you forget there's so much more

[wasblindbefore]

The first night, he dreams about her dying.

That in itself shouldn't be so unusual. When he dreams, in the rare instances that he remembers them, they're not often very cheerful, and it isn't like he hasn't imagined this before. Gwen told him once, in no uncertain terms, what was going to happen to her back home, and it isn't as if that's something he could have so easily shaken. The difference is that, now, in the wake of her disappearance, it no longer seems like something that could be avoided. She's gone back to that fate, and there isn't going to be a damn thing he can do to stop it, an entire universe away.

He sees it, though, her body floating down the river — except he's watching from the bridge back in Coward, Texas, and her body looks like his mother's did, recognizable only because of her blonde hair fanned out in the water. He hears Anabelle's voice in his head after that, though it's wrong, he knows, distorted; she's taunting him, saying only what he's thinking. "That's one more gone, Elvis," she says, and though he can't see her, he can hear the smirk in her voice, cruel in a way that Anabelle never would have been. "How many more miracles did you think you were going to get?"

After that, he jolts awake, heart pounding in his chest, and reaches for his phone, as if this might be some mistake and she'll have returned one of his calls. There's nothing, though, and it's the final straw, the last thing he needs to know that he's right. Gwen is gone, back to the death that awaits her, and he's lost someone else, just as was always going to have been inevitable.

When he makes his way over to her place, not for the first time, it's significantly later, after he's called out of work and had a drink. He needs one, if he's going to deal with this shit. He probably shouldn't be at all, he knows, but like hell is he just going to leave all her things for a coworker to come pick up or her landlord to get rid of or something like that. That in mind, he's expecting to have to talk his way in, that it won't be easy. What he isn't expecting is for someone else to be getting there when he is. Instinctively, he bristles, back and shoulders going tense, the look he shoots the kid a wary one. Ordinarily, he wouldn't mind this, knowing that Gwen has plenty of friends, but right now, it seems unfair, like an infringement on what ought to be his job to do. "Who're you?"

Comments

[swing]

He first realized that something was wrong when she didn't answer her phone. Though Peter has only known Gwen, this Gwen, for a little over a month, he can't believe that she would be purposely ignoring his calls. Of course, he considered the possibility that she had a reason. He didn't think that he had done anything wrong, but truthfully, it wouldn't have been the first time that he messed up without realizing. That doesn't explain why she was nowhere to be found when he tried to confront her about it. He circles back to her apartment only after exhausting every other option. Before that, he looks for her at her favorite bookstore, asks around at the lab, even passes by the university only to learn that orientation isn't for another week. Desperate, he dons the suit and spends a few hours swinging around the city, hoping that by some miracle he'll be able to pick her out of a crowd.

Even when he returns to her place, it isn't in defeat. He knows the fate that she was meant to meet in the Scarlet Spider's universe. He remembers losing her in his world, too; that she managed to fight her way back eventually is of little comfort. The last thing Peter intends is to surrender her to that. He'll save her if he has to tear a hole in the universe to do it. After all, if coming to Darrow has taught him anything, it's that such a thing can be safely and repeatedly done. First, though, he wants to check again, just to be sure that he isn't overreacting.

He lands on the roof and changes in the stairwell, pulling a pair of jeans and hoodie on over the bodysuit. The mask he stuffs into his backpack, which he slings over one shoulder as he descends to her floor. Coming in this way is, he figures, a surefire way to avoid being denied entrance by the landlord or less-than-friendly neighbors. He doesn't expect to be called out in the hall, much less by someone not much older than him. "I'm just visiting a friend," he says defensively.

[wasblindbefore]

It's a fair enough answer, really, nothing he should find anything wrong with. On edge already, though, Elvis can't help the way it grates on his nerves, and he can't do much to hide it, either. Gwen has plenty of friends and a life that's all her own and that's a good thing; when he prefers solitude more often than not, it works out well for both of them this way. (It did, and it turns his stomach, having to resort to past tense.) It's just right now that he finds himself bothered by it. He hasn't got the first idea who this guy is or how he knows Gwen, and with that being the case, it doesn't seem right that he should be coming around here now. There won't be anything for him here.

"Gwen ain't here," he says, like the friend in question has even been identified. With both of them heading in the same direction, though, and the defensiveness in both of their voices, it seems unlikely that this is some weird coincidence, that he could have some other friend on this floor. "If that's who you're lookin' for."

[swing]

Somehow, it doesn't surprise him that this man is also here looking for Gwen. It confirms the suspicion that has been sneaking on him since those first unanswered calls. He was able to push it away then, having nothing in the way of proof. Now, it's getting harder and harder to convince himself that he is overreacting.

"When did you last see or hear from her?" He sounds like a cop, he thinks. A cop investigating a disappearance. He hopes that isn't the case. It would be better, so much better, if she were simply mad at him.

[wasblindbefore]

He's right, then, about this guy being on his way to Gwen's as well. If he'd been defensive before, that makes him all the more so, though Elvis knows it's probably unwarranted. She has other friends. He doesn't have some claim to her; he wouldn't want to think that he did. Even so, he can't help thinking that he should be the one asking the questions, that it doesn't concern anyone else half as much. He also can't help thinking that it's a useless thing to ask. There's no point in holding on to false hope at a time like this. It just makes it fucking worse.

"Two days ago," he answers anyway, though he doesn't look particularly pleased about it, expression surly at best. "Far as I've figured out, that's the last time anyone did."

[swing]

Despite having prepared himself for that very answer, it hits Peter hard. He's lost everyone now. Even if she wasn't exactly the Gwen that he knew and loved, that she was here at all was for so lone the one consolation that he got for dying and coming to Darrow without any of his friends or family. Now he doesn't even have a Gwen who barely recognizes him.

He tries not to let his face fall too visibly in front of this guy he doesn't know. That they appear to be going through the same thing, having even had the same idea, is of no comfort at all. Nothing can dull this loss.

"So she's gone." This, Peter says for his own benefit, so that it will sink in. If only he knew where to go from here.

[wasblindbefore]

"Yeah," Elvis says, figuring there's no point in dancing around that subject, defensiveness alone keeping the corners of his mouth from dropping as he does. Whoever this kid is, it's not going to do any good to sugarcoat the subject, least of all when he isn't sure why it matters, or who Gwen was to him. It's different when he's at work, arranging funerals and talking to families, taking care of their loved ones. That's routine, and a hell of a lot more natural than someone vanishing into thin air, even when it happens too soon or unexpectedly, even when he should have seen this coming anyway. This, instead, leaves him with little sympathy to spare, not wanting to have to deal with someone else mourning her (not wanting to be mourning her at all). "How d'you know her?"

[swing]

It shouldn't be a difficult question to answer. But the city certainly made it that way when it brought her here from one world and him from another. He can deal with alternate universes just fine. Before Darrow, they fascinated him, appealed to the scientist and the daydreamer in him both. There are so many, so vast, wild, and far apart, that it should be impossible for two such similar worlds to meet. Yet here they have, his and Gwen's. Maybe Darrow was righting itself by taking her away, making space for someone from a world with no shrimp or a planet with two suns. If that's the case, he'd like to find the forces behind that little piece of decision making and beat them all to a pulp. Or die trying. He isn't sure that this is a life anymore, anyway. It's just a series of meager patches over a gaping wound.

He clears his throat, surprised by the lump that he finds there. He swallows it down, unwilling to cry in front of this stranger. "We were from the same place," he answers. "Sort of."

[wasblindbefore]

There are only two people Elvis knows of who could say that they come from sort of the same place as Gwen, and he's met one of them. Of course, there's probably still a chance that someone else could have shown up, but it seems unlikely. She would have mentioned it. Which means that the guy standing in front of him is almost certainly Gwen's ex, the one who looks the same but remembers things differently, from a different universe or however the hell all of that works. Despite knowing that, though, he's never been able to help his inherent dislike of the guy, remembering too well how upset Gwen was the day she showed up here, telling him about her boyfriend who'd broken up with her just after her dad's funeral. He could try to keep it in mind now, for her sake, that they aren't really the same person, but she's not here, and he can't turn off an almost territorial frustration because of that, wondering what the hell he has to be here looking for Gwen too.

"So you're Peter," he says, and it's only half a question, his mouth set in a thin line. "I'm Elvis." He has no idea whether or not Gwen ever mentioned him, but he figures he should make himself known anyway. Just because Gwen is gone doesn't change the way things were before she was, or how he feels about her. "Her boyfriend."

[swing]

To his credit, Peter makes no remark about the guy's name. He doesn't even feel compelled to laugh. His sense of humor seems to have vanished with Gwen. He was wondering when that would happen, what would prove to be the final straw, the breaking point at which he just gives up on finding a bright side in anything at all. Besides, he may not exactly be Sherlock Holmes, but he's a decent enough study to tell that Elvis doesn't like him. He doesn't want to give him justification for it, even though, for his part, Peter doesn't like Elvis either. He didn't decide that just now; he's disliked the guy ever since Gwen told him that she had a boyfriend. It's stupid and he knows it. But although they only dated briefly and Peter never fell in love with Gwen in that way — or rather, he never stopped loving MJ and so she never had a chance — he still hates the idea of her dating anyone else. It doesn't make any sense of him, but he can't help that it's the way he feels.

"Oh" is all that he says. He can't think of anything else, which is a truly rare occurrence. He would mark it for posterity but he can't seem to care about the future or what it might hold. From what Kaine told him, it's possible that Gwen was returned to her world only to be killed. Whatever version of him exists in her reality may not be able to save her. Just as it was supposed to be his, this city may have been her second chance at life. With that running through his head, nothing else seems to matter.

[wasblindbefore]

"Yeah," Elvis replies, huffing out a dark, dry laugh. There ought to be something more intelligent to say than that, but for the moment, nothing comes to mind, and he isn't sure he cares. Whatever Peter thinks about him or his relationship with Gwen, it doesn't matter, least of all right now. Gwen stayed with him, and it's not like she's here anyway. Had she been, he might have made an effort for her sake. As it is, her absence somehow makes him feel that much more territorial, desperate to hold on to her in whatever way he can. If that means asserting his position as the guy she was with when she disappeared — the guy who wouldn't have broken up with her after her dad died, something that he has to keep reminding himself that this Peter didn't, either — then so be it. "Didn't figure this was how we'd meet."

[swing]

"Neither did I," Peter admits. He doesn't know what he imagined, but this isn't it. He was in no rush to meet Gwen's boyfriend at all and would have gladly put it off for as long as possible. But as soon as he learned that she was with someone, he promised himself to behave, if and when they did ever meet. Mostly, it was for Gwen's sake, so that she wouldn't be caught between current boyfriend and ex. Selfishly, he also didn't want to lose her friendship, should the scales tip away from his favor. But without her here, he realizes that has no reason to be kind or considerate, and a part of him begins to wish for Elvis to provoke him. At least then he would have a target for the anger bubbling inside of him.

[wasblindbefore]

It's really only obvious, Elvis thinks, that neither of them could have foreseen this kind of meeting coming. He sure as hell wasn't expecting Gwen to disappear, which he knows now was his biggest mistake. Even for her, he should never have let his guard down enough to think that anything else would happen, that it would somehow be inevitable in this case. People always leave somehow. That's just a fact of his life, as true now as it always has been. He has to wonder why it couldn't have been Peter instead, but he doesn't say so, much as he might not try to hide it. "Well," he says, "here we are anyway."

[swing]

"Yeah." Peter hates this. He wishes that he could just leave, go off to deal with this on his own, but he also feels compelled to stay. Maybe it's the fact that Elvis hasn't left yet and he doesn't want to be the first one to go. Or maybe he's still expecting Gwen to come back with some crazy explanation for why she hasn't been answering her phone and no one has seen her for days. Even the slightest chance that it could be true makes him want to camp out on her doorstep. The neighbors might complain, though.

"Do you have a key for her place?"

[wasblindbefore]

"Got one from the landlord," Elvis says, reaching into his pocket for the key in question. "They're pretty used to this happening around here, I think." He doesn't know how or why. For all that he's come to expect this sort of thing, for people to leave or be otherwise taken away, he could never treat it as something so commonplace, the weight never diminished. It's why he tries to keep people at a distance preemptively. Obviously, though, he hasn't succeeded in that. "Why? You need somethin' from inside?"