Work Text:
As you entered the compound you furiously wiped your eyes with your sleeve, hoping that it wasn’t too obvious that you’d been crying. It was an embarrassing enough situation as it was, let alone if multiple people were to witness it. Thankfully for you, you usually kept your love life quite private, even from the other members of the team just to preserve some sense of normalcy. You already basically shared your whole life with these people; who under normal circumstances, would have probably never interacted with you in their lives. They didn’t need these parts of you too.
You felt your phone buzz in your pocket, and you took a breath before fishing it out and staring at the screen.
I hope we can be friends.
You sighed. No, you couldn’t be friends. It would be hard enough to have to see him around every now and then due to his security job at the compound. Truthfully you found it amusing that Tony even found it necessary to have security. It seemed almost silly with all the team around that could probably defend this place better than anyone. But, unless a bunch of you wanted to be bound to the compound at all times, a highly trained security team made sense.
You’d been seeing Justin for about four months, keeping it quiet and pretending that you were meeting friends or running errands when you went to meet him. You had thought it was going well, he hadn’t brought up any issues until you were at dinner tonight and he had blindsided you with the breakup.
“It’s just… it’s hard you know? Dating someone like you.” He said, his eyes glued to the piece of bread in his hands that he had ripped in half.
“No, I don’t know.” You responded, trying to bite back the hurt and frustration you were feeling at him breaking up with you in such a public place. “Perhaps you can explain it to me.”
He sighed, looking up. “You’re just always so busy.”
“Any free time I do have I spend with you, and I see you multiple times in a week, so I don’t understand…”
“I just hate that in this relationship, I don’t feel like…”
“Like what?”
He hesitated, taking a sip of his drink.
You shook your head, annoyed. “Well, it seems like you’re done here, so you might as well say it.”
“Look, you’re a really good person, and I never wanted to hurt you. But I just hate how in this relationship I don’t…”
“You don’t what?”
“Feel like a man.”
You let out an incredulous breath, “what?”
He shrugged, “I don’t know, I’m just always used to feeling like…the strong one. But with… you know, what you are… that just isn’t the case.”
You felt like he had knocked the wind out of you for a moment. You took a second to let his confession digest before you responded. “I’m… I told you this happened against my will. You never seemed to have an issue with it before.”
“I know, it’s really shitty of me to bring up. But it’s the truth, I thought you’d appreciate that.”
You didn’t appreciate it. In fact, you could feel the hurt in your chest radiate throughout your whole body at his words. Your abilities were a sore spot for you, they had been the cause for everything being destroyed in your life, and now they were responsible for this too.
“I have to go.” You said, willing the tears not to fall from your eyes until you were alone.
“Come on, don’t be like this.” Justin pleaded, “I’m going to feel bad if you walk out of here all upset.”
You snorted, “and what a tragedy that would be.” You snapped before standing up, reaching into your bag for your wallet and throwing some cash on the table.
When he protested you held your hand up to stop him, “it’s just for my half, can’t have you feeling not manly enough by me paying for you.”
As you walked deeper into the compound, you mentally prepared yourself in case the others were still up and in the common area. Usually everyone tended to mind their own business, but there was one particular person that you were praying was not around.
Loki and you never had the best relationship. But that was normal for Loki who thrived on being a nuisance to everyone in his presence. Wanda had always pitied him, telling you that she thought it was more of a defense mechanism, rather than his real self. You, however, had no such empathy for him because it always seemed like he went out of his way to needle you specifically.
You took a deep breath as you began to cross the common area, which held the compound kitchen and living room, looking straight ahead as you beelined for your bedroom.
You sensed him before he spoke. You could see him perched on the arm of the sofa from the corner of your eye, legs crossed as he held his book. “You’re back late.”
You shook your head, ignoring his comment.
“Sour mood tonight, I hope you didn’t do anything too off-putting to your date.” He continued, setting his book on the nearby table.
“Oh, fuck off, Loki!” You spat, unable to stop yourself. You knew that was the incorrect response because that would only fuel him to continue but you were so upset that you didn’t care.
Loki chuckled as he stood up, following you. “Oh, so it didn’t go well?”
You ignored him, feeling your anger swell up inside you as the tears in your eyes threatened to spill over. You just needed to hold on for a few more seconds and you’d be at your door and could slam it in his face.
“I’m not surprised.” Loki continued, “you’re so easily angered that it might be a bit overwhelming to these mortal men.”
His comment cut through you. He couldn’t have possibly known what just happened, but he managed to say the one thing that would make you snap.
You stopped short which made him bump into you and you couldn’t even retort with an equally as cutting remark before you burst into tears.
You felt Loki tense, “what’s happened?” He asked, the teasing tone in his voice gone.
“Nothing.” You lied, not looking at him.
Unexpectedly, you felt Loki’s hand gently guide your chin upwards, tilting your head so that you met his gaze. “You have never reacted this way when I’ve teased you.”
You didn’t know if it was the fact that you were exhausted or upset or that you just wanted someone to talk to, but you ended up spilling out everything to Loki who appeared to be listening intently.
When you finished you shrugged, moving away from him before sighing. “I know, I’m an idiot.”
He bit his lip thoughtfully before he shook his head, “no.” He argued softly, “he’s the idiot.”
You opened your mouth to respond but he kept going.
“Anyone that could have heard the story of how you obtained your abilities and knew what it cost you, to throw that in your face is…despicable.”
You felt the tears in your eyes again and you looked away from him, almost overwhelmed by how kind he was being.
“Wow, I really didn’t expect this from you.” You admitted.
He laughed softly, “I suppose I have made quite the reputation for myself.”
“You’re an ass most of the time actually.” You laughed, looking at him again to find him grinning at your comment.
He nodded, “a less charitable assessment than I’d give myself, but I suppose that you’re correct.”
You were both silent for a moment, looking at each other.
“Well…” you said finally, “I’d better get back to my room… bit embarrassing to have a breakdown in the hallway.”
“I really wish that you wouldn’t cry over that imbecile.”
“Too late.”
Loki caught your wrist in his hand as you turned away, which shocked you.
“You deserve someone worthy of you.” He said in a low voice, “only a coward would have an issue with how strong you are.”
Suddenly your body acted before your brain and you leaned in, wrapping your arms around Loki and squeezing him tightly.
He hugged you back, gliding his hand up and down your back in a soothing gesture.
“Thanks, Loki.” You said, kissing his cheek before letting him go.
He stood there, a strange look in his eyes as he touched the kissed cheek with his hand.
“See you tomorrow, regrettably bright and early for the briefing.” You said, turning around and heading towards your bedroom.
***
“Has anyone seen Tony?” Steve asked, annoyed as he impatiently drummed his fingers over the file folder on the table in front of him.
You shook your head, having another sip of coffee.
Bruce, who was wildly typing something on his keyboard shrugged, not looking up. “You know as well as I do that he runs on his own timeline.”
Steve let out an annoyed breath, “he’s the one who set the damn meeting time.”
Natasha snorted, rubbing her forehead. She wasn’t used to being up this early. “At least you would have already been awake, old man. This is basically the middle of the night for me.”
“It’s 9am.” Steve said flatly. “It’s basically lunchtime.”
“I rest my case.” Nat sighed.
You tried to suppress a laugh so that Steve wouldn’t get more worked up than he was. You traced the rim of your coffee mug, only looking up when you heard Loki rush into the room and sit down at a chair across the table from you.
You raised an eyebrow at him, he never usually even bothered to come to these briefings, in fact he usually was dragged forcibly to them by Thor.
He smiled, shaking his head before looking towards the door where an irritated Tony appeared moments later.
“Well, it’s nice of you to show up.” Steve remarked, flipping open the file folder.
“Not that it would compute with the ancient tech you’re working with upstairs,” Tony began, tapping his head for emphasis, “but there was an issue with a security officer, apparently his car just burst into flames, and we had to sort out of it was a threat or not.”
Nat perked up, “and?”
Tony shook his head, “appears to be a mechanical malfunction. Hell of a headache for the security guy though, what’s his name? James? John?”
“Justin.” Loki finished.
Tony paused, “that’s it, but how the hell would you know that?”
Loki shrugged, “he works a lot.”
Tony didn’t dwell on the subject and turned to Steve and gestured to the folder, “alright, lay it on us.”
You barely managed to listen to the briefing, instead giving Loki a look, quietly asking him if he was completely insane.
Loki winked, turning to Steve for the remainder of his spiel until everyone was dismissed.
When everyone cleared out and it was just both of you left in the conference room, you finally spoke.
“You blew up his car?”
“I haven’t the faintest idea of what you’re talking about.”
“Loki…”
“Those human motor vehicles malfunction constantly, it could have been anything.”
“Right.” You nodded, standing up and moving closer to him until you were standing in front of his chair. “You really shouldn’t have done that.”
He smiled, reaching out to place his hands on your hips before standing up.
He leaned in, his lips at your ear, “I wanted to set him on fire, but I suspect that you’d feel terrible about that.”
You didn’t pull away, feeling your heart flutter at his closeness, “you’re correct.”
“Then we’ll call it a compromise.” He whispered, his lips now brushing the shell of your ear.
Your brain felt like static and you couldn’t form a coherent sentence as a response, so you just made a sound of agreement.
“Excellent.” Loki said before pulling away.
With some space you could breathe for a second. “What are you…”
“If you are not otherwise occupied for the day, I would be delighted if you would accompany me to one of your human ice cream shops that Thor is always raving about.”
His request took you aback, was he asking you on a date?
“Oh, uhm, sure. Icecream would be nice.”
He smiled, taking your hand in his before bringing it to his lips, “I’ll come find you after dinner then?”
You smiled back. Internally melting at how sweet he was being, minor incident of arson aside.
“I’d love that.”