BLACK WIDOW

aversion

aversion
(n.)
a strong dislike of deep seated inclination

•••

"i cannot make my anger beautiful. i cannot make my pain sweet."

•••

"Anthony, dear," an elder woman of 70 said as she poured a glass of water. She wet a folded rag. "Your parents will notice."

The young man of 21 that the woman was talking to scoffed, taking the glass of water. He's obviously hungover. "As if dad would notice. He cares for me about as far as he can throw me."

They were in a quaint, clean, fresh smelling kitchen that was obviously decorated decades ago. The young man, Anthony was sitting at a table.

"Oh, is that what it is this time?" asked the old, yet very well kept and regal seeming woman as she pressed the warm rag to the young mans face. "Last it was that your father was more prone to study you hard enough to find any and all defects and use them to your disadvantage for his enjoyment."

"Wait... yeah. That sounds about right. Sorry, Peggy," the man said sarcastically, rolling his eyes.

"That's Aunt Peggy to you, young man. Or Agent. It you really want to get that cold wit me."

The man look up at the older woman with sadness in his eyes. "Aunt Peggy..." he said in just more than a whisper, his voice laced in sadness.

She smiled, hiding her pain. "I'm sick, Tony. There's nothing we can do about that. My memories are fading away faster than I am."

Tony began to tear up a bit, looking at his "aunt" with an untouchable love. "Don't say that, please."

"But you know it. You know what's not fading away, dear?"

He looked up at her in curiousity.

"You, Tony. You are going nowhere. You are the strongest soul that I have ever known. And I knew Captain America pretty damn well."

Tony scoffed at the name.

Peggy sighed. "I know the name is cold to you. But that's no reason to hate your father. He is trying his best to raise you to be someone he never could be."

"Aunt Peggy, Dad hates me. He is not trying to 'better' me. He's trying to run me off."

"Trying to run you off, huh? Well if you hate him so much, why haven't you?"

Tony scowled. "I could never leave mom."

Peggy sighed and sat in the chair across from Tony. "Promise me, Anthony Howard Stark that you will grow up to be a handsome man do do some good with you father's company. That you will find a beautiful woman and have so many pretty boys that you will know exactly how your father feels. He is under so much stress. He knows things that would age you fifty years. And the sad thing about it is that..." she stoped for a moment, a tear appearing in her eye. She placed a hand on Tony's cheek. "That these things that he knows, he knows in the protection of you and this country. That I'm going to outlive him and I've got a terminal illness."

Tony's brows furrowed. "What do you mean?"

Peggy sighed and leaned back in her chair. "You know what I mean. You father is living out his last few days. And you are here at my home, hungover from an idiotic party and squabbling about how much you hate each other."

Tony looked down at his feet. A smile tugged at the corner of his lips. "I hate it when you talk sense into me."

Peggy smiled. "And I hate how I have to do it nearly every week. Tony, dear. I'm not going to be here very much longer to do this do you."