Chapter Text
It was winter in New York. More specifically, it was the time of year that Peter’s teachers referred to as the “Dark Ages”— after winter break but before spring break. Three consecutive months of school without a holiday. Tests, projects, essays, and college prep started stacking up exponentially. This was also the time of year that Senioritis started taking root in the minds of seniors, which Peter now was. And besides the plague of Senioritis, the actual plague of flu season was upon them, so everyone felt miserable physically, mentally, and academically. Altogether, it really was the worst time of the school year, objectively speaking.
Peter was in the back of AP Civics when that Senioritis really started hitting. His grades were great, there was nothing he could do to not pass Senior year, and he’d heard this slideshow lecture about the Constitution about five times before. And Ned was two rows away. This was a prime time to goof off. He shot him a text from behind his desk.
I really want to web the projector up so we don’t have to listen to this again.
you would literally be my hero
Game Pigeon instead?
only if it’s not eight ball
Tired of losing?
honestly? yes
Peter smiled a little bit and sent back a message invite to a game of chess. He and Ned sent moves back and forth for a while. The class finally ended after a few rounds and their teacher was none the wiser.
“What you up to after school?” Ned asked as they walked out of Civics together.
“The usual stuff,” Peter said. Ned knew he meant dinner, homework, and Spider-man patrol.
“Well, maybe after all that, you could swing by mine and we could do a movie marathon?”
“Oh, hell yeah! I forgot it was Friday.”
“Not a school night,” Ned nodded sagely.
“I’m in. Let me make sure May isn’t expecting me home tomorrow, we can make it a sleepover again.”
Peter thumbed through his phone notifications, he kept them silenced during class. No texts from his aunt, but a missed call from Matt. That usually didn’t happen because Matt knew he had school during the week. But it wasn’t his “work” phone, so Matt wasn’t in trouble or anything.
“We good?” Ned asked.
“Yeah,” Peter said. “I gotta make a call before class— see you tonight?”
“I’ll leave the window open, man,” Ned said, walking off to his next period.
Peter dialed up Matt.
“Hey, Pete. Sorry, you’re still in school, right?”
“Yeah, I got a couple minutes between classes, though.”
“I just wanted to ask if you were free to talk in person about something later today. Just for a few minutes, whenever you’re free.”
“Me and Ned have plans tonight. It can’t wait until practice this weekend?” They still tried to keep up sparring lessons once a week, though Peter had cancelled a lot because of schoolwork.
“No, it’s about this weekend. It’s a lot over the phone. And you don’t have to come to the Kitchen, I could come to you.”
“Sure. Dismissal’s in an hour,” he offered.
“Works for me. Meet me at the bodega next to Midtown?”
“Works for me,” Peter echoed back.
One calculus period later, Peter bounded down the front stairs of the school. He was walking the few blocks between Midtown and the bodega spot when he heard Matt’s cane behind him. Peter slowed his pace to fall in step beside him. Matt was wearing a heavy yet fashionable peacoat for the cold. Peter was wearing a massive puffer most would call overkill, but his stupid cold-blooded body said otherwise.
“Fancy meeting you here,” Peter said.
“Hey, Pete,” Matt nodded in greeting.
“Can’t remember the last time I saw you in Queens.”
“Probably the night we met,” Matt said.
“Heh. Yeah. Good times.”
“You almost died.”
“Oh, yeah,” Peter hummed. He’d actually forgotten about that part.
They arrived at the bodega and Peter held the door for Matt.
“Hi, Mr. Parekh,” Peter said.
The bodega owner was an older Pakistani man, hair graying at the roots. He didn’t bother to look up from his magazine. He was usually grumpy towards Peter— he’d cited something like an “overly energetic personality” and “annoying voice.” That didn’t stop Peter from dropping by after school most days. Cheap snacks were cheap snacks. Peter had a hunch he secretly liked him anyway. Grumpy old men show affection by scoffing, not a lot of people know that. It’s how they laugh.
“What’cha reading? MAD? Tiger Beat?”
“You’re not old enough to make that reference.”
“And you’re too old to get that reference, but here we are.”
Mr. Parekh scoffed. Peter mentally high-fived himself. “Can I get a turkey and cheese?” Peter asked.
“It’s on me, Pete,” Matt said.
“Oh, hey, you’re that lawyer guy,” Mr. Parekh said, finally putting his magazine down. “I saw you in the news. I got paid out in that class-action because they denied me my prescription.”
Matt gave a small shrug. “Yep. That’s me.”
“And you know Peter?”
“Yeah, we go way back.”
If Peter didn’t know better, he’d say Mr. Parekh looked impressed. “Well, grab what you want, it’s on the house today. Don’t get used to it,” he said, that last part directed at Peter specifically.
“Just the sandwich for me,” Peter said. Matt made a face. His stomach was growling very loudly. “Fine, two sandwiches.”
“Can I grab you anything?” Mr. Parekh asked Matt.
“Do you have any teas?” Matt was trying pretty unsuccessfully to cut back on caffeine.
“Yeah, a few,” Mr. Parekh said, pointing to a rack of teas on the coffee bar behind Matt. There was a beat when Matt didn’t acknowledge him and he quickly retracted his gesture. “Uh, what kind did you want? I’ve got some seasonal boxes in the back, too.”
“Chai?”
“Can do,” he said. He ducked out from behind the counter and returned a few minutes later with a paper cup and two foiled sandwiches.
“Eat here?” Peter asked Matt. There was a small counter against the window with stools.
“Let’s walk and talk. Well, you eat, I talk.”
Matt tried paying anyway, but Mr. Parekh passed the money back to him. Peter grabbed their order and they both thanked him on the way out.
Peter instantly tore into his sandwich and Matt nursed his chai while they walked.
The streets were crowded enough that the ambient noise of the city provided the two of them privacy; no passersby would catch much of their conversation.
“So, what did you wanna talk about?”
“A mission of sorts.”
“Okay…” Peter said at length. He normally would’ve just told Peter the details over text.
“It’s different,” Matt said, picking up his tone. “I wanted to preface all of this by saying you have a choice— in tagging along or not, I mean. If you’re not interested I can ask Wade to help out. But I figured I’d come to you first because stealth would be preferable.”
“Yeah, not his strong suit,” Peter nodded. “Disclaimer noted— what’s the job?”
“I have strong evidence that suggests Alchemax isn’t entirely dissolved.”
Peter swallowed a bit of sandwich, hard. “How do you mean?” Peter asked, trying to mask the unease in his voice. He didn’t know why he bothered, though. Matt would just hear his damn heartbeat anyway.
“As part of the settlement in court, they declared a form of bankruptcy and were forced to auction off every single one of their assets. Well, the assets that weren’t already seized by the government.”
“And that’s good?”
“Yeah, mostly. Their financial assets went towards the workers that they screwed over. And the government took all their weapons and lab records. But everything else is fair game to anyone who has money to auction on it. Equipment, lab materials, experimental drugs, and so on. And who wins each set of auctions is public knowledge, so we know the people behind Alchemax aren’t buying their stuff back. But after a ton of research— I can send you it later— I have reason to suspect that there’s a group placing bids on behalf of Alchemax with the intention of helping them starting everything all over again.”
“So what do you want to do about it?”
Matt took a sip of his chai. “Break into the auction house and smash shit.”
Peter stifled a laugh, “So not your style. And you said this is a stealth mission?”
“We’d be getting past a load of guards and leaving undetected, so yeah. And being quick enough to not be noticed without missing anything in the storehouse— which is why I need an extra set of hands. I’m good, but I’m not that good. The way I figure it, the only way we stop this permanently is by destroying their progress so they can’t rebuild.”
“Makes sense,” Peter nodded. “When would this happen? And why not just have Wade blow all their stuff up?”
“I’m a little unclear on the date, actually. The auction is slated for a month from now, but I want to hit them after the auction; we can get the names of the bidders so we can keep an eye on them in the future. Which is why Wade can’t blow everything up; we need to know who we’re dealing with. I just need to figure out how long after the purchase the auction lots get shipped. It’ll probably be a week at least, so we have some wiggle room.”
“Okay. I’m down.”
“Really? The last time we—,”
“I remember, Matt,” Peter said a little more harshly than intended. “It’ll be cathartic, smashing their shit.”
“Only if you’re sure, Pete,” Matt said, voice soft.
“I am.”
“Okay, then.”
“You said you wanted to talk about this weekend, over the phone earlier,” Peter said.
“Just that I won’t be free for our training because I’m staking out the auction house. They get the first shipment of equipment on Sunday night.”
“Oh, alright. It’s settled then.” They just reached Peter’s block. “Keep me posted about what you find and when we’re breaking in?”
“Will do,” Matt nodded. A beat. “Did you turn in all your college apps?”
“I do not want to talk school right now. I am schooled out.”
“The regular decision deadline—,”
“I know, I’ve got it handled, and I’m walking away now,” Peter said.
Matt let him go and Peter buzzed himself into the apartment building. To his surprise, when he got up to his unit, he found Aunt May waiting for him inside. She was an older woman, but her age only made her look more warm, softened her around the edges. She was perpetually in scrubs with her hair in a messy bun, but not today. Her short, dyed-brown hair was worn down and framed her face and she was wearing a tank and jeans.
“Hey, you’re not at work,” Peter observed very astutely.
“Traded shifts with someone who asked for the extra hours,” she said nonchalantly. She was leaning against the kitchen counter in a very James-Bond-villain-like manner. Peter couldn’t help but feel like he was in trouble for something he didn’t know about. She was good at putting on an air of strictness, even though she hardly ever used it.
Peter continued on with life like she wasn’t being menacing. He shrugged off his coat and his backpack and fished out his homework. “Do you want to order a pizza for dinner or something?”
“Sure,” she shrugged. “Who was that guy you were talking to outside?”
“What?”
“Blind dude. You walked up the block together. He’s a famous lawyer, Murdock, I’ve seen him in the news.”
“Sounds like you already know who he is,” Peter said.
“You know what I mean. How do you know him?”
Now this was where Peter was backed into a corner. Because there was no universe in which Matt met a random teen on the street and striked up conversation. He couldn’t pretend like they didn’t know each other. Fuck, he was taking too long to answer— “He’s my mentor.”
May seemed taken aback but not suspicious. “Yeah? I didn’t know you liked law.”
“I don’t. It’s a thing the school’s doing for seniors. We get paired up with someone in the community and we get counseling from them. Career stuff, life skills, that kind of thing.” He was just spitballing now. “It’s selected for us, doesn’t matter what subject you’re studying.”
“Guess you lucked out. Seems like a cool guy from what I’ve read.”
She seemed convinced, that was good. “I guess so. He gives good advice.”
“I’ve read your college admissions essays, they’ve definitely improved. Oh, and that internship you tried out, I bet that was him too, huh? You should invite him over for dinner one night, to thank him for all the help.”
Shit, backpedal. “I don’t know. I’ve only talked to him over email before. It was my first time meeting him in person today. A dinner invite seems… like overkill?”
“No, it’s professional!”
“He’s a really busy guy, though,” Peter said. “I wouldn’t want to bother him with it.”
“Well, even if he can’t make room in his schedule, it’s still the polite thing to do, I think,” she said. “Just receiving the invite says that you appreciate him.”
He really couldn’t come up with an argument against that.
“After you finish your homework, we’ll draft it up together,” May said, her mind made up. “Then we can order a pizza, that was a good idea. I really need to get groceries…” she said to herself and walked off.
Peter melted into the couch. Matt would corroborate his lie to May after Peter explained it to him, he wasn’t what he was worried about. He really wanted May as far apart from Spider-man as possible. Aside from moving out, all Peter could do was keep every other aspect of that life away from May. That meant her not knowing the same people that Spider-man knew.
If he explained all of this to Matt, he could probably come up with an excuse to not come over for dinner. But knowing Aunt May, she’d probably keep pressing until he agreed to it. Matt was a good lawyer, but no one could out-argue her. Was it better to get them meeting out of the way sooner rather than later? Do it in a controlled environment on their terms? Maybe if he asked Matt to act like a dick in his response to their invitation, she’d drop the issue?
Peter managed to stop thinking about all of that long enough to finish his calc homework. It didn’t take too long and May was back in the room by the time he was done.
“I’ve been thinking… is it rude to send a blind guy an email?” May asked.
“No? It’s not like he can’t read it.”
“Right, text-to-speech. Shouldn’t we just call him, then?”
A glimmer of hope. “I don’t have his number. And it’s past work hours, if we call his office no one will be there.” Both of those were lies, but it was sound reasoning.
“That’s true,” she hummed. “We’ll just call his office on Monday, then. He wouldn’t check his email until the workweek, anyhow. Pizza?”
Well, he bought himself some time to figure out how to get her to drop the dinner idea, that was a win in his book. They ordered a pizza, Peter walked a few doors down the block to pick it up, and he restrained himself from eating more than half of the pie.
After dinner, Peter sidled up to Aunt May. “So… I may have promised Ned we’d have a movie night tonight.”
She feigned a gasp of betrayal, “You’re abandoning me? A teenager abandoning his old fart aunt on a Friday night to spend time with friends? This is outrageous.”
“You’re not old—,”
“But I am a fart?”
“Yes, you are.
“Take that back.”
He ignored her, “But you’re a fart I would love to have a movie night with… if I didn’t have plans with Ned.”
“I know, I know, I’m just having fun. Go bother Ned. Bring him the leftover pizza,” she passed the box to him.
“I’ll bring back conchas tomorrow?” Peter offered. There was a bakery by Ned’s.
“That’s why you’re my favorite nephew.”
“I’m your only nephew.”
“I don’t see how that’s relevant.”
Peter grabbed his backpack and scooted towards the door, “Love you, you’re not a fart. Be back in the morning.”
“Love you, make smart decisions,” she called back. She always said that.
Peter didn’t go out on patrol, he just went straight to Ned’s. His dad let him in and back to Ned’s room with nothing except a “Oh, hey, Pete.” Peter was over here so often they could reasonably charge him rent.
Peter had never outright told Ned that Matt was Daredevil. The first night Peter and Matt met, Peter had told Ned about their encounter, that he’d introduced himself as Matt and that was it. When Peter started spending more time training with Matt, he told Ned about that. But when Matt ran into Ned while trying to rescue Peter, Ned just connected the dots. Daredevil was named Matt, and here was a Matt who knew Peter as well as Daredevil did.
Ned was kicked back in a beanbag chair and had everything set up for their movie binge: popcorn, soda, candy, and a stack of DVDs. Peter tossed the pizza box to him and collapsed in another beanbag next to him.
“I fucked up, man.”
“I just saw you, like, three hours ago, what happened?”
“May saw me with Matt and she knew who he was and was asking a bunch of questions.”
“What’d you say?”
Peter explained his lie, about May’s insistence on meeting him, his worries about her safety. Ned took it all in and nodded. “I don’t think Matt coming over for one dinner would be that big a deal.”
A pause. “…Because….?” Peter asked at length.
“Well, think about it,” Ned punctuated the thought with a wave of a Twizzler. “You’re worried that if Matt gets his identity exposed or whatever, it’ll get traced back to you and May, right?”
“Kind of, yeah.”
“Who knows you’re close to Matt? Foggy, Wade, and me,” he twirled the licorice around, spinning out the idea. “No one who wouldn’t protect you. Or lie on your behalf at least.”
“I guess so…” Peter said. The candy was distracting him.
“And it’d be one dinner. In this completely imaginary Daredevil-unmasking scenario, you and May would have plausible deniability. She met the guy once, and he was just tutoring you or whatever.”
“Huh. That makes sense. You’re pretty smart, Ned.”
“I’m your guy in the chair for a reason. Just… explain all this shit to Matt and have him over for dinner so May will drop it. It’s not like he can’t lie, he has a secret identity. Lying’s his part-time job.”
“Yeah… yeah, okay. Thanks for talking sense into me, dude. I was freaking out a little.”
“You just wanna protect May, I get it. But now that that’s settled… Lord of the Rings time?”
“Hell yeah,” Peter smiled.
“I still can’t believe you haven’t seen these movies before. You can get your nerd card revoked over that.”
“Better late than never?” Peter shrugged.
“No. It’s a crime that you haven’t watched any of these. Honestly, I feel like I’ve failed you not only as your friend, but as a fellow human being.”
“Okay, okay. You’re hyping this up a lot, my expectations are high.”
Ned pushed the first DVD in, “As they should be. Now, get comfy. We’re not leaving this spot until you’ve seen the trilogy.”
Ned fell asleep halfway through the second film, but Peter was used to staying up late and made it through all of them. Ned was right, they were really good.
The weekend flew by and Monday evening rolled around. Matt agreed to dinner that night after Peter sent him a long explanation text. May was thrilled it all worked out, and Peter couldn’t be mad at her. As much as she pried or pushed his buttons, she was just looking out for him.
When Peter got back from school late in the afternoon, May was in the kitchen blasting Lauryn Hill and dicing onion and garlic.
“You’re cooking?” Peter asked.
“Yeah?” she said. “It’s not gonna cook itself.”
“No, I just mean it’s weird. Normally the fire alarm is going off by now.”
“Har har, she said dryly. "Okay, am I a little clumsy in the kitchen? Occasionally. But I do know how to cook.”
“Alright, alright. As long as you don’t poison Ma— Mr. Murdock.”
“I haven’t managed to kill you with my cooking yet, so it’ll be fine. Besides, it’s lasagna. Easy-peasy.”
Her cooking was… slightly below average most days. Not that Peter was picky, he had to get the horrendous amount of calories that his spider-metabolism demanded from somewhere. But there was a set list of things Aunt May made really well, and pasta was one of them.
Peter helped out in the kitchen, stirring marinara and duetting with May and Lauryn until he heard a knock at the door. Peter answered and saw Matt there in his usual office attire, except instead of his red shades he was wearing a brown tortoiseshell pair. Foggy had gotten him them for Christmas and Matt had been wearing them more and more frequently. Matt also had a loaf pan tucked under an arm.
“Hey, Peter,” he said.
May joined them at the door, “Hi, Mr. Murdock. I’m Peter’s aunt, May. Thanks for coming over on such short notice, I’m sure you’re very busy.”
“Please, call me Matt. Pleasure to meet you. And… you’d be surprised how slow it gets at the office.” Peter read something on Matt that wasn’t immediately familiar. He wasn’t just being humble about his law practice, there was something else in that pause that Peter couldn’t quite place. Nervousness? Matt was never uneasy, that wasn’t it.
“Is that bread?” Peter asked. “I didn’t know you baked.” Matt was a good cook, but he insisted baking was a science he didn’t have a knack for.
“Yeah,” he held the loaf pan out for Peter, which he took. “I can’t believe I didn’t know Braille measuring cups existed. It makes it a lot easier.”
Peter set the bread down at the kitchen table and Matt followed him in. “I wasn’t sure what we were having for dinner, but bread goes with most food, I figured.”
“Just lasagna. And that was awfully nice of you,” May said. “If I tried to make bread from scratch, there wouldn’t be a building here after.”
Matt laughed, “Hey, I used to think the same thing. You gotta give baking a chance first.”
“Maybe I will,” May hummed. “But I’d start with something small. Like cookies.”
Polite conversation continued. It was weird making small talk with Matt after knowing him for almost a year. Peter had to stop himself from bringing up Foggy or asking about how Diablita was doing. But even weirder was Matt’s behavior. That moment of awkwardness from before didn’t seem to be a one-off occurrence. Matt acted cordial outwardly while continuing conversation with May, but Peter knew him better than that. He was fidgeting with his cane. He usually fidgeted when he was overstimulated, which took a lot. But nothing about Peter’s apartment was intense enough to make someone like Matt uncomfortable.
The lasagna finished baking. They continued conversation over dinner: Matt’s practice, May’s work as a nurse, and, much to Peter’s dismay, the conversation steered to his college applications.
“I have sent them out, okay? We won’t hear back from any of them for, like, at least a month.”
Matt shot him a look and Peter ignored it. He knew he was lying; he didn’t need a reminder.
“About time. You’ve been sitting on those for ages. If you wanted to take a gap year, that’s one thing, but you said you wanted to go to—,”
“I know,” Peter said. “I was just… doing my final essay edits.” He still hadn’t done those, actually. He didn’t know why he was procrastinating so hard. He blamed it on the small part of him that didn’t want to leave May and Queens if one of those big, one-in-a-lifetime-opportunity colleges accepted his application. But at the same time, he knew that being Spider-man didn’t pay bills and fancy degrees did. He’d submit the applications he was sitting on soon. He would.
“Well, we should celebrate!” May smiled. “That’s big! I don’t have anything for dessert, though… Maybe now is when I’ll make my first attempt at cookies…”
“You should get out of here while the building’s still standing,” Peter told Matt.
“Shush,” May chided. “Want any more lasagna?”
“I’m stuffed, thanks,” Matt said. “And I probably should be heading out. Not that I don’t have the utmost confidence in you, May,” Matt laughed. “This was a really nice meal. I’m glad that I got to meet you and Peter.”
“I was gonna gush about everything you do for the city, but I don’t want to hold you up,” May said. “Get outta here. Take some lasagna with you.”
“Can I talk to you for a sec, Peter?” Matt asked as May went to fill a Tupperware. Matt pulled him into the living room out of earshot of the kitchen.
“What’s up?”
That nervous look from before was back. “Ah. I… uh. Fuck. Your aunt has cancer.”
“Oh,” Peter breathed an internal sigh of relief. “Yeah, I know. Breast cancer. She’s been in remission for the last eight years.” Matt didn’t look comforted by this.
How the fuck was he supposed to do this? He had to, obviously, it could help May. But it was Peter. His Peter. His aunt was all he had. She smelled like Wade, there was no way she was… God, how the fuck was he supposed to do this?
Peter watched Matt fidget some more without saying anything. “What?”
“Just— convince her to get a checkup. It could be nothing—,” It definitely wasn’t.
“She gets checked up every month— what aren’t you telling me?”
He couldn’t fucking say it. He should be strong enough to spit it out. For Peter’s sake, at least. Matt turned and walked out of the apartment.
May heard the door close. “Aw, did he just leave? He left his… ach, whatchamacallit… loaf pan,” she sighed.
“I’ll give it to him next time I see him,” Peter said absentmindedly. What the hell was Matt on about? His words did give Peter pause, though. It wasn’t entirely unprecedented. Peter remembered the first night Matt met Wade and told him he was dying. Matt must’ve been mistaken this time, though. May was perfectly healthy. But… on the off chance she wasn’t in remission anymore, they could catch it early and put her right back into remission. Better safe than sorry, he supposed. How exactly was he supposed to slip that into conversation?
“He’s a nice guy,” May said.
“Yeah,” he said, still not really paying attention. “I, uh, I have some homework I forgot about, I’m gonna go finish that up real quick.”
“Well, come back out for some cookies later,” May called back as he went to his room.
Peter sat on his ceiling and Matt’s words ran through his head. After a while he climbed down to his bed and flipped open his laptop. After a light SQL injection hack that Ned would approve of, Peter had May’s oncologist’s hospital portal open in front of him. They really should make that kind of thing more secure…
Her recent records were what he expected, everything was nominal. Still, he sent a message through a nurse’s account to May telling her that they needed her to come in. He made up some shit about needing new imaging to adjust her chemo prescription. After the direct message was sent, he deleted it on his end. May would receive it, but the nurse wouldn’t know anything had been sent. The fact that she worked at the hospital would make them a bit more inclined to believe she knew what she was doing, and that they were the ones who had screwed up and forgotten an appointment. A harmless bit of gaslighting. Hopefully, she’d call to schedule the appointment and get in to see a doctor before any of the staff knew she didn’t actually have need for said appointment.
Peter didn’t know it at the time, but she actually did need that appointment.