The streets of Queens were crowded. Filled with people who were fighting their ways through the others . Passing each other without even sharing a glance, none of them paid attention to the world around them. None of them cared about what was happening around them. No one felt or even saw the other's pain... Tony's pain.
Tony, who was sitting in the edge of a building's rooftop. The same building, the same rooftop Peter always sat on. He was looking down at people. He just couldn't understand. All of them were acting like nothing has happened.
Tony couldn't stand it. When Peter died, when his eyes looked at the world for the last time and then closed forever, it was like the world disappeared for Tony as Peter couldn't see it anymore. When his cold body never got up from the ground, the world must have ended. Everything shattered as he was buried under the ground. Peter was dead. The boy would never look into Tony's eyes with life shining in his own eyes. He was never gonna wave his hands for Tony when he got out of school. Tony was never gonna embrace the teen in his arms. He was never gonna hold his kid's hands again. Those hands were never gonna be warm again. So it couldn't be a world out there. Life wasn't supposed to go on if Peter wasn't in it anymore. Everything was supposed to stop with the kid's last breath. Everything around him must have shattered into pieces as his son's heart stopped. But it didn't.
It didn't and Tony couldn't stand it. Life was happening. People were walking in the streets, living their life, as if nothing has happened, as if the brightest light of the world hasn't just faded. Everyone were acting like nothing has happened. Looking at Tony, none of them realized he wasn't alive anymore. Child still laughed, parents still smiled, sun still came out every morning and moon still shined in the darkness of the night. Mothers gave birth everyday and smiled at their kids, not knowing that there was someone out there who was dying to see his kid's face again. They celebrated their kids success, not knowing that the chance of being succeed was taken from someone who deserved it the most. Everyone were busy with their own problems and Tony just couldn't get it. Did it matter anyway? Did anything matter now that Peter wasn't there? Did it matter that he could't sleep at nights? Couldn't eat anything, didn't do anything? when Peter couldn't do any of them either?
Life was still going on and the hardest part of it was that Tony was a part of it. He was supposed to be one of those people who didn't care about Peter's death. He was supposed to move on. He knew that he had to forget it, deal with it and only then he could continue living. But the problem was that he didn't want to. He didn't want to forget Peter, didn't want to live in a life without Peter. He didn't want to spend everyday without caring about how good it could have been if Peter was a part of it. He didn't want to look at the youths when they graduated, without caring that Peter could have been one of them....probably best of them. He was supposed to live his life everyday and forget what a great day Peter would have had if he was alive. How Peter would have shined in the world if he was alive. Then all of the people he was looking at from the rooftop, wouldn't be so careless about his absence.
But they missed Spiderman. They needed him and that showed they needed Peter, even if they didn't know that. and that made Tony proud. That his kid was such a great kid that people did miss him after his death. Even the ones who didn't completely knew him.
Tony sighed and whipped his tears. He looked at the view. This was what the city looked like in Peter's eyes. Just days before, Peter was sitting in where Tony was, looking at what Tony was looking at. Just days before life was so much easier, Tony wasn't struggling, May wasn't crying, MJ and Ned weren't grieving, and all of that was because Peter was breathing.
Without taking his glance away from the view, Tony took his phone out of his pocket. Finally he looked at his phone and dialed Peter's number and put his phone against his ears. Deep down he was praying that every beep would be the last and Peter would pick up. But he didn't and Tony prepared himself to leave another voicemail to someone who wasn't ever gonna listen to it. He breathed heavily and started.
"Hey, Pete...another voicemail. At first I thought it was a revenge for all the times you called or texted me and I didn't react. But...it's not fair underoos...you always knew that I would be there for you.....I always called you back..."
Tony paused for a minute. Then started again.
"You know what, Pete?...I...uhhhh..."
He started to feel nervous as his voice began to shake. He laughed nervously and continued after a shake of his head.
" I still don't believe that you're gone. Everyday I wake up..I pray that all these days were just a nightmare and you are still alive ...I still can't believe that you're...I mean you're ....you Were..."
He corrected himself no matter how much it made his heart ache.
"You were so young. Way younger than me. I never worried that I would have to see your de....''
He didn't want to use the word, but it didn't matter. It was too late now.
"I was supposed to go before you...and you...you were so bright that de..dea..death wasn't an option. I imagined a lot of fates for you. This was none of them. All of them were so good that death wouldn't be accepted in them...."
He was struggling to hold his teas back. He remembered how he imagined Peter's future. Peter in a cap and gown. Peter as a scientist. Peter working in labs. Peter as the manager of a company. Peter working with Tony...just like the days they spent in lab. Then the picture of Peter's body laying on the ground as rain poured down on him, dying alone and in pain... it was not what he imagined. It was just too much for Tony.
"And...you...you ar.. were..you were Spiderman. Nothing has gotten you to your feet. You weren't supposed to leave like that. Just...that...I wasn't supposed to lose you that easy..."
He couldn't take it anymore. So he started to sob as he talked.
" Beside...you were Peter ...PETER...underoos ...the kid, MY kid. You were just something that needed to stay. You were my everything. You weren't supposed to leave. You were a part of the world's explanation for me. There wasn't supposed to be a world ..a world without you....and I just can't ...
Tony wasn't fighting with his tears anymore. He just broke down. He let the phone fall down beside him, and then he put his head in his hands and sobbed. he kept telling himself that crying wouldn't change anything...but it just made him cry harder, because nothing changed this. There wasn't anything in this world tat could make Peter Parker alive again.Not his science, not his money, not his tech....and not even his love for Peter.
The only thing he could see even when he closed his eyes was Peter's smile, The only thing he could hear was Peter's voice and his laughs...the excitement in his tone as he talked about his day...his broken voice as he told Tony he was ready to die, when he told Tony he loved him. He would do anything to touch his messy curls again, to call his name and have him turn back to face him and smile at him. He would do anything to hear Peter call him Mr.stark. All of his thoughts were killing him and the only way he had so he could live was to forget all of this. To get rid of Peter's voice in his head. But forgetting Peter, not remembering the voice of someone who was life itself, was another kind of death for Tony.
He looked down. Life had lost the meaning and it wouldn't mean anything if Tony ended it. It was just so easy to jump. To end this heaviness, the sorrow in his heart. World without Peter was prison, this would be like breaking free. The only thing he had to do was to jump. A simple movement would full the empty hole in his heart. ...
But Tony knew that he wasn't going to do it. Peter wouldn't him to do that. Peter wanted him to move on, no matter how hard it was Peter always did the right thing. He always fought his problems, and didn't care how hard or impossible they looked. Peter was strong. He would have fought this, if not for himself for the ones that cared about him. He wouldn't give up...so wouldn't Tony. He will fight. He will live just so the thought of Peter wouldn't die. He would live to keep Peter's memory alive. He would do this for Peter and the one he loved. He would take care of Peter's family, his friend and the one he cared about. This was the right thing. And he was going to the right thing...for Pepper , Rhodey, Bruce, Happy, May, Ned, MJ....Peter...and himself. He knew Peter would be proud and this was all that mattered, all that he wanted...needed.
He looked down and smiled, he wasn't alone anymore. Because Peter was not completely gone. He was alive in Tony's mind. His memory was going to be with him forever. It would keep him warm and get him up every time he fall, it would keep Tony as the person he was with Peter, someone with a bright and caring heart.
He wasn't alone and he was alive...Because Peter was always with him and he would always make Tony's heart beat.