Chapter 4
“And that web – he makes it himself, can you believe it? He's fifteen. What?”
Pepper brought her cup of tea down and her shoulders raised in a silent laugh.
They were having lunch. A lunch date. A date. Well, Tony was having lunch, jet lagged as he was; it was more of a late tea time for Pepper. It didn't matter. They were reconnecting, that's what mattered.
She shook her head as she put her cup of tea back on the small coffee table they were sat at, letting her hands rest against it. It was a cold day and her sleeves covered her hands. “Nothing”, she replied, biting her smile. She looked at him straight in the eyes and was it... pride? There definitely wasn't nothing but he let it pass because he liked what he saw in her eyes.
“What did you say his last name was?”, she asked.
“Parker. Peter Parker.”
“Isn't that the son of Richard Parker?”
“Yep.”
“Tony.”
So she had figured.
“Did you keep track of the kid?”
Stark Industries had worked with Richard Parker for a short period of time in the early 2000s. Short because death had hit Richard and his wife too early. Not that Tony really knew the man, but he knew he had a kid, and he knew what it was like to lose his parents. So yes, “I checked on him from time to time. To see if he was doing alright.” He shrugged it off. He just knew the main events. The adoption. Ben Parker's death. And the last time he wanted to check on the kid, Tony found out he played spiders in the streets.
Pepper sighed. “And people say you don't have a heart.”
“But I have brains.”
“Sometimes.”
“Sometimes?”
“I'd say twelve percent of the time?”
Tony chuckled. “I'm gonna pay for that comment all my life, aint I?”
“Yes.” Pepper nodded with a smile.
“I'm selling it, by the way.”
“What?”
“The tower.”
Pepper raised her eyebrows, then lowered them in a frown as her expression darkened. “Does this... what seems to be a very sudden decision have to do with the recent events?”
Tony kept his look focused on his plate. “Maybe. Hey, Guy, could I have dessert please?”
“Sure”, the man replied, picking up Tony's plate.
Happy's cousin looked almost just like him, if only less grumpy. The small and quiet café had been recommended by Happy for their first date and it had quickly become a favorite of theirs.
“Thanks. You know you're my favorite Hogan.”
The man rolled his eyes. “Of course.”
“Don't tell Happy.”
Guy made it to the backroom and Tony couldn't keep his hands and eyes occupied with food anymore. So he had no other choice but to face Pepper's gaze. It felt like looking the truth in the face all over again. Because he couldn't lie with Pepper. She could read his eyes better than anyone. “So what is it, Tony?”, she asked again fondly. “We've been here for an hour and all you talked about is how the kid impressed you, which was nice to hear about, but... What is it you're trying to forget about? What is it exactly that... broke you?”
Look, she knew the Avengers had never really bonded. She knew there had been tensions in the past. From the making of the team to the Ultron catastrophe and even in between – they had tried to connect but there had been more disagreements and arguments than bonding moments. Sadly. Tony had rearranged the tower so it became the Avengers tower and could be shared by all of his teammates so they would feel like a family, even become one, but it never happened. That part was, to quote Pepper's words, “nobody's fault.”
So she knew a few more tensions wasn't what left Tony as damaged as he was – and not physical damages - because tensions were part of the Avengers relationship from the beginning. She knew that meant there had been a breaking point. She guessed.
And Tony... he needed to let it out because it was bubbling inside, but it was just damn painful. He would rather avoid even thinking about it and not deal with all he was feeling than relive the moment.
But look where ignoring had led him until now. Not in a good place. And it didn't just put a strain on his own psychological state but also on Pepper and their relationship. And he'd rather relive the last weekend than the past year.
So he took a deep breath and told her everything. From signing the accords, to trying to convince Steve to sign the accords, to Barnes reappearing, to having to stop them, to realizing it was a set up, to those final events in Siberia. “So… Barnes killed my mom. But in the end it’s not what hurts the most, I guess. Not anymore. It’s the lie. Rogers looked at me straight in the eyes and lied. It feels like -”
“Betrayal?”
“Exactly. After Obi…”
Pepper reached for his hand on the table and squeezed it gently. “I know.”
Pepper felt things, she guessed, she knew, she understood. Tony was plagued by nightmares, ninety-nine percent of the time, whether it was his own demons or the endgame up there that haunted his nights and days, but that woman in front of him was the woman of his dreams. She was the only dream he had.
Tony kept chasing nightmares when he could just live a dream. So he interlocked his fingers with hers. The dream starts here.
He didn't realize it but Pepper could see it: he had the most genuine smile on his face she had seen in a long time.
Tony cleared his throat. He had felt a bit too much lately. It was time to move on to something else. Something else was Pepper. He needed to know about her too because gosh, he had been so worried. It was one thing to be on a break, it was another to not hear from her anymore. “So how was it at, hum...?”
Pepper rolled her eyes amusingly. “Morgan's. It was good. I think he's starting to lose his mind, though.”
“If you want my opinion, he went crazy a long time ago. How's Bernie?”
Pepper raised her hands in the air. “How come you remember Morgan's goat's name but not his own?”
“Some pets make an impression.”
“Yeah, I know, Bernard has been your lock screen picture for a month after our visit.”
Tony tried to supress his smile. “Are you still jealous?”
“Jealous of a dead goat?”
Tony gasped. “No?!”
“She passed last summer.”
Tony gulped.
“I'm sorry, Tony. She had a long life. And she has a son. Lottie.”
“An inspiration.” Tony raised his glass in the air. “To Bernie.”
Pepper chuckled and Tony joined her once his glass finished. Then he tilted his head, resting his cheek on his hand, and stared at her fondly. “You're tanned”, he said. “It looks good on you.” He had forgotten. Not that she was beautiful, but what she looked like when she was tanned. They hadn't taken holidays in such a long time. Suddenly he was craving for some. They were planning to fly to Greece, before Ultron. He had gone to Sokovia instead.
It surprisingly made Pepper blush, and she touched her neck almost shyly. “Yeah, well, I spent a lot of time outside”, she said.
“You look happy too.”
“I'm happy because I'm here.”
It moved him so he found himself lacking for words. Everything he felt within the last two weeks, she felt it too, he realized. She was better at handling the pain but that didn't mean she didn't feel it.
It looked like she tried to work on herself, too. Which was dumb in Tony's opinion because his Pepper was already perfect and there was nothing she needed to work on yet he witnessed some change in the way she acted towards their relationship. Like earlier. Tony had been twenty minute late to their date, which he cursed himself for - how was he fucking up already, just when she was willing to give them – to give him - another chance? - but she didn't seem to be mad.
“That's okay”, she had said, and there was nothing like the old bitter that's okays she used to tell him in the past year, Tony had realized. It wasn't like she just wanted to move on because it didn't deserve a fight. This time she really meant it. “It's only ten in the west coast, after all”, she had pointed out with a smile.
It had made Tony chuckle. “So I'm early?”
“Or I am.”
“Which side are you on?”
“Ours.”
It echoed in his head. Ours.
He had spent days fighting his own team, siding against his own friends, trying to rally people on his side but the real team he belonged in was...
The Starks. And that isn't a team, that is a family. The family he had always been trying to build, and she was the one laying the first stone.
“I'm happy too”, he said sincerely. “You know where I'd be even happier with you?”
Pepper nodded. She could always finish his sentences. “Home.”
"Please come back home", he whispered.
She pressed her lips together, as if she was trying to hold back a sob from coming out of her mouth, and she nodded again.
So they made it home. Together.