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On December 29th, the living room is silent.
Peter’s curled up in his self-dedicated corner of the sofa with his head slumped down on Morgan’s new ladybug shaped pillow – one of her favourite gifts from Santa - finally letting the post-Christmas exhaustion settle deep inside of him.
He's only half-awake, really, basking in the warmth of the cabin. The soft glow and the occasional crackle of the fire. The stray remnants of wrapping paper that they've been finding since Christmas Day when Morgan got her hands on the presents under the tree. The smell of the cinnamon apple spice tea that Pepper made him earlier that he's yet to finish drinking on the coffee table.
Home.
Then, when it feels like he’s only just closed his eyes and let sleep wash over him for a well-deserved nap, the warmth and Peter’s sleepy reverie is broken by the front door opening, an icy blast of air rushing in and sending shivers down Peter’s spine. The hairs on his arms stand up in goosebumps.
He cranes his neck around, too comfortable to fully commit to moving from his position, to glare at the offenders, finding Morgan and Tony stepping through the front door. Snowflakes swirl outside behind them, falling to coat the garden and porch with an icy white.
They’ve both got beanies shoved onto their heads and it looks like Morgan is wrapped in about five extra layers, mittens and her thickest winter coat emblazoned with tiny ducks, for good measure.
They’re bickering back and forth about something, as well. Peter’s ears have been able to pick it up ever since they got out of the car, alongside the rustling of the countless grocery bags Tony is holding. He'd hoped they might have stopped by the time they got in the front door, but instead, they bring it inside and break his peaceful silence.
“Daddy, please! We always go see the fireworks!”
That’s Morgan, her higher-pitched, whiny voice in play. Peter’s familiar with this - it’s the one she pulls out when she really wants something.
“I just don’t know about this year, bug. I bet we can still have tons of fun if we stay here. Even more than usual, I bet.”
Tony. His tone sounds fairly unwavering today, which is unusual. Most of the time he’s a little like Peter, unable to resist buckling and giving in to Morgan at least a tiny bit.
“But why? We always, always, always watch them from Uncle Happy and Aunt May’s apartment! They’ll be so, so sad if we’re not there!”
“They can both just come up here, and we can have a nice fun night here instead,” Tony reasons. Peter can catch the tiniest twinge of exasperation in his voice - not that he would ever make it obvious enough for Morgan to pick up on - and he gets the sense that they’ve probably been having this conversation for a while. “I bet everyone will be dying to play a round of Hungry Hungry Hippos with that new set Peter got you for Christmas. That’ll be fun, right?”
Morgan doesn’t look impressed with this answer. She frowns petulantly. “I won’t get to see the pretty fireworks.”
“Mommy bought some sparklers the other day, we could do those down by the lake. You loved doing that for your birthday.”
“Fireworks are way cooler," she declares, and Tony probably should have known. She's a Stark, after all. She was never going to be impressed by the tiny offering of a fizzling sparkler if the thrilling explosions of a firework display are on offer.
“Fireworks are overrated,” Tony shrugs. Morgan looks like she wants to disagree, but Tony continues before she can. “Plus, I bet Pete could use a quiet New Year’s this year, we’ve all been super busy so I bet he’s tired. See? Look at him now. He can’t even get up off the couch to help us with the shopping.”
Peter finally tunes into the conversation fully, instead of half-listening with the ear that isn’t still smushed into Morgan’s pillow, when he hears himself mentioned in Tony’s teasing tone. He glances up with a frown to see the both of them looking over at where he’s sprawled on the sofa. “Huh? What’d I do?”
“Nothing, Pete. Just-”
“Daddy’s being boring!” Morgan says, slipping her snow boots off and leaving them in the middle of the entryway in favour of charging towards Peter, flinging herself onto the sofa next to him. She’s still mostly dressed in full snow gear, and Peter gently reaches over to slip her mittens and coat off, laying them over the back of the sofa. Tony picks her boots up and slips them into the shoe rack next to his own.
“Dad’s being boring, huh? What’s new?” Peter grins. Tony catches his eye with a good-natured scowl.
“Watch it, kid."
Peter laughs, then looks up to ask, “what’s all this about, anyway?”
Tony is still standing in the doorway, grocery bags discarded at his feet as he rummages for something in his coat pocket before he takes it off. He looks up to meet Peter’s gaze and gives him a nonchalant shrug of one shoulder.
“Usually we go into the city for New Year’s Eve. Happy and your Aunt have a killer view from their balcony, so usually we watch the fireworks from there,” he explains, and Peter nods. The view is pretty nice. Sometimes after patrol, he likes to clamber up onto the balcony and just sit out there for a while before retreating inside. "We don't have to deal with the crowds or anything, but I thought maybe this year it might be nice to do something different, y’know? Spend it here instead.”
He can hear the underlying meaning of Tony’s words. Peter knows that he’s been gone but he wishes people would stop acting like they can no longer partake in their regular holiday traditions, the ones formed in the five years that he was absent from the same face of the earth they’ve all carried on walking, or as if Peter might break apart if they do.
May and Happy did the same, as if they genuinely thought he might be put out by the fact that they needed to pop into the West Village before the hit the freeway to get upstate in time for Christmas Eve, to pick up a box of croissants from their favourite bakery to eat Christmas morning (he wasn’t put out, obviously, but he will admit that May having a favourite bakery took a minute to digest. Peter has always been more used to the two of them shopping for luxuries like baked goods in the discounted section of the grocery store.)
Peter doesn’t want this to happen with Tony. He needs to show that he’s fine, that he doesn’t mind just desperately trying to fit in amongst a whole season of holiday traditions that he’s not a part of. He’s done almost an entire month of it. He can handle one more night.
“No, no, fireworks would be great. Totally fine by me” Peter says pointedly.
Uncertainty flits across Tony’s face. “You sure about that, bud? Being up here will be just as good.”
Peter shakes his head resolutely. The Starks have done so much for him already this year since he’s been back, an absolutely unfathomable amount, so the least he can do is just not get in the way of their New Year's Eve traditions.
“How boring would I have to be to say no to fireworks, right, Mo?”
“The boringest,” Morgan agrees solemnly. She pushes herself closer to Peter’s side until she’s almost in his lap. Her tiny feet and hands are still cold pressed up against him from the chill of the December air outside, but he wraps his arms around her anyway.
If fireworks for New Year's Eve are what’s going to make the Starks happy, then he can do that.
No problem.
Peter is curled up in bed when Tony pokes his head around his door later that night.
Peter already said a somewhat distracted goodnight to him, sometime around an hour ago when he first retired upstairs. Tony and Pepper had been busy pouring over Stark Industries December sales numbers at the dining table - or more accurately, Pepper was pouring over them (Peter isn’t convinced that Pepper actually ever stops working,) while Tony sketched what looked like an upgraded version of the War Machine suit thrusters in the margins of a scrap page that’d been swept aside.
Even so, having already exchanged their goodnights doesn’t stop Tony from popping in to check on him one more time. It’s a habit of his, regardless of whether he’s already hugged both of his kids to bid them goodnight, he always checks on them one last time, smoothes out their covers, presses a gentle kiss to their foreheads and wishes them sweet dreams (though, for him and Peter, wishes for good dreams never really seems to do all that much.)
“Hey, buddy. You’re still awake,” Tony says, voice soft and reverent as he observes the scene in front of him.
Peter, tucked under his duvet. Gaudy festive tinsel that was hung up over Peter’s window frame at the beginning of December has drooped sadly as the month’s gone on and has now fallen into a heap on his desk. There’s a tiny plastic Christmas tree as well, tucked into a corner, yet another thing Peter hasn’t bothered to take down yet even now that Christmas has been and gone.
Tony can’t help the quirk of his lips at the sight of the tiny Iron Man and Spider-Man figurines perched on top. Personally he thinks it’s kind of tacky, but Peter’s grin had lit up his face when they stumbled across it at one of the Astoria holiday flea markets, so there was no question about buying it. Anything that made Peter smile like that, after such a hellish year (a hellish five years, for Tony,) was worth it over and over again.
Peter smiles lazily up at him as he sees him come in, glancing away from his phone and rolling over to face him. “Mmm, yeah. Relaxin’. Gonna sleep soon.”
Tony nods. “Good, good.” He steps further into the room, shifting slightly from one foot to another.
Peter narrows his eyes curiously at him. “What is it?”
Tony hesitates for only a second. “I just wanted to make sure that you’re definitely okay with us going into the city for New Year's Eve, with the fireworks and all that. I was just about to text Happy and let him know our plans so I thought I’d check in with you once more.”
Peter fights the urge to roll his eyes.
He appreciates people looking out for him, he really, really does, but he’s not made of glass. He’ll be fine. He can handle the reality that people moved on while he was gone. Plans change, people change, traditions change, he gets it.
“It’ll be good, Tony, I promise. The city sounds great,” Peter rushes to reassure him, and the same look of uncertainty and hesitance flits across Tony’s face again, before it’s gone again. He opens his mouth as if he’s about to say something before snapping it shut again, and as usual, stepping closer to the bed to pull the covers closer around Peter with a gentle hand before leaning down to press his lips quickly to the crown of his head in an unabashed display of affection.
“Night, kid. Sweet dreams.”
“Mm, thanks, you too. See you in the morning.”
On the night of December 30th, Peter can’t sleep.
He spent most of the morning shovelling excess snow out of the way to make a safe path for Morgan to go sledding, trying to keep control of said sledding expedition, then consequently working late into the evening trying to help Tony repair and upgrade their heating unit when Morgan crashed her sled into the generator it’s connected to at the side of the house.
So, in theory, he really should be tired.
But he’s not.
He gave up on trying to sleep about an hour ago, and now he’s back in his corner of the couch, but this time it’s one am and it’s so dark outside he can’t even see the snow falling. The house is quiet, apart from the rustling of the trees outside, soft snores from upstairs and the gentle hum that Peter has come to associate with any residence of Tony’s he’s ever visited, FRIDAY’s presence wired within the walls.
There’s a house-hunting show on TV and the middle-aged white couple trying to find a two-bedroom apartment somewhere in Chicago is just vaguely interesting enough to keep Peter from changing the channel with the remote hanging loosely in his grip as he watches through bleary eyes.
The show switches to commercials. There’s something about perfume for a while, maybe life insurance after that. Peter isn’t sure, because he zones out, squinting down at his too-bright phone screen at a picture Ned’s just sent him.
Then the room is filled with flickering light and he glances up, gaze drawn back to the television screen. Perfume and life insurance and god knows what else has been replaced with fireworks, exploding right in front of him and he stares at them for a moment, frozen. Rationally, he knows they can’t hurt him, but he’s long since learned that trauma has no logic and the images make him want to shy away and hide where his memories and pain can’t reach but he urges himself on, watching curiously as if to prove he can do it, that he can handle it.
He can’t though, not when the fireworks burst into hues of red and orange and then suddenly there are fiery sparks surrounding him, bangs and crashes echoing in his ears, excited cheers and chatter turning into screaming.
His mind is dragging him back to the kind of battlefields that he never wants to have to set foot on again, fighting for his life while his body tries to figure out how to coordinate itself again, atoms recalibrating after being stitched back together.
It’s too much.
Flying sparks flash behind his scrunched eyelids and Peter can feel his breathing start to catch, so he fumbles with the remote in his grip until he can slam the off button.
The room descends back into silence and darkness. He flops back against the couch with a shaky exhale.
Of course, it’s going to be an advertisement for the Times Square ball drop that makes him finally lose it.
This is what he’s afraid of.
He still hasn’t told Tony about the fateful fourth of July a few months back, when Tony was still recovering, just coming out of a coma. Peter was out patrolling when the first round of fireworks bursting over New York had been enough to send Peter webbing desperately - and probably slightly dangerously - straight back to their apartment.
Happy had found him later that night, cowering in the back of the wardrobe he shares with May now, one of Ben’s old sweatshirts clutched to his chest, rocking himself back and forth.
If Tony found out, he would freak for sure, and that’s the last thing Peter wants. Because he’s not going to ruin New Year's Eve, he absolutely refuses.
Later that night, when he finally retreats back up the stairs to bed on shaky legs, he falls asleep with the menacing golden of deadly explosions searing the back of his eyelids.
On the morning of December 31st, Pepper and Morgan leave early for the city.
Peter thinks Pepper must have been scared of a repeat of the whole sledding incident yesterday, so she offered to distract Morgan for the day while he and Tony finished off the heating unit.
This means Peter’s had the whole day alone with Tony, the whole day to try and work up the nerve to mention the knot of nerves building up in his stomach at the idea of being confronted with the loud noises of fireworks that send him hurtling back to the battlefield outside the decimated compound.
He worked it up on the tip of his tongue once or twice, but swallowed it back down nervously every time.
He tells himself he’ll be fine
He has to be fine now, anyway. He doesn’t have a choice because he’s halfway down the porch steps as they prepare to leave for the city. There’s a slightly tattered reusable grocery bag full of sparklers and stupid party hats clutched in the grip of one hand and his overnight bag in the other. He’s just pulling open the boot to drop everything in there when Tony calls out to Peter from where he’s behind him, only just stepping out of the front door.
“Shit. You haven’t eaten dinner.”
If Pepper or May were here, they would chew the both of them out for their lack of self-preservation and basic self-care when they get too involved in bouncing back and forth over their work. Today, after they finished repairing the rewiring the main heating back in, it had been figuring out whether they could install some sort of party popper function into Tony’s prosthetic to surprise Morgan and liven up tonight's festivities. They never quite managed to figure anything out that was streamlined or effective enough, though, before FRIDAY was urging them out of the garage, buzzing both of their watches to remind them that their journey will take them at least two and a half hours.
“Neither have you,” Peter counters.
“Yeah, well I’m fine. It’s not me I’m worried about.”
“I’m fine, Tony. Literally not even hungry. I had that huge lunch, remember?”
Tony does indeed remember. He had initially thought that leftover pizza was going to last them days. How entirely naive of him. Maybe in a world before Peter had been brought back from the snap it might have done, but that’s not a world Tony ever wants to imagine having to live in again, even if his leftovers disappear from his fridge at an alarmingly fast rate. It seems like a small price to pay.
Tony huffs in disgruntled agreement and carries on towards the car. He’s got his own overnight bag resting over his stronger shoulder, the one attached to the prosthetic, the one that doesn’t tremble and twitch at random.
“Fine,” he concedes, among with a mildly dramatic sigh to let Peter know that he is in fact, not okay with this. “But if you get hungry halfway down the freeway and your stomach starts eating itself or whatever sort of bugged out thing your DNA has going on then it’s not my problem. Got it?”
Peter snorts. “Ha. Was bugged out a pun?”
“Get in the car, Parker.”
All things considered, it’s actually sort of impressive that Peter makes it forty-five minutes down the freeway before his stomach rumbles.
He holds his breath, hoping that maybe this is something he might get away with because they’re already running so behind and he doesn’t want to let May and Happy down by arriving late tonight. For a second the music continues to blast and Tony continues to drive, fingers tapping out a slightly out of time rhythm against the steering wheel. But then, because Peter never has any luck, ever, and the universe seems to be personally out to get him, Tony glances over to look at him after a couple of long seconds, eyes narrowed suspiciously.
“That was your stomach.”
Peter is never sure how Tony does it, because it’s not like his hearing is enhanced, and he just stares at him uselessly. “I - uh, no, it definitely was not.”
Tony reaches forward to turn the music down. Peter almost misses the raucous sounds of the AC/DC that had been blaring through the speakers.
“I heard your stomach. It rumbled.”
“I didn’t hear anything.”
“Pete,” Tony warns, and sometimes Peter forgets just how seriously Tony seems to take his well-being since the snap. It’s comforting, if not sometimes just a tiny touch exasperating.
“Okay, so my stomach rumbled. So what? We’ll be there soon.”
“Not for like an hour and a half at least. You said you weren’t hungry,” Tony accuses, eyes refocused on the straight stretch of highway ahead of them.
“I wasn’t when we left home.”
“Ah-ha. So you admit you’re hungry now?”
Peter groans and he tips forward to rest his forehead against the dashboard. "It's just my stomach. It thinks I'm always hungry when I'm not, you know this. I'm fine, just keep driving. We're already late as it is."
“No, I think you mean your stomach always knows when you’re hungry, you just choose to be a little shit and ignore it. Then you pass out or do something dumb and somehow it ends up being my problem,” Tony laments. Peter knows he doesn’t actually really mean that. The residual instincts from living a large part of his adult life as a superhero never really go away, and as a result, sometimes Tony can get a little restless and uneasy when everything has been going too smoothly for too long.
Tony tends to gets frustrated when Peter tries to keep his problems to himself, more than anything.
“I think calling me a little shit was unnecessary,” Peter frowns, unable to counter Tony with anything other than this. Tony doesn’t appear bothered.
“We’re stopping."
“I thought you said you were just going to let my stomach eat itself, or something? Didn’t you?”
“Well, I changed my mind. That sounds gruesome and kind of messy, do you know how much the leather interior of this car costs?” Peter doesn’t know, nor does he want to. He’d probably be afraid to sit in it ever again. “Too much for any activities reminiscent of cannibalism on your stomach’s part.”
“My stomach isn’t going to eat itself. You’re being dramatic.”
Tony fixes him with a firm look, but the corners of his lips tug up ever so slightly and Peter can see fondness shining behind his eyes.
“I don’t wanna test that theory. We’re stopping,” Tony says firmly. “Burger King or McDonald’s? I’m not letting you drag me back to Denny’s, I’m almost positive it was that damn breakfast sandwich that gave me the food poisoning last month when you dragged me there.”
“I think you just caught Morgan’s stomach bug from school.”
“Not a chance. I was poisoned, kid.”
Peter chooses Burger King eventually, only because Tony is very stubbornly ignoring any and all of his protests and assurances that he’ll be able to make it into the city without his metabolism tanking, having turned AC/DC back up to make it clear that he is very much finished listening to Peter. They pull off the freeway into the first rest stop they come across.
The rest stop itself – consisting of the wondrous selection of an Arby’s, a Burger King and a gas station – is virtually empty, and Tony pulls in to the first car park he finds.
Peter opens his mouth to apologize again, guilt still toying with his stomach for being the reason that they have to stop, but almost as if Tony is one step ahead of him (which he is, always), the man turns towards Peter and quirks his eyebrows in his ever so slightly challenging way, as if daring Peter to try to apologize for something that isn't his fault.
Peter concedes and lets the words die on his tongue as Tony pulls the keys from the ignition and yanks the beanie he'd been wearing earlier back over his head, and covers up both his hands with a pair of woollen gloves he finds in one of the side pockets that Peter thinks might belong to Pepper, to cover up his prosthetic to try and make himself as least recognizable as possible.
Saving the world does tend to make you pretty popular, after all.
The closer they get to the city the more the snow lessens, but the air is still frigid and biting when they step out of the car. Peter’s physiology has never exactly lent itself to helping keep him warm during the colder months since the spider bite, and it’s even worse if he doesn’t have much food inside him to run off, but warmth blooms a little in his chest when Tony extends an arm out to casually tug Peter closer to his side as they walk, boots crunching in the remnants of leftover snow.
Tony shoves a few bills into Peter's hand and sends him up to order once they're inside the building, a warm respite from the cold outside. Tony, himself, leaves to claim a table in the far corner out of what must be a force of habit for the two of them, considering that they're the only customers in here bar a small gaggle of school-aged children. Turns out most people have better things to do with their New Years Eve rather than hang out in a Burger King on the side of Interstate 87.
Only a few minutes later, Peter is thanking the bored-looking cashier who would probably rather be anywhere else on his New Year’s Eve and beelines his way to Tony, who has his eyes down, tapping away at something on his phone. He does look up, though, when Peter unceremoniously dumps their tray - loaded with five cheeseburgers, fries and a few milkshakes, too much food for two normal people with non-enhanced metabolism – down onto the garishly red tabletop.
There’s little chatter at first as the two of them dig in.
“I texted Pep to let her know that we’re just making a pit-stop,” Tony offers eventually, punctuated by a sip of his chocolate shake. “Her and Morgan only got to May and Happy’s half an hour ago apparently, so we shouldn’t be too late. I did happen to mention that we’re having dinner, though, and Pepper said she’d make sure that May doesn’t save us anything. She’s making turkey loaf.”
Peter grimaces. Maybe them having to stop isn’t such a bad thing after all. He’d rather be properly, obnoxiously and rudely late than try to keep down May’s turkey loaf. It’s always been a staple at this time of year, making use of Christmas leftovers, but it’s never gotten easier to stomach.
“You’re doing god’s work, right there.”
Tony chuckles. “I’ve been known to do my best in that department, kid.” He reaches out to steal a handful of the very few uneaten fries Peter has left sitting in front of him. They’ve gone a tad cold but it’s fine. “That enough to satisfy you, kid?”
“Yeah,” Peter nods, around one of his last mouthfuls of burger. “Thanks.”
Tony shakes his head placatingly. “Anytime. Not your fault anyway. My bad, probably. I need to be better at keeping us on a somewhat healthy schedule when we’re out in the garage.”
"Eh," Peter shrugs, "We should both be better. It's not like I'm a little kid anymore, I can look after myself” he says, purposefully the way Tony smirks just a little doubtfully at that.
Peter’s just opening his mouth to speak again and ask whether Tony is ready to leave so they can get on the road when there's a faint echo of a bang from somewhere outside.
He notices Tony tense as another one follows close behind, louder this time. Peter puts two and two together in his head and he sees Tony do the same. “Who the ever-living fuck is letting fireworks off at…” - he curses, tugging his coat sleeve up to glance at his watch, a scowl on his face - “ six-thirty in the evening? Who forgot to pass round the memo that the new year doesn’t start until twelve? Jesus.”
Peter shrugs. He’s not feeling so great about the noise either, but it’s a bit further away than it will be later tonight so he figures after the late-night TV incident last night, this gives him a chance to get used to it.
“I think I saw a sign for some New Year's carnival at the elementary school we passed just before we pulled off here? Pretty sure it’s the school Morgan played in T-ball the other week? Probably just letting them off early for the kids or something," Peter offers, but at this point, it's clear that Tony isn't even listening.
Another round of bangs go off in quick succession, and Peter has to shove the thought of rapid gunfire out of his head as he glances up, looking out through the grimy service station windows to catch the scatters of bright colours in the distance against the darkened evening sky
They look pretty from far away. It helps that they’re green and pink, nothing too ominous – nothing too close to the gruesome hues of destruction. Maybe, just maybe, Peter might be content to sit here and appreciate them from afar for the first time since the battle, if Tony didn’t jolt him out of his thoughts by bolting upright in his seat. He almost sends their greasy tray spilling to the floor as he scrabbles out with his still-gloved hands to shove himself up away from their table, but he doesn’t seem to notice, breathing stilted all of a sudden and panic flaring wildly in his eyes.
He stumbles away, towards the illuminated bathroom sign and Peter can see his shoulders shaking with tremors that wrack his entire body as he disappears around the corner.
Peter just watches on for a split-second, slight dumb-struck.
In what feels like slow motion, fireworks continue to light up the sky and reverberate in his ears, delighting children a few open fields over. A bright red one explodes, shattering into a million tiny fragments of light just as Peter tears his eyes away and shoves himself to his feet with a similar urgency that Tony had done. The employee behind the counter is watching him, Peter very vaguely registers, but he’s too busy racing towards where he saw Tony disappear.
This is not good. This is very, very bad.
Peter’s never had to use his strength to do anything like break down a bathroom door, and he wonders distantly whether this is the moment he’ll have to do so, but as he turns the corner he realizes that he doesn’t have to worry, because he almost runs into Tony, who very clearly never made it all the way to the bathrooms and is just resting up against the wall, slumped on the tarnished linoleum.
His knees are brought up to his chest, arms tucked around them as if he’s trying to protect himself from something that isn’t there.
His breathing sounds erratic and wheezing, as he forces oxygen in and out of his reluctant lungs. Peter knows the feeling all too well, and he knows it never gets easier. He also knows that Tony’s lungs are already weak as they are, especially after the snap, and a lack of oxygen like this can be dangerous. Panic fizzles and sparks inside him.
Why is he so useless? He needs to do something, goddammit!
He crouches down slowly until he’s at eye-level with Tony. The floor is sticky, like one too many soft drinks have been spilt on it in its time.
“Hey, Tony? Can you hear me? It’s Peter. I’m here,” he says, keeping his voice soft and slow. He reaches a tentative hand out to rest it on his knee, but he’s not sure Tony registers his presence or touch at all though, because his eyes continue to stare right through Peter, the painful sounding wheezes not coming to an end.
“I really need you to breathe, Tony,” Peter says, trying again, this time bordering on begging. “I promise we’re safe. We’re both safe.”
It’s this that has Tony’s eyes snapping up suddenly, and he gasps, a horrible, dry, choked up sound. Peter tries not to wince.
“P-Pete…”
“That’s me, I’m here,” he rushes to reassure him.
“Not - n-not safe,” Tony stumbles out. His words slur together in between his broken breaths. “You… y-you need to - need to hide.”
Peter feels his own breath catch. God, the two of them are a pair. Probably the most fucked-up pair you could ever come by. “We’re safe, Tony. We’re sitting in Burger King. We’re driving to the city to go to May and Happy’s. It’s New Years Eve-”
Tony cuts him off, voice urgent.
“We’re gonna lose… we’re gonna lose. You need to g-go.”
“I need you to listen to me, Tony. I really do. We’re not there anymore. We won, you saved everyone. We won.”
“N-No. Run,” Tony rasps, urgency overtaking his voice and flooding his eyes as he pleads with Peter, brokenly, desperately, delusionally.
Peter reaches forward to grasp both of Tony’s hands in his, clutching them tightly and pulling them back against his chest. He takes a few over the top deep breaths, his chest expanding, rising and falling with each one. “Match your breathing with mine, just deep breaths, in and out, as slow as you can.”
Tony doesn’t reply, but maybe he finally listens to him this time, because his breaths slow incrementally.
One breath in. One breath out. Peter keeps letting his lungs expand and collapse, keeping an eye on Tony as he gradually does the same.
“F-Fuck,” Tony shudders out eventually, followed by a quiet sigh. Peter watches him closely.
“Tony? You back with me?”
Tony nods. “We’re not, uh… not back there? We’re okay?”
“We’re okay,” Peter says, voice heavy with promise. “We won.”
Tony nods again. Peter watches his eyes do a quick sweep of his surrounding, finally looking like they’re actually seeing again.
They sit next to each other, tension releasing Peter from its gripping hold and leaving him to sag back against Tony's shoulder.
After all these months, even after the past few sleepless nights worrying about how he would react to tonight, it never occurred to him that Tony would have the same stress triggers around loud noises as he does now. It seems like a painstaking oversight on his behalf and maybe it's selfish, but there's a part of him that's almost glad. It makes him feel less alone in the tangled mess his mental health has become since the reversal.
There’s quiet for a while as Peter thinks this all through and Tony seems to calm. There’s just the muffled booms of fireworks from outside, the sizzling of the deep fryer from the Burger King kitchen and a dripping tap somewhere in the bathrooms through the door in front of them. Peter presumes maybe it’s only him that can hear the last two sounds, but he knows Tony can definitely still hear the first because he seizes up ever so slightly whenever another one goes off.
Tony speaks eventually. Peter hadn't wanted to be the one to break the silence, making sure that he gave Tony as much time as he needed to come back down from his panic. "Fuck," he mutters again. "I'm a mess." He lifts a hand to run it through his slightly dishevelled and greying hair. "I'm sorry, kid."
Peter shakes his head. "Don't be stupid." Tony frowns at him as if this definitely isn't the reaction he'd expected. "You'd kick me into the next century for trying to apologize for a panic attack," Peter finishes.
Tony’s lips quirk up at this. “Yeah, I would.”
“So don’t you try it. It’s not your fault.”
Tony doesn’t respond to this. Instead, his face sets, hardening a little as if he’s trying to mask all the vulnerability and hurt that had been there just a second ago. He sucks in a breath. It’s a little less shaky now.
“Well, if we weren’t late before then we definitely are now. We better get going,” he announces. He makes to get up off the floor but Peter beats him to it, climbing to his own feet and reaching down to try and help him up. Tony just stares at Peter’s proffered hand for a long second before taking it and accepting the hand up.
It’s all far too sudden and Peter stares at Tony for a second with a furrowed brow, trying to figure out whether the man is actually serious. This is nothing out of the ordinary, really, Tony trying to deflect and draw the focus away from his own pain after something like this, but surely he can’t expect Peter to let them keep going after this. The last thing either of them needs - especially Tony - is to be penned in on a tiny balcony, surrounded by cheers that morph into screams and fireworks that morph into blazing explosions. The only thing that’s on Peter’s mind is getting them both back home safely and curled up on the couch, perhaps under that comfy new throw someone bought Pepper for Christmas, and relaxing.
That’s all he wants, and he hopes desperately that Tony isn’t too proud to try and reject that.
“Let’s just go home, Tony,” Peter suggests quietly. As expected, Tony’s eyes widen at this. He shakes his head.
“No, no, fuck, kid, that’s totally unnecessary. You said you wanted to go up to the city so that’s what we’ll do okay. I’m fine, totally a-okay, a box of birds, all that shit, okay? I'm fine."
Peter sighs.
“You can’t tell me you seriously want to go to the city? You tell me that you fully seriously want to go, for you, not me, or Pepper or Morgan or anyone, for you, and I’ll drive us down there instead.”
Peter holds Tony’s gaze.
Tony opens his mouth and Peter seriously thinks for a second that he’s still about to insist that he’s fine, when he just had a panic attack on the floor of a Burger King, when he finally concedes and drops his eyes back down to his shoes.
“I guess I can’t. Not really. I just, god, fireworks freak me the fuck out. Clearly.” He laughs, but it’s humourless.
“We’re going home,” Peter insists, “back to the cabin. We’ll call Pepper and May. It’s not like they’ll mind once they know what’s going on. Then, we’re going to spend the rest of the evening on the couch rather than crammed into the city along with the entire state of New York, probably. Who’s winning? Definitely us.”
“Yeah. Great plan, Pete, sure. Except I’m not exactly in a state to drive,” Tony points out, slightly helplessly. He raises his hands in front of him. Both his real one and his prosthetic are shaking.
“I’ll drive,” Peter says, pleased to finally have a problem put in front of him that he knows exactly how to solve. “I got my permit renewed by the DMV when I came back, don’t worry,” he clarifies when Tony looks apprehensive at the idea.
“You promise not to kill us both?” Tony asks.
“I promise! I’m a good driver,” Peter says. “You’ve driven with me before, anyway.”
“Yeah, and I felt like I needed at least five of Steve’s super-strength pain killers to get rid of my headache afterwards.” He rubs at his temples before a slight shrug of his shoulders is visible through the padding of his coat. “It’s not exactly like I’m any state to be picky, so good enough for me, I guess.”
“I’m making hot chocolate. You want hot chocolate?”
“You don’t need to fuss over me, Pete,” Tony laments with a quiet sigh as he drops onto the couch once Peter’s let them both in the front door of the house, having made it safely home without damaging the car, anything else on the road or either of them - a complete win, in his opinion.
Peter levels him with a stare from where he’s hovering near the entryway to the kitchen. “You didn’t answer my question. Do you want one?”
Much to his relief, Tony just gives him a small nod, along with a smile - albeit a tiny, tight smile - but a smile all the same. “That would be great, kid, thanks.”
Five minutes later, Peter returns with a cup of cocoa cradled in each hand. He sets them down carefully on the coffee table before he takes the spot right next to Tony. He reaches one arm out to tug the plaid throw off the armchair next to them and smooths it across both of their laps. Tony has already switched the TV on, the coverage of the ball drop playing. It looks like it’s strategically been muted though, the newswoman talking with no sound coming out of her mouth.
Tony speaks up almost right away as if something has been on his mind that he couldn't wait to get out. “I’m sorry you’re missing the festivities and all that, kid,” he says. He glances up as Peter settles into his side, but doesn’t quite meet his eyes as he speaks. “I bet that anything would be more exciting than being stuck out here with me.”
Peter is sure he’s feeling guilty - he figured as much when he heard Tony on the phone to Pepper during their drive back, remorse in his tone when he told her that neither of them would be making it to the city at all that night – even so, he doesn't like the self-deprecating tone in which Tony is talking. He clearly has no idea that he's just inadvertently done Peter a favour by getting him out of having to attend the event he'd been dreading ever since Tony asked him about it days ago. Now seems like as good of a time as any to come clean about it.
“I actually didn’t even want to go to the fireworks anyway, so, uh, this is good. Trust me, this is really, really good.”
Tony frowns at him. “What?”
“The fireworks. I didn’t want to go. I hate fireworks, I’m the same as you apparently, they scare the shit out of me. You shoulda seen me on the Fourth of July. You were still out for the count, but trust me, it was a total train wreck.”
The look of pure pain that crosses Tony’s face when he says this is enough to make him wish he’d kept quiet.
“I – kid,” Tony sighs. “Why on earth did you say yes to going up to the fireworks if you didn’t want to? I gave you literally every opportunity in the world to get out of it, god, I was hoping so badly that you’d just give in and admit you didn’t want to.”
Peter feels kinda stupid now.
There he was convinced that Tony was like everyone else, trying too hard to make him comfortable back in this new world that was once his home, when really Tony was just trying to give Peter an out for something that he thought was likely to trigger them both. Well, something that after tonight, they have confirmation does trigger them both.
“I thought… I, uh,” Peter stumbles over his words, unsure of how to explain it. Tony rubs a thumb up and down over his knuckles comfortingly, where their fingers are tangled together in a desperate search for comfort on top of the blanket. “I dunno. I thought it was a tradition for you guys. Didn’t wanna get in the way of that, me being a new-comer and all, y’know. Everyone already treats me like I, um, not like I’m in the way or anything, because that’s not it, but like I’m kinda stopping them from going about their lives a little? Or at least the lives they had while I was gone. And now I’m back, I don’t wanna ruin all that for everyone.”
Tony sighs and pulls Peter closer to him until the kid's head tips forward to rest against his collarbone.
"Oh, Pete. No, no, no. You're never in the way, I promise you. The only reason I was suggesting a change wasn't because I thought you weren't part of our stupid fireworks tradition or whatever you're thinking. It was because the idea of it scared me shitless and I thought maybe it might have the same impact on you. I was right, but obviously, but not as right as I thought. You did well tonight, kid, handled that so well. I don’t know what I would have done without you.”
This is the point where pre-snap Peter would have made some snarky comment like, “just die, probably,” but post-snap Peter would never joke about that, so he doesn’t. Instead, he mumbles out, “I was still scared though. M’not that brave.”
“Braver than me, kiddo. So proud of you. I just need you to promise me one thing though?”
Peter nods against him. “Anything.”
“Next year, next July Fourth, next New Years, next anything that vaguely sounds like it involves anything explosive, no bullshitting each other, okay? We’re both done with that shit.”
Peter nods again and they sit side by side for a little while, sipping at their hot drinks and revelling in the peacefulness and silence. All of the tremors have finally stopped, and Tony is completely still.
The last few minutes of the year slip through their fingers.
Peter ends up being half-asleep against him when the ball finally drops, head still tilted to the right slightly to droop against Tony’s shoulder, quiet snores and soft-even breathing escaping him, calming Tony in a way that not many other things can these days.
As the new year is rung in, the television lights up with the bright lights of fireworks, which have already caused them more grief than at all necessary tonight. Tony's calm now, he's sure of it, but even so, he diverts his eyes away from the screen just in case to focus on Peter instead. He nudges him gently until the kid mumbles something sleepy and incoherent against his neck.
“Sorry, bud. Not trying to bug you. Just wishing you a happy new year.”
Peter blinks a few times as he registers this, then he hums blearily. “That’s fun. Happy new year, Tony. Love you.”
“Love you too, kid.”
In the very early morning of January 1st, Tony Stark lays on the couch with a sleeping Peter Parker resting against him. He contemplates.
The whole concept of a new year and a new beginning is kind of flimsy to him. It always has been. He doesn’t need a resolution, to set out to rapidly change and turn his life around, he’s done enough of that. He’s fought tooth and nail, to the death, for what he’s got now. His only resolution, not for the year but for life - as long as he’s got left, is to keep what he’s got for as long as humanly possible.
So he’s just gonna keep doing what he’s been doing. Tinkering. Fixing. Driving Pepper to the verge of insanity every now and then. Looking after his family. Loving this kid in his arms until the end of time.
After all, who needs a happy new year when you can have a happy forever?