Are you browsing the fantastic @marveltrumpshate auctions, and thinking "DAMN! I wish someone would take the cinematic RomCom masterpiece starring Sandy B and RyRey that is The Proposal and make it into a Stony fic."?
Do you see this GIF 👇👇👇
And think "That would just be better if it were Steve Rogers and Tony Stark!"**?
Do you look at the bids and think "Well that is already way out of my budget, there's no way I can get this arranged-engagement-sorta-enemies-to-lovers epic now!"?
Well!
Have I got some good news for you!
WE CAN HAVE IT!!!!!
And you can be part of it for however much you want to pitch in because we are making a Pod Bid to have the fantastic @betheflame write it for us!!!
To join in to the fun, all you have to do is join us on Pod Bid Beach 2 on Discord, add yourself to the "makeitallstony" channel and let me know how much you are in for! No amount is too small!!
Like our fave boys always say:
We can do this.
(👇👇👇 Live shot of me, in the future, when we win this one! 👇👇👇)
(And a totally gratuitous shot of Canada's Abs, because I can and it is my sworn duty to share them whenever possible as a Canuck!)
**Cannot guarantee this scene will make it into the final fic, but I'm sure if we ask nicely, it can be arranged.
Steve startled at Tony’s loud shout, his mouth falling open as a disbelieving laugh passed his lips. “What?”
“Shut up,” Tony said, voice sounding dazed, far away. He was stood in front of Steve, looking down at him with his hand resting over his chest. “Steve, fuck off. Just fuck off, no. Shut up… no! Are you – did… fuck right off!”
“I… is that – that’s not really an answer, babe.”
“Fuck off.”
“You already said that.” Steve was still smiling, but his shoulders were tensing up. It had been funny at first, but his knee was starting to hurt from pressing into the cold ground and he was beginning to panic ever so slightly. Of all the ways he’d seen it going when he’d imagined it over and over again, he didn’t think he’d ever thought it quite like the apparent reality.
“Shut up.”
“You said that too.” Steve reached out for Tony and took his hand, circling his thumb over soft skin. “Do you have an actual answer for me?”
“Yes.”
Steve tilted his head and narrowed his eyes. His heart was beating loud in his chest and he was struggling to breathe. “Yes, you have an answer for me, or yes to something else?”
Tony finally smiled and turned his hand over in Steve’s. “Yes, I have an answer for you.”
“And?”
“Yes.” The world seemed to slow to a complete stop as soon as the word left Tony’s lips. It was everything Steve had ever dreamt of and more; fireworks and butterflies and a marching band and anything else that movies had ever proclaimed would be felt by one as happy as Steve. “Of course it’s a yes.”
Steve laughed, relief bleeding into the sound. Of course it was a yes.
“Well, actually it was a fuck off,” Steve said, his voice light and mouth curved into a happy smirk as he teased his boyfriend – fiancé, he corrected himself giddily. “Several times over. And you told me to shut up.”
“I was processing,” Tony protested, grin wide across his cheeks as he held Steve’s gaze. “I just had to work through the question. Weigh up the pros and cons. Assess the situation, if you will.”
Steve snorted as he pushed himself up to stand, not letting go of Tony’s hand. “Well, I’m glad you managed. You had me worried for a minute.”
Tony softened and reached out to press the knuckles of his free hand to Steve’s cheek in a faux punch, pushing his face lightly. “There was never any doubt, you fool.”
“Good.”
There was a moment of quiet where the two just stared at each other with soft smiles before Tony shook himself.
“Hey!” he said suddenly, tugging on Steve’s hand. “Where’s my ring?”
“I was getting to that part,” Steve let go of Tony’s hand to pull out a small box from the pocket of his jacket, “but someone freaked out before I could. Don’t think I even managed to ask you anything, did I?”
“I did not freak out,” Tony sniffed, trying to hold onto some of his dignity. “I was merely taken aback. And no. Now that you mention it, I don’t believe there was anything asked.”
Steve rolled his eyes, but he wasn’t all that upset about the situation. After all, he had the love of his life in his arms and a ring about to be placed on said love-of-his-life.
“Well then,” he said, tone embarrassingly fond as he smiled down at Tony, “will you do me the honour of–”
One day he’d get round to asking, Steve thought as Tony surged forward and stole the words out of his mouth with a bruising kiss. But for now, that was answer enough.
Tony’s voice was beautiful in the morning, deep and husky and such a turn-on that Steve just had to lean over and kiss him. “Morning, gorgeous.”
“I heard you get up in the night,” Tony said, his mouth half buried in his pillow as he rubbed at his eyes.
“Mm. Needed the toilet.”
“Right.” Tony yawned and reached out to stroke his hand over Steve’s neck. “You were gone a while.”
Steve tilted his head down to catch Tony’s hand between his cheek and his shoulder and smiled. It was true, but Steve hadn’t realised that Tony had noticed. Steve had been hunched over the kitchen table second guessing every decision he’d ever made in his life and it had taken him quite a few hours. The sun had started to rise before Steve had snapped himself out of his own head and slipped back into their old, lumpy bed. “Miss me?”
“Always. It was cold.”
Steve yelped when Tony suddenly kicked out and stuck his cold feet onto Steve’s legs. “You’re forever cold.”
“And yet you love me anyway.”
Steve took a little too long to reply and Tony pulled away with a squint.
“I do love you,” Steve hastened to say. He took a deep breath and wet his lips. “So much. Which is why I have a question for you.”
Tony yawned again and closed his eyes. “Is it what I want for breakfast? Because that’s got to be bacon. Or pancakes. Haven’t decided yet, actually, so give me five.”
Steve smiled and brushed a loose curl back from Tony’s face. “No. I’d like to know if you’d marry me.”
That woke Tony up and he finally lifted himself off the mattress, blinking down at Steve in confusion. Wild horses couldn’t have stopped Steve’s smile at the sight.
“Wait, what?”
Steve didn’t move. All of the fears and the worries he’d felt during the night disappeared in an instant with the look of shock and barely-concealed hope in Tony’s eyes. There was no way that he was doing the wrong thing.
“I want to marry you,” he said again, this time with confidence. “I want you to be mine, I want to be yours forever.”
“Really?”
“Yup.” Steve rolled over and reached behind him for a little box he’d stuffed under the mattress. “Hang on. I…” With a sigh, Steve held the box out to Tony. “This is all I have.”
Tony took it with a squint. “The romance had really gone, huh?”
Steve gave a low chuckle and stroked a finger down Tony’s cheek. “Sorry, sweetheart.”
Dropping his eyes down to the small box between his hands, Tony shrugged. “I’ll forgive you. If you make me pancakes.”
“Of course I will. If you’d like to give me an answer.”
“Oh. Did I not do that part yet?”
“No,” Steve said with a growing smile. “You did not.”
“I’d better got on that, then,” Tony replied. “But I guess it all depends on…” As he opened the lid of the box, his voice trailed off.
Steve held his breath. Choked on it, more like. Scratch whatever he’d told himself seconds before, because all of his nerves had come back with a vengeance. The butterflies in the pit of his stomach seemed to be mating with tigers, clawing at his insides and making him feel positively ill. How could he ever think that that would be enough for Tony?
Things had never been easy for Steve. As a young boy he had been near-constantly ill and had therefore racked up a huge amount of debt in hospital fees. His mother, though working all the hours that she possibly could, could only earn so much as a single parent in New York. Somehow they had scraped together enough to send Steve to college where he had met Tony, a recently-disowned electronics student who was in need of a roommate to help him pay the rent of his ridiculously-rundown apartment.
Things between them had moved quickly and, before Steve even knew it, he had been sharing Tony’s bed for months and couldn’t imagine his life without the man he loved by his side. Which had led him to his realisation.
He wanted to marry Tony Carbonell, no matter what. They couldn’t exactly afford a wedding, though. They couldn’t even afford a ring – last month’s rent and a replacement boiler had completely ruined them. It would be a couple of months living on noodles and bread, especially as the art studio where Steve often picked up a couple of hours of work had closed for renovations, leaving him with only his coffee-shop job. With no spare cash to buy anything to make a ring, all he had were the necessities he’d borrowed from his art teacher for his latest project.
Tony Carbonell deserved the world and the only thing that Steve could offer him was a borrowed piece of metal.
“Is this a paperclip?” Tony pulled out the ring – if it could even be called that – and blinked down at it, shock all over his face.
A dark flush flooded Steve’s face and the butterflies flew up into his throat. His own brain was screaming at him: though he had absolutely no money in the bank account, almost to the point that it was ridiculous to even have an open one in his name, he should have done something more. Steve had racked his brain for weeks to find an alternative to an engagement ring and come up blank.
Because he had needed to give Tony something. He just had to; there were no two ways about it. Steve needed Tony in his life, needed him to be his forever, and a proposal was the only thing that Steve could think about.
There had been a slurry of sleepless nights with Steve bent over the kitchen table by the light of the moon fiddling with pliers and paperclips. He’d drafted a few sketches of a final design, ones with twists and loops to take the thin piece of flexible metal to something that Steve could present as a ring. He had a fair few cuts on his hands, but he had twisted the very last paperclip in his jar into something resembling jewellery. It had actually been a piece that Steve was almost proud of.
He’d straightened the paperclip out into a long piece of metal and then used looping pliers to twist the two ends into tight swirls. Though it had looked passable in the darkness of a low morning sun, in the cold light of day in Tony’s hands Steve was struck by just how idiotic the whole idea was.
A paperclip. How stupid could he have been?
Tony had grown up in money, whether or not he had it anymore, and he’d grown accustomed to certain things. Steve couldn’t compete with Tony’s old life, couldn’t offer anything close to what Tony deserved.
“It’s not much,” Steve said into the worryingly-long silence. “In fact, it’s nothing. I know it isn’t and I know that it’s not what you – mphf!”
Tony’s lips interrupted Steve, a passionate kiss swallowing his next words. Even taken by surprise, Steve reached for Tony, settling his hand on Tony’s bare hip and letting his mouth fall open to accept Tony’s exploring tongue.
“Yes,” Tony whispered against his lips when he pulled back. “Oh my God, Steve. Yes.”
“Really? You’re saying yes to the office supplies?”
Tony brushed another kiss over Steve’s mouth, then another on his jaw. A third went to the apple of Steve’s cheek and a fourth to his nose. “I’m saying yes to the fact that you made me a ring. That you actually made me a ring.”
“I did.” Steve reached blindly for Tony’s hand, wrapping his fingers around the other man’s tightly. “And one day, when I can afford it, I will buy you the best ring on offer.”
“Don’t want it,” Tony said against Steve’s hairline, kisses being dropped between words. “I want this one, from when we were young and poor and in love.”
Steve grinned, relief washing over him and Tony’s love echoing in his ears. “What about when we’re old and rich and in love?”
“I can have two rings,” Tony muttered petulantly. “Could even have one for every day of the week, but I’ll always want this one more. Because this means you love me. You love me. The real me, with not a cent to my disowned-name.”
“I do.” Steve squeezed Tony tight and lifted his chin to find Tony’s lips. “Now and always.”
Hey! Not to sound rude but you haven't posted number 14 for the all month fics you are writing 🙈. Can we get that, please??
14. Heliotrope (devotion)
“Marriage.”
Steve startled awake at the sudden noise from his partner. At his jolt, Steve’s book fell off the edge of the bed and clattered to the floor. He nearly shot out of his skin at the loud bang and he blinked up at Tony, a sleepy-haze clouding his brain. “What?”
Tony was looking at him with an extremely judgemental expression on his face, which Steve didn’t think was fair in the slightest. “I’m sorry, but are you going to have a mini heart attack every time I bring up something serious?”
Steve rolled his eyes as he recovered from his shock. When his heart was beating a little slower and he’d blinked a few times to clear the drowsiness, he leant over the edge of the bed to pick his book up from the floor. Inspecting it for bent corners before dropping it into his lap, Steve turned back to Tony. “Every time that you drop a bomb at a completely inappropriate time, yes.”
“How is this an inopportune moment?”
“I was asleep!”
“No, you weren’t,” Tony said. In lieu of a verbal answer, Steve just raised an eyebrow at his partner and Tony winced. “Oh, whoops. Sorry. Thought you were reading.”
“Yeah.” Steve scrubbed a hand down his face and yawned widely, rolling his neck from side to side as he settled back down. He’d not been sleeping all that well for a couple of weeks and he knew he had another few days of meetings ahead of him that would wear him down constantly. “You will be sorry.”
There was a long pause and Steve had just started to drift back off again, even with the lights still on and his book in his lap, when he heard Tony clear his throat.
“What?” Steve asked, eyes firmly shut.
“Marriage,” Tony said slowly as though he actually afraid that Steve had actually lost it. Steve let out a slow, deep breath and opened his eyes.
“What about it?” Steve asked, confusion colouring his voice. Maybe he was more tired than he thought – or Tony had finally lost it.
Tony was still staring at him, so much judgement on his face that it was literally radiating off his body. “We should do it.”
Steve didn’t say anything, just gawked back at Tony with wide eyes and an open mouth.
“Oh, come on.” Tony narrowed his eyes and held Steve’s gaze. “This cannot come as a surprise to you.”
And it wasn’t. Steve wasn’t surprised by this. Of course the thought of getting married wasn’t something that Steve was surprised by; he had thought of little else in the last few months. They’d been together for just over three years and their relationship was more solid than ever. They had moved in together after only six months and Steve still felt the same as he had done back then, his love for Tony only growing each day. He knew – had known since almost their first month – that he didn’t want anyone else; and that he would never want anyone else. Tony was his first thought each morning and his last thought each night and he wanted nothing more than to slide his ring onto Tony’s finger.
“Or maybe it can,” Tony said in a dejected voice when Steve let the silence drag on for too long.
In his defence, it was nearing midnight and he’d been mentally checked out since at least 9pm, but Steve also knew what Tony was like without reassurance. So when Tony rolled over and stretched out to flick off his bedside lamp, Steve reached out to touch his arm gently, thumb stroking over soft skin.
“No,” he said simply. He waited until Tony turned back to look at him in surprise, head twisted over his shoulder and his arm still poised to switch off the lamp. Steve shuffled down the bed, finally placing his book onto his own bedside table before lying down. He made himself comfortable, smacking his pillow a couple of times and pulling the comforter up to his chin. “No,” he repeated, “it’s not a surprise.”
Tony smiled and relaxed once more, barely looking away for long enough to turn off the light before he too shimmied down the bed. He lay on his side and reached out a hand to hold Steve’s, their fingers twisting together in a familiar way. “So, what do you think about marriage?”
Steve huffed a laugh. “I like it.”
“Yeah?” Tony said, hope in his voice. There was a very brief moment of silence before his fingers flexed around Steve’s. “Think we should do it?”
Steve couldn’t help but let out another soft laugh. Typical Tony. There was a ring not ten feet away from Steve hidden in his sock drawer – the old, classic cliché – and he had had a lot of plans for how to bring it out. There was going to be a meal in a fancy restaurant with suits and reservations, or possibly a walk through the park that would end in a picnic and a dozen roses. Steve had even contemplated just organising a few drinks in the bar that they had had their very first date and then heading back to their shared apartment for a takeaway and a film.
But whatever he was going to do, it was sure as hell going to be more romantic than lying in bed when he had been asleep not more than five minutes ago and Tony’s question being phrased more like a survey than a life-altering request. He needed a little romance, a little something to set the mood rather than mismatched pyjamas and an alarm set for half past six the next morning.
“Yeah.”
For fuck’s sake, Steve, he thought to himself, cursing the words that fell from his mouth without his own brain’s permission, it’s okay to say ‘no’ to Tony just one time in your life.
But even as he chastised himself, Steve saw Tony’s bright, beautiful smile and realised that he didn’t want to say ‘no’. Not about anything. Not to Tony.
To be fair to the men that had kidnapped them, they had obviously done their homework. The grab had been smooth and none of them had seen it coming in the slightest. Steve and Tony had been knocked out almost immediately and Tony’s eyes hadn’t been uncovered again until they’d been thrown into their dark cell. There was no telling where they were or how long the journey had been, and their captors kept their faces covered with thick, black masks.
The chains that were holding Steve’s arms stretched above his head and locked to the wall were hefty with massive links that could clearly withstand even Captain America’s extreme strength. They’d tried them enough times to know that was true. The metal seemed to have some sort of coating on as well, a substance that was cutting into Steve’s wrists and leaving thick, red welts with every sharp movement.
Tony had been thrown down to the floor with his hands bound behind his back, a long chain tied from his bonds to a hook on the hard ground. It wasn’t dignified, but it gave him more freedom than Steve had. Not that freedom counted for much where they were.
Hours passed. Somewhere along the way those hours had turned to days. There was no real routine of which to speak, no schedule of food and water being delivered to them. It couldn’t be followed, couldn’t be counted down to the next time that Tony’s throat would be wet with a small glass of desperately-needed water. Their phones had gone, watches and wallets stripped when they had been taken off the street. Time eluded them.
The cell was clearly deep underground, or at least reinforced a ridiculous number of times with a ridiculous number of metals to make it impossible to escape. There was a single vent at the top of the wall with the door on it, only big enough to allow air into the cell and presumably the noise of Steve and Tony’s conversations to travel back out. It wasn’t beyond the realms of possibility for there to be a little something extra in the air flowing through the vent, as Tony never used to fall asleep as easily when at home in a real bed as he did in a dark and dingy cell.
The door itself was thick and just far enough away that Tony’s chain forced him to a halt before he was able to get a decent look at it.
No demands had been made to them personally; no requests for bomb designs, no explicit threats, or even promises of release after payment. There’d been no contact and Tony and Steve had nearly driven themselves mad trying to think of what they were being held for.
“Hey, sweetheart.”
Tony lifted his head as he tried to focus on Steve’s voice. When he managed to open his eyes and blink a bit of the blurriness away, he was rewarded with a gentle smile being shone down at him.
“There you are,” Steve said. “Was worried I was going to have to talk to myself.”
Though his tone was light, Tony knew what he meant. It was no secret that Tony was physically weaker and a hell of a lot more human than Steve was and was therefore struggling more with the lack of regular nourishment that came with being held hostage.
“Course not,” Tony said back, voice hoarse but plastering a smile on his face all the same. “Would I ever do that to you? You’d never get a sensible answer.”
Steve laughed lightly, though Tony could feel his worried gaze boring into the side of his head when he looked down for a moment.
“There is actually something I wanted to talk to you about,” Tony started, wincing as he tried to roll his shoulders into a more comfortable position. It was nigh-on-impossible, what with how long he’d been forced into the stance, and Tony dropped his head back as he resigned himself to his fate.
Steve made an inquisitive noise, shuffling around a little as he too tried to find a comfortable pose. Two or three food-services ago, their captors had seemingly deemed Steve weak enough and had released his arms from above his head, choosing to strap Steve to a medical table instead.
Tony was even more sure that he had been right about the tampered-with air, as he’d apparently slept through the entire exchange.
That had finally been when he’d broken down and cried.
“Tony?”
“Oh. Right.” Tony shook his head, blinking a few more times to try and focus. “I wanted to talk to you. I’ve been, been trying for ages and I couldn’t find a good, a decent time.”
“This isn’t exactly my idea of a good time,” Steve said dryly, “but go on, sweetheart.”
“Oh, I don’t know,” Tony said faux-seriously, looking around with a considering look. “A creepy basement and a bunch of psychos upstairs? Not my weirdest Tuesday.”
Not that he had any idea whether or not it was Tuesday. He was pretty sure it had been a Wednesday when they’d been taken. The memories were hard to keep straight in Tony’s tired and confused mind, but he’d though they’d been jumped as they were leaving their coffee shop.
It was a shame really; Tony had always rated their coffee as some of the best in their neighbourhood.
“Tony,” he heard Steve say and he tried to refocus. “Don’t do it now.”
“I have to. Got to today.”
“No.” There was a loud rattling of chains and a scuffle of material and Tony winced at the noise. “Tony, no.”
“Steven Grant Rogers,” he started, taking no notice of Steve’s calls for his attention, “will you–”
“Tony. Don’t, please.”
“I want to.” It took a momentous effort for Tony to lift his head and look over at Steve, their eyes locking together almost instantly. “I want to ask you and I want to hear you say yes.”
“Ask me when we get out.”
“And if we don’t?”
Steve recoiled as though someone had stabbed him. “Fuck. Don’t say that. Tony, don’t. Please don’t ever think that.”
“You’re always the optimist, you always have been,” Tony said, hating the defeat that was colouring his voice. Stark men didn’t cry. Stark men were made of iron. Tony was meant to be a superhero, and there he was. Giving up. “So you tell me. Tell me, Steve, do you think we’re getting, getting out?”
“Tony….”
And that was an answer in itself. Tony let his head fall back once more, giving in to his protesting muscles as they screamed out for rest.
“Please.” Tony was weak. He was ready to go, but he needed to know that he had Steve until the end. “Please say yes.”
“I will. I promise you, I will.” There was a beautiful urgency in Steve’s voice, a promise that Tony clung to even as the tendrils of permanent rest started to claw towards him. “But I don’t want to say it like this, not chained to a wall whilst you’re halfway to unconscious.”
“‘M fine,” Tony slurred entirely unconvincingly. He knew there was no way that Steve was going to believe him, but he wasn’t going without his answer. “I have to ask. I need, needed to hear you say it before he, they come back and I–”
“Don’t,” Steve almost snarled his interruption before he sighed deeply. There was some more rustling and some metallic clanking, but Tony didn’t bother looking up to see what was happening. “Don’t say that. They’re not going to get you again. The team will come, sweetheart, you’ll see.”
Steve’s voice was like a lotion, like a gentle and soothing lullaby.
“And if they don’t?”
“They will. I know they will.”
“Steve,” Tony’s voice was quiet and he couldn’t make it any stronger, “come on.”
“No, Tony. The team will come and we’ll get out of here. As soon as we do, I’ll go to your workshop and get the ring from the desk drawer you never bother looking in, even when you say you check there whenever you can’t find things. And once I’ve got that, I’ll ask you.” There was a loud sniff and then Steve’s voice started again, thicker than before but just as beautiful to Tony’s clouded brain. “There’ll be flowers and chocolate and champagne and so much romance that you won’t know what hit you.”
“Hey!” Tony’s eyes were closed even as a soft smile tugged at his lips. “You can’t. Can’t ask me first, I’ve already asked you. I think.”
Steve huffed a laugh and let out something akin to a sob. “I love you.”
“Love you too. So please, Steve, marry me.”
Steve sighed. “I wish I could kiss you.”
“They’ll come for us.” Tony didn’t know if that was true. Didn’t know if he’d even be awake if they did ever make it to them, but he wanted to go out with something close to hope in his heart. “The team. Get us out.”
“Yeah?”
“They have to.” Tony’s throat was tight, breaths closer to wheezes than anything else, and he wasn’t sure what he was telling his brain to say was actually what was leaving his lips. If it was his time, then at least he had Steve. “I apparently have plans to attend.”
9. “Oh, you’ve started stealing my socks now?” (Steve/Tony)
“Oh, so you’ve started stealing my socks now, have you?”
Tony shoved his leg between Steve’s and curled closer into his side. “You have no proof.”
Steve laughed and wrapped his arm tighter around Tony, digging his fingers lightly into the man’s sensitive side to feel him squirm. “I can see my name stitched around your ankle, sweetheart.”
Tony lifted his head just high enough off Steve’s chest to squint down the bed. “Who the hell has their name stitched into their socks?”
“People who need to be wary of thieves,” Steve replied, tugging Tony back down and running his hand through messy hair, “that’s who.”
“Surely you have bigger things to worry about than losing your socks?” Tony asked around a yawn and Steve chuckled.
“Maybe. But I thought we’d curbed your stealing habits with the sweaters, anyway. ”
“Woah, stealing?” Tony’s fingers danced up and down Steve’s treasure trail absentmindedly. “What’s yours is mine and all of that. It’s not stealing if I’m entitled to it.”
“I’m pretty sure that’s only true if you’re married,” Steve commented lightly, his eyes slipping closed with the warm weight of Tony comforting him.
“Oh.” Tony was quiet for a moment before he slid one of his stolen-sock-clad feet up and down Steve’s calf. “Did we not take care of that already?”
“No,” Steve said, his smile clear in his voice, “we did not.”
“Huh.” Tony pressed even closer and kissed Steve’s chest, his breath hot when he spoke again. “Maybe we should get on that.”
Steve smiled into Tony’s hair. “Yeah, okay. Maybe we should.”
