Before
Most people underestimated him. Mistook him for just another billionaire wasting countless amounts of money towards absolutely nothing.
And at times, he was exactly that. But then it happened.
The crash, the desert. The huge wave of stress and anxiety. He was only able to save himself with a car battery and a lousy metal suit.
A couple months later, he was Iron Man. And even more months later, he was an avenger.
Living with the avengers was okay, though at times he wished he was alone. Steve was always being an old man, Clint was annoying, Natasha scared him, Bruce was okay, and Thor was too loud.
Until the stupid winter soldier came and ruined everything for him.
With no other place to stay, Steve and his crew came back to live at Tony's tower. It was a hard decision to let the man who murdered his parents and the people who betrayed him live with him, but he agreed out of loneliness. And as expected, things were never the same from there.
After their breakup, Pepper was never as close to Tony as she used to be. They remained friends, but hardly talked at all with the exception of work purposes.
That's why Tony's sitting alone in his lab, working on some shield upgrades, shutting himself out from everything else.
He has officially just broken his record of not eating or sleeping, for 5 whole days. He didn't seem to notice though, being too focused on making his machines work.
"Sir, I must insist you get some rest. You have not eaten or slept for 5 days and 14 hours."
The sudden voice of Jarvis snapped Tony back into reality.
"Not now J, I'm almost done." he grumbled in annoyance.
"My apologies sir, but I worry for your health. According to the department of science, a normal human will die after 2 weeks of no food or sleep."
Once again, Tony sighed at the AI's words.
"Fine Jarvis, but don't ask me again, or I will sell you to some college." Tony stated, trudging slowly out of his lab.
"Understood, sir."
Nobody knew what was really going on inside of Tony. I mean, he's had 40 years of experience with his "paparazzi face" and acting to the public.
But deep down, something was slowly consuming him. Feelings of losing self worth, depression, and anxiety began to overcome him, as he sank into a hole he could never escape from.
As he made his way out of his lab to the kitchen, he noticed it was unusually quiet in the tower. Not that he minded though.
He scavenged through the refrigerator looking for food, when he heard a sudden BOOM.
Tony jumped at the sound, with his anxiety completely taking over. He clutched the refrigerator door as he slowly sunk to the ground, gasping for air, as the events in Afghanistan all came back to him.
"Breath in and out sir, slowly."
He remembered Jarvis's words, and began to slowly breathe in and out. Panic attacks were awful, always hitting him at unexpected moments with almost anything being able to trigger them.
Breathing heavily one last time, Tony slowly stood up, groping the kitchen counter, and made his way to the sound of the gunshot.
He grabbed the gun hidden in a file cabinet, backed to the door. As he turned around and pointed the gun in the room, he realized there was no gunshot or intruder.
It was only a movie, coincidentally his favorite, Saving Private Ryan. As he crept into the room, he saw all the avengers curled up together on the couch.
Natasha was laying on Steve's shoulder, Clint on Natasha's lap, Thor was accidentally slobbering as much popcorn as he could on Steve, Bucky was getting pissed off, Wanda was on the edge of the couch, and Bruce was on his own separate chair.
Tony was confused at first, until he realized it was Friday, and each Friday was the weekly avengers movie night.
He tried tapping his foot lightly to get someone to notice him, but nobody seemed to hear. He then tried it a little louder, yet still nobody heard.
Nobody listens to you.
Ouch. Sudden thoughts like that occasionally came up to him, and had a bigger effect than they should've.
"Ahem.." he finally mumbled.
Everyone on the couch suddenly either got up or turned their heads at him.
They looked weirdly guilty in a way.
"Uh, hey Tony..." Bruce spoke softly with a guilty grin.
"Um, hey, watcha watching!" Tony said awkwardly, scratching his neck.
"Saving Private Ryan." Bucky spat with a glare. "You wouldn't like it".
"Well, for a matter of fact this is my favorite movie so.....you wouldn't mind if I joined you, right? I mean it's also kinda my house so....uh..." Tony asked with a cringe.
The avengers exchanged disappointed and cringed glances, until Steve finally replied, "Yeah, sure."
Tony gave a weak smile as he awkwardly walked to the couch and sat in the only open spot, near in between Clint and Natasha.
Natasha moved further away from him as she scanned him head to toe, then continued to lie on Steve.
Clint looked pissed off, having to leave Natasha's lap for Tony to sit.
Nobody looked as relaxed and happy as they used to be, not focusing on the movie, but rather the fact that Tony was there.
Nobody wants you here.
He knew he shouldn't care about the small things like this, but all the disgusted and annoyed looks were getting to him.
Tony began to fidget with his hands in embarrassment and disappointment. They were his friends, and he shouldn't need to feel this way in front of them.
But why did they feel this way about him?
To his surprise, the movie suddenly stopped, with the pause icon showing in the TV corner.
Tony turned to Steve, with the remote in his hands, as Steve got up.
"Okay, it's pretty late, so, uh, we should all go to sleep now." Steve said with a fake smile.
All the avengers looked at Steve, puzzled, until Natasha got up as well.
"Steve's right, we should go." She (fake) yawned.
Clint and Thor nodded their heads in agreement and quickly paced out of the room.
Wanda and Bucky both exited without a thought.
Bruce sighed and slowly walked out, glancing at Tony one last time before heading to his room.
"Uh, here Tony, you can finish it." Steve dropped the remote near Tony as he quickly walked out.
It had only been 45 minutes through the movie, yet they all decided to "go to bed" at 8:00.
Tony remained alone in the room with a confused and sad look, as he got up and looked around.
Nobody cares about you.
Tony sighed and walked out of the room, back into his lab.
These people he thought were his friends, who he considered his only family didn't even care about him. Sure they had their hardships, with the winter soldier incident and constant bickering, but he still considered them family.
Nobody likes you.
Ouch.
It was only a matter of time until he would break.
With nothing to do or nobody to talk to, Tony began to work on his equipment once more.