Harry Potter Proves Itself Useless
Peter is stiff from sleeping on his stomach, having remained in bed for—he checks his phone—ten hours. He groans as he stretches his legs, otherwise unmoving and hesitant to try his arms or back. Only one side of his face was clogged up from sleeping on it all night, and he had no headache or fever, which is good. He aches all over, but the real show stoppers were the tight knot in his shoulder and the throb of the wound in his back. As much as he doesn’t want to move, he certainly needs to, so something will have to give eventually. He lay there, likely for another hour, sunlight from the window warming his back until he cannot hold out any longer and he must get up. Slowly, he slides his right arm under his stomach and grabs the edge of his bed with his left in order to lift himself up. He anticipated the pain so intensely that it was more bearable than he was prepared for at all, a small blessing he gratefully accepts. The pain grew to be more of a nuisance and a shallow sting than anything else once he was accustomed to walking about the room. After using the bathroom and checking the largest gash in the mirror, he carefully prepares a can of soup and green beans in his largest pot on the stove. The claw marks have significantly shrunken and he hopes they will be healed entirely in the next two or three days—they would have healed so much faster if he could have stitched them up, but alas. He can’t do it all.
If only he could call MJ or Ned, not even for help with his wounds but just so he can feel anything but dread whenever he picks up his phone. Two notifications from the Daily Bugle mock him from the lockscreen, and he begrudgingly opens the newest one as he sits down to eat the soup out of the pot at his desk. Oh, that’s right, the presentation for J.J.J.’s son’s archeology expedition at the museum was today, and the Daily Bugle is livestreaming it. Peter’s honestly grateful for anything that isn’t the talking mustache whining about Spider-Man, so he opens the link, curious. Two men and a woman dressed in semi-formal wear stand in front of a projector on the staircase of the museum, and the camera is positioned amongst the chairs in the audience, dead in the middle. He’s hardly paying attention as they click through slides of discoveries, each taking a turn when speaking until, wait—where is J.J.J.’s son? There are only three archeologists, not four, and neither of the men are blonde.
Perhaps he was sick with whatever Peter had. Something could be going around the city.
An eighteenth century depiction of three men hunting a wolf-like creature appears on the slide, captioned The Beast of Gévaudan.
“I’m sure some of you are familiar with this, as it is one of the more well known origins of werewolf legends, particularly here in the West. However, this legend wasn’t born out of thin air. There is plenty of historical documentation of dozens of killings of fieldworkers across 18th century France due to a beast like this. A bounty was even put out by the king in response to pressure by the people to do something about it. That’s how prevalent death was.”
Werewolves? Are we kidding?
A few familiar images clip by, dusty pictures that must have appeared the other day in the preview on the Daily Bugle. Peter recognizes them now as a formerly untouched chest of treasures, bricks he assumes are from an old monastery or castle, and a red gem peeking out from the dirt.
“Multiple animals were hunted and caught, and eventually the killings stopped. Reportedly, deaths continued after the so-called beast was declared eliminated by the king, so the general consensus is that the king just caught a really big wolf and called it a day.” The audience laughs appropriately at that, and the woman passes the clicker to the older of the two men standing behind her.
The slides continue, one displaying the fur rug of a plain, large wolf generally thought to be what the king of France and his men had caught. But Peter lingers on that distinct ruby, and images of the red thing he now also registers as a ruby lodged in the chest of the werewolf from last night involuntarily surface in his mind.
Nah. It couldn’t be.
Except wizards were real, half of the entire universe had been deleted and restored, and for a moment, Peter had held the Infinity Stones in his own hands.
The broadcast concludes while he is lost in thought, and it was very short so he must have joined at the tail end of the presentation. J.J.J.’s pinched face takes up the screen instead, apologizing for the absence of his son and that he was feeling under the weather.
Ah, Peter knew it. The flu or something was going around.
J.J.J. switches gears in an instant, steam-rolling into a rant about Spider-Man. A picture from last night of Peter on the subway with the children appears, taken from the front of the train car by what seems to be someone’s old Android. He does look goofy in that jacket with his array of air fresheners, but come on, how could this man complain about him hanging out with some kids? No rest for the wicked, he supposes. The werewolf’s eyes flash through Peter’s mind. Suddenly, the waistband of his pajama pants feels sticky. He touches it to find a trail of blood up to the giant gash in his back—it’s split open, and Peter emits a frustrated sound. He isn’t tired enough to nap, he’d only woken up an hour ago, but he needed to lie down and be still. He coughs as he crawls into bed, not entirely over the sickness and the contractions from his cough feel awful, causing him to become too aware of the wound on his back.
Peter lay in bed, phone clutched in his left hand too close to his face as he scrolls, nothing much else he can do. Another day of not working, and he ignores the part of his brain that is pleading with him to do financial calculations right now. He gets up once for more Advil, but the bottle is empty— that’s right, he finished them off. Shit. He can only imagine what this injury might actually feel like if he weren’t on pain killers for the last twenty-four hours. The air is cool on the open gash, but it doesn’t seem to be bleeding much anymore. He lay in bed, growing antsy. Hungry. Anxiety creeps up, just because he can’t move for the day. It would be one thing if he were lying on his back, but being trapped on his stomach was slowly suffocating, and if he didn’t move soon he might just freak out. But he can't, so he scrolls. Checks all of his friends' known socials, reads articles, watches videos. Peter’s eyes tire of his phone and he finally discards it, tossing it out of reach behind him across the bed. It’s only then that he notices he is sleepier than he thought; thankfully time flies in the endless scroll of social media. Despite waking later than usual this morning, he’s asleep before the sun sets.
🕷🕷🕷
Same as yesterday, a string of knocks at the door woke him. Relentless knocks— MJ must have been at his door for a while.
“Hey,” he calls out, groggy. “I’m here, I’m awake.”
“Hey,” she calls back through the wood. “Can I come in?”
Peter’s still as stone. There’s not a drop Advil coursing through him anymore, and the pain signals in his back are doing everything they can to let him know that. Usually, adrenaline is enough of a distraction to keep him from feeling like this, but he's been at rest for so long now. Thankfully he isn’t bleeding (as far as he can tell).
“Yeah, you can.”
MJ jiggles the doorknob. “Can you open the door?”
“Uhm…” Peter attempts to roll over so he can sit up, but the pinch of the skin on his back is enough to convince him to stay down. That, and his legs are numb from lying like this for so long. “I can’t move.”
He turns to face the door where he lay, groaning at his stiff neck and he sees the handle jostle aggressively as MJ panics on the other side. “What do you mean you can’t move? Are you okay?”
“I’m just really, really sore,” he replies. He could force himself to leave the bed and regain feeling in his limbs as he stumbles for the door, but he’d rather not, and MJ can’t come in here anyway—the bathroom is covered in blood-splattered Spider-Man air fresheners.
MJ releases the doorknob. “Is there anything I can do?”
“Well, you can’t get in the room and I can’t sit up, so,” he moans. “No, I guess not.”
She doesn’t respond, but the doorknob rattles. She’s not jostling it, something else is happening. Moments pass and suddenly the door flings open, and MJ stands in the entryway with a bobby pin in one hand and her tote bag in the other.
Peter lay there, shocked. “Did you just—did you just pick my lock?”
“This apartment is shitty. You should invest in a new deadbolt.”
He follows her with his eyes as much as he can from his position as she walks into the room, shuts the door behind her and dumps her tote bag out on his desk once again, removing the mostly eaten pot of green beans and soup with one hand while the other rearranges items on the desk. There were books this time and a new bottle of painkillers, among other things.
“Advil,” Peter whines, not even reaching out with his arm. He thanks Peter-From-A-Few-Hours-Ago for being cold enough to pull his blanket up over his wounded back so she couldn’t see it.
“Okay, here,” MJ laughs nervously under her breath, shaking out two pills for him.
“Six, please—”
“Peter!” She snatches the Advil on his nightstand and shakes it to find the bottle empty. “I’m worried about your kidneys—”
“MJ, please, I can’t—I need—” he doesn’t want to cry, but he might out of sheer frustration if she doesn’t pass him the fucking Advil.
MJ rushes to fill a glass of water and back to his side, gently trying to sit him up. “You sound like an addict, oh my God,” she laughs, but it’s empty. There’s a slow dread churning in her because she’s confused, and Peter feels terrible for being the source of that confusion.
“I can’t sit up,” he protests, clenching his arm in resistance when she tries to pull him up. Her hand catches on his blanket as she pulls back in response, and anxiety spikes him in the chest— she was this close to exposing his back.
“Why not? You can’t take these lying down—”
“My shoulder, uhm, it hurts. Like, so bad. There’s a knot in it, I think.”
“Oh,” she says, softly. “Do you mind?” She gently smooths her palm over the back of his neck as he lay there. “Which one?”
“The right side, ah—ow,” she presses her thumb into the meat of his shoulder between his spine and shoulder blade.
“Is that not it?”
“No, that’s it, it’s the good kind of ‘ow’, I just don’t know if I can handle it being rubbed out right now.” He’d ignored that knot in his shoulder for far too long, and it was his fault, but he needed Advil for his overall state of being—achy, half sick, and on the verge of bleeding once again.
“I’ll be gentle,” she says, sure of herself. And she was. It hurt because it was a knot, but she patiently worked at the tissue. He endured it, and it began to loosen up, eventually. It was difficult to completely relax when he’s so on edge, only the blanket between her and the unexplainable claw marks on his back. MJ’s soft laughter brings him to her attention.
“My aunt is a masseuse,” she says.
“Ah. That explains—hm, that explains why this is working so well,” he laughs with effort from lying on his stomach.
“So it feels better?”
“Yeah, I can really feel the difference. Thank you so much, you didn’t have to help me with this,” he says quietly.
“Don’t apologize like you’ve done something wrong by having a knot in your shoulder, of course I'll help you. I think we all have knots in our shoulders at some point from overuse without checking, anyways.”
“I bet you’re right.” Peter finds himself smiling, face tucked comfortably onto his pillow. He tries to unwind, mind and body. When she leaves, he’ll take the medicine and get to washing his suit so he can mend it. It’ll be fine.
“You don’t have to bet,” she chuckles, “I am.” She flattens her hand on his back and rubs lightly, no longer working the knot but just being affectionate, it seems. “I’m sorry, my wrists are tired, I can’t massage it anymore. It’s almost gone, I can feel it—”
“Don’t say sorry, you did plenty. Thank you. Uhm, you can get up now. You don’t gotta sit here.”
Her fingers trail down to the blanket and he feels her pinch the ends with both hands and gently peel it off his skin, but she doesn’t fold it down to reveal his back. Instead she lifts it up, closer towards her face. It’s hard to see her from his current angle.
“Is this blood? On your blanket?”
Oh, no. Fuck.
“Uhm.” There's no use in lying, it won’t get him anywhere. “Yeah.”
He knew this was coming at some point, anyway. He shouldn’t pretend otherwise, not with himself. But he’s just not ready.
He can feel her rolling the blanket down, and she gasps. He hears her hand clapping over her mouth mid-gasp, and she leans over him on the bed, thumb gently pulling skin that’s much closer to his wound than his shoulder.
“Peter.”
Come on. Shit, what can he say?
“Peter,” she says again, breathless, “what the fuck is this?”
“Uhm,” think quick. He can do this. “It’s embarrassing, I don’t wanna talk about it.”
“When’s the last time you’ve cleaned this? Peter, what the fuck—”
“It’s blood from yesterday, don’t worry about it.” He still can’t see her fully, and he hopes her expression is that of a believing, trusting friend. It isn’t.
“You have to tell me how the hell this happened. I’m—”
“Like I said, it’s embarrassing, I don’t wanna—”
“Peter.”
“I was attacked by my neighbor’s dog, going down the stairs.”
MJ folds the blanket down so it lay across the small of his back. She watches him breathe, body tense because he can't inhale fully without discomfort. There are three claw marks, and the longest one on the right glistens with fresh blood. His elbows are tucked at either side so his hands are near his face, and he closes his eyes and sighs, shallow and stunted.
"A dog."
"Yes, a Great Dane, actually. It happened on the stairs, me and the dog, uhm, I forgot it's name—we both tumbled down the stairs, so I guess I can't say it attacked me on purpose. Well, I guess— "
"Okay, okay," she cuts him off. He prays the claw marks look believable for a Great Dane. Should he have gone with a German Shepard instead? He assumed Great Danes had the largest paw span so it would better explain the placement of the claw marks, he wasn’t sure exactly how much they’d decreased in size, but only the one was bleeding, so it can’t be that bad. Right?
"I'm just going to have to believe you right now, because patching you up takes priority."
"I told you it was really embarrassing," he tries.
He can feel her fingertips ghosting over his skin as she inspects his back. "It looks clean."
"Yeah, I basically showered with rubbing alcohol. It stung, like, a lot."
"Peter! You know you can clean cuts with just water and soap, right? It doesn't have to hurt that bad."
Oh. "Well, I couldn't really reach it otherwise."
"You should’ve called someone."
"I guess. But I don't have anyone to call."
"Me? Ned?"
"We don't have each other's numbers," he admits.
"We don't?" MJ rises from the bed and retrieves her phone from the desk. "Well, we're fixing that today. And I'm calling Ned."
"Oh my God, please tell him to bring butterfly stitches— "
"What do you think I'm doing?" MJ laughs, incredulous. Ned answers after two rings. "Hey, this is gonna sound crazy but I need a shit ton of medical supplies. Gauze, medical tape, butterfly stitches…well, Peter got attacked by a dog, apparently. Yes...well it's not like any of us could afford a doctor. Yes, I'm for real. I'm at his apartment. Peter, say hi to Ned." MJ holds the phone level with his face.
"Hi, Ned. I got attacked by a dog."
This couldn’t get more ridiculous.
MJ paces in tight circles between his bed and desk while she fills Ned in with the whatever details she has and Peter stares at her shoes. She hangs up and kneels by the bed so they can be eye level while she speaks with him. Ever so delicate, she moves the limp curls out of his eyes and strokes her thumb along his brow, following the break in the cowlick instead of trailing to his temple.
"When Ned gets here, we're going to sit you up and fix all this, okay?"
Peter swallows. "Yeah, okay."
"And you can have four Advil."
"Okay," he stutters as he laughs. She stares into him, and the dumpster fire in his mind fizzles out, like everything really will be okay— even if he only has four Advil.
"Do you want me to stay the night?"
Yes, God. But no, bad idea. "No, it'll be okay once I've got stitches. But you could come back tomorrow, if you want to."
She doesn't press him further, even though it would be easier for her to remain than go and come back in the morning.
He couldn't let her stay over. For all of humanity's psyche being factory reset on the concept of Peter Parker, MJ behavior is— it was like he was never gone. She wasn't the complete fortress she was at the dawn of their friendship, rather she was much more like the person he had grown to know. Perhaps the impact of that growth stayed with her while he was wiped from the narrative. It was hard to tell with Ned, Ned was an open book to most people, friendly and fun-seeking. Falling back into rhythm with Ned was as easy as breathing.
They sit in silence, her rhythmically stroking his face while he tunes into that touch to drown out the pain, eyes closed. The girl who’d slink around the cafeteria without a backpack was long gone. He'd noticed her skitting around himself and Ned at school, but never stepping fully into their friendship because of how little she expected out of people, how afraid she was to get close. But once Liz was out of the picture (he still felt bad about that— Liz's dad, that is— ) MJ'd grown bolder. It’d thrill him to catch her staring at him in class, to be pursued, not silently watching and waiting the way he was used to. It’d prompted him to make a move himself that he might not have otherwise. It would even keep him up at night, chest fluttering as his mind raced over reasons she might like him. She'd always been interesting and pretty, most people were in some way or another, but once he'd got one piece of her shell cracked he had only wanted more and more, to break it all off at once so he could have her: just her, not hiding behind her hair or sarcasm but MJ, complex and securely herself. Her hands, her jokes, her eyes, her ability to put one foot forward no matter how afraid she was, her values.
He was in awe of how she struck him to his core, solace like no person or thing alive could and only hoped he could be the same for her, but he knew he couldn't, not like this.
He'd gotten himself in quite the predicament, wanting to be there for her when he was constantly pushing her away and getting into weird shit like fighting werewolves, but being Spider-Man was what he could do best. It's what he could do for them, for everyone.
Suddenly her face shifts with realization. “I forgot to ask Ned to bring more rubbing alcohol, I think it’ll be quicker for disinfecting before we wrap you up. Do you have any left in your bathroom?”
“No!” MJ rises from the floor, but Peter grabs her arm before she can stand up right.
“It’s okay, you don’t have any more? We’ll have to use soap and water.”
“No, I have some, but you can’t go in there. I’ll get it.”
She scoffs. “You don’t look like you can get it. It’s alright, I can get it for you.”
Peter swallows air. There’s little he can do to prevent her from walking into that bathroom if she decides to ignore him. “You can’t go in there, it’s covered in my bloody clothes.”
MJ gives him a look that lands somewhere between goofy and surprised. “I’m not afraid of your clothes, Peter, you still haven’t even tried to sit up yet.”
“No. No, you can’t. It’s like a biohazard, other people’s blood and stuff— just wait, please. I’ll take care of it after I get up. Okay? Please?”
MJ exhales, slow and frustrated, mouth in a flat line. “Okay,” she concedes. “It makes no sense, but okay.”
Peter can’t even get the satisfaction of sighing in relief because his chest is stiff from laying for so long. His request is counterproductive to their entire evening, but she respects him enough to not overstep, even in this instance. If only she knew how reassuring this was right now.
Ned knocks on the door, and MJ lets him in.
"I've got all the stuff, was he really— oh wow," Ned's eyes go wide as he sees Peter lying on the bed. "I guess he was. Okay. That's— damn. A Great Dane?"
"Yeah," MJ sighs and gestures towards him in defeat. Peter's eyes shut as they move about the room, he can't see them from this angle anyways.
"Are you gonna, like, press charges or something?" Ned asks.
"I was thinking of that as well," MJ agrees. "What can we do about this?"
"Oh no, no, I'm not pressing charges. It was kinda an accident anyways, remember? I said it was on the stairs."
"Yeah, but are Great Danes even allowed in this building?"
Peter barks a laugh in disbelief. "Everything's allowed in this building, MJ, how else do you think I live here?"
He groans as MJ and Ned carefully lift him up and plant his feet on the ground so that he sits on the side of the bed, supporting his upper body weight with his forearms on his thighs.
“What do you mean?” MJ asks as he finally downs six extra-strength Advil and chugs his entire glass of water. Ned looks at MJ for help, like he needed confirmation that hadn’t really seen Peter just take three doses of medicine at once. She can’t give it to him, of course.
“What do you think I mean? This place is totally unregulated, how else could I live here? I won’t be eighteen until August and I have like, no paperwork or even a clue of how to handle all that, if I’m honest.”
Ned and MJ appear extremely shocked to hear that, which confuses Peter. Hadn’t he told them about how he never finished senior year?
“You’re seventeen?” MJ pauses in the middle of tearing open the package of butterfly stitches to give him her full attention.
“I’m lost.” He looks between the two of them where they stand, perplexed. “Aren’t we all the same age? Same blip and all that?”
“Well yeah, we’re seventeen, and I thought you were until we came to your place,” Ned gestures between himself and MJ as he unwraps gauze. “Then I thought, okay, this guy must be nineteen or even twenty, because you have an apartment and a job and all that. You’re really our age?”
“I thought that too,” says MJ, voice heavy, like she pities him. “No wonder you don’t have anything in your apartment, you don’t even know what you’re doing.”
Peter does not like the sound of where this is going, he simply cannot handle a conversation deeper than this right now. “Well, that’s not true, clearly I am doing, I don’t know, something. I’ve got a job, and I've got this place.”
“I know, it’s just that you lost your aunt—”
“I don’t really want to talk about this right now, if that’s okay.”
MJ kneels on the bed behind him and reassuringly smooths her steady hand over his shoulder. “No, you’re right, I’m sorry. Most college graduates don’t know what to do with themselves, so I’m just all the more shocked that you live like this at seventeen,” she laughs. “When you spent the night with me—”
“You spent the night at MJ’s?” Ned interjects, bangs dancing as he snaps his head up to meet their gazes.
“Peter, I’m going to have to use a little bit of rubbing alcohol just to be sure, but it shouldn’t sting too badly,” MJ says, changing the subject. “Ned thought to bring disinfectant wipes, so you don’t have to break your back to make the bathroom presentable,” she jokes as she shows him the alcohol wipes from behind him so that he can see it before she applies it. “Ned, pass me some gloves, please.”
The largest gash was the only one that was bleeding, and MJ was gentle and sparing with the alcohol, so it doesn't hurt nearly as much. Ned hands her the butterfly stitches and stabilizes Peter by his left shoulder while MJ methodically pieces him back together, starting in the center of the largest gash.
"Damn, that looks nasty. At least it wasn't the werewolf that got you,” Ned quips. “Have you guys seen that thing?"
Peter can't respond, because if he does, he'll probably split his back open from die hard laughter. Ah, Ned. If only he knew.
"Yeah, we saw it on the Daily Bugle last night," MJ answers. “Pass me the gauze. I’m gonna wrap this around your waist, okay?”
“Okay,” Peter sighs. He takes another deep breath, and she somehow moves even gentler across his back— she probably thought he was struggling with the process of getting stitched up, it's not like she could know he was reeling from the werewolf-ness of the entire situation.
Right, the werewolf, the werewolf that scratched him. That one. Panic floods his senses before he can rationalize it away. Man-Wolf is probably running around out there right this moment, and he can't do anything about it. He's too aware of the dull pain in his back now, thankfully dampened by the painkillers. A horrible thought invades at full force.
"Hey, Ned, you know the werewolves in Harry Potter?"
"Yeah," Ned says as he packs the supplies he brought.
"Doesn't just like, a bite or a scratch turn you into a werewolf?"
"Yeah, I think so."
Don't panic. Don't freak out.
"But you know what's weird, now that you mention it?" Ned thoughtfully gazes at the speckled ceiling. "This guy has been out every night, but there’s no full moon.”
“Definitely some freak in a costume,” MJ says as she cuts the end of the medical tape. She does one quick check with the flat of her hand across his abdomen to ensure that the tape isn't twisted, then the bed dips behind him as she rises so that she can walk around and confirm it.
“Okay, it looks good,” she announces. “Do you wanna lay back down?”
“No, I’m really hungry.” His appetite was restored, and he could eat three cows right now.
“Do you want soup?”
“No, like I’m really hungry, I haven’t eaten properly in days.”
“I’m ordering Chinese,” Ned says, and no one objects.
“Get me like, ten spring rolls and twenty crab rangoons along with the usual, please. I’ll pay you back later.”
“Nah, you don’t have to pay me back,” Ned says, clapping him on the shoulder, and Peter winces. “Oh. I’m sorry, dude.”
Peter laughs. “It’s okay, man.” The werewolf is still on his mind. “So that werewolf is really out every night, huh? If Harry Potter is wrong about that, then a werewolf scratch can’t turn you, either.”
Ned giggles as he taps the order in on his phone. “Yeah, if Harry Potter was right, and you were scratched by that thing, you’d be in big trouble.”
“Harry Potter used abra-cadabra for it's big bad murder spell, I don’t think we should take anything from it seriously,” MJ adds. The two of them are seated on the floor in front of him again, and they laugh together. Ned had ordered from the nearest Chinese place available, so dinner arrived sooner than expected. Ned answers the door, retrieves the food and places it on the desk. Peter isn’t entirely sure how he’s going to have dinner, because he can’t sit up comfortably for long without using his arms for support.
“Here, let’s do it this way.” MJ sits next to him on the bed so he can lean against her on one side and use his free arm to eat. Ned sits at the desk with his food and checks the delivery app once more before digging in himself.
“Sorry I used UberEats, I shouldn’t support your rival company, or else we’ll turn into Romeo and Juliet.”
They chuckle, and Peter takes a bite of a rangoon. The next hour is filled with good food and jokes, Ned even forces them to do a mad-lib randomly because he got an ad for an app on Instagram. His phone dings, and there’s a notification for Flash’s Instagram live.
“You have notifications on for Flash?” MJ giggles before she takes a bite of a spring roll.
“I have notifs on for everyone, hush,” Ned laughs. “Let’s see what he’s up to.”
Ned opens Flash’s Instagram live to a shaky camera, open street, and unseen shrieks in the background.
“Holy fucking shit you guys,” Flash pants as he sprints. “The werewolf is here. I saw it, I saw that thing—oh, fuck!” He trips before he continues running. He holds his phone over his shoulder and in the background the werewolf can be seen charging in his direction, but it isn’t chasing him. Instead it grabs a metal pole that was advertising a new restaurant and pulls it out of the ground, but it doesn’t use the pole as a weapon. Instead it looks around, frantic, then takes off out of the screen frame and Flash brings the phone back to his face, his nose taking up the entire screen. “You guys, this is crazy—this is so crazy—”
“That’s like fifteen minutes away from here,” MJ says. The three of them look between each other and Peter reaches for his own phone to check the Daily Bugle. Just as he expected, J. Jonah Jameson is yapping away in real time.
“Some might complain that our police are doing nothing to stop this madness, but that’s not the case. That’s not what we’re really dealing with here,” he spits. “The police are doing nothing, because the police are regular, hard working people who didn’t sign up to handle maniacs in costumes who have taken it upon themselves to be domestic terrorists . That’s a job for other maniacs in costumes, like Spider-Man, who is nowhere to be found for the last hour.” A live clip streaming from a building up high plays next to J.J.J.’s head, and the werewolf is barely visible on the ground, running in circles with the metal pole still in tow.
“Perhaps this idiot is working in tandem with Spider-Man, and the bastard is waiting to make a grand reveal ! Who knows anymore, people, who knows. I try to know for you, but I'll admit that even I'm stumped right now.”
Peter clicks the screen to black without closing the app and tosses his phone on the nightstand, unable to endure the sound of that man's voice any longer. He leans forward into his hands, runs his fingers through his hair and supports his elbows on his thighs, head hanging in frustration.
“I don’t know what’s going on, but I hope that thing doesn’t hurt anyone,” Ned says after a beat of silence.
Peter sighs and resigns himself to fate. “I think you guys need to stay here tonight. Call your parents and whatever, but I don’t want you out there while that thing is out there too.”
Ned nods and texts his family. MJ rises from the bed and stands by his front door while she calls her mom.
“It’s fine, I’m at Peter’s apartment with Ned. We saw the news and we’re gonna stay here and watch a show or something. Yeah…okay. Okay. I’ll see you tomorrow. Love you too.”
If they’re going to be here overnight, Peter will have to deal with the bathroom now. He doesn’t know what he would have done with himself if he hadn’t bought the pitch black trash bags for his kitchen instead of the white ones, he thinks as he stuffs air fresheners along with his suit into one. The wash cloth will have to stay in the shower. He wipes the sink down with the Lysol MJ had left at his house and spot cleans whatever blood he finds on the tile floor. Heart pounding, he carries the bag through as casually as he can, tying it once before placing it in the corner between his window and night stand.
“Sorry I don’t have a king sized bed,” Peter jokes as he turns to face them. He doesn’t even have a spare pillow for either Ned or MJ. “There’s a sleeping bag in one of the unopened boxes in my closet, but that’s it.”
“That’s okay, I think I’m gonna be up late tonight,” Ned says. He opens the closet and after much digging finds the sleeping bag. Peter tosses him his pillow and Ned looks at him, confused.
“I feel bad because the floor is hard, so. Take the pillow. I’m sleeping on my stomach anyways.”
Ned spreads the blue sleeping bag out parallel to Peter’s bed, but with enough space so that MJ can get out comfortably on her side of the bed. She steps over the sleeping bag and walks to the dresser, opening the bottom drawer. “Do you mind?” She asks. “I can’t sleep in jeans.”
“Yeah, of course. There should be black sweatpants in there.”
“Thanks,” she says as she takes them to the bathroom to change. The moment she closes the door, Ned sits next to Peter and rattles off questions.
“You spent the night at her house? Dude, MJ does not fly like that. Why—”
“It was after everything that happened, uhm, that day when Skip came to the donut shop after you left. I was just really stressed out and she was keeping me company.”
“Oh, that’s nice,” Ned says, sincere. “How did your neighbor’s Great Dane get you like that?” MJ exited the bathroom and laid her jeans over the back of the desk chair before and she sat behind Peter on the bed, since Ned was sitting next to him.
“I was going down the stairs and something must have spooked it, then I got spooked by the giant ass dog, then we sorta tumbled and its paw got under my shirt, and here we are.”
“Right, okay…that’s wild.”
“Yeah, it sure is. Trust me, I would have rather it not happened,” he laughs as he touches the wrap around his waist.
“Oh, let me get you a shirt,” MJ says. She brings him a navy tee. “I got the darkest one I could find in case of blood.”
“Thanks, but we don’t have to worry about that. I’m sure I’ll be a lot better in the morning.”
The lamp on the nightstand burned bright, but Ned was passed out in the sleeping bag not even ten minutes later. So much for staying up.
“Hey,” Peter whispers. “I’m sorry to ask you to get up again, but could you get me another shirt?”
“Yeah, sure.” MJ tiptoes around Ned and returns with a gray tee. “What is it for?”
With effort, Peter slides the gray shirt on and places the navy one over his lamp so that the room is much darker, but not too dark. He lays down on his stomach and so does MJ, facing each other.
“I know you don’t like the dark, so. T-shirt lamp.” Peter giggles, the phrase t-shirt lamp is much funnier out loud. He imagines a lampshade shaped like an actual t-shirt, with a little pocket on the chest and everything.
MJ rolls on her side so that she can softly trace his forearm with her fingertips, sending goosebumps wherever they meet his skin.
“Next time you take a trip for your super important NDA job, tell us, okay? You were gone for weeks, it was a little scary."
“Okay.”
His eyes are closing from the soothing feeling of her tracing his arm, but his heart is thumping too fast to sleep. Images of the werewolf flash through his mind, interrupting his desire to be closer to her. Her affection felt unearned. So unearned, but he needed it so badly. He couldn’t feel at peace anymore, not since he allowed himself that moment at her apartment. Here she was, comforting this idiot she knew from showing up at her workplace every possible moment because he was lonely. She didn’t really know him, she didn’t know how much he had screwed up.
Maybe this was really why he was so hesitant to tell her and Ned the truth. He’d done it, he’d found them just as he promised, wasn’t that enough? Did he have to pour all of his mistakes back out to them? Relive his flaws, his worst moments? He could become more deserving of their company if he did things right this time, if he protected them, and the city— the world again, if he had to. If it came to that. It almost felt as if New York was too small, the pattern of catching crooks becoming so clear and he was getting too comfortable with it. God must have rolled the dice and landed on werewolves this time for him. After this, if he could solve it, if he could conquer the Man-Wolf— then what? The other Peters battled men made of electricity, men made of sand—corrupted scientists who murdered his aunt in cold blood. What did life have in store for him?
Laying on her stomach again, MJ takes his hand.
He dreams of the werewolf tearing her limb from limb.