Sorry I Almost Killed Your Girlfriend - Pete and Pete

[st_arlord]

Quill felt terrible for yesterday. He had argued it wasn't his fault, but he knew Peter had been right. Quill was the adult and he needed to be responsible. I pushed her and I knew she wasn't ready...

He sighed as he hung out by the pool bar and tried to figure out the best way to approach Peter and talk about it. He hated talking about things. He liked ignoring stuff. If something like this happened between him and Rocket, they'd ignore it and move on until Quill apologized by taking a bullet or something for Rocket and they'd officially move on and things would be forgiven. Peter Parker seemed more like the talking type.

He twirled around a mimosa thoughtfully. It was 11am, so mimosas were classy.

Comments

[st_arkintern]

"Yeah," Peter says. "I guess so." He dampens his lips. "I still wish that Liz could meet May and Mr. Stark." Mr. Stark's obviously not his father, but he'd already admitted his feelings to Quill, so he felt comfortable including his name alongside May's. "Even though she's not really close to her family --" Few people had the sort of relationship he had with May. "-- I really want to meet them, too."

Not really something he'll get to do while he's here. Not unless Liz's parents or May or Mr. Stark suddenly showed up. And after a year of being here, Peter was starting to doubt that was going to happen.

[st_arlord]

"I think you might be one of the first boyfriends in history to say they want to meet a girlfriend's parents so easily." He said, amused. "But good on you. Means you're serious about her. Or you're just a masochist. Maybe both."

Quill winked. This was an easier line of conversation for him to have.

"You think May and Stark would like her?" He asked, then shook his head. "Never mind, of course they would. She's likable and basically screams 'take her home to your family' material. The real test is, do you think your friends would like her?"

[st_arkintern]

"Yeah," Peter says quickly. "I don't really have a lot of close friends back home, though." Ned was about it. Maybe MJ, too, but she always seemed to hold people at arm's length. Peter didn't really take that personally, though, because she did that with everyone.

"Flash'd probably make fun of me for having an imaginary girlfriend," he says. "And then when I actually showed up with her, he'd probably find another way to give me a hard time."

That much, Peter was sure of. It'd probably be more mortifying to have him mock him in front of his girlfriend. Liz'd seen part of it and he'd really been embarrassed. In person, that embarrassment would almost certainly be multiplied.

[st_arlord]

"Wait, wait, wait," he said, hands up. "Is this Flash guy giving you a hard time? Dude, you're freaking Spider-Man. Just one punch to the face and trust me, that guy will back off. People like that are cowards."

[st_arkintern]

Quill's might be right, but...

"I'm not going to punch him," Peter says. "It's just... it's not me, you know?"

It's true; it wasn't him. Spider-Man might not have problems throwing punches, but Peter Parker?

Peter Parker didn't.

"Besides, he might just double down and it'd just get worse."

[st_arlord]

"I could always come and punch him for you, but he's probably like 12, right?" He said. "Probably best not to hit a kid."

Quill put his hand on Peter's shoulder.

"Really all you need is confidence, my friend." He explained. "Trust me. Confidence = like honey to women and like kyrptonite to bullies."

[st_arkintern]

"He's 16," Peter corrects, even though it probably doesn't really matter.

It's not until Quill puts his hand on his shoulder and he relaxes that Peter realizes how tense he was. Maybe talking about Flash stressed him out...

"It's really a lot easier to be confident when you're wearing a mask," he says, though it's embarrassing to admit it.

[st_arlord]

"That's true." He agreed. "That's why people like that guy are jerks. That's their mask for whatever they think is wrong with them. Trust me. Growing up a Ravager, I learned that quickly."

[st_arkintern]

"What happened?" Peter's genuinely curious. He has a hard time imagining Quill being bullied, but maybe Quill had to do the same thing he was suggesting Peter did before he got there.

[st_arlord]

"With the Ravagers?" He asked, surprised. "Oh. Nothing really."

Quill shrugged. He tried not to think about some of those times.

"I was just given a hard time, you know?" He said. "Being a human and basically a kidnapped kid. Got called names a lot. Was pants'ed a few times. Woke up with a shaved head."

Why am I sharing these things?

"Anyways, the point is, they stopped after I stopped letting it bother me," He said. "And, well, also played a few pranks of my own. But still."

[st_arkintern]

Even if it’s not true… it really does feel like Quill is being vulnerable around him. And somehow, Peter feels some sort of obligation to be vulnerable in turn. Logically, he knows that it doesn’t make any sense, but emotionally, it’s exactly how he feels.

“They call me Penis Parker,” he says. “I really do try to not let it bother me, but…”

It’s not easy.

“How’d you get it to stop bothering you?"

[st_arlord]

"You're probably not going to like my answer," he said honestly. "I picked a fight with the biggest a-hole and caused him to lose a few teeth."

He sat back.

"But we all have our own way of fighting," he said. "You said Peter Parker isn't a puncher. So how does Peter Parker fight? I imagine it might be the same way Liz fights. Liz, who doesn't have an alternate ego to go to when she needs to."

[st_arkintern]

Peter thinks about it.

"I really don't," he says, though he still thinks, hoping he can pull together something. "I mean, I argue sometimes. Mostly with Mr. Stark."

But was that really his way of fighting?

[st_arlord]

Quill doesn't appear to be buying it.

"Okay, Pete," He said, "You're stuck in a room. Let's say your bedroom. Window's been barred, door's been locked. All your powers are gone and you're hungry and need to pee. How do you, Peter Parker, get out?"

[st_arkintern]

Peter considers this.

"I'd probably knock on the door until May let me out."

Not a particularly exciting method of escape. He's not even sure if it's the kind of escape Quill wanted. But it was the first solution that popped in his mind.

[st_arlord]

"Alright, my bad." He said. "No one else is around. You're in some Madonna Inn stuff. A room in some other dimension so the only person you can rely on is you."

[st_arkintern]

"I'd probably look around first," he says. "Make sure I knew my surroundings. And once I did that, I'd find what tools I could use to get out of there based on what I knew from looking around."

That might not be specific enough.

"I'd probably build something to help," he says. "Or look for weaknesses."

[st_arlord]

"See? There you go," He said with a hand gesture. "You'd use your smart brain to solve the problem. Nothing wrong with that either. That's Peter Parker's super power, fyi."

[st_arkintern]

"I don't feel like I'm really smart when it comes to know how to deal with Flash, though," Peter admits, thinking about the time where he was almost going to show up as Spider-Man to the party just to prove Flash wrong.

But that leads Peter to his next question:

"What's Peter Quill's superpower?"

[st_arlord]

Huh...

"Peter Quill and Star-Lord are pretty much one and the same," He said. "Just for some weird reason not a lot of people like to call me Star-Lord. Pretty sure it's because they're too impressed with the name. But I'm me, dude. You get what you get."

He gestured to himself to demonstrate he was an 'open book.'

[st_arkintern]

Peter has to admit, Quill is pretty much exactly what you see is exactly what you got. There really wasn't ever a time when he wasn't sure what he was thinking.

"Liz's probably going to be getting out soon," he says. "I should probably go pick her up."

[st_arlord]

"Yeah, sure, of course." He said, nodding. "Tell her I hope she's feeling better. Or, well, only tell her if you think she'd want to hear it."

[st_arkintern]

"I will," Peter says, rising to his feet. "Thanks, Mr. Star-Lord."

Peter stands awkwardly at the table for the moment, deliberating whether or not this is a hugging moment, then finally decides that maybe it'd be weird. Instead he shoots Quill a smile and makes his way to the door.