Chapter 3
When Peter described high school as “the worst years of your life”, Tony wasn’t sure what he meant by that. If all the movies he’d watched with Rhodey back in college were indicative of anything, then high school would be perfectly fun as long as you weren’t labeled a loser. Which Tony certainly was not.
Sure, he wasn’t up with some of the trends, but he’d been told by many reliable people that he was charismatic enough to get away with whatever he wanted.
So he didn’t think it’d be an issue.
What he wasn’t expecting was how mind-numbingly painful the boredom would be. It wasn’t like he was expecting MIT level of classes, but it was still clear how different Tony’s private, individualized boarding school was from Midtown Tech. Midtown was the top public high school in the state, but it was still subject to the pitfalls of the public education system.
Some of those being the class restrictions. Since Tony was now physically 17, he was shoved into the Junior class. Looking at the schedule, it was clear Pepper had negotiated some higher classes when she signed Tony up (like his AP Multivariable Calculus class), but then others he was stuck at the Junior level (AP U.S. History and AP English Language & Composition).
When Peter talked him through how the schedule worked (it switched daily; his 1st, 3rd, 5th, and 7th blocks were on one day, and his 2nd, 4th, 6th, and 8th were on the other, but he had the same Homeroom every day), he had explained that STEM classes were a lot more flexible with the grade levels, but Humanities tended to be assigned to each grade level. Peter’s own Humanities classes were aligned with the Sophomore level, but he was ahead in some STEM classes, which Tony was proud to see.
They shared 4 classes, Homeroom with Mr. Harrington (Peter informed him that he was also the Academic Decathlon coach), and Periods 1, 3, and 8 (AP Physics 2, Woodworking, and AP Chemistry respectively). Apparently, Ned and MJ had Homeroom with Mr. Harrington as well, with Ned sharing their Woodworking class and MJ sharing their AP Chemistry class.
Outside of that, Tony was left to fend for himself. He noted that Pepper had got him into an Engineering Design class, which could be fun, and Russian III, which would not be fun. He was already fluent in Spanish, Italian, and Dari, two of which the school offered. Pepper probably signed him up for Russian on purpose, knowing Natasha had already declared his pronunciation “incorrigible”, “distressing” and “atrocious”.
The reminder of his former teammate had stung a little, but the taste of betrayal had lessened in the past months. He’d had other things to focus on since then, things that required him to move past the depressed funk he had been drowning in. Things like Peter.
Tony will admit, he wasn’t as present as he should’ve been those first few months. Scratch that, he wasn’t present at all. He could throw out a million excuses of being busy over the Accords, his declining mental state, or just plain old forgetfulness, but he should’ve at least made the effort to call and check in every so often.
Maybe if he had the whole Vulture incident wouldn’t have ended with Peter looking like he met the wrong end of a meat grinder.
But he couldn’t take back the past, so Tony did what he did best. He fixed things.
Peter got invited over for the occasional lab days, which sometimes devolved into movie nights or training sessions. He made sure to check in weekly with Peter regarding patrols and other stuff, rather than just listening to the voicemails he left Happy. Tony even started working on a new suit for the kid, employing the nanotechnology he had developed for the Mark L Iron Man suit.
Overall, Tony would say things were going well.
That is, of course, when things went to shit.
Pissed-off employee, magic spells, and an overprotective Pepper have landed him in high school. Yay!
As much as Tony lamented about the whole high school part, that wasn’t what got to him. Sure, it was weird. Going to high school for the first time as a 46-year-old, disguised as a 17-year-old, with his 15-year-old mentee was certainly not on his bucket list. But weird he could deal with.
It was the physical stuff that was getting to him.
For one, he’d lost about 30 pounds in muscle, which severely damaged his ability to cart around heavy things, like the Iron Man suit that was currently hidden in the duffle bag in Peter’s room. His limbs felt long and lanky and not quite right. The grace he’d trained himself to carry over the years suddenly felt 10 times harder to summon. Not to mention the beginnings of strange mood swings. Tony wasn’t a morning person, but adult him still would’ve never been as snippy with Peter as he was earlier. All in all, it was stressful and a tad overwhelming.
He would note though, the changes weren’t all bad. Tony suddenly felt a lot more energized, the caffeine having more of an effect than usual. If Peter had pushed adult him out of bed like that, Tony would’ve walked around sore for the rest of the day. Now? It was like it never even happened.
There was his hair too. Tony wasn’t the type to bald early, but his hair was graying (in part because of Peter’s antics). It was a much darker brown now, and longer too. Tony hadn’t had a chance to give himself a haircut before they left for the Parkers’, so his hair was curling at the end. His facial hair though was troubling. It’d been a day and a half since he was turned bite-sized and there wasn’t even a hint of stubble. Which sucked, but whatever.
The best part of all was the lack of an arc reactor. It was one of the first things he noticed when he woke up, suddenly able to breathe a lot easier without the device encroaching upon his lung space. He ordered FRIDAY to scan him, just in case the fragments were still there, slowly making their way into his heart to deliver the slow death Yinsen had warned him of. But they were gone too. The arc, the shrapnel, the scars. It was like his entire history had been wiped clean from his body.
A part of him mourned it. Yes, it represented a miserable time in his life, but it was still a part of him. It was proof that he survived what they did to him and came back stronger. Another part of him felt a weight off his shoulders like he was free of a heavy burden he wasn’t even aware of.
It was confusing, and entirely too much for his mind to handle.
So he didn’t.
Tony focused on the other issues at hand. The sorcerer, his safety, Peter. Clinging to those made it easy to ignore the impending anxiety attack. No matter how many physical ailments this spell had cleared him of, it seemed his mental inflictions were still ever persistent.
However, if his classes continued to be this mind-numbingly boring, Tony might induce the attack himself if it meant injecting a little drama into things.
Today’s classes were the even ones. Periods 2, 4, 6, and 8, otherwise known as AP Language & Composition, Russian III, AP U.S. History, and AP Chemistry. If the Russian III wasn’t enough to remind him of his former teammates, the fact that the AP U.S. History class was just about to start the World War II unit left him on edge. Other than that, there was nothing intellectually stimulating for him to focus on. He didn’t care at all for poems they went over in Lang & Comp, and he certainly didn’t enjoy going over conjugations in Russian III, but he knew that Peter was in his Chemistry class at the end of the day.
If Tony remembered correctly, Peter used to make all his webs in that class before Tony let him use his lab to do so.
Technically, they shared their Homeroom, but Mr. Harrington had spent the whole time fretting over Tony. The teacher was clearly suffering from some sort of anxiety condition. He’d barely known Tony for five minutes and he was already muttering about how he’d catch up on all the missed classwork.
Regardless, Tony had barely had a second to talk to Peter.
The final bell rang just as Tony slid into the classroom. He wasn’t stumped by the map, but he was held back by Mr. Dell last period, the teacher going off on some tangent about werewolves on the western front. Tony was interested to see his take on all the Captain America conspiracies.
Peter was sitting near the mid-back of the room by himself, probably because that Ned kid didn’t have this class.
He was perched up on one of the stools, left foot kicking back and forth as he gazed absentmindedly up at the board. The girl from earlier, Michelle, was sitting at the table in front of him, scribbling furiously in her notebook.
“What’s cooking, kid?” Tony dropped his bag next to Peter, grabbing the chair next to him. Peter’s attention snapped to him, a funny look on his face.
“‘What’s cooking’? It’s a miracle no one has figured out you were born in the 1800s,” Peter scoffed. It was a departure from his usual polite and over-excited manners. Tony’s seen some of the patrol clips, the kid can get a mean attitude on patrol, quipping with the best of them, but he’d never brought it up with the older man.
Tony huffed. “What’s with the attitude? You’re normally like a persistently, annoying ray of sunshine to be around.”
He was joking when he said it, but the tips of Peter’s ears turned pink. The kid rubbed a hand on the back of his neck, clearly embarrassed.
“Right, sorry, Mr. Stark,” he said, quietly so no one heard Peter use that name. The kid’s tone went from teasing to pseudo-professional in a matter of seconds, causing Tony to wince. He should probably say something, but the words that came out of his mouth weren’t the ones he wanted.
“It’s Tony, now.”
The reminder just caused Peter to go even pinker.
It was then that the teacher at the front of the room cleared his throat and started the lesson.
He didn’t take the time to acknowledge Tony like Mr. Harrington and his Russian teacher had (if only to assign him a “Russian name” to be used for the rest of Tony’s sentence here. Though the name she chose, Anton, was a blast from the past and Ivan Vanko’s father). Rather, Mr. Cobbwell started blathering on about Acids and Bases.
The content was child’s play for Tony, and Peter too judging by his far-off stare. If they were in the lab, Tony would’ve snapped his fingers in front of Peter’s face and asked for the kid to return back to Earth.
It looks like they weren’t the only ones not paying attention, the Michelle girl was glaring off to their right. Tony followed her stare to find another boy. This one had a collared shirt and coiffed hair, reminiscent of the boys from Tony’s private school. He was wearing an even dirtier look than Michelle, aiming it right at Peter.
Now, wasn’t this curious?
Tony caught the eye of the other boy, raising an eyebrow in challenge. The boy just sneered at him and returned to his notes.
Nudging Peter, Tony whispered: “Hey, who’s that?” while nodding at the boy. Peter fidgeted in his seat, all the movement returning to his body the second he was pulled out of his trance.
Peter just shrugged.
“You don’t know the name of your classmate who you’ve been around for the past two years in this prison?” He asked incredulously. Peter frowned, fiddling with the edges of his notebook.
“His name is Flash,” he said. Tony noted how Peter started tapping his foot against the rungs of the barstool. A nervous tick Tony recognized from whenever Peter pulled something stupid on patrol and didn’t want him to know about it.
“Who names their child Flash?”
“Technically,” Michelle turned around, clearly having heard their conversation. “His parents named him Eugene. He wants to go by Flash.”
Tony wrinkled his nose, what kind of nickname is that? Sure, Eugene was atrocious, but Flash wasn’t much better in terms of names.
He wasn't much of a fan of 'Anthony' either. Too stiff and formal, but his mother wanted to name him after her father, so he never complained too much. At least he had a tolerable nickname in the form of 'Tony'.
"Huh," Tony said. "I wonder what his problem-"
"Mr. Reilly, since you're new, I'll give you the benefit of the doubt, but Miss Jones-Watson, Mr. Parker, you know better than to talk during my lectures. Do it again and you'll be talking with Principal Morita," Mr. Cobbwell said, looking at them over the rim of his glasses like a bored retiree. Michelle shrugged and went back to her notebook, but Peter uttered a quiet sorry before picking up his pencil again.
The teacher turned back to his lesson, leaving Tony bored once more.
Tony glanced over at Peter, only to find the boy scribbling in his notebook. Leaning forward, he found equations similar to Peter's current web fluid written across the page in messy handwriting. A new variant, perhaps?
The pull of the notebook was enticing, his scientific mind already picking it apart, but so was the mystery of this Flash character. Peter seemed uncomfortable with the idea of the guy, avoiding the question and squirming in his seat. Michelle didn't look particularly happy with him either, based on the dirty looks she was sending him. Tony wondered what Flash had done to earn their ire, and why Peter had never brought the other boy up before.
It wasn't like Peter was particularly shy about his life, quite the opposite in fact. He was a chronic oversharer who talked a million miles an hour just to get all the relevant, and non-relevant, information out. The only times when Peter got tight-lipped is when it came to Spider-Man activities that he knew Tony and/or May would disapprove of. So why the sudden quiet?
The animosity between the boys was clear, but Peter had no issue proclaiming his dislike for other villains or criminals before. The sudden hesitation when it was just another kid was disarming and confusing.
Tony wanted to ask Michelle, hopefully, it would just come across as a curious relative without much otherwise insight into Peter's life, but the girl vanished as soon as the bell rang.
The only thing she left was a caricature of Tony with a perplexed expression.
It felt mocking.
______
Peter was staying behind for Academic Decathlon with Ned and Michelle. The kid had extended an invitation to join them, but Tony already spent 7 hours around a bunch of hormonal teenagers, he didn't need to drag out his torture. Instead, he rode back to Casa De Parker with Happy.
Tony dragged his feet going up the stairs (he made a mental note to get the elevator in the building fixed as soon as he was back to normal), Happy a few steps ahead of him. He was suspicious of the older man's offer to walk Tony up, knowing that Happy would've normally elected to drive straight home, but the sudden spring in his step was more evidence that the boxer had been possessed by some form of alien life.
As they exited the stairwell, Tony made a flippant comment. "What's got you so excited, Eeyore?"
Happy pursed his lips, slowing down his gait just a tad. "Nothing, what makes you ask, boss?"
Happy's fingers tapped an impatient beat on the side of his pant leg.
Tony snorted. "Aw, does Harold have a crush?" He wanted to take it back immediately, the high, pitchy teasing voice that was often associated with real, actual teenagers. He was already starting to act younger than he really was, although Pepper and Rhodey might argue that he was always this childish and immature.
Happy clearly thought the same, shooting Tony a grumpy look despite the hints of blush.
Tony just shrugged, deciding to not press things just yet. Whatever Happy got up to with Peter's Aunt wasn't any of his business until Peter came complaining to him about it.
Speaking of, May opened the door as soon as Happy knocked. Smoke escaped into the hall as she did so, raising both of their alarms.
"Is that-"
"Hmm? Oh, yes. I tried making some gnocchi from scratch, but the stove fritzed out a little."
The smoke was thick and cloying, Tony would argue it was more than a little fritz.
"Do you not have fire alarms?" Happy asked, concern bleeding through his words.
May shrugged. "Our landlord is being difficult. Besides, Peter's sense-thing acts essentially the same as a fire alarm."
Despite her calm exterior, Tony could see the lines of worry on her face. The firm alarm, the stove, the elevators, who knows what kind of state the rest of the apartment was truly in. This, Peter's extracurriculars, the financial troubles Tony knew the Parkers were having, and the recent family tragedy…
May had never been Tony's biggest fan, but he could understand why. She was trying her best to hold her life together, to keep Peter safe, and meanwhile, Tony had lied to her face and dragged her last living family member off to fight superhumans halfway across the globe. He'd be furious if he was in her shoes. So the fact that she'd not only forgiven him but opened her home to him in his time of need, did not go unnoticed.
She was a kinder person than he was.
"Sorry, sorry. Come in, I'll open some windows to clear this out."
She went around the apartment, bustling from window to window as they made their way into the foyer.
"Thank you for dropping him off, Happy," May shouted from somewhere in the laundry room.
Happy shrugged, before realizing she couldn't see that. "Of course. I don't think he would've been able to make it back here if he took the subway."
Indignation flooded Tony's body as he gave Happy a look of utmost betrayal. May's laugh echoed from the other room before she emerged to join them.
"I too would've been fine on the subway. I'm not incompetent," he sneered. Happy just rolled his eyes.
"Whatever you say, boss."
May invited Happy to stay, but he declined the offer, saying he should probably head back to the school and get Peter before his practice ended. May tried to argue that, unlike some others, Peter was capable of taking the subway home, but Happy and Tony insisted.
So with the older man gone, that left May and Tony, alone for the first time since this all started.
She wasn't looking at him expectantly, rather leaving him to his own devices as she moved to start cleaning up the kitchen. Tony had a feeling she wouldn't have protested if he decided to retire to Peter's room, but something sparked him into moving toward the kitchen.
May looked up for a second, elbow-deep in dirty sink water as she washed off a large pot. Her face was not surprised, but approving, when he grabbed a towel and started to work on cleaning up the stove.
She didn't say anything, but May hummed something quietly under her breath. Tony didn't recognize the tune, but it reminded him of summer days at Stark Manor, walking around the gardens with Ana Jarvis as she sang along to whatever tune was stuck in her head and plucked fresh flowers for the tables in the house. It was soothing.
Working on his cars was relaxing, because there wasn't much inventing involved. It was just repetitive motions, tune-ups, repairs, etc. Once he got into the rhythm of inventing, it was like his conscious brain took a step back and let his hands take over. This felt the same, a similar calming haze settling over his body.
He complained a lot about physical labor. One of Steve's biggest points of contention with him as a roommate was that Tony liked to rely on "all his fancy gadgets" to do the dirty work for him. Which wasn't entirely wrong, but that didn’t mean Tony didn't know how to work.
He was almost done scrubbing the grime and ash off the surface when May spoke up.
"Did Peter even tell you how you met?"
The question took a moment to process, his subconscious receding enough for him to consider and respond to the question.
"What?"
Eloquent, Tony.
"Did Peter ever tell you the story of the first time he met you?"
Tony wasn't sure how to answer the question. "He never needed to, I was there as well," He joked. "It's not like I'd ever forget trying your walnut date loaf."
May laughed dryly at that.
"You’re funny," She deadpanned.
"That's what they say."
May put down the dish that was in her hands, letting it drip dry on the towel she'd let out.
She turned around, leaning against the counter. Sensing the shift in the atmosphere, Tony put down his own cleaning supplies, giving May his full attention.
"The Stark Expo, back in 2010, you remember?"
Tony grimaced. How could he forget? The disastrous Hammer drone display that almost resulted in the loss of life of hundreds of civilians. It was hard to forget that ugly stain on his legacy. In an effort of creating a better future, Tony had neglected the ghosts of his and his family's past, which just made it feel like one big joke on him.
Tony settled on a simple nod, prompting May to continue.
"We were there-" and those three words seemed to take the breath right out of his chest. Because 'we' meant Peter, and Tony didn't want to think about Peter in a situation like that, left to the mercy of drones designed to dominate military combat. Even now, when Peter had the ability to catch a bus with his bare hands, it made his heart skip a beat every time he found Peter in a dangerous situation. "It was around the anniversary of Richard and Mary's death, and at that point, the wound was still a few years fresh.
"Ben wanted to do something to cheer Peter up. It'd seemed like the perfect idea at the time, a combination of Peter's love for science and his admiration of superheroes. The tickets were cheap enough that we only had to pick up a few extra shifts at work, and it was all worth it when Peter's face lit up when we told him. For a moment, it was like he was that carefree little boy again, just waiting for his Mom and Dad to come home, rather than the shell he became after we received the news of what had happened."
May's head was hung low, her eyes trained on her fingers. Tony noticed how she twisted her wedding band back and forth, a remnant of Ben Parker that she still wore with her today.
"And the Expo was amazing. Even someone like Ben and I, who never had much of a grasp on all the science stuff Peter loves, were able to enjoy it. Then, Hammer happened. The skies were filled with these terrifying robots, and I couldn't find Peter."
Tony hung with bated breath on every word of her story, watching as decades-old terror reignited in every line on her face.
"One second he was there, and the next he was gone. Ben and I screamed ourselves hoarse trying to find him, but people around us were panicking and running and the drones were descending from the sky like some kind of horrible sci-fi movie. I'd never been so scared.
"We saw you before we saw Peter, flying out of the sky to take down one of the drones. Then I saw Peter, with his little plastic Iron Man helmet and gloves that we'd bought the day earlier. And he was facing off with that drone, arm out like he was the real Iron Man.
"Even back then, he was stupid and reckless, and playing at a hero," she laughed, shaky and unsure. "I don't know why I was ever surprised that he turned out like this."
There was a memory, niggling at the corner of his mind.
"You destroyed the drone, Tony. You saved his life," she looked back up at him, eyes searching for something in him. "You know what you said to him?"
"Good job, kid."
And it was like it had happened yesterday. The memory of the little boy and the drone that had towered over him. Tony would've never known that that was Peter if May hadn't said anything. He could’ve lost Peter before he ever even met him.
She gave him a smile.
"Yeah. Peter wouldn't shut up about it for months on end. That was the scariest moment of Ben and I's life, but it was one of Peter's favorites."
Tony had to imagine what it was like. If he had a kid jump into the line of fire like that, with no way of protecting them. He wondered if it was anything like the way he felt when he found out Spider-Man had gone and taken on a villain far above his pay grade.
Even now, it seems like Peter doesn’t know how much his reckless bravery has an effect on the people around him. Tony wondered if it ever registered to the kid how much he scares them, but then he remembered the whole reason why Peter didn’t want to tell May in the first place. He never wanted to worry her, but he also couldn’t put down the mask.
Tony was intimately familiar with the issue. The worry lines on Pepper’s face, her anxious tone anytime he lets her know he’s off to fight in a battle she couldn’t help him with. He hated how much she worried for him.
He has a feeling May would have liked Pepper much more than she liked him.
“The kid never told me about that,” he said, the only response he could think of. May just shrugged, as if saying ‘Well, what can you do?’
“The only reason why I’m telling you now is that I need you to know something important about Peter,” she said gravely. “Peter’s a very independent person. He’s going to be Spider-Man whether you or I like it, and that’s never going to change. But that doesn’t mean he doesn’t care what we think.
“You were his hero long before the Expo, but that only cemented it. He looks up to you more than you realize.”
Tony knew that Spider-Man was a non-negotiable for Peter. The kid would rather run off in a onesie to fight a high-tech supervillain on the top of an airplane than listen to Tony about giving it up. As much as it pained him to realize, the kid was just like Steve. ‘If I see a situation pointed south, I can’t ignore it.’ Neither of them is capable of putting aside the hero in them, it was just part of their nature.
He also knew that Peter held him in high regard. The kid managed to walk a fine line between hero worship and his own stubborn nature, ping-ponging between acting as if Tony hung the stars in the sky and acting as if following Tony’s directions would literally kill him.
“Why are you telling me this?” He asked.
“Because Peter is opening up a part of his life to you that he hasn’t before. And he won’t stop being friends with the people he likes and doing the things he loves because you say something about it, but he’ll still want your approval. I know you like to put forth this image of distance between you two, but people don’t just give a kid they don’t care about a multi-million dollar suit to keep him safe.
“So, if you care about Peter as much as I think you do, just make an effort. I’m not saying you need to be Peter’s best friend or anything but try and be a little friendlier with him so he doesn’t think you’re looking down on him and his life. He’s already concerned about impressing you, don’t make it worse.”
She was serious about this, and Tony was glad Peter had someone in his corner, fighting for him in the way May was doing now. And he wanted to reassure her that he wasn’t looking down on Peter or anything like that because that argument would be useless. May didn’t care about his opinion, Peter was the one Tony had to convince. The kid had never struck him as insecure, not with how bull-headed and stubborn he was, but Tony had been a (real) teenager once too. He remembers how desperate he was for his parents' and professors’ approval.
No matter how many times he and Howard got into a screaming match over something entirely pointless, deep down he was still the first person Tony had wanted admiration from when he invented something new.
Howard’s message to him during the Vanko fiasco had meant nothing when Tony had years of memories saying otherwise. He didn’t want things to be the same with Peter, a secret affection that Peter would never know until Tony was dead.
He was going to be better with Peter, better than Howard was with Tony, and better than Tony had been in the past. Because Peter deserved it.