TW: mentions of death, mentions of malnutrition, mentions of trauma.

Y/N's P.O.V

I drove my car into my building's parking lot, pulling into a random space before stopping the car. I put it into park and turned off the ignition before looking at the boy who sat in my passenger seat. Peter gulped and looked like a deer in headlights as his eyes darted around the window, studying the outside surroundings.

"Have you really not been back here in five years?" I scoffed quietly, trying to sound more shocked than judgemental as I looked at him. He shook his head and returned my gaze.

"To be honest with you, I thought that the next time that you and May saw me would be in a casket." He admitted. My eyes wavered and I tried my best not to cry at his words as I forced a smile onto my lips.

"Well, you're safe now, Pete. No more half-burnt down houses, or thugs who are waiting to rape women, or anything like that. Nothing but recovery from here on out, yeah?" I asked. He sighed and nodded, the pain in his eyes telling me that he was scared. I couldn't blame him, we both knew that the most painful hours of his life would start in a day or two. He was still ready, though.

"Come on, let's get your stuff inside." I nodded.

"What little of it there is." He chuckled slightly, making me give him a reassuring smile as I climbed out of the car. Peter did the same a moment later, his small body wrapped in a blanket that I'd had in the car as I opened the boot and took out his one trash-bag of stuff. Even the trash-bag was pretty much empty. After all, Peter only had two outfits of clothing, a phone, and about two dollars to his name. Which still only filled about a quarter of the trash-bag. Peter walked slowly next to me, his speed something that I was attributing to how weak he was as we headed into the building and up the stairs. Eventually we reached my floor and I immediately unlocked my door. It took me a moment to realise that Peter hadn't followed me into the apartment. I turned around, my heart breaking slightly as he remained stood at my door, head turned to look down the hallway. Head turned to look at May's door. His eyes wavered, a tear leaving them as he just stared at the structure.

"You want to go and see her?" I asked, Peter's head snapping back to look at me as I spoke. He sighed and looked back at her door briefly before shaking his head and moving into my apartment.

"No. I don't want her to see me like this. I'll go see her once I've recovered." He decided as he shut the door. I nodded as he walked into the apartment and looked around.

"This place has changed more than I thought that it would have. Looks more like you live here." He chuckled quietly as he walked in.

"Yeah. Obviously when I lived here with my parents, my tastes had to be limited to my room, but in the five years that you've been gone, they bought another house and let me stay here. I pay them rent and they live happily in a nicer part of Queens." I explained.

"There must be perks to your landlords being your parents." Peter stated as he gently ran his callous fingertips over the marble countertops in the kitchen.

"There are. Rent is next to nothing, apart from anything else." I chuckled. His eyes wavered at my comment and he looked down at his now joined hands.

"About that, Y/N, I, erm...I can't afford to contribute even a quarter to the rent until I'm back on my feet. I understand if you don't want me living here because of that." He nodded. I looked at him.

"Peter, you didn't actually think that I expected rent from you, did you?" I scoffed quietly. He looked back up at me, his red eyes telling me that he had gotten upset simply at the prospect of getting kicked out of my apartment. Which told me that we were already making progress.

"Y-Y/N, I can't live here rent-free, that's asking too much of you-."

"No, it's not, Pete. Look, you don't have a job, you've got no way of making money, I get that. If you really want to earn your keep or whatever, you can cook once a week or something, but I really don't mind. Mi casa es tu casa, until you can get back on your feet." I promised. He choked, his stunning eyes wavering as a tear fell from them.

"Thank you, Y/N. You have no idea what that means to me." He shook his head.

"It's okay, Pete. When I said that I wanted to help you, I meant it." I reassured. He nodded and gave me a small smile before sitting down at the island.

"One thing, though." He spoke. I looked at him again and raised my eyebrows, hinting for him to speak.

"I don't want you giving up your bed for me. I know what you're like, and I know that you were going to sleep on the sofa and have me in your bed whilst I recover. But I won't let you do that." He shook his head. I sighed an exacerbated sigh.

"Pete, you haven't slept in a real bed in five years-."

"And you've let me move in with you, rent free, after only a month of us being back in contact with each other. You've already done more than enough. You're sleeping in your bed." He stated. I sighed and nodded, knowing what Peter was like when he wasn't willing to negotiate. And this was one of those times.

"Okay, Pete. Look, I need to get to work, but towels are in the bathroom, you can have a bath or a shower, whatever you want, and you just turn the faucet to get the water running. The cupboards, fridge and freezer are all full, help yourself to absolutely anything." I nodded as I tried to put as much emphasis as possible on the word "anything".

"Will do, Y/N. Thank you." He returned. I gave him a small smile and bit my lip before rushing out of my apartment and heading to work.

I rushed into work, puffing out as I was five minutes late already. The small heels of my pumps clicked as I ran into the elevator, grateful for the doors closing immediately after my entry. I clicked the '30' button and stood there impatiently as the elevator rose. Soon enough, the elevator stopped at the thirtieth floor and I rushed out. Not to my surprise, Mr Jameson was stood by the open glass doors that led to our offices, his eyes on his watch.

"Y/N, late again! One more time and I'll have to cut you loose." He tutted and shook his head.

"With all due respect, sir, I've worked here for five years, and this is only the second time in those years that I've been late." I puffed out. He rolled his eyes and walked into the office, leaving me by myself. I sighed, bracing myself for another long day as I walked into the office and to my desk. But something was already off. My eyebrows furrowed, the white envelope that sat on my desk coming into view as I approached it. I sat down, confusion filling my mind as I looked at the envelope that only had the scribble of 'Y/N Y/L/N' on it in messy handwriting. At least there could be no confusion about who it was for. I gulped as I looked at it. Of course I wanted to open it, but I knew better than to open a random envelope sent to a newspaper journalist. After all, our office alone, in the last five years alone, had had countless suspicious packages and anthrax-ridden parcels and letters sent to various journalists. But for some reason, this felt different. I picked the envelope carefully, dodgy packages being so common now that we often had meetings and training that advised us as to what to look for. This, didn't display any of the signs. I gulped, my heart still in my throat as I turned the envelope to the front and carefully lifted the flap, which to my surprise wasn't stuck down in any way. I carefully pulled the piece of paper out of the envelope, the paper outing empty apart from the letter. I sighed in relief. At least it wasn't rigged with super-thin and undetectable explosives or anything. I unfolded the piece of paper, my eyes immediately widening as I read the words. My heart dropped to my feet, my stomach suddenly wanting to empty itself at the contents of the letter. Despite my reaction, the letter was only twelve simple words. And yet they had the potential to change everything.

I know who killed MJ. And I know who they work for.

I gulped, my eyes continuing to flick over the words. Several things majorly bothered me about the note, the first being that whoever wrote it called Michelle 'MJ'. Whilst that was all that we called her in our friendship group, she rarely got called that outside of Peter, Ned and I, and the news certainly hadn't called her that when reporting her death. And yet, whoever had written this knew to call her that. The other part that bothered me was the second part of the letter. And I know who they work for. My mind tried to comprehend the words that implied that MJ hadn't just been killed by a couple of angry thugs, but instead that the attack had been planned, and maybe even that her death had been planned. Not to mention that the 'work' wasn't in the past tense. Suggesting that the assholes who killed my best friend were still active and still worked for the asshole who sent them. I couldn't be sure, but I also couldn't write that possibility off either. I looked up as Liam walked past my desk.

"Hey, Liam, did you see who put this on my desk?" I asked as I held up the letter.

"Nope. Weird thing is that I was the first one in this morning, and it was already there." He shrugged, looking at me as he sat down at his desk behind me. I sighed and looked down at it.

"Why? Is it a threat letter or something?" he asked.

"No, nothing like that. It, um, doesn't matter. Thanks, anyway." I smiled, making him return it as I turned back to my desk, my smile dipping as soon as I was facing away from him.

I sat at my desk, my fingers typing away to write my most recent article.

"Oh my fucking god!" I heard Robbie laugh behind me. I turned around to look at him, my eyebrows furrowing slightly as he was reading the copy of this week's newspaper.

"What's funny, Robbie?" I asked as I pushed my chair over to him.

"Look at your article." he chuckled and shook his head. My eyebrows furrowed more, confusion filling my mind as he showed me the newspaper. He was on the page of my article, making me look at him.

"Seriously, read it." he pushed. I sighed before I started to read the words.

"I don't see why, Robbie, I know what I wrote-." my voice trailed off, my eyes widening as my eyes flicked over the article. I gulped, my heart starting to thump as I read the entire thing. Including the paragraph about how the city was better off when Spider-Man was here. The one that I was sure would be edited out on order of Mr Jameson.

"Oh, shit." I mumbled.

"'Oh shit' is right. Did you have a death wish writing that?" he chuckled. I bit my lip and looked at him.

"I didn't think that Mr Jameson would allow it to be kept in. I only convinced myself to leave it in because I was sure that he'd take it out. Do you think that he left it in intentionally or do you think that it just slipped past him?" I gulped.

"I think that you're about to find out." Robbie nodded. I sighed and closed my eyes as I heard footsteps stop behind me. I looked down and opened my eyes before forcing a smile onto my lips as I looked up at Mr Jameson.

"Yes, Mr Jameson-."

"Cut the bullshit, Y/L/N. My office, now." he spat before turning to walk back to his office. I sighed and looked at Robbie, making him give me a sheepish smile as I stood up.

"I'm definitely getting fired." I groaned.

"Oh, one hundred percent." he nodded, making me chuckle and sigh as I walked towards Mr Jameson's office. I bit my lip, my heart in my throat as I opened the door and slipped in before closing it behind me.

"You wanted to see me." I stated as I stood in front of his desk. He nodded and pursed his lips, his hands in his trouser pockets as he stood on the other side of his desk.

"I meant to leave that final paragraph in your article. The one about how supposedly great Spider-Man was." he admitted. My eyes widened slightly, my eyebrows furrowing at his words. Why the holy fuck would he have allowed it to stay in?

"I'm sorry, Mr Jameson, I don't understand-."

"I won't lie to you, I did it to make an example out of you. That little kiss-ass paragraph just shows how out of touch you are with the views of the Queens' public." he scoffed and shook his head. I narrowed my eyes at him.

"Excuse me, sir? You think that it shows how out of touch I am?" I returned the scoff.

"Course it does, it shows you for the ignorant writer that I've always believed you to be. Who the fuck wants that waste of space back? The city is better off without some dumbass vigilante like Spider-Man." he spat. I clenched my jaw, tears pricking my eyes as I looked at him.

"With all due respect, you're wrong." I stated. His head shot to me and his eyes widened.

"I beg your fucking pardon?" he spat.

"I said that you're wrong. The city was better with Spider-Man protecting it. Life was better with Spider-Man. He spent years trying to protect us, trying to protect the city that he loved, only for people like you to spit on him and say that we deserved so much better. Well, what I wrote is the truth, Mr Jameson. We didn't deserve so much better, we didn't even deserve him. He didn't look after our city out of obligation, he looked after it because he cared about it. He cared about us. But we fucked him up. We made him disappear, and we suffered for it. And I think that you'll find that I'm not the only one who believes that. So, no, I'm not ignorant, my views most definitely reflect the views of Queens. You'd do well to educate yourself on that." I rambled before stopping. Mr Jameson stared at me with wide eyes, making me gulp and my eyes waver as I looked down.

"I'm sorry, sir-."

"How DARE you speak to me like that! Let's get one thing straight, you are nothing compared to me. You'd be nothing without this newspaper. You'd do fucking well to remember that. The only reason that I'm not about to fire your ass on the spot is because you're so popular that there would be uproar. Count yourself very fucking lucky that you have friends here. Get out of my fucking sight." he spat. I tried not to smirk and feel proud of myself for putting him in his place as I looked back up at him.

"Course, sir." I nodded, making sure to have a slight spit in my voice as I turned and left the office. My eyes widened slightly as I left to see everyone staring at us with wide eyes, Liam and Robbie stood up as everyone stared at us. I gulped, it being clear that everyone had heard my little outburst. I looked at Robbie, making him wink at me as he raised his hands and started to clap. My eyebrows furrowed at what he was doing, Liam starting to clap too as other people started to stand up and join in. I bit my lip, tears pricking my eyes as everyone started to stand up and clap, making my heart swell in pride as they backed me up against our asshole boss. I turned around and gave Mr Jameson a small smile as he also came out of his office, his eyes wide.

"See? People did love Spider-Man." I nodded, making him clench his jaw as I turned and walked back to my desk.