Irondad and Spiderson

What If I'm Not Good Enough?

The day before going back to school was like Christmas for Peter. He had already set out his clothes, his supplies, the amount of homework that he had done since he had left. It pooled around his bed on his floor, creating an ocean of excitement.

    “How ya doin’?” Tony stands at the only non-chaotic part of Peter’s room, the doorway. Everything else is covered in a layer of frantic planning and quick gathering.

    “Good.” Peter says distractedly as he swings across the room and lands on the back of his desk chair. He grabs some papers on top of his desk and tosses them onto the floor.

    “You’re gonna have a heck of a time trying to get all those ready before school tomorrow.” Tony looks at the fancy watch on his arm. “It’s already nine o’clock, Pete. Lights out in thirty.” He turns to leave, but then steps back into the room.

    “Can I help with anything?” He says. Getting your kid ready for school is one of the most important things to know how to do as a parent. Is it a bad sign that Tony has no idea how to do it?

    “Uhhh…” Peter thinks as he stuffs something in his backpack. “Lunch. I need to pack a lunch for tomorrow.”

    “I’m on it!” Tony says, rushing away to make himself useful. Now, this is something he can help with! He puts some leftovers in a container, and throws in some snacks. He makes sure to exceed a certain calorie limit so that Peter doesn’t get depleted during the day. He’s already put a tracker in Peter’s backpack, and called for Happy to station himself outside the school during the day. He’s debating it, but he also had the idea to lace Peter’s clothes with a tracker to monitor Peter’s vitals throughout the day. But if Pepper heard about that idea, it would be shut down quicker than it had come into Tony’s mind.

    “Alright, done!” Tony throws Peter’s full lunch box towards him, which Peter catches effortlessly while swinging in the air.

    “Woah, Mr. Stark!” Peter says, squeezing the lunch box. “What did you put in here?”

    “Is it too much?” Tony instantly regrets putting so much food into the lunch box. Was he wrong about how much food Peter needs to eat?

    “No, this is-” Peter had unzipped the lunch box and was looking into it, but he cut off his sentence with a loud gasp, followed by, “IS THAT A PUDDING CUP?!” Tony laughed from the doorway. “So, it’s good then?”

    “It’s great!” Peter beams, tossing the now-zipped lunch box at his backpack. “Thanks Mr. Stark!”

    “Of course, kid.” Tony smiles. “I’ll be back at 9:30 to say goodnight.”

    “Sounds good.” Peter becomes distracted picking out clothes for the next day and attempting to stuff all the loose papers into his binder.

    Approximately twenty minutes later, Tony Stark appears again at Peter’s doorway. Peter’s already getting into bed, snuggling under the big, fluffy covers. Tony watches with a confused expression as Peter turns on his phone to set an alarm, and immediately turns pale. He turns the phone off and sets it down, turning with a grimace to the doorway.

    “Hey, Mr. Stark.” He says, trying to muster a calm tone.

    “Don’t ‘Hey, Mr. Stark’ me, Peter. What’s wrong? Did you get another text from May?”

    “Noooooo.” Peter says, slowly snatching his phone from the table and putting it under the covers on his bed.

    “Peter, what did it say?” Tony says sternly.