CHOCOLATE. ❪ Eddie Brock ❫ ✓

ten

On Mondays, Maple's bakery opened at ten a.m. instead of the usual nine a.m.. She liked the extra hour of sleep, so she headed off to work with a skip in her steps.

However, when she saw another case of vandalism on her shop's window, she felt deflated. Instead of spray paint, it looked more like blood. She wasn't sure if it was fake, human, or animal blood, but she knew she would find out while cleaning it. She took pictures of it on her phone and scooped a sample of the blood into the jar. It would have made more sense for the police to come, but she didn't want it to get in the way of business and lose her reputation.

"Whore to monsters," repeated Clark as he read the bloody text. "That's something."

She offered him a soft smile. "I'll clean it. I took a picture already. We'll call after today's shift. I'd rather have the cops come in the middle of the night than during business hours."

He nodded. "If only Venom could knock some sense into these people."

She smiled. "That would be nice."

"I'll get started," offered Clark. "Unless you want me to clean this up?"

She shrugged. "No, it's fine, I'll clean it."

Clark unlocked the door, holding it open for Maple so she could grab cleaning supplies. Clark got started on the pastries while Maple cleaned the outside.

Meanwhile, Eddie wanted to surprise her with a breakfast burrito from the diner she liked around the corner of their apartment building. He definitely did not expect her to be cleaning blood off her bakery window.

"What is this?" he asked.

Maple froze, turning around. "Eddie, what are you doing here?"

He held up the brown bag containing the breakfast burritos, eyes glued to the window. She had cleaned the S, so only whore to monster was left.

"Maple, what is this?" he repeated.

She sighed. "I don't know. Some punks doing vandalism on my shop again."

"Again? This happened before?"

She winced. "Yeah, once."

"Why didn't you tell us?" he asked.

"I didn't want you to freak out or for Venom to just - you know. How mad is he?"

"Pretty mad. Hungry, too," added Eddie. "And not in the good way."

If Maple looked close enough, she could see thin, black tendrils slipping from Eddie's jacket, swirling around his hand. She shuffled closer to him and touched the tendrils. They slid up her arm, underneath her shirt before laying there comfortably.

"Sorry, V," she whispered.

The tendrils gave her arm a squeeze. Eddie sighed, eyeing the window once more. She felt guilty, even though she knew it wasn't anything big.

"I'll help you clean," he offered.

She shook her head, attempting to step back before he could grab the rag, but Venom's tendrils kept her close. Eddie grabbed the rag, dipped it into the bucket of water, and began wiping the window down.

"Maybe we should stop coming here as Venom," Eddie suggested.

The tendrils shuffled around, suddenly agitated. Maple was sure he was talking Eddie's ear off.

"I don't want that either," she spoke. "I like it when V comes by. It's refreshing to see him. I like it when you're here as well."

"But if we keep coming and people see us - "

"It doesn't matter. They haven't done any real harm. I like seeing you two when I work. Most of my customers like you too," she explained. "Besides, this will all be over if I can just find out who keeps doing this."

Venom's tendrils slid back into Eddie and turned around with smirk that wasn't his. "We can help," said their voice.

"Oh no."