[Kübler-Ross | Stage Two | Anger]

[daretodo]

The kitchen table's been overturned and the splintered remnants of a chair are scattered across the floor, along with broken plates and glasses, silverware. In the living room, a bookshelf's collapsed in on itself, the end table responsible for its destruction still hanging through the slats of one of the shelves. One of the couches has been torn

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[onlyforthedream]

There are a few people I haven't seen around as much since my discharge from being a full-time resident of the clinic, and Peter is one of them. As much as I would attribute it to the information I shared with him during his initial visit, I get the feeling that isn't necessarily the case, at least not exclusively

[daretodo]

I don't want company. There is absolutely nothing about my actions to suggest that anything other than this is true. I've purposely isolated myself. Withdrawn from the public. Been holed up in my house for God knows how long. I eat only what food's been brought to me out of some misplaced sense of pity, and shower just to get people to leave me alone. But for every person I tell to leave, someone else comes to take their place... Only it's never the right person, because that person -- Mary Jane, my wife -- is gone. Were I in any other frame of mind, maybe I would appreciate the concern that's been directed my way, but I'm not, and I don't.

Steve Rogers' presence comes only as an intrusion. I back away from the wall just enough to turn, leaving the latest line of my equations unfinished for the time being, though my grip on the marker hasn't loosened any for the distraction. There's no warmth in the look I give him, my gaze steady and cold; he's not welcome here.

"I should invest in a lock."

[onlyforthedream]

It would be a waste of money- there is quite clearly nothing left here he cares about losing.

Mary Jane, regardless of what universe she might be from, would never let this happen. Having seen Peter go through some staggeringly difficult times lately, I also can't imagine anything not having to do with her that would evoke this kind of response. The math is simple, but grim. She isn't here.

"Then I'm not the only one who's concerned," I observe, instead of telling him I'm sorry, or that I'd heard he'd been- not missing- scarce, or any other of a hundred easy observations, things to say that would be noise to fill up space.

[daretodo]

"No," I say on a short exhale of laughter, the corners of my mouth tugging outwards in a brief, bitter smile. For a moment, my gaze drops down to his shoulder. Last month, I stared inside this man's open chest cavity while a doctor who's since disappeared patched him up. I'm not about to treat him to the same show, even metaphorically. I look back up to his face.

Abandoning my station at the wall, I walk towards him, encroaching in on his space like he's done to mine. My heart's pounding in my ears; he's 6'2" and built like a house. I don't care.

"So you can leave now."