#but now those kids are starting to move onto the bigger grades ;____; omg...

[britneyshakespeare]

in a very strange way which confounds all logic and human emotion, i do enjoy substitute teaching

[bubble-tea-bunny]

what to do when you have a crush on your best friend 

[peter parker x reader]

author’s note: watched homecoming last night and i loved everything about it. this took a while to write because i kept getting distracted, and that title is whatever because i literally couldn’t think of anything else lolol

word count: 2,369

Peter gets the text message that afternoon during physics.

Happy: Tony’s got a new mission for the two of you.

Chat bubbles appear and two seconds later another message pops up.

[Name]: OMG. Down

Happy: What?

[Name]: You know

[Name]: like

[Name]: I’m down for a new mission ???

Happy doesn’t respond, but he’s probably shaking his head because working with “kids” (as he likes to call the two of you) is very nearly out of his pay grade most days. It makes Peter wonder just how many gray hairs he might’ve gotten since Tony recruited you and him. He smiles as he glances up at where you sit across the classroom. You give a glance to your phone before turning your attention back to what your teacher is writing on the board. There’s a hint of a smile on your face.

Peter looks back down at his phone and types in his own response quickly.

Me: Yes! Let’s do it!

Suddenly the vector diagram on the whiteboard is the least interesting thing in the world. Peter’s fidgety and in order to alleviate it, he bounces his leg. Just the thought of going on a new mission is making adrenaline rush through his veins. It had been a while since the last time you’d been called in by Tony. Between such calls, the both of you have been handling things in the neighborhood. It still kept you on your feet of course, and with two of you in the area, the work could be split evenly. At one point there had been an agreement that you would switch off, so that one person could take the extra time to concentrate on school, but you never actually talked about it anymore than that, didn’t figure out who would go out on what nights. You’d both just show up whenever there was a robbery to thwart or a stolen car to retrieve, clear evidence that you’d rather do the work together.

When 2:45 rolls around, Peter, you, and Ned walk out the front doors of Midtown High School. The flow of students is like a flood, some getting onto the buses, others walking down the sidewalk.

“I got the Imperial Star Destroyer set yesterday,” Ned begins. “We should build it tonight. It’s not as big as the Death Star one so it shouldn’t take too long.”

“Maybe not tonight,” Peter tells him.

Ned looks up at him, brow raised. Peter doesn’t say anything, just gives him a smile that’s half apologetic and half excited. Then Ned glances at you, and your smile is much the same. It clicks then, and his eyes light up. “Something came up with the internship?” he asks eagerly, voice hushed. He already knew your secrets, working for Tony as superheroes and such, but you’d all agreed to continue calling it the internship so as not to arouse suspicion if Ned got a little too animated and forgot to keep his voice down. The calls from Tony are few and far between still, picking and choosing as he is what missions to assign to you until you’re ready for tougher ones, or at least more frequent ones. And because these missions seem to appear once in a blue moon—at least, that’s how it feels to the three of you—it’s easy to get excited.

You crack first. “Right?" You practically squeal, thrilled as you are to have a change from nabbing bike thieves and saving cats from trees. “I mean, what do you think it’ll be this time? What if our assignment brings us to Manhattan?”

Manhattan is where all the bigger crimes happened, since it’s the economic and administrative hub of New York City. Tony had never given you missions in that area, preferring you to stick to easier ones for now. Besides Manhattan attracting more dangerous criminals, all the skyscrapers and bumper-to-bumper traffic made damage control a challenge. With each day you and Peter take to the streets of Queens in search of miscreants, you’re honing your skills. It’s slow, but it’s consistent. You might not notice the improvements and increased control of your abilities over time, but maybe now they’ve gotten good enough that Tony will let you take on the big guys.

At your speculation, Ned gasps, becomes just as giddy. “Dude, that would be so awesome!”

Peter laughs at your guys’ antics but to be fair, he feels really excited too. Just getting a call-in from Tony is amazing in and of itself, no matter if it took you two to Manhattan or if you were staying in Queens. Whatever the mission might be, it was one brought to Tony’s attention and one he wanted you to take on yourselves, and that’s incredible to consider.

The three of you part ways at the end of the block. “Good luck,” Ned tells you both. “Tell me all about it when you’re done!”

You laugh. “If you don’t see it on the news first!”

You and Peter go to his apartment to wait for Happy, who would be picking you up to bring you to the Avengers facility upstate for your briefing. It feels like it takes the subway forever to arrive today, and Peter is jittery again. He wrenches his hands together while the two of you wait on the platform because he doesn’t have anything else to keep them busy. He rocks himself to and fro on the balls of his feet. He sighs heavily as he stares at the tracks which disappear in the distance, willing the train to just show up already.

“It feels like we’ve been waiting forever,” he remarks.

You glance up at him amusedly. “We’ve been waiting for two minutes.”

“That’s so long,” Peter drags out the last two words in a tone of exasperation that’s equal parts joking and genuine. “What if Happy gets there before us and wonders where we are?”

“Doubt he’ll beat us to your apartment. He’s probably stuck in traffic.”

You end up being right. Happy arrives fifteen minutes later than the time he gave in the group chat. You and Peter slide into the backseat and as soon as Peter’s closed the door behind him, Happy’s merging back into the street, muttering something about “stupid traffic” and “people don’t know how to use blinkers do they even know what blinkers are?”

Unfortunately the mission doesn’t bring you to Manhattan. The two of you are tasked with following some vehicles carrying suspicious cargo. In Tony’s words: “I want you to tail ‘em, find where they hide out, and shut ‘em down if the operation isn’t large-scale. If it is, let me know and I’ll bring in backup.” You and Peter are sitting at a conference table, the wood cool to the touch, as you watch surveillance tapes. They give you an idea of where to start, and what the trucks look like. Come nightfall, the two of you are suited up and staking out a warehouse the trucks are supposed to be leaving from within the next twenty minutes.

“What do you think they’re carrying?” Peter asks you, the eyepieces of his suit shrinking slightly to imitate the way he’s narrowing his eyes as he stares at the loading bay.

“I want to say pastries, but I think that’s just because I’m hungry,” you respond easily, eyes also watching the loading bay attentively.  

“An underground pastry trafficking organization?”

“Dangerously delicious and highly lethal to your health,” you quip playfully.

Peter laughs, thinks that if such were the case, he’d be curious to try one of those pastries himself. He glances at you. You’re not wearing a mask since you don’t need one for your superpower, and while the place you’re hiding out in is dark, his suit HUD adjusts accordingly, allowing him to see you clearly. Usually you like to tie your hair to keep it out of your way, but you’d lent out your only hair tie earlier in school today and you’d depleted the spares you kept in Peter’s room (you either lent them or lost them). So tonight it flows freely over your shoulders. Your [eye color] eyes are full of focus, your face etched in concentration. He smiles almost subconsciously as he studies you, but you can’t see it because he has his mask on.

“Hey, they’re finally leaving.” At your words, Peter turns his attention to the loading bay. Two trucks enter out into the street, but before the two of you can get a move on, the vehicles go in two separate directions.

You and Peter look at each other in confusion. “Think they’re heading to the same location?” he inquires.

You sigh and stand up. “Only one way to find out.”

“Stay safe.”

You look back at Peter and smile softly. “Always am. You stay safe too, Spidey.”

His cheeks warm at the nickname and he stays where he is when you jump down. You start shifting, no longer an unassuming teenage girl but a large and menacing werewolf. The suit you wear had been engineered to adjust to your size whenever you shifted, so it fits snug to your body as you take off after one of the trucks, keeping a comfortable distance as you follow it. These trucks take industrial roads so there’s no reason for you to be worried about being spotted by anyone else, especially at this time of night. Peter gets his bearings back quickly and takes off after his own truck before it can disappear.

“You like her,” Karen speaks up, her voice a familiar presence while he’s in the suit.

“Who, [Name]?” Peter plays dumb. “Of course I like her. She’s one of my best friends.” He really hopes that’ll be the end of the conversation, but knowing Karen, it won’t be.

“You’ve got a crush. I can tell.” If Karen had a face, she’d be smiling teasingly.

“I do not have a crush,” he says, cheeks burning all over again.

“Your heart rate’s increased.”

Damn. He’d forgotten about that feature. “I’m just excited the mission is finally getting started.”

“It increased when the two of you were still hiding. Before the trucks left. While you were staring at her.” Right. She could see what he saw. He forgot about that too.

“Okay, maybe I do like her a little.” A pause. “Or a lot.” There’s no sense denying it anymore. He’d basically revealed his crush on you to Karen without meaning to. When he’s in the Spiderman suit, it’s like she’s a part of him.

“Have you told her?”

“No! What if she gets all weirded out? I’m not risking our friendship!” He cannot believe he’s having this conversation while tailing a truck.

“She won’t be ‘weirded out.’ I promise.”

“How can you be sure?”

“Because you’re Peter Parker, and your heart is gold. If I were her, I wouldn’t be weirded out at all.”

A warm feeling settles in his chest at Karen’s words. He swears she's like his personal cheerleader. Despite being just an AI, she seems so human, perfectly willing to give him advice outside of what’s relevant to his missions. She reminds him of Aunt May, encouraging as she is. He smiles. “Thanks, Karen.” He means it with his whole being when he says that.

She hums as though to say you’re welcome, another mannerism that’s so reminiscent of humans. “Ask her on a date,” she suggests.

“How?” They seem to be closing in on the hideout now.

“Just ask. It doesn’t have to be anything fancy. It could be while you’re doing homework.”

The truck starts to pull in to another factory building, and Peter tries to find you, hidden somewhere in the darkness, to confirm whether or not the trucks had indeed been traveling to the same place.

“Karen, help me find [Name], will you?”

“Initiating thermal vision.”

The HUD turns blue and Peter scans the area, searching for heat signatures. There are some he can spot inside the factory. He sees you behind a power box, just outside the fences. The form is no longer a werewolf but a person. You’d shifted back. He goes to find you and drops down next to you. You don’t flinch when he does.

“Looks like they did come to the same place,” you comment.

“Yeah,” Peter agrees as his HUD switches back to normal. “It didn’t look like there were many people inside. I think this is something we can take on our own.”

You nod. “Okay.”

“And, um, [Name]…”

Peter trails off and doesn’t actually finish the sentence, and you look over at him. He’s not looking at you, instead staring at the ground. “Hey, you okay?” you ask worriedly.

“Did you uh…” No turning back now, Peter. Spit it out! “Did you maybe wanna go get some ice cream after this?”

It takes you a moment to realize just what he’s asking, but when you do, your grin is wide and your stomach is doing somersaults—and not because you’re hungry.

Peter hasn’t looked up, too nervous that you might reject him, and he’s surprised when he feels you kiss his cheek, lips passing over the smooth material of his mask. He looks up at you, eyepieces widening, and you laugh.

“I’d love to get ice cream with you.” Your smile is bright and gosh, you are so pretty. Peter feels light as air and he swears he can fly all the way to the moon. You look so happy to have been asked, as though this is something long overdue. Now he wonders why he ever felt any doubt, because clearly it was misplaced. He can’t but smile too.

“Now come on, let’s clear out that warehouse before Baskin Robbins closes!” Before he can respond, you’ve jumped over the fence, shifting mid-run and taking off toward the loading bay, where the doors are still open—your ticket inside. Peter follows, clearing the fence easily, and sets off in a run.

“Hey, uh, Karen?” he begins. He doesn’t worry about you hearing him since you’re just a tad out of range.

“Yes?”

“Thanks.”

“You’re welcome, Peter.” He can practically hear the smile in her voice.