![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
breakinglight11Into the Spider-Verse:
“Dad Body”
By Phoebe Roberts
~~~
Summary: Peter thought that he'd done too much to screw up his old life. But Miles's faith in him made him wonder if maybe he had it in him to fix things after all.
Previous chapters:
1. Call, Not Text
Chapter summary: Peter goes to see Mary Jane, for the first time in over a year.
~~~
2. Flowers
He tried to put himself together a little, before he went over. Threw on the one suit that still fit, even figured out how to get the travel iron hot enough to press the shirt collar. Wasn’t great, but at least Aunt May wouldn’t be rolling over in her grave. It wasn’t until he was passing a store on the way over— not even a florist, just a grocery store —that he thought to pick up flowers. Not roses, that would be a little too presumptuous, but the pink daisy-looking ones seemed inoffensive. He wasn’t terribly well versed in flower language, but in the absence of anything that said “sorry for wasting the best years of your life,” he supposed they’d have to do.
He used the web shooter to ring the bell. She used to get a kick out of that, way back when, letting him appear on the street in just the right insouciant pose. But that wasn’t the real reason this time; the web gave him a little distance from the door. Going right up to the threshold was a bit more than he could handle.
She hadn’t seen much of him in a while, and when she had, there hadn’t been… quite so much of him. Recent events had made him painfully aware that he wasn’t exactly in perfect fighting trim, and he wasn’t sure of her feelings on the dad body— particularly given how much he’d fallen short on the dad part. It hadn’t helped to see an alternate version of himself, plastered on billboards fifty feet high, who had basically been everything a gal could ever want with probably like an eight-pack to boot. In that instant he found himself spinning out a dozen ways he didn’t measure up, ways he’d let her down, didn’t deserve to be there. All that, in the few moments before she appeared in the doorway.
Just the same, it’d been a while since he’d seen her— the her of this universe anyway. She didn’t look exactly the same as the Mary Jane of Miles’s reality, or the one of his most recent memory. But the way she looked then… great, of course; she always looked great, in that low-key effortless way that suddenly made him feel grossly self-conscious. But more than that, she looked like… like life, the future, possibilities, so much it twisted his heart.
“Hello, Peter.”
“Hey, MJ.”
She accepted the flowers graciously enough, though it didn’t take a spider sense to detect the note of confusion in her face. As she put them in water, he was suddenly distracted looking around her apartment— once their apartment, which he’d almost forgotten until this moment. God, it was weird, to see a place that felt like it should have been home but wasn’t. It wasn’t that different, he found, except perhaps a little neater, without the disarray of his things cluttering up the place. But, he noted with some dismay, it didn’t feel as empty as he thought, or hoped, it would; there was a tennis bag hung on the coat rack, a ticket stub in the key bowl, a wall calendar scribbled over with events and appointments. She had her own life, of course, a life that had gone on without him.
He cringed in sudden shame at the thought. Why should he have any right to hope her life was reduced without him? He should be glad she was getting along, that he hadn’t left her worse off after everything she’d gone through.
He noticed her noticing his noticing. “I like what you’ve done with the place,” he murmured by way of explanation.
Her lip quirked. “Yeah. I cleaned it.”
He’d almost forgotten that, how she could be funny in that deadpan that way. A laugh burst out of him, unexpected, a little too loud. He swallowed it abruptly, and she stood there beside the kitchen counter, regarding him.
“So…” he said at last, raking a hand through his hair. God, did he have even more gray than he did before going through the supercollider? “How you been?”
But she just shook her head, curls bouncing about her shoulders. “Peter,” she said. “What is this about?”
He swallowed hard, throat tightening. “MJ…”
Her brows drew in. “I haven’t heard from you in months now. And now you call me out of the blue, wanting to meet…” She gestured toward the vase. “With flowers? Did something happen?”
He had to laugh a little at that. “I’m Spider-Man. Something always happens.”
Wearily she sighed. “So what is it this time? Time bomb? Clone saga? Some supervillain coming to take me hostage to use against you?”
“Oh, God.” He dragged his hands down the sides of his face. “It might be easier if it was. That stuff— I know how to handle. This…”
She stared at him; he could see her exasperation mounting. “What, Peter?”
“MJ…”
Her voice started to break. “Jesus Christ, what?”
He ripped the words out of him like a knife from a wound. “I want to try again!”
She froze and stared at him, eyes as wide as dinner plates.
~~~
Next chapter: 3. Ready
“Dad Body”
By Phoebe Roberts
~~~
Summary: Peter thought that he'd done too much to screw up his old life. But Miles's faith in him made him wonder if maybe he had it in him to fix things after all.
Previous chapters:
1. Call, Not Text
Chapter summary: Peter goes to see Mary Jane, for the first time in over a year.
~~~
2. Flowers
He tried to put himself together a little, before he went over. Threw on the one suit that still fit, even figured out how to get the travel iron hot enough to press the shirt collar. Wasn’t great, but at least Aunt May wouldn’t be rolling over in her grave. It wasn’t until he was passing a store on the way over— not even a florist, just a grocery store —that he thought to pick up flowers. Not roses, that would be a little too presumptuous, but the pink daisy-looking ones seemed inoffensive. He wasn’t terribly well versed in flower language, but in the absence of anything that said “sorry for wasting the best years of your life,” he supposed they’d have to do.
He used the web shooter to ring the bell. She used to get a kick out of that, way back when, letting him appear on the street in just the right insouciant pose. But that wasn’t the real reason this time; the web gave him a little distance from the door. Going right up to the threshold was a bit more than he could handle.
She hadn’t seen much of him in a while, and when she had, there hadn’t been… quite so much of him. Recent events had made him painfully aware that he wasn’t exactly in perfect fighting trim, and he wasn’t sure of her feelings on the dad body— particularly given how much he’d fallen short on the dad part. It hadn’t helped to see an alternate version of himself, plastered on billboards fifty feet high, who had basically been everything a gal could ever want with probably like an eight-pack to boot. In that instant he found himself spinning out a dozen ways he didn’t measure up, ways he’d let her down, didn’t deserve to be there. All that, in the few moments before she appeared in the doorway.
Just the same, it’d been a while since he’d seen her— the her of this universe anyway. She didn’t look exactly the same as the Mary Jane of Miles’s reality, or the one of his most recent memory. But the way she looked then… great, of course; she always looked great, in that low-key effortless way that suddenly made him feel grossly self-conscious. But more than that, she looked like… like life, the future, possibilities, so much it twisted his heart.
“Hello, Peter.”
“Hey, MJ.”
She accepted the flowers graciously enough, though it didn’t take a spider sense to detect the note of confusion in her face. As she put them in water, he was suddenly distracted looking around her apartment— once their apartment, which he’d almost forgotten until this moment. God, it was weird, to see a place that felt like it should have been home but wasn’t. It wasn’t that different, he found, except perhaps a little neater, without the disarray of his things cluttering up the place. But, he noted with some dismay, it didn’t feel as empty as he thought, or hoped, it would; there was a tennis bag hung on the coat rack, a ticket stub in the key bowl, a wall calendar scribbled over with events and appointments. She had her own life, of course, a life that had gone on without him.
He cringed in sudden shame at the thought. Why should he have any right to hope her life was reduced without him? He should be glad she was getting along, that he hadn’t left her worse off after everything she’d gone through.
He noticed her noticing his noticing. “I like what you’ve done with the place,” he murmured by way of explanation.
Her lip quirked. “Yeah. I cleaned it.”
He’d almost forgotten that, how she could be funny in that deadpan that way. A laugh burst out of him, unexpected, a little too loud. He swallowed it abruptly, and she stood there beside the kitchen counter, regarding him.
“So…” he said at last, raking a hand through his hair. God, did he have even more gray than he did before going through the supercollider? “How you been?”
But she just shook her head, curls bouncing about her shoulders. “Peter,” she said. “What is this about?”
He swallowed hard, throat tightening. “MJ…”
Her brows drew in. “I haven’t heard from you in months now. And now you call me out of the blue, wanting to meet…” She gestured toward the vase. “With flowers? Did something happen?”
He had to laugh a little at that. “I’m Spider-Man. Something always happens.”
Wearily she sighed. “So what is it this time? Time bomb? Clone saga? Some supervillain coming to take me hostage to use against you?”
“Oh, God.” He dragged his hands down the sides of his face. “It might be easier if it was. That stuff— I know how to handle. This…”
She stared at him; he could see her exasperation mounting. “What, Peter?”
“MJ…”
Her voice started to break. “Jesus Christ, what?”
He ripped the words out of him like a knife from a wound. “I want to try again!”
She froze and stared at him, eyes as wide as dinner plates.
~~~
Next chapter: 3. Ready
![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png){kind=small}