Deadpool Syndrome - Spider Soulmates

Chapter 23 - My First Mistake Was To Smile At You

***PETER***

Gwen and I fall asleep on the quinjet, the two of us holding hands. At some point, Stark - who's somehow reverted back to adulthood since I last saw him ("because magic," he said when I asked about it right away when I boarded the quinjet) takes a picture of us in this pose, and by the time we land at the Avengers facility, he's threatening to tweet it to the whole world.

"You know what?" I say, yawning for what has to be the tenth time this hour. "You're an adult now, so don't let me stop you." At this point, with midnight coming on, I comically fall onto my bunk in the barracks, barely even having the strength to shed my street clothes (my Spider-Man uniform stays on) before drifting off to sleep.

Maybe because of my having slept on the quinjet, I wake up very early on Sunday morning - around six-thirty, according to my watch, which sits on the haphazard pile of my clothes on the floor next to my bunk. Selecting a more fresh pair of pants, T-shirt, and hoodie, I stagger out of the barracks, passing by an empty bunk on the way. Rogers' bunk, I think. Where could he be, I wonder?

Down the hall I go, into the shower. There, the water (which is, at first, as cold as the ninth circle of Hell) does a better job of waking me up than any cup of coffee. When I get dressed again, I decide to leave off my uniform for now. I'm sure I'll need it later, but for now, after close to eighteen hours straight in that thing, it needs a little airing out, I think. So I just put on my regular threads, transferring my wallet and phone into the pockets of my next pair of jeans.

By sheer coincidence, I walk out of the men's locker room at the same time that Gwen emerges from the women's. She's still wearing her uniform hoodie - I really need to invest in a similarly less-skintight Spidey-suit for myself.

"'Morning," I say sleepily as we toss yesterday's clothes into the laundry chute. Yes, this place has a laundry chute, not to mention some pretty impressive industrial-strength machinery to take care of all our supersuit needs.

"Happy Sunday," Gwen laughs.

"I hope we have a less long day today," I say with a smile. "Yesterday was too much overload."

"Tell me about it." She pushes her blow-dried hair back. I'm assuming it's blow-dried, anyway - how else would it not be so dripping wet? Like mine, because I do very little to style my hair after I shower, other than sometimes putting gel in it.

I kiss her behind her ear, allowing her hair to tickle my nose. She moans softly. Huh - I didn't know the story I'd once heard about ears being erogenous zones was true. "Yesterday was too much overload," I repeat, smiling into her hair.

"That's not what I meant," Gwen whispers, reaching around and placing her hand on my side, the one facing away from her. Her fingers curl under my shirt and touch my skin, making me shiver despite the warmth of her hand. I respond by pulling her in and kissing her deeply. Neither of us has brushed our teeth, so we both have the same morning breath. It doesn't stop me, however, from being turned on simply by how close we are. And how touchy-feely we've become in the last few seconds.

Gwen breaks away long enough to ask, "We're not gonna do this where everyone can see us, are we?"

"Looks like the supply closet's gonna come in handy once again," I say. In my head, my brain is short-circuiting. How far will we go? All the way? This seems like the most random time to lose my virginity, but considering who would be taking it...

"Not the most glamorous place, but...you have a condom?" she asks, reaching for the nearby closet door.

Yep, home run for Team Gweter. "I always wondered what that was doing in my wallet," I laugh. Well, at least, I did before I got my memories back in San Cas. Until then, I just assumed I was carrying it on a "just in case" basis, not that I really needed it.