toblameforit | (no subject)

"I love that game. You any good at it?"

"Yeah." Cal tips the screen back toward himself in time to catch a square and put it in its proper place.

"I've been playing since I was a kid. I think I'm pretty much as good as anyone can get by now. You know, until it gets like physically impossible to keep up."

Brightly: "Whaddya mean it gets physically impossible?"

Cal snorts.

"You are so full of it your eyes are brown."

And Tony's eyes are, in fact, brown. So there you are.

"All right, you got me."

"You've always been a terrible liar, Tony," Obadiah observes.

"Nothing wrong with that," Cal says comfortably, sparing a casual glance for Stane.

"The problem is, he tries anyway. It's going to get him in a lot of trouble when he's older," Obadiah says, with what passes for fondness coming from him.

"Hey, I can lie when I have to."

There is something more than the obvious going on in this conversation.

Cal grins at him.

"I can give you lessons," he says. "My family lies for a living."

"You kidding? Sherry's been trying to teach me for years, and he lies so hard reality changes to fit."

Cal's answering laugh is genuine. It's funny because it's true.

"Then maybe we should do your lying for you."

"Don't let me stop you."

"I'm gonna remember you said that."

It's practically like being given permission. Maybe he can even apply it retroactively. Cal hasn't exactly been one hundred percent truthful today, but it's all been for Tony's benefit. That counts, right?

Obadiah smiles approvingly.

Gross. Cal cheerfully ignores him, keeping his attention split between Tony and his game.

With unusual perceptiveness: "I said lie for me, not to me."

"Whoops," says Obadiah. "There goes your surprise birthday party."

The comment is actually kind of funny, which makes exactly one thing Cal has ever heard Stane say that didn't make Cal immediately want to smack him or go take a shower.

But then, even a stopped clock is right twice a day.

(Stane has also - no doubt accidentally - given Cal a few extra seconds to cover his surprise at Tony's remark by being the one to speak first.)

"Oh, like I could even get away with that. Sherlock would give me shit for the rest of my life."

"No shit, right?"

His faith in Sherlock is absolute. Something Cal might have noticed about him.

"And you," this to Obadiah, "are bullshitting me. The last time you threw me a surprise birthday, I was five. And I ate so much cake I puked on your shoes."

Funny how Tony's childhood memories are so... Sherryless.

It is. But there's no room for dwelling on that right now.

(When he gets back, Sherlock said.)

So Cal just laughs.

Obadiah chuckles. "And your father told me he'd pay my dry cleaning bill if I never mentioned chocolate frosting in his house again."

Snort. "Yeah, that sounds like Dad all right."

Cal maintains an amused expression, but he can't help thinking of Sherlock's investigation, wondering what he'll find. If anything.

Obadiah is too busy smiling nostalgically to notice.