Back home, I realized the team was still gone, as expected. I walked into the kitchen and looked in the fridge for something to eat. I grabbed an orange from the bowl on the kitchen counter and decided to throw myself on the living room couch while taking out the surveillance camera footage on my phone, to watch the rest of what happened this morning.
"Jarvis, play the video on my phone on the TV," I ordered. Meanwhile trying to remove the orange peel without spilling the fruit juice on myself and the expensive couch.
The video continued to play from where I had stopped at school. I boringly ate the orange, only listening with one ear.
After watching what was left on the tape I summed up that they did not go into as many details as I had hoped to. I only figured out that Mister Barnes was alive after all, but I did not know if he was the Winter Soldier, who was behind two dozen assassinations, or Steve's best pal Bucky. And neither did they. If he was the Winter Soldier, Steve was the only one with a positive mind, who thought that they somehow could bring him back and make him remember who he truly is — someone who stands up to bullies and watches over the little guy.
I shivered at the thought of the Winter Soldier, everyone knew who he was and everyone had heard the stories about him. The rumours about him only got worse with time, each time the story was different. If someone said he killed two guys just for fun, another person said it was four. He was like a wolverine — killing every hen in the den but only eating one. He was the monster parents warned their kids for and he was always portrayed as the bad guy.
Each time a new rumour spread across the internet about the Winter Soldier, the Avengers did everything they could to find out how much truth was in it, and at the same time tried to keep it away from Steve. They knew it was hard for him to try to accept the fact that his best pal was an assassin and a good one for that matter. And the fact that he was not his Bucky anymore broke him.
◦ ☆ ◦
After two hours of watching a boring cooking show on the TV to get the thought of the possibility of an assassin living under the same roof as me, I decided to make some dinner before starving to death. I walked to the kitchen and scoured the cabinets looking for anything easy to cook, when I opened the fridge I saw a small box with leftovers and mumbled a 'thanks' to Natasha for making sure I was fed. She knew I would be too lazy to cook.
After I had microwaved the spaghetti and meatballs I poured myself a big glass of water and returned to the same place on the couch, continuing to watch the cooking show. That kind of competition shows made me realize how badly I would work under pressure.
After eating my boring meatballs that looked very store-bought, unlike the food on the show, I decided to go to bed early and completely forgot about the homework that was due tomorrow. I just did not care enough anymore, I did have the Stark brain l and could remember almost everything, so there was never a problem when the teacher wanted me to answer something written on the board.
◦ ☆ ◦
"Miss Stark, wake up!" Jarvis said, sounding like he was worried for my health and begging me to open my eyes.
I slowly peered them open, but they widened as soon as I looked at the digital clock on the nightstand to my right.
"7:40, how is that even possible?!" I exclaimed in panic, stumbling out of bed while trying to not entangle myself in the sheets and putting on some decent clothes at the same time. "Jarvis, you are supposed to wake me up at six o'clock!"
"I'm sorry miss but I tried to, you just did not react."
"Stupid robot," I mumbled while running down to the kitchen in a half-awaken state, nearly tripping over my foot.
I grabbed an apple, looked in the mirror and tried to decide if I looked good or not before exiting the tower through the elevator down to the garage.
Happy stood in front of the SUV looking nervously at his wristwatch — a very shiny Rolex. When the elevator doors opened and he saw me he opened the passenger door and hurried back to the driver's seat.
"I was starting to get worried about you," he mumbled.
"Well, there gotta be a first time for everything right?" I said making Happy chuckle. "Now drive, I cannot be late," I said in a way that got him to stay silent for the rest of the ride.
It was nice to sit in silence where I also could calm down from my abrupt awakening and eat my breakfast — an apple — in peace.
I rushed into school when the last bell rang and was relieved that the classroom I had to be in was near the entrance.
My teacher Mister Harrington had tried to start the lesson when I walked in and was already writing on the board, so I discreetly sat down in the back behind Peter and Ned. Who seemed to be in a deep discussion.
My classmates continued to talk and ignored poor Mister Harrington, and since I could not hear a word he was saying due to the loudness, I had nothing better to do but eavesdrop on Peter and Ned. I tried to focus on their voices, just like I had trained with Natasha. She had taught me how to not draw too much attention to oneself when listening to a conversation you were not supposed to hear.
Ned talked slowly which made it easy to hear every word he said. "She just disappeared, there were too many people around me and it took fifteen minutes to discover that I was following someone else. Why couldn't you follow her instead, we both know that you would never lose her."
"May wanted me to come home as soon as school ended," Peter mumbled back before our teacher managed to silence the classroom.
I once again thanked Natasha, this time for teaching me something I have use of, to listen to the latest gossip and to satisfy my curiosity.
Still, who was Ned following yesterday, and why did he do it for Peter? I wondered while Mister Harrington had everyone's attention on the board.
Probably Liz or some other cute girl that Peter thought he had a chance with, what a perv. Even if my imagination made it up I felt sick at the thought of them stalking a girl, I thought they were better.
In my first year, Ned and Peter were the only ones who I could think of getting to know better, maybe my gut feeling was not as good as I thought it was.
After five minutes of thinking I turned my focus to the board and began taking notes.
When Mister Harrington finally was done writing and explaining he told us to follow the instructions on the paper he handed out to us. It was a simple task I had done with Bruce when I was around ten years old and he had wanted me to be prepared for school. We were supposed to lower the water's freezing point by combining water and salt.
As he walked past me I told him I could do it by myself since we were an odd number of students in the class. He agreed.
I quickly mixed the salt into the paper cup half filled with water, wrote a detailed lab report and handed it to Mister Harrington, who gave me a boring look and told me to help the others for the rest of the lesson.
Before I could even turn around there was a loud bang from the back of the room, everyone started to scream and began running to the door. I froze for a second before slowly walking to the windows and opening them to let the white smoke out, hopefully before a fire alarm would set off.
How was this even possible?
When I turned around I saw the only ones still sitting in their seats, Peter and Ned, with pale faces and covered in something white. It looked pretty sticky.
Mister Harrington looked like he was going to explode any second, which Ned noticed. He simply pointed at Peter.
"I expect to see you in detention at three pm today, Parker," he said trying to calm down a bit. Ned had a relieved look on his face.
"Clean this up, both of you," he grabbed his books and stood up. "And do not think I have forgotten about you Leeds, see you there as well." A smirk plastered on his face for a second.
As he walked out of the room he yelled dismissed to the rest of the class, who was beginning to calm down and stood in the doorway and peeked into the classroom.
◦ ☆ ◦
The rest of the day passed as ordinary, nothing more happened after the incident in the lab, sadly. I could frankly need a big distraction so I would not worry about my dad and the rest of the team. They would be fine as usual but I could not help but overthink too much, I always found at least ten different ways for the bad guys to win. Living alone on the big floor escalated the bad thoughts in my awful mind, and the longer they were gone, the worse it got.
When the bell finally rang, I gathered my things and quickly walked out, trying to avoid the other students. Well outside the school grounds, I slowed down and picked up my phone, sending a message to Happy.
Sad man
Where are you? School starts soon!
Read 7:47
I'm going shopping now so you don't have to pick me up
Read 15:34
Tony wouldn't like that and you know it, I'm waiting for you in the alley, hurry!
Read 15:35
No, see you tomorrow. Because I'm walking back!
Read 15:35
I'm calling your father if you aren't here in 5 minutes!
Delivered 15:36
Samantha! Don't ignore me!
Delivered 15:37
Before I could see his last texts I turned my phone off and started walking towards the galleria. I needed a distraction and Happy was only a reminder.
I walked around in different stores, mostly clothing related, looking for anything. And ended up buying a wine-red satin dress with matching high heels. At the jeweller I bought a necklace with a thin golden chain that had a soft golden star, it was one of the last things they had on sale. The cashier stuck her eyes on me as soon as I walked into the luxury store, presumably thinking I would shoplift the silver rings that were closest to the door and in no locked cabinet.
The shoes had high and narrow heels, and small straps around my lower calf to secure and stabilise the foot. The dress showed a bit too much skin and sat tight on my curves. My shoulders were almost bare, except for the spaghetti straps, but that was what I had been searching for. I wanted to feel gorgeous and have people glancing at me, even for just one night. I knew that my dad always threw a party after a successful mission and hopefully, I was invited to this one.
As soon as there were any visitors in the Avengers tower I had to lock myself in my room and had to wait for Jarvis to tell me that everyone had left before I could walk around normally again. This time, my goal was to sneak out of my room and go to the party.
◦ ☆ ◦
In a park near the tower, I stopped to get some ice cream, sat down on a bench with the bags to my left and relaxed as the sun shone brightly on my pale skin.
After eating the ice cream I looked around more closely, studying the people around me. I saw a little boy with a puppy in a leach. The cute and energetic puppy jumped around the boy, almost pulling him over before the parents rushed over to them. I giggled at them but it died out as soon as I saw a familiar face — Ned's — near them.
Why was he here, and alone? I thought to myself.
Before I was allowed to go to public school my dad had checked all of my classmates and their parents, inspecting where they lived and worked. Just in case someone's parents were a big threat to me because of Iron Man.
Out of boredom one day I had gone through the very detailed list, and Ned lived far away from here. On second thought, I did not live near any of my classmates. So I was wondering what he was doing here, especially after his odd behaviour recently and overhearing him and Peter stalking someone.
Ned was talking to someone over the phone, he looked nervous and his eyes wandered over the crowd of people. I stared at him but as soon as his eyes found mine his mouth fell open and he quickly turned around. I also turned my head away, slightly embarrassed.
I stood up, grabbed my bags and began walking towards the tower, I wanted to get away from Ned as soon as possible. If he did see me and wanted to talk — he is remarkably social — and it would not surprise me if he would come right over to me.
When I was around a hundred meters from the tower I thought of what Peter and Ned had talked about in the morning. I quickly turned around and began looking for him, as a precaution.
He stood behind a dumpster.
Our eyes locked for the second time and now I began feeling irritated, I started walking in his direction. Not breaking our eye contact. Ned realized what was happening, turned around in a swift motion and hurried away.
I stopped and let out a relieved sigh, spun around and calmly walked towards the tower. I took the door by the garage to enter the tower, said hello to Jarvis who informed me that Happy was waiting for me upstairs and that the team still had not come back.
As the AI had told me, I found Happy walking back and forth in the living room.
"Do you know how worried I have been? Do not ever do something like that again!" He said sternly, trying to keep a stern face and lecture me.
"My phone died" I mumbled. "And by the way, you know I can take care of myself."
Happy left me with a warning, as usual, for when I did stuff like this.
There could be times I felt so sick being locked up in this house, that I just wanted to leave and never come back. Maybe travel around the world, or just jump from a balcony. Anything for the hiding to stop, and that is why I sometimes ignore Happy's texts and calls, to be somewhat of a rebel.
As soon as Happy left me I went up to my room, I lay down on the bed and stared up at the ceiling. Completely exhausted.
A few minutes later I was sleeping.