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It was Flash’s turn to host the weekly Decathlon meet.
Usually, he wasn’t nervous. You could throw a couple of snacks and a half-done puzzle to his nerd group and they would be happy for the three hours they were usually together “practicing” for their next competition –everyone knew that the only way they got to really practice was when they met at the school library, even MJ had stopped trying to make them hit the buzzers to chemistry trivia.
It had taken some time for Flash to be comfortable with his Decathlon team, but after Washington, they all had united some over their recently-discovered fear of elevators. Then their trip to Europe and (yet another) near-death experiences had cemented their friendship. Yes, with all of the Decathlon team.
Flash wasn’t an idiot, and both Peter and Ned were horrible liars. By the end of the trip everyone knew that Parker was Spider-Man.
[They loved to tease him about it, even going as far as changing his name on the chat to Night_Monkey . It had been MJ’s idea.]
It had taken Flash all of two seconds to go from Penis Parker is Spider-Man?! to a more reasonable Of course Penis Parker is Spider-Man, of course he is . Honestly, it was kind of humiliating to have figured it out after a whole year of Peter being a vigilante. But now Flash was happy to be part of the Spidey Squadron group chat, where the whole Decathlon team (plus Mr. Harrington because he was the only responsible person besides MJ) spent half their time teasing Peter over the cat that didn’t want to be rescued from the tree.
[The other half was spent yelling at Peter because holy shit, Parker, that is a very sharp knife, get out of there! ]
But Flash’s storytelling has gotten a little off-track, hasn’t it? Where was he? Ah, yes, the Decathlon meet.
As he was saying, Flash wasn’t usually nervous when he hosted Decathlon meets; they were actually a fun time and an excuse to pass the time with his friends.
But this was the first time that his parents would be watching over them and “help them study for their upcoming competition”, which was just code for we want to know who you’re hanging out with and then criticize all of their life choices after they leave our house.
So Flash did the only thing he could think of: got some snacks ready, and took out the puzzle they had all started to put together last month.
Peter and Ned were the last to arrive.
They came in, soaking wet, with Parker holding a –drenched– hoodie over both of their heads, one arm draped around his boyfriend’s shoulders. Ned was holding a tattered school bag with all their flashcards, some snacks (because they all knew to feed Peter, especially before patrol), and the occasional LEGO piece.
They knocked on the door at the exact moment that Flash’s mother asked the first History question of the evening.
“1988!” Peter shouted from the doorway, his eyes scanning for a place to leave his wet shoes to dry so he could come inside without leaving wet footprints on the floor.
His mother pursed her lips, before forcing a smile and nodding at his classmate.
“Correct! You two can leave your shoes and the hoodie in that corner over there. I’ll get you some towels.”
Peter and Ned did just that, but because they were the most adorable couple Flash had ever met, they took turns drying each other’s hair (which, really, was just an excuse to mess with each other’s hair and then take the time to comb it with their fingers). They gave all of the team diabetes.
Flash could see his mom staring with a smile on her face, and if he hadn’t known her, he would’ve genuinely thought that she was as smitten with them as everyone in Decathlon was. But, being her son, Flash was just waiting for the shoe to drop.
Surprisingly, it never did.
They managed to get through 12 History questions and a stray chemical reaction before everyone became too focused on the puzzle –a circular, wooden, 1000-piece masterpiece of the Aztec calendar– to answer any more questions. Flash and Abe were in charge of finding all the corner pieces (are they even corner pieces if the puzzle is a circle?) while Sally and Cindy worked on the center of the puzzle. Ned and Peter were happy to look for pieces that could belong to the outer ring of the calendar.
Being the true nerds they all were, it wasn’t long before they got into a heated conversation on Mexico’s history before Spain went and fucked everything up. At one point, everyone decides to help look for the corner pieces while MJ lurks in Wikipedia for more information.
When his mother brings out a tray full of hot chocolate, they all collectively agree on their love for the culture that discovered cacao beans.
“So, Peter, was it? Why did you come with all the rain outside? You could’ve at least grabbed an umbrella!” his mother says from her place across the couple, where she had promptly sat down after giving everyone their dose of liquid sugar.
Peter, of course, sees nothing wrong with the question.
[To be fair, no one in his team does, they don’t realize that his mother cannot possibly be up to anything good. Flash does, he knows his mother.]
“The wind was too strong for an umbrella, and Ned and I decided to meet at the subway and walk together here, so we just grabbed the biggest hoodie we could find and hoped for the best!”
His mother laughs good-naturedly and changes her focus to Sally and her upcoming competition with the robotics club; her eyes sparkling with a secret smile that only she knows the reason to.
His father comes home in the middle of their second puzzle-put-together binge. They’ve all managed to join all of the not-corner pieces and have all collectively moved into hunting for anything that resembles a face sculpted into a giant rock. Ned and Peter have unconsciously formed a team and have hogged half of all the puzzle pieces. No one on the team really minds.
Ten minutes later, Ned’s phone comes alive with an alarm he has set specifically for Peter.
[They all know the alarm, the obnoxious I’m gonna monch… I’m gonna cronch had scared them out of their minds the first five times it had sounded in the middle of practice]
Ned blushed and turned the alarm off while stealing small glances at his parents’ faces, and when you hung around the guy long enough you learned to read all his facial expressions. That particular one meant Oh God, I hope that wasn’t too weird.
Peter, naturally, shook his head while laughing at his boyfriend and procured three (yes, three) bags of popcorn out of the school bag they had brought with them.
“Uh, Mrs. Thompson? Is there a microwave we can borrow to make popcorn? I promise if we somehow manage to make the bag explode, we’ll clean it!”
His mom laughed and directed his classmate to the kitchen, and Ned promptly followed. Flash managed to find two matching puzzle pieces before giggles erupted from down the hall, followed by an almighty clank! that could’ve only been made by an aluminum bowl. A faint sorry! and more giggles completed the soundtrack of two dorks in love trying to make popcorn in the kitchen.
Everyone in the team laughed at their antics. His mom clinked her glass with his father’s and calmly sipped her wine.
His team left two hours later, leaving him with a half-done puzzle and a bowl full of un-popped popcorn.
As soon as the front door closed behind the last of his teammates, his father pours himself another glass of wine and leans comfortably on the sofa.
“ This is why our nephew is having so much trouble finding a girl, there’s just a bunch of these people running around!”
His mother laughs, and Flash wants to grab her by the shoulders and shake her until there’s red wine all over their carpet.
“I know! At this rate arranged marriages are going to have to make a comeback. Just look at them! They’re like housewives, think it’s contagious?”
His father slaps her arm good-naturedly. Flash grits his teeth.
“Oh shut up! They brought most of the snacks you were gorging yourself on, so you better not leave me alone on our bed tonight!”
They both laugh as if they were listening to the funniest joke in the world. Flash busies himself with cleaning up after his team, hurrying to the kitchen, and aggressively washing the dishes.
[He never thought that someone could do the dishes angrily, but here he was.]
They were still cackling in the kitchen, probably feeling like the next famous stand-up comedians.
He finishes the dishes and makes a point to shake off the excess water onto the floor and step on it as much as he can with his shoes. Then he stomps all the way to his room.
Or, well, all the way to the bottom of the stairs.
“And what’s got you so angry, mister? You know, if this is how you’re gonna get then maybe don’t invite those two over? I completely understand, son; I’d be angry too.”
Are they for real? Is this really happening?
“Are you kidding?” –he shakes his head, moving away from the stairs to stand right in front of his parents– “ Those two are my friends! And what you’re saying is disrespectful! You even waited until they were gone and couldn’t defend themselves!”
His father opens his mouth, probably to scold him, but Flash beats him to it.
“And you know what? It’s not an illness, it’s not contagious” –the word leaves his mouth as if he had spit out poison– “and they’re people ! Which is frankly more than what I can say about you if you’re talking all this bullshit . You don’t have to like it! But the least you can do is have some freaking human decency and get through your heads that they won’t stop loving each other just because you’d rather make jokes!”
He hears a faint you come back here, mister! but by the time his mother shouts it, Flash has already slammed the door to his room and had proceeded to punch the living daylights out of his pillow.
Being the teenager he is, his next course of action is to grab his phone and scroll through social media –maybe tweet a not-so-nice thing about his parents– and play the first playlist he can find.
And that was all on his plans, before he opens his messages and sees Peter’s texts.
biderman: hey man, 2day was fun.
biderman: should I bring more food next time?
biderman: ohgosh we left all the trash to you
biderman: dude im so sorry! We’ll help next time, promise!
And then there’s one, from two minutes ago.
biderman: Thank you.
Fucking super hearing.
Next Monday, Flash finds both Ned and Peter in front of the hero’s locker after school.
His hands are sweating, and there’s a second –or three– when he’s seriously worried about the chocolate bar he’s holding slipping to the floor like a bar of soap in the shower.
But then they’re making their way outside and he has to act.
“Leeds! Parker! Wait up!”
They both turn to look at him in perfect sync, and if Flash hadn’t spent as much time as he had around the two, he would’ve found it creepy. As it was, the familiar sight of those two acting like an old married couple gave him the courage to grip the chocolate tighter (thankfully, since it wasn’t a bar of soap, it did not fly into the hallway’s ceiling).
“If- if you want… I’ve heard a lot about your Mario Kart skills and if we could, y’know, hang out and play sometime, my place’s always open.” –he extended the ( sweaty, oh my god so sweaty ) chocolate bar as a metaphorical olive branch– “I promise my parents won’t be there, and I’m so sorry about all the stuff they said…”
Peter takes the chocolate, (not even flinching when he definitely notices that the plastic is damp, dear Thor, he’s a saint ) and smiles at him.
“We’ll be there, thanks man.” And when he says thanks , Flash knows he’s not just talking about the chocolate.
When Flash makes his way to his car five minutes later, he catches Ned and Peter sharing a –melted– chocolate bar outside of Midtown, sitting on the sidewalk right under the only tree on school property. Peter smears chocolate on Ned’s nose, and even though he’s not anywhere close to where they are, Ned’s giggles travel all the way to his ears.
He smiles.
They both show up on Friday with a bunch of chips and their own videogame controllers. Ned’s have a hand-painted Spider-Man logo that Flash just knows MJ painted for him; Peter’s is red and gold, with a signature on silver sharpie that could have only been done by Tony Stark.
Two hours later, Ned’s alarm surprises Flash into snorting soda from his nose, and he laughs so hard he ends up spread out on the carpet.
They leave just as his parents’ car pulls up on the driveway. Flash stares at his father in the eye, not blinking, until his phone lights up with a text from Ned that says they’re safely on the bus.
They meet up every Friday to play videogames and do homework.
It’s become tradition to try to beat Ned’s alarm by playing vines on YouTube just before it rings.
Every night, they leave just as his parents arrive from work.
Every night, there’s a text message on his phone.
biderman: Thank you.