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TRIGGER WARNING: VERY BRIEF MENTION OF SA
Y/n's POV:
After three days, I was finally let out of my bed and allowed to move around the tower. Tony had given me a 'guest room' but it was bigger than the living room in my Father's apartment. It was a lovely room, with a double bed and an en suite with a shower, but I was dreading what would happen next.
I was sitting in the kitchen and eating my third small bowl of cereal in two hours, I was finding that I couldn't eat as much food at once as I used to but Nat and Tony were constantly checking on me to make sure I was getting better.
They both walked into the room, taking the seats opposite me at the table.
"We need to ask you a couple more questions." Nat said gently, "Is that okay?"
I nodded and swallowed my mouthful.
"When did it start?" Tony asked, I knew exactly what he was referring to, I didn't need to check.
"I don't know." I replied truthfully, "I don't remember him being too physical until the age of five, but then I don't remember much at all."
"Like you've blocked it out..." Nat mumbled, a hint of pain behind her eyes.
"But I don't remember a time where he wasn't constantly yelling at me." I added. I wanted, and needed, them to know the whole, unadulterated truth. I couldn't let them send me back to him.
"Did you ever tell anybody? Other family, friends, or even school councilors?"
"We didn't have any other family, and he just threatened to hit me harder if I told anyone else." I explained.
"Did he ever try to..." Nat choked up at the question.
"Did he ever try to sexually assault you?" Tony asked, looking right into my eyes.
Shit.
My Father didn't...
"No." I answered hesitantly, "Not that I can remember."
It was the truth, and I was only going to tell them the truth. I wasn't ready to talk about the other man yet, and my Father never tried to do anything like that, so I told them 'No.'
Both of their eyes were looking intently into mine, trying to see if I was lying, trying to figure out what was going through my head.
Nat nodded at me, not breaking the eye contact, and moved on to the next question. "Where do you want to go now?"
My mind froze. "What?"
"You can't live on rooftops." Tony told me, "Where do you want to live?"
"I-" I didn't know. I didn't have anywhere to go.
"There are options..." Nat explained. "We're not going to let you go back to him, but you could stay in a home, or we could find you a foster family..."
My heart sank a little, I don't know what I was expecting. These weren't people with time to spare. They worked almost 24/7, their jobs were violent, and Stark Tower was a workplace, they just happened to live there.
"There is another option," Tony suggested slowly, "We could have the right forms made up pretty quickly and..."
"What Tony is trying to say," Nat broke in, "Is that we've talked and if it was something you wanted, then we could both adopt you, shared custody and all that. You could live here."
I was silent.
It was as if all the words had been stolen from my mouth.
"If you don't want to then don't worry about it," Nat said, trying to disguise a hint of disappointment in her voice.
"I've never had a Mom..." I heard the words leave my mouth, but I wasn't sure it was me that was saying them.
A tear pricked in Nat's eye, "We would never be trying to replace your family, Y/n. If you wanted then you could still call us Tony and Nat, but we don't mind."
"We just want you to choose something that would make you happy, kiddo. It's all up to you." Tony added.
I got up from my seat and walked over to them. "I could live here?" I checked, I had to make sure I wasn't tricking myself.
"Of course." They replied, barely having a moment to breathe before I flung an arm around each of them and felt happy tears start to roll down my face.
I was going to live here.