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Peter needed a nap.
He had slept maybe four hours during the past week, due to a bizarre spike in crime. Every time he webbed a mugger, there was a fight breaking out a couple blocks away, and once that was done there was robbery and once that done there was something else! It was an endless cycle.
“Don’t you baddies have a bedtime?” Peter quipped to one such nighthawk in the early hours of dawn one night. “Surely you have a Papa Criminal who wants you back before sunrise so he can tuck you into your beds and read you a story about The Big Bad Wolf That Could and inspire you do be the scariest criminal around?”
“What are you on man?” One guy had asked, trying to wriggle his hand out from where it was taped to the wall.
Peter sighed and shot a web at his other hand. “My 72nd hour without proper sleep man. It’s rough.”
It didn’t get better. He slipped in his apartment window, shucked his spidey suit, and crashed onto his bed with a mere thirty minutes before Aunt May came and woke him for breakfast.
“You look tired Peter,” she remarked over the kitchen table, reading the morning paper lazily. “Sleep well?”
“Mmf.” Peter replied through a mouthful of cereal, staring blankly at the wall just to the left of the TV playing some morning talk show.
Aunt May didn’t even glance at him, “You’ve got that presentation first period, right?”
“Mmf.”
“Are you prepared for it? I don’t want poor Ned to have to give that presentation himself because you’re too tired for it.”
“Mmmf.”
“You don’t need to be be whine, I was just asking.”
They fell into an easy silence as Peter finished his first bowl and started munching his way through another. He almost felt personable by the time it was time for him to go. Peter grabbed his backpack and stuffed his homework into the biggest pocket.
“Oh, Peter, you have your internship today right?”
“Yes,” he confirmed. “I won’t forget.”
Aunt May hummed, standing up to kiss Peter’s forehead in the motherly way she often did. “And will you forget the ground beef I want you to pick up on your way home again?”
“Mmf,” Peter rushed forward and kissed her on the cheek before ducking away to grab his shoes. “I should really be going to Ned’s now. Just text me the things you want me to get, and I’ll tell FRIDAY to remind me about it once I get to the lab!”
“I just want ground beef, Peter!” Aunt May laughed after him as he waved her off.
•••
Ned was, unbelievably, out with chickenpox. Apparently despite his mom being a nurse, he was never vaccinated and never got it as a kid. He did, however, catch them on Monday while being knocked into the trashcans by Flash Thompson who apparently didn’t wash his hands ever because he’s was contagious from taking care of his little sister who caught the pox from a classmate.
“I’m sorry Peter,” Mrs. Leeds said to his heartbroken face after she opened their front door. “Ned was very upset to leave you alone, but he’s covered in spots.”
And so, as Peter explained passionately to his first period teacher, it really wasn’t fair to present the paper without Ned—who had worked hard on the project too and would be in by Friday! Especially when it was Flash’s fault that Ned was sick and he was due to present next!
But his teacher didn’t care. She wanted to see Peter squirm and ever since the beginning on freshman year when he had tripped and spilt grape juice all over her new dress. She never forgave Peter and paid the lunch ladies not to serve him any dark drinks.
So Peter gave the 15 minute presentation by himself, yawning every couple minutes, squinting at the too bright projector to read Ned’s parts, and stumbling over his words when Sally Avril clicked too far ahead on his slides.
“Disappointing, Parker,” was all his teacher had to say on the subject, averting her eyes when Flash tripped Peter for trying to throw him under the bus.
His day didn’t get better from there. His second and third period teachers didn’t let him sleep through class and by the time he sat down at lunch, he bashed his nose on the table in his haste to fall asleep.
His nose still ached when Michelle sat next to him.
“Hey nerd,” she said, patting his shoulder when he groaned.
“Let me nap please.”
“You gotta eat though,” she said and Peter raised his head off his arms to glare at her. She smiled widely like she didn’t notice. “Anyway I have a proposition for you.”
Peter put his face back down to signal his lack of interest, but this surprisingly didn’t stop Michelle. And because his spidey sense never seemed to recognize the real threat Michelle posed to his sanity, it didn’t inform him to move out of the way when she smushed a piece of banana against his cheek. He squawked but turned his attention to her.
“Listen to me! This benefits you too,” she said, “When I was clearing up after art club this morning, I looked through Mr. Pardo’s agenda and saw he’s planning on giving pop quizzes for the rest of the week and all next week on themed vocabulary and verb tense.”
Peter slumped over even more. “Nooooooooooooo.”
“Yes,” Michelle said, “and we have like two major tests in chem and bio coming, so I suggest a trade.”
“That’s… like mutually assured tutor destruction. We’d take each other out long before our tests do.”
“No, you’d pass Spanish and I’d raise my GPA.”
Peter sighed. “If I say yes, will you let me sleep?”
“No,” Michelle bit into her sandwich. “You’ve got 30 minutes to memorize all the sport vocab she taught while you napped last week. And that’s not counting the time it takes to rub that banana off your face. Seriously Parker, that’s just gross. ”
•••
After lunch was no better. He probably passed the Spanish quiz, but at the expense of his mind. He was so tired and he was standing on his feet in labs all day. Not that he couldn’t sleep standing up, but since Ned was gone, Liz Allen was his partner. And Liz Allen was pretty and hated cutting things open and hated walking to the chemical station to pick up supplies and would totally be wooed over by his practical lab safety skills.
After school, he had to go to Stark Tower.
For all he thought his internship would involved working side by side with Tony Stark, he actually wasn’t. He worked on the 10th floor of Stark Tower and functioned mainly as the person to do all the recursive and boring lab work. He was mostly ignored unless he was being criticized or the sentient ceiling machine decided to talk to him.
Sometimes, this gave him ample opportunity to do his homework. Like today, where he was waiting on lab results that had nearly a two hour wait before the results came in. Unless the sentient ceiling machine decided to talk to him.
“Mr. Parker,” FRIDAY said. “Sleeping on the job is not advised.”
Peter rubbed at his eyes. “I was studying Spanish.”
“With your face flat against the page?”
“…I was study Spanish very closely.”
“Of course, Mr. Parker. Boss wants to see you.”
“He’s in New York?”
“Yes. He returned from Washington approximately two minutes and 28 seconds ago.”
“And he already wants to see me?” Peter usually saw Tony for two reasons: 1. Tony had invented some cool toy and wanted someone trustworthy yet science-literate to share it with or 2. Tony had entered into one of his mother hen phases and wanted to nag Peter about his “reckless disregard for his own safety and life.”
“Yes, as I said. The elevator is waiting for you.”
•••
“You called for me, Mr. Stark?” Peter said, stepping carefully onto the floor. He had only ever been on Tony’s lab floor before and he wasn’t sure what to say about the large open and well-decorated area that greeted him. He was pretty the front (elevator?) foyer was larger than his whole bedroom.
Peter found Tony sprawled out on his couch, half asleep and oh forget speechlessness, Peter had endless emotions about how comfy and large that couch looked. He would write a love soliloquy to whoever let him nap on that couch, writing line after line about its plump cushions and high thread count (did that even matter in couches?) .
“Hey kid,” Tony sounded as condescending as ever, but the bags under his eyes and slump to his shoulders told a different story.
“How did the meeting at the White House go?” Peter asked, “The news was reporting every day with speculation about the Iron President team-up against supervillainry, especially after that selfie.”
“It wasn’t a team-up. That implies we agreed on anything we discussed,” Tony’s nose wrinkled in disgust. “And between you and I, I took that selfie just to get him away for discussing petitioning for more restrictions in the Accords for the sixteenth time.
“Sounds exhausting then,” Peter said, pausing to allow Tony to start nodding before continuing, “Looks like it was exhausting too, sir.”
Tony froze mid-nod and jerked his head to glare at Peter. “What are you trying to imply, kid? Kinda hypocritical when you’re the one who looks like shit. That’s actually why I called you here.”
“You called me here to tell me I look like shit? No offence sir, but you could have just had FRIDAY sent the message along.”
“No, I called you to talk about the fact you were sleeping on the job.” Now it was Peter’s turn to freeze. “I’m not paying you to sleep, kiddo.”
Peter shrugged, and scratched at the side of his head. He really had no excuse for that. “I mean, you’re not technically paying me at all.”
Tony raised an eyebrow. “I gave you a scholarship. And a new phone. And a new suit. And an internship that will give you your pick of any Ivy League you want.”
“I know, Mr. Stark, and I’m really grateful for the opportunities. I’m just so tired today. I’ve barely sleep the past few days.” Peter really hoped he hadn’t screwed this thing with Tony up. It was like his life’s dream to work at Stark Industries and be mentored by the lord himself.
“I can see that,” Tony sighed and rubbed his hand across his face. “Look, Parker. We’ve been over the rules, haven’t we?”
Peter bristled a little at the thought of them. The ones Tony assigned to protect him against his “disregard for his own well-being” and “martyr syndrome.” They had gotten into disagreements about these rules before finally settling that Peter had to phone Tony the second he spotted any “unusual crime” and wait for orders before acting further. “Avengers Lite” Tony called it where “You Think I’m a Defenceless Child” fitted better for Peter.
Peter gritted his teeth, “Yes, and I’ve been following them.”
“Then why are you so tired? What part of ‘leave the big stuff to the professionals’ don’t you get?”
“All of it! I haven’t been doing anything big, just all the small stuff has been piling up.”
Tony huffed and rolled his eyes. “Then ignore it and go to sleep.”
“It’s not that simple,” Peter argued, “Me ignoring one small thing could lead to a person being mugged or dying on the street after having a heart attack or a little kid losing their home to a fire. I know that huge systemic evil is more important than all the small crimes, but what I do helps people too, just on a smaller scale.”
“A very small scale,” Tony said. “The tiniest. You call me the second it gets bigger.”
“I know.” Peter tried to remain annoyed but couldn’t help it when he yawned which made Tony’s stance soften.
“You should sleep, kid.”
Peter yawned again. “I can’t. I work until six and then I have to go get beef for Aunt May, and probably drop off Ned’s homework at his house, and study for Spanish and find practice questions for Michelle to do, and then go on patrol. And I should probably take some action photos for triple J before he fires me.”
Tony yawned. “Jesus kid, stop it. You work too hard. I'm tired just listening to it.”
“You employ me.”
“Yeah, and I’m telling you to sleep.” Tony pointed over at the other end of the couch. “Listen I’m wiped and you need sleep and this couch was meant to fit ten people, so why don’t you lay down on the other side of that couch and we can both nap like men until the end of your shift.”
Peter could have cried at the thought. “Really, Mr. Stark?”
“Yes. FRIDAY don’t let anything interrupt us until someone’s dying.”
“Alright Boss.”
Peter fell onto the couch and every love poem he’d thought of while talking to Tony was proven right because it was the comfiest thing he’d ever felt. When he closed his eyes seconds later, he was grateful to know that at least this time no one was gonna wake him up.