Peter was late and Tony didn't understand it. Peter was never late. Never for the internship. Never for lab time. He had sent Happy to pick him up as usual, and Happy called Tony, saying he had been waiting outside the midtown high school for almost 50 minutes, seeing every student but Peter leave.

"Just walk in there, Happy. Ask a teacher or something." Tony said, feeling slightly concerned that Peter hadn't bounced out of the building as he used to. Happy agreed, walking into the school, asking around for Peter, finding out that he already left.

"Seems that he already left, boss." Happy sighed as he called Tony again. Tony groaned, doubting whether to search for Peter or not.

"Okay, well, just come back to the tower okay? If Peter's injured, FRIDAY would have alerted me." Tony said, finding comfort in his own words, and so he went to his lab, disappointment rushing through his body. He had looked forward to his lab session with Peter, he always did. But for once, he was the one who got stood up. Ghosted.

Tony glanced at the clock every few minutes and concluded after two and a half hour that Peter wasn't coming. And just as that, he heard the door of the lab open. His head shot up, his eyes meeting Pepper's as she lead Peter through the door with a hand on his back.

"Have a nice time, Peter." She said, smiling at Tony before leaving the lab again. Tony wasn't satisfied to say the least and when Peter opened his mouth to explain, Tony simply cut him off.

"I thought we had a deal?" He questioned leaning back in his chair. Peter let his head hang low, discovering the floor.

"Every Monday, Wednesday and Friday at four, is that hard to remember?"

"No, sir..." Peter mumbled fiddling with his fingers.

"Good, then don't be late." Tony said, no emotion clear in his voice. Peter nodded silently and looked up carefully. Tony pointed to the couch where a bunch of cables were knotted together over the armrest.

"You go untie those. I'm gonna need them later." Tony said quietly and continued working, and when Peter didn't seem to move, Tony looked at him again.

"You promised that we were gonna work with the web shooters today.." Peter mumbled.

"I know I did. But when you show up almost three hours later than I told you to, we won't have time to work with the shooters. If you don't keep your promises then I can't either."

That statement made Peter walk to the couch starting to untie the massive knot in silence. Tony glanced over at the kid, trying to ignore that he was completely soaked and that his hair was sticking to his wet forehead.

It only took ten minutes for Tony to feel bad for the kid. Peter was sniffling every few moments and he was trying not to shake so badly that Tony would notice. Tony walked over and stood behind the kid, putting his hands on the soaked shoulders. Peter was tense.

"You good, kid?" He asked, trying to make Peter feel less guilty. Peter nodded silently, not answering with words.

Tony grabbed Peters arms, pulling him up from the couch, turning him around and wrapping his arms around him. Peter let out a sob, which he had been holding back for far too long.

"I'm so sorry I was late, Mr Stark!" Peter cried. "We h-had a test today, b-because it's midterms r-right? And N-Ned and I finished up fast s-so I told him I didn't have to be h-here for a while, so we went to the sandwich shop to get some lunch but they were closed a-and then w-we just went home and w-watched Star Wars, b-but I fell asleep because I almost didn't sleep last night. A-and I lost track of time and w-when I woke up, I-I rushed over here as fast as I could but that wasn't fast enough and now you're punishing me!"

Tony was overwhelmed to say the least. He hadn't expected Peter to have so much on his mind. He rubbed the kid's back and held him tightly.

"Hey..." he started out. "Let's get you some clothes and a warm shower. Then I'll order a pizza and drive you home so you can get some sleep. Tomorrow you can come by again and we'll fix the web shooters and go on a small patrol. What do you say?"

Tony's hand tangled through the brown, wet curls and Peter looked up at him and nodded a little, a few tears spilling from his eyes.