Author's Note:

This chapter's a feel-good finale, so drop those shoulders. There's nothing to brace for but a pretty good time.

XXIX

In theory, college promised freedom from supervision, but Peter and MJ would have to work around their roommates' schedules to ensure privacy. Date nights between May and Happy would come sooner than going off to college, but May wasn't really comfortable leaving her nephew at home at night yet, fearing another break-in. Under the current circumstances, MJ had begun the process of accepting that she and Peter might not be alone together for quite some time. She hadn't considered the tedious godsend of furniture shopping.

It was Wednesday, the last day of summer holidays, and with Peter all set in terms of school supplies (and who knew how prepared in terms of everything else when he walked into school tomorrow with everybody knowing he was Spider-Man), May had redirected her attention to other concerns surrounding the Parkers settling back into their home. One of those concerns was the fact that MJ's attackers had kinda trashed the place. She'd felt guilty about it, since she was here and had been part of the destruction and those men weren't around to offer to chip in for new furniture, but two things had assuaged her guilt: Stark offering to foot the bill and furniture shopping guaranteeing MJ and Peter hours of alone time while May contemplated coffee tables. Bringing Happy along for access to the company card or whatever (and for security), May apparently felt pretty relaxed about letting Peter stay home in the middle of the day. He, MJ, and Ned were supposed to be hanging out. And maybe they'd forgotten to mention that Ned wouldn't be coming. Their heads may have been slightly swimming with heat and lust as May left the apartment and Peter flipped the lock behind her, so who could blame them?

"You wanna keep watching TV?" he asked, ambling back over to the couch where she sat.

MJ twisted in her seat and looked up at him.

"Not really."

"Movie?"

"Nah."

"Hmmm snack?"

"No thanks."

With a thoughtful expression, Peter touched her shoulder, drawing sloppy circles with his fingertips on the bare skin next to the strap of her tank top.

"Wanna go for a walk?"

"In this heat? It's like a hundred degrees outside." MJ lightly clasped his hand and hung on as Peter trailed his fingers along her collarbone.

"So I should keep you in."

His fingers skated up her throat, higher and higher, until she shuddered, flinching her head to the side.

"And quit suggesting distractions," she said.

Peter's laugh was slightly choked as he watched her guide his hand back down. She watched him swallow.

"I'm just trying to be a good host."

"Well, quit trying to be a good host..." MJ brought his hand to cover her breast through her shirt. "...and start being a better one."

He moved faster than she could track while concentrated on the feeling of his palm lightly kneading, head suddenly on her level, mouth suddenly on hers, body not pressing her back into the couch but urging her up into his. She was standing and that wasn't enough for him, apparently. Bending slightly and swiftly, Peter grabbed the back of her thighs and forced his hips between them as he hoisted her up. MJ cupped his face in both hands, at first just trying to keep up with his frantic kisses, then to slow them enough by slipping her tongue into his mouth that Peter could walk them to his bedroom without bumping into anything. At least there wasn't a coffee table to fall over. They'd have to watch out once May brought home a new one.

The sun was as hot and golden as a grilled cheese sandwich through Peter's window―MJ glanced over with her back flat on Peter's bed―but it was early afternoon and the light wasn't yet slanting through the glass. It left their air-conditioned space cool. Cool sheets on her back, cool shadows in the bedroom when her boyfriend flicked the curtain across. She huffed a laugh when he bounced down on top of her with a huge grin, catching himself on his elbows so he didn't crush her. Gradually, Peter lowered his weight and MJ quit laughing. Her gaze roamed from his eyes to his mouth and he got the message. His lips skimmed hers, then pressed firm, firm, firmer, like he didn't know his limit, continuing to press down as her chin tipped up. A ripple of heat went through her. MJ's hands flew to his waist and his moved hastily to part her thighs and pull her knees up as he pressed his growing erection between her legs as needily as he'd pressed their mouths together.

They broke the kiss gasping and dove right in for another. It was faster, messier, wetter, and so was everything else. MJ ground back against him as Peter rubbed the seam of her shorts into her clit with his dick. He shoved his hands beneath her shirt at her hips, bunching it up higher as she moved. Those hands, they were hot on her skin, and it didn't matter because her skin was hot now too, and that didn't matter because she was covered in goosebumps as Peter's mouth went to her neck. She felt his tongue just below her jaw and began to breathe unevenly. Scrambling, she wrestled his shirt off over his head while he laughed breathlessly, briefly trapped inside it. When he thumped back onto her, he planted his fists on the mattress, holding his arms stiff to either side of her. With his eyes locked on hers, Peter rocked his hips with a possessive certainty that had MJ, face flushed, lowering her eyes to watch his abdomen flex with the movement. She smoothed her hands up the hard planes of his naked back to encourage him back down to her. Before his chest could rest on hers, she hooked an arm behind his neck and surged up to kiss him.

Hips still working steadily, he traced the tip of his tongue across hers and, with one hand, inched her tank top up to uncover her bralette; it was too hot for foam cups and wires. Peter didn't have to look to find her nipples with his fingers because they were already poking the cotton and MJ squirmed from the gentle way he circled one then the other.

"I want you so bad," he mumbled against her lips. She hummed in response.

His eager words were a contrast to his delicate touch and MJ squeezed his hips between her thighs and drew a line down his spine with one finger, to say that she could be hard and soft at the same time too. She spread her fingers on his lower back, palm planted on his skin. In his room, there was only the sound of them breathing. Then, the clatter of a delivery truck driving over a pothole somewhere down below and the rumble of an inbound plane up above, and Peter's heartbeat when she pressed her other hand to his strong chest to feel it―her favourite familiar rhythm of the city.

"I love you," she said, eyelashes flickering as she looked to his eyes, then his mouth, both of which were too close to focus on.

"I love you."

Their kissing became fevered and MJ shifted and stretched to let Peter remove her shirt and her bra. She smelt the earthy sweetness of his shampoo (oddly and wonderfully similar to the scent of sunscreen―was it coconut?), the biting freshness of his deodorant. His fingers were flipping open the button of her shorts and hers were curling around as much of the bulge in the front of his as she'd be able to grasp until he was fully undressed when he froze. His head snapped up.

"You wanna try it?"

"Try what?"

She narrowed her eyes a little in curiosity over the way he spoke rather than the words themselves. Before Peter's 'exile,' this wasn't an uncommon question, passed between them on nights her mom worked or when Peter visited MJ for a quick, uh, break during Spidey patrol. One time, she'd asked the question with Flash's car keys dangling from her fingers. (She'd witnessed them drop from his pocket during second period and she and Peter had made out in the backseat over lunch. At decathlon practice that afternoon, MJ had returned the keys without a word.)

Really, the intensity of his excitement should've helped her figure it out faster, but her hair was strewn around her head and she had Peter's erection cupped in her hand and the full force of her intellect wasn't reporting for duty until school tomorrow morning.

"B.A.R.F.," he said, face pink and beaming.

"Oh. Oh." She chewed her lip. "Yeah. Yes. We should try it."

"Cool."

Peter basically flung himself off of her and the bed as she blinked, then rolled to watch him.

"One sec," he requested, rapidly shucking his shorts to reveal his birthday briefs (yay!). "I was thinking... maybe the suit..."

"Take your time."

A lazy smile spread across MJ's face as she studied her boyfriend, starting at his disheveled hair, down his muscular back and solid thighs. It was easy to feel at ease while he got ready; once he started up the simulation―the specifics of which she knew fuck-all about―she expected her heart to begin racing. She stared with interest as Peter donned the nanotech suit Stark had made him before Europe. It seemed to glide across his skin to form a shining, metal mosaic. Quickly, he lowered the mask that had whooshed up over his head as part of the suit and turned towards her. With a little sideways grin, he fluffed his hair.

"I need my face exposed for the sensor."

"And for kissing..." MJ waved her hand casually. "...etcetera."

"And for kissing etcetera," Peter agreed, gaze sliding to her unbuttoned shorts.

He crouched and unpacked the projector and sensor that he'd stowed in the back of his closet. That's where his Iron Spider suit had been too―as opposed to his everyday Spidey suit, which hung on the back of his half-shut bedroom door like a floppy suit of onesie pajamas.

"You got enough room in there?" she asked as he stood up, positioning the small sensor at his temple. Aligned with his sightline, it would guide the projections, orienting them around his position.

"What? For the sensor?"

"There," MJ corrected, nodding in the direction of his crotch. "Did Stark make it to accommodate... swelling?

Her boyfriend blushed and laughed awkwardly.

"It's fine so far. He made the suit to be capable of moving with me, but no, I don't think Mr. Stark ever thought I'd be wearing it in, um, this kinda situation."

She shrugged as she sat up, hands braced behind her. Without an evil drone to affix it to, Peter glanced around, then set the projector on his desk. He fiddled for a minute. MJ's heart rate sped up, just like she'd thought it would. Oh boy, oh god, what had he created for her? She knew the idea had come from how much she'd loved the feeling of being surrounded by Peter when they had sex in front of her bedroom mirror. Beyond that, he'd kept this project pretty secret.

"You ready?" he checked, then babbled, "It's... it's probably a little rough and definitely embarrassing, so if you hate it, just tell me and I'll shut it off right away, no problem."

"I want to see," MJ assured him.

He looked as apprehensive as she felt now. Nerves. She knew this loser inside out and how little scope he had for his own abilities. She wasn't wary of the thing not working; she was practically trembling over how good this might be. Peter did something more and she could see a glow around the edges of his body. Well, it looked like the projector had turned on. He'd learned something over the summer besides Shakespeare. His shoulders rose and fell in a deep breath and he came back to her, back to bed, but MJ's gaze slipped away from him because he was no longer the only him in the room.

"Peter," she said.

"Peters," he corrected.

They couldn't see her, but she noticed the simulated Peter she was looking at run his gaze over her chest as real Peter did. Wow, good call on her part with the sensor.

"They're... they're..."

"They're tracking my line of site," Peter explained enthusiastically. "The ones I recorded that way are, anyway. I did a couple early ones to practice programming them into the projector and I felt a little weird thinking about looking straight at you when you weren't actually there, but then for the later ones I thought I should really try to, because that's what'll make it personal for you, right? Like, that's what you'll like and―"

She grabbed the back of his neck as she kissed him.

"They're perfect. They're all perfect. All... how many of them are there?"

Peering around the real Peter, MJ felt her insides swoop pleasurably at the array of false ones. They were all clothed (some in t-shirt and jeans, some in his regular Spidey suit), all standing, and hopefully all visible. If one of them was going to pop out from under the bed or something, she could see herself going from horny to horrified very quickly. One's personalized kink machine should not spring any haunted-house style surprises on the user. Unless those surprises have been previously agreed upon, she thought. Or it was Halloween.

"There're five of them. Six if you count me." Peter smiled.

"I definitely count you. You're still my favourite, don't worry."

"See if you say the same thing when we're done."

"Show me a good time and I will. Spider-Man."

"And that's why I put on the suit," he rushed out, pulling her mouth hungrily to his.

It was strange, holding his neck and feeling both the glossy metal of the suit and his warm skin; she spent several minutes just stroking with her fingers to test the difference in textures. Every pass of her fingertips below Peter's hairline made him try to lean his neck into her hand. He did love to be caressed.

"What are you doing?" he asked between kisses, sounding amused.

"Just exploring."

Her eyes darted to a simulated Peter who wore low-slung pajama bottoms. He stretched his arms above his head, lifting the hem of his t-shirt, and she thought oh yeah. She and the real Peter hadn't lain back down yet and MJ was starting to wonder about that. She enjoyed toying with this particular kink of his―how he practically wrapped himself around her finger when she called him by his other name―but the softer suit was more user-friendly in the arena of heavy petting.

"How long are you planning to keep this thing on, Spider-Man?" she wondered, moving her hands to his shoulders and probably leaving fingerprints all over it. The ultimate source of forensic evidence.

"Seeing as I can only be covered by one thing at a time, I'm thinking the suit comes off when we go for a condom. AH!"

MJ shrieked too, jerking back from her boyfriend. His suit had emitted a loud, cartoony kissing sound and spat a wrapped condom straight out of his chest. There had to be some hollowed out section there, she figured as she tried to slow her breathing, but she couldn't see it. The suit had sealed back up immediately after providing what it had understood them to be asking for.

"Karen?" Peter asked weakly, turning his head from MJ to address his incorporeal suit lady. "What the hell was that?"

Though she'd looked away when he had (Pajama Peter was pulling his shirt off over his head now and she'd decided this was her new favourite TV channel), MJ was close enough to hear the answer.

"That would be the newly-installed After-School Special protocol."

Peter closed his eyes and groaned.

"And what triggered it?"

MJ thought they both probably knew, but she understood why he'd want to be sure.

"'Condom.'"

"Yeah, that's what I figured. Mr. Stark loaded a whole bunch of con- of them in there didn't he?"

"There are twenty-four still in the chamber. I will also be notifying you a month in advance of their expiration date, should any remain that long, so that you can refill it."

She squeezed her boyfriend's shoulder supportively, or at least tried to. The metal didn't give.

"Ok, thanks, Karen."

Despite the scare, MJ found herself smirking.

"What was that you were saying before about Stark not preparing this suit for a scenario like this?" she prompted.

"I don't even know when he messed around with it! I don't think I ever left it alone! Ugh, unless he installed the updates one of the times I snuck out to come see you." He sighed like he's realized something and looked at her with an exasperated expression. "Leaving the property of the compound activated a playlist Mr. Stark put in the suit. I bet it also let him know I was gone. That's so... it's so sneaky! I thought he was too preoccupied with baby stuff to even think about my suits."

"I mean," MJ said, picking up the condom his suit had fired out, "it's not not baby stuff. It's of the anti-baby variety." Peter groaned again. "It's nice to know he cares, I guess."

Her boyfriend looked at her doubtfully.

"Really?"

"No, it's invasive and presumptuous and I hate it, but I'm trying to make you feel better, dork."

He touched her knee; she'd reacted to the surprise condom projectile by tucking her legs up against her chest.

"How 'bout I ditch the suit and we forget all about this?" Peter suggested, taking the condom from her and flinging it clean across the room. He was obviously trying for 'out of sight, out of mind,' but her brain didn't work that way.

"Not sure I'll be able to forget. Maybe if you take the suit off nice and slow," she teased.

Peter laughed.

"I think there's only one speed." He leaned in to kiss her and she tilted forward, folding her legs to bring her knees down. "But I can take my time with other things." His lip dragged on hers and she could hardly stand it or the sight of wispy lashes on his lowered eyelids. "If you want."

Her fast nodding had him packing away the nanotech in seconds, suddenly standing at the end of the bed in his underwear. Again, she admired the birthday present she'd bought him, then examined the bonus Peters.

"This isn't going to turn into some kind of Magic Mike show, is it?" she checked as a second Peter removed his t-shirt.

The real Peter laughed and lightly grabbed her ankles, spreading them apart before climbing up in between. MJ lowered herself down onto her back as Peter hovered over her, grinning.

"No. I tried not to do anything too..."

"Provocative," she supplied, running her hands down his sides. Nice. No more metal suit in the way.

"Yeah. In case anybody saw the footage by accident."

She nodded her approval. Peter kissed her softly, then harder when she threaded the fingers of one hand into his hair and tugged gently. He made a low, happy noise and rolled his hips against hers. When his chest brushed her breasts, MJ sighed into his mouth and felt him slip a hand between them, abruptly cupping and massaging her breast. By the time he was pinching and plucking her nipple, she was rocking up into him, trying to find the right pressure, the right spot. Peter's hand moved leisurely over her ribs and down her stomach. He reached the open button of her shorts and fingered the skin right above.

"You still have your shorts on."

"Maybe I need Spider-Man's help getting out of them."

Peter smiled against her mouth, his teeth on her lips, then kissed her swiftly a final time. Shifting his weight, he worked his way south with his lips. Meanwhile, his hands undid her zipper. He kissed unhurriedly across both of her breasts as he shuffled her shorts and underwear down her legs. MJ held his shoulders and dug her fingers into the firm muscle as he bit her nipple and closed his mouth over it. He sucked and she had nothing to rub against, no erection to grind on for relief. Restless and too wet, she pushed at his shoulders.

"A little faster would be fine," she suggested.

His mouth left her nipple. He gave it a long lick before speaking.

"How much faster?"

Before she could tell him, Peter fucking curled two fingers inside her unexpectedly. MJ gasped, then angled her hips sharply to try to direct him to exactly the right spot. He began moving them in and out of her quickly, leaving her feeling hot and blurry and a step behind, wiggling her hips to sync with his pace.

"You might wanna look around every once in a while," he said when he caught her watching him kiss the undersides of her breasts. "Don't want all my hard work to go to waste."

She smirked and laughed (and moaned, when he curled his fingers just right again). But she did turn her head and almost choked on air as one of the simulated Peters came closer. Thanks to the sensor, his gaze appeared focused on her chest, where her boyfriend's face was. Ok, Peter wanted her to watch them? She'd watch them. They were all him, after all. Yep, MJ thought as Closest Peter tapped his chest to drop his Spidey suit and display his sculpted body in nothing but boxers, that's all Peter. Her gaze zipped to another, who was down to his jeans, and even those were hanging undone. That guy got a double take out of her when he smoothed his hand down his abdomen and she 100% thought , in spite of what Peter had told her, that he was going to reach into his underwear and start stroking his dick to prominence before her eyes. She heaved a heavy breath as her boyfriend started playing with her clit, other fingers pumping shallowly in and out of her.

MJ thought Peter might've mumbled something with the word 'distracted,' but she was watching Jeans Peter again. So intently, in fact, that her boyfriend's mouth all of a sudden between her legs got a loud cry out of her. Peter looked up from his first licks and raised his eyebrows at her.

"Oh please," she said hoarsely, "you're not that good."

It was a lie and her boyfriend smiled at her, then kissed just above her clit.

"So how come you're still watching me? Me me, I mean," he sort of clarified.

"I..."

She forgot her answer because he returned to working at her with his tongue as she began to speak. But the nerd held her eyes with all the politeness he usually showed while listening to her, as if he was calmly waiting on her answer, rather than slipping his tongue beneath her clit in a way that floated potential screams of pleasure up her throat like bubbles rising through water. MJ didn't look away until she saw one of the simulated Suit Peters trip over his Spidey costume as he tried to step out of it. That was probably one of the instances in his recordings that Peter was embarrassed about, but at the sight of the clumsiness, MJ clutched her boyfriend's hair, holding him momentarily still to rock herself against his tongue. The feeling it sent through her clit was icy, or fiery, she couldn't tell, but it was strong. His simulations' tiny slipups made them seem more real. Also, the ones tracking the sensor with their eyes now appeared to be keenly observing the real Peter making passionate love to her with his face between her thighs. Heat rushed up her neck into her face. That was more than she could bear. She came with her gaze back on Peter eating her out, just seeing his hips bumping desperately against the mattress before her eyes squeezed shut. One of those screams she'd felt rising burst out of her and formed into a rounder version of his name, the harsh sound of consonants sanded down by hazy bliss. Her hips rocked against his mouth until MJ regained enough awareness to let Peter―grinning in satisfaction as her eyes blinked open―pull away.

"How was that?" he asked quietly, wiping his mouth roughly with his palm and laying himself over her. He kissed quickly and lightly at her neck as MJ attempted to find even one thought to collect, slowly caressing the back of his head where she'd ended up kinda yanking at his hair.

"That one," she said, swinging her arm out to point at Jeans Peter, "almost killed me."

Peter snorted hot air against her throat as he laughed. She looped her arms loosely around his neck, enjoying the sound of his laugh, and wriggled a little in place to find a cooler spot in the sheets beneath her. Letting her eyes close, MJ turned her head and brushed her lips and nose along her boyfriend's biceps. His laughter trickled to a stop and she thought she could sense the mood in the room do a lateral slide―from the happiness of joking around together to the waiting bliss of moving together again. Her hands crept down his back. She squirmed her fingers under the band of his briefs. Peter's head rose with a jerk. The focus in his eyes as he stared down at her, six inches between his nose and hers, made everything in her swish like a curtain in a breeze; she felt as though he'd abruptly picked her up off the ground to wave and twist and shake off gravity's grip on her. She smoothed both hands over his ass, then seized hold and encouraged him down and forward, rubbing against her through his underwear. As colour suffused his face, MJ watched him lick his lip.

"I'm gonna take these off now," she told him, maintaining eye contact.

Peter nodded and she worked his underwear down, mindful of stretching the elastic away from the head of his cock. She pushed the briefs as far as she could reach, cheeks likely glowing, threatening to flame from the heat of his gaze. Her breathing was shaky, her eyelids half-lowered, as Peter ducked his head to kiss her with his lips parted, tonguing tracing hers. She went, "Mmmf!" into his mouth when his rigid, straining erection grazed her stomach. They drew each other close with greedy hands, her boyfriend's grip suddenly secure on the back of her neck as he swirled his tongue around hers until her channel clenched impatiently. MJ tilted her hips in invitation.

But Peter, that idiot, always had his own plan.

She clung on when he tried to pull away and between her quick hands and the briefs caught around his knees, he was forced to halt for a minute.

"Would you quit getting up?"

"No, no, no," he said with a smile. "This is gonna be good. I had an idea."

"Here's an idea," MJ countered, wrapping her legs around his hips. Peter's breath caught and his eyes flickered shut as the head of his cock nudged between her thighs. She traced a finger behind his ear, making him shiver, and whispered, "Come on, Spider-Man."

MJ seriously thought that would do it, but he surprised her, like he did sometimes.

"Exactly," Peter said. She frowned as she released him so he could sit up, then bound smoothly off the bed. "Spider-Man."

He gestured to one of his projected selves who wore a Spidey suit. Well, kinda wore it; this version of Peter had made his suit go slack and stripped off the top half, only keeping the bottom of the suit up by gripping the material at his hip.

"Yeah, he's hot. What's your point?"

Her boyfriend fumbled for words at her blatant admiration. Hey, he was the one who'd filmed that footage with his abs and chest and arms out, so many rounded planes of muscle she wanted to rub her hands over, memorizing by touch before doing her best to replicate them in the Night Pad.

"If we stay on the bed," Peter explained, now expressing how flustered he was through too-big gestures, "you won't get the full effect."

"I promise to look around, ok? I like the bed. Let's stick with the bed, sticky boy."

She arched her back slightly in an attempt at underhanded persuasion and saw her boyfriend stare at her boobs. But he shook his head.

"Peter," MJ said sternly, "we are not having sex on your floor. I'm willing to bet you haven't cleaned in here since you guys moved back."

"Ok," he muttered to himself, turning to present her with his ass (she was temporarily placated by the sight), "not the floor… Yes!"

He wheeled the chair away from his desk and spun it so the seat pointed towards her. As she observed the way the simulated Peters reoriented around her boyfriend, now at their center, he grabbed a condom and waved it at her.

"Come on, M," he said with a smirk that was rising in confidence. "Don't you want to feel surrounded?"

She swore under her breath and exhaled a sigh through her nose, laying flat on the bed.

"I think this is definitely my version of how you feel when I call you 'Spider-Man'," MJ admitted.

It was a little hard to do, to tell Peter he had this power―he had a lot of powers, but this one was over her specifically. What he'd said… that phrase brought back visceral memory of them fucking in front of her mirror, his fingers light on her spine. The most important thing was that it was Peter who had the power. Peter would never hurt her with this. This was safe with him, the secret as safe in his mind as her body was in his hands. Because she trusted him, she rose from the bed, and because he was Peter, he waited as she took the few steps to reach him, admiring the extra Peters as she went. She skirted around one who was bent over, struggling to peel off his socks. She didn't have to, she could walk right through (or send her hand flying through his ass if she attempted to slap it), but they felt real. That was the whole point.

MJ took another long breath and nodded to him. Him, the condom, the chair. She felt good about this idea, she felt fond. Another glance around at the array of projected boyfriends confirmed that the chair was the way to go. They seemed to be looking at her as she got closer to the real Peter. She could be at the center of it all. Her toes scrunched the rug in anticipation.

"After you," she said. "Pretty sure this only works if I'm the one in your lap."

Unexpectedly, Peter hugged her. She caught his cheek with a kiss as he pulled away and sat on the chair. He was… he was so infuriatingly, unrepayably eager about his plan to give her even more pleasure than she was already getting out of this scenario―a scenario he'd also facilitated by using his own two hands to make a sensor, repair an evil-drone projector, and program video of himself getting semi-naked (ok, nope, fully naked in one case―MJ just spotted the base of his dick and brown curls when Jeans Peter's thumb snagged the band of his boxers as he went to take his jeans off). He'd done so much. And it was for her. Could she count crying as another way Peter made her wet?

She blinked before anything like tears could accumulate though. He was staring boldly at her, rolling the condom on while tracking the way she gathered her hair and drew it over her shoulder, then pushed it restlessly back. When she bent the first knee to position her left shin on the chair alongside his right thigh, Peter's gaze snuck between her legs. MJ settled into place, hips not quite in contact with his. She grabbed her boyfriend's chin and looked at him with a smirk. She only needed three words for this.

"I love you," MJ told him.

With his hands clutching securely, lovingly, at her thighs and the evidence of hours of work intangibly filling the room around them, there was nothing more to say. Peter had to buzz his reply into her lips as she kissed him. As he gripped his erection, she sank down.

The emotion she experienced was finally. Anyone who didn't consider that an emotion didn't know shit, MJ thought, or hadn't been in love like this. Maybe she hadn't even realized she was in love like this―in a way that she'd waited for and argued for and literally fought for, leaving attackers and Flash and a summer of sweating and pining in her wake. Drawing and dreaming and feeling Peter press her to the wall inside Yankee Stadium, eating breakfast at Tiffany's with Princess Shuri and having her boyfriend give her head with the both of them covered in bruises. It had seemed like so much time as it passed; hours riding on hot buses and sketching in cool, clammy hospital waiting rooms. Now, all of that was a moment. It was that one time she wasn't with Peter and it was over. He was here and he would be here. MJ jerked her hips hard with his. She'd been complete, her own person without him, but to be herself beside him was something she couldn't replace.

"What are you thinking?" he asked, softly pushing hair out of her face as his hips slammed up into hers, making MJ heave forward and fumble for a hold between his shoulders and neck.

"Summer holiday retrospective," she gasped out. She rolled her hips to rub her clit against him.

Peter huffed an amazed laugh, gradually taking more control. He pushed his legs apart to widen the spread of hers and MJ groaned low in her throat, head falling back, at how deep he was inside her. While he guided her hips up and down, forward and back to stimulate her clit, capable hands on her hip and the back of her thigh, she pressed her face to the side of his. He made a noise in his throat like gargling gravel as she tightened up around his cock. Her breath caught and skipped. MJ knew that, as close as their heads were with her cheek bumping up against his, Peter was looking at her. She knew because the projected Peters were too. They appeared to study her flushed, panting face, shifting their weight as they stood around the chair in their boxers and slackened Spidey suits. Heaps of blatant eroticism, designed to turn her on―MJ was well aware―but also tiny moments that meant even more because she knew Peter had known she would notice them. Like when Pajama Peter stretched his arms up to mess with his hair in a way that exposed a dangerously low glimpse of his torso (she was certain that one was not wearing underwear), or one of the Suit Peters pretended to adjust his hold on the fabric slipping from his hips when he was actually discretely palming his dick.

MJ's boyfriend bucked and held her close and made a noise of humbled wonder as he climaxed and she started to quake in his arms, her legs twitching as they gripped him. He took a deep breath and buried his face against her neck, breathing heat across her skin, leading her, guiding her, working with her, almost there. Either on purpose or by accident, her boyfriend's foot struck the floor and the chair spun slowly. She moaned and clutched at his hair, gaze darting to each of the simulated iterations of him. They were all around her, and Peter? Of all the places in the world, Peter was right here.

EPILOGUE

"Hey, man," Peter greeted Flash, bumping fists with him as they headed to practice.

MJ rolled her eyes when Flash glanced around to see who might be observing this clear act of friendship between him and Spider-Man. Today had been a mix of seeing her boyfriend bombarded with questions and silently stared at whenever he entered a room. Fortunately, between herself, Ned, Betty, and Cindy (and, fine, Flash), Peter didn't have a single class without one of his close friends in it and MJ knew everyone had stepped up to shield him from the ogling and other weirdness of their fellow students. Even Mr. Harrington had stared at Peter with wide eyes, though that could've just been his amazement that Peter was still alive.

She let their hands swing, fingers loosely interlocked, and turned back to her conversation with Cindy, who was walking along at her side in a black-and-white tie-dyed t-shirt. MJ wondered if it was a compromise with her parents between her largely utilitarian wardrobe and acid-washed jeans. Her friend also had her hair back in a French braid instead of her classic ponytail and that, MJ thought, could be the influence of someone else in Cindy's life. She wouldn't be putting so much significance on the braid if Cindy wasn't making it perfectly clear who was on her mind.

"It's too soon to be sure," she was saying at a whisper, "but I might be going over the holidays."

"To Wakanda? Seriously?"

"I'd be the guest of the princess," Cindy confirmed and she was blushing, so MJ elbowed her playfully in the side. "If! If it happens. Getting permission for something like this is apparently a lot more complicated than planning a trip to Disney World."

"I'm sure the princess is already strong-arming her brother into arranging everything," MJ assured her.

Flash pushed open the door of the decathlon practice room and held it for Peter. MJ rolled her eyes again, but then he held it for her and Cindy too, only flinching a little as she narrowed her eyes at him in suspicion.

"And if this trip goes well," Cindy said, shrugging her backpack off her shoulders, "Shuri said she'd work on setting up an exchange."

"What do you mean?"

"With whatever university I decide to go to. Shuri's involved with Wakanda's outreach initiative and she's interested in the idea of bringing a select handful of exchange students there to learn. I could do a semester, or even a year, studying Wakandan architecture and put it towards my degree!" She drew out a chair at the table and sat, shrugging. "But we don't want to get ahead of ourselves."

MJ raised her eyebrows.

"Oh, I can tell. The princess setting up an entire exchange program just to spend time with you is very low-key."

"Shut up."

MJ laughed and sat next to her friend, bumping into her boyfriend as he tried to pull the chair back for her.

"Dork," she accused.

"You love it," he reminded her, kissing her swiftly and surprisingly on the cheek.

She darted a look at Flash, whose eyes were on his phone. Had he seen that display of affection or not? Fuck, it wasn't that MJ actually cared about his feelings now, but she didn't need any more team drama. They were heading into the term one teammate short anyway, since she'd made it clear to Brad that he was not invited to return. She'd have to recruit new members, maybe do tryouts. It was her responsibility as captain to keep their team intellectually robust. That, and to kick off the first meeting of the year. MJ waved a hand to catch the attention of Betty and Ned, murmuring adoringly to each other across the table from her. She didn't miss that they had matching backpacks.

"Mr. Harrington told me he's going to be a few minutes late," she informed the group.

Immediately, MJ lost the flow of her words. She'd forgotten how to do this. She knew these people, knew them well, and everything was so normal. It was almost like it was just so good to see them all together that she'd rather not rush them through the itinerary. But it left an awkward pause as they'd clearly expected her to go on after signalling for everyone's attention.

Her boyfriend decided to rescue her.

"So," Peter asked casually, "how was everybody's summer?"

MJ was startled into a laugh along with the rest of their friends. He grinned when he found her eyes on him and she reached for his hand under the table. This time, they held on tight.

The End

[fade to black]

[Nina Simone's cover of "Here Comes the Sun" plays]