In the Blink of an Eye

Chapter 7

I sat down at the table for dinner, Pietro taking a seat next to me. On the other side of me sat Wanda, who smiled at me, a smile that I returned.

Over dinner we all got to talking about anything and everything, and then the subject became me, which I was quite surprised about, after all, why would anyone want to spend their time talking about me?

"So, y/n, how old are you?" Thor asked.

"I'm 19," I answered politely.

"Oh, you're quite young then," he said, looking slightly shocked.

"That's only two years younger than me," Pietro beamed down at me.

I looked at him, his dorky grin making me smile. For some reason I had thought he was older than that. Maybe it was the slight facial hair he possessed, or maybe his build. I mean he was in pretty good shape. Great shape actually. I quickly realised I was staring, and hurriedly looked away, as I felt a slight blush creeping up on my cheeks.

The rest of the evening was filled with many stories, laughs and weird conversational topics. It was midnight before I decided to head up to my room, exhausted after a long, hard day at work.

I was walking down the corridor to the elevator, being too tired to take the stairs. I heard Pietro call out from behind me, and then felt a sharp breeze against my skin, and he was beside me, same as always.

"Hey, you heading up?"

"Yeah, I'm super tired so I'm gonna call it a night," I replied, yawning at the end of my sentence.

"I'll walk you to your room," he said, making it sound like more of a statement than an offer.

The elevator came and we both got in. I rubbed my eyes groggily as he pushed the button for our floor. For a while it was silent, we both just stood there, not saying anything. It wasn't an awkward silence though, more like a nice silence. The kind of silence where you don't need to say anything.

The walk to the room was the same, although I could feel him glance at me a few times as we moved along. When we got there, I opened the door before turning around and thanking him. We both said our goodnights and then I slipped away into my room, and he disappeared down the hall to do the same.

As I clambered into bed, I found myself thinking about Pietro, how sweet he was. I liked him. He was kind, and caring, and I could tell he was an overall good person, even though I hadn't known him for that long. He made me laugh too, and I thought about all the funny things he said to make me crack a smile, or burst out laughing at a completely inappropriate moment. Yeah, I liked Pietro. He made me happy.

The next day was the same old routine. Wake up, get ready, have breakfast, go to training, freshen up, have dinner, go to bed. The day after was the same, and the day after that. I had soon been there a week, and even though that's really not very long, I was beginning to feel at home, like I belonged. I had never met a bunch of people who all seemed to genuinely care for me like these ones did, or at least I thought they all did.

I had been helping Tony and Bruce work on some computer programme they'd developed, as I was just as educated as they were when it came to technology. However, something had not quite gone the way they wanted it too, and now Tony was freaking out and yelling at me. Bruce had tried to calm him down, but failed in his attempt.

"It's really not that hard y/n! Now everything is ruined because of you."

"I'm sorry. I didn't know that was going to happen. I just thought that maybe-"

"Maybe what?! Maybe it would all just magically work out?! Well in case you haven't noticed, that's not actually how it works," he spat, anger seeping out of him like a wet sponge.

I really didn't know what to do or say. Maybe it was my fault, maybe I'd thought it out wrong. I had no clue. The only thing I knew was that he had now succeeded in making me feel like a complete piece of shit. Luckily Steve walked in at just the right moment.

"What's going on here?"

Tony glared at me and then looked over at Steve, who was also looking pretty pissed off. Without uttering another word, Tony moved away from me, and went to work on some other device that had been lying around.

"Are you alright?" Steve sighed, clearly not that surprised by Tony's crazy outburst.

"Yeah, yeah I'm fine, I just kind of hate being shouted at," I answered.

"Okay then," Steve let out another sigh before walking away from me and over to Bruce, presumably to talk about what just happened.

Unfortunately, the situation didn't end here.

I was heading down the hallway leading to the lift after training, when I heard shouting coming from a branching hallway. I knew it wasn't a good sign, but decided to follow the sound anyway, to find out who it was and what was going on. I got to the end of the hallway and was quite shocked at what I saw.

Pietro was standing having a full blown argument with Tony, and it was getting pretty ugly. Pietro looked as if he were about to punch Tony in the face, turning it into a full on fist fight, so I stepped in.

"Guys, stop it!" I yelled so to be heard over all of their yelling.

"Y/n," Tony looked surprised to see me, and then ashamed, "I want to apologize for earlier.  I – I don't know what came over me. I know I'm a bit of a hothead sometimes but, I shouldn't have talked to you like that. I'm sorry."

"It's fine, Tony," I gave him a small smile.

"That's not an excuse for being a total dick," Pietro said.

"Hey, you want to take this outside, 'cause I can go all day," Tony shot back, a threatening tone to his voice.

Pietro looked like he was about to say something else, but I stopped him, moving him away from Tony, and away from the fight that would soon commence if I didn't do something.

We began to walk together, and then I finally spoke.

"Pietro, why were you yelling at Tony?" I asked, wondering why on earth such a kind person would be screaming at someone else like that.

"Because y/n! He did it to you, and he can't just speak to you – no – yell at you like that and get away with it. I had to say something," he said, agitation and frustration in his voice.

"Pietro, you really don't have to do that for me," I said, completely taken aback that someone, let alone Pietro, would stand up for me in that way.

"I know," he sighed, "I just care about you, you know?"

"Yeah, I know," I said, "and I care about you too. But please, no more fights."

"We'll see," he smirked.

I had to admit, he did look pretty damn hot when he was mad, and that smirk got me every single time.

We continued to walk down the hall, deciding to move on from the situation, and to forgive and forget.