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They had been broken up for three weeks.
It was over a fight about Lucas keeping secrets. It was just at the tip of his tongue, just the tip. It was almost about to slip before Max said the words.
“I can’t continue like this, Lucas, I’m sorry.”
Lucas wanted to beg, yell that he was Spiderman, that that’s why he was so secretive, that she should please take him back because he couldn’t live without her.
He couldn’t do any of that.
Instead, he just nodded like the idiot he is and said, “If that’s how you’re gonna be happy.”
Happy my ass.
They were both miserable. Both are only thinking about each other at every hour of the day. And every hour is every hour.
That includes when you’re bleeding half to death in an alley after fighting off a villain that just tried to rip out all your internal organs.
The slash from his chest to his stomach was big. not that deep, thank god, but the type that made him question whether he could go home in this state without being noticed by his parents.
With a painful groan, he got up and started to swing mindlessly. He had no idea where to go, what to do. Maybe a hospital? That went against his principles. His home was too risque, and Dustin –the only person that new about his identity, his quote unquote “man in chair”- had no idea about first aid.
Then he realised where he actually was going.
He knew the road by heart; he could find it with his eyes closed, 50 miles away.
He was going towards Max’s house.
Before his reasonable side could tell him off, he was standing in her back garden, the one overlooking her window.
He took a deep breath, which came out shaky, both with stress and pain.
What a nice way to break the no-contact rule.
So he carefully climbed to her window, giving a few gentle knocks. because god, he wouldn’t want to startle Max even when he was actively bleeding through his suit.
Max was doing her algebra homework –the one Lucas would have helped if they were still together- when she heard a few knocks on her window.
knocks on her window? That sounded stupid. No one could climb to her window; it was high.
She turned her head towards the sound, only to be met with the image of the infamous Spiderman.
and god, he looked bad.
His suit looked torn, with blood seeming to come out of the cuts. The way he was holding himself up did not seem to fit a well-man’s.
She rushed to her window to open it as quickly as she could. She still had no idea just how and why Spiderman was in her room right now as he basically threw himself in with a thud.
“Do not freak out,” the injured man said with a muffled voice as it was coming from behind the mask.
The redhead could only nod her head, still in shock.
The boy slowly peeled off his mask, revealing a busted lip and an already-bled-and-now-stopped nose to sight before pulling it off completely to reveal his face.
A gasp was what followed the reveal. Then shaky hands are going to cover the mouth.
“No…” was all that came from the young woman as she stood over the injured boy with now tears prickling in her eyes.
“Hi, Max… sorry to drop by like this,” Lucas said with a soft chuckle, trying to lighten the mood a bit.
“Lucas..?” she said, still shocked in her voice as she slowly lowered herself to his level, trying to look at him better and maybe prove to herself that it was all real.
“That’s me,” he said, a small smile of love forming on his lips already. god, how much he had missed this girl…
“You’re... the Spiderman?” Everything she said sounded like a question as she was not sure of anything at the moment. She wasn’t even sure if she was real right now.
Max slowly raised her hand to touch his cheek –it had a small scratch to it- which immediately earned her a lean in towards her hand.
Lucas was about to say something cheesy, maybe, but a cough came before it, which resulted in his stomach to tense up, which then resulted in a groan to spill from his lips.
The groan made Max alert.
Her hand went from his cheek to his stomach, slowly touching the wound, which again made a groan come out.
“Was hoping maybe you could help me..”
Max gave a quick nod, of course she would help him.
Still, this was not how she had pictured her Wednesday night going.
She had a first aid kit under her bed, you know, for skating scratches.
Not usually for tending idiot spiders that turn out to be your boyfriend- well, ex now.
She got the first aid kit under her bed with fast movements. Opening the case, she was familiar with the supplies and what to do.
“We need to stop the bleeding first. God, it bleeds a lot.”
Lucas could only give a nod in response. His eyes never leaving the blue-eyed girl, even for a second. He was looking at her like she was the only thing in the world, just like he always did.
Max, deciding that these cloths were too small to hold his blood, stood up to grab one of her less-used tops to use as a tampon for blood.
“Your top- “ Lucas began to object, not wanting her to ruin her top like that. Also, how the hell do you hide a blood stain like this?
“I don’t wear it that much anyway,” Max cut him off before carefully pressing the cloth onto the wound, which earned yet another hiss from the spider himself.
They waited in silence for a few moments as Max continued to press the cloth and Lucas sat there on her floor. None of them could speak at the moment, even though they had the world to say to each other.
After a few moments, Max finally pulled the cloth back; it had a considerable amount of blood on it alright. She found a part with less amount of blood to press the cloth to him one more time, trying to see if his bleeding had stopped or not. Sure enough, it was down to a minimum Max could accept, so he set the now blood-stained top of hers and looked into the first aid kit one more time. She was only working with practised ease now, because if thought she would talk and ask “how”, and “why”, and now really wasn’t the time for that.
“I need you to take off your top, if you could do that.”
Now, normally Lucas would have said something about how she wanted to see him naked, but right now it really didn’t seem like she would take that joke well. So he just shut up and peeled the top of his costume off obediently.
Max worked to clean the wound first with some antiseptic cream she had. While she rubbed the cream on the wound, Lucas tried his best to keep himself from making any noise.
Though his breath did come out shortly from time to time. He forced himself to focus on Max, just looking at her face as her hands worked on him.
When it was time to bandage the wound, Lucas leaned closer so Max could do it properly. Their breaths mingled as Max ran the bandage across his torso from back to front.
Though after it was done, none of them made any effort to pull back. They were in a silence that felt too familiar and too comfortable. Lucas felt as if he could stay in that position for the rest of his life –well, perhaps not fort he rest of his life, he couldn’t refrain from kissing her that long- but their comfortable bubble was shattered by Max clearing her throat and leaning away.
“So, talk.” It sounded so serious to the extend where Lucas could actually flinch from it.
“Talk?” he repeated, trying to buy himself some time maybe.
“Yeah, talk! You are the spiderman? You’re the Spider-Man!” Max said as she got up from the floor to kind of jolt around the room, a frustrated habit.
“You know.. The friendly neighbour.” Lucas said with a smile on his face that could not convince Max to calm down, even for a second right now.
“Stop fucking with me, Lucas!” She said, the only reason she wasn’t yelling right now was because her mom was watching TV in the next room of their apartment. She was probably fast asleep, but still. She couldn’t explain this to another person.
“Why didn’t you tell me?” Her voice was still a mix of very much anger but also reproach.
“I tried to, I swear!” Lucas said immediately. He knew that probably save his ass right now. But he was ready to fight with whatever he had to win her back tonight.
“You know how many times I almost told you?” Lucas got up from his seat on the floor as well, following Max with quiet steps, ignoring his body’s need of sitting down –actually laying down and sleeping- and walking towards Max instead.
“Loads, Max. It was always at the tip of my tongue. But I chickened out every fucking time…”
“Well, you didn’t and that’s the main issue now, isn’t it?” she said, continuing to pace around the room back and forth.
“God it makes so much sense now… How you always just disappeared, how you always made the lamest excuses to why you’re late on almost every date night.” Max mumbled, speaking more to herself now than Lucas.
Lucas grabbed Max’s wrist with a web sling before bringing it to himself and wrapping her fingers around it, stopping her in her tracks. “I always wanted to tell you,” he spoke, his voice so earnest it made Max lose her temper for a second.
“Trust me, I did. But I was afraid it would put you in danger, you have to understand. Do you know how many times Dustin was kidnapped?”
“Yeah, I know, a lot- OH MY GOD LUCAS DUSTIN KNOWS!?” she was so furious with him now that she would have walked away in an instant if he wasn’t already holding her from her wrist. Dustin knew? Dustin knew! She got that he was Lucas’ best friend, but still. If he knew she definitely should have known, she felt.
“Everything alright, Jolene?” a voice called from the other room, the sound of the TV pausing for a moment. Max panicked for a moment before remembering the boy she was with right now was literally Spiderman. Worst-case scenario, he could just jump out of the room.
And god did she hate it when her mom called her by her middle name.
“All good, Mom,” she yelled back, sending Lucas death stares for making her yell and letting her mom hear her.
“Sorry,” he mouthed, ready to leap out any moment.
They waited for a second to see if Susan would come into the room, but when she didn’t, they both relaxed and continued to speak freely once again, although this time more hushed.
“So… you’re Spider-Man. And that’s the reason behind every shitty thing you have done?” Max said once again, more like she was trying to make it make sense to herself.
“Exactly,” he said, seeing that she looked calmer now, he slowly loosened his grip on her wrist. And when he saw she didn’t move back, he took a breath of relief.
“Now that I’ve told you… Are we good?” Lucas asked, hope laced in his voice. He would give everything he had right now, just to have Max be his Max once again.
“Are we good?” Max repeated his words, waiting for him to elaborate.
“Are we good? Do you forgive me? Can I be your boyfriend again?”
“That's presumptuous of you,” Max said, though the slight smile on her face that she couldn’t hide told to Lucas all he needed to know.
“Please..?” he pleaded a side of him serious the other side teasing. He once again got hold of her from her wrist –not wanting to move to her waist to overstep any boundaries yet- this time though, to draw her closer to himself. His wound pain all forgotten when he was in the presence of this girl.
“No more secrets, no more keeping you in the dark, I promise,” he said, now himself coming closer to her. Both standing so close together that their breaths almost mixed.
They were both leaning in closer now, old instincts kicking in as their lips almost met. Almost. Before Max pulled away with a teasing smile.
“Make it up to me first.” she whispered, pushing him away from his chest, careful to not touch his wound and hurt him any further.
A smile made it’s way to Lucas’ face as well. Of course. He would expect anything less from her.
“Noted.” he whispered back before stepping away from their bubble.
A comfortable silence once again embraced them. This time even more free of any tension.
Lucas broke it with a fakeish cough –when he did that, his wound hurt further.
“I kinda have to go now… Erica can only manage me for some time,” he said, fidgeting with his fingers as he did so.
“Erica knows!?” Max whisper-yelled this time, learning from the last time.
“Jesus Lucas, was I the last?”
“Nobody else knows, I swear.” Lucas said quickly, trying not to worsen the situation.
Max looked like she was about to explode once again but a quick breath in and out calmed her down into deciding she was done with yelling –for the night at least.
“Alright, alright. But if I find out just one more person knows-“
“Then you have all the rights to kill me, promise,” he said, his hands up defensively in a surrender position as he spoke.
“Well, better get going now,” he added not soon after, his feet going backwards towards the window.
“You sure you can go like this?” Max asked, a bit of worry etched on both her face and her voice.
Lucas would again tease her about her being worried, but he decided not to. Pushing Max and making her even angrier were off the thoughts tonight.
He just gave a small nod with a smile, showing he was sure of himself as he climbed the window, one feet already dangling on the air of the 5th floor of the apartment.
“That was one way to break no contact.” Max said as she walked towards the window as well.
“It’s broken now though, right? I can talk to you at school?”god, Lucas was so whipped for this girl that sometimes it seemed more pathetic than it should have been.
“Considering that you actually smashed the no contact… Yeah, yeah I guess you can come up to me at school.”
A wide smile spread against Lucas’ face hearing the words. Maybe getting absolutely smashed on that fight was actually really worth it.
“Take care then,” Lucas said, itching to kiss her but he knew, not yet. Not until she initiated it first as he was still in dangerous waters.
“You too, get home safe,” god it sounded nothing like how they used top art. But they were both willing to take that. Despite the wound and the blood and all that this was the best they have felt in this three weeks they have been broken up for.
Lucas leaped off the window, mixing into the night with his black suit. Max watched from the window as her love slung from one building to another, getting to his home.
And as Lucas was swininging, all he could think about was –like the three weeks he spent- Max of course. But also how thankful he was to that random man that decided to get a big ass knife as his weapon.