Setting It Up
“A movie night?” Adeline bit her lip and looked toward her dad’s study. “I dunno, Sage. It’s dad’s weekend and we were going to take Eddie to the zoo.”
“What about afterward? Peter wanted to make up for the way you guys met.”
She laughed softly. “Is that-”
“Spider-Man. He might have a boyfriend by then too, we’re working on that bit.”
“He what? Spi-” Addy cleared her throat and lowered her voice. “Spider-Man’s gay?”
“Are you kidding? He wears glorified spandex and swings around the city. He literally swings both ways. Did you think he was straight?”
She laughed again. “Alright, that’s fair. So a boyfriend huh?”
“Yeah. Well… maybe. They’re really good friends that just found out the other one wasn’t straight. You know how it is.”
“Gotcha. Well, tell… Peter? That I support all of his gay endeavours. I’ll see what I can do about movie night, okay/”
“Okay, that’s fine. I just wanted to make sure that you got invited. It’s the first one we’ve done since… ya know? I just wanna sort of boost morale.”
“That makes sense. Thank you for thinking of me, babe.”
“You’re welcome. Hey. I love you.”
Addy grinned. “I love you too.”
---
Sage has created a groupchat!
Sage named the groupchat Avengers Assemble!
From Sage: We’re having a movie night on Friday, and I expect everyone and their significant others to be there.
From Steve: Care to explain that caveat?
From Tony: That’s not for you spangles. Tall Dark and Brooding is already in the chat.
From Pietro: It’s for Wanda!
From Sage: And Peter!!!!!
From Wanda: excuse me?!?!?!?!
From Peter: rude!!!! We haven’t talked about it yet!!!!
From Bruce: Wait who is Peter dating?
From Peter: NO ONE
From Sage: He’s dating Ned.
From Pepper: Why am I in this groupchat?
From Sage: Because I want you to come!
From Pepper: I'll see what I can do
From Wanda: sorry to disappoint ,,,,, everyone apparently but there aren’t any SOs over here babes
From Pietro: ther could be
From Wanda: I’ll murder you.
From Peter: wait hi hello i got distracted @doctor banner i am Not dating ned
From Tony: Yet
From Peter: mr stark!!!!! Asldkjfsldk
From Loki: Anthony
From Tony: What
From Loki: Leave the children be
From Tony: But!
From Thor: I will be delighted to join, Sage!!
From Sage: Great! Lmao
From Clint: Wanda, I think we need to have the talk
From Wanda: barton I will castrate you while you sleep I swear to god
From Natasha: hey now no need to take drastic measures
From Peter: i’m going to cry pls stop
From Sage: If I add Ned to the gc will you feel better
From Peter: NO
From Peter: how do you have his number??
From Tony: Is that really an honest question?
From Peter: i’m quitting the avengers goodbye i won’t miss any of you
From Phil: Peter come back we’re sorry
From Sage: that’s the fakest thing I’ve heard all day Peter stop being a dramatic bitch
From Natasha: Phil why are you apologising stop that
From Natasha: Peter if you quit the team I’ll track you down and abduct you until you agree to rejoin
From Peter: this is bullying
From Peter: doctor banner they’re bullying me
From Tony: Hey! As the resident father figure I resent that you’re taking this to Bruce
From Steve: Tony you’re part of the problem
From Bucky: Steve he knows damn well he’s the instigator don’t encourage him
From Steve: I wasn’t!
From Sage: Movie night. Friday. Be there or be square.
From Clint: because you’re not a-round!
From Peter: kill me
---
“Do you want to meet the Avengers?” Peter braced himself for an outburst.
Ned’s eyes practically bugged out of his head. “The Avengers?!” His voice dropped to a stage whisper. “I get to meet the Avengers?!”
“Well you already know one.” Peter laughed and elbowed him in the side.
Ned shrugged. “Yeah, but I’ve known you forever.”
“Yeah, that’s fair. Well anyway, remember the whole ‘I wanna do a movie night’ at three am thing? It’s happening and Sage… may or may not think that you and I are dating.”
“She- I- you- WHAT?”
“Okay, wait, I’m sorry, let me explain. It’s not a good explanation, but I do have one. Peter held up his hands defensively. “So I’ve told you about Sage. Tony’s kid.”
“Your sister. Right.”
Peter groaned and rolled his eyes. “I’m not going to argue about this with you. Anyway, the point is, I told Sage that you and I came out to each other the other day and she was all like ‘wow oh my god you two should date’ and I was like ‘maybe I guess but I’ve kinda got a preference for girls and Ned probably wouldn’t date me anyway’ and then she asked if I’d told you the swing both ways pun and I said I had and-”
“Wait, you don’t think I would date you?”
Peter’s eyes went wide and he stopped walking. ‘I- um. You- well… I-”
“Dude, I would date you in a heartbeat!”
“You would?”
“Bro! Absolutely! Twelve out of ten definitely would date.”
“Oh.” A silly little smile started spreading across his face. “Well anyway, Sage made a groupchat to announce the movie night and now the whole team thinks we’re dating. So. You’re invited if you wanna come and meet the team or whatever. You totally don’t have to and you can tell them that we aren’t dating, that’s chill and cool, I just figured you might want to meet them and Sage wants you to come.”
“Cool. Cool cool cool cool cool. So they all think we’re dating?”
“Well I mean, they just- yeah. Yeah, all of them. Blame Sage. We can tell them that we’re not though, it’s fine.”
“Okay, sure. Great. Awesome. What if we don’t though?”
“Come again?”
“What if we didn’t tell them that we’re not dating?”
“But… we’re not. Are we? Oh my god. Are we dating and I didn’t realise it?! How long have we been dating?!”
“No! Nonoononononono, Peter! I was- damn it. I was trying to ask you out.”
“Oh. OH! Oh my god. I’m-”
Ned laughed. “Go to class. I’ll catch up with you later.”
---
From Peter: for the record i’m not opposed to the idea
From Peter: the dating thing i mean
From Peter: if you were being serious
Ned rolled his eyes.
To Peter: Aren’t you in precalc right now?
From Peter: well yeah but we’re just going over complex zeroes of a polynomial function. Nothing serious.
To Peter: pay attention in class nerd
To Peter: I”ll talk to you after class
---
Sage’s phone was ringing. No one ever called her. “Hello?”
“Hey, Sage.”
“Peter?” He sounded breathless. “Are you calling me while you’re on patrol?”
“No. Well yeah, kinda. I’m not actually patrolling. I’m just-”
“Swinging around the city?”
“Yeah.”
“Hey, I was thinking of a theme song for you the other day. It’s got puns in it.”
“Really?! No, wait, that’s not what I’m calling about”
“No, yeah, right. What’s up?”
“Sooooo a kind of big thing happened today.”
“Oh yeah?” What happened, did you tell your history teacher you have a crush on him?”
“No, I- how did you know about that?!”
“I didn’t. Thanks for the blackmail.”
“Goddammit.”
She laughed. “What's up?”
“I don't’ know if I want to tell you any more.”
“Oh, come on. Please?”
Peter sighed dramatically. “Okay, so Ned and I were talking today-”
“Whoa, shocker.”
“Shut up. Anyway I invited him to the movie night, and I told him that the whole team thinks that he and I are dating thanks to you which led to a whole conversation about whether we were dating or not and the point is-”
“Oh my god.”
“What?”
“Did he ask you out?”
“... Yeah.”
Sage could hear the smile in his voice and broke into a grin. “Congrats!”
“Thanks. Anyway, he’s coming to the movie night as per your request, so you have to get everyone to be nice to him.”
“No promises there. Are you excited? Does May know? Can I tell Tony? Where are you guys going on y- oh no.”
“What?”
“Peter. My darling. My love. Dearest brother of mine. Your first date with your best friend cannot be to an Avengers movie night.”
“Why not?”
“Why not?! Are you kidding me right now?!”
“N- no… What’s the big deal?”
“Peter. The big deal is that this is going to be the first time that Ned has ever met any of the Avengers. Ever. You know how the team is. It’s going to be nonstop teasing and questions for you two all night on top of a movie. Is that really what you want your first date to be like?”
“Dammit.” Peter sighed. “You’re right. Well, what am I going to do?! The movie night’s Friday and today’s Wednesday. Should I just take him out tomorrow?”
“I dunno. Probably. Just take him for food or something after school. It doesn’t have to be huge. I mean, for Chrissake you two have been best friends for years! Listen, I know I was kind of being frantic earlier, but honestly? You two are best friends. You’ll either be fine and you’ll work and you’ll be in love forever or it won’t work and you’ll go back to being best friends, no harm no foul.”
“Yeah?”
“Yeah. Take him somewhere a little nicer, but not so nice that he’s uncomfortable. Make stupid inside jokes with each other. Have fun with it. Just make sure to warn him about what’s in store for Friday, okay?”
“Got it.”
“Listen, Peter, I’ve gotta go, but I’ll see you Friday, okay? Love ya tons!”
“Yeah, see ya.”
Peter hung up and swung to sit on the roof of a nearby building. He looked over the city, his legs swinging and an all too familiar feeling starting to burrow into his chest. He shouldn’t be nervous about this. Should he? Was this a mistake? God, he wished he could talk to Ned about this. Wait. He could! Or… no. Was that too awkward? How would this whole thing affect their relationship? Like, obviously they would be dating now probably which was great, but could he still talk to Ned about being nervous for dates and stuff? Was there some sort of protocol for this? How should this work?!
“Peter, an incoming call from Ned.”
Oh, thank god. “Yeah, go ahead and pick up, Karen.”
“Hey, bro.”
“Hey, dude. What’s up?”
“I mean, not much, just some dumb stuff. I just wanted to call you.”
“Oh, okay. Cool. Cool cool cool. Hey, uh… Can I talk to you for a minute?”
“Weren’t you… already doing that?”
Peter let out a breathy laugh and rolled his eyes. “Okay, asshole. You’re so rude to me, goddamn.”
“Oh, I’m the rude one?! Really? You’re really gonna go there?”
This got a full laugh out of Peter. This was good. They were fine. They could do this.
“Anyway, what were you gonna say?”
“I mean, it’s stupid.”
“No, man, come on. What is it?”
“Okay, no judgement.”
“None whatsoever. I’m a Planet Fitness up in this bitch.”
Peter grinned. “Okay. Okay okay. So, uh, it’s just… I’m kinda… wigging out about the whole dating thing. Not that I don’t want to! I do! I was just like freaking out because, hey, what if this changes things between us, and what if our first date is kind of awkward because we’re trying to like do things differently or whatever, and what if things are just weird between us, and like that probably won’t happen? But I was just…”
“Overusing your huge ass brain.”
“Yeah, that.” Peter grinned. Everything else aside, this was still Ned. This was still his best friend. They had nothing to worry about. “I told you it was dumb.”
“It’s not… Dumb, Peter. It’s reasonable. I get it. It’s scary. I just… I trust us, ya know?”
“Yeah. Sorry, I just started worrying about it and I couldn’t stop, but then you called and now I’m fine!”
Ned laughed. “You’re such a weirdo.”
“Thank you. Anyway, how do you feel about going out after school tomorrow for food? I figured our first date could be Friday, but then Sage reminded me that the team is crazy so I thought maybe we should do one before that.”
‘I’m free as far as I know. I’ll have to ask my mom though.”
Peter snorted. “Yeah, that’s fine. Actually, I still haven’t said anything to May about any of this, so… I need to do that.”
“Okay, so… You talk to Aunt May, I’ll talk to my mom, and we’re planning on going out after school?”
“Sounds about right.”
“Great! See you tomorrow!”
“Yeah, I’ll see ya. Bye, Ned.”