It was a fairly normal day in the lives of Earth's mightiest heroes. There weren't any missions to go on, so they were all relaxing at the tower. "Hey Steve, can you toss me the remote?" Steve nodded and handed Clint the tv remote. He channel surfed for a while before landing on some random action movie. No one was really paying him any attention as they had their own side conversations.
Steve got up from the couch and went over to the kitchen where he ran into Tony. "Want me to fix you a drink Capsicle?"
Steve chuckled at the nickname "I'm just here for a bottle of water. But thanks anyway."
Tony rolled his eyes "You're so boring! You need to live a little! Get some adventure in your life!"
He raised an eyebrow "Tony, you and I both fight giant robots every other Tuesday. How is that boring?" he shrugged and walked back into the living room.
They all continued their chit chat when they heard the elevator ding. A second later, Pepper walked out with another woman behind her. Tony got up to greet her, but she walked right past him. He looked like he was going to faint. "Steve?" She brought the other woman to him "This is Miss Hathaway. She's a social worker."
"Hello, Mr. Rogers." She shook his hand.
He smiled "You can call me Steve ma'am."
She blushed "Well, then you can call me Sarah." She brushed a hair from her face "I have something that I need to discuss with you."
"Ok." He nodded "Let's go somewhere more private." He led her into one of the conference rooms.
She rummaged through her bag and pulled out some papers from a folder and handed them to him "This is going to take some explaining, do you remember your cousin Ethan Parker?"
"Sure!" Steve smiled. "He was the son of my Mother's sister. What about him?"
"Well," she continued "He went on the have a son named Samuel Parker. Samuel Parker had two sons, Richard and Benjamin Parker. Richard and his wife Mary died several years ago. However, they had a son. He went to live with Ben and his wife May. Ben died a year ago and May died last week."
Steve looked up at her "I am very sorry to hear that but, why are you telling me this now?"
She pointed at a picture clipped to the paper in his hands. "Richard's son is 15 years old. He has lost his parents, his uncle, and now his aunt. He has no other living relatives to take care of him and will be put into a foster home in two days. That is..."
It all fell into place. Steve looked down at the picture "I'm his last living relative..."
"Exactly." She nodded. "I know this would be a huge responsibility, and I know that you are very busy in your line of work. All I'm asking is that you consider letting him stay with you. Just until he's 18. The boy can really use a father figure about now and I think you're the last chance he's going to have at getting one.
Steve stared at the picture of the smiling boy with curly brown hair. "What's his name?"
"Peter. His name is Peter Parker."
~time skip~
"Peter chill! You're going to be fine!" Michelle grabbed his hands to keep him from picking at his shirt sleeves.
"Dude you need to calm down," Ned added. "You're getting yourself worked up over nothing."
Peter took a deep breath "It's one thing finding out that I'm related to Captain freaking America, but it's a whole other thing to be going to live with him!"
"Assuming he says yes," Michelle added.
Ned elbowed her "Not. Helping."
Peter sighed "No she's right. He has so many other things on his plate, he doesn't have time to take care of a teenager."
"Hey don't say that." Ned put a hand on his shoulder "you need to have a little faith."
Peter looked down at his watch "He's supposed to be here soon. I should probably go downstairs."
They nodded "Come back up as soon as you're done!" Ned smiled.
Peter was about to walk out the door "Peter?" he turned around "Everything's going to be ok. I promise." He smiled at Michelle and walked down the stairs.
~time skip~
Steve arrived at the address Sarah had given him and saw her waiting outside. "Hey Steve!" he walked over to her. "Ok so here's what's going to happen. You and I are going to go into Mr. Leed's office, Peter is already in there. You both are going to have a bit of time to get to know each other. Once you have made your decision just tell me and you and I can talk it over in the hall. Depending on what you say, I will go in and tell Peter your answer. Sound good?" he nodded and followed her into the house.
They walked in and Steve saw two adults sitting on a couch drinking coffee. They waved at Sarah then went back to their own conversation. He looked up and at one point saw a boy and a girl looking down at him from the top of the stairs. When they knew they were spotted they quickly ran back up the stairs. They must have been Peter's friends.
They reached the end of a hallway and he took a deep breath as Sarah opened a door. Inside was a large desk, some bookshelves, and a few lamps. But that's not what Steve was paying attention to. In the corner of the room, a boy with curly brown hair sat messing with his shirt sleeves. When he heard the door open he immediately stood up.
"N-nice t-to meet you, Mr. Rogers... er... Captain Rogers... do you prefer Mr. or Captain? Mr. makes it sound like that old kids show... but that wasn't really your time... I'm sorry I mentioned it. That probably wasn't very polite..." Peter didn't know what else to say so he hung his head in embarrassment and stuck his hand out "I'm Peter... but I'm sure you knew that... or you might not have... I shouldn't assume things. That's rude... Actually... I'm just going to stop talking now..."
Steve chuckled and shook his hand "You can call me Steve if you'd like. And several of my friends have made the joke about Mr. Rogers. I feel like I'm sort of obligated to see it."
Peter perked up and grinned "Oh you should! I watched it as a kid and really liked it!" he did a one-eighty "Then again I was like 5 so I liked most tv... you would probably think it was pretty silly... it's just a kid show... god why did I mention that..." he whispered under his breath so only those in the room with super hearing heard him.
"Why don't we all take a seat?" Sarah said motioning to the 3 chairs set up in a circle. They both did as she asked. "For starters, Peter why don't you tell Steve one thing interesting about yourself."
"Um..." he rubbed his neck nervously "I'm not exactly a very interesting person... I'm no good at sports, I stink at video games, I tried the trombone once but that didn't turn out very well... I like science. So... I guess that's different..."
Sarah smiled at him and turned to Steve "Peter attends Midtown School of Science and Technology. He is at the top of his class in Physics, Chemistry, Algebra, and Trigonometry. He is so advanced in these subjects that the teachers have to assign him extra homework just to give him an actual challenge."
Steve whistled "That's impressive! I was never good at math myself. Literature and grammar were always my favorite classes."
Peter scrunched up his face "I am terrible at grammar. Especially spelling. I cannot spell to save my life. Like literally, if some guys held me at gunpoint and were like 'spell 'oxygen' or you'll die' I would just jump off a cliff right then. Ok... that's a pretty morbid analogy... I need to stop talking..."
Steve started laughing "You've got a fun sense of humor."
Peter perked up and grinned "All of my friends say it's my best feature!" he looked down again "All two of them... in fact... most people say it's my worst feature... it really depends on who you ask..."
Steve looked up at Sarah concerned and she just sighed "Steve why don't you tell Peter something about yourself?" he looked up and met his eyes. Steve could see that he was hurting but he could also see that there was hope for him yet. "There's no need." The other two were confused "Assuming it is alright with you Peter... I would like to offer you a place to stay with me."
Peter's eyes widened "Really?!"
Steve smiled "Really."
Peter out the door and up the stairs. A few seconds later they could hear screaming. Sarah smiled at him "Thank you."
Steve smiled as well "He's a sweet kid. Goofy, but sweet." He thought about the best way to word his next question. "Is Peter... ok?"
She sighed "I just don't know. I haven't known Peter long enough to know what he was like before the loss of his aunt. From what I gather, he has two friends, he gets picked on at school, and ever since his uncle died his grades have slipped slightly. According to his teachers, he has started falling asleep in class and he often leaves class to use the bathroom and doesn't return. All of his teachers pitied him though so none of them have ever confronted him about it."
Steve nodded "None of that sounds good."
"No, it doesn't," she answered. "Maybe you can find out what's up with him."
"I'll try."
(A/N - Hey guys! :) Thanks for reading! I hope you like it so far! Remember, with great power comes great responsibility!)