LOUD MOUTH → PETER PARKER ✓

Chapter Six: Uncle Ben

𝐂𝐇𝐀𝐏𝐓𝐄𝐑 𝐒𝐈𝐗: UNCLE BEN

Another hour Callie strolled around the streets of New York, letting herself cry until she didn't need to any more. It was getting colder, but she didn't want to go home just yet. Her hands were numb from the cold, turning a sickly pale. She noticed that her yellow nail polish had almost completely chipped off. She didn't like the color as much now as she did before.

At one point, she stopped in the middle of the street. No cars passed by, no one walked around her. It was completely quiet. She found it comforting, though she had never felt that before. For once, it seemed like the dangerous state of New York had been tamed.

The silence was broken a moment later with the decisive bang of a gunshot. Callie's eyes flew open, her first thought being that it was her mother. That she was gone. A figure turned the corner at a sprinting pace, but she couldn't tell if it was a bystander or the shooter.

She ran the way he had come, finding herself standing in a dimly lit sidewalk. And, in the center of the concrete no more than ten feet away, a body lay on the ground.

Callie walked forward, shaking from more than just the cold. Her footsteps quickened as she noticed the glasses the person was wearing, and an oddly familiar jacket. Uncle Ben was lying in the middle of the sidewalk, a gunshot in the stomach.

She froze. She couldn't move, couldn't look away from the frozen expression on Ben's face. The tears that had stopped more than ten minutes ago came back, but she didn't notice them this time. She opened her mouth, but no words came out. Instead, there was a strangled sort of croak that came from her throat.

Then, all of a sudden, her body came back to life. She dropped to her knees, putting pressure to the gunshot wound with her hands. The blood pooled around her hands, unbearably warm on her frostbitten fingers.

"Y-You're going to be okay, okay?" she breathed, nearly choking on her words. "Everything will be f-fine."

She looked around the street, seeing no one. "HELP!" she screamed, tearing her throat in two. "Someone help!"

None of the cars passing by noticed a thing. The gunshot had cleared people from the street. Callie got up, searching her pockets for her phone. She hurriedly wiped away a few tears and felt warm blood being streaked across her face.

As she dialed 911, she noticed a figure crossing the street slowly. He stepped into the dim lighting, and Callie saw Peter, walking slowly like he wasn't sure what he was seeing was real.

"I don't-I don't know what happened." Callie sobbed, her voice frantic. "He was just . . hello? Yes, yes, we need an ambulance, someone's been shot."

After she called the police, she crouched down by Peter and wrapped her arms around him. He was screaming things she couldn't hear over her own sobbing. And even though she felt like the world had suddenly split in two, she said something she could never tell herself: "It's going to be okay."

               THE AMBULANCE ARRIVED IN A FEW MINUTES, along with several police cars. When they got there, Callie had sat down on the street, sobbing into her knees.

"Callie!"

She looked up to see a familiar woman, a police officer named Etta, running up to her. She was a friend of Callie's mom. She paused when she saw Ben's body lying five feet away from her.

"I tr-tried to help, but he was already . ." she trailed off, bursting into another fit of shaking. She saw Etta noticing she blood streak on her face and the blood that had crusted all over her hands. "Where's my mom?"

"She's back at the station, come here, let's get you home." Etta said gently, reaching out to help her up. Ben was being lifted onto a gurney.

Callie shook her head fervently. "I'm not leaving him." she said as Etta pulled her to a standing position. "I-I can't leave him." But Etta gently guided her into a police car, and she got in without a fight. Not once did she look for Peter.

The five minute car ride back to the Parker's felt like three seconds. Callie looked out the window when they got there to see May standing on the stairs in front of the shattered door, talking to a police officer. As she watched, she saw May's hand cover her mouth before she started sobbing.

She turned her head when she saw Callie getting out of the police car, bloody tear streaks on her face. Peter got out of the car parked behind them, and May ran and pulled them both into a tight hug. Callie felt herself apologizing over and over, but she wasn't sure if it was to May, Peter, or herself. Or all of them.

Police were swarming the inside of the house. May sat at the dining room table, looking as though she were in a state of shock. Peter stood by the kitchen doorway, staring blankly at the floor. Callie had shoved herself into the space between the wall and the chair she had been sitting in less than an hour ago.

She stared down at her hands, where the blood was turning black and crusting. She hadn't known that would happen that fast. She caught herself wondering where her mom was, if she knew what had happened, if she was coming to get Callie.

Etta tried to talk to Callie and eventually coaxed her into giving a description of the man she saw running down the street. She told her everything she saw, from his long blonde hair to the sunglasses he was wearing―at night. 

Beyond her, no one tried to talk to Callie for a while. She had stopped crying and started picking crusted blood off her hands. Ben's blood.

Her mother didn't show. Even after the police officers left and May stayed at the table, sobbing into her hands, her mother didn't show up. She didn't call or text. But Callie realized it wasn't her mother she wanted to talk to.

She finally peeled herself off the floor and went to the bathroom to finally wash the blood off her hands. She refused to look at her reflection as she scrubbed, the water turning a threatening red in the sink. It slowly faded into an orange, and eventually ran clear as it went down the drain. When she finally did look at herself, she saw that tears had drawn lines through she blood streak on her cheek. She scrubbed that off too, but kept rubbing until her skin was a raw pink.

She left the bathroom and saw that the light was on in Peter's room, but the door was closed. She sunk back down onto the floor beside the door with her knees tucked to her chest.

After sitting there for a minute, she breathed in shakily. "Peter," she began, already feeling tears building in her eyes and strangling her voice. "I know that you don't want to talk to anyone right now. Neither do I. But if I'm going to leave you here, I have to tell you that I'm sorry." she was sobbing now, but still tried to keep her voice still. "I'm sorry for yelling at you, for making you think there's something wrong with you, f-for not getting to him fast enough." she paused as she started shaking again, tears falling in a steady stream down her face.

"And if you don't ever want me to talk to you again, I won't. I promise you, I won't." her voice broke, but she needed to finish her thoughts before leaving. "I'm so sorry."

She paused, seeing if there was any sort of response. When she didn't get one, she wiped her face again and sighed. "Try to get some sleep, okay?"

She got up, feeling her knees shake underneath her. She tried to walk down the creaky hallway as quietly as she could, but she felt like every footstep was as loud as a gunshot. Just as she was about to turn the corner, she stopped and waited another moment, just to see if he would say anything. 

But he didn't. And she supposed that, for now, that was okay.