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Of all the things you’d expected when you started working at Vought, getting close to the Seven had never been one of them. They may have walked among you and bitched about assistants not getting their goddamn coffee orders right, but they were still decidedly Not Like Everyone Else. Supes were getting more common in this day and age, but these were the elite – the cream of the crop.
Being asked out by The Homelander, of all people, felt like an April Fool’s Day prank or a dream. Any moment you were waiting for something to happen, someone to jump out with a camera, your alarm clock to go off, anything. But nothing did, and he was waiting for an answer, his hands tucked behind his back as they often were when he was in repose. In your head you heard a faint echo of a drumroll, like the world was tilting itself towards you as it awaited your answer.
“Well,” you said, and then paused.
Because the thing is – the thing is- you’re not an idiot. You’ve worked in here long enough to know that any whiff of romance and the Seven and it’s promptly pounced on and exploited for all its worth for clicks and views. It’s not the only time someone from the Seven has dated an employee, you remember rumours about Translucent being a menace towards interns back when he was still around, or Queen Maeve having some fling, and they don’t often last long once the relationship inevitably fizzles out. You wouldn’t be that sad to be fired from Vought – as a makeup artist, you can easily use your talents elsewhere and you’d probably be asked to leave with a pretty generous severance package in the bargain.
But the idea of going on a date with The Homelander is terrifying, and not just because he has superpowers and a temper. Nor is it that you don’t find him attractive, because as infamously prone to being an asshole as he is, he’s never been directly horrible to you and you’d be a liar if you said your stomach didn’t tighten at the sight of those piercing blue eyes or when you heard that smooth, velvety voice of his.
But how could you explain your stage fright to Homelander, a man who has been in the limelight with that megawatt, all American boy gleam for as long as you can remember. And more importantly, how could you agree to going on a date with him without all the pomp and circumstance that would take your natural awkwardness and drag it into the forefront in the worst way?
Homelander was watching you intently and he gave a little chuckle when you trailed off mid-sentence.
“’Well’, what?” he said, his tone light and playful. “Out with it. Are you busy or something?”
There was a faint mocking lilt to the words, like he couldn’t fathom you might have plans more important than entertaining him – he’s never been one for seeing Vought employees like people with rich inner lives. You press your lips together for a moment, unsure of how he’s going to take this, but you might as well say it now you’ve gotten this far.
“Well, we could go out.” You say, haltingly. “But…maybe something a bit more casual than a…dinner?”
Homelander looks somewhat surprised. Whatever he’d been waiting for you to say, it wasn’t that. His arms lower and now he’s studying you more closely, the little smirk on his face replaced with confusion and that faint glimmer of curiosity. His voice is both a challenge and a question when he asks;
“What did you have in mind?”
~
So, to indulge you, because he was amused that you’d suggest to The Homelander to do something lowkey – he didn’t really do lowkey in general – he’d acquiesed to your suggestion for him to pick you up at an agreed location. The whimsy of it was at least a change from the usual monotony of his routine, of the sea of insects scuttling around trying to arrange this, that and the other, of the heads of Vought trying to maneuver him around like a chess piece and Ashley hovering around him like an irksome little fly in a horribly tacky suit.
He wasn’t expecting you to be waiting on the street already, holding…a takeout bag?
But you had been, and as per your request, Homelander had appeared and, after picking you up in his arms without so much as a hint that he was carrying an entire adult, flew up to a randomly chosen rooftop. To his astonishment, you’d straightened up when he set you down, walked over to a little platform that sat on this particular roof, and made yourself comfortable.
Homelander blinks once, his brain whirring.
Good god, you were serious.
“I’m glad it’s not as cold out as it was a few weeks ago,” you remark happily, sitting down on a ledge and placing the takeout bag beside you, opening it up where heat rises from the freshly-made food and you pull out two milkshakes that are nestled in their little cardboard container. “So it should be fine to sit up here for a bit.”
Homelander stares at you like he’s waiting for the punchline, his head cocked. Really? You just wanted to sit on top of a building and eat fucking cheeseburgers? (He knows it’s a cheeseburger and fries without having to use his X-ray vision – he can smell them as clearly as if you were waving them under his nose). Non-supes were weird little creatures.
After a couple of seconds, you glance up when you notice Homelander has not sat down to join you. His face is one of blank confusion and while it’s a relief to see he isn’t doing that technically-a-smile expression he does when he’s annoyed, you feel a wave of uneasiness anyway – what if he thinks you’re taking the piss?
“Is this okay?” you ask him, hands hovering over the bag.
“Is…what okay?” he says, turning his body this way and that like he’s looking for the source of an unknown voice. (You can’t help but think he looks like an action figure when he does that, like when little kids make them ‘walk’ by rotating them). He flicks a wrist at you and the takeout bag. “What is this?”
“Up here, it’s private,” you explain. “I wouldn’t have been able to get up here without you, so this way, we can just…talk. Nobody will bother us up here, and once we’re finished I can always just climb down the fire escape if you have to be somewhere.”
You swallow when you’re done, anxiousness swirling in your stomach, but his body language starts to shift as he realises that you’re not messing around – this is your idea of a date. Slowly, Homelander twirls his cape up behind him like a lady in an old movie does so as not to sit on her dress and perches on the ledge next to you, the takeout bag sitting inbetween you. His back is rigid, like he’s been ordered to sit up straight and he’s looking at you out of the corner of his eye with suspicion. Still, the fact he sat down at all is an encouraging sign.
"And... this is what you want to do?" Homelander says, his voice soaked in incredulity. “Just sit here?”
“Uh-huh. I told you, somewhere expensive would just make me feel uncomfortable and things wouldn’t really go anywhere. I’d be too busy worrying if the waiter was judging me or if the paparazzi were going to appear from behind a bush or something.”
Homelander looks baffled, like he can’t fathom why this would bother you. You suppose he wouldn’t get it – he doesn’t care what some random peon paid to serve him might think of two assholes hogging an entire restaurant to themselves and he’s accustomed enough to the paparazzi that he doesn’t think twice about their presence anymore. They were background noise and flashing lights to him. Besides, if they showed up when he didn’t want him there, it’s not like they’d ever be able to sneak up on him unawares.
You tilt your head, wondering if this was all an extremely stupid idea. You know he’s humouring you, like you would a skittish animal you’re looking to tame, but maybe this is too much out of his comfort zone. You honestly hadn’t considered that, and you feel a little guilty.
“You don’t have to do this if you don’t want to,” you say, hurriedly. “I’m sorry, maybe this was dumb. I just thought, you know, nobody would be able to see us up here and it wouldn’t take any time or advanced preparation. And it could be fun – something you haven’t experienced before.”
Something in Homelander’s expression shifts as you speak. It’s the very last thing you said – because of course, Homelander could have any restaurant in the country cleared out for his own personal use if he wanted to, so he thinks nothing of doing it. It’s not special to him. It was in fact what he was going to do before you suggested he go along with your weird little idea instead. But…the earnestness of the suggestion, the fact you were thinking of him, of giving him a taste of something outside of his sphere of reference…that changes things. At first, he thought you were kidding, or that you were recommending something so odd and yet mundane at the same time was you purposefully trying to be different and quirky to impress him. (What’s it called in movies? Psycho Fairy Girlfriend or some shit?) But no – it’s because you were trying to find something you’d be comfortable with but also something he might find novelty in.
People don’t often think of that. Of something he might enjoy.
“Well,” he says, with a rueful smile that instantly soothes the nervousness swelling in your chest, and he turns to you properly now, his smile quirking his lip just enough to reveal a sliver of fang. “I did promise to try your way, didn’t I?”
You smile in return, relieved.
“Come on. I’m sure we can think of enough to say to each other to fill the duration of eating a cheeseburger. I promise I’m not that bad of a conversationalist.”
That makes him laugh and it’s a wonderful sound – rich and not fake like he does in TV interviews sometimes (you’ve seen enough of them to know the difference). Relieved, you laugh as well, pulling open the bag fully and tugging out a portion of fries and a cheeseburger, still piping hot since Homelander just lifted you up onto a nearby rooftop. You didn’t even have to walk home to eat.
After that, you start talking about the new movie about the Seven Vought wants them to do. Homelander eases into it quickly and starts ranting about how he hated the last-minute changes they kept doing to the script of the third movie, that the writers didn’t know a pen from their own dicks and that a fucking braindead monkey could’ve done better. You decide not to admit to him you’ve never bothered to watch any of the Seven movies – you’ve seen clips of them, but why would you need to watch a film about the Seven? You literally see them in person every day and they don’t have horrendously cheesy dialogue to sit through.
“You know, I came up with the idea for the end scene where I drag the submarine back to the harbour,” Homelander rants, gesticulating with his arm. “Me. And it worked way better than their idiotic plan of The Deep raising his dolphin army or whatever the fuck it was gonna be. How’s anybody going to believe that? That scene was all the critics talked about when it came out, but did they bother asking me how we should end the fourth one? No, of course not!”
“Oh yeah, now you mention it, there was that random line from The Deep how ‘he had a little help’ and it never made any sense.” You say, vaguely recalling the bit Homelander’s talking about – you remember it mostly because he was dripping wet in that particular scene and his hair looked all sexy and messy. He really should wear it like that more often instead of slicking it back so aggressively. “Though even if you’ve got the context of the original ending, it’s still a stupid line. Especially that dumbass face he makes when he says it.”
Oops, you probably shouldn’t mock one of Homelander’s colleagues to his face, even if it is The Deep, but he seems highly amused by the assessment.
“Exactly!” he grins, pointing at you. “The fucker can never remember his goddamn lines, so he’s always so proud when he does. It’s like a fucking five year old showing you his finger painting.”
You snort and he grins, pausing for a sec as he spots somebody shifting their curtains in the building across from the rooftop you’re on, but they aren’t peeking on the date – perhaps it’s a cat playing with them or something.
You swallow your comment about how Queen Maeve looked like she had a poker thrust somewhere uncomfortable during the movie too and instead take a second to observe Homelander. This has gone much better than you’d expected despite his initial surprise, and a thought occurs to you.
Does he ever just...hang out? With people?
Somehow, you doubted it. As far as you know, Homelander doesn't seem to have a family - the official story is his parents died a while ago and he has no siblings or grandparents or anything else, apparently. He has the Seven, but you've noticed he's never seen hanging out with them outside of press releases or movie premieres or anything. The Supes are entitled to their private lives, of course, but Homelander has long been a bit of a mystery in that regard because nobody has ever seen him out of that suit of his. Other Supes always have people crawling out of the woodwork, complaining that so-and-so gave them a wedgie in high school or such-and-such acted like an asshole at a bar. But nobody has ever showed up claiming to know a pre-Seven Homelander. You wonder how Homelander spends his downtime when he isn't working, he's certainly never photographed anywhere compromising like some Supes have and he famously doesn't drink or do drugs. He doesn't even smoke.
A mysterious man for sure.
Despite how baffled Homelander clearly is by all this, he's adapting remarkably quickly. His body language speaks volumes - he's not so stiff anymore, instead leaning back to stretch out better. He's even eating his cheeseburger without complaint.
"So? Isn't that one of the best fucking cheeseburgers you've ever had?" you ask him with a smile, and to your delight, he smiles back.
"The best," he says throatily, taking such a hearty bite of cheeseburger that it's almost lascivious in its intensity.
“I got fries too,” you say, and he waves a hand in a gesture you take to mean ‘maybe later’. Fine, more fries for you anyway.
“You know,” you say as you finish swallowing. “I heard they want to do a Homelander: Origins movie as well.”
“Oh, that.” Homelander says distractedly, and you’re surprised to notice he’s already finished eating. Either he’s a naturally fast eater, doesn’t like to eat in front of others so made sure to consume the rest of the cheeseburger when you weren’t looking, or he simply isn’t as slow as you are. “Yeah, it was in the pipeline, but I shot that shit down. Too hokey for an hour and a half, nobody would go for it – who wants to see some whining kid all scared of using his superpowers when they can see the man in action?”
“Well, that and…” you say before you have time to actually think about what you’re saying. Hurriedly you shut up, but it’s too late. Homelander turns to look at you.
“What?”
“Nothing, forget it.” you say, reaching for more fries so you can occupy your mouth with something else, but his hand shoots out and grabs your wrist. It’s not painful – he knows how to mind his strength – but the undeniably firmness of his grip lets you know you’re not going to get away with distracting him. You raise your eyes to his and there’s an unwavering stare ready to meet you.
“Say it,” he orders softly, and your tongue nervously swipes across your bottom lip.
"It's just that I heard a rumour it's not true. None of it."
Infinitesimally, Homelander stiffens. Memories of that fucking farmhouse, canned smiles and rehearsing over and over, lines about baseballs games and apple pie, while memories of blinding white lights, beeping monitors and that cold, harsh scent of disinfectant flashed through his brain. Hips lips twitch and a gasp of mirthless laughter whooshes from his lungs. He lets go of your wrist before his grip reflexively tightens and you pull your arm to yourself protectively.
“Where’d you hear that?” he demands in a clipped tone and you could kick yourself for your stupidity, of just blurting out whatever you want without remembering who he is. What he can do.
“Just somewhere online,” you reply vaguely – you’re not lying, it was a while ago, but the user posited a pretty convincing hypothesis about why they were sure the whole farmboy routine was fake and you’ve been walking around convinced of it ever since. You just never realised how sure you were until right now.
Homelander scoffs but doesn’t press you for more details, probably because he knows the random speculation of a few basement-dwellers on the internet means nothing. Instead, he has a more pressing concern.
"What do you think?" he says and though there's a challenge in his tone, you can plainly hear something else beneath it - an unease, almost anxiousness. He wants a confirmation.
"Well," you say, and he can tell you're measuring your words, taking care with what you say but staying honest. He appreciates that - not many people are so direct with him, but you're not using honesty to be a bitch either. A lot of people think they can get away with that until he corrects them. Sometimes people want to be put in their place, he’s found. "I don't know anything for definite, obviously, but it does seem pretty unlikely all of it's true. Nobody's life is that perfect."
Homelander presses his lips together, but he's nodding before he even makes a decision to do it. He can't tell you the whole truth, of course, but since you already have reasonable suspicions, he doesn't have to correct them. You’re not a reporter or anyone important at Vought – you’re simply telling him what you’ve heard.
"No," he says, his voice coming out husky, like he's forgotten how to talk. He clears his throat and tries again. "It wasn't."
He braces himself for further questions, sharp deterrents lingering on his tongue, like a hidden knife, but you don't ask him anything else. Instead, you take another thoughtful bite of cheeseburger, glancing down at the view from your rooftop perch.
“I didn’t think so.” You say in a quieter voice.
“Well, what about you?” Homelander says, and there’s a bite of challenge in his voice, his lips pressed together in what’s meant to be a smile but it looks more like he’s resisting the urge to bite you. “What about when you were growing up, huh? Was that all peachy fucking keen?”
“Oh, well, it’s probably going to sound pretty boring.” You shrug, deciding to ignore the vein of sarcasm running through his words. Homelander arches an eyebrow, but the needling quality fades from his voice.
“Try me.”
So you talk for a little bit about where you grew up, how you ended up at Vought, that kind of thing. You try to keep it relatively light instead of moaning on about your personal problems, friends who screwed you over and disappointing dates. You do this because you don’t want to bore him, but also because you’re expecting him to do that thing men do where they zone out when you talk and it would hurt a lot more if he did that, but he isn’t. He’s listening with rapt attention, like you’re delivering a plan for a tactical military operation or something. It’s…flattering.
You abruptly break off, unable to hold back a laugh of disbelief. His lips twitch as well, like he wants to laugh but isn’t willing to commit to it until he knows why.
“What?” he says.
“No, it’s just…you’re not exactly what I expected.” You say.
“And…what does that mean?” he prompts, leaning forwards slightly and the eagle epaulettes glint in the early evening sunlight.
“I mean…I never thought you’d agree to this,” you reply, waving a hand at the general space around you, the grey rooftops, people moving around in the streets below like ants, the vents spewing pale grey smoke that rises into the darkening sky. “When you asked me out, I thought you were just fucking with me.”
“Well, hopefully the fucking comes later.” He smirks and you groan and playfully shove his arm.
“Shut up.” You say, trying and failing to hold in a giggle, and he looks delighted at the undeniably flirty contact. “My point is, that you’re The Homelander and I’m…”
You struggle to think of something to sum it up without sounding pathetic.
“…a staff member.” You eventually come up with, flustered.
Homelander hums in acknowledgement of the fact. He’s heard this before, of course. The people he rescues often just can’t believe their luck, that The Homelander had come to save them from whatever silly peril they’d gotten themselves into. Sometimes they hug him or babble an endless stream of praise or cry. It’s both annoying and ratifying – they should be thankful he’s bothering to save their pitiful little lives, of course, but it’s good to have their adulation nevertheless. But you’re not grovelling at his feet, you’re merely stating facts.
“Well, maybe that’s why I did,” he says, his voice quieter than before, a hint of a purr in his voice. “Maybe I liked what I saw.”
You smile shyly and glance at him.
“Well, that’s why I said yes.” You admit, because it seems pointless to act otherwise.
You fish out a straw from the bag and stab it through the hole of your drink, taking a deep gulp of thick, sweet milkshake. Combined with the greasiness of the fries and burger, it’s exactly what you need. You do the same with the other one – you vaguely remember him saying in an interview once he was a sucker for ol’ fashioned vanilla, so that’s what you pass him.
“Here. They’re surprisingly good for fast food shakes.” you say.
Homelander quirks an eyebrow but he takes the shake and sips on it, like he’s just humouring you even though he already admitted the rest of the food was good. But once he gets a taste, his eyes slide shut like he’s receiving a message from a higher power, throat twitching as he gulps down long, languorous sucks of milkshake. You’re glad his eyes are closed because the way he’s slurping it makes you a little…excited. You cross your legs and glance away, hoping that you look suitably nonchalant. You’ve noticed Homelander is good at picking up on little weaknesses of people and exploiting them – you don’t want to make yours so obvious.
“Damn.” Homelander mutters when he finally lets the milkshake go for a minute. His bottom lip is shiny. “How’d you know what flavour I like?”
“I told you, I just ordered two of the same thing.” you reply, but he smirks and points at you.
“Ah-ah, I can see you blushing.” he says in a teasing drawl and you scoff and swat at his arm, which probably feels like being lightly flicked with a piece of paper from his perspective.
By now it’s gotten darker, the streetlights flickering on, the wail of a siren somewhere in the distance. You’re surprised to realise that you’ve been on this rooftop for a couple of hours now, a lot longer than you’d anticipated. You’d assumed he either wouldn’t show up at all, or he’d label you as completely weird and ditch you.
You glance down to realise you’ve finished all your food too – you’ve been so distracted by Homelander you weren’t paying much attention. You crumple up all the wrappings and stuff them inside the bag – there’s no bins anywhere but you feel a little bad for littering so this seems a good compromise. Homelander watches this with palpable amusement.
“So. This was…fun.” he says, like he’s testing out the word for the first time.
“It really was,” you say, and you mean it. Aside from him getting understandably a bit touchy when you mentioned his childhood, it was nice just chilling out and talking. He wasn’t performing for a crowd or being primped for any cameras. Really, this is probably the most relaxed you’ve ever seen Homelander. “But I should probably get home soon. S’dark out.”
“Well, I can’t just let you walk home with all those…unsavoury types wandering around,” Homelander says with a smirk, rising to his feet. He turns to you with a little smile, like he’s got a secret he’s dying to tell you. He opens his arms as though he’s bracing to catch you, and you recognise the gesture – he means he’ll fly you home, if you want him to. “How about it? Or is that breaking your date rules?”
You pause. You know what he’s asking, and he knows it as well. But you’re glad he’s at least asking, that he didn’t just swoop you up the moment you finished eating and assume he was going to get some action out of this. And to tell the truth, even if being under the full beam of his attention is overwhelming…there’s something about it that’s undeniably exciting too.
You’re not ready for it to end yet.
“Well, I don’t usually fuck on a first date,” you say matter-of-factly, and you love the way his eyes light up as you speak, his eyes flickering to your mouth as it shapes the word ‘fuck’, his lips curving in a devilish smile. “But I guess I can make an exception.”
~
And when you do get home and Homelander makes effortless work of undressing you, peeling off your leggings and tossing you on your bed in one smooth movement, the giddiness in you ratchets higher and higher. The feeling of being cradled in his arms was exhilarating, the wind whipping at your hair, the solidness of his chest like an anchor in the skies…but him hunkering down inbetween your legs feels even more like a freefall.
“Now,” Homelander says in a rumbling purr, his fingers toying with the crotch of your panties. “That cheeseburger was, I admit, pretty good…but I’m still hungry.”
The line is so cheesy, but you find you don’t care – not when he yanks your underwear down so quickly you’d swear he almost gave you friction burns, and he dives right in, easily holding your thighs apart like he’s simply parting curtains. You cry out as his tongue laves over your cunt, his breath hot on your skin.
“Fuck…fuck, Homelander!” you ramble, his name tripping off your tongue. “Oh god!”
His back arches at the praise and he goes in with more vigour, tongue thrusting deep inside you to make you keen and you twine your fingers in his hair, tugging a bit – you know it won’t hurt him and since thinking about that movie, you want to see it all messy again. He shoots you a quick, devious little grin from between your legs before returning to the task at hand. You’ll give him credit – he knows how to put his back into it when he wants results.
He pushes you relentlessly towards that soaring peak, heat and fizzing, delirious lust surges through your system, your core pulsing with it and his lewd snarls and moans filling the air. He’s like a wild animal, focused only on what’s in front of him, lost in a haze of taste and scent and carnal pleasures.
As you arch your back and moan his name into the darkness of your room, you recall hazily Homelander never gave you a proper answer about why he picked you to ask out, but you’re glad he did. Glad that you said yes. As he pulls you down to him by the ankle, you giving a bitten-off giggle, his hands undoing his belt, you smile to yourself.
It looks like tonight, both of you got to try something new.