Chapter 3

He rested his right forearm above his head and against his locker, his fingers impatiently tapping the metal doors of it. His eyes kept alternating between staring at the corner of the hall and at his watch on his left wrist, neither of them showing him what he wanted to see. There were only a few seconds left of the morning passing period before he had to rush to his class, yet he was not very compelled to do so without making sure to greet his girlfriend before that. She had been so distant the day before, and she then had conveyed to him how worried she was over something she could not even pinpoint, so when she had failed to respond to his texts and phone calls for the rest of the day, and then early this morning, his anxiety had been dialed up to eleven.

"Dude, we're gonna be late," Rhodey's voice behind him made the inventor frown.

"Where is she, Rhodey? What if something bad happened to her?"

"T, the armor hasn't even been activated. She's fine."

"If she's fine, then why hasn't she returned my calls?" Tony asked as he turned around in place and reluctantly began following Rhodey to their first period classroom.

"She probably overslept," Rhodey shrugged. "Maybe she watched a movie with her dad last night and lost track of time. He's rarely home, right? Can you blame her for wanting to spend time with him?"

"Well, no," Tony sighed. "But if she was busy, she would've told me, right? I mean, this is Pepper we're talking about. Pepper! When has she ever not returned a call or a message within half a second of being sent?"

"When she's mad at you?" Rhodey offered.

"Exactly!"

"So, she's mad at you."

"No, she's not!"

"You sure? Because sometimes you're as clueless and slow to react as a guppy."

"I am su– Mmhhh…"

Tony interrupted his own response, reviewed in his mind the events of the day before, and then frowned. He was confident that their goodbye had been very amicable, especially since there had been some kissing involved. Girls did not kiss guys they were angry at, right? Girls would not let their boyfriends make out with them if they had done something wrong, right?

Then again, what if it was not Pepper who was mad at him, but her dad was? What if her dad had seen them kiss in the streets? Was if this was why she was not here? Was she grounded? Had Pepper lost her phone privileges because of him? Or worse: had her father banned her from even speaking to him?

Wait a minute, Tony's head suddenly recoiled. "Did you just call me a guppy?!"

"Mr. Stark!" the teacher growled, making the genius flinch where he stood. "Can you please sit down? Class started two minutes ago!"

"What?" Tony's eyes widened. He then looked away from the angry teacher and towards the rest of the class, only to see that every other student was already busy with the first assignment of the day, while he was still standing by the door, looking like a mumbling idiot.

"I won't ask for a third time, Mr. Stark."

Third time?! The inventor wanted to scream. How spaced out could I have been?

"Mr. Stark…" the teacher's voice trailed, signaling her approach to the end of her wits.

"Sorry," the genius whispered with a gulp; his head hung, his shoulders rose in embarrassment, and he then slowly walked to his seat. As soon as he sat down and took out his book to find the page the assignment was on, he heard Rhodey whisper to him.

"See? Guppy."

"Shut up," Tony said between gritted teeth.

"Alright, people," the teacher began from her standing position at the front of the class. "Once you finish that warm up, I need you to–"

A knock on the classroom door made the teacher groan, pinch the bridge of her nose, and then sigh loudly in exasperation.

"I'm trying to teach here," the woman mumbled on her way to the door. "Does anybody care about that?"

Wanting to avoid being sent to the office, Tony lowered his head even more, opting to concentrate on finishing the warm-up as soon as he could. He was already behind in time, but he knew that he could complete the simple task before anyone else could. He was Tony Stark, after all, and a topic as easy as English Grammar was no match for him. And maybe, just maybe, seeing as he might be able to finish the 10-minute assignment in just two, it was possible that the teacher allowed him to go to the bathroom, even if he actually wanted to use the opportunity just to check that Pepper had made it to school. They did not share a class until third period, and then their common off period took place. But he honestly could not wait that long. He had to find out if she was OK right now.

"DONE!" Tony practically screamed at the top of his lungs, his arm high in the air before he even lifted his head. "Can I go to the bathroom?"

"Uhm, T…"

"Mr. Stark! You're really testing my patience today! Plus, you also just interrupted our new student. Do you mind?"

"What?" Tony finally lifted his head, allowed his field of vision to expand, and then realized what the commotion by the door had been.

"Oh," the blue-eyed boy lowered his arm. "Sorry."

"I should've gone to med school," the old teacher mumbled under her breath. "Anyway, please continue your introduction."

"Sure," the short brunette shrugged. "My name is Samantha. I'm new to the city. And I go by Sam."

"Welcome to the Tomorrow Academy, Sam," the teacher patted the girl on her shoulder. "Now please, find a seat next to Mr. Rhodes so that we can actually get some work done today. Mr. Rhodes, please raise your hand."

The boy immediately did as told and, not two seconds later, the beautiful brunette sat to his right. The girl carefully placed her paper and pencil on the table, and was then addressed by a flinching young billionaire.

"Sorry," he apologized again. "I didn't mean to be rude to you just now."

"That's OK," Sam replied with a smile. "I'm late to class. It's kind of my fault. What are we doing?"

"Answering the questions on page 394."

"Oh," Sam frowned. "I don't have a book yet."

"Want to borrow mine? I'm already done," Tony offered the book to the girl, which was then transferred from one side to the other by Rhodey's assistance in between.

"Thanks, Tony," Sam grabbed the book and then quickly searched for the page in question.

"You're wel – Wait, you know who I am?"

"Well, duh! You're Iron Man! And you are–" Sam pointed at Rhodey, but the boy simply rolled his eyes.

"Chopped Liver," Rhodey said, unamused that he was being ignored by the hot new girl again. "If you know who he is, then my name is Chopped Liver."

Sam giggled behind her hand. "No, you're not. You're James Rhodes. You're War Machine."

"Someone knows who I am," Rhodey said with raised eyebrows before his head snapped to his right. "Wait, you're not psychic, right?"

"No," Sam frowned in confusion. "Why?"

"No reason," Rhodey cleared his throat.

Tony rolled his eyes, returned his attention to his plan to get the teacher to let him go to the bathroom, but was then interrupted by his book being handed back to him.

"Done," Sam smiled. "Thanks for letting me borrow your book."

"Huh?" Rhodey arched a single eyebrow. "You're… done? As in, you don't get the assignment, or…"

"As in I finished it," she shrugged. "Pretty easy."

"No, it's not," Rhodey groaned. "It's ten questions, and I'm stuck on number 3!"

"Comparative," both Sam and Tony provided the answer in unison.

"What?" Rhodey shook his head and pointed towards the girl. "What just happened here? You weren't even in class here yesterday! How do you know this?"

"I read," Sam replied.

"Grammar books for fun?!" Rhodey spat.

"Grammar, for fun? God, no!" Sam chuckled. "That's what science books are for!"

"Science?" Tony's interest was suddenly piqued. "What kind of science?"

"Any kind!" Sam replied. "Although, I do have a favorite science."

"Which is?" Tony eyed the smiling girl.

"Physics! I love physics!"

"Really?" Rhodey asked with confusion. "You like physics?"

"Yeah! I have that class during third period! I can't wait!"

"Professor Klein?" Tony asked.

"Yeah!" Sam nodded.

Tony slammed his left palm on his desk. "I have that class, too!"

"MR. STARK!" the teacher's voice resounded in the entire room. "Principal's office. NOW!"

xxxXXXxxx

"Oh, man. This is nuts!"

The visit to Principal Nara's office had turned out to take longer than he had anticipated – as in it had taken the rest of first period, all of his second period class, and the passing period to third. Not only was he now late for his third period class, but he had also been assigned detention during his off period. He was very tempted to just skip the rest of the day and look for Pepper, but he knew that this would only make matters worse. If she was in trouble or grounded, the last thing he wanted to acquire was further punishment that would eat up more of his time that he could have been using to find out where his girlfriend was.

"My dad's so gonna yell at me, too," Tony mumbled as he knocked on the door to his science class, tardy pass in his hand. Before he knew it, the door was unlocked and opened for him, by none other than the new girl in school.

"You're late," she tilted her head to the side and took a step back to let him in.

"Had to wait in line," he said as he walked inside, waved the tardy pass towards the teacher, sat at his favorite two-seat desk at the front of the class, and then noticed that the seat next to his was soon occupied by Sam.

"Mind if we share a desk?"

"Uhm," Tony grimaced. "Actually, I already have a lab partner."

"Oh?" Sam's head recoiled. "Really? Where is he?"

"She," Tony looked around, his head slowly turning all the way to the back of the class, and then frowned when there was no sign of the redhead. "She doesn't appear to be here right now."

"Oh, well," Sam smiled and handed him the day's worksheet. "I guess we can be lab partners for today, then, huh?"

"I, uhm… I-I guess, yes."

"Cool! I already started and got up to question #5, but I think the answer choices are wrong."

"Mmhmm," Tony was not sure what he was responding to, as his eyes were now staring at the classroom door.

"I think the answer should be 3.0 Ohm, but it's not even one of the answers. What do you think?"

"Yeah."

"Yeah, what?"

"I agree."

"Agree, with what?"

"With, uhm…" Tony briefly returned his attention to the assignment, eyeballed the area where her finger was pointing, and then frowned. "Yeah, you're right, Sam. The answer choices are incorrect."

"I thought so. Let me tell Professor Klein."

Before Sam had the chance to get up from her desk, the front door was unlocked from the outside by the school nurse. The woman held the door open for the student she was escorting to class, and when said student walked inside, her head hung, Tony's world shrunk to focusing only on the redhead before him.

"Professor Klein. I'm sorry about the interruption," the nurse began, "But you know I'm required to drop off students if they're under my care."

"It's no problem, Nurse Owen. Miss Potts, please come in."

Pepper slowly lifted her head, realized her seat was taken, and then looked down again. Without sparing Tony a glance, the ginger quickly walked towards the other end of the room, deliberately avoiding the knowing glances of everyone in class. The only space left to sit in was a single-chair by the back right corner of the room – one that was hardly ever used because it meant being partner-less in class.

"Pepper," Tony's voice denoted how worried he still was for her, even if she appeared to be physically alright.

"I take it that Pepper is your lab partner?" Sam asked, her eyes on Tony's even though his were on his crestfallen redhead.

"Yeah," he nodded.

"So, I guess you do all the work and she just puts her name on the paper, huh?"

It took Tony a second to process Samantha's words but, once he did, his head snapped from staring at Pepper, who was obviously avoiding exchanging looks with him, to practically glaring at a smirking brunette sitting next to him.

"What did you just say?"

"Don't worry," Sam waved her hand dismissively towards him as she stood up, paper in hand. "I won't tell anyone, I promise. It's not my problem if you don't mind her cheating off you."

"What?" Tony felt his jaw clench. "She doesn't cheat off me!"

"Relax," the girl shrugged. "Your little secret is safe with me."

Tony opened his mouth once more to set the record straight, but Sam had already reached the teacher's desk. As such, the genius opted to focusing all of his attention on Pepper again. Samantha was too busy debating with Professor Klein about the mistake on the assignment, so she could wait to be told she was wrong about Pepper once she returned. While it was partly true that the redhead required a lot of help in the area of physics, she did put a lot of effort into understanding the concepts rather than just letting Tony answer every question for her. He was not sure why this girl had just automatically assumed she knew how he and Pepper operated in class, but it was a misunderstanding he was definitely going to squash as soon as he could.

After I find out why Pepper was with the nurse.

The genius looked towards the teacher's desk yet again, made sure that Professor Klein was distracted enough with the presence of the new girl, and then slowly began sliding away from his desk. He was halfway out of his seat, his eyes locked on Pepper's turned away head, but before he could take one step towards his destination, Professor Klein addressed the entire room.

"Class," the man began writing on the board, "There appears to be a mistake on the assignment. Please refer to question five and…"

Tony tuned out the rest of the announcement, knowing exactly what the teacher was about to point out, but he was then brought back to reality when the boy behind him chuckled derisively at him.

"Wow, Stark. Partnering up with the new girl already? I didn't take you for that kind of player!"

"What?"

"Like you don't know," the male student scoffed. "I know they look nothing alike but, c'mon, man! They're sisters!"

"Sisters? Who-what?"

The student rolled his eyes, opened his mouth to retort, but then closed his mouth when the genius was loudly addressed by the professor.

"Seems you have competition, Mr. Stark," the professor teased, Samantha smiling with pride next to the old man. "Miss Potts has a good eye for catching my mistakes."

"Miss… Potts?" Tony frowned, his eyes briefly landing on Pepper's form to watch her cover her face with her hands.

"Keep an eye on her, people," Professor Klein nodded. "Miss Potts here is very smart!"

Samantha practically skipped back to her seat, sat next to Tony, and then gave him a thumbs-up before returning her attention to the paper.

He should have noticed before – way before now, but it was not until this moment; until his eyes finally bothered to look at the top left corner of the paper, where the students' names were to be written, that he understood what had just taken place.

Samantha Alexa Potts.

The inventor's jaw dropped.

A sister. Her sister.

Pepper Potts had a sister – one that he had never known about.

Or at least not until now.