Sweet Hibiscus Tea [DISCONTINUED]

For the first time in ages, Peter Parker goes outside without the Spider-man suit.

Crazy, he knows.

Sadly, he’s not just taking a walk. No, he’s going to The Bulletin.

But Peter, you ask, why The Bulletin?

And the answer is simple.

He worked there. Well, more like sold any and all photos of vigilantes that were particularly newsworthy. Also maybe he liked bothering Ellison about giving him a properly paid internship but hey. No one had to know about that.

Plus he had just been able to snag a shot of Daredevil that he was actually pretty proud of.

Two unconscious and bloody guards and a menacing daredevil with his back turned and head tilted, horns catching the light from the city while framed by shipping crates. 

Considering the fact that this very gang had been bothering Hell’s Kitchen and other areas of Manhattan for quite a bit, there probably will be a nice sum of money for him once he turns the picture in. 

More than enough for the rest of his rent, that's for sure. 

Kicking the doors open and announcing his presence, he immediately bee-lined towards wherever Ellison was at that point in time - the dude constantly smelled like black coffee, old paper, and resigned acceptance - with workers rolling their eyes in amusement as he walked by. 

Most people who worked there knew him, or at least knew him by reputation. 

To them, he was the weird cryptid-like teen who somehow got amazing shots of barely-seen vigilantes, while also having absolutely no record of ever existing. 

They had searched him up after he turned in a close-up picture of The Punisher (he modified the camera lenses to zoom further, he’s not a completely reckless idiot), and walked in the next day with a small limp and a grin on his face, brandishing his first photo of Spider-man in two years. 

He had turned the camera on a timer then dropped it and swung over it to get a cool perspective.

The limp was from almost shattering his leg against a wall trying to catch the camera before it broke into a bazillion pieces.

Needless to say, the workers were very surprised when they found out that Peter Benjamin Parker did not exist until four months ago. He thinks that a solid 30% of them believe he’s a spy. 

He does not correct them.

He wants to see how far the conspiracy theories go so he can laugh at them and ignore reality.

Ellison took one look at Peter, with his ruffled hoodie, torn jeans, and slightly manic grin before breaking. 

“Alright, what have you got for me?” 

Peter rifled through his pockets before victoriously pulling out his Daredevil photo from the day before

“One shot of the Devil of Hell’s Kitchen, right after beating up some thugs from that one gang that's been bothering Manhattan for a while,” 

 Ellison sighed again, sounding more and more tired with every word he spoke. Snatching the photo from Peter’s hands, he inspected it. “once again, you have defied expectations and have given me a picture that would have any other photographer quaking” 

Peter perked up

“Does this now mean I can have an actual internship?” 

Ellison groaned “kid, you gotta stop asking for that.”

Peter gave him a look

“but fine. God, now there’s two of them begging for extra work” Ellison muttered the last bit, clearly not meant for Peter to hear but whatever 

“Alright kid, check into the desk over there - they'll set you up”  

Peter snickered as Ellison stalked off with his picture, and quickly scurried over to the main desk. Introducing himself, the desk lady made a vaguely annoyed noise before inputting Peter’s (very little) data into the system. 

“Alright, you weird cryptid, your work starts tomorrow at 3:30 pm, and it’s gonna be every Tuesday and Thursday”

Peter beamed up at the lady, getting an amused huff in return, before scampering out of the office and into the sunlit day outside, pleased with himself for finally getting a job.

Kinda. 

Eh, it's paid, so it’s a job. Good enough for him.

He grabs a bite to eat from a nearby hotdog stand, then waves down a cab.

He might be Spider-man and have more than enough endurance to run the entirety of New York, but there is no way in hell that he will walk from one end of Hell’s Kitchen to the other in broad daylight. 

And besides, 

The Kitchen might have a lower crime rate than before . . .

but everyone knows that the Devil only comes out at night.