Helios (Steve Rogers x Male!OC x Darkling)

XXI

You were in your room before you could register half your thoughts and almost imagined Steve to be standing in front of you, his eyes as bewildered and flooding with regret as you'd left them, but he wasn't. The room was empty, both literally and figuratively, and quite honestly far more pathetic in its pretentious modernist minimalism next to the rooms of royal extravagance you'd just walked through that still remained fresh in your memories. It was half-past four and you still had an hour and a half before you were supposed to be home with Steve nonetheless. Thankfully it being a Saturday, Steve would most probably be with Mark in the conference room if he was still sticking to his schedule. 

You quickly changed into jeans and a sweatshirt before taking the elevator to the twentieth floor. You'd asked Jarvis as soon as you'd gotten into the elevator, the AI having been disabled on your floor on Steve's request, and sighed out of relief when he told you that Steve was in fact in the conference room. You didn't know what you'd expected of Steve and how he would react or what he'd do but at that moment, all you could really think of was the questions Phil would ask and how you would answer him. How you would pretend for everything to be okay was beyond you and quite unimaginable, really, as thoughts ran by in a whorl of excuses and explanations you'd have to give to Phil if he found out.

As soon as you opened the door and honestly felt you should've taken a moment or even knocked before going in when you saw multiple pairs of eyes settle on you, two in a genuine moment of surprise. Steve only looked at you momentarily before gently tapping Mark on his shoulder as he ushered everyone out. "Oh damn, if it isn't Prince Wuss himself gracing us with his presence," Mark said to you on his way out at last.

Before you could react, Steve shook his head at you and spoke once everyone had left the room. "Don't mind him," he said with a sigh, not looking nearly as surprised as he had when you'd first walked in almost as if he had already been anticipating your arrival all along, "He's had his rough bit of a weekend." 

"So he can say what he wan-" You'd just begun to retort when Steve walked over to you in a swift stride and hugged you, nestling his face in the crevice of your neck like a journeyed traveller plummeting down on a pillow forgotten.

"I'm sorry," Steve said, his words stretching with his breath and dying out at the end as he stopped to inhale. "I'm sorry," He repeated, clearer the second time.

You stood there in silence, hands at your side, suddenly too conscious of the things you'd said to Steve and a feeling of guilt running past your veins like venom from every point of contact of his skin to yours. His murmured apologies were a brutal reminder of all the times you'd slapped him, twice in front of other people, had insulted him without thought and had entirely forgotten the concept of apologising and accepting your fault. 

You sighed, shifting a little as Steve pulled back, leaving you colder. "Never fail to make me feel bad, do you?" You said as you sat on a chair. 

"Wha-" Steve started but seemed to have understood what you'd meant as he stopped and spoke after a pause, "I didn't mean to."

"Phil's expecting us," You said, awkward in the silence of unspoken words that you knew Steve was silently begging for. 

"Yeah," He said, shaking his head as he walked over the table, gathering his files. "He called me earlier, that's how I knew you'd come back."

"Oh," You said and looked away, aware of Steve's eyes on you. "What?" You asked finally.

"Can I kiss you?" He asked and for once, neither of you spoke. You were just getting up and had turned to leave when Steve gently grabbed your wrist, pulling you closer so you faced him. His eyes ran down your face after failed attempts of getting you to look at him as his other hand cupped your face, his thumb running past your lips. "Did you have fun?" He asked, his face nonchalant and his tone ordinary almost as if he was reading out his grocery list without interest. 

That made you look up at him and you finally realized. He knows. Swollen lips, a mark, or maybe Aleksander had left a hickey you hadn't noticed but whatever it was, you could tell Steve knew you'd kissed someone. You pulled back after a while, your mind going numb as you thought of things to say to him. "W-We'll be late," You said. 

Steve looked at you for a second and opened his mouth as if to say something but chose not to. He simply nodded, "Is this fine or should I change?" He asked, gesturing to himself.

You shook your head, "It's fine," You said and even though you couldn't have given two fucks about kissing somebody else before, it felt like a great weight over your head as if Steve had just forced you out of your bubble of selfish perceptions and had made you look at him as another human being and not a mere caricature of his celebrity image as other people had always done.