JUST A LITTLE BROKEN|| t. s.

Chapter 8: 'F' Word

"Tony?" Mom calls out.

"Yeah?" Annoyance and hope in his voice.

"Thanks so much, I'll make it up to you," Mom says in a, dare I say it, sultry voice. With this, dad perked up, and I understood what they meant. Ewwwwwwwwwwwwieeeeee! These two forkin' lovebirds are going to have- Eeewwwwwwww! Oh forks! These two parents of mine... I love them but when they say or do this in front of me, their daughter, I want to just go into my room and stuff my face with food.

I sighed. Dad made his way to the bathroom to change, while I was left with Lucilla and mom.

"Elise, hon, make sure to watch over your father, you too Lucilla," Mom directed to me and Luci.

"Yes ma'am," Lucilla said still on the couch.

"Yeah sure," I replied.

After we chatted a bit, mom went out of the line to sleep or nap. I smirked my way at Lucilla and she rolled her eyes, fishing out a 100 bucks out of her wallet.

"Damn, I was so sure I was winning," she muttered shaking her head. I took the money and stashed it in a secret compartment in the couch.

"I never lose a bet," I said, a matter of fact. She rolled her eyes again and I smiled.

"Yeah right."

Dad came out a few minutes after mom went out, and he was wearing the pants and shirt, his jeans and sweatshirt tucked on his left arm.

"She never does, trust me," he said referring to our previous conversation.  He put his clothes on the armrest of the couch and sat down, taking his scotch again.

The three of us chatted a bit and watched some lame old movie.

A few minutes later, we went down a few minutes early to the conference hall of Stark Tower and sat down on our places. Lucilla was beside me while Happy was beside dad. We were chatting away, until more guests, officials, and reporters came around. The time came and Lucilla stood up for the opening. She stood straight on the podium with the mic a good few inches away from her mouth.

"Good morning, ladies and gentlemen, please be settled down in your seats and one question at a time, please. Thank you," she said kindly with a smile. She looked back at us.

"You're on." Dad and I stood up from our seats and went on to the podium, with the mic in between us. Reporters raised their hands and dad picked out a blond woman. Typical.

"Mr. Stark, since when have you moved in Stark Towers?" she asked, the camera rolling.

"Well, considering I accidentally blew up our home in Malibu,” cue laughter, “-A few months back, we decided to move in here after sorting out the problem in California. We have been staying here since February and plan on staying here until the house in California is rebuilt," dad answered effortlessly. After she sat down, another reporter called out.

"Mr. Stark is Stark Tower powered by an arc reactor or is it running on electricity? If so, why?" he asked. I thought we said one question at a time? Dude, were you even listening?

"Well, for now, Stark Tower is powered by electricity in the meantime. My daughter and I are still working on making a new reactor for the tower," dad answered, his usual paparazzi smike on his face.

"Ms. Stark, what led you to recreate a new arc reactor for the tower, given that there already is an existing one with provided blueprints?" a new female reporter asked. Wait, who picked you again?

Well, that arc reactor was actually destroyed and the arc reactor in Malibu was actually the newer and improved version of the arc reactor technology. But since nobody knew what actually happened back in the Afghanistan and birth of Iron Man incident, we were very careful about these types of questions. So, I answered her with a far-fetched but still remotely accurate answer to her question.