The rest of their morning was spent playing with Lego's at Katya's insistence, much to Peter's apparent amusement, and changing bandages- for Katya, most of Peter's wounds were already gone- and apparently napping, which hadn't been on purpose. The two awoke entangled on the floor, lego's scattered about, to Peter's phone ringing. He wedged his arm out from underneath Katya's head so he could answer it. "Hey Aunt May."
"Hey, you!" chirped Aunt May from the other side of the line. "Ready for lunch? I"m about five minutes away."
Peter sat up then, which Katya groggily mimicked, swiping a piece of lego out of her hair. "Yeah, I can be ready- can Katya come? We've been hanging out."
"Katya? Oh, er- sure, I don't see why not. I wanted to hear about your homecoming date though."
"Oh yeah, she won't mind. We were all kind of there together."
Katya glanced at him quizzically, stretching each bicep behind her head in turn.
"Okay, sure! I"ll see you in five. Love you."
"Love you too."
He hung up the phone and turned to Katya, who had spread into side splits and was now stretching her legs, lowering her stomach to the ground. "So, Aunt May is on her way to take us to lunch, if you're cool with that."
Katya's face, which had fallen momentarily, brightened. "You mean I can come?"
"Yeah, but she wants to hear about Homecoming, so- "
"You were with Liz most of the night but we hung out as a group for parts of it, got it." Katya nodded, taking the words out of his mouth.
"But 'I' got back later than Homecoming would run, so we have to think of-"
Katya shrugged, sitting up. "There was an after party somewhere, you choose."
Peter thought back to the first time they'd all gone out to eat together, and how easily Katya had handled May's questions. It was like she'd funneled diplomacy out of nowhere. Also, she didn't know what high school graduation was but she knew what after parties were? Peter knew most of her pop culture knowledge came from movies, but what kinds of movies was she watching? "All right then." That was easy.
They met May at the entrance to the apartment complex.
"Oh my god!" were her first words upon seeing Katya, her eyes glued to the bandage that spanned the side of the girl's face. "Did you go to Homecoming or a cage fight?!"
Katya laughed, but in a weird, airy way- almost polite, nothing like how she laughed when they were alone, and it was weird to hear- "It's super embarrassing. I'm not used to wearing heels."
"Oh, honey," May smiled down at her, trying and failing to look more sympathetic than bemused.
The story went over smoothly at lunch, Katya chiming in with perfectly specific -and entirely fake- details at just the right times, and Peter could tell that Aunt May bought it completely, but there was still some confusion in her voice that Peter didn't understand until they'd gone their separate ways afterwards. (Katya had said she was going to run to the library before heading home, when really she was going to wander a few blocks away and then have Happy pick her up.)
"I thought you liked Liz," Aunt May blurted as soon as Katya was out of earshot. "Did something happen?"
Peter shook his head almost too quickly. "No, no, nothing happened, I still like her-" even as the words left his mouth, they felt like a lie he didn't mean to tell.
Aunt May sent him as serious a look as she could, which wasn't nearly as intimidating as the one she'd used when he'd gotten home from the Ferry debacle. "Don't bullshit me Peter. What's going on with you and Katya?"
Peter scuffed his sneaker against the sidewalk. "I don't know," he answered, which was the truth. They hadn't discussed the kiss at all that day, because it felt like- to him at least- they didn't need to. Things just felt …natural, with her around. Nothing felt awkward, which confused Peter to no end when he thought about it for too long, but usually he didn't have that time to think. Aunt May smiled knowingly.
"I think you do- you just don't understand it yet."
There was a bit of a pause as they continued to walk before Aunt May piped up again. "But if Liz is your girlfriend you've got to-"
"Oh, no, god no-" Peter laughed hollowly. He kicked at a pebble on the sidewalk in front of him. "Liz isn't my girlfriend. Liz was just…a crush."
Aunt May's face lit up, like she'd won something, and it took a second for Peter to put together. He'd used was, as in past tense…on purpose. WIthout realizing it. But that didn't make it any less true.
"I see." Was all May offered, her voice trailing off playfully. "Well, 'tis the way of young love."
Love.
Peter reddened and maintained an avid interest in the cracks in the sidewalk for the rest of the walk home.
—- —
"You know, it was so insane! That whole-it was just, like, crazy." Ned chattered as he and Peter walked down the hallway that Monday morning. "He-he was just like- bzzzzzzt- and you were like, 'aaaaah!' and then I just hit him with the vshhhttt, it was so-"
"I mean, you saved me." Peter conceded, smiling at his friend's excitement. At the end of the hall he spied Liz Toomes, giving Betty Brandt what looked like a long, sad hug. He jogged over to her.
"Liz!"
She glanced at him as Betty walked away and rolled her eyes, turning away. He kept walking to meet her where she stood anyway. "Liz, look, I'm so sorry-"
"You say that a lot,what are you sorry for now?"She snapped, but her voice sounded more exhausted than angry."The dance? Yeah. That was a pretty crappy thing to do."
A pang shot through Peter's chest. "Yeah. And I mean, with your dad- I can only imagine what you're going through." It had been all over the news that morning, as The Vulture- whom the news referred to as Adrian Toomes- had been arrested and was awaiting trial. "If there's anything I can do to help-"
"I guess we're moving to Oregon. Mom says it's nice there, so-" her voice cracked, and she shrugged. "That's cool. Besides, Dad doesn't want us here during the trials." Peter opened his mouth to say something, but she cut him off. "Bye, Peter. Whatever's going on with you, I hope you figure it out." She turned and left, before he could respond.
