drainednerves: He's definitely getting better, lol
Jill Cohen: Writing the Stark Expo scene has me hyped. Thanks for the kind review! :)
So...Here Tony is again. Staring his inevitable demise in the face.
This time, though, he has no idea what the hell he's going to do.
He can figure out the logistics simply enough. Pepper becoming CEO will just have to happen, now. There's no one else who will be able to fill in his shoes. No, outgrow his shoes. He can write a will and get his affairs taken care of. Peter will be a bit tricky to figure out...He plans on leaving just about everything to him, but how to do that without pointing a giant neon sign that says IRON MAN'S SON! at him? He can't give him the mansion...He could give it to Pepper. Sell it and donate the money?
It's all numbers and calculations, and Tony can do that. It's everything else that's crushing him down, like he's at the bottom of the ocean.
He tried. He's still trying. He's looking for any way out of this, but not only is he coming up short, his efforts just feel humiliating. Like he's pushing and pushing and pushing against a giant brick wall. He can only choose which way he wants to die: take out the Arc Reactor, spend maybe ten or so minutes just like he did when Stane took it from him: gasping for air like a fish out of water, spasming and crumpling up, nerves firing off in a panic. Or, he can just ride out the time he has left.
The first days after Tony realizes the hopelessness of it all, he ceases to function. He doesn't remember anything. He did not eat, or sleep. He walked in his house like a ghost, and only snapped out of it three days in, when J.A.R.V.I.S.'s voice shot out like a gunshot to remind him to take care of himself, that his health was at risk. Tony could have laughed at that, but the sound of the A.I.'s voice had rattled him thoroughly. He'd spent the last three days in utter silence. No ACDC, no Guns N' Roses, just the poisoned blood rushing in his ears.
Probably everyone gets asked the question, What would you do if you found out you were going to die in one day? How would you spend your last time alive?
And of course people always answer with the most inspiring and uplifting of things. I'd do everything on my bucket list! I'd go bungee jumping, mountain climbing! I'd spend the rest of my time with my family. I would take all the money I have and spend every last cent of it.
Tony, though, he thought it was just a dumb question, for this exact reason. Does anyone really think they're going to discover they have a day to live, and get right to business? Put on a smile and get started? No. They're human. They're going to freak the hell out. They're going to panic. They're going to try and save themselves. Like anyone thinks they're going to go through the five stages of acceptance in record time.
He still holds onto what he thought in the cave: that it's crueler to have time instead of having it all be over in an instant.
Tony knows he's only going to go faster if he spends his every waking moment in dread. So many things he has to do, with a deadline he won't be able to meet. With Pepper, what regret does he want to go with? The regret that he never did pursue that Unsaid Thing Between Them, or the regret of doing all that damage to her image and then leaving her? Or even just the regret of bothering to start something at all when it was all going to go away so soon?
Things with Rhodey are just going to stay broken, he supposes. This isn't like last time, where he's starving for his presence, too proud to just try and make amends. He isn't going to mend the bridge this time. No, that's all on him. Him and his patriotism-rotted, subborn-as-steel brain of his, so it's already a done deal.
And yes, Tony is simply scared. No one is supposed to think about their own death. Tony is incapable of imagining himself unable to breathe, unable to move, never feeling the warmth of the sun or the ground beneath his feet again.
This is all without mentioning the countless things Iron Man will never be able to accomplish now—possibilities even Tony can't imagine. This wasn't supposed to be his last huzzah. He was supposed to be the dawn of a new era, and now it looks like he isn't even going to make it to the first anniversary of being named Person of the Year.
Oh, Stane's probably having a field day in hell right now. He'll probably welcome Tony with that plastic smile of his.
Maybe he should just be grateful it didn't end in the cave. Grateful for all the things he has accomplished, instead of just dwelling on the things he hadn't. Won't.
And Peter...
Peter is just...
Tony doesn't know.
This can be considered a good thing, in a morbid, deranged, sick definition of the word "good." Peter is blinded with adoration for him right now. Tony cannot remember the last time Peter so much as implied to Stane's existence, or those dreaded days with the father who hated him. Is this a blessing in disguise? Peter's last memories of him will be that of the world-beloved, unstoppable hero who always saves the day. As long as he doesn't ruin that between now and his demise.
Yet he also knows that this is going to crush Peter. If he loves Iron Man so much that it's becoming his stable ground, then Tony can only imagine what will happen to him when that, too, is ripped out of his hands. He can't take the slightest bit of relief in Peter's love. He just can't. All he can think about is all his promises to make things right, and then just vanishing. Like he's leaving Peter behind on purpose.
Whether he lives or he dies, Tony is still waiting for Peter to wake up and smell the daisies. Remember everything that's happened and purge every hint of Iron Man from his room, set fire to his designs, pop that deflating balloon. He'll probably do what Tony did when his father died: feel the first hints of grief, then remember everything that happened, and feel that grief evaporate.
He probably doesn't even love Tony. Maybe he just loves Iron Man.
Whatever the case, however Peter is going to take it, Tony knows that he can't blindside him. He can't blindside anyone. He has to tell Peter, and Pepper. Rhodey. Happy, even. He flirts with the idea of a public announcement, and just as quickly tosses it in the trash. Like he wants to deal with flashing cameras and recorders in his mouth after that.
He's going to have to tell Peter. And he's going to have to find a way to cushion the blow.
Cushion and cushion and cushion it.
He thinks he can do that.
Nevermind.
The second he sees Peter standing in the bed of the truck, Tony's mouth goes dry. He is bouncing on his heels, only deterred when Ben steadies him, and even then still buzzing. His cargo shorts are barely covering his knees. He has a striped Band-Aid on his shin. Not two weeks ago another baby tooth had fallen out, and he tries to hide it when he smiles, lips stretching to the point of snapping but never pulling open.
Behind him is an image right out of a dream. The New Jersey Kite Festival. Tony had thought he'd found the absolute perfect thing, because it was exciting and colorful and everything a kid would love, while the beach could offer him the privacy that New York could never. Tony had never done such a thing in his childhood—he doubted Howard would let him bother with something so tripe—but looking at the blue sky stirs that little part of him that's still a child. Some are just stars and jetstreams, triangular gliders, but the real stars of the show are the dragons, the winding snakes, squids with writhing tentacles. The tiny people wandering at their tethers don't even seem to exist.
Peter looks between his approaching car and the kites, split between them. He'd probably love to actually be with them now, dwarfed in their shadows, but he stays waiting for Tony. He is young, and excited, and thrumming with joy. A little kid living his best life.
Aaaaaaand here Tony is with the plan to emotionally bodyslam him when this is all over.
As Tony parks, he wonders if he can actually do this. Peter is supposed to head back to Queens with Ben afterwards, so at what point is Tony supposed to pull him aside and tell him? God, this feels cruel now. Peter's probably going to be bawling his eyes out and those colorful, smiling kites are still going to be flying.
The second that the door opens, Peter runs up to him and throws his arms around his legs. "Hey, Dad!" Then, remembering himself, he whispers, "Hey, Dad."
"Hey, Pete," he whispers back. Though they're probably in the clear. They're so far away from the mingling crowd, they all look like ants. He ruffles Peter's hair, then opens the back door and reaches in. "Are we ready to roll?"
"Mm-hm! What can I do?"
"You are going to be our Designated Pole-Stick-Thing Holder," Tony declares. He gives all of them to Peter, whose hands have grown large enough to hold them all. Another reminder of how big he's getting. "Benjamin, how goes it?"
"It goes fine," Ben replies. He has the whole "Cool Uncle" ensemble going at the moment—Brooklyn T-shirt, cargo shorts, sunglasses. He looks more like a dad than Tony does. "May wanted to say she was sorry she couldn't make it. Someone at work didn't show up and they begged hands-and-knees for her to come."
"When I see her again, I'll keep my rubbing it in how much fun we had to a minimum." It's the only thing he will say in acknowledgement. This is still a thing that does not ask for conversation. Even Peter glances away, like watching the kites will tune out the words he's not supposed to be hearing. "Alright, get over here with your freakish gorilla hands."
It takes a good fifteen or twenty minutes to get everything in place. Tony wonders why he didn't just make a kite himself—it's not like it would've been out of his skillset. It would have spared them the issue of the instruction manual being in French, necessitating Tony to translate into English while Ben translates the English to his hands. Peter does the best job out of all three of them, dutifully passing over whatever rods they need. Though he is often distracted by the kites flying behind them.
Finally they have their masterpiece completed, and again Tony has that feeling of, "If I were still a child, I would be drooling over this." The kite is in the shape of a pirate's ship, with crossbones on the sails and a mermaid mast. Folded just once, it still takes the entire span of Ben's arms to hold it—and Ben is far from a small fellow.
"Alright." Ben dusts his hands off and looks around them, like someone may be hiding in the knee-high grass. "I hope no one noticed us banging away at this like monkeys."
"You were being the monkey, I was translating." Tony folds up the manual, calls out, "Take a look at her, Pete. It's the S.S. Parker."
Peter has already admired it, but he admires it some more, kicking himself off from the side of the truck to come around and see it up close. The whole thing is bigger than him. However, his smile drops off his face, and he looks down at his hand. "What about this one?"
He holds up one last rod. Ben and Tony look at one another, then the pirate ship. It looks completed.
"That is..." Tony takes the rod from Peter, but after thinking over disassembling the kite for another fifteen minutes, he chucks it over his shoulder. "Well, we're just not going to worry about it. Go, Captains. Set wind to her sails."
While Ben grapples with the massive thing, Peter frowns and inches closer. "You're not coming with us?"
Tony sighs, looking back at the shore. Someone is lifted up a great orca kite—it's curving up through the air like it's about to surface from the ocean. He imagines how pleasant it would be, to stand with Peter under all those fantastical shapes and creatures, guiding his hands as their pirate ship sails overhead. He knows it won't be that simple. It never will.
"It would be so much fun, and we would show all those amateurs how kite-flying is done," he tells Peter, "but someone will recognize me. And I don't want to deal with a crowd while we're supposed to be hanging out."
Peter quietly chews on the inside of his cheek, and Tony can guess the retort that he wants to give: "But we're not hanging out." Ben gives him a tiny nudge with his boot—he can't even see Peter past the pirate ship—and gently encourages, "He has to stay here and judge how well we're doing anyway, sport."
Unfortunately, Peter is getting older now, and these attempts at swaying him to perk up do not work anymore. The nod he gives is not happy or determined to show Tony his best effort out on the beach, but resigned, not wanting to fight. He leads Ben through the grass solemnly, not racing ahead, not calling behind for him to hurry up.
Fortunately, he does not stay upset for long. As he's reaching back into the car for a bottle of water, not so much out of thirst but to distract from the guilt, Tony hears Peter gasp and call out, "Dad! Dad! Look!" He doesn't even think to chide him, just follows his tiny pointing finger to the shore. Iron Man rises up from the sand with his hands and feet tilted down to blast him through the air. The material is shiny, almost like tinfoil—he almost looks as heavy as his true self, even as mere strings tie him to the earth. From his palms and soles, blue ribbons form jet streams.
"I see it!" He calls out to Peter, and his son stops his jumping and pointing, satisfied. Now he carries on with some pep to his step. Tony wonders if he and Ben will set sail to their pirate ship first, or if Peter will run to stand beneath Iron Man's shadow.
As Peter and Ben shrink smaller and smaller, until at last Tony loses them among the other dots mingling across the shoreline, he looks back up to Iron Man and feels something he can't name. Humor, discomfit? Iron Man looks giant and otherwordly, like a god someone just barely managed to form an image of. That's probably how Peter sees him. And there is jealousy, too, jealousy for himself. That Peter is now standing among the sand, gaping up at that godlike visage flying above him, while Tony sits in the bed of a truck and waits for him to return.
Remembering why he decided to come here in the first place, a stone sinks down to his stomach. He doesn't think he can do it; not today. It would just be heartless. How many good memories has Peter made ever since that night at Stark Industries? And now here Tony is to ruin it all. Not "the day me and my dad and Uncle Ben went to the kite festival," but "the day my dad told me he was going to die." Peter and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day.
Thing is, Tony can't even imagine how Peter could deal with such a thing—or how anyone deals with the knowledge that their time with a loved one is limited. He didn't think he could crumble into any more pieces when he was told his mother and father were killed in a car crash. If he was told it was coming, would that make things worse, better? Would getting to spend more time together be a blessing, or a curse? He imagines one more Christmas with his mother. His skills in sneaking out would be master-class—they could go look at the lights for hours and hours without Howard ever knowing.
This could very well be their last good day together. They could go to Legoland, or Rio, or the damn moon, and it will never be like this again. If all Tony will be able to think about is all the "lasts," how soon they will be unable to do any more "firsts," then he can't expect Pete to do anything different.
The pirate ship rises up from the earth. It is no larger than the half-moon of his fingernail from here, but Tony smiles anyway. It drifts up between the squids and the dragons. A new jealousy sours inside of him, jealousy of Peter. How marvelous it would be to be young again, to see all those kites above you and have the rest of the world and all its problems fade away.
Peter has probably already forgotten he is here. Tony feels almost like a ghost. A specter. That leads his mind down a different path, wondering if maybe this is a hopeful glimpse of things to come. If he's seeing a vision of next year, or the next, or the next. Peter happy, Peter smiling, Peter with nothing to worry about but keeping his grip on the string of a pirate ship kite. Tony is not there, but Tony does not need to be.
An hour goes by. He finishes his water. He takes off his jacket and leans back against the truck window, stretching his legs across the bed. The kites dance and glide and sometimes stay utterly still in the sky.
He knows that that hope is in and of itself rather selfish. Not wanting Peter to heal, but the expectation that his loss will be a wound. In only a few years Peter will be a teenager. The world will have to brace itself for him, if he's already so mature now. He's going to look back on all the memories of Tony with a different lens, and see things he never saw before. No matter what has happened already, or what will happen later, there is always the possibility that Peter may one day regret ever going with him to Malibu in the first place.
After maybe two hours, Peter and Ben return, Peter prancing through the grass and utterly oblivious to his uncle's wrestling match with the ship. Tony scoots over on the bed to let Peter on, but doesn't help him up—he doesn't like for anyone to do that anymore.
"How'd we do?" he asks once he's situated. "Did you show everyone who's boss?"
"They were all jealous," Peter preens. "You could tell."
"That's my boy." As Ben sets the kite down, anchoring it with Peter's sneaker, Tony asks, "Got everything, Ben?"
"Yeah, everything's alright. Now! Lunch time. Water."
"Water," Peter affirms as he passes the sweaty bottle over to Tony.
"Fruit."
"Fruit," Peter affirms as he sets the little Tupperware bowl between them.
"And Lunchables."
"Lunchables," Peter affirms as he takes the two boxes with his small-but-not-as-small-as-they-were-before hands.
Tony whistles. "Two Lunchables? You're getting a second stomach."
"One's for you!" Peter hands it over to him with a big, toothy grin, flashing the new tooth peeking out of his gums. "You always said you wanted to try one."
"Well, isn't that nice?" Tony tears off the plastic, looks inside. A Capri-Sun, mozzarella, packets of marinara sauce, candies, and bread. "See, this is what Stark Industries should do now. We could make millions."
"You could come up with new kinds," Peter says, and Tony almost wants to laugh at how different he sounds now. Not long ago everything Peter said had to be fast and energetic, stumbling over his words. Now he's mastered the blasé of casual conversation. "Or make them really, really big. Like—like whole pizzas in the box."
Tony takes his notepad out from his pocket, clicks his pen, and scribbles down, BIG PIZZA LUNCHABLES—GOLDMINE? "I got you, I got you."
"Here." Peter lifts his foot off the kite, which stirs across the bed in the gentle breeze, and hands Tony the string with eager fingers. "You can do it now."
"How am I going to eat my—" Tony looks at the label. "—pasteurized prepared cheese product if I'm flying the kite?"
"I can make it for you." Peter pulls the box back over to him, and tears open the marinara packets with surprising deftness. "It's your turn."
Tony lets out feet upon feet of string, until the pirate ship is no larger than a dollar coin. The crossbones sails look a bit lonesome with nothing else in the blue sky with it, but somehow Tony feels a quaint calm, like sitting in the shade. He holds the kite string while Peter makes him his tiny pizzas (which aren't nearly as bad as Tony thought they'd be, maybe there is a profit here).
"Hey." Tony nudges Peter's foot with his own. "How'd that poster project go?"
"A-plus," Peter nods. He reaches for the chocolate sauce and candies in Tony's Lunchable, but Tony waves at him.
"Eat some of yours, Pete. Who'd you do yours on?"
But Peter shakes his head. There's a coy smile on his face as he reaches into the Tupperware and pulls out a honeydew cube—he must be the only child on the planet who likes honeydew, Tony is sure—and pops it into his mouth. "It's a surprise."
"Uh-oh. So secretive. It's foreboding."
"'For-boad-ing.'"
"It means I'm keeping an eye on you."
"You'll like it. Promise."
Tony leans forward to look at Ben. He's leaning back against the car door, peering out at the kites. He is also eating a Lunchable.
"Can you vouch for that?"
Ben locks his lips and throws away the key.
Tony takes a drink of Capri-Sun and gives the pirate ship a bit more slack. Peter is showing the first hints of redness on his nose. Why didn't they think about sunscreen?
"Hey, let me ask you something. What do you want to be when you grow up?"
"An astronaut," Peter says without hesitating for a moment. "I wanna go to space. Mrs. Powell says that the stars are so far away that the light we see is old light. It takes so long for it to get here."
"What else? When you get older?"
"I don't know. I think I want to live in New York still but I want to go to other places, too. Like Japan and Paris. And I want to go to Omaha."
"Omaha?" Tony takes his eyes off the kite, looks down at him. "What do you have waiting for you in Omaha?"
"Mom said she wanted to go there. I dunno why."
Tony nods. He hopes that Mary could see Peter right now, just sitting in the bed of a truck and watching kites fly. Maybe not okay in the grand scheme of things, but okay right now.
He doesn't like to think of what happened to Mary often, because even if he's more than familiar with death, it makes his gut turn to know that someone so filled with life could be snuffed out like a candle flame, a single breath and gone. If he remembers it right, she was gone on impact, but no one but Mary really knows that. Tony wishes she did. He wishes she wasn't like he is now, and that she didn't have time to think, I'll never see my son grow.
"What's the Stark Expo?"
"Hm?" Tony snaps himself out of it.
"The Stark Expo. That thing that's coming to Flushing Meadows. It's like—your Stark, right? What is it?"
"Yeah. It's...It's kind of like a talent show, I guess." Tony wonders if it's fate or some kind of weird joke that the Expo is happening, and always has happened, in the same town his son now lives in. Out of all the places in the world. "Stark Industries and other companies just kind of show off what they're working on."
"Oh. But it's an old thing, right?" Peter scratches at his head with the hand not holding his pizza. "I thought I saw it in museums and stuff."
"It was something that S.I. used to do. Stopped doing it after—after my dad died." Tony drinks more Capri-Sun. Empty. That was quick. "I just figured why not bring it back? Seems like it'd be fun."
Peter eats his pizza, and scratches at his nose before Tony can stop him. It doesn't look too bad; probably won't peel.
"Can I ask you something?" he says.
"You just did."
Peter blows a raspberry. "I don't like that joke."
"Alright, tough crowd. What is it?"
"How come you don't talk about your dad a lot?"
Tony sucks on his teeth. Add this to the list of "Things You Should Have Seen Coming."
Peter blinks up at him with the giant brown Stark eyes. Not just Tony's. He's tried to imagine Peter when he's older, but never once did it occur to him that he may take on some of Howard's traits.
Words cannot express how shitty Tony feels for thinking it, but he wonders, even if he somehow lived through this poisoning to see it, if he'd be able to cope with that. It makes him nauseous to think about it. Not just looking at his son and seeing his father, but himself turning away, pursing his lips, unable to take it.
Tony gives the pirate ship more slack. It's really up there now. If he lets go of the string, it may never come back.
"We were not very close," he says. Each word comes out so slow, so careful, like he's pulling a piece from a Jenga tower. "He didn't really seem like my father when I was growing up, he just seemed more like someone that I was around a lot. Does that make sense?"
Peter's brows have formed a small knot on his forehead. "Was he bad?"
Yes, Tony almost lets out. At first he doesn't know why he doesn't. He doesn't think it's going to hurt Peter to find out a person he never met was not the golden boy everyone thought he was. He thinks Peter is old enough now that he won't get his feelings hurt, as though telling him his grandfather was bad is an insult to himself.
But, thinking it over, Tony doesn't want to punish him like that. No matter how many years go by, Tony will forever be the thing that came along, not the thing Peter always had. He just wants to know more about the grandfather he never knew, the grandfather that's in the museums and built up the company that his father now runs.
"He wasn't a bad person," Tony settles on. He can feel the words running down his chin. They're thick, slimy things. He won't be around, but years from now, Peter may want to revisit this. Tony has to say something that, hypothetically, won't contradict what he would say then. An open end, not a lie. "He wasn't a bad guy. He never wanted to hurt anyone or cause any trouble. He just put his focus in the wrong places. When it came to me, he was pretty indifferent."
"'In-diff-er-ent.'"
"It's when you don't really care. When you don't pay attention to something."
Peter's fingertips are stained in the chocolate sauce. The wind is twisting his hair into a nest. He's still young, but he sounds so inquisitive when he asks, "Do you miss him?"
Tony feels that slime's bitterness anew. A rotten berry, burst in his mouth. He has to say yes. That's the only thing he's allowed to say, otherwise he will sound heartless and wrong, because how can someone lose their dad and not miss him?
Suddenly Ben's voice cuts in like a bell. "Alright, your turn with the hat." He takes the Mets cap off of his head and stuffs it over Peter's, the bill covering his eyes. Peter squawks. "Hey, why don't you tell Dad about the Mets game we just went to, huh?"
Peter lifts the cap up, looking affronted about it, but he asks, "You mean the game or the big fight that happened when they ran out of cotton candy?"
"I do want to know about the game," says Tony, "but you have to tell me the other thing first. Was it a fight-fight? People threw punches? Over cotton candy? Was there blood."
While Peter launches into his story about the "really grumpy old guy" who starting pitching a fit when the walking vendor ran out of cotton candy right when he got to his row of seats, Tony sent a thankful look Ben's way. Ben said nothing, just returned to his lunch and the kites in the distance. Tony doesn't think he's ever talked about Howard with Ben in the slightest. That doesn't make his gratitude any lesser.
Peter's hands fly about in fists as he continues the story. (Apparently the unavailable cotton candy was supposed to be for the man's daughter, who "looked like she didn't really care, you know?") He seems to have forgotten all about his grandfather in favor of this stranger with a bad temper (who didn't hit the vendor at first but waved his hand around like, "oooh, I'm going to get you!"). Or maybe he's just taken the cue that it's time to start talking about something else (like the other guy who threw his bag of cotton candy at the screaming man, saying, "Just shut up and take mine, would you?" Then fists started flying. And the little girl still didn't look like she cared).
We should probably still talk about it, Tony thinks as the story concludes. While I still can.
It occurs to him that he and Howard will both be going out not in one last blaze of glory, but a puttering gasp that no one saw coming. Instead of everything they've done, the question the world would instead ask, "What could they have done?"
He wants Peter to grow up even if he can't see it. Not just into a teenager, but a man, an old man, with a partner and children and grandchildren. He doesn't think he can accept anything else for his son.
Peter and Ben return to fly the kite one last time. The sky has melted from robin egg blue to a crisp gold. All the kites are black now, fewer and fewer. Tony stays on the bed of the truck and watches them drift down one-by-one, the orca's final dive, Iron Man's descent. He sees when the pirate ship comes to harbor, and realizes that this is it. No going back now.
Peter and Ben return with the pirate ship folded (and probably incorrectly, but whatever, Tony can just get them another one) and the cap still loose on Peter's head. He keeps swatting Ben's hands away when he tries to tighten it for him.
"Can we do this again next year?" He asks when he comes up to Tony again.
Tony pretends that he didn't hear him, which he knows is a shit thing to do, but there are zero good responses to that. "Ben, can Pete and I talk for just a minute?"
"Go right ahead." Ben waves them off. He reaches up to adjust his cap, and remembers it isn't there. "Just don't talk about me."
"Of course not." Tony waves Peter forward, hissing out a loud whisper: "Come on, let's go talk about how much of a dork Ben is!"
"The biggest dork," Peter whisper-hisses right back to him. While they walk off into the grass, Ben pretends to sniffle. Peter is smiling from ear to ear.
Tony is, too, until he remembers what he's about to say. He feels wretched for smiling at all today. And for today, as a whole. He should've just told Ben and May he needed to have a serious, face-to-face with Peter, not promised him a fun day flying kites.
"What is it?" Peter blinks up at him with his big brown eyes, and glances back towards the truck. "Are we actually going to talk about Uncle Ben?"
"No. We are going to talk about..." Tony runs a hand over his neck, then across his mother. His shoe is tapping on the dirt. "We are going to talk. Talk about..."
Peter's brow knits tighter and tighter as he fumbles. It's not a fearful look, but a "what the heck is wrong with my dad?" kind of look. He takes off the cap when the bill keeps Tony out of his sight.
Just say it.
You have to say it.
"Is something wrong?" Peter asks, and now the fear is there. Something is wrong. Adults don't act like this unless something is wrong.
"No. Well—Hold on. I'm trying to get my words together."
"Okay?"
Tony looks off into the grass and the yellow sky, unable to look at him anymore. This will be easier if he doesn't look at him the whole time, he thinks. This will be easier if he doesn't have to watch Peter's face crumple.
"I am...sick."
"Sick?" Peter looks him up and down. "Like you have a cold or something?"
"No, it's a different kind of sick. It's..." Tony scratches at the bank of his neck, then taps on the Arc Reactor through the fabric of his shirt. "It's coming from the Arc Reactor."
Peter tips his head to the side. He can't see the glow of it, but he stares under Tony's collarbone nonetheless. "What do you mean? I thought it's supposed to help you?"
"I mean that it's kind of leaking now, in a way. Getting into my blood. Making me sick."
Again Peter looks at him up and down. "Do you feel bad?"
When he asks, it only then occurs to Tony how the final days of this poisoning will not be pretty. He'd gotten it into his head that he'd just keel over and die, when really, he's probably going to be in a bed, a corpse strapped into an IV tube. He'll probably be pale and bony and too weak to stir. He feels himself rocking on his shoes—trying to familiarize himself with the feeling of his feet on the earth.
"Not right now," Tony says, "But I'm telling you this because. Because..."
"Because...?"
Tony finally returns his eyes to him. He can't stop it: the image of Peter's crying face invades his mind as easily as a sledgehammer through drywall. He thinks of his skin flushing red, the snot running over his lips. The tears that run in rivulets down his cheeks, blinding him. He hears the sound, the shuddering breaths, the croaks, the hiccups.
It's the face of when he scrapes his knee, when he lost his grip on his balloon at Legoland, but this time Tony can't stop it. No, it's not the same. He'll cry just like he cried the first night at the mansion. Not wailing in fear—gasping for breath with a broken heart. Tony never saw his face when he cried that night. Pepper soothed Peter on the other side of the door, because Tony couldn't handle it.
Peter will cry so hard that the golden sky will turn violet, then black, and he'll still have tears to shed. When Tony goes—because he has to—he'll be clinging onto Ben, perhaps unable to even wave goodbye. Their video calls will cease because Peter won't be able to look at him anymore.
When Tony is gone, Peter will cry more, because both the mother he always had and the father he thought would stay were gone. The wound may scar over in time. Tony doesn't think this will break him. But the stitches may come undone at random in the future, nights where Peter is trying to sleep but all he can think about is how his life as he knew it was shattered into pieces. He may weep simply because of the unfairness of it all, just like Tony did and still does.
Tony can't stop him from crying in the future. He won't be able to comfort him. If he sees Peter from the great beyond, that will be it: seeing.
But...
But...
"Because I'm going to be a little out for a while. Like I have the flu. I'm just going to spend every day in bed and not want to do anything."
"Oh." Peter scratches at his neck, too, and throws Ben's cap back on. "I'm sorry."
"Hey, don't be. It just means I probably won't be able to talk for a while, y'know? I don't want you to see me when I have fluids coming out of every hole in my body."
"Gross!" squawks Peter.
"Exactly. You understand."
"Yeah," he agrees. His nose is still scrunched up. "Okay. Can you call me when you're okay again? So I don't call you when you're taking a nap or anything?"
"Soon as I feel right as rain, I will let you know. That said! I do have a little gift for you. Hold out your hands."
Peter does, eagerly, and Tony withdraws it from his back pocket. Peter's eyes shoot up, but he also asks, "I already have a phone?"
"You do indeed have a phone that many others have. This is one of a kind, though. No one else in the world has this. Here, let me show you."
Tony kneels down so they can tinker with it together. Peter's eyes are glowing not just with the reflection of the screen. Tony gets it. It's sleek, it's new. It's something that will make all of his friends jealous.
"So it's all the same stuff. You can still call me, you can still message me, you can still play Angry Birds and poker and all that—"
"I don't know how to play poker."
"I'll teach you. The real star of the show is this. Wake up, Jar."
The dark home screen melts away, leaving only a glowing white circle that wavers and jolts with that familiar voice. "Hello, sir. Hello, Peter."
Peter grins from ear-to-ear and waves at the screen. "Hey, J.A.R.V.I.S.!"
"Jar," says Tony, "Let me see the living room."
"Yes, sir."
All the way across the country, the living room of the mansion is quiet and still. The sky outside the windows is a pale blue, not quite at sunset. There are the sofas, and the coffee table, the stack of papers under the lamp. Tony's lips purse when he spots the bottle set beside the coaster (aside, not on top, because Tony can't even do that right). Peter doesn't seem to notice it at all. His smile drops into a gape of wonder.
"This is the mansion?" he asks. He snatches the phone from Tony's grip. "Right now?"
"Right now. Jar, show Peter's room."
Tony hasn't looked inside for months now. Peter's smile is genuine, but Tony has to force his. He sits there and watches Peter's eyes flit about, drinking in every detail, as if he'd forgotten what it ever looked like. The board of controls still lies at the foot of his bed. The star-shaped bookshelf is a bit cocked from its last spin. At this angle, and in the daylight, it's hard to see the stars in the ceiling, but they are still there. Tony can't look at it. Peter doesn't see how the bookshelf is empty, doesn't see how long it's been since he's lied in that bed to see those stars. Tony does.
"Now," Tony goes on, "Unless I'm doing something gross, like if fluids are coming out of every hole in my body—"
"Stop!"
"—then you can look back home any time you want. The only exception is the lab. I know that may not sound fair, but, remember your pop can say some not-good words when he hurts himself while working."
"You mean like 'f-?'"
"Don't. Don't give me an example. And Jar will always be here to talk to you when you need him. One last thing I want you to know. This is very important; I need you to look at me."
Peter has to tear his eyes off of his new toy to do so. Tony's okay with that; if Peter treats his books so preciously, he'll treat this like it's fine China. He can goof around and busy J.A.R.V.I.S. with all the questions his mind can hold—barring the few that Tony has put a lock on, like "Where do babies come from?" He just needs him to pay attention to this.
"I want you to keep this on you all the time. You hear me? All the time, no matter where you're going." Peter nods. "I know you know how to call the police if you need help, and that's good. But, if you can't get to it, you call out, 'J.A.R.V.I.S., call the police!' Then there's this thing."
Tony reaches into his pocket again and withdraws the necklace. It's very simple, just a silver circle on a chain. Tony takes Peter's hand and presses his thumb flat to it. It lets out an affirming beep, and as Peter withdraws his hand again, a brief shadow of his thumbprint remains.
"This is if you can't get to it at all, but it's only for emergencies. Not for talking. You press this three times, and the police will know where you are and come right to you. And one last thing: do you remember what you said about your friend Rebekah, how she and her mom had that secret code?"
Peter nods. "In case she was in trouble but people were listening."
"Right. Now, we're going to say the same thing. If you're in trouble and someone's listening, you say, 'We're going to Burger King.'" Peter looks at the phone, but nothing happens. "You have to say it."
"We're going to Burger King."
Instantly the phone goes dark, and Tony's lets out a loud blare. Tony withdraws it to show Peter how the screen flashes red, and then changes to an overhead map that's pinpointing their exact location along the New Jersey shore.
"Now I know you need help, and like I said, the police will know, too."
"What if I just say it because I say it? Like what if we really are going to Burger King?"
"Then you say, 'I meant McDonald's.' You got that? Tell me what you say if you can't get to it but you don't need to be quiet."
"'J.A.R.V.I.S., call the police!"
"How many times do you press this if you have to be completely quiet?"
"Three."
"If someone's listening, you say..."
"'We're going to Burger King.' Then 'I meant McDonald's' if I say it by accident."
"You got it down pat." Tony pulls the necklace over Peter's neck, and sees that even with his adjusting it still hangs a bit far past his collarbone. He'll grow into it. "This takes tons of pressure to break, but I know how freaky strong you are, so just don't go hog wild on it, 'kay? Here you go."
Peter looks like he has to summon all his willpower to put the phone into his pocket instead of scouring through all its treasures. "Thanks, Dad."
"No prob, Bob. This was fun, wasn't it?" He twists the cap on Peter's head, swirling his curls around. Peter giggles. "This was a fun day."
"Yeah. Thanks for coming."
"Thanks for inviting me. But now I think it is time for us to go. We both got some long rides ahead of us."
Tony helps them get everything back in order. The pirate ship is stuffed into the back. It's odd, watching Peter get the passenger seat ready for his stay. He's big enough to sit there now, and he's preening about it.
As Ben fishes out one last water for him, and flicks the melting ice off his fingers, he asks Tony, "Everything good?"
"Everything good. I'm just going to be MIA for a while." He taps on his Arc Reactor again, like its an annoying piece of junk and not the thing that's killing him. "This thing's causing me some grievances, going to get some treatment."
Ben grimaces. "Ah, that sucks. Sorry for that. Take care of yourself."
"Will do. Also, thank you for a while ago. Appreciate it."
"Don't worry about it." Peter already cannot hear them, low as they're talking, yet Ben whispers lower still. "I don't miss my dad, either."
Tony nods and says nothing, even though he wants to ask. Part of it is just that stupid human response, the dark curiosity to know more of another's suffering just because. Especially with Ben being Ben, Tony struggles to imagine how he could have parents that were anything less than spectacular. Another part of it is maybe him wanting more. More solidarity. He thinks that it would be cathartic, for him and Ben to just sit down and vent about how shitty their fathers were.
He knows they won't. Ben doesn't talk about those things, and that's fine, it's not like he owes it to Tony. Ben closes the cooler and shuts the door and that's that.
"Bye, Dad," Peter says when he rounds to the other side. He's already strapped himself in, and even so he fights against the belt to give Tony a hug.
"Bye, Pete. Hey, try to keep that on the down-low, alright? I know you're going to want to rub it in your friends' faces."
"I won't. I hope you get better soon."
"Soon enough. Alright, you boys are past curfew. Get out of here."
Tony slaps the side door, and right on cue Ben gets the engine running. He asks Peter, "So do we get to talk about how dorky your dad is now?" but Peter answers, "No." He protests, and Peter laughs, and then the truck pulls away for the road. Peter presses himself to the window and waves for as long as he can, until Tony can only see the pair of taillights blazing red.
Good job, Tony, he thinks even as he waves. Good job.