Chapter Text
It's me, hi, I'm the problem, it's me
At tea time, everybody agrees
I'll stare directly at the sun but never in the mirror
It must be exhausting, always rooting for the anti-hero
Anti-hero, Taylor Swift
Tony startles awake to the sound of FRIDAY telling him that Mini Boss is in distress.
“What?” he croaks, his brain fuzzy. This is what happens when he gets a proper amount of sleep. There’s a reason he’s lived most of his life on coffee and lab benders.
“Mini Boss is in distress,” FRIDAY repeats, in the same tone Pepper uses when Tony hasn’t been listening. FRI’s been sassy about Peter since the night she alerted Tony that his spider-kid was bleeding out, as if his one slipup due to magically induced memory loss means he doesn’t love the boy with every ounce of his being. Since her persistence saved Peter’s life, Tony’s being chill about her impertinence instead of forcing through an upgrade. Only Peter could make an AI love him more than its own creator.
“Distress. Got it. Give me the details, baby girl,” Tony demands as he launches out of bed. He’s not quite as panicked as he would have been, once. Distress has become an unfortunately familiar state.
“Mini Boss woke suddenly fifteen minutes ago. His elevated breathing and heart rate indicated a nightmare. He asked that you not be alerted. However, his wishes were overridden by the Care Bear protocol after the stipulated time had elapsed. He has not gone back to sleep, and his vitals are consistent with emotional distress.”
Peter has been doing so much better lately. When Tony first rescued him from New York he’d been little more than distress—the epitome of trauma wrapped up in the skin of the teenager Tony so loved. But therapy had helped. The day Peter confessed that he’d contemplated suicide had been a surprising turning point. Afterward he’d started improving by the hour. Joking around. Laughing again. The funeral for May had been an unexpected leap forward. Tony had worried it was too soon, but Peter had handled it like a champ, and then he’d found the courage to reach out to his friends.
It had all been a whirlwind since then. Peter had returned to Midtown two days later. Tony had worried about rushing that, but there wasn’t much time to salvage Pete’s senior year. Tony wanted to give him some of the milestones he’d never had, like prom and graduation. And as much as Tony didn’t want to leave Peter out of his sight, he knew it was healthy for teenagers to spend time with people beyond their immediate family.
Peter had returned to the penthouse after his first day back drained and a bit dazed, scarfing down his takeout quietly and then passing out ten minutes into the movie Tony put on. But on Tuesday he was practically his old self, joining Tony for hours in the lab before demolishing an entire pizza. Tony hadn’t realized exactly how worried he’d been until he felt the relief at the return of his rambling, bubbly kid. As much as he’d told himself, over and over, that Peter would be okay, Tony finally believed it more often than not.
But recovery was never a straight line. Thursday night nightmares seemed pretty par for the course.
“I’ll take care of this,” Tony said, striding down the hallway.
“That is why I woke you, Boss.”
Tony rolls his eyes, then takes a deep breath as he reaches Peter’s doorway, taking a moment to compose himself. Peter has nightmares a lot, but he almost always asks FRIDAY not to alert anyone. After Tony had ignored that directive for the third time, Peter had gotten angry, leading to an emotionally charged argument at 1am that Tony never wants to repeat. It had been FRIDAY who’d suggested the Care Bear protocol. Now Peter has fifteen minutes to compose himself after a nightmare. But if he’s still worked up, Tony gets called.
Tony thinks fifteen minutes is far too long for his kid to suffer alone. But he knows Peter hates being a burden, and he’s expressed embarrassment about how emotional he’s been since his return. And most of the parenting books Tony read before Morgan arrived say compromise is important so—fifteen minutes it is.
He knocks softly on the door. Everything is louder for Pete when he’s upset. “Hey, buddy. Can I come in?”
The immediate response he expects doesn’t come. Tony stands flummoxed in the silence for a few long moments before he knocks again.
“FRIDAY’s a snitch,” Peter grumbles, his voice faint but aggrieved.
Tony takes that as permission to enter. He pushes the door open gently. “FRI, lights at ten percent.”
The sight that greets him makes Tony want to rewrite the Care Bear protocol so that Tony is summoned whenever Peter wakes, no questions asked. Because his kid is curled up on the edge of his bed as if he’s trying to make himself disappear, and that’s unacceptable.
“Oh, bambino, what’s wrong?”
Peter flinches at the nickname, bringing his knees even tighter into his chest. Tony flinches too, because yes, maybe Peter is a little old for that nickname, but he’d seemed to like it before.
“Go away.”
That hurts. Enough that Tony stops in his tracks. Seven or eight years ago he would have listened, annoyed at being sent away, embarrassed to have come at all. But now he loves the kid far too much to give up so easily.
“No can do, champ. Something’s eating at you, and I’m not leaving you alone with that. But if you don’t want to talk, we can move this to the living room. Put on a movie.”
“What I want is to go back to sleep. I have a Spanish quiz tomorrow.”
“Forget school. You can take the day off.”
“No I can’t! There aren’t that many days left. I need to be there. I want to be there. And I don’t want to have to make up the stupid quiz.”
“Ok. You don’t want to leave this bed. How about I get you something to drink. Warm milk? Hot chocolate?”
Peter pulls a pillow over his face. “Don’t want anything.”
Peter is so rarely a typical teenager, at least not around Tony. He’s too polite—or maybe too starstruck--for much moody brooding, although he and Tony have had plenty of fights over superhero stuff. But Tony has a five-year-old now, so he’s learned a lot about dealing with petulant kids.
“Fine. Scoot over.”
“Why?” Peter says from behind his pillow.
“I’m gonna lay there.”
Peter huffs, but eventually shifts himself back on the bed.
Tony slips under the covers and opens his arms. Peter, who has rolled over to face the wall, ignores him.
Tony lets the excruciating silence hang awhile before saying, “All right, come here.”
“You told me to move.”
“Ahuh. To make room for me. Do you really want to stay over there by your lonesome?”
When Peter doesn’t answer Tony starts to worry. He’s not sure what his next move should be if Peter really doesn’t want him here.
Whenever Peter wakes in distress Tony thinks of his own childhood, where there was no one to comfort him when he had a nightmare. He’d made the mistake of seeking out his parents exactly once. The dressing down Howard had given him had been far worse than the actual nightmare. The whole time he’d wished that Mama would intervene. That she would hold her arms open for a hug and kiss him on the forehead and tell him not to listen to Father, he was just cranky at being woken up.
But she’d stayed silent.
She’d stayed silent more and more often after that, until she was practically a ghost of the loving mother who lived in his earliest memories.
Despite Howard’s cruel words, Tony had wanted someone to hold him and tell him everything was going to be all right.
But maybe Peter doesn’t want that? He’s not exactly a kid anymore, even though Tony will never give up calling him one.
But then the pillow is sailing to the floor and Peter rolls into Tony and wraps him in his enhanced grip so suddenly it presses the air from Tony’s lungs.
Tony reciprocates, one arm holding him in place and the other rubbing up and down his back. “There. That’s better.”
Peter doesn’t say anything. He’s so still for so long that Tony thinks he’s fallen back to sleep. He’s contemplating attempting the same when he feels the wetness on his chest. Peter’s face is pressed into his t-shirt above where his reactor used to be, crying silent tears.
It’s like Tony can feel the reactor again, shrapnel vibrating in his chest. None of the parenting books warned him that he would feel his kid’s pain. But Peter and Morgan’s agonies are worse than waterboarding.
Morgan’s lived a sheltered life. The only physical pain she’s ever known is a broken arm when she fell out of her treehouse, and the tonsilitis episode that nearly undid Tony. But even her tiny emotional turmoils are hard to bear. When she cries because someone is mean to her at recess Tony wants to charge up his gauntlet and raze the world to make her smile again.
But Pete is intimately acquainted with pain. He’s taken a lot of hits as Spider-Man, seeming to live by the fool notion that if his body heals fast, the pain doesn’t matter. He is strong and brave and an absolute idiot, and it’s one of the few things he and Tony fight about.
Emotional pain doesn’t roll off him quite so easily. The kid has withstood more loss than any child should. Tony’s far less equipped to deal with that than a broken bone. For most of his life he’s tried to numb his emotions, bury his pain with drugs and sex and alcohol, and when that failed, heroics. Genius and innovation and a suit of armor around the world (and his heart).
That had gone so much more spectacularly wrong than all the partying.
He can’t just ignore Peter’s pain. He won’t. It’s essential that he finds a solution.
Tony threads his fingers through Peter’s curls, marveling at how soft they feel under the synthetic skin Peter had added to his prosthesis just a few hours ago. Beyond the second-hand pain and the mounting panic Tony is overwhelmed by how much he loves this kid, this brilliant miracle-maker. “I can’t fix anything if you don’t tell me what’s wrong, Roo.”
When Peter doesn’t answer right away, Tony begins to worry that he won’t.
When Peter finally mumbles, “You can’t fix this,” into his chest, Tony wishes he hadn’t said anything.
Because his kid—the glorious prodigy who’d been doing so much better and spent ten minutes at dinner cackling at Tony’s concern that his real hand and his artificial hand wouldn’t tan equally, and this might keep him out of the running for the future Sexiest Man Alive—sounds broken. Hopeless.
And that isn’t acceptable at all.
What if Peter’s been laying here in the dark, thinking about ending it all? Peter’s admission that he’d been suicidal was more terrifying than the looming threat of Thanos, and that had scared Tony shitless. He’s glad Pete trusted him enough to tell him. But the very thought that Peter—selfless, big-hearted, give until he breaks Peter—was so low that he thought about killing himself—in several different ways—threatens to tear Tony apart whenever he lets himself think about it. He knows he probably shouldn’t have told Peter that he couldn’t handle it if Peter took his own life, but it’s absolutely true. Tony would not be able to live with that. And guilt is the only way he knows to get through to the kid, who has always put everyone else’s needs before his own.
But Tony doesn’t want to assume that’s the problem here. And he doesn’t want Peter to know that he’s always worried now. Doesn’t want to remind Peter about those awful thoughts if that’s not what he’s thinking. Were those thoughts that easy to summon, when Tony himself felt that way? It hurts too much to think of those times. All the drugs have blurred most of his memories anyway. All he knows is he doesn’t want his complexes to become Peter’s complexes. His mental health has always been a landmine. He doesn’t want to be what makes Peter’s explode.
Saying nothing feels like a cop out, though. What if Peter’s waiting for Tony to remind him that it’s all right, that he loves him anyway, that he’ll always love him? Because Jesus, he will. There’s no possible worst-case scenario where he doesn’t adore this kid.
He’s not qualified to make these decisions in the middle of the night. He’s not sure he’s really qualified to make them at all.
“I’m too old for this,” Peter whispers, voice thick and hoarse with all those tears he tried to swallow.
“For what?” Tony whispers back, so glad the kid is finally talking.
“Crawling into my parent’s bed when I have a nightmare.”
“Technically I crawled into your bed, if that makes it better.”
“No,” Peter huffs. “That makes it weirder.”
That’s fair. Probably. Whatever. “Who said you’re too old?”
“I dunno. Society.”
Also Howard Stark and anyone he’d deign associate with. Screw ‘em. “I think your scary Mini Potts would say that’s bullshit.”
Peter groans. “She heard you call her that, you know.”
“I mean it as the highest of compliments.”
“MJ doesn’t like nicknames.”
“But she likes you.”
“Yeah.” Peter doesn’t say it like a kid in love. He says it like a man who’s just been condemned. As if Michelle’s regard physically pains him.
Tony had been hoping he’d be able to goad the kid a little about his crush-that-is-clearly-more-than-a-crush to keep him talking. But that seems like the wrong tactic.
Honesty it is then. “Look. We’re not gonna sell photos of us like this to The Bugle, but it’s fine. You’re never going to be so old that I don’t want to be there for you if you’re sad. Or going through something. Or just don’t want to be alone.”
Peter lets that settle between them. It’s uncomfortable in the way most honest things are, but Tony stands by every word.
Peter pulls away enough to look up at Tony. Even in the dim light Tony can see his red eyes, the trenches of tears carved into his cheeks. He wants to wipe those tears away like he would with Morgan. But maybe that’s too much.
“A couple of years ago this would have totally freaked you out. Me clinging on to you like this.”
“Yeah, well.” That part of him is still there, whispering that he ought to leave Peter alone and go to bed. It’s been painstaking work, learning to ignore any voice that sounds like Howard.
If he gives in, then Peter suffers alone. So Tony does the opposite. He tells the truth.
“For most of my life, Rhodey was the only person who bothered getting close to me that didn’t want something in return. I learned to keep people at a distance.”
“Colonel Rhodes was the only one?”
Peter sounds so heartbroken, and Tony hadn’t meant to turn this into a pity party. He tries to lighten his tone to find the joke in it all. “Well, Pepper, too. Eventually.”
“What about your mom?”
Tony’s breath hitches inadvertently. That’s a more painful wound than Howard, because it’s never quite scabbed over. But he finds that he can discuss this with Peter, who’d lost two moms before Tony had lost one. “My father had strong opinions on how children should be raised. Seen and not heard, made of iron bullshit. The older I got, the less willing my mother was to oppose him. She was part of the problem long before she died.”
“I’m sorry.”
Tony reaches up to smooth Peter’s messy curls. He thinks it sooths him more than the kid. “Hey. No. That’s not the point here, kiddo.”
He’s not sure what the point it. Why they’re talking about this at three in the morning, when what he really needs to know is why Peter was crying. Why he’s so adamant not to tell. Maybe if Tony bares his soul a little, Peter will reciprocate.
Sometimes, there’s something healing in the telling, as much as it hurts. Thank you, therapy. At least this isn’t costing him several hundred bucks an hour.
“There wasn’t anyone else?”
God, he must think you’re pathetic.
But Tony doesn’t listen to Howard anymore.
Peter’s hair is so soft under his fingertips. His erratic breathing is a goddamned miracle.
“I guess there was Ana. Jarvis’s wife. Jarvis was very British. Stiff upper lip and all that. I knew he cared, but he wasn’t very demonstrative. But Ana was the opposite. I used to spend a lot of time in their quarters. Ana was always hugging me. Kissing me on the forehead. We used to curl up on the couch together and watch Saturday morning cartoons.”
He’d forgotten that, actually. It’s been a long time since he thought of that kindly woman.
“When I was six, I told my mother I wished Jarvis and Ana were my parents. I wasn’t allowed to stay with them after that. I still saw Jarvis when he was helping Howard, but rarely Ana.”
“That’s terrible.”
“Yeah,” Tony admits, something freeing in voicing it out loud. “But it was a long time ago.”
Peter hums. It might be assent or disapproval. Tony stares straight ahead, unwilling to look down and gauge his reaction.
Peter holds him a little tighter, pressing his ear against Tony’s flailing heart. “What changed?”
“Morgan.” That answer is easy. “After she was born I was determined not to pass along any of my complexes. I needed to be better, for her. But there’s this thing about babies. She just trusted me, before I’d even done anything to earn that. She was a little cuddlebug, and she just wanted to be close to me. And I didn’t mind. I loved it, actually. It got me thinking that my favorite spider was probably a cuddlebug too. Turns out I was right.”
He skitters his fingers up Peter’s side, and Peter presses into him harder to try halfheartedly to get away. “Spiders aren’t bugs,” Peter protests, as if that’s the most shocking bit of this Lifetime Movie revelation.
“I’m sorry, Darwin. I suspected you’d be a cuddle-arachnid.”
“Better,” Peter pronounces. His fingers twist in Tony’s t-shirt. “May and Ben hugged me a lot,” he whispers, quiet like a confession, but Tony didn’t need to be a genius to intuit that, “especially when I first came to live with them. I think they were just trying to calm me down. I was such a mess because my parents were gone.”
Pete’s tiny voice shatters Tonys heart, everything about his tone and his conclusion wrong wrong wrong. “I think they loved you a lot,” Tony counters. He wishes he knew how to make Peter believe that. All he can do is hold him a little tighter. “It’s impossible not to, with your bambi eyes and your enormous heart. Your pain probably made them crazy. That’s why they couldn’t keep their hands off you. I understand the feeling.”
Peter huffs, a tiny sound of disapproval.
“Hey,” Tony croons, raising a hand to cradle his kid’s face, his thumb brushing away the tears with as much tenderness as he can manage. “You know I wouldn’t say all this soppy shit if it wasn’t true.”
This huff sounds a bit more like a laugh, and Tony counts it as a win. He allows himself a few moments to map the contours of this treasured face, rounder now than they’d been when Pete first came back to him. His quirky left eyebrow that doesn’t quite match his right. The dimples that haunted Tony for years from the photo besides the sink.
“There’s another reason I don’t mind this.” The words fall from his lips on their own accord. Penance, for this absolution that he didn’t deserve. “You died in my arms, kid. You fucking crumbled under my fingers. That messed me up for a long time. Now whenever I get to hold you and you stay solid that memory loses a bit of its power. You’re doing me a favor, letting me get all clingy.”
He should expect the shame that comes from that admission. But when Peter uses his super strength to pull away, Tony’s shocked at how much it hurts.
“Okay,” Tony stutters. “I guess that was weird.”
But what’s weirder still is how Peter scuttles away until his back hits the headboard, as far from Tony as he can get without falling off the bed.
Is it really that repulsive that Tony wants to hold on to him? He thought Peter knew that. That Tony told him enough times since breaking through the spell that this should just be repetition.
Of course he’s repulsed, you pansy-boy. No self-respecting man wants his father’s hands all over him. Or did you think Peter was like you?
Tony could really use some scotch right about now. Or at least a mint, to counter the bile rising in his throat.
He needs to fucking fix this.
“You died.” Pete’s been speaking in whispers tonight, but this is a shout, ripping the quiet apart with something vulgar. “In my dream. It stuck this time. No coming back. And I—I don’t think I can keep going without you. And it’s gonna be my fault.” Pete’s whole body shakes with the admission. He brings his knees up to his chest and wraps his arms around them, like he’s trying to make himself small again. “I can’t live with that. Can’t—can’t do that to Morgan and Pepper. So I think—after graduation, I should get an apartment in Cambridge. And I should just stay there. Forever. Even—even during breaks and stuff. Boston has crime, right? I’ll be useful and you’ll be safe.”
“Peter.” Tony slides towards him, but Peter throws out an arm.
“Stay back!”
The kid is full out trembling. Tony’s heart is shaking too. It’s so cracked he’s afraid it just might shatter. “Okay.” Tony holds his hands up in surrender, trying to appear calm. “I’ll stay right here. But I need you to run this by me again, cause I’m not following. If you can’t live without me, then why do you want to run off to Cambridge and never come back?”
“I don’t want to. I have to. It’s the only way you’ll be safe.”
“I’m still not following. That was just a nightmare. I’m fine.”
“You won’t be.” Pete says it with such finality, like it’s a natural law, that Tony gets chills.
“And why is that?”
“Because I kill everyone I love.”
Suddenly Tony is feeling Peter’s pain again, and it hurts so fucking much. “Don’t say that.”
“But it’s true. Parker luck. First my parents. Then Ben. Then—May.”
It’s heartbreaking, the amount of loss one pure soul has been made to carry. It amazes Tony every day how strong Peter is despite that. How he’s turned that loss into heroics, when Tony just spiraled into self-destruction, oblivious to who he took down with him. “You didn’t kill them, bud. They died, but it wasn’t your fault.”
“It was! Maybe not my parents. I don’t remember why they got on that plane. But Ben was my fault. We got in an argument, and I said awful things. He went to that convenience store to buy me my favorite snack as an apology, even though I was the one out of line. I felt so bad I chased after him. My Peter tingle was going crazy. I had my powers. I could have stopped the guy who shot him.”
Peter never talked about Ben, though Tony knew the basics from the police report he’d read during his background research on Parker, Peter: teenaged youTube vigilante. He’d known the kid had seen his uncle bleed out. He hadn’t known why.
He wants so badly to squeeze the kid’s shoulder. To pull him into his chest, press a kiss to the top of his head. Rock him back and forth to distract him from the pain. But when he tries to slide forward Peter flinches, pressing himself against the headboard with a whimper.
Tony knows what it feels like for his heart to give out. He thinks he could die right here. But that would destroy Peter when he needs to find a way to put him back together. “Okay, okay, okay. I’ll stay here. Just—listen, okay? It’s not your job to jump in front of bullets. Powers or not.”
“Ben died because I was being bratty and selfish. And May died because she wanted me to be better than I am.”
“That can’t be true.”
“I made the mistake to trust Beck. Then I made it worse by going to Doctor Strange. May wanted me to help all those villains, but they wouldn’t have been there if I hadn’t been so stupid and selfish. Then the Goblin came after me, and she was just in the way.”
Tony wishes, for one awful second, that he’d ignored FRIDAY, or listened when Peter tried to send him away. He’s not equipped to talk Peter off this ledge. How is he supposed to convince Peter there’s any justice in this world when for so long Tony believed there wasn’t? What Peter needs is for May to be here, with her soft touch and her soothing advice. All this Ben stuff seems like a powder keg of trauma, but Peter had been fine when Tony met him. That had to be May’s influence. She had to have found a way to get through to him.
Of course, if May was here now there’d be less of a trend. Peter would be off with her as Tony missed him from afar. But if he was well, happy, hopeful, that would have been better.
But May had trusted Tony to take care of their kid. And damn it, he would find a way to do that.
“That was tragic, kid, and it sucks. Sometimes the world is just unfair. You’ve been dealt some real shitty cards. But you’re not responsible for every supervillain who crosses your path. And Ben and May didn’t die because they love you. Correlation doesn’t equal causation. You know that.”
“Correlation doesn’t necessarily equal causation. But it can. I’m the deadly variable here, I know it. I’ve already almost killed you. Thanos practically eviscerated you on Titan cause I wasn’t strong enough to get the gauntlet off. And then when you snapped. You told me you went back in time to bring me back! That means if you would have died, that would have been my fault.”
“That’s not what you were supposed to take away from that story.”
“I thought you had died. For months. No one told me you were in a coma. You know how hard it was to live with that?”
“Christ kid, I’m sorry.”
“I just can’t keep doing this. I can’t keep losing people. Who I am puts everyone in danger. Spider-Man. Peter Parker. Does it even matter? I’m a menace.” The kid tugs at his hair until his knuckles are white. Tony doesn’t need super senses to hear how ragged his breathing has become.
“Hey, Pete, please. I won’t come any closer but you gotta breathe for me, all right? You’re starting to panic.”
“No shit.” There’s no humor there, just dead resolve. Tony feels his own panic swirling. Should he have FRIDAY call Wilson, even though it’s before the ass crack of dawn?
There’s only one way he knows to get through to the kid. It’s below the belt, but effective, and Tony’s out of other tricks.
“Peter Benjamin Parker Stark.”
Tony’s so focused on getting the tone right—trying to sound commanding when he just wants to collapse and sob—that the fourth word slips out automatically—an instinct, a wish, a promise.
He and Pep have talked about the adoption—its logistics and legalities—but nothing’s in writing yet. This is the first time Tony’s strung all the names together. He hasn’t even asked if Peter wants to be a Stark. The name is tainted with blood money and hubris, and Tony’s spent most of his life hating it. Yet he realizes, in a burst of clarity that shatters his heart into three thousand pieces, that he wants his son to take his name and elevate it to something better.
Peter’s wheezing has stopped, though Tony’s afraid he might not be breathing at all right now. His eyes are so wide it’s like he’s wearing his mask. Tony can tell from his expression that when Peter hears the word Stark he thinks mentor, hero, genius, not Merchant of Death. And he knows that the kid will take his name and wear it proudly without hesitation, just as long as Tony can convince him not to exile himself.
“I don’t believe for a second that you’re cursed. But you wanna talk about the dangers of being a superhero? Fine. You know what’s also dangerous? Being rich. Have enough money and everyone’s always trying to kidnap you and the people you love for ransom. So annoying. Dangerously annoying. And you know what makes it worse? Telling the whole world you’re a superhero. You kept Spider-Man a secret to protect the people close to you, but I told the entire world I was Ironman in a press conference. I figured, Fuck it, let the bad guys come after me, there’s no one I care about anyway. But that was a selfish lie. Rhodey. Pepper. Happy. They were all in danger because of my big mouth. Happy was almost killed once because of me. Then a psycho kidnapped Pepper and almost turned her into a human bomb. Again, because of me. Following your reasoning, the right thing to do would be to let them all go. Marrying Pepper put her in indescribable danger. And Morgan. Having Morgan was irresponsible. Best thing to do would be to send them away. They could change their names, start over. Live a simple life where they’re safe. FRI, how quickly can you formulate a couple of new identities?”
“FRIDAY, don’t!”
“Ah,” Tony says, feeling the first flush of victory. “Why shouldn’t she? My girls would be safer.”
“They wouldn’t want that! They need you.” Peter chews on his lip. His right hand trembles at his side, as if he’s just itching to reach out. “You need them.”
“Bingo.” It’s a calculated risk, but Tony slides closer. Peter watches him warily, but doesn’t freak out. “I do need them. And I need you. And what’s the difference between you and me, except I court danger willingly and you’ve done everything you can to protect the ones you love? There’s always a risk, getting close to people. Doesn’t matter who you are. And you take that risk, cause the alternate is worse. You said you don’t think you can make it without me. I think you’re probably right. Cause you were in bad shape when I found you. You have too much love in that hero heart of yours not to get any back in return. I know what it’s like to feel like no one loves you. And you know where that got me? A drug problem, a death wish, a ton of meaningless sex, and a reputation as the world’s richest fuck-up. When I said I wanted you to be better than me I was projecting all my insecurities, but what I really meant was I didn’t want you to make the same mistakes that I did. And walking away from everyone who loves you is the biggest mistake you could make right now. So just don’t, okay?”
“But if it saves you--”
“Nope. Not worth it. I know what my life is like without you, kid. I’ve lived that twice. Once when you were dead and once when you were just gone. Unacceptable. I don’t believe for a second I’m in any more danger from knowing you than I am from my own mistakes. And you know what I decided, after I almost got Pep killed? I decided that I needed to get the shrapnel out of my chest and stop living in the past. Because we don’t know how long we’ve got. So we have to make the most of every moment we’ve been given. However long that is. Cause that’s out of our control, even if we make all the best choices. And we won’t. No one does. But you gotta remember something else.”
Peter leans forward at Tony’s pause, his face scrunched in confusion. Tony gives a little hand gesture, prompting him, and Peter finally asks, “What?”
“I’m Iron Man. I invented time travel to bring you back, and I survived the full power of the infinity stones because I was too stubborn to die. What I want most is to watch my kids grow up together. If Parker Luck does come at me, I’m gonna fight back. Though if the time ever comes that I need to die for you, I’d do it in a heartbeat, with no regrets.”
“I don’t want you to die for me!” Peter sobs.
“I know.” Tony reaches out and grabs one of Peter’s hands. Peter holds on like a vice, like he doesn’t realize that his super strength is engaged. But Tony’s thumb is free, and he rubs it soothingly across Peter’s wrist like a metronome. “That’s why I’m going to do my damndest to live for you, tesoro. For a long, long time. Until you’ve got a family of your own to support you when I’m gone. Cause I do hope to go first. Not until I’m ancient. But I can’t fathom burying you again. There’s something about being a parent that makes you almost desperate to go out before your kid. Cause the world is so much better with them in it, and you can’t imagine going back to the way it was before. I’m sure May felt that way. Ben too. And god, Pete, I hope you get to experience that someday, if it’s what you want.”
“Me, a—a dad?”
“Yeah, champ. You’d be an amazing one. Not a doubt in my mind.” Suddenly Tony can see it—Pete with a little bambino of his own, his goodness compounded in ways Tony can’t yet comprehend, and it raises his spirits immensely. This crummy world might just be saved after all. “Just not yet!” he teases, finding the proper tone. Suddenly he can remember what it’s like to be funny. “My spider-baby’s too young for spider-babies of his own. But one day. Gosh. The sweetness of that’s already giving me a toothache.”
Peter ducks his head, but Tony still sees the flush on his cheeks. “You’re ridiculous.”
“There’s my boy. Can we just stop punishing ourselves for things that haven’t even happened? I’m not going to leave you. And I’m certainly not going to let you leave me.”
Tony can almost see the wheels turning in Peter’s head. His free hand is tangled in the sheets, the other clammy and trembling in Tony’s grasp. He’s far too young to be contemplating fate and mortality, to feel like he must carry the survival of everyone he loves on his shoulders. Tony wonders if he’s thinking about the moment Grindelwald told him what he had to do to protect the multiverse. If Peter feels like he’s facing the same decision all over again—to save his world at the cost of everything he holds dear.
Tony won’t let him make that sacrifice a second time.
“Whatever comes our way we’ll face it together, yeah? Like one of those superhero team-ups you used to yammer on about. Peter Parker and Tony Stark. The best team there’s ever been.”
Peter’s face scrunches together. Tony can only stare, pray to a nonexistent deity that he’s finally broken through.
The kid tilts his head. “What about Tony and Peter Stark?”
And Tony didn’t know he could go from low to high so damned fast. Like a hit of the good stuff, straight to his veins. “Yeah, bud. Absolutely. If that’s what you want. But could you just come here? Your old man needs a hug.”
Then Peter’s scuttling forward, and finally, finally, Tony has his arms filled with his favorite young adult once again.
“I’m sorry,” Peter sobs into his shoulder.
“Hey, none of that. None of that,” Tony coos, one hand cupping the back of Peter’s head, the other arm a band across his lower back, holding him exactly where he’s supposed to be. “I gotcha. I’m okay. You’re okay. We’re okay. I know all about your sacrificial bullshit. No need to self-flagellate. But let’s not have this conversation again anytime soon, okay?”
“Okay.” The kid shakes and eventually stills, his tension slowly melting away as he sinks into the embrace. Tony feels his own adrenaline fade. Thinks he could spend the rest of his life like this, with this kid in his arms. He’d need his girls to join them eventually. But there’s really no other need to leave this room.
Had Pete really been so upset at the prospect of losing Tony? It’s inconceivable, that he could care so much.
Peter nestles closer, like the adorable baby creature that he is. “Thanks, Dad,” he whispers. “I’m glad FRIDAY’s a snitch.”
Suddenly Tony’s wide awake again, waiting for the punchline. But Peter doesn’t seem to be joking this time.
“Are you okay?” Peter asks, pulling away enough to blink up at him with those hypnotic cartoon deer eyes. “Your heart’s going all crazy.”
Tony knows. He can feel it. Like it takes up too much space in his chest. “Mmm-hmmm. Those are just—acrobatics. Terrifying to anyone watching but totally safe. Totally.”
“You’re rambling.”
“Am I? You know you can call me anything you want.”
Peter leans back and fixes Tony with a look. “You have literally spent our entire relationship reminding me what you want me to call you.”
“Yeah, but. This. You don’t have to. If you don’t want.” Tony can’t fathom why he’s trying to talk Pete out of this, when he’s literally been waiting years for the kid to acknowledge his somewhat out of the blue paternal claim. These past few weeks, as they’ve gotten closer and closer and Tony’s actually gotten the chance to be Pete’s father, Tony’s started dreaming of this moment. It’s never gone anything like this.
But this can’t be about Tony’s ego or what he wants. And it can’t be about the guilt he used to derail Peter’s little crusade to spare everyone else at his own expense.
This has to be Peter’s call, and Peter’s judgement can’t be clouded by Tony’s desperate need for validation.
Peter rolls his eyes, and the tension between them breaks. “And if I want to call you Dad?”
Tony grins, feeling the joy in every one of his cells. Maybe tonight wasn’t such a shitshow after all. “Being your father is one of the greatest honors I’ve ever received. Of course I’d like frequent reminders.”
Then Peter’s grinning back. A grin from before—the smile that made its appearance during lab discoveries and rambling monologs about successful patrols or the latest Star Wars buzz. A grin that Tony loves, and hasn’t seen in far too long.
Soon they are just two idiots, giggling in the darkness. Like father like son.
“Why now, bud?” Tony eventually asks. It’s not like he handled the evening masterfully. They’d both spent nearly an hour teetering on the edge of a panic attack.
“A wise man told me to make the most of every moment we’ve got. I didn’t wanna wait anymore.”
So maybe he’d handled the night well enough. “He does sound wise.”
“Wise guy. Wise ass.” Peter shrugs.
“Language,” Tony quips.
Peter’s laugh ends as a shuddering yawn, reminding Tony of the ungodly hour.
“Well, it’s way passed spider-baby’s bedtime now. Are you sure you won’t play hooky tomorrow?”
Peter contemplates it for just a second. “Nah.” He eases back toward his pillow and then fixes Tony with those do-whatever-I-want eyes. “Stay?”
“No place I’d rather be.” Tony fluffs up the pillows, slips back under the covers and opens his arms.
His son wastes no time curling against him, his ear pressed against Tony’s heart. This time it’s Tony who melts.
“FRI, cut the lights.”
Tony lets his eyes close, his body settle. One hand creeps into Peter’s curls, his fingers combing through them gently.
Peter hums in appreciation, pressing himself a little closer. “That’s nice.”
Tony marvels how such a simple action can bring so much pleasure to a child who has known too much pain.
How this kid has chosen him to be what he needs.
“May could never get me to stay home from school either,” Peter whispers. He doesn’t sound sad, just sleepy.
Tony drops his neck even though it’s awkward and presses a kiss to the top of Peter’s head. The invocation of May Parker feels sacred. Peter opened the door. Now Tony must walk through.
“Did she do anything special on those mornings you wouldn’t stay home?” Tony asks.
“She’d make breakfast.”
Tony hesitates. The next words are poised on the tip of his tongue. His response would have been automatic, before. Now he worries it’ll sound crass.
For a genius, you sure are an idiot. He can picture May staring down at him from the pearly gates with fond exasperation. Everyone knows I can’t cook. Even the big man upstairs.
“Was it edible?”
Peter snorts and doesn’t pull away, and Tony passes the test. “Kinda.”
“Kinda edible seems right in my culinary wheelhouse. I’ll see what I can manage.”
“I love you, Dad,” Peter says, and the acrobatics start up again right under his ear. Tony’s heart races, but he’s never felt such peace. “So much.”
And Tony is twisting again, until his lips find Peter’s forehead, the kiss saying everything he doesn’t know how to put into words. “Right back atcha, kiddo.”
Tony knows that Howard wouldn’t recognize him, this grown man cradling his teenage son like he’s the most precious things in any multiverse. Tony isn’t the cold business tycoon Howard wanted him to become, or the rebellious man-child he’d been when his parents had died. He’s worn many disguises and twisted himself into plenty of caricatures through the years. Hated what he saw in the mirror so much he’d poisoned himself until he couldn’t see straight.
But he’s done with that now. He’s figured out who he wants to be. Mechanic, husband, father. Everything else is secondary. He’d give up every cent of his fortune to hang on to the trust of this exceptional man curled against his chest, and the wonderous little girl tucked into her princess bed across the state.
Because Tony wasn’t the broken one; he finally understands that now. There had been something wrong with Howard, that he hadn’t loved Tony enough to say it. Because loving Peter and Morgan is as natural as breathing. Tony had thought himself incapable, and managed it anyway.
Turns out he’s always been whole. He’ll try not to forget that again.
As he listens to Peter’s breathing deepen into an adorable little snore, he thanks the indomitable spirit of May Parker for giving him someone to remind him.