Junior Year
Band camp sucked. In all honesty, just the two weeks before the start of the normal semester that he spent memorizing song after song and endless pages of drill made him wish he had quit once he started going out as Spiderman more, just a little bit. He’d walk to school every morning at 6:30 and rehearse until 5:00, most nights he’d even patrol until 2:00 or 3:00, so he barely slept. By the start of the second week of rehearsals, the rest of his section was starting to notice their star mellophone missing his step-offs and falling behind. It wasn’t like him. Peter tried to hide it, but he wasn’t very successful. In the second week, the one person Peter didn’t want to know about his exhaustion finally noticed.
“Let’s take a water break, everyone back in 15 minutes,” normally Ava didn’t call water breaks this early into rehearsal, but she just watched Peter mess up his solo three times in a row, it was very clear that he was starting to get frustrated. Coming down off the ladder, Ava tapped the other Drum Major, Bobby, on the shoulder and whispered, “I’m going to go see what’s up with Peter, can you hold down the fort?” Bobby nodded, and Ava ran over to catch up with Peter before he could sit down.
“Hey Peter, can I talk to you for a second?” Peter looked hesitant to walk with her but did it anyway.
Once the two of them were separated enough from the band Peter finally spoke. “Look Ava, I’m really sorry about my solo. I can ask Ryan to give it to someone else if you want.”
“No, that’s not why I wanted to talk to you. I know you’ll get it eventually. I wanted to talk to you because I’m worried about you, that’s all.”
Peter’s eyes widened, “What makes you say that?”
“Look at yourself Pete, we haven’t even started the semester and you already look like you’ve pulled several all-nighters.”
“Can we not talk about this here, Ava? I don’t want people to start worrying about me.”
“Yeah, of course.” Ava checked her watch, twelve minutes left in the band’s water break, “Let’s go over here.” Ava practically dragged Peter into the bathroom on the field, just the two of them. Once the door closed, Peter slid down the wall to the floor, letting his head fall in between his knees.
“I should’ve quit last year,” he muttered to himself.
This statement was a shock to Ava, she’d been in band with Peter since they were kids. He loved it almost as much as she did, and he was her biggest supporter when she ran for Drum Major last year. “What do you mean Pete? You, Peter Parker, quit band? Are you sure that you’re feeling okay?”
“I love it, I do. But it’s a lot. I have a lot of other things going on, like the Stark Internship.”
Ava checked her watch again, nine minutes to go, “Is that why you haven't been sleeping?”
“Is it that obvious?”
“Maybe not to everyone, but to me…yeah.”
“Yeah, the internship has got me at the tower really late and then I’m getting here so early that I just haven’t had the time to sleep”
“Wow, and I thought it was because you were going out as Spiderman every night.”
At this Peter’s head shot up, “What.”
“Ya’know, patrolling the streets as Spiderman, stopping petty crimes, and standing up for the little guys. Isn’t that your whole brand?”
“Ava, what are you-”
“Peter, you’re not slick. I’ve known you for years and I live in the apartment building across from you. It wasn’t that hard to figure out.”
A small beep came from Ava’s watch, five minutes until she had to be back on the ladder. She quickly pulled out her phone and texted Bobby.
*Can you tell everyone we are going to extend the break by five minutes? I’m kind of dealing with something right now.*
*Of course. Is Peter okay?*
*Yeah, he’s fine. Just having a rough time, with his internship. It’s taking a toll on him.*
*Okay, see you out here in ten minutes.*
*See you in ten.*
Ava added 5 minutes to the timer on her watch, “Okay, we have ten minutes now, Bobby is going to extend the break for us.”
Peter was hyperventilating now, “Do you think anyone else knows, no one else can know. I promised Mr. Stark I would keep this a secret.”
Within seconds Ava’s hand was rubbing small circles onto Peter’s back, “I shouldn’t have told you I knew. Not like this. Peter, I’m very observant, especially when it comes to you. I literally can never take my eyes off you, so I notice the little things. Things that no one else notices.”
Peter’s breathing finally started to slow down and he let out a small laugh, “Funny.”
“What’s funny, Pete?”
“I can never take my eyes off you either. You’re the reason I’m still doing this Ava. I was going to quit last year, once I started going out as Spiderman more, but I didn’t want to lose this one connection between us. I didn’t want to lose you.”
Peter looked up at Ava and watched as her hand found its way to his chin. Was this really happening, after four years of pining, and something finally was coming of it? Peter watched Ava’s eyes break contact with his just for a moment to look down at his lips. Peter nodded, knowing exactly what Ava was asking. Ava's position over him, allowed her to force Peter into a standing position, letting his exhausted body use the tiled wall as support. Ava’s slight height advantage over Peter put her in control of the kiss. It was soft at first, both of them testing the waters at first. After a minute or so Peter pushed forward, a slight aggression behind his action, but Ava didn’t let him take control that easily. Her hand snaked up to behind his head tugging on his curly brown hair. With one hand on the back of his head and the other now on his shoulder, Ava pushed him backward, kissing him harder. At this Peter let out a quiet moan, his mouth falling open just enough for Ava’s tongue to push past his lips. Peter's hands finally left his side, wrapping around Ava’s waist, pulling her into him, the kiss only getting deeper by the minute. Ava slowly rolled her hips into him, letting him take the lead.
They would've kept going, but a small beep came from Ava’s watch once again.
“Shit.” Ava didn’t want to pull away from Peter’s warmth, but she had to. She had to get back out on the field in five minutes.
Peter breathing heavily again, but definitely not anxious this time. “Holy-”
Ava tucked a misplaced hair back behind Peter’s ear, “Well, that was something.”
“A good something?”
“A great something.”
Peter smiled, more than he had in the past two weeks. “Oh, well that’s good. Would you, um. Would you like to-”
“Would I like to finish this later?”
Peter only nodded, blushing beet red.
“I would love to Pete,” Ava placed one more soft kiss on Peter’s lips, “We really do need to get going. How do I look?”
Peter’s eyes looked up and down her whole body, “Beautiful.”
“Peter.”
He let out a small laugh again, “You look fine, I wouldn’t suspect a thing. How about me?”
Peter looked more displaced than she did, his hair was more of a mess than usual and the sleeves of his t-shirt had come unrolled.
“You look like you just made out with the Drum Major in the bathroom. Here let me help you.”
Ava ran her hands through his hair, smoothing it out as much as possible, and then she quickly rolled the sleeves of his t-shirt back up into the classic style of the horn section, showing off his insane amount of muscle. Maybe her hands rested on his biceps a little longer than necessary, but he definitely wasn’t complaining.
Just as the two of them were about to leave the bathroom, and head back to the rest of the band, Peter grabbed Ava’s arm, “I’ve liked you for a long time Ava.”
“I have too, Pete. Now, look upset. And put your arm over my shoulder, we don’t want the rest of the band to catch on, do we.”
“No, we do not.”
Ava walked back to the ladder, with Peter by her side. As they got close, Bobby ran over to them.
“Is he okay?”
“Yeah, Peter’s fine. He’s exhausted, but he’s fine. I think the ten minutes in the air conditioning over there helped a lot. I’m going to force him to take a nap in the shade for thirty minutes, while he’s resting we’ll move on to one of your sets.”
“Sounds like a plan, do you want me to walk him over there, while you give the update?”
Ava transferred Peter’s body over to Bobby, who walked him the rest of the way to the shade. As the two of them walked away Ava gave a long blast on her whistle followed by four short rhythmic tweets, “Band, ten hut!”