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Gym. The one uniting enemy of every single kid in high schools across the country. The only lesson in which teachers seemed to get away with the physical torture of kids under the guise that kids should be taught to keep fit and enjoy sport. Seriously, who thought that it was a good idea to put a group of sweaty, acne-ridden teens together in a room and expect them to not bully each other into the ground? It was supposedly done to 'bring teens together', and 'encourage healthy competition'.
Bullshit.
The only competition Peter had seen the rest of his class actually actively take part in was the holy sport of dodgeball; an excuse to pumell the rest of your class with foam rocks without getting a detention, and that wasn't exactly the healthiest thing - you were lucky if you got out of there with just one or two bruises. Unfortunately, that year, Peter had been put with seemingly the only gym teacher in the school that hadn't yet died of old age or had a nevous breakdown - working at Midtown definitely couldn't have been the dream job for anyone. Saying that the guy didn't give a shit was an understatement. They had so far had 4 gym lessons that year (Peter's senior year timetable blessed him with one ray of hope - they only had gym an hour a week), all of which had been, yep, you guessed it - dodgeball. Something that Peter had noticed, however, was that Alec seemed to conveniently dissapear before every lesson, and materialise in the next without a word of explaination.
In the four weeks after the whole staring debacle went down, Alec and Peter had struck up something of a companionship - Peter didn't yet know much about A,etc, just that he'd moved to New York a month and a half ago, and that he had the prettiest eyes, but he also knew that the boy was kind, and had listened when Peter and Ned talked his ears off about some new Star Wars creation. The boy clearly had some secrets; there was still so much he didn't talk about. Peter had still yet to solve the mystery behind Alec's bruises, or why he always seemed to skip gym, but he was beginning to open up to the two friends, and, if anything, he seemed a little happier when he was around the boys than he had been in his first two weeks of school. If that was all he got from the boy, then Peter would have been happy.
It was sort of amazing how quickly it all went down the drain.
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Another Tuesday, another torturous gym class. Peter's Tuesday morning had been going a little better than usual, however; his biology professor had forgotten to ask for the assignment Peter had yet to start, his English professor (the evil witch, as Ned had coined her on the first day of term) had been away with painful constipation (serves the old bat right) and he'd run into Alec on his way to their shared gym class, jumping straight into a debate on which was the best Star Wars movie. They'd spent the entire walk laughing and giggling to themselves, until they came in front of the changing room, where Alec seemed to stop in his tracks, the smile thoroughly fading from his face. Peter quickly nudged him, not liking the sit of his friend looks quite so distressed.
"What's up?" he questioned. Alec opened his mouth to reply, but like a sweaty, overweight beacon of doom, the gym teacher's voice shouted from behind the two boys.
"Hunt! Parker!"
They both slowly turned to see the old man, dressed in his usual, too-small tracksuit, waddling across the corridor towards them. The colour seemed to drain from Alec's face at this, earning a concerned look from Peter.
"Parker, you get in there and get changed," he said in a gruff tone by the time his short legs had sidled across the corridor. "Hunt, you ain't goin' nowhere."
Alec seemed to gain back some control of his vocal cords at that, and muttered out a small "but-"
"I ain't fallin' for no more excuses, get in there and change like everyone else. "
By this point, almost everyone in the corridor was looking to Alec, including Peter, who had chosen to ignore the professor's previous instruction. Over the first few weeks of term, Alec had gained a reputation for standing up to his professors, and in fact other students, who questioned him; he'd managed to make at least half of the school and faculty scared of him - the other half just hated him. At this point, though, he seemed to have lost the ability to speak - whatever it was that had stopped him from doing gym the past few weeks clearly had him so scared that even the thought of stepping inside the room had him nervous. Before he could retort, the professor pushed them both inside the room.
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As soon as Alec was inside of the room, he had turned around in an attempt to escape. Peter noticed that he had clung to the strap of his newly acquired backpack as if his life depended on it, turning his knuckles white. Before he could walk out, though, a voice came from behind them.
"Hey, new kid! Finally decided to join us!"
Fucking. Flash. As soon as Peter heard his snarky voice ringing out from the other side of the changing room, he knew this couldn't possibly end well.
"Come on, Flash, just leave him alone," Peter retorted in Alec's defence. At his words, the boys behind Flash, who Peter recognised as Flash's obnoxious cronies, all started laughing amongst each other. At this, Alec whirled around, coming straight up to Flash to stand him off - Alec seemed to have mastered the act of hiding his fears, as the only clue as to how afraid he possibly could have been in that moment was in his stark white knuckles gripping his bag.
"Leave. Me. Alone."
"Oh yeah? And why should I do that," he smirked cockily and leaned in to whisper in Alec's ear. It was only in this moment that Peter wished he didn't have his enhanced hearing, as he heard the next word that Flash uttered out as clear as day.
Tr***y.
All of the fake confidence that had once masked Alec's face disappeared in a second. His breathing began to quicken - almost as quickly as Peter's heart was racing. What the fuck was going on.
Somehow Alec managed to mutter out a weak "What?" Just loud enough for Flash to have heard it.
"Well, new kid, you're so quiet! And, obviously it was just the polite thing to do to get to know Midtown's resident Brit kid, so, naturally, we had to do some digging," Flash's friends all shared his arrogant little smirk from behind as he continued.
"And, when it came to giving you a little search, the only thing we found, was a lovely little girl by the name of Ellie. Pretty name, don't you think, Penis?"
At the call of Peter's nickname, he was brought out of his head. Anger flared up inside him - he'd known for a long time now that Flash was a bully, but this had just gone too far.
"Fuck off, Flash, leave him alone." He gripped his hands into fists, willing himself not to loose control - any show of power here could have easily given away his secret identity, which was not something he was willing to admit to his classmates under any circumstance.
"Erm, him? Think you need to get your eyes checked, Penis."
"Too far, Flash, leave Alec alone."
"Alec, huh? You sure about that?"
Alec jumped in himself, still staring at the ground in shame. "Fuck. Off."
There was a sudden lull in the conversation - the atmosphere in the room as electric, as if something was about ready to burst. Everything lay almost still, tense, until Flash uttered out, "Well, we just wanted to check."
The horror of what those words could have actually meant for Alec hit Peter just a fraction of a second too late, by which time, Flash had already pulled at and ripped the boy's shirt, leaving him completely shirtless in front of a room of gaping boys. He wore a tight, clearly worn white binder over his chest, and the edges of scars and scratch marks could just be seen peeking over the edge of his arms as he quickly crossed them over his chest. For a minute, everything was totally still, everyone in the room still slightly in shock by the revelation. Soon, though, Alec seemed to regain his ease and his breath seemed to leave him. Gasping desperately, he bolted from the room. Before running after the boy, Peter launched himself at Flash, landing a strong fist right into the centre of his face, sending him falling backwards into his now-not-so-smug cronies. After watching Flash fall, satisfaction spearing through his chest, he sprinted from the room, armed with his own hoodie, and ran in the direction of Alec's pounding footsteps.
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Fortunately for Alec, the boys' bathroom stood just a door or two down from the changing room, where he was probably still laughing along with his friends. As soon as he pushed through the door, thanking whatever gods were listening that there was no one else in the bathroom, Alec threw himself into the first cubicle and locked the door behind him. He immediately collapsed to the floor, his breaths already coming in sharp gasps. Flash knew, he'd found out one of the secrets that Alec had been so desperate to keep when he came to Midtown - too many memories of past cruelties haunted him too often to trust people that easily. He couldn't risk anyone finding out - he'd known if Peter or Ned ever found out they'd scamper, and now they both knew. They both knew how wrong he was, how he'd been lying to them about everything. God, Alec couldn't handle this - he'd known coming here was a mistake. His breathing was already rapidly out of control, and he could feel his power crackling at the tips of his fingers. Everything just felt so wrong and out of place, it felt like his ribs were about a second from caving in, and he couldn't help but think that he shouldn't be here, he shouldn't have come to New York, he shouldn't have-
"Alec?"
Peter's soft, concerned voice rang out through the bathroom, cutting through Alec's haze. Alec had no hope of responding, and wasn't quite sure in his head whether he actually wanted Peter to see him like this - something in him, however, was screaming for the pretty boy to just come and make things better, if only Alec could just say-
"Hey, listen to me - j-just try and take some deep breaths, okay? Can you unlock the door? I brought you a hoodie."
So Peter didn't completely hate him then. He shakily reached up a hand to slide the bolt across, before curling back in on himself, trying desperately to hide his shame from Peter, scrunching his eyes shut to avoid the disappointment on the boy's face. Of course, he only brought him the hoodie out of pity - why would anyone actually want to help him? He was just a weird, disgusting t-
He was interrupted by the feeling of a soft, warm hoodie that smelled so delightfully like Peter being draped across his shoulders and pulled across him. Suddenly, it stopped shifting, and Alec felt a soft touch on his wrist, which, up until now, hadn't felt as tender as it did at Peter's touch. Strange.
"Oh God, Alec."
At that, Alec managed to open his eyes just a crack to glimpse what Peter was so shocked by, and immediately forced them shut again in shame. At some point between the changing room and Peter coming, he'd managed to scratch long, bloody lines into his arms - a long standing bad habit as a result of his frustration. God, he was seriously messed up, and he hated that Peter had to see that. He wished that maybe, had Peter become his friend just a few weeks later, when everything was under control, Alec could have been the practiced, better version of himself. Everything could have been better, easier, if only-
"Alec, can you hear me?"
While Alec had evidently been burying himself in his own self pity, Peter, ever the selfless gentleman, had been attempting to talk to him. Alec took a shaky breath, forcing words out of his mouth.
"I-I'm s-s-sorry."
Peter immediately took in a sharp breath. "You have nothing to apologise for, okay? Just take some deep breaths, we'll figure this out."
"We?"
Alec realised quite how condescending that made him sound just as it had slipped past his mouth. He hurried to correct himself. "T-thought y-you'd be run-running for the hills b-by now."
"What, because you're trans?"
Alec immediately flinched at the honesty in his voice. Before Peter, no-one had stayed after he'd made that confession, except for just one, and everyone knew the man had already seen enough to question a lost young trans kid. Peter didn't have to stay, and Alec had no right to ask him to.
"Alec, I don't care." Alec took a sharp intake of breath at the words. "Seriously, I don't care if you're trans, it doesn't change anything - you're still my friend, okay?"
At that, Alec completely broke down, giving up the pretence of not craving Peter's comfort and collapsing into his outstretched arms. The next few minutes were spent exactly like that - with Alec clinging on to Peter for dear life, and Peter whispering gentle words into Alec's ear. After Alec's breathing had calmed to a near regular rate, he whispered a careful 'thank you' into Peter's ear, and they both pulled away. Alec, however, noticed that Peter still had that concerned look on his face, and was still looking at Alec's wrists.
"I, uh," Alec stuttered. "I'm sorry you had to see me like that." Before Peter could say anything else, Alec jumped straight back into his explanation. "I don't usually - It doesn't usually happen, just when I'm stressed." Peter nodded slowly, still obviously concerned.
"You'll need to make sure it - um, heals okay, right?" He stuttered, obviously out of his depth, but desperate to show that he cared.
"I'll keep an eye on it." Alec smiled a little.
"A-and, um, you c-can come to me, if you ever-"
"Thank you." Alec replied, desperate to save Peter the embarrassment. "N-no one's ever cared this much."
"I'm sorry. B-but I guess now you've got me." Peter smiled carefully, and Alec just pulled Peter's hoodie more firmly around himself. Peter giggled at that (God, that sound was the cutest, he couldn't help but think).
"You can keep that, if you want. Looks better on you anyway."
If Alec blushed at that, well, no one else had to know.