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Peter felt absolutely exhausted, but one wasn’t exactly supposed to be well rested after two hours of sleep.
It wasn’t an extended night of patrol that kept the teen up most of the night, he got home on time. No, it was a slam of homework and needing to study. An english packet along with a test in that class, a “group” history project that he ended up doing entirely by himself, forty questions in geometry, and a chemistry test. Those two hours of sleep he got didn’t even happen all at once, causing him to feel even more exhausted. He fell asleep for about an hour after patrol, a half hour while he was working on the project, a few minutes here and there throughout the rest of the night that probably added up to another half hour. It didn’t help that he barely slept at all the night before, so he was basically running on fumes.
May actually let him have coffee this morning, and that said something. The woman would normally only allow her nephew to have caffeine during exam weeks, knowing the boy was getting little to no sleep during those times, and Peter looked just as exhausted this morning. Yes, part of her knew that it wouldn’t do much to his energy level considering his enhanced metabolism, but it was the thought that mattered. After all, the usual hyper and talkative kid was barely just mumbling in response to her attempts at conversation and he nearly fell asleep when he knelt down on the floor to grab some apple juice off of the bottom shelf of the refrigerator.
May offered Peter the chance to stay home and just go back to bed, but as suspected the teen insisted that he was fine and insisted that he’d be fine to go to school.
He made his way down to the train station a usual, nearly walking right on pass it on one point. God, he needed a nap or something. Maybe he could nap during lunch and then eat his lunch in English class after the test? He sat in the back corner pressed up against a filing cabinet— he had the best seat in class for hiding secret eating from the teacher. Perhaps he could also get a couple minutes of sleep in during history, too? Peter truthfully wasn’t sure if he could make it to lunch. In fact, he was practically falling asleep standing right here and now on the train. He probably would’ve, too, if his phone hadn’t begun to ring.
“Hello?” He answered, failing to suppress a yawn.
“Hey kid,” It was Tony who answered on the other line, which honestly surprised the teen. Tony usually didn’t call him during the day, let alone at seven-thirty in the morning.
“Mister Stark?”
“The one and only. You sound surprised.”
“Yeah, uh, I--” he yawned again. “--didn’t check the caller ID ‘nd you don’t us’lly call this early.”
“Well, I just thought I’d let you know that after this weekend when you picked Transformers for the movie night, you totally hooked Pepper on it. We got up to the one with… I think the name was Megatron. Yeah, that was it. She was falling asleep by then, so I suggested we wait until next weekend to finish it with you. Also you sound tired,” Tony pointed out the obvious. “Everything okay?”
“Mhm, yeah. Jus’ didn’t get a lotta sleep last night. School stuff.”
“Slammed with work again?”
“Mhm.”
“If you wanted, I could pull you out of school early after the last class you have work in? Then, you could just take a power nap for a while.”
Peter considered it for a moment. “That… that act’lly sounds great. Thanks, Mis’er Stark. I got a ‘nglish test sixth period, ‘nd that’ll be the last of it.”
“Alright, so why don’t you text me when you’re finished with it, okay? I’ll let Aunt Hottie know what’s goin’ on for you.”
“You gotta stop calling her that, or I’m gonna start ignorin’ you,” Peter mumbled in tired annoyance.
“Ouch kid, that’s harsh!” Tony said with a little laugh.
“Stop flirtin’ with my aunt, ‘nd I won’t needa be mean.”
“Now approaching Midtown Transit Station.” Announced the loud speaker on the train.
“Alright,” Tony said. “I should let you get going.”
“M’kay, sounds good,” Peter agreed, yawning once more. He shuffled his way towards the doors of the train now.
“Keep me updated, and let me know if you want to go home earlier.”
“‘Kay,” Peter agreed, and running largely on auto-pilot now, continued, “Love you. Bye.”
Instantly, Peter panicked. Of course, with how exhausted he was to even say that aloud, the teen wasn’t thinking totally rationally. So, instead of profusely apologizing as he typically would, Peter just… hung up before Tony could say anything else.
For the first time that day, Peter’s eyes were wide open with humiliation.
He was mortified!
He said that to May , his aunt who was like a mom to him. Not to Tony!
Sure, sometimes he nearly called him ‘dad’ and got strong parental vibes off of him a lot, but that was just him being stupid and childish. Right? Right. That had to be it.
It’d go away eventually.
It’d be nice, however, if he could avoid absolutely humiliating moments like this. Then, suppressing embarrassing memories could be way easier.
Peter walked to Midtown High School, feeling like absolute shit, and contemplating how he could erase that little mishap from both his and Tony’s minds.
And of course, being the teenager he was, Peter thought in various memes. One audio from one came to mind in this particular moment. ‘If I kill myself, techincally, let’s be honest, the problem would be gone’ .
Outside the steps of Midtown High, Ned was sitting, recording a Tik Tok of a pigeon who seemed to be dancing along to the music coming off his phone. At first, he downloaded the app to like videos, but at this point, he would make little videos here and there for fun to share with Peter and MJ, this bird was going to be one of them. In the background, however, the camera caught Peter walking on through towards a trash can. “Dude, dude come check out this pigeon!” Ned called to his friend excitedly. Birds dancing were cute, sue him for being excited.
Peter didn’t answer, however, and took the lid off of the trashcan. Immediately, he began sticking a foot inside-- thank god it was freshly changed.
Ned focused the camera on his friend now, failing to stifle a laugh. “Dude--” Laughter broke through. “ What are you doing?”
Peter then looked at him dead in the eyes, more serious than Ned had ever seen before, with both feet in the trash can now. “Going home.” Was all he said, closing the lid with no hesitation as his phone buzzed.
Ned was dying of laughter as Peter checked his phone. Oh great, he thought. Mister Stark’s probably gonna call me weird or somethin’.
[P Parker & T Stark CHAT-- 07:45AM]
T Stark: Love you too, kiddo.
You hung up before I could say anything.