The city forgot him quietly.

No headlines. No dramatic shift in the sky. Just a thousand little absences piling up until Spider-M@n — until Lando — became a ghost in plain sight.

The spell worked. Too well.

Every trace of him was erased from the people he loved most. Phones wiped clean of messages that once meant everything. Photos that used to exist reduced to empty spaces in albums. Memories rewritten so smoothly that no one questioned the gaps.

Including you.

You went on with your life, the way people always do when they don’t know what they’ve lost. You still took the same route to work. Still ordered the same coffee. Still laughed at the same dumb things. There was just this quiet sense sometimes — like walking into a room and forgetting why you went there. Like a name on the tip of your tongue that never came.

Lando watched from a distance.

He saw you on the street once, months after the spell. You walked past him without slowing, without that instinctive glance you used to give him — the one that always said there you are. He stood frozen on the sidewalk long after you disappeared into the crowd, heart hammering against his ribs like it was trying to break free.

That was when it hit him hardest.

Saving the world had cost him you.

He learned your routines without you ever knowing. Learned the café you liked, the table by the window you always chose. Learned the way you tucked your hair behind your ear when you were thinking, the way your expression softened when you laughed at something.

You didn’t remember him.

But he remembered everything.

So when he pushed open the door of the café that afternoon — bell chiming softly overhead — his chest tightened in a way no fight ever had.

You were there.

Sitting exactly where you always sat. Coffee cooling in front of you. Sunlight spilling across the table, catching in your hair. For a split second, it felt like nothing had changed. Like he could just pick up where things left off.

But then you looked up.

Your eyes met his — curious, polite, empty of recognition.

Lando stopped.

This was the moment he’d imagined a hundred times and feared even more. The moment where reality would either shatter him or prove he could survive it.

You frowned slightly, the way you do when someone’s standing too close for too long. “Uh— sorry,” you said, gentle but firm. “Do we… know each other?”

The words hit harder than any punch ever could.

“No,” he said quickly. Too quickly. Then softer, correcting himself. “I mean— not really.”

You tilted your head, studying him. There was something about him you couldn’t place. Something familiar in the way he looked at you — not like a stranger, not like a flirt. Like someone trying very hard not to say too much.

He gestured vaguely toward the counter, nerves finally catching up to him. “I just—.”

Every instinct screamed at him to tell you everything. About the nights on rooftops. About the way you used to say his name like it was a secret. About how loving you had been the only thing that ever made him feel normal.

Instead, he folded his hands together and forced himself to breathe.

You wrapped your fingers around a mug. “You come here a lot?”

“Yeah,” he said, and meant always. “Guess you could say that.”

You smiled. “Huh. Funny. I feel like I’d remember you.”

He swallowed.

“Yeah,” he said quietly. “People usually do.”

Something passed between you then — not recognition, but curiosity. A flicker. Like your heart was tugging on a thread it didn’t know existed.

You opened your mouth to say something else.

Lando realized, that this was the moment everything could tip. That he could stand up, walk away, let the universe keep you safe and ignorant… or he could stay and risk breaking the spell in ways he didn’t even understand yet.

He leaned forward just slightly. Close enough that you caught the faintest hint of familiarity in him — not a memory, just a feeling.

“I know this is gonna sound weird,” he said, voice careful, almost restrained, “but… do you ever feel like you’ve met someone before and just— forgot?”