__________
To say Peter is nervous is an understatement.
He debates between swinging to her house or walking like a normal person, and he concludes that walking will help him think more about what he's gonna say, so he hides his webshooters underneath his dry fit long sleeve and starts the fifteen minute trek to her place. What normally isn't a long trip feels like forever, all because he's trapped in the voids of his panicking mind.
Peter made a note earlier that day to wear some cuffed jeans because she says she likes it so much, but patrolling takes a lot out of him, and throws on the first pair of sweatpants he sees on his floor in a rush to get out of his house. He's halfway out the door before he realizes he forgets his backpack, and he curses to himself as he runs back to get it and sprint out his apartment door. The kid desperately hopes she isn't disappointed.
His walk feels longer than intended. Kneading his fingers together out of nervous habit, he rehearses what he's gonna say in his head, but he reiterates himself so often that all of his thoughts are jumbled together in a pathetic, love struck mess, and he curses to himself because he's so smitten that he's forgetting how to even formulate words.
The thought of him and Ryder being conceptually friends has never crossed his mind. If someone told him that he and Ryder would be friends two months ago, he'd laugh so hard he'd crack a rib.
But none of that matters now, because he's currently on his way to her house. Frankly, it's for a project, but it's a huge step for a kid who never gets any sort of opportunity with any girls. Right now, he's currently over the moon.
As he gets closer and closer to her house, his breaths get shorter and more rigged and his palms start to sweat. He rubs them on the waist band of his sweatpants with nervous sighs, suddenly doubting his confidence he once has, the confidence that tells him to tell Ryder how he feels about her.
Peter then laughs to himself. Who does he think he is?
The GPS on his phone alerts him that he's arriving to her apartment, one in the rich neighborhood complex to which he stumbles a bit upon seeing her place. He suddenly feels very small, standing outside a luxurious apartment to which he's too poor to even be looking at. He feels unworthy as he swallows hard, taking reluctance steps towards the entrance of the marble floored lobby. Shooting the doorman a nod, he heads towards the elevator and presses in the correct floor.
His heart is beating so hard.
Soon enough, he's standing outside her apartment door and he forgets how to breathe, and frankly, freezes. He can't do this, he can't do this, he can't do this. Is he too underdressed?
Peter sucks in a breath and raises his fist to knock on the door three times, his heart fluttering when he hears her voice from the inside chirp, "One second!"
Fuck, the dry fit makes him look...well, fit, and he doesn't want it to seem like he's trying to show off, because then she's gonna take him as any other guy who's trying to impress her. Are the sweatpants too casual? Should he have gone for a more preppy look? Fuck, he should've worn the jeans with a baggy sweater, why does he always have to be in such a—
Before he can register it, the door is swinging open and he's met face to face with Ryder, her long locks up in a messy bun with pieces shaping her angelic face, clad in workout shorts and an over sized sweatshirt. His heart skips a beat, and words he plans on saying die in his throat, because he's seen all the looks of Ryder, the preppy one, the sporty one, the sophisticated one, even the flirtatious one, but he concludes that the lazy look she's got on right now is his absolute favorite, just because she looks so comfortable and at ease. Her smile is what brings him back to reality.
"Hey, Peter! You're just in time, dinner's almost ready."
"Oh, uh, thank you," he says, stumbling over his words as he walks in. He takes a look around and suddenly feels very small in the expensive apartment, nicely decorated with a beach theme with a Cape Cod kind of atmosphere. He's seen stereotypes of people using the beach theme but he honestly thinks it's a great style. "You have a beautiful home."
Ryder shuts the door behind him and takes the compliment. "Thanks, but I'm not the genius behind all this." She then grabs a fruit platter that is sitting on the marble counter. "We can head to my room to start brainstorming for the project before dinner's fully ready, if that's alright."
The boy nods, and realizes he isn't actually saying anything. Stupidly, he blurts: "Yes, yeah that's totally fine."
Ryder looks at him sideways with a small smile as she leads him to her room down the hall. He tries not to hear his heart pounding against his rib cage or his foolish thoughts telling him to turn back now and run home, because he's overwhelmed - so overwhelmed. The thought of them being alone makes his thoughts go haywire, and he can't even form coherent thoughts in his head as he thinks about it.
However, as soon as another figure steps into view at the end of the hallway, he knows that they probably won't get much privacy.
"Ah! You must be Peter," a tall, blonde woman grins, approaching him with her hand stuck out for a shake. He shakes her hand. "It's nice to meet you."
"It's nice to meet you too, Ms. Phoenix," Peter replies with a smile, but on the inside his heart is going completely off the charts.
"Nonsense, call me Lisa. Are you thirsty, sweetheart? I could mix you guys some lemonade or something?"
Peter shakes his head politely. "Oh no, I'm alright, thank you though."
Actually, his throat is killing him from yelling at criminals for a couple of hours, so his voice is a little hoarse.
Ryder finds it extremely attractive, as well as the dry fit navy blue shirt he's sporting. She's only ever seen him in jumpers and plaid shirts, but this look, this athletic look, is a great change.
Then suddenly, as if his nerves couldn't get any worse, another women steps out from the end of the hallway, who's shorter and Hispanic with short ebony hair just above her shoulders. Once she sees the boy, her indifferent expression soon turns excited and welcoming, a wide smile appearing on her face.
"Oh Peter! We've heard so much about you!" the shorter woman says cheerfully.
His pink cheeks do not go unnoticed.
"I'm Valeria, it's so nice to finally meet you, hon," she says happily, shaking Peter's hand. "Now, I know you guys have a project to work on, so just keep the door open and we'll call you when dinner's ready, alright?"
"Alright," Ryder agrees, playfully rolling her eyes. She takes Peter's hand as she leads him down the hall, and his heart flutters. "We'll be doing schoolwork, don't you worry."
Ryder leads him into her room, and the stupid blush off his face doesn't seem to go away, especially not when he sees her room that's so her. Decorated fairy lights on the perimeters make him smile and the black comforter with pastel purple walls make him feel at ease. He stands about a step into her room as he takes it in, a small smile planted on his face as he scans the walls and overall theme of her bedroom.
He notices a shit ton of papers and her laptop on her desk, knowing she's busy as she frantically tries to neaten it up.
"Sorry, I was working on something before you came here," she admits sheepishly, the boy glimpsing at construction paper and designs for something he can't make out.
His curiosity claims the better of him. "What is it?" Then his eyes go wide. "If you don't mind me, asking, of course."
Ryder notices how nervous he is and smiles to herself, but then she freezes, because no one has asked her about her projects before. No one ever seems to care besides her parents, and her close friends don't even know what goes on at the mahogany desk in the corner of her room.
"You really wanna know?" she asks quietly, sort of sounding embarrassed.
Peter nods, "Yeah, I do."
The girl, containing her excitement, slowly sprawls out her designs and methods bulleted on paper and moved her computer to the side. "Well, this is kind of an off to the side project, but I'm currently working on, or designing, I should say, a machine that'll easily collect garbage floating on ocean surfaces." She then points to a blueprint of the machine itself. "It functions motion wise as a boat, but the netting and forty five degree angled ramp hanging about two feet deep in the water is the primary component in terms of collecting the garbage. Now, I know that plastic is a polymer and is tightly packed together so it isn't magnetic, but I'm trying to come up with a formula regarding the currents in the ocean. I know that some plastic doesn't float, and instead of diving, what if my equation could enable the plastic at the bottom of the ocean to surface without any divers? And then using the netting with the scooping contraptions here," she points to one machine in the blueprint, "the trash can be collected efficiently. And once we find a way to recycle plastic effectively, we can reuse these goods and reduce the amount of plastic wasted," explains Ryder, sucking in a breath from talking so fast.
He freezes.
Peter, getting whiplash from what she just says, examines the papers and the blueprints with an impressed look, a smile lingering on his face because this is what she's passionate about, and it's about saving the environment? Fuck, he's in love.
He's stunned for a moment before letting out a breath he doesn't realize he has been holding. "Ryder...this is...extraordinary. Truly, it is. This could...this could change so many things."
She smiles shyly. "You think so?"
"Oh, I know so."
Ryder has a ghost of a smile lingering on her face as he continues.
"I mean, the mechanics seem great in terms of the machine, and I know finding the equation is gonna be the hardest part," he says, almost to himself. "If you, uh, need help, or anything, I'm pretty good at chemistry, so if you, I don't know, wanna test equations I'd be happy to help." Then he adds, "Of course, only if you want."
God his cheeks are so red and he can't even look her in the eyes because he knows she's looking at him with her stupid beautiful smile.
Ryder places a hand on his bicep and he finally looks at her, the girl noticing his cheeks and nervous gulp. "I'd love the help, I'm more of a biology student anyways."
He lets out a breath he doesn't know he is holding. "Cool, nice. Sounds good."
Ryder is about to say something else, but her computer dings to notify her that it's on low battery, so she curses and removes her hand from his harm, to his dismay, and takes her computer in her hands.
"This thing needs an upgrade," she laughs, "because I accidentally spilled coffee on it a while back when I was up late, and it's never been the same." She walks over to her bedside and plugs in her computer, aimlessly typing away at something that he cannot see from where he's standing. He looks away.
Well, he also looks away because she bends over to pick up the charger, and she's wearing short athletic shorts, and what? He's a teenager.
He glances above her desk to see a bulletin board of a bunch of pictures and some other miscellaneous things pinned up. He sees photos of her friends, Gina, Molly, and Finn, she sees a couple pictures of her with her mother's, and some pictures of when she was young and in Disney. He smiles to himself, loving to see how she's happy. He loves the cute grey and baby pink pins she uses to hold up the pictures, almost looking as if she colored coordinated the pins so that each color is evenly spread across the board. He nearly laughs.
But then something else catches his eye, and he nearly misses it because he doesn't notice it at first. At the bottom right corner of the board, he sees a paper pinned up there, the top of the paper from Duke University itself, and he reads carefully that, one, she's been accepted gratefully, and two, she's going on a full ride. He doesn't bother to read the rest because...wow, he's so impressed.
A ghost of a smile hints his lips as his eyes don't come off the letter. "I didn't know you're going to Duke."
The girl perks up and stops typing, her heart skipping a beat as she sees him looking at the letter. Cursing herself for not taking it down, she makes her way over to him slowly, cheeks tinting pink because no one really knows about her college decision besides her family and friends.
"Yeah," she murmurs beside him quietly, "I'm going to be studying marine biology there. It's one of the top schools in the country for that major."
Before Peter can register what he's saying, he blurts: "You're so smart, you know that?"
Ryder, stunned, looks up at him with a sideways glance and narrows brows, a sort of disbelief glimmering in her crystal eyes because no one has ever said that to her before. It's so different from guys noticing her from her looks versus understanding her intellectually. Her heart nearly melts and she wants to cry, because for the first time in a long time, someone other than her parents recognizes her brain more than her beauty.
"Wh...what?"
Peter looks down at her, noticing her lack of accepting response. "You're really smart. You should...I don't know...flaunt it, I guess."
Ryder laughs bitterly and looks back to the letter. "People see me as a pretty face and nothing more."
"I see you as a lot more."
"You'd be the first."
Peter sighs. "Listen, I really think you should stroll up on Monday with a huge Duke sweatshirt and just, deck yourself out in all the Duke shit you've got, because people ought to know," he laughs. He then looks at her sincerely, his gaze darting back and forth between her eyes. "You're so much more than a pretty face, I'm tellin' ya. Show those assholes that you are."
Ryder, with furrowed brows and a newfound look of determination on her face, she grins up at him, proudly stating, "You know what? I will."
_______________
Ryder and Peter eat dinner shortly after their motivational encounter.
After eating, they actually start working on their English project and got the main planning of it done. Their task is to analyze one of the texts they've read in class and relate it to a theme in modern day, so they've chosen one of their texts and are relating it to the unjust laws made against women by men who will have nothing to benefit from by making them.
When finishing the main plan and continuing their research, Ryder sighs, looking at the clock to see that it's just last nine pm. It's a Friday, so they have the whole weekend ahead of them and she assumes that Peter isn't in a rush to get home, so what does she do? She closes her laptop and sparks the attention of the boy sitting a few feet away from her, a brow raising in return.
"You alright?"
"I'm bored," complains the girl. "We've been working on this for an hour and I'm sure we're ahead of the majority of the class. I'm calling intermission."
Peter chuckles, sitting in her desk chair. "Sounds good to me." He then shuts his computer and stuffs it in his backpack. "What were you, uh, thinking of doing?"
Ryder shrugs. "A movie? We could eat our hearts out even more? I'd you're still even hungry?"
"I'm always hungry."
"Well," she smiles, "I'll grab some more food and you can get comfy on my bed, yeah?"
"Uh," stumbles Peter, "yeah, yeah sounds...sounds good."
Ryder leaves her room and he's quick to pull out his phone.
CONVERSATION WITH: NED
PETER
NED
PETER
ITS GOING GREAT
PETER
WE STOPPING WORKING
AND NOW WE ARE GONNA
SIT ON HER BED AND
WATCG A MOVIE????
IM SHAKING
NED
IM SO PROUD
OF YOU
NED
DID YOU TELL
HER YOU LIKE HER
PETER
nah man im SO scared
PETER
i already told her she's
more than a pretty face
and that she's so smart
PETER
i asked her about college
and her projects she's
working on and she looked
stunned i feel so bad
because she said that no
one really asks her
about that stuff NED
my heart MELTED
NED
I want to give
her a hug
PETER
me too man!
PETER
but I'm not gonna
do it tonight
PETER
it seems a little fast and
i don't want her to think
im trying to coddle her
to just get into her pants
yno?
NED
Yeah that
sounds good
PETER
fuck she's coming
back ill update you later
Peter slides his phone in his loose pocket of his sweatpants as Ryder walks back in, this time with two bags of chips and another fruit platter. She sets the bags of chips on her bed and coddles the fruit platter in her lap as she sits down on her bed, where she had been originally sitting before.
"You comin' or what?" she jokes, gesturing to the spot next to her on the bed.
Peter's heart skips a beat. "Yeah, yeah, I'm coming." He quickly moves to the opposite side of the bed and sits down hesitantly, afraid to really move closer in fear of her being creeped out.
In fact, she's the opposite. "I don't bite," she jokes.
Well...
Peter nonetheless scoots towards her until their arms are almost touching, and she likes this company a lot more. Setting the computer on her lap (and slightly on his), she sets the fruit bowl on her hip closest to him, and he starts to instantly pick out the strawberries. (She purposely put more strawberries on this time because she saw how much he loves them the first time she brought out a fruit platter, but who needs to know that.)
"Any movie suggestions?" she asks, popping a grape in her mouth as she seamlessly scrolls through Netflix.
Peter shrugs beside her. "'M fine with anything. I'll probably fall asleep anyway."
Ryder chuckles, and after a couple minutes, they settle on Star Wars: A New Hope, and he has to internally scream because fuck, she likes Star Wars? He's in love. Also— he cheekily points out the fact that her most recent things she's watched has been Planet Earth, and instantly blushes when he turns his head to do so and their faces are inches away.
The fruit platter is gone within minutes and the chips aren't even opened, so the two just lie there in utter silence. Peter hopes Ryder cant hear his rapid heartbeat because this is the closest he's gotten with a girl in, well, forever.
It doesn't help that fact that she slightly leans her head against his shoulder and his breath hinges slightly. The girl he's been smitten over for four years is leaning on his shoulder.
Peter can't even focus on the movie because of her, whereas it looks like she isn't suspecting a thing. His mind is wandering all over the place and he feels as if he's gonna explode, his thoughts not even focused on his favorite movie, but rather his favorite girl beside him and that thought alone makes him internally squirm. Now he really wishes he wore the sweater and jeans because she instantly leans into his muscle and he nearly curses.
Shit.
Suddenly, halting his thoughts, Ryder pauses the movie and his mind goes haywire, because she's gonna say something about him being nervous and he's gonna—
"I never asked you where you're going to college," she blurts, looking up at him with a grin, and he can't look away because she looks stunning and their faces are so close— "I realized that we talked so much about me that we never really talked about you."
Peter's flushed cheeks don't go unnoticed.
"Oh..Uh, well, I'm going to MIT, so...so that's cool." God, he can't even focus because their faces are so close. "I got a good scholarship, too. Because of, you know, academic decathlon and my internship."
"You have an internship?" she asks. "Where?"
Peter sighs. Here he goes. "Stark Industries."
Ryder's eyes lit up. Her head is removed from his shoulder as she sits up quickly. "Stark Industries? Jesus, Peter, that's fantastic! You've gotta be, like, seriously smart."
He grins sheepishly. "I know a thing or two."
"What the tech like?" she asks excitedly, involuntarily gripping his bicep lightly. "I mean, the tech there has got to be...fantastic."
"It's super advanced," he responds, equally as excited. "You know, if you really wanted to...I don't know...I could take you to the compound...if you'd like? We could work on your project there, and test out some equations for the magnetic courses for plastic...Only if...only if you want, you know?"
Ryder's eyes light up. "You mean that?"
His eyebrows furrow. "Yeah, I mean they have all the equipment for all kinds of STEM projects—"
Ryder squeals in excitement as she pulls Peter in for a bone crushing hug, to which he hesitantly reciprocates with a small smile, placing a hand on the smalls of her back. The feeling of her so close against him makes it certain that she can feel his erratic heartbeat (which she can). He knows it's nothing besides a platonic gesture, but he cannot help but grin to himself and get his hopes up just slightly.
"Alright, alright," she says while pulling away, getting up from the bed and walking over to her closet. "Since you've helped me build up confidence to flaunt my intelligence, I'm giving you this," she tosses him a sweatshirt that he easily catches. "It's one of the many sweatshirts I have from Duke. It's only a fair deal if you give me one of your MIT ones."
He holds up the grey crew neck that has a navy blue DUKE on the front, and it's big for her but it seems like a perfect fit for him. He grins and accepts, the material already dripping of her scent.
"Don't worry, I have a plethora of apparel that a friend upstate bought for me," he chuckles, still admiring the sweater as if it'll disappear if he blinks. "I'll find my best sweatshirt for you."
Peter left her apartment shortly after, his aunt calling him to make sure he's alright and still coming home. He apologetically says he has to dip, and Ryder completely understands, helping him get his things together as they talk about miscellaneous things while he clutches to her sweatshirt with dear life.
They bid goodbye at the door, but not before Ryder pulls him into a quick farewell hug, but not before he kisses her forehead so lightly she barely feels it, and leaving before she can see his wild blush.