2,805 miles
There’s 2,805 miles between here and home.
If he hadn’t changed his mind, there would only be 181.
Why did he change his mind? The question would probably forever haunt him, the biggest decision he’ll ever make, he’ll always wonder whether or not it was the right choice. MIT had been his dream for so long, but he chose Caltech.
MIT was a good school, one of the best, but it was also the school Tony went to. Peter didn’t mind living in Tony’s shadow, but he was worried about the possibility of added pressure or being handed things because of his relationship to one of the biggest alumni. He doesn’t want an unfair advantage like that.
But god does the 2,805 miles feel uncrossable.
MJ’s at Harvard. Ned’s at MIT. Flash is taking the year abroad with Harry. Cindy’s at NYU. Betty’s at Yale. Their group of geniuses have been split up and scattered across the country, and Peter’s alone on the west coast.
It shouldn’t be this bad, the homesickness, the ever present ache in his chest, the crushing loneliness, the bittersweet phone calls. It shouldn’t feel like this. He’s in college, for god’s sake. He should be out partying, meeting new people, studying in beautiful libraries, being a free adult. But instead, he’s curled up in bed, laptop open to the Skype screen as he counts down the minutes until Tony will call him.
He knows what Flash would say. Poor baby wants his mommy? Oh wait. And it shouldn’t sting, it wouldn’t if it weren’t true. Flash knows what lines not to cross anymore, dead mom jokes are okay, they should be fine, Peter makes them himself all the time, but it’s true, and it hurts. He wishes his mom were here. He wishes his mom and dad were still living in California, just a bus ride away, and he could go visit them for Family Dinner.
What he really wants is just a hug.
What he would give for May to give him a hug and kiss his forehead and tell him everything would be okay.
The text comes through, an apology, an excuse, something about Morgan, and the postponing of their Skype call.
And it’s okay because Tony doesn’t know. He doesn’t know how desperate Peter’s getting, how much he craves the smallest normalcy, how much he needs these conversations to function. It’s okay.
He calls MJ instead.
“Hey, I’m a bit busy, dude, can I call you back?”
“Yeah, no worries!” he says, proud of himself for keeping his voice even. And then she hangs up and he’s alone in his small, empty, unhomely dorm room with plain white walls and textbooks stacked carefully on the edge of his desk and his pile of clothes in the corner of the open closet.
It’s pathetic really.
“Fuck,” he says, out loud because it’s the only human voice he gets to hear that isn’t tinny or crackly over device speakers. “It’s going to be just fine, okay? Five weeks until Spring Break. Five weeks. You can survive five weeks.”
He sits up, stretches, counts to ten and then drags himself over to his desk.
*
“I think I’m depressed,” he tells Ned the next day.
His back aches, the pit in his stomach has just gotten darker, his head hurts, his eyes are so dry, his hands keep cramping, but at least he’s ahead in his physics class, right?
Ned kind of laughs, one that means he’s not quite sure if it’s a joke or not. “Homesick?”
“How do you know me so well?”
“You’re, and I mean this in the nicest way possible, a momma’s boy. You like familiarity and comfort and your love language is physical affection which I’m sure you haven’t been getting much of lately. Even if your family has it’s… complications, they’re still the most important thing to you so it’s hard to be so far away.”
“What the hell, dude?”
Ned laughs, realer this time. “Sorry, I’m taking a psych class.”
“Is it easier there? Being closer, I mean?”
He pauses, thinks about it, the sound of Peter’s fan, the one constant in his life, that fills the space between. “It’s not like I’ve exactly got the time or money to make the roadtrip home all the time. A hundred and eighty miles is still a hundred and eighty miles.”
“I guess.”
“All I’m saying is that you made your choice for all the right reasons, and you shouldn’t change your mind now because you think MIT will be easier. Peter Parker doesn’t give up for the easier option.”
“Please don’t tell me you’re taking a philosophy class too.”
“Speaking of, I’ve gotta go, dude, I’m sorry. Listen, take a shower, get dressed, go for a walk, eat something good. It’ll make you feel better.”
He gets a notification for five dollars sent to him by MJ with a little note buy yourself a coffee bestie.
Peter’s nothing if not a good listener, so he gets up and does as he’s told. It’s a nice, cool day in California, so he puts on a pair of jeans, a collared button-up, and a comfy sweater overtop, a classic Peter look. If MJ saw him, she’d definitely tell him that college is about experimenting and finding yourself, not sticking to what you’ve always been. Despite them not being here, he’ll always have her voice in his head. And he buys himself a coffee from the shop just around the corner of his dorm building.
Campus is big so it’ll be a long walk to go around the campus in a circle. He puts on some music and starts walking, getting lost in his head.
Smell the roses, May would say. Get out of that big head of yours and see the world around you.
And if Ned were there, he’d laugh and say, If we had brains like his, we’d never see the world either.
Peter would blush and shake his head, try to peel back the compliments but he’s learned it’s pointless with them.
Someone touches his arm, a barely there feeling, and he looks up, a polite smile on his face. You have a resting sad face, MJ says in his head.
“Sorry, I didn’t mean to bother you.”
He focuses on the southern speaker, a young man with wild dirty blond curls, sunkissed skin, a sprinkling of freckles over his nose, a silver nose ring, dark blue eyes, and eyelashes he knows Cindy would fawn over. He’s wearing an old black t-shirt that reads Yee and a flannel over top with a pair of even older straight-legged jeans.
“It’s alright,” Peter says automatically. You’re too nice to strangers, it’ll get you killed, MJ would say.
“Penny for your thoughts?”
“Just thinking about how my friend would say I’m too nice for my own good,” he replies honestly. “And too honest.”
The man laughs. “Maybe, and my sister would say I’m too forward or maybe that I’m annoying, but it’s who I am… My name’s Harley, we’re in the same chemistry class with Bailer. You didn’t show up for class yesterday and I was thinking about reaching out to offer my notes, but I chickened out. Like why would a random student notice one person missing from our class of like three hundred? It seemed creepier than helpful.”
“That’s very kind of you,” Peter says. He takes a nervous sip of his coffee. He doesn’t know why he’s nervous, but he also knows exactly why he’s so nervous. It’s just a conversation with a classmate, but Harley’s paying his full attention to him, looking at him and smiling and nose ring catching the sunlight.
“It wasn’t too complicated anyway,” Harley says. “And from what I’ve seen, you’re like a certified genius, so I don’t know how much my notes would help, but at least it’s something.”
Harley pulls open his bag adorned with colorful pins and pulls out a notebook filled to the brim with cue cards and sticky notes and paperclips a variety of colors. He flips it open and rips out the last few pages and hands it over.
“Here,” he says, smile unwavering like it’s what he was born to do. “You can give them back to me the next time you’re in class.”
“Sure, of course, thank you so much.” May would roll her eyes at his constant good manners and say you sure didn’t get that from me or your uncle.
Harley nods. “Yeah! My mom would say it’s southern hospitality or something.” He puts on a higher pitched, slower voice to imitate his mom.
Peter can’t help the smile that tugs at his mouth. They have very similar thinking patterns, apparently. “Well, thank you.”
“Hey!” Harley says, looking at Peter’s coffee. “Do you live at Pasadena? I’ve been meaning to try their coffee place, is it good?”
“It’s really good, yeah… Maybe we can study together there sometime?” Peter offers shyly. “We have that big chem midterm coming up and I haven’t found any study partners yet.”
Harley smiles a little wider. “That sounds perfect. Here, I’ll write my number on those notes so you have it and we can find a time that works.”
He pulls a red sharpie from his bag and writes his number on the chemistry notes.
Nice one, loser, didn’t think you had it in you, MJ would say. And Ned would laugh and demand pictures and the phone number so he can see for himself if Harley’s good enough. And May would ruffle his hair and try to give him a condom. Just in case! she’d say, hands lifted in defense and try to teach him about safe sex again. And Cindy would start spouting statistics about first dates and relationships. And Flash would say, how’d you score someone so out of your league, Parker?
“It’s a date,” Harley grins. “I’ll see you around, Peter. And, might I suggest, get out of that genius head of yours before you run into a tree.”
And maybe he’s not so homesick. Maybe he needs to make California his new home with people like Harley. Maybe he should reach out to Gwen from his English Literature class who he worked on a project with. And maybe he should start talking to the boy who lives across the hall from him in Pasadena, Harry, who loaned him a couple quarters to do his laundry and bakes cookies every weekend to share with the floor.
Maybe he will get out of his head and into the world.
There might be 2,805 miles miles between Caltech and Queens, but there’s only half a mile between his dorm and coffee and a world of possibilities.
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