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Alright. It’s been decided. Tommy asks too many goddamn questions.
“What do you need Gene’s number for?” is his first response when Joel asks him if he still keeps in contact with an old employee of theirs.
The truth is, Joel doesn’t exactly want to explain why he needs Gene’s number because it has to do with the newfound partnership he’s struck up with Spider-Woman, and Tommy wouldn’t approve. Ever since Joel quit this vigilante business, Tommy’s been watching him like a hawk to make sure there’s no relapsing. This doesn’t quite count as relapsing, but it’s probably close enough to it that it’ll still make his little brother worry needlessly.
Joel skirts the question. “Do you have his number or not?”
“I do,” Tommy nods. “He comes out with the guys sometimes, you know, he’s one of Vinny’s buddies.”
“Great,” he says. “Can I have it?”
A beat passes where Tommy just watches him, chewing on a french fry rather skeptically, if that’s at all possible. Joel thought doing this over dinner at Tommy’s favorite burger joint would buy him some nonquestioning leeway, but apparently not.
“You hate Gene,” Tommy says finally.
“I don't hate Gene,” Joel tries to defend, though it sounds a bit flat.
“Last time you saw him, you fired him then threatened to break his jaw.”
He makes a face. “C’mon. That’s not fair. You heard what he was saying to Tess.”
“Oh, I’m not saying it wasn’t a just reaction,” Tommy raises a hand defensively. “Gene’s an asshole. I’m just saying, you ain’t exactly his biggest fan. So, I’m just wondering why you want his number.”
Shit. He really should’ve come into this conversation with a lie prepped. Tommy is as nosy as any little brother is supposed to be, and he should’ve been prepared for that. For all the shit he’s gotten into, he’s still a terrible liar. He usually tends to favor harsh glares and long silences in place of lies. Most people don’t ask too many questions if they’re scared of you.
Unfortunately, Tommy more or less stopped being scared of Joel thirty some years ago. Not like that, at least. He still says Joel scares the shit out of him sometimes, though for completely different reasons.
“He’s still in demo, right?” Joel asks.
Tommy nods. “Yeah. He’s doing that old high school on Adams right now.”
Good. Good. Joel was hoping that’s what Tommy said. Gene wouldn’t exactly be any use to him if he were demoing an old industrial park. Unless that industrial park happened to have a warehouse full of workout equipment. Or had some kind of martial arts studio in it. That would work too. A school is his best bet, though.
“I need a favor from him,” he explains.
“Shit, really?” Tommy snorts a laugh. “Joel, I hate to be the one to break it to you, but you ain’t in any position to be asking for any favors from him.”
Yeah. No shit.
“I’ll handle it,” he says. “Can I have his number or no.”
“Yeah, sure,” he shrugs. “I’m not sure you’ll get too far with him, but why the fuck not?”
“Thanks, little brother.”
“Yeah, no problem,” Tommy pulls out his phone, presumably to text the contact information on over. “Just promise me you won’t beat the shit out of him without me there.”
Joel rolls his eyes. “I’m not going to beat the shit out of him. Just asking him for a favor.”
Okay. That’s one problem down. He has a way to get into contact with Gene. Now, just to figure out how exactly to go about asking him for this favor. Joel ain’t about to go grovel or anything. Not to anyone, but definitely not to Gene.
And maybe he should also figure out why the fuck he agreed to help Spider-Woman in the first place.
——
Joel ends up having to grovel.
When he first calls Gene, the man immediately tells him to fuck off and hangs up. It looks like he’s still got Joel’s number saved. Still, Joel is nothing if not persistent, so he calls three more times after that. Each time, he’s immediately sent to voicemail, and after the third time, Gene texts him to fuck off. Joel decides to give up calling and text him instead.
Hey
FUCK OFF
I need a favor
Are you fucking kidding me?
You blew up on me and fired me for no reason and now you want a favor???
That’s rich.
It wasn’t for no reason. You got wasted and called Tess a frigid bitch after she refused to sleep with you.
Yeah. I know it’s not cool to hit on your girl and call frigid bitch but that doesn’t mean you fly off the fucking handle like that.
Joel is about to protest and say Tess is not his girl, but that is so besides the point. And also something he doesn’t want to get into. Not with Gene, not with anyone. Joel just sighs and decides to buckle down on apologizing without apologizing. He settles into the couch rubs at his face before looking back at his phone.
Look buddy I may have overreacted.
Thank God for texting. Joel never would’ve been able to deliver that lie face to face, but he manages to hit send on the text with only a little bit of contempt curling in his gut.
Can you help me out? I’ll owe you one
You gonna give me my fucking job back?
We got a demo guy
He sighs and blinks real hard for a moment, resigning himself to this. It’s too late to back out now. He already promised a stupidly annoying and bright kid that he’d help her out with all this vigilante bullshit, and there’s no backing down from this promise. He supposes he could always leave Gene hanging and find another place to get old computers and gym mats and other assorted materials from, but he probably won’t be able to find any of those things for free elsewhere.
But I can keep you in mind for our next job. Or in case our guy also has a problem with my girl.
It makes him cringe to hell and back to hit send on that text, but he does. Spider-Woman better be real fucking grateful.
What do you need buddy?
——
It takes Joel all week, but he manages to get everything he needs from Gene, and he starts to convert the top floor loft apartment into a suitable space for Spider-Woman to use.
He covers the floor with the old gym mats he got from Gene, and he managed to fight his way through setting up a computer in the corner. It should, if it works as he intended, surf the web and tap into the local police frequencies. Nothing fancy, but that’s all they need, and all he knows how to do.
That’s the hardest part of the whole thing, besides having to grovel to Gene. The rest of it—wiring in the new lights, boarding up the windows, installing the kitchenette, switching the doors to heavy duty steel, and installing new locks—all of that comes easy. It’s shit Joel can do in his sleep. He also makes sure to set up a decent medbay with the nurse’s table he snagged from Gene, and a cabinet full of just about all the first aid supplies he can get his hands on.
By the time it’s all said and done, he’s only got about fifteen hours before Spider-Woman is supposed to swing in for their next training session.
He would be more worried about putting renovation into a loft that isn’t his, but his buddy is the landlord, and he knows damn well that he has no intentions of finishing the loft apartment because it’ll make the property taxes go up. Or something. Joel doesn’t quite pay attention when he gets going about taxes and all that shit. He runs his business, and he runs it well, and he doesn’t give a damn about taxes beyond that.
Anyway, point is, Joel knows for a fact that the landlord will leave them the fuck alone up here. The man isn’t even in the country for most of the year.
Honestly, he’s more worried about the fact that he went this far for some kid he’s talked to all of five times. This kid has the potential to blow up his entire life. It’s all hanging on by a thread, and if she keeps swinging in like she does with those stupid jokes and boxes of donuts, he just knows he’s going to be fucked.
It’s too late to just cut contact, though. She knows where he lives. They made plans to meet up again. He also really can’t bear the thought of her doing this on her own.
Joel can’t help but think of what he went through. Doing what he did, what she’s chosen to do, it’s…it’s so fucking lonely.
It’s the kind of lonely that’ll kill you before the job ever gets a chance to. It’s expansive and terrible and all encompassing because half of your life is being hidden from those you care about. Even if they know, it doesn’t really matter. They don’t know . They aren’t there. They’re still sitting on the sidelines.
Living a double life is supposed to mean two lives, but no one ever tells you that it doesn’t mean that. It’s like living two half lives. No—that’s not quite right because the vigilante side is always taking from the civilian side, like some kind of fucked up conjoined twin who’s stealing all the nutrients and shit. Being a vigilante is a life and a half, but with all that extra life comes a whole lot of extra pain.
Joel doesn’t want that for anyone, but he certainly doesn’t want it for this kid. He doesn’t want this life to steal her light and break her spirit the way it seems to break everyone. He barely knows her, but he wants better for her. He’s going to fight tooth and nail to make sure she gets something better than he ever did.
Joel wipes the sweat off his brow and looks around the loft he just spent the past week converting into a suitable homebase for Spider-Woman.
Yeah. Maybe he’s a little fucked already.