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May loves Peter, and by proxy she loves most of the things that make her nephew happy.
Okay. Most is doing a lot of work there.
Because there are a handful of Peter’s interests that either scare her, stress her out, or — in today’s case — bore her to absolute death.
Robotics is very cool, or so Peter and Ned insist. They have delivered more than one passionate, long-winded explanation about why it’s an underrated extracurricular and how people only think it’s uncool because of outdated stereotypes. Not at Midtown, of course. That school practically runs on nerdy things like robotics. Still, the boys maintain that the rest of the world just doesn’t get it.
May does not argue.
Not because she agrees, but because she doesn’t have the heart — or the energy — to unpack her personal feelings on the matter.
She hates the competitions.
She is more than happy to listen to Peter chatter about robotics club meetings at home. Peter can talk, and May has always been content to be the listener. But the competitions themselves are another story. Loud. Long. Overstimulating. Endless hours spent sitting on temporary risers in cavernous convention centers that smell faintly of hot metal and cafeteria food.
And still, she goes. Every time she isn’t scheduled for work. Every time she can request the day off in advance.
Because showing up matters.
Because Ben would have been here, and because he can’t be, it’s her job now.
Unfortunately, stepping up today means May is only on hour three of what will almost certainly be an eight-hour affair. She’s settled into a spot on the bleachers, her bag tucked at her feet. It’s packed carefully — her favorite snacks, Peter’s favorites too. She’s downloaded ten episodes of Grey’s Anatomy for emergencies, because there will be downtime, and she wore her most comfortable outfit that still qualifies as presentable. The risers are unforgiving, and she has learned from experience.
Peter abandoned her hours ago. Something about the robot. Or the code. Or the wheels. She hadn’t entirely followed, but she’d waved him off anyway, proud and nervous in equal measure.
So when someone stops directly in front of her, blocking her view, she assumes it’s Peter coming back for something.
She looks up from her phone.
It is not Peter.
It takes her a second — actually, it takes her a full double take — to register Tony Stark standing in front of her.
He hardly looks like himself. No expensive suit. No tailored lines. Just worn-in jeans, a faded gray MIT hoodie, and a baseball cap pulled low enough to hide his usually perfect hair. The sunglasses perched on his nose look… normal. Affordable, even.
He’s still unmistakably Tony, if you know him — something May still can’t quite believe she does — but the disguise is working. No one around them is staring. No phones are being raised. He looks relaxed. Almost comfortable.
May blinks at him, phone paused mid-episode.
“What are you doing here, To—”
He cuts her off, not sharply. Just quick. “Anthony,” he says. “Today, please.”
She blinks, then nods, recalibrating. “Okay. What are you doing here, Anthony?” she asks, turning her phone off and slipping it into her pocket.
“I’m here for the robotics competition,” he says, gesturing toward the chaos of the event floor behind him.
He says it like it’s obvious. Like this is something he does all the time.
May frowns. “Like… to judge?”
It doesn’t track. Not with the hoodie. Not with the hat. Not with the very deliberate effort he’s making to blend in.
“To watch Peter.”
That makes her pause.
She knows they’re close. Close enough that a few weeks ago they’d sat together in the Midtown office and added Tony as a secondary emergency contact. Close enough that Peter sometimes goes to Tony when his senses are overwhelmed. Tony understands that Spider-Man side of him in a way May never quite has.
And he even took Peter to MIT, last week — those things made sense. Internship things. Academic things.
But this?
Showing up to a high school robotics competition, disguised and unannounced, when you’re a public figure who very clearly doesn’t want attention — especially where her nephew is concerned — feels risky.
“Does Peter know you’re here?” she asks.
As risky as it is, May can’t ignore the other side of it. The part that feels… generous. Peter’s awe of Tony has softened over time, matured into something steadier, but it’s still there. This would make his day. It’s already making hers, if she’s being honest. It’s nice — startlingly so — to see someone care enough to show up.
“No,” Tony says. “He hasn’t seen me yet. But I saw his team getting ready for one of the rounds.”
He glances toward the floor again. “Come on. Let’s go watch.”
He offers her his arm.
May hesitates. She prefers her spot on the sidelines. Her bag. Her snacks. Her updates from Peter and Ned between matches. But Tony Stark came all this way, dressed down and careful, just to stand in a noisy gym and watch her nephew compete.
So she stands, loops her arm through his, and lets herself be led into the chaos.
“You know,” Tony says as they weave slowly through the crowd, “I always wanted to be on the robotics team in school.”
May lets him guide them. He moves with purpose, like he already knows where they’re headed.
“Why weren’t you?” she asks. It’s hard to imagine a robotics team not falling over themselves to have him.
“I graduated high school at fourteen,” he says. “Boarding school. Howard had this rule about no extracurriculars. Thought they were a waste of time.”
Something in May’s chest tightens. She knows pieces of Tony’s history are public knowledge. Peter, in his earlier super-fan days, probably knows all of this. She doesn’t.
“No extracurriculars?” she repeats. “Really?”
“Nope,” he says, popping the p. “And everyone at that place teased me mercilessly, so honestly, I probably dodged a bullet. And a lot of bullying.”
She looks at him, startled. “You were bullied?”
It’s almost impossible to picture. Tony Stark. Billionaire. Iron Man. The man beside her now, confident and self-assured.
The smile that crosses his face is faint, a little rueful. “I wasn’t always this charming and irresistible,” he jokes. “High school Tony was too small, too smart, and too much of a smart-ass for people to like me very much.”
He shrugs, like it’s old history. Maybe it is.
“But,” he adds, brightening, “every single one of those guys applied to Stark Industries eventually. Every one of them got a rejection email.”
May laughs despite herself. That tracks. That sounds like the Tony she knows.
“Pete doesn’t get bullied, right?” Tony asks then, quieter. His hands slip into his pockets as he looks at her, genuinely searching her face.
May exhales.
She sees the shift immediately — the way his posture tightens, the way his attention narrows.
“I don’t know for sure,” she says carefully. “He says he doesn’t. There’s a boy in his grade — Flash — who picks on him and Ned sometimes, but he insists it’s no big deal.”
She doesn’t fully believe that. She knows how words can linger. How damage doesn’t always leave marks. But Peter isn’t forthcoming about these things, and she’s learned the hard way that pushing doesn’t help.
Tony’s mouth twists. “Who names their kid Flash?”
May snorts. “That’s exactly what I said.”
They’re both smiling, but it fades as they slow near a fenced-off area of the gym. Beyond the metal barriers, teams swarm around their robots, adjusting parts, shouting over one another, moving with frantic coordination.
Peter’s team is there.
He hasn’t noticed them yet. He’s animated, talking with his hands, eyes bright as he confers with his teammates.
“I don’t like the idea of him getting bullied,” Tony says softly, standing beside her now, gaze fixed on Peter.
“Me either,” May replies.
She watches her boy — bright, eager, wholly himself — and hopes, fiercely and quietly, that the world is gentler to him than it has any right to be.
And that the people who love him will keep showing up.
-
They sit and watch as four teams send their robots onto the field.
The task, as May understands it, involves collecting chunks of PVC pipe from one side of the arena and transporting them to what looks like a bare, leafless metal tree anchored at the center. The goal is to place as many pieces onto the structure as possible, using the robot only.
May watches when things get exciting, but most of the time she has no real idea what’s happening.
Tony, however, provides a running commentary.
“The green team’s moving too slow,” he murmurs.
“The red team’s not going to keep up once their arm overheats.”
“Yellow’s got a solid design. Bad execution, though.”
He explains each observation in plain language, translating mechanics into something May can follow. Leverage. Timing. Efficiency. Suddenly the match makes sense. Suddenly it’s fun.
And just like he predicts, every single one of his assessments proves correct. She isn’t surprised. Tony Stark isn’t considered a genius for nothing, and this kind of thing is clearly second nature to him.
When the round ends, Peter’s team comes out on top.
The smile on Peter’s face is blinding. So is the one on Tony’s.
It isn’t until they step away from the fenced-off area that Peter finally spots them.
His eyes widen. His grin stretches impossibly bigger. Then his gaze flicks to Tony, confusion flashing for half a second before recognition hits.
It’s Christmas morning.
He says something quick to his teammates, who nod and head back toward their pit, and then Peter is bounding toward them at full speed.
May gets the first hug, as expected.
“I thought you’d be in your seat watching Grey’s,” he says breathlessly.
“Well,” she laughs, squeezing him back, “I had a personal announcer explaining everything to me, and I couldn’t turn that down.”
Tony’s arm settles around Peter easily, familiar by now. A ruffle of hair. A squeeze at his shoulder.
Then Tony pulls him into a full hug.
It’s new. Different. Peter freezes for half a second before melting into it.
“I didn’t know you were coming, Mr. Stark!” Peter says, voice muffled against Tony’s chest.
“You wouldn’t stop talking about it in the lab yesterday,” Tony replies lightly. “Figured I had to see what all the fuss was about.”
“But I thought Miss Potts said you had a big investor meeting,” Peter says, pulling back, brows knitting.
Tony raises an eyebrow. “You think I’d rather go to an investor meeting than a high school robotics competition?”
Peter considers this for exactly half a second.
“Fair enough,” he says, grinning.
May watches them both, heart full in a way that still surprises her.
-
May and Tony watch the rest of the matches together, and they end earlier than she expects.
Or maybe she’s just enjoying herself more than she thought she would. Either way, by the time the final buzzer sounds, she doesn’t find herself wishing for the quiet comfort of their small Queens apartment. That alone feels like a minor miracle.
It’s a good thing, too, because Tony insists on taking Peter out to dinner to celebrate the win. His treat. She doesn’t argue this time. Not even a little. Anyone who willingly sat through five straight hours of high school robotics competition and still wants to keep the night going has clearly earned the right.
She, Peter, and Ned are ushered out through a back entrance and into a town car, Tony following close behind. Somehow, mercifully, his presence goes unnoticed. No stares. No phones. Just the four of them squeezed into the backseat, Peter and Ned buzzing with post-competition energy.
Twenty minutes later, the car pulls up in front of Peter’s favorite Thai place in Queens.
May blinks.
That, almost more than anything else today, throws her.
There are a few quiet adjustments made — a corner table in the back, seats angled away from the windows — but it works. No one bothers them. No one interrupts. And Peter, grinning so hard it almost hurts to look at, talks a mile a minute between bites.
He looks… happy. Uncomplicatedly so.
May watches Tony listen, leaning in, asking questions, laughing at the right moments, entirely present. She realizes she doesn’t mind — not even a little — that Tony Stark hijacked their day.
Not the competition.
Not the dinner.
Not the joy on her nephew’s face.
If anything, she hopes he does it again.