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Harry's dead. Harry's dead. Harry's dead.
He tries to get used to that being said. Or it being true, is the more likely problem.
Spending the past few years with his once-best friend as his enemy should've made this easier, but that was far from true. Perhaps they had found solace by the end of Harry's time, but it had not been enough for Peter, not after he'd spent countless nights awake, unable to rest or feel at peace.
He channeled that energy into anything that could distract him. But even as he swung through the streets of New York, all felt different. Every petty crime he witnessed and stopped was not catalogued away as per-usual in his head, rather it was looked over and forgotten within a matter of moments. Questions from beloved bystanders went unnoticed as he perched himself atop buildings to overlook the chaotic city.
Would things always be like this, he wondered to himself. Would he always just be Peter Parker or Spider-Man, with no in-between?
Growing up, he hadn't been popular. Peter Parker? He still wasn't popular, or anything other than ignored, really. After all he's done in the past few months, anyone who did acknowledge him wasn't doing it for good reasons.
His actions were his own-- whether affected by that crazy alien goo or not. He knew that.
He also knew that Spider-Man was expected to be the good guy. No matter what, he would have to maintain the peace. This was written in stone from the very moment he saved someone. He couldn't escape it.
And he wasn't sure if he wanted to.
As dreary as life was, he could see a purpose in defending New York-- maybe beyond these streets, someday. There's an uprising, and Peter knew this--- it was not just Spider-Man; he was far from the only person in the world who'd undergone some tragic upheaval of normalcy. As he clung to the sides of skyscrapers, as he watched crimes unfold, he could see it all. The mutants which were rapidly increasing; the heroes that were coming out of their hideaways.
He wondered if he was just the first of many, and if someday Spider-Man would only be as notable as Peter Parker.
The both of them weren't so different, after all. Spider-Man was the same as Peter, and Peter the same as Spidey. Anyone could be Spider-Man, anyone could be a hero--- with or without powers. But if you put a mask on someone, they seemed to change. He wondered if one day taking off the mask would be futile, or if it'd be the other way around. In a way, it felt like he was losing his sense of self--- to an extent where he no longer knew who he was.
New York would be ever-changing, along with the entire world. You could figure that out by reading the columns in the newspapers and picking out what you wanted to believe. As every place is full of lies, it would be hard to know what was real or not.
Maybe, someday , Peter thinks to himself, we'll see a time when there's happiness for me and Spidey. But for now, the citizens call for me.
And as he put his faith, as always, into the powers he had developed, he started free-falling from the top of the building he'd been resting on, his webs slinging out in time to find him a point from which he could swing, and so life went on .