teen spirit|| peter parker [1]

seven

The days turn into weeks and suddenly it's been almost two months since I last heard from Peter Parker. More accurately, since he heard from me.

The last time we spoke was the day we arrived home from Berlin, and my text message inbox held a notification from Peter - 'i hope you got home safe. thanks for an awesome trip.'

I didn't reply.

Sometimes, on my evening walks around the city or when I'm running minor errands for my father- like getting his favourite bagel from the bakery a block from the subway- I'll see Spider-Man slinging through the city with his webs. Dad has made it my allocated job to collect coffee and snacks while he's working, and I know does it to make me feel useful and to get me out of the Compound while they're all so busy passing through paper work and other boring files about relocating upstate

Usually, just before the sun sets, I'll take the subway until I feel like getting off just so that I can be as far away as I can from the Compound while still feeling as safe as possible. And sometimes I'll see Peter sitting on top of the trains or patrolling around the streets, swinging between skyscrapers.

But I'm too busy for that, now. There's so much going on, yet also nothing at all. It's empty- so empty- without everyone here. Watching Friends and 80s slasher movies without Wanda seems strange and discomforting. Training with Happy instead of Nat isn't as fun- he mostly complains- "Come on, Happy. You've gotta help out, Happy. Get your ass kicked by a fifteen-year-old girl, Happy," he moans every time in that sardonic whine.

Hearing the crackling of Steve's old vinyls spinning on his record player, usually Harry James or sometimes Chet Baker. I always knew he wished he hadn't been put in the ice. He wished he had died properly- and that was that.

That's what I miss. All of it. Even the bickering and the sleepless nights and the quarrelling over the culprit behind the empty milk cartons being left in the refrigerator - Rhodey. It was Rhodey.

Silver linings don't exist, but at least there are less people to watch me smash lightbulbs and fuck with the electricity.

During the nights when my nightmares are too scarring and terrifying- when even the brief darkness of my blinking eyes is harrowing enough to make any sense of rest and sleep laughable- I'll find myself trailing down the hall and into Wanda's bedroom just for a sense of familiarity. I suppose, her old bedroom. It's strange to take in the emptiness of it all; the walls stripped of drawings and pictures of the two of us. No guitar, no black nail polish stains on the cashmere rug. Just a bed and an empty shell of the pre-existing memories; nights spent gossiping about how much Clint could piss us off at times, as well as her strange yet perfect 'friendship' with Vision.

But when the night would draw further and further on; when the cookie dough ice cream had been eaten and all of the classic rom-coms had been watched (usually Bridget Jones' Diary, or Clueless), the conversation would take a turn, and Pietro would be brought up. She'd begin really happy, talking about childhood memories with an pure glint in her eye, and how much love was in their home. How even when her Mother and Father had been killed, she never felt completely alone- she had Pietro through everything. And, fuck, she could hardly bring herself to remember that he wasn't still alive. She'd most likely try to deceive herself and imagine him still being around, leaving his muddy sneakers on the living room carpet or dirty towels on the bathroom floor, and eating his body weight in chips.

She talked about him as if he were still here- but she knew deep down that he wasn't. And nothing would ever be able to fill the gaping holes in her chest- because what he felt, she also felt. And when he left, the pain was insurmountable.