AN: Anyone still there? So sorry for the long delay. Life and house guests were conspiring against me.
Pepper took a deep breath and smiled as she looked at the painting hanging in front of her. She hadn't been thrilled when Tony had decided to relocated to New York full time. Stark headquarters was located in California and, as CEO, she knew that she would have to travel back and forth constantly. Tony had spent months trying to convince her that New York was the perfect place for them before she'd finally agreed. In all that time it had never occurred to him to just take her to the Museum of Modern Art. No, that had been Bruce's idea. She had of course already decided that she was going to move to New York. Tony was a part of the Avengers and it made the most sense but, she wouldn't lie, the museums had helped.
Pepper looked up at the painting again. It was incredible how just looking at something so beautiful could make everything in her life seem more manageable. Looking over to her right she was reminded that those feelings weren't always universal.
"It's called Invisible Sun," Pepper said. "What do you think?"
"It's nice," Fenrir said looking off to the side.
"What do you feel, when you look at it?" She asked. Fenrir briefly glanced over at the painting.
"Lonely," Fenrir said, immediately dropping his eyes back to the floor.
"Well, at least you have a theme," Pepper said to herself. So far the paintings that Pepper had shown Fenrir had apparently inspired pain, sadness, isolation, and abandonment.
It wasn't that Pepper had thought that a trip to the museum was going to magically fix all of Fenrir's problems. But she had hoped that it might distract him, if only for a little bit, from everything that was going on in his head.
Pepper watched as Fenrir walked to the next painting. She had been so sure that a trip out of the Tower was exactly what Fenrir needed. Sadly though, since they'd arrived the only change in Fenrir had been his location.
"We can go home if you want to," Pepper said.
"What?" Fenrir asked, looking back over to Pepper.
"We don't need to stay," Pepper repeated. "I can see you're not really enjoying this."
Fenrir quickly began shaking his head. "No," He said. "I'm fine. We should continue."
"I brought you here to get your mind off of things," Pepper said. "Not to make you even more depressed."
"I'm sorry. I'll try to be more pleasant," Fenrir said, looking over at her guiltily.
"You're allowed to be sad," Pepper said, reaching out to hold Fenrir's hand. "If anyone has the right to be upset about what's going on in their life then it's you."
"You were enjoying it," Fenrir said.
"We can come back again. Some other day," Pepper said. Fenrir didn't say anything else for a moment. Pepper decided to take his silence as an answer and they began making their way toward the exit. She had almost forgotten that she was still holding Fenrir's hand until she felt herself being tugged backwards. Turning around Pepper saw that Fenrir had stopped cold in front of one of the sculptures.
It was straight forward enough. An abstract figure of a man standing in front of a smaller version of himself. The plaque at the base read, Father and Son in Bronze.
"I like this one," Pepper said. Fenrir continued staring at the two abstract figures in front of him.
"I made him leave," Fenrir whispered. Pepper looked over to him. "My father, he… he left because I made him think that I chose Thor over him."
"You didn't make him think anything," Pepper insisted.
"I wanted my father back so badly," Fenrir said, leaving Pepper to wonder if he'd even heard her. "I just wanted to see him. To hear him say that he didn't hate me for the things I'd done. That he still cared for me. And I finally got what I wanted. He came to find me and… and now he's gone again."
"He'll come back," Pepper said.
"You don't know that," Fenrir said.
"Yes I do," Pepper said, turning to meet Fenrir's gaze. "I watched the security footage from the roof. I saw how happy he was when he saw you."
"And how disgusted he was with me when he left," Fenrir interrupted. Pepper chose to ignore the comment and keep going.
"He left for his own reasons but, sooner or later, he will be back," Pepper said.
"Do you really believe that?" Fenrir asked.
"Yes," Pepper said, believing it completely. Last she'd checked everyone in the Tower was certain that Loki would be back to see his son. They'd been somewhat less sure about how they were going to handle him wanting to stop in for visits; but she decided that it was probably best not to share that with Fenrir.
Fenrir stared searchingly at Pepper for a moment before returning his gaze to the sculpture.
"It really is a beautiful piece," He said quietly.
"It's fifteen stories tall and takes up two city blocks. It's the biggest bookstore in the country," Bruce explained to a stunned Fenrir.
"I don't think I've ever seen so many books in one place," Fenrir said, reverently. Bruce watched him walk over to the nearest set of shelves and run his fingers lightly over the spines of the books.
"What about the college in Vanaheim? Thor said that the library there was the most extensive in 'all the nine realms'," Bruce said.
"Children aren't allowed inside," Fenrir said, pulling a book off the shelves and examining it. "I was too young before so I never had the chance to go there."
"Just pick out whatever you want," Bruce said, incredibly grateful that Fenrir was too distracted by the books to be see how uncomfortable his last comment had made him. He watched as Fenrir continued his walk down the aisles. He hadn't been sure what Fenrir would think about the bookstore and he was relieved to see that he seemed to be enjoying it.
Not that Bruce had had much of a choice in whether or not he was going to take Fenrir out. Pepper had made it pretty clear to everyone the night before that the Avengers new mission was to cheer Fenrir up. This had of course put Bruce in uncharted territory since his main focus in the past several years had been how to keep his emotions neutral. As a result he'd become somewhat rusty when it came to getting someone excited and happy. So he'd decided to just stick with the basics and just take Fenrir to go and get some books. Seeing the way that Fenrir was looking at the store he felt like he'd made the right move.
"It's divided up into sections. Where would you like to start?" Bruce asked.
"If I let myself start picking books then I don't know if I'll be able to stop," Fenrir admitted.
"Don't worry about it. Tony gave me one of his credit cards before we left," Bruce said. Admittedly that wasn't quite true. What Tony had actually done was leave his credit card lying on the kitchen table. But seeing as Tony basically paid for everything in the Tower, and that this was the third time Bruce had found one of his credit cards abandoned, he had a feeling that Tony wouldn't mind too much.
Despite Fenrir's initial reluctance to spending Tony's money Bruce was eventually able to wear him down and within the first hour they'd amassed at least one bookshelves worth of books.
"I'm going to go see if they have a delivery service," Bruce said. "That way we won't need to cart all these home." Fenrir nodded his understanding and quickly brought his attention back to the books. Bruce hurried to the front of the store to figure out how they were going to transport their increasingly large pile of books home.
He was almost at the registers when his eyes drifted over to scan the magazine rack. Tony Stark's New Rival? Immediately caught his eye and he hurried to grab a copy. Just as he'd been afraid of, there on the cover was a photo of Pepper and Fenrir at the art museum. Bruce hurried to find the article.
Was it really only a few weeks ago that Captain America was seen running through the streets carrying a mystery man? The Avengers were quick to release a statement saying that the Captain was simply helping the man in question. Or, more accurately, Pepper Potts issued a statement saying that the two were most certainly NOT in a relationship. My my Miss Potts. You certainly were eager to clarify that little tidbit. Could it be that Tony Stark has some competition for his fiancé's heart? She and her new friend certainly seemed comfortable together this past week when they were seen walking hand and hand through the Museum of Modern Art. Once again we are left to wonder, who is this mystery man, and what is going on in that Tower?
Bruce couldn't decide whether to laugh or roll his eyes at what he was reading. Apparently the articles about Fenrir and Steve must have been more popular than he'd thought. Pepper didn't usually get hit by the paparazzi, so people had probably already recognized Fenrir when they'd gone to take the pictures.
Bruce quickly sent a text to Pepper to let her know what was going on. Normally they wouldn't have cared about some fictional tabloid story. Unfortunately they had recently learned that Thor was a little unclear about which stories in the news were true and which weren't. It had taken them all nearly an hour to calm Thor down when he'd found the articles about Fenrir and Steve, and Bruce was hoping that they weren't going to have to repeat that again any time soon.
Looking around him, Bruce decided that maybe it would be a good idea if he found Fenrir and they started heading for home before anyone took a picture of the two of them.
"Fenrir," Bruce said, when he finally found him three floors from where they'd separated. "You think you have enough for one day?"
"Why do people think that you have a cat?" Fenrir asked him.
"Excuse me?" Bruce said. Fenrir held up what he'd been reading and Bruce realized that Fenrir had found the comics. "I guess the idea of the Hulk having a kitten makes people laugh." He offered.
"There are stories about all of you," Fenrir said, indicating the pile of comics laying on the floor next to him.
"Yeah, there is a comic line for each of us," Bruce said, remembering how thrilled Tony and Clint had been when they'd discovered them the year before. "What do you think of them?"
"They are interesting," Fenrir said, trading the comic in his hand for one featuring Captain America. "Are any of them true?"
"Some of them. Tony's entire life has been in the news, and he's not exactly camera shy, so people don't have to look too far for inspiration. Clint and Natasha are pretty private, so anything written about them is probably made up," Bruce said. "People aren't nearly as interested in writing about me as they are in writing the Hulk so those are usually made up too.
"Steve is sort of a mix. If it's set during World War Two then it's probably based on something that really happened, but the ones set today are total nonsense."
"What about Thor?" Fenrir asked, putting the comic back on the pile.
"The actual stories are made up but most writers have been good about capturing his personality, so they aren't much of a stretch," Bruce said. Judging by the smirk on Fenrir's face, Bruce had the feeling that he'd already read a few Thor comics.
They talked for a little longer but Fenrir could see that Bruce was ready to leave and they were soon making their way back to the Tower. Not, of course, before they'd taken the time to pay for Fenrir's new comic collection.
AN:See, I can write chapters that don't end with crippling emotional pain. Hope you all enjoyed this and that I haven't lost all my readers by making you wait. In case you want to assure me that you are still there, there is the comment section.
Read, review and I'll see you next chapter.