Chapter Text
It is possible that Peter didn't think the whole mass memory wipe thing through.
No one remembers him—not the government, not the banks. He'd found that out the hard way, numbly trying to buy a coffee on the way home from ruining his own damn life, only to find his wallet bereft of ID or a Debit card. He'd broken into Aunt May's house that night and cried himself to sleep on her bed, since his room no longer fucking existed. He'd felt like a true piece of shit raiding the rainy day fund she kept tucked in her closet. It was enough to rent him the grubbiest apartment in all of New York, but he'd needed a landlord who was willing to overlook his lack of identification. That was the same quality he'd had to look for in a boss a few days later.
And so, Peter Parker set about rebuilding a life from something less than ashes.
*
Mr. Hilevich is the epitome of a crotchety old man. He sits chain-smoking on a stool near the cash register, grunting at boxes and crates and making impatient noises. Peter is 90 percent certain the guy speaks English, but he doesn't deign to speak it to Peter, so it is hard to say for sure.
Stocking shelves in the little bodega is mind numbing work, but Peter is paid in cash, and receives enough to keep the rodent-infested roof over his head, and ramen in the cupboards.
What else can he do? He has no school record, no résumé, no references. His past is a void and the loneliness gnaws his heart out day by miserable day.
He patrols at night; for hours he patrols, until his very bones ache, until his cartridges run dry and he collapses onto his creaky futon and passes out for a few scant hours.
He visits MJ only once more.
“Peter Parker,” she says, grinning, when he comes in. She remembers his bizarre introduction, but she doesn't remember him. He buys coffee. He tips. He leaves.
It makes things worse, he thinks.
He considers jumping ship, making his way to DC to join forces with the remnants of The Avengers, but he's already sacrificed his whole life, does he have to sacrifice his city, too?
And so the months pass. It's summer and he sees MJ holding hands with a guy he doesn't know through the window of the café, and she looks happy—happy and laughing and beautiful and most of all, safe. Safe in a way she never had been, never would be with him.
He tells himself it is for the best, but the loss is a physical blow, a caving in of his centre, a sinkhole that leaves him gasping from the viscerality of it.
The next time he passes the café, he doesn't see her there at all.
It's autumn, and she is not in the city, and Peter feels his heart beat out a hollow rhythm in his chest.
He bothers Dr. Strange from time to time. The sorcerer only knows him as Spider-Man, but he has a lab in a pocket dimension that Peter can tinker in, restocking his cartridges, sketching out potential improvements. He helps people. The memory wipe seems to have taken care of the whole Mysterio death switch thing and Spider-Man is beloved again, savior of New York. It's not nothing, he tries to convince himself.
He celebrates his birthday alone. He buys himself a cupcake on a whim, but it’s grainy and overly dense, and he immediately regrets wasting the money. He tries to remember the last time somebody touched him.
It's winter again.