Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

“No.”

“Meesh,” her mother says with a sigh, Michelle grinding her teeth as they stare at each other. 

“It would mean a lot to him,” her father gently argues, Michelle biting her tongue to not say what she’s really thinking. 

Would it? 

She doesn’t have to say it because it’s written all over their faces— warm and exhausted and still so unabashedly relieved just at seeing her in a way that makes her wonder if that look will ever go away. 

She can’t take it, the staring— averting her eyes elsewhere to the unfamiliar kitchen and the unfamiliar living room and this unfamiliar life. 

Last month her biggest worry had been what she was going to see during their trip to MoMa, running through the different exhibits in her head and fingers itching to try her hand at free sketching some of the paintings there. 

Except it wasn’t last month— it was five years, turning dust into a field trip that was anything but ordinary and coming back to find the world completely changed. 

That world including her family and her not so little brother Michael who had been twelve last month and was seventeen now— had lived through hell the past five years with their parents and had mourned her and didn’t move on but moved forward. 

But now she was back— half the world was back— and Michelle didn’t know how she fit into it anymore. 

“Think about it,” her mother says, throwing her out of her thoughts as Michelle brings her eyes back to them. She can see the worry and the love and that relief— as if they thought if they tore their eyes away from her that she would disappear again— and it’s enough to make her repent, shoulders sagging as her defenses crumble.

“Okay,” she says. “I will.”

Five years and one month ago, her little brother’s biggest obsession was Pokémon. He was nerdy and small and hated being outside so much she used to tease him about being allergic to the sun. 

Now Michael was a foot taller, taller and his hair that much longer— tightly wound in braids that the little brother she used to know refused to ever get. 

It was skating now— the thing he was obsessed with, spending his days out at the local skate park three blocks down. A skate park that Michelle isn’t even sure existed five years ago last month since she never had known about it and had never cared. 

Despite her resistance, she cared about Michael. She wanted to get to know him, whoever he was now but she felt out of her depth— the only way to relate to him being that of an older sister of which she decidedly was not anymore. 

“You ready?” He asks, his new voice three octaves lower and his new height causing him to tower over her.

She nods, swinging her backpack over her shoulder as the two of them set out— walking to the skatepark in relative silence. 

The early summer heat is already blistering, Michelle feeling the sheen of sweat building across her forehead and at the back of her neck— her hair sticking to her uncomfortably as she pushes it back.

“I hate this heat.”

“Yeah.”

Michelle huffs, walking forward as they move around people on the sidewalk. It’s awkward, stilted— in a way that makes her supremely uncomfortable because it feels so much like she’s getting to know a stranger.

Which she isn’t— it’s Michael. Her same baby brother that she used to change diapers for, the same baby brother that five years and one month ago, she had cuddled with on the couch because he was terrified of the movie they were watching. 

She hasn’t tried to hug him since the one fierce and emotional “glad you’re not dead anymore” hug he’d given her when she got back home— wondering to herself if they’d ever get back to that when he nods to some graffiti. 

“Wonder how long that’ll last.”

She turns to look at it and sees that it’s a mural of Iron Man, pursing her lips together and shrugging.

“For a while, probably,” she replies, Michael turning to her. “Since he died and everything.” 

He mutters something that she can’t decipher as they continue to walk together, Michelle’s mind wandering as they do.

She didn’t have particularly kind feelings about Tony Stark when he was alive and that hasn’t exactly changed now that he’s gone. She knows in pieces of what happened that led to her and half the universe turning into dust, the mood about the Avengers varying wildly from total adoration and complete disdain. 

She’s read enough to know that life after everyone was “Blipped” as people were calling it wasn’t easy and that bringing everyone wasn’t back wasn’t a universally appreciated decision.

Michelle liked being alive but up until a month ago, she hadn’t even realized she’d been technically dead— wondering not for the first time if it would’ve been easier had they never came back or if it could’ve been fixed so that they never left in the first place. 

Those weren’t the kind of answers that she’d find on Reddit. And the only one that she could think of that would know the answer to that— if her theory was right at least— wasn’t exactly available. 

She’d heard through the group texts that Peter was one of the Blipped but wasn’t in town— Ned sharing as much when what was left of the AcaDec team met up for ice cream.

“Him and May are upstate,” was all the reply he had given and no one had pushed it— Michelle at least relieved that she didn’t have to contend with yet another person she knew that was five years older than her. 

If Michelle’s theory was right— and the absence of a certain superhero for five years and one month kind of proved it— than Peter was dealing with a lot of shit right now, more than the usual kind that they all were anyway. 

She wanted to reach out to him but she also didn’t know how— not when she was still trying to figure out her own place in her own family.

By the time they make it to the skate park, it’s awkward and quiet again— Michael tapping his fingers against his board a few times.

“You want to… try?”

Michelle shakes her head, partly because she still knows her brother and can tell that he isn’t particularly interested in talking or sharing right now but mostly because she’s hot as fuck and regretting wearing her hair down.

“No go ahead. I’ll just…” she gestures vaguely towards the edge of the fence, Michael shrugging in response.

“Okay.”

He walks off without another word, Michelle blowing hair out of her face and exhaling loudly.

Okay.

She goes to sit on the hot asphalt, regretting the decision but too stubborn to find somewhere else to go as she plops her backpack down— looking up and seeing Michael walk over to a group of people.

They’re all teenagers— her age more or less— and yet Michelle feels completely separated, knowing without having to ask that these were kids who had lived through the Blip. It was like some unspeakable code that they all knew— the difference between Blipped and non-Blipped kids that served as a gulf between them. 

It made Michelle dread going back to school to fall. It made her dread the fact that her little brother would not only be joining her but be a grade above her even more.

Rather than dwell on that anymore, she pushes her hair out of her face, making a mental note to ask if her Aunt Gayle was still alive— since that was a thing they had to check now— to see if she could come over and braid it for her. 

Michelle digs through her backpack until she finds her sketch pad, grabbing the charcoal pencils that are familiar and the headphones that still work as she pops them into her ears.

Her music taste is dated now, just as her phone is but Michelle doesn’t care— letting the familiar playlist lull her into a more comfortable environment as he watches Michael laugh and joke with his friends.

His smile comes easily and he looks so relaxed— so much like their dad that it’s unnerving. Michelle finds herself smiling at that, tapping her pencil against the sketch pad only to be distracted by a blur of teal and pink— blinking a few times in surprise. 

Michelle’s eyes follow the blur— a girl with pink converse and a board that’s an almost obnoxious shade of teal— as she dips in and out of view, skating around and into the half pipe.

Michelle watches, knowing she’s staring and profoundly not caring from how mesmerizing the girl is— short blonde hair that whips around in the wind, tan skin that’s a warm contrast to the bright white of her t-shirt. 

The thing that grabs her attention, more than the shoes or the board is the look of freedom on her face— getting a glimpse of her skating towards the other end of the park, eyes closed and glasses almost falling off her face until she opens them again and does a trick flip.

Michelle is staring and she can’t stop— her stomach doing a little swooping sensation that she actively tries to ignore, focusing instead on the blank page in front of her. 

But for as much as she tries to focus on her sketchpad she can’t— eyes drifting back up to watch on the blonde girl with pink sneakers as she skates throughout the park. 

Michelle’s always been observant. And she’s always liked finding new things to draw. 

That’s what she tells herself, at least, bringing her eyes back down to her sketchpad as she starts something new. 

Chapter Text

Michelle is watching her.

She’s always been observant, even more so now that the world doesn’t make sense.

It never made sense, at least five years and a month ago, Michelle better understood how much it didn’t make sense. Now she doesn’t even know what the rules are, much less how to break them.

It’s why watching her— teal board and pink converse— is so mesmerizing. She doesn’t know what the rules are and if she does, she doesn’t care.

The mystery girl is comfortable, content, completely unbothered.

Michelle wants to know why. 

Michelle sketches and she watches, eyes steadily taking her in as the girl skates back and forth. 

She has to be like Michael, not Blipped and comfortable in her skin, in herself, in her life. Yet there’s something different about her that Michelle can’t quite put a name to, a difference that she can’t tell is because the girl’s like her -- out of place-- or if it’s just different because Michelle doesn’t know what “normal” is anymore.

It’s enough to keep her occupied-- the girl, sketching the girl, rethinking her existence-- that when Michael finally walks back up to her blocking her light, Michelle’s annoyed.

“What?”

“You ready to go?” He asks, a conflict in his voice. Michelle recognizes the tone-- it’s hers , the authoritative kind of conversation that came from the older sibling and needing to get the younger one into place.

Michael is biologically older and taller but Michelle refuses to give up the mantle of older sister.

It’s a weird sensation.

“Um,” Michelle says, glancing back over to where the mystery girl was last only for her stomach to drop when she realizes she’s gone-- sitting up even more from the chain link fence that she’d been leaning against. She looks around, embarrassingly obvious but teal board and pink converse girl is nowhere to be found. 

“Meesh?” 

Michelle’s head snaps back up to Michael at the use of a nickname that he’d yet to use on her, concern and confusion written all over his face. 

He has a hand extended out to help her up, a metaphor right at the tip of her tongue that she tacitly ignores as she takes it.

“Yeah,” Michelle says, adjusting herself and her sketchpad as she looks around the skatepark once more. 

“Let’s go.”

The walk home is just as miserable and just as quiet, even more so because now Michelle has a mystery to solve and nothing to go on. 

Michelle’s always been observant. 

Mysteries are what keep her going, or at least they did. Murder investigations and unexplained phenomena and weird facts about the world, it’s what made the world that much more interesting five years and one month ago. It was also the one place where everyone was out of the loop, on the same page and on the same track of trying to figure out the beat in a life where Michelle always felt just a little out of sync.

The irony of her obsession isn’t lost on her. 

Michelle shoves that away, choosing a different tactic and trying to regain some kind of normalcy when she clears her throat-- Michael looking down at the sidewalk as they make their way home, probably counting the cracks in it if he’s still anything remotely close to the little brother she knew five years and a month ago. 

“What’s that girl’s name?”

Michael snaps his head up, Michelle chewing the inside of her cheek as he squints at her. 

“Who?”

“The girl,” Michelle says awkwardly, Michael just frowning as she shrugs her shoulders. “You know. At the skatepark.”

“There’s a lot of girls at the skatepark,” Michael replies, clearly confused. Michelle pinches her lips together, wondering where to go from here. He’s technically not wrong, Michelle definitely saw more than a few trying out tricks with their skateboards-- even saw a few on rollerblades going back and forth. 

It’s an accurate statement but it doesn’t help.

Not when the only girl she noticed was teal board and pink converse. 

“The one with the teal looking skateboard,” Michelle offers, hedging her bets. Michael’s a foot taller and now a year older but he’s still her little brother-- his relentless teasing when he found out about her crush on Cory James when she was in middle school being enough of a warning to never give any hint of interest to anyone unless she never wanted to hear the end of it. 

A lot has changed in five years-- for the world, for them-- but Michelle still would like to think that at least some things haven’t changed. 

She’s proven right when Michael makes a face, seeing the gears behind his eyes move as he thinks. “I don’t know. She just showed up one day. Taught me how to do a kickflip.” 

“She did? When?” Michelle asks, curious now that Michael’s not only met the mystery girl but has interacted with her-- something that clearly didn’t leave any kind of impression from the nonchalant way Michael shrugs again. 

“I don’t know.”

Michelle wants to press but she can tell from a lifetime-- save for five years-- of knowing Michael that he’s reached the end of his conversational capacity, surprised when she looks up and realizes they’re already back home. 

They walk up the steps in silence, Michael going to unlock the door of their brownstone when he pauses.

“Thanks. For coming with me today,” he says, staring at the door and not at her. 

Michelle feels a lump in her throat, a small and shameful part of her flaring up since she’d completely forgotten the point of this whole endeavor was for the two of them to try and ‘bond’ again. 

“Yeah. It was fun.”

“Yeah,” Michael says, going to twist the door open only to look at her and ask, “Going again tomorrow. You wanna… join?”

Michelle can see it then-- the briefest flash of the little boy that she used to know-- an ache in her chest and an unbearable need to bring him into her arms like she did five years and a month ago when he had a nightmare. 

There’s an earnestness in his eyes, another mystery for her to solve-- of how to bridge the gulf between her not so little brother and herself. To be the big sister to him that she isn’t in any capacity at all-- regardless of how out of place she’s feeling.

“Yeah Mikey,” she says, using the same nickname she used to and seeing the spark of something in his eyes that’s a little more familiar. “That’d be cool.”

“Cool,” he says before opening the door, Michelle following after him in silence even if her thoughts are anything but. 

“Hey.”

“Hey,” Ned says as he slides into the booth across from her, the diner serving as comfortable background noise as he looks at the menu. 

“What’s good here?”

Michelle shrugs, making a face as she studies the menu herself. “Beats me. This place was a laundromat before.”

Ned snorts, Michelle glancing up to him and seeing the smile on his face.

“Wonder if the water tastes like soap,” he says, turning his attention back to the menu. “Or like, detergent or something.”

“They’re the same thing,” Michelle counters, expecting the look of offense on Ned’s face.

“They’re different , MJ,” Ned says with a laugh, Michelle smirking at him.

“Debatable but okay,” she says, feigning interest in the menu and smiling at the way Ned laughs once more. 

It’d been his idea, to meet up. Michelle knows now that half his family was Blipped-- his dad and his little brother living through the five years while he, his mom and little sister all were gone. It was weird and exhausting, trying to keep track of everyone’s new lives and old lives and how they were all supposed to fit into it. 

At least, Michelle thought to herself, Ned’s younger siblings were still younger than him. 

If she knew Ned as well as she’d like to think she did, he wanted to meet up not cause he wanted to get away from his family but because he was missing someone else-- someone who from what all Michelle could gather was still upstate doing God knows what. 

If Peter was in trouble or what, Michelle knows Ned wouldn’t be so easy going and casual so she comforts herself with that. It doesn’t make meeting up with Ned any easier since it was always a reminder that someone else was missing. 

“We can try pancakes,” Ned says, Michelle glancing up to him. “You can’t ever go wrong with pancakes.”

Michelle feels warm all over, at the comfort and familiarity of Ned Leeds-- wanting to share food to figure out what they liked, just like the three of them used to do in Midtown’s lunch room. 

It’s one thing that hasn’t changed, another constant that she comforts herself with as she nods. 

“Yeah Leeds,” she says as he beams, “can’t go wrong with that.”

Michelle says her goodbyes to Ned and makes her way to the skatepark, backpack slung over her shoulder as she makes her there. 

She passes a few more murals, a protest about some stuff with the GRC that she makes a mental note to look up and then she’s there-- some of the same kids she saw from the day before still steadily skating as if the world hadn’t been turned upside down a month ago.

Then again, Michelle thinks as she glances around for Michael, if these were non-Blipped kids-- they were used to the whole world upside down thing. 

“Hey.” 

Michelle turns, only to short-circuit and for her eyes to widen when she sees who it is.

It’s mystery girl-- teal board, pink converse, blonde hair-- Michelle seeing now that she’s right in front of her the deep brown of her roots, the way her hair is cut and frayed as if she’d cut it herself. 

She’s mesmerizing, Michelle’s mouth growing dry as mystery girl stares at her through her wide thin-framed glasses. She has on orange earrings-- literally oranges -- Michelle blinking at her a few times as mystery girl nods.

“You skate?” 

“What?” Michelle asks, looking back down to herself and to the backpack she’s holding like a tight grip in her hands before looking back at mystery girl. 

“I saw you, the other day,” mystery girl says and Michelle thinks that she might want to just sink into the floor-- to realize that she must’ve been that obvious that she noticed her staring at her, “you don’t skate.”

“No,” Michelle says, one word responses being the only thing that she can really think about now. 

Mystery girl doesn’t seem to care as she purses her lips, shrugging as she asks, “You want to learn?” 

“Um,” Michelle says less than gracefully, only for mystery girl to turn when someone calls for her.

“GWEN! Hurry your ass up!”

Michelle looks over to the person yelling for her, someone in a beat up looking car that looks older than she is as Gwen snorts. 

“Or not,” she says with a smile-- one that sets off a flutter in Michelle’s stomach. 

“I’m Gwen,” she says.

“MJ,” Michelle offers without question, Gwen smiling at her. 

“Nice to meet you, MJ,” she says as the car horn blares across the skatepark, causing Gwen to wince.

“ GWENDOLYNE .”

“I’M COMING!” Gwen yells back, turning back to Michelle with a smirk on her face. 

“See ya.”

Michelle doesn’t even have the fortitude to respond, so thrown by Gwen-- Gwendolyne -- as she drops her skateboard down and skates over to the car.

She can’t tell from this angle who is waiting for her but Michelle already feels embarrassed that she was caught out from staring, only to be doubly surprised when Michael is suddenly next to her.

“Holy shit, what the fuck dude?” Michelle says, Michael grinning at her.

“You came,” he says, with the kind of boyish hopefulness that she thought was lost to her now-- Michelle softening as she brings a hand down. 

“Yeah Mikey, I said I would.”

He’s beaming, like he did when five years and a month ago and she snuck him out of his room to watch movies with her-- making Michelle’s chest tighten in more ways than one.

“Cool,” he says, “I’m gonna…”

“Yeah, I’ll be-- I’ll be right over there,” she says, still awkward and still figuring this thing out-- the roles of being the older sister watching her little brother play being out of date-- literally -- yet being more familiar than whatever this new dynamic was supposed to be.

She walks over back to the chain link fence that she was at before, finally glancing over her shoulder to the car that Gwen had skated to.

It was gone, as she expected.

Michelle didn’t mind all that much now.

Mystery girl had a name.

That was enough for now. 

Chapter Text

Michelle is staring up at the ceiling of her bedroom, fingers lightly tapping against her stomach. 

She can hear her parents laughing in the kitchen, the smell of the cooking causing her stomach to rumble. Michael’s in his room, like he always is now-- the appeal of wanting to be in her room having been lost sometime in the past month and five years. 

She didn’t think she’d ever miss that-- Michael constantly undertow, opening up her door and messing with her stuff and leaving-- only to laugh when she would yell at him about it. 

But she does, miss it-- just as much as she misses her old room, her old family, her old life -- looking up at the ceiling of her bedroom that isn’t the bedroom she knows. 

It doesn’t surprise her that they had to move when half the universe disappeared, the more that she read about the problems with the GRC, the more she secretly wondered if it would’ve been easier for everyone if they all had just stayed gone. 

Her mom and dad still looked at her like she was a ghost and Michael was her little brother that wasn’t little anymore and Michelle didn’t belong here-- she didn’t belong, she didn’t belong --

She snaps herself out of it with a gasp, sitting up and fingers itching. She needed to get out but she knows that she can’t-- knows that her mom would want to talk to her and her dad would want to hug her, affection that a part of Michelle desperately wants to lean into and another part wants to shove it all away. 

How can she explain to them that their very care and love is the thing that’s setting her off, that she can’t get away from the understanding that when they see her they don’t just see her but they see all that they had lost for five years-- that she struggled with how to exist in the world where she constantly she felt she had to choose back before it was cut in half, now made even more difficult when her identity was split in yet another way.

It’s conflicting and it’s impossible and it’s something Michelle knows she can’t do anything about.

So she takes a deep breath. Then another. Then another.

Michelle grabs her sketchpad and begins to draw. 

“You good?” 

“Yeah,” Michelle says with a grimace, walking with Michael towards the skatepark. “Aunt Gayle needs to relax.”

Michael laughs at that, Michelle smiling at him as he nods towards her newly braided hair. “Nah, you’re just tender headed.”

Michelle rolls her eyes, shoving him on the shoulder like she used to-- even if she has to adjust the angle since he’s taller than her-- as she says, “I’ll show you tender headed.”

Michael swats her hands away, giggling and laughing like the little boy she used to know as she grins-- the headache she has from how tightly Gayle had braided her hair. 

It’s dusk now, Michelle’s stomach grumbling and her ass hurting from having sat in the same position for hours-- knowing that if it wasn’t summer that their mom would’ve wanted them to come straight home. 

“Home by ten. No questions,” she had said, long red hair swishing back and forth and a finger pointed to them-- both Michael and Michelle holding back a laugh from the seriousness of it, sharing a glance as their cousins ran around. 

Michelle didn’t argue and neither did Michael, not when Aunt Gayle’s house wasn’t that far and they both knew that when the music started playing and the drinks started flowing that the adults would be too preoccupied with family gossip to mind the time. 

At least, they used to-- Michelle thinks as the skatepark comes into view-- surprisingly well-lit as the streetlights come on, back before everything.

She hears the whispered conversations they have in the hallway and has always been in tune with the news, learning more and more on her own time of what it must’ve been like to have lived through the Blip and now having to adjust to a world that’s different.

It’s a moment-- a small one-- that reminds Michelle that she’s not the only one adjusting to something different.

“Sketch girl!”

Michelle startles, Michael standing beside her when she looks over and sees Gwen-- beaming at her as she waves from the top of a half-pipe.

Michelle feels like a deer in headlights, awkwardly waving back as Gwen falls in and starts to skate towards them-- feeling Michael’s elbow nudge at her side.

“Is that the girl you were talking about?”

“Shut up,” Michelle whispers on instinct only to wince when she realizes that was the exact wrong thing to do from the grin on his face.

“Oh shit,” he says, Michelle making a face as his eyes widen, “you like her.”

“You’ll like how my fist feels if you keep talking,” Michelle says with no heat to it, Michael laughing her off before slowly walking away.

“Yeah, yeah, whatever Meesh,” with the kind of casualness that they’d been missing, almost like before-- Michelle feeling a little too flustered with Gwen skating right towards her to really bring any attention to it.

He dips in just as Gwen skates up, blonde hair a mess, sweat slicked across her forehead, beaming at her with a smile that takes her breath away. To add insult to injury, the injury being the stampede that’s taken residence in Michelle’s stomach, Gwen kicks up her board and takes it in hand in one fell swoop-- the cool breeze flowing through there doing nothing for the sheen of sweat she feels building across her temple and the back of her neck.

“Hey,” Gwen says with a smile, wiping at her forehead with the back of her palm. “You’re back.”

“Yeah,” Michelle says, clearing her throat. “Yeah, my brother. I come with him.”

Gwen turns to where Michelle was gesturing, nodding a few times in recognition, “Oh yeah, he’s cool.”

“He likes to think so,” Michelle says, cause it’s easier to talk about him than herself as Gwen looks back at her with a smile. “He’s still a little punk to me.”

It’s innocuous but it’s clearly enough for Gwen to be clued in-- confirming what Michelle had already suspected when Gwen gets a funny look in her eye. 

“You were Blipped.”

It’s a statement, not a question-- one that Michelle responds to with a nod. 

“He wasn’t?” She asks, probing and invasive and far too personal for someone she barely knows-- small talk that didn’t feel like small talk when it was talking about her family. 

But Michelle doesn’t feel like barely knows Gwen, not for as much as she’s watched her and sketched her as she shakes her head in reply.

Gwen clicks her teeth together, still breathing heavy from the exertion of having skated around. “Sucks dude. Sorry.”

Michelle laughs, making Gwen smile brighter when she asks, “Yeah. Sucks.”

“I get it. Kinda,” Gwen says with a shrug. “I’m out here with my dad for the summer.” 

“Oh,” Michelle says, cause she didn’t ask for more information about her and yet she wants to know every and anything Gwen wants to tell her as she Gwen continues, “He was Blipped. Got emotional about missing out on my life or whatever.” 

Gwen snorts, rolling her eyes. “Not like he cared before but I guess seeing your eleven-year-old suddenly have boobs is traumatic.”

Michelle laughs again, doubling over slightly as Gwen joins in-- awkward and fun and a familiarity between them that makes her instantly like her. 

Gwen bites her lip, nodding towards Michelle as she says, “Your hair’s nice.”

“Thanks,” Michelle says as Gwen frowns, messing with some of the strands that she has of her own. 

“My dad lost his shit when I dyed my hair.”

“I like it,” Michelle blurts out, the stampede taking over once more from the way Gwen smiles at her.

“Thanks.”

Michelle bites the inside of her cheek, wanting to continue the conversation but unsure of where to go next-- only for Gwen to take the lead when she asks, “So. You want to skate?” 

“What?”

Gwen brings up her board, Michelle catching a graffit’d version of Spider-Man on it that makes her stomach flip for a different reason, “You want to learn? You said you didn’t skate before.”

“I don’t,” Michelle says, Gwen’s earnest expression on her face making her mouth go dry as she smiles.

“I can teach you,” Gwen says in a rush, the first indication to Michelle that maybe Gwen’s just as nervous as she is-- something that she doesn’t put a lot of thought into.

Not when she’s been overthinking everything about her life, herself and her world for so long. 

“Okay,” Michelle says with a smile-- Gwen still beaming at her.

“Cool.” 

Just like that, Michelle becomes friends with Gwendolyne Maxine Stacy.

Which is her name, one of the many things that she learns about her in the weeks that follow-- of who Gwen is, where she’s from, what she likes and dislikes, and what brought her to Queens in the first place.

Like that she has a thing for earrings, specifically weird ones-- giggling to her one day as she described the look on her aunt’s face-- her dad’s sister, who they’re both staying with cause he doesn’t have an apartment anymore and who was the one yelling at her to leave cause she doesn’t like skating or Gwen skating or maybe even Gwen-- when she wore eggplant shaped ones. 

“She should be glad I’m sticking to food,” Gwen said with a wink that made Michelle’s cheeks warm, almost as much as Gwen holding her hand did as she helped her skate around the park. 

She learned that Gwen was born in Ranipet, a small city right outside of Chennai-- adopted when she was two years old by two people who shouldn’t have had kids to begin with. She learned that Gwen adored her parents but adored them better apart, glad when they finally called it quits when she was in third grade and her mom moved the two of them to Los Angeles. 

She learned that Gwen understood what it was like to be a part of two different worlds, long before the universe was snapped in half-- sharing ice cream and identity crises as the summer sun beat down on them. 

She learned that Gwen liked skating but she liked dancing more-- that she stopped when the Blip happened and her ballet teacher disappeared right in front of her eyes, a trauma that Michelle was beginning to understand was just as disorienting for the Blipped kids from the haunted expression on her face. 

She learned how to skate-- slowly but steadily-- tacitly avoiding Michael’s teasing, only to be glad that he was teasing her at all. 

It was warm and it was fun and it made summer feel all that much more comfortable and familiar-- even if Gwen was frustratingly intent on making sure that of all the things that she learned from her, that skating would be the most important.

“You can do this.”

“I can,” Michelle argues as Gwen glares at her, “I’m not.”

“MJ.”

“Gwen.” 

They stare at each other, Gwen squinting before reaching for her hand. Michelle takes it without question, quieting the butterflies in her gut as Gwen helps her back up on the board. 

“You’ll never learn if you don’t try.”

“I don’t want to learn, so I don’t have to try,” Michelle says even as she steps on the board, looking back over to where Gwen wants her to drop in. 

“Come on scaredy cat,” Gwen says with a laugh, dropping her hand only for Michelle to feel like she can’t breathe when Gwen gently rests her hands on her hips. 

“Lean forward, just like I taught you,” she says, Michelle staying quiet and trying very hard to focus on not falling and not on the fact that Gwen’s hands are on her-- warm and gentle and making Michelle feel like she could faint. 

She doesn’t because if she could survive an embarrassing crush on Peter Parker long enough to actually become his friend, she could survive Gwen’s hands on her guiding along as she skated with the hot summer sun beating down on them. 

Michelle’s beginning to question that though when Michelle finally freaks-- stuttering slightly as she tenses up right. 

“Okay, okay, okay. Don’t worry about it,” Gwen easily soothes, “we can try again later.”

Michelle grimaces, stepping off the board and looking back to Gwen who is sweating buckets and still impossibly looking just as pretty as the day Michelle first saw her.

“Do you have a hair tie that I can borrow?” Gwen asks, Michelle nodding.

“Yeah, uh. Here you go,” she says, taking one off her arm that she keeps as a reflex and handing it to her.

“Thanks!” Gwen says, pulling the strands of her hair up. Her hair isn’t long enough to fully be put in a ponytail but it’s enough that when she turns around to kick up her board, Michelle sees that she has an undercut-- the tomato earrings that she’s wearing dangling as Gwen tightens the ponytail.

Fuck , Michelle thinks as her mouth goes dry-- Gwen looking back at her with a funny expression on her face.

“You okay?”

“Yeah,” Michelle says, voice embarrassingly cracking, “Yeah, just. Sorry.”

“It’s fine,” Gwen says with a shrug, “we can try again.”

Michelle just nods because she doesn’t trust herself to not say anything stupid like ‘of course’ and ‘you’re really pretty’ and ‘I think I like you’ when she’s saved by the buzzing of her phone-- head snapping down as she digs into her pocket. 

She takes her phone out, stomach dropping in a different way when she sees Ned’s name flash across the screen and reads the message as it pops up.

Peter’s back.

Chapter Text

It’s awkward.

It’s awkward because it’s been two months and five years since they’ve all been together. It’s awkward because Peter is clearly struggling-- clamped up and wringing his hands together as they watch a movie in he and May’s new apartment, her and Ned sandwiched in on either side of him.

It’s awkward because Michelle knows something that they don’t know that she does-- that Ned desperately wants to talk about with him and that Peter clearly needs to talk about but neither of them will because she’s not supposed to know.

Michelle has lived with awkwardness, a lifetime of it even before the lifetime that all three of them missed out on when the world kept spinning without them-- grabbing the remote and turning the television off.

“What--” Peter asks, Ned looking over at her as Michelle puts the remote down.

“Are we going to talk about this?” 

Ned tenses up a little, eyes growing wide and taking on a slant that she recognizes-- Peter stiffening slightly as he asks, “Talk about what?”

Michelle chews on the inside of her cheek, debating for a second before plowing forward, “About where you’ve been for the past month.”

“He was upstate,” Ned is quick to say because he’s a good friend and he’s trying to help Peter out-- but Michelle likes to believe that she knows them well enough, knows Peter well enough to see that this isn’t something that they can just gloss over. 

“Upstate with the Avengers?” She blurts out because there’s no point in beating up around the bushes, Peter sitting straight up as Ned’s eyes get wide as saucers.

“What? I-- no. No, why would I be--”

“Because you’re Spider-Man,” Michelle says with a certainty that she’s only sixty-seven percent sure of, a certainty that grows from the look on both of their faces.

“I’m not-- I’m-- that’s not --”

“I mean it’s kind of obvious,” Michelle says, a small voice in the back of her mind whispering that maybe this wasn’t the smartest thing but the more curious part of her propelling her forward anyway. “Washington? Homecoming? The fact that Spider-Man’s been missing for five years and didn’t show up again until last week?”

When you and May got back into the city goes unsaid but Peter sees it anyway-- pressing his lips together as Ned makes a valiant effort to save the conversation. 

“Maybe Spider-Man was just really busy. He was Blipped, or we think. Who knows? I mean does anyone--”

“Ned, it’s okay,” Peter says with a sigh, one that causes his shoulders to slump and that makes him look a lot older that what he is. 

He looks back over to her, rubbing his hands together. “I’m Spider-Man.”

“I know,” Michelle says, repositioning herself on the couch. “And I’m not saying you have to tell me everything but…”

She trails off, cause she hadn’t thought this far-- only to think of something Gwen had said once at the skatepark.

“I’m here, if you want to talk about it. I just… I just didn’t want you to think you couldn’t.” 

Peter’s eyes soften at that, searching her face and holding her gaze before he nods.

“Thanks MJ,” he says, voice thick as he tries to smile-- only for it to look more like a grimace. 

Michelle nods again, a wave of love for him and for Ned who’s leaning forward-- throwing his arms around Peter who laughs.

“Oh thank God , she knows. I was so tired of holding it all in, dude.”

Peter laughs and he awkwardly hugs Ned back, Ned motioning for her to join in. 

“Bring it in, MJ.”

Michelle rolls her eyes but does anyway, Peter repositioning himself to hug the both of them-- forming a little huddle and feeling his warmth against her and the smell of his shampoo. 

It was so achingly familiar, in a way that Michelle hasn’t felt in a very long time-- choosing to believe that’s why she feels a lump in her throat as they squeeze each other tighter.

The world was different, it always was going to be. 

At least some things didn’t have to change. 

“So how’s your friend?”

Michelle looks over at her, Gwen still staring up at the sky. It’s nearing sunset and the asphalt has cooled considerably, both long having given up on trying to teach Michelle how to skate today. 

The skatepark’s relatively quiet, Michael flirting with a girl on rollerblades that Michelle cannot wait to tease him about on their walk home as Gwen continues, “Peter right?”

“You remember?” 

Gwen finally turns back over to her, Michelle feeling like her heart’s leapt up to her throat at the way Gwen softly smiles back at her.

“Well yeah,” she says as if that’s not the most perfectly devastating thing for her to hear. “I remember everything you tell me.” 

It’s devastating because so does Michelle-- the more time that passes and the closer that she gets to this impossible, mystery, magnet of a girl the more she begins to dread getting closer to her. 

Cause she is-- Gwen’s her friend. She’s pretty and she’s fun and she’s someone who just instantly seems to understand what it’s like to live in a split world, to be split across two different cultures and people and now actually split in half like the rest of the universe is. 

But Gwen’s also split from her life-- or will be-- never forgetting that she’s only here for the summer and that there’s an expiration date to the two of them.

Not that there is a two of them, Michelle clearing her throat as she replies, “That’s creepy.”

“I’m observant,” Gwen says with a wink, Michelle snorting as she looks back up into the sky. 

“He’s okay,” Michelle answers honestly, thinking of the last time they met up for pizza just the two of them. Ned had game night with his family and Michelle thought it would be awkward, just her and Peter, right up until they met up-- falling back together with a familiarity that she so desperately craved and hadn’t realized how much she missed until she was back in it. 

It was conflicting and a little stupid because she’s had a crush on Peter Parker since she was fourteen years old. They were friends, he was one of her best friends she thinks and they were dead for five years and she knows his secret now. 

But Michelle’s also feeling things for the girl lying beside her that she knows that she can’t, only because the things that she feels for her are too big and too wide and too consuming for what Michelle already knows has an end date. 

For as much as she overthinks almost everything about her world and her existence and everything about the life that she has now, this is one thing that Michelle is determined to not think about it at all as she amends, “He’ll be okay.” 

“Yeah he will,” Gwen says easily, Michelle looking back at her to see the confidence in her eyes and the certainty in her gaze as she stares at Gwen-- butterflies taking over once more. 

“He’s got you.”

Michelle is skimming her fingers across her sketchpad, rain lightly tapping outside of her room.

It’s been pouring down rain for days now, holed up in the apartment that still doesn’t feel like home but she’s desperately trying to. 

BUZZ . 

Michelle glances over to her phone, smiling when she sees Gwen’s name across the screen and reads the message asking her how she’s doing. 

MJ [2:39pm]: bored. You?

The text bubbles fly across the screen almost immediately, Michelle smiling at her phone as Gwen’s reply comes in. 

Gwendy [2:39pm]: same. think my aunt leslie has lost it. she found my banana earrings and somehow they’re worse than the eggplants.

Michelle snorts, replying back to her only for her door to swing open.

She looks up to see Michael bursting open, staring at her with a blank expression on his face.

“What?” She asks, Michael just staring at her before breaking out into a smile as he shrugs.

“Nothing,” he says with a grin, “what’s up with you?”

Michelle furrows her eyebrows together before saying, “You came into my room.” 

“And?” 

Michelle scoffs, grabbing a pillow to throw it at him.

“Get out,” she says, only slightly annoyed when Michael does what he’s told-- annoyance ticking up slightly when he leaves her door open. 

Michelle sighs, leaning back on her bed only to laugh to herself. 

It was annoying, he was being annoying. But Michelle knew him well enough to see that it was his way of signaling that things were looking better between them. That things could be better between them. 

He was still her annoying little brother in her mind, if not in practice. He was older than her, he was gonna graduate high school before her, he’d lived through hell for five years without her-- moving from being the youngest kid to the only. 

But Michelle had changed his diapers, Michelle had been the one to hold him tight during his nightmares and cuddle with him on the couch during thunderstorms just like this one. 

Nothing-- not even five years and two months apart-- could change that. 

BUZZ.

Gwendy [2:40pm]: if i dont show up next week then you know who took me out. maybe i’ll be on those crime docs you like

Michelle snorts, quickly tapping out a reply.

MJ [2:40pm]: crime docs are only about white women

Michelle laughs out loud when Gwen sends her a gif of a yelling white woman, followed with a reply of her own.

Gwendy [2:41pm]: tru. damn mj. 

MJ [2:41pm]: truth hurts stacy. 

Gwen sends another gif back, followed by emojis that don’t make sense but that Michelle doesn’t care to decipher-- feeling light and warm and like she’s still basking in the sun even as the storm outside rails on. 

Michelle has given up on learning how to skate. 

Gwen tries, it’s cute how much she tries-- but it’s not gonna happen. 

She still shows up at the skatepark though, to hang out with Michael and Gwen and more of his friends. 

Michael likes Gwen, something that Michelle hadn’t even realized she needed until she saw the look of approval on his face when Gwen launched into some debate about longboards vs. shortboards that she completely lost track of. 

Gwen’s fun like that, easily relatable and able to pick up on any number of topics-- a skill that Michelle envies for how fluidly she’s able to switch gears. 

It’s not an envy that burns or even one that stays, too enamored with the way her hair flits across her face when she’s deep in conversation or the way her lips twist together when she’s thinking-- the way she becomes someone else entirely when she’s skating. 

It’s something that she tries desperately to capture in her sketchbook, something to hold on to and keep forever when Gwen goes back to California. 

She wants to give it to her-- something of the two of them -- but also for herself, debating back and forth whether or not she’s just thinking there’s something there when it isn’t.

Michelle is used to being the observant one and used to being the one with the unrequited crush. 

It’s something that’s familiar to her, no matter how painful it is. 

“When are you bringing your friends over?”

“What?” Michelle asks, sketching a snippet of Gwen’s skateboard as Gwen stretches out her legs. 

“Your nerd friends,” she says lightly. Michelle knows Gwen now and can hear… something in her voice. “I mean, if they don’t wanna come that’s fine but…”

“I haven’t uh, I haven’t invited them yet,” she says, looking up and seeing Gwen’s face take on a complicated expression.

“Oh.”

“It’s just not really their… thing, you know?” She says, feeling a little desperate even if she knows she shouldn’t. It’s not that she hasn’t thought about it or that her mom hadn’t even suggested it. 

But to do so would be to bring Peter and Ned into something that was strictly hers. Gwen and the skatepark-- it existed in another dimension, as if they’d found a little pocket of time and space just for them.

It was objectively untrue, the smattering of elementary school kids who were currently occupying the half pipe that Gwen is avoiding right now being proof positive of that. But it still felt like theirs. 

It was new. And Peter and Ned, despite how much she loved them, were part of the before-- part of her old self that was only old by virtue of having been left behind five years ago-- that she wasn’t sure how to blend together just yet. 

“It’s not really yours either,” Gwen says kindly, smiling encouragingly as Michelle feels something in her chest tighten. “You still come.”

“Yeah,” Michelle says, holding Gwen’s gaze for maybe a beat too long.

It’s a test, a hint-- one that makes Gwen’s lips twitch and makes Michelle’s stomach twist once more from the way her eyes look down. 

“I think they’d like it. You should invite them,” she says with all the certainty and confidence that only Gwen Stacy seemed to possess-- Michelle laughing as Gwen moved to stand. 

“Well if that’s decided.”

“It is,” Gwen says with a wink and Michelle thinks she might have forgotten how to breathe because of it-- sticking her tongue out instead. 

Gwen shoots her the finger, grabbing her board and saying something under her breath about conquering some fifth graders but Michelle’s mind is racing-- thinking of the possibility of bringing Peter and Ned and Gwen all together. 

It’s a possibility that she keeps thinking about, eyes glazing over as she stares at the sketch of Gwen’s board-- an unease flowing over her that she can’t explain. 

Chapter Text

To her surprise, Peter and Ned jump at the offer. 

“You’ve been skateboarding ? Holy shit, MJ that’s the coolest thing you’ve ever done,” Ned said over pizza, Michelle laughing as Peter grins at her.

“I’m not actually skateboarding,” she clarifies, “Gwen’s tried to teach me but--”

“Gwen?” Peter asks because of course he does. Because Peter Parker hasn’t met a person that he’s not eager to get to know or to watch out for. 

“Yeah,” Michelle says, “she’s cool. She’s from California.” 

“Gnarly bro,” Ned says with exaggeration as the three of them laugh, Michelle rolling her eyes. 

“ Do not say that in front of her,” she warns, Ned snickering as Peter grins. 

“Well be on our best behavior, MJ. Promise.”

“I doubt that,” she replies easily, only for her stomach to twist around again into knots at the idea of them actually all meeting.

It’s a feeling that doesn’t go away when the day finally comes-- Gwen having left the city for a wedding for a weekend and another freak thunderstorm pushing back the day they were going to meet up. 

Michelle doesn’t believe in signs from the universe but she does begin to question whether or not this was something that was actually supposed to happen-- nervous and twitchy and picking at the edge of her braids until Michael has to physically make her stop.

“Calm down. They’re gonna love your girlfriend.”

“She’s not my girlfriend,” Michelle whispers furiously to him, especially since Gwen is walking right up to them.

“Right,” he says under his breath, laughing as Gwen smiles-- this time wearing pineapple earrings. 

“Where they at?”

“Probably late,” Michelle says, shrugging. “Peter is incapable of being on time and Ned won’t want him to look bad.”

Gwen snorts, Michelle grinning at the sound.

“Sounds like a good guy.”

“He is,” she says, Michael launching into a discussion about her board without preamble once more. 

They’re so taken with the conversation that Michelle allows herself the chance to distance, scanning around and getting more and more nervous as time passes.

She shouldn’t be nervous. There’s no reason to be nervous. But she is-- a nervousness that doesn’t go away when Peter and Ned finally come into view.

“MJ!” Ned calls out, waving as they walk up to them-- Michelle seeing Gwen perk up out of the corner of her eye. 

“Hey,” she says as the two of them walk up to her, Peter’s eyes traveling from her, to Michael and finally landing on Gwen. 

“So you’re the famous Peter Parker and Ned Leeds,” Gwen says with an easygoing smile, Peter laughing a little.

An unfamiliar feeling passes through her-- a twinge of something in her gut at seeing the way the two of them look at each other, only for Peter to say, “and you’re the famous Gwen Stacy. We’ve heard a lot about you.”

“It’s not true and I didn’t do it,” Gwen says seriously, only to break out into a smile when both Ned and Peter laugh. 

She sends Michelle a look just then, a look that strikes her in the chest for how honest it is-- the flash of something that Michelle hadn’t been able to put a name to until right this moment. 

It’s a question, the explanation for her nervousness-- the eager and fervent hope that they would get along. 

It’s something that Michelle can see in that moment that Gwen was feeling too, as if she was seeking recognition and acceptance in a way that’s so foreign to how Michelle perceives Gwen.

“I’ll keep that in mind,” Peter says easily, only for his face to go a little pale when he sees Gwen’s board. 

Michelle’s eyes flit down and she sees the graffit’d version of Spider-Man-- Spider- Gwen , as Gwen had described.

Before Michelle can make a joke or change the subject, Gwen seems to notice the way his eyes travel down to his board before saying, “You got something against spidey?”

“What?” Peter squeaks out, Ned glancing at Michelle in alarm.

“You look like you want to hurl,” Gwen says bluntly, almost looking defensive as she clutches her board closer to her. “You don’t like spidey or something?”

“Uh, no. I uh, no,” Peter says awkwardly, Michael now looking confused as he makes a face at Michelle.

What’s his problem? Michael seems to ask. A question Michelle can’t answer. She might know Peter’s secret— and he knows she knows— but it still isn’t her secret to tell. 

“I know the Avengers bullshit is, well. Bullshit,” Gwen says before Michelle can redirect the situation. “But spidey’s cool. Thought you New Yorkers liked him.”

“We do. I do, I think he’s great,” Ned says so that Peter can get some color back into his cheeks. “You got the colors wrong though.”

“Maybe Spider-Man’s colors need a change,” Gwen replies with a laugh, Peter smirking at her and looking at Michelle knowingly. 

“Maybe he does,” he says, shrugging. “Couldn’t hurt.”

Gwen snickers, bringing her board down. “Yeah, guess not.” 

It’s awkward for all of five seconds before Michael cuts in-- Michelle being pleasantly surprised that he does as he says, “Okay. Well, now that we’ve gotten that done. You guys wanna skate?” 

“I brought my rollerblades,” Ned says with a smile-- Michelle thanking the universe and whoever else was out there that even if half the universe had been gone and that the world was turned upside down, that there’s the consistency in knowing that Ned Leeds would always be prepared. 

“Cool dude. Let’s go,” Michael says as if he’s the older one, a dynamic that doesn’t seem to phase Ned probably because he didn’t really know him-- before. 

Peter goes to follow after Ned, smiling at Michelle then nodding to Gwen. 

“It’s nice to meet you,” he says meaningfully, sharing a glance with Michelle as Gwen waves. 

“You too, dude.”

They walk with Michael, presumably so that Peter can bum off a skateboard from one of his friends. 

“Well,” Gwen says, “you were right.”

Michelle looks over to her, seeing the smirk on her face.

“Not really their thing huh?”

Michelle laughs and laughs and laughs. 

Despite it’s awkward beginnings, it turns out okay-- hanging out together. 

Peter’s Spider-Man and yet absolutely terrible on a skateboard, horrifically unathletic for a person who could throw a bus with his bare hands. Ned fares much better, being a better student than Michelle has been all summer as he rollerblades with Gwen-- the two of them tag teaming to go in and out of the pipes. 

Peter and Michelle are sitting on the edge, knee to knee and watching them skate together as Michael skates across from them. 

“She’s really cool,” Peter says, Michelle looking back to him.

“Yeah, she is,” Michelle replies, seeing something in his face then that she can’t quite read. She chooses not to, looking back over to Gwen, Ned and Michael-- only to see Gwen staring at the two of them. 

The butterflies are back in full force, taking up all this space and all her oxygen that she feels like she can’t breathe. 

Gwen looks unsure of herself, in a way that she doesn’t think she’s ever seen before. It’s a feeling that Michelle doesn’t care for-- to see Gwen look that way and one that she immediately wants to fix, even if she doesn’t know what the cause is.

At least, so she tells herself. 

Peter has to leave before the rest of them do-- both Ned and Michelle sharing a glance at knowing what the alert on his phone means. 

Ned leaves with him, just to make sure that he gets there okay-- the sun beginning to set and Michelle’s stomach rumbling with the knowledge that their dad was barbequing. 

Michelle knows that they also should leave soon, especially if they want to get there before all the good pieces are taken by some of her cousins-- putting her stuff into her backpack when Michael comes up to her.

“What are you doing?” He asks, Michelle frowning as she looks up to him.

“What do you mean what am I doing? We gotta go,” she says, zipping up her backpack and moving to stand.

“Where’s Gwen?” He asks and Michelle immediately stands up straighter, seeing the teasing in his eyes.

“Bathroom.”

Michael snickers, nodding towards her before saying “So are you gonna ask her to be your girlfriend or…?”

“ Michael ,” Michelle admonishes with all the fury that an older sister can give, only to frown at the realization that it didn’t work any more now than it did when she was his older sister as he grins.

“What? I know you want to. She wants you to. Shit, think even Peter and Ned want you to.”

“Peter talked about her?” Michelle asks, Michael giving her a smug smile. 

“He talked about you ,” Michael says simply, the thought occurring to her that to Peter and Ned, Michael wasn’t just her kid brother but was just one of the guys. “Talked about how happy you looked.”

“Oh,” Michelle says, unsure of how she feels about that. Michael, being her brother and older and far more intuitive than she’s been willing to give him credit for gives her an amused look. 

“It’s not hard to see, Meesh,” he says gently, almost placatingly. It would be more soothing if it wasn’t an immediate reminder of how much their roles have reversed as he continues, “You’re more like you when you’re around her.”

Michelle doesn’t know how to respond to that but Michael doesn’t seem to be looking for an answer, kicking up his skateboard and shrugging. 

“I’m gonna head to Aunt Gayle’s. Don’t be too late. You know mom.”

“Yeah,” Michelle says, still reeling from the realization that her not so little brother was so easily able to see right past her. He nudges her shoulder as he goes to leave, looking meaningfully into her eyes. 

“We’re good right?”

Michelle smiles, hearing the trace of the little boy she used to know in his voice. Here he is, giving her advice about a girl, encouraging her and teasing her all at the same time-- and still wanting her acceptance. 

“Yeah Mikey,” she says softly, seeing the smile on his face, “we’re good.”

He laughs, shoving her a little more before he turns to leave-- Michelle watching him as he goes. 

Michelle had never been particularly great at getting close to people, not when she had all the people she needed within her family. The thought that her own family was at odds with her, or at least so she seemed to think, made Michelle feel unmoored-- the idea that she couldn’t feel at peace within her own home making her wonder if she’ll ever be able to find it. 

A summer of skateboarding, of Gwen, of hanging out with her big-little brother and Michelle doesn’t feel any more grounded in the world that she’s been snapped back into. 

What she does feel is grateful, watching Michael until he disappears out of sight, that she can at least count on the fact that she’s not the only one still figuring this thing out-- and that just like before, she’ll have at least someone to try and navigate this new world with her. 

“You leaving?”

Michelle turns, surprised and taken off guard at Gwen arriving so quickly.

“Yeah, I uh, dinner’s almost ready,” she says, feeling awkward and sweaty now-- a feeling only exacerbated by the look on Gwen’s face. 

“Cool. Um, your friends are nice,” she says, tapping her fingers against her board. “Blipped huh?”

“Yeah,” Michelle says, slinging her backpack over her shoulder. “Can you tell?”

Gwen shrugs, Michelle seeing the tension in her eyes as she says, “Sixth sense.” 

She laughs at that, only for it to fall flat when Gwen just looks at her with an expression she can’t quite read. 

“Peter’s nice.”

Michelle doesn’t say anything, seeing the storm building behind Gwen’s eyes. “I can see why you-- why you guys are friends.”

“Yeah.”

It feels awkward, so terribly and horrifyingly awkward that Michelle wants the ground to swallow her up whole-- not because Gwen is talking about Peter but because Gwen is so damn perceptive to know why she didn’t want to bring Peter around. 

For the longest crush you’ve had to be noticed by the crush you currently have hadn’t been something Michelle wanted to explain, only for now to be embarrassingly obvious to both of them. 

“It’s good, that you got good people,” Gwen says, a smile on her face that Michelle can see she’s trying very much to mean. “There’s a lot of kids that are moving around, back home. I don’t even know if I’ll even be going to the same school, with everything.”

“That sucks.”

“Yeah,” Gwen says, shifting her weight back and forth. “You know, just life I guess.”

And it’s that-- the unease and unsettled and conflict written across Gwen’s face that tells Michelle in unequivocal terms that the feelings that she’s had aren’t unrequited. That Gwen isn’t bringing up Peter as a point of jealousy because Gwen likes her, but more that Gwen likes her enough to see the facts for what it is.

That Peter will be here when Gwen is gone. That Peter understands what it’s like to be Blipped when Gwen does not. 

That Peter is a person that’s significant to Michelle, especially for as much as she was reluctant to introduce them. 

Michelle sees that so easily written all over Gwen’s face and it hits her-- how much that profoundly doesn’t matter. 

Peter is one of her best friends, her longest crush, a person she used to daydream about for years before even more years got taken away from her.

But Gwen-- smart, funny and breathtaking Gwen-- is the girl that’s captured who Michelle is now , who sees her and understands her and makes her feel alive in this brand new world. 

It’s that recognition and moment and fit of raw emotion that propels her forward, pressing her lips against Gwen’s quickly before leaning back-- adrenaline flowing through her veins at the surprised expression on her face.

Gwen blinks, Michelle having a millisecond to wonder if she made a colossal mistake only for that to be thrown out of the window when Gwen drops her board and rushes forward-- taking Michelle’s head in her hands and kissing her fully on the mouth, a kiss that Michelle closes her eyes and leans into.

Her lips taste like the strawberry lip balm that she knows Gwen uses, Michelle’s stomach doing a flip when she pulls Gwen closer-- inhaling sharply as Michelle tugs at her waist. 

She doesn’t have a lot of experience with kissing but she thinks Gwen might be her best, noses bumping into each other and fingers pulling at her until Gwen finally brings her hands down-- Michelle feeling out of breath and shell-shocked.

“Wow,” Gwen says with a huff, laughing as Michelle takes a step back-- keenly aware now that they’re still in the middle of the skatepark rather than in their own little world like she’d felt.

“Yeah, wow,” Michelle replies, licking her lips and tasting the strawberry balm all over again.

“So. You like me?” Gwen asks with a smile, Michelle grinning at her as she shrugs. 

“Damn Stacy. Kiss a girl once and she thinks you like her,” Michelle jokes, Gwen’s eyebrow raising. 

“You kissed me twice.”

“No,” Michelle says, taking a step forward. “Kissed you once. You kissed me the second time.” 

Gwen gets closer to her again, a fluttery feeling in the pit of Michelle’s stomach as she does. 

“Might have to kiss you again then,” she says, eyes half-lidded and a smile on her face. 

Michelle takes her hand, squeezing gently and bridging the gap between them.

In that moment, it doesn’t matter that Gwen is leaving or that the summer is almost over. In that moment, it doesn’t matter that Michelle doesn’t know how she’s going to fit in with her family or her friends or her life . 

All that matters is the feel of Gwen’s hands in hers, the taste of her strawberry lip balm and the way that Michelle feels as she pulls Gwen in closer. 

When their lips meet for a third time, Michelle feels as if there’s nothing else in the world or the universe.

Just her. 

Just Gwen. 

And for once, Michelle starts to believe everything else will be alright.