Peter was ecstatic. He was finally going to his first pride parade. To be honest, he had no idea what it would be like. Queen had never had one exclusively, and Peter had never managed to get to Manhatten pride - for one reason or another. Ned and MJ had gone the year previous, and they had said it was amazing, even though they’d not quite managed to get there early enough to look at all the stalls and floats before everything was packed away. This time, however, Tony had let the three friends, plus Shuri, stay at the Tower the day before, so that they could wake up at a reasonable hour, as well as have the time to experience everything.
— — — — —
It was the evening before the parade, and the four friends were playing Just Dance when Tony decided to strike up a conversation. However, they were halfway through dancing to Umbrella (again - they were trying to all get five stars), so none of them were going to answer Tony until it was over. The billionaire stood at the door and watched them, a tiny bit confused as to what was so imporatnt that they couldn’t pause the game and listen to him for just one second -
“Shuri, you suck at this game.” MJ said, as soon as the song ended.
“Oh, come on! I was only, like, two hundred points off? And I’m furthest away from the sensor! It can barely see me!” Shuri retorted.
“That’s not good enough! Now we have to play again, and I have to watch Peter beat me, again .”
“You’re just a sore loser, MJ. I’m just too good at this game.” Peter laughed.
“How though?” Ned decided to join the conversation.
“Practice.”
“I though you hated playing this on your own?”
“Yes, but when I’m home alone it’s different - I know no one’s watching me.”
“I hate you.” MJ spoke up again.
“Love you t-” Peter started to reply before Tony shut him off.
“Now that was very entertaining from an outsider’s point of view, but seeming as none of you were listening the first time I said it, I need to introduce you to someone. I met him a while back - during the Mandarin incident - and he wanted to go to Manhattan pride as well, so, seeming as you were all going this year, I got him a plane ticket, and he’s here now.” Tony stepped aside, allowing the teenagers to see a boy, who was a little taller than Tony - none of them knew how Tony had managed to hide him. Maybe it was because none of them had really been paying attention, wanting to get back to their game.
“Oh, hi!” Shuri was the first to speak. She was the most confident of the group - considering that she was a princess, and therefore had to participate in many press conferences in Wakanda, meaning she had to talk to a lot of strangers. “I’m Shuri. This is my girlfriend MJ, this is Ned, and this is Peter.” The princess continued, pointing to each person as she said their names.
“Hey, I’m Harley. That was definitely the best Just Dance performance I’ve ever seen.” The boy, now known to the group as Harley, smirked. “Mind if I join in?”
“Sure, you can take my place.” Ned offered, already taking his Wii remote off his wrist. Tony wasn’t strict on household rules, but after Clint had put a hole in the TV after acciedntally letting go of the remote after a family game of Wii sports, Tony made the rule that everyone had to play the wrist strap when playing.
“No, Ned, keep your remote. Harley, please come and take Shuri’s place. We’re all trying to get five stars on this, and Shuri is the only one who can’t do it. We’re getting tired over here.”
“Ned and I aren’t, but go off.” Peter spoke up for the first time since Harley had got there.
“Well, Ned isn’t because he’s only moving the hand that the sensor picks up. And god knows why you’re not tired.” MJ replied. Suddenly, everyone (excluding Harley) gave MJ a weird look as if to say ‘we know why’. “Okay, yes. Five out of six of us in this room know why he’s not tired. I was trying to cover Peter, but I guess you all didn’t want that.” MJ corrected herself with a shrug of her shoulders.
“Four out of five people in this room, actually. I’m out. Pete, you can explain if you’d like. You’re gonna have to make an appearance as ‘the other guy’ tomorrow anyways.” Tony said, turning to leave. He was probably going to the lab to work on things. Peter made a mental note to tell FRIDAY to make sure that Tony was out of the lab by two, and wasn’t allowed back in again until nine the next morning.
“What?” Harley asked as soon as Tony left the room.
“Thanks guys, really helpful.” Peter sighed.
“I tried, don’t blame me.” MJ fired back.
“Okay, not you. But Shuri and Ned.”
“Okay, I have no idea what’s going on. What did Tony mean by ‘the other guy’? Harley asked.
“Peter’s Spider-Man.” Ned said, after a quick glance at Peter, and a nod of confirmation from the latter.
“Oh. Makes sense. I thought it was a bit odd that Tony had a personal intern. Let alone a personal intern that he lets stay at the Tower and have friends round.” Harley responded. In his head, everything started to make a little bit more sense.
After that conversation, they all payed Just Dance for three hours, before having pizza, and then continuing. FRIDAY told Peter that Tony had sent him a message saying: “Fuck you, Underoos” when he got kicked out of the lab by his own AI. Peter had just smirked. By three in the morning, everyone but Peter and Harley were asleep. They decided to switch off the Wii console before watching random YouTube videos. Within half an hour, Peter had fallen asleep. Right on Harley’s shoulder.
Half of Harley’s brain was telling him to move the boy, so that he wouldn’t feel uncomfortable, but the other part of his brain was telling him that it would be fine, Peter looked cute, and he didn’t want to disturb him. After coming to the conclusion that the worst thing that was going to happen was that it could be a bit awkward in the morning, Harley decided to stay in the position he was, and leave Peter resting on his shoulder. And within the next half an hour, Harley was asleep.
— — — — —
Peter woke up at around four in the morning. He wondered why he was so warm, considering the fact that he usually woke up covered in blankets and was still cold. The only ‘cover’ anyone had used that night were their pride flags. It took a few minutes for Peter to realise that he was pressed up against someone, his head under their chin. Their hand was around his waist. His hand was on their chest. His first guess was that it was MJ (Peter, Ned, and MJ often fell asleep like that at sleepovers) - seeming as she was next to Peter earlier that evening. Then it occured to Peter that MJ was on the other side of him, cuddled up to Shuri. Peter also wasn’t against Ned, because he was on the other sofa.
Then, Peter realised that he was sleeping against Harley, who had been a complete stranger not twelve hours before. Peter felt his cheeks heat up a little. How had he managed to get cuddled up to pretty much the most attractive boy he had ever met in less than a day? He wondered if Harley minded, but then he remembered that he had been the first to fall asleep, and Harley’s hand certainly wasn’t around his waist beforehand. That means that Harley must have decided to do that after Peter fell asleep.
So, Peter went back to sleep.
— — — — —
MJ, Shuri, and Ned woke up first. They’d pretty much woken up within thirty seconds of each other. MJ and Ned were about to start up a jumpscare video to wake Peter and Harley up, before Shuri stopped them and actually made them look at the boys. For the first time, the other two teenagers saw how the two were cuddled up to each other.
“Gay.” MJ snorted. “FRIDAY? Take a picture. Send it to Mr. Stark with the message: ‘look what you’ve done, they’re gonna do the dirty in your tower now.’ See how much that scares him.” Shuri and Ned laughed.
“Do we wake them up?” Ned asked, after a couple of minutes of silence, raising his phone to show MJ and Shuri that he still had the jumpscare video up.
“Nope, wait a minute.” Tony had entered the room, with a printed version of the picture that MJ had asked FRIDAY to take. The teenagers didn’t expect Tony to have done that as quick as he did. He grabbed a frame from on top of the shelf in the middle of the room. It had a picture of Tony falling asleep on the sofa with Rhodey, both of them sprawled across each end, their legs overlapping. He replaced that photo with the picture of Harley and Peter. “This is the frame where we put embarrassing photos of people sleeping. We see how long it takes for the people in the photo to notice, then we replace it when we take a new one.” Tony walked out of the room after placing the frame back onto the shelf. “By the way, they are not ‘doing the dirty’ in my Tower. You can wake them up now.” Tony added, popping his head around the door frame.
“Honey, you’ve got a big storm coming.” Shuri muttered, causing Ned and MJ to laugh. Unfortunately, the three teenagers couldn’t go ahead with their jumpscare plan, as their laughing woke the two sleeping boys up.
“FRIDAY? Dim the lights, please.” Shuri said, once she saw Peter open his eyes, wince, and immediately shut them again, covering his face with his hand.
“Thanks, Shuri.” Peter murmured, attempting to sit up, and then slumping straight back into Harley, who still hadn’t moved his hand from Peter’s waist. “Move your hand, I want leftover pizza for breakfast and I need to get there before Clint eats it all.”
“No, can’t be bothered to move.” Harley responded, tightening his hand around Peter.
“It was probably more effort to do that.”
“It’s easy to put in effort for things that I actually want to do, darlin’.” Harley’s eyes were still closed, but he knew Peter was blushing, due to the fact that he felt Peter try to cover his face a bit more by hiding himself under Harley’s chin. “Or for people I want to do.” Harley whispered, so that only Peter could hear. Peter made an indignant squeak, and buried himself further into Harley’s t-shirt.
“I have no idea what you just said, Harley, but considering Peter’s reaction, that’s definitely our cue to leave. By the way, Clint already ate the pizza. We’re making pancakes. Meet you in the kitchen when you stop being cute and shit.” MJ said, before turning and leaving the room. The others followed suit, leaving Harley and Peter alone in the living room.
“Now can I get food?” Peter said, although he didn’t really feel like getting up now, his beloved pizza had already been eaten. But Peter realised that, if Clint was up, then he could be in the vents, and he could totally see the way that Harley and Peter were sitting right now. And Peter would definitely prefer if Tony didn’t know (little did he know, Tony had already seen), and Clint would almost definitely tell Tony - and probably the rest of the Avengers in the Tower, for that matter.
“Hm, wait a second, I need to properly wake up.” Harley removed his arm from around Peter, and rubbed his eyes. Peter would never admit it, but he was definitely a little disappointed. But how else was he supposed to get up if Harley didn’t move? Anyways, it was only how they fell asleep, it wouldn’t happen again. “Hold up, if you’re Spider-Man, can’t you just, y’know, carry me to the kitchen?”
“I mean- I could-” It would be an obvious lie if Peter said he totally didn’t blush, but he was going to lie to himself anyways.
“Great. I can’t be bothered to walk.”
“Oh- okay.” Peter thought for a moment about how to pick Harley up without it seeming too invasive of personal space, before reminding himself of how close they were on the soda not two minutes ago. In the end, Peter just thought ‘ fuck it ’, and lifted Harley up bridal style. Peter walked into the kitchen, expecting the only other people in there to be MJ, Ned, and Shuri. Really, Peter should’ve known better. He certainly wasn’t known for having the best luck. Of course Clint, Steve, and Bucky would be in the kitchen at the same time.
“Oh, Peter! I thought you didn’t have a boyfriend or girlfriend to take to pride with you?” Bucky was the first to see the two boys walk in (well, one of them walked in - the other one was being carried, and was now very awake upon hearing Bucky’s voice).
“I don’t. Harley just wanted to be carried, because apparently he couldn’t be bothered to walk. We’re not dating.” Peter said, putting Harley down, making sure he was standing up properly before letting him go.
“The picture in the living room says differently.” Clint smirked, taking a sip of his coffee.
“The what? What picture?” Peter asked, sounding panicked. He hoped Clint was just joking around. He hoped that Clint wasn’t saying what Peter thought he was saying - that would be a disaster.
“Tony put a picture in the ‘sleep people’ picture frame this morning. It was quite entertaining to find out about that, by the way. Why didn’t you tell us that existed?” MJ spoke up, having finished making a stack of pancakes, and placing it in front of Steve, who looked away from Harley and Peter for a second to say thank you to the girl, before taking a pancake and turning back to face the boys.
“First of all, I didn’t think it was important. Second of all, what did Tony say?” Peter asked, now a little bit more calm - but not by much.
“He said, and I quote: ‘by the way, they aer not ‘doing the dirty’ in my Tower. You can wake them up now’.” Ned saod, laughing.
“Technically, it’s not even his Tower. It’s his and Pepper’s - he owns like twelve percent or something - so…” Harley formed a sentence for the first time since entering the kitchen. And of course it was something that made Peter blush.
“Seeming as no one else is going to help Peter out, these two have known each other for less than twenty-four hours. No, they aren’t dating, but God knows what happened after me, MJ, and Ned fell asleep last night. They were the only ones awake after half-two. When we woke up, they were pretty much cuddling. So, yeah. MJ took a picture and sent it to Tony-” Shuri was cut off by Peter.
“So it was you who gave it to Tony, traitor.”
“Well, you didn’t buy me a cake that one time I asked.” MJ said, like her reasoning for exposing Peter and Harley was obvious, and made complete and perfect sense.
“That was months ago!” Peter protested.
“Yes, and I never did anything to get you back for it.” MJ smiled, definitely one of her fake-sweet ones, and turned back to another stack of pancakes - this time for Bucky. Peter just huffed.
“Anyways, Buck and I are going to pride too, and we’ve only ever watched it from the Tower windows, so can those of you who have been before show us around?” Steve asked, taking the attention off of Peter and Harley - who were still in the doorway of the kitchen.
“Sure,” Ned said. “MJ and I have only been once, but we’ll try not to get lost.”
“Sounds reassuring.” Bucky smiled. “Oh well, we’ll just scare people into telling us where to go.”
“ Or , we could just ask them nicely.” Steve interjected.
“Nah, that wouldn’t be fun!” Bucky smiled even wider. Steve just rolled his eyes at his boyfriend and went back to eating his pancakes.
“Okay, kids! Eat up. We have to be ready in an hour and a half!” Shuri called, handing them each a plate of pancakes. Peter and Harley walked over to the table and started eating.
After the smallest of food fights (they ripped up a pancake and MJ, Ned, Shuri, Harley, Peter, Clint, and Bucky were throwing the pieces at each other, before Steve told them to stop), the teens were filing out of the kitchen and into Peter’s room - apart from Harley, who went back to grab his outfit from the guest room Tony had arranged for him. When Harley came into Peter’s room with everyone else, they all got dressed, helping each other paint their respective pride flags onto their cheeks, using the face paint that Peter had brought over from his apartment.
— — — — —
Peter had decided on a simple outfit. He was wearing his favourite black skinny jeans (they were only his favourite because they made his ass look good, but he’d never tell anyone that was the reason), a Freddie Mercury shirt, his bi flag around his neck like a cape, and he’d asked Harley to paint a bi flag on each of his cheeks.
MJ was wearing black jeans and a white shirt with rainbow strips along the seams. She’d done her hair up in a bun, with bits of hair hanging down the side of her face. She had the lesbian flag tied around her, and Shuri had painted that same flag onto her cheeks for her.
Ned was wearing blue jeans, a yellow shirt, and had his pan flag hung around his shoulders. He had also gone for the flag on his cheeks - although he’d asked for the lines to be wavy because ‘if the lines are straight, they don’t represent me, do they?’
Shuri was wearing a similar outfit to MJ, except she’d gone for a rainbow skull on her shirt instead of the stripes. Again, Shuri had the lesbian flag hung like a cape around her shoulders, and had gotten MJ to paint a flag onto her cheeks.
Harley had gone for tight black jeans - because, let’s be real, they were the only type of jeans he wore - and a black shirt with rainbow flags all over it. He wore his gay flag as a cape - as the others had - and asked Peter to paint on the same flag to his cheeks.
When Tony had come in to check on the teenagers, he had found them dancing to Minecraft parodies and other songs on Peter’s meme playlist. Tony just smiled at the lot, and asked FRIDAY to take a photo. He’d frame that and have it hung in Peter’s room and Tony and Peter’s joint lab.
“Alright, kids. It’s time to go. I would go with you, but I really have some meetings to attend. Steve and Bucky will look after you - although, by the sounds of it, I think it’s going to be you looking after them. Have fun, don’t get mugged. Peter, you need to make an appearance as Spidey at some point - PR are insisting. Maybe around midday, when it’s busiest? Or when it’s quieter, if you’re more comfortable, I’ll sort it with PR if they complain about ‘not enough press’ or something.
“Well, I guess it’s time we were gay outside.” Shuri said, opening the door for everyone to leave. There was a smile on everyone’s face as they left the tower.
— — — — —
The five teenagers and two super soldiers had walked in the parade in between a human rights group and a trans rights group. The teenagers had managed to strike up a conversation with a few people, but no one was sticking around for the pride shows in the evening. They did manage to grab a few people’s Instagrams, though, so that was one way to keep in touch with some of them. So far, no one had noticed Steve and Bucky. They’d gone for the classic cap and sunglasses disguise - Peter still had no idea how it worked.
Halfway through the parade, they met up with Betty, who immediately gave Ned a kiss on the cheek (where there wasn’t face paint). She’d been invited to their Tower sleepover, but she said that she’d rather actually meet Tony Stark before sleeping in his living room. That was a fair point, so they’d all arranged to meet her there.
“Hey, I kinda feel lonely now. Wanna hold hands, darlin’?” Harley whispered to Peter. Peter looked ahead, noticing that he and Harley had fallen behind the two couples they were with.
“That was the cheesiest way of asking that, but sure, I’d love to.” Peter smiled at Harley and grabbed his hand. Harley grinned in return. Again, Peter would be lying if he said that he wasn’t blushing. This was becoming a habit, and Peter didn’t hate it. Harley would do something somewhat ‘not platonic’, and Peter would become a tomato. “We should catch up to the others, though.” Harley nodded in agreement, and the two sped up.
“Oh, Peter! You didn’t tell me you had a boyfriend!” Betty near-shouted when she saw Peter and Harley holding hands.
“Wh- Oh! We’re not dating.” Peter replied. “We just felt lonely, what with MJ and Shuri being together, and you and Ned too.”
“This is becoming a recurring theme, Parker. First, you and Harley fall asleep on the sofa together, pretty much cuddling, then you carry him - bridal style , may I add - to the kitchen this morning, and now you’re holding hands.” Bucky said, his voice laced with sarcasm. This comment caused the rest of the group to laugh - at Peter’s expense, of course.
“Don’t forget that Harley didn’t turn down the idea of ‘doing the dirty with Peter.” MJ added. When Betty looked confused, MJ explained further. “I sent Tony a picture of them cuddling and gave him the message ‘look what you’ve done, they’re gonna do the dirty in your tower now’, and Tony told me that they would not be doing that. I re-told the story to Harley and Peter when they got to the kitchen this morning, and Harley just said something along the lines of ‘it’s technically not just his Tower, so…’”
“Not to mention, Harley called Peter ‘darlin’’ earlier.” Ned added.
“To be fair, we did only meet, like… sixteen hours ago or something.” Harley squeezed Peter’s hand, arguing for their side.
“Leave them alone, guys. They’ll date in their own time.” Steve smirked.
“Steve! I thought you were on our side!” Peter - however hard he tried not to - started laughing. And then everyone else did. Peter’s laugh really was infectious.
— — — — —
When it reached midday, Peter ran off with a ‘see you guys in a minute’, before running into a back alley, hidden from all the stalls and parade, and quickly put on his suit. He made sure that his pride flag was tied securely around his neck before swinging back towards the parade. He’d left his bag with his friends, so there was no risk of it being stolen from a random alleyway.
Tony had told him just to swing above the parade, and make sure that there wasn’t anybody being attacked on any side streets that the police department couldn’t see and / or get to. Luckily, there didn’t seem to be any of that going on, according to Karen. Peter just swung around, taking pictures with the people who asked.
This lasted for around an hour and a half before Peter had got around to every stall and taken pictures. He didn’t want to spend too much time as Spider-Man, if he was being honest. He was at pride as Peter Parker, not Spider-Man. Even Tony had told him that. Peter swung back into the alley that he got changed in, and put his civilian clothes back on. Luckily, they hadn’t got too dirty inside the box Peter had found at the back of the alley.
— — — — —
“Okay, I’m back. Anything happen while I was gone?” Peter asked, once he found his friends, who had now found a quiet place in a small park near to the stalls.
“We got some free stuff for you. We also signed all of us up to a thing which is, like, a massive gay gathering.” Harley said, handing him the said free stuff. Once he saw Peter’s confused expression, Harley explained further. “Basically, there are days out for gay kids. Apparently the first one is to Stark Tower, which will be funny as hell. It’s next week.” Peter laughed at that.
“I’d love to go to that, to be honest.” Peter replied.
“Good, because we’re all going.” MJ grinned.
Peter sat back, looking at his friends (and Avengers). Steve and Bucky were sitting against a tree not too far away from the teenagers. Upon asking Harley why they were over there, Harley had said that the two supersoldiers ‘didn’t want a headache’. Fair enough. MJ and Shuri were sitting close together, MJ’s head on Shuri’s shoulder, talking quietly about who-knows-what. Ned and Betty were being that cheesy couple, and kept showing each other memes every now and again.
And Peter had to admit, he did feel a little lonely. But it was okay, because seeing his friends happy was what made Peter happy. However cheesy that sounded.
“What are ya thinkin’ about?” Harley said, shuffling closer to Peter, so that their legs were nearly touching.
“First, that I really am lonely. But also just that this is so… peaceful. This is probably one of the best days I’ve had in a while. I’m just so happy to be here? I don’t really get much peace, being Spider-Man and all. Tony says I over-work myself. And I see where he’s coming from, I really do, but he’s a bit of a hypocrite.” Peter laughed, and so did Harley.
“I mean, I can change the lonely part if you want me to, sweetheart.” Harley winked, smirking at Peter. This sent Peter into another wave of laughing, even if there was a slight blush gracing his cheeks.
“I wouldn’t mind, if you’re serious about it.” Peter replied, grinning at Harley. He had no idea where this slightly confident side of him came from, but neither boy was going to complain about it.
Harley hummed in response before putting his arm around Peter and kissing the top of his head. Peter blushed once again, but leant into Harley nonetheless.