obviously."
"How did you meet with this mystery-man of yours, Tony?" Chris intervened, finally taking advantage of the situation that he could act as the presenter and guide Tony's ramblings in the right and hopefully informative direction.
Tony rubbed his chin thoughtful and for the very first time he seemed to be at a bit of a loss of what to say. It was hard to deduce, but maybe he was considering which words to use. And that made everyone even more interested. It meant that this topic, this man was special for the great Tony I-don't-give-a-fuck-for-anyone-but-myself Stark.
"I was working at an absolutely dull, grey high school as a roustabout, utility man, whatever you call the broke genius kid everyone hates but nevertheless is smarter than the teachers so he is only allowed to work there – anyway! I was about to sabotage the set of the lights and sound of the theatre hall – I had my reasons, don't look at me like that! – and then this kid stumbled in, and jeez, he nearly jumped out of his skin when he realized I was there! I've never seen cuter. Or a brighter blush when I kindly told him that the way he spoke he wouldn't even made the heroine of the play he wanted to get into."
"A play?"
"Yeah. Some kind of stupid musical. Just the usual idiot High School musical shit, I don't know."
"And what happened then?"
"Well, as a gentleman I am I offered my humble services to get him in shape." Chris' eyebrows rose into disbelieving heights. "No, seriously, I was very nice. You try and be rude to those big blue eyes and I'd pay you a million. But I warn you, you succeed and I'd have to kill you. Or much better, everyone else would. That would be like kicking the most adorable puppy ever. And we all know we don't like such big bad people."
"Shame, for a second I considered making a fortune with you. But let me get it straight: you helped this guy – sing?"
"Yupp."
"I didn't know you can!"
"I didn't either. But actually, I'm a master at faking what I'm not. If I'm convincing enough who cares if I can or cannot?"
"And what happed after your crash-course? Did your friend get his role?"
"Good question. Probably not. We met about three times, he was sick all the time, and I was getting at him more often than not. Plus my sabotage went amazing. So no sappy play for the year – checked."
"And you might have ruined the career of a young star. I may be having him as my next guest, if not for your evil deeds."
"Ohyeah. I'm sooo evil." A mischievous grin spread his face and Steve wouldn't be so surprised had it broken that cheeky face in two. "I just insured my place as your most special guest for the decade."
"So humble."
"You're talking to me, honey, I'm the humblest."
"What happened then?"
"Then?"
"Come on, Tony! You can't presume I'll accept that it was all your mysterious story!"
"Now you say something..."
And Stark took off his glasses. Probably just out of habit to add some dramatic emphasis to his words, or maybe just to give his hands something to paddle with, who knew. As if on cue the camera zoomed on his face and Steve could finally gaze into his eyes. Big, chocolate brown framed with long lashes with a distant, thoughtful look in those eyes.
Something deep and sad and strangely amused.
"Well imagine the following- You made your count with your life, because you're actually sitting in jail. Just 'cause you might have broken the nose of the favourite asshole of town. No money, no connections, all in all nothing I'd have today. And then the boy-scout of the school drops in and says you're free, he paid your fine. And from one 'what the fuck is happening' moment you fall to the next, when at 'home' – what a disgusting word – on the wrenches of your once apartment, contemplating how to put together a gun from all the shit around, and don't even giving a fuck if you go back to jail for murder, because what's ahead of you now, really? Your hero from before just grabs your hand and announces that you're gonna live with him and his mom from now on. You know I barely ever get speechless, but I was fucking out of words.
"Sorry, man, I gave you one hell of a lot to beep out, but really! On top of all, my hero from definitely-not-even -this-universe, was that scrawny kid from a year ago!"
"And is it so surprising that such nice people might cross roads with you sometime?"
"Hell, no!"Stark exclaimed all of a sudden and wriggled in his place, leaning on the armrest, nearly dropping his expensive sunglasses, pulling one leg underneath himself up on the couch, just like to get closer to Chris, as if he could get his point through easier. "Or not at all. I actually haven't met many good people either way, but God, he'd changed so much! I looked scrawny next to him! He grew like half foot over me, and was all tall and muscular and handsome, anything you ever wanted to be. A perfect man, seriously! And they are not supposed to be so perfect! They should flow with the other bastards, get into the football team, or whatever shit normal people do at high school, and be one of those assholes breaking down that miserable excuse of a flat I'd had, but NO! He took me home like a kicked and soaked puppy, and let me live in the closet!"
"Sorry, Tony, I don't want to sound – sceptical, and all, but I'm not perfectly aware of your living standards at that time –"
"Really damn small."
"By Tony Stark standards, it doesn't sound that –"
Stark groaned in frustration, and got into wide gesticulation, annoyed that Chris was making fun of him when he finally got to the serious business.
"Fuck, man, let me tell you, my closet now is bigger than their flat." he scoffed, and pouted like a sulking child – even though as strange as it was, it put more emphasis on his words.
"Well... – wow... So you were like Harry Potter?"
"I was the ideal dream of a Harry Potter. Because they were just so nice! Like everyone wanted to kick me into next year the way I acted! Damn, I wanted to kick my own ass the hardest at that time. And he just treated me like a – like a person. I was all the time trying to get behind his back. Like, where the fuck are your wings, man? You just can't be real!"
"That sounds great! Now the only question is: why don't we see him around? You apparently left for some reason."
"Had to."
"I don't really understand. Because, you see, it's obvious that you are the great genius prodigy Tony Stark, but that sounded like your own little odd paradise." Tony nodded in confirmation. "So pray tell, why did you leave?"
"Because the world is still full of stupid bastards, myself included."
"Do I have any chance to pull any more details out of you?"
"Not a chance." And there was a weaker but still re-approaching version of the Stark-smirk.
"Shame, just when it started to get very exciting. Okay, one last question: don't you want to meet your angel man again?"
"Chris, as a presenter, you should listen more." Stark scolded in mock seriousness. "First, as a reminder, I don't care much for the so labelled 'nice' people. Second: he surely doesn't even remember me, and all the papers can tell you what an asshole I am, so why would anyone want to refresh any relationship with 'the-greatest-asshole-of-their-teen-years'?"
"You are Tony Stark."
"And my world thinking you know people well has just crashed down on me." The drama queen. "The point is he probably thinks I've jumped off that bridge. For real. Plus no. He is the most naive man I've ever known, but there are things you don't want to come back knocking on your door. Especially if they are dead, right?"
The ending of the show, the dimming of lights, the closing phrases, nonsenses and the cheering of the audience passed by Steve in a haze. The next thing he actually realized was that he had been sitting in the dark staring at some teleshop advertisement in the break, and his mother switched on the lights as she arrived home.
"Hello darling."
"Hi Mom." Steve greeted her back, and he just hoped his mother was too tired to actually recognise how out of character he sounded.
"Is anything good on?" She asked as she entered the living room.
"Errmm... No, not really. Sorry Mom, gotta go – drawing – you know..." Steve was rambling. Of course he was! He couldn't even handle the crazy wobble of thoughts, voices, pictures chasing each other in his mind, how could he put together an actually acceptable reasoning?
"Of course, Steve." God bless the understanding and best of bests of a mother he had. "I'll call for dinner." She pecked him on the cheek, and smiled kindly up at her son, as he stumbled to his room in a daze, barely missing walking face-first in the closed door.
Tony Stark. Tony Stark. Tony Stark...
The name was going round and round in an endless blur in his mind.
That voice, the stance, the way he held himself as soon as he got excited and wanted others – others he knew were dumber than him to understand, to fully understand what he was saying, with all its aspects. Like the beauty of his tech, Steve could never grasp. Like the worlds only his mastermind could wander over and engulf in its full brightness.
The gleam in those big expressive eyes. The excitement. That reluctant, disbelieving joy – distrusting his own senses, wondering if such good things were really happening to him. That deep sadness. And that even deeper, darkly burning hatred and loathing and disgust.
He knew them! He knew them all!
And he thought them to be dead with an amazing young man he stumbled into by mere accident.
Now he inherited that manic glint in his own blue eyes. Influenced by the one and only Tony Stark.
His Tony Stark.
A/N: thanks for everyone following my story so far! And I'm already sorry, that I have no idea when I'm going to update soon. I became terribly slow at writing and drawing both and I really want to illustrate somehow when Steve finally starts his sketching ;)
So please bear with me, and don't forget that faves/follows/and especially REVIEWS make my day and inspires me to continue :))