The Legacy of a Hero
Chapter Thirty-Two
Mary Jane pushed the cup of coffee in front of Heather along with a plate of toast. Heather stared at the food blankly.
Her mother sighed, taking the chair across from her. "Sweetie, you need to eat. I've lived with an enhanced for the last twenty plus years, I know what your metabolism is like," she sipped her own coffee, running a hand through her red hair in an attempt to wake herself up more. Despite years of early mornings chasing kids and crack of dawn rehearsals, MJ was not a morning person and was pretty sure that she never would be.
"I just…" Heather picked up the toast and took a tentative bite, chewing slowly. "I can't believe he lied to you. I thought -" She shook her head, "I don't know what I thought."
MJ seemed to think about that for a long minute, studying her coffee cup. "It was more of an omission," she said slowly.
"That's just another word for a lie!" Heather snapped.
MJ gave her a steady look and Heather took a deep breath. "Sorry," the younger woman murmured.
Mary Jane sighed, sipping her coffee. "You lied to us, when your powers appeared. I've told lies... we all have. I'm not saying it makes it right, I'm saying neither of us can sit here and claim to have the moral high ground." She raised her hand as Heather opened her mouth to object. "I'm not saying that I'm not angry, either. I'm very angry… but I have to be objective about this."
"Why? Why do you have to be the calm, rational one?" Heather demanded, her voice small.
MJ gave her a soft smile. "Because I'm the mom, and sometimes that means what's best for my children comes before what might be best for me."
Heather shook her head, tears slipping down her cheeks again. "That's not fair to you."
"No one ever said being a parent was fair," the older woman shrugged, and for the first time ever Heather thought her mother looked every year of her age.
"You don't have to forgive him," Heather denied, raking her hands through her hair. "I'll never forgive him!"
"Don't say that," MJ pulled her daughter's hand away from her tangled tresses. "You know, he may not be your father-"
"He's not," Heather snapped.
MJ nodded, "I know, I know. But… Ben died when you were six. Peter has been with us for the last ten years. Peter… isn't perfect," she said after a moment's hesitation. "But think about it honey. Remember those nights I had to work late, and he tucked you into bed? The nights you had a cold and he stayed up with you to give me a break. That was Peter, not Ben."
"But-" Heather wiped her face, chest tight. "But Daddy he…"
"I know you miss him darling, I miss him too," MJ pushed away her own tears, smiling tightly. "Ben was a wonderful man, and nothing can ever replace the years we spent with him. It also doesn't change the years we spent with Peter."
"He never said anything! He had so many chances to just tell the truth," Heather knew she was whining, and she didn't care. For so long, she'd tried to be grown up, to handle life as it came at her. Like none of it bothered her, and she just had to keep pushing through. But right now, she felt like the very young sixteen year old she was, and all she wanted was for her mother to make everything right again.
"Sometimes that's the hardest thing to do," MJ said as gently as she could. When her daughter continued to cry, she got up and gathered her in her arms. She pressed a kiss to Heather's forehead. "It's alright, honey. It's all going to be okay."
"Do I have to go to school?" Heather asked tearfully a few minutes later.
MJ thought about it for a moment. "No, baby. I'm going to call Harry's school too. You kids need a day off to take all this in."
"Can I-" She sniffed. "Can I tell him? About Daddy? I know he doesn't remember him but…"
MJ gave her a careful look. "How did you know?"
"That Harry was Ben's too?" Heather shrugged. "He's six years younger than me, and he came two weeks late… I dunno, I just did the math."
MJ smiled sadly. "My smart girl," she murmured, kissing her daughter again. "Okay, honey, you can tell him about Dad, but please don't be too harsh on Peter."
Heather started to say something, then seemed to change her mind. "Alright, Mom."
"That's my girl," MJ got her purse off the hook by the door.
"Where are you going?"
"Peter and I are overdue for a very long talk," MJ smiled at Heather, "I'll be back before you know it. Try not to burn down the house while I'm gone, okay?"
Heather rolled her eyes but smiled. "We'll try, but no promises."
"I knew I would find you here," Mary Jane leaned on the door frame of Peter's office, watching him rub his temples as he hunched over his desk.
"I don't know why you came," he admitted.
There was a glass of iced scotch on his desk, but judging by the amount of condensation that had gathered around it, she knew he'd barely touched it. It didn't surprise her. Neither Peter nor Ben were drinkers, and both had had the habit of pouring a drink just to look at it. That thought had her eyes misting again, and she swiped at them subtly.
"Because you're my husband," she said simply, coming inside and slowly closing the door.
"I'm not, though, you know that now," He refuted, picking up the glass to roll it between his hands.
She sat down in one of the two chairs in front of his desk, crossing her knee and letting her gaze roam around the cramped office that had once been Ben's. His degree was still on the wall, along with countless photos of their family, but she noticed the newer photos became more sparse. She counted at least four from when Heather was two, but the newest photo was from last year's holiday card. She decided that with everything else going on, she didn't have the energy to unpack that as well.
"You still asked me to marry you first," She reminded him and shrugged. "It counts."
"Does it?" He snapped then rubbed his tired eyes. "Sorry. Out of line. I haven't been sleeping."
"I know," she said quietly. "You didn't tell me why, but I noticed."
"You always notice."
"It's a gift."
There was a long, awkward pause, and that was wrong.
MJ and Peter were never awkward. Twenty some years together, they could read each other like open books… or so she always thought. Maybe she'd been wrong about that too. Maybe what she'd assumed she saw in his gaze and microexpressions wasn't what he'd been thinking at all, and she'd been projecting the thoughts and feelings of a man she had unknowingly lost ten years ago.
She took in a sharp breath and looked down at her lap, willing the tears down. She had mourned for Peter, all those years ago. She and Ben had cried together over his loss for months. But… that wasn't right either, was it? She'd been mourning the wrong man, and he had never bothered to tell her. Her anger rose to the surface again, shimmering just beneath her skin like heat.
"I don't understand. Why?" She finally said, quietly.
As a young woman, her temper had run bright and hot, a flare that would ignite and extinguish at almost the drop of a hat. She'd lived up to the stereotype of the fiery redhead, and been quite proud of it. But years of working in an industry which required a great deal of patience, married to a man who habitually missed dates and broke promises, had eventually cooled her temper into a quiet storm. Now, her anger was slow to build and slower to dissipate. It was hard to say which was the lesser of two evils.
"That night…" Peter stopped, swallowed and scrubbed a hand over his face again. She almost told him that if he kept that up he'd give himself wrinkles, then decided that maybe she didn't care. "I found them in the warehouse. I was too late. I'd tried, believe me MJ, I'd tried everything to get there in time! It wasn't enough - it's never goddamn enough," his voice cracked and he buried his face in his hands again.
On any other day, she would have gone to him then. She would have gathered him into her arms and kissed his demons away. A part of her heart still pushed her to do so, but she knew if she stopped him now she might never get the answers she wanted. She stayed where she was and waited for him to compose himself.
"Ben was gone, and Heather was," He took in a shuddering breath as tears slid down his face. "God, Mary Jane, she was devastated. It was like - like my parents! And Gwen, and Harry, and Uncle Ben all over again! Just history repeating itself, over and over."
Now MJ was crying too. She could still see her, even now. Heather had come home covered in ash and dirt, reeking of smoke, tear streaks cutting through the filth on her cheeks. MJ had been terrified she'd never see her again when Ben had called her at the theater to tell her their baby was gone. She'd held onto her daughter tight that night, unwilling to let her out of sight for even a second for the next two weeks.
MJ pressed her heels into her eyes, willing herself to focus. She needed to be calm if they were going to get through this conversation. "But why Peter? Why didn't you say anything?"
"I…"
"You what Peter?"
"What else did you expect?!" He shouted suddenly, banging the glass onto the desk, liquid sloshing over the rim unnoticed.
"What is that supposed to mean?" She demanded.
"He was the one you wanted to come home," he said, the burst of anger gone as quickly as it came, replaced with something like shame and self loathing. "You chose him! You loved him, he was your hero. I should have been the one trying to bring her home. I should have died that night, not him. He had you, and Heather, and a life, and I took him away from you. When you called me Ben…" his voice broke again and he stared down into the still untouched glass. "I… what did you expect me to say? How could I say - how could I possibly explain that your husband was gone, but I'm still here? That I'm still here..." he added, so low that she was sure he hadn't meant for her to hear it.
MJ spent a long moment just looking at him. She didn't think she'd ever seen him look so miserable. "But you had the next ten years to say something, to find a way to explain it. Why didn't you?"
"Because I was scared!" Peter snapped. "I was scared, and angry, and lost, and…" His words grew quieter as he seemed to lose momentum.
"I'm sorry, Mary Jane," he whispered brokenly.
She drew in a long breath, but kept her eyes locked on his. "You said I chose him, and I did. But I said 'yes' to you first. You pulled away from me, and you didn't even have the courtesy to tell me why. I loved both of you - the difference between you and Ben?" She leaned forward, voice earnest, "is he told me the truth. He gave me a choice. I didn't pick him because I didn't have other options. By all accounts, I could have left you both high and dry. Ben never tried to 'steal' me away from you. He just wanted to be there for me. He told me, more times than I can remember, that if it was too weird to have him around he'd leave. Or that if I wanted to be rid of the whole Peter/Ben mess, I had every right to walk away. He respected my right to choose my own path."
"I just wanted you to be safe," He whispered desperately.
"Being with you or Ben didn't put me at any more risk than living a normal life," she said, and pointed at him when he opened his mouth to protest. "I mean it, Peter. I had an abusive, possessive boyfriend before we were together. I live in New York City, where people get mugged, raped, murdered, and god knows what else on a daily basis. I could step off a curb and be mowed down by a cab tomorrow. You can't protect me from everything, but I have never asked you to. You or Ben. All I've ever asked is that you love me and my children."
Peter's eyes flicked to the closed door for a moment. His expression reminded her of cracked glass, like any second he could shatter.
"When you asked me to marry you, we agreed that we'd do this together. We'd face whatever came our way together," MJ slid her hands over his, her touch finding all the familiar calluses and scars. "What suddenly made that change?"
"How could I promise you anything, when I wasn't even sure who I was?" He asked, voice trembling.
She took a breath, a spark of relief igniting in her chest. Finally… finally we're getting somewhere. "Do you have any idea how many times Ben and I talked about that? How many long sleepless nights we spent together, going around in circles over that? But at the end of the day, we kept coming back to the same conclusion: that it. Doesn't. Matter."
"How can you say that?"
"Because it doesn't! You are two different people. From the moment you started living your own lives, you became different men. You're no different than siblings who have the same childhood memories. You share DNA, but not the same soul," MJ stressed, squeezing his hands. "I loved Ben. I will always love Ben. I shared a wonderful life with him, but he's gone and you're still here. You've been here for ten years. I know you love me, or you would have left a long time ago. That's why I came looking for you."
"Mary Jane," he whispered, shaking his head. "I don't deserve your forgiveness."
She took in a slow breath and waited for a beat.
"You don't forgive me, do you?" Peter asked and his eyes threatened to break her heart.
"Peter, I love you," She said slowly. "But I am still very angry with you. I'm angry that you lied to me and our children. I'm angry that you've spent the last several years pushing our kids away. Don't try to deny it," she said sharply, seeing the argument in his face. "I know you probably did it because you were scared of getting too close to them, in case something happened to you too, but that's no excuse. They're children, Peter, even Heather. They need their father."
"It's not just that," he admitted, shoulders sinking as his head hung with guilt. "I look at Heather, at… at Harry, and all I see is Ben. I see it in how Harry laughs, the way Heather gets lost in her thoughts when something's bothering her. Ben should be here to see them grow up… he never even knew you were pregnant with Harry, and he won't see Heather graduate."
"So because their birth father isn't here, you're going to deny them your attention too?" MJ retorted, her patience wearing thin. "Excellent logic, Peter. They could have used you during the Cuban missile crisis."
Peter winced at her sarcastic jab. "If I push them away, it won't hurt as bad if - if I die in the field… if I push Heather away from this life, I can keep my promise to Ben to keep her safe…"
"If you push them away, you push me away," MJ spat. "Do you want that Peter? Do you want all three of them to grow up fatherless? It's not just Audrey that's your kid," she continued more gently. "When Ben died, Harry and Heather became yours as well. You're the only father Harry has ever known! And Heather would be a lot safer if you taught her to do this job well, rather than you continually trying to bench her," she added.
She hesitated for a moment, debating whether she wanted to go for the low blow. The doubt lingering in Peter's eyes cemented her resolve. "When Ben and I found out we were pregnant with Heather," she said quietly. "He worried that she might have his powers. He told me a few times that he thought she had something, a spider sense at least, but he had a feeling it wouldn't truly develop until she was older. I asked him what he wanted to do if she did. He didn't hesitate; he told me he would teach her everything he knew. He wanted to train her to be the next Scarlet Spider, if that's what she wanted."
"She's just a kid!" He protested.
"So were you," she shrugged. "Wouldn't you have given anything to have someone there to mentor you from the beginning?"
He sighed heavily. He picked up the glass, the ice long since melted, and swirled the amber liquid. "So you're angry at me, but you want me to stay?" He asked carefully.
"I am angry with you, but I'm mostly disappointed," she acknowledged, and he winced.
"Dammit MJ, that's Aunt May's line," he joked weakly.
"It's a mother's line," she smirked.
She sighed, "Peter, regardless of what problems we're having, our kids have to come first. I don't want them to choose sides - either because we create sides, or the kids think they need to. I don't want them to grow up resenting either of us."
"Bit late for one of them."
"No, it's not," she denied. "You can still fix things with Heather. You still have time with her, and I won't let you squander it." She got up and came around the desk to cup his face in her hands, waiting until his eyes met hers. "Come home, Peter. Come home and be the father I know you can be."
Peter studied her features for a long moment, tracing over the familiar curves and dips of her smile, the spark in her eyes. He raised a hand up to meet hers still cupped to his cheek, leaning into the touch. "I'm not sure I know how," he admitted.
"We'll figure it out," she promised. "Please, Peter. I know this is what Ben would have wanted."
His eyes flicked to a photo on the wall, and she knew immediately which one. Ben at the hospital, a newborn Heather in his arms, the gentle awe and happiness in his face so pure it almost hurt to look at. A tear slipped down his cheek, sliding through her fingers.
"Okay, MJ… I'll try."
AN: To the person who was worried I wouldn't fix MJ and Peter's marriage *looks at the bandaid placed over the wound gushing blood* Uhhh, this counts, right? Seriously though, I think MJ and Peter will make it through this. There's a long road ahead of them, but I think they can get to a better place if they both put in the work. Marriage takes hard work on both sides, especially when it goes through something this traumatic. I have no desire to tear them apart, but I don't think this is just a matter of kissing and making up, either. I hope you all had a lovely weekend, and a good week so far. My sister's due date is coming up soon, so my schedule will become much more erratic. There will be a lot of weekend trips to see my niece, but I'm committed to finishing this. W4 will also be getting a bit of a tune up as well, but I'm holding off on it until this is really done, or close to it. Then... well, who knows? We'll have to see where muses take me after that. Reviews are always appreciated, lovelies ^_^