Mr. Harrington clapped his hands together, trying to get the attention of all the teenagers around him, “Alright, everybody! I know you’re all excited about the return of the school fair, but we still need to come up with some ideas for fundraising!”
A hush fell over the classroom... almost. A couple of excited titters came from the cluster of girls toward the back as the one girl they’d nominated to be spokesperson threw her hand up in the air. “We have an idea for that, Mr. Harrington,” the blondest of the bunch, Lena offered (at least that’s what Peter thought her name was?). “What about doing a kissing booth? It’s totally classic, right? And we—” she gestured to her and her clique of a friend group, “could take turns covering the booth. It wouldn’t be too hard to convince some of the football players to volunteer to balance things out, and then we’d sell kisses for...” She looked back at her friends again, “What do you think, girls? Ten dollars a kiss?” They all nodded vigorously in agreement, prompting Lena to turn back confidently, “Ten dollars a kiss. And we’re sure there’s already some booth built and hiding back in the storage shed that we can paint fresh. No big deal, and then we’d be in business!” Lena grinned big, like she’d solved world hunger. “What do you think?”
A couple of ‘less civilised’ seniors high-fived each other while Mr. Harrington stood there, obviously uncomfortable with the every aspect of the idea. “I think...” he trailed off as he tried to find a way to diplomatically explain why this was an absolutely awful idea.
“I think the school board would love having to shut the school down because of an in-house covid outbreak,” MJ muttered from her seat at the front of the class, just loud enough for Peter, Ned, and Mr. Harrington to hear.
Mr. Harrington glared not so disapprovingly at his Aca-Deca captain, she had made a reasonable point after all, and then addressed the room at large, “While the idea may have had merit at one time, times have changed, and I’m certain the school board will deem it too risky, at least from a public health perspective to approve.” He smiled sincerely, “Thank you for being so... willing to help, though.” He added.
The groans of disappointment took a minute or two to die down but eventually the meeting moved forward when Flash raised his hand from his seat near the back of the room. “What about doing some sort of eating competition instead?”
Mr. Harrington thought for a moment, not immediately shutting the idea down, “Okay. I’m intrigued, but what exactly were you thinking about, Eugene? Remember that we are working with an extremely limited budget, so it can’t be cost prohibitive.”
“Well, I was thinking that we could always approach some of our local businesses; see if they’d be willing to work together and donate something in large enough quantities that we could make it a competition of sorts. Like Joey Chestnut, you know?” Flash took the opportunity to make another dig while he could, “In fact, maybe Parker here could convince his boss at Stark Industries to cater the whole thing for us?”
“Eugene, behave, please.” Mr. Harrington cut him off before he could go any further, “I’m sure that Mr. Stark would absolutely be willing to help, but the premise for this event is to bring the community together. Let’s see if we can make an effort to keep this a little more home grown, shall we?”
“Um—” Peter raised his own hand awkwardly. Flash’s idea didn’t suck, and they were all there to help so he could run with it—“I could talk to Mr. Delmar. I mean, he’s definitely a part of the community, and I bet he’d be willing to connect us with some of the other local business owners to get this all done.”
“I think that’s a fantastic idea, Peter... and you, too, Eugene,” Mr. Harrington added before Flash could get upset at the order of things. “Seeing as you’re both so eager to contribute to its becoming a reality, let’s get you two working together to make it happen. Lena?” Mr. Harrington turned his attention to the girls in the back again, “I’ll put you and whomever you decide to corral into helping in charge of tracking down a booth, painting, and setting up once you’re assigned a location, okay?” He stepped back and addressed the class in general. “Anyone who hasn’t specifically been assigned a task by this point, be ready to jump in when you’re asked for help. For now, though, anticipate helping out with advertising—distributing flyers, hanging posters, and so on,” he nodded to MJ in acknowledgement, “or set up, ticket sales, or 50/50 sales on the day of.”
As he had begun, so Mr. Harrington ended with a clapping of hands. “Only four weeks to go till go time, everyone! Thank you so much for participating, all! This fair is going to be amazing!”
Peter and Flash each gave each other the side eye. This was not how it was meant to be.
“Don’t forget to bring updates to our next meeting. You are dismissed!”
/-/-/
“You guys are so screwed.”
Both Peter and Flash cringed at Ned’s statement, knowing that he wasn’t wrong. “Well,” Peter piped up, “At least we know it was easy to paint the sign up booth.”
Flash snort laughed at the understatement of the century, “Ya’ think?”
And, honestly, Peter was trying really hard not to. “To be fair, who’d have thought that the only item anyone would have been willing to donate would’ve been...” He couldn’t even say it out loud.
Oh, but MJ could. “Bananas.” She planted herself between the two of them as they stared in disbelief at the boxes upon boxes of bananas stacked in Coach Wilson’s office being kept out of the sun until the competition that was scheduled to start only an hour from then. “You know, my art teacher told me I should contemplate using some colour in my distress sketches. In this exact moment?” She clapped them both on their shoulders and nodded, “I can see it.”
“Stuff it, weirdo.” Flash stepped out from under her hand. “Besides, this is all your fault, Penis,” Flash crossed his arms in frustration. “If you actually had a real internship with Tony Stark, you could have called him up and we’d have been done. We could’ve done pies, or cakes or, I don’t know! Something that didn’t have to be so stupid! But nooooooo...” Flash scoffed as he gestured to their chaos. “Here we are stuck with a bunch of ripe freakin’ bananas—and this fundraiser is going to flop.”
“Maybe you can send any leftovers home with the winner along with their trophy so they can make banana bread?” Ned offered not helpfully.
Peter gritted his teeth and breathed deep. He wasn’t even going to reply to Ned. And he definitely wasn’t going to admit to Flash that he’d intentionally chosen not to call Tony about all of this. Would Tony have said yes if Peter had asked? Absolutely! But their relationship was... changing? And no way was Peter going to start asking for favours now that he and Tony were getting closer—ESPECIALLY now that they were getting closer. “Stuff if, Flash. It’ll be fine. We’re a school full of science nerds and a couple of pretend sports teams. The expectation is not that high.” Peter flushed with embarrassment.
Okay.
Maybe it was a little bit higher than bananas.
“Whatever, losers. Mr. Harrington says it’s time to get this all outside.” She moved past them and grabbed the small cart they’d parked in far the corner. “And while I normally believe in an equal division of labour, I also believe that I have some sketching to do.” She pointed to the boxes. “Get loading, you three. The masses are waiting.”
/-/-/
The fair was well underway by the time the four of them exited the school with their stacked cargo and made their way to the parking lot where all of the exhibits and games were set up. It didn’t take long for them to find their booth and tables, along with a very grumpy football player.
“You had two people sign up for this, Flash,” he waved a clipboard in the air in frustration. “Except they thought you were just, like, selling bananas, so you actually have no one, man.”
Of course the football player knew Flash.
“I know, Josh- I know—” Flash commiserated with him, “But what could we have done? Oh, wait! I know!” Flash made a show of dragging his gaze over to Peter. “We could have called our imaginary billionaire boss and made this booth into something, well—” Flash looked back at his buddy and shrugged in defeat.
“If I had to make a choice, I’d have been totally down for doing the kissing booth, is all I’m sayin,’” Josh continued.
And Peter said nothing. What could he say? Yeah, Flash had done the exact same schmoozing with the neighbourhood business folks as Peter (they’d made a script, even!), but maybe Flash had been right and he should have pulled some strings?
“Ah, perfect!” Mr. Harrington snuck up amongst the group and took everything in. “Lena’s committee did a great job on your set up,” then he patted the top of the stack of boxes, “and I’m so glad to see that the community really stepped up and came through!”
Was he looking at the same stack of bananas as the rest of them? How could this man be so optimistic?
Mr. Harrington picked up the clipboard Josh had been holding, which apparently gave Josh the permission he’d been waiting for to bolt for places unknown while Mr. Harrington checked out the list. “Oh!” His forehead furrowed, “That’s a little light...”
Ugh. Peter couldn’t bear to disappoint his favourite teacher. “Well, uh, we were thinking of switching things up and seeing who we could convince to join us from the crowds, ya’ know—playful peer pressure and all that,” Peter was grasping now. The plan had been for this to be a one and done and then he, along with Ned and MJ were going to check things out too, but no way was that happening now. “And oh!” Peter had an epiphany! “Flash is going to live stream it!”
“But-!” Flash had apparently had plans, too.
But Peter’s face said enough that Flash’s eyes bugged out as he became enmeshed in Peter’s plan. “Uh, yeah!” Flash was definitely not impressed. “But first, Peter here is going to get the party started by eating the first batch of bananas and he’s gonna keep it up until we hit a hundred dollars either in sign ups to join in the banana eating contest or in straight up donations towards the fundraiser, so...”
Now, Peter hated Flash, but he also hated bananas more than just about any food on the planet thanks to some nasty banana flavoured antibiotics for a particularly nasty case of strep throat as a kid. Every part of him was ready to throw his hands up and head over to the guy making deep fried oreo cookies... but this was Mr. Harrington, so... “Yup,” Peter smiled big, “In fact, Ned is going to go and get them to announce this over the loud speaker right now.”
Ned was quick on the uptake and nodded eagerly, “I can do that—Banana eating for the cause- live streaming- give us money—in just a few minutes, right?”
Peter nodded. Sooner started, sooner done, right?
“Got it,” Ned replied, then bolted for the main tent and the event emcees. “I’ll make sure they hype it up.”
“Yay,” Peter gave a pathetic thumbs up as he lost his will to live. “So yeah, Mr. Harrington. We’re all under control. Flash and I are just going to get these bananas ready to go and we’ll be set to start. Right, Flash?”
Flash smiled big, too. “Right.”
Mr. Harrington handed the empty clipboard to Flash and smiled the biggest. “I knew I could count on you two. Good work!” With a spring in his step, Mr. Harrington left them to their final preparations.
Peter and Flash stood side by side until Mr. Harrington turned toward the back of the school and the midway.
“I really hate you, Flash.” Peter stomped to the boxes and got to work.
And Flash didn’t care. “You know, if you’ve got a problem, you could always call your boss and just have him show up, buy the damned fair, and call this done.”
Peter glared. Their reasoning may have differed, but it still led to the same outcome.
MJ, ever the devoted observer, flipped her sketch pad open to a fresh page.
Peter Parker was about to eat a load of bananas.
/-/-/
Peter was in the zone— so intent on trying to choke down another banana that he didn’t notice Flash’s eyes growing wider and wider from behind his phone.
Peter was also too distracted by his efforts to not vomit to notice Ned stepping behind Flash to take note of what exactly Flash was freaking out about.
However, when MJ joined in the fray, mouth dropping open in shock, Peter couldn’t help but finally figure out that something was going on.
“Ned?” Peter called over as he peeled his umpteenth banana. “What’s going on?”
Ned made his way over to Peter, trying to stay out of the video Flash was still live streaming. “Uh, we’ve got a bit of a situation—like, an amazing situation going on and I’m not sure how to tell you without you freaking out...”
Why did Ned look nervous?
“Ned?”
Ned put his hands up in defence. “Hey, it’s not my fault that your freaky metabolism thing has kicked in!”
“What?” Peter was confused. “What do you mean?” –and what did his spider metabolism have to do with anything?
“Peter,” Ned gestured to the now empty table, “no one else is joining you. One guy had considered, but bailed after watching you do your thing.”
“And the best part!?” Flash called out from where he was still filming, “This banana thing is turning into a freakin’ mukbang—and people online are willing to pay for you to keep going!”
Peter’s jaw dropped. “People are—wait a sec.” Peter looked from Ned to Flash and then to MJ who shrugged.
“I’m going to go get Mr. Harrington,” she said, then disappeared into the crowd.
Hang on—crowd?
Peter sighed and covered his face as he processed what was going on, “Everyone is watching me scarf bananas?”
Flash and Ned both nodded.
“And they’re donating?”
They nodded again.
“Can I ask how much we’ve raised?”
Ned and Peter both looked at Flash for that answer, “If my tally is right, and people follow through on their pledges,” Flash flipped the phone to stare at all of his viewers, “because they will!” Flash flipped the phone back to Peter, “We’re looking at more than a thousand dollars so far... and as long as you’re eating, they’ll keep donating!”
Peter dropped his head to the table. “How is this my life?” he muttered before taking a deep breath and mentally preparing himself to continue.
“You don’t have to keep doing this, you know.” Ned took a second and inched closer so he could speak more privately with his best friend.
“I know.” Peter laughed and leaned a little closer to Ned, “Dr. Cho is never happy with my potassium levels- what with my activity levels and all,” Peter confided, “So this can only be a good thing, right?”
Ned snort-laughed, “Or too much of a good thing?”
Peter took another deep breath. “I guess we’re about to find out.”
/-/-/
“Give me the final tally again, please?” Peter begged as he hunched over the toilet in the private bathroom of his bedroom at the tower. “Make this all worth it, please?”
Tony rubbed the boy’s back and sighed, “Two thousand three hundred forty-two dollars, my dear, sweet spider-idiot.”
Peter clunked his head against the arm resting against the toilet seat. “Mm-mm. That doesn’t sound right.”
Tony rolled his eyes, “Fine, it was two thousand three hundred forty-two dollars and sixteen cents... better?”
Peter hummed in satisfaction. “Better.”
They stayed there in silence for a few minutes waiting for Peter’s stomach to finally settle when Tony finally said it, “You know, I could have just written a—”
“Nope.” Peter cut him off before Tony could say it. “Just don’t.”
“Don’t what? Say, ‘write—
“No! Don’t!” Peter protested.
“— a cheque?” Tony finished anyways, figuring there must have been something behind Peter’s insistence.
“Shhhh.”
“And if nothing else,” Tony added, “I could have just bought you more bananas...”