Chapter Text
New day, new work to do. Living on your own means stuff just keeps piling on, day after day. There's always dishes to be washed, carpets to be vacuumed, countertops to be wiped, and never mind all the classwork you need to catch up on. The more you think about the growing to-do list (metaphorical, you don't believe in writing things down), the more you settled into accepting your fate of being a homebody for the weekend. Sunlight filters through the small gaps between your bedroom curtains, you fumble through the bed sheets looking for your phone. Finally, you find it, and you read the time on the screen, and...
12:36 pm.
Fuck.
Whatever. It's Saturday. You can just get started whenever the hell you feel like it. You lay in bed for a half hour longer waiting for your brain to fully switch on while mindlessly scrolling your news feed.
Who is Spinneret? Exclusive new look at the web slinger!
Wilson Fisk revealed as mysterious benefactor of new art exhibit, more on page 5.
Alchemax denies rumors of decades of alleged human experimentation
Yeah, of course they would.
What finally manages to perk you up out of bed is the thought of grabbing something from the cafe across the street. Now your brain is up and running with the promise of a little treat, like dangling a carrot in front of yourself to get you moving, and you'll be damned if it isn't effective. While you wash your face in the bathroom, you find you find yourself reflecting on your most recent adventure.
For as long as you could remember, you've had lucid dreams so powerful you were sure they were real. As a kid, you used to dream about visiting the characters in the cartoons you watched, how you played with them and even visited them frequently enough where you'd befriended them. From the ages of three to six, you told people that a magical rainbow unicorn from an animated TV show was your best friend, until Maxine Stacy came along and became your new best friend instead. From the ages of eight to ten, you learned how to use the internet. At thirteen, you learned what astral projection was, and your thirteen year old self came up with a name you thought was much cooler than "astral projection": dreamwalking. During your tumultuous teen years, it had only gotten worse. When you weren't sleeping, you were daydreaming. The only times you weren't daydreaming were when you were asleep and actually dreaming. It didn't matter that your grades were slipping, or that you only had one friend. As long as you had your dream worlds, what did it matter?
You could never tell anyone about this, not your family, not even Maxine, who was still your best friend after all this time. Oh god, especially not your family; the more you came to understand it, the more you realize nobody would ever understand, let alone believe you. This was how you lived your life until your final year of high school, sleeping in waking, but awake in your sleep. Maybe it was the fear of your future that startled you awake. Or maybe you were just starting to grow out of it the more independent you got, and when you were miraculously accepted into the university of your dreams, you finally woke up. Going away to college meant being away from your overbearing family and finally living a life that was yours. Now that you're doing your postgraduate studies and you have your own apartment, you just couldn't afford to have your head in the clouds anymore.
It didn't mean you'd stopped entirely though, you just didn't have as much time or energy for it as you did back then. Whenever things were stressful, whenever you felt low, you'd slip into old habits again. Like three weeks ago, for example: Your new semester had a rough start and you had fallen behind on your courses. As midterms were looming over you, you'd turned to escapism once more
See, you'd read a comic your friend recommended a while ago, and something about the slick noir era detective turned vigilante protagonist lit a fire in you. So you thought, why not slip by and visit? You'd done it countless times before, dreamwalking your way through the alternate worlds that lit that spark of adventure in you. Though you still didn't fully understand how it worked, projecting yourself into these alternate worlds was easiest when you knew enough about them to visualize them clearly. You could appear as an avatar of your own creation, though you haven't really experimented much with your appearance other than tailoring it to fit the world you slipped into. It was like the most vivid lucid dream, asleep in your bed one minute and floating through the cosmos in an out of body experience you barely had the words to explain to anyone else, not even yourself.
You let yourself into that world, in a dark green dress with that vintage Dior silhouette inspired by a piece you'd seen online. Problem was, you'd forgotten the comic was set in 1933.
The dress you'd taken your inspiration from was designed in 1951.
You didn't think something so small would've caused such a stir-after all, how much different could the two decades be in style? You came to realize it was very much a big difference in Depression-era New York City. Worse yet, what you'd assumed was a visual choice was actually the reality of the world you invaded. Everything and everyone was in black and white, and there you were, an eyesore of color in this monochromatic world. People panicked, you'd grabbed their attention so abruptly and violently with your appearance alone that a small mob was beginning to approach you. And to add fuel to the shit-show, you had no choice but to dip out of that reality as abruptly as you dipped in. You left without ever even considering the ramifications of the chaos you caused, and you didn't even get to see the one you were even there for.
That entire incident made you too embarrassed to try again, or dreamwalk anywhere else for that matter, for the past few weeks. It didn't bother you too much, you were too caught up in the affairs of your waking world to have the mental energy to do it again anyways.
Now that you're fully dressed and ready to head out, you grab your tote and walk out of the door-
-And right into something solid.
Or rather, someone solid.
"Ohmygod- I'm so sorry!" You yelp, taking a big step back to look up at the person you collided into, his expression mostly unreadable from behind black sunglasses.
"It's fine. I was in your way anyways." Came a gruff response, from a gruff looking man, presumably your new neighbor since his own apartment door was ajar. God, these doors are just way too close to each other. Didn't the architects ever consider something like this ever happening? Up until now, you'd only ever heard this voice from outside your door, chatting with the other people on the floor. You never bothered trying to put a face to the voice, but now there he was. You figured it was the polite thing to do, stuttering your way through small talk with the guy who moved in right next to you.
"You're the guy in apartment 28B, right? Nice to meet you, I'm 28A."
God. You hated how you sounded making small talk. Still, this earns you a polite enough smile from the man, one that doesn't do much to soften a face all sharp angled and chiseled, with eyes hidden behind dark lenses.
"28A, strange name you got there." He dryly quips.
"Oh-Sorry," You laugh sheepishly, "I'm [name], nice to meet you." You hold out your hand and he takes it, his hand almost completely envelops yours.
"Miguel. Nice to finally meet you too, you're heading out?"
You nod.
"I was just about to call the elevator, let's go?"
"Oh, yeah. Thanks." You follow behind him, he steps aside once the elevator arrives, motioning for you to go ahead first. You mutter another quick "thanks", and he walks in right behind you. He moves to press the button for the ground floor, and you catch a flash of something silvery peeking out from the sleeve of his gray cardigan, something that you assume is a watch.
"So...When'd you move in?" Your voice cuts into the silence, and it makes you cringe internally again.
"Last week, actually."
"Cool, cool. Welcome to the 6th floor," You notice the corners of his mouth quirk up in another little smile.
"Hey, did you meet-"
"Mrs. Serrano?" He finished your sentence, deftly rolling his Rs on the name the way only a native speaker could, "I did, she brought over-"
"Flan?" You grin, seeing your own reflection reflecting back at you on his sunglasses.
"Yeah," He chuckles. "She did."
The two of you parted once the elevator arrived, exchanging a "see you around" before you left the building in different directions. You went across the street and he went left, and you realized you were watching him walk away for a bit longer than was normal. You no longer felt the promise of your little treat keeping your brain running, but instead you buzzed with the recollection of your first encounter with your new neighbor. You can't help but scrutinize every little detail while waiting in line at the cafe, from the tone of his voice to the little half-smiles he'd given you. Mostly polite, though he seemed genuinely bemused during your chat in the elevator, right...? You made him smile, didn't you? Asked enough questions, made decent enough small talk.
Was it a successful social interaction? Perhaps. Or maybe you were just reading too into what should be little more than small talk. Never mind all that, one thought bounced around shamelessly in your skull, even after you finished ordering your breakfast:
Miguel in apartment 28B was kinda hot.
"How hot are we talking?" Came the response from Maxine on the phone, while you sat on a table in the cafe terrace indulging in your croissant and coffee.
"Like...I don't know. The kind of hot you don't expect to have move in right next door."
"Wow, that's really descriptive. And you said you made him laugh?"
"Mhm," You grinned a little, proud of yourself.
"Alright, it was more of a snort, but still." You added quickly.
"He's probably pining for you as we speak." Maxine laughed.
"Yeah, totally. Even though I literally just met the guy."
"Didn't stop you from crushing on that other guy from class. What was his name again?"
"...Eddie." You mumbled.
"Oh yeah, the photographer." She laughed again, before she cut herself off.
"Wait, sorry. I'm getting a call, I'll call you back later, alright?"
"Don't worry about that, I have some stuff I gotta get to anyways."
"Aw, so you're gonna be too busy for me today?"
"Just answer the call already, Maxie."
"Fine, fine, whatever. Talk to you later, good luck being productive!"
"Thanks, I'll need it. Talk to you later."
I wish I could tell you about everything else going on in my head.
You ate the rest of your almond croissant in silence, watching the pigeons gathered on the sidewalk. As ineffectively as your day might've started, the feeling of a fresh early noon breeze on your skin was invigorating. Sometimes you can just tell how a day is gonna go as soon as you wake up, and as you watched the flurry of pigeons scurry and soar into the gentle wind, you remembered what it was like to fly.
Today feels different, you just can't pinpoint why.