Bring Your Secrets, Bring Your Scars

Enter: Peter Parker

Dedicated to ellantyson

Peter Parker's POV…
First day at midtown high.  I sighed as I caught ahead of spiky blond hair coming up quickly behind me.  Can't he just leave me alone?  I guess not.

Flash Tompson rammed into my shoulder and shoved me into the lockers.  Ouch.  I steeled myself for the blows I knew would soon come.  This is MIdtown, after all, teachers hardly care, much less other students. 

Flash was saying something snarky and mean, but I wasn't really listening.  I was just resignedly waiting for him to be done and let me go on to lunch.  He was just about to send his fist into my stomach when a skinny, like an unhealthy skinny, pale black-haired boy caught his attention.

I watched with confusion as the scene unfolded.

Flash stopped his fist about three inches away from me and turned to look at the raven-haired boy.  More people were paying attention now, expecting a fight.  As soon as Flash’s attention was no longer on me, I moved out of his reach and into the small crowd.
The skinny boy stood with his hands in his pockets and was staring at the white tile floor.

“What do you think you're doing interrupting me?” Flash asked in a deceptively sweet voice.  The other boy shrugged before replying “It's not very nice to hit people you know.” The crowd all gasped and Flash snarled.

The raven-haired boy walked off silently.  Flash charged him with his signature football tackle.  This wasn't going to end well.  Surprisingly, the raven-haired boy just sidestepped the attack, and without a backward glance walked into the lunchroom.

The warning bell rang.  I raced into the lunchroom to find my protector and get lunch of course.  Flash headed in the opposite direction, he didn’t have lunch until the next period. 

I knew the raven-haired boy would be receiving a not-so-friendly visit from flash later on.   Upon entering the lunchroom, I caught sight of the pale black-haired boy.  He was sitting alone in a quiet corner of the lunchroom, oblivious to the stares and whispers of those around him.  He just sat there, sketching on a piece of paper.

Wasn't he going to eat lunch?
I saw Ned and MJ looking between me and the boy. I walked over to them and told them what had just happened.

They suggested that I invite him to come and sit in our little group.  I got my lunch and walked over to the boy.  About ten feet away from the table I stopped and looked at the raven-haired teen.

His dull sea-green eyes glazed over and he was twitching staring off into the distance.  I had seen this before somewhere.  It clicked.  I had seen both Mr. Rogers and Mr. Stark do this.  It was a flashback, a symptom of PTSD.  I looked at the boy, what could have happened to make him this way, he looked so sad and lost.

A moment later he was right back to drawing on his sketchpad.  I almost thought I’d imagined his little episode.

Without even glancing up from the paper he said, “are you just going to stand there staring at me, or do you have something to say?” My face bloomed red in embarrassment as I sat down across from him.  He closed the sketchbook before I could get a good look at what he was drawing, from what I saw it looked like a... minotaur?

Maybe he likes greek mythology, that could be useful information for later.  Now that I was closer to him, I could tell that even though he was skinny he was absolutely ripped.

He continued staring down at the table while I spoke to him, “So, um, yeah, I, uh, just wanted to say thanks for, um, stopping flash earlier, y’know?”  Wow, Peter could you be any more awkward?