Enter, Caroline
Peter
Sometimes, selfishly, Peter wishes that he had just let the Multiverse collapse if it meant he got to see his Aunt again. If it meant that he could see MJ and Ned and even Flash again.
And not just see them, like he had from afar so many times, but speak to them, touch them, Laugh with them.
Peter had picked some nicer flowers from the store. He had splurged a bit, getting some brighter, less dead ones than usual. They brought some color to May’s tombstone.
Ben, whose tombstone was erected next to hers, was lacking color. Peter had noted that he should go back to buying deadish flowers if it meant he could afford to buy a bouquet for both May and Ben.
“Hey, May.” He cringes at hearing his voice, it sounded raw, as it always did when he visited May. Probably because of the crying.
“I’m living in Hell’s Kitchen now, next to that lawyer that we hired. The blind one that you thought was pretty cute.” He chuckles. “My birthday is coming up in a couple of weeks. I’m thinking about actually spending this one with someone. I think having my eighteenth, nineteenth, and twentieth birthday alone was enough. I have this friend, a friend, that I might spend it with. His name is Deadpool. Well not really, but he’s sort of got a secret identity thing going on too.”
Peter hears the sound of gravel crunching under wheels and turns to see a familiar car rolling up.
Happy Hogan gets out.
Peter had been surprised, to say the least, the few times that he had seen Happy show up to May’s grave in the past three years. He didn’t realize that her death had affected him that much.
Peter stands up, patting May’s tombstones before walking away, smiling politely at Happy as he passes. Happy smiles back, tightly. His hair, which used to be speckled with age, was now completely grey, and his face was void of his token goatee, replaced instead with a full, neatly trimmed, beard.
His hands fly up to his hair, the curls tickling his ears. He pulls out his phone and reaches for his wallet to pull out the business card that Karen had handed him.
All of the cards in his wallet had become unorganized from when they had fallen out and he riffled through them looking for the business card.
Credit card. Pizza restaurant loyalty card. Driver's license that he never uses. Various other business cards that he had collected over the years were, previous to the spill, organized in alphabetical order. The new Nelson, Murdock, and Page card.
Peter pauses.
Where was the old card?
A small flare of panic rose in his chest. The card wasn’t that important, it was simply a keepsake from before everything had gone to shit. Well, before everything that had gone to shit, went more to shit.
Peter sighs sadly. He’d be lucky if he found it again.
Pulling out the new card Peter types in Karen’s personal phone number, sending her a quick text.
Hey Ms. Page, do you have any hairdresser recommendations in Hell’s Kitchen
It’s Peter by the way :)
He moves to put his phone down but opens it again, sending one more text.
*Karen, lol
His phone almost beeps instantly with a new message from Karen.
I don’t have any recommendations, I cut my hair.
Peter frowns, prepared to turn around and awkwardly start a conversation with Happy to ask him for a recommendation but his phone beeps again.
I could cut your hair if you trust me with that.
Peter sighed, relieved that he wouldn’t have to start a conversation with Happy. He’d forgotten how awkward he was when they first met and he did not want to go through that again if he didn’t have to. He quickly shoots back a text.
I would like that!
Karen replies with,
I get off at 5, want me to come round yours?
Peter sends back a thumbs up and heads back to his apartment.
~~~~~~
“So this is about it,” Peter says to Karen as she stands in his kitchen/dining room/living room, staring around at the blank walls with fake interest.
“I never realized how lucky Matt got with his apartment, his is massive compared to this,” Karen replies incredulously.
“Yeah well, I bet it would cost a couple of limbs for me to be able to afford.” Peter pulls a folding chair that he had bought away from the wall and sits it in. Karen places her bag on his counter and pulls out a small box containing hair-cutting shears.
“So, tell me more about Peter. I feel like we only scratched the surface at dinner the other night.” She turns around running her hand through Peter’s hair. It’s soft, strands curling around her fingers as if they were grabbing her. Peter relaxes into her repetitive strokes, sighing quietly.
“Um, what do you want to know?”
Karen shrugs, turning back around and grabbing the scissors.
“You just want a trim, yeah?”
He nods.
“Well, tell me about your aunt.” She says, taking a strand of his hair and snipping it. Peter sighs at the sound of his hair being cut, closing his eyes gently, reminiscing in the way May used to do it.
“Well, her name was May. I moved in with her as a kid after my parents died.” Karen clicks her tongue at the same time as she snips another strand of hair, the noises overlapping.
“I’m sorry to hear that, Peter.”
“It’s fine, I didn’t know them well. I lived with my aunt in a small apartment near Rockefeller, and it was just the two of us until I was 17.”
Karen stops cutting his hair for a moment, patting his shoulder in sympathy.
“Wow, you’ve lost a lot of people.”
Yeah, everyone.
He doesn’t say it out loud.
“Yeah, my aunt used to call it Parker luck.” He chuckles weakly and Karen continues to cut his hair. He lets the sound of the clippers clicking and his hair being cut fill the room for a couple of minutes before he continues speaking.
“I went to Midtown High School until she passed away, then I left school so I could work and took the GED test when I turned 18, so I passed high school at least. I’ve had the same job since. I work at a tech repair store, I’m super lucky to have even got it in the first place considering I never went to college.”
Karen nodded along, even though he couldn’t see her. The shorter she cut his hair, the straighter it got. She was slightly disappointed to see the curls go. She ran her fingers through his hair, tussling it so that any loose strands would fall onto the floor where a ring of Peter’s hair was.
“Do you want to go to college?” She moves to stand in front of him, smiling down at him before moving her concentration back to his hair. He shrugs.
“I’ve always liked science and technology so I thought about doing something related to those. Or possibly work at the homeless shelter my aunt worked at. I don’t know if I’ll ever leave my current job though. I enjoy it. I don’t have to talk to people much and I get to keep my hands busy as well.”
He can see Karen nod along to what he’s saying now that she stands in front of him.
“Sorry if I’m saying too much.” He says, suddenly feeling shy.
“No, I enjoy listening to you talk." Karen replies, still laser-focused on his hair.
“I don’t know what else to say, I think that’s about it.” Karen nods, stepping away from his hair again, tussling it once more. She smiles at her work.
“All done.” Peter smiles, standing and walking into the bathroom, looking at his hair in the mirror. He wasn’t used to having he be short. His curls had practically disappeared. He thought that the curls would make him look younger but now realized that the short hair made him look younger.
He rubs his fingers over the part of his eyebrow that stands up, and then runs his fingers over the few freckles on his face, more noticeable now. He looked pale, his bags prominent under his eyes.
“What do you think?” Karen asks, appearing in the doorway behind him. Peter smiles at her in the mirror.
“It’s great, thank you.” He turned around to face her, noticing now that she was slightly taller than him, having to look up the smallest bit.
“Um, how much do I owe you?”
She laughs, waving her hand in dismissal.
“You don’t owe me anything, your company is enough.” She moves back out of the doorframe towards the kitchen to grab her bag. Peter follows behind.
“It’s rare that I get to see anyone other than Matt or Foggy these days so it’s nice to talk to someone else for once.” She shrugs her bag onto her shoulder and walks towards the door.
“I insist. You’ve fed me, and now you’re cutting my hair, I owe you something.”
Karen thinks for a moment before her eyes light up.
“If you’re ever bored or not busy, we have a finicky printer and copier at the office, you could come to take a look at it.” She suggests. Peter nods enthusiastically.
“Yeah, I’ll text you whenever I have some free time and we can arrange something.” Karen gives Peter's hair one last look over, before saying goodbye.
But she doesn’t go home.
When Peter closes the door she turns and walks over to Matt’s apartment, digging out the key copy that Matt gave her, and unlocking it.
Matt meets her at the door when she enters.
“I’d be surprised to see you if I couldn’t hear you next door.” Karen rolls her eyes, pushing past Matt and sitting down on his couch, sighing.
Matt follows her in, sitting down next to her. He knocks her knee with his and she smiles.
“What were you doing over there?”
“Peter needed a haircut- wait, you could hear what I was doing, why are you asking?” Karen raises her eyebrow at him questioningly. Matt smirks coyly.
“I don’t believe that you just wanted to give Peter a haircut. Your questions seemed innocent but your intentions, hm, they did not.”
“I don’t know what you mean.” Karen lies easily, knowing that Matt would catch it even if he couldn’t hear her heart.
“Karen.” He deadpans. She groans, leaning back against the couch.
“Alright so maybe I wanted to try and figure him out more, I can’t help it, Matt.” She whines, Matt laughs, leaning back against the couch with her. She looks over at him, reaching up and removing his glasses, once again hanging them off of her shirt.
“Why do you do that?” Karen shrugs, looking away from Matt, suddenly embarrassed. She plays with Matt’s glasses, clicking the arms together. Matt grabs her hand, stopping her fidgeting.
“Sorry.”
“It’s okay.”
“I like to be able to see your eyes,” Karen says, honestly. Matt nods.
“Are they still brown?” Karen laughs.
“Yes, yeah, they’re still brown.” Karen brings her finger up and runs it over one of the scars around his eye. It’s a longer one that runs across his cheek and over his crooked nose. She pauses, bringing her finger down.
“Sorry.” Matt smiles.
“You’ve been apologizing a lot tonight. It’s okay.”
Karen smiles softly before cringing in on herself.
“Oh, I don’t know if I ever told you this, I just remembered that I did it.” She laughs and shakes her head, Matt tilting his head slightly to listen to the honey tone of it.
“Do you remember Ms. Cardenas?” Matt nods. “When Foggy and I were at her apartment all those years ago, you were out doing… you things, so Foggy and I were alone which gave me the perfect opportunity to ask Foggy about you. I was curious about how you… saw things I guess, and Foggy told me about how you touched his face once.”
Matt laughs.
“Yeah, I don’t do that much anymore.”
“Well, after Foggy told me that, I, ugh this feels so embarrassing, told him to touch my face because I wanted to know how it would feel for you to see me.” Karen hides her face in her hands, a strand of hair falling out from her bun. Matt smiles at her.
“Do you want me to?”
Karen groans, curling in on herself, even more embarrassed.
“No Matt.”
“Are you sure? Because I want to.” Karen peeks out from between her fingers, staring at Matt’s face. He had a small smirk on his face, his dimples casting prominent shadows on his face.
“Are you being serious?”
Matt nods.
Hesitantly, Karen pulls her hands away from her face, turning to face Matt. She crosses her legs, resting her hands in her lap. Matt mirrors her, crossing his legs the best he could on the small couch. His hands do not meet his lap though, as they instead make their way towards Karen’s face.
He tucks her hair behind her ear and Karen stifles a sigh.
“You’re blonde. Foggy told me so, and I can smell the bleach in your hair when you get highlights.”
“I haven’t gotten highlights in years. I feel like my hair is probably turning grey.” Karen whispers. It feels wrong to talk at a regular volume when she is as close to Matt as she is right now.
“I can still smell the bleach sometimes.” His hand moves from her hair down the rim of her ear. There is a small, almost invisible scar on her earlobe from the ear piercings she had in high school that had since grown over.
His fingers trail down her jaw, every peach fuzz on her face making Matt’s fingers buzz.
Karen shivers.
Matt’s fingers continue to move along her face. They ghost over her lips, barely touching them. Matt can feel Karen’s warm breath on his fingertips. His fingers continue to gently move, pausing slightly as they move over the beauty mark on her face. The corner of his mouth twitches upwards.
“I didn’t know you had a mark on your face.” Matt also whispers. Karen nods and Matt’s fingers move with her face.
“I have two beauty marks on my neck, the one on my cheek, and then.” She grabs his hand and moves it to the other side of her face, and up to her eyebrow. Above the fine hairs of her eyebrow is a thin raised scar. It’s slightly paler than her natural skin tone but she usually covers it with makeup to hide it.
“And then I have this scar on my forehead from the accident.”
Matt’s fingers continue trailing down her face, even after Karen removes her own hands. They skirt past the outer corner of her eye and her eyelid flutters, her lashes ticking Matt’s knuckle.
Finally, Matt’s fingers trail down Karen’s neck, and she holds her breath, staring into Matt’s blank eyes. Sneakily, Matt grabs his glasses back from where they hang low on her collar and pushes them back up his face, hiding his eyes from Karen. She is met with a wine-red reflection of her own eyes.
“Let’s go grab some dinner. Or groceries for dinner.” His warm breath skates across Karen’s cheeks as he whispers.
Karen thinks for a second, lips pursed. She didn’t have any food at home that she necessarily wanted to get back to.
“Sure.”
Matt stands up, smiling.
“It’s a date.” He extends a hand out to help Karen stand up, pulling her up after she untangles her legs from where they were crossed.
Karen blames the nervous burst of butterflies in her stomach on how quickly Matt pulls her up from the couch.