Pepper has a ring. Not like an engagement ring, because she's a whopping seventeen years old. That wouldn't work right, would it? No, it's a little copper wire ring that she got when she was eleven. She slipped it on her left ring finger and when her mother asked her if she wanted to get married, she was indignant. Pepper was way too good for a male, or anyone in her life, at least romantically. She could take care of herself. That's exactly what she told her mother. It had been her eleventh birthday and she spent the rest of it pouting in her room with unwrapped presents, convincing herself that she would never ever need a man. Locked her door and didn't open her gifts until her mother mentioned something about a toy piano the next morning.
Seems like nothing changes, or that eleven year old had a lot of power over her future decisions, because her mindset is stable on the choice that she could take care of herself and she still has that ring on. She can't take it off, but she's just telling everyone it's her favorite. Even if she's mistaken for being engaged every once in a while. She hasn't grown much from that birthday, except her for legs, which insist on growing so that her feet and hands aren't proportional and dainty and she looks like a doll or a fairy. Except a really ugly one. The ring has stretched into an oval and it's nasty and rusty and she really, really hates it. The 'P' engraved it is has looped and stretched so it's almost an 'O' or 'Q'. She really hates that.
"Here's a suggestion: go out with me."
Pepper's lip curls. "Here's a suggestion: kiss my ass." Her nails tap on the counter impatiently. Tony has showed up to the store every day since the first time he dropped by a month ago. It's just a craft store. Tony needed a notebook or something and that's when he noticed Pepper at the counter and he needs to get her out of that collared shirt (not like, take it off, but like, let me see you outside of this stupid store. And take it off.) that's part of her uniform. However, the rejection is becoming more and more hostile and Pepper is starting to believe it's only boosting his ego and convincing him even further that, yeah, she wants me.
It's giving Pepper a headache.
"Why are you even here? You're not gonna buy anything."
"If I do, will you go out with me?"
"Yes," Pepper says, sarcasm painting her tone obscenely, her lips drawing into a straight line. Her eyes narrow at him from behind a line of over-grown bangs. Honestly, she doesn't know why someone like Tony likes her. She's not an idiot, and neither is he, most definitely not, no matter how much he comes off as it. He's that smart kid who lives in the neighborhood away and goes to a Catholic private school and drives a drop top and will sometimes have a bruise under his eye because (and everyone knows) he's hit. By which parent, Pepper hasn't figured out or looked into. Then, he'll be wearing his hood up and he'll stop coming by the store for a day or two.
The school he goes to isn't for people. It's for prisoners. Her eyes would travel up to where a pointy tower rose, like a witch's hat, three stories above the entrance. Below the tower was a clock, and on each side of the clock was a small pointy tower. The whole building was four stories high in the highest part, the middle section. The rest was just three, but each story was very tall. Yeah, it wasn't made for people. It was made for witches with plenty of room for their hats. Each boy wore an unchanging uniform, and once in a while, Tony wouldn't bother changing out of his. Khaki pants and a dark navy sporting suit jacket over a white button up with a tie. He always wore sunglasses, but when driving past the asylum on her way to her own relatively normal public school, she noticed his lack thereof. He had plenty, in different shapes and different colors. The most frequently worn ones had a black, square frame with dark purple lenses.
Yeah, Pepper's been watching him, but she didn't know he'd been watching her. She's boring and has a scrunchie on most of the time and she's shapeless and blah. And yeah, maybe he goes to an all-boys school and maybe just seeing a girl that talks to him catches his interest but they live in Marin, California. There are plenty of other beautiful girls in the populated area to choose from. Not someone working at a craft store with absolutely no characteristics.
That's what she is. She doesn't have any characteristics because she has no character. She's a black hole. And it's confusing her! Tony's attractive and successful and everyone knows it, but…
He's alone. Just like her. Maybe that's where the appeal is coming from. Still, pity doesn't rise in Pepper's chest. No, pity-dating him wouldn't end well for either of them.
"Really?" And he sounds like a small animal offered food with his ears perked up if animals could talk. Pepper just raises her eyebrows in the universal sign for 'you're kidding me, right?' and Tony slumps down in dejection. He's like a cartoon character, to Pepper. Maybe she'll sketch him with a big head and small body with a bunch of tiny hearts over his head in infatuation. Then she can draw a homely girl with a pony tail beside him. At the top will be a giant question mark.
One of the boys in her Physics class, Steve, always draws. He sits by a large window that lights up his sketch book and has neat hair and doesn't say much at all except to a boy named Bucky who's much louder. She's never spoken to him but she wonders if she can ask him for art lessons.
"How come?" he'll ask.
"I'm trying to figure out some weird short kid who likes me and I think a caricature of us will help me delve into him and discover his deepest demons."
Then skinny-ass Steve will never talk to her ever again. She turns around to fold some of the fabrics that she's purchasing for a project, because while she can't draw, she sure can costume. Home economics is probably the only place she feels truly secure. Not that'd she'd wear anything she actually makes, but she's good at sewing.
When she turns back around, Tony's gone.
"Why do you work at such a butch store?" Tony's sitting on the counter, his legs dangling off the side. He's pushed the candy rack aside for room to sit his ass on and two 3 Musketeers have already fallen off. Fumbling with a bouquet of plastic flowers that he's purchased and a pair of scissors, Pepper watches with exasperation as he snips the flowers off their stems. He sing-songs: 'Goodbye receptacle, goodbye sepal, goodbye filament," each time he destroys the fake plant. What a freak.
"Probably because I'm butch," Pepper says, reorganizing the candy bars. She's given up on pushing him out of her personal space, because it's embarrassing to not be strong enough to shove a kid that probably only consists of 140 pounds off of her counter-top. Customers had been watching, and she'd given up by dropping her head onto his back and letting out a groan. She could feel his spine through the fabric of his button-up and could smell a mixture of cologne and something that smelled like graham crackers. It was almost pleasant, the cloth on her forehead and his actually not-too-bad musk, but his cocky little chuckle had him snapping her head up instantly after she lingered a little too long.
There's a 'goodbye stigma,' and then a plastic piece falls to the wood before he looks over his shoulder at her with a raised eyebrow and once again inquires: "Really?"
Pepper opens up her economics textbook and skims through her sticky notes pasted in it, and mutters: "Yes. I fit into stereotypes for your amusement. That's why I work here, you know."
He shrugs, and Pepper's not looking at him, because she's reading about accounting frauds, and he says: "It'd be hot, I bet. Up on another girl, with your tight little—"
Pepper slams her textbook shut. Her smile is big and all-teeth and her knuckles are white around the spine of her book. A few customers look their way. "Tony. Get out." When he looks over his shoulder, Tony's lips are pulling upwards awkwardly, as if its a grimace. He flinches when she sternly says: "Now." Hopping off the counter, leaving behind a mess of leaves and stems but still with half the bouquet in tact, he sets the scissors down.
"Sorry, that was perverted. Sorry—"
"Now," Peppers fingers clench around the book and Tony's mouth parts a little and his eyes go from her grip to her mouth and ambles there for far too long and Pepper is sure he's about to kiss her but instead, he reaches for her arm. She's not quick enough to pull away.
Dragging her wrist to his chest, Pepper glares. "Let me go."
"I'm sorry." His grip is strong and its leaving prints in her skin but it doesn't hurt. Even if it looks like it does. Then, like fucking magic, his other hand drops the flowers and he pulls off her stupid ring with ease. Her line of vision falls to her finger, and its almost surreal. The skin there is irritated and imprinted with a red circle and she makes a little squeak. It's off. He lets the copper piece go and it clatters the floor. When she looks back up to him, he lets her go. She rubs her wrist and ring finger immediately, stepping as far away from him as her limited space will allow her. "Sorry, that thing was really ugly."
"Get out."
And Tony does.
Pepper's starting to believe the regular customers are only coming around to see what's going to happen between them now. Her peripheral vision isn't failing in receiving the glances and she swears someone squeals when Tony saunters in, his uniform in place and white sunglasses propped up on his nose.
Last night, Pepper presented her hand to her mother and her mother cleans up the marks with various creams until it's not so harsh of a red. The skin would definitely become furiously infected if she had left it on any longer.
Pepper opens her mouth to speak when he approaches her, but he lifts a finger to his lips and shushes her. An unimpressed expression falls over her face and she crosses her arms, a brow quirking on her forehead. She's been doing that a lot. The black messenger back slung over his shoulder is opened and searched through, and then he's presenting a flower crown with the remaining roses from yesterday. It's white and pink and she loathes it already. He places it on her head, and her hands shake because she hates it.
"I found hot glue in my garage," he says, looking at her with some sort of satisfaction behind his douche-y glasses.
"I don't like you, Stark," Pepper finally growls. She doesn't yell though, because that's unprofessional. And Pepper Potts is most definitely professional. His expression doesn't fall, he doesn't ask 'Why? Look at me! How can you not?' Like she's expecting. Instead, he shoves his hands in his pockets and looks at her like she's the most beautiful thing he's ever seen. Which is stupid because she's not pretty.
He doesn't even respond to her speech, just contradicts her thoughts and goes: "You look so pretty always."
Pepper sighs and reaches up for the crown, pulling it off and looking at it with a small smile that she doesn't realize crept onto her face. When she looks up at him, she's searching for a smirk or something that implies that this is a joke. She doesn't find anything.
"Pick me up at seven."