Gwen Stacy Syndrome

"It's not that kind of dinner," Mary Jane said, Felicia just having shown up at her door in a trenchcoat and not much else—though the 'not much else' seemed prohibitively expensive at first glance.

"You said your roommates weren't home." Felicia stepped inside, her walk seemingly designed to make her coat flutter open. "And that they were gay."

"Yes, and they know how to party," MJ replied, a little smugly.

Felicia groused "I wish I had some gay best friends. The best I can do is Gambit."

"Doesn't he have that thing with Rogue?"

"Yes, but he wears magenta. And he's one of the X-Men. Remember when they all moved to San Francisco?" Felicia planted herself on a couch. Mary Jane's apartment looked comfortable enough—not much to make you single it out as the home of three gay men and one woman of weaponized femininity, aside from the blasé attitude toward male nudity in the art prints on the walls.

Score zero for stereotypes

, Felicia thought. "So, if eating out is off the menu, we're, what, ordering in?"

"I have a meatloaf in the oven," Mary Jane assured her. "But my main goal tonight is to get packed for the move before my roommates get back in the wee hours of the morning and things get crazy. So it's an all-purpose dinner slash packing slash decluttering kinda thing."

Felicia nodded along. "When you said you wanted me to stuff your box, this wasn't what I pictured."

"I never said that."

"Yes, but if you had, it would've been hilarious." She vaulted to her feet, tying her coat resolutely shut. "'Decluttering'. Two dates and we're downright domestic. You really have this lesbian thing down."

"Thanks," MJ said. "C'mon, I'll feed you first."

"When you said you had some sweet meat for me—"

"I'm not the one who makes all the innuendos, Felicia. Let's keep it straight."

"She said under the poster for Priscilla, Queen of the Desert."

"S'good movie..."

***

If they were still rivals, Felicia would probably resent the fact that Mary Jane's meatloaf actually tasted good and was halfway healthy. Domestic goddess versus the leather-clad tramp—such a cliché. But, now that they were ménage a troing, she could both have sex with Mary Jane and enjoy her cooking. A good deal all around.

"So you know when Peter's getting here?" Mary Jane asked. "He usually used to make it home in time for dinner."

"Oh, he had a thing with the Avengers. Shipping out to Wakanda for the night. Said he'll be back by morning."

"You're not..." MJ gestured noncommittally. "Going with him?"

Felicia shrugged and helped herself to another serving. "I'm not an Avenger."

"Still, you could tag along. Or go on patrol. Something."

"Red, am I not being good company?"

"You haven't said the word 'biotch' once, so you're very refreshing dinner conversation," Mary Jane assured her. "I just thought you'd be shadowing Peter, that's all."

"I'm not gonna be his bodyguard," Felicia told her. "I don't mind the team-ups, but I don't want it to be a Thing. Living together is enough intimacy."

Mary Jane pushed a slice of meatloaf around her plate. "I kinda thought you were like him. Great power, great responsibility, my city needs me—that sorta thing."

Felicia shook her head, mouth full, then swallowed. "I do this for fun. Sure, it's nice to help people and beat up guys who could use a beating, but if I take a night off to get over a stomach flu," Felicia lurched into a B-movie voice, "

the faces of those I've wronged

won't start floating in front of my eyes."

Mary Jane laughed. "Yeah, I gotcha. You're Chaotic Good and Peter's Lawful Good."

"Hmm?"

"You know, character alignments."

Felicia craned her head.

"AD&D?"

"Advanced Dungeons and... Discipline?"

"Dragons," Mary Jane corrected. "I played it a few times with Peter and some of his friends. Johnny Storm's a surprisingly good roleplayer."

Felicia blinked. "You play Dungeons & Dragons with Peter?"

"Yeah, I know, domestic bliss, right? He goes to spas with me, I watch MST3K with him—"

Felicia was mildly aghast. "Honey, I let him fuck me in the ass, but

you

—you need some boundaries. You are the goddess woman-spirit. You were not put on this Earth to play AD&D."

"Whatever keeps him from swinging around the city with his arm in a sling," Mary Jane said, giving Felicia the whole story.

Felicia nodded. "Yeah, I love the silly bitch, but can we agree the guy needs to loosen up?"

"I wouldn't say that..." Mary Jane hedged, getting up to take their empty plates to the sink.

Felicia put her feet up on the cleared table. "What would you say?"

"That he needs to loosen up. Just not... like

that.

"

"I'm not saying he needs to sell crack to orphans, just that the man could afford to be a little more... 'Chaotic Good'."

Mary Jane turned on the tap water and her voice rose above it. "I wasn't saying you were saying that—"

"What were you saying?"

"I'm getting to that." MJ scrapped off a dish. "I want him to be less neurotic, I want him to feel less guilty, but Peter's a very responsible person. He's got a moral compass that points true north; he'd be Captain America's sidekick if Steve was hiring. And I like that about him."

"I like that too!" Felicia protested. "I mean, I'm thrilled that he's not cheating on you and we can all be this Thing without him—wearing black leather and growing out his stubble and slapping around J. Jonah Jameson..."

"But you want to change him."

"Don't you?"

Mary Jane turned the water off. "I want to make it easier for him to be him. He's a pretty great guy—even with the AD&D and the responsibility kick and

the faces of those he's wronged floating before his eyes

..." She raised her hands over the soaking dishes like a wizard casting a spell. "Don't take this the wrong way, Cat—I know you're in love with him. But I don't think you quite know who it is you're in love with."

Felicia stood, hands on her hips like she was about to fire off a rejoinder, but she pursed her lips instead. If there was anyone she could concede a point to, however silently, it was Mary Jane Watson.

"Hey." MJ came over and took Felicia's hands, her own warm with water and suds. "That's not a bad thing. You have the rest of your life to get to know him—to fall more in love with him—to go on this journey, with both of us. Just know what you're in for. He's a Hero. Not just a superhero—a real, Joseph Campbell

Hero.

And that's not an easy thing. It was almost too much for me, once."

"And now?" Felicia asked.

"Now I see what kind of person he makes me and what kind of hero I make him. I belong with Peter. It's my destiny."

"Baking meatloaf for a man to eat after he beats up Doctor Octopus?" Felicia asked dubiously.

"I know," Mary Jane grinned like she wanted to giggle. "It's not special. I'm not the chosen one or an A-list star or... Beyonce! That's the point. With Peter, I can just be me. That's enough. And be honest. Doesn't Peter make you feel a lot more special than if you were Shang-Chi or whatever?"

Felicia grinned, and was ashamed to realize it was more a doofy smile than a seductive one. "Is this girl-talk? We having a talk of girls?"

"Not a lot of girlfriends growing up?"

"Nope."

Mary Jane glanced at her cleavage. "Wonder why."

"But once I got into college and I realized that tingly sensation from looking at Elisha Cuthbert wasn't just wanting to be able to rock a tanktop like she did—"

"Oh, you had sex with women?" MJ gasped in surprise. "I'm shocked! Ice cream or packing?"

"If I help with the packing, can I eat the ice cream off you?"

"If I just say yes now, will you stop with the double entendres?"

"Almost entirely."

"Deal."

"Okay!" Felicia cheered. "Let's go stuff your box!"

***

"Pitch or keep?" Mary Jane asked, holding up a black rectangular box Felicia took a moment to recognize.

"Is that a VHS player?"

"Yes."

"Pitch."

"But..." Mary Jane pouted. "How else will I play my video tapes?"

Felicia stared at her. "A wizard magically turned them into these things called Blu-Rays. I'll get you some."

"They're not all The Princess Bride," Mary Jane said, protectively digging the box of tapes out of the closet. "I've got

Spider-Man's wedding

in here, the first soap opera I ever played in, our sex tape..."

"Okay, we're definitely keeping it. Tapes can stay, I'll have Peter convert them to something millennial. But that player is

going

."

Mary Jane put it on the pile. "I meant what I said earlier."

"That there was a sex tape? There'd better be."

MJ opened another box. Gifts from Aunt May. Keep. "About us being on a journey. There's no more—Team Mary Jane or Team Felicia."

"Please tell me no one has said those phrases."

"There's just Team Spider," Mary Jane insisted. "We're like sisters or something."

Felicia snapped her fingers. "Like in the vampire sense where they sleep with each other."

"Yeah!"

"Cool." Felicia pursed her lips. "I've never had a sister. Lotta boyfriends. Never a sister."

"Did you watch Gilmore Girls? I think it's kinda like that."

Felicia pulled open her coat a little. "What about me says I watched Gilmore Girls?"

"Fine, fine. Oh, hey, I've got this weird trick—"

"Yeah?" Felicia asked, setting aside some old playbills to sit facing Mary Jane.

"You know how you're dating someone, something comes up, you say 'we need to talk'—and it's like their penis retracts into their body?"

"Yeah, it's like a genetic memory. I think there was a dinosaur that used to say that before eating men."

Mary Jane tilted her head to consider it. Stranger things had happened. "Well, as hard as it is for you to believe having tasted my meatloaf, but I was quite the hellion once. I did not go in for the usual boyfriend-girlfriend stuff."

"So?"

Mary Jane looked around as if someone might be eavesdropping. "Don't tell anyone else this, I don't want it to get out, but—sometimes I'll say 'we need to talk,' but then instead of telling him I found his porn stash or something, I pull him into the bedroom, take off my shirt—'we need to talk about these boobs.'"

Felicia laughed. "What would Peter's porn stash look like? Don't tell me—Black Widow?"

MJ shook her head. "You're not following. See, somewhere in the caveman part of his brain that likes Jason Statham movies, he's thinking of other women who said 'we need to talk' and gave him the riot act, and then he's thinking of me, who said it, and then gave him boobs. It's like entering a cheat code in The Sims. I give him a five minute blowjob, suddenly we have a relationship like Nick Offerman and Megan Mullally."

"They seem so cute together." Felicia scratched at her ear. "So. did some evil genius share that with you when you were kidnapped?"

"No, I'm evil enough on my own."

"No wonder he stayed with you so long. Christ! You had the boy hypnotized!"

"Come off it." Mary Jane flipped her hand dismissively. "It's not like I kept the Ms. Marvel outfit or anything.

That

would've been cheating."

"Kept?"

Mary Jane shrugged. Dug into another box. "Oh God, scale model of the Spider-Mobile, why did I keep this?"

"Why

wouldn't

you?" Felicia asked. She picked through her own box. "Commemorative Godzilla glasses from Burger King. Pitch."

"Those could be worth something on eBay!"

"

Pitch.

" Felicia decisively added them to the pile.

For a few minutes, they picked through boxes, the silence a little strained. Before, Felicia would've attributed the tension to Peter. They'd both slept with the same man. Now, that was part of their bond. So it wasn't that.

"Hey, Red?" Felicia called. "I do like to play the slutty girl in leather with the big tits, but—I know people don't do projects like these without any procrastination. Not unless there's a lot of energy and they don't know what else to do with it. So if you want to talk... I mean, I'm no Peter Parker, but—"

"The producers were going to call me today," Mary Jane interrupted. "If I got the part. Hard call to wait for."

Felicia looked at the clock. It was late. Really late.

"I'm sorry."

"I just felt so invincible," Mary Jane said. "With you, and Peter, everything seemed to be sorting itself out. I thought my lucky streak could keep going for one more day, just one, then—"

The phone rang.

While Mary Jane sat there, paralyzed, Felicia scrambled up with a thief's reflexes, plucked the handset from its cradle, and shoved it against MJ's ear.

"Hello?" Mary Jane said numbly. "Mary Jane Watson speaking? Yes. Uh-huh. Yes. Oh, that's great. I'm looking forward to it. Okay. Bye."

Felicia took the phone away, suddenly hearing its dial tone. "Well?"

Mary Jane hugged her. Their breasts pressed together, but there wasn't any sex in it. Felicia wasn't used to that. No tension, no sensuality, just the warmth of friendship. Sisterhood.

"I got the part," MJ said.

***

A Saturday evening—the night club was packed. A hot spot to begin with, it burst into supernova with the weekend crowd, the rich and famous. Peter didn't think he'd get in, but Felicia and Mary Jane dragged him by both arms, past the long line of wannabes and never-woulds, and didn't even break stride as they pulled him past the waving bouncer.

Inside, everyone was just a bit too young for Peter to consider a contemporary. The glitzy red and blue neon hurt his eyes as much as it thrilled them. The deejay was loud, the champagne bar was obscenely priced. Peter discretely smeared some webbing over his ears to subdue the blaring dance rap. He wasn't here for the music. He was here for the girls.

Felicia and MJ wore body-hugging minidresses like the metal in a furnace, trapping the fire inside but letting the heat waft off them. Just looking at them, Peter felt drugged. High on the atmosphere alone. He'd never been that guy, never wanted to be that guy, never much liked that guy to begin with. But seeing the dude clubbers look at them, look at him like they wanted Puny Parker's life—it wasn't the worst.

Mary Jane and Felicia were like the Secret Service, he was like the President. They ushered him through the club chaos until hitting a booth. There was one of those white rappers in it. He left as soon as he saw Felicia coming. Then all three of them were packed in, finding respite in the shadows from the red floods that filled the room like lightning. Peter didn't hear the music so much as feel it throbbing inside him.

Felicia put her feet up. "We need shots! Bring vodka!"

A waiter nodded, more from lip-reading than anything else. Felicia laughed and Mary Jane tugged the blonde's hip-hugger down her legs a few crucial inches, keeping everything covered.

"I think I've figured out your cunning plan," Peter said, somehow making himself heard over the din.

Mary Jane was next to him, already kissing his neck, hand twisting on his knee. "Yeah?"

"Yeah—basically, you're going to make us all look like such sluts that we're in a menage a trois while Felicia does Spider-Man on the side. Then we'll all move in together and no one will suspect my secret."

"It's a good plan!" Felicia cried. "I like it!"

"I wouldn't expect it to work," Peter said, "but then, I wouldn't expect Tony to use a satellite to wipe everyone's memories of him being Iron Man, so screw it, yeah, let's go for it."

"And let's celebrate Red getting the fucking part!"

Felicia's vodka arrived. She stood to take it, didn't sit back down. Instead, Peter and Mary Jane watched as her hips began to move. Then the rest of her body. Slow, sexy, controlled when so many of the idiots on the dance floor were freaking out. Peter tried to keep from gaping as she gyrated in front of him, all seduction, finally turning around. Teasing her way back to him.

"Of course," she said, pushing his head back with one finger, "for the plan to work, we have to be seen together. Acting intimate."

His mouth was open. Felicia poured vodka into it. Then Mary Jane's mouth was on his, kissing a shot off his tongue. Felicia displayed a naughty smile as she poured a long gulp of vodka onto their dueling tongues.

"All three of us," Felicia added. She took Mary Jane's hand and pulled the redhead away from Peter. They grinded together, Mary Jane shimmying her way down Felicia's body, then wiggling back up it—her swinging ass in Peter's face—Felicia rewarded her by tipping the bottle into her mouth, making the model chug as Felicia licked the sweat from her gulping throat. The tonguing almost became a kiss, but Felicia tapered her tongue off Mary Jane's chin and moved the bottle to her own mouth, sucking the vodka out of the bottleneck... as Mary Jane kissed the bottle.

Peter watched as if hypnotized, glad he was sitting behind a table as Mary Jane licked the bottle's mouth with Felicia, dancing again, a mish-mash of high fashion and sculpted flesh, tanned limbs and pale, the woman he loved and the woman he loved.

Suddenly, Felicia bolted away from Mary Jane, holding the bottle high, claiming Peter's lap. The last third of the vodka sloshed in its glass home as she waved it about. "Tell you what, Parker." She dropped her hand to his crotch. Rubbed. "I'll keep doing this as long as you keep chugging."

The vodka was gone in one go. Peter nearly came in his pants. Then Felicia was spinning away from him, a nymph fleeing from a satyr, embracing Mary Jane, picking her up and spinning her around and locking their mouths together—throwing away the key.

Peter joined them, kissed one, the other, both... moaning as their two tongues slipped over, around his own. Peter lost a hand in Mary Jane's hair, fisted it, pulled her head back, then took Felicia by a hand at the nape of her neck and pressed her lips back to Mary Jane's, the two kissing as he circled, pressed himself against Felicia from behind. She felt his conspicuous bulge between her buttocks.

Mary Jane swayed invitingly in Felicia's arms as the thief cooed back against Peter, playing with his tie like a cat with a string. "Christ, Peter, you and the vodka have got me so hot—" Mary Jane kicked her a little. "And Red, of course. Are you gonna fuck me right here on the dance floor?" Felicia looked down at her crotch, almost exposed by the high hem of her dress. "I know a certain someone who likes that idea... an old friend of yours, in fact..."

Then, laughing, Felicia shoved her ass back and bumped Peter away. He stumbled back, the vodka hitting him like a charge from the Rhino. He fell on his butt and watched Felicia and Mary Jane dance above him, the electric currents of their lips and bodies running together. He put a hand on Mary Jane's bare leg, playing the smooth skin like a flute. Mary Jane let Felicia practically dry-hump her as she put out her leg like Angelina Jolie at the Oscars... Peter bit her thigh and the women both laughed as they pulled him back up, Mary Jane's dress too short to cover the hickey on display.

Like a diver caught in a whirlpool, Peter was pulled to the center, swept onto the crowded dance floor along with them as Felicia and Mary Jane grinded on either side of him, their hands consuming him, Felicia tagging away any frat jerk or thirsty co-ed who tried to step into their perfection.

Peter had never felt so blissful. He didn't even want to have sex—at least, not beyond the slow fire that burned in him with their names, heating into an inferno whenever he saw either one. He wanted to stay in this moment, when having a drink didn't make him sick, but left him loose and massage-warm, when he didn't have to be a disguise because they both understood, when he could be as uninhibited as Felicia, as infectiously happy as Mary Jane.