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Peter Parker was exhausted.
He’d had a morning class at eight, had decided to patrol until his next one, gotten stabbed in the shoulder, fixed up and drugged to oblivion with pain meds by his girlfriend, and then dragged to his two hour long bio class. Luckily, Gwen was in the class as well, so Peter had someone to droop against as his professor jabbered on incessantly about a subject he’d learned three years before.
He’d been hoping to be able to just sleep through the torture, but his professor watched him pointedly as he reminded everyone to take copious notes. Peter’s immediate instinct was to dig through his backpack for his laptop, but it was on the wrong side and his shoulder got jarred. He sucked in a breath sharply, slowly hissing it out through his teeth.
His arm was in a sling and then tied tightly to his chest to prevent movement. He and Gwen had found that the less he moved his injuries, the quicker they healed, so this was necessary.
Gwen rubbed his back soothingly as he struggled to rein himself in. “I’m taking notes for you. Don’t worry about it. Just hang in there.” She muttered lowly.
Peter nodded slowly, gritting his teeth. Another half hour through the lecture, and Peter’s head was dropping dangerously close to Gwen’s shoulder. She certainly didn’t mind, but she knew her professor might. She moved her hand from his back to his knee, squeezing gently. Peter’s brown eyes flickered back open. Gwen turned her laptop toward him, her notes open. ‘ Hey, you need to at least look like you’re awake.’
Peter grimaced and shifted into a more awake position, wincing as he jarred his shoulder again. Gwen noticed this and began typing another message. ‘How’re you doing with the pain?’
Peter made a face. Before slowly typing back his message with one finger. ‘ I’m not sure how much longer I can sit here.’
If Peter was actually being honest, that meant he truly was in quite a bit of pain. ‘Let me know when you need to go.’ Gwen typed and Peter nodded.
Another fifteen minutes went by and Gwen could feel Peter slumping in his chair. With his enhanced metabolism, he burned through normal pain medicine about ten times quicker than a normal person. She’d given him double the regular dose, knowing he could handle it, and estimated what time it would wear off. There were about five minutes left on that timer, and she could tell from Peter’s face that she’d been pretty close with her guess.
She closed her laptop, putting it into her bag and slinging both hers and Peter’s bags onto her shoulder. With the other shoulder she hoisted Peter up, holding about half of his body weight as he slumped. Her professor glanced at them, but seeing Peter’s condition, she abstained from commenting.
Gwen could feel her boyfriend trembling slightly in her arms. She pulled him to the side of the hall as a class next to them let out, hugging him so that no one could see his face as it screwed up in pain.
He laid with his head in her lap on the subway ride home as she ran her fingers through his hair. He was about as weak as a kitten now, barely able to hold himself up, and half delirious because his shoulder hurt like heck.
When they got home Gwen immediately went to find the pain meds and a glass of water, then she held him while they watched tv, waiting for the medicine to kick in. Gwen could feel Peter relaxing as the drugs pulled him into a contented delirium. “Gwen?” He mumbled, his speech slurring a bit. “Yeah, Pete?”
“I love you a lot.”
Gwen smiled, trying not to laugh at his uncontrollable openness.
“I love you even more, Bugboy.” She grinned.
Peter gasped, his eyes going comically wide. “That’s so much!” He exclaimed.
This time Gwen couldn’t keep herself from laughing. “Yeah, it is. And you deserve every last bit of it and more.”
When he’d fallen asleep later, she got up to change his bandages, coming back to find his eyes open and clear again.
“Hi.” He said, sitting up and beginning to peel off his bandages.
“Hello, dopey. Feeling better?” Gwen snickered.
Peter raised his eyebrows, but then his face dropped in realization. “Oh no. What did I say? Did I say something stupid?”
Gwen laughed loudly. “No, what you said was really cute, actually.”
She relayed the previous conversation to him while changing his bandages. His wound had already closed up, but it was heavily bruised still, so they decided it was better to keep ointment on it for the night. As Gwen put the stuff away, Peter leaned forward and caught her lips in a kiss. After a moment he whispered, “I really do love you a lot. More than anything else.”
Gwen smiled, because the strongest man in the city, the Spider-Man, was the one who loved her a lot. And dang, was she lucky.