[AO3 Crosspost] Dots: 2-4, 1-2-3, 1-3-6 [2/2]

[terresdebrume]

✗ TECHNICAL DETAILS

FANDOM: Marvel’s MCU
SERIES: The Dots Verse
RATING: Mature
WORDCOUNT: 10 599
PAIRING(S): FrostIron
CHARACTER(S): Loki, Tony Stark, Thor, Sif, Natasha Romanov, Clint Barton, Pepper Potts, Steve Rogers
GENRE: Alternate Universe (Blind!Loki)
TRIGGER WARNING(S): None
SUMMARY: In a moment of anger against his stepmother, Tony decides to screw his previous plans and applies to a British university for a degree in modern language. He doesn’t know it yet, but it may be the best decision he’s made all his life.
NOTE(S): Written for an Anon who wanted a college AU.

THE DOTS VERSE ON LIVEJOURNAL: [Series Masterpost] [Dots part 1]


--------------------------------------------------

{One year and eight months ago}

Finals come and go.

On the last day of exams, After Tony and Clint are done with German, and Natasha’s out from her Russian session, they decide to buy some McDonald’s and got to the park to enjoy the sunshine. It’s a nice morning of mid-June, and Tony catches himself thinking back on last summer, when he was still eighteen and thinking of maybe going to MIT, until he changed his mind.

He doesn’t regret it. He knows he can still go there once he’s done with his Modern Language degree if he wants, because his gift for mechanics and machinery isn’t going to disappear overtime.
In the meantime, he’s met people he would never even have heard of if he’d stayed in the US. Clint and Natasha, though strange and a bit too skilled in the art of fighting for Tony’s taste, are good friends. They taught him a few basics of self-defense, in return for him looking at Natasha’s broken car and, really, that’s not much of a payment when he enjoyed it so much.
Then there’s also Sif, and Thor, and Thrúd, with their big smiles and their loud voices, and the first job Tony has ever had. He likes the atmosphere of their café, the buzz of rush hour, and the strain in his legs from the few times he works full day. And of course, there’s Loki.

Loki holds a special place in Tony’s mind, not because he’s a teacher, not really. Rather because, like Clint or Natasha, he doesn’t care one peanut about who Tony’s father is. All he cares about is what Tony can or cannot do, and he’s constantly pushing him to be better, to think harder.
They’ve bonded, over the previous month. Now they talk about all and nothing: the latest book they’ve read, Barack Obama, the value of ‘mate’ over ‘dude’, Tony’s cars collection… and one memorable morning, Loki’s motorbike, which is still sitting in his garage.

“You could have it, if you’re interested,” he says, and Tony stares.

“I’m… thanks. Thanks for the offer, really, but I… well. I’m not really into bikes, to be honest. It’s more my best friend’s thing.”

“Then take it and gift it to him,” Loki shrugs without slowing the movement of his fingers on his keyboard. “It’s not like I’ll ever use it again anyway, and Thor’s always hated it. I only ask for one thing.”

“What is it?” Tony asks, rising to greet the newly arrived customers.

“It’s called Sleipnir. I know it might sound stupid, but I’d really appreciate it if this didn’t change.”

“Uh… okay,” Tony says. “Sure.”

“Good. You’ll have to work on it before it’s back in working order though. It had several things to fix before I became blind, and I never asked anyone to fix it.”

“Not a problem,” Tony says, and he hurries back behind the counter.

{One years, seven months and three weeks ago}

Tony whistles when he sees the garage, neat and ordered and covered in a thin sheet of gray dust.

“Wow,” he says, “when’s the last time you came here?”

“I was nineteen,” Loki says. “I came to check what needed to be done, and what I could do myself.” He keeps his breath shallow, Tony notices, probably to avoid getting too much dust into his lungs… he’s more sensitive to smells than anyone Tony’s ever met. “The next day, my boyfriend and I decided to go for a weekend in Paris. We went to Calais, rented a car. The other driver was drunk out of his mind, and it wasn’t even eleven. I was the one who got caught on impact, but and Victor died on the spot. I got away with cornea scarring, a little brain damage and a few scars.”

Tony isn’t really sure what to say.

The way Loki speaks, it’s obvious he’s learned to live with what happened, even if it still pains him. There’s nothing Tony can do about survivor guilt, though, aside from putting a hand on Loki’s shoulder and squeezing a little, because Loki may have twelve years on him, but they’re friends now and that’s what friends do.

For a second, Loki tenses under Tony’s hand, and he fears he’s spoiled something, but Loki relaxes quickly enough, and he fishes in his pocket for a small golden key with a silver mask keychain.

“There,” he says, taking Tony’s hand to put the key in it, “this way you don’t have to wait for me to come and work on it.”

Tony nods, even if it’s useless, and pockets the key, while Loki checks the time on his watch. It’s a large thing with a strong leather band, and the glass opens so that Loki can touch the clock. Tony knows there’s a raised line where the number twelve would normally appear, two dots for three, six and nine, and then only one dot for the other numbers. All it takes is for Loki to touch the hands for a quick second, and he says:

“It’s nearly lunchtime now… How do you feel about spaghetti Bolognese?”

“Uh… I didn’t see an Italian nearby,” Tony says, and Loki chuckles.

“I can cook, you know. Come on, I’ll show you.”

In a way, Tony is surprised to find that Loki’s flat looks like any other flat he’s visited. It’s wide, and clear, with soft green and blues everywhere, a color scheme that strikes Tony as very Loki, once he sheds the armor he wears outside.

Actually, what looks different here is, precisely, Loki.

In the street, at Uni, at the café, there’s a carefulness to his demeanor, because he’s never sure what is or isn’t there, what people will do. Will they go out of their way to avoid him? To bump into him? Will they notice him or not, will they be careful or not, will they help or not… whenever Tony thinks about it, it feels insane, the number of things in Loki’s life that depend on people he’s never met before, people he’ll never meet again. It feels unfair and scary to imagine, and every time Tony is struck by an egoistic –and somewhat cruel- relief that he isn’t in this position, and admiration for the way Loki never lets it affect him or his life. He wonders if all blind people are like him, determined never to let the world hurt them. He wonders if he’d be the same in his position.

As soon as he passes the door, Loki rests his cane in the hallway, and greets Fenrir, who was waiting by the sofa. The flat is extremely tidy, yet not in that un-lived in way you get from magazine. It’s more of a way for him not to have to worry about unexpected obstacles, Tony guesses.
Immediately on the right, there is a dark grey wall that is about waist-high, but Tony can’t see what’s behind. On his left, a sofa, apparently convertible. It’s dark grey too, a sharp contrast to the pale blue-green of the walls, but it fits, and Tony smiles as he follows Loki to his kitchen.

Actually, it’s an island rather than a separate room. Loki steps into the square, which is surrounded by bar stools, and Tony watches him trail his fingers on the edges of cupboard door, where small Braille labels are stapled. Simple, really, but tony wouldn’t have thought about it before. He keeps watching as Loki sets the fire going, heat controls identified with dots of bright green glass-like glue, the professor’s fingers sure and practiced around his instruments.

“How do you distinguish between Bolognese and Carbonara?” Tony asks at last, tearing his gaze from where it wandered, at the crook of Loki’s spine. “And how do you not mistake that with other kind of sauces or whatever?”

“Thor or Sif usually help me mark the pots,” Loki answers, and throws the sauce at Tony. The plastic lid sports two long gashes, put here by the blade of a kitchen knife, no doubt, and Tony nods.

“I can’t believe I haven’t thought of half the things you do to help yourself,” he says, and Loki chuckles:

“That’s because you like to think life’s more complicated than it really is.”

Tony doesn’t have anything to say to counter the argument so he just shrugs. Loki doesn’t seem to be bothered by the lack of sound, and he continues his cooking in silence, until Tony asks:

“How do you grade our papers, by the way? I’ve always wondered, since it’s obviously not you who write in the margins.”

“Oh I can still write,” Loki corrects, pouring the pasta into boiling water. “I’ve done it for sixteen years, and I remember how to. But since it needs to be tidy for copies, I’ve hired a help of sorts. Jane comes in every two nights. She reads the papers to me and I tell her what to write. It’s a bit tedious, but we manage. And it gives us an occasion to chat a little, which is always nice.”

“Are you sure you’re allowed to do that?” Tony frowns, and Loki pushes him aside to reach for plates.

“The staff never complained. Jane isn’t even from the campus, she’s got no tie there aside from me –she works for an independent laboratory. As for the students, they never learned about this, and I trust you not to go babble about the method. Some people would actually try to sue me for that.”

It makes Tony half sad and half angry that he can name most of the people in his year who would be the ones to try and sue Loki. Those dicks who never learned to stop and still throw papers at each others, detailing in very crude words what they’d do to Loki if they could. Sometimes it’s violent, sometimes, it’s sexual. More often than not, it’s a mix of both, and Tony ends up shaking in his chair every time one of those papers land on his desk. Clint and Natasha are on his side, he knows, but it’s not the same. They do it because it’s moral, not because they really care about Loki.

Sometimes, it frightens Tony, the affection he feels for this man.

They eat in silence at the counter, careful not to spill Bolognese sauce all over themselves. Frustratingly enough, Loki is more successful than Tony, and he jokes about it, accusing Loki of sorcery. They both laugh like idiots.

“So,” Tony says after they’re done, when it’s time for him to leave and he doesn’t feel like it, “Guess I’ll see you around then? Between Sleipnir and the café….”

“Oh, I don’t come in that much during summer,” Loki says. “Friends of mine are coming over from San Francisco, we’ll probably spend our time doing sightseeing or something.” He pauses, then amends: “Or, well. One of us will, the others will do some sight-touching and audio guide listening.”

Tony smiles.

{One year and six months ago}

“Come on Stark, you said you’d keep up!” Clint calls over his shoulder, and Tony groans:

“Yeah, when I thought you were jogging, I didn’t know you were adepts of daily marathon!”

Natasha laughs –laughs, the traitor- and she and Clint resume their pace of practiced running, talking and joking while Tony struggles to keep his lungs and stomach inside his body. It goes on for a few more minutes, until Natasha points at another path in the park, one that comes from their right and fusion with theirs:

“Hey, isn’t that professor Odinson?”

Tony looks around, and indeed, there is Loki, clad in plain green shorts and black wife beater, grinning and shining with sweat. Thor is running next to him, their wrists linked by a loose green ribbon. There are two other men with them, one is as tall as Thor, black hair trailing behind him as he runs, his wrist linked to the black man at his side, whose eyes seem to point to the sky. Their groups join at the intersection, and Tony ends up running next to Loki and Thor, with Clint and Natasha behind him, and the two strangers closing the march.

They finish their session together, merged into one bigger group, and when they’re done, Thor and the man who looks like a native American –Mai, his name is- go buy them ice cream to reward them. (It’s terrible for their health, apparently, but Tony insisted, because he needs to eat something sugary anyway.)

He lies in the grass next to Loki, whose face is turned toward the sun, eyes wide open and pupils dilated by the post-run rush of endorphins. They talk about all and nothing, the weather, how they’re spending their holidays, Natasha’s planned trip to Russia with her girlfriend, Clint’s struggles to woo his right hand neighbor. Eventually, after a long debate about the value of Psychic Type versus Specter Type and a quick incursion in the land of Homophobia Is Mostly Fear Of Misogyny, Clint and Natasha have to leave, one because he’s waiting tables in a Chinese restaurant, and the other because Darcy insisted on a date night for their third month anniversary.

Tony stays with Thor and the others, ignoring Clint and Natasha’s mocking gazes and mouthing of ‘brown noooooose’, because they don’t mean it, and the truth is much more pathetic than that anyway. They talk for a while more, before Thor announces he’s got to go back to the café for his shift.

“You’re going to be okay Loki?”

“My cane is in your backpack. Just leave it with me, I’ll come by to take Fenrir back.”

“Good,” Thor answers, and Anansi rises too.

“Mind giving us a lift?” He asks. “I’d like to shower, and Mai needs one too, if we want to be presentable for the ballet tonight.”

Thor agrees, and Tony finds himself alone with Loki. He’s not sure it it’s just him, or if the atmosphere really did change in the few seconds it took for the others to leave. They keep talking about all and nothing: Pepper and Steve, and his parents; how Loki met Mai during a trip in America, and how they got into a fight with a couple of guys who didn’t approve of Anansi walking down their street. Tony learns that Loki and Thor used to fight all the time when they were younger.

“After the accident, he was the only one I could really trust,” Loki says. “I never got along with my parents. Not that we fight or anything, but I don’t get them, and they don’t get me. Thor and I don’t always get each other either, but we’ve practically grown alone together, so in the end, even if we fought all the time, it’s… you know. We got each other’s back.”

“I’m the same with my sister,” Tony admits. “Pep and I are constantly arguing for stupid things, and we drive each other crazy, but I’m the only one allowed to mess with her, and vice versa. It’s not too bad a motto.”

Loki chuckles, and Tony leans on his side, head resting on his hand to get a good look at him. His eyes are wide open, fixed on the sky to catch as much light as possible, and the sun makes them look almost transparent. Tony watches the flaming curls shining with the sunlight, the smooth chin. He counts the scars around Loki’s right eye, pale and shiny with sweat and daylight, lets his eyes trail down Loki’s throat, his collarbones, and then further down, his stomach, smooth though not exactly toned, and then….

Tony looks at his face again.

“I’d like to know what you’re like,” Loki says, completely out of the blue, and Tony’s brain short-circuits.

“What?”

“I’d like to look at you,” Loki explains. “My way.”

Tony must have made of agreement, because Loki props himself upwards and sits cross legged, turned toward him. Tony mimics his position, tries to force his breathing back to normal -but it’s mostly a failure- and then takes Loki’s wrists and bring his hands to his face.

He’s surprised that Loki’s hands aren’t soft.

They’re not callused exactly, not like his, but they’re… rough. Like someone forgot to polish the skin after they conceived the prototype, or maybe like extra layers compared to your average human. Tony closes his eyes, unable to look at Loki’s face for now, and he concentrates on the feel of his fingers on his cheeks, his eyebrows, his ears. Loki traces the outline of his face, soft like a thought, and inches his way inward to trace the bridge of his nose, the outline of his smile.

Tony opens his eyes when he feels a finger trace his lips, almost painful with delicacy where it touches his upper lip. Loki’s face is close enough that Tony can see every single scar smattered on his temple, and the sun is still bright enough that his hair looks on fire, red and gold, and a hint of bronze just at the corner of Loki’s left eye, where the longest scar links his eyelids and his scalp.

The spot looks soft, and oddly attracting, and Tony leans forward to kiss it.

Loki’s hands fall away from his face like he’s been burnt, and Tony hears him stammering an apology before he gets up, unfolds his cane, and walks away with a speed Tony never expected to see him use.

It’s the fifteenth of August, and it’s the last time he sees Loki that summer.

{One year and four months ago}

One of the first thing they talk about when the term starts again is that afternoon at the park. Loki says it shouldn’t have happened, and he hopes Tony understands that, and also that their relationships should remain strictly professional from now on, to prevent that kind of things from happening again.

Tony agrees, tries to convince himself that Loki is right and this is for the best, but he can’t help feeling like he’s been robbed somehow, not of something he had, but something he could have had, something that could have been one of the best thing he’d ever have.

And maybe it’s cliché, maybe it’s not, but Tony still feels more than a little depressed by the thought.

{One year ago}

He gets the highest notes of the promotion for the end of term exams.

Apparently, throwing yourself into your studies does pay off on the academic side, and Tony has been dutifully abandoning social life for the past three months, spending his time drunk out of his mind or plunged in his textbooks.

He notices the concerned gazes of Clint and Natasha, to whom he hasn’t spoken since he’s had this conversation with Loki. He knows Clint finally managed to ask Phil out, and they look happy when he sees them. He hopes they go on double dates with Darcy and Natasha, just because the four of them would terrify an entire restaurant with just one arched eyebrow –they all have the Judgmental Eyebrow down to a T.

He also notices the way Loki’s head turns the other side when he walks past him, as if not allowing Tony to see his eyes is really going to change something. Tony chalks it up to a habit he kept from back when he could still see, but it doesn’t hurt any less.

Thor corners him the day after Christmas, asking if Tony knows what happened to Loki.

It’s a trick question: of course Thor knows, or at least guesses what happened. Thor may not always be the brightest tool in the shed, but he is a people person, he feels when people around him are upset, even when he doesn’t understand why, and that makes Tony wonder how much of his and Loki’s bad relationships during their teenage years was his fault, and how much was Loki’s.

He doesn’t think he’ll find out.

After a few minutes of stubborn and unconvincing denial, Thor sighs, annoyed, and he says curtly:

“Look, what happened between you two is your business. He won’t talk to me about it either, and even if I wish one of you would trust me for once, I won’t insist anymore. But you need to get your act together, Tony, because your grades may have skyrocketed but you’re getting more sloppy here every day, and if you don’t do something about it, I’ll have to find someone who can do the job properly.”

“I’m sorry,” Tony says with honesty, because he never meant to put Thor or Sif in a difficult situation –they’ve never been anything but supportive to him, after all- “I….”

“Don’t be sorry,” Thor says. “Do whatever it is you have to do, but shake yourself before it’s too late.”

{Six months ago}

Somehow, Tony does get his shit together.

His grades suffer from it a bit, but they remain acceptable, he’s more efficient at work, and he has a social life again. Clint, Natasha, Phil and Darcy make sure that he spends as little time alone as possible, which he understands given that he was a glass away from cirrhosis when Thor decided to get some sense into his head.

Thrúd stops asking why he looks so sad, and Sif eventually stops giving him those worried looks, but Tony suspects it’s mostly because she hides her concern better.

He starts learning to read Braille.

He knows it’s probably not a good idea, but he can’t help remembering the few times Loki invited him for lunch or dinner after he’d spent time working on Sleipnir, and he remembers what he said about reading print and reading Braille.

He called it a different experience, not only because you’re reading with your fingers, but also because, he said, it makes you more aware of your own body. If anything, Tony finds it to be at least an exercise in concentration. It took him a while before he learned the alphabet well enough that he didn’t need to go back to his printed version all the time, but now he can read Braille. It’s slow, and not always easy, but it keeps his mind focused, keeps him balanced, if you will.

Now he’s trying to get quicker, but it’s difficult, because his brain is always expecting his eyes to provide the information. So far, the only thing he’s found to avoid being too distracted is to blindfold himself while he reads. He doesn’t really care that it sounds weird.

Nobody mentions how he is in French classes, letting his audio recorder do its job while he spends his time filling endless rows of groups of six small circles, and always the same sequence of black dots amongst them.

Second and fourth, first, second and third, first, third and sixth.

I L U, I L U, I L U, I L U, written for all to see except the one person who should read it.

{Three months ago}

At some point during the summer, Clint and Natasha decided it was high time he started trying to date someone, because really, two years and barely a few dates isn’t healthy.

Tony tried to protest, said he’d had relationships, but they’re so happy, the two of them, in their respective relationships, that they wouldn’t accept hookups as a viable answer. Tony still hasn’t forgotten the Justin Hammer disaster, but at least now he’s able to laugh about it, more or less. And anyway, they’re only trying to cheer him up, he can’t blame them if he doesn’t feel up to dating just yet.

On the whole though, he thinks he’s mostly gotten over Loki during the summer. That not seeing him at all helped.

He’s wrong.

Not even five minutes in and Tony feels like he’s forgotten how to breathe all over again. Loki changed his looks. He shaved his beard, and straightened his hair, and the black of it makes his eyes looks even paler, even more hypnotic.

He still turns his head when tony walks past him, and he still smells of cinnamon and leather and clean hair. Tony thinks he sees his hand move toward him once or twice, like Loki’s restraining from reaching toward him, and it makes him more angry than he thought was possible with such a simple gesture.

On the first Friday, after their second lesson, he goes to Loki’s office, and he doesn’t wait for permission before he comes in, breathing harder than he should after such a short walk. Loki doesn’t really look surprised to have Tony here, and he redirects his eyes toward Tony for the first time in nearly a year.

“Do I pretend to ask what you want, or shall I tell you ‘no’ right away?”

“Fuck you,” Tony answers. “Fuck you, for making us both feel miserable!”

“What makes you think I feel miserable, exactly,” Loki asks, and Tony closes the door behind him, lowers the blind on the windows before he says:

“You’re crossing your arms, for once. That’s a defensive posture if I’ve ever seen one.”

“Maybe I’m being defensive because a student just invaded my office and started yelling insults at me,” Loki replies without missing a beat, and Tony snarls:

“Bullshit. You’ve been avoiding me for a full year, and you expect me to believe you when you say you don’t feel something too?” Tony clenches his fists when his voice comes out more plaintive than he’d like. “I’ve seen you turn your head when I come in, and I’ve noticed nobody sees you outside of your office anymore. And you forget I’m friend with Darcy too now, and she keeps telling us Jane’s worried about you. And not just her, Sif and Thor and Thrúd as well. If they’re all worried, it means something’s wrong with you, and oh surprised, it started exactly after you started avoiding me for no reason!”

“I told you,” Loki hisses, “I told you it was better if—”

“You told me it was better if we went back to a normal professor-student relationship,” Tony cuts in. “This isn’t normal! This is far from normal, and you know it! But you’re too afraid of what you feel, of what it means to admit it… damnit Loki! At least have the decency to tell me the truth! Are you afraid of people judging you? Is that it?”

“Oh spare me your cheap psychology!” Loki snaps. “You know exactly why this can’t happen. I’m twelve years older than you are, and more importantly, I’m your teacher! Don’t you realize what’s wrong in the picture?”

Tony notices the rigidness of Loki’s back, the tightness of his arms and hands, knuckles white where they grip his jumper, the thin line of his mouth, and he wants to shake him, scream at him until he changes his mind, wants to make him realize, make him understand that Tony doesn’t care, that he doesn’t give a fuck what people can think about him and who he dates.

“I’m a fucking adult,” he says, fists tight enough that he feels even his short nails digging in his palm, “I’m twenty-one and I’m mature enough to make my own decisions!”

“You’re throwing a tantrum in my office,” Loki answers with a coldness that doesn’t feel right, “Pardon me if I’m disinclined to believe you right now.”

Tony growls, lower than he thought possible, and he strides to the other side of the room, marches on Loki until the older man pushes his chair away, gets up and almost falls down as he backs away into the wall. It only lasts for a second, his feature schooled and steady once more, but one second is long enough for Tony to notice the widening of his eyes, the worried slant of his brow, and he just gets it.

Loki is blind.

It sounds stupid to put it like that after so long, but it’s because Tony hadn’t realized the full implication of that up until now. Loki’s entire life is based on routine and organization. He goes to the same places all the time because going to new streets, or new addresses, or new clubs, forces him to plunge into the unknown. He can’t use signs to direct himself, he can’t always trust people to be helpful –he once told Tony that people have voluntarily messed up his change count, or given him something he didn’t ask for… or draw obscene images on papers he could have to hand out to his superiors and colleagues. The only thing Loki sees is the difference between night or day, and even that can get tricky in winter or when there’s bad weather.

There’s nothing illogical in Loki being afraid to break his routine, especially in such a drastic way, and Tony really can’t blame him for that now that he finally understands it.

“Please,” he says, stopping short, “please don’t be afraid of me. I’m sorry I made you uncomfortable. I just… I just want a chance, that’s all I ask for. Please.”

“You say you don’t want to make me uncomfortable, yet you keep insisting when I tell you ‘no’,” Loki says, and Tony physically flinches.

“I’m sorry,” he says. “I never meant to… I’m sorry. I’ll just. I’ll go now.”

He makes sure to close the door softly, in apology.

{A month ago}

In the end, he decides to transfer back to the United States.

He knows Virginia is going to laugh at him for coming back so close to his diploma, and that he’ll hear about that for as long as he tolerates her presence in his life, but at this point he doesn’t care anymore. He’s surprised when Thor and Sif encourage him and make him promise to keep in touch, less so when Clint and Natasha threaten to kill him if he doesn’t invite them over next summer, now that he’s going back to his obscenely full bank account.

He agrees to both, of course, and he stops going to French lessons.

He still sneaks into Loki’s office when he’s not here, just once, but he makes sure not to disturb anything after he leaves.

{Now}

“Please don’t make me go to Howard’s,” Tony says.

Pepper’s face literally crumbles, and she looks a blink away from tears as she hooks her arms around his neck and presses against him, warm and solid and familiar, safe in a way nothing else ever was. She smells of sweat and her favorite perfume, something spicy that Steve got her for her eleventh birthday and she never stopped wearing ever since, not even when she dated Happy Hogan for two years in high school.

Steve, wonderful Steve, takes his cue and disappears into the bathroom while Pepper maneuvers Tony to their kitchenette and sits him down, like she’d done when Tony tried his hand at dating with Obadiah Stane and it turned out to be a wrong idea, after all.

Except, this time, it feels a thousand time worse, because this time, he’s had the time to actually fall.

“Take a deep breath,” Pepper says, setting a cup of coffee in front of Tony just as Steve joins them -in pajamas this time- “and tell me everything.”

And no matter his age, Tony is forced to admit that talking to Pepper and Steve will always go a long way toward making him feel better.

{A month later}

Tony gets settled in his new university.

It’s nothing but the local college, and he overhears Virginia laughing about it on the phone to Pepper, before she hangs up on her. Still, it’s closer to home, closer to Pepper, and several thousands of miles away from Loki, which he hopes will help, over time.

He’s found a new job, an assistant in a bookshop, for the distraction more than anything else.

People here recognize him. They see his face and whisper, wonder what he’s doing here, why he’s not in England like he should be. Tony doesn’t care, really. It’s his story, not theirs, and all that counts right now is that he finds a new flat and stops squatting Steve and Pepper’s couch, because the whole pretending-we’re-alone-in-our-respective-rooms is getting old very fast, and he really doesn’t feel like being a burden for much longer.

He’s in the middle of packing his books –the few classics he bought and read in Braille- when Pepper sets a hand on his shoulder.

“There’s someone at the door. For you.”

“I don’t want to see any salesman,” Tony sighs, and Pepper tugs at his shoulder.

“Tony, he’s not a salesman, he’s a guy with a dog in a harness and a British accent.”

If you’d asked him a month ago, Tony wouldn’t have thought it possible for him to go down the three floors of the building as fast as he does now.

Loki’s standing there, in his usual long grey coat, with the green scarf he’s been wearing for the past two years, Fenrir patiently waiting at his feet while he shuffles from foot to foot. His eyes snap up when Tony reaches the door, and Loki may not see him but his gaze still makes Tony stop, blue and green and grey, and the occasional brown freckle.

Tony forces himself not to jump in nervousness, but it’s a close thing.

“Hi,” Loki says, and it comes out like a sigh, like he’s been holding his breath for a long while and he’s only releasing it now.

“Hi,” Tony says.

“I got your note. I’m sorry it took so long to reply.”

“I thought…. I was under the impression that you had nothing else to say,” Tony admits, fingers aching with the need to touch Loki, to make sure he’s real and that he’s not talking as shadows.

“I thought so too,” Loki admits. “But Thor has always been fond of knocking some sense into me. So. Here I am.” He smiles, but it’s wobbly, unsure, like a question. “I just… well. I had to finish my four weeks.”

“Does it mean…” Tony can barely speak through the realization, but he pushes the question out anyway: “Does this mean you’re staying?”

From the corner of his eyes, Tony sees Steve and Pepper hurrying toward their car, and Steve gives him the thumbs up as he goes.

“If you let me,” Loki says, and Tony seizes him by the waist, lifts him in the air and spins him so fast that Fenrir barely has time to dodge out of the way.

“Oh my god yes,” Tony says, “yes of course!”

He is aware that he looks ridiculous and manic and not at all like himself when he sets Loki down but he just can’t help it, and honestly it’s not like he cares.

He guides Loki to the lifts, Fenrir trailing behind them, and they go to the third floor, where Steve left a sticky note labeled ‘Good job’ on the door. Tony snorts and invites Loki in, then does a beeline for the kitchen and the coffee machine. Coffee is always a good idea when there are nerves, right? Right. He can vaguely hear Loki working the harness off of Fenrir as he sets the coffee maker to heat, bouncing on the balls of his feet like a kid on a sugar high.

Loki’s hand comes to rest on his shoulder, and Tony turns to meet him, still not entirely convinced this is not a dream. He lets Loki trace the outline of his face, his eyebrow, the bridge of his nose, his lips, and it feels so much like that afternoon in the park, he can’t help but hold his breath… except this time it’s Loki who cups his jaw with his hand, reaches down, and kisses him.

It starts soft, almost chaste, but it doesn’t remain that way for long.

Soon, there are tongues meeting, exploring, mapping every inch of mouth they can reach, and Tony brings his hands to rest on the sides of Loki’s neck, anchoring him here, with his lips on his and his hands in his hair because. Because it feels good, and overdue, and it feels like coming home, and Tony wants it to feel that way forever.

Somehow, he manages to guide Loki to his sofa, which Steve had the good idea to unfold –and Tony will have to thank him for it- but once they’re here, the position end up reversed.

Tony lets Loki set the pace, lets him having control for now, because he feels like it’s the thing to do, because for once, not only doesn’t he mind relinquishing control but he also wants to. It’s freeing in itself, to accept to be guided, to trust someone completely, and he briefly wonders if it’s what it felt like for Loki the first time he went running with Thor.

They keep kissing, deep and slow, like there is all the time in the world and Loki intends to spend it making out. Tony readjusts himself on the sofa, leans back on the mess of cushions and rests his hands on Loki’s hips, brushing against the skin he can reach from here, in that soft spot between pelvis and belly. It fits, he thinks stupidly when his palms find the point of Loki’s hipbones and settle, there, while Loki keeps kissing him on the mouth, his cheeks, his eyelids, his throat.

Loki’s hand keep moving on his body, jaw to neck, to collarbones, over his nipples and to the line of his pectorals, and tony realizes –a bit late- that this isn’t foreplay, but the very first time Loki ‘sees’ him. His hands are tracing every line of his chest, follow his ribs and trace each of them, and all that Loki does without ever stopping kissing.

Tony’s hands move upward, caressing Loki’s sides, stroking them like you stroke a cat, lazy and content to do just that for the rest of the night, and Loki readjusts himself so he can straddle Tony’s waist, and when their cocks brush through the fabric of their jeans, Loki gives the slightest push, and Tony’s breath hitches in his throat. He start moving his hands too, tugs on Loki’s shirt, and the latter’s clothes fly to the ground, forgotten until they need them again. Loki doesn’t wait very long before he follows Tony’s lead, and his hand reach under Tony’s clothes, skin touching skin for the first time, before his hoodie goes to the ground as well, landing not too far from where Loki abandoned his coat near the door.

Loki’s eyes are still opened, focused on Tony’s face, and Tony doesn’t want to close his, wants to keep watching the beautiful colors he’s admired since day one… except he also want to kiss Loki, and that implies not seeing those anymore. Loki solves the problem himself when he leans down and kisses him again, still mapping the expense of Tony’s chest, the lines of his back, the texture of his shoulders, his biceps, his shoulder blades, and Tony closes his eyes, tries to look with his hands too, tries to memorize the curve of Loki’s spine, the feel of his dimple, right here on the right shoulder, the shape of a scar, pale and barely marked where it crosses Loki’s ribs.

It’s intimate and it’s close, and in many ways, it’s hotter than anything Tony has ever done, hotter than any of his craziest experiments with hookups, male and female alike, because this time there’s a meaning. This time his hands touch a chest, a heartbeat, and they say I want you, I want to know you, I want to keep you, and it feels so good, so right, that Tony doesn’t even feel disappointed when they finally go to sleep in the small hours of the morning, and nothing happened south of the border.

{Eight years later}

It’s Loki who opens the door, Fenrir by his side, and Tony comes in, careful to take only shorts steps to accommodate Matt’s small legs. He guides him to the living room-slash-dining room, where Peter is attempting to read a story by himself –he’s a bit small for a boy of nine, but he’s just as smart as Tony or Loki, and he took to call them Dad and Daddy last year, and that’s something that never fails to make Tony’s heart skip a beat.

“This is our home,” Tony says while Matt clutches his hand. “I like it because it smells like pancakes more often than not. Daddy Loki makes awesome pancakes.”

Loki, who went back to the sofa once the door was closed, smiles as Peter uses him as a jungle gym to try and see the new addition to their household. Matt rubs his face against Tony’s knee.

“Daddy Loki is blind, too,” he says calmly, “We told you that when we came to see you last week, remember?”

“Yesh,” Matt mumbles against his leg, arms still circling his knee.

“There’s also Fenrir –you remember Fenrir, right? Good. And there’s Peter, your new big brother.”

“’S Pter blind too?” Matt asks, and it’s Peter himself who answers:

“No, I’m not, but I can read the dot alphabet,” the boy exclaims cheerfully, “And so can Dad! We’ll teach you if you want!”

He bounces closer to the spot Tony and Matt are standing in the doorway, close enough that Tony sees Matt’s short hair vibrate under the wind of Peter’s breath when he speaks again:

“Daddy told me you looked at his face with your hand, and that you looked at Dad’s too, so there’s only me left, right?”

“Yes,” Matt acquiesces timidly, and he extends a hand that’s rapidly snatched up by Peter.

Once his first hand is in contact with Peter’s jaw, Matt lets go of Tony’s suit leg, and he starts touching every inch he can reach, while Tony walks to the sofa and sits next to Loki, one hand on the small of his back.

Loki reaches for his wrist, and strokes the inside of it with his thumb, the spot where he knows the familiar sequence of circles and dots is tattooed: I L U, for Loki, for Peter, and now for Matt, too.

“You’re smiling,” Matt says as he’s still stroking Peter’s face. “You’re all smiling when I touch your face.”

“That’s because we’re happy to have you,” Peter says, and as Tony watches a smile spread on Loki’s face, he makes a note to send flowers to Virginia.

After all, he wouldn’t be here today if she hadn’t made fun of him one too many times.