Thank you to everyone who read or reviewed the last chapter. Now for something different in honor of Steve surviving 98 years of life, a conversation not from the perspective of Tony or Steve's cell phone. I'm going to let you guess who "me" is in this chapter. I will let you know in the next chapter.

Also a quick note, any text message that has in parentheses (message not sent) was never forwarded to the other person participating in the conversation.

Steve is Nomad.

Interlude 1: Six-year-olds are More Mature than You

Nomad: I think Anthony has or at least had a crush on me.

Me: Good to know I won the pool but why are you not having this conversation with your counselor friend?

Nomad: 1, He is not with me on this mission. Only red and her advice is essentially just sleep with Anthony.

Me: Which would at least get rid of the toxic sexual tension (message not sent)

Nomad: 2, He said you were more qualified to handle this since you have a preteen. I don't get why he said that.

Me: Because even Ly is more mature than you two and she's 6 (message not sent)

Nomad: I'm not sure if Anthony still likes me like that because of what happened. I don't even really like myself right now.

Me: You both fucked up equally. Because of the fact that he's using the phone that you got him for emergencies to flirt via text message I'm going to assume that he still has a crush on you.

Nomad: You already knew about this?

Me: Everyone did except for you apparently. How are you just realizing this now? He flirted with you all the time. We used to call you guys mom and dad.

Me: Okay that was mostly just me and L.

Nomad: He flirts with you too. He flirts with everybody.

Me: Not like you.

Nomad: He had a girlfriend.

Me: Actually I think they've been over since probably December. He did show up to a very farmhouse Christmas alone.

Nomad: She was just working and guys who usually have girlfriends don't also want boyfriends too.

Me: I knew I should have L go over the LGTBA curriculum with you. I assume you never googled Tony Stark gay sex tape?

Nomad: I didn't want to invade his privacy. Also, you do realize that bisexuals existed in the 1940s?

Me: Because you are one. Yes I know. I'm a Spy. We notice things.

Nomad: I didn't notice a lot of things like the fact most people are now terrified of the fact I can bench press a Buick. Anthony being serious with the flirting was the least of it.

Nomad: Although, now I understand why he had that particular poster in his workshop.

Me: They were always terrified, but now they have twitter.

Nomad: Except it's more than empty threats behind a keyboard. A group of them blew up a federal building in the name of getting rid of people like me, using Howard's secret and dangerous tech to do it.

Nomad: Anthony was afraid of where things were going. He mostly went along with the Accords because he thought it was the best option to keep us all safe and together.

Me: And he underestimated how big of a dick Ross was in the process because he is an arrogant asshole.

Nomad: The crush makes it easier to understand why he did what he did.

Me: Why he went off the deep end when he realized you lied to him?

Nomad: Yes.

Me: Love makes you do irrational things, especially when you realize that person doesn't love you like you love them.

Nomad: I didn't say love. It's just a crush. I think he's over me or trying to get over me. Friday sent me the link to the video Best Thing I Never had the day before we started exchanging text messages. She followed up by sending Tears of a Clown after we started talking to one another.

Me: I hope Stark's AI isn't going off the deep end again. (Message not sent)

Me: At least it wasn't lemonade.

Nomad: He shouldn't like me anymore after what happened. We were absolutely awful to each other.

Me: Agreed. You can't change what happened, you can only move on from it. Now that you know, what are you going to do?

Nomad: I don't know

Me: L would suggest anger management and couples counseling. I would have you talk to her, but it's too dangerous and I don't think we'll be taking another trip to the island of Dr. Anthony anytime soon.

Me: On the bright side, he is paying L a thousand dollars an hour to help him work out his issues.

Nomad: I'm sorry about all of this. I wish I could talk to Nat.

Me: So do I, but there's no point in apologizing. I'm a grown-up. I knew what I was getting into.

Me: You, I'm not so sure about. Which explains why you're wandering around the world rescuing people in a new costume. (Message not sent)

Me: Hey Godmother, I have no idea if this burn phone is in the nearest lake, but you should know that you owe me 20 bucks because Captain Oblivious just realized that Shellhead has a schoolboy crush on him.

Me: Or rather Captain Oblivious just thinks that it's a school yard crush and is in denial about the fact that Shellhead is kind of in love with him, despite their fuck up.

Me: Shellhead is trying to buy his way out of it, but he's keeping Secretary Asshole away from my kids and came up with a way for me to see them, so maybe I'll forgive him eventually.

Me: L is running interference, but I wish you were here to help keep those two from doing more stupid thing

Me: Actually, I wish you would just come home. I miss you. You're still my friend after everything.

To be continued…

Friday's Tony Stark's complicated relationships soundtrack:

Best Thing I Never Had by Beyoncé

Tears of a Clown by Smokey Robinson and the Miracles

For those of you reading this on this site, I'm sorry I can't link videos here, but there are available elsewhere where I post.