peter parker x reader - wattpad (more unposted fics are located here) - requests closed as of august 2021 - fics by other authors that I love
updated jan 30 2022
💋 - suggestive / 🌻 - personal favorite / ✨ - soulmate au / 🌧 - mostly angst / 💕 - mostly fluff / ⚡️ - super hero or super powered reader
one shots:
sweatshirt - you and peter broke up a long time ago, but something about seeing you in his old sweatshirt makes him act impulsively
stood up 💋⚡️- you and peter get on each others nerves - funnily enough you would not have expected a date-gone-wrong to be the start of fixing your relationship
fake it 🌻💕⚡️- peter comes up with the brilliant idea of you both fake dating each other as a way to get the team to back off on the couple comments
spider-man cookies and napkin notes 💕- peter has finally been bullied (lovingly, of course) by his friends into asking out the cute barista, but things go a little wrong. or maybe a little right
reward system 💋- sometimes you feel a little behind everyone else, but peter makes sure to remind you that you’re not as alone as you think you are
boys and girls - based on the song “boys and girls” by james tw
second chances 🌧- you meet your unrequited high school crush/best friend years later at a college frat party of all places - things go about as well as expected
good looking 🌻💕- spider-man landed on your balcony once and the rest is history (said every peter fic ever)
back to december 🌧- you meet peter in december, and his sad eyes and shy personality pull you in (no way home spoilers)
just the two of us 💕💋 - peter is pretty much the only thing keeping you sane during your time in grad school
series:
long distance - you drop the bomb to your boyfriend peter that you’re moving across the country
one - two - three [complete]
revelations 🌻✨🌧⚡️- peter hates the idea of soulmates. but meeting your soulmate is inevitable, and it’s not always so easy to avoid what the universe wants to happen
series masterlist
begin again 🌧 - you meet peter at his lowest - but maybe meeting you is just what he needed
one - two - three - four - five - six - seven - eight [complete]
far from love ⚡️- your life is finally starting to get back to normal after everyone (yourself included) returns from the snap. the last thing you need is to get bitten by a radioactive spider
one - two - three - four - five - six - seven - eight - nine - ten [current]
sunburn ✨🌧- you’ve dreamt about meeting your soulmate forever - but you didn’t expect it to be a rejection
one - two - three - four - five - six - seven [complete]
all these years - your friends constantly bug you about not being with peter anymore, even though you had convinced yourself you moved on. but even you could admit that the lines between being “just friends” again and dating had been crossed a long time ago
one - two - three - four - five [complete]
fine line 🌧⚡️- you and spider-man are great partners, friends, maybe even more - but you and peter absolutely despite each other. there’s only so much time left before one of you has to realize who the other really is
one - two - three - four - five - six - seven - eight [complete]
fine line (alternative) 🌧⚡️ - an alternative ending to the fine line series (read summary of the first part to know what’s different, make sure you read all of fine line first!)
four - five - six - seven [complete]
accident 💕⚡️- spider-man is strict on keeping both of your identities a secret, even from each other, but especially from anyone else. in order to save your friend’s life, though, you have to reveal your identity
one - two [complete]
all I ask 🌻✨🌧⚡️- even a criminal like you has always looked forward to meeting your soulmate and feeling the click everyone talks about - but even when it’s with the boy you always wanted it to be with, there are still barriers in your way. namely, how peter seems to hate your alter ego more than anyone you’ve met
peter parker x black cat reader soulmate au ~ main masterlist
total word count: ~38k
warnings: language, blood mentions, gun mentions, angst
summary: even a criminal like you has always looked forward to meeting your soulmate and feeling the click everyone talks about - but even when it’s with the boy you always wanted it to be with, there are still barriers in your way. namely, how peter seems to hate your alter ego more than anyone you’ve met
one - two - three - four - five - six - seven - eight - nine - ten - eleven - twelve
a/n: this one is an oldie that I’m sure has been on tumblr on my old account but 🤷🏽♀️fake dating tropes are just a classic
warnings: so much cheese, mentions of blood/fighting/guns, language of course, and oh no...there’s only one bed...
pairing: peter parker x reader
word count: 9.9k (damn)
summary: peter comes up with the brilliant idea of you both fake dating each other as a way to get the team to back off on the couple comments
masterlist ~ requests are closed
~
"Okay so you know how the team won't leave us alone about wanting us to date?"
"Weird way to start a conversation, but go on," you barely glanced up from your math homework to see your best friend biting his lip with his eyebrows scrunched up, clearly deep in thought.
"Okay hear me out," Peter put his hands flat on the table, leaning forward. "What if we did date?"
"What?" You laughed a little, giving him a weird look. "Did you hit your head during patrol?"
"I meant like, what if we pretended to date? We already hang out a lot and it wouldn't be so hard to act like we're together. It would get them to shut up about it, right?"
"That's just giving them what they want, though," you knit your eyebrows, "Wouldn't that just make the comments worse?"
You and Peter had been friends ever since you both joined the team as trainees a few years ago. It was easy to get close when you were both the same age, and you did missions and went on patrol together. Peter was your best friend and even though that was all there was, the team didn't seem to think so.
It seemed like you couldn't even look at Peter without one of them commenting on how cute you would be together. Or how Peter needed to hurry up and ask you out, since it was apparently so obvious you two were into each other. But that wasn't the case for either of you.
Sure, Peter was cute, but you had never thought of him as anything more than your friend, and you knew he felt the same. It was getting weird with the team trying to push you together when you were perfectly fine with what you already had. Your friendship was getting strained and uncomfortable, and you were both looking for anything to get them to stop so it could just go back to normal.
Maybe Peter was onto something with this idea.
"At first maybe, but then we could like, stage a break up and decide to be just friends or something and they'd have to lay off because that would be messed up if they kept pushing us to be together after we broke up. They aren't mean, it'll finally stop."
"Okay," you could wrap your head around the idea a little easier. You tapped your pencil on your head, thinking, "But I thought you were going to ask MJ out, why don't you just date her? Then they'll leave us both alone and we don't have to lie about it."
Peter let out a groan, sitting in the chair next to you and putting his head in his hands in a typical dramatic fashion. You might've laughed if he hadn't looked so upset all of a sudden.
"Oh, should I have not brought that up?" You winced a little as his annoyed expression. "I thought you had, like, a plan and everything-"
"Brad Davis is ruining my plan," he muttered, and you frowned. "I hate that the blip made him our age and now I have to deal with him trying to get with MJ before I can."
"Hey, but there's still a chance, right?" You encouraged, hating seeing him this upset over something that hadn't even happened yet. "I mean, he's not with her yet. As long as you don't use that God-awful lego themed pick up line on her-"
"Shut up," he whined, pouting a little dramatically as you snickered. "That was a joke when I said it to you."
"And it was the worst line anyone has ever used on me," you tapped his nose with your pencil, chuckling when he scrunched his nose up and swatted it away. "But seriously, I'm sure you have a chance still."
"I don't know," he sighed, shaking his head. "Okay but if we did fake date then maybe she would get jealous and then-"
"Bad idea," you cut him off, "Making a girl jealous like that would never work in your favor. It could backfire bad. Plus, I don't hang out with your friends often, how would she even know? It's not a good plan. If we're doing this, the team is the only one that can and should know. I don't want to lie to a bunch of people and make a mess."
He lifted his head, grinning, "So we're doing it?"
"It seems like it could work," you shrugged, "I'm getting tired of Sam saying I give you heart eyes every time I look in your direction. Literally yesterday I looked out the window and he asked if I was thinking about you, but really I just saw a billboard advertising half off milkshakes and that's all I could think about all day. No offense but that sounded more appealing than you do."
Peter snickered, "Yeah, and whenever I train with you and Tony tells me to keep my hands to myself. Which doesn't even make sense because how am I meant to keep my hands to myself when we're sparring?"
You chuckled with him, shaking your head. "We have to plan it. They need to buy it and it needs to last long enough to be believable, but also short enough that they don't get suspicious when we end things and decide to stay friends. Okay?"
"Sounds good to me," he agreed, sticking his hand out for you shake. You laughed and shook it, squealing when he yanked you up and spun you around in a hug.
"Put me down, menace!" You laughed as he set you down, frowning at the nickname you started giving him ever since that guy at the Daily Bugle coined it for Spider-Man.
"This'll be easy," he stole your pencil from you, sitting down and sliding your homework over to look at. "Not as easy as this math homework that you're somehow doing wrong, though."
"What?" You complained, sitting next to him and looking at your sheet over his shoulder. "What am I doing wrong?"
You weren't sure how Peter managed to keep such good grades while also being Spider-Man, but you supposed it was because he was just naturally so smart. You were struggling just to pass at this point, and you didn't even patrol with him as often just so you could try and save your grades.
Sometimes you wished you went to school with Peter just so you could copy his notes and pass a class as easy as he did.
"I'll show you," he said a little cheekily, and you stuck your tongue out at him. "We covered this stuff last year."
"Oh sorry, I forgot you went to a genius school," you poked his cheek, and he made a face, "Nerd."
"Do you want my help or not?"
"Hey lovebirds," Tony's voice interrupted your comeback, the nickname making you grimace a little as he walked into the kitchen. "What're you kiddies up to?"
"Peter's trying to teach me math since apparently I'm incapable."
"I never said you were incapable," he protested.
"Okay well, keep things PG," Tony grabbed something from a cabinet , "I'll allow PG-13 but only once I leave, please."
You tossed your empty water bottle at the back of his head as he left laughing, but Peter webbed it and brought it back before it could smack him. He shot you a glare while you crossed your arms, leaning back.
"Should've let me hit him."
-
"Peter, I've removed a bullet from your shoulder, I can hold your hand without getting weirded out," you muttered, and he gave you a sheepish look.
You were both in the elevator on your way to the briefing room for a mission that would be in a few weeks. Being briefed this early was a little annoying, but Steve liked to plan ahead. Way ahead, apparently.
"Just don't want to make you uncomfortable," he said, which was pretty sweet of him but also it was literally just holding hands.
"Dude, we're gonna have to do more than hold hands to convince them we're dating," you pointed out, taking initiative and just grabbing his hand.
"Like what?" He made a face, "I don't really feel like making out with you in front of the team, although that would definitely get the point across-"
"I didn't mean that, idiot," you rolled your eyes, "Pet names. Cheek kisses. Put your arm around my shoulder. Staring into each other's eyes. Be like that really annoying couple in second period that always gets separated. We don't have to kiss at all but if we just act like normal and all we do is hold hands, they're gonna be suspicious."
"Okay, fake dating expert," he wiggled his eyebrows at you and you shook your head, "What's your favorite pet name?"
"I don't have one," you shrugged, "Just call me babe or something, I don't know."
"That's not romantic enough," he gave you a look, "Aren't we supposed to be, like, in love?"
"In love?" You couldn't help but laugh at that, "We're two high schoolers just beginning to date, I doubt they expect it to be that deep. And if they do then something is wrong with them."
"Whatever you say, sweetheart," he grinned just as the elevator doors opened, and you tried to ignore the weird feeling you got when he said that nickname as he tugged you out into the briefing room.
Maybe you did have a favorite pet name after all.
"About time you guys showed up, Steve was going to start without you," Bucky grumbled, earning a look from Steve.
"We aren't even late," Peter complained, "And Tony isn't here either!"
"He's not joining on this mission," Steve said, "Are we gonna start the briefing or talk some more about Tony?"
You exchanged a look with Peter while Steve and Nat started going over the basics, Bucky and Sam listening as you both sat down. No one seemed to notice you and Peter were holding hands and sitting as close as possible, which was weird.
Though you figured soon enough someone would have to point it out, considering how eager they always are to tease you both.
During the rundown Sam made some comment about you two always being paired together and how it was a sign from the universe or something. Instead of protesting or making a snarky comeback you and Peter just glanced at each other.
"Yeah, maybe," Peter shrugged, shooting you a wink. Normally you would've rolled your eyes but you just smiled back at him.
"Yo, they're holding hands!" Sam suddenly yelled out, pointing to you both. That comment must've made him finally notice.
"So what?" You acted nonchalant. "Isn't it normal for couples to hold hands or is that like, some weird rule and not allowed in the briefing room-"
"You've been dating?" Nat asked flatly, raising an eyebrow. "You're together?"
"Yeah, we thought you guys knew," Peter said, frowning. "You kept referencing us being together? I thought we were all on the same page here."
"Wait, really?" Bucky asked with a blank expression, and you both nodded. "This isn't a joke?"
"Yeah I mean, you guys kept pushing it and we realized maybe you were right. What's the big deal?" Peter shot you a soft grin, throwing an arm over your shoulder.
"Okay, well, should we continue talking about their dating lives or the really important mission we're meant to be going on?" Steve changed the subject while Bucky gave you both a suspicious look.
Pranks were common from you both and you could already tell Bucky thought something was up. If this was going to really work, they had to think it was real before you guys "broke up". If they thought it was fake at all, the teasing would never stop and probably only get worse.
Peter squeezed your hand and gave you a thumbs up when the others weren't looking. But you knew this was only step one.
The easy part was over - convincing them you guys were serious would probably be harder.
-
"How was school?"
Peter let out a groan and collapsed against you in the middle of the sidewalk, making you laugh. He gave you a giant bear hug and didn't let you pull away, letting out a dramatic sigh while you patted his back.
It had been a few weeks now of the fake dating thing, and it seemed like Peter got way more comfortable around you what with all the hand holding and hugging and forehead kisses the last weeks entailed. You weren't even with the team and his hugs seemed to linger longer than normal, and once he even held your hand without realizing that no one was watching.
For the most part, they seemed to buy it - though Bucky and Tony were both obviously suspicious, and had tried to trick you both into admitting you guys weren't dating, but so far you and Peter were in the clear.
"That bad, huh?"
"Boring," he mumbled against your hair before finally pulling back. "I just want to patrol."
"We can patrol after I eat, I had to skip lunch and now I'm starving," you complained, tugging his arm. "Can we please go get Thai? I haven't been to that place by your apartment in ages and I'm kinda hoping that guy gives us free food again because of how hot your aunt is."
"I'm gonna pretend you didn't say that," Peter shuddered while you grinned, "Yeah, I guess we can go there. But May isn't coming just so you can get free food."
"You're no fun."
He just gave you a look as you both headed toward the Thai place, complaining about how you were always hungry after school. You went into a long, definitely unnecessary rant about how you couldn't pack a lunch or buy lunch, as you both finally reached the restaurant.
"You could ask Sam to pack a lunch for you, he makes good PB&J," Peter held the door open for you.
"Thanks. But how could he make it good, it's literally three ingredients?"
"I don't know, he just does. Maybe it's his secret super power."
You both sat at your normal booth and you tried not to snicker when the waiter asked Peter if his aunt would be joining. Peter got his usual and you changed it up, Peter making a face when the waiter left.
"Why do you always change your order when you know you're probably going to hate what they give you?"
"It's called living on the edge, Peter," you pointed a finger at him, "And also I've never had anything here that I've hated, it's only that Italian place on seventh that I usually regret changed my order at."
"Right," he rolled his eyes, "Must've mixed them up, silly of me."
"If you're mean to me I'm going to email J.J. Jameson and tell him that Spider-Man sleeps in Thor themed pajamas and also send him photo evidence. I bet that would at least make the second page."
"Damn, you're diabolical. Wait where did you get photo evidence-" he paused as the waiter came back already, way more food than you ordered. "Uh, sir we didn't order this?"
"On the house. Tell May I said hi," he gave you both a little grin before going to the back, Peter putting his head in his hands.
"He gave us free food and she's not even here," you cheered a little while Peter rolled his eyes. "I wish I had the power your aunt clearly has."
"Okay, but seriously, you don't actually have a photo of me in Thor pajamas right?"
"No, but I could probably get it. Unrelated question but when is the next time you're spending the night at the tower?" you shoved some food into your mouth while Peter shot you a glare.
"Well now I'm not telling you."
"Fine. Any updates on MJ and that Chad guy?"
"Brad," he corrected, staring dejectedly at his bowl while he twirled his noodles. "I think she likes him."
"Really? What makes you think so?"
"I don't know, they just seem to be hanging out more. Ned said he heard them talking about going to a protest together."
You choked out a laugh, "Peter, a protest hardly sounds like a date. I mean, good on them for being activists or whatever, but I doubt it's a date thing."
"I don't know, I'm just...I feel like she's not into me like I thought she was," he sounded sad as he said it, and you couldn't help but feel bad.
"Peter, you're a great guy, and if MJ doesn't see that then she doesn't deserve you," you said simply, taking another bite of food while Peter stared at you for a moment. "What?"
"Nothing," he scrunched his eyebrows together. "Um, anyway. What about you?"
"Too busy to think about that," you shrugged, "Also I'm almost failing chemistry so I should probably focus on that instead of thinking about boys and girls right now-"
"You're failing chem?" Peter squeaked out, "Since when?"
"Since I started patrolling every single night with you, and training in my free time," you made a face, "I think I should take a break."
He gave you a concerned look, "I can help you study if you want."
"That would be nice," you agreed, shaking your head. Peter glanced above your shoulder while you were talking and frowned, but you didn't notice. "That math trick that you taught me the other night actually really helped, so if you got any more tips like that then you'd be a life saver-"
Peter suddenly moved a hand up to tuck a loose strand of your hair behind your ear, before leaving his hand cupping your cheek. You felt your cheeks warm up under his palm as he smiled softly at you.
"Uh, what're you doing?"
"Bucky and Sam are five tables away from us," he said quietly, and you relaxed a little. But then you frowned.
"Oh, God. Are they seriously spying on us?"
"I think so, they have hats and shades on, but I can totally tell it's them, plus Bucky hates Thai food so I doubt they're here to eat," he chuckled, dropping his hand from your face but taking your free hand in his, playing with your fingers, "Sorry if I caught you off guard."
"Don't worry about it, this is good actually. They're trying to see if we're faking it, maybe they'll lay off when they see we're clearly a couple since we act like this outside of the tower."
"Hm, seems like this just became a date then," he pressed a kiss to your knuckles while you laughed, wishing you could see the look on Sam and Bucky's faces, but you knew better than to look back.
Man, you hadn't been on a date in ages. And Peter was a really good fake boyfriend.
He cracked jokes and told ridiculous stories like he always did, but this time he was holding your hand or throwing an arm over your shoulder or even dropping some pick up lines (not involving legos, thankfully) that managed to fluster you a little, which you were sure was probably enough to convince Bucky and Sam.
You couldn't help but wonder why he hadn't been in a relationship yet. Sure, there was that brief thing with Liz, and he was trying to get with MJ, but you were shocked that there hadn't been anyone to snatch him up yet.
"I think they just left," Peter whispered after a while, and you risked a glance back to see the two men leaving.
"We should be actors," you lifted your hand up for a high five and laughed when Peter slapped his palm against yours.
"I can't believe they came and spied on us. When do you think they'll let up?"
"I'd give it a few weeks," you shrugged, "Then after I dump you it should hopefully stop completely."
"Why-why would you be the one dumping me?" He sounded offended, putting a hand on his chest.
"Because you're too nice to break up with me," you laughed when he scoffed, crossing his arms.
"Can't it be a mutual break up?"
"I don't know Parker, it seems like you're pretty in love with me," you teased, "It would be hard to convince them it wasn't me breaking your heart."
"Ouch," he mumbled, but there was a grin growing on his lips as he poked at his food.
"We all know you're a hopeless romantic," you laughed as he turned a little pink. "No point in denying it."
"Whatever," he threw a crumpled up napkin at you while you laughed again, ducking to avoid it.
"MJ's gonna be lucky when you finally get the guts to tell her how you feel. You're a pretty good fake boyfriend," you lifted your drink toward him while he rolled his eyes.
"Thanks. You're a good fake girlfriend, too."
"Aw, thanks babe! It's gonna be so hard when I fake dump you."
"Oh, shut up."
-
The next week you and Peter had pretty much gotten a routine down perfectly. It was almost too easy to pretend to be dating. You were so used to holding his hand around the base that you figured it was a habit now.
Tony and Bucky didn't seem totally convinced, but at this point you didn't care. You and Peter figured once they stopped being so suspicious, you'd stage your break up, he could go after MJ and you could just try and save your school grade.
Easy peasy.
"I swear that's his name," Peter laughed when you shook your head, swinging you hands in between you both as you walked toward the kitchen from the main floor.
"Come on, Pete, you know that's just ridiculous, why would his actual name be Dr. Strange-"
You both stopped as you saw Tony walking down the hallway with someone behind him, but you couldn't see who.
"Hey Mr. Stark," Peter greeted, and Tony turned with a look of glee on his face, like he had been waiting for you both to show up.
Uh oh.
"Hey Romeo and Juliet, look who's here," he said brightly, stepping out of the way to show whoever was with him. To your shock it was MJ, who looked as surprised to see you both as you did her.
You had only seen MJ a couple times before, but you liked her as soon as you met her. She was funny and you both had similar taste in books, and she liked politics like you did. You always thought her and Peter could be a good match, and now you were sure you just unintentionally butchered any chance they might've had.
"Uh, hey guys," her eyes flickered down to your intertwined hands, and it took everything in your not to snatch your hand from his. But Tony was standing right there with his arms crossed and an expectant look on his face as he waited to see how this would play out.
"MJ!" Peter squeaked out, quickly letting go of your hand. Tony noticed that and gave you a look but you just shook your head a little. "What, uh, what are you doing here?"
She pursed her lips, "Touring the facility...you didn't tell me you two were together?"
"Hm, that's weird. They've been together for a while, apparently," Tony butt in, and you shot him a glare.
"We were keeping it on the DL," you attempted, not really getting a read on MJ's feelings since she had a pretty good poker face.
"It's nothing serious," Peter said quickly, and you ignored how Tony raised his eyebrows at that, trying to resist the urge to smack Peter on the head. He was just making it seem way worse.
"Hm," she said simply, turning back to Tony, "Thanks for letting me tour the place, Mr. Stark."
"No problem Miss Jones, I hope to see you again soon," he shook her hand, still grinning as she bid you both goodbye and headed for the exit.
"Why was MJ here?" Peter hissed out once she was gone, and you threw your hands up.
"I don't know! I didn't invite her!"
"I did," Tony said with a smirk, "I told you guys about the new internship programs, didn't I? I thought since Peter talked highly of her I'd invite her to join and take a look at the facilities. Did she really not know you two were together? Why wouldn't one of your best friends know you guys were dating? Kind of strange if you ask me."
"Well we didn't tell her cause she kind of had a thing for Peter and we didn't want to rub it in her face," you lied quickly, gritting your teeth. "So nice job on that. You couldn't have warned us?"
Tony didn't seem too satisfied with that answer, but he accepted it and shrugged.
"She would've found out at some point," he pointed out, turning on his heel. "I'll see you kids later!"
Peter tugged at his hair once Tony left, giving you a scared look.
"He knows we're faking it," he sounded a little horrified, "He's gonna tell everyone. Oh God, we're never gonna live this down."
"Hey, he doesn't know," you insisted, taking his hand to try and relax him a little. "He might be suspicious but they don't know for certain, I mean come on, we've been pretty good at pretending. We just need to not mess up like this again."
"Did you see her face?" He groaned, putting his head in his hands. You patted his shoulder, feeling bad that this might have ruined his chance with her in the future.
"I'm sorry, Pete," you mumbled, "Hey, it might not be bad, though. Once we stage a break up you can just tell her the truth about it being fake and maybe she'll understand?"
"Yeah. Maybe."
But that idea seemed shot down when Peter came back from patrol early and looking miserable.
You had taken the day off to get some work done for school, an awful project that you knew you shouldn't procrastinate on even if you wanted to. Peter had begged you to go with him but you knew it wasn't a good idea if you wanted to keep your grades up.
And now that you saw how sad he looked you kind of wish you did go.
"What's wrong?" You asked as he came in, suit still on and mask in hand. He glanced around to make sure no one was in the living room but you before sitting down on the couch and sighing, leaning his head back.
"I talked to MJ."
"Oh," you raised your eyebrows. You knew she had known for a while that he was Spider-Man, just as Ned did. "I take it that didn't go well?"
"She saw me swinging by and texted me to talk," he grumbled, "She's really excited that you and I are dating, apparently. She just acted neutral in front of Mr. Stark because she was trying to be professional for the internship offer."
"Oh, no."
"Yeah. She seemed so glad you and I finally got together," Peter muttered, and you winced. "Apparently she's been rooting for us. Claims she knew all along that we would get together or something like that. She does have feelings for Brad, I guess. She even offered double dates if she asks him out, ugh."
"I'm sorry, Peter," you said sincerely, and he just shrugged. "Hey, at least you didn't get that ridiculously expensive necklace for her, right?"
He managed to crack a smile at that, "Yeah, I guess that's a plus."
"Why don't we go get Delmar's before reporting for the mission tonight," you suggested, hating seeing him look so disappointed. "On me?"
"Hey, if you're paying," he agreed, and you looped your arm through his to drag him off the couch.
"Anyone else here?" He asked, running a hand through his hair.
"Nat and Wanda are somewhere. I think the rest of the team is out until we have to get on the quinjet."
"Sweet. I'll go get dressed, unless you want to go to Delmar's with Spider-Man," he grinned, and you were pleased to see he was already out of his sad mood.
"Maybe another time."
-
"We'll be staying the night in Austria so we can get an early morning start on infiltrating the base," Steve said, pointing to somewhere on the hologram. "We'll get there late so try and get some sleep before morning."
Steve was giving another short briefing as the quinjet made it's way toward where the Hydra base was located, one of the last few that hadn't been taken down. You had been flying for what felt like a couple hours now, and since the jet was way faster than an average plane, you knew you were probably close.
Peter had his head in your lap and feet kicked up on along the seats, while you ran your fingers through his hair. It was almost too easy to act like a couple in front of them - a lot of this stuff you did anyway as friends, just minus the little pet names and cheek kisses.
"The hotel only had four available rooms, so some of us gotta share. Since you two are together, sharing a room won't be a problem?" Steve asked you with a raised eyebrow.
"'Course not," you replied, smiling tightly.
"Wouldn't be the first time," Peter grumbled and you smacked his chest, pretending to be embarrassed. He just grabbed your hand and put it back on his head, a silent way of telling you to keep running your fingers through his hair. You just rolled your eyes but did it anyway, a small smile on his face as he shut his eyes again.
"Okay, we don't need to hear that, you're children," Sam joked, and you gave him a look.
"Don't be gross," Nat chided, "Also, you and Bucky are sharing a room just for that comment."
"Why am I getting punished," Bucky muttered, and you couldn't help but let out a laugh at that.
"We're here," Steve said just as the jet seemed to slow down. "Get some rest, guys. Tomorrow is gonna be tough."
"Aye aye captain," Peter hopped up and offered you a hand. He pulled you up easily, his arm not leaving it's spot from around your waist as you all exited the quinjet. The hotel was quiet considering how late it was and Steve got you all checked in quickly, the staff giving your group a weird look but not questioning it before assigning rooms.
"Make good choices," Sam directed towards you with a grin when everyone parted. You gave him the finger as Peter pulled you down the hall to your room with a laugh.
You figured the rooms would be double beds anyway, but you were sadly mistaken when you all finally arrived at the room and unlocked your door to find one small bed in the already tiny room.
"They gave us only one bed," you said flatly, and Peter's eyes were widened. "Assholes."
"They're testing us," he bit his lip, "If they like, burst in here and one of us in on the bed and one of us on the couch then it'll be obvious we're not together."
"You're really keen on making them believe us, huh?" You raised an eyebrow, seeing his face scrunch up.
"Yeah, I mean...they'll never let us live it down and I just want them to shut up already."
You got it - the jokes and jabs were tiring before you both starting "dating", and they hadn't died down yet. You could only imagine how much worse it would get if they found out it was fake all along.
"Fine, I call left side," you threw your bag in a corner, already feeling how heavy your eyelids were. "I'm gonna shower in the morning, I'm too tired right now."
"I'll go now then," he said quietly, glancing at the bathroom. "Uh, want to brush your teeth first?"
"Sure, Mom," you joked, ignoring how he rolled his eyes as you grabbed your bag of toiletries. You were quickly in and out, trying not to laugh at the look on Peter's face as he stared at the bed.
"This bed is really tiny," he muttered, putting his hands on his hips.
"I'll leave you as much space as I can without falling off," you promised, jumping in and getting comfortable. "I might be asleep when you come back though so just shove me over if you don't have enough room."
He snickered at that, saying goodnight before going to shower. You managed to doze on and off to the sound of the water running, too tired to even laugh when Peter stubbed his toe on a chair and cursed as he got changed and lifted the sheets to join you on the bed, leaving as much space as possible.
There really was barely more than a few inches in between you with how small the bed was, but you tried to ignore that.
-
You woke up feeling warm and comfortable, making you squeeze your eyes shut tighter and snuggle up more to your pillow, not wanting to get up. But you froze when you realized that was not your pillow you were cuddling up to.
Peter must've shifted a lot closer last night, considering he was practically wrapped around you. His arms were holding you to his chest and you felt his lips on your hair, soft snores leaving his mouth and tickling your scalp. His legs were tangled with yours and one of your arms was stuck between your chests, the other thrown over Peter's back while you were tucked against his chest.
You lifted your head carefully to look at his face, seeing how relaxed he was when he was asleep. The last thing you wanted to do was wake him up, especially in this position, so you carefully removed one of his arms from around your waist, hesitating when he moved slightly.
"Mm, no," he mumbled, his arms pulling you back against him. You huffed a little, not really able to move with how strong he was.
Oh, and he definitely wasn't wearing a shirt.
There wasn't any point in struggling unless you wanted him to wake up, which you didn't. You kind of hoped he would just roll over and free you and you would never mention this to him ever, because a weird feeling starting crawling it's way up your chest as he held you closer, mumbling something else into your hair.
Being in his arms like this, and how the last few weeks he'd been shooting you loving glances and holding your hand and kissing your forehead and cheek and flirting with you - even if it was all fake and for show, something real was changing in your feelings.
You liked this, and that scared you.
Finally he moved again, this time blinking his eyes open as he woke up, a tired smile on his face as he looked at you before it suddenly dropped. He probably just realized he was holding you a little too intimately for just friends.
"Didn't know you were into cuddling," you said quietly, amused at how quickly his face turned red and he scrambled to get off of you.
"Oh God, I'm so sorry," he stuttered, actually falling off the bed while you cackled.
"Get up menace, I want to get breakfast before the mission," you laughed as he stood up and stumbled on something on the ground, his face still bright red.
You left him to get ready while you took a quick shower, trying to ignore any weird feeling you previously had when you were still wrapped up in his arms. It wasn't right - you never had feelings for Peter, or you at least never acknowledged them, and you certainly didn't want to now. Not now that he was still probably hurting over MJ and you were meant to be staging a "break up".
What a mess.
Peter was sliding a jacket over his suit when you came out of the bathroom, already dressed and ready. He gave you a glance but didn't quite meet your eyes, just mumbling a quick "good morning" before sneaking past you into the bathroom and shutting the door.
Great.
He didn't say anything to you until you were both in the elevator on the way down to breakfast and to meet with the team before the mission.
"Team's probably down there already," you said as you took his hand, threading your fingers together. It went silent again and you snuck a look at him, just knowing he was still thinking about it by how tense he was and how pink his cheeks still were.
"We're good, right?" Peter asked suddenly, giving you a side glance, "Like, that didn't make things weird?"
"Course not," you hummed, squeezing his hand, "I've been pretending to be madly in love with you for a few weeks now, I don't think anything is gonna make it weird anymore."
He gave you a lopsided grin, "Okay. Just checking."
You weren't lying, but you weren't really telling the truth either. Something did change after waking up to Peter holding you like a koala, but you didn't want to address it. Looking at him brought that weird feeling into your chest and you really, really didn't want to dwell on what that might be.
-
The whole team looked tired when you joined them for breakfast, no one even making a single comment toward you as you and Peter grabbed some food. Peter let you take the last bit of hash browns, and Sam didn't even have the energy to tease you when you kissed Peter's cheek as a thank you.
"We'll leave in twenty, meet at the jet. Don't be late," Steve warned you all before leaving to get ready, Nat and Bucky following behind. Sam was still working on his breakfast and he complained about being left alone with you two, but you and Peter just made faces at him.
Peter swiped one of your pieces of toast and you stuck your tongue out at him. "That was my last piece, jerk."
"I'm a growing boy, sweetheart, sorry about it," he wiggled his eyebrows and you tried to ignore the feeling you got when he used that nickname. "And Sam took like four pieces of toast, so. Who's really to blame here."
"Man, you can't steal your girlfriend's food like that," Sam chuckled, "She's gonna leave you if you keep that up."
"Nah, you'd never leave me, right babe?" Peter started pressing kisses to your face and you shoved him off, laughing.
"I'm thinking about it," you teased, hoping you didn't look too flustered after that. "Should've thought about that before stealing my food."
"I like seeing you two like this," Sam commented, and for once you could tell he was being genuine and not teasing. "Seriously. You guys are good together."
"Thanks, Sam," you pinched his cheek and he swatted your hand away, frowning.
"Yeah, you're both annoying, it works out perfectly."
"Hey!" Peter tossed a plastic fork at him as he got up, laughing and dodging it.
"See you kids in five!"
"Well he clearly buys it," Peter said as soon as he left, taking a bite out of your toast. "I don't think Bucky or Tony do."
"Hm, yeah they'll be hard to convince, but we're doing a great job so far, even I almost believe us," you chuckled, grabbing your remaining toast out of his hand and taking a bite while he pouted at you. "Come on, Spidey, time to join them before they accuse us of making out in a closet or something."
He choked on his drink at that while you stood up, stretching your arms. "Man that bed was uncomfortable. Or maybe it was cause your arms wouldn't let me move all night."
"Sorry," he cringed a little, "I didn't mean to-"
"I'm just messing with you, Pete," you cleaned up your plates, "At least I didn't need a heater last night since you basically wrapped around me like a koala-"
"Okay, okay," he blushed while you laughed at him, dumping your dishes with the rest of them. "I get it."
You were both right on time to report in the quinjet as Steve had the hologram back up, giving you all last minute directions. The base was only a few miles from the hotel, so you were hovering in camouflage mode until everyone was ready.
"Nat and Y/N, you two got the east side for intel and Sam and Bucky will get the south, Peter stick with me in the southwest-"
"Wait, hold up, why aren't Peter and I going together?" You interrupted.
"You're dating now. You guys might do something reckless to protect each other or you'd just get distracted in general, so you can't be partnered."
You didn't like that at all. Peter was always partnered with you on missions and patrol and the idea of going into the field without him scared you. You bit your lip and exchanged a glance with him, seeing his expression and knowing he also felt uncomfortable not going in with you.
But Steve continued talking and you knew protesting that wouldn't work out for you, anyway. Soon enough you were all landed about half a mile outside the base, your group needing to split up to circle around. And Peter was still holding your hand right up until you had to go.
"I don't like it," you admitted as you both stood outside the jet, "I don't like being separated from you."
"Me neither," he said softly, sighing, "We'll be on comms, though. We'll be fine."
He suddenly cracked a smile, "You have jam on your face."
"Shit," you muttered, bringing a hand up to find it but he caught your wrist, stopping you. Instead he brought his thumb up and wiped it along your cheek, leaving his hand to cup your face.
He held your cheek for a moment, looking like he wanted to say something else but instead he just leaned forward and pressed his lips to your forehead. Despite how many times he had done it in the past few weeks, something felt different this time as he let it linger a little bit longer for pulling back. He let his hand fall back down but he kept staring at you for a moment, still looking like he wanted to say something.
"Wrap it up lovebirds!" Sam called out, breaking you out of the weird staring contest you seemed to be having with Peter.
"See you in a bit," he grinned, shooting you a finger gun before turning and jogging to where the others were.
"You ready?" Nat's voice brought you back our of your trance, and you nodded, adjusting the electric gauntlets on your wrists that she gave you for the mission. "We're going in first, comms channel five."
"Sounds good," you agreed, following her down the opposite path. You glanced back one more time to see Peter leaving with the others, and you tried to ignore the bad feeling in the pit of your stomach.
-
The mission proved to be a shit show almost immediately.
As soon as you and Nat were inside, you heard fighting through someone's comms. Bucky said that there had been an ambush waiting on their end, and you felt your heart leap in your throat when Peter confirmed it, also having been caught up.
"They'll be fine," Natasha said to you once they cut out again, like she could read your mind. "Let's focus."
"Right."
You followed her through the base, the silence compared to what you could hear through the comms a little concerning. She had you both pause outside a door, nodding at you to be ready.
She kicked the door open with guns up, but it was empty. You both dropped your arms and frowned.
"It's a set up," she said quickly, pushing you back outside the room just in time.
An explosion went off and sent you both flying, but luckily all it did was throw you against some boxes in the hallway, and you weren't hit directly.
"Shit, was that all the intel?" You grumbled as you rolled back up. "They destroyed it all-"
"They must've known we were coming," her eyes widened, "We need to go help the others."
You felt your heart skip a beat and nodded, running with her down the hallway toward the south side. She tapped her comms and updated them on what was going on, and right as you both got to another door, they both slammed open to show agents.
Natasha grabbed your arm and yanked you behind a wall just as they started shooting, letting out a curse as she got clipped.
"You okay?"
"You go through that hallway, I got this," she pointed at one down the hall. "It seems like a back way to get there, no one should give you trouble."
You nodded, not wanting to defy her orders as she handed you one of her guns. With a grimace you turned the safety off and went down the hall, hearing her start to shoot back at the agents.
It was silent again except for the sound of your feet hitting the floor as you ran through some doors, making sure to have your gun up just in case. At the moment all you could hear through comms was Steve barking orders at Bucky and Sam. Nothing from Peter. Nothing from Nat.
You kicked another door open to see that you found some kind of security room. There were two guards watching screens that showed all the fighting you could hear through the comms, and they both turned when you burst in.
"Hi guys," you said cheerfully.
Despite the gun you held up, the first guy jumped you immediately. You managed to get out of the way and duck his arm, using a neat trick Natasha taught you and grabbing his arm and twisting it so he couldn't move, before pushing him against the other guy.
Suddenly someone's arms came around your neck from behind and you grabbed them, trying to pull them away so you could breath. The gun fell to the floor and you kicked it under the file cabinet so none of them could grab it.
The two men on the floor recovered and one came towards you, but you used the momentum of the guy who was still trying to choke you out and jumped up, kicking his chest with both feet. You landed and pulled the guy behind you over your head and flipped him over, ignoring the strain in your muscles as you did so. He ended up hitting his head on the metal cabinet, knocking out immediately.
Ouch.
You blocked a punch from the first guy (he really didn't want to give up) and managed to hook his leg with your foot, sending the both of you rolling to the floor. He growled as he tried to pin you down but you kneed him in the gut before shoving him off of you, using your gauntlets to give him a little shock so he'd also knock out.
"Parker's not responding on comms," Sam's voice came through, and you froze. "He's been off for five minutes now, not responding on any channels. Does anyone have eyes?"
"What?" You demanded, barely dodging another punch from the last Hydra agent. You caught his fist as he tried again and twisted it behind his back, trying not to freak out. "What happened? Where-where is he-"
"Y/N, I'm sure he's fine, it probably just got knocked out. Happens all the time," Bucky's words didn't relax you at all. "We're almost wrapped up here, someone get a location on Peter."
Steve said he was on it as you grabbed the keyboard from the desk, smacking it hard against the agent's head so he's be knocked out. You stood up and tried to relax your heart rate, knowing it would be pointless to freak out about Peter when he was probably fine. This was why you hated being apart from him. If you could see him in front of you then you knew he was safe, but now...
"Shit!" You cursed as a sharp pain caught you in the abdomen, and you nearly buckled over. The second agent hadn't really been knocked out, and he had managed to get your gun when you were distracted with the news of Peter not responding.
"Everyone check in," Steve said through comms as you collapsed against the wall, gripping your stomach as the pain became overwhelming. The agent who shot you just got up and ran.
"Sam and I are good," Bucky responded.
"I'm all clear," Nat confirmed while you winced, raising a shaky hand to your comms.
"Shot," you breathed out, wincing as the pain got worse when you spoke. "I was-"
Your finger slipped and accidentally changed the channel a little, their voices blurring together. "Shit!"
"Y/N?" Nat's voice sounded scratchy, "Guys, I think Y/N's down, we need backup. I'm going to try and find her. Did you guys get Peter yet?"
"Can't find him. Comms still down, we'll keep looking."
"Y/N?" You barely heard Peter's voice closer, and it didn't sound like it was on comms, "Y/N, hey, what-what the hell happened?"
You squinted as his face came into your view, or his mask at least. "What-how did you-"
"My senses, I-I felt something wrong," he said quickly, squatting down in front of you and ripping his mask off. He looked terrified. "What happened? Where-"
You lifted your hand away from where you were shot, feeling dizzy at the blood on your hands as Peter cursed.
"You're never going in without me again," he muttered quickly, leaning over and ripping off part of one of the passed out agents' shirts as if it were paper and wrapping it around your waist. You winced as he tied it, apologizing a hundred times as he applied pressure to it.
"Nat, Steve, someone," he tapped his comms, his voice shaking, "Fuck, it's still down."
"Pete, I'm tired," you said weakly, not wanting to open your eyes even as you felt Peter's hands on your face trying to keep you awake.
"H-hey, don't say that, please stay awake," he said quickly, shaking you a little. "You're gonna be fine, I promise."
He took your comm out of your ear and hooked it on his own, his words sounding like mush to your ears as you felt your eyes rolling back. The pain from your wound and how tired you already were was starting to hit you hard.
"Sweetheart, hey," his voice pulled you back a little, "Nat's coming, can you stay awake for me?"
"Trying," you mumbled, but your eyes shut again as you felt his hand on your shoulder, shaking you again.
"Damn it," you felt his arms move under your knees and around your shoulders, lifting you up. "I got you, I got you."
"What the hell happened?" You heard another voice but couldn't bring yourself to open your eyes, your body starting to feel way more fatigued.
"She, she was shot, please, I-I can't stand it if..."
You didn't hear the rest before you blacked out.
-
The beeping woke you up.
You were lucky enough not to have many hospital visits, but you knew enough to recognize the smell and the sound and the general feel. Your eyes were still shut but you could tell you were in a hospital bed, your hand sore from an IV with one of your fingers clipped, a heart rate monitor beeping, a painful ache in your stomach.
And someone was holding your hand.
You blinked a few times against the harsh lights, your eyes moving down to the boy who was holding your hand in his. As far as you could tell Peter was knocked out, his chair pulled up next to your bed and his head resting on the bed space next to your hand and by your legs. He was the only one in here and it seemed dark outside, but you had no idea what time it was.
"Pete," you tried squeezing his hand a little, though you were pretty weak. "Wake up."
"Hm?" His head lifted up a little but then his eyes widened and he shot up fully, "H-Hey, you're awake!"
"I am," you confirmed as he leaned forward and gave you a hug, "Ooh, careful."
"Oh God, sorry, I'm sorry," he pulled back and let his hands hover over you, "Are you okay, should-should I call someone-"
"I'm fine," you smiled a little, leaning back and sighing. "Just fragile at the moment."
"Good, good," he mumbled, sitting back down and not quite meeting your eyes as he took your hand in his again.
"What happened?" You asked, having some trouble remembering exactly how you ended up in here. You definitely remember getting shot, but the rest was kind of blurry. "Is everyone-"
"Everyone's fine," Peter interrupted, and you realized now he had tears in his eyes, "We got out fine, there was a set up and the intel couldn't be saved but-but it doesn't matter. You've been in here for a few days, they wanted you to wake up naturally instead of medically, so-so, yeah."
"Are you okay?" You asked softly, concerned at the way he looked now and how scared you remembered him being when he found you.
His eyes were rimmed red, bags under the, his hand almost too tight as it still held one of yours. "I'm not okay, because you're in here and you got hurt and I was being an idiot with a broken comm and I-I'm so sorry, Y/N."
"Wasn't your fault," you said, your voice sounding croaky.
"They said you got distracted because I wasn't on comms," he sniffed, "It was my fault."
"No, it was my fault for not paying attention to my surroundings," you tried to clear your throat, the scratchiness starting to annoy you. "Hey, do you mind-?"
You didn't have to finish before he grabbed your water from your side table and handed it to you, somehow knowing what you wanted. You took a few smalls sips while Peter watched you, still not letting go of your hand. His expression gave away that he had something to say so you just waited, hoping the water would help your throat a little.
"I'm in love with you," he blurted.
You choked on the water, "Excuse me?"
"I'm in love with you and you almost died and I should've told you before but I didn't so I'm telling you now," he said quickly, his expression terrified but also relieved at the same time, like he had been holding those words in since you blacked out.
"Peter, no one else is in here, you don't have to pretend," you said slowly, but he just shut his eyes and gripped your hand tighter, shaking his head.
"I'm not - no, Y/N, I'm not saying it to try and fool anyone. I'm saying it because it's true and I almost lost you and I can't keep lying about how I feel, I can't."
You stared at him in shock, but Peter was already talking again before you could even think of a response.
"I think the team's teasing always bothered me because I was in denial about how I really felt about you," he said quietly, almost sounding scared as he said it. "I got distracted with Liz and then MJ but...but it was always you. When MJ told me she liked Brad I was hurt but I realized it wasn't because she didn't like me - it was because I realized I liked you. And you had been encouraging me to go after her so much that I knew I never had a chance with you. And I didn't want to accept that I loved you because you're my best friend and...and it was obvious you didn't feel that way about me."
"I do, though," you whispered, his eyes widening a fraction. "I realized recently that I did, at least. And maybe I always have, but...but being with you like this made me realize that I do feel that way about you."
"Really?"
You nodded and he grinned, bringing your intertwined hands up to his face and pressing a kiss to your knuckles. "I love you."
"I love you, too."
He stood up and leaned over you, being careful not to press against you at all as he took your face in his hands, a contagious smile on his lips. "Say it again. Please."
"I love you," you promised, letting your hand that wasn't wrapped in an IV clip come up and hold his face too, as he let your foreheads press together. "I love you, Peter."
He moved forward and pressed his lips against yours, kissing you for real this time. You hadn't pictured your first kiss with him to be when he was still all teary eyed and you were stuck in a hospital bed, but you weren't complaining as you moved your lips against his, trying not to smile.
You both pulled back when your heart rate monitor started going crazy, Peter's eyebrows scrunched up in confusion. You groaned as he got a smirk his face, now realizing why it was going off.
"Seriously? Am I that good of a kisser-"
"Shut up," you mumbled, catching his lips in another gentle kiss, moving back before your stupid heart rate monitor decided to betray you like that again.
He brushed his lips against your forehead briefly before pulling away, his hand still holding your face delicately as his expression got serious. "I hate seeing you like this."
"And I hate seeing you like this," you ran your thumb under his eyes, the dark circles more prominent than ever. "Have you been sleeping?"
"In this chair, couple hours a night."
"That doesn't count."
"Well shit," another voice made Peter jump a little, turning to see some of the team standing in the doorway. Tony and Bucky looked pissed while Sam did a fist pump.
"Called it! Okay, you idiots both owe me a fifty," Sam said with a shit-eating grin, both Tony and Bucky groaning as they reached for their wallets.
"What's going on?" Peter asked, and Tony just glared at you both.
"You two just had to actually be together, didn't you?" He muttered, smacking the bills onto Sam's hand. "It seemed so obvious it wasn't real, now I don't know left from right."
"What are you guys talking about?" You winced as you sat up a little, Peter's hand on your back to support you.
"We thought you guys were faking it to get us off your backs," Bucky admitted. "But clearly not since we just walked in on Peter laying one on you with no one else around. Glad to know we were right to force you two together though, I guess."
Peter and you exchanged a look, trying not to laugh.
"Why in the world would you think we were faking it?"
a/n: don’t forget to let me know if you want to be on the taglist!
warnings: jealously, feelings of insecurity around intelligence, slightly suggestive language/situations
pairing: peter parker x reader
word count: 6.8k
summary: sometimes you feel a little behind everyone else, but peter makes sure to remind you that you’re not as alone as you think you are
masterlist ~ requests are closed
~
"How did I even get into Midtown?" You banged your head against your desk, making your best friend snicker. "I have no brain cells in my head. Maybe just one but it's bouncing around and not retaining anything."
"Come on, you're just not trying hard enough. You can do it," Peter encouraged, and you couldn't help but smile at his enthusiasm.
He had always been this way. Ever since you met his little nerdy self in fourth grade, he had pushed you to believe in yourself more and try harder. The fact was, you just didn't have things click for you the way they seemed to click for him. But his faith in you was relentless, and you supposed that was part of the reason why you started to love him so much.
"Is it bad if I don't even know what an...inertia...is?" You read slowly, looking up to see Peter putting his head in his hands.
"It's not a thing, it's an action, or an inaction I guess - that's not really the point," he sighed, "Y/N, were you paying attention last lecture?"
"Uh..."
"I already know the answer to that, I guess. What's on your mind?"
You. Of course you weren't going to say that out loud, but really, how were you supposed to concentrate when Peter was right next you to every class and had the audacity to look so cute? It was his fault you were failing, obviously.
"I dunno," you mumbled, leaning your face on your arm and staring at him, "How can you do all this and be Spider-Man?"
"I have many brain cells bouncing around my head, unlike your single one."
You threw your water bottle at him and he caught it easily, laughing at you. "I don't know, Y/N. School's never been stressful for me, you know that."
You couldn't help the spark of jealousy you felt at that, knowing he didn't mean it in a bragging way, but it still sucked. He barely had to study to take a test and still ace it, and he spent minutes on homework that took you hours.
He never made you feel stupid, even when you would stare at words of a question and have to reread it multiple times to understand what it was asking. Even when you had to have him repeat concepts to you over and over again until you finally remembered. Even when you mixed up definitions and dates and equations.
"I think you need a new studying approach," he suggested, his eagerness to help you focus making your jealousy evaporate almost immediately. He was too kind for you to be annoyed at.
"What do you have in mind?" You asked, tapping your pencil against your paper, "Because I've tried pretty much every tactic there is."
"What about a reward system type of studying? You nail one concept and give yourself some kind of reward."
"And what would my reward be?"
He snapped his fingers like he got a sudden idea, "I'll take you swinging."
"Seriously?" You gave him a funny look, hoping you didn't look flustered at the idea, "You told me no, like, years ago."
"Hey, it's something you want to do really bad though, right? So it's the perfect motivator."
You frowned at his excited expression. He wasn't wrong - ever since you found out he was Spider-Man, you had begged him to take you swinging. It looked fun! But he always said no, at first because he wasn't confident enough in himself that he wouldn't drop you, but now because he was worried if someone saw, they'd somehow track you down as a target.
"Fine," you pouted, "I really do want to go swinging."
"Then once you nail these concepts, we'll go."
"Promise?"
"I promise," he grinned at you, "But low swinging only, in case you suddenly decide you're afraid of heights. And we'll need to go early in the morning, not at night, I don't want anyone seeing Spider-Man swinging some girl around. Okay?"
"That's a lot of rules," you joked, but you couldn't help the excitement building in your chest.
Maybe a reward system wasn't such a bad idea after all.
-
"I got in!" Ned's excited voice made you and MJ glance up. Peter was grinning next to him as they approached your lunch table.
"To MIT?" MJ asked, and he nodded and held up his letter.
Both of you cheered, Peter joining in on hyping up your friend by shaking Ned's shoulders.
"Told you you would get in," you teased, making Ned roll his eyes as he sat down with you all.
"Hey, now we all know where we're going next year," Peter grinned at you, and you smiled back weakly.
He wasn't wrong. You had decided first, choosing only to apply to the small community college that was close to where you were going to get an apartment with some friends that were going there, too. It would save you money, which was nice. There wasn't a point in applying anywhere else given your grades, but you hadn't told your friends that.
It didn't really bother you until your friends started getting tons of acceptances to their "safety" schools, which were ones you wouldn't have ever gotten into. Then MJ got into Princeton, Peter got into Columbia, now Ned to MIT - you suddenly felt small compared to them, and it bothered you a little.
They didn't brag about it, at least not around you. Ned and MJ were excited that you were going to the school you were going to, saying it would be awesome to be able to come back and visit New York and know that you would be there. Peter was thrilled that you'd still be in New York with him. It didn't make you feel any better about it, though.
"We're gonna go celebrate after school, want to join?" Ned asked, and you forced a smile.
"I'd love to, but, uh, actually I have to go to Ms. Smith's class to go over a quiz," you sighed, trying not to pay attention to that stupid feeling of jealousy you were getting.
It left a bitter taste in your mouth whenever you thought about them going to such prestigious schools, despite knowing that they deserved everything they got and more. You were so proud of them, even if you constantly felt like you were a step behind.
You'd have to get over that some day, but you weren't sure how soon that would happen.
-
You were nearly finished with your first year of college when you decided that you didn't like it very much.
It wasn't necessarily that it was harder than high school - you had gone to a science school meant for smart kids, so it really wasn't that different. Your classes were pretty much on the same level that Midtown was on.
But you missed your friends. You missed Peter the most, and not being able to see him every day sucked. He still was able to visit you frequently, but he was busier than ever with school and also with missions that the remaining Avengers would now suddenly spring on him since he was legally an adult.
Multiple times he would drop into your new bedroom, ripping his mask off and looking so tired that you would just let him sit and rant.
If possible, you loved him more than ever. His determination, his kindness, his eagerness to help people who often didn't return any thanks - you loved every part of him. Seeing him in the fleeting moments made you just miss him more, and realize more and more that you needed to do something about it, or you'd regret it forever.
It was nearly summer break when you were able to get your hands on something you knew he'd love. Your science teacher provided all students with four tickets to a science exhibit that wouldn't normally interest you, but you saw it as an opportunity.
He liked stuff like this. And you liked him. Obviously you were going to invite him, if just to be able to spend time with him and see how excited he would get about the exhibit.
Still, you invited MJ too since she was in town. You were a coward.
"Y/N, this is so awesome!" He hugged you tightly when you presented him with the tickets during a study session, making you laugh. Your heart might have also skipped a beat, but you made yourself let go before it became awkward.
"I had an extra ticket for Ned, but I don't think he'll be in New York," you shrugged. "And my roommates aren't really science people, so."
"Do you mind if I bring a friend?" Peter asked, "Her name's Gwen. She's in one of my classes and would probably love this."
Huh. Gwen, a girl in his class he's never mentioned before, but apparently he knows enough about her that he knows she likes science stuff. You felt the frown on your face as you recognized that ugly emotion rising in your chest. You hated jealousy.
You really hoped he wasn't reading too into the expression on your face, and you masked it quickly. "Oh, sure. That'll work! Yeah, okay."
He stared at you for a second with a strange emotion in his expression, one that you couldn't place. "You alright?"
"Yeah?"
"Okay, just checking," he didn't look away from you for a moment, before suddenly reaching for your pencil. "You did this equation wrong, by the way."
"What?" You pouted, the sudden subject change taking you slightly by surprise.
"All you did was accidentally switch these around," he suddenly leaned closer to you in order to write on the page, and you almost felt like you had to hold your breath as he scratched out some numbers and rewrote the problem. "See?"
"Ah," you replied, ignoring how he didn't move away, instead just keeping his chair close to yours as he squinted at your paper some more. Your eyes trailed over his knit eyebrows and down to his lips before you forced yourself to look away.
You needed to chill out.
"Simple mistake," he looked back at you, grinning, "The rest of this is flawless."
"For once," you muttered, quickly changing the subject, "Well, thanks, Peter. I seriously appreciate these tutoring sessions."
"Anytime, sweetheart," luckily he wasn't looking at you, so he missed the way you nearly choked at that nickname. "How did your bio test go, by the way?"
"Uh, great, good," you paused, collecting your thoughts, "Actually, the grade isn't out yet, so I don't know for sure."
"You did really good in the last studying we did, I'm sure you'll do great this time, too," he smiled, nearly making your brain short-circuit.
He was sitting way too close to you, being way too sweet, calling you pet names that made your insides churn - he needed to stop, or you would probably combust.
"Wow, look at the time!" You suddenly scooted your chair back, "It's pretty late, shouldn't you be patrolling soon?"
He gave you a funny look, his gaze sliding over to your clock. "It's not even three?"
"Crime doesn't work around a clock," you chuckled awkwardly, "I actually have to meet a classmate at the library anyway, so. I'll see you for the exhibit?"
"Sure," he agreed, still giving you a weird look, but letting it slide nonetheless.
You sighed and resisted the urge to bang your head against your door once he left, just leaning your head against it instead. You should've just lied and said there were only three tickets. Or even just said two and gone with him alone like you should've done in the first place.
Coward.
-
Sooner than you would've liked, you were waiting outside a coffee shop with Peter, waiting for Gwen and MJ to show up.
"Gwen should be here in about five," Peter said after glancing at his phone, and you shrugged.
"Cool."
It was quiet for a minute, which was unusual for the both of you. You glanced up at him, surprised by the weirdly giddy expression on his face. Peter might have loved science, but he was strangely happy for just an exhibit trip.
"Why are you grinning like that?" You questioned, and he just shook his head.
"No reason. What time will MJ get here?"
Hopefully soon, you thought to yourself bitterly. Peter's suddenly happy mood made you wonder if this Gwen was really just a friend. Was he really grinning like an idiot because she was coming?
A few introductions and coffees later, and you were all walking through the exhibit. MJ stuck with you, catching you up on her life since being at Princeton. Peter had seen her more recently, but this was only the second time you saw her in person since starting college, and you were happy to listen to her and share stories.
Unfortunately, that meant Gwen and Peter were pretty much left to each other.
Gwen was excitedly talking about the process of something or other, Peter listening to her intently as she pointed at something on the exhibit. MJ had stuck right next to you while you stood a few feet away, pretending to be interested in something else.
"You look a little green," MJ grinned, and you shot her a dirty look. "You're lucky Peter is blind to jealousy."
"Leave me alone. I'm mourning."
"You're dramatic. He doesn't like her like that."
"You should've seen how excited he was for her to get here," you grumbled, ignoring it when MJ rolled her eyes.
"You're the only one for him, Y/N. One day he'll have to admit that."
Maybe in your wildest dreams.
Gwen was smart. She was smart, and pretty, and really nice - you didn't want to be that person who got annoyed at someone just because you were jealous, but it didn't really help that Peter was around her a lot.
She was pointing out things in the exhibit and talking about them in a way you never could. How could she remember all this stuff and just pull facts out like a magic trick?
She would suit him better. She was as smart as him, he wouldn't have to sit with her for hours and explain concepts to her. She understood and liked the same niche science things that Peter did. He deserved someone like that.
"Well, I have to head back, I have my internship in the morning," Gwen said in an apologetic tone, snapping you out of those thoughts. "It was really nice to meet you guys, thanks for inviting me!"
"Of course," you smiled back, hoping it didn't look forced. She really was nice, and you would need to get over it - she seemed like a good fit for Peter, and you were sure you'd see her again.
"She's great, isn't she?" Peter asked once she had left, and you nodded.
"Yeah. Really...smart."
MJ shrugged, "She was cute. I have to meet up with my mom pretty soon, you guys alright if I take off?"
"Sure, I'll make sure she gets home safely, Miss Jones," Peter hooked his arm with yours, making you laugh a little.
"You better," MJ pointed at him accusingly, before laughing and hugging you both goodbye.
It was only about ten minutes into the walk home when you started complaining.
"Can't we just swing home? It'll be faster!"
"Nope, swinging is for the studying reward system only," he said firmly, making you pout. "Alright, don't give me puppy dog eyes, it isn't going to work."
"It'll take so much longer to walk, though," you clasped your hands together in a pleading motion, and Peter just scoffed.
"What, you hate spending time with me that much?"
"You suck," you dropped your hands, frowning at him, "You know that's not true."
"Well, I know that I love spending time with you," he grinned, and you felt like you would melt into a puddle if he ever looked at you that way again. "Thanks for inviting me today. It was fun."
"Of course," you smiled back, looking away as you realized you were already approaching your apartment building. Maybe it was a good thing you didn't make him swing you both - it was kind of a short walk.
You were going to bid him goodbye when he suddenly wrapped his fingers around your wrist, stopping you.
"I know this is a weird question," Peter hesitated, "But...you never want to come visit me on campus anymore. I usually have to come to you, and this is the first time we've done anything in a while. Did...did I do something wrong?"
You felt your heart drop, hating that that was the first thing he was assuming. "No! No, not at all, I just...I don't really feel like..."
He waited patiently, looking at least slightly relieved that you quickly denied him doing anything wrong.
"I feel out of place whenever I visit you on campus," you admitted, and his eyebrows knitting in confusion pretty much told you that he didn't get it. "I didn't bother applying because I knew I wouldn't get in. There's so many smart people there, and I feel like...the more I'm there, the more you'll realize I don't belong there, with your smart friends. Like, for God's sake, you have to tutor me in a subject I've been taking since the eighth grade, you'd never have to do that for any of them."
Peter was silent for a minute, his expression almost looking angry when he finally spoke. "You think...you think I'd rather be friends with people that go to Columbia, over you? Because you think they're smarter than you, or because it's apparently a burden for me to tutor you?"
"Is it not?" You looked at the ground, frowning, "I mean, don't you get tired of it?"
"I like tutoring you," Peter insisted, his fingers lifting your chin up to look him in the eye. "I like being around you, I like being your friend, I like supporting you. You aren't stupid, Y/N. In fact, you're so smart. You can't base your intelligence off of grades or standardized testing, you know? And you can't base your value off of how quick you can pick up a concept."
He made it way too easy for you to fall in love with him. You stared at him for a moment, trying not to blurt your feelings even as the words crawled up your throat. "Thanks, Peter."
"You know that you're pretty much my best friend, right? And that I would never think less of you just because you don't go to an ivy league?"
"I know," you said quietly, finally forcing yourself to lift your chin out of his loose grip. "I know that. Guess I just need reassurance every once in a while."
Best friend. You should have been thrilled that he called you that, but something in your heart cracked nonetheless. One of these days you would need to face your feelings head on, and just deal with the consequences.
"Does this mean you'll visit me on campus again?" He asked, his hopeful grin making you laugh a little. "There's a new cafe right down the street that I think you'll like. And it's quiet enough for studying!"
"I'd like that."
That weird look from the other day crossed over his face, making you once again wonder what he was thinking. Instead of saying anything, he just took a closer step toward you. He leaned forward and pressed his lips to your forehead, "Have a good night, Y/N."
You felt something weird building in your chest as he grinned and waved goodbye, and you couldn't even bring yourself to say anything back as he walked away.
-
Even after all these years, you still hated studying.
The music was not helping. In fact, it was really distracting, but you were trying to force yourself to make it work anyway. The reward system idea was the best one, but it wasn't the same when Peter wasn't there.
Your window was always open this time of day, the summer air finally cooling down enough. While New York didn't exactly have "fresh" air, it was nice to have a breeze come in and to enjoy it before it was nighttime and bugs would come in from the light. You also lived several stories up - the only thing that ever really came into your room was Peter, but he hadn't been around for a few weeks. Maybe you hoped he would randomly show up if you just kept it open every night.
The last several weeks had been crappy for several reasons. You hated summer school, you hated the fact that you had to do it at all, but also the work load was ridiculous. You hated that Peter wasn't around - not just for studying, but because you missed him. His stupid jokes, his Spider-Man stories, the sound of his laughter and the smile on his face when he got excited about something.
You had to tell him how you felt. But the idea of any type of rejection made you want to curl up and die and never speak to anyone ever again.
Summer school was really frying your brain.
You grit your teeth and forced yourself to read the math equation again, determined to get through at least this worksheet before giving up. You were in an awful mood, but hopefully if you just got through this, you could go and hang out with your roommates and calm down. And maybe Peter would text you before you started to worry.
The sudden sound behind you made you jump out of your chair, eyes widening at the sudden appearance of a tall figure standing by your window. Normally you wouldn't jump to conclusions and would assume it was Peter, but you couldn't see who it was in the dark. And Peter would've texted you first, right?
You almost let out a scream, but suddenly a hand was covering your mouth and you stared wide eyed at Spider-Man's mask as it was muffled. "It's just me!"
"What the hell was that, Y/N?" Peter still didn't drop his hand when your roommate shouted from the other room.
You grabbed his wrist and removed it from your mouth, glaring at him as you yelled back, "Nothing! Just thought I saw a spider!"
Peter snickered at that and you shushed him, going to lock your door just in case one of them decided to investigate. He ripped his mask off, shaking his head and making his hair stand up all funny. He took one look at your annoyed expression before bursting into laughter, making you shush him again.
"What the hell is wrong with you?" You hissed while he kept laughing quietly, "You scared the shit out of me!"
"Sorry," he didn't sound sorry as he crossed his arms, "Just wanted to say hi, it's been a while."
"Yeah, where the hell have you been?" You relaxed a little, realizing how much you had missed him during his absence. You definitely knew you missed him, but having him here in front of you made you want to hug him and never let go. You hated when he had to leave abruptly and he couldn't even text you.
"Sam and Bucky asked me to join on a mission, it wasn't a big deal, just had to leave last minute and had no cell service," he sighed, plopping down on your desk chair and spinning around in it. "What have you been up to? And what the hell are you listening to?"
You pouted as he leaned forward and squinted at your playlist. "I heard that classical music helps you study and actually focus so I wanted to try it."
"This is making me feel like we're in the 1600's," he laughed, grabbing your phone and looking for something different, ignoring your protests.
"You have a lot of nerve coming in here and messing with all my stuff after being absent for two weeks," you muttered, crossing your arms.
"Aw, I knew you missed me," he winked at you, and you pretended that didn't make your heart skip a beat.
If that didn't fluster you, it certainly did when he started playing "I Hear a Symphony". You recognized it the second the first few notes played, staring at him wide eyed as he stood up and offered you a hand.
"May I have this dance?" He asked, the expression on his face making you take his hand no questions asked.
Peter's hand held yours tightly while he let his other rest on your waist, pulling you right up to his chest. For a minute he stared at you, and you let your free hand hold onto the top of his shoulder while he seemed to shake himself out of his stare.
"You looked like you needed a break," he whispered, and you felt yourself relax. His eyes focused on a spot just beneath yours, probably noting the dark circles. He wouldn't know that they were because you were worried about him and could hardly sleep.
"I probably do."
He spun you around your room as the music picked up, making you laugh at the goofy smile on his face as he essentially was ballroom dancing with you to possibly the cheesiest romance song you'd heard this year.
"I really did miss you," you managed to say as he dipped you, unable to keep the grin off your face, "Even if you are trying to make me trip over all the shit on my floor."
"You have just enough room for dancing, my dorm would be way too small for this," he lifted you back up, his hand tightening on your waist as he started swaying with you again. "And I missed you, too. A lot."
He spun you a last time, his hand finding your waist again immediately as he smiled at you. For a second you stared at him, the soft expression on his face almost making you suspicious. It almost mimicked the ones that he had given you weeks ago, the ones that you couldn't really figure out.
The mood was cut short when the song ended and instead skipped to the next one, which must've been from your cleaning playlist. You both flinched at the suddenly loud music blasting, barely able to look at each other for a second before bursting into laughter.
"What the hell is wrong with your playlists?" Peter chuckled in your ear, for some reason not letting go of his embrace on you, "You go from classical music, to whatever the fuck this is?"
"Don't bash on my taste," you patted his chest, making the move to go over and just shut your phone off. Peter held onto your hand as you did so, surprising you by pulling you back to him once you stopped the music.
"Yes?" You asked, a teasing smile dancing on your lips until you saw the look on his face. "You alright?"
"I need to tell you something."
"Okay?"
He continued staring at you for a minute, his eyes moving over your curious expression, as if he were contemplating what to say. You stared right back, trying to look him in the eye despite the suddenly nervous feeling you had in your chest whenever his brown eyes looked at you like that. You didn't want to get your hopes up, but...
"There was a moment, on the mission," he finally spoke, shutting his eyes for a second, "I-I wasn't sure if...I didn't know if we were going to make it out. I don't want to go into detail, and looking back on it we were definitely fine, but...it made me think some things. Like some 'my life is flashing before my eyes and I don't want to go with regrets' kind of things."
You raised an eyebrow, waiting for him to continue. He only stared into your eyes for another minute before bringing a hand up to your face. His eyes moved down to your lips and you were suddenly aware of how close he was, how his fingers were now trailing down your jaw, how your heart was racing and you were certain he knew it by the slightly shy grin suddenly appearing on his face.
"I'm in love with you, Y/N," he whispered, his eyes moving back up to yours, "I think I always have been. I never wanted to say anything, because I wasn't really sure how you felt back then, but then I wasn't sure if I was going to make it back home and I knew I had to tell you. In case I never got the chance again."
You stared at him blankly while he waited for your reaction, his expression as nervous as you had been feeling before. Unfortunately, you had a tendency to deflect to humor when you were nervous.
"You had to almost die to realize you had feelings for me?"
He let out a groan, leaning his forehead against yours as you laughed at him, forcing yourself to relax as he did. "Come on. I've known how I've felt for you for a while, but this just...gave me the push I needed. And hey, I'm trying to be romantic here. You're killing my vibe."
"You were being really romantic up until you brought up your vibe."
"Y/N."
His tone was warning, one of his hands sliding up your back and his eyes searching yours while you tried not to grin at him. All you could think about was that he loved you, and you were wondering if you were going to wake up any second to realize this was a dream.
"Peter."
"I love you."
"I know."
"I swear to God, if you Han Solo me right now-"
You reached your hands up this time to hold his cheeks, making him stop talking. "I love you, too. I have for a while."
His mouth broke into a wide smile, "I know."
"If you already knew, then why are you acting like a nervous wreck?"
"It's different knowing something versus you actually saying it out loud," his smile turned soft, one of his fingers catching and playing with a strand of your hair. "Say it again."
"I love you," you repeated, his smile contagious, "And I'm going to kiss you now because you're taking way too long."
"I'm not gonna protest that," His hand moved to cup your cheek, bringing you toward him. "I seriously do love you."
You felt it. The way he was now kissing you, the way his hands were holding you, like he never wanted to let you go - he meant it. He almost died and his last thoughts were that he wanted you. He wanted you.
That thought made you press against him even more, forgetting any thoughts about how you should probably not go any further with your roommates in the other room. He didn't hesitate to match your energy, and you didn't even realize he was moving you both until you felt your back meet your mattress.
"I can't believe I waited so long to do this," he muttered once you broke apart for air, hovering over you with a hand still on your face. "I love you."
"Say it again," you whispered what he himself said earlier, not able to help the childish giddy feeling in your chest when he said it. Even if he already said it multiple times now. It was all you had ever wanted him to say, and it still didn't feel real. If your alarm clock went off in a second and woke you up, you wouldn't even be surprised.
"I love you," he repeated, his smile mirroring yours as he leaned down to kiss you again. "I love you so much, sweetheart."
His lips moved to your nose, your cheek, your jawline. You shut your eyes as he started moving toward your neck, but you grabbed his face and pulled it back to yours, knowing better than to let him move into that territory just yet.
Peter didn't hesitate this time to part your lips, deepening the kiss enough to make you feel slightly dizzy. His hand gripped your waist, and you squeaked against him when his other one brought your leg up to hook over his hip.
You let your hands move up to his hair, and you felt him groan against your lips when you unintentionally tugged on it. That noise made you pull back, pressing a hand to his shoulder to keep him from following your lips, though you could tell he still tried.
"My roommates are home, dude."
"You did not just call me dude after I had my tongue in your mouth."
You bit your lip to keep from laughing, the annoyed expression on his bright red face making you almost go over the edge.
"My roommates will be coming to bug me in about ten minutes to go out for drinks, and will wonder why a maskless Spider-Man in is my room. Or, if you took the suit off and wore your normal clothes, they'd be wondering how Peter Parker just magically appeared in my room. Think logically, you're supposed to be the smart one here."
He sighed, resting his head against your collarbone and relaxing against you. "Fine. Whatever."
"You're such a boy."
"I missed you," he whined, and you laughed as you let your fingers run through his hair, "Are you really going to kick me out?"
"Maybe if you came through the front door like a normal person, I'll let you back in."
"Hey, I can do that," he sat up, making you laugh as he hurried to put his mask back on. "I'll go knock on your door and everything!"
"You're a dork," you snorted as he hurried to your window. "See you in five?"
"More like two," his masked eye winked, and you chuckled again as he ducked out.
It wasn't even a minute later that you heard a knock on your front door. You waited, arms crossed as you heard your one of your roommates groan and get up to answer it.
"Peter, what a surprise," you heard your roommate say flatly, almost making you laugh. "You know we love you, but on drinking night? Seriously?"
"Sorry, Y/N said she needed a study buddy," you heard Peter say apologetically as you made your way around the corner.
"I did," you shrugged as she glared at you, "Sorry?"
"I'm guessing this means to drinking tonight," your other roommate frowned, making you laugh.
"Not for me at least. Got a lot of studying to do, I'm sorry," you apologized, hoping Peter wasn't making a face behind you that would give away the lie. "Tomorrow?"
"Sure," she waved her hand, smirking a little, "Have fun you two!"
You shot her the middle finger as you shoved a snickering Peter into your room. He tossed his bag on the floor, turning to grin at you as you shut and locked your door.
"Hello," he circled his arms around your waist, and you tried not to grin when his eyes moved to your lips again.
"Hi," you whispered back. "I'm really glad you're back okay."
"Me too," he rested his forehead against yours, shutting his eyes. "And I can't tell you how happy I am that you feel the same."
A warm feeling made its way through your chest and you couldn't help the smile on your lips when he opened his eyes to meet yours again. "Come here."
You tugged his hand and brought him back to your bed, ignoring the raised eyebrows he shot at you. "Don't get any funny ideas. I still have roommates and now they know I have a boy in my bedroom."
"Hey, I didn't say anything!" He held his hands up, and you tugged him down onto the bed with you anyway, rolling your eyes.
You were tired, and he was extremely tired from what you could tell. So you let him settle against you between your legs, tucking his head into your neck and wrapping his arms around your waist before shutting his eyes. Just like before, you let your hand travel up and tangle in his hair, feeling him sigh against you as you both relaxed.
"How long have you known?" You asked quietly, meeting his eyes when he lifted his head to rest his chin on you.
"Known what?"
"That I've had feelings for you."
He smiled a little smugly, making you roll your eyes. You had always figured he was just blind, or that maybe you weren't as obvious as you thought you were - but no, apparently he knew that you liked him. You just hoped it wasn't for an embarrassingly long amount of time.
"Pretty much since the face you made when I brought up Gwen Stacy for the first time. You have a cute jealous face, by the way."
"Oh," you raised your eyebrows, "You haven't known too long then. And really? I thought I covered it pretty well."
He frowned, "Wait, when you say that wasn't too long...how long have you liked me?"
You didn't answer immediately, which made him squint his eyes at you. "I don't know if I want to say it now."
His hand squeezed your side, making you jump and glare at him while he grinned.
"Y/N," he said softly, his teasing expression dropping, "I don't think you could possibly have liked me as long as I've liked you. As long as I've loved you, even."
"Try freshman year of high school," you said flatly, and his grin only widened.
"Try fifth grade," he countered, making you stare at him in bewilderment. "Maybe it was just a crush then, but I still think it counts."
"Fifth grade?" You asked weakly, "God, that means you liked me even through my emo phase. And you still liked me when I tried experimenting with make-up and looked like shit for three years in middle school. Something is seriously wrong with you, dude."
"And you liked me pre-Spider-Man," he raised an eyebrow, "I was like a twig. What the hell did you see in that?"
"I saw the sweet, funny, and cute guy that I couldn't picture not being in my life. I miss the glasses, actually. And you still are a twig."
"Why didn't you say anything?" He ignored that comment, resting his cheek against your collarbone again. "We could have been together literally all of high school if you had told me."
"Why didn't you say anything?" You threw the question back at him, "You had a longer amount of time to tell me."
"I didn't think you felt the same until last month," he mumbled against your skin, "I wasn't gonna risk the best thing in my life until I knew if you felt the same."
"And I didn't know you felt anything else aside from friendship toward me, until about...ten minutes ago? So I guess we're even."
"How did you not know? I thought it was obvious."
You suddenly sat up straight, "Was that why you were smiling like an idiot the day I met Gwen?"
"You being jealous was hilarious. And also it confirmed that you did feel something for me, of course I was happy about that."
You grabbed your pillow and smacked him with it, making him laugh as he blocked it. "I thought it was because you were excited to see her, you asshole!"
"I know," he snickered when you started hitting him more, "Hey!"
"You suck."
"I'm a suck-er for you, sweetheart," he grinned, making you roll your eyes. "Shouldn't I let you get back to studying?"
"Or you could tutor me, because I hate this class and you'd taken it in high school," you suggested.
"You know I love tutoring you. And the reward system we've made up."
"Alright. Swinging the prize again?"
He suddenly grinned, taking your hand in his and kissing your knuckles. You felt your face heat up at the gesture, especially at the grin he was now giving you.
"I actually have a different reward in mind, now."
a/n: ok I’m kind of going back on what I said and posting fics that haven’t previously been on tumblr yet first, so any of you that didn’t follow me to wattpad can see some “new” content :)
warnings: really bad coffee puns, but otherwise it’s just really cute
pairing: college!peter parker x reader
word count: 6.5k
summary: peter has finally been bullied (lovingly, of course) by his friends into asking out the cute barista, but things go a little wrong. or maybe a little right.
masterlist ~ requests are closed
~
"God, you are so whipped," Ned's grumble made Peter break his gaze to give his friend a dirty look.
"What?"
"Maybe if you'd stop ogling at our barista for five seconds, you'd be paying attention to what I just said.
"Her name's Y/N," Peter defended you, "And I was paying attention. But, uh...say it again anyway."
"You are awful."
Peter listened this time as Ned went over the crazy professor he had, making sure his attention didn't waver even as you passed by their table to help another customer.
He had been coming here since the beginning of college, discovering it was unusually quiet compared to other cafe's near campus, and it had some of the best coffee he'd ever had. Caffeine didn't affect him as much since becoming Spider-Man, so he didn't usually care for it - but one cup from here changed his life.
Though, there was another reason that he liked to frequent this place more than the ones closer to campus.
And that reason walked right up to their table, making his attention slip away again from Ned's rant.
"Are you guys wanting anything else?" You asked as you started gathering up their empty cups, "Maybe a refill?"
"I'm good, thank you," Peter said softly, barely trusting himself not to stutter around you.
He knew he had a track record for falling too quickly and too hard when he had a crush on someone, but he was convinced it was entirely different with you. When you first smiled at him and complimented his Iron Man shirt, he swore it was just a coincidence that he turned bright red and stuttered a thank you, which made MJ lose her mind. But the fact that he still had that reaction around you was enough to tell him that he liked you. And he didn't mind it at all.
It had been months now, you knew him and his friends by name, and you always greeted them like friends. The little conversations you all had between you helping customers made his day, and made him like you even more. And lately he had a feeling that maybe you liked him a little too.
"Well, I'm not," Ned interrupted his thoughts, making him frown, "I think I need something strong to get through the day, this class is killing me."
"Well, you're taking computer science, so I don't know what else you expected," you teased a little, pointing at the menu, "Our cold brews are pretty strong if you want to try that?"
"Yes, and please add some type of sugar, I can't handle drinks like the ones Peter orders."
"I'm more a sweet coffee girl myself," you smiled a little as you wrote that down, "Anything else? You sure you don't want anything, Peter?"
He ignored the increase in his heart rate when you said his name, "Uh, I-I'm good, thanks."
He was pathetic.
You just shrugged, somehow always oblivious to his nervousness around you, which he was grateful for.
"We saw you guys have Spider-Man cookies now," Ned asked, and Peter wanted to bang his head against the table. "How much are those?"
"Oh, they're only a dollar, and they're really good," you promised, "Do you guys want two?"
"Yes please. This boy needs some type of sugar in his life."
Peter shot Ned at angry look while you laughed, telling them you'd be right back.
"When are you going to ask her out, dude? She's clearly waiting for you to."
"No she's not," he glared at his friend again, forcing his insecure thoughts away. "She probably has a boyfriend, anyway. Or a girlfriend. She could get anyone she wants, she-she wouldn't say yes to me."
Ned rolled his eyes, "You're such a pick me boy."
"And you're an-"
He didn't finish that sentence as you were already back with their cookies, dropping them off with a quick smile before going to help another table that was waving you over.
Peter read the pun you wrote on each of their cookie bags, like you always did whenever one of them got a pastry. His said "made espresso-ly for you" with a winky face, and Ned's read "dough me a favor - enjoy these cookies!"
"These puns are awful," Ned chuckled, "You two must be made for each other. And she gave you a winky face!"
"I didn't even know they made Spider-Man cookies," Peter grumbled, ignoring everything he said. He didn't want to read into something as silly as a winky face and get his hopes up for no reason.
Ned was dying as Peter stared down at the frosting version of his mask. "Seriously, dude?"
"What, I think it's hilarious," Ned laughed, taking a ridiculously large bite out of Spider-Man's head. "And besides, Y/N said they were really good."
"Shut up, man."
-
When Ned and MJ exchanged a look when Peter brought up going to the cafe to study, he knew he was in for it.
"Why don't you go alone today?" Ned suggested slyly, making Peter frown even more. "Maybe without us there you'll finally get the guts to ask Y/N out."
"Please, we'd literally have to force him to do it," MJ rolled her eyes, "But I did want to check out that new place by my dorm. Apparently they donate have their proceeds to the organization of your choice."
"Guys," Peter clasped his hands together, pouting, "Please don't make me go alone. I don't really like any other coffee shop but it'll look weird if I'm by myself and-"
"Stop making excuses!" MJ threw her hands up, "You complain about not getting to know Y/N better because we're always there, so this is your chance! If you actually want to talk to her like a normal human being instead of gaping like a fish."
"I don't gape like a-"
"MJ is right," Ned put a hand on his shoulder, "We're doing this because we love you, and it's been way too long since you've been on a date."
"This wouldn't be a date-"
"At least ask for her number," MJ continued, "Anything. This is getting pathetic, I'm about to ask her out if you don't."
"Okay!" Peter threw his hands up, "Fine! I'll go by myself but I won't promise anything, I don't want to make her uncomfortable."
"At least you're a gentleman," MJ rolled her eyes, throwing her arm over Ned's shoulder, "Have fun with Y/N, I'm going to be enjoying coffee that probably tastes like shit but will at least be for a good cause. Who are you thinking of donating to, Ned?"
Peter droned them out for the rest of the walk, barely giving them a wave as they split ways to go to each different shop. He was getting too much into his own thoughts as your shop came into view, almost wanting to turn around until he saw you behind the window.
You were just cleaning a table, looking at the front door every once in a while like you were expecting someone. Maybe he was stupid to think that maybe you were hoping him and his friends would show up, but it was the usual time of day they would all go...never mind. He was being ridiculous.
Still, he managed to make himself go inside anyway. You looked up at the door ringing, your lips spreading into a wide smile.
"All alone today?"
He noted that you seemed to be in a really good mood today, which made him feel giddy. He dropped his stuff on the usual table, trying to get himself together before speaking to you. God, he hadn't had this much trouble speaking to a girl since Liz. At least then he was a kid and there was an excuse.
"Yep, Ned and MJ are cheating on this place for one closer to campus," he sighed dramatically while you gasped.
"The betrayal," you put a hand over your heart, making him laugh, "How will I ever forgive them?"
"I'm sure once they realize the coffee cakes here are better than anywhere else, they'll come crawling back," Peter joked as he sat down.
"I'm guessing that's what you want today, then?"
"Please," he smiled as you jotted that down.
"And your usual drink?"
"Why don't you...surprise me this time?" He asked, and your eyes lit up. The look on your face made him glad he was risking his usual drink for whatever you would make in its place.
"Really? Okay, do you want caffeine today? Cold or hot?" You were already writing faster on your little notebook, your excitement making Peter melt.
"Hot, it is freezing outside," he shuddered, making you laugh, "And you can choose caffeine or not. I trust you."
You smiled at that, "Sure thing. I'll be right back."
There was only one other customer in the cafe, an older man typing furiously on his laptop. Peter tried to pay attention to his own computer instead of watching you behind the counter, but he couldn't really help it.
You were pacing between machines and syrups, and he tried not to wince when he saw you were using quite a few different ones. To him, syrup meant sugar, and he needed to prepare himself to act like he would enjoy whatever you were making him.
"Ta-da!" It was only a few moments later that you were presenting the drink to him like a prize, your excited expression making him smile despite how...light the coffee looked. Still, no matter what it was - he didn't regret it in the slightest if it meant you were going to smile at him like that.
Peter took a sip and tried his best to keep his expression neutral, but it was way different from his normal drink.
"Wow, that's...that's great!" He tried, and you frowned.
"You totally hate it," you sighed, but you were hiding a smile.
"No, no, it's really good," he promised, but you were already laughing.
"Too sweet, huh?"
"Maybe a little," he winced, and you grinned wider.
"Then it's on the house, and I'll go make your usual right now instead."
He had to admit he was a little relieved when you brought him his usual drink, setting it in front of him with another chuckle. "I guess I should have remembered you're not a sugary guy."
"Hey, coffee is better without sugar," he defended himself, "Besides, that's what the coffee cake is for."
"Oh, let me grab it!" You hurried back to get it, almost making Peter laugh at your rush. "I'm sorry, I was so excited about your drink that I forgot."
"No worries," Peter chuckled, taking the bag from you and immediately looking at the pun you wrote.
Where have you "bean" all my life? He hoped his face wasn't red enough for you to notice. And he definitely wasn't going to read into that too much. You always made puns on the pastry bags...even if this was the first one that sounded like borderline flirting.
Surely that didn't mean anything.
"Do you want me to take that away?" You were stifling a laugh as you gestured to the other drink you made him.
"I feel bad wasting coffee, even if it is disgustingly sweet," he admitted, but he was grimacing at the thought of drinking it.
"I actually made it really sweet on purpose," you winked, and he thought he was going to die right there. "I know how much you hate sweet drinks and thought it would be hilarious to see your reaction."
"You...are evil," he finally managed to say, making you laugh, "How could you betray me like that?"
You held your hands up, "Hey, it was funny watching you scramble to tell me it was good!"
"I'm never coming back here again," he said dramatically, making you laugh even harder.
"Yes, you will. You like me too much to ever abandon me like Ned and MJ did," you teased, not knowing how true your words really were.
"Yeah, I suppose," Peter said carefully, making himself take a drink before he said anything stupid. "But I'm never letting you surprise me with a drink again. I never knew you could be so cruel."
"You're so dramatic," you laughed, picking up the drink you made him, "This is my favorite drink from here, I'm a little offended."
"If I didn't drink straight black coffee every day, I might've found it good," he tried, making you roll your eyes. "I'm very sorry for insulting your favorite drink. Please forgive me?"
"Fine, I guess," you sighed, "Enjoy your incredibly bland and boring coffee, Peter."
He scoffed as you walked away laughing, going to check in on the other customer. He forced his eyes back down to his computer, knowing that he would be in trouble if he spent his whole time here focusing on you instead of his school work.
Even if he wanted to do the former instead.
-
Peter was by himself again the next time he visited the coffee shop. This time it wasn't because Ned and MJ ditched him - in fact, he went by himself on purpose. For one, you never worked in the evenings, so it wouldn't matter if you were there, anyway. For another, it was nearly eleven at night and he needed to do last minute studying somewhere he could actually focus.
The cafe was quiet when he came in, and he didn't see anyone behind the counter. Whoever had the night shift was probably cleaning in the back, considering they would only be open for a few more hours.
Peter didn't rush to get his things out, though he was hoping someone would have heard the door bell and come to get his order. He needed something strong if he was going to get through the night.
It was only a few seconds later that he heard footsteps, but he didn't look up from his computer until they were right next to him.
"Late night studying?" Peter was already smiling in surprise at the familiar voice, looking up to meet your equally tired eyes.
"I-I thought you only worked in the afternoons," Peter said with raised eyebrows, a little embarrassed that you were seeing him like this. Frantic last minute studying wasn't exactly the best impression of himself.
"I took a long shift today," you shrugged, and Peter realized you really were just as tired as he was. "Coworker is sick, so they needed the help. Anyway, what can I get for you?"
"The usual," he smiled a little, "But with like four extra shots, please. I need to stay awake."
"I'm considering making one for myself," you agreed, "I'll be right back with that, Pete."
Luckily, you were already walking back to the counter and didn't see his face turn pink at that nickname. Unfortunately, more customers came in, most of them his age and likely also doing last minute studying for finals week. You were busy with other customers to the point where he couldn't talk with you much, but that was okay - you looked exhausted and he didn't want to make your shift any more difficult by bothering you.
He didn't know how much time had gone by until he realized you were on your way out.
"Your shift done already?" He asked as you passed by him without your apron or name tag, and you nodded.
"Yep, finally," you stifled a yawn, and he felt awful that you had to work so long, as if it was his fault. "Hopefully I can stay awake on the walk home."
"Walk home?" He repeated you, glancing at the time and seeing how late it was. "Wait two seconds."
You watched him curiously as he started quickly gathering his things up, only processing what he was doing after a second, "Oh, wait, you-you don't have to walk me home, that's really sweet but you said you had studying to do-"
"Trust me, that can wait," he zipped up his bag, slipping it on, "Besides, it's really late, I was just about done anyway. Do you...mind if I walk you home?"
You hesitated, not wanting to be a bother - but the look in his eyes convinced you to cave. "No, I'd like that, actually."
He smiled and held the door open for you, a soft "thank you" coming from your lips before you both headed out into the night air.
"How many hours did you work?" He asked as you both started walking down the street, almost afraid of the answer.
"About eleven," you winced at the expression on his face, "I know, that wasn't a great idea. But overtime, am I right?"
"I suppose," he chuckled, "Hopefully this is a one time thing, though?"
"I won't be doing again for a while," you shuddered, and Peter thought it was because of the idea of doing a long shift again. But then he realized you were holding your arms to yourself, and it was cold, and you had no jacket.
Peter hesitated for a moment before shrugging his jacket off, really hoping this wasn't crossing a line. "Here, it's freezing."
Your expression softened as he held his jacket out to you, "Are...are you sure? You only have that thin sweatshirt-"
"Please," he insisted, holding it out further, "You're only wearing a t-shirt and it's about to snow. The last thing you need is to get sick."
"Thank you, Peter," you smiled as you took it from him, sliding it on gratefully. "I guess I hadn't really planned on walking home this late when it was cold."
You immediately felt warmer, still hugging your arms to yourself as you warmed up. Maybe it was a good thing you left your jacket at home.
Peter let you lead the way, considering he had no idea where you lived. He assumed it was close by since you walked instead of taking the subway, and he found that it was a nice walk nonetheless. Despite that, he was racking his brain for something to say, wanting to talk to you in the spare time he had before you reached your place. Luckily, you spoke for him.
"So, what do you study that requires a textbook that massive?" You raised an eyebrow at the one book Peter couldn't fit in his bag, held between his arm and side.
"Biophysics," he held the book up, "It's hard, but I like it. What about you? Are you in college?"
He didn't realize how much he didn't get to know about you in the fleeting moments he had with you.
Between helping other customers and cleaning up tables, you two only got to talk briefly. He knew you liked to crack bad puns, you liked Star Wars because you complimented Ned's shirt once and expressed excitement for the new movie, and you read a lot based on the amount of times you would take a break and have a book in your hands.
Otherwise, he didn't know much - but he wanted to know it all.
"I'm actually taking a gap year," you smiled a little, "I wanted to save up for school and honestly, I hadn't really figured out what I wanted to do right after graduating. So right now it's just the cafe, I guess."
"That's great, actually," he grinned, "It would probably be hard to tackle a job and school at the same time."
Technically, if he wanted to count being Spider-Man as a job, then he was doing just that. But obviously he wasn't going to tell you that.
"I'll have to do that in the fall," you made a face that he found adorable, "But I'll probably just take less shifts. Still, it'll be nice to have some extra cash, I suppose."
"That's a shame, if I don't get to see you as often," he said without thinking, but luckily you laughed in response.
"That would be a shame," you agreed, your smile making him relax, "Though I'm sure I'll be there for late night studying just like you are."
He couldn't help but feel disappointed when you stopped walking outside an apartment building. The walk went way faster than he had hoped, but he was relieved to know you lived close by your job and you didn't have to walk through any sketchy areas to get back and forth.
"Well, this is me," you gestured a little awkwardly, making Peter grin. "Thanks for walking me home, Peter. That was really sweet of you."
"Anytime."
To his surprise you pulled him into a hug, and he tried not to get lost in it. He counted only a few seconds before he made himself pull away, already missing the feeling of your arms around him.
Okay maybe Ned was right - he was whipped.
"Thanks again," you smiled, "I'll see you tomorrow?"
"Definitely," he breathed out, watching you give him a small wave as you entered your apartment building. He waved back, suddenly not feeling as tired as he was before. And he wasn't even upset that you forgot to give his jacket back.
In fact, he kind of hoped you would keep it.
-
Peter felt awful.
His side ached, he was pretty sure a nasty bruise was growing on his face, and he was losing energy. It was almost midnight and he had only fought the group of drug dealers because he thought there were three, which should've been a piece of cake.
But more came out of the shadows and even though he won and they were all carted away in police cars, he was beaten up pretty badly.
He sat down hard on the ledge of a building, ripping his mask off and sighing. Everything ached, and he knew he should go home, but the light of the cafe across the street distracted him.
It was your cafe, still open despite the late hour. He squinted as he noticed the worker cleaning tables, and he frowned when he realized it was you. He didn't see any customers, but also no other workers - were you in there by yourself?
He slipped his mask back on and leaped off the building, shooting a web to bring him to a more gentle landing. A pain still shot up his leg, and he winced, hoping his super healing would kick in soon.
Coffee. He needed coffee and a break and his energy back - that was why he was going in there. Not any other reason.
You looked up immediately when the bell rang, already behind the counter, but you froze when you realized just who was walking in.
Spider-Man. Freaking Spider-Man, who you never thought you'd meet in person in your entire life, had just walked into your coffee shop of all places. Despite not seeing his face, you almost thought he looked nervous, the way he hesitated before crossing his arms. Was this some kind of weird dream?
"Uh, hello," you finally spoke as you stared at him wide-eyed, your hand hovering over the cups, "Um...what can I...get for you?"
Peter resisted the urge to reply with 'the usual', luckily remembering at the last second that he was in his suit. In fact, he should probably order something different just to throw you off.
"Can I get a vanilla latte?" He clasped his hands together, "Please?"
"Sure thing," he found it cute how you scrambled to grab a hot cup and write his order on it. "Anything else?"
"And one of your Spider-Man cookies, of course. I've been told I look like that guy."
You chuckled at that, making Peter's heart skip a beat. He'd never get sick of that sound, he was certain of it. "That all?"
"Yep," he grabbed his card from one of his suit's pockets, "What do I owe you?"
"Oh, it's on the house," you waved your hand, "With everything you do for us everyday? It's the least I can do in return."
"I couldn't possibly-" Peter couldn't protest because you already left the register, starting work on his order and completely ignoring him. He just sighed, going to stand at the end of the counter and crossing his arms.
"Do you like latte art?" You asked as you were steaming the milk.
"Absolutely," he leaned against the counter, "What do you have in mind?"
You held the cup away from him, narrowing your eyes, "It's a surprise."
He sighed dramatically, making your mouth twitch as you tried not to smile. That was...a little familiar. It only took a few seconds for you to finish the design and be happy with it, and you slid it over the counter to him.
He took the cup, glad you couldn't tell how red his face was when he realized you had done latte art of...his mask.
"I love it," he looked back up to see your beaming smile, "You're really talented."
"Thank you," you did a little curtsy, making him laugh. You grabbed some tongs and got his cookie in a bag, handing that to him as well.
"Thanks," he took the bag, glancing around, "Are...are you the only one working tonight?"
"Yeah, my coworker has the flu," you frowned, eyeing the clock, "I've closed by myself before though, it's not so bad."
"This late at night?" He asked, not liking that at all.
"Are you about to give me a whole superhero speech about how I shouldn't walk home alone at night?" you crossed your arms, "I have...pepper spray."
"Still," he shook his head, plopping himself down in one of the seats. "I'll wait with you and walk you home."
"We're still open for another thirty minutes," you protested, "And then your drink will get cold! I'll be fine, seriously. But I appreciate the thought."
"I would feel really bad if I left right now and something happened," he shrugged, "Besides, you seem like nice company. Are you alright with me staying?"
You frowned, jumping up to sit on the counter. "Okay, fine. It was getting boring here by myself, anyway."
Without really thinking about it, he lifted his mask halfway as he had done several times on patrol when he was eating between fighting crime. He braced himself for the drink, hoping it wasn't as sweet as the one you made him the other day. Luckily, it wasn't too bad - though the vanilla was probably too much.
He noticed your eyes were trailing his jawline, and you almost laughed when his mouth turned down in a frown.
"Hey, don't be trying to sneak a peek," he pointed at you, making you roll your eyes, "Secret identities are secret for a reason, Y/N."
"Well, it's not like I could tell much from the bottom half of your face," you crossed your arms, but Peter didn't like the look in your eye. Maybe he should have just let his drink get cold. Surely you wouldn't recognize him? You had tons of customers every day.
"Have you ever had a vanilla latte before?" You asked suddenly.
"Course I have. It's my favorite," he lied, his mask's eyes narrowing as you bit your lip to keep from laughing.
"You don't seem to be enjoying it very much."
"I don't drink it that much," he tried, "Uh, gotta stay healthy, you know?"
"Sure," you got up from the counter, "I'm going to start cleaning up, but continue struggling to enjoy that latte."
"I-I am definitely enjoying this latte!" He protested, making you laugh as you went to the back.
It was quiet as he finished it, quickly finishing the cookie, too. You were humming as you cleaned the counters and the tables, adjusting things so they'd be ready in the morning. He was glad you didn't seem as tired tonight as you had the last night shift he encountered you on.
"I'm about ready to lock up," you told him after a little while, and he immediately jumped up. You grabbed your bag and to his surprise, shrugged on his jacket. He was glad the mask was covering up his undoubtedly red face, his chest feeling warm at the thought of you wearing his clothes.
He was in way too deep.
"So," he started speaking the second you locked the doors, feeling much more confident behind the mask. "What's your favorite flower?"
You gave him a funny look, "What?"
"Just curious. I like getting to know the citizens of the city I protect."
You smiled a little as you put your keys away. "So you ask them what their favorite flower is?"
"Among other things. So, what is it?"
He was grinning as you answered that question, and when you didn't hesitate to answer the next one he shot at you. It was a lie that he asked everyone this, but he wanted to know more about you, and he wasn't going to waste the chance on another short walk to your apartment.
And he loved listening to you talk, even if you didn't know it was him. Every little thing you said that gave him something more to know about you, he tucked away into a mental folder for later. You mentioned your favorite song, and he made a note to listen to it later. You told him your favorite color, and he scrambled to think of a shirt he could wear in that color.
These were things he hoped you would tell him as Peter, and he knew he could only do that if he finally shoved his fears away and asked you out. And he planned to - tonight had solidified that decision, and the next time he saw you, he would ask.
And hopefully it would work out how he wanted it to.
"This is me," you stopped outside your building, the deja vu hitting you both pretty hard.
"Thank you for letting me walk you home," Spider-Man bowed, making you laugh.
"And thank you for walking me home," your eyes sparkled like you knew something he didn't, making him nervous again. "It was a pleasure, Spider-Man."
"Have a good night, Y/N," he waved as he backed up, his chest feeling warm as you smiled back at him before heading into your building.
-
"I'm going to ask Y/N out."
"Finally," MJ groaned, much louder than Peter's whisper to her and Ned. "I'm sick of hearing you talk about her and not doing anything."
"Shh," he glanced over at where you were making a drink, glad the machines were too loud for you to have heard her say that.
"So, what are you going to do?" Ned asked, always the supportive friend.
Peter held up a napkin and a pen, "Leave a napkin note."
"Sweet," Ned gave him a fist bump.
"Are you gonna write a love poem?" MJ snickered, and Peter gave her a dirty look.
"No," he frowned, "I don't think that would go over very well. I suck at poetry."
"Not to mention that would be corny, and even though you are an incredibly corny person, I think that would be a little too far."
Peter ignored the other quips from MJ, focusing instead on what he was going to write that would hopefully make you want to say yes.
He made the note short and sweet, writing his phone number down at the end with shaking fingers. A note was probably the best way to do it - the last thing he wanted to do was put you on the spot, especially at your place of work. This was probably the best option he had to not make you uncomfortable if you didn't feel the same.
His heart ached at that idea, but he felt certain that you felt something toward him. Enough for him to put his heart on the line with this note.
Okay, maybe that was a little dramatic, but he would definitely be devastated if you didn't feel the same.
MJ and Ned had stacked their empty dishes up like they always did, and Peter folded the napkin and tucked it next to his cup instead of with the other trash so you'd see it. Considering he wrote your name on the note and that you were the only one working on the front end, he was sure no one else would take it by mistake.
"Are you going to wait for her to open it, or head out with us?" Ned asked, and Peter jumped up immediately.
"Definitely head out with you guys," he said quickly, "I'm sure she won't see it for a while, anyway."
His friends both agreed, and they headed out to spend the rest of their day on campus. It was nearing spring break and they were all going home soon, so they had decided to hang out for the day before splitting off.
He wished his mind was focused on spending time with his friends instead of wondering about that note.
Peter waited by his phone for ages. He tried to not make it obvious around Ned and MJ, but he kept glancing at it, waiting for that text. You probably had a long shift, and he was sure you didn't carry your phone on you while working behind the bar.
Still, several hours later, and his phone was still waiting for that text. As he was falling asleep, he was still staring at his phone, the disappointment and embarrassment feeling like it would eat him alive.
He clearly read it all wrong. Of course you didn't feel anything toward him, he was just a customer. You probably acted like that with everyone. He remembered telling Ned that you probably had someone in your life, or maybe you just weren't interested in him regardless
He was suddenly really thankful he left a note. At least it saved you from having to reject him, and it saved him from the embarrassment.
Still, it hurt more than anything else.
-
You were smiling when Ned and MJ came in, but it dropped when you realized it was just them. You loved their company, of course, but you were pretty disappointed that Peter wasn't with them.
"No Peter today?" You asked when you approached their table, hoping that wasn't too weird. But you missed seeing his usual smile among his group of friends, and it was strange for him not to be there.
"He's a little butthurt," MJ shrugged, "Boys tend to take it hard when a girl turns them down. He'll come around."
You felt your heart drop. "He...he asked someone out?"
You felt so stupid. He didn't like you like that - he was just really nice, and funny, and charming, and...it didn't matter. He asked someone else out, and you were angry at the thought that they rejected him. How could anyone not see how great he was?
Ned and MJ stared at you blankly, "Is that supposed to be a joke?"
"What? No," you said, lowering your notepad, "Am I missing something?"
"Y/N, he asked you out," Ned gave you a funny look.
"No he didn't," you said quickly, scrambling to remember the last few conversations with him. You would definitely remember if he asked you out, and you wouldn't have ever said no.
"He left his number and a note on one of the napkins," MJ tapped said napkins, making your heart drop again, "Didn't you see it?"
"I-" you tried to remember the last time he was in, "No, I-I must've cleaned it up without looking at it. Oh, no."
MJ burst into laughter while you put your head in your hands, "This is hilarious. Of course that would happen to him."
"Wait, so you wouldn't have rejected him?" Ned asked excitedly.
"No," you said quickly, waving your hands, "No, not at all, I'd love to go on a date with him. I-I can't believe this."
"Hey, we can fix this. I have an idea."
-
You had to wait for your shift to end, but a few hours later, you were standing in front of the door of the apartment building Ned had given you the address to. He also gave you the code, and you had double checked probably too many times that you had the right door, knowing it would be embarrassing if you knocked and anyone other than Peter answered.
Once you were sure, you knocked twice, stepping back a little and clutching the pastry bag tighter in your hands. Despite knowing that Peter shared your feelings, you couldn't help but feel kind of nervous. And bad that he thought you didn't feel the same because you weren't being observant when you cleaned up their table.
Peter answered the door after a minute, his eyes widening when he saw you standing there. It was silent for a second as he processed that, and you finally spoke.
"Hello," you couldn't help but smile brightly at his confused face.
"Hi..." he glanced around, "How-what is happening?"
"Ned told me your apartment number," you almost cringed, realizing now how weird that probably was that you just showed up at his place. "I messed up. Ned and MJ showed up today without you and when I asked why they explained and I feel awful. I didn't know you left me a note, or I would've answered it immediately and said yes."
Peter stared at you for a minute, "What? You mean...you never saw it?"
"No, when I was cleaning up the tables I didn't realize it was there," you winced, "Which was stupid. You guys always leave everything tidy and I should have realized there was a napkin out of place, but I didn't, and...I'm sorry."
"Don't apologize," his mood changed quickly, his eyes brightening, "I probably should have thought about that. So...you would have said yes? To a date?"
You nodded, "I would love to go out with you, Peter. I figured the pastry puns I wrote on your bags were a hint enough."
"I-I couldn't really tell," he admitted, his smile widening. "Though maybe the last one should have been a dead giveaway."
"Well, this one definitely will be," you said a little nervously, holding up the pastry bag. He laughed at the pun you wrote on it, that familiar blush on his cheeks making you grin.
"I like you a latte too," he grinned with you.
"Open it."
Peter opened it curiously, chuckling when he realized you brought him one of the Spider-Man cookies.
"You shouldn't have," he said teasingly, making you laugh with him.
"Well, it matches your mask," you winked, while his expression dropped.
"What?"
"Come on," you shoved his shoulder a little, "You think I didn't recognize the bottom half of your face? Or your voice?"
"I don't know what you're talking about," he forced a chuckle, but he was certain by the look on your face that you weren't buying it.
"Well, the obvious giveaway was that I wasn't wearing my name tag that night, and you still knew my name. Not to mention insisting on walking me home, that was classic Peter behavior. The way you were acting around me in general, actually. Did you really think I wouldn't realize?"
He let out a groan, making you laugh while he circled his arms around your waist into a hug that you happily returned. "I am really, really stupid."
"It was sweet," you smiled against his shoulder, "And I couldn't picture anyone else as Spider-Man."
It was silent for a minute, neither of you pulling away from the hug until Peter suddenly laughed. You gave him a curious look.
"Hey," he grinned at you, "We're the perfect blend."
"You're even worse than I am."
"Ah, you love it."
"Yeah, I love it a latte."
~
taglist (message me if you want to be added): @lilbeatlebear
a/n: another soulmate fic (first skin to skin touch & can’t see color until they meet & can feel each others emotions after contact), there’s about eight parts to this one!
warnings: language
pairing: peter parker x reader (soulmate au)
word count: 4.1k
summary: you’ve dreamt about meeting your soulmate forever - but you didn’t expect it to go quite like this
masterlist ~ requests are closed ~ part two
~
"Apparently she dyed it pink."
"Pink?" MJ scoffed, "There's no way it's pink."
"Is pink not a normal hair color?" You choked out a laugh, though you were slightly serious in asking the question.
It wasn't your fault you couldn't see color. How were you supposed to know if pink was a normal hair tone? You couldn't see it anyway. You didn't know what it looked like, or what brown or purple or green or any of them looked like.
"Shut up, I know you can't see color but I also know you at least know what natural hair colors are meant to be," MJ snickered, nudging your arm as you both walked.
"What's it like?" You asked wistfully, though you knew she was probably tired of you asking.
"I think I need to open a kickstarter for you to find your soulmate cause if you keep asking me that question-"
"I know, I know," you kicked a rock on the sidewalk, frowning, "I'm just getting impatient."
MJ pursed her lips, and you could tell she was holding back from trying to say something comforting. You didn't like being told that the right person would show up when the universe deemed it time - you were just getting tired of watching everyone around you meet their person, while you still remained color blind and lonely.
You were with MJ when she met hers. It was a year ago and MJ was arguing with them about the last available book in a bookshop, some biography about the black panther party, and when they both reached for the book, boom - their worlds burst into color.
It was a sweet moment to witness. You watched MJ smile more and look around the world in awe and fall in love with her soulmate - and that was fine. A year ago you weren't as desperate to meet yours. But then you had to sit while Ned and Betty realized they were soulmates, when Peter started going out with Liz and you put two and two together, even Flash met his (at least, he claimed so, since they didn't go to the same school apparently).
You were the only one in your friend group left, and it was starting to annoy you.
"I know you don't like hearing this bullshit," you groaned at MJ's words, knowing what was coming, "But they'll come, okay? You'll meet them and it'll be like you didn't even have to wait at all."
"Yeah, yeah."
You went about your day as usual - you and MJ only had a few classes together, but you were lucky enough to have all your classes with at least a few friends. You shared history and Spanish with Ned, and you had Peter and MJ in English. All three of them were in your science class, too. You only had Peter in math, but Liz and Betty were both in student council and all of your friends were in decathlon, which was nice.
It was definitely a blessing and a curse to have the friends that you did. They were all great - you and MJ were close over your love of books and politics, you and Peter were both the smartest of the group and he was the best study buddy, you and Ned liked to nerd out about sci-fi movies, and Betty and Liz were your go-to girls for advice on anything you needed. The only downside was at lunch when you were painfully reminded that they all had someone else.
"I can confirm her hair is indeed pink," MJ said as soon as you sat next to her at the cafeteria table, making you laugh, "I'm shocked."
"It doesn't look too bad," Liz cut in, giving MJ a look, "At least it's a pretty pink!"
"Hey guys," Peter jogged up to the table, and you ignored the sting when he gave Liz a kiss on her cheek and sat down, looking at the empty side of the table. "Where's Ned and Betty?"
"Probably making out in a supply closet," MJ quipped, making you and Liz choke on your drinks. "What, it's true!"
"Gross," Peter replied flatly.
"As if you two weren't like that at one point!" MJ retaliated, and Peter stuttered to make a response.
"She's kind of right," Liz muttered over her drink while Peter just gave her a look and you tried to keep a straight face.
"Who's kinda right?" Ned's voice saved you from that whole conversation, him and Betty sitting down and joining everyone. Luckily someone changed the subject and for most of lunch it wasn't too bad. For a while, at least.
You bit your lip a little as Peter and Liz exchanged some inside joke, ignoring that tight feeling of jealousy. Jealousy that you convinced yourself was just because you wanted someone to be with - you wanted so badly to meet your soulmate that it felt like it was eating away at you at times. That's the only thing you were jealous about, that's what you told yourself.
There was no way you liked Peter Parker like that.
"At least when she goes to college we won't have to sit through that anymore," MJ muttered, making you laugh a little.
"Just face time calls during lunch, probably," Ned replied while you and MJ snickered.
"What's so funny?" Peter leaned forward, raising an eyebrow at the three of you for the first time during all of lunch.
"Just talking about how gross you two are," you teased, making Liz laugh while Peter's face turned a shade of darker grey, making you assume he was blushing.
"Young love!" Ned said loudly while the rest of the table laughed, and you ignored the familiar sting in your chest when Liz hid her face in Peter's neck, laughing with everyone else.
You loved your friends, but sometimes lunch could become almost unbearable. Liz and Peter would get lost in their own little world, Ned and Betty would be much the same, MJ would be on her phone with a smile that told you she was talking to her soulmate. The empty seat next to you felt painfully obvious
Meeting your soulmate was the main thing you thought about lately - seeing the unconditional love between your parents, your older sister and your friends who were lucky enough to meet their other halves already...that was all you wanted.
You remembered listening to your sister's funny stories about how she met her soon to be husband. She told you how amazing colors were, and how it made it so much better to love someone when you could see them completely - the color of their skin, their hair and eyes.
She insisted the best part was how you could feel their emotions, especially their love for you, so you never would have to doubt it.
That was what you craved so badly.
"Hey, I found a new bookstore on third that you might be interested in," MJ gave you a nudge, drawing you out of your thoughts. "Maybe tomorrow we can go check it out?"
"Yeah, that would be nice," you agreed, glad for the distraction.
"Do you guys mind if I come with?" Liz asked, "I need a book for English and I can't find it anywhere, maybe they'd have it."
"'Course," MJ smiled, and you nodded.
"We'll make a girls day out of it," you agreed, giving Peter a look, "No boyfriends allowed."
He pouted a little, making you and MJ snicker as Liz just agreed with you, laughing at his offended expression.
You managed to get through the rest of lunch avoiding looking at them and especially not at Ned and Betty, who were still in the honeymoon part of their relationship and were even getting on MJ's nerves.
By the end of the day you were packing your bag with all the textbooks your teachers made you bring everyday, grumbling about the amount of them. You were only interrupted when you heard a familiar voice calling your name.
"Hey, Y/N!" You ignored the little skip in your heartbeat as you turned to see Peter jogging after you, a little breathless.
"Hey, Peter," you smiled, raising an eyebrow as he reached you. "What's up?"
"So listen," he clasped his hands together, giving you a pleading look. "I need your help."
"Sure, what do you need?" You wished you didn't agree that quickly, but the relieved look in his eyes made up for it.
"I really need a study partner for Calc," he ran a hand over his face, sighing, "I've been so caught up with the internship and Liz and other classes that my grade is dropping and May will kill me if I fail this class, and you're the only one who has the same teacher as me-"
"Peter, relax," you interrupted, trying not to be hurt at the fact that he only really asked because you both had the same teacher. Not that you cared, or anything. "I can totally help. But only if you help me with English because I'm kind of in the same boat."
"What, psh," he crossed his arms, giving you a look. "You're great at English, what are you talking about?"
"I like English, that doesn't mean I'm great at it," you pointed out, pretending to ignore the warmth rising in your cheeks at the compliment, "But I appreciate the compliment. When should we start?"
"Is today okay?" He scratched the back of his neck, "We have that test on Thursday and I promised Liz I would see her Wednesday but tomorrow you guys are going to that bookstore so-"
"Today's fine," you smiled a little, "Should we go to the library or my place or-?"
"Is mine okay? It's close to school and I have a feeling the library will close before we're done studying, it's a big test. If you're okay with that, of course! You can totally leave early if you need to-"
"Peter," you laughed a little, cutting off his rambling for probably the hundredth time. "Honestly, it's fine. You're really nervous about this test?"
"I can't fail it," he sighed, "Mr. Grant said one more fail and I won't pass the class."
"Shit," you mumbled, shutting your locker, "We better get started then."
-
You tried not to stare.
But you couldn't help that Peter was cute. He had his tongue poking between his teeth as he wrote down a few formulas, his other hand tapping on the desk. His eyes skimmed the paper and his curly hair was a mess on his head, bouncing a little whenever he moved his head.
He seemed even cuter now that you were in his apartment, in his room, and you saw how he was at home. His aunt was sweet and had to leave nearly the second you both got there, but you knew you liked her already just from her attitude. He seemed to be more relaxed and happy around her, if that was even possible. You could see that just from the few minutes they interacted before she had to leave.
And now you were in his room, which was covered in posters and pictures of may and his uncle and Liz and all of your friends - some of you were up there too, smiling next to MJ at prom or with your legs kicked up over Ned's lap at decathlon practice. He had a lot of candids like that, for all of you - you knew he liked photography but you were still a little shocked at the amount of photos he kept of the group, and it made you happy to see how much he cared about you guys, knowing the feeling was obviously mutual.
There were also small drawings taped to the wall, some that you noticed he snatched quickly and stuffed into a drawer as soon as you came in, but you didn't say anything about it. His desk had lego bits, a nice camera, some old movie ticket stubs and pieces of plastic that probably belonged to something. He had brushed most of it off and apologized for the mess, but it honestly wasn't that bad for a teenage boy.
His room only made you feel like you knew him more, which only added to the feelings you wished you didn't have for him.
"What did you get for forty five?" He asked suddenly, making you snap out of your thoughts and focus on your paper again, realizing you were so distracted by him that you weren't even there yet.
"Uh, haven't gotten to it yet," you laughed a little awkwardly as you skipped ahead to that problem, "One sec."
"You gotta keep up, L/N," he said a little cheekily, and you felt your cheeks warm up.
"Not my fault I'm studying with the school genius," you said back while he laughed, finishing the equation. "I got seventeen."
"Nice, me too," he sounded a little proud, "So far so good."
"Peter honestly, you're fine with this, you know the material," you huffed a little, giving him a look, "Are you just a bad test taker or something?"
"Yeah, I get test anxiety pretty bad. But seriously, once we get to the stuff from chapter fifteen, trust me, you'll see how bad I am," he promised, making you snort.
"Okay, we'll see," you joked, shaking your head.
That mood was ruined when his phone started buzzing and you saw Liz's name, grimacing a little as his face lit up and he grabbed it.
"Sorry, I'm just gonna take this real quick," he grinned and you and you just gave him a tight smile in return, gesturing for him to go ahead. He stumbled as he got up, making you laugh a little while he answered and went outside the room for some privacy.
You chewed your lip as you focused on getting some problems done, trying to ignore his laughter you could hear through the door. You wanted to pretend that your jealousy only stemmed from not having a soulmate like he did, but you knew it was more than that.
You had to accept now that you liked Peter, and you hated it. Acceptance was just another step toward moving on, though, so you were at least on your way to getting past it.
"Sorry," you jumped a little as Peter came back in, a wide smile on his face, "Ready to struggle through another twenty problems?"
"Can we move on to the English homework and then switch back? My brain hurts," you pouted a little while he laughed, nodding and grabbing the assigned book.
"Good idea," he pulled out his binder and you sifted through your papers to find the worksheet.
"Do you mind sharing your copy, I can't find mine," you grumbled, shoving through your mess of a backpack and still not seeing it.
"Yeah, no prob," he tossed you the book and you barely caught it and shot him a little glare while he just grinned a little. "Sorry."
"Sure you are," you smiled a little while he scoffed, pretending to be offended while you opened the book to find the right page for the first question.
It was mostly silent as you went through the worksheet, and it was only interrupted when you had a question you struggled on that Peter was able to help with.
You groaned in frustration as the next question asked something specific about colors and their significance in the story, and it would be impossible to answer. Your teacher said that anyone who hadn't met their soulmate could skip those questions, which was nice in retrospect because you got to do less work, but it was just a constant reminder that you hadn't met them yet.
"Wish I could see color already," you sighed, tapping your pencil on your paper. "That would make this a lot easier."
"Tell me about it," he chuckled, but the words made you frown. "I can't answer half of these."
You stared at him blankly for a moment as he continued his work unfazed. It had never been stated before, but you were positive he could see color. Liz could. And it seemed clear they were together and soulmates so...what? You had to ask.
"You can't see color?"
"Nope, still a black and white world for me," he joked, but you were still confused.
"But...you and Liz?"
"Oh, well, we aren't soulmates," he said simply, but the words made you stop in your tracks.
"You and Liz aren't soulmates?" You asked in shock, "But...what?"
"Yeah, don't tell her I told you, she kinda wants to keep it on the down-low," he scratched the back of his neck, "She met hers when she was really young and they ended up moving to another state and she doesn't think she'll meet them again. She says she doesn't even feel their emotions that often, she can only really see color. And I obviously haven't met mine but...I don't really care."
"What happens when you do meet them?" You asked in confusion, "Or if her soulmate appeared again?"
Peter bit his lip, shaking his head, "It doesn't matter. We've talked about it and we care more about each other and...soulmates don't even have a foundation, you know? Like you meet and suddenly you're just supposed to love them? It doesn't make sense, I think I would care more about Liz, someone I've been with for a while, rather than some stranger that the universe deemed my soulmate."
You frowned at that, sort of getting what he meant. But at the same time the idea of having another half out there just waiting for you made you feel giddy inside, so you decided he was entitled to his own opinion, and you to yours.
"To each their own, I guess," you shrugged, deciding to drop the subject. "Personally I can't wait to meet mine. I'm tired of sitting around all of you love birds, I'm getting bored."
He let out a laugh at that, "I'm sure the wait's worth it. I hope they're everything you want them to be, you deserve it," his reassuring smile made you feel a little more hopeful about it.
"Thanks, Peter. I hope so too."
You only studied for another few hours before deciding to call it quits. English only took half an hour and as for math, Peter really only needed help on certain concepts that you were luckily pretty good at, and he seemed to get them down by the end of your study session.
"You're a lifesaver, seriously," he thanked you again as you both packed up, but you brushed it off.
"Don't worry about it," you waved your hand, slinging your bag over your shoulder. "Just let me know if we need to study again, I'm down."
"I will," he grinned, "But really, I owe you one."
"I'll hold you to that," you warned as he walked down with you to the steps outside his apartment.
"I'm sure you will," he chuckled, before staring up at the sky and frowning. "It's getting kinda dark, I can walk you home?"
"It's barely seven, it won't be dark for a while, don't worry about it," you shook your head, but he was already shutting the door. "I've walked home by myself plenty of times."
"That's not very safe," he pointed out, "And I want to."
You threw your arms up in defeat and starting walking away while he laughed, jogging a little to catch up with you. It was easy to make conversation with him - you were friends, after all. That was something you were both thankful for and something you hated, though.
It wasn't easier to get over him if he kept dropping jokes that made you laugh until your sides hurt, or asking about your day and remembering little things you told him months ago without thinking twice about, or offering to walk you home when it wasn't dark and you knew the path like the back of your hand already.
"Welcome to my humble abode," you gestured to your normal looking apartment building, making him snort. "Thanks for walking with me, Pete."
"Thanks for helping me with those equations," he said back, about to wave goodbye before you cursed, reaching for your backpack.
"Oh, I almost forgot, here's your book back," you reached into your bag and handed it to him, but it slipped through your fingers at the last second.
"Ah, shit," you muttered, bending down the pick it up at the same time Peter did.
"Don't worry, I got-"
His voice caught the second your hand accidentally brushed against his.
They called it a "sunburn" - it was like the feeling of having sun-kissed skin, but instead of the hurting of a burn, it feels like a nice, pleasant warmth. Soulmates know when they meet because not only does their world burst into colors, but they feel the sunburn in their chest.
As soon as Peter's fingers brushed yours, your chest felt almost uncomfortably warm, and your vision was no longer black and white. The book you dropped burst into a color you couldn't name, and suddenly Peter's hand had color, too - and so did yours, and the floor, and the sweater he was wearing-
This wasn't what you expected to happen.
"Peter..." you flinched when he snatched his hand away, panic in his eyes. His eyes that suddenly had color, a really pretty color that you couldn't wait to find out the name of.
"No, we-I don't understand," he said quickly, taking another step back. "We've already met!"
"But we've never touched," you felt your lip tremble slightly as he just kept backing up, already knowing where this was going. "Don't-please don't leave, we need to talk about this."
"There's nothing to talk about," he straightened up a little, not meeting your eyes this time. "You already...you already know how I feel about it. Nothing's changing."
He suddenly winced and brought a hand up to his chest, scrunching his eyes up, "What the-"
You felt confusion briefly take over the hurt that was overflowing your thoughts and heart, but it disappeared just as quick as the realization dawned on Peter's face as he looked back at you. Then it turned into guilt before being overtaken by your pain again.
You forgot about the emotions thing.
"Y/N-" he reached a hand out toward you, but you stepped back, shaking your head.
"It's fine," you said quickly, holding a hand up, but he knew it wasn't fine, he could feel that with how bad his reaction (more like rejection) was hurting you. Your emotions were betraying your ability to lie and blow it off. You'd probably never be able to lie to him again, not with how soulmates were able to feel each other's emotions so easily. "Go home, Peter."
"I..." he didn't know what to say, the look on your face and the pain he could feel from you telling him to shut up. "I'm sorry, I-"
"Go home," you insisted again, wishing your voice didn't crack and wishing he couldn't feel your hurt and definitely wishing it wasn't him. Well that was kind of a lie, you did wish it was him (you always had), but you wanted him to actually want you back. "Please go."
This wasn't what you were waiting so long to have.
It wasn't fair.
He still didn't move so you took it upon yourself to turn around and continue walking to your door, ignoring when he called your name. Instead you quickly unlocked your door and shut it behind you, resting your forehead against the frame and resisting the urge to cry as you remembered his words from earlier.
a/n: hello all! forgive me for taking so long for posting my fics on here again, I’m getting used to the changes tumblr has had since I was last on here, lol. I won’t be posting all of my fics on here, but all of my popular ones or ones I like will definitely be reposted here. any that aren’t here are on my wattpad. my page and masterlist are in the works right now so this post will be edited when my masterlist is up and running, but I did want to get at least one fic out there! x j
warnings: mentions of a break-up, undoubtedly some good ol’ swearing, nothing else!
pairing: peter parker x reader
word count: 2.9k
masterlist ~ requests are closed
~
Sitting atop a building that had become familiar to him in the last four months, his hands freezing despite the built-in heater that Tony had created in his suit, all he wanted was to shove his hands in pockets or mittens because God, New York was so cold this winter.
It wasn't snowing, not yet, but it would probably be within the next few hours. Everyone walking about below him was bundled up, making him think that maybe next time he would wear that Spider-Man sweater Ned had given him as a joke, over his suit. After all, heroes had to stay warm too, didn't they?
He shifted slightly on the ledge, trying to remain a bit hidden but also stay out enough so he could watch the front door of the apartment building across from him. For the last couple months he had kept up this routine, at eight pm every night. He felt ridiculous about it, but it wasn't like he could stop himself from pausing his rounds to sit on this ledge and wait. He never had that kind of self-control.
Right on cue, you came out into the open, your apartment door slamming as you rushed to lock it behind you. Peter felt relief, and the usual stab of pain in his gut, when he saw you shove a hat over your head and glare at the sky. He chuckled lightly at your expression, knowing how much you hated the cold, but loved the snow - ironically.
As you began walking down the street, pulling on mittens and biting your lip in concentration as you struggled to get them on your freezing fingers, he stood up and followed, rubbing his hands together for a bit of warmth.
He swore to himself every night it wasn't creepy that he followed you. Okay, maybe a little, but he couldn't help it. You worked a night shift at a local 24-hour cafe, something he protested against when you two were dating, and he didn't like the idea of it any more now.
Peter just wanted to make sure you were safe. He was doing his job - you were a citizen, he was the friendly neighborhood Spider-Man, it would be messed up if he didn't make sure you got to work safely.
His eyes were on you as you finally got your gloves on, shifting your purse and walking with a bit of a quicker pace. He remembered how paranoid you got about walking alone, and he knew you had a right to be - how many people had he saved from muggings in random alley ways?
It had been four months since you ended things, but it still made his heart hurt to see you. He didn't see you any other time, because when you left, you had no reason to visit his side of Queens. You went to a college in a different borough, and you only lived and worked here. Peter lived on the other side of town.
Maybe, he always thought, that was why you waited until graduation to break up. He knew he was hurting you by always skipping dates, or being extremely late, or not telling you the reasons for his tiredness and bruises. If you had dumped him while you were still seniors, you still would've had to see each other every day.
He hated himself for doing that to you, but ever since May and Ned found out about Spider-Man, his life had gotten so much more complicated. He realized things that he hadn't considered before - they were in danger now because of him. They had knowledge of who Spider-Man was, and if that ever got out, it could get them hurt, or worse. He couldn't take back the fact that they knew, but hell if he wouldn't try to keep it from you. You were such an important person in his life, and if endangered you for something like this, he would never forgive himself.
When you turned a corner, he shot a web at the adjacent building and swung off, following. He didn't mind if anyone else saw him, but he would rather not have you see him. Of course, you didn't know it was him, but he also didn't want to freak you out if you realized Spider-Man had been stalking you for the last few months.
He landed on the side of the building, climbing up easily and perching on the ledge, watching with relief as you made it into your cafe, the sound of the bell ringing reaching his ears, something that he never would've been able to hear had it happened prior to the spider bite.
Waiting a few seconds before he hopped off the building, he knew you would be safe while he did the rest of his rounds before returning back here to see you home safely.
It was two am when your shift ended (Peter had no idea why you decided to take that time, since you loved sleeping early) and he was waiting once again on a building rooftop where he could see you clearly.
This time, he noticed what you were wearing, and his chest tightened when he noticed the familiar grey sweatshirt that was a bit too big, rolled up once at the sleeves and hanging loosely over your work uniform. His breath caught when you shoved your hands into the pockets, a small smile on your face before you continued on your way home.
You still wore his sweatshirt. It was his favourite on you - in fact, he had given it to you to keep, even though he liked it so much, just because you loved it more. Seeing you in that piece of his clothing was the final breaking point for him.
Before he knew what he was doing, he dropped down in front of you, making you jump back a bit. His brain screamed at him to stop before he did something stupid, but you relaxed with a sigh, a small smile on your lips when you realized who it was.
"I was wondering when you were gonna approach me," you laughed lightly, causing him to frown behind the mask. His head tilted to the side slightly.
"What?" He asked, not bothering to cover up his voice at all. He didn't think that you might recognize it, and if you did, he wasn't sure he cared anymore. He just needed to talk to you before he went crazy.
"You've been following me," you said flatly, your voice not carrying any hint of accusation or fear or anger like he might've expected. His eyebrows raised in shock, his thoughts jumbled as he tried to form a sentence, or an excuse, anything.
"Whaaaaat?" He asked, laughing lightly, "Ma'am, I think you're mistaken-"
"I'm not stupid," you ran a hand through your hair, and he realized you didn't have the hat this time. "I've seen you, you aren't as stealthy as you think."
"Oh," he scratched the back of his neck, not sure what to say. He thought he had been pretty good about not being seen, but he should've known you would realize, since you were pretty perceptive that way.
"What made you decide to drop down and finally say hey?" You questioned teasingly. Peter was surprised he hadn't broken down yet - he hadn't been this close to you, or talked to you in so long, it was causing his head to start hurting.
"I-I um, thought I'd, offer to walk you home. It's pretty late."
You bit your lip, "I'd like that. Thanks."
"Of course, it's kinda my job," he gained a bit more confidence, grinning when you chuckled and rolled your eyes, walking next to him.
"Your job, huh? Does someone pay you?" You asked, making him laugh and shake his head.
"Nope," he sighed, "I get paid in churros sometimes, though."
You gave him a weird look, making him laugh again, "Helped an old lady with directions, she bought me a churro. Pretty good pay if you ask me."
You snickered, "Spider-Man's got a sweet tooth. Who knew."
He shrugged, "Who doesn't have a sweet tooth?"
"Touché," you crossed your arms, trying to get more warm, even though your ex-boyfriends sweatshirt was comfy.
In all honesty, you don't know why you still had it, much less why you still wore it. It certainly didn't help you move on, and since you ended things in the first place, it wasn't right of you to keep it. But you missed Peter so much, especially on cold days like this, and this sweater was one of the last things you had to remind you of him.
"You alright?" The soft voice broke you out of your thoughts, and you glanced at Spider-Man's mask.
"Hm, yeah," you answered, "Just had a long shift, and I zone out sometimes."
"How come you chose a night shift?" He asked curiously, which caused you to eye him, but he didn't seem to notice.
"Um, it was just more convenient. I go to school, when I get back I do my homework, and then I go to work. It's a good system."
"Yeah, good except that you walk alone at the worst possible times," he pointed out, making you shake your head.
"You sound like my ex," you rolled your eyes, not seeing him tense. "But I can handle myself. Plus, I heard there's this superhero guy that watches out for Queens."
You said the last part teasingly, making him laugh despite your earlier sentence. Now it was his turn to roll his eyes at you.
For the rest of the walk, you noticed things about Spider-Man that reminded you way too much of Peter. Enough to make it more than just a coincidence that he scratched his neck the same way, or moved his hands in gestures just like your ex did. The thing that really gave it away was his voice, because even though you hadn't heard it in months, the more the hero talked, the more you became sure it was him.
When you reached the door to your apartment, your heart was racing. You missed Peter so much and never felt enough closure with the break-up, and if this was really him, you might have answers to the unanswered questions. And maybe you wanted to see his face again, even if you would break down later because of it.
"Night, Peter," you said softly, eyeing him to see if he would catch what you just said.
"Night, Y/N," he said back quietly, and you could hear the small smile in his voice. Your chest tightened when he responded, confirming your suspicions.
You stared at him, waiting for him to catch on. Even though he was a genius, the boy could be kinda dense sometimes.
"Oh shit," he finally blurted, making you want to burst into laughter, but you managed to keep a straight face.
"You've never been very good at keeping secrets," you said quietly, a sad smile on your lips.
He carefully pulled his mask off, since no one in their right mind was up and around you two right now. Your breath caught when you saw his face for the first time in so long - the brown eyes you would always get lost in, the curls you used to love to run your fingers through. His slightly chapped lips that reminded you of memories too painful to think about. Of course, you noticed the other things - the bags under his eyes and the bruise on his cheeks, things that drove you crazy not to know the cause of.
And now you did.
"Y/N," his lips formed around you name as though it held such importance, and you shut your eyes for a moment and took a breath. He didn't say anything else, so you decided to talk.
"Peter," you replied after a moment of silence, meeting his gaze again, "Why have you been keeping an eye on me for four months?"
"You know why," he said instantly, making you bite your lip.
"Why didn't you just tell me you were Spider-Man?" This time you said it in a whisper, even though no one was around. The idea that he didn't trust you with this secret hurt, and it felt like your heart was breaking all over again.
He hesitated, fiddling with his fingers and biting his lip, avoiding your sharp gaze. "You know I couldn't let anything happen to you, Y/N. If you were kept in the dark, it would be safer."
You scoffed, making him meet your eyes again. "That is the lamest thing I've ever heard."
He knit his eyebrows, "Your safety is the most important-"
"Peter," you interrupted, "Me knowing you were Spider-Man would have made me more safe. If I was in danger, I could have called you-"
"But people could have found out!" He interrupted you this time, running a hand through his hair and tugging at the strands a bit, his voice cracking once from the stress of the conversation. "If you knew, and someone knew that you knew, they could've hurt you to get to me, to find out my secret. I didn't want to tell anyone for this exact reason, especially not you. Sweetheart, if anything happened to you, I don't know what I would do with myself."
You stared at him for a moment, your eyes a bit wide at his outburst. The last time you saw him get this emotional was when you left, and the memory caused your fists to tighten, hating yourself more for doing that to him.
"You still have that sweatshirt," he pointed out, desperate to change the subject, even though he wasn't getting far from the topic. He said it before he could realize how dumb it was to, but luckily you didn't seem upset by it.
"It's a really comfy sweater," you said with a shaky laugh, easing the tension only a bit, "But...that's not why I kept it."
His eyes met yours, which had started tearing up a bit.
"Why did you keep it?" he asked in a quiet tone, one that you wouldn't have heard if it hadn't been so quiet aside from the snow starting to fall and the occasional car driving on the other side of the building, far from you both.
"You know why," you repeated his words from earlier, your voice catching a bit at the end. It seemed he got what you were saying, since you both meant the same thing when you said the words to each other.
He stepped closer to you hesitantly, one of his hands still gripping his mask tightly. His other one reached upwards to cup your rosy cheek, the contact making his heart race and fingers tremble slightly, because God, it had been so long since he'd touched you.
Your eyes shut and you leaned into his gloved palm, your other hand coming up to cover his hand and holding it tightly, afraid he'd let go and remember how much you had hurt him all those months ago and leave.
"I still love you," he finally managed to say, causing you to open your eyes to look at him, seeing the adoration in his eyes as he smiled softly at you, his thumb brushing along you cheek.
"Even though I hurt you?" You asked shakily, to which he nodded, leaning forward to press his forehead against yours.
"I deserved it," he chuckled, interrupting before you could protest. "You probably thought I was in a secret fight club or something. I should've been more honest and told you from the beginning, but I was too scared. I'm the one that hurt you."
"First rule of fight club - don't talk about fight club," you said jokingly, causing him to laugh and get those crinkles by his eyes that you loved so much.
"I love you," you smiled after a moment, causing his gaze to meet your again, his eyes hopeful. "I never stopped. Clearly, I have a hard time moving on."
You gestured to his sweatshirt, making him grin again, before he leaned forward to press his lips against yours for the first time in what felt like forever.
Your hands went to cup the back of his neck while you tried not to smile into the kiss, only pulling him closer and wishing this moment didn't end, because it was all you had been dreaming of ever since you stepped out of his apartment.
His hands were now tangled in your hair, his mask discarded on the ground as he held you as close as possible, not thinking of anything but the feeling of you finally held against him again. When you had to pull back for air, he let out a shaky laugh, causing you to smile a little breathlessly and give him a weird look.
"I can't believe it was this stupid sweatshirt that finally gave me the guts to jump down and talk to you," he explained, tugging the strings a bit.
"Well, I'm glad it did," you replied, pulling him in for another kiss as the snow fell more heavily around you both, and despite the cold, you hadn't felt this warm in a long time.
a/n: this series (and all posted fics) will be on a set schedule of posting everyday at 11:00 AM and 7:00 PM PST. this will only be the posting schedule for fics already written and just needing to be reposted on here. when I get back to new fics, there won’t be a set schedule. keep that in mind! italics are flashbacks - there’s quite a few in this series
warnings: language
pairing: peter parker x silk!reader
word count: 8k
summary: your life is finally starting to get back to normal after everyone (yourself included) returns from the snap. the last thing you need is to get bitten by a radioactive spider
masterlist ~ requests are closed ~ part two
~
"We're really excited to open this program to high school students," the woman at the front of the room spoke, shifting her glasses, "You interns will be gaining so much experience from working here at Oscorp, and we hope you are all ready and eager to learn. This is a once in a lifetime opportunity."
You knew this was a once in a lifetime opportunity - you remembered how long you spent grueling over the application, asking multiple people to review your entry essay and qualifications, doing phone interviews and in-person group interviews and finally a last interview with the head of the research labs, before managing to secure the position.
It was hard, but you worked for so long for it, and you couldn't help but be proud that you were one of the five chosen out of who knows how many high school students that applied.
So now you stood with four other eager and smart kids being shown around the labs and having orientation for your first official day at Oscorp Industries. The other kids seemed nice so far, but you knew you weren't going to work with them much. The jobs were mostly individual work or assisting with scientists in other labs, and you were all chosen for a specific section, so you wouldn't be surprised if you didn't see them at all for the rest of your time here.
"We're going to split you all up and send you with your supervisors to tour your specific labs, get to know the people in your groups, and give you your first instructions," the woman continued, gesturing to five researchers standing off to the sides with badges and tablets. "Enjoy your time here at Oscorp, we look forward to having you all."
Everything went quickly from there - you were assigned to a researcher to guide you around and explain your job and tasks. Yours was a younger lady who was excited to have you on board, and seemed very into the work she did.
You weren't too thrilled when she mentioned that you would be starting in the radioactive unit, particularly with the test subjects. There were a lot of non-disclosure forms you had to fill out before accepting the internship position, and now you knew why - it seemed like Oscorp was still doing some research that maybe they didn't want the public to know about.
Still, you followed her as she led you through different labs and explained various jobs and functions. She led you to a lab at the end of the building, far from most of the other work stations.
"We're going to get you set up with a coat and badge, and then I'll explain your first task on the way, sound good?" She smiled and you agreed, feeling excited to do something aside from listening and nodding along to whatever she said.
You felt giddy as you slipped a lab coat on, feeling official for the first time as she pinned an ID badge to your front. It granted you access to almost all levels of the radioactive unit, as she explained, as well as the main levels where the cafeteria and break rooms were. Though since you were only interning a few hours a day a few days a week after school, you doubted you would need to go there often.
She explained some more things as she led you to the room where you were going to officially start, and you felt more excited as you got closer. This was a dream for a long time for you - to work in a lab, to get experience and learn new things about science that you didn't know before.
You wished you could tell Peter all about it.
There was a twinge in your heart at that thought, but you pushed it away to focus on what the researcher was telling you. The last thing you needed was to get distracted and forget about what you were doing.
"We've opened this section up recently, a few years before the snap they shut down the radioactive spider unit except to visitors, and then last year completely shut it down – but the board has finally let us continue research on them," she said enthusiastically, tapped her card to a scanner. The doors slid open with ease, the room a little warmer than the outside. "Y/N, I'm gonna have you prep this room for next week's reopening of the lab – it's pretty simple, there's instructions on your tablet and I'm a call away if you have any questions."
"Thank you so much," you smiled at her as she walked away, wishing you a quick "good luck!".
The instructions were simple – mostly you had to sterilize the work stations, organize a few empty flasks and chemicals for the lab, and count the spiders to make sure none were missing (which concerned you only slightly – was there really a chance for some to go missing when they had been locked up?).
Once she left, you got right to work and realized almost immediately why this room was so familiar. Two years ago (well maybe seven technically, with the snap) you were in this very room with your then best friends on a field trip.
The first and only time aside from now that you had been to Oscorp was on that class trip, back in freshman year. Peter and Ned were goofing off around the spider exhibits and you followed them when they begged you to, even though it was ditching the rest of class.
You remembered when Ned knocked over a few glass cases in this room and you all bolted, though it didn't seem like anything broke, luckily. And no one mentioned when you three appeared back with the class like nothing had happened. You had to all suppress yourself from laughing when your class went back into the same room, the glass cases back where they were meant to be and a researcher in the corner was giving you all dirty looks.
You missed that Peter.
He had changed after the snap. You weren't sure why - it had been months since everyone returned, but he had drifted away from you in that time. Originally you both had been relieved to see that the two of you were the same age and had been snapped together, but then Peter seemed to shut away and close you out.
It came out of nowhere and man did it hurt.
You regretted not fighting harder to keep him in your life, but you moved on. Or you at least told yourself that - whenever you saw him looking at MJ the way he used to look at Liz, you felt your heart squeeze in on itself. Losing your friendship hurt, but losing someone you loved in more than a friend way hurt more.
Still, you don't know what you did to make him create this distance between you both, so suddenly. He probably just wanted space after his mentor died, and then realized maybe being friends with you wasn't what he wanted anymore.
You just had to learn to accept that, even if you still didn't want to.
You wiped down a counter a little harder, trying to push those thoughts away. It had been a while since you thought about Peter or Ned or any of that. You missed them, and MJ was the only real connection you had left to your old best friends, but you weren't as close with her either. Especially not now that you saw the way Peter looked at her, and vice versa.
After an hour, you had cleaned the lab space as best you could and organized beakers and scales and the like in the correct places. You had moved the spider cases to the front as required by the list on the tablet, and counted them accordingly. They all seemed to be in there, though it was hard to check when they moved around so much.
You snapped pictures of the lab for your report and marked test tubes, hung coats and checked the room temperature. It was simple work - nothing fun yet, but you hoped that would change soon.
Within the two hours that your internship required, you had fixed the room to near perfection. The lid on one of the glass cases was loose but you were able to fix it, proud of yourself for doing everything without needing to call for help.
The day had gone quickly - you were sent home with a simple "good job!" and "see you next week!", but you were satisfied with how it went. For a first day, not so bad.
You wondered if this was how Peter felt when he first started the Stark internship - he never talked about it much, always getting weird and quiet and changing the subject, but you guessed it was because he didn't want to give too much away and get in trouble. If Stark Industries was anything like Oscorp, they wanted to keep their secrets under wraps as well.
"You know, you work an awful lot for just an intern," you took a bite of your sandwich, giving Peter a funny look across the table at Delmar's. "Isn't it against the law technically for a fifteen year old to be working basically a full-time job-"
"It's not a job, it's an internship," his face was a little red, "And-and I like working this much. It's fun."
"You never talk about it, though," you pointed out, and he conveniently decided to stuff his face with food so he couldn't answer. "Fine, don't tell me, but don't expect me to shut up about it if I get into Oscorp's internship."
"Oooh, we'll be working for competing companies," he wiggled his eyebrows, and you threw a crumpled up napkin at him while he laughed.
"If I even get in," you grumbled, leaning back and crossing your arms.
"Y/N, you're crazy smart, you work really hard, and your entry essay is killer," he said confidently, making your cheeks warm up, "You're going to get in, there's no need to stress."
Of course, you never got to apply - the snap happened and suddenly you came back to life five years later, your mother losing it when you appeared in the living room like nothing had changed. You had called your best friend and he hadn't answered - you remember he and Ned had been on a field trip to MOMA while you had stayed home for a doctor's appointment.
And then he showed up at your window with tears in his eyes and was relieved to see you were still the same age as him. He had hugged you tighter than he ever had before when he explained how Tony Stark had died and he wished he could've done more.
"Peter, you, I know you guys were close, but there wasn't anything you could do," you mumbled while he held you tightly, burying his face in your neck. "You're his intern, not a superhero, there was nothing to be done. It isn't your fault."
You remember how he tensed against you when you said those words, pulling back almost immediately. His eyes were still red but suddenly he looked unsure, like maybe he regretted coming to you, but you didn't know why.
"Yeah, you're right, I'm just an intern," he said a little harshly, not meeting your eyes. Your expression softened at the look on his face.
"You know I didn't mean it like that," you said quietly, reaching a hand out for him, but he flinched away and took a step back. You tried not to be hurt by that, knowing he was hurting from this loss. "Pete, you're just a regular kid, we all are. What could you have done?"
He stared at you for a moment, clenching his jar and nodding. "Right."
He went back to your window while you protested, "Wait, Peter, don't leave. I'm sorry if I said something-"
"Bye, Y/N," Peter said quickly, hopping down your fire escape before you could call him back.
Whatever you said that struck a nerve with him seemed to ruin your friendship - he never spoke to your after that, he ignored your texts and somehow avoided you at school. Ned told you he wanted space, and so you gave it to him.
But he never came back around.
Your phone rang with a text and you snapped out of it, coming back to the present where you were on a subway on your way home from the internship, not Peter's friend anymore, not really Ned's friend anymore either, and you had to be fine with that.
It had been months anyway - you should be over it by now.
With a sigh, you glanced at your phone and saw it was a text from MJ, asking if you had the notes for the class she missed today. The subway came to your stop and you hopped off, digging in your bag a little to make sure you had the notes she was looking for, and didn't leave them at school.
"Aha!" You pulled out the right ones, snapping a picture of them before stuffing them back in your bag and making your way home.
When you lifted your phone back up to answer the text before you could forget, your eyes suddenly widened upon seeing something crawling out of your sleeve and onto your wrist.
You flinched at the sharp pain on your hand and smacked it off, shuddering a little. You hated spiders more than anything and stomped it with your foot, making a noise of disgust at the sound that made.
"Gross," you muttered, looking at your hand and seeing the area it bit was already turning red. Luckily it was near your wrist so you just tugged your lab coat sleeve over it, hoping that by the time you got home and put ointment on, it wouldn't be worse.
You hand itched a little the rest of the way home, but you had almost forgotten about it when you reached the steps to your building.
"I'm home!" You yelled out when you opened the door, feeling a little faint as soon as you did so. For a minute you paused, almost not hearing you mom yell back a response as you blinked a couple times, wondering why your eyesight was getting blurry.
You took your glasses off and tucked them away, frowning as your vision got better, which made no sense. "What the hell?"
"Hey sweetie, dinner will be ready in five!" You winced and put your hands over your ears as your mom's voice sounded way too loud, but she wasn't next to you like you thought.
Your ears were ringing as you dropped your bag by the door, flinching at the loud sound in made.
"You okay?" Your moms voice sounded even closer but also somehow softer with how loud your ears were ringing. "Y/N?"
"I'm feeling really sick," you said quietly, your head starting to pound, "Can I just go to bed?"
She put a hand on your head and you tried not to flinch away at how cold her hand felt. "Oh, you definitely have a fever. Yeah honey, go get some rest, I'll bring soup up later if you're awake."
"Thanks," you hurried up to your room, still feeling weird and faint and also like you could sleep for ten years. You didn't bother to change out of your clothes, only throwing your lab coat in a corner before falling onto your bed.
You knocked out as soon as you hit the pillow.
-
You woke up several hours later in a panic, the position you were in making you jump out of your skin.
"What the-" You would've fallen in shock if your feet hadn't been literally stuck to the ceiling. Your shirt was bunched up around you from the gravity pull and your hair was also falling toward the ground, but you remained upside down and somehow...not falling.
With a pull, you tried to get your feet off the ceiling but they wouldn't budge. You squatted, using your hands to yank at your feet but nothing was happening. It didn't feel like you were upside down - you felt like you were simply standing normally, and if the room hadn't been upside down you wouldn't have known the difference.
"What is going on?" You whispered to yourself, pulling again with no success. "Am I still freaking dreaming?"
"Honey?" Your mom's voice made you freeze, still on the ceiling in a squatting position. "Are you ready for school? I brought you breakfast."
"I'm still not feeling well," you said a little breathlessly, hoping she didn't open the door, not remembering if you locked it the night before. What the hell would she do seeing your feet stuck to the ceiling? "Can you leave it outside the door?"
She sighed, "Should I call and tell the school you won't be in?"
"Please," you replied, trying to pry yourself off the ceiling again. With a little screech you finally fell off, smacking your back against the ground and letting out a groan of pain.
"What was that?" Your mom asked worriedly, jiggling your door handle.
"Nothing!" You panicked, rolling up and trying not to touch anything in fear of sticking again, "Just, ah, fell off the bed?"
"That sounded louder than falling off the bed," she huffed, but stopped trying to barge in. "What did I tell you about locking the door?"
"It's a habit," You shot back, to which she just sighed.
"I'll call the school, get some rest, honey."
You didn't rest. All you did for the remainder of the day was pace around your room and try not to touch anything else. When you went to try and google what was wrong with you, your fingers ended up sticking to the keyboard and you nearly ripped your keys off the computer, so you gave that idea up really quickly.
All you knew was that you were sticking to things, and you suddenly didn't need your glasses, and you felt weirdly on edge and jumpy all day. Eventually you gave up trying to figure it out and just went back to sleep, somehow still exhausted.
The next day you felt a little better, more relaxed for sure - the vision thing was still the same, but so far you didn't stick to anything when you got ready, so hopefully you were in the clear.
You looked in the mirror a few minutes before leaving, frowning a little. Everything seemed normal - you didn't look sick anymore, but you still didn't need your glasses and you were sticking to ceilings. Maybe you picked up some weird disease at Oscorp.
"Okay," you mumbled to yourself, looking at your hands. "Please don't stick to anything else today."
Everything was fine on your walk to school. You picked up a coffee at your usual shop on the way, took the subway, even arriving on campus a few minutes earlier than normal.
You seemed back to normal. After the weird incident with sticking to your ceiling and not needing your glasses anymore, you decided maybe it was a fluke thing. Or you were just dreaming it all up.
"Hey, Y/N," MJ's voice brought you back to the present as she came by your locker. "You got sick too?"
"Uh, yeah, something must be going around," you shrugged it off, putting your combo into your lock and tugging it off, "I feel much better now, though."
"That's good," she looked amused while you struggled with your locker, somehow always fighting with it just to open it up.
"Stupid thing," you muttered, tugging a little more.
"Still jammed?" MJ tried not to laugh as she watched you frown at the door.
"Come on," you grumbled, yanking the door again a bit harder. This time it not only opened, but it also went a step further and ripped right off the hinges. You stumbled back a little, staring in shock at your open locker, the hinges falling and hitting the floor.
MJ was just staring at you with her mouth open.
"What the hell?" she muttered, giving you a weird look as you held the locker door in your hand.
"Um," you dropped it, thanking the universe that it didn't stick to your hand. "It was loose for ages, I figured it would come off at some...point..."
That was a dumb excuse since you knew damn well the door was always jamming, and MJ had literally just pointed that fact out, but you didn't have any other explanation. There was no way you or anyone would have been strong enough to rip a locker door off the wall. It must have been loose.
You felt a weird tingle on the back of your neck and had the feeling someone was watching you. Without thinking about it you glanced over MJ's shoulder, meeting that someone's eyes.
Peter Parker was staring at you.
You hadn't spoken to him at all in the months since you two had drifted apart. It was sad, especially considering your feelings for him, but it wasn't the worst thing in the world. You missed him a lot, but he seemed happy, so you let him go. It was easier when he ripped it off like a bandaid and you didn't have to talk to him or have him acknowledge your presence...like he was now.
Sure you broke a locker, but he didn't just give you a weird look and go back to ignoring you. It seemed like he was suspicious about something as he gave you another funny look, staring hard at the locker you dropped.
Why the hell was he staring at you like that?
"Earth to Y/N," MJ waved a hand in front of your face, bringing you back to reality. "Are you going to do anything about that?"
"Oh, right," you grabbed the locker door and put it back on, leaving it for the time being. "I'll, uh, tell someone about that later."
On instinct you went to push your glasses up, but remembering you didn't need them anymore, you dropped your hand awkwardly and crossed your arms, knowing MJ just noticed you do that.
"Where are your glasses?" She suddenly asked, confirming what you suspected and sounding as suspicious as Peter looked a second ago. You glanced back up at him to see his back was turned now, talking to Ned.
"Oh, contacts," you waved a hand dismissively, starting to feel weird again. You had some goosebumps on your arms, but it wasn't even cold out.
What the hell was going on with you?
"Okay," MJ shrugged, shifting her books, "We're gonna be late, maybe try not to break any more lockers?"
"I'll try my best," you laughed a little nervously, hoping she wouldn't press more about that. You didn't have any answers as to what just happened, but you didn't want to think about it anymore.
Nothing else seemed weird for the rest of the day. Your classes went normally and you got the work you missed during your absence. Peter gave you an odd glance once in a while, which was starting to annoy you - how could he have ignored you for the last several months and now was deciding to pay you some attention? It was getting tiring.
Especially because you missed him so much.
By the time P.E. came around, you almost forgot about the whole issue with the locker. But there was a weird buzzing in the back of your head and you felt even more on edge than you had for the last two days, and you weren't sure why.
"Dodgeball day!" Coach Wilson announced, making everyone groan in frustration. Except for Flash, who looked excited - probably so he could use it as an excuse to take out Peter. "Quit complaining and go get into teams."
It only took a few minutes to break up in half - your class was often split into two and now it was habit to move to a certain side. Flash was on the other team and was looking smug as he tossed a ball between his hands, but he was the only one. Everyone else just seemed bored.
MJ let herself get hit almost immediately so she could duck out and read on the side. A few more people on both sides were out almost immediately, and you were a little surprised you hadn't been hit yet. All the balls flying around were starting to make you dizzy, you could barely tell where any of them were coming from.
Suddenly there was that weird buzzing in your head again and everything in you was screaming at you to duck, so you did.
"Wow, nice dodge!" Ned complimented next to you, and you didn't even realize you had barely missed the ball flying toward you. "How'd you see that coming?"
"Well, nice," he chuckled, giving you a fist bump. "Our team might just win!"
You had never been good at dodgeball, and Peter was already giving you a suspicious look (though you wished he would stop staring at you, it was bringing back feelings you had spent the longest time trying to push away). So with a little humiliation you let the next ball hit you so no one else would notice how you suddenly became great at a sport you usually sucked at.
Something definitely wasn't right, and if that wasn't clear before, it sure was now. You'd never been able to dodge something so easily and you also could suddenly see perfectly and you were strong enough to break a locker off the wall and you were sticking to things.
By the end of the day, you had pretty much made up your mind to retrace your steps and figure out what was wrong, considering you were fine two days ago. You weren't meant to be at your internship for another week, but you were sure if you acted like you forgot something there, they'd let you back into the rooms you'd been working in. Maybe you had touched something or spilled something and it had infected you.
You shook your head at yourself on the way to Oscorp, knowing it sounded ridiculous. But what other explanation was there? Everything was fine but now you had weird (God, you didn't even want to say it) superpowers, and you needed to figure out where the hell they came from.
But something caught your eye on the front page of a paper on your way there, and that same buzzing in your head told you it was important for some reason, so you stopped in your tracks.
You grabbed the newspaper, frowning in annoyance at the front page - it was just another weekly bashing of New York's favorite hero. Spider-Man had returned from the blip and was out helping people and all the Bugle had to say about it was criticizing him for not being there the last five years. Did they even consider that he was probably snapped as well? It was pathetic.
You didn't know why you had the urge to stop and read the paper, but clearly it was a fluke. Stupid weird powers.
With a sigh, you went to put the paper down, but paused when it didn't come off your fingers. You knit your brows and shook it a little, realizing to your horror that it was stuck to your palm. You shook it with a little more force, trying not to freak out.
"You gonna pay for that or just stand there?" The salesman snapped, giving you a dirty look.
"How much is it?" You grumbled, not wanting to draw anymore attention to the fact that you were still not able to drop it. Maybe you could pay for it and leave so he wouldn't get weird with you.
"Five dollars."
"Five dol-" You scoffed, "I'm not paying five dollars for this, are you kidding me?"
"Then put it back on the stand," he muttered, and started getting annoyed when you didn't move. "Is this a joke to ya?"
"Uh, no," you tried one more time before huffing, "Sorry!"
"Hey-Hey!" He shouted as you turned and sprinted away, knowing that nothing was going to come from you standing and arguing with him all day. And you weren't sure how to unstick, or why you were sticking in the first place-
Your eyes widened as you rounded a corner, coming to a stop in an alley as it suddenly hit you.
Sticking.
Strong.
Spider bite.
Spider-Man.
"Oh, God," you leaned against the brick alley wall and put your head in your hands, forgetting you still had the paper stuck and crumpled it to your face. You pulled it away and tried to relax your shaking, understanding now what was going on, but it only brought a million more questions.
"Come on, unstick," you whined to yourself, shaking your hands more. The whole realization you just had could be dealt with once you figured at least this part out. The paper just refused to fall off. "What the hell!"
"Uh, ma'am?" The voice made you panic a little, staring up to see Spider-Man with his arms crossed, leaning against the alley wall. Speak of the devil. "I just saw you steal that paper."
"It's not what it looks like," you insisted, lifting your hands up again and shaking them some more. You imagined he was probably giving you a weird look under the mask, but you also just realized that maybe this was the perfect opportunity to see if he had any idea what was happening to you.
He scratched the back of his neck, "I mean, you kind of ran away with it in your hand, so-"
"I was reading it, and now I-I don't know what's happening," you said in more of a panic, trying to pull the papers off your hands with more force this time, "Why-why isn't it coming off?"
"Hey, hey - you have to relax," he tried to say it calmly, moving forward and putting his gloved hands on your shoulders, "Y/N, calm down. Panicking is making it worse, relaxing will release the tension and you can unstick."
"How am I supposed to relax? I can't have these powers, that's your thing!" You complained, "Why is this happening to me? I don't want this!"
"I didn't choose it either, you know," he said, his voice softening, "I don't think we really get to choose it. Just try and think of your happy place, whatever helps you chill out, and you can get these papers off and we can move to the next step, okay?"
Something told you to trust him so you shut your eyes, nodding and breathing through your nose, trying to ignore the thoughts that had been all over the place all day and the weird tingling feeling you kept having.
The only thing that could possibly be in your "happy place" involved Peter. It wasn't hard to just pick one and try to focus on that instead of the feeling of Spider-Man's hands still on your shoulders trying to calm you down.
On walks home from school, or rides on the subway, or even just sitting on each other's beds – you'd share headphones with Peter. Usually one in his left ear, one in your right, listening to anything he had on his playlist. You both had similar music tastes and it was nice to show each other new songs. Sometimes he'd shoot you a little smile and hook his pinky with yours as you walked or stood or sat together, his cheeks turning a little red as he looked away, but the smiling staying the same, always.
You hadn't done that with him in ages.
"Hey, you did it!" Spider-Man's voice made you snap your eyes open, and you saw that the paper had fallen on the ground, no longer stuck to your hands. "Told you so."
"Oh my God, thank you," you pulled him into a hug, trying not to cry, "Thank you so much. I think I'm going crazy."
He hesitated a little, feeling almost tense, but then he hugged you back, his arms snaking around you and holding you close. "Hey, don't worry about it. I've been in this boat before, I get it."
You pulled away from him to look at your hands, almost as if they'd start glowing. "I don't understand. I was fine yesterday, I-I was just in my school and then my internship-"
"Where's your internship?" He asked a little sharply, "Oscorp?"
"H-How'd you know?" You asked, eyes wide.
"Were you around the radioactive spider unit?" He pressed on, rubbing his forehead. "Did you get bit?"
"I got bit on my way home, I-" you frowned, pulling your sleeve back to see the bite. It was gone now, except for a little red mark where it had bitten you. "It didn't occur to me until a few minutes ago...I thought it was a normal spider."
Spider-Man reached forward and took your hand, a thumb brushing over where your bite was. "I was bitten there. A few years ago, back when they had the unit open to visitors. Or I guess several years ago, what with the...blip."
"You - that's how you became Spider-Man?"
"Well, the fancy suit didn't come with the bite, but yeah," he said a little cheekily, almost making you laugh. "It's crazy they're still letting people near those spiders, I figured after me they would've closed it up...but I guess maybe they don't know their spiders bit me? Sorry, I'm rambling. Anyway, are you...are you alright? I know it's a lot."
"Um, yeah," you let out a breath, shaking your head. "It is. A lot, I mean. I don't know what to do."
"I can help you?" He offered, sounding a little unsure. "H-Have you told anyone about this? Your family, friends?"
You scoffed, "I don't really have friends. And my mom is my only family but I-I can't tell her about this, she'll probably take me to a doctor. Or a psych ward."
He was silent for a second, and you felt a little uncomfortable knowing he was staring at you, but you couldn't see his eyes. "What do you mean you have no friends?"
You looked away for a moment, shaking your head. "I didn't mean it like that, I have friends, I just...I used to have closer friends but we drifted apart. I don't have anyone close enough that I would tell about this."
He was silent again, and you almost worried that you weirded him out, but then he nodded. "Well you have a close friend now. Us spider people gotta, uh, stick together."
"Very funny," your lips pulled up into a little smile at his pun, and by the way his mask shifted, you could assume he was grinning, too. "And spider people, really?"
"I don't know what else to call us, I haven't met anyone else that was bitten by a spider and got weird powers, so," he rubbing his chin. "Do you think there's anyone else?"
"I guess when we see someone else swinging around on webs, then we'll know," you chuckled, "Wait, how do you get your webs? Do they like come out of your wrists or what because I definitely have not gotten that weird power-"
"No, no," he laughed, twisting his wrist around so you could see a bit of machinery on it. "Um, Tony Stark made them for me. I make the webbing myself, but uh, these came with the suit."
"Tony Stark, huh?" You sighed, noticing his shoulders tense. "Were...were you close with him?"
"Yeah," he answered quietly, the mood souring a little. His voice sounded off, like maybe he had something in his suit that changed the pitch or something so it wouldn't be recognizable, but you could tell he was upset.
"I'm sorry," you apologized, and he started shaking his head, "No, seriously. It's hard to lose someone you're close to. I get it."
"Yeah," he was silent for a minute before suddenly jumping right back into being upbeat. "Okay, anyway, moving on - you got these powers, you definitely might need some help with them cause I know they can be weird."
"That would be much appreciated," you sighed in relief, but he was already moving to the next step.
"I might have a way of getting you a suit," he said, his masked eyes widening a little. "It could be so cool, I could help you learn about your powers, we could fight crime-"
"Wait, wait, slow down," you held up your hands, "I-I don't know about all that, I've never been very agile and I don't know how keen I am to get punched in the face."
"The powers help with agility, I'm sure you've probably noticed. We can go back to that," he crossed his arms. "Aside from the sticking, anything else weird happen?"
"I broke my locker, I don't need glasses anymore, I can dodge dodgeballs which I think is part of the power thing considering I've never been good at dodgeball," you counted on your fingers, "Uh, and the sticking thing, obviously."
"I call it my spider sense," he tapped his head, "It warns me when I'm in danger. Maybe that's what happened to you at...dodgeball?"
"Maybe, I didn't see it coming but-but suddenly I just felt like I needed to duck, so I did."
"We really do have all the same powers," he put his hands on his hips, "This is so weird. I never considered another person with my powers being out there..."
"How did you do it on your own?" You rubbed your temples, "I feel like I'm going crazy."
He shrugged, "I, uh, just went through it, I guess. But you don't have to, I can totally help-"
Both of you suddenly tensed at the same time, your ears ringing a little as you both looked towards the left. You were still in the alleyway and nothing seemed wrong, but by how tense Spider-Man suddenly was, and that weird buzzing you felt, you knew something was up.
"I gotta go," he said quickly, backing up again, "But listen, why don't...why don't you meet me again tomorrow, do you know that sandwich place called Delmar's? On 17th?"
You almost winced at the memories that brought. "Uh, yeah?"
"Meet me on the roof of that building it's in, around seven," he backed up some more, "I can talk more to you then, but, I really should go - and remember the key to unsticking is finding your happy place!"
"Okay?" You said in a questioning tone as he quickly hopped over the fence at the end of the alley, shooting a web and swinging toward whatever danger your "spidey senses" were warning you both about.
"My 'happy place'," you mumbled to yourself, kicking a rock and frowning at the newspaper you had dropped on the ground. "What the hell just happened?"
-
The next day all you could think about was meeting Spider-Man again.
You couldn't concentrate, your "spidey sense" (or whatever he called it) all over the place, your body probably trying to adjust to having these new powers. Luckily you remembered the trick he gave you about sticking to things, and you managed to be able to stop that from happening too much.
Though you wished your 'happy places' didn't involve Peter and Ned so much.
Whenever you got stuck to something, a pencil or your textbook or even the bleachers in P.E., you thought about the stupid things you used to get up to with them - like taking Ned's dad's car to McDonald's at the crack of dawn even though none of you could legally drive. Or the time Peter used his shoe to try and knock his backpack off the basketball hoop Flash had stashed it on as a prank, but he ended up getting his shoe stuck there as well. You remembered those times being hilarious and the most fun you'd had (yes, even watching Peter eventually get both his shoes stuck with his backpack was considered the most fun you had freshman year). They were easily moments that made you happy and thinking about them relaxed you a little and you were able to unstick from whatever it was you were stuck to.
The one thing you couldn't completely handle was the strength you suddenly had. You almost gave some guy a black eye when you tossed him an eraser to borrow. Luckily he had laughed it off and not paid much attention, but you vowed not to "toss" anything to anyone ever again.
Plus, your locker was still broken, and you had managed to craft a lovely story to the office about how it broke. They moved you to a different one that was also jammed, so you had to be extra careful not to break it again.
All in all, a great day of trying to adjust to what that stupid spider bite gave you.
By the time you were sitting on the roof Spider-Man wanted to meet you at, you were a little more excited.
Having powers could be cool - especially with someone there to help. You didn't know how old Spider-Man was or what else he did with his life outside of this, but you hoped he could give you some pointers for how to keep the powers controlled when you were out doing normal things. The last thing you needed was to shake someone's hand and break their fingers accidentally, or not be able to let go, or something horrifying like that.
"Sorry I'm late," the familiar altered voice almost made you jump. The senses thing wasn't totally working yet, apparently. "I, uh, went to pick something up."
"What's that?" You asked, seeing something in his gloved hand as well as a take out bag hanging from his wrist.
"I brought presents," he said a little cheerfully, making you raise an eyebrow. "I know we didn't talk much about it yesterday, but I hoped you'd be willing to maybe, I don't know...use your powers like I do?"
"You mean fight crime?" You asked, and he nodded. "I mean...if you think I can do it-"
"I know you can," his mask shifted in a grin, "You want to?"
You'd never considered it before, obviously, but you knew that maybe you were given these powers for a reason. Maybe you could do good with them, like Spider-Man was. And he seemed eager to help you, and it would be wrong to not use them for good like he was.
"Okay, yeah. I do want to."
"Awesome," he set the takeout bag down before sitting next to you on the ledge, the other thing still in his lap. "So, Mr. Stark made my suit for me years ago, and I wasn't sure how I would get one for you, but I doubted you'd want to be out there in like, your regular clothes and without a mask. Or that horrible suit I had before this one."
You snickered, "It looked like pajamas, if I remember correctly."
"Hey, I worked hard on that! But anyway, I pulled some strings with some friends," he said as a little pun, making you laugh as he held what was in his lap out to you. "I kind of guessed on measurements, but it's built like my suit so it'll shrink to your size anyway. But, uh, what...what do you think?"
You held up the suit, a little in awe at the design details. It wasn't red and blue like his was, but white and black - with a red mask and hood that would cover your face and hair. It seemed a little less restrictive than his suit, and it was different enough but also similar enough to his. The web design across the front and back of the top part made it clear that you were also someone with spider-like powers, but you didn't copy his spider emblem or red and blue design either.
It was perfect.
"I love it," you smiled at him, seeing his shoulders drop with relief. "Seriously, this...this is amazing. I can't thank you enough."
"Nothing to thank me for," he said in an excited tone. "Seriously, it's-it's cool that you agreed to let me train you and stuff. It'll be nice to have someone who gets it. And someone to watch my back, too, and vice versa."
You ran your hands over the suit, "You really think I can do it?"
"Yeah, I know you can," you could almost hear a smile in his voice, "Seriously, you're taking this way better than I did when I got my powers, I can tell you're gonna do great. Plus, you have me, so you're in good hands."
The last bit was said a little smugly and you couldn't help but give his arm a little shove, laughing, "No one told me Spider-Man was so full of himself."
"Hey, I didn't say anything like that," he held a hand to his chest, chuckling. After a beat of silence, he said, "I really missed this."
"Missed what?" You raised an eyebrow in confusion, watching his shoulders drop as he tensed.
"Having...someone to talk to about these kinds of things," he said a little weirdly, like maybe that wasn't what he was actually talking about at all. "I don't really - I mean, after Tony..."
"Sorry," you frowned, putting your hand over his and missing the way he jumped a little at your touch, "You have someone now. As long as you promise to not let me die when I try swinging for the first time, then you definitely have someone to talk to about these kind of things."
"No promises," he said a little cheekily, his joking mood back while you rolled your eyes. "Hey, what's...what's your name, by the way?"
"Y/N," you stuck your hand out, letting him shake it with a laugh. "What's yours?"
"Once I determine you aren't secretly a villain trying to find out my secret identity, I'll tell you," he said simply, dropping your hand to grab the takeout bag you almost forgot he brought. You scoffed.
"What, that's what I get after you gave me a suit and promised to help me fight bad guys? You think I'm a super villain?" You huffed, not able to keep from smiling while he laughed at you, pulling out drinks.
"Hey, I have a lot of enemies, okay? I'm playing it safe," he chuckled, handing you a cup. With a pout, you took it from him, noting the logo on the bag.
"If this wasn't a smoothie from what happens to be my favorite smoothie place in Brooklyn, I would be very upset with you right now," you took a sip, surprised to realize he had somehow guessed your favorite flavor too. "Wow, I actually forgive you for that comment, how did you know I liked strawberry?"
"Lucky guess," he shrugged, and you could see a grin on his lips when he pulled his mask up to take a drink of his own smoothie. "Who doesn't like strawberry?"
"I could've been deathly allergic," you pointed out, making him laugh. "How bad would it be if you killed me before even getting to train me?"
"Pretty bad," he leaned back, kicking his feet over the edge. "But then if you did turn out to be a super villain, it would've made this a lot easier."
It was really hard to believe you met this guy yesterday. Maybe it was easy to bond over both of you getting bit by a radioactive spider, but it was so easy to get along with him, it almost frightened you. You hadn't been like this with anyone since Ned and Peter were still a part of your lives.
"What do you wanna call yourself?" He asked suddenly, taking another sip of his drink. "You could always be called, I don't know...Spider-Woman, but if you want to be more unique or something..."
"Would you sue me for copyright infringement?" You joked and he laughed.
"I promise not to sue you. But I don't know, there's a lot of spider puns you could use if you want to. But please use a spider related name or you really have learned nothing from me so far."
"Got any ideas, since you're so good at spider related names?" You asked, chuckling.
He paused for a moment, tilting his head a little as his masked eyes squinted and got wide again as he hummed.