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Peter prefers secrets.
He’s horrible at keeping them, but at the most he just doesn't tell people things and waits for them to come up in conversation. To keep people on their toes, throw them off their game. As the great JJ Bittenbinder once said through John Mulaney. “STREET SMARTS!” Because at that point, it’s technically not a secret anymore, right?
“I’m going out.” He says to the majority of Avengers who are currently sitting in the common room.
“With who? A giiirlfriend?” Sam teases, looking up from his laptop for the first time in about three hours.
Peter shrugs. “Yeah.”
Bucky spits out his tea, spraying half of it on Steve. Natasha looks up from where she was deeply engrossed in her book in shock. Clint stops from where he was restringing his bow and gapes at the boy.
“You have a girlfriend? Since when?” Natasha stage whispers.
“I don’t know,” he starts counting on his fingers. “A year around. I think we’re coming up on 12 months soon.”
“How have we never met her?!” Bucky has recovered from shooting tea out of his mouth and partly nose.
“She’s only gonna talk politics and accords with you guys, ask your opinion and all that. She only really wants to meet Nat because she’s a raging feminist and activist and wants to give her an interview.” Peter tells them, Nat nods excitedly and Peter makes a note to let them meet as soon as possible. “There’s no reason you shouldn’t have met her yet. She comes to the tower often and occasionally joins me at the compound. She’s met Pepper and Tony though. Rhodey and Happy too.”
“They’re more important than us?” Clint fakes being hurt.
Peter shrugs again, a sheepish smile crossing his face. “Well, yeah?”
“Never mind all that, where are you going?” Steve cuts into the outraged argument that starts boiling.
“A bookstore, they also sell tea and coffee there so she’ll just sit in the corner and read for hours with me, she likes reading more but I have a few books on advanced quantum physics from there.”
“Why don’t you take her out on a proper date? A bookstore is nothing.” Sam laughs.
“It’s just what she and I like to do, sit around and read, have some tea. I’m not a tea person, I prefer my coffee but they have coffee too so I don’t complain. I actually pass her favorite tea shop on my way to school so I get her some Chai to energize her. Unless she has a test, then it’s Honeybush, for stress. But any other time of the day it’s Peppermint, her favorite kind. She happens to pass my favorite coffee shop on her way to school, so she gets me a drink.”
“That is the most wholesome thing I’ve ever heard.” Natasha whispers.
“Anyways. That’s just us, it’s how we roll,” he checks his watch. “I gotta go, she’ll kill me if I’m late.” He runs for the elevator.
“What’s her name?” Bucky shouts towards him.
“You’ll have to figure that out on your own!”
Everyone turns to Natasha.
“What? I’m not interfering in his love life. This time.”
__
Peter strolls happily down the street towards the bookstore. He knows MJ is already there, she’s alway there no matter what time he arrives. He once got there 20 minutes early and MJ was already curled up in her usual chair, pouring over a book different from the one he saw her reading at lunch, sipping on her Peppermint tea. So today he was just going to be on time. He reaches the front of the shop and pushes the door open, saying hello to Valentine, the desk worker for the day and steering himself towards the back of the shop. Their usual spot. He reached the velvety chairs, expecting to see MJ there legs tucked under her body, flipping the page of some murder mystery.
She was not there.
That set off his internal panic immediately, because she was always there. He checked his phone and found no voicemails or texts from her. So he called her.
“What’s up loser?” She sounded normal. Which helped him breathe a bit better.
“Nothing much, just wondering where you are. I’m at the bookshop.”
“Oh shit! Was that today?” He can hear rustling on the other side of the call.
“Yes MJ, that was today. And you yell at me for being late to AcaDec.”
“It’s different.”
“I’m being Spider-Man! How is that different?”
He hears her sigh. “I’m sorry that I’m late dipshit. I’ve had a migraine like all week, and I can’t do my homework.”
This is news to him. MJ pretty much never expresses pain. So his eyes widen in surprise and he starts protesting.
“No, no no no no. You don’t have to come to the shop. How about I’ll go over there and we can watch something.”
“I don’t know, idiot. My parents are fighting again.”
She has explicitly expressed that in no way is he to make a big deal out of her parents. So he doesn’t.
“So we’ll go to my apartment. I’ll pick you up?”
“I can go over there myself.”
“Alright,” he assumes this would happen, MJ has this need to be incredibly independent. “I’ll grab snacks. You have a key and May’s working.”
“She loves me so much that she wouldn’t care if I stumbled into your apartment at one am.”
“Probably true. Just go, MJ.” He was already out of the door and down the street towards the nearest 7-11 near his apartment.
“See you.”
“Love you.”
“Love you too.” He beams at her response, she said it a lot before but it still surprises him. She hangs up, leaving him to run down the street towards his apartment.
He enters the first 7-11 he sees grabbing sour gummy worms, a party bag of cheetos and some M&M’s. He pays after throwing his stuff on the counter and races out of the store. He gets another call, from MJ.
“Wassup?” He answers.
“I can’t get in.” She sounds panicked, and unsure of herself, which is super un-MJ.
“Do you have the key?”
“Yeah, but the door might be jammed.”
“I’ll be there soon.”
“Alright, bye.”
“Bye.” He hangs up and quickens his pace to get to his apartment faster. He finally makes it to the front of the building and bustles up the stairs towards his apartment. MJ is standing outside the door, eyes closed and face mostly in peace. She’s wrapped in a hoodie, one of Peter’s. It’s a little small for her because she’s tall, but it fits well enough. She gives him a small wave. And he gives her a smile. He sets the bag down by the door and shoves his body into it. Not even a budge. And he has super-strength, so this door is not coming down. He tries a few more times and when it won’t open, he stands there baffled.
“Anywhere else we can go?” MJ pipes up, she’s smothered herself in a blanket now, which seemingly came from nowhere until he notices the backpack hanging off her shoulders.
“I know a place.”
“No. Peter. Are they there?” She seems to catch onto his implication.
“Sadly, yes. Right in the common room entrance, and since it’s the penthouse, there isn’t an elevator to the second floor!” where Peter’s room resides. “I’m sorry Emmie, but if we can’t go back to your place, the tower it is.”
“Fine. I’ll even give up my last bit of dignity. Will you carry me?” She holds out her arms and gives him a questioning smile.
“Sure, piggy-back?” He offers. A little less shameful than the bridal carry. She nods, agreeing with the part about shamefulness, most likely and hops onto his back. He starts walking down the street, barely noticing the package on his back except for when she starts slipping down, then he’ll adjust her and keep going. She rests her head on his shoulder and he smiles softly. He finally makes it into the tower and heads straight to the elevator. He nudges MJ with his head and she gives a soft groan.
“I’m awake.”
“What movie do you wanna watch? Floor 98 please FRI.”
“Of course Peter. Welcome Michelle.” The AI replies.
“‘s MJ” The girl mumbles under her breath. Her head has moved on top of Peter’s own. “Let’s watch a show.”
“What show did you have in mind?”
“The new season of Good Place is finally on Netflix.”
“The Good Place it is. I knew you always had a soft spot for William Jackson Harper.”
“Kristen Bell.” She corrects, letting a small laugh.
“My bad. Kristen Bell is queen.” He says as the elevator doors open, he walks out, finding all of the previous Avengers in the same place they were before. Except for Clint. Clint’s on the fridge.
“Damn straight.” MJ’s voice catches their attention. Steve looks over, followed by Bucky. Their mouths are gaping open and Nat rolls her eyes.
“I thought you were going to be at the bookstore?” She says.
“We were, but MJ has a migraine and didn’t bother to tell me and my apartment door is jammed, so here we are.” He lets go of MJ for a second to bring his hands up for a shrug. Natasha laughs.
“So that’s her name, MJ. Well it’s very nice to meet you MJ.” Nat laughs.
“Nice to meet you too Ms. Romanov.” MJ replies.
“None of that, it’s Natasha. You know how long it took this little fucker to call me Natasha?” She points at Peter. Who mocks offense. “9 months. 9 months of cruelty and Ms. Romanov this Ms. Romanov that. I won’t go through that again. I just thank god every day I’m not Tony. Peter still calls him Mr. Stark 88% of the time.”
MJ laughs at this and promises not to call her Ms. Romanov. Sam walks in from wherever he was and finds the two teenagers talking with Nat, which surprises him.
“Who’s this Parker?” He asks, Peter turns his head towards Sam.
“This is MJ, my girlfriend.” MJ gives a small wave from where she lay on Peter.
“Hi Wilson.”
“Hello MJ.”
“Let’s go dipshit.” MJ pats Peter on the shoulder, and the boy complies, starting to walk out.
“That's her term of endearment for you?” Nat snorts.
“You should see what she calls other kids, this is the nicest she goes. Wait, actually sometimes she calls me ‘Spidey’ and ‘Babe.’”
“Funniest insult you’ve heard from her.” Sam immediately says.
“Crazy bitch canoe.” Peter replies, it sends Sam into a pile on the ground and a smirk on MJ’s face.
“Alright, well we better be going if we want to finish the whole season by tonight.”
Peter sets off down the hallway, MJ bouncing on his back every step.
“We need to find out more about her.” Bucky says, looking Natasha straight in the eyes.
“We can do it naturally, I’m positive she’s staying for dinner, you can ask her questions then.” She replies, rolling her eyes.
“Come on, Nat!” Steve says, emphasizing the ‘on’. “Aren’t you curious about MJ? She’s this feisty thing and Peter is dating her. Peter!”
Nat sits for a moment, puffing up her cheeks. “Fine.” The boys cheers. “But nothing too personal, let's get the basics.” Natasha grabs her laptop and does a search for MJ, and Midtown High. A few results come up, like school newspapers, stating that the teens real name is Michelle Jones, but she goes by ‘MJ’. So Natasha rewrites her search, typing in Michelle Jones, and Midtown High. Many more results come up. Letting Natasha learn about the AcaDec stuff and writing competitions Michelle was in. She tells the boys everything she can find.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Sam calls for dinner as he sets plates and a pot of fried rice on the table. He can hear two sets of feet thumping down the stairs and smiles, knowing MJ hasn't left yet. The teens are talking rapidly in another language and Sam's smile dissipates. He doesn't know this language. Peter and MJ sit down and keep talking. He sits down across from Michelle and Natasha sits next to him. Bucky on her side and Steve on his, at the head or bottom of the table. Clint sits where he can, scooting onto the bench. Tony and Pepper make their way down the stairs, Pepper talking into a bluetooth earpiece in what seems to be Mandarin and Tony is checking his phone.
“Oh! MJ! I didn’t know you’d be here tonight.” Tony says when he catches eye of the two.
MJ switches back to english. “Well, I am. We were going to be at Wendy’s but I got a little sick.” She explains.
“Ahh, I see.” He sits down next to Peter, ruffling his hair. Peter grabs his hand, smiling and rolling his eyes and detaches it from his head. Pepper seems to say goodbye to the person on the other line and takes out the earpiece. She gives Peter and Michelle a kiss on the head and sits down next to MJ, across from Steve. Everyone takes this as a welcome to start eating and Bucky immediately reaches for the spoon. MJ gets up and goes to the fridge, opening and searching for something inside.
“What’s wrong? Don’t like fried rice?” Steve asks her. She turns back around with a container of baked ziti, no meat in her arms.
“I’m vegetarian.” She said, popping the container in the microwave. When it was done heating, she took the container and sat back down next to Peter, resuming her conversation.
“Donc de toute façon, je disais que le flash ne méritait même plus vraiment d'être dans l'équipe parce qu'il ne répondait pas du tout aux questions mais c'était juste comme ça, mais Parker n'était même pas venu s'entraîner, pourquoi est-ce qu'il méritent d'être dans l'équipe? puis abe a sonné.” She started to Peter. The boy just nodded along, looking like he understood every word.
“What are you even speaking in?” Bucky cut in. He knew Russian and Romanian and that was it.
“French.” Peter replied, not looking up from his bowl.
“alors Abe a sonné la cloche et a dit, parce qu'il répond correctement à la question? et j'ai dit oui et Harrington lui a crié d'utiliser la cloche à des fins comiques.” MJ finished.
“Comme il le fait” Peter replied.
“C'est une histoire hilarante, mais pouvez-vous parler au reste de la table s'il vous plaît?” Pepper cut in. They all knew that she knew French though, so it wasn’t surprising.
“Non puoi farci fare nulla” Peter said, crossing his arms and turning to Italian. Tony stopped eating for a minute, holding back a laugh. Pepper glared at him, eyes slanting and eyebrow raised. Peter squirmed under the glance, and gave in.
“Ok, fine!” He yelled, putting up his hands. “How was your day, Clint?” He looked super passive-aggressive and widened his eyes and deepened his frown when he asked the question. Clint stops from where a forkful of fried rice is about to make its way to his mouth. He put down the fork and coughed, bringing his hands together.
“It was good? I guess, I got to talk with Laura and the kids.” Peter paused.
“Who’s Laura?” Peter asks.
“She’s my wife. Then I have three kids, Cooper, Lila, and Nathanial. Cooper’s 16 now and Lila’s 14, you should meet them sometime.”
“I would love to meet them!” The 17-year-old exclaims. “I’m already in a group chat with Cassie, Harley, Shuri, and Kate. We’ll add them in.
“Keener?” Tony sputters, Peter nods.
“You know Harley!?” Tony exclaims. “How the hell do you know Harley?”
“Oh, um.. after the snap, 16-year-old Harley met 11-year-old Cassie at the dusted Avengers funeral. She got his number from Hope who got his number from Pepper who got his number from you. They started texting and became very brotherly towards her. Other than me and Shuri, they have the closest connection.”
“Huh.” Tony says. He vaguely remembers this.
“Yeah! He’s great. Those times when I disappear on the weekends with Shuri when she visits? I’m driving down to Tennessee with her and then we go with Harley to visit Cassie in San Diego. We hang for a few days and then go back home. Kate travels for work too often and she’s technically in the gray area between Gen-Z and Millennial, but she comes when she can. She brings her girlfriend sometimes.”
“Who’s Kate?” Bucky asks.
“Kate Bishop.” Peter shrugs. “She works for S.H.I.E.L.D, I think.”
“Holy shit you know Kate Bishop?” Clint sputters, while Natasha awe’s and says “I love Kate!”
“Yep. You know her?”
“Know her? I trained her. Who’s this girlfriend though? I never heard about one.”
“You trained Kate? Dude, that’s so cool. Her girlfriend's name is America? Chavez? You know her?”
“And I thought Steve was patriotic.” Sam snorts.
“They’re together?” Clint questions.
“Oh my god Kate and America are together! Cliiinntt! You have to call her!” Natasha screams, slapping the man's arm.
“I think it’s been a year or two?”
“Clint is as oblivious as we thought!” Tony shouts. “When Nat and Bruce were together for a bit Clint had no idea!” Natasha goes blank.
“I can call Kate. She said she’s in Canada with America and Billy I think?” Peter offers.
“Do it. Do it.” MJ starts chanting, pounding her fists on the table. She met Kate and really liked her. Peter fishes his phone from his pocket and clicks on Kate's contact.
It takes two rings for her to pick up. Peter puts it on speakerphone.
“Hey! Little Bitch! Kate starts, Peter and MJ don’t seem phased but everyone else seems either confused or horrified.
”Dick Ass! How’ve you been?” Peter replies. Steve is about to open his mouth but Peter sends him a stern glare.
“Could be better, Billy almost got his arm shot off but we’re going to meet Kamala in a few days in North Dakota because for some fucking reason that’s where she is.”
“Sucks to be Billy.” Peter snorts.
Kate laughs. Then you can hear voices in the back.
“Is that Peter? Lemme say hi to him!” He hears another woman’s voice, there’s some rustling, the opening of a door and steps. “Peter! How’re you?”
“I’m good, America.”
“Wow, full name? You usually just call me Merri. You ok?”
“I’m fine, just here with some people and letting them know who I’m talking to. Speaking of. Can you give the phone back to Kate? You can listen in too, you probably know some of them.”
“Yep, gimme a second.” There’s some shuffling and Kate’s voice enters again.
“Whaddayou need?”
“I’m with someone you often and currently refer to as ’Hawkass’ and ‘A literal Angel.’ And MJ.” Clint gasps I’m offense and Peter shrugs. Nat grins.
“Oh my god you have Nat and Clint?!” Kate screeches. They can hear shuffling and thumping and then a low voice say, “what’s goin on?” Billy has woken up now.
“Billy. Peter has Clint and Nat.” America hisses. Peter laughs.
“I also have ‘Dumb Bitch’, ‘The kind of cool guy’, ‘Tin Can’ and ‘Boss Ass Bitch’” Peter cuts in the shrieks of excitement from Kate.
“Oh my god, how many Avengers do you have?” Billy groans. “Billy, do you not realize that Peters in the same room as Steve Rogers, not a vibe, Sam Wilson, kind of a vibe, Tiny Stank, mostly a vibe and Pepper Potts, the most important Avenger, we Stan and love? This is important!” Kate says.
“I’m dumb bitch?” Steve whispers. Sam just pats his back.
“Yep! And, Shuri’s coming down next week so if you can, come to New York and we can drive down to Tennessee when you’ve reconnected in Iowa.” Peter responds. “Apparently we are picking up Clint’s kids on the way. Older ones. 14 and 16.”
”Sounds great.” Kates starts. ”Just make sure you don’t scare them like you did with America and y-” He quickly turns it off speaker phone and chuckles, a blush rising.