Chapter Text
1: The One With The Clothes
The very first time the unofficial and undeclared pair had an argument was over clothes. Walking into his bedroom, Clint hadn’t been expecting to find Tony standing by his bed with a large grin as he was surrounded by a sea of shopping bags.
“Tony… what’s going on?”
“So…” He drawled out, his grin staying just as large though a shimmer of shyness fell into it, “I might have bought you a bunch of clothes and may have been waiting here for fifty minutes for you to come in. But now that you’re here, you can try them on.” Before Clint could fully understand what Tony had said, the short genius was throwing him a Dolce & Gabbana bag before pushing him towards his walk-in-wardrobe to change. Neither had really seen the other naked yet, so it was more out of respect that Tony made him go into the wardrobe…plus it had a full-length mirror that would help Clint out.
“Do you mind telling me why you bought me a bunch of clothes? I don’t need any, I have plenty. Also, come and help me with my tie.” Clint shouted to him and Tony complied, entering the large yet rather empty wardrobe. His fingers working gently as he tied the tie and straightened the blazer making Clint look presentable.
“Well, we Avengers are being forced to go to some stupid Winter Gala and I know you don’t have any suits for such an event.”
“Tony…I can tell that there is way more than one suit in those bags.”
“Okay… so maybe there’s like three… ten… twelve suits for you to try on, but the rest are just some more clothes because, Clint, Honey, you don’t actually have much to wear.” Tony cast his gaze around the tragically bare closet, “and I suppose, once I started shopping, I just couldn’t shop. I sort of understand why Pepper and Natasha love it so much.” He shook his head, “give us a twirl.” He demanded as he took a step away from his… partner of sorts and looked on with a calculative gaze as Clint turned in a slow and mocking circle.
“How’s that?” The archer snarked, Tony hadn’t noticed that his mood had dropped significantly as Tony spoke,
“Hmm… too tight around your shoulders. Try this one.” He said handing the man another expensive labelled bag before turning and leaving back to the room. “Now, typically, I’d have called in my tailor to sort you out, but we only found out about the gala this morning and it’s tomorrow so there wouldn’t be enough time. Plus I think my tailor’s in Italy visiting his daughter.” He added as a side thought as he browsed through another few bags, trying to pick out what to hand Clint next if the suit wasn’t good enough.
“And I suppose it’s too much to ask that I go in my nicest jeans and shirt?”
“Honey, you’re nicest jeans have a huge hole in the knee and it was designed that way, whilst your nicest shirt is somehow missing its right sleeve. Which is not purposeful.” Tony replied, not hearing the grumbles that Clint released in what may as well have been another room given the size.
“Tie,” Clint shouted in need of assistance, he’d never needed to learn how to tie a tie, even on the few missions where he’d had to wear a suit, Nat had done the tie for him. After helping him out, Tony stood back to cast a gaze over the archer.
“Hmm, let’s try the Tom Ford.” He demanded handing over another suit without giving a single critique; Clint sighed, he was beginning to feel extremely irritated, which was why he ended up snatching the bag off Tony quite harshly without truly realising and whether Tony noticed or not, he didn’t comment on it.
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The Tom Ford suit was lovely, but the fit wasn’t good enough. Clint could easily get away with it, but all Tony could see was the slightly too short trousers and how the shoulders were just the slightest bit too big.
“Try the Burberry.” He stated holding his arm out so Clint could grab the suit bag, but the archer just ignored it, untied his tie and loosened the top few buttons of his shirt, as he walked back into his bedroom where all the bags were.
“No. I’m done being you’re little model, Tony, if I’m going to this stupid gala, it’ll either be in nothing or this stupid Ford suit. You can take the rest back. Including,” he gestured around the room at the other bags, “all of these. I don’t want them. I don’t need them. You had no right to go ahead and buy me a shit ton of stuff. So take it all back.” Tony was frozen with his mouth parted ever so slightly and his eyes wide,
“I…I don’t understand.” He murmured, his confusion clear but Clint was too annoyed to care,
“You don’t understand?” The archer repeated with conviction in his voice, “for god's sake Tony, I don’t want this stuff. I’m fine with what I got, you don’t need to -no, you have no right to go ahead and buy me all of this shit. Take it back. That’s all I have to say on the matter.” He stormed back into his wardrobe to take the suit off and give Tony time to leave.
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Casting a glance around the room, Tony tried to decipher where he’d gone wrong, what he’d done to upset Clint. Did he buy him the wrong stuff? Did he hate the brands he’d gone to? Maybe it was the Dolce & Gabbana suit he’d had him try on, after all it was the cheapest suit Clint had tried on, what with it being over $3000 cheaper than the Tom Ford. Or even the Tom ford, maybe it wasn’t expensive enough, was $6437 too cheap? Tony would have to consult Pepper on that one. With one last look around the room, he decided to leave the bags where they were, just in case Clint decided to look through them and saw something he liked. He’d come back in the morning and return them.
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He waited until he’d heard Tony leave before returning to his room; Clint knew that the bags would be staying in his room until the next day, he knew Tony had left them so that the agent would have a look and despite not wanting to give in and do so, Clint found himself fighting a losing battle against his curiosity. Seconds later, he was looking through the bags and was annoyed to find himself putting several things aside such as a few pairs of relatively cheap -for Tony at least- jeans and t-shirts.
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“I’m sorry for snapping earlier, I kept a couple of things, but I’d like you to return the rest, please.” Clint murmured into the darkness of Tony’s room later that night as the pair lay staying at the ceiling; the archer’s arm resting beneath the shorter man as he held Tony.
“It’s alright, I understand what I did wrong,” Tony replied and his partner of sorts mumbled something unintelligible; neither realising that the other had different ideas about what exactly was wrong nor realising that Tony’s thoughts on what he did wrong were completely… well, wrong.