Chapter Text
Peter had never been particularly shy about his dynamic. But he’d never let it define him, either. He wasn’t some obsequist or sub’s rights activist, but he tried not to let anyone walk over him when he didn’t want them to.
That was quite possibly one of the most valuable things he’d ever learned from his uncle. For all that Uncle Ben was a bit old-fashioned, he never let anyone but Aunt May push him over, and Aunt May had always made sure Peter knew his rights, knew how to use boundaries and never let doms cross them without his permission.
Sometimes, though, Peter wished the lesson hadn’t stuck so well.
Like when he was getting beat up by Flash.
“Still not taking the picture,” Peter gasped, reeling from the punch across his jaw. He could hear uneasy murmurs around him, but however much it sucked to watch a sub get beat-up by a dom with serious issues, it sucked even more to be beat-up yourself. No one was willing to step in just yet...
...except Gwen Stacy.
Flash already had him by the collar, hand raised for a back-handed hit. Peter was bracing himself for it when a white-clad arm shot across his vision and a thin but firm hand wrapped around Flash’s fist.
“Back off, Flash,” Gwen said tightly.
“Why, is he yours?” Flash challenged. “‘Cause if he is, you’ve been doing a lousy job of keeping him in line.”
“I never pegged you for the type to beat-up subs,” she said, stepping forward and crowding Flash back. He let go of Peter to move back, though glaring at her head-on.
“...I’m not beating him up because he’s a sub-”
“Doesn’t matter,” she said. “You should know better than that. The rest of us do.”
There was a moment of thick silence as everyone watched the two doms facing off against each other.
Gwen, however broke the tension by stepping back, letting Flash move forward again - though only a little - as she said, “We still on for tutoring?”
Flash glanced around and saw the wary looks around him, and said gruffly to her “Your place, three-thirty?”
“I’ll see you then,” she said with professional cheer, only the slightest edge of dismissal in her voice.
With a frustrated growl, Flash turned and stormed off, and with a firm look from Gwen, the rest of the crowd dispersed.
For a moment Peter just stood there, flushed in the face, as the rest of the kids moved away. He spared a moment to hope this hadn’t scared the younger students, ones who hadn’t manifested yet, before he turned to Gwen and said, “I would’ve been fine, you know.”
“Oh, I’m sure,” she said. She started prodding his head and asking him weird questions, ignoring his indignant protests with an easy, “Relax, I’m just checking for a concussion.”
“It feels like aftercare.”
She only raised a critical, disbelieving eyebrow before finishing up and walking away, her steps punctuated with the sound of the bell ringing.
Okay, so maybe he had occasional obsequiest tendencies that make him smart just a little at her defending him and checking over him so publicly. But he wasn’t going to deny how nice it felt, either.
~*~
“Some jerk at school,” Peter said, pressing the frozen meat to his skin.
“I gathered that, but who?” Uncle Ben asked, turning on the spot quickly enough to splash water all the way up to Peter’s knees. “Something tells me you didn’t just get into a puppyfight with another sub. If some dom hit you-”
“It’s fine, Uncle Ben,” Peter said. “Really. I can deal with it.”
“...are you sure?” he asked. “Because once Aunt May figures out where that bruise really came from-”
“I don’t need another dom stepping into my fights!” Peter cried out, nearly dropping the steak into the water below.
There was a tense moment, then a slow smile spread over Uncle Ben’s face.
“I can’t say I agree with that,” he said. “But I certainly know the feeling. Fine, I won’t step in - but if this sort of thing happens again-”
“It’s fine,” Peter said hurriedly. “Seriously.”
“I believe you. Just make sure to remember we’re here for you - your Aunt May and me - if you ever need any help.” He patted Peter’s shoulder as he slogged through the water before and headed upstairs. “Now see if there’s anything else worth saving.”
~*~
Hearing the resounding crasssshhh as the backboard of the basketball hoop broke, though...not so much.
“Is it true, what I heard? That you humiliated that boy?” Uncle Ben asked in the hallway.
“...yeah,” Peter mumbled. “But this guy - he - he really-”
“Is he the dom that hit you?” Ben asked quietly.
“...maybe...” Peter mumbled.
Uncle Ben sighed. “Peter, when I said I’d let you deal with it, I didn’t mean this. Getting even is not the way to go about it. If he’s being violent-”
“He’s not being violent, not really, he’s just a jerk,” Peter said. “This wasn’t really even about getting even, he was harassing another sub.”
Ben raised an eyebrow. “And you didn’t think to mention this to the principal?”
“Geek student body secretary and dork photographer versus their leading basketball player - whose side do you think the school will take when it’s just our word against his and his team’s?”
“This kind of thing shouldn’t be tolerated - your behavior or his,” Uncle Ben said carefully. “Next time this sort of things happens, don’t do property damage or resort to humiliation just to get even. That leaves you no better than an abusive dom. You have other options and you know. Promise me this won’t happen again?”
“...I promise,” he said with a sigh.
“Good. Now, thanks to all this I’ve had to change shifts, so you’re going to need to pick up your Aunt May from work tonight. I don’t want either of you walking home alone in the dark.”
“Got it,” Peter said.
Uncle Ben was about to turn so they could keep walking away, before he looked over Peter’s shoulder and said, “She looks familiar.”
Peter turned and saw Gwen standing there with an amused smile on her face.
When Uncle Ben started going off about his computer and being his probation officer, Peter thought he might die of embarrassment (he did not, unfortunately).
It didn’t get any better when Gwen came up after Uncle Ben and said, “I had a...word...with Flash. I heard what he was doing when you started your schtick with the basketball.”
“You’re not my dom,” Peter said just a tad bit defensively. “Seriously, why does everyone else keep stepping into my fights?”
“Because we care about you?” Gwen offered.
“That’s not-”
“I didn’t talk about you,” she said. “I told him beating up subs was not cool, and he was on the fast track to ending up in prison done day for domestic violence if he kept that up.”
“We aren’t even dating!” Peter cried out. “No way you’d be this upset if I were a dom or if he were a sub, too.”
“Maybe I did that for his benefit, and not yours?” Gwen said pointedly. “Trying to stop him from ending up in prison, one day.”
Peter’s jaw snapped shut.
“Look, I’m not...I’m not trying to claim you or anything,” she said. “I like you. I want to look out for you. And Flash isn’t exactly my friend but I’ve known him long enough to want to keep him from ending up...well. I just want everyone playing nicely, here, that’s all.”
“...if he plays nice, I will,” Peter agreed a little reluctantly.
“That’s what I wanted to hear,” she said with a smile. She kissed his cheek and started walking away. “Seeya later, Parker!”
Peter reached up to brush his fingers over the warm spot on his cheeks where her lips had been.
“Seeya,” he echoed.
~*~