Chapter Text
May Parker didn’t “get to know people”. She studied them, the way a meterologist studies weather patterns, the way a cardiologist measures the rhythm of an uneven heartbeat — with an eye out for change.
It was why Peter couldn’t go five minutes after getting home before May clocked that he’d had a bad day; it was why Tony’s best efforts couldn’t hide a stressful week even over the phone. Ned collected stories of her observations like an apostle compiling miracles — the day he’d tried a new shampoo for the first time and May complimented it the moment she greeted him, the day Flash got detention and May figured it out just from the slight smirk on MJ’s face when May came to pick up Peter from school. The list went on. How Peter had hidden Spider-Man from her for any length of time was anybody’s guess.
“I think she just thought I was doing drugs,” Peter whispered to Harley, by way of explanation.
“Metal,” was Harley’s sole reply.
All this to say, May was…and she called herself this with a blush of embarrassment, blaming her anxiety…a “noticer”.
Perhaps that was why she made Harley so nervous.
~~~
“Get an internship with Tony Stark, they said. It’ll be fun, they said. They didn’t mention the fucking pranks,” Harley grumbled. He and Peter had been cleaning up the scummy remnants of a perhaps-not-entirely-unintentional chemical explosion for the better part of an hour, with scant help from Tony.
“Didn’t they? I feel sure it was in the orientation.” Tony spun his chair to face a different monitor at another desk. Harley felt sure he was on Tumblr. “Besides, you left yourself wide open by not following safe lab procedures.”
“Could’ve been worse,” Peter said, with a very knowing look.
“Stop looking so wise for no reason.” Harley flicked a wet rag at Peter’s head, which Peter easily dodged. “I followed proper lab procedure or whatever, I just don’t see the point of putting on gloves every time.”
“Which is why…” Tony’s chair spun too far and a moment passed while he waited for it to circle back around. “Which is why I gave you the opportunity to form a core memory around not wearing gloves that wouldn’t actually give you chemical burns.”
“How the hell was that…”
Peter jumped in helpfully — or at least with the intention of being helpful. “The compound on that slide would have been neutralized by nitrile or latex, so it’s…kinda your fault for touching it with bare skin.”
“Fucking chemistry nerds with their fucking chemistry things,” Harley muttered under his breath.
“Hey, I agreed to tutor you under the condition you wouldn’t insult chemistry anymore,” Peter complained, pouting a little for good measure.
Harley was on the verge of retorting — probably with a scalding remark about chemistry that would have sent even Peter over the edge — but the sudden refrain of “Lay All Your Love On Me” from Mamma Mia pouring out of Tony’s phone nipped that war in the bud. Tony just about fell out of his chair and Harley, who had been squatting, slipped onto his butt. Peter the Un-startle-able remained unfazed.
“Stupid spider powers,” Harley said, giving Peter’s knee a little kick. But then Peter looked so forlorn Harley couldn’t resist giving Peter’s knee a conciliatory pat.
Peter’s puppy dog eyes turned into a smirk at once. “You’re so easy.”
“I hate you.”
“Yes, May?” Tony said, very loudly. “What’s that? Why yes there are two very chatty hooligans making it impossible for me to conduct a normal volume conversation with a fellow adult over the phone, how did you know? Is this about dinner tonight?”
Peter and Harley went quiet at once. Peter snickered and Harley did not.
A slightly panicked voice over the phone made Harley’s metaphorical hackles raise for a moment, but when both Tony and Peter (who was eavesdropping as usual) held back a snort, he figured no one was dying…probably…
“We can absolutely bring pizza, don’t worry about that. And I’m guessing you don’t want Hawaiian?”
Harley couldn’t hear the words, but the sheer disgusted tone he caught a few syllables of warmed his soul. Outnumbered by Peter and Tony, sometimes he forgot there were other people in the world who were sane and thus didn’t like pineapple on pizza.
“Unfortunately you’ll have reinforcements this time. Yeah, our Southern belle is no fan either.”
Harley’s eyes widened. “What?”
Peter blinked at him. “What? He’s telling May you don’t like pineapple on pizza.”
“Shh,” Tony said, brow furrowed with concentration. May tended to talk very fast over the phone.
When Harley’s expression remained blank, Peter poked him in the shoulder. “You know, dinner tonight? At my house?”
“I didn’t think I was invited to that.”
“Of course you were invited to that!” Peter said, seeming unsure of whether to laugh or not and scanning Harley’s face as if trying to figure out whether he was joking. The amusement died away after a second. “I mean, if you don’t want to come…”
Tony had his hand over his free ear and was listening closely into the phone; as he wandered away, the boys’s whispers loosened into normal volume.
“I do, I do, I do want to come,” Harley said instantly, without really thinking about whether it was true. “I don’t know, it just…took me by surprise, that’s all.”
“There won’t be anybody there you won’t know. Just you and me and Tony and May.”
“What about Pepper?”
“She’s got that meeting, remember?”
“Oh, yeah. Hey, do you want to get off the floor, or…?”
~~~
“You never let me carry anything,” Peter whined. Tony, balancing the salad bowl on top of the pizza boxes, said something grandiose back, to which Peter had a suitably snippy reply…
But Harley was having a hard time paying attention to that. Instead he focused hard on his converse not catching the lip of the weird, old apartment stairs as he trudged up one step at a time, trying not to think about all the things a dinner necessitated thinking about.
They just had to have pizza. At least with forks you had a clue the normal way to use them. Pizza was unpredictable. Messy. And the nutritional value... One slice of pizza can stick with you forever, did you know that, Harley? Once something like that enters your body it doesn't leave! Harley shuddered, swallowed hard, and shook his head. Don’t think about that.
“Harls? You good?”
Harley’s head jerked up at Peter’s concerned voice and he stumbled on the top step of the stairs. “What? Yeah. I’m great. It smells like World War 2 in here.”
Tony rolled his eyes but Peter just grinned. With a perhaps unearned pride, he swept an arm out towards the very normal-looking and definitely modern-updated apartment hallway and declared, “World War 1 actually. That’s why the ventilation is shit.”
Harley broke out into a sweat at once. Sometimes he really had to applaud his body for somehow getting anxious about stupid shit (such the structural integrity of a building that had been standing for almost a hundred years) before his brain even had the chance.
Tony had left them several steps behind, walking quickly but heavily in the way a person who realizes they’re carrying too much often does, and had already greeted May at the door by the time Peter and Harley caught up.
“Here, Tony, let me take something…oh, no, okay, you make yourself at home.” May let Tony squeeze by her in the tiny hall apartment and turned back to the open doorway, still propping the door open with her hand. “Hi, honey.” She dropped a quick kiss on Peter’s head as he bent to untie his shoes and beamed at Harley. “You must be Harley. Welcome!”
“Hi,” Harley said, very loudly, like it was the only word he knew. The singular syllable rang in his ears like a mistimed trumpet blast, but May seemed unfazed.
“Come on in, come on in. Peter, move your butt and let your friend through.” A crashing sound from the kitchen drew May’s sudden attention. “Oh dear. Just a moment.” She vanished around the corner and Harley let out a breath.
He sidled past Peter (who had not in fact moved his butt and let his friend through) and sat down on the tiny bench that took up a third of the width of the hallway. Feeling rather like a spider, long legs curled up like he was in the backseat of a Chevy Spark, he somehow got his shoes off without tripping Peter. As soon as his sneakers hit the floor, Peter grabbed his hand and yanked him into the apartment.
Harley hadn’t been to the Parker residence before. It had a weird normalcy about it that didn’t quite make sense to Harley until he realized he’d been raiding a billionaire’s high tech stainless steel pantry in Avenger’s Tower for the past two months. Avenger’s Tower was home, for the time being, and it felt like home, but it also still sometimes felt like someone made the Batcave into an Airbnb. This place felt like…a home.
It made Harley sweat even more.
The kitchen occupied one tiny corner, the living room another, and a miniature hallway lead to two closed doors and one half-open one which allowed a glimpse of a metal-frame bunk bed and clothes all over the floor. A dining room table occupied a moment of space just ahead of the entry room; Harley smacked his leg into it when he dared to take one extra step towards the kitchen.
May and Tony bantered at each other over pizza boxes and Peter started to raid the fridge despite dinner being actively prepared right under his nose. Harley stood awkwardly in front of the dining table like a fool and tried not to look like he was standing awkwardly in front of the dining table like a fool.
“Harley, relax,” Peter said, in a friendly faux-whisper. He dusted Pop Tart crumbs off his hands and guided Harley towards a pair of concealed bar stools behind the miniscule kitchen island. Harley took the one closer to the wall, taking some small comfort in the toaster which served as the most meager of barriers between himself and the enthusiastic chaos that was May and Tony preparing dinner together. Peter sat on the other stool and peeked into one of the pizza boxes.
“Hawaiian,” he said in triumphant sing song. May and Harley groaned in unison. Then made eye contact. Then both grinned.
“Disgusting?” May asked.
“Repulsive,” Harley answered decisively. “Who puts fruit…”
“…on pizza? I know.” May rolled her eyes.
“May, you’re literally Italian, you ought to appreciate the…” Peter was promptly interrupted by May both tutting at the volume of a rooster and making as much cacophony as possible getting out plates.
“No! You think because I am Italian I have to accept every pizza topping you Americans come up with? Disgraceful."
"Actually, pineapple on pizza was invented by a Canadian," Peter rejoined.
"Really, I didn't know that," May said, her pretended rage melting into a bright-eyed curiosity. "Peter, do you know if we have ranch? I hear they like ranch on pizza in Tennessee." She tossed Harley a wink, which startled him thoroughly.
Peter let out a whine. "You're fine with ranch but not..."
"Pick your battles, underoos," Tony said, edging by Harley to get to the cabinets and giving him a casual pat on the shoulder on the way.
A few minutes of less heated conversation passed as Tony poured chips and May mixed the salad and Peter dug into his first couple of slices. Harley just sort of...existed in the corner.
“Let’s move to the dining table,” May suggested amiably. “It’s crowded in here.”
“An excellent plan,” said Tony, and scooped up the bowl of salad with rather too much enthusiasm. His elbow knocked the chip bowl and...
At the sound of shattering glass, Harley's brain went white.
May let out a very creative Italian curse. Tony just said fuck.
“Language, mister,” were May’s next words. She looked down again as Tony ventured to step out of the kitchen. "Careful, Tony, there’s glass everywhere." The gentle benediction somehow doubled the tension in Harley's shoulders. He waited for her to start yelling, but all she said was a breathy, "Goodness. You're buying me a new bowl.” She almost sounded like she was trying not to laugh.
“My fault. I was overzealous,” Tony said in the commanding tone of flustered arrogance. “And God said to Abraham something about your children will outnumber the shards of glass that will someday besmirch May Parker’s kitchen by the error of one Tony Stark…”
“That’s offensive,” Peter said in a very chipper tone.
“Oh, we Gentiles just can't mention Abraham, can we,” Tony said, rolling his eyes. “May, where do you keep your vacuum cleaner?”
But May wasn’t looking at him. Her gaze had found something of more concern to her than the glass, her eyebrows knitting and softening in turn. “Harley? You all right?”
Harley tried to take a breath but his chest stuck.
His ears were buzzing. He was all too aware of his now suddenly heaving chest, so aware he knew he could stop it, stop it, just breathe normally you motherfucking weirdo…
Peter’s hand on his arm startled him nearly out of his seat but also jarred him back into a slightly more normal breathing pattern. “I’m fine! I’m fine. No, what? What? I’m fine. Literally…like…” His ears still buzzed like TV static but he tried to scoff and detached Peter’s gentle grip on his wrist. “I’m fine.” His skin crawled where Peter had touched him. Something about all this was just too gentle…
It was like a dream. Like a goddamn night terror with no jumpscare. Harley blinked hard like that would erase the utterly confusing scene in front of him. But what so surreal about a calm reaction to a...
“Harls?”
Harley hadn’t realized he’d been holding onto Peter’s hand so tightly and immediately loosened his hold. “Oh, fuck, sorry…” He blinked back to himself once again and turned back to May. “Fuck, sorry, I’m not supposed to say fuck, am I, fuck…I mean, fuck, I’m sorry…oh fuck…” He let his head fall into his hands and forced out what was meant to be a laugh but sounded more like a groan.
“It’s okay, honey,” May said. Like Peter, everything about her was too gentle. Her voice, her face, her concerned smile…
The sound of the bowl shattering kept echoing through his head. Even when he slumped against the wall and May and Peter turned reluctant eyes back to the mess and Tony started to vacuum it up and Peter and May started scouring the floors and carpet for missed pieces…the sound of breaking dishes wouldn’t stop. Like a TikTok audio on endless repeat. Without any depressing music in the background, despite a perfect opportunity for some.
Harley knew what was wrong, and he could face it head on. He remembered and he didn’t mind remembering. Fuck, how many times had he described it to himself in his mind, until rawness turned to numbness and all feeling went out of the memory until some days he couldn’t remember what was wrong with it...
But still it felt profane to think about it in a room with Peter Parker and May Parker and Tony Stark all calmly cleaning up the pieces of a broken bowl like it was nothing more than a…nothing more than a broken bowl.
“Are you okay?” Peter asked timidly, when he finally came back to sit next to Harley again. Tony and May had served themselves each a plate and were talking in low voices, as if not to disturb.
“Yeah, I’m fine,” Harley said automatically.
“Um…you sure?”
Harley finally looked up at Peter. He stared at him for a moment. The wide-eyed concern. The puppy-like eagerness to help. Fuck, he couldn’t take advantage of that.
Harley smacked a hand on top of the counter to break the stillness, brought back to himself by the pain dancing across his palm, stood up from the bar stool, and loudly declared, “We have got to make cinnamon rolls after this.”
“Yes!” Peter crowed, immediately matching Harley’s energy.
May and Tony exchanged a slightly perturbed look. But it passed. Thank God, it passed.
~~~
"That's what I'm saying, you could totally make a prosthetic foot for a duck out of vibranium, you'd just have to design the artificial tendons properly..."
"Eugh, Peter, don't talk to me and my pizza about tendons," Harley said, curling an arm protectively around his plate. Peter trained his puppy dog eyes on Tony, seated across from him at the table, and started right back in on talking about tendons. Harley left them to it and got back to work on his last slice of pizza.
The sun had mostly set by now; only 6:00 p.m., it felt oddly early for it to be dark. May got up from her seat across from Harley and, bypassing the lightswitch, went on a little adventure to turn on several lamps throughout the kitchen and living room.
“The overhead lighting is too clinical for me. I work in a hospital,” May said as she slipped back into her seat with an apologetic smile.
Harley spoke before he could catch himself. “My mom used to be a nurse.”
“Really?”
“Yeah. That was before I was born, though. Things sort of…” Harley hesitated, then grinned. “Things sort of changed after that.”
May shared a split second glance with Tony; Harley frowned and started to open his mouth, but May got there first, switching the topic with the same deftness she used to snatch up Peter’s plate to serve him salad.
“How do you like Midtown?” May asked, passing Peter’s plate back. “I hear you’re doing pretty well there.”
“It’s…it’s fine,” Harley said. Peter kicked him under the table. “It’s great. I don’t know. It’s mostly...kind of easy.”
Peter took a break from his artificial tendon conversation to sigh melodramatically and announce, “Forecast: cloudy with a chance of homeschooler statistics.”
“What?” May asked through a laugh.
Harley kicked Peter under the table. "Dude, stick to your own weird conversation." Peter stuck his tongue out at him and did so.
“Um,” Harley chuckled nervously, turning back to May. “What he means is...homeschoolers on average outperform traditionally schooled students...on standardized tests, at least. But I’ll concede chemistry is biting me in the…” He cleared his throat. “It’s, uh, pretty hard.”
“When I said ‘language’ earlier it was a joke. You can swear if you like.”
“Oh thank fuck,” Harley breathed.
May gave him a knowing grin. “So, you were homeschooled?”
“Yeah. Up until…up until midway through last year. I’m a junior now.”
“Did you start homeschooling in Texas?”
Who told her all this stuff? flitted through Harley’s brain, but he packed that away to panic about later, settling for giving Tony an unimpressed side eye. Tony just shrugged innocently. “Uh. We moved from Texas in...when I was still pretty little. So...uh, just in Tennessee. Good ol’ Rose Hill.”
The sarcasm came through a little too strong; a flicker of confusion, or maybe that was worry, creased May’s brow. It vanished in a blink. She wiped her fingers on a napkin and changed the subject easily yet again. “And how do you like the big city?”
“It’s big. Very…” Harley tapped the table and avoided May's eyes. “Very city-like.”
May giggled, in a sweet, motherish sort of way that inexplicably and suddenly made Harley want to cry. “I’m making you so nervous, I’m sorry!”
Harley felt his cheeks go red, but he couldn’t find the voice to protest; he just blinked at May as she leaned over and whispered, “I usually save this for a second meeting but I think you’d really like to hear about the time Peter tried to make a parachute for an egg in grade school…”
“May, no!” Peter shouted.
Harley let out a laugh, suddenly feeling out of breath. “Yes, Mrs. Parker, I would absolutely like to hear it.”
"Oh, please. Call me May."