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pendragonfics · 5 years

Text

messes and confessions

- ̗̀ Bruce Banner Bingo 2019 ̖́-

Paring: Bruce Banner/Reader

Square filled: domestic au

Tags: female reader, Domestic, Domestic Fluff, Domestic Avengers, Adorable Bruce Banner, Anniversary, No Plot/Plotless, Slice of Life

Summary: There's an anniversary coming up, but __________ isn't that sure if everything's okay in her relationship.

Word Count: 2,702

Current Date: 2019-09-18

Instead of going into a life of fighting crime with your abilities, you focused on your studies, travelling abroad. That’s how you met Dr Banner. Even though he couldn’t technically die because of his Green Friend, he insisted that you saved his life in an attack on the Pakistan-India border. And since he was perhaps the most loyal man you’d ever met, he insisted that he had a sort of debt to you.

To that, you asked him to buy you a drink.

Not to outdo you, Bruce persuaded you to return to the U.S with him. And in the subsequent year, you did the milestones with him, eventually moving into the Avengers Tower together. But despite it being a year together, it still felt like the early stages of the relationship. Being with Bruce after all this time still left you wondering about his feelings. He wasn’t the most vocal about intentions, but the doubt crept up, and took a hold of you.

When you couldn’t sleep, you’d snuggle with Bruce until he fell asleep, and then you’d sneak from the covers, and float to the roof. Your mutation wasn’t exploitable, and without military training, it was more of a quirk than a superpower. It was more comfortable sitting upside down. With your head lowest to the ground, hair falling from your eyes. It was more natural to you, coming easier than staying grounded. Sometimes, you even fell asleep up there, but you’d never let Bruce wake to find you above the bed rather than in it.

When he was off on missions, you’d try and get as much work done as you could on your commissions, but the path of freelance never did run smooth. Your mind would always be cluttered with so many thoughts. Often you spent most of the time asking J.A.R.V.I.S. questions that could have been sourced from yahoo answers, or better yet, a therapist. But the disembodied voice never breached confidentiality, and you got some traction on what to do.

“Can I borrow the team card?” You sat beside Tony with a smile.

He huffed. “What, no sweet talk? Usually, people are more conspicuous when it comes to borrowing money.”

“I’m not like most people,” you replied with a flourish, “and if I was loaded, I wouldn’t need to do the humiliating task of asking for money when I’m on below minimum wage in your own residence.”

“Touché.”

“So?” you pressed, growing nervous. “Come on, Stark, I know you can spare fifty bucks.”

He blinked at that. “You just want fifty dollars?” he rephrased, incredulous. He dug in the pocket of his jeans, and withdrawing a designer wallet, he presented a metal card into your hands. “Don’t spend it all in one place.”

---

Before living in the Avengers Tower, you had a dinky apartment beside a guy named Pete who you suspected was a street fighter. Apart from the fact you barely made rent there, moving in with Bruce was a godsend. Life in the Tower was great, to an extent - central location, fantastic wi-fi, walls that weren’t caked with mould and grime. The downside: living with the other Avengers, who are wonderful! It was just a little too much to fight over cereal with Thor and Captain America.

Scuttling to a warm spot, you sat with your laptop in the living area. The window was the wall, and the view from this far up was terrifying, to say the least. But if you didn’t look down, the sunlight on your back was enough to keep you focused on your task.

In a week’s time, it was your anniversary. You’d been racking your brain for what you’d get him for months now, but every time that you’d conclude on something to get him, you’d either chicken out of it or see him with a similar thing a week later. You tried everything, to no luck.

That was until you traipsed upon a DIY gift shop. It was meant for independent artists to sell their works through, but the further you dug into the site, you realised that it was mostly used by fans and admirers of topics, making things for niche audiences. Which is how you stumbled onto the sweater. User green-Man had made artwork for the item, which to the untrained audience, read as nonsense. Bruce had a weird sense of humour; you really, really hoped that this gift would fit his niche.

Hence, Stark’s card.

You had just selected the shipping when you heard the door open. Swiftly, you finished the process, and shoved the laptop aside, and hid the credit card.

“Hey,” you looked Bruce up and down, taking him in. “You’re back early.”

“By a day,” He sighed, making his way toward you on the floor. He wiped a hand over the scruff on his face and gave you a look which you read as both content and tired. “We tied things up quicker than we thought.”

“Did you -,”

“Yeah.” He sighed, taking a seat beside you, curling into your side.

Bruce Banner was a grown man. He had been through some terrible, horrible, no good things in his lifetime. He had seen some things which people should not have to see and had things done to him that no person should ever have done. He’d defied death in a laboratory and lived precariously with a persona that took a toll on his psyche. To the kids who bought the Hulk dolls in their Avengers set, he was a hero. But to you, he was a man, a man with the world settled upon his shoulders, and without anyone to share the burden with.

You hoped you could be the person he could share it with, but it seemed not.

“Do you need anything?” you asked him, softly. He made a noise into your shoulder, the softest grunt, and you smiled, “Just say what you need, and I’ll try my best.”

“This is good,” Bruce murmured. “…but I should shower before I pass out.”

“I’ll run us a bath,” you say, and kiss his cheek.

As you walk off, he says something. You don’t quite catch it, but it makes your heart flutter a little.

---

You’re vacuuming the ceiling the day before the anniversary, because last time you walked on the roof, you had no idea your feet were so grubby. Bruce is sitting in the armchair by the window, reading a novel. You’re sure he’s just re-reading the same line in repetition because there hasn’t been much page-turning going on. Just as you switch off the vacuum and return to normal gravitation, there’s a notification on the panel by the door that Tony installed.

It’s basically a fancy way for you to know if anyone’s waiting for you in the lobby, have delivery food, etcetera. But you’ve been waiting on this notification for days and as soon as you hear it, you clamour to get downstairs.

“Is everything okay?” Bruce asked, looking up from his book.

“Oh yeah,” you reply, shoving shoes on, trying to keep a poker face. “Peachy keen.”

You practically skid down the stairs, as the elevator is being too slow for your liking, and you make it down before the postal service worker has left. You know each other by proxy; you shop online (because going out in real life is a drag when there’s next day delivery) and they still have a job. They give you a smile before leaving, and you unlock the box for yours and Bruce’s level of the Avengers Tower.

“Yes!” you whisper, thrilled.

You take the elevator up, feeling slightly out of breath. As you near your floor, you tuck the package under your sweater, suddenly realising that you had no other way of hiding it as soon as you walked back in. Bruce would most certainly be curious as to what made you sprint like a madwoman at the notification of a package. But before you make it to your floor, the elevator stops.

“Hey there Moon Walk,” Tony beams, hitting the button to your floor.

You look to him with a strange look. “Don’t call me that.”

“Okay, Gravity, 2013.” He replied, smug.

As the elevator stopped, you watched as he entered your floor like he owned the place. Well, he did own the place, but it didn’t mean he couldn’t knock. Would it kill him to ask, even? Maybe you were just being antsy because of the whole anniversary present thing.

Bruce is on your laptop. He blinks, looking between the pair of you - his teammate, wearing a suit at ten in the morning on a weekend, and his girlfriend, with a strange lump under her sweater. Bruce looks like an animal caught doing something they shouldn’t be, but before anyone can speak, he finishes up what he’s doing, and closes the laptop.

“Hi, Tony,” he says. “Do you need anything, or…?”

The Iron Man strolls toward Bruce, placing a hand upon the back of the chair he sits in. You’d take the time to hide your package that’s growing warm under your shirt, but Bruce looks a little uncomfortable, and you linger.

“Just my card. I’m spoiling Pepper to brunch on that new restaurant with the -,”

“I thought I gave it back to you,” you say, and add quickly, to divert attention from Bruce, “Pepper told me about that place. There’s an old gelato shop she likes, a block away from it.”

“I Scream or Piccola?” Tony asks, distracted.

From the corner of your eye, you watch your boyfriend relax, not the centre of attention anymore.

“Piccola.” You move, standing at the opposite side of Bruce’s chair. “Enjoy brunch.”

You look steely into Tony’s eyes, noticing something is going on. He wouldn’t come in just to brag about a date with his fiancé, at least, not without more spectators. The genius, billionaire, playboy philanthropist looks you up and down, as if he’s J.A.R.V.I.S., and not the bodiless voice, and smiles.

“Thanks,” he beams. Snagging the card from Bruce’s lap, Tony leaves the room. But not before he turns back and flashes a bright smile. “and Big Green? You and the Upside Down’s anniversary is today.”

He closes the door before the pair of you can admonish him.

---

“It’s today?” Bruce asks, face pale. He buries his face in his hands with a groan, your laptop falling to the side of the chair with a harmless plunk. “I had it bookmarked as tomorrow!”

You chuckle, tucking a rouge curl behind his ear. “He’s messing with us.”

Bruce mutters from his hands, “I’m the worst boyfriend ever.”

“Babe, it’s tomorrow in USA time, but don’t forget we hooked up in India,” you remind him, sinking to your knees. In the moment, you forget that you’re hiding the package, and it slides out from your sweater unceremoniously, making a noise as it hits the hardwood floor. You don’t notice it, though. “Like I said, he was messing with us.”

Bruce groans. “Even if he is -,”

“He is.”

“- I’m always afraid of screwing up,” he confesses, voice so very soft. You realise that there’s tears pricking in the corner of his eyes, and he squinches them shut tight, gripping at the bridge of his nose to keep them from falling. “I don’t want to lose you.”

“Bruce, I love you so much, why would I lose you?” you ask, unsure.

He looks down into his lap, fiddling with his fingers. He takes a deep breath, and expelling it, meets your eyes. “…apart from Betty, I’ve never had anything serious, and I’ve never felt like I do with you.” He explains, and inhaling, he breathes, “You have no idea how much I love you. How much I’m afraid of him -,” He cuts himself off, expectant that you’ll say something. “- that he’ll take you away.”

But you just sit on the floor, watching him. If bodies could mimic the extent of the emotions you had inside, Bruce would see your eyes, wide and sad and unsure.

“Bruce, babe,” you stroke his cheek, feeling the stubble beneath your fingertips. “Despite the fact that Hulk and I tight, I’m not going anywhere. We’re unbreakable.”

He swallows.

“Sorry,” he chuckles, but you can tell he’s shaken, “Tony really set me off.”

“I can see,” you lean forward, and kiss his lips, his cheek, the shell of his ear. Each kiss is slow, is deliberate, and with every time your lips brush his skin, you feel his demeaner return from panic to composure. “Seeing as we’re here…how about we celebrate both days?”

“Of the anniversary?”

“Hell yeah,” you smirk. “Let’s treat ourselves.”

Going for the package under your shirt. It’s then you realise it’s fallen, and ever the hero, Bruce picks it up for you. He regards the mail bag; it’s fire-engine red, with your name on the address label.

“…it’s for you,” you smile, watching his face, “you can open it if you like.”

He tries to open it where the drag tab is but ends up tearing the plastic bag. Birthed from the sack comes his gift; the sweater you bought online. You hoped he liked it; unfolding it, Bruce regarded his gift, rubbing his thumb over the printed image on the centre of the sweater. It’s fan artwork of the Hulk’s face in MS Paint, rendered in a lovely way reminiscent of 8-Bit art, with the words ‘Lemme Smash!’ in text below. A smile broke out on his face, and he laughed.

“I love it,” he beamed, and untangled its arms as to wear it. It fit him, and the image fit snugly across his chest, thank goodness for universal sizing.

“I got you something too,” he says. He takes the laptop back to the centre of his lap, and opens the screen wordlessly and looks to you with a smile.

Your face drops.

“You - you,” you felt your mouth grow slack, “You spent fifty million dollars?” you whispered.

“Yes,” Bruce says, taking your hand in his. You felt your pulse quicken at his touch, at his words, and you bite your lip in anticipation, and he adds, “Officially, Tony signed off on it.”

“Won’t he notice that millions have gone from his accounts?” You worry at your lip, unsure. Usually, Bruce was the nervous part in the relationship, and now you are! Oh, how the turn tables have - “I mean he asks for every dollar I borrow back.”

“Babe,” Bruce nuzzles your ear with his mouth, kissing the skin there lightly, “Apart from the fact that this is the money I’ve made in the last year working as an Avenger, Tony signed off on it himself…” Bruce grins, “and there’s a press release about it being filed by Pepper’s assistant in about -,” he refreshes the tab, and a new thing pops up. “Now. And now neither of us can’t back out if it.”

“…what did you spend fifty million on?” you ask, quietly.

Bruce’s face grows warm with a crimson blush. “I didn’t say?” he asks. “…it all went toward the charity we were working on in India. Hopefully it keeps them afloat for a while.”

“Do you know how much I love you right now?” you ask him, feeling a little giddy.

Bruce smiles. “I can fathom it, a little.”

You laugh. “Why is it I never get to see your mischievous side more often?”

“Oh, it’s just for you,” he replies, softly, and closing the laptop, he adds, smooching your cheek with another of his kisses, “besides,” he breathes, “what’s fifty million to a multibillionaire?”

“How about,” You meet his lips with your own, “what’s a scientist to his lover?”

---

“I can’t believe I let him sign off on this,” Tony grumbled at brunch.

“Tony,” Pepper put a hand over his, rolling her eyes. “Don’t forget that you’ve done more ostentatious things for me, none of which involving charity and multimillions,” she hushes.

“I’ll donate sixty million dollars right now,” he retorted.

“Oh really?” she teases. “I don’t believe you.”

“…let’s get a raincheck on this date,” he mutters, standing up abruptly. “I’ve got to make a few calls.”

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