Work Text:
it’s not that bad at first.
it starts off simple, like forgetting where he’s going on the subway, or needing a new timetable because he can’t remember what lessons he had that day. he’d brushed it off, nonchalantly bringing it up to mr. stark, who’d shrugged it off and assured him it happened to everyone.
of course, nobody noticed when peter started walking into classrooms dishevelled and confused. they didn’t really worry when peter, honours student, stopped doing his homework, stopped turning up to lessons.
they started to worry when his absence morphed from hours into days. ned would turn up at his door, to see a confused looking peter, still in his pyjamas. (school? not today, surely?) he’d seemed so genuine that ned just couldn’t pin the blame on him.
not long after, he started blacking out, and would wake up in places often dangerous to himself. the little spells were getting more and more frequent, and it eventually became a daily thing to wake up and not remember how he’d gotten there. he would pass out at his desk, and sometimes wake up in the shower. he would pass out in his bed, and wake up hunched by his toilet, blood on his wrists.
bits of his memory were fragmenting with every passing day, until he couldn’t remember ned’s last name, and he couldn’t remember what he’d done yesterday at all. he begins shutting down at the slightest inconvenience, staring into space and coming to, not remembering a single thing in the aftermath. he’s driving himself crazy, and the diary he keeps by his bed to help with the memory loss is just littered in page upon page of garbled gibberish and pleas of death.
in a flurry of tears and confusion, he’d written down mr. stark’s name and number on a piece of paper on the unlucky chance that he’d end up getting so bad he’d forget his childhood hero. the thought of losing something so dear to him terrified him more than any villain ever could.
eventually, the dissociation had gotten so bad that peter had begun to seriously fear for other people’s lives. he had no care as to whether he would drown in the bath, or fall fifty two feet from a building in his suit. what he feared for ran deeper than his own suicidal fantasies, and tainted his memories of his favourite people. he’d dissociate whole conversations with may, and she’d look horrified when he’d eventually come through. he’d be in the lab with mr. stark, and wake up on the floor with wet cheeks and swollen eyes. he feared what happened in the episodes he couldn’t control, so he hid it deeper and deeper until it exploded and he found himself here, on the bathroom floor, covered in blood and sobbing his heart out for god knows why.
he doesn’t know why he’s on the floor. he doesn’t know why he’s crying, or why he’s covered in blood, or why there’s a shaky note to his left telling may not to cry and to please, please forget about him, but he does know that he’s fucking terrified. peter can’t remember his own birthday, and his name comes to him in a language he doesn’t recognise. he’s petrified.
his body trembles as he warily looks around himself, flexing his fingers to watch the wilts in his wrist open and close. blood trickles out of them individually, and they join like a river to run down his fingertips and onto the floor. peter can’t find the energy in himself to move, or he’d scream for help.
he doesn’t remember making the cuts - in fact, he can’t remember where he lives, and he’s sure he lives with a woman but he can’t remember her name for the life of him. he’s sure there’s a man in his life he should call, but he can’t remember the password to his phone, and wouldn’t know who to look up in the phone book.
peter clumsily gets to his feet, stumbling around the bathroom until he finds the door handle. he grips it, hard, hard enough that he can see his knuckles through his skin, and opens it to stumble into a room with white walls and a pale carpet.
he stops, and stares at the bed in the middle of the room. his eyes travel to the walls, to the bookcase, to the small table holding an iron man mask.
peter smiles and walks over to pick up the mask with wobbly legs. he stares at it for a moment, before harshly shoving it down onto his sweaty curls, locking the clasp under his chin.
he smiles. no matter what, he’ll always have iron man.
the mask’s a little small, but he breathes deeply and grounds himself nonetheless. he can see a little clearer now, and the anxiety in his chest has somewhat deflated. he still has no clue where he is, but he knows iron man, and that’s good enough right now.
there’s a note next to the bed, and peter sits with his legs crossed before pulling it off of the nightstand. in scrawled handwriting, is a name and a phone number, and peter furrows his eyebrows at it.
tony stark.
01896 69210 - PERSONAL!
the confusion that washes over peter is so frustrating that he starts crying again, so lost that he doesn’t know what to do with himself other than sob and shake. he looks at the paper, covered in small little wet dots, and bites his lip.
perhaps, if he could remember the password to his phone, he’d phone the number and find out who tony stark was. instead, he cries in pure frustration and lets out a shallow scream when nothing comes up in his memory but fog.
”tony stark, tony stark, tony-” he repeats to himself, over and over and over again. it grounds him slightly, keeps his head slightly more focused.
with shaky legs, he pulls himself to his feet and sets out through the door opposite. it opens onto a landing, some stairs to his right, and he chooses that option. he has no idea what’s in any of the other rooms, and he’s not sure he’s supposed to.
when he reaches the bottom step, opening out into a large room with two sofas and a tv, he takes note of the phone hanging on the wall. it’s beeping at a gentle pace, a soothing comfort in the silence of the airy home. he looks down at the crumpled note, and back at the phone. the numbers are right there, so he doesn’t hesitate in punching them in.
it rings for a long time, and then goes to voicemail. a gruff voice answers, introducing himself as happy. oh. perhaps he’d got the wrong number.
he rings it again, just to make sure, and this time someone answers.
“hello?”
the voice is husky and full of sleep, and peter furrows his eyebrows and tilts his head at the window. oh. it’s nighttime.
“tony stark.” he says.
“the one and only.”
“tony stark, tony stark.”
“kid? are you alright?”
peter freezes. he hadn’t expected to get this far, and now he doesn’t know what to do. why had he phoned him anyway? he can’t remember getting down the stairs, let alone figuring out a way of contacting this tony stark.
“look, kid, if this is a prank with your friend neil or whatever his name is, please hang up.”
“tony stark.” he repeats, and starts to cry.
“kid? what’s going on? why are you calling me?” the voice is more awake now, and it sounds closer, like he’d been on speakerphone before. peter slows his breathing to match the man’s, and tries to calm down.
“i...” he trails off, almost sobbing there and then. “i don’t remember.”
“what do you mean?”
the tone’s more urgent now, and there’s a gentle whirling in the background that peter can’t recall ever hearing (although, can he recall anything?)
“i can’t remember anything.”
“underoos, i’m not understanding. you’re gonna have to help me out here, kid.”
“i don’t know who you are!” he screams, shaking in anger. his hands are balled into little fists at his side, and he can hardly breathe through the pressure on his lungs. the whirling stops, and tony’s breathing ceases.
“kid? what’s going on?”
“i don’t know.”
“kid, you’re gonna have to elaborate. i can’t fill in all the gaps here.”
there’s a strange sound of iron clinking, and then something that sounds like a whoosh of air, and then peter can’t breathe. his lungs won’t work in time with his brain, and he’s panting and gasping on the floor before he can realise where his body’s taking him. ‘tony stark’ is shouting in his ear, telling him that he’s nearly with him, but peter can’t hear him over the dizzying in his head and the bike that builds up behind his tonsils. he’s crying so hard he’s driven himself to such a frenzied panic that he finds the phone out of his hand, and hanging off the wall.
he tries to breathe through his lungs, but they refuse to inhale, and he gasps like a fish out of water at thin air. retching, he pulls himself to his hands and knees before collapsing in a shaking heap by the wall. there’s a knock on the door ahead of him, and his brain can’t decide whether to be afraid or relieved. his mouth jumbles up the scream of terror with a whimper of relief, and all of a sudden his vision’s going black and his head is so light, he feels like he might die. the iron man mask has been discarded from his head to the floor, and he tries to focus on it with all his might.
“kid?” the voice from the phone is back, but it sounds like it’s coming from underwater, and it travels through his ear like a slush. his head twitches at the noise, but he’d more focused on trying to breathe than answering the person.
“hey, pete, it’s me. you gotta breathe, okay? breathe.”
there’s arms around his shoulders, pulling him up into the warm chest of someone, and he sobs into thin material, too frantic to care about who’s comforting him.
“can’t...breathe.” he chokes out, but he can breathe now, and he’s panting and breathing far too quickly to catch his breath but at least he can inhale now.
“you’re alright.” the voice soothes, and there’s a hand running through his hair.
“i don’t know what’s happening, i don’t-”
the tears don’t stop until his lungs start working properly again, and peter finds his body exhausted to the point that he’s collapsed on the floor with his back against the wall. a man sits opposite him, in a t-shirt covered in tears and trousers full of tiny holes.
“peter?”
peter twitches. at least he can remember his own name.
“it’s me, tony.”
“tony s-stark.” he confirms, hands shaking violently as his chest rises and falls. slowly, he’s coming to, but he still can’t focus, and he has no idea why he’s on the floor.
“yeah, kid, it’s me. what’s going on? i thought you’d gotten over the panic attacks, huh?” the tone in his voice is gentle, but peter flinches nonetheless. he can’t remember ever having panic attacks before.
“where’s may?” tony tries, and peter jolts in confusion.
“who?”
tony’s breath catches in his throat, and he leans forward.
“may. your aunt, pete.”
he doesn’t say anything, but apparently that’s enough for tony to see the genuine confusion in his eyes. his breathing has calmed down now, so his senses are all too clear when tony continues to interrogate him.
“where’s ned? what about that girl, mj?”
peter just shakes his head as the tears fall quicker, and he sobs through his hands.
“i don’t know, i don’t know! i can’t remember anything!”
tony asks him where they are, and peter can’t form a proper answer for him. in all honesty, he has absolutely no clue where he is at the moment, and he’s not sure why the floor is so cold underneath him, but it’s grounding him and he hates feeling.
“kid, do you know who you are?”
“peter.”
“are you just saying that because that’s what i’ve been calling you?”
peter freezes.
“oh, kid.”
the warm hug isn’t expected, but peter welcomes it nonetheless. he sobs against the shoulder of this man he doesn’t know, repeating that he can’t remember anything, and that he doesn’t know who, or where, he is. tony just whispers sweet nothings in his ear, rocking him back and forth gently.
“i promise we’ll get you sorted.” he murmurs, over and over again.
peter sniffles, and tony takes that opportunity to rest back against the wall, his arms guarding peter’s small body in a gentle hug.
“that’s me.” he smiles, and nods towards the iron man mask. it’s too small for peter, and the paint is scuffed in more places than one, but he calms down at just the sight of it.
“i’ve got the life size one. wanna see?”
despite his pain, peter manages a wobbly, tearful smile and nods, almost shyly. when tony gently lets him out of his arms and stands up, letting peter grip to his arm, he doesn’t complain. when peter cries into the real iron man mask, he doesn’t complain, because iron man is the only thing peter can remember and he’d be damned if he took that away from him.
from behind the mask, peter smiles, a genuine toothy, smile, and relaxes, if only slightly. when he has nothing, he’ll always have iron man.