A.N: Yay, I'm writing in a comp notebook all the time, adding more of this. In fact, I'm slapping kids in the face so I can get lunch detention and be able to write in peace for half an hour. *laughs* I need to stop that. Also, sorry for the late update. Finals, drumline auditions, DCI camps, and the like.. I've been busy.

Chapter disclaimer: Its more an apology, because I have NO IDEA why the hell I'd have Pepper bring Fletcher to the place she brings her. So, please don't hold that against me. Haha, I already (literally)beat myself up about it. And I couldn't think of another way to do it. Everything just rolled together so well.

Review or e-mail me people. I'm a lonely soul. Contribute! Give me lines or situations, the best stuff makes it in. A lot of the stuff going on in my stories have indeed occurred in real life.

~~x~~

love is the

w e a p o n

(tolerance)

~~x~~

"You should have seen her, Rhodey," Tony started, flicking the welding visor down. "Talk about bitter cat-lady…" He carefully welded a piece of the left gauntlet for yet another Iron Man armor set. "But she's cute," he laughed over the scratch-like sound of the metal.

"How cute…?" Rhodey asked. They had different definitions of the term.

The welding torch stopped. Flicking up the visor, Tony turned to Rhodey. "Shoulder length straight brown hair, and she does that side-swept bangs thing? I don't know.. Um, kind of like Pepper does her hair, I guess. Dark brown eyes, she's pretty skinny, and maybe like 3 or 4 inches shorter than me," he described. With a groan of frustration, remembering everything that had occurred when he thought of her, Tony turned back towards his schematics.

Rhodey, who was practicing the remote controls of the armor, replied, "Hm. Yeah, she sounds alright."

"Whoa!" Tony shouted, leaning out of the way of the armor, which was flying around the room. "Rhodey, I'd kindly ask that we express some caution with the trillion dollar armor."

With a nervous chuckle, Rhodey responded with a, "Right. Sorry."

"But seriously… Fletcher? That girl needs to lighten up. It's Valentine's Day, it's her birthday, and she's all angry, and catty, and 'get off my drums before I beat your head in with these tenor sticks, Stark!' God, what's her problem?!" Tony continued.

Rhodey laughed. "Sounds like someone's got a crush."

"As if!" Tony replied. "If I never see her again, it'd still be too soon. I can't stand her, man."

"Well, head's up. Pepper's got a friend…" Rhodey commented, pointing to a window. There the two boys could see the approaching Pepper, and a brunette figure walking behind her. Like always, Pepper was talking. A lot.

"Hurry, get all this out of sight!" Tony exclaimed, rushing to hide the armor and schematics, as Rhodey typed in some commands to shut off systems and hide on-screen schematics. There was a knock on the door. "Uh, come on in, Pepper!" he shouted, everything hidden.

"Ta-daaaa!" the red head exclaimed, bursting through the door. She looked behind he, and the birthday girl herself walked through the door into the lab.

"Stark." she greeted, coldly.

Tony returned the glare. "Fletcher."

Rhodey stepped forward, to put space between Fletcher and Tony. "Hi." He gave a small wave. The brunette returned it, looking to Pepper with a "told-you-so" type look. The boy leaned in closer to Tony, and whispered in his ear, "You're right, Tony. She is cute."

Tony's face went red.

~~x~~

Paper was strewn about the room. Things were in shambles, bed unmade, and small objects littered the floors.

"2, 3, 0, 4…"

There was a hum of a computer, and the light from the screen was the only light in the room. Clothes were piled up against the closet door. There was a snap of another pencil breaking. "Damn it." She merely grabbed another pencil and continued.

"2, 3, 0, 4, 2, 3, 0, 4, 2, 3, 0, 2, 3, 3, 0, 4, 3, 2, 3, 0, 4, 3, 3, 0, 4, 2, 4, 0, 3…" Fletcher mumbled, continuing the sequence. She was sitting in the center of the floor, a guitar in her lap. She was writing the numbers down on the appropriate line. Tablatures. Then she played it through.

"Don't bite your lip to hold back your smile, just think of this as bending the rules…" she quietly murmured the lyrics to Asteria's "A Lesson in Charades". It was one of her favorite songs.

He's such a jerk.

Fletcher shook her head, reminding herself not to think of Stark. Even if it was thoughts of how big an ego he had, no matter if the thoughts were insults, Fletcher wouldn't allow herself to think about Stark. She knew if she thought about him long enough, she'd find whatever it is about him that made girls love him so much.

There was a soft ring, her cell phone. Fletcher reached into her pocket and pulled out the phone. Caller ID showed her it was Pepper. Lovely.

"Hey, Pepper," she greeted.

"Fallon, hi! So, why did you totally ditch me at Tony's lab? Huh? What was up with that?" Pepper hammered Fletcher with questions.

"I didn't really want to be there, and it was apparent neither did Stark. I told you that before you dragged me there. Besides, I had a guitar at home calling my name, so here I am."

"You play guitar? I thought you were a drummer," Pepper replied.

"I'm taking lessons. I play acoustic guitar. Drumming comes easy, guitar not so much." Fletcher shook her head, a hand on her temple. "I have trouble stretching out my fingers into the more 'unique' chord shapes, since I'm used to keep my fingers tight around a drum stick."

"Oh. Okay. So, um, I'll see you at school tomorrow, right?" Pepper asked.

Fletcher hung up the phone.