Work Text:
I’ve been bitten by the Fitz-Simmons bug in a major way. Needed to write and get this out. Forgive me any mistakes, as it hasn’t been beta’d. I hope to write more eventually, but reality may prevent it for quite a while.
This is just what the title says: Five times Fitz regrets his decisions, and one time he’s finally pleased. Enjoy!
-K
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
He regrets not kissing her the night they met at the Academy.
Fitz remembers Simmons being beautiful that night, her cheeks flushed and eyes glowing, in part thanks to the alcohol, and presumably in response to good conversation. At 21, they were the youngest research applicants to the S.H.I.E.L.D. Academy and had quickly found each other during the opening mixer. Fitz could barely contain his excitement at finding someone with whom he could speak so easily.
He walked her home that evening, and even though her roommates were out, even though she gave him every signal in the book, he only bid her goodnight and promised to see her in their first class the next day.
He deeply wishes that he could go back and kick that knob in the arse.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
Fitz is tortured by his decision to live with Simmons after their early departure from the Academy.
She was (and still is) a wonderful roommate; she was clean and orderly and was around to talk through his ideas when he needed her to be. As an added bonus, she sometimes cooked, and Fitz was never one to turn down free food.
But she also dated, particularly when she had been teaching instead of working in the lab.
It seemed to Fitz that there was a constant stream of specialists, students, teaching assistants, and even professors who came calling on Simmons. He watched them come night after night, often sharing a glass of wine on the same couch where he and Simmons would discuss their experiments or watch the latest episodes of Dr. Who. He seethed at the thought that more than a glass of wine had ever been shared on that sofa, but Simmons was a beautiful young woman, men were men, and Fitz knew better than lie to himself.
When she asked why the walls in his room seemed to constantly need repair, he muttered an excuse about personal experiments while making sure his hands were well out of sight.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
Bringing women home to make his best friend jealous was silly at best, downright cruel at worst, and he knew it.
But that didn’t stop him from marching through Lisa, Kelly, Annie, Jane, Mary, and Sarah, and even though his gut twisted each time Simmons saw them, he couldn’t help parading them through the flat every single time.
But after bidding Sarah goodbye at the door with a promise to call that he’d never follow through on, he spotted Simmons rushing from her room to their bathroom. Her eyes were red-rimmed, and she refused to meet his gaze.
He stopped bringing home women after that.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
The night that they accepted their positions with Coulson’s team, Simmons dragged him out to the pub for a celebratory drink.
She failed to mention that their next stop would be the tattoo parlor next door.
His heart flew into his throat when she turned her back to him, peeled off her top, and straddled the chair. She was on a first-name basis with the artist, so this had apparently been part of the plan all along, and the two shots of whiskey at the pub had just been for courage to see it through. Fitz did his best to sit still as he watched the artist prepare the skin of her right shoulder before applying the stencil and getting to work, but found it difficult to do so. He wasn’t sure why he had been so worried. It wasn’t as if she could know he was staring at her anyway.
Fitz wasn’t sure how long it took to finish; he had been too distracted by all of the bare Simmons skin before him to bother tracking the time. Even making conversation with her during the process had been difficult, something that had never been a problem for them.
He remembers that when the artist was done, Simmons asked him if he wanted a closer look. He approached her, heart beating more quickly with each step he took towards her, to peer more closely at her new tattoo.
It was a smallish compass, surrounded by red roses and a banner declaring, “Not all those who wander are lost.” It was beautifully done, and he told her as much as he watched her skin break out in gooseflesh where his breath ghosted across it.
“You should get one yourself, Fitz. This is a big event in our lives. Commemorate it.”
Instead, he begs off, promising to buy her another drink at the pub before heading home.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
He should have eaten the damn sandwich well before arriving at that sorry excuse for a pub in South Ossetia.
(He’d be lying if he said he didn’t still seethe thinking about it ending up in the belly of some rat.)
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
Every year, Simmons threw a Christmas party.
Which meant every year Fitz got sucked into helping her with the planning. Fortunately, his participation this year only went as far as preparing and taking charge of the bar, which he was more than happy to do.
Within two hours, both Skye and Ward were sacked out on one of the lounge sofas, Coulson was in his office “working,” and May, the only member who had not partaken in Fitz’s holiday punch, was ensconced in the cockpit.
“Here’s to being the only two super-secret agents on the Bus who can hold their liquor!” Fitz gave as a toast as he drained the last of his glass. Simmons finished her own drink with a grin that melted his heart before grabbing his glass and heading to the bar. Once there, she tipped a bottle of Glenfiddich 15 at him in question; he declined another drink, and instead gestured for her to join him on the sofa.
It was her turn to shake her head as she declared, “Fitz, I want to dance.”
He could never deny her, so heaved himself off of the couch and made his way over to where she was fiddling with the Bus’ entertainment system. He couldn’t help joining in with her giggles as the first strains of Sinatra’s “Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas,” drifted out of the speakers.
She turned to him, her smile suddenly bashful as he took her in his arms and pulled her close. It wasn’t as if they hadn’t danced before; there had been enough cocktail hours for awards they were expected to attend, but the intimacy of moment threatened to overwhelm him. His hand was low on her back, lower than it should have been. Her right arm clung to him and her head nestled against his chest as they moved to the music.
He could imagine, for a perfect moment, that this was every day for him, pressed tightly against Simmons at the end of the day with no need to use a recent tragedy or a holiday as an excuse. He stopped swaying as the desire for that life washed over him. When he stopped moving, Simmons pulled back slightly to peer up into his face.
Her eyes were serene and the most beautiful shade of honey he’d ever seen, she was still so close, and he was suddenly dangling on the edge of something he couldn’t describe as anything other than “life changing.”
“Leo, what’s wrong?”
It was her use of his given name that did him in, and with a quickly muttered, “Nothing’s wrong,” he brought his right hand up to the back of her head and pulled her up for a kiss.
He swears he only meant it to be a quick, friendly peck for the holiday, something fueled by too much alcohol and pent-up emotion and easily set aside, but she clung to him and mewled into his mouth, so he pressed forward. He ran his tongue against her bottom lip, and with a quiet whimper, she allowed him entrance. She tasted of spice and liquor and oranges and Fitz believes to this day that he could live on that taste forever.
He could feel her nails where they clutched at his back and scratched his scalp, and he swore that in that moment that it was the only thing anchoring him to reality; it could easily have been anyone of the not-so-friendly dreams he’s had about his partner of nearly six years, if it hadn’t been for their abrupt crash into one of the walls.
The jolt broke them apart, and for a moment Fitz worried that she’d come to her senses, push him away, and ask Coulson to file a sexual harassment report.
Instead, she dissolved into giggles and pulled him back to her, effectively trapping herself between him and the bulkhead as her arms twined around his neck.
“Look at us, Leo, snogging like teenagers against the wall.”
He grinned at her, thrilled that he wouldn’t have to find out what Director Fury does to S.H.I.E.L.D. agents who molest their partners first hand, and kissed her again. That kiss was less frantic, more exploratory than the previous, but no less heated, and it was all he could do to match her movements when she flexed her hips into his. She gave a pleased moan at what she discovered there and broke away from their kiss.
Trailing pecks and nibbles along his jaw to his ear, the minx who had replaced his partner whispered, “Perhaps we should finish this elsewhere,” before slipping away from him and down the hall to her bunk.
That time, Leo Fitz didn’t hesitate.
Now, in the hazy light of the morning after, he certainly doesn’t regret it.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
Fin
I have two follow up pieces to this that I’m currently working through in my head, one of them decidedly risqué. Whether those are written depends on the feedback I get here. Either way, I sincerely hope you enjoyed reading this!