weeping willow
A weeping willow: a Eurasian willow with trailing branches and foliage. It's a symbol of a new life, a willow branch can be planted in the ground, and from it, a new tree will grow in its place. Survival and thriving in harsh conditions.
“Hello,” Peter chirps as he enters the empty candy shop. MJ is behind the counter, her hair held at the nape of her neck in a bun. For once more, Peter is crushed under the relief of knowing Michelle is safe and healthy.
“Hello, Parker,” she deadpans, “came here to have the best city in town again?”
Peter, like the stupid little child he is, keeps staring at MJ’s face with a stupid smile. She looks the same, just as he remembers. Just as how she looked like the last time Peter hugged him. All sunshine and wit and wisdom and beauty. Like a little puppy looking at his owner, he is only able to nod as an answer.
“Coming right up,” MJ murmurs and turns around to bring him his cup of stale black coffee. Secretly, like she always does, she puts a pack of sugar and cream without asking him, and Peter acts like he doesn’t see her fingers lurking around the cup.
“Are you going to take the exams this year?” MJ asks nonchalantly as she puts the cup forward. They are, Peter guesses, some sort of acquaintances right now as he comes here almost every evening, just before the end of her shift. MJ is the most perceptive person he’s ever known, so he isn’t surprised that she sees right through his act of buying coffee, but still, she is kind enough to offer him a few words and rarely, very rarely, a smile, so Peter thinks it’s okay. He can keep living like this if it means everybody is safe.
He assumes a part of MJ’s kindness stems from pity as Peter looks worse and worse every day, and claims the coffee is to study for GED exams he is planning to take. MJ doesn’t ask anything else, but he has the strange, hopeful twinge in his heart that she knows something’s eating him alive, like she already did before, and at least offers her friendship as a remedy.
“I think so,” Peter says after taking a sip of his coffee, “I’m not really sure whether I can do it though.” He is, in a way, genuine in his words. Although his fake papers are enough for the underground pharmaceutical company he works for, he still has the childish urge to be successful in life the way May would have wanted to see him, to graduate from high school and go to college. He is sure he can pass the GED on any given day, but he struggles to think about sitting still for a few hours and not thinking about how his life is coming down in shambles enough to answer some questions.
“Maybe you should start studying instead of walking to the other end of the town to get coffee,” MJ says with a straight face, but her sternness only makes Peter’s moronic grin grow.
“No,” he says sweetly, “I think I will keep coming here.” The clock makes a ping sound, marking the end of MJ’s shift. He gets up from the little stool and waves at the girl before walking out of the shop. “See you tomorrow,” he says dreamily.
Usually, MJ either sends him a friendly death-stare or simply shakes her head in disbelief. This time, her eyes focus on the arm stretched forward to wave at her. “What’s wrong with your arm, loser?” she says steadily, counting the contents of the little tip jar at the same time.
Peter’s arm is bent at a slightly weird angle as the burn in his shoulder still hurts after almost a week, but it’s almost unrecognizable even to him. “Strained it while benching weights,” he shoots at her with his shit-eating grin, which earns him a middle finger from MJ. Maybe he is imagining things, but he is almost sure he saw MJ’s mouth twitch just the tiniest bit at the corners. He stays in front of the door just for a millisecond more, taking the color of her skin and the warmth of her eyes in.
Then, he leaves. He leaves his smile inside the shop to linger around MJ’s hands. He leaves a part of himself inside, or what’s left of it, to aimlessly wander around the streets of New York City for a while.
No Ned to text. No home to go back to. No homework to do. He tries to think of what May would have wanted, which carves an open wound inside him because May will never tell him what she wants, but he tries to be grateful that he is alive and MJ is alive and she almost smiled at him today, so he lifts his head up and takes a long, long breath in. He’s alive. Ned is alive. Mr. Stark is alive. It’s going to be okay.
*
“Peter,” Karen’s voice softly echoes in his ear, “might I suggest getting medical attention for your shoulder as it seems to be infected?”
“You sure might,” Peter mumbles as he dangles his feet from the corner of the roof. “Are you sure there is nothing I can do around here?” He repeats for the third time that night after a few seconds.
“Sorry, Peter, there seem to be no disturbances around,” Karen reports.
He rolls his shoulder around, trying to assess the damage after swinging on it for an entire week. Sure, it aches, and sometimes, mid-swing, it twinges so bad he thinks his arm will snap into two, but it’s not that bad. “Karen, why do you think it’s infected? I wrapped it well.”
“It could be your dangerously low blood sugar, lack of medication, straining, lack of adequate rest, swinging-”
“Okay, lady,” he says with a fake offended voice, “I thought we were on the same side.”
“We are, Peter,” Karen says kindly, or just like she says anything else, “I am programmed to look out for your wellbeing, hence the insistence on medical attention for your injury.”
“Thanks, Karen,” Peter mumbles.
“Always,” she answers quickly.
Peter lets himself slide back, and lies on the roof instead of sitting. One more night sky. “Do you think,” he blurts out suddenly, “that every single person in the world is loved?” Although the words sound weirdly intense and forced, it’s a thought that’s been crossing Peter’s mind for a few nights now. Is it possible that he is the only person left in the world with no one to love? Surely, among the other eight billion people, there must be one that’s as lonely as him.
“I do not have the capability to measure the parameters of love, however, the statistical possibility suggests that the answer is most likely, yes.”
“Damn,” Peter mumbles, “so I’m the odd one out?”
“I doubt that’s correct,” Karen answers. “What would be your definition of love?”
“I’m not sure,” Peter says, “me and May. Me and MJ. I don’t know. That one cat that slept on me yesterday. I loved her,” he adds passionately.
“Then, Peter, I’m sure there are hundreds of people who love you,” Karen concludes.
“Why?”
“You have helped 481 individuals in your suit in the last two years,” Karen starts, “they had an average of three immediate relatives, and about 32% of them had civil partners. Although there is no data about the friends, it’s possible to conclude you have touched the lives of up to two thousand people.”
“Oh,” Peter says dumbfoundedly, “I’ve never realized it’s been so many people.”
“One of the kids you saved last week had uploaded a video online about you,” Karen continues, disregarding his surprise. “Would you like to see it?”
“Sure,” he mumbles, and a blurry video fills his screen.
“Zainab,” a man calls softly, “it’s on.”
The girl looks up from the paper in front of her and looks up to the camera with big, brown doe-eyes. Two of her little fingers are bandaged, but she seems healthy compared to the ashy hue of her face on the day Peter saw her the last.
“Dear Mr. Spiderman,” she starts with a cough, “thanks for t-taking me out. Swinging was fun.”
“Good job, asalam,” someone murmurs from behind the camera, and the girl smiles shyly at the camera. “I drew this for you. My daddy helped,” the camera turns around to reveal a man in impeccable clothing, smiling fondly at the little girl with the same black curls and dimples, “Love you. Okay, bye!”
The man watches the girl sprint out of the camera with quiet giggles before looking at the lens himself, and for a second, Peter feels as if the man is right here, speaking directly to him. “Thank you,” he says quietly and smiles at him before the video is cut.
Peter isn’t crying but a few drops of water fall out of nowhere. “Maybe it’s time to go to sleep, right?” he mumbles to Karen.
“I think that would be a smart decision,” Karen approves. Almost the entirety of Sunday flies away with sleeping, waking up, and going back to sleep. At 9 at night, a notification from his phone jerks him awake just before he dozes off.
“There seems to be a disturbance two blocks from here,” Karen reports, “a bank robbery.”
Peter jumps awake, pulling his suit on in a second. He speaks quickly as he opens the window, “Any hostages?”
“There is no information on the police channels.”
“Alright,” he swings himself forward, “let’s go.”
And then, he falls.
It’s just for a brief moment. As he pushes himself forward with his left shoulder, a sharp pain conquers him so fast that his body goes rigid and black dots cover his eyes. Karen’s blaring voice echoes in his mind meaninglessly, but he manages to shoot a web at a window ledge fast enough to avoid becoming a spider stain on the asphalt.
He barely pushes himself to sit on the fire escape. “What the fuck was that?” he pants frantically, trying to catch his shallow breath.
“I detect damage on the shoulder of the suit, and the infection on your shoulder seems to have spread. I would advise immediate medical attention, and not using your suit until the damage is repaired.”
“But I did repair it,” he shouts hysterically as he crawls up to the roof of the building.
“You have sewn the rip,” Karen explains, “but the suit is damaged farther than that.”
“What am I supposed to do now?” he says desperately. He has a few ideas. He could break into Midtown’s lab to get a few things, but he doesn’t think he would find enough materials to fix a nanite suit. He could steal something from the job, maybe something to create a substitute fabric for the shoulder, but he doesn’t know whether that would affect the machinery of the rest of the suit. Plus, his shift starts in eight hours, and he does not have eight hours.
“Might I suggest-” Karen starts, but Peter stops her. “Nope, sorry.” He can do it. He has saved half of the universe. He lifted a building off of himself in an actual onesie. He fought interdimensional mad scientists with his alternate realities. He can handle a few robbers with one working arm.
As he swings forward with his healthy arm, Karen interrupts again. “Peter, it would be highly inadvisable to keep swinging in your current conditions.”
“Bummer,” Peter murmurs. Every time he swings with the same arm, there is a longer period of falling down as he can’t use the second arm to shoot the web, and each time Peter thinks he is falling to his death, yet through the rush of plummeting towards moving traffic and concrete every thirty seconds, he becomes hyper-vigilant of his surroundings.
“Peter-” Karen interjects again, but Peter cuts her off with a scream as he almost hits a building. “Oof, that was close, wasn’t it?”
“Peter, your shoulder-”
“Karen, would it be awfully rude if I muted you?”
“I do not understand human concepts like rudeness, however, if it will stop you from muting me, I will say yes.”
“Smart girl,” he murmurs, “look, we’re here!”
As he enters through the door, Peter realizes there are only three robbers in the bank, and they all wear Spiderman masks. “Karen,” he calls out, “am I hallucinating as a result of fever?”
“No, the robbers seem to be wearing a replica of your mask.”
“Is it deja-vu if they weren’t wearing my mask last time? I could swear I’ve fought you, like, a year ago guys!” he shouts as he lands on Spider-man number 2.
One of the guys murmurs a long curse which makes Peter blush under his mask. “C’mon, guys, I would never say that. Add a little bit of gusto, please,” shouts as he webs the man to the wall.
“Okay, what are we doing here? Are we having a Spiderman look-alikes convention because nobody told me.”
“Oh, for fuck’s sake, man,” one of them grumbles, “just shut up.”
“No can do,” Peter replies, this is literally the only form of human interaction I have these days. “You know,” he continues jovially as he webs the second man, “I just met some other guys who looked just like me a few days ago,” he kicks the man before jumping to the ceiling, “and they loved my jokes.”
He jumps back to avoid the last man’s kick, but instead, it hits him on the shoulder. For a second, the whole world seems to stop as Peter falls from the ceiling in slow motion.
“That was,” he says as he scrambles back, trying to catch his breath, “very rude, man. Very rude.”
From a safe distance, he webs up the last man and makes sure each one is secure before leaving until the police come to collect them. Just before he steps outside, he sees a board marker lying on the floor as a result of the trashed entrance, flashing under the bright lights as if begging Peter to take it. Without thinking, he picks up the pen and walks up to the webbed robbers.
“I was calling you guys Spider number one to three, but I just remembered me and the other guys are Spider number one to three. Do you have any preference, like, a favorite number maybe?”
No one speaks as a result of Peter’s web covering their mouths. “Yeah, you are right, it’s kind of rude but I didn’t want you guys calling me unfunny again. Let’s go with 4, 5, and 6, then, and everybody will know you are not me or my buddies,” he explains as he writes the numbers on each of the plastic masks.
“Okay, it was nice meeting you guys,” he chirps before sprinting out as the police sirens become more prominent.
As he is out of jokes to make and bad guys to catch, the blinding pain in his arm also becomes more prominent. “Okay, alright, Karen, I’m all ears. What do I do now? What are the options?”
“Regular medical clinics or emergency rooms may not be equipped to handle your mutation, which significantly decreases your options.”
“Do I even have any other options?”
“SHIELD has a medical base downtown.”
“I would rather chew my arm off, I think,” he reasons after a second.
“I could try searching databases for existing numbers of the Avengers to see whether one would be willing to help.”
“That’s rude,” Peter interjects, “they don’t remember me, I can’t just turn up at their door. What if I just get something from the pharmacy?”
“I’m afraid the infection is far too spread for that, and you seem to be in too much distress to be able to care for yourself. But there may be one other option.”
“No, Karen, you know I can’t go to Ned’s. I know he would try to help Spiderman but-”
“The odds suggest that Mr. Stark would be willing to assist you,” Karen interjects.
“Did you just set me up for this?” Peter asks incredulously and stops crawling over the building to take a breath. His vision is blurrier than usual.
“It seems like Mr. Stark is currently at the Tower,” Karen continues, “and ready to help Spiderman, as he mentioned in your last encounter.”
Maybe it’s the delirium setting in, maybe the sheer curiosity of what Mr. Stark would do if a vigilante suddenly appears on his roof. Nonetheless, he lets Karen prepare a route for him.
“What if he tries to exterminate me?” he asks Karen as he leisurely swings between buildings, each small movement hurting immensely.
“I doubt that would happen,” Karen reasons.
“What if-” Peter keeps going, “What if Morgan or Ms. Potts is there and I scare them and Mr. Stark decides to swing me off the roof for it?”
“Children of six years are advised to go to bed at around 8, which would eliminate the possibility of you running into Morgan. If you do indeed bump into Ms. Potts, however, she would most likely try to have a conversation as she’s been curious about you as seen by her previous internet history.”
“Karen,” Peter chastises with mock awe, “Why are you inspecting Ms. Potts’s search history?”
“I’m programmed to be on the lookout for any individual who demonstrates a specific interest in you or Spiderman to be aware of potential threats. However, Ms. Potts seems more concerned about you than being dangerous.”
“What do you mean?” he huffs as he barely misses going headfirst into a window. He sticks his feet into the side of the building and leans into cold concrete to rest. He can clearly see the building now but the ache in his arm and the overall dizziness makes it difficult to focus on the lights.
“Her recent search history includes, Who is Spider-man? Is Spider-man a teen? Where is Spider-man? Spiderman news and most recently, about fifteen minutes ago, Is Spider-man okay? which probably indicates she has seen the viral video of you falling headfirst into the busy traffic.”
“Viral video,” he squeaks and he almost unsticks himself with the power it took to utter the words, “what viral video?”
“Someone took a video of Spiderman freefalling, presumably the first time you blacked out mid-swing tonight.”
“I didn’t black-out,” he grumbles but it sounds too childish, “I got distracted for a second. You know what? I’m sorry, Karen, I love you, but I can’t keep having these conversations tonight. Too much talking. I think I just exceeded my limit. Mute.”
He swings in silence to the Tower, and lands on the black-out windows without much thought. It’s almost midnight, so he assumes Mr. Stark would be in his lab. At that exact moment, it crosses his mind whether he should go to the actual entrance of the tower and take the elevator, but his arm hurts too much to crawl down a few hundred stories, and he really doesn’t want to explain to the security why he really needs to see Mr. Stark.
Whether it’s fate nudging him or pure luck, the window to Mr. Stark’s lab is cracked open. Notes of an old song he’s never heard of seeps through the little gap. With May’s face in his mind, he collects the visible pieces of his scattered mind and knocks on the window politely.
Mr. Stark jumps up and a gauntlet forms around his arms, and Peter doesn’t move at all even though for a second he is sure he is about to get the second infected burn wound of the week. Then, the cloudy look in the older man’s eyes disappears and he lunges forward to open the window.
He looks tired, Peter realizes, so utterly exhausted that it almost feels like looking at a mirror. “Hello,” Peter mumbles weakly as he slides in, standing awkwardly next to the man. He has not thought about what exactly he would tell the man once he is here. Hello, heal my wound (please)?
“Hi, Spidey,” the man says incredulously, “what brings you here?”
Peter thinks the words burn through his skin faster than the infection and fever. Mr. Stark had never been the kindest, but he usually looked at Peter with slight excitement and eagerness in his eyes whenever he’d come to the tower. Like a little child, he would tell him about all the things he had created and things he could create, things for the future, he would say, “For you, Pete.” Now, his eyes don’t look unkind or hostile, but they lack the intimacy they once had which is enough to shake Peter deep to his core.
He wonders whether it’s too late to jump out of the window and get lost in the darkness of the night. “Is this a bad time?” he says meekly instead.
“No, no,” Mr. Stark shrugs, “actually, it’s a great time. I really don’t feel like sleeping tonight, kid. Show me what you got.”
Peter can tell he won’t sleep. He has that slightly hysterical look in his eyes that sets when he thinks too much about Afghanistan or his past or Sokovia, a look of deep sorrow that eats one’s soul, one that would plague their dreams if they let it. Mr. Stark never does.
“I need help with fixing the suit,” he finally blurts out, “something’s wrong with the shoulder, I can’t make it work with what I have in hand.”
“Alright, let’s have a look,” the older man says, an excited glint glimmering in his eye as he points to the work tables around.
“And,” Peter adds quickly, “the mask stays on.”
The man shrugs again. He turns his back to Peter to tinker around as he takes the suit off. The movement sends a spasm through his shoulder, and he sucks in a sharp breath. “Everything okay?” Mr. Stark calls out.
“Just peachy,” he breaths out, trying to stop himself from cursing. Then, another problem resurfaces: he doesn’t have his bag with him, which means he doesn’t have any clothes on him other than the small athletic shorts he's wearing, and the horribly wrapped wound is impossible to hide.
After a second of thinking, he decides if he acts nonchalantly enough, Mr. Stark most likely wouldn’t ask about his scar. Probably. Except, as soon as the man turns around to face Peter, his face distorts with the slightest bit of confusion, and settles on… concern.
Or, Peter thinks, he is simply delusional.
“That doesn’t look peachy,” Mr. Stark remarks as he takes a step forward.
“It’s fine,” Peter retorts easily, “it’s wrapped.” For now, his plan is to let Mr. Stark help with the suit, and then ask for some super-strong increased metabolism fever reducers just before he leaves. “Here,” he nudges the suit forward, not allowing the other man to answer, “that’s where the rip is.”
Mr. Stark looks conflicted for a second but allows Peter to change the subject. He lays the suit on one of the tables and leans forward. After that second, Peter’s mind comes and goes in short intervals, but he successfully manages to keep in conversation with the man.
Mr. Stark asks him questions about his powers and webs and clothes, and Peter carefully avoids anything that would be too incriminating. The mask feels like it’s suffocating him, but he can’t risk taking it off and letting Mr. Stark see him. He now knows what happens when people know about him. He knows how much danger he puts everyone around him in, and he simply cannot bring himself to show Mr. Stark his face even if he is almost certain the man wouldn’t care. After all, Spider-man is no one to him, and neither is Peter Parker.
As he is lost in his mind for a second, Mr. Stark gently lowers something on his back which makes Peter flinch slightly. It’s a zip-up hoodie. “You look cold,” Mr. Stark explains himself simply.
Peter only nods as speaking feels too exhausting. After a thousand hours or a single second, Mr. Stark speaks again without looking up, “Can you fetch me that tablet?”
Again, soundlessly, Peter nods and gets up, but as soon as his feet hit the ground, he sways as if he’s been put on quicksand. Without even looking, Mr. Stark launches forward to put a steadying hand on his back. “Jeez, kid,” he remarks, helping Peter sit back on the stool, “are you alright?”
Peter opens his mouth a few times without a sound before croaking out a thin, “I’m fine.” A second later, he repeats himself, trying to sound more confident. “I’m fine, sorry. I got distracted for a second.”
Mr. Stark clearly doesn’t believe him, but he gently takes his hand off his back, which almost makes him keel over. To stop him, the older man puts his warm hand on the naked skin of his stomach. Peter squeaks with the increasing pain in his shoulder.
“I’m fine,” he repeats and tries to extract himself from Mr. Stark’s hands because this scene, these hands, these concerned eyes are too familiar and they carry a sense of deja vu that Peter is not yet ready to face (or lose).
“I think you have a fever, Underoos,” Mr. Stark continues, “it could be the wound. Did you see someone?”
“No need,” Peter croaks, “I heal fast.”
“Doesn’t seem like it,” he insists. “Friday, dear, would you scan him for injuries, please?”
There is a second of silence, and the mechanical AI voice fills the room. “Spiderman seems to be suffering from an infected burn wound on his shoulder, and currently has a fever of 103.2 degrees. Immediate medical attention is advised.”
“She sounds like Karen,” Peter murmurs.
“Your mother?” Mr. Stark raises an eyebrow, clearly unaware of the dagger he just put into Peter’s gut.
“No,” he forces himself to say, “my AI.”
“That’s cool, kid,” Mr. Stark continues, “an AI. Maybe you should start listening to her as well, eh?”
“It’s okay,” he insists, and breaks character for the first time that night, “I’ll heal.” Before these words, even when he squeals in pain and lets Mr. Stark joke about his onesie, he is Spiderman. He is a persona, a mask. Not a child who is scared he will go alone to an empty room tonight and it will be darker and colder than it has ever been, and he will wake up in the middle of the night in cold sweat asking for her mom or May or just anyone only for his meek voice to echo on the walls. As he says, “it’s okay”, he realizes, he simply becomes the little child he feels like he is, all but 17 years of age, feeling six and sixty at once.
“Oh, kid,” Mr. Stark says, and his eyes crumble with concern and fear so much that Peter can’t bear looking at him anymore. “You really are a kid, aren’t you?”
“No,” Peter says indignantly. “No.”
“Is there anyone who could help you? Do your parents know you do this?”
“I should go,” Peter mumbles, realizing he has already overstayed his welcome. “I’m sorry for interrupting.” He tries to get up, but Mr. Stark puts a hand on his shoulder to stop him.
“Let me look at your shoulder, alright? I won’t tell anyone. I promise.” He doesn’t say another word about parents or mothers after that, and Peter knows he understands. Before the Snap, when Peter came to the Tower to hang around for a while, they would talk. They would talk about Captain America and Ben and Howard Stark and Mr. Stark’s college years. As a rule, they never talked about Peter’s parents, but whenever something about them pained Peter too much or stuck in his mind, Mr. Stark would miraculously understand. Now, it seems like his magical power is still intact, and is even stronger combined with the apparent warmth he has adopted since before the Snap. Perhaps it’s being a father, Peter thinks, or maybe the absolute realization of life is too short to ration how much one loves or feels.
“Kid,” he urges, “let me help.”
“Promise you won’t try to find who I am,” Peter whispers.
“I promise,” he says sternly.
“You don’t have to help me because of what happened in the kindergarten,” Peter continues, “you don’t owe me anything.”
“That’s not it,” Mr. Stark says, “you need someone in your corner. That’s how it works. Even superheroes need some help.”
“I’m not a superhero,” Peter mumbles weakly, black spots dancing in front of his vision.
“You aren’t?” Mr. Stark asks with humor, almost as if entertaining a child. It makes Peter feel young, young like how he felt so small when May hugged him even when he was taller than her.
“Nope,” Peter says, barely audible, “just friendly neighborhood Spider-man.” Just as the last word leaves his mouth, promptly, he faints with the frantic cursing of Mr. Stark echoing in his mind. In the dark, he dreams of that one weird tree in the backyard of Mr. Stark’s cabin.
The shade and long arms of green running to the ground.
How Morgan ran between the leaves, giggling like a madman.
How one night he laid on the ground beneath it and thought to himself of all the things he would give just to see Mr. Stark again.