Spider-Son & Iron Dad one shots

Freudian Slips

a/n: previous authour's note from last chapter still applies—this book isn't abandoned! just workin on some other stuff atm:-)

Freud·i·an slip

/ˌfroidēən ˈslip/

noun

noun: Freudian slip; plural noun: Freudian slips

an unintentional error regarded as revealing subconscious feelings.

His mind had been frosted over for a period of years, time locked in ice, and yet—Steve Rogers knew things. He didn't need to be a thousand years old or even four to know that life unfolded differently for a variety of people.

He had seen it with himself, of course. Growing up as some scrawny kid who went home with bruises every day. The advice he was given by his mother stuck with him and influenced him his entire life, shaping what would be. He always got back up.

Now he's whatever a hero is said to be, according to the public and his close friends. Bucky gives him constant smiles, the soft and patient kind that reaffirm him whenever he's doubting himself again.

But, Steve was okay.

He was doing okay.

After all, he had just gotten Bucky back, as well as everyone else that had dusted from Earth that had made him stay up with shaking hands and cold blank stares nearly every night before. They had a long talk, when Bucky came back.

Steve has told him that he ought to retire, sitting on a bench after giving Sam the shield away. He had seen Peggy, when he went back—but something didn't settle right. Something deep in his bones knew that he wasn't meant to stay. So he didn't, and he knew in a bittersweet way that what he had done was right.

Steve also told him everything that had happened over the five years Bucky was gone. He told him about the restless nights, he told him about the hours sitting alone, trying hard to keep everything together and almost losing it.

When he was done, Bucky pulled him into a tight hug, and told him things would be better this way, and that he was supportive. Steve cried.

Needless to say, he understands too. The fragility of life twists differently for all. The one thing Steve should have realized, especially considering his own personal situation, was that life could unfold at any time from the moment you take your first breath right up until your last.

It was a slow night. One of the many, now that Thanos was finally gone. Tony was healing nicely, so it seemed, trying to adapt to using a bionic arm rather than his real one, which had crumbled to dust from the power of the stones. (Tony said it wasn't that hard, one night, right before proceeding to lose an arm wrestle with Bucky.)

The Avengers were still trying to find a way around everything. How would things work, now that it seemed most everything was either upturned or lost?

(The Avengers Compound, what once stood industrial and strong on a field of fresh green grass, was now in shambles over ruins and plants that would seemingly never grow back, so badly damaged with the dust and fall out of the weapons and war.)