The date wasn’t anything particularly original, but it didn’t need to be.
We took a walk around the city, and I enjoyed seeing New York with my own eyes instead of through Sam’s memories.
Apparently, I was the only one who wasn’t bothered by how ordinary our date was.
Penny was clearly nervous because she hadn’t been able to come up with anything better than a simple walk.
From the looks of it, she’d asked me out on impulse.
Even if she’d been planning to invite me beforehand, she probably hadn’t expected me to say yes.
And if she had, she had likely spent more time fighting her own insecurity than actually coming up with a plan.
I did my best to make it clear that I was more than happy with how things were going.
“You stopped wearing glasses?”
I asked mostly to pull her out of her spiral of self-doubt.
I was almost certain I already knew the answer.
“Huh? Yeah… My old ones broke again, so I decided to try contacts,” Parker replied hesitantly, obviously making up the excuse on the spot.
Again?
Of course, that wasn’t the real issue right now, but there had always been one reason Penny’s glasses kept getting broken, Thompson.
Apparently, the bully thought it was hilarious to leave a girl with severe nearsightedness practically blind.
I needed to do something about that.
Still, I had to be careful.
I couldn’t forget where I was.
If I openly stepped in to defend Parker, I might only embarrass her and completely destroy what little confidence she had managed to build.
Come to think of it, despite the fact that Thompson clearly wasn’t short on money, Sam had never shown the slightest interest in her.
I had Amanda to thank for that.
Despite her gentle approach to raising her son, she’d still managed to teach him the right attitude toward that kind of behavior.
“Hmm, that’s a little unfortunate.” I narrowed my eyes playfully and looked her over.
“You looked even cuter in them.”
“T-thank you!”
Such a simple compliment affected Penny far more than I’d expected.
Her face turned bright red, and her eyes darted around as if she were desperately searching for somewhere to hide from her embarrassment.
“Oh, a café! Let’s go in!”
I quietly chuckled at the kaleidoscope of emotions flashing across her face.
She really was adorable.
I followed the even more flustered girl into the café.
Despite being chosen at random, the place turned out to be rather pleasant.
It was clean, bright, and spacious.
I’m not particularly picky, but eating somewhere tidy is always preferable to sitting in a dive that reeks of cheap alcohol.
There were several empty tables.
Once we’d taken one, I noticed a group of girls from our school sitting nearby.
They were staring at us with a mixture of surprise, disbelief, and envy.
If Penny hadn’t already made it obvious that something was going on between us when she loudly called me aside earlier, the rumors would definitely start spreading now.
I’d have to be careful.
School gossip didn’t bother me in the slightest, but there was no telling who might decide that the school nerd Parker was getting too ambitious.
There was one small problem with eating at places like this, though.
Paying.
No girl had ever paid for me before, but that was simply how things were done in this world.
There wasn’t even a good comparison to our world.
Sure, in some countries, splitting the bill was perfectly normal.
A woman paying the entire bill wasn’t unheard of either.
Here, though, that wasn’t even a possibility.
The woman paid for the man.
End of story.
I would have felt incredibly awkward letting Penny pay for both of us.
Especially since my financial situation was clearly better than hers.
However, if I paid for myself, or, God forbid, paid for both of us, then she’d be the one feeling uncomfortable.
An insecure girl could easily interpret that as a sign that I was rejecting her advances.
So what was I supposed to do?
Reluctantly, I decided to let her handle the bill.
I’d survive the embarrassment.
Right now, it was more important that everything went as smoothly as possible for her.
When the waitress brought our orders, she was almost suspiciously friendly toward me.
After setting everything down, she walked away, making sure to give me one last flirtatious glance.
That was when Penny brought up a rather unexpected topic.
“So, what do you think about superheroes?”
Interesting question.
Was she simply curious, or was she trying to figure something out for herself?
Either way, I needed to choose my words carefully.
I doubted one careless remark would be enough to convince her not to become a heroine, but it was always better to be cautious.
Spider-Man was an extremely important character in the Marvel universe.
Without him, things could go very badly.
“I don’t have a problem with them. Why?”
“Well, you see…” Penny shifted in her seat, nervously rolling her coffee cup between her palms.
“I was reading about it online recently, and a lot of people say that supervillains only started appearing after superheroes did. They think things have actually gotten worse.”
“Which came first, the chicken or the egg?”
I was now certain Parker was asking about herself, so I decided to encourage her.
“The whole argument about whether villains appeared because of heroes is pointless. The fact is, people with superpowers have started appearing all over the world. The police, and even the military, don’t always have the resources or the ability to stop someone if they decide to use those powers for evil.”
I paused to take a sip of coffee.
“Sure, you can argue that a masked vigilante shouldn’t be above the law, especially if they make a mistake. But that’s a question of regulation, not whether superheroes should exist in the first place.”
I exhaled and took another drink.
Motivational speeches weren’t exactly my strong suit, but judging by how much brighter Penny’s expression had become, I’d apparently done a decent job.
“You’re right. I guess I think too much about those comments. Sometimes people really amaze me with how cynical they can be.”
“Heh. Let me guess. ‘You can’t save everyone,’ ‘nothing has really changed,’ and all that?”
I’d seen those comments too.
“But here’s the thing. That kind of attitude lasts right up until one of those people finds themselves alone in a dark alley with some lunatic holding a knife. At that point, I bet our cynical commenter would be jumping for joy if a ‘freak in a costume’ showed up to save them.”
Parker clearly liked my perspective.
If her smile and shining eyes were anything to go by.
We spent about an hour at the café, talking about superheroes, movies, and all sorts of little things.
Overall, I enjoyed spending time with her.
At the same time, our conversation had given me something to think about.
Once I got home, I would have to seriously reconsider what I intended to do with my powers.
It was getting close to six, so I decided it was time to head home.
Naturally, Penny walked me out, since that was simply the custom here.
“Are you coming to school tomorrow?” Parker asked hesitantly.
“I am.”
Judging by how red her face became, she’d taken that answer personally.
Well, I wasn’t going to correct her.
Let her enjoy it.
If she believed that her love had inspired a chronic truant to return to the path of righteousness, it might do wonders for her self-esteem.
It seemed like it was time to say goodbye, but neither of us moved.
We simply stood there, facing each other.
I’m no expert, and I can’t read minds, but I had a pretty good idea what she wanted.
She wanted a goodbye kiss.
She just couldn’t bring herself to make the first move.
So I decided to take care of it.
I leaned toward her and pressed my lips against hers.
The kiss only lasted a couple of seconds, but that was enough to turn Parker’s face an even deeper shade of red.
“That’s for being such a perfect lady,” I said with a smile as I stepped back toward the front door.
“See you tomorrow, Penny.”
“S-see you tomorrow.”
Her dazed voice followed me inside.
Through the peephole, I watched her touch her lips in amazement, as if she couldn’t quite believe what had just happened.
Then a genuine, radiant smile spread across her face, and she suddenly threw a fist into the air with a strange little cry.
Adorable.
Still chuckling to myself, I went to change clothes and prepare dinner.
Back in my old life, my cooking skills had been limited to boiling dumplings and frying eggs.
Sam, however, was considerably more capable in the kitchen.
My thoughts inevitably returned to our conversation at the café, too.
In a way, I’d just tried to push Penny toward becoming a hero.
It would be pretty hypocritical to tell a girl, “Go save the world,” while I stood around doing nothing.
I’d look like some NPC in a video game.
I really liked Penelope, and Amanda was a wonderful woman.
I wouldn’t say I’d fallen madly in love with either of them, but I certainly cared about them.
I had no idea how many people I’d become close to while living here, but I knew one thing for certain.
A certain purple giant was going to try to take them away from me.
Losing my loved ones for five years, or disappearing myself for the same amount of time, wasn’t exactly appealing.
Which meant I had to pull myself together and try to prevent it.
Of course, I wasn’t planning to rush headfirst into everything.
The first thing I needed to do was get myself into shape.
Sam had absolutely no interest in sports.
He hadn’t even attended physical education classes for about two years.
As for martial arts schools, though, I needed to be careful.
The last thing I needed was to accidentally end up at a recruitment center for the Hand.
I also needed to talk to Penny about all of this.
Keeping secrets when they could easily be avoided was a terrible idea.
I suspected that if I told her about my powers, she’d tell me about hers in return.
Working as a pair would definitely be safer.
A superhero team was already taking shape.
Sure, it was only two people for now.
It would be fun.
Or we’d get shot.
One of the two.