"Steve?"

He woke to a knock on the guest room door. It opened and Tony poked his head inside.

"Why are you on the floor?"

Steve closed his eyes and grumbled, "Bed's too soft."

"Can a bed be too soft?"

No answer.

"Can I come in?"

"It's your house," Steve said through a yawn.

"It's your room," Tony countered.

"Yes, you can come in."

He dragged a blanket behind him as he entered. Tony jumped onto the bed and began to fluff the pillows. He didn't say anything more. Steve watched as Tony huddled beneath a blanket and sank back into the pillows Steve couldn't stand. The silence between them was long and awkward.

"Why are you here?"

"What you did tonight was—"

"What you hired me to do," Steve finished.

"Right."

"I cannot believe how people speak to you."

"You get used to it after awhile. Hell, I am forty years into it, but a year from now I don't want you to be."

"Tony, I was in love with another male soldier. I was used to it a decade ago."

"But ten years ago you weren't kissing me and letting me grab your ass in front of cameras."

Steve laughed.

"You grabbing my ass is not a problem."

There was a long pause before Tony asked, "You mean that?"

"Of course I mean it. But you didn't hire me to like you, Tony, you hired me to be at your side for a full year."

"Yeah." Tony sighed heavily and turned his back to Steve.

"Tony?"

"Yeah?"

"You never answered my question. Why are you here?"

Tony flipped back around and sat cross-legged on the bed. He tugged at the blanket for a bit then folded it through his fingers as he answered.

"Why haven't you asked me about Afghanistan?"

Because the last time he mentioned Afghanistan they ended things on the spot. Or perhaps it was because Steve didn't want to feel any closer to Tony than he needed to be.

"It's not the sort of thing you ask about," Steve answered. "If you wanted to tell me, you'd tell me."

"I think I should tell you."

"Should you?" Steve asked.

"What do you know?"

"Nothing much. Ten Rings held you captive somewhere in the Hindu Kush. You were there about three months and made a weapon to escape. Anything else you want me to know?"

"I wasn't alone."

Steve couldn't keep the surprise out of his voice when he asked, "Someone was captured with you?"

"No, he was captured before me and the Ten Rings used him as a translator." Tony paused for a long time. So long that Steve thought he might've fallen asleep. "His name was Yinsen."

"He was your friend."

Tony slid off the edge of the bed onto the floor, and fell back like it'd taken everything he had just to reveal just this much.

"I would've been dead were it not for him. There are two pieces of shrapnel less than an inch away from my heart." Tony pulled off his t-shirt to reveal a black tank top, but something was off about it. There was a lump about the size of a fist in the center of Tony's chest, emanating a bright blue glow. He tucked his arms inside the tank and pulled it up to rest around his neck. The scarring around the circular ... whatever the hell was glowing in the middle of Tony's chest, was faint. Whomever cut into him knew what they were doing.

Steve could only muster a weak, "What the hell ... ?"

Tony grimaced. Steve didn't really know what to call it; the metal ring about four inches in diameter giving off a neon blue light.

"It's an arc reactor. Same thing that powers this tower and my house in Malibu, but smaller. There's a magnet in here that keeps the metal away from my heart. Yinsen helped me build it." Tony angrily pulled the undershirt down to cover it up again. "Sacrificed everything to help me."

"He didn't make it out?"

"He sacrificed himself to save me." Tony turned to look at Steve with sad, tired eyes. "I will not let anyone else give up their life for me."

"Is that what you think I'm doing?"

"Isn't it?"

Steve rolled his eyes.

"My life here in New York wasn't worth much. I'd say you've already given me a hell of a lot more than I had when I got back. This is not a hardship for me. We're a team, we have a goal, and I am going to do something worthwhile for the first time in God only knows how long."

"You've given up your privacy," Tony countered. "A guy whose only internet presence is three friends and a fake name on Facebook? My guess is that meant something to you."

"It meant everything to me." Steve pressed himself up to lean back on his elbows. "But I've been hiding my entire goddamn life; I don't need to do it anymore."

Tony stared resolutely at the t-shirt between his hands. He began stretching out the neckline, but still said nothing for a long while.

He asked, "You know you don't have to hide from me, right?"

Steve sat up and twisted so they were face-to-face.

"I know. I trust you."

"No, you don't."

"Hey!" Steve shouted. "You don't get to tell me what I feel—"

"Sometimes I don't think you know," Tony replied. "But you're hiding something from me. Pep won't tell me, so it has to be big."

"Apologies," Steve spat, "that coming out to you, admitting my feelings for my dead best friend, and telling you why I left the service wasn't personal enough for our first eight days together."

"Hey, High School Musical, you are the one who keeps saying 'we're a team' and 'we're in this together.' Teams, no, friends are honest with each other and I told you about Afghanistan, so you ..."

Steve fell back onto his pillow and stared up at the ceiling.

"I don't need to tell you everything; you're not my Thorapist."

"Thorapist?"

"You know what? Forget I said anything."

"Fine."

Steve rolled his eyes and Tony dragged himself back up onto the bed. He flipped over and smashed his face into his pillow. Steve sighed, but didn't say anything. Neither did Tony. The evening had gone rather well ... How had it ended up like this?

Would it always end up like this?

"Can I stay?"

Tony pulled Steve from his thoughts. He was surprised Tony thought to ask.

"Don't say 'It's your house,' because you are here for a year. This is your room and I'm ..." He trailed off like he didn't know what to say. "If it's okay, I want to stay."

Steve admitted, "Tonight was nice."

"Didn't answer my question."

"Did you think tonight was nice?"

"I like being around you," Tony admitted, "so yes, tonight was nice."

"Good then," Steve replied. "You can stay."

.oOo.

"Good morning, Sir!"

Jarvis's voice pulled Steve into consciousness. It took him a few moments and more than a little effort to pry his eyes open. Tony groaned from atop the bed.

"You have a visitor."

Tony grumbled something unintelligible, so Steve tugged on his arm. He swatted Steve's hand away, so Steve tugged on his pajama pants. He dodged the pillow Tony threw his way as Jarvis said,

"Colonel Rhodes is in the elevator."

Tony groaned, "Tell him to wait. My boyfr—Steve and I slept in."

"You plannin' to get up?" Steve asked.

Tony sat up and hopped off the bed before slowly trudging to the door. He pressed the heels of his hands into his eyes and sagged against it. He was sort of adorable like that, his hair sticking up in five different directions and his voice gravelly with sleep.

"I haven't had a good night's sleep in ..." Tony shook his head. "I can't remember."

Steve hesitated to ask, "Do you want me to meet him?"

"Rhodey?! Hell, yes! My best friend, my better half, my ... Wait, no, what if you like him more than you like me? Who wouldn't? Maybe you should hide here until something goes wrong, which is always, and the Air Force calls him back."

"Tony?"

"Steve."

"I'm always going to choose you."

"Because I hired you."

"Because I like you," Steve countered.

"I know," Tony winked, "I just like hearing you say it."

Steve shot him a wan smile in lieu of a reply. He stood up and went through his routine of cracks and pops before saying, "Five minutes to brush my teeth and change."

"Aye, aye, Cap'n!"

Tony was out the door before Steve could say, Not that kind of captain.

Steve had packed his oldest leather jacket and one of the t-shirts from his drawer, which he grabbed without looking, just prayed it didn't have a hole in the hem. The jacket was his father's, who died in the Persian Gulf when Steve was six. When he was little he'd sleep with it tucked beneath one arm. It fit Steve much better with the added years on his shoulders.

Steve glanced at himself in the mirror before brushing his teeth. He looked a bit less tense, and supposed that was a good thing. There were so many moments over the past ten years when he assumed he would end up like his father: a soldier dead from being in the right place at a bad time. But now? Now there was Tony Stark and his robots and his company.

He spat into the sink and rinsed his mouth. Almost everyone had told him to leave ... Everyone except Miss Potts. Of everyone in Tony's life, Steve felt she had his back more than anyone. She chose Steve, of all people, and he'd do right by it. The only remaining roadblock was convincing Rhodes. Rhodey? What the hell was Steve meant to call him? James was off the table.

Steve shook the thoughts from his head and told himself to act naturally. How had he done this with Peggy's family? Poorly, to be honest. He bumbled it all, couldn't even get the right words out. Peggy laughed it off and so did everyone else because it was a loving sort of nervous. Everything around Tony made him nervous, so it shouldn't be that much of a stretch.

He surveyed himself in the mirror like he was going to meet his boyfriend's family for the first time. Which, in a way, he was. Steve stuffed his feet into his sneakers, took a deep breath, and headed down the hallway before he could give it another thought.

Rhodes was speaking to Tony at the bar. In five minutes Stark had gone from sleep-mussed mess to completely presentable, while Steve hadn't even bothered to shave. Tony was wearing the everyday uniform of t-shirt, blazer, pants, and shoes that cost more money than they were worth. Rhodes was a complete one-eighty, in jeans and a t-shirt that read Happy Halladays!

"Morning!" Tony half-shouted when he caught sight of Steve. The smile on his face was real. "Steve, this is my best friend, Colonel James Rhodes. Rhodey, this is—"

"Captain America!"

Steve's heart dropped all the way down to his stomach. Colonel Rhodes was walking toward him, hand outstretched. Steve accepted the handshake as Rhodes continued to smile at him. Tony had an adorably confused expression on his face.

"Captain what, now?"

"Wow." Rhodes turned to look over his shoulder at Tony and said, "I can't believe you snagged this guy."

Tony frowned, then asked, "How do you know Steve?"

"I don't know him," Rhodes clarified, "but he's Captain America!"

"That connected zero pieces of information for me."

"He doesn't know?" Rhodey asked, seemingly a bit starstruck. "You didn't tell him?"

Steve grimaced and admitted, "Never thought it would come up." He walked around the bar to stand next to Tony.

Rhodes pointed at Steve and said, "This guy is a legend. He single-handedly saved forty soldiers from terrorists holding them hostage in Austria, of all places."

"I'm going to guess that was in the redacted part of your file," Tony pouted, unhappy he'd been left out of the loop.

"We're talking Medal of Honor-level," Rhodes insisted. "And I can't believe you're dating Tony!"

"Hey!"

"You can thank Miss Potts for that," Steve replied. "She thought we'd be a good match and, for what it's worth, I believe she was right."

"Damn." Rhodes shook his head in disbelief, unable to wipe the smile off his face. "As soon as I heard Tony had a boyfriend I had an entire interrogation planned, but you're Captain America!"

"Why do you keep calling him that?" Tony asked.

"Because he's been Captain America since, like, 2002."

"He's been Captain Handsome for eight days, and I'm gonna make that one stick."

"I like Tony's better," Steve admitted. He needed a subject change, and fast. Think, Rogers. Think! He looked at Rhodes's t-shirt and asked, "You're from Philly?"

"South side," Rhodes confirmed. "I met Tony at MIT."

"I bet you have loads of stories I want to hear."

"NO!" Tony insisted. "No, no, not allowed. Prohibited. Forbidden."

Rhodes laughed and said, "I have to tell you about the time he set his bed on fire."

"That was an experiment!"

"Please," Steve insisted, "I want to hear them all."

"Only if you tell me about how the Howling Commandos managed to overtake a HYDRA tank with nothing but a grenade and a flashlight."

"Done deal," Steve answered.

Which is how he ended up at lunch with Colonel Rhodes somewhere in Chelsea. The place was very quaint and homey, the perfect spot to swap war stories. But the most important part of it all was how Rhodes spoke about Tony. It was how Steve spoke about Sam, how Bucky spoke about Steve, true friendship that comes from years together in the trenches. Steve answered all Rhodes's questions honestly and enthusiastically because all of it felt real. He was having lunch with his boyfriend's best friend.

Just when Steve had told Tony not to get any closer, to fall any further, he tripped head over heels.

.oOo.

"Forty men, huh?"

"Thirty-seven," Steve corrected. "Thirty-eight, if you count me rescuing my own dumb ass."

They spent the evening playing Dishonored on the Xbox. Tony spent his time away from the controller tossing bits of popcorn at Steve, while Steve spent his free time fishing the popcorn out of the cushions.

"You thought this didn't merit a mention?"

Steve stared very intently into the popcorn bowl. It was mostly kernels and liquid butter that had begun to harden at the bottom. Tony kept chattering to fill the silence.

"Dating a soldier is one thing, but a war hero is something else. I knew you were out of my league, but what the absolute hell? How did Pepper not know?"

"She knows." Steve took a deep breath and repeated, "Last week when she invited me into the office ... She didn't say it, but she had the look people get when they know."

"When they know what, Steve?" Tony snapped. "What are you keeping from me?"

"I ..." He shrugged. "I'm ashamed."

"Why?!" Tony shouted. "What happened?!"

"My CO had given up on them. There wasn't a way to rescue the soldiers via ground or air, so they just had to 'fall back and regroup.' They said it was impossible, but I couldn't believe that. I wasn't well-versed in terrorist negotiations, but I knew hostage situations didn't usually last long enough for the negotiators to 'regroup.' Those were our men and I don't leave people behind, soldiers or otherwise."

Steve placed the bowl on the floor and laced his fingers together.

"I hitchhiked close to the HYDRA base, then hid myself in the back of an SUV underneath a mountain of stuff. They rolled me right inside. I found the guy with the keys, put him out of commission, freed the soldiers and we hotwired enough cars to get us back to base."

"You snuck inside and snuck back out?"

"Not exactly ... The HYDRA base went into self-destruct mode. Next morning there was hardly anything left. We rolled back into Camp Darby and that was when my life changed. They spun the narrative that I saved thirty-seven men from terrorists, which was technically true, and the story spiraled from there. People insisted I should be awarded the Medal of Honor, which I didn't deserve. You don't give that medal to someone who disobeyed a direct order, no matter how honorable the intentions. Instead, they compromised and made me a captain."

"Ah," Tony realized, "thus, Captain America was born."

"It worked out well for me," Steve admitted. "I led the Howling Commandos unit, which was all I ever wanted. I worked with my best friends and even got to work with my girl."

"I don't understand. Why would you be ashamed of being a hero?"

"I'm not a hero!" Steve half-shouted. "What I did was not heroic, it was stupid."

"It wasn't stupid, Steve. Like you said, you don't leave anyone behind."

"I would've."

"What do you mean?"

"Do you want to know why I went over there, Tony? Why I risked my career, my life to get those men?"

"I assume Barnes was among the hostages."

Steve nodded.

"I wouldn't have gone if he wasn't. Bucky was ..." He choked off the words and let his face fall into his hands for a moment. "Tony, I can't even begin to tell you. I loved him so much that I didn't want to be a soldier without him. I didn't want to live without him, so I rescued them all. If they'd taken only Bucky, or they'd taken a hundred men plus Bucky, it would not have mattered. I did not disobey the order because it was the right thing to do. I disobeyed the order because Bucky needed me. There's a world of difference and I didn't deserve a damn thing for it. I got him out; I had everything I needed."

Tony was quiet for awhile, staring at the PAUSED screen on the television. Steve wondered what he must be thinking. Wow, Steve's not a hero at all. Not the sort of man I thought he was. He'll never be able to move on from Barnes.

"Steve, I don't really know what a hero is, but if they exist it means there are two groups of people: those who are heroes and those who aren't. The way I see it, you had two options inside the base. You could have done what most people would do, find Barnes and make a quick getaway. Finish the mission, but that's not what you did. You found Barnes and rescued thirty-six other people. Thirty-six lives that would have ended if it wasn't for you. You didn't walk away when you had every right to. Maybe that's what heroes do; fight for everyone, even when they don't have to."

Steve admitted, "I've never thought of it like that."

"When it comes to self-loathing, I am king of that castle," Tony said as Steve wrapped his arm around Tony's shoulders. "But I learned to see the good in other people. I believe in the future, and if the future is a good place that has to come from somewhere, right?"

"I'm not sure I have the same outlook, but you have awhile to convince me."

"Yeah, well, you suck at video games."

Tony always seemed to do that, change the subject when things hit too close to home.

"I suck at this, but I'll kick your ass at Mario Kart."

They leaned back against the couch and didn't say anything for awhile. Tony snuggled into Steve's side and it felt nice. He could get used to this, to holding Tony, playing video games, threatening anyone who so much as looked at him wrong ...

Tony chuckled.

"You get that look on your face when you're thinking about something you're afraid to be happy about."

"You're not far off."

"Well then, I have a proposal for you."

"I think marriage can wait until the six-month mark, at least" Steve teased.

Tony asked, "How would you want me to do it? Hot air balloon ride? Fly you to Paris and drop to a knee in front of the Eiffel Tower?"

"Do it at a board meeting."

"HAH!" Tony doubled-over in laughter and whacked Steve in the stomach. "Oh, God, that would be amazing."

"What were you going to say?"

"Right, before I was planning our wedding I was wondering if you have plans on Wednesday."

"Therapy in the morning, but nothing after eleven."

"Since I'm making you part of my life," Tony said, "I'd like to understand yours. If you're willing, there is nothing planned for me Tuesday night or Wednesday, and I'd like to see what your life is like."

"You want to hang out with me?" Steve asked. "In Brooklyn?"

"Yes. A day in the life of Steve Rogers."

Steve chuckled, "Prepare to be bored off your ass."

"I doubt I'll be bored. Sometimes slowing down is nice."

"You're only saying that because you finally got more than three hours of sleep."

"I'm serious, Steve, I want to get to know you so that when you're ready to make this a real thing—"

"Tony," he gave him a sad smile, "you've known me for a week. Maybe I could make you happy for awhile, like I know you could make me. What happens when it begins to fall apart? Because you know it would, we fight too much for it not to. It'd end before you are out of probation. We're attracted to each other but we can't make life-altering decisions based on that."

"Yes, you have this line in the sand between us. We're just friends, anything in public is just for show, if we have more it becomes complicated and messy. But a week should be enough for you to understand that my life is always complicated and messy. You said you didn't want to hide anymore, but that is exactly what you're doing. You're hiding yourself away from me, from your feelings toward me, and I am selfish enough to not want you to do that."

"But—"

"You are damning a relationship before it even begins! Maybe you're right and it will fall apart before the year is up. Maybe we are completely incompatible or you get tired of having your photo printed in magazines, but I want to try."

"And—"

"Because I'm—"

"Annoying the hell out of me!" Steve shouted. He sighed and ran a hand over his face. "Yes, you can spend that time with me. On one condition."

"Which is?"

"You won't pity me when it's over."

Tony frowned.

"Why do you think I would?"

"Because you have," Steve made a vague gesture to the penthouse, "all of this. My life here isn't one I've settled into, let alone one that can compete with this."

"It's not a competition."

"Feels like it is."

"Then I promise not to pity you, which I wouldn't do anyway."

"Great." Steve smiled. "It's a date."