Work Text:
“This is stupid.”
Tony glances up at Quentin. “Don’t let Peter hear you say that,” he says.
“What,” Quentin snaps, “you really think he’s going to be able to alpha me into it?” He flings himself down on the couch, not even near Tony.
Tony barely manages to stop himself from rolling his eyes. Quentin is just… insufferable. “Because it’ll make him sad,” Tony says, and Quentin stiffens. “Why else do you think I’m doing this?”
He gestures at Quentin; “Why else would you do it?” he says. “Now come on, you know that’s not going to work.”
“It’s not fair,” Quentin says as he shifts, turning sideways on the couch, facing away from Tony. “Peter’s just— it’s not even the bond, it’s just him.” He lays back, gingerly resting his head on Tony’s leg.
“I know,” Tony says, trying to figure out what to do with his hands. “The sad puppy routine is brutal. Thank god it’s not intentional; if he ever figures out how to weaponize it we’re fucked.”
Quentin snorts. Shifts, trying to get comfortable, pulling one leg up and then switching. Looks like he’s having as much trouble with his hands as Tony.
This is supposed to make things… better. Supposed to make them a little less likely to spark off each other, though Tony doubts anything in the world could really do that. But Peter insists contact and associating comfort with each other is recommended, so off they go.
Quentin turns his head a bit, enough to see the TV. Switches legs again and then shoves his shoulders into Tony’s leg. “Ugh, why are you watching this. Give me the remote, will you?”
“Just tell FRIDAY what you want,” Tony says, a little absently, already digging back into his work. “And I wasn’t watching it, not really.”
“Sure,” Quentin says, but whatever else he says is lost because Tony’s tuned him out.
He can’t tune out the restless movement nearly as well, though. Every time he thinks Quentin has finally settled, he turns his head or stretches or moves his arms— “Will you stop that?” Tony says. “Just settle already.”
Quentin turns to glare at him. Tony raises his eyebrows and Quentin—still holding his gaze—very deliberately wiggles, pushing himself further into Tony’s lap. “Insufferable,” Tony mutters.
“Whatever.”
He does seem to settle after that, no more real movement or talking.
It’s not awful.
Quentin’s stopped being deliberately annoying, and Tony’s used to having Peter like this, fairly often, that if he doesn’t think too hard about it, he can almost pretend that’s who’s there. Which backfires a little when he absently drops his hand onto the top of Quentin’s head, slowly sliding his fingers through his hair.
He realizes his error a second later, when Quentin tenses slightly. Waits for the explosion, but instead— instead, Quentin relaxes, not acknowledging Tony’s touch at all. Well. That’s better.
Tony loses track of how long they sit like that; Peter said at least forty minutes, and that might not be as impossibly long as it sounded.
“Hey,” Peter says, Tony nearly starting. “How’s it going?”
He smiles at Peter. “We haven’t killed each other yet,” Tony says.
Peter laughs, very quietly. “Sounds like progress. Quentin?”
Quentin turns to face Peter, his eyes half closed. Doesn’t say anything at all for a moment, and then tilts his head back, offering.
“Oh,” Peter says, almost whispers, and Tony agrees. He hadn’t expected that.
Peter starts to reach for Quentin and stops. Bites his lip. “Tony,” he says slowly. “I think— why don’t you accept.”
What the— He looks at Peter, trying to get everything he wants to say and isn’t going to into one expression. Peter just nods slightly.
If Quentin bites him he’s never going to let Peter live it down.
Carefully, very carefully, Tony rests his hand on Quentin’s neck, the curve of it above his collarbone where Peter’s mark on him sits. Covers it with his palm and lets his fingers settle on Quentin’s throat, thumb over his pulse. Quentin glances at him, the same sort of distant, weighing look he gets during heat.
Closes his eyes and tilts his head back just a little further. Fuck. Well. That’s definitely progress.
Quentin stays like that as Peter joins them, ending up with Quentin’s legs over his lap. When Tony glances over, Peter’s got a hand wrapped around Quentin’s ankle; Quentin shifts a little more onto his side and zones out.
He’s almost tolerable like this, sprawled over their laps, quiet and relaxed and tentatively happy. More than tolerable, even approaching nice. Maybe Peter was onto something.
They’ve been like that for ages when Quentin suddenly stiffens, his eyes opening. Peter’s head comes up too, and a moment later Pepper comes through the doorway. ‘Tony,” she starts.
Quentin snarls.
Pepper takes a half step back, her eyes wide, and Tony feels pretty fucking shocked too. Sure, Quentin’s growled at both of them before, but those were small, cranky things, just a wordless ‘fuck off’. Not like this, not a real warning, vicious and defensive. “Hey,” Tony says, pressing down on Quentin’s neck. “Cut that out. She’s not a threat.”
“Oh, honestly,” Pepper says. “If you’d just blocked this time off like I told you—” Quentin snarls again, deeper, and goes up on his elbows, whole body tensed to jump her.
“Quentin,” Peter says, sharp, right on the edge of a command. “Stop it. You’re being rude.”
Like Quentin has ever cared about that, Tony thinks, but it works. Somewhat. Quentin goes silent, but he doesn’t settle back down until Peter reaches over and pushes him. Even once he’s lying down, head on Tony’s lap again, he’s tense, not taking his eyes off Pepper for a second.
“What did you need?” Tony asks. “You could have gotten pretty much anything from FRIDAY.”
“I thought you’d be alone,” she says. “Peter blocked off his schedule, so I thought—”
Quentin moves suddenly, rolling onto his side, his back against the couch. He stretches out, winding up with half his chest on Tony’s lap, head on top of his crossed arms, legs spread wider over Peter’s lap. Taking up as much room as possible, and Tony doesn’t know if he should be amused or offended that he’s apparently part of Quentin’s claim.
Pepper’s smart; she doesn’t even look at him as she continues talking, and okay, maybe she has a decent reason for coming here after all. Tony slides his hand into Quentin’s hair again as they talk, and Quentin pushes up into it, not subtly. Peter got one hand on Quentin’s ankle and the other just above his knee; if Quentin lunges, he’s set up to keep him in place. That’s a little reassuring. Still, Quentin doesn’t relax one bit the entire time Pepper’s there, and doesn’t take his eyes off her either.
He tenses even more, his fingers digging into Tony’s leg, when Pepper glaces down at him for just a second. She shakes her head slightly. “This is improvement?” she says.
“Actually,” Peter says, quiet, “it is.”
She looks a little worried, and Tony doesn’t blame her one bit. “It’s a work in progress,” he tells her, and she frowns at him before she leaves.
Tony lets his breath out in a whoosh. “Seriously?” he says. “Talk about an overreaction, Quentin. What was that?”
Quentin doesn’t respond, his shoulders coming up. He rolls forward, almost onto his stomach, and tucks his face against Tony’s thigh, practically hiding. “Quentin?” Peter says.
Quentin just burrows further into Tony’s lap. Tony looks at Peter; Peter looks back, just as uncertain.
“Okay then,” Tony says eventually, drawing it out. “Well, we knew you were possessive.” Quentin makes a small sound, mostly muffled, but doesn’t move.
It’s slow, so very, very slow, but as Tony and Peter go back to their own distractions, Quentin calms. Relaxes, inch by inch, until he stretches, shaking off the last of that tension, and goes limp over their laps. It’s probably a sign to get up, before Quentin manages to wind himself up again. But getting up might do the same thing too. ‘Do nothing’ seems like the best choice for now.
It isn’t until Quentin’s hand falls from Tony’s lap to the couch with a thump that Tony pays any attention to him again. He glances down, about to say something.
“Shh,” Peter says. “Don’t.”
Tony looks over at him. “Don’t what,” he starts, and then he hears it. It’s faint, barely there at all, but still, there’s no doubt in Tony’s mind.
Quentin’s snoring.
“Really?” Tony says. “Insufferable. Eternally.”
Peter laughs. “If you minded that much,” he says, “you’d have pushed him off ages ago.”
“I didn’t say I don’t like insufferable,” Tony says. “I like you, after all.” Peter makes a face at him. “Do you think he knows he snores?”
“Don’t tell him,” Peter says. “You’re getting along so well!”
“Because he’s asleep,” Tony points out. Still, he thinks, curling Quentin’s hair around his finger, he probably won’t tell him.
Or at least he’ll save it for a time when Quentin will be most offended by being called cute.