"Okay, Baby Girl, hit me," Tony ordered, relaxing in his chair. It was time to get down to it.
"Should we begin with Mister Parker or Miss Maximoff, Boss," Fri asked straight away.
"Maximoff. Wanda. Go with her," Tony said, thankful for the question. It was nice of her to pretend Tony hadn't spent countless nights reading about every little file in existence about Peter. Nice of her to act as if he needed the introduction; as if he was not the most informed person in the galaxy about Peter Parker.
What he needed now was to know everything about the person he had invited to live with them.
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Peter somersaulted over the couch, landing on top of the centre table, perfectly balanced on the tip of his toes. Tony blinked, trying to stop his racing heart from bursting out of his mouth.
God, he needed to get a grip.
The last thing Peter needed was for Tony to act like his mutation was a freaky thing that made him uncomfortable — especially because that wasn't the case. Tony wasn't freaked out by Peter's powers; he simply couldn't see the boy doing acrobatics without feeling as though he was about to fall and get horribly injured.
It's pathetic, he's painfully aware.
It also made no sense.
Peter had proven many times over that he had a good grip over his abilities and that they were much more impressive than Tony had ever believed them to be in the first place. The kid could adhere to walls, for Christ's sake.
He wasn't about to die from a little jump in the living room. And yet, no matter how many times Tony repeated those words to himself, he still couldn't get over the feeling that all it would take was a slip, a wrong move, a distraction…
He lived in fear of the moment that Peter would inevitably get hurt, and it was eating at his insides.
After five years of living without him, after watching him disappear in Titan, after the fight, after everything, goddammit, Tony's brain had developed an almost Pavlovian response to Peter.
Tony saw him, and he needed to protect him with everything he's got.
Then he realized Peter was talking to him. Opening his mouth, forming words, informing him that—
Tony stopped. Waited for the words to sink in. "You don't want to visit your aunt?" He repeated, hoping he had misunderstood Peter's clear words.
"No," Peter confirmed, his tone completely flat. "No, I don't."
"Peter—"
"I just don't feel like it," Peter spoke over him, going for an expression of disinterest. He landed closer to a pained, twisted frown.
It was useless to try, Tony wanted to say — Peter's eyes always gave him away.
"You've returned from the grave, basically," It's what Tony said, instead. "I think she wants to see you. I wouldn't put it past her to storm in here."
"I'll go. Just not now," Peter said, looking away. "We've texted. She understands." The words were clipped and the tone ended the conversation, just like that.
Tony knew May understood nothing, which just about left them together on the clueless train. Two idiots with no idea of what was happening inside Peter's head.
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"Don't you have anyone to visit? People who came back from the snap?" Wanda asked a week later, over breakfast.
Tony battled against the sudden urge to stuff the piece of toast in his hands down her throat. "Nope," he said instead, keeping his tone light. He couldn't resist the dig, though. "You?"
She glared at him, fingers curling around the knife in her hand. Tony vaguely wondered if she would have the balls to try to stab him in his own kitchen, then wondered if his lack of concern should raise some alarms in his head.
"You know I don't," she gritted through her teeth.
"I don't, actually," Tony lied. He knew her life better than anyone else alive — maybe even better than she did when it came to the technicalities. "Who knows what sort of adventures Uncle Steve had planned for you guys and all? Being on the road and shit — I'm sure it was a blast."
"Fuck off, Stark."
"Ouch."
"We drove and hid," she explained, although he never asked. "Not many friendships along the way, believe it or not. Surprisingly, people aren't very friendly to strangers in a van."
"They aren't? I wouldn't know. Vans aren't really my thing." He shrugged, going back to his toast and hoping this conversation could be over now. In his experience, dragging up the past rarely led anywhere good.
"I bet," Wanda mumbled under her breath, also going back to her food. For a long moment they ate in peace, and Tony almost tricked himself into believing that would be the end of it. The second he took his last bite, however, she came back swinging. "Why do you do this?"
The temptation to take the golden opportunity she had given him and make a haste escape was nearly irresistible. A terrible joke, a well-placed jab… so many options there, really. Wanda was close to begging him to slither his way out of this conversation.
Despite his better reasoning, he stayed. Tony exhaled and stayed where he was, internally wondering about his masochist tendencies.
"Do what, exactly?" He dutifully asked, following his cue to perfection.
Wanda didn't even have the grace to look pleasantly surprised. "Pretend you don't know about my life," she said, all business. Their eyes met, and Tony wished he could read whatever emotion hid in hers.
"Not like I know everything about you, Quick-Fingers. I'm not sure if you are aware, but I have more important things in my life to do than to spy on you and the whole Steve summer camp."
"Ugh, stop. You're always so—," she waved her hand in the direction of his face, "—this! Stop."
Tony blinked. "I'm not sure what I can do about my face."
"That's not what I mean, Stark, and you know it. You evade. There's always an answer, a response, a trick."
"That's how conversations work, sweetheart. You ask and I answer," Tony explained, sipping his lukewarm coffee and nearly grimacing at the taste. He could almost see the levels of irritation rising inside Wanda. Tony wished that was enough to stop him. "Otherwise shit will get confusing, right?"
She shook her head at him, a familiar mix of frustration and disgust twisting her features. "What does one have to do to get you to speak plainly, hun? Is this all you have?" Wanda asked. Weirdly enough, she seemed to mean it. "The tricks? Is that all you give people?"
Wouldn't that be so much simpler?
Christ, if only Tony could've done himself away with the emotions and confusing feelings and kept a healthy distance from others… well, that would've been fucking wonderful. Instead, he got this clusterfuck of failed relationships tied to his name — one worse than the next.
Howard. Rhodey. Obadiah. Jarvis.
Vision.
Steve.
Pepper.
"You want honestly, princess?" Tony said, wishing the words didn't have such a bitter aftertaste. "Call my assistant and schedule an appointment during my office hours. Right now I'm having breakfast — I don't take requests."
Wanda's lips curled in a sour smile. "I see," she said quietly, getting up from the table and taking her dirty dishes to the sink. On her way out, she stopped at the table once more. "You're good, Stark. I'll give you that. I almost believe you. Almost."
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"Let's get a screen up, Fri. Peter — wherever he is," Tony ordered, too tired to fight against the urge. "Keep it running."
Thankfully, his A.I kept her witty comments to herself and only replied softly, "Yes, Boss," before settling a small holographic screen to his left side.
It was a private scene. Peter was rolling in his bed, clearly trying to go to sleep and having some difficulty. He was wearing nothing but a pair of grey sweatpants that Tony had the sinking suspicion belonged to him — bare-chested and spread lazily across the bed.
Tony had absolutely no business watching that.
Spying on Peter.
None at all.
It was wrong and inexcusable.
And yet it instantly calmed him a little bit. So Tony kept the screen right where it was and went back to work, happy to be able to focus on the numbers once more.
If every now and then he stopped to check on Peter, well, that was still better than a million other options Tony had running through his head, so he fought down the guilt and told himself it was alright.
Only once, Tony mentally promised.
Only today.
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They had a tacit agreement. Tony pretended he didn't know where Wanda went to at night and she pretended not to know when he had visited during the day.
Tony was grateful for it.
He didn't want to talk about Vision.
He most certainly didn't want to talk about his grave. Or Wanda's grief. Or the never-ending crashing waves of regret that threatened to swallow him whole every time he allowed himself to look at her for a second too long.
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The feeling still threatened to drown him whole. No matter how many days had passed and how much time Tony spent looking at Peter and watching him on endless screens and listening to the sound of his voice and the never-ending noises he made as he moved across the house.
The feeling was still there.
Not the same as before, of course.
No.
It was a different sort of fear. A whole other kind of desperation that sat heavily on top of his chest every single day — so alien to him, and yet maddeningly similar.
So, so similar.
Tony needed to watch Peter. To see him. To keep him within touching distance just so he could prove to himself that his return was not an intricate plot of his sick mind after the years of psychological torture.
The thing was: the task never seemed to get easier. It should — in theory. It fucking should, right?
As the days turned into weeks and nothing changed, his damn oh-so-genius brain should've adapted to the new reality and allowed Tony some measure of peace. Some resting time where his thoughts weren't consumed by the need to make sure things were still exactly as they should be and Peter was still where he needed to be.
And yet.
Despite reason, however, there Tony was, staring at another holographic image of Peter Parker with enough focus to hurt.
Like a fucking psychopath.
Like the fucked-up person Tony had admitted to himself he was, deep down.
It was late — closer to sunrise than to sundown — and Tony was sitting in his bed, wide awake, with a Stark Pad in his hands, many formulas left unfinished there as he lost himself in the projection of Peter's room.
Of his bed.
Of Peter.
"Shut it down, Fri," Tony ordered sharply, closing his eyes to avoid seeing the images fade away. God, he was losing it. He's getting completely wrapped inside his own paranoias and fears, imagining scenarios that would never exist.
Tony needed to get a grip.
He needed to get a fucking grip, and fast. Before he lost the last strand of sanity he still had left as he stared at a fucking holographic image of a person who was sleeping a few feet away in the room next to his.
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"Could I go back?" Wanda asked, once again interrupting his moment of peace.
"Do you want to?"
The question made her pause for a few beats. "That's not what I asked."
"You can," Tony answered, keeping his eyes on the screen in front of him. He knew she wasn't going anywhere. "Of course. You're not a prisoner here. If you want to return to the compound, you're free to leave."
"Why bring me here, then?"
"I thought Peter could use the company."
She bristled at the suggestion. "Could you be serious for once?"
"I don't know what you mean; I'm always serious."
"Stark. Why did you bring me here?"
His last name coming from her mouth again was enough to get him to lift his head and meet her eyes. Tony had almost forgotten how much he had once hated his name crossing her lips — how much anger she had put behind it.
That wasn't how she said it now. But, still…
"Would you have preferred to stay there?" he asked, knowing he had given her zero choices at the time to say no to him. To choose her own fate.
"I don't know," she said. Then thought about it for a moment. "No. I wouldn't. I don't know. I guess it would've been… strange to live there without—"
Vision. Jarvis.
Of course.
Tony winced, wishing she had never brought the subject up, because now the memories flooded his mind all at once and it seemed impossible to remember how he could've been doing anything other than looking back and regretting his every decision regarding Vision.
"I'm sorry," Wanda said, as though she couldn't get enough of twisting the knife deeper and deeper. And how insane it was for her to be apologizing to him? "I understand-I mean, I know the two of you were rather close—"
"We weren't," Tony corrected. "We weren't. You knew Vision better than anyone else, probably. I didn't."
"But he—"
"It wasn't the same," he carried on, hoping she would desist from this line of questioning. "Jarvis was… When he… They weren't the same. Vision was his own person, as you very well know."
"I. yes," Wanda agreed, although there was a look of confusion on her face that Tony forced himself to stop analyzing. "He was."
Tony wished the words weren't so goddamn bitter in his mouth.
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The music stopped.
"Miss Potts is calling again, Sir," F.R.I.D.A.Y announced all of a sudden, breaking the new silence with her gentle voice. Tony was smart enough to read between the lines.
"And I remember telling you to redirect all my calls earlier today, hun?" He still tried, but his hands came to a halt and the screw he had been reaching for stayed put on the floor beside him.
"She insists, Boss," Fri said, and Tony knew that was his A.I's way of bossing him around. It was a touch insulting, and yet… It reminded him enough of J.A.R.V.I.S. that the words of protest never reached his lips.
He sighed.
It wasn't purely F.R.I.D.A.Y's fault, he was painfully aware. Pepper was insisting, no doubt. If he didn't take the call now, it was just a matter of time before she came in person to scream at him about whatever it was this time.
"Put her through," Tony said, sliding out from under his car and wiping his dirty hands on his shirt. This call wouldn't remain a call for very long, he knew.
Within seconds, Pepper's voice erupted from the speakers, louder than any voice had the power of being for reasons Tony would rather not examine too closely.
"Anthony Stark," Pepper spoke straight away. "Do you have any idea how many times I called you?"
"Why, hello, Pepper. I'm great, thank you for asking. How are you on this lovely morning?"
"It's almost dinner time, Tony. Don't start with me. I would have had plenty of opportunities to ask about your mood if you had bothered to pick up any of my dozen calls."
Tony winced. "Well, you know how it is… having roommates and all."
"No, Tony, I do not know. The only roommate I ever had was you, and I'm sure that's far from what one might call a normal experience."
"I have no idea what you mean with that."
"I'm sure you don't," Pepper said, then paused. A moment passed in silence, which quite surely preceded the actual reason for the phone calls. "Tony… how are you, really?"
The question was so tentative, so unsure. A less threatening way of wording the worries they both knew hid in between the lines.
"I'm alright, Pepper," he answered, ignoring the bitter aftertaste of the enormous lie. In a way, it was such a small one in the endless line of lies he had told her. "No need to worry your pretty head of fiery hair about me."
"I always worry about you," she said without missing a beat. "You know that. If you didn't lie so much to me, perhaps it would help me worry less. I already know you're not alright, Tony, don't bullshit me. I asked how are you, not if you're alright. Give me something to work with."
Tony sighed. "What do you want me to say, Pep? I'm as alright as I'll ever be, I suppose."
"Don't say that," she said, so hopeful. So very full of expectations and desires for him, and it hurt. Pepper wanted so many things for him, so much. It was a heavy weight to carry. "Don't."
It brought out the worst in Tony. The self-destructive, rebellious instinct that made him want to ruin his goddamn life if only it would make people stop trying to tell him what he ought to be doing instead. "What? Does it hurt to hear the—"
"Stop," Pepper cut him off, speaking over him with such force that the rest of the poisonous words died in his mouth. "Please. Stop."
She understood.
Pepper — the most patient, understanding person to ever walk the earth — had lived with his bullshit long enough to know his triggers almost better than Tony did. So, yeah, of course she knew. Of course she could predict the words he had been about to utter even if he never got the chance to actually do so.
Pepper knew.
And she was doing her best to help.
As always, Pepper was going above and beyond to help Tony.
And for Christ's sake, it burned.
Burned that she was so right and Tony had only ever been wrong in his entire life.
"What do you want, Pepper?" He hissed the question, hoping she would get to the point already and leave him to his work. To his projects, his cars, his lab, his inventions, his personal space, his thoughts and self-flagellation, which were all he had now after, well, everything.
"I want to know how you are. How you really are," she said, her voice but a whisper. "Do I need to drive there? 'Cause you know I can, I only need to—"
"Pep. Pepper. Stop. You don't," Tony rushed to say. The last thing he needed was a visit. "I'm as fine as I'll get. Let's learn to live with it."
You left, he wanted to say. Stop calling when you were the one who left.
He said none of the acid words burning at the back of his throat, though, and instead, kept repeating that he was fine, that he was alright, that he wasn't about to lose his shit, and all the other lies he had practised his entire life, until she accepted it. Until she gave up.
When she finally hung up, Tony released a deep breath he hadn't even known he had been holding in all throughout the call.
She wouldn't come. No one would show up. They were okay.
No one was coming.
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Peter had changed.
Tony had expected that. Had known that what they lived through was bound to leave a deep mark even on a good kid like Peter. So, yeah, he had prepared for nightmares, panic attacks, strange coping methods, and a lot of weird, uncomfortable talks about, well, everything.
What he hadn't prepared for, were the insane mood shifts.
These days, Tony walked around wondering which sort of mood Peter would be in when he turned the corner, and it wore off on Tony's considerable tolerance to stress.
The way Peter would wake up smiling and flipping around and jumping over couches and tables, only to land on a chair and remain seated there, in silence, for two hours, a sour, contemplative look on his face that seemed almost wrong when paired with his young, smooth features.
He laughed at a joke on Monday, only to flinch at it on Tuesday. He danced to the beat of old rock on Friday, and couldn't bear the loud sound on Saturday. He wanted, only to turn around and claim he had never wanted it in the first place, and for Christ's sake, Tony's nerves were fraying more and more with each passing day.
Maybe because he was so attuned to Peter in a way he had never been to anyone else before, the changes seemed almost impossible to handle. His mood started to mirror Peter to an extent that it became laughable.
The universe had almost come to a collapse, and Tony was empowering all his considerable intellect to foresee the necessities of one single person. And with mediocre results, to show for it.
It was just fucking impossible.
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"No one's calling," Wanda said one Saturday morning as they had lunch, shifting her food around her plate. She raised her head and met Tony's eyes. "Why is no one calling?"
Tony swallowed a mouthful before answering her. "Because I told them not to." He gave her the truth, figuring she deserved that. In his mind, Tony had imagined that both Peter and Wanda had already figured that out.
She blinked, surprised. "Why would you do that?"
"I figured we all needed some time after…" He weighed the words, wondered how to phrase the words better, and then promptly gave up. Far too much work to embellish it. "...Thanos and everything."
"And it didn't occur to you that I might have wanted to make that decision for myself?" Wanda questioned, her voice getting progressively louder as she worked herself up. By his side, Peter also turned to stare at him with curiosity stamped on his face, although he lacked the anger Tony could see simmering in Wanda's eyes.
The whole situation could turn ugly quickly, Tony realized.
Very ugly, very quickly.
Shit.
"Would you like to return to the field?" he asked slowly, doing his best to keep a neutral expression on his face.
"You ask that now?"
"Well, there's still a lot of shit to do. No time like the present. If you want to get back on the rotation, tell me. I'm sure there's a ton for you to do."
"And would you?" She pressed, holding her fork in a way that spoke volumes. Again with the cutlery. Tony began to wonder if he would need his suit in the near-by future. "Would you let me leave?"
The question was perplexing, though.
"What?" He asked. "Why wouldn't I?"
"Well, why are you keeping me here in the first place, Stark?" Wanda demanded, standing up and slamming the fork down on the table. The whole table trembled with the force of it.
In response, Tony forced himself to relax further into his chair, leaning back and making no defensive moves. The last thing he wanted was to escalate the situation. "I'm not keeping you here. You're free to leave whenever you please. I've told you so already."
"You use words as magicians use their hands, Stark," she spat, frowning. "You manipulate and you hide. How can I believe the things you say when you keep so much from me?"
Peter shifted in his place. "Wanda, perhaps you shouldn't—"
"Shut up, Peter," she cut him off, angrily waving his words away. "This doesn't concern you."
That spiked Tony's anger more than her previous words. Still, he breathed in and out, in and out. He would not escalate. He was better than this. He had promised himself to do better, to be better.
"It's okay, buddy," Tony said, placing a calming hand on Peter's shoulders and giving him a light squeeze. "Wanda can say whatever she wants. It's fine."
Her eyebrows lifted. "Oh, thank you," she mocked. "It's a blessing to know that I can—"
This time, Tony was the one to cut her off, speaking over her without any struggle. This he knew how to do. "However, it does surprise me that you are asking me this in the first place."
"What do you mean?"
"Why not get the information directly from the source? Why ask me when you could make your own decisions, as you pointed out?" Tony calmly asked. He already knew the answer, though. "When was the last time you called anyone from the team?"
Wanda blinked. Stared.
"I. I mean- I didn't know I could," she said weakly after a few moments of significant silence.
"You didn't? I doubt that. I told you on your first day here that F.R.I.D.A.Y. was available to you for any need you might have, including making phone calls. And you have your cell phone, I'm sure — all the Avengers get one."
"That's not- You are the one who—" Wanda's words died on her lips. She fisted and relaxed her hands several times. Tony squeezed Peter's shoulder once again, feeling the tension there. "You could've told me. Who would I have called?"
"Anyone. You know some of them better than I do, Wanda," Tony pointed out. "You could've even called Maria. Fury. Phil Coulson. I'm sure many people are willing to accept a call from you."
"No one called," she said, still so angry, so frustrated. The words betrayed her, the tone even more so. "I couldn't…"
"And that's fine," Tony finally said, giving her a serious look. "I figured you needed a break. A lot of us do. It's alright."
"Don't tell me what I need. I know how to take care of myself."
"I'm sure you do. I never said otherwise."
"You allowed the others to believe me weak, broken. As though I couldn't help—"
"I never said any of that. No one thinks you're broken or weak. Absolutely no one who saw you fighting Thanos alone could ever think that." Tony shook his head. He was starting to understand what had brought this up, and it was not good. "And you have helped. There are people who are doing what needs to be done now."
"I could help!" She screamed, furious. There are rivers of hurt flowing behind her eyes. "I could be there, helping them, instead of being locked away in this house, doing nothing. Being useless."
"There is nothing for you to do," Tony explained. He wished she wouldn't look so vulnerable, so breakable. Like something, someone he might have to protect. "We're working on behind the scene shit now. Paperwork, speeches, money, evidence, cover stories… People are getting their lives back together after five years. That will take time. There's no fight, Wanda. What would you like to do?"
"But- if Clint and James and Dr. Banner—"
"Clint is at home with his kids. Barnes is off the grid — taking some time off as well. Bruce is at the Compound working because that's what Bruce does. He likes to work. He's doing research and helping at the medical bay," Tony listed, waving his hand at the empty space in front of him. "You would like to help with what part of this?"
At that, Wanda had no words. She just stared at him for the longest of times, her eyes shining with poorly concealed anger and resentment, before she turned around and walked away.
This time, when Tony pressed the heel of his hands against his eyes, torn between relief and regret, it was Peter who placed his hand on Tony's shoulder in a silent show of support. And even as the minutes grew long and Tony couldn't seem to find the strength to get up, Peter remained there, by his side, saying absolutely nothing.
Tony just stayed there and tried not to regret every single decision he had ever made in his miserable life.