Chapter Text
Harley Keener didn’t exactly know why his aunt had thrown him out. He had some clue as of why, but he wasn’t certain and it’s not like he could walk back in and ask. He could see his sister looking out from her bedroom window and not really understanding what was going on, and he couldn’t blame her for that, after all she was only nine.
Oh my god, he was actually being thrown out at the age of 13.
What was he supposed to do now? It was already September, in a few weeks it would be too cold to sleep outside. And where was he supposed to go anyway? His mom had actually worked herself to death. They had no other family that they knew of except the aunt that had just thrown him out. Speaking of her, here she comes again.
“YOU THINK I WOULDN’T FIND OUT? YOU ARE AN ABOMINATION!” and weren’t those the perfect words of a goodbye.
Harley could feel his heart hammering in his chest, like it was begging to be let out. His aunt started throwing his stuff out and Harley himself had trouble breathing. Tears were welling up in his eyes, tears of shame, humiliation and fear. Had she really found out? Would she really react this badly? If his own family could react like this… Not just his own family, but the only family he had left non-the less.
Oh god, what was he going to do? What would now happen to his little sister? He was only 13 how was he supposed to survive on the street? He couldn’t stay in Tennessee, could he? Oh god, oh god.
The second his aunt slammed the door shut and locked it Harley tried staggering himself to his feet. It took a couple of tries, but he did it. He was shaking quite badly, however he did manage to pick up the stuff that was now laying on the wet ground. At least she had been nice enough to throw out two bags and his piggybank. He started shaking more as he packed his stuff into the bags. His aunt had thrown out clothes, a pair of shoes, some jackets, some of the tools and the inventions that had been laying around in his bedroom. No blankets, no pillow, nothing to sleep on, not even an old teddy bear.
After packing it all down in the two bags, he started walking down the street. Not really sure what to do now, he started to walk towards the rubble the whole Iron Man incident had led to three years prior. It was abandoned, and no one had really done anything with it after Iron Man left.
When he arrived there it was already dark out. And after walking around for about five minutes he confirmed what he had thought, it was no-one here.
He was alone.
It was like someone had shifted him into autopilot, because if you asked the next morning he would have no idea how or when he made a makeshift bed with the clothes his aunt had thrown out or when he had found PotatoGun Mark IV and laid down it beside him. But he had done it. It was either him or someone else and he couldn’t remember anyone being there, plus it was a creepy thought.
It took him a couple of seconds to remember everything and start crying when he woke up. He must have been crying for a good hour before his stomach started rumbling. Oh god, oh god, what was he gonna do about food? That was all it took for him to start balling again. The tears pounded down his cheeks like there was a rainstorm going on. Snot started mixing with tears and some of the salty snot-tears got into his mouth while he tried calming himself.
‘Deep breaths, deeper, deeper, let the hiccups pass and take a deep breath again. Pack your bags and get going, you can hitchhike to New York or Florida. You are a genius, a smart kid, you can figure it out, just get going.’ Harley set these thoughts on repeat as he packed his stuff down again, only stopping when he got to the piggybank. Every cent he had ever gotten was in that piggybank, but how much it was, he wasn’t sure. Well, there was only one way to find out.
Harley gathered all the anger, fear and sorrow he felt and threw the piggybank to the ground. It broke in a million pieces. He started picking up the money. Not really caring about the broken pieces laying around. He let out a snort as he thought about how his mother would have reacted, him with all these sharp pieces that he could hurt himself on.
“That doesn’t matter now though does it, Ma being dead and all” Harley whispered bitterly.
He only cut himself twice picking it all up, but it didn’t hurt badly so he ignored it. After counting the money twice it seemed he had gathered a little over 300dollars in his 13years of life, it wasn’t bad. He packed the money in many different pockets, some in his jeans other in his jackets and hoodies. The 13yearold made sure to place some of the money in the pants he already wore and some in the outer pockets on both his bags.
While making his way to the main road he decided that the truck stop was probably a good place to start, that was they did in the movies and books anyway. As an added bonus he could still do the big eyes and trembling lip shebang. Yeah, Harley could totally do this.
And he did! Kind of…