[for Friends] happy birthday

[daretodo]

The only reason I remember it's my birthday today at all is because Pepper asked me if I want a party earlier in the week. I declined the offer, of course, both not wanting to trouble her any more than I already have and not up to the celebration. It's an occasion I meet with trepidation instead of jubilation, never having honestly thought I'd live

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[lucked]

No matter how much family hurts you, how much they scare you, even sometimes how much they betray you, it's pretty much impossible to stop caring. I know that I'm not the first person to learn this lesson, and there's no way I'll ever be the last. That doesn't mean that the sheer force of it hits me any less as I wake up in my hut, as I peek over at the calendar I've made for myself, carefully compiled after endless trips to the Council offices, trying to document everyone's birthdays, key anniversaries, deaths. I've seen this one coming for quite a while already, honestly. When people leave your life, you end up trying to take up little pieces of their burdens, I've found. Definitely true for me when it comes to Mary Jane, anyway, and I know that more than anything else, she'd want to make sure that Peter's okay today. She wouldn't want him to mourn, to be upset, and while I don't know Peter well enough even now (maybe especially now) to know how hard it'll be to get his chin up, the goal's the same regardless

[daretodo]

The truth is, I haven't exactly made myself available to the general public since the elections. In a lot of ways, the mansion has been the perfect hideout. It's almost silly to me now how resistant I was about moving in Tony and Pepper temporarily, and while I know I'm not going to impose my presence on them much longer, it's been good, living far enough out of the way -- well, comparatively out of the way -- that people didn't come knocking very often.

But I'm not at the mansion right now. I'm in another tree, having needed to pause on my way back to the mansion to switch out one of my web cartridges -- a task I immediately abort when I realize I've got company. I nearly fumble the cartridge in my surprise, but I catch it at the last second, leaning forward far enough in the process that I manage to catch sight of who, exactly, my company is.

Can't really say I was expecting Claire Bennet.

"...thank you?" I reply.

[lucked]

I breathe an immediate sigh of relief when it sounds like Peter isn't immediately balking at my presence. It's probably unexpected, sure, especially considering that I haven't made any real effort to chase after Peter these past couple of months. But at least he isn't glaring at me in the way that he did the last time we really talked, if you can even call it that. Maybe I'm just grasping at straws anymore after everything that's happened in my life lately, but as far as I'm concerned, there are worse things to chase after.

Licking my lips, I stare up briefly, although my gaze quickly starts trickling down the side of the tree, wondering how easy it'd be for me to climb up there. Probably not too hard, I figure. I'm pretty physical, if sometimes clumsy, but... pain's not really an issue, at least. I always deal pretty well with pain

[daretodo]

This is awkward. Not the conversation itself -- well, not just the conversation itself -- but the fact that I'm in a tree, and Claire's vertically challenged without me being a good thirty feet off the ground.

The problem is, I can't hop down. I mean, I could, but not in my usual way, or then I'd have to explain how I could do so in my usual way. At least she's not asking what I'm doing up here in this tree, I guess, though I should probably come up with one of my lame excuses before she does, just so I'm prepared. (Ha, there's a laugh. Being prepared, right.)

Slowly, I start to pick my way down the tree, making a show of finding footholds that I don't even need.

"You've seriously just been carrying around a cake all morning?"

[lucked]

Watching him climb down from the tree, I start wondering if I'll ever bring up the fact that I know the sort of activites that he got up to back at home. The fact that I know that he's Spider-Man. I've never really been that big of a comics fan, really- I know a lot of the big names, and I guess I've read the odd issue here and there, between my dad's and Zach's comic collections (the latter of which was far more extensive), but not enough for Peter to feel like a fictional character to me so much as my math and science teacher. Still, I do know enough of his background that holding that secret back seems to twist my stomach until he's back on the ground, at which point I try for a winning smile and hold out the basket with a small smile.

"Well, the way I figured," I shrug, like it's nothing at all, "if it took too long to find you, then I'd just have a very sugary meal on my hands."

[daretodo]

"Well, I've always been a proponent of cake for breakfast."

This is true in the sense that the only reason I didn't weigh four hundred pounds at home is because webslinging burns calories like you would not believe.

"It's the most important meal of the day, you know." Which is why I skipped it like a champ, but then, I was distracted by having a small, but significant epiphany. I'm allowed, especially since I've actually been pretty good with my eating habits, lately. I can't train with Cap on an empty stomach. The few times I have, I nearly passed out about fifteen minutes into the session.

[lucked]

"I'm partial to waffles, myself," I reply with a slight laugh. It's... clearly not back to the way it was, whatever relationship there is between the two of us. Today, though, I can't help but wonder if it's mostly on my end, for once. He seems to be okay. He seems to be doing a lot better than he has in months, actually, and here I'm just the one who's worried, and maybe a little scared, and god, just wanting for something in my life to calm down, as melodramatic as I'm sure it sounds. But the way I figure, things like your best friend disappearing from the island, things like finding out that one of your closest friends already died back home, none of them are easy to work with. Maybe I've got an excuse to be taking things at my own pace, just like Peter's had the same excuse. We're all trying to be okay. "Sometimes if I was running late, dad would make grilled cheese. It travels well

[daretodo]

I don't follow her right away. In fact, there's at least a few seconds between her sitting down and my taking the first step forward to join her, but while in my head they stretch out for an awkwardly long beat, I try to tell myself that it wasn't even noticeable, that -- hopefully brief -- moment of reluctance. I perch myself on a decent-sized rock, drawing one leg underneath me, and try not to think about the last time she'd asked me if I'd eaten.

"Um... No," I admit, ducking my head a little, though I'm quick to lift it again, along with both of my hands in a sort of defensive gesture. "But I do. Usually. In the morning. And the afternoon, and the evening. Three square meals, I promise." I let my hands drop down into my lap, and lean forward, dropping my voice down to a conspiratorial whisper. "Sometimes, I even snack."

[lucked]

I know that it's not really the sort of thing that a normal girl my age would laugh at, that kind of wink-wink nudge joke, but I do anyway, and with more (although definitely not complete, it's never completearound him) abandon than I have in quite some time. Because this is... well, the guy that I'd known before Mary Jane disappeared. Goofy, fun, kind of hip and nerdy for his age all at once, and I guess that's just the sort of person that I'm comfortable being around. Now, anyway. Not always. Cheerleading is still that kind of blemish on my record, back when pleated skirts and pom-poms were seriously all that mattered.

"Goodness," I play right along, dropping my voice to a hush, brows furrowed in an expression that I'm pretty sure is trying for stern, although I bet my eyes are giving me away, because I'm seriously about two seconds from just breaking down and laughing again. "But Peter, haven't you heard? Snacks can totally spoil your meals! You'd have to watch how much you eat. And what you eat. But then again, you're probably

[daretodo]

The metabolism comment makes me wonder if she knows about me, if Mary Jane told her something or if I'm nothing but a comic book hero in her world, but then she motors right on past it, and I'm so set on making this a good day that I motor, too, dousing the flare of panic in my chest with a bucket of stubbornness.

"Do I?" I ask, leaning forward to take the fork off her hands, and I twirl it a little between my fingers. "Got any suggestions? I've never been very good at wishes."

This isn't true. I'm great at wishes and hopes and dreams, but right now, every last one of them is more depressing than the last, and getting direction from a head that's not mine right now strikes me as a good idea.

[lucked]

Oh, do I have suggestions. The ones that all come to mind first are selfish, of course. No matter how much we might say that all we want is the best for our families and friends, I think... everyone has an idea of how that would ideally look to them. Maybe what Lyle wants more than anything else in the world is to become a monster truck driver, for instance, but maybe what I would most want to see making him happy is, is a normal high school life. Getting to join the semi-jock clique, the boys who play soccer instead of football. Getting into a good college. (God, I sound like my mom.) And so my mind rattles off a million things that I could want. Hundreds related to Peter himself