Work Text:
It feels like they’ve crossed a boundary.
Steve hasn’t shared anything so intimate with anyone in a long time and he doesn’t think he can go back to how it was before. Not with the memory of the way Tony’s hands had felt going through his feathers so clear in his mind. He doesn’t know how he got along without it so long now he’s had it again.
And now he thinks about it, he wonders if anyone’s done something like that for Tony.
His wings may be gone, but Steve doesn’t think that changes how much a person needs to feel that, to share it with somebody else.
He imagines Tony feeling the way he had and he can’t stand the thought of it.
So he resolves to do something about it. He gets his chance the next night when Tony stops by, face smeared with grease and a blackened rag in his hands. “Hey, Cap. How’re you feeling today?”
Steve smiles, setting aside his book. He stretches out his wings, showing off how good they look, glossy and pristine white. “Great, Tony. This is the best they’ve looked in ages.”
Tony’s eyes crinkle, his mouth curving in a small genuine smile. “Glad to hear it.”
He starts to turn away and Steve hurries to get to his feet. “Wait, hang on a second, Tony. I’d like to repay the favor.”
Pausing, Tony looks back at him, his brow furrowed. “That’s nice of you, but as an artist, I’m pretty sure you’re observant enough to see that I’m kind of missing a few things that would be needed for that.”
Steve blushes against his will. “I know. I know that, but that’s not the only way to do it.”
Tony’s eyebrows crawl toward his hairline. “Are you propositioning me, Cap?”
“No!” Steve exclaims, and then bites down on the urge to say, maybe. Now isn’t the time. He sighs and steps forward. “I was thinking a massage. I know some of the guys at the VA have a hard time with the muscles tensing up around amputated limbs. It’s not the same, but it could be nice anyway?” He ends on a question because out loud, it doesn’t sound as good as he hoped.
Tony stares at him for a beat, his body language shifting to something more hesitant. “You’re serious?”
“Absolutely,” Steve says.
Tony licks his lips, then deliberately makes himself relax. “Yeah, okay. Fair’s fair.”
Steve’s heart flutters in his chest. “Okay. Where would you like to…?”
Glancing down at himself, Tony says, “I should probably clean up first. I’m grimy.”
“I could do it,” Steve blurts, without thinking and then flushes beet red. He doesn’t take it back though. Tony stares at him again, stunned.
Steve’s a little shocked when Tony says, “Okay. Let’s stay above the waist though, huh?”
“Whatever you’re comfortable with,” Steve agrees.
“Let’s…go to my room,” Tony says. He points. “Unless you’ve got massage oil around here somewhere?”
Steve finds himself blushing again. He hadn’t thought of that. Great work, Steve.
He follows Tony up to his room, growing more and more nervous with every step. When they step through the door, he takes a deep breath and swallows it down.
Tony’s room is even bigger and more spacious than the others. His bed is simple, wide and expansive, covered in white sheets. There’s a dark wood headboard behind it, brushed steel glass tables on either side. A big shaggy white rug covers the floor at the foot of the bed.
Tony moves to a simple, dark wood dresser against the interior wall and digs around in one of the drawers, emerging with a dark reddish-brown glass bottle. He tosses it to Steve, who nearly fumbles it, in spite of his reflexes.
“You sure you want to do this?” Tony asks.
That’s an easy question, anyway. “Yes.” He looks down at the bottle in his hands. “You know, you’re the first person to have touched me like that since I woke up.”
Tony’s expression goes sad, grim. “Yeah, I got that impression.”
Steve glances up at him and then goes for it. “I don’t think anyone’s touched you like that in a long time either.”
Tony turns away so Steve can’t see his face, taps his knuckles on the dresser. “Yeah, well. Like I said before. Kinda hard to do when the hardware’s gone.”
“Well, that ends now,” Steve says. He moves to the bed, feeling more confident now. “Strip down.”
Tony glances over, raising an eyebrow, with a smile pulling at the corner of his mouth. “Aye, aye, Cap.”
Steve tries not to watch too intently as Tony peels off his tank top. He doesn’t do a very good job.
Tony drops it on the floor as he moves to the bed, never meeting Steve’s eyes for more than a few seconds. “Where do you want me?”
A few months ago, Steve would have taken him at face-value. But he knows better now, and Tony’s careful nonchalance belies how anxious he really is. What Steve isn’t sure of, is whether he’s more bothered by the arc reactor or the amputation scars.
“Wherever makes you comfortable.”
Tony sprawls across the bed on his stomach, throwing a seductive look over his shoulder that falls a little flat. Steve likes that he’s able to tell. They’re closer than he thought, and this is just going to bring them closer. Tony is trusting him, allowing Steve to see this part of him, and it’s and it awes Steve a little.
“Relax,” he tells Tony. “I’ll be back in a second.”
He goes to the en-suite bathroom and gets a washcloth, soaks it in hot water. When he goes back out, Tony’s rolled onto his back and propped himself up on his elbows. He’s tapping at the comforter with his fingers, fidgeting.
Steve smiles wryly at him. “I told you to relax.”
Tony smirks. “You and I both know that’s not my strong suit.” Steve sits down next to him and Tony holds out one arm imperiously. “Wash me.”
Steve starts with his hands, which are smeared with black. He takes Tony’s fingers one at a time, rubs in circles down the length from palm to fingertip. Tony shivers and goes very quiet.
His hands are covered in scars and calluses, thin white lines, pink irregular shapes. All of his hard work is written on his skin.
Tony lies back and stares up at the ceiling while Steve works, and Steve is wiping down his arm when he lets his eyes flutter shut.
Steve is gingerly washing the gnarled scarring around the arc reactor when Tony says, voice low and soft, “They cut them off in Afghanistan.”
That’s startling enough that Steve almost stops what he’s doing. He quickly realizes that will break the fine connection between them right now, so he keeps going, not saying anything.
Tony covers his face with one arm, voice rasping when he goes on. “They wanted me to build the Jericho—a weapon, a bad one. I told them no and—”
Steve can’t help it, this time he does stop, horrified. “They tortured you.”
A giggle slips out of Tony, just shy of hysterical. “Yeah. When one didn’t work, they cut off the other, and when that didn’t work, they commenced with the waterboarding. That was fun, let me tell you.”
Steve feels sick and angry; he can’t imagine how difficult it must have been—how hard for Tony to go through something like that with no training, no expectation that it might happen. To go through it at all, his wings, Jesus.
“I’m sorry,” he finally manages to get out and sees Tony’s mouth flicker upward.
“I’m only sorry because it took such a hard kick in the ass to dislodge my head.”
Steve clears his throat, not sure what to say to that. “Turn over?”
Tony acquiesces, seeming grateful to bury his face against the bed. Steve refreshes the cloth and then begins again, determined to give Tony everything he’s been missing all this time. He cleans Tony’s back, and gets his first good look at what’s left after what had been done to him.
The scars are knotted uneven pink gashes over his shoulder blades. There are bumps under the skin that Steve guesses are the joints. It’s incredible that Tony hadn’t died. He knew men during the war who had died just from having their wings nicked. Big blood vessels run through the wings.
When he finishes with the washing, Tony’s mostly relaxed under him, his breathing slow and even. He tosses the rag back into the bathroom.
“Is there anything I should know about? Anywhere that’s sensitive or off limits?”
“Nothing off limits,” Tony mumbles. “Yeah, it’s sensitive, I’ll let you know if you hit anything wrong.”
Steve takes him at his word and gets to work. He gets a liberal amount of oil in the palm of his hands and rubs them together until it’s spread evenly and warmed up, then he sets them on Tony’s lower back and starts to press upward. Immediately he can feel how hard the muscles are, tensed into tight knots. Tony groans, low and breathy as he pushes his hands inexorably up to where the small remainders of his wings are.
He doesn’t really know what he’s doing, but he knows where Tony is tenderest after a few minutes of smoothing his hands over the muscles, carefully feeling around the scar tissue. He focuses on those places, determined to fix as much as he can.
Tony groans again as he digs his knuckles into his shoulders, careful not to press too hard or pull too much. Just steady, firm pressure. Working methodically, Steve finds every hard knot in Tony’s back and works at it like a dog at a bone until it melts away. At one point, Tony hisses and Steve pulls back only to have Tony slur, “No, no, ’s good.”
He keeps at it until Tony is completely limp, drooling a little on the sheets under his head. His hands ache, but he’s so happy to be able to do this for Tony and he remembers how good it felt not just to be preened, but to preen the others.
“Thank you,” he murmurs, readjusting Tony’s arms so he’ll be more comfortable and won’t wake up with any weird numbness.
Tony’s brow furrows slightly and he squints at Steve through barely slitted eyes.. “F'r wha’?”
“Letting me do this,” Steve says and runs his fingers through Tony’s hair, enjoying the way it makes him shudder and sigh, his eyes slipping the rest of the way closed. “Sleep well, Tony.”