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We had no idea human torture could be so innovative.
“Oh my god,” Eddie groans. “For the millionth time, it’s not torture. It’s baseball. America’s pastime.”
American torture is innovative, then.
Eddie sighs and drags a hand through his hair. He's not sure why they’re even here. He’d had some vague idea that he could attend a Giants game, write something up, maybe kick start a new career in sports journalism. Jack’s job offer sat heavy in Eddie’s brain and he’d just needed to feel like he had other options. Or something.
Instead, it had been hours under the hot sun explaining the game to his symbiote and then listening to them bitch about it.
Baseball is boring.
Case in point.
Eddie rolls his eyes.
We are bored. That man is bored.
They gesture toward the right fielder with an inconspicuous tendril out of the back of Eddie’s hand.
People are leaving as we speak.
“Listen.” Eddie leans forward to snag his half-drunk, lukewarm beer out of the cupholder attached to his armrest. “You’re always begging to know more about human customs and shit.” He slouches back in his chair and kicks his feet up on the back of the seat in front of him. The stadium is dead, Venom was right about that, so he doesn’t feel like as much of a dick for spreading out. “And now I’ve brought you to the most human of all human things and you’re complaining.”
A tendril slips out of the side of Eddie’s neck and snakes up to tug on a piece of his hair.
You can’t lie to us, Eddie. We’re in your brain.
“Well, get out then,” Eddie suggests, tipping his head back to drain his beer.
More tendrils twitch out of Eddie’s skin, sliding across his scalp, soothing in a way that feels almost like a massage. He plunks the empty beer bottle into the cupholder again and tips his head back, letting his eyes drift shut as Venom’s touch dips under the neckline of his t-shirt and across his collarbone.
You would be a terrible sports reporter, Eddie.
“Why?” He asks, flipping his hand over on the armrest, palm up, waiting for Venom to twine through his fingers. “Because I’d be distracted by your commentary the entire time?”
A low, rumbling laugh rolls through Eddie’s head like thunder and he melts further into the hard plastic seat as Venom wraps around his wrist on the way to his hand.
No. Because you would hate it.
Eddie exhales heavily as Venom settles across his shoulders, pulling their tendrils out of his hair. He opens his eyes and sits up again. They’re right. He would hate it. But then—
“What am I supposed to do?”
You don’t actually want us to answer that.
“I don’t?”
No. Because you already know what you want to do.
“I do?” Venom wraps around Eddie’s torso under his shirt and squeezes. A symbiote hug. He absentmindedly rubs his hand across his chest, feeling them under the cotton. “Yeah, I guess I do.”
Eddie has known for a while that he wants the job Jack is offering. He doesn’t really care about the potential to reboot his show, but he does want to be an investigative journalist again. He wants to interview people and lose himself in research and uncover something that could make a difference to the community.
Call attention to where all the power in the city coalesces.
Expose corporations that taint the drinking water in low-income neighborhoods.
Throw a wrench into multi-billion-dollar development deals that will tear down affordable housing.
Eddie had become a journalist to do those things, but somewhere between his first byline and the first time he saw his name and face plastered on TVs across San Francisco, he’d lost sight of them as dreams. They’d grown into nightmares that were suddenly too big to control. Things with teeth and claws that dug into Eddie and drove him toward the next big source. The next big story. His next big break.
He wasn’t Carl Brock’s son anymore.
He wasn’t the guy that fucked up in New York.
He was Eddie Brock, and hadn’t you seen him on TV?
When did I become the thing that was being corrupted?
Now you’re getting maudlin.
Eddie huffs and squeezes his fingers around the tendrils threaded across his palm. When he bought the tickets online this morning, he hadn’t been expecting this conversation. But here it is.
Atoning for Past Mistakes 101.
“I really fucked up last time,” Eddie admits, watching the Giants stream off the field and into their dugout. “I let the story become the whole thing and I forgot…” he blows out a breath, chest moving under Venom’s weight. “What if it happens again?”
That’s not what you really want to know.
Eddie scrapes his teeth over his bottom lip in thought. He’s only half-watching as the batter stands in the on-deck circle with the bat squeezed between his legs, yanking batting gloves onto his hands. It’s an innocuous sight while his brain chews over Venom’s statement.
They’re right.
They know him so well and they’re always fucking right. He hates it, but it’s also exactly what he needs right now. And somehow, they know that, too.
“What if I haven’t changed? What if I keep hurting the people that are closest to me?”
Then you apologize, devour your enemies for strength, and adapt.
Eddie snorts out a loud laugh, earning a nasty look from someone several rows down because the first Giants batter just struck out.
“Maybe not that middle part.”
Venom tightens around Eddie’s chest, and he hears their voice in his ear instead of his brain this time.
“It bothers you that you hurt Anne and you can’t stop thinking about that when you think about the job.”
“You think I should tell Anne about the job?”
“We think you should talk to Anne about what happened whether you decide to take the job or not.”
Eddie opens his mouth to speak, not quite sure what will come out. “I don’t want to put any of the weight of this decision on her. That’s not fair.”
Venom slithers back under his skin, making a shiver race down his spine.
And you were worried that you hadn’t changed.
Eddie works his brain over that statement like a rosary. He wants to believe he’s changed. He wants to believe he’d never hurt anyone that way again. But he also wants to tell Anne about the job, and he can’t tell if that’s selfishness or prudence.
He knows he should apologize. He’s known it for a while, and he thinks (hopes) that’s mostly what’s driving him. To give Anne a real fucking apology. Something he hasn’t quite managed yet.
At first, he didn’t say anything because he knew that what he actually wanted was for Anne to absolve him of his wrongdoing. He needed her to forgive him and forget about it. And he knew that was fucked up, so he just hadn’t said anything. Even in the back of the cab, when Venom told Eddie to apologize because he was halfway to dead, he’d been trying to make her feel something for him.
It had taken a long time for that selfish desire to disappear. Eddie thinks maybe he’s past it now, but it’s also been so long since he fucked up that he wonders if bringing it up now will do more harm than good.
Jesus. Why is this so fucking hard?
Anne deserves an acknowledgment from Eddie that his behavior hurt her. He can never undo what he’s done, but she deserves—
An apology.
“Yeah.”
The sharp crack of a bat splits the air in the stadium, pulling Eddie from his thoughts. Well, the sound and Venom’s excited squirming under his skin.
Eddie. Something is finally happening.
The hit is nearly a line drive directly over the right field wall, heading straight for Eddie. His seat had originally been in the nosebleed section, but he moved down here when the score was still 0-0 after eleven innings and everyone else started emptying out. He hadn’t brought a glove and wasn’t prepared for the absolute rocket that flew off the bat toward him.
The scuffling of feet sounds from nearby and Eddie realizes that the remainder of the crowd are converging on him to catch the ball from the winning home run. He reaches up, snatching the ball out of the air, softening his hands as the ball smacks against his palms. A thin, black membrane flows over the ball, essentially gluing it to Eddie’s hand so it doesn’t bounce off and roll away.
He barely hears the disappointed groans and excited celebrations of the other fans over his symbiote crowing in his head.
We caught it, Eddie! Did you see that? We caught it!
Eddie looks down at the ball in his hand, rubbing his thumb across the stitches as the black membrane recedes, and lets a genuine smile spread across his face. He’s in a different place than he was with Anne, thanks in no small part to Venom. Maybe he finally is ready to make amends.
“You did, babe. That was amazing.”
Venom coils around his bicep, underneath the sleeve of his shirt, and squeezes.
Maybe baseball is not so bad.
Eddie laughs. “I told you. America’s pastime.”