Behind a Smile

C3 - Of blanket burritos and normal burritos

Peter didn't sleep until 4:30 AM which happened before when patrol got out of hand – He couldn't just walk away from a burning building, could he? – But this time it wasn't because patrol got out of hand. It was because he was anxious about May being in the hospital, him being home alone – He was Spider-man, why would he be scared to be home alone? – and this resulted in his brain going a thousand miles a minute and him seeking distraction by trying to invent something so that's how at 4:30 AM he was sitting with fully drawn-out blueprints for a Baymax-like caretaker that was more compact. It probably was something that was already done, or didn't even work or- or-.... It didn't even matter. It was not like he could actually get the resources to make it. At least it distracted him for a while. On the plus side, now his brain was calmed down enough to go to sleep.

Peter felt weird waking up. The apartment was quiet. Normally there would at least be... something. He knew Aunt May was at the hospital and there were plenty of times where she had an early morning shift that she was already gone but somehow today it stood out to him. He hated it. Hated it being so quiet in their apartment. Hated how alone he felt. It wasn't like she was gone, she was just... working an extremely long shift at the hospital. That was it. As long as he just believed it, all would be okay.

(He didn't believe it in the slightest)

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Peter had slept around two and a half hours, which was way too little to be dealing with this. Still, even with enough sleep, who thought it would be a good idea to start the day with gym class. At least Peter had his powers so it wasn't as exhausting for him as before the spider bite but on the other hand, he had to struggle to keep his powers in control which was also exhausting so either way. It was a terrible idea for them to plan gym classes for the first and second periods.

"Parker, keep it up. You want to be a boy, then run like one." The gym teacher yelled. Oh, you try running with a binder on – there was no way he was going in without one – but it didn't matter to that teacher. His idea of masculinity was already so old school that the museum is asking him to describe his views so they can write a description of the gender roles in the 1920s. Kidding, of course. About the museum part, not about his views.

It wasn't like he wasn't proud of being trans. If the world was perfect he'd share it because it gave him a unique perspective. But the world wasn't perfect and so when he had been forced to share he was trans, it resulted in the teacher treating him like THAT. He often wondered what would happen if he would be proud as trans as Spider-man. He was sure a lot of people would be happy to be represented by a superhero but on the other hand, there would be bigoted people who would ruin the escape that Spider-man was to him. So he couldn't. Maybe if he had had top surgery or something. When him being a guy was not up for debate at all. When he looked and sounded like a guy. When the word she was not a dagger in his gut. Maybe then. But not now. For now, there was Peter Parker, the nerdy trans boy, and Spider-Man, the hero that nobody debated was a guy.

Peter survived another gym class. After the running, he had to suffer through a game of dodgeball where he had to ignore his spidey senses while Flash threw ball after ball after ball at him. "Hey, Parker! I heard you don't have any balls, here have some!" It could have been funny if he didn't know that it came from a place of unacceptance. So he just took the hits and hurried to get changed after practice so he didn't have to spend too long in the locker room.

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The one thing that everybody loves after just being physically exhausted by gym class, is being mentally exhausted during English class. All he asked was one lesson where they didn't have to find a reason for the author to describe something as yellow. Sometimes things were just yellow. Sometimes the reason was that the author was writing and needed a color and saw a sunflower and thought 'Oooh yellow that is a good color.' But no such luck.

At least the rest of the day would be topics he excelled at. He needed to make some more web fluid and his chemistry class was next, so he didn't have to wait long. What was the teacher talking about again? Oh, right the homework, maybe he should write this down.

Chemistry class was a breeze. He made some new web fluid, he got called on by the teacher, and even though he could finish the assignment before the class had even ended and the teacher had said his work was excellent. Physics class was after that and while the teacher was busy explaining centripetal force, Peter had already been using it when he designed his web-shooters where he was currently adapting the calculations for. He was trying to calculate whether he could create more force by reducing the friction somehow and whether it was worth it to compromise his web-shooters like that. Because if they broke, he had a huge problem. So he had to calculate it.

"Peter, can you name an example aside from the movement of the planets of how centripetal forces are impacting our world?" The teacher asked him.
Peter sat up straight. "Well whenever a car rounds a corner, centripetal forces make it so the car doesn't fly out of the corner. A rollercoaster loop is also dependent on centripetal forces and when spinning a lasso you enact a centripetal force on it." The teacher looked disappointed that they couldn't catch him in the act of not paying attention and continued with the lesson. Peter continued with the calculations that were probably more advanced than his physics teacher could comprehend.
The rest of the day was pretty straightforward, talking to Ned and MJ, being either bored by the subject they are teaching or already knowing what was being taught, sneers from Flash, a normal day. But unlike an actual normal day, after Decathlon practice Peter immediately ran out to change in an alley and swing to the hospital.

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Tony was still sitting on the couch, wrapped like a burrito when the first avenger walked into the common room. It was Steve who had just come back from his morning run. He took a look at Tony, took a look at the blanket that was wrapping him, and continued towards the fridge. "Want anything, Stark? Something to eat? Some more coffee?" He asked as he grabbed his own protein shake. Luckily he was looking at Tony so he could see him shake his head. Talking was too exhausting right now. A nod from Steve who then walked back to the elevator. "I'm going to take a shower. Bucky will probably make breakfast as soon as he wakes up so if you don't want anything now you could wait for that." A nod from Tony. "Huh, no snarky remarks? You really are out of it. Well, if you need anything just have FRIDAY notify me." Another nod and Steve stepped into the elevator.

The next avenger he saw that morning was Natasha Romanoff. She was wearing his hoodie – He knew it was his hoodie because it had his name stitched onto it. – and raised a coffee cup up to him with a raised eyebrow. He shook his head so she just filled one for herself and joined him on the couch to watch TV with him.

As Steve had said, Bucky immediately started making breakfast as soon as he got downstairs. Probably had a rough night then, baking usually helped him with that. Not to enjoy his suffering but he was glad because it meant he didn't have to make breakfast for himself. So not much later Bucky brought Natasha and him their standard breakfast order. It was really good and it made Tony feel a bit better.

It appeared the time without sleep had taken out more of him than he expected because even though he didn't realize it, he had fallen asleep. He only realized he had been sleeping when he was awakened by a Clint who couldn't find his hearing aids and currently had trouble adjusting his speaking volume to an appropriate one. Tony sleepily looked around before pointing at the TV stand where the hearing aids were laying.

During his brief, he thought it was brief, period of dozing off, the TV had been changed to show a documentary of what goes on inside the mind of cult leaders. It was interesting enough that he kept watching it and it eventually woke him up, which was helped by the coffee that Natasha brought him once he sat up a bit straighter. He had to ask her someday how she just... knew things like that.

Regardless, Tony really started feeling better, like his brain was starting up again. Enough to remember that Pepper wanted him to mentor someone. So he needed to make a way to pick someone. He at least needed to figure out what he wanted in a mentee. So he hopped up, still keeping himself a burrito, and picked up a pad and a pen before sitting down again. Once he started writing, he just couldn't stop. Once he finally did stop, he had the perfect plan.

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Official Stark Industries @StarkIndustries

As you may have heard, Stark Industries is currently working on a plan to help with the homelessness epidemic that New York and other cities are currently facing. We are currently focussing on LGBTQ+ youth, not exclusively but making sure that all shelters are at least LGBTQ+ friendly.