Chapter 2
3 months
Peter sat with her, every appointment she had Peter was there. He made suggestions, the doctors were impressed with his ideas, but they couldn’t do it. Not legally anyway, and if its not legal and it put’s a doctors reputation on the line theres no hope for success.
So that’s where they were at, the doctors gave her a timeframe and they decided to use it as best they could.
Three years they gave her… well they didn’t physically hand her three years to live, no one can put a perfect time stamp on an unpredictable death. But that’s what they said.
Its not what May got though
3 months
That’s what she got
Tony and Pepper were there the whole way through the last two months, they each held the two broken souls in their hearts.
2 months
2 months before she passed, Peter told Tony
He told Tony at the hospital after a frantic phone call to the mentor he didn’t realise he was making
It was a hot day and it had got to May’s head. She fell in the kitchen before Peter could get there. He was sitting on the couch watching TV when his spider senses went off and he bolted towards the feeling.
The feeling of fear
The feeling of pain
The feeling of falling.
The second he got to his unconscious aunt he lifted her up and onto the couch, and called.
He called who he though was 911
He called and a familiar voice answered unbothered and unknowing
“Key kid, how was school?”
Peter felt his heart clench at the sound of the voice, the voice that was Tony’s and suddenly he couldn’t breathe, the air was thick and his lungs were tight and it just didn’t match and it didn’t fit through. His mind went through thoughts, thoughts he shouldn’t have been thinking in his time of crisis. Thoughts of not just loosing May, but also loosing Tony. Where would he be if they were both gone and there was nothing left for him. He thought May to be his mother and he thought Tony to be his father, they might not be blood, but they were his and there was nothing else too it.
He heard words over the phone that wouldn’t register until later.
Later didn’t come too long after as Tony blew down his front door to his apartment, ironman suited and ready to fight.
That’s when he thought back, thought back to those words
“Pete? You there?” … Tony
“Boss, Mr Parker seems to be having a severe anxiety attack, and his Aunt is unconscious” … and that must have been F.R.I.D.A.Y
How would she even be able to tell anything through a phone call? He decided he didn’t even want to know.
Peter was thrown from his thoughts as a hand that laid pressure to his shoulder and brought him to reality. He looked up to his mentor/father figure then to May.
“What happened? Did you call an ambulance?” Tony asked with concern
“I thought I did, but you answered. And I didn’t catch her, she was just… and I was-“ Peter fumbled through words not quite filling a sentence.
“Peter, hey, hey. Breathe with me okay, just breathe” Tony said levelling him self to match the kid.
Peter took a moment to listen, matching his breaths to Tony’s, listening to the rhythm of Tonys battered heart.
He let out a long breath before speaking again “Tony” Peter looked from the mans chest up to his eyes “May has cancer”
Not ten minutes later Tony had flown May to the hospital in his suit
And the second Pepper and Happy arrived to pick Peter up he was in the car and pulled into Pepper’s arms.
They arrived and were ushered in by the hospital security to a hospital floor Peter didn’t even know existed, he soon learned they had a special floor made especially for the higher ups, celebrities and people the press would want to get a hold of.
The moment he saw Tony sitting in a chair looking out to nothing, he ran to him.
He ran like he was being chased and didn’t want to look back to the terrifying scene behind him
The terrifying scene that would do nothing but shatter his world from within
The terrifying scene that was the worst villain of all
The worst villain of all that was a cancerous Aunt May
He melted into the arms of the billionaire, the billionaire that could do nothing more than be there for his kid. Because there was nothing more he could do, this isn’t any problem that Tony had thought about on a personal level. This isn’t any problem he can fix with his weapons and or his money.
This problem is Cancer
And Cancer has no cure
Peter sank low until he was huddled on Tony’s lap on the chair crying loud enough for a few sad faces to turn to the sight from the two other families who were seated in the room
Crying loud enough for the nurses walking through to slow down and witness the sight
Crying loud enough to drown out the inevitable sound of the everlasting hospital beeps that came through the doors to left
five minutes later he was asleep, Tonys arms wrapped around him tight and comforting
His exhaustion got the better of him, from the anxiety attack, the growing panic within the past hour and a half and the constant use of his fast healing eating away at his metabolism trying to find a problem his brain couldn’t locate due to the lack of physicality, there was no other way to go than to sleep.
He woke up with a start getting a wheeze from the man beneath him, he woke up because he heard the accelerated heart beat and fast paced step of a person he couldn’t match a scent too as someone he knew.
Because he didn’t, it was the doctor.
The new doctor Tony managed to scrounge up from no where.
“Sorry” Peter said to Tony before moving too the seat next to him, still close enough to be in contact with, because that right now is the only think keeping Peter grounded
Because that right now is the only think keeping Peter from swinging into something too dangerous for him to handle
“Are you all here for May Parker?” The doctor sounded kind looking to the four nodding their heads
“What happened? Whats wrong with her?” Peter asked, his voice was small and he sounded like he was about to cry again and Tony wrapped a loose arm around his shoulder pulling him closer until the seat divider wouldn’t let them.
“We gave Miss Parker some fluids, but she has an extremely low guarded immune system right now due to the cancer. I believe she has picked up a bug, possibly due to the weather change. She will be needed to be monitored over the next week or so and I’ll be sending home some medication she will have to take until she’s better.”
“Is she awake?” Peter asks the doctor sitting up a little straighter
“She is” the doctor says with a smile “she’s just got to finish this lot of fluid and she will be fine to go back home”
“Thanks Doc” Tony says with a small smile of gratitude
“She’s in room 12, you’re more than welcome to go see her” The doctor didn’t even finish his sentence before Peter had left their sight.
“Anything else you want to add Doc, without the kid here?” Tony said standing and fixing his suit
“I read her file, the doctor she had gave her no more than three years. Looking over his findings and analysing the tests we just done… I don’t think” he sighs “I don’t think she has that long”
Tony visibly stiffens at the doctors words “so how long do you think?” He puts his clenched fists in his pant pockets
“Four, maybe five months max… I’m sorry, but I’d start to prepare for the inevitable future Mr Stark.” The doctor has a perfectly practiced sorry look on his face, he flips the folder under his arm and walks off leaving Tony in a state of shock
Leaving Tony in a state of denial
Leaving Tony in a state of sadness
A state of sadness not only for May, but for Peter too. Tony is all the kid has left and he knows that, Peter has told him once before. Once was enough for it to stick, deep in his brain to be remembered for the rest of his life. He has to help his kid
His kid
He has too
1 month
1 month later and that’s just what he had to do and not just willingly this time, it was legally bound.
May finalised her will to leave Peter to Tony
May finalised her will to leave her boy to a man she had once despised
A man she had once despised, but learned to love
She learned to love not as a companion, she learned to love as a friend, as family
She learned to love for her boy, her Peter
Her Peter that turned into their Peter
Their Peter that was now only his Peter
Only his Peter because she was gone and Tony was all he had left.