stranger ; 𝐩. 𝐩𝐚𝐫𝐤𝐞𝐫

29 | twenty-nine

"hey, it's peter, leave a message. or, you know, a star wars joke, if you feel like it."

lucy rolled her eyes at his voicemail. why was she surprised?

when the tone sounded, she said, "hey, petey, it's lucy. i just wanted to know if you're okay? i haven't heard from you since last night and i'm started to get worried. is everything okay? call me back. okay, bye." she hung up.

after two more failed calls and two more equally concerned messages to his voicemail, lucy decided to call ned. if anyone knows where he is, it's him, she thought as she jabbed her thumb on his name.

he picked up within the first ring. "uh, hi, lucy. what's up?"

"do you know where peter is?"

there was a pause, hurried whispers in the background. "is that him? is he with you?"

"no," he cut in quickly, "no, he definitely isn't. why don't you call him?" ned asked, his voice going up at least two octaves.

lucy sighed in annoyance. "honestly, ned, do you really think i would call you before him if i wanted to know where he was?"

another beat of silence. "well, you didn't have to sound so crabby about it," he replied softly.

her shoulders slumped. "sorry, i'm just worried about him. are you sure he's okay? you'd tell me if he wasn't, right?"

"yeah, i would, don't worry," his words sounded true, s there was that. at least ned wasn't holding anything from her. "just...maybe give it a few days."

"what? why?" she asked, and but her thumb nail as she waited for a response, a nervous habit from her childhood.

"he went up against an evil, psycho killer dude with wings. less than twenty-four hours ago. maybe he just needs the time to...rebuff...oh, recover." now he sounded unsure.

"you're sure you're not with him?" lucy repeated, suspicion rising in her voice.

"yep!" ned responded, again in that high voice. "talk to you later, lucy!"

he hung up without another word.

lucy laid back on her bed, pushing out a sigh. ned had a good point, what with the recovery bit and all. but she was almost certain that he'd been with peter, reading off a cue card held up for him.

clever boys, she thought, but unfortunately, not clever enough.

had she disagreed with peter needing a day to recover after his night of terror, perhaps she would have given him another call. but instead, she turned her phone off, proceeding to stare at the ceiling.

when she closed her eyes, all she saw was peter. not spiderman, but peter parker, the boy she was never supposed to meet. but here she was, thinking of him all the time. the boy who'd stolen her heart.

little did she know, however, she'd stolen his as well.

[a/n: hellooooo!! double update today! woop woop! and in a few minutes(maybe an hour?), the final chapter will be updated! i literally love peter and lucy's relationship, they're all i want in a high school romance]