Spiderman: Finding Home

Chapter 7

Peter's POV

Turns out, Peter did not have time to shake the hornet's nest of MJ's world because his own life became a hornet's nest itself.

It was during lunch while Peter was waiting for Ned and MJ that he felt his phone buzz with a notification from Facebook Messenger.

Liz: Hey, Peter. You busy next week?

His heart froze for a second before beating erratically. He kept reading the same message, over and over again.

"You okay bro?" Ned asked as he took a seat next to him. MJ slid into the seat across from him, eyeing him quizzically before pulling out another book to read. "You look pale."

"it's nothing," his voice sounded a higher pitch than usual and he coughed to clear it. "Just a meme Aunt May sent me."

"Can I see?" Ned reached for his phone and Peter pulled it back towards his chest, clutching it tightly.

"Sorry Ned, too inappropriate for your eyes," he tried to joke and thinking quickly, entered his pin and searched for naughty memes hoping nothing too pornographic would come up. "Just kidding. I just don't want you to see our other messages, too personal even for us bro."

Ned's hurt expression relaxed back into a grin as he waited for Peter, taking a big bite of his egg and lettuce sandwich.

"Understandably," he spoke with his mouth full. "You would die if you saw what my mum sends me."

MJ let out a snort and Ned glanced at her.

"Oh sure, I bet you're mum doesn't send you any lovey-dovey messages."

"No actually," she replied coldly, staring him down. "She's a crackhead so only messages when I need to save her from an overdose."

Peter felt his mouth drop open and his fingers stilled as both he and Ned stared at her with wide eyes. Peter's arm hovered over the table, phone extended to show Ned a meme which both had forgotten about now.

"Umm," Ned coughed and swallowed his mouthful. "I can't tell if you're joking or not."

"Wouldn't you like to know?" she smirked, eyes returning to her book, satisfied with the reaction she received.

Ned laughed and began to chat about a new movie he had watched last night, but Peter wasn't listening properly the way he usually would. He surveyed MJ, taking in her dishevelled appearance. They hadn't met up for a few nights now because her mum hadn't been working as late. Was she joking? He had come to learn that under MJ's barbing comments and jokes that there was sometimes a level of truth.

"Stop thinking so hard," MJ muttered to him behind the pages of her book and peered over at him with a frown. "You're giving me a headache."

He continued to stare at her, trying to read something in her face and her frown quickly deepened as she stared right back.

"You should probably get back to that text," she finally said, snapping her book closed and standing to her feet. "It looked really important."

Peter's stomach dropped.

"Wait, what?" Ned asked, glancing from Peter to MJ and then back again. "What text?"

But MJ had turned sharply and was strolling back through the crowd, Peter staring after her.

MJ's POV

It shouldn't bother her, but it did. She had stood in line for lunch with Ned, chatting about the latest Doctor Who episode and she was feeling surprisingly good and she was looking forward to continuing the conversation with Peter. However, as she walked to the table with him, she had passed a glance over Peter's shoulder on her way to her usual spot and her stomach had dropped. She hadn't seen the full message, just the name attached to it.