Malen'kaya Zemlya [2] [P. Parker]

3.2 Everything Has Changed

A few days after Peter and I had talked to Flash at the therapists, it was a Monday again.

I walked from the apartment I was renting (with Tony's help, of course) to the school. It was a short distance, maybe a ten-minute walk on a good day, but that day it was a bad one.

Along with there being a multitude of traffic jams, the foot traffic was equally horrendous.

I almost fell over about seven times which is just another perk of being a small girl in a huge city, and on the eighth near fall, I felt my phone buzz frantically.

Pulling it out, I saw that Renée was calling me.

A wide smile spread on my face as I pressed the green button. "Ren!"

"Hey, Ash, how's it going over in NYC?" she asked.

I dodged another businessman. "It's busy. Today's worse than usual."

"Ah, one of those days, huh?" she laughed.

I laughed too. "Yeah. How's San Francisco?"

"It's... Quiet. Ryker's gotten restless. I have too, but not as much. San Fran doesn't really need any superheroes."

I frowned. "Really? I was sure you could find something to do there."

"Yeah, so was I. But Scott, Scott Lang, has apparently been asking to meet up with us. Should we?"

I snorted. "Why are you asking me?"

"You were on the same team in the... The airport battle. You know him a bit better than we do."

"Yeah, true," I thought for a second. "Go see him. He's pretty chill. He's probably bored too."

"Okay, I'll try and meet him properly. You on your way to school?"

"Yeah, Midtown's a mess right now."

"What do you mean?" she asked. I heard scuffling sounds like she was lying down.

"Homecoming's coming up, and I don't have you or Rina to help me choose my dress." I pouted, turning a corner to see the gates to Midtown School of Science and Technology.

"You're going?" she asked.

"I think so," I replied. "Well, I haven't been invited yet, but I'll probably go anyway. Just to have some fun and get out."

Renée practically squealed in excitement. "Oh, you've matured so much!"

I laughed without humour. "Yeah," in a low voice I added, "But is it a good thing?"

"What was that?" she asked.

"I didn't say anything," I replied, walking into the school grounds. "Someone was shouting close by."

"Oh, okay. Well, you can FaceTime me and Rina when you're looking for your dress and we'll help you."

I sighed with a smile. "Thanks, Ren."

"Anytime, Ash." she paused. "Ugh, I've got to go. Mom wants me to do something. I don't even know anymore."

I laughed softly. "Alright, enjoy whatever that 'something' is."

"Will do. Later, Ash. Love you!"

"Love you too, Ren," I replied as she hung up.

Someone snickered behind me.

With a sigh, I turned around. "What?" I asked Flash tiredly.

"He didn't laugh." one of his friends, named Jeremy Pollux, pushed passed him and stared at me with a smirk. "I did. Flash has gone soft."

I raised a brow. "Okay, that's nice. Why'd you laugh?"

He simply shook his head. "Girls are so weird."

My brow raised further. "Oh, really?"

"Yeah, you say you love each other but then you go and stab each other in the back." he shrugged.

I let out a breathy laugh. "Not always."

"Well, Oswald almost killed you, right. And you forgave her?"

All the breath felt like it was sucked out of my lungs. I struggled to pull more in. "I-"

"I don't know why you did that. People who kill people, or even almost kill people should go to prison." he continued.

My head spun and I felt sick.

Still struggling to breathe, I clutched my stomach and stumbled away.

I staggered to the nearest girls bathroom and bent over the toilet, throwing up.

As I did, someone pulled my hair back and rubbed my back.

"Let it out," they murmured. "Let it all out."

A few tears rolled down my face as I threw up again.

The person kept holding my hair and rubbing my back.

"I'm sorry," I choked out. "I'm sorry."

"Hey, it's okay." They said. "You didn't do anything wrong."

"Y-Yes, I did." I sobbed, holding down more vomit. "I did something very wrong."

"Don't think about it." the hand rubbing my back wrapped around my shoulders. "How do you feel?"

"Guilty." I coughed. "Sick. I wanna go home."

The door opened.

"Hey, is she-"

"Can you sign her out?" the person who now held me asked the girl who walked in.

There was silence then the door closed, leading me to believe that she'd nodded and left.

My eyes slowly closed. "Thank you..."

"It's okay, Ashley. Come on, let's get you to your home."

(A/N)

Finally another chapter, am I right?!

This chapter is basically a filler that sets up for the next one and a couple after that.

Also I'm really excited to write HOCO.

Also also, FFH has only been out for a day and I've already gotten a bunch of spoilers on Instagram which really upsets me.

In other news, I finally got to chapter 40 overall in Malen'kaya Zemlya (on the doc)!! When I saw that the other day in English I had this mini heart attack and kind of froze for about five minutes so yeah.

I also made some rings out of paper clips so that's fun.

I also also did this in art for a project we're working on:

It's not finished yet but from left to right it's: Rina (bottom), Lou, Ren, Ryk (hiding) and Ash. They're standing on top of a giant baby Groot thing I did but that's nowhere near finished. I'm really proud of this.

-lost_in_a_book__