A/N: I know I said I'd make the chapters longer, but I ran out of time to edit and I really wanted to give you guys an update before I leave for my trip. I'll be gone until Sunday or Monday, and I'll probably, if I have time, post another chapter around there. Thanks! :D

Clint shrugged as he sat down on one of the nearby stools. Upon realizing that it rolled, he pushed himself away from the table and skidded across the room. "Yep, guess so," he smiled.

Tony moved to sit down as well and he sighed again. "So I have to bring the food to him. Great," he muttered.

"Hey, you're the one who just walked away like an asshole after Steve gave you a present he'd been working on for months. Stop complaining."

"I thought I was going to drop the floor and become a drooling mess. Excuse me if I didn't want to freak Steve out." Tony said defensively, walking over to Dummy and patted his head, and the robot chirped happily and nudged Tony's stomach.

"Pretty sure he'd be a lot less freaked if you told him what's going on with you." Clint shot back. "And he'd understand why you ran off if he knew."

Tony grumbled something and began walking throughout the lab, gathering a few utensils and scrap parts that were littered across the various tables, floor, and even a lone piece that was on top of the fridge. His forehead was scrunched up in concentration as he began furiously placing the scraps on the table in what he felt was the right place and then pulled up a manipulative screen and started scanning and assembling. "Maybe I should build Steve a little robot."

Clint's jaw dropped, aghast at Tony's abrupt change of subject. "Tony!"

"What? I'm bored," Tony complained, poking at a circuit board.

"You're avoiding the problem."

"What problem?" He asked innocently.

"You know what problem!" Clint glared at him. "We let it be for a while, we gave you some space. But they're getting impatient, Tony, and they know you're hiding something about your memory. Pretty soon, they're also going to know /I/ know something, and Natasha will hurt me until she knows about it too."

"Oh, come on. You can handle Natasha."

"Um, no. She's scary," Clint muttered as he watched Tony scowl at something on the screen. "And I'm running out of excuses trying to cover your ass. It's exhausting!"

Tony huffed. "So would Steve like a robot or not? Because I think-"

"NO!" Clint snapped as he abruptly stood up. "He wouldn't like a fucking robot! I'm sure he would love it if his husband would just let him actually /help/ so he wouldn't feel so damn sad and helpless all the time!"

"He doesn't feel-"

"Yes he does, Tony."

Tony paused in his tinkering of the robot, with his back still turned on Clint. "I can't do anything to help him."

"There's a lot of things you could do, actually. You could tell him about your memory-"

"And what then?" Tony suddenly yelled, whipping around. "He's going to have Bruce poke and prod me until everything comes flooding in! I did my research, and Jarvis figured out that if the..." he struggled for a description, "wall in my head breaks, the effects could be bad."

"What kind of bad?" Clint pestered.

"Not being able to wake up from a episode bad," Tony told him, walking past him and taking a water out of the fridge. In all honesty, it was actually half true. Jarvis was making estimated guesses based on a hypothesis. "And mind you, I want to wake up."

"You're going to push everyone away because you're scared we'regoing to screw up? That's ridiculous."

Tony took a big swig of water. He really did want to tell everyone, especially Steve. It didn't occur to him until he'd woken up from his earlier memory trigger, but it had been lingering on his mind persistently. How easy it would be to just let it off his chest, tell Steve what was happening, and maybe Steve would understand and stop pushing him, letting him sort out his emotions and recover slowly.

Or maybe Steve would do the exact opposite. No, he's not like that, he told himself firmly. But what did he know? He debated giving Steve his fondue (why in the hell melted cheese appealed to Steve was beyond him) and telling him. That could help Steve, right? He wouldn't feel so bad, right? It wasn't fair to do this, he had to do something to help -

"You don't trust us, do you?" Clint accused, clearly have been pushed to the brink from stress. Did he? He wasn't sure. Trust didn't come easily to him anymore, not since the shebang with Obediah. But the more he thought about it, if he had jumped off a building and Steve, or any of the Avengers was tasked in saving him from his death, there was no doubt they'd do anything in their power to save him. That could either be the key to helping Tony through this or making it all the worse.

"Oh, Jesus Christ," Clint muttered to himself as he ran a hand through his hair. "You're probably not even listening to a word I'm saying to you, which is just awesome…" he let out a frustrated sigh and then looked at Tony again with an expression to let the inventor know that he was completely serious. "Look. Just… think about telling Steve that you're remembering stuff, okay? Because I cannot keep this secret for much longer. I'm no good with this sort of shit," he started for the door like he was going to leave, but abruptly stopped and glanced over his shoulder. "Also, I was serious about the robot thing. Steve wouldn't like that. Bring him food, mkay? The guy likes to eat." With that, he left, sick of spouting off stuff to Tony, who he was pretty sure didn't give a crap about what he was saying. Whatever. Now he needed to find a way to avoid Natasha and that death glare she gave him when she knew he was hiding something.

Groaning, Tony rubbed a hand over his face and plopped down in his chair. "Yeah. Great." he mumbled and then looked at one of his screens for a moment, his mind running with several different things at once. Steve. Fondue. Anniversary. Clint. The memories. All this shit was just... annoying. "Jarvis," he finally said in a whiny tone, not caring that the AI would probably sass him for it (and how an AI could be so sassy he never knew), "what the hell do I do now?"

"Might I suggest finding a place for fondue, sir?"

Tony groaned. "Of course you'd say that. Okay, take a look. I'm gonna..." he scowled, "I don't have anything to do."

No one, not even Jarvis, answered him. He sighed heavily and span around his his chair, blinking up at the ceiling. His brain was, as always, on high alert and running way too many things at once. At least he was alone. Finally. No one seemed to be able to leave him alone for 5 minutes. His eyes had just slipped close in a sleepy daze when he heard an access code being punched in through the door. "No, please let it have been my imagination..."

"Stark, I need to ask you about Clint." Natasha's voice rang out.

"So close..." he muttered to himself before opening his eyes and turning his head to Natasha's direction. "What about Clint?"

"Don't you agree that he's been acting...edgy the past week or so?"

Tony pretended to think about it and then shook his head. "Nope, nothing strange."

"Usually he's most jumpy when someone asks about you," the spy continued, "so what do you think is going on?"

He looked at her for a moment and shrugged. "I dunno. Maybe he's just freaked out by this whole... accident thing," he muttered.

Natasha's eyes narrowed as he studied Tony carefully. "It's almost like he's trying to keep a secret from the rest of the team," she pressed.

"Okay? Well from what I've gathered, Clint would be shitty at keeping a secret. And it's not like I have anything to tell him anyways, if you're trying to imply that this secret is from me," he turned around in his chair to pick up a screwdriver. He messed with it for a moment, just turning it over in his hands.

"Hmm," Natasha mused, not soothed. She walked over to him, her eyes watching his every breath, every twitch. Christ, Tony thought, I take it back, Clint, buddy. She is scary as fuck. "What's going on with you?"

"Uh...nothing," Tony pretended to look confused. "Why, do I have something on my face?"

She frowned. "You're pale, there's bags under your eyes, and your heart beat just accelerated, which means you just lied to me."

"How can you possibly know that?" Tony said, bewildered. "You know what, don't answer. Hey, can you ask Bruce when I can get in my suit again? I miss it. God, I'm deprived. I can't take the waiting anymore. My ribs are almost healed and I have a Velcro cast for my wrist and I can use it fine, anyway, and since you nosy group want me to get back into my...your Tony's usual routine it's a good start..."

She still hadn't taken her eyes off him. "Ask him yourself. He's upstairs."

"I'm busy," he whined.

"Come join us for lunch, Tony. We have Chinese take-out." Her voice was flat, but softer.

"Mm...nope."

"Tony..."

"Natasha, I said no. Besides, I have things to do. I have something I need to do." he said firmly. "For Steve."

"Like what?" she asked slowly.

"It's a surprise. I need you to let me leave the Tower in about 5 hours," and at Natasha's outraged expression, "Just for one hour, I swear!"

"The last time you left alone, you nearly killed yourself!" she snapped. "And since you won't talk to us, we don't know what's going on in your eccentric head. We trusted you, Tony, remember?"

"No, you didn't," he scowled. "Jarvis told me that you'd overridden my commands to give you updates on how I was doing when you left for the mission! Vitals, medical scans while I was asleep, and who knows what else?!"

"We were worried about you. You had a brain injury, Tony, in case you didn't remember." Despite her matter-of-fact answer, Natasha clearly didn't know that Tony knew about their secret eye. Oh, he'd known. He'd known the very second they walked out the door. Almost immediately, before his leaving to see Pepper, he'd got rid of it all. It hadn't bugged him all that much. Now it did for some reason. Lack of sleep?

"Yeah? Well there's a line you don't cross with me, the old Tony. I don't need anyone." he spat, anger flaring. "So, I am going to try make it up to Steve because I feel bad about what he's going through...because of me. But I am not your Tony Stark, got it?"

"Maybe you should start realizing that you do need people, Tony. Isolating yourself isn't going to do anything," Natasha shook her head and then headed for the door, her jaw clenched in annoyance. "And Tony? If you do leave the house, don't cause a mess. It'll give Steve a heart attack and I'm sure that's the last thing he needs on today of all days."

He merely scowled as she walked away, and when the door slid shut he let out a noise of frustration. "I don't need anyone," he muttered again, shaking his head. What did she know? Nothing! Who did she think she was trying to come in here and bitch at him?

"Sir," Jarvis chimed in. "I have located restaurants that provide fondue, if you would like to take a look."

"Thanks, Jarvis. Pull 'em up." Tony told the AI, and groaned tiredly, "What am I supposed to do until dinner now?"

His eyes scanned over the pile of tools that he'd assembled for the robot. Actually, he hadn't really intended to build one. His mind was too distracted. Then again, imagining the look on Steve's face at a little robot following him around made Tony store it into the back of his mind. "Next time, baby."


A few hours later from when Clint and then Natasha not too long after came storming up from Tony's lab, making short remarks of how Tony was being difficult and it was in their best interest to steer clear for now. Although Steve looked crestfallen, as he did often lately, he went back to sketching in his notebook. He seemed to be a little lost at what to do draw with his anniversary present finished.

With Thor settled on the couch and absently handing off hints to a bemused Natasha (whom just wanted to watch TV) that having a cat in the Avenger tower would be "an excellent addition to our family", Clint perched on a table in the kitchen table as he read a book, and Bruce working on a written experiment that he wanted to put to the real test soon...it was an easy going afternoon for the group. The comfort broke, however, when Bruce left to ask Tony what they should eat for dinner.

Almost immediately, Bruce ran back up upstairs. "Tony's gone!"

A/N: Smooth, Tony. Reeeeeeaaaaal smooth. Please review! :B