Lamborghini | Tony Stark

EIGHTEEN - A FOOL

Sasha was fed up. She'd grown used to the warmth of the Stark Tower and being able to call it home indefinitely, though ever since the night of the second attack on New York, the entire city seemed cold.

Wintery clouds greyed the skyline and snow began to fall towards the end of November. Evenings were spent in O'Shea's alone or still in the office until the building was locked by security close to midnight. Tony was nothing more than a shadow down a long hallway after that night.

He'd kept an unnerving distance from Sasha, making her begin to question every decision she'd made since crossing paths with him. There had been rain droplets of moments with Tony that had made a version of Sasha's future flash before her eyes. They were dismissed easily at first, blamed on alcohol or exhaustion, even lack of physical and emotional love from another person, though those same rain droplets soon turned into thunderstorms, and the clouds hadn't shifted an inch, drowning Sasha more and more each day.

She couldn't look Tony in the eye without her stomach rising into her chest and her heart thumping so hard her head began to spin. The pen writing the next chapter of Sasha's life had been but a centimetre away from touching the paper, only to be pulled away at the last second and placed down on the desk again.

Sasha realised slowly but surely that the thing she'd feared most had happened. She had grown to like Tony, more than one friend should like another. She missed him when he wasn't around and craved his company like a human craves air to breathe. She missed talking to him and laughing with him, watching movies with all the lights out and drinking wine while playing cards.

It was the little things that changed the way Sasha looked at Tony, but what changed it most was when she realised the way he looked at her, too.

Which was why Tony's sudden step back was so hard to comprehend. Sasha couldn't work out why he was on the cusp of finally letting go of the worry and kissing her like she knew both their hearts willed him to, only for him to act like they were ships passing in the night whenever he saw her around the tower afterwards.

He was cold and seemingly resentful, refusing to look her in the eye or hold conversation. Sasha had tried to talk to him the morning after when she woke up on the couch, only to find a note on the kitchen counter that said he'd be back in a couple of days after going out of state for work.

Nothing made sense for Sasha anymore and as she sat on the edge of the bed she'd been sleeping in for the past month, she allowed herself to mourn the loss of another person, realising then that she'd lost Tony, too.

Though that time, there was no explanation.

Tony was walking down the hallway when he noticed Sasha's bedroom door wide open. Her clothes and belongings were strewn across the floor and two suitcases were open. She had her hair tied back and a track pants on, ironically wearing one of his sweaters that reached halfway down her thighs.

He sighed, pausing as he watched her continue to sit on the floor folding clothes and packing them away inside the cases. He knew exactly what was going on and ultimately, he couldn't blame her.

Tony had kept his distance from Sasha since the night of the second attack after making himself believe that the universe was telling him to keep Sasha at a friendly arms length, nothing more, nothing less.

The only problem was, Tony didn't see her as a friend, not anymore. He couldn't look in her direction without wanting to grab her face and kiss her. He couldn't hear her name without feeling his insides twist or his heart ache, he hated people asking about her because he hated the way it made him feel, despite the pain being caused by his own hand.

"Hey," Tony said, clearing his throat as he leant against the doorframe with his arms crossed at his chest, "What are you, er, what are you doing?"

Sasha looked up at him from across the room and, as expected, Tony's entire soul froze. Her face was emotionless but her eyes were red, clear that she'd been crying not too long ago.