Archive of Our Own

Spider-Man. The one and only superhero—an enigma who could crawl on walls, swing across skylines, and disappear into the shadows before anyone even snapped a photo. Kids adored him. Teenagers idolized him. The press tore itself apart trying to uncover the man under the mask. From the outside, it all looked like a thrilling game. But Neil Perry knew it wasn’t a game at all.

He wouldn’t call it “easy.” Not when the spider bite had rewritten the map of his DNA during a class trip to the Boston Science Museum. One minute he was looking at the handrail beside a radioactive display; the next, he was waking up with headaches, muscle cramps, and the sickening weight of something unspoken buzzing beneath his skin.

His father never missed a chance to sneer at the masked hero whenever his face popped up on the six o’clock news. “Stuntman in a Halloween costume,” he’d mutter. “He’s a menace. Attention-seeking freak.” 

Neil would nod. Smile, even. Bite down on the inside of his cheek until it bled.

It had been a year since Spider-Man first swung into headlines. A year of split identities, of missed dinners and quiet bruises, of lies rehearsed in the mirror. And Todd, quiet, sweet Todd, had become his most unexpected complication.

He was obsessed. Ever since Spider-Man had saved him from a runaway car downtown, Todd had been a little different. He kept a scrapbook hidden between his literature notes. Drew what he thought the hero might look like under the mask. Wrote poems about the silhouette on the rooftop and didn’t think Neil noticed. But Neil noticed everything about Todd.

“How can you say that? Don’t you like him?” Todd asked, his brows drawn together, half-offended, half-confused.

Neil shrugged, leaning back against the dorm wall, arms crossed in careful casualness. “I mean… he’s fine, I guess.”

“You guess? He’s a hero, Neil.”

“Yeah, I know that.” Neil met his gaze for a second too long before looking away. “But, I don’t know. Doesn’t he seem… pretentious? Maybe he’s doing it for attention.”

Todd’s eyes narrowed. “He can’t be.”

Neil wanted to laugh. If only Todd knew how right and wrong he was in the same breath.

“People don’t put their lives on the line every night just for attention,” Todd added, quieter now. “I don’t think anyone could do what he does unless they actually cared.”

Neil opened his mouth, then closed it again. He could still hear the shriek of that car’s tires, feel the weight of Todd’s body in his arms as he yanked him out of the way, too stunned to speak. For a moment, he’d forgotten the mask was even on his face. It was just him, and Todd, and the terrifying realization of how close he’d come to losing him.

“You really think that?” Neil asked.

Todd nodded. “Yeah. I mean… he saved my life. That has to mean something.”

Neil smiled, tight-lipped, trying to steady the twist in his stomach.

“It does,” he said quietly.

Todd tilted his head. “What?”

“Nothing,” Neil replied, standing. “I just mean… It does mean something. You’re right. I guess.”

They fell into silence for a beat, the only sound was the buzz of the old dorm light overhead. Neil’s fingers itched. He could feel his powers humming under his skin, a sixth sense always alert, always reminding him who he really was, even when he desperately wanted to forget. He glanced at Todd again. The boy who didn’t know, couldn’t know. Not yet. Maybe not ever. But something in Todd’s expression, thoughtful, curious, a little too observant, made Neil wonder if the truth was already cracking at the edges.

It had started to rain halfway through Neil’s patrol. Not the kind of cinematic, romantic rain that blurred city lights into soft watercolor streaks, this was sharp, unrelenting, slicing across his suit like razors. His fingers ached through the fabric of his gloves. He was perched on the ledge of a fire escape, staring down at a quiet street below, the city holding its breath beneath the storm. No sirens. No gunshots. No screams. Just the shiver of wind between buildings and the occasional flash of a taxicab's headlights.

Neil wasn’t sure if he liked nights like this or hated them. There was something about the stillness that made the suit feel heavier. He swung back to Welton just past midnight, dropping onto the rooftop with practiced grace. Peeling off the mask felt like resurfacing from underwater, his lungs burned, his skin itched, and the shadows of alleyways still clung to his mind like cobwebs. Quietly, he let himself into the building through the window of the tiny room he shared with Todd.

Todd was still awake. Of course he was. The lamp on his desk spilled soft yellow light over the pages of an open book, but he wasn’t reading. He was staring at the window, eyes tired but alert, like he’d been waiting for something. Neil froze for a second, unsure how much Todd could guess. His hair was damp. His jacket was an old hoodie pulled over the suit in a rush, but the cuffs still bore hints of red and blue. He caught Todd’s gaze for a heartbeat too long.

“You went out,” Todd said, not quite a question.

Neil nodded. “Couldn’t sleep.”

Todd didn’t respond immediately. He just glanced back at the book, turned a page he hadn’t read. “You’ve been doing that a lot lately.”

“I guess I like walking at night,” Neil said, too quickly.

Todd said nothing. He didn’t press, never did. That was the strange mercy of Todd Anderson, he always knew when not to speak.

Neil moved to the bathroom, shut the door behind him, and leaned against the sink. The mirror was cracked from an accident last month, one he never explained. He peeled off the hoodie, then the suit, piece by piece. The bruises were faint but stubborn. A yellowing one over his ribs. A scrape on his forearm. He washed them off like they were just part of the routine.

By the time he came back out, Todd had turned off the light. The room was quiet but still warm, still filled with Todd’s soft breathing. Neil climbed into bed, facing the wall. He didn’t sleep right away. He remembered the way Todd had looked at him earlier, concern without accusation, familiar and foreign all at once. The same way he used to look at Neil during those first months at Welton, back when Neil smiled too easily and Todd flinched at every raised voice.

That look hadn’t changed.

What had changed was Neil. The suit hadn’t made him braver, only more tired. Every day he had to be someone else: the son his father wanted, the student Keating had believed in, the friend who pretended not to notice the way Todd’s eyes lingered too long on him sometimes. And now, the hero people cheered for but never really saw.

It was all masks. All layers. And the worst part was, he didn’t know who he was under all of them anymore.

Outside, thunder rolled far in the distance. He thought about how easily he could tell Todd. He could roll over, close the space between their beds, whisper it into the dark: “I’m him.” Just that. See what Todd would say. If he’d hate him. If he’d understand.

But Todd believed in heroes. Selfless, radiant people who saved others without asking anything in return. And Neil wasn’t selfless. He was selfish. He wore the suit because it made him feel alive, because it was the only time he didn’t feel small and scared. Because in the suit, he wasn’t his father’s puppet or Welton’s tragedy or Todd’s best friend.

He was just something more.

So instead, Neil stayed silent. He watched the shadows shift on the ceiling. He listened to Todd breathing, and eventually, he slept.

The mornings after patrols were the worst. Neil sat hunched over a cup of coffee in the corner of the café Charlie had dragged him to, his eyes shadowed and dull behind his usual smile. The place smelled like burnt espresso and pine-scented floor cleaner. Some college-town charm or something. Neil didn’t really care. Charlie was talking, half-ranting about his newest LP and some man who didn’t get art or revolution or whatever it was this week, but Neil could only half-listen.

“You look like hell,” Charlie finally said, mid-sentence, flicking a sugar packet at him.

“I’ve been busy.”

Charlie leaned back, crossed his arms. “Busy climbing walls in the middle of the night?”

Neil froze. His eyes snapped up to meet Charlie’s. He just raised an eyebrow, calm in that maddening way he always was when he knew more than he let on.

“How—?”

“Come on,” Charlie cut in. “You think I wouldn’t notice? You come back to the dorms bruised and scraped and walking like you’ve been hit by a car. You disappear for hours. You flinch every time someone talks about Spiderman like they’re describing you in the third person. I’m not an idiot.”

Neil stared at him. Panic clawed at the edges of his throat. “Charlie, you can’t—”

“Relax,” Charlie said, leaning forward now, voice dropping low. “I haven’t told anyone. And I won’t. But don’t lie to me.”

The words settled like cold stones between them. Neil let out a breath, long and sharp. He hadn’t realized how heavy it had been, carrying it alone. He stared down at his coffee.

“Why didn’t you tell me?” Charlie asked.

“Because if I tell you, then it’s real. And if it’s real, you’ll start worrying. And then—” Neil paused, shaking his head. “I don’t know. It’s easier if no one knows.”

Charlie didn’t answer for a second. “You don’t get to say that when I’m the one picking you up off the floor with broken ribs.”

Neil looked up. That memory still pulsed in the back of his mind like a phantom bruise. A week ago. A back alley. A man with a gun and too many choices made too quickly. Charlie had shown up by accident, wrong place, wrong time. Or the right time, maybe. Neil couldn’t lift his arm for three days after. He hadn’t thanked him.

“Sorry,” Neil said, softly.

Charlie’s expression softened. “You scared the hell out of me, Perry.”

“I scare myself.”

Silence settled again, heavier than before.

Across the café, Meeks and Pitts were arguing quietly over a chess game, Cameron was quietly reading a book, and Knox was halfway through reciting poetry aloud to a girl who seemed far more interested in her girl best friend. Todd hadn’t come yet, he’d claimed a paper to write, but Neil suspected he was just tired of pretending not to watch him fall apart.

Charlie glanced in their direction, then back at Neil. “Does Todd know?”

“No.”

“Are you going to tell him?”

“I can’t.” Neil's voice cracked on the last word. He didn’t mean it to.

Charlie nodded slowly, like he understood too well. “You love him. I know you do.”

Neil didn’t answer. He didn’t need to. Charlie didn’t push. That was the thing about him, he was loud about everything except the things that mattered most.

“You could,” Charlie said eventually. “Tell him.”

“I’d rather he hate me for being distant than hate me for lying,” Neil said. “Or worse, for being… this.”

“This?” Charlie’s tone sharpened. “A hero?”

“A mess,” Neil corrected. “I’m not a hero, Charlie. I’m a kid in a suit who gets beat up and stitched together and comes home shaking.”

“Yeah,” Charlie said. “But you still go back out.”

Neil didn’t know what to say to that.

Charlie finally stood up and stretched, looking at him with something between exasperation and loyalty. “Well. Come on, Spidey. Let’s go pretend we’re normal.”

Neil followed him out into the morning, blinking against the sharpness of the light. The others were starting to rise from the table, and Todd caught his eye as they approached, he arrived there a few seconds ago, always looking for Neil. Just a glance. Just long enough to make Neil’s chest ache. He looked away. He wondered, not for the first time, how long he could keep walking this line between who he was and who Todd thought he was. How long before it all cracked open. But for now, he smiled. For now, he sat beside Todd and listened to Knox misquote Byron and Charlie start some new argument about someone he disliked. And for now, he let himself pretend.

The day was unusually warm for October. The kind that carried just enough leftover summer to make you think the cold wouldn't come. The Dead Poets had scattered after classes, Knox off to trail some new muse, Pitts buried in physics notes, Charlie allegedly helping someone with “political theory” (though Neil had his doubts). Neil had promised himself he'd rest. Maybe even nap.

But then he heard Todd’s voice. Low and sharp with that rare kind of energy Todd only used when talking about something that made him feel safe. Neil froze in the hallway just before entering the dorm common room.

“...I’m just saying, he saved my life,” Todd was saying. “I don’t care what the papers say. Spiderman’s good. He has to be.”

Neil’s breath caught. He pressed his shoulder to the wall just out of sight, guilt creeping up like ivy.

“You still don’t know who it was?” Meeks asked. His tone was light, teasing. “Didn’t get a good look at the guy?”

“I told you, he was just there and then gone,” Todd said, voice a little breathless at the memory. “I was, God, I don’t even know. In shock, I guess. It happened so fast.”

“Maybe you’re in love with him,” Meeks joked.

There was a pause.

Then Todd said, very softly, “Maybe I am.”

Neil shut his eyes. Something inside him twisted.

Meeks let out a low whistle. “Okay. That’s maybe parasocial.”

“I mean,” Todd went on, quieter, “Not like that. Or—I don’t know. Maybe. He’s just… brave. Kind. Always there when people need him, even when no one asks. I don’t think anyone ever thanks him.”

Neil turned his face toward the wall. His throat felt tight.

“Sounds like you’re describing someone else I know,” Meeks said.

Neil could practically hear Todd’s silence. The way he pulled inward when things got too close.

“Anyway,” Todd said, changing the subject too quickly. “Are you done with the Keats essay?”

Neil slipped away then, before he could hear more. He didn’t want to know what Todd would say if Meeks pushed. He didn’t want to hear himself compared to someone he couldn’t be. Not to Todd. Not when the truth would tear everything open.

Later that evening, when Neil was walking back from town, he saw the crowd before he heard the commotion. It was near the campus bookstore, sirens, someone yelling, people moving in the kind of frantic motion that always meant something bad had happened. Neil ducked behind a parked car and pulled his hood low, scanning.

Then he saw it. A truck, half up on the sidewalk. A delivery van, the windshield spiderwebbed from impact. Someone must’ve taken the corner too fast. There was smoke curling from the hood, but that wasn’t what stopped Neil’s breath.

It was Todd. Standing in the middle of the crosswalk. Frozen. Books spilled around him. The van hadn’t hit him, but he was right in its path, and Neil could see the driver struggling to shift into reverse, panicked.

Neil was moving before he could think. His backpack hit the ground behind him. He ducked into the alley beside the bakery, pulled the mask from under his coat. No time to suit up fully—just the mask and gloves. He launched himself up the fire escape, hands aching, blood roaring in his ears.

He hit the roof just in time to see the van jerk forward suddenly, losing its brakes.Todd still wasn’t moving. Neil didn’t hesitate. He leapt.

The air whipped against him as he dropped, web-shooters up, heart pounding. He aimed, fired, webbing snagged the front of the van, yanking it off course just enough. It skidded sideways, screeching as tires burned. Neil crashed into Todd at full speed. They rolled, tumbled, hit the sidewalk hard. Neil's arm cradled the back of Todd’s head on instinct. Pain bloomed across his ribs. The van missed them by inches.

Todd was gasping. Wide-eyed. Neil could feel the heat of his breath through the mask.

“Are you—?” Neil began, voice distorted.

But Todd was already nodding, trembling. “Yeah. I-I think. Yeah.”

Neil helped him sit up. People were yelling now, coming closer. He had seconds at best. “You need to be more careful,” Neil rasped, voice deep and strained.

Todd blinked. “I… Thank you. I… God, thank you.”

Neil nodded once, already backing away. He fired a web and shot up, gone in a blink.

He didn’t hear Todd whisper, “I knew it,” to the empty air. Didn’t see the way Todd touched the spot on his arm where Neil’s fingers had lingered for just a second too long. Didn’t know if he’d been careful enough.

It had rained that evening, and the bricks of the city steamed faintly under the night air. Puddles scattered reflections, halos of streetlamps, the flicker of neon signs, the washed-out red of a stoplight bleeding across the slick pavement.

Todd didn’t know what had made him follow.

It was instinct, maybe. Something buried deep and humming, like a chord struck low in his chest when Spiderman had disappeared up into the sky after saving him. There had been something familiar in the way he moved, in the small, unconscious care with which he touched Todd’s wrist as he helped him stand. The way his voice cracked—low, trying too hard to be something else.

Todd had felt it again. That ache. That pull. And so he ran. He chased the shadow along the side streets, darting across intersections with no real plan. His lungs burned. His legs threatened to give. But ahead, just ahead, he caught flashes. The red of the suit. A darting blur between the rooftops. A rope of web slicing through the dark, catching the edge of a fire escape.

And then, the noise. A loud crack , the sharp sting of shouted threats, metal on concrete.

Todd slowed near the mouth of a narrow alleyway, breath catching in his throat. The shadows stretched long here. The brick walls boxed the scene in like a stage, harsh yellow light from a swinging bulb lit the center. Three men. Armed. One with a crowbar, another a knife.

Spiderman stood opposite them, steady, breathing hard. His shoulder rose and fell too quickly, like he hadn’t had time to recover. Todd recognized the stiffness in his stance. The barely hidden tremble in his fingers. Whoever he was, he was tired.

But he didn’t stop.

The first man lunged, and Spiderman moved like lightning. He ducked under the crowbar, twisted mid-air, kicked off the wall. Webbing snapped, fast and sharp, a direct hit to the man’s chest, pinning him to the trash bins. The second swung wildly, knife slicing empty air. Spiderman dropped low, kicked his legs out, and the guy crumpled with a grunt. The last man turned to run. A quick shot of web roped his feet to the pavement. He fell hard. Silence.

Spiderman stood in the middle of it, panting, the steam from the street curling around his boots like smoke. For a second, he swayed. And then Todd stepped forward.

“Hey,” he said, voice gentler than he meant it to be.

Spiderman turned sharply, half crouched, defensive. His chest heaved.

Todd raised his hands slowly. “It’s okay. I just… I was walking by.”

Spiderman didn’t respond. The mask made it impossible to read his face, but something in his posture shifted, less alert, more still.

“You saved me,” Todd said. “Earlier. I didn’t get to thank you.”

“Didn’t need to,” Spiderman replied, voice deeper than Neil’s but not enough to be unrecognizable to someone who knew him, really knew him.

Todd took another step closer. “You always show up at the right time.”

“I try.”

A pause stretched between them. Todd looked up toward the fire escape where Spiderman had come from. The quiet buzz of city traffic sat low in the distance. In the alley, all was calm.

Then, softly, Todd said, “You’re not who I thought you’d be.”

Spiderman tilted his head. “No?”

“I thought you’d be taller.”

There was a pause. Then a faint huff of laughter beneath the mask. “Sorry to disappoint.”

“You didn’t.”

Spiderman turned slightly, hand twitching toward the wall, toward escape.

“Wait,” Todd said.

Another step.

“You don’t have to talk,” he added, voice quieter now. “I just wanted… I mean, I know what it’s like to have to hide. To pretend all the time.”

Spiderman froze.

Todd's chest was tight. His fingers curled into fists at his sides. “Sometimes I think people don’t really see me. They just see what they want. Who they expect. But then someone does something, says something, and it’s like…”

He met the masked gaze.

“It’s like maybe they do see you. The real you. Even if you’re scared.”

The air between them was thick. Still. Then Spiderman stepped back, glanced up toward the fire escape. “I should go.” He shot a web to the underside of the platform above, gripping it one-handed.

“Wait,” Todd said again.

He moved forward just as Spiderman lifted from the ground, hanging upside down by the web just to look at the boy who told him to wait again. The movement brought them level, Todd’s face near Spiderman’s chest, then just inches from his mask.

His voice was barely a whisper. “Can I…?” He hesitated.

Spiderman didn’t move. The rain-damp alley flickered with passing light from a car beyond the alley’s mouth, illuminating the curve of his lips through the thin fabric, the rise and fall of his breath.

Todd reached up, fingers trembling. He took the edge of the mask, pulled it just halfway up, enough to reveal the mouth, the jaw. He stopped, searching the exposed skin, that familiar shape of a chin he knew . His hand lingered there. And then, without thinking, Todd leaned in.

The kiss was slow. Unsure and breathless. Spiderman’s lips were soft, chapped at the edges, warm and trembling beneath Todd’s. The world narrowed, collapsed into the press of mouths, the warm mist of breath shared between them. For one suspended moment, neither of them moved. Then Spiderman pulled back, just barely. Todd stared at him. He smiled, soft, hesitant, heartbreakingly real.

“Whoever you are,” he whispered, “Thank you.” And with that, he turned and walked away, leaving Neil still suspended upside-down in the quiet dark, his heart hammering against his ribs so hard it ached.

Todd had never felt more like he was floating. Not in the light, airy, euphoric sense that people always talked about, more like drifting untethered, as if the ground beneath him had melted away, and he wasn’t sure whether to panic or fall asleep in the warmth of it.

He hadn’t slept. He’d gone back to his dorm at dawn, shoes soaked through, heart still pulsing with something like disbelief. He had kissed Spiderman . Kissed him upside down in the rain like something out of a fever dream or a comic panel that should’ve ended with a full-page spread and a gasp.

Except it had been real. And somehow, impossibly, it had felt familiar .

He kept replaying it, the awkward angle, the quiet between them, the shape of his jawline. The way Spiderman had frozen, like he wasn’t expecting it. Like maybe he had wanted it but never thought it could happen.

There was only one person that made Todd feel like that. He hadn’t said it aloud. Not yet. Not even to himself. But the truth was swelling inside him like a tide he couldn’t stop.

“What do you mean you kissed him?” Meeks nearly dropped the book in his hands.

“I mean,” Todd said, trying not to shrink into himself, “I kissed Spiderman. Upside down.”

Knox made a loud, incredulous noise, nearly falling off the edge of his bed. “ You kissed Spiderman ?”

“Jesus,” Pitts said, his tone half amazement, half concern. “Are you okay? Did he… say anything?”

“Not really,” Todd said. “I think I surprised him.”

“You think ?” Knox snorted. “You kissed the masked vigilante of New England. I think he’s allowed to be a little stunned.”

Todd sat with his knees pulled up on Cameron’s bed. They were rather close, he always thought Cameron’s dorm room was a safe space to talk about these kinds of things.

“Do you think he’s a student?” Meeks asked. “Spiderman, I mean. He’s too… lean to be one of the staff, and the way he moves, it’s like he’s used to crawling around here.”

“He’s definitely our age,” Knox said. “Maybe he goes to Jefferson or Briarwood.”

“Or maybe…” Pitts’s voice lowered. “He’s one of us .”

They all turned to look at Todd. He didn’t meet their eyes.

“Is that what you think?” Cameron asked, voice low and quiet beside him.

Todd hesitated. “I don’t know.”

Cameron placed a hand lightly on his shoulder, grounding. “I know that look. You do know.”

Todd closed his eyes, leaned just slightly into the gesture. They’d always been quiet friends, he and Cameron. Not loud like Charlie, not fiercely loyal like Neil. Cameron saw things. He didn’t always say them, but when he did, they mattered.

“I think I know,” Todd murmured.

The room went still.

Neil had been pacing for nearly an hour in the cave before Charlie finally showed up, hair still wet from swimming, the collar of his coat turned up against the damp chill.

“I kissed Todd,” Neil blurted, the second Charlie stepped inside.

Charlie blinked. “I beg your pardon?”

“I mean, not as Neil,” he said, rubbing a hand through his hair until it stood on end. “As Spiderman. He kissed me , actually, but I… God, Charlie, I didn’t stop him.”

Charlie dropped his bag on the rock ledge and gave him a long, careful look. “Do you regret it?”

“No,” Neil said too quickly. “Yes. I mean, I don’t know. He doesn’t know it was me. Not for sure. But I think he suspects. And now I can’t stop thinking about it.”

Charlie leaned against the wall, folding his arms. “You love him so much.”

Neil gave a laugh that was more of a breath. “Of course I love him. I always have.”

“Then what’s the problem?”

“The problem is I can’t be both,” Neil said. “He kissed Spiderman, not Neil Perry. He kissed someone who saves people and wears a mask. Not someone who gets forced into chemistry club and pretends to be someone he’s not around his own father.”

Charlie was quiet for a while. Then, with a shrug, “Todd isn’t stupid, you know.” Neil looked up. “He sees you,” Charlie said. “He always has.”

Neil sat down on a stone ledge, his shoulders sagging. “He said something the other day. About pretending all the time. Like he knew. Like he knows what that feels like.”

Charlie smiled, not unkindly. “Then maybe you’ve already told him everything that matters.”

Neil didn’t answer. His hands were trembling.

“If it makes you feel better…” Charlie spoke once again, patting Neil’s shoulder “I kissed Cam the other night.”

“ Excuse me ?” Neil almost yelled. “Cameron?!”

“Oh, so this is a safe space for you, but not for me?”

“You know it’s not like that,” he gave him a nudge, “I’m just… Surprised? Didn’t you hate him?”

Charlie just shrugged, “I guess not.”

The courtyard was gray and half-empty by the time Todd found him. The rain had stopped, but the trees still held droplets like pearls on their branches, and the grass gleamed with the soft weight of it. Neil was sitting on the stone steps near the chapel, pretending to read a book that hadn’t been turned in twenty minutes. He looked up when Todd approached, eyes wide, surprised, then guarded.

Todd sat beside him. Neither said anything at first.

Neil’s fingers curled around the edge of the page. “You’re up early.”

“I didn’t sleep.”

Neil nodded. “Me neither.”

Another beat of silence. Then Todd said, without looking at him, “I kissed Spiderman last night.”

Neil stilled. Todd turned to him, slow and deliberate. “I know it was you.” The silence roared in Neil’s ears. “I figured it out a while ago,” Todd went on, voice low. “Not just last night. You always disappeared. You flinched whenever someone mentioned him. And I kept thinking, he moved like you. Like someone I knew . Someone who watched quietly. Who carried too much.” 

Neil didn’t speak.

“I kissed you,” Todd said. “Because I knew.”

Neil’s breath hitched.

“I didn’t want to push,” Todd added, softer. “I didn’t say anything before because… maybe I thought if I did, you’d disappear again. But I wasn’t scared of you. I never have been.”

Neil’s voice, when it came, was almost a whisper. “You should be.”

“Why?”

“I’m not… I’m not who you think I am.”

Todd leaned in, just a little. “You’re exactly who I think you are.”

Neil looked at him, really looked. All the walls in his face cracked, not crumbled, but shifted , exposing the sharp glint of pain and hope and want beneath. His eyes were wet, not with tears, but with the strain of holding it all in.

Todd reached for his hand. Held it. And Neil didn’t pull away.

Winter came softly that year.

It didn’t crash in, didn’t sting with icy teeth or chase them into their coats with breathless urgency. It arrived like a hush. A quieting of leaves. A silvering of the grass in the early mornings. Breath turned visible. Sky bleached pale as paper. And for once, Todd wasn’t afraid of the stillness.

It was the first December in memory where he wasn’t waiting for something awful to come.

He still startled sometimes when a shadow passed his window. He still hesitated in crowds, eyes flitting to rooftops as if hoping, half-hoping, to see that red-and-blue silhouette flash overhead. And sometimes he did . Just for a second. A blur of motion on the corner of the gym roof. A line of web swinging across the chapel spire. Never enough to be certain. But enough to feel him.

Neil never said when he went. He didn’t tell Todd before he slipped out, didn’t make promises or leave notes. But somehow, Todd always knew. Maybe it was the way Neil would linger a moment longer after study hall. Or the way he’d look at Todd’s hands like he was memorizing them. Like they were a tether.

And Todd always waited. He left the lamp on low, pages of his poetry book turned but unread, half-listening for the window groan that told him Neil was home safe. Some nights he came back with bruises. Some nights he came back shaking. Once he didn’t come back at all until dawn, shoes streaked in blood, not his. Todd didn’t ask. He just helped him clean up and pulled the blanket over both of them, neither of them saying a word until morning.

And yet, they didn’t talk about Spiderman. Not really.

That was the unspoken promise, Todd had known , long before the kiss, and he hadn’t said a thing. Neil had waited , long after the kiss, and never ran. That space between them was full of unspoken things, and yet none of them felt heavy. They were just theirs .

When Charlie asked about it, Neil only smiled and shrugged. “We’re figuring it out.”

“Figuring what out?” Charlie grinned, nudging him in the ribs. “How to be a boyfriend and a vigilante?”

Neil flushed red enough to nearly combust. “I… He’s not… We’re not calling it that.”

“You’re literally sneaking into his bed at night like some kind of superhero Romeo , man.”

“You’re not the one to talk if you also sneak into Cam’s bed every night to beg for kisses.” Charlie frowned, ready to argue. “Did you think I wouldn’t notice that mark on your neck?”

“Bitch.”

“Jerk.” Neil rolled his eyes and smiled.

Todd, for his part, didn’t tell the others much. Meeks teased him for weeks. Knox tried to get the full story out of him one night in the library and nearly exploded from dramatic frustration when Todd wouldn’t budge. Only Cameron seemed to understand. One quiet glance and he’d said, simply, “You look lighter.”

“I feel lighter,” Todd admitted. “You too look better.”

“I guess so. Thanks.”

It was snowing the first time Todd kissed Neil in daylight. Not the upside-down adrenaline-fueled moment of confusion and wonder. But a quiet kiss. Real. Simple.

They were walking back from the town bookstore, shoulders brushing as they trudged through the soft powder building in patches along the sidewalk. Neil had insisted they go, even though the sky had already gone steel gray, because Todd had mentioned wanting a new journal and Neil had said, “Then let’s find you the right one.”

They took their time browsing. Todd picked one with a navy blue cover and gold stars embossed in the corner. Neil said it looked like the night sky had secrets in it.

They didn’t talk much on the walk back. The silence was easy. Familiar. When they stopped just outside the treeline near Welton, snow clinging to their coats and eyelashes, Neil glanced over and smiled like he’d been holding something inside him all day.

Todd leaned in, slow and sure.

The kiss was soft. No wind. No rushing. Just two boys beneath bare trees, kissing with mittened hands barely touching, breaths warm between them.

Neil pulled back first, forehead resting lightly against Todd’s. “You knew,” he whispered.

Todd smiled. “I always did.”

Neil closed his eyes. “You didn’t run.”

“I never will.”