The Solstice Springs Resort had come highly recommended, and Wanda seemed to be more familiar with the Silniara coven anyway - their apothecary was where she purchased the tinctures and creams that helped his aching hands when he had bad pain days, when it felt like streaks of lightning had cracked his bones and broke apart the steel pins holding everything together. Getting the chance to soak in a healing hot spring now, however, brought relief to those hands. Relief to his spirit too, a well-deserved second honeymoon after the first one had been rudely interrupted.
He should have been used to things like that, but he wasn’t. Stephen Strange knew himself - he knew what it was like to die, to have every atom and cell blasted apart by a being powerful enough to be beyond any mortal comprehension (over and over again). Knew that he had lived far more lifetimes than any one person should. That he’d seen exactly fourteen million six-hundred and four versions of a future that was doomed, a future where heroes fell and villains rose up, up and the rest of everything left behind spiraled into chaos - he was doomed to remember death, crumpled lifeless bodies the main focal point on his trip through what the time stone had to offer and when he encountered a roadblock the timeline would reset and he had to search once more until he found the only way; he would have borne the burden of sacrifice if it had been on him, truly, though it wasn’t.
And he hated himself for that.
And he hated that people like Nicodemus West threw it into his face, and he hated being affected by that small man’s cutting barbs.
Nothing had gotten better since then, and his most recent dreams of home showed him that - he’d always repressed his trauma and had ever since Donna fell through the ice (the silence that hung in the air, her shrieks of laughter cut off as the fissures spider-webbed beneath her feet and they both knew something was wrong), never properly unpacking those dusty boxes or properly burying those bones. But here, in Vallo, it was a respite - he had so much he couldn’t bear to lose. He was reminded of that when he played a game of chess with Carol and chuckled at her reaction when he won, or just so happened to pop up into Sofia’s when Colt was working because garlic knots, or went running in weird creature form with Kate, or found Peter passed out on the couch in the Sanctum only to drag a blanket over him, or Roz rolling her eyes because what was a Tik Tok? And so on and so on.
Then there was Wanda - arguably the best part of everything. His Wanda - happy and healthy and so, so beautiful and he almost said to hell with it when he saw her in her fake apple orchard, needing to spirit her away past the equally fake sheep and into her bedroom so they could both forget how badly the world had mistreated them. Before she revealed the Darkhold-ravaged landscape, that is.
Even that hadn’t entirely killed the mood, if he was being honest.
The walk back to their cabin was about ten minutes, and after a soak in one of the hot springs - where it felt like the greatest kind of human soup bowl - he’d been hoping he would have sobered up (they’d definitely been drinking while soaking) but no such luck. Everything was still very whoooooooo and it was a small miracle he hadn’t cracked his head open on a rock yet. “I think you’re a little drunk,” he announced, fluffy towel wrapped around himself as he fished for the keys to their cabin - he was still a little wet, t-shirt sticking to him, but his swim trunks were mostly dry and he had packed the keys in the tote bag, right?
Right? Oh well, he’d get the door open regardless - he simply flicked a wrist and there we go. He grinned at Wanda like he just won the lottery - and Vishanti, he loved her. He would have given her babies the old-fashioned pump-and-dump way in a heartbeat if she’d asked for them (he still would, but now it was less pump-and-dump and there was love behind it, and wow, he was drunk as hell).
This was it. This was everything Wanda had needed, what they had needed - a respite from everything; their mundane responsibilities, the usual Vallo hurdles, the weight of memories from a home they were displaced from. Their intent was redemption to the original honeymoon that had been hit with hurdles, and while parts of it had been enjoyable, it had been overshadowed by shock. Grief. Regret.
Now they were drunk.
A little drunk.
This was better.
“A little,” Wanda concurred, index finger and thumb held up with a tiny sliver of space between them. “This much, I think.” Instead of a towel she wore this luxurious bath robe that had been overpriced (but it was warm, and divine) and she had this flush to her cheeks - from the steam of the spring and cocktails. However many they had. No point in keeping count. She knew her limits, and right now she was experiencing that ‘sweet spot’ buzz.
But the moment the door opened, she sauntered towards the bed, spun around dramatically and fell into it - back into the mattress, a little bounce with it, as she giggled towards the ceiling.
Then, after a second. “It is hot,” she complained, and undid the sash to expose the swimsuit underneath.
As if it had been waiting by the door (it probably had), Cloak flew to follow its companions - and when Wanda said she was hot the accommodating relic fluttered enough to produce wind in order to cool her off, and Stephen frowned. “Now you’re just trying to seduce her, that’s my job,” he grumbled playfully and flopped onto the bed to cover her like a blanket - a drunk, Strange-shaped blanket which probably wasn’t helping her feel hot but he would be considerate, just give him a moment to pepper her with scruffy goatee kisses that probably tickled. “You know what - I should open a bottle of wine,” he deduced, kissing the tip of Wanda’s nose next.
Cloak sighed. If a piece of sentient fabric could indeed sigh (it couldn’t, not really, but he was drunk enough to imagine that he heard one).
Wanda was making noises. They were not sexy ones. A groan, a giggle, a nooo - a lot of conflicting sounds because, alas, Stephen draping himself over her didn’t help her hot situation but she also had very little desire for him to budge? Then the kisses tickled, and somehow throughout it all she managed to pull her arms from the sleeves of her robe.
That was better. Her skin could breathe.
“Open it in a way that doesn’t require you moving,” she said, pushing back all that lightly damp hair away from her face so she could - finally - reciprocate those kisses. They were a little uncoordinated, breathless too because the struggle out of the robe must have been physically taxing but they were kisses anyway. “I will trust your medical expertise when you tell us it is time for water.”
“It’s probably time for water,” Stephen allowed, as if the idea just occurred to him - but it was a good idea since they needed to stay hydrated. They also probably needed to eat something but that would come later, probably from either the store or one of the three restaurants at the resort. He could eat here and not get indigestion as well - of course he’d already done the research and checked.
He shifted off of Wanda, fully amenable to not moving - at least not very far. His hands smoothed down her waist, and he tugged the robe fully away from her so she wasn’t lying on it anymore. For Stephen, the towel he was using floated off to be hung up and he peeled off his t-shirt to go half-naked in the red-hot heat of the room. Drunkenness just tended to cause that flush - he was dizzy and carefree, experiencing that fuzzy glow in the center of his chest or maybe that was just his feelings. His affection.
“You’re so beautiful,” he observed, summoning both water and wine - a bottle of each, though the wine was red and tasted like black cherry and the woods and chocolate; he could smell it when he uncorked it with a spell he was surprised he remembered right now. “Guess how much I love you.”
Cloak left the room for this. Barf.
Enough to stay with me while I tried murdering you across the multiverse, she thought darkly but did not voice it for obvious reasons - they had talked about it, cried about it, sat around in silence processing. Wanda would not allow another mention of it to taint this moment.
They were happy. They deserved this.
“Must be quite a lot to call me beautiful while I look like a mess,” she scoffed - her hair was frizzy, half up in a bun and they had gotten so tipsy that she kept jabbing her elbow and stubbing her toe on stone while they boiled in a ditch of crystal clear water. They had gotten in with the intention of relaxing and several shots of something later they had made complete and utter fools of themselves. What happened to the limes??
Wanda kissed his forehead (that spot where she knew that third eye rested - somewhere) and sat up to position herself lazily against bed pillows. There were almost a dozen on the bed; it made lovely support so she could keep drinking. “Water first,” she advised. “Then wine. Come up here.”
As if he could disobey the command - Stephen would never. He chuckled, a deep rumble of sound, the rise and ebb of waves. Something very sloshy and relaxed - because he too was sloshy and relaxed, which matched the look in the bright blue of his eyes (which weren’t tight with worry for once). “It’s quite a lot,” he agreed because, oh yes, Wanda had nailed it right on the head there. Quite a lot was what was in his cottony, swimming head and in what he thought was an unbeating heart too - but of course it beat. It beat for her. “I like this mess too - “
He sat up with a clench of ab muscle, steadying himself to immerse in the nest of pillows and get really close. The bottle of water (it was more like a carafe, really) was handed to Wanda and Stephen toyed with the floof that was her half-bun, running his fingers through the hair that had escaped. “Perfect mess.”
Just like them, no? Maybe that made sense. “Did I ever tell you about the time me and Donna almost burnt the house down because we put our mom’s slippers on the stove?” Talking about her now was a lot easier - especially while drunk, that helped too.
Oh no, it was a terrible time for Stephen to tell her that. She was literally midst proper hydration from the fancy carafe when he confessed to almost-arson, and Wanda laughed and attractively (not) sputtered water from her mouth. It was fine, most of it got on her bare chest anyway (she was wearing a bikini too, not like there was a shirt to mess). “Stephen, why -”
Wanda wiped at her chin with her palm and passed off the glass to him. Hopefully he could actually take a swig without making a fool out of himself - unlike her. “Why did you put a pair of slippers on the stove??” she asked, pink-faced and smiley. “Wait, please also tell me how old you were so I can picture it more accurately.”
“Twenty,” Stephen deadpanned, but it was clearly a quip - his eyes were twinkling, and he took the water supply to chug from the bottle. There, see, proper hydration - then he switched to wine and who needed glasses? He simply chugged from that bottle too, Adam’s apple bobbing as he swallowed more fermented grape juice than he probably should be consuming now - and yet he didn’t care. He and Wanda weren’t going anywhere for the rest of today, most likely - if they did, it’d be a trip to pick up food (or he’d just portal to get it, granted, a drunken-ass portal was always interesting. Reminded him of the time he and Vax ended up on top of a Wal-Mart).
He stretched in the expanse of pillows a little, tipping his head back to rest against something soft and squishy. “I think I was about eight or nine. We were trying to help though - by putting her slippers on the stove to warm them, since it was a cold winter’s day.” It really was, he remembered that clearly - farm life was tough during the more frigid months, when you had to figure out other ways to grow vegetables (lots of herbs and cherry tomatoes). “Except it ended in two shoe-shaped burnt rubber marks on the stovetop. We tried to scrub it off with steel wool and that failed too. Overall it was just a lot of failure. And a bad smell.”
Honestly, he was surprised it hadn’t ended in spontaneous combustion and fireballs - they’d gotten lucky in that regard because that had been a wood stove too.
No plans to move for the rest of the day, at all - she suspected they’d be babbling until an afternoon doze took over, and she was content with that. Wanda molded herself into him, using his shoulder as a pillow and hooking a leg over his waist. Her body temperature leveled after the robe was off and very little was going to keep her off him, anyway.
“How creative of you,” she grinned at him, and the eyes she was giving him - goodness, they were smitten. “Also - dangerous. Slightly dumb. But also very adorable and sweet.” Growing up her own living conditions were very poor; she could also recall doing less-than-safe things for the sake of simple comforts, she understood that desperation. “And was this your idea or your sister’s? I have to know who to blame if our own eventual child accidentally tries to burn the Sanctum down the road.”
Stephen had to think about it for a second since it seemed like so long ago - not to mention he’d purposely stuffed those beautiful, warm memories down into a box in his head, so afraid of losing them he kept them a little too locked up. But it felt good, getting a chance to let them out - inch by inch, that is, and he didn’t want but we don’t talk about that, do we? to be a thing he continued to have in common with a very Darkhold-tainted sinister version of himself.
One who remained the lone survivor in a universe that was falling apart due to his own selfishness - it was a very clear this could be you, and this Stephen Strange veered away from that as far as possible.
He’d much rather be in bed with Wanda, fresh from a dip in healing hot springs and flushed from drinking, all tangled up together and on the verge of dozing (then they’d wake up and probably go at each other - seemed par for the course). “Pretty much every dumb childhood idea was mine,” he laughed at himself, stroking her hair. “So we can blame that part of Iryna’s genetics on me.”
There was a pang in his chest when he thought of their future child, but not in a bad way - he just wanted that so badly it actually hurt.
Sometimes Wanda was afraid to talk openly about Iryna. It seemed like a disservice not to; they had met her, she was theirs, was supposed to still be theirs down this Vallo timeline. But she was also someone who wanted a lot - dangerously, often desperately, and perhaps it was safer to not want. She rarely ever got it anyway.
She wanted, though. So much. Wanted him and Iryna and whatever normal family they could all make together, her sons involved and all the stray almost-adults they kept opening their doors to. It wasn’t the typical sitcom life where there was a camera to make a face at everytime something dumb happened, though she liked watch she envisioned more.
The wine was taken from him. Her turn, Mr. Maximoff-Strange. “I can’t wait,” she giggled. “Every dumb childhood idea was Pietro’s, too. The both of you can shoulder the blame.” Was that technically true? Stephen would never know, it didn’t matter. After a healthy gulp of the bottle, she set it on the nightstand and settled back to rightfully curling around him. A heap of tangled limbs, damp swimwear, warm faces. “I love you, you know. Deeper than -”
Excuse her, she burped.
“Deeper than bones. I’m sorry, that was,” she cleared her throat and patted her chest, “that was gross and not romantic. I’m drunk.”
“You’re drunk,” Stephen agreed, damn near having a giggle about it - and also about the fact that Wanda was expelling gas. “It was very romantic. At least you didn’t Dutch oven me.” Silver linings, he guessed? Though he was pretty sure she’d done that to him before too - not that he minded. He was still going to fuck her.
Case in point? “Missus,” he announced, and now that the wine was on the bedside table and so was the water and their tongues were stained it was safe for him to roll over and tackle Wanda to the mattress, a human game of cat’s cradle with blankets and pillows and Stephen testing his dexterity by remembering how to undo a bikini top as opposed to a regular bra. It was decidedly more difficult while intoxicated, he had to admit, yet he would persevere.
“I love you too,” he grinned, touching noses with Wanda as he held his weight carefully and wasn’t a log on top of her. “...do you want to...you knooooooooow?” There went the eyebrow waggle, almost cartoonish - normally he didn’t do such dumb things but, again, drunk. “Gonna let me go pearl diving?”
Yes, that was also the most romantic way to ask if she wanted him to go down on her.
Constant giggling. Constant. Stephen had heard her burp before, it wasn’t like she was the definition of class - she had a twin brother who used to take glee farting on her at all times, and she would fart back - but she was a tiny bit embarrassed by the mouth flatulence. What kind of marriage did they have if she scared him off with a little burping, though.
The giggling persisted, and she hid her face behind her hands as Stephen flipped them and caged her in with his body, the very one she had been ogling and touching shamelessly at the hot springs. “Yes,” she answered and split her fingers to peek at him. “But do not call it that.”
Then, to retain some kind of dignity in all of this, she freed her face so she could put a hand over his head and push him down to direct him. “Down to business, thank you for your services.”