Work Text:
In the early light of a November morning, Steve walks through the penthouse, gliding along the shadows. He stays close to the walls, wanting a full vantage point of the living room, but counting on not being seen. Not yet, anyway.
It’s a silver tipped blue-gray day, the sun struggling to tip over the horizon while a lazy rain dampens the air, painting the windows with crystal-like streaks of water. When he peeks outside, the city is muted and somehow still brilliant, all the colors blended and dipped with gray.
It's dim and gloomy, but inside the rooms are warm, lit with the soft glow of yellow lamps and there, curled up on the couch with a book lying flat open on his chest, a sleeping Tony adds a vibrant blue light to the golden hue from the lamps. The arc reactor emits a beautiful aura that is bright with Tony's genius. There's a contrast, a divisive argument between the dull blue creeping over the buildings and the brilliant light in Tony's chest. A play of colors– blues that are playing different characters in the same scene.
Carefully, Steve lifts the novel, marking Tony's place and setting it aside. He tucks Tony's favorite blanket around him– a king sized blue abomination that went out of style decades ago, but is worn and warm and frayed at the edges. It's covered with yellow daisies and intricate leaves, though most of the color has faded throughout the long years that Tony has dragged it around from place to place. Yet another character, this one an old friend. The daisies are hand-embroidered, white and yellow, most missing a third of their stitching.
Daisies. Maria's favorite flower.
In Norse mythology, they are given to new mothers, and the blanket had been Maria's. It’s how Tony remains close to her memory.
Tony's favorite flower is a sunflower. Adoration.
Steve's is a bluebell. Humility.
Flowers that speak volumes about who they are. One, a man who loves with all his heart, but hides behind a flamboyant mask, the other a man who's stubbornness often gets in his way, but who is constantly striving to better himself.
And a mother, celebrating a new beginning, but taken too soon.
The rain picks up, sending a pattering of taps across the glass of the windows. It feels fitting; nature has taken up the mood Steve had set by slamming the bedroom door in Tony's face the night before. He had been so angry, so sure he was right. They had fought, and not with the bickering that was normal, but in an all out screaming match that had rattled the framework of their home.
Steve had been so sure he was right. He hadn’t been, and Tony had spent all night on the couch.
Waking up to a cold and empty bed, to the lack of a soft blue glow– it had sent all of Steve's priorities back to where they should be.
Perhaps a hyacinth is in order; a flower to say that he is sorry. Or lavender to show his love and devotion.
But when Tony wakes up a few hours later, it's to none of those.
He's nestled in Steve's arms, wrapped in his blanket of daisies, and on the end table is a vase of orange blossoms.
"I'm sorry," Steve whispers, his voice reserved and remorseful. "I was wrong. I do need you. I missed you so much last night; I had no right to–"
"Yes," Tony interrupts, sitting up so he's straddling Steve's lap. He cups his face, pressing his forehead to Steve's. "Yes."
"Tony–"
"You're asking me to marry you, right? The orange blossoms– I thought–"
"Yes."
When Tony smiles, the room lights up. The rain, the gloom, the fight from the night before just fade away. "Jarvis," Tony says, his lips a hair from Steve's, "order some red chrysanthemums. Make it a huge order; Steve and I are getting married."
Steve smiles, the glow of the arc reactor lighting up his face, and he knows, without a single doubt, that he will love this man forever.
Through darkness as well as light…