Cats in (and out of) Bags: Part 2

Pepper's naked body was caught in the current, drifting. She was dead. Tony knew she was dead somehow, though she looked as lovely as ever, her long golden hair spread out in the water like a halo. There were flowers caught in the strands, delicate springtime blooms, bluebells and cherry blossoms. Tiny white rues that look like scattered stars.

Tony started down the sloping bank. It was reedy, with tall grass and cattails; frogs jumped into the water as he approached. This was a bad idea. He knew that, too. He didn't know how deep it was, couldn't judge the strength of the current below the waterline, but he had no choice. There were fish in there with her, little flashes of silver in the water, and—

"Tony?" Steve put a hand on his arm. "Tony, don't. It's deeper than it looks, and there's nothing you can do for her. Look away." It was tempting. Further up the grassy bank, Tony could see a picnic blanket spread out under a willow tree; Morgan was feeding pastries to her stuffed owl.

"I can't, Steve." With a motion of will, Tony called the armor, the metal flooding over him so he couldn't feel Steve's warm fingers. "The fish will eat her."

The river was much colder than he was expecting, and he could feel the icy chill through the armor.Meltwater, he thought,from the spring thaw. The muddy bottom sucked at his boots as he trudged out towards the middle. He'd nearly reached her when he stepped into some kind of hole, sinking down calf-deep into the sticky silt. Even when he tugged, he couldn't pull his foot out. He tried to engage the thrusters on the bottom of his boots, fly out of the water, but nothing happened. He was inert. Something in the suit had shorted out. That shouldn't happen…unless he'd sprung some kind of leak.

An icy trickle of fear ran down his spine, a parallel sensation to the creep of cold water up his legs. The armor was filling up, and he hadn't noticed. He was getting colder and colder, and his legs were getting heavier all the time. It was up to his waist inside the armor. Up to his chest. And his foot was still stuck in the mud. No, worse—he was sinking. The weight of water and metal were dragging him down into the silt. He watched helplessly as Pepper's body slipped past him in the languid current, only managing to touch her drifting hair with the tips of his gauntlet. Fear squeezed at his heart.I'm going to drown. He gasped, and the water in his helmet rushed into his mouth. In a second, it'd be in his nose, his throat, his lungs.I'm drowning. I'm drowning. I'm—

"Wake up, Tony." Tony could hear Steve's voice in his ear, but it was muffled, like it was coming to him under the water. "Easy."

Tony came awake in Steve's bed, choking on a phantom river, drenched in cold sweat.

"Hey, hey." Steve's face was close in the dark, his big hand on Tony's cheek. "You with me?" Tony gasped, then dove face first into Steve's warm chest, rubbing against his chest as Steve's arms came around him. "There you are. Shhh," Steve soothed, rubbing his back, "Deep breaths." Tony could feel the deliberate rise and fall of Steve's chest under his cheek, and he stuttered, trying to make himself match. "What was it?" Steve asked quietly.

"Lady of Shalott. With the fish and the flowers." Tony's voice was small in the dark. And then, even smaller: "But this time I was…"

"What, Tony?"

Drowning. But Tony just shook his head. He couldn't talk about it. If he did, he'd feel the water pouring into his mouth, blistering his throat with the burning cold. If he did, Steve would get that look on his face, the expression that made the heavy lines between his brows a little deeper, and what was the point, anyway? They'd have the same conversation they'd had half a dozen times, with Steve telling him he needed trauma therapy, and Tony saying nothing at all. He just wanted to cram the dream away until next time. He wanted erasure. He wanted…he wanted what he always wanted.

Without a word, Tony lifted his face from Steve's chest, surging up, pushing their mouths together, and Steve kissed back, ready for him, anticipating, opening his mouth for Tony's tongue to hide in.

"Tony?" Steve was breathless as they parted, running his fingers through Tony's hair, letting them slip down Tony's too-bony spine.

"Yes," Tony said, breathless himself.

Steve didn't need to be told twice. Under the covers, he peeled off Tony's pants then kicked out of his own, already erect when Tony's hand closed around his cock. It was probably Pavlovian at this point, Tony thought, flushing with lust, with shame: he'd taught Steve's body that bad dreams meant sex, that an erection was required anytime Tony reached for him after midnight. Still, Tony was grateful for it, wanted him intensely in his ass and his mouth and hot in his hand all at the same time.

"God, you're sohard." Tony could hear the edge of a whine in his voice, shamefully needy, embarrassing, but not embarrassing enough to stop him. Rolling over, he pressed back against Steve with his naked ass, grinding, desperate. This wasn't the way to handle problems. It wasn't. Waking Steve up every night, fucking through the grief and mortal terror, falling asleep again too tired to dream, pretending things were fine in the morning. Rinse. Repeat…Tony whined again and kept grinding.

"Wait, Tony. Just—" There was a brief scuffle in the bedside drawer, and then Steve's wet cock was against his rim, pressing against the muscle. Flirting, foreplay, those were games for evening hours, before Tony's demons came slouching from their hiding places. After midnight, the sex was stripped down to its most basic form. "Ready?" Steve whispered.

Yes," Tony sighed, pushing back against the pressure until Steve finally pushed in. It was disappointingly easy. Tony wanted intensity, wanted some real burn, the kind of sheer physical overwhelm that made his brain white out, but Steve wasn't the only one who'd been trained: Tony's body was completely limp with relief.

I'm sorry, he thought as Steve rocked into him,I'm sorry I need this from you. This isn't your problem. I know it's not was all so much trouble, all for something that was just a band aid, a patch to slap on so Tony could get from one moment to the next, not that Steve ever complained. Tony was terrified Steve would tire of it, that the shine (dull as it already was) would wear off completely, and Steve would put his foot down about waking up four nights a week to soothe a stick insect who had so far refused to help himself. What dire coping mechanism would Tony choose then? Xanies and expensive liquor? He'd done it before, when Pepper had told him the situation was untenable, that she would exercise the nuclear option and stop seeing him full stop unless he got professional help. So he'd gotten it. Gone to the psychiatrist and everything, described his wet-eyed, heart-racing panic, and the nightmares that left him shaking with fear, and he'd come out with a disastrous prescription that could well have been his undoing if Pepper hadn't smelled trouble—

Fucking concentrate, Tony snapped at himself. He was going to go soft if he didn't start paying more attention, going to waste the finite resource of Steve's affection the way he'd wasted Pepper's. Wasted Morgan's. Wasted his mother's. He needed to pay attention to every second…

Steve put his hand on Tony's hip.

The sharp point of bone fit pleasingly in his palm as he pulled Tony in a little tighter. Tony felt so good, always, luxurious, like he was tailor-made for Steve, custom and one-of-a-kind, perfectly right. Tony was still soft and wet from earlier, and Steve rocked into him slowly, savoring the slick heat as Tony moaned low in the back of his throat. It made Steve feel guilty, how much he liked this, how he liked every single thing about it. Steve liked that Tony was still slippery with lube and cum from a few hours before, the mingled fluids hot inside Tony's pliant body. Steve liked the quiet sounds Tony made as they moved together, liked the way Tony pressed back against his chest, a silent request to be wrapped up in Steve's arms. Most of all, he liked Tony's neediness, liked the way Tony looked to him for solace. It felt good to be wanted like that, not for strength or grit, but for tenderness. For so many years, Steve's worth had been tied to his capacity for violence, but he'd left violence far behind, five months and a million years ago. Instead, he was here, the Boyfriend-in-chief, kissing Tony's shoulder blade through a sweaty t-shirt. Reaching around, Steve found Tony's cock under the covers. He wrapped it in a loose fist, stroking slow and deliberate, and Tony hissed deliciously, his hips shifting forward and back from one point of pleasure to the other.

"Good?" Steve asked, just to hear his voice.

Tony's voice was soft, thick-tongued with fatigue and relief. "Yeah, it's good."

"You wanna come?" Steve murmured in his ear—a real question. Tony wasn't rock hard, not like he'd been when they'd made love a few hours ago. He often wasn't for these incredibly late (incredibly early) sessions, and he didn't always care about an orgasm. Steve liked that, too, liked that sometimes Tony's only objective, if it could even be called that, was closeness. Steve had never had sex without a goal post before, and it felt strangely intimate.

"I'm really tired," Tony confessed. "But I think, maybe."

"You should. Help you sleep." It wasn't Steve's only motivation; he was experiencing an intense craving for Tony's orgasm, but he didn't want to add any pressure and kept it to himself. Still, he sped up, just a little, made his thrusts a fraction less sleepy, a fraction more intent, and he could feel Tony's body waking up in response, cock firming, movements tightening, though it remained leisurely as Steve rocked into him, over and over again, letting the pleasure build between them, inexorable.

"Steve," Tony said later, clutching at Steve's arm across his chest, close to tipping over into his climax. Steve reached under the covers for a pair of underwear, and stuck it between the mattress and Tony's cock, sacrificing his boxers to save the sheets. That was the problem with spooning, or maybe just the problem with under-planning…but then Tony was moaning, and any worries about the sheets were gone, eclipsed by Steve's sudden, intense flush of erotic happiness. Tony contracted and then fluttered around him, cock pulsing in Steve's hand, and then Steve came, too, and it was like his own, private summer, lingering and sun-filled.

"Thank you," Tony murmured after, as if this were some favor Steve was doing for him, and not Steve's pleasure and privilege.

"There's no place I'd rather be," Steve murmured back and placed a precise kiss on the nape of Tony's neck. "No place in the world." He pulled out, started to pull away to clean them up, but Tony tangled their ankles together and tugged on Steve's arm, keeping him wrapped around his back.

"Stay?"

"Sure."

Stay. One little word, and Steve felt like he was going to break open because how much more happiness could a man hold? Steve subsided back against the mattress, heart aching with love as he curled around Tony again. He still had a couple hours before Morgan woke up, and he settled an arm over Tony's waist, gratified when Tony sighed and snuggled closer to his chest.I'll set an alarm,he thought dimly.I'll do it in a minute.

But he didn't. He never did.

"Chirrup."

Something furry bumped against Steve's face. When he cracked open an eye, he found Stanley glaring, disapproval all over her feline features. "Chirrup,"she complained again.My bowl is empty. Rectify this problem immediately.

"Get out of my face, Stan," Steve groused, pushing her away. "I'll feed you in a minute."

"Chirr—"

"In a minute. You won't starve." He gave her another push, and she went to the foot of the bed, eyeing him moodily, but he ignored her and burrowed further under the covers; she would just have to wait. Steve was still wrapped tight around Tony's back, morning wood pressed hot against Tony's naked ass, a set of conditions he planned to enjoy a minute or two at least. He circled his hips a couple times, soft and lazy, not enough to wake a sleeping Tony, just enough to feel a little , he thought, kissing the back of Tony's head,you're mine, and I'm yours, and I love you. I love you so would be wet inside from round two, and the thought hit Steve with a satisfying surge of possession. Steve had long admired Tony Stark out in the world: smart, handsome, untouchably polished, but helovedTony this way: half-naked and stubbled, messy, vulnerable in a way only Steve was allowed to see. Steve had had little in life to call his own, but Tony, like this, felt like he belonged to him and him alone. It was a continual wonder.

"Chirrup," Stanley said again.I'm still here, you know, quietly wasting away.

"Yeah, yeah," Steve yawned.

Still lazily grinding, Steve checked his watch, the hands glowing a sickly green in the gray morning light: 6:00. Ash Wednesday. Mass in an hour, and he was determined to go. He'd only been once since Christmas, and he owed God quite a few prayers. He still hadn't decided on something to give up for Lent; it should be something significant this year, something that he'd really consider an absence, to underscore all the new blessings in his life.I could give up this, he thought, savoring a last, slow rock with his hips, knowing that he wouldn't.

He kissed Tony's neck, the soft spot just behind his ear, and rolled over—coming face to face with Morgan Stark standing beside the bed.

"Good morning," Steve breathed, his mind supplying absolutely nothing else. He'd never lost an erection faster in his life. "I was…" Steve wasn't even sure how he'd thought he would end that sentence.

"Are you going to church now?" Morgan asked in a loud whisper, skipping the pleasantries. "You said you were going to church today. Really early, you said."

"Yeah," he agreed, nonplussed.

"Can I go? I'm already dressed." She was, though her sweater was buttoned crooked, and her hair looked like a rat's nest.

"I see that." Surely she had something else to say, something about which bed she'd found him in…
"So can I?" she asked eagerly, apparently uninterested in the sleeping arrangements.

"It'll be kind of boring," he warned. "We're just going to sit there. There won't be any music. I'm not sure you really—"

"Please? I won't think it's boring, Steve. Please?"

"Okay. I'll take you," he agreed, wanting the conversation to end, exquisitely aware of the fact that neither he nor Tony had pants on under the covers. More than that, there was a pair of semen-spattered boxer briefs under there somewhere and probably a wet spot on the mattress. "Give me a minute to get dressed. Find something to do, okay?"And somewhere else to do it."Can you feed the cats? Stanley's hungry."

"I'll feed them! Come on, Stanley!" Morgan dashed off again excitedly, Stanley dashing behind, chirruping all the while. Morgan would give them way too much food; Steve just hoped most of it made it into the bowl and didn't wind up all over the floor like last time.

The sun was coming up over the trees as they drove to town, and the sky was pink and gold and blue, like an Easter egg, though it was only the first day of Lent.

"Steve," Morgan said a few minutes down the road, the words slightly muffled by a mouthful of blueberry muffin, "did Daddy have a bad dream?"

"Yeah," Steve said, surprised. "Yeah, he did." He looked at the rearview mirror, trying to read her expression, but she was watching the morning go by out the window and eating her muffin, completely unconcerned as far as he could tell.

"I thought so. Mommy always cuddled him when he had bad dreams. So he could go back to sleep."

Thanos, Steve's mind supplied,Titan. It was all too easy to fill in the blanks: Tony had traded dreams of Peter dying on Titan for dreams of Pepper dying right in his own backyard. So the nightmares weren't new. Steve had assumed they'd started after October, but they were actually old and ongoing. He was witness only to the latest iteration. It was hardly surprising; Tony Stark had seen all kinds of horrors, but Steve was still saddened by it.

"What'd you do, Morgan," Steve wondered, "when he had bad dreams?"

"Oh, if I was in the bed, I'd cuddle him, too. Daddy called it a sad sandwich."

It shocked a little laugh out of Steve; he could hear Tony saying it so clearly, but inside, Steve's heart broke a little in a way that couldn't be fixed: he could never give Tony that back, the feeling of being surrounded by his girls. All Steve could do was love Tony the best he knew how and hope it was enough.

It was late, eight thirty or so, and Tony was still so tired he felt hungover as he headed down the hall, one slow step at a time. He'd never replaced the wheelchair, deciding it was better (if much, much slower) to putter around the house on his own steam.Every step builds muscle, as his chipper little therapist liked to say, though mornings like this one made him regret his decision. With a motorized wheelchair, he'd have had coffee already in hand.

Of course there were a million things on his schedule: the physical therapist was coming soon, and there was a teleconference with the interim CEO of S.I., and Rhodey was going to come by, and he wanted to call Parker to talk about that wiring diagram…it all exhausted him, but he shouldn't feel so tired. After all, it was Steve who had left a warm bed and a cuddly Morgan to save Tony from his own psyche, Steve who had gotten up before dawn to make breakfast and coffee and keep the house running. Tony wondered if he'd actually made it to Ash Wednesday services. Knowing Steve? Probably. And Tony had barely made it back into his pants.

"Whenever it's early twilight, I watch til a star breaks through—"

Tony stopped short at the end of the hall.

Singing.

There was singing.

In his house.

It was coming from the kitchen, not too loud, but loud enough, the kind of completely sincere singing a normally non-singing person only does when they're sure they don't have an audience. Peeking around the corner, Tony could see through the living room and into the kitchen, and sure enough, there was the songbird. Tony didn't even need binoculars because it was the biggest, hairiest damn songbird he'd ever seen.

"—Funny, it's not a star I see—"

The rare bearded lark was sweeping the floor, swaying a little as he pushed the broom, and singing. Tony had never heard Steve sing before, not in all the years he'd known him. He had a light baritone, pleasant and warm. Positive that Steve would stop if he knew he was being watched, Tony ducked back around the corner. He leaned against the wall, closing his eyes, listening.

"—It's always you—"

Something painful was happening in Tony's chest, a burning tingle, like fingers warming up after a long time in the cold.

"—Wherever you are, you're near me—"

Tony's mother had liked to sing. Even all these years later, Tony occasionally heard her in dreams, her voice floating through the house on a drift of piano. He'd look for her, following the music from room to room, but the conservatory was always empty when he got there, the piano and harp covered with white sheets, the curtains drawn.

"—You dare me to be untrue—"

If she'd been alive, he'd have taken Steve to see her. He knew how it would go: Tea in the conservatory, the sunlight streaming in through the windows, glinting off the silver tea service and the gold leaf on the china. Because Steve was Extra Special, he'd rate the teacups with the gilt bees, the one's from from the estate of a lesser Bonaparte.

"And Tony tells me you sing," his mother said, setting down her cup.

"Oh, no," Steve said immediately, looking startled, "I really don't."

"You lie, Steve?" Tony teased. "To mymother? You sing all the time. You sing in the shower. You sing in your sleep."

"Now who's lying?" Steve muttered, turning a most becoming shade of pink. Tony found Steve's blushes delicious. From experience, he knew they didn't stop at the shirt collar, but just kept on going all the way down…

"But you'll sing for me, won't you?" Maria was already moving to the piano. "I collect singers, you know. Everybody sings for me." His mother coaxed songs from everyone: businessmen, scientists, heads of state, poets, painters, actors, but Captain America would be a particular coup.

"Play 'It's Always You.' He knows that one," Tony offered, ignoring Steve's glare.

"Oh, that's a pretty one. I never get to play that." Maria flipped through a book of standards, opening it to the correct page, setting it on the stand. She played a chord, stretching her long, elegant fingers. She was a good accompanist, able to follow anyone no matter how far they strayed from actual notes or lyrics. "Turn the pages for me, Steve, darling."

Tony smiled behind his cup. It was a shameless ploy; she could play the song blindfolded, but the request forced the reluctant Steve to his feet. She was impossible to resist, his mother.

"Yes, ma'am," Steve said, finally bowing to the afternoon sun shone gold on his hair, gold on his pink cheeks. Maria gave him a beautiful smile, a couple of graceful opening bars, and then a cuing nod…

"—Funny, each time I fall in love, it's always you," Steve sang in the kitchen, the last line trailing away into happily aimless humming. Tony wiped something out his eyes (goop, he told himself, definitely morning goop) and went into the kitchen for his coffee.

"Good morning," Steve said, his face lighting up. There were ashes on his forehead, a big black smear that made him look like he'd walked in from some rubble-strewn battlefield. Abandoning the broom and a pile of swept-up cat food, Steve pulled out a chair for Tony, and the tingling in Tony's chest intensified. God, Steve looked sohappy. It wasn't sustainable, that kind of happiness. Tony didn't trust it; the dizzying height of joy just left you farther to fall…

"Morning," Tony said, not willing to commit a 'good' to it. He eased into the seat while Steve poured him a cup of coffee. Steve set it on the table, then leaned over, kissing the side of his neck, breathing deep. The kiss turned into a not-so-gentle bite.

"Hey," Tony protested with a laugh, "what was that for?"

"You smell good," Steve rumbled.

"So you bit me?"

"Sorry," Steve murmured, gnawing at him, which made Tony suspect he wasn't actually sorry at all.

"You know Rhodey's coming right? You leave visible bite marks, you get to answer for them."

"I'll blame the cat."

"Stanley does have a history of violence," Tony admitted, closing his eyes as Steve continued nibbling and snuffling at his neck. And suddenly, even with a full schedule and a terrible night's sleep, itdidfeel like a good morning. He put a hand into Steve's hair, tipping his head back against the chair so Steve could chew under his chin. He could feel himself smiling, purring a little under Steve's hot is this?Tony this really happiness? Am I really happy right now?It didn't seem possible. Just five minutes ago, he'd been so miserable. Pepper had been dead four months, three weeks, and 1.67 days. He was missing his right arm, and it didn't seem to be regrowing. His kid wouldn't touch him. A garden snail could beat him in a speed run, and occasionally he still hallucinated anchovies. Still—

"Steve? Daddy?"

Tony opened his eyes, and Steve snapped upright like they'd just been caught by General Eisenhower. Morgan was standing at the edge of the kitchen, a piece of yellow construction paper in her hand. Like Steve, she was black from the eyebrows up. It stirred something in Tony's mind, churned up some long-forgotten memory of mass with his Italian mother. She'd been drummed out of the church for marrying outside the faith, hadn't been able to take Communion, go to confession, have her child baptised. But she'd still gone sometimes, and Tony had liked to go with her to see the elaborate pomp of the mass, though he hadn't even believed in it at the time.Religion is a fairy tale, Tony,Howard had intoned,a story people tell themselves because they're afraid of dying or a lie they tell other people to control them. God is just a big Tooth Fairy, and Heaven is a euphemism for a hole in the ground.He'd been so sure. Tony had been sure, too, sure Howard was right for so long, though he was considerably less sure post-coma; maybe Maria and her quiet counter-programming was finally kicking in.And look at this one, Mom, Tony thought,you might get a good little Catholic after the mysticism just skipped a generation.

"Good morning, Morguna," he said calmly. Acting guilty made you guilty whether you'd done something (or someone) wrong or not. He'd been caught before and in much more compromising positions. The key was to play it cool.

"What are you doing?" she asked, her eyes snapping back and forth from one to the other. While Tony maintained an expression of strict neutrality, Steve looked like he'd been caught pilfering from the poor box.

"Having coffee." Tony lifted his cup by way of demonstration. "We're both having coffee. Would you like some?"

"Some…coffee?" Morgan was intrigued but suspicious. "Coffee is just for grown-ups."

"True, but today you can have some. Special one-time offer."

"Will I like it?" she asked shrewdly.

"Probably not."

After a moment's consideration, curiosity won out. "I want my own cup. Like yours." She slid into the chair on the opposite side of the table, still watching them closely, like they'd slip and do something else interesting.

"Steve," Tony said, turning to look over his shoulder at Steve; he seemed to be glued to the spot, "get this lady a cup of coffee, will you?"

Steve blinked at him, blinked at Morgan. "Okay. How…how does she take it?" Tony turned back to the table.

"How do you take your coffee, Morgunaline?"

"What's that mean?"

"Means 'what do you want in it.'"

"What's in yours?"

"Just coffee."

She nodded, taking in the information and looked over into Steve's cup sitting beside her on the table."What's in Steve's?"

"A tooth-rotting quantity of sugar and half a dairy cow."

"I want that."

"Barista?" Tony said, looking over his shoulder at the still-frozen Steve. Steve practically bolted for the coffee pot, relieved to have something to do other than stand around being scrutinized by a suspicious preschooler, but Tony was made of sterner stuff, holding Morgan's gaze as he sipped at his mug.

"What was Steve doing to your neck?" she asked him, eyes narrowed.

"Smelling it."

"Why?"

"Because I smell good."

Steve came back to the table, presenting Morgan a creamy coffee in a Stark Industries mug identical to Tony's. Morgan eyed it warily, then took a tentative sip. Her eyes popped, and she had another. And then another.

"What have you got there, Morguna?" he asked, nodding towards her sheet of yellow paper.

"A letter for Santa. I need an envelope and some stamps." Steve quietly produced a box of envelopes and a stamp book from a kitchen drawer and set them on the table, sliding into a chair like he'd hoped nobody would notice him there.

"You know Christmas isn't for nine months, right?" Tony asked her.

"I know. It's not about Christmas presents. You can read it, if you want," she offered, holding out the paper to him. It was covered in little drawings and a jumble of vague, letter-shaped squiggles.

"Maybe you could read it to me? I don't have my glasses."

"Dear Santa," Morgan began, finger following the word-ish scrawl, "please give Daddy good dreams tonight and give me a stuffed otter in my Easter basket. The End.Steve said you had a bad dream last night. I saw him cuddle you," Morgan explained to a quizzical Tony. "I said a prayer for good dreams, too. You know, at church? But I'm not sure praying really works. I think it might be just pretending."Oh, well, Mom. Evidently, Howard's skeptical genetics remained dominant in the family line.

"But you're confident in Santa?" Tony asked. He shot a look towards Steve, but Steve was looking determinedly into his mug. Apparently, the Boyfriend-in-chief had been caught twice in one day. No wonder he looked so guilty.

"Santa brought me a stuffed owl," Morgan pointed out reasonably. "And I asked Santa for you to wake up in my Christmas letter. Steve said you can't ask Santa for stuff like that. He said you have to ask God, but I did it anyway." Tony felt a shiver run down his spine, like someone had stepped on his grave.She wants Tony Stark for Christmas, Pepper said in his ear.It's what Steve Rogers wants, too. He asked God on his knees at midnight mass.

"Question," he said, recovering, "if you're making requests for your Easter basket, shouldn't you write to the Easter Bunny?"

"No," she scoffed, folding her letter and cramming it in an envelope. "That's silly. Bunny holes don't have a mailbox. And bunnies can't read."

"Right," Tony agreed. "Right. Flawless logic. But how's the Easter Bunny going to get the message?"

"Santa Claus will read it to read." She licked the envelope flap and stuck it down, then added a handful of stamps, enough to send it to China, but neither he nor Steve intervened. "Will you write the address?" She asked, handing Steve the sealed letter as if he were her personal secretary, and took a last gulp of sugary coffee. "Coffee is good," she pronounced when she was through, wiping her mouth with the back of her hand, jumping out of her chair. "I'm going to go play Barbies." She bounded up the stairs.

There was silence in the kitchen; they listened to the pounding of her feet on the upstairs landing, the unnecessary slam of her bedroom door.

"She was really going to town on the coffee," Tony observed. "Just how much sugar did you add? She wasn't actually supposed to like it, you know."

"Oh," Steve said, sounding a little dazed. "Did we…did we actually get away with that?" Steve wondered, staring at Morgan's abandoned cup.

"I doubt it." Tony took another sip of coffee. "She knows what she saw. It's rattling around that little brain of hers now, processing. She caught us in bed, I take it."

"Yeah." Steve rubbed the back of his neck. "She guessed you'd had a nightmare." Gently, he added, "Morgan said she used to hold you when they happened. She and Pepper. She assumed I was doing the same."

"We're getting sloppy, Steve."

"Maybe we should just tell her, Tony."

"Tell her what? That we're 'seeing each other'? That doesn't mean anything to a five-year-old, not really."

"Well, we're going to have to tell her something sometime. We'd better start thinking of what it should be."

Tony had thought of telling her himself:I love him, Morgan.I love him like you love him, and I think we should keep him. But Tony was reluctant to say it. Steve would be trapped if he did, inextricably bound to the Stark Family Unit even more than he was now. Steve thought he wanted it; Tony could see him salivating over the domestic handcuffs, but Tony didn't trust his motivations because he still didn't understand them, not really. He studied Steve's earnest face: the stupid, straight nose, the strong chin, the golden hair, a perfect match to Steve's straight, strong, bright morality, and couldn't explain what Steve might love in him. He reached for him, smoothing back some blond escapees from his blackened forehead.

"You look like you've been cursed," Tony observed, running his fingers just around the edge of the ashes.

"It's a blessing."

"I don't know, dust to dust returnestsounds pretty curse-y."

"We all die. It's not bad to think about it, consider what we want to do with the time we've got left, however long it is."

"Have you been thinking about what you want?"

"No." Steve leaned forward and snagged Tony around the back of the neck, holding him still while he placed a kiss in the middle of Tony's forehead, right where a smear of ashes ought to go. "I don't need to think about it, Tony. I've got what I want."

And the way Steve said it, with that certain, steady faith, almost made Tony believe it.

Steve was readingThe Goldfinch. He'd gotten the impression somehow that it was about a kid from New York who loved art and accidentally stole a famous painting. That impression had turned out to be only kinda halfway right. More accurately, it was eight hundred pages about a guy's soul being slowly eroded by a secret he didn't even want to keep but that he was, so far, too cowardly to reveal. Eight hundred pages of guilt and depression, rationalization and self-deception. Steve was pretty sure he hated it, but he also couldn't put it down. It might all be worth it if it had a happy ending.

"Steve?" Morgan dumped another shovelful of cold sand onto Steve's bare foot. They were at the little beach by the lake, enjoying the sunshine. It was still chilly, but the breeze was soft and smelled like green, growing things.

"Hmmm?" Steve flipped the page.

"Steve, what does Daddy smell like?"

It had been a week since she'd caught Steve chewing on her father's neck at the kitchen table, just enough time that Steve had convinced himself he was going to get away with it after all. He should have known better.

"I don't know exactly." Steve closed his book and put it on the sand beside his shoes. It wasn't what Tony would've done; Tony would've kept reading and played it cool as far as possible. But he wasn't Tony.

"Daddy says he smells good. Doyouthink he smells good?"Oh boy. Maybe he should have kept the book after all.

"Yeah, he does. He smells good." He could hear the conversation getting repeated somewhere, maybe over lunch with Parker:Peter, do you think Daddy smells good? Steve says he smells what was Steve supposed to say? Was he supposed to say Tony smelled bad? That wasn't any better.

"DoIsmell good?" Morgan added more sand, then some more, until Steve's ankle culminated in a vague, sandy lump.

"You smell terrific, sweetheart," he assured her, happy for the change of topic.

"What do I smell like?"

He thought about it. She smelled like lavender shampoo and clean laundry, and Tony smelled like fancy shaving cream and expensive aftershave. But under that? Under that there was something else, something warm and ineffable, something complex and deeply human, and he couldn't get enough of it from either of them..

"I don't know. I don't know how to explain it. It's hard to describe. You just smell like you."

Morgan abandoned her shovel and put her arms around him, leaving little sandy handprints on his sweater as she buried her nose in his neck."Are you smelling me now?"

"Yep." She really was, taking big, theatrical whiffs of him. He was oddly touched by it, somehow. "You smell like…you smell like a lion," she pronounced.

"A lion?" he laughed. "Is that good?"

"Yep. All lions smell good." She said it confidently, as if it were a known and universally acknowledged truth. With one last sniff, she let him go and went back to shoveling, burying his other foot this time. When she was through, she started decorating the pile, adding leaves and twigs and pebbles. Steve was about to pick his book back up when she said, matter-of-fact, "I wish I remembered what Mommy smelled like. She smelled good, I bet." Steve felt his heart break a little. "I don't remember what Daddy smells like, either." His heart broke a little worse.

"Parker," Tony poked at a wire, "thissucks." He stuck his finger under it and pulled it free from its sad connection. "I'm supposed to wear this thing, remember? And here you are, trying to send me out in the world with shoddy soldering."

"Hey!" Peter protested. "Don't do that! Don't pull stuff out! Just flag it with the colored tape!"

"Do it right the first time, and I won't have to. At the rate we're going, this project is already going to take us into the next century. Why don't you want to be homeschooled again? I can teach you ten times whatever it is you think you're learning at Midtown, and I'll only keep you, what? Three days a week? Monday, Wednesday, Friday? And then we'd both get our weekends back."

The kid came on Saturdays. He was terrible at soldering and could barely weld. Some days, Tony thought a monkey in a little hat would be a better assistant; they'd never finish at the rate they were going. Tony also found he didn't much care. The hours he got with Peter were easily the best part of the week.

Other than the hours Steve spent fucking him stupid, of course.

"Yeah, well," Parker said, rubbing the back of his neck. "I don't know. I don't think May would let me drop out of school—"

"You wouldn't drop out. I mean, not technically. You'd re-enroll at the Stark Institute for Biomimetics. Tell her that the program comes with scholarship money and a guaranteed spot at MIT whenever you're ready to matriculate. You're going to get publications out of this, Parker."

"But I kinda, y'know,likehigh school. I want to graduate with my class."

"Since when?" Tony scoffed. "Before the Blip, you'd have thrown over dear old Midtown High in a New York minute for a chance at private tutoring with yours truly."

Peter, turning pink, grabbed some tiny pliers and dove back into the wiring.

Interesting.

Something had changed, but Parker evidently wasn't going to tell him about it. As far as Tony remembered, high school was more or less a boring waste of time for a budding genius, which Parker certainly was. Except for occasional house parties and fingering his fellow classmates in the back of his GTO, Tony's stint in traditional high school had boasted few charms…Tony snatched the tiny pliers back.

"It's the girl," Tony asserted. "The girl 'friend,' emphasis on 'friend.' You two using the condoms I put in your wallet?"

"What?" Peter was blushing furiously now; he was almost as pink-prone as Steve. "No, she—We aren't—Give me the pliers."

"So itisthe girl." Tony stuck the pliers in his back pocket. "I want to see her picture again."

"I–"

"Picture!" Tony barked.

Peter fumbled out his phone, scrolled through his photos, then presented it sheepishly. Tony narrowed his eyes, not quite believing it. "This girl is gorgeous, Parker. What is she doing hanging out with a dork like you?" He studied the picture again with a more critical eye, going pixel by pixel, taking in the clothes, the posture, the less-than-perfectly-plucked eyebrows. "Ah, okay. I see it now. You're crushing on The Weird Girl."

"What?" Peter said, taking the phone back. "No! What do you mean? She's not—"

"Yes, she is. I was a pimply teenager once. I remember the taxonomy, and that's aWeirdus girliusif I ever saw one. No, no," Tony said, raising his hand before Peter could interrupt, "I like this. This is promising. 'Weird Girl' is good for you. You're a dweeb of the highest caliber. I mean, my god, you're seventeen, and you spend your Saturdays looking at wiring diagrams—"

"Hey, who's fault is—"

"No normal girl would look at you twice, but this one mightactuallylike you. Have you asked her out? Other than that sad dance you took her to as a 'friend'?"

"No."

"Well, why not?"

"I dunno. I was kinda sorta thinking I might?" Parker's voice squeaked up at the end in a hesitant question mark. "But if she says 'no,' then…"

"Then she says 'no,' and you're no worse off than you were before. You've got no girlfriend either way."

"But what if she says 'no' and then doesn't want to be friends at all? She's, y'know—she's…" he searched for the word. "She'sintegral."

Integral.

Tony felt a sharp pain, like a quick jab with a needle straight into his . He understood 'integral.' Pepper had been integral which is why dating her had been so terrifying. One false move, and it seemed like his whole life would go down in flames.

"That's tough," Tony admitted. "Integral is tough. But the other possibility is someone else asks her out, and then you're friend-zoned. You ready to hear about her love life? Being your crush's confidante is a uniquely excruciating form of hell."

Parker looked vaguely ill just thinking about it. "Well…" he chewed his lip. "How would I even…how would you do it?"

"In English. Unless The Weird Girl would be impressed by a proposition in Klingon."

"No! I mean—" But Parker was interrupted by the garage door opening. Steve came in wearing Pepper's ruffled apron tied around his waist and carrying a tray. He looked distinctly put out.

"Lunch," he announced brusquely, setting the tray on an empty corner of the table and distributing bowls of soup. "Morgan helped put in the vegetables, so the ends of the carrots and a few potato peels made it in there. I fished out what I could find, but you might not want to eat it with your eyes closed."

"Oh, uh, thanks?" Peter eyed his bowl dubiously.

"No problem." Steve set Tony's spoon down harder than necessary beside and gave Tony a pointed look. "When I get this bowl back, it needs to be empty. Completely empty." It sounded like a threat. "Eat these, too." A plate of saltine crackers appeared beside Tony's soup bowl, each spread with a generous glob of butter.

"Are those buttered crackers?" Peter wondered. He reached for one curiously, and Steveswatted his hand.

"Those are Tony's, and he has to eat all of them."

"I respond better to a gentle 'here comes the choo-choo,'" Tony said archly.

"I mean it, Tony. Don't try me."

"What's got your panties in wad? Did Morgan use your toothbrush on the cat again or something?"

"Dr. Basu called me with the results from your bloodwork." Tony felt a pang of guilt. Or maybe that was just regret at being caught. Sometimes it was hard to tell the difference. "You want to guess what he said?" Steve continued without waiting for an answer. "You're severely the word he used. He's not happy with your weight, Tony. Not at all. I believe he used the word 'atrocious.' Which you completely failed to tell me after your appointment last week."

"That's not true," Tony protested weakly. "I told you Basu said I needed to gain a few pounds."

"A few pounds?!" Steve was going red in the face. "Tony, he wants to put you back on a feeding tube!"

The correct response went like this:Gee, I'm sure sorry, Cap, but I didn't want you to worry. Besides, it isn't sexy to tell your new boyfriend you're the exact same poundage as a middle school girl—

"And why ismydoctor talking to you aboutmyweight, exactly?" Tony asked peevishly, losing the battle with his impulses. He wasn't about to snivel an apology, particularly in front of Parker—

"Because you never answer the phone, and I'm on the paperwork. Why didn't you tell—?"

"Friday," Tony said irritably, "remind me to update my medical disclosure forms—"

"Friday," Steve said over him, "belay that order. Tony, if you take me off that contact list, swear to God, I'll—"

Parker loudly cleared his throat, "The soup's really good, you guys!"

"Nevermind. We'll discuss it later," Steve muttered with a shake of his head, heading for the door.

"Wait." Tony snagged the trailing end of Steve's apron sash and reeled him back towards the table. He could still save the situation, maybe, smooth it over, at least make it easier to talk about later. "Wait. Steve, thank you for lunch."

"You're welcome," Steve said stiffly, still clearly wanting to leave.

"I'll eat the crackers."

"Damn right you will," Steve snorted, not mollified in the slightest.

Tony tried again, giving the apron string what he hoped was an affectionate tug. "The kid needs some help: he wants to ask out a girl at school."

"Is that right?" Steve's expression softened, at least in the kid's direction. "Good for you. If I had one piece of advice I could go back and give myself, it'd be to maintain some kind of personal life. The job will take all of it if you're not careful."

"But I don't know what to say to her," Peter explained.

"Well, that's an easy one," Steve said with confidence. "Tell her you want to take her on a date. If she says 'yes,' take her to the movies Friday and let her pick what to see. If she says 'no,' take Ned and you pick. Either way, there's popcorn."

Peter nodded earnestly, looking like he wanted to take notes.

"Okay," Tony interrupted, dismayed. "Whoa. No. Absolutely do not do that. I take it back. We are un-asking your advice."

"We are?" Peter's eyes went wide. "I thought that sounded pretty good."

"I mean, it was fine except for the use of the 'd' word. See how the movie goes, andthendecide if it's a date when you take her home."

"But itisa date—?"

"Kid, nothing is a date until you try to get physical. Up to the lip lock, it's just an outing. If this girl is important to the day-to-day functioning of your life, leave it nebulous until you're confident it'll work out."

"I disagree," Steve said firmly. "It's not fair to the girl. Tell her what you want, then she gets to decide if she wants it, too. Everyone should understand the stakes."

"But this isn't just some girl he likes, Rogers. This girl is a real, actual friend. It's a…a Pepper situation."

"A 'Pepper situation.'" Steve repeated, frowning.

"Means she's too important to—" Steve waved him off.

"Do you love her?" he asked Peter.

"Love?" Tony scoffed. "Love? He's seventeen. He can't—"

"Yes," Parker said. "Yeah, I do. I mean, at least I think so."

"Then you've got no choice. You've got to tell her." Steve's gaze moved from Peter to Tony, so direct it made Tony want to squirm in his seat. "I learned the hard way that lies of omission are still lies, and that if you wait too long to tell someone how you feel, you might never get the opportunity. Now," Steve tugged back the tail end of his apron, and its reclamation hurt more than Tony expected, "if you'll excuse me. I left Morgan alone with a box of Legos, and I'd rather they didn't end up all over the floor. They really hurt if you step on 'em. That's another thing I've learned the hard way. And Tony," his mouth compressed into a thin, disapproving line, "if you don't eat every one of those crackers…" he trailed off, but it was threat enough.

Tony watched him go in silence; Tony could feel Peter's stare boring into the side of his skull. "What?" he snapped.

"Nothing," Peter said, in that way people do when 'nothing' is most definitely 'something.'

Tony grabbed the tiny pliers out of his pocket and thrust them towards Parker. "Shut up, and get back to work."