Peter woke up to the sound of his alarm blaring out of his phone and almost directly into his ears. Making sure to temper his reaction, he reached over and took the device in his hand, silencing it. It had taken a few years and more than a few crushed phones/alarm clocks for him to not reflexively smash it to pieces for the sake of shutting down the annoying but necessary sound, but he'd finally gotten the hang of it.

Rubbing the sleep from his eyes, Peter made himself sit up, planting his feet on the floor. Last night had proven a late night; after a good swing around the city didn't do any good for distracting him from everything, he opted to go ahead and get the photos he'd taken from that evening uploaded, submitting the best of the bunch into his boss. The shuttle crash, while personal on some level to those who'd been at the Bugle for a long time, was also sure to be the biggest news story for a while. Therefore, it made sense to Peter for him to do his part to get ahead of things in that regard.

Plus, again, restless minds don't make for a good night's sleep.

Checking his phone for the time again, Peter finally got up from his bed and went about his usual morning routine: slipped on his suit and his street clothes, made some breakfast (a.k.a. a quick slice of toast), made sure he overall looked and smelled passable to the public before grabbing his keys and heading out the door. As usual, M.J. was already in the hallway, waiting patiently while leaning against the wall.

"Good morning," she said, greeting him with a quick peck on his lips.

"Hey," he said. "Sorry again about..."

"I'm going to stop you right there," M.J. interrupted, putting her finger to his mouth. "I know that this may be news to you Peter Parker, but you can't control when a major emergency will or will not happen. It's fine, seriously; yes, I wish our time hadn't been interrupted last night, but you know that I'll always support you being...well, you know who."

Finally removing her finger from his lips, she maintained eye contact with him.

"So, there was something you wanted to say?" she asked, the smile on her face conveying just a hint of snark.

Unable to resist the impulse, Peter put his hand behind her head and drew her to him, planting a deep kiss. Not even showing a hint of being caught off guard, his fiancé returned his gesture without the slightest hesitation. They soon separated, and his gaze met hers.

"Just that I am getting married to the most beautiful, smart, ambitious, and downright amazing woman on this planet," he said proudly.

"Mm," M.J. muttered, a wide, closed-lipped smile spreading across her cheeks. "I like the sound of that. You sure do know how to make a girl feel special, Tiger."

"Well, you deserve to feel special," Peter assured her.

M.J. smiled even more brightly at him before the two finally set off for their respective workplaces today, going down the elevator and out the door, walking along towards the bus stop M.J. now opted to take to get to the new store. Really, their little routine really seemed to be just what Peter needed this morning. He'd woken up still struggling a bit with the events of the night before, between those who lost their lives, whether a certain ooze had been what was causing his spider sense to go crazy and Eddie's issues with his consistent disappearances. That wasn't to say that all those worries didn't exist in his mind anymore, but something about walking alongside his fiancé, talking with her, even just looking over and seeing her smile just gave him this feeling that, somehow, he'd figure it all out.

"Oh, don't forget that we need to meet soon to finish the save-the-dates," M.J. said as they approached the bus stop. "Think we can do it tonight?"

"It's a date," Peter assured her. "I'll get them printed up after work."

"Excellent," his fiancé replied. "I'll have the address labels made up, and we'll send them out."

Despite the pervasive smile maintaining itself across M.J.'s cheeks, there was a hesitancy in the words of her last sentence that gave Peter the sense that something was off. When she broke eye contact with him almost immediately after, he knew something was up.

"You okay?" he asked her.

Returning eye contact, his fiancé spoke up.

"Yeah, why do you ask?" she said.

"You did that thing where you look away from me right after you say something that you usually do when something is on your mind," he explained. "Plus, you also did that thing where you just barely bite the edge of your lip; that definitely means there's something in there."

Dropping eye contact again, Mary Jane's expression change was less subtle this time, most notably in how her smile dropped from it.

"I just know that you had a lot on your mind from last night," she explained, looking back up again. "I didn't want to burden you with anything else right now."

She hung her head, so Peter came a little closer, rubbing her arms a little to try and comfort her.

"Hey," he said softly, drawing her attention once more. "I can handle it. Besides, you're the one who's always telling me I don't have to go through anything alone, remember?"

M.J. let out a light huff.

"Glad to see that you're taking my words to heart," she said.

"You really do give some good advice sometimes," he replied.

"Sometimes?" M.J. questioned, her right eyebrow shooting upward.

"Most of the time," Peter jokingly corrected. "Nobody's perfect, after all."

M.J.'s smile had now almost fully returned, even if there was still a tint of melancholy to it.

"We can talk about it tonight," she said. "It actually pertains to the save-the-dates anyway."

"Oh no," Peter said. "You don't hate the design that I came up with, do you?"

"No no, goodness no," M.J. quickly clarified. "Nothing like that. It's just..."

The bus then pulled up, drawing their attention for a second.

"It's okay," Peter assured her. "We'll talk about it tonight."

"Okay," M.J. replied. The two of them leaned in for a quick goodbye kiss and said their I love yous before Peter watched his fiancé get on the bus.


Once he'd found an opportunity for a break, Peter got up from his desk and made his way through the building, heading for Eddie's desk. He still felt bad about how things went down between them last night, and he wanted to do his part to try and make amends. That wasn't to say that he knew exactly what he was going to say in that regard, but he felt that he had to do something. Besides, there was another subject he'd wanted to talk about for a little while now but hadn't, because these exact kinds of scenarios kept happening, putting the occasional distance between them.

Unfortunately, Peter made it to his coworker's area only to find that the man wasn't there. He glanced around the busy newsroom, only to find no sign of his friend anywhere nearby. Giving up on the idea for the moment, Peter turned and started heading back for the elevator. Really, he should have expected that Eddie likely wouldn't be there, as he was likely following up on the shuttle story from the night before, maybe even checking in on how Colonel Jameson and his copilot were.

Granted, if that was the case, then that meant that he specifically went without him, which meant that he was still upset and maybe even that he didn't trust them to be out in the field together anymore...

As he got into the elevator, Peter took in a breath, trying to relax his mind. There was no sense in jumping to conclusions, and besides, he'd had a decent start to the day so far, and he wasn't about to let some worries about a misunderstanding spoil that. Really, he'd felt pretty good most of the morning. He seemed to have a little more energy than normal, and he wasn't sure where it was coming from. Perhaps he'd gotten a better night's sleep than he thought.

The elevator door opened, and Peter was only a few steps out from it when Glory Grant approached him.

"Oh Peter, I've been looking for you," she said.

"Let me guess, Robbie wants to see me?" Peter guessed.

"Yes, and Mr. Jameson is in there too," Glory added. "Also, have you seen Eddie?"

"I was just looking for him actually, but he wasn't at his desk," Peter explained. "I'll go ahead up there though; maybe I can help."

He then made his way up to Robbie's office; even from a distance, he could see his current boss and former boss standing by the former's desk, appearing to talk about something. Jonah seemed the more animated of the two, which wasn't a huge surprise given both his tendencies and the personal nature of the situation.

Knocking on the door, he got their attention.

"You wanted to see me?"

"Yes, Peter," Robbie spoke up, "please, com..."

"Parker, tell me that you finally got some useful pictures!" Jonah blurted out, approaching Peter as he let himself in.

"Slow down, Mr. Jameson," Peter replied as he let himself in. "I already submitted what I had both to Robbie and to the people at the NASA base here in the city in case it helps with the investigation as to whatever was going on onboard the shuttle."

"And did you capture anything that proved that Spider-Man was behind it?" Jameson questioned.

Okay, he REALLY should have seen this coming.

"Jonah..." Robbie spoke up.

"No Joe, I won't hear your usual defense of that wall crawling menace again!" Jonah asserted. "He's been terrorizing this city for years, and now my son is his latest victim!"

"Spider-Man was trying to save your son!" Peter insisted.

Jonah turned to him, staring Peter straight into his eyes. If this were about ten years ago, Peter would have been terrified of what was to come, but he wasn't about to back down now.

"If that's true," Jameson spoke up, his tone more sincere but still every bit as bitter as before, "then why is it that he always knows when to show up at crime scenes? He's the one connection to anything and everything that goes bad in this city, and he doesn't care who..."

"Stop!" Peter suddenly yelled, his tone spiking in intensity. "All you've done your whole career is make trouble for someone who is just trying his best to do some good! My goodness Jonah, how did this place ever make it with you running the show all these years, spewing out nothing but personal vendettas against anyone you didn't like!"

"Peter, that's enough!" Robbie spoke up, his tone stern and far more booming than Peter had assumed the man's vocal cords to be capable of. It was enough to stop Peter's rant in his tracks, and he took a breath. As he did, the weight and cruelty of his words suddenly hit him. He looked his former boss in the eye, his face suddenly warm with embarrassment.

"Jonah," Robbie continued, coming closer to them both, "you need to be with your son right now. He needs you."

"I can't," the man said, his tone significantly less aggressive than before. "He's been in isolation. They won't tell me anything; they won't even let me see him, my own son..."

The man abruptly turned and forced is way out of the office. Peter turned to follow after him; after his sudden tirade, he felt he needed to apologize, but he felt Robbie's hand on his shoulder, stopping him.

"Let him go, Peter," the man said. "He's hurting; he's not thinking straight."

"And I just made it worse," Peter said, covering his face with his hands in embarrassment. "Mr. Robertson I'm sorry; I don't know what came over me."

"You two never did see eye to eye," Robbie said. "Like I said, give him some time. You may not believe me when I tell you this Peter, but I think he always liked you."

Peter turned to face his boss, his curiosity ramped up, albeit with some skepticism as well.

"I'm not sure what you saw over all those years, but..."

"There were a lot of conversations behind closed doors," Robbie said. "Like I said, leave him be for now. I'm sure you'll get your chance to make amends once this is all settled."

"Right," Peter replied, though he wasn't sure how much he believed it. "Well, I guess I better get back to work, unless there was anything else?"

Peter's boss shook his head, so he made his way out of the office, heading back for his workstation. As he neared it, he saw Eddie standing nearby, so he approached him.

"Eddie, hey, I've been looking all over for you," he explained. "Look man, I'm really sorry again about last night.

His best friend looked at him; just going off his expression, Peter couldn't quite tell if he was accepting his most recent apology or not.

"It's alright man," he finally said, "just...please try and not just go running off again."

"I...will absolutely do my best," Peter stammered out, desperate to say something that wasn't a flat out lie.

"Well, I guess that I'll have to take that," he said. The man turned as if he was heading back to the floor his desk was at, but Peter spoke up again.

"Actually, there was something else I wanted to talk about."

Eddie stopped, turning back to Peter.

"Look man, I would have asked you this sooner, but I know that things have been a bit rocky between us at times over the last few months," he continued. "All that to say, I was hoping that you'd be my best man."

Eddie's expression shifted from one of frustration to one of surprise. A wry smile then came over his face.

"Of course, man," he said. "I'd be honored."

He extended his hand for Peter to shake, which he did.

"Thanks man, I appreciate it," he said. "I really wasn't sure who I was going to ask otherwise."

"Truth is, I've been waiting for you to ask," he said. "I've already been looking into some ideas for the bachelor party.

"Here we go," Peter muttered, leaning his head back and looking up at the ceiling.

However, before Eddie could continue, the man's phone rang. He pulled it from his pocket, observing whoever it was on the screen.

"I have to take this, but we'll talk more later, alright?"

"Sure," Peter replied, "and thanks again man."


Excusing himself, Eddie walked away, hitting the answer button on his phone and putting it to his ear.

"This is Eddie."

"I hear that you're looking into who the new kingpin is," a voice replied. "I can help you."

Stopping, Eddie glanced around, moving over to a more private area so that he could get away from the noise and crowd around him.

"Who is this?" he asked.

"Just meet me at the corner of 10th and Bensonhurst, across the street from the diner," the voice replied. "Eight O' clock on the dot."

The line then went dead before Eddie could ask any more questions.


Thanks for all the love for this story so far; hope you're still enjoying it!

Continuing to pray for you all; stay safe and healthy!

"I desire to do your will, my God; your law is within my heart." Psalm 40:8