Love in Ones And Zeros

[4]

Chapter 4: secrets exposed.

"You're the Spider-Man. From YouTube," Ned said with his jaw still nearly dropped to the floor.

"I'm not," Peter said, as he pressed the small black spider on his suit, making it slide off easily, revealing his upper body. The sight of his muscled chest made [Y/n] quickly try to look away, try to. "I'm not," Peter repeated as if here were some faulty gramophone.

"You were on the ceiling," Ned brought out, pointing up.

"No, I wasn't," Peter said, "Ned, what're you doing in my room?!"

"May let me in. You said we were gonna finish the Death Star!" Ned explained.

"you can't just bust into my room!"

At that moment aunt May opened Peter's bedroom door, giggling. She waved the smoke from the kitchen away with her hand while saying, "That turkey meatloaf recipe is a disaster. Let's go get dinner. Thai? Ned, [Y/n], you want Thai?"

[Y/n] was about to answer before Ned replied longingly, "yes."

"No. Ned's got a thing," Peter intervened with a smile, nudging Ned to play along.

"A thing...  to do... after," Ned added, trying to go along with whatever Peter was getting on.

[Y/n] gave himself a mental facepalm. He really was surrounded but a bunch of idiots. "I'm sorry miss Parker, I've still got some homework left to do," [Y/n] said.

"Okay, that's fine, maybe another time." May said kindly, smiling and closing the door behind her, "maybe put on some clothes," she added to Peter before leaving, to which Peter blushed and nodded in response.

"Oh, she doesn't know?" Ned whispered when May had left.

"Nobody knows! I mean, Mr Stark knows because he made my suit but that's it!"

[Y/n] faked a cough and looked meaningfully at Peter. "Alright, fine and [Y/n] knows because he found my suit in my room..." he said.

"Tony Stark made you that?!" Ned whispered and gasped, "Are you an Avenger?" "Yeah, basically," Peter said nonchalantly as he put on a shirt.

[Y/n] frowned at him, no he wasn't. Ned leaned against Peter's bed as if he was having a stroke or mental breakdown

Peter stepped in front of Ned, "You can't tell anybody about this," he issued, "you gotta keep it a secret."
"A secret? Why?" Ned asked confused.

"You know what she's like," Peter said, pointing at the door, indicating he was talking about May, "if she finds out people try and kill me every night, she's not gonna let me do this anymore. Come on Ned, please."

"Okay, okay, okay, okay. I'll level with you." A silence followed.
Ned sighed, "I don't think I can keep this a secret. It's the greatest thing that's ever happened to me, Peter!"

"Ned, May cannot know! I cannot do that to her right now," Peter yell-whispered, "you know? I mean, everything that's happened with her I— please," he begged.

"Okay," Ned said.

"Just swear it, okay?"

"I swear."

"Thank you,"
Ned then immediately started asking Peter loads of questions, but Peter told him he'd tell him about it at school and led him out. [Y/n] followed him, saying goodbye to Peter.

The next day at school Ned bombarded Peter with questions, as well as during the classes as the breaks. During PE [Y/n] and Daniel formed a duo and Peter got together with Ned. [Y/n] had wanted to tell Daniel about what happened last night, but that would've meant he should tell him Peter's a superhero. It was frustrating to keep secrets from his long time best friend. But he did it in favour of his other friend, so such a reason surely made up for that.

Then suddenly they heard Ned yell, "Peter knows Spider-Man!"

The entire room went silent and everyone turned to Peter and Ned, [Y/n] pulled his hair in frustration, cursing silently in French. Maybe MJ was right, cursing in other languages is fun.

"No, I don't. No," Peter said, walking towards Liz, 'of course, again with the no's' [Y/n] thought. "I— I mean—..." "They're friends," Ned said, making the situation even worse.

"Yeah, like Coach Wilson and Captain America are friends," said a voice which made [Y/n] want to vomit. It was Flash, he walked towards Peter. [Y/n] wanted to help him but Daniel grabbed him by his arm, "Don't," he advised with a nod towards the coach "he's a dick, but you'll only get into more trouble." [Y/n] had wished he hadn't said something so logical, but stepped back.
"I- I've met him," Peter began nervously, "A couple of times. But it's ummm... through the Stark internship."

"Uh-huh," Flash hummed in doubt, Peter angrily turned to Ned, "Yeah, well, I'm not supposed to talk about it," he said through his teeth.
"Well, that's awesome. Hey, you know what?" Flash continued, "Maybe you should invite him to Liz's party. Right?"
"Yeah, umm... I'm having people over tonight you're more than welcome to come," Liz said.

[Y/n] got worried, Peter's impulse to try and impress Liz would become too big of an issue now.

"Having a party?" Peter asked.

"Yeah, it's gonna be dope!" Flash said, "you should totally invite your personal friend Spider-Man." [Y/n] wanted to beet that horrific grin of his face.

"Umm..." Peter brought out.

"It's okay," Liz said "I know Peter's way too busy for parties anyway, so...."

"Aww come on, he'll be there. Right Parker?" Flash asked with a smirk.

The school bell rang.
On the way to the locker room [Y/n] hit Ned on the back of the head. "See you at the party Peter," he said as he turned to him, "and I said Peter. NOT Spider-Man."

"You got invited too?" Peter asked, he looked happy about that fact.

"Yeah, Liz came to me earlier today and asked if I would come, and I said yes. But only if you could come." [Y/n] shrugged, "so it'd be cool if you came as yourself. And not as who you think you should be."