A/N: this is it guys, this is the last chapter. gosh, i feel like i'm holding my breath

there's no author's note at the end but there is a final a/n chapter directly after this so please be sure to read that! this lowkey feels like the last day of school before break lol

anyway, there's a bit of a twist in this chapter (not the obv one i know you're hoping for) and i think some of you might have already guessed it so this chapter will probably feel satisfying in a sense. it's on the short side, but there's a huge chapter will lots of deleted scenes after this so hopefully that's exciting!

as for now, enjoy the very final chapter of from the dark :,)

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"Tomorrow I will tell you that..."

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DECEMBER 18, 2016

It was late into the night and Peter couldn't sleep.

His head was filled with worry. It had been five days. What if Ada never woke up? What if he would have to walk out of this hospital without her? Who would he call when he had a problem? Whose blue eyes could possibly match up to the beauty of Ada's?

He began pacing the room, thinking about all the things in his life that would be different without Ada. He paced and paced until it drove him crazy.

With a frustrated grunt, he sat down in the edge of the sofa, holding his head in his hands. He tapped his foot anxiously.

Then he harshly rubbed his hands over his face and stared out the window. The view wasn't much— he could see a few tall buildings in the moonlight. He stared at them until his heartbeat finally came down.

He looked over at Ada and sighed.

His mind drifted back to the last peaceful moment they had at the Winter Dance, right before he went and screwed everything up.

Adelaide would never forget the way he was looking at her in that moment.

His eyes were filled with a heavy, lustered look. She had never been looked at that way before. It was so intense, she felt like she was closer to him than physically possible. And yet, at the same time, it was gentle, like soft waves in shallow waters.

Peter was looking at her like he was...

He leaned closer, glancing down at her lips before looking at her wide blue eyes again. Adelaide felt her breathing picking up speed. Her heart hammered loudly in her chest. It was insane how much control he had over her. Just one look and Adelaide found it impossible to remember her own name. Slowly, he leaned forward until she felt his soft lips brushing against her cheek like a beautiful sin. Her breaths turned shaky.

"Pete..." she breathed as her eyes fluttered closed. She slid her hands up from his shoulder to the back of his neck to steady herself. Her fingertips brushed his soft hair.

His lips lingered on her cheek and she swore she felt them branding her skin with their heat. She felt Peter lightly kissing her jaw. It was a lingering kiss that made electricity sparkle through her veins. He had total power over her. Just one look, and she would come completely undone at his whim.

And then, when she thought she had drifted away from reality, she heard him say:

"Могу ли я поцеловать тебя?" he whispered softly in her ear (Can I kiss you?).

"What have you done to me, Ada? How am I supposed to go home without you? Go to school? Do literally anything without you," he mumbled. He felt angry at her for not waking up even though it wasn't her fault. Ironically enough, he needed her advice on what to do and how to handle this. She always got him like no one else ever had before. Like she knew him better than he knew himself.

Suddenly, Peter knew what would calm him down.

He walked over to her bedside table and pulled out his notebook and a pen. Then he sat down cross-legged in a chair beside her. He thought better of it and settled onto the bed, just by her feet. He uncapped the pen and then closed his eyes, taking a deep breath. He glanced at her.

Peter would write a poem for her.

All those other poems he had read just reminded him how much he had to lose. So he would write the poem about her for the assignment.

"I know you were born with your heart already broken," he whispered, studying her face in the moonlight.

For once, she hoped she couldn't hear him. Everything he was about to say were the most honest, raw thoughts from deep inside his heart.

And they were just that much easier to say when he knew she couldn't hear him.

"But the world began in pieces and somehow made itself whole," he continued quietly. He thought about the promise he had made to keep his distance from her. He swallowed.

Peter wondered how something so close to him could be so far away at the same time. She was standing in his arms, wasn't she? She was looking into his eyes too, wasn't she?

But as much Peter hated to admit, he could still see the pain swimming in her vivid eyes. Up close, he could see everything from the freckles that dotted her face to the fear in the wisps of gray in her iris.

Even here, she wasn't fully here. Even with only a few centimeters of space between them, there was something keeping them far apart.

Peter pressed his forehead against hers in a way that Adelaide could feel just how much he was holding himself back. Her heart twisted. He closed his eyes, letting out a soft breath that she felt tickling her lips.

"How much longer, Ada?" he whispered.

"And I know how much this is going to hurt," he whispered, "But it's too late for me to get off this collision course."

Peter thought about his conversation with Mr. Stark, when he had asked him what he wanted from her. He had told the billionaire that he couldn't imagine his life without this girl.

She had been his rock but she was so much more than that too. She was his best friend. She owned pieces of his heart that even he didn't know about. But most importantly, Ada was his light at the end of the tunnel. She was his silver lining. She was the person whose smile made his terrible day better.

Ada was the girl who owned his heart and all the love that Peter Benjamin Parker was capable of giving.

"I will always be here for you, Ada," he whispered back, "However you need me."

It was his turn to be there for her. After everything she had done for him, now she needed him and Peter wasn't going to put himself before her again. He had already made that mistake several times before.

She had shown him how much she cared when she gone the extra mile just to be sure he that he was safe or he wasn't going to make a mistake he would regret later. Ada had already shown him how much he meant to her.

But now, he had to show her just how much he cared about her. It was her turn. She needed his help and he would be there for her, however she needed him. Even if she just needed a shoulder to cry on or someone to talk to, he would be that person for her because he cared. And he wouldn't ask for anything in return.

Because before he could be anything more, he had to be her friend first.

And maybe, just maybe, Peter thought he could put her back together piece by piece.

Without her, Peter would have no sense of direction in his life. Without Ada...life would be dull.

And that was the moment he knew.

This wasn't just a crush. To feel something this deeply, it felt like a force of the universe. No, this was something else entirely. It was...more. More than crush, more than a friend, more than...more than just I like you.

Ada didn't just have bits and pieces of his heart. She owned it entirely. Peter felt like he had jumped off of a cliff and he never stopped falling. Except the fall wasn't fearful because he knew Ada was there waiting at the end of it all. It was bittersweet and painful and utterly maddening.

"Tomorrow...Tomorrow I will tell you that..." he started quietly.

His heart began to beat faster. His stomach flooded with butterflies. His breaths fell out of their rhythm. He swallowed hard.

Now he finally knew.

"I love you," he whispered.

"And nothing in the world can stop the maddening rush of those three words."

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"I'm sorry," he whispered later that night. He had been doing a lot of thinking about what he said. "I know I promised I would keep my distance. But..."

He looked down at the poem still resting in his lap. Something in his heart twisted and he didn't know the feeling well enough to say if it was pain or love.

Maybe both. One couldn't exist without the other, it seemed.

"...I couldn't help it, Ada," he whispered, sighing, "I'm in love with you."

"I tried to tell myself that I wasn't. But it didn't work. Because every time I look at you, I just...god, I just know, you know? I get this feeling and it's messy and confusing—but somehow I just know it's because...I-I love you. I shouldn't, because I promised. I don't know what I was thinking when I promised you that. I think I might have broken it the second I made it. I don't really know. I've never been in love before."

He dropped his head with a sigh.

"You...You were just always there, you know? You saved my life from being a-a murderer and even when I pushed you away, you never left. You were— are the best friend I could ever ask for. I guess I should have know from the day I first met you that you were going to change my life. You're my person a-and I am...hopelessly and completely in love with you, Ada."

"I'm sorry," he whispered after a moment, "I don't expect you to say it back. That's not fair to you, I know. I just...I guess I thought you should know that there's a boy in this world named Peter Parker who is madly in love with you."

He looked up at her, smiling softly.

"I guess it's easier this way, huh? I don't think I'd be brave enough to tell you this if I knew you could hear me. I just...I hope you wake up and maybe one day, I can find it in me to tell it to your face."

"But for now," he whispered, looking at her sleeping face. He reached out for her hand and wrapped his fingers around it. He gently kissed her hand, closing his eyes and brushing his nose against the backside tenderly. "This is enough."

The girl beside him slept unmoving as usual. The only proof of her heart beating was the steady beeping coming from the machine. Without it, she was just a girl who was lost in time and no way out. Running from her past had froze her in the present, causing her future to be unsure.

Adelaide Rivers was the girl who had been searching for the light for many years.

And, today, more than ever before, she had to find it. Because otherwise...

She would never wake from the dark.

THE END