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cap_ironman2012-03-03 01:01 am
metaallu.livejournal.com) wrote in cap_ironman2012-03-03 01:01 am
Entry tags:
Tony-Centric: How to be Kind PG [661 words]
Title: How to be Kind
Author:![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
metaallu
Beta: None
Universe: Movie
Rating: PG
Warnings: Hurt with no comfort, self-hatred, signs of depression.
Summary: Someone once has the gall to ask him why he's so cruel. Tony smiles. If only they knew he was being kind.
Personal Disclaimer: The author of this fan fiction is unstable. Comments have enabled, but will be disabled at the author's discretion.
Sometimes Tony looks at the people in his life and he thinks about all of the words that he'd take back. He thinks about the things he's said to Rhodey, the things he's done to Pepper, the people he's never protected, or the people he trusted — traitors, and his insensitivity, and selfishness, and the way that his brain and mouth connect so rarely that he should win a Nobel prize every time they do, because normally Tony Stark opening his mouth is equivalent to Godzilla breathing fire over Tokyo; his brain and his mouth connecting saves lives.
But there's no time in Tony Stark's Very Busy Schedule for regrets or apologies, or for trying to make up for all of the mistakes that he's made — and there are a lot of them. There are so many mistakes under his belt that he could make another belt out of them — or to pick up the pieces of his life or revive the dead to fulfill the unfulfillable. There isn't even time for therapy, mostly because Tony doesn't need therapy and he's not a sociopath and he has a heart, okay? He has the tacky souvenir of his brief and almost-deadly vacation to Afghanistan to prove it.
Regret is the staple of the Stark enterprise, and alcohol is what passes for stocks. He acts like he thinks highly of himself, and he lets everyone else think it, too, and then he goes home to his toys and his robots and his motor oil, and he gets piss drunk and sometimes drinks motor oil instead of beer. Being a genius is tricky business, and he doesn't have time to be kind or magnanimous between all the carefully scheduled self-loathing and the brief stints to the hospital because lo and behold, motor oil and stomachs don't mix.
Pepper also builds him a schedule, which he follows willy nilly. He needs her to hate him, at least enough to make sure they don't stumble and collide together again in a mess of hurt and hatred because he can and will ruin everything. So maybe she doesn't hate him, but she rolls her eyes, and looks indignant, and shouts at him and shoves papers in his face, and she acts like his mother — not his mother, a mother, a mother who is acting as his mother but who isn't his mother because she's younger than he is — and that's good enough. Sometimes he almost apologizes, but he's usually drunk and she gives him an exasperated look that conveys just how conflicted she is — because he's brilliant, she knows he's brilliant; and she knows that he can be kind and he can be thoughtful and remember things but he doesn't and he won't; and because he's pathetic — and so he never does.
He holds Rhodey at arm's length, and he lets Nick Fury hate him, and Phil Coulson be exasperated, and then he Doesn't Work Well With Others, and he lets everyone else roll their eyes, too, and he lets his childhood hero glare at him from across the room and hate how he lives in the moment and the present and can't be bothered with modesty.
He spends his nights mentally highlighting things and running over check lists and making line graphs and bar graphs and doing sophisticated equations. He wears the same cologne he has for ten years and still manages a brilliant smile when someone compliments him on it. Charity balls, charity dinner, charity concerts. The Maria Stark Foundation is a lifeline and a salvation and he hides behind it like a big, giant mask. He pretends to be generous while really being generous and he helps orphans and dying people and sick puppies, and Captain America finally smiles at him, so he waves it off and says that it helps stock prices.
Someone once has the gall to ask him why he's so cruel. Tony smiles. If only they knew he was being kind.
Author:
metaalluBeta: None
Universe: Movie
Rating: PG
Warnings: Hurt with no comfort, self-hatred, signs of depression.
Summary: Someone once has the gall to ask him why he's so cruel. Tony smiles. If only they knew he was being kind.
Personal Disclaimer: The author of this fan fiction is unstable. Comments have enabled, but will be disabled at the author's discretion.
Sometimes Tony looks at the people in his life and he thinks about all of the words that he'd take back. He thinks about the things he's said to Rhodey, the things he's done to Pepper, the people he's never protected, or the people he trusted — traitors, and his insensitivity, and selfishness, and the way that his brain and mouth connect so rarely that he should win a Nobel prize every time they do, because normally Tony Stark opening his mouth is equivalent to Godzilla breathing fire over Tokyo; his brain and his mouth connecting saves lives.
But there's no time in Tony Stark's Very Busy Schedule for regrets or apologies, or for trying to make up for all of the mistakes that he's made — and there are a lot of them. There are so many mistakes under his belt that he could make another belt out of them — or to pick up the pieces of his life or revive the dead to fulfill the unfulfillable. There isn't even time for therapy, mostly because Tony doesn't need therapy and he's not a sociopath and he has a heart, okay? He has the tacky souvenir of his brief and almost-deadly vacation to Afghanistan to prove it.
Regret is the staple of the Stark enterprise, and alcohol is what passes for stocks. He acts like he thinks highly of himself, and he lets everyone else think it, too, and then he goes home to his toys and his robots and his motor oil, and he gets piss drunk and sometimes drinks motor oil instead of beer. Being a genius is tricky business, and he doesn't have time to be kind or magnanimous between all the carefully scheduled self-loathing and the brief stints to the hospital because lo and behold, motor oil and stomachs don't mix.
Pepper also builds him a schedule, which he follows willy nilly. He needs her to hate him, at least enough to make sure they don't stumble and collide together again in a mess of hurt and hatred because he can and will ruin everything. So maybe she doesn't hate him, but she rolls her eyes, and looks indignant, and shouts at him and shoves papers in his face, and she acts like his mother — not his mother, a mother, a mother who is acting as his mother but who isn't his mother because she's younger than he is — and that's good enough. Sometimes he almost apologizes, but he's usually drunk and she gives him an exasperated look that conveys just how conflicted she is — because he's brilliant, she knows he's brilliant; and she knows that he can be kind and he can be thoughtful and remember things but he doesn't and he won't; and because he's pathetic — and so he never does.
He holds Rhodey at arm's length, and he lets Nick Fury hate him, and Phil Coulson be exasperated, and then he Doesn't Work Well With Others, and he lets everyone else roll their eyes, too, and he lets his childhood hero glare at him from across the room and hate how he lives in the moment and the present and can't be bothered with modesty.
He spends his nights mentally highlighting things and running over check lists and making line graphs and bar graphs and doing sophisticated equations. He wears the same cologne he has for ten years and still manages a brilliant smile when someone compliments him on it. Charity balls, charity dinner, charity concerts. The Maria Stark Foundation is a lifeline and a salvation and he hides behind it like a big, giant mask. He pretends to be generous while really being generous and he helps orphans and dying people and sick puppies, and Captain America finally smiles at him, so he waves it off and says that it helps stock prices.
Someone once has the gall to ask him why he's so cruel. Tony smiles. If only they knew he was being kind.
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This is a wonderfully perceptive and prettily written insight into Tony Stark.