HEROES: The Fan Fiction Magazine presents
The Spectacular Spider-Man
Episode 1 – “Man About Town”
No matter how difficult things get in my life there’s one thing I’ll always love: web-slinging. It clears the cobwebs out of my head, if you’ll excuse the pun. Soaring high over New York City I get a new lease on life each and every time. It doesn’t matter if Kraven is hunting me or I just put away Doc Ock for the umpteenth time. Whenever I flick my wrist and cast out that webline I flush all my troubles away.
That’s the great thing about being a superhero. You don’t have to worry about always looking forward and losing yourself in the imaginative moment. Your whole life is nothing but fantasy. Least, that’s how I look at it.
I caught the top of the Bugle building with a webline and made sure to swing by Jonah’s office for giggles. Like I expected, he rushed to the window and slammed his sourpuss against the glass, waving one hand over his head. I’m sure he was screaming something about me being a menace, or a plague on the city, or a wanted felon. I merely saluted him as I swung by, smiling under my red mask.
J. Jonah Jameson has a good portion of the city thinking that I’m the worst thing to hit since…well, ever. “A reckless vigilante that’s in league with all these super-criminals running around!” That’s what he says in every single press conference he’s ever given. I’ll never understand how a jerk like that gets go much attention.
A few blocks and a few uplifting somersaults later, I’m plopping down on top my apartment building. My wife, Mary Jane, and I have lived here since we got married six months ago. It’s not much but it’s all we can afford with her budding acting career and my part time work for the Daily Bugle. Yep, that’s right: I work for the pigheaded Jonah. Ironic, huh?
I slip into the jeans and t-shirt I had left on the roof and haul butt down the stairwell. I didn’t want to be late for dinner again, not after the last time MJ had ended up waiting for me while I tangled with the Shocker.
“Welcome home, Tiger!” she exclaimed as I cracked open the door and waltzed into the kitchen. “You’re just in time for my famous homemade waffles.”
I kissed her on the cheek and checked out the stove. “Waffles? For Dinner?”
“It’s eccentric.”
“You’re eccentric, sweety,” I replied. MJ was a beautiful and talented redhead and I was lucky to have tricked her into loving me, but her cooking? Let’s not go there.
I tickled her side with one hand as I reached for a clean plate out of the sink with the other. She squirmed like she always did but didn’t pull away. God, I loved her.
“Let me just shut the TV off here--”
“Wait,” I said, leaning around the corner to see the screen. There was a news report on, something about an explosion uptown around the Clark building.
“No, no, no.”
I looked at MJ, set down my plate, and kissed her on the other cheek. “Sorry, babe,” I apologized. “I’ll be back as fast as I can.”
And just like that, despite an irritated wife and famous waffles, I ran back up to the roof and threw the tights back on. Peter Parker may have a private like but Spider-Man sure doesn’t.
TO BE CONTINUED