To All Those Brave and Lovely

Chemistry

School is long, long and slow and lonely, with the only bright spots in her day being when she gets to see Evanegline and when her phone starts buzzing with one of Peter's texts.  

And it's hard.

"How is it possible that you got this?" Tony asked her, for the third time, upon seeing her grade in chemistry.  It wasn't a failing grade, but it was close, and she wanted to take her report card and put it through the shredder to keep him from seeing it.  Apparently that wouldn't have mattered, though, because at the beginning of the year he had set up that progress report account and was checking it once a week.  And it was good, a solid B, until the last few tests got put in and it wasn't good anymore.

"Because I failed some tests!"  She threw her arms up.  This was ridiculous, an incredibly domesticated scene, with him waving that paper around and her sitting at the table like a scolded kid, Pepper trying to play peace keeper between both of them.  It wasn't working, because while apparently staying out until four in the morning and sneaking off to go to out of state protests weren't a problem, getting a D in chemistry was the thing that finally made it stick.  "They were hard, I didn't get the material, it happens!"

Tony stared at her, and it reminded her of the time when Peter said he couldn't go to the gala becuase he had homework.  Like it was a shitty excuse and both of them knew it.  "You were tested in order to get into all these classes.  You tested into this class, which means you are able to do it."

Nora doesn't know how to respond to that, because she's feeling like the room is too crowded even though there are only three people.  She wants to run, and she also wants to yell, tell him that those placements tests were crap and it was a lot harder when none of the words seemed to want to make sense.  But she doesn't get the chance to, because a call is coming in and Tony is gathering up his keys and sunglasses, and Pepper is running after him with her heels clacking on the floor, shouting.  "You,"  Tony says, turning back when he gets to the elevator.  "Stay put."

Nora doesn't stay put.

Mostly because she never had liked to be told what to do, and also because the longer she sat there the more it seemed to snow ball- him being mad, the whole thing happening between her and Eden, how lonely she was at school, how reporters followed her around and she was still being paraded at Stark events, and she was having to work to remind herself that the ground was solid all over again.  So she ran, taking that car that Tony bought her out of the garage and turning back towards home, where she knew she belonged, and where people wouldn't freak over something as silly as a grade that wasn't even failing.

"What are you doing here?"  Ty stares at her when she walks into his house, where the same after football party is going on, just like he's been doing since the sixth grade.  He doesn't act like its a bad thing, just a surprising one, and he shoves a cup into her hand so hard that the drink sloshes over the side and splashes onto her hand.  "I thought you were famous now."

Famous.  She realizes that they have the same magazines here, have been looking at the same stories, probably bought them just to read about her.  Nora fights down the urge to run away or snap at him, just accepts the drink and raises it up in a parody of a toast.  "Not tonight,"  She says, looking behind him at everyone else, who had fallen silent upon seeing her.  "Tonight I'm getting drunk with you."

Nora didn't get drunk, but she did drink enough that Ty wouldn't let her leave, motioning her to couch instead with all the others who couldn't be bothered to get up.  It was nice to see familiar faces who were glad to see her, even though they had a lot of questions about the avengers, and about what its like to have everything you ever wanted at your fingertips, as well as so ar eyou dating that Peter guy or the Michelle girl, we've got a betting pool on it and were very dissapointed when the answer was neither.