Angsting Our Boy Peter

Pushed To The Edge

Please heed warnings for fairly graphic bullying, grief, death, and suicide. Seriously, this is pretty dark, and it's got some pretty graphic stuff in there.

 Peter Parker and Flash Thompson had never gotten along. Ever since a day in kindergarten, where Peter had accidentally spilled his apple juice on Flash. One kid announced loudly that Flash had wet himself, and the whole class took the story and ran with it. The next week, Flash deliberately spilled his juice on Peter and started the story himself. And he'd been attacking Peter ever since.

It was always just little things. Knocking his shoulder into Peter's in the hall, pushing him down on the playground. Making snide little comments under his breath. It didn't help that Flash was the richest kid in school, and Peter could only attend on a scholarship. The first week of freshman year, they both tried out for the Academic Decathlon team. Peter made it, and Flash was made an alternate, only there to stand in if someone else couldn't make it. That day Flash cornered Peter in the locker room and beat him up after PE. It all went downhill from there.

Then Peter got bitten by the spider, and his uncle Ben died. Flash seized onto Ben, constantly mocking Peter about he had no parents, and now no uncle. Laughing about how he was poorer than ever. When the news got out that Peter had been present, had seen it happen, Flash doubled down on that.

"Bet you think about it all the time," Flash whispered, from his desk behind Peter's in history. "You see your uncle bleed out every night, Penis? Too bad you're so pathetic. I'd have stopped the guy. I never would've let someone kill my dad right in front of me."

Peter had stood up and punched Flash in the face. Broke his nose, too.

Peter was suspended for a week.

"We have a very strict policy against violence," Principal Morita said, in a meeting with Aunt May that afternoon. "I'm afraid I have to suspend you. And if you get in another altercation with Flash Thompson, your scholarship could be revoked, Peter. This is serious stuff."

So Peter sucked it up. He didn't rise to the bait, he didn't respond to anything Flash said. Ned stood beside him the whole time.

"He's just jealous of you," Ned insisted one day. "He's just mad that you're smarter than him, and that people actually like you."

"I don't think he's jealous, Ned," Peter sighed. "He's got his parents, and his friends, and all his money... why would he be jealous of poor, parentless, pathetic Peter Parker."

Ned stared at him for a moment. "You're not pathetic, Peter," he'd said. After a moment, he spoke again. "That was a good alliteration, though."

They'd both laughed.

When Tony Stark showed up in his apartment, took him to Germany, and gave him the suit, Peter was ecstatic. Sure, Flash was still a dick, but he was a superhero. He'd fought Captain America. He'd basically beaten the Winter Soldier and Falcon. And every night, he got to go out and save lives as Spider-Man. Then there was the Ferry incident. Then Toomes. THen the Avengers got pardoned, the team got back together. Then Tony showed back up, and told him he could have the suit back only if he agreed to have an official internship. Suddenly Mondays, wednesdays, and fridays Peter was driven up to the Compound by Happy, where he spent his afternoons and evenings working in the lab with Tony, training with Steve and Natasha. Everything was looking up. Sure, everyone thought he was lying about his Stark internship. Sure, Flash and his friends usually beat him up after every gym class. Sure, he dreaded every time his phone went off, because it was usually a message from Flash.

Fuck you Parker.

The world would be better off if you weren't here.

Did your mommy pick your clothes out for you? Lol wait you don't have one.