Chapter Text
The projection fades and the room darkens a fraction as the glow from the holographic table shuts down. Tony finds that he can’t quite move except to blink rapidly; the wetness in his eyes had appeared less than halfway through the film, but now the tears are escaping and he isn’t quite sure what to do first.
Peter’s hesitant ''Tony?'' helps him make a decision and he turns and pulls the kid towards him, wrapping him up in an embrace that has Peter squeaking slightly under the force of it. He holds on just as tightly, fingers sticking to the back of Tony’s shirt and his face pressing into the juncture of his neck and shoulder.
''What is it with you kids turning me into a leaky faucet, huh?'' Tony grumbles, kissing Peter on the temple. '''S’just rude, kiddo.''
''Does that mean you liked it?''
''Look at my face, Pete,'' Tony says as he leans back, swiping the tears away with his thumb. ''What do you think?''
Peter laughs softly before a shadow of uncertainty falls over him, sending his fingers into a little dance with one another.
''I just wanted to do something, y’know, a bit different but, like, meaningful, I guess. To show how much I love you – '' Peter freezes as the last three words leave his mouth, looking a little stunned, like he isn’t quite sure he should have said them. He swallows and carries on before Tony can interject, '' - and I know I love you isn’t something we really say but I do – we all do, I mean, and – ''
Tony lets him ramble on, watching him closely, savouring the moment of Peter just being Peter.
It’s true that it isn’t something they really say; now that he thinks of it, Tony can’t recall a time that he’s said it to the kid apart from the moment shown in the video. He remembers hearing Peter whisper it to him as he drifted between asleep and awake after the surgery on his arm, but after that, it’s all been unsaid; little unspoken moments like the ones they've just watched, small gestures and soft touches and words that declare the same thing without actually saying it.
It confuses Tony greatly. This, what he feels right now as he looks at Peter, at his kid, is a love that is the end result of a slow burn, something that came to life in flickers before transforming into an all-consuming rush that only grew more palpable as time went on, as he came to understand just what being a father, what having children, truly meant.
He’s lived and nearly died for this love, cried and grieved and denied until his once ironclad barriers couldn’t hold it back and had to let it in, let it take over all that he knew and replace it with something warm, fierce and unconditional.
''Underoos,'' Tony’s voice is gentle and soft, the tone he discovered when he said his very first hello to Morgan. It stops Peter’s jabbering and the kid waits, looking at him with big, anxious eyes.
Tony reaches out and cups Peter’s cheek, clearing his throat as something overwhelming tugs at the back of it. He thinks of how hard it must have been for the kid to go back and look through moments where he didn’t even exist in the world, after he had been stolen away and held far from Tony’s reach, seemingly forever. It’s a clear example of Peter’s unfailingly generous nature that he would put himself through such a thing, place himself willingly on the back foot just so that he can do something good for someone else.
God, Tony loves him. So damn much.
And the truth is, even after looking at the clips and pictures, after being reminded of a darker time before Peter was even a blip on his radar, Tony can’t clearly recall exactly what life was like before he loved him as ardently and as irrevocably as he does right now.
And that’s why the words all but skip out of his mouth in their eagerness to be heard.
''Kiddo, I love you,'' he says, voice catching on the most important word which has Peter drawing in a sharp breath, ''more than you could ever imagine.''
Peter’s laugh surprises Tony, but then he’s smiling as the kid beams at him, eyes shining with happy tears as he jerks a thumb at the now blank space where the projection had been. ''I think I’ve got a pretty good idea.''
Later on, after they’ve hugged a lot and cried it out and brushed off the questions about their impressively red eyes, they stand together in the yard, Morgan between them and Harley and Nebula on the other side of Tony, pressing in as close as they can so that Tony is essentially serving as the pillar for their little mismatched huddle. The fireworks turn the night sky a majestic rainbow of colour and rock the ground with the force of their bangs and Tony tucks Peter close as the kid lets out a startled laugh at an impressively loud rocket that erupts into a shower of blue and red. He leans in at an awkward angle to avoid squashing Morgan but manages to rest his head against Tony’s shoulder. Dum-E, who has somehow managed to get hold of a fire extinguisher, is hovering near to Steve and Bucky as they set off the rockets. His arm is craned back as far as it can go and he lets out a steady rhythm of excited trills as each firework escapes into the darkness.
''I still can’t believe you named it the Iron Dad Chronicles, you little shit,'' Tony mutters into Peter’s ear and closes his eyes with a grin as Peter chuckles into his neck.
''You should embrace it. Personally, I think it sounds way better than Iron Man.''
Tony tilts his head to catch Peter’s gaze and soaks in the happy smile on the boy’s face. He thinks of all the moments the kid re-gifted to him in the video, of all the days he was a dad without realising and all the times after that when it was as obvious as the sun in the sky. He glances at Harley and Nebula, taking in the childlike excitement on their faces; looks over at Dum-E and marvels fondly at the oddly human-like qualities of the bot as he wriggles with what can only be happiness; looks down at Morgan and feels his heart skip at the joyful delight in her eyes and then turns back to Peter, pressing a kiss to his forehead.
''You know what, kid? Me too.''