Chapter One: Best Friends
Kat's POV
"Come on, Peter, we'll be late!" I shout to one of my best friends as I race through the streets on foot. "You don't want Mr. Doufon giving you a detention, do you?" I grin as I say the words. He'd already had some close calls, and there were rumors about how horrible Mr. Doufon's detentions were. In fact, some students had said-
"Hey!" shouts Peter, interrupting my train of thought, "That's not fair! You got a head start!" I laugh, then nearly fall over from grazing a bicyclist pedaling down the sidewalk.
"You snooze, you lose!" I yell, speeding down the street. He's so slow… but at least he's faster than other kids our age. It stinks that we have to keep all of this stuff a secret, I think, the school just around the corner. Well…. More like five corners. Or ten. Whatever.
Ten minutes later, I arrive at the front steps of the school, with Peter a few yards behind me. "Midtown Tech," I say with a joking tone, "The school of misfits, weirdos, and nerds." I look at the red bricks that make up your typical school building. "Hey, Peter," I say, "That sounds just like you!" I laugh, looking at his slightly sweaty form slowly moseying towards me.
"Hey! You're a nerd, too!" he protests. I snort.
"Not as much as you..." I trail off, catching a glimpse of a pea-green flannel shirt in the door window. Oh, crud, I think to myself, we're gonna be late!
"Peter! Come on! I just saw Mr. Doufon's favorite sweatshirt! We've gotta get to class before him!" I exclaim. I look up at the rust-colored building, and I suddenly have an idea. "Hey, PETER!" I shout to the older boy. His head swivels in my direction, body following soon after. "I have an idea how to get to class on time!" I look determinedly at him, ready to haul him up to class with me if he doesn't cooperate.
"What's it gonna be now, Kat? Are we going to scale the building with our bare hands?" I shoot him a look of both surprise and excitement. "Oh no, we don't. There's no freaking way that I'm going to climb up four storiesof a building just to get to class on time." He states. "Besides," he says, lowering his voice to a whisper, "Wouldn't that risk our identities?"
"Come on," I plead, moving close enough to him to whisper in his ear, "You're Spider-Man, you can do anything!" He hesitates for a moment, indecision showing on his face.
"Fine," he eventually declares, "But you have to carry my backpack." He hands over the dark blue bag with a tiny little Spider-Man symbol in the corner, too small for human eyes. But for us… I couldn't concentrate on that now. I had a wall to climb.
As I knock on the window of our homeroom class, I see Ned nearly fall out of his seat, and MJ sitting next to him, give me a small smirk of amusement. Wow, I think, I must really be getting through to her. She almost never smiles! MJ and Ned were my two other besties, and pretty much the only people (other than Peter) in our entire group of 'people that we talked to and remotely tolerated'. (JK. They're like siblings to me.) They are also the only people that hang out with me, and me with them. So, it's kinda a win-win.
All of this goes through my head in a matter of seconds, and then Ned gets enough of a grip on reality to open the window and let Peter and I into the classroom. We get into our seats not a second too late, because Mr. Doufon steps into the classroom right after Ned closes the window. When Mr. Doufon meets my eyes and glances over to see Peter and I sitting peacefully in our chairs, his eyes widen slightly in surprise. I realize that he must have seen us while Peter and I were just reaching the school after him. The ringing of the school bell snapped my thoughts back to reality, and I shifted my gaze towards the clock. Only five more minutes until-
"STOP DOING THAT!" A loud bellow snapped me out of my thoughts, and I realized that that was the second time today that had happened. Annoying. I shifted my attention to whomever had interrupted my thinking. There was a security guard standing in the doorway of the classroom, pointing in my and Peter's general direction. I put a look of both innocence and confusion onto my face, and turned my head slightly to the side to see if Peter was doing the same. He was.
"YOU TWO!" He roared. "THE GIRL WITH THE LONG BROWN HAIR AND HOGWARTS T-SHIRT. AND YOU. THE BOY WITH THE DARK GREEN INCEPTION SWEATSHIRT." The red-faced man stalks up to our seats, places both hands firmly on our shared desk, and says in a shaky voice, "No more climbing the frickin' school buildings to get to class," he finished, taking a deep breath. He shuffles out of the classroom, muttering to himself. I look at Peter, and find relief showing on his face. I have no doubt that my face mirrors his.
"That was a really close call," he whispers, "and it was a huge risk too. Remind me to never do that again." I snicker, and realize that Mr. Doufon is almost at his desk.
"Yeah, but you had fun," I whisper back, ending the conversation since I didn't want a detention. Peter shoots me a glare, and then falters. A huge grin appears on his face, and he writes on a slip of paper, Yeah. I guess I did. I smile, and look up to our Homeroom teacher.
"Okay, kids. Now, since we're done with this, we're going to move onto our next unit. Class, turn your textbooks to page-" RRINGGGG! Ms. Nichol's intriguing lecture on AP Physics is cut off as the bell rings, signaling the end of school.
"See ya later, Penis Parker!" Shouts Flash as Peter and I step out of the classroom. My eyes follow him as he runs down the hall, looking like an overgrown penguin with a sack on its back. I shoot a glance at Peter, concerned.
"Ignore him. It can only get better from here, right?" I say, attempting to reassure my bestie. We walk down the hall, side by side.
"I guess…" he grumbles. "It's just so annoying, you know?" I look at him, and notice he has a small frown on his face.
"Yeah. It's probably only 'cause he's jealous of how smart you are. I mean, we're the only two students in the history of the school that have qualified for AP in every single one of our classes." He snorts.
"That is true…. But still. Why me?" I smirk, a witty retort already brewing in my mind.
"So, what you're saying is that... you'd rather me be bullied?" He looks at me, horror on his face. I hold in a laugh at the look on his face, feeling a little bit sorry for him.
"No! Of course not! That's- That's not what I meant! I was just saying that-" I cut him off, not wanting him to embarrass himself further.
"Yeah, I know. I was just kidding, Peter. No harm done." He sighs.
We walk out of school together, arms brushing each other with every stride. I glance to my right, and notice that MJ and Ned are walking towards the two of us. I look back at Peter, and see that he noticed as well.
"Hey, guys!" shouts Ned. MJ shoots us a blank stare, and then gives in with a tiny little smile. WOW! She's actually responding to stuff! We must be softening her up! I remember when she would just stand or sit somewhere, and if anyone tried to talk to her, her face would always be devoid of expression! I'm probably too excited, but still! I think, with a small smile.
"Hey, Ned!" shouts Peter. I shoot Michelle an exasperated look. How old were they, really? Come on, guys.
"These two never grow up, do they." She states, in perfect view of both of the boys. My eyes widen for a second, surprised that she pretty much read my mind. Silly, I think. That's my thing! Besides, I would have noticed by now if she had any powers like Peter and I, right? I brush it off.
"Yeah," I laugh, "It's almost as if they grow younger with every year…" I trail off.
Peter shoves me. "Hey! That's not fair!"
"Yeah!" Ned agrees. "It's not like you guys are that mature, either!" MJ shoots Ned a withering look, and I look away. Peter pokes me, concern showing on his face.
"Oh my god, Kat, I'm so sorry-" he says, trying to apologize for his words.
"It's fine, Ned." I cut him off, not wanting anybody to push any further. Maturity was a tough subject for me, having to do with some sore spots in my past. I looked away, trying to now distance myself form the conversation. Yeah, maybe I was a bit sensitive, considering it had happened over two years ago, but…. This was the one thing that I couldn't stand. Everything else, even Raelynn. Other than that, I was completely fine.
We talked for a bit, and then we reached the end of the walkway. That's one pretty long walkway to get to the main street from the building, I think. Kind of useless, too.
"Hey, MJ," I say, "Do you want to maybe… come over and do homework or something tonight?" I look at her, and to my surprise, there is an actual smile on her face. Huh.
"Sure. Let me just call my sis and tell her that I won't be home tonight. Well, not until late, anyways." She walks a few steps away, and gets out her phone. Peter and Ned shoot shocked looks at me, surprised that I got through to her. To be honest, I was a bit surprised too. She usually kept to herself and went home alone, too, but I guess she was opening up to our little band of ragtag misfits.
"Shizzlepop!" MJ whispers angrily. She looks a bit embarrassed. "Sorry, I used to babysit for little 'uns all the time, and I had to break the habit of using real swear words." Pete is on the verge of a laughing fit, while Ned and I are considering.
"Yeah. A while ago, before…. Well, when my brother and parents were still alive, I came up with a ton of really creative ones. One of my favorite ones was 'schist'. Since schist is a type of stone, I would carry some around with me, and whenever I said 'schist', and someone would shoot me a glare or something, I would pull out the rock and launch into an explanation of what it was and something like the molecular structure of it or something crazy like that, and they would always leave me alone after that if they heard me fake-curse." I say. Ned looks at me, a weird expression on his face. "What?" I ask, confused.
"That's a hella good idea, Kat!" he says. "You all know how mad my parents get when I curse, so I'm probably going to use that in the near future. Anyways. Back to before, MJ, why did you 'cuss'?" he asks, using tiny finger quotes around the word 'cuss'.
"Oh. That. My sister says I can't today, but I can come Monday, Kat, if that's alright?" she shoots me a nervous but questioning look.
"Yeah! Of course you can come Monday. Oh, schist." I say, noticing Peter's grin at the use of the word. "It's already 4:25! Jem's gonna kill me if I don't get back within five minutes! Sorry, guys! I've got to go! See you tomorrow?" I say.
"Yep! Speaking of, May's gonna have my head, too. I should probably come with." States Peter. "Bye, guys!" He shouts to MJ and Ned, who are standing there, kind of confused about what just happened. Of course, MJ regains her bearings first.
"Hey, Ned," she says, knowing that Peter and I can hear her with our super-senses, "You wanna walk home together?" I can tell that she meant it both sarcastically and genuinely. She also adds a bit of a flirtatious tone, just to make fun of Ned.
"Oh- uh… Yeah, I guess, maybe-well, yeah, sure." Ned flusters for a minute before coming out with a real answer. Oh, come on, Ned, I think, This is so obvious, man! We could all see that he had a bit of a crush on MJ, and he had already told Petey before I weaseled it out of him a week ago.
Peter and I were already halfway home when all of that went down, so I broke my focus from their conversation to my attempts at not running headlong into a car and breaking a few bones. I couldn't afford to go to a hospital, both financially and in regarding to my own safety. You see, I am like Peter. Well, not exactly. More like the Scarlet Witch. I have powers. Powers that can be pretty clearly seen on, say, a CAT scan. I have quite a bit of abnormal brain activity. I know that because after… my parents were killed, murdered,and I was…. Anyways, they took me to a hospital along with my brother, and ran scans on me. They refused to tell me what they saw, saying everything was fine, it was just a bit of weird brain activity. So, I did what any normal, curious 12-year-old child would do. I hacked into the hospital's database, copied down all of the information, and replaced it with normal stuff.
So, long story short, it would be really frickin' bad if I was hospitalized. Oh, look at that. I was home already. That was fast. I look behind me, and see Peter. His face is red from running, like, 30 blocks in basically 5 minutes. We're fast with all of these enhancements. And, we lived in the same building, which made for a fun race to and from school every day. I started singing really quietly so that only Pete could hear me while I began to jog up the stairs. "Peter, the red-faced spider, had a very sweat-stained shirt, on-ly be-e-cause, he was super duper sloooow…"
"Hey! That's not fair! You're basically the Flash, you run so fast! There's no way I could keep up with that!" he whines.
"You're Spider-Man, man," I whisper, "It's not like you're slow!" I decide to comfort him a bit, seeing the dejected look on his face. "You're really fast, Pete. Not many 16-year-olds could keep up with me, or run 30 blocks that quickly," I say, as I arrive at our floor. What were the chances that two superhuman teenagers would live in the same state, city, street, block, apartment building, and floor? Those were some pretty low chances, I thought to myself as I opened the door to my and my only living relative's apartment. "Bye, Petey," I say. "See ya tomorrow."
"See you tomorrow. Oh, wait, no. See you tonight." At my confused look, he said, "May invited you guys to come over for dinner tonight. She's making mashed potatoes." I perked up at that. "The only decent thing she knows how to make," he mutters. I laugh, and close the door to my residence.
"You're late!" Jem calls out, while cutting veggies.
"Hey, no I'm not!" I protest. I look at the clock. "Oh come on, Jem. It's fifteen seconds past 4:30!"
"Exactly…" He says, shooting the Overprotective Parental Figure LookTM at me. I gulp, and he breaks out into laughter. "Yeah, you're fine. Hey, you look a little tired. How fast did you run?" I grin.
"I left school five minutes ago," I say while putting down my backpack.
"What in the hell- well, it's you. How on earth did you run one and a half miles in five minutes? Darn it, girl. You're fast." He says, in shock. I was glad to see he was teasing me, though. The first time, when I ran for ten whole minutes (jeez, so slow), he dropped a vase and cut himself. Talk about overreacting.
"Actually, Jem, I broke my record today." I looked at my watch. "Four minutes and thirty-four seconds. I stopped to talk to Peter for a second before I came in."
"Wow. You're crazy fast, Kit-Kat." I grumble at the name, and walk over to give him a good-natured shove. He gives a short laugh. "You're so annoying, Kitty." I smile, already walking towards my room.
"Yeah, but you love me anyways."
