He'd said no.
Well, he hadn't exactly said no, not specifically. He'd just done his typical Tony thing and danced around the question, rambled for a few minutes about his plans and events that week to sound like he was booked, then ended the conversation with "I'll see if I can make it."
In the Starkian dialect, that meant no.
As disappointing as it was that Tony seemed so hesitant to accept that he was going to father a child, Pepper couldn't say she hadn't been expecting that response. It was a lot to process, and she understood that all too well. Bruce had been right, after all—today was kind of a big deal, and maybe Tony just wasn't ready yet.
Quite frankly, neither am I.
Pepper sighed. She wanted to be mad at Tony, she really did. His reactions seemed an awful lot like not wanting to take responsibility and be an adult about this (which was basically his M.O. anyway), or like he was trying to take the easy way out. It felt like he was being a typical, early twenty-something man who'd knocked up his girlfriend and then backed out by saying "I'm not ready."
She really wanted to be mad at him for that. She wanted to be furious about it, to march right back to his workshop and demand that he own up to what he did and start being a damn part of this like he was supposed to be. She wanted to be so fucking pissed that he'd come running back with his tail between his legs.
And honestly, she also wanted to be mad at him because there was a part of her recently that still felt like she loved him, and it was infuriating that he wasn't around when she really needed him to be. She was having his damn baby, for god's sake. However, Bruce was still in the picture, and it would be incredibly selfish of her to put him in that kind of position.
God, this was so fucking complicated.
So no, she couldn't be mad at Tony. She couldn't be mad at him since it would be terrible for her to compromise his relationship with the man he now loved, and on top of that, Pepper knew that if their situations were reversed, she'd probably do what Tony was doing and try to avoid it. She wasn't ready for a baby, either. However, she had the unfortunate circumstance of having that baby growing inside of her, so she kind of had to face it.
"Where do you think you're going all alone?" Pepper had just been about to unlock her car when she heard another voice echo across the garage. She looked over her shoulder, finding Bruce standing by one of the cars with a little smile on his face. "I know he's not coming, Pepper," he continued, "I just saw him in the lab. Come on, we'll take my car."
Pepper slipped her keys back into her bag and walked towards Bruce. She was almost surprised that he actually remembered, or still even wanted to go at all. "This is your car? I was wondering whose it was, I never see anyone drive it," she teased lightly, smiling gratefully at him to silently thank him for his generosity.
"Yeah, well… I don't drive much," Bruce replied with a little chuckle, opening the passenger door for her before he walked over to slide into the driver's seat. "My big green roommate doesn't really care for cars. Or large cities… or being in cars in large cities, so I usually try to walk if I can. Tony insisted on me having a car, though. I couldn't really say no, even though I tried." He looked over at Pepper just before he began to pull out of the garage. He could tell that she was avoiding the obvious topic of conversation, and Bruce didn't want to push it—he didn't know the intimate details of how she felt about this, nor did he need to. "You'll have to give me some directions, though. I'm not sure where your doctor's office is."
"It's only a few blocks away, so not too far," Pepper replied, gesturing for him to turn a corner. "Thanks again for doing this, Bruce."
"No need to thank me, I'm happy to do it." Bruce looked over at her and smiled while they were stopped at a light. Maybe it was selfish of him, but this was probably the closest Bruce would ever get to the experience of starting a family. Pepper was just a friend, though, and he was only doing this out of the goodness of his heart. He wouldn't have the ultimate endgame of holding a baby of his own in his arms and a loving spouse to raise it with, but it was nice to imagine it just for a moment.
It wasn't much longer until they reached the doctor's office, and after Bruce had asked yet again if she was still okay with him being there and Pepper had assured him again that yes, Bruce, it's just a routine ultrasound, it's fine, they were taken back to a room. They were left alone for a few minutes after a nurse took Pepper's vitals, and Bruce spent a moment of that time watching Pepper's body language as she fidgeted and wrung her hands in her lap. It was an odd look on her—Bruce was used to seeing her standing tall, confident, unwavering. Honestly, right now she seemed like a completely different person, and Bruce felt a pang of sympathy for how much this pregnancy was changing her.
Pepper seemed to have zoned out, so Bruce decided to break the somewhat heavy silence. "You doing okay?" he asked, softly and calmly enough that he wouldn't startle her.
Regardless of Bruce's effort, though, Pepper still flinched a little bit when she was pulled out of her thoughts. She offered Bruce a small smile once she'd blinked out of her trance. "Yeah," she replied, not exactly meeting his eyes, "yeah, I'm alright. Just a little nervous, that's all," she admitted. Honesty was probably the best option here; after all, Bruce wouldn't have said anything if he hadn't noticed that she was a little off.
That's as much as she was going to tell him, though. The statement had been honest, but not completely informational—she wasn't sure if she could put into words how terrifying it was for her to get another glimpse at her child (and consequently, motherhood), or if she could verbally admit how much it hurt that Tony wasn't here to experience it with her. Even harder to admit, however, was the fact that somehow having Bruce there with her made it feel like that wound had closed, and when he reached out to touch her hand in comfort, Pepper wasn't sure if the flutter in her stomach was her baby or those ridiculous butterflies she hadn't felt since high school.
Pepper wouldn't have gotten a chance to say any of that anyway before they were joined by her doctor, and she had to look away from Bruce's warm, chocolatey gaze to greet the woman.
"Nice to see you again, Pepper," the doctor said, flipping through a few pages of the chart in her hands before she looked up to smile at the two in the room. "I see you brought a guest," she pointed out, looking over at Bruce.
"Oh, yeah, hi." Bruce pulled himself out of his chair to hold out his hand in greeting. "Dr. Banner," he said, but he quickly realized that this situation didn't really call for his formal title. "Or, uh, Bruce. Just Bruce. Nice to meet you."
"Dr. Montgomery," the woman replied, stifling a quiet chuckle at how Bruce stumbled over his words. "I've seen some of your work, Dr. Banner. It's quite impressive." She paused for a moment, glancing between Bruce and Pepper. "You must be the baby's father?"
"No." Pepper and Bruce said the word simultaneously, Bruce's tone almost panicked while Pepper's seemed more lonesome. "No, I mean, I'm just—just a friend," Bruce explained, a tentative smile on his face. "Here for moral support," he added, reaching over to pat Pepper's hand.
"Okay. My apologies for assuming," the doctor said, and the two of them dismissed the confusion with a quick "it's fine" before the woman turned back towards Pepper with an encouraging smile. "Let's get started then." She stepped towards where Pepper was sitting on the examination table, gesturing for her to get comfortable before she began to feel around Pepper's belly. "How have you been feeling?"
"The same." Pepper cracked what looked like a rather forced smile, and the doctor looked up to meet her eyes.
"So the pain hasn't gotten any worse?" she asked, "just stayed consistent?"
"It hasn't gotten any worse, fortunately," Pepper replied. Her gaze flicked towards Bruce, who was clearly masking his concern under his typical expression of practiced calm.
"Well, that's a good sign. As much as we'd both like for it to have gotten better, the fact that it hasn't gotten worse is promising considering how difficult this pregnancy has been for you." The doctor smiled warmly again before she stepped away to prepare the ultrasound. "Ready to take a look?"
"Sure." Pepper's tone was tentative, as were her hands as she lifted her shirt away from her stomach. Bruce found himself staring for a moment, struck by how beautiful the sight of her was—he'd seen a fair share of pregnant women during his years that he worked as a traveling doctor, but Pepper was… different. Strikingly gorgeous. He couldn't quite pinpoint why, maybe it was the way in which he knew her, but he was pulled out of his trance when he looked up to meet Pepper's eyes and was struck by the realization that he was seeing her in what was probably one of her most vulnerable states.
Bruce also noticed that Pepper had extended her hand towards him, and he took that as a cue to take a few quiet steps forward and wrap his hand around hers. He squeezed her fingers gently and gave her a smile that more or less expressed the words "I'm here for you" before they were interrupted by the doctor's voice again.
"There she is," the doctor pointed out, turning the monitor so it faced the two of them a little more. "She's definitely healthy, I don't see anything that's out of the ordinary. Heartbeat is strong," she continued, but both Pepper and Bruce seemed far too preoccupied with staring at the greyscale image of the baby on the screen to really be listening too hard.
For his part, at least, Bruce definitely couldn't look away. He'd seen plenty of ultrasounds, but being on the other side of the display completely changed the experience—and it wasn't as if he even had any claim to the tiny child he was staring at. Even so, that didn't stop his heart from swelling with a kind of warmth he didn't know he could feel anymore. Pepper's daughter was beautiful, and Bruce was endlessly grateful that she'd let him experience this with her.
He couldn't believe Tony was missing this.
If Pepper wasn't getting anywhere in helping Tony to realize what an amazing experience he was giving up, then Bruce was going to have to take care of that himself.
"So she's okay?" Bruce was startled out of his trance by Pepper's voice, and once he came back to himself he realized that she'd been holding onto his hand so tight that he could barely move his fingers.
"Well, she is a bit on the small side, but it's nothing to worry about. Her vitals look good, and I don't see anything that's a cause for concern," the doctor answered, moving the probe around to get a few different angles on the baby while she looked, "so yes, it's safe to say that she's okay. She's wonderful, really." She looked back at Pepper, smiling genuinely and encouragingly. "Did you have any other questions or concerns?"
Pepper just stared at the monitor for another moment, almost purposefully stalling her response just so she could watch her daughter for just a little bit longer. "No," she finally said, forcing her gaze back to the doctor, "thank you."
"Alright, looks like we're done here then. I'd like to see you again in six weeks, but if you need anything, don't hesitate to call before then." The doctor gathered a few things, but before she left, she handed Pepper a small print-out of the image from her ultrasound. "Thought you might like to have that," she smiled, "I'll see you soon."
Pepper and Bruce both said a quiet goodbye as the woman left the room, and Pepper sighed a little bit as she sat back up properly. She looked down at the photo she held in her hands and felt her heart tighten again, and she stayed where she was in the room just because she didn't know if she was quite ready to go back into the world again just yet.
"So what's this 'difficult pregnancy' your doctor is going on about?" Until she heard Bruce ask that question, and Pepper realized that she was going to have to face reality again a lot sooner than she would have liked.
(Honestly, Bruce had considered not asking the question at all, but the phrase had been weighing on his mind since it was spoken. He just hoped he wasn't pushing the boundaries too far.)
Pepper, on the other hand, didn't know how she wanted to answer that question, or if she even wanted to at all. She knew Bruce well enough to trust that he wouldn't go running back to Tony and tell him everything she said (that is, if Tony even cared), but she also felt too vulnerable right now as it was and talking about this probably wouldn't do much to make it better.
"Well…" Regardless of her own insecurities, Pepper decided to just tell him anyway. She didn't want him to feel like she was intentionally shutting him out, not after everything he'd already done for her. Maybe getting it off her chest would do her some good. "It's been a bit of a bumpy road."
"I think that might be the understatement of the year," Bruce murmured dryly. He saw Pepper crack a tiny smile, but the rest of her expression told him that wasn't exactly what she meant.
"Very true," Pepper agreed, "but since Dr. Montgomery clearly doesn't know about our awkward little triangle situation, that's not what she meant." She looked away then, but before she did she caught the concern that flashed through Bruce's eyes. From the corner of her eye she could see him step closer, hip leant against the table she was still sitting on while his arms folded over his chest. "I'm sure part of Tony's rant to you about this was how we thought I couldn't have kids, right?" She looked up to see Bruce tilt his head just slightly, but enough for her to know that he knew. Of course Tony had mentioned that. "It's not that I can't, it's that it's just hard for me to. My body doesn't exactly… adapt well to a change like this, so yes, it's been difficult to say the least. Honestly, I thought this was just going to end in another miscarriage, that's why—um, that's why I waited so long to tell Tony."
Bruce's brow furrowed, but he still did his best to hide the pain he felt for her. "Another?"
"It would have been my third." A sad smile crossed Pepper's lips as she looked up at Bruce. "Tony doesn't know. I don't think he'll ever know, although… I don't know, maybe I should have told him. Then maybe he'd actually appreciate that I'm finally having this perfectly healthy, amazing little girl instead of just… throwing it away." She tore her gaze away again and instead looked down at herself, sliding both hands over her stomach. "Or maybe he wouldn't. I've known the man for the better part of fifteen years and I still can't figure him out."
Bruce wasn't sure where to look or what to say. He was actually a little taken aback that she had suddenly shared so many intimate details with him with so little hesitation—though for all Bruce knew, she could have been a nervous talker and spilled things she hadn't meant to. Still, that didn't mean he felt any less sympathy, and he was still stuck trying to find the right words. "Why didn't you tell anyone?" he finally asked, his voice quiet and as kind as he could manage. "About… anything?"
"Who was I supposed to tell?" Pepper questioned in reply, the words barely above a murmur.
"Me." Bruce shuffled a little closer to her, arms falling away from where he'd had them wrapped around himself. "You could have told me, Pepper." In an uncharacteristic show of boldness, he didn't even hesitate to reach over and place a hand over one of hers. He wrapped his hand around hers, and for a second he could have sworn that he felt the baby kick just underneath where his fingers brushed against her stomach. "I told you that I'm here for you."
"Bruce…" Pepper glanced up at his eyes before lowering her gaze back to where Bruce's hand was curled around hers against her belly. She was suddenly regretting saying so much—not because she didn't trust Bruce to keep it quiet, but because she probably trusted him too much. It wasn't supposed to be like this. She wasn't supposed to be sitting here like this, ever so slightly leaning into his warmth beside her and silently hoping that his hand would never leave hers; she wasn't supposed to be feeling those goddamn butterflies again, not for the man that the father of her child loved.
She wasn't supposed to be thinking those things or feeling those things, but she was regardless, no matter how hard she tried not to. It felt wrong, but it also didn't, because he was kind and gentle and handsome and quite literally there for her when she absolutely needed it. Somehow it seemed like he was what she'd always needed.
"What?" Bruce's voice interrupted Pepper's thoughts. Pepper just shook her head and shrugged, lifting her free hand to brush it through her hair.
"Nothing, it's just…" After how much she'd spilled just moments ago, Pepper wasn't sure if she should even continue talking at that point. "It's just… all this. You're with Tony, and I'm pregnant, and Tony's being Tony about it, and now I'm here and you're here with me, and you're…"
"I'm…?" Bruce raised an eyebrow. He thought he knew where she was going with that statement, and he really couldn't pinpoint if how he felt about it was good or bad.
"You're you." Pepper looked up at him again, and in what was probably a momentary lapse of judgment, leaned in just close enough for their lips to touch. Her mind finally stopped spinning for a minute, the soft warmth of his lips against hers enough to allow her to relax and maybe even forget about the screwed up whirlwind of a life she had right now. Bruce was warm and sturdy and pretty damn near perfect, and kissing him somehow just felt right—until Pepper noticed that he wasn't really moving, and she suddenly realized the implications of what she'd just done.
"Oh my god," Pepper muttered immediately after she'd pulled back, "oh my god, Bruce, I'm—"
She didn't get a chance to finish the sentence before her lips were otherwise occupied, and Bruce's move to kiss her again very much surprised both of them. He couldn't really pinpoint what exactly motivated him to do it, but for some reason it just felt so good, like the tension had finally melted away and they were able to uncover what they both clearly felt was there. He didn't edge it into anything more than the smooth slide of lips and tongue that it had turned into, and he found himself marveling at just how delicate she felt in his arms, how different she felt from Tony.
Oh god, Tony.
As soon as his partner's name crossed his mind, Bruce had to break away, breath coming quick and heavy from the adrenaline of the moment before. As much as he'd gotten caught up in the way Pepper felt pressed against him, as intensely as he was feeling whatever these things were for her, he couldn't do this to Tony. He loved the man too damn much to do something like this to him, despite what he felt for the woman still sitting in front of him.
Honestly, he didn't know what he felt anymore. Bruce had never been good at feelings, anyway.
"I think we should start heading home," Bruce said quietly, clearing his throat once he got his voice back.
"Yeah." Pepper swallowed thickly, and made a move to slide off the table and back onto her feet. "Yeah, I agree." She could only guess as to what made Bruce pull away and change his attitude so quickly, but she had a pretty good idea. Tony had told her that he was in love with Bruce after all, and given their interactions that she'd witnessed, she could only assume that Bruce probably felt the same.
The two of them were nearly silent as they slipped out of the room, checked out, and made their way back into the parking lot. Bruce still stayed close to her side so things didn't seem too awkward, but his efforts went down the drain when he spotted the car parked next to his own.
The hot rod red car sloppily parked in the lot made Bruce's admittedly quite nice vehicle pale in comparison. A car that ostentatious and luxurious could only belong to one person, and that was confirmed by the license plate that neatly spelled out STARK 11. What surprised him more than just the presence of the car was the plate's namesake leaning casually against the back end, hands in his pockets and dark sunglasses shielding his eyes.
"Hey." Tony looked over when he heard the other two approaching. He was a little surprised to see Bruce there, but decided that he would figure that out later as he looked at Pepper over the rim of his sunglasses. "Let me drive you home?"