Chapter Two: Flash Back

Spider-Man looked down at the streets of the city from a perch high on the vertical wall of a twenty-story building. From this distance, the cars looked like expensive toys, lit up and moving past miniature streetlamps and tiny doll-like pedestrians. He wondered how there could be so many people with reasons to be out at nearly three in the morning. A few minutes ago Spidey had stopped a break-in, coming down out of the sky at a gang of young men wearing stocking caps, carrying TV sets and even furniture out of a drab apartment building. The family inside had been tied up but not hurt, which made this a good night for Spider-Man. Now, resting his wrists on his bent knees, totally unconcerned that he was sideways to the rest of the world, he took a few minutes to enjoy his own unique perspective before heading home. No way was he planning on waking up early the next morning.

Mary Jane was awake early the next morning, so worked up over her first real audition that she was ready to leave an hour ahead of time. Janeen, whose first class wasn't until nine, sat around eating Grape Nuts and watching the morning news. As MJ headed out the door, she could hear the anchorwoman saying, "It's looks like Mayor Kelly will be running for the senate on a platform including Mutant Awareness issues..." Politics, thought Mary Jane. Can you get more boring? She pulled the door shut behind her.

The audition was terrible. It's not like Mary Jane expected Broadway to fall at her feet. Everyone knew it was tough, breaking into acting. Everyone knew it took guts, persistence, talent, and luck. But she hadn't expected to walk into a room full of aspiring actors and feel like an outsider.

All through high school, Mary Jane had auditioned for every school play, gotten practically every leading role. Her parents had never been willing to pay for summer workshops with the local university, but Mary Jane had gotten all the experience she could with the community theater, acting with weekend artists who'd never made it or never tried, who went back to their jobs as accountants and cashiers and teachers when the play was over.

And she had spent hours lolling around on her bed, or on the floor in Lisa's bedroom, reading through movie magazines. She and Lisa gone over the clothes, the make-up, the look of every actress in exhaustive detail. They'd giggled over the thought of working with hunks like Orlando Bloom, wondering what it would be like to have a love scene with a hot guy. Lisa, who wanted to be a fashion designer, had put together outfit after outfit for herself and for Mary Jane. She'd thought she was ready to go for the real thing.

When she went in for her first audition, for a television commercial, she found herself sitting next to a tall guy with dark hair who looked like he might be twenty-five or six. He had his back turned to her, talking excitedly with a lovely brunette wearing a sleek grey pantsuit that made Mary Jane's crop top and skirt look unsophisticated and shapeless. Words like "justification" and "super-objective" floated around their conversation. Mary Jane finally figured out they were discussing acting technique when they smirked over the performance of the actress standing at the front of the room, reading out "Whiter than I thought teeth could get," over and over with various tones of voice and poses. Everyone seemed serious, professional and slightly desperate. Mary Jane had come after finding the audition call posted at a community theater, with the vague idea that a toothpaste commercial would be easier than plunging right in to play auditions. She'd known enough to bring a portfolio with a studio portrait and her pitifully short résumé but self-consciously covered them in her lap, wishing she could be somewhere else.

The woman auditioning finished with a mumbled comment from the casting director and left, looking resigned. Everyone shifted around as a distinguished-looking older man stepped up and began to read the same line. The dark-haired actor sitting next to her turned to light a cigarette (his third) and noticed her sitting next to him.

"Hey, haven't seen you making the rounds. New?" he asked, in a friendly voice.

"That obvious?" said MJ.

"Sorry, girlfriend, but yeah. You look terrified." He waved his cigarette carelessly, indicating her from head to foot. "You need to take a deep breath, relax a little. I'm Marco, by the way.

"Um, yeah." Mary Jane took a deep breath, letting her tight shoulders release, and stretched her mouth into a smile. "I'm Mary Jane, MJ."

"Nice to meet you, MJ. Looks like I'm up—I'd wish you luck but I'm saving it for myself." Marco grinned at her and MJ thought resentfully that he'd probably get the job, the way his teeth gleamed.

After what seemed like an endless wait, Mary Jane was called up front and tried to put emotion into a line that by this time was driving her insane. The audition itself was over in a ridiculously short period of time, and the casting director didn't do more than grunt to indicate that she could leave. Walking out of the building, MJ felt shaky and depressed. Picking up the pace, she tried to get away from the embarrassing experience as fast as possible.

"Hi, MJ! Wait up!" The redhead turned, surprised, to see Marco walking up to her from where he'd been leaning against the building. "Thought maybe we could have a latte or something. There's a Starbucks right down the block," he said. Seeing her hesitation, he added, "Non-psycho no-pressure friendly latte."

MJ laughed and nodded, turning to walk with him. They found a booth in the café and Mary Jane defiantly ordered a caramel latte, diet be damned. Marco was fun to talk to, joking around, although he continued to make Mary Jane feel naive and ignorant with his references to acting and to the New York acting scene. After a while, he put his head to one side and looked at her thoughtfully.

"You'll get it, hon, don't worry," he said.

"Huh?"

"Just give it a little time, you'll get a handle on auditioning. Watch what people do, especially the ones that impress you. Try to figure out what makes them good—not just their acting, but their presentation of themselves, the way the directors react. Take some classes or attend some workshops too, if you get the chance, but just—well, you're doing exactly right. Just jump in and keep going."

Staring intently at her drink, Mary Jane chuckled softly and said, "Thanks. I needed to hear some friendly advice, I'm feeling lost here."

"Free of charge, unlike this ridiculously priced trend-oid drink." Marco took a swallow. "God, I could use that job."

"No kidding. I've got some money from graduation, but it looks like I'll be applying at fast food joints soon if I intend to pay my rent. My boyfriend will love that, he's—well, he's got no money worries, and an actress is glamorous. I can't see him dating a short-order cook."

"Rich kid, huh? He got a cute older brother?" Marco wagged his eyebrows at her and she relaxed more, relieved to find that her new friend was just exactly that. By the time they'd finished their drinks, Marco had given her some information on a workshop being held at a little back street theater that would be holding auditions the week after for their summer run. As they walked together toward the subway, she was still avoiding the whole audition memory, but reassured herself that she'd taken the first step toward plugging into this new world of acting, making her first friend and her first connection.

Marco and Mary Jane passed a blond guy with a cowboy hat and a guitar at the foot of the subway stairs, who was singing enthusiastically, "Look out, Woo! here comes the Spider-Man!" They parted at the platform and MJ caught a train headed her way.

Funny thing was, Marco had looked—and acted, sometimes—a lot like Flash Thompson, her old boyfriend. She snorted, imagining Flash's reaction if she said that to him. But Flash had the same clean-cut good looks, and the same class-clown sense of humor. But Flash was a bully, too, always trying to prove himself by pushing other people around. She remembered the fight he'd gotten into with Peter Parker, just before school ended.

That had been weird. Not Flash deciding that he had to beat Peter up because the poor guy had somehow managed to spill his lunch tray all over Flash; that was expected, although she'd tried to talk him out of it. Flash had followed Peter out to the hall, and thrown a punch that missed Peter's head by an inch and dented Peter's locker. A crowd of students formed, and that was normal too. Everyone had waited to see Flash deck the smaller kid, or to see if a teacher stepped in to stop it in time. That creep Thad had jumped in to help Flash out.

And then Peter had started fighting back. Thad backed out of the fight as soon as he'd realized it was going to be harder than just shoving a scared geek around—he was a coward and MJ had never liked him, even though he was Flash's best friend. Mary Jane had asked Harry to help out, but by then it was obvious that Peter didn't need the help. And that was the weird part.

Mary Jane frowned to herself. It had all happened so fast, so couldn't remember just how Flash had ended up flat on his back halfway down the hall, with another tray full of food dumped on top of him. She only remembered Peter standing there, fist still raised, looking as astonished as everyone else. She supposed it was a good example of how sometimes all it took to stand up to a bully was a little courage.

Afterward, when Flash had gotten cleaned up and changed into his P.E. shirt, Mary Jane was afraid he might go after Peter again. She liked Pete, who had been her next-door neighbor forever, although they'd never hung out together. But Flash had shrugged it off, his anger gone as fast as it had come. Thad had gone on and on about Peter being a freak, still mad, but Flash was never the kind of person to hold a grudge and eventually Thad had shut up. If anything, Flash had seemed to have some respect for Peter after the fight. And Flash had been too excited about his birthday present—a brand-new silver Dodge Viper—to think about Peter for long.

Leaving the subway and walking the two blocks back to her apartment down the sunlit street, MJ passed by a newspaper vending machine. The paper in the window had a blurry black-and-white picture of the city and a bold headline that read "Who is Spider-Man?" She paused and saw that a small dark figure in the upper center of the picture, apparently flying or swinging through the air, had been circled. On an impulse, she dropped in some change and bought the paper. Taking it up to her apartment, she read the article, which basically re-hashed the news from the last few nights and included a photo-copy of the handwritten 'friendly neighborhood Spider-Man' note. The whole thing reminded her of Big Foot pictures or tabloid UFO articles. It was hard to take seriously.

Before the end of the week, Mary Jane had found a job waiting tables at a skuzzy little diner, attended an acting workshop with Marco, started to realize just how hard getting into acting was going to be, and gotten into a fight with her roommate when Janeen complained that her yoga students were having a hard time reaching her because MJ was always on the phone. When Lisa, her best friend from high school, invited her over Friday night, she was ready for a break.

Lisa was still living with her parents, working at a department store and saving up money for art school. MJ flopped down on Lisa's bed in her familiar bedroom, glad to be somewhere that felt more like home to her than her own home did. She and Lisa spent a few happy hours catching up on each other's lives.

Lisa pulled open a bag of chocolate cookies. "No way," Mary Jane said. "You should see how thin some of these actresses are."

"No, go on, they're low-fat," Lisa pulled out a handful and handed the bag over.

Mary Jane gave in and grabbed a couple for herself, munching as she went on, "so Harry and I have been out on, I guess, four or five dates now. Seems pretty serious."

"You rock. Do you know how rich the Osborns are? Forget it. Three weeks after graduation and you've managed to trade up." Lisa was clearly envious.

"Oh, come on. It's not that...Harry's really nice."

"Nice? Oh, there's an exciting word."

"Lisa!" MJ was turning red, embarrassed by her friend's open assumption that she was dating Harry for his money.

"Hey, I'm just saying, smart move." Lisa licked the center out of her next cookie. "And he's not bad. I could go for him."

"Yeah, right," MJ laughed. "Like I'd give you the chance." Finished with her cookies, she picked silently at the bedspread for a minute. "You know, I haven't told him I got a job as a waitress."

Lisa stretched. "I can see that. Go classy if you can."

Mary Jane opened her mouth, wanting to talk about how different acting was than what she expected, wanting to tell someone that she felt lonely, that she wasn't sure she could make it. She shut her mouth again without speaking and then said, "Are we going to watch a movie?"

Lisa stood up and walked over to the TV. "What do you want to watch first?"

MJ let her decide. The evening had gone flat, and Mary Jane wondered if she'd secretly been hoping that Lisa would talk her out of lying to Harry, reassure her that she was good enough for him, waitress or not. Kicking back, she forced herself to stop thinking about it, losing herself in Under The Tuscan Sun. It's not like Harry or Lisa or anyone else wanted to hear her whine. She could do bright, happy and confident. She'd been doing it for years.

After all, Mary Jane thought, it's who you convince people you are that counts.

Norman Osborn strode through the halls at the main OsCorp laboratory in his white coat, nodding regally at the employees he passed. He was a tall, dark-haired man with a lined, intelligent face and an athletic shape that seemed to barely contain the dynamic energy of the man. His son, Harry, a less-impressive copy, was slouching along beside him, staring moodily at the floor. Norman sighed to himself. It was so hard to have a son that lacked even the most basic interest in his work. It wasn't like he demanded genius from the boy (now, that Parker kid, there was someone with potential); he only wanted an heir who occasionally came out of his adolescent sulks and paid attention. And after all the strings Norman had pulled to get the boy into Colombia University, with his rotten grades, he'd even had the nerve to protest the curriculum that Norman had set up for him. How was he going to run OsCorp someday without a few science classes under his belt? It wasn't like Norman was an unfeeling father. He remembered the conversation.

"Well, Harry, if you're interested in some other field, I'm willing to listen. I've never wanted to push you." Harry rolled his eyes, and Norman kept his temper with superhuman effort. Something inside him had whispered about how an ungrateful child was a burden and he had clamped down on it fast, before it could make any suggestions on what to do about Harry. All parents found their kids exasperating at times. You loved them anyway, right? Norman smiled paternally at Harry.

"Dad, I don't know. I, well, I don't think I'm much good at this whole science thing. I don't..."

"You don't what? You don't have any interests?" Norman snapped. Harry was silent. "I can't help you out if I don't know what you want, Harry," Norman continued with a sigh, oh so reasonably. Harry didn't appreciate how reasonable he was. "Why not take the science/business curriculum we've got set up for you until you know what you want? Hmm? Parker can help you with it, can't he?"

"Oh sure," Harry said bitterly. "Peter's great. Peter knows it all, Peter can help me out. Can we not talk about Peter for once?"

"Fine, Harry." Norman closed his eyes and fantasized briefly about a son who didn't whine and need support all the time, a son who would give him confidence in the future, follow in his footsteps, a son like Peter...Then he opened them again and looked at Harry. It was time to be stern, let Harry know that he had to pick up the slack. Somewhere in the back of his head Norman heard a laugh bubbling up, and shoved it back...no, he didn't want to hear...there was nothing there...only, he had a headache again. They seemed to come more often these days. He realized that he'd been looking at Harry without speaking for a few minutes now, and Harry had an odd look on his face. Almost scared.

Like Harry could ever have any reason to be scared of his father.

"Look, Dad, it's...hey, it's no sweat," Harry said rapidly. "I...uh, can take the classes. You're right, I need to get a handle on what I want." Harry paused a moment and gazed at the floor. "It's not easy, you know," he added softly. "I've got a hard act to follow."

Not that Harry's grades were any better now than they'd been in high school. Norman had asked him to come and spend the day together, do some father-son bonding. He'd let Harry tag along all morning, listen in on important negotiations, look over the new projects and all the frantic activity that was making OsCorp once more the bustling, important company he'd spent his life building. That minor slump, a few months ago, when it looked like OsCorp was losing ground to its competitors, that was a thing of the past, definitely a thing of the past!

"Look at it, Harry," Norman proclaimed, waving one hand grandly. A passing technician ducked out of the way, but he didn't notice. "Since Quest Aerospace was unable to come through on its promises, people have started to realize that firm commitment, a willingness to stick to it during hard times, is worth more than a flashy design. It's quality that counts, boy. Quality built the business that's going to be yours someday."

"Yeah, it's...it's really something, Dad." Harry glanced at a computer-controlled experiment with such obvious incomprehension that Norman winced. They climbed the short flight of stairs and leaned on the railing that overlooked the main floor.

"Quality...and loyalty." Norman's voice dropped and deepened, and for an instant he sounded almost like a different person. Harry looked at him with concern. "Look. All these people, all these people working, not for the money, not for fame—although they're getting both, Harry, working for a company like this. No, they've got loyalty. The kind of loyalty that comes through in a pinch, loyalty to something greater than they are."

Harry thought his father looked odd, over-intense, almost fevered, and he couldn't help but see that the quiet assistant standing behind him had a skeptical, almost disbelieving expression on her face. For an instant, he thought maybe his father was getting carried away with his own vision. But he knew it was right. His father was an important person, always busy, always demanding the best. He had to, with so much depending on him, all these people, their jobs, everything Norman Osborn had built over his lifetime. Harry had never been able to be the kind of person his father needed to support him, and he had a constant, hard knot in his stomach from his fear that he never could be. If he could do better, pay more attention in school, get his head around the stuff they threw at him in class, then he would spend time with his father. He'd be worth his father's time. After all, you had to earn approval.

"It's really great, Dad," Harry said, and meant it.