Days of Pretending

Rated PG-13

Chapter 9: Rooftop Rebirth

So, he thought to himself as he closed another photo album, look where I am now.

Peter had spent days and days pouring over photographs of his childhood, photographs that seemed to have too many pictures of Mary Jane, yet not enough. They were all a little faded from age, from sitting out on the counter at his old house, from simply being looked at repeatedly. There were pictures from kindergarten recitals, little Mary Jane's head at the back of the class, with the other kids whose names ended in "W" or maybe "Y" and "Z." There were some pictures of them standing together, smiling, but they never really touched. Those were the one that made Peter cry, because that was when he had unconditionally loved her, before he was Spider-man. Those were the times when he had really known no bounds to his love.

Peter did not know how many boxes of tissue he had used before finally resorting to toilet paper. He had used up all the tissues in the house.

The other pictures made him depressed more than tearful. They smiled in each other's arms, cheek to cheek, hands clasped. They seemed to be outside a lot, maybe in the park, with the wild red leaves blowing around and melting in with Mary Jane's hair. The pictures were beautiful, but that in itself pained him. They acted like they were happy and thought that they were happy. Peter could not bear to look at them for long, because they reminded him of three months that he had lived lying to himself. Were we doomed in this picture? Were we doomed in this one? We did not know three months ago that we would end up with nothing.

Peter closed the last album, wondering why he even looked at the images when he knew they would shred his poor heart in a merciless manner. A wretched disease whispered in his brain with black shriveled lips. It was a hopeless, dreadful feeling that told him he would never get over Mary Jane. He would never forget the way she had looked into his eyes so many times with passion, the sensuality of her lips upon his, how she would pull of his mask and toss it to the side. He remembered throwing a blanket on the grass and feeding her strawberries under the starlight and sleeping with cooling coffee forgotten on the table. So many things had happened but now were lost, because they were dead.

Peter did not know why he spent time on such memories, haunted images and sensations that rolled through his body. He set down the album next to him and rose, heading for the kitchen area. He opened a cabinet, his reddened eyes scanning the contents.

Harry had been gathering an assortment of liquor since his father had passed away; Harry himself only used it when he was desperate, so it was the unwritten rule of the house that it was for emergencies only. The stash was hidden where no one could find it. The secret hoard was particularly put in a high place where the short, small Aunt May would not discover it when she went on a motherly cleaning rampage. The fact that it was meant to be kept a secret made Peter feel all the more guilty when he picked a bottle of vodka up; he hated to keep things from people. But it was getting easier.

He dragged the thing back to the couch and plopped himself next to the abandoned photo album. Peter stared at the oddly-colored liquid, the rusty red of the alcohol reminding him of sweet caramel, which was innocent and pure. Sweet, pure vodka - there was no harm in it. It wouldn't be so bad to take a few drinks. It would help.

"If there was ever a time for alcohol, it would be now," he told himself, and picked it up.

An hour later found Peter on the couch staring blankly at the ceiling, his blue eyes vacant and bloodshot. His head was empty. If a thought came to his head, it disappeared into the void of his mind. He felt so dazed and dumb, but it was better that way, because he could not feel anything in the silence. The door creaked open, and Harry entered, carrying a bag of groceries. "Peter, I got some food," he said with a faint smile. When Peter did not respond, Harry inched towards the couch, setting his package down on a chair on the way.

"Peter?" Harry asked worriedly.

"I'm not hungry," said Peter without blinking or flinching. His voice was hoarse and shaky, as if he weren't quite connected to it. The dark haired young man seated himself on the chair adjacent to Peter. At the moment that he was seated, Harry noticed the significantly emptied vodka bottle, and his stomach dropped.

"So, bad day," Harry commented roughly, rubbing at his temples and leaning forward to rest his elbows on his knees.

"Bad day, bad week, bad month. Bad everything. Bad life," Peter replied in a few broken phrases. His voice was monotone. "Same thing." He still did not move.

"I see," said Harry. He leaned back. "C'mon, Peter. It's not going to do any good laying there. Have something to eat, huh? Liven up a little." When Peter did not respond at all, Harry insisted, "You'll be okay, Pete. Tomorrow's another day. C'mon."

"You don't get it," Peter argued. He felt his eyes water up, lingering at the cusps of his eyelids. "It will be the same tomorrow." There was a silent pause when he tried to contain his sorrow, but he could not. He sobbed out unexpectedly, making Harry jump. The tears released, spiraling down his face, smoothly flowing over his cheekbones. "I'm not going to be okay, because I lost her." He cried out again, his breath hitching, the tears running crystal down his face.

"You broke up with Mary Jane?" Harry asked, his brows knitting together.

"No," Peter replied, sniffling. "I don't think we were ever together-" he started to explain, but he started to cry again, and Harry couldn't understand the garbled words he choked out. He didn't think he would be able to get it at all, even if he did hear the words.

Peter's eyes slammed shut in his pain as if to block off the rest of the tears that came. "Harry," Peter went on, slightly more composed. "Harry, Harry, Harry," he gasped, struggling to find the words to say, only thinking of the fact that his friend was near, and how much he needed someone right then and there, and how good it felt to know that at least he had Harry still, if not Mary Jane.

"I'm still in love with her. I'll always love her. I'll never get over her, Harry. I can't take it. Help me, Harry, tell me what to do," Peter whispered with slurred words. He finally stirred, his muscles moving for the first time in over half an hour, and he rolled over onto his stomach, his wet eyes meeting Harry's. Peter smudged his tears with his fist. "Harry," he said with a hiccup, "I don't know what to do."

"Here's a start. Don't drink any more, okay?" Harry reprimanded him, picking up the bottle and putting it back. "It's making you overly emotional."

"Well, I need to cry," Peter responded, hoisting his upper torso up weakly. He shifted to a sitting position. He wiped his still streaming eyes and felt his throat tighten up again. Harry came over with a class of cold water and handed it to his drunken friend.

"What's this for?" Peter asked, looking at it with his head cocked.

"Just to get something non-alcoholic in you," Harry explained with a shrug. "How long have you been drinking?"

Peter looked at the clock and forgot how to read it. "I don't know."

Harry sighed. "Drink the water, Pete," he commanded, and Peter proceeded to do so. Once he had drained the glass, Harry asked, "What happened?"

Peter's face fell, and he looked at the ground. "I don't know. Conflicting interests, or something like that. God, I don't know anymore. It's so hard to explain." He looked up to Harry's eyes. "I'm never going to be over her."

Harry shifted in his sear uncomfortably. "Neither will I."

It was at that moment that Peter remembered how Harry had dated Mary Jane as well. The fleeting look in Harry's eyes was one of slight regret, nostalgia, and perhaps deja vu. "I'm sorry," Peter apologized for stirring up the negative emotions in his friend.

Harry waved off his friend with a hand. "Listen, Pete. There's no need to be sorry for me. I'm not the one crying in a drunken stupor on the couch," he said, attempting a joke. Harry's eyes twinkled. It worked; Peter broke into a smile and chuckled, laughing at his own stupidity.

When Peter had regained his composition, Harry continued on a more serious note, "Mary Jane is no longer mine. Though I'll always love her, I am not the one who has her heart. It's not me she wants, but you. I don't know what happened between the two of you to cause this supposed 'break-up,' but Mary Jane will always be yours. She always has been, even when she hasn't known it."

Peter wiped his eyes for the millionth time that night. "You're so sure," he said, baffled.

"Of course I'm sure. And I'm right, you know," Harry said, rising to stare down at Peter. "Think about it, Pete. I have no idea what happened between you and Mary Jane, but you both love each other, and I think that's enough to get you over whatever happened." Harry headed for the kitchen area to put away the milk and fruit from the store in the refrigerator.

"You don't understand. You don't know it all," Peter replied, knowing he was unable to explain to Harry about Spider-man, and his own limitations, and what he could not do for her. "You can't understand everything."

Harry turned back to face his friend, leaning on the table. "Of course I don't understand. But I don't have to understand it all. It's simple. You love Mary Jane, don't you?"

Peter closed his eyes, just thinking of her everything. "Yes. I love her so much."

"There you go. Then get her back," Harry said bluntly, turning back to the refrigerator and setting the sliced lunch meat on one of the shelves.

Peter's eyes opened. He watched Harry move across the room, tossing the empty grocery bag in the trash can, organizing things, wiping off the counter. "Thanks, Harry," he said with a slight hiccup.  

~~

Meanwhile, across the city, Mary Jane was having other thoughts. Her thoughts were darker and deeper, and she did not know how to react to them. It was a very doomed, depressed feeling, as if the walls of her bedroom were closing in on her as she attempted at slumber. Peter was gone from her life now. He was her "ex-boyfriend." Just that alone sent an evil shiver up her spine. She hated the way it felt.

She sat up with a vengeance and slammed her hand on the light switch near her bed, turning on the lamp and shooing away the darkness. Bitterly, she yanked up the covers to her chin and felt the tears well up behind her eyes. Mary Jane sniffled, not knowing if she could take the idea of not being with Peter.

I want him still, more than ever before. I need him, deep inside of my heart. I cannot ever let go of him, her brain screamed in agony, writhing. Why can't we go on? It's my own fault. It's because I am a fool, because I cannot accept Spider-man inside of him. I cannot learn to live with his gift, his curse, his faults, his lack of perfection. What is wrong with me? She fell out of bed, thumping on her knees on the carpet, wincing. Her flesh crawled with bugs.

Mary Jane wandered to the kitchen, deciding to make some tea to calm her nerves. As the kettle whistled, she was still lost in her heart's wonderings.  I need to get over the fact that he's Spider-man. I need to forget it. I need to get over it. But why can't I? Am I too needy, too clingy to understand and accept that he can't be there 100% of the time? She poured the water and rummaged in the cupboard for a teabag. Wouldn't it be better to have him some of the time rather than not at all?

"I want to try again," she whispered to her mug of hot water. She stirred it with her finger. She had not found any teabags. "I still need you. I want you back. I want to forget that it ever happened so we can start anew."

Peter, she thought, collapsing into a chair, Peter, what if I could forget that you were Spider-man? What if I could love Spider-man as a part of you, like I loved him before? He is a part of you, all your good together. She nearly did a double-take as something greater than she could understand hit her. Spider-man is not evil. He is not out to get us. He is the goodness in you, the part that saves children, the part that loves humanity, the symbol and strength of the city. I should love him, because you are that man, Spider-man. He is not your weakness, but your beauty. He is not your cruelty to me or your indifference, but your passion for mankind. He is not the hate in our relationship, but the love in the world.

She could no longer feel envy for him. She could no longer hold a grudge against him. Because though Peter's absence made her suffer, Spider-man presence protected her. They were not separate, but one. She had to accept them both, or neither at all. And the more she thought, the easier it was to betray her prior aches and fall back in love with them both.

~~

"Take care of the last customer of the day, young lady," said the fat man behind the stove with his thick accent. "And then you're good to go. Maria is closing tonight." He wiped his greasy hands on his apron, his wet eyes flitting away from Mary Jane, much to her relief. She did not like him, the way he looked at her like she was a piece of meat, the way he seemed to hire only women and no men.

"Thanks, Enrique," Mary Jane said with a smile that didn't quite reach her eyes. "What table?"

"Twenty-nine," he answered, and returned to scraping dried crust off the stove. Mary Jane drew out her notebook thoughtlessly and heartlessly from her apron and wandered over to the booth in the far corner, her heart not quite in her job. She didn't even see anyone in it until she was right up next to it.

"May I-" she began, but she stopped. "Peter?"

He looked up at her with bloodshot eyes. His heart was racing, his pulse pounding, the heat radiating from every part of his body as sheer, skittish, horse-like nervousness wracked his whole self. "I'm not here to eat," Peter said in a voice that was much too steady to be his own.  

"I…I didn't think so," she answered, sliding into the booth next to him. It was a good thing she sat. She felt shaky, like her knees might snap at any moment. Mary Jane felt suddenly like she could tell him a million things, like she could pour out her heart to him in apology and love and desperation. But she didn't know where to start. There was too much to say all at once. If she spoke, it would come out garbled.

Peter somehow managed to speak. "I… I'm sorry," he whispered, interrupting the quiet, his gaze fixed on the napkin dispenser.

"Me, too," she admitted. "I never should have said those things about hating you."

"Those words you said were justified, within reason. I don't grudge you them." he replied distantly, still looking at something else other than her. It still stung to remember what she had said, those awful things about how she couldn't accept him and love all of him, those harsh words that bit repeatedly, even after they were long dead. "But I was so wrong to do what I did."

"What do you mean?" she asked, confused. "I…I was cruel. I blamed you for us not working out." Mary Jane's voice lowered as she scanned the diner for listening ears. "Everything negative that has happened has been my fault," she confessed, leaning forward in her seat, resting her elbows on the table.

"For me to not accept your identity as Spider-man was something vicious. I just realized that you and Spider-man are not two different people vying for the same body, good versus evil. It's just a single person's good side versus their second good side. You were not wrong in leaving me once in a while; Peter, you were going off to save children. You were working for goodness, being civil, and using what power you could to make the world right. How could I be so selfish to let you not be that? How can I hog all of your wonderful self for me and not let you share it with the world?" She paused. "There's nothing wrong with being Spider-man, like I thought. There's something beautiful in it. I just didn't realize what you were saying to me all along."

Peter couldn't think of anything to say to her then.

Mary Jane swallowed her pride. "I was a jealous child in hating Spider-man, who is such a part of you. And I am so sorry for that. But I will never hate you again. I never can hate you again, because you were only doing what you thought would better for the rest of the world. "

Peter met her eyes. "This was not all your fault," he told her. "Don't let yourself think that it was."

"But you did no wrong. Who else can be blamed?" Mary Jane countered.

Peter shook his head at her. "But that's not true. There was one time when I left you for real, and I did not have Spider-man to hide behind. It was that night three weeks ago in the snow. I was a moron, such a moron, in being so hopeless, in not willing to try again. What did I think I was doing in running away from you? Did I think that things would be better if we were apart, unable to touch each other? Was I saving you, saving us from each other? No. You said you didn't want that in the first place."

"No. No, I just want to be with you, Peter." She laid her hands on top of his, and fire raged through his skin from not having touched her in so long.

"And I want to be with you, Mary Jane." He felt her squeeze his hand for reassurance; and it worked.

Peter continued, "I don't know what I was thinking when I said that we were over. I thought you could never love me." He swallowed hard.

"And then I realized that it wasn't you that this was all about. It was about me. It was about if I could accept Spider-man or not. I didn't want to accept him, and that made the both of us hate him more. If I could accept Spider-man, that meant I could accept myself and love myself for who I was. And one must love himself before anyone else loves him. That's what this is all about."  

"Peter-"

"I was afraid of myself; I didn't know anything." Peter shook his head and hid his face with his hands as he wept. "I am so sorry, Mary Jane, for making you my guinea pig. I didn't mean it." Her name sounded so good on his tongue, but not the sobbing tone in which he said it.

She shushed him immediately, disliking his tears. "Don't cry. Don't kick yourself over this," she told him, resting a hand on his back. Instinct drew him into her arms, and he cried onto her shoulder, his hands on his lap. Mary Jane kissed Peter's temple gently. "We were both in the wrong in so many ways. But it's all right now. Let's just kiss and make up, then, Peter." Her eyes sparked. Not until after she had spoken did Mary Jane realize the double meaning.

Shyly, he looked up at her teary eyes and saw the twinkle there. He brought his lips upon hers hungrily; the touch almost ached after three weeks without her. The only thought in his head was not of regret, not of sorrow or guilt; he lost all that in the kiss. The only thing Peter could think about was that everything would be fine as long as he was against Mary Jane's lips.  

They broke apart, gasping. "Are you… saying you want me back?" he asked her.

"Yes."

"Even after everything, you want me back? Even after I hurt you, after we hurt ourselves because of each other?" She nodded.  "But we might not work out, you have to remember. We have such conflicting needs, conflicting desires, conflicting lives," Peter said. "I can't-"

"I know. But we still love each other. We'll have to make do with that, won't we?" Mary Jane replied. "We just have to be patient with each other, and remember that we aren't perfect." She smiled with tears in her eyes and held his hands in her own and kissed his cheek tenderly. "I love you – all of you – too much to give up so easily."

He sighed audibly and let his cheekbone rest against her soft pink lips, red-rimmed eyes closing thoughtfully. "I love you, too, even though it might not seem like it sometimes. I really do," he insisted.

"I know."

His eyes lifted suddenly. "Let's get out of here," Peter suggested lightly in a voice that suggested mystery and romance. Mary Jane smirked at Peter for the first time in a long time, and the smile really reached her eyes and glistened there, and she had never felt better in her life, not even when she had first loved Peter. It was new and fresh and real now, and there was hope in the world after all.

"Okay," she agreed. They rose from their seat, disentangling themselves from each other only to tangle each other up again as they latched arms and left the diner behind. Mary Jane's apron and notepad were discarded on the table behind them.

The door swung open and they emerged just as the streetlamps came on and the horizon darkened and six o'clock was struck on the watches of the city.

They made quite a sight, the redhead in her bright costumed uniform and the bleary-eyed student with his faded green high-collared sweater. They were everything out of the ordinary. Even weirder was how he met her eyes and nodded and turned down an alley with her in hand and disappeared from the view of the common people.

A minute or so later, a red-suited warrior streaked across the sky with another in his arms. Squinting, his cargo was a young woman, who seemed to not be in fear but rather in joy as she soared across the skyscrapers. There was laughter ringing in the air.

"So," the masked hero said with a smile underneath his fake face, "you like dates like these?" She could hardly hear him for the wind whipping around his face.

"Definitely," Mary Jane whispered, watching the streets like ribbons below them. Everything else seemed so far away right then, like they were untouchable. She felt like she was leaving the whole world behind, like she was becoming someone else as she hung there. All she had ever known was slowly fading away and the new reality was something more beautiful than anything she had ever seen.

They spent the night counting stars on the rooftops and hoping that darkness would give them cover.

The End

~~

AN: And you have reached the end of "Days of Pretending." I hope you liked it! I hope it was an enjoyable journey, full of happiness, sadness, joy, wisdom, and tears. I hope it touched you. It touched me, somehow. *sniffle* I was writing it and sometimes it made me want to cry because I felt so awful for my characters. Peter and Mary Jane, please forgive me for torturing you so. Please review and tell me what you think about this. I really need reviews to pump me up.

I was trying to do the whole story without little breakers (~~), but I really needed them this chapter. Aw, oh well! And in case anyone was wondering, I prefer using "Mary Jane" and "Peter" because "MJ" sounds a little cheesy to me in the actual story and "Pete" reminds me of a stupid white horse that I ride, and it's just a funny connection that disturbs the way I write. (It's not a very romantic name, either.)  I only use "Pete" when Harry's talking because it's a sort of buddy-to-buddy name. I can't see Harry referring to him as "Peter."

In case anyone noticed, I have a parallel structure in here that's kind of symbolic. Remember in chapter 2 how MJ and Peter met at the diner but MJ couldn't leave? It happens again in this story. And this time they could leave and go off wherever. That was meant to be a symbol; the first time, they couldn't go anywhere, sort of implying they were stuck (on their differences). This time, they were free of those things. Aren't I a little genius?

Yeah, that's about all. This was my brainchild and my blood, sweat, and tears. Good God, review me! And goodbye.