"It's game day." Aunt May said, her voice much more serious than the situation called for. She and Peter were parked right outside the Toomes' house, so he could pick her up for the dance. "So what's the plan?"
Just like they'd rehearsed. "Open the door for her."
May nodded, and he continued, "Tell her she looks nice, but not too much, because that's creepy."
"Yeah, we don't want to be creepy." May agreed.
"And when I dance with her I put my hands on her-" he hesitated, but remembered. "Hips."
"You got it!" May squealed, and pulled him in for a hug. "You got this."
Peter did a mental check. Freshly tied tie? Check. Pressed suit? Check. Lapel flower? Check. Corsage, hot pink, to match her dress? Check. "I got this."
The walk up to the Toomes's front door felt interminable, but he made it. And knocked. And waited.
And who else answered the door, but the Winged Man.
There was a beat.
"You must be Peter," he smiled, "I"m Liz's dad." He held his hand out to shake, which Peter took a little too forcefully, still trying to thaw himself out from the frozen position he'd found himself in. "Hell of a grip there." Winged Man- Liz's Dad- noted. Peter managed to stop himself from laughing nervously.
Peter was let into the house, Liz's dad disappearing somewhere off to the end of the hallway,and Peter couldn't help but feel like the house was full of landmines with how cautiously he approached the kitchen. Liz's dad was chopping vegetables, but all Peter could focus on was the glinting of the knife in his hands.
"...You okay, Pete?" Liz's dad asked, "You look a little…" he gestured to his face with the knife. "Pale. You want a drink? A bourbon, a whiskey?"
Peter barely registered the question before his answer flopped out. "Er- I- I'm not old enough to drink."
Peter's dad smiled. "That's the right answer." He looked somewhere over Peter's shoulder and his face fell into one of awe. "Wow. Wow wow wow - you look gorgeous." Peter turned to see that Liz has made it down the stairs and was on her way towards them. "Doesn't she, Pete?" Liz's dad goaded.
"Yeah, erm- you look really nice." Peter's eyes kept tracking the knife.
Liz's dad smiled again. "Once again, the right answer."
"Is that a corsage?" Liz asked, and it took Peter a second to register that she was talking to him and that he did, in fact, have her corsage in his hand. He handed it over to her bluntly. Every tingle of his spidey senses was rapid firing, but he had to ignore it, even though it blared like a fire alarm between his ears.
He somehow managed to get through a set of pictures Liz's mom insisted on taking whilst still trying to keep an eye on Liz's Dad, who'd announced he was their 'chauffeur'. "I"m on my way out of town anyway, it's right on the way, no problem."
And now they were in the car, and the spidey sense alarm was blaring in his ears, and Liz was sitting in the backseat beside him and the space between them was part of the amorphous, awkward silence that blanketed the entire car, though Peter felt like he was the only one who noticed the undercurrent of electricity.
"So what're you gonna do, Pete?" LIz's dad asked him, glancing at him in the rearview mirror. His voice was casual, but Peter was beginning to think that he wasn't the only one who noticed the buzzing.
"Erm, what?"
"After you graduate, what're you going to do?"
Peter's grasp on the English language was slowly slipping. His hand twitched, wanting to raise to his ear instinctively as if to check if his comms was there, but of course it wasn't. It'd been taken along with the suit. "Erm. I don't know."
"He's got an internship with Tony Stark though," Liz piped up, smiling. "So he probably doesn't have to worry about that."
"Tony Stark, eh?" Liz's dad asked. They made eye contact in the rearview mirror and the buzzing got significantly louder. "What do you do?"
"Actually, erm, I don't intern with him anymore."
"You don't?" Liz was clearly surprised. Which made sense, it's not like he'd made it news.
"Yeah, nah, it got- er…boring."
"Boring?! You got to hang out with Spiderman!"
"Spiderman?" Liz's dad was now steadily watching him in the rearview mirror. The buzzing had become insufferable. "What's he like?"
"Yeah, he's nice. Nice man. Solid dude."
Liz leaned over to show him something she'd found on Instagram, "Look how cute!"
"Aw," Peter managed out. He wasn't even registering what he was looking at.
"I've seen you around right, kid? Somewhere? Have we ever- cause even the voice, I-"
Liz cut her dad off. "He does Academic Decathlon with me. And he was at my party."
"Yeah!" Peter grabbed the life raft gratefully and clung, hard. "Great party. Beautiful house. Lots of windows."
"Peter, you were there for like two seconds. And then you disappeared, like you always do."
"I don't disappear-"
"-Yes you do. Just like you did in Washington-"
Peter felt Liz's Dad's gaze on him, and he met his eyes in the rearview mirror.
He knew.
"Horrible thing that happened there, in DC. Were you scared?" He asked, his voice low.
Peter grasped at his pant legs momentarily before loosing them. "I actually, erm, didn't go up."
"Good thing your pal Spiderman was there, though." Liz's dad turned around to look at him directly. "Good ol' Spiderman."
"Dad, the light." Liz prompted, as it turned green before them.
They somehow made it to the school without Peter's head exploding.
"You head in there, gumdrop." Liz's dad told her, smiling, "I"m gonna give Peter the old 'Dad Talk"."
Liz rolled her eyes. "Don't let him intimidate you." she said, before exiting the car and running up to a gaggle of her giggling friends.
Liz's dad waited until she was out of sight before he all-too-casually pulled a handgun out from beneath the passenger seat, holding it loftily as he turned to speak with Peter. "Does she know?"
Peter swallowed. "Know what?"
"So she doesn't, good." He smiled that same smile he'd been smiling all evening, though it was plastered with sinister intentions. "Close to the vest. I admire it. Got a few secrets of my own. Of all the reasons I didn't want my daughter to date, " he joked, his face unchanging. Peter steeled himself, meeting Liz's Dad's gaze with his own, as steady and measured as he could.
"Peter," He continued. "Nothing is more important than family. And you saved my daughter's life- I"m not going to forget that. So I"m gonna give you one chance. Are you ready?
Peter said nothing.
"You walk through those doors and forget any of this ever happened, and don't you ever, ever interfere with my business again. 'Cause if you do, I'll kill you. And everybody you love. I'll kill you dead. That's what I'll do to protect my family. And hey-" Liz's dad waved his hand that held the gun casually, as if just to remind Peter it was still there. " I just saved your life. What do you say?"
Peter swallowed. "Thank you."
"Right answer. Now go show my girl a good time- but not too good."
The buzzing in his ears had stopped at some point and it was just a low, constant ringing, every nerve in his body on fire as Liz's dad drove away. Peter had no clue where he was going, but he had a plan. He just needed to find Ned and Katya.
