A/N: Day 2! Thank you for your comments 3
Tony is elbow deep in rewiring one of his older suits when F.R.I.D.A.Y. announces Peter's arrival and for the fraction of a second he just stops.
He's tired. The I'm-insomnia's-bitch kind of tired. The tired where he hasn't had more than three hours of sleep a night for almost four days in a row and the few hours he did get were laced with different version of the same old stories over and over and over again.
Dark caves, people shouting in foreign languages. Fear, pain, cold.
Bunkers in the middle of nowhere, a tiny screen in a dark room. Screams, blood, death.
Pepper falling. Rhodey falling. A shield shoved into his sternum. Darkness, cold – so much cold.
A sassy teenager, in over his head, fighting fights he shouldn't be fighting. He's falling, drowning, suffocating and Tony can't –
"Hey Mister Stark!"
The billionaire blinks down at his hands that are still stuck in his armor, clenched around one of its powering units, and with a very deliberate exhale he forces his body to relax and his fists to open. It's hard but he does it and through sheer will power alone manages to crack a smile along the way. It's not a good one. Peter can see right through it but he's trying, that's what counts, right?
"Hey kid," he greets him, making a conscious effort to keep his voice just a little more cheerful than he actually feels without sounding over the top. "How's school?"
Of course it's not working. The kid's a genius and aside from being very empathetic to his surroundings he also knows Tony. He knows Tony's moods and he knows what it looks like when he's pretending to be okay. And Tony hates it. He hates that Peter knows how messed up he is and he hates how he sees him using Tony's own coping mechanisms and he just can't have that, he won't allow it.
What he hates most, though, is that Peter just won't turn away like everyone else did. Peter refuses to give up on him and while it's nice to have someone around, sometimes the trust the kid puts in him makes him feel lightheaded and trapped and lost and oh-so-scared. The thought of disappointing him is too much to bear on a good day and today is not a good day. Today is two days away from the worst day and he doesn't know if he can handle the pressure.
He doesn't want to flip and have Peter suffer from the consequences. Maybe he should tell him to go home, maybe he should call raincheck and postpone to – sometime after Christmas, when he's got some strength back because right now? Right now he's a mess and Peter deserves so much more – a mentally stable mentor, a nice fun evening with his friends, lightness.
Ultimately, Peter deserves light and Tony's soul has been in the shadows so long he has forgotten what it looks like. Sometimes just looking at it makes him feel like he's going blind.
When he focuses on his breathing to keep himself from spiraling, he realizes that Peter has already flung his backpack into the corner next to his desk and himself on the spinning chair and is now talking animatedly about his day. Tony makes a mental note to listen to F.R.I.D.A.Y.'s recording later on in case he missed something important but right now, despite the gloomy knot in his chest, he feels the corner of his lips twist upwards at the sight of the teenager gracelessly hanging from the chair.
With the next inhale something warm fills his chest, gentling pulling on the untethered strings until the tangle loosens and suddenly breathing isn't as hard anymore.
It's still not easy, there's still too much baggage for the breaths to come out effortlessly. Too many scars, too many memories, too much loss. But it's easier. As if Peter's presence in itself widens his bronchia and helps the air pave a way.
"Got homework?" he finds himself asking, the tiny smile still on his lips when the teenager dutifully bobs his head up and down. "When's May gonna be home? Are you staying for dinner?"
Just like that the offer stands in the room, without a second thought, and he realizes that he doesn't regret making it. It's been lonely in the Tower without Pepper and Peter – Peter is Peter and taking care of him, making sure that he eats, sleeps and drinks enough has become an integral part of his DNA at this point.
"May's working night," Peter tells him with a pout, fidgeting until he's sitting cross- legged on the chair, "But she's not working all weekend and we're having brunch tomorrow when she's up again."
"So, that means you want to stay the night and catch breakfast here, too?"
"I mean –" For a second Tony thinks the kid is too polite to invite himself over but then a shit-eating grin spreads on his face as he turns on his swivel chair. "Yep. That was pretty much the plan. Hope I'm not keeping you from important – you know – stuff."
Just from another lonely night spent staring at the alcohol cabinet. He doesn't say, though, because he doesn't drink and he hasn't for months, still, the reflex never really left.
Instead he scoffs, "Me? Doing something important? In your dreams." Peter giggles.
It's still fake and he's still not fine but when he turns back to the armor again as Peter starts taking out his books to work on his homework, he feels a lot lighter than he has in days.
They work on their own for a while after that and it doesn't take long for Tony to get immersed in the inner workings of the suit once more. But while his mind is running difficult algorithms, trying to figure out how to best deweaponize it for a presentation without giving up too much of its soul, he's always acutely aware of Peter's movements behind him, like a sixth sense that comes to him easier than breathing most days.
"Pete," he turns around with a frown after giving the boy another ten minutes of fidgeting, "what's up? Do you need help?"
"Wha –?" The kid looks startled but shakes his head. "No. I was just," he points to a pile at the foot of the couch in the far corner of the room, "I was wondering what that is."
Tony can see the books that lay untouched on the desk with his pencil case emptied out and its content scattered all over the place and he sees the hole Peter is currently poking in the sleeve of his hoodie and he understands the restlessness behind it.
It's a curse. One he has had to deal with all his life and one he wish he could take from the kid but as it is he can only try to get that genius mind of his to focus on something or else the jiggling would get worse and he'd probably end up hurting himself.
"What's it look like?" he asks, feeling his whole demeanor change now that he is needed. Now that his purpose is making Peter feel better. Superficially cleaning his oil stained hands on a more-black-than-not towel he wanders over to the teen and settles on the couch, inviting him to inspect the pile with a nod of his head.
Peter, god bless him, jumps at the opportunity and almost trips from his chair with his limbs flailing in the air for a second before he manages to catch himself with a splutter, diving headfirst into the soft pile.
Normally, Peter would dissect any abnormality, anything new, with immaculate care but now he's tearing through all blankets and pillows and comforters like a mad man on a mission. Only when he's gone through them all he stops. Sitting in the middle of the mess he created he cocks his head to the side, leaning back on his arms with his legs stretched out in front of him.
He's wearing his thinking frown and Tony watches as his mind works with new information, needing just a little bit longer than usual to figure it out. "They're blankets," he summarizes then, with a smile so warm Tony swears it could singlehandedly cause global warming and melt all remaining ice on the planet, even the one stuck in his heart. "You got blankets 'cause I get cold easily, didn't you?"
Of course he did. Of fucking course he got his kid blankets so he wouldn't be cold in winter. It cost him one voice command and the boy is looking up at him as if he has just hung the moon in the sky specifically for him.
The look made him feel fuzzy. A good kind of fuzzy that he never got from alcohol anymore, and probably never really had.
"Of course I did," he tells him when his emotions come too close to surfacing and he has to swallow past the growing lump in his throat. "Wanna cuddle up until I'm done working?"
Just like that, it looks as if Peter's strings have been cut and he sags in on himself a little. "Um – yeah, sure," he mumbles, hands running over the fabric of a dark blue blanket and clenching around it, "I mean, I could maybe work on my homework a little bit ya know. So, uh, so I get something done." He trails off, shoulders and head hanging low as he attempts to get to his feet again.
Tony frowns. "No, why would you-?" Oh.
My dad never really gave me a lot of support. I'm trying to break the cycle of shame.
"Or," he tries a different approach, not missing how Peter is perching up just that tiny little bit at his softer tone of voice, "Or we could both take a break and relax a little. What do you say?"
He can see that it's on the tip of his tongue to decline but apparently all their talking the past few months about accepting what Tony offers has gotten them somewhere and in the end Peter simply nods, a happy grin spreading on his face once more as if he just flipped a switch.
"Can we build a blanket fort?"
And – what?
"I have never once in my life built a blanket fort."
And, yeah, maybe he should've seen it coming but he hasn't and it might just cost him his hearing.
"WHAT THE –"
"Do not finish that sentence."
As always his words fall on deaf ears.
"- HECK, MISTER STARK!" Peter all but shouts from two feet away, staring at him with wide, accusing eyes. "You can't be serious! No way, you've never built a blanket fort!"
"Yes way," he gives back, swallowing the biting bile as he tries to be supportive and nice and all that shit good mentors apparently do. How on earth where there people having and raising kids full time out of their own free will? "And I am not going to start now."
"Oh come on, please!"
Ah, yeah, that answers is questions. It's definitely the disarming puppy eyes. And possible the shear endless amount of full body hugs.
"Fine," he relents contritely, "But if we're gonna do this we're gonna do this right, understand? The full ten yards and then some."
"Aye, sir!"
Peter is jumping up and down and he looks so much more at ease than just ten minutes ago and that's worth all the back pain Tony is going to get from that experience. Damn kids.
It ends up taking them two hours to finish but by the time they do the ceiling of their fort is fitted with two chains of light, giving the arrangement a somewhat mystical touch to it.
They're both lying on their backs, heads resting on their respective pillows while a fortress of other pillows is stacked around them, effectively shielding them from the outside world (the lab) and keeping them in their very own cocoon except for the small opening they made for food supply and such.
Dum-E has done a great job providing them with snacks and drinks albeit Tony vetoed the kid's wishes for hot chocolate.
Peter has already forgotten he was sulking, though, and just stares up at the lights in wonder and, as Tony notes in satisfaction, otherwise perfectly still.
"This is what I've always imagined stargazing must be like," he whispers, voice so quiet and in awe that Tony barely catches it.
It hits him again how different their upbringings have been and how he's going to make sure that he only ever passes on the good things if he can help it.
"I'll take you stargazing one of these days," he promises, voice soft as to not startle the peaceful boy.
The teenager turns his head to meet his eyes, unruly curls falling over his left eye that Tony itches to push them back. "Promise?"
"I promise," he says, reaching out to brush the curl away gently.
He promises him a lot more in his head but he doesn't know how to form the words to let him know, yet. He hopes Peter understands anyway.