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“Oh, wow,” Peter says nervously as the car pulls forward, his eyes widening as the size of the crowd in front of the building comes into view. “There are a lot of them.”
Tony leans over Peter to glance out the backseat window. Even through the tinted glass, his face is illuminated by streetlights and camera flashes. He doesn’t look fazed by the crowd, so maybe this is a normal amount of press for a Friday night fundraiser with Tony Stark billed as the main speaker. Tony had warned him that there would be some reporters, but he’d thought that meant two or three. There are actual television cameras out there, like they’re about to walk down the red carpet.
Yeah, Peter’s been in the news before, but it was always as Spider-Man. It’s never really been Peter Parker that any of them cared about. He suddenly feels the impulse to press the button that deploys his suit, to not leave the car without his mask as a safety blanket.
“You can still back out,” Tony says, resting his hand on Peter’s knee. It’s been three months since Tony first kissed him, three months of these casual touches, but sometimes they still give him butterflies. “I know you’re sick of me telling you that, but it’s true. Happy can drive you home.”
“I wish you’d stop reminding me that Happy’s here,” Peter says, dodging the question. “That’s never going to stop being weird.”
“You get used to it,” Tony says.
“It’s pretty weird,” Happy admits from the driver’s seat, not taking his eyes off the road. He still has trouble seeing Peter as an adult, so whatever hesitant acceptance he’s willing to give Peter and Tony is nice. Still, this is kind of a date, and Peter would be on-board with having all dates be Happy-free.
“Seriously, kid,” Tony says, dropping his voice a little and leaning in closer. Peter breathes in the scent of Tony’s expensive cologne, the same scent that’s been making him hesitant to wash his pillowcases lately. “You good?”
Peter nods. He’s nervous, but he knows that this is worth it. He wants to be able to go out in public with his boyfriend, and when that boyfriend is a billionaire CEO-slash-superhero, that apparently means things like “getting ahead of the story” and “controlling the narrative.”
Translation: they can go out tonight and let the picture of them holding hands be accompanied by the pleasant, Pepper-approved press release, or they can wait until some asshole with a telephoto lens catches them kissing on vacation.
(God, the idea that they’re serious enough that Tony assumes they’ll be going on vacations together, that this thing they have requires a press release, makes something settle warm and heavy in Peter’s stomach. Like they’re a sure thing. He doesn’t quite trust that feeling, not yet, but he really likes it.)
Tony says he doesn’t care what the public thinks, and Peter knows he means it. He’d hire a skywriter to announce their relationship if Peter asked for it, or let their new romance stay in the closet if Peter wanted that instead. But Tony sat through Aunt May’s horrifyingly awkward shovel talk without complaining, so in comparison one event and some pictures can’t be that bad.
So Peter is here, doing the Stark Industries approved thing that he knows is best for Tony, at least a little bit because Tony will keep insisting that Peter doesn’t have to.
“Switch seats with me,” Tony says suddenly.
“What?”
“You shouldn’t be the first one getting out of the car,” he explains. “Let me get their attention on me before you come out.” Tony pats the seat on his other side, tilts his head a little. “C’mon.”
Peter thinks there’s going to be attention on him anyway, but he lifts his hips up from the seat and moves easily over Tony’s lap to sit on his other side.
“Occasionally you manage to go five minutes without reminding me how flexible you are,” Tony comments, his eyes drifting over Peter. “Jesus.”
“I’m still here,” Happy says, deadpan, as the car rolls to a stop.
Peter raises one eyebrow and gestures toward the front seat like see, it’s weird.
“Fine, maybe a little weird,” Tony tells Peter. He pulls a pair of sunglasses out of his suit jacket pocket and holds them out. “You want these? The camera flashes can be a little much, even without jacked up senses.”
“Are you sure?” Peter asks, staring at the dark, blocky glasses he’s being offered. “I know those are – “
“You can talk to FRIDAY if you ask for her, but I trust you,” Tony answers. “Just don’t ask her to call in a drone strike, all right?”
“Wait, could she do that?” Peter puts them on, and at least for now they just look like regular sunglasses.
“Ask me again when there aren’t any reporters around,” Tony says. “You ready?” Peter nods.
Then Tony opens the car door, and it’s like someone turned the volume all the way up.
Peter’s powers have always come with a downside. When he was first bitten, he had to wear sunglasses everywhere for like a month because the world was way too bright. Even inside. Aunt May eventually admitted that she thought he’d started smoking weed and was trying to hide his red eyes.
Then there were all the sounds, and the smells. He almost threw up the first time he walked into a store with scented candles. He’s mostly learned how to handle his supercharged senses by now; if he hadn’t, he wouldn’t have survived living in a thin-walled Queens apartment building, let alone student housing.
The point is that he’s been living with heightened senses for years now. He can handle gunshots and explosions, can keep on fighting with bleeding wounds and fractured bones, but somehow the roar of the small crowd and the brightness of the camera flashes feel like an overload, even from behind Tony’s sunglasses.
There’s a dog barking a block over, and sirens blaring a couple blocks in the other direction. Tony extends his hand to help Peter out of the car and he takes it as he steps out into the chilly New York evening. A reporter asks her coworker who the guy with Stark is.
Tony holds up the hand that’s not in Peter’s, giving them a perfectly executed half-smile and a wave. It’s amazing how good he is at this, with his years of experience honing an effortlessly cool persona. Peter wonders how long it would take for him to learn to be that comfortable in the spotlight.
A hundred cameras flash all in sequence, one shutter click blending into the next. Peter squints against the brightness and tries not to let on just how overwhelming all of this is.
Give us a smile, Tony!
Mr. Stark, who’s your friend?
“Eyes on me,” Tony says gently, his lips brushing Peter’s ear. Peter looks up at him, sees the concerned lines around his eyes. It makes it easier to remember how to tune out the rest of the world, how to pretend for a second that it’s not all too bright and too loud and too much.
Tony leads him through the parted sea of people, giving perfunctory waves and nods but not slowing down. Peter’s grateful for the glasses, because he’s sure that otherwise he’d look weird and squinty from all the lights.
Fortunately, the walk into the building is shorter than it had looked from the car, and Tony’s ushering him inside after just a few seconds. The general press doesn’t seem to have been allowed inside the building, but there are still people everywhere and standing next to Tony means he’s still the center of attention.
“I’ll have to make you a pair of those glasses,” Tony tells him quietly as they walk through the entryway. “Somehow you pull them off better than I do.”
A man in a suit comes to lead them to their table, the first person to act nonplussed by Tony’s celebrity. Thank god for service workers who’ve seen it all already.
“You doing good?” Tony asks, his hand letting go of Peter’s and moving to steady him at his lower back instead.
Peter smiles. “Yeah. I’m good.”
Tony pulls Peter close to his side for just a moment, giving him a soft kiss to his temple before letting go.
“General!” Tony exclaims to one of the well-dressed men at their table as he sits down. “Good to see you. This is my date, Peter.”
Peter smiles as he’s introduced, feels his heartbeat start to settle as he relaxes into his role for the evening.
It’s definitely worth it.
***
When Peter rolls over to check the time on his phone the next morning, he has way more messages than he wants to deal with. A message from Aunt May says she’s proud of how brave he is, which is strange because going to a fundraiser seems way less brave than all the crime-stopping that’s usually on his Friday night agenda, but it’s still nice to hear.
He scrolls past the other messages from acquaintances and people who can wait until he sees one from Ned. It’s a photo of Peter and Tony from last night, holding hands, with Tony whispering into Peter’s ear while Peter looks up at him. Even with his eyes hidden by the sunglasses, Peter looks smitten. God, that’s a little embarrassing.
Everyone’s talking about how cute you guys are, Ned says, followed by a line of puking emojis.
“Time’sit?” Tony mumbles, his face still buried in the pillow. His hair’s sticking up ridiculously, and Peter feels a sudden wave of affection at seeing this little bit of him that no one else can have.
“Too early,” Peter answers. He ignores his other messages, shoving his phone back onto the nightstand. He settles back under the sheets and curls into Tony’s warmth to fall back asleep.