Flash turns red, he almost cries. He knows it's his fault. It's all his fault. And now he has to fix it.
'Flash Thompson. What are you talking about? We weren't going to punish anyone here. However, you clearly aren't okay now and thus we send you home. Since it's already 9.30 pm, we let you stay at the tower, but we have to send you back home first thing tomorrow. Your parents have already been alerted,' Mr. Harrington says to his fussed student.
Flash just wants to get away from this place. He's okay with whatever outcome. 'That's okay, sir. I'm sorry for my behavior today.'
The whole Decathlon team looks at their classmate. What happened to him? He used to be so hateful to everyone, but he got polite overnight! That doesn't make any sense, but they're all too aghast to even make a sound.
When Flash doesn't hear anything, he walks to his room. He slammed the door, but since it's the Avengers tower, no big sound went through the building. Tony must've adjusted that when the rooms were made.
Monique claps in her hands, trying to get the attention of the students. When she has all eyes on her, she says: 'Do you remember the fireworks you made yesterday? We're going to the roof and light 'em up! Be careful making wishes in the dark. They never turn out to be good. That's a warning. Let's go to the elevator!'
The students make their way to the elevator, but Peter stays behind. 'Aren't you going to come, too, Pete? You don't want to miss this!' Monique states. She sees Peter look at Flash's door. 'You can tell him where we're going, if you want to. But you can also not waste your energy on helping someone who's been your bully for years. Go light the fireworks with me. Flash'll be fine.'
Peter nods and the two of them get in the elevator. 'Fri, take us to the landing ground, please!' Peter says to the AI, who immediately does what Peter says. The team isn't even surprised about the fact that Peter can say whatever he wants to the AI, they just go with the flow now. These past two days have been a total mess, and no one knows how weird it still can get.
When they're above the penthouse, outside, everyone shivers a little. Even though it's April, almost May, it still gets chilly outside late at night, and especially more than 1,300 feet [400 m] in the air.
'I guess I should've told you to bring a coat,' Tony, who appeared out of nowhere, says to the freezing children. 'However, I did not. I think I should turn on the heaters, then.'
'Please do, Mr. Stark. It's so cold, I can't feel my fingers anymore,' Peter says. It's not that cold, not at all, but since he's half spider and spiders dislike cold, he's freezing.
Quickly Tony turns the heaters on, and while they're outside, it still gets a lot warmer than it was before.
Tony guides them to the boxes of fireworks they worked on yesterday. Peter wishes MJ could be there, but she can't. According to the text message he just got from Bruce, MJ won't be back for a while. He'll sleep alone tonight, and he already doesn't look forward to it. He'll film the fireworks instead, and send it to MJ right away. That's the least he can do for bringing her inside of this mess.
¬¬¬
The team is allowed to take a seat at the roof. Monique and Tony will light up the fireworks they made, and they're supposed to watch. Their teachers are half asleep, dozing off and waking up again. Some children are chatting with each other, others are on their phones and Ned and Peter are looking if they can help the adults.
The mini geniuses are sent away rather quickly, and they're taking a seat among their teammates. They just sat down, and there goes the first flower! It's pink and white, probably made by Betty, because she yells: 'I never knew the fireworks were going to turn out that beautiful!'
Multiple flowers follow. Green ones, blue ones, red ones, gold ones, you name it. They arrive at the last box, and this has to be the one with Peter's design. He didn't see it among the others.
First, there's a black with red one. Peter smiles, this is MJ's design, a tribute to Nat, her hero. Now it also fits MJ herself, being the little widow she is. After the black and red, a silver one with multiple colors in it lights. This one is the most beautiful Peter has seen so far, but he doesn't know who made it. Next to him, Ned was bouncing from excitement, and Peter realizes that his friend is better in any way than anyone else, besides maybe MJ.
Then, a red, blue and black one appears high up in the sky. It's mostly red, with blue on the outside. On the inside, a spider's web and two eyes are clearly visible. It's better than Peter ever imagined. His class seems to like it, too, and Ned hits him on the shoulder, whispering in his ear that he wants Peter to make that Spider-Man merchandise. He'll think about it.
¬¬¬
Back at their floor, everyone says good night to each other, and they quickly disappear in their own rooms. Peter says to Ned that he wants to take a shower and then sleep, so Ned won't be talking to him 'till sunrise. 'Good night, genius,' he says, doing the famous hand shake with his friend.
'Good night, Spidey,' Ned answers, clearly being extremely tired. And so they go their separate ways.
When Peter is in his shower, he has the urge to write out what happened to him these past days. So when he's in his PJ's and has made up his bed, he sneaks out of his room and sends Friday to his own apartment. He sneaks in, says nothing to May, who is watching some movie he never heard about, grabs his journal and a pencil from his desk, and he sneaks back to his room.
There, he makes himself comfortable in his bed. He looks if MJ responded to his Sweet Dreams and the firework videos, but she didn't even see it. She must be passed out. Peter hopes she gets better.
He shut down his phone, charging it, and grabbed his journal. He refuses to call it a diary, since he uses it not that often, and he also writes new web formulas and stuff in it. For now, he just started writing.
April 23rd, Field trip to Avenger's tower, 11 pm
These past two days have been a lot. We started all normal, with gifts from me for MJ, with Flash being the annoying human he is, and Ned being the great hacker everyone needs.
We all made a robot in the labs with Bruce, when Shuri judged it. She wanted to make mine the best, but Abe's design for the snow maker was way more efficient. That's probably why he won, too. We were unanimous about it.
Then we had lunch, which should've been calm, and it was, until uncle Clint showed up. First, he fell out of the vents, then he dragged me in them, and then he embarrassed me in front of the whole team!
After lunch, we went to the museum. I had an argument with Flash, again, about whether or not I knew Spider-Man. If only he knew...
We bet about it. He said that if I was able to shoot at his target, I'd prove that I knew myself. Of course I won, and he finally admitted that he was in the wrong.
Some time later, we all played Truth or Dare. Harley arrived as well, and he and Shuri completely soaked my pants. Not like I needed them, I just took a shower after. MJ joined. She called it "her surprise".
The next morning, so, today, we had training from my family. Mama spider completely killed the class, she should teach more often.
Tony and Bucky pranked me. They made the weight on the bench press way heavier than they actually are. I'm not sure how bad it was, but it wasn't fun.
We had a break, and MJ fainted. It was because of her sugar being not correct. I guess she did too much during the training. I was so scared, I thought I might lose her, and I can't lose her. Her, Ned, May, the Avengers, I can't lose them.
Then, at the Q&A, I had a sensory overload. Mama spider helped me. It was okay. I took everyone back by starting a Code Blue. I loved that. We won, obviously.
I found out Wanda had been inside of Flash's head. Flash ran away as soon as he saw Wanda, and almost got thrown out of the building. MJ and I stopped him.
I don't even want to write down what happened.
MJ got ill, I'll keep it on that.
And Flash found out about me being Spider-Man. Oops.
Then we got back.
Mr. Harrington and Mr. Dell weren't happy.
Fortunately, that didn't last long. Flash got sent home. I should go check on him. It's not too late to do that, is it?
Peter looks at his clock. 11:45 pm. If Flash's asleep, he's asleep. If he's not, Peter can check on him. That's why he sneaks out, again. He walks quietly to room 68.7. He holds his ear to the door, and hears a regular breath. Flash is asleep. Maybe he should sleep, too. He'll say goodbye tomorrow morning.
With that thought, he walks back to his room, shutting it, falling into his bed. It only takes a couple of seconds before he's far, far away, dreaming about a world with him and his lovely girlfriend, who'll be okay.
Word count: 1648 words
That was something.
I made an outline for the rest of the book, I guess I should take way less time writing it. I hope to finish this within two months. This'll have 20 chapters total. I hope you'll all stick with me 'till the end!!!
Kind regards, Eski
date of publication: October 1st, 2021