Even after the talk, the tension stays.
In all honesty, Gwen doesn’t know what she expected. Her relationship with her dad is still strained — he tends to walk on eggshells around her (valid, given that up until recently, he’d been threatening to track her down and accusing her of murdering her best friend right to her face), and on her part, she’s never been the kind of person to want to talk about her feelings. At the very least, she knows she’s welcome in her own home now, even if her dad isn’t around a lot.
Despite the limited interaction, she knows he’s concerned about her, with the way he not-so-subtly leaves notes under her door when he leaves for work in the mornings, fooled into thinking she’s asleep. Often, she watches through tired eyes as his fingers push the slip of paper through the slit, stilling just momentarily before he retracts them.
Every time, he stands with a sigh, shuffling away from her door. Even then, she waits until the light has gone, until she hears the resounding click of the front door locking in its place, before she crawls out of bed to retrieve the note.
Every time, it speaks of the food in the fridge, and it has entailed a reminder of “Don’t skip your meals! :(“ after the first message went unheeded the first few times.
And every time, it ends with “Love you, Dad”.
This morning, she sighs, placing the note on the top of a stack of its predecessors sitting on her desk. She climbs back under her blanket, tugging her hood further over her head. Every morning, she chides herself for not making good use of the vacation she’s conned her way into with an excuse of wanting to spend more time with her father, and just like every other morning, she presses her cheek into her pillow and shuts her eyes.
She doesn’t know how she can go back to Spider Society, how she can face the other Spider-People and act like everything’s normal when she fraternised with people who were knowingly outcasting her best friend in an effort to lie to said friend. How she couldn’t bear to see her dad sport a disappointed gaze because of her yet again, couldn’t relive that experience, and so pushed that weight onto someone else’s shoulders. She doesn’t think she’ll ever forget the look of hurt, desperation and betrayal on Miles’s face, but it hurts the most that it was directed at her, and for good reason. The guilt swallows her whole and colours everything bleak.
And in classic Gwen fashion, she thinks bitterly, she avoids it.
It works, until all her belongings start to swirl in the air, and there’s the telling electrical thrum of a portal opening. She pulls herself up, perplexed, until a familiar face exits the portal–
–and steps right onto an untouched sandwich.
“Hobie?” she asks, cringing when her unused voice comes out as a croak.
He stares down the now squashed sandwich. “Using the floor as a table; subverting local conventions. I respect that.”
Gwen pointedly ignores the remark. “What are you doing here?”
“Right,” Hobie says, turning to face her. “We could use some help. You’re nearby.”
She sighs. “Not a villain-of-the-week?”
“You know I don’t believe in consistency.”
She scrubs her hands over her face roughly in an attempt to extract herself from the haze that’s been plaguing her, and wordlessly pulls herself out of bed to retrieve her suit.
“Gwendy,” Hobie starts, watching as she sets her jaw. “You good?”
“Fine,” she grunts, shutting him off.
“Alright,” he says, unconvinced, shelving the matter for later probing. “Let’s go.”
They step through the portal together, and Gwen thinks the objects clattering to the ground could barely make her room look messier than it already was.
~
They’re deposited on the edge of the fight, around the corner of a miraculously surviving building. Hobie rushes back into the chaos, while Gwen follows with slightly more caution. She braces herself as she enters, but once she catches sight of the villain, she stills.
Unfortunately, with its attention diverted by the opening of the portal, the Lizard — at least five times the size of the one she’d fought — growls at her.
She hasn’t got much sleep over the past week despite practically living in her bed. It isn’t new — she’s struggled with insomnia for years — but it’s exacerbated by her mental exhaustion, and she’s started seeing things she doesn’t think are real. It’s also made her slower and a bit more sluggish, and even though her Spidey-Sense is screaming at her to run or swing or find high ground or just fucking do something, all she manages is a shaky exhale. “You’re not real,” she whispers, more to herself than to anyone around her. You’re not real. You’re not real. You’re not–
Her mind goes blank when a very real claw grazes her side and a scaled palm flings her body across the road and into a wall. Her upper back collides with the wall at full force and erupts with blinding, burning pain. It’s more than she’s felt in weeks, and she gasps.
She thinks she hears someone shout her name, but she can’t be entirely sure — she doesn’t trust her senses much, not after being thrown like a ragdoll. She grits her teeth and stands, swallowing a cry when the motion jolts her spine, sparking flames that lick up her back.
(Spider-People always get back up.)
The monster faces away from her now, re-engaged in battle with the rest of the team. The adrenaline rush works to numb the pain, and she ignores the way her back throbs as she swings upwards and launches herself at the monster.
(You’re the monster, a voice whispers in her ear.
It sounds like her own.)
Almost distantly, she watches through her own eyes as her body lands a kick squarely in the Lizard’s right eye. It roars and rears its head, giving Miles the opening to—
Wait, Miles?
She barely registers when he webs its eyes shut, and she subconsciously joins in as the team starts webbing the creature’s limbs to the ground. It thrashes, even managing to tear through some of the webs, but they eventually manage to immobilise it. She doesn’t think to take note of how it seems to be stuck in its reptilian form instead of turning into a human, and as she swings herself upwards to perch on a lamppost, she feels herself slipping back into what she now calls her “fuzzy state” — a veil hazes her vision, and a low, constant hum drowns out the voices around her.
She catches sight of Miles and watches as the rest of the team give one another pats on the back, the Lizard now trapped in an impenetrable, translucent orange container. Her job is done here.
(Not that you’ve done much, comes the voice again.
You’re not needed here.)
Her guilt crashes low in her gut; it twists and burns and crackles and she doesn’t know, not anymore (hasn’t for a while), how much of what she feels is real.
(You won’t be missed.)
Quietly, she steps off the lamppost and swings away as quickly as she can manage, biting down on her lip as her shoulder jerks and sets her back alight with a searing pain.
(Spider-people always get back up.
But she always runs.)
~
She finds a deserted alleyway leading to a dead end, its deep end blocked off by a gate of mesh wire. She lowers herself to the ground, stumbling slightly before crumpling in a corner where metal converges with brick. She takes off her mask, pulls her knees to her chest and curls into herself, leaning against the mesh wire. The crash in adrenaline has left her exhausted, and her entire body aches fiercely, relentlessly. She closes her eyes and breathes, shallow and rapid, trying to calm the piercing throb in her ribs with every inhale.
(She doesn’t cry. She gets what she deserves, fair and square.)
Something tells her she needs to get up. Should find Hobie, or anyone else on the team for help, even if the idea of interacting with any of them makes her want to throw up. Should at least activate her stupid Gizmo so she can get back to her room, where she can lie down and wait for her accelerated healing to do its work. Should find Miles. But her body refuses to move, her muscles screaming even at the mere idea of it.
(Spider-People always get back up, but she always fails.)
She discards the idea. Vaguely, she thinks the wound on her side might actually be a bit more than a graze, now that she can feel the fabric around the tear growing cold and slick. Maybe she’ll heal soon enough. Or maybe the blood loss will get to her first.
(Maybe it’s for the best, she tells herself.)
She’s loathe to die before she’s had the chance to apologise to Miles, but things don’t always work out. (They mostly don’t.) She submits to her fate — even if her fate is death in an alleyway in a universe that isn’t her own. She closes her eyes as her head pounds softly, in a way that could seem almost comforting in its rhythm.
She thinks she hears the distant thwip and whoosh of swinging, but it’s not hard to convince herself that she’s just being a little delusional.
Until she hears a call of “Gwen?” laced with an unhealthy amount of concern that has her defences up immediately.
“Peter,” she calls out, meaning for it to sound threatening, but landing somewhere closer to fucking tired, “leave me alone.”
“Not Peter,” the familiar voice quips, “and no can do.” He lands in front of her. “You’re bleeding.”
She decides, on account of her limited energy reserves, not to dignify that with a response.
“Hey,” he says, softer and more serious, and she feels a touch on her shoulder, which she quickly squirms away from, igniting her back in pain again. She can’t help scrunching her eyes tighter in a wince, nor the whimper that escapes her throat.
“Gwen,” he prompts again, and she gets a little closer to placing who this voice belongs to. “Open your eyes for me. Please.”
She finds herself obeying, disappointing as it would be to Hobie. The light that enters her eyes worsens the pulsing ache at her temples, and she’s about to shut her eyes again when she finally realises that the figure crouching in front of her is Miles.
“Miles–”
“No,” he interrupts, his hands moving to press against the gaping wound at her side. She nearly screams when it sends shockwaves of agony through her body, forming a smatter of dark spots in her already cloudy vision. He mutters an apology, before continuing, “Where else are you hurt?”
Miles’s business-like tone worries her, but she complies. “Ribs,” she grits out, “and back.”
“Jesus,” he says under his breath. “Why did you run?”
I always do is the first response that comes to her, but she thinks, knows that Miles deserves more, deserves better. “I didn’t know–” she inhales sharply, a fresh wave of pain stealing the words from her tongue– “how to face all of you.”
Miles hums noncommittally, a cue for her to continue. “I thought– I thought you guys wouldn’t need me.”
He shakes his head, eyes filling with tears. “Gwen–”
“I was scared,” she admits, smiling gently. Her vision grows hooded as her eyelids grow heavier, and she can’t resist their weight any longer. “Miles, I’m sorry.”
“For what?” he demands, eyes widening in panic. “Gwen, open your eyes. Please.”
“For lying,” she says, barely audibly. She doesn’t open her eyes.
“I don’t care,” he replies, exasperated. “Gwen, c’mon, this isn’t funny. Stay with me.”
She groans faintly when he picks her up. “Medbay,” he declares, the same time she goes “nonononono”.
“Gwen.”
She knows she doesn’t have much of a choice, and that she isn’t being afforded one, but the idea of seeing more people or being touched and probed is too overwhelming for her to fathom; her head throbs, but her brain goes into overdrive–
“Gwen, breathe,” Miles reminds softly, “you’re going to be fine.”
(He doesn’t know whom he’s trying to convince.)
Gwen vaguely registers a portal opening, and gives in to the pull of unconsciousness as Miles steps through, cradling her broken body in his arms.
(Spider-People always get back up, but Gwen Stacy always falls.)
~
The next she wakes, she isn’t entirely sure it’s real. (It’s becoming a trend.) Her ears are ringing faintly and her vision is swimming. She feels the numbness, the dulled edge of otherwise piercing pain afforded by painkillers, yet her eyes sting and her body aches, aches, aches.
Miles is holding her hand. Something escapes her eye; a thumb caresses it away gingerly.
(With a care she doesn’t deserve.)
It smears, cool against her skin. A tear, perhaps?
Everything hurts.
“I’m sorry,” she says. “I’m so sorry,” she repeats, and she blacks out.
~
She wakes again. She apologises again.
She falls unconscious before she can catch the response, if any.
(Gwen Stacy always falls.)
~
She wakes up, this time in her room, on her own bed. She nearly sheds tears of joy. Or maybe she’s high on painkillers.
Miles is still holding her hand. She won’t question it, not yet.
“Miles, I’m sorry,” she whispers, and it sounds practised. “I’m sorry. Don’t leave me. Please.”
Another tear. She sniffles. Miles has only just woken up and registered her words. “Gwen–”
She attempts to sit up before he can stop her. It pulls at — well, everything, from the feeling of it — and she sucks in a breath through gritted teeth as she falls limp. He starts saying something, but she doesn’t hear it.
She’s out like a light before he manages to stand.
(Gwen Stacy always falls. Again, and again, and again.)
~
The next time she wakes, there are no painkillers.
She sits up, and her back aches. Miles is still holding her hand.
“Hey,” she says, and his attention snaps towards her. “Why’re you in my room?”
“You’ve been in my room,” he retorts.
She hums in acknowledgement. “How long has it been?”
“Hard to tell with all the travel through space and time,” he says. When he gets a blank stare, he appends, “About two days, since…”
“Since?”
“Sorry, just trying to think of a nicer way to say ‘since my best friend almost bled out in my arms’,” he deadpans.
She looks away, remorse eating away at her again. “Are you mad?”
He levels her with a look of incredulity. “What? Gwen, I–”
“Because I’d get it if you were. I’d be furious at me, too. It– it was wrong and I’m sorry that I lied. I shouldn’t have lied to you–”
“Gwen–”
“I- I lied to you for so long, just because I was too much of a coward to talk to my dad. It’s my fault–”
“Gwen.”
She stops rambling when Miles squeezes her hand. “I’m not mad about you lying,” he says.
The implication of the reassuring statement makes her heart sink again. “Then what are you mad about?” she asks, fearful.
“I’m not– Gwen, I’m not mad at you. I’m mad that we didn’t keep you closer. I’m mad that you felt like you couldn’t let us take care of you,” he says, voice thickening steadily. “I’m mad that I had to find you dying in an alley alone because you didn’t feel safe enough to come to us instead.”
“That last one’s on me,” she jokes weakly.
He shakes his head in fervent disagreement. “That’s our job too,” he says, “I’m sorry.”
“It was still wrong to lie to you.”
“You were under stress and subjected to extenuating circumstances. You didn’t have a choice.”
“But I did,” she insists, plucking at a loose thread on her blanket. “I put you through all that just because I was scared to face my dad. It was selfish.”
“It’s not selfish. He had you at gunpoint.”
“How did you–”
“You mumble in your sleep,” Miles declares smugly.
“Fine,” Gwen concedes, “justified. But still wrong. I’m still sorry.”
“I know, you said it a lot. Too much.”
“How much do I talk in my sleep, exactly?”
“Not that much,” he says, “more when you’re high on painkillers.”
Her eyes widen in horror as he bursts into laughter. “I’m kidding,” he reassures. She punches him in the shoulder, but dips her head and shuts her eyes briefly in pain when her ribs twinge.
He schools his expression immediately. “How are you feeling?”
“Better than ever,” she lies, putting on what she hopes is a reassuring grin. When he frowns, she rushes to add, “I’m fine. Seriously.”
Miles huffs in exasperation. “You don’t have to act tough around us all the time.”
Gwen laughs, and it sounds forced, even to herself. “Yeah, I acted real tough on painkillers.”
Miles narrows his eyes. “You know what I mean.”
She looks away and doesn’t respond — doesn’t know how to. Miles sighs, moving out of his chair to sit beside her on the bed. “It’s just– you’re my best friend, and I’m worried, sometimes. You know you can talk to me about anything, right?”
She looks up. “We’re still… best friends?”
His gaze softens. “Of course. Gwen, I wouldn’t leave you. Not ever.”
She slows, fear receding and guilt taking the backseat. Best friend. I wouldn’t leave you.
(Maybe it doesn’t always hurt to let someone in.)
She exhales shakily, overcome with relief. She closes her eyes and rests her head on his shoulder, warm and firm and steady. He slings an arm gently over her shoulders, the warmth soothing on her bruised and aching back.
(It doesn’t hurt to let Miles in.)
“Thank you,” she says, so softly he barely hears it, even with her temple on his shoulder.
“No hay problema,” he says, just as softly.
(Gwen Stacy always falls.
But Spider-People always get back up. Again, and again, and again.)