since you said you could give ironhusbands a shot...... hehe... angst, 49: "i wish we never met"
Clarity wasnât something Tony enjoyed having. It had its uses, its advantages, it sure did but they seldom worked out for him.
Rhodey was sleeping on him, his breaths soft and even. Snoring only a little bit.
Usually hearing his lover snore would make Tony smile. It would make him feel something. The TV was still turned on and some yellow car raced over a street. Rhodey was deeply asleep. Tony almost unconsciously started to stroke his Rhodeyâs neck, worked out the kinks there, drawing soft noises from his love.
It was too late for him to be awake. Heâd long stopped caring about what was happening on the screen, the voices and the blue flicker had turned into a background noise. It left him thinking and thinkingâ? Thinking never did him any good.
Because he then had to come to terms with what kind of person he was.
And in all honesty? Tony didnât like himself. He liked the person he was when he was around Rhodey. That Tony was aâ not a good man but he had fun, he had a man at his side who he loved and was loved by in return. And dark clouds were as far from them as they could be, Rhodey was his sunshine and his eyes, so deep and warm, were also Tonyâs stars and his moon.
When he didnât have Rhodey with him then his life turned dark. Pepperâs bright hair couldnât compare, the warmth of Happyâs smile didnât have the same effect. No. Rhodey was his actual arc reactor and helped him move on, to go on andâ
What did Tony do? His nails scratched over Rhodey as he got lost in his own musings. Bitterness crawled over him and stuck to him like flies whoâd smelled prey. Perhaps he was the foulness.
The TV was too loud in the background. Rhodey had the remote somewhere hidden because Tony hated how music and voices never were on the same noise level, always one louder than the other and it irritated him so muchâhe played with the volume almost every scene and Rhodey hated it because he wanted to, âWatch a movieâ and not argue with the volume.
It wasnât Tonyâs fault that he was bothered by it.
Often, he thought about not doing it anymore, of simply letting everything be but he couldnât because it did his head in. Rhodey suffered for it but no, he couldnât give in because it was about him, it always wasâ
Rhodey was still snoring softly. His face was half buried in Tonyâs shirt and he felt his breath warm against his skin. Affection curled in Tonyâs chest and he kept on stroking Rhodey, his hand slipping beneath the shirt like a thief at night into a house.
Tony had just lost his house and while it was just a house â it had been his home. He still didnât like going to sleepâ
Perhaps that explained why he still wasnât asleep. Apart from all his troubling thoughts, nesting inside of his head and refusing to let go of him. They didnât tear him up from the inside out. No. It was almost worse because they settled in him like a cat walking onto a pillow and making itself comfortable there. Nobody would think of chasing the cat away, only pet it and encourage it to stay.
Tony didnât have the energy to shoo the thoughts away. They sat on his shoulders like a scarf did, snug and oh so comfortable that he almost didnât feel himself being choked by it.
Rhodey had offered for him to join him, to finally move in and DUM-E as well as U were in the kitchen and charging.
Here he was, Tony Stark, also known as Iron Man and was again abusing his loveâs generosity.
He wondered when he would ever stop doing that.
We can take the chance and spend finally more time together again, Rhodey had said with his excited smile and the fucking love that Tony had felt. This intense whirlwind of emotions. And while Rhodey had been happy, so excited that Tony was coming with him that they were together nowâ
All that he had felt was dread.
Not because he didnât want to spend more time with Rhodeyâ but because he hadnât noticed again how little time theyâd spend together. Everything had been crazy the last few months. A fucking alien invasion. How fucked up was that? Nobody had said that this was possible and while a part of Tony had loved it because aliens were real, he needed to buy area 51, he couldnât believe that it had happened either.
And Rhodey had only been a target of Killian because of him.
Happy still was at the hospital. Because of him.
Pepper was scared and had been an explosive bomb. Because of him.
Everythingâ because of him.
Tony wondered how he could be worth that. How he could be worth that his friends got so much damage dealt with only so he would end up hurt. And hurt, he did. He took a shuddering breath, his other hand buried in his thigh.
One dayâ one day if he wasnât careful heâd end up with more dead friends than he wanted to have.
Perhaps it would be Rhodey.
Because if someone got Rhodey into his hands? Tony felt his gut clench in fear. He wasnât sure what he would do then. Go ballistic, tear everyone and everything apart until he had him back, safe and sound in his arms where nothing and no one would harm him.
There wasnât anything that Tony wouldnât do for him.
And it was terrifying. To feel so much for a single person. Was Rhodey aware of how much he meant to him? What power he had in his hands? It was scary, it was so scary that facing the Mandarin and the Ten Rings seemed like a joke now.
Rhodeyâs presence felt like too much and yet, Tony wouldnât want to let go of him. He wanted to keep him at his side, selfish as he was â but at the same time he wanted him only from a distance. He could (not) live with Rhodey being away from him, a relationship could work like this too. He knew it, at the end it would be a long-distance relationship only the distance more in emotional terms than in distance-distance terms. But if it would keep Rhodey safe and have him not end up dead?
Maybe it would be better that way.
It wouldnât give anyone the idea to take Rhodey from him.
Heâd be doubly safe.
And yet, the knowledge that Rhodey felt safe and comfortable enough around him to fall asleep, that he hadnât given up on him yet where others surely would haveâ? It made him want to never let go of him.
He turned his head so that he saw Rhodey better in the blue light, a Transformer exploded on the screen.
âI wish,â he whispered when everything started to become too much again, âthat we never met.â
Rhodey stayed silent, sleeping unperturbed by Tonyâs growing desperation on his couch.
If they had never met â Rhodey wouldnât be War Machine. But he also wouldnât be in as much danger as he was when he stayed with Tony, that was for sure. It was a given, granted, foolproof.
And in the end, it would all depend on if Tony was selfless enough to let Rhodey go or if he would keep him at his side with his charm and whatever he threw at him in the hope it was enough to have him stay.
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