Chapter 9
He should have known, he and Howard, as much as he loathed admitting it, had quite a bit in common. Why he expected Howard to give up and go away he had no idea, neither him nor Howard were the quitter types, they were both annoyingly persistent actually. What he didn’t expect was for him to bring one of the replacement kids around, probably because he thought Tony wouldn’t be as snide if he had to worry about scarring a child for life. Well he was scarred for life on a regular basis as a kid and he turned out ok; he was sure a thirteen year old could fair fine. “And you’re here because?” he asks Howard, not bothering to keep up with any niceties. He’d been waiting his whole life to tell Howard to fuck himself and now that he had the opportunity he wasn’t about to let it go, the fact that he happened to be sitting in a company he created and Tony now owned made it all the better.
“I thought you said he was nice,” Grant mumbles to Howard.
“Eat shit, Grant,” he tells him, not caring that Grant hadn’t done anything wrong. He had a unibrow, that was reason enough for him.
“Hey!” Howard says, offended on his kid’s behalf. That was cute, he probably didn’t even know that he has said way worse things to him as a kid and he didn’t even have a unibrow.
Grant shrugs, “Maria has said worse,” he says. So Grant was passive, well that was boring.
“Look, I don’t actually care why you’re here; I just asked to be polite. Get out,” he says and starts shuffling papers around on his desk, pointedly ignoring the two people across from him.
“Okay, so can someone please explain what the hell is going on here?” Grant asks, glancing back and forth between Howard and Tony.
Howard looks pinched and Tony seizes the opportunity, “so it turns out fifteen years ago when my dad got into a car accident your mom, who has freaky healing powers by the way, save Howard’s ass presumably by killing someone and transferring their energy to him. This apparently healed his fatal wounds and regenerated his all the cells in his body, returning them to their former youth and voila, here we are. So basically by some fucked up and twisted turn of events I’m your half brother,” he says. Howard sighs and accepts defeat and Tony feels proud he managed to throw the asshole off his game. Sure, maybe he wasn’t the same guy, but that hardly meant he was about to forgive him for all he’s done in the past.
Grant frowns, “that’s the most ridiculous lie I’ve ever heard, it’s really creative though, you should make a story out that of that, I’m sure people will read it.”
Tony snorts, “I couldn’t make this shit up if I tried, frankly if this had happened a year and a half ago I probably would have thought this was ridiculous too but that was before I ended up housing Captain America and his traumatized best friend. I’m a little past ‘that isn’t scientifically possible’ by now. Also the mini arc reactor in my chest isn’t technically possible either but here it is,” he says, tapping the glowing front plate.
Howard’s head snaps up, “you found Steve?” he asks excitedly, “can I see him?”
Tony gives him an annoyed look, “fuck no! And no, I didn’t find him, S.H.E.I.L.D did,” he says. Grant blinks and looks between Tony and Howard again, obviously aware that he is behind on knowledge. “I was serious about telling you to fuck off by the way, I fully expect you two to leave within the next ten minutes,” he says, making a shooing motion with his hand.
“S.H.E.I.L.D is still in operation?” he asks,”that’s great!” he says, smiling.
Tony roll his eyes, “yeah, yippie, what an accomplishment” he mumbles.
“What did he do to you?” Grant asks, upset that Tony disliked his dad so much. Well at least Howard was nice to him and Maria, if only he got that luxury. He should have to be upset that he didn’t receive his father’s love, it should have been unconditional but he has never been so lucky.
“What did he do? Count your lucky stars you didn’t get the same dad I did, kid, because as a toddler I would have thought my name was ‘fuck off Tony’ if it wasn’t for my mom and my nannies, he told me to fuck off that often. The best birthday I ever had was when I turned twelve, why? Because I got shoved down the stairs, why would that be a good thing? Well because Howard remembered my birthday for the first time ever and he acknowledged me long enough to shove me. I don’t think I was supposed to take a trip down the stairs but does that really matter? When I got into MIT I was eleven and Howard’s response? ‘What, do you want a gold star or something?’ When I got my first PhD at seventeen he was proud for like four seconds, which is the best four seconds I ever had with him by the way, until he found out it was in engineering. He then proceeded to tell me if I wanted the PhD to count I should have got it in something I wasn’t naturally good at because then it would be an actual accomplishment, not a confirmation of my pre existing knowledge. The best day of my life was the day I found out he was dead because for the first time in my life I didn’t feel like I was failing him because he wasn’t around to fail. How fucking sad is that?” he yells, throwing his hands up.
Grant looks horrified and Howard, for his part, looks pretty disgusted himself. Well it was good to know that Howard 2.0 wasn’t a piece of shit, how fucking comforting for him. Not. Of course Howard would come back as the Perfect Dad when Tony got shit on for seventeen years of his life. He still had a hard time accepting that he was actually successful because there was always something more he could do, something better. That was how Howard looked at him and no matter how often the entire world told him he was enough he still heard Howard in the back of his mind telling him that he wasn’t doing anything he didn’t know he could, that he wasn’t really challenging himself at all. If he wasn’t challenging himself his success didn’t really count after all. It drove Steve nuts and Tony didn’t know how to explain that his friend had been a really shitty dad so he mostly just alluded to it.
“I… I don’t remember any of that…” Howard says, frowning.
Tony snorts, “of course you don’t, Selene said you’d only remember what mattered to you and if I know anything about our relationship it’s that you didn’t give a fuck about me. Now get out,” he growls. This time they listen, mercifully.
*
Bucky looks confused, “I don’t understand, didn’t you way you always wanted your father’s approval? I mean from what I gathered he has some weird obsession with you, does that not count?” he asks, looking at Steve for help. Well, there was that, Bucky seemed to be growing more comfortable with Steve, even if it was only when Tony was around.
Steve shrugs and looks at Tony. He sighs, “I wanted my dad’s approval, not for him to be a groupie,” he says, wrinkling his nose at the thought.
“You have groupies?” Bucky asks, adorably confused by this.
“Yeah, Tony Stark fans call themselves ‘Starklings’, it’s actually kind of cute,” he says, not that he would ever admit that on T.V or anywhere else. He was cool and aloof, like a cat, it was part of his image.
“Do Captain America fans have a name?” Steve asks.
“Yeah, patriots,” he says and Steve wrinkles his nose.
“No, like Captain America fans, not people with a very misplaced sense of pride in a country that isn’t really that great. Denmark is better,” he says, “the people are happier there.”
Tony laughs, “Not, Cap fans seriously call themselves patriots,” he says.
Steve rolls his eyes, “real fucking fucking original,” he mutters.
Bucky looks between them, “do I have fans?” he asks, “I know I was a side kick, but people like those. I think,” he says, looking pinched.
“’Buckybears’,” Tony confirms, “Named after the adorable Bucky bear, I had like ten as a child. I always made them date my Captain America bears and in a somewhat ironic twist of events I actually guessed the true nature of your relationship with my childlike hope and imagination,” he says. Howard had always hated that and insisted that Steve and Bucky weren’t together, Steve was with Peggy. Well it turned out he was wrong and he wished child Tony could tell Howard 1.0 to eat a dick because he was fucking right.
“I knew it!” Bucky says, “I knew we were dating, you told me you loved me to much too only be my friend,” he says, looking triumphant.
Steve looks shocked, “you remember things? About us?” he asks excitedly. Tony pretends he doesn’t feel like he ate a lead ball because he had more important things to worry about, and he’d also be a hypocrite.
“Sort of,” Bucky says, looking confused, “just bits and pieces. HYDRA never did manage to wipe your memory away completely, that’s why I could remember so fast sometimes. Other times it took me awhile because I wouldn’t see anything that reminded me of you, but you were always the reason I remembered,” he says. Wow, that was probably the sweetest fucking thing Tony had ever heard and it wasn’t from him to Steve. There was literally nothing he could do to beat ‘despite being brainwashed and tortured for seventy years or so I never forgot you, at least not for long’. Talk about feeling inadequate. He wanders off to let the two of them bond or whatever and tries not to feel like absolute shit.
*
He doesn’t really mean to end up drunk in a bar but that’s where Pepper finds him, slumped in a corner and pretending he didn’t exist. “What are you doing,” he asks, crossing her arms. So it was Strict Pepper than, he liked Caring Pepper better but apparently she thought he needed an ass kicking instead of a hug. He disagreed.
“Mmm drunk,” he slurs and tried to stand up straighter and nearly falls over because his eyeballs suddenly shift in his skull or the world starts tipping dramatically, one or the other.
“I can see that Tony, why are you drunk?” she snaps, apparently having no patience for him tonight.
“Because I’ma grown man,” he mumbles, “and I can do stuff.”
“Oh for fucks sakes, you’re a goddamn child. Let’s go,” he says and grabs his ear, pulling him by the lobe. He goes with her because he has little choice, she doesn’t even slow down when he stumbles.
Pepper deposits him in the back seat of the town car Happy drove to get collect him, “is he okay?” he hears Happy ask. He had no idea why Happy cared so much, he was never really nice to the guy, he wasn’t mean either, but he made Happy’s job a real pain in the ass.
“No,” Pepper says, “but he isn’t in the talking mood. Maybe Steve can change his mind, he’s good with Tony, I’m sure he’ll be able to help.” Tony snorts and curls up on the seat, not bothering with a seat belt, he probably wouldn’t be able to work one anyways. Pepper gets in not long after and rearranges him, including looping a seat belt around him, and she pets his hair. He smiles and shuffles closer to her for comfort. At least she wasn’t that mad; when she was really mad at him she took a cab home and made Happy drop him off alone.
The ride was relatively quite thankfully and Tony drifts in and out of consciousness, half paying attention to Pepper’s hand through his hair and half trying to ignore everything and sleep. “Why do you always do this to yourself?” Pepper asks quietly, probably to herself.
He was sure she wasn’t expecting an answer but he gives her one anyways, “cuz’it drowns it out. Better feel nothing than everything. Everything’s exhausting, numb is safe,” he mumbles, surprisingly coherent. Sober him was going to be impressed with drunk him in the morning, he could feel it, he managed to not fuck up ‘exhausting’. Pepper sighs and continues to pet his hair and he drifts off to sleep.
When he wakes up again he’s being pulled out of the car by someone who was not Pepper. Pep was strong enough to drag his ass around he was sure, but Happy knew his place. He cracks an eye open and spots Steve frowning at him. He closes his eye again so he can avoid judgement for a little while longer. “Hey Steve,” he says, mostly not slurring Steve’s name.
“I’m not Steve,” someone says and he cracks his eyes open again to find Bucky frowning down at him.
“Thank god,” he says and leans over Bucky’s shoulder, promptly throwing up all down poor Bucky’s back.
“Humans are disgusting,” Bucky mumbles, “I wish I was a cat. Cats are clean. And they don’t throw up on you.” Tony was pretty sure Bucky had never owned a cat because cat litter was gross, and hairballs were worse.