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Ned has been her best friend since junior year of high school so she doesn’t mind entertaining his various monthly parties. She likes to avoid the one at Christmas for reasons she never likes to talk about, mainly including and excluding various family members - but it’s Ned. And he has steadily introduced her to all of his friends over the course of the last few years and it turns out Ned Leeds has good taste. And there’s another one he’d like her to meet - so here she is. Looking at the side of Peter’s face trying to work out why he’s wearing such an ugly jumper. Ned’s email didn’t say anything about ugly jumpers.
She wasn’t aware of there being any dress code to be truthful, but she’s glad to be in skin-tight jeans and a silky green vest, which yes is cold, but also has tiny mistletoe on so - Christmas appropriate without the ugly fluffy jumper. She's not sure she could pull it off like him.
She’s spending too long looking at the shape of his mouth - working out whether or not it will fit against hers in the way she hopes it will. Ned had already pre-warned her that he’s attempting to set her up with his friend, Peter. She was annoyed for the three weeks it took for the party to arrive but now she’s here and she can see the way Peter’s ugly Christmas jumper is stretching over his chest so she forgives him a little bit.
Looking away from Peter she takes in the decoration of Ned apartment. There’s a small tree in the corner with the baubles that she and Ned make every year - she smiles at that. There are millions of lights around the entire living room/kitchen combo and it’s the first time this year she’s felt Christmassy.
“Looks cute in here-” she says to Ned as he takes her coat, clearly about to thank her “-Where’s Betty so I can tell her?” she continues smugly as Ned glares at her.
“Hey - the lights were me MJ!” He says as he hangs her coat on the hanger that has a Christmas hat on top - cute.
Doing the rounds to say hi to everyone at the party is almost tiring - does everyone have to be in a couple? The whole, I’m setting you up with a friend, was barely acceptable when she thought there were numerous options here - but it turns out, just her and Peter. Fabulous.
“Peter, c’mere!” Ned bellows and she watches as Peter winces and turns around to see her, presumably for the first time. His eyebrows shoot so far into his dreamy hairline she’s surprised they don’t get lost - she’s not mad about it.
He comes over but looks increasingly more uncomfortable the closer he gets. He smiles tightly at her but doesn’t offer his hand or anything in a way of greeting and she can’t figure out why Ned would want to set her up with him. If anyone knows her it’s Ned Leeds - so maybe it’s Peter he’s got all wrong.
He said he’s been talking about her for weeks and Peter has been super keen, which initially put her off but then she settled down and decided that someone is excited to meet you was a good thing.
They both settle with their backs against the kitchen worktop facing into the living room, clearly not there with each other but still the only single ones so it makes sense for them to congregate.
“So how did you get dragged into this?” She asks, hoping he doesn’t notice the way her heart beats faster when he looks directly at her.
“Ned asked me a couple of weeks back-” he takes a swig of his drink mid-sentence which she should find weird, but for some reason is only interested in the taut muscles in his neck “-said he needed a wingman because he was into Betty.” He smiles quickly as he finishes the sentence, clearly thinking the same thing she is.
“But they’re together?” She says leaning slightly closer to him through no fault of her own - her body just gravitates towards him. She watches as he tenses as if she’s spooked him, so she backs up a bit.
“Er - yeah.” He replies seemingly disinterested. She’s not upset about it like she barely knows him - but he is cute and he is the only other single person at this party. She can third wheel though, Ned and Betty are cute, maybe she’ll go over there. Or there’s Brad and Harry in the corner, also very cute. Maybe they’d be interested in - nevermind.
“Okay, well. Gunna, go mingle.” She says to the side of his face as he looks anywhere but at her. She watches him nod while looking at his beer bottle and tries to stifle an eye roll at how unreasonably rude he’s being - she’s not sure it works.
Walking over to anyone else she tries to think about why he’s so put off talking to her. She wasn’t overly flirty - maybe a bit in tone but you can play that off. Really she was just making small talk. Does she smell? It’s doubtful she has great personal hygiene. Throwing herself onto the couch next to Cindy she tries to remember this is a party, and that he doesn’t matter.
“You good, girl?”
“Yeah - sorry. Just feeling a little like a thirteenth wheel over here.” She says with a smile she hopes conveys that she’s simultaneously joking and one hundred percent serious.
“Peter… is single too,” Cindy responds with a not so subtle look towards where she just came from. She looks over and Peter is blushing furiously as if he can hear them. Great, now she’s mad that she finds it cute.
“Mmm - he doesn’t think I’m worth talking to, and I’ve had too bad a week to force conversation on someone that can’t even look at me.” She says with more fury than she meant to let out. Chancing another look over and he’s already looking at her. Like he can hear her, to be fair she wasn’t trying to whisper but she also doesn’t want to create a scene. That’s not what she finds strange. It’s the look on his face - like he heard and she’s wrong. Michelle isn’t used to being wrong, especially not when the facts are right in front of her. So she turns away again.
“Game? Specifically a drinking one?” She asks Cindy and watches as she beams at her and starts to gather everyone around.
Settling back into the sofa with a full glass of margarita - yes it’s a holiday drink leave her alone - she looks around the group and hopes to death that it doesn’t end up being a partner game. She listens as Cindy explains for a good four minutes the rules of how to play, ‘truth or dare’. Rolling her eyes as Peter double-checks whether or not you can skip questions you don’t want to answer. It’s not like she’s planning on asking him why he can’t stand her - she has some pride. Maybe after two more drinks though, who knows.
“Okay. MJ - truth or dare?” Cindy asks her with a glint to her eye she doesn’t enjoy.
“Truth.” She replies with a lift to her chin. Cindy knows a lot about her, but she’s not that buzzed now so she won’t -
“Who’s the most attractive person-” oh for fuck sake, well at least she can say Felicia “-sorry. Who’s the most attractive man , here.” She glares so hard she’s pretty sure the glass in Cindy’s hand is about to shatter. She could lie. But she’s not a liar. So she takes a large gulp of her margarita, swallows it along with her pride as she says,
“Peter.” It gets the reaction she expected from everyone except the guy himself. Who looks shocked and a divine shade of pink. What? Just because he doesn’t want to talk to her doesn’t mean she’s going to lie - why would you even play the game?
She rolls her eyes again because she suddenly feels embarrassed that someone might ask him the same question and then look at her with pity when he says someone else (Felicia, everyone would say Felicia). She tries to remember she’s twenty fucking seven and she doesn’t care if the hot guy doesn’t think she’s attractive - this isn’t high school.
Thankfully everyone moves on and there are a few boring rounds - no one quite drunk enough to go for a dare. Cindy is sending what she thinks are inconspicuous eye signals to Ned and she has to hold back her nth eye roll of the night.
“Er - truth.” She hears Peter stutter out from across the room. Looking over she’s annoyed at herself for the stirring in her gut at the way his forearms look when he’s tensed like he is.
She’s pulled out of her daydreams about pinning him against a wall by Ned humming happily and saying, “Who do you think is the most attractive girl, sorry, woman?-” he throws sheepish glances around the room “-Here?” Downing the last of her margarita, she almost coughs it back up when she hears his reply.
“Michelle.”
She kicks Cindy’s shin when it seems like she’s about to start something - which has the desired effect and she snaps her mouth shut with an audible pop.
“More alcohol?” She says getting up without waiting for an answer. She mixes another jug of margarita while thinking about what on earth is up Peter’s ass. If he thinks she’s the most attractive one there, not that she cares, why is he so set on not talking to her? They don’t have to hook up, they could be friends. Is her personality so standoffish that their almost immediate conversation has him running for the hills? Annoyed at herself again for falling back into the insecurities she had in high school, she grabs the jug and returns to the sofa.
“Flash, no one cares about the avengers anywhere near as much as you!” Lucy shouts across the room, leaning back into the crook of Cindy’s arm - MJ knowing this is a sign that they’re well on their way to being drunk . She smiles at them not noticing the way Peter has been staring at her since she got up to make a drink.
“Okay, listen. Let’s go-” Flash says hiding a burp behind his hand “- I wanna know everyone’s favourite Avenger.” Everyone seems pretty keen to start shouting out so she waits for the inevitable whistle from Cindy.
“Hey-” a wolf whistle this time “-orderly fashion, I’ll go first. Scarlet Witch.” She listens to them all with varying degrees of disdain - she’s never been one for The Avengers. Far too much damage but then again they did save the world so she has trouble voicing these opinions too much. Then all eyes are on her.
“Spider-Man.”
The only thing she notices when people start shouting at her saying that Spider-Man doesn’t count - is Peter. He’s pretty much the only person she’s been focused on for the entire evening - but there’s something about the look in his eyes. Like he’s desperate to talk to her - like he needs to know what she’s thinking.
Shaking her head a little to free herself from whatever spell he has her under, she zones in on a question from Ned.
“Spider-Man? I thought you didn’t like him?” He says with such urgency she’d think he was Spider-Man. She knows he's not, she knows everything about him. He knows everything about her too - so she knows he knows she has a lot of love for the wall-crawler.
“I love Spidey,” she says nonchalantly, shrugging her shoulders and sipping her drink. She’s not lying, she does like him! But all the eyes being on her is a lot right now - one set in particular.
“Yeah?” She hears Peter say from across the room. Like her answer means something to him. Like he cares.
“Yep.” She says quickly so she can turn her head and stop looking at his ridiculous puppy face. Just because he’s cute doesn’t negate that fact that he’s treated her like trash all evening.
The conversation disperses into talks of another game - dares. As if that wasn’t what they were just playing and no-one was drunk enough to embarrass themselves in front of anyone. As if they’re 12, not 27. She agrees anyway. She’s on her fourth margarita and should definitely swap it out for water.
There are a few rounds with people being dared to do boring things like updating their Twitter bio (Flash), text their mum something rude (Abe) and down their drink (Ned). Although it’s her turn next and she’s half glad she finished most of her drink and half-mad she didn’t. She’s going to need to be much drunker than this to finish the rest of the party.
“MJ!” She looks over to Ned who is bellowing her name and he looks like a child at a candy store.
“Yes, Nedward?”
“I dare you, ouch- ” he gets hit by Peter and she’s pretty sure she knows where this is going and fuck Ned truly “-to kiss Peter.” She takes a deep breath, watches as Peter turns beet red, gets mad at herself that she doesn’t hate it. She stands up because Mama didn’t raise a quitter, and walks over to where Peter is sitting on a barstool whispering ‘I didn’t hit you that hard’ to Ned who is definitely bruising.
Ned moves away and ushers everyone to spin around so they’re not all staring and she's utterly mortified. She tried flirting with him earlier - and he turned her down, couldn’t even look at her. And now Ned has gone and called her bluff on being a badass and now she’s going to have to kiss him.
She must show the turmoil on her face because Peter lightly holds her forearm to get her attention.
“Hey - it’s just… it’s a game we… if you don’t want - we don’t have to do this.”
“It’s fine - but if you don’t-” she’s cut off by him pulling her between his legs, eyes flitting between her lips and her eyes in question. She leans in while placing her hands on his chest.
The kiss is soft, and she’s enraged with how good it feels to be pressed against his body. It only lasts a few seconds before she pulls back and opens her eyes to find him looking at her as if she hung the moon for him. His hands are still lightly holding her at her waist and instead of letting go like she thought he would - he moves one hand to the side of her neck - thumb rubbing up and down her throat in a way that makes her clench her thighs together.
He leans back in, kisses her once quickly like he can't help himself but then pulls back as if he’s nervous. He should be nervous, she’s got no idea what’s going on. She doesn’t move away though.
She has her hands intertwined behind his neck, lightly playing with the hair at the nape while Peter asks Ned to turn the music up and get the group to do something other than just sitting around silently. She notices Peter tenses and his grip on her throat tightens ever so slightly when the pads of her fingers run down behind his ear - she’s not mad at it.
“Erm - so-” he starts.
“Yeah, care to explain? Why were you acting as if I asked for your kidney earlier?” She says in a way which is meant to be scathing but comes out as breathy as the thumb at the waist starts to move.
“What?” He replies so high pitched she’s surprised she could hear it, “Weird? Me?”. She goes to move her hands because honestly at this point she’s just going to go home, strong shoulder muscles be damned.
“No, wait-” he says moving his hands to lightly grip her wrists, “-I’m sorry. I just - fuck. Can we talk on the roof? It’s kinda private.” She’s not sure, it’s cold, it’s dark, she’s not interested in listening to some lie he’s concocted on the way up the stairs - but then she looks at him and he looks so sad. She’s not sure why -it’s not her fault he was rude. She gives a nod and moves back so he can get off the stool.
The walk to the roof is one the more awkward things she’s ever done - but it helps that Peter looks like he’s about to puke, so she’s not alone.
“So?” She says pushing her hands further into her coat pockets when they’ve been staring at the skyline that disappeared in the darkness about three hours ago - for over five minutes. She watches him tense and he clenches his jaw so tightly she thinks he might hurt himself.
“Look - it’s whatever… we don’t know each other, you clearly don’t want to know-”
“You’ve been all I can think about for weeks.” She’s taken aback by the fact that he’s talking and about the fact that she’s never met him before.
“I’m not - I’m not a stalker or anything. I just, fuck-” she watches as he weighs up what to say “-I saved - no, no, sorry - I watched Spider-Man save you.” He says with so much emotion in his eyes she takes too long to take in what he’s telling her. The secret he’s sharing with her.
“You’re Spider-Man?”
“Nonono - I watched-” she raises her eyebrow at him, does he think she’s stupid? He literally just told her it was him and then very badly lied about it.
“I won’t tell anyone - I promise. Ask Ned, I am a good secret keeper.” She says quietly. She really doesn’t like it when he lies to her and she can’t figure out why she cares.
“I didn’t know who you were, when I saved you, obviously-” he starts off slowly “- but you were so mad at me that night - so I knew you didn’t like me already and it felt manipulative to talk to you tonight knowing what I knew. I didn’t - I don’t-” he cards his fingers through his hair in a way which reminds her of the masked superhero “-I - you've been on my mind consistently. And there was nothing I could do. I mean you hate me and -”
“I don’t hate you.”
“What?”
“You. Spidey-” he rolls his eyes at the name but she’s pretty sure it’s going to stick “-why do you think I hate you?”
“Well, you shouted at me and hit me the entire time it took me to swing you four blocks and then ran off when I put you on the ground. So-”
“Dumbass.” He looks a little surprised at her semi-rude comment. Eyebrow raised, she decides she should explain.
“I’ve never swung through the city on webs before and I’m pretty sure I was only shouting because my eardrums burst. It wasn’t at you.” She says lightly grazing his wrist with her fingers.
“Do you know what I was running from?” The confusion etched on his face suggests that he doesn’t. Michelle has tried really hard to forget the events which could have been that night before Peter had come to her rescue. So she attempts to speak around the lump in her throat, hoping she’s over crying about it every time it crosses her mind.
“I was - there was-” clearing her throat she continues “-there was like four of them and-”
His arms are around her before she can finish the sentence.
“Sorry, I’m so sorry - shit. I shouldn’t have just grabbed you like that. You were - you were just running and you looked scared and I-”
“Peter, it’s not your fault.” She says pulling back to look at him, “really. Thank you. I didn’t know I’d given you such a bad impression of me.”
“It wasn’t bad - I don’t think I’d be capable of thinking about you in a bad way, Michelle. I just - God, you're perfect. Not just you now-" he waves his hands up and down "-Ned talks about you all the time. You sound- I want. I was just gutted that if I spoke to you the way I wanted to tonight… it was only going to end badly for me. I'm really sorry, Michelle."
"MJ." He cocks his head in an infuriatingly adorable way.
"My friends call me MJ." His answering smile takes up his entire face and she can feel herself mirroring his expression.
"What do your boyfriends call you?" He says with a cockiness she didn’t know he has and also does not hate, pulling her towards him by her waist.
She rolls her eyes because come on. But it’s Christmas. And anything can happen at Christmas time.
"I dunno, Spider-Man -” she says against his lips ”- you tell me.”