Chapter 2
May was sitting in her favorite booth at the local diner, her eyes fixed on the book in front of her.
The diner wasn’t the most glamorous place. It was small, the fluorescent lights never stopped flickering, the tables were all old, and the seats well-used and worn. What few menus that still remained were all faded and barely legible, but it didn’t matter because May only ever ordered one thing. The diner also always smelled faintly of fried bacon, simmering vegetable soup and ketchup and there was the constant hum of sizzling oil in the background.
May absolutely adored the place.
Far as she was concerned, there was no other place that could beat it. It was conveniently located at the midpoint between her house the library, the food was cheap and incredibly tasty, and the owner – a woman named Therese – pretty much loved her. May first found the diner about a year ago and since then, it had become a second home to her.
Now, every day, after her shift at the library, it was something of a ritual for May to stop by the diner, order a cheeseburger with fries and get to work on the day’s studies.
Today, it was mathematics. May hated mathematics, but it was still important if she wanted any chance of getting through this last year of college.
So, with her hands pulling at her hair, she continued her to stare at the problem that had her stumped. Her fries sat half-eaten beside her book and her burger was completely untouched. Staring didn't really help matters, of course, and only made her more frustrated but May was shit with numbers. Her current plan to solve the problem was to force some higher being to have pity on her and send divine intervention.
May untangled one hand from her hair and reached out to pick up a fry. It had grown cold, but she didn’t care. She dipped it in ketchup and was halfway to her mouth when suddenly, the diner’s door crashed open, loudly ringing the tiny bell above it. Startled, May dropped the ketchup-slathered fry right on her open book.
Fuck.
“–one job, Happy. You had one goddamn job.”
“I didn’t know you would jump into a–”
“I didn’t jump into anything. I was jumped on!”
“I’m sorry, Mr–”
“My eye hurts, Happy. And look, it’s on my good side!”
Dabbing at her book with a tissue, May stared daggers at the two newcomers who were making their way to the counter, still arguing. Walking ahead, gesticulating wildly and complaining loudly was a kid. He looked barely out of his teens, but he was clearly in charge. May couldn’t get a good look at his face, what with his frenetic movements, but he was about 5’11” and dressed casually in a black leather jacket and jeans. Trailing behind the kid, apologizing, was a large man in a plain black suit, white shirt, and black tie. He had the hard edges of a fighter– a boxer, perhaps and the way his eyes kept flitting around the room made May think he looked like a bodyguard.
She was proven right a moment later when the kid opened his mouth to complain again. “You’re supposed to be my bodyguard, Happy.”
“I know–”
“Look at me! Look at my face! Does it look guarded?”
“No, but–”
The bodyguard – Happy – didn’t get to present his counter-argument. “No buts,” the kid snapped. What an obnoxious asshole, May thought, discarding the tissue. Her eyes didn’t leave the kid, who was now leaning on the counter and pressing the call bell. A few moments passed before he spoke again, his voice having lowered for the first time since he had entered the diner. “I am craving a cheeseburger,” he stated. “You want a cheesebur–”
It wasn’t until the kid trailed off did May realize she was openly staring at them.
Fuck.
She whipped her head back to her open book and fixed her eyes on the ketchup stain. But she knew it was too late, and her heart started beating faster. She couldn’t see him now, but when the kid spoke again, she could hear the obvious amusement in his smug voice. “Happy?”
“Yeah, Mr–”
“Get me two cheeseburgers, will you? And get yourself… What do you eat anyway? No matter. Get yourself whatever. I’ll be over there.”
May cursed silently. “Fuck no.” Though her head was down, she could see the kid walk towards her. She kept her head down and hoped it would perhaps discourage him, but it didn’t have any effect on him.
The kid slid into the seat in front of her. “Like what you see?”
Fuuuuck.
Eyes still determinedly boring a hole through her book, May considered the options available to her. She wasn’t a fan of talking to strangers, much less strange, overconfident, complaining assholes but her options were limited at the moment. The first option was to get up and run away, of course, but was that really viable? She would have to gather her books, stuff them in her bag– it would take too long. And it would be showing weakness. May didn’t like showing weakness. The second option was to ignore the kid, but what little she knew of him told her that being ignored would do nothing to deter him.
That left her with the third option: face the asshole head-on.
She took a deep breath, snapped her head up and fixed her eyes on the kid, seeing him properly for the first time.
He was beautiful. Aw, fuck. He had a wild mess of dark brown hair and the beginnings of a carefully maintained goatee framed his mouth, which was shaping into a sly grin. The only thing out of place in his soft, smooth face was an ugly bruise over his right eye, but somehow, it only made him more appealing. His deep brown eyes were fixed on hers, and they shone.
May did like what she saw, but she would swim in the sewers before she would tell him that.
Instead, she fixed her best glare on him. "Why are you here?"
He shrugged, smiling. "I'm waiting for my cheeseburger.”
May made a vague gesture around the diner. It was empty. "It's not like you don't have the space to wait literally anywhere else." She pointed at the bodyguard sitting alone on the other side of the room. “Or you could always sit with your babysitter.”
The kid’s smile deepened. "I could, yes. But,” he leaned in close. “Happy is not nearly as pretty as you are."
May ignored a sudden urge to smile and instead, rolled her eyes at him. The kid, obnoxious, pretty asshole that he was, was putting her off balance. But she wouldn’t reveal that to him. She forced her head down and set her eyes back on her book and pretended to be focusing on her work, though all she could do was stare at the ketchup stain and try to tamp down the caterpillars leaving chrysalis in her stomach.
She had about a minute of quiet before the kid piped up again. “Can I have your cheeseburger?”
May looked up again. “What?”
“Your cheeseburger. Can I have it? My order is taking forever and I’m hungry,” the kid said. Then he pointed at his bruised eye and made a poor imitation of a pout. “And I’m hurt.”
“So?”
“So… give me your cheeseburger, and I’ll give you mine once it’s here. A simple transaction.”
May considered his proposal for a moment. “Will you stop bothering me if I say yes?”
The kid fiddled with his left hand for a few seconds. “Sure.”
May could see the benefits of that deal. It was a fair deal, in all aspects. But she wasn’t going to agree to a totally fair deal, either. “Alright,” she said. “But I also want your fries.”
He agreed immediately. “Deal.”
“Deal.” May pushed her cheeseburger towards him. “Have at it.”
The kid picked up the cheeseburger and started eating in a rush, taking large bites, only pausing once every few bites to moan in appreciation. She had peace and relative quiet now, but she could only feign interest in her work. A part of her actually wanted to solve the problem, but she didn’t know how to and the kid was more interesting. So, head lowered, she watched him.
“That was good.” He finished the burger and wiped his face with a tissue. “And I think you lied.”
May looked up again, wary. “What do you mean?”
The kid relaxed and leaned back into the seat, and smiled again. “I think you do like what you see.”
May opened her mouth to say something to deny his totally true accusation. She didn’t exactly how she would have denied it, but she didn’t get a chance to speak.
The kid spoke again, gesturing at her open book. “And I can help you with that, by the way.”
“Help me with what? This?”
“Yeah. It’s a simple problem, really. And you’ve actually got it partially right.”
She raised an eyebrow. “And how do you know that?”
“Because I like calculus. Well, I am really good at it, at any rate.” He reached out for a tissue and wiped his hands before fumbling through his pockets. “Where’s the damn– Ah, here.” He pulled out his wallet, flipped it open and handed her an ID card to her. “I’m not in MIT for no reason.”
May scrutinized the ID card. He lacked his goatee in the picture, but it was definitely him. A fresh-faced, younger version of him with the same insufferable smile. The card identified him as Anthony Edward Stark. The name triggered something in her memory, but she didn’t have the time to figure out where she knew it from.
“So… you want help?”
May looked at the question again and her scrawled attempts at solving it. She was definitely lost and had no idea how to get the answer, so it wasn’t like she didn’t need the help. What was holding her back was accepting help from the kid, knowing it would only make him more insufferable and obnoxious.
Fuck it, she decided. If he was studying at MIT, he couldn’t be in Queens for long. Whatever had brought him two hundred miles away from Boston, he had to leave soon, right?
“Fine.” May shrugged. “Sure, Anthony Edward Stark, impress me.”
“Tony,” he corrected her. “Just call me Tony.” He pulled the book towards himself. “And you are?”
“May. May Reilly.”
“May? May Reilly?”
Tony Stark didn’t know whether he was hallucinating.
It was certainly possible, after all, with how tired and weary he felt. The reality of the current situation had only really settled into him on the plane ride back to the U.S. and like a rabid dog tearing at fresh meat, it was gnawing at his very soul, exhausting him. He just wanted to run away from it all and hide. But Tony Stark didn’t have that luxury. He couldn’t run away. As long as there was something he could do, Tony knew he could never rest.
The only way out was through and so, he had to figure out a way to fix things. Somehow.
He wanted to ensure that Steve wouldn’t get in more trouble than he was already in. He wanted to secure a normal life for Wanda, where she wasn’t feared for her powers but embraced for who she was as a person– Tony didn’t know Wanda very well, except that she was capable of some real mindfucks, but he did know that she deserved better than the hatred aimed at her. He wanted a fair trial for Barnes instead of another manhunt that would inevitably end in him being dragged in forcefully, caged like a wild animal.
Tony wanted to– No. Tony needed to hold the team together.
They were all he had left.
But the universe hardly cared for what Tony wanted or needed. What had started out as a disagreement had somehow fractured the Avengers into two groups. Tony knew they were inevitably heading towards an actual brawl and Tony’s team could do with more support.
That was what had brought him to where he was at the moment: standing in front of May Reilly and wondering whether he was hallucinating. It wasn’t the twenty-year-old he had once known, but it was most certainly May Reilly. Save for a few wrinkles and deeper smile lines, her face was straight out of his memories. Her deep brown eyes hadn’t lost their shine, though the emotions he saw flitting through them wasn’t what he remembered. She was dressed in a plain, loose white t-shirt with seemingly nothing underneath because Tony thought he could see her–
No. Bad Tony.
“I…” he started to speak but realized he didn’t know what to say.
Apparently, neither did May. She opened her mouth and then shut it again. An awkward silence settled in, giving room for Tony’s mind to wander again. Several images flashed in front of his eyes in rapid succession: Their first time in the back of his car, hot, rushed and sweaty. Rolling on the carpeted floor of an expensive hotel suite somewhere. Tackling each other in a pool. May gyrating on top of him, drawing out half-whispered moans from his lips.
“You want to come in?” May’s voice cut through his momentary reverie.
Tony took a moment to clear his breath and control himself before he nodded yes. He still couldn’t find his voice. May turned around and walked inside, and he followed after, trying not to stare at her behind. She walked over to the couch, sat down on the far end and gestured at him to take a seat.
He did.
Neither of them spoke for a minute. Tony pointedly looked everywhere but at May, trying instead to observe his surroundings. The apartment wasn’t anything fancy and it wasn’t lavish, but it looked and felt like a home. He was intently staring at TV stand and trying to figure out May’s current tastes in movies when she spoke again, once again beating him to the punch.
“Why are you here, Tony?” she asked.
“I–”
“How did you find me?”
Tony chuckled. “Trust me, I was not looking to find May Reilly, of all–”
She cut him off. “May Parker. It’s May Parker now.”
May Parker– Peter Parker. Tony made the connection almost immediately and felt his brain short circuit. He cursed at himself for not having learned all the facts about his new recruit, but there wasn’t time to correct that now. There wasn’t much he could do about the surging heartache he felt, either. May had a son and he just had to deal with it.
May spoke again and this time, it was as if a dam had broken. “You don’t get to do what you did and then saunter back into my life like you goddamn own the– Why? Of all the fucking people to–” She stopped. Tony could see the swelling tears in her eyes as she took a deep breath. “I’m sorry. That– I’m sorry.”
Tony wanted to reach out and comfort her, but he didn’t know if it was the right thing to do. “You have no reason to be sorry, really. I’m the one that fucked up. And I swear, I didn’t know you lived here.”
“Then why are you here?”
“I… I’m here for your son. Peter?” Tony couldn’t tell May the real reason he wanted Peter, but he had a lie prepared for this. Lying to May made him feel even worse, but that was the only option. “He applied for the Stark Industries September Foundation grant. I assumed he might have told his mother, but I take it he didn’t?”
“No.” May shook her head. “No. Peter didn’t say anything about a grant.”
“Huh.” Tony feigned thinking, though he couldn’t take his mind off the tears in May’s eyes. The fact that she had just lashed out at him, the fact that they were seemingly ignoring everything they had shared in the past… Tony felt knives twist in his heart. This kind of heartache was not what he needed on top of everything else. But then again, Tony was the master of ignoring his feelings. He soldiered on, casually as he could. “Maybe he didn’t want to rush it? Raise your–”
“And I’m his aunt,” May cut him off again. “Not his mother.” With that, May suddenly stood up. “I gotta– I’ll go get some… Coffee. Yes. You still like coffee, right?” she asked, more to herself than for his benefit and before Tony had a chance to say yes, she walked away.
He watched her walk away until she disappeared behind a doorway and then turned his eyes to the TV stand again. The May he remembered walked differently and he could still see her in his mind’s eye. The spring in her step, the playfulness, the way she sometimes purposefully taunted him with her hips– Now, there was none of that.
Everyone had to grow up, I guess.
But Tony didn’t have a lot of time to ruminate about the past.
Because if things were bad enough when he only had the fate of the Avengers to worry about, they were just downright fucked now. He was sitting in May Reilly’s– No. It’s May Parker now. He was sitting in May Parker’s apartment, which was the last place he had expected to ever be in. Tony considered himself an expert at dodging the curveballs life tended to throw at him, but this… This was the curviest ball of them all. He didn’t have a clue what to do.
May Parker.
May. Fucking. Parker.
The one who got away. Or rather, if Tony was to be more honest with himself, the one he had let get away. There was a time when he had fully expected to have a future with her – commitment had been a foreign concept to eighteen-year-old Tony, but he had wanted to devote his life to May Reilly. Until, of course, everything had become an absolute shitshow.
But the past was the past and he was sitting in May’s apartment now and his mind was working on overdrive. Like a computer running multiple programs, his mind was simultaneously considering everything. A part of him wanted to turn around, walk out the door and forget Peter Parker just so he could keep May away from the continuing cascade of cockups he called his life. Another part of him wanted to seek her out, right now, wipe her tears away and kiss her, taste her lips again. Another part of him hated himself for lying to her about his intentions with Peter and wanted for him to leave.
All he really wanted to do was to hold her tight, just once more, and tell her that he was so, so, sorry.
He looked once again at the direction where May had disappeared. He couldn’t hear much. He didn’t want to face her again and have to lie to her, but he didn’t like sitting alone with his thoughts overwhelming his mind either. But he didn’t have any say in the matter. He turned his eyes to the TV stand once again and fixed his gaze on the stack of movies, trying to ignore the mess in his head.
Gods, I am truly fucked.