“Dad, I’m fine.”
February 9
Harry’s knee was jiggling repeatedly like it used to before he started his medicine. Instead of it being because of some extra energy Harry had though, it was pure nerves.
When Harry agreed to meet with Bucky, he didn’t know that he’d feel so anxious and ill over it. It was nice that Harry didn’t have to go to the prison that Bucky was sentenced to for the visit, but he wasn’t exactly comfortable in the office in MACUSA either.
Tony had wanted to join Harry, but Harry knew that he wouldn’t be able to say the things he planned if he had to say it in front of his dad. Pepper had stayed up late with Harry the night before… trying to help him put it all in words like Michael suggested Harry did.
It sounded so stupid to Harry, he regret even agreeing to it then. Harry knew all he had to do was tap the table with his wand and he could leave. It would be easy, Harry would be able to join Tony just outside the office he sat in and go home.
Peter would be there. Sirius would be there. Pepper would be there. Joey, Hedwig, and Tri-Paw’d would be there.
Harry stayed in his chair, jiggling his leg, until the door he watched opened with a click.
An auror in a professional black suit and dark sunglasses entered the room first. Harry watched as he waved his wand and then stepped to the side. Behind him came Bucky, dressed down in the navy jumpsuit Harry assumed prisoners wore and shimmering metallic handcuffs on his wrists.
Another auror followed behind Bucky and blocked the door they entered, but Harry only had eyes for Bucky. Bucky looked… not so crazy. There was a depth of emotion in his blue eyes that were locked on Harry’s, but whatever it was he felt it wasn’t madness.
Bucky sat across from Harry at the small table and they only looked at each other while Harry’s heart hammered and his leg bounced erratically.
The note in Harry’s pocket felt so ridiculous. There was nothing in those scribbled lines to describe what Harry felt.
Regret, that Bucky would be going to prison for something that Harry felt he had a large part in.
Relief, that someone had decided that Harry was a person worth receiving justice for.
Just those two contrasting emotions were causing a lot of sleepless nights for Harry since before the trial. It didn’t even count for the anger, hurt, disappointment, and fear that Harry could privately admit to having.
Bucky opened his mouth and Harry’s leg that no longer existed suddenly shocked his body with an electric bolt of pain and Harry twitched in his seat.
“I’m sorry,” Bucky said lowly, his eyes shimmering when Harry looked up at them again. “It don’t fix it, but I wanted you to know. That’s it, I just… I’m so damned sorry.”
Bucky started to stand up and Harry spoke up before he lost his nerve.
“You seem better,” Harry said in a rush. Bucky blinked and slowly sank back down in his seat. “I mean… you know who I am.”
“I don’t think I’ll ever forget ya,” Bucky said tonelessly. “Be hard to forget the kid whose life i ruined.”
Pepper told Harry not to ease any of Bucky’s guilt, but that wasn’t why Harry corrected him. Harry had to correct him or what would stop Harry from one day being Anderson and thinking his life ended when he lost a limb?
“You didn’t ruin my life,” Harry said. “You changed it, but it’s not ruined.”
Harry could fly, he could walk, if he was ever really drunk maybe he could dance again… probably badly. Harry didn’t lose his family or his friends, he lost a leg.
It sucked, but Harry had lost worse things before.
Harry coughed quietly and his eyes flicked up to the aurors that seemed uninterested before he pulled the things he wrote from his jacket pocket.
“I think that you only wanted to talk to me because of my leg,” Harry read, looking up occasionally at Bucky.
Harry saw how miserable Bucky had been in the courtroom and it hurt Harry to testify against him because Harry didn’t know that Bucky deserved to stay in prison for making bad decisions while his head was so messed up. Harry had made bad decisions before when he’d been the one with the depression that crushed his mind and wrecked havoc on his thoughts. Nobody had beaten Harry in the ground for it though.
Harry said as much the night before to Pepper. They were in the quidditch field together, enjoying the magical warmth and eternal sunshine the room provided. Harry’s pets ran wild while Harry struggled through penning down his thoughts.
Pepper painted her nails, doing a good job at pretending she wasn’t there to help Harry, and he finally caved and said that he’d been thinking.
“I jumped off a roof once,” Harry blurted out. “Everything was messed up in my head and I just jumped.”
“I remember,” Pepper said, not looking up from her sparkling blue toes.
“Right…” Harry struggled to word what he was thinking and he was grateful that Pepper, like Tony, always seemed endlessly patient when Harry needed time to form his thoughts.
“Nobody was mad at me,” Harry finally said. “I was sick—” that was what Michael said anyway “—and I did something stupid. Nobody was mad then.”
“As compared to now when people are angry with Barnes?” Pepper asked, accurately guessing why Harry brought that up.
“Exactly.”
Pepper hummed and Harry repaid her patience with his own while she finished her little toe. Pepper put the brush in the bottle and then stretched her legs out in the grass and tilted her face up to the sun.
“You only hurt yourself when you did that,” Pepper said. “You terrified me and your dad, but physically? You only hurt yourself.”
Harry’s thoughts on Bucky slowed and he blinked at Pepper.
“You and Dad weren’t together then,” Harry reminded Pepper, feeling suddenly bashful.
Pepper grinned over at Harry. “Do you think I didn’t start caring about you until your dad and I got together?”
Harry didn’t answer, he only shrugged shyly.
It was easy to accept Tony in Harry’s life, sort of. It actually hadn’t been easy really at all, but Tony was firmly there.
Tony was Harry’s biological father and he was his dad. James had been just as much Harry’s dad and Harry liked to think that maybe he’d be happy that the bloke he once… did what he did with… was there for Harry in a way James couldn’t be.
Pepper was… something. Pepper was family, but there were times - like then - that the line between family and Pepper’s role in it blurred.
Harry knew he was hurting himself with his fears, but there was nobody he knew that was close enough to his mum to know how she would feel about Harry’s thoughts when that line blurred in his mind.
They focused on Harry’s meeting with Bucky after that, but Harry scooted a little closer to Pepper and was grateful that Tony had good taste in partners.
The awkward semi-relationship he once had with Sirius notwithstanding.
Bucky didn’t interrupt Harry and so he continued reading the disjointed thoughts he prepared.
“I know you were sick but- but I know there were times where you knew what you were doing too,” Harry read with his muscles tensed and his eyes on the paper. “You knew I was Harry sometimes and you kept apologizing.”
“I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”
“I think if my leg wasn’t amputated because of decisions we both made—” Harry glanced up then, checking to see that Bucky knew Harry didn’t solely blame him for his leg. Bucky’s eyes were clear of the madness he once had but they were filled with tears that made Harry uncomfortable. “—that maybe you wouldn’t actually regret what happened.
“I’m grateful you killed Voldemort and I’m relieved you took a plea so you won’t be in prison so long, but I wish we’d never met.”
It was probably the hardest thing Harry had ever done- not forgiving someone and trying to move past a bad history. It wasn’t that a large part of Harry didn’t think that Bucky had needed help more than he did punishment, it was just that Bucky’s illness shouldn’t have broken Harry’s bones and left him unable to sleep some nights.
Harry was actually attacked by his dad the second he left MACUSA’s office. By the way Tony’s hair was standing up all crooked, Harry would guess that he had been pulling on it the entire time Harry was out of his sight.
“You have problems,” Harry said with a roll of his eyes as Tony attached himself to Harry’s side.
Tony had his arm around Harry’s shoulders in a way that looked casual as they strolled out of the building. It didn’t feel casual, it felt like Tony had been as anxious and ill during Harry’s meeting as Harry was.
“What’s the move, kid?” Tony asked cheerfully when they were outside. “Therapy? Paintball? Go get in the builders way at the new house?”
“Uh…” Harry felt a rush of guilt suddenly. Ever since the first time Loki showed up at their place, Tony had been kind of clingy. And it wasn’t that Harry minded, a part of Harry actually liked that his dad wanted to be around Harry so much, but… but Harry and Peter had plans.
Plans that very much did not include Harry’s father.
Tony looked at Harry with his kind brown eyes and it made it a hundred times worse to tell him about those plans.
“Peter and I are going on a double date with Gwen and her girlfriend,” Harry explained guiltily. “I asked Pepper if it was okay…”
Technically, Harry asked Pepper if she could do something with Tony so that Harry didn’t feel so terrible for abandoning him. Harry really, really, wanted to go out with his friends but he didn’t want his dad to be upset either.
“Oh.” Tony didn’t look disappointed, maybe just a little surprised. “Cool, no worries. Am I dropping you off at Petey’s?”
Harry let out a quiet sigh of relief and shook his head.
“He’s picking me up,” Harry explained. Gwen had offered to just drive Harry with her after she finished work, but Harry still had ‘a thing’ about cars.
Peter never seemed to mind if Harry abruptly decided they had to find alternative methods of transportation when they made plans. It was embarrassing and Harry would rather not have anyone else see him panic over a vehicle.
Harry never struggled when he drove though, which Tony let him do when they left MACUSA. It was awkward to position his left leg in the car, but Pepper said that when Harry had a car of his own that adjustments could be made.
“What’s on the agenda for the LGBTQ date night?” Tony asked cheerfully when Harry pulled off the curb they were parked on.
“A comedy club,” Harry said with a crooked grin. Harry had no idea what that was, but Gwen bought tickets for them and Harry was excited to find out. “After that we’re going to dinner at some posh place Gwen’s trying to impress Brittany with.”
“That sounds fun,” Tony said. “Oh, by the way, what did you and Barnes talk about?”
Harry had been waiting for that. Tony was a lot of things, happy to be left out of conversations was not one of them. While Harry didn’t want Tony present while he talked, he didn’t mind giving him a repeat of the conversation.
“He said he was sorry—” Tony snorted and Harry ignored it “—I told him… I told him that I’m glad he’s better and I wish we never met.”
Harry clenched his jaw to the side when tears prickled at his eyes. It had been a cruel thing to say, but it was still true. Harry knew his life wasn’t ruined anymore than the lives of his mates at the VA were ruined, but Bucky had still somehow managed to up the graveyard in ‘experiences that caused nightmares and anxiety’.
“I knew I should have said no!” Tony threw his hands up and Harry glanced at him curiously before looking back at the highway they were on.
“I was going to say no but then I thought about how much you’ve matured and I thought maybe you knew what was best for you. And now you’re upset and I’m honestly never going to tell you ‘yes’ about anything ever again. Damn your mom’s puppy eyes- no, wait, I didn’t mean that.”
Harry let out a startled and genuine laugh at Tony’s heated rant.
“Dad, I’m fine,” he assured him. He was a little upset over his mixed feelings, but Harry was glad he had the chance to see that Bucky was healed and Harry got to say his piece.
“And… thanks,” Harry added, carefully accelerating past a yellow light. “I didn’t know you didn’t want me to do it, so… so I appreciate it.
“But also you already said yes to me leaving tonight so no taking it back now.”
Tony didn’t take it back and so Harry took a thorough shower when they made it back home. They would only be in the tower for another month, their house was supposed to be finished by Spring Break and Harry honestly couldn’t wait.
Harry had been hesitant at first about moving, until Tony and Sirius showed him all the ‘tweaks’ they made to the standard looking house. Harry liked that the entire underground floor of the house (he refused to call it a basement because it made him think of cupboards too much) was set up like an apartment just for Harry. There would be a little kitchenette setup, a living room with a sofa and telly, and an area that Pepper insisted Harry have with a washing machine and dryer.
The underground floor also had three rooms and a ‘Harry-capable’ bathroom. Harry’s bedroom was the largest room, then a guest bedroom for if Harry had any friends stay over (Harry wasn’t sure how he’d fit all the Weasley’s and Hermione in one room that summer, but he’d figure it out). The best room was the quidditch field room that Sirius would recreate for Harry and his pets. It would give Joey and Tri-Paw’d a place to run and Hedwig a place to fly even when it was cold out. There was an elevator that went from Harry’s floor to the other two floors, but they didn’t bother Harry much since the only people inside the house would be his family.
It was almost set up as if Tony thought Harry would never move out… which Harry probably wouldn’t.
Especially since Harry had high hopes for siblings to fill the three extra bedrooms on the second floor of the house. He thought Sirius would take a room at first until he saw that Sirius was getting his own house on the large property.
Harry had a lot of good memories within the tower, but he sort of thought that the house they were moving to would be something magical for all of them.
When Peter arrived, Harry was ready to go on their double date. Pepper and Tony were curled up sweetly on the sofa - it actually wasn’t that sweet because they were smacking the hell out of each other as they fought over the remote.
“Er… bye then,” Harry said, pausing for a moment to watch them wrestle like children.
Pepper had one of her hands over Tony’s face while her other hand held the remote up in the air, out of his reach, and she turned to grin at Harry.
“Have fun,” she said. “We’ll be here watching Christian Grey get his Anna.”
“No we aren’t!” Tony lunged and knocked the remote from Pepper’s hand, knocking it to the floor. “That’s some chick flick.” He winked at Harry before he began smacking at Peppers legs to get the remote first. “Have fun, we’ll be here watching Little Nicky.”
Harry hummed and then shook his head at their play fight as he made his way to the lift. When Harry stepped on it, he heard Pepper sighed.
“Tony, you have no idea what Fifty Shades of Grey is, do you?”
“I know it sounds like some French producer who thinks he’s the edgiest bastard to ever live.”
Huh.
For the first time ever, Harry knew something that Tony didn’t.
Harry also knew that he’d probably ask to stay with Peter and his aunt that night since Pepper would likely win the war over the remote and Harry very much didn’t want to return home on a night when he just knew that his parents would be having sex.
Peter was in a good mood when he picked Harry up. He had the radio in his car playing at full blast with the playlist they shared that had all their favorite songs. Harry had forced himself in the car and felt clammy at first, but it eased when Peter started signing.
“Hey.” Harry blinked at his boyfriend and maybe it was just rehashing last winter because of Bucky’s trial or maybe it was the way that Peter always looked ridiculous when he sang with his entire chest, but…
“I love you,” Harry told him after Peter turned down the radio for a moment to hear what Harry had to say. Harry shrugged and turned it right back up to full blast.
He just thought Peter should know that.
“Hey, Bright Eyes.” Peter beat Harry out of the car as usual - it was unfair that Peter had super spider powers. Harry met a clan of acromantula before and all he got were nervous ticks when he saw spiders.
Peter was a sap though, he liked knowing he could beat Harry out of the car and open the door for him. Peter offered Harry his hand with a grin.
“I love you,” Peter said as Harry stood up. He moved his arm around Harry’s shoulders and led him toward where Gwen and Brittany waited. “I just thought you should know.”
Harry rolled his eyes, but he grinned too.
It was strangely fun having a double date with Gwen and Brittany. Brittany’s cousin’s fiancé opened the club they went to and so they got a table just beside the stage where the comedian went on at.
Harry found a new career goal when he realized that a muggle comedian wasn’t a magician, as he’d been thinking it was. It was just some bloke who told stories and made fun of members in the crowd. They weren’t knock-knock jokes or anything daft, just… a lot of sarcasm that was twisted in a way to make everyone laugh.
Harry could do that.
Harry changed his mind when the comic made a joke about the Avengers adding a wizard to their team (“I’ve personally always found Hawk-Eyes ass to be a thing of magic”) and Harry’s friends’ looks and laughter brought him to attention. Then there were a lot of jokes about Tony Stark and Harry ‘hopping along in his footsteps with his two girlfriends’.
“Humiliating,” Harry laughed when the show ended. “If I heard one more joke about my dad’s sex life I was going to be sick.”
“I thought his comment about the Avenger Orgies was both pithy and politically charged.”
The four teens were walking to their two cars together and they all stopped to look at Brittany. Brittany curled her dark-purple painted lips to the side in a smirk and rolled her eyes.
“Kidding,” she drawled.
Harry laughed and nodded at her. “See? That was funny.”
They stood around in the parking lot and talked for a bit, nothing of consequence. Brittany talked about a new art exhibit she wanted to see they opened on Valentine’s Day and Gwen was quick to say they would go.
Harry was just as quick to say that he and Peter already had plans when the girls looked at them. They didn’t, but if they did it wouldn’t include a ‘modernist view of ancient wars’.
Whatever the hell that meant.
“What’s our super secret and incredibly romantic Valentine’s Day plans, Bright Eyes?” Peter asked when they left to head toward his house.
Neither his aunt or Harry’s dad cared if Harry stayed over. Tony told Harry to wear a condom so he didn’t have spider-babies and Peter’s aunt said they couldn’t sleep in the same bed.
Since neither Harry or Peter had pushed to do much more than some heavy snogging and light touching (Harry wasn’t sure how he felt about being undressed in front of Peter with his stump exposed), they planned to ignore both bits of instruction.
“Oh. Er…” Harry tried to think of something that they could do next weekend for the ridiculous holiday and came up blank. “It’s a surprise,” Harry said finally. “Oi, I love this song.”
Peter grinned and obligingly turned the radio up and Harry spent the rest of the night trying to think of what they could do for Valentine’s Day.
‘Tell Professor Dumbledore that it’s your fault Professor Snape is missing’ was Hermione’s reply to Harry’s frantic text.
Do something special was Ginny’s rubbish advice.
Have sex was Ron’s equally rubbish advice.
The twins sent Harry websites for… horribly embarrassing porn websites after Ron apparently told his brothers about Harry’s dilemma. As payback for the horrifying images they exposed Harry to, he sent the video of them fainting to Pietro, who talked a lot about Fred when Harry was around him.
After that, Fred sent Harry a real suggestion that he take Peter to dinner and ‘somewhere bloody romantic’ but that was daft.
Luna suggested Harry take Peter for a romantic lakeside picnic, which Harry forwarded to Ginny.
Greene, who was dating a pretty nurse, told Harry to think about what brought Harry and Peter together and incorporate that in their plans…
Harry wasn’t sure that alcohol, skateboarding, and a prosthetic leg would make for a very good date. It would certainly be unforgettable, but Harry wasn’t keen on breaking his good leg.
When Harry finally broke down and asked his parents what he should do, the night before Valentine’s Day, Tony looked startled.
“That’s like weeks away, kid,” he said with a wave of his fork. “You’ve got plenty of time to think of something perfectly adorkable for your geek.”
“Tony.” Pepper stared deadpan at Tony and lifted a strawberry-blonde brow at him. “It’s tomorrow.”
“No it’s…” Tony scratched his chin and looked momentarily horrified. “Shit.”
“I was stuck with him,” Harry said drily when he and Pepper watched Tony actually run from the dining table to get to the staircase. “You chose him.”
“I waited a long time for him to grow up,” Pepper said fondly. “He’s bad with dates, but I think that’s a side effect of being irritatingly brilliant.”
“If you saaaay so.”
Harry just hoped that Tony would do something special for Pepper. Sirius and Strange had plans, Harry and Peter would have plans if Harry could come up with something. He’d hate for the upcoming wedding to be ruined because Tony was too busy thinking of a million other things to remember Pepper.
“I do,” Pepper said bossily. She pulled her phone from her blazer pocket and began tapping away at the screen. “What’s Peter’s favorite band?” she asked.
That was easy, it was the same as Harry’s.
“Papa Roach,” Harry said.
Pepper hummed and continued tapping away at her phone while Harry ate his chicken and waited for her to save his arse.
If Harry had fessed up at the start that he only said they had plans because he didn’t want to go to an art show then Peter might have laughed. Instead, Harry carried the lie all week and internally groaned when Peter loudly told Flash that Harry couldn’t meet up with him to work out on the fourteenth because they had plans.
Harry hated Valentine’s Day.
“Done!” Pepper put her phone away just as Harry’s chirped in his pocket. Harry pulled it out and tried to interpret the information Pepper sent.
“‘The Wilma presents Papa Roach’?” Harry read aloud, squinting at his phone screen. “What?”
“You and Peter can take your dad’s jet, go to Montana in the morning, check out the sights and then go see Papa Roach tomorrow night,” Pepper said casually. “I heard they’re playing for an excellent cause.”
Harry’s jaw dropped both at the absolutely perfect plans and the speed of which Pepper just made it all happen.
“Dad won’t want me to be gone overnight,” Harry hedged. Staying with Peter was one thing, staying in a different state was another.
Tony was clingy.
Pepper smiled at Harry and it was a smile like Mrs. Weasley used to give him when he’d stay at her house. It was the kind of smile that made Harry feel wistful and bashful all at once.
“He will be worried and he will be fine when he sees that you’re not going to get hurt every time you walk out of his sight,” Pepper said. Harry liked that she didn’t belittle Tony’s anxieties, it was just further proof that they were sort of perfect for each other.
“You’re the best,” Harry decided. He got up and quickly moved his dishes to the sink before giving Pepper an awkward one-armed hug. Harry needed to call Peter, pack clothes, get his medicine if he was going to be gone the next night. He’d need to make sure all three animals had plenty of food and water, everyone else always forgot that Hedwig liked the bacon flavored dog treats.
“Thanks, Mum, love you,” Harry called absently as he left the room almost as quickly as Tony did to go get ready for the impromptu getaway.
As soon as Harry was in his room, Pepper glanced upward to spot one of Tony’s many hidden security cameras.
“Jarvis, be sure to send the last sixty seconds of footage to my email,” she said.
“Yes, ma’am.”
In the end, Harry and Peter had to take Happy with them. It was reasonable enough, Tony said that he was too well-known of a person to not give Harry protection when he was alone.
Harry didn’t know why Tony was worried, he had taser-toes and portals, what else did he need?