Just Kids | Peter Parker

22 | Lost My Mind

PETER

_

"You think I'm your friend?"

That's what she said to me that day, sitting on top of my Aunt's car, the movie playing in the background.

I always thought she considered me like that, but I was wrong. She didn't think I was her friend. She didn't think I knew her well enough to.

"Am I not yours?" I responded.

"I just don't think we know each other well."

But she was wrong. Even though she didn't know it, we did know each other. Like when she sent me the picture of the ducks at the pond. She told me she thought I'd like them, and that was friendship in itself.

She knew I would like it. She knew me well enough to know.

Wasn't that enough?

_

"All we know is that she's alive," Mr. Stark said, pacing back and forth, "we just don't know where she is."

We were running on 3 gallons of coffee, a couple blueberries we found in the kitchen, but that was it. It was almost 1 am and we still didn't find anything else helpful to the situation.

"So you saw her in the alley," I restated for the fifth time, "with a man who trapped her in a gate?"

Steve nodded his head, "with a man, who we can't identify."

"Isn't that the point of a security camera? To literally identify people's faces?"

"Yes, but that was the security footage from a 1975 model camera," Mr. Stark cut in, "so clearly it wouldn't be in the best condition."

I let myself topple over into the couch, slamming my face into the pillow. I felt sick to my stomach thinking about it. Thinking about her, thinking about how she was trapped, thinking about how she might as well be gone at this very moment.

Gone from the person I knew.

"So I have a plan," Mr. Stark said, stopping his path to pull up a holo-screen, "but there's a catch."

"We don't have time for a catch," I frowned.

"Well it's the only thing that could help us."

The man displayed a chart of every security camera in New York, the ID numbers filed into the never ending chart list. It was like staring at a giant grocery store receipt.

"So what's the plan?" Steve asked, tilting his head.

"I'll ask F.R.I.D.A.Y to look through all the footage, and try to identify her face," Stark said, "but that would take more than a few days."

"And we don't have that much time," Bucky said, "we don't have anything."

He had been silent this whole time, just listening to us talk and argue. Just like the rest of us, he had been hit hard with the news, but it was the worst for him. He's known her for longer.

Longer than any of us.

Yet, somehow I didn't want that to matter, even though I knew it did. I knew her for the least amount of time, but by the looks of it, I was the only one who actually cared about going out there and finding her.

Longevity didn't justify his silence.

"Maybe we wouldn't even be here," I said, standing up, "if any of you actually trusted her."

The three men looked taken aback at my outburst. At this point I didn't care, I was already pissed off. I had sat there for hours, waiting for Mr. Stark to use his technology to find an easy way to find her, but instead he only offered a week of waiting.

I couldn't wait. I couldn't wait at all.

"What the hell are you talking about?" Bucky scoffed, "since when did any of this have to do with trusting?"

"If all three of you actually believed she was getting better," I explained, sticking my pointer-finger out, "she wouldn't have to be coming to the tower!"

"What does the tower have to do with anything?"

"You tell me," I spat out, turning to Tony, "whatever your little experiments were, they hurt her. The first day, she cried in front of me, because she felt worse than ever."

Whatever I said, it shocked the three of them. Deadpan shocked. Bucky and Steve exchanged a glance of confusion, and turned back to look at me.

"She cried?" Steve questioned, "you saw tears coming out of her eyes?"

I furrowed my brow, "yeah, why?"

"Peter, she's never cried in front of anyone."

"Not even me," Bucky sighed.

He seemed a little offended when he admitted that, and slumped back onto the couch. Were they messing around? I couldn't believe that I was the first person she let herself cry around. Why me?

I... didn't know I meant that much to her.

Just by thinking those words, it made me want to find her even more. Pushing my hair out of my eyes, I regained my defensive stance.

"There has to be a quicker way to find her," I stated, "what else can we do?"

Tony tilted his head, "did she tell you anything?"

"What do you mean?"

"Did she make a hint at all that she was in danger?"

"No..." I started, before stopping myself.

She may have made a hint, but I didn't notice it. Maybe that was because she wasn't making the hint to me.

Maybe she was making it to someone else. Or something else.

"She had a video diary," I exclaimed, rushing towards the door, "I saw it back at my house."

Before they had a chance to respond, I scurried out of the tower, desperate to get back to my apartment. I needed the video camera. Desperately. Even if it had nothing to do with her escape, I still wanted it.

It was the last thing I had left of her.