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“Eat this.”
Miguel O’Hara, Spiderman 2099, is holding out a freshly peeled orange towards you.
“Huh?” you ask, mostly just caught off guard.
“There’s extras in the caf and they’re going to go bad if people don’t eat them, so take this one. Don’t make me say it twice,” Miguel says flatly. “I peeled it and everything.”
Does he seem almost petulant when he says that?
Nah, must be your imagination, yeah? No way he would get pouty over you not getting a daily intake of Vitamin C. You realize that as he’s talking, he’s holding a bag of oranges, and you almost laugh out loud with that realization.
But he’s offering, so…
“Okay,” you say, taking it from him. You raise a portion of it up to him, kind of like you’re extending a wineglass to him or something. “Cheers.” (He rolls his eyes.)
As you walk away, you pop one slice of the orange into your mouth. It’s nice and juicy, and you suck the juice from your fingers to relish the taste.
[…]
It’s an hour that you’re ashamed to say that you’re awake at.
In your occupation, it’s not hard to have nightmares. You rub at your eyes, resolving to maybe get a glass of warm milk and a melatonin gummy that’s coming way too late for your sleep to be anything but fitful.
You head into the cafeteria and find—
The kitchen’s light is on, casting a yellow glow into dark blue shadows.
Oh, dammit.
Now you have to make awkward conversation with whoever the fuck is inside. You don’t think you’re ready for that, but whatever. You press forward and enter the kitchen, squaring your shoulders to ready yourself for inevitable doom.
But it’s…
Miguel is cutting apples.
A truly obscene amount of them.
The circles under his eyes are dark as he works, his paring knife working slowly and carefully through apple flesh, cutting intricate patterns into them. Animals of all sorts. Shapes of all kinds. Checkerboards, swirls, rabbits, cats, maybe even a few spiders.
He’s fucking good at it.
Is there a single thing that he’s not good at? you wonder, trying to step as quietly as possible to get to the fridge and pour yourself a glass of milk. Of course, then there comes the problem of heating it up in the microwave… Miguel would definitely be able to hear—
“I can see you,” Miguel’s voice is tired.
Oh, right. The enhanced vision thing. You’d forgotten.
You abandon all pretense of being sneaky now, walking as casually as you can towards the fridge.
“It’s not good to stay up so late,” you say. “You need sleep if you’re going to have enough brainpower to process anything.”
Miguel scoffs.
He cuts another set of apples into sixths, beginning to dig his knife into the skin to carve out details.
“I’m managing,” Miguel says. “And anyways, why are you up so late? Ever heard of the pot calling the kettle black?”
“…” you find the milk, pouring a tall glass of it. “Touché.” As you set the milk on the counter, you begin rooting around for the honey, figuring that making the drink a little sweeter might actually make it something comforting.
A litany of all kinds of condiments lines the shelves—Spidermen, each with their own tastes, makes this a chaotic kind of melting pot, because some of the things in the shelves are packaged neatly in glass bottles, while other bottles seem to undulate and writhe with a will of their own, still others seem to only be acknowledged by an apparent void marking their location.
You can’t find the honey you like.
It’s just a simple one. Not even in a glass bottle— it’s just a plastic one, one of the honey bottles that are packaged like bears. You’d even brought it in from your home dimension, too.
“Where is that fucking thing,” you mutter to yourself as you struggle to hold in the desire to scatter all the bottles from the shelves. You need to find that honey or your day-night will be ruined. Whatever’s left of it, at least. Literally fucking ruined.
“Bottom from the right, third from the edge,” Miguel says, not even dignifying himself to turn around.
You find it right where he said it was, and you put it as another mark on the Fuck Miguel O’Hara Counter. As in, fuck him every time he’s right or ends up being ridiculously competent at something he has no right in being that competent in. (Including things like any motley combination of sports, acrobatics, and giving incredibly thoughtful gifts for birthdays.)
“Thanks,” you say placidly, squeezing out a good portion of the honey into the milk, stirring it with a spoon.
Miguel just makes a noise in response.
He’s still cutting apples.
You watch as he carefully cuts a rabbit out of one of the apple slices, adorning the ears of the rabbit with small hearts and a cute face. It’s a type of intricate, delicate workmanship that you would have never, ever expected from Miguel whatsoever.
You realize, and you hate that it takes you this long to realize, but the apples that Miguel’s cutting are the ones that show up in the cafeteria when the friendly cafeteria (also Spidermen) staff ask you if you’d like apple slices with your burgers or sandwiches or salads, or fuck, literally anything.
You’d seen a few Spidermen leave the canteen holding patterned apple slices, but you hadn’t really bothered to figure out where they were coming from—surely the chefs were just having a bit of a laugh, flexing their creative muscles or whatever—but no, could they really have all just come from Miguel?
“Do you just… do this every night?” you ask cautiously.
“No.”
Okay.
Well.
You got your answer, you guess. Too bad he delivered it kind of like an asshole, but what did you expect?
You peek over his shoulder to find that he’s working on something new.
He’s cut a half of a perfectly round apple— too perfect, maybe genetically modified?—and is now carving patterns into the crisp skin. He’s saved two dark seeds from the apple, and you realize as he assembles small, sharp shapes and a rounded teardrop that he’s…
“A turtle,” you say as Miguel places the eyes delicately. “That’s amazing.”
Miguel doesn’t say anything, but you think you catch a peek of a smile.
“My Aunt May used to make stuff like this for me,” you say, crouching down so that your chin can touch the countertop, and you reach a hand to poke at the turtle’s head. “Albeit a lot less cute and way more terrifying.” You laugh a little, despite yourself, thinking about the unholy concoctions she’d make.
She did her best.
You miss her.
“Uh huh,” Miguel says, and you know he’s not really listening, but you think you appreciate the fact that he’s saying anything at all.
“When did you get so good at this?” you ask. “I mean, hell, you could be a woodcarver or something with skills like these.”
Miguel shrugs.
“Lot of early mornings,” Miguel says, and his gaze darkens, and his fingertips seem to tremble, but it’s nearly imperceptible.
Oh.
“Keeps me busy,” Miguel continues, as if nothing had happened. The haze over his eyes clears a little as he continues to work. “Don’t think as much.” He returns to the apples, the pile almost done.
You take a sip of your milk.
You try to hide a loud yawn behind the palm of your hand, and Miguel seems unimpressed.
“Go to bed,” Miguel says. “Lyla will be contacting you about an assignment in the later waking hours. Best be on it.”
“Yes dad,” you say sarcastically, making sure to give him an exaggerated dirty look as you walk away.
When you wake up a little while later, you get a coffee, and when the Spiderman working the canteen asks if you’d like apple slices with it, for some reason, you take them.
You pick up one of the rabbits, and as you turn it in your hand, you find that you can’t seem to bring yourself to put it in your mouth.
[…]
Miguel’s peeling oranges.
He’s really good at that, too.
His claws, that you have only seen mangle the flesh of anomalies and a lot of surfaces, are working oh-so-carefully to scrape the white, stringy bits off orange slices.
It’s become somewhat of a ritual–when you can’t sleep, you find him here in the kitchen late at night, seemingly also unable to fall asleep himself. You watch his face, his brows furrowed in concentration.
“You’re good at this,” you say, and he raises a brow. “I–I mean, I don’t know. You don’t give off the impression you’re good at like, doing anything domestic. No offense.”
“... None taken,” Miguel says.
It’s silent for another moment.
“My brother couldn’t stand the piths of oranges,” Miguel says, and his voice adopts an almost instructorly tone as he gestures to the pile of white stringy orange bits– piths, you remind yourself–on the countertop. “So I had to get good at dealing with these. Otherwise he wouldn’t eat the orange at all.” He sighs, though it comes out fond.
“Ridiculous, though,” he adds. “The stuff’s not harmful.”
“It could just be the texture,” you say. “Once a texture is different, that puts me off completely.”
“I see,” Miguel says.
You reach out for an orange, rolling it in your hands.
“Mind if I help?” you ask.
“.. Sure,” Miguel says. “Help yourself.”
You’re no master at peeling oranges, but you generally get the job done when you have to. You set to work on peeling, but whether it be due to the fact that you’re a little too sleep deprived or the fact that your hands are suddenly not listening to your commands, you fumble the orange, and you end up puncturing the skin too deeply and the juice goes everywhere.
“Fuck!” you hiss, and you realize Miguel’s staring at you with a wry smile.
“Cabezón,” Miguel drawls, and takes the orange from you.
You watch as he manages to recover the rest of the orange you absolutely obliterated, placing the slices into a bowl. Your gaze lingers on small things—the cut of his cheekbones, his strangely long eyelashes, the faintest hint of freckles—
Oh, snap out of it, Jesus Christ…
“Thanks,” you say dumbly once you find your voice.
Miguel just makes a noise of assent.
You sit with him in amicable silence.
“Sour or sweet?’
You snap your head up as you realize that Miguel’s speaking to you, asking you that question–
“Uh,” you stop and think. “I dunno. Depends on the mood. Especially for oranges.”
Miguel nods.
“And you?” you ask.
“... Sweet,” Miguel admits.
“Huh. Didn’t peg you for the type to enjoy anything sweet,” you say. “Like, I thought you could even be the type to like bitter oranges. To match your dark soul.” It’s all mostly jest, of course, and Miguel snorts.
“No,” Miguel says slowly. “Sometimes, a little sweetness is… nice.”
He doesn’t say anything more after that, and you find yourself lulled into a soft sense of security, with him working at a truly obscene stack of oranges. You yawn a little, despite yourself, and you close your eyes.
The next time you awaken, you’re lying in bed with a blanket covering you haphazardly.
You raise your head blearily, blinking sleep from your eyes, and notice that on the bedside table is a plate of orange slices.
When you put one in your mouth, you find it sweet.
[…]
“It’s amazing how you’re this bad at peeling oranges,” Miguel says to you one night as you work in tandem with him through the pile.
“What? Noo,” you bite back defensively even as you burst another orange unevenly. “Oh, goddammit.”
Miguel laughs, and it’s a proper chuckle now. In the passing weeks you’ve known him like this, you’ve watched as he opened up to you—and today he gives you his laugh, a proper one that makes him scrunch up his nose and raise his shoulders up like he’s a shaking tree, and standing at 6’9”, he might as well be.
You find yourself entranced, staring up at him—
He takes the orange from you, still laughing, and peels it out quickly and deftly with his claws.
“Never change,” he says to you, and his expression…
It’s fond.
You laugh, more of a nervous reflex than anything.
“I’ll try not to,” you reply, your voice hitched.
You don’t really know how it’s happened, but he’s suddenly so much closer to you, towering over you. You blink up at him and your face feels hot, and you don’t trust yourself to know how much of it shows up on your face.
He seems to realize the situation he’s in as well, finally, and he parts his lips to say something, but then—then he just backs away, rubbing at the back of his neck.
You feel…
Almost disappointed?
“Sorry,” Miguel mutters, not meeting your eyes. “I… I don’t—”
You cut him off, leaning to kiss him on the cheek, close to his mouth. You pull back almost as quickly as you kiss him, and your face is burning now as you try to process what the fuck you just did.
Miguel is silent.
Why does that scare you more?
His face is unreadable, and he almost seems to shift away from you, his hand rising to cover his mouth, and then his eyes. You’ve never been good at telling what he’s thinking, but now even more so—
“Mig,” you say, despite yourself. “I—”
Miguel mutters something unintelligible under his breath—but he leans forward, a hand on your arm, and kisses you.
It’s quiet, chaste, and he pulls back after a moment that feels both too short and too long.
He looks intensely vulnerable at this moment, and you can almost see a flash of the young boy he used to be at some point in his life.
“I—” you both say at the same time.
Miguel shakes his head, and gestures for you to go first.
You swallow.
Okay, well. This has to be good. A good, convincing argument for why Miguel has to give you a chance.
“Do you want an orange?”
Oh.
That’s not it. That can’t be it. You’ve fumbled it. He’s going to call you an idiot, walk away, be turned off—
Miguel’s eyes widen, and then he reaches toward to sweep you up in his arms and you gasp out; startled and surprised but he’s laughing, his eyes squeezed tightly shut with the force of his laughter as he leans his forehead against yours.
“Never change,” Miguel says fondly, and his eyes sparkle with warmth.
Happiness looks good on him, you think. It makes his features more relaxed, the hard tension that he seems to keep within his chest dissipating.
“And, sure. About the orange,” Miguel adds after a moment.
It’s sweet and sour, this one—a sour punch before the sweet juice coats your tongue, and when Miguel kisses you again, he tastes like citrus and warmth.
[…]
Miguel’s paring apples. His knife glides over the apple skins, working his usual magic.
You’re by his side again, peeling oranges. You’re a little more competent now, and most of the time now, you don’t puncture the orange unevenly and cause the juice to go everywhere.
You’re no Miguel, but you’ll manage.
You’re surprised at his boldness sometimes, when he leans in to kiss you.
When he pulls back, he gestures for you to open your mouth, and when you part your lips, he pops an orange slice into your mouth.
“Hey,” you mumble through it, “that’s playing dirty.”
Miguel snorts.
“Just eat your orange,” he chides, going back to his apples.
It’s not exactly a confession, but for Miguel, it’s probably the closest you’ll get.
And the orange is sweet this time, too.