Chapter 6
4:22AM. Street in front of some nightclub. East Village.
A string of spun-up criminals bound in webs left a trail on the streets and back alleys of East Village, leading the way right to the middle of a crowded sidewalk. The Spider-Man was knee deep in violent crooks, fighting off web by web and punch by punch. There were six men, all yelling and flushed from drunkenness, trying to best the webslinger with kicking and bottle-throwing. They were almost more of a nuisance than an enemy, and not hard to fight off. Swiftly, he kept fighting back, barely getting bruised. A crowd of late-night partiers and the inebriated gathered in the few feet surrounding, too afraid and too trusting of their friendly-neighbourhood-crime-stopper to intervene in any way. He could most definitely handle it though. They'd ganged up on him after he'd swiftly webbed up their syringes full of very illegal highs from the rooftop above the alley they'd intended to shoot up in. He'd climbed down with the very intention to fight them, and expected nothing less than a fight. He only wished it hadn't shifted into the street, in view of all those who'd be out at four AM. Which, in East Village, there was no shortage of. Prostitutes and drag queens and drunken college kids alike huddled to watch the Spider-man fight off some criminals. As the junkies kept coming at him, he wondered how much longer they'd keep throwing their lopsided punches and tossing (And missing) their empty beer bottles at his head. Quickly, he glanced over between dodging punches to see that the crowd to his left was disrupting in noise and quickly parting. From a distance, growing louder, he heard a loud voice. "CANONBALL!!!!!" It distracted him for a minute, just long enough for one of the men to finally get a hit in. A beer bottle loudly smashed against his skull, and he suddenly felt very lightheaded. The last thing he saw was the blurry image of Deadpool, running full speed in his direction, diving full force into the men fighting Peter. Just as he knocked four of the six men to the ground, in uncanny resemblance to bowling pins, he felt himself crumple to the floor with a rather unpleasant thunk. There was a vague feeling of being shaken, and then a general feeling of painful numbness.
4:46AM. John V. Lindsey East River Park. East Village.
Spider-man slowly opened his eyes, a sharp and painful ringing in his head. He blinked slowly a few times, slowly taking in the reality before his eyes. He felt wooden slats beneath his body, and quickly put together he was probably on a park bench. The sky was a dark, silk-like navy blue, littered with only two or three visible stars. He could catch the orange glow of nearby streetlights at the bottom of his eyesight. He sat up slowly, forearms against the bench. A spurt of anxiety rushed to his heart and sped his heartrate as Peter quickly put his hands up to his face to ensure his mask was still on. The wave dissipated quickly at the feeling of his mask under his gloved hands. Sitting all the way up, Peter winced as he readjusted. His head was stabbing with excruciating pain. Suddenly a very worried Deadpool came rushing up to him from a few feet away, having realized his regain of consciousness. "I- ugh. Where am I? What- What time is it?" He grimaced. Deadpool perked up, making attempts to help him stand. "Hey! Webs, you're alive! I thought for sure you'd have kicked the bucket from that blow. At least gotten to like, vegetable status. Severed some kinda wire in your brain at least-" Spider-man interrupted him. "Man, shut up. Do you know how bad my head hurts right now?" Deadpool continued his rambling. "I mean, probably, you know I got stabbed in the head one time? On a first date too. He didn't even kiss me first." Peter's brain slowed to process that comment for a second. "… He?"
"… Problem?" The merc retorted apprehensively.
"No I just, I uh, didn't know you swung both ways."
"I do! Violently. And with katanas." He proudly declared.
The conversation paused for a second as Peter achingly rubbed his temples.
The association of anxiety suddenly rose again as he touched his mask.
"You didn't, while I was out, you didn't look-"
"Yep. Totally did."
"You looked under my mask?!"
"… Not your mask."
"Dude! You looked at-"
"Your wounds? Of course I did. Nasty bruise on your arm. Cuts on your neck from the bottle smashing. Wait, what'd you think I looked-"
"Nevermind." Spider-man instantly blurted.
He stood up and staggered across the sidewalk to the railing over the east river. Deadpool hovered around him like a worried mother, making sure he didn't stumble too far without being caught. "I got it. Thanks, man." He patted the arm hovering around him, grimacing as he rested his arms on the cool metal. He was mortified he was this injured after fighting off nothing but some homeless junkies. Blame it on emotional detachment, I guess. Should definitely be less out-of-it on the job, but he couldn't help it. The complicated feelings bubbling up in his mind were getting harder and harder to ignore. He'd been stuffing things down with the whole What-the-fuck-I'm-not-supposed-to-like-guys-much-less-Deadpool-and-my-fucking-roomate thing for about a month now. It'd been two weeks since the last time he actually saw the merc, giving his questions and feelings more time to stew, and Wade was true to his word about not being home much, apart from in passing and their mutual days off, which tended to be few and far between. Peter would fully admit he'd been avoiding Deadpool after that weird interaction in Central Park. Meeting again was not by choice, and he considered himself way too much of a pansy to ever bring that incident up. He just hoped the merc wouldn't either, which he was entirely aware of being incredibly unlikely.
"So, like, are we gonna talk about the elevator in the room?"
"The what?"
"You've been, like, completely avoiding me."
Ah, shit.
"I hate to break this to you, because elevator is a much better word for the term, but it's actually elephant in the room." He was shamelessly trying to change the subject.
"Elevator sounds way cooler though."
"No it doesn't." Peter scoffed and smiled under his mask.
"Are you okay to walk? I need to have my romantic comedy moment." Deadpool vacillated.
"Yeah, I'm okay. Wait... Your what?"
5:52AM. John V. Lindsey East River Park. East Village.
Deadpool walked on the ground, talking nonsense and gesturing violently with his hands, Spider-man talking back and Mm-Hm-ing along, swinging back and forth from the trees above. He was feeling much better, still a dull pain in the side of his head, but generally functioning well enough to go back out on patrol. He knew he should've said that close to an hour ago, but he was genuinely having a lot of fun indulging Deadpool's weird rambling. Patrol was over at 7:00 anyway. Peter scolded himself constantly for a few days after every time he hung out with the merc. It was like being in middle school and hanging out with the bad kid when your mom always told you not to. He couldn't help it. The subject of conversation shifted from subject to subject as they looped around the small length of grass over and over. As they were on the way back to where they started, the sun just a sliver in the sky, they passed on the sidewalk under Williamsburg bridge. Spider-man stopped his swinging above and crouched on the high rafters, peering down at his friend like some sort of super-powered red and blue bird. Deadpool stopped in his path to stare back up at him. "What? Don't get all voyeuristic on me now. You know that turns me on." Spider-man laughed uncomfortably and replied. "Well I do now. Careful, you might not want to tell me those things. I'm quite capable of using them against you." He challenged. "Is that a threat?" Deadpool spoke in mock seriousness. "Of course it's a threat." He was just being playful at this point. What's he got to lose? How he feels about this guy isn't anything he cares about hiding anymore. "… I'm officially convinced you're either inhumanly observant or you've somehow found my apartment and bugged it. You're not legally allowed as my friend to know, and purposely fuck with, my turn ons." Deadpool lamented. The sun was growing in the sky now. Spider-man swung to the next rafter, now directly above the merc. He hung upside down, not far from where the webs anchored on the metal beam. He looked east at the rising sun and asked out of pointless curiosity, "Hey, what time is it?" From fifty feet below, his friend pulled back his glove to reveal a wristwatch with a Spider-man logo on the watch face. "It is 6:28, m'love." "I can't believe you let me waste two hours of my night on you." Peter scoffed. "I can't belive you'd waste two hours of your precious time on little ol' me." Deadpool confirmed. "We gotta stop doing this." He slowly dropped down a little further. "… Yeah, but like, do we though?" Spider-man was almost at eye level. "I mean..." "Is this actually, seriously, about to happen?" They stared at each other both upside down. Peter put his hand up (Or down?) to the edge of the merc's mask. "… Can I?" He nodded gently, and uncharacteristically for that matter. They both lifted the bottom half of the other's mask, and after a few long seconds the initial wariness faded, and Peter's hand lingered about an inch away from the side of his friend's face. The silence in those few seconds felt so serene until Deadpool had to go and fuck it up. "So, does this mean I'm Mary Jane? Cause, you know, I've been thinking of going ginger. I really think it'd be a good-" His words were cut short by the sudden collision of their lips. It was such a cautious kiss at first, but within seconds both men had melted into lovesick teenagers. Peter's hand instinctively cradled the side of the other man's face, bringing it back closer to his own the first time he tried to pull away. It was only a few seconds, but it felt so impeccably right it was like it could've lasted hours. Finally, they both naturally pulled away. It felt like a tremendous weight had been lifted off of his shoulders, like something in life finally felt perfect. Never, not in a million years, would he have guessed this would be it. Never could he have guessed the lips of the most obnoxious, disreputable, utterly chaotic person he'd ever met would be the ones he'd kiss and feel like this at. "I should get home. I have, uh, classes."
"Please tell me I didn't just kiss a kid."
Spider-man hesitated.
"… I'm twenty-one." And I definitely should not have told you that.
"Twenty-nine." The merc responded.
"See you around?"
Deadpool sighed a content sigh. "Yeah. By 'yeah' I mean I'm going to follow you around every night from here on out. Congratulations. You're officially stuck with me."
"I think I'll survive."
"Are you sure?"
"Positive."