章 3: Birthday Dinner Surprise
New York
August 10, 19:20 EDT
"Oh my god, we're late." said Richard, his voice rife with trepidation as he pulled up to the valet stand outside the restaurant, "Your mother is going to kill us."
"Us?! You're the one who decided to drive in rush hour traffic through half of Manhattan." Peter said as he exited the car, "Besides, I'm the birthday boy. She can't get mad at me."
"Thank you." Richard said, handing over the keys to the valet and tipping the man before walking to Peter, "Alright, I'm going to level with you here son. I need you to fall on this grenade for me."
"Cause it's my birthday." said Peter.
"Exactly. It's like you said. It's your birthday and she can't get mad at you. Just say we stopped at a store because you wanted to check something out and lost track of time." he said, stopping at the doors of the restaurant.
"Alright, I'll jump on the grenade for you," said Peter after thinking about it for a few seconds.
"That's my boy." Richard smiled as he shook Peter, "We'll say we stopped at that antique shop a block away from work. You saw a vintage camera you wanted to check out. Sound good?"
"Yeah, sounds good."
"I owe you one kid." he said, tidying his clothes before doing the same for Peter, "Alright, let's go."
Shaugnessy's was a fancy restaurant that featured live music and dancing, and the interior of the place looked straight out of an old mobster movie. Ambient lighting, candles on the tables, lively music, and a dance floor with a sparse amount of people.
The first floor of the restaurant was for smaller parties of up to four people while the second floor consisted of a balcony overlooking the dance floor and private rooms for bigger parties. It was also where the two Parker boys were being led by a hostess.
"Enjoy." said the hostess, leaving the two after leading them to the door that led to their private room.
"Remember the plan." mouthed Richard to Peter.
Before Peter could nod in reassurance, the door to the private room was opened, revealing Mary with a small smile on her face. To those not in the know, her smile looked quite polite but to the Parker boys, it was not a good sign.
"Correct me if I'm wrong, I feel like I said the dinner was at 7." she said.
"Y-you did, light of my life, and we're so sorry we're late, but Peter wanted to see a vintage camera and we lost track of time." explained Richard, trying his very best not to cave.
"Is that so?" she said, turning to look at Peter, her eyes scanning him for any minute detail that would unravel their story.
"Sorry, mom. It was a really nice camera." he simply said, stopping the sudden urge to swallow.
"Huff. A little heads up would've been nice." she said, moving away from the door.
"Sorry, honey." Richard felt a weight lifted off his shoulders as they entered the room.
The private room looked the same as it had every year before. Pictures of New York in the past hung on the walls while a window could be opened and closed as the guests wished so they could listen to the live music. The table was a large cloth-covered wooden table with enough seats for 12 people, which was more than enough.
After quickly taking in the room, Peter looked at the seated people.
"There's the birthday boy." said Uncle Ben, as he and Aunt May stood up and walked over to him before taking turns hugging him.
"Happy birthday, Peter." said Aunt May.
"Thank you, Uncle Ben, Aunt May." Peter said, smiling.
Ben and May Parker, like him and his parents, looked exactly like they did in the Amazing Spider-Man movies, except a little more youthful since they didn't have to deal with the death of their family members and having to raise a child.
He was extra thankful that his Aunt May didn't look like she did in the MCU films because it would've been very, very confusing as he had previously been a ... hormonal teen.
"Give him the-" said Ben.
"After dinner." said May.
"He's here right now."
"You stubborn-" muttered May, walking back to her seat, picking up a small box with a bow before walking back and handing it to Peter, "Happy birthday."
"Come on, you guys. You being here is more than enough for me." said Peter.
"Don't be stubborn like your Uncle Ben and take the present." May said, practically shoving the box into his hands.
"Open it. Open it." said Ben, excited to see Peter's reaction while May just shook her head at her husband.
Peter undid the bow and opened the box, revealing a vintage watch. The
"That's Dad's watch." said Richard from behind Peter, his voice full of emotion.
"You're giving me your dad's watch?" asked Peter, incredulously.
He had never met any of his grandparents since both his maternal and paternal grandparents had passed before he was born, but he had seen pictures of them and heard stories of them. In nearly every photo of his paternal grandfather, he was wearing a watch that he considered his prize possession and one that had been left for Ben as the oldest of the two brothers.
"I am. I always meant to pass it on to our child, but it just wasn't in the cards for us." he said, hugging May to his side, "I'm not getting any younger and if God forbid I pass, I don't want it to just sit in a box or worse, get sold. You'll get more use out of it."
"I don't know what to say." said Peter before hugging Ben, "Thank you."
"Ah, forget it. Just a watch." Ben said, clearing his throat and wiping his eyes.
"I feel like I shouldn't have come." said a whispering voice.
Turning to look, Peter saw the black-haired and blue-eyed Zatanna whispering to Teresa.
"Zatanna." said Peter, causing her to whip her head around to look at him.
"Peter, h-hi. Happy birthday." she said, smiling as she batted her eyelashes.
Teresa rolled her eyes at her friend while Peter thought she might have something in her eye.
"Thank you. I'm glad you're here." he said, causing her to giggle before snorting a little, her face turning red.
"T-thank you for letting me be here."
"No problem. How's your dad been?"
"Good. Busy. Magic and stuff." she said, tucking her hair behind her ear.
"Don't you have a present you wanted to give him?" said Teresa with a smirk.
"Teri!" loudly whispered Zatanna before bringing out a gift bag and handing it over to Peter.
He opened it and saw a black and silver vintage camera and a couple of rolls of film. It was an old Wayne camera that was released back in the 60s and was one of their first forays into the product. It also happened to be one he had been wanting to get his hands on for a while, something he had previously mentioned to Teri.
"This is amazing! Thank you, Zatanna." he said, happy to add a camera he had been wanting for a while to his collection.
"It's nothing. I found it at a thrift store for practically nothing." she said, beaming with joy that he liked her gift.
"Alright, that's enough of the presents. Let's sit down and order some food." Mary said, knowingly smiling at Zatanna while everyone sat down.
On the left side of the table sat Richard, Ben, and Peter while opposite them were Mary, May, Teresa, and Zatanna.
Seeing as they had been to the restaurant many times before, they knew what they wanted to order without having to look at the menu. It also helped that everyone besides Peter and Richard had been waiting around for nearly half an hour with nothing to do besides talk and look at the menu.
Mary pressed a button and the server assigned to their room arrived and took everyone's order before leaving.
"So how was the tour?" Mary asked Peter as she sipped her wine.
"It was cool. I'm interested in interning there." said Peter.
"He's not even an intern yet and he's already being poached. Can you believe that?" added Richard.
"Really?" said Mary, sounding proud of her son.
"He's exaggerating. I'm not being poached." said Peter, shaking his head in amusement at his father's words.
"I'm not exaggerating. He's being poached." said Richard, causing everyone to chuckle.
~
The birthday dinner went as expected and the food was as good as always. They talked about interesting stuff going on in their lives and the interesting things going on in the world at large which was mostly stuff that revolved around the Justice League and their going ons.
Peter noticed that Zatanna looked a little odd during the Justice League talk which made sense since they talked about her father more than once, though it was unknowingly to everyone except Peter.
After finishing their meals, the adults decided to go down to the first floor and dance the night away. Being the gentleman he is, Peter invited Zatanna and Teresa to dance with him. Teresa rolled her eyes but ultimately danced a song with him while Zatanna was very eager to from the get-go, which Peter attributed to her having an interest in dancing.
Thanks to Peter's many years in martial arts, he was a fine dancer. Teresa had little interest in any physical activity and was not a good dancer, while Zatanna was clumsy at first but quickly caught on. The two were so good in fact, that the restaurant put a spotlight on the two of them, ending the song with a round of applause.
With that, they retired to their private room before Peter excused himself to go to the restroom.
'Dragon did say some people see martial arts as a dance of the body and soul. Makes sense why I'm so good at dancing.' thought Peter as he washed his hands after using the toilet.
As he went to get a paper towel to dry his hands, he noticed a common house spider had woven a web near the dispenser.
Having been bitten multiple times by various spiders as a child, he had become quite knowledgeable about spiders, thus he was able to easily recognize the common house spider aka Parasteatoda Tepidariorum. Thanks to his various handling of spiders as a child, he developed a fondness for spiders.
Because of the common house spider's synanthropic nature, they rarely bit humans which, along with his fondness, gave Peter the confidence to put his finger up to it in the hopes it would crawl onto his finger.
The small brown spider curiously put its legs onto his finger before crawling onto it.
"What a cute little guy." said Peter, putting his finger close to his face to get a better look at the spider.
As he was about to put his finger back near its web so it could go back home, Peter felt a shooting pain in the tip of his finger.
"You motherf-" he said, stopping himself from shaking his hand as most people do after feeling pain in their hand so as not to send the innocent spider flying, "You're lucky I like spiders."
Instead of waiting for the spider to get off on his own, he gently picked it up and placed it back on its web before checking to see where he got bit.
'Common house spiders aren't even supposed to bite. It's a good thing they don't have much venom so I'll be fine. It'll be like an ant bite.' Peter thought as he washed his hands again before going back to the private room.
Opening the door, he was met with everyone standing near the door, a cake in Mary's hands with fifteen candles ready to be blown out.
"Happy birthday to you. Happy birthday to you. Happy birthday, dear Peter. Happy birthday to you." they all sang, finishing it off with a cheer.
"Thank you." said Peter before blowing out the candles.
"I think you forgot to make a wish." said Uncle Ben.
"I made one earlier. I don't think the universe will appreciate me being greedy." he said, causing everyone to chuckle.
They divvied up the cake which was a basic birthday cake, and ate the slice before it was time to go. Naturally, as they had been invited, they did not have to pay for their food, but Ben and May did leave a tip of their own.
~
Standing outside the restaurant waiting for the valet, the nighttime breeze brought about a nice chill that signaled the end of summer was not far off.
"So, are you interning with your father because you want to work or because you want to learn?" asked Ben.
"Little bit of both, but mostly the learning part." said Peter, "Why do you ask?"
"Well, if it was because you wanted to work I was going to say you can come work with me at the salvage yard. You can earn some money and get first dibs on parts."
"That's ... not a bad deal." said Peter.
Ben owned a salvage yard that Peter often visited to scour for parts he needed for his tinkering. If he worked there he could get first dibs on any new stuff that came in and he could take his time looking for anything he needed, plus he could make some money.
"Yeah, well, think about it. Offer stands indefinitely." he said, patting Peter on the shoulder.
"Thanks, Uncle Ben." said Peter, as the valet pulled up in Ben's car before handing him the keys.
"Alright, I'll be seeing you kid." said Ben, hugging Peter before moving to say goodbye every one else.
"Bye, Peter." said May, checking over Peter's shoulder to see where Ben was before whispering to Peter, "He's lonely."
"Uncle Ben?" asked Peter, lowering his voice to match hers.
"It's why he offered you the job. He said he was going to offer Teresa a job as a receptionist or filekeeper. He wants to see you kids more. I do too." she said.
"I-"
"I'm not trying to guilt you into accepting his offer. I know you're a young man with his own life to live. I guess ... I just get lonely too. That's all. Look at me, a grown woman crying over something so silly." she said, chuckling as she wiped a tear from her eye, "Maybe I'll just get a dog or a cat."
"Aunt May, I can't promise I'll visit every week, but I promise to visit you guys more often. Especially if you get a pet."
"Hahaha. Thank you, Peter. That's more than enough." she said, patting his arm before going to say goodbye to everyone else.
'Can't say I'm not getting the Peter Parker experience.'
~
As Peter opened the door to his room, he noticed he was feeling off. His hands were clammy, he was sweating, he had chills, and his stomach was hurting. He placed his two gifts down on the dresser before closing the door behind him.
Feeling himself get hotter, he clumsily took off his shoes and threw off his jacket and shirt before throwing himself onto the bed. Raising the blanket to cover himself, he saw the spider bite he got in the restroom and his heart started racing.
Before his mind could follow that particular train of thought, a knock sounded on his door.
"Peter?" he heard his mom saying, "Can I come in?"
"Yeah."
"Oh, gosh. Not you too." she said after opening the door and seeing the state of him.
"W-what do you mean?"
"Your Aunt May just called. She said your Uncle Ben wasn't feeling too well. Looks like food poisoning." she explained, moving to put her hand on Peter's forehead.
"W-we both got the s-shrimp scampi." said Peter.
"How you feeling? Feel like throwing up?"
"N-not really. A-at least, not y-yet."
"My poor baby." she said, moving his hair away from his forehead, "I'll bring you a trashcan and something with electrolytes."
"T-thanks." he said.
"Of course." she said, kissing his forehead before leaving the room.
'And here I thought it was finally happening. Turns out it was just some bad shrimp.'
Disappointed and tired, he closed his eyes to get some sleep.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Author's Note
Not too happy with this chapter, but I really just wanted to get to the good part.
クリエイターの想い 
RubberPeen
RubberPeen Third chapter done and as always let me know what you think.
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