Ghost of You

t h i r t y - t h r e e

Bending over slightly, I rummaged in the cabinets for a strainer.

"How old are you?"

His voice was slightly muffled by the sound of pots and pans shifting but even so, I could still hear the youthful exhilaration. My hand finally found the metal collainder, I pulled it out from the cabinet and stood up. 

"Didn't anyone ever tell you it's inappropriate to ask a woman how old she is?"

He shrugged, unfazed by my question. 

"Mr. Stark's told me a little about you." He said, bouncing onto the next topic of conversation. "You weren't in Berlin with everyone else though. You're the first Avenger I've gotten to meet since coming back."

"You were in Berlin?" I asked, not bothering to hide my surprise or clarify that I was most definitely, in fact, not an Avenger.

"Yeah, Mr. Stark asked me to go, it was totally amazing!"

"Amazing?" I repeated, plopping the strainer into the sink. 

"Yeah, I got to fight against all of these Avengers and I was like pow, take some of this, and wham, take some of that!" He said, animatedly. "I even stole Captain America's shield!"

His last sentence was said with an air of pride, as if he clearly expected me to be impressed by this. I was too busy trying to figure out what the hell Tony was doing bringing someone so young into this. Peter seemed to have come out of whatever battle in Berlin that I'd missed unscathed, I had no clue how given that he was as thin as a twig. Maybe Steve had gone easy on him on purpose? Even so that didn't explain what reason Tony had for recruiting what couldn't be just an ordinary fifteen year old, even if that's exactly what he seemed to be. 

"So Tony just showed up out of nowhere and took you to Berlin?" I confirmed, still a little skeptical.

"Yeah he even made me a new suit! It's totally sick, so much better than what I used to wear."

I picked up the wooden spoon, tasting one the of the noodles. They seemed like they were cooked enough so I carried the pot over to the sink, pouring the pasta into the strainer. 

"What kind of suit?" 

"My spider-suit." He said with the same kind of tone a person used when they said "well duh."  

He seemed to notice that I still had no idea what he was talking about. I guess the fact that I had spent the last weeks either in a glass holding cell or in my bedroom sobbing had not been one of the things Tony had told Peter about me. I hadn't worked in over month and was still very much behind the times.

"Aw man, I thought Mr. Stark told you!" He whined. "I'm Spider-Man!"

From the look on his face he seemed crushed that Tony hadn't mentioned him to me yet. I didn't have the heart to tell him I had no idea who Spider-Man was other than the fact that he was apparently the boy standing right in front of me. 

"Oh, cool." I said, pretending I knew what that meant.

I grabbed a jar of red sauce from the fridge, pouring some into the empty pot, and dumping the penne on top. Then I used the spoon to mix the pasta around until the sauce was distributed. 

"Yeah! I'm hoping Mr. Stark is going to make me an Avenger soon!"

I once again didn't have the heart to tell him that I wasn't sure the Avengers really existed anymore. Thor and Bruce were off who knows where, Clint was on house arrest and Steve, Nat, Wanda and Sam were all on the run. There was no team left to assemble. 

"You hungry?" I asked instead, starting to pull two bowls out from off the shelf. 

"Starving." He replied, looking grateful as I spooned some pasta into one of the bowls and pushed it in his direction.