Chapter Text
To my Guy In The Chair.
I remember the day we first met. I don't know if you do too or not, but I never really expected you to. Not that I don't think you would, but I just think that's a ridiculous thing to expect of somebody. To remember something that happened when we hadn't even learned our parents' real names. It was the first day of kindergarten. I was crying really bad. I wouldn't let go of my mom. That was when you came up to me. You told me your name and asked me if I wanted to play spaceships, and I knew we were going to be best friends forever.
I don't know why you did that. I don't know why it made me stop crying. Sometimes I like to think it was fate, but I know that's not the truth. We were just kids. We didn't know the things we know now. Nothing was ever really bad when we didn't know what it felt like to hurt more than scrapes on our knees. Then again, that didn't last long, did it? Because a few months later, my parents died and I didn't know what happened. Neither did you, but we both knew my mom and dad weren't coming back, and you didn't leave my side for three weeks straight.
I don't think I would've made it this far without you by my side. I think I would've ended up dead in a ditch by fifteen if you weren't here to rein me in when things got crazy. I mean, every decent hero needs a Guy In The Chair, right? You've saved my life more times than I can count, and given my intelligence, that's a pretty tall order if I do say so myself. I don't think it's possible to express how grateful I am for you being here, so I'm not going to try. It would be sad and pathetic and, honestly, it would just be rude. The words that I need to tell you don't exist, and trying would be a crime.
I'm sorry, by the way. For everything. I'm sorry for the way I tore up your life with my own issues. I'm sorry you never got to be normal. I'm sorry we never got to be normal. You never should've had to be my Guy In The Chair. You never deserved that sort of burden. It should've been somebody who wasn't a teenager as clueless as I was, somebody who was only a little less scared than I was. I never should've been Spider-Man. Spider-Man should've never existed. He wasn't meant to. He never deserved to. That spider was never meant to bite anybody, and that bite was never meant to turn anybody into something like me.
But more than anything, I'm sorry it had to be this way. But the world needs me. The world needs Spider-Man.
Gonna need a rain check on our Star Wars movie marathon. A week next Saturday, at my place.
Peter.