Chapter 2
Peggy had a theory, one she'd never had cause to doubt. Her theory was that Angie Martinelli could win over anyone with half a brain and half a soul. After setting up the guestroom for Tony, Peggy returned downstairs to find that, again, said theory had proved correct.
Angie had followed through on her promise of food, and Peggy tried not to grimace. All that cheese and marinara wasn't meant to be eaten with one's weaker hand, but the plaster surrounding Tony's right arm took away any choice in the matter. Angie had taken the time to cut the pasta up for him, but he was still making quite the mess. And inhaling his food like a starved refugee. "I take it he approves."
"Oh leave him alone, Peggy," Angie said, settling down with her own plate. "He's never been treated to Ma's recipe before, don't ruin the experience. Anyway, he probably has to do all that prim and proper salad fork on the left, butter knife on the right stuff when he eats at home. Right, Tony?"
Tony nodded vigorously, making an agreeable noise around a mouthful of pasta and garlic bread.
Peggy bit back the urge to ask when the boy last ate. She could play it off as a joke, but knowing how lax Howard could be about basic needs, she was afraid of the answer. "Yes well, we'll forego all the unnecessary cutlery while you're here, darling, but do keep in mind the importance of chewing."
Angie scoffed without trying to hide it. "You're one to talk. Remember, I served you lots of meals at the L&L. You shoulda seen it, Tony. Aunt Peggy here comes in all stiff and British. You live with Jarvis, you know what I mean."
Tony nodded again, small cheeks bulging as he tried to swallow.
"Right, so all elegant and British. So I say hi, get a listen to that accent, and I think, this lady is too classy to be real. Or at least too classy to come into this dump of a diner. And I'm a little intimidated, you know? But then I serve her the pie she wanted, and what happens? She sucks it up like a vacuum cleaner. And I realize hey, this lady's human too. You'd have to be, stuffing your face in public like that."
"I think that equating me to a vacuum cleaner is a bit of an overstatement. Besides, you'd eat quickly too if you never knew when your next meal would be. Or if you'd be able to enjoy it without getting shot at."
"Hey, I ain't saying you don't have good reasons, I'm just saying."
"Brilliant. Thank you for clearing that up."
"Oh stop being all grumpy and English, English. Grab a plate and pull up a chair."
Peggy worked very hard not to smile. "Not terribly hungry, I'm afraid. I did have that bagel this morning."
"Bagel schmagel," was Angie's response as she pointed a sauce-stained fork at Peggy. "Sit down and eat, will you? All this food and you want to let it go to waste?"
Giving up her battle, Peggy did as instructed, smirking as she passed Angie on her way to the table. "By the way, Angie, Sofia called last night. Sorry I forgot to mention."
The remark had the desired effect. Somewhat impressively, Angie managed to choke and glare at the same time while Peggy cut very delicately and very deliberately into her food. She'd never once managed to leave the Martinelli house without eating her weight in pasta first, and the only times Sofia. Martinelli got truly cross with her were when she tried to decline those meals.
Turning into her mother indeed.
Angie played angry with her for approximately ten seconds before turning her attention to Tony, requesting the details of his fall. She displayed genuine interest in the aborted satellite setup, and Peggy savored her unexpected lunch, content to watch the other two. That Angie was good with children didn't surprise her, she'd seen the actress with plenty of nieces and nephews. But Tony wasn't a relative, and he wasn't terribly boisterous like the rest of the Martinelli clan. He required a certain kind of attention, and Angie seemed able to provide that without thought. She was definitely more of a natural than Peggy, who'd initially balked at the idea of being appointed godmother "To keep me from screwing up too much."
Howard's words, spoken from Maria's bedside as he held his son out to Peggy with an impossibly hopeful expression. That statement, only half-joking, seemed tragically prophetic now.
Peggy was drifting to places she'd rather not be when Angie squeezed her knee under the table. The contact was brief, there and gone. So was Angie's gaze as it caught Peggy's. She didn't stop her conversation with Tony, and Peggy didn't need her to. Her free hand grazed Angie's knee in return, in silent thanks.
She tuned in again, properly, blocking Howard from her mind. Then almost wished she hadn't, because Angie's new tactic for keeping Tony in good spirits was to describe in vivid detail her own list of childhood injuries.
"So, every kid in my neighborhood was at that game," Angie said as they were finishing their meal. "And I don't even like baseball that much, but my fathead brother kept runnin his mouth about how girls can't play. So I hit a homerun, just to shut him up, and I'm rounding the bases, ready to rub it in his face, when I feel this pain in my foot. And whatever it is, it hurts like hell—"
Peggy cleared her throat.
"Heck," Angie said, giving Peggy a look without losing the flow of her story. "But I keep movin, 'cause I really wanna get that run and piss Frankie off—"
Peggy cleared her throat again.
"And I slide into home," Angie continued, not acknowledging the interruption this time, "and only after do I find out that this rusty nail went right through my shoe. I take it off and there's blood everywhere, just gushing!"
Angie's usual dramatic recitation made it seem like she'd lost half her life's blood that day, Peggy worried her lower lip, knowing she'd have to reapply her lipstick. She'd heard the story before, and it wasn't among her favorites. Well, except for the bit about Angie fighting through life threatening blood loss to prove a point to her brother. The blood loss itself, the thought of Angie in pain, that was the part Peggy hated.
Tony, totally enthralled, countered with his own tales of injury. The ones about the supercharged tricycle and the prototype robot gone bad, they made a muscle in her jaw twitch, but they weren't news. She didn't get truly uncomfortable until Tony recounted a recent incident with his chemistry set, He wasn't calling it mustard gas, maybe it wasn't exactly mustard gas, but the substance he described was close enough that Peggy welcomed the out when the phone in her study rang.
Only a Stark child could show such enthusiasm for accidental exposure to mustard gas. Peggy hoped that the excitement Angie displayed in return was a typically stellar acting job.
Five minutes into the call, Peggy wished she'd stuck around to hear about her loved ones maiming themselves. She made apologies whenever there was a pause in the ranting, meaning none of them. This wasn't the first time she'd dropped everything to help a Stark, and it wouldn't be the last. But it was for Tony, so she kept on apologizing, feigning regret until the man at the other end was out of breath, making her escape as soon as possible.
When she did manage to get away, Angie had cleared the lunch plates, and moved to the living room. She and Tony were sprawled on the floor, huddled with one of Angie's scripts between them. Peggy took the opportunity to observe, her frustration with the call dissipating rapidly.
"See, you read Torvald's lines, and I read Nora's. Then I can remember them during rehearsal, and hopefully not embarrass myself."
"Rehearsal?"
"Yeah. That's where I read my lines in front of the director, and he tells me all about how I'm doing it wrong."
Tony nodded with an understanding Peggy didn't like. She looked on, silently damning Howard.
"Torvald's a dumb name," Tony declared, like he was stating something irrefutable.
"Yeah, lots of the ones in these old plays are. You wanna hear a really dumb name? Arlene French."
"Who?"
"Arlene. She beat me out for this part a few years back in some off-Broadway joke of a production. All smug about it, too. Well, guess which one of us got the job on Broadway, and which is still doing voiceovers for toothpaste commercials. Off-brand toothpaste too, not even the good stuff. Her teeth are probably falling out of her head by now."
Unable to hold back any longer, Peggy spoke up, alerting the other two to her presence. "Not that Angie isn't a graceful winner, of course."
Angie's supremely adult response was to stick her tongue out at Peggy.
"How do you always talk that fast without breathing in between?" Tony asked, wearing an awed expression as he studied Angie.
Peggy didn't even try to stop the bark of laughter that escaped.
"It's a skill," Angie said, pretending the Englishwoman wasn't snickering at her. "I'll teach you, if you want."
"Yes, please."
Shaking her head, Peggy forced herself to break the moment. She couldn't remember the last time she'd been this entertained. "Later, perhaps. Tony, I'm afraid I have to steal your leading lady for a moment."
"'Kay," Tony said, a hint of disappointment in his tone.
"Won't be a sec," Angie said, ruffling his hair as she stood. "Check out the next act while I'm gone, will you? I'll need help with that one later."
Tony agreed, stupid names aside. Angie followed Peggy back to her study before speaking.
"For the record, I'm your leading lady, not his, so stealing me is never necessary. He is adorable though, Peg, a hell of a lot nicer than my brother's oldest brat."
"You adore Vince's oldest brat. And I wouldn't be so sure about you and Tony. I believe the boy's a little taken with you."
"You always think that everyone is taken with me, English."
"That's because everyone with any taste is."
"You're just worried I'll snatch up your Cool Aunt Peggy title."
"My what?"
"I'm turning into the fun one, and you're feeling threatened. Admit it, Agent Carter."
"Director Carter, darling. Unfortunately, that's the problem just now."
Angie's teasing smile dimmed. "Yeah, I noticed you were in here for a while. Was hoping you were just trying to get out of doing the dishes. So what's up?"
Peggy sighed. "Nothing too dire, I promise. However, I was supposed to have a discussion with the Vice President this morning, and he's rather displeased that I cancelled."
Angie's eyes went wide. "You blew off the Vice President?"
"Not exactly the phrasing I would use."
"That's who you were on the phone with for twenty minutes?"
"Only twenty? It felt quite a bit longer on my end."
"Wait, the Vice President has our home number?"
"The private one in the study, yes."
"Has he called here before?"
"On occasion. Angie—"
"I can't believe this. How long has that guy had our number?"
"Since he was elected, I suppose. Angie, love, I'd prefer if you didn't answer that particular line."
"I know that, English, jeez. Wait, you sayin I couldn't handle talking to him?"
Peggy smiled. "Quite the opposite, darling. I'm not confident our VP could survive a conversation with you."
"Nice save. I wouldn't wanna gab with him anyway. If you're gonna have a conversation, make sure it's with the guy who's really in charge, right?"
"Indeed. The next time the President calls for a chat, I'll send him straight to you. In the meantime though, I'm wanted back at headquarters, and Tony…"
"Don't sweat it, Peggy, I'll take care of him."
"But your rehearsal—"
Angie shrugged off the protest. "I'll take him along. Kid needs some culture anyway. All those robots and chemicals without any theater? It's not good for him."
"And your director won't be upset?"
"Eh, he's always upset about something or other. He'll moan and groan for a minute, then go back to yelling at Sandy about her posture, like usual. It'll be fine."
And, for roughly the millionth time, Peggy Carter fell in love with Angie Martinelli.
"You're not to make a racket," she said a few minutes later adjusting her coat and pushing aside a stray curl. "Do as Angie says and be patient, all right?"
"I'll be good, promise," Tony replied accepting the hug Peggy stooped to give him.
"I know, darling." Punctuating the word with a brief kiss to Tony's cheek, Peggy stood tall again, walking the few steps to the door, and Angie. "I'll meet you afterwards at the theater, barring unexpected catastrophes. Call if there are any problems."
"There won't be problems. He's with Cool Aunt Angie, we'll have a great time."
"I refuse to acknowledge you when you use that title."
"And yet you just acknowledged me."
Angie almost kissed her then. Peggy nearly allowed it, unused to playing platonic within their home. Then she saw Tony from the corner of her eye, quietly watching them. Angie seemed to remember their guest at precisely the same moment, because they both turned their cheeks to the other, and the result was patently awkward.
"Yes well," Peggy stammered as Tony stared at them. "I'll see you both later. Break a leg, Angie."
As she left, Peggy thought she heard her lover whisper more of that cool aunt nonsense, and shook her head.
Thankful for small mercies, Peggy headed into the back entrance of the theater only five minutes later than she'd hoped. Navigating through hallways she wasn't strictly meant to be in, she noted the lack of noise from the main stage. Rehearsal over then, Angie must've been packing up her things.
As she neared the dressing rooms, Peggy heard the unmistakable sounds of many women congregating in one place. Angie's dressing room, as it turned out, was packed to bursting. Peggy was fairly sure the production couldn't possibly have this many female cast members, but she guessed most of them worked behind the scenes. She had to crane her neck to see past the gaggle of women, and then had to smirk in amused exasperation.
Tony occupied the chair by Angie's dressing table. The ladies were fawning and exclaiming over him as if they'd lived their whole lives without seeing a male child until this one glorious night. Pushing her way through the throng, Peggy saw that Tony's cast, a mass of white when she left, was now covered in signatures, tiny drawings and, in several cases, lipstick prints. It took her a moment to find Angie in the crowd, hearing the woman before she saw her.
"Back off, Ellen, my God. He's a kid, not a monkey, quit pettin at him and go have one of your own if you're that desperate."
"But Ang, I can't afford to be out of the game for nine months, then have to lose baby weight too."
"That's not his problem, Elle. Give the kid some room before he suffocates from all that perfume you're doused in!"
Oddly warmed by Angie's protective instinct, Peggy decided it was time to offer backup. Speaking with the voice that once held hundreds of soldiers at bay at Camp Lehigh, she made herself heard over the commotion. "All right ladies, time to disperse! I'm sure you're all exhausted from your service to the arts tonight, and the man of the hour has a bedtime. So please, if you would." Peggy indicated the door.
There was a collective groan. Peggy smiled a bit, remembering the gaggle of women who'd followed Steve around during those ridiculous USO tours. Some of the departing ladies greeted her, and she answered politely. A petite brunette, Laura, Peggy recalled, halted in front of her.
"Hey Peggy, can you believe it? I got Tony Stark's autograph! That kid's on TV all the time, all kinds of magazines. I'll be rich off this one day!"
Laura produced a crumpled bit of paper with a signature that wasn't close to legible. Tony's writing was remarkably good for someone his age, but not when his writing hand was in a cast. "Did you?" Peggy drawled, annoyed that this woman saw her godson as a meal ticket. "Splendid. If you'll excuse me, Lorraine."
"It's Laura," the brunette corrected as Peggy strode in the other direction.
"Is it?" Peggy replied, not waiting for an answer. By then the room was near empty. Peggy was dodging the last few stragglers and returning the smile Angie gave her when a forty pound missile launched itself at her.
"Aunt Peggy!"
She had just enough time to open her arms and brace before Tony was on her, good arm wrapping around her neck. His hair was a mess, doubtless from being ruffled by countless strange women, and Peggy smoothed it down with one hand, letting him burrow into the space between her neck and shoulder. "Missed me, did you?"
"Uh-huh," said Tony, pulling away back enough to look at her. "But Angie was really good. Really, really good."
"She always is," Peggy murmured, taking the last few steps to the woman in question.
"You're biased, English, and he hasn't seen enough theater to know the difference."
"Well, we can be thankful that he's seeing only the best for his first experience then."
"I'm still not giving you the cool aunt title, so you can quit trying to butter me up." The actress's gaze shifted to Tony, who still clung to Peggy. "Sorry about the madhouse there, buddy. Those girls, they see a cute kid and their brains fall out."
Tony shrugged, but his eyes were down, and Peggy instinctively tightened her hold. "Tony, darling. Are you all right?"
He shrugged again, but met her gaze this time. "I wouldn't mind it so much. Dad's always making me talk to strangers, and they always get excited, like they know me. But they don't, and they don't want to. They only care about Dad. Or his work, or his money."
"Tony," Angie murmured, eyes soft, "I'm sure that's not true."
In response, Tony raised his injured arm. Amidst the mess of handwriting, Peggy saw what he wanted her to. A woman named Hope, whom she'd met in passing while waiting for Angie one night, had written her phone number on the cast. Next to it, encased with a heart, was an entreaty for Howard to call her sometime.
And how was she to argue with an extremely perceptive boy who had that scrawled across his arm?
There was a pained silence during which Tony squirmed in her arms and Peggy let him go. Reluctantly. Red nails cut into her palms as she thought about Hope. The woman must have an understudy. Everyone had an understudy in these things, didn't they? Angie's play wouldn't seriously be affected if Hope were to suffer an unfortunate accident. A broken arm, perhaps. Or leg. One of each, to even things up.
"Listen bud," said Angie. "You know how I said some girls lose their minds when they see a cute kid? Well that one never had a mind to begin with. She's dumb as dirt, with just as much acting skill. So don't you think about her, 'cause she ain't worth it."
"If she can't act, then how'd she get in your play?"
Angie opened her mouth and Peggy gave her a look. She'd already heard Angie's complaints about Hope, and just as she didn't want to explain her sexual proclivities to Tony, she also didn't want him hearing about D-grade actresses who slept with producers.
"Dumb people, dumb luck," Angie said, apparently getting the point.
The silence stretched. Lacking a better option, Peggy fell back on that false smile she'd used at Howard's place. "So, Anthony, care to escort us home? I'm sure Angie's got a frightening amount of leftovers stowed away that you didn't get to try this afternoon."
Angie grumbled something about how it wasn't her fault her mother only knew how to cook for an army, and how Peggy should be happy about that, since she used to be in the army, and at least she wasn't living on rations anymore, so show some gratitude. Tony grinned catching Peggy's hand, letting her lead him from the room.
Peggy asked the both of them about their day, and Tony spoke of the costumes and the sets, and how Angie was great, even if the characters in the play had stupid names and talked funny. Angie kept up her end of the conversation, exuding her usual warmth, but Peggy noticed that her lover seemed to fight off a glare every time she caught sight of Hope's signature on Tony's cast.
Much later, Peggy sat on her living room couch with pen and notepad in hand, and Tony leaning in to read with her. After stuffing him full of Italian cuisine, Angie had disappeared to another part of the house. Shortly after that, Peggy was forced to turn a mildly amusing cartoon show up to an extremely high volume to drown out the sound of cursing, both English and Italian. Angie had apparently thought it necessary to call Hope and discuss the evening's incident. Leaving Tony in front of the TV for a few minutes, Peggy got close enough to hear Angie's side of the conversation.
Hope probably would've had an easier time of it if Peggy had handled things herself and broken the girl's arm.
Tony, whose mind worked too quickly to be hypnotized by a television for long, got restless shortly after the cursing stopped. Peggy's solution was to give him a basic tutorial in codebreaking. Creating a simple cipher off the top of her head, Peggy watched his frown of concentration as he puzzled it out, filling in the letters for him as he went.
Angie asked him repeatedly if he actually found this enjoyable. Once satisfied that he did, she'd shaken her head at Peggy and Tony both, referring to them as "crazy braniacs" before leaving the room.
"I'm stuck," Tony announced after nearly fifteen minutes of silence.
Peggy glanced at the clock on the opposite wall. "It's getting late, you're probably tired as well."
When he looked at her, Tony's expression was almost frantic. "I'm not tired, I can get it."
Peggy sighed. "I've no doubt you can, but it's just an exercise, you know, and it will still be here tomorrow."
"I can get it now, though."
Peggy shut her eyes a moment. I can find it, Peg, I can find the plane. We need to find him, you know that. Sometimes it scared her, how much Tony resembled Howard. "Ten more minutes. If it's not finished by then, we'll have something to do in the morning. Understood?"
It was, so she helped him, went back until they'd caught his error. It didn't take long. He was smart, he should've been happy, but he kept frowning at the corrected paper until Peggy, very gently, pressed him about it.
"Dad wouldn't make mistakes. He wouldn't get stuck."
Peggy nearly snapped the pencil she was holding. "Your father makes mistakes, Tony, the same as anyone."
"That's not what everyone else says."
She could only assume that 'everyone else' meant the press, the people at Stark Industries, who made their living by reaffirming Howard's belief in his own brilliance. "They don't know him as well as they'd have you believe."
Tony's look was skeptical. He rarely questioned the truth of anything she told him, though he was apt to question most anything else. Then he was staring at that page again, as if his entire existence hinged on unlocking its secrets. And the pose was so very Howard so focused on all the wrong things, that something in Peggy threatened to break apart.
"Tony." Peggy touched his cast as she spoke. Angie had scratched out Hope's signature along with a few others. In their place, she'd drawn an elaborate comic strip revolving around the adventures of a stray dog she'd known in Queens. Peggy cracked a smile at the simple yet painstaking artwork. Tony glanced at her, glanced at the cast with his own smile, and would've gone back to staring at the page if Peggy hadn't touched his cheek, tilting his face up to look at her. "Those people at the theater today." She paused, because he hadn't mentioned it all night, and he seemed very close to pulling away from her, but didn't. Her gut uncoiled a bit at that, and she held his eyes as she spoke. "There will be a lot of people like that. I wish that weren't true, but it is. But Tony, you're more than Howard's son. You're sweet and kind and so, so brilliant all on your own. Anyone who bothered to look would see that right away. And the people who don't care enough to look, they don't matter. What they think doesn't matter. There are plenty of people who know exactly how special you are. Me, your mother, Jarvis, Angie—"
"Dad doesn't think that."
Damn Howard. Damn him to bloody hell. "He does. He can't always show it, but he does think it."
Tony looked very much like he wanted to argue that point. Instead he breathed out, studied the ceiling for a moment, then let his head fall to Peggy's shoulder, squirming until they were closer together. "I'm not sleeping," he declared, eyes dropping closed. "I'm still going to solve it, I'm just thinking for a minute."
"All right," Peggy murmured, recognizing his roundabout way of telling her to drop it. Wrapping an arm around small shoulders, she set the pencil and pad on the couch next to her. They spent a few minutes like that, Tony using her as an impromptu pillow. She was thinking she'd have to carry him to bed when he spoke up, surprising her.
"Aunt Peggy?"
"Tony."
"Do you not kiss Angie because you're British?"
Peggy nearly jumped out of her skin. Not the best response, since Tony was still using her to stay upright. His eyes were open again, innocent and curious, and she tried not to stare too incredulously at him. "What…what was that, darling?"
"You and Angie. You love her, right? And you were going to kiss her, because you love her, right? Before you left? You could've, I wouldn't have minded."
Peggy opened her mouth several times. "I…I love Angie, do I?"
Tony frowned in that concentrated way of his, like she was asking a trick question and he needed to be careful with his reasoning. "You act like it. She acts like it."
Peggy chuckled, half-hysterically. "Well, yes. But tell me, in your vast experience on the subject, how do people in love act?"
"Like Anna and Jarvis. He loves her a lot, and she's really nice to me, like Angie is. And I figure if he loves her, he must want to kiss her, but he never does, not in front of me, anyway. I asked him why, and he said it was a British thing. So is it a British thing with you and Angie?"
Peggy, uncharacteristically stunned, took longer than she should've to answer. "I…yes. Yes, it's a British thing."
"Oh. Well you guys can kiss when I'm here. It's not gross or anything."
Peggy blinked. Repeatedly. "That's very kind of you, Tony. You don't have any…questions?"
That thinking frown came back a moment, then Tony shook his head. "Will you help me finish?" he asked, gaze on the discarded code page. "I think I'm stuck again."
Peggy nodded, then forced her vocal cords to work. "Of course," she said, taking up the pad and pencil. "Of course, Tony."