"Mr. Parker?" Hector’s voice is a gravelly whisper. "It’s Delgado. From 2B."
He opens his front door. The hallway smells of boiled cabbage and loneliness. He climbs the stairs. It takes him seven minutes. His lungs are screaming. His knees are screaming louder.
For the first time that night, Peter Parker lets himself break. He takes the cookies. He doesn't cry. But he leans his forehead against the old man’s shoulder. Just for a second. Just long enough to remember he is human. Tu amigo y vecino Spider-Man Temporada 1 Dual 1...
He swings home not because he wants to, but because his body is on autopilot. He rips off his mask. The fabric is stiff with dried sweat and a thin crust of someone else's blood. He looks at his reflection in the dark window of his bedroom. He’s seventeen. He has the eyes of a fifty-year-old war veteran.
Earlier, he couldn't save the convenience store clerk on 7th. A guy with a plasma rifle, high on something that made his veins glow blue. Peter got there four seconds too late. The clerk, a kid named Arjun who always gave Peter an extra gumball for free, was already staring at the ceiling with the geometric pattern of a bullet hole in his forehead. From 2B
Aunt May is working a double shift. The fridge is empty. The landlord taped a third eviction notice to the door. Peter doesn't have the strength to peel it off.
The same night. Same sounds. Different soul. It takes him seven minutes
It’s the sound of a door closing gently. And behind it, two heartbeats. One young, one old. Both shattered. Both still beating.
Hector remembers his own son, Mateo. How he would come home on leave. He would laugh too loud. He would sleep with a knife under his pillow. He would stare at the wall for hours. That same hollow look. The look of someone who has seen the abyss and knows the abyss is winning.