Steve had actually braced himself to have opened a giant can of worms there, so when Tony deflects--the way Tony often does--his shoulders drop with relief, and he laughs quietly. "Yeah, that's pretty much it. And you didn't like me because your dad thought I was cool and beautiful."

Or one of his most successful projects. Something like that. That's the other thing; Steve isn't as certain in retrospect that Howard thought of him as a friend so much as a success story. But that's also one of Steve's worst issues of late, that uncertainty as to whether people see him or the Star-Spangled Man With a Plan. Even worse, how many see him as human.

He just doesn't know. And he doesn't, in many cases, want to know.

"Yeah? Well, if we're not on the same road, they probably run parallel." Steve is full of good intentions. "You talking about this particular project, or something else entirely?"

He may or may not be bracing for a bombshell.