“Explain chemistry to me.”
“You are a Gryffindor,” Harry muttered to himself before raising his hand and knocking on the door in front of him.
Harry hardly had time to question if he’d knocked too aggressively before the door was thrown open and Harry came face to face with a woman.
She had a soft face, pretty brown eyes, and had long dark hair piled on top of her head. She was older, a few streaks of grey in her hair and the wrinkles around her eyes told him that, but she looked kind, like Mrs Weasley, and Harry liked her immediately.
“Oh! You must be Harry!” She smiled and ushered Harry inside the little house and off the porch. Harry looked around the sitting room and felt the similarities to Ron’s family home rise. It was cozy, filled with inviting furniture and a little telly with the news muted on it. It was a little cluttered and felt like how a home should.
“We have heard so much about you, I’m May,” she said, smiling over her shoulder. “Hold on, PETER!” she yelled up a staircase. “YOUR FRIEND IS HERE!”
Harry planned on wandering upstairs to Peter’s room, but Mrs Parker ushered him toward the kitchen in the back of the house and Harry, feeling rather bemused and awkward, just followed her.
“Oh,” Harry stopped in the kitchen doorway when Mrs Parker moved to the stove to turn off what looked like a tea kettle and there was someone else sitting at their table. An older man with a head full of grey hair and a pair of glasses perched on his face. Peter’s uncle, Harry assumed. “Hello, sir,” he said.
The man looked up and offered Harry what seemed to be an utterly genuine smile. “Hello,” he held his hand out, causing Harry to have to step further in the kitchen and shake his hand or risk offending him. “I’m Ben Parker, Peter’s uncle.”
“Harry P- Stark, nice to meet you,” Harry said politely, if not truthfully.
“Why don’t you have a seat?” Mr Parker offered, nodding toward one of the chairs. “Tell us about yourself, Harry.”
“Peter’s so secretive,” Mrs Parker tsk’d. “Tea, Harry?”
“Uh… sure, thank you, Mrs Parker.”
Mrs Parker laughed, a warm and sweet laugh, and shook her head while she grabbed three teacups from the cabinet next to her stove. “Just May, dear,” she told him. “Here you go.”
Harry was rather bemused as ‘May’ slid Harry and Mr Parker each a teacup and filled them, and her own, before sitting down and blowing on her cuppa.
Harry wasn’t an idiot, he knew that some people surely had kind aunts and uncles, it was just… it was rather startling to have that vague idea actually confirmed right in front of him. And here he’d been sweating for days over Peter’s invite to come over and have dinner with his family because he thought he’d be faced with a family like the Dursleys.
Well, part of Harry’s nerves came from the odds of being faced with Dursley-like relatives, the other part came from Peter himself.
“Where is Peter?” Mr Parker asked May after grabbing a bag of sugar and plopping it on the table and scooping some into his glass.
May grinned as she sipped her tea. “Showering.”
“Again?” Mr Parker chuckled and shook his head. “I guess it’s his age.”
A confusing statement, as Harry had showered at every age of his life.
“I think it’s Harry,” May said, she smiled at Harry and Harry was struck by how much he missed Ron’s mum, who had always felt like a pseudo-mum to him. “Peter talks a lot about you, you know.”
Harry bit back his retort that clearly he wasn’t as secretive as she just said then, and instead nodded. “He’s really my only friend here. Well, and Gwen, I suppose.”
“You’ve met Gwen?” Mr Parker asked. “She’s a good girl, smart as a whip too!”
“Ben’s a bit infatuated with her,” May whispered conspiratorially to Harry with a wink. “He thought he’d be getting Gwen as a niece-in-law one day.”
“Oh, bah.” Mr Parker waved his hand, nearly knocking over the bag of sugar. “You drop that nonsense, May, I told you when Peter was seven that he was going to be gay.”
Harry was startled by that easily spoken admission of something that would have had his own uncle screaming about poofs and queers.
“You, er… you’re fine with that, then?” Harry asked hesitantly, ducking his head when both adults turned to him.
“Of course we are,” May said firmly, driving Harry to pick his head back up, though he kept his eye on his teacup as he took a sip. “We’ve loved that boy his whole life—”
“From the instant he was born,” Mr Parker added fondly.
“It makes no difference to us if Peter brings home a sweet girl or a quiet boy,” May said. “He’s ours and we’ll always love him.”
Harry nodded and felt his throat tighten as he was faced with another acknowledgment that he always logically knew, but still left a bad taste in his mouth. Not only were some people’s aunts and uncles perfectly lovely seeming people, but… but they were perfectly lovely people who loved their relatives even if they did get forced to raise them. The Parkers probably spent as much on Peter as the Dursleys did Harry, and yet they said they’d always love him.
It wasn’t a new revelation, but Harry realized that life could truly be unfair sometimes.
Mr Parker cleared his throat and gave Harry a crooked grin. “Did Peter ever tell you what he wanted to be before he decided to become some photographer scientist?”
Harry tilted his head curiously and shook it. “No, sir.”
Peter didn’t even tell Harry he wanted to be a scientist. Harry imagined it was quite a bit like what Bruce and Tony did and wondered if they would mind letting Peter look around their labs? Sure, Harry would probably have to be nice to them for a while beforehand, but they were the best two out of the group anyway, besides Pepper of course.
“You’ll like this then,” Mr Parker chuckled. “Harry, you call me Ben, and May, go fetch those albums, will you? My back isn’t what it used to be,” he added with a cheery wink toward Harry.
“Ben…” May said in a warning tone. “Peter’s going to get on to you if you go showing his friend those photos.”
“Nah,” Ben grinned. “I’m sure Harry’s parents have albums full of embarrassing photos of him they can show Peter, right, son?”
Harry forced a smile on his face and jerked his head in a noncommittal nod.
Another reminder that life was truly unfair.
Harry would have given anything to have his parents, have a family, be able to embarrass him with baby photos. But photos of Harry between one and eleven simply didn’t exist.
Despite Harry’s mixed emotions, when May did bring out the thick photobook they had, and Ben revealed what little five year old Peter with his gapped teeth and bright eyes wanted to be when he grew up, Harry was in stitches as he laughed.
“He makes a pretty damn cute princess, doesn’t he?” Ben laughed with Harry.
“WHAT?!”
Harry looked up and his uncontrollable laughter was made worse as Peter skid in the room, his wet hair dripping on his shoulders, and his eyes horrified as he stopped in the doorway and stared at the book.
Harry quickly looked away, his face suddenly burning as he considered the odd series of texts he had exchanged with Peter that led to him being invited to meet Peter’s family.
Tony had irritated Harry into texting Peter, a simple ‘hey’ that he assumed would go unanswered. Peter responded almost immediately with a ‘hey’ and one thing led to another until Harry confided in him that he was debating on going to Midtown in the fall and that he was worried he’d flunk out immediately. Peter offered to hold a ‘study date’ at his house and let Harry ‘meet his family’.
And study date sounded a hell of a lot like ‘date’ so Harry had stared at his phone hard for a while, debating if he could or should have a date with a bloke…
Then he text back a simple acceptance and surprised himself by actually showing up.
“Uncle Ben, how could you betray me?” Peter groaned as he moved further in the kitchen.
“Betray you? He had to do something to entertain your guest while you took your sweet time in the shower,” May tsk’d at her nephew, sounding fond instead of stern.
“I was in there for five minutes!” Peter cried. “And you break out the baby photos?”
“Baby photos were five minutes ago, we’re onto Halloween photos,” Harry told him with a grin. “Where’d you get the dress?”
“I made it,” May answered for Peter. She smiled up at her nephew and Harry couldn’t doubt the love in her eyes.
“And some neighborhood brat called him a freak and what did our Peter do?” Ben puffed his chest up proudly. “Thumped him just once while wearing his pretty pink dress.”
“And I was grounded for a week,” Peter said, rolling his eyes at Harry and propping himself against the kitchen doorway with a small grin.
Ben winked at Harry before shaking a finger at Peter, “Did I let you finish trick or treating though?”
“You did,” May said with her own small smile. “You spoil that boy, Ben Parker.”
“Well, I think he turned out just fine,” Ben said confidently. He smiled at Peter, who easily returned the smile even if he looked mildly embarrassed, before looking at Harry and raising his grey eyebrows. “Wouldn’t you agree, Harry?”
“Okay then, that is enough,” Peter laughed and ran a hand through his wet hair, pushing his fringe back before it ultimately flopped in his face again. “Harry, you ready to study?”
“Yes,” Harry said, trying to not sound too eager. It was just… it was so bloody unfair. Ben and May seemed lovely, and they obviously loved their nephew, even though Peter wasn’t ‘normal’. And, no, he wasn’t a wizard, but Harry never dressed up like a princess either.
Harry thanked May for the tea and Ben for the photos then followed Peter up the stairs and into…
“Bloody hell,” Harry grinned as Peter shut his bedroom door. “I forgot the paint.”
Peter hadn’t been exaggerating. His walls, what was visible of them beneath a variety of posters for bands and photographs he must have taken himself, were actually pink.
“Oh, it’s fine.” Peter flopped himself on his bed, throwing a dramatic arm over his face. “Since it’s apparently my favorite color.”
Harry laughed and sat in the black chair in front of a desk covered in paper and a computer. “They love you, it’s nice,” he said lightly. He plucked up one of the papers on Peter’s desk, grimacing at the equations and numbers that seemed to blur together in front of his eyes. “Blimey, is this math?”
Peter sat up and gave Harry a curious look before squinting at the paper Harry held. “Chemistry,” he said. He tilted his head at Harry while Harry hastily dropped the paper as if he were burnt. “England not big on chem?”
“Not where I went to school,” Harry snorted. He ran a weary hand over his face, feeling overwhelmed by how much muggle knowledge he didn’t know. “This- this is mad, I can’t go to Midtown.”
It had been a stupid idea. Harry was a wizard, he- he wasn’t made for muggle stuff like high school and chemistry.
He hadn’t done math in over four years.
Hogwarts was barmy, why would they not continue math courses?! It wasn’t as if the students wouldn’t have to one day work their own finances!
“Were you like really bad at school?” Peter asked, he didn’t sound judgmental, just curious.
Harry scowled up at the ceiling of Peter’s room. “I am… better at hands on learning,” he said slowly, choosing his words carefully. “I’m okay at essays and stuff, but I’m terrible at science and math and,” Harry glanced down at the sheet of paper on Peter’s desk and scrunched his nose up, “chemistry.”
“Perfect!” Peter was smiling, god he smiled a lot, it was distracting. “I am terrible at essays, so you can help me in English, I’ll help you with other classes, and we can both fail gym together!”
Harry sent a pointed look up at the framed award on the wall behind Peter’s desk, even he knew what honor roll meant, but he smiled back all the same.
“Alright then,” he said, a challenge in his eyes, “let’s see if you can explain chemistry to me.”
An hour later, Harry and Peter were sitting cross-legged on his bed, an open book and a plate of actual warm homemade chocolate chip cookies from Peter’s aunt, sat between them.
“This is impossible,” Harry scowled, his voice rough as he stared down at the book and blinked his irritation out of his eyes. It didn’t matter how much Peter tried to explain it, Harry didn’t even understand the basics of the damn equations.
“Hey.” Peter slowly reached out and lifted Harry’s chin, his hand warm and soft. He kept his hand there and grinned at Harry, “We’ve got all summer to work on it.”
Harry was once more distracted, Peter’s face was very close to his, and his hand was on Harry’s face, and was he leaning in? and—
Harry leaned forward and hesitated for less than an instant before he kissed Peter.
The fireworks were there again, explosions in his stomach for his daring, fire racing through his chest in time to his loudly beating heart, and a certainty that he had questioned last time, but was confident this time—
I am gay.
Peter’s hand moved from Harry’s chin to his cheek, cupping his jaw, pulling him closer, and eliciting a small gasp that drove Peter to deepen the kiss rather than end it this time. Harry tentatively brought his hand up, tangling his fingers in Peter’s soft hair. Peter actually opened his mouth, a noise that felt like an especially harsh explosion in Harry’s stomach poured from his mouth. Their teeth clicked together when Peter used his free hand to brace himself against the wall behind Harry, his torso pushing against Harry’s and causing Harry to tilt his chin up, not wanting to lose contact with him.
If Harry had ever been so filled with excitement, every nerve standing on edge, he didn’t remember. He didn’t want to fit in a box, not if fitting outside them felt like this. He just—
Knock. Knock.
“Boys? Keep the door open, huh?”
Harry yanked Peter’s hair, pushing him away from him, his face burning at Ben’s voice on the other side of the door.
“Jesus.” Peter gasped then laughed quietly. “Will do!” he called toward the door.
They waited until the footsteps in the hall disappeared and Harry’s heart slowed down to an almost normal rhythm.
Harry wasn’t sure if he was more embarrassed at nearly being caught or his obvious interest in Peter being… well, obvious, or—
“Hey, Harry?”
Harry hummed and looked at Peter’s shoulder instead of his face.
“You’re- you’re gay, right?”
Harry’s eyes flew to Peter’s. Peter was smiling like he’d just won the quidditch World Cup, his eyes filled with amusement, so Harry grabbed the pillow he’d been leaning against and quickly smacked him with it, causing Peter to laugh loudly. Harry rolled his eyes, fighting his own smile, when Peter snatched the pillow from him and tossed it on the floor.
He cleared his throat, tried to look like anything that didn’t resemble a tomato. “I mean, er… bisexual, at a minimum, I guess.”
Peter laughed again then jumped off the bed, dutifully opening the door, and then plopped down in his desk chair, leaving too much space between them.
“If I’m over there we’ll never get anything done,” he explained with a teasing look. “Come on, let’s make a nerd out of you, Bright Eyes.”
Harry groaned- he’d actually rather go back to snogging, but he sat upright and reluctantly nodded. “No more chemistry,” he said. “I can’t handle it.”
“Cool, we can do algebra instead, it’s way easier.”
It was not ‘way easier’.
By the time May called up for them, telling them dinner was done and ending their study session, Harry was certain that going to Illvermony would be his best bet. At least there he’d just go back to being ‘Harry Potter the Boy-Who-Lived’ instead of ‘Harry Stark the Idiot’.
And when dinner was finished, the entire meal being filled with fond teasing, genuine seeming smiles, and just overall leaving an aching sense of jealousy in Harry’s chest, and Harry made it back home, he’d planned on telling Tony he made up his mind.
“Hey, kid.” Tony was spread out on the sofa, some sort of holographic screen lit up above his face that he drew complex designs on with his finger. He glanced over at Harry, then did a double take and quirked a brow at whatever expression Harry was making. “Good study session then?”
Harry took a deep breath, “Midtown,” he blurted. “Er… I’ll probably flunk out in a week, but when school starts, if- if it’s still an option, I want to go to Midtown.”
Tony narrowed his eyes at Harry for a long moment while Harry’s heart raced, afraid that now that he’d admitted what he truly wanted, it would be denied.
“Sounds good,” Tony said, turning back to his screen and flicking his finger across it, changing the design he had been drawing. “Think we can see if your friend Gwen wants to tutor you?”
Harry had barely processed that Tony merely said ‘sounds good’, no… no nothing, just ‘sounds good’, before he frowned at the question.
“Gwen? Why?”
Tony grinned and kept his eyes on the screen he worked on. “How much studying did you and Peter actually get done today?”
Harry’s face was once again bright red as he scowled and tried to maintain his dignity as he made his way to his room to get Joey to take him out.
“Not that it’s your business, but all we did was study,” he lied firmly.
Tony laughed, “Sure, kid. Hey, has your godfather given you the talk? Because someone should. I’m not going to, because I don’t know it, but I can get Pepper on it.”
Since Joey was asleep in Harry’s bed, Harry shot a glare at Tony and curled his lip up in a sneer.
“I do not need ‘the talk’, goodnight.”
Tony was still laughing when Harry closed his door firmly.
Merlin.
Apparently Tony didn’t need baby photos to embarrass Harry, he was doing just fine by simply speaking. In fact, maybe it was a good thing he didn’t have any photos of Harry to show people, he sort of seemed like the kind of person to think they were ‘funny’ while they were actually mortifying, a bit like Peter’s uncle, really.
Harry considered it later, while he laid in bed and stared up at the ceiling, and… and he probably wouldn’t have cared too much if Tony did have awkward photos of Harry as a kid. It would have been nice just to have photos of himself at different ages. Instead, Harry had one photo of himself as a newborn in his mum’s arms, one photo of himself in a high chair with his dad behind him, both of them covered in icing from a cake, and then nothing until Christmas break in his first year, a group photo with the Weasley boys as they all showed off their knitted jumpers.
Ten years of Harry’s life, missing.
Life was incredibly unfair at times.