◤ chapter four: ❛ never too early ❜ ◢

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BELIEVE IT OR NOT, TONI DOESN'T LIVE A BORING LIFE. She's dramatic, yes, and that means that a lot of the time she's not even that bored when she complains about being in that state of emotions. However, being the daughter of the man who worked as the Head of PR at Stark Industries, her life is anything but boring when it comes to the galas that SI holds.

She knows that most teenagers would probably complain at the thought of being forced to a gala with rich men and woman and virtually no other kids her age, but Toni sees it as an opportunity. She might live on daddy's money right now, but that's not a forever thing. Everyone in her family has to grow up and make their own money instead of living off the family funds – her cousin Jeremy tried that a couple years back and got knocked in the head with the real world.

But galas were her chance to get to know all the rich businessmen and woman and worm her way to the top. Toni's ambitious and knows that she's better than some boring lowlife job; she's Antionette fucking Alderson and she deserves the very best positions so she'll get them and everyone knows the best way to the top if through your connections. So, even though she's still in high school and totally not going to get a top corporate job anytime soon, it's never too early to start making her way to the top.

Toni applied the top layer of her gloss, rubbing her lips together and looking in the mirror, fixing her hair so that she looked utterly perfect. Any visual imperfections could be her downfall and Toni worked too hard at every gala to lose it all because one stand of hair was out of place or her makeup got a bit smudged.

"Toni!" Eden called from downstairs, causing her daughter to huff and roll her eyes to herself in her room.

"Coming!" Toni yelled back, taking a deep breath and muttering, "You're gonna fucking get it," to herself in the mirror before leaving and joining her parents downstairs.

It didn't take long for them to arrive at the event and as they stepped out of their car, Toni strut with complete confidence into the building. People might not know her name, but they will, and even if they give her odd looks now for acting as if she's as big as Tony Stark himself, they won't question her one day.

"Remember your manners," Eden whispered in her ear, "Don't embarrass us."

Toni wanted to roll her eyes exaggeratedly and scoff, but that would be the embarrassment her mother just told her not to bring to the family. And even though she doesn't really care about the reputations of her parents, she does care about her own. She's perfectly crafted it here so that she seems like an ambitious angel who would be a great asset to any company and she's not about to damage that but reacting negatively to her mother and being a bratty teenager.

So, instead, Toni nodded. "I know, mother, I'm not an idiot," she snapped softly so that no one could hear. Then, before her mother could say anything about her attitude, Toni walked away into the crowd, going first for a drink. Of course, technically it wasn't legal and doing this with cops lining the walls as security measures wasn't the best choice, no one was going to question a guess of Tony Stark – even if she was underage. So, she took the drink and sipped on it, not chugging as she usually would if she were in another setting.

That was too typical of underage drinkers, that was too casual and left a bad impression. She had people to impress – not turn away. Toni looked around the room at all the people. She saw Pepper Potts, the current CEO, being her polite and businesswoman-self having a cordial conversation with other guests. She saw other celebrities, and then she saw the worst person in the entire world (according to her anyway); Harry Osborn.

Of course, Satan should be the worst person in the entire world – you know, if you believed in the Bible and everything and even then Satan isn't human, he's a demon, but whatever. And she knows that supervillains are generally well-liked and are probably worse than a billionaire's son, but in her defense he called her a bitch which was so not okay even if it was mildly (only mildly, partially, and totally not completely) justified.

Ugh, and did he have to look so good in a tux? What? Toni may not like him, but even she can recognize a cute guy when she sees one, sue her!

Toni turned away from him, sipping at her drink again and wishing to disappear into the ground. Well, she did and she didn't. She wanted to stay very far away from him but at the same time she still had a duty and becoming a puddle on the ground would not get her what she wanted – and she always got what she wanted.

She walked away from where she stood before, seeing her parents talk to one of her dad's colleagues. Or, well, she thought so anyway, Toni's not exactly sure. She spotted the restrooms not too far from where she was and even though it was a little childish to hide in one – at least for a couple minutes to calm herself, anyway – it seemed like the best choice.

Downing the rest of her drink and placing it on a random tray that passed her, Toni walked towards the restrooms only to bump into someone. Before an apology could come out, she looked to see who she happened to tumble into and couldn't help the sneer on her face.

"Really? You?" she asked the figure of the boy who was worse than Satan in her book.

Harry raised his wands up in innocence. "Hey, it's not like I was meaning to run into you."

"Oh, yeah? Then why weren't you paying attention?" she fired at him, crossing her arms.

"It's not like I was the only one not paying attention, Toni, you still ran into me," Harry pointed out, staring at her incredulously.

"Unbelievable," Toni scoffed, "Now you're trying to blame the situation on me when it's clearly your fault."

"My fault?" Harry repeated, looking at her as if she had lost her mind, "It was not my fault – or at least not all of mine. What are you doing here anyway? Stalking me?"

He added the last part with a small smirk, moving away from his annoyance to something that brought him a sort of sick satisfaction. Instead of playing with him, Toni gave him a face of disgust. "Ugh, as if. Who would wanna stalk you anyway? And for your information, I'm here because my dad works pretty high up at SI."

Harry snorted, "Must be if he got invited to an event like this. Not every employee gets the joy."

"Whatever, I don't even know why I told you that," Toni shook her head, "Goodbye, Harry, let's hope that we don't run into each other again."

Before he could say anything else in return, Toni stormed off from him into the bathroom, making sure she was alone before letting out a noise of anger and slamming her hand against the sink, which only made it burn with pain. Harry just infuriated her so much, like was he so arrogant and narcissistic to really think that she would break into a gala just to stalk him? As if.

However, of course, Toni wasn't lucky enough to just ignore him the rest of the night because why would the universe be on her side for once?

It happed several hours later, after much cozying up to high officials and playing the part of a dutiful daughter and creating the illusion of a perfect family with her parents. Her father would wrap his arm around her waist pulling her close and introducing her to a colleague or whoever he was talking to with a and having you met my wonderful daughter yet? which was her cue to smile brightly and shake the man's hand. She knew how to play the part, it's not her first time at the rodeo.

It only happened again when she had – by chance – stumbled upon a high official at SI's kid around her age that she saw Harry again. She was charming the boy, who was overly flustered and obviously unused to being flirted with and being invited to these events causing her to realize that he's fresh meat and super easy to manipulate.

He's not used to this environment, doesn't know how the game was played. He's not like her or others which had endured this (or used this to their advantage) for years – just the way Toni liked them.

She giggled at what were supposed to be jokes coming from him and touched his arm before fluttering away, watching as he ducked his eyes to her lips and her chest. She would usually roll her eyes and mutter something about how her eyes were not located on her chest if this were a different setting, but she has to play nice. Like with Caden. Thankfully, she's had a lot of experience with Caden and guys like this kid.

"Careful, Jimmy," a humorous voice broke in, interrupting their conversation as a hand was clapped on the poor kid's shoulder. Both of their eyes instantly flicked to the figure who approached and Toni just barely contained her look of disgust when she recognized him as Harry. Ugh – this guy asks if she's stalking him but now it seems like he's stalking her. "Toni here will bite of your head if you're not careful."

He said it in a teasing manner, but Toni wasn't in the room to joke with him. Still, she forced out a small laugh as Jimmy did the same before looking at the boy she was attempting to sink her claws into. "He's just kidding. Harry here is such a jokester."

Jimmy chuckled and looked at the heir of Oscorp. It looked like he wanted to joke back but was too scared, something which Toni could understand in his fragile position of being fresh meat. She certainly would've never dreamed of talking back to someone when she was younger, but she's grown more confident and maybe a bit more reckless. But whatever, at least her reputation's still intact.

"Yeah, you know me. Always the class clown," Harry agreed with her, sending a charming smile to the boy in between them, "It helps you be the life of the party."

"Mm, but I don't remember you ever actually getting much attention from your jokes," Toni said after careful consideration, playing the game with him even if she despised doing so.

Harry shrugged, not taking offense to her comment which infuriated her slightly. "Eh, never said I was a comedian or anything," he then turned to Jimmy, "Hey, you don't mind getting me another drink, do you?"

Jimmy only nodded and scurried off without another word, allowing the façade to drop and Toni to glare at Harry. "Thanks to you, my chances with him are over."

Harry chuckled, raising an eyebrow and glancing over to where Jimmy had run off. "Really? Him? I didn't peg him as your type," Harry said, "I mean, I guess I expected you to have more of a thing for bad guys – like smokers, or I'm in a gang type of them. Not nerdy. Oh well, guess I was wrong."

"You are," Toni agreed with that statement quickly, "You don't know anything about me or what my type could be. Anyway, it's not like I was trying to date him."

"The flirting would suggest otherwise."

Toni sent him a pointed look, "The flirting is a weapon to draw him in. You should know with how often you use it."

"Ouch," Harry mockingly brought his hand to his heart, "You wound me, Toni. Really, do you just think of me as some type of womanizer. Am I supposed to be the young version of Tony Stark who seduced everyone?"

"No, you're a future businessman," Toni corrected him, "And a little bit of a womanizer, but whatever. Everyone knows businessmen do whatever it takes, like flirting to get what the want."

"Like you were doing," Harry concluded. Toni nodded in confirmation causing him to whistle. "Damn, low blow. You know a dude like that's gonna be talking and dreaming about your for weeks. You're setting him up for failure later when he thinks that hot girls like you are actually interested him so he works up all this courage to ask one out only to be laughed at. Low blow."

Toni rolled her eyes, "You're being dramatic. That's never going to happen."

"On the contrary, it happens all the time," Harry rebutted, "Guess you just don't care enough to notice. I mean, what with your plan of world domination or whatever you want with him."

"Taking over the world is too time consuming," she shook her head, "I'm just establishing connections."

"By breaking a poor guy's heart," Harry added causing her to send another glare his way. He raised his hands up in innocence – which he obviously was not in possession of. "Hey, I'm just stating facts."

"Not facts, your opinion," Toni corrected him again, "And isn't a bit hypocritical of you when you were flirting with that waitress earlier?"

Harry straightened and smirked at her, "You were watching me earlier."

"No, I just happened to glance over and see what you were doing," Toni defended herself, "Why would I want to watch you?"

Harry shrugged. "I don't know, I am looking pretty good tonight."

Damn, he was right about that. He did look good and it infuriated her further because she wanted him to amazing and not call her a bitch so that she could fuck him but no; he just had to fuck things up. It was all his fault, really. And maybe he was right that she had glanced towards his direction to check him out a bit, but it didn't mean anything. Really, it was so not a big deal or anything.

"Conceited," she snorted, covering her differing thoughts, "So not a good look on you."

Harry cocked his head and raised an eyebrow, "Oh? Then what is a good look on me?"

"Hm," Toni pretended to think, not mentioning that her thoughts turned to a dark corner of anything because you're hot enough to pull off anything you wear, but instead saying, "A trash bag because you're trash."

"That's a little harsh," Harry said in retaliation, still not too bothered by her comment. (God, why couldn't he just get mad like before so that she had another reason to hate him?).

"Is it? Well, maybe you take it as a hint of my feelings toward you," Toni told him just as Jimmy came up with two drinks. Not glancing at him – not caring to anymore – she turned and walked away from them.

God, that boy infuriated her.