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Have you ever opened a book? I don’t mean one of those thin paperbacks. I mean a real, good book. A book with a hard cover that, when you open it somewhere in the middle, makes it hard to read the words close to the line that separates the two opened pages.
It doesn’t really matter what your answer is. Books exist in all sorts of shapes and sizes. What really distinguishes a book from others is its worth. Take Tony Stark’s book for instance. It is not extraordinarily thick, because little happens on its pages — at least, in the genius’ opinion. But that of course, has to do with the fact that he can read as fast as he can. Letters are nothing more than a hundredth of a second to him, words only a waste of time.
But that was in the past. The older he got, the more each word gained meaning, and the more he started to enjoy reading.
The first years the book only showed pictures, illustrations of the story of his life that helped him understand the world around him. At the age of two, he could already have full blown conversations with adults. This was also the age when the pictures had to make room for words, words which, the more cultured and linguistic he became, also appeared in French, Spanish, Italian — you name it. Some pages didn’t contain words, but sheet music; piano pieces that served as photographs of events which had happened in his life.
The reason those photographs didn’t exist was that Tony didn’t like being in them. He did love music, and thus he wrote pieces about the moments in his life he wanted to keep forever.
He wrote one about Jarvis’ death.
Tony had never consciously thought about the way he read before, but now, as he stood on the edge of Malibu Point, on the very ground where his living room used to be, he realized how peculiar it was, the way he had composed his life’s work. Every single page was different, and every chapter distinguished itself from the others.
A gust of wind stroked his cheek. He let his thumb slide over the cover of the flip phone in his hand. Strange, how much could depend on a single call.
He flipped the device open and phoned the only number which was saved in the list of contacts, and he waited.
Voicemail.
He tried again.
The exact same result.
Third try.
No Steve.
He took a deep breath, waited for the beep and held the phone close to his ear.
“Hey, Steven.”
He kept silent for a moment, not sure what to say. Then suddenly, the dam broke, and the words flowed out of his mouth, tumbling over each other in the flood.
“Have you ever read a book, Steve?” he started his story carefully. “Have you ever thought about the way you read? Whether it was slowly, or very swiftly because you hated the story?
“Well…”
Silence.
“I have reflected on it, and it scares me, Steven. It frightens me how carelessly I have been with words, how easily I have let an paragraph be and turned the pages just to get to the end of the book.
“I have regretted it all, Steven.”
“For me life - my life - is nothing more than a book, ya know?. In the beginning, only pictures painted the pages, and even of those I did not understand their worth. Later on, words came to be, words over which I just quickly scanned because I didn’t want to be there, Steven. I wanted to be away from here, and I thought if only I read fast enough, everything would be over just like that.
“But then I moved out, Steven, got a degree in MIT, turned twenty, thirty, forty even.
“The book was still not finished.
“I continued reading, but calmer, because I found something new. A chapter of which I had never thought I would reach it.
“I found myself in Afghanistan.
“I know I never told anyone much about it, Steve. It was a terrible situation, I assure you. But it was a period, a chapter of my life that gave me a new purpose. I became Iron Man, Steven. I loved it. People cheered me on and stopped calling me a murderer.
“I even became an Avenger.
“But then you.
“In the entirety of my life I have never hated anyone as much. Don’t get me wrong, Steven. I simply did not like you. You were perfect - everything I could never be for my father. You were everything I was not, and more. You were the ultimate being Steve, and I couldn’t bear it. It hurt me that you didn’t have any shortcomings.
He laughed nervously. He tasted the salty air that was blown from the sea to the land. “Strange, how everyone always seems to be okay. Of course, people have their own problems, but those are less numerous. They don’t complain, Steven.”
Tony’s voice became almost inaudible. “My father always told me I complained too much.
“But then we fell in love, Steven. A new chapter in my life started. I was happy. For the first time in what seemed like forever, I read slower than needed, hoped that it would never end.
“But our relationship was finite, Steven. I was aware. Only, it ended so much sooner than I had thought. Unexpectedly, people pushed us towards the Sokovia Accords. I was called out for being a murderer again. It tore me apart Steven. And the moment when I needed you the most, you decided to leave. You went, without a goodbye, without an “I wish you well”. You disappeared, without a warning. Gone with the wind.
“I was replaced by someone else, someone who couldn’t even remember you.
“It was okay, Steven. I understood. At least, I tried – and still try – to understand.”
The tears were rolling down his cheeks.
“But I didn’t want it to end like this. Even though I knew the pages till the end of my book were limited, I had to follow you.
“And then that video.
“I lost myself, Steven. And for that, I want to apologize. I was angry at you. But all that anger should never have been directed at you or your friend or anyone else. It was mine. If anyone deserved my own spite, it was me.
“So, I’m sorry for that.
“The only thing I didn’t understand, and never will, is why you ran your shield, my father's shield, still with all those colors he had painted it in, into my chest. That just wasn’t fair…” he paused, longer this time. “Right? I didn’t deserve to be terminated in such a metaphorical way, did I? You had already broken my heart, Rogers. Did you really have to shatter it as well?
“I survived it. A miracle, if you ask me. I don’t deserve to live.
He swallowed, standing at the very end of Malibu Point. Close as he was to the sea right now, he hadn’t been since the time he had almost drowned in it. Deceivingly blue. One moment it could be so beautiful, so calm: a gigantic, wrinkleless surface. But the next moment… the next moment it could swallow you, pull you to its very depths, daring you to try to get out and catch your breath again.
“Look at me now, Rogers. I keep extending the little space between words till the extreme, to end up tripping over the following letter. Everything, everything I would give to stand here for a little while longer just to be able to speak to you.
“But of course, you say nothing back, because this is your voicemail, and I am worth nothing more to you than that, apparently…
“More than that I don’t deserve.
He took a deep breath. “Goodbye, Steven.” He pressed the red button and dropped the phone. He raised his chin and, as slowly as he could, went to stand on his toes. He breathed in, a last time, deeply, and leant forward. First a little bit, then more and more until he couldn’t change his mind anymore, and dashed down, approaching the rocks with immense speed.
Ironic, isn’t it, how his life started and ended with the very same word? Even though the first pages of his life contain no words, the first conversation he was present at is still engraved in his book.
You know how writers always write down a wish or aphorism on the first page? Maybe a message as an attempt to better the world, or to make the reader ponder already over the meaning of the story before it has even started?
On that page in Tony’s book, only three sentences filled the page:
“Steven.”
“No Howard. We won’t name our son after Captain America.”
And then, the back cover, that supposedly contains the magic words to persuade people to open the book and let themselves get carried away by the story:
“How about Anthony? Antony Edward Stark?”
But Tony’s book actually doesn’t end like that at all, because while a lonely billionaire was falling off America’s surface, the flip phone that lay there, forgotten, on the foundations of the once beautiful villa, was ringing.
The only response the caller received was Tony Stark’s voicemail, and you could hear him sigh, and then an authoritative voice that desperately called out a name:
“Tony… “