Work Text:
Today’s News – NYC – 2 days ago
- Crime Rates Spike: Is This Spider-Man’s Fault?
- Spider-Man Crashes Wedding
Today’s News – NYC – 1 day ago
- Bruce Banner Taken to Custody
- Director of D.O.D.C. Bill Metzger Missing
- Spider-Man in Critical Condition
Today’s News – NYC – 3 hours ago
- Spider-Man on the Mend
Trending Now
- Who Is Mrs. Spider-Man?
INCOMING: NED LEEDS
“E.V., take the call,” Spider-Man says as he shoots another web to attach to a building. He pendulum-swings as the call connects and his back only slightly twinges at the stretch and pull. It could be way worse, though. DeWolff told him to rest and he is, he’s just…warming up.
“Uh, Spider-Man?” Ned sounds concerned.
Web. Shoot. Swing. Let’s try turning now. Web, shoot, shoot, pull—oh God, bad idea, bad idea, bad idea. He hisses out, “Yeah, man?” Maybe he should take it a little easy at least for the day. Just a straight shot down 3rd Ave should be enough to loosen his muscles. He’s really not in high school anymore.
“Have you seen the news?”
“What news?” he asks.
A couple of headlines flash across his eyes. There’s a robbery up in Harlem that he is expressly forbidden from involving himself in. Dr. Banner’s still locked up at Bellevue with a spare inhibitor on his wrist. The senate’s gridlocking a new piece of superhero legislation that’s got both parties in-fighting with each other.
Ned texts him a link that uploads to his lenses.
Threats and Menaces: Top Stories
Who Is Mrs. Spider-Man?
By Norah Winters · Published July 31, 2028 02:02 PM EST
♥️ 63 🗨 19 🎧 3 min 🔁
It’s a sunny, Sunday afternoon when heiress Luna Rollings and tech mogul Teo Graham tie the knot. The couple was about to thank their guests when Spider-Man crashed through the window right into their cake. The still unknown force that controlled part of Manhattan traced back to this wedding day when the bride revealed that Spider-Man was “in a race to save the love of his life,” a guest reported hearing Rollings say.
“I don’t remember saying anything. I only remember Spider-Man ruining my wedding and chasing after one of the servers,” said Rollings. “He attacked my pilot and left him hanging on a crane. We couldn’t even have our dream send-off because of him.”
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“Threats and Menaces isn’t exactly a credible news source,” says Peter as he makes another turn that will bring him closer to Ned and MJ’s apartment. His muscles burn.
“Yeah, I know that.” There’s a typing sound. A click of a mouse. Click, scroll. Click, scroll. “But the article blew up on Twitter. Everyone’s asking about ‘Mrs. Spider-Man’ and someone did their research.”
Peter frowns. “What do you mean by research?”
“I mean,” Ned starts, hesitating, “some people cross-checked the Spidey Tracker’s archives with the wedding date and a couple of tweets and found out that you saved MJ.”
Peter almost splats like a bug on the side of a brick building but saves himself just in time to attach to it. “What?”
“Wait, no, let me explain,” Ned hurries to say. “Not MJ, specifically, but a tall girl with long hair who lives…around here. Nobody took pictures or anything, but a couple of witnesses said that you were holding MJ and went inside her building afterwards.”
Peter stands sideways on the wall and starts pacing. “Is anyone bothering her?” Guilt gnaws at his insides. He should’ve been more careful. Maybe he shouldn’t have stayed. There were people watching them, he knew. Whenever he’s in the suit, somebody’s always watching him, especially when he’s not up among the clouds with the other skyscrapers. “Is she okay?”
Further away, her voice: “Are you calling Peter?”
“Yeah,” Ned says, louder.
Her voice comes closer. “Put him on speaker.”
“All right, all right.” A little thump as Ned puts his phone down. “MJ’s here.”
Yeah, he knows. “I’m sorry about all this, MJ,” he says immediately. Peter rubs his face. “I was gonna come by to see if you’re all right, but maybe I shouldn’t—”
“No, you can come,” she says quickly. “Just probably not as Spider-Man? I mean, I’m okay. Nobody’s figured out that I’m…” She clears her throat. “Nobody clocked that it’s me.”
From below him, somebody on the street yells, “Yo, Spidey!”
Spider-Man peers down. “What’s up? You doin’ all right?”
The teen has their phone pointed up at him. They’re wearing an oversized Spider-Man themed shirt and jean shorts and beat up Air Forces. “I should be asking you that.”
Peter grins. “Takes a little more to bring me down, kid.”
“And what’s up with this Mrs. Spidey shit, dude?” the teen asks, pinching their phone probably to zoom in on him. “You save her?”
He freezes.
In his ears, MJ says, “Tell them the truth.”
“Really?” Ned asks.
“It’s not it’ll change what people think.” How logical. Peter was thinking about going live on national television to say that he’s not romantically involved with anyone, let alone a tall girl with long hair. And it’s a truth, to be fair. He’s not. They’re just friends.
“Oh, fuck, you didn’t save—”
Spider-Man hurries to say, “I did, I did. She’s unharmed. She’s safe.” And he’ll do his best to make that a fact of existence.
The teen slumps. “Oh good. I didn’t know you had a girl.”
“Oh, I, uh—” Spider-Man points his thumb behind him, which is coincidentally, up. “I’ve gotta go.”
He shoots a web, pulls himself back, and lets tension spring him forward.
“Smooth, Spider-Man,” MJ says like there’s a laugh trapped in the back of her throat.
His lips crack into a grin. “Shut up, I was cornered. I couldn’t think of anything else.”
“Aren’t you supposed to be witty when cornered?” she asks. “Like that’s your whole thing.”
“It’s not my ‘whole thing’—”
“You’ve yet to prove me wrong,” MJ continues like he didn’t talk. “Jean cornered you. Like three times.”
“She did not corner me,” he corrected her, heading right to his closest backpack that he has stashed around the city. Conveniently, there’s one a few blocks away from their apartment and that was there before they moved in. Parker Luck working in his favor this time around. “And we’re cool now, so it doesn’t matter.”
“Uh, guys, not to interrupt your weird flirting—”
MJ starts, “It’s not—”
“We’re not—” he says.
They both stop, embarrassed. Thankfully, Ned ignores them both. His mouse clicking gets worse and there’s a Spidey Tracker chime.
“You made it worse.” Ned texts him another link. This time to a tweet with a couple of replies.
“What’s this?” he asks even as E.V. uploads it to his mask without prompting.
Cal ❤️🕸️💙 @spiderHYPHENman · 2m
SPIDER-MAN HAS A WIFE CONFIRMED
[video attached]
friendly nbhd 🕷️ @allwebbedup · 1m
Reply to @spiderHYPHENman
omfg ur telling me that fake news is REAL????!!?!?!
🕳️@H0LEIN1 · 1m
Reply to @spiderHYPHENman @allwebbedup
Update the spidey tracker bruh
Cal ❤️🕸️💙 @spiderHYPHENman · 36s
Reply to @H0LEIN1 @allwebbedup
U fucking dumb bro? How abt u update ur gd phone or smth lmfao I’m not stupid I already did it
friendly nbhd 🕷️ @allwebbedup · 12s
Reply to @spiderHYPHENman @H0LEIN1
stop arguing. spidey literally has a WIFE WE NEED TO LOCK TF IN
Spider-Man webs his backpack towards him and quickly changes. “So I guess I have a wife now,” he says, throwing a shirt over his head. “Honestly, if it stops people from trying to jump off roofs to ask me out, this might be a good move.”
MJ snorts. “There’s no way real life people are doing that.”
“What, you’re calling me a liar now?” Peter shoves his backpack over his shoulders and looks down into the empty alleyway.
“They don’t even know what you look like,” she argues. “You could have, I don’t know, half a face that’s melted from a fire.” She pauses. “That might be cool actually. But whatever, not the point.”
He and Ned laugh, and Peter jumps down. He takes a few steps, touches the mask on his face, then scrambles to take it off. “I’ll be at your place in a few.”
“You’re taking the front door, right?” Ned asks.
“I mean, yeah, unless you don’t want me to?”
“I’ll meet you downstairs,” says MJ and ends the call.
Hurriedly, Peter buries his mask into one of the pockets and blends into the throng of New Yorkers. Is it the recent news that their cross streets are busier than usual? This seems a little more crowded. A couple of people have their phone out, the recognizable Spidey Tracker screen visible from where he is.
God, they’re trying to find Spider-Man’s wife.
His entire body vibrates at the phrase. He ignores it.
MJ opens the door, and Peter’s hand wrings around the strap of his backpack. Her hair’s in a braid, and she’s in a white tank top and jeans, and she’s so pretty it ties his stomach in knots. She smiles when he sees him and his heart flutters wildly. He smiles back, waving, then he wants to kick himself for waving because why would he do that? Is that too awkward? But she waves back and tucks a stray strand of hair behind her ears.
“Hi,” he says breathlessly. He’s got probably the stupidest grin on his face, but he can’t help it. Never around her.
“Hi,” she says. Teasing, she adds, “I didn’t even need to jump off a roof to get you here. Everyone else is trying way too hard.”
Peter laughs and follows her inside, up the stairs. “You’ve got special privileges.”
“Oh, so it’s a privilege to be near you?” MJ hooks her head over her shoulder to look at him. “I didn’t know you had such a massive ego.”
“You know that’s not what I mean, MJ,” he says. Her braid swings as she moves, a mesmerizing pendulum, and it’s kind of maybe making his mouth dry.
She left her door unlocked, so she just walks in. Ned leans on his door frame and scrutinizes his phone. “Spectrum News is reporting you two.”
“Fuck,” says MJ. “Spectrum, really?”
That means this rumor became a hundred percent more real than a JJJ-newsroom off-shoot and a couple of trending tweets. This is ‘real’ now. God, isn’t there actual stuff to talk about instead of his supposed love life? Peter pulls at the collar of his shirt.
“Should I make an official announcement or something?” He looks between MJ and Ned. “I really don’t want you guys to be hounded. I know you don’t remember the last time you were associated with me when my identity was revealed—it was a shit show. It took like a whole month until people stopped visiting you at work, MJ.”
Ned comes close and claps his shoulder. “They don’t know it’s her, Peter.”
“We’ll be fine.” MJ leans her arm against his. “You can make a statement to the press or not. It’s up to you.”
“But it involves you.” The words leave his mouth without thought. “Sorry, I mean, like, you were the one who was seen that one time, not that you’re Mrs…Spider-Man,” he ends lamely.
She has a boyfriend, he reminds himself. She has a boyfriend who kissed her during their welcoming party a couple of days ago.
MJ was Mrs. Spider-Man, though. Once. Obviously, they weren’t married. They were just kids—scared kids—but she was his someone and he wasn’t even thinking about marriage at the time and hadn’t thought about it at all for most of his life until MJ. Until she asked him if he had a Mrs. Spider-Man, and it made him laugh in a way he hadn’t in a while. She makes him soft. She’s always done that to him. He can catch a moving car, fight armed men into a standstill, outsmart his way out of so many situations, but she’s the only one who’s ever gotten him to lay himself bare. MJ, the only girl he’s dated. The girl who kept his secret, even from him. The girl who told him she loved him when his entire world was cracking into a billion unfamiliar pieces.
“Still up to you.” She squeezes his forearm.
Peter weighs it for a beat. And another. Another. “I won’t deny it, but I won’t confirm it either. If somebody’s trying to get to me through ‘Mrs. Spider-Man,’ they’ll get a run around which would buy me time. And as long as I don’t visit this place as Spider-Man, then I think we’ll be okay?”
“Wise,” says Ned.
“Sounds like you’ve got it all figured out.” MJ’s mouth curves.
Peter’s eyes catch on her lips then dart back up to her eyes. “Well,” he says, “not everything.”