Pinned & Stuck

Prologue - Aoi

Insert song: Taeyeon - All About You (A Poem Titled You)

It has been roughly more than five months since Peter and I started dating properly, a.k.a after the Winter Ball. It was a bliss. He was attentive and patient. Two things from someone I appreciated very much since I'm not easy to handle normally. My mood swings combined with the overthinker and oversensitive personality would be a nightmare for anyone. But Peter was different. When I was randomly excited he became excited too, but when I was in a really bad mood he would just be quiet and bought me a red velvet cake in the hope to ease my anger. I asked him how he could stay patient once. He answered smoothly with, "Because it's you." I also asked him what part of me he liked. He answered nonchalantly with, "All about you." See, answers like those are my kryptonite. And he sounded so genuine when he said them. I usually became speechless after hearing them and randomly ran away, something Peter enjoyed watching so much. On the particular Friday evening, my parents invited Peter for dinner at our house, after hearing about Aunt May being busy for overseas work. Aunt May lately had taken the job as a secretary for Stark Industries. She said it would help for Peter's college tuition in the near future.

"Thanks for having me Mr. and Mrs. Ueno," Peter being polite as he is as ever.

"Please take some more, Peter dear," my mom scooped more side dishes and gave them to Peter, "I cooked too much when I heard you are going to eat here."

"A-ah... thank you," Peter became burdened but didn't want to be seen as rude.

"So, Peter," my dad suddenly spoke, "I heard from Ms. Parker you are going to MiT?"

"About that... I haven't decided yet about college," Peter laughed awkwardly, "But Mr. Stark had submitted my applications and letters of recommendation without me knowing. He made me took the tests last December and he forced me to confirm the enrollment first."

"I'm sure you'll definitely be accepted," my dad gulped his food before continuing, "Take your time to think as long as you want. But use the time wisely, okay?"

"I will, sir," Peter smiled.

To break the heavy conversation, I asked my dad randomly.

"Papa, Peter and I are gonna walk around after this, is it okay?" I asked him, "I'll go back to the dorm after."

"Be safe you two," my dad advised, "Though, I'm sure Peter can handle some big guys by himself. I mean look at him. Compared to you, Aoi-chan..."

"Papa!" I whined, "If that is your way of making me work out, it won't work!"

"Peter, I'll trust my only child to you, okay?" my mom also added.

"Mom!"

"I will Mrs. Ueno, don't worry. I'll keep him safe," Peter acted as if he was being serious jokingly, "Though, I'm sure he can take care of himself. I mean if you see what he did to the bullies-"

"Stop it and eat this," I forcefully feed him the fried shrimp.

"Oh yeah! I heard about it too from Ms. Blake," my mom recalled, "Aoi-chan has become some sort of a boss around school."

Peter giggled quietly.

"WHAT? No!" I protested, "It's only a rumor. You know I'm always well-behaved, right Papa?"

"Yeah, yeah," my dad sighed, "Just finish your food please, child."

"Okay...," I said while nudging Peter who was still holding his laughter.

After dinner, Peter and I walked around the city. We have no chance to properly have a date together for two months due to him going to a field trip and were dealing with his absurdly revealed identity by Mysterio. Lucky for Peter, Mr. Fury had a connection with some shape-shifting aliens who could mimic his face. Still, although the problem had been cleared up, some people were skeptical about Spider-Man's agenda. Peter started his hero thing again just this week. During his 'hiatus', I unintentionally replaced him for a while. Every time I walked mindlessly by myself or went shopping, or even just wanted to get a drink from a café, I kept running to some criminal activities or dying civilians. I didn't even have to patrol the city like Peter. While he had a super intuition-thing he referred to as 'spider-sense' or a more fun name given by Aunt May as 'Peter tingle', I had this magnetic force that attracts troubles. I asked Dr. Strange about it, but he still has no answer to what it was. When solving these uncalled-for problems, I usually used my powers secretly from the by-standing crowds. But some of my jinxing were too obvious to hide and people started to notice it. From my costume, they started to call me 'Blue Fox', 'Demonic Fox', or the worse ones like 'Japanese Wizard' and 'Anime-looking Avenger'. My favorite nickname was 'Blue Kitsune'. The person who coined it must be an intellectual. I missed walking while holding hands with Peter. I appreciate simple days like this. I looked at his face and tried to detect any stress left there. He never showed me any of his bad days in expressions or in words. I kind of wish he would.