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Harley toddles through the front door wrapped toes to nose in knitwear mailed from Tennessee, and drops his shopping bags beside the door.
To hide the fact that his heart just melted into a puddle on the living room floor, Peter asks, "How was the holiday rush, duckling?" Then, because he realizes too late that it sounded like a term of endearment more-so than the mockery he intended, he says, "I mean dickling."
Harley shoots him a weird look from the narrow gap between hat and scarf. Voice muffled, he asks, "What?"
"Forget it. I made stew."
Alarmed blue eyes dart a glance at the kitchen, but Harley still makes no move to so much as take the scarf off his mouth. "Christ, why? Did I do something?"
Peter scowls. "What's that supposed to mean? Are you going to stand there all night or what? Your boots are puddling."
They aren't and Harley is standing on the doormat anyway, but it's only a matter of time and the sooner he stops looking all soft and adorable, the sooner Peter can stop thinking up insults.
"Means you're a crap cook," Harley says lightly, "and I don't deserve the punishment." He stomps his feet a bit and tucks his mittened hands in his armpits as he adds, "It's cold. I'm waiting to warm up."
"It's canned stew," Peter says with all the acid he can muster, "and it's seventy in here. I turned up the thermostat a whole two degrees for you. Didn't your mom teach you about gratitude?"
"Is it really?" He stomps his feet again, like he's trying to force feeling back into them. "Why's New York seventy feel like Tennessee twenty?"
Peter sighs and resigns himself to a miserable evening. He thought summer Harley was the worst he'd have to endure with those denim cutoffs and his boots and the tank top with the obnoxious arm holes. Autumn Harley was only marginally better with the endless flannels rolled up to show off bare forearms still freckled from the summer sun. Winter Harley was supposed to bring relief. He was supposed to be safe. No skin. No freckles. Just cold and slush and dark. Peter didn't plan for snuggly heat-seeking Harley. He wasn't braced for the impact of over-sized hoodies and mittens and fuzzy socks tucked under his thigh. He's unbalanced and extra guarded and punchy because of it.
Peter kicks free from the blanket on his lap and sets aside his half-finished stew. Over his shoulder, halfway into his room, he announces, "I'm giving you your present early."
"Wh— But Christmas is only two days away!"
Alone in his room, Peter pauses with the gift bag halfway out of his closet to imagine how it will go if he holds onto this gift and spends the next two days within the polar vortex that's churning over the city huddled against Harley to keep Harley from expiring like a lizard without his heat lamp and sunbaked rock.
Yeah, that's not happening.
"I'll make up the difference and give you next year's two days late."
Harley doesn't know it, but it's a minor miracle Peter 1) already got him a gift and 2) wrapped it. Or bagged it. Whatever. He used to be a last-minute scrambler and kept his Jewish heritage locked and loaded, ready to deploy as his excuse for forgetting if someone so much as glanced at him critically. The truth, though, is that since he became Spider-Man, he's been too busy to keep track of the passing days, and holidays—especially the non-Jewish ones—have a habit of sneaking up on him.
Not this year, though. He's had Harley's gift ready for weeks, waiting for the excuse (Christmas) to give it to him. Two more days is about two weeks too long.
Peter returns to the living room and finds Harley in the same state he left him in. Pink nosed and huddled on himself and adorable.
Ugh. Bastard.
Peter thrusts the gift bag at him and picks up his stew as Harley fumbles with the slick packaging and small string handles with his bulky mittens
"I really— I could wait until— I don't have your—"
"It's charged and everything," Peter says. "Open it already."
"Fine, jeez," Harley mutters. "Merry Christmas, I guess."
"Yeah, whatever. Merry Christmas." Peter crams a spoonful of stew in his mouth and watches from the corner of his eye as Harley plucks out a crumpled bit of tissue paper and peers into the bag.
"Oh. A blanket. Thanks."
Peter swallows, and a chunk of potato goes down hard. "It's not a blanket. It's a— a cape, or—"
"You got me a cape?"
"Fine, a shawl."
"You got me a shawl?"
Peter makes an annoyed sound in his throat and abandons his stew on the couch cushion to approach Harley. "If you'd take it out of the bag you'd see—"
"My mittens are slippy."
Peter swallows the animalistic keen that threatens his throat. His mittens are slippy.
"Then take them off, Harley." Peter pinches one and yanks it from Harley's wrist.
Harley snatches his naked hand back and holds it protectively against his stomach, but Peter is too far beyond his limit to so much as tee-hee at the scandalized offense on his face.
He plucks the knit hat off Harley's head next. Golden locks fluff free and static cling to wind-chapped cheeks.
"Gotta be fucking kidding me," Peter mutters to himself.
He reaches for the scarf next. Harley tries to fight him off, but his back is against the door and Peter is Spider-Man. He unwinds the scarf and while Harley is scrabbling for it, Peter grabs the zipper on his coat and rips it down.
Harley actually gasps and drops his scarf to cover himself with the gift bag despite the three layers of clothing Peter glimpses under the coat. This time, Peter does laugh.
"What the hell, Parker?" Harley swings at him with the mittened hand still clutching the gift bag and socks Peter's shoulder.
"You gotta stop going around looking like a big squashy igloo man!" Peter shouts, nonsensically. He gestures at Harley's coat, a normal canvas-like Carhartt, thick and designed for protection against the elements. "You look ridiculous."
"Because I dress for the weather?" Harley asks, incredulous. "Sorry I don't scurry around in a sweater and sneakers like you. Is that what you want?"
This wasn't supposed to turn into an argument.
"Forget it," Peter snaps. "Just take off your coat."
"But I'm cold."
"That's what I'm trying to fix, if you'd just—"
"You think your shawl is warmer than my—"
"Stop calling it that!"
"That's what you called it!" Harley exclaims, then laughs. Like this entire conversation is ridiculous. Which it is. He shakes his head and shrugs off his coat. "What wild hair crawled up your—"
Peter ignores him and plucks the shawl out of the gift bag. It's gray fleece and, to Harley's credit, looks like a blanket except with a single slit cut from the edge to the center, designed to hang around a human neck. Like a cape, or a shawl. Peter drapes it around Harley's shoulders and finds the power button on the front corner beside the pocket where the rechargeable battery pack sits.
"There," he says. "Merry Christmas."
"Oh," Harley says. "It's warm." He presses his cheek to his shoulder. "And soft."
Peter purposefully didn't get the blue one that would have brought out Harley's eyes, so it's a special sort of betrayal that the gray makes the blue of his eyes especially bright.
"Ooo," Harley continues, ignorant to Peter's plight, "there's pockets." He fits his hands into the corner pockets and wraps his arms around his middle with a content sigh as it heats up. "This is a great gift. Thanks, Pete. D'you want yours now? I'll have to wrap it."
Peter shakes his head, then turns on his heel and snatches up his bowl on his way to the kitchen, muttering, "Kill me. Please, kill me."
Harley follows belatedly—first, taking the time to remove his boots and store them on the rubber mat that contains the winter runoff. Then, to put away his outerwear in the closet by the door. By the time he joins Peter in the kitchen, Peter has two bowls of stew in the microwave. He keeps his hands on his hips and his stare fixed to the countdown as the bowls revolve in a slow spotlit dance.
"Hey," Harley says. It's all the warning he gives before enveloping Peter from behind. And he's right. The heated shawl, blanket, whatever, is warm where it settles around Peter, and soft where it brushes his chin. "How come you want me to kill you?"
Peter closes his eyes. "Get off."
"Tell me first." Harley locks his arms tight around Peter's chest, even though they both know Peter could easily break his grip if he really wanted to.
And therein lies the problem. Peter really really really doesn't want to. This—standing here with Harley pressed against him, microwave humming, snowflakes falling past the window—is the dirty secret desire he has coveted months, ever since Harley rambled into the city with his drawled y'alls and darlin's, and Peter's heart took a flying leap into his back pocket. They became fast friends early in the summer, and by the start of fall, it only made sense that they split a lease and share an apartment. As friends. Only friends. Except Peter doesn't want to be only friends. Except except being more than only friends only ever goes bad for him. He has too many responsibilities—too many secrets—and they have to be kept separate from everyone and everything else.
He learned the hard way—the hardest way—that letting people too close to Spider-Man ends in heartbreak. It's been five years since he last saw Ned and MJ. They'll be graduating from MIT in a few months and he's been torturing himself with the idea of going to the ceremony. He has four more months to agonize about it and still no clue which way he’ll land. He misses them desperately, but it's not like they miss him. Not like they'd recognize him if he shook their hands and told them he's proud and wishes that…
Well, he wishes a lot of things—mostly things that are flat out impossible at worst and contradictory at best. What he wouldn't give to turn time back a decade and—
The microwave chimes, jarring him from his thoughts and bringing Harley's chin—perched atop his shoulder—to the forefront of his attention.
"And he's back," Harley commentates softly. "How was the trip? See any sights?"
"Terrible," Peter says shortly, "and no." He wriggles and Harley blessedly releases him.
Peter collects the bowls from the microwave and hands the full one to Harley. "Drink?"
"A beer would be nice."
While Harley collects spoons, Peter grabs two bottles from the fridge. He only ever drinks when Harley does. Whether for show or solidarity, he's not sure. All he knows is alcohol doesn't really affect him much—for better or worse—so if Harley's not around, drinking is a waste of money.
"Wanna pick up where we left off?" Harley asks.
Peter follows him into the living room. "Sure," he says, but he doesn't remember what they were watching. It doesn't matter. What matters is the nearness of Harley beside him on the couch, the clink of another spoon against cheap ceramic, and the occasional laugh huffed out like a startled horse.
Peter watches the characters on the screen and gradually settles back against the couch and back into his skin.
Being friends with Harley, the only person who remembers him from before—not as Peter Parker, but as Tony Stark's intern who he long suspected was Spider-Man—is bearable. To not be friends with Harley is unbearable. He lived that for years before Harley finally caught up to him on patrol and forced a friendship on him with a battalion's worth of charm and persistence. Lucky for him, Peter was more than a little desperate for companionship of any kind by then. Years of social isolation will do that to a person, even if that person is Spider-Man.
It doesn't take long for cold toes swathed in fuzzy snowflake patterned socks to migrate across the couch and burrow under Peter's thigh. Harley sighs softly, content with his shawl around his shoulders and stew between his hands. Meanwhile, Peter's heart beats and beats and beats.
~*~
Peter doesn't know how long he sits staring at the silent TV after the show ends. He surfaces from his thoughts and it’s over, and just as dark outside as it's been for hours. Two empty bowls and a matching pair of beer bottles are set aside on the table, although Peter doesn't recall drinking his. Harley’s feet are still keeping warm under Peter's leg and he's watching him. Peter can feel Harley's stare on the side of his face. Thoughtful, he thinks.
"Hey, Pete," Harley says. He waits for Peter to look at him before he continues—something he's learned to do after many conversations begun before Peter was mentally present to hear it. "You didn't answer my question earlier."
Peter hums and lets his gaze drift back to the TV. It's easier when he doesn't have to look at Harley. Especially when he's all cozy and close and looking at Peter like he sees all the way through him.
"Which one?"
"About why you were saying to kill you."
Peter rolls his eyes and lets his head fall back against the couch. "I didn't mean it," he says to the ceiling. "Not like that."
"How did you mean it?"
Peter works his jaw but can't think of a good answer. "Forget it. I didn't mean anything. I was… annoyed," he settles on. "I was annoyed."
"With me?"
"No." He sighs. "Just leave it, Harley," he says tiredly. It's not late enough for how tired he feels. Normally, he'd be out patrolling, but the polar vortex is holding strong, keeping the wind chill deep in the negatives. Far too cold for crime. During the day, he can still swing around and help with dead car batteries and such—friendly neighborhood stuff—but at night? The streets are quiet like they belong to somewhere else.
"Hey, Pete?"
Peter lolls his head to the side to look at Harley silently.
"You know I like you, right? You know I— It wouldn't be weird if you liked me too."
Peter's heart kicks up to a curiously strong pace. "Yeah, pretty sure that's how friendship works." Although, honestly, what the hell does he know?
"More than friendship," Harley says, eyes steady. Tone, matter of fact. He's like this sometimes. Like everything is so simple and clear cut in Harley World. Like he can see the path ahead despite the waves and the deep and the crushing pressure. Or maybe Harley World isn't like that at all. Maybe that's just Peter World and everyone else lives under the sun with the horizon stretched out for miles.
Peter closes his eyes and turns his face to the ceiling. "Don't open that door."
"Why not? That's why you've been so prickly, right? You want to open the door."
"Doesn't mean it's a good idea."
"Why not?" Harley asks a second time. He gets like this. Stubborn. Determined to wring the truth out of him even though Peter would prefer to waterboard himself in the dishwasher. He's too tired—exhausted, all the way to his bones—to dive into all the reasons he's been repeating to himself for months.
"It's a bad idea. Just leave it, and for fuck's sake, cut it out with the mittens. It's making me crazy."
The couch dips as Harley leans forward. Peter cracks open a wary eye and finds Harley watching him, knees to his chest, toes under Peter's thigh, his gaze solemn and fixated.
"It's because of what happened, right? Whatever made everyone forget."
Peter hasn't told him the whole story—probably never will—but Harley dug up the crux of it in his search for Tony Stark's forgotten intern.
"Everything is about what happened," Peter says.
Harley's lips curl into a ghost of a smile. "Even canned stew?"
Peter's throat goes tight. Ben, gone before Peter was mature enough to pay attention to lessons in the kitchen, and May, a disaster cook on a good day—also gone.
"Yeah," he croaks. His eyes burn but, with effort, he forces back the tears. "Even canned stew."
"Christ, you're breakin' my heart, Parker. Get over here." Harley holds out his arms, hands still in the corner pockets of his shawl. He looks like a manta ray. When Peter fails to do anything other than eye him suspiciously, Harley rolls his eyes and dryly adds, "For a bro hug of friendship. C'mon. Any day now, darlin'." He wiggles his fingers.
Peter scoffs, but gives in. It's hardly the first time they've comforted each other like this. He used to get the same from Ned and MJ when the occasion called for it. It's different with Harley, though.
Peter crawls into his arms and the couch is barely wide enough for them both, but the shawl and Harley radiate heat and his head fits nicely below the hollow of Harley's throat, and maybe it's a bad idea, but it's hardly the first one Peter has acted on.
Harley kisses the top of his head and pulls his arms in tight before resting his chin on Peter's crown.
"For the record," Harley says, his voice a low rumble. "I like you alive. Not killed by me or anyone else."
"I know," Peter says. And he does. It's not the first time Harley has felt it necessary to voice this particular preference.
"And for the record," Harley continues, "I'm talking about Peter Parker, not Spider-Man."
Peter stiffens. This part is new. "Okay," he says slowly.
"I think you know how badly Spider-Man would be missed, but I need you to know Peter Parker would be missed too. Just as much. Maybe more."
Peter's throat goes tight again and his eyes burn, but this time a few tears slip free before he can stop them. He swallows. Then swallows again, but his voice still comes out choked when he belatedly replies, "Okay."
Harley squeezes him closer and buries his nose in Peter's hair. Finally, he lets the subject drop.
Peter stops fighting the tears and they soak into the shawl where, hopefully, Harley won't notice. His throat aches with the pressure of a sob caught at the last barricade he refuses to let fall. This is already more than he's let go of in a long, long time. He doesn’t know what will come out if he stops fighting to hold it all in.
Harley doesn't push for more. His piece said, he holds on and doesn't comment on the tears or the odd way Peter's breath shudders out of him after being held too long, or how when Peter sags into him it's with all of his weight. The night goes on and Peter's heart beats and beats and beats.
April
There's no reason for Peter to be standing on the lawn outside MIT's auditorium. Actually, there's one reason and his name is Harley and he's holding Peter's hand. But other than that, nothing, no reason at all.
"Ready?" Harley asks.
"Not even a little."
"Sucks, darlin'. Think they got concessions in there? I think I saw someone with a pretzel."
"If I eat, I'll puke."
"Not everything is about you, Parker."
Peter glares at him. He's difficult to look at. Turns out Spring Harley is the worst of them all. Today he’s dressed nicer than Peter’s ever seen him—solid ivory button-up that’s open at his throat, gray slacks, and chestnut loafers that match his belt exactly—but it doesn't matter what he's wearing. He unfolded from winter's gloom into a creature of sunlight, planting little shoots that root deep and grow towards his light every time he looks at Peter with that quiet joy in his eyes. He's impossible.
Harley catches Peter's scowl and grins, impish, before stealing a quick kiss.
Utterly impossible.
"Boring speeches are over," Harley says, "The even more boring diploma distribution is over. I'm afraid you're out of time to stall, hun."
"We should just go," Peter grumbles as people spill from the auditorium. He jerks involuntarily toward the parking lot where Harley's truck is parked on the grass for lack of an open spot, but he doesn't rip free from Harley's casual hold. "This is stupid."
"You said you wouldn't be able to live with yourself if you didn't try, so we're trying."
"I didn't mean literally, Harley."
"Well, I'm not taking any chances. Is that MJ?"
Peter's heart nearly ricochets out of his mouth, but the Black woman in the cap and gown that Harley is looking at is unfamiliar.
"You can't ask that about every Black girl you see."
"It's Ivy League," Harley says with a disdainful curl of his upper lip. "How many people of color do you think they actually let in? Is that her?"
Peter almost doesn't look, too keen to dive into a pointless argument that MIT isn't Ivy League and where did Harley get that idea, but then he does. Then he looks again because it is MJ and she's looking back.
His heart rate quadruples as she steps away from her dad and toward him—her expression familiar. Intense and curious and hell bent. Fixated on him.
"You," she says as she gets close. She stops several steps away and stabs a finger at him. "Is this the guy?"
Peter is thrown for a moment, but then Ned steps into his line of sight—pale and skinnier than he should be, but unmistakably Ned.
"That's him," Ned says without tearing his eyes off of Peter. "MJ, that's him."
Peter's knees quake and his grip on Harley's hand is tight enough he should probably let go to keep from breaking anything, but Ned and MJ are standing in front of him after five and a half years and they're looking at him like they know him. Like they remember.
MJ squares her shoulders and takes another step, eyes alight like they were the night she guessed he was Spider-Man on a hunch. She plants her feet and crosses her arms. "You're going to explain why we've been dreaming about you and we're not letting you out of our sight until you do."