When Piper woke up, she knew she was in trouble.

Not only, she noted as she slowly rose to a sitting position and blearily scoped her bedroom, because it seemed like every single part of her body hurt (although, certainly not as badly as it had – earlier today? Yesterday? Longer? Yikes).

Not only, she thought as she scrambled across her bed – her body protesting, reaching out to her alarm clock, 6:12 (A.M.?) – because she could now clearly see her torn and bloody Spidey suit crumpled on the floor. That probably wouldn't have slipped by her Aunt May. May would have been the one to put her in a fresh t-shirt and sweatpants –

Not only, she reminisced as stared in her mirror and saw the cuts, grazes, bruises (one around her left eye, a faded yellowish brown), because of the numerous things that had gone wrong in the fight with Toomes, the station, the kid lying on the platform, struggling to breathe –

Her face crumpled, and she let herself drop to the floor, covering her mouth with her hands, please let him be okay, please let him be okay –

There was a knock on her door, and she froze. Only Aunt May could let you know you were in the ess-aitch-eye-tee by such a simple little knock.

"Piper?" She sounded calm. Chipper, even. Calm before the storm. "You awake?"

Piper wiped at her face, forced her voice to be even. "Yeah – I'm awake."

"Could you come out here, when you're ready?" Even though it was slightly muffled by the bedroom door, Piper could clearly hear how clipped her aunt's tone was. "We need to talk."

Piper sighed. Everything hurt. Ribs, head, heart.

Chest, a voice in her head challenged, but it was a weak and feeble attempt. It was her heart. It ached like the rest of her.

She didn't want to think about it.

Because that was another reason she was definitely in trouble.

Because the last thing she could remember thinking was: thank God you're such an asshole, or else I definitely would've tried to kiss you sooner. Which didn't make a lot of sense that she'd thought that of all things in that moment. Maybe she'd been really lightheaded – of course she'd been lightheaded!

Right?

She wondered if Aunt May would let her have a shower before the showdown. Or at the very least, brush her teeth.

As Piper ventured out from her bedroom, she saw that Aunt May was standing behind the kitchen counter, hands resting on the bench, her shoulders set. She was staring into a cup of tea.

Piper cleared her throat. "I can –"

"When I came home yesterday, I thought you were dead." Piper went quiet as her aunt cupped her hands around the teacup, steam curling up towards her face. "You had blood all over your face. All over your stomach. You…" May faltered.

"They're shallow," Piper offered solemnly. She'd checked her stomach; four long thin cuts, already on their way to healing. Bless you, weird mutant spider powers.

"Are you kidding me?" Aunt May hissed, whipping her head up.

"I can explain," Piper began, holding her hands up in the "Whoa, Nelly" gesture, and her ribs helpfully reminded her that they were not in the best of ways –

"Oh, you can explain?" Aunt May whispered derisively, nodding vigorously. "You can?"

"Yes," Piper whispered back, not entirely sure why they were being so quiet – sure, it was early, but they didn't have to whisper.

Aunt May crossed her arms, eyes wide and ready. "All right. The floor is yours. Let's hear it."

Piper hesitated. This was insane. She couldn't help but laugh, although none of this felt very funny. "I bet you're wishing I had a convict for a boyfriend right now, huh?"

May slammed a hand down on the counter. "Damn it, Piper!"

Piper jumped guiltily before the hairs on the back of her neck stood up – now?! – and she sailed across the room, ready to shield Aunt May from whatever danger was in the living room –

The movement was quick, sharp: somebody bolting upright on the couch, their head and shoulders just visible over the couch's back. Piper blinked, her stomach lurching in jubilation.

Tony Stark slung an arm over the back of her couch, his hair a mess, his pale blue button-up creased and crinkled. He had been lying on her couch. Correction: he had been sleeping on her couch. He had been sleeping. On her couch. Tony Stark.

And good God, he looked adorable when he was all rumpled and half-asleep.

No, he doesn't, that feeble little voice in her head protested.

Piper turned to Aunt May, her heart hammering. He had spent the night – sleeping on the couch – because… why?

"By all means," her aunt huffed, gesturing towards the couch. "Explain that too."

He'd offered very politely to leave the room, but Piper had rapidly schooled Aunt May into her messy bedroom, while her aunt told her boss that he was welcome to anything in the kitchen or the fridge –

"How long has he been here?" Piper demanded (quietly) the second her door was closed, whirling towards her aunt in desperation. Then she remembered she hadn't brushed her teeth and delved into her backpack in search of gum.

May was sitting on Piper's bed, her arms and her legs tightly crossed. She arched an eyebrow. "How long has Tony Stark been here? It that what you're asking?"

Piper waved her hands around in silent frustration, kneeling over her backpack. She hoped this would emphasize… whatever it was she was feeling. (Why had he stayed? That was meant to be good, right? But then, why had he barely looked at her? Probably because she had yelled at him and he was angry at her because she'd ruined a train station. But then why had he stayed?)

She chucked two sticks of gum in her mouth and chewed hurriedly. Then she added a third. Mint exploded in her mouth.

Her aunt sighed. "Yesterday." Her lower lip began to quiver. "He was carrying… you looked so – so small, and all I could think –" Her aunt's face crumpled and she buried her face in her hands.

Piper stopped chewing. Guilt had replaced impatient elation, slowly making her feel heavier, more weighed down. Reluctantly, she spat her gum into her bin.

She carefully snuggled up to May, wrapping an arm around her. "I'm sorry. I should've told you. But I didn't want you to worry." You'd already lost Uncle Ben, she couldn't bring herself to say. "I… I'm sorry, but I… can't just stop doing what I do. It's like I've been given the chance to make a difference. I can't throw it away."

After a few quiet moments, her aunt sniffed, wiped her eyes. "Okay. Okay." She nodded, clearing her throat. "You're – damn it, Piper, why does it have to be you?"

Piper shrugged. "It just is."

"Yeah. But I don't like it. I kind of wish you were dating the convicted felon."

Piper let out a huff of laughter. Her ribs groaned. Her bed squeaked. She wondered what Tony was doing out in the living room. Maybe he'd left. Maybe he'd drifted off to sleep again. On the couch, she thought again, and it made chest feel funny.

Her head turned towards her bedroom door and she squinted, as if somehow this would bring on a bout of x-ray vision.

"Yeah," Aunt May said interestedly. "Is there something I should know about there?"

Piper kept her face blank. "Finding out I'm Spider-Woman isn't enough for you?"

Aunt May still looked shrewd. "Is there?"

"No," Piper said emphatically. Probably a little too emphatically. To cover it up, she cleared her throat. "It's not like that. He thinks…"

God, what did he think? What did she think?

I think I'm in trouble.

Aunt May just shook her head, her expression one of mingled pity and amusement.

"Honey, I love you to death, but for a kid so smart, you are so clueless."

When he'd seen her standing in the kitchen (still very battered and bruised but, y'know, alive), relief had swum through his veins so fast he'd felt dizzy.

Now they were in her bedroom and he was playing with his phone, throwing it from hand to hand, trying not to think about –

(Not if it means I have to be around you for one more second –)

He wondered if he should leave now. He'd stayed to make sure she was okay. She definitely didn't want him here.

Tony checked his phone, scrolling through the texts of admonishment from Pepper (did you actually RUN OUT before your speech? are you kidding me?), trying to ignore the inner turmoil he was currently experiencing. He was vaguely reminded of a song by the Clash when Piper's bedroom door swung open and her unnaturally attractive aunt walked out, smiling of all things. He'd been waiting for her to crucify him, or at the very least yell at him for failing to keep her niece safe –

"Hi! Do you wanna stay for breakfast? We have bagels."

Tony blinked before flashing a smile back at her, the kind he knew lots of women thought were charming and easygoing. "Thank you, but I think I'll get out of your hair, you probably –"

"It's really the least I can do," Aunt May said warmly. From behind her, Piper peered out into the living room, her face set and resigned. "Aunt May," she said quietly, "if he wants to leave…"

"I can totally leave," Tony said with a lightness he didn't feel, jumping to his feet and grabbing his suit jacket off the end of the couch. The muscles in his back protested; Piper's couch was clearly an unforgiving bastard.

"Sit down. You're staying for bagels," Aunt May said determinedly, grabbing her purse from the kitchen counter.

Tony glanced at Piper, who was leaning against her doorframe. She raised one shoulder in a shrug, rolling her eyes (but at her aunt's behaviour, Tony realized, not at his).

"Yes ma'am," he said dutifully, dropping back onto the couch, his spirits a fraction higher than they had been a moment before. They rose a little higher when he saw Piper seemed to be smiling ever so slightly.

Doesn't mean anything, he told himself. It does not mean anything –

"Okay, well, I forgot we don't have bagels," May Parker said cheerfully, grabbing an eco-friendly shopping bag. "I'd better go get some. I'll be back in fifteen minutes."

The front door shut behind her. He swung his head to look at Piper, and she shrugged again, this time a little defensively. "I know. Subtlety is not her forte."

"Really? I didn't notice," he said, trying to sound sincere.

That little smile was back, tugging at the corners of her lips. He felt one side of his mouth jerk upwards in response.

"Did you sleep okay?" Piper asked softly. "I'm sorry. I know that couch is not the world's greatest –"

"I slept great," Tony lied. He hadn't slept a wink. That hadn't entirely been the couch's fault, to be fair.

Maybe, just maybe, they could engage in sparse polite conversation for the next fifteen minutes and then never have to talk about anything serious ever again. Maybe he didn't have to acknowledge just how his insides had tied themselves into a knot, a knot that seemed to be two parts guilt and one part longing bordering on pining.

Because he had to tell her. Well, maybe not that he was so hopelessly attracted to her that he'd lain awake the whole night just in case she'd woken up and needed something… Maybe just the other parts.

Tony sighed, placing his head in his hands. "Piper –"

"Really," she said fixedly. "Thank you for staying. I appreciate it."

He closed his eyes. "That is the last thing you should be doing."

"I shouldn't be grateful?" She sounded perplexed.

"Not to me," he said shortly. She stayed silent, so he took that as a cue to better explain. "Piper, would you have been out there today if it hadn't been for me?"

"I'm not really sure."

"But I'm right, aren't I? Because I told you that you couldn't do it? Because I don't think you're good enough, right?"

Piper was silent.

Tony rubbed his temples, grimacing. "I think there's been a misunderstanding."

"Mister Stark," she said, and he nearly jumped at how close her voice was; she was on the couch beside him. "You don't have to make me feel better. Trust me, yesterday was a pretty clear example of why I'm not really cut out to do this –"

"Really?" He turned his head, opened his eyes. She looked pale and tired. "I mean, there were no civilian casualties. The damage was brought on because of an argument between Toomes and a guy trying to make more money than he was apparently worth, and frankly, if you'd tried to intervene with that, you probably wouldn't be here right now –"

"No civilian casualties?" Piper interrupted, her eyes wide and bright. "The guy who fell, he's –?"

"Gonna be fine." He'd scoured the news sites routinely through the night.

She sighed, her shoulders sagging in relief. "Thank God." She glanced at him with a curious expression, crossing her arms. "So… why?"

"Why what?"

"Why'd you shut me out and tell me to," her nose wrinkled, "cool it?"

Tony hesitated. He wished his phone would ring, wished her phone would ring, wished Aunt May would burst into the room with bagels. No such distraction appeared.

"I'm not mad," Piper said gently, and to her credit she almost sounded like she was telling the truth. "Well… okay, I'm a little mad. You can be kind of frustrating."

"Yeah, I get that a lot."

"But I know that if you hadn't shown up when you did yesterday, I probably wouldn't be here right now."

The words were pulled from his throat as he remembered it. "If something happened to you, I don't know what I'd do." Jesus, Tony, good job sounding like a casual friend. But he was surprised to find his eyes starting to sting. "I'm sorry for making you feel like – believe me, you're more than good enough. Just sometimes… it doesn't matter. All it takes is one little mistake and…"

Here he was, sitting on her couch, trying not to cry. Yep. This was just great. Women just went crazy for this kind of Tony.

"Mister Stark?" Her hand, small and warm, tentatively touched his forearm. He swallowed. "You okay? Do you want… I don't know, some tea?"

He let out a shaky little laugh – a laugh that only lasted a moment, barely a second. "No thanks, Doctor Parker, although I appreciate the offer." Then, because he thought he couldn't possibly be more of an idiot than he'd already been, he placed his hand over hers… before the boldness fled, and he quickly moved it away. As if this confirmed something, she swiftly drew her hand up to her face, under the pretense of tucking her hair behind her ear.

He continued, smoothly changing gears. "So, breakthrough. I'm pretty sure in the midst of you yelling at me about what an asshole I am, you called me Tony."

Piper rolled her eyes in spite of her rapidly coloring cheeks. "I'm glad that's what you took out of it."

"Hey, silver lining, right? You know, you can keep it up if you want to."

A flicker of a smile played about her face. "The yelling?"

"Maybe not the yelling. Calling me Tony."

"Who, me?"

"Sure. You could even make a habit of it."

She started to really smile when, all of a sudden, it dimmed, apprehension dwelling in the line of her mouth, the furrows in her brow. She bit her lip hesitantly – Jesus, Piper biting her lip like that should have been made illegal – and she said, "Did you mean all that stuff you said that night?"

The night you told me I was useless?

"None of it," Tony said immediately; not only because it was the truth but because he couldn't have her looking at him like this: her shoulders tense, a nervous energy playing in the way she tapped her fingers. "I wasn't thinking. It… it wasn't actually how I felt – how I feel. About. Things." He cringed, wishing he could kick himself in the face. Nailed it.

"Oh," Piper said. Only she sounded disappointed, not to mention looked disappointed. He blinked.

"'Oh'?" he repeated, his brows drawing together in bemusement. "What's wrong?"

"No, I just… it's fine. I mean, I thought you were…" She shrugged. "It's all good, I must've read you – the situation – wrong."

Tony squinted. "Surprisingly, that did not clear things up for me –"

"When you were looking after me," Piper said, staring firmly at the ceiling. "At the gala for Oscorp."

Something clicked into place in his brain, and a bright feeling seemed to crack open in the region of his stomach. He held his breath, not even letting the possibility enter his mind, no matter how tantalizing it was.

He forced his mind to land on Lang, and how Piper quietly adored him with the power of a thousand suns. The feeling in his stomach faltered and stalled. "Ah."

"Harry's not my boyfriend," Piper blurted, now giving the ceiling a vaguely pained expression. "I don't want him to be. Or… or Scott. I, um. I couldn't care less about. Him. Anybody else. I mean, apart from…" Her eyes flickered towards him, almost apologetically, and she cleared her throat. "Um. And I'm probably super wrong about this… and you can just totally pretend that I said nothing – I thought I'd…"

She was getting flustered, and he was worried that if he kissed her when she was flustered, she'd get even more flustered and pull away. But he couldn't help that the sensation in his stomach had returned in full swing, as vivid and as elating as fireworks. The feeling swelled, and he struggled to keep a straight face, suddenly sure that he would burst out laughing. She'll think you're crazy, under no circumstances should you do that –

Piper glanced at him, eyebrows raised. "Anytime you care to stop me, Tony, or tell me that I'm wrong, please do – cause I can just steamroll my way through this all day if you don't say something."

"C'mere," he said.

She did.

"Say my name again?" he asked.

She did.

The next morning, Piper found that she had a heck of a lot of voicemails to get through.

A lot of them, she was surprised to find, were from other members of the Avengers. She had one from each of them (or almost each of them: Clint had said "oh and Natasha says congratulations on not dying" and she didn't really know Wanda or Vision well enough). She even had one from Scott ("Piper! Bruce said something like you're under house arrest or that you fought a whole heap of bird robots. Anyway, I hope you're okay, and I've sent you, like, a whole heap of those cheesy pretzels. Or I would, if I had your address. Hey, give me your address, and boom, I promise, giant box of cheesy pretzels headed your way –") but, she was happy to note, it didn't make her feel anything that was remotely beyond platonic friendship.

Bruce had sent her some emails. Most of them were just little messages asking how she was doing, but some of them had images attached. Piper now had a photo on her desktop titled "best picture ever" – it was an actual selfie of Bruce, Sam, Scott and Steve sitting in the kitchen at Stark Tower, holding a big cardboard sign that read, even heroes get grounded, #free piper. Not only was it hilarious, it also made her heart swell with joy. There were no words to convey just how gratified she was, and she would be mortified for them to learn just how much their messages meant to her.

The most pressing of these voicemails came from Gwen, who Piper had finally Skyped.

"Grounded?" Gwen cried, looking horrified. "But – but you're twenty!"

"I know," Piper said grumpily, swaying her desk chair from side to side. "But I think Aunt May might kill me if I don't do as she says. It's not for long, anyway. I thought I'd be stuck here for years."

"Far out," Gwen said with feeling. "Can I still come over?"

"Probably. I don't know." Piper hesitated. "She's kinda holding my suit hostage. She takes it to work with her."

Gwen face was a mixture of sympathy and amusement. "That sucks, dude." Then she frowned, squinting. "What happened to your face?"

"The station, like I told you –"

"No," Gwen gestured to her own mouth. "It's kinda red – what happened, did you –?" She paused, her eyes widening in comprehension and she grinned. "Oh my God."

"It's not funny," Piper said uncertainly.

"Do you have pash rash?"

Piper dropped her head on her desk theatrically. "Jesus, Gwen –"

"Who gave you –?" Gwen trailed off before yelling, "Oh my God! I knew it!"

"Please stop," Piper groaned, although she was laughing too much to be taken seriously. It was hard not to see the funny side.

"But it's Tony, right?" Gwen was still too exuberant to be quiet. She was laughing too, bouncing around on her queen bed.

Piper shrugged, her face feeling hot. She might have felt a stronger sense of embarrassment had she not been so pleased.

"Oh my God," Gwen said again, finally sitting still, processing. Piper had gone through the exact same sequence of emotions at least fifteen times today.

"So?" Gwen demanded, practically shaking her laptop. "You guys finally sorted it out?"

"Well… we probably still have to talk about some things." Piper shrugged again, not quite wanting to share every detail with Gwen just yet. Like how they hadn't actually spent that much time talking. Or how his eyes flickered shut when she let her fingers trail through his hair. Or how, when he had first kissed her, it had been so gentle that for a second she hadn't even realised he'd done it.

Or how she had practically leapt off the couch in pure shock as Aunt May had yanked open the door, cradling a bag full of delicious smelling breakfast foods. (Tony's poker face had been impenetrable as he went to the kitchen to make a cup of coffee; Piper's, not so much.)

"Piper?"

Aunt May hadn't said anything, but then she'd claimed to have forgotten something else, and had to go back to the shops to get that, and the second the door had closed behind her, Piper had practically flown out of her chair and vaulted onto the kitchen counter, tugging him towards her, and he'd tasted like coffee, which she'd found very fitting…

Her toes curled against her rug. Nobody ever told her that remembering could be almost as good as the real thing.

"Piper!" Gwen looked as though she'd watched the last episode of her favourite show, only to find that the series ended on a cliffhanger. "What happened? Are you guys dating? Is he a good kisser?"

But a phone started to ring. Piper nearly sighed in relief when she saw it was Gwen's.

"Damn it, Connors." Gwen sighed. "Look, I'll call you tomorrow, and we are talking about how you made out with –"

"Okay, love you, bye!" Piper cried cheerfully, slamming her laptop shut.

Then she picked up her own phone, calling her message bank and listening to the voicemail she'd saved from last night, her heartbeat skyrocketing.

"Hey, hey. I'm just calling – well, I mean, obviously – but I wanted to check in with you. But you're probably resting, which is good – in fact, if you're not resting, just start doing that, right now. Anyway, everyone here misses you, except for me, and Bruce is taking lots of photos for you because he thinks you need to see things like Steve struggling to use a microwave. I said I'd be in them if we did like a Playgirl kind of photo shoot, maybe turn it into a calendar, and he was surprisingly not keen on doing that. I'm not gonna lie, I'm a little hurt.

"So, I'm flying over to L.A. tomorrow – work conference, Pepper wants me to be there. So, let me know if you want any thing specifically Californian and I'll find a way to sneak it back. Coyotes, Disneyland, anybody from the cast of the O.C. I'll find a way.

"Hey, remember earlier how I said everyone misses you except for me? Just clarifying, that was a joke. Thor always tells me he can never tell when I'm joking. So yeah. Call me, beep me, if you wanna reach me. Jesus, I just said that. Okay. I'm hanging up. Is this thing gonna cut me off, or am I just gonna keep rambling on and –"

There was a beep.

Piper rolled her chair across her room, her toes trailing on the carpet, trying to contain her grin, her stomach an exuberant mess of butterflies.

All in all, she thought, being grounded could be worse.