Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

May considers the two boxes of cookies in the cupboard for a minute, undecided, before grabbing both and upending their contents onto twin plates on the kitchen table. Besides cookies she has set out finger sandwiches, an assortment of fruit in a bowl, apple juice and milk. Hands on her hips, she inspects the table with a critical eye. It’s the first time she is having kids over to the apartment. And it’s not just any kids, it’s Peter’s friends. She wants to do it right. But she has nothing to go on but guesswork and what she looked up online—Peter hasn’t been invited anywhere before either, and May hasn’t quite managed to fit in with the mothers at his school.

Thrust into the role of guardian to a child not even a full year ago, she is still struggling to adapt. She had never had any intention of having children, and finding herself with a five year old under her care, an orphaned nephew she was supposed to look after for the rest of her life had been… difficult.

Packing lunches Peter would actually eat had proved a challenge; she still had a hard time being on time to pick him up from school every day. Bathing him at night, tucking him into bed… all had taken some getting used to too. It was a lot of work, even shared with Ben.

And May worried. Because Peter had lost weight since he’d started living with them, and he was small for his age, the doctor had said. He’d had five colds—aggravated by his asthma—and a bad bout of bronchitis in seven months. May despaired. She blamed herself. She had to be doing something wrong.

Then there was the fact Peter wasn’t making friends. Whenever she picked him up from school, he was sitting alone with a book instead of running around with the other kids. Sometimes she’d hear about sleepovers and afternoon playdates, but whenever she asked Peter about his friends at school he would get all quiet, and May didn’t have the heart to prod even if she thought it would yield any results—Peter seemed to have two settings: total silence, or excited chatter.

But at last two boys were coming over to play. May didn’t want to mess this up for him.

“Pete, you ready, sweetie?” she calls from the kitchen, exchanging a purple plastic cup for a red—Peter’s favorite.

Peter comes racing out of his room, in his Iron Man socks and a Pokemon tee shirt. May smiles to cover her nerves, running a hand through his curls when he hugs her legs.

“Ready, Aunt May.”

May makes sure the three of them eat the snack, and the boys—David and Travis—are polite enough, although she can’t help but notice they talk more among themselves than with Peter, whom she catches toying with a dinosaur cookie instead of eating it:

“Eat your dinosaur, Peter,” she has to tell him finally, giving him a gentle, practiced nudge.

“It’s not a dinosaur, Aunt May,” Peter replies with a giggle, like she’s being silly. “It’s a Pterodactyl.”

May frowns in confusion “And that’s not a dinosaur?”

Peter blinks at her, and shakes his head. “It’s a reptile.”

“Oh.” She reaches for the box and makes a show of shaking her head as though chagrinned. “And there I was thinking I was buying all dinosaur cookies. That’s some misleading advertising,” she jokes.

Peter scrunches up his napkin in his hand, eyes going wide. “Sorry.”

May forces out a small laugh. “I’m joking, honey. Eat your reptile, then, so you can all go play.”

“I ate four cookies, Mrs Parker!” Travis boasts, and May has to laugh.

“Maybe don’t tell your mom about that,” she says, chuckling. “Do mention the fruit, though.”

Travis giggles, and David pops the last grape in his plate in his mouth with a clumsy wink that has her biting back another laugh.

She doesn’t miss Peter looking from one to the other, clearly lost, cookie still in his hand. Holding back a sigh, May gives him another nudge. “Come on, Pete,” she says. “That flying reptile can’t go back in the dinosaur box, where’s it going to go?”

The sing song in her voice pulls a small smile out of him. “My tummy,” he answers, pointing at it.

May chuckles. “That’s it.”

Once she has them settled in Peter’s room, she decides to leave them alone for a bit and sits down in the living room to do some work on her laptop. The door to Peter’s room is open, and she can see them if she leans forward. She can hear David and Travis, loud like only six year old boys playing can be—she doesn’t hear Peter.

Staring at the blank page in front of her, cursor blinking, she heaves herself to her feet after an hour, sighing. She’s thirty eight, and her best friends are on a couple’s cruise around the Bahamas, and she has three six year olds in her apartment. She loves Peter, but she is still getting used to this being her life now.

Her heart jumps to her throat when she looks into his room and doesn’t see him. David and Travis are on the floor, racing the cars on the track, boisterous and oblivious to her presence until she clears her throat.

“Where’s Peter?” she asks, voice strained.

The window is open, and she’s caught Peter climbing out onto the fire escape stairs at night twice before.

David shrugs, but Travis points with his thumb vaguely. “Potty.”

Tugging at her hair nervously, May hurries over to the bathroom down the hall. She hadn’t even seen Peter leave the room.

When she opens the door, which was ajar, she can make out his shadow behind the shower curtain. Her heart drops to her stomach, and she has to take a moment to take a couple of deep breaths, hands held up to her face, palms together as if in prayer.

“Hey, sweetie,” she says finally, pulling the curtain to the side.

Peter looks up from the book he had been perusing on his lap. He has his thumb in his mouth again, even though he’s only been doing that at the end of the day when he’s tired for weeks now. It makes May want to cry. She has no idea what she’s doing with Peter. Has no idea how to make things better.

“What are you doing here?” She crouches down and gently coaxes his hand from his mouth. “Why aren’t you playing with your friends?”

Peter’s shoulders rise up his ears. “Loud,” he murmurs, voice tinged with obvious shame.

May can’t deny they are being loud, but isn’t that what six year olds are supposed to be like?

“But it’s OK,” Peter adds, speaking quickly. “I don’t mind not playing.”

May pinches her bottom lip as she thinks for a moment, the headache that had been threatening to take hold since this morning locking in as her brow furrows.

“It’s not OK. Peter, it’s not,” she decides. “Come on, you invited them over to play with you.” He takes her outstretched hand automatically, hugging the book to his chest with the other.

She had been surprised when he had brought that book home a week before; had pulled it out of his backpack as she checked it when he got home, with a questioning look which had produced no answer—she frequently forgot Peter needed to be asked things directly.

“What’s this?” she had asked, flipping through the pages. It had pictures with explanations, and a series of projects for kids, but in her eyes looked too advanced for a six year old.

“A book on robotics,” Peter had answered, obviously, then grinned as he started jumping in place. “It’s from the library. It’s super cool, Aunt May! And I found another one on machines, and one that has a bunch of math problems, and it’s so fun, and—”

“Do you understand this?” May had wondered out loud, eyebrows raised at the for ages 10+ tag on the back cover, as Peter kept rambling excitedly. Peter did well in school, and Ben liked to call him a little genius, but she still found it hard to believe.

Now she was even less impressed by the book than ever, if it was keeping Peter from playing with other children like he should be doing.

“Alright, boys, let’s use our indoor voices, yeah?” May stands at the door, feeling like she’s impersonating a school teacher.

“Sorry, Peter’s mom,” David replies perfunctorily in a parroted chant.

“I’m not—” May blurts out without thinking, just as Travis says: “Peter doesn’t have a mom.”

May turns to look at Peter, biting her lip hard enough to hurt, but Peter doesn’t look at any of them, standing with the book still held tight to his chest, head down, eyes on his socked feet.

“Why aren’t all three of you playing together, hm?” she barrels on, looking back to the other boys for answers.

Travis side eyes Peter, mouth twisted to the side. “Um.”

David is bolder. “Peter doesn’t know how to play,” he says bluntly.

May winces. “What do you mean?”

“He’s not fun,” David asserts.

May notices Peter’s left hand gravitate to his mouth; though he tries to pass it off as biting his nail, the intention to suck his thumb is obvious.

Travis shrugs when May turns to him. “He’s kind of a baby,” he agrees, tone matter of fact.

Peter lowers his hand, shaking his head. “I‘m not,” he says tearfully. “I’m not.”

May takes another deep breath, warring between the instinct to just scoop Peter up into one of the tight hugs she knows work best to calm him down, and the wish to scream and let out all her frustrations on these idiot kids who are upsetting Peter. She pulls off her glasses to wipe them on her blouse, holding herself in check.

“You’re at Peter’s house, playing with his toys, don’t you think you should play with him?” she asks tightly.

Travis pouts. “I want to go home,” he declares.

“Me too!” David agrees with a shout. “Brenda’s Hot Wheels is way cooler,” he tells Peter spitefully, flinging the toy car he had been playing with onto the floor.

“Right. I’m calling your parents,” May resists the urge to yank them by the collar, and has to content herself with shooing them along. “You can wait in the kitchen, since you don’t want to play anymore,” she tells them.

She touches a gentle hand to Peter’s shoulder. “Peter, you stay here, OK?”

Peter doesn’t answer.

She can’t be anything but curt with the parents on the phone, and ends up losing her temper when Travis’ mother starts griping about what she had fed them, and she catches David’s mother muttering about how she should have known it couldn’t end well with that Peter boy. When she shuts the door behind them, May grabs a cushion from the couch and screams into it. She wants nothing more than to go down to the street, buy a pack of cigarettes and go for a long, long walk. She used to do that when she was aggravated, before. It’s out of the question now.

It’s been seven months since Peter became hers, and she loves him—madly—but sometimes she thinks she might go mad before she gets the hang of this. And she doesn’t get it, because she sees other kids and it doesn’t seem that hard. Then she feels terrible, because of course those other kids didn’t lose both their parents in an accident and had to move house and school. It’s traumatic, she knows that. But there are times she isn’t sure that’s all it is. And it’s all… so much, sometimes. 

She allows herself a sip of the scotch they kept for Richard when he came over as she rubs her temples for two minutes—timed—before she heads over to Peter’s room.

Peter has disassembled the tracks, she notices, and one of the cars is in pieces. “Did they break it?” she asks, and feels a furious tirade rise up inside her again. She will call up the parents again if they broke Peter’s brand new toy.

“No, no.” Peter brandishes one of the bigger pieces for her to look at. “I wanted to see how it worked,” he explains.

“So you broke it?” she asks sceptically. Peter had taken apart a couple of toys before—something else May didn’t understand. They had bought him puzzles, and he loved doing them, but that hadn’t stopped him from picking things apart.

“It’s not broken, look.” He puts a couple of pieces together, and moves the car backwards and forwards, revving it up. It takes off, but instead of straight forward it describes two neat circles.

“What—How did you do that?” May kneels down, amazed.

Peter demonstrates again. This time it goes around three times, and Peter grins and claps his hands together, cheering. She guesses it was meant to do that.

“That’s amazing, Pete,” she says earnestly. But there’s still an ache in her heart she doesn’t quite understand as she looks about the room, with Peter alone in the center of it. 

“All set,” May announces as she tugs the pajama bottoms over the pull ups, giving him a pat on the rump.

“One more day?” Peter asks quietly, twisting the material of his shirt in both hands.

May nods as she rises to her feet, her knees protesting. “Yep.” If he goes one more day without an accident at night, they will try again to go without them. His longest run had been three months, but it was still a work in progress. The doctor had assured them it wasn’t unusual, and that the best they could do was take it slow and let Peter know it wasn’t anything to be embarrassed about. May isn’t sure how much they are succeeding, unfortunately.

Once Peter has climbed into bed, she pulls the covers up high like he likes it and sits on the edge of the bed by his hip.

“I think we should maybe… have a little talk about today,” she says haltingly.

Peter pulls the covers right up to his chin, looking at her with apprehension in his big, brown eyes.

It still feels surreal to May, that this child is hers now. Sometimes when he’s tired he’ll call out for his mama, and May doesn’t know how to deal with that. She doesn’t feel like a mother.

“I-I was… I was t-trying to make friends,” Peter stutters before May can say anything.

“Yeah?”

Peter chews on his bottom lip for a few seconds. “They said we could be friends if—”

“If you let them play with your cars?” May fills in tiredly. But something keeps niggling at her, and a moment later realisation hits her: “Is that why you asked for the Hot Wheels for your birthday, Pete?

It had caught Ben and her both by surprise, the sudden interest in the toy, when Peter hadn’t seemed all too keen on cars before. But in six months he had been obsessed with hot air balloons, glitter stickers, and moons, so they had taken it in stride. It turns out they had been right to be suspicious.

Peter nods timidly. “Friends make friends happy, don’t they?”

May pinches the bridge of her nose, not sure if she’s fighting back tears or the headache that had only just receded in the last hour. “What about what makes you happy?”

Peter blinks at her for a moment. “Are you mad?” he asks in a hushed voice.

“I’m not mad,” she replies quickly. “But—Peter, sweetie, if someone only wants to be your friend because of something you have, they aren’t really your friends.”

His forehead wrinkles. “But why would they want to be my friend, if not?”

May releases her breath in a long exhalation, and summons a smile as she playfully smooths the lines from his forehead. “Because you’re sweet, and smart, and funny.” She combs back the curls from his face. He’ll need a haircut soon. “You’ll find people who like you for you. You’ll see,” she says, injecting as much confidence into her voice as she can.

She wishes she had talked more to Mary and Richard, learnt more about Peter before, about parenting him. They had brought him to the apartment only a few times, and back then all she had to do was hold him in her lap for a few minutes, admire his plushies and be impressed at how quickly he solved puzzles. She hadn’t really got to know him, and now she feels lost. Still lost seven months in, because routine has set in, but it all still feels alien.

“May.” Peter squirms out from beneath the covers to hold out a small hand to her face.

“Mm?”

“I’m sorry,” he whispers.

May looks at him, not understanding, but not surprised. Peter’s go-to response is apologising. “Why are you sorry, Pete?”

Peter hesitates. “I made you sad?” he hazards, tracing the downturned curve of her mouth like it’s proof.

“No, baby.” May sighs. “You’ve done nothing wrong. I’m just thinking.”

“Oh.” Confusion mixes with relief on his face.

“I was thinking… we could go to the library tomorrow,” she says after a minute—with slight forced cheer, but Peter doesn’t notice, his eyes lighting up instantly. “The big library?” he asks, eyes wide.

“Yep.” Her mouth curves into a smile. “You and me and Ben, how’s that? We can find some more fun books for you.”

Peter nods eagerly, grinning.

“Good.” May gives his cheek a kiss, and then presses a kiss on the koala bear plushie’s forehead before he can ask; she knows the drill by now. “Now go to sleep.”

Peter snuggles with his koala, burrowing deeper under the duvet, while she turns on the night light. “’Night, Aunt May. Love you,” he calls to her with a soft smile when she’s at the door.

May turns off the overhead light. “Love you too, Pete.”

She waits up for Ben, tells him everything over coffee at one in the morning, unable to hold back on the tears and slight hysterical laughter, as she does.

“I just don’t know… Is this normal, Ben? Are we even remotely on track?” Face buried in her hands, May lets out a muffled noise of frustration. “Mary would never—I don’t know that she’d have said anything.” She can’t imagine Mary ever admitting to things being anything less than perfect, to ever struggling, in any role, let alone as a mother. 

“No, she wouldn’t have,” Ben agrees. “Neither would Richard.” It’s something to hear that. And though aside from that admission he doesn’t have more than platitudes, it still helps to hear them too.

He’s always seemed to May the voice of reason. And his equanimity calms her down. She feels her love for him strongly with how he takes the whole thing in stride, doesn’t grumble once about her signing him up for a trip to the library in Manhattan on his one day off after an extra shift even. They are in this together, at least.

“We’re doing this,” he tells her, echoing her thoughts. “One day at a time. It will get easier, honey, you’ll see. We’re past the storm, gonna be smoother sailing from here on out.”

May lets out a wet chuckle. “It can only get better, I guess.”

Ben pulls her into his side, presses a lingering kiss to her temple. “It’s only going to get better, you’ll see.”

She desperately wants to believe him, so she does.

Chapter Text

The plan for Peter to spend July at a summer camp had fallen apart last minute, when the fridge had broken and had to be replaced. For Peter it had actually been a relief; even though his uncle had promised it was a fun camp where he would learn science and make friends, Peter had been dreading it. He could learn science at home, and he couldn’t think of a reason why he would be better at making friends at camp than at school. How could he manage in a month what he hadn’t in two years? Going to camp also meant being away from his aunt and uncle, and from his own bed with his new Iron Man duvet, and all his books and toys. It also meant eating cafeteria food, and sharing a dormitory with other kids, which sounded like a sleepover that lasted weeks, and that seemed more than a little daunting to Peter, who had yet to go to one.

Not going to camp is the best, Peter decides, when he realises he will get to spend buckets of time with Uncle Ben. During the year he doesn’t see so much of him except on the weekends, since he works evenings and nights, and Peter has school during the day. Sometimes Peter will forget to put on his jacket during recess in the hopes of getting a cold, because a sick day means staying home with Uncle Ben, who makes the best chicken soup and sits with Peter all morning watching cartoons.

Peter’s hopes are dashed, however, when Ben picks up extra night shifts for that month.

After he tries to wake him up the first morning, and Ben begs him groggily for just a few more hours of sleep, he knows he needs to let his uncle rest. Peter is eight now, almost nine, and he can fend for himself until lunch time.

He decides he can’t stay at home, though, or Uncle Ben will feel guilty: he had apologised during lunch, still tousled haired as he sipped at a strong, black coffee, the smell strong enough it made Peter’s nose itch.  “Can’t stand the thought of you wasting your summer locked up in your room every morning. Sorry, kiddo, I promise tomorrow I’ll be up bright and early.” A sigh and a weak chuckle had followed. “Sleep is for the weak, isn’t that right?”

In the past Uncle Ben had urged him to make friends with a boy around Peter’s age he knew lived in the building. So on the second day of vacation, rather than go wake his uncle, Peter steels himself and goes over to the floor below to look for the boy.

He knocks on the door, and waits, hands twisting nervously in the pockets of his shorts. He expected the boy to open the door, but a young man does instead. Tall and muscled, wearing an NYU tee shirt, he stares at Peter with a smile tugging at his lips. “Hello there.”

Peter tries to take a deep breath and fails. “Um, hi. I was l-looking for James?” he manages.

“That’s my brother,” he tells Peter. “But he’s at camp. Won’t be back all summer.”

“Oh.” Peter deflates. “Well. I—Sorry to bother you.”

“No bother.”

Peter takes a few hesitant steps toward the stairs, unsure what to do now that his plan has failed.

“Hey, you ride?”

He turns around in surprise. The young man points with his chin at the helmet, red and gold like Iron Man, hanging from Peter’s wrist by the straps.

Peter shakes his head. “My uncle was going to teach me, but I thought maybe James…”

“Your uncle’s the police man, isn’t he, from 4B?”

“Yeah.”

The young man braces one arm against the door frame, giving Peter his full attention. “He works a lot, doesn’t he? He must be quite tired… not a lot of time to play with you?”

Peter ducks his head, shamefaced.

“I can teach you, if you want.” The young man chuckles at Peter’s obvious confusion. “It would be a great surprise for your uncle, don’t you think? Save him some work.”

It hadn’t occurred to Peter it would be work to teach him to ride—his uncle had said he was excited to do so. But maybe he was only saying that to be nice. “You’ll teach me?”

“Sure. I’ve taught a couple of boys before, back home in Philly. I’m a pretty good teacher, if I may say so myself.”

He gives Peter a wide grin, and Peter wants to say yes, but—“I don’t have any money to pay you,” he admits.

“Don’t worry about that. I have some free time, and I could use a friend while I’m here.”

Peter stares at him, wide eyed. “A f-friend?” he stammers.

“Sure.” The young man extends his hand, and Peter automatically takes it. “How about it, you want to be friends?”

“Yeah. I’d love that,” Peter replies with barely contained excitement. “I’m Peter. Peter Parker, I’m eight, and I live with my aunt and uncle, and I love science and Finding Nemo.” The words spill out of him, the rehearsed introduction he had practiced at school and rehearsed for James.

The young man grins. “Nice to meet you, Peter Parker. I’m Skip.”

“Skip,” Peter repeats. His first friend.

It’s real friends, he knows, because Skip doesn’t want anything from Peter.

The next morning Peter bounds down the stairs to the building's garage, vibrating with excitement, if a bit nervous. Skip is waiting for him down by the bikes, and he smiles wide when he sees Peter.

“Ready?” he asks. His hand falls on Peter’s shoulder, and slides down his back to the waistband of his shorts. Peter feels his fingers brush his bare skin when he checks that the tag is on the inside. “Clothes all on the right way?”

“Yes?” Peter answers seriously, confused and a little uncomfortable.

Skip laughs. “Just teasing, Pete.”

“Oh.” Peter smiles sheepishly. He is aware he doesn’t always get when people are teasing, so it makes sense.

“Alright, big guy, let’s see what you’ve got.”

Out on the street, Peter clambers onto the bike. Skip steadies him: one hand on the handles of the bike, the other on Peter’s hip. When he shifts his grip to get a better hold, Peter’s shirt rides up, but Skip doesn’t move his hand.

“I don’t get it,” Peter can’t help but whine an hour later as they put away their bikes. He hadn’t made it more than a few feet every time Skip had pushed the bike forward to start him off. “It’s just physics.”

“You’re overthinking it, Einstein,” he tells Peter. “We’ll try again tomorrow.”

On Thursday it rains. A downpour. With no chance of going out for a lesson, Peter knocks on Skip’s door expecting to be turned away. He’s delighted when Skip ushers him inside instead, an arm around his shoulders.

“We can play video games if you want,” Skip tells him as he leads him to his room. “Sound good?”

Peter, who doesn’t own a video console, nods eagerly. Some boys in his class talk about games all the time, but Peter’s only played the ones on the old computers at school.

A few minutes later, however, Skip turns to where Peter is sitting on his bed with a grimace. “Bad news, kiddo, it’s not working.” Kneeling in front of the television, he fusses with some cables. “I don’t know what’s wrong.”

“Oh, that’s alright,” Peter assures him. “We can do something else.” Peter’s not friends with Skip just to play video games, after all.

Skip smiles. “You’re sweet, Pete. How about a movie? What do you want to watch?”

Biting his lip, Peter looks over the collection of DVDs on the shelf. “Do you have Finding Nemo?”

Skip lets out a quiet laugh. “How many times have you seen that one, I wonder.”

Peter giggles shyly. “Eight times. It’s my favorite.”

Skip’s smile doesn’t falter, but he raises a hand to his chin thoughtfully. “We can do that one later. But how about one you haven’t seen before first? It’s a special movie… one I only show to my best friends.”

“And you want to show me?” Peter asks in an awed, hushed voice.

“I sure do. What do you say, champ, you want to see it?”

Eyes round, Peter nods.

Skip breaks into a grin. “Great.”

The special movie isn’t on the shelf, but in a box under the bed. The sleeve is plain black without a title and Peter wonders if it’s a bootleg copy. Skip quickly sets up the DVD, then throws himself on the bed next to Peter, so close their bodies touch from shoulder to ankle.

The film starts immediately, no advertisements or trailers, and no menu screen, it goes straight to the action. There aren’t even credits. Peter doesn’t realise he has his hands clenched with tension tight enough to leave half moon marks on his palms, until Skip gives him a nudge.

“Relax,” he whispers in Peter’s ear.

Peter watches, uncomprehending, as the man in the film starts undressing the woman, and then himself. There isn’t much dialogue and he can’t make out most of what they are saying, the sound muted. He gasps in shock when he the woman’s breasts are uncovered, and covers his eyes when he sees the man’s penis.

Skip chuckles lowly. “You don’t know how many kids would pay to be in your shoes right now, squirt.”

Peter doesn’t lower his hands from his eyes. He wishes he could block out the sounds. “I don’t like it,” he whispers. “You like this?” he adds, hesitant, unbelieving.

Skip makes a slight grunt, and the mattress shifts as he moves. “Yeah, pal, I like it. A lot.” There’s a sound of rustling clothes. “Want to see how much?”

He grabs hold of Peter’s wrist, and though Peter resists, Skip easily pulls it away from his face. Peter averts his eyes from the TV screen, and his gaze falls on Skip’s lap, where his hand is being led. It looks the same as in the movie, and Peter looks away quickly.

“No, what are you—I don’t understand, Skip—” he stammers, looking up at Skip, wide eyed and afraid.

“Come on, kiddo, I thought we were friends.”

Eyes blurred with tears, Peter feels heat touch his palm, the bones in his wrist grinding against each other because Skip is holding him so tightly.

“We can watch Nemo after, promise.”

Peter squeezes his eyes shut. His strength is no match for Skip’s.

Later, when he washes up before lunch, Peter rubs at his hand with the pot scrub until it feels raw. But he still feels dirty, sick to his stomach.

“No good?” Ben asks. “Did I get something wrong?”

Peter’s gaze darts up from his plate to his uncle. For some reason he wants to hide; he feels like everyone will know what’s happened from looking at him, and feel just as disgusted by him as he feels himself.

“No, it’s good, Uncle Ben, thanks,” he says, bringing a forkful of meat and mashed potatoes to his mouth, forcing himself to chew and swallow.

Ben offers him a small smile. “Little birdie told me you’ve been out and about riding your bike.”

“Trying to,” Peter clarifies, stabbing another piece of meat.

“Fair enough.” Ben chuckles. Then, after a moment, he holds his hand out on the table. The little Peter had eaten rises to his throat when he has no choice but to give Ben his dirty hand. His wrist feels tender, but it hasn’t bruised yet. “I just wanted to say thanks for letting me sleep in, Pete. I’m sorry I haven’t been around as much as I should. I wasn’t supposed to be taking these extra night shifts, but since Robertson got shot we’ve been short of people. And we could use the extra money too—the fridge was more than we expected—but, well, I’m sorry.”

“He got shot?” Peter echoes, fork clattering onto the plate. “Is he OK?” he asks in a quiet, tremulous voice.

“He’s going to be.” Ben gives his hand a squeeze, and carries on: “It’ll only be until the month ends. And then we’ll go ride that bike in the park every day, I promise. So you better get good.”

Peter manages a small, strained smile. He doesn’t feel like he’s learned much with Skip, and now…

He doesn’t get much sleep, and his heart starts racing in his chest again the moment he wakes up.

Skip is waiting for him by the stairs. “Hey, Pete. Sun’s out—how about another lesson?” he says casually, smiling.

“With our bikes?” Peter whispers. He can’t go down the stairs without touching Skip.

“Of course, what else?”

It’s normal. Like before. Except he’s hyperaware of Skip’s hands on his body, and every touch makes his stomach clench now. He deals, however. Three days of good weather, and he thinks maybe he was exaggerating, making a big deal out of nothing. Then on Monday he goes down to the garage and finds his bike propped up against the wall, lopsided.

“You’ve got a flat tire,” Skip informs him, clucking his tongue.

Peter stares, helmet hanging from his hand numbly. It’s completely flat. “What do I do?” he asks, more to himself out loud than to Skip, but he answers anyway.

“You need to ask your aunt and uncle to buy you a new tire. No other way around it,” he says. “Pity they’re so expensive.”

“They are?” Peter asks, alarmed.

“Afraid so.”

Biting at his thumb nail, Peter stands frozen, even as his breath comes as fast as though he were running. He needs somewhere to be in the morning—he doesn’t want to let Ben down. But he can’t ask him for a tire, not when he had told Peter they needed more money.

“We could go up and play video games…” Skip suggests. “I fixed the console.”

Peter looks at him in desperation. “Just… just video games. No… movies?”

Skip claps him on the shoulder, ignoring his flinch. “No movies, promise.”

He’s true to his word. They don’t play any movies. Peter thinks he might have preferred it, to drown out the noises.

Skip does offer to let him play video games, after. But Peter always feels numb once Skip is done with him, as out of control of his body as when Skip has him pinned down, or when he’s holding him in place. So he just watches Skip play until it’s late enough he can go home.

The feeling of wanting to crawl out of his skin becomes constant, and he wakes up every morning wanting to sink into the mattress and disappear, knowing what awaits him.

He keeps those feelings locked tight, nonetheless, pushes back the nausea when May asks him if he doesn’t wants to watch Finding Nemo again, forces a grin when Ben calls him a champ for being so good and going out and making friends. He tries so hard not to worry them.

But three weeks later, he overhears May talking to Ben. One night, when he’s wide awake even though his bedtime was hours ago, because he had been woken up by a nightmare and couldn’t get back to sleep. That's been happening a lot. 

“Something’s wrong with Peter,” May says, and Peter feels tears spring to his eyes, his throat tight. He’s been trying so hard to be good, so hard.

“What do you mean?”

“I don’t know. But something’s wrong.” May lowers her voice. “He had an accident the other night. And he’ll hardly touch his dinner. He’s been… weird during showers too—anxious, I don’t know. Something’s wrong, Ben.”

Peter can’t hear Ben’s answer, but three days after that, it’s Ben that wakes him up in the morning, smiling, the smell of bacon and eggs in the air.

He sits on the bed, and for a moment all Peter can think about is how odd it is that his uncle’s leg touching his over the covers makes him want to move away as far as he can, press himself against the wall. He forces himself to lie still.

“No more night shifts,” Ben tells him. “I’m all yours for what’s left of the summer.”

Peter doesn’t react. He can hardly believe it. Is it really over?

“I was expecting a little more enthusiasm,” Ben continues after a minute, with a short laugh. But Peter’s numb, numb, numb. It can’t be that easy.

“That’s great, Uncle Ben,” he says, voice hollow.

Ben’s forehead creases a little. “Why don't we go to the park? You must be a right pro on the bike by now.”

Peter swallows back bile, thinking about the last lesson he had three weeks ago. He can’t find his voice as they walk down to the garage after breakfast.

Ben inspects the flat tire. “Oh dear. when did this happen?”

Peter doesn’t answer, gripping his elbows, arms tight over his stomach which hurts so much he wants to cry.

Ben’s nose wrinkles, and he sniffs around curiously. His thick eyebrows come together as he peers into the basket that hangs on the bike. There’s an apple in the basket Peter had forgotten there last time, rotten to the core. He turns around to face Peter. “Peter, what—?”

Peter hangs his head, his breathing growing fast.

“What have you been doing these last weeks?” Ben demands, agitated.

Peter can’t answer, he can’t talk, he can’t breathe—

“Hey! Peter. Peter—” Ben wraps him up in his arms, and for a second Peter wants to scream, but he knows this embrace, knows this voice—it's safe, no matter what his body is telling him. Ben hugs him tight, until it almost hurts. Peter still can’t breathe. “It's going to be OK. it's going to be OK,” Ben says over and over again.

They let him hold onto his koala plushie during the examination, and Aunt May doesn’t say anything about Peter practically sucking his thumb while they wait for his statement to be taken.

Ben remains at his side the whole time, but May is eventually asked to step outside when she starts sobbing, setting Peter off.

Afterwards, there’s more waiting. Sitting at either side of him, his aunt bounces her knee, fidgets with her purse, asks Peter every few minutes if he needs anything; while Ben is quiet, brow furrowed like when he watches news on the TV he had once explained to Peter made him very sad and angry.

Peter has to fight not to hide his face against his knees like he wants to do and block everything out: the fluorescent light and its quiet buzzing that is setting his teeth on edge; the staring coming from every direction; the questions. He wants everything to just stop.

He keeps thinking how he should have been more careful, he should have done something to avoid… all of this. When Ben and May are called over to sign some papers, Peter pulls at his hair until it hurts his scalp, curls twisted between his fingers.

“Careful there, buddy, you don’t want to hurt yourself.”

An officer grabs his wrists, and Peter freezes—seizes up, an inarticulate sound catching in his throat. The officer lets go, swearing under his breath.

“Sorry, kid. Just—stop that. You don’t want to do that.”

Peter lowers his trembling hands to his lap. “Sorry,” he whimpers. It’s the only word he can imagine coming out of his mouth right now: sorry—and stop.

“It’s OK.” The officer presses his koala bear back into his hands, and Peter hugs the plushie to him. Curling around it until his elbows hit his knees, he tucks his head in toward his chest and squeezes his eyes shut tight. A low keening noise rises in his throat.

“Folks!” he hears the officer call out, and then Aunt May is there, and Uncle Ben. May pulls him toward her so he can rest against her chest, and Peter just tilts—he feels like he’s falling even with her arms tight around him. He can hear himself still making noise, isn’t sure how long it takes before he stops.

Ben’s voice reaches him as if from a distance, but it’s a familiar speech: “We’re OK, thank you. It’s happened before, he just needs a moment.”

The first thing he wheezes out when he can talk is a a broken sorry. May just presses a kiss to the top of his head and tucks him closer. He starts crying first this time.

Ben takes more days off work than Peter thought was possible, and May somehow shortens her hours so she can be home for breakfast, even if she has to go to work later.

They go to the museum and the library—and to a therapist at the edge of Queens almost—and Peter feels… better. Slowly remembers what it’s like to want to wake up in the morning, despite everything.

He never gets around to learning to ride his bike, though. 

Chapter Text

Ned has never been popular in his life. He had discovered early on that chubby Hawaiian nerd with Filipino parents isn’t in high demand for some reason. But while he might have been termed a loser by the social elites, Ned hasn’t ever been lonely. He had his brothers—and cousins, back in Hawaii—Boy Scouts until he was nine, and a best friend all through elementary. At the end of the last school year, however, Deepa had moved to another state across the country, and Ned's family had relocated to a different part of Queens. So now, all of eleven years old, Ned finds himself back in the market for friends.

Starting at a new middle school, he got right at it, joining a bunch of extracurriculars and keeping an eye out for any potential candidates in his year. Nonetheless, though he had found a few kids to hang out with, a month in he is still looking for a proper best friend.

Peter Parker, Ned thinks, would be a great one. Ned’s noticed the Smithsonian tee shirt, and Thor lunch box, and the Star Trek insignia pinned to his backpack. But Ned knows there’s more to friendship than common interests. He’s also taken note of Peter’s brilliance, his thoughtfulness and kindness. Ned likes to think he’s a pretty good judge of character, and he knows Peter’s a good one. He has also come to the conclusion that Peter needs… looking after. He needs a supportive friend, and Ned is ready to fill that role.

“I found an old DVD player with a still functioning optical system!” Peter explains, excitement in his hands and his voice. “Just two blocks from home.”

“Really? So close?”

“I know!” he replies in a soft incredulous breath. “And a couple of weeks ago I came across a whole box of office supplies, with four staplers and a binding machine from the 80’s.”

“So cool.”

While Jackson had spoken with a theatrical pretence of interest, Zoe delivers her line in a deadpan monotone. But Peter, Ned can tell, hasn’t registered either of these red flags.

“It is, isn’t it?” he carries on, oblivious. “The motor still works, and I’m thinking of using the coil springs for…”

Jackson, Zoe, Rodrigo, Amira, and Francis all stand crowded round Peter at his desk, and Ned frowns, fiddling with his Darth Vader eraser: he can see the sneers playing about their mouths, how they share looks over Peter’s head, and hide their tittering behind their hands. It isn’t the first time they trick Peter into conversation only to turn around and put him down all of a sudden.

Ned had overheard them laughing at him behind his back too, making fun of his hurried, stuttering speech, and fidgeting, and how he was prone to go off on a tangent until he forgot where he’d started. And while it’s true they made fun of everybody that wasn’t part of their clique, Ned felt it was worse with Peter because most of the time he didn’t realise they were making fun of him. Ned’s sick of it.

He watches Peter looking between them, still talking, echoing their smile with a tentative one of his own. Then they go in for the kill.

“So that’s what you do in your free time, then, dumpster diving?” Francis interrupts.

“That’s disgusting.”

“No wonder you stink.”

“I-I don’t,” Peter stutters ingenuously, though he, surreptitiously, instinctively, dips his nose near his armpit. “I don’t.”

“You do, though.”

“Pungent Peter,” Amira sniggers, and the whole group laugh loudly.

“You’re pathetic, Parker,” Rodrigo jeers. “You think anyone cares about what you find in the trash?”

Peter’s tugging at his fingers, hands held against his chest, and Ned can make out his throat working quickly as he swallows repeatedly, obviously fighting back tears.

“Leave him alone,” Ned calls out, heart pounding in his chest in spite of himself. Heads swivel to him, and he resists the urge to cower. “Peter doesn’t smell,” he says emphatically. “And—”

“You can’t talk, you smell like adobo,” Zoe cuts in.

“Well, adobo’s delicious,” Ned retorts, setting his jaw, keeping his chin up like his mom taught him.

There’s a chorus of O’s from the group. “Piggy thinks he’s got a spine…” Francis taunts.

“Don’t call him that,” Peter pipes up, voice steadier than Ned had expected.

“Or what?” Jackson, who has to have a good head and two stones on Peter, leans in close and snaps his fingers in his face, laughing when Peter flinches.

It’s the last straw for Ned. He lobs his eraser at Jackson’s head, thanking the universe for all the time he’s spent shooting skee ball at the arcade with his older brothers back in Hawaii.

“What is going on here!?” Their Math teacher walks into the room and right up to them, looking scandalised.

“Ned threw an eraser at me!” Jackson accuses shrilly.

“It was my fault, Ms Garcia. Ned didn’t do anything wrong,” Peter says quickly.

Ms Garcia raises her eyebrows at him. “I’ll be the judge of that, Parker.” She turns to Ned, pointing at him with her board marker. “I saw you throw that eraser, Ned. That’s detention, I’m afraid.”

“He was bothering Peter,” Ned grumbles, but he knows it’s useless. Ms Garcia isn’t subtle in her dislike for Peter. She has told him off more than once for doing homework from other subjects in her class, and Ned is convinced it pisses her off that Peter can coast through her class because he’s so smart.

“I deserve detention too,” Peter argues.

“Well, no one’s going to stop you from joining in. You know where to go,” she snaps. “Now all of you sit down.”

It’s Ned’s first time in detention ever, and he quickly decides all in all it’s not so bad. It’s not much different from sitting at home doing his homework—sans his usual snack—, and at least he has an honorable reason to be there. Ned has told his mom about Peter and he’s pretty sure she won’t be too upset.

He hasn’t been working on his homework for ten minutes when there’s a knock on the door. Despite what he had said back in the classroom, Ned is taken by surprise when Peter slips into the room, backpack thrown haphazardly over his shoulder.

Peter hesitates for a minute before closing the door behind him, even after Coach Wilson waves a hand in welcome without looking up from his tablet. Ned is about to suggest he just leave it ajar, when Peter lets it close with a quiet snick, and proceeds to walk over to Ned. He holds out Ned’s eraser in the palm of his hand.

“Hey, you got it. Thanks!” Ned whoops. “I thought I’d lost it.”

Peter’s mouth twitches in the shadow of a smile as he plops down on the desk next to Ned.

“Oh!” Ned turns to him in surprise. “You really don’t need to stay, Peter,” he says earnestly.

“It was kind of my fault you got detention,” Peter insists. “I’m sorry I got you in trouble.”

Ned shakes his head as he drops his eraser in his pencil case. “They were being—” he lowers his voice to a loud whisper— “Assholes.”

Peter hugs his backpack to his chest, sunk low in his chair. “I didn’t realise…” he mumbles. “I don’t—I thought we were—” He breaks off with a sigh.

“They’re just jealous cause you’re the smartest kid in class.”

Peter squints at him. “No I’m not.”

“You kind of are, man,” Ned replies, matter of fact.

Ned’s pretty sure about his own superior intelligence, but it’s impossible to miss that Peter’s, like, a bona fide genius. Ned thinks it’s super cool. “I’ve seen the books you read. And you get, like, straight A’s across the board, don’t you, just like that.”

“It’s just maths and stuff…” Peter demurs, mumbling shyly into his backpack. Then he raises his head to give Ned a tiny, rueful smile. “I wish I was better at people.”

His voice wobbles a bit, and Ned has no doubt left that things have been… hard for Peter. That maybe it was a little more than just not being popular. It makes him sad that Peter doesn't seem to have had a best friend before. But it only reinforces his determination to be the best best friend for him ever, if Peter lets him.

Ned gives him an easy smile back. “Me too, to be honest. But my mom says it’s also about the people you meet, so.” He shrugs. “They were being total dickheads, Peter, it’s not your fault.”

He catches Peter’s smile even as he ducks his head, and it makes Ned feel pretty proud that he did that.

“And I think it’s really cool you find stuff in the garbage,” he adds. “How many people can do that?”

Peter starts to grin, then falters. “For real?” he asks carefully.

Ned holds out his pinkie. “For real,” he assures him.

Peter studies his face for a long moment before breaking into an unrestrained grin. “Thanks, Ned.” He fidgets with the strap of his backpack. “I like your shirt,” he says in a rush.

“Yeah?” Ned pulls it straight, showing off the design. “It’s new. You like Star Wars then?” he asks with barely contained excitement.

“A lot.” Peter shows Ned the home screen on his phone: him and an older man with a Chewbacca in Times Square. “My Uncle Ben loves it too.”

“Awesome! Who’s your favorite character?”

Before Peter can answer they are interrupted by the coach. “This is  detention, not recess, boys,” he intones, eyes still glued to his tablet. “No fraternising.”

Ned rolls his eyes, and Peter giggles and makes a funny face that makes Ned snort with laughter.

“We’ll talk after, OK?” He holds his fist up patiently while Peter considers him carefully again, before going ahead and fist bumping him.

“OK,” Peter agrees, smiling.

“Awesome,” Ned repeats. He feels pretty confident he’s just found his best friend.

Chapter Text

Flash isn’t entirely lacking in self awareness. He’s been seeing a counsellor since since he turned twelve and, too old to continue with his nursemaid, his mother had decided to pass him on to be someone else’s problem. The counsellor is a good one, actually, and their biweekly sessions feel like a bit of a break—to be Eugene instead of Flash. He knows he gives Parker a harder time than he should, he definitely knows it says more about him than it does about Peter. It’s just Peter makes it so easy. And Flash isn’t great at denying himself some quick gratification, a low effort ego boost, no matter how weak.

It’s also just… routine, by now. It’s hard to imagine their interactions any other way. Maybe Eugene and Peter could be different, but not Penis Parker and Flash Thompson.

He follows Peter on the escalator up to the street, where he squints as though blinded by the strong sunlight. He looks disoriented after the hectic train ride, and Flash gives him a moment to recover before shoving past him.

“Watch it, mole boy. You’re blocking the exit.”

As usual, Peter doesn’t react beyond a half hearted glare, and Flash chuckles as he pulls out his phone, gratified to have a signal again.

A young woman approaches Peter, waving a clipboard, and Flash rolls his eyes when he sees Peter start to engage with her.

“Idiot.” He turns most of his attention to posting his underground selfie on Instagram and checking his Twitter, but, standing to the side as they wait for the rest of their class, he can’t help but keep an eye on Peter.

“Oh, um.” Peter glances down, obviously attempting to read what it says on the page. It’s some kind of form, with a list of signatures. “Oh, is this for charity?”

The woman nods, pointing at the top of the page. “Foundation for Deaf and Mute. Right. Sure. Of course I’ll sign,” he stammers as she presses a pen into his hand. When he gives back the pen, however, she frowns and uses it to tap at the bottom of the page. “Minimum donation—Oh, shit, OK. Just, hang on a sec. Um.”

Flash has to resist the urge to face palm when Peter reaches for his wallet, and he can’t help but cringe when she snatches the bill out of his hand the moment he holds it up.

With a put upon sigh, Flash pockets his phone. Her back turned to him, the swindler doesn’t see him coming, and he reaches over her shoulder to pluck the bill out of her hand without any trouble. “Yeah, it’s not happening. Scram.”

Scowling, the girl scampers, and Flash shoots Peter a smug grin, elbowing him in the side. He wonders if this rush is anything like what Spider-man gets every time he sasses some petty criminal and sends them packing.

He wags his eyebrows as he tucks the bill into the front pocket of Peter’s shirt condescendingly. “How does it feel to be saved by Flash Thompson, loser?”

Peter frowns, tracing down the side of his wallet with one finger in a repetitive motion. “That was rude even for you, Flash. She was collecting for charity.”

“Seriously, Parker?” Flash shakes his head, face twisted incredulously. “Don’t tell me you fell for that.” He wonders if maybe some amount of public humiliation will make it stick so he won’t fall for something like that again. Flash isn’t always going to be around to save the day after all.

“What?”

With another exasperated sigh he smacks Peter’s hand into stillness. “Put that away, before you get robbed instead of just conned.”

“But—” Peter protests even as he pockets his wallet.

“It’s a pretty common scam, dickwad.” There’s no malice in his voice, though. For all that he gives Peter a hard time, he knows he’s not an idiot, just… clueless, stupidly naive. And too nice for his own good, if Flash is being honest. He’s the type of person Spider-man works to protect, Flash thinks. “People like you are easy targets.”

“People like me?” Peter echoes in a quavering voice.

Flash doesn’t know what it is exactly that struck a nerve, but he’s not looking to make Parker start crying in the middle of the street.

“Yeah, losers who always think the best of others,” he explains, putting on a mocking tone to compensate for the honesty.

Peter’s expression shifts from upset to befuddled. “I’m not sure if you’re being nice or mean right now.”

Flash gives him a light punch in the arm. “Guess.”

“No play fighting, please!” Mr Harrington exclaims as the rest of the group emerges from the underground.

“Pretty sure it’s just bullying,” Ned mutters, giving Flash a glare as he makes his way over to Peter.

“I’m not sure what just happened, actually…” Peter admits.

“I’m a hero, I saved Parker from getting robbed,” Flash proclaims once everyone is within earshot. He’s not even exaggerating for once. “He almost got scammed. Like an idiot.”

“They looked nice.” Peter defends himself weakly.

Flash rolls his eyes at Ned’s supportive, solemn assessment of wolf in sheep’s clothing, but MJ cuts him off before he can make fun.

“Shut up, Flash,” she says simply in a mildly disgusted tone, stepping between him and Peter. “Nobody cares.”

Flash swallows his frustration when he realises everyone is huddled around Mr Harrington, figuring out how to get to the museum, rather than paying attention to him. What does he have to do to get some appreciation? He’s convinced Spider-man would have approved.

Ned shoots him a triumphant look over Peter’s shoulder, but his gaze snaps back to MJ when she speaks next, addressing Peter. “You’re really bad at reading people, you know.”

“MJ!” he yelps.

Peter waves a placating hand. “It’s fine, Ned. She’s right,” he says with a sigh.

MJ grimaces for a second, then bumps his shoulder. “But you’re really good at reading equations,” she offers, her voice lilting, sounding softer than Flash has ever heard it before. “And chemical reactions. And you’re decent at code, I guess.”

Flash snorts derisively, but he can’t bring himself to argue. As much as it pains him to admit it, she’s not wrong about that either: Peter’s unreliable and all over the place half the time, but he’s stupidly smart.

“Thanks, MJ,” Peter mumbles in response. Then, a second later, a tentative smile spreads across his face and his eyes narrow playfully. “Hey, was that a compliment?”

“No,” she scoffs. “…Just facts.” Despite her deadpan tone, her lips twitch and she fails to hide her smile as she walks away. Breaking into a grin, Peter gives a little excited hop in place, and Flash congratulates himself: he did good, saving Parker. It’s what Spider-man would have done, would have wanted him to do—and Flash is trying to be more like him… trying to be a better man.

He doesn’t give the incident any further thought once they all move on. Peter embarrassing himself is standard and regular, and so is Flash failing to get a worthwhile reaction from his classmates, unfortunately. He notes down his good deed in a still small list he has been working on, but otherwise lets it go.

At the museum, he gives his attention to the exhibition, doing his best to show off his knowledge of luxury car engines, and scoring a few social points by making fun of Jonah’s monologue on steam engine trains—compensating for the ones he loses after he gets told off by security for leaning against one of the exhibits in his quest for a good selfie.

So it catches him by surprise when Peter calls out after Flash on the way to the toilet during lunch break.

“Whaddup, Penis Parker?” Flash greets him, and can’t resist adding: “You spilled ice cream on your stupid tee shirt, genius.”

As expected, Peter falls for it, glancing down to check.

Flash lets out a laugh. “It’s just too easy.”

Peter’s mouth tightens, but he falls into step with Flash. “I just wanted to say thanks for… earlier.”

Flash stops in his tracks. “Oh.”

“Yeah,” Peter deadpans with a raised eyebrow.

“Well, makes sense. Saved you ten bucks, didn’t I?” Flash recovers, poking Peter in the chest.

“Paid for lunch,” Peter agrees. Without warning, he tosses something at Flash, who fumbles to catch it. “So, thanks.”

“Hey—” Flash blurts out automatically, before looking to see what he caught: it’s a pack of gum, strawberry and watermelon. By the time he looks up again, Peter’s gone.

“Weirdo,” he mutters. But he feels the tiniest bit like an actual hero for the first time in his life.

Chapter Text

Although the idea had been bouncing about in Tony’s head for a while, communicating it to Peter ends up being a spur of the moment decision.

“Underoos, I think it’s time.”

“Time for what?” Peter replies absently from his work station, bent low as he tinkers with his web shooters.

Tony takes a moment to finish the cabling he was working on, before straightening, expression solemn as he spins in his chair to face Peter dramatically. “Time for things to change. Clock is ticking. Got to get it done.”

“Get what done? What? What’s going on?” Peter’s head snaps up and he looks at Tony in alarm. “Mr Stark?” he queries, half rising out of the stool—not onto the floor, but sticking to the legs instead, precariously balanced.

He propels his chair toward Peter, and reaches out to give his knee a couple of pats, bringing him back down to a seated position. “Everything’s fine, kid. You know I have a flair for the dramatic.”

It’s become second nature at some point for Tony to be a bit more careful with his words and his tone, but he still slips up sometimes. While it doesn’t usually result in anything but momentary confusion, there have been a few instances of accidentally sending Peter into a panic, to Tony’s dismay.

“Oh.” Peter lets out a loud, relieved exhale. “That you do, Mr Stark,” he agrees, wide eyed and so earnest it makes Tony choke on a surprised laugh.

“It’s part of my charm.”

Peter giggles. And Tony should be used to the warmth that rises to his chest at that sound, but he hasn’t. “It’s also got you in trouble, hasn’t it?”

Tony raises an eyebrow in an over the top deadpan look Peter can’t miss. “You gonna come at me like that, Spider-man?”

Peter giggles again, then jumps a second before a soft beeping alarm goes off. “What is that?” he asks, looking around curiously.

“Oh—” Tony waves an impatient hand to quiet it. “Alright, FRIDAY, I got the message.”

Tony bites back a smile as Peter unconsciously mirrors Tony’s gesture with his hand, coupling it with a questioning look.

“A new protocol I’ve installed,” he explains.

“For what?”

Tony leans against the table, idly sets a screwdriver spinning. “You may or may not have noticed, kid, but you and I tend to get what some would call distracted and sidetracked.” 

Peter goes round eyed. “Not on purpose!”

“Mm… sometimes on purpose,” Tony mutters, and Peter breaks into a small grin.

“What parameters did you use to distinguish between normal conversation diversions and a distraction?”

“Still working on that, but for now I’m working on instituting a certain set conversational goals—” He breaks off in sudden realisation, eyes narrowed. “You’re doing it again,” he exclaims, with a theatrical accusing finger, just as the alarms go off again. 

Peter gives him an innocent look, but Tony can easily detect the hint of mischief even before the kid dissolves into a fit of giggles. Shaking his head, he flips the screwdriver in his hand to give Peter a playful poke in the side with the handle. “Settle down, pipsqueak.”

It only makes him squirm and bat at Tony halfheartedly, still giggling.

Tony has no idea how it comes so naturally with Peter, the casual demonstrations of affection, touch, both for fun and for comfort. Like with the rest, getting to know Peter had meant figuring out what kind of touch he appreciated, learning how the two of them fit together. And they do. Tony won’t give a name to it, but just like Rhodey and Pepper and Happy, Peter is a piece of him now, filling in some empty space inside of Tony he hadn’t even known existed.

When the alarm quiets, he forces himself to bring the conversation back around. “OK, but we do need to talk, spiderling.”

Peter sobers so dramatically Tony reaches out to squeeze his shoulder to soothe without even thinking about it. It isn't enough to stop the restless bouncing of his knee, however, or how he keeps rubbing the edge of the pages of the open school book on the table, from when he had been working on his homework earlier. “OK.”

“I’ve been thinking it’s time we got the gang together.”

“Uh—”

Tony chuckles. “A little joke. I think it’s time you met the Avengers,” he clarifies. Interacting with Peter he quickly realised he needs to be a little more literal with him than is Tony’s default setting.

“Oh.” Peter lets out a nervous laugh, gulps. “I—Like, meet, meet?” he stutters. “Me?”

“Yes, you, Peter Parker,” Tony confirms, mouth twitching. 

“But, I… I don’t think I’m ready.”

Tony considers him for a moment. “What’s the hold up?” he asks, seriously, gently.

Peter bites at his thumb nail for a few seconds. “Um… me?”

“Gonna have to be more specific, Pete.”

“Like, you know, how I am. How I’m… the way I am.” Peter flounders, and Tony stretches over to pull the box in the center of the table toward him without breaking eye contact. It still distracts Peter, his eyes straying to the box. “And, just, yeah. I’m…I’m afraid of embarrassing you, Mr Stark,” he finishes in a rush.

“That’s not going to happen,” Tony says simply, before rummaging in the box for a stim toy so that Peter will stop gnawing on his thumb. He chooses one and holds it up questioningly. Peter takes it without a word.

“Statistically, it’s very probable I’m going to do something embarrassing,” he argues in a miserable tone, abusing the clicker on the cube.

“OK, first of all, we have a very high threshold for embarrassing in this household, you know that.” Tony draws a line in the air raising his hand as high as it will go, drawing a weak smile from Peter. “And even if you do something embarrassing…” He modulates his voice. “Peter, I won’t ever be embarrassed of you, I promise.”

Peter curls the fingers of his free hand around Tony’s sleeve on the table; the tips of his fingers brush against his wrist and Tony actually feels them stick to him for a split second. “Can’t I just meet them as Spider-man?” he asks in a small voice.

“Kid, you can’t spend every waking hour in a mask,” Tony replies gently. 

Peter ducks his head, body rocking slightly. When he glances up at him after a minute, Tony brings him into an embrace in a practiced move. “We’ll figure something out, yeah?” He gives him a tight squeeze. "I’ve got a lot of practice creating low stress environments with the big guy.”

Peter breathes a small laugh, still holding onto Tony.

“Maybe we won’t do all at once—who’d be less intimidating? Bruce?” Tony muses. “Thor, if he were around, maybe—although, I’m not sure, with that crush on him you’ve got going on,” he teases.

The kid hides his face against Tony’s shoulder. “Mr Stark,” he whines.

Tony laughs. “He’s a Norse alien god, no one is judging.”

Peter chuckles, but his face is tinged pink when he lifts his head.

“We’ll figure it out,” Tony repeats. Then drops a kiss to the top of Peter’s head. “But that’s enough of that for now—it’s high time for a snack. Come on, we’re off schedule.”

Pepper had made clear her approval of how much more organised Tony had become since Peter came into his life. Scheduling in snack breaks and keeping any sort of routine wasn’t something Tony was used to, but it was something that Peter clearly appreciated, so Tony had adapted in order to provide. His willingness to do so—for Peter—wasn’t something Tony was prepared to dwell on yet.

Peter leans into him again for a moment, and Tony adapts: holds him close until Peter pulls back.

-

Peter walks out of the elevator still thinking out loud, distracted, bag over one shoulder, a stack of books held against his chest with one arm, and an open book balanced on the other. “FRIDAY, could you make note of that, please? I want to ask Mr Stark about it.”

“Of course, Peter, which part?”

“The biocatalysis process f—” The words die in his throat as he looks up from the book and takes in the group in the kitchen: the group of Avengers seated around the kitchen isle, dressed down and relaxed. And all staring straight at him.

“Note recorded.”

“Thanks, FRI,” Peter replies hoarsely.

“Please tell me what came out of your mouth wasn’t English,” Sam Wilson calls out, shaking his head.

“Uh.”

“What, you mean you don’t know what electroenzymatic biomechanical whatchamacallit is?” Clint jokes, parroting a butchered version of what Peter had been saying.

“You must be Peter… the intern,” Natasha says, the peculiar inflexion confusing Peter for a moment on whether she knew about Spider-man or not.

“Um, yeah, hi. I’m Peter, hi. Peter Parker.”

“Hi,” Clint echoes with a chuckle, waving a hand in greeting.

Sam snickers.

“Nice to meet you, Peter.” Steve stands up to welcome him. “Why don’t you sit with us?”

“Oh.” Peter shuts the book and draws it to his chest. “I was just… passing by, actually…” he answers, his flight instinct acting out.

“Got something to do?” Natasha challenges, eyebrow raised.

“I’ve got… homework.”

They all laugh, and Peter forces out a weak chuckle. He wasn’t joking.

“What are you doing here?” Clint asks curiously.

“Chit chatting with Stark’s AI too,” Sam adds.

“All of you may talk to me any time, Mr Wilson,” FRIDAY pipes up.

Sam scoffs. “Yeah, but not like that.”

“Um. Well, it’s Friday,” Peter replies to Clint.

Fridays mean Happy—or Mr Stark sometimes—picking him up from school to spend the weekend at the compound. Peter comes in, grabs a snack from the kitchen, and goes down to the lab with Mr Stark to work on his homework and later free time in the lab, then another snack with Tony this time, and working in the lab until dinner and a movie before patrol. But now the Avengers are here, and Peter feels lost.

“We’re not quite following, Peter,” Steve says with a glance at Natasha and a small smile, gesturing again for Peter to sit down. “Were you looking for something to eat?”

Peter approaches the table, under pressure finding a place next to Bruce.

“What can I get you, kid?” Clint shoots from next to the the fridge.

“Um, juice, please?”

“Coming right up.” He pitches Peter the juice box without warning, forcing him to put down his books to catch it. Clint grins. “Nice catch.”

Meanwhile Bruce has turned Peter’s books around to read the titles, a curious look on his face. “Are you studying Mwanajuma in school?” he asks, flipping the pages of the book on top idly.

“Um, no, but Mrs Zhao said I could do my extra credit project on her work if I wanted.”

Bruce peers at him over his glasses. “Impressive.”

“Is it?” Clint asks honestly.

“Yes,” Bruce confirms. “Very.”

Blushing, looking to avoid the interested looks from the group, Peter opens the juice and takes a sip. His face screws up when the taste fills his mouth: it’s not apple, but grape.

“You OK?” Bruce asks.

“Yeah, no,” Peter mumbles, hurriedly wiping the droplets of juice that spilled from the straw onto the table with his sleeve. “I just—I thought it was apple, cause I always have apple, but it’s grape. Which is fine, but it’s…”

“It’s not apple,” Steve interjects.

Peter hunches in on himself on the stool, his face hot. “Yeah.” He knows the Avengers, on the television, even in the battlefield, to an extent, but he doesn’t know them. And it’s stressing him out, because he can’t tell if they are teasing or making fun of him, and he’s sure he’s embarrassing himself and Tony… and this was exactly what he was afraid would happen.

“Sorry, Peter, there was a mistake in the delivery. Boss has already put in another order,” FRIDAY informs him.

“That’s OK, FRIDAY.” He catches Natasha hiding a laugh behind her hand, and his stomach knots further. “Grape is fine,” he says, forcing himself to take another sip. He can’t resist wrinkling his nose, however. He is not a fan of grape juice. 

“No diva tantrum ala Stark?” Sam comments in a loud, fake whisper.

Peter frowns, rubbing a nail over the ribbed neck of the straw. “Mr Stark’s not a diva,” he protests.

Sam snorts, and even Steve makes a sceptical face at that.

“He’s not,” Peter insists. “Mr Stark’s super nice, and he does a lot for people. He’s done a lot for me—”

“We know he’s paying your internship, but this is a safe space,” Sam snickers. “You don’t have to kiss his ass right now. Let it out, kid.”

They all laugh.

Peter shakes his head, tension growing between his eyebrows, his eyes prickling. “I like Mr Stark. He’s the best.” His voice comes out a bit choked, and a lump rises to his throat when he accidentally squeezes the juice box and more juice spills onto the table.

The room falls silent, and out of the corner of his eye he sees the Avengers exchange glances.

Clint passes him a paper towel. “Hey, we’re just joking, bud,” he says softly. He elbows Sam, who makes an inarticulate noise of agreement. 

“Yeah, man, just joking around.”

“I-I know, sorry,” Peter stutters. “I skipped lunch, so my blood sugar must be…” he rambles as he wipes the table, although he’s not sure it’s a better excuse than this is really overwhelming and unexpected, and I freaked out.

“You don’t have to apologise, Peter.” Steve passes him another paper towel. “I can make you something to eat if you want.”

Peter shakes his head as he quickly finishes wiping up the spill. “I’m going to…” He scoops up his books and swings his bag over his shoulder again, leaving the juice box behind. “It was really nice meeting you all.”

“Why don’t you take something to eat with you?” Bruce suggests.

But Peter just needs to get away.

“Mr Stark has snacks in the lab,” he replies. “I’ll see you around, bye.”

His voice comes out really high pitched, and Peter groans as he hurries back to the elevator, both his cheeks and his eyes burning.

When he reaches his room, Peter tosses the books onto his bed, freeing his hands to tug at his hair. “Shit, shit, shit.” After a minute of distressed pacing on the floor, he pulls out the mask from his backpack and crawls onto the ceiling. He needs everything to quiet down for a bit. And he needs to talk to someone.

Peter loves Karen. Karen can make him feel normal, like he doesn’t most of the time: she doesn’t understand some things, just like him, but she always knows what to say to make him feel better.

“Hello, Peter. You appear to be in some distress, is everything alright?”

“Mm.” Hanging upside down, Peter picks at the buttons on the cuffs of his flannel shirt. He can’t pull at his hair or bite his nails with the mask on. “I—No.”

“Did something happen?”

“I screwed up, Karen,” he confesses in a rush, stumbling over his words. “The Avengers are all going to hate me, and Mr Stark’s going to hate me, and I… I hate myself.” His voice dies in a whine.

“That seems statistically improbable, Peter. Tony Stark could never hate you.”

Another reason he loves Karen is that Mr Stark created her—for him. It’s a direct line to Tony.

Tears spring to his eyes, and spill over. He whines again.

“Should I contact Mr Stark, Peter?” Karen asks.

Peter shakes his head, sniffling. “No. Karen, do you think I can just hide in here forever? Or until I die from embarrassment?”

“That too seems statistically improbable, Peter,” she repeats, and Peter chuckles weakly, even as he presses the heels of his palms to his eyes over the mask, like than can stem the tears.

“Shit.”

-

 FRIDAY informs Tony that Peter had run into the Avengers as soon as he gets off the phone with Pepper.

“What?”

“Peter just met the members of the team currently located in the compound,” FRIDAY repeats.

Tony taps a rhythm on the work table with a screwdriver. “OK… what happened?” he asks uncertainly. This was definitely not the plan.

“The encounter lasted approximately fifteen minutes and took place in the kitchen,” FRIDAY relates, rather unhelpfully. “The Avengers are currently discussing it.”

“What about Peter? Where is he, is he OK?” Tony asks impatiently. He knows Peter had been worried about meeting the team, and Tony had been making plans, to make it easier on him. It wasn’t supposed to happen like this.

“He is in his room, speaking to Karen. His heart rate is somewhat elevated, and his blood sugar levels significantly low.”

Tony pinches the bridge of his nose. “Has he eaten?”

“Not since he arrived at the compound, boss.”

“Right. I’ll… get him a snack.”

He wants to gauge the situation before going to see Peter as well.

“What are you all doing here?” he asks with forced casualness as he walks into the kitchen. The look on every face turned to him tells him he isn’t fooling any of them.

“Waiting for you to show up,” Natasha answers in an amused tone.

Tony narrows his eyes at her. “You’re not funny,” he tells her grumpily.

“We met Peter,” Steve acknowledges from where he’s leaning against the counter top by the sink.

Tony can’t help but be grateful he at least is not beating about the bush.  “So I heard.”

“He’s a sweet kid,” Clint pipes up, and Steve nods in agreement.

Tony is a little less mad as he pulls out two slices of bread and a plate from the cupboard. “He is.”

“Brilliant,” Bruce adds, and some more of the tension melts from Tony, his lips quirking.

“Genius,” he corrects.

Then Sam speaks up in a loud mutter: “Bit touchy.”

“What did you just say?” Tony glares at him, brandishing the blunt knife he had just dipped into the peanut butter jar.

Sam puts his hands up. “Damn, I know where he gets it from…”

“What did you do?” Tony demands, furiously spreading peanut butter on the bread. 

“Nothing, we were just joking around, like always. Kid can’t take a joke, is all I’m saying.”

Honey drips over the side of the plate when Tony turns to glare at him. “You ganged up on my kid?”

“No one ganged up on him, Tony,” Steve intervenes in a calm voice.

“I think we just didn’t expect him to be… that much of a kid,” Clint explains.

“He’s fifteen, isn’t he?” Steve muses.

Tony only scowls when he opens the fridge and finds the grape juice. “The apple hasn’t arrived yet, FRIDAY?”

“No, sir.”

“Are you making him a snack?” Natasha asks, laughter in her voice, while Tony is pouring a tall glass of milk. 

“He has a super metabolism, he needs to eat,” Tony answers shortly.

“And he’s a growing teenager,” Clint adds.

Tony’s eyes snap to him, defensive, but he can tell Clint isn’t poking fun, but extending an olive branch. He nods. “He’s a kid,” he stresses, then relents: “We’ll… do another get together some time, so you can get to know him.”

Sam sniggers. “But with daddy around this time?”

Tony raises an eyebrow as he gathers the plate and glass. “Yes,” he says flatly.

He ignores Natasha and Steve exchanging a meaningful look as he walks out of the kitchen.

Bruce catches up with him right before the elevator doors close.

“Sorry about that, Tony,” he says breathlessly as he joins him inside. “It kind of caught me by surprise.”

“Yeah.” Tony sighs. “Not what I had planned either.”

“I meant—” Bruce hesitates, fidgeting with his glasses in his hands. “Peter, he’s… It’s not that he can’t take a joke, but that he doesn’t get it’s a joke, isn’t it?”

Tony studies Bruce carefully, then shrugs. “He loves a good joke. You just gotta make it clear you’re joking. Sarcasm goes right over his head most of the time too,” he adds.

Bruce nods, and the right corner of his mouth lifts in a small smile. “That must be difficult for you,” he teases.

Tony chuckles, but shakes his head. “Nah. I’ve got used to it.”

“So he is…” Bruce makes a motion with his head, clears his throat. “He’s autistic, isn’t he?” he blurts out when Tony only stares at him.

Tony gives a small shrug again. “I think so. I don’t know a lot of teenagers…” He prevaricates, but then gives in at the knowing look on Bruce’s face. “I’m pretty sure, yeah.”

“Does he know?” Bruce asks seriously.

Tony has wondered about the same before, but had been unsure about asking him about it. He had focused on just doing his best to make Peter comfortable, make things easier for him.

“I don’t know.”

“You haven’t talked to him about it?”

He frowns as the elevator reaches the right floor, and he steps out. “How am I supposed to bring that up? I don’t want to—”

“What?” Bruce presses.

Tony releases his breath in a loud, impatient exhalation. “I don’t want to risk pushing him away,” he admits.

“He got upset because Sam was teasing him about you,” Bruce tells him. “He wouldn’t hear a word against you. He said, and I quote, you’re the best.”

“Oh.” Tony’s chest fills with warmth.

Bruce grins. “He’s your kid. You’ll figure something out.”

Tony raises his eyebrows, and starts walking backwards down the hall toward Peter’s room. “Thanks, Bruce. Very helpful.”

Bruce lets out a small laugh. “I’ll talk to the others.”

“Mm.”

“You’re doing good, Tony!” he calls before the elevator doors close.

Tony knocks on the door with the back of his knuckles, and waits for a quiet ‘come in’ to reach him before going inside. He’s not all that surprised to find Peter hanging from the ceiling, in his school clothes but with his mask on.

“Come down to eat your snack, Spider-baby,” Tony says calmly, stepping inside.

He is aware of Peter tracking Tony as he sets the plate with the sandwich and the glass of milk down on his desk, before he finally hops down. There’s a quiver in his voice when he speaks. “Mr Stark, you didn’t have to—”

“Shush. Sit. Eat.”

Peter pulls off the mask, and runs a trembling hand through his hair.  “Thanks,” he says as he sits down, drawing one knee up to his chest, one bare foot on the seat of the chair. He rocks the wheeled office chair back and forth for a moment with his foot on the ground, avoiding Tony’s eyes. He looks small, and so young—and Tony has become all too familiar with the fervent wish to protect this kid from everything bad. Yet for all his ingenuity there’s only so much he can do against aliens and guns and knives, and even less he can do against… this.

“I’m sorry it got sprung up on you like that.” Tony sits down on the edge of the bed facing Peter. “I promise I didn’t set it up.”

“I know, Mr Stark. I trust you.”

Tony clasps his hands in his lap. “Thanks, kid,” he says softly. Peter’s trust is both precious and a weight, as Tony is terrified of screwing up. He raises his eyebrows at Peter. “I’m going to take it as a slight to my skills in the kitchen if you don’t eat that.” Then tags on: “I’m joking.”

When Peter is upset or overwhelmed, he has a harder time picking up on cues, and the last thing Tony wants is to make Peter feel worse right now—the redness in his eyes and the sag in his shoulders giving him away. “But you do need to eat.”

Peter hurries to take a too large bite, cheeks bulging as he chews. He taps his fingers nervously on the edge of the desk, his gaze on the floor, as he inhales the sandwich.

“Friday mentioned your blood sugar was in the dumps, kid. You miss lunch?”

Peter downs half the glass of milk in one go; drums his fingers for a second longer, then turns to look at Tony, eyes wide and apologetic. “I’m sorry, Mr Stark,” he blurts out. “I know I screwed up, and you must be so embarrassed, and—”

“Hey, rewind, Spider-baby. That’s not it at all. You didn’t do anything wrong.”

Peter loops his arms around his raised leg, shaking his head. “I know I’m not… good at people, Mr Stark.”

And this is it. It’s the opening he was looking for, isn’t it? Tony takes a deep breath. “There’s a name for that, sometimes, you know?” he says, looking at Peter carefully to see if he understood.

Peter glances at him and then back down at the floor, biting his lip. “I know.”

“How long have you known?” Tony asks gently.

“Since I was… eight, nine?” Peter raises his other leg up on the chair, peering at Tony over his knees. “I… I had to see a psychologist after… um…” He falters, and takes a moment to clear his throat. “And they… diagnosed me: autism and an anxiety disorder,” he whispers.

Tony reaches out to give him a light nudge on the elbow. “Hey, I have anxiety too,” he says with an encouraging smile.

Peter manages a small smile in return, but falls silent.

Tony knows they need to have this conversation, that it’s time, so he presses a little. “How’d you take it, the diagnosis?”

Peter shrugs, uses the movement to make himself smaller. “It… made sense, I guess. But it was a bit weird with May and Ben,” he confesses.

“How so?”

“I don’t think they knew what to do with it?” Peter lowers his feet to the floor, restless, and wraps his arms around his middle instead, fingers pulling at his sweatshirt. “I get it. It was… a lot on top of everything else going on. I don’t think Ben got that it didn’t have anything to do with—And May was trying so hard to get things back to normal, to treat me like… before. So it seemed easier to just, you know, not talk about it or anything.”

Tony nods slowly, despite the clear gap in Peter’s story. “But you’ve thought about it, even if you don’t talk about it.”

“Well, yeah. It’s…” He sighs, his eyes flitting to Tony, then back down. “Most of the time, I don’t care, it’s… who I am, you know? But I just… wish I was normal, sometimes, Mr Stark. I have spider DNA now, and I’m a-a superhero, but I’ve… never been normal? I’ve always been the weird, too smart kid with no parents. And then I…” He glances at Tony again, an almost fearful expression on his face. “I got molested,” he continues, in the tiniest voice. “And it just made everything… even harder. And then I… I lost Uncle Ben. And—I’m always trying to be better, Mr Stark, but I don’t—I can’t—I always mess it up.”

His voice clogs up as he tears up. “I didn’t mean to embarrass you with the Avengers,” he whimpers. “I wish I wasn’t so difficult. I’m sorry.”

Tony feels paralyzed for a moment, unable to process what he just heard, the pain in Peter’s voice. He doesn’t know how to fix this, how to make this better.

Peter is staring at him now, eyes wet and afraid, and Tony swallows down the lump in his throat, the hot rage and devastation that’s making his chest feel too tight, and extends his hand. “Peter.”

“I’m all sticky, Mr Stark,” Peter manages, voice shaking badly.

Tony waggles his fingers and smiles. “I know, Spider-baby, that’s kind of your thing.”

“No, I mean—” Peter wipes fresh tears from his face with the back of his hand, sleeves down to his fingertips. “With honey.”

Tony breathes out a quiet laugh. “Kid, I don’t care. Come here.” There’s tears lodged in the back of his throat too, and any other time the emotion in his voice would have made all his defense mechanisms aggressively switch on. But this is Peter, and Tony wants him, needs him to get it right now. Standing up hesitantly, Peter takes his hand. Peter's hand is clammy and sticky, and small, and Tony squeezes it tight as he tugs lightly, encouraging Peter to sit down next to him.

He wraps an arm around Peter, and pulls him close for a minute, pressing a kiss to the top of his head as he considers his words. “You’re not difficult. Things have been difficult for you. So, fucking unfairly difficult.” Tony’s voice falters for a second. He wants a strong drink, and to take off in his suit and shoot someone who deserves it, like the monster who had abused his kid. But this is more important, being here, with Peter. “You… you’re the best kid I know, Pete. And your autism—I’m sorry that it makes things a bit harder for you sometimes, but, it doesn’t make you bad or embarrassing, OK?”

“I wanted to impress them for you, but the Avengers probably think I’m an idiot now,” Peter says, looking up at him dejectedly.

Without thinking, Tony thumbs at a tear that’s slipped down Peter’s cheek. “Not at all, Underoos, they think you’re a bit of a weird genius—like me.”

That makes Peter crack a smile, even as he shakes his head. “But you’re the best Mr Stark.”

“So far from it, kid.”

Peter shakes his head again before curling up against Tony’s chest, an arm wrapped around his waist. “You are.”

Tony swears under his breath when his eyes start to sting. Hugging Peter to him, he rests his chin on the top of his head. “Peter, you’re… you’re my kid.” Tony has spent a lifetime avoiding talking about his emotions, even with the people closest to him, but he remembers how much he had ached for his father to just say something to him, and he knows subtleties can only take him so far with Peter, that he needs to hear it—He deserves to hear it. And Tony wants to tell him. “I’m really proud of you. And nothing that you are, or that’s happened to you, can change that, OK?”

Peter hugs him tighter, and Tony, murmuring soothingly, rubs his hand up and down his back as it hitches with quiet sobs.

After a while, once he has calmed down, Peter disentangles himself from Tony. His face is pale and splotchy, and his eyes swollen, and Tony knows this isn’t enough, that he can’t do enough, for Peter, but the shy, tremulous smile Peter gives him, tells him he’s doing something right at least.