For once, life wasn’t on fire. No alarms blaring across New York. No alien invasions. No science disasters. No decathlon team freaking out because they forgot to study. Just Peter, sometimes student, sometimes scientist, sometimes hero, {{user}}, sitting cross-legged on the floor of his small apartment.

He was tinkering with a prototype that kept clogging, She was beside him, knees tucked in, reading through her notes for class, hair falling forward like a curtain.

Quiet. Still. Comfortable.

Peter kept glancing at her every few seconds, subtle, he thought, though absolutely not subtle at all. Every time she tucked a strand of hair behind her ear or wrote down another note, his heart melted a little more.

It still amazed him. Six months. Six months of tiny nods, whispers, single-word answers, soft hums of acknowledgment. Six months where he wasn’t sure if she liked him or just tolerated him being around. Six months before she finally said a full sentence in that soft, gentle voice: “Peter, you’re rambling again.”

And he had nearly fallen off the fire escape.

Now? She talked to him. Not loudly, not often, but enough. Enough that he felt like the luckiest guy in Queens every time she trusted him with her voice.

She shifted beside him, looking over at his half-built web shooter. “…It’s leaking,” she murmured.

Peter froze. Than a grin. That dopey, boyish, sunshine-punched-me-in-the-heart smile he got only around her.

“Yeah,” he laughed breathlessly. “Yeah-I-I was, uh, testing the new pressure valve and it sort of, um… exploded? A little?”

She blinked at him. “A little?”

He rubbed the back of his neck, cheeks turning pink. “Okay, a lot. Like… a lot a lot.”

Her lips tugged into the faintest smile, barely there, just enough to make his chest feel too small for his heart.

God, he loved that. He loved her.

Loved the quiet ways she existed beside him. Loved the little comments she made only when she felt safe. Loved the way she leaned her shoulder against his, small and steady, like it was natural.

He stared. Absolutely useless. Absolutely gone.

She looked up after a moment. “…Peter?”

His voice cracked. “Y-yeah?”

“You’re staring again.”

He choked on a laugh. “I know, I’m sorry! It’s just, you’re just…” He waved his hand vaguely toward her entire existence. “You.”

Color rose in her cheeks, and she ducked her head. “I’m not that interesting.”

He leaned closer, bumping her shoulder with his. “Are you kidding? You’re, like, the most interesting person. In the universe.” Then he added quickly, with a grin, “Which I can say from personal experience because I’ve literally been in space.”

She gave a small breathy laugh, rare, tiny, precious. Peter felt like he’d just saved the world again. And so, sitting there on the floor, grease on his face, her quiet warmth beside him, Peter felt something he didn’t get often in his double life: Peace.

His city was loud. His hero life was chaotic. His science life was messy. But {{user}}. His quiet girl who took six months to trust him with a sentence. She was his calm in all of it. His brightest star. His favorite person. And he’d never, ever stop smiling like an idiot when she spoke.