Work Text:
Howard stared up at the stars that cast their bare white light out into the cold vacuum of infinity. He imagined the lot of them growing steadily more bitter when they never received a response, no life that grew up under the warm beam of their rays. Just a court of dead planets and a belt of common rocks to array them.
Only one golden sun lit the lives of creatures aware enough to appreciate it, scattered in a thin film of livable space spread across the surface of a blue-green planet.
Only one truly good man had ever walked beneath the sun's rays. Super Sentinel Steve Rogers had lit up Howard's life all too briefly. A falling star that had streaked across the sky until the war ate him up, as it did to too many men.
Now here they were, unworthy shadows clinging to the skin of a rock that spun around space, trying to find meaning in a life that had none.
“Howard, are you having a Nietzsche moment again?” asked a soft lilt, reeling him back to her with the lifeline of her voice. Maria appeared at his shoulder, hands clasped around a not-yet-swelling belly. “Why must you look at life through such a dark glass when God has finally answered our prayers?”
“God is dead,” said he and she pulled a face, choosing not to engage in a debate they had had in some form every day of their courtship. Instead, she rose up on her toes and kissed the tip of his nose, so he crossed his eyes and put his hand on her shoulders.
“Maria, we don't know that this time-” he started, in a tone he would call chiding and she would call whining.
“Nothing is certain in life,” she interrupted. “We can only hope and try, love. It's hard enough without borrowing trouble.”
“Fine.” He looked around them. The lawn was wet from the day's rain, the air spiced with an autumn chill and Maria was wearing only slippers and a shawl over her night gown. “Come on, let's get you inside.”
“Says the man who does his philosophising outside in the middle of the night in his pyjamas,” her voice warm and sweet as mulled wine even when she roasted him like the old chestnut he was.
“Come on, we have to be up on time in order to make it to Shepherd's Mass.” She preceded him through the terrace doors into their bedroom, lit only by the low glow of the night light next to the bathroom door.
“Do I have to go?” he asked, because he always did.
“Yes, it's my favourite, as you well know. So full of hope and light,” she sighed happily as she folded her shawl and put it over the back of an arm chair. In it sat a teddy bear he had bought her six years ago, the first time she'd told him she was pregnant. He barely remembered the jubilant man he had been back then, brimming with faith in the future.
“I'll come,” he promised softly. Even if hope had left him, they could perhaps hold on to hers.
She came into his arms and he held on tight, staring at the two shadows they cast upon the wall, huddling together against the cold night. “Merry Christmas,” he whispered in her ear. She smiled against his collarbone.
*~*
March in California meant everything was in full bloom, drinking in the last of the rains before the dry summer came. Howard stood upon the balcony in the entrance hall to his brand-new office and factory.
His latest 'vanity project', as Stane called it, the ARC reactor, powered the entirety of it. It wasn't commercially viable, however, not with the technology and materials available on the planet at this point in history. Not even when he augmented it. He would have to shelve it until technology could catch up or he could hand it over to his son.
A smirk crossed his face when he remembered Maria's response to his lament at dinner, that King David had never finished the temple. “I'm an atheist, Maria, God doesn't stop me .”
“You don't have to believe in God to get the point of the story, Howard,” she'd said pointedly. “You do not carry the fate of the world on your shoulders. Get that through your damned proud head. The next generation will do what we never could, because we make it possible.”
His eyes had been drawn to her belly. “Is...?”
She'd nodded, smiling. “I've reached my third trimester. We're not out of the woods, but I've never gotten this far before, so... Doctor says we're in calmer waters.”
A hand clapped him on the shoulder. “How's the wifey, hm?” asked Stane. “Bun still in the oven, this time?” He chuckled, as if he'd told a grand joke. Howard closed his eyes and breathed deep so he wouldn't sock the man in the jaw. It wasn't even the first time this week he'd heard such a thing.
He suddenly, fiercely, missed Rogers, Carter and Barnes and their band of misfit guides and sentinels. They had never had trouble propping each other up when one of them showed their belly. There had been heckling, but in good spirits. Not this.
Perhaps he should prod Maria to invite Peggy over for dinner again soon.
“How's business, Obadiah?” Best keep to safe topics among the old boys. God, he was an old boy himself these days. He refused the cigar Stane held out for him as they walked to his office. He opened a window when they reached his office.
“Businessman after my own heart,” said Stane. Howard grunted in agreement and focused on their common interest, Stark Industries.
*~*
“No, Maria, I'm sorry, I can't make it home. These negotiations -”
“-Yes, I'm sorry-”
“No, no I'm not abandon-”
“Well, your sister is there isn't she. She'll do you more good than a middle-aged mechanic. I don't know anything about the womanly-”
“-I'm not running away-”
“-Maria, be reasonable-”
“-Well excuse me for being good at putting food on the table-”
“-No, your charity work is immensely meaningful-”
“-No, love, no, you're a better person than I am...”
“...I tried, honey. I did. I practically begged Stane to take this one, but I already owe him from when he took over in Japan last June.”
“...Yeah... yeah... when we lost Jeremy.”
“...Yes. I'm sorry, sweetheart. I'll try to make it home as soon as I can.”
“...Love you too. Bye.”
Numb, Howard put down the phone.
He fixed the hair he had tried to pull out while he had to explain to his wife she'd likely have bring their son into the world without him. He changed out of the shirt stained with the whiskey he'd drunk before he made the phone call. He pulled up his pants and affixed the suspenders he'd taken off when he thought he was done and could start packing. He picked up the jacket he had tossed across the room in a ball when he'd gotten the news he had to stay in London for another three weeks.
He combed his hair with pomade, because he needed to feel like the driven idealist he'd been once upon a time. Cap's friend.
He looked into the mirror as he tightened the noose of his neck tie. A tired, old man stared back at him.
He needed a drink so bad.
*~*
He stared into the crib at the strange creature he was supposed to love. “She's a she,” he said to his wife, who'd just appeared in the doorway, not quite able to reconcile the sight of the pink blanket with the otherwise blue nursery.
“Predictions aren't perfectly adequate, Howard. Does it matter?” Maria loaded the question with enough disdain that he knew to tread carefully, but his jet-lagged brain was too slow. He had had plans.
“No, but, an heir for the company, the name.”
His wife crossed the room in two furious strides and slapped him upside the head, hard. “Don't you dare, Howard! It's the seventies! You yourself helped put a woman in charge of an intelligence agency. You said we were equals at the wedding. Were you lying?”
“N-no.” Shit, no. Every woman who had been satisfied to hang off his arm submissively had felt like a fetter. Maria could carry her own weight. It was one of the first things he'd liked about her, that, and that she had been enough of a spitfire to royally ream him out when he'd insulted her. That sharp Italian tongue had had him hot under the collar in no time flat.
“It's the seventies, Howard. A daughter can be your heir as easily as a son.”
He blinked, turned back to the child. His heir... Maybe. More importantly, this was Maria's daughter. His seed had finally succeeded in giving her the child she'd dreamed of. Yes, he could work with that. A weight he hadn't known he was carrying fell off his shoulders.
He stroked the girl's face with one finger. “What's her name?”
“I was waiting for you to come home,” she murmured, leaning against his side.
His head snapped up to look at her sideways. “You...”
Maria gave him a melancholy smile. “We've waited so long for this moment. When you weren't there, I just couldn't...” She sighed. “She's been baby-girl Stark, but we need to get her registered. And baptised.”
“Right.” It was a wonder the bishop wasn't camping on their doorstep. He had rather strong opinions about the sacraments. His nose scrunched up every time he caught sight of Howard, like he wanted to shoo the unholy atheist out of the sanctuary. Howard usually made it a point to talk to him after service just to torment the man.
His mind hopped from the bishop, to church, to Christmas, to a night he had looked up at the stars and despaired, only for his wife to come to him then, too.
“How about Celeste?” He pronounced it the Italian way, Cheh-LES-teh.
Maria tasted it on her tongue. “I like it. But most everyone is going to mispronounce it.”
He snorted. “Good way to weed out the chaff.”
She shook her head. “Not everything has to be a test, Howard.”
“Good way to see what quality you're working with.” He looked back at the child. Failed to feel anything, still. But at least now he wanted to try. “How about Maria for a middle name? It's traditional.”
“Oh, don't make up excuses. I see through you. You're a sweetheart,” he was admonished. And then roundly kissed. He didn't mind that she saw through him. Not at all.
“How about we take the Latin root for the first name when we baptise her, hm?” She bent over the crib, picked up the child. So natural, it looked. The picture of a loving mother. Howard stepped forward, putting his hands on her elbows, wanting to be a part of it. Feeling the swell of a tentative something below his heart.
“Whatever you like.” He gazed at them, fixed the image in his mind, in the hopes he could fix the both of them in his heart, someday.
*~*
Howard stood outside in his suit pants and shirt in the oppressive summer night, in their walled-in garden, safely in the centre of the mansion's grounds. He looked up at the stars. “I wish you were here, Steve,” he whispered. “I don't think I know how to love her.” Liquid in his eyes made the stars blur in the sky, those that were visible with the city's shine obscuring them from the ground. “How can I be a good father when I'm not even a good man?” he asked the only good man he had ever known. A man who was long dead. “I could use your help.” He fell to his knees. “More than ever, Cap, I could use your help. I need a friend.”
He cried quietly, hidden by the night.
An unknown amount of time later, he toasted the sky, salt still on his tongue. “Caelestis Maria Stark. In the sky, bare and bitter, like the stars.” He smirked. “May you be a better man than me.”
He drank deep and refilled his glass from the bottle he'd planted on the lawn. When the whiskey ran dry, he found himself lying on the grass as well, next to the empty bottle.
When rustling footsteps broke the quiet, he looked up. Jarvis approached, wearing a wrinkled sweater vest he liked to wear on long drives. “Howard,” was all he said, and after some rummaging, produced a fresh-washed handkerchief.
Howard, red-faced, sat up to wipe his cheeks, eyes, blew his nose. From the corner of his eyes, he saw the other man sit down next to him.
“Tell me, my friend,” he said softly.
Howard unwillingly smiled into the hand scrubbing his face. Thank you, Steve, he thought, reassured the sentinel watched over him.