Tickle stories - Marvel (One Shots)

A beautiful imperfect human (Tony x Peter)

“You okay, Pete?”

When the kid didn’t answer him, Tony gave his shoulder a shake. Peter started, nearly knocking his web-shooters to the floor, and looked up at him.

“Huh? What?”

“Are you okay?” he asked again. “You seem, I don’t know, distracted. Tired. Less bouncy and hyperactive than normal.” He patted his head. “I thought you were excited about this. You’re the one who wasn’t satisfied with my work and decided you just had to add your own upgrades to your web-shooters, remember?”

Peter looked stung by his words, which surprised him. He turned back to the devices on the table, his expression clouding over.

“Yeah,” he said. “Sorry.” He fiddled absentmindedly with the triggers. “Just not really feeling it today.”

Not really feeling it today. By now Tony knew that was code for something very bad. He had not, however, learned the perfect approach to situations like this just yet. The whole ‘mentoring-a-super-powered-protege-but-also-having-to-deal-with-him-being-a-15-year-old-teenager’ was still a bit of a gray area for him, with new challenges to face around every corner. Peter Parker was an amazingly smart and hard-working mentee, but he was still a kid. A kid in high school. That was the part that always tripped Stark up.

But he cared for the young hero. Tony hated seeing him down in the dumps. So, ever since half the universe had disintegrated then come back to life, Stark had tasked himself to do what he could to lift Peter’s spirits whenever they were dampened, despite how out of character it felt. He stood beside him, tilting his head to the side.

“Is there…a reason for that?” he asked cautiously. Peter swallowed, not looking up from the table.

“I…” he began. He rubbed at his forearm and bit his lip. “I don’t know. I’ve just been feeling kind of useless lately.”

“Useless?” Tony repeated. “A kid that can climb walls and write a research paper on thermonuclear astrophysics like it’s fourth grade science—useless?”

“I forgot Ned’s birthday,” he said, voice breaking. He bent his head towards the ground. “I’ve missed four Decathlon practices in the past two months. I let a stupid rookie burglar get away last night after he hurt two boys. May asked me to get groceries on Tuesday, but I forgot the milk. I can’t even pick up groceries right, Mr. Stark. I feel like I’m failing everybody I care about. I’m useless. I keep disappointing all the people who depend on me, and I don’t know what to…I can’t…”

Tears welled in his eyes. He breathed in sharp, raspy breaths. Tony felt his heart split in two. These were the times when he was supposed to have the right answer, the perfect thing to say to make everything better. He wrapped an arm around his shoulders, guiding him out of the stool.

“Hey, come here. Come on.”

Sniffling, Peter slid out of the seat. He let Stark walk him to the couch by the wall, hating himself for crying in front of his idol, hating himself for coming up short on all of his responsibilities, hating himself for not being enough. He sat, and Tony sat beside him, resting a palm on his back.

“Listen to me, okay?” Peter looked up at him with red-rimmed eyes, tears slipping down his cheeks. “You, Mr. Parker, are an amazing little person. You’ve got more goodness and bravery in you than all of the Avengers combined, and the biggest heart for helping others I’ve ever seen.”  After a small hesitation, he started running his hand up and down his back, trying his best to calm the troubled teen. “But even the greatest of heroes aren’t perfect. You know that. Everybody fails, especially after going through everything you’ve dealt with. And if the people you care about can’t forgive you for making a few mistakes, then they don’t deserve you.”