#lightsonparkave

i know i hurt you, tony. i guess i thought... by not telling you about your parents i was sparing you, but… i can see now i was really sparing myself.

made for @lightsonparkave round 65 – lies

Summary: The wound, though grievous, would close, given time and anger hot enough to cauterize. As long as Tony didn't pick the scab, as long as Tony eventually stopped loving him, like he promised.

If you haven't already heard, it's the tenth anniversary of CA:CW and there's a Steve/Tony event for it: @stevetonycacwfest! I'm running it with my friend, @magicasen. This is my submission for the Steve/Tony CA:CW 10th anniversary prompt fest as well as @lightsonparkave round 65.

My inspirations for this fic are these prompts from the two events: "Liar" by Paramore and the scene from Fleabag where the priest tells Fleabag that her love for him will pass.

Also inspired by this sucker punch of an art piece based on the Fleabag scene by @citsiurtlanu/@californiatowhee, whom this fic is for.<3 Thanks for being such a great friend, lanu! I'd go on about how grateful I am to have met you and share this fandom with you except the notes section would be a gazillion words long like our DMs haha.

Often difficult to give or receive, sometimes undeserved and self-destructive, but most of the time necessary for one to move on and start afresh. Absolution allows for a future to be possible.

The theme for Lights on Park Ave Round 63 is forgiveness.

Here are the prompts:

Toni Morrison talks about how to give yourself grace even if you do something horrible in a 1988 Mavis on Four interview

"Hold No Grudge" - Lorde

Robby tells two heartbroken adult siblings about "ho'oponopono" to help them say goodbye to their dying father in The Pitt

Parallel scenes of Art catching Patrick during their first scene together as best friends and partners and Patrick catching Art after years of bitter estrangement at the end of Challengers

A quote about how living without forgiveness is a type of death from Pachinko by Min Jin Lee

Steve and Tony make up and embrace after Civil War in Avengers Prime

Tony tells Steve that he hates resentment and wants peace and Steve agrees in Endgame

A quote about needing to be judged and absolved by someone Dmitri sees as higher than himself in The Brothers Karamazov by Fyodor Dostoevsky

Soyoung tells Dongsoo that he doesn't need to forgive his mother for abandoning him as a baby and Dongsoo says he'll forgive Soyoung instead as she cries over her decision to give up her own baby from Hirokazu Koreeda's Broker

Louis and Lestat talk about Claudia's death and hold each other in shared grief, guilt, and love after decades of separation in Interview with the Vampire (AMC)

Tommy surrenders after refusing to give in despite being seriously injured because Brendan apologizes for leaving Tommy to fend for himself as a kid and tells Tommy he loves him in Gavin O'Connor's Warrior

Frank apologizes to Mary, his genius niece, for giving custody over her to his estranged mother despite raising Mary her whole life, and Mary accepting the apology in Marc Webb's Gifted

An excerpt about being scared to let go of anger from What My Bones Know by Stephanie Foo

Patrick jokingly lists all the instruments he can buy Kat every time he messes up in 10 Things I Hate About You

An ill and dying Tim tells Hawk he's too angry to forgive anyone while Hawk tries to take care of him, years after Tim cut off ties due to Hawk's self-destructive choices, in Fellow Travelers

"Remission" - Leila Chatti

An excerpt from "The Merchant and the Alchemist’s Gate" by Ted Chiang about how the past can't be changed but one's relationship with it can through repentance, atonement, and forgiveness

Alec asking Laura to forgive him for loving her and bringing her so much misery and Laura saying she will if he does the same for her in David Lean's Brief Encounter

A quote about what forgiveness does for one's past and future from Why Be Happy When You Could Be Normal? by Jeanette Winterson

"Moon Song" - Phoebe Bridgers

Round 63 will end on February 28, 11:59 PM ET (what time is that for me?).

And When the Sky Was Opened

Steve/Tony. PG-13, 2,957 words.

Steve broods as the rain lashes the windows of Avengers Mansion. He knows something in his life has got to change.

Iron Man helps him figure out his options.

My fix for Captain America V1 #228.

READ HERE

Also a fill for @lightsonparkave round 62 - Tenderness using this prompt, a fill for Avengers Mansion in the 2025 @cap-ironman bingo.

Title: love (if it means you) Ship: Steve Rogers/Tony Stark Universe: MCU Rating: Explicit Major Tags: Porn with Feelings, Virgin Steve, Demisexual Steve, Getting Together, Hand Jobs, Frottage, Shower Sex, Blow Jobs, Multiple Orgasms, Anal Sex, Top Tony, Bottom Steve, Abandonment Issues Word Count: 10,000

Summary: Steve isn't a puritan prude, thank you very much. He may not have had partnered sex, but it's not because of some moral conviction or a conscious choice of abstinence. He simply never felt like he needed a partner. Even with his serum-enhanced libido, the idea of sex never meant much to him before he's fallen in love. With Tony, however, it does. Even if Tony doesn't think he's the right partner for Steve.

This poem, Deer Tracks by Richard Brautigan, offered by @lightsonparkave Round 56 for the theme Hibernation served as my inspiration for the last scene. The title is from this poem, Bare by Danez Smith, offered by Lights of Park Ave Round 53 for National Poetry Month.

I finally wrote something for @lightsonparkave! Written for this prompt, you can find this fic on ao3 here (and a brief preview below)

~

Breakups are hard enough on their own, but they’re even worse when your best friend won’t let you cope in your preferred way.

“Bucky, I don’t want a vacation,” Steve says, trying to sound patient and not like he’s growling.

Bucky nods like he understands, which he clearly doesn’t or they wouldn’t still be having this conversation two months after he first brought it up. “I know you keep saying that, and I hear ya, I really do. But I think you’re not hearing me, pal. I’m not saying you want a vacation, I’m saying you need one.”

Steve loses the battle with his growl. “Bucky—”

“Steve. Listen to me. When’s the last time you went out on a Friday night? Forget going to the bar or anywhere you might meet someone—when’s the last time you went to the movies? Or out to Coney Island? For that matter, when’s the last time you left this office? I know you’ve got a bed in that private office back there, and Natasha tells me you’re still here when she leaves every night and here when she gets here in the morning. Steve, she’s one of the first people in the office, so what are you doing getting here so early? Are you sleeping in there? That’s it exactly, isn’t it? You’re sleeping inside your office, and that’s just another whole level of sad.”

“I’m not sleeping in my office,” Steve snarls, but he is and Bucky absolutely knows it going by his judgmental scowl.

“Really? So if I went downstairs and pulled the security logs…”

“Fine! So I’m sleeping here. Who cares?”

“I care, Steve. It’s been six months since Peggy left, and you’re a fucking wreck!”

“Star Designs has had its most successful quarter since—”

“I don’t give a fuck about the company. I care about you. You might have the board fooled with your expensive suits and fancy hair, but I see right past that to the kid from Brooklyn, and I’m telling you, you’re floundering. What’s going on?”

“What do you think?” Steve snaps, dropping heavily into the ergonomic chair behind his desk. He doesn’t drop his head into his hands but that’s only because that seems a little too melodramatic. He’s the CEO and founder of the biggest advertisement and marketing company in the country. He is not a high schooler experiencing their first breakup on prom night.

“She hasn’t been by to pick her stuff up yet,” he says quieter. And I can’t bear to go back home and see her sheet music and clothes and programs from her concerts, he doesn’t add.

Bucky blinks at him. “So?”

“What do you mean so?”

“So text her, tell her she’s got another week to pick up her shit, and then hire a moving company, but stop letting her push you out of your own goddamn apartment.”

“I can’t do that! Most of those are from her shows. They mean something to her.”

“Well, they can’t mean that much if she’s left them there for the last six months,” Bucky points out reasonably. But the idea of just throwing them out makes him want to shudder. His dad used to throw his mom’s things out every time she did something he didn’t like. Eventually she stopped doing them, but by that point, she wasn’t really Steve’s mom anymore, just an empty husk.

Maybe Bucky remembers that because his face softens just a touch. “Look, take the week off. Take the vacation that Natasha booked for you. I’ll handle getting Peggy’s things out of the apartment, and when you come back, promise me you’ll stop sleeping in your office. You’re thirty-two years old Steve. Stop acting like you’re ninety.”

Steve sighs. He still doesn’t want to, but maybe Bucky is right. Maybe he’s been pushing everyone—and himself especially—too hard so that he doesn’t have to think about Peggy. It’s been hard enough trying to get used to sleeping alone again, but maybe he should stop trying in his cold office and get used to the warm sunlight on his face waking him up in the morning in his east-facing apartment instead of his alarm in his windowless private office.

“Fine,” he agrees.

“Yes!” Bucky exclaims, pumping his fist in the air. He’s not even a little bit subtle about it, and Steve can’t help the chuckle that escapes him.

cw: minor flashing, mild blood

My entry for @lightsonparkave round 36, inspired by this lovely moodboard from round 26 C: I just knew I needed to draw the boys as very cheeky vampires as soon as I saw it ♥

Still images and closeups under the cut!