I'm so sorry it took so long to get this chapter up. I've been busy traveling a lot this past month, and things have been crazy at work. Next chapter is already half way done so it shouldn't be too long before the next chapter is up.

Chapter 6

Peter stood shell shocked next to the front door for a few more minutes. A wave of pity fell over Peter as he listened to his aunt's sobs from the bedroom. Having Henry come into their lives had ruined May. A few years back, Peter would have never thought that one person could change someone so drastically. But his aunt was a prime example of just that. Sure her issues did start when Ben passed away, but they grew ten times worse under the clumsy handling of that man. The teen had never known May to become so violent, even when angry before she started dating Henry.

With a soft sigh Peter shook himself from his stupor and glanced around the apartment. It was a mess. The floor was covered with the shattered remains of plates, pots, pans, candles and whatever else his aunt had thought to throw at her boyfriend during their fight. Going by the looks of the kitchen, May had not started dinner before the fight began. So Peter decided to start a box of Mac-n-Cheese, before grabbing a broom to start cleaning up the apartment while waiting for the water to boil. He had managed to get everything cleaned up off the floor by the time the food was ready. Aunt May was still shut away in her room, but he couldn't hear her crying anymore, even with his enhanced hearing. So Peter figured it was safe to bring her a bowl of food. Knocking on the door resulted in a sharp, "What the f- do you want!" from the woman.

"I made you some food…" Peter timidly responded loud enough for her to hear through the door. He did not get a response from her, so Peter gently tried the doorknob to see if it was locked and found that it wasn't. Figuring that if she really didn't want to be bothered she would have locked the door, and cautiously opened it up. The woman was sitting hunched over on the bed with her back facing the door. "Aunt May…? The boy spoke softly, ready to make a hasty retreat if she was unhappy with him walking in.

She turned around to face him, showing off her splotchy red face. The trials of eyeliner and mascara ran down her cheeks from the tears that she shed. She no longer looked angry, just… defeated. Peter gave her a soft smile and took few steps forward to hand her the bowl of food. "Thank you Peter," she said with sincerity and accepted the food. Peter sat down on the bed next to her, and she leaned over to give him a kiss on the cheek. This was one of the rare times that the aunt from before the tragedy happened, before Ben passed away, came out. A lump swelled in Peter's throat as he was overcome by sudden emotion. How he longed for that person to come back into his life. How long had it been since he felt the soft caress of a mother, the surge of protection felt by a father's embrace. Or just any type of affectionate touch from a parental figure. It had been years since he had felt anything like that, and being so starved of affection Peter leached onto any hint of it.

The boy unconsciously leaned into his aunts touch. Her lips had left his cheek too soon, he was half tempted to pull her into a hug in the hopes that she would hug back. Before he gave into the temptation, May was speaking again. "I don't know how we're going to get by, now that Henry's not gonna be living here anymore." Peter didn't have a response to this, he actually had to fight to stop from rolling his eyes. This isn't the first time May had kicked him out. He always came back eventually. The longest he ever left since he first came into their lives were two weeks, and that was when Henry chose to leave and by the end of it May was begging for him to return. Despite how twisted their romance was, May couldn't live without the guy. "But we'll figure something out… Might just have to use some of your September Foundation grant." May added this as an afterthought and it caused Peter's breath to catch in his throat. He technically didn't get that grant, so there was no money for them to take from. "You had your first day doing your internship thing today right?" May asked him, with an expectant look on her face.

"Yeah…" Peter mumbled not sure how he was going to get out of this.

"How is the grant going to work? Is Mr. Stark sending you a check or debit card?"

"I…" Peter's mind began racing and he said the first thing that came to his mind. "I think it kind works like a rebate. We buy the stuff I need for my school projects and stuff and he refunds us…"

"Oh…" May's expression became stony. "I guess you're really not all that helpful…" And just like that, in the blink of an eye the tender loving Aunt was replaced by the cold shouldered woman that Peter had known since Uncle Ben passed away all those years ago. "I supposed the internship you'll be doing after school every day isn't paid?"

Peter just shook his head with his eyes downcast. In a final attempt to justify himself Peter spoke in a small voice, "But doing it could eventually lead to a real job." He was assuming that being an official Avenger came with some sort of paycheck. He didn't actually know for sure though.

"How does that help us now Peter…"

Peter felt a bit disheartened when he woke the next morning, and found that he did not have a single text, call, or even voicemail from Happy about his patrol last night. He even wondered if the man even got his message, and debated on trying to call again before school. He ended up settling on shooting the man a text, since it was still early in the morning and he didn't want to accidentally wake him up.

Me: Hey Happy, it's Peter Parker. Call me if you need anything! I get out of school at 2:45 today, and I've been keeping the suit with my at all times.

With that he pressed the send button, and continued getting ready for school. Happy was probably just too busy to respond to him yesterday. He did have a very important job being the head of security for Tony Stark, and Peter couldn't expect him to drop everything just to respond to Peter's message. Peter left the apartment that morning, with slightly higher spirits, and an eagerness for the school day to end so he could go back out as Spiderman again to protect the city. Unfortunately his day at school didn't go much better than it did the day before. There were no instances of public humiliation, but the jabs about his new 'Internship' and supposed friendship with Tony Stark continued throughout the day. Ned had also been bugging him all day with details about how his first day in the internship went.

After what happened yesterday with Ned, Peter had decided he needed to bring the hype down about the internship. It wasn't even a real one, and pretending that it was the most awesome thing in the world could eventually get him into some trouble, in more ways than what happened yesterday. So he ended up telling his friend that it was a little boring, because all he did was bring people their coffee, do some filing, and he did not see Tony Stark the entire time he was there. Ned understandably was a bit disappointed in the news, but it stopped him from getting too hyped up about the internship, which was what Peter was aiming for.

Peter was not able to leave school as soon as it was over today, because he had his robotics lab at three, and then band practice at four. So he ended up only able to go out as Spiderman for two hours before he needed to head back home. Peter wouldn't go as far as to say that he was shocked to see Henry in the apartment when he got home. But he was a bit surprised that he and his aunt worked it out so fast.

It seemed that there was some work on Henry's end, as to why they were suddenly back together after just a night. Peter spotted a large bouquet of flowers sitting on the kitchen counter, obviously given to May by the man. He must have come by with the flowers earlier and buttered up May with smooth apologies, and a bunch of promises that she's forgotten that he already made and broken before. They were both standing in the kitchen when Peter walked in the front door. The teen could hear Henry whispering seductively in Italian into his aunt's hear causing her to giggle like a schoolgirl. "Oh Henry… you turn me on every time you speak to me like that…" the man laughed along with her and the the two leaned in and kissed.

The scene caused Peter to roll his eyes with a disgusted look on his face. Seriously… he cut his patrol short just to come home to this? He probably could have stayed out an extra hour or two and neither would have noticed him coming back late. They were too wrapped up in their silly messed up romance that they didn't even notice that he'd walked through the door. So resisting the temptation to just turn around and walk out the door, Peter walked past them and went into his room without announcing his presence.

After a week of radio silence from Happy, Peter began to wonder if maybe he wasn't putting enough time into his Spiderman career. It would make sense, in a weekday week he only got about 12ish hours in as Spiderman, and adding that to what he got in on the weekends. He probably only get about 30 hours in a whole week. That's not even a full time job. So of course it wouldn't be that impressive compared to the time the Avengers get in. So with that thought settled, Peter promptly quit the school band which gave him a few extra hours to add to his patrol. It's not like band was something he actively enjoyed doing. He just joined it his freshman year so he had an excuse to spend less time at home. He didn't really need the excuse anymore. Excited to let Happy know how serious he was taking things, Peter quickly send the man a text after he told his band teacher that he was done.

Me: Happy, it's Peter again! I decided to quit the school band so I'll be starting my Spiderman Patrol at 4 today! But if anything comes up that you need my help with, I still get out of school at 2:45!

Another two days passed with no response from Happy, so Peter decided to quit Robotics lab also. The boy was a bit more sad to see that extra curricular activity go, but it was for the best. Now he had no after school obligations, except for the school Decathlon Team. Peter wasn't ready to let that go, it was an excuse to spend time with Liz. They mostly met to practice during school hours, and only every once in a while had to meet after school, or do a weekend trip for nationals. None of his effort seemed to help. After a few more weeks passed with no word from either Happy or Mr. Stark, Peter had come to a conclusion that maybe May had been right this whole time. He was nothing but a useless burden to her, to Tony Stark, to the world... Even being spiderman didn't make him worth the time of Tony Stark and the other Avengers.

Slowly the texts to Happy became less frequent. He stopped staring expectantly at his phone, waiting for a call or text that would never come. He accepted the fact that no one in the school except for Ned thought he actually had an internship with Tony Stark. Aunt May wouldn't stop reminding him about how much they were hurting for money, along with a large amount of not so subtle hints that Peter was the main reason they didn't have enough money. There was one particularly terrible argument that happened one evening when he came home after patrol. The minute he walked through the door, May was screeching at him. This wasn't really unusual, as his Aunt usually made him the fallout guy when things went wrong. In one way or another, every problem that came across May's path was somehow Peter's fault. This was no different.

What was different about this incident was that she wasn't calling from the kitchen, or the front room, or her bedroom like she normally did. No it sounded like it was coming from his bedroom. But no way, would she go in there. That place was his sanctuary, it was almost an unwritten rule that no one was allowed to enter that room without Peter's permission. Sure enough though, when Peter started making his way down the hallway towards his bedroom; May was indeed standing in the room. Given she was just barely in the room, her back was leaning against his door frame. Her arms were crossed over her chest, with a fierce glare stricken on her face. "Why the hell was your window open?" she asked with a hint of a growl in her voice.

Peter was able to glance past her into the room, and saw the window that he knew he left open when he went to school that morning, was closed. This meant that she had gone into his room, causing anger to surge through him. "Because you cause this whole place to smell like shit! And that's the only way to keep the smell down in my room!" the teen snapped angrily.

"Don't you raise your voice at me!" the woman yelled at the top of her voice. She had pushed away from the doorframe she had been leaning against and glared at him threateningly.

"Why should I!" Peter screamed back just as loudly. Normally he tired keep his anger in check when he spoke to his aunt, and at least make an attempt to be respectful. But he felt like his privacy had been violated when she dared step into the room. It had probably been at least a year since she had gone inside and even when that happened she had asked him first. "You're shouting at me, it only makes sense that I shout back!"

Anger flashed through May's eyes and she pushed over a side table that leaned against the wall in front of him. This caused a deafening crash, as everything that was sitting on the table fell to the floor in heap, and the table smashing on top of it all. Some years ago, Peter would have been intimidated by this action, but not anymore. He stood his ground, glaring at the woman in front of him. May did not seem to like his reaction, and kicked the wall next as if hoping that would be enough to scare him out of his defiance. "I'm the adult here! I can do whatever the f- I want! You are the child! You don't get to yell at adults!"

"Hey, hey, hey." A voice suddenly spoke up from down the hallway. Henry had arrived. He must have just gotten home, and had gone to investigate the yelling.

May turned around to see who had spoken, but only gave him a moment's glance before she rounded back on Peter. "I went into Peter's room and found that his window was left wide open!" she explained angrily.

Henry started down the hallway closer to them, and stopped when he was standing a couple feet from where Peter stood. He stood with his arms crossed over his chest, a disapproving look on his face. With both standing on either end of the hallway with May blocking the entrance to his room and Henry blocking the other end of the hallway, he was effectively trapped, and unable to escape. Even though he knew that neither May or Henry would hurt him, the trapping feeling he got caused his spider sense to give off danger signals. "And what the hell were you doing going into my bedroom!" Peter yelled, voice full of defiance.

"You better lower your voice their boy," the man spoke in a low warning voice. "I don't see you helping with the rent, and you have no right to claim any part of this apartment. Your aunt and I can go into that room whenever the f- we want, and you have no right to tell us otherwise."

Peter's anger fumed at the very thought of Henry going in his bedroom and rifling through all his stuff. He bit back his angry retort though, knowing that it wouldn't help the situation. "Why does it even matter if my window was open or not?" the boy managed to keep his voice level so he wasn't shouting, but the defiance was still prominent.

"The heater is on, and I'm not paying to heat the outdoors!" May shouted. "We're having enough problems with paying bills, without having you rack up the electric bill when your not even here!"

Seriously? This was probably the dumbest thing they've ever fought about. He kept the door shut for heaven's sake. It's not like they were losing heat in the rest of the apartment. "I still don't see why this is a problem! I keep the door shut all the time, we're only losing heat in the room you don't even spend time in!"

"You better drop the attitude young man!" Henry's patients seemed to have run out, and his voice was now raised. "You're aunts been good to you, taking you in all these years. And she deserves more respect."

"Some talk from someone who treats her like shit!" Peter snapped at him in his rage.

Peter saw the man's eyes darken with anger, his fist clenching tightly. He took a move towards Peter, no doubt with the intention of doing Peter some sort of bodily harm. Aunt May's arm stretching out in front of his chest to stop him. "Get in your room Peter! You're grounded!" she shouted, and Peter was only happy to shove his way past where his aunt stood and shut himself in the bedroom. He stalked into the room, and slammed the door so hard the wall's shook.