“Sammy, when are you going to introduce me to your girlfriend?” Mom suddenly asked.
With all the superhero training I’d been doing lately, I barely had any time for her.
I always tried to get home in time to make dinner, but it didn’t always work out.
Amanda was understanding about it and never got upset, which somehow made me feel even worse.
Penny had been right.
Sometimes, understanding only made things harder.
“What makes you think I have a girlfriend?” I asked without looking up from what I was cooking.
Today was supposed to be a rest day.
We’d been pushing ourselves pretty hard lately, so we needed a chance to breathe and relax.
I decided to spend the day with Amanda.
Fortunately, she had the day off.
Penny, meanwhile, had gone to the Daily Bugle to try to sell our photographs.
Hopefully, making a little money would help her stop worrying so much about finances.
I doubted she’d get much for them, though.
If I remembered correctly, Jameson wasn’t exactly known for being generous, and I couldn’t imagine her gender change had made much difference in that regard.
Still, it should be more than enough for a teenager’s spending money.
“Well, there are several reasons,” Amanda drawled, tapping her manicured fingers against the table.
“Mrs. Christens saw some girl walking you home, and apparently you kissed goodbye. You’ve also started disappearing all the time. You’re hardly ever home, you smile more, and overall, you’re just… more alive, I suppose.”
Oh, Mrs. Christens.
If I was cosplaying Corvo Attano whenever I put on my costume, she somehow managed to cosplay Aunt Petunia from Harry Potter without even needing one.
She was a thin woman with an unusually long neck who loved gossip.
Though, apparently, gossip wasn’t supposed to be a particularly female trait in this world.
Then again, I’d already figured out that people liked talking about other people’s lives regardless of gender.
I didn’t think the change in my behavior was entirely because of my girlfriend.
I was simply more open and friendly in general than Sam had been.
It wasn’t like I was hiding Penny from Mom.
Meeting your girlfriend’s parents had always been a pretty nerve-racking experience for me.
That was despite the fact that I’d never been bullied at school and had never really struggled with self-confidence.
For Parker, though, something like that could be a genuine ordeal.
That’s why I’d decided to wait until she felt more confident.
“It hasn’t happened since Gabriella left,” Amanda continued with a sigh.
“It’s a shame things turned out that way. She was a good girl.”
Yeah, Osborn already knew Mom.
I wasn’t sure exactly how it had happened.
Maybe her mother had been preparing her to run the company and had taught her how to get along with people.
Or maybe Gabriella was simply naturally charismatic.
Whatever the reason, Amanda had absolutely adored her after barely ten minutes of knowing her.
“Heh, I guess I can’t hide anything from you,” I said with a grin.
“Fine. When the opportunity comes up, I’ll introduce you.”
“As soon as possible.”
The woman clasped her fingers together and smiled with an almost suspicious amount of anticipation.
She looked like a cartoon villain.
“I need to make sure my son made a good choice and didn’t get involved with some little tramp.”
“Come on, Mom.” I never thought I’d find myself saying those words again.
“Just don’t scare her off.”
“Scare her off? Do I really look that terrifying, or did you get yourself involved with a coward?”
“No, you’re not scary, and she’s not a coward. It’s just that every girl gets nervous when meeting her boyfriend’s parents. Well, Gabriella doesn’t count.” Visit novelping dot com for the full chapter.
Honestly, I wasn’t too worried about them meeting.
The only potential problems were Penny’s lack of confidence and her financial situation.
Amanda wanted the very best for me, and a poor, stuttering girl might not necessarily meet her standards.
But even if Parker somehow made a terrible first impression, which I seriously doubted, I didn’t think it would become a major problem.
Mom had never been able to be particularly strict with me.
If I kept insisting, she’d eventually accept it.
Besides, Penny had plenty going for her.
She was incredibly intelligent, and she was beautiful too.
I was sure Amanda would appreciate that.
“All right. I promise I’ll be on my best behavior so I don’t scare your brave little girlfriend,” Amanda promised, without losing her smile.
“Good. Now let’s eat.”
Penny
“You’re fired!”
The words hit Penny the moment she stepped into the office.
“But I don’t even work here!”
“Well, fine. Melanie! Put this girl on the payroll, then fire her!”
Penny winced.
The telephone on the desk, which was supposed to be used to contact the secretary, was being completely ignored by the woman behind the desk.
Instead, she preferred to yell at the top of her lungs, loud enough to make Penny’s ears ring.
“Yes, boss,” came the secretary’s voice from outside.
Anyone who had ever watched the news knew that Josie Jonah Jameson was an eccentric woman.
Knowing that was one thing.
Seeing her in person was something else entirely.
“All right, what have you got?” Josie finally calmed down enough to ask why her visitor was there.
“Photographs. They told me to bring them straight to you.”
Penny hurried over to the desk and placed an envelope in front of her.
“Hm. Let’s see what you’ve brought me.”
Jameson began examining the photographs with a critical eye.
“These pictures are crap! Crap, crap, complete crap!”
She continued announcing her verdict as she flipped through the photographs.
“I’ll give you three hundred dollars for them.”
“Three hundred?! These are worth at least five hundred!” Penny protested.
“That’s highway robbery! Fine, four hundred dollars and a coupon for free coffee.”
“Four hundred and fifty, and two coupons.”
Parker wasn’t giving up.
“Ah, hell with it. Take the coupons, take all of them for all I care. They’re still crap, and nobody drinks that stuff for free anyway.”
Jameson finally relented.
“Melanie! Get Angela in here. Front page headline: Costumed Freaks Cause Chaos in Broad Daylight.”
“Boss, if we go after the new male superhero, they’ll tear us apart,” the secretary said as she appeared in the doorway.
“And am I teaching you how to be a useless freeloader?” Jameson snapped.
“Then don’t teach me how to do my job!”
People needed to know the truth about those crazy masked lunatics.
Then Jameson turned her attention back to Penny.
“You. What’s your name, sweetheart?”
“All right, Parker.”
Josie grabbed a sheet of paper from the desk and quickly scribbled something on it.
“Take this to the lady at the entrance. She’ll pay you. If you take any more pictures of those super freaks, bring them straight to me. Otherwise, I’ll fire you.”
She waved her hand dismissively.
“Now get out.”
Penny wisely decided not to point out, for the second time, that she didn’t actually work there and had already been fired.
She took the paper and awkwardly said goodbye before leaving the office.
Only after stepping outside the newspaper building did she allow herself a satisfied smile.
Despite Jameson’s eccentric personality, things had gone surprisingly well.
She had four hundred and fifty dollars and two free coffee coupons, the latter obtained mostly out of sheer stubbornness rather than any real need for them.
There was just one thing left to do today.
Sam had flatly refused to take his share of the money from the photographs.
Of course, Penny had known money wasn’t particularly important to him ever since he’d been dating Gabriella.
But sometimes, he took that attitude to ridiculous extremes.
Still, if Sam thought he was the most stubborn person in this relationship, he was making a serious mistake.
He might refuse to take the money, but nothing was stopping her from spending it on him.
She would have to be blind not to notice how his eyes lit up whenever she built something for them.
“So, how far is the nearest electronics market from here?” Parker wondered aloud.
Gwen
How many times had she watched the video of the two new superheroes helping during the fire?
She could have been there too.
Her eyes instinctively drifted toward the bed, where the costume she’d recently made was hidden underneath it.
But making the decision wasn’t easy, and her mother certainly wasn’t helping.
Captain Stacy loved talking about superheroes and how they interfered with the police doing their jobs.
There was another problem, too.
According to her mother, Gwen knew perfectly well that plenty of inexperienced heroes simply died during their first outings.
The police often found the bodies of brave fools who had decided to put on a costume and try to make the city a better place.
Two new superheroes.
A boy and a girl.
Were they a couple?
Gwen had no idea how she’d feel if her man wanted to become a hero.
Not that she had a boyfriend.
The girl’s abilities were remarkably similar to her own, except for the webbing.
Was that part of her powers, or some kind of gadget?
The videos posted online were terrible quality, making it difficult to figure out much of anything.
Damn, Gwen wanted webbing like that.
Swinging through the city with it had to be incredibly cool.
Maybe she should try to join them.
Working with a team had to be safer.
Of course, there was no guarantee they’d accept her.
Finding them would be another challenge altogether.
Still, it could be a good place to start.
The vibration of her phone pulled her out of her thoughts.
It was a message from Dr. Connors.