Author's Note: This is my first foray into the Spider-Man fandom...in fact, into any comic fandom. I saw the movie (multiple times) and fell in love with Andrew Garfield's deliciously awkward and angsty portrayal of the webslinger. Add Emma Stone's Gwen into the equation, and you've got the most compelling couple I've seen onscreen in a long time.

This story, such as it is, will feature a bit of everything: some character introspection, some missing scenes, and eventually something of a continuation of the film. Some fluff, a little action, a touch of backstory...hope you enjoy my little cocktail of Spideyness. :) Reviews are especially valuable since this is my first shot.

Trouble

Chapter One:

The Siren's Song

"Oooh…I'm in big trouble," Gwen Stacy whispered as she watched Peter Parker plunge into apparent oblivion over the balcony railing.

She stood still in the hallway, listening to the wail of the sirens…the rhythmic howl that drew him away from her, his face shuttered, his gaze targeting the sound. He hadn't even said goodbye.

Never mind that, only moments before, they had been locked together in a kiss that sent joyful sparks out to her very fingertips…a kiss she could still feel, tingling on her lips.

The siren's song—ha. She allowed herself a half-bitter chuckle. Was it wrong to feel a twinge of resentment at whatever idiot it was who had gotten jumped in a dark alley…or held up in a liquor store…or left his car with a careless valet?

"GWEN!" Her father's voice razored through her thoughts. Slowly she made her way down the hall, pushing open the door to the living room. He was pacing irritatedly over the plush cream carpeting, hands on hips, while her mother murmured words calculated to soothe and calm.

George Stacy had always been the epicenter of Gwen's life. When she was younger, she'd been impossibly, insufferably proud of him. There was not a case he couldn't solve, a criminal he couldn't catch. She had felt a kind of pity for the other kids she knew, whose parents were doctors or investment bankers or pilots—all very well in their way, of course, but nothing compared to the chiseled embodiment of truth and justice who sat at the head of the table every night, who listened to her prayers and tucked her into bed.

As she grew older, Gwen started to realize that her household god had some very human frailties. Once her passion for science took hold, the Captain's black-and-white worldview felt too simple. In science, there was always another theory, another possibility, waiting just around the corner; you didn't just "decide"—you hypothesized, you experimented, you studied results…and then you hypothesized again.

Nonetheless, her father's influence still loomed large, and his forceful personality cast a long shadow over her other relationships. He didn't need a gun or a badge to command a room; his mere presence was enough to compel a kind of tense focus from anyone in the vicinity. The boys she met at school, or the young bucks at Oscorp, were pale imitations, diluted forms of the species. Their narrow interests bored her; their smug assumptions annoyed her. Occasionally, she had brought one of them home, where their egos inevitably deflated like pricked balloons in the face of Captain Stacy's questioning. Really, it was more for comic relief than anything else—she and Howard made a game out of how long it took before they choked on their water or tripped over their own feet in their haste to get out the door.

Peter, of course, was different. There was something she had seen in him—something that reminded her of her dad—in the way he'd stuck up for Flash's lunch-table victim. A determination that justice would be served; a kind of grim assurance, beyond fear, even in the face of violence.

Peter, who wore his intelligence as carelessly as his old grey hoodie, whose grin made her stomach flip, whose brown eyes still held grief for his uncle, and another, darker pain she didn't recognize…Peter hadn't wilted. He had, in fact, given as good as he'd gotten, and she'd laughed outright to see her father, finally, meet with a worthy adversary. It was too bad, really—Peter had been right when he'd said that Spiderman and the Captain stood for the same things…only her father would never see it that way.

Maybe that was why, as he stood in the living room, arms crossed in the I'll-tell-you-how-things-are-gonna-be stance that was so familiar to her, that he looked a little less imposing, his voice less booming, the room larger around him.

Gwen lifted her chin, hesitant but not penitent, and prepared to cross swords.

"Where's your…friend?"

"He left."

George Stacy raised an eyebrow. "He couldn't use the front door?"

"He—was in a hurry. Homework—" She really shouldn't lie so easily, she thought, backtracking. "Stuff… He went out the back." That, at least, was true. Relatively speaking.

"So about this Mr. Know-It-All—"

"George!" her mother interjected warningly.

"Fine." Then, with exaggerated politeness, "About Mr. Parker—will we be having the pleasure of his company again?"

This was a loaded question, and Gwen knew it. "Oh, I don't know," she said, mock-airily. "You'll probably be seeing him around."

"Great." The Captain managed to cram a world of sarcasm into that one syllable.

Gwen turned to leave. "Was that all? I have a page full of calculus problems that won't solve themselves."

"Go." Her father waved one hand. "But Gwen? I'll be watching..."

"I'm sure you will be," she replied, walking out the door.

Later, her calculus book lay disregarded on her desk, while she stared out the window into the night sky...wondering...wishing...worrying.

Yep—she was definitely in trouble.