Reminded

chapter 6

Peter stood in the middle of the road, his eyes blurry, filled with tears and his heartbeat in his ear. He was shivering in the 70 degree weather of October. He tried to reach out and grab anything he could to ground him back to earth but there was nothing. There was nothing and no one.

Peter had always felt alone, but for the very first time in his short life, he truly was. There was no shelter from this feeling, no cave to take refuge in, no motherly arms to fall into, there was the sound of cars honking. And that was all.

--

"Deadly car crash leaving one dead and another extremely injured in queens on 8th. Spiderman was caught on the scene, removing an extremely injured driver from the vehicle. Shortly after, the car had caught on fire. Local ICU nurse, May Parker was pronounced dead on sight."

Tony took in a sharp breath of air when Mays picture was flashed on the screen. He shot up, already running towards the garage and opening the door of his audi. "Friday. Peters location. Now"

--

Peter didn't leave. He sat on the curb, right next to Mays car. The car they had gone to the store in, the car they went out to dinner in, the car that took him to school on days when it was too rainy to walk to the subway. He watched as tow trucks took it away and as the clean up crew tried to remove the blood from the road and he had no intentions of leaving.

He silently sobbed through the mask, where could he go? Its not like she was laying in a hospital bed. He couldn't go grab her hand and yell at her to wake up. She wasn't real anymore. May wasn't real anymore. What was there for him at the apartment? A social worker waiting for him to take him into foster care? Peter no longer belonged to anybody and he had nothing left that belonged to him. He couldn't even focus on the one life he saved because he lost his own.

He heard voices for the first time as his heartbeat slowed down after playing anxiety ridden songs in his ear.

"Sir you can't come over here, you need to wait until this road is cleared like everyone else"

Tony dramatically took his sunglasses off while looking intimidatingly at the worker "I will buy this whole goddamn road and then you won't have a choice but to let me" He said pushing past towards Peter, who still had his suit on. Tony couldn't see his expression but he knew it wasn't good.

"Come on kid, up." he said, grabbing the kids arm standing him up, careful to not say his name around all of these people. He didn't want to come off cold or rude to Peter, but he needed to get him away from people who could find out his identity before anything.

Peter numbly walked, still not fully coherent of what was going on, he just followed the hand that was guiding him, with a strong, but not threatening grip on his arm. He faintly heard a car door open, and somebody helped him into the passenger's side. As the door slammed closed, Peter's ears started ringing.

It was complete silence, and it felt like isolation. Tony got into the driver's seat and locked the doors. His tinted windows guarding them from the outside.

"Pete" He started, feeling sympathy for the boy he hadn't seen in over a month

Peter slowly raised his hand up and pulled up his mask, eyes puffy and tears spilling out. He looked at Tony for the first time and completely lost it, his facial expression went from uniform and numb to a lost puppy in a matter of seconds.

Tony was never good at affection, but he knew he would have to step out of his comfort zone for the sake of the kid who felt like the world had just crumbled in on him. He pushed back the center console, allowing room for Peter and without thinking Tony grabbed peters head and put it into his chest.

Peter cried, loud into tony's chest, staining his expensive suit with tears. He didn't think, he just did the only thing he could do, and that was mourn his life that felt like it was ending.

Tony's hand found its wait to Peters back, rubbing comforting circles on it, while his other hand remained in his hair, trying to calm down the hysterical boy.