Associations

“How,” Joe said flatly.

Peter’s lips parted into a victorious grin, and he struggled to push it back down, trying to play nonchalant. “How what, Joe?”

Joe’s expression remained flat, and he let out a slow, heavy exhale, clasping his hands together in a loose hold. “How, Pete, didja fuckin’ dent the concrete?” he asked pointedly, following through with gesturing at said dent with his linked hands.

“It’s less of a dent and more of a crack?” Peter debated lightly, scuffing his shoe over the mini crater that now marred the ground between them. He looked up at Joe, raising a challenging brow. “And you tell me, man. You’re the one who’s hand did that,” he pointed out.

“Cause you slammed it inta the ground!” Joe rebutted incredulously, unclasping his hands and making an exaggerated gesture at the concrete.

Peter huffed, crossing his arms. “Well it’s not like I thought I was gonna break your hand or something! I know it’s bionic, or something. So.” He paused, eyebrows scrunching. “Wait. I didn’t hurt you, right? It doesn’t have like some kinda weird fake nerve endings or something that makes you feel pain? Like, I didn’t just actually make you feel like you broke your hand-”

“I’m fine, Pete,” Joe interrupted, sighing and pinching the bridge of his nose. “I meant how’dja beat me, cause, I gotta say, that ain't a walk in the park sorta thing ta do.”

Peter stared at him, mouth open slightly, and waited for a few moments longer, as if thinking that Joe would magically change his question or come to some realization on his own. “Are you serious right now?” he questioned after he received no response, then steamrolled over whatever Joe tried to say. “No, like, I’m super offended right now dude. Have you literally not seen anything on Spider-Man? I mean, there are, like, a bajillion videos on YouTube!”

“Wasn’t exactly a priority of mine,” Joe responded dryly. 

Peter groaned. “Okay - fair,” he admitted, slouching but then brightening up just as quickly. “Hey! This means I’ve proved myself though, cause I’m stronger than you-” Joe crossed his arms over his chest and Peter hastily amended, “-but I’d still totally lose against you in a fight, like a hundred percent. I mean, at least without my webs, but, with them, maybe? No, yeah, no, definitely not, never mind.” 

Joe sighed again, more wearily than before. “Pete…”

“Do you even lift bro?” Peter questioningly demanded, expression dead serious. Internally, his pride and other related features withered and screamed in a fiery death. 

Joe opened his mouth, closed it, opened it again. He spread his hands out, entreating. “You wanna try that again, pal?”

Peter shook his head mutely, but when Joe said nothing more, he spoke, albeit begrudgingly, and actually attempted to think before he articulated his words. “What I was trying to say is that since the whole arm wrestling thing was basically a strength test, like, physically, I’m pretty good in that whole category?” he surmised, voice lilting up in the end like a question, making him cringe minutely. 

Joe hummed, tilting his chin up. “You know how much?”

Peter pursed his lips, tone pitching high. “Um. Probably, like, around a couple hundred…” he trailed off.

“Pounds?” Joe said dubiously.

He chuckled nervously. “Tons?”

Joe leaned forward. “You wanna try that again?”

“Nope!” Peter replied, tapping his finger against his thigh in a quick beat. 

“You’re serious.”

“Yep!” Peter agreed, voice reedy.

“And you know this because…” Joe led on.

“I… searched it up?” Peter tried.

“Searched what up, Pete,” Joe prodded impatiently.

“Um. How much, an, uh, certain, uh, thing weighed?” 

“What thing.”

“An uhhh, a warehouse?”

Joe dropped his head into his hands and hunched forward, elbows resting against his knees where he sat. “Just spit it out, Pete, cause what I’m hearin’ is you figured out how much you can lift by carryin’ a whole goddamn buildin’. But that ain’t right, is it, Pete?” Silence. “Is it?” he said with more emphasis.

Peter caved, running his fingers through his hair. “It’s not like I wanted to, Joe!” he defended, flinging his arms up, palms open and out, beseeching.

“So, what? It just drop on you?” the man jabbed, then paused. Exhaled lowly. “It goddamn did, didn’t it Pete.” He took a slow, measured breath, looking heavenwards. “Of course if fuckin’ did, it bein’ you an’ all,” he muttered.

Peter readily nodded along. “Good ol’ Parker Luck,” he agreed, making a rainbow with his hands. “I caught the guy though, so it’s all good. And, bonus, I know my weight limit, so, that’s pretty cool,” he mused.

“You’re killin’ me,” Joe said reproachfully. Peter rubbed at the back of his neck with a sheepish smile. “No, really, Pete. This is fuckin’ ridiculous.” 

“I mean, at least now you know my life’s already chaotic so whatever you throw at me’ll probably be fine,” Peter wagered.

Joe groaned. “You’re a kid.”

“I’m not a kid!” Peter objected heatedly, brows pinching. He’d at least been partially expecting that argument to be made, but it didn’t make it any less frustrating for it to happen. “I’m young, yeah, sure. I get that, sixteen’s not old, like, at all, but I’ve been doing this for two years already, and I’m not gonna be stopping any time soon. I deal with the whole ‘dark’ side of things already, Joe. I’ve seen what people can do, I’ve seen people show the worst sides of themselves. I know it’s not pretty. I don’t expect it to be, that’s kinda the whole point of why I’m out there, doing what I do, stopping it. The stuff you’ve got going on, I don’t expect it to be any better, I mean, heck, you just admitted - yes, you basically admitted it Joe, the look on your face man - that there are literal Nazi’s after you! No duh that’s not anything good! But I can deal. I wanna deal, Joe, cause I’m on your side ‘till you give me an actual, legit reason why not to be.” He took in a few deep inhales, trying to quiet how out of breath that rant just made him as he stared resolutely back at Joe’s blank expression. 

 “I’ve killed people,” Joe said bluntly. Peter faltered for a moment. “Killed lotsa people,” Joe continued, head tilting slightly like he was looking off to the side. 

“Is… is that why they’re after you?” 

Joe’s lips twitched, curling up slightly and forming a bitter sneer of a smile. “In a way.”

Peter let a heavy silence settle between them. Joe was a killer - had killed people. Lots of people. And an apparently very large group made up of Nazis was after him at least somewhat because of it. A barrage of questions swirled in his head, and he couldn’t decide which one to try to pick up and spit out. He lifted his eyes from where they’d drifted down to stare at the busted concrete to gaze back up at the man. His face was blank again, but it was still lowered, hair falling forward and framing his cheeks. He’d shifted slightly to no longer be facing Peter directly, hunched so his left side and arm were further back, mostly hidden from view. His right hand was held in a loose fist, twitching like he wanted to form a white knuckled grip of it but holding himself back only just. He looked tense. Anxious. Defeated, in a way.

Peter pinched his upper lip with his teeth. “Were they - the people you… killed - were they all… bad guys?”

Joe’s mouth twisted. “Doubt it,” he answered mirthlessly. 

That response gave Peter pause. “You doubt it?” he echoed. Joe nodded - a slight, jerky movement. “You doubt it,” he repeated, more firmly. 

Joe’s head finally turned to face him, his lip’s pursing in either confusion or frustration. Probably both. “‘S what I said, Pete,” he threw back harshly. 

“No, no, I get that’s what you said,” Peter placated, leaning forwards slightly, “I’m just trying to figure out what it means.” 

“Whad’ya mean what’s it mean,” Joe retorted, flinging his right hand up.

Peter unconsciously began picking at the skin around the nail of his index finger, his attention concentrated on Joe. “Because it kinda sounds like you don’t even know who you killed.”

Joe stilled. 

Peter continued on, trying, and probably failing, to keep his rambling at a minimum as he let his mouth freely spew his unfiltered thoughts. “It sounds like you… didn’t? kill whoever you did because you just felt like it, or something. And if you didn’t do that - and honestly, okay, I never thought you would dude - but if you didn’t, and you also didn’t go after them for some, like, personal vendetta or something, which, by you basically saying you don’t even know who you went after means you didn’t do that either, then I don’t know, man. That basically just leaves someone else telling you who to go after, right?”

Now Joe was tense, had continued to tense up more and more throughout Peter’s deductions, and Peter nearly held his breath waiting to see what he’d say in response. It took a minute, where Joe seemed to force himself to somewhat relax, before he quietly said, “You’re right,” and nothing more.

Peter filled the silence tentatively, scooching forward another couple of inches. “Still doesn’t make sense to me, though, if I’m being honest,” he started, tilting his head slightly as his eyes trailed over the worn, navy colored brim of his friend’s cap. “Not gonna lie, I didn’t really peg you to be the type who, like, murders people?” He watched the way Joe’s demeanor seemed to sink further down, and felt more resolute in his thoughts. “And honestly I still don’t, dude. Cause, it…” he sighed frustratedly, raking his fingers through his hair. “There’s a difference between killing someone because you don’t really have another option and because you want to. Yeah? Yeah. In the first, well, that’s a super sucky situation that I’m totally glad I haven’t been put in yet. And I say ‘yet’ because I know that, with what I’m doing, there’s a good chance it might go that way at some point, and it’s gonna be real shitty and I’m gonna feel guilty as heck and still be regretful even if there wasn’t any other way it could’ve gone down, for, like, forever.” He took a breath, focusing in on Joe once again to see if he was following along. It seemed like it. He picked back up. “And then there’s the latter one - the one that’s actual murder because you do it cause you want to. And… that’s bad. That… you don’t get to come back from that so easy cause you took away a life when you didn’t have to.”

Joe was staring resolutely at the ground, so the top of his cap was visible, hands now clasped together between his knees.

Peter doggedly continued. “With that, sure, you can still feel guilty, but even if it is a super spur of the moment, well, murder, that guilt’s not the same. For both, you’ve got guilt, yeah, maybe even for both you’ve got guilt for killing whoever. But when you do it cause you wanna it’s never a guilt that’s purely over taking another’s life. There’re always other emotions twisted in it, like, if you knew the person, you have guilt over killing someone you knew - maybe cause it could’ve been resolved or something, I dunno. It’s just not the same. There’s always some other reason tied into that guilt other than just someone’s dead cause of you.” 

He was probably confusing Joe with this tangent, he knew, but he persisted.

“And it’s like with every other type of guilt that comes with actually being, like, guilty? When it’s not an accident or unintentional and something goes wrong. Like. Ah! Think about it like this. So, say I was holding a cup and it slipped from my hands? Right? So it shattered on the ground. If May came in wondering what happened, I’d tell her sorry - cause I was sorry - that I dropped it - even though I hadn’t meant to - and I’d clean it up. You with me?” Joe didn’t nod, but the tilt of his head was enough of an acknowledgement. “So, in the second case, I throw the glass into a wall, and it breaks. May comes in, and, yeah, I’m still sorry. So I apologize. But that’s not it. I get into explaining why I threw it, like, I was upset or mad or sad about something and couldn’t keep my emotions in check and on and on. But it’s an excuse - obviously. But that’s the thing, right? I didn’t have some excuse for the first one because it was just a happenstance - something I didn’t want to happen but happened anyway. Sure, in the other after I threw it I realized I didn’t want that result later either, but I still did it and I had wanted it in the moment. So they’re different.” He paused. "God, I hate analogies with an intense passion." 

“What’s your point, Pete,” Joe asked roughly.

“My point, Joe, is that it’s weird.”

Joe stared at him, bemused. “What?”

“You’re weird,” he clarified, except not really. He exhaled sharply. “Yeah, not what I meant,” he admitted. He tried again. “You’re ‘weird’” -he used finger quotes this time - “because from what you said, you should fall into the second category, but the way you act totally puts you in the first.”

Joe didn’t react, still uncomprehending.

Peter sighed. “Dude, you just admitted to having killed, like, a whole bunch of people.”

Joe nodded slowly.

“And then you did literally nothing to explain yourself.”

Joe moved slightly in what could possibly have been chalked up to a shrug but was too slight to guarantee.

Peter huffed. “I’m not gonna lie, you kinda look like a kicked puppy” - Joe frowned, so Peter amended - “a super strong, macho kicked puppy.” The appeasement didn’t seem to work much, so Peter moved past it. “I mean, you seem super sad and guilty but you’re doing nothing to defend yourself.” 

“Defend myself?” Joe scoffed. “I murdered, I don’t even know how many people, Pete! I’m a fucking trained assassin,” he snarled.

“See there, that!” Peter interjected, pointing at Joe. “It’s like you’re trying to make me think you’re a bad guy!”

“That’s cause I am!” Joe retorted angrily, throwing his hands up. 

Peter hummed noncommittally. “Why’d you do it?” he asked. “Kill them, I mean.”

“Cause I was told to,” he spat.

Peter tilted his head. “That’s all?”

“That’s all,” Joe replied shortly, face pinched.

“But you didn’t want to, did you?”

Joe didn’t answer.

“I’m right, aren’t I?”

“I could kill you,” Joe said abruptly.

Peter nodded agreeably. “But you won’t,” he said.

“And how the hell would you know,” Joe snarled, surging up to loom threateningly above Peter, steely eyes finally visible though still heavily shadowed under his cap. 

Peter remained seated, only bothering to look up to meet his gaze, not even leaning back. He shrugged, giving a crooked smile. “I’d like to say it’s just cause you're my BFF and I trust you not to take the forever out of that saying,” he quipped, huffing at Joe’s incredulous expression before admitting, “but I also don’t want you to think I’m a complete idiot so on top of the fact that I trust you I also have this super duper useful spidey sense thing that lets me sense danger, and, um, you’re not it.” His smile widened into a totally shit-eating grin. “Not to me, that is,” he finished with another careless shrug.

Joe finally took a step back, wavering for a moment before sitting down in his previous spot. His head tipped back, so his eyes were now completely unconcealed and the color now distinguishable in the dull light of a nearby street lamp. They really were a greyish blue, and were filled with a swirl of largely indistinguishable emotions. “You’re serious,” Joe said, though it was clear he didn’t really need the affirmation.

Peter nodded along anyway, finally taking a bite out of his sandwich. “As a heart attack.” 

Joe stared at him. 

Peter amended, “As a stroke? Cause those are pretty bad too but I guess heart attacks are more serious. By at least a lil’ bit. I think. Right?” 

More staring.

“Seriously, I’m not a no drama llama typa guy, Joe. Spill them beans. Some of them beans have already been spilled so you might as well just dump out the whole can, right? I mean, Nazis Shmatzis, you’ve fought one, you’ve fought 'em all. Not that I’ve gone against a Nazi before. At least, not knowingly.” He stared off into the distance, eyes going wide and unseeing. “Woah, that’s super weird. What if I’ve fought against a Nazi before and I’ll just never know?”

Joe raised his hand wearily, halting his ramblings. “I get it, Pete.”

Peter brightened, popping the last bite of his sandwich into his mouth and jumping up excitedly. “Great!” he exclaimed, “So -” his alarm blared out from his hoodie pocket, cutting him short, and he pulled his phone out quickly to shut it off, glancing apologetically at Joe, who waved it off. “May had an early shift today so she’s gonna be home soon - I’ve gotta head out,” he said reluctantly. 

Joe stood as well, this time picking up his sandwiches with him. 

Peter tossed the pack of gummies back at him. “This discussion is so totally not over though, alright?” he staunchly asserted, narrowing his eyes at Joe. 

Joe rolled his own back in response before sighing in exaggerated defeat. “See ya tomorrow, pal,” he saluted lazily, strolling past him without a backwards glance.

“I’m gonna hold you to that,” Peter threatened, following behind him as they exited the alley. “If you don’t show… I will find you…”

“And I will kill you,” Joe finished with mock seriousness, voice going low and gravelly.

Peter laughed delightedly. “You did a meme!” he exclaimed ecstatically, swinging around to walk backwards in front of Joe, who raised his eyebrows. 

“I did a reference,” he corrected dryly, the corner of his lip twitching up.

Peter grinned as they came to a stop at the corner, the one they split at if they left at the same time. “See ya later, gator,” he farewelled airily.

“In a while,” Joe drawled, a lazy smirk forming as he turned away with a mocking wave.

“Crocodile!” Peter called out after him. “You’re supposed to say crocodile!”

The breath of laughter he caught as Joe turned the next corner, out of sight, left a smile on his face.

Tomorrow, he thought, turning heel and heading home.