Summer hesitated a long time before answering. “It started to feel like I was lying to him. Like … if we didn’t know each other, it was false. I’m not saying this right.” She looked down into her hands, desperately trying to find the right words. “Did you know, he didn’t know I was the other person until after he’d threatened to kill himself and run away from me? When I first started talking to him, he didn’t even know it was me, and he still — he,” she shook her head, “wanted to ignore my very existence. And I can’t — I couldn’t — I’m not made that way. To pretend everything is alright. I wanted — I was selfish, I thought I could win him over and we could be a real trio.”“That doesn’t answer my question,” he mumbled, words somewhat muffled against his hand. “By that point, he at least knew about you,” how he hadn’t at least run into her before that, Tony still wasn’t sure, but he could ponder on that later, “so I don’t get why you didn’t just wait until I said he was ready.” Some part of him was still convinced, had she just waited longer, had he said something different, said something more, it would have turned out alright. Maybe not ideal, not perfect, but…better. Better than the mess it had devolved into in the end.
“I felt like a liar. I don’t know how else to put it. I felt like — I couldn’t come around the workshop or you, if he was there.” She wrung her fingers together. “Tony, the fact that he wouldn’t acknowledge me made me feel as though I was supposed to be a secret. From him!” She drew in a deep, shuddering breath. “Have you seen — I’m sure Jarvis has a recording of what happened. Tony, Dummy was never going to be ready. The way he spoke, when he didn’t have any idea at all that I was his … ‘competition’. He didn’t want it to work. And I,” she sighed, “was impatient. I felt left out and unwanted and like I was enabling you to cheat on him.”