Author's Note: Spoilers for No Way Home and Hawkeye. When I took the job at Bishop Security, I was convinced Kate Bishop would be my boss, nothing more. Never in my wildest dreams did I think I'd fall in love with her. Eventual Peter/Kate, with some Peter/MJ moments. T for now.
Potential trigger warning: this chapter briefly alludes to abortion. Reader discretion is advised.
Reunion
By Ninazadzia
We visit a life we both left behind
Ignore the heart
Move to the ever-moving
Or, blazin', we go over
And over and over and over again
If I wait too long
I'll lose you from my sight
Maybe tonight
I could stop dreaming
And start believing in forever
And ever and ever and ever again
~Reunion, the xx
June, 2025
Clear across town, MJ was starting a summer internship when she got a phone call from Ned.
"Random question—" he started.
MJ immediately interjected. "If by 'random question' you mean 'quick question,' fire away—I'm so late for work it's not even funny."
"Right. Any chance you're free this afternoon?"
"Potentially yes, assuming I'm not too swamped at work." MJ paused, scanning the subway map. For a born and raised New Yorker, you'd think she'd have an easier time figuring out the easiest way to get from Queens to the West Village—but as it turned out, she was realizing she'd barely spent any time outside of her neighborhood in Queens, much less clear across Manhattan. "What's up?"
"Do you happen to remember ever giving me a box of things to hold onto for you last year? You know—framed photos, cards, things like that?" And then he paused before adding, "photos that very clearly look there's supposed to be another person in the frame, but it's just you, and a disproportionate amount of space to your left…?"
He didn't have to say any more. The way Ned trailed off told her everything.
She stopped in her tracks. "Shit. You're kidding."
"I wish I was."
"Ned, I swear to God, if you're fucking with me—"
"I swear, MJ, I'm not. I'm literally shaking right now—I think whoever your Ghost is, he's haunting me too."
It all started six months ago, right before the holidays.
It was something as simple as the butterfly necklace she wore every day, and being asked by a new coworker at the coffee house where she'd gotten it from—and instead of immediately being able to come up with an answer, she'd drawn a blank. "I don't know," she replied. "I honestly can't remember."
That on its own would have been innocent enough—after all, we all have stuff we've accumulated over the years that we have no idea how we got in the first place—but it was the mention from her boss that really got under skin. "What are you talking about? You've worn that damn thing every day for the last six months, I figured it must have some sentimental value or something." And then, because he was the douchey kind of boss, he added "especially because it's obviously broken" as an afterthought.
That was where it started, and from there, it kept happening. She'd find photos when she was scrolling through her phone that she couldn't explain—pictures of her trip to Europe over the summer, for example, and she couldn't remember for the life of her who had taken them. Pamphlets from different plays and shows she'd seen in New York and abroad, and she couldn't place the circumstances of her being there.
And then there were other things that she had a really, really impossible time figuring out—like the fact that she'd missed her period for three months straight.
At first, she figured it was stress from college apps, or school—she'd heard stories of girls in her grade losing their period during intense phases of stress. But the real kicker came when she went in for her annual appointment, only to find out she was apparently three months pregnant.
Pregnant, and—impossibly—a virgin.
It didn't make any sense, and there was no logical explanation for it. She didn't drink, she didn't have some blackout tryst where she could have woken up the next morning and had sex and forgotten all about it. Hell, she hadn't done anything beyond kiss a guy—forget anything about letting his sperm anywhere near her. At first she was convinced it was a mistake, that they must have screwed up her test results with someone else's, and then once an at-home pregnancy test came back positive, she'd fallen down the internet rabbit hole of trying to find any possible explanation she could have gotten a false positive reading, devouring article after article about how certain forms of cancer or eating too much potassium could result in a false positive. Anything made more sense than her actually being pregnant.
It was surreal, all of it. Everything from the trip to the ob-gyn, to seeing the image on the ultrasound, to realizing that she sure as shit was pregnant, and last she checked, definitely a virgin. And that she didn't have any reasonable explanation for it, nothing that made sense.
Until, that was, Ned threw out the theory that she had a Ghost.
"What if you're being haunted by a former lover?" he asked. They'd been at the library all of spring break together when he threw out that theory. He'd been on a real spiritual kick that semester, with his recent discovery of his wizarding heritage—he'd spent most of that winter break mentoring under Dr. Strange and learning how to use a sling ring. "I talked to Wong about it. There's not a ton to refer to, but some of the documents at the Sanctum—"
"Ned. What did I tell you about my whole 'situation'?"
All she'd needed to do was raise her eyebrow, and that was enough to jog his memory. The 'situation' had been her trip to Planned Parenthood, which was a secret between only her, Ned, and now Wong, apparently. "Right. I'm sorry. I just—I believe you, you know? Like we've known each other for years, I know that you haven't hooked up with anyone, or that you would have told me if you had. The whole thing is just so weird…"
She'd shaken her head. "Whatever it is, I took care of it, and I haven't found anything new from my 'Ghost' in a minute. And besides—it's not like we'll ever get an answer to this. We'll be out of here and living in Boston in six months, so what does it matter?"
She'd thought they'd agreed to drop it there. And sure, there had been little things that had come up here and there in the two months since that conversation, but nothing that was enough to cause her any concern.
Until, of course, her summer phone call from Ned.
"I get off work at five today," she said, "I'll text you when I'm on the way to your place?"
Author's Note: *cue Mushu's "I LIIIIIIIIVE!" from Mulan*
Let the record show, I am NOT abandoning this fic! Nothing like going through an amicable-yet-still-heart-wrenching breakup to get the creative juices flowing again, amirite?
In all seriousness, thank you guys for being patient with me and bearing with me these last couple of months—recently got re-inspired with this fic again, and I can't tell you how much the positive reception to the first couple of chapters means to me. Sorry this one was on the shorter side and was very MJ-centric; I think it's important to address Peter and MJ's relationship before we can move on to Peter and Kate's, so at least from the jump we'll be seeing a little bit of her here and there. Regardless, you can expect PLENTY of Peter/Kate in the next few chapters to make up for it.
Best,
xx Nina
PS. To address the trigger warning at the top—I personally am as pro-choice as they come, and want to be very clear that I wholeheartedly support a woman's right to do what she pleases with her body, and my intent is not to shame anyone who has had to terminate a pregnancy for one reason or another. The reason I included it is because I know it can be a sensitive subject if you're going through it yourself or if you have someone close to you who is, and I also want to be respectful if you are pro-life and let you know right now that while I do not intend for this fic to be political or to have an overtly pro-choice message, my personal beliefs/opinions will likely bleed into the storytelling. So, that's the first and last trigger warning you'll ever see for this topic in this fic—we're gonna deal with some real-world, heavier problems here. And if you're not down for that, it's all good, just keep on keeping on and thanks for checking out my writing regardless.