Seeing Beyond

17

Tony helped her set up some feeds and they sat on the couch watching TV.

"I missed so much," she sighed and took a sip of water.

"You really did."

Aurora looked at her phone.

Peter
Are you home?

She set the phone down and looked at Tony. "So you went to Wakanda?"

"Yeah. Food's hella good," she nodded. "I really wish I could eat."

"Few more days and you can start with the soft stuff."

"Ugh!"

Tony smiled. "So you made peace with T'Challa?"

"No grudges. He didn't know me, I didn't know him. I knew Rhodey wasn't gonna kill me, but neither of us knew about each other in that sense."

"You make friends with anyone else?"

"Shuri, his sister. She's around my age."

"Cool. What'd you do there?"

"Oh, it's super awesome!" She cried, her eyes lighting up. It made Tony so happy to see her like this again, not broken and upset. "I'm actually helping her..."

"Helping her..." Tony urged her to continue.

"I don't know if I can tell you. I don't want any of them to go to RAFT."

"I won't say anything. I just want to be in your life."

"I'm helping her get the shit out of Bucky."

"Cool!"

"Yeah. T'Challa offered me asylum."

"Yeah?" Tony looked a little worried.

"Yeah. I don't know. I definitely want to go there often to help Shuri. Nice to know it's always there, though."

"Yeah, true."

Aurora sighed after a moment. "I should probably talk to Peter."

"Probably."

"Will you drive me over there tomorrow?"

"Yeah, sure. Only if I get to keep May busy," he winked.

"Gross. You're staying in the car."

"Hi," Aurora smiled at May after she opened the door.

"Rory! What happened to you?" the woman cried.

"It's... a long story. In short, I had a family emergency then got super sick."

"Peter had only told me about the family thing..."

"Yeah, I never told anyone. I didn't want anyone to worry so I just said that I needed to be there for my family."

"I understand that. Oh, come in, please!"

"Thanks," Aurora smiled and leaned against the counter. "Uh, is Peter home? I need to explain everything to him."

"No, he's still at school. He should be home in, like, half an hour?" she shrugged. "Please make yourself at home. Can I get you a snack?"

"I'm not allowed to eat again, yet," Aurora rolled her eyes. "It sucks."

"You were that sick?"

"Yeah. It wasn't great."

"Jesus. You have some bad luck, don't you?"

"I guess. Could I just get some water?"