They fell asleep watching an endless loop of YouTube videos, superheros upon superheroes from the perspective of an onlooking civilian. Peter drifted off only after she did. He was going to return to the air mattress, but by the time Lena had finally fallen back asleep, he felt that any sudden movement might jerk her awake. So he laid his head back on her pillow, her head sitting on his left shoulder blade.

Laying next to her made his dreams empty. He wasn't forced to watch the same replay of Lena's parents falling in love and being murdered. For once, waking up to his alarm at 6 in the morning felt like a chore. The apple ringtone dragged him awake rather than being something he waited for.

When he opened his eyes, she wasn't next to him. He found her in the bathroom, brushing her teeth, her hair lightly tousled, almost longer than-

He snapped his eyes back up to the mirror, blinking as hard as he could.

She opened the drawer and handed Peter a toothbrush, probably a spare that Mr. Stark had provided. Peter noticed that she put a lot of weight on her arm, almost falling as she handed Peter the toothbrush.

"Hey you're getting better at standing," he said, a little awkwardly, putting toothpaste onto his brush. She didn't respond, not even in his head, just continued to brush, spit, and crutch her way back into the bedroom.

"Everything all right?" his voice was muffled from the toothpaste, which he spat out, "Are you okay?"

Nightmares. A little…

"Shaken up?"

Sure.

Peter didn't have to be at school until eight, but he usually woke up at six to account for the subway. It took him a moment to realize that he would most likely be returning to school in the same clothes he had left in, which would either go unnoticed, or be dramatically projected by Flash Thompson. He looked at his reflection in the mirror, wondering if taking off the blue flannel shirt and wearing just a t-shirt would look less like he hadn't changed at all.

As if she had been reading his mind, Lena crutched over, holding something in her hand. She handed him a black, crewneck sweatshirt, prompting him to take it. He smiled and pulled it over his head. The inside of it smelled like her shampoo.

Not that-

Not as if that was important or significant in any way. It was just a fact. He had had his head buried in her hair all night. He was bound to recognize the smell.

He said a goodbye, wishing Lena good luck on her work that day, and closed the door to Mr. Stark's car, watching as she disappeared in the rearview mirror. He heard Happy chuckle from the driver's seat. Chuckle. He was unsure if he had even seen the man smile.

"Something funny, Mr. Happy?"

"Oh what? Nothing Peter. Nothing," the hint of a smile was gone as soon as it had appeared. Peter, still exhausted from staying up so late, rolled his eyes and shut up, leaning his head against the window to possibly catch up on some sleep, allowing the Beatles to take him to dreamland.

He woke up to Happy saying his name in a dull but aggressive voice. His eyes drooped open to the unfortunate doors of Midtown Tech, where he rolled his eyes once more, thanked Happy, grabbed his bag, and walked up the steps to get to Calculus, pulling an earbud out of his ear in case someone tried to get his attention.

When he got into his first class, everyone was whispering, but it was blatantly loud. He didn't think much of it initially, but when he sat down, the hair on the back of his neck stood up. He already could hear everyone in the room, but it was odd that his senses would warn him about some measly gossip that was going around. He pulled the remaining earbud out in an attempt to hear them a bit better.

"Yeah I heard Tony Stark has to do with-"
"Maybe Peter Parker knows-"

"No one knows if Parker has actually even met Tony Stark!"

"Anyways, Tony Stark knows why the ships are going missing and won't tell the government-"
"No way!'
"Sounds just like Stark to be honest."
"Prime example of disappointed but not surprised."

The people holding this discussion were all the way in the back of the classroom, and Peter sat in the front, so it would have been a terrible idea to ask them what they heard, but it ate him alive to know that it might be out soon that they knew mermaids existed. Mr. Stark had told Peter he was handling it, but he also wasn't oblivious to the fact that the man could be a bit reckless with information. The memory of him saying 'I am Iron Man' flashed across his brain, and he felt his heart rate pick up.

The day, per usual, went by slowly, but the anxiety of the conversation he heard this morning stayed with him. By the time his lunch period arrived he felt as if he had five shots of coffee in his system. He sat down in between Ned and MJ, sighing as he picked at the food on his lunch tray.

"Someone's stressed," MJ lifted a single eyebrow and met his eyes for a second before refocusing on her sketch.

"It's...a long story," Peter ran a hand through his hair and looked at her sketch, knowing what would take his mind off of the drama of the day, "Hey, MJ, would you mind doing another doodle for my novel?"

He saw a hint of a smile, "Yeah of course."

"Yeah Peter really loves the main character of his novel-"

"Shut up, Ned!" he looked over to find his best friend laughing, the familiar, goofy laugh as he exchanged a knowing glance. Ned had spent endless moments teasing Peter for having some form of a crush on Lena, but Peter always made sure he knew that it wasn't the case.

Because that was not the case.

Right?

"Peter," MJ snapped him back into reality, "Drawing?"

He blinked a few times, in a similar way he did when he saw Lena this morning, and fished the moleskine notebook from his bag, opening it to a blank spread of pages and giving it to MJ, "Yeah, yeah. So She has legs now, like we talked about last time, and uh...I kind of picture her standing, holding herself up with with her arm. She can stand better than the last time, but she still needs to use the counter for support."

He watched his friend use his words to create a basic outline of Lena, knowing already that she has a small frame, a tiny waist, and hair that barely goes past the end of her butt. MJ was a talented artist, and drew Lena almost perfectly without having seen her. A part of him felt bad that he couldn't share a significant part of his life with one of his closest friends, but MJ still didn't know that he was Spider-Man, which made keeping Lena from her a little easier.

At least she would be coming to Midtown soon enough, so while MJ wouldn't know the whole truth, she would get to meet another one of his best friends.

He was happy with how well he connected with the siren. He felt like he could tell her anything, and she actually cared about what he had to say. It wasn't just because he knew she had no one to spill his secrets to, but she had a way of looking at him like she was hanging onto every word, and responding to him with care, letting him know it would be all right. That he always had her and she always had him.

MJ handed him his notebook, and seeing the drawing instantly lifted his mood. She had drawn Lena so that she was looking through the mirror at the person that was standing behind her. Looking into those eyes, even though they were a sketch on a piece of paper, made his heart skip a beat.

"You better let me read this novel, Peter," MJ scoffed and returned to her own sketch.

"I - uh - I don't know."

"Peter won't even let me read the novel MJ," Ned raised his eyebrows, his backhanded comment hitting Peter in the chest.

"We'll see, you guys."

…

Seventh period: Modern Politics.

Mr. Ellis strolled about the room, almost nervously when Peter sat down for class. It was a tense form of motion that he only had seen once before, during the election season two years ago. As students filed in, he didn't say a word, which was very out of character for the normally wildly enthusiastic man.

The bell rang, and all attention turned to Ellis.

"So the first unit of this class was on the Sokovia Accords, but something has arisen that somewhat involves them. What was the main shock behind the Sokovia Accords?"

"That Tony Stark agreed with them," a student didn't even raise his hand before answering the question.

"Correct. Way back when Tony Stark first announced he was Iron Man, he claimed he was privatizing world peace, which in a way he was, but this deviant behavior brought people to think that the Avengers would follow in suit similarly."

"Mr. Ellis I have a question."

"Yes?"

"If we've already gone over this, why are we talking about it months later."

"It has been discovered that Tony Stark knows vague information about the disappearance of the ocean liners back in November."

A roar erupted in the classroom, solely out of the pure shock of it, all but for Peter. He looked at Ned, who also sat idly, already knowing the supposedly classified information. He tried to contain a laugh, but practically failed, burying his face in his arms atop the desk.

The class continued, Mr. Ellis discussing the similarities this presented to Tony Stark's Iron Man reveal, what this could mean for both the families, and for Mr. Stark, and by the time the period was almost over, Peter had sweat buckets from nervously thinking about the possibility of Mr. Stark being sued.

When final bell rang, he flew out the door, not paying attention to anyone that called after him.

Text from Happy Hogan.

He flinched in surprise, unlocking his phone to find a single sentence.

I'm waiting outside, boss needs you at home base as soon as possible.