TASM Peter Parker Imagines

The Process of Mourning

Peter Parker has been quiet as of late. He has been quiet for quite some time now, ever since Gwen died, but this is something else. You've long since learned to cope with Peter's silence, how to tell the shifting of his emotions from the barest of sighs or nonverbal cues, and today is no exception.

It's not hard to learn it, you know. It's not hard to see Peter as someone who needs saving, or at least someone trying to run himself into the ground in an attempt to make penance for the fact that he failed Gwen twice: once in killing her father, once in killing her. No matter how many times you tell him that neither of the recent deaths in the Stacy family are truly Peter's fault, he won't pay attention. Peter bears the weight of his grief in full, calling it responsibility and duty and obligation, anything to keep it around that much longer.

That's what Peter is afraid of most, you think. He's terrified that he'll wake up one day and be alright. If Gwen can't do that, why should he? Peter will bind himself to his grief until the end of time if you'd let him, and never have a life outside of it.

You don't let him, though. You understand that he needs to mourn, you all do– you can't throw a stone down one of the shifting streets of New York City without hitting someone that's been affected by Gwen Stacy in some way. Her work in science, her easy laughter, her kind spirits, they've all been parceled out to somebody or other throughout the years. You don't know that you've seen a funeral with such a massive attendance in quite some time.

What Peter is doing to himself is different from the normal sort of mourning. You know what it's like to grieve Gwen– if it didn't kill you, hearing about her death for the first time, it certainly felt like that. Soon enough, however, the worst of the despair started to leave you. It takes a shorter amount of time than you would think. You swear to yourself that this loss will never be anything but constant, but it isn't. At some point, you realize that you've gone a few days, a few weeks, without locking yourself into a trance of hurt and nothing more. At some point, you start to move on.

Peter hasn't. He visits Gwen's grave almost every day, leaving flowers that join the other bouquets in piling up in mountains of pink and white and red. He always comes to school with his hands smelling that same sickly sweet of rotting petals to let you know where he'd been in the morning, how his nightmares of that one time he couldn't save the person he cared most about have haunted him to the point of having to visit the cemetery as soon as he could.

You've tried to talk him through it. You've lost track of the amount of times you've shown up at the Parker household with food or movies or something, anything to help take Peter's mind off of how it felt to descend to the base of that ruined clock tower and realize that he hadn't done it, he hadn't saved her. Peter has told you the story of that awful discovery so many times that you almost think that you must have been there for it yourself instead of just hearing it through word of mouth.

May Parker is grateful for your presence, you can tell that. Peter's grateful too, even if he refuses to admit it to himself. During the first few weeks, he would hardly say a word, just sit there beside you staring out into nothingness. He came back slowly, though, slowly but surely into someone whose only words were about. Gwen, and only Gwen.

If you were feeling particularly selfish, you would admit to yourself that you hate it. You are Peter Parker's oldest friend, the one who's stuck with him through everything. Back when you and Peter were just two boys in grade school, when kindergarten hide and seek partners on the playground were the only sure sign of a camaraderie that would last more than a week, you swore you'd never leave him. Best friends forever does have a certain ring to it, doesn't it?

You haven't given up on that promise, either. There's another reason for it too, you know. This isn't just you being a truly excellent friend, why you're here for Peter day in and day out. No, you're worse than that. Peter has always been the saint. You're just the one in his shadow, watching as the sun casts a halo around his head and leaves you staring hopelessly after him.