I Can Do This All Day [Oneshots]

False Impressions // Pepperony + Peter

Pepper watched the photo she had framed and placed on a desk in her home office. The photo shows Peter and Tony sleeping in a workshop. The redhead sighed. It had been a year since Peter had lived with them, but their relationship had hardly changed. When the three of them were together, everything was fine. Pepper felt like they were a real family, but once Tony wasn't home, Peter spent most of his time in his room, and it was as if he wasn't here either. He called Tony Dad, but she had something to do to make him call her Pepper and not Miss Potts. He simply made it clear that he didn't need a mom. And it made her heart pound because she really liked him and envied her husband for his relationship with Peter.

"Mr. Stark on the line," Friday told her, distracting her from her self-pity. 

"When are you returning home?" she asked as soon as the call was answered. She was usually glad for a few days without Tony because sometimes she really needed a rest from him, but now she was too sorry to never be Peter's mother.

"Miss me already?" he teased her, but when she did not answer him with a sarcastic remark, he knew something was wrong. "Did something happen?"

"No, I'm just sad," she muttered.

Tony paused for a moment. This was not like Pepper at all. And it didn't take him long to figure out why. After all, that was primarily the reason he had gone away to a conference he would other times have gladly sent someone else to, but he needed to leave so that the two stubborn could finally spend some time alone. And by those stubborn, he means his wife and son.

"Do you know you really have to spend some time with him for that to change?" he told her with a sigh. It never occurred to him that he would have to be the sensible one. When they adopted Peter, he thought it would be just the opposite. Just like it always was. Pepper has always been the sensible and mature one.

"But he's in his room all the time! Let's face it, he doesn't want to be closer to me," she said resignedly. She should tell May about it, but she didn't want to worry her. She moved back to Italy and the main condition was that Peter would be happy here. Could she tell her she failed?

"Alright, that's it. Listen, I didn't want to say anything, especially not over the phone, but you don't give me another choice. Peter loves you. He just thinks the same thing you do. He thinks you don't want to have anything to do with him. He thinks you tolerate him just because of me. And he really admires you and doesn't want to bother you because he thinks you're too busy with a leading company. Of course, I told him it wasn't true, but he didn't believe me. You have to start talking to each other," he told her. He was very much looking forward to Pepper taking over this responsible role again.

"Does he really think so?" she asked in surprise. She had no idea he could think that, and she was immediately ashamed. Tony was right. She had to talk to him. She acted hurt and it was not like her. She saw it now. "Thank you so much, Tony! You helped me a lot, I don't know what happened but you opened my eyes. I have to go now!" she blurted out, and before her husband could say anything, she was out of the study.

She headed straight to Peter's room, thinking he would be right there, but it was a surprise to her when she found his room empty.

"Friday, where's Peter?"

"In the workshop, Miss Potts," the artificial intelligence replied, slightly worried, which made Pepper nervous. It was no secret that Tony's AI would often accept human qualities, and although Friday was not yet as emotionally intelligent as Jarvis, it was often clear what she thought from the tone of her voice.

Pepper sped up her pace. It probably wouldn't be anything serious, otherwise, Friday would have warned her earlier, but it still didn't stop her from worrying. And when she finally arrived in the workshop and found Peter holding a needle in his hand, she didn't know if she was panicking or getting angry.

"Peter, what happened?" she screamed worriedly, already standing beside him.

"Just a little stab during the patrol," he replied sleepily, staring somewhere behind her.

"Just a little stab? Jesus, kiddo, and why didn't you tell something? And how come you didn't inform me, Friday?" she asked,  now her voice firm. It was not the first time she had found herself in such a situation. She was already trained for that. 

"I told her it was nothing. And it's true, it'll be gone by morning, it just needs to sew it up," he told her as she took the needle from him. "You don't have to worry, I'll do it myself."

"You don't have to do it alone. Do you know how many times I've put Tony together? Believe me, I'm an authorized person here," she said and disinfected the needle.

"But I can really do it myself. You must have a lot of work to do," he muttered under his nose and it made her heart ache.

"Well, I think there's a conversation we need to have," she said and she began to sew a stab wound on his arm. "As it turned out, we were both idiots who thought the same thing. We both thought the other didn't care about us. But that's not true. You need to know that I love you and I care about you. And it really bothers me that we don't spend that much time together. I thought you didn't want to, and I didn't want to force you," she explained with a small smile on her face.     

"Are you serious?" he asked quietly, finally giving her a look.

"Of course, honey. You don't even know how much I envied Tony all this time! He's not the only one adopting you, you know? On paper, I'm your parent just like he is. I would be happy if that would be the same in reality," she confided and completed the last stitch.

"Do you really want to be my mom?" he whispered in amazement. 

"It would be an honor," she smiled. "Your wound is stitched up, so it really should be gone by tomorrow. This time you were right, it was a small wound, but you should have told me anyway, okay?"

But he didn't listen to her at all. "Pepper? I love you, too," he told her gently. He was so happy.

Pepper smiled so much it must have been blinding. "I'm going to make dinner. Do you have any wishes?"

"Actually yes. What if we ordered something and watched Star Wars?" he suggested and her heart missed a beat. She knew that Peter adored Star Wars and that he wanted to watch it with her meant a lot to her.

"I think that sounds great," she agreed, so they went to the living room. And it became one of her favorite nights in her life.

•••

I wanted to write something with Wanda or Bruce, but I ended up with Pepperony again. I have soft spot for them. ✨