#cap's wake

[gammarayedarchive]

[Bruce is bagging some trash and grabbing idle plates and cups left around by others, really close to reaching the nadir of the evening, emotionally speaking, when the corner of his eye catches someone unfamiliar. Bruce turns and visibly blanches when he sees Nick Fury, plain as day, eye patch and all. The trash bag slackens in his hand and he feels the green flash in his head, it's probably visible in his eyes but he can't bring himself to care yet.]

[furynicholasj]

Nick didn't own any fancy clothes. When he needed them, he'd buy them, but it was seldom that he ever did. He couldn't remember the last time he'd donned a suit.

Oh yeah. Date with Val that turned into a shootout. 

Good times.

But today, he found himself in black cargo pants and a black shirt. He wore a jacket if that made it any better or more appropriate. What did one wear to a wake to when he didn't want to dress like he was going to a wake?

Nick was only here to pay his respects to a man he'd grown up respecting and idolizing. His father had fought in the war with Captain America. He'd raised Nick with stories about the man. Nick had grown to idolize the man just like every other little boy in America. And when his agents found him in the ice, Coulson wasn't the only one who'd been in shock and awe. Steve Rogers was quite literally a national treasure. His body found like one the greatest treasures in the world.

Nick secretly took pride that that was his doing.

Now here they were. Mourning the great man's death all over again. As if the previous seventy years of cherishing his memory hadn't been enough, luck had run out for him yet again. One could, would, should argue that it just wasn't fair, but who was listening anyway?

This was bullshit. 

And the minute Fury left this place, he would find out who was behind this and he'd make sure it didn't go unpunished. Rogers deserved that much and so much more.

[gammarayedarchive]

[Bruce is aggressively trying to chip at a hunk of ice bought from a bodega, getting the smaller pieces into a large glass bowl. It's more of a labor than it should be, having bought the last bag in the freezer, so it's mostly a solid mass. And really, he's probably...overdoing it. Freaking people out. Just maybe. Next to him, a ludicrous amount of liquor, of all brands and colors, he didn't know what people liked, so he, well, panicked. He sets the ice pick aside for a second, dismayed with the pithy amount of ice he's managed to accumulate with a sigh]

[listentothemockingbird]

Your tie's crooked. 

[pluginyourheart-blog-blog]

Tony is uncharacteristically quiet at the funeral. In fact, he doesn't say a word.

It's a little bit of a show, what with the military send-off and all. Cap probably would have hated it, he thinks, but not enough to put a stop to things. Not so long as it was tradition, one that meant something, that helped people get by. One side of his mouth hitches up into a smile as he imagines it, the face Steve made when he was being too nice to say he disapproved. Christ. Tony scrubs a hand over his face and presses the heel of his palm against his eyes.

There were so many people, some old, some young, most of them looking halfway to dead themselves from grief.  An old soldier salutes shakily.

Tony considers leaving. Everyone here, these heroes -- they're his friends. all of them, and Tony, well. You save the world together a couple of times, so what, that's nothing. He adjusts his cuff-links, caught by the realization that Steve probably wouldn't want him here.

Or no, that's not quite right. Captain America didn't hold grudges. 

Tony looks at the casket (closed, and god, he couldn't even find the fucking body for him, just let it get washed up by fucking policemen in fucking New Jersey, goddamn it--) and wonders if this is how his father felt that day, when the fabled plane had gone into the water. He thinks maybe it would explain a lot. 

There's a microphone in front of his face, and Tony knows the drill, he says a few words. A good man. Gone too soon. Something about differences and heroism and the great state of New York -- honestly, he feels sick just listening to himself, but he knows it's what people want to hear, and he doesn't have it in him to be a real boy today.

Apparently, there's a wake. Bruce invites him. And because he never learns, he says yes.

[gammarayedarchive]

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And the Racket They Made - King Creosote

and your words chased round and round in my head last night they chased their own tails and your words jigged round my mind all night to look at me now i'm quiet as sound

[gammarayedarchive]

It was a bad idea with good intentions. Stuck in a fit of goodwill, watching everyone miserably shuffle away in their black attire through the too-sunny-too-bright cherry-blossom-flecked lanes of Arlington, past rows and rows of white headstones, heading back towards whatever had taken them there. The idea of being alone didn't seem fitting, didn't seem right, anticlimactic. And so, at an attempt at taking the next steps towards coping, an idea was hatched between the Banners. They had the space, they had food...this is what you were supposed to do, right? This was funeral etiquette? Cap would want people to get together, reminisce, and maybe not be so sad.

A word of mouth invitation was spread around, addresses sent via text message, come if you feel like it, and in the very back of Bruce's mind, he was hoping no one would, but there was a sense of wanting to prove that this could be handled. That alliances could be tightened over a few drinks, a hot meal and they would come out of this one stronger than when they had started all that long time ago. It was wishful thinking, but no one knew what else to do.