( closed ) misery loves company

[inebriety]

who: Tony Starks (inebriety, buildsomething) and Steve Rogers livingsymbol)
what: Quantum Tentacles
when: 12th Feb onwards
where: Back of a bar
warnings: alcoholism, suicidal thoughts, depression


There's nothing to suggest this day would be any different from any other day except at some point they'll suddenly feel the heavy weight of Tony's unhappiness. Tony had finally run out of those candles and he was handling the mood drop poorly. Every now and then he lets himself entertain the possibility of ending it. His direct thoughts aren't revealed by the unexpected connection so they're spared Tony's detailed plans if he ever decided to go through with it.

He failed once and he wouldn't fail a second time.

His depression feels like a suffocating weight making everything seem pointless until Tony gets his hands on some alcohol and the mental haze it produces gives him just enough breathing room that he can ignore his darker thoughts. To others there's a barely noticeable difference except now he's clearly drunk.

Surrounded by bottles, too lethargic to do anything else and not drunk enough to pass out, Tony would call this being content.

Comments

[buildsomething]

"I can probably manage that." And he does indeed grab the bottle and take a healthy drink. There's a brief moment where his brain gets confused, unsure if the sensation is his or not, but the burn clears that up soon enough. It's a familiar enough feeling.

"So," he says once he's set the bottle back down. There's a little bit left in it, nothing much. "At least tell me what we're drinking to."

[inebriety]

Tony finally gives up and slouches in his seat. He stares up at the ceiling and briefly ponders what to say. "My shitty brain, I guess. I got to remember what it felt like to be happy and now I can't handle being depressed again."

He scrubs his face with a hand. "Do you have a therapist? Ignore that, it'd be a stupid idea seeing the same person."

[buildsomething]

He blinks once. "I don't, no." Whether or not he should have a therapist is a very different question. "There's got to be at least one around here, though. Sam, if nothing else."

Though it does make him pause for a second. Tony is well aware that he is probably one of the last people qualified to have this conversation, but. He's here. He can't just drop it and run.

"So you...feel like this all the time?" Jesus.

[inebriety]

"I have one, they're not clicking and it's a terrible idea to see someone you know."

His next words has Tony look over to try and figure out what he meant by that. Tony put in less effort to cover things with his counterpart, but not to the extent where he should be asking something like this.

"Like what?"

He's not going to be able to do any rocket science in this condition, but he's going to try and figure this out.

[buildsomething]

Is it? That might explain why Bruce whines so much whenever Tony tries to talk to him. But he shakes his head. "I meant more he might have a better idea of who all else might be available." And he has plenty of experience with the general superhero mindset, let alone Tony himself.

But the question pulls him away from that line of thought in a hurry, even if it's just to fix the other Stark with a long, dry stare.

"Unhappy," he responds finally, because he's going for the gold in the understatement olympics today. And Tony might be oblivious about some things, but even he could take in the way the man's slumped down against the bar surrounded by empty bottles and put two and two together. Without the aid of feeling exactly how bad it is.

[inebriety]

Tony bursts into laughter. He's never tried to hide how he felt even as he pushed people off kilter so they didn't know how to handle it.

"I thought that was obvious."

He lays across the table with his head in his arms as he tries to stifle further giggles. If not this he'd probably cry because this was the saddest thing he's ever heard. This is how much people don't pay attention to him and he's probably brought it on himself because that's just how he is.

[buildsomething]

The laughter visibly startles him, but Tony doesn't have to feel it to recognize gallows humor when it's smacking him in the face. And christ, what is he even doing here? How does he think he can help with this at all?

"We put on a good show," he says in the face of all that laughter, heavy on the irony. In truth he's never quite sure what this other him is thinking. Too similar and not similar enough. Even then, he couldn't have guessed at quite this depth of misery.