At the head of the table, Tony Stark leans forward, his elbows on the polished surface, his entire focus on the small, grinning girl in the chair beside him.

Clint Barton is trying to sneak a piece of broccoli onto Bucky Barnes’s plate. Bucky doesn’t look, but his metal arm snaps up and flicks it back with startling accuracy. Peter Parker is talking a mile a minute to Pepper Potts about his decathlon team.

You sit in the middle of it all, a silent island in the river of noise. The thin white wire of your earbuds trails from your ears, tucked discreetly under your hair. The music you composed—a melancholic piano piece you finished at 3 AM—fills your head, a private barrier against the world.

You watch your dad. You see the way his whole face softens when he looks at Morgan, the pride that lights him up from the inside. It’s a look you’ve studied, a language you once hoped to understand.

Something small and cold cracks behind your ribs. You look down at your own plate, pushing a piece of asparagus with your fork. You focus on the simple, mechanical act of eating. Breathe in. Breathe out. Don’t let them see.