Torn

-|SPIDERBOY|-

Katia walked through the door and went to her room to set her bag down. She took out her homework and started working. She finally finished after an hour. Her AP tech teacher had given her extra homework. He said that it was because she was "so smart" but Katia knew that roughly translated to "this is for being a smart-ass and making me look dumb." The truth is, her teacher didn't need Katia for that. Adults can be so oblivious, which is why they're so surprised when they learn that kids aren't stupid.

When she finished, she ate dinner and watched "Wierd Science", a John Hughes movie, with Natasha.

"This is incredibly degrading."

"Well, so was the 20th century."

"Huh."

After the movie, Natasha went to bed and Katia went to her room, but didn't go to bed yet. She usually stayed up late. She didn't want to get nightmares. Most nights she would just fall asleep at 1:00 AM. Tonight, she wanted to stay awake because she knew for a fact that she was going to get nightmares about school. She decided to open her window. What Natasha didn't know was that it's quite easy to sneak out through the window onto the roof.

And that is what Katia did. She clibed the fire escape up to the roof and sat down, looking at the moon. Her knees were hugged close to her chest. Part of her wanted to go back inside to the sweet bliss of sleep. The other part knew that her sleep would be plagued with nightmares. So she sat there, conflicted. At least there was a slight breeze to dry her tears. Suddenly, she heard someone behind her. Why is there someone on my roof? Is it Hydra or the Red Room?

She turned around and flipped open her pocket knife, holding it threateningly towards the mysterious figure.

"Woah, woah, woah! Chill!"

"Who are you, and why are you on my roof?"

"Uh, I'm Spiderman."

"You mean like a superhero?"

"Yeah, kinda..."

"And you're wearing sweatpants, to fight crime?"

"Umm... yeah?"

"Okay, what do you want?"

"Um, I was just doing my nightly patrol and I saw that you were crying, and on the edge of a roof, so I just wanted to make sure..."

"Oh. Yeah no."

"Why were you crying though?"

"Oh, jesus why am I not crying?"

Katia let out a forced laugh.

"Do you wanna talk about it?"

"I don't really know if I should be telling this to a stranger..."

"That's fine. So, um did you just come to your roof to cry, or..."

"I need it to be hard to fall asleep. I get really bad nightmares sometimes."

"Don't you have school tomorrow?"

"Unfortunatley, yes."

"Well, I gotta go."

"Bye..."

Katia watched as the hero swung off to somewhere else. Why was she so trusting to him? She didn't even know the guy! However, Katia kept going up to the roof and "Spiderman" (whoever he was) would always meet her there.

The next few weeks at school have been a little less than hell for Katia. The only thing that made her school life a little bit better was sitting with MJ at lunch. MJ didn't push her to talk about herself at all. They sat in comfortable silence.

One day at school, they heard Peter and Ned having a conversation.

"Guess what happened yesterday?"

"What?"

"Got an internship at Stark Industries!"

"Dude, that's amazing!"

Katia already knew there was something up with that because she had heard from Natasha that Tony stark doesn't take interns, and doesn't like kids.

"And, even better, I'm going to be in Berlin for the rest of the week!"

"For the internship?"

"Yeah!"

Katia tuned out of the conversation. Was Tony Stark really taking teenage interns?... Maybe out of guilt for what happened in Lagos a few days ago. He literally funded all student projects at MIT, so Katia wouldn't put it past him to take teenage interns who didn't even have their SAT scores yet.

Katia walked home to see Natasha packing some stuff for a mission. She was also packing some spare clothes which meant that she would be gone for a few days.

"Hey."

"Hey, Kat. Oh, I wanted to let you know I'm gonna be on a mission in Berlin for the next few days. Well, it's less of a mission and more of Steve being stupid."

"Cool... Oh, someone from school got a Stark internship in Berlin."

"Huh, that's weird. Stark doesn't usually take interns, let alone teens. He doesn't really like kids. Plus, he's gonna be on the mission in Berlin."

"That's weird."

That night, Katia went back onto her roof, like always. Spiderman was waiting for her there, like always.

"Sup, Spiderboy?"

"Aw, c'mon. It's SpiderMAN."

"Tell that to the lack of testosterone in your voice."

"How do you have so much energy this late at night?"

"Three words; Five. Hour. Energy."

"Oh my god. You didn't."

"I did. Tomorrow's a Saturday anyway. I'll be fine!"

Peter sat down next to Katia, who didn't even know it was him. He was excited to go to Berlin, but part of him didn't wanna leave her alone. He knew she gets nightmares, and he knew that she was lonely. But Mr. Stark said it was important...

(A/N - Sry this chapter is shorter than normal. I'll try to make the next one longer. For now tho, comment! Tell me what you think!)