A/N: This takes place post A Night of Neglect. Other Glee episodes don't happen in this AU.
There was a disco ball attached to the ceiling and multicolored lights were bouncing all over the walls and gyrating alumni at MIT's auditorium.
It was a batch reunion and Rhodey had dragged Tony into it.
Tony wasn't really one to look back and commemorate stuff that happened years ago. It distracted a lot from the future. And he was a futurist.
Well, at least there was good booze.
Waiting for his order and after flashing the usual dazzling smiles at the occasional passing women, Tony turned back to survey the crowd on the dance floor. Rhodey dancing in his tight pants and patterned shirt (unbuttoned at the top) fit in the 80s theme pretty well.
Tony was similarly attired but wore his yellow tinted sunglasses to complete the look. Just because he disliked reunions didn't mean he wasn't going to look great in it.
He scanned for familiar faces on the dance floor but couldn't find any. It was either he didn't know any of these people or he wasn't good with faces—and knowing him, it was probably the latter.
There was a woman that caught Tony's eye, however.
She was dancing and giving absolutely zero people a single mind. She turned, her head thrown back in beat with the music ("Party All the Time" by Eddie Murphy) and Tony couldn't take his eyes off her. Not with that shiny, shimmery backless halter top and tight holographic leggings on those legs that went on for miles.
She had that 80s hair where everything was wavy to the point that it could be called frizzy and it made Tony want to run his fingers through it.
Finally, he thought. Some life at the party.
There was a faint thunk. Tony's drink was ready.
After downing it in one gulp, he tucked his collar up and sauntered over to the lively woman.
She was doing a body wave a la Madonna and just as she finished turning, he caught her by the hand. He grinned. She grinned back, unfazed at the sudden dance partner.
Instead of dancing alone this time, she let him join her. Their hands clasped together and she led the dance, pulling him as she moved back and then pushing him as she moved forward.
"Party aaaalll the tiiime," the woman sang and she sounded great, better than Murphy even.
...
Tony didn't start a conversation until the song ended and she pulled him back to the bar.
She ordered her drink before turning the most seductive pair of blue eyes on him. "Nice moves, hot stuff."
"Dance lessons when I was 16." Tony shrugged dismissively. "But you, on the other hand, you can sing!"
The woman blushed and grinned. "Music's sort of my thing."
"You a singer?"
"When I want to be." She eyed him a little bit before asking, "You look familiar. Have I slept with you before?"
Tony barked a laugh. He knew there was a reason he liked her at first glance. "I think I would remember if you did."
"Hmm." The bartender slid her drink over to her and she took a long sip. She studied Tony again, trying to put a name to the face.
Tony decided to help her out and said, "Tony Stark."
Her eyes widened in recognition. "The billionaire playboy!" she said and Tony couldn't help but be surprised at that. He had expected her to say something along the lines of "Stark as in Stark Industries?" or "The Tony Stark?" Playboy wasn't even in the running. He mentally shrugged. It wasn't like that wasn't untrue.
He flashed her a charming smile, the one he knew no woman could resist. "And you are?"
"Holly Holliday."
Tony had a few words to say about that name but knew enough from experience that he should keep his mouth shut. Doing otherwise was just asking for a slap to the face.
Tony leaned an elbow on the table top and watched as she ate all the olives of her extra dry vodka martini. He couldn't make her out so far; he took a risk. "Let me guess, you're from Music and Theater Arts."
Holly blinked at him before realizing what it was he just said. "Oh, I'm not a graduate here."
"So, you're with someone."
"Nope." She popped the P of the word and didn't seem at all forthcoming about helping him out to the answer.
"Wait a minute. You didn't graduate from this school and you're not someone's plus-one, either. Why are you here?"
Holly looked at him like Tony wasn't making any sense and then said, "Cause there's a party! Duh!" She laughed and the corner of Tony's mouth curled up at her response.
"So, you just appear in all the college reunions, huh?" Tony asked, wondering how she managed to get in in the first place.
Holly winked at him. "Only where there are billionaire playboys."
Tony had no idea if she was flirting or was actually after sex and his money. But despite the voice in his head telling him to walk away and find another girl who was easier and not as mind boggling, there was something about Holly's bluntness, about how straightforward she was with him that made him want to stay and see this night through.
"How about I give you a tour of the school?" he asked her.
She grinned and said, "I thought you'd never ask."
…
The chemistry lab was locked but even years after having graduated from MIT, Tony knew where the keys were kept.
They went inside.
Looking around, Holly wore a mischievous glint in her eye behind the sunglasses she swiped from him and immediately started going through the cabinets, taking beakers and other lab equipment and mixtures.
"What are you doing?" Tony asked her, wondering if she even knew what she was doing with those chemicals. Some of them were explosive when mixed together.
"Science experiment. Now hush. Miss Holliday is demonstrating."
Tony shook his head slightly, telling himself to relax. He opted to watch her, trying to figure out what it was she was doing and intervene if it became too dangerous.
Tony wasn't expecting her to sing though.
She had looked up at him through the sunglasses and Tony remembered thinking how attractive she was standing inside a lab when she opened her mouth and out come Tom Lehrer's The Elements Song.
"There's antimony, arsenic, aluminum, selenium," she sang, mimicking Lehrer's nasally deadpan voice. "And hydrogen and oxygen and nitrogen and rhenium…"
Tony immediately forgot all about the experiment he was supposed to be monitoring and instead was left amazed at the fact that she had the freaking time to memorize The Elements Song and have the breathing capability to sing it.
As she sang and worked, she occasionally looked at him and nodded at him to sing along.
Tony shook his head at her. There was no way he was going to be caught dead singing that.
"And iron, americium, ruthenium, uranium," Holly gasped for breath and then cried, "Come on, Tony! Europium, zirconium, lutetium, vanadium—"
What the hell, Tony thought.
"And lanthanum and osmium and astatine and radium," Tony sang, finally joining in. Yes, he knew all the lyrics to the song. It was among the stuff he retained in his memory from his brief time in high school.
They sang the next lyrics together and as they ran out of air and gasped for breath, Holly mixed her substances together and Tony's eyes widened.
He quickly rounded the table and tackled Holly down, twisting their bodies so that Holly was on top of him and Tony's back got the full brunt of the landing.
Just as he hit the floor, the mixture exploded. Fire briefly lit up the whole room and then it was gone.
"Are you crazy?!" Tony asked her, angry.
Holly repositioned herself so that she was straddling him. "Well, I had to get you on your back somehow." She grinned and Tony didn't know whether to be mad that she almost burned down the lab (that was exaggerating things a bit, but a little warning would have been nice!) or amused at how far she'd go to sleep with him.
He ended up laughing. "You knew that was gonna happen?"
"I'm a substitute teacher, babe, and that means, I know everything there is to know about every subject. Chemistry's my jam. One time, I had my kids cook me up some medical grade marijuana!"
Tony blinked at her. "You're kidding."
"Of course, I'm kidding. It was just a tiny bit of coke."
Tony shook his head, marveling at the somewhat lose canon sitting astride him. He never knew if she was telling the truth everytime she opened her mouth.
They just didn't make women like this anymore—the kind where you didn't know if she's going to kill you or make you feel alive doing something stupid.
"You're really somethin' else." He pulled her down on him and kissed her right then and there.
Holly pushed him away with a hand on his chest and sat up again. "Hold on, hold on."
That was a first, Tony thought.
"I have some rules."
"What rules?"
"I don't do romance." At Tony's raised brow, she clarified, "I do sex."
"What a coincidence! Me too!" Things were just simpler with sex only.
"That means no personal information."
"You just told me you're a substitute teacher!" Tony said, pointing out that she had already broken her rules a moment ago.
Holly cocked her head and looked at him like she knew something he didn't. "Am I? Maybe I lied to get in your pants."
Tony's mouth twitched. Everything she had done and said so far had made him wonder if she was a real deal or was somehow playing a role.
"Is Holly Holiday even your real name?"
She shrugged smugly, lips sealed.
"Fine. But why the rules?"
"Well, it's fun isn't it? Being a different person every day, doing something spontaneous. Life is never boring."
"You're an actor then."
"Shh." Holly giggled, pressing a finger to his mouth and started lowering herself down again. "Just let me take you for a ride."
…
Tony woke up the next day to a pissed off janitor that looked a lot like Hugh Hefner. He had a silver mustache resting above his lip.
"You kids come in here and expect me to clean up all your nasty fluids!" he cried as Tony got up and quickly started locating his clothes. "Well, I'm not scrubbing the floors again. You do it!" He shoved the mop in Tony's hands.
Tony didn't take it, letting it clatter to the ground. He finished zipping up his pants. Man, these were tight! But Holly had easily—
He quickly clutched the janitor in the arm. "There was a woman. Blond, legs that never ended, might be a little bit insane. Did you see where—"
"No woman. Just you and your pink ass." He shook his head and walked out the lab, but not before he sent Tony a judging look.
Tony stood alone in the room, realizing for the first time that this was what women felt when he stole away before they woke.
He looked around him. There wasn't even a sign of Holly anywhere except for what remained of her experiment. It was like he had dreamed her up but he wasn't even drunk last night for that to be possible.
A thought occurred to him and he immediately pulled out his wallet, a sickening feeling in his gut that she had stolen his money or cut out his kidney and sold it in the black market.
But no. All his cards were accounted for, even the cash. Not a single thing missing.
Tony sighed. She had told him what it was she was after. Sex and sex only. For some reason, she didn't stick around for the romance or the personal information or anything else that could lead to a relationship.
It wasn't like he was after a relationship. Him? Tony? In a relationship? Pssh.
But still he wondered what everyday would be like with her.
He tucked his wallet back in his pocket and—
There was something in his pocket.
A note.
Had a BLAST (if you know what I mean).
I'm keeping the shades.
-Holly.
Tony couldn't help but chuckle. Even when she wasn't around, she still managed to surprise him.
Tucking the note back in his pocket, he filed the memory of the night in a mental folder. Who knows, maybe he'd see her again one day.