Worlds Apart

Chapter 15

A/N

Quick PSA that today (12/17) is Loki's birthday so HAPPY BIRTHDAY LOKI!!!! :D

Okay now onto the fic :)

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Although Max knew that the infamous Tony Stark birthday party was coming up fairly soon, she had not expected to be invited to it.

Sure, she'd been to one of his parties before - two if you count Pepper's birthday party, but personally, Max didn't, because she only went after Pepper asked her last minute - but that was partly a company thing, so it wasn't a personal invitation. This was. And it wasn't that she wasn't just Pepper's plus one, either; no, Tony asked for her by name. Well, technically it was still Pepper who did the actual reaching out to invite Max, but according to Pepper, Tony had asked for her by name.

According to Pepper, he'd said that if she wanted to bring Max, then she was invited too - which technically implied that she was sort of a plus one, but it also implied that she, specifically, was invited, and not any of Pepper's other friends. Unless Tony had said otherwise after the fact, but Pepper didn't mention that part, so Max chose to believe that she was the V.I.P. friend in this.

When the night of the party arrived, Max picked out a short, black dress to match the theme of the party, and then went down to the lobby of her apartment complex, where she waited for the car Pepper was sending to pick her up. Normally Pepper would have joined Max for this portion of the evening, however this time Pepper was very busy setting up to host, and if tonight was going to play out anything like it did in the movie, she couldn't blame her at all for being as busy or as stressed as she seemed over the phone.

When the expensive-looking black car pulled up out front, Max assumed that it was for her and walked out of the front door. Just as she passed through the exit, the driver's door opened, and out stepped Happy Hogan. The sight gave her a bit of whiplash, since she wasn't exactly expecting it to be him, however she managed to keep her reaction mostly internal and though she paused in her movements for a moment, kept on walking towards him and the car. The more she thought about it, the more she realized that it being him to pick her up actually made perfect sense.

As Happy shut the door, he looked over towards the building and noticed Max walking towards him. He smiled and nodded at her in greeting.

"Hello," he said, holding his hand out for her to shake. "I'm Happy; I'm going to be your driver today."

Max gladly accepted the gesture and shook the man's hand. "I'm Max. I don't think we were ever formally introduced, but we actually met briefly last week."

"I know, I'm really good with faces," Happy said as the two dropped their arms back down by their sides. "I'm just surprised that you remembered me, actually."

What Max wanted to say was "How could I not remember meeting someone like Happy Hogan," but she had a feeling that would give off the wrong sort of impression.

"Of course I remember," she answered instead. "It's not every day I get to watch someone get TKO'd in the ring, live and in person." As the words left her mouth, a part of her worried that she might have brought up a potentially sore subject for the man, but she was relieved when she saw his lips curl up into a smile and he scoffed.

"I slipped," Happy corrected her. "Besides, you caught me on a bad day; I'm usually much better than that."

Max chuckled and shook her head. "Oh, I'm sure you are."

"I am!" he said with only a small amount of offense taken. "Come on, get in the car; your BFF is waiting."

Max had to admit, it felt good to hear him call Pepper that, even though it was said in a way that seemed like he was trying to tease her. A smile broke out on her face as Happy opened up the back door for her, and she stepped inside.