A Bad Decision Leads To Worse Ones

Have you ever had those moments that you just replay in your head over and over again? You say or do something REALLY stupid and since then you’ve thought of about a thousand different ways for it to have gone better? Well that’s been me all day. My mind was completely stuck in that moment, Gwen frozen in the doorway as she stares ahead, as those words left my mouth.

Would things have been better if she turned around? Chewed me out? Maybe there’s a reason she didn’t respond? Did she feel the same? Was it embarrassment? Maybe she saw Faith coming up behind me and didn’t want to get in on the group “make fun of Petra” session…

Going to classes didn’t exactly help either, they were all filled with very boring topics that didn’t hold my attention. And as I walked through campus I could have sworn I saw Gwen at least twice before she dipped her head down or ran away a little extra quick… God was it really that bad?

Even I knew the answer to that. I sat down on a bench in the middle of campus after my last period and stared down at my phone… I didn’t have a ton of time until the lab, about an hour and a half. Part of me wanted to get there early just to get a bit of extra science time with Conners… the other part of me wanted to cancel all together to avoid Gwen. So what do college students do whenever they are lost in their thoughts and don’t want to make a decision? We doom-scroll!

No I don’t mean that dictator in Latveria! She’s a whole different thing.

I opened up twitter and started to scroll to try and find something that interested me. There was nothing much in the general feed, so I switched over to the local NYC feed to see if that was more interesting, and indeed it was.

The first thing I saw I was just about to scroll past, as the hideous and disturbing face of J. Janette Jameson flashed across my screen on a dimly lit ad that looked like it was ripped off of tiktok. I was about to continue scrolling, but I hesitated just long enough to hear the important parts that made me wanna stay and watch.

“Hey! You ungrateful brats out there on the internet!” She screams in a harsh, almost militaristic tone. Good start Jannette, I thought with a quick chuckle, but kept listening as something very quickly caught my ear.

“Are you tired of being broke and worthless? Do you actually wanna do something with your stupid lives, help out the public, while making some real money?” She growls with the same arrogant smirk that always plastered her face. As much as I hated it, the idea of better money did sound appealing… so I kept listening. “Here at the Bugle we are looking for one thing and one thing only: Pictures of Spider-Woman!”

My ears perked up a bit and my eyes widened at her words. My jaw dropped slightly as I pulled the phone slightly closer to me, as a very blurry image of a red and blue blur flashed across the screen.

“All of the photos our best photographers can seem to get is a stupid blob that looks like something my pre-schooler would have made if she got a concussion!” Her voice over screams, before the photo flicks away and JJ returns. “If you think you can do better I want you to give it your damndest! Take a picture and bring it down to the Daily Bugle, and if it’s good enough? We’ll get you paid!”

Great. The last thing I need when fighting bad guys is the fucking papparazi trying to get a quick pic… imagine if someone was there at that Rhino fight? I’d be ruined! Still though… could be a good way to earn a quick buck. With a shrug I scroll on to the next few posts, about to turn my phone off, whenever the police radar shows up on my feed. My eyes get wide, and a small smirk grows on my face.

The scene was of the first national bank, just a couple blocks away, surrounded by police and SWAT cars. Captain Stacy was on the front lines getting people to safety, and all of them had their guns pointed at the front door. The caption said “HOSTAGE SITUATION AND ARMED ROBBERY” which, after the day I had, I could use a good robbery to blow off some steam.

I take a quick look at my phone and notice the time… I still got time. Very quickly I rushed to the closest empty classroom to change, hide my backpack, and then swing towards the chaos.