𝐈𝐧 𝐋𝐨𝐯𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐌𝐞𝐦𝐨𝐫𝐲

2 | a breath of fresh air

"Gosh, are you okay young man?" Says an elderly gentleman approaching me, his walking stick clicking loudly against the sidewalk.

"Y-yeah, just food poisoning," I yelled back, trying to overcompensate for how loud everything was right now. Except he looked at me like I was crazy for yelling so loudly at him, maybe he thought I naively assumed he was partially deaf.

With the sounds and lights swirling around me, I soon realised that New York City was the single worst place to be right now. I pushed my way through hoards of people on the street, trying my best to find some sort of dark alleyway to go down to escape the sound. I could just sit down and relax before swinging myself home. I could gather my thoughts, wait for this headache to subside and then try and sleep it off.

Dashing across the road without looking, I slammed my hands against the bonnet of an oncoming taxi before it could hit me, yelling a string of profanities at the driver like the typical Queens native I am. The first alleyway I had seen wasn't particularly dark nor quiet at first, but I knew that it would eventually lead me further and further into the maze that is New York's back street system. Seriously, there's so many tiny alleys in this area, you could get lost.

My eyes adjusted to the darkness, away from the nausea inducing lights of the main street and I slumped against the brick wall. My back pressed against the flat surface as I slid down to the ground and I felt my shirt stick to my back from the sweat; why am I sweating so much? Is the wall damp from condensation perhaps? That's not all from me right?

All too familiar to me, yet wildly more irritating, the tingle at the back of my head felt like a sudden sharp stab rather than an alerting reminder. My Spider Sense, or as Aunt May liked to call it my 'Peter Tingle', was a sensation I felt when danger was present in my imminent surroundings. It usually felt as if someone had put their cellphone inside my brain and it was ringing on vibrate. It was a soft but noticeable buzz. Right now though, it was impossible to ignore as the pulsations mixed with my already debilitating migraine and echoing heartbeat.

I snapped my head towards the other end of the alleyway, hearing the scuff of a shoe against the gravelled concrete on the ground. I got up, walked towards the sound and slowed down once I heard two men brawling around the corner. I hadn't particularly gone out tonight to patrol for crime, in fact I rarely went out specifically seeking petty crime, I just fought whenever I had to. But I needed to break up this fight purely so I could stop this fucking Peter Tingle inside of my head and let me rest.

"Hey kid! I think you're in the wrong place man," a tall and tattooed man said in my direction when he noticed me standing in plain sight. He was gripping the shirt of a significantly smaller and scrawnier man, threatening him over god knows what.

"And I think you should let him go," I retorted, pulling my hands out of my jumper pockets and putting them out beside me to show I wasn't armed. Well... Armed in the way they defined it.

"The fuck did you just say to me?" The thug spat at me, letting go of the lanky man who fell down quickly onto his ass with a grunt.

Encounters with New York street criminals like this prick always followed a very similar pattern. I'd confront them, they'd see me as a little sleep deprived white guy and challenge me by brandishing a weapon as an empty threat. I'd then defeat them before they would get the chance to use it and finally I would leave them ashamed and emasculated. It's as simple as that.

Tonight was no different to the usual pattern. He swiftly pulled out a gun from inside his jacket, pointed it directly towards me and before I could even realise that he wasn't bluffing about pulling the trigger, I felt the bullet lodge itself into my lower ribs and stumble back from the impact.