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Peter was most definitely not high. But he might have taken a tad more than the recommended amount of painkillers.
Now that wasn't usually a problem, but this just happened to be the super powered painkillers Mr. Stark developed a few months back.
One or two was enough to make him pleasantly buzzed and numb but three had turned him loopy and that left Peter resorting to calling Mr. Stark as he watched his distinctly thin and bony shoulders becoming curvy in the mirror. Peter didn't even know that shoulders could be curvy.
So....he has a problem, therefore he's staring at the three dots on the screen of his phone, which was progressively getting blurry.
The phone gave two rings before Tony's voice rang out, "Stabbed, broken limbs or angry aunt?"
Peter blinked and tried to think through the fog to formulate a response," Um....neither or wait there's more than two..so uh none?"
"Eloquent. So, what's the problem kid? You don't usually call me at odd hours to just hear my voice now?"
"But....I like hearing your voice Mr.Stark, you talk fast.....and it's usually funny.....I like funny...did you know Happy was cracking jokes the other day. It was so weird Mr. Stark. Heh...."
There was a long pause and Peter checked twice to see whether he hung up. He could just make out a blurry grey screen but since he could hear Tony's breaths he put the phone back to his ear.
Finally Tony replied.
"Are you high, kid?"
"What! No why would you think I'm high, Mr.Stark? I'm not high, jeez."
"Uh-huh, then why are you weirder than usual?:
"Mr. Stark ....you think I'm weird....I'm sorry. It's so hard to be normal.....I don't think I know how to.....do you.. do you think I can learn?" With Peter's voice growing decidedly sadder and quieter to almost choked up, Tony's anxiety hit the roof.
"Peter did you take something, or did someone give you something? Where are you right now?"
"Aw, Mr.Stark don't worry so much. I'm fine. No one gave me anything. But there was a fire and a beam might have fallen on me and it might or might have been .....on fire. And it began hurting so bad that I may have taken likthreeofthosepillsyougaveme."
There was a pause for five seconds and in a voice Peter just knew was gonna get him grounded for most of the foreseeable future. "What did you just say?"
"I took like three pills that you gave me and now I'm all loopy and my room's changing dimensions and May's on a date so I can't call her and I can't reach the splinters in my back but I can feel them and it's so itchy- "
"Take a breath, kid. I'll be there in ten."
"But you don't have to come all the way here....maybe I can swing over."
"Whatever you do, you will not swing here when you're as high as a kite. Cool your sticky little boots."
Peter was still listening ...somewhat. But the buzz had surpassed the loopy stage and now the voice and lights were dimming and flashing, there's a ringing in his ears and everything slowed down till Peter thought he just stopped breathing entirely. Because his chest was like rising and falling so slowly and god, he can't even lift his hand. Why was everything so slow?
Then there's a noise and Peter can't make out if it was real or in his head or oh no what if he wasn't real? Then he blinked and Tony was looking down at his curled form in the bathroom.
"Are you real? If you're not then that's OK too. I don't mind imaginary Tony."
"Oh yeah, why's that, kid? Because he's imaginary?"
Peter giggled,"No, because I can tell you anything and it won't matter because you're a gifment of my imagination."
"You mean...figment?"
The teen frowned. "Gifment. Like ....unicorns and infitely tessellated hexagon tortillas."
"Infinitely tessellated hexagon.....tortillas?"
Peter perked up. "Yeah, Ned and I the other were having lunch the other day and then we used three pieces of bread to make a sandwich and it worked!.....that was so cool."
"Oh yeah, and then what happened?"
"That was amazing cos that totally proves that 3 fold symmetry sandwiches can make way for spherical sandwiches and tessellated hexagon tortillas."
Tony snorted and grabbed the pill bottle, "Great. You know what everytime I think you can't get nerdier...well take another pill."
"WHAT ? But the whole problem was that I took too many...." His face scrunched up, eyes blearily trying to focus onto Tony but slipping every which way.
"Yes, and the next time you do so you can be well assured that I will tell Aunt Hottie. But, taking out all these splinters are gonna be a while and clearly you're still lucid enough to talk about tessellated tortillas and hexagon sandwiches and what not. The problem was that you're unaccompanied, not that you took so many pills. Who knows what kind of shenanigans you might have been upto? The resident 'high' superhero is me, kid. The spot's taken."
Peter blinked in confusion but he obediently swallowed the pill and within a minute his already droopy eyes closed completely.
"But you shouldn't be high, Mr.Stark. Drugs are bad for you. You know that drugs can accelerate your heartbeat instantly and old people with heart conditions shouldn't do drugs."
"Thanks for that, short stack. You called me old and sick when you're the one who's A: high and B: in a bathroom."
Peter decided to not respond to that by giving a half hearted eye roll. Then sighing a little, he dropped into sleep and Tony quickly stopped his head from hitting the floor and laid him on his side.
The man huffed and set to work, carefully taking the splinters out and bandaging the cuts all the while with small smile on his face.
~*~
When May came back at 3 in the morning she found her kid curled up in the bed with a bright neon note stuck to his forehead.
"Is drugged, do not disturb.
Will talk about tessellated tortillas
You have been warned.
T.S"
May simply sighed and tucked the comforter in around Peter and went to her room to change.
She's dealt with far more than high and nerdy teenagers and their sober and nerdy mentors.
What she needed to do was flop onto bed and dream about the beautiful date she had.
~*~
"Mr.Stark, what's that on the table?"
"An Infinitely tessellated hexagon tortilla. I wouldn't recommend eating it but it exists, so woo-hoo for you spider-baby."
Peter turned red. "So, you were there the whole time?"
Tony laughed. "Yeah kid. Did you think the splinters crawled out on their own?"
"No, but....ugh so you heard everything too?"
"Of course. 3-D printed this baby a few hours ago. So is your yearning for weirdly geometric Mexican food fulfilled?"
Peter who shed every bit of embarrassment, was staring unabashedly at it with stars in his eyes and said nothing.