chapter six!
by the window, romeo

    GETTING HOME that afternoon, Nina said a quick hello to her mother and went straight to her room. Her father wasn't home yet. He had work until later in the evening with patients booked in until five-thirty. But her mother worked at home, selling artwork through her own business. Nina passed her in her art studio, the painting she started last week half-done in a splash of acrylic colours. Her mother blew her a kiss in greeting, waving her fingers as a hello as Nina continued on. She made it to her room and opened the door, throwing her bag onto her bed and already grabbing her books, and everything she'd need to study.

     Almost immediately, she got a message from Felicia.

     cia🙇🏼‍♀️: You coming to Liz's party this weekend? Might get the chance to see your Spidey again (¬‿¬)

     (Felicia didn't use emojis. She downloaded an app in which she could paste text emoticons instead of having to search them up or make them because Felicia was nothing if she wasn't dramatic).

     Nina rolled her eyes but smiled nonetheless. She was tempted, but she had to study for Nationals and get her homework done.

     That was a lie, she knew it. The reason she wasn't going was because Peter now was. She didn't trust herself to be around him after a few drinks, nor did she want to handle the awkwardness, or start another argument ... she just wanted a weekend with nothing happening. She wanted a break because this week at school had already been so eventful than usual.

    (That was also a lie. She didn't want to go because she didn't think she could deal with seeing Peter smile at Liz the way he does).

     Nina sat down on her bed and replied, pulling her legs up to cross them. Can't, studying

     It didn't take long for her friend to reply. Boring wife.

     Nina chuckled. Ex-wife, she corrected.

     (╥﹏╥), answered Felicia

    Still smiling, she set her phone aside. She felt a little better at that. Felicia knew her better than most, and ever since she broke up with Peter, they had gotten closer. She had been there for her, and Nina was trying her best to be there for Cia at this point in her life without being overbearing, because she meant a lot to her now.

    She didn't know how long she had been working; perhaps an hour, taking notes for her practice essay on Schrödinger's Cat before she'd actually have to create a paper on basic quantum mechanics. She was really into biology and chemistry, and so this was a stretch for her━but that didn't mean she wasn't determined to do really well and learn. But ... Peter had always promised he'd be there to help her, and they'd do their papers together.

     ... And she was in that horrible mood again.

    She felt that urge to text him again. To say what? That she was sorry? That she still felt the same after it all? That she was angry, and she was sad, and she was so stranded and wished that he was right here with her? No, she couldn't. He had broken up with her, not the other way around. He obviously was moving on with Liz despite all he said, and Nina was going to have to deal with it.

    Felicia's mantra was starting to sink into her more than it had before. Move on.

   Nina didn't need Peter's help in quantum mechanics. She will figure it out herself. She will move on━

     There was a strange tap on her window.

     At first, Nina thought a bird had just brushed past; some pigeon scurring along or accidentally bumping into the glass thinking it wasn't there. She just continued, adding a tab to her textbook for later reference━

     Tap, tap, tap.

     That wasn't a bird.

     Nina looked up this time, and her breath hitched into a surprised smile.

     A figure in red and blue peered back at her through the glass. Spider-Man's lenses flickered as he waved. He tapped his fingers onto her window before gesturing her to open it up.

     Nina's heart fluttered. She felt giddy. She swung her legs off her bed and rushed to the window. Unlocking it, she pushed it upwards and the sound of Queens outside, and the weather broke through. She stared at Spider-Man, confused, but also strangely happy to see him.

     "Hi?" she chuckled.

    Spider-Man propped his elbows on her window sill, gazing up at her. "Hello there, Nina Hart."

     A thought struck her and she frowned, the smile still tugging her lips. "How ... how did you know I live here?" she gasped a little. "Have you been following me?"

     "What?" said Spider-Man. He was struck with silence for a moment, caught-out. Nina wasn't freaked out. Instead, her heart rose to think that Spider-Man wanted to see her again enough that he went out of his way to know where she was, to surprise her at her window, tapping his knuckles against it like he was Romeo, and she was Juliet. "N━No!" he lied━she could tell, just at the nervous stammer of his voice. "No━I━I didn't follow you. I━I saw you." He cleared his throat, pointing a thumb to the city behind him. "Through the━um━through the window."

     "So you were watching me?" Nina smirked, amused.

     Spider-Man froze. "I━" he then back-tracked, chuckling. "I━I'm not gonna answer that."

     Nina tried to act upset through her want to laugh. "Wait, so you weren't watching me? Damnit."

     The web-slinger's eyes were tilted upwards; he was smiling. Nina gazed at him for a second, wondering what colour his eyes were behind that mask, or how wide his smile was. Were they blue? Green? Brown? She imagined them bright, and youthful━as mischevious and estatic as his voice. His voice that was so familiar, and yet not at the same time.

      Spider-Man blinked and shook his head. "Uh━um━look, I just━I came to check up on you ... you know ... see whether you're okay. Have you got your helmet yet?"

      Nina rolled her eyes, "Are you playing with me?" she asked him. She stepped away from the window, but kept it open. Spider-Man took the offer and slipped inside, taking a seat on her boxes for her old books and stuffed toys covered in a blanket and pillows.

     She had her first kiss with Peter amongst those pillows━

    Stop it.

    "Playing?" quipped Spider-Man. "No! 'Course not. I'm abiding by the laws of skateboarding and expressing my wish for safety━you know, the usual superhero stuff. It's my obligation━"

     "To make sure I wear a helmet?" Nina was grinning. She sat back on her bed, pulling her study notes towards her.

     Spider-Man swung his legs against the carpet of her bedroom like a little kid. "Exactly."

     Nina smiled to herself, shaking her head as she picked up her pen. "Is that all, Spidey?" she asked.

     "Is it?"

     She pursed her lips to stop her smile from growing. Ducking her head, she couldn't hide the tint in her cheeks with her hair, for it was up in a pony-tail. But she tried nonetheless, biting the cap of her pen and looking down. He sat there, swnging his legs and looking around her room, lenses widening and narrowing as he examined her post-it notes, her Stark Industries convention posters, the pictures of her and Felicia when they found a photo-booth at the mall, the picture of Nina and her family at the Statue of Liberty one time they visited. He saw more of her study notes on her desk for biology.

     He glanced at her, and the pointed hesitantly towards the papers. Nina shrugged, finding no harm in showing Spider-Man her school work. He jumped to his feet and made his way over. He walked with ease━like he's been in her room many times before, and knew his way around it like it was rooted in his head.

     Spider-Man picked up her papers and there was silence as he read and Nina kept working. But it was hard for her, since she kept glancing up, watching Spider-Man read; his fingers flipping the pages, his padded feet shuffling. Her eyes traced the designs of his suit; the webs embedded into the red and blue.

     When he finished, she quickly looked away, amused at herself. She didn't even know him, and yet she felt like she was on her first date, a giddy, nervous mess who couldn't stop smiling.

     Spider-Man looked at her. He seemed winded, like it wasn't what he expected. "Nina..." he murmured. It made her gaze snap up. For a second ... she thought she heard someone else. "This ... this is really good."

     Nina blushed. "Oh ... um ... thanks. It's a first draft, I mean━it's just a practice essay, really, for my upcoming test. I━I'm sure there's a lot of things that need fixing but━"

     "No, this is really, really good," Spider-Man cut her off, his lenses wide. "I━I━what you're talking about: cross-species genetics. Nina, these pointers━about lizard DNA to help lost limbs, Zebra Fish for Parkinson's ... if this works, these people are practically just healing themselves..."

     "Yeah, but it has a lot of dangers," mumbled Nina, not expecting him to be so delighted. "I mean, if it's even possible, people could make weapons, experiment on themselves, create supersoldiers━even if I'd think it'd be great for medical purposes, doesn't mean it should be used. Like I said, it's just a practice essay for school."

     Spider-Man kept watching her. "You're really smart, Nina."

     She shrugged, bright red. How could someone watching her behind a mask feel so intimate and familiar? "Thanks ..." she mumbled again.

     "You should make a future out of this. Seriously. Like━chemistry and biology ..."

    "I want to," said Nina. "I━I plan to, I mean. I planned on joining the next group of interns for Stark 'cause Pete━"

     She stopped herself, but it was too late. Spider-Man froze again. He slowly set her papers down again and the silence was no longer gentle, and mischevious, it had somehow turned very tense very quickly. "P━Pete?" asked Spider-Man, unsure.

     Nina pursed her lips. She fiddled with her pen, nervous. "I━I heard you know him? Peter Parker?"

     Spider-Man seemed confused for a second, before he quickly nodded. With a clear of his throat and his hands on his hips, he said, "Yeah! Yeah, I do. Um━uh━cool guy. He works at Stark Industries, yeah? The intern?" She nodded. "He ... he didn't━um━he didn't say anything about you━I mean━you want to join Stark Industries?"

     She found it hard to meet his gaze for some reason. She felt she was caught red-handed in a secret. "I ... I wanted to surprise Pete. He ... he got an internship, and after that we just━we ... we never had time to do anything anymore. He was gone all the time, he was always late to dates or just never showed up, and ... and he never picked up his phone. I ... I thought that interviewing would ... well, would let us have more time together. Then ... then I found out that there was no more entries for the internship ... it doesn't even exist anymore ... so I'd have to join Stark Industries out of university. I still want to join, now, but ... but Pete and I ... we broke up."

     Spider-Man still stood by her desk. He looked rather awkward. "Oh."

     "Yeah," Nina hated how she felt the lump in her throat. She will not cry in front of Spider-Man over Peter Parker. "It's stupid, really ... I just thought ... we were supposed to be together forever, like a fairytale. But that was on me. I now know that high-school friends-to-sweethearts are just for comics and movies, rarely ever real life."

     Carefully, Spider-Man sat down on her desk chair. He gripped the back of it tight, like he was scared he was going to fall off. "What ... can I ask what happened?"

     Nina held her pen just as tight. "He ... he got too busy for me. Said he couldn't handle a relationship. But I know he lied to me. Because ... because he definitely has a crush on this senior girl, and━and I want to be angry at him, but it hurts more instead. But at the same time I'm just ... I'm just really worried about him."

     There was more silence. Spider-Man was uncharacteristically solemn. He didn't even take the chance to swing the chair around. "Maybe ..." his voice sounded dry. Nina frowned at him, wondering why. He didn't meet her gaze this time. "Maybe━I mean, from knowing Peter a little bit━that perhaps he thought that ... maybe ... by breaking up with you, he was protecting you."

     "From what?" scoffed Nina. "From the Stark Internship? Seriously?"

     "Well..." Spider-Man rubbed his hands against his suit pants. "I━I━I mean━you know━Stark's an Avenger ... he━uh━he works for Avengers. M━makes it a bit dangerous, you know?"

     She didn't believe that. Nina rolled her eyes. She didn't say anything though━she didn't have the energy to argue about Peter with Spider-Man. "Whatever," she muttered. "It's over now, anyway, so ..."

      The distant call of, "Nina!" down the hallway jolted them back to reality. The conversation about Nina's ex-boyfriend was over, and she was happy for it. But in hearing her mother's footsteps get closer to her bedroom door, she gasped and rushed to her feet.

     "Go!" she whispered to Spider-Man, gesturing harshly to the window. "Go! My Mom can't see you, she'll freak!"

     "Oh! Oh! Right!" Spider-Man hurried to get himself back on track. He accidentally ran into her desk and her chair. Her study notes fell onto the floor and he crouched down to pick them up. "Oh━sorry━I'll━um━I'll just━"

    "No! It's okay!" Nina told him, back to wanting to chuckle again. How could someone so clumsy be a web-slinging, crime-fighting, agile superhero? "Just get out of here! Quickly! Before she━"

     Her mother knocked on the door. Nina's words were cut off by a gasp and she gestured wildly for Spider-Man to go the window before she opened the door quickly and stuck her head through the crack. Her mother's eyes widened, startled by the quick movement. She had Nina's sandy-blond hair and soft cheeks with the beginning of wrinkles at the corner of her eyes and in between her brows. On her nose, she had some blue paint━though, Nina had learnt not to ask how it got there.

     "Mom!" she greeted, and winced at how high-pitched her voice sounded. "Hi!"

     Her mother frowned, bewildered. "You okay, hon?"

    "Yeah!" Nina nodded quickly. "Yeah, I'm fine! What's up? Is Dad home yet?"

    Behind her, she heard the sound of webs flinging out to attatch to a building. There was a scuffle━and she knew that Spider-Man had left.

     She joined her mom outside to help make dinner, but in her head, seeing a blur of red disappear out of the window of the lounge room, following the sound of sirens that had blared up in the distance, she thought with a smile: go get 'em, Tiger.    

*ೃ༄

      STANDING in OSCORP right now was like standing under the shadow of a looming, gigantic tower of anxiety, ready to fall right onto her; crash and submerge her with every ounce of negative and doubtful thought she's gone through a hundred times already this morning. This was where Nina wanted to be, and yet she's never felt so out of place, and so uncomfortable. Gwen had assured her plenty of times that she was fine, her hair was fine, her outfit was fine, she was going to be fine and yet still, Nina flattened her skirt and checked her socks. She tucked her hair out of her eyes and was careful not to rub her mascara onto her cheeks. She was surrounded by others just as nervous as her: aspiring scientists welcomed into the internship program with bubbling, bright, young minds and anxious, racing hearts.

     Gwen told her: you're all right, you're going to love it. Doctor Curt Connors was great! Nina told her, in a very dramatic text: I'm going to die! And she was left on open since because Gwen's shift had begun. The blonde, intelligent daughter of the police captain already had her future secured, and now it was Nina's turn to take a page from her book, take the daunting step, and secure her's, too.

     "It's fine, I'm fine," she whispered to herself, so low she hoped none of the other interns would hear. Shuffling on her feet, Nina took a deep breath and fiddled with her pen. "It's going to be great! We're finally here!"

     Someone had heard her. He gave her an estranged look before returning his gaze onwards, waiting for their guide to arrive. Nina blushed and hugged her stomach. She wished there was someone else she knew here. Someone who was just starting, like her, and not head intern. Someone she could stress about things with and then realise they were both being overdramatic and there was nothing to be afraid of. They were both smart, and they could both do this.

     She didn't expect her wish would actually come true.

     Nina caught him standing in the back; head low, shoulders hunched━like he usually did with his glasses pushed up his nose. Peter Parker looked as though he shouldn't be here, constantly checking over his shoulder and not meeting anyone's gazes. He fixed the rim of his glasses and Nina found herself walking towards him before she could even think what to say.

      He didn't see her until she was right there beside him. She grinned, ignoring the flutters in her chest to say, "Hey, I didn't know you applied for the internship?"

     Peter jumped. He turned to face her, frozen like a fly stuck in a spider's web. He gaped for a moment, at lost for words like he had been in class. Nina grinned. "N━Nina?" he managed. "W━um━heh━" he chuckled.

     He fiddled with something on his jacket. Nina automatically glanced down, and the smile on her face dropped a little in confusion as she read the intern name badge. She quirked a brow back up at him, suspicious, "Rodrigo?" she stated with a knowing tone that made him frown, confused.

    Then, he glanced down at the badge he stole. He chuckled lightly, "O━Oh, yeah," as if he had just come to the revelation that he was wearing someone else's name.

     Nina rolled her eyes, but she smiled nonetheless, "What are you doing here?" she asked him.

     "I work here." He faltered and shook his head. "I don't work here, I━I━" Peter smiled at his stumble, if not a little embarrassed at being caught-out, "━I was gonna say that I work here, but it seems like you━you would know that I don't in fact ... work ... here."

     Nina watched him for a second, her confusion falling away and being replaced by a giddish amusement. He looked just as struck as he did in the classroom, and she smiled, liking the way his cheeks were growing a hint of rose and how he stuffed his hands in his jacket pockets. She never took time to notice Peter Parker until recently, but now, Nina couldn't stop noticing him. And now here was here, with someone else's stolen name-tag, smiling at her and she couldn't help but wonder━

    "Have you been following me?"

    Immediately he blurted out a, "No! No, I'm not following you, no," still with a smile on his face that made Nina have to stifle her giggles. "I━I had no idea you━I was just━"

    "Then why would you be here?" Nina hugged her stomach, a different set of nerves coming towards her. She felt her heart begin to race, but not in the way she felt like she was under the shadow of her doubt ... no it was good. It made her not want to stop grinning.

     Peter's gaze filled with that mischevious glint she hadn't been able to get out of her head since that day at school. He noticed the slight flirt on her end━the whisper of how she wished he had snuck in to see her again. He smiled again, shrugging with a quick glance back to the escalators at the edge of the landing. "I━I snuck in because I━I━" she waited patiently, admiring the way he ducked his head and waved his hands to gesture still in his jacket pockets. "I love science."

     Nina couldn't stop her smile even if she wanted to. "You love science."

     He nodded, matching her smile, "I'm passionate about it."

    "And so you snuck in...?" Nina glanced back as she heard the foosteps. She caught a glimpse of Gwen making her way over in a tight pony-tail, and a white lab coat over her jumper and skirt. She quickly turned back to Peter. "If Gwen sees you..."

     Peter nodded vigoriously, "I know━"

    "━You'll be in so much trouble━"

     "I know."

     Nina chuckled at his antics. She gave him a small shove that he blushed at. "You're dumb, Parker," she told him in a tone that meant far from that. Nina rushed back to join the group, glancing over her shoulder at Peter who shrugged again, still with that smile that made her heart leap out of her chest.

 *ೃ༄

     a/n: i'm in a serious spider-man mood so as we wait the days for homecoming and definitely afterwards don't be surprised if this book is updated quite a lot ahahah. let's pretend it's because i'm tryna keep up with the hype and not because i'm hyperfixated ...

     nina and peter are both dorks in every single universe it's a scientific fact.