A Second Family

~Chapter 16~

May sat down on the bed in her new room, it'd been a very busy day. She was utterly overwhelmed by her situation. All she wanted to do was go back to her little apartment in Queens with her nephew. But that wasn't possible, the apartment was gone. That life was gone. Now all there was was Avengers and a giant building. At least she'd always have Peter, and she was never going to let something like that fire happen to the poor kid again.

"May?" There was a knock on her door that did in fact, slightly startle her, taking her out from thoughts. She reluctantly jumped up from her bed and moved to the door.

"Tony? It's getting late, shouldn't you be sleeping?" May questioned the man standing before her.

The billionaire laughed at her question, as if the Tony Stark actually slept, "Me? Sleep? Ha! Since when?" He chuckled as if it were funny, not a serious concern. "Really though, I wanted to talk with you about something."

"Alright, what is it?" The middle aged woman frowned as Tony welcomed himself into her room and sat on her bed.

"It's about Peter. In the uh, time you were out, Nat and I, well, Peter got in a bit of trouble with a kid at school."

"Trouble? What kind of trouble? Like a fight?" May was immediately all ears at this new information.

"Yeah, yeah, like a fight. Well, not 'like', it was a fight," her eyes widened with pure worry. "Some kid named Flash or something, he was talking shit about Peter and his friend, maybe even you, and Parker threw the first punch." Stark sighed, rubbing his face. "But the thing is this has apparently been going on for awhile now I just-"

  "Peter's being bullied?" May was beyond sad at this point, she'd felt like an utter failure. All she had left was her nephew, and she couldn't even protect him from a bully, heck, she wasn't even around enough to know about it.

  "Yeah, I just thought you should know before you found out on some sort of worse circumstance."

"Thank you for telling me Tony. Do you uh- can you show me to Peter's room?"

  "Sure thing, yeah," Stark helped May off the bed and together they walked down the hall to the room of Peter Parker.

  "Peter hunny," she knocked softly. "It's me can I come in?" There was no answer. "Peter, I want to talk." Silence. "Mr. Stark and I were talking, please open the door."  No reply. She helplessly looked to Iron Man, "Is he upset about something? Why isn't he opening the door?"

  The lack of response that was coming of the kid's room brought reminded Tony of something. Peter Parker is Spider-Man. He's out Spider-Man-ing. "Maybe he's sleeping, maybe you should just wait until the morning."

  "No, Tony, this is important, I really need to speak with my nephew. Why wouldn't he tell me?"

  "Please, May. The kid needs sleep, give him a break."

  "Why don't you want me to talk to Peter?" May glared daggers and the man before her. She'd hardly seen her own nephew since she got to the Avenger's Compound, and now she was being completely denied seeing him. "Never mind, Peter can sleep in half an hour after we talk." She wiggled the doorknob until it properly opened. May carefully moved into the dark room, "Wait- where is Peter?" She frantically looked to Tony who was nervously looking at his feet, fearing the deadly eyes of May Parker. "H-He's not here? Did you, did you do something with Peter?"

  Now it was Iron Man's turn to be pissed, "What accusations are you trying to make of me? Do you actually think I'd do something bad to Peter after all the good I've done for him?"

  The woman couldn't help but roll her eyes, "Please, ever since he accepted your internship he's been beyond stressed. She's skipped school, he even quit band, and he loves band!"

  "You have no idea-" at that, Tony was cut off by a loud thump combined with an, "oof," he looked over to the window in panic. He immediately sighed in relief at seeing Spider-Man on the floor, apparently coming in through the window with a rough landing.

"Mr. Stark? Aun- I mean- uh- you..." he said with uncertainty behind his voice.

"Spider-Man, what are you doing here?" Stark asked through gritted teeth.

"I uh- just checking on my good friend Peter. Like I do."

"Great," May sighed in annoyance not even caring that she was in the presence of Spider-Man. "Well guess what? Peter isn't even here, and I have no idea where he is!" Throughout this, Stark was eyeballing Spidey nervously, while the kid was doing the same under his mask. But Tony was brought back into the conversation when he was roughly hit on the shoulder, "Why don't you even care? He's being bullied and he's missing, and I don't know what to do." She cried.

"Peter's being bullied?" Spidey sniffled under his mask at his aunt's words. "Pfft, he's too cool to be bullied, no way!" Peter was in a moment of complete self conflict, on one hand, he could tell May he was Spider-Man and make his life easier and make May feel better, but also putting her in danger. On the other hand, he could not tell her and not put her in danger, but he had no idea how he'd get out of this situation without telling her or doing anything stupid.

When he came back to, Tony Stark was so desperately trying to get May Parker to calm down, but his attempts were futile, despite his best efforts.

"Uh," Spider-Man coughed, trying to silence the room. "You wanna know something, a-about Peter?"

"Underoos?" Tony looked at him in a sort of warning expression, but the kid knew what he was doing.

"He uh, I know his secret." May just couldn't process what the superhero in front of her was trying to say. For all she knew, Peter didn't keep any secrets from her. The kid put his hand on his head, pinching onto the red spandex on his face. He tugged until his head was completely free of the mask, "Surprise!"

  Today's my birthday!!!! Woot woot, and its homecoming weekend for my school!!! So that's fun, before anyone asks, yes I'm already working on Chapter 17, no worries! I hope you enjoyed!!!