Work Text:
I
The accident happens on Tuesday at 11:47 PM, and Tony could say he’s surprised, but he won’t, because Tuesday has always been exactly like that: the ugly middle child of the week that doesn’t owe anyone anything and therefore does whatever it wants.
There isn’t even a hint of drama in it. No ominous music. A yellow taxi blows a red light—the driver, apparently, is a busy man unburdened by rules—clips the rear of a black SUV, and the vehicle swerves. Just a little, just enough to veer into Tony’s lane. Tony jerks the wheel, and his car slams into a fire hydrant (which looks nowhere near as cool as it does in the movies); the airbag explodes right into his face.
He sits there for a while, blinking. It takes a few seconds to realize he’s still in the car, and in front of his face is a deflating bag. Tony tries to move his jaw, checking if his teeth are still in place, and only then breaks the silence:
“I’m fine,” he tosses into the void. “Totally fine.”
His arms move. His legs are there. His head, well, his head is behaving a bit peculiarly, as the world is running on about a two-second delay, but that’s manageable, he can work with that; he’s seen worse. Once in high school, he hit his head on a locker door and spent half the day speaking to teachers in Japanese, which he didn’t know before or since—so the current situation is quite tolerable.
Then, through the cracked windshield, he notices the SUV. It’s come to a halt at an angle cars shouldn’t stand at; the door is already open (meaning someone tried to get out), and a figure is half-lying in the doorway.
This is ‘Not Good’.
Tony gets out of the car. Looking back, it’s exactly at this moment that the evening truly begins.
The guy Tony finds in the doorway is tall—that’s the first and perhaps least useful thing Tony’s brain manages to register. His brain, by the way, isn’t running at full capacity itself, so the expectations are low. Following that, however, something more substantial catches up: a coat—clearly expensive, the kind people buy without looking at the price tag—and a crimson streak on his temple, right where his head met the side window.
Alive, which is already good news. His eyes are open, but they’re staring at nothing—the person is conscious, but his consciousness isn't quite with him yet.
“Hey. Hey,” Tony grunts, dropping into a crouch that immediately informs him his knees were also involved in the accident. “Don’t move.” He reaches out a hand, not quite sure what he intends to do. “And don’t try to be a hero. I’ve got the patent on that, I checked.”
The stranger’s gaze eventually drifts to Tony’s face. His eyes are green. Startlingly, obscenely green, of a shade that occurs in nature approximately never and Tony notes this, files it away somewhere deep, and pretends he didn’t note it.
The guy parts his lips, a faint, elegant wrinkle appearing on his forehead, but no sound comes out.
“You’ve got a cabin depressurization,” Tony remarks in the tone people usually use to say hang in there, though the words hang in there somehow won’t come out. The streetlights begin to pulse—that’s probably a bad sign, but the list of bad signs for today is already long enough. “Got a phone? Emergency contact? A ‘Break Open in Case of Imminent Brain Hemorrhage’ card?”
The guy just looks at him.
“Got it. Okay. Silence is golden. Moving to Plan B.” Tony fumbles for his phone; his fingers feel like someone else's. “Calling 911. Stay with me, Green-eyes. Don’t go toward the light; it’s tacky and cliché.”
He calls.
And then, because the guy keeps trying to move and Tony keeps repeating “don’t move,” he stays there, crouching in the middle of the street with his hand on the stranger’s shoulder, for all eight minutes until the ambulance arrives. In that moment, Tony’s vision does an interesting somersault; one of the paramedics looks at him and asks: “Sir, are you injured?”
“It’s nothing,” Tony waves him off. “My head. But I’m fine, whereas my...”
“Sir,” the paramedic continues, pulling out a penlight. “You’re bleeding.”
Tony touches his nose. His fingers immediately come away wet and bright red. “Huh. Would you look at that.”
...
A concussion is boring. That is Tony’s professional medical opinion, formed over thirty minutes of lying on a hospital bed. He was told not to sleep and not to use his phone, which is, of course, complete nonsense—they only say that to make the patient feel guilty. He, naturally, uses his phone.
RHODEY 00:36
Are you ever coming home or are you just going to haunt the office until dawn?
TONY → RHODEY 00:37
funny story
RHODEY 00:37
Tony.
TONY → RHODEY 00:37
had a bit of a fender bender
i’m fine
concussion, minor thing, barely counts
RHODEY 00:38
I’m coming to the hospital.
TONY → RHODEY 00:38
absolutely not
i’m fine
besides i don’t know which hospital this is
st. charles something, there’s like fifteen of them in the city probably
RHODEY 00:38
Tony.
TONY → RHODEY 00:39
i’ll handle it and text you
stay put, rhodes, i said — everything’s fine
there’s this other guy here too
RHODEY 00:39
What guy?
TONY → RHODEY 00:40
from the accident
dark hair, very tall, looked like a menswear model until he hit his head
they took him somewhere, don’t know where, they won’t tell me anything
RHODEY 00:40
Tony. Tony, listen to me.
This is not your problem.
TONY → RHODEY 00:41
i know
RHODEY 00:41
You didn't cause the accident, did you?
TONY → RHODEY 00:41
taxi driver ran a red
not my fault, not a drop
the guys said i was the only one who stopped to help
RHODEY 00:42
Good. You did the right thing, called 911, now he’s in the hospital. Go home, Tony.
TONY → RHODEY 00:42
yeah
...
He doesn’t go home.
And all because when he tries to fish for information from the nurse at the desk—purely out of civic interest, he assures himself, just to confirm the guy is okay, a one-minute formality and all that—she listens to him and replies that she doesn’t have the right to disclose patient data to unauthorized persons. It’s hospital policy.
Tony looks at her. She looks at him. Somewhere to the right, a man in a rumpled blazer is trying to achieve the same thing—apparently a colleague or neighbor of some other poor soul—and receives the same answer: only relatives or official contacts.
Tony opens his mouth and is about to say: “Reasonable, of course, I understand, thanks.” But instead, due to the slight sluggishness haunting him for the last hour, what comes out is:
“I’m his boyfriend.”
There is a pause. Everything goes blurry in his head again, and somewhere in the recesses of his skull, a tiny voice screams: “Tony, no!”, but the connection is poor, and the voice quickly fades.
“Name?” the woman sighs, her fingers already hovering over the keyboard.
“Tony,” he provides. “Tony Stark.”
“And the name of... your young man?”
Now, here is a minor technical difficulty. Tony has about three seconds, because a pause longer than three seconds is suspicious. He saw the name on the paramedic’s tablet. A glimpse, out of the corner of his eye, while everything was still swimming, but his memory is good. His memory is, in all honesty, outstanding.
“Loki Odinson.”
Tony stands there, trying to breathe evenly and not look like a man who just lied to medical staff about a personal relationship with a stranger for the sake of accessing confidential data. This is likely a violation of some law. Maybe even several.
“I’ll think about that later,” he decides. Later is an excellent time for thinking.
The nurse types something into the database, clicks the mouse a couple of times, and, without a change in expression, says:
“Room 207. Second ward. Try not to make noise; visiting hours ended two hours ago.”
Loki Odinson is unconscious, which is entirely expected with a head injury. He’s hooked up to a bunch of monitors. The coat is gone, and without it, he looks younger, which feels wrong for a man who managed to look like a Roman statue even while he was bleeding out.
Tony sits in the chair. Just for a minute, he promises himself.
He falls asleep in twelve.
...
At 04:38 AM, Clint Barton makes a decision that the others will regret before they even wake up.
The others are five people united by one common pathology: they have known Tony Stark long enough to love him, and well enough to understand that leaving this man unsupervised for longer than an hour is dangerous for the city’s ecosystem.
The chat was created two years ago, right after the ‘Motorcycle Incident’. In the group's folklore, this event holds the honorary first place: that time Tony went through a coffee shop window at full speed and then, sitting in a pile of broken glass and spilled latte, spent twenty minutes trying to prove to the patrol officers that it was a conceptual performance about the fragility of existence, while simultaneously taping a deep gash on his hip with duct tape.
Sam was the first one to throw his helmet in the corner back then and declare that they needed a common line of communication to promptly figure out which part of the world Stark had decided to self-destruct in, or—as happened far more often—decided to save someone at the cost of his own sanity.
Since then, the group has served as something of an early warning system. Natasha provides the intelligence. Clint panics first. Bruce tries to be the voice of reason (usually unsuccessfully).
Sam reminds everyone that Tony has Rhodey, and Rhodey has the patience of a saint and direct access to military satellites. Thor is a new addition, a gym friend of Sam’s who has heard many legends about Stark but hasn’t met him in person yet, which, by common consensus, was sparing his nervous system.
Usually, the alerts concern missed dinners or suspiciously long silences. Today’s is of a different caliber.
CLINT okay. who’s awake
SAM I am, but only because you texted “who’s awake” at four-thirty in the morning, and now I’m awake from anxiety
CLINT natasha sent me a google alert on stark
SAM Clint
CLINT accident, he’s fine, blah blah
but here’s the kicker...
BRUCE I’m awake too, for the record. Just reading and hoping we don’t have to go pick him up from the police station.
CLINT worse. he’s in the hospital
and according to natasha’s source at the registration desk (seriously, nat, how do you do it?)...
SAM She has sources everywhere, it’s actually frightening
NATASHA It’s called “maintaining contacts.”
CLINT ... so anyway. he told the nurse he was the boyfriend of some guy from the same accident
just so they’d let him into the room
and he’s been sitting there for three hours
SAM ...
This isn’t the first time, is it
NATASHA He was the first to stop at the scene. You know how that affects him.
BRUCE I remember the story with that cyclist on Third Avenue.
SAM I remember the story with the cyclist on Third Avenue, the dog at the vet clinic, and that guy on the fire escape who he spent almost an hour talking out of jumping, only for the guy to turn out to be a technician trying to fix the AC, who eventually started convincing Stark to get down and stop bothering him
CLINT savior complex, classic
NATASHA It’s not a complex. He just doesn’t know how to leave.
SAM Nat, that IS a complex
BRUCE Wait, is the second person alright?
NATASHA Head injury. Under observation.
CLINT speaking of injuries
nat, who is this guy anyway
NATASHA Loki Odinson.
BRUCE Beautiful name.
SAM Agreed, but that doesn’t change the fact that it’s almost five in the morning and Stark is sitting in a hospital pretending to be someone’s boyfriend
CLINT thor, are you even reading this
we’ve got your namesake in trouble or something here
CLINT thor?
THOR i am reading.
that is my brother.
A pause lasting approximately the time it takes five people to simultaneously realize: Tuesday isn't finished destroying them yet, and the world is much smaller than it seems at 04:38 AM.
SAM WHAT?!
II
The world returns to Loki at 06:52 AM in jolts, through the intrusive hum of fluorescent lights and the sterile, pervasive smell that only exists in hospitals: a mixture of bleach, other people's pain, and hopelessness. For a while, he just lies there without opening his eyes, trying to pull himself back together. His head responds with a heavy, pulsing rhythm, his body feels foreign and sluggish, and the space around him is cold and completely unfamiliar.
He peels his eyelids open, squinting against the harsh light.
A moment later, he slowly turns his head and sees a man sleeping in the chair next to the bed.
The man is dark-haired, sturdy, with the hint of a beard and a dried speck of blood near his left temple. He’s wearing a suit that was likely very expensive until it was rumpled into the state of laundry-basket clothes. He’s sleeping with a phone resting on his chest and his mouth slightly open.
Loki thinks that this man clearly didn’t plan on falling asleep here.
He studies him for several long seconds. He definitely doesn't know him.
Loki presses the nurse call button.
The nurse is cheerful. Her badge says ‘Carla’. Carla explains in the tone of someone who has done this a thousand times: accident, date, moderate concussion, bruises, nothing serious, he got very lucky. Then she pauses—the pause people make before saying something they think is sweet.
“Your boyfriend hasn't left your side since last night,” she coos. “He fought the night shift a bit to stay, but honestly...” She lowers her voice as if revealing a secret. “At that point, he needed the chair more than the argument. But it’s so sweet.”
Loki looks at the sleeping man.
“My boyfriend,” he repeats.
“He introduced himself as Tony. Is he always this attentive, or is it...”
“Could you leave me for a moment?” Loki interrupts. “I need to speak with the doctor. Before...”
Carla nods and leaves.
Loki looks at the man again—Tony. He looks at the chair, at the dried blood, and at the undignified posture of a man who preferred someone else's hospital room over his own medical care.
He considers several facts in order.
First: he doesn't remember this man.
Second: he doesn't remember the last... how long? He needs to find out. His last memories feel like yesterday, but clearly, that isn't the case.
Third: this man is obviously not his boyfriend.
Loki is not stupid. He has a head injury, not a personality replacement.
Fourth: this man is somehow still here.
He reaches for the water on the nightstand, drinks, and waits for the doctor.
The doctor is young and slightly nervous. He informs Loki with all possible tact: retrograde amnesia. The scans are good—no hemorrhages, no structural damage—but the last two years are currently inaccessible. This might pass. It often passes with time.
“How much time?” Loki asks.
“We can’t say for sure.”
“Roughly.”
“Weeks. Sometimes months. In some cases...”
“I understand,” Loki cuts the doctor off with a sharp nod. He knows how to understand things he doesn't like. He has a lot of experience.
When the doctor leaves, Loki sums it up. Two years. He should have been—he calculates—twenty-nine. Now he is thirty-one. Two years of life have simply evaporated.
He needs to call. Get in touch with people. Figure out what his life looks like now.
But first.
He looks at the sleeping man in the chair.
The man looks rumpled, arrogant, and completely foreign. Loki tastes the very idea that he could have chosen this man—or anyone at all—and finds it questionable.
He speaks in an ordinary conversational tone:
“You have exactly one attempt to explain why you are lying to the staff of this hospital regarding our... union.”
The man wakes up instantly—meaning he wasn't sleeping deeply. He sits up, grabs his phone, looks at it (07:14 AM, Loki notes), and shifts his gaze to Loki. His face goes through about six stages in two seconds, the last of which is ‘oh god’.
“You’re awake, Green-eyes,” the man says, rubbing his stiff neck.
Loki’s brain trips for a fraction of a second over that ridiculous word. ‘Green-eyes’. In his personal hierarchy of acceptable forms of address, this sits somewhere between an insult and total nonsense. He ignores the nickname so decisively it's as if it was never spoken, merely lifting an eyebrow slightly.
“Awake,” Loki echoes.
An awkward pause ensues.
“How much do you...”
“Everything,” Loki says, his lips curling imperceptibly. “The nurse is quite the delight. She was very forthcoming.”
The man—Tony, Loki reminds himself, trying to anchor that short, snap-like name in his memory—places the phone face down on his knee and rubs his face with his hand.
“Right,” he exhales, finally taking his hand away. “Right. Listen...”
“You told them you were my boyfriend,” Loki states, “to get into the room.”
“I had a concussion,” the man justifies himself clumsily.
Loki tilts his head slightly, studying his companion with icy curiosity. He switches to the informal “you” so smoothly it’s as if he’s stripping Tony of the right to a polite distance after his dubious performance.
“You have a concussion,” Loki corrects. “In the present tense. And judging by your appearance, you belong in the next ward over, not playing the part of the devoted partner in that uncomfortable chair.”
Tony freezes, catching his gaze.
“You’re... not mad?”
Loki considers the question. He glances at his guest’s rumpled suit and takes into account the fact that this man spent the entire night here for a stranger met on a roadside.
“I shall reserve judgment for now,” he says. “It would be premature to be angry with a man who, while concussed, decided to spend the night in a stranger’s hospital room.”
Tony blinks, and then unexpectedly laughs. A short, surprised chuckle he clearly hadn’t planned.
“Fair,” Tony gives in under his gaze. “Fair enough. I’m Tony. Tony Stark.”
“I know. The nurse mentioned that as well.” Loki pauses before adding: “I’m Loki.”
“Yeah, I’m aware.” Tony falters for a moment. “How... how are you?”
“I have retrograde amnesia,” Loki says. Dramatizing the situation feels too exhausting; it’s easier to hit him with facts. “Two years. The last two years are erased. For now.”
Tony’s face takes on a complicated expression.
“Oh,” he breathes. “I see. Do I need to call someone? Family or...”
“I have yet to determine that. My phone... do you know where it is?”
“It was in the coat. Coat’s in the closet.” Tony stands up—his movements are a bit stiff—and retrieves the item. The screen is cracked, but the device shows signs of life. He hands it to Loki and, not knowing what to do with his hands, shoves them into his trouser pockets. “I should...” He gestures vaguely toward the door. “Probably leave you in peace. Let you get your bearings. And... finally get home. Sleep in a real bed. Like a human being.”
“Probably,” Loki agrees.
Tony nods, picking up his jacket from the back of the chair. He looks at Loki—briefly, with an expression Loki can’t decipher—and says:
“I’m glad you’re awake.”
It’s so simple. Loki doesn't know what to say to that.
“Thank you,” he finally manages. “For not leaving.”
Tony nods again, jerky and quick, then leaves the room.
Loki looks at the cracked phone screen. He needs to call Thor. He definitely does.
But for a moment he just sits there, feeling the strange weight of the morning and the realization of a fact: this man sat in a chair all night for a stranger because... why? Because he couldn't bring himself to leave?
Loki doesn't know. He suspects it’s interesting.
...
RHODEY 08:02
did you go home?
TONY → RHODEY 08:04
yes
(no)
(just left the hospital)
(the guy woke up)
RHODEY 08:05
How is he?
TONY → RHODEY 08:05
concussion
and amnesia, actual amnesia
minus two years of life
RHODEY 08:06
Tony.
TONY → RHODEY 08:06
i know
RHODEY 08:06
Tony, I love you, but this is the moment where you go home, sleep, go to your own doctor, and leave the man to the professionals. He doesn't need you anymore.
TONY → RHODEY 08:07
yep
on my way
getting into a cab
RHODEY 08:08
Good.
TONY → RHODEY 08:08
btw, he caught onto the “boyfriend” thing immediately
RHODEY 08:09
good god
TONY → RHODEY 08:09
he was hauntingly calm about it, which is even worse
looked like a disappointed professor
don’t know how to react to that
RHODEY 08:10
GO HOME, TONY!
...
PEPPER → TONY 08:22
Tony. I saw the news. How bad is it?
TONY → PEPPER 08:23
mild concussion, i’m fine
off topic, hypothetically: what are the etiquette rules for flowers for someone you lied to in a hospital about dating?
PEPPER 08:23
I’m sending Happy to get you.
TONY → PEPPER 08:24
i’m in a taxi!!
PEPPER 08:24
I’m sending Happy to follow that taxi.
III
He sleeps for six hours. He sees a doctor, who confirms a mild concussion and orders him to rest, limiting screen time (Tony interprets this as ‘don’t overdo it with the laptop’). He eats. He replies to fourteen work emails—the height of restraint. He watches a documentary about deep-sea fish (specifically chosen so that nothing reminds him of reality).
At 03:47 PM, he gives in and picks up his phone.
TONY → RHODEY 15:47
what do you think is the flower protocol in this situation?
RHODEY 15:48
No.
TONY → RHODEY 15:48
i’m asking a normal question
RHODEY 15:49
You just want an excuse to go back to the hospital.
TONY → RHODEY 15:49
I want to be polite, James. I lied to his doctors and now I feel responsible.
Tony always writes in lowercase and without periods—it’s not laziness, it’s his style. When ‘James’ and a capital ‘I’ appear, it means he’s not joking, and everyone who has known Tony long enough knows this.
RHODEY 15:50
And this isn’t ‘savior complex’?
TONY → RHODEY 15:50
i don’t have a complex
that thing with the guy in the kayak was pure coincidence
stop labeling me
RHODEY 15:51
Aha. And that woman in the parking lot. And that kid at the farmer’s market. And...
TONY → RHODEY 15:51
fine, i get it
...
He buys flowers. Not romantic ones—that’s a matter of principle, and he monitors this at the counter for about three minutes with a suspicious focus that the shop assistant, judging by her look, doesn’t entirely approve of. He chooses yellow ones, something light and non-committal, because he isn’t about to show up in a stranger’s room like some pseudo-boyfriend with roses.
Tony is not an idiot.
At 04:30 PM, he knocks on the open door of Room 207 with lilies and a vague intention to spend about fifteen minutes there, ask how things are, and leave.
Loki is on the phone at that moment. He is sitting on the bed—not lying down, sitting, which is a good sign in itself—in a hospital gown that looks as if it were custom-tailored to his frame (which is unfair, because hospital gowns are supposed to be the ultimate equalizer).
He looks up, and for a second, an expression flitters across his face that Tony, were he more generous, would call ‘almost pleased’. And that’s already something.
“I’ll call you back,” Loki drops into the receiver.
The voice in response doesn't exactly object; it more or less collapses. A drawn-out phrase in which the intonation suggests something along the lines of “you’re joking, right, you must be joking.”
“Thor,” he enunciates the name with an icy, exhausted patience people usually reserve for the hopelessly dim-witted. “I. Will call. You back.” He hangs up and looks at Tony, then at the flowers. “You returned.”
“I felt awkward,” Tony admits. “About the ‘boyfriend’ thing. Flowers seemed like...” He lifts the bouquet slightly, as if not entirely sure what he’s doing. “A polite gesture.”
“That is debatable,” Loki remarks.
“What is, exactly?”
The other man tilts his head, seriously analyzing the situation.
“All of it.”
Tony freezes for a second, processing the answer. Okay, one-zero in favor of the guy in the hospital bed.
“Fair,” he nods briefly, accepting the rules of the game. “Consider it an apology then.”
He still hasn't moved from his spot, clutching the flowers. The bouquet feels superfluous, heavy, and entirely out of place, but Tony resolutely doesn't know where to put it: laying it on the bed is too intimate, shoving it into the transparent plastic cup that passes for a vase here is humiliating for the lilies.
Loki watches this silence with the flowers for another second.
“For the lie, or for the intrusion?” he clarifies.
“For a bad first impression,” Tony replies and almost immediately, following his own thought, adds: “I could have started with something a little less... legally dubious.”
At the word “legally,” he winces—involuntarily and somehow too sincerely for a man who has spent the last ten years doing nothing but negotiating with his conscience and his lawyers. Tony catches Loki’s gaze and realizes: this microscopic gesture did not go unnoticed.
“You take it upon yourself with quite some confidence to determine the impression you have made.”
Tony shrugs—the movement is a bit stiff, as if his body is lagging behind his intent.
“I’m an optimist, Green-eyes,” he declares, trying to pull back the usual mask of easy confidence. “A rare condition.”
“Usually, such things are cured by experience.”
“I’m working on it,” Tony agrees readily. “Sometimes even successfully.”
There is a short pause.
Somewhere in the hallway, a cart rolls by with a piercing screech—judging by the sound, wheel lubricant is considered an unaffordable luxury in this hospital.
Tony finally unburdens himself of the bouquet and perches the flowers in the vase on the windowsill. It performs a dangerous somersault, nearly putting a full stop to his already questionable attempt at looking elegant (saved lilies, a miraculously non-failing Stark—one-one, moving on).
Loki follows the movement more closely than he should.
“Did you come to check if I am alive, or is this, like the flowers, a courtesy visit?”
Tony lingers his gaze on the lilies for a second, checking if they are going to commit suicide and fall off the sill after all.
“The latter,” he says. And after a short pause, adds: “And a little of the former.”
Looking at his companion at this moment feels like too much, so he chooses to study the texture of the windowsill instead.
“My brother is currently on his way... from somewhere,” Loki says a moment later, as if returning to something internal. “He apparently believes I am incapable of spending a few hours without supervision.”
So Thor is the brother, Tony notes.
“Brothers generally tend to overestimate the level of catastrophe,” Tony responds.
He finally turns directly toward Loki, taking the hit of his attentive gaze, and only then hides his hands in his trouser pockets.
“Or underestimate it.”
Tony huffs quietly, acknowledging the point.
“That’s an option too.”
“I do not remember the last two years of our relationship, yet he does. A strange inversion.”
“That must be hard.”
Loki looks him right in the eye. A faint bewilderment reads in his gaze—apparently, the word “hard” doesn't appear often in his personal dictionary.
“Sit,” he says, nodding toward the chair. “Since you are here.”
Tony sinks into the chair.
“I won’t stay long,” he warns honestly, already knowing it’s a lie.
“Mmm,” is all Loki answers.
He stays for two hours.
...
THOR I am on the plane. Should be there by eight.
NATASHA Thor, Clint and I have been thinking.
CLINT we have a theory about the stark situation
THOR What situation? Is Loki alright? The doctors said...
NATASHA He’s fine. We’re talking about his visitor.
THOR The boyfriend?
CLINT HE IS NOT HIS BOYFRIEND
nat, explain
NATASHA Stark was the other driver. He called the ambulance and stayed with Loki until they arrived. Then he lied to the staff saying he was Loki’s boyfriend to get access to the ward. He does this kind of thing quite often.
THOR He often pretends to be someone’s boyfriend??
SAM No, he often rushes to the rescue. He can't let go of a situation if he’s decided someone is his responsibility
BRUCE Actually, it’s quite sweet.
CLINT it’s very sweet until you think about it for more than two seconds. then it becomes a problem
THOR Why is it a problem?
CLINT because tony is at the hospital for the second time today
natasha’s contact confirmed it
he brought flowers
THOR ...
NATASHA Thor.
THOR My brother is very handsome.
SAM Thor.
THOR I am just saying. If a handsome man brought me flowers in the hospital...
CLINT okay, we are NOT discussing this
BRUCE Let’s agree: let things take their course, nobody interferes.
NATASHA Agreed.
THOR Yes, of course.
...
Does Stark have a good character?
SAM THOR!!!
...
Thor arrives at 08:43 PM—and honestly, there was no need to specify the time, because his appearance always feels like an event rather than a point on the clock.
Loki hears him while he’s still in the hallway: the heavy, confident steps of a man who has never in his life crept. Then he appears—all broad, blonde, and overflowing with emotions that are, as usual, written across his face in large block letters.
“Brother,” Thor exhales, and in that single word fits about a ton of worry.
Loki allows himself to be hugged (well, rather, Thor just hugs him, and Loki stoically endures it). Thor’s hands are enormous and warm, and somewhere deep in Loki’s chest, something treacherously tightens. He hates that feeling. It’s far too familiar.
“I’m fine,” he says, pulling away first.
“You don’t remember the last two years,” Thor objects, sitting in the chair that still holds the imprint of Tony Stark’s presence.
“Yes, thank you for the reminder. I was just about to forget.”
Thor looks at him.
Loki recognizes the look instantly, which is in itself a separate cause for annoyance: his memory refuses to cooperate on major matters but dutifully supplies this—the expression on Thor’s face meant for situations he cannot fix.
Since childhood.
Always the same: a mixture of determination, helplessness, and a nearly offensive belief that if he just sits nearby long enough, the world will change its mind.
It irritated Loki then.
It irritates Loki now.
Nothing, essentially, has changed. And that is perhaps the most aggravating part.
“Tell me what you remember,” Thor finally asks.
And Loki tells him.
It takes time—outside the window, it manages to turn completely dark, the corridor outside shifts from daytime noise to a thinner, nightly version, and a nurse peeks in once, assesses the situation, and delicately vanishes.
Thor doesn't interrupt.
It is, to his credit, his rare and valuable skill.
When Loki reaches the final part of the story, he hesitates slightly:
“...and that man from the accident. Tony Stark. He returned today.”
A very readable thought reflects on Thor’s face, which he tries to make unreadable.
“I see.”
“He brought flowers,” Loki continues, trying to keep his voice as dispassionate as possible. “Pointedly unromantic ones.”
“That is...” Thor begins and stops himself. “That is thoughtful.”
“I thought so too.” Loki looks at the yellow flowers on the windowsill. “He was here for two hours. Mostly talking—about nothing in particular. I think he was keeping me company on purpose in a way that I wouldn't notice he was doing it on purpose. He is very...” Loki hesitates again. “He is strange.”
“In what sense?”
“In the way people very carefully portray indifference.” Loki tilts his head. “I do not remember the last two years. But I do not think I have forgotten how to recognize that.”
Thor leans back in the chair and remains silent for a while, clearly gathering his strength. He looks at his hands, then at his brother, and Loki feels the tension thickening in the air—the precursor to a “serious talk.”
“About those two years...” Thor begins cautiously, like a sapper suspecting there isn't just one mine under him, but a whole warehouse. “You were... with someone. For about six months. It didn't end very well.”
Loki raises an eyebrow. His heart gives an extra thud. With someone? He tries to summon even a single image, the warmth of a hand or the sound of a voice, but inside there is only silence and white noise.
“‘Not very well’—is that a euphemism, or do you just not want to give details to me while I have a head injury?”
“More the latter.” Thor rubs his neck. “I just wanted you to know: at the time of the accident, you were alone. There is no one.”
Loki shifts his gaze back to the yellow lilies.
“I didn’t ask,” he says calmly. “But thank you.”
...
TONY → PEPPER 22:14
fine, just don’t make a thing out of it
PEPPER 22:15
I’m already making a thing out of it in my head, but go on.
TONY → PEPPER 22:15
i was at the hospital again
PEPPER 22:15
I know.
TONY → PEPPER 22:16
how do you know?
PEPPER 22:16
Happy told me. I asked him to keep an eye on you.
TONY → PEPPER 22:16
PEPPER!
PEPPER 22:17
Anthony, you had a concussion this morning.
TONY → PEPPER 22:17
first of all, that name is a war crime
second of all, i’m fine
third of all
okay, look
this guy
loki
he’s interesting
PEPPER 22:18
In what sense?
TONY → PEPPER 22:19
well, the way he takes everything in. i thought he’d be upset, you know? wake up, two years of your life gone, some stranger telling people he’s your boyfriend... but he was—very calm. very precise. he notices everything. i said something about the accident and he listened like he was systematically building a full picture, not just reacting.
and he’s funny too
he has a dry humor, very quiet
if you aren't listening closely, you might miss it
PEPPER 22:21
Tony.
TONY → PEPPER 22:21
i know, pep.
PEPPER 22:21
You barely know him.
TONY → PEPPER 22:22
i know. i know that.
PEPPER 22:22
...Is he single?
TONY → PEPPER 22:23
WHY DOES EVERYONE IMMEDIATELY—i don’t know, pepper. he has amnesia. he doesn’t know himself!
it doesn’t mean anything, i’m just... being a decent human being. that’s all
PEPPER 22:24
Of course.
Go to sleep, Tony.
TONY → PEPPER 22:24
going. going.
...
do you think i should stop by tomorrow?
PEPPER 22:25
Goodnight, Tony.
...
Tony shows up with coffee. Two cups. He asked at the entrance if the patient in 207 could have coffee, and the nurse replied, “Probably not, but if it’s decaf, then why not.” Tony said, “Decaf it is,” and here he is with two cups of coffee, toward which he harbors deeply conflicted feelings.
Because decaf coffee is a philosophical problem. It’s like non-alcoholic beer or fat-free ice cream: a thing that painstakingly pretends to be itself while being stripped of the very quality for which it was invented in the first place. Tony has been drinking coffee since he was fourteen and believes that if you take away the caffeine, all that’s left is bitter water masquerading as a beverage. But fine. This is a hospital. It has its own rules.
“You’re here again,” Loki observes, looking at him from under lowered lashes, and in that gaze is something like “I’ve noticed a pattern, and I’m curious if you’ve noticed it too.”
“Coffee,” he explains, and if one listens closely, a slight hesitation can be heard in the word. “Decaf. Approved by the medical community… in some very conditional sense.”
He sets one cup on the nightstand, slightly more carefully than he intended—because yesterday’s incident with the vase is still fresh in his memory and, frankly, in his reputation—and keeps the second for himself.
“Did your brother leave?” he adds, glancing around. “I saw him in the hallway.”
“Gone to get breakfast. He doesn’t trust the local food. He believes a decent plate of scrambled eggs only exists in two places: at home and in Scandinavian countries.” Loki carefully takes the cup, wrapping his long, slender fingers around it. Tony involuntarily finds himself staring at the gesture—it’s far too elegant for a hospital bed. “You know, you don’t have to do this.”
Now, that sounds like the beginning of a conversation Tony, in all fairness, should have seen coming.
“Bring coffee?” he clarifies, because stalling for time is also a strategy, and it’s one he has quite mastered.
“Any of it.” Loki is watching him intently now. “You’ve fulfilled every obligation you imposed on yourself. The story with the guy, the flowers, the visit. You’ve done more than enough.”
Tony sits in the armchair—he already catches himself thinking of it as his chair, and that is a problem he will deal with later.
“I know,” he says.
Loki waits.
“I wanted to come back myself,” Tony says. And, as is often the case with honest confessions, it comes out a bit quieter than planned and sounds a bit more personal than he would like.
Loki looks at him for a long time. Then:
“I want to ask you something.”
“Okay.”
“My brother said…” he begins, and that ‘said’ carries a hint of doubt. “That there was someone. During those years I don’t remember. It’s all over. I remember nothing about it.” He cups the cup with his palms. “You don’t know me. You don’t have a biased opinion. I’d like to hear what you think about it.”
Tony blinks. “About… the fact that you had a relationship you don’t remember?”
“About starting over,” Loki phrases it calmly, almost detached, but there is an effort in that calmness that is impossible to miss if one looks closely enough. “With a clean slate. Is it a loss, or is it…”
He falls silent. Tony waits, because he senses this is a sentence Loki has been trying to finish for the last day and a half.
“Is it possible,” Loki says, “that it is also something else?”
Tony thinks about it seriously, because the question deserves it. He twirls the cup in his hands and thinks about the things that were in his life and didn’t survive, and about the strange mercy of not having to drag every version of them behind him.
“I don’t think a loss and ‘something else’ are mutually exclusive,” he says. “You can mourn what you don’t remember. And at the same time…” He gives a slight shrug, but there is no flippancy in the movement. “You can decide that you are the person who is in this room right now, and move on.”
Loki remains silent.
“Not the most useful advice,” Tony adds, his lips twitching slightly. “Right?”
“No,” Loki replies. “Actually, it’s very useful.” He sounds as if he’s surprised by it himself. “Thank you.”
“I have my moments of clarity, Greeneyes. Rare, but they hit the mark.”
Loki raises an eyebrow ever so slightly.
“‘Greeneyes’?”
“Yep. I came up with the nickname while you were bleeding out on the asphalt, so it’s official now.”
“I see.” A pause, during which Loki bites his lower lip slightly, looking like an attempt not to smile. “Tell me something about yourself. Something irrelevant.”
“What kind of ‘something’?”
“Anything. I’ve been in this room for twenty hours and I’m about to run out of spots on the ceiling that I haven't studied yet. I can tell you everything about the crack in the left corner and the smudge that looks like Australia if you tilt your head.”
And Tony laughs. It comes out husky and kind of stupid, but he doesn't care.
“Alright,” he agrees. “Alright. I build things. Started at sixteen—mostly taking things apart, but then I realized putting them together was more interesting. By twenty-one, I already had a company; everyone thought it was madness, which, honestly, was the main argument ‘for’ as far as I was concerned.”
“Do you like being thought of as a madman?”
“I like being thought of as capable of the impossible. Those are different things.”
Loki looks at him.
“Yes. I suppose they are.” He pauses briefly. “I am a lawyer.”
“No way?” Tony becomes genuinely animated.
“Corporate law. Mergers and acquisitions. Before that… I wanted to be a scholar. Ancient languages. My father thought it was impractical.”
“And was he right?”
“Probably. I don't regret it.” Today, he seems to be picking his words more slowly than usual. “At least, I don't think I regret it. The last two years might have changed my mind. I don't know that.”
“Can I…” Tony cuts himself off. “Sorry. Forget it.”
“Ask.”
“Is it scary? Not knowing what you were thinking? What kind of person you became over those two years?”
Loki looks at the ceiling.
“Less so than one might think,” he says. “I know who I am. I know how I think. I know what I find funny, what I find unbearable, what I value. All of that is in place.” A pause. “The events are missing. Но I myself—am not missing.”
Tony looks at him. He thinks: “That is the most amazing thing anyone has said to me all year.”
But he doesn't say it out loud.
He says: “That’s a good way to look at things.”
“I know,” Loki replies, and Tony laughs again.
...
CLINT so, thor, give us the intel
THOR What kind exactly?
CLINT About the vibe. About Stark. About the situation with the not-boyfriend.
THOR I returned to the hospital, and that man is there again.
SAM I knew it
THOR He is telling my brother about engineering. Loki is asking questions. He looks...
I do not know what to call it.
NATASHA Interested?
THOR Yes. Even more than that.
Loki does not ask questions of people he does not like.
He falls silent. He becomes very polite at first, and then he falls silent, and you can feel it with your skin.
But he asks this man questions.
CLINT okay, that's a good thing, right?
BRUCE It is a good thing.
SAM is Loki seeing anyone?
THOR No. Not since that incident last year.
NATASHA I’m going to ask something tactless.
THOR Ask.
NATASHA Does the amnesia change anything? For him, emotionally.
THOR ...
I believe so.
After everything, he was very guarded. For a long time. I saw it.
Now, he does not remember that he needs to defend himself.
He is just... himself. Like before.
Like in the times when he was more...
“Open” is not quite the right word.
NATASHA Less defensive.
THOR Yes.
CLINT so, we're not going to, like, interfere?
SAM We are not!
BRUCE We won't.
NATASHA Obviously.
THOR Of course.
...
I have already spoken with the nurse to have Stark added to the list of authorized visitors.
CLINT THOR!!!
THOR It is simply logistics! Practicality and nothing more.
IV
Tony has a system now. And, what’s worse, the system has rituals. And he realizes: it’s a symptom.
He sends a text before coming—not that he’s asking for permission, it just feels polite. And Loki replies every time. Tony reads into these replies exactly as much as is reasonable, and not a gram more.
He knows the nurses’ names. He knows that Carla works the day shift, finds the whole situation charming, and never stops calling him ‘honey’. He knows that the evening nurse Derek is skeptical and has checked Tony’s ID badge twice. He knows that in the room three doors down there is a patient who plays the harmonica at nine in the evening, which Loki dubbed “my personal war crime.”
And Tony—and this is happening right now, while he sits in the armchair—realizes that he is in serious trouble.
He watches Loki argue with the doctor about why he should be allowed to read (the doctor compromised: thirty minutes, then rest), and thinks: “I don’t want to leave when he gets discharged.” That’s... a thought. That is a serious thought.
He doesn’t know if Loki is interested or if all of this is just the gravity of a strange situation: two people in a small room with nowhere to go, and Tony is mistaking proximity for something more.
He should ask Thor. Thor is constantly loitering somewhere nearby, hovering over the ward in the manner of a very large man trying to be inconspicuous. And he seems to genuinely like Tony.
Which is strange in itself, considering Tony is technically still the person who ended up at the very center of this whole mess with the accident, the hospital, and someone else’s memory loss, and if the world worked by more logical rules, Thor should be looking at him with suspicion at the very least. But Thor, evidently, hasn't signed any agreements with logic.
“You’ve gone quiet,” Loki says.
Tony looks up. “Just thinking.”
“About what?”
“About whether I should ask you something.”
Loki tilts his head ever so slightly. “Ask.”
Tony looks at the yellow flowers. They are beginning to wilt. Three days is a good run for a hospital bouquet, and perhaps long enough for Tony Stark to finally lose his brakes.
“I’ve been sitting in this chair for three days,” Tony begins, and his voice sounds a bit huskier than he’d like, “And I catch myself thinking that these few hours with you are catastrophically not enough. So... I’d like to take you to dinner when you get out of here.”
Silence falls in the room.
“Dinner,” Loki repeats.
“If you want. If it’s…” Tony makes an indefinite gesture with his hand. “You have every right to say ‘no,’ and I’ll still drop by because the chair here is very comfortable and Carla makes great coffee. But the offer… it stands.”
Loki looks at him for a long time.
“You brought me yellow flowers,” he says, “specifically so I wouldn't think of them as a romantic gesture.”
“Correct.”
“And now you want to take me to dinner.”
“Correct.”
“Your logic is somewhat circular, Stark.”
“I know.” Tony steadfastly holds his gaze. “I was just trying to be decent. Give you your personal space.”
Loki is silent. Tony waits—waiting was never his strong suit, but for this occasion, as it turns out, he has enough patience.
“I don’t know you,” Loki finally says slowly.
“Three days,” Tony counters. “I think we’ve made decent progress.”
“You know me by a hospital bed. That is a very specific context.”
“That’s why I’m suggesting dinner. A different context. If you don't mind.”
Loki, like Tony earlier, looks at the flowers. Then at Tony. His face takes on that very controlled expression again, and Tony catches the small signs he’s learned to recognize: a slight relaxation in the corner of his mouth (meaning Loki is fighting something inside himself), a nearly imperceptible glance to the side (meaning he is actually thinking, not playing a role).
“Ask me again,” Loki says, “on the day I’m discharged.”
Tony’s heart does a somersault completely unworthy of a grown man. “Yeah?”
“I want to be sure,” Loki explains, “that the answer I give won’t be dictated simply by the hospital walls.”
Tony nods. He feels himself smiling and tries not to make it too obvious. “Deal.”
Loki picks up a book. “Now stop grinning.”
“I’m not grinning.”
“You are absolutely grinning.”
“I just have a pleasant resting face.”
“Not at all,” Loki cuts him off and turns a page.
Tony laughs. Outside the window, the afternoon light falls at a low angle. For a while, they are both silent, and the silence comes to them surprisingly easily.
…
TONY → RHODEY 16:17
i asked him to dinner
RHODEY 16:18
...
RHODEY 16:18
You asked out a guy with amnesia, for whom you accidentally became a “fake boyfriend” in the hospital.
TONY → RHODEY 16:19
when you put it that way, it sounds weird
RHODEY 16:19
Tony, it IS weird.
TONY → RHODEY 16:20
He told me to ask him again on the day of his discharge. Wants to make sure the answer isn't “hospital-driven.”
RHODEY 16:21
...
Actually, that’s pretty sensible.
TONY → RHODEY 16:21
right?
RHODEY 16:22
He seems like a smart guy.
TONY → RHODEY 16:22
he’s very smart
and he’s got this insanely dry sense of humor that i am 80% sure is going to be a problem for me
RHODEY 16:23
I know.
TONY → RHODEY 16:23
what do you know?
RHODEY 16:24
You. I know you. You’ve been texting me every day about a guy you “just feel responsible for.”
Go for it, Tony.
(After he gets discharged. Don’t be a creep.)
TONY → RHODEY 16:24
me? never
RHODEY 16:25
You definitely will be.
…
Tony knocks on the open door of room 207.
Loki is in his own clothes—the coat is back in place, dark and impeccably tailored. “He looks like himself,” Tony thinks. Or like the “himself” that exists outside these walls. Loki is standing by the window and turns at the knock.
“Free to go?” Tony asks.
“An hour ago,” Loki replies. “Thor went to get the car.” He looks intently at Tony. “You’re early.”
“Was in the neighborhood.” Tony leans against the doorframe. He feels a strange nervousness—a sensation he doesn't have much experience with. “How’s the head?”
“Better. They want to see me in two weeks.” Loki hesitates. “The memory…” Another pause. “Something happened this morning. A small thing. An image. A street I recognized. I didn't know what to do with it, so I wrote it down.”
“That’s good,” Tony says. “Right? That’s gotta be good.”
“I think so.” Loki shifts his gaze to the empty windowsill—the flowers have been removed, the room has become sterile once more. “Ask,” he commands.
Tony straightens up. “Greeneyes. Will you have dinner with me?”
Silence. One heartbeat, then a second.
“Yes,” Loki says.
Just like that.
Tony doesn’t immediately realize what he’s heard. The word hangs in the air—so ordinary, so short, that it’s impossible to believe. “Yes” is a word people say when they are offered coffee. When they are asked if they want their change. “Yes” shouldn’t be doing what it just did to his ribcage.
But Loki doesn’t repeat himself. He isn't the type to repeat himself at all.
Tony exhales the air he had, as it turns out, been holding (he only realizes this now, by the way the air comes out—with some effort, like from a pinched hose), and smiles. “Yes?”
“You sat in a hospital chair for four days, Stark. You’ve more than earned that ‘yes’.” Something in Loki’s expression changes—it becomes a bit more open. “I want to see what you’re like outside this room.”
Tony could say something clever. He usually has something to say—it’s his primary professional skill, tested by years of practice at conferences, courtrooms, and corporate dinners where he had to keep three conversations in mind while remembering everyone’s names. But right now, he is standing in the doorway of room 207 and, apparently, just smiling. Like some kind of Labrador.
It is, honestly, a little alarming.
“Probably better,” he finally manages. “I know how to clean up well.”
“I noticed that even with a concussion,” Loki drops, perfectly deadpan.
Tony stares at him wide-eyed; Loki turns away to pick up his bag, and Tony has a distinct premonition that he is in deep. And, as it turns out, he doesn’t mind at all.
…
THOR He said “yes”.
CLINT !!!!!!
SAM I knew it
BRUCE Oh, thank god
NATASHA Good.
THOR I had to carry Loki’s bag to the car, and he told me to stop smiling.
CLINT were you smiling?
THOR Very much so.
SAM Thor, you are a walking disaster in the best possible way
THOR They have dinner planned for Sunday.
I may have suggested the restaurant.
Stark mentioned he was unsure of Loki’s preferences, and I quite accidentally happened to be standing nearby.
NATASHA Thor.
THOR It was helpful!
CLINT you just don't let things take their course at all
THOR I am his brother. “Taking its course” is within my jurisdiction.
BRUCE I think we should all agree to never tell them about this chat.
SAM Agreed
NATASHA Agreed.
CLINT agreed, obviously
THOR Agreed. Though I suspect Loki knows anyway.
NATASHA Most likely.
THOR He said nothing directly.
He simply sent me a text this morning:
“I recall that you always had terrible taste in restaurants. Please keep your advice to yourself.” ...and twenty minutes later:
“What is the name of that restaurant?”
CLINT i'm starting to love him
SAM I love him too
BRUCE This is going to be amazing.
NATASHA Definitely.
Outside on the sidewalk, in the pale light of the November sun, Loki Odinson looks at the sky—the grey kind he always preferred to artificial blue. Tony Stark stands beside him, hands shoved in his pockets. A taxi pulls up, and Sunday looms on the horizon as something to look forward to.
“Thank you,” Loki says.
For this whole strange story.
“Anytime,” Tony replies. It sounds ridiculous, they both know it, and neither can stop smiling.
Sometimes the best things really do start on a Tuesday.
With a stupid taxi that broke the rules, and a chain of decisions, none of which looked sensible at the moment they were made.
Loki always considered Tuesday the most pointless day of the week—devoid of the status of Monday or the hope of Friday, existing purely by inertia, like an error in the schedule that no one bothered to fix. And, of course, that is exactly where it all begins.