Cerebral Palsy
Tony woke with kisses being pressed all over his face and neck. His shoulders scrunched and he giggled, opening his eyes to his husband’s beautiful blue ones. “Goodmorning, baby.”
“Mornin’,” Tony slurred halfway through a yawn.
Steve smiled wide and pressed a wet kiss to Tony’s cheek. Tony shouted out in disgust but smiled wide.
Steve moved towards the bottom of the bed and grabbed Tony’s leg. He started massaging it gently. “So, any plans for today?”
Tony held in a wince as Steve started pulling at his tight muscles. “Just the debrief and then I think movie night?”
Steve moved to Tony’s thighs. “Ugh, I forgot about the debrief.” Steve moved up to Tony’s hips and he felt the man wince at the touch. “Still hurt?”
Tony hummed. “Moving up my back now as well.”
Steve sighed sadly. “Are you doing your stretches during the day?”
“Stevie, I am, I promise. I’m just getting old,” Tony grumbled.
“Never,” Steve smirked. He pressed his nose to Tony’s before bringing their lips to meet.
Steve quickly helped Tony stretch out his arms before pulling the genius to the edge of the bed and handing him his crutches.
Tony groaned loudly as he made to stand causing Steve to frown. Tony ignored the look and made his way slowly to the bathroom.
While his husband did his business, Steve made the bed and laid out their clothes.
Less than an hour later they were sitting with the team enjoying breakfast. Clint and Natasha had made pancakes while Rhodey and Bruce made eggs, muffins, and bacon.
Instead of spending his energy trying to sit himself at the table, Tony decided to eat his breakfast on the couch with his twisted legs laid out in front of him. He could hear the team talking in the kitchen, but he ignored their conversation in favor of watching the news.
He was invested in the story of a robbery when he started choking on a piece of bacon. His airway was abruptly cut off, which he thought was unfortunate because now he had no way to call for help. He sat on the couch, choking almost silently, fist banging weakly on the side of the couch in hopes of making noise. He hated these common reminders of how much help he relied on.
Steve was in the middle of talking about his weekend plans when a bad feeling trailed up his spine. His super hearing was picking up a weird noise so he pushed past the group and moved towards the living room. He was met with the red face of his husband as he silently choked.
“Tony!” Steve shouted, but the man didn’t look up at him. Steve quickly straddled Tony from behind and leaned the man forward. He hit the genius on the back gently and slowly increased his strength.
“Harder, Steve,” Bruce said from where he had quickly sat in front of Tony.
Steve tried to balance his strength and hit Tony’s back a bit harder. Food came sailing from Tony’s mouth and the genius started coughing.
Bruce reached into the genius’ mouth and cleared out all traces of the food.
Tony immediately collapsed backward into Steve, his energy evaporating. Steve cradled the genius, wrapping his arms around his front. “You’re okay, baby. Just a scare, you’re okay,” he whispered.
Tony nodded, breaths almost back to normal. He closed his eyes, heart a bit fast. He didn’t even notice when Rhodey started wiping up the drool from around his mouth.
“M’ sorry for scaring you,” Tony said to the room.
“It’s okay, Tones. We shouldn’t have left you alone,” Bruce said.
Tony huffed, growing angry. “M’a adult, I don’t need to be babysat.”
Steve sighed, pressing kisses to the side of Tony’s face. “Of course you don’t, babe.”
“Come here, Antoshka. We are taking a nap until it’s time to go to the debrief,” Natasha said, pushing Steve off the couch. She moved so that she was sitting on the far edge and lowered Tony onto her lap.
“I’m not tired,” Tony whined, though his eyes were drooping comically.
“Well I am,” Natasha said, shooing the rest of them out. “Keep me company then.”
“Fine.” It only took minutes for both of them to fall asleep.
Natasha woke to someone whimpering her name.
“N-Nat?” Tony whimpered, voice choked up.
Natasha was quickly alert. “What’s wrong, Tones? What’s wrong?”
“Nngh, h-hurts...H-hurts,” was all he could force out.
Concern shot through Natasha’s body and she went to stand up. “Ahhh!” Tony shouted, trembling in pain.
“I’m sorry, I'm sorry,” Nat stumbled out. She sat back onto the couch. “Where does it hurt, Tony? What happened?”
“A-all over. F-f-forgot p-pills,” he gasped.
“Jarvis, can you-”
“Mr. Rogers has been alerted and he is on his way up,” the AI answered.
Steve rushed into the room not a minute later, frantic. “What happened?”
“I don’t know, we were napping and then he woke up and said he was hurting all over. He said something about forgotten pills?” Nat explains.
“Fuck!” Steve shouted, running to the kitchen. “I forgot to give him his pain pills after breakfast. With the choking and everything I was distracted.”
“We all were, it’s okay.”
Steve came back with two large pills and a glass of water in his hand. He kneeled next to the couch so that Tony could see him.
“Baby, I'm going to need you to sit up for me so that you can take your pills,” Steve asked softly.
“I c-can’t. It hurts,” Tony cried, tears wetting Natasha’s lap. Steve could see the genius’ body literally shaking with pain and the way his limbs were stiff and pulled tight.
“We’ll go slow,” Steve asked, heart breaking. He hated seeing Tony in pain, which was more often than not. But it had been awhile since Tony had operated without medication to soothe the pain of his cerebral palsy. “Please baby.”
Tony squeezed his eyes shut, already able to picture the pain his back was going to stab him with. But he really really needed those pills. He finally nodded.
Natasha’s eyes watered as Tony screamed in pain at being moved. Steve lifted him slowly by his armpits but it did little to stop the pain of jostling his legs and back and hips. Unmedicated, Natasha was able to see the stiffness that was present in his arms- the way they were pulled tightly to his chest when he usually had some control over them.
While Steve helped Tony swallow the pills, Natasha had Clint fetch Bruce and gather heat packs.
Thirty minutes later, they finally had Tony settled. In between his back and the couch sat heat packs to hopefully sooth the tightening muscles in his back. Steve sat on the far end of the couch with Tony’s head in his lap. The genius wasn’t sleeping, the pain was too bad to let his mind wander far, but his eyes were closed. Steve ran his fingers through Tony’s hair, scratching his scalp lightly.
Bruce was on the other end of the couch with Tony’s legs in his lap. He was massaging the man’s limbs, as gently as possible, to try to work out the stiffness. It would never completely loosen, but Bruce hoped the pain would abate enough for Tony to be able to use his crutches by tomorrow.
Rhodey and Clint were in the kitchen making lunch for the group while Natasha was on the phone with Fury.
Steve froze when he noticed Tony’s arm kicking out. “Bruce, stop.” When the movement in the room stopped, Tony’s grunts were able to be heard.
Steve leaned over so he could see Tony’s face and saw the genius’ eye and mouth twitching. Bruce noticed as well and looked at his watch to time the seizure.
After a few seconds, Tony’s body stopped its small twitches and grunts turned to whimpers. “You’re okay baby, you’re okay,” Steve said softly, rubbing his husband’s face.
Tony’s eyes squinted open and they quickly found Steve. Steve smiled at him and wiped away the drool from his lip. “That was a quick one, Tones. You feel okay?”
Tony let out a yawn and his eyes closed. “Tired,” he sighed.
“That’s okay, go to sleep. We’re right here, okay?” Steve said. Tony let out a little smile.
“Fury moved the debrief,” Natasha said, sitting herself in front of the couch. She pressed a kiss to Tony’s nose and the genius’ lips twitched.
“Does that mean we can move up movie night?” Clint said, walking over with bowls of food. “I want to choose tonight!”
“It’s not your turn, Birdbrain,” Tony spoke up, eyes still closed.
“Shut up Tin Can, none of us want to watch your math documentaries,” Clint snarked back. They both stuck their tongue out at each other childishly, prompting a laugh from the room.
“Disney movie it is then,” Rhodey said, grabbing up the remote.
Natasha clapped as Clint groaned. “I haven’t seen ‘Luca’ yet.”
Tony smiled as his friend’s voices dulled in the background as he was pulled to sleep.