Growing Pains
There was a continual stream of people in and out of Peter’s infirmary room over the course of the following week. Tony had gotten used to seeing different staff members of the like popping their head in for necessary tasks; nurses for wound care, techs for lab work, therapists for P.T — it wasn’t a surprise to see someone else occupying the room alongside the recuperating kid.
Seeing Steve Rogers, however — that was a surprise.
Tony came to a sudden halt as the sliding doors spread open for him. It may have been early in the morning, and he may be far from a morning person to begin with, but he had gotten enough sleep last night to know that his eyes weren’t deceiving him.
Sure enough, Steve looked up from his seat at Peter’s bedside and gave an acknowledging nod.
“He’s pretty out of it, from what I can tell," Steve’s words were hushed in tone. “I had faith you guys would figure that out.”
In the half-minute that it took him to absorb the surprising sight, Tony went from frozen in the doorway to quickly shaking himself of his stupor, sauntering into the room with a false sense of indifference.
Instead of heading for the empty chair across from Steve, he stationed himself where multiple monitors lined up flush against the wall, fixating his attention on the medical records filed away.
“Should have told me you were coming back. Would have thrown you a party,” Tony dryly greeted, typing on the keyboard and distancing himself for as long as possible.
Steve managed a small smile. “That’s why I didn’t tell you.”
“Oh cut the crap, Rogers.” Tony craned his neck around, ensuring that Steve could see his dramatic eye roll. “I’ve seen your dancing can-can girls from the forties. You love to put on a good show.”
Steve’s chuckle practically broke through the growing tension in the room, nearly eliminating it entirely. Tony glanced at him from the corner of his eye, noticing that his smile seemed a little less forced this time around, more natural, dare he say relaxed.
At the very most, it gave him a sense of what to expect— what type of atmosphere was about to lay its groundwork between them. He was already caught off guard by the man’s sudden and unannounced return, not to mention it had been a hot minute since they last spoke to each other.
And it wasn’t like their last days spent together were picking daisies from the garden.
Tony found himself clicking away on the keyboard in front of him, reviewing information he already knew or could easily assume. Anything that kept him distracted.
It didn’t take long for him to notice that his presence had made little to no difference for Steve. The soldier stayed seated in the plush, upholstered armchair at Peter’s bedside, his focus was unbreakable on the teenager that was so out of it Tony was sure an air horn wouldn’t wake him up. Blissfully asleep and heavily medicated at that, a tell-tale sign from large, red sticker slapped on the front of his IV bag, pumping drugs intravenously through his body.
Tony glanced at the clock near the bottom of the computer monitor; it would be a couple more hours before the kid would wake up. They had only been using the heavy stuff to get him through the night, that and rough patches of physical therapy. Looking to the bay window, the sun had barely started to rise, a pinkish-orange glow cascading into the dimly lit room.
“He looks a lot better,” Steve finally commented.
Tony jerked his head away from the window and towards Steve. He looked the man up and down, examining him. Despite the fact that he seemed well put together, barely a hint of a five o’clock shadow on his face and his shoulders taut like he could run a marathon, the half moon crevices resting underneath his eyes didn’t go unnoticed.
“I made a promise to you, Tony. I plan to keep it.”
Tony cursed to himself, blowing a sigh through his cheeks that he liked to believe released what frustration he had boiling inside. It was unlikely, but it at least got him moving.
A few clicks of the mouse — delete this, delete that — he was quick to wipe away any traces of his access on the computers before reluctantly approaching Peter’s bedside.
“He’s doing a lot better,” Tony reluctantly engaged, folding his arms over his chest along the way. He was sure to stand a few feet away from the empty chair on the opposite side of the bed, across from where Steve sat. “It got close there for a while but...he pulled through.”
Steve hadn’t looked away from Peter, a worn, hardened emotion coating his expression.
“He’s tough.”
Tony nodded. “Like you wouldn’t believe.”
Whether it was exhaustion at play or something more, Steve kept his focus on Peter, his stare omehow both intense and fragile all at the same time.
It was his eyes that gave it away for Tony. Something more laid beneath the surface, something that flashed beneath the fierce arctic blues containing an untold story begging to be heard.
“You need to be with Peter right now. Stay there, it’s for the best.”
Tony had been replaying that conversation in his head for weeks now, over-analyzing it in a way he did most things. Yet he never considered what he’d say when Rogers finally returned.
Tony bit the bullet and sat down across from Steve, though not before pulling the chair back a few inches. The distance helped him with...whatever this was. Insecurity? Shame? He shrugged it off for another time never to be dealt with.
“So not that I don’t normally take glutinous pleasure when SHIELD gives you a time out, because trust me, I do —”
“We’re fine,” Steve abruptly cut in. “Everything’s fine.”
Tony arched an eyebrow. “When are things ever ‘fine’ with SHIELD?”
For the brief moment that followed, Steve was silent. His lips parted with words that died on his tongue, his mouth running dry as he struggled to form a sentence. If his hesitance caused any suspicion on Tony’s end, the man didn’t let it show.
Finally, Steve shrugged, his movements slightly tight. “What’s there to say? They wanted to hear a story, we gave them one.”
Tony raised both eyebrows.
“You, Cap?" The corner of Tony’s mouth curled up despite the deep-seated tension churning within in. "The man who always plays by the rules went off and told bald-face lies?”
“Yeah, well...” Steve tore himself away from his inner musings, looking at Tony with a weathered smirk. “Sometimes the rules aren’t made with the best interest in mind.”
Tony laid his hands down in his lap, fingers entwining as he leaned back into his chair.
“So the three musketeers got away scot-free then?” he asked flatly, lifting one leg up and letting it rest on the bottom frame of the hospital bed.
"Would you believe that they already had a Doctor Strange on their radar?" Steve felt a quiet, exasperated smile pulling at his lips. "We went in thinking magic would be the hardest part to convince them of. I guess after Asgardian God’s and enhanced mutants, nothing surprises them anymore.”
“Huh,” Tony acknowledged, giving a noncommittal shrug. “Go figure.”
Steve crossed his arms over his chest, mimicking Tony’s body language. “Calling in a favor with Fury certainly helped.”
Tony tried to play dumb, keeping his expression neutral up until the moment Steve quirked a coy eyebrow.
“What can I say?” Tony gestured his arms out in presentation, managing to sound and appear completely unapologetic. “I’m not one to sit back and watch the shit-show, I like to be a part of it.”
Steve shook his head with a tired chuckle, his gaze once again falling down to where Peter rested.
Tony darted his eyes between the two, caught off guard by the soldier’s sudden fascination in what he personally considered to be a snooze-fest of a sight. Emphasis on snooze-fest — Peter was clonked out. If there was one thing Tony found to be the most boring thing in the world, it was Stark Industries board meetings and a sleeping Peter Parker.
He was close to making a joke about it, something about crossing the line of concern and creepy. Tony decided against it when that something flashed across Steve's eyes again.
What was that? Guilt? Commiseration?
There wasn’t a chance to ask about it. Steve uncrossed his both arms from his chest, looking Tony square in the eye as he did.
“Then you should know that Fury is going to want Peter registered under SHIELD’s directory of mutants.”
“What?” Tony straightened immediately, both feet planting on the ground as if he was about to shoot up from his chair and storm out of the room in protest. “Whoa whoa, wait, what? No, the kid’s not — he’s not running under SHIELD’s wing of propaganda, he —”
“Not immediately,” Steve interrupted, taking notice of Tony’s abrupt change in mood. “Legally, they can’t force anything on Peter until he’s eighteen. You know that. His identity can stay secret as long as he wants it to be, but SHIELD will get tabs on the Spider-Man business. Fury promises it’s only registration, nothing more.”
Tony scoffed, the sound of distrust heavy and thick. “You’re believing in promises from the man who faked his own death?”
“There are different rules for us, Tony,” Steve insisted, his voice strained but firm. “We don’t have a choice in this Peter won’t have a say, not after...”
The unspoken hung in the air, teasing the anticipation of resolution only to dissipate in the white noise that stretched between them.
Tony didn’t rush to fill in what Steve didn't say. After all, there wasn’t an official name for the incident that started it all. The Brooklyn bridge accident? The fire mishap? The OsCorp tampered Chitauri catastrophe?
He shrugged it off; it was easier to leave the blip unnamed. The less attachment to it, the better.
“You accidentally get a minor killed once and they never let you forget it,” Tony wearily joke, trying to casually brush the subject away.
They had time to deal with that another day, another month, hell even another year. Time had become his mantra as of late. As long as they had time, everything else could wait.
It was almost as if Rogers could sniff out his internal struggles though, eyeing him with a tongue that fought to stay quiet.
“Even if that had happened...” Steve started to say.
Tony managed to hold back his eye roll. The man was so predictable.
“The burning building?” Steve brought up the sensitive subject with caution, tilting his head low with sincerity. “It wouldn’t have been your fault. It wouldn’t have been anyone’s fault.”
For a fleeting moment, Tony couldn’t find the strength to answer. There were few occurrences in his life that he never wanted to experience again, and the day in that park, in that abandoned warehouse, was certainly high up on his list. And although Rogers hadn’t been around for his little melt-down post-bunker rescue, he was sure the man wouldn’t be surprised to about the unwanted distance he tried to create between himself and Peter.
“A little more practice with that speech and you might sound like you actually believe it,” Tony bit back, his words dripping with sarcasm.
Steve remained unfazed by the retort. “I know it’s hard for you to believe, but it’s true. We try to save as many people as we can in this job. Sometimes it doesn’t mean everybody.”
Tony drummed his fingers alongside the armrest of his chair, never once making eye contact with Steve as he spoke. Too raw, too personal. It took every ounce of his energy to ignore his gut screaming ‘walk away, Stark. You’re free to walk away, you don’t have to talk about this.’
He stayed seated instead. A dull ache formed in the back of his neck, a headache growing almost like punishment to his actions.
There were weeks to stall on the conversation and though Steve’s arrival was a surprise, one Tony greatly did not appreciate — birthday parties were the only surprises he enjoyed, if that — it was time they hashed it out.
They had been sitting in limbo too long, since the night Peter revealed his identity to the team, since the moment this all formed into the nightmare it had become.
“But you were right.” The words tumbled out of his mouth before he could shove them back in. “His life is my responsibility. He goes down and that’s on me. Always has been.”
Steve seemed to soften a little bit. The thunderous tension clouding him wavered with the hint of a smile perking up his expression.
“It won’t always be," he said in turn, earning a look of surprise from Tony. "He’s a kid now, but give it a few years. He’ll grow into his own shoes.”
Tony swiped at his nose with his thumb, shifting uncomfortably where he sat.
“You know, his aunt’s encouraging this schmuck now,” he mentioned, eyeing Peter as he slept in the bed, absentmindedly wishing the kid’s gentle snores would distract him long enough to stop blabbering on. “I can’t stop thinking that...that I signed his death warrant by even getting him involved.”
To his surprise, Steve replied without missing a beat. “You haven’t.”
Tony shot his head up with an incredulous look. “I’m sorry, aren’t you the same guy who patronized me for recruiting a fifteen-year-old-teenager?”
Steve gave a one-shouldered shrug. “I’m not as proud as you are, Tony. I’m able to admit when I’m wrong. And you were right, I didn’t know Peter, not then.”
“You don’t know him now,” Tony insisted, shaking his head to clarify his point. “I tell him to stay out of this mess and he’ll jump in head first.”
“It’s not a mess,” Steve corrected, a small apology laced into his tone along the way.
“You’re right,” Tony interjected, his tone growing colder with each word spoken. “It’s a war.”
He stared at Steve head-on, knowing they both echoed the argument in their heads, bitterly wondering what kept them from staying on the same page for longer than two seconds at a time.
And though their disagreement back then had ended with harsh words and the slamming of doors, Steve didn’t engage in hostility this time around.
With a tight-lipped smile, he met Tony’s gaze. Firm and sincere. “Then I guess we need all the soldiers we can get.”
Tony stared at him, his expression grim, somber. He ignored the swell of his pulse that increased with an onset of anxiety, his face hot with irrational rage. The kid threw a couple good punches and suddenly Rogers was all for tossing him into the battlefield?
‘Bullshit,’ he thought. Peter wasn’t a product of war. Despite having recruited him for bigger things, the kid was too good for that.
“Peter’s not a soldier,” Tony vehemently said. “Hell, he’s barely a man and yeah,” he turned to the bed where Peter laid, pointing his index finger at the sleeping kid. “If you can hear me I said that, twerp.”
Steve chuckled, smiling with a warmth that seemed genuine and yet in every sense of the word pissed Tony off.
“What?” he snapped, looking away from Peter with a scowling frown.
Steve held his hands up in a placating manner. “It’s just nice. Seeing you...let someone in like this. You’re different around him. Better." Steve paused. "You care for him, a lot.”
Tony rolled his eyes, stiffening. “For Christ’s sake — lay off. He gets the same treatment from me as anyone else.”
“I’ve seen you interact with others, Tony. This ain’t that.” Steve jerked his head towards Peter and the bed they sat around, as if further indicating what he meant. “It might be presumptuous to say that we’ve all noticed it.”
Tony squinted his eyes in a way that highlighted his discontent. “Presumptuous is correct. Just because those super-soldier legs of yours are capable of jumping to conclusions doesn’t mean you should, Rogers.”
The only response Tony received was Steve’s smile, the grin well-intended and still managing to further irritate him. It didn’t help that the man could say absolutely nothing and still speak a thousand words with one single look on his face. Tony had gotten used to that look being one of disappointment.
He wasn’t too sure what the expression said now.
The overhead paging system outside the room sounded, muffled from where they sat, and the quiet beeps from Peter’s heart monitor chimed in a rhythmic pattern. The companionable silence went on for an undetermined length of time, a pause in conversation that Tony was fine with until Steve cleared his throat to speak.
“You know, I’ve come to realize something about you,” he started, straightening in his chair. “You use things to express yourself and your…” Steve paused on the word, “affection towards others.”
Tony gave a short, derisive snort.
Steve held up a hand to forestall his dispute.
“Think about it,” he encouraged. “When you wanted to show the world that Pepper was your girl, what did you do? Buy her a ring. When you wanted to keep the team together, you gave us a home. And Peter? The question becomes what haven’t you given him. A suit, your tech, your time. Nearly gave him your life and expected anyone else to do the same.”
Tony’s jaw clicked with tension, so tight he could hear his teeth grinding against one another.
“Okay?” he conceded after a brief pause, shrugging with an exaggerated annoyance. “Isn’t that what this whole shindig is about? Willing to lay our lives down on the line to avenge those who deserve it?”
“Tony,” Steve chided, the bite in his words drowned out by his smile, his head once again nodding towards the sleeping occupant in the bed. “This ain’t that.”
Tony relented, his fingers harshly rubbing at his temples as he muttered a few foul-mouthed curses underneath his breath. He had gotten sloppy at hiding things in his old age. Or perhaps it was Pepper who had him slipping up — that was good, he blamed it on Pepper.
“So I have a soft spot for the kid,” Tony griped, propping his feet up on the bed’s lower frame again. “Big deal. That doesn’t mean I recruited him so he can die before his eighteen birthday — hell, I don't want him touching death until he's at the ripe age of one-hundred-six.”
Steve nodded emphatically. “None of us do.”
Tony kept his head low, eyes locked on his shoes and the floor tiles below that. Though Rogers was being a bit smug — “That man could eat an apple and you’d call him smug, Tones,” Rhodey once told him — he couldn’t dispute that the team’s act of convergence was an added benefit.
Witnessing them come together the way they had, desperate to help, determined to save the kid — it was unexpected, for sure, but he couldn’t express his gratitude enough.
His eyes looked up while his chin stayed close to his chest, seeing Peter and softening at the light snores that came through his slightly parted lips.
Who would have thought the kid could have such a way with people?
“You say he’s in this for the long haul, right?” Steve asked, tearing him away from his thoughts. “No convincing him otherwise?”
“Tried it once,” Tony stated flatly. “Didn’t end well.”
Steve nodded in sympathetic understanding. They both remembered all too well Tony’s tale of confiscating the suit and the fallen building shortly after. Between everything they had been told and personally witnessed, there was no doubt that Peter had the strength to endure any situation he was thrown into.
Still, there was no reason he should have to go at it alone.
“Then it’s best he’s got a group of people watching his back.” Steve smiled, whereas Tony looked at him like he had grown two heads. “A family to take care of him.”
“Who, us?” Tony gave a self-deprecating laugh. “That makes us one hell of a dysfunctional family, you know.”
“Yeah, well...” Steve shrugged, his grin slowly widening to show the whites of his teeth. “Aren’t they all?”
Tony studied him for a moment, his gaze hard, concentrating as if he could detect any lies solely from the way Steve appeared.
There was nothing, not even a hint of deceit. His words seemed authentic and genuine, no whistling bells or red flags drawing Tony’s attention.
It seemed that his hesitancy in Peter’s involvement had dissipated almost entirely since their last pow-wow’s together.
Tony counted that as a win in his book, especially after all they had dealt with lately.
“Yeah,” he mumbled, nodding along. “Yeah, I suppose they are.”
It was crazy to think that months had gone and passed since each escalating event they had dealt with, each layered on top of one other — the Accords, Siberia, the repeal, Barnes’ exoneration, re-banding the team — yet it was in that moment Tony finally felt closure to it all.
Finally feeling the weight lifted off his conscience, finally feeling free of past years burden — he could breathe a little easier with a little less baggage to carry around.
Tony found himself snapping his fingers in a way that hyped him up, a faint frown creasing his brow as he struggled to put words in the correct order
“Listen,” he started, adjusting awkwardly in his chair. “I’m not good at this stuff so just stay quiet for a hot second —”
“Don’t, Tony,” Steve interrupted, shaking his head. “You don’t have to.”
Tony frowned, annoyed. “Bold move for not knowing what I was going to say.”
"True." Steve nodded, his smile growing. “But I have a feeling I know what it would have been. And I would do it all over again in a heartbeat.”
Tony raised an incredulous eyebrow. “Which part?”
There was a pause, one Tony noticed that went on a millisecond too long. Steve never looked away from him, unwavering, blue eyes soaked with kindness only he could obtain.
“All of it,” he answered.
Tony’s lips twitched into a smirk.
The sun outside had come to a full rise, the half-drawn curtains behind Steve letting in a sharp stream of natural light into the room. Tony hadn’t even noticed, running his fingers through his hair as he sagged back into his chair.
For what it was worth, Steve seemed to relax as well.
It was crazy how their blaze of glory had turned ordinary, a near-death experience once again becoming a tale of action and reprieve. It would take time, certainly with baby steps along the way, but they could rebuild bonds on a new foundation.
A stronger foundation, this time around.
“Well...you still deserve a thank you.” Tony pulled in a deep breath. “Without you, there’s no way we’d have gotten half those doors open in the base. I mean, don’t get me wrong, I’m pretty strong —”
Steve laughed, giving an easy grin.
“Sure. Right.” He perked up, gesturing his hand towards Tony. “It was a team effort. Besides, it looked like you gave Dmitri one hell of a beating before he even got to us —”
“Yeah, but getting your shield to the kid like that?” Tony mentioned, without missing a beat. “Quick thinking there, Cap.”
“Wouldn’t have made a difference if he didn’t react on it,” Steve said, eyes set on Peter, oddly aware of how much younger the lad looked when asleep. “You were right in recruiting him. He’s good, he’s smart.”
“Yeah…” Tony nodded. “And he’s got heart.”
It was when Steve glanced over at him with a smile, appreciative at hearing his own words reflected back to him that it dawned on Tony what exactly he saw hiding beneath the soldier’s eyes.
It was never an emotion of pity, of sympathy or regret.
Steve related to the kid.
Tony could have laughed. The star-spangled-man had a connection with him. No wonder the look was so foreign; there were few people in this crazy new world Steve Rogers had awoken to that he could relate with.
And somehow, the kid became one of them.
To think that he'de recruited Peter months ago to try and get through to Rogers. Maybe he managed to do just that after all.
With a screw-it-to-all attitude, Tony let himself ask, “How’s everything with Barnes?”
The question hung in the air, frozen by Steve’s brief flustering.
Tony stared at him, his expression shifting from mild concern to annoyed impatience.
The silence that stretched between them staled the air. Steve would have answered sooner, had it not been for the unexpected startle that tightened his throat shut. Words seemingly dissolved on his tongue.
Tony had never asked about Bucky. This was the first time since...Steve couldn’t even recall. Despite being months stacked on months since Siberia, the name never seemed to leave his lips, he never had a reason to talk about the man.
It didn’t take long for Steve to realize why. He never asked because he never cared. Up until now, at least.
“He’s good,” Steve finally answered, swallowing hard. “He’s doing better. Thanks.”
“Good,” Tony answered succinctly, eyes noticeably looking up and away. “Good to hear.”
As wrong as it felt to take advantage of the moment, Steve also knew there was no better time than the present. It wasn’t often they had these conversations, the idea of going through another one tasking for them both.
So Steve leaned forward, lacing his fingers together with elbows braced on his knees. “Listen, speaking of...back there in the bunker, what you said about Bucky...”
Tony rolled his eyes. “You really like to re-live our least proudest moments, don’t you?”
Steve stayed somber, serious. He lowered his chin, asking, “Did you mean it?”
‘It’ didn’t need to be clarified. Tony’s shoulders tensing up with anxiety proved the point.
“I did,” Tony answered, short and clipped.
Steve nodded, leaning back in his chair slightly. “What does that mean? Where do you stand with him now?”
Tony eyed him conspicuously. “I stand here, in New York, where he is safely tucked away with King T’Challa in Wakanda. Unless you’re looking to put out room and board for the man, I don’t think it matters too much where I stand with him.”
The absence of an immediate response was suffocating in its wake. Steve’s lips set in a thin line, bobbing his head up and down though the action didn’t seem to meet his eyes.
“Yeah...” he muttered idly, his mind seeming a million miles away with his thumb rubbing over the curve of his jaw. “Right.”
Tony leveled a disbelieving look his way. “Something you want to tell me, Rogers?”
Before Steve could even open his mouth, the sliding doors behind Tony opened first. He looked up while Tony craned his neck around, the both them catching sight of Bruce standing in the entryway of the room — hand gripping the handle to a tray of medical supplies that hung at his hip.
“Steve!” Bruce greeted, exhausted features managing a wide grin. “When did, uh, when did you get back?”
Steve felt a smile tug at his lips as the scientist walked into the room, having already set the basket down on the bed so he could review the monitors scattered around. His focus was unbreakable, fiddling with wires and reviewing numbers even as Tony persistently poked him in the side.
“Hi, Bruce.” Steve gave a small wave. “Just recently, we landed around o’three-hundred.”
Bruce spared him a glance between pressing buttons on the infusion pumps. “Well I’m uh, I’m glad to see you guys are home. You — you guys, right? Or just...just you…?”
“Natasha’s in the training room,” Steve filled in knowingly, watching Bruce as he lowered the guardrail to the hospital bed on Tony’s side. “Said she needed to get her frustrations out. Not a big fan of the corporate hoopla.”
“Ah, yes, of course,” Bruce stammered, making a confirming hum in the back of his throat. “Good for her.”
“God, you are so obvious,” Tony mocked derisively, going to prop his legs on the mattress of the bed. Bruce slapped his knees away, twice.
“Is Clint back as well?” Bruce asked, his voice neutral as he shot Steve a sideways glance, stethoscope in one ear while he listened to Peter’s chest.
“Don’t act like you give two craps about Barton,” Tony sarcastically butted in.
Steve chuckled. “He’s back on the farm in Iowa. His family says hi.”
Bruce nodded, satisfied with what he heard from both Peter and Steve. He stood tall, his thumb rolling the clamp of the IV line that trialed into Peter’s arm, decreasing the amount of medication dripping through the catheter.
“Of course,” he echoed, more robotic this time around. “Good for him.”
“Wow.” Tony feigned offense, kicking his legs on the mattress and leaving them there now that Bruce was finished. “Should I tell Barton how less excited you were to hear about his safe return? Because really, the difference between your response to Romanoff and him is just astounding.”
“I don’t know, Tony,” Bruce wryly bit back, head titled to the side. “Should I tell Steve about how your hand was physically stuck to Peter’s for an entire eleven hours?”
Steve made a choking sound, one he hid behind a tightly closed fist. Tony shot him a glare before pointing a threatening finger at Bruce.
“Patient confidentiality breach. HIPAA would like to have a few words with you.” The finger wagged the length of Bruce’s body. “Take off that lab coat, you’re not worthy of it.”
Bruce rolled his eyes, barely paying attention as he logged vitals into his tablet. “Not how patient confidentiality works.”
Tony crossed his arms over his chest. “Is too.”
“Definitely not how HIPAA works,” Bruce mumbled.
“I disagree,” Tony childishly threw back at him.
Steve watched the two bicker with a humorous smile, his gaze flickering rapidly back and forth between Tony and Bruce, each responding faster than the last.
“You know, Tony,” Bruce turned to face him, stylus pen sharp in his direction. “Helen is fully aware you sneak in to review his medical records which is a breach, so —”
“FRIDAY?” Tony looked to the ceiling, smirking. “Dear, please tell Doctor Banner if there’s any record of me accessing confidential documents belonging to Mr. Parker.”
There was a pause, one that Steve wondered possibly involved protocols of his A.I erasing history before answering. Sure enough, her Irish accented voice came through the ceiling speakers with stern professionalism.
“No record, sir.”
Bruce narrowed his eyes. “You’re a dirty liar, Tony.”
Tony looked as smug as ever, crossing his legs that sat propped up on the bed. “And you, Brucey, have been schooled.”
Steve frowned, looking at Tony as his thumb pointed to Bruce. “Is that what just happened?”
Waking up sucked.
Peter would happily take five-hundred pop quizzes over the misery that accompanied waking up.
For starters, it never failed that for the first twenty minutes or so he could barely form a coherent sentence. It was as if someone had replaced his once incredibly intelligent brain with a soggy cotton ball instead. He had become determined that before he left this place he would manage a proper, sensible ‘good morning’ to the cute nurse who flushed his central line, but it didn’t help that she always arrived just when basic syllables were impossible to enunciate.
Still, that was nothing compared to what would come next. Laying still all night in a deep, blissfully medicated sleep would mean one thing for his poor bruised and battered body — waking up stiff as a board and in uncomfortable, pulsating pain. It felt like someone had replaced the fluids in his joints with cement.
Burning, fiery, hot cement.
“Baby, you have to eat something for breakfast,” May encouraged. “I had them make you waffles, your favorite. Come on, the faster you get moving the better you’ll feel.”
Peter made a disgruntled whine from his fetal position in bed. While May was right, moving around did manage to help the stiffness, moving around also meant moving around which hurt like a mother effin —
“L’ve me a’ne,” Peter dramatically mumbled, the side of his face deep in the stack of pillows behind his head. “I never wanna move ever again.”
May chuckled, and if he opened his eyes he was sure that she’d be staring at him with exasperation. But he was a teenager, he was allowed to be dramatic. That was his excuse, and until it didn’t hurt to move his toes when he woke up, he’d stick to it.
“Make you a deal?” she offered, scooting the over-the-bed side-table closer to his chest. “If you manage to eat just a little bit, I’ll give you your phone back today.”
Peter cracked one eyelid open. “You got my phone back from school?”
May nodded.
And just like that, Peter managed to woof down two and a half waffles drowned in syrup, scrambled eggs and a slice of bacon.
The rest of his morning was spent catching up on his phone, utterly shook to see how many missed calls and messages he received while he was away.
Of course, at least ninety percent of them came from Ned. But still.
Peter scrolled through the messages one by one, starting with the day he ditched school.
“You going to put that down anytime soon?”
Peter peered over his phone to look at May. He blinked twice, not realizing how dry his eyes had become, stars dancing in his vision from the sun blasting through the window ahead.
Slowly he could make out May’s figure, bent over and stuffing items into her purse.
“Sorry,” he sheepishly apologized. “There’s so much I have to catch up on!”
“Uh-huh,” May hummed, swinging her purse over her shoulder. “I’m sure the nerd clique is just bustling with activity.”
Peter gaped, feigning melodramatic offense. “Hey!”
“Put it down soon, mister.” May wagged a finger at him. “You’re here to rest.”
“I am resting!” Peter defended, gesturing to the bed he laid in and the blankets covering him. He hadn’t even moved from the curled up position on his good side — the painful lesson of not messing with his right side one he wouldn’t forget anytime soon — practically wrapped like a burrito in the softest blankest he’d ever had granted the pleasure of using.
“Don’t get smart with me, tough guy,” May jokingly threatened, a lighthearted laugh in her tone. “Or I’ll take that phone with me on my way out to work.”
The smell of coffee hit his nostrils before the doors to the infirmary room even slid open. Peter was a hairsbreadth away from letting May know that Mr. Stark was arriving when — woosh — the man already strolling into the room.
Damn, his senses really weren’t up to par lately.
“Mhmm, smells like teenage discipline in here,” Tony greeted, handing May one of the two styrofoam cups he had in his hands. “One for the road. What’s going on with the pip-squeak?”
“Thank you,” she replied easily, as if it was a common experience to have a billionaire hand her coffee — which for all Peter knew had become the norm for her, what with a missing week in his life having gone by. She nodded her head over in Peter’s direction. “Gave him his phone back this morning. He hasn’t put it down since.”
Peter frowned, head jerking back at offense to May’s tattle-telling.
Tony crossed the room, taking a sip of his coffee as he passed by Peter’s bed. Or at least that’s what Peter assumed, half his face being pleasantly smooshed into his pillows.
“Listen to Aunt Hottie, kid. Or I’ll take the phone away myself,” he warned.
“Pssh,” Peter muttered, eyes locked on the screen of his device. “No you won’t.”
A large hand dipped into his frame of vision, snatching the phone right out of his grip.
Peter gawked, staring at his fingers that gripped only air. He looked up, seeing Tony walking away with the device and pocketing it into his blazer.
Did that just…? He spared a glance to May, who seemed equally humored, doing a poor job at hiding her laugh behind a clearly fake cough.
“Oh, damn.” Peter sat up straighter in bed, smiling ear-to-ear. “It gotta be like that?"
Tony snorted humorlessly, smacking the side of Peter’s leg lightly with the back of his hand.
Peter watched him head for the recliner chair nearby with a blank expression, worried for a moment that he may have said something wrong. Normally Mr. Stark was quick to engage in witty banter with him, always one to throw it back faster than he received it. This time though, he kept any wisecracks to himself, wordlessly opening the laptop he kept in the room and filling the silence with clickclickclicks of the mouse and keyboard.
Peter looked away, slowly but surely adjusting himself in bed so that he was sitting up. First and foremost, he gave himself a pat on the back for not crying like a baby in front of Mr. Stark when he moved, because damn that still hurt. Moving still equaled pain. Noted.
As Tony typed away on his laptop, Peter convinced himself that he had to be busy — he had stuff to do. He was Tony Stark. He really needed to stop taking everything so personally.
“Alright sweetie,” May cut through his running-rampant thoughts. “I’ll be back later tonight. Behave.”
“Yeah,” Peter snorted, rolling his eyes. “Cause there’s so much trouble I can get into here.”
She stopped on her way to the doors, shooting him a glare that had him sinking against the cushions of his bed. “Mouth. Watch it.”
Tony let out a noticeable chuckle from his position across the room.
May shot him the same glare, an added finger wagging toward him thrown in the mix. “Don’t even, I think he gets some of it from you.”
Tony knew better than to respond. He instead smiled with charm, giving her a wave as she left the room. She returned it, blew a kiss to Peter, and went on her way.
The doors slid shut with an airy hum and Peter fiddled with the edges of his blanket, suddenly feeling oddly uneasy without the distraction of his phone.
It was strange. For the most part, he never even needed his phone, too busy sleeping to even use it. That was the nice part about his recovery; he slept, often. Everyone did more than just encourage the act, they urged it on, even when he wasn’t medicated.
Which was fine by him, it was like his body wanted him asleep, like a hibernation of sorts. He assumed it had something to do with the spider-bite. There were days after a rough patrol where he could sleep for eleven hours and still feel tired.
But sleeping was also nice. Sleeping kept his mind at ease.
He didn’t hear the sound of a laptop closing shut until a voice broke through alongside the noise.
“Alright Parker, what’s your deal?”
Peter dragged his gaze away from the doors, not even noticing he had been staring at them in the first place. He looked at Mr. Stark, who eyed at him from his spot on the recliner. The laptop had been closed and put aside, the man’s attention now solely on him.
“What?” Peter asked, fingernails digging into the seams of the blanket. “Oh, it’s — that’s — I’m just giving her a hard time. She knows it. We have fun.”
Tony quirked an eyebrow. “That? Yeah, that’s obvious.” He eased back into the recliner, seeming much more relaxed than Peter currently felt. “I’m talking about that fifty-yard stare you got going on. What’s that all about?”
Peter ducked his head low, hiding the blush that reddened his cheeks. He must have spaced out again. May mentioned he was doing a lot of that lately.
“It’s nothing,” he dismissed, about ready to curl up on his side again when a plop! landed between his knees.
Tony tossed him his phone, the device landing on top of the blankets. Peter wondered if he had short-circuited for a moment — looking down at the phone, looking up at Tony, down at the phone, up at Tony —
“Trade off,” Tony nonchalantly explained. “Now, a penny for your thoughts?”
Peter gave a sad attempt at a chuckle, his fingers still picking at the frays of the blanket. “You sure? No refunds.”
“I can afford the loss.” Tony followed his words up with a smile.
Peter nodded, though he couldn’t seem to shake the odd feeling that gnawed at his insides. A part of him wanted to talk about things, a part of him never wanted to utter a single word, and he was never sure which side would win in the end.
He managed a slow, deep breath to calm his nerves.
“I’ve just been thinking a lot lately.”
Peter had more to say. Really, there was a whole flood of things waiting to be unleashed. But he stayed quiet with each passing second that ticked on the clock, feeling embarrassed the longer it took him to talk.
Tony must have noticed, having gotten up from the recliner with a grunt and loud crack of his knees.
“Wow. Really? You don’t say,” he dryly joked, stretching his arms over his head. “Who would have thought a kid-genius like you would be thinking. Careful with that, it can be dangerous.”
Peter had been expecting him to leave the room when he first got up from his seat. It wasn’t like they were in the middle of a conversation, he couldn’t even manage more than a few words.
To his surprise though, Tony instead came closer to the bed, sitting down in the chair directly next to him. It was the same one he found May usually occupied. It was close. So close that May would almost always be holding his hand and still be comfortable from where she sat.
And now Mr. Stark chose to sit there.
It took everything in Peter not to tell Tony that he didn’t need to stay. It was a habit of his to easily dismiss people when he actually needed them most — ‘It’s okay, Mr. Stark. You’re busy, I understand.’ He didn’t want to push anyone away by making them think he didn’t want them around. Especially right now, because he did, he most certainly wanted people around after...
“Do you think...” Peter started to say, desperate to get any words out of his mouth. “Do you think that all this would have happened if I didn’t screw up?”
Tony blinked. “If you didn’t — what?”
The look of confusion that fell over his face was one Peter had never seen before. It seemed to grow more absurd by the second, as if he had been asked the most ridiculous, idiotic question ever spoken in existence.
Peter’s stomach fluttered with more anxiety, the part of him that never wanted to speak about things gaining the lead in its battle of tug-of-war.
‘Come on, Parker. You can do this.’ His thoughts hyped himself up. ‘You need to know.’
“If I had nailed Mysterio that night in Times Square. Or — or caught him when he broke into your lab to steal the helmet. Or...listen to you and not go into that burning building,” Peter’s voice dipped low as he asked, “Do you think this would have happened if I never got involved?”
Tony stared at Peter, lips pursed, brow creased. The cogs in his head failed to turn, practically grinding to an abrupt stop.
“I’m not following you on this, kid,” he said, a discerned tone of concern in his voice. “Are you blaming yourself for what happened?”
Another lull fell between them, one that required a great deal of patience for Tony to get through. He watched silently as Peter’s throat convulsed, the small muscle in his jaw tensing up as his upper teeth bit down his lower lip.
“Well...yeah," Peter finally admitted, head bowed and eyes looking down. “I mean, you even said I let Mysterio get away in Times Square. It was all over the Daily Bugle — everything I do has been scrutinized by the Bugle.” He let out a frustrated sigh, one that heaved his shoulders high. “Every time I try to help, I make things worse.”
Tony frowned. He titled his head to the side, hoping to squeeze his face into Peter’s line of vision. “You helped us with Awesome Android. It was your quick thinking that saved the day there, bud.”
Peter lit up at the use of the nickname for the creature they'd defeated, only to deflate shortly after.
“Yeah, but that’s like," he almost trailed off, "one good thing and there’s like, a million bad things that follow. I just feel like a giant screw up. Like I’m failing at everything.”
Tony pondered his words over for a moment, nodding absentmindedly. And as Peter continued to grip the blankets in his fingers, clenching and unclenching with a turmoil that was implicit, Tony couldn't help but notice the raw honesty in the feelings he vocalized out loud.
“You can’t win them all, Pete,” Tony eventually said.
"I know." Peter gave a slow, hesitant sort of nod, although his eyes were still glued to his hands. “But I’d like to win some.”
Tony didn't miss a beat. “You have.”
Peter's brow creased with confusion. “What?”
Tony adjusted in his chair, sitting up straighter.
“Dmitri — Chameleon? That was all your win, kiddo. Your take-down." Tony gestured a hand out towards Peter. "Hell, you saved both me and Cap from being sucked into the ocean with that fast-thinking of yours. Don’t let yourself get discouraged too easily just because the Bugle says a few crappy things about you to sell their newspapers.”
Despite his encouragement, Peter remained dejected. “You were right, though. The moment I mess up and it’s ‘Spider-Man: Thwarted by local street magician.’ So stupid.”
“Yeah, well...” Tony popped his lips, shrugging hard. “What do they know?”
Peter scoffed and rolled his eyes.
“No, seriously, what do they know?” Tony asked again, piquing Peter’s interest. He finally looked up from his hands, frowning deeply.
Tony met his gaze head-on. “Tomorrow’s issue isn’t going to be about Spider-Man taking down a psychopathic Russian spy in an abandoned, underwater, research laboratory bunker, all with two broken wrists, hypothermia, a concussion—”
Peter blushed with embarrassment. “Okay, I—I get it—”
“A shattered leg, a gaping hole in his stomach and back,” Tony went on, ignoring his protest. “And you still managed to knock that Bond wannabe flat on his ass. Don’t let some outdated, old fart of a journalist who’s a couple years away from retiring and starting a podcast get under your skin.”
Peter gave a soft, wobbly laugh that brought on the inkling of a smile. With it, the tension seemed to thin just enough that Tony felt comfortable leaning forward, resting a firm open palm on Peter’s shoulder.
“For every ten good things Iron Man does, there has to be fifty that the press doesn’t talk about. They will always pick and chose what the public wants to hear. That doesn’t discredit your doing, kiddo. You know in your heart what you’re doing is right.” Tony’s voice dropped a little, quieter but no less sincere. “And if I’ve been hard on you lately about that, well...I really have no excuse. I just want you to be safe out there.”
Peter nodded, letting his smile widen a tad bit more. The feel of Tony’s thumb stroking over the curve of his shoulder was grounding, comfortable. It reminded him a lot of the same feeling he’d get when he wore his suit — protection, safety.
“Thanks, Mr. Stark," he said, letting Tony his smile head-on.
Tony patted his shoulder before leaning to the side in his chair, grabbing his coffee cup from next to him along the way.
“Always thanking me, and I never know what for.”
Peter gave an easy smile and shrugged, a swell of warmth and gratitude replacing the butterflies of anxiety in his chest.
“For being here.”
Tony looked up from his coffee cup and gave him a wink — all charm, no bite.
Peter grinned as he picked his phone back up, though he was too distracted to really use it. He stared down at the device, flipping it around, caught up in his own thoughts.
He almost felt silly for having panicked earlier over what he’d say, about how he felt after this whole...man-napping business. It was just that he and Mr. Stark always had an odd relationship, never really defined, always bouncing between ‘he helps me do my superhero-ing and keeps me in line’ to ‘he’s like my mentor and teaches me all these cool things’.
But that had changed lately, since Homecoming, since Peter broke-in-but-not-really-broke-in to the Avengers compound. He wasn’t exactly sure what this was now, what they had become.
Peter didn’t care either way. He liked it.
Uncle Ben would always tell him to try and find the positives out of any situation he was faced with.
Peter smiled — he was pretty sure he just found one.
“Hey, Mr. Stark?”
Tony sipped from his cup. “Hm?”
“What are the chances of me actually going to Paris before returning to school?” Peter asked, pointing to his phone. “Cause like, my friends are going to want proof and Flash is going to say any photos I show him are photoshopped so I was thinking...”
As Peter rambled on, Tony shook his styrofoam cup, judging how much liquid was left.
He was going to need more coffee.