Frostbite

Parts Out of Other Parts

Peter wasn't sure, but he thinks he's tired.

Not physically tired because he was lucky he didn't need to sleep as long as a regular human—but a sentence like that being normal just added another reason for the tiredness. The super tiredness. The almost-can't-deal-with-it tiredness. And he wasn't saying that he couldn't deal with it, hence the almost, but he used to be just Peter and Spider-Man and he could barely remember thinking just those two things were too much.

Strange how life worked that he ended up getting bit by the spider; he was one punk kid in a city of other punk kids, going to school and getting pushed around and doing homework and being able to lift a car with one hand. Puny Parker, leaping off street lights. May's kid, getting thrown into buildings. Queens, drowning in river water and concrete.

But that was fine. He'd gotten used to it.

Except then he was the new dish boy.

No one looked at Ferret the first week, and when they did it was always pitying or mocking and not one dang thing in between. Ambrose never met his eyes when his nachos got served with no guac and Mox would shake his head whenever he walked past with a stack of dirty plates in his hands. But that was okay because being alone was already kind of his thing; at school because he flakes, on the phone when another voicemail hits and he can talk about whatever because he knew no one was really listening, in the skyline because there was only one Spider-Man to do what he could do.

Some days were a little harder than others, though. With no one who got it and not wanting anyone to worry, it kind of sucked. So sometimes when he dropped from a web he fell, and fell, and there was a last second where the ground came at him so—

But the longer he stayed, the warmer it got. His jokes started getting chuckles and thanks were grumbled whenever he stopped by a table. "That dead kid, Ferret or whatever" turned into "Weasel's dish boy, Ferret" or "Wade's kid, can you fucking believe that" or "I'm good, Ferret. How many people died last week? I've got fifty on the dead pool and I think it's finally my day."

Still... that shouldn't be right. Right? That he felt right at a place that Spider-Man wouldn't hesitate busting. It brought up a lot of questions he wasn't answering anytime soon, but yeah, why not just throw in a bigger headache in there?

Peter Parker, Midtown High student. Spider-Man, suped up vigilante. Ferret, Mr. Weasel's assistant.

That math didn't add up. That math was three different formulas!

But he still juggled STEM student and freak and criminal and it was the most messed up act he ever played. One second he was memorizing Keith Douglas' key poems—Vergissmeinnicht, How to Kill, Desert Flowers—then there was a bat in his gut and now he was printing cards and updating hit lists and he was spending time with May and Ned and now Neena at June's and Wade at the gym and both of them at the bar and Flash shoved him again, Mr. Harrington lectured him again, Happy didn't answer again.

The night usually ended with Spider-Man or Dish Boy-Man and both of them perfected the art of evenly spaced sutures.

And that—that wasn't even mentioning the mom thing.

Mom. Where was he even going to start with that?

Maybe from when he saw the sky tear open and he thought the world was going to end.

... No, that was too much trauma. He was probably better off starting from Wade's apartment instead.

So Wade's apartment had been a safe-haven ever since Wade himself brought him by and explained how to lockpick every lock after all the keys were forgotten in the other Deadpool suit, and not twenty-four hours later he found a new keyring on his carabiner with ten different lock keys, two hours keys, and a fat Pikachu keychain.