Izurich
Hound55
Crimson Flame
Simple Unicycle
Qia
Skai
Issue 5
New York City, NY ---Thompson Memorial Hospital
The doctors had departed and the sense of reverie was gone from the hospital room now, leaving the Parkers to only settle into a bizarre kind of new normal while they awaited Ben’s discharge. Ben thumbed through the pages of The Daily Bugle as was his custom, occasionally giving a great harumph and shaking his head. May left for the cafeteria to grab her husband lunch, leaving Peter to shift in one of the hard plastic chairs and twiddle his thumbs.
Peter rubbed the inside of his palms and he could feel his suit beneath the surface, ebbing and flowing, reacting to his touch. It had been too long already, by Peter’s measure. A week without Spider-Man, and Ben’s shooter was only getting farther away. Maybe closer to whatever the hell Tombstone is. Ben would get discharged soon, and that meant taking care of him, and going back to school, and --
”I can’t believe they let them print this rag, huh Pete?” Ben smacked the paper. ”Going after those poor kids in Bayville. The nerve.” Peter nodded and his eyes flashed over Ben. He cranked his hospital bed up and moved more freely on the over-sterilized mattress, but still looked somehow restrained in a web of machines and life support. Peter nodded and looked back out of the hopper windows, tracing the arcs of buildings with his eyes, out to the reaches of Central Park and the Upper West Side beyond. Soon.
”Something on your mind, kiddo?” The paper rustled as Ben set it down on the bedside table, next to a pot half full of wilting flowers. Peter pushed himself back in his chair and hid his hands in the long sleeves of his shirt like he would when he was small, pulling back into himself.
”Ever since… Well, your, uh, accident, things just feel different. Somehow.” Peter shrugged. He looked back down at his hands.
Ben propped himself up more, smoothing out the creases in the dull blue plastic hospital bedspread. “It’s a one in a million thing. It could’ve happened to anyone. I’m just glad it was me, and not some kid.”
“No, it’s not -- I’m not scared or anything.” Peter turned his eyes back up to meet his Uncle’s. The corners of his eyes crinkled and he shook his head.
“Well, I’m not a mind reader, unfortunately.” Ben smiled. He motioned for Peter to move closer, and Peter swept his chair up to the bedside. “You’re growing up, kiddo, and this whole thing must’ve been some kind of a shock on top. You’re starting to see things differently. The city, friends, decisions, girls,” Ben started.
“Don’t tell me we’re segueing into a sex talk.”
Ben laughed. “No, no. But your Aunt May has been telling me we’ve been seeing more of Gwen around--”
“Ben!”
“Kidding! Kidding. She’s a lovely girl anyhow. How is she?”
Peter nodded. “Good. Harry and I are supposed to go to one of their band practices, this Saturday.” He leaned back in his chair, balancing just off the floor on two back legs.
“That’s great. Is there anything else going on?”
Well, I’m a Spider-themed vigilante who occasionally gets grounded by his Aunt when he’s not getting shot at by the cops. So that’s, yknow, fun and cool. “School’s supposed to start again for me next week. Same old same old.”
”Hmm.” Ben looked at Peter for what felt like an age, sizing him up from his scuffed converse and beaten jeans to the strained smile on his face. Peter’s two innermost fingers twitched every few moments, gently rubbing his palm and then straightening back out again just as quickly, like the nervous tic was some kind of secret. Ben sighed. He reached for the copy of the Bugle.
“Are you up on the news?”
“Huh? What about?” Peter’s focus broke and the chair legs came down. He flinched.
“What do you think about this Spider-Man character?” Ben turned the Bugle to his nephew. There was a blurry picture, a screencap of CCTV footage. It was a black mass of pixels with the flash of a white spider, holding an unarmed SWAT officer aloft with one hand, inches from the camera. What a flattering picture. At least he didn’t photoshop ‘I Hate Cancer Patients and Children’ onto my forehead.
“Aunt May was giving me an earful about him the other --”
“No, Pete, what do you think about him?”
Peter paused. “He… I dunno. Seems fine to me.” He rocked back in his chair.
Ben shook his head. “I’m of the opinion he’s irresponsible. Power like his, and he attacks the police, an innocent reporter. I don’t much see how it helps people, if he’s supposed to be a superhero.”
“You never liked Jameson.”
“Doesn’t mean he should be attacked.” Ben took the Bugle back, scanning over the picture and the article for the umpteenth time.
“Maybe that’s how it is with superheroes, sometimes.”
Ben flattened the article across his legs on the bed and used both hands to turn himself to face Peter. “Hey, I get it. It’s gotta be tough. Gotta feel like he has the weight of the world on his shoulders. Maybe he was scared and didn’t know what else to do. But, hey, maybe he reads this, hears about it somewhere. Sees what he’s done. Maybe tries to get a little better every day. It’s all that anyone can do. All we can ask for, really. Then maybe, there’s something to be made of him.”
Peter looked down. “Maybe.”
A little better every day. Peter thought about the doctors, the hushed tones they didn’t think he’d hear. He thought about the metal in Ben’s body, fragments of lead that they couldn’t get out, inching closer and closer to the remains of Ben’s spine, day by day. He thought about the time Ben had left. A little better every day. If only.