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This is for her.
MJ thinks it over and over, the words falling into the beats of the subway tracks, until the words lose all meaning. Maybe they never had meaning. Has she ever truly understood?
It’s substantially harder to reach Frank’s house alone. Her hands are still trembling from… whatever that was earlier, and her thumb hovers over the emergency alert on her phone. She’s nearly died so many times in the past 24 hours, and speed-walking towards the dry dock at nighttime feels like staring fate in the face and screaming at it to finally finish the fucking job.
It’s only when she reaches the boundary and sees the rubble of a propeller that she stops.
The words fall silent.
What the hell is she even doing here? The place is littered with traps, and she has neither the knowledge or capability for how to cross the space. Even Peter hadn’t known with all those enhancements and—
“Frank?” She takes a half step forward, peering left and right. “Are you here, Frank?”
The cavernous space echoes back her words, mocking her with a sick humour.
“Frank!” This time, she screams it. Fuck avoiding attention. “Frank, it’s MJ! I need to talk to you!”
She closes her eyes and exhales. Of course he isn’t here. The city’s in chaos; he’ll be out there in the thick of it somewhere. That’s his job.
Is the letter still in there?
MJ turns before the thought can begin to expand. She desperately does not want to think about this; not now or ever. She jogs back to the subway stop, sweat dripping down her neck and into the collar of her jacket, and she doesn’t register which line she’s on until three stops have passed and she stops internally screaming Ned’s favourite jingle long enough to hear the announcements.
Bellevue Hospital is five stops away.
This is for her.
Perhaps she’s simply lost her mind; it has been invaded twice in one day after all, and historically her track record is even worse. (Apparently. It’s hard to know for sure when it doesn’t feel like anything is missing.)
Or, maybe, this is what she’s been waiting for.
Finding her. Knowing her.
She wishes she didn’t know.
Her life was going great until yesterday; she’s got Ned and her parents and an apartment and she’s a goddamn aerospace engineer! Well. She will be when she accepts a job. That’s purely semantics, but all things considered, her life was pretty awesome.
The possessing thing wasn’t ever in her control, but a lot of what came next was.
She just had to be nosy…
As she slips through the crowds, there’s a pained kind of aura hovering over everyone that she’s felt before—New York has some of the worst battle scars, and for the first time their protector is in trouble. Tragedy has a way of uniting people, and tonight it glows in shades of crimson and cobalt.
Getting into the hospital itself is surprisingly easy. She’s been here once before, but she was only a child with a broken arm; the layout is confusing and she somehow always ends up at the cafeteria regardless of the direction she takes. There’s not many people in there and she’s crashing from the 24 hour adrenaline spike, so she heads over to the automated coffee dispenser.
Her hands are still trembling. She presses the wrong option on the touchscreen three times before finally getting it right.
This is for her.
“Was wondering when you’d show up.”
MJ jumps a foot in the air at the gravelly voice. “What the hell, Frank?”
“You gotta pay better attention to your surroundings, kid.” But the man in front of her isn’t quite the same as the murderous vigilante she met the day before. He looks out of sorts. Less angry and bitter and more… guilty. “He’ll like knowing you’re here.”
She’s already shaking her head. “No. I-I’m not here for him. I just… please don’t tell him I was here, okay?”
He scowls. “I thought you guys were, you know. Close.”
“I don’t even know him.” She searches for her coat pocket to avoid his gaze. “I was actually looking for you.”
“Me?”
“Yeah.” She pulls out a piece of paper, straightening out the soft wrinkles from her journey. “I was hoping you could deliver something to him.”
Frank unfolds the drawing, twisting out of her reach when she tries to hide it. His eyes scan over the lines and curves, and something in the anxious twist of his face softens. “Looks like you know him to me.”
And isn’t that the problem?
MJ has no idea who Peter is, but he knows a version of her; loves a version of her.
It’s not her. She is not his MJ.
Yet she feels like she owes him something anyway. It’s why she had invited him into her home despite her personal feelings on the whole messed up situation. He is all alone in this world because he wanted to keep her and Ned safe, and she has a feeling the other her would have wanted him to have a new memory together.
He’s earned the chance to have it; to have people. Finding out the truth hasn’t changed that she thinks he’s a really good guy.
This is for her.
Somewhere in this hospital, Peter is hurt and dying. A man once loved by a version of her. He may be gone by morning, and she will never get to say goodbye.
She loves Peter. She lost everything because of him.
He deserves to live.
She deserves a chance to live again too.
The cost is just losing herself.
“Is he going to make it?”
Frank wipes a hand over his face. “I really don’t know. A normal kid wouldn’t, but there’s a lot of shit that don’t make him normal.”
MJ manages a weak smile. “Yeah, I got that impression.”
“You’re a pretty good artist, you know. Nice to see him smile.”
She grabs her coffee cup and makes to leave, but hesitates when she hears Frank refolding the drawing.
“You’ll make sure he gets it? It’s important he knows he's not alone.”
“It’ll be the first thing he sees.”
There’s a dozen missed calls when she’s finally through the worst of the crowd, all from Ned. Her boyfriend has only messaged once; it’s been 36 hours and an entire lifetime since they last spoke.
She debates returning the call before chickening out, typing out a simple, I’m okay. Home soon.
All she wants is to hear Ned’s voice telling her it’ll all work out. A pity she can’t bear to look at him.
Spider-Man is Ned’s hero. He’s also his best friend. How can she hide something like that from him? How could she ever possibly tell him?
When she finally makes it home, Ned is camped out on the sofa with the TV tuned to the constant coverage. He’s across the room in seconds, tugging her into a hug so tight that it pushes all the broken pieces of herself back together for just a moment.
She grabs herself a glass of water and curls up at her friend’s side. All of her aches to sleep, but they both know they won’t. The only thing to do is wait.
Hours trickle by. The city continues to hope.
Then finally there’s a shift in the wind. The headline changes and the videos pour in.
Spider-Man lives.
Her next inhale is a little easier, and as she goes to celebrate with Ned she finally sees it.
There are three seats in their living room—no, wait.
There has always been three seats. In every apartment, at every table; there is always a third seat lingering. MJ, Ned, and an empty space.
Unoccupied. Waiting.
Just in case.
Her hand rises to touch her neck at someone else’s command.
Stumbling into the bathroom, she gasps desperately over the sink. Fear grips her heart with all its strength, worse than falling or trip wires or mind control. For a moment it feels like she might black out.
She splashes water on her face and the face looking back in the mirror is not one she recognises.
MJ has always been sure of herself. The world was always a little more complicated and it took breaking free of her childhood to truly settle into her confidence, but when it comes to the girl in the reflection she has remained sturdy and true. Never faltering.
This woman is anything but. Her sense of self is crumbling with every passing second, a billion what-ifs building in pressure until she is trapped in their serpentine storm; a hurricane of unanswered questions that only one person can possibly hope to answer.
A girl who isn’t here. Not anymore.
But what happened to her? Is she locked away somewhere, or was she wiped clean away? Could she ever be recovered?
They shared so much of their lives, but there’s experiences she had in this body that MJ may never know. She is an alternate. She is the original. She was stolen and stripped and replaced.
By her.
She was an MJ who was loved and happy, who probably did big impressive things of her own. She laughed and cried and talked and lived. She must have been really brave, and never once felt like everything she did was a fraction of a degree off kilter.
She probably never got accused of being withholding, or spent endless nights staring at the ceiling waiting for a punchline to a joke she no longer remembers.
Tears slip down her cheeks as she stares at the girl in the mirror. Is that her? Is she trapped behind the glass watching MJ live a life she should have?
Which MJ do these tears belong to?
She mourns for the what-might-have-been’s. She yearns for time she never got to have.
But somewhere in the wreckage left behind by the last two days, there is healing to be found. Compassion and forgiveness can prevail. MJ must honour the sacrifice of her former self in order to move forward.
For today at least, she allows herself to grieve—she crawls into bed and cries herself to sleep.
This is for me.
Night has come again when she finally wakes. Her eyes are puffy and sore. The blankets are soft and warm and she could stay wrapped in their safety for the rest of her life.
It is her stomach that finally motivates her. It’s hard to remember the last time she actually ate.
Ned is at his desk when she meanders over with a bowl of cereal. He gives her a smile and rolls aside so she can lean against the windowsill.
“What do you think? I’m almost ready to push out the update.” An animation plays out across the Spidey Tracker homescreen celebrating Peter’s survival, complete with a fanfare noise clearly made by Ned’s voice. “Figured people needed something positive to see instead of an empty map, you know?”
He has no idea what he could have lost; what he’s already lost.
The truth weighs heavy on her tongue. Ned is the calmest person she’s ever known, rational and sure and able to peer through any storm. He sees the completed puzzle without even needing all the pieces. Throughout their friendship he has been her guiding light, and she’s never needed that more than right now.
But despite how much she values it, this is not her truth to tell.
So she nods and makes dry comments, and she tries not to stare at the glaring evidence before her that Ned has spent four years trying to fill a hole in his heart that he doesn’t even know exists.
A restless energy settles into her bones after that, so she grabs her coat and heads out into the city. It is just after 4am, and streetlights bathe the crowds in sepia tone. Her feet make a rhythm with the sidewalk and she hums along to it. The tune is there but she can’t identify the melody. Maybe it’s a song that doesn’t belong to her.
The path she treads leads her home.
Even on this rooftop, she sees the unoccupied seat; the empty space beneath their names that she had once carved into the ledge; the echo of moments that no longer are.
Her eyes close and she traces the worn broken edges of her necklace.
Between two beats of her heart, she hears a refrain.
The lyrics whisper a message in her own voice.
Is this how it has always been? This other version of her, not dead or buried but simply out of reach, watching over her as she tries to navigate life on her own terms. Supporting her when she makes mistakes or overcomes huddles. Loving her for all that she has been afforded to become the woman she is today.
She gave up everything for her.
Could she do the same?
Or is there a different truth to the version that she has been victim to since finding that letter. One that isn’t so black and white.
What if she could find a way to be both? Not a cost or a sacrifice, but an opening of her heart to an old friend finally coming home.
This is for us.
A spectrum of purples and reds swirl across the deep blue of the sky as the sun rises on a brand new day.
It is a promise of change; renewal; hope.
MJ gazes upon it all and smiles.