The next day, which was Thursday, Peter went to school, still feeling a tad sullen about his conversation with his aunt the previous night. He knew she had his best interests in mind, but sometimes he felt like she needed to have more faith in him. Of course he was going to graduate. How could he not? Despite his few tardies to class, he still had at least a 3.6 GPA, and you needed at least a 3.5 to participate in the Academic Decathlon, so he was good, right?

Either way, he hated disappointing her.

On a different note, since yesterday, he and Ned had been wracking their brains trying to figure out what their next step should be in solving the mystery of the missing serum.

"You think we should ask Sarah's dad about any strange activity going on at Oscorp?" Ned suggested on their way to the lunchroom that afternoon. "Maybe he would've noticed someone acting suspicious."

Peter shook his head. "No, we shouldn't get Sarah involved. It's too risky," he replied. "And like I said earlier, anything about the serum is probably classified, so I doubt he would tell us anything."

The two walked in silence for a moment before the larger teen spoke.

"I still can't believe you were bitten by one of Oscorp's 'special' spiders. That's too freaky, bro."

Peter nodded. "I know, man. It's messed up."

"Not to mention those spiders were made with the same serum thing that was stolen," Ned added. "In a sense, I guess that serum is what made you Spider-Man in the first place."

"To think that it could have been anyone," Peter said, glancing down at the ground, struggling to wrap his head around the entire concept. "Makes me wonder if the spider that got loose is still out there."

The smaller teen's train of thought was interrupted when he heard his friend's voice as they entered the lunchroom.

"Hey, there's Michelle and Sarah."

Peter looked up from the floor to see that, indeed, a familiar brunette girl and her fair-haired counterpart were sitting a few tables away from where they were standing.

"Wanna go sit by them?"

Knowing the true motivation behind Ned's interest in sitting with them, Peter rolled his eyes. "Sure."

When they neared the table, the girls looked up to see the friendly faces of Ned and Peter approaching them.

"Hey MJ. Hey Sarah," Ned said, his eyes resting on the latter. "May we sit with you?"

"Of course," Michelle said.

However, no sooner than the words had left her mouth, the larger boy had plopped down on the bench across with them, with Peter following his example.

"So, how's your guys' days been so far?" he asked, forcing himself to allocate his gaze equally between the two girls.

"Pretty good," Michelle answered. "I convinced Mr. Harrington that we should get new uniforms for next year's academic decathlon. Those ugly yellow blazers aren't really cutting the mustard for me. They're also the color of mustard so..." she trailed off.

Both Ned and Peter exchanged uncertain glances, knowing Michelle was going through one of her quirky spells again.

"...Anyways," she said, turning her attention back to the boys. "How have your days' been going?"

"Good, good," Ned answered, nodding. "Nothing too exciting."

"What about you, Peter?" she asked, glancing over at the brown-haired teen, who appeared to be lost in thought.

The mention of his name made Peter quickly snap out of whatever daydream he was in.

"Uh, fine, I guess."

A brief silence fell over the group before Ned took it upon himself to keep the conversation going.

"So Sarah, excited about the chem homework we were assigned today?" he asked.

Sarah shook her head, shyly looking down at the table. "No, not really," she answered. "To be honest, I've struggled with chemistry since middle school."

"Well, Peter and I could tutor you," Ned suggested, earning a look from the brown-haired teen himself.

"Too late. Sarah and I are going to the library after school to work on it together," Michelle declared, almost proudly. Being the highly observant individual she was, she could sense that the larger boy was crushing on the blonde. Therefore, it was kind of fun to torture him.

As she expected, Ned's eyes flickered with disappointment. However, the disappointment was short-lived as other ideas came to his mind.

"Well, do you need help in other subjects like Calculus...English...Geography...?"

"I'm sure Sarah will ask us for help when she needs it," Peter interjected in an attempt to silence his friend. He wasn't sure if the guy knew it or not, but he was being painfully obvious about his infatuation with the new girl.

"Come to think of it, Peter's pretty good at chemistry," Michelle started, her gaze moving towards the smaller teen. "He can probably tutor you whenever I'm not available."

"That's a good idea, Michelle," Ned said, nodding enthusiastically. "And I'd be more than happy to help out as well."

Sarah smiled. "That's very nice of you guys," she said. Her heart warmed at the fact that she had barely been here a week, yet she had already met some admirable people who supported her and wanted her to succeed.

"Eh, it's nothing," Ned said, waving the girl's expression of gratitude off. "Being nice is kind of our specialty."

Suddenly, Sarah's eyes lit up, as though Ned's response had caused her to remember something important.

"Speaking of nice, my dad said that his boss had a nice conversation with the guy they call 'Spider-Man' yesterday."

Peter's ears immediately perked up at the mention of the masked superhero.

"Really?" Ned asked, trying to sound surprised.

"Yeah, he said Spider-Man was going to help him figure out who took the serum."

"That's nice of him," Peter remarked.

"It is," Sarah agreed. "Now I guess he'll have three people trying to solve the case: you guys and Spider-Man."

Thankfully, the blonde was oblivious to the puzzled expression that had momentarily overtaken Peter's face, as he had to remind himself that Spider-Man and him were two separate people.

"Y-Yeah," Peter said, quickly nodding. "Spider-Man's awesome. I'm sure he'll do everything he can to solve the mystery."

"Have you guys found anything interesting yet?" Sarah asked curiously.

Peter shook his head. "Nope. Nothing yet."

"Huh," the girl said, glancing down at the table. To Ned and Peter, it seemed like she was perplexed by the lack of leads as well. "I can ask my dad. Maybe he worked with someone who was acting suspicious."

"Sounds like a great idea," Ned said, giving Peter a knowing look, which earned an eye roll from the smaller teen. He knew that after shutting down his friend's idea so many times, Ned would not let it go after Sarah herself suggested it too.

"Cool. I'll ask him tonight then and then let you guys know tomorrow if I find out anything."

"Good deal," Ned said, nodding. Peter slowly nodded as well.

In the meantime, Michelle had been quietly observing the exchange between her new friend and the boys. She wondered exactly why the boys were so obsessed about this serum thing but decided that it was probably just some weird, dorky phase they were going through.

"Now that that's settled," she began, sensing the conversation had come to a close, "You guys should get in line before the pizza tacos run out."

All thoughts of Oscorp were quickly erased from Ned's short-term memory as his face lit up like a Christmas tree.

"There's pizza tacos?" he asked, looking behind Sarah's shoulder at the line, which had gotten quite long in the past couple minutes. Michelle nodded.

"C'mon Peter. We should go grab some before the line gets too long," he said, glancing over at the brown-haired boy, who nodded in agreement. "We'll be back in a sec."

As the two got up and began making their way over to the lunchline, Peter gave the girls one last look over his shoulder, as if he was expressing his amusement towards the larger teen before following Ned to the line.

Sarah smiled, catching Peter's playful 'help me' look as they walked away, while Michelle simply waved back at him, a small smirk tugging at the corner of her lips.

"They're such dorks sometimes," Michelle said, shaking her head as she refocused her attention back on her own food.

"Yeah," Sarah answered, still observing the boys in the distance as they claimed a spot in line.

A few seconds passed before Michelle suddenly turned to her.

"What do you think of Peter?" she asked.

Sarah blinked, slightly taken aback by the question. "Oh, uh, he's nice. They're both nice actually," she replied, hoping she didn't appear as flustered as she felt.

Michelle nodded. "I agree," she said. "Though he hasn't really been himself since that Liz girl moved away."

Sarah's ears involuntarily perked up. "Liz girl?" she repeated.

Michelle nodded. "Yeah, Peter had a huge crush on her before she moved away. Apparently her dad was arrested for dealing weapons."

"That's not good," the blonde said. However, for some reason, she couldn't help but feel a pang of envy towards the young woman mentioned.

"Yeah, before she moved away she was pretty miffed at Peter for flaking out at the Academic Decathlon and ditching her at the homecoming dance last year," Michelle explained. "Not sure if they ever made up though. Peter says that they were on okay terms when she moved away, but if I were her, I'd be pretty mad at him too for ditching."

Sarah took a minute to process this new information. She couldn't help but feel her stomach sink slightly at the knowledge that Peter had had a girlfriend before she had come here. Not that it mattered anyways. After all, she had just met him and she really didn't know anything about him. She was just looking for people to chill and hang out with while she was at school. Nothing romantic or anything.

On the other hand, Michelle seemed to know a lot about Peter, including the details regarding his love life. It made her sort of wonder if her friend had any feelings for the brown-haired teen?

She knew it wasn't really any of her business, but her curious nature got the best of her, especially when it involved this Liz person.

"Did he ever say why he ditched?" Sarah asked. "The dance? Or the decathlon?"

Michelle scrunched her nose, trying to think. "No, not really. Everytime I'd ask him he'd just give me the runaround. Kinda suspicious, actually, now that I think about it..." she said, beginning to stare off into space.

Sarah eyes her curiously, wondering if she was going to say anything else about the matter. However, before she could ask another question, Michelle shook her head, freeing herself from her train of thought.

"Whatever, he's just weird."

"Who's weird?"

The girls practically jumped out of their seats at the familiar voice, belonging to Ned. Apparently the line had been shorter than the girls had thought.

"You guys are," Michelle replied casually as the boys sat back down with their trays of pizza tacos.

"Wow, MJ. Talking about us behind our backs. Real smooth," Ned remarked, his voice dripping with sarcasm.

Michelle shrugged. "Not saying anything I wouldn't say to your faces," she retorted, earning a small smile from Sarah, who found the light banter between her friends amusing.

Ned and Peter exchanged looks before they began eating and conversation returned to normal.

However, Sarah's mind couldn't help but remain on Peter's former love interest, Liz, the rest of the day.