Friends, your comments give me liiiiife. I'm just saying.
Also, the number of chapters I still have to write keeps getting longer. It was, what, 30 when I started? I've added plans for 5 more chapters since then. This whole project is going to be 102 chapters at this point, which is actually equal parts exciting and daunting, at least to me.
Anyway, onto tonight's chapter which is mostly just fluffy stuff. The song for this chapter is "New Morning" by Alpha Rev. If you've never heard it, go pull it up. You'll be glad you did.
Enjoy!
Chapter 4: Getting Kinda Rich
In spite of Monday being awful, the rest of the week of Peter's birthday was pretty good. Tuesday he did end up getting to go to the arcade with Ned and Ned's mom, and they even bought him a cupcake and sang for him at dinner time when he stayed over. He and Ned stayed up way too late watching Star Wars and trying to reenact scenes in real time with their Legos, so by the time he got home Wednesday afternoon, he was too tired and happy to care much that he was on his own. He spent the rest of the day working on the Legos Ned had gotten him.
Thursday, as Mister Carbonell had warned, he didn't see the man even though he did go knock on the door of the workshop just in case. Instead, he decided to make use of the loot he'd gotten at the arcade. The prizes for paper tickets were cheap things, and neither he nor Ned really wanted six plastic slinkies or bouncy balls, but Peter had discovered they were trying to get rid of a bag full of thumb-sized plastic alien figures whose faces were all printed wrong.
He traded all of his tickets and some of Ned's for forty of the things. By the time May got home that night, Peter had hidden them everywhere. She found two right away and three more before he went to bed.
Friday morning, Peter found those five and three more in the garbage. He rescued them and re-hid them. He checked on the rest just to make sure they were all where he expected them to be. It kept him amused and entertained for probably longer than it should have. But it was fun.
May had only a short shift, so she was home in plenty of time for dinner. She attempted to cook, failed, and they ended up at the other Thai place instead. It was Peter's first birthday without a home-cooked meal that he could remember because Uncle Ben had always taken pride in his celebratory meals and cakes from scratch. (And Peter's first birthday without Uncle Ben at all.) Peter missed Uncle Ben with a pang in his gut whenever he thought about it, so he tried not to, and he knew Aunt May was doing the same. But the Thai was extra spicy, so they had an excuse for watery eyes, and they did what they did best — they made it work together.
"Better go to bed early," May warned when they returned to the apartment.
"How come?"
"I've got a note for you from Tony." She pulled a piece of paper from her purse and Peter was immediately suspicious because he had no idea when May and Mister Carbonell had seen one another.
Mister Carbonell's handwriting looked just like him — rushed and messy, and yet every word was clear as day, if slanted sideways.
Be up and outside my workshop at precisely 10am, dressed, and make sure you eat breakfast first because lunch will be late. Wear shoes that are not covered in dirt, oil, or whatever other substance generally stains your stuff, but that you can walk in, pants that you would wear to church, and either a nice shirt that May chooses for you or a shirt with your BEST science pun, Parker. Don't let me down.
Peter read the note twice, then looked up at May, who was doing an absolutely awful job of not grinning at him.
"Aunt May, what?"
"It's a birthday surprise, honey. Lucky for us your day is on a Saturday."
"Do you know what we're doing?"
"I'm sure you'll love it," was all Aunt May would say, and that was just profoundly not fair.
After two solid hours of creative verbal traps and some whining, Peter learned that he and Mister Carbonell were going somewhere (he'd already figured that out, thanks), that May was not going to join them, that they would get lunch while they were out, and that they would be back for dinner and cake and presents.
Peter knew that May wasn't working, so he was doubly suspicious about how she would spend the day when he was "out."
"Never you mind," was all she would say.
"Ugh, I hate surprises," he replied, slouching in his chair.
"You actually don't," May told him. "You just hate not being able to figure it out. And, guess what? You'll never guess this one, so just enjoy the suspense."
As if Peter was going to be able to sleep after that.
-==OOO==-
Tony looked at his watch for the eleventh time in the last twenty minutes — he wasn't counting; that was JARVIS putting up little annoying hash marks — anticipation and nerves roiling in his gut.
What was I thinking? How do I even know what to do for a kid turning twelve?
But he'd asked May that on Tuesday when he broached the subject about how to spend the kid's day. And when he'd posed his tentative, not-at-all-already-arranged plan, she was enthusiastic. It helped that he could sweeten the deal with a gift certificate for a massage that "somebody gave me since they couldn't pay me for a repair I made, so it should get used by somebody who likes that stuff."
Obviously that was all fake, but May didn't need to know that the gift certificate was something he got Pepper's people to put together and he had even rented a bay in an existing massage parlor over in Brooklyn for them to use to maintain the illusion. Pepper had a whole group of people who did massage, something about stones, maybe face masks — who knew about that stuff? But they all agreed to pretend to be offering a special that day for anyone with a gift certificate, so May was in for about four hours of luxury.
The woman worked practically every day of her life. And he was stealing her nephew for whom she had specifically requested today off — the least he could do was see her taken care of for once.
His watch beeped at precisely 10am and he immediately heard the familiar tap-tap on the workshop door. "Mister Carbonell?"
"Hang on, kid. I'll be right there." He straightened the cuffs of his shirt, feeling more awkward than he would in either a proper suit or a smudged t-shirt. But today he was playing Mario Carbonell and he had to look like him. This blue button-down was out of Bruce's closet, had seen better days, and didn't quite fit him right, but it was clean and, most importantly, looked the part.
Tony strode out of the workshop, locking it behind himself, before he eyed Peter.
He was wearing a pair of sneakers that were on the worn side of life, but the laces were new and clean. The slacks looked like May had intended them for the first day of school, still creased from being folded. But Tony's eyes alighted on Peter's shirt and he grinned.
"That new?" he asked.
Peter grinned back. "May gave it to me over breakfast. Does this count as a good pun?"
"Yes, it does." Tony owed that woman. Chemists are so happy in the lab because they're in their element. "And it's more appropriate than you know. Okay, we're going to take a trip together. You ready?"
"Yes, sir!"
Tony Stark would have gotten one of his flashy convertibles out of the garage for this, but Mario Carbonell had to settle for a late model sedan with a sunroof. Still, once they got the music playing and the sunroof open so the wind whipped over them and tousled Peter's hair beyond recovery, it felt kind of the same.
"Where are we going?" Peter asked.
"Nope. Here's the deal. You have until the Jersey border to come up with guesses. After that, you can guess as many times as you want until we see the sign."
"Do I win anything if I guess right?"
"The pleasure of being too damn clever," Tony said, and Peter giggled.
The kid was nearly silent as Tony wound the car expertly along the BQE through Brooklyn, across to Staten Island, and finally to New Jersey. The instant the tires hit land on the other side of the bridge, Peter began spouting ideas he'd clearly saved up in his head.
Tony was amused to learn that Peter's guesses ranged from "picnic" and "zoo" to "really big metal dumping place for scrounging" and "world's biggest hammer."
"Is the world's biggest hammer even in New Jersey?" Tony asked after that one.
"I dunno. But it seemed like a safer thing to ask about than the world's biggest screwdriver."
Tony laughed so hard he choked.
But he was delighted that Peter didn't guess correctly even though he got dangerously close a few times. Still, when they hit the sign announcing their exit, Peter went suddenly silent and Tony could tell from the side that his eyes were getting impossibly wide.
"Too late to guess now," he teased.
"Mister Carbonell...are we really…?"
His nerves weren't settled, but that feeling was very much outweighed by satisfaction and a deep kind of excitement. "Yep. Turns out a friend of a friend knows someone who runs it. Thought you might appreciate a private tour."
Peter was practically vibrating. "We're going to a Stark research facility!"
"A chemistry research facility," Tony added.
"Oh my god I'm going to be such a dork in there, Mister Carbonell." Peter hid his head in his hands. "You'll be embarrassed to be seen with me."
"Not a chance, kiddo."
"And you really know somebody who runs it?"
Close. Priya Gupta is on Bruce's super-special research squad dealing with Pepper's Extremis thing, but when she's not holed up in the lab with his team she runs three or four labs for me. I've never met the person who runs this branch, and they don't know me, but Priya signs the checks, so… But all he said was, "Turns out, I do."
He circled off the exit and almost directly into the parking lot, looking up at the building with its clean lines and "Stark Industries" sign at the top. The nerves were continuing to be a thing, but he just took a deep breath and forced himself not to let them get to him.
Priya and JARVIS will have cleared the building of anybody with any chance of knowing me on sight. The head person here has been briefed and cleared with the right story. And the worst that happens is a few more people on my payroll know my alias, and that means more NDAs and I have enough lawyers for that.
It'll be fine. Pete won't find out.
Peter was apparently torn between running straight to the doors and taking shelter behind Tony as he led the way up the sidewalk to the main entrance. As planned, he buzzed the reception desk, knowing it was vacant. A moment later, a slim woman with lines of silver in her black hair appeared and manually released the door.
"Welcome to Stark Labs," she said, fixing most of her smile on Peter. "I'm Doctor Chen, but you can call me Yelan if you like."
"Nice to meet you, Doctor Chen," Tony said, shaking her hand. "Mario Carbonell. Thank you for taking the time."
"It is always a pleasure to spend time with budding scientists," she said, a genuine light in her eyes as she held her hand out for Peter.
"I'm...Peter. Peter Parker, ma'am." Then he frowned. "Did...this might be rude, but...did you publish a paper about scleroproteins potentially being used to assist in muscle regrowth? I read it when I was looking up peptide sequences and got off track and the name sounds familiar."
Tony huffed a laugh because of course he did.
Doctor Chen's smile widened in surprise. "Yes, that was one of my studies. I'm very impressed, Peter. How much of the paper did you understand?"
"Um, not all of it. The chemistry is easier than the biology."
"Well, let's see what we can do to improve that today, shall we?" She gestured at the lab. "We have the place to ourselves. I'll show you around, let you visit a few of the labs where we have ongoing, non-confidential experiments happening, and, if we have time, we can take a look at my paper's findings and see what we can reproduce. Sound good?"
Peter looked like he might cry from glee.
"I only have one rule, though," Doctor Chen said, holding up a finger warningly. "If you do not understand anything, I require you to ask me for clarification immediately. You won't learn anything if you don't ask questions."
Oh, Tony liked this scientist. She was definitely getting a raise after this.
If anything, the invitation to ask questions made Peter even more ecstatic. He started asking rapid-fire questions even while they were in the lobby, barely able to contain himself long enough to hear the answers. Doctor Chen actually seemed to enjoy his badgering, and by the time they had taken the elevator to the next floor to see some of the labs, there was a distinct spring in her step — to say nothing of Peter practically leaping from foot to foot.
Tony was content to sit back and watch. He knew these labs a bit; he'd toured them sometime after they were built, after all. And he had a basic idea of what they were working on here, and not just the sanitized versions Chen would show Peter today. But, then, none of this was for his edification, after all. However, as much as he had intended on letting their chatter roll over him, instead he started paying closer attention. Not to Doctor Chen's answers, but to Peter's questions.
Every time Tony thought he had a handle on how smart this kid was, Peter surprised him again. Peter was asking questions high schoolers might not think of, maybe even questions better suited for the college crowd. And it wasn't that he was just clever about how to pull out information from context clues; he understood the context, and Doctor Chen's answers.
Tony realized he was looking at the kind of kid who would go on to discover new elements, invent things no one had ever even imagined, make easy that which had previously been thought impossible.
And all that wrapped up in a kid who put kindness first.
It was humbling. Utterly and completely. Not to his ego — Tony didn't care if Peter was smarter than him. It was humbling to know that a kid like this with a brain the size of Jupiter and a heart that could outshine the sun, had given Tony his trust.
Peter kept pausing in the discussion to check in with Tony, to make sure he wasn't bored, to see if Tony had anything to add. He told Doctor Chen about their experiments together with pride, and when she presented him with a branded Stark Labs t-shirt, he shyly asked if there was one for Tony, too.
Not that Tony intended to wear it, but he couldn't turn the kid down, not after those hopeful brown eyes looked up at him with a size large shirt and he mentioned "now we'll be lab twins."
A month and a half and this kid has me so thoroughly wrapped around his little finger I might as well just sign Stark Industries over to him now and be done with it. What will it be like after a year? Maybe I should take him to the UN. Peter Parker talks to the world leaders and all of a sudden everybody becomes friends and peace will reign forevermore.
They took a break from the tour around 1pm for lunch. Doctor Chen hadn't intended to eat with them even though Tony arranged for a boxed meal for her as well, but Peter just couldn't stop asking questions and leaning on her every word, so she sat at the table in the cafeteria with them and the impromptu lecture series continued.
After lunch, they took two more hours of time at the lab, but this was all practical. Doctor Chen had some demonstrations ready to go with supplies and equipment that would be too dangerous or too out of place in Tony's workshop, and she proved to have the flair of a magician. Peter applauded the dramatic reactions of color, heat, and light, and poked in awe at the various solids and plasmas that resulted other times (as long as they were safe, of course). For the last few, Doctor Chen allowed Peter to gear up in lab supplies and assist her properly.
And did Tony get a picture of Peter in the white lab coat that trailed on the floor, the gloves, the goggles, all branded by SI? Yes, yes he did. And saved a copy for May, of course.
On the way out, Tony made sure to pull Doctor Chen aside while Peter stared through yet one more window into a lab.
"Doctor, I gotta say, this was way beyond what I was expecting. I can't tell you how much I appreciate this, or how much Peter does."
"It's my pleasure," she said. "Peter is a delight, and unbelievably intelligent for his age. I'm not sure what your connection to the family is, but if you get the chance, please encourage them to make certain Peter gets as many opportunities as possible. Maybe SI can even do something. That kind of potential must be nurtured."
"I understand. I'll make sure of it."
Doctor Chen looked sharply at him for a moment, then glanced back to make sure Peter was well out of earshot. "You know...Tony Stark himself attended MIT at fifteen. I think Peter could do the same, at least when it comes to the sciences. Though I suppose you'd have to ask Mister Stark if it was a good idea."
Tony's breath got caught in his chest, but he forced himself to speak normally. "No matter how smart somebody is, there's different kinds of experiences a kid should get before they have to worry about college. I want to make sure Peter gets the chance to be a kid."
Doctor Chen's face bent in a knowing smile. "I believe I am very grateful to have spent this time with you today, Mister...Carbonell, was it?"
Oh well. He flashed her a very famous grin. "Call me Tony."
Doctor Chen nodded, not batting an eye. "Now," she said, "I ought to show you and Peter out, though I'm sure you could find your way. I believe I'm about to receive rather a lot of extra legal paperwork in my email."
Tony laughed. "Yep, probably." He made a show of pulling out his phone and texting JARVIS. But, while Peter remained distracted, he caught her eye again. "If you ever need anything, resources, personnel, whatever. I owe you one."
Doctor Chen shook her head. "Stark Industries takes good care of us. You help that boy grow up into whatever he wants to become, and the world will owe you the greater debt."
Tony texted JARVIS again to make sure her bonus was huge.
-==OOO==-
The ride home was much quieter because Peter fell asleep practically as soon as they hit the highway.
"S-sorry, Mister Carbonell," he said as his head nodded against the window. "I didn't really sleep last night and…"
"Don't sweat it, Underoos," Tony told him. "I'll wake you up when we hit Queens."
"...Kay."
Tony left the music playing, though he turned it down a bit. He could have signaled JARVIS to take over the driving completely, but the act was familiar and comfortable. Besides, driving gave him time to relax without having to think about why he was relaxing.
Honestly, if Tony started down the rabbit hole of thinking about the day and Peter and various possible interpretations of the things that kept jangling in his heart like loose screws, he might not have the mental resources for the last part of Peter's birthday. So he shoved it all away and just enjoyed the sun on his face, the wind whipping overhead, and the boy curled up beside him.
They were most of the way through Brooklyn when Tony reached over to nudge Peter.
"Hey, kid. Quit making like a sloth. We've still got stuff to do today."
"Aw…'m not a sloth," he managed around a yawn.
"Then prove it and wake up." Tony grinned at Peter's bedhead made infinitely worse by the wind coming in from the open sunroof. He was starting to look like a curly dandelion. May was going to take so many pictures.
He was not wrong.
"Hi sweetie!" May cheered, waiting outside when they pulled up. Tony was pleased to see that she appeared to be completely relaxed, her skin scrubbed and radiant, and, for once, there was no trace of the nervousness that seemed to hang on her shoulders like an oversized jacket. "Did you have a good time?"
"Yeah!"
"Give the kid another year and he could run that place," Tony told her, walking up behind Peter who bounded across the parking lot to give her a hug.
"I bet!" She grinned. "Well, we have supper and cake and ice cream inside. Oh, and a few presents."
She looked up at Tony and gave him the barest nod. He'd already stashed most of Peter's gifts in the supply closet on their floor that morning, not trusting the kid not to go peeking at anything he could find if he gave them to May to hide early. Of course, that wasn't all of it, but some things are really hard to wrap.
Peter chattered all the way up the stairs, rehashing most of the day in a breathless stream of consciousness that Tony wanted to patent because if he could master that way of talking without pausing, he'd have a huge advantage the next time he had to testify in front of Congress; they couldn't stop him if he didn't give them the chance to interrupt. Finally up all seven flights — and, seriously, this was getting stupid, he was installing an elevator sometime, seriously — May let Peter be the first one into the apartment.
In Tony's fantasy world, he would have absolutely showered the kid with presents the way he did Harley. Like, wall-to-wall stuff. But Mario Carbonell didn't have that kind of money, and he had a feeling May wouldn't have accepted it even if he did. So, instead, he focused on the essentials.
Still, the one big box he had contributed besides the littler ones made for quite a dramatic statement on the kitchen table, like the Hulk hovering over everything.
Peter wanted to go straight for the gifts, but Tony and May insisted on everybody eating their pizza first. But they couldn't ask him to delay any longer when he dropped his slice twice because he was trying to figure out what could be in the wrapped pile for him.
Tony had hand-wrapped his gifts, and so had May, and apparently they were equally horrible at wrapping, so there was no telling what came from who given the outside. But because of how she'd piled them, Tony's were all underneath hers and so hers went first.
A few were boring presents — socks, pajamas, underwear ("Aunt May! Don't give me that in front of Mister Carbonell!" "It's okay, kid, I wear them, too." "Ugh!") — but there were three more science pun t-shirts, a new pair of sneakers, a bunch of individual Lego Star Wars characters that weren't sold in the larger sets, and at least three books having to do with Star Wars, the making thereof, memories from the set by the actors, etc. Peter hugged May so hard Tony thought she might get bruised.
He had fewer gifts for Peter, but they were bigger, especially the one he didn't wrap at all. He had contributed a shirt of his own to the collection, one bigger Lego set (though not too extravagant), two more books of experiments they could try including some geared more towards biochemistry or chemical engineering, and a nondescript watch.
Was that watch also tied into JARVIS's systems with a basic GPS and biometrics tracker? Absolutely it was.
The last two were what he was particularly worried about.
"Okay," he said, pulling up the smaller box first. "This...you can open it, but it needs a little explanation. So does the other one, but...here."
Peter opened the box carefully and gasped. May leaned over to see and made an identical sound.
"Tony...I'm not…"
"Look, before you get weird, I got one for you, too." He snatched the box from Peter and revealed a second SI smartphone hiding under the first. "I know you had one but you don't now, and Peter needs a way to get ahold of you if something happens. They're not new — I got them pre-opened. But I've got a good deal with them, so you can even leave them on my plan if you want."
No matter what you think, you're definitely using my plan. The one with all the extra security and JARVIS backup. And I did, technically, get them pre-opened. I requisitioned some from SI and refurbished them. Nothing store-bought here.
May was hesitating, so Tony leaned forward and put a hand on her arm. "I just want you both to be able to get help if you need it. That's all. This was something easy I could do. I'm sorry if it's overstepping, but…"
May shook her head. "I didn't expect it. But I'm...my god, Tony, I'm so grateful." And before Peter could say anything, she had moved from his side to lean over where Tony sat and gave him an actual hug. "Thank you," she whispered.
Tony was not expecting the hug, and he tried not to make it awkward, but he was stiff and uncomfortable, so he just patted her shoulder until she let go.
"Yeah, thank you, Mister Carbonell," Peter echoed, eyes shining. "Now I can text Ned when he gets a phone!"
"My number's already in there," Tony said, hoping he didn't sound as off-kilter as he felt. "I don't speak emoji, but otherwise, knock yourself out."
That left just the big box on the table. Tony sat back and let Peter work the paper off, pulling at the lid. The box itself was one he'd scrounged from the recycling bin; he definitely wasn't giving Peter a carton of oranges.
Peter lifted the flaps and his face lit up like when he saw the Stark Labs sign earlier. May blinked at the odd collection, uncomprehendingly.
"It's...Oh, Mister Carbonell, really?"
"Really, kid. That's the basics, but I've got a ton of stuff in the workshop so we can customize it together. Buying it piecemeal is way cheaper than getting one all put together, and you can learn how to do it yourself."
"Aunt May," Peter looked up at her breathlessly, "we're gonna build a computer. From scratch."
"No," Tony corrected at once, "if we were starting from scratch you'd have to print a circuit board and stuff. That's way out of our league right now." He sniffed. "There's one more thing, but it's not up here. It's in the shop. But we don't have to check it out right away."
"Yes we do! Can't we, Aunt May?" Peter looked up at her beseechingly.
May sighed and shrugged. "It's your day, Peter. But go put your things away first."
"Okay!"
Peter grabbed an armload and ran to his bedroom. May gestured for Tony to follow her into the kitchen area. Tony's nerves were back in full force.
"Look, I should have asked about the phone, I get that now. I'm new at this and — "
"It's not...I'm sorry," May interrupted. "It's just…" She hauled in a breath that sounded like it should hurt. "There's so much I can't give him. So much I can't even understand about him. Ben...Ben was more like his brother. More on Peter's page. No matter how much I love him...I can't build a computer with him."
"I'm sorry," he said, hating the tears gathering in her eyes and the fact that he'd put them there.
"No. Don't be. I'm-I'm grateful that you're here. That someone understands what's inside him. Someone who can help him. But I…"
She shook herself and pinned Tony with a look that felt like a repulsor blast.
"We're going to talk, Tony Carbonell. I'll knock on your door at nine o'clock on Tuesday night while he's at Ned's. Don't stand me up."
His throat was dry. "I won't."
"All right. Go show him whatever thing is in your workshop. I'll clean up here. But come back soon for cake. It's tradition for us to watch Return of the Jedi before bed on his birthday and I want him to get some sleep tonight."
"May…" he started, having no idea how to finish that sentence.
"It's fine," she said, shaking her hair out of her eyes. "Tuesday."
"Tuesday," he agreed.
"Peter!" May called. "As soon as you get the next load put away, you can go down to the workshop for a bit before cake and the movie. Okay?"
"Okay!"
The interval between then and the walk down to the workshop felt longer than most of the Board meetings he'd ever had to sit through, and twice as painful. Tony knew he was not good at not going overboard — Pepper's giant stuffed rabbit was proof of that. He didn't know any better way to feel out boundaries than to push them hard and see what exploded in his face, usually literally. But a misstep now seemed a lot more dangerous than poking the Hulk or challenging a terrorist to a battle of wits.
Because there was nothing good to win, but something very good to lose.
Still, with a lifetime of practice of forcing fear and uncertainty away, Tony led Peter down to the workshop, trying to act like everything was normal and not like he was wondering if May was about to revoke his visitation rights or whatever the hell they had quietly agreed to without saying anything about it.
Peter's chatter helped, though. Tony was only listening with half an ear, but Peter was already going on about the computer parts and how much better it was to build it than to just buy it from the store because it was more fun. And that helped Tony smile again, because it absolutely was more fun to build it than to have it given to him. Something so few people really understood.
Something else he and Peter could share.
"Look, don't get too excited," he said as they approached the workshop door. "It's nothing earth-shattering. It just doesn't wrap well."
"Mister Carbonell," Peter said, suddenly serious, "it's something you did for me. So it's important no matter how big or small it is."
Oh my god this kid is going to kill me. "Okay, well, check it out." He unlocked the door and let Peter go in first.
The workshop looked as it always had, with one exception. Next to where Tony had installed the now-working fume hood, there was a new table replacing one of the shelves, a stool, and an array of the tools he had been planning to give Peter anyway because he had plenty. Peter's sketches and notes had already been pinned up on the wall behind the table, and there was a brand new Star Wars notebook sitting in the center of the table waiting for more write-ups and plans.
Peter stopped. Stared.
Then turned around very slowly.
"Ground rules, Pete," Tony said before anything else could happen. "You aren't getting a key. You're only here if I'm here. No unsupervised science. But...yeah. Now you have your own...you know."
Tony didn't expect the kid's eyes to well up, nor for him to bolt forward and throw his arms around Tony's middle. But he probably should have.
And it was only then that he realized that giving the kid physical space in his workshop meant a lot more metaphorical stuff than he'd considered. Even if Peter didn't really get it, he did.
He'd made a place for Peter now, in a spot that had been his alone.
There was no coming back from this, probably. The last person he gave lab space when it mattered wasn't even Bruce — it was Rhodey at MIT. And to this day he couldn't imagine life without the man.
"Sorry," Peter said, suddenly tensing, and Tony realized he wasn't hugging him back. "I didn't mean to make you uncomfortable. I'm just...it's so, I mean — "
Tony rolled his eyes, told his inconvenient emotions to take a break, and hauled the kid back in to return the hug. He wasn't about to ruin Peter's birthday just because he was weird about physical demonstrations of trust. "You're fine. You Parkers sure are huggy."
"Yeah," Peter said against his shirt. "We are."
Tony ran a hand over Peter's hair and decided he was an idiot, but this had been a good stupid thing to do and he would worry about it later. Right now, Peter was twelve years old and he was happy. And that was, honestly, more than enough.
"You're welcome, kid."