"This is stupid." Eren, wearing a low-quality version of his old red and black Spider-Man costume, stood next to Harry, Lily, and Cindy in front of a massive mansion. Cindy was wearing a Captain Marvel costume next to him, and on the other side of him, Harry wore an insanely high-quality Iron Man costume. Next to Harry, Lily wore a Black Cat costume, one that was really high quality. Apparently, she was a big fan.
It was Halloween night, and the four of them were invited to attend a superhero-themed costume party at Flash Thompson's house. For obvious reasons, Eren had no interest in attending such a thing.
Firstly, he hated Flash Thompson, despite telling Gwen that he would try to forgive him for his past. However, she was the only reason why he decided to go. He wanted to give it a try and thought this could be the first step.
Secondly, he hated parties or places with a lot of people in general. When he was doing superhero stuff, he didn't mind, but as Eren Parker, he loathed it.
"It'll be fuuuun." Harry told him nonchalantly, standing with his hands on his hips as Tony Stark would. Harry looked at Eren with a smile on his face before making fun of him for his choice of costume. "Did you seriously just come as yourself?"
"I thought it would be ironic." Eren told him.
"Isn't that kinda boring?" Cindy chimed in, opting to wear something completely different than her real costume.
"Yeah, it's totally lame." Lily added. At this point in time, Lily knew about the three of them and their antics. Like Harry, she wasn't very surprised after what happened with Cindy and Harry telling her his theories.
"What? No, it's hilarious. You guys don't get it? I'm really him but no one knows that. It's hilarious." Eren tried pleading his case, but his friends still thought it was super lame.
The three of them eventually found themselves at the mansion's front door, ringing the doorbell before it was opened by a blonde girl wearing a Silk costume. Eren immediately recognized her, it was Gwen Stacy.
Cindy was taken aback, never having thought that anyone would want to dress up as her of all people. She was actually really popular amongst girls under the age of twenty-five, she even had stans on Twitter who made fancams of her.
"Hello, Black Cat. Mr. Stark. Spider-Man. Captain Marvel. Come on in!" She said, backing up and allowing all four of them to enter. Harry, Lily, and Cindy entered first and Eren followed behind them, greeting Gwen on his way in.
"Didn't know you were a Silk fan, Gwen." Spider-Man teased her. She immediately recognized his voice since the two of them would talk daily on their walks home from their internship.
"Eren!?" She was astonished seeing him looking so much like Spider-Man. The costume was low quality, but his build was almost exactly the same as the hero's. "You look just like him! I didn't know you had such a built body."
Since Eren always wore layers, his shredded, acrobat's body was rarely ever seen by anyone outside of Cindy when they were intimate or Harry when Eren was in his PJs around him.
Cindy immediately found herself feeling jealous at the moment. 'Who the hell is this girl?' she thought to herself, wondering why she was so comfortable talking about her man's body like that.
Cindy swooped in, grabbing Eren's hand before introducing herself. "Hi, I'm Cindy, Eren's girlfriend."
"OH! Hi! Eren talks about you all the time!" Gwen shook Cindy's free hand with a big smile hidden beneath her mask. "I'm Gwen Stacy. We went to the same high school, but you probably don't remember me."
"Can't say that I do." Cindy told her.
Eren, sensing the odd tension, rejoined the conversations. "Yup, we are coworkers. She's also an intern at Oscorp. She's Flash's girlfriend."
'Ew? Flash Thompson?' Cindy thought, though she kept this thought to herself.
"I see, that's nice. How's that?" Cindy asked her. "Dating Flash, I mean."
"It's cool. It's been rough sometimes but he's really working on himself. I know you probably remember him from high school, but I promise you, he's not the same kid you knew back then."
Cindy and Harry didn't believe a word this girl was saying. Eren believed her only a little since the two of them had grown rather close during their walks, but he wasn't completely sold.
"That's good for him. I hope he sticks to it." Cindy told her.
As if he heard his name being spoken, Flash Thompson jumped, literally, into the conversation. He was wearing the Phantom Spider's all-black costume, striking a three-pointed pose on the ground.
"Shazam!" he said, doing the hand motion that Spider-Man does to shoot his webs before getting back up on his feet.
'Shazam?' Both spiders, Lily and Harry thought to themselves, having no clue where he got the idea that Spider-Man said anything close to that.
"Sup, babe." Flash hugged Gwen, revealing to the four of them exactly who was beneath the costume before greeting the three of them. "Cindy Moon? It's been a while! I'm guessing the other three must be..."
"Parker."
"Osborn."
"And Lily?"
All three of them nodded.
"Damn Parker you're huge!" Flash told him before realizing his identity was still hidden. Everyone knew it was him, but he wanted to make sure. He lifted his mask, revealing his freckled face and blonde hair.
"Tadah! It's me!" He said, extending his arms outward.
"We know. It was obvious." Eren told him plainly.
Flash laughed, feeling awkward as he could sense the negative energy in the air. None of the four guests liked him, in fact, they all hated him. Lily and Harry were just there for the party while Eren and Cindy were dragged along.
"Anyway, I didn't know you were a Spider-Man fan, Parker. That's cool." He told him, actually trying his best to be nice to the boy.
"Yeah." Eren answered, leaving it at that.
"Well... I'm gonna go check up on the other guests, see you guys later." Flash put his mask back on and swiftly made his exit.
There was this tension in the air, it was clear as day. Before leaving, Gwen had some last words for Eren. "He really is trying, Eren." Gwen walked away, following behind her boyfriend as Lily, Harry, Cindy, and Eren looked on.
Harry clapped his hands together before shouting at his friends. "Let's get drunk!" He grabbed Lily by the arms and the two of them made off toward wherever the drinks were. Eren and Cindy weren't really the drinking type, so they stayed back. Being able to tell Eren was down, Cindy tried to comfort him.
"Wanna talk about how you're feeling?" She asked him.
He didn't really want to, but he knew she'd insist if he said no. "Gwen really wants me to forgive Flash. She's adamant about it. She keeps telling me that he's sorry, but that means nothing coming from a mouth that isn't his."
"Maybe he's scared." Cindy told him. "Look, I hate Flash too, but if he really did change, maybe give him a chance. I was there when he bullied you for all those years, so I get why you wouldn't. I probably wouldn't either..."
"I don't think most people would." Eren told her.
"But would Spider-Man?" Cindy saying this actually got Eren thinking. Spider-Man would one hundred percent forgive Flash for the things he'd done in the past. However, Eren and Spider-Man still felt like two halves rather than one in Eren's mind.
"Maybe." he told her. "Maybe he would."
And so, the two of them walked further into the mansion, having a decent time since they had each other's company. It wasn't long before Harry and Lily were completely wasted, which made Eren scared that Harry would do something really stupid.
The most Harry ended up doing was telling people that Eren could do backflips, forcing Eren to perform some as a party trick. Outside of that, Harry stayed with the other drunk college students with Lily while Cindy and Eren stayed with the sober people.
However, as Eren and Cindy sat on one of the couches, making small talk with the sober students, a drunken Flash appeared behind Eren. "Parker!" he shouted, startling Cindy due to how loud it was.
"Parker, we need to talk... buddy." Flash was slurring his words, but he wasn't too drunk. "I want to talk about being sorry... okay? But not in front of everyone."
Eren had almost no interest in having a conversation with a drunk Flash Thompson, however, upon seeing Gwen nodding at him from across the room, he folded. "Alright, fine." he told him, getting up as he looked at Cindy. She smiled and nodded, thinking this would be best for him, as he followed Flash into a different room of the house.
Flash closed the door behind them, leaning against the door as he tried speaking to Eren about their past. "Hey, man... I just really wanted to say that I'm really sorry." Flash was still slurring his words, but it seemed genuine enough.
"Sorry about what?" Eren asked him.
"You know... being a piece of shit. You were so right about me. I was jealous of you and I wanted to put you down to make myself feel better. I was a privileged asshole who hated himself. I mean look at me, I come from a wealthy family, and yet I still wasn't satisfied... It was pathetic. I'm sorry for all the times I hit you and said those fucked up things."
"What made you realize that?" Eren asked him, still not really convinced.
"You did. And Spider-Man. And Gwen. When you stood up to me and your graduation speech mainly. Seeing my hero, Spider-Man, look at me like a monster also changed me. Gwen was also a big part of it... when we first started dating, she started listing things about the types of guys she hates and her list was just her describing me..."
"I just wanted to tell you that I truly am sorry."
Eren stood standoffishly with his arms crossed. He thought about what Cindy told him, about what Spider-Man would do. Looking at Flash wearing the all-black Phantom Spider costume really drove that point home for Eren.
'I begged Maya Fisk to forgive the Phantom Spider for far more...' he thought, looking at the drunken mirror image of himself.
"Alright, Flash. Thank you for changing and admitting that to me." Eren didn't want to lie, he wasn't fully sold on this, so he couldn't say that all was forgiven but he did accept it. "I accept your apology."
Flash approached Eren, hugging him tightly as if the two of them were best friends. By Flash's embrace alone, Eren could tell that this was something that Flash wanted off of his chest for a long time.
Eren, wearing his Spider-Man costume, hugged back Flash, allowing the two versions of Spider-Man to embrace each other. "Thank you, Parker. Thank you for excepting my apology. I swear I'll change."
"Yeah." Eren didn't know what else to say at that point as Flash continued to drunkenly hug him.
It was surprising to him, but it seemed that Flash really did change who he was, or he was at least trying to change. It only took a little bit of alcohol and good timing for him to finally admit his own faults to the boy.