"Alright, Ned, power up the regulator but don't overdo it, or we're going to leave the school's entire west wing in the dark," I warned him as I held the prototype's glass tube over the lab table.
We were right in the middle of our free hours at the science club, and the room was a complete disaster of loose wires, tools, and component boxes scattered everywhere. Ned was hellbent on adding a particle ionizing module to his electromagnetism project to create visual plasma arcs that would blow the science fair judges away. The problem was that the device looked more like a B-movie bazooka than a responsible school experiment, and to top it off, its shape looked strangely like a dick. When I pointed it out to him, the bastard shot back without missing a beat: "A hungry man only thinks of bread".
"Relax, Peter, I have everything under control," he defended himself, rubbing his hands together with a mad-scientist smirk before grabbing the main switch. "The coil is ready. We just need to charge the electrodes. Ready for ignition?"
"Hold on, we need to give it the official touch," I replied, adjusting my plastic safety goggles with utter solemnity as I aimed the glass barrel toward the test circuit breaker. "Activating the gayzer beam".
Ned let out a clean, loud laugh that almost made him drop his physics manual right off the table. The device let out a blueish spark and a sharp electrical hum that finished stabilizing the circuits. Spending the afternoon making dumb jokes and messing up scientific rigor with my best friend was, honestly, one of the few things that managed to remind me that keeping some normalcy was still worth fighting for. Having two lifetimes' worth of memories crammed into the same head wasn't the healthiest thing in the world, and moments like this anchored me a bit.
Gwen and Harry had left early to get a head start on their own reports, and when Ned finally packed up his things to head to the restroom before catching the bus, the lab fell into a silence that felt almost weird. I still had some free time left, and since January was moving at an unusually slow pace in the city, the stillness in the streets was starting to get on my nerves.
The silent truce from the gangs following the raid on the Manfredi warehouse caught my full attention. There were no muggings, no shipments moving. I didn't need to be a genius to realize that the Maggia was orchestrating something massive in the shadows, pulling back pawns for Hammerhead's arrival. But being naturally impatient made waiting for the enemy's move exasperating.
To burn off that energy, I ended up walking toward the school's outdoor training fields. In New York, soccer, real football, not that armored imitation they play here, had already earned an official spot in school sports, and the field happened to be completely empty at that moment. I found a ball next to the substitutes' bench, picked it up, and started doing small juggles, controlling it in the air with a finesse that made me feel envious of myself.
In my past life, I loved football. It wasn't just a simple hobby; I tried with all my might to aspire to play professionally, spending whole afternoons training, dreaming of packed stadiums and making my debut in the first division. But just like what happens to millions, I didn't make it. Talent wasn't enough, opportunities never arrived, and the dream died in front of a screen watching others achieve what I so desperately wanted.
A smile drew across my face as I kept the ball in the air using my thighs, shoulders, and the inner edges of my sneakers. How goddamn ironical life was. In my previous existence, I broke my back searching for an agility and endurance I never had, and now I woke up every morning with the reflexes that would allow me to be the best striker on the planet without even sweating. But destiny had other plans for me: instead of scoring goals in a stadium, my duty was to use that very same power to break the ribs of mobsters and criminals in this city.
I did three quick flicks upward, cushioned the ball with my chest, and before it hit the ground, I fired a Zidane-style volley that sent the ball embedding straight into the upper left corner of the empty goal. The sound of the net shaking violently was the only noise across the entire field.
"Nice shot, Parker"
A mocking male voice echoed behind me. I turned around and found Flash Thompson standing near the track field in his Midtown Tigers varsity jacket. His arms were crossed, his expression trying to mask genuine surprise. His jaw had tightened upon seeing that the school "brainiac" knew how to handle a real football.
That was one of the few things that truly disgusted me about the original comic book Peter Parker and nearly all his other versions. It seemed that to be a smart nerd you had to be a complete physical write-off by default. I myself had been a geek in my past life, devouring comics, science, and video games, but that never stopped me from having a functional body. In fact, I even represented my school in several athletic disciplines, though truth be told, I never won a single medal for the school. My only trophies were won playing for my neighborhood's football club.
Flash swept me with a look from top to bottom and let out a disdainful scoff, trying to regain his usual posture of superiority.
"Didn't know lab rats knew how to use anything that wasn't an algebra book, Parker," he shot back with hostility, though his eyes remained fixed on the ball I held under my arm.
We had been best friends in childhood, sharing bikes and whole afternoons before high school fractured everything. When we entered middle school and he tried to use me as a target for his jokes to fit in with the jocks, my own narcissism prevented me from staying quiet like a submissive martyr. I snapped back with enough firmness and haughtiness to put a dead stop to it, and since then, things had stayed as an awkward hallway rivalry, miles away from the physical bullying of the series and movies from my previous life.
Flash turned around to leave, but I decided to call out to him before he took three steps. I remembered perfectly what day it was today. My ego forced me to keep my distance, but the codes of the past still carried more weight than I liked to admit.
"Eugene!" I shouted to him. He stopped dead in his tracks and turned his head. "Happy birthday".
I reached my free hand into my backpack, pulled out a small, simply wrapped package I had bought that very morning, and tossed it to him without warning. Flash extended his hands and caught it in midair. He stared at the gift with absolute bewilderment, as if his brain were trying to process something that didn't fit into his playbook.
"What the hell is this, Parker? A joke from the science geeks?"
"Open it and find out," I replied with a calm, slightly haughty tone, turning my back to walk toward the locker rooms. "Consider it a reminder of when you actually had good taste. See you tomorrow, Flash".
And with that, I left the place. I knew perfectly well that things between us were going from bad to worse and that we would probably never be the same childhood friends again, but at least for a second, I had managed to completely unbalance him.
The next day at Midtown, nothing particularly relevant happened. When dismissal time came, I headed to the hallway to gather my things, intending to go out on patrol as soon as I could.
"Hey, Peter…" Liz Allan's voice interrupted my thoughts by my locker.
"Hey, Liz. What's up?" I replied, leaning against the lockers.
"Nothing, just… wanted to know if you're going to the library later. You've become a walking mystery over the last month, you know?" she said, playing with the edge of her jacket. "You barely show yourself outside of biochemistry classes".
"The Baxter Building demands high standards, Liz. There are only two spots for a scholarship in their labs. I have to focus on my project if I want to secure a place. I promise you that when I'm done, the tutoring sessions will go back to normal," I gave her a calm smile.
"Oh, please, it's not like you're going to discover the cure for cancer tomorrow," she laughed, crossing her arms. "Besides, studying in the library is a thousand times better than going to that coffee shop we went to last time. Do you remember the guy at the next table? It still makes me laugh thinking about how he spilled coffee all over his own computer just from staring at the ceiling".
"Oh, please, it's not like you're going to discover the cure for cancer tomorrow," she laughed, crossing her arms. "Besides, studying in the library is a thousand times better than going to that coffee shop we went to last time. Do you remember the guy at the next table? It still makes me laugh thinking about how he spilled coffee all over his own computer just from staring at the ceiling".
"He spilled it because he was trying to overhear our explanation on hydrogen bonds, Liz. Science clearly overwhelmed him," I joked, recalling the absurd incident.
"Yeah, right, I'm sure that was it," she replied sarcastically, letting out a laugh. "Anyway, let me know if you head over later, okay? Flash has practice and I'm going to die of boredom alone".
"Sure, I'll let you know," I replied with a polite nod.
Liz gave me one last smile and turned around, losing herself in the crowd of students emptying the hallway. Just as I turned to close my locker, I almost crashed head-on into Gwen, who was walking from the opposite direction. I hadn't noticed at all that she was there.
"Ah! Hey, Gwen. I didn't see you," I said, adjusting my backpack.
Gwen didn't even hold my gaze. Her lips were pressed into a thin line, and her brow was noticeably furrowed. She swept me with a freezing glare that almost chilled my shoulders.
"Yeah, I can see you didn't see me," she snapped in an extremely dry and irritated tone of voice.
Before I could form a single question, she abruptly whipped around and quickened her pace toward the exit, visibly in a terrible mood, leaving me dead in my tracks. I just stood there in the middle of the hallway, holding my arms out slightly while looking from one side to the other in absolute bewilderment.
A few paces away, by the stairs, were Ned and Harry. They had been there since the very beginning, waiting for me to finish talking to Liz, so they had witnessed and overheard absolutely everything. I scratched the back of my neck and turned toward them, hoping one of them might enlighten me. However, both of them were just as bewildered as I was.
I had no earthly idea what the hell I had done wrong to make her mad at me like that. My spider-sense was great for dodging the Maggia's bullets, but it was completely useless at processing a girl's logic.
I finished closing my locker and we walked together toward the bus. I was glad to see that things at school were staying relatively peaceful and that my friends were doing well, but the city's reality kept spinning in the back of my head. The truce wasn't going to last forever, and I knew it.