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Being a Stark [Superfamily]

Chapter 4

Tony left the compound about an hour ago after Cap practically threw him out. He can understand that, though, since he’s been there all week except for when he’s needed for important meetings. Somehow, his new assistant has found a loophole through Steve to actually make him show up. Maybe Tony should just look for a new assistant, right? Would that make him an asshole?

He’s felt close to cancel all meetings so far, but he would feel like that would be unfair to the students; there are about three of them that come for an internship at the logistics division, two for the engineering program, and then there’s one more interview for the scholarship itself, which is actually the second one that comes to ask for it one year in advance.

Of course, there’s always a thorough background check for every kid that has come in there so far, and of all the twenty that have asked for a scholarship, he’s only had to refuse three of them who quite obviously came from wealthy enough descend to pay for the education themselves. Tony’s not an idiot, and he’s aware that most parents just tell their kids to try it, but there are certain rules to it that even he has to follow, no matter how much he might like said kid’s attitude.

His last appointment is around five, which means that he can return home after that one; which actually means he’ll go back to the compound instead, having avoided his penthouse up until then. He’d rather waste his time with Sam Wilson’s dumb jokes than having to spend another lonely night up there.

“Mr. Stark, I’ve brought you a coffee,” his assistant suddenly says. Stark turns around in surprise, and sees that the woman indeed is holding a cup for him. Still, though, her charming smile and glowing golden hair doesn’t compare to the beauty of Pepper, and for a moment, Tony just wishes she were still his assistant. Then at least she’d have to still be around him. Being the CEO of Stark Industries is a job she can easily do on her own; it’s not like he’s been much help to her about that, anyway.

“Thank you, Katie. You can just put it on my desk,” Tony says, seeing her walk to the middle of the room and drop it where he’s told her. Then he watches her go, and his eyes go back to the clock above the door. About ten more minutes before the last kid comes in. Maybe he should just start his research about him? Most kids don’t like it when he looks them up with them around, but on the other hand it feels weird to listen to the kid when he already knows everything about him.

Instead, he remains standing in front of the window for a little moment. His coffee stays on the desk, probably already getting cold, but Tony figures that coffee won’t help him. He knows what will, and that’s mostly the reason why he’s not spending more time at the penthouse. At least at the compound he’s not alone, and there are people there to keep an eye on him and keep him under control. He doesn’t need more public disgraces from being drunk again.

Somehow, talking with Rhodey, Natasha and Cap helps quite a lot. They manage to distract him with sparring sessions and self-defense lessons. He’s not as strong as Cap, and surely not as agile as Nat, but just the basic moves are enough to make him forget about Pepper for a little longer. Yet, not completely, and every night in bed he stays awake instead of falling asleep. Some nights he just wanders around the compound and finds himself looking at the starry night, but other nights he hides himself in the lab, where he starts working on some new modifications for his teammate’s uniforms.

“Sir, your five- ‘o-clock interview is here,” his assistant suddenly says, and Tony wonders how he did not hear her knock. When he turns around, he finds Katie standing there with a small and slender boy next to her. He looks a bit pale, kind of… nervous, maybe? It’s nothing he’s never seen before; most of them are kind of scared of him, but he’ll quickly find out that he’s got nothing to worry about. Of course, unless he’s one of those rich kids that don’t think they’re rich enough already.

“Sure, yes, thank you Katie,” Tony says, and only then does he move away from the window, pointing towards the chair in front of his desk right before sitting down himself. “Please sit, Mr. …” Tony can almost curse. He doesn’t even know the kid’s name yet.

“Parker, sir,” the kid answers then, not seeming offended at all. “Peter Parker.”

Parker… now that’s a name he hasn’t heard in a long time. One would think that with such a big company, at least one of his workers would have that surname. Still, the only Parker he can think of is… what was his name again?

“Your name sounds familiar, are you family of anybody I know?” Tony asks, wondering why the name is bringing up something in him, and cursing because he can’t place it at all. What’s wrong with his super-brain lately?

“My parents worked at Oscorp,” the boy – Peter – reveals. “Though my mother used to work for you for a while before that.”

“Are you Mary’s son?” The words escape from Tony’s mouth before he can think of it. The only person he knows of that has left his company to work for Oscorp is Mary, and that’s one person that he hasn’t heard of in a while. Probably because she completely shut herself off from his life. “Did she still marry that scientist? What was his name…? Richard?”

“Yes, they did marry,” Peter answers. Tony doesn’t know what that weird tugging in his chest is all of the sudden. His friendship with Mary had been something he cherished for long even after she made it clear she wouldn’t see him again. She’s probably one of the first people he genuinely loved, and he had on multiple occasions even almost asked her out, only to whimp out at the last second.

The truth had been… he’d been afraid of losing her friendship, in case things would go bad. And then she met that Richar-guy, and after that he swore not to try anything. Of course, that was before they both were as drunk as one could be and eventually ended up in bed together.

That had literally been the last time he’d seen her. He’s never heard of her since, so to suddenly find her son sitting there in front of her… he doesn’t know if it’s a sick joke coming from the universe, or a chance at redemption; a chance to do right by her by helping out her son.

“So, how is she?” Tony asks, not even caring that this interview is not going the way it’s supposed to go. There’s time to ask his usual questions later, right now all he needs is to know if Mary’s okay.

“Eh,” Peter says, looking down at his hands in his lap. “She and my father died, about ten years ago. Plane-crash.”

Tony feels his body go cold, and all the sound around him just disappears. Mary Fitzpatrick, one of the few people that had been there for him after his parents died, is not even there anymore. And somehow, he has never even been made aware of this.

Their family never even thought of mentioning him, which could mean one thing; she told them she didn’t want him in her life anymore, and they followed her last wishes.

“That’s… oh,” Tony then lets out in a gasp for air. Why does his chest feel so tight? Why does it suddenly hurt when he looks this kid in the eyes? Is it because he reminds him of his own status as an orphan? Peter had been that much younger than Tony had been, so this kid actually had to grow up without his parents.

Tony doesn’t really realize he’s stood up until he finds himself leaning against the window again, one hand on his forehead and the other on his hip. His eyes are closed while he tries to calm his breath, and for a moment he wonders what else could go wrong right now. First, Pepper leaves him, and then he learns that the first woman he’d actually fallen in love with had died years ago and he never even knew.

“I could just return another time,” Peter suggests then, and immediately Tony turns around to face him again. Only one look at Peter makes Tony realize that the boy seems a bit off, himself. There’s this strange expression in his eyes that make it clear that something is bothering him. The bags under his eyes indicate that he hasn’t had a good night’s rest in a while, and then there’s the fact that he looks like he’s actually shaking.

“No, no it’s fine,” Tony assures him. He goes to sit down again immediately, and decides it’s better to just go on. Better to get this one over with so he can start grieving one more person. As if he isn’t already grieving enough. “Now, I’m going to ask you a few questions, and I’d like to know your household’s income to see if you actually qualify for this internship. If you brought that in paper, that would be great, but if not we can look it up together.”

Peter nods and sits up a bit straighter. His eyes light up a bit when Tony lifts up the screen, making sure that the boy can watch along with him. There’s nothing much Tony’s going to look up, mostly just how much his family has as an income.

“Who do you live with?” Tony asks, wondering who had taken him in after Mary and Richard’s death. Tony still can’t really believe that she’s not here anymore. He feels like his body is real close to just crying, but he chokes it up for a little bit longer. The kid doesn’t need to see this.

“I live with my Aunt May. My Uncle used to live with us, but he passed away a few years ago,” Peter says, stumbling a little bit over his words. Tony takes another deep breath, wondering how many family-members one kid can lose at such a young age.

“I’m sorry to hear that,” Tony tells him genuinely, earning him a small nod from the teenager. “How would you describe your living-situation?”

At that, the boy seems to need a minute to think about it, and Tony offers it to him patiently. He still feels his eyes sting a little bit, and he almost curses at leaving his sunglasses back at the compound, otherwise he could have just put them on to shield away his red eyes.

“My aunt works full-time at the hospital, mostly doing night shifts. She’s always been offering me to go to college but I knew we couldn’t afford it. Instead I took a few jobs this year, but they never could use me for very long. Right now I work at a pizza-place, and whatever I earn goes to Aunt May to pay the bills,” Peter says. Tony gives him a long look, but he can’t really detect any lie in his voice. His breathing is calm and he’s not nervously biting on his lips, so Tony’s inclined to believe him.

And even if he didn’t, the screen with information he now has in front of him proves it even more. He makes sure to let Peter look along, but Tony doesn’t look at it in detail, only just checking the numbers to make sure. After that, he nods and pushes the screen away.

“I saw that your grades have been… a bit on the low side. Is there any particular reason for this?” Tony asks, feeling almost like a therapist. Of course, he needs to know if the kid’s just lazy, or if there has been something that happened. He knows it’s the latter when he sees the boy grit his teeth together and lower his gaze back to the ground.

“My-uh… I lost somebody I l- my, uh, girlfriend-“ Peter starts, but he never manages to finish the sentence.

“If she left you, she’s an idiot,” Tony says then, trying to relieve him from the answer. He realizes he’s wrong when the kid looks up with big eyes and a mouth dropped open. Oh, he and his insensitive mouth all the time!

“Uh, she’s just- the Goblin- couldn’t… catch her,” the kid then stammers out, not really making any sense at all. But, the mention of the Goblin is enough for Tony to figure it out on his own. He did hear that one of the victims from the whole Goblin-affair half a year ago had been a teenage girl. Another person he had lost… poor kid.

“If you want a chance to bring your grades back up, you’re always welcome to apply for the internship. There’s still a few open slots for the time being, which you might get if you hurry,” Tony says, trying to change the turn in the conversation. The kid looks relieved for that.

“The school has been trying to get me to try it out, but I have been hesitating between here and Oscorp,” he says. Tony raises an eyebrow at the mention of Oscorp, but he doesn’t take it personal at all; Oscorp is good for the biology-side of life, while Stark Industries would offer possibilities in engineering. “I’m hesitating still between electrical engineering and biochemistry,” Peter confirms Tony’s suspicions. So the boy is leaning towards the scientific side of life. Interesting; it only means he’s got that from his parents. They’d both been very active in that field as well.

“I graduated from electrical engineering, myself. Interesting subject, if you ask me,” Tony explains with a smile. Peter smiles back, but not for long. Somehow, something must be bothering the boy. He’s been quiet and even a bit sick-looking ever since he came in here. Hopefully the kid didn’t catch anything.

Tony finishes filling in the form, afterwards offering the paper back to Peter with his pen pointing at an empty line.

“You’ll need to sign here. Seeing as you’ll only start college after you’ll graduate next year, the scholarship isn’t immediately yours, but you can be certain that you’ll get it once the time is there, Mister Parker,” Tony says, watching how the boy’s face lights up a little bit after hearing that.

“Thank you, Mr. Stark,” Peter answers shyly, accepting the pen Tony offers him and then signing his name. After that, Tony offers him another empty form where he needs to fill in his own stuff.

“You can fill in this paper now, or you can bring it back later this week. There’s no deadline, really, but I’m sure you’ll want it finished before you’ll start college, am I right?” Tony forces out another smile. His body just feels exhausted right now, and all he wants at this moment is to lie down in his bed and stare at the ceiling. Rather with Pepper at his side, but he can’t have everything now, right?

“That’s alright, I can fill it in right now,” Peter says, continuing his quick scrambling on the paper. After that he gives it to Tony and starts standing up. In his haste, his bag tips over, and a big brown envelope falls out of it, right in front of Tony’s feet. A few papers slid out of it in the fall.

“Here, let me help you,” Tony says, kneeling down to pick up the papers and push them back inside. A few sentences catch his attention, though, but he decides not to spend too much attention to it. Especially after noticing how pale the boy had gotten while Tony took the papers in hands. Quickly enough, Tony offers it back, seeing how Peter actively seems to avoid making eye-contact with him. Why is he so nervous all of the sudden?

“Are you alright, kid?” Tony asks. Peter just nods quickly and pushes the envelope back inside.

“Yeah I’m fine, just… got some weird news today that I still have to process,” Peter says. Tony nods slightly and leans back against his desk.

“I can understand,” Tony says. Hearing that you suddenly have another living family-member can be quite the shock; especially when you’ve lost so much of them already. At least, that’s what Tony supposes the DNA-test is for. He knows what they look like, he’s taken more of them than he’d care to admit each time somebody came to cause drama and tell their kid was his. “Just think about the internship, though. Give it a good thought, and if you’ll choose for us, we’ll be glad to hear from you.”

“Th-thank you Mr. Stark,” Peter says. After finally managing to put everything away, he accepts the hand Tony had held out, and shakes it.

“Your mother was a real smart woman, one of the smartest I’ve known. I’m very sure you’ll be just as great as her, if not even better,” Tony finds himself saying. He doesn’t understand where this sudden need to comfort Peter has come from, but it’s probably normal. This boy is the sixteen-year-old son of a woman he loved dearly almost seventeen years ago. And even though she completely shut him out of her life for that little slip-up, he never stopped caring for her. And if this boy is her only legacy, the kid is even all the more precious.

After that, Peter is gone, and as if an unseen force has pushed him, Tony falls down onto his chair and his whole body just becomes so heavy that he feels like he might sink through the floor. His chest is hurting; from his quick breathing or his fast heartbeat, he doesn’t know. He’s actually sweating, and he doesn’t know if he’s imagining his muscles tensing and relaxing continuously.

He could have been sitting there for an hour; he wouldn’t be able to tell it. He doesn’t notice the call that comes through. His mind clears a little bit when suddenly something cold is pressed against his face.

“Tony, are you listening?” the familiar voice of Steve Rogers asks, and Tony then opens his eyes to look straight into the Captain’s blue ones. There are hands slapping his face to wake him up; do those belong to Cap? Or is there someone else here? What’s going on?

“What are you-?” Tony finds himself asking, but he can’t find it in himself to finish that sentence.

“You had a panic attack, FRIDAY called me,” Steve explains calmly. He puts a hand behind Tony’s back and suddenly the man is sitting up again. When did he fall down on the ground?

Only once Tony’s vision is cleared again does he notice the carnage around him. His whole office is a mess; his desk is tipped over. His chair looks like it was thrown through the room. A few glasses are shattered on the floor, and so is a, what used to be, full bottle of scotch. The amber liquid is now lying in a puddle and sinking into the wooden floors.

“When did the Hulk get here?” Tony jokes, trying to lighten the mood. His eyes are stinging, and his cheeks feel sticky. That probably means that he must have been crying. Crap, and of course it’s the Cap that found him this way.

“Stop joking around, Tony. What happened?” Steve asks, clearly unimpressed by his attempt to lighten things up. Tony just takes a deep breath, and his eyes drop onto his hands; they are scraped and bloody. He’s probably been punching the wall or something…

“Ah, you know, learning that the first woman you’ve ever loved died years ago without you ever knowing might sting a bit,” Tony says dryly. He just wants to get up and get a drink, but clearly that won’t be possible with the last bottle lying on the ground. At least his subconscious helped him stay away from the booze again.

“What?” Steve asks, sounding a bit shocked. Tony can only shake his head and let out a sinister chuckle.

“It’s of course even better when you get said news by her sixteen year old son who came in to get a scholarship because his family, which by the way only consists him and his aunt, can’t afford college,” Tony adds, thinking back of the poor Peter, and wishing that he didn’t have to go through all those bad things.

“Oh Tony,” Steve says with a pained sound. Tony suddenly feels a hand resting onto his shoulder, and he looks up, only to find Steve staring at him with a worried look. “I’m so sorry.”

“Not your fault, Cap,” Tony says, pushing himself up and cursing when his hands protest in pain. Steve immediately takes them in his own and inspects his fingers thoroughly, but Tony doesn’t like the look in his eyes.

“We need to get these hands checked, Tony. I think you actually broke a few fingers,” Steve says, and with that he helps the man get up at last. With an arm wrapped around him, Steve supports Tony out of the building through the private exit. It’s Steve who drives all the way back to the compound, and they’re both completely quiet the entire way.

Once they get there, Dr. Cho wraps his hands up, counting at least three broken fingers. Tony gets some painkillers, and after that, he’s brought back to his guest room at the building.

He’s also perfectly sure that the Captain will never speak a word about the hour he spent crying against his shoulder when the realization hits once again that Mary is dead and Pepper left him.


---


On his way to the interview, Peter has thought about how his talk with Mr. Stark would have gotten. His mind had gone over a casual conversation to him eventually interviewing Mr. Stark instead to figure out what kind of man he is.

He didn’t expect it to end up with him practically telling him his whole life and revealing that the guy once knew his mother.

And he’d seen the pain in Stark’s eyes, and the way his breath caught when Peter confessed that she’d died years ago. That expression was not one of a stranger learning somebody he once knew passed away. This look was one of complete distress and agony. This was the face of someone learning that somebody he loved had died.

And now here he is; with the envelope still in his hands, sitting on his bed. One part of him only wished Mr. Stark had read the file, had asked questions, and that Peter would have spilled the beans. But the other part of him is glad; if Peter would have come there, asking for a scholarship and at the same time revealing that he’s his son, the man wouldn’t have believed him at all.

He takes a deep breath, and waits for Aunt May to come home; there’s the matter of him possibly going to college that he needs to discuss.

But by the time that she gets home, he still can’t find anything to say. He’s got only his messed up mind to think with and, honestly, there hasn’t been any opportunity to think of a plan. Right now, all he wants is for Gwen to be here.

She would have helped him figure it out. She would have been by his side when he’d have his talk with Stark. She’d help him find his words when Peter couldn’t.

So instead of talking with Aunt May, Peter takes his jacket – since it’s softly snowing again – and walks towards the nearest subway station. The drive to the cemetery isn’t a long one, and nobody’s paying attention to him while he’s walking through the different graves around him.

It’s easy for him to find her grave; he’s been visiting it every day for three months before toning that down into once a week. Her grave is located next to her dad’s, which was one he’d actually been avoiding after he’d died.

His hands are stuffed in his pockets, and his hair is slowly getting wet from the drops falling into it. He’s only aware that there’s a tear rolling out of his eyes when his eyes actually start to sting.

“Hey Gwen,” Peter says lowly in a greeting. Of course there’s no answer, but every time he’s spent here, he’s always talked to her, and his mind often offered an answer that she’d probably would give. So with keeping his eyes closed, he can perfectly imagine her standing there next to him with her little bonnet on and her knee socks. Her blonde hair is soft and perfect as always, and her blue eyes are as sweet as he can remember.

“Hi,” she would answer to him. She would reach out her hand to take his in hers, but as he imagines that, he doesn’t feel the touch on his skin.

“So, a lot of stuff has happened,” Peter clarifies after a moment of just standing there. His heart makes a twitch when he imagines her smirking at him.

“No kidding,” she says. Peter can’t help but laugh along. “So, you have a dad again?”

Peter just shakes his head, smile suddenly faltering.

“He’s not my dad,” he mutters out. “I mean, biologically, yeah, but… I don’t know him all that well. And I can’t really find a way for me to talk to him about it.”

“How come?”

Another shake of his head. “I used to talk to you when it came to stuff like this. You gave me ideas all the time.”

There’s no answer in his mind now. All he can do is imagine Gwen standing there, looking at him with sadness and pity. It’s not a look he wants to receive, but in the end it’s his own mind giving him these images.

“Maybe you should stop pushing people away, then,” Gwen’s memory offers kindly. Peter finds himself looking up in surprise, almost expecting her to really stand there in front of him. But he knows that she won’t ever be able to do that again.

“What do you mean?” he asks.

“I know you’re afraid of things ending the way it did with me, but these new people you’ve met… they’ve got powers as well. They won’t be vulnerable.”

Peter looks down and lets out a long sigh. His hands nervously tap against his legs and he ends up whistling an annoying tune to calm himself down a bit.

“Like I’d really want Deadpool as my friend,” Peter answers after a long thought, but he realizes that she’s actually right. The best thing he might be able to do is to just talk to these new people. He’s got Wanda already on his side, but now there’s this Yaël girl whose life seems even more fucked up than his own, and, sadly enough, Wade. Of course, the more Peter is able to avoid Wade, the better he’ll be from it.

“Right, well, he might not be so bad?” Gwen’s memory asks. Peter snorts.

“The dude has already created invitations for our supposed ‘wedding’. I know because he felt the need to text me this about half an hour ago,” Peter says, picking up his cellphone and showing the text to the open air. Gwen won’t be able to read it because she’s just not there.

“That sounds like fun.” Even in Peter’s mind Gwen starts to make jokes. “Just, don’t hold on to me for too long. I might be your first love, but I won’t be your last one. Open yourself up for more things to come.”

“Woah, I never mentioned anything about dating!” Peter suddenly calls out, and while he only has been whispering the whole time, now that he raises his voice some heads turn towards him. Probably people wondering who he’s talking to.

Just chatting with my dead girlfriend, nothing to worry about, Peter thinks bitterly.

“Yet somehow your head lingers to the thought. People have been asking you out a lot these days. I just hope you’re rejecting them all the time just because you’re not interested rather than you being stuck on me.”

Peter squeezes his eyes shut again. The raining has gone even stronger now, and Peter’s completely wet from head to toe. If he stays here much longer, he’ll probably end up with a cold, which really is a no-go in August.

“I haven’t been asked out that much,” Peter retorts, but the moment the words leave his mouth he realizes that it’s not true. During the whole summer holiday a few girls have been asking him to hang out for a while. At his workplace there’s a girl who is obviously crushing on him and he’s been ignoring that the whole time. And then, recently, when that guy at Mr. Stark’s reception gave him his phone number… people have been noticing him, but he hasn’t been noticing others.

“Okay maybe I have, but the last one doesn’t count! He’s a guy!” Peter counters before she can say anything to it. He can just imagine her smirk as if she’s standing right in front of him.

“Yet you still kept that number?”

Right. He did.

But in his defense, it’s mostly because that damn number is put on a piece of paper that held all the details on his appointment with Mr. Stark.

Right?

“Come on, you know I’m not-“ Peter starts, but his own mind stops him.

“Of course, I’m not saying you are. But you never know for sure until you try it,” comes out. Peter wants to smash his own face against the ground. He came here to look for a way to talk to Mr. Stark, but somehow his train of thoughts brought him onto a point where he might actually think about going on a date with another dude.

“Well, I’ll see. So far hasn’t peaked my interest,” Peter mutters with a shrug.

“You know, it would help you if you would talk about this with real friends instead of imaginary ones. The advice I’m giving you is actually just your own,” Gwen says with a grin. Peter laughs then as well, and then figures he’s right about that. With his eyes closed he imagines Gwen disappearing again, and after a few more seconds of just standing there in silence, he turns around again and heads back home to take a hot bath and warm up his body again.

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