Penny loved her sister, she really did. It didn't matter that she had known her for six months or that Morgan was a little annoying sometimes. Or that she seemed to have everything young Penny had always wanted.

A real family. With a father that you met when you were born and a mother that didn't leave you on the front porch of another country when she didn't need you anymore.

Penny couldn't believe herself; Morgan was five. How could she resent a five-year-old so much? Yes, sometimes she wanted to hate her, because what did Morgan have that made her deserve all that Penny wanted. But then she spent time with her and how could she not love her.

And then she saw her dad, who treated Morgan like she was everything he ever wanted. He stopped being Iron Man for her, how many times had Penny asked him to stop? Many, and the answer was always the same. It is my duty, Pen. What about his duty to Penny? What was different with Morgan that her father deemed her more important than his duty to the world. Penny wanted to scream, to ask all these questions

But she kept quiet because her father seemed happy, and Pepper and Morgan. So why couldn't she? Why couldn't she be happy with what she had? She was determined to be.

Until it all exploded.

Did she expect her father not to show up at all? Yes, she did. But not only did he showed up, he planned everything from the beginning, he made the balloons, picked up the cake, everything. Penny couldn't remember a single time Tony Stark, her father, did anything of the sort for her birthday parties. He only appeared to one just to leave five minutes later.

She was happy for Morgan. That she had such an amazing dad, but part of her...

It isn't fair.

Morgan took her out of her thoughts, telling her to come open the gifts. All of them got her something and when they thought there was nothing left, her dad came with something.

The little girl screamed with delight at the obvious bike shaped object. She had asked Tony for a bike last week, only receiving we'll see.

Immediately she forgot all the other gifts and got on the bike. Her father then began teaching her how to ride it.

Penny couldn't help the tears forming in her eyes. Because she got a bike with her father's credit card, with Uncle Rhodey's help, when she wasn't much older than Morgan, refused everyone's offers to teach her, waiting for her father just for him to leave her after an "important call". She never learned how to ride after that.

The thoughts that Penny had been trying to avoid came again. Hatred filled every cell of her body. She didn't know who it was towards. Her father? Morgan?

Penny tried to stop again, tried to avoid the guilt that came with hating a five-year-old that had done nothing wrong. She began looking at the scene, examining it with the eyes of a scientist. What was different from last time? Her dad was there. The Avengers, the threat towards the world. All the excuses Tony Stark had given as to why he couldn't be with his daughter were there. Every single thing was the same. Except one.

The answer was so obvious it made Penny want to cry. Because it was her. The little girl was different. The little girl longing for a father wasn't the product of a one-night stand and too much alcohol anymore, she was the product of love.

Until now, Penny had avoided comparing herself to Morgan, but she couldn't stop herself anymore. Their mothers, their personalities, everything a good reason for her father not to love Penny as much, for her father not to try harder

Her father telling Morgan to go to the kitchen for some snacks brought her back to reality. She was standing with the Avengers outside her father's cabin. Everyone looked at where Tony and Morgan were leaving, minus her Uncle Rhodey and Happy, who looked at her with worry.

"He really is a good father isn't he." Steve wondered.

She was going to stay quiet; she really was. "I wouldn't know, he was terrible with me."

Everyone looked at her with surprised eyes. "Pen..." Her Uncle Rhodey began.

"I just don't want Morgan to get hurt when he leaves for work or decides to be Iron Man again" She snapped, letting her mouth act without thinking.

"Come on Penny. We changed, you changed, mayb3 he changed too." Steve comforted her. "No, it can't be." Penny really wanted to believe it was a lie.

"Why can't you accept that he's living a good life. That he is an attentive partner and a good father." Natasha tried

But their efforts were in vain. There have been a thousand problems and emotions stored in a little box. And it exploded.

"Because I wanted that dad." Penny hissed, turned to see all of them, with angry tears in her eyes. "I wanted the dad that made me afternoon snacks, instead of ordering me out of his lab to ask the nanny. Why does Morgan get that dad? If Tony Stark has truly changed then that means he was always capable of changing." Penny took a breath before saying her last thought that had been burdening her since she came back.

"I just wasn't worth changing for."

All of them look at Penny with pity in their eyes. No one knew what to say. Finally, her Uncle Happy came forward.

"Kid, I think you need to talk with your dad."

But Penny couldn't, because she wasn't brave enough, because she didn't want confirmation.

"I will go to my room." Penny was about to leave when she turned back. "Please Uncle don't talk to him, I need to do it." And she would, someday.

Penny barely slept that night. She kept turning in her bed thinking about her uncle's words. She should speak with her dad, maybe then he would understand how much he had hurt Penny. But why? Why did she needed him to acknowledge that? She didn't want him to treat Morgan badly. And no matter what, no one could bring back the childhood Penny had lost, or never even had.

Because of her sleepless night, adding all of her continuous problems, the next morning Penny was irritated. Meaning that during breakfast with the Avengers, who had stayed overnight, a fight was unavoidable. The possibility was higher with her father. who decided that now, after a little more than 16 years, was the time to get involved and teach her manners.

"I am just saying, Penelope." He knew Penny hated to be called that. The fight had escalated quickly, so quickly that their spectators were too stunned to speak. "That if we have guests, the correct thing to do is not to lock ourselves in our rooms."

"That's a very hypocrite to say, Mr. stay-in-my-lab-for-48-continous-hours."

"I don't do that anymore" he said, offended, as if the truth hurt him.

"I don't even know why I am staying with you." Penny screamed before she could stop herself.

"Then go to your very lovable mother." He shouted back. "I am sure that she will welcome you with open arms just as she always did. ¡Oh, wait!" His words turned sharper with every second. "She never has."

His words hurt Penny like a knife. Scratch that, it was the worst. She had been stabbed and it hadn't hurt as much.

"Tones." Rhodey begged. "Maybe you should both calm down before you say another thing you will regret."

Neither of them listened. Penny felt tears forming in her eyes. Swallowing down her anger, she spoke.

"Maybe I will." With that she walked to her room ignoring her family's calls to come back. When

she was there, Penny began packing, only the necessary.

In the living room again, she headed to the door ready to catch a bus or run to New York.

"Penelope." Her father's voice was a warning. "You better put that luggage back where it was."

"I would like to see you stopping me." There was too much resentment, too much everything.

"Penny, I..." Tony tried to get words out of his mouth, the reality of what he had said finally hitting him.

What has he done?

"I don't want to hear anything from you, ever again." The girl snapped. "I no longer consider you, my father."

What has she done?

Not allowing herself to think more, to watch more carefully the destroyed look in her father's face, she left. Penny looked back, but she would never admit it.

Living with her mother was just as she remembered. Mary had been surprised to see her but received her happily. Penny wasn't dumb enough to think that her mother was happy to see her. She was simply happy to make her father miserable.

It was a week after her arrival that everything came crashing down. Penny hadn't slept a full night for a little more than a week and sleep deprivation didn't let her think.

Because Penny deserved better. She deserved better than a neglectful mom and an ignorant father. She deserved to be loved, to be held and everything she didn't have as a child. Most important, she deserved a fucking bike.

With that last thought, she got up from bed, changed and ran outside.

The bus left her almost two km away from the cabin. Penny didn't have a plan; she just wanted her fucking bike. She didn't know what she was thinking, she probably wasn't. The cabin was probably watched by FRIDAY, who would alert everyone when she approached. But she wanted that bike, and logic wouldn't stand in her way.

FRIDAY's voice was what woke him up.

Tony's first thought was what Penny was doing here. His second thought was to stop her from leaving again.

The AI apparently woke the avengers because just as Tony and Pepper were coming down the stairs, they found the others watching through the glass door. Tony was about to ask what the hell they were doing just standing there, when the scene going on outside made him stop as well.

In front of them was Penny, who seemed to have forgotten she had super strength, because she was fighting to get Morgan's bike free from the lock. The girl kept pulling even as Tony step outside, the others following him. She must have heard them, since they woke up even, but she didn't mind them, her focus on the bike alone.

"Penny." Tony's voice was what brought Penny out of her stupor. "What are you doing?"

What was she doing? Penny moves her eyes from the bike to her father and then again to the bike.

"It's not fair." She murmurs after a while, going back to Morgan's bicycle immediately.

Tony didn't understand. Sadly, he was the only one. Everyone, one way or another, already knew where this was going, and were debating or leaving them or stay in case they needed to step in.

"I don't understand!" Tony talked again, this time more agitated. The only answer he got was a loud "This is mine!"

"I am sorry, Pen, you are gonna have to be more clear." Tony responded exasperated, moving his arms around. "That's your sister's bike!"

Penny threw the bike to the ground, finally looking at her father directly in the eyes. "Morgan gets a childhood, a dad, a real family, and a bike.?" She cleans the tears in her eyes and at the same time she shakes her head. "No, I at least get the bike, I am taking it."

Realization ran across Tony's face. How could he had been so stupid? He should have realized something like this was going to happen. He needed to fix this now.

"Just come inside, kiddo." Tony said in the gentlest voice he could manage while his heart broke with the sight in front of him. "We will talk there."

"Why should I?" Penny shouted, arms moving around, bike again on the floor. "You are lame. all right? You are just some lame suburban dad."

"Why does that make you so mad?" Her father shouted in response because he was still emotionally constipated.

"Because if you were gonna be some lame suburban dad," Penny sobbed. "Why couldn't you have been that for me?"

If everyone was quiet before, now it was even more. The only thing that could be heard was Penny sniffling.

"Listen Penny, I know I screw up"

Why couldn't her father understand how much his lack of affection had impacted her life? How could he not understand that him being a real father to Morgan broke her more than everything he ever did? And she hated herself for that. But she wanted him to understand Penny needed him, and he wasn't there. She was tired of pushing it aside, because while that didn't seem to affect him, it hurt Penny, a lot.

"Oh, screw up doesn't even begin to describe how much..." "I know, okey"

Penny laughed. "Do you really?"

Did Tony really knew?

"I wanna fix this." Tony tried to calmly explain. "But I do not know how. Please, bambina, tell me what I can do. I will do anything."

What struck Penny more about that sentence was the word "bambina". Her father hadn't called her that in years. She tried to focus on that, on the fact that she still was her father's "bambina", but she

couldn't. Why should Penny have to explain it to him? He was there, he should know.

With even more tears in her eyes, she continued to fight with the bike, that, until then, was abandoned to the floor, still in the fucking chain.

Penny saw his father run inside, and even if she had indirectly told him to leave her alone, she was disappointed.

Until he came back. With a key.

He handed it to her, and slowly, Penny took it. She looked at the key, and even tried to move her arm with the key to the bike, but she just kept staring. Finally, she dropped her arm.

"I never wanted a bike." she says, her voice hoarse from crying. "Not now, not then."

Tony waited for her daughter to continue. He had begged her to talk, he wasn't going to interrupt her now.

"I just saw a girl's dad teaching her how to ride one at the park and I wanted that, '' Penny continued. "I wated my dad to take me to the park, school, help me do my homework and even tuck me to bed."

"I didn't want a bike; I wanted a dad."

Tony knew he hadn't been a good father to Penny, but he never realized how much it had hurt her. How much it still did.

"I am sorry, kid" Because what else could he have said?

"I never learned." Penny's voice broke at the end.

Because she was still a kid. His kid.

"I know, baby." Tony murmured. "I owe you a lifetime of apologies, and I don't even know where to start, but I promised I will try."

Penny hugged him and broke down crying, hard.

"What does Morgan have that I don't?" She sobbed in his nightshirt.

"Nothing, Pen, you are both the same." Tony kissed her in the head. She was so small. "It was me; I didn't know what to do. You taught me everything, but I still couldn't do it."

"Promise you will try." Penny whispered. "I don't want you to be the least worst. I want you to be the best."

At that moment, Tony promised to himself, and his daughter that he would try. "You will know how to ride a bike by the end of the month, bambina."

And she did.