It wasn’t until lunch that Peter slammed his hand down on the table just loud enough to grab the attention of his two best friends, Ned and MJ. They both turned their gaze to him, scanning his face for clues and completely ignoring where his hand was still resting on the table, sporting a shiny new ring.
It was a fairly thin band made of 18K white gold with a 1.20 carat diamond in a claw setting. There were five small diamonds embedded in the band on either side of the main one. It was fairly simple, just as Peter had wanted, but he realistically knew that it must have cost an arm and a leg.
“Peter,” Ned began cautiously. “Did we like forget that it’s your birthday or something?”
He looked concerned. Peter just scoffed happily; his smile still hadn’t faded from the night before.
“No, dude,” he replied. He lifted his hand to wave it in Ned’s face. “Look!”
The squeal that the revelation drew out of Ned was not exactly what Peter had expected, nor was it a sound he had ever heard Ned make before, but it sounded excited so he didn’t question it.
“He finally asked? Like, actually?” Ned asked.
“Your boy is getting hitched,” he stated.
Ned pulled Peter into a tight hug expressing his excitement and congratulations over and over.
“So you’re finally going to shove it in Flash’s face that the knowing Tony Stark thing is actually true now that you’re going to marry his son?” MJ questioned, at last inserting herself into the conversation the others were having.
Peter just shrugged, taking a bite of his sandwich.
“He’s gonna tell his dad tonight and we’ve got the trip on Friday, so I don’t know,” peter explained. “Anyway, we might see him when we’re on the tour.”
*
Peter didn’t realise he had forgotten his Stark Industries ID pass until they were getting off the coach outside the building. He patted down his jeans pockets again just to be sure it wasn’t there before scouring his brain to see if he could remember where he had had it last. That would be in his car, he deduced, the very car that Harley had driven to work that morning and so would be parked in Tony’s garage.
“I’ll just be a second, Mr. Harrington,” Peter said as they entered the building before stepping away from his class, ignoring whatever his teacher was saying.
Happy was standing off to the side of the lobby . He smiled as Peter approached.
“How can I help you, Peter?”
“Hi Happy,” Peter mumbled awkwardly. He rubbed at the back of his back, a nervous habit. “I left my pass in the car. Can I borrow your garage key so I can go and get it?”
Happy didn’t even bother verbally responding, he just let out an affectionate tut and removed the garage key from his key chain.
*
The group, led by Mr. Harrington, was still waiting in the lobby when Peter dashed back in, returning the key and re-joining the others. His ID pass was clipped securely to his jeans pocket, clearly visible, just as Happy liked.
“Sorry about that, Sir,” he addressed Mr. Harrington. “There’s a strict one pass per person rule here and I just had to go grab mine from where I left it.”
Flash scoffed; a leering snarky sound that made Peter want to roll his eyes.
Everyone else had already been given their guest passes by the receptionist. She was a smiley blonde girl, incredibly friendly from what Peter could remember of their limited interactions, called Lucy. He didn’t really know any of the staff at Stark Industries, only from polite small talk in corridors when he was visiting with his partner.
“I’m still calling bullshit on you actually knowing Stark,” Flash sneered. “You’re just an attention whore, Parker.”
Both Ned and MJ went to respond in Peter’s defence but they were cut off by their tour guide introducing themselves.
“Hi, I’m Clem,” she said. She nonchalantly snapped her chewing gum from time to time as she spoke. “But most people call me Tango. I’ll be your tour guide for your visit today. Please make sure your pass is clearly visible so building security knows you’re allowed to be here. During the tour, we are going to look at several labs, the testing rooms and the museum.”
Peter had met Tango on a multitude of occasions and he could definitely say he was amused by the blunt, unimpressed attitude she had when it came to – well - pretty much everything.
“Feel free to ask questions at any point in the tour. I was told to say that there’s no such thing as stupid questions, but there is, and I will just ignore you if you ask one. Now scan your badge and go through one of the turnstiles over here so we can get started.”
She pressed her own badge up against the sensor and walked through when the gate doors opened, showing off how simple it was. The class began to flow through, mostly stunned into silence by Tango’s frankness. Flash was still crooning under his breath to anyone close enough for him to force to listen. He was going on and on about how Peter was going to be ‘exposed so good’.
*
The tour was just that, a tour – fairly mundane and with a lot of walking. The class had had their giggles the second, and then third, time Flash asked a question and Tango completely ignored him. He had mostly ceased his insisting that Peter was a liar due to the embarrassment of it.
It was just a normal field trip, that was until the arrival of one particular little girl.
*
They were looking around one of the research and development labs about an hour and a half into the tour. Lunch break was going to start soon and Peter was hovering at the back of the group with MJ. Ned was somewhere near the front, enthralled by the equipment that lined the room.
A small pair of hands tugged on the leg of Peter’s trousers, drawing the last of his focus away from the speech Tango and Dr. Seaver, the head of the lab they were in, were giving the class.
Morgan had always been fond of Peter, and Peter had always been fond of Morgan in return. There was something about his boyfriend, sorry – fiancé’s, little sister that had made Peter want to protect her with his entire being.
“Hey Morgan,” Peter whispered, not wanting to draw the attention of his classmates.
He hauled the little girl up onto his hip.
“How’s the watch holding up?”
It had been her birthday a few weeks prior and he had worked hard to get her the limited-edition Dora the Explorer watch that she really wanted. She pulled her sleeve up in response, showing off where it was securely wrapped around her wrist.
“The numbers glow in the dark,” she replied. Her smile was eager and unfiltered. “It’s sometimes confusing because the numbers get really big but dad helps me, and so does Harley when he’s here.”
Peter let a fond smile fall over his face. He could feel MJ’s eyes on them but he didn’t really care.
“Harley’s a really good big brother, isn’t he?”
Morgan hummed in agreement.
“Did he tell you about the question he asked me?”
Morgan’s eyes lit up even furthur somehow. She squirmed a little in his grip in excitement. The movement rucked up the front of her ladybird jumper a little bit but Peter was quick to fix it with practiced motions.
“Yesterday, when we had spaghetti that Mama made, which I like. Mama’s good at making it, unlike Daddy; he makes it taste nasty and burnt,” she explained. “Harley said that he was going to marry you and Daddy said, ‘tell me something I don’t know’ because Harley has been saying he’s going to marry you for forever.”
Peter flushed pink at her words. He was pretty sure a fair portion of his class were watching them now. She continued on with her ramble, talking so fast that he wasn’t even sure she was actively breathing.
“And then he said ‘no, I asked Peter to marry me and he said yes’. I didn’t really know what he meant until Mama explained it to me. She said he gave you a ring.”
Shifting her weight to rest against one arm, freeing his other hand, Peter asked, “He did, do you want to see it?”
He’d barely managed to get his question out before she had grabbed his fingers and was closely inspecting the ring.
The lab door swung open again to reveal none other than Tony Stark himself. He looked slightly dishevelled, panic in his eyes until his gaze landed on Morgan sitting safely in Peter’s arms.
“Thank god,” he mumbled before straightening himself out.
Peter offered him a shy smile.
“Daddy!” Morgan squealed happily. “Look at Peter’s ring! It’s all shiny!”
She was poking at it happily, twisting it back and forth on Peter’s finger with pure fascination. Tony’s face relaxed into a genuine smile.
“I’m sure it’s beautiful, sweetheart,” Tony replied. “Did you tell Peter congratulations?”
“Maybe.”
She was far too focused on looking at his hand to bother with something as trivial as saying ‘congratulations’.
“It’s fine, Mr. Stark,” Peter said.
“Absolutely not,” Tony stated firmly. “Stop with the Mr. Stark nonsense. You’re marrying my son, that means you call me Dad or T-Dog.”
“Don’t call him T-Dog,” Morgan muttered with a trace of disgust.
Peter was reminded of his classes presence when a voice cut in from behind him.
“Holy shit!”
“Watch your language, Flash,” Peter snapped. “Morgan’s only three.”
“You actually know Iron Man?”
Tony spoke up before Peter had a chance too.
“Peter’s finally going to be my son-in-law,” he mused. “I’ve been waiting for this for the last two years so shut your mouth and let me enjoy this moment.”
“Shut up,” Morgan repeated and Tony didn’t bother to give her a warning for inappropriate language use.