TODAY HAD TO BE BETTER.

My 'first day of high school' was a bust; apart from our small interaction, the Parker boy and I did not end up interacting at all, and I was left to plaster on a smile and pretend like I was excited to be the new addition to Midtown High. All throughout the day, students and teachers that had no business with me otherwise would stop and ask how I was taking the new system, or if I wanted to care about what little information they had to offer - no doubt, things that were already provided to me from Madame or Inga - and force me to make more interactions with people of little-to-no-value to me. Peter, try as I had, had not crossed my path at all.

Inga was not too happy about that.

The problem was, I had no idea how to approach him, for he had not turned out to be quite the threat as I had imagined up. He was a quiet kid, mostly keeping to himself or with his annoying friend that seemed to be more of a shadow than a companion. He also did not talk much, leaving little chance to bounce off and create some more interactions. His time in class was spent furiously scribbling down notes or doodling in his mysterious notebook, and outside of that, he had been in the library, first alone and then chatting with Ned Leeds. I had wanted to talk to him at first, but I feared a straight-up conversation would startle him and would cast me as someone I didn't need to be in his eyes.

No, when we were to talk, it had to be natural. I had to be delicate, offering up a gentle smile and a hand outstretched with whatever he liked, in order to lure him in. One wrong move and he would scare like a baby deer, darting away into the bush with no desire to emerge again. Unlike how Madame had described him and his tendencies to me, it seemed as though he would be a delicate subject to deal with. 

It certainly did not help that his friend never left his side and followed him everywhere, babbling on about some sort of nonsense or other at a constant rate. Any attempt I could make would have to be with Parker and him alone, not his clingy shadow that did not budge. 

My eyes, seemingly cast downwards to anyone who glanced my way, were trained on the two of them at that very moment. They were in the sunny courtyard, discussing something that I knew nothing of - or could not pick up over the chatters of others around. Peter, for once in the times I had seen him over the past day or two, was extremely engaged in the topic and his hands moved around, gesturing wildly as he made his point. Unlike every other time I had observed him, he was filled with passion and an animosity I did not know existed in him. Contradicting every note I had made yesterday. 

However, that was good. It meant that there was a point I could begin on, forcing a conversation and a mutuality between us that might not have worked before, a-

"Hi!"

Shit.

I had been so wrapped up in my thoughts, I had not focused on who could be behind me, or acknowledged the footsteps that could have been easily noticed - something I would have picked up on at the Academy. My eyes and ears were trained on him and him alone, not to the girl that would approach and tap on my shoulder, forcing my acknowledgement and my begrudged attention.

The girl was short, shorter than I was, but made up for that loss of height with her gigantic smile and widened eyes that made her look a bit younger than an assumed fifteen, sixteen. In her hands was a large clipboard of information with random swirls and doodles drawn across it, with a pink ball pen clutched at the top of it by carefully manicured hands. Her smile was what caught me off-guard, however, the most. It was strange, almost worrisome as to how many people at Midtown High wore the same large, brainwashed smile that made someone think there was nothing floating around inside their heads; eerie, bizarre, confusing as all else I had seen so far.

Never before had I seen so many smiles in one place, or really anywhere.

"Hi!" She exclaimed again, filling the empty silence with more sounds of a high-pitched squeal and an outstretch of her hand. "I'm Gwen Stacey, and you're..."

It took several seconds for me to realise that she was casually hinting towards who I was, and I hurriedly cleared my throat to answer. "Um, Emily. I just arrived here."

"I know," she admitted. "I was told to come to find you; we thought you might need some help getting around school and all? I know this is sort of intimidating at first, but having someone help always makes things easier. Better late than never, too!"

I moved my head just the tiniest bit to the right, disappointed when Peter was nowhere to be seen. He must have left when I was preoccupied; dammit. "It is okay, I do not-"

"It won't be long; I have to get to class myself. But I've got a friend who, along with me, are able to get you situated in this area if you would like?"

Her friend, a sour-looking teen with red-streaked hair that flew all over the place in the wind and not paying attention to whatever her friend was telling her; she was clearly too absorbed in her pile of papers to care much about her friend's endeavours. I hid a frown, realising that this Gwen girl was probably the sort of person who dragged others along to everything - in this case, the dark girl waiting impatiently to keep moving.

Still, it would make me look bad if I didn't say yes, and I didn't need to create any enemies so soon into this. Plus, she may be able to supply me with new information and details that would serve to fill out the character of both Peter Parker and the lesser-important Ned Leeds, two people that were my focus that day. Both for very different reasons, of course, but that did not mean I was opposed to news on either.

It was for that, I shouldered my backpack and nodded, rather regretfully.

"Sure."

"Great!" She exclaimed, shooting out a bony wrist and linking with my arm, causing me to promptly freak and immediately refuse her grip. However, she hardly reacted and only grinned, gesturing me to follow her lead. "Hey, meet Emily - she's new here! This is Mary Jane, Emily!"

Up close, one could see the girl's flashing, surprisingly bright eyes and the red streaks that hid behind black locks of thick hair, an interesting combination. "Hey. Cool of you to visit Midtown High."

It was not so hard to read her, taking in her tone and way of dress and assuming a character about her. Mary Jane was attempting to look more in control than she truly was, obvious by the way she stood and popped her bubblegum and lifting her right brow. She clutched a book in one hand, thinner than those I had seen before, with a cover of a girl frozen in song.

I offered no words in reply to her comment, and Gwen was left to fill the silence once more.

"Come on; you're going to miss everything, and we now only have a few moments to show you around! What do you want to see most?"

My only answer was a shrug and what I hoped to look like a helpless smile, baring my teeth while gritting down.

Luckily, Mary Jane took over and led the way out of the sunny courtyard and down a long, older-looking hallway with bunches of crowds and lots of colours around us. "Let's go down here, and I'll show you down where the auditorium and drama room and all that is. I don't know if you're a drama kid, but it might be useful later on, right?"

Gwen rolled her eyes with a look back at me, evidently meant as a teasing slight towards her friend. "You're just doing that because you live down here, Janey. Let's show her things that would actually help her, okay?"

"Okay, but-"

"It is alright," I cut in, shaking my head insistently, already growing annoyed at the bickering pair. It was not the way I expected to spend the free period between classes, and certainly not how I planned to, either; not with them arguing about the littlest, unimportant details. "This is fine."

The Stacy girl did not seem convinced but shrugged and allowed Mary Jane and me to continue down the hallway, no more protests coming out of her. "Fine, but next can we go to the main floor? That's probably good to know too, right?"

"Whatever you say, Gwen. Whatever the hell you say." Her friend sent a private wink back at me, one I did not react to, and gestured forward. "Let's just see how this goes first."

||

The 'tour' ended up being very extensive, and though it was not meant to, it helped me plan out routes and rooms that could help me do my work in peace, avoiding those who could search to bother me. Gwen and Mary Jane proved to be very friendly as well, meaning I could nod and play along perfectly as they babbled and quibbled over the strangest things that I did not exactly understand but still played along to. However, in the end, I was more than grateful to take a break and head off to English class - though, mostly because it was a chance to interact with the Parker boy and to spare myself from an upcoming headache.

"So, if you need anything, don't hesitate to give us a call, okay?" Gwen gushed, pressing a piece of paper, now containing both of their contact information into my hand. "We're here to help if need be."

Mary Jane nodded, though she was definitely less enthusiastic about it than her friend. "S'long as I'm not busy, I can be there."

"Thank you," was my forced mumble, though they were already jogging down the hall and I had lost interest. The paper was stuffed into one of my pant pockets, and my attention was turned back to the original route planned before the interruption. I had no intentions of calling - they were not my concern  - but it was good to have in emergencies, I supposed. What sort of emergencies, I wasn't sure of, but any information was welcome right then.

No matter; Gwen and Mary-Jane were not of any importance to my work ahead in English class.

The classroom was practically empty, with only a few early birds scattered through the desks on electronic devices, including the Parker boy himself. Manoeuvring through the desks, I slid into the empty seat beside him - intentionally, of course - and smiled at the quiet boy. "Hello."

At my words, he started and quickly pulled an earbud out, looking as if he wasn't used to someone speaking to him. "Uh, um, right - right, sorry. Hello?"

"I am Emily," I replied, observing how he trembled ever so slightly. He was guarded, unsure of my presence, meaning my tone had been a bit too forceful at the start. "I transferred in yesterday. You are Peter Parker, are you not?"

He nodded, quite forcefully, a confused look fleeting over his face, and I realised my mistake. I had not been introduced to the boy properly, and yet I knew his entire name. "Yeah, yeah I'm...I'm Peter."

"I was told that - by the teacher, in science. We have science together, and he told me who the students were." That was not entirely believable, sort of an awkward retelling but it was too late to take back. "He said that you were very smart, and I wanted to say something to you. We have many classes together."

I watched him for his response, curious as to how he responded to compliments. Not to my surprise, he flushed red, the tips of his ears brightest down to the dullest in his lower neck. He reacted quickly, and seemingly to any sort of praise or individual attention placed in his direction. Not to any surprise, he was a nervous boy, one with many secrets tucked loosely up his sleeve. Without practice and knowledge of much of the world around, it would be hard to be comfortable around strangers, or even vague mutuals.

When he fumbled for something to say, I cut him off, "I look forward to talking more with you, Parker."

"Peter."

"Peter, course," I replied, turning to the front of the room just as the teacher walked in, shooting a quick smile before seemingly losing interest in the boy. However, as he corrected his posture and lifted himself up to pay attention to what the teacher had to say, I was leaning back and holding my phone in the right hand, waiting for a chance to peek at the notes he had taken on that precious notebook. My hand was poised just as practised, waiting for a chance to just blink and snap any evidence - as well as to take in more of the boy's reactions, behaviours, absolutely anything at all that could work to prove against him. 

While he was distracted by the teacher's useless mumbles, my eyes were scanning his page in search of anything that could prove useful - ranging from a scrawled note to a sloppily hidden drawing of a person in a red and blue costume, to information from classes prior to that one. In my lap, safely tucked down so no one else could see, my phone beeped out numbers counting up from seconds, saving absolutely anything said or done that could be seen or heard from under the desk. Not that I imagined much would be said by Peter, but Inga had requested it and it was best to do whatever was asked.

The teacher began her lesson, and I sat up and looked forward with my legs straight as a bone, just as I had been taught - the only one to do so in the class. However, my mind was not on them, or how they sat and doodled on scrap paper or drooled on their desk, my thoughts were all dedicated to the flushed boy beside me. To me, nothing else mattered in this school aside from him.

My eyes grazed down to the side, watching him stare down at the blank page in front of him. He had stopped his focus on the lesson, instead staring down at the small screen of his cell phone on his lap, droned out of the world. I found it curious how he was watching a small figure jump from object to object, dressed in a uniform I couldn't make out, spinning strange things with his-

"Peter?"

Immediately, his head shot up, and I, in turn, darted away and back on my own page. "Y-yes?"

The teacher sighed and clicked her tongue. "Would you mind joining the rest of the class and focus on what we're learning?"

"Yes, um, sorry."

"Right." She lost interest and turned to the board, scribbling on it random words that meant absolutely nothing to me. "Now, who can tell me the answer to..."

It was him, on the small screen; my brain had finally connected those two thoughts. That was what the Parker boy could do - or, rather, Spiderman could do. That was, essentially, who I was up against.

Interesting.