Archive of Our Own

Chapter Text

Peter didn't really believe in fate. Ned was always going on about it- like the hopeless romantic he is, and really, he needs to get over Betty- but it just didn't really click for Peter. Sure, there's something to be said about coincidences that pile on top of each other; but if you ask him, it's more the fault of the Swiss Cheese Model than anything else. He's a scientist (in his class lab), okay, sue him!

That was before he got bit by a spider, fell through a few roofs, got found out by Iron Man of all people, went to Germany, skipped a math test, had to do extra credit for it, scaled the Washington Monument, fought a guy in a bird costume who happened to be the dad of his ill-fated crush and prom date, watched the Avengers get back together, and ended up with a Stark Industries "internship" on top of his AP classes.

So… the Swiss Cheese Model can only take you so far, Peter figures.

("You literally go to Stark Tower every day after school," Ned said, staring at Peter's ceiling and juggling his Lego Darth Maul figure.

"It's Avengers Tower, technically. Mr. Stark renamed it-"

"That's even crazier! This time last year you cried watching Dead Poets Society in English class and now you're basically Tony Stark's prodigy!"

"That movie is really sad, Ned."

"It is, isn't it.")

So, fate. Peter concedes some of his life might be made of a web of coincidences that may or may not be being pushed around by some cosmic force. Hopefully whatever cosmic force is up there has a regard for his well-being in this particular moment, because he's pretty sure he's going to get an earful from Mr. Stark, who heard from Happy, who heard from Aunt May.

"You did what?"

"In my defense Mr. Stark-"

"No, no, lemme just stop you right there," Mr. Stark holds up a finger, pinching the bridge of his nose with his other hand. Peter idly wonders if he's slept in the last few days, given the general state of the lab. FRIDAY will give him the juicy details later of whatever Mr. Stark's been busy with, if not Colonel Rhodes. "You blew up your school lab?"

Peter fiddles with the sleeve of his hoodie, looking anywhere but the exasperated man in front of him. "Technically, it wasn't just me. And it didn't blow up! It was just webbing fluid-"

"You were testing webbing fluid in your school lab???"

Peter winces. "You were out and the lab was locked and I had an idea for a new design-"

"I can't do this. Oh my god," Mr. Stark puts his head down the table, laying in a puddle of blueprints and papers and coffee stains. "Someone could've figured you out, kid!" He groans at a frankly dramatic volume.

"But no one did!" Peter responds, voice leapfrogging. Mr. Stark continues groaning dramatically, like Peter isn't even speaking. He's even doing that thing with his leg where he jitters it like he's about to take flight. The items on the table clatter with the force of it. "I told Mr. Grace it was for the Academic Decathlon! He didn't suspect a thing!"

The items stop moving with a sudden silence so loud Peter feels like he went deaf for a second. He's not deaf is he? He pinches himself and then wonders why the hell he did that.

Peter continues, because at this point he's afraid he might explode. "Really, it wasn't a big deal. The school admin was just overreacting- and really, if Mr. Grace wasn't there I probably woulda broken a lot more school equipment-" Peter has to stop talking about breaking expensive things, "-and honestly without context it just seems like I'm interested in creating a new type of glue or something! We only broke one beaker and yeah some shards may have gotten in the hallway but I cleaned them up and Mr. Grace really took most of the fall for me and honestly I feel kinda bad because he's already in trouble with Principal Morita for that thing he said to the Brooklyn Visions' coach at the last Academic Decathlon and-"

Peter's voice whittles down to a high pitched whistle, forgetting that he needs to breathe to continue creating more sound.

Mr. Stark remains face-down on the table.

After a few more agonizing seconds during which Peter weighs the possibilities that he just gave his mentor and the savior of the world a heart attack, Mr. Stark looks up at him, eyes suddenly wide.

A beat passes.

"What's your teacher's name again?"

Huh?

Peter blinks. Mr. Stark does not. DUM-E chitters from his charging port.

"My-? Uh… Mr. Grace?" Peter hesitantly responds, briefly wondering why the hell that's relevant before realizing, oh, Mr. Stark probably feels bad for the guy, wants to give him some cash or something for his troubles in dealing with Peter's science experiments.

…Either that, or Iron Man is gonna pay Mr. Grace a home visit to ensure he doesn't spill any secret-identity spider-related beans. Peter imagines poor Mr. Grace opening his apartment door to a fully suited up Mr. Stark, eyes dark through the mask like that time he confronted Peter about the boat incident.

He shivers. He hopes its not the second option. Mr. Grace may actually die from fear alone.

"What's his first name?"

Okay, this is weird. This is weird, right? The billionaire is staring seemingly past Peter at this point, not blinking like he's having a flashback in some old movie.

Peter tries to step into Mr. Stark's zoned out field of vision. It doesn't work.

"I… think it's Ryland. Why…?"

All at once, like time started moving again after being frozen, Mr. Stark stands up from his chair, the legs scraping back against the tile.

And then he just… walks out of the room.

Oh god, Mr. Stark is totally going to kill him.

Peter waits in the lab for what feels like an hour, and what FRIDAY tells him is a cool twenty minutes. He's almost afraid to leave the room; something in his head tells him that if he stays here in this little bubble, he won't have to go outside to see the Daily Bugle's new headline read "BREAKING: MIDTOWN HIGH SCHOOL TEACHER MURDERED BY IRON MAN IN BROAD DAYLIGHT."

He makes himself four sandwiches while he waits. Leave it to Mr. Stark to have a fully stocked fridge and pantry in here, even if that definitely shouldn't be in the same space as a nanotechnology related fume hood. Whatever, if it works it works, Peter figures. He waves at Ms. Romanoff and Mr. Wilson as they pass by the glass doors, clearly on their way to do something really important and spy-like.

He's halfway through the third sandwich and definitely not snooping on the designs Mr. Stark is working on- updated arm for Mr. Barnes, nice- when the man in question returns, striding through the lab doors like a man possessed.

Peter immediately perks up, wiping breadcrumbs off his face. Please don't say you killed my favorite teacher Please don't say you killed my favorite teacher Please don't say you killed my favorite teacher-

Mr. Stark claps him on the back with surprising force. Peter chokes, just a little.

"Okay, so here's what we're gonna do!" He starts, with far too much pizazz. "You can invite Ry-Mr. Grace, to the tower lab on Thursday to do whatever it is you nerds need to do without damaging school property and endangering your fellow, less enlightened of course, Midtown tech students. Sound good?"

He doesn't wait for Peter to respond. "Great! Good talk, kid." The hand on his back pats once, twice, and then Mr. Stark walks right back out the lab doors.

Peter sits there, mouthful of sandwich, the peanut butter sticky in his gums.

"What?"

In hindsight, it should not have been a broken beaker and some glass shards that caused all of this. When it comes to Peter's life, though, he should just be happy that the glass shards didn't give him invisibility or the ability to fly…though that would be pretty cool.

It's extremely easy for Peter to say that Mr. Grace is by far his favorite teacher at Midtown. It really isn't even close. Ms. Warren would be the runner up, and he does like how she teaches physics, but Mr. Grace is like having a real life Bill Nye running around lighting things on fire and showing students how to get around police toxicology reports. In the few years Peter's been at Midtown, Mr. Grace's been his science teacher the entire time; the man's become almost like a mentor of Peter's- not unlike Mr. Stark, now that he thinks about it. One for science, one for superheroing.

Though, Peter knows a lot about Mr. Stark- as does most of the world, really- and not a whole lot about Mr. Grace. He knows that technically, he's Doctor Grace, though the man refuses to go by that title. Peter knows that he used to be involved in the more scholarly side of science, though he also remains tight-lipped about that whole thing. Peter's not as nosy as MJ or Ned, both of whom probably figured out why already, even if he wants so desperately to know what happened. Other than that, there isn't much to write home about his teacher. He's soft spoken, keeps to himself, and doesn't seem to have much to do outside of teaching. Oh, and he bikes to school.

Mr. Grace already knows about his Stark Industries "internship," which is how Peter got his face plastered on the wall of the science lab like he was one of those dead legendary scientists. Albert Einstein, Nikola Tesla, Marie Curie, Bruce Banner, Katherine Johnson, Peter Parker. MJ once tried to put a little asterisk under his picture that said "just has an internship with Stark Industries," but Mr. Grace made her take it down.

("After all, it's you guys' generation that'll be up there in fifty years!" He had said, smile big, "It's important to nurture confidence!"

"Hopefully Peter'll have a better picture by then because whew," MJ snickered, making Peter blush and cover his face.)

It's the nature of the frankly insane invitation that makes Peter squirm in his seat. How in the world is he supposed to bring this up?

Hey Mr. Grace, I just wanted to say that Tony Stark- yeah you know, that Tony Stark- wants you to come to Avengers Tower- yes that Avengers Tower- so we can blow up lab equipment in peace and I won't get expelled or my secret identity revealed. Oh, by the way, I'm Spider-Man. Yes I'm serious. No this isn't a prank. No you don't need to call my aunt.

Like, seriously.

So he decides to just… rip the band-aid off, line up a needle through a block of Swiss cheese and hope it makes it through to the other side, after the last bell rings and the class files out for the day. Mr. Grace is packing up his notebooks, erasing the last bits of equations from the board. There's still caution tape blocking off a portion of the lab space- which, really, is overkill- so Peter has to step around it to approach the man.

"Hey Peter, you wanted to ask me something?" Mr. Grace smiles at him from over his glasses, tilting his head downward whenever something was just out of his range of vision. The sun is low on the horizon later than usual, a telltale sign of spring settling in, and the warm rays make rainbows dance across the wall and whiteboard.

"Yeah, Mr. Grace- uh…" Peter trails off, scrunching his nose. Seriously, this can't be worse than the I'm secretly a superhero talk with Aunt May. He shakes the nerves off. "So you know my Stark Industries internship, right?"

Mr. Grace nods, eyes warm.

Peter mirrors the motion, picking at his hands. "So, it seems like they caught wind of the, uh, incident?" He throws a glance toward the crime scene in the corner, and Mr. Grace physically winces at the reminder.

"Oh, Peter-" Mr. Grace starts, voice sad, and Peter quickly realizes how his body language and hesitance comes off.

"No, no! It's okay! I still have the internship, don't worry!" He quickly reassures, watching in real time how his teacher's entire body slumps in relief. It's probably just because taking Peter's picture off the wall would ruin the cohesive look of the delicately decorated space. "Actually, my supervisor- Mr. Stark- heard about what we were trying to do and wanted me to invite you to come with me after school to continue our work in the lab at the tower!"

Mr. Grace stops, looking at Peter like he's grown a second head. Or sprouted spider legs. "You said Tony Stark… invited me?" He points toward himself like he's not entirely sure Peter's speaking English.

Peter nods.

"We're talking about the same Tony Stark, right?"

Peter nods again.

Mr. Grace seems to inhale more air than he can handle for a second, exhaling it all out in a rush. "Yeah- yeah, sure, I'll come to your-" he breaks off for a second, fumbling for the right words. "What did you say he was?"

"My supervisor-"

"Your supervisor, right. Right. Yeah, absolutely." Mr. Grace looks like he's about to burst into tears. Or start screaming. He's starstruck, maybe. Must be. It's how Peter felt when he walked into his apartment to find the very same Tony Stark on his couch, after all. "Yeah, of course. I'll be there. Besides, this lab can't really be used anymore, you know."

We can't really use the space anymore, is what Mr. Grace declines to say out loud, though they both know that's the real reason. Principal Morita made that very clear to the both of them in a thirty minute rant.

"Who am I to turn down an offer from Iron Man, anyways?" Mr. Grace says, flush high on his cheeks. Must be the sunlight reflecting through the windows. The A/C is famously terrible in this room.

"Great- great, yeah that's great." Peter says, smiling nervously. "Thursday works? That's when I have my next intern shift."

Mr. Grace nods, grip so tight on his backpack that Peter wonders if he's about to turn into the Hulk but blonde. "Sounds perfect."

Peter smiles, a weird, lumpy shaped weight lifted off his shoulders. That was… less awkward than he thought it would be, and yet exactly as awkward as every interaction normally is with Mr. Grace.

Whatever, it's done now! That's the important thing. Everything is settled, and Peter isn't going to get expelled, Mr. Stark isn't going to fire him- can he fire him? He's Spider-Man after all, maybe he can't- and Mr. Grace won't know about his secret. Peter feels light on his feet as he leaves the school and heads out. Every hole in every slice of cheese lined up perfectly.

The rainbow shifts and bends with the sun, reaching toward the sky, where it follows Peter all the way home.

Grace is outside Avengers Tower before he knows it. He had almost biked into several open manholes on the way here- and really, he'll never get used to New York's seemingly endless construction- mind racing just as fast as it had been throughout the school day. And it's never a good thing when Grace's mind races, because he starts to think about everything and anything and in this situation, the variables are endless.

Let's review.

Tony Stark. Tony Stark is inviting him to the big huge tower in Manhattan- Avengers tower- to do science in what is probably the world's most advanced lab. Peter Parker, his star student and the culprit of a minor explosion the other day is somehow the messenger, personally sent on behalf of the most famous person possibly on the planet.

If he's being real with himself, he thought it was some kind of prank, when Peter first approached him about it. Though, Peter's not the type to pull a stupid prank like this- if it was Flash Gordon, sure. Grace would find himself standing outside Avengers Tower with egg on his face. But Peter? No way.

Yet, this whole situation seems insane. How does a high school student have a personal connection with Tony Stark?

Maybe he's actually secretly Stark's kid, Grace's brain adds unhelpfully, remembering that Peter's only really shown up with his strikingly young aunt to parent-teacher conferences.

He shakes that thought away. That's stupid.

It's much more likely that the kid just climbed his way up the intern ladder and got the attention of the man whose name is on the logo; Grace wouldn't put it past Peter, the kid is smart.

And still, there's the giant red flashing sign in Grace's head that is screaming at him to pay attention to it. He tries to banish it like he had been trying to the past however many hours, but concedes defeat.

Because twenty-some-odd years ago, at a Model UN conference of all things, MIT and UC Berkeley went head to head.

And Ryland Grace hooked up with Tony Stark on the second day of the competition.

Really, it was inevitable. They were both prodigies, young compared to their peers and fellow competitors, wicked and whip smart with egos the size of Texas that clashed like no one's business. Ryland had something to prove in the world of academia and Tony was doing everything he could to get out of the shadow of his father. With enough alcohol, it was only a matter of time 'til they met in the middle.

And god, did they meet in the middle. If he's being honest, Grace still thinks about that conference all the time. How could he not? Tony Stark's been at the forefront of most major news since he unveiled himself as Iron Man almost a decade ago. Between that, the battle of New York, the Avengers, and Grace finding himself teaching in the same city where you can pay a tour guide to watch Iron Man fly overhead every other week, it was always going to be a memory he revisits.

Though, if he's being really honest, that stupid Model UN conference hookup might have been the best romantic- if he can call it that- experience of his life. And he's not just saying that because he was a few Smirnoffs deep with no chaser at the time.

("Ryland? Like the grain?" Stark- Tony asks, nursing a bottle in his hand, dark eyes lidded.

He hesitates. He's never liked his name. "Rye's 'pposed to thrive in cold environments. Parents ran out of ideas, I guess. My brothers have more… normal names."

"Nah… fits you. 'S cute.")

Anyways. That's all besides the point. The point is that he's currently standing outside of Avengers Tower, mind racing with memories interlinked with the smell of asphalt and nail polish on his tongue, wondering what in the world he is doing here.

It's probably fine. Statistically, it's definitely fine. There's no way he remembers Grace after all these years; it was decades ago, a time that was fun, granted, but meant nothing. Grace is definitely the only person still thinking about it years later, like a creep. Unlike Stark, Grace faded into obscurity after his fall from academia. To Stark, Grace is probably nothing more than a memory of an outdated spiky blonde hairstyle and a face not quite remembered.

(Hushed whispers.

"Tony, we're gonna get caught up here-"

"Don't be such a wuss, don't tell me you've never snuck around on a roof before?"

"We could get disqualified!" The nervousness he feels outweighs the alcohol in his system.

"And god forbid your ego takes that blow." Tony's laugh is so bright. It makes him want to make reckless decisions.

Ryland leans in, their lips brushing. "You're such a jackass-")

Time to pick a different train of thought, Ryland. The opening and closing of automatic doors directs his attention ahead of him, where a neatly dressed woman- an employee, he supposes- exits the tower. He's never been this close to Avengers tower before and it is definitely the most imposing thing he's ever seen. If it didn't stand for what it did, it would probably be intimidating. Though, considering the statistical anomaly that is New York's super-villain to civilian ratio, having a tower full of super-powered beings is nothing but comforting.

He's always thought about taking a tour of this place, like with Midtown's annual field trips, but always found a reason to weasel his way out of it. He didn't have a reason, really. Call him a coward.

"Mr. Grace?" Peter's voice cuts through his train of thought, dragging his eyes away from the tower to the waving boy approaching him, skipping his way over. "You got here super early!"

"Oh yeah, I biked," Grace gestures to his bike, chained up by a bush.

"From Queens?" Peter looks genuinely astounded.

Grace sputters, "Only when I got over the East River. I'm not that crazy." He's lying through his teeth. Biking's always been a way for Grace to get out of his head. Never mind that it was something like 8 miles to get here, that's besides the point.

"Right," Peter definitely does not believe him,"well, wanna go in?"

Honestly, Peter, the chances of seeing a college situationship in there are more than 0 and I don't know if I can handle that.

"Yeah, of course," is what he says out loud instead. Peter nods, and he follows the teenager in.

Grace adjusts his raincoat. It's not even raining.

("Y'look good in yellow."

"What're you talking about?" Ryland huffs, really not wanting to break this rhythm of kissing, thank you very much.

"Your coat from yesterday- the yellow one." Tony's breath mingles with his. They're outside, and it's November in Boston, but Grace feels like he's on fire. "It was so cute on you."

"Really?"

"Scout's honor," Tony teeters into him, the warmth lighting him up from inside. "So damn cute."

Their lips meet, and nothing much of substance is said for a long while after.)

Chapter Text

Grace is a scientist by nature. There's nothing that can't be explained away with math, equations, and logic. The flow of traffic, strands of DNA, the composition of stars, the entire story that led Grace to where he is right now: all of it is made of variables, all of it has a statistical probability, all of it had factors that will lead to a determinable outcome.

Grace believes in math.

Math says this is fine.

(It was a logical decision to join the Model UN team at UC Berkeley. Ryland needed extracurriculars to beef up his resume before he applied for grad programs, and the ultimate frisbee team wasn't exactly his calling.

It was a logical decision of the Model UN team to put their club fair booth right by the entrance, just so they could catch all the wide-eyed freshmen shuffling in. Hook, line, sinker.

It was logical, then, that it was the first club he signed up for. And not just because they advertised themselves as the perfect place for those who loved to argue.

Ryland excelled almost immediately, like he did with every other subject. It was no surprise, but a simple probability value that their team made nationals in his freshman year.)

If anything can get Grace through today, it will be math.

Peter’s leading him through the front doors, and he follows the kid in like a lost puppy, head bowing subconsciously like he is trying to make himself seem smaller by comparison. He didn’t get enough time to psych himself up properly before Peter showed up- his hands still feel clammy. He clenches and unclenches them in time.

(“You’ll be fine, Ryland. Remember the rules of procedure. We definitely have a chance to get a best delegate award and maybe even- oh fuck.”

“What? What’s wrong?” Ryland looked over, nerves overtaking him for the third time this week, tie uncomfortably tight around his neck. “Yazhini? Hello?”

She didn’t look back at him; her eyes were fixed on the other end of the hall, toward the team from MIT.

“Goddamnit,” Yazhini cursed under her breath. Ryland didn’t understand what she was looking at- he knew the MIT team was supposed to be the cream of the crop, but it’s not like they didn’t know they would be here and- “That’s Tony Stark.”

Just as the name left her lips, Ryland spotted him.

The guy was short, that was the first thing he noticed. Brown, quaffed hair, probably combed through with product that cost more than Ryland’s tuition. Dressed in a suit but tie undone and hung loose around his neck with an unbuttoned collar. Sunglasses inside like the dress code was more of a suggestion. Clean shaven, with what looked to be an unlit cigarette between his lips.

They’re not supposed to smoke in here, Ryland thought blankly.

It’s not like Ryland hadn’t seen him before, in newspaper clippings and cited in scientific papers- they're both circling the same fields of study after all and Stark's already a junior- but this man is nothing like Ryland pictured. Nothing like he looked in the papers. Nothing like-

“Howard Stark’s kid. Jesus,” that was Sebastián’s voice from his other side, “That should be considered cheating. When did he even join?”

“I heard a rumor about it from the Duke team, but I didn’t think he would actually grace us lowlifes with his glorious presence,” Yazhini said, sarcasm dripping from her words. But Ryland wasn’t really listening. He was still looking at Stark.

It wasn't a cigarette between Stark's lips. It was a lollipop. It was a goddamn lollipop that the kid was twirling on his tongue as he chatted up another member of his team, completely oblivious to, or maybe relishing in, the attention he was receiving from the rest of the room.

From Ryland.

As if he could read minds, Stark turned his head, then, a subtle thing, and made direct eye contact. He looked Ryland up and down slowly.

Stark twirled the lollipop once, twice, smiled around it, and winked at him.)

Grace has a plan. He rehearsed this five times in the mirror this morning before realizing he was running late to school and rushing out the door. Systematize it, write it down. He spent the better half of last night scratching wildly in a notepad that he keeps around to write down literally anything he deems important enough. So what, he spent a few hours on this? This is beyond important.

It was quite simple.

-       Tony Stark does not remember you.

-       Even if he does, it was decades ago. It means nothing.

-       You are a high school teacher here to do his job and nothing else. Don’t let anything else get in the way.

-       You are shaking hands with Iron Man today, not a man whose had his tongue down your throat multiple times.

-       Do not think about the roof.

-       Do not think about the kiss(es).

-       Do not think about that week.

-       Shake his hand, and make sure it’s firm but not too aggressive. Two pumps: up down, up down, done.

-       Stay professional, stay neutral, give him no reason to think you’re acting weird because to him, he has never met you before.

Peter’s giving him tour guide commentary as they head toward the elevators. Grace doesn’t register how Peter easily bypasses the main set of doors, walking instead toward a more hidden, private set labeled “NOT FOR PUBLIC USE.”

Instead, his mind is running a constant string of thoughts and formatting them into questions he would give to a student on a quiz. For example: what’s the probability that the next hour or two of his life is going to be horrendously awkward? P(A) = the number of favorable outcomes over the total number of possible outcomes.

Well, there’s endless possible outcomes, but let’s go with a hundred. Honestly speaking, if he sticks to his script and does everything correctly, he thinks he has a pretty good chance of this working out.

The elevator doors close, and Peter is still talking. Grace is half listening. Something about the work he does while an intern here, something about the first time he met Tony Stark, something about his biology exam from last week, something about a deli down the road from Midtown. It’s like background noise, the constant speaking a nice balm to his racing mind.

If he sticks to his script, it’s probably a 4/5 chance that he makes it through. Maybe 50/50 if there’s a curveball thrown in- like maybe Peter really is the secret child of Stark’s and they let it slip while Grace is there.

“What floor would you like to go to, Mr. Parker?” A feminine robotic voice says from the speakers, Grace registers dully.

“Labs, please. Thanks, Fri.”

“Of course.”

Carry the one, dot your I's, and cross your T's. Sign your name so you don't get points off. 

The elevator doors open and Grace runs the checklist through his head one more time. Before he can do anything else, he places his bike helmet on a very expensive looking table. He picks at the hem of his raincoat- why is he still wearing this? There's not a coat check as far as he can tell, but maybe-

Footsteps approach, expensive shoes on tile floor. Click Clack Click Clack.

You know that feeling, when you look at someone and your brain goes oh before you’ve even processed anything? When your heart feels like it dropped through to your stomach and is slowly leaking out all over the floor? Maybe your legs get that pins and needles feeling radiating up and down, or your fingers lose all sense of touch? You feel kind of like your body is in one spot, and your brain is in another?

Grace is experiencing all of that, all at once.

Tony Stark is standing in front of him. He’s dressed to the nines in a sharp suit, hands in his pockets. He's wearing tinted sunglasses, the arms brushing over perfectly quaffed hair doppled with gray strands. He looks nothing and everything like the interviews and press photos Grace combed over last night. He looks beautiful.

Professional. Remain professional, Grace. First point on the list: Tony Stark does not remember you.

“Hi Mr. Stark!” Peter says brightly, waving.

Grace reaches his hand out to shake Stark’s, before realizing he had somehow picked his bike helmet back up again in his anxious stupor. He places it back down to free up his hands (again.)

Remember: firm, but not too aggressive. Two pumps: up down, up down, and done. He takes a deep breath, wills his brain to coordinate with his mouth. “Nice to meet you- I’m Mr. Grace, Peter’s science teacher.”

(“I’m Grace, uh, Ryland.”)

Stark doesn’t reach a hand back out to him, and his brain stutters, just a bit.

Instead, the man tilts his head down, looking up at Grace over red tinted sunglasses, and smirks.

“Don’t remember me, Ryland? I feel like I should be offended.”

He did not account for this.

He’s faintly aware of Peter staring at them with eyes the size of saucers. He's whipping his head back and forth like Grace and Tony are two animals in a nature documentary, but Grace can’t bring himself to turn his head over the sound of all the blood vessels in his brain exploding at once.

Tony’s smiling.

God, Tony’s smiling, and it’s the same smile.

It’s so unfair, he thinks distantly. Twenty years and it’s the same smile.

(A crinkle of eyes, long lashes fanned over tanned skin stretched around white teeth. Sharp canines curled around a grin.)

He’s still looking at Grace over his glasses. Just like-

(“Well, Grace comma uh Ryland, lovely to meet you. I’m sure you know who I am.”)

“Tony.” He breathes, neurons working overtime to even get the word out.

“There you are.” Tony says, eyes bright.

Insufferable. God, he’s so insufferable.

(“I swear- that guy- I can’t stand him! We prepared so much-“ Ryland broke off into a loud sigh, rubbing a hand over his face before realizing all that did was smudge ink all over himself, which only proved to make him more upset.

“Probabilities aren’t everything,” Yazhini conceded, twirling a pencil between her fingers. “We got our asses beat. How were we supposed to predict they would pull the bloc strategy?”

“Speak of the devil,” Sebastián muttered. Ryland turned his head and was faced with the man of the hour, hands in his pockets, grinning down at the Berkeley team in their various positions of squalor.

“There you are,” Stark said. Insufferable, God he’s so insufferable. Ryland was losing his mind.

Ryland wanted to-)

Grace wants to kiss him. Or jump out the window.

“You two know each other?” Peter says, eyes still wide, so quiet it almost feels like he's in a different room than the two adults. He’s glancing between the two like he’s afraid one of them will throw a punch.

“Uh-“

“I know everyone, kid,” Tony says nonchalantly, shrugging, as if Grace isn’t still having trouble reeling his brain back in from outer space, “I’m surprised he didn’t tell you.”

Peter slides now-narrowed eyes at Grace, and he feels himself sweat at the surprising pressure. “He didn’t…”

“So, shall we begin the tour?" Tony claps his hands together. "Welcome to my humble abode. Mi casa es su casa and all that."

Grace ducks his head, and follows.

Tony leads them toward a standard materials lab. It's impressive and nothing like Grace has seen in years, not since his PhD days at least. The room is wide and filled with glass and chrome- almost reminiscent of a spaceship. There's people inside, a few of which react to Tony lightly knocking on the window and waving at them.

"My minions, and some of the brightest people you'll ever meet."

Grace waves too, the movement slightly aborted when he realizes no one is really looking at him.

Gliding smoothly over to the other side of the hall, Tony pulls back a partition and leads them down a level to a different kind of space.

It's quiet in here, and empty, Grace notices immediately. He also notices that the equipment here is much more precise, a level above the materials lab. He hasn't seen machines like this in years, and some of them he's only ever seen mentioned in news articles.

"This is the biomimicry lab, where Peter does his very important work," Tony says, "the very same work he was exploding in your lab."

"The glue," Peter supplies quickly, coughing, "It's a synthetic polymer, super strong and elastic." A glue startup. Interesting.

"A proprietary formula with various applications," Tony notes, smirking at Peter.

Peter looks at the ceiling- and Grace swears he hears the kid pray for a second. Maybe Thor's upstairs, or something.

Tony slides a sample container over towards them. The fluid inside has a viscosity similar to the one Peter was attempting to make in the school lab- obviously, this one is more stable. He hopes, at least.

"What's the base protein structure?" Grace asks, head tilted.

Tony pauses, taking a moment to actually consider the question. Grace feels a beat of satisfaction; he's still got the ability to make the man think.

"Modified spidroin." Spider silk? "Mr. Parker here engineered stability at room temperature without losing any of the tensile strength."

Spider silk is known to have proteins that fold into tight structures, but getting them to do that outside a spider? At room temperature without degrading? That's stumped researchers for years.

Peter rubs a hand on the back of his neck, smile wobbly. Grace knew it was a good idea to put his picture up on the wall. This kid is a genius.

"You solved the beta-sheet crystallization problem?"

Tony throws an arm around Peter's shoulder and smiles like a proud dad. "There's a reason I wanted him at SI."

It should have been cocky, but Grace could find nothing but fondness in his tone.

His gaze wanders toward a report on the table near the sample container, eyes brushing over the words. Tony's distracted, noodling Peter in the side about something or another.

"Have you looked at venom gland cell cultures for extraction?" He mentions, after a beat. "If you're already trying to modify the spidroin gene, then the secretory cells might give you better a yield than bacterial expression."

Grace feels his chest puff up and his back straighten as he speaks, the confidence previously buried under years of teaching middle and high schoolers peeking out through the cracks in his spine. Tony is an engineer, and Peter's smart, but he's not a doctored molecular biologist, so maybe Grace can help in some way.

Tony goes quiet. It's a specific kind of quiet that Grace recognizes as an idea landing. He's staring at Grace, and his eyes are dark with something.

("Your resolution's sloppy," Stark said, not unkindly, which somehow felt worse. A floor full of delegates, and the guy was dismantling his entire argument with the precision of someone who'd been doing this since he could talk. "The policy recommendation's worthwhile, but the implementation is a mess."

Ryland was so furious. He also couldn't look away.)

"Friday, log that for later." Tony doesn't look away as he speaks. Neither does Grace.

The tour passes without incident, for the most part. Granted, Grace spends most of it looking at Tony and not, well, the lab, but he survived.

Tony and Peter walk him back to the elevators, the latter deciding to stay for a few more hours to get some work done in the lab.

Grace picks his bike helmet up from the table and throws it over his head haphazardly, the buckle sticking out away from his head like an antenna. He doesn't even get to fix it before Tony speaks up.

"Cute helmet," He says, gesturing to the lump on top of Grace's messy strands.

"Oh- uh, thanks. I bike to work," Grace responds, pointing at the helmet like a genuine idiot. Did he just call me cute?

"I like it. Eco-conscious." Tony says, before winking at him. Oh god.

"Right, eco-conscious." Grace splutters, in lieu of actually, I'm on a teacher's salary and having a car in this city is like throwing your rent into the gutter every month. He's so caught up in himself that he doesn't realize he takes the helmet back off, setting it on the same expensive-looking table.

Tony fits his sunglasses back up on his nose, whipping out a piece of what looks to be scratch paper with numbers on it. He holds it out between two fingers.

"My personal line, in case you need to reach out." He says, eyes lidded. "Or in case you want to discuss your ideas for the spidroin further."

(Stark slid a folded piece of paper across the table, a subtle gesture with two fingers. He didn't even bother breaking eye contact with the delegate he was currently cross-examining with.

Ryland opened it up under the table.

A time, a room number. Nothing else.

He had shown up anyways.)

Grace takes it.

He makes it approximately one block before he has to stop his bike and just stand there for a second, staring at the sidewalk. The moon is bright in the sky now, and the shadow of Avengers tower is eclipsing his view.

(Their legs tangled, and Ryland looked up at Tony, framed by the moon and stars.

"What?" Tony breathed out, breathless and lips swollen.

Ryland didn't answer, pulling him back down instead. His fingers brushed against cropped hair at the nape of Tony's neck and he could still taste that disgusting alcohol on both of their tongues.)

Grace gets back on his bike, and rides home faster than he got here.