I Know Your Secret, Peter Parker

SIX. you're amazing, peter parker

September 18th, 2017
Observation 6
Peter Parker has two friends, Ned Leeds and some old guy named Happy Hogan.

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"H-Happy, wait, wait, don't hang up!" Peter pleaded with someone on the other end of the line.

Usually, he wasn't up and moving at such an early time—6:00am—but today, he had good reason to. Nellie needed a favor.

Okay, Nellie needed a huge favor. And Peter Parker was not going to let down his Homecoming date, despite that he was now getting berated and harassed by Happy Hogan for it.

"Kid, look, I don't know what to tell you. You should've thought this through before you pretended to email Tony to impress some girl. You don't even know his email address." Happy ironically didn't sound too happy.

Peter groaned, "That's why I'm calling you! You need to get ahold of Mr. Stark for me! This is important, I swear."

There was a silence on the other end of the line.

"Happy?" Peter tried once more, hoping he hadn't disconnected the call.

"Okay, what do you want me to do? Tony's a b—"

"A busy guy, yeah, I know. But this girl, Nellie Jenkins, she's a really talented writer and she'd like to meet with him. I promised her I'd try to help her out." Peter made his argument, and he hoped that he wasn't making his bed along with it.

Happy sighed, "I'll run it by him. Stark will call you—"

"Oh, thank you thank you thank you, Happy! I promise I—"

"He will call you if he thinks it's worth looking into. Send me an email attachment of one of her stories. If he's impressed, you'll hear from him. And Peter?" Happy finally caved, just as Peter hoped.

"Yes, sir?"

"Next time you try to send a fake email, don't send it to jarvisismycopilot@hotmail.com. Lord, I hope this girl didn't actually fall for that."

And with that, the call disconnected and Peter was left to hear the dial tone buzzing. A moment later, he received a text from Happy with Happy's email address.

Peter grinned and tossed his phone back on his bed as he got dressed and ready for the school day.

Once he made it to Psychology first period, he laid eyes on Nellie. He could tell she was excited—and hopeful—that he was bringing good news.

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"Hey Nell, so I heard from Mr. Stark this morning. He just wants to read some of your previous work before setting up a meeting. Can you forward anything you have that's like, super impressive to my email?" He slumped into his desk and waited eagerly for her reply.

Nellie beamed, "Peter! You're amazing, thank you! I can't believe Tony Stark is going to read some of my work. Oh, shoot—" she interrupted herself and looked down, then back up at Peter.

"I don't have anything from this semester written yet. I'm no where near finishing my junior article and I won't be until Homecoming." She stopped herself, remembering that she couldn't tell Peter she was actually writing an article about Peter.

Peter shrugged, "That's okay it doesn't have to be from this semester. Do you have anything you've written in your free time? Like non-school related?"

Nellie's heart sank. The answer was yes, she had wrote something in her own time, not submitted or read by any teacher or student ever before.

"There is this one thing. . .but it might be too personal. I don't know, Parker."

She let out a huff, her bangs blowing out of place. Peter reached forward and smoothed the hair back into place with a small smile.

"Mr. Stark would like something like that." He reassured her.

It was settled, she was finally going to let someone read a story she never was brave enough to share—her story. In it, were details of her father abandoning her and her mother, her mother's drug abuse, and her experience shuffling in and out of foster home's throughout the city. It was an emotional rollercoaster—and she couldn't believe Tony Stark, the founder of the world famous Avengers would have his hands on it.

"You really think so? I mean it's about the foster care system and my real parents." She felt unsure, but knew this might be the only way.

"Happy said you need to impress Mr. Stark, and I think he will respect that you were strong enough to share your life story with him." Peter glanced over his shoulder, checking to see if Mrs. Turner was glaring him down like usual.

Luckily, there was a substitute today, and she seemed far less interested in the back row of the class than she did the candies Mrs, Turner kept in her desk drawers.

"Wait," Nellie grew confused, "who is Happy?"

Peter's chocolate brown eyes widened, "Oh," He stammered, "Happy works for Mr. Stark. We spoke on the phone this morning."

"I thought you spoke with Mr. Stark this morning," she narrowed her eyes at him, chewing nervously on her bottom lip.

And what kind of a woman named their kid 'Happy'? She wondered.

"Well, I have to go through Happy Hogan to get to Mr. Stark. You see, he's a busy guy." Peter explained, which Nellie had recalled him saying before.

No doubt, he's a busy guy, Nellie thought, he's often busy saving the world, Peter.

"But Mr. Stark really will be the one reading my story, right?" She wanted to be sure that her words weren't going to have to go through a dozen other men before they could fall into the hands of Tony Stark first.

Like she told Peter, this story was personal.

"I promise, only Mr. Stark will read your story. I'll be sure of it." His smile was warm and honest, and she truly did believe him.

Peter was a really good guy, and she was starting to actually like him more, now that she was learning more about him. Sooner than later, she'd have an article about Peter Parker written in no time, and hopefully, she'd eventually have something written about Spider-Man, too.