When Elle laid in bed, usually exhausted, she could sleep. She would feel fatigued, a heaviness in her chest which urged her to find a nice spot for her to doze off. Her sleep was a good seven hours, in parts, all through the day and if even one of those were snatched away, she would feel like someone had trampled over her sanity. 

She was far from asleep when she heard noises from across the hall, strange metal clanging and the whizzing of an automated screwdriver. With a surprising draw of her breath, she shot up from the pillow. 

'Tony,' she whispered, shaking him profusely. 'Honey, wake up. I think Margo is still awake.'

He only lowly grumbled, turning on his back to scrub the sleep out of his eyes. His gaze fell on Elle who was wide-eyed, glancing at the slightly ajar door and concerned. He sighed, placing a hand over her waist. 

'JARVIS, is that true?'

'Sir, it appears Mrs Stark is right.'

Those mere words were enough to set off trepidation in Elle. She mumbled about how it was the fourth time that week and she was out of bed in seconds to pull her back into a ponytail. He watched her with one sleepy eye, rolling it slowly.

'So she's a night owl,' he muttered, his words muffled by the pillow. 'Leave the kid alone.'

'I think it's insomnia,' she offered.

'Elle, stop overthinking.'

'I'm not! I think she needs a shrink.'

'I swear if you don't get back to sleep, I will knock you out myself.'

'No, absolutely not,' she hissed. 'She's a six-year-old child and she should be getting her rest.'

'You and I both know nothing in that sentence applies to our kid.'

'I don't care,' she disapproved. When his response didn't come, a pillow came crashing down on his face and a painful grunt leaving his lips. Before he could shoot Elle a glare, she had already disappeared behind the door. 

Elle's footfalls were soft and walking across the hall to knock on Margo's door. She knew the response wouldn't follow because of the slow hum of a rotor and so she let herself in.

The sight she was greeted with wasn't pretty. The hardwood floor in her room was barely visible due to the array of mechanical instruments that laid in an unorganized clutter on the floor. There were colourful wires and metal panels which were sown in half by a handheld saw. She had to hold her chest when she saw the article.

'Oh my god,' she breathed out. 'Margo!'

A few boxes moved from near the desk and causing choice swears to traverse around the room. A dark head bobbed from behind the box, her eyes clad in loose goggles which belonged to her father. It was wobbly, Elle mentally worried. What if she took her eye out?

'Momma, relax,' Margo rose from the ground, swiping the screws from the lap and yanking the goggles off. What shocked Elle was the swimming sleep in her eyes, confirming her insomnia theory.

'I cannot,' Elle bit out, palming her eyes. 'I cannot, Margo. You⁠—you aren't sleeping and you're doing all⁠—all this,' she waved her hands to the mess, 'you can't expect me to be all dandy with this!'

'It's just a project I was working on,' she mumbled.

'A project?' Elle cried out in disbelief. 'A project at the three in the morning?'

'It was a very important one at that.'

'You are still a child, Margo!'

'But, I'm not stupid!'

Elle forced herself to count to ten before she blew her top and started yelling. Taking slow breaths, calming her senses, she looked back at Margo with a wary gaze. Sidestepping the crates and boxes of inventory, She reached Margo who had dropped over her bed with a sigh.

'Baby,' she started, 'I would never call you stupid.'

Her light eyes were hurt, looking away with a sneer. 'Yeah, but you implied it when you called me a child.'

'I worry about you,' she explained, treading a hand behind her head softly. Margo still looked away, an evident frown curling on her face. Elle barely smiled.

'Tell me what's going on, love,' she coaxed, her voice smoother than honey. 'You haven't been sleeping properly in a while.'

It took a minute for her daughter to respond. She turned a little so Elle could see the side of her face, confusion obvious in her tired frown. She rubbed a hand down her face.

'I can't sleep,' Margo confessed, slumping her shoulders. 'I close my eyes and I count to a hundred, just like you told me to. By the time I reach twenty, I'm considering daddy's ridiculous string theory breakdown.'

Elle laughed when Margo's lips kicked up with a small smile.

She heard soft shuffling from near the door, seeing Tony listening on intently. His eyes were unreadable, strained on Margo's slumped back. Seeing Elle's deterred concentration, Margo turned around to see her father's figure inside her room.

'What were you working on, pipsqueak?'

An excited smile broke out on her lips as she jumped off the mattress. She was happy that there was one person in the house who spoke her language. 

'You won't believe it if I told you.'

'Eh, no I think I would,' Tony disagreed, pushing the boxes away with his legs and reaching where Margo had slouched to the ground. 

She pushed a crate out of the way to produce a miniature, cuboid-shaped and vertical metal structure. It had a thin wire set that held it up securely and nine, horizontal perfect cylinders stacked over one another with delicate rotors on the inside.

'The hell is that?' Tony asked, seating himself on the ground. 

'It's a reinvented carbon dioxide extractor,' Margo spoke, unable to contain her squeal. 'I mean, it's just a prototype but⁠—'

'⁠—it works?' Tony was shocked. 'This thing?'

'Nah duh,' she rolled her eyes. 'The ion-exchange resin was hard to formulate. So, I stole it from your armour's matrix.'

'Are you⁠—' Tony scowled at her. 'Zero embezzlements under my roof, Mags. Ask me next time.'

She let out a scoff. 'If I did, you'd say the same thing as Mom.'

'Well, yeah, because I am still your dad,' he sighed, looking back at the model. He flicked a finger past the metal cylinder, narrowing his eyes on the rotors. 'Did you test it?'

'Absolutely,' she said simply. 'Traps the air like a charm.'

'This is revolutionary, Mags,' Tony tried hard to fight off a smile, 'do you know that this could drop the catastrophic climate change by a healthy percentage?'

Margo scratched the back of her head, sheepishly looking between her parents. 'I actually, er. I made it for my garden.'

Elle blinked. 'What?'

'To help with photosynthesis,' she nodded. 'In the night time, it captures it and the morning, it gives it out. Sort of like, reusing air.'

Tony looked lost for words. 'That's⁠—'

'That's incredible,' Elle mused. 'Margo, you⁠—you thought of this?'

'That's what I do,' she breathed out. 'I couldn't stop thinking about it, ma. I had it in my head for weeks, that's why I couldn't sleep for a few days.'

'Oh, my love,' Elle said, pressing a kiss to her forehead. Her eyes lit up with an idea, rising from the ground to hold out a hand for Margo to take.

'Let's go for a walk.'

Margo looked at her mother dumbfounded. 'What?'

'Come along,' Elle smiled, tilting her head towards the door. 'Just you and I. To clear your head.'

Tony got to his feet with a smile. 'And me?'

'No,' they said in unison.

He raised his hands in surrender, saddened. 'I got the message. No boys allowed.'

∞

The mother and daughter duo's footfalls were dim as they exited the house through the backdoor, slowly paddling their way to the lakeside. The creek was tranquil at this hour and the houses on the other side glinting with no lights due to the same. Margo was confused as her mother toed off her slippers, unfolding a blanket that was stashed over her father's hammock and dipping her bare feet into the water. The scaffold was sturdy, smooth wood so Margo had no reason to worry.

Her mother waved at her with a smile. 'Come on.'

With a shrug, Margo took off her shoes and joined her side. Her toes lightly skimmed the water surface, shivering as the cold lake played ripples around her toes. Bracing her hands over the platform, she sighed.

'I haven't bathed in two days,' she admitted under her breath. Her mother looked at her. 'I haven't eaten in fifteen hours and I'm not even hungry. I know there's something wrong with me but I just⁠—I just can't stop thinking.'

'You can't stop thinking,' her mother repeated quietly. 'Hmm.'

'What?'

'Your father does the same thing,' she shared. 'He thinks and thinks until he's drained. If anything, I think he's rubbing off you.'

Margo giggled. 'I should stop hanging out with Daddy then?'

'Of course not,' her mother smiled. 'That is the last thing I want you to do.'

'Then...?'

'How about,' she mused, 'you reframe your situation? Take a break.'

'What do you mean?'

'Just close your eyes, hug yourself and think about something else. Anything else from the subject, like changing a channel.'

Margo thought about it for a moment, mouth agape. 'That doesn't sound hard.'

'It isn't,' she laughed. 

Her mother always seemed to have the perfect solution to all her problems, easing her worries and mending troubles. Made it seem so simple for her. It was as if it were her superpower reserved only for Margo, it caught her by surprise every time. Besides, there was no explanation as to how her mother nailed the solution all the time.

'You know you will be my baby no matter what, right?' Her mother asked softly, placing a hand at the back of her head in a caress.

Margo easily nodded.

'Don't stop talking to me,' her mother said slowly, her eyes downcast. 'I know you're smart enough to infer it out on your own and you're growing so fast but, I want to be there for you. Even if you associate yourself plentiful with your father. I'm scared you will drift away.'

Margo, strangely, felt selfish. She had always thought her problems started and ended with her but now, she had failed to realize that there were others involved. During her times of hustling, she was troubling her mother without her knowing it.

'Momma,' she breathed out, her arms coiling around her abdomen. Her face drove into the dip of her waist, evoking a choked laugh from her mother. She only tightened her hold.

'I won't,' her small voice was muffled into her mother's shirt, 'I love you both fairly. Actually, you a little more because Daddy can get on my nerves.'

She heard her mother laugh breathily. 'He tends to do that.'

Her mother's hand guided her closer, allowing her to rest her head over her lap and crush her face into her stomach. She continued to run her hands through her dark curls, combing out the snarls with slow tugs. Margo's eyes drooped shut slowly, bringing her knees to her chest to curl into herself.

Elle let out a sigh. She watched her daughter fall asleep to the sounds of the slow ripples of the lake and the golden light from the lamp near the shores of the bridge casting shadows over her face. 

'Hey,' he heard Tony's voice near the waterfront and try to keep his footfalls soft. She could see all his teeth as he took their situation in, pursing his lips in adoration. Over his arms was another blanket, draping it over Margo's shoulder and flanking Elle's empty side.

'She is a freaking genius,' he whispered, excited. 'A carbon dioxide extractor—why didn't I think of that?'

'Because you don't like horticulture,' Elle scrunched her nose.

'She built it without knowing the effect of her invention,' he urged. 'That is—that is just—god, I am so thrilled.'

'Don't pressure her,' Elle murmured, dragging her fingers through Margo's dark curls. She watched it divide, thin out and spring back again. 'She's worried as it is.'

'I know,' he sighed, dropping his head over my shoulder. 'Shock of the new is taking longer than expected.'

She laughed. 

'Don't laugh,' he mumbled. 'I'm serious.'

'All right, futurist. Why don't you take Margo to bed?'

'I'm thinking of slingshotting her from the hammock to the lake,' he whispered, snickering quietly and making Elle join in softly.

∞

'Hey, Dad?'

If Wednesday mornings and overflowing laundry were all omens of ineptitude then, this definitely was it. Tony and his vivacious little daughter were slumped in the middle of the plenteous clothes, whistling show tunes and sharing hypothetical situations until they had given up, and started to stare off into space. 

Margo, with the ever-curious glint in her eyes, rolled onto her front and looked up at Tony. She was sprawled over the heap of laundry on the bed, propping a hand underneath her chin. Tony began to feel fear when he spotted inquisition in her, chewing the insides of his cheeks.

'Yeah, Mags?' He breathed out. Please don't be serious, he started to pray inwardly. Nothing on sexual reproduction and yes, I ate all the brownies you made.

'Why didn't you and ma have a wedding?'

Tony did not know whether to feel ecstatic relief or confused hysteria. He proceeded to blink at her, trying to form words out of the nervous droning hum that left his lips. Margo only stared on, not willing to leave it until she got a satisfactory answer.

'Well,' he started, 'we did have one. Just not as magnificent as expected.'

'But, how come you don't have a photo album of the day?'

His eyebrows furrowed in confusion. 'We er, we—'

'Nana has one of hers,' she replied before he could, her smile wider than her curiosity. 'She got married in the town chapel and everyone came. Mom was there, too.'

That he did not know. So, Elle had been born out of wedlock. It would also make sense of Elle's previous, irrational fear to get married before she had Margo. Due to her fear, they had shotgunned their marriage. This prompted a different fear in Tony just as soon as he had fitted the pieces together. He swallowed hard and shortly, their repercussed yells of delight and swirling terror started to ring through the house.

'Elle!'

'Mom!' Margo continued with a laugh. 'I can't even⁠—Mom, get in here, right now!'

Before Margo could blow out into another yell because of the building flare in her nostrils, an overjoyed voice called from the kitchen. Elle paddled in with simple homewear and holding her cheeks in delight. Her dark hair was in a towel over her head, her face left bare with only joy.

'Look at the two of you,' she cooed, 'folding laundry for me.'

'Yeah, yeah, we're amazing,' Margo waved off as ancient history and rising up on her knees. She poked the side of Tony's arm with a small chuckle. 'Actually...Dad, over here, has something to say.'

'Yes?' She grinned at him. 'Ready to vacuum the living room?'

'Uh, no,' he admitted sheepishly. 'I never will be, FYI.'

'Worth a try,' she mumbled, rolling her eyes. 'Go on.'

'I know what I want to do,' Tony said, looking at Elle with a winning smirk. 'For our anniversary next week.'

Elle, as if sensing the utter idiocy, shut her eyes and raised her palm in a ceasing gesture. Her cheeks coloured a bright red as she slammed a hand into his shoulder. 'In front of Margo? Have some shame—'

'It's not what you're thinking,' he added quickly. 'I want to get married.'

'What?' The mom and daughter said in unison after a relenting beat of silence passed between them.

'You and I,' he cleared his throat, ready to elaborate, 'we never had the entire procession.'

Elle's blue eyes were so wide that he could almost see the cogs and gears in her brain shifting to place what he was trying to put across to her. She looked at Margo who seemed just as confused, looking back at her father.

'Tony,' Elle muttered, 'how hard did you hit your head against the cupboard?'

'Get this,' Tony brushed off, letting Margo to the ground who continued to leer up at them in curiosity. 'It was Vegas, baby. We never had the ceremony, the suit-and-tie, the white dress—nada. I just,' he sighed, 'I want to marry you in the average process.'

Elle waited for a moment before she chuckled in disbelief, taking a step back. 'You're pulling my leg, aren't you?'

'What—no! No, I'm being serious.'

'You want to marry mom?' Margo had an expression of distaste on her features. 'That doesn't sound right.'

'I know, it doesn't,' he rolled his eyes. 'Nothing I say ever is. But this, this is something I want. The last time we got married, it was so spur-of-the-moment but you're not just an impulse, Elle. You are, well, a forever. Mine at least.'

Elle smiled softly, bewildered. Tony knew a part of her was denying the probability of it ever happening but another was begging for her to take the chance. What she thought was mere skinship for her had blossomed into marriage, the inevitable practically defeated.

'Say yes,' Margo urged her mother, shaking her hand fiercely. 

'But, it's so absurd,' she whispered. 'I mean, I would love to.'

'Look, it could just be the three of us,' he tried harder, satisfied with her positive response. 'In the living room. Maybe Rhodey. And Cal Quinn. And Pepper and Happy, because Potts would—'

'Tony,' she snapped. 'We're already married. We can't remarry.'

'Just the procession,' he expressed, wearied. 'Babe, come on.'

'Oh my god,' Margo squealed, giddy with delight. 'We have to invite everyone from the street and Riri's friends—'

'No,' Elle disagreed. 'No! That's too many people!'

'No pressure,' Tony added with his hand over her shoulders. 'Keep it simple. I like that. Margo?'

'Fine, just the important ones,' she rolled her eyes when her parent's eyes fell on her. 'But, I decide everything. Clear?'

'Yes, madame secretary,' Elle nodded, a smile on her face. 'Can you handle dress shopping?'

'Like a boss,' she smirked.

∞