You're What?

A Bad Time to Intern

Peter wanted nothing more than to die in a black hole. He was seriously considering letting himself get stabbed tonight on patrol or feigning sickness so May would keep him out of school. Unfortunately, he doubted the last one would work at all since May was rarely fooled easily and the first one was more painful than he would like to admit. Besides, if he did get stabbed, it would have to be a large stab and it would have to be life threatening. Otherwise he would heal well enough to still attend school and he was trying to avoid that. He loved school, he really did. There was just one thing: his school, the place where smart people were supposed to be, was making the stupidest decision Peter had ever heard of: they were going on a field trip to Stark Tower. Tomorrow. For the entire day.

He had the permission slip in his backpack for May to sign when he got home. Maybe he could just hide it and tell his teacher he forgot to get it signed. However, he knew the teacher would then just call May and ask her for permission. That would bring a bigger problem than he wanted because May would scold him for "forgetting" to let her sign it and Flash would accuse him of having a fake internship the whole time. As badly as he wanted to prove Flash wrong, he didn't want to deal with Mr. Stark embarrassing him the whole trip.

"What do you think, Karen?" Peter asked, legs swinging off a fire escape of a tall building. Whilst waiting for criminals, he'd developed the habit of talking to Karen and eating, much to Mr. Stark's amusement.

"I think you should tell Mr. Stark and ask him not to embarrass you," Karen replied. Peter snorted and shook his head.

"He'll embarrass me if I asked him," Peter said. He sighed and finished off his sandwich. "It would just be worse," he told her with his mouth full.

He grabbed his trash and jumped off the building. He threw the garbage in the bin nearby then swung off through Queens, still considering getting injured until Karen informed him she would tell Mr. Stark if he did.

* * * * *

Peter tried telling May he was sick, but she saw right through him. He had not gotten more than halfway through his excuse before she sent him out the door to meet the bus with a piece of peanut butter toast and an apple.

Arguing with himself over whether or not he should tell May he was sick had taken enough time he was going to be late if he didn't hurry, so he ran to the bus. He made it just in time and raced on board, sitting down in his regular seat and pulling out his headphones. With a little luck, the bus would be late enough he'd miss the trip.

"Are you ready for today?" Ned asked as they climbed off the bus only to load another one.

Peter shook his head and sat down on the second bus, biting into his apple.

"At my funeral, make sure to mention how it was all May's fault since she made me go."

Ned gave him a sad smile and Peter sighed, putting his head back against the window. He looked back up when he felt someone sit down beside him, but wasn't too surprised to see Michelle beside him. She didn't look up at him from her book, but she gave a quiet 'hey, loser' before she continued reading. With a shrug, Peter went back to leaning against the window with his eyes closed.

"Hey, Penis!" Flash yelled. Peter's eyes snapped open and he sat up, spotting Flash a few seats back. "Now we finally get to watch you die of embarrassment when Mr. Stark calls you out on your lie."

"Whatever, Flash," Peter mumbled, laying back, closing his eyes as the bus started up and they headed to the Tower.

When they got there, he grabbed his bag, shared a look with Ned, and followed Michelle off the bus.