king_quentin (king_quentin) wrote in thedisplaced, @ 2018-02-21 15:18:00 |
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Entry tags: | !log/thread, quentin coldwater, steve rogers / captain america (mcu) |
Who: Steve Rogers & Quentin Coldwater
What: Sitting together and talking
Where: Middle Earth somewhere
When: Feb 12thish?
Rating: Medium? Idk. There are feels and conversations about things and so many unsaid things and mentions of a magical abortion
Steve had spent the day with Quentin and his friends. They visited a few places and listened to Quentin babble on about each place excitedly. Steve had read The Hobbit when came out, but the trilogy that followed came out while he was in the ice. At one point they stopped in Gondor and Steve thought of Natasha’s crude joke. Goddamnit, Natasha. The day was winding down and Steve had climbed up onto a rather steep rock formation. He went back down and gave Quentin a hand. At the top of the craggy thing was a nice place to sit. They had a view of the sun going down that was actually really pretty-- somehow nicer than the view from the boat. Steve usually sat up straight, but at the moment he was slumped over kind of like how Quentin usually sat. He wanted to be in the other man’s eye line. His hands were laid in his lap and he didn’t know what to say. Maybe Quentin could fill the silence. Quentin had enjoyed his time with everyone. He’d felt better...even without being able to swear. He knew that things were no less complicated than they had been before, but somehow it felt easier. He felt a little less dramatic about it. Being around Steve always seemed to make him feel less fucked up, but he didn’t really tell him that. He just sort of spent time around Steve quietly and let himself feel better. He had been glad for the assistance with climbing because he really wasn’t sure he was in any sort of physical shape to climb up on his own. The view had been amazing and Q felt his spirits bolstered by it. Somehow things felt less terrible, less heavy. Even with Steve’s uncharacteristic slouching, Quentin felt comfortable where he was. He looked over at Steve for a moment, trying to think of something to say. “Thank you. For this. For putting up with all my rambling and weird anecdotes.” He smiled. “And I’m sorry if I talked about Boromir for close to five million years.” It was a complete exaggeration, but he’d been pretty excited about Boromir in the movies and the books and he was still pretty excited about him now that they were actually in Middle Earth. “This place just...it’s been a while since you could feel the magic in a place. Like it was all around.” His gaze shifted out ahead of himself and he pulled his knees up against his chest. “I miss this feeling. I don’t miss people forking with me just because they think they can, though. That’s still annoying.” Steve glanced over at Quentin as he spoke, then looked out at the horizon again. “It’s ...you don’t have to thank me for being around you, Quentin. I want to.” He didn’t sound annoyed, but maybe a little exasperated. “Boromir sounded pretty neat, actually. And… you don’t feel magic other places? Even though you can do it?” He didn’t really understand the concept … but then got it a moment later. “I think I know what you mean. Something that feels … unreal.” Quentin felt a little of the nervousness creep back in. He knew that Steve was weird about things like this. “I know. It’s just that…” He didn’t know how to explain it without sounding like himself about it. “You helped me climb up here and I’d probably have fallen to my death otherwise, so you know…” Yeah, that wasn’t really what he’d meant to say, but it was all he knew how to say at the moment. He just wanted to appreciate Steve being there for him and making him feel less shitty. He’d opened his mouth to explain what he meant, but then Steve seemed to figure it out on his own. Quentin nodded. “Yeah. There are some places that just are. There’s something about them that makes you remember that magic is real and it’s just…” He gestured vaguely, not really sure he knew the words he wanted to use. “I miss that feeling.” He glanced over at Steve. “Everything here is beautiful and amazing and unreal and it’s like being in a movie, but not even exactly that. Things aren’t exactly the same. It’s like someone magically knitted the movies and the books together to make something new and inspiring and beautiful. It’s...it’s…” He sighed, trying to find the word he was looking for, but gesturing vaugely again. “Magical isn’t the word I’m looking for, but it’s the closest thing I can think of.” He shrugged, looking out in front of him again. “It feels like being home. Like I’m me, but without all the bullshirt that usually makes me up. The parts of me that want to pretend to be a pirate on a boat or go on epic quests or…” He paused, brow furrowed thoughtfully. “It’s like when I first discovered magic was real and suddenly all the things I felt, all the things I wanted to be real were.” He looked at Steve. “I am still really annoyed about the swearing thing, but all of that aside, the magic makes up for it and Kylo offering to let me squeeze his hand if I wanted to swear and you...just being who you are. It made me realize that being dramatic about it wasn’t going to make me feel any better about it. I have people and an entire magical place to spend time in.” He wrinkled his nose up. “And even here I can’t help but ramble on forever. But at least I can ramble about what a badash - you know what I mean - Boromir is. I’d probably be a hobbit if I was in this place as me. I think maybe I would be Frodo. Or Pippin. I do royally fork things up a lot of the time even though I mean well. I could be okay with Boromir saving me from certain death.” While Quentin spoke, Steve’s attention slowly went to the other man. Pretty soon, he was grinning stupidly at Quentin. Yeah, he was fond of him. He got so excited over things, he was pure and honest and all the things that Steve wished he was. The things people thought Steve was when he actually wasn’t. “Epic quests…” he repeated with a laugh. “I remember liking The Hobbit a lot. The writing was good, made me forget that I was half dead and Bucky was doing all the work around the house.” He reached over and squeezed Quentin’s shoulder. “It’s okay that you can’t curse. I’ll curse for you, goddammit.” The hand squeezing Q’s shoulder moved to reach around and pull him by the shoulder closer to Steve. “I think being a hobbit would be all right. You can be Boromir if you want. I could show you how to fight.” “Epic quests are what I was meant for.” He smiled a little. “The Hobbit was really great.” He felt a little warm inside him as Steve squeezed his shoulder. It was such a small thing, but such a big thing at the same time. Even the smallest of touches felt big to him. He knew he wasn’t supposed to fall in love and he knew he had said he wouldn’t, but he found it more difficult than he’d expected to stop feeling anything. His smile grew even more as Steve swore for him. He was much better than he knew, but maybe that was the problem. They both felt the same about themselves. Other people were better than they were in their own eyes. Quentin leaned against Steve, letting himself curl up a little again. “Being a Hobbit would be pretty great,” he agreed. “I don’t think I’m much of a Boromir. You could probably make a pretty good Boromir, though.” He tried not to smile at the idea. “I mean, your hair’s a little short, but you have a beard, so that makes up for it. I’ll have long hair for both of us.” And it was down to his shoulders by now, which was longer than he’d ever really had it before, but then he hadn’t bothered to get it cut. “But if you want to show me how to fight, that could be okay.” Steve craned his neck to look at Quentin under his arm. The small smile made him smile too. “They eat a lot, I think I could deal with that. And they live a long time. I’m practically a hobbit already.” Squeezing Quentin to his side felt… right? He felt like he belonged for a little bit. Sometimes he felt it when he was at the Avengers house. Or with Bucky and Sam. Around Natasha. Quentin was feeling familiar to him. “The beard,” he repeated, rubbing a hand over the hair on his face. “My ma would be horrified if she saw me now, with a beard, hugging a boy with such long hair.” He laughed a little, noticing that Quentin’s hair was a bit longer than when he met him. It didn’t remind him of Bucky anymore. “I think most people could deal with that. If not, I guess they could be elves and eat Lembas bread.” Quentin liked being there, pressed against Steve’s side, which was definitely not somewhere he’d have imagined himself months ago. He was happy, though. Unless he thought about things too much. He was trying not to. “I like the beard,” he said quietly. “I’m at least a nice boy with such long hair. I’m pretty sure she couldn’t mind me too much as long as we didn’t talk about my habit of killing gods and robbing banks to help...a friend.” He had kept himself from saying ‘pay for magical abortions’ because he was trying to let Julia do her own thing and tell people if she wanted. “Or all of the other things that I do that are questionable. You could just tell her I’m royalty and it should be fine. Or whatever. Everyone wants their children to be with royalty, right?” He shrugged. “I think Dad would just be surprised more than anything. You’re kind of a big deal in most worlds. I think he just wants me to be happy, though. Even if we didn’t always get along.” Steve never thought when he met Quentin that he’d be holding him in his arms. They became friends fast, but being affectionate never crossed his mind. He still wasn’t quite sure what they were doing here. “Yeah, don’t talk much to my mom anymore,” he said quietly. There was a chance she could show up here, but it didn’t seem to likely. People that showed up here seemed to have a bigger story to them. Steve’s mom Sarah was a simple lady. Her only claim to fame was that she had given birth to Captain America. But Steve adored her, loved her like she was a goddess. The thought of her alone made him feel a little misty eyed and he stopped to change the subject. “Wait, you robbed a bank?” Quentin understood that to a point. He felt like Steve probably had no real choice in the fact that he didn’t talk to his mom. Being frozen for so long...Quentin couldn’t imagine making peace with something only to come back to a completely different world. “Uhhhhhh.” Quentin attempted an innocent look, but the slight wince that accompanied it probably ruined the effect. “It was only once and I really want to explain more, but I kind of promised not to tell people things that weren’t mine to tell. It’s just...I had to help a friend and...I’m pretty sure that I won’t do it again. Mostly because I really hope to have no reason to. I mean, I might have offered to when we were in 50s Tumbleweed, but then we got money from Rogue instead. So…” He frowned slightly. “But I won’t do that again.” Nope. He didn’t really want to disappoint Steve. He knew it was probably stupid, but...it was what it was. Now he didn’t know what to say. Steve didn’t pull his arm away, just gave Quentin a Look. “You could have gotten a job, I guess?” He couldn’t help it, he didn’t see stealing as something commendable. Even if he was a war criminal, he still had standards. The last rays of the sun shone out at them as it slowly ducked behind a mountain. Steve dropped his arm from Quentin’s shoulder, letting it linger near the small of his back. “I don’t know what I’m doing anymore.” “It was...complicated.” He looked away when Steve gave him the look because he knew it probably meant he was disappointed and Q didn’t like it. “I won’t do it again,” he said quietly, fidgeting with the knee of his pants. Julia had needed him and he couldn’t leave her there with nothing. He knew it was bad, but he’d just...she’d needed him and he wanted to be there for her. Magical abortions weren’t cheap apparently and the longer she’d let it go, the more difficult it would have been. Looking up at him again, Quentin’s brow furrowed a little. “What you’re doing in what way?” Because it was probably good to know before trying to help him talk through it. He’d felt a lack of knowing when it came to his life before. It just always seemed to fix itself somehow. Or it didn’t and he just wallowed in it. “I understand it was complicated. Just… don’t get thrown in the brig or arrested in Texas. I’d bail you out, believe me, but don’t make me do that.” He held his hands up in protest, almost like he was being mugged. Steve shook his head, “I’m … doing this. With you.” That seemed like enough explanation to him. “I’ll do my best to avoid both of those things.” He didn’t think he was going to do anything. If anything, he’d been the one that got thrown into a wall and tried to talk the robots out of arresting Alice because he’d known he’d fucked up in the future. He knew that was a thing. He knew that it wasn’t just that now. It was also Alice losing her dad. He felt guilty about it even if it wasn’t his fault, but he was sure if he squinted hard enough it would be his fault. Oh. Quentin studied him for a moment, moving to face him better, still not wanting to move too far from Steve’s side. “Do you still want to be doing this?” It felt painful to ask, but he needed to know. “Or is there something I need to do differently?” He knew Steve didn’t like it when he was insecure, so he tried to sound nonchalant about it. “Whatever I can help you figure out, I’m here.” He just didn’t know what that meant fully. Steve had been so wrapped up in himself and his own bullshit, he hadn’t asked Quentin about the situation with Alice. And upon remembering it, he would be afraid to mention it-- because of how Q felt about Alice. But Steve was being selfish and didn’t mention it. He nodded his head, “Yeah, we can still be doing this.” Whatever This was. “I don’t know what else to do and this feels right.” For the most part, at least. He told Quentin that they weren’t using each other and for Quentin to not fall in love with him… and that felt Very Wrong. But on the outside, he was ‘having fun’ as Natasha put it. So it was right in a way? Quentin tried to hide his relief even as he felt it wash over him. Steve didn’t want to not do this...whatever it was. Friends with benefits with a side of one-sided feelings that only one of them knew about? He didn’t really want to explain it. “Okay.” He let his gaze drop for a moment. “So how can I help you know what you’re doing?” He wasn’t sure if it was something he could help with. But that didn’t mean he wouldn’t try. “This is really only the second time I’ve been with another guy and this is a lot longer than that time. If that makes you feel any better. So I’m still sort of figuring things out myself. And this involves a lot less drunkenness than the last time. So I mean, I have an understanding to a point and I mean, I can always ask Eliot if I need pointers, but that might be awkward.” More for Steve, he thought, than for him. Steve shook his head, “You don’t have to do anything, Quentin. You’re fine.” He didn’t know how to explain that it was himself that was the problem. When things keep messing up, it’s your own fault. “Don’t-- no, don’t ask Eliot. He’s a nice guy, I just … we don’t need him to help.” It made him feel awkward, Quentin admitting that to him. Steve was trying really hard not to get hung up on that part. He always had some feelings for Bucky in the back of his mind but he told himself he liked women. And now here he was. Quentin had known those thoughts. He’d thought them more than he wanted to admit to. But he didn’t know it was part of Steve’s thought process. “Okay.” He wasn’t sure how to help, though. It was complicated enough without the level of uncertainty lingering over it. “I won’t.” He offered Steve a small smile, lightly bumping Steve with his shoulder. It was the wooden one, so he didn’t really feel much. He just knew he’d done it by the push back. “If you want to say whatever’s on your mind about it, you can. Some things are difficult to put into words, I guess. But you can be honest with me about whatever you’re thinking. No matter what it is.” The other man moved his tongue around in his mouth, as if willing it to help him speak. “I don’t know how to be in a relationship. Or enjoy whatever it is we’re doing. I don’t know how to with a woman, let alone a man. I don’t think anything’s wrong with it, obviously, it’s just… Programmed into me.” Steve sighed deeply, “Maybe we should just enjoy the view.” Talking about your feelings was also something he was programmed against. Though, he was more sensitive than other people, and found it easier to talk about this stuff. It still was difficult. Q nodded. He felt an odd sort of emotion bubbling under the surface. He couldn’t place the exact name of it, but he pushed it away. He tried to find words, but he wasn’t sure which ones were the ones he should use. He wasn’t even sure if any of the words he could use were the ones that Steve needed or wanted to hear. He sighed a little, moving himself back so he could lean against Steve’s side. “Yeah, maybe.” He didn’t know what to say or do. He just wanted to exist in Steve’s presence and not question everything that happened anyway. “Don’t think about it too hard,” was the only advice he went with because he thought maybe they were both thinking too hard about what this was. He probably needed to take his own advice. Those words, ‘don’t think about it too hard’ are what got him into this in the first place. “I’ll try, Quentin.” Steve couldn’t help but think about things too hard. Everything else in his life was leaps of faith. |