A/N: I own nothing related to Marvel, except my dvd's.
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Pepper paid the delivery driver and using the intercom system, notified Tony that lunch was here. She started dishing out food on two different plates when Jarvis told her Tony wasn't able to come upstairs at the moment.
'Of course not.' She thought. "Thanks Jarvis."
She put the food on a tray with two cups of coffee and went downstairs.
"You didn't eat breakfast, you have to have lunch Tony." Pepper said as she entered her code to open the door. "No music?" she put the tray down on an open side table and turned to find her boss sitting on the floor with a bottle of scotch. "What's wrong?" she walked over to him and crouched down to his level.
"Tony, talk to me."
Tony glanced up at her before taking a swig of the bottle.
"Go away."
"Not until you tell me what's wrong."
He drank some more, "leave me alone Pepper."
She looked him over and stood up. She went and retrieved his plate of food and one of the mugs of coffee. She placed both on the floor next to him. "Try to eat, please."
She pulled a chair up to a table and proceeded to start eating. She finished eating and while she was drinking the rest of her coffee she checked her emails.
"You have a request from MIT to guest lecturer in one of their graduate classes."
Tony didn't respond but she heard the bottle click. She kept her focus on her phone even though she could hear him moving to get up.
He placed his now cold food next to her and started to eat.
Pepper pretended not to notice him as she continued to work on her phone.
"Argh!" she exclaimed tossing the phone down on the table. "Stupid thing froze again." She picked it back up and smacked the table with it.
Tony raised an eyebrow at her but continued to eat while she berated her blackberry under her breath.
He cleared his plate before opening one of the drawers on the table and pulling out a slim silver thing that he placed in front of her.
"What is this?" she asked picking it up.
"It was something I had been working on, now it's your new phone. I've already got it synced up with the Stark servers, and I made it compatible with your current charger. You can check email, play music and I even programmed it with solitaire, since I know you secretly love to play it." He explained.
"Wow, thank you Tony."
He shrugged and took a gulp of his now cold coffee.
"I'm going upstairs to charge this. Will you be okay?" she asked standing up.
Tony was now sitting on the table so he had to look up to see Pepper's face.
"Thanks for lunch."
"You're welcome." She gathered the dirty dishes and headed to the stairs. She paused as the doors opened, "I'm here for you, Tony. Anything you need, I'll help…if you want to talk about it, I'll listen."
Tony turned his head to meet her eyes but after a moment of silence, he got off the table and picked up the scotch bottle. She watched him raise it to his lips before she let out a sigh and continued upstairs.
She was in the library reading when she heard Tony stumbling up the stairs.
"Damn." He muttered and she rolled her eyes before getting up and going in search of her boss.
She found him sitting on a step with a new bottle of scotch in his hands.
"Oh Tony." She muttered to herself before going down to stand in front of him.
"Hey, Pepper, want a drink?" he slurred a bit holding the bottle out to her.
She accepted but instead put the bottle down on a step out of Tony's reach, unless he wanted to fall face first down the stairs.
"I was drinking that."
"Not anymore." Pepper said. "Come with me." She held her hands out to pull him up.
Tony looked at her hands, "What?"
"I have something for you, if you want to see it." She taunted.
He grabbed onto one of her hands and used the other to brace himself on the step. They managed to get him fully upright without toppling down the stairs together. She started to direct him up the rest of the stairs.
"Gah, Tony. Maybe I should go back to not making you eat every meal, you weigh a ton." She was slightly out of breath by the time she got him to the top since she was supporting most of his weight.
"Hey, I'm in good shape and I look fantastic." He protested as they started down the hall to his room.
"Sure you do."
"Want me to prove it to you?" he tried to waggle his eyebrows at her, but only succeed in making her laugh at his facial expression.
"Maybe another time, Tony." She opened his bedroom door and tugged him through. "Right now it's bed time."
She pulled him over to the bed and let him fall forward onto it.
He groaned and rolled over. "I don't think that was necessary."
"Trust me, it was." She gave him a small smirk as she walked to the other side of the bed and tossed back the comforter. "Come up here and get under the blanket."
"I can't go to bed with clothes on."
"Well I'm not undressing you." She crossed her hands under her chest.
"Spoilsport."
"Yep." She said turning and walking out of the room. "I'll be in the library if you need me, but try to sleep."
"Yes, Mom." He said.
A/N: Thanks for reading. Feel free to leave a review if it strikes your fancy.