Peter was lucky in love, as hard as that was to believe. At least, he considered himself so. No matter what grave misfortunes his love life had suffered, how could he consider himself unlucky when he had people like Mary Jane, like Felicia in his life? Then there was Ana, Betty, Debra... it took a lot to make girls like that pale in comparison, but nonetheless, MJ and Felicia were goddesses to him. He was a long way from the high school dweeb who couldn't talk to a girl without showing symptoms of some new and exciting mental disorder on every occasion.
Carol took him right back to all that. She downright intimidated him. Smart, funny, noble in a way he had to constantly aspire to. And beautiful. Unassailably beautiful. Tall, taller than him, with golden hair and a bronze tan and... well, several other physical features that fully justified a one-piece bathing suit as a costume, like that Amazon wore in all the comic books. Nothing could detract from that beauty, not anger, not battle—he'd seen Felicia get into scraps that left her with broken bones, oozing blood, and she'd slink away like a cat to get plastic surgery and do yoga and come back more herself. But all blood and bruises did to Carol was make her look even more the warrior goddess. Legs and muscles and tits and that fucking jaw, that damn smile...
Peter was a little bit in love with her. That pure, innocent, crush-love that could never come to anything. She was one of those big 'what ifs' that kept you curious.
And she was flying him. Peter could subvert gravity, rebel against it, play with it, and thumb his nose all he wanted, but it always caught up with him—usually after someone else had given him a going over to soften him up. But Carol made gravity fuck off. Peter found himself wishing he'd found a way to run into her over in that alternate universe. It just would've been nice to know what it was like... or at least how her costume looked over there.
He had to say something. "So you know about the thing with Mary Jane and Felicia?"
"They mentioned it," she said, knowing just how much to raise her voice to be heard over the rushing wind, without being so loud as to be unladylike. It was amazing. "I think it's a bit of a dirty trick myself, coming at someone without shooting straight like that, but it's not really my business."
"Isn't it?" Peter asked. "I mean, seeing as we're both Avengers..." And sluts, an inner voice suggested. Why had he even gotten rid of the symbiote when he had something saying that in his subconscious?
"You want to know what I think?"
"Always."
"You should go through with it. Weird set-up or not."
"But what about—"
Carol interrupted stridently. "You really think there's any doubt you've had that she hasn't had?"
"Well... I suppose not. But I'm not comfortable with it yet. Doesn't that count for anything?"
"It counts fine. But you should get comfortable with it." Carol flew faster. "Because damn, do I hate to see you screwing up a good thing."
"Technically, I'm not screwing anything at the moment."
***
Felicia had upgraded her apartment since Peter'd been gone. The windows now had biometric sensors that recognized Peter and Carol, then opened automatically, letting them fly inside without a suspicious deceleration. Inside, Carol moved to set Peter back on his feet, then thought better of it, carrying him to the couch instead and laying him down. Peter winced appreciably, the throbbing in his groin still nowhere near pleasant, but jangling with pain on every breath.
"I'll get some ice," Carol said, and strode out of the room.
Her new costume didn't make anywhere near as big a presentation of her hindquarters as the old one, but there was only so much any costume could do to mute a posterior like that. Peter wondered if it'd been something Rogue had absorbed when she got her powers. The two were definitely voluptuous in equal degree.
Carol returned, bearing a bag of ice. Peter gratefully took it and rested it on his lap, the chill daunting at first, then relieving. The painful ache became a dull roar—not painful, just somewhat intense. Peter skittishly laid back. As long as he didn't move, it wasn't too bad.
"I'm guessing you're not going to want to move for a while?" Carol asked.
Peter nodded.
"Okay. Need anything? Water, some snacks—TV remote?"
"All of the above," Peter said, and added a belated "Thanks!" as Carol went rustling them up.
He noticed something, though. Peter'd never been a keen study of the human animal, but years of life with Mary Jane, running lines with her as she prepared for this scene or that audition, had taught him a thing or two about facial expressions, tone of voice, body language. He'd seen Mary Jane layer emotion after emotion onto a scene, shifting her performance by degrees to include hints of fear, nervousness, love, lust, amusement, self-centeredness. Everything and anything was just a matter of the quirks of her face, the look in her eyes. And the way Carol was acting he recognized from quite a few of Mary Jane's performances. She was anxious. Embarrassed. Guilty.
"Everything okay?" he asked when Carol came back, setting down a little survival kit on the cushion beside him.
Carol sighed, taking a moment to rearrange the items so that nothing would fall over. "There's something I need to tell you. It happened while you were gone..."
***
"Did I miss the baby shower?" Jessica asked, sweeping into the apartment.
She found remnants of a party—torn wrapping papers, a limply hanging banner, balloons losing their helium, the archaeological detritus of played out party games. But no guests. Just Felicia, cradling her baby bump on the sofa.
Felicia Hardy had not yet given herself over to being pregnant. Her jeans were tight, showing off svelte, toned legs, while her feet were bare, showing off that her ankles were still dainty. Her shirt was loose—the better to partly obscure the bump that from some angles was a potbelly and from others disappeared entirely—but tight across her breasts, which had to have gone up a cup size. Jessica noticed that many of the presents were new bras.
"You're lucky that way," Felicia said. "God, I hired a stripper, what more can someone do to stop a baby shower from being so boring? Why does everyone want to feel my belly? Am I the Buddha? And why am I supposed to be so obsessed with diapers?" She lifted her feet from the armrest. "Rub my feetsies?"
"I brought you a present," Jessica said, recusing herself.
"Rub them anyway?"
Jessica had to admit, Felicia would've done the same for her a few months ago, even if only in the hopes of getting in her pants. She sat down in the armchair beside the sofa, kneading Felicia's feet. They were swollen, a little warmer than Jessica would've expected. Even Felicia, with all her yoga and calisthenics, couldn't defy biology forever. She'd be in a muumuu before she knew it.
"So where is everybody?" Jess asked.
"Out with Mary Jane. I wanted to get rid of them and not be rude, so MJ took them all for cocktails and left me here to wait for a call from my agent, which I totally have and am totally getting?"
"Tell-all book, love?" Jessica asked. "Or a cat burglar's guide to pregnancy?"
"Oh, I haven't figured it out at all. What about you? Any insider tips?"
