Secrets
“Dude,” Ned whispers hurriedly, hands clapped over his cheeks like the boy from Home Alone.
Peter’s eyes flick back and forth from his friend and the shouting class. “Dude,” he whispers back frantically. Shoulders climbing up, he asks Ned in a panic, “Wait! Wait! Did I do anything incriminating?”
“What the Hell is this, Parker?” Flash shrieks, stomping over.
“Aside from jumping on the ceiling and doing the Spidey landing pose thing? No, not at all,” Ned whispers sarcastically with worry in his voice, throwing his hands around.
Peter groans. He shouldn’t have come to school today! He knew he had been getting too little sleep and was too stressed. He’s been too anxious, and he should have seen a screw up like this coming.
Flash grabs one of Peter’s shoulders, jerking him from his thoughts to face him. “What the fuck was that, Parker?”
Mr. Harrington’s seems to gather at least a handful of his wits and rushes over, separating the two bodily. “Flash! Get off of him!” he says sternly, then turning to Peter. “Peter, you better tell me what’s going on right now.” Mr. Harrington’s eyes are beseeching and filled with concern.
Peter’s eyes blow wide. “Uhhhh…”
“Yeah, Peter,” Betty blurts from the next aisle of desks, curiosity burning in her eyes. “Are you Spider-Man?”
“No way!” Flash yells angrily over Mr. Harrington’s shoulder.
His classmates continue shouting and clamoring over one another, now swarming him. “Woah!” he exclaims, as they get too close, and some begin to grab at him. Mr. Harrison looks troubled but cannot get them all to stop. “Uh! I uh! I…” he flounders, eyes flying around rapidly.
He hears a groan and turns to see MJ rolling her eyes. “It’s already obvious,” she mutters, taking her seat again.
Peter’s lip wobbles. He’s so tired. He puts his hands over his face, his messy mop of hair flopping over his eyes.
“Fine. Yeah. I’m…yeah. But please don’t tell anyone. This could literally ruin my life, and the bad guys could even come after all of you. It’s life or death, okay? Please trust me on this,” he begs them, wide watery brown eyes glancing between his classmates. Some look scared at that, but one in particular looks horrified. Peter’s brow scrunches. “Charlie?” he asks warily. “Are you okay?”
Some of the other students turn to their classmate. “I’m sorry,” Charlie whispers, and Abe gasps. As people back away from him, Peter sees why. Charlie’s hands shake around his phone.
“No,” Peter gasps as his eyes widen. “What did you do, Charlie?”
“I’m sorry, Peter,” Flash’s lackey says. “Please, I’m really sorry.”
“What did you do?” Peter asks with more force, volume rising. A fist clenches at his side.
“I…I….” Charlie inhales sharply, suddenly pulling his phone up again and opening it with quaking fingers.
Deciding there is no use hiding it anyway, Peter whips out a web and pulls the phone away from the floundering teenager, who grabs at it as it flies away from him, eliciting gasps from around the room. As he turns the phone in his grasp and sees the screen, Peter’s heart drops the rest of its way to the floor. “No…” he mumbles. Looking to Ned, he asks, “Ned. He put a video on Snapchat. People already recorded and screenshotted it. Can you…?” He pushes the phone at his friend, face even more sickly pale than it had been before. “Can you…?”
Ned’s eyes blow wide as he snatches the phone. He hurries to pull out his computer and connect the two. After about ten minutes, Ned’s expression is resigned.
“I’m sorry, Peter,” he shakes his head.
Peter puts a hand over his exhausted eyes, tilting his face toward the ceiling and taking deep breaths to calm himself. His classmates chatter and mumble to one another, fear beginning to set in.
“Does that mean villains are going to try to kill us?” Betty asks worriedly, eyes teary. After a minute more of silence, she prods, “Peter?”
Scrunching his eyes closed tightly, Peter gathers himself. “Look,” he says, observing his class. “I don’t know, but everyone around me is in trouble now as far as I know, so….” His eyes blow wide again, mouth agape in a silent gasp. “May,” he breathes before whipping out his phone, hurriedly dialing a number and holding it to his ear as he anxiously speed-walks back and forth.
“Are we gonna die?” Jason asks fearfully.
“Oh my gosh. We could literally get murdered!”
“If he’s Spider-Man, Peter can protect us right?”
“Mr. Stark! Thank God! Something really seriously crazy bad just happened. I fell asleep and had a nightmare and kind of freaked out when I woke up and jumped on the ceiling, and….”
“Think he’s gonna follow all of us 24/7, smart ass?”
“I need to call my parents!”
“OH MY GOD, ARE WE GONNA DIE?”
“Quiet, kids!” Mr. Harrington yells over the panicked jabber. His students look to him like frightened deer. Putting his hands on the shoulders of the students closest to either side of him, Mr. Harrington asserts across the rows of desks and students, “Look, you guys. We need to stay calm for now. I know this is all a big surprise, but let’s see what Peter says to do and take things a step at a time for now, okay? Now, I’m going to call Principal Morita. We will figure this out and make sure nobody gets hurt, okay?” He makes eye contact with Charlie. “And learn from your mistakes, okay?” When he receives frantic nods in reply, Roger turns away and whips out his phone, trying not to mirror the worried walk of Peter as he pulls it up to his ear.
“Principal Morita. Yes, this is Roger. We have a problem. Can anyone else hear me right now? Good. A lot just happened, and it turns out Peter Parker is Spider-Man. Charlie posted—yes. Yes, he is. No. No! I don’t know! Just listen!” Mr. Harrington screamed, making some students, including Peter, still on the phone, to jump—thankfully not onto the ceiling. Mr. Harrington pinches his eyebrows. “Sorry, sir. Sorry. I’m just a bit stressed out. Please just hear me out for a minute. Charlie posted an incriminating video of Peter online, and Peter is concerned that we may be under threat because villains will know we are related to him. Please come to my classroom as quickly as you can. Yes. Great, okay, thank you. Goodbye.” He clicks his phone off, still rubbing at his brow. He looks over to see Peter finishing up his own conversation and walks over. “So, do you have any plans?” he asks his young…way too young student.
Peter runs his hands through his hair nervously. “So, Mr. Stark is coming over right now and is going to take me to the tower.” He gesticulates distractingly as he speaks. “His AI is working on minimizing the publicity of the video for now, but it won’t last, so…” he rubs his hands over his face aggressively. Mr. Harrington grimaces. “Ughhhh…this is so messed up!” he yells, throwing his hands up and turning around.
“Peter,” Ned calls worriedly, from where he now sits beside MJ. He and Peter look at one another for a moment, and Peter gathers himself again.
“Right,” Peter continues, turning back to his teacher, “so basically for now he wants to provide security to the school. You know, so that it doesn’t get destroyed by people coming after me. And he hopes that’ll stop most of the bad guys from even trying. He says he’ll talk to the principal more about other details and safety things, but he also wants to make sure everyone I know has safety stuff too….” Everyone looks confused at that. “Like security cameras at your houses.” That garners disgusted and upset looks. “Look!” Peter yells again. “I know! I know this is messed up, and I’m sorry! But we need to try to keep everyone from getting kidnapped or hurt, okay? Really, I’m sorry,” he pleads, big brown eyes watery and arms spread out. “This is the last thing I wanted to happen. Now my aunt can’t even live normally.” He is glad Tony already sent Happy to pick May up, but his only living family can barely live anymore, all because of him.
“Hey, loser!” MJ calls, and Peter turns to her. “You’ve risked your life enough times. We owe it to you by now, so don’t beat yourself up over this, alright?” She raises an eyebrow, and Peter could almost laugh from the grateful relief.
A bit of spirit and resolve seem to return to some of his classmates as they agree, though reluctance remains heavy in the room. As things calm down, Peter goes to sit by his friends while he waits for Tony. After a while, Mr. Harrington cautiously makes his way over as well, taking a seat beside Peter, who looks at him in confusion.
The look of concern makes Peter nervous, and Mr. Harrington speaks carefully. “Peter, how old were you when you started doing this? Being Spider-Man?”
Peter tilts his head a bit. “Uh…14?”
Mr. Harrington sighs. Gathering resolve, he speaks strongly, though keeping his voice low and away from snooping ears, “Look. I know you are really talented and a great fighter, but you’re still a kid. You shouldn’t be out there risking your life, Peter.”
Guard going up, Peter’s gaze turns harder. “Mr. Harrington, I can do things other people can’t. I can protect so many people. Before he died, my uncle told me that…with great power comes great responsibility. I live by that, and I’ll continue to no matter what.” His teacher maintains eye contact, and Peter begins to feel uncomfortable with the concern shining in them. He looks down at his hands, which he fidgets with in his lap.
“How’d it happen?” comes a quiet question from his teacher.
Neglecting to look up, Peter recounts, “You know the field trip to Oscorp?” Mr. Harrington nods, urging him forward. “They had radioactive spiders they were experimenting on. One got out and bit me. Got powers really soon after that….”
It is silent between them for a while, and Peter cautiously looks up at his teacher again.
Seemingly uncertain of whether he should say his next words, Mr. Harrington speaks cautiously, though there is a fierceness and heaviness to his voice, “I want you to know you’re still my student, Peter, and I’ll take care of my students however I can. If you ever need a hand from someone without cool super powers or even just want an adult to talk to, I’m here. Got it?”
Stricken, Peter blinks at his teacher for a moment before nodding back. “Yeah. Uh…thanks, Mr. Harrington.” The man nods back just as they hear a familiar sound of repulsers from outside the window.
Just then, Principal Morita pushes the classroom door open, looking out of breath. “Roger,” he calls, and the teacher stands to speak with him.
Not a minute later, Tony Stark busts into the room in full Ironman regalia. “Come on, kid,” Tony’s tinny voice calls, ignoring the ogling kids.
“Mr. Stark, I think I’ll need to speak with Peter, before you go,” Principal Morita says as Tony turns back toward the door.
Flipping up his face plate, Tony responds, “Maybe later. For now, my lawyers will be contacting you. I will be, too, but I have more important things to deal with for now,” he says nonchalantly, flipping his face plate back down. “Now come on, kid. Bring Nedward and Michelle, too.”
“He knows my name!” Ned shrieks, standing up.
“He clearly doesn’t,” MJ raises her brow, following after her peppy friend.
“It’s close enough!”
“Sorry Principal Morita. I’ll probably contact you soon,” Peter calls before rushing to close the door and run after Tony.
“Wait, so was the internship not a lie?”
“I think Spider-Man might be the internship.”
“Dammit. Penis is Spider-Man,” Flash says, horrified, hands clenching at his hair.