#billynate

Maybe Billy was overthinking it, and maybe the smiles and the hand holding and the fancy dinners that led both Teddy and Billy sneaking out the back because why is pasta that much money really was just Teddy being chill.

And then Teddy showed him the comic shop and Billy was certain that there was to be sex or a long conversation (about responsibility and parents and the distant future that was apparently just around the corner) coming but Teddy just offered to buy Billy a comic book and stalled at the apartment door and left with a charming and awkward smile.

(And, of course, Billy was thinking of before. He thought about video games and debates about the integrity of the comic world that led to fits of giggles even though they were vehemently disagreeing and Nate telling him that it was okay.)

The thing with Teddy was that he never told Billy it was okay. Billy knew it was okay, because even when he started yelling about movies and games, Teddy would just grin and talk him down or let him rage and then lean in close and whisper something that set Billy off talking again because volume one was better.

Teddy didn’t care if he won the debate. Sometimes, Billy became aware that Teddy was watching him move or talk.

“Kiss me.”

Billy said those two words, and Teddy looked up from dinner-pancakes with shock across his features. Billy doesn’t take them back.

Afterwards, Teddy smiled (and it terrified Billy that there wasn’t a sharp edge to it. No leer. Terrified him that no one had won because, Billy guessed, relationships weren’t supposed to be about who outmaneuvered who.)

Billy felt like a man waiting for the guillotine. (Waiting for the day he felt resentment instead of butterflies, of snippy comments, of having to think ten moves in advance and blowing all that fucking planning and ending everything in arguments.)

They go through a doorway, mindful not to knock anything over or to hit any particularly unstable spots, and—they’re in a bedroom.

Billy frowns. “What’s…”

And then the color scheme hits, the blue and white with red trim, pictures on the wall crooked from the attacks but still of recognizable people, the newspaper clipping framed next to one window.

“Is this Captain America’s room?”

“Isn’t it cool?”

“Oh my god it is.” And…an insane impulse. A completely insane, ridiculous, childish impulse. “I kind of want to jump on the bed. Just to say I jumped on the bed in Captain America’s room.”

Well…

So they don’t jump on the bed. They get to it, and they sit down for a second and sort of bounce, and then they’re both almost. Too shy to jump? Like, if they do that, that’s what’ll get them caught. That’s what’ll get them in trouble.

They sit side by side, gripping the edge of the bed with its somehow still military-tight covers, and stare out at the view that Captain America used to wake up to every morning, and then..

“Look, can I…” Nate trails off.

Billy blinks. “What? Can you what?”

Nate glances at him sidelong, takes a deep breath, and says, “Can I kiss you?”

“Can you…” Billy’s face goes hot. “What?”

“Kiss you, I said. Can I kiss you.”

“Um.”

Nate doesn’t quite meet his eyes.

Billy swallows hard and says, “Sure.”

Nate leans towards him, and Billy leans forwards too, and their lips meet in the middle. And. Billy’s kissed people before—or, well, he kissed Jimmy Stidham that one time—but this is more.

More intimate.

It’s not quite romantic, being near Nate doesn’t make his stomach lurch in that sort of awkward-awesome-scary way that being near Teddy does, but it’s good. It’s sexy. Kissing Jimmy Stidham wasn’t really sexy, especially since they’d been faking CPR in front of their class the whole time.

He’s not even sure if Teddy likes him, anyway.

But Nate has a hand behind his head, sort of cradling his neck, and their mouths are pressed together, and it is hot as hell.

He feels something, and he parts his lips, and now this is definitely a kiss with tongue. Which he is totally cool with.

He grabs Nate’s shirt.

After a few more minutes of very concentrated kissing, Billy says, breathlessly, “Are we actually making out in Avengers Mansion?”

Nate looks a little dazed. “I think so. I think we’re making out in Avengers Mansion.”

“Cool.”

They keep it up for a few minutes more, and it looks like it might go somewhere really interesting, until—

“Oh, shit.” Nate sits up suddenly. “Do you hear something?”

Billy tilts his head to the side, listening intently, and his eyes widen. “Shit, I think I do.”

“We need to get out before someone catches us in here.”