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chapter fourteen
SURPRISE VISIT
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PETER SITS ACROSS FROM Graham, his head in his notebook, eyes furiously scanning the same three sentences over and over until he must be dizzy. Ned tries to pretend that he doesn't notice. It's futile, though. How can the quietest person at the table somehow be so loud at the same time?
Lena taps her pen on the table. Her novel for AP Lit — Pride and Prejudice — is being held open by her other hand, highlighters sprawled out around her in a dizzying rainbow of color. Her sticky notes have started to escape to Graham's fourth of the space. He doesn't seem to mind, because he's trying to focus on AP Calc.
They're all tackling different subjects. Ned is attempting to complete an outline for AP Euro while Peter is tackling Physics— they have a quiz tomorrow. She's so shocked to see him actually studying and not blowing off something school-related that she's afraid to break the silence.
Soon, though, it gets to be too much for Ned to bear. "So, Graham, how's life?"
Graham's shoulders slump in relief at the ruination of the quietness. He looks up from his calculator, shrugging. "Alright. I've been working on this song for a few days, and I think it's going to be decent."
Lena fights the urge to scoff. Decent isn't in Graham's musical vocabulary. He's practically a prodigy. In the few songs he's sung for her, they've always brought tears to her eyes one way or another.
"Your mom told me you finally applied to Julliard," she mentions as casually as possible. The corners of her mouth tug into a small, proud grin.
Ned's eyes nearly bug out of his head. He slaps a hand on the table, causing several passerby to jump, but Peter stays intently focused on staring at his notebook. "Dude, you want to go to Julliard? That's so cool!"
"Thanks." Graham smiles sheepishly.
"I hope you make it, bro," Ned says with an intentional poke on Peter's arm. The pale boy jumps as if he had been zoning into a completely different world. "Did you hear? Graham applied to Julliard."
"That's cool," Peter hums with a nod. "Good luck."
He glances back down at his notes. Just like that, the tension in the air is back to its normal, palpable thickness. Lena's face falls as Peter rests his cheek on his hand and twitches his nose absentmindedly.
She'd turned on her phone last night to see three missed calls from an unknown number. Then, after reading texts from the same person, she discovered it was May, who had gotten her number from Ned and was insanely worried about Peter.
Lena had called back immediately. May picked up within half a ring, causing Lena to stumble over her words as she explained that she was at a friend's to study and had turned her phone off, but she thought Peter said something about doing something for his internship.
It didn't feel good to lie to May, but it wasn't like she could tell the truth. And she will keep lying if it means keeping the remaining shreds of Peter's happiness somewhat intact.
"Uh, Lena," Graham says pointedly with a nudge to her elbow. "Ned and I are going to grab coffee. Do you want anything?"
"Yeah, sure," she answers, sliding out of their booth at Ristretto so he can climb out. "You know my usual."
"We'll be, um, back," Ned stammers before scurrying away. Graham sighs, following him toward the line near the counter.
Peter doesn't seem to notice the absence of their friends. His eyes haven't moved, almost like he's trying to burn holes into the paper with the force of his stare.
Lena releases a breath before reaching across the table and sliding the notebook away from him. Peter jumps, protesting clumsily as he watches her take it and wrap her arms around it securely so it's against her stomach.
"No, you listen to me," she says sternly. Her eyes bore into his, forcing him to focus on her as she turns her voice a little softer. "Peter, you can't do this to yourself. We failed. And, yeah, it sucks that we did. It sucks that you got your suit taken away. But still, you can't let your abilities define you. You can't just ... give up like this. If Tony, or Cap, or Thor, or any of the other Avengers gave up after they made a mistake, they wouldn't be Avengers, and they certainly wouldn't be who they are today."
Peter furrows his brows. "Cap's a fugitive." Lena stares at him again until he relents, glancing away from her. "I guess you're right. That was, uh" — he scratches his ear — "that was good."
"Thanks," she says, pleased, and leans back in the booth. "I took speech last year."
Thank you, Aristotle, for writing Nicomachean Ethics.
"Did you..." he trails off for a moment before finding the courage to look her in the eye again. "Did you mean what you said about you thinking I'm something without the suit?"
"Of course." Lena shrugs like it's no big deal, even though her cheeks are starting to warm. She unwraps her arms from his notebook. "Here's your notebook back."
She slides it back to him, accidentally shoving highlighters out of the way and causing them to take up even more of the table. Two of them fall to the ground with a clatter. Peter reaches down to retrieve them just as Graham and Ned return to the table, a drink in each hand. They both stop short to recalculate the atmosphere clinging to the booth.
Finally, after a few seconds, Graham announces, "You owe me five dollars."
Ned groans. He sets down the cup of coffee in front of his empty spot across from Lena and whines, "Peter, you couldn't have kept brooding for five more minutes?"
Lena casts the two boys a confused glance. It's amusing to see them standing next to each other, really, because Ned is shorter than Peter and Lena and Graham is six-foot-two. He easily towers over the Filipino boy.
"Ned didn't think you'd get Peter to break," Graham explains as Lena climbs out of the booth so he can get back to his spot beside the window. "I always had faith in you, though."
Peter playfully rolls his eyes and accepts the coffee from Ned, setting it beside his neat arrangement of homework. Even though he seems determined to continue studying, the tension is gone from his shoulders. He appears less lost in his own mind. Instead of trying to shut himself out of the world, he becomes an active part of it again.
"Sorry if I was being an ass," Peter says sheepishly.
"You're moodier than a teenage girl sometimes," Ned teases. When Lena sends him a warning glare to remind him that she is a teenage girl, he quickly backtracks. "Not that that's a bad thing. It's just that I'm used to—"
He yelps. Graham's brown eyes are sending alarms toward him, subtly shaking his head. He must have kicked Ned's shin under the table. How his long legs managed to miss Peter and Lena's is impressive to her. Such grace had been applied to a single kick.
Peter clears his throat. "Anyway, I'm sorry."
Graham gives him a benign smile, a drastic difference from the warning look he'd given Ned only moments beforehand. "Of course we forgive you, Peter. But if you mess up again..."
"Oh, shut up," Lena says with a roll of her eyes, giving her best friend a halfhearted shove. Graham laughs at his dumb joke that was only funny to him. Noticing the way Peter's complexion has grown slightly paler than normal, she adds, "Ignore him. His threats are empty."
"I wouldn't say empty," he corrects, "because I did martial arts for, like, ten years and taught you everything you know about hand-to-hand."
This does not lessen the brunette boy's fears. Graham isn't usually intimidating, but when you take into account his height, the sometimes violent swing of his emotions, and the way his biceps seem to slightly strain against the sleeves of his shirts, you begin to realize that he has the potential to be dangerous.
"You're going to make him shit his pants," Lena scolds. "Peter, seriously, don't listen to him. He isn't going to hurt you, and you're forgiven."
"This time," Ned adds cheekily.
Peter sends him a glare that could wither crops.
-♕-
As soon as she unlocks the door to her apartment, Lena is hit with the smell of food. She pauses in the doorway to identify the source of the scent before she can see it on the stove. Dinuguan?
"I'm home!" she announces to whoever is there to hear her. She kicks her ankle boots off at the door before placing them neatly beside the welcome mat. Her socked feet slightly slide against the wood floors as she crosses the threshold into the kitchen.
The room is as colorful as ever, with pork stew being prepared by Pa, just as she suspected. There isn't any music playing from the radio or her phonograph. Rather, Pa's posture is tense, his shoulders hunched over the counter as he chops vegetables. The way he stands directly contradicts the brightness of the room. It sends a sense of unease down to her gut as she slides her backpack off of her shoulders and lets it softly hit the ground.
"Pa?" Lena questions hesitantly. It's during times like these — when she can tell the smile lines are absent from his eyes, a frown pulling down his lips — that she feels small.
Her father sets down the cutting knife and releases a breath before turning to face her. Sure enough, his mouth is set in a firm line, a crease between his eyebrows. His tanned skin appears taut in his face. Something in Lena shrinks. Pa would never hurt her, but he can be scary when he's angry.
Her mind begins to whirl, automatically assuming the worst. They'd finally found her suit, mask, and wig in its hiding place. Her secret's out. She'll be forbidden from stopping crime ever—
"Sorry to stop by during dinner," a voice says from the living room, making Lena's blood freeze in her veins. "That was very rude of me."
She turns, and if she hadn't reached out to grasp the island counter beforehand, she would have collapsed due to her suddenly wobbly knees. Her heart plummets. The thoughts that had been mounting up in her head come to a screeching halt, leaving only one thought left among the ringing silence:
What the hell is Tony Stark doing in her apartment?
He's dressed casually in a long-sleeved AC/DC band shirt and jeans that probably cost more than her laptop. Despite the fact he tried to dress like someone who isn't utterly rich, he still sticks out like a sore thumb amid the clutter of her home.
Suddenly, Lena becomes acutely aware of how small her apartment is. For a family of three, it's the perfect size, but somehow, he makes it seem tiny. He's too big for this place. A stadium wouldn't be a sufficient size to contain his personality, his reputation, his ... everything.
Tony doesn't look fazed by the pile of dusty classic novels on the coffee table or the fact that their kitchen is a wreck. In fact, he only seems concerned with Lena. He had barely looked at her during that time on the roof. But, now, she has all of his attention, and she hadn't been prepared for it whatsoever.
Lena swallows in an attempt to soothe her suddenly dry throat. "How long have you been there, Mr. Stark?"
"Oh, pshhh, only about" — he swings his right arm around so his sleeve rides up around his watch — "fifty minutes." She tries and fails not to gulp at the thought of Tony Stark alone with Pa for that long. "Did you see the kid? How is he? You know what, never mind the small talk." Tony claps his hands together, facing a silently fuming John Rivera. "Mr. Rivera, it's a shame your wife isn't here to receive the news firsthand, but I wanted to wait until Lena was here to state my business being in your humble abode."
Your daughter is a recipient of the Stark International Scholarship in Technology. This will help you with the funds for college. She wants to go to Cornell, right? Tough competition, very expensive. Not only will this alleviate some of those costs, but it will also make it slightly easier for her to get in."
Lena never applied for the Stark International Scholarship in Technology, nor has she heard of it before. Maybe it's another one of his alibis for something secret and Avenger-related. After all, the Stark Internship meant Peter got to go to Germany to fight Captain America & Co, so he's probably lying out of his ass about helping them out with money.
Pa, however, buys Tony's serious tone and the very official-sounding terms he uses. He blinks, the crease between his eyebrows disappearing as the words sink in.
"I didn't even know she applied," he says, glancing at his daughter.
"Surprise?" she says in a slightly unsure tone. Her eyebrows raise, shoulders shrugging up in an attempt to seem innocent.
"If I may, sir," Tony cuts in before Pa can begin to form more words. "I need to give Lena a packet on the further requirements for this scholarship. It's best if we discuss things in private. Is that okay?"
Lena has rarely seen her father speechless, but, in this moment, he doesn't seem to be capable of responding verbally. He only nods and urges Lena toward the superhero.
Her father, who thinks the Avengers are abominations, letting her speak to Tony Stark alone? Her father, who distrusts everything they do ever since his co-worker was killed in the Battle of New York. Her father, who only wants his daughter to have a better chance at school than he had.
Damn. It seems Tony's done his research.
Lena's legs struggle not to shake as she leads the way to her room. She had cleaned the floor, right? Her mind zooms back to this morning before she'd left for school. Is it presentable? There isn't really anywhere else for them to go that's private except the office, and that's littered with Pa's research.
She pushes the door open and lets him inside first, relieved at noticing that her floor is, in fact, clean. The only issue is that her desk is covered in supplies from a project she'd worked on a few days ago and hadn't bothered to put away yet. She quickly shuts the door and leans against her desk in hopes he won't notice.
Tony glances around at the Wonder Woman poster, the stack of records in milk crates, and the overall messy aesthetic that makes her room hers. "Cute."
Words fire from Lena's mouth before she can stop them. "First of all, Mr. Stark, I'm sorry for literally anything I have said to you, ever, and I'm sorry about the ferry, and the Vulture guy, and not listening and almost dying in D.C."
Lena usually isn't one to be insecure. She considers her self-confidence to be pretty high for the average teenager, but under the eyes of such an influential man who's in her house for some unknown reason, all of that is lost.
Tony, seeming to notice this, holds up a hand. "Hey, kid, I'm not here to smite you."
"There's no scholarship, is there?" she questions somberly.
"Not yet, but I'm making one for you." Tony lifts a briefcase she hadn't even noticed he was carrying. "You're gettin' into Cornell in two years."
Lena, overwhelmed to the point where she's certain she'll collapse, tugs her swivel chair around and plops herself into the seat. She rakes a hand through her wavy hair. Her fingers get stuck in a knot, causing her to have to take an embarrassing moment to detangle them.
"I don't understand," she says, hoping her face isn't cherry red by now.
"I've done my research," Tony explains. "A lot of research. I know about your financial situation, about your powers, about your friends and the clubs you're in at school. But... I also need you to prepare yourself. I dug deep."
It's suddenly hard to breathe. "What do you mean?"
"You're adopted, correct?" Tony questions with a meaningful raise of his eyebrows. Lena nods, then her eyes widen and her chest compresses even tighter.
"You..." she falters, nearly unable to speak the words her brain wants her to communicate. "You found information on my parents? My... real... parents?"
The older man holds the briefcase up with one hand and expertly opens it with the other. He removes a file from the inside. It appears to be average, but the energy radiating from it makes the weight in Lena's gut return twice as heavy.
"I'm going to give you a choice," he says, the usual amusement gone from his voice. "I compiled this information because I thought you deserved to know. You don't have to read it. If you don't want to right now, I'm just a phone call away. If you want me to burn it, I'll light it on fire. But if you want to read it..." He holds the manila file out toward her.
Lena swallows again and eyes the papers inside of it. Her past, something she's been wanting to learn about for her entire life, is literally being handed to her. She's been dreaming of this moment ever since she was old enough to understand adoption. It seems surreal that it's happening now. Now, when she isn't prepared. Now, on an ordinary Wednesday mid-afternoon. Now, and by Tony Stark, of whom she didn't even know knew her name.
When she was younger, Lena would daydream about her parents. They were doctors, both of them incredibly smart and so loving toward their daughter. Two perfect beings who were distraught when they lost her. Then they morphed into two superheroes who had to work undercover. That's where Lena got her powers from, and they were passed onto her through birth.
She's had countless other visions of what she thought her real mother and father were like. Now it's time for her to face the truth. Is she really ready to throw all of her childhood dreams out the window?
Lena glances up at Tony for guidance. His expression alone informs her that he really will do as she wants. If she wants to read it, he'll give it to her. If she wants him to destroy it, he'll do so without question or complaint.
She takes the file. When it's in her hands, Tony straightens and clears his throat. "This is gonna change your life, kid, and you're not going to like what's in it. Are you completely sure you want to do this?"
The hopeful six-year-old in her is shoved aside. Her eyes flicker with determination as she stares down at the ordinary folder that has the power to make her into a totally different person. For some reason, she isn't scared anymore.
Without a word, Lena releases a slow breath to steady herself and opens the file.
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cliffhanger because i love you guys
first thing's first: i read an mcu timeline and apparently this movie took place in 2016 and infinity war was present-day, so lena would be in the process of graduating by then. just pretend that isn't the case i guess?? oops?? can't believe i already fucked up the timeline wow
i was really excited to write this chapter and delve more deeply into tony and lena's relationship because it's going to be important in infinity war and avengers 4! i love tony, what a dad
also, CAPTAIN MARVEL TRAILER GOT ME LIKE JAFKRMAFKJFFJANJLP
-kristyn