Chapter 2
Disclaimer: Not mine; don't sue.
Prompt: 003—Red
Rating: K
Summary: Virginia Potts had never had much luck with nicknames.
Virginia Potts had never had much luck with nicknames.
Her first nickname, the one her father gave her the day she was born, hadn't been all that bad: Ginger Cat, short for Virginia Catherine. No one called her that after her parents divorced, and it was definitely too childish for a grown woman anyway.
Once she started school, people started calling her Red. This infuriated Virginia, who didn't care to be defined by the color of her hair. The more she complained, however, the more people (boys, mostly) insisted on referring to her as "Red." This form of teasing got worse, of course, once she hit junior high school and the boys' hormones kicked in. It ended in high school, when the boys started realizing that Virginia Potts never went out with any of the guys who called her "Red."
By then, she had resigned herself to "Ginny." It was too pedestrian for her tastes, really. But at least it was a traditional nickname for "Virginia," and, besides, "Ginny" was what her mother called her. (Unless Ginny was in trouble, at which point her mother referred to her as "Virginia Catherine.")
At first, she was irritated when her new boss added yet another nickname to the list. Each time he called her "Pepper," she crisply replied, "My name is Virginia, Mr. Stark." Mr. Stark, being Mr. Stark, paid no attention to her protests.
Everyone at Stark Industries was soon calling her "Pepper." After all, it was Mr. Stark's company. If Mr. Stark said, "Don't bother me with this; call Pepper," not only would the employees call her, they would call her by the name Mr. Stark had bestowed on her.
She wondered occasionally whether Tony Stark's insistence on calling her "Pepper" was motivated by an impulse similar to the ones that had caused her male classmates to call her "Red."
She decided that even considering the matter was unprofessional.
She also decided not to tell Mr. Stark, about six weeks into their professional relationship, that she had realized that she quite liked being Pepper Potts. Pepper seemed, somehow, to suit her personality better than Ginger Cat, Red, Ginny, or any other nickname did. She did, she admitted to herself, feel rather peppery—quick-witted, energetic, even (in a thoroughly professional manner, of course) spicy. At last, she thought, a nickname she could live with.
As long as Tony Stark didn't discover that she liked it.
Disclaimer: Not mine; don't sue.
Prompt: 004—Black; 005—blue; 006—green; 007—gray; 008-brown.
Rating: K
Summary: She's never liked black at all; that's the irony of it.
Author's Note: It's probably cheating to include so many prompts in one drabble, but all those colors just made me start thinking about Pepper's relationship to color.
She's never liked the color black at all; that's the irony of it.
Every morning she picks out yet another black outfit to wear. (Occasionally, if she's feeling daring, she'll substitute navy blue or a dark gray or a somber brown.)
It's not only a matter of looking professional, she tells herself; it's a matter of looking distinguished. Black jackets and pencil skirts set her apart from the women whose dry-cleaning consist of warm blues, deep reds, or frilly pastels. Those women are disposable, at least from Tony Stark's point of view; Pepper Potts is the permanent fixture in his life. The women may not get the point Pepper's making, but it reinforces Pepper's self-esteem.
Self-esteem is a necessary quality when your first professional assignment most mornings is to escort your boss' latest conquest out the door.
Blacks (and navy blues and grays and browns), however, are not the colors she wears in private. At home, or on the rare evening out, she prefers jewel tones. She goes to yoga class in canary yellow, cooks dinner with a turquoise tunic over her jeans, lounges around the house in a gypsy skirt that combines emerald green and amethyst.
She loves the way that skirt twirls around her ankles when she dances to the music on her stereo system. Her love of the colors, the movement, and the fabric, she supposes, reveals a sensuous side of her nature that no one in her professional life would suspect.
At least, she would hope that one individual in her professional life doesn't suspect it.
If Tony Stark even suspected that side of her exists, Pepper suspects, she would need to change her name and move to another continent for protection.