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As brilliant he was, Tony was actually used to coming in second in almost every aspect of his life. In technology and such, he was nearly always the leader. Making the best and coolest toys was fun for him, which was the main reason why he did it. The moment it stopped being fun he would find something else to do – probably learn how to quilt; that had been on his bucket list for a while. However, outside of his engineering passion, Tony was very used to being placed on the back burner. Having been so much younger than everyone in schools, Tony had a hard time learning how to socialize with his peers. When it came to relationships, Tony found it difficult to learn how to react – and act – and by the time he started making meaningful relationships, few people were willing to take the time to teach him something they inherently knew, that his hope for a solid relationship was thrown out.
The point was – Tony was used to relationships ending because he didn’t know what to do. It hurt but he liked to pretend it didn’t bother him, that he didn’t need people, and for a long time it worked. Until it didn’t.
It started slowly. First, Phil Coulson did some of Tony’s paper work. It had been a messy mission and a busy week for the billionaire. Tony had been stuck in meetings, fundraisers, busy upgrading equipment for SHIELD on top of SI, and when Phil went to hunt down the man because all the other Avengers – even Clint – had managed to get their paper work in, he found an exhausted Tony Stark bent over an upgrade that had to be handed over in a few hours.
“JARVIS, can you show me what Tony has been up to this last week – not what was scheduled but what he actually did,” requested Phil quietly, not that Tony would have heard him, he was too wrapped up in his work to notice much of anything.
JARVIS brought up a screen and if Phil hadn’t known that the AI was created by Tony Stark and Tony Stark did not make mistakes – not with JARVIS – then he would have thought that JARVIS was malfunctioning. There was no possible way that any one person could accomplish so much in that many given hours, not without going mad, not without collapsing from exhaustion. But then again, no other person was Tony Stark. So instead of nagging the billionaire for the paperwork, Phil simply took the stack and a few others that JARVIS directed him to, and filled them out himself.
When Tony arrived at the next weekly Avengers meeting – which he liked to call the ‘Weekly Remind Tony of all the Shit He has to Do’ meeting – he was shocked when Coulson didn’t bring up the paperwork Tony knew he hadn’t gotten around to yet. He was even more shocked when Coulson told Tony that three equipment requests by SHIELD had been pushed back several weeks.
“But Fury demanded those upgrades by next week,” said Tony slowly. “I’m pretty positive his exact words were ‘Stark, I need those upgrades by next week and if I don’t have them on my desk by 5pm I will have your ass, your spot on the Avengers, and I will make sure you attend the next twelve board meetings.’”
“Yes, and Director Fury actually has no right to make those demands seeing as he didn’t fill out the proper paper work,” said Phil Coulson drily. “It’ll take him about three weeks to get all of that done, so you have at least a month before SHIELD expects anything.”
Tony blinked owlishly but before he could come up with a protest, Phil had moved on with the meeting and Tony couldn’t protest any further.
After that, Tony noticed both his SHIELD and SI lists grow shorter. All of the things that could be done by lesser engineers were suddenly delegated to those lesser engineers. Tony questioned Pepper about it and she said that Coulson had pointed out how much extra work he was doing and she fixed it. Tony had JARVIS ask Coulson the same question and JARVIS gave much the same answer. Tony decided not to investigate and sleep instead.
Eventually, Phil started bringing food to Tony. When the agent went away for missions, he would bring back little trinkets. At first, Phil didn’t know if he was getting through to the genius but then he noticed that Tony had cleared off a shelf, out of the way of his projects, and on that shelf lived the trinkets. Despite all of that, it wasn’t until Tony found himself out on his fifth date with Phil Coulson that he brought up the subject of relationships.
“I’m no good at relationships,” stated Tony bluntly, swirling his fork around the pasta on his plate. They were eating at a small Italian place called Tasteful Noods. “I fuck them up.”
“You haven’t so far,” said Phil calmly. He knew this would come up eventually.
“I don’t know what you want,” said Tony.
And that was the crux of the matter. Tony didn’t know what anyone wanted in relationships.
“I’d like to continue dating you,” said Phil. “And beyond that we can figure out together. My hopes is that this will turn into a long term relationship. Dating casually isn’t really my scene.”
“I’m going to fuck this up,” said Tony again.
Phil smiled and took a sip of his wine.
Four months later, Tony and Phil stood across the bedroom from each other. Phil was closest to the door, Tony three steps from the corner near the bathroom, both breathing hard and glaring. It was their first big fight.
“I don’t know what you want!” yelled Tony, stumbling back the three steps before sliding down the wall, hands in his hair, tugging roughly, trying to come up with some way to figure out what Phil wanted, what the agent expected out of him so Tony could just do it, so he could make it work.
They were fighting about how not getting enough time together. The last month had been hard, their schedules conflicting so much it was difficult for them to even find time to call each other. Phil’s last mission hadn’t gone well and he had arrived back at the Tower to find Tony exhausted and run down. Tony hadn’t had a full night’s sleep since the last time he and Phil had slept together – and that’s all they did, sleep. Phil wanted to take things slow. Phil had taken one look at his exhausted boyfriend and rolled his eyes – which had made the strung out Tony get defensive, expecting the worst. Eye rolling was the start of every break up he’d ever experienced. The eye rolling had triggered an hour of yelling, which ended with Tony curled up in the corner of the room with Phil close to the door, ready to leave.
“I want you to sleep,” said Phil, much more softly, slowly approaching his boyfriend until he was kneeling in front of him. “I want you to tell me why you look like you haven’t slept in a month.”
“I can’t,” whispered Tony, still yanking at his hair, scared to admit weakness aloud but grasping at the instruction, wanting to make the relationship work. “I keep trying but there are too many nightmares. There are always nightmares. They won’t leave me alone and I missed you and I’m just really tired and I don’t know what to do to make you stay.”
“Oh Tony,” sighed Phil before he gathered the younger man into his arms.
Tony was shaking, struggling to process why he was getting comfort instead of being left alone yet again. Phil didn’t say anything, just sat on the ground, rocking slightly with Tony all but in his lap. The agent could finally see how much progress Tony had made in trusting him but also how far they had to go.
“We’re going to get some sleep,” said Phil gently when Tony had calmed down some. “And then we can talk about ways to help you sleep when I’m not around. Sound like a plan?”
“You’re not leaving?” said Tony, hardly daring to believe it.
“I’m not leaving. We’re in a relationship, which means we work together and talk things out. We are going to have fights, babe, but I promise, I’ll always keep talking to you.”
For the first time in a long time, Tony thought that maybe he wasn’t so bad at relationships.