The city feels quieter after everything that's happened.
Not actually quieter—New York is never truly quiet—but there's a different quality to the noise now. Less catastrophic. Just the normal chaos of the city functioning the way it's supposed to.
Peter Parker moves through it easily, blending into the afternoon crowd without conscious effort.
No mask. No suit hidden under sleeves. No spider-sense humming warnings about disasters three blocks over.
Just a Tuesday afternoon, errands for Aunt May, and the kind of mundane responsibility that used to feel suffocating but now feels almost grounding.
He's carrying a bag from the pharmacy—May's prescription refill that she'd asked him to pick up since he was "in the area anyway"—and mentally calculating whether he has time to grab the science textbook he actually needs from his locker before evening patrol.
Probably not.
He's been absent from Midtown so much lately that he's pretty sure half his teachers have forgotten what he looks like. The Stark Industries internship excuse works—Mr. Harrington practically vibrates with excitement whenever Peter mentions it—but it also means he's basically a ghost at school.
Shows up for tests. Turns in assignments remotely. Exists in the gradebook but not in the classroom.
Normal for Spider-Man.
Weird for Peter Parker.
But he's gotten used to weird.
He checks his phone—3:47 PM, May won't be home until six, plenty of time to swing by the bodega for the sandwich supplies she texted him about.
A sixteen-year-old running errands. Completely normal. Utterly mundane.
He likes it.
The pharmacy door swings open just as Peter reaches for it.
He pulls back instinctively—enhanced reflexes making the dodge automatic—but the person exiting is already apologizing, already stepping aside.
"Sorry—" Peter starts.
"No, my fault—" the other person says simultaneously.
Then—
Recognition.
The kind that hits like ice water, not because it's painful but because it's unexpected.
Liz Allan stands three feet away, hand still on the door, eyes widening in surprise that probably mirrors his own.
A full second passes where neither of them speaks.
Peter's brain catalogs details automatically: She's in casual clothes—jeans and Midtown's track team hoodie, hair pulled back in a ponytail. Looking exactly like she always does after practice. Like someone who still shows up to school every day, participates in normal high school activities, exists in the world he used to occupy full-time.
"Peter," Liz says finally. Not a question. Just acknowledgment, layered with surprise. "Wow. Hi. I didn't know you still... existed."
It's meant as a joke—light, acknowledging how rarely he's at school anymore.
But there's an edge underneath.
"Hey," he replies, equally neutral. "Yeah, I exist. Just busy with the internship."
"Right. The Stark thing." The way she says it—not quite skeptical, but not quite believing either—suggests she's heard the excuse as many times as everyone else at school.
Liz's shoulders tighten visibly—micro-reaction Peter's enhanced senses pick up easily.
She's bracing for something.
He can see it in the way her grip on her own bag tightens, the way she takes a half-step back that could be making space but reads as retreat.
She expects awkward tension.
Or hurt.
Or the desperate energy of someone trying to prove they're fine while obviously not being fine.
The old Peter would've given her that. Would've fumbled through the interaction, shoulders hunched, making himself smaller the way he always did when things got uncomfortable between them.
Especially toward the end—when his constant absences and weak excuses had worn her patience down to nothing, when her frustration manifested as sharp comments about his reliability, when he'd absorbed every criticism as confirmation that he wasn't good enough, wasn't present enough, wasn't enough.
She remembers that Peter.
The one who apologized constantly. Who shrank during arguments. Who carried guilt like it was his primary personality trait.
She's bracing for that Peter.
Peter just smiles.
Not forced. Not sarcastic. Not the tight, brittle smile of someone performing okayness while bleeding internally.
Just polite. The social smile you give classmates when paths cross unexpectedly outside school.
"How've you been?" he asks, and means it in the most general possible way.
Liz blinks. The defensive posture holds for another second, then... wavers.
Because Peter doesn't tense.
Doesn't flinch.
Doesn't look smaller or defensive or like he's preparing for criticism.
He's just... there. Present but not invested. Polite but not performing.
The absence of weight is so complete it creates its own presence—negative space where expectation met nothing and had nowhere to go.
Liz notices immediately.
Peter can see the exact moment it registers—the slight furrow between her eyebrows, the way her head tilts fractionally like she's recalibrating.
It unsettles her.
"Good," Liz says, filling the silence. "Busy with college prep stuff. SATs next month. You know."
"Right, yeah." Peter shifts the pharmacy bag to his other hand. "That's coming up fast."
"Are you even going to take them? With the Stark thing, I mean."
It's not quite accusatory, but there's something underneath—curiosity mixed with skepticism mixed with something else he can't quite name.
"Probably," Peter says with a shrug. "I mean, internships end eventually. Good to have options."
"That's... surprisingly practical for you."
The comment lands weird—like it's meant to be teasing but comes out slightly sharper than intended.
Old Peter would've flinched at that. Would've heard the implicit criticism: *you're usually impractical, unreliable, flaky*.
Current Peter just nods. "Yeah, May's been on my case about planning ahead. Can't argue with her logic."
The response is so aggressively normal that Liz seems thrown by it.
She tries again: "I haven't seen you at school in like... weeks. Flash keeps saying you're going to flunk out."
"Flash says a lot of things." Peter's tone is mild, unconcerned. "I'm keeping up with assignments. Teachers have been pretty understanding about the internship schedule."
"Must be nice," Liz says, and now there's definitely an edge. "Some of us don't get special treatment."
Old Peter would've apologized for that. Would've felt guilty for having opportunities she didn't, would've shrunk under the implication that he didn't deserve the accommodation.
Current Peter just says, "I mean, I'm basically doing two full-time jobs. The flexibility helps, but it's not exactly easy."
It's not defensive. Not apologetic. Just matter-of-fact.
The conversation stutters.
They stand there for another few seconds, the silence stretching in that particular way that happens when small talk runs out of momentum.
And through it all, Liz is processing something Peter can see happening in real-time:
He's not pretending to be okay.
He is okay.
Not in the defensive, overcompensating way of someone proving a point. Not in the bitter, I'm-so-over-this way of unresolved hurt.
Just... actually fine.
The relationship they had—the dynamic that existed where she had the upper hand and he was always apologizing, always accommodating, always trying to be enough—is gone.
Not replaced with resentment or triumph or any of the complicated emotions she'd unconsciously prepared for.
Just absent.
Peter doesn't need her to know he's doing well. Doesn't need her validation or acknowledgment. Doesn't even seem to care that they're having this conversation.
He's not the person she bullied anymore.
And crucially—devastatingly—he doesn't seem to notice or care that she notices.
"Peter—" Liz starts, voice shifting into something more serious. "I wanted to say—"
She stops.
Peter waits politely, genuinely curious what she's about to say but not needing to hear it.
"Things got kind of messy between us," she continues carefully. "I wasn't always fair about the whole... popular thing. I know you had stuff going on with Uncle Ben. I just wanted to say I'm sorry for being so harsh towards you."
It's a good apology. Probably something she's been thinking about since the day it happened, working up the courage to say if they ever ran into each other.
Peter considers it for a moment—not weighing whether to accept, but recognizing it for what it is: a gift offered to someone who no longer needs it.
"Thanks," he says finally. Gently. "But honestly, we were both dealing with a lot. You don't need to apologize."
"I kind of do," Liz insists, and there's something almost desperate in it—like she needs him to accept the apology, needs this interaction to matter.
Peter shakes his head slightly. "We're sixteen, Liz. We're both still figuring stuff out. It was a mistake of the past, but that's okay. No hard feelings."
The words are kind but final.
Liz opens her mouth to respond, then closes it.
Because she realizes—suddenly, uncomfortably—that it doesn't matter anymore.
Not to Peter.
Not in his life. Not in his head.
She's already filed away as past, alongside middle school and old friend groups and all the other things that shaped him but no longer define him.
The apology she'd been carrying? It was for her benefit, not his.
And he doesn't need it.
The silence answers more clearly than words could.
Peter checks his phone—3:54 PM.
"I should get going," he says, not anxious about it. Just matter-of-fact. "Aunt May needs stuff for dinner, and I've got... work later."
He almost says patrol. Catches himself. The lie comes easier now.
"Right. Yeah. The internship." Liz steps aside fully now, making space. "It was good seeing you, Peter."
"You too. Good luck with the SATs."
"Thanks."
Peter walks past her, pharmacy bag in hand, already thinking about whether the bodega has the specific bread May requested or if he'll need to try the grocery store two blocks over.
He doesn't look back.
Not to make a point.
Just because there's no reason to.
The door closes behind him, and Liz doesn't cross his mind again.
Liz stands outside the pharmacy longer than necessary.
People flow around her—students from other schools, adults running errands, delivery workers navigating the sidewalk. She's an obstacle, stationary while everyone else moves.
She processes what just happened.
Not the conversation itself—that was barely a conversation, just social script and polite nothings.
But the absence underneath it.
Peter didn't need her apology. Didn't need closure. Didn't need to prove anything.
He'd already moved on, completely and thoroughly, in a way that didn't require her participation or acknowledgment.
She wasn't a wound anymore.
Just a memory.
Not even a particularly important one, apparently.
The realization sits uncomfortably—not because she wants to befriend him again (she doesn't, she's pretty sure), but because of what it reveals:
She's not relevant anymore.
Not in his life.
Not in whatever story he's living now with his mysterious internship and his constant absences and his complete, genuine indifference to her opinion.
She'd thought—maybe hoped—that he'd still be the awkward, apologetic Peter who shrunk under criticism. That she'd still have some kind of power, after all that time.
But that Peter is gone.
And this new one doesn't need her for anything.
It's a strange kind of loss—losing relevance in someone's story while still being sixteen and seeing them at the same school and existing in the same social ecosystem.
Except she barely sees him at school anymore.
And when she does, apparently, he's this.
Just polite. Just neutral. Just... past her.
Peter steps back into the flow of the afternoon.
The pharmacy bag swings slightly as he walks, and he's already pulling up his phone to check May's text again—bread, deli turkey, the good cheese not the cheap stuff, tomatoes if they look fresh.
He doesn't feel triumphant about the encounter with Liz.
Or vindicated.
Or even particularly affected beyond the mild social awkwardness of running into an old bully.
Just lighter.
Not because he proved anything or won anything or got closure he'd been seeking.
But because he realized—in the moment of not reacting, of just being politely neutral—that the weight he'd been carrying wasn't there anymore.
Hadn't been there for a while, actually.
He'd just never had a chance to notice until it was tested.
Some ghosts didn't need confronting, he thinks, dodging around a group of middle schoolers blocking the sidewalk.
They just faded on their own once you stopped being afraid of them.
Once you stopped giving them power by expecting them to hurt.
Once you grew into a version of yourself they couldn't reach anymore—not because you'd built walls, but because you'd simply moved to different emotional geography where their criticisms and judgments and old dynamics had no purchase.
The bodega has the bread May wanted.
Peter grabs the other supplies, pays with the cash she gave him, heads back toward the apartment.
He's got two hours until patrol. Enough time for homework, maybe some research into his new gadget he's building, definitely dinner with May where she'll ask about his day and he'll give her the edited version that doesn't include fighting crime or running into his ex bully.
Normal.
The kind of day that would've been impossible a year ago when he was still carrying Liz's disappointment like proof of his inadequacy, still shrinking under criticism, still trying to be enough for everyone while having no idea how to be enough for himself.
He's not that person anymore.
Hasn't been for a while.
But running into Liz confirmed it in a way that felt almost anticlimactic—like checking a wound you'd been worried about and finding it completely healed.
Some ghosts fade on their own.
You just have to stop feeding them.
Stop giving them space in your head.
Stop bracing for impact from punches they're no longer throwing.
Peter makes it home, drops the groceries on the kitchen counter, and texts May that he got everything.
She responds with a thumbs up and a heart emoji.
Normal.
Forward.
The city hums outside his window—crime happening somewhere, emergencies brewing, people needing help he'll provide in a few hours when he puts on the mask and becomes someone bigger than a sixteen-year-old running errands.
But right now?
Right now he's just Peter.
Making dinner with his aunt.
Doing homework at the kitchen table.
Living a life that isn't defined by what he's lost or who he used to be or the ghosts that tried to haunt him.
And somewhere in the city—already fading into irrelevance—Liz Allan becomes just another person he used to know.
Not important.
Not painful.
Just past.
And Peter keeps moving forward.
Because that's what you do with ghosts.
You acknowledge them if they appear.
You're polite.
And then you keep walking.
Lighter for having proven to yourself—accidentally, without even trying—that the weight you thought was permanent was actually just temporary.
And temporary things end.
Even when you're sixteen and the ending feels impossible.
Even when the healing happens so gradually you don't realize you're healed until someone from before tries to wound you and the blade doesn't land.
Peter pulls out his chemistry textbook—the one he actually managed to grab from his locker last week—and settles in to catch up on assignments.
May hums while cooking, the apartment smells like garlic and tomatoes, and outside the window the city waits for Spider-Man.
But Spider-Man can wait two more hours.
Right now, Peter Parker has homework.
And groceries.
And a quiet afternoon that feels more like victory than any fight he's won.
Normal.
Forward.
Free.