Reckless
"I'm on my way," says Peter, "but Gwen—what's going on?"
"What are you wearing?"
"Excuse me?"
"Peter, I'm serious," Gwen says into the phone, careful not to raise her voice in case MJ recognizes it and turns around. She keeps a safe distance from them. They've stopped in the front of the drama building and are standing there. MJ is talking and Peter, or whoever the hell he is, is listening to her wordlessly, occasionally nodding his head and looking down the street.
Gwen ducks behind a streetlamp.
"Um—a blue shirt? And pants?" he says.
The Peter Gwen is looking at is dressed in green. To her alarm it's a shirt she recognizes. Was this guy in Peter's apartment? Why the hell is he talking to MJ? "I didn't want to have to explain this over the phone, but I'm going to have to. Are you listening?"
"I'm running."
"Do both," she says.
"Gwen—"
"Listen. You're going to run down here, and you're going to see a guy who looks just like you, literally just like you, because the guy we've been dealing with—Peter, he's not your father."
"He is, I just saw him, what are you—"
"He has some kind of … transformative abilities," Gwen cuts him off, which is a difficult task since she's trying to keep her voice low. She watches MJ look down the street as if she's searching for something, and then drop Peter's hand unceremoniously. She doesn't wonder about it long, though, because she's more concerned for MJ's safety now than anything. "This guy, he can change his appearance at will, and it looks like he can physically take on the abilities of the people he comes into contact with. When you saw him just now, did you have any prolonged exposure with him?"
"Yeah, I mean—I was in my street clothes, there were cops everywhere, I couldn't fight him back," he says, somewhat defensive sounding. "What are you trying to say?"
Gwen takes a breath. This really shouldn't be happening over the phone, but what choice does she have?
"I'm saying he knows you're Spiderman, and now that he's had a good enough glimpse and long enough contact, he has transformed himself … to look exactly like you."
That's when she hears the footsteps crash to a halt behind her. She whips around and sees Peter, breathless and confused and sporting a black eye.
"What the heck are you talking about?" he asks Gwen, grabbing her by the shoulders, looking her up and down as if to make sure she's still in tact. He breathes some sort of sigh of relief and releases her, but the question in his eyes is still demanding and impatient.
Gwen motions in the direction of MJ and the fake Peter. "Keep your voice down," she says, "I don't want him to hear us. But look—this is what I was trying to tell you."
Peter's eyes lock on his duplicate and all the blood seems to drain from his face. "Holy—"
"Shh," Gwen reminds him.
Peter blinks a few times, hard, as if he's trying to shake himself out of a dream. "He looks—he looks just like me. Who is that?"
"It's the guy who's been targeting you, the fake Spiderman. Listen, Peter, it's not your father," Gwen reiterates, because it's clear that after whatever he saw he still doesn't believe her. "It's a long story, but trust me. The guy you're looking at is the same one who's been attacking you. He has these …" Gwen struggles to explain, as Peter seems to grow more alarmed and confused with every second that passes. "Regenerative abilities, if he has prolonged contact with someone—the same way he just did with you—he can become them."
Peter's mouth is wide open as he stares forward into the street, watching as his alter self stands stiffly next to MJ and nods.
"How did … how on earth …"
"It's a long story," says Gwen. "What's important is—"
"Is that Mary Jane?"
"Yes," says Gwen impatiently, "that's what I've been trying to tell you. She's been talking to him for almost ten minutes now, and I have no idea what he might try to do to her."
"Oh my God," says Peter, and Gwen almost feels a twinge of annoyance at his concern. "She thinks that's me."
"Yeah," says Gwen, very intentionally failing to mention that MJ was holding hands with him just a few moments before.
Peter steps forward purposefully, but she grabs his arm to yank him back.
"We've got to do something," he says vehemently.
"Not like this," says Gwen, "I don't want her getting involved, I don't want her to know too much. That's not fair."
"And having her stand there and talk to some violent, genetically enhanced chameleon—that's totally fair," says Peter, his voice controlled but sharp. "I don't want to drag her into this any more than you do, but what else are we supposed to do?"
"Just … wait," says Gwen, a little hesitantly. "Maybe—maybe she'll just leave at some point. I don't think he's even said a word to her, she's just standing there talking to him and I know how she hates you."
"Thanks," he snorts.
Gwen offers him a small smirk, trying to lighten the mood. "I like you just fine," she reminds him. He doesn't relax at all, though, watching the pair of them like a hawk, the muscles in his neck straining. She puts a hand on his shoulder.
"They're way out in the open," says Gwen, "and we're right here. We won't let anything happen, and once she leaves, we'll follow him."
Peter shakes his head. "You'll have to go with Mary Jane. I'll follow him alone."
Gwen takes her hand off his shoulder and steps forward to get his attention. "Peter, you don't even know what you're dealing with here."
"I know enough to know that it's too dangerous to risk you coming with me."
She feels the urge to argue with him like a reflex, like a chronic condition that she can't ignore. He needs her. He needs her, he just doesn't know it yet, because he doesn't understand that he may have a hand in this, but she has a hand, a forearm and half her body in it—the lab, the solution, Bonnie and Clyde, the secret visits to Connors. She knows everything. If she can get to the lab and figure out how to fix this, she might be the only one who can help.
But for now, she relents. For now, maybe he's right. She can't do any good following him around the city and what he's too nice to say is that she'll only slow him down.
"Fine," she says. "But from now on, humor me on this." She reaches into her pocket and pulls out a pen to mark a star on the top of her hand, then grabs his and makes an identical one before he can protest. He looks at her curiously and she explains, "Keep redrawing one. So then I'll know it's you."
A slow half-grin forms on his face in appreciation, but then he flicks his eyes back over to MJ. To Gwen's enormous relief, MJ is walking away, just as she predicted she would, and the fake Peter doesn't seem to be following her. Instead he has continued walking along the sidewalk, away from them.
"Go with MJ," says Peter. "I've got it from here."
"Peter …"
He lowers his eyes at her solemnly. "I think he's looking for you, Gwen."
She stares up at him. She knows he's right. "Call me as soon as you can," she says, balancing on her toes to reach up and kiss him. The gesture seems to startle him, but in a good way. For all his bold intentions and determination he seems all too quickly to forget that there's a task at hand, and she can't help but smile as she pulls away from him and he just stands there, his cheeks red and his breathing not quite regular.
"G'bye, then," he says, a little too happily for someone who's about to chase down their deviant clone.
She turns to make sure MJ is still in sight and by the time she looks back, Peter's already gone. She stares at the space where his body just was and feels a familiar ache, but doesn't let herself linger. She'll see him soon, and this time she will have him, all of him, not just a part. She feels confident that it's different this time. So she turns back on her heel and starts pacing down the street, toward where MJ is about to descend into a subway station.
"MJ!" she yells at the top of her lungs over the traffic, waving her hands up.
By some miracle her friend looks up and sees her. She waves amiably but keeps walking down until she sees Gwen gesture for her to stop. It takes Gwen almost a minute to get to the next intersection and cross the street.
"Hey," says MJ. "What are you up to?"
To her credit, Gwen makes a real effort to be casual. She thinks she'll tell MJ that she was studying at the library, or coming back from her apartment, or any number of things that are less aggressive than, "Why were you just holding Peter Parker's hand?"
She can see MJ's cheeks start to flare up before she stares down at her boots. "You saw that?"
Gwen stares at her friend disbelievingly. Is she seriously blushing over Peter? "Yeah," says Gwen, jutting her chin out involuntarily. "Yeah, I did."
Something in her tone must rattle MJ, because she looks up with incredulous eyes. "Are you mad at me?"
"Yes—no!" Gwen stammers, feeling like an idiot. "I just—what was that about?"
MJ scowls at her. "I don't like what you're insinuating," she says. "If you must know, Richard was in town for some stupid job interview and he was across the street, so yeah, I asked Parker to hold my hand for a few minutes to make him jealous. What the hell is up with you, Gwen?"
"Well," says Gwen. She isn't going to say it, she knows that she shouldn't, but her blood is pumping and the rush of adrenaline wells up her throat and she ends up bursting with, "We're dating. Peter and I are … dating."
Mary Jane claps a hand to her mouth theatrically. "A-ha! So you finally admit it!" she says, gleeful.
This isn't what Gwen expected. She hates to admit that she was expecting MJ to look a little crushed, or at least not as happy as she is right now, because Gwen has been so suspicious of her interactions with Peter lately. Now her excitement makes Gwen feel like a clingy, paranoid version of herself, because she must have imagined it all. Of course MJ was never interested in Peter. And even if she were, MJ is her best friend … she would never go after someone Gwen liked.
"You don't have to worry about Pete," says MJ, waving her off, not noticing Gwen's cringe at her nickname for him. "I don't think he even spoke to me. He was just being a pal. For once," she says, with an eye roll.
"Richard's in town for a job interview?" Gwen asks, more than ready for a change of subject.
"I guess," says MJ, trying to sound nonchalant. Gwen raises her eyebrows and MJ deflates a bit and says, "I saw it on his Facebook page. I just didn't think I'd run into him."
"New York's a big city," Gwen agrees.
MJ kicks a crushed up soda can on the sidewalk. "He sucks."
"That, too."
They walk on a little aimlessly. Gwen figures they'll end up in a coffee shop somewhere, and she'll let MJ rant about Richard over some kind of pastry. It is pretty awful of him, she thinks, to show up in the city just days after breaking things off with MJ over a text. He could have just told her to her face if he knew he would be in town. Some part of Gwen almost hopes that Richard did see MJ with Peter, if only for the sake of justice. In the meantime, though, she doesn't say anything, waiting for MJ to bring it up. She doesn't want to strike a raw nerve.
To her surprise, MJ doesn't say much as they walk, looking thoughtful and put out. Gwen grabs her hand and says, "I know what will make you feel better."
MJ watches her curiously as Gwen pulls out the pen from before and traces a heart on her hand.
"What's this for?" asks MJ, bewildered.
Gwen shrugs and smiles, as if it were just a fun, spontaneous gesture. "Better than wearing your heart on your sleeve, right?" she says cheekily.
MJ nods, some of the usual determination back in her eyes. "Yeah," she says, letting her hand drop back to her side as if Gwen's lame explanation makes perfect sense. "You're right. Forget him."
They walk on a little longer in silence until they veer toward a coffee shop, the way Gwen predicted they might. MJ lingers a bit at the door before they enter, and says out of the blue, "I don't think he even saw me there, anyway."
"MJ …" Gwen says consolingly.
MJ shakes her head, opening the door and walking into the café, pushing her hair out of her eyes and trying to seem nonchalant. "It's just weird, you know. To know someone that well and for so long and then to just have them walk right past you like you're a complete stranger."
Nobody knows this feeling better than Gwen. She unwittingly imagines that feeling over and over again, standing on sidewalks, walking through the halls of a campus buildings, sitting in the dining hall and wishing she could scream or throw a firework into the air an demand that Peter notice her when she passed, or at least spare her a glance.
"It'll get easier," says Gwen, even though it never did for her. She likes to think that MJ is more resilient than she is, that she'll be able to move on from this faster than Gwen would, and she also likes to think that what she and Peter have is far more powerful and compelling than what MJ could have had with Richard. For some reason she has always felt inextricably tied to Peter in an almost bleak, for-better-or-for-worse, forever sort a way nobody else their age is.
She feels silly, presuming that her feelings for Peter are more deep and insurmountable than anybody else's feelings for each other, but it's the only way she can explain the madness of trying to have him again and again, no matter the cost.
"That's easy for you to say, now that you've got someone," says MJ, a little begrudgingly.
"Hey, you'll find someone soon enough," Gwen says, knowing full well it's true. Already she can see several undergraduates and what might be a professor eyeing her pint-sized friend, who is maybe asking for it by wearing leggings instead of pants again. "You're Mary Jane Watson. Guys are falling at your feet."
She rolls her eyes. "The wrong kinds. Richard was different."
"You'll find someone better than Richard," Gwen says confidently.
MJ smirks. "Like Peter Parker, nerdy hipster extraordinaire?" she says.
Gwen smirks back at her friend, feeling comfortable, feeling at ease, and feeling a bit guilty that she can be this happy while her friend is this low. They're next in line, so they walk up to the register, and just before they get up to the counter Gwen jokingly says to her friend, "Ha, you wish."
Well. This week has, unsurprisingly, been incredibly awkward. I first and foremost want to thank everyone who said nice things to me in your reviews - I smiled and laughed outright at some of your comments, and it was a delightful pick-me-up after the terrible terrible stifling awkwardness that is me trying to interact with the opposite gender.
I wish I could say I was totally cool this week and handled everything like a mature adult, but let's be real, I'd be so much more boring if that were the case. So after all the awkward sideways glances and unnecessary tears and exams (wait, what? learning? but I'm having a romantic crisis, jeez!) of this week, I've decided to just not care, which is proving a bit impossible (because he is fucking EVERYWHERE, ALL THE TIME), but I'm sure will get better with time. He is kind of a dick. TheproblemisIlikethat.
Unrelated, did anyone see Andrew on the Ellen show? Minus the unforgivable beard growth on his face, he was hilarious and charming (as to be expected). I've never watched an interview with him that hasn't left me in stitches. There is comfort in knowing that there are decent men left in the world (unfortunately, they are all taken).