chapter eleven; dorothea tanning

Maggie inwardly groaned as she saw Ned and Peter awkwardly ambling down the main hall, trying not to appear suspicious. She was seated in the library, having been excused from assembly on account of her hearing aids acting up a little the previous period. Her nose had been stuck in a book as a few other sophomores played chess across the room. It was only when she saw the flash of khaki pass the window did she lower her literature and inch forward curiously. She saw the Death Star patch on Ned's bag, and she got to her feet, grabbed her hearing aid and decided to investigate.

She hadn't seen Peter much since the party, where he had disappeared and left them to figure out socialising on their own. Maggie didn't have a bad time, she enjoyed being with Ned, but it was a bit sad that the brunet boy couldn't have joined them. 

"First, we put the glowy thing into the mass spectrometer," she heard Ned mutter, though his voice didn't really seem to have that setting. 

"We gotta come up with a better name than 'glowy thing'," Peter responded softly, and Maggie quirked her eyes a little as they jumped in front of the library window, as if they'd just seen something. She quirked an eyebrow and walked through the exit, coming face to face with a frightened Peter Parker. "Maggie?"

"What's going on?" She asked, though Peter held his finger up to his lips. Maggie stepped towards them until she was at Ned's side, not having a clue what was going on. She could hear a conversation between two adults around the corner, but she didn't want to raise the volume on her aids seeing as they were low on battery as it was. 

"That's one of the guys that tried to kill me," Peter gasped after taking a quick look. Maggie's eyes widened and she smacked his arm in shock. He looked over at her with wide eyes and shrugged sheepishly, trying not to be affected by her worried stare. 

"We gotta get out of here," Ned exclaimed, and Peter quickly shook his head.

"No, no, no, I gotta follow them," Peter insisted, to which his two friends exchanged an irritated look. "Maybe they can lead me to the guy who dropped me in the lake."

"Someone dropped you in a lake?" Maggie inhaled sharply, crossing her arms over her chest. 

"Yeah, it wasn't good," Peter mumbled distractedly, looking around the corner once more, before moving away so that he could go after the men. Ned tried to grab his arm, but it was swatted away. "I'll be fine, just stay there!"

Ned and Maggie both held in groans at Peter's actions, but before Maggie could question anything, one of the members from the chess club, Tiny, tapped on the window behind them. "What're you doing?"

"Nothing!" Ned said quickly, though it was unclear if he was assuring Tiny or himself. "Yeah, you good?"

 Tiny grinned in response. "Chess."

Everything went quiet again, as neither sophomore knew what to say or do. It was over within minutes though, as the door to whatever classroom the people had gone into had opened once more. Curiosity had gotten the best of the teenagers, so they poked their heads around the corner to see three tall men retreating. Maggie's eyes narrowed on the one to the far right, recognising how he walked. She crept forward a little more and saw a white ink tattoo on the back of his neck. Three letters. L-C-M.

Shock instantly seeped through Maggie's body and she grabbed onto Ned's arm as she lost her footing for a moment. "Maggie? What is it? Is something wrong?"

She lifted her free hand to her mouth as she saw a gun attached to his hip as he turned the corner. Peter came out of the class and saw the girl looking nauseous and upset. He jogged towards her and hesitantly reached for her shoulder. "What happened?"

Maggie swallowed, blinking a few times as she tried to comprehend what she'd just seen. "What did you say those guys did to you?"

"They tried to kill me the other night...at the party," Peter responded, not catching on to what the girl was getting freaked out over. Maybe she was worried about him? That thought made his stomach swirl a little. 

Maggie's breath trembled as she exhaled. "My dad. He's one of them."

★☆

"How do you know it was him?" Peter asked softly as the two sat on the top bunk in his room. Maggie was cross legged, her fingers fiddling with a pen she had found; taking it apart and putting it back together seemed to be the only thing her mind was capable of in that moment. "It could've been anyone."

Maggie shook her head. "It was my dad. I saw his tattoo."

"He might not be the only one with that particular tattoo," Ned tried to justify, his eyes glued to Peter's watch, which was tracking the movements of a device he'd planted on one of the guys that day. "What was it of?"

Maggie reluctantly tried to form a response. "The letters L, C, M in white ink. I know it was him. What was he doing at school? Why didn't he say anything to me?"

"What did you say he did for a job?" Peter asked softly, trying to meet her eyes. 

"He said he was a driver or something, but I don't know if I can believe anything he tells me anymore," she muttered. "He had a gun, Pete. My dad hates guns. He told me the day he touched one was the day the world would end. What am I supposed to say to him? Hey, dad, saw you in my school with a weapon invented for killing people, how was your day?"

"It's gonna be okay, Maggie," Peter responded, nudging her knee softly. "We'll figure it all out."

Hours had passed, and Maggie knew she didn't want to go home. She had texted her neighbour, Sammie, to look after Marty a few days early, which the older woman was happy to do. She was looking after the dog anyway seeing as Maggie was set to go to D.C for the Academic Decathalon, so it wasn't too much of stretch. She didn't bother texting her dad, it wasn't like he was going to be at the apartment anyway. So, she sat with her overthinking mind and ended up falling asleep on the bunk as Peter and Ned watched the tracker.

★☆

Maggie didn't know what time it was when she woke up. Ned was fast asleep on the bottom bunk, and Peter was quietly piecing together a part of Ned's Death Star at his desk. At the sound of squeaking from the cheap metal, the boy looked up at met the tired girl's gaze. He smiled softly and got up from his chair, helping her down the ladder. "How're you feeling?"

Setting her feet to the floor without making much noise, Maggie shrugged. "I don't know."

Peter didn't really know what to say, so he glanced back at the LEGO he was fiddling with. "You wanna help me with this?"

Maggie nodded quickly, and the boy moved the pieces onto the ground, where they sat opposite each other. The room was filled with Ned's snores and the traffic in the streets outside, but Maggie felt quite peaceful. Well, as peaceful as one could feel when learning her dad was making ends meet by trying to kill teenage boys. 

"Has it always been you and your dad?" Peter asked after about ten minutes, to which Maggie pursed her lips and looked down. She had expected for this question to eventually arise, but they were so far into their friendship she thought she'd managed to to avoid it. Her fingers twirled a strip of grey LEGO, suddenly quite focused on what didn't matter. Peter quickly noticed that he had overstepped a little, and he swallowed anxiously. "Sorry, I didn't mean-"

"It's okay," Maggie blinked a few times, her face growing a little hot. She knew Ned was a very deep sleeper, which was why she decided that maybe it was time she opened up a bit. "Um, it's been just me and my dad for about seven years now. My Mom and my older brother died on the freeway when they were coming back from his late night football game. My Dad had to stay home to take care of me cause I had the flu. It was a drunk driver, he was changing lanes and he didn't see them..."

Maggie felt her throat close up a little, as if a lump had formed to stop her from continuing. She hardly ever addressed what had happened, she hated to remember.

"What were they like?" Peter asked, his hands nervously wringing together. Maggie's lip twitched a little as she envisioned her lost family members.

"My mom, Lucy, was so beautiful. She was one of those big fancy lawyers you see walking up and down the street. She was smart and funny, and she loved to bake," Maggie closed her eyes and imagined coming home when her mother had days off work, where the house would smell like fresh chocolate chip cookies. "Cameron, he was seventeen...he planned to go to Juilliard, and then to play cello in the London Symphony."

"That's amazing," Peter's jaw slacked a little in awe. Maggie's eyes opened and she gazed at her friend, watching him immerse himself in the conversation.

"He was funny, too," she felt the smallest of smiles appear on her lips. "He would pick me up from school sometimes, blasting Jesse McCartney's newest song cause he knew how much I loved it."

"Do you talk about him a lot?" Peter inquired, shuffling a little closer to her. He tried to make it subtle, but seeing as he was cross-legged, he literally had to awkwardly hop on his backside to close the gap between them. Maggie averted her eyes, not able to swallow the uncomfortable subject . She shook her head. Peter pursed his lips, reaching for her hand.

"My dad doesn't like to talk about it, and I know better than to ask," Maggie shrugged, tucking a curly strand of hair behind her head. She had pulled it back into a tight braid in her last class of the day with the help of Michelle, and now there were a few baby hairs springing out of place. "I've kinda just learned to deal with it, as painful as it is."

"I'm really sorry, Maggie. That must be really hard," Peter's voice was so gentle it almost put her at ease. "Losing people is the worst thing ever."

Maggie looked up and met his eyes, which were now glossed over in sadness. 

"I lost my parents when I was around five," he muttered, looking away from her quickly. "They left me with Aunt May and my Uncle Ben and they never came back. Ben died over summer."

"Peter, I-" Maggie began, but her voice trailed off. She pursed her lips, lacing their fingers together. "I'm sorry."

"I didn't really know my parents all that well, so I don't get as sad anymore. May's great though, she's taken care of me almost all my life. After Ben, I wasn't sure if we'd be able to make it, but we have. Sometimes I miss all of them though. I wonder what my life would've been like if they never went away," he responded. The clock by his bed read 4:15AM, but it didn't seem to matter all that much. It seemed the deepest conversations happened when the world around them was quiet. "Maybe I'd be different. Maybe I wouldn't be the way that I am."

"I think about that too," Maggie said, resting her head on his shoulder. It was as if they'd broken a barrier of some kind, allowing themselves to finally be physically comfortable with each other. It was nice. Maggie didn't realise how much she liked the comfort, and it seemed that Peter was the same. "But we don't have control over the stuff that happens to us. If none of this had happened I'd never have met you guys. I didn't realise how important it was to have friends until I got to know you and Ned."

"I'm glad you're here," Peter remarked, leaning his head atop Maggie's. "I know you sometimes don't think so, but you're a really great person, Maggie."

And with that, the two let their fatigue catch up to them, their tragic pasts left lingering in the air for a different conversation on a different day. 

★☆

yeehaw motherfuckers

sorry it took so long to update thiiiisiss but i really wanna get it finished so imma try my best and update regularly

also i'm seeing endgame tomorrow and i am unprepared hahahahaha kill me