Stephen was a doctor. He was trained for this, for noticing symptoms and giving an accurate diagnosis. He’d spent twenty five years of his life in school to become the surgeon and decorated doctor he was today.
So he should be good at it, right?
It was his job, to cure people, to save their lives, to figure out what was wrong with them and fix it.
There was one person he just couldn’t seem to solve. Tony Stark.
His lips were soft against his own. Stephen gripped the sides of Tony’s face, holding him in place as a ghost of a smile fell across his lips. For a moment, everything seemed to fall into place. And then Tony pulled back.
Their eyes met, and Stephen was sure he saw peace in Tony’s dark brown depths. It was a nice change.
“Your hands are cold,” Tony murmured.
“Sorry,” Stephen whispered.
Tony smiled, leaning his head forward into Stephen’s chest. Stephen rested his arms around Tony’s shoulders, inhaling the scent that was so specifically him.
“I have to go to China tomorrow,” Tony mumbled into his shirt.
“And?”
“You’re supposed to care that I’m leaving.”
Stephen laughed. “I do care.”
“I know,” Tony whispered.
The quiet was nice, with Tony leaning heavy against his own chest and the sound of gentle wind through the curtains. Stephen stared out the window at the almost-full moon that was steadily rising in the upstate night sky, and shut his eyes.
He didn’t understand the person in the room with him. He loved him, that’s for sure, but he didn’t understand him.
—
Pepper was always on Tony’s mind. The girl he knew before. Stephen had seen her on the news a few times before the war, but he never knew her.
He didn’t mind. If thinking of her keeps Tony sane, he’s okay with it.
His medical training never prepared him for patients— or, in this case, lovers— who could hide the bad times as well as this. Usually he’d find out days later, only when Tony was willing to tell Stephen, or weeks later when Stephen picked up the courage to ask.
But he’s been getting better at reading the clues.
“When’s your flight?” Stephen asked him, the next morning, over a warm cup of coffee.
“One,” Tony murmured, yawning.
“You have everything you need?”
“Think so.”
Stephen watched as Tony stood there for just a moment too long, before snapping out of himself and walking towards the kitchen. That was the first clue. The second was the choice in coffee— hard black, no sugar. Tony usually took sugar.
“I have stevia,” Stephen said, and Tony turned.
“It’s all right.”
“If you’re sure,” he murmured.
After a few minutes Tony joined him at the counter.
A nagging worry wormed it’s way into Stephen’s stomach, that if this really was one of Tony’s bad days, he shouldn’t be leaving for China. But he knew the second he let that come to light, Tony would shut him down, and shut him out like he’s seen so many times before.
The way Stephen understood it, he had two options. The first was to let everything be, and hope that Tony’s mental health didn’t deteriorate too much in the few days he’d be gone. The second was to get him to open up, and talk to him. Maybe not cancel the meetings, but at least get him to talk. That was a lot harder to execute.
“You look tired,” Stephen murmured. “Did you sleep well?”
Tony hesitated. “Fine.”
Stephen just nodded, taking another sip of his coffee. He unfolded the newspaper in front of him, deciding that he wouldn’t push it any further. If Tony thought it was a bad idea to go, he wouldn’t go. He trusted Tony enough to make those decisions for himself.
—
The flight was long. Too goddamn long.
Tony downed three sleeping pills right when he boarded— maybe four, but who’s counting?— and passed out for around half of it.
But now he was awake, and the sky outside was dark, and they must be flying over an ocean because the earth was dark, too. The only light came from inside the plane, on the little lines of light along the floor and lining the roof. They glowed pale blue-white in the dimness of the rest of the cabin.
At least he took business class, he thought to himself, blinking his eyes and staring around at the other people nearby. The seat next to his was taken, thank god, but everyone else in this side of the cabin was asleep.
He guessed there was about six hours left of the flight.
There was a twisting feeling in his gut, mostly from exhaustion. Mostly mental. He wanted to be alone, not surrounded by people. He wanted his feet planted on the ground, because heaven knows how nervous he gets flying when he’s not in control. He wanted Stephen there with him, but a nagging worm started planting the old seed, the one that said Stephen doesn’t really love you anymore.
Logically, it made no sense. But Tony didn’t seem to be thinking logically these past few days.
So instead Tony ordered three plastic cups of dry gin.
He watched the seconds turn into minutes and the minutes turn into hours, until eventually he fell back asleep on his own, within a sinking stone in the pit of his stomach that just wouldn’t leave him alone.
—
By the time he got to the hotel, it all had spiraled. It was dark in China. Dead of the night. They dropped him off at the front of one of the tallest buildings, gave him a room key, and told him to be ready for pickup in the morning.
He doesn’t remember how that next day went. He knew it was some convention, about clean energy in national military, but he didn’t retain any information. They gave him vodka tonics, which was all that really mattered.
He got back to his hotel, once again past dark, sat down at the little cold counter without turning the lights back on, and thought about what it would feel like to be dead.
Would it be better than this? Logically, it wouldn’t be better than anything— he wouldn’t be there to feel it. But logic wasn’t the point here, the point was escaping this heaviness that he felt... in any way he knew how.
And there weren’t many ways he knew how.
He took the tequila from the minibar, expertly popping the cap, and tilted the bottle so the bitter alcohol poured down his throat. There was that familiar intense burn in his throat, which led to his stomach, that he was sure most people couldn’t tolerate. For some reason, that thought seemed to calm him. Because everything would be numb soon. He was drawn to it even though he knew it would hurt him.
Like a siren, he thought drowsily, as he took another shot or two from the bottle, before everything started to fade out.
—
The sun was high in the sky when Stephen got the call. He reached for his phone as it buzzed in his pocket. It was one of this rare days at the Sanctum when he actually brought his phone in. He was glad he did.
“Tony?” he asked, eyebrows furrowing as he calculated the time in China.
“Yeah, it’s me.”
Stephen recognized that voice, the way the words sort of slurred together but not all the way.
“Are you drunk?”
“Maybe,” said Tony.
“Wh— what time is it? What are you doing up?”
“You asked those two questions as if you knew the answer to both,” Tony murmured. Only then could Stephen hear the telltale whir of wind through the speakers, and his blood ran cold.
He fucking knew it, he knew this would happen and yet he was powerless to stop any of it.
“Tony...”
“Yes, love,” he said sarcastically, bitterness stinging his words.
“Stop it, Tony,” Stephen muttered. “Just stop it. Wherever you are, whatever you’re doing, just... just go to bed.”
“I knew you wouldn’t want to speak to me.” Tony sighed, and it was then that Stephen realized that it was a show. A sick, twisted show that Tony felt the need to star in, to risk his life for.
“It’s not that. God, I do want to talk to you. You know that.”
“You sound stressed.”
“Yeah, well, I am stressed. Can you tell me where you are?”
“The roof of the Four Seasons Hong Kong,” Tony said, and Stephen could hear a tremor in his voice. “I think I’m gonna jump.”
Stephen’s heart fluttered in his chest. “No, you’re not.”
“Says who?”
Stephen swallowed.
Stephen sort of knew that Tony knew manipulation was a useless tactic. It never worked on the people Tony chose as lovers because the people Tony gravitated to were smarter than that.
But the heartbreak was what killed Stephen. It dug it’s claws into every word, every breath Tony took, this heartbreak.
“Listen to my voice, honey,” Stephen said quietly. “Just listen. Are you listening?”
“Yeah, I’m listening,” Tony whispered.
“T-tell me what you can see from up there.”
“Why?”
“Because I’m curious,” Stephen said, hating the way the tremble in his voice betrayed the fear he felt.
He guessed Tony could hear that, because he heard a sigh, and some shuffling as if Tony had sat down.
“‘s funny,” Tony started, and it sounded as if something had changed. “There aren’t any stars here, either.” There was a pause. “Well, I can’t see ‘em, at least.”
“We’ll go to the mountains, then, sometime,” Stephen said. “We’ll go during a meteor shower.”
Tony didn’t respond, there was just some uneven breathing on the other line, even though Tony was presumably not moving, meaning that he was either trying not to cry or trying not to panic.
“What else? Can you see the streets below?”
“Yes,” Tony responded, swallowing. He sounded like he’d sobered up a little bit, and Stephen wondered then if he’d been faking it in the beginning. “It’s busy still, like New York.”
Stephen shut his eyes, crouching down where he stood because he was starting to feel lightheaded, as if the oxygen he drew in was only going to his brain, skipping the rest of his bloodstream, so that the rest of his body was as exhausted as a runner after a race, all so that he could think hard enough to come up with a solution.
He didn’t have time to think about how he should’ve stopped Tony from even going to China at all; he should’ve read the signs. But he did read the signs.
All he kept his mind on was what they were going to do next. What were Tony’s options? Hurtling himself off a 150 story building in downtown Hong Kong wasn’t ideal.
American Embassy, if things were so bad that he couldn’t even get on a plane. At least then he could be hospitalized, maybe, even if it was a Chinese hospital.
“You got a jacket? Is it cold? How’s the weather over there on the other side of the world?” Stephen hated the way he shook, because he knew Tony could hear it.
“Not too bad,” Tony murmured. “A little chilly.“
“Oh. Okay.” Stephen exhaled slowly, willing his mind to think. What could he say that would make Tony step away from the ledge? How do you even start?
Stephen felt a hand on his shoulder, and he looked up, eyes squinting in the light, thrown back into reality.
“What’s up?” Wong said quietly, worried, but aware that Stephen was on the phone.
“It’s Tony.” Stephen held his hand over the speaker. “He... I don’t know what to do.”
“What?”
“I... nevermind. I’ll tell you later,” he mumbled quickly, focusing his attention back onto the person on the other end of the line.
“Okay,” Wong said, suspicious. “Let me know if I can help.” Stephen jumped at another hard pat on the shoulder, betraying the way his nerves seemed to be on end.
He just nodded.
“Sorry.” Stephen said to Tony, back into the phone. He felt hopeless all of a sudden, as if he kind of realized that nothing he said, no distraction will draw away from the fact that Tony is about to kill himself.
“It’s okay,” Tony whispered, and the whisper felt a little more gone, as if each minute pulls away another piece of Tony’s already fractured facade.
“No, it’s not,” Stephen muttered. “No, I mean... none of this is okay, Tony. What happened? How did it get this far? Could you please just talk to me? For once in your goddamn life, could you please just accept my help?”
In the five seconds of silence Tony allowed, Stephen felt his heart try to climb its way into his throat, terrified that maybe his words were too harsh, that Tony couldn’t take it.
“Okay,” Tony whispered. That was it.
“Okay,” Stephen repeated, relief flooding his body. “W-why didn’t you say something sooner?”
“Why didn’t I say something sooner?” Tony echoed, as if confirming the question. “I was drunk, Strange,” he said, as if the answer was obvious.
“Don’t call me Strange,” Stephen murmured. “You don’t call me that anymore.” He sighed. “Anyways, you know that’s not what I meant.”
“Well, then, what did you mean?” Tony sounded exasperated, but Stephen could see through that and into the dry exhaustion below.
“Why didn’t you say something before that? Yesterday, even? You had to have known—“
“Known what?” Tony interrupted.
“Tony—“
“What? What would I have had to have known?” He demanded, and Stephen knew that the exhaustion was really setting in.
“That this could happen,” Stephen said softly, willing himself to be patient and steady. “You’ve been here before, Tony. Why didn’t you do anything to stop it?”
There was a pause, as if Tony were summoning the courage to say whatever he was going to.
“Because maybe I didn’t want to stop it.”
Stephen’s stomach seemed to drop.
“Don’t say that,” he murmured. “You know it’s not true.”
“I don’t know a lot, these days,” Tony said. “Maybe— maybe death is easier.”
“If you really think that’s the solution,” Stephen breathed, shutting his eyes, “then why didn’t you just jump? Why did you call me?”
“I don’t know,” Tony admitted, defeat sinking into his words. “I... I don’t know.”
“So you see what I’m getting at, here.”
Tony sighed, but didn’t reply.
“I love you Tony. Just... just know that. I don’t care what you think, I don’t care what— what goes on inside your head these days, but just know that I love you.” Panic seemed to rise in Stephen’s stomach, climbing up his throat again, but he swallowed it down. “Please just come home, give life another shot, because I— I—“ He trailed off, listening closely to the sound on the other end.
It was like laughing, but... but Tony wasn’t laughing.
“Tony— Tony, don’t cry,” Stephen whispered. “Shh. It’s okay. It’s okay, honey. I’m here.”
Stephen hated the sound, he hated it so much that he wanted to rip it out from the phone lines, tear it from Tony’s throat a half a world away. But he couldn’t, he just had to sit there and hear it, hear the person he loved most in this world break apart, cold and alone at the top of some foreign skyscraper in some foreign city, so far away from anyone that means anything to him.
“I just want to feel okay again,” Tony said into the speaker, voice thick with desperation, between trembling gasps he tried to control. It sounded like he was holding the phone a bit away from him. “Just for once, feel like the world isn’t crashing down around me.”
“It’s not crashing around you,” Stephen murmured, knowing that the words didn’t really mean anything, that he just needed to speak, make Tony hear his voice.
“Yeah, but it feels like it,” Tony breathed, shaking. He wasn’t crying anymore, it didn’t sound like. Stephen didn’t know if that was a good sign or a bad sign.
Stephen swallowed. “You called me for a reason. You wanted me to talk you down.” He inhaled steadily. “Well, here I am. Talking you down, Tony. I know you don’t feel okay right now, but someday, you will. There’s no one in the whole god damn world with a mind like yours, with all of its genius and beauties and flaws, and— and I can’t let you take that all away. You’re— you’re next in line for a miracle. That’s the way I see it.”
“I’m— I’m what?”
“I said you’re next in line for a miracle. I— I just... that’s what I tell myself, you know? So it’s what I believe.”
“Oh.” Tony’s voice seemed softer, less out of it, more present. Butterflies rose in Stephen’s stomach as he grew more hopeful.
And then it happened, Tony told him that he was heading down now, throwing out a weak little joke about shitty jet lag and how Stephen’s horrible negotiating skills actually worked this time, but there was a kind of thick remorse in his voice that still left Stephen uneasy.
These concerns were voiced when Tony was safe in his hotel room, with no balcony— Stephen checked.
“I’m sorry for doing this to you,” Tony murmured. “I know. I know it’s not your fault.”
“It’s okay,” Stephen said. “It doesn’t matter, so long as you come home in one piece.”
He heard Tony let out an ironic laugh, and for a moment wondered what that was all about.
But he didn’t ask, he just sat there listening to Tony say something else, something irrelevant, but it was okay because Tony was alive to say anything at all.
—
The helicopter landed on the helipad at three forty-seven in the morning. Stephen knew because he couldn’t sleep at all that night, and instead lied awake staring at the paint lines on the ceiling until he heard the rhythmic noise of the chopper from the window.
He waited a few minutes until he knew it had dropped Tony and then flew off again, and then he rolled out of bed.
The funny thing about the time three forty-seven— or, now three fifty-four— is that you’d think that only the crazies are awake that late. But it’s not just them that are up, not here at least, not in this starless city.
It’s the poor folks who got stuck working the midnight shifts. It’s the businessmen who took the red eye from San Francisco or Stockholm or Vancouver or Hong Kong. It’s the sad kids who get out just for a bit of fresh air and anonymity.
But maybe one could argue that all of those people are crazy anyways. Because maybe everyone is sort of crazy.
At least, that’s what Stephen was thinking about when he stared at the back of Tony’s head through the big window in the upstairs office, right next to the door that opened to the helicopter landing pad. Tony sat on a little ledge of concrete which surrounded the landing pad in one big circle, where he knew the big yellow H was. His back faced the big window.
He thought about how Tony sort of epitomized late night New York city, with his brilliance and neuroticisms and rough-lined beauty.
He thought about the human brain in its entirety, and how incredible it was to even be able to think about itself objectively. And how far science has come since the days of the greek philosophers. And how fucking easy it was for some people to slip into that same familiar cycle, the same one that told Tony that he’d be better off dead.
Stephen opened the door finally, watching Tony closely for any movement. There wasn’t any, so he stepped forward, wincing in the cold. The sting always surprised him.
“It’s a long way down,” Stephen murmured. He knew Tony heard him.
There wasn’t any response, though, so he took another few steps forward, and then he heard a noise.
Like a gasp, or a hiccup, and he knew Tony was crying again. His heart sank.
“Tony, it’s— it’s okay.”
Tony turned away from him, the back of his hand covering his mouth, and inhaled, shuddering.
“I’m sorry,” Tony whispered, wavering, and thick with emotion.
“Stop it, you don’t need to—“
“No, no, I— I do. It’s not your fault, y-you shouldn’t h-have to be doing this.“ Tony swallowed, voice raising in pitch, as if speaking were difficult. He let out a broken sob, breaking down and shutting his eyes tight for a moment, and then clearly trying to pull himself together.
Because Stephen knew that Tony wouldn’t let himself crack when other people were around, so this, here, was the blunt of it.
“I’m freezing out here,” Stephen murmured. “Come inside with me.”
He saw Tony turn his head further away from him, and he heard that awful sound again, the one that made him want to rip it out of Tony’s throat when he was a half a world away.
Tony complied anyways, leaning into Stephen’s touch as he helped him up from the concrete, and then back across towards the glass door.
Stephen stole a glance at Tony, heart breaking as the tears glinted in the city lights. Tony didn’t look up, he just kept his eyes focused on the his feet.
Once Stephen shut the door, he let go of Tony’s hand, noticing the way it kind of hovered there, as if feeling the absence of Stephen’s warmth.
“Do you want anything?” Stephen asked softly. Tony’s back was turned, and he didn’t respond. Then in one fluid motion, as if he’d made the deduction just moments before, he turned. He took a step forward, stumbling into Stephen’s arms like a magnet.
And that was it. He didn’t break down into sobs, he didn’t fall apart right there, he held himself together— Stephen knew because he could hear his controlled breaths.
Tony turned inwards so the side of his forehead rested on Stephen’s collarbone.
“What the hell is wrong with me?” he whispered.
“I don’t know,” Stephen admitted.
“I’m not sure I can beat it,” Tony breathed. “How do I fight an enemy I can’t see?”
“We’ll figure it out,” he said softly, breathing in the sweet, familiar smell of Tony. He almost choked up because he could’ve never been able to do that if things had gone differently tonight. “Promise.”
“I’m sorry. I’m— I’m gonna try to get better. You shouldn’t have to do that again.”
“Alright,” Stephen whispered. “But I’ll still be with you for every step of the way.”
—
Tony liked to fall asleep to the city lights dancing outside of his window, so Stephen kept the curtains drawn back.
Tony was laying next to him, and it looked like he was asleep but Stephen knew he wasn’t. He shifted, turning around so that he faced Stephen again, and blinked open his eyes.
“I don’t even know how long I’ve been awake,” he murmured, gentle humor seeping into his voice.
Stephen smiled softly. “Didn’t sleep on the plane?”
“Not a wink.”
“Shame,” Stephen huffed.
“I meant what I said earlier,” Tony whispered. “I’ll do whatever I have to to get better. I— I don’t want to hurt you anymore.”
“I know,” Stephen responded.
“Okay. Good. I just... I need to figure it all out. I need to figure myself out.”
“I’d say cut the drinking for the time being,” Stephen suggested softly. Tony just let out a gentle laugh.
“Yeah. You’re probably right.”
Stephen hesitated. “Hey, uh... do you still feel it now? Even when you’re not drunk?”
Tony swallowed, moving his eyes from Stephen’s face to the big window with all the lights.
He looked like he was thinking about his answer for a while.
“Kind of.”
Nervousness rose in Stephen’s stomach, a kind of sick, churning feeling.
“Oh.”
“It’s a part of me,” Tony whispered. “I don’t know what is me and what shouldn’t be there.”
“The war is over, Tony,” Stephen said softly. “Remember?”
“Yeah, seems like I can never stop fighting.” His eyes shifted to meet his again. “But I’m going to try.”
Stephen smiled softly, through unmasked worry. “Okay.”
“Not to be dramatic, but I think you saved my life.”
Stephen rolled his eyes. “Thank me later. When you’re—“ he cut off abruptly, something occurring to him.
He was going to say, When you’re actually happy, but then he wondered if Tony was ever happy.
“You... you feel happy sometimes, right?” He whispered.
“Yes,” Tony said quietly.
“You do.”
“I’m— I think I’m happy now.”
Stephen smiled softly. “Then we will stay here forever.”