Chapter Text
Tony’s favorite place on campus is Professor Jonson’s classroom. It’s a nice quiet room at the end of a nice quiet hall. It’s a calm quiet space that he can fill up with his music because Professor Jonson lets him play it as loud as he wants. Nobody yells at them to turn it down because there’s usually no one else in the hall. Just Tony, Professor Jonson and Professor Jonson’s giant blackboard.
Now, Tony has seen big blackboards before. His father had many of them around the workshop. But they were never big enough. They were never big enough to fit everything in Tony’s head. He hated having to simplify his thoughts so they could all fit. He hated not having any way to explain his ideas just because the stupid blackboard was too small.
But this blackboard is always big enough.
It can fit everything, and there’s always room for more.
It never has any chalk marks on it; the Professor is very picky about keeping his blackboard clean.
The texture makes Tony cringe when his fingers touch it, and he has to scrub his hands until they’re red and raw to get the grimy feeling of chalk off them. But it’s so tall and wide and clean and shiny that it’s worth it.
So, every weekday evening, he walks down the quiet hall to the quiet classroom. He plays his music as loud as he wants and writes out everything on the big blackboard. Professor Jonson stands over his shoulder and watches, occasionally asking a question or thinking out loud about the mystery of Tony’s mind (‘’We should let the neurology department study you. The way you’re brain works is fascinating, but surely you want to find some way to manage your complexities’’)
‘’Incredible work Anthony’’ Professor Jonson says as Tony takes a picture of the mess of numbers on the board.
‘’Thank you, but I think there’s something wrong with the formula.’’ He smiles softly before starting to clean the board. It takes a long time to wipe off everything. The cloth soaked in cool water makes his hand sting and the feeling of swiping it across the board makes him want to scream. But at least Professor Jonson finally stopped breathing on his neck.
‘’See you tomorrow Anthony’’
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Someone is already playing his music. As soon as he turns into the hall, he can hear the muffled sound of his ‘Science Mix’ that he left in the class last night. Tony didn’t think Professor Jonson liked his music that much, but who else would be playing it?
He walked into the class to see someone using the blackboard. He was tall, wearing a tight shirt that showed off his muscles and Tony can already see that half of the stuff he’s writing is wrong.
He looks a little intimidating, but his math is all wrong and tony can’t just let him mess up everything and have to start over.
‘’Um, excuse me?’’ the words come out much too timid. The man turns around, his eyes search the room for a minute before landing on Tony. He smiles, ‘’You must be Anthony,’’ he says, putting down the chalk and fully turning towards him. ‘’Um, yeah…’’ Tony says barely above a whisper. ‘’Professor Jonson said you’d be coming, I was wondering if we could talk about the blueprints you left here last week’’
‘’You want to talk about my blueprints?’’ Tony asks, hesitantly making eye contact with the man.
‘’Yeah! I mean, they’re brilliant!’’ He smiles. Tony can’t find any trace of mockery on his face. He feels an unfamiliar emotion swell in his chest. It’s warm and makes him smile. He’s never had someone actually want him to talk about his work. Sure, Professor Jonson likes to watch, but as soon as Tony starts talking about it, he tunes him out. All the reporters want to talk about is how proud his father must be. They couldn’t care less about the work Tony put into his inventions. But this guy wants him to talk. He’s eager to listen. He wants-
‘’And my friends are gonna be so jealous when I tell them I saw a Stark’s blueprints!’’
Oh. The warm feeling goes away. He only wants to brag about him. Tony tries his best to hide his disappointment. This is still someone who wants to listen, even if it’s just for bragging material, and Tony will take any chance he can get.
He puts on the Stark smile and pulls the blueprints out of his bag.
“You got a name?” He asks, imitating the way his father speaks when he’s explaining his inventions. If the man noticed the sudden change in Tony’s demeanor, he didn’t show it.
“James Rhodes.” He says, putting out a hand for Tony to shake.
“Hi James. Call me Tony.” He hopes James doesn’t notice the pain in his eyes when they shake hands.
They spend hours hunched over the blueprints. Once James has asked every question possible and Tony has explained every subtle detail in the design, James invites Tony to his dorm for frozen pizza.
Tony spent what felt like hours contemplating the invitation. Did James actually enjoy his company? Did he want to be Tony’s friend? Even if it was just because of his name, Tony would like to have someone to talk to other than his professors.
What if he was using him? Howard warned Tony about people who did that. People pretending to be friends with Tony to get inside Stark Industries. “And if that ever happens, the fall of the company will be all your fault” Howard’s words ran through Tony’s mind at one hundred miles a second.
But he really, really wants a friend.
“Sure” He smiles. A real smile this time.