Archive of Our Own

Part 1

“What are you doing right now?”

Peter hissed in pain, only for his senses to scream at him, just barely dodging the debris that Rhino throws at him—a bench from the looks of it—as he launches himself into the air.

“Nothing much,” Peter says through gritted teeth, ignoring the pain in his side screaming at him as he swings out of the way back towards the fight, “how about you?”

“We need to talk,” he hears Michelle say, Rhino roaring at him as he lands a kick to the face. “Wait, are you dying right now?”

“Not currently,” Peter replies, the kick bringing Rhino down to his knees. Peter does a flip, launching web bombs at him to try and keep him down as he says, “what’s up?”

“This is a face to face kind of talk not a ‘distract you enough that you’ll die’. God, Stark’s right. You’re an idiot.” 

“I’ll tell him you agree with him,” Peter says with a grin, Rhino throwing his free arm in the air only for Peter to switch webs—electrifying Rhino just enough to give him a buzz as he kicks him down once again. 

He hears Michelle scoff on the other end as she says, “don’t you dare.”

“You’re the one who said it, not me. When do you wanna talk?”

“Now? If you’re not dying then it’s not like you're busy,” Michelle replies, hearing the teasing in it as he rolls his eyes.

“I could be busy. That’s rude. You’re so mean to me.”

“I’m not mean, I’m right,” he hears her say, laughing as Michelle asks, “ Did you have any plans today?”

Peter frowns as he knocks out Rhino—finally—shooting off some more webs to pin him down for the cops before he shoots a hand out to swing away. 

“No,” he says with a huff, “but that’s not the point.”

“Can you be at Elio’s in fifteen?”

Peter lands on a light post, glancing down at the scene below him. Rhino’s knocked out and he can hear the sirens already, a cluster of people on the sidewalk all with their cell phones out, taking pictures of him.

Tourists , Peter thinks—shaking his head before sending another hand out.

“Yeah, I’m on my way.”

“So then I told him, ‘this city ain’t big enough for the two of us and he said’—“

“Chew please, then swallow,” Michelle says with mild disgust, Peter grinning as he noisily takes another bite of his burrito. Michelle just rolls her eyes, Peter quickly chewing then swallowing like he was told before continuing. 

“He didn’t like that so much so we had a little disagreement.”

“Of course you did,” Michelle says in monotone, Peter slurping up some of his drink as he studies her.

Something was up with her—though what, Peter hadn't figured out. In all the years he’s known her, Peter likes to think he’s gotten better about understanding Michelle. Her moods, the little tics she had and the subtle changes in her facial expressions that told him everything he needed to know before she said a word. 

It was a benefit of having been friends with her for as long as they have, glad in more ways than one that she’d settled back in the city after law school. With Ned back in the city too, it was like no time passed at all—feeling like they were sixteen and the world was so much simpler, even if even then—it had been anything but.

Whatever’s going on with her, it has to be serious—enough that she wanted to talk to Peter about it first. Ned’s office was only a few blocks away—if Michelle hadn’t extended the invitation to him, there had to be a reason for it. Though what that could be, Peter didn’t know.

But if he knows anything about Michelle, she’ll bring it up when she wants to and not a second before— putting his drink down and picking up his burrito once more as she makes a face. 

“It’s no wonder you’re still single. You eat like an animal.”

Peter frowns, shooting her a withering look as he says, “I don’t eat like an animal.”

Michelle just raises an eyebrow, Peter pointedly ignoring her gaze as he takes another massive mouthful of the burrito. He can see her staring at him out of the corner of his eye, Peter fully immersing himself in the joy of eating his burrito as he says, “You’re just jealous Tomas likes me more.”

He nods towards the server behind the counter of the taco truck that they’re at, Michelle rolling her eyes as she says, “He doesn’t like you more. He was seduced. You’re shameless, Parker.”

“Shameless… or smart?” Peter says with a wink, Michelle laughing as Peter takes another bite of his burrito. They fall into a comfortable silence, Peter’s mind drifting as he eats his food. 

He really should text Tomas back though from the looks of things—his burrito was hot, quickly made and delicious—he didn’t take Peter’s slight-ghosting seriously. It was probably one of the better scenarios Peter could want to find himself in, grimacing as he thinks of the current state of his love life. 

Disappointing would be putting it mildly, thinking that at his age he should arguably be better at communicating with people—much less nailing down a date. He couldn’t rightfully say he was as helpless as he had been when he was a teenager, Tomas’ smile at him as he’d passed him his food being proof of that. But there was still a part of Peter that wondered if he ever had a chance of finding something real, dating being hard enough without having to deal with a secret identity and a schedule that took him away at all hours of the night. 

Before he gets the chance to brood anymore about his love life, Michelle throws him out of his thoughts as she says, “speaking of smart, I made a decision.”

“Hm?” Peter asks, mouth still full with his burrito as Michelle seems to sit up straighter, steadying herself for something. In hindsight, Peter would wonder how he didn’t catch on sooner that something was going on—that she’d been fidgety since the moment she’d sat down, picking at her food and avoiding his gaze. 

As it was, Peter was completely blindsided when she said, “I’m gonna have a baby.”

Peter immediately chokes on his burrito, slamming a hand to the table. The sound causes a few heads to turn, Michelle glaring at him as he tries to swallow the still unchewed food in his mouth as he squeaks out, “What ?”

“I’m gonna have a baby,” Michelle repeats, Peter’s heart working double-time—literally feeling his blood pressure rise as his eyes instinctively jump down to her stomach. She smirks, Peter feeling like he has tunnel vision until she says, “I mean not now. I’m not pregnant yet.”

“Yet?” Peter asks, the world still feeling like it’s running in slow-motion and hyperdrive all at once as he tries to process what she’s saying.

Michelle looks completely unphased, shrugging as she leans forward on the table and crossing her arms as she does so. 

“I’ve been thinking about it. I always wanted a kid. Someday at least.”

“Yeah,” Peter says, nodding as he swallows, working to calm himself, “I know, you’ve mentioned it. But uh, can I ask why…” he trails off, hoping she’ll be able to pick up on his confusion. 

She does, a grim smile on her face as she says, “You remember that biopsy I had a few months ago?”

Peter does, his face falling as he nods his head. Of all the terrifying things Peter had ever encountered in his life, of all the tragedy and the heartache, the few weeks of waiting for the results of Michelle’s biopsy stood out as being some of the worst of his life, his breath catching at the memory of how helpless he felt as he held her hand when she got the call. 

He also remembers the unimaginable relief when her results were benign, Michelle actually allowing Tony to pay for a spa package the same day. She had slipped her hand back into his while Ned had filled the silence with that easy going way he did, her gentle touch reminding him that she was okay as they walked into the spa. 

“After that I just… I realized I just keep pushing things off for someday or a future I’m not even sure I want. I mean, my parents got married because of me and got divorced anyway. You don’t need to be with someone to have a baby.”

Peter shakes his head as Michelle pushes forward, “And it’s not like I can’t do it. I’m making good money and I finally feel like I have my life together, or as much as anyone can. I’m just— I don’t want to keep pushing something I want off for someday when I don’t even know if that someday is guaranteed.”

Peter’s heart sinks at that, wondering if he’s been a terrible friend to not have picked up on how much her cancer scare had terrified her as she sighs. 

“So. Yeah,” Michelle finishes awkwardly, Peter just staring at her as he absorbs this information. “I want a baby and there’s no time like the present.” 

He knows her well enough by now to guess that this wasn’t a rash decision, though the nervous way she’s tapping against the drink in her hand tells him that she’s unsure of her decision.

No, not unsure, Peter thinks as his mind works in overdrive, with Michelle’s steady gaze on him as he takes a deep breath. Peter’s not stupid enough to think that she was asking for him to give his opinion on it per se. But there’s something there, a flash of vulnerability that Peter only knows of her from how long they’ve been friends, getting the sense that she wants Peter to affirm that she’s making the right choice even if objectively, Peter knows she doesn’t need him to do that anyway.

“I think you’d be a great mom, MJ,” Peter finally says, Michelle’s eyes boring into him in a way that makes him want to step back. He holds his ground, hoping that he’s giving the kind of reassuring and affirming smile that he knows she needs even if she would never admit it. 

Her eyes dance across his face for a moment before she seems to find whatever she’s looking for, the corner of her lips rising slightly as she says, “Yeah, I think so too.”

“I know it,” Peter says with a bit more certainty, leaning forward. “You’re incredible, MJ. Your kid’s gonna be the luckiest kid in the world.”

Michelle smiles at that, Peter’s heart skipping a beat for reasons he doesn’t want to think too much about as she says, “Now you’re just flattering me.”

“Like I said, I’m smart,” Peter replies, Michelle rolling her eyes as he laughs. 

“That’s debatable but okay.” Michelle picks up her fork, whatever tension she’d been holding now released since she’d shared her news. Yet for as relaxed as Michelle looks now, Peter feels his anxiety rise tenfold; his mind racing with dozens of questions and he has no idea where to even begin. 

He starts with the simplest, clearing his throat while she glances up to him as he asks, “So… how are you gonna do it?”

Michelle smiles, the look on her face doing nothing for Peter’s nerves as she says, “I thought you’d never ask.”

“How does this work again?”

Peter rubs his hands across his thighs, the sweat collecting across his palms leaving little trail marks along his jeans. He can’t stop his knee from bobbing up and down, forcing himself to try and stay still since he knows that this bothers her. 

But Michelle is thankfully too immersed in whatever she’s looking at on her screen, Peter glancing over to her as she says, “The agency said that after I finish all the checkups, I’ll get to officially start the process. It’s a lot of bullshit honestly but,” she shrugs, fingers flying across the keyboard, “you get what you pay for.”

“This is legit right?” Peter asks, the nervousness he feels bleeding into his voice as she looks over to him and smirks. 

“No, I just found these people on Craigslist.”

“Ha ha,” Peter says sarcastically, Michelle smiling a bit more genuinely as she turns her attention back to the laptop screen. 

“Relax. I’m not deciding on anyone today. Think of it like window shopping.”

“Uh huh, yeah. Sure, window shopping,” Peter rambles nervously, forcing a smile on his face when Michelle looks back at him. 

“Are you sure you’re doing okay? You’re looking a little pale. I thought you said Scorpion wasn’t that big of a deal—”

“He wasn’t, I’m fine,” Peter says, feeling very much not fine as he smiles even wider. Michelle looks unconvinced but doesn’t push for now, something that Peter knows he won’t be able to avoid for too much longer as she focuses back on the task at hand.

It’d been a little over a week since Michelle had told him of her plan. Apparently she’d already gone through the bulk of the research and the planning, deciding on a sperm donor over adoption because she didn’t trust the state to actually give her a fair shot at having a kid. 

Michelle had even already gone through the steps of picking out an agency, going to doctors appointments and check-ups on her own—only finally telling Peter it seems when she was having to choose a donor, Peter trying and failing to squash the uncomfortable feeling in his throat at the idea of her carrying someone else’s child.

Peter chases away that thought as quickly as it comes, forcing himself to try and stay in the moment. 

Objectively, Peter knew he had no say in the matter nor was she really wanting him to have one. He knew she’d already talked about the decision with her mom and that by telling him, she was allowing the people closest to her the chance to be there as a support system that Peter knows the Michelle he knew when they were younger never would’ve dreamed of. 

It hits him then, how much they’ve been through that she would even trust him to be there for her with this. They hadn’t been particularly close at Midtown, Michelle always on the peripheral of him and Ned. After the Blip, the snapped kids banded together but not anything like they were now—Michelle heading to Harvard and Ned to CalTech after graduation, Peter sticking to the city as a means of keeping something in his life the same. 

Moving back to the city for law school, staying here after getting a job at an environmental justice non-profit—Peter couldn’t have ever dreamed he would be this close to Michelle Jones when he was sixteen. 

Even if he wasn’t sixteen, he felt it in the moment—hands still absentmindedly running up and down his thighs at the thought that for as excited as he should be about Michelle making a decision for herself and being appreciative that she was allowing him to be a part of that decision, something he couldn’t explain nudged at him in the back of his mind about it all. 

“Are you sure you’re okay?” Michelle asks, throwing Peter out of his thoughts once more. 

“Yeah, I’m—”

“No, you’re not. What’s wrong? If you’re bleeding internally again—” Michelle says, her eyes scanning the rest of him. Peter can feel the frustration emanating off of her as he shakes his head. 

“No, no, no, I promise. I’m fine.”

“No, you’re not ,” Michelle says more plainly, turning to him as her eyes narrow. “Something’s going on.” 

Peter swallows, unsure of what he’s feeling for himself much less to share with her—watching something shift in her expression when she asks, “Are you… not okay with this?”

“No, that’s—that’s not it, MJ. Not at all,” he says, feeling the lie on his tongue even if he can’t understand why that’s the case. Michelle seems to hear it just as he says, Peter turning to her and saying more clearly, “I’m not, MJ. I mean it, you’re going to make a great mom and it sounds like you’ve done your research.”

“But?” She asks, Peter sighing as he runs a hand through his hair. 

“But… I just want to be sure you find the right person you know? I mean this guy,” Peter gestures towards the laptop, “your kid is gonna be half-him. Shouldn’t you, I don’t know, have the chance to meet him or something?”

“That defeats the purpose of a sperm donor,” Michelle deadpans, leveling him with a look. “Yeah my kid’s gonna be genetically half-him but that’s just it, Pete.”

Peter stares at her, Michelle pursing her lips together as she says, “It’ll be my kid. The profiles give me the basics but I don’t get to know who they are and I don’t want to. It’s not about them, it’s about me. And the kid.”

“Of course, I’m not—that’s not what I’m saying.”

“Then what are you saying?” Michelle asks, Peter hearing the frustration in her voice as he grinds his teeth. 

He searches her face for a minute before sighing, shaking his head as he says, “I don’t know. I don’t know what I’m saying. I just—I want you to have the best, MJ. For whoever you choose.”

Michelle looks touched at that, her eyes softening before she says, “You’re getting sappy on me, Parker?”

Peter grins, reaching a hand out to her and resting it gently on her arm. He catches how Michelle freezes, Peter squeezing her arm gently before saying, “I mean it, MJ. You deserve the best.”

There’s an unreadable expression on her face, a thousand things passing through her eyes that Peter doesn’t understand before it shifts—a smile on her face as she rolls her eyes and says, “Of course I do. So if you’re not actively dying, can you help me decide on someone?”

“Yeah,” Peter says, clearing his throat as Michelle turns the laptop towards him. He ignores the feeling in his gut that won’t go away, forcing his attention on the screen and not on Michelle’s careful gaze.

“Anything you need.” 

“So let me get this straight,” Ned says for the third time, Peter sighing as he opens his fridge. There’s predictably nothing there, tapping his finger against the open door as Ned says, “MJ told you that she wants to have a kid.”

“Yep,” Peter says, grabbing a half-opened peach tea and closing the door.

“And she’s going to use a sperm donor.”

“Yep.”

“And you’re totally okay with that?”

Peter frowns, opening the peach tea up as he stares at Ned. “It’s not like it’s up to me.”

“No not like that ,” Ned replies, sounding a little annoyed as Peter takes a swig of his drink. “I mean, you don’t think that’s a problem?”

“Why would I?” Peter asks as soon as he swallows down the drink, making a face and wondering just how long the tea has been in his fridge as Ned stares at him. 

“Dude. You like her.”

“What?” Peter squawks, spilling a little bit of the tea on his shirt. He frowns, rubbing at the stain already forming as he says, “No I don’t.”

Ned doesn’t respond at first, Peter looking back up to him to see the exasperated expression on his face. 

“I don’t,” Peter says more definitively, “We’re friends, Ned.” 

“No, I’m friends with MJ. You two have been dancing around each other for the past decade in this weird mating ritual that’s honestly getting a little annoying,” Ned says with a grimace, Peter’s frown deepening as he continues, “Case in point, I knew about this three months ago.”

“You what ? Dude!? Why didn’t you say anything?” Peter asks, Ned shooting him a look before shrugging. 

“Well first of all, she told me when you had that fight with the Octopus guy. Remember, when you had to be airlifted to the compound?”

Peter nods, still reeling from the fact that Ned of all people had been able to keep a secret from him for as long as he had as he says, “Yeah, I remember.” 

“She told me when we were waiting. Mr. Stark said something about Morgan and after they left to go check in on you, she told me.”

Peter feels like he’s been punched in the gut, betrayed in a way that he knows he shouldn’t as he says, “I didn’t… why didn’t you—”

“She said she was going to tell you later and it’s not like it was my secret to give anyway,” Ned says plainly, Peter just blinking at him as Ned continues, “I’m honestly not surprised it took her as long as it did.”

“Why?” Peter asks, setting the peach tea down as Ned sighs, looking at Peter with a knowing expression. 

“No reason,” Ned says, Peter getting the distinct impression that he has a guess but isn’t saying so, “God, what would you two do without me?”

Peter smirks. “What does that mean?”

“Nothing,” Ned says as he waves his hand around, “I just want you to remember this moment, when I say I told you so.”

“Told me about what?” Peter says, feeling like he’s missed something in the conversation. 

Ned just laughs, grabbing his phone out of his pocket as he says, “Nothing dude. Considering you grabbed the same peach tea you always do when I come over, how does Thai sound? You want the chicken larb?”

“Yeah,” Peter says, eyeing Ned up and down as Ned says, “Cool.”

As Ned busies himself with ordering the food, Peter glances at the peach tea on the counter in front of him—trying to come to grips with what Ned told him. 

It didn’t make sense to him why she would tell Ned about her plans before Peter, a part of him wondering now if May knew considering how close to the two of them were. He can’t help but feel a little hurt that she hadn’t told him first or that Ned had kept it a secret from him for so long, even if he knows that’s ridiculous considering Ned was right. 

It was her life, her business, her body—Peter was thankful she trusted him enough to share it at all. But there was still something nudging at him in the back of his mind, a similar feeling to how he’d felt when she was looking through donors the first time. 

But Peter shoves that away for now, ignoring the sinking feeling in his gut that he can’t explain. 

“Be honest with me. Is what I’m doing crazy?” asks Michelle, staring into her wine glass. She’s on her second one now and her eyes are starting to get glassy, and her mood dipping towards melancholy.

“No, you’re not being crazy at all,” says Peter, sitting up on the couch. 

When she texted him last minute asking if he was free to hang out tonight, even going so far as to preemptively offer to bring the alcohol, he knew something was up. 

He helped her browse for sperm donors online over a week ago, and she hasn’t brought it up again since. So when she showed up at his apartment with a bottle of wine in each hand, Peter braced himself for what she probably came here to tell him after a week of careful deliberation. 

His stomach clenches unpleasantly when he wonders if she ended up going with the Norwegian cross-country skier who speaks four languages, or if the six-foot-tall artist with a PhD in economics won out in the end. 

But Peter pushes the feeling away so he can focus on Michelle instead, trying not to make this any more difficult for her than it needs to be. 

Putting his empty glass down on the water stained coffee table, he turns to her and says, “If having a baby is what you want, then you should do it, and I’m here to support you all the way, okay? And if you change your mind because it’s not what you want anymore, and not because of anyone else, I’ll still be by your side, too.”

Letting out a deep sigh, Michelle slumps against him as if a great weight has been lifted off of her, and rests her head on his shoulder. “Thanks, dork.”

They sit like that for a while in comfortable silence, sinking into the same couch Peter’s had since his undergraduate ESU days. Staring at the wine pooling at the bottom of his glass and feeling the heat of Michelle’s body radiating against his side, he savors the last few moments of things between them being this simple. 

Taking a deep breath, Peter decides to be the one to bring it up first and give her an easy opening. 

“But that’s not all you wanted to tell me tonight,” he says.

Turning her head to look at him, Michelle blinks in surprise. 

“Okay, you’re right,” she finally says, reaching for the half-empty bottle of Shiraz to top herself off. “So, I know I said that this isn't about the donor, that he’s just an anonymous set of genes and nothing more. But I couldn't stop thinking about what you said the other day, about me and this kid deserving the best. And I don’t think ticking off a checklist of qualities will necessarily get me that.”

Her nose and cheeks are getting pinker as she works her way through her third glass of wine, and Peter wonders why she’s taking so long to tell him about the donor she’s selected. It’s not like he was particularly partial to any of the top contenders Michelle was considering. 

Unless she’s decided to go with an open-identity donor after all, so her kid can have the option of meeting their biological father after they turn eighteen?

That ended up being the toughest decision for Michelle when filtering her prospects; while she had no interest in knowing anything about her sperm donor, she didn’t feel right about making that decision for her kid. 

Maybe that's why she's stalling and not telling him who she's chosen to father her baby—before, the donor was just going to be an anonymous vial of semen, but now, the donor could be a real live person who walks into her life someday. 

But all that matters is that she's happy with her choice, so Peter prepares himself to react positively to her news, whatever it may be—even though the idea of an open donor makes him queasy for some reason.

“So, what exactly is on this checklist of yours?” he prompts when Michelle goes quiet again, and he notices that she's still avoiding his gaze. 

"That's top secret information," she replies sullenly, before taking a big swig of her drink.

"Come on, try me. Or is it that you can’t find anyone who meets all of your requirements on this checklist?"

Michelle finally looks up at him, suppressing a small smile like she's enjoying a private joke with herself. But then she shakes her head and says, “My problem is that the qualities on my checklist aren’t the kind of things you can determine from an online profile. Like, is this guy kind? Brave? Intellectually curious?"

“Those aren’t the kind of things that get passed on through genes either.” He rests his hand on her knee to get her attention. “Listen, your kid is going to be kind, brave, and insanely smart because of you . Because you’re their mom, Em. Not because of some chromosomes from some guy you randomly pick out of an online database.”

Covering his hand on her knee with her own, Michelle says quietly, “I just want this kid to be a good person, you know?"

“I know.”

“I want them to become someone selfless and compassionate, but with a strong sense of integrity and responsibility,” she continues, hiccuping slightly. “Because otherwise what’s the point? I don’t want to add another shitty person into this world.”

"It's all just a leap of faith, I guess," Peter shrugs, giving her knee a reassuring squeeze. "You go with your gut and hope for the best. That's all any of us can really do."

A look of resolve crosses Michelle's face, like she's finally made up her mind about something, and Peter musters up a supportive smile, ready for her to tell him all about the amazing genetic jackpot she has selected.

“I have an idea,” she says, shifting closer to him. “And you might actually think I'm crazy for this one.”

“You’re not crazy, MJ. Not for wanting what you want—”

“What if you were my donor?”

Peter freezes. He's not sure if he misheard her, or if his drunk and sleep-deprived brain decided to indulge itself for one delusional moment.

"You wanna run that one by me again?" he asks in a strained voice.

Licking her lips, Michelle blows out a nervous breath. "What if you were my sperm donor? I mean, I was basically describing you before, right? Which isn't all that surprising.”

"It's not?"

“You’re kind, brave, and smart sometimes. You're the best guy I know," says Michelle, swirling the liquid in her wine glass. "So maybe, subconsciously, I was looking for someone like you. But no one in the world is like you, Peter. Not even close."

She glances up at him, looking more open and vulnerable than he has ever seen her, and his heart flutters in his chest. 

“My best qualities are all thanks to how Aunt May and Uncle Ben raised me,” he hedges, looking down at his hands. “And any kid you have will be an amazing person because you raised them. Not because of my, um, genetic contributions.”

"That's why I want it to be you. You're the full package—both in terms of the qualities that I can filter for on a website, and the ones I can't."

He glances up to find Michelle looking at him intently, her cheeks darkened from the alcohol but her eyes focused and serious, making him wonder how impulsive her proposal actually is. A million thoughts and questions bombard Peter’s mind as he tries to make sense of what she is saying to him, but in the quiet place of his heart, he already knows his answer.

"You don't have to answer me tonight,” she says, sitting back. “Take some time to think it over."

She’s right. He should take more time to consider her proposal, weigh all the pros and cons carefully before committing to something so completely life-altering. But she’s also right about not putting something off for ‘someday’, because that someday isn’t guaranteed for anyone. 

“I’ll do it.” 

"What? Really?" Michelle sits up, her eyes still watery. "Wait, you’re being serious right now?"

Peter nods, still letting his decision sink in and waiting for the panic that still hasn't gripped him yet.

"You’re not joking with me? Like you’re a hundred percent serious? Because it’s really not funny if you're not serious." 

It might be the wine, but she's looking at him with a very un-Michelle expression of bewilderment and earnestness.

"No, I’m not joking. I want to give you a baby, MJ."  

"Okay, awesome. I mean, good," she nods, beaming. Michelle looks so happy that Peter feels certain that he made the right decision. 

"And to be crystal clear," she says, chewing her lip again. "I'm proposing that we do this the, you know, old fashioned way. Not you jerking off into a turkey baster or whatever."

Peter nods and gulps. He hadn't thought that far. Or rather, his mind had jumped from the online roster of hundreds of faceless donors to a hypothetical baby that has her eyes and his smile, without stopping to think about what would happen in between.

“So, you wanna start now, or…?” he jokes, feeling the heat creep up his neck.

Michelle rolls her eyes, but she's still smiling. “You wish. I've got to be, y'know, ovulating.”

“Oh, right, right. Of course. And, um, when does that happen, exactly? For informational purposes."

“You want me to send you a calendar reminder?” she asks with a raised eyebrow.

“That would actually be super helpful,” Peter grins, regaining some calmness in his nerves. “It’ll give me time to prepare for, y’know, peak performance. Because you deserve the best.”

“Only the best,” Michelle agrees, stretching out on the couch and resting her legs across Peter’s lap.

Part 2

“Hey May!”

“In here,” he hears her voice call out from the bedroom, Peter closing the door behind him as he glances around the cluttered living room. 

It was a new place, relatively speaking—Peter smiling as he looks at the couch that’s just a bit too big for their living space and the boxes in the corner that she still hasn’t unpacked. It was a fact of being a New Yorker, having to move every so often to combat rising rent prices. If Tony had his way, May would’ve been in the same apartment he found the two of them back in high school. 

Peter smiles when he thinks of how insistent May was that whatever business Tony had with Peter that it be between the two of them, financially at least. Though considering how little Peter accepted his gifts over the years, it didn’t surprise Peter in the slightest to see the wildly expensive blender—still in its box—in the corner. 

He takes a few steps, minding the coffee table that he always hit his knee against as May comes into the living room, a huge smile on her face as she says, “Come here.”

Peter smiles as he walks to her, letting May envelop him into a hug. He always felt safest with May, the comfort and warmth of being around someone who loved him so much making Peter feel at ease no matter what he was dealing with. 

They had a weekly dinner plan, set in motion during his ESU days—what had first been an easy way to do laundry served as a transition for the two of them into a new phase of their lives. 

May had her own life now—a new boyfriend that Peter liked well enough, busy with her work and volunteering at FEAST. And Peter, for as chaotic as his own life felt sometimes, had still created something of a grown up routine for himself—working at a shitty lab that didn’t pay well but gave him freedom with his powers, balancing his time as Spider-Man better than he ever could’ve dreamed when he first started.  

The one constant in his life since high school were these weekly dinners with May, just as much a part of his routine as his nightly patrols. 

That routine was going to be disrupted this week, ever since Michelle sent him an actual chart of when she’d be at her peak—fertility wise.

He and May’s regular dinner night happened to fall on the same day, and for as much as Peter had grown from high school, he didn’t trust himself not to blurt out exactly what his plans would be that day. 

Better to avoid that, he thinks, smiling as May squeezes him tighter. 

“Food’s not here yet,” she says, kissing his cheek before leaning back, “you can help me set the table.”

“Sounds good,” Peter says, smiling as he trails after her towards her small kitchen. 

“You doing okay? Not that I don’t love it when you come by for dinner but—“ May begins, Peter interrupting her with his practiced excuse—running through it in his mind once more. 

Plans with Ned, championship video game night. Ned. Video game night. Ned. Video games. 

“I’m uh, I have plans Thursday so I thought I’d move it up,” Peter says carefully, taking the plates she hands him as May’s eyebrow raises. 

“Plans? What kind of…” May trails off before some recognition washes over her features, Peter going to fill in the blanks when she says, “oh Peter finally!”

“Finally?” Peter asks, May beaming at him as she claps her hands together. 

“You and MJ! Oh I’ve been waiting for this for years. Tony owes me money, he thought we’d have to wait till you two were thirty.”

“ What ?” Peter squeaks out, his mind racing as May smiles at him.

The idea that Michelle had told May about what they were doing made him wildly uncomfortable—though it wasn’t a total surprise considering how close the two of them were. May had taken a liking to Michelle even back when they were in high school and before the Blip, ever since the awkward car ride home after their sophomore year trip to Washington DC.

Peter, for once in his life, has the good sense not to blurt out what he’s thinking, swallowing down the lump in his throat as he asks, “What are you talking about?”

May looks at him knowingly, playfully shoving him back towards her little kitchen table as she says, “MJ mentioned she had a date this week, and she was nervous of all things. Which, of course, made me wonder who it could be and why now?”

Peter just blinks at her, May taking the plates away from him since he’s making no effort to put them on the table.

“It’s about time. I always thought you two would be perfect for each other.”

“We’re not—we’re not together ,” Peter says, glad that it wasn’t technically a lie since May’s bullshit meter was just as good as Michelle’s, if not better. “I have a video game tournament. With Ned.”

May sets the plates down, only to frown—eyes narrowing as she studies him. 

“So you’re not meeting MJ this week?”

Fuck , Peter thinks—scrambling as he says, “I mean I am, I think she might be coming? Maybe,” Peter winces at his terrible joke even as May’s frown just deepens, “she didn’t mention a date. Maybe we’re her back-up plans in case it goes bad.”

May looks at him as if she doesn’t believe him, humming noncommittally and about to say something further only for the door to knock. 

Peter stands up straighter, thankful for the interruption, and says, “I’ll get it.”

Relief and terror flow through him in equal measures as he opens the door and pays for the food. As May watches him divide up their take out, the silence in the apartment feels so thick that Peter thinks he could cut it through with the same knife. 

How the hell he had ever been able to hide Spider-Man from her when he was in high school, Peter didn’t know—if she keeps staring at him that way, it would be only a matter of time before he breaks.

Luckily, May relents first, asking him a question about work that he’s easily able to answer—the two of them falling into a comfortable back and forth that makes Peter think May’s going to let it go. 

It’s not till they’re cleaning up that he realizes he should’ve never underestimated May Parker. 

“So, what’s it gonna be?” 

“Hmm?” Peter asks, shoving the last take out boxes into the trash. 

“You gonna keep pretending like you’re not meeting MJ this week for a date or do I have to watch you squirm until you finally break?” May asks. 

Peter whips his head around to face her as he pushes down the garbage. 

“Uh—”

“Think carefully Peter, about how you want this to go,” May says, a smirk on her face as she looks at him over her glasses.

Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck , Peter thinks—swallowing down the lump in his throat as May says, “I get that you two have been friends for a long time, and you don’t want to tell people if it's still new, but Pete, come on. It’s me.” 

“I, uh—” Peter starts, scrambling as he walks to her with his hands out. “That’s not it, May.”

May just squints at him, and the words come out of Peter’s mouth before he can stop them. “MJ’s gonna have a baby.”

May freezes, and Peter kicks himself for blurting out a secret that wasn’t his to tell—wondering if he ever had any chance of keeping anything to himself. 

Only for May’s expression to change, her eyes softening as she says, “ Oh Peter, she told you.”

“Y-yeah?” Peter says, May coming up to him with a remorseful look on her face. 

“I was wondering when she would. She should’ve picked a donor by now unless…” May’s expression shifts again, looking at him with a sympathetic expression on her face as she says, “you’re going with her to the appointments? Is that where you’ll be on Thursday?” 

“Uh, yeah, yeah I’m—sorry I didn’t know that you knew,” Peter says, filling in the blanks that May must have known about Michelle’s plan just as Ned had, but also getting the distinct impression that she wasn’t aware that said donor was actually her own nephew.

His gut instinct is confirmed when May moves to wrap him into a tight hug, Peter immediately leaning into it as May squeezes him tight. 

“You’re being a good friend to her, Pete. She’s gonna need people around her, now more than ever.” May laughs, Peter nestling his head into her hair. 

Something pangs at Peter when she says that, closing his eyes only to open them and land on a family picture that May still had of the two of them with Ben and his mom and dad. 

“I know this will be tough for you, even if you don’t want to understand why,” May murmurs, Peter’s gaze fixated on the picture as she says, “but it’s not about you now, it’s about MJ. She’s doing an impossibly brave thing and needs all the support she can.”

Peter says nothing, not trusting himself in the moment—glad that his silence was taken as an acceptance of May’s words as he continues to hug her. His focus is still on the picture, a thought occurring to him that while May was right, it wasn’t about him but about Michelle, he couldn’t help but wonder what their kid would look like. 

Not my kid, they’ll be MJ’s , Peter is quick to admonish himself. 

Yet the thought is still there, while he's holding May in his arms and focusing on the picture—his mind focused on all the possibilities he can’t bring himself to have. 

Bouncing on his heels, Peter exhales slowly and flexes his hands, but it does nothing to calm his nerves. He checks his breath for the third time and runs his tongue over his teeth again, hoping he doesn't get performance anxiety tonight. 

Oh no, what if I get performance anxiety tonight?

Before Peter can let his doubts get the best of him, the door to Michelle’s apartment swings open.

“Hey,” he gasps, suddenly feeling out of breath. 

With her hair down, Michelle is wearing what he recognizes as her go-to look for a particularly hot date that she wants to impress—only this time, he's the hot date, and she seems to know exactly what he likes. 

Her backless dress ends mid-thigh, showing off her long legs and the dip of her waist from every angle, and her dark eyes are even more unreadable than usual beneath her thick lashes and smokey eyeliner.

“You look really pretty,” he blurts out when he realizes he's been standing in her doorway for too long.

Her lips twitch, trying to suppress a smile. “Thanks. You look really pretty, too.” He stares at her, expecting her to say something else, but she just nods at the forgotten bouquet in his arms. “Are those for me?”

“Oh! Uh, yes. I didn't know what kind of flowers say ‘hey, can't wait to make a baby with you’,” says Peter, thrusting the red roses at her. “So I just went with ‘you're sexy and beautiful’.” 

“Thanks, nerd. Did you get me a matching corsage, too?”

His short-lived burst of confidence turns into panic. “What? Oh, crap, is that what I’m supposed to get for this kind of… meet up?”

“I’m just messing with you,” she laughs, taking the flowers. "Thank you. This is actually a pretty smooth move, Parker. I’m reluctantly impressed."

When Michelle turns around, his eyes can’t help but linger on her back and trail down to see how low her dress really goes... 

Shaking his head, Peter forces himself to stop staring and follows her into the apartment. 

He’s been over here countless times, and he always loves how much the space feels like her: lived-in, casual, natural, earthy. From the books that line the shelves all along one wall to the framed prints and artwork that she’s been creating and collecting over the years, there’s something effortlessly cool and distinctly her about the apartment.

It’s certainly nicer than Peter’s cramped little studio in Chinatown, which is only barely affordable because it's on the sixth floor of a building with no elevator. He hovers over to where Michelle has an easel set up by the biggest luxury in her apartment—a bay window overlooking the quiet tree-lined street—and runs his fingers over her neatly lined-up art supplies. 

But tonight, her apartment feels oddly unfamiliar—with the lights dimmed and the smell of perfume that she never wears lingering in the air, the space seems to beckon him, inviting him to explore the places he used to think he knew so well.

Settling down in his usual spot on the sofa, Peter crosses and uncrosses his legs twice, but can’t seem to find a comfortable position. 

“Hey,” he says when Michelle sits down beside him, crossing her legs.

“Hey."

She looks beautiful. Normally on a date, Peter would say so, without hesitation. But he doesn't want Michelle to think he's only saying it as a line, so he says nothing.

His knees start to bob nervously as they continue to stare at each other, unsure of what to do next.

"Do you maybe want something to drink before we...?" Michelle trails off, chewing her bottom lip.

"Yes," Peter says immediately, sitting up. "I mean, yeah, that sounds good. Please."

To take the edge off, they pop open a bottle of wine while making the kind of small talk they typically reserve for when they’re out in public and can’t talk freely about what they really want to.

Chuckling nervously, Peter searches his mind for something witty to say, or at least something to diffuse the awkwardness, but keeps coming up empty. They keep stealing glances at each other in between sips of their drinks, only to look away when they catch the other's eye. 

It feels so much like high school all over again, when he used to find himself looking at her during class or assembly, half-hoping she’d look back while also half-hoping she wouldn’t so the moment could last. Back then, Peter told himself it was only because snapped kids had to watch out for each other, even though Michelle was the only person aside from Ned that he’d look for every morning at Midtown. 

To fill the silence, Peter finds himself asking her questions that he usually asks on a first date.

Michelle plays along and tells him about her five year plan, and how she'll be eligible for a federal loan forgiveness program in a few years after working in public service. Then she can switch to the private sector for a significant pay bump, on top of finally being free of law school debt.

But she has finally gotten some traction and recognition in her industry, and cares about her work too much to sell out now, she sighs. While a non-profit sector paycheck isn’t nearly as lucrative as working for big law, Michelle wants to keep making a positive impact with her degree, and Peter is repeatedly reminded why he likes her so much. 

Peter in turn tells her about his job and hobbies--the first date version that obliquely references his secret Spider-themed side-gig and filled with so many half-truths that Peter would almost feel bad if Michelle wasn't laughing so much.

Her flushed cheeks burn darker and she’s resting her head in her hand now, casually reclining against the back of the sofa, though Peter can hear how quickly her heart is beating. His nerves are still on edge, too, but the sound of her laughter soothes him, especially whenever he gets a genuine snort out of her. 

They get more comfortable as they keep talking and drinking, even though the air is still crackling between them, charged and ready to snap the moment they acknowledge it. 

When Michelle leans over to set her glass over a coaster on the table, the curve of her breast flashes in the space exposed by her dress, and Peter inhales sharply. 

Smirking at him over her shoulder, she sits back down, closer to him this time. Her dress rides up her thighs, and Peter wants to make a joke about her not having to do much to seduce him.

But the words get caught in his throat, and before he gets a chance to say anything, Michelle leans in and kisses him lightly on the lips. 

Peter’s hand instinctively comes up to cup her jaw to keep her from drawing away, and he kisses her back, slower and deeper this time. At first he’s so caught up in the taste of her mouth and the smell of her perfume that he almost forgets what he’s doing—that he’s kissing Michelle, and she’s kissing him back and smiling against his lips. 

Peter already feels the urge to start undoing her dress but holds back so she can keep controlling the pace of their kissing, which is becoming more frantic and sloppy by the second.

Snaking her arms around his neck, Michelle shifts and maneuvers herself to straddle him without breaking their kiss, and his hands slide down her bare back to her waist. 

“Are you still sure about this?” he asks, leaning back and holding her away from him by the hips.

“Peter. I’ve been thinking about this for months,” says Michelle, sliding her hands down over his. “I’ve been sure about this baby thing for a while now, but I’ve been too—I don’t know, scared?—to pull the trigger and just go through with it. But if it’s you…” She chews on her lips lightly. “You’re the missing piece that I needed. If you’re sure, then I’m sure.”

He wants to tell her he’s been thinking about this nonstop ever since she first asked him to be her donor, and he's been wondering what it would feel like to kiss her for much longer.

“I really, really want this, too,” he says, slowly closing the space between them. 

But Michelle pushes him back against the sofa and gets off his lap before he can protest. 

“Good,” she smiles over her shoulder, and stands up to lead him to her bedroom.

His body is hovering over hers, tense and flexed. He can feel her watching him, waiting. The room is dark and smells like her everywhere.

She leans up to kiss him, a quick peck on the lips, experimental and light. It’s too brief, so he goes in for another one, and they kiss for longer this time, exploring the taste and shape of each other’s mouths. 

He slides his hands up her dress, and stills when he discovers that she's not wearing any underwear.

"I wasn't planning on leaving the apartment tonight," Michelle shrugs, reaching around to unfasten the clasp that held her dress together. 

Peter rests his hands on her bare thighs as he kisses her again, harder and more urgently than before, and his fingers travel down further when she drops her knees apart. 

He groans when he finds her already slippery and dripping.

"I usually like to spend more time on foreplay, but it looks like you're more than ready to go," he teases.

"Don't flatter yourself,” she scoffs, eyes glittering in the dark. “I'm ovulating, so almost anything can turn me on right now. It's just biology."

"Oh yeah?" he says, unzipping his jeans. "So you'd take just about any cock right now if you could?"

Michelle smirks up at him, reaching to help him pull his shirt off over his head. "But I want yours, Peter."

Peter leans down to kiss her, pushing his tongue into her mouth while his hard-on rests between her legs.

They could still turn back now. It isn't too late for him to change his mind, to choose not to cross that line with his best friend—he only needs to say the word and Michelle would drop it, even if it would disappoint her. 

But Peter doesn't want to turn back—he wants to give Michelle what she wants.

“Don’t stop,” she pants, pulling him closer. 

He's aching to be inside her. It would only take one thrust and she knows it. 

“Okay, okay,” Peter says, breathing heavy. “But I should go get a condom—”

He stops and they stare at each other for a moment before bursting out in nervous giggles. 

"Nevermind," he says, suppressing a crooked smile. "Guess we don't need that."

"Not tonight," Michelle agrees, smiling indulgently at him. 

He swallows thickly. "We're really doing this."

"Yeah, we really are," she breathes out. "Ready to knock me up, Parker?"

Her words make him instantly harder, and he hisses through his teeth, making Michelle smirk at him. 

Grabbing hold of himself, Peter lines up against her and pushes in slowly. A rush of pleasure floods his senses, and he doesn't think he can last more than a second when he's inside her like this, raw skin on skin. 

He bites down on his lip hard, hoping to distract himself from tipping over the edge too soon. But she feels incredible all around him, so hot and slick without the numbing barrier of a condom, that he has to stop and catch himself.

"How does this feel?" he asks, straining to keep his pace slow and steady.

"Good," she hums, wrapping her arms around him. "Keep going."

They move together in the darkness, sliding and thrusting and pulling at each other, until their slow deliberate movements become furious and desperate, and the thing building up between them becomes too much to contain any longer. 

Michelle throws her head back when she finally gives into her climax, and Peter buries himself deeper inside of her and kisses her hard on the mouth, holding her tight. 

Her body arches into his, shaking as she comes around him, and her fingers are raking his back desperately for purchase as their sweaty bodies continue to pump and slide against each other.

When Peter is about to come himself, his Spider-sense goes off—screaming at him to pull out before it's too late—and he has to fight it and push past the urgent warning blaring in his head.

"Come on, Peter-tingle," he mutters to himself. "Just do it, just give her what she wants…!"

“You okay there, tiger?” Michelle teases, though her breathless voice wavers a little. 

"Uh, yeah. Totally fine," he says, even though he feels like he's about to explode. 

Sensing his inner turmoil, Michelle puts a hand to his face and asks him to look at her.

It’s then that Peter realizes they haven’t been looking at each other this entire time, too caught up in the moment and busy tasting and feeling each other before.

Their eyes meet, her heavy-lidded gaze telling him to let go, and any shred of restraint left inside him snaps.

Throbbing, he unloads everything he's got into her, and Michelle lets out a deep, satisfied moan, clenching her thighs around him. 

Then they both collapse on the bed, flat on their backs, breathing heavily, and their hands instinctively reach for each other in the darkness, fingers curling in a loose hold.

“I can’t believe we just did that,” Peter exhales, wiping the sweat off his forehead with his forearm.

Reaching down between her legs, Michelle flashes him a satisfied smirk. “Oh, we definitely did.”

They both let out a laugh, breathless and nervous at first, then giving way to full-bellied, genuine laughter as the reality of what they just did sinks in.

“You think it… worked?" he asks, turning to face her. "Do you think we did it?”

Michelle reaches up to stroke his jaw absent-mindedly, and Peter tilts his head to follow her touch, looking down at her flushed face and the glistening sweat on her brow and neck.

“I mean, if not, we can always try again?”

Peter nods seriously. "Well, I'm definitely not a quitter."

“Me neither,” she says, suppressing a grin as she rolls over and pulls him in for a kiss, and Peter happily obliges. 

Part 3

Peter receives a phone call from Michelle while he's in the middle of a stand-off with Shocker by the south street seaport, urgently telling him to meet her at her office tonight. She’s stuck at work late but had just taken her temperature, and it was, as she phrased it, 'prime baby-making time'. 

After making quick work of the supervillain and leaving him webbed up with his now-useless web-fluid clogged gauntlets, Peter swings his way over to midtown and crawls up the side of Michelle’s law firm's building to the floor she works on.

They do it in a dark conference room, hushed and hurried with her bent over a table, her skirt rumpled up around her waist. Feeling for each other in the dark, they try to be as quiet as possible, but quickly give up when they can’t stop the conference table from rattling. 

"I can't believe you came here in your suit—"

"You called in the middle of patrol!” Peter whispers, adjusting his hold on her hips. “Besides, it was the fastest way to get here."

"What do I say if someone walks in on Spider-Man banging me?!" Michelle hisses back.

“That I'm paying you back for some... pro- bono work?"

"Oh my god, I can't believe I'm procreating with you," she huffs, but keeps rocking against him at the same urgent pace, and whines when he slows down to tease her. 

"Too bad I was the best option you could rustle up,” he grunts, shifting his footing to hike her leg up higher, and she lets out a deep moan when he starts hitting her at a different angle.

"Fuck, that feels so good," she whimpers, pushing back against him. 

Hissing through his teeth, Peter keeps moving, tempted to thrust harder and faster, but he wants to get Michelle to come first. Except the feeling of her all hot and wet around him is taking over all of his senses, and there's no way he can last much longer. 

"I'm close," he groans, the pressure building up inside him, aching and urgent.

"Good, don't stop," Michelle pants back, her thighs quivering from the strain of their position. "Fuck me until you come inside me, Peter—don't stop until you've filled me up."

Her words immediately send him over the edge, and his entire body shudders and quakes uncontrollably as he finishes inside her, jaw clenched tight so he doesn't cry out loud. 

Peter barely has time to pull out before Michelle starts sliding her underwear back on. His head still feels dazed, and the sudden loss of her body warmth makes his heart lurch.

As the afterglow of his orgasm subsides, Peter murmurs, "You didn't get to—I want to make you..."

"Next time," she says while he’s tucking himself back into his suit. His expression must have fallen, because she looks up and adds, "I'll only be in the office another hour or two. Why don't you come over to my place? Stay the night? Might as well make the most of my um, fertility window right now."

"Yeah, I can do that," says Peter, tugging his mask back on and preparing to slip out the conference room window. “Just the right amount of time for the ol’ web-shooter to recharge.” 

He makes the eye lenses of his mask wink at her, and Michelle rolls her eyes. But then she stops him just as his mask is about to cover his mouth and kisses him. "Okay, weirdo. I'll see you at home. Oh, and can you pick up more oat milk on the way?"

“Yeah, for sure!” 

With a little salute, Peter leaps off the window ledge, shooting a web that swings him across the avenue and into the night.

When Michelle gets her period that month, Peter could tell she was disappointed. But in true Michelle Jones fashion, she shrugs it off, downloads another app on her phone to track her basal body temperature and ovulation cycle, and redoubles her effort—with Peter’s eager assistance.

During the week leading up to her next peak fertility window, which usually lasts anywhere between twelve to twenty-four hours, they take every opportunity they can to squeeze in frantic baby-making sex. 

From impromptu quickies during the day to evening marathons, Peter has lost count of how many times they’ve attempted to conceive. But Michelle is a woman with a mission, and he’s more than happy to help her find satisfaction. 

Even when her legs start shaking uncontrollably and she can barely keep thrusting, Michelle refuses to be the first one to tap out. 

"It's really okay if you need a break, Em." Peter flexes his arm as he reaches around to massage her thighs. "Superhuman stamina, remember?"

"Just shut up and fuck me," she says, lying back down and wriggling her hips impatiently.

Michelle has to get to the courthouse downtown for a deposition in less than an hour, but Peter is still nowhere close to finishing.

"We've been doing this for six days straight now," he pants,"so the tank might be running low."

Unsatisfied with his answer, she flips them around so that she’s on top, sending a thrilling shiver down Peter’s spine. From this position, Michelle has total control and it takes her no time to get him to climax.

As soon as he pulls out, Michelle rolls onto her back and reaches down to catch the thick spurt before it runs down her legs, and rocks her hips up to keep it inside her. 

He can't stop thinking about Michelle going into work and spending the whole day with his cum inside her, her thighs squeezed together just to hold it in.

Watching her ignites something primal in Peter’s gut, and he wants to make her feel as good as she made him feel.

But when Peter says it’s her turn for an orgasm, she shakes her head and says she needs to get to work. 

He’s disappointed that she has to go, hoping they could at least cuddle a bit, but pushes the feeling away. Non-foreplay cuddling was definitely not part of their agreement. 

So he watches Michelle as she rushes to slide her underwear back on and wriggle into that work dress he likes, and then she walks out the door without looking back.

“So are you guys… dating now?” asks Ned, peering at Peter out of the corner of his eye. 

“No, I’m just helping her out, dude,” Peter replies, ignoring his friend’s suspicious gaze and scanning the grocery aisle, but doesn’t know what he’s looking for.

“Ok,” says Ned, not remotely convinced. "You're just helping out by having a baby with your best friend? Who you're secretly in love with?"

"Come on, Ned," says Peter. " You're my best friend."

"Uh huh, stop trying to change the subject,” says Ned, throwing packets of ramen into Peter's shopping basket, along with an assortment of his favorite Pinoy snacks. “Are you at least gonna tell May?” 

“What? Why?” Peter frowns, lifting his shoulders. “I wouldn’t tell her if I was picking a friend up from the airport or helping them move apartments.” 

“Dude. Not the same.” 

“Dude, it’s just a favor for a friend.” 

“Dude.” Ned stops in the middle of the aisle. “Do you hear yourself right now?"

Waving him off, Peter escapes his friend’s interrogation by ducking into the next aisle to pick up some of that tea that Michelle likes. 

"So how does this work?” Ned asks when he catches up to Peter. “You just do your business into a test tube or whatever?"

"No, we're going with the… natural semination route," Peter says cautiously.

Ned narrows his eyes at Peter—not threateningly, more like he can't believe how stupid his friends are. “So you guys are just having a bunch of sex.”

"It's what she wants," Peter says evasively.

"Sure, of course," Ned nods, still eyeing him suspiciously. "Whatever MJ wants."

"Besides, she's objectively gorgeous, so why wouldn't I fall for her a little bit if we're having sex all the time? Doesn't mean anything."

"Dude."

"Shut up."

They make their way to the frozen food aisle in silence, though Peter can almost hear Ned straining to hold back from saying something. 

"I just don’t get why you’re always out of groceries," Ned finally says, mercifully changing the subject. "It's not that hard, just put a reminder on your phone or something," he continues, throwing bags of frozen lumpia and microwaveable dumplings into Peter’s basket.

"Yeah, I know, but I've been staying over MJ's a lot lately," Peter admits sheepishly, feeling like he owes Ned something truthful, "because of the... y'know."

"Because of the baby-making ?" Ned says loudly, looking at Peter dead in the eyes. "You've been over there for the non-stop baby-making?"

"Ned!" Peter looks around, but none of the other shoppers care about his and Ned’s conversation. He lowers his voice anyway. "Okay, okay. We've maybe been talking about me possibly moving in with her when my lease is up in a few months," he says in a rush. "You know, to help with the baby. Temporarily."

Ned doesn't freak out like Peter expected him to, but he goes unsettlingly quiet as they head to the register.

"Wouldn't it be weird living together with a baby and trying to date other people later?" Ned asks when they get in line to check out.

“What? What are you talking about?”

“If you’re not together-together and only co-parenting, at least one of you is going to want to go out on dates with other people at some point.”

“That’s the point to co-parenting,” Peter says defensively. “Either of us would have someone to watch the kid when we go out. With other people.” The very idea fills Peter with a strange ache that he’ll do anything not to admit to Ned, even though he’s pretty sure his friend can see right through him.

Before they check out at the register, Peter picks up two pre-made meals from the grab-and-go fridge, and Ned makes a sound. 

“What now?” asks Peter, exasperated. He can feel his friend’s judgement like a beam aimed right at the back of his head, a skill Ned has annoyingly picked up from MJ.

"Are you going over to her place after this?"

“No,” Peter replies quickly. At least it’s the truth. “What’s it to you?”

“You grabbed two bowls of pinakbet, MJ’s favorite.”

“I have a big appetite,” Peter counters, though Ned's face remains staunchly unconvinced.

"Contrary to what you may think of me," Ned sighs as the cashier rings Peter up, "I don't actually enjoy telling you 'I told you so' but…."

“Then don’t.”

Peter’s voice comes out sharper than he intended. But instead of taking it personally, Ned only pats his shoulder and gives him a pitying look that makes him feel worse.

Ned’s words keep running through Peter's head even after he gets back to his apartment, and he ruminates while he tidies up the hopeless clutter. 

But when Michelle shows up at his door, all his doubts magically disappear.

"You're doing all the work tonight," she says, catching her breath. "Those are a lot of fucking stairs."

Chuckling, Peter picks her up, and she wraps her legs around his waist as he carries her to his bedroom. “You got it, pretty lady.”

Afterwards, they lie wrapped up in each other’s arms, their bodies sinking into the center of Peter’s squeaky old mattress, and he wishes he could extend that moment forever. 

When she feels him twitch against her stomach, Michelle grins against his lips. 

"Again, already? Wow, Spidey, give a girl a chance to recover," she teases, sliding her fingers back into the mess he left between her legs. 

“I thought you were serious about this baby making business?” he retorts, tucking her hair behind her ear.

Michelle’s face is glowing when she smiles up at him. "I’m glad you’re as committed as I am to the cause…"

She licks her sticky fingers and spreads herself for him, so he can watch his efforts ooze out of her. 

It’s the hottest thing Peter has ever seen, and he’s surprised that his brain is still functioning at all. Seeing her thick folds, all wet and swollen, turn him on so much that he wants to go for another round immediately.

But when his eyes dart back up to her eyes, her expression is so soft and earnest that it catches him off guard. 

It feels wrong to hide his feelings from her. This isn’t what they agreed to. If he was honest with himself, Peter would have to admit that he’s been lying to her since the beginning.

It makes him feel guilty, like he’s using her for more than they had agreed to give each other. But maybe, if they accomplish what they had set out to do and he gives her a baby, then he won't feel this way anymore.

But she feels so good that he pushes the uneasy feeling away again, too caught up in how she feels beneath him, her limbs wrapped around his body and her fingers tugging at his hair.

Could he do it? Could he stand watching her date someone else, build a life with someone who wasn't—

Pushing the thoughts to the back of his mind, he grabs her by the ankles. 

"Come here," he demands. 

Giggling, Michelle lets him pull her towards him until he can position himself to take her again.

MJ : See you tomorrow 🍆🍆🍆 

Peter laughs to himself, tapping his fingers against his phone as he thinks of a reply only for the microwave to ding. It jogs his memory of Ned’s commentary during their grocery trip last month when he bought the damn things, frowning as he glances up to it. 

He slips his phone back into his pocket, opening the microwave door to grab his dinner—the hot plate burning his fingers slightly as he hisses in pain.

Couldn’t have gotten heat-resistant powers like Johnny ? Peter thinks to himself, nearly dropping the meal on the counter from how much it stings. 

He opens up a drawer to find a clean fork, leaning against the counter to dig in—only to make a face when he tastes the half-scalding hot and half-frozen glob of mess that despite it being a recently bought microwave dinner, felt like it expired three years ago.

“Eugh, so much for eating in,” Peter says to himself, discarding the rest of the meal into the trash before grabbing his phone—only to smile when he sees yet another message from Michelle. 

MJ: Thanks btw. I know this is… weird. 

Peter’s quick to reply, thumbs flying across the screen as he immediately tells her it wasn’t weird at all. If anything, the past three months of his life had been some of the best he’s had.

The shit with Shocker and Rhino last month had been annoying, Scorpion giving him a run for his money last weekend sending phantom pains up and down his legs. But aside from the usual problems he faced on the streets and the monotony of his piss poor lab job, Peter couldn’t help but feel as if he had something to look forward to.

Consistent sex—good sex at that—no doubt contributed to his mood lately. But there was something particularly fulfilling in having sex with Michelle, feeling as if each time that he did that he was not just one step closer in helping her achieve her goal but was somehow getting even closer to her. 

Peter smiles at that, going to reply that he thinks he’s getting the better end of the deal only to freeze—the thought stopping him right in his tracks as Michelle’s text bubbles light up the screen once more. 

Oh shit. Is Ned right? Peter thinks, staring at the screen yet his mind drifting elsewhere—wondering how in the world he could possibly continue to fool himself. 

He thinks back to the first time they’d ever had sex, the awkwardness and the electricity between them that sent him straight back to high school—having an impossible crush on his impossible to understand friend. Sixteen year old Peter wouldn’t have ever dreamed of being best friends with Michelle, much less the middle-ground and yeah, weird relationship that they had now. 

They weren’t dating—despite what May seemed to think—though Peter hadn’t exactly asked if they could see other people, even if the thought of that made his stomach twist into knots. He didn’t want to be sleeping with anyone else but it wasn’t as if he couldn’t , especially since once Michelle was finally pregnant their “arrangement” would finally come to an end.

Peter feels a sense of loss at that, chastising himself for even thinking it. Yet as Michelle’s message comes in, some sarcastic joke that his brain can’t process right now, Peter is still focusing on a cyclical line of questions. 

Did I make the right decision? Am I doing this to help her? Or am I just being selfish? 

The thought of Michelle dating someone else  in the future, raising their child with that person sends his stomach into knots once more—wishing with everything within him that he can push that thought away but finding he can’t, knowing it’s a terrible thing to think to begin with.

Michelle hadn’t put any expectations on him, she’d been very clear from the beginning that Peter was serving as her donor because she trusted him. The fact that she was even allowing him the chance to co-parent was a privilege, one that Peter didn’t forget for a second. 

Her focus anytime they had sex was laser-sharp, making sure Peter came so he could uphold his side of the bargain and expecting nothing more—something that Peter knows from being friends with her for as long as he has that if she was into him beyond their plan, Michelle would rightfully demand more from a partner in bed.

But that’s just it, Peter thinks—still staring off into nothing. They weren’t partners, not in the traditional sense. Peter is her best friend, agreed to be her sperm donor and that was it. The kid they were actively trying to make wouldn’t be his kid, though it occurs to Peter just then that they hadn’t exactly signed anything to make it official.

His stomach begins tangling itself into knots less because of the half-digested microwave food and more from the realization that whatever he was feeling was way beyond what Michelle had asked for. 

How the hell could he ever continue with this, keeping up the facade that he’ll be capable of platonically co-parenting their—her—child with some imaginary stranger when Peter’s not even sure of his own feelings? That at the end of the day, if she met someone else—they would be the one Michelle raised the baby with, not Peter. 

Michelle sends him another text, Peter forcing himself to stay in the moment and shoving that problem for future Peter—a sinking feeling in his gut at the realization that for as short as this part of their relationship had begun, it would eventually come to an end. 

Something that Peter can’t help but hope—hating himself as he does—doesn’t come anytime soon. 

Part 4

Peter’s knee deep into wiring and mechanical parts, the Spider-Man suit looking more like a disassembled mess of circuitry rather than a suit when the doors to the lab open—Peter having heard his pacing fifteen minutes ago. 

“Hey Pete, what you working on?”

He gestures towards the suit, screwdriver wedged in his mouth in an act that he knows annoys Tony but is the easiest way for him to get his hands dirty. 

Tony predictably makes a sound of disgust as he walks up to him, leaning against the lab table and looking down at him. 

“What?” Peter asks, mouth garbled from the screwdriver in his mouth and with one hand mixed in with the wires. 

“Not that I mind these random late night visits, especially when they’re less because you are a mess rather than your suit,” Tony says, motioning towards the suit once again. “But you mind telling me what brought you here when you just revamped this particular one last week?”

Tony stands, grabbing a StarkPad as Peter takes the screwdriver out of his mouth, only to sigh when Tony says, “Yep, just as I thought. You not only did a full scale work up last week but you’ve managed to do some for five different suits . One of them,” Tony flips the StarkPad around, “isn’t even yours.”

Peter shrugs, looking back at the suit spilled out over the lab table as he says, “It needed a new paint job.”

“What it needs is your grubby little hands away from the merchandise. I don’t pay you to come crawling in at all hours and vandalize my shit.”

“First of all, you don’t pay me,” Peter says with a smirk, looking up to see Tony rolling his eyes as he sets the StarkPad down. “And second of all, you just said you didn’t mind when I visited.”

“ Visit ? Yes. Hyper-fixate on a suit that you haven’t worn since you were sixteen? Not so much.”

Tony folds his arms, leaning against the lab bench once more as he asks, “What’s going on? Trouble in paradise?”

Peter makes a face, confusion flowing through him only to groan in embarrassment when Tony says, “With MJ, I mean. May says you two are dating. Cost me a fortune.”

“You’re a billionaire,” Peter deadpans as Tony shrugs.

“My pride is priceless.”

Peter rolls his eyes, leaning away from the bench as he says, “We’re not dating. And stop talking about me behind my back. I liked it better when you two hated each other.”

Tony just laughs, unfurling his arms again as Peter cracks a smile—only for his mind to latch on to the reality of what Tony was saying.

Has it really been that obvious all this time? He thinks, wondering how he could’ve possibly missed all the clues until they were staring at him right in the face—that nearly every significant person in his life had seen this coming a mile away.

His mind starts to race, mortified at the possibility that Michelle had been aware of it—only to be immediately thrilled and then mortified all over again.

If Michelle knew, she hadn’t given Peter a clue. Which either meant that Michelle was less observant than Ned, May and Tony combined— unlikely —or, the thought of it causing a sinking feeling to form in the pit of his stomach, she did know and didn’t want Peter like that at all. 

Of the many changes that the two of them had undergone in the years they’d known each other—Michelle Jones being forthright and to the point about what she wanted had never wavered. The meticulous fertility plan the two of them had been on for the past few months being more than enough evidence to support that. 

If Michelle knew that Peter liked her, as middle school as it sounded even in his head, and said nothing about it—it could only mean that she wasn’t interested. 

Ned had all but given up on trying to convince him of anything else - Peter feeling his frustration anytime they talked for the way Ned would ask about anything but their “arrangement”. As a result, the three of them hadn’t really had the chance to hang out as much as they normally would - though Peter got the sense that Ned and Michelle still kept up their weekly sushi dates.

From off-hand comments that both May and Michelle made, it was clear they still spent time together too - though how Michelle was able to keep the arrangement a secret, Peter didn’t know. For all May knew, Peter was being the supportive best friend - going with her to appointments at the clinic and nothing more.

A part of Peter whispered in the back of his mind that May clearly had to know the truth by now, even if the very thought of that caused him to feel equal parts dread and mortified. 

As much as Peter wrestled with his feelings about everything - sleeping with his best friend, the idea that everyone around him knew how desperately in love with her he was, the knowledge that this new aspect of their relationship would eventually come to an end - he couldn’t bear the thought of what being Michelle’s sperm donor would mean for May. 

It eats at him once again, keeping this massive secret from the people in his life much less his own complicated feelings about everything. How could he possibly expect May to not connect the dots, if she hasn’t already, about Michelle’s sperm donor when their - her - baby was born? How could he live with himself knowing that he’d robbed May of having her first grandkid, even if by definition of being a donor, the baby wouldn’t even be his kid to begin with—

“You still with me?” Tony asks, throwing Peter out of his thoughts. 

He glances up, to see Tony searching his face - an uncomfortable feeling of being put under a microscope that he hasn’t felt since he was a teenager creeping down his spine. 

“Yeah,” Peter says with a scoff, hoping to throw Tony off whatever path he was on, “just pissed that you guys seem to think my life is a soap opera that you can gossip about.”

Tony snorts. “Kid, your life is a damn telenovela with the amount of shit you get into. I mean what, last week you had Chameleon and Shocker tag teaming you in the Bronx? While you were wearing a paper bag —“

“That was a joke from Johnny that—“ Peter cuts himself off, “never mind.”

Tony shakes his head before saying, “That’s not even half of it. You somehow manage to always to find the path of least resistance, look it straight in the eye long enough to say ‘fuck you’ before turning tail and finding the absolute best way to make your life harder.”

“You’re a terrible mentor,” Peter says, watching Tony as he smirks. 

“You’re almost thirty. You don’t need a mentor, you need a therapist . How is Melinda by the way?” Tony asks, moving away from the lab desk and towards his own—Peter laughing in return as he shakes his head.

Tony begins to wax poetic about therapy—something Peter’s had years of and yet wonders how he could possibly explain this scenario to Melinda when his phone buzzes, discreetly sneaking it out of his pocket and to feel a flutter in his stomach when he sees who it is. 

MJ: you almost done? Been waiting for you all night. Hope you’re saving it up for me 💦 

Peter feels his cheeks flush into no doubt what’s a furious shade of red when he gets the next message, a picture that makes his eyes wide and his dick hard. He flexes his fingers, immediately going to respond only to hear an exaggerated cough.

He lifts his head up, Tony staring at him with an amused look on his face as he says, “Oh excuse me, am I bothering you, underoos?”

“No! No, definitely not. Uh sorry, what were you saying?” Peter says, putting his phone down with one hand and subtly trying to readjust himself with the other.

Tony just raises an eyebrow, snorts before rolling his eyes and turning away as he starts to talk again. 

Peter’s beyond paying attention, too focused on the message Michelle had sent, on thoughts he can’t run away from and the feeling twisting in his gut that feels something almost like regret.

“My cramps are killing me,” Michelle grumbles, curling up against Peter's side. “I keep forgetting this part about being off the pill. That and the sore tits.”

Reaching around her shoulders, Peter tries to stroke her arm consolingly, but she keeps twisting in discomfort. 

"Sorry I'm ruining our plans tonight," she sighs into his chest. She's just finished a string of late nights at work, only to have her period arrive the first night she has off.

If he is being completely honest, Peter is actually glad for a quiet night with Michelle, just watching a movie in bed like they are right now, instead of having their entire night dominated by the single-minded purpose of fucking and getting her pregnant. 

"Nothing to apologize for, Em. I'm sorry you're feeling crummy," he says, pressing a kiss to the side of her head. 

They try to continue watching the movie on her laptop, but Michelle keeps adjusting and re-adjusting her position. 

“That's it, I’m taking a hot bath,” she announces, standing up. Seeing Peter sit up eagerly at that, she wags a finger at him. “Alone, this time. Unless you want to see a scene from Jaws.”

He pouts, but doesn't stop her when she slips out of bed and disappears into her closet to undress. Sitting back, his gaze travels across her room, idly imagining where to put a bassinet.

His eyes travel to where Michelle's work clothes are hanging over a chair, and her purse and shoes lie discarded on the floor beside an expensive-looking bouquet still cradled in tissue paper and cellophane. 

"Nice flowers," Peter observes, crouching down to pick up the bouquet. "From a client?"

"Kind of," Michelle calls from her closet. "They're actually from the client on the other side of the lawsuit I just won." Wrapping her hair up in a towel, she shrugs into a bathrobe. 

“That's awesome, MJ!" Peter beams, pride bubbling up inside his chest as if her victory was his win, too. "Wait, is that normal? For the losing side to send you flowers?”

“Not really," she says, lifting her shoulders. "But maybe they were so impressed with how much I totally obliterated their case that they’re trying to recruit me to be, like, their in-house counsel or something.” 

As she's stepping into the bathroom, Michelle asks him to take the note that came with the bouquet and to put the flowers in water.

After doing as she asked with the bouquet, he slides the card out of the envelope, telling himself he isn’t snooping because Michelle specifically asked him to take care of the flowers for her.

Michelle--

I'm not used to losing, but it was worth it to meet you. 

How about you try cross-examining me over dinner? 

—H. Osborn

Alright, so not a job offer. 

A nauseating feeling creeps up Peter's spine and his fingers are itching to throw the card out, but he dismisses the petty and ridiculous impulse immediately. 

Then revisits and dismisses it again.

The bouquet is needlessly ostentatious and totally not Michelle’s style, Peter decides. This guy clearly doesn’t know the first thing about her or her tastes. If anything, Peter almost feels sorry for him.

Almost.

Maybe he could accidentally lose the card—down the trash chute at the other end of the floor. 

No, he can't do that.

Peter listens to the sound of the bath running, the water churning like his stomach, and stares down at the thick card stock between his fingers.

He and Michelle hadn't talked about dating other people—they were spending all their time together anyway, so it never came up. 

But Peter should have known he was only putting off the inevitable and trying not to think about the possibility.

Besides, what if he’s standing in the way of Michelle’s shot at happiness? This guy could be the one she's supposed to end up with; they could get married and have a kid the normal way, instead of this weird arrangement she has with Peter. 

Ned was right, Peter doesn't think he could bear it, watching Michelle go out on dates with other people. They've been friends for years and he's heard about plenty of her upcoming dates and been debriefed on the aftermath, but that was before they decided to have a baby together--and before Peter realized how he feels about her. Fuck.

He doesn't know if he can stand sitting at home while Michelle is out with someone else, knowing that someone who isn't him gets to figure out how to undo her dress that night.

Peter paces around the room, enough to wear down a path in her rug.

Maybe they shouldn't move in together after all. 

He could still help with the baby and just commute back and forth--which isn't too bad if he gets to thwip his way over from downtown Manhattan to Brooklyn. Living together might prove to be too difficult if he has to confront the reality of their arrangement all the time--being cordial to Michelle's dates, watching her leave with them, and constantly wondering if they're good enough to deserve an evening with her.

And if one of those dates becomes a long-term boyfriend or girlfriend that Peter has to see all the time? What then?

Could he stomach a stranger—perhaps this obnoxious flower-giving stranger?—raising his baby with Michelle? No, her baby. Could he stomach seeing her with someone else at all?

Wiping his hand down his face, Peter sits back down on her bed with the card still clutched in his hands.

The sound of the faucet being turned off shakes him out of his staring match with the words on the note, and he quickly slips it back into the envelope and leaves it on top of Michelle's vanity.

"Feeling better?" Peter asks nonchalantly from  the bed, his arms folding behind his head. 

Unwrapping the towel around her hair , Michelle smiles serenely at him. "For now."

He watches her pick up the little square note, wondering if he'll remember this as the moment everything changes, and if he'll regret not being pettier.

Michelle slides the card out from the envelope and glances at it, snorts derisively, and drops it in the waste bin by her dresser.

Peter raises his eyebrows at her. “Not interested in the job offer?”

“Wasn’t a job offer,” she says. “Guy just wanted a date.”

“Oh?” says Peter, crossing his arms and feigning surprise. “That seems… unprofessional.”

The ache in his chest seems to thaw, and he can breathe again.

“I don’t think some young hotshot CEO cares about being professional,” says Michelle, leveling her gaze at Peter. “Just ask pre-Iron Man Tony.”

“Well, it’s still unprofessional, even if he doesn’t care.” 

Michelle sits down beside Peter on the bed, eying him up and down. “Are you jealous?”

“Me? Jealous?” Peter scoffs. “No way. I mean, I feel sorry for the guy.”

“Oh yeah?”

“Totally," he replies, staring at the low dip of Michelle’s half-tied bathrobe instead of meeting her eyes. "I mean, does he really think he can just win you over with some flowers?"

"I dunno, Parker," she asks, smirking. "Do you think his flowers are telling me 'I'm sexy and beautiful', or just that he wants to make a baby with me? Or both? 'cause it's an awfully large bouquet. Like, I could barely get my hands all the way around it."

Peter feels his back stiffen, and he pinches his lips to keep from grinding his teeth. He thinks he's missing something, but he's too distracted with visions of a faceless guy in an expensive suit trying to seduce Michelle.

"Sounds more like mister fancy CEO is compensating for something," he manages to cough out, glancing up at her.

"Right." Michelle's lips twitch, slowly curling into a smile, and Peter feels like he’s just missed some joke. 

"You're making fun of me," he exhales, feeling his cheeks get hot.

"I wouldn't dare."

"You totally would." Peter shifts closer to her, the bed sinking in when they’re side by side.  "Anyway, I'm not jealous." 

Michelle furrows her brows into a mock-serious expression and nods gravely. "Of course you're not. Because you only get jealous when you're really into someone. Like, totally obsessed with them."

"Come on, that was one time," he says, playing with the edge of her bathrobe. She raises an eyebrow at him, and Peter sighs, hanging his head. "Okay, twice , but that's still not a pattern! It's not like I've ever ordered a drone strike on anyone over someone."

"Whatever you say, Parker."

With a smug little grin, Michelle stretches her arms over her head and groans.

"Still sore?" Peter asks, eager to change the subject. "I could give you a massage or something."

She considers his offer, her hands playing with the bathrobe tie around her waist. “Just a friendly massage?"

"Yeah, exactly," says Peter, positioning himself behind Michelle so she can sit between his legs. “What are friends for?”

Before he can get his hands on her shoulders, she maneuvers herself around to sit in his lap, face to face and legs wrapped around him, and shrugs off her bathrobe. 

“To make it easier,” she explains coolly. “Nothing you haven’t seen before.”

His eyes dart around her face, taking in her mischievous smile and trying not to drift lower. 

Peter swallows thickly. “That doesn’t make it easier.”

“You coming tonight?”

Michelle laughs over the phone, Peter smiling as he sends another hand out, swinging himself forward. 

“You really need new jokes. That’s the third time you’ve said that to me this week.”

“Why mess with a good thing? It’s punny,” Peter says, as Michelle laughs again. He flips through the air, relishing in the feeling of gravity taking its hold before he swings again. 

“It’s actually not that funny—“

“No, not funny,” Peter interjects, wind rushing past him as he swings through the air, “ punny. ”

The exasperated sigh on the other end is completely worth it, Peter grinning so hard his cheeks hurt as she says, “You’re the biggest dork on the planet you know that? If our kid pops out with your stupid ass jokes, I’m blaming you.”

“You chose me, remember?” Peter says, the knots building back up in his stomach at the reminder of their endgame. Yet there’s also the fact Michelle referred to the baby they’re actively trying to make as ours - the knots turning into butterflies when she doesn’t immediately correct herself. 

Michelle laughs, only for everything else to drown out when Peter’s senses are assaulted with a sheer flood of panic—whipping his head around towards the docks. 

“Hold on,” he says, changing his trajectory midair—everything in him screaming for him to go the other direction, just confirming for him that something’s wrong.

“Pete?” The light and joking tone they’d had only seconds before completely gone as she asks, “What’s going on?”

“I don’t know. I don’t—something’s wrong,” Peter says, half to her and half to himself as he propels himself even closer to what should be an abandoned warehouse—his senses going haywire the closer he gets to it.

“Do you need to call someone? Is it Shocker again? Scorpion?” Michelle’s voice is firm, calming and direct—the opposite of the swell of panic building in his chest the closer he gets to the building. 

“I don’t—I don’t know. Something’s wrong. Something’s—”

Before Peter can say anything else, his senses scream at him—dodging a blast of electricity right before it hits him, turning to see Shocker with a wicked smile on his face as he swings towards him. 

“Herman, buddy. We gotta stop—ahh!” Peter yells out, a burning pain along his leg as he glances down—only to see one of Scorpion’s darts attached to him. 

“What the—” Peter instantly feels woozy, barely avoiding slamming down onto the ground as he swings—the disorientation being the best explanation his mind can think of when he’s snatched out of the air.

“Shit,” Peter mutters to himself as Rhino appears out nowhere, roaring as he slams him down to the ground. 

Peter wheezes, whatever Scorpion had drugged him with flowing through his system so fast that his attempt to move makes him feel dizzy. 

“Peter! Peter, what’s going on?” 

Michelle’s voice is distant, Peter’s vision blurring as he glances to the three villains making their way towards him—Peter backing up and sending a hand out to swing him towards the warehouse. 

It’s an instant mistake, Peter crying out as he propels himself into the air and whispering to Michelle, “I’ll call you back.”

“Peter don’t you dare—”

He cuts the call off, looking back behind him only to get hit by something that takes the wind out of him, his vision going black before he even hits the ground. 

Part 5

Peter should’ve guessed it would only be a matter of time before he fucked things up. 

From the team-ups around the city to the surprise attacks at times when Peter was otherwise distracted—he should’ve guessed that the criminal underground was planning something . 

As it was, Peter found himself on the wrong end of a supercollider, and the last coherent memory he has of that night is Michelle’s terrified yelling and his spider senses screaming at him while he fought Shocker, Rhino, and Scorpion in an abandoned warehouse off the Hudson. 

The rest of the night is a fuzzy mess of swinging and punches and bright lights, and his head still hurts with phantom pains anytime he attempts to dwell on it. 

What he later learned was that Fisk had been attempting to recreate time travel. But he was unsuccessful thanks to Peter’s quick thinking and even quicker reflexes, something he doesn’t even remember doing, though it’d come at no small cost to himself. 

At least the threat was eliminated, with Fisk safely in jail and the rest of those he’d enlisted all enclosed in the Raft, and all that was left was for Peter to recover. The explosion and having the building collapse on top of him had shattered seventy bones in his body, not to mention the poisoning from Scorpion ravaging his healing powers. He was put into a medically induced coma for three weeks, followed by another painful two weeks of recovery at the compound medbay before he could finally be discharged. 

None of it had been particularly easy for Peter, much less those in his orbit—Peter’s own memories of when he’d been drugged out of his mind in recovery being a mixture of May, Michelle, Tony, and Ned coming in like a revolving door. 

That was the worst part of being Spider-Man, second only to losing people—not that he got hurt but rather waking up and seeing the terrified expressions of the people he loved when he did. 

As soon as Peter was cleared, he was itching to leave the compound—not just because he was ready to get back into the city and see what had sprung up in his absence, but because of what his extended recovery meant for his relationship with Michelle.

She’d been distant ever since he’d woken up, not ghosting him outright but offering only short, impersonal responses whenever he’d message her in between rehab sessions. He kept trying to figure out what could possibly be the reason for her sudden aloofness--if he’d done something wrong or missed something important. 

It hit him when he finally arrived back at his apartment and saw the calendar he put up to track Michelle’s fertility windows. 

His injuries and recovery had set them back by over a month, missing an entire cycle and possibly a second one now or soon. 

He knows Michelle isn’t a shallow person—that she cares about him more than any sort of plan or agreement they may have. But he also knows that this isn’t what she had agreed to, and a pang runs through him at the idea that if she had gone with a traditional sperm donor, Michelle wouldn’t have to deal with the constant threat of said donor’s mortality disrupting her plans.

Peter rocks back and forth on his feet as he raises a hand to her apartment door, hesitating for a second before he knocks. 

It makes perfect sense to Peter that she would be upset, and a darker part of him wonders if he should tell her to find someone else to be her sperm donor. What if she did find someone else, and didn’t know how to tell him all this time? Or, more likely, she was having second thoughts about the whole thing. He hates that this is a possibility but wants to be sure he gives her the opportunity to back out, even if it kills him. 

Peter swallows down his bad joke in his own mind, summoning up his courage and knocking at Michelle’s door. 

It takes her a few minutes to get to it, and Peter kicks himself for coming over impulsively rather than texting her beforehand. As soon as she opens the door, Peter is immediately on edge—her cheeks are slightly puffy and her eyes are red, as if she’d been crying.

“Peter? What’s wrong? Are you okay?” She immediately asks, eyes dancing up and down his body. 

“Yeah, I’m—I’m sorry, I know I should’ve—”

“You’re okay?” Michelle asks again, Peter nodding silently as she meets his eyes. “What’s going on?” 

“I, uh, I just wanted to—see you,” he says, holding up a bottle of wine. “I know I’ve been out of it for the past few weeks, and I’m not sure when your window is this month but—”

“You’ve got to be fucking kidding me,” Michelle says, pressing her lips together before exhaling sharply out of her nose. 

She looks annoyed, aggravated—enough that it churns something in Peter’s gut at the idea that his deepest fears were true. 

“What? Is… can I come in?” he asks quietly. 

Michelle’s eyes bore into his for a moment before she steps back from the door. Peter enters and glances around her apartment, which is uncharacteristically in a state of disarray—looking more like how his apartment does at any given moment.

He knows Michelle well enough to recognize that this means she’s upset, stressed--or both.

She closes the door and says, “I had a long week.”

“Yeah,” Peter says, swallowing the lump down in his throat, as he shifts the wine bottle in his hand. “Uh, here. I got your favorite--free wine.” 

Michelle glances at the bottle of some fancy red from Tony’s stash—a gift to Peter that he hadn’t ever gotten around to opening. He figured this night was as good a night as any, and life was too short to keep saving the good stuff for later. 

“Thanks,” Michelle says dully, sniffling and swiping at her nose in a move that’s so unlike her that it gives Peter pause—only for her face to transform into the cool, expressionless mask he hasn’t seen in years. “Here, I’ll take it.”

Peter wordlessly hands it to her, and Michelle takes it without her eyes ever reaching his—turning away from him as he says, “I was going to bring dinner but—”

“I’m not hungry,” Michelle says sharply, and Peter clamps his mouth shut as he watches her disappear into the kitchen. 

He glances around her apartment again, a place he’s become even more intimately familiar over the last few months. Only he’s never seen her place like this, and his mind tries to recall the last time Michelle was ever this stressed out. 

Wracking his brain for what the cause could be and coming up empty, he feels like a terrible friend--not only because he didn’t uphold his side of their baby bargain, but because being Spider-Man kept him away from her for almost two months, and he knows it won’t be the last time. 

“Are you?”

“Huh?” Peter asks as Michelle comes back from the kitchen, looking at him with an unreadable expression on her face. 

“Are you hungry?”

He quickly shakes his head. “Uh, no, no I’m good,” he says, giving her a thumbs up. 

He inwardly winces at himself for his awkward gesture, only to frown when he sees Michelle just continue to stare at him impassively. “Is everything—”

“What are you doing here, Peter?” 

Michelle’s words stop him in his tracks, a sinking feeling in the pit of his stomach as he shoves his hands in his pocket. 

“I told you. I wanted to see—”

“No,” Michelle shakes her head, her voice a bit more stable and her eyes flashing with something that Peter doesn’t quite recognize as she says, “Why are you here ? You’re supposed to be at home, recovering. God, do you want to open your stitches back up?”

“I don’t have any stitches anymore,” Peter says a little indignantly. When Michelle’s expression starts turning into a frown, he adds, “Super healing, remember?”

Her lips twist, and Peter can feel the tension emanating off of her as she stares him down. He scratches the back of his neck, feeling as if the few feet between them may as well be an ocean as he stammers out, “I know my healing wasn’t exactly working right for a while, but I’m good now. They did a full chemical detox on me and everything for Scorpion's poison, and I was doing physical therapy, so it’s… it’s all good now.”

Something breaks in her expression just then—a flash that lasted a split second, and if Peter hadn’t been staring at her so intensely he would’ve missed it—something so raw and so painful that it almost causes him to take a step back before it shifts again into the same neutral expression she had not even five seconds before. 

“You should go home, Peter.”

There’s a part of him that wants to, if only to respect the boundaries she is so clearly drawing for him right now. But there’s something in his gut that nudges at him, an instinct telling him that there’s more to it than her just wanting some space, so he says, “I will, if you really want me to. I just… I just came by to say I’m sorry.”

“You’re sorry?” Michelle asks, the neutrality falling only for confusion to replace it. 

Peter takes that as an opportunity to push forward as he says, “Yeah, I—I know this isn’t what you had in mind when you picked me. If you had a regular donor, you wouldn’t have to deal with all this. I never meant for my messes to become yours.” 

Michelle stares at him blankly for a second before she laughs—a sharp, undignified sound that just confuses Peter further. She puts a hand to her mouth, crossing her arm over the rest of her body with the other before bringing it down as she says, “Is that—you think I’m upset because of that ?”

“Well… yeah?” Peter asks, scratching the back of his neck again as she just stares at him with disbelief all over her face. 

“Ned’s right. You’re an idiot.” 

Peter’s not sure how to take that. But before he can say anything, Michelle takes a step closer, and he immediately sobers up when he sees the tears in her eyes. 

“Peter, I thought you were dead . You almost died several times the past few weeks. I was--I couldn’t even sleep. I came home and just…” she gestures around the apartment, the pieces starting to fall into place as he follows her line of sight. She sighs, Peter looking to her once more as she says, “That’s the worst part, you know? The waiting. Not knowing what’s going to happen to you. Seeing you in that fucking medbay and wondering if—if this is the one time you don’t wake up.”

“I’m so sorry, MJ,” Peter says, tentatively taking a few more steps towards her as she searches his face. 

“Sorry for what? Because if you’re actually that much of a dumbass to think that this is about being my sperm donor then—”

“I don’t! I mean, I did think—” Peter says, taking another step forward—an unmistakably hurt look on her face as she does the same.

“You actually thought I was mad at you for what? Not being a punctual stud or something? Missing your spunk quota?”

“No! I don’t know!” Peter says, taking one last step until they’re right in front of each other, “You haven’t been texting me like you used to and—”

“Because I was scared . Because I thought that maybe you got hurt because I tired you out too much the night before, so you missed a critical hit during the fight or something, and that it was all my fault you got hurt! You don’t know what it’s like to see you like that—” Michelle cuts herself off, and Peter tentatively reaches his arms towards her. 

She looks at him for a moment before relenting, and Peter feels an instantaneous relief when her arms wrap around his waist. 

It hits him then that this is the most physical contact they’ve had in over a month, aside from hazy memories of Michelle holding his hand while he was still drifting in and out of consciousness in the medbay. 

He hadn’t realized how much he missed this—the closeness and warmth of physically being in her orbit, of being able to press her body against his--and he closes his eyes as he hugs her tighter. 

Michelle buries her head into his neck and her hand gently grazes across his back as they hold each other. 

“I’m sorry,” Peter whispers again, something unlocking in his chest as he does—a truth that he’d been too terrified to acknowledge. “I’m sorry for scaring you. I know this isn’t what you signed up for.” 

Michelle laughs into his neck, the sound muffled and wet as Peter smiles—bringing her just enough out of the hug so that they can look at each other but still hold each other. 

“I signed up for it the moment I became your friend, Pete. Spider-Man is always going to be in the picture, and yeah, it scares the shit out of me,” she says, her voice wavering slightly, “but if you weren’t Spider-Man, you wouldn’t be you.”

She loosens one of her arms wrapped around his waist, bringing her hand up to cradle his face as she says, “But I also can’t help how I feel.”

Peter’s eyes bore into hers and he swallows nervously, bringing his hand up to cover hers. “Tell me how you feel, Em. Please.”

Michelle searches his face as she says, “If we have a baby together, I can’t help but think about what would happen if... That you’ll—” she swallows, and an ache grows in Peter’s chest as she continues, “I’m just so scared of losing you, Peter, and not just because you’re my best friend.”

Nodding in understanding, Peter presses his fingers into her side and wills himself to say, “If you want to call the whole thing off, I understand.”

“Call it off?” Michelle asks incredulously, bringing her hand down in surprise. “Is that what you really want?” 

“No,” Peter whispers, his lips just barely hovering over hers. "Unless it’s what you want? If this is too much, if it’s not what you want anymore… all I’m saying is, it’s okay if you’ve changed your mind, MJ."

Michelle looks up at him, her half-lidded eyes smoldering with a look of determination, the air around them shifting as he hears her heart skip a beat.

“That’s not what I want,” she whispers back, her breath hot against his lips. 

"Then what do you want?" he asks, his heart caught in his throat.

"You." She glances down at his lips and absentmindedly licks her own. "Us. This." 

Unable to hold back any longer, Peter closes the distance left between them and kisses Michelle, his hand coming up to her chin. He's missed the taste of her mouth and the way her lips feel against his, and he’s already wasted too much time not kissing her.

But before he can go any further, Michelle puts a steadying hand on his chest and pulls back. “Peter, wait. I have to tell you something. I’ve been thinking about it a lot while you were gone.”

Taking a deep breath, Peter looks at her and nods, his arms releasing her. 

“When you agreed to be my donor,” she starts, avoiding his eyes, “I told myself that this was about having a baby, luckily with someone I trust and care about—and maybe I’d get to have some good sex along the way.”

“Michelle Jones just wants it all, huh?” he teases, nudging her shoulder.

“Yup,” she says, not bothering to suppress a self-satisfied smile, “and I did. I was on track to getting everything I wanted.” Then she sighs, dropping her shoulders. “But I also swore to myself that it was just supposed to be a physical thing, a means to an end, and that I’d keep my feelings for you out of it. But then I screwed it all up and fell for you anyway.”

Feelings for him? Peter’s not sure if he misheard her or if his mind was toying with his heart, but every ache in his body seems to melt away as her words sink in.

“Okay, please say something,” she chuckles nervously, wrapping her arms around herself.

“I didn’t know that you liked me like that,” he says, his chest warm and his head feeling light. 

“You really are an idiot,” Michelle laughs. It's a soft sound, and he can’t help leaning in to catch her next laugh in his lips. 

"Hey!" Peter protests in between kisses. "How was I supposed to know how you felt about me? Especially when you'd always run off as soon as I, y'know—"

"Creamed inside me?" she offers with a wry grin. But then her expression softens and goes serious. "If I stayed, I don't think I could have kept it up—pretending that I didn't want more from you. I really, really didn't want to fall for you again. It was mortifying enough the first time--"

"Again? When was the first time?" Peter asks, brows furrowed. 

"Oh, come on," she says, impatience masking her embarrassment. "You know how I felt in high school."

"In high school? About me?"

His mind races through his memories of Michelle at Midtown, her face always hidden behind a book or sketchpad, and certainly never looking at him when he was looking at her. 

"Yeah, and I thought I was being painfully obvious back then. Everyone else definitely did,” she says, blowing her hair out of her face. “But now that I know you better than I did back then, I guess I wasn't being obvious enough."

"I can be a little bit clueless sometimes," Peter admits, making her roll her eyes while still smiling at him. 

After the Blip, he and Michelle became closer in that unspoken way that snapped kids often banded together, united in their sense of displacement in a world that had moved on without them. But neither of them had ever made a move toward anything romantic, and then they graduated from high school and didn't see each other for years. 

“Maybe now's the right time for us after all,” Peter says softly, taking her into his arms again.

He could regret the time they didn't spend with each other sooner, or he can savor the time he gets now--and Michelle seems to be thinking the same thing.

Digging her fingers in Peter's hair, she kisses her way down to his jaw and then his neck, nipping just hard enough to leave a bruise.

A deep groan rumbles in his throat, and he holds himself back so Michelle can set the pace.

“I thought about you all the time in highschool," she admits between kisses, her cheeks flushing. 

"Me, too," he says, running his hands down her arm and resting his hands on her waist.

"No, I mean I thought about you a lot ," she says, worrying her lips. "Like, it could have been considered borderline obsessive if I wasn't so, you know, cool."

"Why didn't you say something?"

“Well, I don’t have a lot of luck getting close to people,” she says slowly, though he can hear her heart racing. "And it was even harder back then. I didn't want to risk making it weird with one of the few people I didn't hate interacting with at Midtown."

Desperate for Michelle to know how he really felt, to know that she wasn't the only one hiding her feelings, Peter says, "I liked you, too. I still do. I think I like you even more now. You're one of my best friends, Em."

"I think we may end up being each other's only best friends," she replies, taking him by the hand and leading him to her bedroom. "Ned is going to disown both of us for being stupid for so long."

Peter laughs, and everything feels light and warm inside him. His skin heats up under Michelle's hands while she strips him of his clothes, and he tugs off her shirt over her head next before she leans back on the bed. 

Michelle is breathing heavy, her kiss-swollen lips parted as Peter takes his eyes all over her body as he moves to hover over her. 

He's really missed seeing her naked. 

Cupping her breasts, Peter leans down and eagerly starts to lick her nipples one by one, feeling them swell and perk up under his tongue.

Her fingers tangle in his hair, holding his head against her chest. Her soft panting gets louder and more urgent as his tongue swirls around, licking and sucking at the tips of her breasts.

"Let me worship your body," he murmurs as he licks and kisses her breasts, leaving her aroused nipples wet and swollen.

She scrunches her nose at him, but lifts her hips so he can take off her sweatpants. "You're so cheesy."

“And you're so beautiful, MJ," he says, looking up at her. "I want to make you feel good."

A trembling, delicate expression crosses her face and she nods, watching him from beneath her lashes.

Pushing her underwear to the side, he slides his fingers between her folds to coat them in her slickness. Her eyes widen when she feels him curl his fingers and pinch her clit, and she whines softly as he works her over.

Fighting the urge to suck his fingers clean, Peter rubs her clit until it swells and stiffen under his touch. MJ kisses and nips at his neck impatiently, urging him to go further, so he does.

The room is quiet except for her soft moans, the sound of raindrops hitting the AC unit in the window, and the rhythmic creaking of the bed.

"Tell me what you like," he murmurs into her stomach, inching his lips lower and lower.

"You," she replies easily, and adds for good measure, "even though you're a nerd."

That makes him smile, his lips curving against the soft skin of her inner thigh. "I like you, too."

"Can I tell you a secret?"

He nods, staring up at her tight naked body, her legs spread for him.

“I think I’m falling for you harder this time around,” she says.

Peter can hear her breathing deep and slow while her heart races, like she's trying to calm herself down. He wants to tell her she doesn't have to, because he wants her as much as she wants him, and he wants to see her lose control. 

"Good," he says softly, caressing her thighs, "because I'm already completely gone for you, Em. I want you so much." 

"What do you want to do to me?"

"Can I taste you?"

"Fuck, yes," she gasps, lifting her hips for him.

He smothers himself in between her thighs, inhaling her sweet musk and nosing the moist cotton of her underwear. Without hesitation, he hooks his finger in her underwear and pulls them off, letting his hands skim down the backside of her thighs and calves along the way, leaving her completely naked on the bed.

He kisses his way all the way down her body and, after a moment of aching anticipation, licks her slowly between the legs.

She tastes even better than he imagined–hot and sticky and slightly sweet, and he loves the way she responds to his tongue and fingers as they alternate in pleasuring her.

Holding his head between her legs, she is twisting and grinding into his mouth, and he pushes his tongue inside.

"Your mouth—fuck, keep it right there," Michelle groans, squeezing her thighs tighter around his head. 

Peter licks and sucks at her like he's trying to de-seed a watermelon with only his tongue, letting her juices run all over his greedy mouth. 

"You look so good when you're between my legs, right where you belong," she pants, looking down. "I want your face to be a complete mess from eating me out. You like how I taste?"

"Yes, you taste so good, Em," he groans. Sweat dots his brow, and his chin is slick and dripping with her arousal.

Panting harder and faster, she clenches around his fingers and begins bucking against him erratically. 

"Oh my god," Michelle moans, her own fingers digging into his back as she squirms. "You're gonna make me black out. I'm so close, fuck—"

He feels her entire body tense up, limbs going rigid around him, and her face contorts into an expression between ecstasy and agony. Peter keeps pumping and licking until her release comes like a wave crashing on shore, and she cries out, shaking and sweating. 

He lies down beside Michelle while she catches her breath and comes down from her first orgasm, gently caressing her as he reacquaints himself with every curve and line of her. His heightened senses are in complete overdrive, and all he can focus on is Michelle--the smell of her hair, the musk of her arousal still all over his face, the taste of her in his mouth. 

"Peter," she says softly, shifting her hips to the edge of the bed. "I'm ready for more."

Swallowing thickly, he gets up and holds his erection in his hand and moves in between her legs. Michelle gasps as he enters her.

Peter looks into her eyes as he moves inside her, pressing into her body and squeezing her hips. Even after months of frenzied unprotected sex, Peter still can’t believe he’s with Michelle right now--that he's making love to her, and that she wants him, too.

As if reading his mind, she reaches down to touch him where they're joined, feeling him plunging in and pulling out of her, again and again, slick and foaming. Her eyes meet his, and she brings her fingers to her mouth.

"I love you, MJ," Peter rasps, "I fucking love you so much, I can't stand it. I can't stop thinking about you, and I don't want to."

"I love you, too," Michelle says, voice cracking. "Peter, I…I…. Fuck, I can't think. You feel too good, I can't…"

Pulling her to the side of the bed, Peter flips her over and takes her from behind, unleashing everything he has. Michelle has a white-knuckled grip on the sheets as she screams into a pillow, and as he delivers his final thrusts, his orgasm comes in waves, rushing through his entire body.

"Oh fuck, yes, fill me up, Peter," she gasps, reaching back to spread on herself wider for him. 

Peter pushes in deeper and holds Michelle close so she can feel each pulse of his warm cum hit her as he finishes.

Reaching for his arms, she tells him to stay inside her for a little longer, so he holds her while she rocks against him gently.

He pulls out while she's still hanging off the edge of the bed, limp-limbed and panting as his cum runs down her thighs. 

"You're dripping me all over your sheets," Peter smirks, licking his lip. "Not very conducive to baby making."

Michelle looks up at him from her sprawled out position on the bed, smiling dreamily with the afterglow of being freshly fucked. "Oops. Guess we'll have to go for another round or two. Or three. Just in case."

"Better safe than sorry," he grins, crawling back into bed and into Michelle’s waiting arms. 

Peter wakes up feeling more rested than he has in weeks, not least of which because it’s his first night out of the medbay.

He blink opens his eyes, rubbing the sleep out of them only to smile when he hears the water running—Michelle’s humming some pop song he knows she’d never admit to liking while she’s in the shower.

Peter brings his hand down before stretching his arms as he sighs, only for the water to turn off as he puts his arms behind his head and waits for her to walk out the bathroom.

When she does, Peter can barely hold back a smile at seeing the way she looks at him—eyes roving over him before her eyebrow raises with a smirk.

“Morning,” Peter says with a wink. 

Michelle laughs, letting the loosely tied bathrobe she has on fall to the floor, and Peter grins appreciatively when she replies, “Morning loser.”

“I’m surprised you’re up before me. I thought you would’ve been out till noon at least.”

Michelle rolls her eyes as she walks to her chest of drawers, and Peter appreciates the view as she rummages around for clothes. “I’m supposed to meet Ned for brunch today. Though,” she turns back to him with a smile on her face as she slips into some underwear, “can’t say it wasn’t hard to get out of bed. We should’ve been doing this years ago.”

Peter laughs as she continues to get dressed, sitting up in bed as he says, “You know, I did read an article that says you having an orgasm is key to conceiving, since that causes contractions in the uterus that will get my swimmers—" he makes a gesture with his hand "—right up there."

"Is that so?" asks Michelle, raising an eyebrow as she buttons her jeans. "Is this a peer reviewed study?"

“Uh,” Peter scratches at the back of his neck before saying, “does Buzzfeed count?” 

She snorts at him, scrunching up her nose as she laughs, and he gets a strange pang wondering if their hypothetical child would have the same laugh.

"I mean, not really ,” she replies. “But let me get this straight you’re saying making me come is supposed to help you knock me up?”

"It couldn't hurt our chances," he grins, Michelle coming up to his side of the bed as he extends a hand out to her. "I'm game to try it next time, if you are."

Michelle sits down and Peter brushes some hair from her face as she says, “I’m not gonna argue against that.”

She gets a somber look on her face that Peter can’t place, only for his stomach to drop when she adds in a lower voice, “I mean, unless that’s… not what you want anymore.”

“What do you mean?” Peter asks.

Michelle looks as if she’s steeling herself for something when she says, “We agreed to do this as friends, before. I know what we said last night, but it’s… it’s different now.”

Peter understands what she means just as well as he understands her , bringing his hand down and searching her face. This is new territory for them, in more ways than one. They’d spent the past few months fucking to avoid their feelings—now having everything out in the open being as if the missing pieces were finally slotting into place, while simultaneously feeling new at the same time. 

If Peter has ever been certain of anything in his life, though, it’s this. Setting his jaw and chewing the inside of his lip, he says, “I meant what I said before. I love you, MJ. I think I've loved you for a while."

He takes her hands into his, searching her face as he continues, “And I want to have a baby with you. I want us, doing this thing together. As a team.”

She smiles at that, running her thumb over his hand before saying, “I want that too.” 

Peter smiles back, knowing that this doesn’t even begin to cover the depth of the conversations that they need to have in the future but having a gut feeling that they’ll be able to figure it out anyway—only for a phone buzzing to interrupt them. 

Michelle looks at her cell phone lighting up. “Shit, that might be Ned.”

Peter laughs as she reaches for it across the bed, beating her to it and handing the phone to her as he says, “How come you and Ned don’t invite me to your sushi dates?” 

“Because not everything’s about you, Pete,” Michelle replies without missing a beat. 

Peter makes a face as she taps out a reply on her phone. “ Ouch . That’s a little harsh. First rule for the kid, lessons in tactfulness .”

Michelle rolls her eyes, but Peter sees the playfulness in her expression as she puts her phone down and says, “Only if rule number two is not being so sensitive.”

Peter pouts, exaggerating a puckered lip which only serves to make her laugh—the intended reaction as he grins and says, “Okay, but really, what do you and Ned talk about?”

Michelle smirks, looking infinitely pleased with herself. “It bugs you that you don’t know huh?”

“I would willingly fight Rhino and Scorpion again to find out.”

Her smirk turns into a frown, and Peter puts his hands up in surrender. “Too soon?”

“A bit, yeah,” she says with a small smile, and Peter leans forward to pull her into a kiss—one that she freely returns. He can taste her toothpaste and her damp hair tickling his cheek. Bringing a hand up to cradle her chin, he deepens their kiss , only for Michelle to hum and lean back. “Nope, I gotta go. Whoever gets there second has to pay, and I’m not about to break my streak.”

“Come on,” Peter murmurs against her lips before pulling her closer to him, “Ned’ll understand. He’s been trying to get me to tell you how I feel for months.”

“He’s been telling me that for years,” she whispers before moving off the bed. Peter groans as she walks back to her dresser to pick out a watch from her jewelry pile, only to be struck by her words as he shakes his head. 

“Wait. Years ?” 

Michelle laughs, fastening the clasp of the watch May had gotten her for her birthday last year. Peter smiles at the memory of that day as she says, “I can’t decide if he’s gonna be thrilled, relieved, or smug as hell that we’re finally doing this.”

She motions between the two of them, and Peter snickers to himself as he says, “All of the above. Don’t worry, he’ll forgive us when we name our kid after him.”

Michelle purses her lips, tilting her head as she says, “I can dig it. Edward can be gender neutral too. Fuck it.”

“Nah, I’m thinking bolder. Consider,” Peter wriggles his eyebrows suggestively, “Nedwina.”

Michelle makes a face, and Pete snickers as she declares, “I’m not naming my child Nedwina”

“ Our child, MJ,” he says with a grin. She laughs, exasperation mixed with fondness as she waves her hand dismissively at him and heads back to the bathroom to finish getting ready. 

Peter laughs to himself, before smiling at the idea of what Ned would say when he found out that he and Michelle were finally together —no doubt some form of “I told you so”. 

He thinks of the bet that May and Tony had, the mortifying realization occurring to him that he’ll have to finally tell May the truth of his part in Michelle’s fertility plan had been, only for the mortification to magnify at the idea that in the months that had passed since that first day, that she’d likely already figured it out and hadn’t said a word. 

Peter runs a hand through his hair, kicking himself once again for all the time the two of them had wasted being apart when it had been so blatantly obvious to the people around them, but lets it go just as easily as he had last night. 

He could regret all the time they hadn’t spent together, or he could be thankful that they finally figured it out now. Maybe they wouldn’t have gotten here if anything had been different. A sense of certainty settles in his gut at the idea of raising a kid with Michelle, of nurturing and showing the world to a brand new person that’s both him and her. 

Peter meant every word he said to her. He loves her, has loved her for so much longer than he even thinks he can recognize—just as he’s sure from the look in her eyes that Michelle loves him too. It’s a conviction that hits him just as natural as breathing, the realization of how much he wants to spend the rest of his life with her. 

The thought of leaving her alone because of Spider-Man, much less leaving her alone with their kid, still terrifies him to the core, but he swallows down that fear just as much as he forces himself to think of the possibilities. Peter couldn’t plan for the future anymore than he could change it, but he’s convinced that no matter what comes next in his life, he wants to be with Michelle for the rest of it. 

She walks back in from the bathroom, Peter turning to her just as she’s going to say something—only for Michelle to pause.

“What’s wrong?” she asks, buttoning up her shirt.

“Nothing,” Peter says. Michelle squints at him in doubt, so he adds, “Just thinking a lot of sappy, cheesy things about you.”

“Of course you are,” she says playfully, folding her arms and leaning against the door frame. “I can’t believe I’m in love with such a corny dork.”

“Tragic really,” Peter replies with a grin. “Especially since I’m in love with you, too. Is corniness contagious?”

Her eyes soften at that, and the vulnerable smile on her face makes Peter believe that despite his crazy strength, his weird life, and the villains he confronts all the time, he is more than all that. There is something about Michelle that makes him gentle, makes him shy, makes him strong and happy to be alive. 

No matter what comes their way, what obstacles may get in their way or new challenges they’ll have to face—as friends, as partners, as parents—Peter knows that as long as they have each other, they’d be okay.