Gwen Stacy

It was the sad puppy eyes that got her. Every time. The nervous guy with the brown hair and big eyes who always looked at Gwen like he knew her. He had a way of suddenly looking sad when she caught him staring, and it killed her. In ways that Gwen refused to dwell on, it made her hurt and made her want to fix it. But she had no clue how to start. So she started with avoiding him when she could

He was a regular at her coffee shop where she worked, so there was some difficulty there. Especially when she was working. But she kept the conversations light and superficial. Short. Nothing too exciting. But a part of her, deep down where she told herself it was easy to ignore, wanted exciting. It wanted more than the two minute chats they had, that part of her insisting that more would be so much better and do so much for those massive gaps in her that she woke up with one day.

Her spider senses refused to let her, however. Not when she could hear how his heartbeat changed when they saw each other, or the way his smile changed when it was directed at her. It felt right to see, and so familiar that it scared her because she had no idea who he was except Peter, Black Coffee.

Let it never be said, however, that Gwen let something scare her for long. Her fear always motivated her to figure out a problem. She refused to let it chase her away from something her intuition told her was good, and her intuition insisted loudly that Peter was a very good thing, indeed. A needed thing. A part of her she wasn't aware was missing entirely.

So, on the way to class at Julliard one day, her ballet shoes hanging from her backpack and her school hoodie zipped up against the cold of New Yorks winter, Gwen purposefully missed the bus. She'd spotted Peter through the window of Delmars III, seated at a table as he ate a sandwich and read a book and Gwen in her work-out attire and messy ballet bun was feeling bolder than usual.

The owners greeted her with their usual "Miss Rogers, honey! Your usual?!" and Gwen nodded, before heading right to Peter, setting her backpack on the ground near his table, turning a chair around backwards and sitting down. Arms folded across the top of the chair, eyes trained fully on Peter's face. This is a look of determination. This is a look that, Unbeknownst to Gwen, he's seen more times than she was even aware of.

Gwen Stacy has made a decision, and like hell was she going to let anything get in her way until she hit some kind of resolution.

"So, other than Beans and Books, where do I know you from? Because you always look at me like you've known me forever, but all I know of you is how you like your coffee and what breakfast sandwich you like best. Start talking."

Oh, boy. She's in a mood right now, isn't she?

Gwen wasn't supposed to be back from Wakanda for another three months. That's what she and Shuri estimated. She was being tutored out there. She was training. She was healing and she and Shuri were doing their best to get her memories back.

She kept in touch with Peter. Facetime calls practically daily unless whatever she and Shuri were doing to get her memories back made her tired. And she hated to admit it, but those days made her so tired, and there were far too many of them that she wants to think about.

But one day, it happened. Gwen's memories flooded back within a week and she was ready to go home. It was hard to keep this exciting news from Peter, but she wanted to tell him face to face. So, at the end of the school year, she flew home.

She was sure he'd think of the radio silence as just another time Gwen was worn out beyond belief, and with that knowledge, she decided to casually swing by the apartment he shared with May.

Literally swing by. She knows he's home, she's been staking out his apartment for an hour and saw him come home from running errands for May.

So Gwen decides to wait on the fire escape right outside his room.

Her Same Hat sense is purring at her, she's sure his is, too. She's just gonna wait for him to notice her.

A late-night showing of Nightmare on Elm Street was the perfect date. Gwen wasn't exactly fond of horror films, but she was with Daniel. They spent more time trying to not crack up at the others reactions, and a decent amount of time kissing during the film, that Gwen wasn't sure either of them really watched Freddy murder anyone. Holding Daniels hand as they walked back to the car, enjoying the quiet of the town at almost one AM, had also been really great.

But in Gwens experience, good things come to an end. And this ending was the end of a lot. It was the end of Gwen trying to live a normal life, it was the end of Gwen keeping a pretty major secret from her best friend.

And Gwen was sure it was the end of the shortest relationship she'd ever been in. Ever. Not that Gwen had a lot of experience with that. She's had a handful of romantic relationships in her time. But this one was nice. Danny was amazing. She cared so deeply for him that when the man with the knife stole her backpack and threatened them both, it was Ghost-Spider that reacted.

That man was a threat. That man was a danger. He had to be stopped.

So while the man ran across the street to the darkened park, Gwen followed. And she followed fast. Supernaturally fast. Not that she was going to beat The Flash in any races, but it was enough to catch up to the guy.

Now, Gwen wore her webshooters everywhere out of habit. They stayed tucked away under the long sleeves of the shirts and hoodies she wore and for all that anyone cared, they looked like watches.

But watches don't have a pad that flips out to rest in the palm of her hand, and they don't shoot strings of webbing when the pad is pushed.

It's just a few short moments after that, a quick kick here, a fast punch there, Gwen dodging knife-swing after knife-swing with twists and jumps that defy gravity and human mobility, all influenced by both her years as a dancer and years learning Karate before grabbing the mans hand and taking the knife out. Throwing it at the sidewalk with such ferocity that it snaps. Leaving the guy webbed to a tree and then it hits Gwen.

She should have let her backpack go. Now she's probably fucked everything up entirely. Now there are three people in this universe that know about her abilities, and honestly if Danny wasn't scared away by that, she'd be surprised.

So she stands on the sidewalk, clutching her backpack tight and staring at the knocked-out and very drunk mugger (and thank God he's hammered, because no one would believe what happened to him), afraid to look anywhere else because she's pretty sure Daniel took off running.