Tony Stark finally gave me what I wanted. His power and his indifference. Much to my surprise, it left me with a knot of uneasiness in my stomach.
I saw the attack in Monaco on the news. I didn't call to ask if he was okay. I also saw the attack at the Stark Expo, followed by Justin Hammer's trial. Again, I didn't call him. He didn't call me either. When I needed something, it was Pepper Potts who answered the phone and made the arrangements.
In the meantime, I was fighting another battle. After it was decided that I was fully recovered from my drug addiction, I checked in the best hospital in California to get rid of the scars on my face. Contrary to my first thoughts, the physical damage was completely reversible.
Because, why not? If there was magic in this world, I could only think of one suitable name for it: Money.
At first, I thought it would be simple. You pay the best plastic surgeons, they fix you. I couldn't have been more wrong. Especially when there was no one to support me, it was a consuming process. The dental implants took days. The surgery was even worse. After the operation, it hurt like hell. The bandages were extremely uncomfortable, turning eating, talking or sleeping into a form of torture. But the worst part was the stressful waiting. My nose, which had been broken a few times, was going to be reshaped. I knew it couldn't be worse than what I looked like now, but I just wanted my old self back.
Tony knew what I was going to go through, he probably knew it wasn't going to be easy. I desperately wanted him to show up one day, with a bouquet of flowers and tell me to get well soon despite all those terrible things I had told him. But again, I was too proud to back down, so I lied on that hospital bed for hours, all alone, my face looking like a mummy's.
It eventually came to an end. They removed the bandages, and thank goodness, there were only expected bruises and swellings on my face. In a few days, I was ready to go home.
The arrangement was simple: I was still 17, so I was going to live in his mansion until I turned 18, which was only a few months away. Then I would be free to go. Ms. Potts had told me so.
It was his personal bodyguard, Hogan, who came to pick me up. He was waiting just outside the hospital, leaning on a black, shiny Rolls Royce. He was alone. I remembered him. This was the same guy who took me to the hospital for the paternity test two years ago. He took my luggage and opened the car's door for me. He was kind, respectful, but distant.
When we arrived, I received the same treatment from Ms. Potts. Although I had overheard her discussing with Tony once and spoken to her a few times on the phone, this was the first time we talked face to face. I remembered her as well. She was the one who dealt with my grandparents after Mom's funeral. Today, she was ushering me to my room. Just like Hogan, she had professional, distant manners. It was like the two were judging me for being such an ungrateful daughter. Was this also a part of Tony's psychological war against me? Maybe I was just being paranoid.
But those thoughts only occupied a small portion of my mind. The rest was busy admiring the place. It was breath-taking. Tony knew how to live, I had to give him that much credit. The mansion was a true palace fit for the 21st century and the centuries to come. My room had only been furnished with the basics—the rest was left to my taste and needs, the same had been for my clothes—yet it would still be the most beautiful place I had ever lived.
Humans' weakness for luxury was a funny thing. It could tempt anyone. Or, it was just my excuse for my own deficiency to resist.
"Is there anything else you need, Miss Stark?" Potts asked as she stood at the door.
I wanted to break the ice. This was the only way to get to know her and decide whether she was really trustworthy. "Where is he now?"
"He spends most of his time in the workshop downstairs."
"I thought you'd become the CEO. Shouldn't he have found a new assistant by now?"
"He is having trust issues after Natalie—or, Natasha… I am doing this as his girlfriend, not as his assistant." If there was someone who could talk about her boyfriend like she was talking about a business partner, it could only be Pepper Potts.
"I hope this isn't too awkward for you." I needed her to lower her guard.
"I hope the same for you."
"No, not awkward for me at all. Congratulations then, both on the promotion and the relationship."
"Thanks."
Phew. Maybe it wasn't the sincerest introduction in the history of mankind, but it wasn't so bad either.
After she left, I started unpacking. Damn, I even had my own bathroom. Should I go downstairs and thank him at least? Or would that make him think he had won the war? The emotional stir I had been through at the hospital was gone now, so I didn't feel like a helpless little girl desperate to be protected by her daddy. Remembering how I needed him back there was embarrassing, actually. I had made my attitude clear, now I had to stick to it. My confidence was back, and hopefully this time it would stay with me. After all, with Mom gone, I was going to be alone for the rest of my life. I had to learn to live with it.
A mechanic, British-accented male voice interrupted my thoughts. "Welcome home, Miss Stark."
I turned around to see him, but there was no one to see. "Who is that?"
"I am JARVIS, the AI system created by Tony Stark. I run this house and Mr. Stark's other personal business."
"Right, an electronic butler."
"That's another way of putting it, Miss."
"An electronic butler with a sense of humor!" Then another fact occurred to me. JARVIS was also a surveillance system. "Are you awake 24/7, JARVIS?"
"Unless I am malfunctioning, yes."
"And how often do you malfunction?"
"So far, never." Was he proud? A computer, feeling proud of having never malfunctioned? This house was stranger than I had thought.
"So, this means you can tell him everything I do here?"
"I have very specific privacy settings, Miss Stark. I will not report any of your actions unless they pose a fatal threat to the members of the household."
"Or, unless Tony changes those settings," I mumbled to see if he could hear that, too.
Of course, he did. "Yes, Miss."
This was how I started living on the lap of luxury. Tony didn't avoid me on purpose, he nodded or say "Hey," whenever he saw me around the house, I did the same to him. Happy taught me how to drive—my mom was planning to teach me the next summer before she died—Pepper suggested to find me a school—right, there was a place called "school," I totally forgot about it—to continue my education in the next fall, but I chose homeschooling. I was too tired to handle the stress of adapting to a new social environment. I had plans for the future, so I wasn't going to waste away the summer. In my case, I mostly learned things myself, or asked JARVIS for help. After all, he was smarter than I could ever be. I met the guy in the military uniform who were standing behind Tony during the press conference, Colonel James Rhodes—or, Rhodey. He was cool. Strangely, the closest people around Tony Stark were good people, unlike Tony Stark himself. The ocean was too beautiful to resist, so I went swimming almost everyday. After all, it was summer time. And sometimes jogging along the beach, for a change and to discover Malibu. The media seemed to have forgotten about me, in the last seven months nothing significant had happened and there were always more interesting celebrity scandals to focus on.
The only thing I couldn't do was shopping, or other girly activities. Being a former model who quitted her career after pregnancy to start a fashion blog and write for fashion magazines, my mom used to be my personal stylist, she taught me how to dress, put on make up, get a cool haircut and stuff like that. Without her, I realized I couldn't even step into a store without bursting into tears. This was because I hadn't had the chance to mourn her. Everything had happened too quickly after her death. By the time I had time to think about her, I was too high to care. Now I was going through a mourning process that had been postponed for two years. Some things in life were inevitable.
I often had nightmares about the pit, or my mother. Sometimes I saw myself as an addict again, all my efforts to recover gone in vain. Or Mom accusing me of killing her father. One night, I woke up from one of those nightmares again in the dark. When that happened, JARVIS usually asked me if he should turn on the lights so that I could grab a glass of water, or go to bathroom to wash my face. This time, the entire mansion was silent.
"JARVIS," I called, still half-asleep. "Turn on the lights."
Nothing happened.
"JARVIS?" I get out of the bed, stumbling upon something in the dark.
No reply.
JARVIS was malfunctioning.
A/N: Thanks again for the reviews guys! Please keep them coming, I love reading them. As for the questions about where this story goes, it will follow the original MCU plotline, with some additional characters from the comics and maybe one or two OCs. Oliva Stark is my humble attempt to add another amazing female badass character into the mix and she will get much more interesting, I promise.