PROLOGUE

Pepper Potts tried to play it cool, though she felt far from chill with the news she was about to give Tony Stark. She sat in cut offs and a flannel shirt. Her ginger hair was in a high ponytail. This is needed to be mentioned because she'd spent the past hour sitting next to Tony nervously pulling at her locks or popping a button of her shirt in and out, or even playing with the strings falling from the ends of her shorts, and it was getting on Tony's nerves.

He let out a huge sigh and paused the television, she couldn't even remember what they had been watching. "Are you pregnant?"

"What?" She nearly shrieked. That was so not what was on her mind.

He shrugged. "You're driving me insane. You've got something to tell me and you're nervous about it. Stop that." He added, exasperated. He grabbed her hands, stopping them in mid-button popping.

"You know me so well." Pepper said with a shaky laugh. How could she even put what she just agreed to in words?

"Pep, what's going on?" Tony replied, but she stayed quiet, trying to form the right words in her mind.

"C'mon." He could understand, she thought. Maybe he wouldn't mind.

"Pepper." He was going to say no, she thought this time. He won't be happy about this.

Heck, she wasn't happy about it.

"Virginia Potts, what has got you so worried?" The use of her real name jerked her wide eyes up to him.

"What, are you dying?" He asked, trying to think of the only reason she should be freaked like this.

"No, no- I mean, yes," Tony's eyes widened, "But no. God, Tony, not like that. I meant, one day, yes, I will die, so yeah, I am dying, but I'm not dying right now, per se-"

"I get it, all right. Just tell me what's going on." He said. He leaned back and folded his arms, feeling slightly irritated she was drawing it out like this. Tony was the dramatic one, not her.

"My sister."

He paused, searching his mind for the knowledge she had a sister. Maybe a faint mention, or more so complaint, on a day off she had where she went to go visit family. "Is she dying?"

Pepper closed her eyes and with a sigh that was more like a groan, "No."

Tony waved a hand, signalling to her to continue on.

"She's coming for the summer. Here." Pepper finally admitted, though more to her folded hands than to Tony.

There was silence. Then, "You mean, getting an apartment downtown?" Atleast, that's what he hoped she meant, though he had a feeling it wasn't.

"No-"

"Because you can't possibly mean here." Tony interupted her., "There's clearly not enough room for one more here. Have you seen my place?"

"Tony, Mel got in trouble and needs-"

"I'm not playing juvie for some kid." He broke her off again, and Pepper pursed her lips.

"She's not 'some kid', she's my sister. Things have finally settled down-"

"Yeah, and I wanted to settle down with you-"

"And Mel's gone off the deep end and my parents are crap at being parents-"

"They did a good job on you, and you should just be with me this-"

"This is a change of pace! California is so different than Virginia-"

"Pepper, a kid running around-wait, is that why you're named Virginia, because of the state?"

"No," She snapped, "It was my grandmother's name. And she's seventeen."

"Your grandmother is seventeen?" He replied, then he pressed his fingers to his forehead. Truth was, he didn't feel ready for this. He was still freaked over almost losing her and the fact there were things bigger than his Iron Man and still plagued with anxiety and he didn't want some seventeen year old girl to witness it. He didn't even want Pepper to witness it.

But when Pepper froze with a fierce look on her face, Tony knew there was no way around this.

Amelia Potts was coming to town.