Archive of Our Own

Chapter Text

The room was cold, and stark, and Peter didn't like anything about it.

Nothing about this was good at all. Wakanda was incredible, and Peter had only heard about the sorts of tech they had here; they had incredible advancements in medicine and technology and vibranium, and if you'd told him a year ago he'd be standing inside a building near the central palace he would have laughed in your face. 

Now, he wasn't laughing at all. Nothing about this was funny.

Tony was lying on the medical cot in front of him, unmoving. The only way that Peter could tell, visually, that he was alive was the machine hooked up to him that showed his steady heartbeat. The slow rise and fall of his chest, barely there, but there enough to make him feel a little more comfortable that Tony was still alive, still breathing.

That and the faint, barely there pulse of his heart. Peter's fist tightened in the material of his pants. When he strained his ears to the point where it hurt a little, he could hear the sound of people walking a floor below him, a baby crying, someone shouting a floor down or so. But he could also hear Tony's heartbeat, so it was worth it.

The door slid open and Peter startled. He whipped around to see Pepper standing there in the doorway.

She looked exhausted. The kind of exhaustion that had settled into her bones, visible in the slope of her shoulders and the hollows beneath her eyes.

She stepped closer, and Peter must have moved or made a noise or something, because she turned and belatedly realised he was sitting across from her. "Oh," she started, voice soft but a little raw like she'd been crying. "Peter. Sorry. I didn't see you there."

"Sorry," he said back, because he didn't know what to say. The words felt enormous and inadequate in his throat. "Sorry about… everything."

Her expression softened, before her gaze flicked back to Tony. "Don't be sorry. It wasn't your fault."

"I should have done better," he murmured.

She just let out a tired breath, but his stomach twisted. Because if he'd been the one to snap - he'd had the gauntlet in his hand - he might have healed faster. He might have been better off. Tony didn't have fast healing like he did, and even if he was in Wakanda, and they had managed to keep him alive, if Peter had snapped, Mr. Stark wouldn't be in a coma.

Pepper gently sank into one of the seats by Tony's bed, next to Peter. She looked sad, but still put together. Her makeup was still well-done. Her French-tipped manicure traced idle patterns on the fabric of the armchair. She looked like she was tired, a bone-deep weariness that reminded Peter of grieving, like May after she'd first heard about Ben. 

"I'm really, really sorry," Peter breathed again, but Pepper just shot him a small, exhausted smile. That wasn't fair. None of this was fair. "I should have been the one to do it. I'm enhanced, and he's not, and now he's…"

He couldn't finish the sentence. The words lodged in his throat like barbed wire.

Pepper just reached across the aisle between them and gave his hand a gentle squeeze.

It felt like a forgiveness Peter didn't deserve, but he'd take what he could get.

They sank back into a comfortable silence, but Peter still felt like he couldn't breathe. All he could focus on was the sound of the machine as it forced oxygen into Mr. Stark's lungs. 

He squeezed his eyes shut, trying desperately to listen to his heartbeat again. He could hear his own, the sound of fabric rustling and skin moving, and then he could hear a heartbeat. Mr. Stark was one. The low thump-thump that wasn't his own. But he could also hear Pepper's, now, too. And something else.

It was much lower, much quieter and weaker than his, or any of theirs. But it was there; quieter than fingers twitching on a table, but it was so low and steady and in that same pattern that it couldn't be anything else other than a heartbeat. 

But that didn't make any sense, because there was no one else in the room.

His eyes flicked uncertainly back up to Pepper, raking over her face. She was tired, with bags under her eyes. She looked miserable, but that was expected. Her fiancé was in a coma. (Because of Peter. He was in a coma because of Peter, and it was all his fault.) 

But it was there. The low sound of another heartbeat next to him, and it definitely wasn't Pepper's. It wasn't Peter's heartbeat. It wasn't Tony's heartbeat.

She was pregnant.

—

The second Peter stepped outside and the hospital room door closed behind him, Peter felt like he was going to keel over and die.

He slumped against the wall, hands on his knees - and they were shaking, god his hands were shaking, he was fucked up everything - because Pepper was pregnant and Peter put Tony in a coma. 

"Are you okay?" 

Pepper was next to him, concerned. She must have followed him out, because all Peter could think about was the fact that he was going to be sick. He could barely look at her. 

"Peter," she tried again, voice a little firmer. "Peter. Look at me."

He couldn't. His vision was swimming, black spots dancing at the edges. It was his fault. God, he messed up everything, he ruined their entire family before it even started-

"Peter," she said more firmly, reaching out to squeeze his wrist, and his gaze snapped up to her, wild and unfocused. "Hey. slow down. Take a breath."

"I can't," he gasped out, his chest heaving, his lungs burning. "I can't, I-"

"Yes, you can," she interrupted, her voice steady despite her own exhaustion. "In through your nose, out through your mouth. Come on. With me."

He tried. He dragged in a ragged breath that hitched and stuttered in his throat, and then the tears started falling, hot and humiliating down his cheeks. "I'm sorry," he gasped out instead. "I'm so, so sorry, Miss. Potts. This is all my fault-"

"-It's not, Peter-"

He could barely hear her over the rushing in his ears. "And now he's in a coma, and they don't even know if he's going to wake up, and now you need to raise a baby by yourself, and I ruined everything, I ruined your whole life-"

Her grip loosened, and her face shifted to confusion. "Peter," she said slowly. "Are you okay? What are you talking about?"

"The baby," he blurted, vision blurring before he pressed his hands to his face. "I'm so sorry, I know I wasn't supposed to know, but I can hear it, and I'm so sorry-"

"Sweetie," she murmured, kneeling in front of him. Her expensive skirt pooled on the floor, heedless of the wrinkles. "When's the last time you got some sleep?"

The question threw him. He stared up at her as he wiped his cheek with the back of his palm, his face wet. "What?" he asked, his voice small and confused. "I'm - what?"

"Sometimes when Tony was stressed, he'd forget," she said softly. "And he'd forget to eat, too. And sometimes he'd say things that didn't quite make sense to everyone else. When's the last time you ate something?"

"I," Peter started, and then he stopped. He paused, squeezing his hands against his shirt more. He tried to remember through the fog of guilt and panic. Then he croaked, "I don't remember."

Her face softened more, something like maternal worry smoothing out the lines of grief. She pulled him into a hug. He collapsed against her, hands trying not to tighten too desperately around her sides. He couldn't hurt her. God, he wouldn't hurt her, too. She squeezed him gently before pulling away. She smelled like some fancy perfume that would cost more than his left arm.

"Let's go down to get something to eat."

Peter didn't think he could eat anything, even if he tried. His stomach was a tight knot of dread, his throat closed around the shame of his confession. But he nodded anyway, because he didn't know how to refuse her, and because some small part of him recognized that she was trying to help him.

He didn't deserve that kindness, but he needed it desperately.

—

She slid into the seat next to him gracefully.

"Are you feeling a little bit better now?" She asked, her voice carefully light as she gestured at the packet of chips in front of him.

Peter gave a loose shrug, staring at the half-eaten packet of chips in front of him. They tasted like cardboard in his mouth, flavorless and dry, but he'd forced himself to eat a few because she was watching him with those concerned eyes.

"I'm just…" he breathed. "I'm sorry. I can't - I know you're already so stressed out, being like, the CEO and with Tony and everything and now you're gonna have to do all this alone, and I just keep making everything worse-"

"Do what alone?" She asked, reaching across the table to squeeze his hand. "I can run the company alone. I've done it for years. And of course I'm upset about Tony, but I've been apart from him before. He's getting the best care he can. He’s stable, and the doctors just said it’s a matter of waiting now. I'll be fine, Peter."

"But the baby," Peter's face screwed up, his throat working as he tried to swallow past the lump that formed there. "The baby, and you're going to have to do everything, and I took him away from you, I took him away from both of you-"

"What baby?" She asked again, looking a little more concerned, her eyebrows drawing together. "Peter, what are you talking about?"

"I know you're pregnant!" He blurted, the words coming out too loud, too desperate. He immediately wanted to take them back, to shove them back down his throat. "I - I'm sorry if you, like, didn't want me to know or something, but I can hear the heartbeat. I can hear it right now, and I'm sorry, I'm so sorry-"

"I'm what?" She looked winded, like he'd punched her in the stomach. Her hand flew to her own chest, her eyes wide and shocked. "I - no I'm not, I just-" she cut off, paling suddenly, the color draining from her face until she looked almost gray. "You can hear a heartbeat?"

"I - yes?" he shifted back at Pepper's panicked expression, his own anxiety spiking. "I'm… I'm sorry, I thought you knew, I thought-"

"Oh my god," she breathed, hands coming up to cover her face, her shoulders beginning to shake.

Peter realised, belatedly and with horrible clarity, that maybe she just hadn't known. That he'd just delivered news that would change her entire life, news that she hadn't been prepared for, in the middle of a hospital cafeteria while her fiancé lay unconscious down the hall.

"Miss Potts…?" he started cautiously, something cold and terrible welling in his stomach, making him feel like he might actually vomit. "I'm… are you okay? I'm sorry, I didn't know, I didn't think-"

She stood up abruptly, her chair scraping loudly against the floor. Her expression was pinched, before she smoothed it over into a strained calmness that looked painful to maintain. "I need to go," she said quickly. "I need to - I need to check something. I'll talk to you later, okay? Just… eat something, and I'll call you in an hour."

She stood from the table, and stalked away with her heels clicking against the floor in rapid staccato, leaving him alone with his half-eaten chips and the crushing weight of his own inadequacy. Peter's head dropped onto the table with a thunk, his forehead hitting the cool surface.

God, he couldn't do anything right.

—

When Pepper stepped back into Tony's hospital room an hour later, it was obvious that she'd been crying. 

Her eyes were red-rimmed and swollen, her makeup slightly smudged at the corners, and she was clutching her phone in her hand so tightly that her knuckles showed white.

Peter felt awful as she sank into the empty seat beside him, the silence between them heavy and charged. She sat there for a long moment, just staring at Tony's unconscious form, her chest rising and falling with shaky breaths.

Then she wordlessly reached over for his hand and squeezed, her grip surprisingly strong.

"Well," she sighed finally, her voice rough and thick with emotion, leaning back in her chair. Her eyes didn't leave Tony's unconscious form. "You were right."

Peter wanted to slam his head into a wall. God, he didn't ask? He hadn't gently broken the news? He'd just jumped to panicking about how much she must hate him and decided that she was lying about a pregnancy she hadn't even known existed. Jesus Christ, Parker, get it together.

"I'm so sorry," he whispered, his voice breaking. "I didn't know you didn't know, I should have - I should have realized, I shouldn't have said anything, I'm so sorry-"

"No," she said softly, finally turning to look at him. Her eyes were wet, but there was no anger in them, only a kind of stunned, overwhelmed acceptance. "It's okay. I just… I took a test. In the hospital. I can't believe I didn't - I mean, I knew I was late, but I thought it was just stress with everything that's been happening…"

She trailed off, her gaze drifting back to Tony.

"How long?" Peter asked quietly.

"Eight weeks," she said, her hand moving unconsciously to her own stomach, resting there lightly as if she was trying to feel what Peter had heard. "I can't believe you could hear it. That's… that's incredible, Peter."

Peter looked down at his own hands, at the tremor in his fingers that he couldn't quite stop. Incredible. He had these powers - he could hear heartbeats through walls, could lift cars, could heal from wounds that would kill anyone else - and he had still let Tony get hurt. He had stood there with the gauntlet in his hand and he had hesitated, and now Tony was lying in a coma while Peter sat here with his useless, incredible gifts.

"It should have been me," he said, the guilt rising fresh and sharp again, spilling out of him like blood from a wound he couldn't staunch. "I shouldn’t have let him snap. I should have been faster, or smarter, or something. I have all these - these abilities, and I still couldn't - I couldn't stop him from-" His breath hitched, ragged and painful. "And now he's going to miss everything, and it's my fault-"

"Stop," Pepper said firmly, turning to face him fully. "Peter, look at me." When he reluctantly met her eyes, she continued, her voice steady despite the tremor in her hands. "Tony made a choice. He chose to protect you, to protect all of us. He knew exactly what he was doing, and he did it because he loved you. This is not your fault."

"But the baby," Peter said, his voice small, shrinking in on himself. "You're going to have to do everything alone, and I can't - I can't even look at him without thinking about what I took from you-"

"Hey," Pepper said, softer now, and she shifted her chair closer, close enough that he could smell her perfume again, that floral scent that reminded him of safety and home and everything he had broken. "Look at me. Tony is going to be fine." 

Her voice carried a certainty that Peter didn't understand, a faith that sounded like absolute truth when she said it. 

"He's always fine. And when he wakes up, he's going to be surrounded by people who love him, okay? He's going to be so, so glad that you're okay. So will Harley."

Peter's breath caught, a sharp intake that felt like inhaling broken glass. Harley. He had been so caught up in the guilt and the fear that he had barely let himself think about him, about the fact that he was back, that they were both back, that five years had passed like a nightmare and Harley had lived through all of it.

"I miss Harley," Peter admitted, his voice shaky and exhausted, cracking on the name. "I really, really miss him. Did he - was he blipped? Or did he…"

Pepper's expression softened further. She reached out and cupped his cheek for a moment, her palm warm and steady against his skin, and he leaned into it, his own eyes burning with the effort not to cry. “He blipped too. It was very quiet without you both,” she murmured.

“I miss him so much,” Peter said, wiping at his face with his palms like he was a child.

"I bet you do," she said gently. "He's on his way. I've sent for the quinjet to pick him up. He called as soon as he got hold of a working phone."

Peter pulled back slightly, wiping at his face with his sleeve. "Was he okay? When he - when he came back?"

"When he un-blipped?" Pepper asked, a small, sad smile touching her lips.

"Yeah."

"He was fine," she said. "Pissed off he was still in an MIT hall five years later without a diploma, but other than that he's fine."

Peter let out a huge sigh, his shoulders dropping as he relaxed bonelessly against the chair, the tension draining out of him so suddenly he felt dizzy with it. 

Harley was okay. Harley was coming.

"He asked about you," Pepper said, her hand finding his again and squeezing. "Had some very colorful language when he found out you unblipped immediately into another fight the second you got back."

Peter let out a miserable little laugh, the sound wet and broken, the first real thing he had felt in days. He could picture it perfectly - Harley's face, the particular shade of furious worry he got when Peter did something stupid, the way his hands would shake when he was too angry to speak properly.

"He was worried," Pepper added, her thumb tracing circles against Peter's knuckles. "We all were. Which is why I think it might be best if you have a break for a little bit. I imagine it's been a very stressful few days."

Peter shook his head, the panic rising again, sharp and automatic. "I don't know… I can't just - I need to be here, I need to help, I can't just leave him-"

"Peter," she interrupted, her voice gentle but firm. "You need to rest. You need to eat and sleep and breathe. Tony is stable. He's not going anywhere. And when he wakes up, he's going to need you to be okay too."

Peter stared at her, at the certainty in her eyes, at the way she looked at him like he was something precious that needed protecting too. 

He didn't feel precious. He felt like a disaster, like a walking catastrophe that broke everything he touched. But she was looking at him like he was family, like he was hers to worry about, and he didn't know how to argue with that.

"I'm going to go back to the tower," she said, interrupting his panic. "I'm going to stop traveling for business meetings, and I’m going to work from home for a while. Shuri says he'll need extensive care when he wakes up, and I want to be there. I want to be somewhere familiar when the baby comes."

Peter nodded, his throat tight. 

"I'll help," he said quickly, the words tumbling out. "I mean - if you want me to? I'm still living in the tower, and I can - I can help with whatever you need. Shopping, or cleaning, or just… just being there. If you want. I know I messed everything up, but I want to help fix it, if I can."

Pepper looked at him then, really looked at him, her expression softening into something warm and sad and grateful all at once. "You didn't mess everything up, Peter," she said gently. "But yes. I would appreciate the help. And Peter?"

"Yeah?"

"Thank you for telling me," she said, her hand finding his again and holding on tight. "I know it was an accident, and I know you're beating yourself up about how it came out. But I'm glad I know. I needed to know."

Peter nodded, not trusting himself to speak, and they sat there together in the quiet room, listening to the steady beep of Tony's heart monitor and the faint, rapid flutter of the new heartbeat beneath Pepper's skin.

—

The quinjet touched down on the landing pad with a hydraulic hiss that sounded too loud in the thin mountain air, its engines cycling down from a whine to a low hum before finally falling silent. 

The Wakandan sun was setting behind the palace, painting everything in shades of gold and burnt orange that should have been beautiful but instead just looked tired and washed out, like the world itself was exhausted.

Harley stood in the doorway for a moment, silhouetted against the dying light, and Peter felt his chest tighten at the sight of him.  

His eyes were the same. That particular shade of blue that crinkled at the corners when he smiled, that looked at Peter like he was the most important thing in the room. Those hadn't changed at all.

"Hey," Harley said, his voice rough, carrying across the distance between them.

Peter couldn't move. His feet felt rooted to the polished stone of the landing pad, his body heavy and uncooperative. He'd been running on adrenaline for so long - through the final battle, through the horrible aftermath of watching Tony fall and not being able to catch him - and now, seeing Harley here, actually here, alive and solid and real, something in him just... stopped. 

The forward momentum that had been keeping him upright stuttered and died, and he felt himself sway.

Harley crossed the distance between them in three long strides, his boots scraping against the stone, and then his hands were on Peter's shoulders, gripping tight, and his face was right there, scanning Peter's features with an intensity that felt like being examined under a microscope.

"Jesus," Harley breathed, his thumbs digging into the muscle above Peter's collarbones, not quite hard enough to hurt but enough to feel real again. "Jesus, Peter, you look like shit."

Peter laughed, or tried to - it came out more like a wet, broken sound. "Yeah," he managed, his voice barely above a whisper. "Yeah, I... I feel like shit."

Harley's hands moved from his shoulders to his face, cupping his jaw, tilting his head up so he could look at him properly. His palms were warm, slightly calloused, and Peter leaned into the touch without thinking, his eyes fluttering shut for a moment. He smelled like airplane fuel and cheap soap and something underneath that was just Harley, unchanged despite everything.

"You're shaking," Harley noted, his voice dropping lower, concern bleeding through.

"I'm fine," Peter said automatically.

"You're not fine," Harley said firmly. "You're swaying on your feet and you're gray, sweetheart. When's the last time you slept?"

Peter opened his eyes. "I don't... I don't remember. There's been... there's been a lot happening."

Harley's jaw tightened, a muscle jumping in his cheek. 

"Yeah," he said softly. "I heard. About the battle. About Tony." His thumbs stroked gently over Peter's cheekbones, wiping away imaginary dirt or tears or both - Peter wasn't sure which. "I'm so sorry I wasn't here sooner. The quinjet had to refuel twice, and then there was some kind of diplomatic hold-up at the border..."

"It's okay," Peter said, and he meant it. Harley was here now. That was what mattered.

Steve appeared at the edge of the landing pad, looking nearly as rough as Peter felt. His uniform was torn in places, dried blood flaking from a cut above his eyebrow that had clearly been treated but not properly cleaned. He was walking with a slight limp, favoring his left side, and Bucky hovered nearby like a particularly deadly shadow.

They must have been on clean-up duty, Peter figured.

"Harley," Steve called out. "Shuri's prepared a room for you. You should... you should both get some rest. It's been a long day."

Harley didn't take his eyes off Peter. "Is there somewhere I can clean up first? I feel like I've been wearing these clothes for three days."

"There's facilities near the guest quarters," Bucky supplied, his voice quiet. "I can show you the way."

"We'll be there in a minute," Harley said, and it wasn't quite a dismissal, but it wasn't a request either.

Steve and Bucky exchanged a look - something tired and knowing and sad - then Steve nodded, clapping a hand briefly on Peter's shoulder as he passed. "We're in the east wing if you need us," he said quietly. "Both of you."

Peter watched them go, Steve leaning slightly on Bucky. He felt a pang of something - grief or envy or just exhaustion - and then Harley's hand was sliding down his arm to catch his fingers, squeezing tight.

"Come on," Harley said softly. "Let's get you inside. You're freezing."

Peter hadn't noticed, but now that Harley mentioned it, he realized he was cold. The Wakandan evening air was cool against his skin, and he was wearing still wearing his suit. He’d been looked over - only a dislocated shoulder and some superficial wounds - but he was still in fabric covered with blood. Some of it was his, but most of it wasn’t.

He should have taken the spare clothes they’d offered him.

Really, though, he’d just wanted to get out of their fancy scary medical center and back to Tony’s side. Now he was realising that the new clothes might have been for Pepper’s sake just as much as his.

They walked together toward the guest quarters, Harley keeping a steadying hand on Peter's lower back, and Peter found himself leaning into the touch, letting Harley take more of his weight than he probably should. The palace was quieter than it should have been with this muted, respectful of the aftermath that had settled over everything like ash.

Shuri had given them a small suite with two beds, a sitting area, and a bathroom. Harley guided Peter to the edge of one of the beds and gently pushed him down to sit, then knelt in front of him, starting to work on the fastenings of Peter's suit with careful, methodical fingers.

"You don't have to," Peter protested weakly, but he didn't stop him.

"I want to," Harley said, not looking up. "Let me take care of you, okay? Just for a minute."

Peter let his head fall back, staring up at the ceiling while Harley worked. The suit was damaged, the mesh torn in several places, the circuitry fried. It was a miracle it was still functioning at all. Harley got the chest piece unlatched, then the gloves, then the boots, working silently with a focus that Peter remembered from their days in the lab.

"Arms up," Harley instructed, and Peter obeyed, letting Harley peel the top half of the suit off him. Underneath, he was wearing a compression shirt that was soaked through with sweat and streaked with grime. Harley made a small, distressed noise in his throat, then stood, pulling Peter up with him.

"Shower," Harley said firmly. "Then bed. You can barely keep your eyes open."

"I should go back to the medical wing," Peter said, but he was already letting Harley guide him toward the bathroom. "I should be there when Tony wakes up... if he wakes up..."

Harley stopped, his hand tightening on Peter's elbow. 

"Peter," he said carefully. "What exactly happened? I got the briefing on the plane, but it was... it was in Bucky’s military speak. Steve said he was in a coma, and stable but unresponsive, but… I need you to tell me. I need to know what I'm walking into."

Peter's breath hitched. 

"He snapped," Peter said, his voice cracking. "He put the gauntlet on, and he snapped, and it was supposed to kill him, it should have killed him, but it didn't, it just... it put him here. In this... this in-between place. He's breathing. His heart is beating. But he's not... he's not there. The doctors say his brain is active, that he might be dreaming, or he might just be... gone. They don't know. They don't know if he'll wake up, or if he does, if he'll be... if he'll be him."

Harley's face went very still, very pale. He looked, for a moment, much younger than he was now.

"Oh," Harley said quietly. "Shit."

"Yeah," Peter whispered. "Shit."

They stood there for a long moment, the silence heavy between them, and then Harley pulled Peter into a hug. 

It wasn't gentle - it was desperate, crushing, Harley's arms wrapping around Peter's shoulders and holding on like he was afraid Peter would disappear if he let go. Peter made a small, wounded noise and buried his face in Harley's neck, his hands fisting in the back of Harley's shirt.

"I've got you," Harley murmured against his hair, his voice rough and thick. "I've got you, sweetheart. I'm here."

"I missed you," Peter choked out, the words muffled against Harley's skin. "I missed you so much, and I didn't even know I was missing you, I was just... gone, and you were gone too, and I'm so sorry I didn’t stop him the first time - I had it, I had it in my hand..."

"Don't," Harley said fiercely. "Don't you dare apologize. You didn't do this. You didn't choose this."

"I should have been the one to snap," Peter said, the guilt spilling out of him like poison. "I had the gauntlet, I had it in my hand, and I hesitated, and he took it from me, and now he's... he's..."

Harley pulled back just enough to look at him, his eyes wet and blazing. 

"And you'd be dead," he said sharply. "Or worse. You'd be the one in that bed, or you'd be dust again, and I'd be... I'd be alone, Peter. I can't... I can't do that. I can't lose you."

Peter stared at him, at the raw, open grief on his face. The words for it had never seemed big enough.

"Okay," Peter whispered. "Okay. I'm sorry. I'm here. I'm... I'm here."

Harley made a broken sound and pulled him back in, and Peter went, letting himself be held, letting himself take up space and accept comfort for the first time in what felt like years. He was so tired. So deeply, fundamentally tired, in his body and his mind and whatever was left of his soul.

They stayed like that for a long time, Harley rocking them slightly, his hand stroking up and down Peter's spine, and Peter felt himself slowly relaxing, muscle by muscle. He could hear Harley's heartbeat, steady and strong, and beneath that, his breathing, and it was the most normal thing he'd ever felt.

"There's more," Peter said eventually, his voice hoarse. He didn't pull back, didn't want to lose the contact. "Other news. About Pepper."

Harley stilled slightly. "Is she okay?"

"She's... she's pregnant," Peter said, and he heard the miserable little huff in his own voice, the self-directed anger. "I dropped that on her without thinking. I could hear the heartbeat, with my enhanced hearing, and I just... I panicked, and I told her, and she didn't even know. She had to take a test in the hospital bathroom to confirm it. Eight weeks. I ruined it. I ruined the moment she should have had with Tony, when he woke up..."

"Hey," Harley said, pulling back to look at him again, his hands coming up to frame Peter's face. "Hey. You didn't ruin anything. You were... you were overwhelmed, and you have super-hearing, and you shared information. That's not... that's not a crime, Peter."

"I should have kept my mouth shut," Peter said, his eyes burning.

"Maybe," Harley allowed. "Or maybe she needed to know. Maybe it was better coming from you, in a weird way, rather than finding out alone later. You don't know. You can't know."

Peter shook his head, but he didn't argue. He was too tired to argue, too tired to do anything but stand there and let Harley hold him together.

"So I'm going to be..." Harley trailed off, his brow furrowing. "An uncle? Or... wait. No. Cousin? Are we cousins? I don't know how family trees work, I never had a big family. Is it too early to tell if it's a boy or a girl?"

Peter let out a wet, exhausted laugh, the sound surprising him. "I think it's probably too early to tell," he said, sinking back into Harley's embrace, letting his head rest on Harley's shoulder. "And I don't know what we'd be. Family, though. Definitely family."

"Yeah," Harley said softly, his arms tightening around Peter. "Definitely family. I can be a big brother again."

“I’ve never had siblings,” Peter murmured. “I hope I’m not terrible at it.”

“You’d be great,” Harley said, pulling back just far enough to kiss his forehead.

They stood there in the bathroom doorway, holding each other up, and Peter felt something in his chest loosen, just slightly. The grief was still there, the fear, the crushing guilt - but there was something else now, too. 

Hope, maybe. Or just the knowledge that he wasn't alone anymore.

"Can we just..." Peter started, then stopped, embarrassed.

"Can we just what?" Harley asked gently.

"Can you just hold me for a bit?" Peter asked, his voice small. "I just... I don't want to move. I don't want to think. I just want..."

"Yeah," Harley said immediately. "Yeah, of course. Come here."

He guided Peter back to the bed, kicking off his own shoes and climbing on fully clothed, pulling Peter down with him. Peter went willingly, curling into Harley's side, his head on Harley's chest, listening to the steady thump of his heart. Harley wrapped his arms around him, one hand stroking through Peter's hair, the other resting on his back, and Peter felt himself finally, finally starting to let go.

"I'm so tired," Peter whispered.

"I know," Harley said. "Sleep, Peter. I'll be here when you wake up. I'm not going anywhere."

"You promise?"

"I promise. Five years is long enough to go without a hug. I'm staying right here."

Peter closed his eyes, Harley's heartbeat in his ear, his warmth surrounding him, and for the first time since he'd come back, since the battle, since Tony had fallen, he felt something like safe.

He slept.

—

The bathroom in the Wakandan guest quarters was all smooth stone and soft light, the shower steaming up the glass before Peter even stepped inside. He stood in the center of the room, swaying slightly on his feet, still wearing the torn remnants of his suit, dirt and blood and ash ground into every crease of his skin. 

He couldn't remember the last time he'd been clean. He couldn't remember if he'd showered since the battle, or just wiped the grime away with wet wipes and desperation.

"Arms up," Harley said softly, standing behind him.

Peter obeyed, raising his arms above his head like a child, too exhausted to feel embarrassed. Harley worked methodically, peeling the compression shirt away from Peter's body in pieces, revealing the damage underneath - bruises in shades of purple and green, scrapes that had already healed to pink scars, the web-shooter burns on his wrists that never seemed to fully fade. Harley made a small, pained noise in his throat but didn't comment.

Peter was thankful for that.

"Step out," Harley instructed, and Peter stepped out of the pooled fabric, standing in just his boxers, and then he stepped out of those, too, shivering slightly despite the steam.

Harley guided him to the shower, his hand warm and steady on Peter's lower back. "Can you stand on your own?"

"Yeah," Peter said, though his voice was rough, uncertain.

"I'll be right here," Harley promised. He adjusted the water, testing it with his hand until he found the right temperature - warm, not scalding, the way Peter liked it. "I'm not going anywhere."

Peter stepped under the spray and immediately felt his muscles unlock, the tension he'd been carrying for days, weeks, months, beginning to dissolve under the heat. He stood there, head bowed, water cascading over his shoulders, and let himself be still. 

Just for a moment, he let himself be still.

Harley pulled back the shower curtain just enough to reach in, a washcloth in his hand. He started with Peter's shoulders, working in slow, careful circles, washing away the dirt and the dried sweat and the blood that wasn't Peter's. He moved down Peter's arms, his touch light but thorough, cleaning around the bruises without pressing too hard.

"Turn around," Harley murmured.

Peter turned, facing him, and Harley's expression cracked slightly - just for a second - before he smoothed it back into careful neutrality. He reached up, his fingers carding through Peter's hair, working shampoo through the tangles. 

His nails scraped gently against Peter's scalp, and Peter felt his eyes flutter shut, a small sound escaping his throat before he could stop it.

"Sorry," he murmured.

"Don't be," Harley said, his voice thick. "Let me take care of you. Please."

Peter nodded, leaning into Harley's touch, letting him tilt his head back to rinse the shampoo, then again for conditioner. Harley worked it through with his fingers, massaging Peter's temples, the base of his skull, everywhere tension had gathered and hardened. 

By the time he guided Peter out of the shower, wrapped him in a towel that was soft and warm and smelled like something clean and unfamiliar, Peter felt like he might actually be able to sleep. Like he might actually be able to rest.

Harley dried him with the same careful attention he'd given to washing, patting Peter's skin dry rather than rubbing, working around the injuries like he'd done this before or had at least thought about it extensively. 

Or, he had done it before. He’d done it a lot when Peter was stupid or too injured or too tired to do it himself. 

God, Peter loved him.

Then he helped Peter dress, soft cotton pants and a t-shirt that Harley had brought from the tower, something that smelled like home, like safety.

"Better?" Harley asked, his hands lingering on Peter's shoulders.

"Yeah," Peter whispered. "Thank you."

Harley kissed his forehead, his lips warm and dry against Peter's skin. "Come on. Let's go see him."

—

The medical facility was quiet in the way that hospitals always were. 

Pepper was in the hallway when they arrived, her phone pressed to her ear, her free hand resting on the wall. She looked up as they approached, and her face softened into something sad and fond, a smile that didn't quite reach her eyes.

"Go on in," she mouthed, gesturing toward the door. "I'll be there in a minute."

Peter nodded, squeezing her hand as he passed, and pushed open the door to Tony's room.

It was the same as it had been hours ago. The machines beeping their steady rhythm, the monitors displaying vital signs in glowing green lines, the oxygen machine hissing softly in the corner. Tony lay in the center of it all, still and pale, his chest rising and falling with mechanical precision. He looked smaller than Peter remembered. He looked like he was sleeping, but wrong - too still, too deep, too far away to reach.

His arm was ruined. Peter was glad he couldn’t see under the bandages, but he could see the burn scars peaking up his neck under the hospital gown he had on.

Harley stopped at the foot of the bed, his hand gripping the railing until his knuckles showed white. Peter watched his face carefully, watched the way his jaw tightened, the way his eyes went bright and wet before he blinked rapidly, looking up at the ceiling, the walls, anywhere but at Tony's unmoving form.

Peter moved to stand beside him just close enough that their shoulders touched, and reached out to take Harley's hand. Harley's fingers were warm, trembling slightly, but he laced them through Peter's and held on tight.

"What happened?" Harley asked, his voice barely above a whisper. "I mean - I know what happened. I got the briefing. But I want... I want you to tell me. What actually happened?"

Peter looked at Tony, and felt the words rise up in his throat like bile. 

"We were on Titan," he said, his voice rough. "Me and Tony and Strange and the Guardians. We almost had the gauntlet off him. We almost won. But then... then we didn't. He snapped. Half the universe, gone. I was... I was turning to dust, and I was so scared, and Tony... he held me. While I disappeared. He held me and I could see how much it was destroying him, and I couldn't do anything. I couldn't stop it."

He paused, swallowing hard, Harley's hand warm under his.

"Five years," Peter continued. "Five years passed, and he built a time machine. He brought us back. And then the final battle, we were winning, we had the stones, and I had the gauntlet, I had it in my hand, and I was going to snap, I was going to fix everything, but I hesitated. I was scared. And Tony... he took it from me. He put it on and he snapped, and it should have killed him instantly, but it didn't, it just... it put him here. In this... this in-between place. Because he couldn't let me die. Again. He couldn't let me go."

Harley was crying now, silent tears tracking down his face that he didn't bother to wipe away. He turned away from the bed, pulling Peter into his chest, his arms wrapping around Peter's shoulders with a desperation that felt like drowning.

"I'm so sorry," Harley whispered into Peter's hair. "I'm so sorry you had to go through that. I'm so sorry I wasn't there."

"You couldn't have been," Peter said, his voice muffled against Harley's shirt. "You were okay. You were alive. That's what matters."

"I should have been there," Harley insisted. "I should have... I don't know. Something. Anything."

They stood there for a long moment. Then Harley pulled back just enough to look at Peter, his eyes red-rimmed and exhausted, but his mouth curving into something determined, something stubborn.

"He's going to wake up," Harley said, his voice firm. "Tony's going to wake up because he's too fucking stubborn to die. You know that, right? He's going to wake up and he's going to bitch at you for getting all sappy on his medical equipment, he's going to be so proud of you, Peter. He's going to be so proud."

Peter looked at Harley, at the certainty in his face, and felt something break open in his chest - not grief, not quite, but something adjacent to it. Something like hope.

He snorted in a small, wet laugh that escaped before he could stop it, and buried his face back in Harley's shirt.

"Yeah," Peter breathed. "Yeah, okay."

Harley kissed his temple, his lips lingering against Peter's skin, and sighed - a long, exhausted sound.

"Come on," Harley said softly. "Let's sit down. We can stay as long as you want."

They settled into the chairs by the bed, still holding hands, and Peter let himself lean into Harley's side, let himself be held, let himself believe - just for a moment - that Harley was right. That Tony would wake up. That things would get better.

That they would be okay.

—

The quinjet ride back from Wakanda was too quiet. 

Peter sat by the window, watching the clouds scroll past beneath them, white and endless and indifferent. The suit he'd worn into battle had been replaced with borrowed Wakandan clothes - soft gray fabric that felt too expensive for his blood-stained hands. 

Across from him, Pepper sat with her tablet answering emails, rescheduling meetings, doing the work of keeping Stark Industries afloat while its heart lay unconscious in a medical facility half a world away.

Harley sat next to Peter, close enough that their shoulders touched, but not close enough to draw attention. He'd been quiet since they'd stepped back onto the Quinjet and said goodbye to Tony, quieter than Peter had ever known him to be.  

The quinjet touched down at the private SI airfield in New York at dawn. The sky was the color of bruised fruit, purple and yellow and sickly gray, and the air smelled like rain that hadn't fallen yet. Peter stood up too fast, his head spinning, and Harley's hand shot out to steady him.

"You good?" Harley asked, his voice low.

"Fine," Peter said automatically. He pulled his arm away, gentle but firm, and didn't miss the flicker of hurt that crossed Harley's face.

While the ramp unfolded he stood off to the side, his hands shoved deep in his pockets, his jaw clenched so tight his teeth ached. He wouldn't cry. He'd promised himself he wouldn't cry, not here, not where Pepper could see, not where Harley could see. Crying meant admitting this was real, that Tony might never wake up, that the last conversation they'd had was about Peter staying alive and now Peter was alive and Tony wasn't really.

Harley's flight to Boston left in three hours. 

They stood in the hangar, the noise of the city distant and muffled, and Peter felt like he was underwater, like everything was happening through a thick filter of glass and time.

"So," Harley said, scuffing his shoe against the concrete. "I'm gonna go. MIT and all. Professors are already pissed I missed the first week of classes."

"Yeah," Peter said. He stared at a spot on Harley's shoulder, afraid to meet his eyes. "You should. You can't... you can't put your life on hold."

Harley was quiet for a moment, then he stepped closer, into Peter's space, close enough that Peter could smell the airplane coffee on his breath and the faint, lingering scent of Wakandan soap. "You could come with me. To Boston. Or I could stay. For a while. I don't have to go right now."

"No," Peter said too quickly. He forced himself to look up, to see the concern etched into Harley's face, the way his hair was sticking up in the back where he'd been sleeping against the quinjet wall. "You should go. You have... you have a life. A real life. You can't just sit around waiting for..." He gestured vaguely at the city skyline and Happy’s car idling at the curb.

"Waiting for what?" Harley asked softly. "For you to be okay? For Tony to wake up?"

"Any of it," Peter whispered. "All of it."

Harley reached out, his fingers brushing against Peter's wrist, tracing the veins there with a gentleness that made Peter want to scream. "I'm scared to leave you," Harley admitted. "I'm scared that if I get on that plane, you're going to... I don't know. Disappear. Stop eating. Stop sleeping."

"I'm fine," Peter lied. He pulled his wrist away, shoved his hand back in his pocket. "I'll be fine. I have Pepper. I have... I have things to do. Patrol. School. Whatever."

"Peter," Harley started.

"I'll text you," Peter interrupted, his voice cracking. He took a step back, then another, putting distance between them like he could outrun the way his chest was caving in. "I'll call. Go to class, Harley. Be normal. One of us should be."

Harley stared at him for a long moment, his blue eyes searching Peter's face for something he clearly wasn't finding. Then he nodded, slow and sad, and shouldered his duffel bag. "Okay," he said. "Okay. But if you don't text me, I'm coming back. I'm not kidding, Parker. I will drop everything and come back."

"I know," Peter said.

They stood there, the silence stretching between them, and then Harley surged forward and wrapped his arms around Peter, crushing him in a hug that felt like goodbye. Peter stiffened for a moment, his eyes burning, his throat tight, and then he melted into it, his face pressed against Harley's neck, his hands gripping fistfuls of Harley's jacket.

"Don't be stupid," Harley murmured against his hair. "Don't be brave. Just be okay."

"I'll try," Peter whispered.

Harley pulled back, his hands lingering on Peter's shoulders, and then he kissed him so softly and sweetly that Peter could have melted into the concrete. Then Harley turned and walked away, his boots echoing behind him.

Peter watched him go, his vision blurring, his chest hitching with the effort of keeping himself contained. He didn't cry. He didn't let a single tear fall, not when Harley paused at the door and looked back, not when he lifted his hand in a small wave, not when he disappeared around the corner and was gone.

Peter stood in the empty hanger for ten minutes, staring at the space where Harley had been, and he didn't cry. He prided himself on that. He was fine. He was handling it.

He went back to the tower.

—

The tower was wrong. Peter had known it would be - he'd prepared himself for the silence, for the absence of Tony's music playing from the workshop, for the lack of coffee smell and mechanical noise and life. But knowing it and walking through the lobby, his footsteps echoing off the marble, were two different things. 

The building felt hollow, like a body with the soul removed, all gleaming surfaces and empty spaces.

Still, he couldn’t stay away from the lab. Then he was spending too long in the lab, and all he was doing was thinking, and then he was taking the elevator to Pepper and Tony’s shared floor because he still felt guilty.

The elevator doors chimed, and she looked up from the tea she was making in the kitchen.

"You should sleep," Pepper said without turning around. She knew he was there - she always knew. "Your room's ready. It hasn’t been touched since you were gone."

"I know," Peter said. He didn't move. "I just... I wanted to make sure you were okay."

Pepper's hands stilled on the blanket. She turned, and her face was composed, her makeup perfect, her posture straight, but her eyes were red-rimmed and exhausted. "I'm managing," she said. "You don't need to worry about me, Peter. I need you to worry about you."

"I'm fine," Peter said. It was becoming his mantra, a reflexive response to any expression of concern.

"You're not," Pepper said gently. "But that's okay. We don't have to be fine right now. We just have to keep going."

Peter nodded, though he didn't really understand. How did you keep going when the center of your gravity had shifted, when the person who had pulled you into orbit was suddenly still, silent, unreachable? How did you pretend that everything was normal when nothing was?

He tried. 

That first week, he threw himself into the pretense with desperate energy. He went to class - online, from his room, his camera off so no one could see the circles under his eyes. He patrolled, swinging through the city for six, seven, eight hours at a time, losing himself in the physical exhaustion of it, the simplicity of catching thieves and stopping muggings and being useful. 

He didn't cry. 

Not when Pepper's shoulders shook with silent sobs while she thought he wasn't looking. Not when he found one of Tony's coffee mugs in the kitchen sink, still stained with the dregs of the last cup he'd ever made for himself. Not when he stood on the roof and looked out at the city and realized that he was utterly, completely alone in his grief, because no one else understood what Tony had meant to him, how he'd been more than a mentor, more than a father figure, how he'd been the architect of Peter's entire adult life.

Bucky and Steve were across the world. Harley was in a different timezone, and Pepper was struggling, too.

He was in New York again, but he still felt so lonely.

He texted Harley every day. Short things - patrol was quiet, had ramen for dinner, Tony's vitals are stable. Harley responded with pictures of his dorm room, of his textbooks, of the Charles River at sunset. He never asked if Peter was okay, and Peter was grateful for that.

Steve's first text came at 9:03 AM on a Tuesday, three pictures attached: a sunrise over some mountain range, Bucky squinting into the camera with his hair sticking up, a street sign in Romanian that Peter couldn't read. The message read: 

Bucky says good morning. We're in Brasov. The food is terrible but the company is good. How are you holding up?

- Steve

Peter stared at his phone for a long moment, something warm and painful unfolding in his chest. He typed back: 

I'm doing good. Tell Bucky I said hi.

The next morning, at 9:01 AM, another flood of pictures: a cathedral, Steve smiling in a way Peter had rarely seen, relaxed and unguarded, a stray dog that had apparently adopted them. 

Bucky fed this guy our breakfast. Says he reminds him of you. Scrappy. 

- Steve

It became a routine. 

Every morning, like clockwork, Peter's phone would buzz with Steve's careful, polite updates. Bucky sent pictures less frequently - Steve doing something stupid (standing on a rickety bridge, attempting to order food in broken Romanian, falling asleep on a train), reminders to eat (You look like a strong breeze would break you in half. Eat something), and requests for pictures of Alpine.

Peter sent back pictures of the cat, of the tower, of the city from high above. He didn't send pictures of himself. He didn't want them to see how thin he was getting, how his eyes looked bruised, how he was slowly unraveling at the seams.

He was fine. He was handling it. He wasn't crying.

— 

Peter was failing chemistry. 

He sat at his desk in the tower, his laptop open to a lecture he wasn't watching, his textbook open to a chapter he hadn't read, and he knew, with absolute certainty, that he was going to fail. The midterm was in two days. He hadn't started studying.

It was chemistry.

How was he failing chemistry? This was supposed to be his thing. How could he be screwing this up?

His phone buzzed. Harley's face lit up the screen, grinning and sunburned from some Harvard rowing event. Peter answered, propping the phone against his textbook so he could see Harley's face while keeping his hands free to pretend he was taking notes.

Harley's face filled the screen when he answered, backlit by the warm glow of a dorm room desk lamp. He was wearing glasses, which meant he'd been staring at code for too long, and his hair was doing that thing where it stuck up in the back from where he'd been running his hands through it.  

"Hey, handsome," Harley drawled, his voice carrying that particular tone of lazy affection that made Peter's chest ache with how much he missed him. "What are you wearing?"

Peter looked down at himself: sweatpants with a hole in the knee, a hoodie that had belonged to Tony and now hung loose on Peter's frame, no shirt underneath. There was a bruise blooming across his collarbone from where someone had hit him with a crowbar last night, and his hair was still damp from a shower he'd taken at 4 AM after dragging himself home from patrol. 

"I'm not doing this," he said, but he was smiling, just a little.

"Doing what?" Harley asked, all innocence, adjusting his glasses with a finger.

"The flirty thing. The 'what are you wearing' thing." Peter leaned back, wincing as his spine cracked in three places. He wasn’t even nineteen yet and he had the back of a sixty-year-old construction worker. 

A snort from the other side of the call. “Okay. How’re you doing, then?”

Peter let out a little breath.

"I'm exhausted. I patrolled for eight hours last night. Eight. There was a hostage situation in Hell's Kitchen, and then some idiot tried to rob a bodega with a flamethrower - who even has a flamethrower? - and then I had to help Pepper with some SI paperwork because she's three months pregnant and she can't reach the top shelf of the filing cabinet anymore, and I just..." He rubbed his eyes, his head pounding in time with his pulse. "I don't have energy for flirting. Sorry."

Harley's face shifted, the playful smirk dropping away into something softer, more concerned. He leaned closer to the camera, his blue eyes filling the screen. "Okay," he said gently. "No flirting. Just... talk to me. What's going on? Are you eating? When's the last time you slept?"

"I slept," Peter lied. He had technically closed his eyes for twenty minutes in the bodega parking lot at 3 AM, which probably counted as sleeping if you were desperate enough to believe it. "And I'm eating. Had ramen for dinner. The good kind, with the... the spicy oil."

"That's not food, that's sodium and regret," Harley said, but he was smiling again, small and sad. "Show me your face. Properly."

Peter adjusted the phone, tilting it so Harley could see him better. He knew what he looked like - he'd caught his reflection in the toaster that morning, all hollow cheeks and dark circles and a split lip his body had forgotten to heal properly. There was a cut on his forehead, too, from the flamethrower incident. He'd webbed it shut himself, but it was still angry and red.

"Jesus, Peter," Harley breathed, his voice rough. "You look like you got hit by a truck."

"Two trucks," Peter corrected, trying to make it sound like a joke. "And a bus. The bus was personal."

"Come here," Harley said, and his voice cracked slightly. "Come to Boston. Or I'll come to New York. This weekend. I don't care about my midterm. I care about you not dying of exhaustion."

"I can't," Peter said, and he hated how small he sounded. "Crime is up like forty percent since word got out that Tony's..." He couldn't finish the sentence. He never could. "Since people know he's not... around. Everyone's trying to test the boundaries, see if Spider-Man's still patrolling, if the Avengers are still watching. I can't leave. I can't take a weekend off. People would get hurt."

Harley was quiet for a moment, his jaw tight, the muscle jumping in his cheek the way it did when he was trying not to say something he'd regret. "Okay," he said finally. "Okay. Then tell me what I can do. Tell me how to help from here."

"You are helping," Peter said. He pulled Tony's hoodie tighter around himself, burying his nose in the collar where he could still smell faint traces of metal and coffee and something that might have been Tony's cologne, or might have been his imagination. "Just... talk to me. Tell me about your day. Something normal. Something that doesn't involve... all of this."

Harley nodded, leaning back in his chair. He picked up a pen, twirling it between his fingers the way he always did when he was thinking.

 "Okay. Normal. Well, I had a seminar on thermodynamics this morning that I slept through because I was up until 4 AM trying to debug a program that kept crashing my laptop. Then I went to the dining hall and they were serving this... this gray meat thing that might have been chicken, or might have been whatever they pulled out of the river. I ate it anyway because I'm a masochist. Then I spent three hours in the library trying to catch up on reading I missed because of the sleeping-through-seminar thing, and now I'm here, talking to you, which is the first good thing that's happened all day."

Peter felt himself smiling, the expression unfamiliar on his face. It felt like he hadn't smiled in weeks, like his muscles had forgotten how. "That sounds terrible," he said. "I'm sorry about the gray meat."

"It was awful," Harley agreed. "I would have killed for the Thai food from the corner near Midtown. Or that weird smoothie you make with the protein powder that tastes like chalk."

"It doesn't taste like chalk," Peter protested. "It tastes like... vanilla."

"It tastes like despair, Peter. I've told you this."

Peter laughed, the sound catching him by surprise. He missed this. He missed the way Harley could make him laugh even when everything was falling apart, the way he felt like himself instead of just Spider-Man.

"I miss you," Peter said, the words slipping out before he could stop them, soft and vulnerable.

Harley's expression softened, his eyes going warm and fond. "I miss you too," he said. "Every day. All the time. It's stupid. I walk past this pizza place near campus and I think, 'Peter would hate this, it's too greasy,' and then I spend ten minutes staring at my phone trying to convince myself not to call you because you're probably asleep or on patrol or saving the world."

"I'm never too busy for you," Peter said, and he meant it, even if it wasn't entirely true.

"I know," Harley said. "That's what makes it worse. You're never too busy, so you answer every time, even when you shouldn't, even when you should be sleeping or eating or..." He trailed off, shaking his head. "Sorry. I'm not trying to guilt you. I'm just... I'm worried. You're running yourself into the ground, sweetheart."

Peter looked down at his hands, at the bruised knuckles and the web-fluid residue he couldn't quite scrub out from under his nails. "I know," he admitted. "I know I am. But I don't know how to stop. If I stop, if I slow down, even for a second..."

"Then what?" Harley asked gently.

"Then I think," Peter said, his voice barely above a whisper. The tower was quiet around him, the midday sun filtering through the windows in pale, watery stripes. "And when I think, I..." He stopped, swallowed hard, and he squeezed his eyes shut, the words feeling enormous and terrifying. "I think I'm going to drop out."

The silence on the other end of the line stretched out. Peter braced himself for the argument, for the you're-so-smart speech, for the don't-give-up-on-your-dreams rhetoric.

"Oh," Harley said instead, his voice considering, thoughtful. He set down his pen, giving Peter his full attention. "You're not feeling it anymore?"

"No, I'm just..." Peter opened his eyes, staring at the chemistry textbook without seeing it. "I'm so tired. With patrol and Pepper and everything, I just... I can't keep up. I'm failing chemistry. I missed three labs last month, and the professor emailed me yesterday saying if I miss one more, I'm automatically failing. And I have a paper due on Friday that I haven't started, and I just..." He opened his eyes, staring at the ceiling. "I don't see how I can do both. Be Spider-Man and be a student. Not right now. Not with everything... not with how things are."

Harley was quiet for a moment, and Peter could hear him shifting, the sound of fabric against fabric, probably sitting up straighter in his desk chair. "Drop out, then," Harley said simply.

Peter blinked. "What?"

"Drop out," Harley repeated. "Take a leave of absence. Pause. You don't need to force yourself if you don't want to. If you're miserable, if you're failing anyway, if you're killing yourself trying to do everything... then stop. Take a break. Come back later, or don't. But don't torture yourself just because you think you should."

Peter winced, though Harley couldn't see him. 

"Should I, though?" he asked, the question directed more at himself than at Harley. "I... feel like I shouldn't. Tony wanted me to go to college. He was so proud that I got into MIT. If he wakes up and finds out I dropped out..."

"If he wakes up," Harley said, and the words hung between them, heavy and awful, "he's going to be proud of you for surviving. For doing what you had to do to keep going. He's not going to care about a degree, Peter. He's going to care that you're alive and okay."

Peter swallowed hard, his throat tight. "Thank you," he said flatly.

"Just sayin'," Harley said, and Peter could hear the shrug in his voice. "Don't force yourself. Besides, I'm gonna be the breadwinner, right? You can just be my kept man. Stay home, cook dinner, look pretty. I'll support your lavish lifestyle of ramen and crime-fighting."

"You're not getting SI yet," Peter snorted, grateful for the deflection. "Pepper will absolutely fight you for it."

"One day..." Harley drawled, stretching the words out, his voice dropping into that teasing register that made Peter's stomach flutter. "One day I'll be running that place, and you'll be my trophy husband, and we'll have a nice house in the suburbs with a dog and a white picket fence, and you can patrol locally like a small-town superhero. Spider-Man of Scarsdale. Very niche."

"You're ridiculous," Peter said, but he was smiling, just a little.

"I'm your ridiculous," Harley countered. "Now go drop out of college and get some sleep. You sound exhausted"

"I will," Peter said. He paused, then added, softer, "Thank you. For not... for not making me feel bad about it."

"Never," Harley promised. 

Peter nodded, even though Harley couldn't see him. He pulled the phone closer, like he could bridge the distance between them through sheer force of will. "How many days?" he asked, his voice small.

Harley's expression shifted, becoming something tender and fond and sad all at once. He knew what Peter was asking. He always knew. "Twelve," he said. "Twelve days until winter break. Then I'm yours for three weeks. No Harvard, no Boston, just... here. With you."

"Twelve," Peter repeated, tasting the number, rolling it around in his mouth. It felt like forever and no time at all. "That's... that's not so bad."

"It's not so bad," Harley agreed. "You can make it twelve days. I believe in you."

"Okay," Peter whispered.

"Okay," Harley echoed. "Get some sleep. Drink water. Call me tomorrow?"

"Yeah," Peter said. "Yeah, I will. Goodnight, Harley."

"Goodnight, Peter." Harley paused, his face filling the screen, his eyes bright and earnest. "I love you."

Peter felt his chest tighten, the words hitting him like a physical thing, warm and heavy and real. "I love you too," he said. "So much."

Harley smiled, that small, private smile that was just for Peter, and then the screen went dark.

Peter sat there for a long moment, the phone still pressed against his ear, listening to the silence on the other end. Then he set it down on the desk and flopped back in his chair, letting his head fall back, staring up at the ceiling. 

The tower was quiet around him, the midday sun filtering through the windows in pale, watery stripes. Somewhere in the penthouse, Pepper was probably napping, her hand resting on her belly, and Tony was... Tony was breathing. That was something. That was enough for now.

Peter closed his eyes and listened to the sirens wailing outside, distant and insistent, calling him back to the city. He should go. He should suit up, swing out, do his job. But for just a moment, he let himself stay here, wrapped in Harley's love and Tony's hoodie and the fragile, temporary peace of the afternoon, and he didn't move.

Twelve days. He could make it twelve days.

For now, though, he sat there in the quiet, the chemistry textbook still open in front of him, and he thought about what it would mean to stop, to let go of this particular thread of expectation. It felt terrifying. It felt like freedom.

He opened his laptop and pulled up the withdrawal forms.

He was fine. He was going to be fine.