Be Careful What You Ask For (Closed to Peter)

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Liz walked numbly through the Inn after having spoken with Emma. It was as if her body were on autopilot as her mind couldn't really focus or process anything directly. What it all meant, how she felt, if she was around to see it happen - these questions were like vague fog in her mind that she couldn't quite grasp.

She thought, ever so briefly, that she might find herself in front of Kitty or Piotr's door, but it was Peter's door she came to a stop at. Liz swayed a little as she stood there, staring blankly at the door. She did that for a good five minutes before she was able to will herself to lift her hand and knock. It was a quiet two rap knock.

When the door opened, when she lay eyes on Peter, the numbness seemed to ebb a little. She stared at him silently, then slowly her face began to twist and contort as anguish spread through her features. She didn't move an inch except for her face. Everything suddenly felt intense and Liz stood there, stiff, and started to cry unabashedly. Cried with every fiber of her being.

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[st_arkintern]

When Liz emerges, Peter is sitting cross-legged on the bed, wearing a dressed in a t-shirt and another pair of drawstring shorts. Normally, he'd just sleep in a shirt and his boxers, but it felt weird to fall asleep with just that with Liz in his room.

The dirty clothes that were on the floor have been tossed into a hamper, along with the clothes he was wearing earlier in the day.

Peter smiles back, pushes himself off the bed and reaches for one of Liz's hands.

Then leads her to bed.

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She still didn't know why it felt so different, but it did. It had to be that it was Peter's room, right? Still, Liz was strangely nervous and was glad that Peter came to get her.

Liz smiled, following him to the bed quietly. She wondered if he felt nervous too, but he probably wasn't over thinking it like she was.

She slid tentatively into bed. The pillows smelled like Peter. It was grounding and her smile warmed again.

[st_arkintern]

Peter pushed out of the bed as Liz climbed in. He was nervous, too, but he didn't really know why; it wasn't like they hadn't slept together before.

"You want me to adjust the thermostat?" he asks, though he's already headed there now.

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She offered a small smile, small only because she felt silly for being nervous.

"Um, I'm okay." You'll probably keep me warm enough - the thought pushed itself in without her meaning to and she ducked her head to hide an upcoming blush.

[st_arkintern]

"Okay."

Peter crawls back onto his bed, then presses his lips together.

"Did you need a water or anything?"

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She suddenly let out a soft sort of giggle on and exhale. "I'm okay, I promise."

Liz reached out to take his arm in hers and suddenly the moment of giggles was gone again and replaced with nerves.

"I don't know why, but I feel nervous." She blushed, embarrassed by the admission.

[st_arkintern]

Peter crawls under the covers then rolls over onto his side so he can still see Liz's face.

"I get it," he says. "It's kinda weird staying in someone else's room."

He knows that from experience.

"Nervous about anything in particular?"

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She slid into the covers and went on her side, too, facing Peter. "I don't think so.... Maybe I'm just overwhelmed a little." Liz smiled warmly. "This is the first time I've been in a boys bed and not the other way around." Somehow that was different. "And everything sort of smells like you and it's... Really nice."

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Peter feels a sudden burst of self-consciousness; he hopes he smells okay. He's pretty sure that she wouldn't say that it was really nice if he smelled bad, though.

"We can sleep in your room if you want."

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She shook her head perhaps a little more quickly than would be a normal response. "No. No... I like it here. It's.. it feels safe."

Liz smiled again and then scooted forward, kissing him slow and soft and warm. She felt her chest flutter and had to work against the urge she felt to press herself against him and kiss him some more.

She pulled back her head, her lips tugging naturally against his own. "You make me feel safe." She smiled to him, then slowly she turned over and in a moment of boldness, reached for Peter's arm and guided it over her body.

[st_arkintern]

Peter smiles. He smiles so much around Liz that it makes his face hurt. When Liz shifts his arm across her body, he doesn't protest or withdraw. He just leaves it there because it's comfortable there. It was if that's where his arm belonged, like two puzzle pieces snapping neatly together.

"I'm glad you feel safe," he tells her, because he is. He always wants her to feel safe around him.

Peter closes his eyes for a second; even with Liz functioning as a distraction, it's becoming more and more difficult to resist the lull of sleep.

"You're really pretty, Liz," he says sleepily.

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Every time they slept together, Liz finally understood why people liked to sleep in the same bed all the time. Sure, she had had sleep overs with Maria, but this was different, and not just because Maria flailed around in her sleep.

She smiled at his compliment. Peter had a habit of making her feel pretty.

Liz could feel Peter's body get pulled into sleep. She could hear his breathing slow. Normally this would help her fall asleep too - it certainly had after the roof incident and the day after when he surprised to by staying the night again. This time, though, Liz couldn't feel the draw just yet. She stared out into the darkness and when she was certain Peter was asleep, she let herself quietly cry again.

Eventually sleep overcame Liz and she fell asleep encased in Peter's arm. Sometime in the middle of the night, Liz dreamed.

In her dreams, Liz was standing in the middle of Time Square.

The scene was familiar.

People walked this way and that way around her, all on a mission and all ignored her for they had places to be. She spun in circle and called out for Peter, but there were too many people, too many cars, and her voice wasn't loud enough. And then everyone walking around them paused, like some sort of massive tableau, and the world went silent. In front of her was Peter, standing several feet away on one of the street corners. He was staring at her silently. He calmly called her name and she started to move to him, but she heard her name again. She turned where her feet seemed glued and there was Max on the other corner with the same calm expression on his face.

Before when she had these dreams, and she had them fairly often, she had never been able to move. She never picked a side.

Liz looked at both of them. Before she could move, Max and Peter were suddenly standing closer. And then from behind Max, Tess seemed to appear, smug and pregnant. Max turned to Tess and lovingly placed a hand on Tess' pregnant belly.

"Max, how could you?" Liz mumbled in her sleep, her voice still pained even though it was riddled with sleep.

Max didn't seem to respond to her question. He leaned in to kiss Tess and Liz felt her heart break.

She gasped for air softly.


Liz took an angry step in his direction and he lifted his arm and sent a blast of energy at her. Liz went flying back violently.

Liz's muscles tensed as she jerked back a little, Peter's body cushioning the blow.

She didn't hit the street lamp like she should have. Liz opened her eyes and Peter held her in his arms, smiling down at her. 'You okay Liz?' Liz nodded.

She looked at him and he smiled, leaning down to kiss her while she leaned up to kiss him, but their lips didn't meet since Peter's head snapped back out in front of him and suddenly Peter was in his Spider-Man outfit without the mask and he shot a web out to help them avoid a blast from Max.

Max didn't look like he was going to give up, even if he remained where he was and Tess was by her side. He looked at Liz and his voice said, 'I love you.'

Liz felt a rush go through her and she climbed out of Peter's arms. "No Max. No you don't. If you loved me you wouldn't have slept with her. You always hurt me, somehow. I can't anymore. I'm in love with Peter. He's the one. You're not."

In her sleep Liz mumbled, "No Max...You always hurt me....I'm in love with Peter...Goodbye."

"Goodbye"

And as she said goodbye, Max and Tess seemed to fade away and all that was left was her and Peter in Time Square.

[st_arkintern]

Peter isn't sure whether or not to wake her up or not.

She'd roused him him awake the moment she jerked, and groggily he propped himself up to look down at her. It didn't obviously seem like a nightmare, the way Alec's did.

He can only make out a little bit of her mumble. Just the I'm in love with Peter... Goodbye part. Peter wonders if she's dreaming about Max.

Peter brushes a few stray hairs out of Liz's face, then settles down next to her. He wraps an arm around her, plants a kiss against her back, then closes his eyes.

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The rest of the her sleep went uneventfully, so far at least as Liz could remember. As the daylight of the morning started to creep in, Liz stirred. Her body wriggled against Peter's as if confuse to where it was - This was only their fourth time sleeping together so she wasn't naturally used to waking up in someone's arms no mater how much she like it.

[st_arkintern]

Peter was the one to wake up first, and like the first time he slept in her room, he went downstairs to make muffins for them both. This time, they came out much better than before.

When he gets back upstairs, Liz is still asleep. He sets the tray back down on the table (muffins, juice and milk because he doesn't know what she prefers with her muffins) and sits down at one of the chairs. Before long, he dozes off again.

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There was confusion for a moment when she suddenly came to consciousness. It didn't feel exactly like her bed. She opened her eyes and was slow to remember she was at Peter's room. She looked out and saw Peter asleep on a chair. It looked like he went and got food.

Smiling, she climbed out of bed and padded over to where Peter was. She debated if she should wake him. He looked really cute sleeping.

Liz decided to walk over and kiss him lightly on the lips to wake him up, like he was sleeping beauty or something.

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As Liz suspected, it was enough to wake Peter up. Groggily, he opened his eyes to Liz's face. He hoped his breath didn't smell. He forgot to brush last night.

"Hey," he says, groggily. "Made breakfast."

He shifted up in his chair and wiped the sleep from his eyes with the back of his hand.

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Being head over heels with your boyfriend meant you didn't often notice bad breath or not.

"You should have woken me up." She smiled as she sat down on the other chair. "You're getting a lot better at making muffins."

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"You should sleep in when you can," Peter says, stretching. "I kept an eye on them this time. With the oven light, so I wasn't opening it and screwing up the temperature."

Peter reaches for a muffin and pulls off the wrapper. "You sleep okay?" He's not going to ask if she dreamed about Max.

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She wasn't going to bring up that she cried when he fell asleep.

"Yeah." She looked like maybe she wanted to tell him something. She thought about talking about her dream or, at the very least, mentioning he was in one.

Liz reached for a muffin as well. "Your bed is really nice." Or maybe it was just wherever he was sleeping, really. She brought the muffin up and picked a piece off, hiding her sheepish expression a little as she ate the piece she pulled off.

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Peter takes a bite of his muffin.

"Yeah, I like it. I'm still not really used to having a room this big, though."

Liz was right, the muffins didn't just look better, they also tasted better.

"You can spend the night whenever you want," he says. Not just the nights she was feeling sad.

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She paused, looking at Peter over the top of her muffin, and then a slow, but very happy smile crept over her face, if not a little shy for some reason.

"Yeah, okay."

Somehow the invitation seemed major. "You can too. For my room." Though that probably went without saying since he had come back to stay a second night before.

Liz took another bite of the muffin. "...What does your room look like, back home?"

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"It's, well, it's a lot smaller. I had a bunk bed and a chess board and --"

Realization suddenly dawns on Peter.

"Do you want to see it? I've worn the Spider-Suit inside my room before." Plenty of times, actually. Before and after sneaking out. "I'm sure if we ask Karen, she can bring something up."

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Her eyes widened a little, but she didn't look like that was a bad idea. "Um. Yeah, sure." She hadn't spoken to Karen since the space station. She wondered if it was weird to be nervous to talk to an AI.

She also thought Peter pulled off the Spider-Man thing way better than she did.

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"You don't have to wear the whole suit if you don't want to," Peter says quickly. He sets his half-eaten muffin in its wrapper back on the table and scrambles for the his dresser.

He pulls the Spidey mask out of the second drawer, then offers it to Liz.

"Here," he says. "You should be able to just ask Karen to show you."