NOWHERE LEFT • Peter Parker

twenty three •

"What is this?"

June 2025

When Cecilia was younger she feared for her father's life more times than she could count. She would hope and pray with everything in her that he'd return in one piece.

Time and time again he'd sneak back into the apartment covered in his own blood as well as the blood of other people. His fists would be bruised and his skin scarred to match the marks on his heart. She'd never tell him but she'd stay awake until she heard him come home, it didn't matter if she didn't know the truth of what he was doing, she knew enough.

She remembered being angry with him when she did find out the truth, because even though her brain held more knowledge than he could imagine he still attempted to lie to her. Cecilia was so angry at what he had brought into their life, a life that wasn't perfect by any means but they had each other and that should have been enough.

Jack Murdock was murdered because he wanted to make his son proud, but instead, he left him in a world in which he felt utterly alone. He left his son to repeat the cycle with a daughter who only ever wanted her dad to love her more than he craved the violence that he brought into his life.

After the events at Midland Circle Cecilia felt alone, it didn't matter that she had Foggy, Marci, Karen, and even the heroes that stood beside him. All she wanted was her dad, and she prayed and prayed to a God she wasn't sure she believed in anymore.

And when she found out that he wasn't really dead, he was hiding in the church that she visited every day after school, she was angry again. Angry that she wasn't enough to make him come back, that he would rather die alone in an alley in the name of justice than be home with her when she needed him most.

She didn't know what he was going through, she was too young to understand the emotions that were leading to his choices. All she knew was that he didn't want Matthew Murdock to exist anymore, he didn't want her. He gave his daughter the exact same fear of abandonment that had wrecked his own life.

Father Lanthom had seen the young girl break down every single day in his church pews, her sorrowful crying nearly silent so she wouldn't attract attention to herself. Her brown curls were pulled back into a messy style, gigantic bags sat under her eyes and her skin was eerily pale. A look nearly identical to the man hiding in their basement as he sat a floor below. The priest talked to her every day about the grief she was feeling, and when she couldn't muster a word through the tears he'd make her coffee and they'd sit together in silence.

Yet he lied through his teeth, day and day again, to both her and Matthew. With Father Lanthom's dying breath he begged for forgiveness, not only from the boy who he hid his mother from, but from the little girl whose heart was too kind for the world around them. He begged that Cecilia would forgive not only his dishonesty but her father's.

So she did, as she held Father Lanthom's bloody body in her lap she felt any sense of anger leave her. It didn't matter what he had done, he was still her dad and he did it to protect her. They couldn't guarantee that other people wouldn't leave, but they had each other, and the Priest wanted it to stay that way.

It was as if history was repeating itself once again, the anger towards her father for not believing in her left her body in waves as she slowly crashed to the hardwood floor. Her phone gripped tightly in her hand as she thought about every choice she had made, about how they had all been the wrong ones.