Yay for second chapter! I finally decided on a name! I want to thank my two guest reviewers and AliciaRoseFantasy for reviewing and themadzz123 and unknowperson203 for following my story! You guys really help with the motivation to get a new chapter up and rolling fast. :] So here it is! Please continue to read and review and tell me what you would and would not like to see!
Disclaimer: I do not own Spider-Man or the Hard Rock.
For the rest of that Monday afternoon, I couldn't get those eyes out of my head. But the thing was, every time I thought about them... I would see Gwen. But then the eyes would always end up belonging to that girl in the end. I had to know who she was, I had to hear her voice again. I needed to put a name to that face, those eyes. I needed to find her.
I was on my way back home from the Bugle now, and night had fallen some time ago. I had to stay late for some meeting Jameson decided to hold about some boring idea he had or something. I had had a very hard time concentrating the whole time... he had had to pull me back into reality a few times by yelling his usual "PARKER!" But I just couldn't help thinking about those eyes. And Gwen's eyes. They were so alike...
I thought about waiting outside the Hard Rock for her, to tell her I was sorry about running into her earlier... But I knew how absolutely crazy that would be. There was no way she would remember me from this morning. I would look like a stalker. So after pacing around the front of Radio Shack across the busy Times Square from the Hard Rock, I decided it best to go home. Maybe I could run into her again tomorrow...
I began to head down Broadway back to the Subway tunnel I always took to get home. It was a few blocks off of Broadway, out of the bright lights of Times Square. I veered off onto the street and continued to walk down the near deserted street to the station when my senses began to tingle again. That was when I heard a struggle around the corner.
My legs instantly picked up the pace as I ran around the dark corner and looked around. There was no one on the street.
"Get away from me!"
My head snapped in the direction of the voice, coming from the alley halfway down that street. As I began to run down the sidewalk, it did not even occur to me that my mask wasn't on.
I entered the alley and saw two grown men advancing on a small young woman in the corner. She was holding what looked like an apron by the light of the lamp above a back door.
"C'mon girlie, hand over the cash and we'll go easy on ya," one of the goons taunted her as the other laughed menacingly.
I stood there, my legs shoulder width apart when I flung out both my arms, shooting webs at both of the men. When the webs had attached themselves to their backs, I pulled them back onto the ground. The girl gasped and looked up toward me, but she looked frightened. I was still concealed in the shadows, fortunately, so that my face was hidden. How had I not thought to put on my dumb mask?
The two goons hurried to their feet and turned me on me now. "What the?" One of them seemed to struggle to find words. I decided to make things a little easier for his mouth and shot a little web at it, covering his lips from uttering another stupid word. As he began to claw at the webs over his mouth, the other came running at me.
He threw a punch, which I easily ducked and dodged and kicked my leg out under him, knocking him to his feet. The other one had then seemed to give up on tearing off the web and came running at me too, but with the adrenaline coursing through me I put my hands on his waist and flipped him over me, landing on the other moron. The two then scrambled to their feet, eyes wide and frightened, and they scurried away out of the alley. I wanted to follow them and capture them for the authorities but my attention was brought back to the girl. She was staring at me still in the shadows.
My heart raced and panic rushed through me. Without knowing what to do, I turned my back on her. "Uh, hold on," I said quickly as I snapped my arm up and shot a web up at the rooftop above me. I took a deep breath as I dug my mask out of my backpack and unbuttoned my shirt and jeans, revealing my Spider-Man attire. I had revealed too much without my mask on already, I couldn't let whoever that girl was see me without it.
I peeked over the edge and the girl was just staring up at the rooftop I had disappeared onto. With another deep breath, I attached a web to the edge of the rooftop and slowly descended back down to the ground as I held onto the web. When I reached the girl's eye level again, her eyes were now wide with wonder and when I finally got a good look at those eyes, I was thankful my face was now covered. My jaw fell slightly and I stared at her, unable to speak again as I hung there from a web in front of her.
"Thank you," she blurted out. "Thank you so much."
I finally willed myself to speak. "No problem. S'part of the job," I said casually. It was awkward for us both, I could tell. The girl had just seen a part of Spider-Man no one else had ever seen. And for me? I had just been thinking of this girl... I had spent all day thinking of her eyes, and here she was. "Uh, do you need a lift home?" It seemed only appropriate for me to offer. I was certain she was a little shaken up and... truth be told, I wanted to make sure she got home safe.
The girl seemed to smile slightly as she looked down at her feet. Her brunette hair fell in front of her left eye a little bit as she looked down a moment and chuckled. "I would, but... if you don't mind, I don't think I could handle..." she gestured to my web I still hung from. "Swinging around... I'm still feeling a bit shocked after... all that." She nodded, looking back up at me.
I finally let go of the web and my feet returned to the ground. "Well, I'll walk you home then. If that's okay?" I offered. "If it's alright, I kinda want to make sure those freaks don't follow you home."
"I'd appreciate that," she nodded. She began to walk out of the alley, clutching her apron to her chest still. I followed her, thankful she accepted my offer. I thought momentarily how if she had declined, I would have found a way to make sure she got home safely anyway. Then I wondered if that made me a creep... then brushed that aside.
We walked side by side now, some space between us as we did so. "So, do you live in the neighborhood or...?" I decided to make a little conversation to fill the air. It felt awkward just walking in silence.
"Yeah, right around the corner actually," she pointed to a building up ahead. I was relieved that her commute to work wasn't that long.
"Great!" I tried to sound enthusiastic. "So, where do you work?" I asked, although I already knew the question.
She blinked, looking confused for a moment then seemed to remember she was still holding her work apron. "Oh," she breathed. "I wait tables at the Hard Rock."
"Yum," I replied. I didn't know why I couldn't converse normally with this girl. There was something about her that just... made me anxious, or excited. And it wasn't just those grey-blue eyes.
We finally reached the front door of her apartment building and we both came to a stop. We stood in front of each other, and she couldn't tell of course but I was having a hard time not smiling underneath my mask. Having spent this time with her, even considering the circumstances it was under, was nice.
"Well," she said, taking a deep breath. "Thank you again. I really don't know how to thank you enough."
I waved my hand to the side. "Don't worry about it," I said.
"There's nothing I could do for you? You're not... thirsty or anything? I could get you a water bottle?" She offered and I chuckled. I thought was nice. Spider-Man never really got offered something in return most times. Her offer... it was kinda cute.
"No, it's alright. Thank you, though," I replied. I didn't want anything in return when I rescued people like this, but it was nice enough to be offered. I didn't expect anything. But then I thought... "Well, actually. You could do one thing for me..." It was a shot in the dark, but worth a shot.
"Yeah?" She looked at me, eyebrows raised.
"You could tell me your name?" My face felt a little warm underneath my mask and I couldn't tell if it was because I was nervous or because it was warm out. I believed it to be the former, but I didn't want to think about it and make myself more embarrassed.
The girl smiled at me now for the first time since this morning. "Elodie," she said. And I don't know why, but it sounded so good to me; hearing her say her own name for the first time.
I then offered up my hand for Elodie to shake. "Nice to meet you, Elodie. I'm Spider-Man," I responded as she accepted my hand with a soft chuckle. After shaking hands, Elodie began to back up toward her apartment building door.
"Thank you again, Spider-Man," she said. With one last smile she stepped inside her building and as she rounded the corner to the staircase inside, I gave her a little wave good-bye.
As I began to walk away from the building, I felt something coursing through me that I had not felt in so long. It was like adrenaline, but there were far more butterflies in my stomach than I had felt in a long time. It gave me an energy I hadn't felt in two years as I broke into a run down the street. I shot a web up at a building and for the first time in a long time, I didn't go straight home; I spent the next few hours deterring from my strict schedule and swinging the streets of my beloved city. Seeing it differently for the first time in two years.
As I swung around between the buildings, I wondered when I would next run into the girl with the grey-blue eyes... Elodie.
