Chapter Text
Night had already fallen when Thor pulled his pickup truck into the driveway. Porch lights up and down the street caused a dim golden glow to reflect on the black asphalt of the road, making it appear murky and depthless. The shadows of cars, bikes, and students walking on the sidewalks and pavement stretched across the houses under lengthy beams of streetlights. The distant sound of thumping bass signalled that there was a party raging somewhere on the block, as did the number of irresponsibly parked cars.
But when the churning engine of the old red and white pickup sputtered to silence, Loki’s mind reluctantly stopped wandering, vision settling into focus rather than blearily merging the colours of what was outside the window. He must have been half asleep, because when he righted himself, his stiff neck protested with a few tiny pops.
He sat forward and rubbed his eyes with the heels of his hands, then looked hazily through the windshield at the place they had arrived. This was house he would be living in for at least the next year. He took a moment to process what he was seeing, and shuddered.
It was a two-story with slightly overgrown bushes, branches and twigs scraping the siding. Leaves were scattered about the lawn, and the whole structure looked slightly tilted to the left; on top of that, it was desperately in need of new paint.
In perspective, though, it fit in perfectly with the rest of the structures on the block. Each was clearly inhabited by students, in various stages of disrepair but liveable enough to be packed with roommates… There wasn’t a lot of neat, comfortable privacy like the younger son of Odin was used to. At the truth of this observation, Loki put his hood up and scowled heavily, getting out of the vehicle and slamming the door.
The echo resounded off the surrounding buildings, and Thor poked his head around the bed of the truck, manbun flopping lazily to one side with the motion, fly-aways present from hours of driving with the windows down. “Don’t slam the doors, Loki. You didn’t pay for her.”
“The thing is ancient anyways, a few dents and scratches would only fit in,” Loki spat as he slung the strap of his messenger bag over his shoulder. “And I thought we were moving in with someone rich. This place is filthy.”
“Well, Stark only pays his share of the rent.” He huffed contentedly, stretching while speaking. “Now quit whining and start unloading, little brother, or you’re sleeping in the laundry room.” Thor smiled and started freeing their boxes from the bed, and Loki felt his blood boil at that idiotic grin.
He picked up a box that was open on the top, and after sighing loudly enough to get Thor’s attention, tipped it over and let the contents spill onto the driveway. DVD cases, a few tangled pairs of headphones, and some chargers clattered across the cement, pathetically skittering in opposite directions like frightened insects.
Although growing more forced, now showing mild annoyance, Thor’s amused smile remained in place. For a moment, he just stared at his brother, then laughed softly and nodded at the things on the ground. “You’re picking those up.”
Ignoring the sneer Loki shot his way in return, Thor turned to lift three enormous boxes with ease and headed up to the porch, propping open the screen door with his foot before unlocking the house and stepping inside. A light in an upstairs room flicked on, the tell-tale sign of their roommates beginning to wake to greet them.
Loki let out a frustrated huff through his nose and glared at the junk on the pavement of the driveway, finally giving in with an audible groan, and cleaning it all up unceremoniously. Without much concern for their condition afterwards, he tossed the items back into the box, almost relishing the chaotic noise as they toppled over each other. It was like throwing Tupperware frustratedly into a cabinet.
He stacked another small container on top of the box he was holding, spitefully trying to avoid the impending number of trips that would need to be made, and balanced the load as he made his way up the wobbly stones leading to the porch. The steps were precariously slanted, and Loki cursed them quietly and foully when he almost stumbled.
While still hazardously balancing the burden, he reached out for the handle to the screen door. With the hinges squealing in violent protest, Loki threw out his foot to hold the door open, and ended up sending both boxes crashing into the bushes off the edge of the front step. Sticks and leaves rustled and fell into the silence as the contents were lost to the dark abyss of the overgrown shrubbery.
“Thor, get your buffoonish, drunken ass out here and get the boxes!” Loki hated how weak and childish his voice sounded, but he was exhausted, irritated, and wanted anything more than to be here. He was already forced to go to his last choice of university, and now had to room with his grossly popular older brother and his gaggle of friends, some of whom had made it quite clear that they didn’t want another roommate. But Thor had obliviously insisted, and now Loki was dragged along to share a basement with him as he struggled through freshman year.
He would have much preferred to stay in an on-campus dorm where he could forge his path through the year with someone totally new, and maybe make a few new friends – or any at all for that matter, considering it seemed that his unpopularity was doomed to follow him even into young adulthood. But Loki saw the continuation of his fateful trend, his chances at getting a social status disappearing like the lost boxes vanishing into the void behind the bushes.
The disappointment was not an unfamiliar feeling.
Displaying the feeling, he sighed heavily and stepped down, squeezing between the house and the foliage to gather as much as he could of the fallen items. When he thought he had them all, he threw them back in the boxes and lifted his leg to step back onto the porch.
And just his luck, no sooner had he moved than the screen door suddenly opened and smacked him right in the nose.
“Shit – ow!” Loki exclaimed, hands flying to his face, fingers brushing gingerly over the bone and arch to make sure it wasn’t serious. Everything structurally felt fine, but it still hurt like hell, and he intended to express so fully. He expected a bruise in the morning, but that could be an exaggeration.
His upward glare was only met with the image of Thor shrugging apologetically and slightly confused, laughing to himself. “What are you doing on the ground?”
“Your stupid stuff fell into the bushes so I thought I’d do you a favour and retrieve them. Next time, though, I’m definitely leaving them there.” Loki stood and faced his brother, matching his muscle with a powerful scowl and taking up the boxes, heading inside.
The interior of the house was shockingly not as terrible as the exterior. The doorway opened into a hallway with a staircase directly on the left, and coat pegs and a shoe rack along the wall. To the right was a living room, and both the hallway and the far end of this room opened into a kitchen and dining room. The walls of the house were slightly darker than cream-colored, more of a comforting light tan.
Loki was surprised at how clean the floors were, given his first impression from the leaf and stick-riddled, nearly overgrown lawn. He walked down the hall into the dining room and looked around, seeing the space opened into a new room on the left. Behind him as he turned was a door under the main staircase, so after assuming that this led to the basement, he nudged it open and began a slow, careful, descent downstairs, his line of sight obscured even as he attempted to crane his neck around the boxes.
The basement was finished, with dark, scratchy-looking carpets and white walls. There was a room to the right connected to a shadowy space that was hopefully just a laundry room, but that looked to be mostly storage, with stacks of totes labelled in unfamiliar handwriting in every corner. To the left was a long room housing a corner couch and a large television, along with some movie shelves and other coffee tables. There was another door at the end of this room, but it looked heavier. Maybe it led outside.
Loki walked almost warily to the end of the room and turned down the small, hidden hallway, seeing the light on in the room on the left. There was a massive empty mattress inside, perched atop a large but rickety bed frame, and some of Thor’s boxes were already stacked to the side. Loki looked to the smaller, pitch-black room on the right.
This was his, then. Small, dark, tucked away as if it had no use. How fitting.
He dropped the boxes in Thor’s room before stepping into what would then be his own; and upon entering, the darkness instantly engulfed him while the temperature seemed to drop ten degrees. Something might have skittered across his foot. Fumbling along the walls until he found a light switch, he was momentarily blinded by the pale but bright white shine that came from the ceiling. It was disgustingly industrial. Loki made a mental note to quickly install the lamps he had brought instead.
There was a full-sized mattress pushed into a corner, the frame it rest in wooden and sparse, but that was it. And yet despite the negligence of character apparent, he was already being swarmed with ideas, envisioning what he’d do with the space. He could tuck a desk into the corner opposite the door, and an armchair into the one under the window well. He could put his clothes in the totes he brought with him and keep them under the bed, and have a short bookshelf under the window itself. That would certainly be enough to hold all his books and journals, while still leaving space on the walls for decoration at will. The closet behind the door was small but workable, and honestly more than he expected.
As much as he wanted to complain, Loki actually kind of liked the space. It had potential; he was open to the idea of it growing on him, becoming inhabitable. It was neat, secluded enough for clear thought, and his own. He’d never had much of that in his life before.
~
When he went back upstairs to get his own boxes, there was another man in the kitchen, talking to Thor. He was much shorter, with messy, slightly curly black hair and wire-rimmed glasses, and was sporting a pair of plum purple sweatpants and a long-sleeved black shirt. He had a glass of water in one hand, and an orange pill bottle in the other, with three others lined up on the counter behind him.
He seemed tired.
Loki shrunk back against the doorway and crossed his arms, but was noticed by the conversing pair, the stranger of which turned his head and raised the fingers of the hand holding the pill bottle in a slight wave.
“Oh, Banner, this is my brother, Loki,” Thor smiled and walked over to whom he introduced, clapping one large hand onto his shoulder. Loki fought the urge to hiss, still cringing away from the touch, and instead nodded in greeting at who he reluctantly accepted to be his new housemate.
“Hey,” Banner responded, shifting his feet and standing straighter. Despite his efforts, his shoulders still sagged in terrible posture, making his likely average height seem all the less. “Welcome to the house, I guess, and no need to call me Banner, that’s my last name. You can just call me Bruce…” He shuffled where he stood for a moment, as if he could not decide how to stand, and glanced up at Loki’s brother before looking back to him. “I don’t know what else to say except for that it gets a bit strange around here. I’m sorry if any of the others are rude to you.” His eyes flicked back to Thor. “Is that all you wanted me to do?”
“You had to convince him to say hello to me?” Loki scowled up, at the both of them. “What on earth have you dragged me in to?”
“No, no I’m sorry,” Bruce interjected. “I was up anyways, but I forgot that Thor was bringing you along. He just asked me for some… uh, words of advice, but I didn’t have anything prepared.”
Loki mumbled under his breath, “Oh, it’s okay, you just didn’t know I existed, that’s all.”
Before Banner could seem to slouch further away or Loki could spit out another desperate gripe to alleviate his own anxiety, Thor’s voice broke the awkward tension, a little too loud for the hour. “Well, Loki and I should finish moving in, and we can finish doing proper introductions tomorrow. Does that sound good?”
Bruce responded with an indifferent if not pleasant “fine with me”, while contrarily, Loki just grumbled out a “fine” with as discouraging of a tone as he could muster.
“Great, come on then, Loki. I know you don’t like me touching your things.” Thor patted his brother’s shoulder again before heading down the front hall to continue to retrieve their things from outside. Loki stood for a moment longer.
It was only when he was about to turn that he could not stop himself; he asked quickly, as if doing so would lessen the intrusiveness of his inquiry. “What are the bottles for?”
And he cringed as soon as he said it. Loki himself hated when his father and brother invaded his privacy by asking about things he’d rather not talk about and snooping around in his issues; as if they really cared how he felt. He knew that they truly didn’t, so he favoured the action of closing himself off. He found it easier to be rude and dismiss them than it was to try and explain himself, his feelings, or search for the words to ask questions of his own.
But now he wanted to know what kind of people he was living with, and something about this tired, polite guy made him curious.
Bruce had since looked up, surprised that he had even spoken before the supplementary discomfort of the question settled in. He glanced at the pill bottle in his hand and then down to his feet.
He paused before he spoke. “This house is… a bit odd. Everyone here has got their thing, and well… these are mine. Well, I have these because of mine. That being said, don’t take any negative comments too seriously, if you can. We’re all just figuring it out as we go, as much as some of us pretend to know exactly what’s going on.” Upturned eyes locked on Loki, something softer stirring within that attention. “Honestly, as much as they might try to push you out, I think you’ll fit right in.”
Loki stared at him. For the first time in a long time, he felt something stir in his chest that was akin to understanding. It came hot and cold all at once, causing his head to spin at the reaction.
Why did everything that Bruce just said make sense? The feeling was far from likeable. It made him feel vulnerable and small and ugly, and he especially didn’t like the sliver of hope that had snaked up his spine at the delivery of the sentiment. He didn’t like thinking that maybe he did belong here, and he didn’t like the fact that he was hoping he did.
So, he tilted his head, sneered through whatever confusion may be present on his features, and said bitterly, “Well, that was rude. Now you’re calling me a freak.”
Bruce sighed softly, looking down at his glass of water, a small smile tugging at the corners of his lips. “I’m not.”
But Loki had already turned on his heel and left to finish helping Thor unload the truck. While he stepped outside and took a deep, gasping breath at the liberating fresh night air, Bruce finished taking his medication.
He put the bottles back in the tiny cabinet above the sink and finished his glass of water, then glanced once more towards the door, now an open maw to the summer evening setting. Bruce didn’t know how well his mental health would persist this year, but he was determined to assert control into his environment to keep it as steady, as anticlimactic as possible.
It seemed so backwards that the most unstable of them all was the only one trying to keep things sane in their home. No one else was stepping up, though, so he was left to scold and comfort and talk them all through their own drama. Between Steve and Tony this year, Bruce could already see his role as the mediator; it was a role he would have to learn to refuse, if anything was ever to be truly resolved between them.
For a moment longer than he would appreciate, Bruce doubted if any of them would do the same for him. Would any of them stay up at odd hours – outside of the odd hours that already made up their chaotic schedules – to talk him through emotions and stirrings he couldn’t explain? Would they be more understanding when he needed space, or needed someone to talk him down from fighting the care of those closest to him? Before it could spiral, he shook his head to clear those thoughts and headed upstairs to his bedroom.
Of course, they would, he assured himself. They’re your best friends, and they’ve done it before. Why wouldn’t they now?
Because you can’t be fixed. Your issues are permanent, and theirs are temporary. Bruce almost winced at the dark voice that crept into his head, so abrupt, and yet it had been lurking since the start of his contemplation. He stopped in the hallway, staring at nothing, barely seeing the closed doors around him.
Three steadying breaths, counting to ten each time. One, two, three, four…
When the pressure at the base of his throat went away, he continued the trudge to his room, closing the door and lying safely back in bed once he reached it. The covers around him were his shield, the walls of his room his fortress. His heartrate slowed as he tried to drift off. He counted the beats.
The thought that often sent him to sleep, along with the small dose of melatonin taken earlier, floated into his mind tonight. Get some rest. Tomorrow might not be as easy as today.
~
Standing in the front lawn while the recently uncut grass teased at the cuffs of his jeans, Loki looked up at the window in which the light had turned on when they arrived. That must have been Bruce’s room, with the rectangular frame of the window now darkened once more.
He found himself wondering what he could have said differently before he stormed out. There was no question that what he said was harsh, especially because the guy seemed like he was trying to help Loki feel welcome. It had just come as a defensive response on his part, a sting to lash out and keep himself from saying anything more, to keep his tongue from running loose. That didn’t change what he had said, but perhaps there was a chance that Bruce understood the reaction, and had already forgiven it?
Regardless, Loki felt he should apologise. These weren’t exactly the best terms to begin on with a new housemate, at a new school in a new stage of adult life.
Despite this train of thought, the night carried on, dwindling like the contents of the boxes as he continued to organise in an attempt to feel settled. And by the time he finally laid down at an early hour of the morning, hoping for a few hours of sleep before people started waking up, he had dismissed most thoughts about Bruce.
They were replaced by unwelcome memories, insecurities that crept into the corners of the room and dripped through the window well. He closed his eyes to keep them out, but they remained. He tried to ignore them.
Falling asleep was a bliss Loki often craved, seldom got enough of, and would miss as soon as he opened his eyes the next morning.