You weren't picking up your phone.
Peter kept murmuring, "C'mon, c'mon, c'mon," underneath his breath as he swung from building to building. The city of New York was disintegrating into chaos by the second, and you weren't answering your phone.
He was three blocks away from the apartment building where you lived with your parents. Peter could practically visualize your bedroom window–always slightly parted open for him to slip into at the early hours of the morning before school.
He would usually come by unannounced (you never minded the surprise), but now more than anything, Peter wanted you to be waiting for him. He wanted to see your face by the open window.
He just wanted to see you alive.
Cars without drivers were crashing wildly into one another in the streets below, and every time Peter would just barely stop a vehicle from running off a bridge, he wondered if you were in it.
You've reached the voicemail of Y/N Y/L/N. Please leave a message after the beep.
"Shit," he curses underneath his breath, just managing to save a poor plane from crashing into the statue of liberty. Every time he blinked, there was another emergency, another life about to end.
Peter knew he couldn't be selfish when it came down to doing what's right. But he just couldn't think straight. He needed to make sure you were safe first. Peter would never admit it out loud, but out of the millions of people left scrambling for help, you were the only one that mattered to him.
Your bedroom window was slightly parted, like it always is. Peter slips through the open crack without hesitation. He didn't know what to expect. Maybe you fast asleep on your bed, perfectly clueless as to what was occurring.
Or maybe you sitting by your desk, reading that stupid math textbook with sticky-notes stuck on pages that you needed his help explaining.
No matter what he was expecting, Peter certainly wasn't picturing an empty room.
He rips off his mask as his head spins wildly. "No," he murmurs as he sees your phone resting gently on the edge of your desk. The pencil that had fallen onto the floor.
All evidence that you had just disappeared.
A giant explosion makes Peter involuntarily whip his head around to face the open window–where he sees the top half of a skyscraper in pieces. Screams tear through the air. He knew Spider-man had to go.
But Peter Parker couldn't feel his legs.
His hands were shaking so terribly that he couldn't even pull his mask back on. Instead, he's forced to stare at it as it mocks him. You're not invincible, it says. So what made you think she would be spared?
Suddenly, he freezes. All the tiny hairs on his arms stand up because he's not alone. The sound of a door opening behind him. Then a soft voice, "Pete?"
Your voice.
Peter spins around and there you are, standing in the open doorway between your bathroom and the bedroom. Your hair was wrapped up in a towel and the smell of your freshly applied perfume could bring new tears to his eyes.
Because he was already crying.
Seeing his reaction to your sudden presence makes you frown with worry. "Honey, what's wrong?" You immediately close the gap between both of your bodies to embrace him tightly.
Peter's arms wrap around your waist instinctively as he buries his face in the crook of your neck. "It's alright," you whisper over and over again, rocking him gently from side to side. "Whatever it is, it's okay now. You're with me and everything's alright."
You are standing on the tips of your toes, the top of your head barely grazing the bottom of his chin, and he wants to tell you how for a moment there, he thought he had lost you.
He wanted to tell you how terrified it made him, and how it felt as if a hole had been drilled in the center of his chest, and how, for the first time in his life, he didn't want to be alive.
Peter wanted to tell you all those things, and more. But there, in the safety of your arms, all he can manage to squeeze out is, "I'm sorry."
You pull away from him slightly to look up at his face, bringing a hand up to brush his tears away in the process. "Don't apologize to me," you reply, eyebrows furrowed a little to express your confusion and disapproval. "You have nothing to be sorry for."
Peter wishes he could stop the tears from pooling in his eyes because he wanted to steal a perfect image of your face. He would never ever take a second with you for granted again. "I can't protect you," he cries. "H-How can I dedicate my entire l-life to saving people when I can't even save you."
His breathing quickens and you sit him down on the side of your bed. You are kneeling down in front of him, fingers interlaced with his, when you softly say, "Pete, you save me every day, don't you know that? In more ways than one. You are there to walk me to school every morning, and you're there in my bed to kiss me goodnight. You never complain when I chuck my math book out the window in frustration. You always retrieve it for me and patiently try explaining some dead guy's theorem to me again. Even though I glare at you the whole time."
This makes him laugh. It's the most beautiful sound in the world to you. "You save me every day, Peter Parker," you repeat, leaning up to kiss him on the lips. "It might not be the cliché damsel in distress act of savior, but you are always there for me. It's a sin to think otherwise."
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