Work Text:
Tony looked up at the sound of his office door opening, smiling as he caught sight of his six year-old daughter being escorted by Happy. Happy, always uncharacteristically soft with Penny, gave the kid a quick fist bump. The girl returned it, though it was definitely less enthusiastic than usual, which was weird. Penny had last week been so excited to give Happy a fist bump that she'd accidentally punched him in the gut, but now she barely returned it, her face and body glum as she padded into the room.
The billionaire gave his bodyguard a confused look as he got up from his desk, but the man just shrugged, mouthing, 'I tried.' And then he was gone, looking more than a little awkward, which was fair. Protecting Penny was Happy's job, making sure she'd had a good day at school was his.
"Hey, Bambina," he greeted, bending down to get to her level, "How was your day?"
"It was fine," she muttered, shrugging.
"Yeah? What'd you do?"
"Uh, Josie and I played fairies at recess," she started, "We had a quiz today in science. And...that's it."
"Yeah? I bet you did great."
Penny nodded, answering shortly, "Yeah, it was fun."
Tony frowned a little at that. It wasn't like Penny to be so closed off. She loved sharing everything about her day, with big smiles and loud giggles that always made her stories way too long because she couldn't stop laughing. That was his Penny, not the sad and quiet kid in front of him.
"Are you sure? You seem a little blue, Sweetpea."
"I'm fine."
He hesitated, "Okay. You got any homework?" She nodded, "Cool, go ahead and get started on that, I'll be right here if you need me."
Penny sat up at the coffee table while he went and sat back behind his desk. As much as he hated it, it was really busy, and while he wanted to help, forcing Penny to tell him was not going to help anyone. She'd come to him when she was ready, not when he'd dragged it out of her. That would only make things worse, as he remembered from experience with his own father.
Despite trying to give Penny some space, he kept glancing up at the first grader, who had shifted from graphing quadratics to coloring with the arts and crafts he'd always kept since he'd started having Penny stay with him in his office. She didn't smile once, and it was concerning, but eventually he got wrapped up in his work, sending too many emails, approving projects and looking over the recent success of his newest tracking equipment that had hit the market--only for the military, of course--barely a month ago.
It was a couple of hours before he heard the sniffling.
His head shot up when he heard the small sniffle, eyes locking onto Penny to see the girl was crying. She was clearly trying to hold it in, but it wasn't working as tears leaked down her cheeks, and the moment she realized he'd noticed, her crying only got louder.
Tony immediately left his desk, hanging up on whoever he'd been on a call with and scooping his daughter up. She gripped onto him for dear life, little fists bundling up the fabric of his suit as she sobbed a messy cry of tears and snot. He began rocking her in his arms.
"Shh, shh, it's okay. It's okay," he assured, bouncing her up and down and carding a hand through her curls. He eventually sat down, still holding her in his arms, and comforted her there on the couch in his office instead, waiting for her to calm down.
It took a little while for her to cry herself out, still bundled in his arms as her tears petered out, though she still sniffled in that way kids did when they were upset.
"What's wrong, kiddo?" he asked, but she just shrugged again, "I can't help if I don't know. Was it something at school?"
"Ye-yeah," she hiccupped.
"Was it Maddy? You didn't mention her today," he guessed, naming her other friend, and he got a nod. Now they were getting somewhere.
"She was--she was mean today..."
"What happened?"
"She didn't like that me and Josie were playing fairies. She called it dumb, and said that we were too old to believe in fairies 'n stuff, and that if we were going to play fairies she wasn't going to hang out with us."
Okay, so it wasn't awful. A part of him thought it was a little funny, since they were fighting over fairies. Schoolyard drama always came with a certain degree of hilarity, not that it made seeing Penny so upset any easier.
"That was mean of her," he hummed, "What did you do?"
"Me and Josie said we wanted to play fairies. So...so she left."
"Well, if she's gonna be a little asshole, I think you're better off."
"But I love Maddy! She's so nice," Penny protested.
"She wasn't nice today, Bambina, and your friends should be nice to you. Why don't you and Josie just hang out for now, and if Maddy wants to, she can apologize. Okay?"
"I guess..." Penny trailed off, and Tony smiled before his face was filled alight with a smile. He picked her up, standing up from the couch, and practically throwing her into the air. She let out a screechy giggle, finally smiling, her smile growing wider as he began tickling her, her giggly protests filling the air, "No, Dad, stop!! I can't--eek!--I can't breathe!! Dad!!"
"Oh, and you're ticklish here. And here. And here." He blew a raspberry onto her neck, making her laugh even louder as she waved her arms at him.
"Ew!! Ew, Dad!! Stop, stop, stop!!" she begged playfully, "I'm gonna--I'm gonna get you!! I'll tickle you!"
"Ha! I'm not ticklish!" he declared, finally stopping and poking his tongue out at her, which she copied.
"You're the worst."
"I love you too."
And he did. He loved her so much. More than he could say.