Different

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**Happy October! Each Saturday, I will be posting a spooky themed chapter, and on the 31st, I will post the Spooktacular Halloween Special, which is over 10k words. Each Saturday will also have a fun hint for the Spooktacular Halloween Special so you guys can try and guess what it about. 

Hint 1) It's about ghosts, so try and guess who is being haunted and who is the ghost!

As for this chapter... My favorite movie is ParaNorman so I was watching it the other night and I realized that Norman and Neil are basically Peter and Ned and I practically fell over from how perfect it was. Here's my obligatory ParaNorman AU with Peter Parker being a super special mutant and his family doesn't really understand that yet. Oh, and there's a Tony cameo as Ned's brother. Enjoy!!**

Being the only mutant in a town of 500 was the worst possible fate Peter could think of. It was even worse because no one in his family - save an estranged uncle - were mutants either. It was made worse by his town's history - nearly 300 years ago, the town had killed a 'witch', but Peter knew it was just a mutant like him.

Peter walked through the school's hall, trying his best to ignore the stares and hushed whispers that followed him down the hall. He could see the big, black letters scrawled on his locker all the way down the hall.

FREAK

Peter sighed and pulled open his locker. He got out the spray bottle and rag he kept in the locker for times like these and started to spray down the metal. The marker came off easily enough, even if it did take a bit of elbow grease.

Peter grabbed his books and put the spray away, slammed the locked, and headed out to main doors to walk home.

"Hey, Peter!"

Peter stopped and hitched his backpack up as he looked over his shoulder. It was Ned, the kid with a locker across the hall from Peter's.

"Look, I told you, Ned. I- I'm like to be alone."

"Me, too!" Ned said, throwing out his hands. "Let's do it together!"

Peter just let out a sigh. Ned was always trying to be his friend, maybe because they were both a favorite target of the biggest school bully, maybe because Peter was the only one to not call Ned a fatty.

Peter heard a small squeak and looked under his shoes. There, where he was about to step, was one of the largest spiders Peter had ever seen.

"Oh. Sorry!" Peter gave a sheepish smile and the spider waved their legs.

"Watch where you're going!" the spider yelled, making Peter wince. The teen stepped over the spider and kept walking,but Ned was frozen where he stood with wide eyes and a dropped jaw. Peter looked back at him with an uncertain look.

"So you can, like, talk to spiders all the time? Everywhere?" Ned asked.

Peter ran a hand up his arm and shrugged. "Uh, yeah- yeah I can."

"Cool!" Ned pumped his fists. "There's a spider nest in my shed, could you talk to them?"

"Probably."

"Let's go then!" Ned grabbed Peter's hand and dragged him down a side street, headed to his own house. Peter followed along happily. If Ned wanted to be his friend, who was Peter to deny him?

Ned's house was cute, with little garden gnomes and statues all over the yard. There was a huge van in the front driveway, where Peter could see someone working on a car. "Neil? Is that you, buddy?"

"Hey, Tony, we're going to go play with spiders in the backyard and ask 'em trivia questions!"

The van bounced and the kid under it banged his head. "Wha- What? What was that?" Tony looked over at Peter, who waved shyly. "Is he the one who - you know - 'oh, look at me, I'm talking to spiders so people will notice me'?"

Ned gave his brother a hard stare. "Can you not do that? It's pretty stupid."

"Ned," Tony said sharply. "You don't need to be hanging out with the weird kids. That's a tip."

Ned just shrugged. "Don't ruin this for me, this one isn't weird, Tones. He talks to spiders."

Ned pulled Peter into the backyard, happily pointing over to the shed. The two went over and Peter spotted the nest easily. It was a hug web, spiders hanging off little silk webs and crawling around the wall. Peter said his hellos, then relayed whatever Ned wanted to ask to the spiders who all clamored to answer them.

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Peter opened the door to his house just before dinner. He tried to sneak in so no one would really notice, but - 

"Peter?" It was May. Peter shuffled into the room, looking through the kitchen doorway.

"Hey, everyone."

May was at the stove, stirring a pot of soup. Ben was trying to fix a light bulb above the dining table, and Wanda, Peter's sister, was siting at the dining table texting someone.

"Hey, Pete. What'd you do today?"

Peter began retelling the story of his day, starting with his walk to school and what he learned. He was starting a unit in history about the witch who was killed in the town years ago. Everyone still called her a witch even though that was technically a derogatory term for mutants now a days.

"-And I ended up hanging out with Ned. You know Ned, he's the kid Flash kind of makes fun of? We hung out at his house and talked to some of the spiders living in his shed-"

Ben slipped off the stool he was standing on, the light bulb crashing to the ground next to him. May let out a little gasp. Wanda's bubble gum bubble popped over his his face.

"Ben," May warned, trying to stop the explosion that was bound to come from this. "Let's not-"

"Peter. When will you stop being such a weirdo and just-"

"Ben!"

May nearly punched Ben's arm and the man stopped talking. Wanda scoffed a little, rolling her eyes at Peter. "You are such a little liar."

"Am not!"

"Prove it," Wanda taunted. Peter flashed a knowing and smug smile.

"There's a spider living in your room and he says it's not very ladylike to keep pictures of the high school quarterback with his shirt off in your underwear drawer."

Wanda's face went white and she shrieked.

"That's enough!" Ben said, stomping his foot. "Peter, to your room."

Peter groaned and started to stomp out of the room and upstairs, mumbling as he went about how unfair and ridiculous the whole thing was. "I didn't ask to be born this way."

"Funny enough, neither did we," Ben said, rubbing tension out of his forehead with hard finger tips.

Peter gasped a little, but he didn't stop making his way upstairs. He slammed his door and flopped onto his bed with a huge sigh. He pulled his phone out of his pocket and unlocked it. There was a message from Ned.

I had a really great time today, so we should do that again.

Peter smiled and sent off a quick reply. No matter what happened, no matter who said mean things under their breath, Peter had Ned, and that was all he needed.

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