Peter Parker One Shots

D.I.D pt 3 (pt 2)

"Peter? It's just me. You seemed a little off in your texts, so I just wanted to make sure you were okay."

There was more silence with no movement. Then the footsteps walked away, and Tony sighed. He was just about to yell that he was leaving when he heard the steps again, coming all the way towards the door this time. There was the sound of a lock clicking, and the steps retreated again, leaving Tony to open the door himself. He did so and locked the door back up behind him, finally turning to Peter.

Who was a mess.

Peter's hair was sticking up in all directions, his face red and eyes puffy. His nose was a little runny, and Peter wiped at it with his hoodie sleeve. He looked like he had just rolled out of bed, which he probably had.

"Peter?"

Peter nodded, and Tony shook his head.

"What happened, kiddo? Are you sick?"

"Yeah," he croaked out, his voice raw and scratchy. Tony winced as he continued. "Yeah, I'm sick. I'm so sick of life. I'm so sick of people screwing me over and me not remembering it. And I'm so excited to kill Deimos for not choosing to either keep this to himself or to let me know right off the bat. I fucking hate him."

Peter was crying again by the end of his rant, holding his throat and trying not to fall over with the force of his painful sounding sobs. Tony walked over to him and gently took his shoulders, leading him to the couch and helping him sit down. Peter pulled his legs to his chest and took a deep breath, wincing at the pain in his throat. God, hysterical sobbing was not something he enjoys, especially the feeling he'd get when his throat would close up and he felt like he wasn't breathing. He took another deep breath, and Tony rubbed small circles into his back to ground him.

"Sorry."

"Hey, no need to apologize. You're fine."

They sat in silence for a little while longer before Tony spoke again.

"Wanna talk about it?"

"I had a nightmare last night. It was... it was... I don't know. God, it scared me so much that I woke up and ran to the bathroom to throw up. And then my brain just did it's thing and I realized that it was all real. It's not often you realize your nightmares are fucking real and came from an altar who is suppsed to be keeping that info for themself. And when I got out of bed this morning, I just couldn't go to school. I-I couldn't look at people. I don't know if I can tomorrow either. Or ever."

"Peter, what happened? What was your nightmare about?"

"Mr. Stark? Have you ever had something done to you without your consent? Stupid question, yes you have, a whole ass surgery. How did you feel afterward? Broken? Changed forever? Like your opinion didn't matter anymore? Twice now. This has happened to me twice now. I have two different altars for the same thing, brought on by two different people. God, why does this keep happening to me?"

"What, Peter? Why does what keep happening to you?"

Peter seemed to have left the room, gone into his own reality as he talked, almost hysterically pushing out the words.

"Magazines and brooms, games and silence, fun and compliance. Clothes and then no clothes and babysitters and bullies and blood and stickiness and touching and belts and screaming and hands and..."

Peter kept going on and on, and Tony didn't think the boy even remembered Tony was in the room. But Tony was in the room, and feeling rather sick at the moment. Peter hadn't stated outright, and Tony didn't know if he would (that would just make it too real, wouldn't it?). But even without the word said outright, Tony still knew what he was talking about.