#I forgot to pick up my pain meds until the critical point where everything hurts

[afroclusterfunk]

This bathroom bleach job, Walmart chain, and 600mg of Gabapentin are the only things holding me together rn

[marvelous-narnian]

Playing House (Peter Parker x Nurse!Reader)

Summary: Peter, now into his twenties and a full-time Avenger, comes to his nurse girlfriend for help with a strange injury from a supervillain he can’t tell Tony Stark about. 

Note: This is my first fic ever and I’m pretty excited about it. I rarely have motivation to write, so being able to actually finish this one felt really good. I would love to hear what you think about it and any constructive criticism you have is much appreciated. Also, the title references the TV show ‘House’, where they solve weird medical cases, it’s a play on words. 

Words: 2,757

Warnings: There’s some blood and gore, and I didn’t hold back on the description. 

You sigh as you shut the door to your apartment, relieved that your twelve-hour shift at the hospital was over. You hung up your coat and turned to the fridge for something to eat. There was some leftover soup from last night that you took out and started to reheat. Over the buzzing of the microwave, you heard a soft bang from the direction of your bedroom. You cautiously opened the door at the end of the hall to see a red-and-blue figure perched on the fire escape outside your window.

Spiderman was hunched over, leaning against the window and clutching his side. You weren’t surprised to see him injured, he almost always was after patrolling, but you were surprised he came here. Peter hadn’t come to you for a patch job since he moved into the Avengers compound after high school, since they had their own medical staff to deal with injuries. But he was here now, looking just like he had countless times as teens after he had found out you wanted to be a nurse and could help him when he got hurt.

“Peter!” You ran to the window and opened it for him then helped him into the apartment. Still clutching his side, he took off the mask with his other hand to reveal a face contorted with pain.

“Sorry, I know it’s late, but I didn’t know where else to go.” He replied in a tired voice. You lead him to the bathroom and took out your first aid kit.

“It’s alright, you know I’m always here for you, Pete. Your timing is impeccable by the way, I just got home.”  He pressed the spider-shaped button on his suit and let it drop to the floor so that you could examine the wound.

You were surprised by what you saw, not that the injury was grotesque, you had seen much worse, but that it didn’t match with Peter’s pained face. It was a deep laceration about three inches wide covered in wet and dried blood. It was serious, sure, but nothing Peter hadn’t suffered about a thousand times during his years as Spiderman. You touched the edge of the gash to get a better look but stopped when Peter hissed through his teeth.

“What in the world did this?”

“Supervillain” he grunted. “Looked kinda like he was made of vines, but he had these claws the size of daggers. That’s what got me, his claws.”

Just then, a trickle of green liquid started to ooze from the center of the slash. You opened your mouth in disbelief and Peter winced and gripped the counter even harder. “What the-“

“Argh! That’s what making it burn so bad! Can you make it stop?” Peter asked, his eyes filled with panic.

“Darn it Peter, I’m not a doctor! I have no idea why your body is secreting green acid, why did you come here instead of the Avengers compound?” As you spoke, more stuff came pouring out of the wound. You found a towel and started wiping it away, but it wasn’t getting better. In fact, Peter’s flesh has started to sizzle and burn. You could tell Peter was trying not to scream in pain.

“I can’t, y/n, Mr. Stark told me not to try and fight this guy, but I went out and did it anyways. If I had the med staff fix me, he’d know I went against his orders. I can’t let him down.”

“Peter, you idiot, when are you going to realize that Stark does this stuff to protect you! You could have died!” You scolded him, the fear caught in your throat causing your voice to be sharp.

“I’ll start following his orders when he stops treating me like a kid! I’m an Avenger now, I’m not a child anymore, and I can handle myself.” Peter leaned against the bathroom mirror and crinkled up his eyes. His face was beat red with pain, anger, and embarrassment.

You exhaled sharply and threw the green-soaked towel on the counter. “Well, you were wrong this time and now you’re in a pickle because you can’t go to a hospital without them asking too many questions. I don’t know how to help you.”

“Can't you just call one of your doctor friends and have them look at me over skype or something?”

You tried to hide your smirk, amused at how quickly Peter was about to get his comeuppance. “You’re in luck. I haven’t worked at this job long, so I haven’t made many friends, particularly with doctors yet, but I do have the personal phone number of one doctor.” You walked over to your desk and rummaged through the papers piled up there until you found one particular slip of paper. You held it up to Peter, “Dr. Jake Allen.” His hopeful face fell.

“Why do you even still have that creep’s number? Didn’t you tell him you had a boyfriend?”

Dr. Allen was one of the resident doctors at the hospital, not too much older than you, who had asked you out a few weeks ago. He was nice, and professional when he needed to be, but had a huge ego that made him pretty unlikeable off-the-clock. He had approached you in the break room after your shifts and given you the slip of paper with his number on it, coupled with a cheesy pickup line. You had told him you were in a committed relationship that you weren’t interested in ruining and that you’d see him tomorrow. Ever since then Dr. Allen had peppered you with questions about Peter, probably so that he could convince you that he was a better alternative. This was hard for you, since your boyfriend was a full time Avenger living at a headquarters which you had to keep a secret. You told Allen that Peter was in between jobs and was living upstate with some friends, which of course painted a pathetic picture. Ever since then you’d been trying to avoid him, until now.

You sighed and set the slip on the counter so you could dial the number. “It wasn’t like I was going to call him or anything, I just forgot to throw it away. And yes, I did tell him I had a boyfriend.”

He tried to protest but then another drip of green goo oozed out of the wound, causing him to writhe in pain more and effectively shut him up. The phone started to ring and then was quickly picked up by Dr. Allen on the other line. You put the call on speakerphone.

“Hey, y/n, did you finally decide to dump the deadbeat?” Allen asked, referencing your horrible cover story of Peter being unemployed. Your eyebrows shot up at the remark and you looked over, amused, at Peter, whose face was contorted in confusion.

“Um, no, actually, and Peter isn’t a deadbeat. He’s just in between jobs.” You cringe at your own lie, meeting Peter’s look that said, ‘oh come on!’. “Actually, I was calling to see if I could ask a favor for him, he’s hurt and I don’t know what to do. I can’t take him to the hospital because, well, never mind. I just need you to help me figure out how to help him. Can I FaceTime you?”

A barrage of questions came from the other end of the phone. “What happened to him? Why can’t you take him to the hospital? Does he not have health insurance? Why don’t you know what to do?”

You just hung up and called him on FaceTime, ignoring the questions. The face of Jake Allen appeared on the screen, his blond hair perfectly gelled and his blue dress shirt wrinkled and rolled up at the sleeves from the long shift at the hospital. You imagined the situation as if he were there in real life and you were introducing him to an actual patient’s case at the ER. You flipped the camera around to show a sickly pale and irritated Peter in his boxers, sitting on the counter of your bathroom. You zoomed up on his torso to show Allen the bizarre injury. “The wound is a fairly deep three-inch laceration on his left lumbar region, which I should just be able to stitch up, except it’s oozing this weird green slime and it’s burning him.”

“Wow,” was all Dr. Allen said, which didn’t surprise you. It made sense that he would be confused, both at the medical anomaly but also wondering how it happened. “Hey Peter, what’s your workout routine? I’d love to have a set of abs like that.”

You guffawed. “That was the most inappropriate thing I could have ever imagined you saying. Aren’t you supposed to be a doctor?”

“Relax, y/n, I’m just joking around. Seriously, though, this is strange. It almost looks like stomach acid. Behaves like it too, with the burning and everything, but the wound is nowhere near the stomach. How did you say this happened again?”

“The patient would not like to disclose that information.” Peter stated through gritted teeth.

“Okay, suit yourself, the point is-” Dr. Allen stopped abruptly, “Oh my God is that the Spiderman suit?”

Peter's head shot up in alarm and you stammered out a response. “Uh, no...those are pajamas.”

Dr. Allen narrower his eyes and his gaze flitted from the suit to Peter to back to the suit. “Oh my God.” He finally said. “Peter, are- are you Spiderman?”

Peter opened his mouth to respond, scrunched up his face, then just shut his mouth again. He sighed then responded “...yeah, I am. But you can't tell anyone! It could put y/n in danger, or even yourself!”

Jake's face lit up like a little kid's with the mention of Spiderman's secret identity. “Oh, I wouldn't even think of it, your secret’s safe with me! I have to tell you, you're my favorite Avenger, I, ugh, have your action figure.” He let out an embarrassed chuckle.

An awkward smile broke out on Peter's face for a moment before another ooze of green came out of his wound. His smile turned into a grimace.

“Alright, Dr. Allen, what do we do?” You asked, bringing everyone back to the matter at hand.

“Um, let's see. I think we can presume that the slime is acidic, which is the reason it's hurting him, and since we can't make it stop, we need to neutralize the acid with a base.”

“Oh! That's brilliant! I've got some baking soda in the kitchen!” You handed your phone to Peter and bolted out of the bathroom. You put some water into a cup of baking soda and mixed it into a white paste.

When you came back Dr. Allen was peppering Peter with questions about crime fighting and the Avengers. Peter looked annoyed. You knew it was because of how hard he worked at limiting the number of people who knew his secret, and how many sacrifices he'd had to make to keep it. Having some random creepy doctor on that small list probably wasn't something he was super happy about. That, and there was acid coming out of an open wound on his abdomen.

“Okay, babe, I need you to lay down on the floor so I can spread this on the wound.”

He nodded weakly and stumbled onto the bathroom floor. By now he was looking clammy, covered with a sheen of sweat. You dabbed at the acid one last time and cringed at the second and third degree burns forming around the laceration. You scooped a spoonful of baking soda paste out of the cup and spread it over the wound. The mixture bubbled a bit, but nothing much happened. You wondered if it worked until looking up at Peter's face, which now looked peaceful and relieved.

He let out a long sigh. “Oh, yeah, that's better.” You smiled and kept spreading more paste on.

“Is Spiderman alright?” You heard Dr. Allen ask from your phone, abandoned on the counter. You got up and picked it up.

“Yeah, the baking soda seems to have worked, thanks to you. I owe you big time. You realize though the responsibility you have to keeping this secret, right?”

He nodded profusely. “Oh yeah! I would never out Spiderman's secret identity! That would be like treason against the city!”

“Thank you. I'll see you on Monday.” You hung up the video chat and set you phone back down, then slumped down on the floor next to Peter. The both of you stared at the white bathroom ceiling. “Who knew a resident doctor was like your number one fan?” You chuckled.

He turned his head and looked you in the eyes. “I'm sorry,” he said, “for making you go through this. And for getting mad. You shouldn't have to deal with this weird supervillain crap just because I'm sneaking around.”

You reached over and took his hand in yours. “I'm a nurse, it's what I do. Or at least, minus the supervillian part. You know I'm always here for you. I'm in your corner, no matter what you're fighting. And I'm sorry I flipped out earlier. That's like rule number one of being a superhero's girlfriend: you don't freak out when he almost gets killed. It's terrifying knowing you're out there risking your life everyday, but it's also your job.”

His brow furrowed. “You shouldn't have to go through that though, not knowing whether or not I'll still be standing at the end of the day. I can't stop being Spiderman, but you shouldn't have to be the superhero’s girlfriend.”

“Yeah, but I signed up for it! I knew you were Spiderman before we started dating, and I knew what dating you would entail. It doesn't matter anyways because I would make the same choice now that I did back then. Getting to be your girlfriend outweighs any trouble or pain that being Spiderman's girlfriend brings.”

He smiled at you warmly and stared at you with those big brown puppy dog eyes and you fell in love all over again. He brought your hand up to his face and kissed the back of it tenderly. “I could never have imagined having a girlfriend as amazing as you. I love you so much, y/n.”

“ I love you too, Pete.”

The two of you laid there for moment, content on the bathroom floor. Then you broke out into a bout of giggles.

“Do you remember when I found out you were Spiderman?”

He smiled and rolled his eyes. “Do you mean when I forgot you didn't already know and started telling you about the little kid I saved earlier that day?” You nodded through laughter. “I was trying so hard to impress you with that story that I forgot I hadn't told you yet.”

“You were so confused when I freaked out.”

He chuckled. “How about junior year when you told me you wanted to be a nurse? You were so excited to tell me, and I just figured that meant I could come to you for free stitches when I got hurt.”

You cringed at the memory. “Ugh, I had no training at all, but I still agreed to sew you up. I had no idea what I was doing, but I couldn't tell you that! So I just prayed nothing horrible would happen. That practice actually helped me a lot in nursing school, though.”

“I just loved getting to stare at you while you worked. Your face got all scrunched up in concentration. It was so cute.”

“Um, I think I got the better end of the deal there. I got to stare at your abs while I worked.” You smirked at him.

“You know, I did have a six pack before I was bitten by the spider, right?”

You laughed. “No, you didn't!”

“How would you know?”

“We were both at Tracy's pool party freshman year. You were like the skinniest kid there. Honestly, it was a miracle the whole school didn't suspect something when you showed up to school one day completely ripped.”

“I thought I was so smooth wearing baggy clothes to cover up the change.”

You guys continued to reminisce about the old days until Peter's wound stopped secreting the acid. Then he was finally able to wash it all off in the shower and you dressed his wound. You found him some clothes to wear and then the two of you dossed off in each other's arms, safe and happy.

Tagged People: @cinnamon-roll-parker @thetranslucentwallaby @spiderneds @starsholland @livluvspiderboy