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Jeff can tell when his wife is pissed.
It’s an art he’s learned over the years. She has her tells, some of them subtle - slightly widened eyes, a crease between her eyebrows, a moment of silence before Jeff knows she’s going to absolutely explode.
She’s not being subtle right now.
Sometimes it’s because of him, though he tries to keep those times to a minimum. Sometimes it’s because of work, or her extended family being pushy, or because a mild inconvenience happened to her after a day of mild inconveniences lumped together and that’s when it’s his cue to step in and soothe her.
Sometimes, it’s because of Miles.
This is definitely one of those times.
Vinny has turned the music back up, and their families and friends are back to making light chatter. Most of them are politely pretending that they didn’t hear what just went down, but a couple of their more shameless family members are very obviously gossiping. Rio, however, is pacing - another tell. Her arms are crossed and her eyebrows furrowed, and she continues to stalk the same two feet of the roof.
Definitely time to step in. “Mi amor,” he begins, laying a comforting hand on her forearm. “It’s okay.”
“It’s not, though, is it?” Rio snaps immediately, her eyes flicking up to meet his. “That wasn’t good, Jeff.”
Jeff sighs. “Okay, we- I could’ve handled that better,” he admits. “But it will be okay. There’s just something going on with him, but we’ll - we’ll figure it out.”
“When, though?” Rio questions again, and now he looks closer, the expression on her face isn’t just angry. There’s something else there too, something closer to despair, or desperation. “There’s been something going on with him for months and we - we still haven’t figured it out. When are we going to?”
Jeff’s heart breaks a little, and he pulls Rio into a hug. “I don’t know,” he murmurs, not caring which guests are seeing them now. “But we will. I just know it. You’re the most amazing mom he could ask for, and I do okay myself.” He chuckles. “He just - he ain’t ready to talk yet, clearly. I didn’t like his disrespect, but we can’t force him if he isn’t ready, either.”
“I’m worried,” Rio mumbles into his shoulder. “I know we should give him time, but he really…” She breaks their hug to look into his eyes once more. “We gave him a window to tell us what’s up and it was like he just… couldn’t. Do you think-“ her gaze shifts down- “do you think he’s scared to talk to us?”
These are the questions that have been plaguing him too. The moment he asked - okay, yelled - at Miles to open up and say what he had to say just a few moments ago runs through his mind. “Maybe I could have been a little gentler with asking him,” he says. “But maybe he is scared. That’s not the end of the world, though, right? You were never scared to talk to your parents about something when you were his age?”
Finally, a smile graces Rio’s features. It’s always wonderful to see one on her, and doubly so right now. “Okay, that’s true. I was scared to tell them about you even when I was five years older than him.” The smile disappears, though, as Rio pauses. Then she says quietly; “But what if it’s something really big, Jeff? Something he’s so scared to talk about that he never will? Something that we made him feel he couldn’t talk about to us?”
Suddenly, Jeff gets the sense that he and Rio aren’t quite on the same page; that maybe they haven’t been this whole conversation. “Are you… are you thinking of something specific?”
Rio’s hands tightening around the small of his back are all the confirmation he needs. “Okay, maybe this is just me overthinking it, but…” She takes in a deep breath. “What if he’s gay?”
Okay, not what he expected to come out Rio’s mouth. “I’m sorry?”
“I mean it,” Rio says. “He’s - it’s like he’s in a different world now, like he’s hiding a whole, massive part of himself. And that would definitely be something he wouldn’t want to say in front of the whole family.”
Jeff’s brain is slowly catching up, and he sees what Rio’s saying. “That makes sense. But that’s not - he isn’t really, is he?”
He doesn’t consider himself to be a homophobic man. It’s just - well, you never expect your own kid to be gay, do you? Unless there are obvious signs, and there haven’t been for Miles. Sure, he’d have no problem with a gay kid - probably - but Miles is fifteen now, and Jeff has been assuming he’s going to grow up and meet a girl and marry her and have kids together because that’s what everyone does. Unless they’re gay. Which Miles might be, according to Rio.
Yeah, his brain is still catching up.
“Well, I don’t know!” Rio replies. “But I just - it would make sense, wouldn’t it? The lying, the sneaking off, the refusal to talk to us…”
Jeff raises a hand to his chin as he pulls Rio closer with his other arm. “It wouldn’t explain everything,” he replies. “I mean, what does him being… gay have to do with him missing his college talk? Or this party? Are you saying he has a secret boyfriend or something?”
“Maybe?” Rio says, confusion and frustration clear in her voice. “I don’t know, Jeff, I’m just trying to work out what’s going on with our son. It’s hard.” She looks up at him. “We’d support him, though, right?”
“I mean, he’s still grounded, but yeah,” Jeff replies. “Baby, you know if you’re right, this would be a shock for me. I’m an old man. It would take me some time to adjust to. We didn’t exactly include this in our talk with him a couple years back.”
“I didn’t think I’d hear you calling yourself old anytime soon,” Rio says, a slight laugh in her voice.
Jeff waves a hand. “You know what I mean. My point is - even though I’m still mad at his attitude, and it would take some getting used to if you’re right… he’s our son. I love him. We’re together on that.” He leans down and presses a kiss to her forehead.
When he pulls back, Rio is smiling at him gratefully. “Yeah.” She takes his hand in hers. “Though, we should probably go and talk to him again before I make any more assumptions.” With a look, she adds: “Gently, this time.”
Jeff has the decency to look a little sheepish. “You got it. You take the lead though, I think he’s more willing to talk to you than to me right now.”
“Okay,” Rio says, “but don’t discredit yourself fully.” The two of them begin to walk through the party, and Rio finds one of her sisters, pulling her aside to let her know that she and Jeff are just gonna head out for a little while.
After Rio reassures her sister multiple times that everything’s fine, they’re finally on their way, walking down the stairwell of their apartment block. It’s a quiet, reflective journey, with both of them knowing that whatever they could say to each other now will be best left for when they’re together with Miles.
When they make it to their apartment, Rio gives herself a moment to breathe in and out. Jeff reaches for her hand. And hands interlocked, they walk to Miles’s room.
“Miles?” Rio says, knocking on the door. “Your dad is ready to listen now…”
No answer. Rio turns to give him a frown. He tries to return a reassuring smile.
She pushes open the door, and the next few moments play out in slow, clear steps for Jeff.
Miles’s room is a mess - half his wardrobe and most of his possessions are scattered across the floor like he hasn’t cleaned the place in months, or he just intentionally messed it up in the last five minutes.
Miles isn’t on his bed.
What is on his bed, though, is a sweater. One that doesn’t belong to him. One that Jeff would say absolutely belongs to a girl.
As Rio picks up the sweater, Jeff turns away in incredulity. This kid.
“That’s three months!”
Rio is not a perfect woman. She doesn’t always get things right. And as she stands side by side with her husband and looks up at her son awkwardly flirting with a girl, she has to admit that this may be one of those times.
Jeff is a wonderful man who isn’t saying a word about her clearly massive misassumption, instead choosing to nod or shake his head as she glares daggers and makes disapproving comments about Gwanda. Gwanda. What kind of name-
“I’m going up there,” she announces.
Jeff gives her a look. “Are you sure-”
“I need to talk to her, at least!” Rio snaps. “If this is the girl he’s been sneaking around with behind our backs this whole time, I need to see who she is. And let him know that we’re still mad and he’s grounded for three months now,” she adds, looking at Jeff.
Her husband sighs. “Right. I’ll be up there in a minute.”
It doesn’t take her long to climb up to the small section of the roof Gwanda and Miles are on. When she gets near, she can see Gwanda reach out to snatch something back from Miles, him apologising, and then the two of them give each other little glances before shifting closer together. Oh, not on her watch. She takes that as her cue to pop up and join in.
“Helloooooo!”
She thinks she hears Miles say ‘Oh, boy’, which, rude, but her attention is then taken by Gwanda, who is beaming up at her with an only slightly forced smile. “Rio! Hi! I’ve heard so much about you!”
Oh, she’s doing first names. Okay, then. That’s how it is.
Two can play at that game, though, and Rio holds out the sweater she’d found in Miles’s room as she hears Jeff join them behind her. What follows is a very awkward conversation, which is thankfully cut short by Gwanda bailing out with some terrible excuses and lying.
Hm. Maybe Rio and Jeff aren’t the only ones not getting the whole truth from someone they care about.
When Gwanda leaves, Miles gives them one look in the corner of his eye before leaning onto the railing, putting his head in his hands with a broken sigh.
And for a moment, all the anger in Rio melts away.
Jeff gives her a nod, and makes his way out. Rio breathes in. This is her one, now.
It’s agonising, seeing Miles struggling with something, and doubly so when she can tell it’s something he thinks he can’t share with her. Maybe she was off the mark with thinking he might be gay, but it’s something, and she aches to know what’s hurting her little boy.
At Miles’s invitation, she hesitantly makes her way closer, leaning on the railing with him. Even as she joins him, he doesn’t make eye contact, shoulders hunched as he keeps looking down at New York below them.
“I hope you know you can tell me anything,” she gently pushes, watching his eyes slide over to her. “There are no lies between us,” she adds in Spanish, and that causes him to almost flinch.
His thumbs anxiously tap at his skin, before reaching down to pull at the fabric of whatever undershirt he’s wearing beneath his many layers. “Well…” he begins, before going quiet for a long while.
She looks at him imploringly, giving him the time he needs to speak while trying to communicate wordlessly how she will love him and support him, whatever he says. She can see the battle on his face as he continues. “I’m…”
With how nervous he seems, Rio begins to wonder if her guess from before really was so off the mark, even with the introduction of Gwanda. Maybe they are just friends. Maybe Miles needs her to be here as his mom, needs to know that Rio truly means it when she says he can tell her anything.
She’s tense, waiting for what Miles is going to finish his sentence with. But then his face crumples, and he goes back to hunching over the railing. “I’m sorry I was late,” he mumbles.
Oh. He still doesn’t think he can trust me, Rio numbly realises, leaning forward onto the railing herself.
Maybe they failed, her and Jeff. They must have, for Miles’s face to look so miserable and torn now.
All she can do, really, is encourage Miles to be who he is, whoever that is, and to go out into the world. To trust that even if he feels he can’t talk to her right now, there are other people out there who he knows love him.
And hopefully, that will be enough.
“Go,” she says eventually, smiling to herself as Miles’s head shoots up. “She seems like a nice girl.”
As she watches him leave, she hopes that one day in the future he will understand that he can come to her with anything, and it would never stop her loving him.
“You nervous?” Gwen asks Miles, as they sit on the roof of his apartment block.
“Of course,” Miles replies, picking at the threads of his sweater. He’s been thinking about this for months, ever since questions started appearing in his mind and a few chats with Gwen and Hobie sorted out his feelings. “I don’t think there’s anything you can do to make me not nervous, sorry.”
Gwen reaches over to give his hand a squeeze. “I get it,” she tells him. “Believe me, I was shaking when it came to telling my dad. But Peter had my back then, and I’ll be right up here for you.”
“Thanks,” Miles replies. “It means the world to me, you know.”
Gwen simply squeezes his hand again, as if to say yes, I do know.
“It’s just,” Miles continues, “It’s not like they’re gonna kick me out or anything, but what if they just don’t accept this part of me? What if they just try to ignore it? What if this is the exception to when they’ve told me I could tell them anything and they’d still love me?”
“I wish I could guarantee their acceptance for you,” Gwen says, “but I do know your parents, Miles. They are kind, accepting people. They’ve accepted me as your girlfriend - every part of me. That’s quite something.”
“You’ve got a point,” Miles replies, sinking into her shoulder. She lets go of his hand to bring her arm around his back. “It’s just different when it’s their own kid, isn’t it?”
“It is,” Gwen admits, “but if my old fashioned dad could go into service with a trans flag on his police uniform, I don’t think you have too much to worry about with your parents.”
“Alright, that’s another good point,” Miles concedes, extracting himself from Gwen’s arm. He stands up, looking down at her. “I think I’m gonna go for it. Before I get too nervous.”
“Good luck,” Gwen smiles at him, and the encouragement and pride openly on her face makes his confidence grow.
He swings down to his window, climbing into his room. Once he shuts the window behind him, he can hear the voices of his parents, quietly chatting in the living room. It’s a Saturday, both of them are off work, and this is supposed to be a regular, relaxing afternoon.
Too bad he’s about to disrupt that.
Get a grip, he tells himself, at the same time. You really think you telling them this is gonna be more shocking than you turning out to be Spiderman?
And yeah, that voice inside his head is probably right. His parents took weeks to recover from that discovery - he doesn’t think he’s ever gonna top it.
For a while, they didn’t accept him being Spiderman, either. Didn’t want to accept their son being in that much danger, especially with how much damage Spot had done. But over time, they realised that their son was Spiderman, and they just had to let him go out there and do his thing. Be himself.
Not without a curfew, though. He remembers that one time Jess had tried to call him for a mission at one in the morning and his mom had picked up the watch and told her that Miles had a very important test the next morning, thank you very much.
So, yeah, the whole Spiderman reveal went pretty well, in the end. And given that, Gwen’s words make even more sense. What does he seriously have to worry about now when his parents are cool with him being a vigilante superhero?
With that last thought, he takes a deep breath and pushes open his bedroom door.
When he makes it to the living room, both his parents are on the sofa, watching TV. They look up when they see him, though, his dad leaning forward to pause whatever show it is.
“Hey, Miles,” his mom says. “Back from your date with Gwen?”
“Uh, yeah,” Miles replies. “She had to head back to her dimension to grab a few things. But would it be okay if she stayed around for dinner?”
“I was thinking she might anyway,” his mom replies, smiling. “Tell her it’s completely fine.”
“Okay. Thanks,” Miles says gratefully, before realising he has no idea how to segue this into the conversation he wants to have.
Before they unpause the TV show, though, his dad gives him a Look. “Are you alright? You look a bit tense.”
“Me? No, I’m fine,” Miles says, the lie coming out of him almost instinctively. Which is kinda messed up. He shakes his head. “There is… something I wanna talk to you guys about, though.”
Both of them are on alert at that, his mom’s expression turning to a frown and his dad straightening his posture. But then, they both shuffle over, leaving room for him to sit down between them on the sofa, like he’s a little kid again. It’s comforting.
“So… you know how me and Gwen are dating?” he begins.
His mom laughs, giving him a pat on the shoulder. “Yeah, we figured that one out already, mijo.”
Miles wants to laugh too, but he just swallows. “Well, uh. Obviously, she wasn’t my first ever crush, y’know. I’d liked other people before, too.”
Over the top of his head, he sees something flick across his mom’s face, and he swears she can see him nod at his dad. He’s gonna take that as a good sign, even though his stomach is twisting up with nerves.
“And some of those people…” he continues, taking a deep breath, “some of those people were girls. But not, um. Not all of them.”
His parents don’t say anything. Either they’re disgusted, or they’re letting him say his piece. Unable to work up the courage to look at them, Miles keeps talking.
“I didn’t think much of it at the time, I didn’t even realise they were crushes. I haven’t been intentionally hiding this for years, or anything,” he promises. “It’s only over the last few months that I’ve realised what any of it meant.”
Another deep breath, his hands twisting together. “What I’m trying to say is that… I’m bisexual. I like girls, I like Gwen, a whole lot, but I like boys too.” He lifts his head, scared to see what the reaction to his words will be. He realises he’s turned towards his dad automatically.
His dad’s expression isn’t one of hate, or anger, or anything similar. Mild surprise, if Miles had to define it as anything. His dad clears his throat. “Well, um - you know, when you were trying to work out how to tell us you were Spiderman, your mother thought you might actually be gay.”
“Huh?” Now Miles shifts around to his mom, who’s looking at him with a slightly amused smile. Something in him relaxes, realising that these aren’t bad reactions. He said it, and everything’s okay. Even if he is a bit baffled now.
“Jeff, you weren’t supposed to say that!” his mom laughs, before taking one of Miles’s hands in both of hers. “It was at that party. Before… everything.” Before Spot almost killing his dad and them learning he was Spiderman, she means. “When you seemed so scared to talk to us, I just… assumed.”
Miles ducks his head. “Well, uh… I guess you were kinda right. Sorry for not mentioning this either earlier.”
“Miles, look at me,” his mom asks, and he lifts his gaze to meet her eyes. They’re full of the same warmth she’s directed his way for as long as he can remember, and seeing that that warmth hasn’t disappeared is beyond comforting. “Of course I want you to tell me things. Of course I want you to come to me with anything important. But I want you to do so when you’re ready.” She lifts a hand to cup his face. “I don’t mind that you took a while to figure this out, or that you’re only coming to us now. You’re my son and I love you, and nothing will change that.”
He can feel tears pricking at his eyes now, and he blinks to get rid of them. “Thanks, Mom.” Leaning back on the sofa, he glances at his dad again. “So you guys - you’re really okay with this?”
His dad gives him his own smile. “I mean, I’m a little shocked, since I kind of discarded what your mother said before the minute I saw you with Gwen. But clearly, I have a lot more to learn about this stuff. I’m - we’re here for you, though, alright? You’re never not gonna make us proud.”
Miles thinks he mumbles out another thank you, barely hearing himself over how his own mind is singing in relief. It’s okay, they accept you, everything’s okay, they accept you.
His mom tugs him into a proper hug, and Miles melts into it as the show on TV is unpaused. He barely processes the moving figures on the screen, his skin still buzzing with the euphoric joy of being loved for all that he is and all he will be.
He doesn’t know how long it is later when his watch buzzes. Hobie implemented a messaging system on their watches with Peni’s help, and he can take a good guess at who’s just sent him a text.
Gwen <3: U okay? Did it go well?
A smile rises on Miles’s face as he replies.
Miles: It went amazing, Gwen.
Miles: And btw, you’re invited to dinner.
With that, he settles back against the sofa, his heart full.