"We could never go back to being only boss and assistant. I couldn't look at you and not be head over heels in love. It's just impossible. I don't know what's wrong with me either." Perhaps there was a small part of him that just wanted to be completely and utterly normal like everyone else. He'd seen how the other version of himself was: completely happy and oblivious to the rest of the world except for his children and his wife. That was what he wanted. He wanted the picture perfect existence that his former self had found. But he wanted it so much that he was blocking it too much with Pepper. Bless her, she put up with way too much stuff from him at the sake of her own sanity.