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It’s not like they wanted to keep the secret, because they didn’t. They never spoke about going public with their wedding, and nobody but for tabloids ever asked either Stark or Stephen about their romantic lives so, again, Tony wouldn’t blame either himself or Stephen for keeping it between the two of them.
It all started shortly after the battle of New York when Tony invited Bruce in Malibu to work on the data they took from the scepter and that they managed to save.
“Is it that the Pollock Christie’s sold for ass-million dollars the last week?” Bruce asked him, because, of course, the man noticed the painting in the huge living room. Tony left it momentarily against Stephen’s piano because he still had to look for a place where to hang it, so he didn’t expect for Bruce or anyone who crossed his door not to notice it. “I didn’t know you were into action painting.”
“I’m into everything, Brucie,” Tony said, smiling at him while on his way down to the workshop. “And while I prefer Boccioni, I really like Pollock and that’s a present.”
Bruce jogged the few stairs that divided him from Tony. “And who is this from?”
The man had never been too much curious about his life, so Tony suspected his intent was to make some conversation before going back to work. “Husband.” He just said, summoning a holographic project, and enjoying Bruce’s surprised expression for a while.
“Husb… I didn’t know you were married,” Bruce’s surprise was honest, and Tony flashed him a sort of apologetic smile.
“Yeah, I'd been in the last couple of years, by now. We preferred keeping it silent, though,” And, actually, they both were still surprised they managed to. Not that he was going to complain anytime soon.
The truth was that Tony really loved Stephen and didn’t want the press between them, or paparazzi, or whatever.
—
Tony was trying to pay attention to whatever the holographic projection of the Secretary of State was saying, when his PA’s voice filled his office, bringing Nat to roll her eyes at the ceiling. He had no idea why the spy was there, she entered and smiled at him while he was halfway into the meeting, and when he silenced the Secretary’s boring voice to ask her why she was there, Nat turned the audio on again.
Now, the Black Widow was looking at her mobile phone pretending not to pay attention to what they were saying. Tony envied her for not having a webcam on her while he pushed the
Interphone button. “Boss, there’s someone for you in the lobby.”
Stark nodded, even if he wasn’t sure about who might show up in the middle of a meeting. The first name that came in his mind was Rhodey’s, but he knew about that meeting and was the person who convinced his best friend to take part to it. “Who’s there?” He asked, reminding a moment later of what day that was. “Don’t answer, I think I know. Jarvis, did I forget my anniversary again?”
“I wouldn’t say to forget, Sir, I reserved a table in the restaurant where you had your first date, and the jet is ready,” The AI answered, and a part of Tony knew he pleaded him to do so the year before when he, indeed, spent the whole day in his workshop, forgetting entirely about his amazing husband.
That, anyway, seemed enough for Nat to going back with her full attention to Tony, a questioning glance in her jade eyes.
“Speaking with you all is terribly funny, but I have to go. Agent Romanoff will update me tomorrow,” He said, to the men he was pretending to listen to, and he could feel goosebumps against his skin thank you so much to Nat’s murderous glances. Her fault for being around the anniversary of the day he married Stephen.
—
Tony looked at Bruce and Nat flirting nearby the bar while the music was blasting in the main room of his Penthouse. He smiled seeing Bruce checks turning a darker shade before going back speaking with Thor. His eyes were looking for someone else in the crowd even if Stephen texted him that he couldn’t make for the party because someone asked for his consultancy at the hospital.
“So, will we meet this famous husband of yours, tonight?” Thor asked him, smashing his huge hand against Tony’s shoulder and fuck, the man really needed to understand that humans were made of bones which weren’t made to bear the strength of a god.
He shook his head and brought the flute from which he was drinking again at his lips. All of the Avengers knew about Tony’s mysterious husband, by now, but none of them ever met him, which turned a god, a super soldier, two assassins and a man with poor angry control into a mass of curious teenagers. They also started to try to picture how Stephen could possibly look like which was the funniest thing ever to speak with both the doctor and Rhodey.
“I don’t think, he wanted to come, but he had an emergency at work,” Thor nodded, and then Tony decided to ask him about his girlfriend, just to change the subject and not give too many details about Stephen to the Asgardian.
It was funny, see the five of them trying to understand what kind of man could keep up with Tony Stark and listen to their hypothesis from time to time. What everyone agreed on, was that Tony’s spouse was rich and busy as fuck, which, according to Nat, that meant, he was probably some random billionaire which whom Stark co-worked. In the end, she gave up looking through that list. All of them were either too old, their marriages were public or both.
Clint tried to steal his mobile phone to track Stephen’s number, but he didn’t get further than unlock the thing. Anyway, Tony appreciated the effort.
The party was almost over when the doors of the elevator opened revealing Stephen and Christine. Both of them looked like they went through a tough night shift and Tony knew that it was possibly what happened to them. With a smile, he went straight to gather them. He could feel the, by now, almost empty room go silent for an instant and smirked the moment he heard Rhodey’s voice trying to keep everyone’s attention away from Tony and the newcomers.
Stark flashed both with a smile and pretended they both were just friends. Stephen winked at him. It was a sort of game between them: see how long it would have taken to the Avengers to, at least, suspect about Stephen being Tony’s husband.
“Guys,” Tony said, reaching his friends seated around Thor’s hammer. “Doctor Christine Palmer and Doctor Stephen Strange. I think you know them all, but just in case, the one with the drumsticks is Hawkeye.”
Clint’s middle finger rose along with everyone else’s laughs. A moment later, both Christine and Stephen were speaking with Bruce — not that Tony expected nothing different in the first place, they all were nerds — before someone suggested to try if Thor was the only one worthy to lift Mjöllnir.
And yes, maybe Tony took his good time to look at Stephen’s ass when Rhodey, that fucking traitor, said that all of them had to try. Maybe Strange wasn’t worthy to lift the hammer, but he was giving a hell worth show while trying.
—
The last place in the world where Tony wanted to be, right now, was one of the conference rooms of the US embassy in Berlin, trying to put some reason his Steve Rogers’s mind. He should have been by his husband’s side, trying to be there for Stephen, trying to save him from the verge of alcoholism and bankruptcy.
He knew Christine was with him but the woman tended to be too soft with her best friend while she could actually roast everyone she wished to. She told him to go and save the world, and Tony was really grateful to have her in their lives. But this didn’t change the fact that speaking with Rogers was the last thing he wanted to do, even more knowing that he kept his secret about Aunt Peggy’s death. Tony understood it was just because Steve was suffering too much, but, right now, it felt as if the super soldier tried to deny Tony his time to mourn.
It was possibly stupid but Peggy’s death and almost losing Stephen in that car crash made his mind wander in places where it didn’t allow his mind to go in the last times. At least since he synthesized the element which allowed him to survive.
He could feel Steve’s cerulean eyes on him, and the last thing Tony wanted was to argue with the man. He didn’t care either, while he was still sure that the only way to get the army out of the picture was for them to sign that goddamned accords. They weren’t perfect but allowed them to have a word in the decisional process, and Tony was sure that he or Nat could push some buttons and have more freedom, with the time. Rogers didn’t want to hear anything about that.
“What’s wrong, Tony?” Steve asked him, seating at the other side of the table. Tony knew they should speak about the Accords, but he wasn’t so eager to do that, and it seemed like Steve understood that.
He ran a hand between his hair and shook his head. “I just want to finish this shit and go back in the US.”
Steve nodded his eyes on Tony’s finger ring. “I’m sorry, about Peggy. I didn’t know you were close. I just really loved her, and I couldn’t think straight.”
Tony rose from the chair. Thinking about Peggy was too painful, at that moment. He clenched his hand while the other was on his eyes. “Just sign the Accords, Steve.”
He indicated to the pen case on the table and saw the moment Steve gave up and took one of the pens, a moment later, though, he asked him about Wanda. And, frankly, the girl who messed with his mind was the last person he wanted to speak about. He knew he couldn’t lie to Steve about that, but he also knew that the truth would have forced Tony not to leave German anytime soon.
He walked out of the room trying to suppress the urge to punch Steve and thanked his mobile which started to buzz in his pocket. Once he closed the call, though, he just wanted to destroy the thing: Christine and Stephen argued and he left, she tried to track him down but there was no news of him since he left New York and his mobile went offline. Tony knew he failed him. He promised Stephen he would have been at his side until his very last day and he left him when the doctor needed him the most. All of that for that stupid Accords and because of politics.
He tried to call Stephen again and simply pushed his head back against the wall at his backs. Nat found him there half an hour later.
“Tony? Are you fine?” She asked, receiving a shake of his head in return. He didn’t trust Natasha; he considered her as a friend but, at the same time, she was still a spy, and he couldn’t completely trust her. He needed to tell someone about Stephen, but he also knew he was better in keeping everything for himself, not to show the world what kind of shitty husband he was. He flashed Nat a smile which didn’t light his whiskey brown eyes and walked away. He had to speak with Ross and told him that Steve didn’t sign. He didn’t want to, but they both knew it was what Tony had to do.
—
Walking around the Penthouse was too painful because of all the memories of Stephen and him that Tony had of the place, so he moved at the Compound which was still too empty, but, at least, was a place were Stephen never spent his time.
Rhodey moved in as well, and even if Vision never had his own place, he was living there, and that was enough for Stark. Having people around him, to walk him out of the workshop or away from any screen on which he was trying to find where Stephen could have been.
Most of the times, that person was Vision, though that day was Rhodey.
“Tony, can you listen to me for a moment?” He asked him, the moment he walked inside the workshop. Stark had to keep himself from asking Friday why she let the man enter the room, but he also knew he was the one who gave his best friend the authorisation for that wing of the Compound.
He rose his eyes from the map of Stephen’s credit card latest movements and looked at Rhodes. “He is in New York,” He said, a hopeless whisper. “What if he had been there all this time? He’s avoiding me because I left when he needed me the most.”
“I think you should see this,” He answered, instead. Tony looked at the folder Jim was handling to him. He recognized Christine’s handwriting, and while he never blamed the woman for Stephen’s disappearing, it was the first time he hard of her in a long, long time. He opened the folder and took some pictures out of it, there were also papers written by the woman.
A glance to the words was enough for him to say that those were Stephen’s. Stephen who was asking for forgiveness, Stephen explaining to him what happened after the accident, Stephen telling him he loved him from the bottom of his heart.
And each of those words was piercing through his heart and remembering him how much he loved Stephen.
“Mr Stark, Mr Rhodes,” The voice reached him through every memory of Stephen kissed and words, while Peter entered the workshop which was starting to be too crowded. “Mr Stark, what’s wrong?”
He was too happy to lie to him. “My husband.” He just answered.
“Wow, he looks like a wizard,” Peter said, and Tony didn’t even pay attention to the pictures, too focused on Stephen’s words written in those letters. Now, looking at them without being mesmerized by his face, he could see that the kid was right: Stephen was dressed as a more fashionable Dumbledore.
—
Thanos was defeated, the Mad Titan, in the end, died, killed by the Avengers, all together, this time, and while Tony knew some things would have never gone back to normality between them all, they managed to win and to undo the Snap.
Bruce was at Tony’s side, helping him stand while his head felt so damned light, and the only thing Stark could do was waiting and see what would have happened after that he took Thanos’s glove which was now destroyed, burning his left hand.
The Stones were at his feet, and while he knew they must be secured sooner or later he couldn’t bear himself to do that right now, while everything in front of his dark eyes was blurred. Bruce’s holding tightened around his right arm. All of them were having a hard time to stay on their feet, but when Bucky’s silhouette appeared in front of them, Steve rushed to hug his friend. A moment later, also Sam, T’Challa, Wanda and a weird tree were standing in the middle of Times Square, along with a lot of people and aliens that the Snap made disappear into dust.
Tony’s eyes were flashing back and forth from Bruce’s face and then the people who were coming back until he felt a pair of arms around his waist. He didn’t need to look at the kid’s face to know who he was.
“Kid,” He said, and despite everything, despite the pain, despite his injuries and the tiredness of his entire body, despite the burning in his left arm, he felt alive for the first time in the past year or so. “You are here, you are fine!” He repeated. He wasn’t saying those words to Peter or, better, he was but was also aware of the fact that he was the one who needed them.
“I knew you could make it,” Someone else replied, and when Tony turned to meet the owner of that voice he knew he was smiling, despite everything. Stephen was there, in front of him, beautiful as the day of their wedding.
“Steph…” Tony said. He didn’t want their last conversation to be that sort of argument they had on the doughnut spaceship, and he would never forgive himself if those were the last words he shared with his husband, that and what he said a moment before the sorcerer tuned into dust.
Stephen nodded, steel blue eyes on Tony’s lips, and then he moved a step forward, closing the distance between them and kissing his husband madly.
“Oh, he must be the husband,” Clint said, receiving a small punch from Nat.