Chapter Text
The Buckley Family used to be happy.
Maddie doesn’t know whether it’s a privilege to have known her parents before loss, or if it made the degradation of their Perfect Nuclear Family that much more devastating.
Before everything fell apart, Maddie and Daniel were attached at the hip. With only sixteen months separating them, people thought they were twins – the way their minds and motivations moved in tandem like two souls whose unification was inevitable.
They were the kind of siblings who would choose to sit together on the school bus, even though there were open seats elsewhere.
They often got in trouble, but it was harmless. They always stayed up too late chatting about everything and nothing until one of their parents would shoo them to bed with a fond roll of their eyes.
It was perfect, and Maddie felt unconditionally loved.
Her parents were overjoyed when they found out they were expecting another child. Given the eight-year age gap, Maddie could tell the pregnancy was somewhat unexpected but was welcomed nonetheless.
Nine months later, the most beautiful baby boy was born.
Maddie loved him immediately.
Evan was a ridiculously happy baby. Her parents always joked that she and Daniel were rather fussy, not liking to be held for long periods of time – but not Evan.
Evan thrived when he was close to the ones he loved, only falling asleep when someone cradled him to their chest, humming softly in his ear.
He loved Maddie most of all. His big blue eyes looked for her in every room, using every ounce of his strength to crawl into her lap with a bright, toothless smile overtaking his features.
Daniel loved him too, and soon the two of them moved their late-night hangouts into Evan’s nursery so that they didn’t have to be apart.
Evan was rambunctious, even as a toddler.
He moved around without any regard for where his limbs ended up, often knocking over plates and cups without thinking. His coloring books filled up faster than their parents could replace them, so he chose to decorate his barren bedroom walls with technicolor scribbles.
Maddie thought it looked beautiful.
Evan’s scoldings and time-outs became more frequent the older he became, and the Buckleys found it difficult to mask their disappointment when his excess energy got the best of him.
They projected a calculated image of stoicism in public, but Maddie overheard the truth after a meeting with Evan’s preschool teacher.
“Causes frequent disruptions," Maddie’s mom said bitterly, slamming a stack of papers on the kitchen counter. “Hyperactive, has trouble focusing, doesn’t finish assignments.”
The boys were both asleep, but Maddie ventured down for a glass of water that night. She was only fourteen and could sense the resentment that stuck to the walls of a room meant to be the heartbeat of a home.
“I know,” her dad sighed, shuffling around the room. “I don’t know what we’re going to do with him.”
“We’ll be lucky if he avoids military school before the age of 18,” her mom replied harshly.
Her dad just said something under his breath, and Maddie backed away silently, not wanting to be caught.
The way they talked about her baby brother made her sick. Little Evan, who smiled until his cheeks hurt and laughed until he couldn’t breathe.
Her baby brother, innocent and sweet Evan, who wore his hurt on his face — who could sense that their parents thought of him as a burden.
No one understood him, except Maddie and Daniel. They knew his excess energy was not an act of rebellion so much as an uncontrollable zest for life. It made him so special, and Maddie always assured him that not only did it make her love him more, but that it was his superpower.
That same night, she tiptoed to his door, taking a peek inside.
Evan slept soundly, a white noise machine blaring. He needed it since he was a baby — his thoughts were often too loud to grant him the reprieve that sleep offered.
When their parents took it away, he sobbed and sobbed until sleep finally found him.
At four years old, they claimed he had outgrown it, but Evan took it as a punishment. Maddie couldn’t help but agree with him, viewing their parent’s actions as an opportunity to make him feel less than — like there was something wrong with needing a little help to fall asleep.
She dug it out from the back of the closet and plugged it back in.
The night she overheard her parents in the kitchen, Evan’s breathing was even, his arms splayed across his forehead while quiet snores left his mouth.
“Love you, Evan,” she said into the room, aware the intended audience wouldn’t hear. She hoped it would enter his subconscious — convince some part of him that he was loved unconditionally.
That was, as it turns out, the night before Daniel got sick.
They woke up that morning, getting ready for school as they always did, but this time Daniel was missing from the bunch.
Maddie watched Evan poke his head inside his room, their brother opening his bleary eyes to greet them.
“Are you okay?” Evan asked, and Maddie’s heart broke as his tiny voice became even smaller — his worry evident.
Daniel gave him a small smile, but his face was wraithlike, his brow slick with a noticeable layer of sweat.
“I’ve got the flu or something,” Daniel responded nonchalantly, his tone deliberately calm. “Can you grab Mom and Dad for me?”
No one knew it at the time, but Daniel didn’t have the flu.
He would never recover, and the Buckley Household Fell Apart.
Maddie found chunks of her mother’s hair in the bathtub, the physical manifestation of her stress as she watched her son deteriorate in front of her.
Her dad stopped smiling, and sitcoms stopped playing on the television — he commented that the laugh track annoyed him. Maddie knew it was because the sound of joy was misplaced in a house so devoid of it.
Her dad’s coffee became stronger, and the two fingers of whisky at the end of the night became four.
A few months after the diagnosis that wrecked their lives, Daniel moved into the hospital for full-time palliative care.
Evan and Maddie visited every day after school, climbing into his bed to snuggle and watch Superhero movies, wanting to erase this horrific reality with a semblance of happiness.
Trying to describe that period of time with words always provides a gross misrepresentation of the torture their family endured while they tried to preserve any last bit of their sanity.
Their parents started exploring alternate treatments, needing to know that they exhausted every single option before giving up hope. That is when they stumbled upon a privately owned genetics lab specializing in gene modification and treatment for terminal illnesses.
For the first consultation, Daniel and their parents went alone, and Maddie waited with bated breath to find out the result.
It lasted into the night; Maddie and Evan stayed awake, cuddled up on the couch, and watched reruns of a cartoon. Finally, the car's headlights could be seen through the living room window, and Evan stood on the couch to watch them park.
“Do you think they’ll save him?” He whispered, his voice timidly optimistic.
“I don’t know,” Maddie responded with a small smile. “I hope so.”
Their parents didn’t tell them much that night, but they seemed happier than they had in ages. Maddie could tell that something was off, though.
The next morning, when they explained the next steps, they couldn’t look either child in the eye for more than a few fleeting seconds. They just clasped their hands together and nodded to themselves, as though this decision required reassurance.
Maddie now knows that her parents were trying to make themselves feel better about what they were going to do to Evan.
Both she and her littlest brother went in for testing the next day, the doctor collecting sample after sample of everything — blood, hair, fingernails.
That day didn’t raise any alarm bells in Maddie’s mind.
The doctor explained that they wanted to see which one would be a better match for the treatment they planned. It all seemed relatively routine, and Maddie was familiar enough with the concept of medical donations at that point.
She prayed that she was a match, uncomfortable with the idea of both of her brothers being poked and prodded, stuck in a dreary hospital room to fulfill a task with the most dire of consequences.
To her abject dismay, she was not the match for Daniel.
Less than a week later, her parents packed a bag for Evan and loaded his things into the car, unbridled grins on their faces.
“He needs to stay overnight?” Maddie asked warily, crossing her arms in front of her chest. “For how long?”
Maddie’s mom practically ignored her, picking Evan up by his armpits and settling him into his car seat.
Evan was silent for the first time in his life, staring straight ahead. At four years old, it looked like he was attempting to make sense of what was happening — what he was being asked to do.
What he was being forced to do.
“They just need to take some more tests,” she answered dismissively, "He's going to be fine, Maddie. This is all perfectly safe.”
This is all perfectly safe.
That sentence rattled around in her head the entire week that Evan was gone, and she wondered why her mom felt the need to include that part.
Before that statement, she didn’t doubt that it was safe — she just didn’t want him to be alone.
Her parents worked full-time, so Evan would likely be left to his own devices most of that week. She worried about Evan navigating Daniel’s mortality without her, knowing that their brother was becoming too weak to stay awake for more than an hour at a time.
She didn’t want him to endure the sadness and confusion that accompanied this horror movie-esque reality. He wasn’t old enough to wrap his mind around life and death — not without her.
She spent that week lying awake at night, dissolving into a puddle as she agonized over the well-being of her brothers.
The night before Evan came back home, she wandered downstairs once again.
“He’s going to be fine,” Mrs. Buckley hissed, and Maddie assumed they were keeping their voices down in an attempt not to wake her.
She heard her father sigh and place a heavy glass down on their mahogany dining table.
“I’m just worried we didn’t think this through,” he said.
“Think what through?” She retorts, practically hysterical, “There is no time to think things through, Phillip. Your son is going to die without this treatment. Do you want that?”
“What about Evan?” He bit back, his voice rising. “We don’t even know what they’re doing to him right now.” He cleared his throat, his voice shaky. “The side effects they outlined. The unnatural abilities. He’s already a handful as it is, imagine he —”
“Keep your voice down,” Margaret said. “You’re going to wake up Maddie.”
Her father let out another hefty breath, the glass being placed back down again, as if he took another sip.
“They are enhancing his genes,” Phillip stressed. “We don’t even know what that means, Margaret. And for what?” he cursed under his breath. “A bone marrow transplant that we can’t be sure will even work?”
Her mom took a moment before Maddie heard a sob echo through the dining room.
Enhancing his genes? Side effects?
Unnatural abilities?
Maddie’s mind was reeling, stomach bile rising in her throat.
Her house felt haunted as she rushed back up the stairs — the darkness emanating from her parents felt like a monster hot on her heels.
She collapsed onto her bed, sobbing into her pillow as she prayed for her brothers.
Maddie Buckley never believed in a higher power, but that night, she did.
There has to be someone out there who could save the Buckleys.
—
When Evan returned from the treatment facility the next day, he looked awful.
Mr. Buckley carried him up to his bed, tucking him under his covers with a sigh. They were covered in firetrucks, Evan having developed an affinity for them after the local fire station stopped by his preschool.
Maddie watched from the door as her dad stared at him, hands on his hips, tears streaming down his face.
Evan was asleep, but his face was devoid of color, his lips a nauseating shade of blue.
Her dad sobbed into his hand, desperately trying to muffle the sound of his devastation.
During this time of her life, Maddie’s fear was like a shadow, clinging to her while she fought off anticipatory grief.
She was scared of fate – scared of time passing – knowing that Daniel’s days were beginning to dwindle.
It seemed she was the only one who could recognize the reality as it played out before them. She was hopeful before, when her parents said that this treatment could save him.
But now, she watched in horror as her dad choked on his sobs over the ailing body of his four-year-old son, and for the first time she felt truly afraid — not of the future— but of a person.
She was afraid of her parents and how their pain had transformed them. She was afraid of who they’d become, and what they’d done to Evan.
Evan trembled in his sleep, weak arms trying to lift his covers, but to no avail.
Her dad maneuvered to do it himself, but Maddie couldn’t stand to watch him get any closer, so she shuffled forward and nudged him out of the way. He startled, obviously unaware that someone was watching him devolve into madness.
Maddie sat down on Evan’s bed, pulling the covers up to his chin, smoothing back his sweat-slicked hair.
Seeing him up close renewed her rage, and she took a deep breath and stood to greet her father.
“You’re evil,” she seethed, “what did you do to him?”
Her father couldn’t answer, his mouth opening and closing around words that wouldn’t form.
“Get out of his room,” she said, her words firm and full of ire.
He was too defeated to say anything at all, his shoulders slumped as she watched the flight leave him in real time.
She didn’t care, though.
She watched him drudge up the energy to leave, and followed him only to lock the door so they couldn’t re-enter. On her way back over, she leaned down and turned on the white noise machine hidden under his bed, her chest caving in at the potential loss of the Evan she knew.
Would he be the same child as before, or would this experience jade him — effectively robbing the world of this wonderful boy whose heart transcends all that is good?
Maddie sat on the edge of Evan’s bed, petting him softly and humming, her voice barely audible over the sound of her heart breaking.
He curled into her touch without knowing, and Maddie let her tears fall.
—
Evan recovered, and Daniel didn’t.
The bone marrow transplant didn’t take, and the family sat around Daniel’s bedside as he took his final breath.
The incessant staccato of her parents' sobs will haunt her for the rest of her life, and she couldn’t even look at them while the doctor unplugged the machine that announced the final beat of Daniel’s heart.
His last words were to Evan, squeezing his hand with a forlorn smile.
“I love you, Evan,” he managed. “And I’m sorry that I won’t be around to watch you grow. You’re going to do great things, you know that?”
Evan had just stared, his eyes huge and full of heavy tears that clung to his bottom lashes. Maddie wondered if he should even be in the room, but their parents insisted.
It felt like retribution.
It was abundantly clear that some evil entity possessed their parents' hearts, and that evil blamed Evan for Daniel’s death.
Evan crawled into her lap, getting a bit too big for the act, but Maddie just scooped him up and held his head in her shoulder as she stared straight ahead.
Tears ran down her face, but she didn’t make any moves to wipe them away, too busy running a comforting hand up and down Evan’s back. His tiny shoulders shook against her, his breath coming out quickly as she recognized the telltale sign of a panic attack.
Maddie stood with him in her arms and walked out into the hallway, sitting on a bench outside the room.
She didn’t say anything and just let him cry it out, knowing that there were no words that could mend his broken heart.
“I didn’t save him,” he wailed, his breathing labored, “I was supposed to save him.”
Maddie’s breath caught in her throat, realizing that Evan internalized their parents’ resentment, much to her horror.
Her stomach caved in on itself, her mouth dry as a result of her little brother’s confession.
“No, no,” Maddie soothed, squeezing him tighter, “It’s not your fault, I promise.”
He wiggled out of her arms and onto the floor and looked at her with furious eyes. At that moment, he looked older than someone who was just about to turn five, and this rapid coming of age terrified her.
“It’s my fault,” he bit back, clenching his tiny fists, “It’s my fault.”
“No, Evan,” she said, a bit stern but still gentle. “It’s not your fault.”
His hands found his hair, pulling hard at the messy blond curls, a frustrated groan leaving his mouth. He stomped his feet on the ground, turning to kick the wall behind them.
He was practically screaming through his teeth, his mouth clamped shut as his agony echoed throughout the empty hallway.
Maddie tried to reach for him, but he jerked away, tripping over his feet and landing on his back. He smacked his head against the linoleum floor, the impact causing him to lose his breath.
“Evan!” Maddie exclaimed, rushing to meet him on the floor. She lifted him by his armpits and sat him up, gently feeling the back of his head.
A sizable goose egg sat underneath his curls, but he swatted her touch away.
“I’m okay,” he grumbled, crossing his arms. “Don’t tell mom and dad.”
Her eyes welled with hot tears as she nodded and mournfully agreed to keep this between them.
Hours later, their aunt picked them up while their parents signed paperwork, and Maddie couldn’t help but peer over at Evan on the drive home.
He seemed alert and oriented, but she wondered whether she should let her aunt know he hit his head earlier.
She reached out to smooth his hair down, anticipating the bump to have grown in size, only to find that his head was completely healed.
She felt around, and Evan looked over at her like she was crazy, his tear-stained cheeks flushed with agitation.
“I told you I’m fine,” he responded before returning his gaze to the street as it passed them by.
Maddie just nodded, unable to find the words, and folded her hands back in her lap.
—
A few months after Daniel passed, she heard her mother scream.
Maddie rushed downstairs to find that Evan had broken a lamp, the porcelain base having left a small gash on his right hand. He tucked it behind him like he didn’t want anyone to see, his gaze downturned while his mother lost her mind.
Maddie intervened, telling Evan to go outside while she cleaned up the accidental mess, wiping up some of the blood that had dripped onto the floor.
She didn’t say anything to her parents, silent as her mom sobbed into her husband’s chest, mumbling incoherently about how exhausted she was.
Maddie stood, walking into the kitchen to throw out what was left of their antique lamp before she reunited with her parents.
“You should get some air,” is all she said, willing her voice to stay level.
Her parents left the house in a daze, slamming the front door as she made her way back into her bedroom.
She watched from her window as Evan scaled the tallest tree in their backyard, branch by branch, until he reached one at the top that would support his weight.
The sight made her nervous, of course, but she knew that he wouldn’t listen if she yelled at him to climb down.
He sat up there for a while, wiping his tears and staring out at nothing, his legs dangling at least twenty feet off the ground.
She wondered what he was thinking about, how his young mind was coping with the extent of this grief.
And then, in the midst of his pondering, a bug flew in his face. He swatted at the air with vigor, causing him to lose his balance on the branch.
Maddie’s hands flew to her mouth as she watched Evan’s body tilt and fall backward, arms flailing.
A white string shot from his arm and latched itself to the tree branch, catching Evan mere feet from the ground. He didn’t move, just hung there, gripping the self-made rope as he dangled.
He seemed shocked, too, just staring at his wrist with his jaw dropped.
He put his free hand on the tree trunk for stability, and soon found that he couldn’t let go.
He tugged on it, propping his feet up for leverage as he tried to yank his hand off the tree.
Maddie watched him struggle, her stomach curdling as she realized that this was the result of all those treatments, all those months ago.
She could hardly breathe as she watched him finally detach himself and drop to the ground in a heap, holding his hands out in front of him in horror.
And from what Maddie could see, the cut on his hand was gone.
—
After Evan went to sleep that night, Maddie barged into her parents’ bedroom.
“Whatever you did to Evan, you have to get them to undo it,” she seethed.
Her parents were half asleep, looking over at her with confusion.
“What are you talking about, Maddie?” her mom asked, her voice unkind, like the conversation already exasperated her. She lifted her eye mask as she sat up, the covers pooling around her waist.
Her father didn’t move, just turned his head to peer at her.
“He’s different now – altered,” she countered, taking a step closer. “I-I saw him climb a tree today, and he fell. But his hands stuck to the tree, and he shot this—” she stuttered, her breath uneven. Telling them about the web felt too dangerous. “He hit his head, and the bump disappeared within an hour.
“He’s different, okay?” she was crying now. “Whatever you guys did to him at that lab, you have to undo it.”
“Maddie,” her father responded, but his voice was devoid of any fight. “You don’t know what you’re talking about.”
Her face flushed with anger, her fists clenching at her sides.
“You did this to him,” she cried, before taking a grounding breath. She didn’t want to wake Evan with her anger. “You have to bring him back and get them to reverse it, okay?”
“Not another word, Maddie,” her mother hissed, “you will never speak about this again, do you hear me? Not to us, not to your friends, and definitely not with Evan.”
“Why not?” She protested, “He’s the one who has to live with this.”
“Do you want to ruin this family?” Her mother spat back, “Do you want to be the reason we fall apart? Because it’s looking that way to me.”
Maddie’s jaw dropped as she scanned the faces of her parents. Her mother was irate, and her father was completely checked out, staring at their duvet in silence.
“Not another word,” she continued, “whatever you’ve seen? Forget it. They told me that the abilities are temporary, so it’s best you keep your mouth shut before you get him carted away to some facility.”
Looking back, Maddie doesn’t know why she believed them. She let them bully her into an isolating silence for almost two decades, an invisible wall between her and her brother while she did her best to watch over him.
She never saw him use his abilities ever again, and Maddie convinced herself that her parents were telling the truth.
She didn’t know whether to call it hope or cowardice.
Maddie forced herself to forget about it, as she did with most things from her childhood, pushing it down and praying that Evan’s story had a happy ending.
But the countdown expired, and one day the alarm rang, waking her from a life lived half asleep.
—
Doug is in a shockingly good mood, which always puts her on edge, the two of them sitting side by side on their sofa while they sipped wine.
She eyes his glass warily, knowing that the faster he drank, the more danger she’d be in.
“Breaking news,” the reporter says, interrupting the show they were watching.
Doug lets out a few choice words at the inconvenience, and Maddie’s heart sinks as her husband’s mood quickly sours. She shuffles closer to him, hoping that by offering up physical intimacy, she’d be able to placate him for a little while longer.
He puts a possessive arm around her shoulder as the news story continues.
“A masked vigilante has been seen throughout the streets of Los Angeles, California.”
Maddie’s eyebrows furrow, knowing that Evan now lives in LA, as indicated by his most recent postcard.
She’s glad he sends them. It helps her feel less lonely after a long night at the mercy of her cruel husband, whom she can’t seem to escape.
Maddie misses her brother with every fiber of her being, and she knows that one day soon she’s going to muster up the courage to escape her life in Boston to find him.
Her heart breaks every day that they’re apart, and Doug’s unbridled rage is too grave for her to survive much longer.
“Everyone, please hold onto your hats, because it seems as though this unnamed savior flies through the streets using some sort of rope-like material that generates from his wrists.” They show a video of a man swinging between buildings. “We thought it was a dramatic feat of technological innovation, until we saw this.”
The man attaches himself to the wall only using the palms of his hands.
Maddie’s frozen against her husband, her heart stuttering painfully in her chest.
“People have been giving him a nickname,” the reporter continues. “They’re calling him Spider-Man.”