I Can't Make You Love Me || Peter Parker x OC

Chapter 38: Spirits Flying High

Anneliesa's perspective

As the sound of my footsteps echo down the abandoned hall there are three things that keep playing in my mind. Firstly, I can't believe how huge this place is. The administrative office was lavish as is, but the lockers that lined each of the hallways were so numerous that I found it hard to believe that that many people could even fit in a building like this. Perhaps it was just my inexperience with stuff like this, but I never knew that Peter's school was this nice.

Secondly, I'm not supposed to be here right now. None of my new security team knew that I took a detour, opting to pay Peter a visit rather than going back home, where I was supposed to be. I didn't have a lot of time here, but with any luck, I wouldn't need it. The prospect of doing this was daunting, but at the same time, ingenious. I knew that Peter when to Midtown High, but past that, I knew nothing. Luckily, one of Peter's classmates, a cheerleader by the name of Emily, had made a post about a pep rally. It was a super tacky picture, one of her posing with her boyfriend Flash--tagged as @TheBig_F-- in front of the school's mural that proudly presented their Tiger mascot. With all of the information that people have access to nowadays, I would think that people would be more careful with what they post to the internet, but no. In just that one picture and its corresponding caption, I have their school's location, their ages, and a date for when the security will be down and the whole student body in the same area.

Now, I don't plan on doing anything threatening, far from it actually, but if I were to do that, I would have just stumbled on a goldmine of information. No, all I needed was one person, and when everyone is together, it will be a piece of cake to find him, because I won't have to track him through the whole school, just the gym. How, after this long, the powers above have let me have this one bit of good luck is beyond me, but I'm not complaining. The reason that I'm going to all these lengths to find Peter is because the information I was just given, the third thing that was eating away at my mind, is just too sensitive to not be told directly to him.

And lastly, the thing that was causing me the most distress, the reason that I had just been crying not but twenty minutes ago, are the results of the test that I had just gotten done. This morning, I drove to the main SHIELD office in New York City. The drive was tedious, but in the long-run, worth it. When I got there, the information that I had been simultaneously dreading and praying to hear was finally given to me. The events of my kidnapping back in March were, in fact, successful. Peter and I had a child.

That's why I was here, to break a bunch of rules and tell him face-to-face. Fury himself was here for today's appointment, the day that would shape the rest of my future. His rules had been clear and not open to interpretation, but that didn't matter to me. Peter was the love of my life and he deserved to hear it from me, not third-hand through an agent that couldn't be paid enough to actually care.

When I finally got to the gymnasium, which wasn't hard because the whole room was buzzing with noise, life, and energy, I was overwhelmed by everything that was going on. There was a large group of people assembled near one of the walls, the blue and disturbingly sticky mats serving as a back prop as they leaned against the walls. Most were easily identified as teachers, the tired look in their eyes not well-hidden, but the rest are what seemed to be former students and parents. The post that Emily sent made it pretty obvious that this was a big deal, so a turnout this large wasn't a surprise. I blended right in, which is exactly what I wanted.

Currently, the marching band was doing a performance, standing in a standard block formation while they played some generic peppy song. In the sweltering heat that all of the bodies in this room caused, I felt bad for them having to be in their full uniforms. Starting my investigation immediately, I started in the farthest and highest place and then worked my way down, scanning for the face that I so desperately wanted to see. I was halfway through when I spotted faces that I recognized, but not the ones that I wanted to see right now. Peter's friends, whose names I forgot, but whose faces were on the lockscreen of Peter's phone. I remember them so well because they were the last thing I saw before I took the final action that set this whole plan into motion. At the time I had no idea how far it would take me, that I would be carrying our child just months later, but it was the inciting incident for all of this, and I will forever remember their face. But they weren't Peter, nor did they have Peter sitting with them. I found that weird, but also knew that I didn't have the time to dwell on it. I needed to find Peter and get out of here.