Picking Up The Pieces

85. Goodbye Yellow Brick Road

  There were tear stains on Peter's face when I found him in the compound's garage.

I paused briefly at the door, my eyes flicking down at the helmet he was clutching between his hands. The straps of my backpack suddenly became heavier on my shoulders. "You really shouldn't be here," I told him softly, though it was obvious I wasn't truly upset by his presence. The boy's chest sagged as he sighed, and he turned away to focus on the motorcycle propped up beside him.

"I had to make sure I could see you before you left," he answered, messing around with some of the controls on the machine. It was Stark technology like most things in the room. I couldn't remember the last time I had ridden one of my father's bikes, but I was depending everything on my ability to. "May's waiting in the car. Your dad said it would be better for us to not be around when Ross..." Peter didn't finish the sentence. The brief silence was quickly filled by a soft cracking noise, and my eyes flicked down to the helmet.

"Peter, you're-" The boy threw the helmet angrily across the garage into the wall, and I flinched involuntarily as the already cracked headgear splintered into pieces. His breathing pattern was hitched from the action, his hand still extended. Glancing at the indent in the wall my father had once claimed to be indestructible, I realized I had underestimated his strength. "I kind of... needed that."

"Why can't I help you?" Peter's head jerked in my direction after speaking his question, a rhetorical statement but still one I knew he wished I could answer. "Hawkes, the battle... now this. I can't just stay on the sidelines anymore- I can't sit back and watch you break over and over again!"

"If I knew a way to fix everything and not hurt you and everyone else, I would've chosen it by now."

"What? No!" The boy shook his head, pressing a hand against his forehead before moving to run his fingers through his hair. "You aren't the issue, Belle... I... I just feel backed into a corner." Peter slumped down on the floor, leaning his body against the motorcycle defeatedly. "If I had even one shot," he told me, lifting up a finger as he repeated himself. "Just one..."

"No- this isn't how this is going to go." I slid the backpack straps off of my shoulders, it giving a muffled thud as I sat down beside him. "My last memory of you can't be this until I see you again... it can't." I could feel my eyes welling up again, and I shook my head angrily. "If you're the reason I cry again today, Parker, I'm gonna kill you."

"You still manage to joke with everything going on."

"I'm not- oh, I hate you," I grumbled as I felt him try to wrap his arm behind me to pull me in, giving a sniffle as I tried to push my emotions back. He didn't attempt a remark, and we sat there hugging each other in quiet. The first time we had ever been in this position was after Homecoming, the night I thought Peter had died and we defeated Liz's father. Back then, it was exciting, almost as if some part of my world was starting over right. Now, it was agony.

Part of me wished I had never begun dating him. It wouldn't have changed our feelings toward each other, but maybe it would've made our predicaments easier. Maybe he wouldn't have felt so helpless about my fate, and I not guilty about being the cause of his pain. Then again... that might not have even happened because-

"I love you."

"I love you too, Pete."

"No, like... I love you," he repeated, and I knew he meant every part of that word. Our heads turned toward each other, pulling the hug apart as he sighed. "Promise me... promise me that you'll send a sign when you're back." I felt him take my hand in his, squeezing it tightly. "Something that would make me know right away that it's you." There was a sharp pain in my chest at that. "I'll always be on your side, Belle," Peter insisted. "If you call... I'll be there."