The dry meatloaf and limp steamed vegetables they give him in the ER that evening are the best thing Peter has ever tasted. He eats them clumsily with his left hand, because his right—the cut held shut by five neat-but-gruesome black stitches—has swollen slightly, just enough to prevent him from holding a fork.
He knows he should be scared.
He's certainly on edge: every time he hears footsteps outside the curtain that blocks the rest of the emergency room from view he snaps his head up, expecting to see the cop who dropped him off here hours ago, back with handcuffs held aloft, ready to take him away for good.
But Peter doesn't feel scared. He feels sick with worry for what Ms. Charlise is doing to the boys at the halfway house, and guilty, because his stomach is finally full and who knows if Felipe can say the same.
But mostly he feels elated. He looks at his swollen hand, still stained reddish brown with iodine, and he feels proud, for the first time in he can't remember how long.
Felipe isn't going to jail, he thinks. In a few weeks they'll let him out. Maybe he'll get to see his sister.
It's not much. It's so much less than he wants to do. But it's something. It's a chance Felipe might not have had otherwise.
Peter did that.
There are footsteps in the hall. Peter looks up, but when the curtain slides open it is not a police officer standing in front of him but his social worker, her hair piled in a flyaway bun on top of her head and looking, as always, like she is millimeters away from bursting into tears.
Behind her is a man. For a second Peter thinks he might be a police officer based solely on his build: he's more than six feet tall and almost too muscular, even though he's graying slightly and has small wrinkles around his eyes, denoting his advancing—though not yet advanced—age. But he's not dressed like a cop. He's wearing jeans and a polo shirt that's a little too small for him, so it's stretched across his broad chest.
He smiles at Peter as he steps into Peter's curtained-off portion of the ER behind the social worker. Peter, surprised, smiles back automatically, then quickly drops it.
"You," says the social worker, drawing Peter's attention, "are one lucky young man, Mr. Parker."
Peter can think of nothing to say to this.
"By some miracle," she goes on, undeterred by Peter's silence, "Charlise Benning has determined to deal with this fiasco internally. Apparently there are conflicting stories about what happened. A mister" —she checks something on the clipboard she has every time Peter sees her— "Felipe Cerna insists that the whole thing was a misunderstanding, though he hasn't clarified what sort, and that any violence was incidental." She nods at Peter's cut. "Ms. Benning disagrees strongly, but because you weren't being held at the house, at least not officially…"
The social worker sighs, flips her notes shut.
"The long and short of it, Mr. Parker, is that you aren't being placed under arrest tonight."
Peter goggles at her.
"I'm not going to jail?" he says blankly.
The social worker shrugs. "Like I said, you are one lucky young man. I wish I could say the same for me, seeing as I'm the one who has to figure out what to do with you now—needless to say, Ms. Benning isn't keen on taking you back—"
Peter's mouth drops open. They can't possibly send him back to the halfway house.
" —but it seems like luck is on my side as well, for once. One of our longest-standing foster parents has just seen his most recent project off to college, and so he has an opening. He's very kindly agreed to take you."
Peter bristles at the word project. It reminds him of Felipe's judge, calling him you people. But when he looks at the tall man, he is frowning slightly at the social worker, as if he too takes offense at the word.
"Steven has a lot of experience with problem cases," says the social worker. "I think he'll know exactly what to do with you. In fact, I'm counting on it. Because I feel I should warn you, Mr. Parker, that this is absolutely your last chance. I don't have anywhere else to put you, and if we have another incident, assuming you once again dodge jail time, you'll likely have to leave the city. Perhaps even the state. So try, for the love of God, to rein yourself in. Life isn't fair to any of us. That doesn't mean we get to go around taking it out on the people who try to help, do you understand me?"
Peter feels another flare of indignation—You think it fucking matters?—but he swallows it down. The thought of leaving New York is worse than the possibility of jail. He might not have a home anymore, but all of the ones he has had were here. His parents passed on their love of this city to Peter. So did Ben.
You are allowed to defend yourself.
(In his head, Uncle Ben's voice has faded. It no longer sounds like his uncle's voice at all. Just an impression of an impression. And soon it will be gone.)
Peter nods.
The social worker returns this with a clipped nod of her own, and steps aside to give the man room to step forward.
"Meet your new foster father," she says.
The man smiles again as he extends his left hand for Peter to shake. Peter takes it, and the man's big hand swallows his entirely. But Peter does his best to match his firm grip.
"Hi Peter," he says. "It's nice to meet you. I'm Steven Westcott. But most people just call me Skip."
Peter tries very hard to feel something about Skip Westcott as he follows him out of the ER and to a waiting car—sensible sedan, a few years old but meticulously clean—but as soon as the social worker told him he wasn't going to jail the coursing adrenaline that has been keeping him upright was flushed away by a wave of exhaustion. His hand is throbbing now (they didn't give him any painkillers: he saw the nurse mark "high risk" somewhere on his chart when she thought he wasn't watching, so he assumes that has something to do with it), and even with the addition of meatloaf, his stomach is still growling. He takes his place in the front seat while Skip throws his duffel bag into the trunk and then concentrates all of his energy on not letting his eyes slip closed.
But beyond this faint sense that he should remain alert, Peter has nothing. Skip could be a lump of human-shaped putty for all that Peter knows or cares about him.
The social worker might have called Skip his foster father, but Peter knows better. Parents, families, homes… these are things of the past. There are only places to stay, now. And—when he can—people to help.
Skip gets into the car beside him, starts it, and pulls out of the parking lot. It's late at night, but Peter recognizes this only when he sees how empty the streets are.
He realizes he is being rude. That he's probably acting exactly like someone would expect a juvenile delinquent who just got kicked out of a home for fighting to act. Surly. Withdrawn.
He clenches his hand shut, uses the pain to pull his focus.
"Um," he says. "Mr. Westcott?"
"Skip," says Skip.
"Okay. Skip. Um, I don't know if it makes a difference, but I didn't try to, you know, shank anybody. Just in case you were wondering."
Skip doesn't respond for a second. Long enough that Peter's insides start to squirm more violently, and not just with hunger now. Suddenly he does feel something, and that something is a low sense of foreboding. He remembers what Felipe said about things being shitty no matter what you do, and he wonders, for the first time, where Skip is taking him.
It can't be worse than the halfway house.
Can it?
But when Skip does answer, Peter is surprised once again.
"I believe you," Skip says.
"I—you do?"
Skip nods.
"Even though—? I mean, there was a knife. I don't want to lie about it, there was. And it was mine. It was definitely mine. I just, I don't want you to think I'm dangerous or something. And I'm not lying, I just—"
Now Skip smiles softly, taking his eyes off the road for just a second to raise his eyebrow at Peter.
"Peter," he says, "didn't I just say I believed you?"
Peter closes his mouth. Frowns.
Skip chuckles and returns his attention to the road.
"You hungry?"
"I'm…"
Peter wants to say that he is starving. Maybe literally. But as soon as he thinks it, his mouth feels like it is filled with glue. He can't form the words.
Out of this bitter stickiness and into his head, a voice rises.
(He's testing you,) it says. Like a whisper, but loud nonetheless. (He's looking for your weaknesses. Don't give them to him.)
It's not Uncle Ben's voice. It's not Felipe's. It does not, in fact, belong to anyone Peter knows. He has a vision of a ghoul sitting on his shoulder and immediately wants to shake himself.
Instead he closes his mouth and obeys it.
Peter shrugs.
"I don't want to establish a bad precedent," says Skip, "but just about the only thing open at this time of night is McDonald's. You have any objection to highly-processed, ethically-questionable meat?"
The last fast food Peter ate was that pizza, sitting on the curb, telling Ned about the Arlingtons and feeling sorry for himself in a way he can hardly believe just three months later. Tonight, a cheeseburger sounds like something he believed in when he was a kid but now knows to be false, like the tooth fairy, or Santa Claus.
And yet the next thing he knows, there is one sitting in his lap. It is in a grease-stained paper bag. In that bag there is also a sleeve of french fries the size of Peter's head, and in the cup holder beside him there is a large Coke, dripping with condensation.
Watching Skip out of the corner of his eye, Peter takes a fry out of the bag and bites into it. It is greasy and salty and so hot it almost burns Peter's mouth, and as soon as it touches his tongue a fat tear rolls out of the corner of Peter's eye.
He turns his head sharply, pretends to look out the window. He's sure Skip saw (sees , because the tears won't stop once they've started, though at least they are silent), but Skip says nothing. He just drives.
"We'll have to be quiet going in," says Skip. "I have two others at the moment. Twin girls. They're seven. I didn't have a chance to tell them you'd be coming, but they should be asleep anyway, so…"
Peter nods and Skip unlocks the door. Full—really, truly full, for the first time in months—of fries and pop and cheeseburger, Peter is starting to feel floaty and distant, and even though he hears the words Skip is saying they are getting stuck in whatever part of his brain translates them into meaning. It's like being in a dream. He just accepts whatever's put in front of him without question.
The dreamlike sensation intensifies when he sees the apartment. It's huge; at least twice as large as the one he lived in with Ben, and ten times as neat. The entrance opens onto an open-concept living area, with a kitchen as large as the whole upper floor of the halfway house to Peter's left, a cozy living room to his right.
In this living room is a girl, sitting on the sofa and watching the flat-screen TV on silent. She gets to her feet as Skip locks the door behind them, and smiles at Peter.
She's a few years older than him, and very pretty. Peter immediately blushes, surprising himself for the dozenth time since the ER: the only girl he's been around all summer is Karen, and he never thought of Karen as a girl girl—more like an older sister. He didn't even know he could think of girls like that anymore.
"Hey, Bea," says Skip. "Can you stick around a minute? I'm gonna show Peter his room."
The girl—who must be the babysitter—nods.
"Welcome home, Peter," she says.
Peter allows Skip to steer him down a hallway, now certain this is a dream, and bracing himself for how awful it will be when he wakes up.
But he doesn't wake up. Instead, Skip leads him to a bedroom that is small compared to the rest of the apartment but still larger than any Peter has ever slept in. Larger than Uncle Ben's room was, at the old apartment. It is mostly bare, but there is a desk with a lamp in one corner, and a full-size bed under the window, neatly made with fresh sheets.
While Peter is wondering at this beautiful mirage, Skip sets his duffel bag on the bed, goes to one of two more doors in the room and opens it, revealing a small attached bathroom.
"Just some basic toiletries—toothbrush, soap. But the towel is clean at least, if you want to take a shower. I usually do my little shpiel right about now, but I'll be honest, Peter, you look dead on your feet. Wanna save it for the morning?"
Peter nods dumbly. His fingers feel numb.
"Alrighty. Anything else you need?"
Peter shakes his head.
"Right. Well, my room is next to yours, if you think of something. 'Night, Peter."
He turns to leave.
"Wait—!"
Skip turns back. Peter feels tiny, standing in the middle of this huge room in this huge apartment, wearing his bloodstained clothes and his crooked glasses and smelling like sweat and hamburger grease. He's never felt more out of place in his entire life.
"Do you know who I am?" he says.
Skip frowns. "Only what they gave me in your file. Why?"
"Because—because I'm. I'm Peter. Peter Parker. This doesn't—I don't—why are you being so nice to me?"
Skip smiles as Peter's words fail him. His eyes sweep over Peter, just once, but in that up-down glance Peter has the feeling Skip is taking in more than his appearance, and his feeling of unbelonging increases tenfold.
"Get some sleep, infamous Peter Parker," he says. "We can talk more in the morning."
He nods, and walks out, closing the door behind him.
"What the hell?" says the infamous Peter Parker into the darkness.
(What the hell indeed,) says the ghoul on his shoulder.
In the dark, Peter shivers. But he is too tired, then, to figure out why.
Peter wakes with no memory of having gotten into bed and no notion, for a second, of what has woken him.
Then he opens his eyes and finds that he is staring into someone else's, round and blue and mere inches away from his own.
"Augh!" says Peter.
The pair of eyes drops out of sight as Peter scrambles to sit up and reaches for his glasses. By the time he has them perched on his nose he has registered that it is daytime, judging from the light filtering in between the curtains. For a moment he thinks he must have imagined the eyes, because a quick sweep of his room tells him it is empty, the door closed. But when he hears a giggle coming from under his bed, the pieces click into place.
Peter takes a deep breath, allowing himself a moment to get oriented. He is not in the halfway house. He is not at the Arlington's, either. He is in an air-conditioned apartment, lying in a big bed, and the person who woke him is not some ham-fisted sixteen-year-old here to punch his guts out for being a snitch but rather—hopefully—one of the seven-year-old girls Skip spoke of last night.
Peter lets the breath out.
"Oh, no," he says. "I think there might be a monster under my bed."
The giggles are suddenly—and badly—stifled.
"What am I gonna do?" Peter says, feigning fear. "I have to get out of bed somehow, but I can't put my feet on the floor. They might get eaten!"
Peter hears the sound of tiny teeth gnashing beneath him.
"Alright, Parker," he says seriously. "Get it together. You don't even know what monster you're dealing with yet, and you don't wanna be the kind of guy who stereotypes mythical beasts. He might be a pacifist for all you know. Or a vegetarian."
"Am not!" says a muffled voice.
"No," Peter corrects himself, pretending he didn't hear, "probably not a vegetarian. But possibly a really nice guy. Or girl. Guess the only way to find out is to—look!"
At the look, he leans over his bed and sticks his head underneath. There is a shriek, and then a little girl in blonde pigtails comes streaking out into the open. She is wearing Iron Man pajamas and a sparkling purple tutu, and she screams as Peter jumps out of bed and chases her into a corner.
"I knew it!" he says, descending on her with wriggling fingers. "It's a tickle monster!"
For just a second they are both caught up in the mirth of the moment, both laughing. Then—
"Lily!"
The mirth drains away. Peter straightens and turns around to find Skip standing in his bedroom doorway, eyes wide, staring down at the scene in front of him—a scene which includes a reddening Peter, who is already scolding himself for thinking, even for a second, that just because the scenery changed the danger might have passed.
Have the last five months taught him nothing?
"Sorry," he says, backing toward the bed. "Sorry, I wasn't—"
Skip's eyes are not on Peter. They are on the little girl, Lily. But when Peter turns to her, she doesn't look frightened. She pushes herself to her feet, panting, and runs toward Skip.
"Daddy! The new boy is a tickle monster! And he's a vegetarian!"
Peter braces himself as Skip looks at him.
And then, amazingly, Skip's expression softens.
"I know for a fact that he is not a vegetarian," he says to Lily, "and it looks to me like you're the monster in this scenario. Didn't I tell you to let him sleep?"
"Sorry," says Lily, clearly not sorry at all, "but Daddy—"
"No buts. Go wake your sister up and get dressed, Bea is going to take you to school this morning."
"Is the tickle monster coming?"
"Nope. The tickle monster and I are going to have a talk."
"Okay. Okay, okay, okay, okay…"
Lily continues to sing okay as she flounces off, out of the room and down the hallway.
Peter shuffles his feet while Skip stares at him. Skip's expressionless face makes Peter certain he has done something wrong, and he thinks with a pitiful surge of self-loathing that at least at the halfway house he knew what to expect when he was in trouble. The edge of anxiety, waiting for Skip to reveal how his anger will present, is razor-sharp, the anticipation almost worse than whatever is waiting on the other end of this long silence.
"You're good with kids," says Skip.
Peter's shoulders snap up automatically, his body on the defensive before the words can sink in. When they do, his mouth falls open.
"I'm—what?"
"You're good with kids," Skip repeats. "My last foster kid didn't know what to do with the girls. You'd've thought they were a couple of vipers for all he wanted to do with them. But you—you're a natural, huh?"
"I'm… yeah, I guess. I mean, I like kids. And there were younger kids at the halfway house, sometimes."
Skip looks Peter up and down again. Again, Peter feels that inexplicable shiver, but this time it is mostly lost under the unexpected flush of pride. Peter used to thrive off of the praise of adults—it was one of the reasons he was such a target for bullies in elementary school. But it's been so long since he's experienced it that having that now feels like uncovering a fossil of his old life: familiar and a little foreign all at once.
"Come on," says Skip.
He leads Peter into the kitchen, where Peter is greeted by another familiar-but-unfamiliar sight: breakfast is waiting on the kitchen table. There are scrambled eggs and waffles and bacon and fresh fruit, a carafe of orange juice, a pitcher of coffee. He almost doesn't understand what it's all doing there until Skip offers him a seat and places a plate in front of him, piled high with a little bit of everything.
Peter stares at it.
"Eat," says Skip lightly.
And Peter is, incredibly, grateful for the instruction. Because for some unfathomable reason, his first instinct was not to eat. For just a second upon seeing the stack of waffles dripping with syrup, the fluffy eggs, the fat red strawberries, the new voice in his head screamed at him to take it and run.
Peter takes a shaky breath, picks up his knife and fork, and smiles while Skip takes the seat beside him and pours two cups of coffee.
"Again, I'm setting a bad precedent," he says, setting one in front of Peter, "but you look like you could use it. You're old enough to drink coffee, right?"
Peter has never tasted coffee in his life. But he nods, and Skip looks pleased when he takes the mug, just like he did when he praised Peter for being good with Lily.
Coffee is awful, Peter discovers. But he works very hard to turn his grimace into a smile as he takes a sip, because Skip is still watching him.
"I'd like to tell you a little bit about myself," he says.
"Okay."
Peter sets down his fork. (Save some for later, Parker. You don't know when you'll get it again.)
"No, keep eating. I want you to feel at home here, Peter, do you understand?"
Peter picks the fork back up, trying to hide the little tremble in his hands as he does. What the hell was that?
Skip doesn't notice.
"The first thing I think you should know," says Skip, "is that I've been a foster parent for almost ten years now. You've probably already noticed that I'm an unusual candidate, right? Single men aren't usually social workers' first choice for placements. But what I do is very specialized. I work specifically with kids who have had a really rough go of things, kids that have been in trouble or who have very specific needs—things that make them difficult to place otherwise. And whenever I get a new child—or young man, like yourself—I like to explain to them why.
"When I was a younger man, Peter, I had very different priorities. I was married, and I had two children—a son and a daughter—but my real love was my work. I was in finance, and it was very competitive and fast-paced and I was very good at it. My main goal—the only thing that was important to me—was making more money, because that was what made me feel important. It probably goes without saying, but my family suffered very much because of this. My obsession eventually led my wife to leave me, but even that wasn't enough of a wake-up call. I dismissed her as ungrateful, and I continued as I always had: ignorant to the pain I was causing others, so long as I got ahead.
"The real wake up call came when my son killed himself."
This time Peter sets his fork down out of shock. Skip says it bluntly, but there is a faraway look in his eyes as he does, something Peter can only recall seeing on an adult's face once in his life: on Uncle Ben's, the night his parents died.
"It was a long time ago," says Skip, catching Peter's look, "but there are some things you just don't get past. And what I found unbearable was the fact that if I had just been looking closely, I could have stopped it." He sighs. "My son, he… he had a lot of problems. When he was about your age he started getting into trouble at school. Causing fights, skipping class. Eventually he got kicked out, and it was around that time that he started drinking, taking drugs, running with all of the wrong crowds. He was in trouble with the law more often than I could keep track, but because I was so self-absorbed, I dismissed all of it as stupid teenage rebellion. I was angry with him, in fact. I thought he was doing it to spite me, and I resented that his behavior was taking time away from my job.
"When he died… it was like waking up from a terrible dream. I realized that I had been the stupid one, that everything my son had done was the result of a horrible, unspeakable pain, and if I had even once opened myself up to what he was trying to communicate…"
Skip swallows dryly. There are tears in his eyes, but he blinks them away, and looks at Peter directly.
"The day of my son's funeral I quit my job. I had more than enough to retire, but I knew I couldn't spend my days sitting on some beach, letting all of the money I had earned while neglecting my family go to waste. I wanted to make a difference. I wanted to make sure that what happened to my son never happened to another young man. I understood, finally, that the world was not separated into good and bad people, winners and losers, but rather into people who had been given chances and people who had not. My son didn't get his chance. But I swore I would make sure that other boys like him would get theirs any time I could help. To date, I've fostered six young men, all of whom were on the brink of jail or worse when I took them in. I've seen every last one of them off to college. I hope one day to say the same for you."
Skip reaches across the table. He takes Peter's hand.
If it's been an age since an adult praised him, it's been even longer since one touched him in a way that was not hitting or shoving or simply moving him out of the way. Even Karen was not allowed to touch the boys except to restrain them, and then only in emergencies. When Skip's big hand closes over Peter's he thinks immediately of Uncle Ben, of how casually he would offer a hug or ruffle Peter's hair, or pull him into his side while they were watching TV, and he has to blink away tears of his own.
Weirdly, though, he also has to suppress a little shudder. Maybe it's been so long he doesn't know how to react anymore, but as soon as Skip's hand squeezes, Peter doesn't know if he wants him to hold on forever or let go immediately.
Before he can decide, Skip goes on.
"I read your file, Peter," says Skip. "You've made some bad decisions. And I want to warn you now, that I don't accept that behavior in my home. I will work with you, I will listen to you—but my priority is safety, and that goes doubly in the last few years because I have the girls now. If I ever think their happiness or their wellbeing is compromised by your presence here, then you and I will say our goodbyes, do you understand?"
Peter nods.
"But just because you've made bad choices doesn't make you a bad person. I believe that with all my heart. And if you're willing to work with me, I think you and I can make some really great things happen. Do you agree?"
Peter feels tingly. The dreamy sensation of last night is back, but underneath there is a tiny light—a flame of something Peter thought he had lost the moment that mugger pulled the gun on Uncle Ben, so small and so foreign that it takes a second for Peter to recognize it as hope.
"Okay," he says.
Skip smiles and releases Peter's hand. He reaches into his pocket, pulls out a StarkPhone, and hands it to Peter.
"That's a privilege," he says. "If I think you're misusing it in any way, I will take it back. But so long as you're responsible, I like you to have a way to communicate with me, all right?"
"Mr. Westcott—Skip—I really don't know what to—I mean, yes, of course. Thank you. Sir. Skip. Thank you."
Skip laughs and gets to his feet.
"It's a deal, then. Now, why don't you go back to bed? I have to get you set up at school, but that can wait until tomorrow, I think. And I need to make sure the girls aren't drenched in slime or something—and if that sounds like a weirdly specific fear, well, you'd be amazed what seven year olds can get up to." He claps Peter on the shoulder. "Welcome home son," he says. "I really am glad to have you here."
He disappears down the hallway.
Dazed, Peter finishes his waffle quickly and then stumbles back to the bedroom—his bedroom—trying to make sense of what has just happened. Twenty-four hours ago he was sitting at a tiny kitchen table in a house full of people who despised him, drenched in sweat and quaking with hunger, watching as Felipe stole a knife out of the kitchen sink. Now he is so full he is almost uncomfortable, heading to a room he doesn't share with anyone, clutching a cell phone that belongs just to him.
(You're letting your guard down, Parker. Why that shiver, earlier? Why did Skip's hand on your hand make you want to run?)
(Bad shit just happens, Pedro. You gotta look out for yourself.)
(What if I don't have to?)
The last thought is the one that scares him the most.
So Peter shakes the voices away.
He enters his room, closes the door, and unlocks the phone with his clumsy, swollen hand. The Gmail app is already installed. Peter opens it.
Ned, he types, slowly, you'll never believe where I am.