A Flash from the Past
Peter's nightmares flicker all over the place.
He's a kid at the dinner table with Aunt May and Uncle Ben, as they did every night upon May's insistence, except Skip eats with them too. And his old math teacher, and the bodega guy, and Ned. Their house is bombed by Stark Industries just before dessert. Weird, but he's stressed, so it’s not like he can expect anything else. He's grown up, he's in the now, swinging through the air, but Skip is flying behind him. How?! Skip can't fly. Skip doesn't deserve to fly. This is his air space, his safe place---but he can't outrun him, Skip is too fast. He can't escape. Suddenly he's somewhere new that he can't recognize with MJ, somewhere conjured up from an amalgamation of places over the years. Images begin swirling and MJ's gone, she's calling and calling for him as if she's right in his ear but he can't see her, can't find her, the panic in him swells and swells until Nick Fury marches up and shoots him right between his eyes.
Peter jolts awake, sweaty, uncomfortable, and the sun has been up for too long.
He showers. He thinks he probably blacked out in the shower, so desperate to escape his thoughts he forces himself into dissociation, like some perverted form of meditation. His water bill is going to be grotesquely high.
Peter decides to busy himself with DoorDash once he's out of the shower since he's so hell bent on making showering more expensive than it needs to be anyways.
No news of Skip's arrest, but that's okay. Tomorrow is Tuesday, he can bring MJ her things and maybe they'll hear something by then.
He works until sunset, heads home and is back out the door in no less than five minutes to patrol as Spider-Man, taking no break for dinner, although he’d had Burger King when a customer ordered the same. It's Monday night, which he ironically finds the slowest night of the week. Not even criminals like to work on Mondays. He swings by both MJ and Ned's houses, twice, just to make sure. He can't remember where Skip lives.
Home again, he changes and collapses in bed. Not three seconds have passed before he shoots up in frustration as he realizes he didn’t stop to buy any groceries. Thankfully, he finds bread in the fridge that he never bothered to open yesterday. Three peanut butter sandwiches will do. They're too sticky, he feels sticky. So he showers. He knows how long he's going to be in there and berates himself for it, but the sound and feel of the running water is what helps him empty his mind.
At least he wasn't touched-starved anymore. After so long without human contact, these past few days of fist bumps and shoulder rubs have almost been overwhelming, he could survive another three months on just that. No, don't think like that, that's definitely unhealthy or something, he could confirm that with a google. The shower is small so Peter can lean his forehead on the tile and massage his sore neck with his own hands while the faint water pressure does whatever it can to soothe his back.
He lay in bed, covers too thin to keep him warm enough and he doesn't have a blow dryer for his hair. Tomorrow will be better, they'll get an arrest report tomorrow. Peter can endure torment from his dreams for one night longer.
🕷🕷🕷
Peter does not think he can endure another string of nightmares. They were already happening on the regular, but now that Skip had re-invaded his mind they're just growing worse and worse. Becoming too realistic, replays of real daytime terrors, not funky imaginations of humans and aliens mashed into one confusing creature. He just has to make it through this day, wait for MJ's evening shift so he can think about her and Ned and the present and nothing else.
DoorDash, DoorDash, DoorDash. He doesn't check the news on his phone.
The moment he opens the door to MJ's work, Ned leaps from his stool to greet him.
"Peter! Peter, dude, we did it, we actually did it."
MJ is smiling like she knows, and Ned holds up the article headline on his phone. It's on Twitter, and a muted video clip of the newscast is playing in the corner, but the summary clearly reads: Serial Molester Sneaks Into School Job, Anonymous Tip Warns Authorities Before His First Shift.
They really did it. Peter backs into the glass door and slides his hands down his face, grinning ear to ear. "We did it!"
MJ rounds the counter to stand with them and Ned pulls her and Peter into a group hug. Peter squeezes them both with restraint and peeks his head around Ned's shoulder to see the ever-present businessman smiling at them, a similar article from a different news site visible on his laptop screen. He gives Peter a thumbs up, and Peter isn't uncomfortable that this man knows. He doesn't think he'd be uncomfortable if anyone knew now, it wasn't weird on his part. It wasn't his fault and it never was.
Ned breaks the group hug and unmutes the clip in the corner of the screen, and it automatically plays from the beginning.
Skip is being perp-walked from his dwelling (it’s definitely too fancy for any public school teacher to afford) and tries to make a scene. He makes grotesque faces at the camera, which is baseline uncomfortable because first of all what grown man does that? But secondly, it's Skip, so it's just going to be uncomfortable no matter what.
The cameras are about to pull away once Skip is in the car until he shouts "Spider-Man fuckin' beat me up last night!"
Peter's blood runs cold. What?
Now the cameras are interested in staying on Skip, even though police can be heard in the background attempting to usher them away.
"He's a fucking maniac. I was just walking down the street, minding my business and he punched me in the face."
"Sir, you have no bruises," a voice behind the camera says.
"Whatever," insists Skip. "He's insane and he definitely killed that Italian guy this summer."
What Italian guy? Oh, Quentin Beck. It hurts, but it's kind of funny that Skip remembers it as him being Italian.
At this point, the cameras are forced out of the car and the footage cuts to a talking head in front of a green screen listing Skip's offenses, ignoring the Spider-Man comments.
Peter just can't fucking believe it. He avoided taking out any of his wrath on Skip, he never abused his power. Skip had basically waltzed into the palms of his hands and he did everything right. It's not like anyone will believe Skip, they'll see it as the obvious attention grab that it is, but the underground current who bear no morals in the first place will run with what he said just because he said it.
"Whatever," Ned groans. Peter wonders about how close to home this hits for Ned and MJ, because they were in Europe in the midst of it compared to everyone else in New York. He realizes how much Spider-Man really must mean to them, and that's sadly not a very good thing.
"Bullshit," the businessman sighs.
Ned turns to him, defensive. "Do you not like Spider-Man?"
"Oh, no, I like him. Seems like a good guy."
"Especially with the likes of J.J.J. and Alex Jones whining about him," MJ chimes in, "you can tell for sure people with some sort of vendetta against him have a motive, whether it be boredom or desperation, y'know. Pick your poison."
"I'm trying to keep it cool, but I'll be honest, I freakin' love Spider-Man," Ned gushes. "Have you seen him around lately? Besides when we were in Europe," he says, looking back at MJ.
"I haven't really seen him, no."
"I've seen him," says the man---their acquaintance, Peter supposes? They don't know his name. "I was on my way home from a family dinner, and I saw him help some lady. Looked real nice, shook her hand and all. And then he flipped, up, up, and away. Fuckin' amazing stuff to see. Nice guy, I'm sure."
"I saw him a couple weeks ago," Ned almost squeals. "Us in the crowd got to talk to him a bit, just to tell him how much we appreciate him, how cool he is, you know? It must be rough for him, he needs all the positive reassurance he can get, I think." Ned solemnly nods. "Good for the soul." MJ and the businessman hum in agreement.
MJ is staring at him with confusion and care, and Ned steps aside as she moves to stand in front of him.
What? He wonders. What's wrong?
"Peter, you're crying."
He's crying? He hadn't noticed at all.
She pushes his loose curls out of his eyes, fingers gliding softly along his eyebrow. He hadn't noticed he was crying, but he does notice Ned make a surprised face at MJ's quickness to comfort.
"I'm sorry, I'm just so relieved, I think, about the news." He can feel the effects of crying in his sinuses now and grabs a coarse napkin off the counter for his nose.
"I've seen Spider-Man," he lies. "Not up close, but I saw him once, swinging from one building to another. It was sunset and he looked like he was doing a cartwheel through the air. I like what he does for the city, for us."
The door had chimed a bit ago but Peter never turned to see who walked in until now, and his jaw strains from how much effort it takes to pull a poker face.
"Are we talking about Spider-Man? I freakin' love Spider-Man." Flash grins, and Peter's gut clenches with the effort it takes to suppress a laugh.
"That's what I said!" Exclaims Ned, dapping Flash up.
Oh, it's just too funny. And it stings a little.
"Fuck that child molester on the news, by the way. I saw this morning," Flash says. He looks at MJ. "I'd like a latte and an apple fritter, please."
She nods and moves behind the counter to prepare his order.
"Yeah, fuck that guy!" Ned exclaims. He approaches Flash, excitedly whispering and jabbing his thumb between Peter and MJ. "We put in the tip!"
"Ned!" Peter and MJ hiss simultaneously, MJ's head whipping around with such a scold that Ned shrinks into himself. Flash's eyebrows shoot into his hairline. He looks between the three of them, mouth open like a guppy.
"Oh, sorry, no it actually wasn't us," Ned reassures. Flash makes a face, the businessman minds his own business.
"Please don't tell anyone, dude, it's not safe. It was anonymous for a reason," Ned begs, but Flash waves him off.
"I won't, I won't. Besides, MJ and whoever that guy is look like they might hide my body in the Hudson if I say anything."
Peter realizes he will probably never be called Penis Parker again. Flash has no precedent to loathe him, he's just "that guy" now.
Soon enough Flash has his food and is out the door. This is the first time Peter's seen him here since he wiped humanity's mind.
Ned excuses himself to go to the now repaired bathroom and Peter walks behind the counter to return MJ's things. She has the charger, tampon and money but her eyes linger on the notebook paper as she slowly takes it from his hand. She knows he's opened it (come on, who can't open the notes of someone they're in love with when it's left at their house? Not that she knows he loves her), and knows he couldn't discern what it says either.
MJ slides her fingers over the seam of the folded note. "You got any plans for dinner tonight?"
"Why?" Peter was about to say something else, but that redirects his thoughts so sharply that he forgets what he was about to say otherwise.
"Well, you got anything else to do? I thought you'd wanna hang out." She pauses for him to answer, but he doesn't. "Sorry. I don't mean to be pushy---but we just jailed a pedophile together and last night you said---"
"I do, I do wanna hang out, uhm" Peter starts but doesn't know where to take his sentence. He wants to be with them, but this is really fast. Like, they're all going to be best friends, the kind that see each other every day and Ned will ask him to be his best man in six months kind of fast---the dangerous kind of fast. He needs them at a distance.
"We can hang," he says, chill as he can manage. He's totally, very chill. "I have been lonely, but I'm also really, uhm, introverted and I work most evenings. But thank you. I'm so grateful for you and Ned's friendship this past week." He emphasizes the word friendship and internally cringes at how it sounds, because he definitely made it too obvious. "You guys have turned my life around for the better," he finishes, gesturing towards the open article of Skip's arrest on Ned's phone that rests face up on the counter.
MJ rocks back on her heels and looks away before stuffing the folded note in her tote bag.
Ned exits the bathroom. Peter sits next to him on the stool as usual while Ned taps through more articles, scrutinizing the language and looking for new details they may not have found in their own investigation.
Peter closes his eyes and feels himself wrapped around MJ in the creaky pull out bed, the night light casting shadows of the dining room table onto the walls while her hair tickles his chin. He slides his hand down her arm that's wrapped around his own torso, giving her forearm a reassuring squeeze before reaching up to comb through the hair at the base of her neck.
In his mind's eye, he watches her sip coffee and poke at the eggs at the dining table in the morning.
He watches her plummet through the air, falling from the scaffolding on the Statue of Liberty and Norman Osborn has knocked him aside mid-leap before he can see what happens next. But he can hear her.
He'd never really imagined what humans looked like falling from that angle before, flat on their back, limbs flailing in their last moments. It all happens so fast.
Skip's behind bars, for good. MJ slides him a coffee without him having asked for it.
The relief doesn't come.
🕷🕷🕷
Peter is once again underdressed for the cold as he and Ned wait outside for MJ to finish locking up the donut shop. His Spider-Man suit was insulated, plus the adrenaline of soaring from rooftop to rooftop kept his blood pumping, so he always underestimated how many layers he would need in civilian clothing to stay warm at night.
"So we're actually celebrating this time, right? No skipping out on us," Ned jokes, jostling Peter with his elbow while the three of them stride down the sidewalk. He's between MJ and Ned, cornered between love and sincerity and forced into attending dinner. Ned also insists upon Chinese, because that was what he’d been craving the night of their sleuthing and he didn’t want it without them.
"I'm buying," Peter announces as he steps in front of them to hold open the door of the restaurant. There's a table that's empty and far from the front, so they sit there for privacy.
"You guys wanna do anything next week?" Ned asks as he trills the laminated edge of the menu with his thumbs.
Peter sighs. "Honestly, I'm kinda exhausted. I've got a lot to do, but I'll for sure see you on Thursday evening if you come, too."
"I might not be able to, my lola could rearrange our plans, you know how it is."
"We could stop by your place, Peter, at any time that's convenient for you," MJ offers.
"Uhm." Peter licks his lips. "Yeah, of course. I just don't know when that'll be."
He thinks MJ finally gets it. His chest squeezes when she doesn't respond, not even a hum of acknowledgment as she flips through her menu. Peter had opened up about feeling isolated, and some unexplained bond left between the three of them was clear as day. She was just trying to take care of him, to reach out for the sake of the three of them without even fully knowing why. So was Ned. And it was his fault for getting too close again so quickly in the first place. It’s funny, he would think that he’d savor every moment in his loved one’s presence like this, lonely as he was, but in truth he can hardly taste his General Tso’s chicken as he constructs an escape plan. He needed an excuse to disappear for a while, just long enough to where it’s believable that he’s gone, but short enough that he gets to see them every once in a while so they don’t grow too attached. Why hadn’t he thought of this from the beginning?
“Peter.” MJ draws him out of his thoughts.
“Yeah, I’m sorry. What did you say?”
“I asked if you wanted to go see the new Tom Hanks movie with me and Ned next Friday.”
“Oh! Yeah, sure. Sounds great.”
“They filmed half of it before the blip and never deleted the footage, and now they’ve just picked up where they left off to finish it.”
“That’s crazy,” Ned chuckles.
MJ twirls her lo mein with her chopsticks.
“Where were you guys?”
Peter and MJ both look at Ned, waiting for him to elaborate.
“I mean, when you were blipped.”
Oh.
“We were all blipped, right?”
“Yeah, yeah, we were,” Peter says as he sticks one chopstick into some chicken, using it like a giant toothpick.
“Neither my mom or dad blipped, but I did,” MJ says. “I’m sure it was batshit insane for them to experience. But for me, I was just—”
“It felt kinda like a nap,” Peter says.
“Yeah,” she says. “Exactly.”
“My whole entire family was blipped except for my uncle and youngest cousin, who is now our second-oldest cousin,” Ned chuckles.
“My Aunt May blipped too. We only had each other, so I’m glad she didn’t have to endure five years of getting through grief just to have the world dumped back on her.”
“I’m sorry,” Ned says. “About your aunt.”
That’s right, he’d already told them May had died. Maybe he shouldn’t have. He doesn't really know what the right move is anymore.
“At least your parents had each other,” Ned then says to MJ. “You know, to have some kinda grasp on reality. And then you came back! I can’t really wrap my mind around it, what it was like here between all this. Crazy as hell.”
“Yeah,” MJ laughs. “My parents were actually mid-divorce when I was reborn into this oh-so-benevolent world, but they kept it a secret from me until I’d adjusted somewhat, as much as any of us could really, and we all started school again.”
She looks expectant of a laugh for her sardonic answer, but Peter can only manage a half-smile with suppressed air forcing itself out of his lungs. Ned makes up for it with his own laughter.
“That’s rough, what the hell,” Ned continues to laugh. “Imagine going five years, not knowing what’ll happen and you end up divorced and your kid just shows back up in her room one day? Holy shit.”
It is funny when it’s framed like that, even if Peter knows the context is so much darker. Ned could smooth out anything that stressed him out by shining his comical spotlight on the situation.
“Yeah, my uh,” MJ swallows, “my uncle should be jail-bird-buddies with our friend Skip we put away as of today, and my dad knew about it. He finally cracked out of guilt or some shit like, I don’t know, a month before everyone was un-blipped?”
Peter can feel the soles of her shoes sliding against the floor as she shifts her legs around over the ground, little room under the table to fidget otherwise. They’re sitting on one side of the booth together, across from Ned, and her hand rests with anticipation between them on the red pleather cushion. Peter doesn’t take it.
“Oh, what the hell,” Ned exclaims as he scatters his chopsticks across his plate. “I’m so sorry. I’m so, so sorry. Well, now I know whose side I’m on for the divorce. Fuck your dad!”
“Yeah, fuck my dad. Not literally, but y'know,” MJ laughs as she raises her plastic Cola-branded cup of water for a toast. Ned and Peter clink their drinks with hers as they all echo another round of “Fuck you, dad!” across the table.
Ned notices a customer sat in the booth parallel his line of sight glaring at them, likely for cheering a round of fucks throughout the restaurant, and the three of them explode into childish giggles. From there on more jokes ensue, and Peter allows himself to be lost in the clouds of the night. They stay out far later than acceptable, particularly on a school night for Ned and MJ, and talk rarely broaches a topic that he can’t worm his way around. Ned is so talkative that he and MJ contribute to most of the conversation anyways. Peter just basks in their presence, their new normality in a world in which half of the living things throughout the known universe had been wiped and restored, as if some salary office worker misclicked a file and had to retrieve it from the desktop’s recycle bin.
Ned hails a taxi, and Peter knows he should walk MJ home. They stroll in silence until he recognizes they’re a block from her apartment.
“I’m relieved,” she says. Looks at him, hands stuffed in pockets as she kicks a clump of icy dirt off the sidewalk.
“Yeah, me too,” he lies.
“It’s too bad you can’t stay over again. I want scrambled eggs.”
“Ha. They were supposed to be omelets, y’know.”
“Then I want Peter-style omelets,” she whines, pseudo-dramatic with her demands and he can feel her looking at him the entire time she speaks.
“Another time.” Shit, why did he say that? He couldn’t even stop himself.
They’re at the front entrance of her apartment block, and Peter stops at the front door.
“I’m assuming I’ll see you at work? Since you can’t live without dirt water. I mean, your coffee.”
“Yeah, yeah, of course,” he laughs.
They stand there with MJ holding the door open and letting cold air into the lobby.
“Okay,” Peter finally says.
“Okay,” she replies too quickly, stumbling into his own words. “Good night.”
“Good night.”
And yet they continue to stand there in silence, unmoving until another tenant needs to enter the building and MJ is forced to shuffle into the lobby.
Happy times with Ned and MJ do nothing to break the rhythm of Peter’s night time routine. He rushes home, suits up and is out and about across the city as fast as Ned probably made it home in his taxi. He started his patrol later than usual, and so he stays out later than usual, but he doesn’t feel the strain. In fact, as it has been all week (it usually was, but this work was exponentially worse) he didn’t want to sleep. Didn’t feel the need to sleep.
There had been so much positive change in his life this week, he thinks as he scrubs his elbows raw in the shower. He was spending more time with Ned and MJ than he ever could have predicted himself to be a few months ago. Spider-Manning was effective as ever, and he’d even jailed a high-profile criminal before said criminal could manage to become high-profile again. He should be looking forward to the future. He should feel better, the best he can at least since the beginning of his predicament when he’d gotten home from Europe.
He should be out of the shower by now.
He should be asleep by now.
Anxiety blankets him in bed. He’d put socks on, but he’s still too cold.
He wonders if leaving the light on might help, like it does for MJ. His lamp is too bright so he finds an old t-shirt and drapes it over the lampshade, creating a soft glow. Exhaustion catch’s up on him, despite all his protests, but the warmth does nothing to aid the state of his subconscious once he finally sleeps. Nightmares. Nothing new, but ever-draining and never-ending, it seems.
Peter wakes, restless. He doesn’t know what else he can do.