A/N: SURPRISE CHAPTER

THIS IS IT YOU GUYS! THIS IS THE CHAPTER YOU'VE BEEN DYING FOR AHHH

I WON'T MAKE YOU WAIT ANY LONGER JUST READ IT!!!!!!!!!! (so incredibly sorry for the cliffhanger in advance 😬)

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"I have to tell you something."

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Adelaide didn't have the heart to go back downstairs to the party.

So she sat down in a chair beside Flash's desk and held her head in her hands as she cried quietly to herself in the dark. God, she was so stupid. All she did was say all the wrong things. Why couldn't she just say yes? Why was it so hard to admit to Peter that she needed him?

"Adelaide?" someone said in a voice that she recognized as Ned's. She quickly wiped her tears away with the back of her hand before he walked inside the room. She sniffled quietly as he spotted her. Ned frowned at the sight of her red eyes.

"Is everything okay?" he asked, "Where's Peter?"

At that, she broke down into tears again. Ned immediately appeared by her side and wrapped her into a hug. He gently patted her back as she calmed down, trying to catch her breath.

"Did Peter say something to you?" Ned asked carefully. Adelaide shook her head, pulling away from him. She sniffled, staring at the ground. Ned crouched down in front of her, reaching up to wipe her tears away and push her hair away from her face. "What's wrong? You're starting to scare me."

Her lower lip trembled, "He's gone, Ned. He said he's done waiting for me. E-Even though he promised."

Ned frowned. That was not what he and Peter had discussed yesterday when he had come to his house. Ned saw in his eyes how much he loved Adelaide. Clearly, there had been a misunderstanding between the two. Peter was in love with her, why would he leave the girl he loves?

"Okay, okay, back up. What did he say exactly?" Ned asked. Adelaide tried to catch her breath.

"H-He said that I-I needed to make up my mind. Th-That he wanted an answer from me right now b-because things were different now," she said, "I thought we were fine, Ned. I-I honestly don't know what happened."

Ned wondered if he should tell Adelaide the real reason why Peter left like that or what all of that stuff he said really meant. Then, he remembered how scared Peter looked yesterday when he had admitted that he was in love with Adelaide. He wanted to know how she felt without tell her the truth about his own feelings because he was afraid of exactly this happening.

And then Ned decided that it was time for an intervention.

These two had been running in circles around each other since the first day they met and he knew that without a third person literally taking their hands and dragging them together, they would never solve things between themselves. Ned knew that he had to be that third person. Otherwise, one day, they would both be seventy years old and still scared of admitting how much they need each other. And Ned didn't know about Vivian, but did not want to spent his remaining life in a retirement home watching these two bickering all day.

"Adelaide, Peter is right," he said slowly. She looked up at him with a frown. Her blue eyes shone in the glow from the pool.

"How can you say that? You know better than anyone how much I've been through," she said, her voice nasal from the crying. She couldn't believe Ned was taking her side. Did no one understand her?

"If losing Peter scares you this much, imagine how it must feel for him every day, not knowing if you'll ever be ready to let him in," Ned said gently. He gauged her expressions carefully. He knew this was a pivoting moment and if he screwed this up, his best friends might never get together. She stared at the carpet, thinking about it.

"It's not fair," she mumbled, "He gave me an ultimatum. He put me in the spotlight and he knew I wasn't ready."

"How are you ever going to know if you're ready?" Ned asked. She shook her head.

"I-I don't know, Ned, but that's not the point!" She tossed her hands up in exasperation. "He knows that I'm afraid of all this. He knows what I've been through. I need...I need time to process it all. I can't do this right now."

Ned sighed, "You're playing with his heart, Adelaide."

There was a beat.

"You know I would never ever do that," she argued, feeling deeply offended he would even think that. Why was everyone suddenly against her? It felt like no one was understanding her. Is that how Peter and Ned and everyone saw her? As a person who would play with someone's heart? She wasn't trying to do that. Things weren't always black and white. Why was she the bad guy here? She began to feel suffocated even in this giant room.

"Not on purpose," he said.

"Or on accident! Look, I appreciate you trying to help, but this all just too complicated and you don't know—"

"Adelaide, when will stop being afraid!" Ned exclaimed suddenly. She blinked, surprised that he had raised his voice at her. He sighed, lowering his voice again. He pinched the bridge of his nose tiredly. She looked away, swallowing the lump in her throat. The air in her lungs was getting thinner by the second.

She had to get out of here.

She needed to get home and be wrapped up into Tony's arms and let him repeatedly tell her that all of this isn't her fault and that she could take as much time as she needed. He would understand. Even if the whole world was against her, Tony would always understand. She shouldn't have even come to this party in the first place.

"I-I have to go," she whispered, beginning to stand up. Ned held her forearm, tugging her back down into the chair. He looked as serious as she had ever seen him before. In fact, he didn't even look this solemn when he was breaking into HYDRA.

"No. Stay. Listen to me. You can't avoid this forever," he said, "I know you're scared of someone telling you the truth because you don't want to hear it, but you need it right now more than ever. You have got to stop running away."

Adelaide stayed silent. Ned kept going.

"There is a boy out there who has been trying to show you just how much he cares about you for months," Ned said and some string deep in her heart broke, "I've watched him, Adelaide. Everyone's seen it. He's crazy about you. He said he was willing to wait until you were ready for him. You're both my best friends, but I swear to god, Adelaide, you are never going to find anyone who cares about you as much as he does."

"I'm sorry if I seem harsh, but I am just so tired of seeing both of my best friends both going crazy without each other. You clearly need him and he needs you just as much. What are you waiting for?" he said desperately, "A symbol in the sky? Someone to rise from the dead to tell you that it's the right time? Why are you stringing him along?"

"Ned..." she said quietly, rubbing her arm. The guilt felt heavy on her shoulders. She wasn't stringing Peter along. She would never do that to him. "It's complicated. You know I have a dark past a-and I still feel like I don't—"

"Belong?" he asked and she nodded. He pursed his lips. "Adelaide...Peter has literally torn himself in half trying to show you that you do belong. We all need you and we all love you, Adelaide. Why can't you see that?"

"I-I do!" she exclaimed, pulling at her hair. She felt herself breaking into sweat from anxiety. Her nerves felt on edge and she felt that familiar tingle that she always did when she used her powers. She tried to control it to bring it back down. "I see that! And it terrifies because I-I'm not who you think I am. Peter could do a million times better than me, you all could! I-I'm not the girl you take to meet your family o-or the girl that you want to spend the rest of your life with! I'm a cold-blooded murderer!"

You, Adelaide, are the villain.

"People can change," Ned said, "Those are all the things you used to be. Can't you see how much you've grown ever since you came to New York? You're not the same person you were all those years ago, Adelaide."

"A part of me will never belong here," she said quietly. It was like she was fighting against herself and Ned was on her team. She had never stood up for herself before because it made her feel like a hypocrite— like a serial killer being his own attorney in court to prove himself not guilty. It might have been Lukov in her head, but that day in the warehouse, he had been right. She would never belong with these people. She would forever be an outsider.

That's the difference between you and those people you love, Adelaide.

You will never be them.

"You are my best friend," Ned breathed in exasperation. He didn't know how to make her understand. She was being so stubborn. He held her by the shoulders and forced her to look at him. "And I feel so lucky to have you. We're here because we love you and we don't care what you've done or who you are. You do belong here. You have every right to be here, to live here. All of this fear you have...it isn't real, Adelaide! It's all in your head. Wake up!" He gently shook her shoulders as if he was trying to wake her up. "You've made it all up because you're afraid of how things will end so you never even let them begin. Stop worrying about how it'll end. You're missing out on so much because you're too busy being afraid of something that hasn't even happened yet. Can't you see that? Your life is passing by your eyes and you're just standing there watching. Do something about it!"

Adelaide thought she heard an actual click in her mind as she realized something.

All this time...She was holding herself back. Not Lukov or her past or HYDRA or anyone else. At some point in all these years, she had subconsciously decided that she didn't deserve happiness and became her own villain. Any shot at happiness she always sabotaged for herself.

That's the difference between you and me, Lukov.

I want to change, I want to be better.

She was too afraid to take a step forward even though she knew she should. Her whole life, all she had known was pain and sadness. Happiness was foreign to her. Happiness was terrifying. What if she lowered her guard and it was taken from her? The higher she climbed the ladder of false hope, the more it would hurt when she fell.

Pain and sadness might feel awful, but it was familiar. She knew how they ended. It was her identity. If she wasn't sad and miserable, then she didn't know who she was. She didn't know how to be happy; she had never been before. Until a while ago, she didn't even think she deserved to be happy.

Her heartbeat quickened at the realization.

That was why she couldn't get out the car earlier and it was also the reason she couldn't say yes to Peter even after all these months. That was why she found it easier to run away and that was why she had considered letting Lukov take her memories that night. That was why she always kept her distance from people and when things got good, that was why she always messed it up.

But right now...happiness was being handed to her on a silver platter and she had no idea how to hold it in her blood-stained hands.

Chances like this didn't come often, especially not for someone like her. Lukov was gone and her window to change her life was dwindling. If she didn't take a leap of faith now, she would forever end up on the edge of the cliff, peering into what could have been. If she didn't take this risk now, she would never change. Ten years later, and she would still be the same person she had always been.

Ned was right. She had to stop worrying about how things would end and start appreciating how things were beginning.

Because if she ever, ever wanted to find an ounce happiness, she was going to have to take the risk of losing it.

That was how everyone lived, wasn't it? Happiness wasn't promised to last a lifetime. It was just a matter of learning to enjoy it while it lasted. She would have to learn to make peace with that. She had been in pain for long enough now.

She deserved to be happy.

She had to let herself step out of this glass cage she had built around herself and shed her past like a second skin.

Lukov was wrong. She was nothing like him.

Maybe she didn't belong right now, but she would. Because she would never stop trying. And that's where they were both different from each other. Her past didn't define her. It was who she grew to be from her past that mattered. If she stayed afraid, that meant she was still letting Lukov drive her life, even from the dead.

But her life, for the first time ever, was finally in her hands.

Her decisions were hers to make.

And now that she knew that she was the only one standing in between her and her happiness, she knew exactly what she had to do.

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"Where is he!" Adelaide breathed, panicked.

She had raced downstairs to the party with no explanation to Ned. The crowd was louder than ever. They were less than one minute away from the new year and the giant tv in the main room was playing live footage of the ball dropping not far from here.

Adelaide had spotted Vivian in the crowd, standing near the door. Vivian frowned when she saw the panicked look on her friend's face.

"Who?" she asked.

"Peter!" Adelaide exclaimed over the noise of the party, "I-I have to talk to him!" Her heart was thundering in her chest louder than the bass from the speakers. She felt the blood pounding in her ears.

Thump, thump, thump.

"Adelaide...Peter just left," Vivian said, glancing at the open front door behind her. Adelaide lips parted. Her heart fell. Shit. He couldn't have left. She still had to tell him.

Tell him the truth.

Without another thought, she left Vivian there and bolted straight out the door, not even bothering to close it behind her. She nearly stumbled and fell over something, but she fell against the wall and pushed herself back up and kept running. Vivian called after her, but Adelaide barely even heard. All she could hear was the sound of her blood pounding in her ears.

Thump, thump, thump.

It was obviously dark outside and maybe Peter was already long gone but she had to try. She had spent so much time not fighting for their relationship that if she spent even one more second in defeat, she was going to lose her mind (A/N: i am seriously freaking out right now eeee!).

Adelaide ran down the path from the front door to where it met the sidewalk, stopping at the end to look up and down the street for him.

And to her relief, he was there on the sidewalk. To her left. Walking further and further away from her with every step.

"Peter!" she shouted to get his attention.

It was in that moment that she realized that it was snowing. The little white flurries floated down from the sky, sticking to the grass and pavement and her hair. 

Thump, thump, thump.

"Ten!" the crowd at the party started to count inside the house as the last few seconds of the year quickly came to an end.

"Ada?" he asked quizzically, turning around. Before she even realized, her feet were desperately pounding on the sidewalk as she sprinted towards him.

Thump, thump, thump.

With every step, she was more and more sure.

It was Peter.

He was the one. He always had been.

"Nine!"

There could never be anyone else even if she tried. It would be Peter forever and always. And the longer she tried to fight it, the harder the realization would hit her in the face. Regardless of the fear and risk and sheer terror, all she wanted was to be his. Whatever that meant, she would figure out later.

Thump, thump, thump.

But right now, in this very moment, all she wanted was Peter Benjamin Parker.

"Eight!"

She finally caught up to him, stopping in front of him to catch her breath. She was heaving not only from the short sprint, but the dawning of her realization just moments ago. Every time she breathed out, there was a little puff of air.

"Seven!"

"What are you doing here? It's almost midnight," Peter said. Adelaide swallowed, catching her breath. She couldn't care less if it was almost midnight. In fact, right now, she wouldn't even notice if the world was ending around them.

She looked up at him and for the first time in a long time, she really saw him.

Thump, thump, thump.

Maybe she was imagining it, but she thought she saw a little red in his eyes, as if he had been crying too. His brown eyes held a sadness that broke her heart because she knew she had caused it.

"Six!"

"I have to...I have to tell you something," she breathed.

Thump, thump, thump.

"Five!"

"What?" he asked tiredly as if he really didn't have the energy to fight with her again. His voice was a little stuffed and that was when she knew that he had, in fact, been crying too. His eyes ran across her face, trying to read her. He sniffled.

Thump, thump, thump.

"Four!"

This was it. She had to do this. If she didn't, she would regret it for the rest of her life. Who cared about the right time? There was no such thing.

Thump, thump, thump.

It was always either now or never.

She realized that Peter was the way she would get to normalcy. It didn't matter how many parties she went to or normal kid things she did, without Peter in her life, she would never feel like she fit in anywhere. It would always feel as if a piece of her was missing.

Thump, thump, thump.

"Pete...I..." she started, looking up at him nervously. She swallowed.

She had been so sure up until now.

Thump, thump, thump.

Maybe it was because a part of her had thought that he had already left the party. But she knew there was no going back from this. Once the words were out there, they would have been said. By her. To another human being. And even more scarily, she would mean them.

Thump, thump, thump!

She would mean them more than anything else she had ever meant in her entire life.

Thump, thump, thump!

"Three!"

Peter's heartbeat picked up. His senses began working overtime. He could feel her body heat and the sound of her heart beating three times fast.

Thump, thump, thump!

Then everything else faded away from his reality and the only people left in this world were him and Ada standing on the sidewalk three seconds before the year ended, holding their breaths in a very painful anticipation.

Thump, thump, thump!

"You what?" he whispered, stepping closer. He tried to keep himself from getting his hopes up, but it was too late. The pink flush on her cheeks told him that there was something urgent resting on the tip of her tongue. That the next words coming out of her mouth would either make or break his already fragile heart.

Thump, thump, thump!

"Two!"

Adelaide wasn't afraid of the