Widespread tendon tears, bone fractures, ruptured alveoli, and necrotic capillaries—injuries like these would be enough to put an ordinary person in intensive care. But for Spider-Man, a few nights of deep sleep would take care of them. Peter Parker would not take time off over such minor injuries. Spider-Man would continue protecting the city tomorrow.
But Peter did not go out on patrol the next morning after all. It was not because he was upset about failing to catch Scarecrow; Gwen Stacy caught him red-handed.
"Morning, smart guy."
When the blonde girl appeared at his door with her backpack on, Peter instinctively scratched the back of his head. His messy black hair swayed like antennae.
"Uh, morning, Gwen. You're up this early?"
"Every morning, you've already left by the time I get up, so I wanted to find out how early I'd have to wake up to catch you."
After saying that, Gwen added, "Of course, mainly because my dad was busy until late last night and told me not to wait up for him."
"Is police work that troublesome? I heard there was some guy jumping around Manhattan yesterday."
"I don't know. He doesn't seem to want to tell me anything."
Having been caught by Gwen, Peter naturally could not put on his suit and go patrol. He could only take the subway with Gwen to Midtown Manhattan. As they bought tickets and boarded the train, they started chatting.
"How's the rock band thing going? Any leads?"
"Yeah, we found a few classmates. MJ, Liz, Betty... Oh, sorry, you don't know any of them except MJ." Gwen smiled. "I have more friends than you do, just like I told you."
Peter gave a dry laugh. He had never thought of himself as introverted, but that was how social rules worked among American students—muscleheaded idiots like football players were adored, while talented people like lab researchers could not even get invited to dances.
Nobody liked studying, so Peter Parker naturally could not find any friends.
"How are you planning to handle practice? I really don't think Uncle George will let you bring drumsticks home, let alone a drum kit."
"I figured."
At the mention of that, Gwen could not help sighing too. But after tossing out a casual, "We'll figure it out later," she stopped thinking about it and turned to Peter instead. "You take the subway this early every day. Don't tell me you just go straight to school and stare into space until class starts."
Peter started considering what excuse he could make up to justify getting up so early, but then he suddenly had an idea.
"Have you ever tried getting off one stop early or one stop late?!"
Just as expected, Gwen looked confused.
"What?"
"I mean, get off one stop early or one stop late, then walk to school. We're really early right now, so we could go to school like that every day."
"..." Gwen looked at him as though he were some alien creature. "Is this why you get up so early every morning?"
"No, actually, it's the other way around. I get up too early and have nothing to do, so this is how I kill time."
Peter sighed, then smiled helplessly. "Want to come with me?"
"I don't have anything else to do anyway, so lead the way."
—This was the decision Peter regretted most that day.
Not because there was anything wrong with the route, but because the moment they left the subway station, a familiar roar came from the giant television screen mounted outside a mall.
"Just yesterday, our beautiful city suffered terrible devastation at the hands of two lunatics. Spider-Man and some lunatic wearing a high-tech suit kept fighting each other. According to the information we have currently received from the police, this super-criminal calling himself Scarecrow was a criminal previously arrested after Spider-Man supposedly fought crime."
J. Jonah Jameson's face was bright red, as though he were about to burst out of the screen.
"Take a good look, New York City! What have these masked vigilantes who overstep their bounds brought us? More masked criminals! I can guarantee that this so-called Scarecrow is a terrifying creation of Spider-Man's own making! I can say with certainty that he became a super-criminal specifically to take revenge on people like Spider-Man, who place themselves above the law! Just think about it—if the police or the Avengers had arrested this Herman, would he still have become a criminal?"
Then Jameson simply stood up, grabbed the studio camera, shoved his face right up against it, and roared. The screen was filled with nothing but flying spit.
"No! Because he would know he deserved it! He would know he had been arrested by someone qualified to arrest him! Not some lunatic in tights who swings around everywhere and sticks his nose into everyone's business! He would not think he was merely unlucky or that he should not have been caught!"
If only you'd said something like that when we first met, little bug.
If only you'd said that to Herman Schultz instead of Scarecrow.
Peter remembered what Schultz had said to him yesterday. A headache came over him, and he rubbed his temples. He seemed to hear another meaning in those words.
If, during that first bank robbery, Spider-Man had told Herman, "Bro, your weapon is awesome," maybe Scarecrow would never have been born. Maybe a supervillain had appeared simply because he had failed to say that one sentence.
"For the first time, I think Jameson might have a point."
Gwen was shocked by Peter's words.
"Seriously? Whenever Jameson talks about Spider-Man, even my dad grits out, 'It's all bullshit.'"
"Hahaha." Peter finally could not hold back his laughter. He shook his head. "He really says that?"
"He never swears in front of his daughter, but I can tell from his expression that's what he's saying in his head. So where exactly are we going?"
Peter casually pointed at an apartment building. "There. The roof."
A few minutes later, they reached the edge of the rooftop. Gwen stood at the ledge and looked down. "The view is really nice, as long as you don't fall."
"Do you remember Andrew Derby? He went to our middle school."
"I never knew him." After saying that, Gwen tried hard to remember, digging that name out of her memories. "When we were in eighth grade, a seventh grader jumped off a building and killed himself. Was that him?"
"It was. Right here."
Gwen, who had been strolling along the rooftop edge, immediately stepped back onto the safer part of the roof. Only Peter remained sitting at the edge, looking out over the New York streetscape he came to see for a minute or two almost every day.
"So... you knew him?"
"No. It's just that I saw him two days before it happened. He looked really depressed, like he'd gone through something awful. Sometimes when I pass by here, I wonder if things would have been different if I'd gone over and talked to him for a bit."
Gwen was speechless for a long while, unsure how to respond. After trying to organize her thoughts, she finally spoke.
"But what if you had tried to persuade him and he still chose to end his life? Would you start blaming yourself for not talking to him properly? Wonder whether you hadn't said the right things? Saint Peter?"
"But..."
"Don't. Don't say that." Gwen sat down beside Peter and cut him off. "Wait. Give me a few minutes to think."
"Uh..."
"Okay, I know what to say now. You would be absolutely terrible at working for a suicide hotline, Peter. You'd go to work on the first day with all your saintly ideals, then on the second day, you'd decide to jump off a building because you failed to save everyone the day before." Gwen gave an example that sounded terribly rude but was fitting. "These things—things like this—they simply aren't your responsibility. You don't need to be responsible for other people's problems, especially people who have nothing to do with you."
"Kindness is a good thing, smart guy, but too much kindness becomes a curse. And curses have never been good things."
After Gwen finished speaking, she sat beside Peter. The two of them sat shoulder to shoulder in silence for a long time. Gwen thought Peter might feel that she did not understand him, that she could not truly empathize with him.
Maybe this kind of thing really could not be empathized with.
So she could only ask again.
"So sometimes, when you think about things like that, you come sit here. Does it make you feel any better?"
"At least I've never jumped from here."
Well, actually, once or twice. But then he had swung away again. He had sought out the feeling of freefall a few times, but he felt fear less and less often now.
"Maybe you should find a priest and make a proper confession?"
"I'm not religious. I believe in science."
"Then you can talk to me, or Uncle Ben, or Aunt May. Don't keep everything bottled up inside, smart guy."
Peter Parker's only response was a calm smile.
"I will."
Gwen was not sure whether Peter had taken her words to heart, but she knew there was someone whose words Peter would definitely listen to. After school today, she needed to have a good talk with Uncle Ben.
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