Spider-Man - Chapter 3: The Dangerous Spidey (Patreon)

“Tonight we're having grilled smoked fish and pasta, with that cream sauce you like.”

After getting out of the taxi, the two took the subway away from downtown and walked slowly through the ordinary, somewhat run-down neighborhood where they lived. Peter didn't speak again until they were nearly home.

“Mm.”

Mary Jane hadn't actually wanted to agree. She was unhappy with the way Peter had treated her today. Or rather, she hadn't been happy with him since that incident.

If she'd obeyed her instincts, she would have defiantly refused even to answer him. But when the words reached her lips, she found herself agreeing anyway.

“It's only because he's such a good cook,” Mary Jane reassured herself, though the corners of her mouth had already started to rise.

The moment she opened her own front door, before she'd even stepped inside, a pungent smell of cheap alcohol hit her.

It came from the homemade liquor her father brewed. The stench was so sharp and foul that it might as well have been sulfur from hell.

Mary Jane ignored the man sprawled drunk and barely conscious on the couch.

Philip Watson.

“MARY JANE!” Hearing her footsteps, Philip Watson shouted despite being almost too drunk to think straight. She paid him no attention and went upstairs alone, leaving his curses behind her.

Once inside her peaceful, carefully tidied bedroom, she locked the door, put her things away, and fell onto the bed. The soft covers seemed to swallow her whole.

She stared up at the ceiling and buried her face in her hands. “Look at you, Mary Jane. You failed again. Peter's still exactly the same.”

After thinking for a moment, she went to the window with a little hope in her heart. Across the gap, the opposite window was tightly shut, its curtains drawn, like the entrance to some mysterious Garden of Eden.

Then luck seemed to smile on her. Peter, on the other side, happened to pull his curtains open.

“Hey, Peter!” Mary Jane called immediately.

Peter just sighed and started to close them again.

“Wait! Hold it right there!” Mary Jane cried, stepping onto her windowsill.

“Mary Jane, how many times do I have to tell you? That's dangerous.”

“Well, if you won't open your window, I'm afraid I'm going to be in even more danger.” The way she said it made it sound as though she was perfectly prepared to jump across.

“Oh, for God's sake. Who taught you to do something so dangerous? This is a terrible idea. If you can't shoot webs, you shouldn't try things like that. I mean webs from your hands, not from down below.” Peter carried on talking as though he didn't know whom he was addressing, but he opened the window anyway.

Mary Jane leaped from her own windowsill with the ease of long practice, caught the ledge opposite with both hands, and let Peter pull her inside.

“You're the one who taught me, Peter. Why wouldn't you open the window? Look at your room. It's so stuffy it even smells strange.”

“That's rubbing alcohol. I use it to disinfect things.” Peter sighed and returned to his chair. “Precision electronic equipment needs cleaning before you put it away after use.”

“And for the record, the reason I don't open the window is to stop exactly this sort of thing from happening. Mary Jane, this room is my private territory.”

“All right, all right. In that case, I suppose I'll just have to jump back through the window.” Mary Jane looked him straight in the eye. “Is that what you want, Peter?”

“You always do this, Mary Jane. You've already turned my life upside down. Now go downstairs. Aunt May's making pasta, and I still have work to do.” Peter didn't actually try to throw her out. After all, he'd invited her to dinner. After a moment, he added, “Next time, please use the front door. All right, Mary Jane?”

“Fine, I get it. I'll go help her.” Mary Jane knew when to leave him alone. When Peter was genuinely busy, she generally didn't interfere.

But as she reached for the bedroom door, she noticed he'd replaced the lock again. The old mechanical keyhole had been replaced by a combination lock before, and now the lock was entirely fingerprint-operated.

She glanced over her shoulder at Peter, who was absorbed in his work, and cautiously tried it.

The lock immediately began to beep.

Peter turned around, his face expressionless. “Just hold down the button beside it. That opens the door.”

Of course he knew exactly what she was thinking. He'd installed this lock specifically to keep her out.

Mary Jane had grown up under Aunt May and Uncle Ben's watchful eyes. As far as they were concerned, she could come and go from their home whenever she liked, provided she let them know.

Which meant Peter needed some way to keep her out of his room.

He was tired of waking up in the morning to find Mary Jane sitting beside his bed, studying him.

He'd complained to Aunt May once, but word had somehow reached Mary Jane. The very next morning, he rolled over and found a beautiful girl curled up beside him.

He'd practically jumped out of his skin.

Closing the door and locking it hadn't helped. Mary Jane always managed to get a key from Aunt May.

So he'd replaced the ordinary lock with a mechanical combination lock. That had bought him a few peaceful weeks before she somehow worked out the code.

Surely a fingerprint lock would be more secure.

Mary Jane headed downstairs. Uncle Ben was sitting on the couch reading a newspaper. He glanced at her, apparently long since accustomed to seeing her emerge from Peter's bedroom.

“Mary Jane, you know how Peter was telling me a few days ago what a wonderful thing his fingerprint lock was? He was so excited he wanted to put one on the front door, too. But we thought the old-fashioned kind might be more reliable. What do you think?”

“Maybe he could add one instead of replacing the existing locks?” Mary Jane suggested with a smile.

“That's a good idea. I'll mention it to him.” Uncle Ben turned to look at the front door beyond the hallway. It was actually made of steel painted to resemble wood, and Peter had already fitted three or four different locks to it. “Although perhaps replacing them would be better.”

The trouble was that the walls beside the door were still wooden. What use was an impenetrable door if it was easier to get through the wall?

Sometimes Uncle Ben seriously wondered whether Peter suffered from a persecution complex. The sentence Peter repeated to Aunt May most often was that they must look through the peephole before opening the door.

After coming downstairs, Mary Jane went into the kitchen to help.

“Oh, it's lovely to see you, sweetheart.” Aunt May kissed her cheek. She'd watched Mary Jane grow up and trusted her completely.

As she worked, May asked, “How's the new school year treating you, Mary Jane?”

“Mm, it was pretty good. Peter's still keeping to himself, though...” Mary Jane stopped in the middle of her sentence.

“He's always been like that. I worry about him so much. I don't know why he's had so few friends ever since he was little,” Aunt May said. “If he didn't have you, I sometimes think he'd have nobody to talk to at all.”

“Oh... actually, maybe that's not true. I think he's made a... friend?”

Peter really was the sort of oddball who kept his distance from everyone else.

But there happened to be another oddball in his class who was just as fond of solitude.

That beautiful girl with the short golden hair. What was her name again? Gwen?

A faint sense of danger stirred inside Mary Jane.