Spider-man: Alone in New York

~ Chapter 25 ~

The car came to a halt in front of my high school, and I could already see Ned standing next to the entrance patiently waiting for me. 

"You have everything?" Tony, still keeping his hands on the wheel, turned to me. 

I gave him a grin. "Yep, everything's in my backpack." Except for my phone... I didn't have my phone because like I had assumed, it was destroyed. Just touching the shattered glass on the screen was a hazard of cutting myself, so grabbing it with a pair of gloves, I had slipped them on and carefully picked up from the ground floor and straight into the trash. I may or may not have gotten a bit teary-eyed at seeing the end of my phone's life.

"Awesome. Happy will pick you up after school. If you need anything during the day, give me a call. I'll come immediately." Yeah... with my non-existent phone. Don't cry, don't cry, don't cry, I chanted in my head. If something were to happen, I decided to use Ned's phone to call. 

I nodded. "Okay, bye Mr. Stark! See you later." I got out of the car and shifted the backpack on my shoulders. By its packed size and crazy weight, I was pretty sure I had a Freshman backpack, even though I wasn't even a Freshman anymore. Fortunately, I had superstrength, so it didn't bother me that much. 

"Hey, Ned! How was your weekend?" I smiled as I strolled up to him, my hands on the straps of my backpack. 

"Good." Ned grinned back at me, but after a second, his grin faltered and he looked at me with narrowed eyes. "Are you okay?"

I frowned and looked down at my clothes, making sure I wasn't wearing something inside-out or wore mismatched socks. Nothing seemed amiss. I said, "Yeah, why?"

"Because, I don't know." He shrugged, keeping an eye on me as we made our way inside the school. "You seem different. Maybe it's just me though." 

Am I acting weird? I chewed on my lip and asked, "Different how?"

Instead of answering my question, he asked me, "How much sleep did you get last night?"

"Nine hours. Mr. Stark told me to go to bed early. I didn't think I was going to fall asleep, but in the end, I did pretty quickly actually. Why, do I look like I got a real night of sleep?"

"Yeah," Ned mused, "But it's more than that."

"What do you mean, more?" I pressed, curious.

"Did you eat how much you're supposed to be eating, with your fast metabolism?" He asked instead.

"Yes, Socrates." I rolled my eyes at how he was always answering with another question. "Would you please finally tell me what you mean?"

Ned shrugged again. "I guess you seem less tense. And you're not as pale as you used to be."

The bell rang, and we hurried our way towards our class, so we wouldn't be marked as late. Before we could even get half-way there, Flash appeared in front of us with his arms crossed. His friends stood behind him, one of them chewing gum that every pop made me cringe and the other one desperately needing a haircut as he had to sweep his hair aside every few seconds.

Flash spoke, "Hey Peter. I haven't seen you in a while. Lucky me. I didn't have to set my eyes on your ugly face."

My mood dampened, and my hands curled into fists. "What do you want, Flash?"

"Nothing, nothing. Just some fun." The side of his mouth twitched in whatever he had anticipated for us. By this time, the hallway had been emptied as all the students had made their way to class already.

"Can't we schedule whatever you have planned later? We've got a class to get to," I remarked, trying to walk around him. Ned shot me a surprised look at my snarky response and followed me. His friends stepped in our way and crossed their arms, causing us to halt. Great. If we didn't go now, Ned and I would be sent back to the office to get a tardy pass. If we had three of those, we would get a detention, and I already had one. Currently, however, I was not looking for one and was going to avoid it at all costs, especially because if the school contacted my guardian to report the detention, they wouldn't be able to reach May because she still hadn't been found, and then what? Who would they contact? Mr. Stark? No way.