Chapter Text
Mary Jane Watson looked around the cafe. It wasn’t their usual place, but they came here occasionally as it was slightly nicer than the automat. If they kept to the sandwiches, it wouldn’t cost much more than they usually spent.
Peter came through the door, looking just a little flushed, and smiled when he spotted her at the worst table in the joint. She looked at him consideringly. He was good-looking, certainly, finally filled out from the gangliness of his youth, into a handsome, long-legged man. And he’d done well for himself—a physics professor, no less! It had been a pleasant surprise to see when she’d come home from the war in Spain, and during those first few dreadful months after she’d come home, pleasant surprises had been rare and welcome.
But he looked tired; she’d spent enough coffee dates with him to know he was spread thin. His work at the university was demanding enough, but now there was the war effort as well...and his other job, that he didn’t talk about in cafes. Peter Parker was the strongest person she knew—but then, he’d had to be. This will help both of us, she assured herself. I hope.
“Hello, Mary,” he rumbled.
“Hello, Peter,” she replied, as he sat across from her.
A waitress came by and got their orders—sandwiches for both of them, with pickles and such, and coffee, of course. All of New York ran on coffee.
“So…” Mary said.
“So,” Peter said, and stirred too much cream into his coffee, until it was as pale as wheat. “What did you want to talk about?”
“I’ve been thinking about what I want out of life. I don’t want to keep living in my father’s house.” She didn’t need to explain why; not to Peter.
Peter pulled the coffee spoon out his mouth and said, “There are a couple of respectable boarding houses for single women over in Yorkville. Aunt May would be happy to be a reference for you.”
She took a deep breath. “I was thinking more that I’d like to get married.”
“Oh?” Peter said, smiling politely. “Anyone I know?”
Mary’s face went flat, her lips a thin line and her eyes narrow. “You cannot possibly be that dense, Peter.”
What? What did I—oh. Oh!
“I don’t think I’m very good husband material,” Peter said.
Mary didn’t change her expression, then sighed. “You’d still be a better husband than my father.”
That is a low bar to clear, Peter refrained from saying.
“It’s a sensible arrangement,” Mary said. “I need to get out, you’re going to need a wife eventually, and Aunt May should have help around the house. We’ve been friends forever, and marriages have been built on less.” She looked composed and determined; she’d thought about this.
“Give me a minute,” he said, and pushed back from the table. It was…well, it wasn’t the worst proposal he’d ever heard, considering he was evaluating research grants on the regular.
But it was plainly practical, from Mary, who’d always been an idealist, hoping and working for better things. Practically, he should consider it.
Peter was already politely declining the attempts by colleagues’ wives to fix him up with friends, or worse, students. An engagement, or better yet, a marriage, would put the kibosh on all that.
Mary moving in, taking over some of the domestic tasks that were getting hard on Aunt May, would be a boon. There was a limit to what May would let Peter do before she kicked up a fuss, but having a niece-in-law might soothe her ruffling feathers. It wasn’t that Peter couldn’t take care of himself—being friends with the other Spiders had cured any learned stupidity, especially when Miles pointedly asked him if he knew how to cook for himself, and then took great delight in teaching him—but it wounded his aunt’s pride that he thought he had to.
And it would get Mary Jane out of her father’s house. He had noticed how she was always happy to come visiting among their circle, and how she quieted when it was time for her to return home. It was more noticeable now, after she’d gone to Spain and come back.
“Mary proposed?” Miguel repeated. “Marriage?! I thought women weren’t supposed to do that for you folks?”
Peter frowned. Miguel didn’t have to make it sound like Peter’s New York was the heart of darkest Africa or something equally baffling and exotic.
“It’s usually the other way round, but Mary’s a modern girl,” Peter explained. “She can ask me. I don’t mind.”
Miguel’s expressive eyebrows were up to his hairline. “You said yes.”
Peter didn’t think that needed an answer. He wouldn’t be here, telling Miguel first after Aunt May, if he hadn’t.
“So this means...I have no idea what this means, what does this mean?”
“I’m getting married. I’d like you to be there.”
Miguel stared at him, goggle-eyed.
“It’ll be at the city registrar’s office, so you won’t have to go to a church,” Peter offered their old joke. “Wouldn’t want you to burst into flame…”
He knew he was in trouble when Miguel just glared. When Miguel didn’t squawk like a chicken about not being a vampire, it meant things were bad. “Why are you getting married?” Miguel asked.
Peter fiddled with his hat. “Mary’s one of my best friends. We’ve known each other since we were kids, and it makes sense.”
“Peter.”
He was going to break like an egg in the face of Miguel’s stony-eyed frown. He knew he would. “She needs to get away from her folks, and I need someone to look after Aunt May while I’m gone, and yes, it’s not the most romantic reason, but I trust her and I love her and I’ll try my best to make her happy.”
“Peter…”
“I told her, I told her I wasn’t good husband material, but she said I’d be better than her father.” Peter snorted. “That’s not hard. A dog in the street is better than a mean drunk.”
“So you’re going to spend the rest of your lives together because it’s not the worst you could do? Terrific. It’ll be a great story to tell your kids.” Miguel paused and frowned. “Is that why you’re doing this? Do you want to have kids?”
“That the only reason people get married, here and now?” People in Miguel’s dimension were a lot looser in their morals, Peter knew, men and women both. They didn’t think having relations before marrying was any kind of problem. In fact, they seemed to think it was an important part of choosing your future husband or wife.
“No, not the only reason, but the biggest one by far is wanting kids. So, do you?”
“Kids generally do show up,” Peter said.
“Only if you’re flarking irresponsible!” Miguel shouted.
Peter sighed, and pinched the bridge of his nose. “Miguel, we only have French letters and Dutch caps as birth control, and I didn’t even know about those until Peter B dropped an educational book in my lap and skedaddled.”
Miguel gave him a flat look. “I can get you a contraception shot in sixteen minutes. Assuming, of course, that you’re going to need one. Have you explained that to the lovely Miss Watson? You’re grayer than I am, Peter. I know, because I had to explain to you what all the words meant, and how that meant you weren’t broken.”
“I can’t tell her that!” Peter hissed.
Miguel tilted his head.
“I can’t. I can’t say I’m—”
“Grayer than a raincloud and full of cake?”
“—queer,” Peter whispered. “I can’t say I’m queer. I can’t.”
Miguel’s face went funny, and he sat down. On Peter’s lap, with his hands on Peter’s shoulders, staring at Peter with his big red eyes.
“Mhlobo, you have to be honest with her. She’s one of your best friends, and she’s going to expect things that you can’t give her. Love, yes, you’re good at that. Sex, well, you say you manage with women. Honest desire, though? No, and you know it. And shiny people, people who aren’t grey like us, they usually want that.”
Peter pressed his face into Miguel’s neck, and shivered.
“You know, this is not how I imagined getting dumped…” Miguel said after some time had passed.
Peter drew back. “Dumped?” He knew that word, he knew what it meant, here and now, “I’m not—”
“Getting married?” Miguel said brightly, bitterly. He was trying to put a good face on it, but he wasn’t happy. Peter could tell.
“...right,” Peter said. “That.”
“You guys still only have man-woman, only-one-of-each marriages.” Miguel said. “Or do I have my history wrong? It was never my best subject.”
Peter shook his head. “No, that’s right. But...I don’t want to lose you, either.”
“Polycules aren’t exactly my thing, Peter,” Miguel said. Peter had no idea what that word meant, except that maybe that he wouldn’t lose Miguel by marrying Mary. “I have a hard enough time keeping one relationship going.”
“You’ve stepped out, sometimes,” Peter countered. He had, and with Peter’s blessing, because while having sex with women was like dancing without having eyes, having sex with men was like dancing without having feet. Peter couldn’t do it, and his attempts with Miguel had been disastrous. At least they’d been funny and disastrous, instead of heartbreaking and disastrous.
“Yeah, I have. Never for long; there aren’t a lot of people who do it for me anyway, and most of the ones who do can’t put up with me for more than a month. You’re kind of unusual that way. I thought, anyway...”
Miguel made to stand, but Peter caught his hand.
“Mhlobo,” he said, “you’re my half, my heart.”
“Mary the other half?” Miguel asked. His face wasn’t so stony anymore.
“I think so, yes.”
“She’s not grey, though.”
“I don’t think so,” Peter admitted. They were part of a rather bohemian set, and there were a few men and women who were quietly queer among them, but Mary was willing to overlook, not out looking for those sorts, he thought.
“You’ve got to tell her—everything, Peter, and I know that’s going to be hard as shock for you. I’ll be there if you want me to, and if she doesn’t throw you out of your ear, or me out on mine, then we’ll sit down, all three of us, and discuss how things will be after you guys get married. That’s what has to happen.”
Peter sighed, and pulled Miguel over to sit beside him.
“I don’t know…”
“Got to start as you mean to go on, mhlobo. I’ve sure shocked more than one relationship because I didn’t. I’m not doing that with you, or letting you do it with a wife.”
Peter pulled Miguel over, forehead to forehead and just breathed along with him. Miguel was right. Of course he was, but telling Mary everything was going to hurt. And there was no guarantee that she wouldn’t throw him away at the end.
“All right,” he agreed. “I’ll figure out how to introduce you…how to tell her.”
Miguel smiled sadly, and kissed him on the corner of his mouth. “Just say the word and I’m there, mhlobo.”
Mary looked at the little glass sculpture Peter kept in the window. It was blocky and amateurish, but it was a flower made of stained glass, and when the light hit it just right it painted the walls with all the tints in the spectrum. She’d thought that was why he kept it, because it was pretty and uncomplicated and Peter needed more of both those in his life.
“It’s a photovoltaic cell,” Peter said. “Basically, it captures sunlight and turns it into electricity. Peni gave it to me, to charge the battery of the gizmo.”
Mary looked down at the not-a-watch in her hands. The watchface was slid off to the side now, and she was looking at a tiny screen of glass, where miniscule words floated like an old silent movie’s intertitles. Peter leaned over to tap it, and the tiny words bloomed in the air until they were as big as a book page.
“This is like something out of Buck Rogers,” she murmured.
Peter nodded, and raked his fingers through his hair. “It’s more amazing than that. Jules Verne, or the Lensmen, maybe. Peni’s world is…indescribable.”
“You’ve been there…?”
Peter nodded again, his face going soft. “It's really different there, Mary. It’s just so…itself, and not like here at all. The others, their New Yorks are different—taller, flashier, more expensive—but I can see ours in them. Peni’s New York is amazing. And…well, scary. Gorgeous, but I couldn’t find my way myself, and it’s so weirdly beautiful, it’s like stepping into a dream.”
Mary looked at Peter as he watched the door. They had light sandwiches in front of them, nothing spectacular but definitely wholesome—one of the better selections from the automat’s offerings, especially this late.
Then his face lit up the way it did, crinkles around his eyes and a tilt up at the corner of his mouth.
“Miguel!”
The man who approached was so unbelievably handsome that Mary had to look away to keep from staring. Hair the shade of cherrywood, a face perfect and debonair as a Hollywood idol, with dark glasses completing the effect. His suit was just the slightest bit too flashy, a subtle and adventurous houndstooth, and his hair a bit too long as it curled against his shirt collar.
Mary would have pigeonholed him as one of their fellow bohemians, except there was something subtly off as he greeted Peter. And she had heard Peter’s story of his adventure outside the world they knew.
Light. Colors. An alien term for an alien phenomenon. There was a time she would have demanded Peter take her to see those other worlds of wonders. But that was before Spain, before she learned that wonders and horrors were so often the same things. She was so much more cautious now.
...still, it didn't hurt to look.
“Mary Jane?” Peter was looking at her with that reserved concern he had now.
His friend Miguel smiled, an odd tight thing. He didn’t like to show his teeth, Peter had said; just tell him to repeat himself if he mumbles.
“Pleasure to meet you, miss,” he said, except he said ‘miss’ wrong, too hard and short, more like ‘mix’. He didn’t sound like a Spaniard or a Puertorriqueño. Or an Irishman, either, for all that he had that Irish surname. He just sounded odd, the rhythm of his words just a little out of step with what they should be.
Miguel sat down in the third seat across as Peter hurried off with a word about getting more sandwiches and coffee.
“No money?” Mary asked. Most people could usually bum up a dime for an automat sandwich.
“None that’s good here,” Miguel shrugged apologetically. “We don’t use coinage where I’m from.”
Mary tried to imagine that. A world without coins. How would you pay for a loaf of bread or a crate of apples without dimes and nickels? Paying with whole dollars and not getting any change back? Did they run accounts, and you only settled up when you bought a dollar’s worth of goods? Running tabs everywhere would be mighty inconvenient, even if they had an account with the grocer.
Mary looked up, to see Miguel looking at her with consideration in his eyes. He leaned forward, as if sharing a confidence.
“Peter still thinks he can make a better world,” Miguel said in a soft, brittle tone. “If he just convinces the right people, or punches the right ones…”
“I used to think that,” Mary said, and it felt like one more failure, admitting that loss. “That I could change the world if I just tried hard enough. If I threw myself into the fight with enough conviction.”
Miguel O’Hara looked at her sharply, and then sighed. “I never really did, but I wasn’t going to let them win without a fight. I even manage to win, sometimes, in spite of the odds are against me.”
Mary frowned at that, and was about to ask what he meant, who he was fighting in his shining World of Tomorrow, when Peter returned with more sandwiches and piping fresh coffee.
“Oh, yum,” Miguel said as he wrapped his hands around the cup, seeming content to just wallow in the scent of it.
Peter rolled his eyes and smiled, tight and small, at that. Mary stifled a giggle.
“Hey, you don’t know how lucky you are to have real coffee, alright,” Miguel said, not opening his eyes as he took a blissful sip.
“Miguel has terrible coffee. I’ve had boiled cabbage that tasted better.”
Miguel snorted, but didn't deny it.
Mary had had worse, in Spain. There had been times, near the end, when...
“That’s a nice houndstooth,” she said. Trying for small talk, diverting herself from that train of thought. Dwelling on the past made her too quiet, worrying Peter.
“What’s houndstooth?” Miguel shot a baffled look over the table as Peter pushed a sandwich over to him.
“I picked that suit out for him,” Peter murmured. “Miguel dresses in the dark, left to himself.”
Miguel rolled his eyes behind his smoked glasses, Mary was quite sure. “He cares a lot more about my clothes than I do.”
“Appearances are important! You dress like a bindlestiff, given your druthers.”
Mary tried to imagine the sleek, urbane Miguel dressed like a hobo. Maybe he’d make it as a Hollywood version, but she couldn’t see him as one of the men who frequented the welfare center, ragged coats and ragged souls.
“I have something to tell you,” Peter said, once they were all settled back at the empty house. “There are things you need to know before we get married. Things I should have told you before I agreed.”
Oh, mierda, am I going to have to keep living with my father? It was a first and unworthy thought, and she squashed it. Hear him out.
Peter looked to Miguel, for reassurance, and Miguel nodded at him, like he was encouraging him to start.
Mary leaned forward. “What is it? What is the problem?”
“I’m queer,” Peter said in a very small voice.
Mary looked over to Miguel. Is he saying—are they—?
“It’s not exactly what you’re thinking,” Miguel said, as if he’d read her mind. “He means he’s gray, like me. Well, sort of.”
“Explain, because I don’t know what that means.” Temper and uncertainty made her voice sharp; he was being deliberately unhelpful.
“I don’t notice if people are attractive, most of the time. Almost all of the time, to be truthful, It makes my love life pretty different from most people.”
Mary frowned, and then turned to look at Peter.
“‘He’s gray, like me’,” she repeated. “What does that mean, Peter?”
Peter looked ill, but he swallowed and said, “I didn’t know why I didn’t start wanting people when and like everyone else did. I only figured it out myself after I met the other Spiders and started talking to them. Started spending time in their worlds and hearing their terms, the way different times think about things. I thought I was broken, until then.”
“Peter B was kind of appalled at how little sex education you have in this dimension,” Miguel cut in.
Peter glared at him, and Mary turned to stare at the man. “Excuse me?” she snapped.
Miguel leaned forward. “I had a very narrow education, but we at least got to learn the basics of how our bodies work, how not to get pregnant or not get anyone else pregnant, depending. But your people get nothing.”
Mary was taken aback. Yes, she’d mostly learned about marital relations in Spain, listening to the local women gossiping and commiserating about their husbands. The idea that somewhere children were being taught that in school…was disturbing.
“What are you trying to tell me?”
Peter’s hand pressed against hers, and he looked her in the eyes. “I’m not attracted to you, Mary—no, shhh—I’m not attracted to anyone. It’s not anything wrong with you. That’s all my problem. But I still love you, and I want to marry you. But you have to be okay with this thing about me, because I don’t think it will work out otherwise.”
Mary looked at him, and then at Miguel. “Where does he come in?” Because somehow, the other man was involved. Peter wouldn’t have him here otherwise.
“Ah,” Peter said stupidly.
“We’ve been partners for five years,” Miguel said, sharp and oddly brittle. “A—guess you’d call it—‘passionate friendship’.”
Mary raised her eyebrows at him.
“That means all the romance, but none of the sex,” he said.
“Miguel…” Peter groaned.
“She asked.”
“Stop helping.”
“So if Peter and I get married,” Mary said. “You’ll be… what? A mistress?”
Miguel’s face went through a whole series of contortions, until he spat, “No. Never.”
“Well…” Peter said.
“The word is ‘metamour’,” Miguel snapped, “at least in my world. I’m not your lover, you’re not mine, but Peter is both ours.” Peter frowned, like he suddenly realized that he was now joint property and wasn’t sure he liked it.
“All right,” Mary said.
That made both of the men blink.
“All...right?” Miguel asked. Peter looked at her searchingly. They both looked so befuddled.
“It’s a better situation than my father’s philandering,” Mary explained. She turned to Peter, “You’re not going to bring home any social disease, he’s not going to either—”
MIguel mouthed ‘social disease?’ with a frown.
“— and I will be happy with that.”
Peter looked at her, and asked, “Really?”
“Yes.” Mary was sure she would be. Peter was already a better husband than her father had ever attempted.
“Mary,” he purred, and pulled her close. Mary let him envelope her in a hug, and then, realizing, looked out of Peter’s arms to see Miguel looking lost.
“Come here, Miguel,” she said, and pulled him into the hug when he cautiously stepped close.
She was going to make this work, come hell or high water.
“Peter, what are you doing?” Mary yelped as Peter abruptly steered them into an alley. Mary didn’t want to go—her arms were full of the deli order that he had insisted on, and that alley looked dank.
“I told you,” Peter said, pulling down a fire escape ladder with a jump that would make an Olympic athlete jealous. “My friends want to throw us a party.”
They’d gone out to lunch at a white tablecloth place after the courthouse ceremony with Aunt May, some of Peter’s coworkers from the university and their wives, and some of the office girls from the radio station. Mary had dropped a letter to her parents in a post box with satisfaction. If it arrived tomorrow, maybe then her parents would notice her empty closet and missing suitcase.
Peter got her up on the roof, but it was just a roof, tar paper and pigeon droppings as far as the eye could see.
“Hold on, and don’t drop that basket,” he said and picked her up.
Then he ran off the roof.
Mary barely had time to shriek before they landed on the next roof over. “Don’t worry, it’s only a couple more blocks!” Peter said cheerfully and not at all reassuringly as he ran for the opposite edge of the building roof.
He set her down on her feet on a roof that didn’t seem any different than any other. “Here we are!”
She rounded on him. “Peter Benjamin Parker, ask next time you want to do that!”
Peter’s eyes went wide at her anger. Mary was glad of it, but then there was rollicking laughter from behind them, some voices loud in glee. She turned to see several people on the roof with them, laughing and chortling, and another two holding it in with bitten-lipped smiles.
“Hello, Peter. Mary,” Miguel greeted them. He’d changed out of the smart suit he’d worn at the courthouse for their wedding this morning, into coarse workman’s trousers and a light knitted shirt. He looked more comfortable, dressed down like a man about to work on his roses.
The young man with the cloud of hair must be Miles, and the women would be Gwen and Peni, though Mary wasn’t sure which was which. The pig (a cartoon pig, standing right there on the rooftop, real as anything!) was nicknamed Ham, which left the man with whitened temples as Peter B. He looked eerily like Peter, just older and a bit shorter, with darker eyes and a loose, open stance.
“Hello, Miguel,” Mary managed. He was the only one she’d actually been introduced to, after all, though Peter had talked about them all. They were still finding their way around each other, but he had stood beside Peter at the wedding.
“Congratulations!” someone shouted, and that must have been the cue they’d been waiting for, as a shower of white hit Mary and Peter. Rice? No, cut paper, and noisemakers—that had better not be Peter’s grogger! He had so few things left from his parents…no, that thing in Peter B’s hand must be his own.
“Alright, alright,” Peter waved his friends off from their fun. They’d be picking out paper bits from their hair and clothes all night, but watching the other Spiders' smiles as they crowded forward to introduce themselves, Mary didn't mind at all. Gwen turned out to be the blonde with thoughtful eyes and a dancer’s walk, and Peni the shorter girl with a cheerful smile and shade-streaked hair.
“C’mon,” Miles said. “We brought cake!”
“And music!” Gwen waved…a pane of dark glass? Except she touched it, and it glowed with its own light, and music filled the air. “We can dance!”
The music was better than a radio, not a scratch or a skip, and it was Glen Miller. Mary gave Peter an inquiring look, and he laughed, and swung her into his arms while his friends whooped and hollered. Then Gwen pulled Miles alongside, and soon everyone was dancing, filling the roof with leaps and whirls and laughter, while music poured from a pane of glass.
Later, sitting on the leg of Peni’s spider machine as a makeshift bench, a paper plate full of the strangest, most delicate cake she’d ever tasted, she realized, I’m married. Peter’s my family now, and I’m his.
And she didn’t cry, but she had to swallow hard a couple times.
She watched Peter among the others, guiding Gwen, Peni, and Miles through a jitterbug pattern while Peter B kibbitzed with Miguel and Ham, like they were a trio of old men on a stoop, and smiled to herself. There was a lot more family than she’d expected, that was all.
Peter was startled to find Peni sitting on his stoop when he came home, awkward in a summer dress. She wore it like it was made of paper and would tear apart if she breathed wrong.
“Peni?”
“Hi, Peter.”
“What are you doing here?” he asked, ushering her into the front room. Aunt May probably wouldn’t be back for hours yet, not until after the 8 pm soup line was closed, but there were beans soaking in a pot and some corned beef in the icebox. He’d make his own supper.
And maybe feed Peni while she explained why she was here unexpectedly.
Peni placed a heavy parcel, wrapped in something that probably only looked like sack paper, on the table. “I brought you this.”
“This?”
“Open it," she said impatiently, and he did.
It was a portable typewriter, glossy black and unremarkable, except for the flowers stenciled delicately around the sides, and the unfamiliar switches down at the base, almost hidden among the feet.
“Thanks, Pen, but I already have a typewriter. I don’t really need another.”
“It’s not just a typewriter. It’s…let me show you. I need a sheet of paper.”
Peter fetched a sheet and watched as she fed it through the rollers, slightly crooked. She snapped the platen tight, pushed a button on the side until it clicked tight, then pulled her gizmo out of her dress pocket.
She ran her fingers over the gizmo’s face, with the quick assured movements Peter had seen countless times before. She tapped once, and he felt the slight vibration on his wrist of his gizmo receiving a message.
Then the typewriter began to clatter, typing out HELLO PETER.
“You made a teletype?!” Peter exclaimed, baffled but intrigued. His gizmo was disguised as a heavy and battered wristwatch, but this was new.
“Is that what you call it? I made it so you can take it with you; it’ll hold the messages until you have the time to respond. I thought the typing might be less conspicuous than your gizmo, but it accesses the same network, and you can get your messages either way. You just need to leave it in a sunny window for a few hours every day to keep it charged.”
“Aw, Peni,” he said, and pulled her close for a hug. She came to his shoulder now, instead of small enough to carry pick-a-back, but still the brilliant girl who’d machined their way out of danger all those years ago.
“Thank you,” he said into her sleek black hair, “but I can’t take it.”
“Peter!”
“No, I can’t. I’m not going to have much privacy, Peni, and if someone really looks, is it going to look like a typewriter? I can see the switches from here, and those are queer enough that someone might tear this open to see inside, and then where would I be?”
Peni’s frown turned bleak. “You won’t take anything, will you?”
Peter hated to disappoint her, but—he shook his head.
“I just want to know you’re alive!” she said, and jumped to hug him.
Peter wrapped his arms around her, his chin against her temple—she’d grown up over the years, but not very much.
“I’ll send letters,” he promised. “We’ll figure out a way for you to get them. And you can write me, and Mary will help you post them.”
“It’s not going to be enough,” Peni sniffled.
He smoothed her hair. He wanted to make this better for her, wanted to tell her everything would be all right, but he couldn’t, not this time. “It'll have to be.”