Work Text:
When Tony doesn’t put product in his hair and lets it grow out. It curls.
He’s not fond of it, but it doesn’t take much to fix it. It’s why he keeps his hair short.
The curls are commonly seen in the lab when he’s had a shower and hasn’t bothered to fix his appearance. Lately, he's grown his hair out longer for variety and also to stave off those ‘he’s losing his hair’ rumours.
Unfortunately, curls are a by-product.
It’s such a normal thing for him that Tony doesn’t think it will be strange or new to someone. He also can’t imagine anyone will care.
Yet, when he’s bent over his work bench with his attention concentrated on design schematics, it’s a miracle he doesn’t jump half a foot when a hand lands on his neck.
He knows its Loki; he heard the mage announce himself only a minute prior. But they’ve never been touchy-feely like this. Loki’s palm is a heavy weight on his neck, but the mage’s long fingers are twirling around his curls.
“Why have I only just learned this?” Loki asks, his voice sounding awed.
“Learned what?” Tony questions, his whole body tense and unsure.
“Why would you hide such locks of spun silk?”
Tony blinks. It takes him a moment before - “Are you talking about my hair?”
“It is soft, like a woman’s, and yet, you are a man, but there is no coarseness, it curls.”
His fingers slip up even further, playing with Tony’s hair and while it feels nice, Tony is still confused. "Is this a joke?”
“Never,” Loki says and he sounds breathy.
Tony does not know how to properly deal with this.
He does carefully turn his head to be able to look the mage in the eye. Loki is looking at Tony with wonder and something that, on any other person, Tony would call smitten.
Loki's in love with his curly hair. Well, stranger things have happened.
“Is this going to be a thing with you now?” Tony asks. “Are you going to play with my hair on a regular basis?”
Loki blinks his eyes clear and draws his gaze to Tony. He looks contemplative before he offers, “I am able to compensate with a massage of your scalp.”
Tony does some mental arithmetic, but doesn’t see a reason to refuse. Loki might be stranger than Tony anticipated, but Tony still trusts him.
“I better not catch you cutting off locks of my hair in the middle of the night.”
Loki huffs out a laugh. “Why would I want your hair? No, I much prefer it on you.”
Huh, Tony thinks, looking at Loki with a sharper gaze, feeling like he’s stumbled into the ‘chicken and the egg’ debate.
Is it Tony’s hair that caught Loki’s attention first, or Tony himself?
He's going to need more data to know for sure and what other way to collect it then: “I thought you said I’d get a head massage?”
Loki smiles before the fingers of both hands come to run over Tony’s scalp. Tony's eyes fall closed and he relaxes into the feeling.
Maybe, he could live with letting his curls show a bit more.