"I'm sorry if I didn't talk to you much at dinner, I was totally distracted tonight, my mind is all over the place."

Estélla and Tony were finishing their drinks on a quiet terrace overlooking the gardens of The Ritz hotel. The sun had set and they were sat on cast iron chairs with a stunning view over the rooftops of Paris, the skyline stretching as far as the eye could see and in the not so far distance, the sparkling Eiffel Tower.

The air was mild and there was no breeze, a stillness that reflected the peace Esté felt after such an incredibly long day, the silence feeling much like a reward.

There were no other tables occupied on the terrace that night, the only other souls being the tuxedo waiters that came to top up their wine glasses and offer more drinks or a blanket if it got too cold for them, though by that point, Estélla was securely wrapped in an alcohol jacket.

"Don't worry about it," Tony shook his head, a glass of expensive Merlot in his right hand as he leant back in his chair, one leg crossed squarely over the other as he glanced at the stars, then at her, "I had no issues talking away to Anthony and Anna, maybe I should try my hand at modelling since I'm so great at everything else."

Esté scoffed and rolled her eyes, tilting her head with a lazy smile, "As handsome as you are, Tony, and as much as I'd love to tell you that there isn't anything in the world you can't do, you don't have the height to walk the runway, I'm afraid."

"You'd really shoot me down like that?" Tony mocked pain with a hand on his chest, eyes squinted closed.

She chuckled and shrugged, "I'm being honest. But show me your walk anyway."

"What?"

"Your walk," she said, "Get up and show me your walk, I want to see."

Tony drew in a deep breath and placed down his wine glass before standing up. He walked down to the end of the terrace with a drunken laugh escaping his lips quietly, turning on his heels and straightening his blazer before locking eyes with Esté who was patiently waiting to judge him.

He didn't quite know how exactly he was supposed to walk that would be any different to how he normally did, but with a surge of confidence coming from the amount of wine he'd consumed that night, Tony pulled his sunglasses over his eyes and strutted his way back along the terrace before throwing himself down into the chair beside Esté once again.

A quiet applause and laughter greeted him when he took his glasses off and he felt his cheeks grow red, though he quickly flushed away the heat with a swig of wine.

"Yeah, yeah, Estélla Goldwyn eat your heart out," Tony mocked with a wave of his hand, "So, how did I do?"

Truthfully, Estélla thought Tony's walk wasn't that bad, but she found the whole thing a lot funnier than she should've as he tried to impress her at her own game.

"You know what, it wasn't terrible. Maybe if we got you some Cuban heels you could-"

"Alright, enough of that," Tony cut her off with a groan, "Are you going to show me how it's done?"

Esté smirked and rose to her feet, giving Tony a playful stare before walking down to the terrace just as he had done before. She composed herself and took a deep breath, pushing her shoulders back and holding up her chin before the smile on her face dropped and her eyes narrowed ever so slightly.

Tony watched as her entire demeanour changed in the blink of an eye, the tipsy smile she'd been wearing all night disappearing and a cold blue steel washing over her face instead.

He was almost mesmerised as Estélla walked towards him, one long leg in front of the other with a perfect sway of her hips and arms, a gaze that didn't slip from the horizon until she reached their table again. She made it look flawless, Tony stunned at how she alone could turn the most obscure places into a catwalk that grabbed his attention effortlessly.

"That is how it's done," she smirked and sat down again, running her hands through her hair with a sigh.

"Yeah," Tony said, clearly impressed by his wide eyes, "Damn well is."

The waiter appeared a few moments later with two fresh glasses of wine. They hadn't ordered any more since they'd intended on finishing their drinks and retreating to bed like the rest of the group had after dinner, but neither of them objected once the glasses were placed down on top of the white tablecloth.

"Seriously Tony, I really do appreciate you being here for me. You didn't have to do it, make all this effort to come to Paris for me, but it means so much that you did."

Tony smiled, "Of course. I'll support you whatever you do, always. Next show you direct or catwalk you own, just say the word and I'll be there."

"And I'll support you with whatever, um, superhero...fight...thing you do, too."

They shared a laugh and Tony appreciated the sentiment, though shook his head as he looked at her, "No way, I'm keeping your pretty face as far away from all of that as I possibly can. Can't get even a scratch on that money maker, can we?"

Esté rolled her eyes, "Absolutely not, not unless you want me to lose my job and end up living in your tower as a freeloader."

Tony shrugged with a cheeky smirk, "That might not be so bad."

They drank their wine in a comfortable silence, both of them with relaxed smiles on their faces as they enjoyed the company of the other. They looked up at the stars and Tony pieced together every constellation he recognised in case Esté asked him about the sky, noticing a hint of curiosity behind her eyes when he stole a quick glance over at her.

The curiosity he'd spotted, however, hadn't turned out to be exactly what he'd thought.

"What was it like?" Estélla spoke up, swallowing once, "When you were, you know...in that place."

Tony stared at her for a moment, the same thick silence lingering a while longer. Their faces were placid and the smiles had gone, Tony's mind drawing back to unlock memories he'd stored away as nightmares to hopefully be forgotten, thought they hadn't quite been erased by that time.

"I'm sorry, you don't have to-" Esté shook her head, feeling a huge weight crush her chest once she watched Tony's eyes flash with vacancy at her question.

"No," he interrupted, looking up at her, "It's alright. It was dark and...soulless. I think a lot of people, maybe most people, would've not even tried...would've given up hope. But my insistence on not accepting limitations which, granted, can get me into trouble, was what got me out of there. It was hard and I was...yeah, I was scared, but I wanted to see the sky again, you know? Hated the idea of dying in there without seeing these stars or the moon one more time."

Estélla was rather drunk that night and her emotions from the day were heightened like never before, though the strength of the upset she felt when Tony recalled his past was enough to make her stomach sink and tears well in her eyes.

She'd thought a lot about Tony and what had happened to him, often feeling riddled with guilt about not being there for him during that stage of his life. He'd gotten over it, Estélla always knew he would, but she saw some of the pain reside behind his eyes as he talked and the way he couldn't look at her when his lips moved, staring blankly at the sky like he was seeing something she couldn't.

"Tony I'm so sorry," Esté whispered, swallowing a lump that had risen in her throat at his words.

He just shrugged, snapping out of his daze and finally looking at her again. He didn't feel pain when he spoke but he did when he saw a tear fall down her cheek, having a detest for seeing his best friend cry since they were children.

"It's not your fault," he said with furrowed brows.

"I know but I feel so awful that I wasn't there for you afterwards, that I didn't reach out and I didn't call. I should've...that's a good friend should do and I..."

Her voice was shaky and Tony could see the regret building in her eyes, anger towards herself at something nobody could change, and something that Tony most certainly didn't hold against her.

Estélla felt sick at the thought of any harm coming to her friend. She hated seeing him fall when they were kids, hated seeing blood seep from grazed knees or a cut on his cheek. She had always been such a careful child while he was boisterous and adventurous, their dynamic making them work in perfect harmony when he'd run to her at nine years old with blood trickling down his arm, Esté always being there to clean it and cover it with a bandaid.

"Don't beat yourself up over that, Stella. You've always been the best friend I could've ever asked for. I'm still here, and you're here now too, which is all that matters, alright?"

She nodded, wiping a couple of tears from her cheeks and taking a few gulps of wine, washing away the emotion that had gotten the better of her for a few moments.

"I just don't like the thought of you being hurt, that's all."

Tony smiled warmly, the coldness behind his eyes melting away in the heart ignited inside his chest.

"Well that's why I wear the suit when I do my superhero fight things. Maybe I'll make you your own."

She scoffed and scrunched up her nose, "I wouldn't be caught dead in one of those things. No offence."

His grin spread wider and a laugh passed from his lips at her quick switch up of emotion, "And she's back, ladies and gentleman."

"Shut up," Esté kicked Tony lightly beneath the table, smirking at him in the glow of the yellow lights from inside the hotel, "Will you tell me about the stars?"

"You want me to tell you about the stars?" Tony said, brow raised in question at a request he was prepared for, though didn't think would actually be asked.

She just smiled with a nod, warm at the thought of the stars and the sky being the thing that carried Tony through his darkest moments and suddenly feeling a lot more interested in them than she had been since they were kids.

"Yes, Tony," she said with a patronising tone, "I want you to tell me about the stars."

She watched as his eyes lit up with happiness, gladly accepting his hand when he extended it out to her, pulling her to her feet and walking over to the edge of the terrace where they both stood with their arms leaning on the brick wall, Paris seeming endless ahead of them and beyond that, the world.

"That huge one here, see? That's Andromeda."

Estélla stared out at the sky and tried to follow where Tony was pointing. He drew a shape with his finger between stars but Esté struggled to make sense of what she was looking at, the same way she always had when Tony taught her about the sky.

Nevertheless, she adored how beautiful it was. The ebony behind the sparkling silver seemed like the most peaceful harmony, a breathtaking slice of something that Estélla felt was too beautiful for their world. And while Tony understood all of it, Estélla was just happy to understand him.

"And I'm pretty sure you can see Jupiter, that super bright one right there."

Esté narrowed her eyes when she followed Tony's arm again, smiling when she realised that she actually knew what she was looking at for the first time.

"It's beautiful," she said quietly, "All the stars too, so beautiful."

Tony glanced at her, smiling as he watched the sky reflect in her eyes while she gazed up into the night, genuine perplexity in a simple smile that graced her red lips.

He'd admittedly been taken aback when Estélla had grabbed his hand earlier that night, though a feeling in his gut moved his hand onto her thigh and it had stayed there until they said goodnight to everybody at the table.

She didn't mention the interaction when they took their seats together outside on the terrace, but as Tony sat adjacent to her and appreciated how beautiful his friend looked that night in Paris, and just how beautiful she looked looking at him, he found himself fighting the urge to reach out and touch her again, the consciousness of space between them feeling wrong.

The closest he got after then was having their shoulders brush together as they stared up at the sky, resisting the urge to take hold of her small hand inside his own despite being unable to stop dreaming about the feeling.

Estélla had been overwhelmed the entire day. From the moment she'd woken up to hearing Anthony reel off his speech of appreciation, Esté had been floored with a scattered mind, the only rational thing she could think to do to calm herself down at the dinner table being to grab hold of her best friends hand.

His touch calmed her down, it slowed down the rate of her heart and seemed to almost turn down the volume of the rest of the world, too. The feeling acted as a relief to her after her long day and Estélla had never felt as calm as she did when Tony placed his hand on her thigh beneath the table.

It didn't feel wrong, in fact nothing about having him touch her or look at her felt wrong at all. And so as she sat next to him out on the terrace, Estélla wished that her best friend would touch her again, noticing how cold her thigh had become without his hand there and how fast her heart would beat when he'd look at her and smile.

It was confusing and the feeling scared Estélla just as much as it had done when she'd almost kissed his lips on the night of his birthday, but she was almost certain that she'd wake up and feel normal again, the same way she had before.

And so with that comfort in the back of her mind that whatever fantasy they were living in that night was finite, Estélla was at peace with her shoulder brushing against Tony's as they stargazed above Paris.

"It's the stars that got me out of that cave," Tony said quietly as he traced the constellations with his eyes.

"My name means star in Latin," she turned to him, stating her fact with a smug smile on her lips, "Did you know that?"

He just looked at her, sighing quietly to himself as he lost the battle of keeping his smile a secret.

"I know, Estélla."