Wrong (...)
Wanda is very good at being exhausted. It’s basic stuff—she managed odd jobs, school, minor-but-critical shoplifting, activism, and being subjected to alien technological experimentation back in Sokovia, none of which left much time for rest or proper ‘self-care’ or whatever.
So why the actual fuck is she so goddamn out of it after one drink at an Avengers event? She swears she used to be able to function post-vodka, and now she’s acting like a total fool after some mixed fruity situation.
Well, whatever. She feels warm and she’s leaning into it. Sam is off in a corner somewhere trying to push Steve toward some random girl who’s clearly flirting with him, while Bruce and Tony ask the bartender no fewer than five dozen questions about the top shelf liquors. Clint and Natasha are bickering next to her. And then… Vision, who’s talking with Rhodey about something. Wanda doesn’t know what.
But Wanda doesn’t care because Vision looks so sweet. He is so sweet, but he looks especially sweet right now, nodding at Rhodey, furrowing his silly human-looking eyebrows to express intrigue, laughing, just being generally… wonderful, really.
“She’s smitten,” Clint laughs, startling Wanda out of her musing.
“I—what?”
“You look like one of those cartoons,” he elaborates, gesturing toward his face. “You know, where the eyes turn into hearts and they start drooling.”
“I think you’ve been watching a few too many kids’ cartoons,” Nat rolls her eyes. “No matter how accurate your assessment is.”
“Ugh, please,” Wanda groans. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Horrendously bad lie,” Clint replies. “Zero points. Back to basic training.”
“Yeah, we’re being pretty clear. You should’ve said something more like ‘I’m not smitten’ or ‘I’ve never had a feeling in my life.’ Instead you said all we need to know.”
“Hate you guys,” Wanda grumbles.
“You don’t hate that guy,” Clint chuckles.
Wanda sighs. Wanda gives up. Wanda is a little woozy and cares a lot less than she usually would, so she’s quiet instead of fighting back.
“Alright, Clint, that’s enough,” Nat cuts in. “She can be mysterious if she wants.”
“Alright, alright,” he replies, holding his hands up in jest. Clint reroutes the conversation somewhere else and Wanda stops paying attention again, but she’s grateful for Nat.
She told Nat about her stupid fucking crush on Vision a few weeks ago, since they’re actually friends and not just casual workplace acquaintances. And, to be fair, she knows she’s being painfully obvious about it. She just gets so flustered around Vision. It’s so stupid. She feels like a teenage girl or something, with all of these ridiculous butterflies and urges and ugh. She’s literally fought a swarm of apocalypse-oriented robots. She should not feel her heart rate skyrocket because some guy gets a really endearing glint in his eye when she asks him how he’s doing.
But, well… Vision’s not just ‘some guy,’ even if the whole ordeal terrifies her. And maybe it’s worth it to deal with the horrors of vulnerability if she gets to feel this nice sometimes. Like now, watching Vision laugh at something across the bar, Wanda’s wishing she were close enough to hear it but she’s also so warmed by the very knowledge that she’s ever heard him laugh, that she’s ever made him laugh, that she’s ever inspired a sound so beautiful.
Nat goes to the bathroom and Clint pulls out his phone to text his wife. Wanda keeps staring, though she’s careful to look around every now and then to make sure she’s not being weird about it. He’s just so good. And so sweet, and so handsome, and so funny, and so smart, and she wants him to turn his skin back to red and she wants to kiss his silly little nose and—
Her comms watch buzzes.
‘Sorry about Clint. You ok?’
(Nat refuses to use anything other than the Avengers comms channels for literally any reason, citing ‘information security’ or whatever. Even for things like this, which contain information that Wanda would literally prefer to share with the actual U.S. President than Tony Stark.)
That’s not what Wanda’s thinking about right now, though, because Vision just looked up to ask the waiter a question and he looked so damn polite and she wants to crawl physically inside of his clothes just to be closer to him. Or something. Whatever. That’s the gist. She’s too distracted and tipsy for anything to make sense.
‘im goooooood. he’s so pretty, nat’
Oh, fuck. No. She meant—
‘vis. not clint. vis is verrryyy pretty and clint is ok i guess. srory clint wife. vision much prettier. would like 2 hold his lil face.’
Wanda allows herself a few moments to giggle at the mere fact that she’s texting a friend about a crush, and then she looks up again to watch the beautiful man over there. But the beautiful man’s face looks different. He’s looking down at his watch with a face she doesn’t recognize at all. Huh.
Fuck.
Wanda’s eyes widen and she frantically checks her own comms watch, and surely enough… yeah, Wanda’s never drinking ever again.
She stands up and walks right out of the bar without a word. Fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck. She’s ruined everything. Wanda collapses onto the curb and cries. There goes her favorite friendship and the only shred of comfort she’s managed to cobble together since Pietro died. Yeah. Wanda Maximoff isn’t supposed to have stupid little butterflies. How could she even let herself th—
“Wanda?”
Her face blanches. Even his angry voice sounds pretty. Or, she assumes this is his angry voice because she’s never heard him angry. She blots her eyes with the back of her sleeve and hopes for the best.
“Hey,” she says.
“I, um… may I sit with you?”
Fuck. No. Please, no. She doesn’t want to even think about confronting this. And if he’s next to her, with his annoyingly cute little fucking smile and that little sigh he uses when he’s thinking? Nope.
“Sure.”
“So… I received a message from you.”
“Oh, god,” Wanda groans, burying her head in her hands. She can’t even bear to look at him, though she can practically feel his eyes on her. He’s so close. She can feel him breathe. She wants to be closer. She wants to burst into fucking flames and go away forever.
“What’s wrong?”
“What’s wrong? Everything, Vision! I didn’t mean for you to see that, and now I’ve probably ruined our friendship and I—well, I mean, fuck, if you don’t feel comfortable being my friend that’s okay and I don’t mean to guilt you into it, it’s just that I never wanted to make you feel like you had to—-”
“Wanda,” Vision says calmly. “May I rest my hand on your knee?”
“Uh… sure?”
Vision rests his palm on her knee and she wants to melt. This is horrible. He’s rubbing it in. He doesn’t seem like the kind of guy to rub things in like this, but maybe she deserves it. God. She’s so fucking stupid.
“I think you’re very pretty,” Vision says.
“What?” Wanda asks, her face snapping up to look at him. He’s still in his human form, which makes it a little easier for her to see that he’s blushing in the dark.
“I think you’re very pretty,” he repeats. “And I’m quite flattered and surprised that you think I’m pretty. And that you—what was it you said? That you want to hold my little head?”
“Face,” she groans. “I’m so sorry.”
“No, no—I’m trying to say that I, uh… well, I’d like it if you wanted to, um, hold my face. Or my hand. Or kiss me. Because I’d like to kiss you.”
Wanda stares at him, utterly dumbfounded.
“Oh. Did you… did you not mean it that way?”
“Kiss me,” Wanda says. “Oh my god. Vision.”
“Wait… are you, um… drunk? Are you in the right space to consent to physical contact?”
Wanda grins. He’s absolutely perfect. Her head is light and it’s not even the alcohol; honestly, she feels like she’s floating just because of how sweet he is and how impossible this feels.
“I like you so much,” she laughs. “And I really really really wanna kiss you.”
“Are you certain?”
“If it’s gonna make you nervous to do it now, how about you kiss me tomorrow, hm?”
“Oh,” Vision smiles. “Yes, I’d like that very much. Oh! And I can plan a little date, too. Make you dinner, maybe. Or we can see a movie. Really, I’d just like to give you the perfect night for that, and… well, only if you want that, I mean? If you just want to kiss once and not do anything romantic that’s alright, too, but—”
“I would love to go on a date with you.”
“Wow,” he sighs. “Wow. Alright. Yes. This is wonderful.”
Vision rests his chin on his palm and his elbow on his knee while he gazes at her. Yes, Wanda thinks. Vision is gazing. That’s such an impossible thing, but it’s happening. Vision. Right here. The day before a date. A real date. A date intended to be romantic and to include kissing and may even imply the possibility of more than one date. Wanda grins and takes his hand. Vision blushes.
“Shall we, um, go home?”
“Trying to take me home before our first date? Bold,” Wanda laughs.
“Oh, no, I just, uh,” Vision coughs. “We’re on a curb outside of a bar.”
Wanda laughs because she truly, genuinely forgot where they were. It feels silly, but the whole world really did zero in on him for these moments, however ridiculous. It’s a dimly lit parking lot outside a seedy bar, with dark clouds rolling in during the aftermath of an enormous mistake that Wanda thinks is perhaps the beginning of something special.
“Let’s go home,” she nods. She hopes it’s the first of many times she says that.