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thranduilsperkybutt · 6 months

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☾ the gold & the rust ☼

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Pairings: Astarion Ancunín/Tav!Reader Warnings: NSFW; angst/comfort smut; yearning; Astarion is not ascended; mentions of past canon-typical trauma/abuse; the struggle of healing; Astarion has racing thoughts and you can't tell me otherwise; canon-typical biting; it's not about the sex it's about the feelings; spoilers for the endgame Word Count: 7,168 words Reader Gender: Female Author: Meg Summary: You’ve told him you will find him some cure for his darkness; you are set on performing a feat no one in history has ever achieved, all for him, but he wonders if it is as futile as the sun laboring to join the moon. Maybe he is destined to forever look upon you with the knowledge that when your bright, beckoning light inevitably burns out, he will be left with only his darkness, alone again... A/N: Look I blame Hozier for making too many Astarion-coded songs that make me sob my eyes out while thinking about the implications of his "good" ending. Astarion has literally changed my brain chemistry.

The sun cusps over the horizon, its soft tendrils spreading over a murky sky. Beckoning the night’s fleeing retreat with a gentle violence as the day demands more territory in each passing second. Sparse hues of blue manage to cling to some lingering clouds that have yet to meet the threateningly beautiful pink and orange sky.

Astarion reaches out from behind the heavy curtain and his darkness, towards the pillar of light that breaks into the privacy of your bedchamber. Pale fingertips dip hesitantly into the light, as if he could believe everything that has occurred over this past week has been only a dream. It takes but a moment for the evidence of his reality to meet him when his skin sparks and dusts under the light of day.

He flinches back, hissing lowly from the burning pain of it. Glaring down at his flexing hand as if the disdain in his eyes could change the fates that have turned the thread of his life into this ever-knotted thing. He’d never imagined he would miss having that damned illithid parasite in his head, yet here he was. Yearning to reach for morning again. Wishing to experience a dawn that may never welcome him again.

He hears the stirring moan, soft and drenched in exhaustion, and dares a glance away from his own skin and stinging regret. Stilling entirely, Astarion hopes he has not awoken you just yet. He does not wish for you to see him like this, in this state of self-pitiful detestation. Though he knows you may yet love him despite having seen it, showing the reality of his mind beyond his comfortable performances is easier said than done. Tension drips from his shoulders, if only a little bit, as he watches your body relax into the cushions with your blissfully ignorant slumber.

The sigh at his lips is shaky. Mournful. He looks back towards the sunlight and remembers how it had felt when it had forgotten how to punish him like this. He doesn’t know which is crueler: to have never felt it at all, or for it to be ripped away from him like this. In the brief time he was granted to finally walk in the sun again after the past two centuries, Astarion can’t help the fresh anger that bubbles up in him at the taking away of it. He didn’t deserve this--- any of it.

Truthfully, he has no clear memory of how the sun had felt to him when he was simply a mortal elf and not a spawn belonging to a master. It had been so long ago; memories fade over time when drenched in horror, he’s discovered well since. Still, something tells Astarion he loved the day even then as he did now. He’s certain he had always loved the heat of it--- the color.

The way it filters through your hair when you stand in the path of daylight, kissing the edges of your skin in a way he forever wished to share with it. It had been warmer and kinder to him than he had ever expected to receive, somewhat like you. You were undeniably beautiful in the light of day.

Even standing within the finality of the sunset of your journey together--- foes vanquished, coated in sweat and victory--- he had thought the same.

But nothing good ever lasts, he’s learned. At least, nothing but you. Astarion wonders if he would still grieve this much if he were to never have known the day at all. Would he know what he was missing? Would a piece of its cosmic heat have whispered of you to him, even then?

He can’t truly comprehend a world in which his fate had not become so intimately entangled with yours. Perhaps that is the worst part, how he knows he would always brave this feeling of loss to gain what he has with you. In the end of it all, he knows he has made the right choice to have this over the temptations of that infernal ritual’s power.

Despite that knowledge, Astarion truly hadn’t expected you to run after him when the lingering illithid protections dissipated from his being and the sun began its remorseless burning again. He had scampered away from the docks in an abject desperation, attempting to flee from the light’s betrayal. Astarion was the objectively faster party, but you had found him eventually--- you always seem to find him--- after he had taken to cowering behind wooden crates that cast a meager shadow of solace. He had been shaking, cradling himself, closed off entirely from the world as that sickeningly familiar taste of how things had been before--- back when he was still Cazador’s--- came flooding back onto his palate. His mind had become drenched in a fear he had thought could never claim him again.

You’d cut through all of it with your worried call of his name. Plunging him into the magical darkness you cast upon the both of you to shield him from the sun’s assault with such a thoroughness that not even you could see through it. His call of your own name sounded far too broken on his tongue for his own liking, but you’d followed the sound towards his outstretched arms all the same.

Dragging him up into yours, only a sliver of the calamity in his soul dissipated when you promised him blindly, “Come, quickly, I’ll get you someplace safe.”

Despite his better efforts, his voice shook as he allowed you to clumsily drape your cloak over his curls in darkness, unable to bring the deflecting humor to his voice that he so achingly wished would return, “Darling, you are a sight for sore eyes; or, you would be, I’m sure, if I could see you.”

“I told you this would come in handy,” you shot back, and he had been grateful for your effort at ignoring the bittersweet grief that so clearly drenched his soul in favor of reminding him of how he had teased you for spending a good amount of your gold on this very cloak when you’d all first arrived in the city.

His breath remained shallow, but his hand tightened over yours in what he hoped you knew was gratefulness when you finished ensuring the fabric had covered any of his exposed skin, “I shall never question any of your purchases again, on my honour.”

“Of course you will, Astarion,” he heard the slight worry in your voice as much as you tried to hide it. He felt the spell waning and with it the returning disorientation that even slight sunlight left him in. You had grasped his arm firmly and spoken with a confident determination that he suspected was as much for your comfort as it was for his, “Now, get ready to move quickly and keep your head down; the dark won’t last much longer.”

You were good for your promises, he’d learned over his time travelling with you, and that had brought some small comfort as the day reemerged before he’d had a chance to respond. Then, you were maneuvering him through the city, towards the darkness of Sharess’ Caress, with such a precision that he might think it more important than any quest you’ve had thus far if he hadn’t known better. Gripping him tightly the whole way, Astarion still has not dared tell you how grateful he was for it--- for you, surprising him against his better judgement every time with how you simply are.

It has been nearly a week now of you coming to his side in the night and yet some part of him still expected the other metaphorical shoe to drop. For you to come to your senses and tell him that you simply cannot carry on like this with him.

He wanted to believe you. Gods, how he wants it. Yet, he still felt like a fool to think he’s earned some love such as yours. He wants to believe he deserves the way you look at him like he can be what you see him to be. It’s too dangerous for his heart to invest in the thought that he maybe can. That maybe he is, already.

For you to look at him and tell him, “We’ll find it together. I promise we’ll find a way for you to walk in the sun again,” with such determination--- for you to be someone who genuinely believed the both of you could achieve it---

Well, you simply must be mad. He doesn’t know how else to explain these little ideas of yours.

Astarion figures you’ll continue to be as much a surprise to him as you’ve made a habit of in the past… and then there was that persistently annoying optimism of yours to contend with.

But this?

He doesn’t think that you understand the truth of the choice you’re making, to stay with him. To love him. How could you know it and still look upon him with such eager hopefulness as you do? He barely understands it at all himself, and he’s had centuries to come to terms with what he’s become. Forgive him if it’s a bit difficult to begin to understand just what “being something better than what Cazador made him” truly means.

He understands how much he wants you, though. He wants it all. The life that was stolen from him, the opportunities, but mostly for you to be there--- here. Where you’ve not wavered an inch from his side; you’ve given him no reason to think you plan on leaving anytime soon.

Why does he still fear it so much, though?

Some part of him had thought--- hoped foolishly, rather--- that killing Cazador would somehow fix two centuries of torment. Fix him. In the brief time after, he discovered that it hadn’t. In his elongated struggle, he worries it never will.

Nightmares still plague him, he still jumps at shadows, he still has thoughtless fear dart through his mind before he remembers again that his former master is well and truly dead. That simply existing in happiness was the rebellious proof of his victory over a man who he hopes will not haunt him forever. When he is with you, Astarion almost believes that Cazador won’t. It is some charm you have bewitched over him surely. Your ability to calm this chaos in him with soft eyes and patient hands that do not seek to own him, yet he eagerly chooses to belong there all the same.

Astarion still has trouble loving you like he knows you deserve to be loved. There are times when he can barely stand physical touch, though craves to want yours. And you understand the duality of the contradiction in him, taking only ever what he is willing to give.

Sometimes he thinks you too understanding, with little concern of how this affects you. He’s always baffled by how selfless you can be sometimes, particularly when you’re taking in strays. He has come to admit, if only to himself, that he does see the irony in his complaints. Moreso, he’s terrified of what will happen when that seemingly endless well of care you hold within you for others inevitably runs out.

What will happen when you can no longer bear his eccentricities? The compromises? The sacrifice that his double-edged love requires of you? Will there come a time when all he offers as part of being in this real love becomes too overwhelming?

Astarion had fallen in love with you in the easy warmth of sunlight. Looking upon you now as the dawn creeps against your sleeping form, his heart aches as he wonders if he can truly doom you to a life in his complicated darkness.

Selfishly, one thought consumes his mind--- he knows he wants to. He would want you, no matter the cost to you both. You have told him over and over again how you want the same but, Gods, he can’t figure out what he has done for this sliver of joy and it eats away at him in the dark. It’s unreasonable what he asks you to give him, but he’ll take it all the same. Bitterly he thinks, if he were a better man--- the man you see him to be--- he might even feel guilty for it.

For now, all he feels is the monstrous need to escape these racing thoughts in his head.

When will you walk away to join the sunlight for good? Hells forbid the answer his weary heart is preparing for ever be spoken from your lips.

Astarion hopes the day never comes when you choose to go where he cannot follow. He wants to spend all his days traipsing after you, wherever you may lead, no matter how much he may complain about it for show.

Astarion wants to spend all of it, whatever it may be, whatever he’s got left, with you. He’s terrified of the day that you change your mind on him. Fearful that you may one day decide these sleepless nights with a vampire spawn who can offer you nothing more than his undying love and sarcastic quips are nothing compared to the full life you could have with someone else. This theoretical, easy life in the sun that he dares to think he is stealing from you by loving you as he does.

Well, he supposes that reclaiming Cazador’s palace is always an option, rather than his other fantasy of burning it to the ground. Spending an eternity draping you in finery and keeping you to himself within a palace feels like something he should want, but he can’t help to think that it would be no better than making his love for you into a somewhat prettier cage.

More than he wants you, he needs you to freely want him. He’d be tempted to take up praying again if he had any faith that it could solidify your love for him forever, but deep down he doesn’t want heavenly intervention. He wants you to want to be with him--- to choose him willingly and without any regret for what the inevitable sacrifice will be. That understanding is, perhaps, what makes his heart swell with this bittersweet glory over all else.

You’ve told him as much and what your lips did not confess to him willingly, your body has whispered to his with an adoration that threatened to scorch him in much the same way of your beloved daylight. You’ve told him you will find him some cure for his darkness; you are set on performing a feat no one in history has ever achieved, all for him, but he wonders if it is as futile as the sun laboring to join the moon. Maybe he is destined to forever look upon you with the knowledge that when your bright, beckoning light inevitably burns out, he will be left with only his darkness, alone again--- this being the most horrible realization of all to have come to him tonight.

Hells, how desperately he wants to believe you, but Astarion has always had difficulty getting his hopes up. He hasn’t been known to bet on losing dogs, and he certainly doesn’t bet on his own odds these days.

But he figures you have more than enough hope for the both of you.

A minute smile quirks his troubled lips at that thought, watching your fingers twitch in your slumber. He shouldn’t doubt you as he does; you’ve given him everything. His freedom, his salvation--- even from himself, when he hadn’t known how much he needed it. Things he can never repay, and yet you’ve never asked him for a repayment. He owes you everything, but you’ve been adamant in tempering his sense of obligation. You’ve reminded him that everything he's done, he’s chosen for himself.

You’ve only ever asked him to love you, and that you have had for far longer than you know--- far before you ever actually plucked up the adorable courage to ask him for it.

He has come to love you more than he’s ever loved anything for as far back as he can remember. The depths of his adoration could scare even him with the raw vulnerability he is left with when it comes to you. How beautifully all his plans and plots for self-preservation have backfired upon him, though. He would not have you destroy his peace of mind in any other way.

Maybe one day, he’ll admit to you exactly when his nice, simple plan truly began to fall apart. The idea dances in his mind, of how you’ll react to that particular information. You’d hang on his every word, he thinks--- it would be rather pathetic of you, if he weren’t in much the same state.

Gripping the curtain, Astarion finally deems it time to push the budding light out of his darkness. If it is to be the only place he may have you for all of your days, he’ll make his darkness a sacred place. He decides he shall worship you in it--- all other gods have forsaken him already. Until the day his little hero saves him once again, he will indulge in this darkness with you.

The patriars nipping at your heels for guidance, the unwashed masses of the Gate clamoring for their glimpse of his hero, even your other traveling companions--- none of them shall invade upon this sanctuary.

He moves towards the bed, returning to you. Exhausted from a late day in the city and an even later night of enjoying his company, you’ve taken to claiming sleep when you can these days. The evidence of your labor rests in the dark circles under your eyes. He doesn’t think he could stop you from your philanthropic efforts assisting the city’s reconstruction even if he tried.

Still, right now, in these hours you are only his.

He dips his weight onto the bed and lays himself alongside you, pulling you tenderly against him as his lips graze your neck. Truly, he knows it is cruel to wake you, but he doesn’t know how he can manage to miss someone like this when you are right before him. It is as if his very soul yearns for you. He melts against the rhythmic flutter of your heart, and it sounds more like his home than the palace he has spent the last two hundred years in ever could.

Teeth graze against your carotid pulse, and you stir slightly. He hums into the soft warmth of your flesh, biting without intent to draw blood--- though the thought of it does cross his mind. He has never recovered from the taste of you. Cold fingers curl into your bare hip, dragging you slightly closer at the feeling of your waking movements.

Your pulse picks up against his lips. Astarion hears the patter of your heart in your ribs as his tongue drags up your throat towards your ear. Your breath hitches when his lips graze your jaw, but your eyes remain closed.

His lips twitch with mirth at your effort to have him do as he pleases.

“Quite the show, my little love, but I know you’re awake,” Astarion murmurs, slurred from the back of his throat like a man lost in thorough indulgence. Drunk with the scent of you on his skin, he leaves another faux bite on your jaw as you squirm beneath his assault.

“Shall you feed again, is that it?” yawning, your hand rubs at your eyes before you blink them open. When his hands run up your sides, your answering shiver reminds him of that first night he’d fed from you. Lit only by the campfire, you had allowed him to take too much before stopping him, even then.

He chuckles breathlessly, shifting the covers to invade your space more completely as you come back to your consciousness piece by piece, “As tempting as it is when you offer oh so nicely to be my treat, I hunger for something more satisfying this morn.”

“Ah,” you gasp from sleep-drenched shock, reacting on a delay as he brings his knee up to strategically push your legs open. Allowing you to feel the growing length of him through the thin linens between you, he levels you with his weight in a slow grind. Blinking up at him, your eyes focus in a darkness lit only by the dim glow of dawn beyond the curtains when he languidly rolls his hips against yours, “A-Astarion---!” He is watching you peculiarly, with a glint of some unreadable darkness in his eye that you can’t quite place. The breathless whimper at your lips sends that warmth of yours straight down his spine, “What’s gotten into you?”

He hasn’t had you since that night he had been so drenched with adoration that he’d taken you on his own grave and truly confessed how he loved you. Ever since then it had been battle and struggle, one after another, in your pursuit to stop the Absolute for good--- constantly ensnared in some new concern that stole any potential moment he could’ve used to steal you away from duty. After the final battle, Astarion had been so dejected by the return of his vampiric limitations, and you had been near constantly pulled away to assist the public---

There was the part of him that enjoyed indulging in the easy-going intimacy you offered him. The lack of pressure to perform was something he had not yet fully become accustomed to; a certain comfortability that has been cultivated between the two of you over the time you’ve been together. The sense of knowing that he is well and truly safe with you. Despite this understanding, he wished to freely want you in every way he was capable of.

And, oh, how he has come to want you over these last few days.

It was so mindlessly simple and immensely complex. He can barely put into words to describe the ways he wants this. Carnally, intimately, wholly, eternally--- nothing is a sufficient descriptor. Maybe in that vast library that your wizard, Gale, insists on boasting about showing him one of these days, Astarion will find an all-encompassing word for how he wants to have you forever.

As it stands currently, he settles on the comfortable seduction that has become second nature to him, “Actually, I was quite hoping to have gotten into you by now, lover.”

He’ll never get over how you melt for him; how you fall for every word. He watches the heat he stokes behind your eyes, the flex of your fingertips where they lay beside your head on the pillow.

Then, he descends upon you.

A practiced mouth parts yours as his cool hand takes the long route from your waist to your throat, indulging in the feeling of everything in-between. He sets your skin on edge in his wake, stirring a familiar feeling that he was entirely too good at urging from you to settle low in your stomach.

Gentle fingers find his hair and he feels the scrape of your nails against his scalp when he finally rests his hand on your throat to hook his thumb beneath your jaw, kissing you deeper. Passionately. As he always does, Astarion excels at unravelling you in every way, but you have no idea how much you manage to rebuild him with your every touch.

Your body welcomes him completely, urging him closer in ways he doubts you are consciously aware of. His hips rock into yours with each passing second that your heat spreads through him, feeling himself grow harder at your soft moans that meet his eager mouth. When you tug slightly at his hair, he lets a cautioning sound fall from his tongue onto yours, but you only nip defiant teeth at him in response.

And then he’s pushing your hands down, captured at the wrists by his. Pinning you to the pillows while he draws back just enough to catch the breath that is coming, labored, from the both of you.

“I’m sorr---” you begin, remorselessly.

“Telling a pretty lie won’t save you from me,” Astarion leans close once more, dragging his skin against your cheek as he kisses a trail towards your ear, feeling you test his grip at your wrists with a half-hearted tug. “I do believe all of this ‘Hero of Baldur’s Gate’ business has kept you from the more important happenings of our bedchamber. It would be a terrible pity if you continued to neglect your baser desires when I am in such a mood to indulge you.”

“Are you sure you’re talking about me?” you tease and he feigns a mild shock at the insinuation that his own behavior is the reason you’ve yet to bed him.

“I’ll have you know I am all indulgence, unlike you, darling hero,” but when he leans away, your eyes capture his. Reading him too easily, you know something is wrong as his carefully constructed mask falters, if only for an instant. It’s all you need, and Astarion regrets losing himself for the moment as he watches your softening gaze survey him.

“Is that so…?” You’re left guessing at what troubles him, “If you missed me, you could’ve just said so. The city can survive a few days.”

“Does the city know that?” it would be so easy to leave it there, to let you think you’ve figured him out once again. The anxiety in his veins won’t allow it, however, and his mouth speaks before his mind can instruct him to shut up, “Tell me, darling, that you won’t regret it someday… Of course, you won’t--- but I would like to hear it all the same.”

He looks down on you with growing vulnerability, confidence cracking. That detestable anxiety that has plagued him all evening coming to the forefront of his mind once more. Crimson irises swirl with a reckless uncertainty and it reminds you of how he had looked upon you when confessing his initial manipulations in those early days of your relationship.

“Regret what?” the confusion on your face nearly has him losing his nerve, but he chokes back the urge to dismiss you so quickly.

“I don’t want you to regret… choosing me,” his voice is clearly pained at the thought, cold hands at your wrists tightening like he is afraid you will run from him should he let you go. “Choosing us, I mean. I am well aware of all you shall endure if you spend each painstaking night of forever with me. It is a price I was willing to pay for my freedom, but you… I--- I know you have said that I am what you want, but I don’t want this to be one of your regrets. I don’t want you to resent me for keeping you here---”

Astarion was constantly preparing himself for the ending of all things; it is a part of his nature that you wish you could soothe with simple words alone. It will be much more difficult to satisfy than that and you know it, but you intend to spend all your years working towards earning his unwavering faith in you. This trust that he has so endearingly placed upon your soul, when every piece of his own screamed at you for doing the same. You doubt he knows how, if you were to someday break him in the way he so fears, you feel it would be as if you were destroying a part of yourself.

You cut off his rambling with a firm, “Astarion!” like it hurts you to hear him talk of himself in this way. His mouth snaps shut as you search him for the cause of this doubt, “Have I done something to make you think I will have these regrets you worry of?”

“Well, no, but---”

When you pull at his grip this time, he wordlessly releases you, only for you to reach up to him to drag him down into a tight embrace, “Then, why is your heart so troubled?”

“I---” he chokes on the word and how shallowly his lungs fill with you holding him so securely in your arms. Maybe it is better that you hold him so closely that you cannot see how he crumbles against you, dissolving into your grasp as if you are the only thing holding him together when he confesses, “I know what it is to live this life of darkness. You are so---! You deserve everything I can’t give you, starting with a life surrounded by the beauties of daylight.” His head turns, misty eyes catching your worried stare. He regrets the distress he’s caused you, but moreso he needs to hear your reassurances that his mind has gotten the better of him in this. He has never hoped so pitifully that he was wrong.

“Astarion,” heart swelling at the loss in his eyes; he looks to be mourning for you. As your thumb smoothes along the lines of his jaw, you come to realize the depth of his lingering sadness, “tell me, what good is the sun? The sun cannot care for me as you do or feel my love in return. A life of pure sunlight is worthless if it means living it without you.” You watch his breath catch in his chest, a stifled sob of his relief that he does not give into so easily.

His voice comes strained and nearly sounds like he’s on the verge of arguing with you, “You so obviously will miss it! You talk of finding a way for me to ‘walk in the sun again,’ but what if it’s impossible? What if we waste our lives searching for something that was never attainable? When you realize it, I wouldn’t have you look differently upon me.”

“Is that it? You think I talk about finding you a cure for my own benefit?” you scoff, before leaning towards him to place a soft kiss against frowning lips. He lingers in the middle ground as you depart just enough to demand he listen, “I only think of you, Astarion. Since the moment I first saw you, you’ve consumed my mind, body and soul. The sun was made for you--- and you’d know it if you ever had the privilege of seeing yourself in it. I only want for you to be happy.”

The arch of his brow tells you he still doesn’t fully believe you, despite his attempt at a half-hearted joke through the tightness in his throat, “I do quite enjoy when you call me beautiful.” It’s more than that, and you both know it, but if he were to ask you right now to name one thing about the light of day that you know you will sorely miss, it would be never seeing him in it again.

Rolling your eyes, you sigh at him with a lopsided smile, “Oh, my silly vampire, I love you much more than the sun. Without you, I would not want any of it. In fact, you can take the moon and stars, too, while you’re at it---”

He cuts you off with the eclipse of his mouth on yours, hands spread along your ribs to dig eager fingertips into your skin as he pulls you in as close as he can manage. The kiss is more languidly meaningful than the last; he intends on burning the feeling of you into his mind to replace the torrid thoughts there. If your words had not been enough to convince him, you hope the way you receive his body with your own can. Every part of you calls to him, blood and sinew, breath and bone, flesh and spirit.

Maybe it’s clear to him now, that you are as intertwined as the earth and sea. Should the tide of your soul ever depart from his shores, he can rest in the knowledge that your reunion is inevitable. As far as you are concerned, you are fated in such a way that not even the gods above or the devils below can alter the course of how your body fits beneath his--- how you shall always welcome him home.

You will have him, for as long as he will have you.

When he finally withdraws, he dares not go far, eyes blinking open slowly in a melancholy acceptance, “How can I be so fortunate?”

Brushing the mess of white curls behind his pointed ear, you hum at the shiver that runs through him when your fingertips graze the skin there, “I don’t know, but it’s about time things start going our way, don’t you think?”

“That it is,” his groaned agreement softens the worry in his eyes and he melts into the stroke of your hand against his temple.

“What you should be worrying about, Astarion, is whether you’ll regret choosing me when I’m all old, wrinkled, and grey,” it’s only half of a tease, and you hope he can’t see through the smile on your lips. The thought has been on your mind for some time after realizing that the two of you were going to somehow survive everything you’ve endured these past months.

“Darling,” he scoffs, nudging his nose with yours, soothing you as much as you do him, “knowing how well trouble finds you, we’ll both be long dead before either of us need worry much about that.” His lips graze yours, when he gives you his earnest answer, “For our sake, I hope to spend every moment we have left with you, watching every sunset and sunrise we are granted until the end takes us both.”

It's more complicated than that, but most real things usually are.

What isn’t complicated is how you feel beneath him, tongue tracing his teeth as he ravishes you. There is a completeness that comes in the way of his body fitting against yours. This reassurance in your touch will never falter. Even if your mind were to eventually escape you, he will know you were always his. If the world were to fall away in this moment and leave nothing but this room, Astarion would happily float out his days with you here forevermore.

He loves you. You love him.

He can scarcely comprehend anything else. Nothing else matters, he decides.

Nothing but your little shivers and whines when his fingers delve down the soft flesh of your stomach--- nothing but the arch of your body into the exploration of his touch. Nothing is worth more than his name whispered from your lips in that scandalous tone you reserve for these moments he sets your skin ablaze with teeth and tongue. You call to him like it were a prayer, but Astarion has hardly done anything so holy to warrant the way you say his name.

His sole inkling of faith is spent on the belief that he could live his whole life, his extended eternity, and never tire of loving you.

Soft and demanding partner within the thrill of his touch, you’ve learned, and his hands part you for him with that comforting understanding. Insistent and hesitant are your finger’s answer to him, digging into the nape of his neck as your head falls back against the pillows. Throat bared, it’s a wonder he doesn’t take another bite of you where he’s done so frequently before, but his attention is too acutely focused on the aching wetness between your thighs and his slender fingers.

Your lips part in an open moan of his name with how expertly he drags pleasure through your veins with each stroke within you, and he drags his teeth against your jaw in a growl, “You sweet, generous thing, always so ready for me.” Finally, he grants you some relief from his constant teasing, pressing the heel of his palm into your most sensitive nub. He allows you to seek your own pleasure with each desperate grind of yourself against the hand that continues to stroke pleasure from within, “Do you have any idea what the sight of you does to me? How dearly I long for us to never leave this bed?” The rasp of his voice has heat rushing up your spine, muddying your thoughts with each continuance of his lascivious tongue, “Leave the Gate to fend for itself, my dear, for I should have you like this always, stripped bare with me between your thighs.”

“Have me then, Astarion,” you really did purr for him in times like these and as much as he enjoys teasing you for it, he truly does relish the tone you get when he has drenched you in lust. His reaction at your words is groaned against your throat; he’s so near, but his hand retreats from you all the same. Never to neglect you for long, your lover is soon tearing at your smallclothes with an impatience that was not wholly unexpected from him.

He pushes his weight onto his forearm beside your head, using his other hand to tug at the laces of his loose breeches while glancing down between you. His eyes, rubies in the darkness, snap to yours and it is as if he has dipped you in firewine and struck a match. You burn for him, from the inside out and in such a way that you know he has thoroughly ruined you for anyone else. You are dripping with it, onto the sheets and the new press of his length against your core. His indulgent rub of himself through your folds is punctuated by him grinding into you, eyes fluttering shut at the feeling for but a moment.

Hair disheveled, you watch the beauty of him as he swallows deeply before capturing you in that piercing gaze once again, “I think I shall have you, now--- how did you just put it?” He crowds you with his arms, and your breath hitches at the feeling of him catching at your entrance when he murmurs lowly, deliberately, “Body and soul? Isn’t that right, my love?”

The way you drag him down into your kiss as he pushes into you is a messy, desperate thing, but it only seems to urge him on. You simply cannot seem to get close enough, though not for lack of trying, as he fills you gloriously. Astarion gasps into your mouth, staggering the push of his hips against yours, devouring you until he is left seated so deeply within you that you can hardly breathe. Then, hands around your thighs push your legs up, and he fits impossibly further.

You sob a moan against sharp fangs, deliriously full of him as he begins a slow fucking that is just enough to drive you into madness. Clambering for something to ground yourself, your nails dig into his back, scraping against the scars that remain there--- his hips snapping faster into you at the feeling of it.

He smears saliva across your jaw and down your throat, understanding your breathless, “Please, please,” for what it is. Permission.

Pain is so fleetingly brief that it may as well not exist at all, because when he bites down hard enough to draw blood from your skin, you are met so suddenly with a lightheaded ecstasy that is compounded by the pleasure he pulses through your body. Only the raw stretch of his every thrust keeps you from dissipating into delirium entirely. You are left keening beneath him as he dissolves into the taste of your blood, feeling his moans against your neck and the way his thrusts begin to match the drum of your heart in your ears. Astarion’s fingers drag in the space between, stopping only when he has found the base of his seat within you.

You feel your heart skip in your chest before he ceases the meal he’s made of you, licking your throat of the sloppy blood that threatens to yet spill. The iron of it meets the smell of sex in the air and he strokes his fingers against where he continuously plunges so deep within you; the wet sounds of your coupling may have been embarrassing if you weren’t so disoriented with the raw need of it. Your every nerve has fiercer concerns than your fickle dignity when he is working to make such a wonderful mess of you as this.

“Delicious,” Astarion groans into your shoulder, nipping and groaning against whatever he may get his mouth on as he feels your increasingly erratic clenching with his harshening pace. Tears prick at the corners of your eyes, feeling him reach to draw tight circles at your clit as his own pace begins to falter. Neither of you will make it much further through this. He is left stained, begging upon your skin, “Come with me--- Hells, darling--- I need you to---"

Finding a grip in his hair allows you to drag his head sharply back to force his open-mouthed gaze to cast upon you once more, desperate to see him as he falls apart with you.

The sight of him is nearly enough for you to lose what little sense you’ve held to; while his complexion has turned slightly rosy with the assistance of your fresh blood, he still looks upon you with a consuming hunger all the same, “I love you.”

“Gods---!” dark eyes slam shut as he gasps out your name before all control leaves him in the mindless oblivion that he drags you down into alongside him. Scorching pleasure burns from the inside out as he loses himself in the trembling heat of your rapture, dissolving into a wild and erratic pace that bursts sparks of euphoria behind your eyes.

You are both left in the sticky aftermath of it, heaving mingling breaths as tension melts into you from where he collapses and lingers atop you. You hold him, content to have his softening length seated within you for all eternity as you let him continue his mindless caressing of your skin.

He has said it before, but it will never be enough, so he says it again in the hoarse aftermath of your lovemaking, “I love you, darling. You have made me so… happy.” Should you ever forget it, he is prepared to remind you for the rest of your days, “Thank you.”

Your own repeated declaration is sighed with a contentment that you hope will last a moment longer as your fingers take to stroking through his hair when he lays his head against your chest. Can he hear it from there, you wonder, how your heart whispers only the sweetest of sentiments for him? You like to think he can.

“Astarion?” you finally croak after some time, and he hums soft acknowledgement without much movement. “We should watch the next one together.”

“The next what, my treasure?”

“The next sunrise.”

There is a smile in his voice when he murmurs, “Always.”

#astarion fanfic #astarion ancunin fanfic #baldurs gate 3 fanfic #baldurs gate 3 female reader insert #female reader insert #newstuff female reader insert #fanfiction #gif not mine #nsft #smut #author meg #fanfic by me

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thranduilsperkybutt · 2 years

Photo

GIRLS ON FILM

Photo sources: 1 | 2

Pairings: Steve Harrington/Reader

Warnings: NSFW; smut; fluff; amateur corn production; literally no proof-reading; plot? what plot?

Word Count: 6,001 words

Reader Gender: Female

Author: Meg

Summary: You need a subject for your photography class assignment. Luckily, your boyfriend is more than willing to help you out. Some pictures, however, might be better off left between just the two of you...

A/N: Caught you in 4k 📸 Had to bang this out before volume 2 crushed my soul, so, here you go 🤡🤡 I’m in full clown-mode denial that anything is going to happen to my faves at all rn---

Hoisting your bag onto your arm, you make your way out of the lecture hall, still dwelling on the newest assignment your professor had given out. You were supposed to photograph someone important to you in your own unique portraiture method, which had set off a few groans in class when the professor had first announced it. There were clearly several people who had no idea who they were going to make the subject of their assignment, meanwhile your mind had immediately gone to one specific person.

Steve Harrington was perhaps the most important person in your life right now, which makes sense, considering your relationship with the man has been serious since last March. It was perhaps the only thing he was serious about at this current time in his life, with how he was still undecided on his major after nearly a year and a half’s worth of college courses.

His father wanted him to go into tech, but Steve had been so uncertain that any chance at getting into somewhere other than the community college a county over from Hawkins had flown out the window. It was still a touchy subject, and the fact that his wealthy parents still had him working part-time at the Family Video store, despite pursuing an education, was evidence enough that his father hadn’t forgiven him for not applying himself harder. He has a little over a semester’s worth of classes left until you both are set to transfer to state, and he has to decide on something to do with his life by then in order to appease his parents.

Well, something other than dating you, because you’re the only thing in his life right now that Steve’s absolutely certain he wants.

And you’re absolutely certain that Steve is the man for this assignment.

He’s already helped you set up a few of your other projects for this class, between studying for the few classes you share together, so you’re pretty sure he’ll help you out again, if you ask him nicely.

Pushing past the double doors leading out to the parking lot, it’s not difficult to find his beamer parked right where it always is. Steve’s sitting in the driver’s seat with the window rolled down, undoubtedly enjoying the temperate weather after having got out of his own class that ends thirty minutes before yours. The closer you get, the more you can hear the music on his radio, and it becomes clear that he’s either taking a nap or has his eyes closed behind the sunglasses perched on his nose, because he makes no move to acknowledge your approach.

Leaning on the windowsill, you bend into the car swiftly to place a peck on his cheek, “Guess who?”

“That better be my girlfriend, or I’m in trouble,” he grins, raising his head from where it had been leant back on the seat to look at you through his shades. “How was class?”

“Same old, same old,” you roll your eyes, pushing off the door to go around to the passenger side. Dumping your bag into the back seat, you slide in beside him, continuing, “Dr. Tanner gave us another assignment.”

“Oh?” Steve hums, shifting gears to drive out of the parking lot. “She likes to give you guys a lot of things to do, huh?”

“Yeah, she always is saying that the more we practice, the better our photos will be. I guess she’s right,” you sigh, sinking into the seat and deciding to test the waters. “How about your day? How’s it been?”

Steve groans, jaw clenching as he turns his blinker on, “You don’t want to know. My dad’s gonna’ kill me when I make a C in biology.”

“You got your test back?”

“Unfortunately. At least yesterday I still could live with the hope of getting a B—”

“I’m sure there’s some way to improve your grade. There’s still one more test before the final, right?” You lean towards him, reaching out to give his shoulder a comforting rub, “I’ll help you. I’m doing alright in biology since Dr. O’Malley explains things pretty well.”

“Yeah, but O’Malley at least teaches you what’s gonna’ be on the tests! I feel like every time my guy gives us a lecture, he’s telling us what not to study, because it’s never on his exams!” Steve huffs your name with frustration, “I made a fifty-eight. A fifty-eight! That’s like if a nuke hit my B-average.”

“I’m sorry, Steve. I know you studied hard for it,” you murmur, knowing there’s nothing you can do about it now, and instead focus on perhaps cheering him up, “Want to get drive-thru before we hit the interstate? Like KFC or something? I know you must be starving.” It’s about an hour’s drive back to Hawkins, and food is the only thing that you can think of that might make the situation at least a little better for now.

“Yeah, I guess I could eat,” he doesn’t sound convincing.

You give his shoulder a squeeze, feeling him relax slightly at the touch, “You’ll feel better after.”

The side-eyed glance he gives you lets you see a glimpse of his dark eyes beyond the sunglasses, and you offer him an encouraging smile that he returns, “You’re probably right. Man, I’m moping, aren’t I? Sorry to be such a downer.”

“No, it’s okay. You know you don’t have to be on all the time with me,” when he stops at a red light, he reaches from the gear shift to rest his hand on your thigh, leaning into your touch when you move to caress his cheek. “We’ll work through it together, yeah?”

Steve nods, smile spreading into something more genuine, something that reaches his eyes, when he sighs softly, “What did I do to deserve you, honey?”

“Probably something amazing, I’m sure,” you giggle, before retreating back into your seat and turning up the radio just enough to hear a familiar song you liked.

The wind flowing through his open window ruffles his hair as he continues driving on the turning of the light, “That assignment you were talking about— what’s it going to be this time?”

“Well, I have to take a series of photos involving someone I care about, and make them unique to my personal style.”

“Ah,” he begins, “so who’re you gonna’ ask—?”

Rolling your eyes, you snort, “You, obviously! Who else?”

“I don’t know! I thought, maybe, like, Robin, or your parents, or something—” he quickly runs through his options.

“Of course I was gonna’ ask you, Steve. You’re pretty much the most special person in my life—”

“Aw,” he grins, teasing, “I’m special to you? That’s so sweet.”

“Shut up,” you fight against the warmth rising to your cheeks. Even after all this time, he still can make you flustered, and you know he knows it, “Well, will you?”

“Will I what?”

“Be my subject!”

“Uh, sure,” he hums, “I just gotta’ work this weekend. I’m off Sunday, though, so we could do it then, unless you’re busy.”

“Sunday works,” agreement on your tongue, you’re glad you’ll have a few days to figure out what kind of set up you want for the photos. “You could bring your bio books, too, and we could study together.” Steve groans his reluctance until you point at him, “Hey, I’m gonna’ make sure you get the grade you need, mister!”

“Sunday’s supposed to be a day of rest or something, isn’t it?” he whines, taking the turn towards the restaurant.

“There ain’t no rest for the wicked, Steve,” you tease, grinning, as he shoots you a look beneath a raised brow.

“The wicked, and college students, huh?” Steve shakes his head, a smile lingering on his lips as he pulls up behind the cars waiting in line at the drive-thru, “Come on, tell me what you want.”

Reaching around the seat, you grab your bag to rummage through it in search of some cash, “I’m treating you today, okay? Because you had a bad day— no arguing!” You can tell he wants to, by the time you plop back into your seat with your wallet in hand, but you silence whatever protest he’s about to start into when you lean into his personal space, his eyes darting to your lips when you repeat, “No arguing,” before kissing him.

Trying to keep it proper, considering you were still in semi-public, you don’t give Steve much attention before you’re pulling away, and he’s pouting, but concedes all the same, “Fine, but I’m getting it next time.”

“Mhm,” you hum, biting into your smile as you flip open your wallet.

“I am,” Steve leans towards you, catching your attention with a playful look of determination, shooting your own words back at you. “See this face? No arguing!”

“I’m not arguing!” Gesturing to the car in front of you which had driven forward in the time it had taken for him to get distracted, you refocus him, “Pull up, Steve!”

“Uh-huh, that’s what I thought.”

A wide grin cuts along his teeth, like he knows he’ll get his way, which he will. He almost always does, when it comes to treating you to little things like this. Steve was the kind of guy who liked to feel like he was taking care of someone, but the truth was, he needed you just as much as you needed him. Maybe neither of you were truly reliant on each other financially, but when it comes down to the little moments of every day you spent together? Without that, you’re certain you’d simply wither up and die.

Steve had been your safe place, whenever something was going wrong in your life. You knew you could confide in him about anything, and he’d try to support you through it. Maybe that’s why you can allow yourself to give him the same, because Steve Harrington made loving you look easy, even when you knew it wasn’t always the case.

Comfortable is a forbidden word to some couples. They’re so used to the high of a honeymoon phase, or the anxiety of a struggling relationship, that when the lull of everyday comfortability sets in, it’s mistaken for boredom. For something being terribly wrong. You’d been that way once, before him, and judging by what he’d told you of his past relationships, he’d been victim to that same uncertainty in the past.

The truth is, you wouldn’t rather have him any other way. Slipping into this sneaky vulnerability that comes with the soft comfort which spreads through your soul every time he touches you, or calls you his, is a state you’d gladly live in for the rest of your days.

You’ve been head over heels for him for far longer than you ever realized.

That’s why the next couple of days were hard. Whenever you were separated by work, only able to see him between classes and shifts, as silly as it sounds, you’re missing him by Sunday. Sure, he called you the night before— he always makes sure to call you on the days you can’t see each other in person, but you’re still a bundle of nervous excitement as you set up the finishing touches for the photos of him you had planned.

It was a photography studio on a student budget, also known as a sheet pinned against your shoebox of an apartment’s wall, with strategic lighting positioned around it. You’ve decided on seeing what you can accomplish with polaroids, rather than the film processing you’d have to do otherwise.

You wanted to focus on minimalism, on just him, hoping that maybe the lack of focus on anything else would show how little everything else matters in comparison. Or, at least, that it’ll get you a good grade on the project.

Sighing, you plop down onto your bed to get as much a distant look at the set-up as you can in the cramped space, before deciding that it was as close as you had imagined in your head as you were going to get for now. The sound of the key in your lock lets you know it’s just in the nick of time, too, because within moments Steve is pushing open your door.

“Your model has arrived,” he calls out, before catching sight of you on the bed. He does a dramatic little spin to show off his outfit, which consists of a blue sweater and gray slacks, before shutting your front door behind him with a grin, “I’m ready for Vogue.”

Chuckling, “Perfect timing! I just got done setting everything up.” He’s tucking his keys into his pocket when you look around him, “Did you forget your biology book?”

“Ugh,” he groans before collapsing beside you on the bed, pushing himself up on his elbow to affix you with a reluctant, “it’s rotting in the trunk of my car. I was hoping you’d forget about bio…” blinking up at you, he bats his eyes as if to persuade you, “since I’m being such a great guy and helping you out with your project, and all…”

“Steve!” you huff when he pokes you in the side, swatting at his hands, “It’s for your own good!”

“I’ve just accepted my fate at this point—”

“No, come on,” you shift to turn towards him more fully, dangling one leg off the bed with the other crossed beneath your hands. “There’s more fight in you than that! Look, how about we do the shoot, then we can study a little, and spend the rest of the day doing something fun together? At the very least, we should go over your test together…”

A smile slowly parts his lips, as Steve jokes, “Alright, professor, we’ll do it your way,” before sitting up properly to sneak a kiss at your cheek. “So, tell me all about where you want me for this shoot.”

Escaping the way his hands have started to snake around your waist, you move towards the camera you’ve set up on the small space of a kitchen counter that you have, “I’m thinking, polaroids this time. I did regular film for the last project, but the professor is giving us more creative leeway with this one. Besides, I’ve been wanting to do something serious with this thing for class ever since you got me it for my birthday…”

“Oh, yeah,” Steve nods, as if he’s said anything different when you told him the last few project ideas you’ve come up with, “I think that’s a good idea.”

“I’m not finished telling you everything about my idea,” you begin, picking at the camera in your hands as you confess the one point you weren’t entirely sure if he’d be okay with. “I wanted to do a minimalist kind of thing, and you can totally say no if you want to. I’m sure I could make it work otherwise—”

Steve raises a brow at your rambling tone, “What?”

“I was thinking… about maybe taking a few pictures… without your shirt? Like I was going to pose you so it’s like, this artistically minimal kind of thing, and it would only be shots from the waist up, but I totally get if you’re not comfortable with doing that—” your voice dies in your throat when Steve stands up and simply tugs his sweater over his head, laying it over the rails of your bed’s iron footboard.

Moving closer, he smirks at having successfully silenced you, “You want me to sit on the stool?”

“Yeah, um,” you tear your eyes away from him, towards your setup, and the stool sat in the middle of it. “Kind of with your back to me— I’ll show you.”

When you have him successfully positioned, in the stool, pushing his hair the way you want it to look, he grins at your look of concentration, “Can’t get enough of this pretty face, huh?”

“Quit smiling,” you snicker, before pulling back to look at him through the camera lens, “I want a neutral look on your face in these shots.”

“Neutral, huh?” he proceeds to frown.

“Neutral, not frowning! Think of, like, clean laundry, or something that makes you feel calm—”

“Clean laundry?” he was heavily judging your choice, “That’s what makes you calm?”

“Steve,” you whine, lowering the camera from your face, “just think of something calming.”

“Okay, okay, just gimme’ a second,” he relents, as you bring the camera back up to line up the shot. Finally, he breathes, “Got it,” before his face settles into a calm neutral expression, dark brown eyes looking at the camera just the way you want.

“Perfect,” you snap the shot, before hearing the whirr of the film as it gets ejected. Fanning the picture until it starts to appear, you feel your smile spreading when you begin to make out the photo. It turned out great. Setting the picture on the counter, you turn back to Steve, “Alright, just keep doing that. I’m gonna’ get some different angles.”

“Okay. Just make sure you make me look cool,” of course that would be his one concern.

Before you can reposition him again, you try out some different angles. You want to have multiple shots to choose from, so you don’t wind up having to take more pictures of him later. You’d learned your lesson before about not getting enough shots, and it was more of a hassle in the long run than just taking your time while you had everything set up. You spend almost half an hour taking the shots between soft banter with Steve, which is honestly less time than you’d expected it to take, but Steve was more focused today than he usually is.

Flipping through the stack of polaroids you’ve taken, you hold out some for Steve to see, “Wanna’ take a look?”

“We done?”

“I think so. They turned out really nice. I’ll have to narrow down my favorite ones to submit for class…” Steve’s fingers brush yours as he takes the pictures from your hands, looking through them. You hope he thinks they look as good as you do, “What do you think?”

“I think,” his eyes flick up from the pictures to catch your waiting stare, “I’ve never looked better.” You let out a breath of relief, taking the pictures back from him to sort out on the counter, while Steve plucks the camera into his hands, “This is a nifty little thing, huh? I didn’t expect it to be able to make pictures that good.”

“That’s the technology of the ‘80s for you,” you joke, only for a flash and the sound of the camera going off to catch your attention. Whipping your head from the pictures on the counter to Steve, you find him grinning mischievously at you as he fans out a picture of his own, “Steve!”

“What? The photographer never gets to be photographed?” holding out the picture, you watch as the candid image of you sorting through the pictures comes into view, “Look at how beautiful you look.”

“Stop,” you can’t stop your giggles when he slides up into your personal space, positioning the camera like he’s going to take another picture, “you’ll waste the film.”

“It’s not a waste. I could use a few more pictures of you.”

Looking towards him skeptically, “You have pictures of me—”

“Yeah,” he sighs, brushing your hair out of his way to kiss you against your temple, “I could always use more, though.”

“What you should use is that biology book that’s in the trunk of your car,” you turn to face him, leaning against the counter as he rolls his eyes at your cheeky changing of the subject. Backing up, he appears to be thinking, before he turns to go and sit on the edge of your bed, still picking at the camera in his hands.

“You said we wouldn’t study until after the shoot,” Steve mumbles, placing the camera to his side.

“Yeah, and I’m done. I got all the shots I think I need.”

“No, you haven’t,” he begins, and you know better than to play this game with him, when he gets that look in his eyes. You know whatever he’s got in his head can only be a bad idea, but you step forward anyway.

Arms crossed over your chest, it’s too fun to give into him to resist, “Oh? What makes you say that?”

“I was just… thinking…”

“That’s dangerous.”

“Shut up,” Steve chuckles, reaching out when you’re within arm’s reach to tug you closer by the loops in your jeans. “I was just thinking about, maybe… you letting me take some pictures of you. Just for me.”

“Just for you, huh?” you lean your hand on his shoulder, steading yourself from where you stand between his knees. “What kind of pictures?”

“Nothing too bad, just… the last picture I have of you is the one in my wallet, and it’s practically falling apart,” he sighs when you card your fingers into his hair, scraping your nails along his scalp. “How am I supposed to brag about my girl with a picture that looks like it’s been through a world war?”

“And who’s fault is that? I gave it to you brand new—”

“I know, I know, but,” and there are those wide eyes of his again, staring up at you with that pleading look that made you melt to his every whim just about, “I want to remember how you are now, when we’re alone together. Not just some professional photo— though, you look nice in those, too.”

Now, how were you supposed to say no to that?

“Okay, fine,” you sigh, knowing full well you’d let him take as many as he wanted to, “just one picture.” He could use the rest of your film up, if it meant seeing him grin at you like he was. Reloading the camera again is a small price to pay.

“Really?” when you nod, he urges you down into his lap with a firm tug at your hips, until you’re left straddling him. His hand finds the side of your neck, dragging your lips against his in a kiss that’s soft, slow, but laced with his hint of grateful excitement before he pulls away with, “Thank you.”

“Jeez, if that’s the thanks I get for letting you take a picture, I’ll let you take them more often,” you laugh, as he picks the camera off the comforter. “How do you want me to sit for the picture, Steve?”

“Hmm,” he hums thoughtfully, bringing the camera to his face to look at you through it, “that’s a good question. I think… I want you to take your sweater off for it.”

“It’s a cardigan,” you correct, reaching down to unbutton the garment.

“Whatever,” Steve lowers the camera, watching you toss the cardigan onto the footboard of your bed, where his sweater still hangs. It leaves you in the casual tank-top you’d been wearing beneath.

“Do you want to use the set?”

“No, no,” he brings the camera back up, still seemingly deciding on how he wants the picture, “I think I want you to sit on the bed.” Before you can move from his lap, he adds, “It would be more normal. I want it to be kind of natural.”

“Alrighty, then,” you shift, crawling off him and to the side in order to lay back on the bed, until he gets up. When you sit upright, Steve’s standing off the end of the bed with the camera, seemingly mimicking the way you had been lining up your shot earlier.

Noticing the strap of your tank top has slipped down your arm when you shifted positions, you go to push it back up, only for Steve’s voice to stop you, “Uh, can you leave it?”

“What?”

“It just makes you look comfortable,” is his only explanation, but you lower your hand all the same, leaving the strap hanging slightly off your shoulder.

“Is this good?” you ask, but there’s a tension in the air, and judging by the strain in his voice, he can feel it, too.

“Yeah, uh,” you watch as Steve swallows, “can you just, lay back a bit?” Doing as he says, you relax against the comforter a little, and he comes closer. His knees brush the edge of the bed between where your calves dangle off the edge of it. He takes another second, before the shutter goes off along with the flash, and then another picture is ejecting from the camera.

Steve fans it a little, while you raise your foot to press into his abdomen, “Did it turn out how you wanted?”

His eyes are a little glazed over, when he looks from the picture to you, as if he were lost in thought for just a moment, “Um, yeah, take a look.” You take the photo when he offers it to you, only to see yourself spread atop the bed, hair spread around your head like a halo, the strap of your tank top falling off your shoulder. The slight smile on your face only adds to how comfortable you look, and you have to admit, you don’t hate this picture of you.

Steve’s hand comes to your ankle, pushing your foot from his path as he kneels into the bed, settling over your body while you stare at the picture, “I did good, huh?”

“You’re quite the photographer, Mister Harrington,” you tease, casting your eyes upon him again to find that he’s so close. It takes only a shift of his body weight to lower himself enough to capture your lips with his, but while this kiss might be slow, it was far from soft. There’s an edge there, a need in the insistence of his lips against yours. The taste of his tongue scrambling your thoughts until you completely abandon the picture in your grip, leaving it somewhere beside you on the bed, in favor of the feeling of his skin.

Your hands snake up his sides, dragging him closer just as much as your legs do, while Steve kisses you senseless. His fingers splay beneath the end of your shirt, pushing until he can feel the soft press of your stomach, and inching upwards with each passing second. The last thing on either of your minds is studying for biology, and any chance you have at returning to the plan for the day is quickly slipping through your fingertips the more his body presses down into yours.

It crumbles away entirely when he pulls back just enough to utter a breathless, “I need you so bad right now,” before delving down your jaw, dragging his lips along the column of your throat.

“Steve—” you’re just as breathless, and you don’t know if it’s the few days you’ve spent apart, or the fact that you have both been so wound-up over school, but you need him just as badly.

“Please,” he groans against your throat, leaving open-mouthed kisses there that were undoubtedly going to leave a mark thanks to the fervor with which he’d descended upon you. You hardly mind. You’ve missed his marks on you, ever since the last ones had faded.

Your tank top is pushed over your chest, a fist in the fabric keeping it up while his other hand presses against your hardening nipples through the bralette you’d chosen to wear today. You hadn’t planned on going anywhere, and wanted to just remain comfortable, but that was backfiring on you now, because you can feel almost everything through the thin fabric.

As if arching into his touch wasn’t enough, Steve questions, “You want it, too, right?”

“Yeah, Steve,” catching him by the jaw to drag his head back up, you mewl against his lips, “I want you.”

His breath shudders from his lips before he draws you into another kiss. Taking his time to strip you down is nothing new, but the words he utters as he pushes his own pants from his hips are.

“I can’t stop thinking about how good you look on camera,” Steve groans, taking himself into his hand, stroking languidly as you shift beneath where he’s knelt himself over you on the bed. Fingers slipping down your thigh, he drags you a little closer, kissing the inside of your knee. You suck in a breath as he pushes himself along your core, spreading your wetness along his length, all the while with a heated look swirling in his dark eyes. When he finally positions himself against your entrance, your mouth falls open, sucking in a soft breath at the feeling of his familiar stretch, but it’s his words that set you on fire, “Now that’s a sight I’d like a picture of.”

It’s an off-handed comment, but now you can’t stop thinking about it. Drowning in the feeling of the slow, steady pace he sets, the idea has time to marinate in the back of your scrambled mind.

You’re reaching for him, brushing your fingertips against his abdomen as you moan his name, but Steve huffs, “Touch yourself,” as he drives his hips into yours once again.

Blinking up at him, you’re struck by the idea of how he would look if you took a picture of him at this very moment, and that thought is perhaps what sets the most foolish words on your tongue, “The camera— Get the camera.”

His hips stutter, and a choked sound comes from him, before he manages to form a sentence, “Are you serious?”

“Just for you,” you nod, and he abandons his grip on your thigh to reach for the polaroid that had wound up against the pillows.

His pace almost stills until he can get the camera in a good enough grip to lift it to his face, and that’s when his thrusts return in long, languid strokes that have you writhing beneath him with the assistance of your fingers pressing circles at your clit, “God, look at you.” His voice is heavy, wrapped around a moan of his own as he presses a hand down against your stomach, pushing your hips down onto his cock in a way that almost makes you cry out, “These are gonna’ turn out great.”

There’s a certain vulnerability to being in front of a camera, and stripped as bare as you were already, you’re practically raw, rubbed against him when the flash bursts upon your skin, camera shutter mixing with your moans as he fucks you slow into the mattress, “Steve, ah—!”

He abandons your stomach to take the photo that slips from the camera, fanning it until it develops enough for him to see the still image resulting from his touch, “Oh, look at how pretty you are.” He holds it out for you to see, but you barely manage a glimpse at yourself before he’s tossing the picture to the side, bringing the camera back up to his eyes.

“You’re— taking another?” you gasp, arching up into your own touch as he hits you deeper with the next roll of his hips.

“Yeah, that’s right. Just a few more—” Steve groans reaching to slip his hand down your thigh, pushing you open even more, “Can you spread your legs a little more— yeah, just like that—” and the shutter’s going off again, the image of you burned into the film as much as it will be in his memory.

You clench around him when the photograph falls onto your chest before he can reach for it, and you hope you’ll never forget the whimper that escapes him when he lowers the camera just slightly. A glimpse of teeth digging into his bottom lip to keep the sounds threatening to spill from him at bay, when he opens his eyes from the feeling, he sees you watching him in a way that seems to spell out your desire in every way words seem incapable of accomplishing right now.

All you can manage are your own sighs of pleasure, when his fingertips overlap yours to press into your clit. Lowering the camera to the bed, he refocuses on turning you into molten lava with every steady, sure stroke, building up the pleasure until it reached a boiling point. Lost somewhere between overstimulation and the peak of your desire, you’re both chasing this feeling and trying to draw it out for as long as it will last.

Your mouth is dry, so you lick your lips, thankful you’re able to think just barely enough to say, “I-It’s not fair. I won’t have any pictures of you.”

“You want some of me?” Steve repeats, as if he didn’t quite hear you right. For all he knows, he hallucinated it at this point, because he’s nearly out of his mind with how good you feel wrapped around him.

“I do,” you shift, using all the energy you have left to push him over, until you’re sitting on top of him. “It’s only fair.” Grinding your hips down into his, his hands catch against your thighs, aiding in your attempt at riding him with just a torturous pace as he had set.

“Oh— Okay,” his head falls back against the bed as he moans, “Yeah— We gotta’ be fair.”

The camera’s in your hands as soon as you can reach for it, but you’re slower than he was. So lost in the feeling that it takes you more time to drag your mind back to the task at hand, until his lips part when you drop your hips down onto him a little quicker than before.

That’s the one.

The snap of the camera seems to only make him rock himself further into your thrusts, and you wind up quite pleased with the way your picture turned out, “Steve, look—” He squeezes your thighs before one of his hands releases you in favor of taking the picture by his index and middle finger, bringing it up to his face.

“Oh, fuck,” he whines at the sight, and you place your hand on his chest in order to get enough leverage to drag yourself almost completely off his cock, just to drop your hips again, and he nearly shouts at the feeling. You’re both shaking, and it shows in the next picture you take of him, but the blurriness is hardly obstructing the view of him, still looking at the photo you’d snapped moments before it.

He falls apart just seconds before you do, fingers digging into the flesh of your thigh as the photograph falls from his grip. Fingers carding through his own hair as you ride him through the brunt of it, desperately chasing your own pleasure at this point, until it detonates with the fullness that comes from his shuddering release.

Steve’s weak call of your name falls on deaf ears as you nearly collapse atop him. Shivering white-hot pleasure down your spine until it settles in the involuntary fluttering of your core around him. He supplies a few overstimulated, shallow thrusts as his arms wrap around you, holding you to him for dear life, until you both manage to float down from the devastation you’ve reaped upon each other.

You’re just glad you didn’t drop the camera, because you would hate to have broken it.

Instead, it lays against the mattress much like the rest of you, though you don’t think you’ll ever be able to use it again without thinking back to this moment. Steve’s fingers trace up your spine, as you feel him slowly beginning to even out his breathing beneath your chest.

“Holy shit,” he murmurs into your ear, and you giggle against him.

“Yeah…” moving off of him, you collapse into the bed, careful to avoid any stray polaroid pictures evidencing your love-making that were strewn along the bed.

Steve tilts his head to look at you, chuckling, “I think I should get a video camera for your next birthday—”

“Shut up.”

#steve harrington fanfic #stranger things fanfic #stranger things female reader insert #female reader insert #newstuff female reader insert #fanfiction #fanfic by me #author meg #smut #nsft

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thranduilsperkybutt · 3 months

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requirements.txt=unsatisfied

Pic source: 1

Pairings: Johnny Silverhand/V!Reader; Exceedingly minor Goro Takemura/V!Reader alluded to Warnings: Endgame spoilers; Arasaka!ending; I take liberties with the ending (everyone lives AU); yearning; fighting; nsfw banter (no actual explicit behaviors); angst with a happy ending; mentions of canon-typical drug use and violence Word Count: 9,936 words Reader Gender: Female Author: Meg Summary: Johnny always wants a lot of things--- a smoke, a good fuck, for you to turn the radio to 107.3 instead of that new age crap you like. In a perfect world, he'd like to have his own body back, too, but this isn't a perfect world. This is Night City, and he doesn't know if he'll ever be able to forgive you for going and doing this. Turns out that being in love requires being unsatisfied. A/N: Look. I finally finished playing the game as corpo!V and I will not live with these endings, alright? I'm gonna make my own.

“Think they make shitty motels like this just for screw-ups like us?”

You make a point to continue staring at the ceiling of the ‘shitty motel’ room, deep breathing the mildew and age-old cigarettes. He isn’t wrong, but you don’t want to hear it right now. He always has a way with words. Wiping your hands down your face, you do your best to ignore him, but Johnny wasn’t the most dismissible parasite you’ve ever had.

“’Parasite’s’ talkin’ to you, fuck-up,” he flicks his cigarette butt at you in retaliation for the thoughts in your head and it glitches through your thigh with a fuzzy tickle in your neurons. “Do ya’ really think Arasaka is gonna’ just let you waltz away after grabbin’ that stuck-up bitch princess of theirs? You’re fucked.”

“Was fucked before that, Johnny--- royally, if you’ll remember,” you groan, and turn away from him. He appears on the other side of the bed, leaning over it to glare at you. “Got you to show for it, after all.”

“Why are you so chill about this? Takemura fucked you both by deciding to take a life-sized souvenir from your trip to Cherry Town---"

“Cherry Blossom Market---” he barely acknowledges your interruption; you doubt he cares about the situation past hearing himself talk either way.

“--- and you’re just gonna’ do what? Sit here like a ditched date, waitin’ by the phone for that ‘Saka scum to call?”

“Johnny,” you push yourself up into a sitting position, headache threatening a presence at the back of your skull. The edges of his shoulders have that glitchy quality you’ve come to know follows his movements at times when he crosses his arms, but his glare is clear as ever.

“What? Don’t like me callin’ him that?” he rolls his eyes as he certainly feels your annoyance spike, “Jeez, didn’t think you could ride ‘Saka’s dick any harder, but if you literally want to---”

“What crawled up your holographic ass and died tonight?” you bark back, and the glint behind his eyes tells you that this is what he wanted all along. A fight, interaction, anything other than you just melting into the stained mattress of this motel room while the fan drones overhead in excruciating monotony. Johnny’s at his worst when he’s bored or cornered, you’ve found.

“I don’t know, V, maybe the fact that while I’m livin’ in your head, I’ve gotta’ listen to all your disgusting little thoughts about that Grade-A asshole? I’ve never had a dry spell that’d make me wanna’ sleep with a corpo drone, but maybe old habits die hard for you, huh?” You try to ignore his jab at your corporate background, but you know he just can’t help himself, “At this rate, alert a joytoy pronto, because I think I’ll throw up if I gotta’ watch you eyefuck your ronin anym---"

“You’re so fucking annoying sometimes, Johnny, you know that?” you rub your temples, trying to bite back the heat in your cheeks. No telling if it was from embarrassment at his inevitable acknowledgement of your major-league crush on Goro, or an oncoming stroke. At this point you are wishing for the stroke.

“You say that, but you’re not havin’ to watch how pathetic you look waitin’ on Takemura to call. Shit, even that cop you turned down would be better than this guy.”

Rising to your knees, you point a finger directly against his chest, feeling the fuzzy presence of your fried synapses mistaking him for something real at your fingertips, “Know what? Maybe I will fuck Goro the next time I see him, just to screw with you. Maybe I’ll finally get some peace and quiet when you slink back to God-knows-where to hide in my head while I lay back and take it from the big, bad, ‘Saka scum.’”

“You wouldn’t dare,” he growls down at you, the fire in his eyes flickering from your own to your lips and back again. “If you wanted me gone, you’d’ve taken those omega blockers by now.”

“Don’t tempt me. I’d take a half-dose of pseudoendotrizine just so I could kick your ass, if it wouldn’t mean kicking mine, too.”

“Now, there’s a thought,” he reaches out, pushing you back by a phantom grip on your shoulder. Your body flings itself onto the mattress without a thought, “But I don’t need a pill to kick your ass, remember?”

“Asshole,” you grumble defeatedly, but his anger seems to dissipate, if only a little.

“Bitch,” he chuckles, and it’s a short sound of disbelief. “Don’t pout like a damn kid.”

“Anyone ever tell you that you’re kind of mean, Silverhand?” you look down to where he still stood beside--- no, knelt onto, now--- the bed. His lips are quirked into a slight smile, one brow raised like he doesn’t quite understand just why all your annoyance has seemed to sink away into the dingy carpet and rotting walls of this place. Maybe it’s the exhaustion settling into your bones?

Or perhaps it’s the uneasy feeling in your gut when he looks at you. Despite the mountain of resentment your soul screams that you have every right to have at him for stealing your life away from you with every waking second, you can’t seem to bring yourself to hate him.

He clicks his teeth thoughtfully, dipping his weight onto the knee he has on the bed, but it doesn’t creak under his weight or acknowledge his presence, “It may have come up, once or twice.”

He isn’t really here, the soft static framing his hard edges reminds you.

“Why, then?” Why does he keep falling into the same pattern? Why does he treat you like this? Why does he look at you like that afterwards?

You don’t ask any of those questions, but you don’t have to. He’s in your head, after all--- but you think he’d be able to figure them out even if he didn’t have a front-row seat to your every thought. You still aren’t sure how much of your consciousness he is privy to, but you know it’s enough for him to know more about you than any other person ever has.

At this point, he might know your mind better than you do.

You wish you could read his half as well.

“Maybe I just don’t like watchin’ you run head-first into what’s bound to be another shit-show’s all, choom,” he deflects, but his eyes don’t turn from your gaze. There’s something guarded in them, sure, but they soften all the same.

You sit on his bullshit explanation for a few seconds, tasting the thought on your tongue, “Is that what we are, Johnny? Chooms?” It’s an unsatisfactory descriptor, but you don’t know if there’s a word in the English language that can accurately describe what you are to each other.

“I don’t know, V. Are we?”

Before you can even think of an answer, the sound of your holo ringing breaks through your ears and Goro’s image appears in your optics.

Johnny huffs and just like that, any softness in his gaze disintegrates with a roll of his eyes, “Go on--- know you’re giddy as a schoolgirl to answer that.”

“Fuck you, Johnny,” you grumble, before picking up the line and watching him straighten up off the bed before disappearing from your gaze in a static glitch. “Goro---”

“V, meet me, quickly as you can. I’m sending the coordinates.”

---

Your fingers run over the markings of Johnny’s initials you’d just carved against the metal. It’s jagged, raw, and as good a headstone as he was ever going to get, given you’d probably never find where his body had been truly laid to rest. In a city like Night City, after so many years? He’s lucky enough that Arasaka had dumped his body at all, instead of incinerating it like most folks these days.

“There, how’s that for a marker?”

Johnny leans back from where he’d been moping and gestures to your makeshift headstone, “Say this was my real grave, what would you write? ‘Here lies Johnny Silverhand…’”

The words roll around your head in tandem with the pit of dread in your stomach. It didn’t feel right talking to him like he was dead, even though the rational part of your mind knew it was true. The real Johnny Silverhand died more than fifty years ago, and you were left talking to a ghost--- a copy that seemed close enough to the real deal, but you never would be able to know if he was a good one. More recently, though, he’s started to seem just as real as the ground you walk on and, while you know that’s something to be deeply worried about, you can’t help but have come to enjoy his company.

When he’s not being an asshole, that is.

For better or worse, he was, “The guy who saved my life.” You’d been through so much--- everything--- together. It hadn’t been intentional on his part; he’s only a piece of broken prototype tech going haywire in your head, but it was still true. He’s saved you in more ways than one, lately.

The words sink into him, dragging his shoulders down like the same ache you feel in your soul. His eyes meet yours beneath his sunglasses, holding you in a regret so deep that you think it will swallow you both with the knowledge that he’ll be the death of you.

Johnny reaches up, metal fingertips clicking on his shades in a way that’s so honest in your ears that it’s difficult to remember it’s just another one of your disconnected mind’s lies anymore, “You don’t know how much I want that to be true.” He pulls the barrier from his face to dangle between his knees as his free hand wipes at the perpetual dirt on his skin, “Listen, I realize I’ve fucked up a lot of things. Either let down or used every last person who gave me their trust--- blind, selfish bastard that I was--- but I’ve managed one thing, for now. Not to fuck this up. What we have.”

Johnny’s always wanted a lot of things--- a smoke, a good fuck, for you to turn the radio to 107.3 instead of that new age crap you like. He's rather demanding, day in, day out.

You've been privy to his every request as it flits through your shared head for long enough that he’s come to annoy you nearly as much as he's grown on you. He’s like moss overtaking a stone, so slow that you don’t realize it until he’s covered all of you. He’s changing you into something neither of you can quite recognize anymore, and as the days pass, you worry you’ll never be able to wash him away and return to the person you were before him.

Worse, you don’t know if you will want to.

“What do we have, Johnny?” you sigh, looking up at the light-polluted sky. You weren’t far enough out of town to see stars, just the dim void and flickering city lights reflected on the clouds above. Maybe if you were at camp with the Aldecados, you’d spot a star among the dusky sky. Maybe life would seem simpler, easier, “I don’t know what you want from me.” All you know for sure is that you were growing so tired of the fight. There’s this hurt in your chest; you can’t tell if it’s yours or his. Maybe it’s something you share. Maybe this is what he means.

Or something close to it, “Most of who I thought were my friends, well, it turns out they couldn’t hardly stand to be in the same room with me. But you?” You hear him pause, but you don’t dare to look at him. There’s a stammer in your chest, and you’re terrified at what it means, “You’re forced to be right fuckin’ here, twenty-four-seven, and you don’t seem to hate my living guts.”

This silence is something you can only achieve on the outskirts of the city, but you know it would be worse if you were further away. It’s almost excruciating, being alone with your thoughts--- being alone with his.

“There a point in there?” your heart aches for him, and you know he can feel it. It’s more than pity, more than friendship, but you try your hardest not to think of what it could possibly mean--- let alone, say it.

He knows, though. Of course he does. He has to.

“Just that… I think you’re my first real choom, even though you’re a real bitch sometimes.”

Your head lulls forward, and it takes all your strength to muster a glare at the pained smile dancing at his lips. There’s more to it than that, you both know it, but you’re grateful that he’s feeling somewhat merciful tonight--- it was something you didn’t know he had in him.

Maybe it’s only something he has in him when it comes to you.

“Chooms, huh?” tilting your head, you pretend to mull it over like it’s a proposition of eddies from a fixer. Playing it off with a shrug, you concede, “I could get used to being Johnny Silverhand’s choom, I guess, even though he was a total dick at first.”

“As if you didn’t deserve it,” Johnny smirks.

“Uh, remind me again, who’s been whining about missing his smokes since day one?” it’s a half-hearted blow, and his widening grin shows it. “Better yet, beggin’ me to get my rocks off?”

“My own personal hell is being stuck inside a non-smoker, and it doesn’t help that you’re practically a nun,” you toss a rock at him for that, and it goes straight through his chest like he isn’t even there. He isn’t, but he grins at you anyways, “Still… who’d’ve thought we’d make it this far?”

You sit there for a beat, feeling your own smile turn at your lips, before sighing, “You know, if you really want a marker, we could get you one at the columbarium.”

“For what, an empty box?” shaking his head, he puts his shades back on to perch atop his nose.

“Please, I have more of your stuff than even your most devoted fanboys. I don’t need it all. We could, I don’t know, ‘retire’ something of yours there. You know, as a symbol,” his gaze weighs heavy on you, and you can’t for the life of you understand what’s going through his mind. It frustrates you nearly as much as his stare seems to, and you shift your gaze back to the sky in your attempt to escape his holographic scrutiny.

“Let me guess, you’ll bring me flowers every day?” it surprises you that his tone isn’t mocking, but rather curious. “Would you visit his grave?” he seems to ask.

Trying to lighten the mood, you tease, “You know me, too busy trying not to die for all that.” You look back to him with a wink, “Plus, preem flowers are expensive these days, choom. ‘Fraid you’ll have to settle for the synth ones. Besides, you seem like a cheap date to me.”

“Bitch.”

“Just say, ‘Thank you.’”

It’s as close as either of you will come to what you really want to say.

---

From the roof of Misty’s building, it’s almost as if the troubles of the city no longer exist. You think you understand why Jackie found his choice up here. It seems as good a place as any to choose between life and death.

You would have to come to yours, too, soon. Maybe you already have, and you just don’t want to admit it.

The thought dwells in your head, and it feels like the only choice that makes sense.

“You’re not considering that. Please, tell me you’re not seriously considering going to those bastards again for help,” Johnny’s voice tears you from your dreadful stare over the neon Night City advertisements staring back at you. Promising everything from NiCola to the market version of the prototype Relic crammed in your head. “You’re trying to make sense of something that makes zero damn sense!”

You think he might wind up hating you forever, for this.

“Takemura said---” you begin, but he cuts you off as he stands from his spot on the ledge overlooking the city and takes up pacing.

“Fuck that guy!” Johnny rounds on you, fiery as ever--- but there’s something more terrible in his eyes; a grief that only comes from knowing he won’t be able to change your mind. “You’re just takin’ the easy way out! Those ‘Saka bastards won’t stay true to their word, you know. All they do is lie, and they’ll keep lying to you so long as it gets them what they want from you. You can’t really believe they’ll help you or me!”

The truth is, you’re too tired and you don’t know what’s worse: the taste of blood on your tongue, or the look of disappointment in his eyes.

You should be at least used to the blood by now.

“I’m dying, Johnny. Hanako is the only person who can maybe help us. Name someone else. Anyone! They made this tech---”

“They’re only gonna’ hurt you. We can do this a different way,” he stops pacing to stand so close that you can swear his boots touch yours. It’s as if you could feel the heat radiating off him, but that may just be the fever settling deathly into your skin, “Hell, give me the keys and I’ll get us to Mikoshi. I’ll burn this whole fuckin’ city to the ground to get you there and I’ll throw the pieces of you back together myself! I’ll gladly die trying---”

“But I don’t want you to die, either,” you fight back the tears at the thought of it, and he huffs down at you in utter exasperation, “can’t you get that?”

“Think they’ll do any better by me at Arasaka?” his chuckle is humorless, coming strained from the back of his throat. “You don’t believe that.”

“I can cut us a deal…” you look down, away from him, blinking out beyond where he stands towards the city lights. You don’t want to fight with him right now. You don’t think you can.

“With what leverage? Deals are only good so long as you have the upper hand, V,” he kneels into your eyeline, reaching out to grasp your chin in two silver fingers and turning you to face him fully. It’s gotten to the point that his hands on your skin feel akin to something real, dulled synapses firing with every spark of his hands on your skin. It’s how you know you’re close to the end. “Who is gonna’ be in your corner after they get everything they want?”

“Goro’s a man of his word.”

“You’re so fuckin’ naïve. Just as dumb as you were when you took that bullet to the brain from Dex, and I had to save your ass then, too,” Johnny growls your name like he hates you for it, but who knew how much you would come to welcome the end? Because when he frustratedly drags you forward by a harsh grip at the back of your head to eclipse his lips over yours, you can feel it. Him. In the burnt neurons of your addled mind, he is there against you--- kissing you with death on the edges of his lips, in all the heavy grief and anger that your choice has brought forth in him. It’s a terrible knowledge that pours from you into him of how much you’ve come to love him, and how desperately you know he’ll hate you for this, because maybe he’s right; maybe you really are naïve for wanting to believe in some way out of this.

He gasps against your lips like it wrecks him to the core; voice hoarse with the emotion as he curses, “Damn, you’re one stubborn bitch.”

“Inherited only your best traits, Johnny,” it’s just as dry on your tongue, and you lift your hand that has been clutching the omega blockers to your lips. You want to say it--- tell him in words how much you care for him. Instead, you murmur against his lips, “Please, don’t be mad,” and swallow the pills.

“I got a feeling you’re gonna’ regret this, choom, and I won’t be there to help you,” he leans away, and you feel the drugs start to kick in when his voice becomes more distant. “Don’t do this. Miracles like the one you’re hopin’ for don’t happen for screw-ups like us, you know.”

“Trust me.”

“I wish I didn’t trust you at all,” he sounds just as tired as you do when he says your name one last time before you blink and he’s gone. The bitter aftertaste of the pills tastes like betrayal on your tongue, and you already know Johnny will haunt you for the rest of your days.

You’re quickly reminded of why you’ve always hated taking the omega blockers.

It takes everything you have left not to sob at the feeling, like you’ve lost a limb--- gone numb and tingling painfully with the ghost of where he was. It’s as if everything is muted, including the deepest parts of yourself. You’re in a bad way, and you know you don’t have much longer now.

So, you find yourself committing to the desperate choice you’ve made, but you don’t call Hanako.

Instead, you call the only corpo you trust besides yourself, and hope it isn’t stupid to do so.

Takemura.

---

He is dressed in all white when he comes to find you at Misty’s Esoterica, looking like a harbinger of death in every sense of the word, “You… look like shit.”

“Don’t look half bad yourself, Goro,” you chuckle, but it turns into a wracking cough that leaves you with a more urgent taste of blood at your lips.

“Are you in any shape to negotiate?” he wonders, but it’s not threatening--- more of a genuine concern displayed with the arch of his brow. Johnny may disagree with you, but you still dare to think him a good man.

“Not in much shape to do anything, anymore, but I know exactly what I’m useful for. My eddies are on Hanako knowing this, too,” you lean on the arm he offers when you stumble on your way to the car. “After all, she sent you. Smart woman.”

“I would have come even had she not,” Goro confesses, pausing with his metal-laced fingertips on the back door. When you shoot him a questioning look, he offers you only a simple, “We have done much work to not see this through to the end, yes?”

“Who’d’ve thought we’d make it this far?”

Goro nods in agreement, before you’re sliding into the car behind Anders Hellman and hoping the Swede knows half of what he thinks he does about your condition, “Agreed.”

---

There’s something to be said for dying. It’s not always as bad as people make it out to be.

Some people would consider you dead. You always find yourself wondering what Johnny would think, these days.

You absentmindedly turn the Rubik’s cube in your hand with no real aim at solving it, letting your mind drift in the overly sterile room Arasaka’s finest clinicians have sequestered you to.

“Barbaric,” Goro called it once, but that didn’t stop them from putting you right back here again. The news plays softly on the screen you’ve been allowed to have after they determined it wouldn’t exacerbate your oversensitivity, but not even the privilege of phoning what few friends you have left can eat away at the boredom that’s settled into your bones in this space station. What was there to say, anyway?

Hi, it’s your favorite lab rat again! How’s it going in the real world? I’m going insane up here!

You can’t help but dwell on the thought that maybe Johnny was right about it all. Maybe it isn’t worth living if life is going to be like this.

Arasaka made no guarantees past what you had signed for on the dotted line the day Hanako had again sent Goro solely to break the news that your body was dying even after Johnny’s Relic had been extracted from your mind. It would seem the soft spot you’d held for Goro was well known by the Arasaka heiress. The woman is nothing if not strategic.

Hell, you’d gotten yourself a worse deal that day than you’d gotten for Johnny at the start of this. After all, you’d had nothing left to bargain with by then.

You were technically a construct, now. A lab experiment dreamed up by Arasaka’s best bioengineers and a team of physicians lead by Anders Hellman. Your current body was a multi-billion eurodollar joint Arasaka-Biotechnica venture that had only been put at the top of Hanako’s list when implanting her father’s construct into Yorinobu had gone awry. You’re convinced she would have been content to let you rot on a biochip in Mikoshi for the rest of your existence otherwise. After all, your contract never said when they had to provide you with a body, only that they were obligated to when the technology existed to allow it.

Turns out, rewriting someone else’s psyche does more damage to the physical body than anyone in Arasaka thought it would. You don’t know why it was such a surprise to them all when Yorinobu’s body couldn’t handle it, considering what it did to you. Maybe they just didn’t care, with how desperate they’d been to get any semblance of leadership back.

All you know is that Johnny Silverhand probably rolled over laughing in his grave, wherever it is, when Saburo Arasaka died a second, painful death.

They were using you as a top-secret prototype for Saburo 2.0, as you’ve come to call what will inevitably be the body they attempt to stick him in next. Sure, Arasaka as a company is facing charges in the New United States on Yorinobu’s death--- something about human testing that everyone knows will never stick--- but that will be swept under the rug much like any bad press Arasaka has gotten over this past year, with either cash or bullets dispensed.

“Shit,” you curse as you grow frustrated with the cube, tossing it onto the thin hospital mattress they kept on your bed. Rubbing your eyes as you try to refocus, it still feels strange to not feel the metal embedded in your skin. Worse still, you had to get used to what a fully ‘ganic body felt like again.

“You even human anymore, with all that chrome?” you can almost hear Johnny’s words to you when you got a new set of mantis blades from Vik’s clinic right before heading out for the oncoming fight at Clouds with the Tiger Claws. It was so long ago, now, but it doesn’t feel like it. That’s what Mikoshi does to a person, you figure. It’s hard to fully comprehend that so much time has passed.

Sometimes, you think you do hear him in more than just a memory. Like he’s still there, in your head. The doctors say it will pass with time, but they’ve been wrong before. Safe to say, Johnny literally changed your brain chemistry.

At least some part of you hopes they’re wrong, because you don’t know how you’ll make it in this world without him if Arasaka doesn’t stay true to their word.

It’s like you’ve lost a part of yourself, and you regret it more every day that you’re forced to live in this white box of a test tube that they’ve put you in. You should have died with him at Mikoshi. Gone out in a fiery blaze of glory and torn it all down with you, if only it would’ve made you feel a little better right before the end.

His last words to you had been as you went under the knife, right before they carefully excised him from your brain like a tumor.

“If this plan doesn’t work, Johnny--- If you wind up being right about Arasaka---” you had called to him through the code, as it weaved and curled around his form. It created and destroyed him all at the same time, but Johnny’s frown was still clear as day to you.

“I’m right about Arasaka,” he sounded nearly as exhausted as you had been on that roof the last time you’d talked. Defeated was something you’d never expected to see on him, “See? You haven’t changed at all. Still think you can outsmart the whole world, when you’re really just out of your depth.”

You didn’t want to think of this as a betrayal, but that’s what it was starting to feel like as you marinate in his sadness, “Look… I just want us to part as friends, for now. Just in case I don’t get to see you again after this, I wanted to tell you goodbye as proper friends.”

“Not sure that’s possible, anymore,” cut you to your core.

You wanted to reach for him, through the flickering code, but you didn’t dare. Heartbreak tastes a lot like blood on your tongue, even here.

“That’s what we are, aren’t we?”

“I don’t know, V. I just… don’t know.”

It was all you could remember of the interaction, though you’re certain there had to be more than that. Sometimes, when you dream instead of sleep, bits and pieces of it come back to you. That’s what you think it is, at least.

It’s far too real to be any normal nightmare.

It sounded too familiar when he said things like, “I just wish you’d stayed loyal to yourself,” or, “Those ‘Saka docs are cutting out a piece of us. Something we’ll never get back. It’ll leave a hole,” in those horrible dreams where memory emerges from the subconscious.

Perhaps this is just what you deserve. Your penance. The price you’ve got to pay for your choices, and the deal you made with the devil.

After all, nothing in Night City is ever free.

Multiple lifetimes of suffering, of being forced to go on without him? It’s almost poetic, in a Shakespearean tragedy sort of way. If this body fails, Arasaka will just test your construct in a new one until they get it right.

You’re company property and the Biotechnica cloning program is only in its infancy. Anders Hellman had told you as much himself when you’d asked.

“You’re one of the first successful cases, so far,” was, specifically, what he’d told you. It wasn’t much; Arasaka clearly wanted you in the dark.

You’d already proved too much trouble when left to your own devices, historically.

Have they brought you back before? How many bodies did you live and die in before this one? They could’ve wiped your memory of it, or maybe cut your engram into a million different pieces until something fit. You would never know the truth of what’s been done to you, most likely.

The door to your room slides open with a whirring noise, breaking you from your thoughts when the same scientist who you’ve come to understand is one of your daily handlers walks in, “It’s time for your daily tests.”

You try to not let the sarcasm drip from your tongue, but you’ve been failing at a lot of things these days.

“Always a pleasure to see you, too, Suki.”

You are dead, and this is just purgatory.

---

They eventually shipped you back to earth, “in accordance with the great progress you’ve displayed over these past few months,” as Anders had told it.

Earth was exhausting. Even though the Arasaka lab they had put you in had all the comforts of home, save for the overly-clinical aesthetics, it still took weeks for your body to become accustomed to its own weight. It was only then that you realized the space station’s simulated gravity was slightly less than that on earth, to allow for less pressure on your new joints and bones as your mind settled in. It’s perhaps why you had been able to relearn walking in the first place, because on earth you were much clumsier than you remember ever having been before.

There were bruises on your legs from the amount of times you’d tripped down or stumbled into something. You’re surprised they hadn’t yet put you in a padded room, but you must’ve been making progress, because eventually they sent a familiar face to see you again.

“おはようございます,” without translators installed into your body’s cyberware, the words that fall from Goro’s lips as he offers a slight bow take a moment for you to mentally decipher.

You don’t rightly care, because you’ve not seen a familiar face other than Anders since waking up in this body. Let alone, anything close to a friend.

He stiffens and freezes when you step forward to drag him into your arms, holding him in a tight embrace that almost has you melting against him with how much of a relief it felt to feel another person. It’s too forward, and you’d never have done it under normal circumstances---

But you’re so relieved to see him.

“You have no idea how good it is to see you,” you murmur as you release him, catching the slight tinge of a flush at his cheeks. He straightens his shirt, donned in black from head to toe. His hair isn’t pulled back, for once; it’s a little longer than when you had seen him last, “You look great, Goro.”

He seems to relax slightly at the familiar words, as if he hadn’t been quite sure what to expect of you at first. You watch as he takes you in, optics dilating as his settings switch with the distance you put between you again. It makes you slightly self-conscious under his scrutiny.

You know you look different. Sure, the core basics of yourself are the same, but you’re slimmer than you were before in this cloned body. Your cyberware is gone, as are the scars from a lifetime of mercenary work. Any tattoos you had were no longer etched into your skin, including Johnny’s. Then, there’s that new Arasaka logo brandished behind your ear that matched his own. The only good thing about your new appearance was that your hair had finally grown long enough to cover the logo when you left it down.

“You look like shit,” he cracks a smile after a second, “but it is good to see you, too.”

“What are you doing here?” you wonder as he walks further into your designated quarters, hands clasped behind his back, “Don’t tell me you get to tell a girl she’s dying twice.” He observes the room not unlike he did when he’d visited you on the space station, though seems less displeased with your living situation this time.

He doesn’t say, “barbaric,” at least.

It’s your words that earn his chastising side-eye, this time, “You should not joke. I do not want to do that again.”

“Well, don’t keep me in suspense,” the prodding does nothing to urge an explanation from him as he moves towards the desk on the other side of the room. The metal on his fingertips glints with sunlight as he moves the papers lying there--- some of the most recent status reports you’ve been given on your performance in Arasaka’s testing. A lot of it was redacted, but you were given just enough to know you weren’t dying currently.

That, they seemed to be taking as a win.

“How are you feeling?” he asks as his optics dart back and forth on the papers, reading them quickly. Surely, he’s had a briefing before he’d been sent to see you. Maybe he just doesn’t trust it was a full picture, or he wants to know what parts of it you know.

Settling into the couch, you reach for the tin of mints you’ve been hoarding recently. Popping one into your mouth, you turn it around as the fresh flavor bursts through your skin, scent sparking in your nostrils.

“Playing doctor now, Goro?” that gets him to look up from the papers to shoot you an unamused look that said just answer the question. You sigh, nail tapping the tin as you take a moment to get his answer, “Well, I’m tired and sore all the time from the physical therapy, and hypersensitive to almost fuck all. Oh, and they still won’t let me get any chrome installed--- even the minor stuff like optics.” You sigh, and the minty feeling tingles on your tongue, “Do you know how much deliberating it took for the white-coats to finally decide I was ready for an operating system update?”

“And the nightmares?” Goro turns away from the desk to instead lean on it, crossing his arms as he looks towards you. So, he had a more thorough briefing on your status than you expected.

You avert your eyes. It was bad enough having to talk to the mandated shrink about them. You really didn’t want to get into what plagued your mind with Goro.

“They’re nothing. It’s the physical symptoms that Arasaka cares about. That’s what’ll get Saburo a new body or not, right?”

He doesn’t let you off the hook that easily, “Arasaka has underestimated the impact of the mind on the body once already, at great cost. I do not think your mental state is considered ‘minor’ to your doctors and scientists, V.” After a moment’s pause, he confirms what you are thinking, “It is not considered something to be ignored by Arasaka’s board, either.”

“Is that what you’re here for?” you can’t help the irritation that seeps into your tone, “To give a first-hand report back to Hanako Arasaka and the board on my progress? Came to see the test subject for yourself instead of just reading the memo?”

“V…” his brow furrows, frown settling onto his lips as you turn your body away from him on the couch.

“Well, you’ve seen me! I trust you’ve gotten all the spicy details you need for your report on my mental status.”

“くそ,” he swears under his breath, as if exasperated with your antics. There is a stillness that comes with the silence between you after that, and you don’t dare turn to him. Instead, you focus on the tin in your hands and the mint in your mouth. Anything other than the pit in your stomach at the remembrance of the nightmares that plague you more nights than most.

There’s a shuffling of clothing and the sound of footsteps approaching as Goro comes to stand beside you, “You are… hypersensitive to words as well, it seems. Look at me, V.” You refuse to do it, and he sighs. In your peripheral, you can see him move to sit beside you on the couch, “Hanako-sama does expect me to relay your progress upon my return, but that is not the sole purpose for my visit.”

“Why’re you here, then?” it may be childish to still refuse to look at him, but you can’t bring yourself to. You feel as if nothing will be as it was before--- like even though you’ve fought terribly to return to normal, there would never be a moment when you felt like yourself again.

“You are being released.”

Your head snaps up to look at him when he says that, utter shock undoubtedly on your face. His own expression remains level, rock steady as he always seemed to be. You can see the truth of his words in his eyes; he has no reason to lie to you. You doubt Hanako would put him in a position to knowingly do so anyway.

“Released?” you breathe the word. You can’t quite believe the truth in his eyes.

“Hellman’s team has decided you have progressed as much as can be expected in a clinical setting. They think you are ready to return to a more ‘normal’ routine. I am here to tell Hanako-sama if I believe they are correct, based on what I know of you… who you were, already,” Goro holds up a hand, quelling the excitement he undoubtedly sees blossoming in your eyes. “This does not mean a return to what your routine was before. You cannot return to mercenary work.”

“So… I’m to live as a civilian, then?” you shift your whole body to face him, legs folded beneath you.

“In a sense… you will still be under Arasaka’s supervision, expected to meet every scheduled appointment and test. If you miss even one, you will be collected and returned here. There are other requirements, but I will leave those to be explained by your care team,” Goro watches as the news sinks in. He looks away, admitting, “I am maybe not the best to answer any questions you have about this.”

“Will I be staying in Tokyo?” is all you can think to ask, mind racing at the prospect of even a little freedom from this quarantine.

“At first, but I believe the goal is to reintroduce you to Night City should you continue to progress---” his words are choked off when you quickly grasp hold of his shoulders, pulling him into another hug. Just like before, he freezes, though this time he recovers enough to loosely hug you back.

“Thank you, Goro, for everything.”

---

The Corpo Plaza apartment didn’t feel like home, but it was closest to Arasaka tower and the Biotechnica building--- both of which you have to visit frequently. Well, at least it was less frequently than when you’d first been sent back to Night City, but it still wasn’t worth the constant drive from a different district.

Your fingers trace along the metal outlining your face as you glance at yourself in the mirror, having just finished a shower. The cyberware embedded in your cheeks is similar to what you had originally, though slightly different. You like it all the same, even if it had to be approved by Arasaka first. Every day you felt more like yourself, but you doubt you’ll ever be 100% you again. Too much has changed for this sense of newness to ever leave.

Even when you had reconnected with Victor, he looked at you like something uncanny. A dead woman walking. Misty could barely manage to look at you at all. Panam and the Aldecaldos had migrated; you were still waiting for her to return your call to figure out what they were up to these days. Judy was long gone, but getting out of Night City was maybe the best thing she could’ve done after everything.

Only Johnny’s old contacts seemed to remind you of who you were, and perhaps that’s because they’d never truly gotten to know you too well. Then, there was the feeling of loss that still gripped your soul. The ghost of Johnny Silverhand haunting your every thought and plaguing your dreams at night. You doubt you’ll ever be free of him. You hope he never fully fades from your psyche.

As much as it hurts, you still love him.

In hindsight, that’s probably the real reason why it would never work out between you and Goro. You’re still holding a torch for a dead man, and you’ll never be truly satisfied with anyone else.

In the end, Johnny has truly ruined you. Maybe it’s his last laugh: your complete inability to move on.

Your deal with Arasaka at the beginning had been for them to save him. To put him away into Mikoshi for the rainy day that the technology existed for a body suited for him to be a reality. The contract required them to release him into Night City after he had been deemed healthy, but you knew as well as anyone that contracts like these had loopholes even with the best lawyers pouring over them. Arasaka could truly do whatever they wanted with him once he was out of your head, other than destroying his engram.

When you had asked them the status on them holding up that end of your bargain, you had been met with cryptic answers. Hanako refused to meet with you, and you were in no shape without your combat cyberware to hunt her down yourself.

You’re terrified, honestly, at the idea of never seeing him again, nearly as much as you fear facing him.

Sighing, you step away from the mirror to move towards your bedroom while you towel-dry your hair as best you can. Tomorrow you were to report to Arasaka for your end-of-the-year testing and physical. Hellman would probably personally chastise you for the pizza you’ve ordered tonight. It was far from the approved meal plan, but it wasn’t as easy to find food that fit the diet and still tasted good outside of Japan. Finally, you understood Takemura’s issue with Night City’s synthfood.

Still, if one slice of pizza was going to kill you, you figure it’s a good enough way to go. Anything beats being an Arasaka pencil-pusher for the rest of your days.

“Night City Legend, Felled by PieZ,” the headlines would read, and it wouldn’t even mention the billions you’d cost Arasaka if you died.

Water drips down your jaw and you wipe it away with the towel before tossing it into the hamper. Scooping up an oversized sweatshirt that screamed support for the debut album of SAMURAI, it soaks up the few water droplets you’ve missed when drying and effectively covers the dog tags against your chest. Looking down at the hamper, you wish that Arasaka would sign off on you having a pet finally. Nibbles was doing fine at Victor’s, but you missed that furless cat.

The sound of your holo ringing is accompanied by Goro’s face flashing in your caller ID, and you pick up after a few moments, “Yo?”

“こんばんは,” Goro appears with his hair pulled up into a bun, and you could’ve been fooled that it was the old days if not for the few extra gray hairs he seemed to have now. “Are you ready for tomorrow?”

“What? You worried I’ll disappoint?” you roll your eyes at his pointed look. “You know I’m doing great now, practically would be back to my old self if they’d ever let me get my combat cyberwear.”

“And you know that Arasaka has invested too much in you for you to involve yourself in a Night City street fight. Do not think they will approve all your requests tomorrow, V, regardless of your progress,” he speaks reasonably, and maybe that’s what grinds your gears the most. You know good and well that Arasaka has everything riding on you. If you successfully keep from pushing daisies they’ll move forward with Saburo’s resurrection. Hell, maybe they already were. For their one and only living test subject, you’ve been doing relatively well, if not a little hypersensitive at times still.

“Not every fight in Night City is one you pick. What if I need to defend myself, huh?”

“Do you feel in danger? Has something happened?” Goro’s voice has an edge to it, concern, and you shake your head.

“I’m just making a point. Most folks who die in this city are just in the wrong place at the wrong time. My combat chrome would give me an edge again. Call it an investment in keeping me alive,” you snort, and Goro’s lips quirk upwards at your dry humor.

“You can plead that to the panel tomorrow after you pass all their tests. I think you should… what is the phrase? Not get your hopes up?”

“Did you call me just to bum me out, Goro?” you sigh, moving through your kitchen to rummage through your fridge and find a NiCola.

“Only to discuss reality.”

“I think you’re just scared I’ll kick your ass with all my chrome one of these days for how sassy you are,” the sarcasm drips from your tongue, and this time Takemura does sound thoroughly amused.

“I would like to watch your attempt at that, but I think you will need to remove the pizza from your diet first, V,” then, he hangs up. Never one for drawn-out goodbyes. You think you prefer it that way.

“I could’ve kicked your ass while on an only-pizza diet, once,” you grumble to the apartment around you, taking a swig of the NiCola. The ring of the doorbell breaks you from the thoughts of just how you can get back at Goro for that comment, “Speaking of pizza…”

Barefoot, you stroll towards the door, hoping the delivery guy followed your instructions to leave your food at the door. You don’t want to deal with awkward small talk with another human right now. Not bothering to check the cams to see if your instructions have been followed, you let the door slide open with a swipe of your hand against the key screen.

The door is barely halfway open when a hand catches your throat and forces you back into the apartment, a body forcing you up against the entryway wall as you choke out a startled noise under a firm grip. Terror claws at your skin as you grab at the arm attached to the hand before you manage to get a good look at him when he stills against you, breathing hard. It takes a moment for wide eyes to take in enough of his features to recognize the dark eyes staring back at you.

“J---”

“You couldn’t help yourself from being corpo scum again, could you? Selfish, that’s what this whole thing was--- what you are,” his voice--- oh, fuck, his voice, it rings in your ears in a way it never has before. Deep, familiar, and real. Strained with anger and choked with a breathless fury, but something else breaks against the fire swirling in his eyes--- some relief that settles nearly as devastatingly in your bones as his skin lays heavy and warm against yours.

You can’t believe it. You must be hallucinating. You’ve finally cracked and lost it. Something was malfunctioning in your head, certainly, because there’s no way he’s here.

Your fingertips shake as they reach out, away from the firm grip he still has on your throat, to ghost against the slope of his jaw. The scruff of a beard still remained there, but was shorter than how he had lived in your head. The scars on his face were gone, along with the tattoos on what skin of his you can see beneath the leather jacket he wears. His left hand was at your throat, and it was made of flesh and bone, not metal.

He swats at your hand when you finally touch him, a hurt in his voice that was so real that you couldn’t trick yourself into believing he was just a hallucination, “Did you ever think about what I wanted, huh, when you chose this?”

But you still can’t get past the sight of him, finally managing, “Is… it really you?”

“Fuck yes, it’s me. What’s wrong with you?”

“Johnny,” you gasp his name, nails digging into his pristine forearm, tears nearly blinding you as they well in your eyes at the overwhelming emotion that surges from your chest. You can’t hold it together, trembling against him, and only then does his grip soften at your throat.

His voice sounds devastatingly mournful as he growls in the quiet of your apartment, “You sold us both to fuckin’ Arasaka, V. Look what they did to you. You’re their property. Doesn’t it make you sick? Some things are worse than death, and I doubt ‘Saka will ever leave us to it, now.”

You hear what he’s saying. It sounds just like him, and your heart breaks at the sound. At the warmth of him, and the way his dark hair ghosts around his cheeks slightly shorter than you remember it being before. He’s really here, and he hates you.

His voice cracks, “Why are you crying?”

“I-I missed you,” you confess between the sobs, trying to swallow up the emotion. Damning yourself for not holding it together better than this at the sight of him, but it was such a shock, and only one thing could run through your mind as dreadful regret sank into your soul, “a-and now you’re going to hate me forever.”

He looks at you like he’s stunned by the words coming from your mouth, or maybe he’s shocked it’s all you’re capable of saying when you’ve betrayed him as thoroughly as he perceives.

“Shit, V,” he murmurs, reaching up to drag his thumb against your cheek and wiping away the messy tears that trailed there. He looks down at you like he’s almost annoyed at you for crying, but there’s a strange look in his eyes that you can’t fully place. “I wish it was something as easy as hating you, but I just can’t seem to catch a fuckin’ break.”

The confusion at his words nearly stuns your tears into small hiccups as you breathe, “What?”

“I don’t think I’ll ever be able to hate you,” it sounds like dread on his tongue, like fear and grief for the situation you’ve both found yourselves in. It sounds like a confession, from his lips, “I don’t think I’ll be able to forgive you for what you’ve done to me, either. I haven’t felt right without you since I woke up in this damn useless body. Feels like I should still be in yours.”

A breathless huff escapes you, almost akin to a laugh, as you realize what he’s trying to say, “You missed me, too, huh, rockerboy?”

“You’re the only thing about this damned city I missed,” he crowds you in, pressing you fully into the wall with his own body. “Not drugs, not alcohol, not music--- I came back here for you. Bein’ clean and having to put up with those ‘Saka corpo-drones has been the worst time of my life, by the way, but I did it because they said you were alive.” He looks at you, a hint of incredulousness in his eye, when he asks, “What the hell kind of a deal did you make with them?”

You’re terrified to tell him, but you can’t lie to him. Not after everything.

“I’m the reason Saburo Arasaka will live.”

Johnny curses, fury twisting his face, but the defeat is worse, “I should hate you. Fuck, why can’t I hate you?”

“I’m sorry---”

“Don’t lie to me,” he cuts you off, biting, “you’re not sorry. You don’t care if Saburo Arasaka lives or dies so long as we get to live.”

“Fine, you’re right,” anger flares in your own gut, exhausted annoyance lacing your tone, “but is that such a crime? I want to be okay again, Johnny! I want you to be okay, too!”

“And you’ll sell our souls for it?!”

“God, you’re such a dramatic asshole!” you nearly scream, slamming your eyes shut in your distress, “Go ahead and blame me for falling in love with a dead man, too, then! I should’ve known it would kill us both, but I couldn’t stop myself from loving you, Johnny! I wouldn’t have been able to go on knowing I’d left you to die, okay? That’s why I did this! Call me a selfish bitch if you want to; maybe you’re right---”

“Yeah? Well, I guess maybe I’m to blame for falling in love with a selfish bitch,” he growls, so close that his nose touches yours, and your eyes snap open just as he leans in to crash his lips against yours. It’s not wholly unlike the last kiss you shared with him, when he was just sparks on your neurons, and yet it’s entirely different.

There’s a taste to him now, but it’s not the cigarettes you had expected, but more akin to nicotine gum. Has he stopped smoking? He smells like leather and some sort of amber-scented cologne that has you weak in the knees.

But the way he kisses you is what nearly scrambles all coherent thought. He’s so warm and firm against you, the reality of his touch, tongue, and lips against yours desecrates the memory of the slight stimulation your neurons had simulated when he’d been in your head. Johnny seems to be in no better a state at the feeling of you against him, gasping into your mouth when your hands find his hair to drag him closer, and all the while all you can think is how happy you are that he is alive here and now.

It barely feels like it should be real.

He parts from you, catching his breath and staring at you with a look that sends heat rippling down your spine, flushing your skin in its wake.

You blink at him, head lulled back, and whisper through the feeling of having him back, like some piece of your soul coming home, “Fuck, I missed you, Johnny, so much.”

“You’re probably the only one, choom.”

“That’s not true. There’s Rogue, and Kerry---”

“They got their closure when I was hitchhiking in your skull. How can I just waltz back into their lives now?”

You tilt your head at him, “It can’t be that the Johnny Silverhand who was never afraid to die, is actually scared to live?”

He scoffs, leaning away from you with a roll of his eyes, “Is that the kinda’ psychobabble your ‘Saka shrink has been feeding you?”

“Could be,” you shrug, and a glint of the light at the metal around your neck catches his eye, “don’t mean it isn’t true.”

“What’s this?” he invades your space again, dragging a fingertip to loop at the chain at your neck, leading beneath your sweatshirt, and tugging it until the necklace drags into view. Dogtags clink in his hand and his eyes snap back up to yours in shock, “These--- you still have ‘em?”

Your cheeks heat with the find, and you don’t know why it’s so embarrassing even after you’ve told him that you’re in love with him. Of course you would’ve kept his dog tags. It only makes sense, but you want to defend it. The words crawl up your throat, and it takes all you have to swallow them down.

Instead, you reach up to begin to remove them, “You should probably have them back, now.”

Johnny’s hand catches yours, stilling it, “I… don’t know if I’m ready to step back into ‘em right now. ‘Sides, maybe I like the look of ‘em on you.”

You search his gaze, but he seems sure enough about the decision, “Alright. I’ll keep them, for now.”

“Good… It suits you,” a ring of the apartment door breaks you from whatever scrutiny weighed heavy in Johnny’s eyes. “The fuck is that?”

“My pizza this time, I hope,” you huff, pushing him back just enough to escape from between him and the wall. “I don’t know if I can take two of you showing up at my door tonight.”

Johnny trails after you, watching you open the door and pluck the pizza box from the ground where the delivery guy had left it as instructed, “Good news, there’s only one Johnny Silverhand.”

Turning towards him, you smirk, “Luckily.”

“Screw you.”

“You wish.”

#johnny silverhand fanfic #cyberpunk 2077 fanfic #robert john linder fanfic #cyberpunk 2077 female reader insert #female reader insert #newstuff female reader insert #author meg #fanfiction #fanfic by me #nsft #trigger warning #trigger: drugs

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thranduilsperkybutt · 2 years

Photo

Hold on Loosely

Gif sources: 1 | 2 | 3

Pairings: Eddie Munson/Reader/Steve Harrington

Warnings: SPOILERS for Stranger Things S4 Vol.1; NSFW (unprotected) smut; dubcon (only tagging just in case because of sex-pollen trope); fuck or die; oral; m/f/m; absolute filth; mentions of canon-typical character injury; taking liberties with literally all of it; smut that is not for the feint of heart; minor proofreading

Word Count: 10,369 words

Reader Gender: Female

Author: Meg

Summary: There’s next to nothing truly known about the Upside-Down, but after you get stuck there with Eddie Munson and Steve Harrington, you learn one thing: don’t touch the flowers.

A/N: If you’re seeing this no you’re not--- I’m sorry but Eddie Munson & Steve Harrington are giving me a reason to live right now. I love them both so much.

Eddie’s learned a lot over the past couple days.

He’s learned there are forces at play in the small town Hawkins that are more dangerous than any drug he’s sold could ever be. That there are creatures which can do things he’s only ever read about in comics, or his dungeon master’s guide, and that there are people who are normal— just like him— that step up to be the heroes no-one in Hawkins will ever know about.

Eddie never thought himself the hero type, but if that were truly the case, maybe he wouldn’t be standing here to begin with.

Stuck in this other world— the Upside-Down, they’d called it— where he realized that maybe King Steve wasn’t the rich-kid asshole he’d always assumed him to be, and Nancy Wheeler had more between her ears than just a pretty face. Hell, even band-geek Robin Buckley had more guts in her than any of the burly jocks who harassed him year after year for being the Freak of Hawkins High.

Then there’s the fact that the cute girl who had lingered on the edge of his classes all of last year was braver than anyone he’s ever known. If someone had told him that a year ago, he would’ve laughed in their face, but he had watched you dive in after Steve with his own eyes. Almost as soon as Steve was snatched into the depths of the lake by those demon-vines that seemed to snake everywhere down here, you’d gone over the side of that boat, and now you were still seven steps ahead of him as your party trudged through this bizarre hell-scape in search of a way out through the version of his trailer that existed here

Eddie once thought his extra years in school had at least allowed him a pretty concrete assessment of the people around him, but turns out, he still knows next to nothing at all.

“You good, dude?” comes from beside him— and he’d been told that Steve Harrington would have ever cared anything at all about his mental state, he wouldn’t have believed that, either.

“Are you?” Eddie shoots back, nodding towards the makeshift bandages wrapped around the man’s waist, covering the gnarly bite-wounds that had been inflicted earlier. He doesn't know if it’s the evidence of his shifted world-view lingering on his face, or what, but Steve doesn’t pry into his thoughts further than his initial question

Instead, Steve raises a brow when he glances down at his own stomach, as if he can assess himself at all in this dim light with bandages obstructing his view, “Eh, I wish I could say I’ve had worse, but— what’s worse than gettin’ chewed on by freakish bats?”

Eddie groans, “Maybe ask that after we’re out of here. You’ll jinx us.” The chuckle on Steve’s lips is dry, and even the dim light of the Upside–Down can’t keep him from noticing the way Eddie’s gaze flicks back to where you meander up the trailer’s porch-steps ahead of them, “So, like, are you and—” Nancy and Robin have already pushed their way inside, but you glance back at the boys, giving a questioning look at their slow pace and silencing the question on Eddie’s tongue. Not that Steve couldn’t take a guess at what he was about to ask him.

“What’s the hold-up?” you call their way.

“Just making sure our wounded man makes it,” Eddie jokes, and Steve rolls his eyes.

They meet the bottom of the stairs, and Steve leans on the rail, “Yeah, I’m sure you’re real concerned, Munson— let’s get out of here before I need a doctor, alright?”

“That ship has sailed,” you huff, glancing down his chest towards his bandages bitterly, and Steve’s jaw clenches when your gaze lingers a bit too long. Turning on your heel as quickly as you notice it, too, you shoot over your shoulder at them, “Hurry it up, fellas,” and disappear beyond Munson’s open front door.

Steve’s wounded, but not wounded enough to watch you leave.

“You heard her,” Eddie sighs, making quick work of the steps as Steve drags himself behind him, and just like they thought, there’s a gate right where Chrissy had died on Munson’s living room ceiling. As everyone works to figure a way to open it, Steve’s still thinking about the way Eddie looked at you, and his almost-question that had been left unfinished.

You and Steve weren’t an item— never had been, but if he were to say there wasn’t some part of him that has grown to wish for it over the time he’s known you, he’d be lying. You’d been Robin’s friend first, and then subsequently his, but in the time he’s spent pining over his breakup from Nancy and fumbling around every attempt to heal from it with some other girl— any other girl— he feels he’s lost the chance at a shot with you.

It would be too weird now, wouldn’t it? If he came out and told you he was finally over Nancy, that the reason it never worked out with any of the girls he went on dates with nowadays was because of the feelings he was harboring for you— it would be strange. It could ruin the laid-back, three-musketeers thing he had going on with you and Robin.

Steve wouldn’t risk it, not even with the inkling suspicion that he might have a chance if he did. It was too uncertain to ever be certain, you know? Your friendship, though— that was on solid ground.

But there’s an interest there, in the way Munson lingered around you… there was more than curiosity behind his question. Steve didn’t have to be the valedictorian of his graduating class to realize that much.

He barely realizes he’s followed the two of you down the trailer’s narrow hallway in his efforts to keep an eye on Munson, until he emerges into the darkness that was Eddie’s bedroom, apparently. It’s pretty cluttered, with a centralized bed flanked by drawers and posters advertising rock or metal bands. Steve notices the fine details as he moves further in, where a guitar hangs on the wall.

There’s a soft chuckle in your voice from the other side of the bed, “What are these for, Eddie?” It catches Steve’s attention, and he stops looking for something to aid in the escape from the Upside-Down to find you dangling a pair of chained handcuffs off the end of your index finger. There’s a mischievous grin you’re trying to subdue, but it dances around the corner of your mouth as Eddie looks like a deer in the headlights for the split second it takes to process your discovery.

“Uh, those’re, uh,” Eddie swallows, trying to shrug off the question as he suddenly becomes very interested in rummaging around the mess that was on the dresser Steve stood beside, “decoration, y’know. They’re cool, though, right?”

“Just decoration, huh?” the cuffs clink as you move them from one hand to the other, before turning to hang them back on the nail where they belonged, careful to avoid the living vines that reach even here. If it weren’t so quiet in this place, Steve’s sure he would’ve missed the soft murmur that slips past your lips, “Boring…”

Something clattering from the living room scurries you from the room to investigate, but Steve’s just as frozen as Eddie seems to be at his side. One glance at Eddie is all it takes for him to know that they were on the same page when it came to your little comment, both in a state of mildly-flustered confusion. What the hell did you mean by boring?

“Hey, Steve!” Robin’s shouting down the hallway, “We broke the gate open! Dustin says to grab a sheet— we’re gonna’ make it a rope or something to get through!”

Steve yells, “Got it!” Boring, boring, boring—

“Let’s, uh,” Eddie clears his throat, cutting through the ringing of your voice in Steve’s ears and stripping the bed down, snatching the sheets back in the process, “just get the hell out of here.”

As the quilt gets pulled back, a thicker collection of vines are uncovered on the bed. In the time it takes the two of them to notice that the vines are writhing with the shifting of the bed, a raised structure in the center that looks almost like some sort of fucked-up, black flower, bursts. Like petals peeling back, the thing opens just as the air hits it, spewing a cloud of spore-like particles into the atmosphere that invades Eddie’s and Steve’s lungs before they can even react. Coughing, they both scramble out into the hallway, sheets left forgotten as they try to escape the spores that float through the thick bedroom air.

Steve manages to wheeze out first, before dissolving into another coughing fit, “Munson?!”

“Jesus Christ! What—!” Eddie’s slapping at his face, as if he can swat away any spores that could possibly linger on him, “What was that thing!? Oh, my god, I got it in my mouth— Shit! Shit! Shit!”

“What happened?” Nancy reaches them first, but you and Robin aren’t far behind, looking just as worried.

“There’s— There’s something in there—” Steve’s still struggling to catch his breath, but Eddie fares better, judging by the borderline-hysterical cursing flying from his mouth.

“Am I gonna’ die? Are we gonna’ die?” Steve glares at Eddie, unable to speak. “I’m too young to get cancer, man—”

“Whoa, what are you talking about? What was in there?” Robin tries this time, patting Steve’s back from where he’s still doubled-over coughing, hands on his knees to support himself.

“This flower-thing— on the bed—” Eddie gestures a ringed hand towards the bedroom door that one of them had managed to slam behind them in their hasty escape. “It totally exploded, and all this stuff came flying out—”

“Like some kind of pollen?” you try to supply, as you pick at the spores lingering in Eddie’s hair, and he nods.

“I guess? I don’t know, but I think we both breathed it in. Yeah, that shit is everywhere in there!”

“It looks like the particles in the air almost,” Nancy observes your open palm, “A little darker, though.”

Steve finally manages to calm his lungs, nearly hoarse from coughing by the time he straightens up, “That’s why you don’t go snatching things up around here, Munson—!”

“Like you knew some kinda’ evil-flower would be under the covers—!”

“I still wouldn’t have just ripped the blanket off—”

“Yeah, right—”

“Hey, guys!” Nancy barks, cutting off their bickering, “You seem to be okay, for now. Can we please get back to trying to get out of here?” Steve sighs, before a bit of latent coughing has him clearing his throat once again.

Eddie shoots him a reluctant glance, “Sure.”

“I guess.”

“You forgot the sheet,” Robin notices, before leaving Steve’s side to shout up through the now-gaping hole in the ceiling— the gate, “Dustin! We can’t get to a sheet on our side! There’s something up with the bedroom—”

“The bedroom? What’s going on in the bedroom?” Dustin’s voice gets clearer as the rest of you move towards the gate, and you’re able to catch a glimpse of the kids on the other side by the time you stand beneath it.

“Just, you’ll have to get a sheet from over on your side,” Robin grumbles.

Henderson looks like he’s going to demand more details, before Nancy jolts him into action with a sharp, “Dustin!”

“Jeez, okay! I’m goin’, I’m goin’!”

The light from the other side filters down through the gate, casting a yellow glow upon Eddie’s wet curls as you continue to pick the spores from him until, “I think I got it all,” comes from your lips. You’re still scrutinizing the taller boy by the time Steve looks back to watch as Dustin throws a sheet knotted into a makeshift-rope through the gate.

“Think so?” Eddie murmurs, blinking down at you with concerned brown eyes which settle only slightly with your answering nod. “Good. Thanks.”

Steve watches the exchange with wary eyes, a nagging feeling settling in the back of his neck that he can’t quite pinpoint. It sets him on edge, as if he weren’t anxious enough just standing in the Upside-Down as it was, and seeps down into his gut with each passing moment that Eddie’s stare watches you.

Something more than unease bites at his heels, and it takes him a moment to remember what the empty hunger of jealousy really feels like, but he’s fully reacquainted with it by the time Robin’s shimmied her way up the rope and landed upon the waiting mattress on the other side of the gate. Nancy goes next, and Steve grows more and more annoyed with the passing moments, drudging on with the slow ache of watching Eddie Munson stand as close to you as he was. Staring at you with some sort of desperate longing in his eyes—

At least, he looks desperate to Steve, but who knows who the desperate one really is when it comes time for your turn through the gate, and you, in some fit of adorable embarrassment, admit, “Uh, guys, someone’s gonna’ have to help me up that thing… I wasn’t exactly the most proficient at rope-climbing in P.E.”

“No problem,” Steve doesn’t want to say he jumps at the chance, but he’s about a beat into saying the words that he notices he could’ve offered his help a tad less eagerly. He can’t bring himself to feel self-conscious about it, though, because he’s too pleased at how his offer removes you from your close proximity to Munson’s side.

“Ah, thanks, Steve,” you sigh, taking hold of the rope, and it’s like his heart skips a beat with the grateful way you look at him.

What’s wrong with him today—

“You know what, Steve,” Munson steps up, and it’s grating to Steve’s ears to hear, “I think I’d actually be able to get her higher… seeing as you’ve been hurt, and I’m a little taller than you.”

Steve can’t help the annoyance in his tone, “You’re like an inch, tops.”

“That’s an inch closer to the gate—”

“Do you hear yourself? An inch doesn’t matter—”

“I think it really does—”

“Can someone please just help me up the rope?” you cut them off, and they both look towards your incredulous expression, as if you can’t believe they’re bickering at a time like this, when you’re all supposed to be focused on escaping this hell-hole.

Max’s scoffed, “What’s up with them?” drifts through the gate, as well as Dustin’s responding remark, which has Steve fighting back the blush that threatens to crawl to his cheeks.

“Who knows? They’re having a pissing contest.”

“Right, sorry—” Steve starts loudly, if only to drown out the commentary, but Eddie’s quicker on the draw. All but hoisting you up with a quick grunt that has you letting out a startled squeak in surprise at how quickly he does it, Eddie’s hands settle on your waist, and then your thighs as you gain ground quickly with the aid of his lifting. Steve’s almost as mad at Munson as he is the breathless sound that passes your lips when you settle in his arms, gripping tight to the sheet-rope.

Eddie’s eyes slip to Steve’s, a ringed hand patting your thigh before he calls through a knowing smirk, “Get to climbing, sweetheart.”

You know what? He was going to kill this guy—

But not before you’re climbing, knees eventually attempting to settle on Eddie’s shoulders. One slips on the leather of his jacket, and Steve’s hand shoots out to catch you by the fabric of your jeans, instead coming into contact with bare skin exposed through the fashionable rips in them, “Woah, you good?”

“Yeah, I got it, now. Sorry—” your voice shakes before you continue your trek upwards with the assistance of the men below.

“Don’t drop her, Munson,” Steve can’t help himself, and apparently neither can Eddie.

“Worry about yourself.”

Steve finally notices the sweat on Eddie’s brow now that he’s up-close, and that’s when he registers how hot it’s gotten in the trailer. It’s strange, because the Upside-Down was usually colder to begin with, so why was it suddenly getting warm?

There’s hardly any time to answer the question bouncing around his head, because you’re making your way to the other side nearly as quickly as he registers it, and his attention is captured by the sound of the wind being knocked out of you when you hit the mattress. Shit, why does the sound nearly knock the wind out of him?

He was flushed, now, and it’s from more than just the warming temperature in the trailer, because the flip in his stomach at the way you blink down at them— sprawled along that dirty mattress, flat on your back— is something else entirely.

It takes all of Eddie’s self control not to clamber up the rope after you just as soon as you clear the landing pad. Trying to hold onto the shred of acknowledgement that Steve’s wounds might mean he needed assistance to get out of here, too, regardless of the jealousy that itched up his spine in regards to you.

“You should,” Eddie tries to be the bigger man, or at least that’s what he tells himself, “go next.”

Steve looks slightly surprised by the offer, but reaches for the rope, managing a somewhat-sincere, “Thanks, Munson.” Harrington winces as he raises his arms to hoist himself up the rope, but manages to get through the gate without needing any assistance. Eddie comes through quicker, and falling to the mattress is more fun than he’d expected.

“What, now?” comes from Max.

Staring up at the hole in the ceiling, Lucas wonders, “How do we get the sheet back down?”

“I don’t think we can get the sheet back down,” Dustin rubs the back of his neck. “Not without cutting it down, because of the separate gravitational pulls—” He drifts off as the edges of the gate begin to sew themselves together, slicing through the sheet once they shut entirely, “Or, it could do that, I guess.”

“That gate could come back open,” Nancy crosses her arms over her chest, and as much as you wish she was wrong, the scar along the ceiling is more than enough to confirm that the gate was still there, only smaller for the moment. “We need to check the other places people have died for more gates.”

“And then what?” Robin huffs.

“Then…” Nancy lingers, clearly trying to come up with some way to fix all of this, “Then, we figure out a way to close them.”

“Comforting,” sarcasm drips from Eddie’s tone as he pushes up from the mattress to stand, “I love knowing there’s a portal to hell in my uncle’s ceiling until we find a way to plaster over it.”

“You could try caulk,” Lucas’ attempt at humor falls flat, and Eddie wipes his hands on his dark jeans.

“Look, Steve’s hurt,” you start, catching the attention of the room. “Those wrappings worked for the Upside-Down, but they’re not gonna’ cut it out here. You need to get your wounds cleaned and dressed before you catch whatever those nasty bats have—”

“Bats?” Dustin gasps.

“Yeah, bats— They were huge—” Steve holds out his hands in a rough estimate of how large they were, only for Dustin to become more intrigued at the revelation.

“First, demodogs; now, demobats…”

“As I was saying,” you continue pointedly at Steve, “there’s no way that you can keep going until that gets cleaned and checked out.”

“I think my uncle actually keeps some supplies around here,” Eddie maneuvers around you and past Nancy, towards the small kitchen in his home, where he promptly begins rummaging through the cabinets. “First-aid stuff, y’know? For if he gets hurt at the plant workin’.” At your questioning glances he shrugs, “Better than a trip to the doctor with no insurance.”

“Alright,” Nancy clasps her hands together, jolting you from your observation of Eddie’s concentrated pilfering of his uncle’s cabinets, “how about you three stay here and handle that, and the rest of us will split off for the other gates. We’ll check back in on the walkies with what’s going on.”

“Nance—” Steve begins in protest, but she stops him with a point of her finger.

“No, they’re right, you need someone to clean those bandages. Robin and I can handle this.”

“Um, what about us?” Lucas crosses his arms, while Max nods.

“Yeah, we’re coming, too.”

“Of course you guys are coming,” Nancy rolls her eyes, a smile at the edge of her lips. “We’ll need all the help we can get, but, you’ve gotta’ do exactly what we say.”

Despite the reluctant agreements on the younger kids’ parts, they file out of the trailer somewhere between Eddie finally finding the first-aid supplies and Steve collapsing onto the couch. Steve can’t bring himself to protest being left here, because there’s an ache to his bones that sets in with every passing moment, and resting on the couch only brings momentary relief.

“Here,” Eddie hands off the supplies onto the coffee-table, pushing around the jumbled items there to make room as you kneel on the floor in front of where Steve sits. Almost as soon as you start to unwrap the fabric around Steve’s waist, Eddie huffs out, “Fuck, it’s hot in here. Let me check the temperature,” and all but throws his leather jacket over the back of the couch before jogging down the hallway to glare at the thermostat on the wall.

“It’s not that hot to me,” it’s an off-handed comment from you, but a surprising one nonetheless, at least to Steve, who protests around a hiss of pain when the fabric catches at his wound.

“How are you not hot? It’s like it’s ninety degrees in here…” the denim vest Eddie had loaned him is sticking to his back, and if it weren’t for your hands working against his skin, he would have ripped it off. There’s a bizarre look on your face at his declaration, but you only apologize before gently cleansing his bite-wounds with the cloth rag and peroxide Eddie had supplied. Steve’s sweating, gritting his teeth as he tries to hold back the whimper of pain behind his teeth to no avail.

You apologize again, but you can’t stop until the area seems properly cleaned. A tinge of red blood seeps from the wounds rather than the strange saliva-like substance that had occluded the area before, but you’re glad to find he wasn’t bleeding profusely. Steve tries to focus on the weird amount of hats that hung along the upper walls of Munson’s living room, instead of the pain in his side, and the growing heat that seemed to claim him more with every passing second. When you’ve finally finished cleaning, Steve’s softly panting, and your apologies fall on dull ears as he glances down to notice the goose-bumps that have appeared on your arms.

“How cold are you getting it in here, Eddie?” you loudly call towards the man in the hallway, minor annoyance lacing your voice, but despite the way your hair shifts with the wind blowing through the vents, Steve can barely feel a difference in the temperature at all.

It was almost as bad as the hottest day last summer to him, but he knows in the back of his mind that weather as warm as this would be strange for an early Indiana spring.

“Something’s wrong with the A/C,” Eddie groans in defeat when he comes back into the living room, slightly breathless despite the short hallway he’s had to traverse. “It says it’s only seventy in here, and I turned it down to fifty-five, but nothing’s changing.”

“Are you insane? You’re getting it freezing cold in here,” blinking up at him, you’re shocked to find he’s sweating through the front of his Hellfire Club shirt. You’ve barely got the fresh gauze wrapped around Steve’s waist before the worry in your eyes shifts onto Eddie, “Are you alright?”

Sure, Steve was sweating, too, but you’d just assumed it was due to the pain. Eddie, though, has you thinking it’s something else entirely.

“I’m fine, it’s just blowing heat or something— I don’t get it. It doesn’t act like it’s not working, but…” Eddie’s hands reach over the vents in the floor, feeling the air temperature for himself, and his frown only deepens. A glance out of the corner of his eye, before he points towards the vent, “See? Hot air!”

“It’s really not,” your voice comes slow to Steve’s ears, and as your fingers press tape along the bandage he gasps out, making your hands flinch away from him quickly. “Oh, my gosh, did I hurt you? I’m sorry—”

“No,” it sounds hoarse even to Steve’s ears, so he clears his throat, before finally affixing you with his stare. Swallowing thick, he tries to beat down the feeling swirling in his veins, settling deep in his abdomen, but there’s an edge to his voice when he says, “But I think something else is wrong.”

It’s the look in his eyes that shocks you still. You’ve never seen him look at you quite like this before. Dark eyes seem even more endless with the way his pupils have almost swallowed his irises in a black void, dilated wide as he almost seems to find difficulty in breathing steadily. A glistening sheen of sweat covers his skin, too, in much a similar way as Eddie. Steve’s lips are parted as he struggles to breathe even, tongue passing over them to wet the salt on his skin.

You pinpoint the look in his eyes, after a moment of sitting still between his knees.

Want.

That was want you saw in his eyes right now, unobstructed from your scrutiny in a way that he was incapable of hiding at this moment, with this fire burning through his veins unlike anything he’d ever felt before. There’s an edge to it, something that catches in his skin, hurts in a way that makes him want to drag you into a kiss right then and there— but he doesn’t dare move, for fear he’ll actually do it.

You’re leaning away from him, perhaps subconsciously, but it stings all the same, “What… what’s wrong?”

Steve can barely bring himself to think it, let alone confess it out loud, but he’s sure it’s written all over his face right now, the mortifying, uncontrollable lust that has latched onto his very soul. Something was very, very wrong about this, but Steve can’t bring himself to care past the scandalous ideas storming through his mind. So instead, he remains silent. Tries to avoid your eyes, but just as soon as he glances over to the side of you, Eddie walks into his line of sight.

“I think Harrington’s right,” Eddie’s hands are balled in fists at his side, as your attention casts up towards the stern set of his jaw and confused furrow of his brow. “I think… something’s wrong with me, too.”

Steve watches your eyes widen for a fraction as you register the same blown dilation in Eddie’s eyes that you’d noticed on Steve, the flush in his cheeks, and the tension in his shoulders, but you dumbly begin to ask again, “What’s wro—”

A finger hooks around your jaw, turning you to face Steve almost roughly, and you’re barely looking his way at all before his lips crash into your own. He can feel your gasp, your reflexive hands meeting his chest and catching on heated skin and denim, but Steve doesn’t think, let alone care. Hell, he doesn’t even care that he can hear the hitch of Eddie’s own breath from where he stands, watching.

None of that matters. Not the biting in his sides of wounded skin straining on gauze, or the way he’s all but doubled himself over from where he sits on the couch in order to have at you.

All that matters is the slight relief it brings. The feeling of your skin on his, the taste of you on his tongue, and the fact that you aren’t— thank God— pulling away from his more-than-rushed assault on your lips.

In fact, you’re leaning into him, fists catching in the denim vest to drag him closer. His hands cupping your jaw drag you even closer between his legs, and he hears the way your knees shift on shag carpet to accommodate him.

He could die kissing you right now, and be completely fine with it. It’s the only thing on his mind— the way you slightly whimper into his urgency. He feels like he has a fever to your chilled hands, but not even the touch of your skin to his is capable of cooling him off. He needs something else, something like—

The hand that settles on his right knee isn’t yours; it’s too large to be, and he can feel the tightening of your fingers on the vest when you’re pulled away from his lips. Steve’s only mad for as long as it takes to blink his eyes open and see the way Eddie’s tugged you back by his hand in your hair— the one that doesn’t rest on Steve’s knee.

Your cheeks feel flushed as Eddie appraises the slightly dazed look in your eyes in that heated moment, before dragging you into his own kiss. Steve’s hand still caresses the side of your neck as Eddie descends upon you like a man who’s lost all his senses, and you’re too stunned by the sudden change of events to so much as even pull away from him— from them.

Not that you would have to begin with.

Munson kisses you just as urgently as Steve had. With the crane of your neck and his grip in your hair, you’re left nearly disoriented when Eddie’s hand releases Steve’s knee to find his grasp against your throat, dragging you away from one man to the other. While Steve had smelled of the metallic blood still smeared on his skin, and whatever remains of his expensive cologne that managed to cling to him, Eddie is different. Sure, it’s drenched in the hint of lakewater that follows all of you, but there’s no denying the scented undertones you can fully realize thanks to being pressed so closely against him.

He’s all leather, and something woodsy mixed into the sweat that drips down his temple, onto the expanse of where your fingertips reach along his jaw. The budding result of a day without a proper shave pricks at your skin, but you don’t rightly care, because Eddie Munson was kissing you like it was his last day to live.

Which, if he were to listen to the burning threat in his chest, it might as well be. He wouldn’t normally just throw himself at a girl like this, but he can’t bring himself to pull away. It’s like something inside him demands that he have you right here and now; urging him to consume you in this very spot. He’s out of his depth, and out of control, which is nearly as exhilarating as it is worrying.

Your attention has been completely snatched away from Steve when you feel Eddie grin into the kiss, only for you to elicit a shuddering breath from him with the drag of your fingers down his chest.

There’s a dull throb in your head from the overwhelmingly sudden intensity of it all, and the only thing that momentarily saves you is Steve’s annoyed, “Quit hogging her,” that tears Eddie away from your lips.

Munson looks down at you through a lidded stare, before his eyes flick towards Steve with a hint of his own annoyance, “You’re one to talk, Harrington. I practically had to pry her away from you with a crowbar.”

“W-Wait,” you take the chance you have while they’re momentarily distracted, “what’s gotten into the two of you—?”

Eddie shrugs off your question, making to kiss down your jaw, but when he groans almost painfully, “Damn, it’s so. Fucking. Hot. In here,” you’re pushing him away again. He lets you, but not without a whine of protest.

“You keep saying that,” you reach out to press the back of your hand against Eddie’s forehead, only for him to catch your wrist and drag you forward, landing one quick kiss in the crook of your arm before you snatch it back. Eddie slumps over in defeat from where he’s knelt when you turn to look at Steve, who is only a better patient than Munson due to the grip he keeps tight on the back of the couch. “You guys are burning up—” Steve murmurs something, and you glance down to his face, “Huh?”

“It started back there— It started getting hot in the Upside-Down, after that flower-thing,” he swallows, trying his best to focus on anything other than how easy it would be to drag you into another kiss with the way you leaned over him. Clenching his teeth, he tries his damned best, but his mind’s running wild. It’s like he’s losing every last shred of control he has left, like he’ll die if he doesn’t have your body against his again.

“Please—” the pitiful sound comes from off the end of the couch, where Munson has fully melted into the floor, an utterly useless mess of hair and limbs at your momentary rejection of his touch.

Steve’s fighting the urge to be in a similar state when you question Eddie, “What?”

“I’m dying over here—” Eddie’s head lulls towards you, the desperate sound of your name falling from his tongue. Despite Steve’s withering silence, he’s in no better a state than the man on the floor, because the same thought that crumbles in the back of Eddie’s throat has passed his own mind,, “I’m going to die if you don’t touch me again. Shit, I’m begging, here!”

And there it is, the one thing Steve’s too terrified to say out in the open, spoken by Eddie Fucking Munson, who has dissolved into a sequence of begging pleas and curses as his fingers card into his own hair like he might pull it out. Steve can see the flush on your face, the struggle of denial in your eyes swirling with the heated way you watch him, trying to turn over your options in your mind. Trying to figure out just what you should do.

Steve’s tired of waiting, and maybe his senses are so blurred to the point that he has no ability to reason anymore, but he doesn’t care if this destroys the friendship he’d so carefully tried to uphold despite his feelings for you. This growing ache in his abdomen won’t allow him to think past this single moment.

So he decides to wear you down with his own honest, “It’s okay.”

And you know you sound like a broken record, when you glance warily towards him, asking again, “What?”

“It’s okay to want this,” the way Steve looks at you cuts through you like butter. Like he can see every aspect of your hidden desire regardless of how terribly you try to smother it down, “I know I do.”

One word from your lips is all he’d need to fully let go, but the widening surprise, the hesitant interest in your eyes— that works, too, “You do?”

Steve releases his grip on the couch in favor of your waist, intent on showing you how much when he nearly manhandles you into his lap, arching into the hands that push at the denim on his shoulders. The involuntary moan that comes from him as he kisses you again would’ve embarrassed him if he had any sense left to feel embarrassed. The truth is, licking up into your mouth is the only thing keeping him sane at this very moment, because with the hasty undressing of his clothing by your hands comes the complete undoing of his mind.

He’s not entirely sure when exactly Eddie picked himself back up from his sorry state on the floor, but the longer-haired man takes to ridding you of your button-up as quickly as he can from where he’s pressed himself against your back, using what little space there is between Steve’s knees to his advantage. You’re easily leveraged between them, as Steve’s forward lean presses you into Eddie’s chest and determined hands.

Eddie’s teeth drag against your shoulder as he strips your upper half bare, and his impatience at the obstruction of your jeans is only a brief issue before he comes up with the solution of simply shoving one large hand into the front of your waistband, not giving you a chance to so much as even rise from Steve’s lap. You’re gasping into Steve’s lips as Eddie’s fingertips delve between your thighs abruptly, a low groan splitting your thoughts as it breezes past your ear with the rumble of Eddie’s ragged breath at the feeling of your growing wetness there.

You can feel the cold metal of his ring as he drags his fingers through your folds, down to your core and back up again, pressing down onto your clit upon his discovery of it, breath fanning against your skin when you squirm against Steve’s lap, “There we go, sweetheart.”

Mewling into Steve’s lips, you’re completely overcome by the feeling of the tight circles Eddie presses between your thighs, jolting electric pleasure up your spine, and when Steve’s hands blaze up the exposed skin of your torso to settle against your breasts, you can’t be held accountable for the way you’re left writhing against them. You can feel the straining bulge in every grind of your hips down upon Eddie’s hands and Steve’s lap, but you’re nearly powerless at this moment to do anything more than catch Steve by the hair and pull him closer.

Eddie’s taken to grinding himself against your hip, letting the most delicious sounds fall from his tongue onto your shoulders, your neck— wherever he can have easy access to lay his open mouth. It’s only when you feel him shift his hand to push his index and middle fingers into you up to the ring that you cry out. Slipping away from where Steve had locked you in his kiss, your head falls back onto Eddie’s shoulder; it’s almost overwhelming. Their hands, their lips— it’s almost too much.

Steve leans back against the couch to fumble at his jeans, undoing them as best he can while Eddie melts into a nearly incoherent string of words behind you, “Is that good? Do you like how my fingers feel? Oh, fuck, I want to be inside you— You’d like that, too, wouldn’t you—?”

“C’mon,” Steve groans as his eyes catch yours, before trailing down the expanse of where Eddie’s draped himself over you and finally stopping on where his hand has disappeared beneath the undone zipper of your jeans. “Tell Munson how you like it.”

Your breath catches in your throat, only to fall out in a moan around his name, “I like it, Eddie— Don’t stop—”

If there were any ability left in you to be embarrassed, you would’ve been mortified in this moment, because you can practically hear how wet you are as Eddie quickens the thrusting of his fingers, allowing you to grind down onto the palm of his hand. Eddie’s pressed his face against your neck, letting out a soft moan at the sound of your praise, until he kisses the skin there in a languid way that’s the complete opposite of the haste with which he drags you further and further towards your inevitable oblivion.

You’re so tense, wound up like you might snap at any moment, when Steve finally manages to free himself from his jeans just enough to grant you the view of the hardened length of him. His mouth falls open slightly when he takes hold of himself, and when he starts with a languid stroke, he lets out a soft whimper. It’s the way Steve watches you, though, that almost throws you over the edge.

Leant back on the couch cushions, head tilted back, he looks down at you through a drugged-like haze, while Eddie Munson takes you apart on his lap. Steve is as wrecked as you’ve ever seen him in his life, blood from the earlier attack still smeared along his skin in places, sweat dripping down his heaving chest— it’s a sight that shouldn’t get you as bothered as it did, but you’re too far gone to care. Eddie’s dark gaze flicks away from you to catch Steve’s, before he gently tugs you back by the hair once more to earn a better look at your parted lips and gasping breaths. It’s like something had bewitched the three of you, and while the men were clearly more affected by it than you, you still felt it in the tingling of your limbs and the thundering of your chest, as Eddie’s intense eyes caught yours.

Then, he leans forward, and spits in your open mouth, only to nudge you forwards a little and chuckle, “Give Steve something to work with, okay? From the both of us.” Grinning as he catches Steve’s wide eyes once more, he bites by your ear, “Go ahead, spit on it.”

And, maybe you’re out of your mind, but you do just what he tells you to do. You lean forward as best you can with Eddie’s arms tangled around you, and spit right onto where Steve’s grip rests along his cock, hearing the ragged breath Steve sucks in at the sight.

“Holy shit,” it breaks, choked in the back of Steve’s throat, when Eddie pulls you back against him. Wasting no time, Steve uses the added lubrication to quicken his hand slightly.

“You really are a sweetheart, aren’t you? Helpin’ out our friend like that,” Eddie teases, turning your head just enough to capture your lips with his own. You can practically taste the lust that oozes from his every pore as his fingers curl within you, your hips shaking at the feeling of them dragging from you just for him to do it all over again. By the time he breaks from your kiss, you see something akin to wild, boyish glee in his brown eyes, “Now, go on and use my fingers to cum.”

“Eddie—” you whine, but the low breathlessness of Steve’s voice silences you entirely.

“You heard the man. We want to see you do it.”

You’ve long since deteriorated into a mess between them, and you’re faring no better than you ever were when Eddie licks a stripe up your neck at the same time he curls his fingers again within you. Pushing the palm of his hand into your clit, your hands are shaking as you reach to grasp at the tattooed forearm holding you to a lean chest.

The way you break in his arms is too hyperreal to ever delude yourself into believing this was some sort of dream. It’s a raw, broken cry that falls from you as Eddie only holds you tighter in your writhing against him. If your nails digging into his skin hurts, he makes no indication of it. The only thing coming from Eddie’s lips are the praises, coaxing you through the blinding ecstasy of it, until you’ve collapsed into his steadying embrace.

Eddie pulls his hand from your pants, but Steve catches his wrist, leaning forward to capture your gaze as he licks the wet evidence of you from Eddie’s ringed fingers. You hear Eddie’s breath hitch in your ear as your own breathing ceases entirely at the sight, until Steve releases the other man’s hand entirely. Your breathing trembles back to life as Steve closes the distance so he can press his lips to yours, spreading long fingers against the length of your neck to drag you towards him on the couch.

Steve groans in the back of his throat when you part for barely a moment, “I think I’ll probably need more of a taste than that, but it’ll do for now.”

Eddie’s chuckle is in the forefront of your mind as Steve pulls you back to his lips, seemingly never over the way it feels to kiss you. His arm wraps around your waist, helping you get to your knees just so Eddie can shimmy you out of the jeans that still clung to your legs.

The room is so cold, so unbearably chilly, but they’re still burning up against you. It’s perhaps the only reason you don’t immediately reach for the blanket draped along the back of the couch. That, and the fact that Steve is pushing your underwear to the side just enough to brush the tip of him through your folds. The sound he catches on his tongue is something you were only mildly scandalized to have whimpered there, as he sinks you down the length of him with his fingertips digging into your hips.

“Oh, my God,” how Steve barely manages to sound at all held-together is something you’ll never know, but any illusion of control breaks as soon as you settle flush into his lap. There’s a stretch that you doubt you’ll ever fully get used to in the way he drops his hips, only to sink back into you again, spilling moans from his lips as he almost selfishly sets his pace. Steve glances down between you, watching as he buries himself into you over and over again, until even that is too much for him to handle. Eyes clenched shut, his head falls back, adam’s apple bobbing as he swallows thick at the feeling of your walls around him.

His fingertips claw into the flesh of your hip as you steady yourself on the bare expanse of his chest, feeling the hair there beneath your hands as he rocks you forward on each thrust he buries into you. You’re so caught up in trying to adjust to Steve’s desperate love-making that you almost forget about your audience for a split second.

That is, until Eddie props a knee on the side of the couch, the movement of his hands tempting your gaze to watch as he tugs his belt undone. You can see a hint of the skin of his abdomen from where he’s pulled up his Hellfire shirt as he tugs at his zipper, and you’re already reaching with the hand you haven’t planted on Steve’s chest for the loops in Eddie’s jeans. Tugging him closer to the aching destruction that seemed to consume you all, you hear him sigh when his length is freed from his jeans.

You want him— you want them both, and you can barely think past that.

Eddie looks like he’s far past holding it together, when his hand comes to the back of your neck, “Can you open your mouth for me?” Steve’s certainly long gone, with the strangled noise that comes from him as you clench around his cock at Eddie’s question.

They’re dragging you down with them, nodding, “Come closer, Eddie.” All it takes is a shift in his posture, your hand slipping to his thigh, as he grasps himself by the base in his left hand to tease your waiting tongue. His rings would’ve looked gaudy on anyone else, but on Eddie you were almost losing your mind to watch his fingers wrap around himself as those skulls stared back at you.

The leaking precum leaves a salty taste on your tongue as you wrap your lips around him, tonguing at his tip while his grip tightens at the back of your neck. Guiding you closer, you feel Eddie shudder beneath your fingertips as he lets out the prettiest groan you think you’ve ever heard, which is saying something considering the way Steve’s almost dissipated into a whimpering mess beneath you.

“Son of a—” Eddie curses as you take him deeper, struggling to keep steady as Steve’s rhythm flounders, becoming something more spontaneous and urgent rather than the methodical thing it had originally been. The moan in your own throat can’t be subdued when you feel Steve’s hand slip down your hip, casting his thumb against your clit in his efforts to trigger your utter ruination.

Steve’s filter is entirely gone, and he can’t stop himself from saying whatever comes to mind, “You look— look so good with your mouth full, you know that?”

Eddie’s fingers tangle in your hair, as if holding onto you will keep him from completely losing himself when he nods in agreement, “Dude— you’re so right. I wanna’ see those eyes, sweetheart. Fuck— Just like that. Keep looking at me.”

It feels like they’ve set you on fire, like whatever affliction had overcome them was also seeping into your bones. It was getting hotter by the second, and not even the cold air blowing on high from the trailer’s vents was helping anymore.

You’re so out of it, they could tell you to do anything and you would probably have done it if it meant reaching the high you were all fighting for. The things they were saying washed over you like a bucket of hot water, and you know you’re dripping onto Steve with his every hurried thrust. It’s so close, you can feel it. Just out of reach, as the muscles in your thighs tense— if Steve just keeps going—

It’s so sudden that he can barely predict it at all, and all the warning any of you get is a series of jumbled curses cried around his increasingly hitched moans when Steve’s hips slam up into yours. Delirium was what it felt like, rushing through his veins to flay every last nerve bare while he mindlessly emptied himself into your fluttering warmth. He thinks he might pass out, when his vision goes, but the feeling of your nails digging into his chest keeps him somewhat grounded to this plane of existence.

His breath was coming in harsh pants, like he could barely breathe, and you can feel the expansive warmth of his climax seeping from you with the weak thrusts he manages before stilling entirely. Steve is on the verge of an apology by the time he can manage to somewhat think straight, but the sight of you with Eddie’s cock down your throat is enough to scramble his thoughts all over again.

“Hell, if the pussy’s as good as Harrington acts like it is,” Eddie groans, pulling from your mouth with a wet pop, tilting your head up to see the fucked-out look in your eyes, “I think I’d like my turn, now, if that’s alright with you.”

Steve’s hands have relaxed at your thighs, but they give you a squeeze when you nod at Eddie, “Please—” You were still so wired, having been sent right to the edge before Steve came, that you don’t care who takes care of you right now, as long as they help you fix this desolate ache in the pit of your stomach.

Eddie helps you pull yourself off of Steve, which has you both gasping with the oversensitivity of it all, and the resulting emptiness that settles into your gut. Sitting beside Steve on the couch, Eddie drags you to straddle his lap from behind, until your back is settled against his chest.

His hand resting against your ribs, he nudges your legs with his knees, “Need you to spread your legs wider, ‘kay?” Snaking his other arm over your thigh, he reaches beneath you when you do as he says, and you’re arching against him as he presses himself up into you with a guiding hand. Shushing your anguished whimper, Eddie murmurs, “Just like that, yeah. You’re— ah, doing so good— taking it so well.”

He’s not much bigger than Steve was, but you feel so full that you think you’re not going to make it past the first thrust at this point, with how close Steve had gotten you moments before. You have to reach behind you to catch at his side in order to steady yourself when he finds himself fully seated within you quicker than Steve had.

“There, how’s that?” Eddie’s voice sounds strained with pleasure as he retreats his hand to the inside of your bare thigh. “Perfect fit—”

You can’t decide if you like his near-constant commentary or not, but raising your hips seems to catch whatever else he was going to say in his throat, “Eddie, I need you to move.”

“As the lady wishes,” his grin can practically be heard, and when he drops his hips to drive back into you at a steady pace, you think your eyes roll back in your head with how this angle allowed him to hit you just right.

Steve’s barely starting to get movement back in his legs by the time he adjusts his slacks back around his waist, but watching you and Munson was doing nothing for the brief clear-headedness that had returned in the aftermath of his climax. He’s certain that the crap from that flower— the pollen, you’d called it— had done something to the three of you, because never in his life had he been as out-of-his-mind aroused like this. A glance towards the scar in the trailer’s ceiling confirms that the gate is still somewhat-closed for now, but whatever purpose that flower held was lost on him. He couldn’t very well ask the group for their ideas, now, could he?

The pretty sounds coming from your mouth were scrambling his mind all over again. At this rate he’s going to get hard once more, so he stands from the couch to escape further into the trailer, trying his hardest to subdue this simmering feeling once more. The bathroom had to be safe from this torture, certainly.

Eddie’s too consumed with you to notice Harrington’s disappearance, and you’re too lost in the feeling to care.

He pushes you off edge you’ve been riding when his teeth sink into your neck, biting gently to smother his groans, but it’s all it takes combined with his quickening pace to set you off. It’s like you detonate, white-hot pleasure exploding behind your chest as you almost scream with the shock of it.

“Are you— you’re coming, aren’t you?” Eddie never falters, but you’re completely incapable of giving him a proper answer with the mind-numbing bliss that overtakes you. Leaning forward, you have to grasp his knee in an effort to keep from completely collapsing onto the floor, but his hands would’ve kept you steady regardless. The involuntary fluttering of your core around him has him stumbling after you, gasping out, “So tight— I’ll never get tired of it— I can’t get enough of you.”

“I can’t take it,” you’re trembling, barely able to stand the overstimulation in the aftermath of your climax, but Eddie has you almost in tears, begging for him, “I can’t take anymore, Eddie—!”

“Just a little more,” he groans, pressing his forehead into your back as he fucks up into you desperately. Voice breaking with his confession, “I’m almost— so close.”

You don’t even realize you’ve shut your eyes in an effort to mute the overstimulation until you’re blinking them open again, pleasured tears falling down your cheeks, only to spot Steve leaning on the kitchen counter in full view of the living room. He’d found himself a glass of water, somewhere in the time it’s taken for you to entirely lose your mind, but the look in his eyes as he watches you is not as entirely unaffected as you would have thought for a man who was barely out of his own post-orgasmic haze.

You know it, before Eddie’s breath hitches behind you, how in trouble you are.

The way Munson comes apart is just as desperate as Steve had, but he drags you back down to him, turning your head to almost beg, “Kiss me—” It’s all teeth and tongue, moans muffled by your lips on his, in a way that makes you feel so vulnerable and raw that you think your tears might actually be from the edge of pain that comes from the resulting feeling of emptiness after he pulls out of you.

Struggling to catch your breath, you know you’re leaking the evidence of what the three of you have done against his jeans, but Eddie’s too fucked-out to care. Trying to shift yourself back into your stretched, and upon closer inspection minorly ripped, underwear without rising from his lap is difficult, but not as impossible as standing with the shake in your legs would have been.

“What the hell just happened to us…?” Eddie wonders aloud, finally catching his breath enough to speak, but it’s a question without an answer.

Hoarsely, you whisper the fear sinking into your heart, “Do you regret it?”

He reaches up, fingers grazing your chin as he urges you to look at him, and when you do, you find his dark eyes have gone soft, “I didn’t say that, now. No regrets on my part.” Glancing towards where Steve’s moved closer towards the coffee table, Eddie smirks, “Harrington? Any regrets?”

A static cuts through the silence, and suddenly Robin’s voice crackles through the walkie resting on the table, “Nancy, come in. Dustin and I just made it to our gate. Are you guys there yet? Over.”

“We’re still five minutes out from ours— How’re things going at Munson’s gate?” Nancy’s voice comes through, and the three of you blink for a moment at the walkie, trying to think of a single thing to say.

Steve steps up to the plate, gaze shifting towards where you and Eddie try your best to collect yourselves when he clears his throat and presses the outgoing button on the walkie, “Uh, no changes over here. We’re all good.”

You’re glad he’s a good liar, because Nancy simply replies, “Alright, then. We’ll check back in when we reach our gate.”

“You’ve got to say, ‘Over and out,’” Dustin suddenly comes through, and Steve rolls his eyes before setting down the walkie.

“Is that kid always so bossy?” Eddie chuckles, shaking his head as he adjusts his shirt and pants.

Steve grunts flatly, “Welcome to my world,” as he watches you pluck your clothing off the floor where Eddie had haphazardly discarded it.

Pressing it all to your chest, you notice the two of them staring, and sheepishly ask, “Where’s your bathroom, Eddie?”

He points down the hallway, “Right down there, second to last door.”

“Thanks,” you try to brush past him, but the long-haired man catches your waist when you’re in reach, pressing a cheeky kiss against your temple before you can squirm away, giggling, “Stop it, Eddie—!”

“Alright, alright.”

Steve takes another sip of his water when you pass, flush on his cheeks as he tries to respectfully avert his eyes to no avail, but you disappear down the hallway either way. He’s in too deep as it is, and when he glances over towards Eddie, he finds he’s being watched with a raised brow.

“What was that?”

“What was what?”

“That,” Eddie nods down the hallway, as if that elaborates anything at all. “When you just didn’t say a word to her after we—”

“I’m so not starting this with you, dude,” Steve huffs, crossing his arms as he looks back down the hallway.

“I think we’re way past that,” he holds up his hands in front of him, “but okay… you do you.” Munson plops back down onto the couch, digging around the cluttered coffee table until he comes across a packet of cigarettes. Plucking one from the pack and placing it between his teeth, Eddie mumbles, “You ask me, I wouldn’t let a girl like that wonder for too long.”

“Wonder?” Steve doesn’t know if it’s a good thing or not to egg Eddie on, but he does it anyway.

“Yeah, wonder— about if you care or not,” he says it like it’s so simple, with a roll of his eyes and a flick of the lighter he’s fished from the sea of clutter. Steve grinds his teeth, glancing back towards the hallway in consideration, before growing annoyed at the smell of Eddie’s cigarette and plucking it from his lips to put out in the ashtray, “Hey—!”

“Those’re bad for you,” is all Steve answers the mild offense on Munson’s face with, before turning on his heel and moving towards the bathroom. There should be no question, right? Of if he cares for you. You’re one of his best friends, after all. You should know that already, but the suggestion by Munson that it was at all questionable was eating at him.

He wanted to rectify that.

Steve’s about to knock when the bathroom door swings open, light spilling into the hallway, “Oh! Sorry.”

You jolt to find him standing there, and he shifts at your awkward chuckle, “Steve, do you need the bathroom?”

“Uh, no, actually,” he reaches out, gripping the frame of the door to accommodate his lean. “I was hoping we could talk, maybe?”

“Talk?” blinking up at him, you can’t help the worry that seeps into you, “What about?”

“Just… what Munson said earlier, about regrets?” Steve begins, but when your eyes avoid his dejectedly, he knows Eddie was right. You weren’t sure about him.

“Oh…”

“Hey,” he steps closer, voice softer as he lifts his hand to the side of your face, urging you to look at him. “I just wanted to tell you that I don’t regret anything. Well, maybe I regret letting Munson touch that flower, but when it comes to you? No. I don’t regret it.”

“Promise?” you question, watching him warily. Steve smiles, bending at the neck to capture your lips with his in a kiss that was far more gentle and leisurely than any thus far had been. It was chaste, even, but it set your skin ablaze either way.

Pressing his forehead against yours, he pulls away, “Promise.”

#eddie munson fanfic #steve harrington fanfic #stranger things fanfic #fanfic by me #stranger things female reader insert #female reader insert #author meg #fanfiction #nsft #smut #trigger warning #newstuff female reader insert

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thranduilsperkybutt · 2 years

Photo

⫷SECOND-HAND EMOTION⫸

Gif Source

Pairings: Eddie Munson/Reader

Warnings: Angst/comfort, happy ending though it hurts to get there; break-ups and make-ups; some cursing; love confessions; minor proofreading tbh i only proof-read like half of this

Word Count: 6,492 words

Reader Gender: Female

Author: Meg

Summary: ”I didn’t know what to do so I... I ran away.” It’s been months since you last saw him, the only man to break your heart. Hell, he’s the only one who ever could. Filled with regrets, it’s too hard for Eddie to lie to you this time, as circumstances beyond your control bring the two of you together.

A/N: Eddie Munson break my heart challenge 😭❤ I’m cursed with a brain that gives me intrusive thoughts like, “What if Eddie Munson broke up with you.” On the bright side(?) for once I’m not writing smut---

“Just great,” slamming the hood of your car closed, you’re nearly on the verge of tears. You can’t help the angry curses that spew from your lips into the dead of night, standing dejectedly on the side of the road, “Piece-of-crap car—! Damn this town!”

Hawkins really was just as cursed as people say, because every way you turn, your life seems to fall apart at the seams the moment you step foot back here.

Blinking back the overwhelming frustration, you move around to the driver’s side of your completely dead vehicle, fishing out your bag and keys. There’s nothing for it, now, and if you were feeling especially self-loathing, you would admit that this was your own fault for ignoring that weird rumbling noise your beat-up Chevy had been making these past two months.

As if you had much of a choice in neglecting the car, with your mom’s hospital bills taking up any bit of extra money that you could’ve used to get it looked at. You barely have enough to make ends meet as it is with your job at the Family Video store. It was just about the only place in Hawkins that had been hiring over the winter break, and when your stay in your hometown had become more permanent as your mom got sicker, you’d barely found the time to get your head on straight, let alone find a better-paying job.

Work was where you were heading home from until you broke down on the side of the road, with one last rattling wheeze from your car before death claimed it. Having closed down at the store, it’s well past eleven in the evening, and this side of Hawkins is all but vacant at this hour. Shoving your work uniform’s vest into your bag, you begin the trek down the road. The 24-hour diner two miles away is where you’re betting you’ll find a payphone, but even the brisk walk you take up doesn’t keep the anxiety from creeping up your spine at having to walk alone at night.

After all, Hawkins was far from a safe little town.

Every skitter in the pitch-black woods to your right has you picking up your pace, and when it starts sprinkling rain overhead, you’re begging to whoever’s listening that maybe Steve will be back from that date he’d been bragging about all shift by the time you get to a phone. You never thought that you would be praying for Steve Harrington to not get lucky, but here you were, practically in a full jog by the time you have the diner in sight, and hoping beyond all hope that Steve’s date has gone horribly in the last half hour.

The diner’s nearly vacant as you push in through the door, the ring of the bell alerting the lone waitress to your entrance. The rain has developed into a full-on downpour, and you’re sopping wet, tennis shoes squeaking on the tile as you step inside. The warm orange glow that the lights seem to cast on everything and the scent of fresh brewed coffee only serves to slightly calm your nerves, while you dig around your soaked bag for enough change to use the phone.

“Please pick up, please pick up,” you were muttering to yourself, listening to the lingering ring of Steve’s land-line. With every repetitive ring, your heart sinks, until finally you’ve hit rock-bottom with the sound of his answering machine picking up.

“How’s it goin’? You’ve reached Steve. I’m probably real busy at the moment, but I’ll be sure to call you back—”

Rolling your eyes at his recorded message, it drones in your ears until you hear the beep, “Harrington! If you’re home right now, pick up! This is an emergency situation. Steve? C’mon, pick up.” You groan, all but whining his name into the phone with one last hope that he’s maybe moping after a bad date, “Steve, please!”

You’re not that lucky.

Clanging the phone back on the hook, you groan. What are you going to do now? Your mom’s still recovering from her latest stint in the hospital, and if only Robin would ever bother to get her license, you would be able to call her up. It’s not like you remember any numbers from the group of people you used to hang around with in highschool off the top of your head—

Your breath catches in your throat at the thought. There was one person’s phone number you could never forget, regardless of how many months have passed. It was muscle memory at this point, with how often you’d dialed it over those three years between Sophomore year and the summer after Senior year.

The breath you take is shaky, and you don’t even want to consider calling him right now, not after how you left off. There’s still a space in your heart that he once occupied, and the mere thought of hearing his voice again after all this time sets a deep, empty ache in your chest.

Truth is, you’ve never quite gotten over what had happened between you and Eddie Munson.

He had been your first everything, and when he broke your heart, you’d lost pieces of it in the process that you don’t think you’ll ever grow back. Hell, you hadn’t even had a relationship since him. Maybe a date here and there, most recently set up by Steve or Robin, but an actual, committed, bona-fide relationship? No chance. No way.

That version of yourself who could learn to love again was still lost in the past, with him.

You still remember the words he’d said when he had torn you to pieces on his uncle’s living room floor. The distant, cruel tone he’d spoken with rings in the back of your mind like you were standing there this very second, and the heartbreak that tears through your soul is just as fresh.

“You need to wake up. We both knew from the start, this was never going to be a long-term thing—” he must have been the only one, because in your silly lovestruck mind, you still thought you would be Eddie’s girl for the rest of your life, even as he pushed you away. “You’re going off to college this fall, right? So now’s the perfect time for us to break up. We had our fun, but it’s time to go our separate ways, y’know?”

He had been so cold, barely able to look at you. There was nothing perfect about that day, or the way you had started to cry, ugly, with the more he said. For the first time since you met him, he’d managed to make you cry from something other than laughter, and the contrast of your reality versus what you’d come to expect from him was so jarring that some part of you had been left hoping this was all just another joke. Only when you were wiping tears from your face did he look at you, but while he only stood a few steps away from you, you felt more distant from him than ever.

“But, Eddie—” you were so broken that even your voice was shattered, barely able to get past his name before another sob bubbled up your throat.

“What? Did you seriously think this was serious?” he cleared his throat, and looked down at his arms crossed over his chest like it was difficult to look at you, as if the notion of it disgusted him.

It was pitiful, the way you bared your neck for him to hurt you, but you couldn’t stop the words falling from your lips, “I told you, we could make long-distance work! Why are you acting like this?”

Biting, he had only cut deeper, “Isn’t it obvious? I don’t want you hanging around here. You’re just embarrassing yourself—”

“I love you, Eddie,” came so quickly, you hadn’t realized you’d sobbed it, until his brown eyes widened, finally staring you dead in the face. In that moment, you could have sworn you saw a hurt of his own reflected back at you. A crack in the unfeeling shield he’d crafted with his words until the small sliver of heartbreak broke through, but he had just forced his eyes away from you once again, and said the one thing that he knew would send you away.

“I don’t love you, don’t you get that? I. Don’t. Love. Y—” you hadn’t let him finish, before you ran. Escaping the trailer that had once been a second-home to you, but right then felt like nothing more than a mausoleum. A tomb for the piece of you that he had killed on the spot, with a cruelty and indifference you had never witnessed from him until that very moment.

Eddie had always been so sweet, so kind, to you in particular. He had completely blindsided you with the break-up. One minute, you were planning out how to spend the holidays that you got off of college together, and the next there was no together at all.

You spent the better part of high-school so entirely infatuated with the boy, that by the time he finally mustered up the courage your Senior year to ask you out, he could do no wrong in your eyes. Maybe it had blinded you. Maybe if you’d spent less time trying to be his friend, and later his girlfriend, you would have seen the red flags.

Or, maybe not, considering that you still hadn’t quite figured out where your relationship turned south, even after spending months replaying every second over and over again in your mind. You had missed it entirely, simply figuring that any annoyance or anger on his part had been directed at the fact that he’d failed senior year for a second time.

Maybe he blamed that on you. Maybe you had distracted him too much. Maybe—

“Order up!”

The kitchen bell dinging breaks you from your downward spiral, bringing your thoughts back to the diner, and the payphone you still held onto for dear life. Your throat is dry, as you stare at the phone for a moment more, dread swirling in your stomach like the milk a patron beside you was stirring into his coffee.

You try to take a deep breath, but fail at even that, because it comes out shallow, shaky, and entirely uncertain of the decision you’re about to make. Even your hands shake, as you pluck the phone off the receiver and slowly bring it to your ear, pushing the last of your change into the machine, and tapping out the numbers that are imprinted in your mind even after all this time.

You don’t know if it would be better, or worse for him to not pick up the phone at all. Part of you wishes his uncle would pick up instead. Wayne had always liked you, if only because you made sure to leave him the leftovers whenever you’d cooked dinner at the trailer in those days. You know it’s just wishful thinking, though, because you doubt Wayne’s quit his steady night job at the plant.

Maybe Eddie wouldn’t come get you, even if he did pick up the phone. You had once thought you could rely on him for anything and everything, but after the break-up, you were less certain in him. Questioning everything about your relationship and the man you once thought you knew had become second nature by now.

You’re so lost in the stress of the moment that you almost miss the sound of the ringing halting abruptly, and the lazy-sounding, “Yeah-lo?” that cuts through the line. A beat passes that you’re too stunned at having reached him to even so much as speak, before Eddie drawls with a little bit of impatience, “Munson residence? Hello?”

“Eddie?”

You said it so soft that you’re left for a second wondering if it had even been loud enough for him to hear you. With how quiet it gets on the other line, if it weren’t for the absence of a disconnection tone you would have thought he hung up.

Then, “Yeah,” comes through, just as soft, with a tinge of awkwardness at hearing your voice again, “It’s me.”

He doesn’t ask why you’ve called, and you take that as a good sign, or at least a sign that he was too stunned to refuse listening to your request, “I wouldn’t have called you so late— or… at all. I know you don’t want to hear from me anymore. I don’t want to bother you— but I really need some help right now and there’s no-one else—”

“Woah, hold on— What’s wrong?” comes clearer this time, but you know there’s no way he could be worried about you. Not after everything he’d said.

But you’re on the verge of tears anyway at the sound of his voice, trying to hold it together despite the crushing frustration that everything in your life building up to this moment has caused, and you’re certain he can hear it in your voice when you start anxiously rambling into the phone, “I was on my way home from work, but then my car broke down out on Dawson Road. I had to walk two miles to the diner, and it started pouring, so now I’m all wet, and Steve won’t pick up the phone—”

“Steve?”

“Harrington,” you sniff, “From work—”

“You’re workin’ in Hawkins?”

“Yeah,” you pause, debating on if it’s worth even telling him, before you cave, “I’m working at the Family Video, now.” It’s almost a relief, telling him about your life. There was once a time when he would’ve wanted to hear all the details, but you keep yourself from spilling more than that. You’re certain he doesn’t care to know anymore.

You can practically hear his confusion in the way he hums into the phone, and it reminds you of the late-nights you’d spent blowing up the phone bill to talk to him in high school. This isn’t high school, though, and you lost more than a boyfriend last summer. That’s what hurt the most, and the deep ache that’s throbbing in your chest tells you as much, because you really wish you could talk to the part of him that had once been your best friend right now, but there’s a cage around the words. Stopping them in your throat, as fear laces your tongue with each passing moment that he’s quiet on the other end of the line.

“What happened to college?” he questions you, and there’s a rustling noise in the background, “Wasn’t it your dream… to get into that program?”

You sigh, clenching your eyes shut. You don’t want to get into it all, especially not on the phone.

Swallowing, you murmur, “Eddie, I used my last twenty-five cents to call you, and I’m sure it’ll take at least another quarter to buy the time to explain.” The sound of his huffed chuckle is bittersweet, and shouldn’t make your stomach flip like it still does. It’s your destiny to be tortured by his every action, you suppose, because you’re torn between regretting ever calling him in the first place, and relishing in hearing the sound of his voice again when you ask, pitifully, “Would you mind… coming to get me, just this once?”

If he refused, at least your torture will be short-lived.

But he grunts into the phone, and you hear the sound of keys jingling, “Yeah, just give me, uh, a couple minutes.”

The relief that washes through you is tinged with nervousness, and your voice shakes when you breathe in, “Alright… I’ll be waiting here.” And you did wait, shifting foot to foot near the window, looking out into the pouring rain with the anxious anticipation of seeing him again.

You’ve had enough time to talk yourself in and out of whether it was a terrible idea to have called him, by the time you see the familiar van’s headlights through the pouring rain. The diner is a ten minute drive from his trailer, but he’s made it here in seven minutes, undoubtedly because he still drives like a bat out of hell, even in the heavy rain.

You don’t give him a chance to put the van into park before you’re pushing out the front door, bell chimes fading with the roar of the rain. Running through the downpour to reach his passenger side, and panting slightly when you wrench the door open to haul yourself inside.

It smells just like you remember, and the sense of peaceful relief that washes over you at the familiar scent of air freshener and faded cigarettes is gone as soon as your eyes cast upon him when you shut the door behind you. The Black Sabbath cassette playing drowns out in your ears at the sight of him, hair just slightly damp, raindrops on the leather of his jacket. Dark hair framing the dark eyes that look at you in a way that was almost too intense to fully distinguish what emotion swirled there, and for the first few moments, you’re both struck by silence.

There’s so much to say, and yet you can’t think of a single word. You had never thought you’d get to be this way with him, so closed off and yet yearning to tell him everything. Knowing far too much about each other, perhaps more than anyone else, and yet just as lost in this uncertain place, strangers to what you had become.

You weren’t even friends anymore, were you? But, he had shown up for you.

And he looked just as terrified as you felt.

You should say something. Anything—

“I guess I shoulda’ got out with an umbrella to get you,” he starts, clearing his throat awkwardly. “You’re, uh, soaked.”

Looking down at your wet clothes, you shake your head, “I got caught in the rain when I was walking to the diner from my car, so… it wouldn’t have changed anything.”

“Oh…” and the silence settles in again. Tense and just as terrible as the swirling grief in your soul at sitting here again, with him. Pain seeping into your heart with the sight of him, with how he was just the same as he ever was, and yet you both felt so different, now.

Once upon a time, talking to Eddie had been as easy as breathing. He used to run his mouth all the time, but right now he’s silent as he pulls out of the diner’s parking lot. With each passing second, you feel the cracks in your heart spread, canyons in their wake with the unexplainable heartbreak that was your complete inability to find the words to say, because what was there to possibly say?

I’m still just as angry as the day you left me? I’d really like it if you gave back the pieces of my soul that remained with you? I wish I could force myself to stop loving you?

You would die first, before a single admission of the truth consuming you passed your lips.

And, so, you sat in silence.

A shiver creeps up your spine, wet clothes allowing the cool air from the A/C to seep into your bones far easier than it would have otherwise, and you draw your arms around yourself. Eddie notices, reaching to turn the air down with a sharp jerk of the dial from cool blue to the warm red, sparing a glance in your direction before his eyes are glued back to the road. Hands planted to the steering wheel, he’s just as stiff as if this were his driver’s test all over again.

He should say something. Say something, damn it!

“You, um,” you blurt out, before trying to collect your jumbled thoughts. They come out just as uncomfortable as you feel, “I’m sorry about this, Eddie… I know you probably have a million other things you’d rather be doing tonight than driving out this late to save my ass…” Your chuckle is forced, and it sounds like it, even to you, “But, uh, it’s real decent of you, you know? So… Thank you… You really didn’t have to come get me. I appreciate it.”

He scoffs, almost like he’s annoyed, “Of course I did.”

“Huh?”

“I wasn’t gonna’ just leave you stranded like that, so of course I had to,” he stops at a red light, casting his dark eyes back to you like it should be obvious. Like he’s offended you would think any less of him. Like it hurt for you to act like he would treat you that way.

“Oh…” you murmur softly, trying not to read into his words. You’re desperately trying to hold yourself together as it is, and the agonizing joy at seeing him again churned with the grief until your whole mind was so muddled that you don’t know quite what to make of him right now.

The light turns green, and his eyes are back on the road before you can dive too deeply into them. Fighting the dwelling silence is an uphill battle, because it’s too easy to just ride this out in silence. You don’t want to do that, though. You don’t want to take the easy way out.

You’ve missed him so much. You’ve missed your best friend, and even if it tears you apart, you wish that some part of yourselves could be like that again. Even if you were left spending the rest of your life wishing for something more, if this is to be it between you, you can’t have your last memory of him be on bad terms.

Friends tastes bittersweet on your tongue, but you would like to be his friend again, at the very least. Perhaps you could get to that place, after the time that’s passed. It’s a hopeful lie to tell yourself, but your wretched heart clings to it regardless.

Giving up is easier than trying, but you always were a fighter, “How’s your uncle?”

“He’s alright, I guess,” is all you get from him, and you can’t help the way it deflates you into the seat beside him.

Coaxing him into conversation is easier said than done, but at the risk of annoying him, you try again, “That’s good. I haven’t seen him since… well, a while… so it’s good to hear he’s alright.” God, you sound absolutely dumb right now, but you can’t stop. Desperate to fill the silence in some way, to urge him into talking with you again. “My, um, mom isn’t doing so great… You know how she was sick… Well, it’s only getting worse, I guess. She’s had to go to the hospital a couple times…”

The car is blowing hot air by the time he looks back to you, defrosting the chill in your bones more than his awkward, “I’m sorry to hear that,” ever could.

Still, you blunder on, “It’s why I’m back here… in Hawkins, I mean. Yeah, I did my first semester and then crap hit the fan, like it always does. I had to transfer to the community college, because I have to be close enough to home to help out my mom right now… so… I’m staying here again.”

“Oh…” Eddie breathes, and you think that’s all you’re going to get, until he shifts in his seat, fingers flexing on the steering wheel, “I didn’t know you were back in town, until you called.”

“Yeah… I guess there’s no reason you would’ve… I’m usually going between work, home, and school, so…” glancing out the window, you sigh, fidgeting with the hem of your wet shirt as you try to think of something else to say, growing frustrated at how hard it was to get him to engage in the conversation. “Oh! I saw Jeff, though. At work. He came in to get some horror flick, like a month ago.”

Eddie bites around a forced smile, sounding more than a little annoyed, “Jeff saw you? It must’ve just slipped his mind to tell me.” His fingers tap against the steering wheel, like he was trying to redirect the anxious energy anywhere other than his voice, but he sounds strained anyway.

You murmur under your breath, “He probably didn’t want to upset you…”

But he catches it anyway, eyes snapping towards you as his breaks hit hard at a stop sign, “Why would it upset me?”

You can’t help your own annoyance from seeping into your tone when you huff, “Well, we didn’t exactly leave off with hugs and kisses, Eddie…” He’s struck back into silence at that, and you mentally kick yourself for letting your bitterness seep through. Sighing, you apologize, “I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have said that.”

“No, you’re right.”

You want to say more, but before you can, you realize he’s pulling into your mom’s driveway. Pushing the gear into park, you sit there for a second, before glancing from the rainy view of your house to the man beside you. He stares straight ahead, fingers tapping on the steering wheel still.

“Thank you, really, Eddie,” you begin, licking your lips as you try to muster the courage to ask him what you want to. It takes a moment, but you get there, “If you want, sometime we should meet up, you know?” Eddie chews the inside of his cheek as he keeps his eyes on your house, but you’re determined to get through it. You’d hate yourself if you didn’t take the chance, “Like old times… back when we were friends, you know? We should catch up, or something… Honestly, I… I wouldn’t mind being your friend again.”

Your heart beats so fast that you’re certain not even the best drummer in the world could compete with it. Thrumming in your ears, you grip your bag, waiting for a response. Anything, from him, but he just sits in silence, looking out the front windshield towards your house.

“Eddie?” you call his name, almost begging for him to speak. Look at you. Something.

But as another beat passes, it’s clear you’re not going to get it from him. Hurt, red-hot anger washes over you then, because who does he think he is to treat you like this?

What had you ever done to him to deserve it?

“Actually, just, forget it,” you hear the way your voice chokes off in your throat, feeling the burning behind your nose, but you’re determined not to cry. Not this time. “I don’t know why I even bothered to try to fix things between us. You clearly don’t care anything about me, but what else is new? You don’t even want to be my friend. I get it. Fine. Whatever.” Pushing open the door, you hop out into the rain, feet hitting the gravel driveway. Fueled with all the anguish you can muster when you call back at him, “Don’t worry, Munson, I won’t bother you ever again! Have a nice life.”

Slamming the door, you could scream, but you push yourself towards the house. You can’t fall apart, not yet. Not until you were inside. Not until he couldn’t see you—

You’re halfway up the driveway when you hear the sound of his door opening through the rain, feet hitting against gravel as he shouts your name. You ignore him. You can’t do this anymore. It hurt too much. Whatever had happened between you was too hard for you to try to unravel anymore, and you were done begging him to care about you.

But he keeps calling your name, and you’re practically running from him by the time your feet hit your front porch, only for a hand to catch you by your arm, turning you so quickly that you nearly slip down on the wet concrete. He’s steady, though, pushing you against the wooden column of the awning and breathing heavily down at you.

Eddie’s just as soaked as you are now, rain dripping down his hair and off his nose, parted lips and angry eyes glaring right back at your own when he says, “Won’t you wait, for just a damn second?”

“What?” you bite back, unable to help it.

His voice sounds just as desperate as you feel, but his words cut through you just like they did last summer, “I don’t want to be your friend. I can’t ever just be your friend—”

“Why do you hate me, Eddie?” you can’t stop yourself, sniffing back the burning urge to cry with the distress of it, “I don’t know what I did to make you to hate me so much—”

“I don’t hate you— I could never hate you!” there’s a rising panic in his voice, as you shake your head at him. Fingertips digging into your arm, his touch burns, but you don’t try to pull away. You couldn’t if you tried. You don’t have the willpower to move from this spot, with how your heart has melted into the ground.

Your voice rises with his, until you’re both shouting over the rain and the roar of your heart in your ears, “You do! Eddie, you do! I see it— You can barely look at me, let alone talk to me—”

“I love you!” he shouts, like it hurts him to say it, or maybe it hurts him to hear you think otherwise, because when he says it again, it’s a whimper of all the regrets he’s carried since the break-up, “I love you, damn it! I don’t hate you— You could run me over with my van right now and I still wouldn’t be able to hate you! I can’t be your friend because I’m in love with you!”

You’re left slack-jawed for all the time it takes for the rage to boil up, and now tears are brimming at your eyes, when you shove him away, “Don’t you dare mess with me right now, Munson! That’s a sick joke after everything—”

“I’m not joking—!” he regains the ground just as quickly, hands coming to your arms as if he can soothe you somehow. Like a simple touch can solve how broken he’s made you.

“If you love me, why did you break up with me?!” you’re screaming now, but you don’t care. Tears are streaming down your cheeks, and you can’t stop them, because you’re so overwhelmingly confused by him that you don’t know which way is up anymore.

“I messed up, okay!” he shouts back at you, his own tears brimming in his eyes, until he backs away to bring one ringed hand up to press his index and thumb against his eyes, wiping the water and tears away. “I fucked everything up last summer, because I was scared!”

Your fists clench at your sides as you lean against the column, watching him until he looks back to you, “You were… scared?”

“I was so sure I was gonna’ graduate with you last year. We were gonna’ finally get the hell out of this town,” he gasps out a bitter chuckle, gesturing widely with his arms, “and then Mrs. O’Donnell’s bullshit class just screwed me over again! I had to watch you walk that stage without me, right beside Steve The Hair Harrington, who is apparently your best buddy now—!”

“We work toge—”

“---and you were going all the way to Indiana State! You didn’t need me to be dragging you down here every couple of weeks, and what if you met someone there? I couldn’t handle it if we just grew apart because of the distance and some,” he grits his teeth, stepping towards you, “some random college guy… So maybe I self-destructed!” Eddie swallows hard, struggling to get out the rest, “I didn’t know what to do, so I… I ran away.”

“You…” you breathe, trying to remain calm, but the outrageous edge to your voice gives how upset you are away, “You broke up with me, because it was easier than us putting in the work?!”

“No,” he steps closer, staring at you with such a grief-stricken intensity that it takes your breath away, “I broke up with you, because if I was gonna’ lose you anyway, I wanted to lose you on my terms, but all I wound up doing was ruining my life, and hurting you, like the stupid son of a bitch I am.” His voice breaks, when he continues, “I thought you would be better off without me. That you’d move on and forget about me, or something… but when you told me you loved me that day at my house, I almost couldn’t do it. I thought,” he clears his throat, “I thought that I wasn’t being selfish by letting you go, but I know that’s a lie. I was only trying to save myself the pain of losing you, but that clearly didn’t work out, ‘cause I haven’t gone a single day since without missing you.”

You’re so mad at him, but the pieces of you that would always love him— that are still in love with him— keep you quiet. He was rambling his heart out to you after so long of you wishing he would just speak to you, tell you what’s wrong, and now he was. You still remembered what he’d said to you the day he broke your heart, though, and he had been far too convincing for his words now to mend your worried heart this easily.

“When you called me tonight, I… I didn’t know what to say, or do. I don’t know how to fix this after how badly I’ve messed everything up,” Eddie brushes his tears away again, huffing out the anguished sound of your name, “I don’t blame you if you hate me after all this. You were supposed to be my girl, and— I treated you wrong. I’m so sorry.” Pushing back his hair, he looks out past the pouring rain, towards the van’s headlights, voice catching in his throat before he takes a breath, “I wish I could go back to that night and take every stupid thing I said back. I wasted so much time that I could’ve spent loving you being terrified of the way you make me feel.” His lip quivers as he tries to breathe steady to no avail, “I should’ve been here for you. Shit! I didn’t even know about your mom, for God’s sake—!”

He’s crying too much to stop it when his dark eyes look back at you, unable to keep the redness from his cheeks any longer, or the tears from falling, despite how he tries to push them from his jaw, “I’ve missed you so bad. You are— you were my best friend, and now I really have lost you.”

Trying to breathe steady is as much a struggle for you as it seems to be for him, but you carefully construct the words on your tongue, “You told me you didn’t love me.”

“I lied,” it comes out broken, in as much anguish as you’ve been these past months. “I was so fucking stupid—”

“You’re not stupid, Eddie,” he watches you carefully as you move towards him, close enough that you can reach up, brushing your hand against his jaw to wipe the tears trailing there with your thumb. “You just overthink everything, and it’s something I’ve always loved about you, even when it backfires.“

“Well, boy, did it backfire, this time,” it’s a dry joke, and a weak smile that he forces at the corner of his lips as he leans into your touch. His fingers come to rest along your shoulder, sloping up your throat as you tilt your head into his warmth. A shuddering breath falls from him when you drag his lips down to yours by the grip you take up on his leather jacket.

He kisses you like not a day has passed, as if the burden of your heavy hearts weren’t weighing you down this very instant, but there’s an edge to it. Some desperation to the way you cling to one another after everything that’s been said and done. Fingers catching in his wet hair, you drag him as close as possible, but even that doesn’t seem enough. You don’t care if he can tell how terrified you are, so scared that the moment you release him he’ll leave again. That all this won’t be real again.

But his hands on your skin are warm, and just as real as he’s ever been. Tilting your jaw into his kiss as his lips move feverishly against your own. If your neighbors were to look out their windows, they’d be shocked to see you and Eddie Munson making out on your front porch at nearly twelve in the morning, but you don’t care who sees. You never have.

You don’t care if the whole world knows how in love with him you are. All that matters is if he knows it.

And you desperately want to believe that he loves you, too. Eddie could break your heart all over again, if it meant he truly loved you for even this moment.

His lips part from yours, breathing against them, so low that if you weren’t so close he would’ve been drowned out by the rain, “Can you ever forgive me?” Blinking up at him, you watch the way the night’s shadows cast along the worried lines of his face with the headlights that still shine on the both of you from the driveway.

“Only if you promise to tell me you love me again.”

“I’ll tell you I love you as many times as you like,” he smiles softly, leaning in to kiss you once more, shorter this time. “I love you. I’m so sorry I ever told you anything different.”

“I love you, too, Eddie,” you hum, “but if you’re coming inside, you better go turn off your van’s headlights before the battery dies.”

He grins this time, one of those wide ones that had always made your heart swell to see, “I’d better go do that, then.” Instead, he takes another moment to kiss you again, before letting you go to jog across the gravel driveway through the rain to his van. Your key’s hit the lock of the front door by the time the lights go out, and he’s jogging back your way when you open it.

Reaching out to him, he takes your hand, and you intertwine your fingers against the silver bands of his rings to drag him into your house, “I missed you, too, you know.”

Eddie follows you, and you have a hunch he’d follow you anywhere, “I got a lot of time I gotta’ make up for.”

You chuckle when he kicks the door closed behind him, locking it, “You can start by telling me you love me again.”

“Like I said, sweetheart, as many times as you like—”

#eddie munson fanfic #stranger things fanfic #stranger things female reader insert #female reader insert #fanfiction #author meg #fanfic by me #newstuff female reader insert

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thranduilsperkybutt · 2 years

Photo

♪ gentle with me ♪

Pic sources: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4

Pairings: Eddie Munson/Reader

Warnings: MAJOR SEASON 4 VOLUME 2 SPOILERS; NSFW; smut; fluff; mild angst (because this is a fix-it fic); oral; minor cock-warming I guess; mentions of canon-typical events and injuries; overcoming everything together

Word Count: 6,505 words

Reader Gender: Female

Author: Meg

Summary: He tells me, he’s gentle when he wants to be, so I think he wants to be gentle with me. Moving on in a town like Hawkins after everything that’s happened isn’t easy, but you’ll do it together.

A/N: I’m begging y’all to go listen to Touch Tank by Quinnie and then get back to me, because...

Collapsing into the bed, you let yourself melt into the beige and blues of his quilt. There’s a relief that comes with the scent of him that lingers on the sheets still, and at this point, you don’t care about the hint of smoke that had settled there. Wind whirring from the air conditioner set in his window, you let yourself relax there in the warm summer evening.

Two months ago, you would’ve ragged on Eddie for how rarely he washed his sheets. Now, though, with how completely the scent of him had managed to cling to them, even when he hadn’t, you would never complain about it again. The thought of his scent fading, his presence disappearing, had been one of the hardest realizations you’ve had to come to in your life.

You weren’t taking this feeling for granted ever again.

The pillow is soft beneath your head, as you hug it to your body and listen to the sound of the bathroom door opening. Kicking your Sunday flats off the edge of the bed, you’re content enough that you’re certain it could take you only minutes to fall asleep, but the sounds coming from the hallway hold your attention. Boots on the linoleum floor of the trailer, walking down the short hallway from the bathroom to fade on the living room carpet, before turning abruptly upon the discovery that the object of his search was no longer sitting on the couch, where he had left you.

There was still peeled paint and rotten wood in the ceiling of the living room that needed repairing, but as much as his uncle complained about it, you were happy that this was all there was to worry about. After everything, a little home maintenance was something you could all deal with.

“Sweetheart?” comes the familiar voice, and you sigh lightly into the pillow as you hear Eddie coming down the hallway, back towards his bedroom, searching for you. “Where’d you go and sneak off to, huh?” A ringed hand grabs the frame of the open doorway when he pokes his head into his bedroom, grin dawning at the sight of you, “There you are.”

“You found me,” turning from your stomach to your side, you watch him toss the balled-up Tigers Green graduation gown he’d been carrying over the back of the chair beside his desk. He’s about as dressed up as you’ve ever seen him, in that blue button-down that he never really wore, save for today. The tie his uncle had insisted he wear was already halfway undone around his neck, and his fingers reach up to strip it the rest of the way off as he comes closer towards the bed, depositing it on the mismatched nightstand atop the stack of automotive and heavy metal magazines there.

“I found you,” Eddie chuckles as he lifts his knee up, wallet chain jingling on his jeans, in order to dip himself into the bed. Leaning over you, he takes the advantage he has to catch the side of your face, your temple, your jaw in his playful kisses, and you dissolve into giggles as you let him push you onto your back. The hand he doesn’t use to attempt to hold you still by your waist catches the crown of his graduation cap, preventing it from falling off when you drag him down to kiss you properly with the guiding touch you leave at his neck.

He has a small scar there, puckered beneath the skin of your right hand, and you know it’s only one of the reminders of how close you’d come to losing him two months ago. You feel as much as you taste the hum in his throat, as he deepens the kiss into a languid, indulgent thing that only further reminds you how lucky you were to have him here, now.

Eddie’s smiling, when he raises his head just enough to look down at you with his big brown eyes, and you think he looks really, truly happy, when he teases, “How’s it feel to have an educated man as your boyfriend, huh?”

You grasp at the linen button-up along his shoulders, dragging him back down to your lips by the fabric, “Better than I could’ve ever guessed.” A muffled laugh escapes against your lips from his, and you won’t dare let the thought of how close you’d come to losing him taint this moment.

The truth was, you’d come far too close for comfort.

Thank God that you’d been a lifeguard briefly during that summer between sophomore and junior year, and thank Steve Harrington for arriving with Nancy and Robin when he did, just in the nick of time before you reached the peak of your exhaustion from trying to desperately resuscitate the only man you’ve ever truly loved. At the end of the day, though, Eddie was still a miracle to be alive, because you had lost him that night.

He had died in Dustin Henderson’s arms, by any medical standard.

The threat of any potential arrest warrant was the least of your worries when Nancy had driven the lot of you to the hospital in that stolen Winnebago, you and Steve taking turns trying to resuscitate Eddie on the floor of it. The pulse you’d gotten back had been weak and thready, but it was there, and that was enough for you to hold out hope when you finally got Eddie to the hospital. He’d been unconscious, but he’d been alive.

At that point in time, you’d had no idea what had happened with Max. It was all so chaotic, and in those first few days afterwards, you had really thought Eddie was going to die. Even if he did survive, by that time there were a set of handcuffs waiting for him, considering that he was still the prime suspect in three recent murders.

If it weren’t for Chief Hopper coming back to Hawkins when he had, you’re certain Eddie would be behind bars today, instead of walking his graduation stage. The story Hopper cooked up with the rest of you to exonerate Eddie and explain, for the most part, what had happened to Chrissy and the others, was one you couldn’t have come up with on your own.

You wished you could say you regretted pinning it all on Jason Carver, but after hearing what he did to Lucas and Erica, you had no room left to pity the boy.

As far as Hawkins was concerned, Jason killed his girlfriend in a fit of jealousy, and pinned the whole thing on Eddie when he had escaped him that night. According to the story Hopper invented, he killed Fred when he found evidence at the trailer that could place Jason there, and went on to murder his friend, Patrick, when he had also discovered the truth. It was a more palatable lie than cult rituals, at least now that the whole group of you were speaking out in Eddie’s defense, and with the story being delivered from the mouth of their returned heroic police chief, who in town could disagree?

Besides, the alleged earthquakes which had ravaged the town in those early days were worrisome enough, and maybe that was the only thing you could be grateful to them for, because it was the distraction you desperately needed in order to clear Eddie’s name.

There were probably still some people who doubted the story, but they’d either left with the majority of those fleeing the disaster, or kept quiet out of uncertainty. As far as the official story went, Eddie had been set to be Justin’s last victim, and he would have achieved that goal if he hadn’t been killed by the earthquake. Hopper’s story left no room for justice to be served, but it saved Eddie, and for that you’d always be grateful.

The truth was something only a few of you would ever know, but as far as you were concerned, it ceased to matter at all the moment Eddie recovered enough to finally wake from the induced coma he’d been put under during his fragile recovery in the hospital. You’re sure you must’ve been quite the terrible sight, with the worried exhaustion that had practically defined every day you’d spent at his bedside, but you’ll never forget the way he had smiled at you that day in spite of it, like he was genuinely happy to see you.

You definitely won’t forget how hoarse his voice had sounded, when he’d spoken for the first time since saying his good-byes to you and Dustin in the Upside Down, “I figured I wouldn’t make it to heaven.”

The sob you had let out at his sorry attempt at humor being the first thing he’d said to you had only tempered any possible anger you could have ever felt at him for it, too consumed with the relief of his improving condition to rightly care. It had taken weeks for his wounds to heal enough for him to be safely discharged from the hospital, and it would take even longer for the scars against his skin to fade from their pink hue to something less noticeable.

They would always be there, though, his battle scars.

“What are you thinking about?” Eddie murmurs against your lips curiously, grounding you back to this earth with the feeling of his hands on your hips, and the quirk of his smile. “Where did you go to, just now?”

Your breath shakes, as you choose to say something adjacent to the truth, “Just, how proud I am of you.” Eyes trailing down his jaw, resting upon the scar at his throat, you continue, “You’re my hero, you know that?”

“For what? Actually going through with flipping the bird at Principal Higgins, like I said I would?” he tilts his head at you, watching you with genuine interest behind his veil of mirth. He’d always been able to read you too well; it was foolish to think you could keep the shadow of your memories from him.

“That, too,” trailing your fingers down his chest, you’ve barely talked about the aftermath of that day he’d almost died. Telling him about how the fear of it had run so deep that it had set your entire being alight with the terrible understanding of just how quickly you could lose him was almost as hard as realizing it had been. Any spats you’ve ever had in the past seemed trivial in comparison, and you hate to admit that almost losing him was the wake-up call you needed to ever truly appreciate how deeply you were in love with him, but it was.

“C’mon, don’t keep me in suspense,” he calls down at you, taking your hand in his to drag his lips along your knuckles with a raised brow, silver rings glinting in the evening sun that streams through his window.

“Do you remember when we first met?” you start, and he hums in acknowledgement. “I was walking through the cafeteria and I tripped down—”

“You were literally covered in chocolate milk? Yeah, I remember,” his chuckle comes easily at the memory. “Admittedly, at first, I thought it was kind of funny, but you looked so upset when everyone started laughing.”

“I was upset, but you— you went out of your way to fall down beside me, making an even bigger mess with your own drink…”

“Mhm, it took me hours to get those Dr. Pepper stains outta’ my shirt,” he was looking at you like he didn’t quite understand the significance of what he’d done, since the moment you met him. Shrugging, “What can I say? Those floors get slippery.”

“It’s not that, Eddie,” reaching up, you brush his hair from his cheek, only for more of it to fall over his shoulder, veiling the two of you, “You made a fool of yourself, just so I wouldn’t have to be laughed at alone. I think, really, I’ve loved you since the moment you helped me up off that floor. You made everything seem alright.”

“Jeez, since all the way back then?” he murmurs in nearly a whisper at your confession.

You nod, “Yeah, Eddie… You were always my hero, you know… You didn’t have to do what you did in the Upside Down to prove anything to anyone, because anyone who’s around you long enough will know it, too.” There’s a shake in the breath you take, and you hope he can see just how special he is, “What Dustin told your uncle that day we got you to the hospital, when none of us knew if you were gonna’ make it or not? He’s right about it. Anyone who ever bothers to get to know you will love you, Eddie Munson.”

His eyes soften at your words, thumbing his hand along your jaw, “I didn’t mean to scare you guys so bad, you know. I just… I didn’t want those bats coming through the gate and getting a hold of you and Dustin.”

Shutting your eyes, you try to swallow down the emotion that threatens to make your voice shake, resulting in your own low whisper in your attempt at keeping yourself from falling to pieces in his arms just from the memory of it, “We almost lost you, Eddie. I almost lost you—”

“Yeah, I know,” the low rumble of his voice serves to soothe your heavy soul bit by bit, aided by the balming touch of his thumb rubbing soft circles against your cheek, “but I’m here now. I’m not going anywhere, right? Hey, look at me,” when you do as he says, you see the intense promise in his eyes. “I’m not going anywhere.”

You hope it’s true, that maybe you won’t live a day of your life without him, but the doubt lingers, “You can’t possibly know that, Eddie…”

A quick huff of air passes his lips, as he looks down to yours, breaking into a smile, “Well, lucky for us, I still have eight of my nine lives left.”

“That isn’t funny,” you can’t help your giggles. He always had a way of lifting your spirits.

“But you’re laughing, aren’t you?” he reaches up to pull his green graduation cap from his head, discarding it in the space beside you with a flick of the gold tassel, “Besides, I already know I won’t need to use ‘em, not when I’ve got you by my side. You know, you’re kinda’ like my hero, now, too.”

“Really?”

“Of course,” Eddie’s fingers play in your hair, wrapping a strand around his index before it falls back to the skin of your neck. “Where would I be, without you?” You don’t dare answer his rhetorical question, but luckily he doesn’t give it long enough to hang in the air for you to truly dwell on the harrowing possibility of it, “The bad news, though, is that you’re stuck with me now, but the good news is, I love you, so I’m willing to make it less painful on you.”

The shuddering breath you take sends a shiver up your spine, but he grounds you, like he always does, as he sinks into your arms, “I’d never want it any other way, Eddie. You’re always so good to me.”

Hands tracing tenderly up your sides, he holds you to him when he buries his face in the side of your neck, laying words there that were just as delicate as your feelings for him, “Yeah, well, I can be gentle when I want to be.”

But it’s nothing new to you, that gentleness he speaks of. He’s been a gentle soul for as long as you’ve known him, beneath the jokes and the persona he’s built up as a façade to defend himself against the reality that comes with being a social outcast in a town like Hawkins.

The proof of it is in how intricately you’ve watched him set up campaign after campaign for the Hellfire Club, and the way you saw him sit on his bedroom floor as he sewed that old cut-up Dio t-shirt onto the back of his battle vest, tongue poking from his teeth like it usually does when he’s lost in concentration. His gentleness is evidenced in his process of bringing others under his wing, and all the protection he offered that he’d never had, in the hopes that high school could be something other than a hell for people like Dustin.

You haven’t had to feel alone, all because of him, and the softness with which he had allowed you to orbit around him these past couple years.

He was gentle in the way he had kissed you the very first time when you had gone to that drive-in movie that wound up being terrible, but would always hold a special place in your heart, because he’d finally plucked up the courage to tell you he liked you as more than a friend that night after driving you home. It’s how he kisses you now, like it was still the first time. Like every day that’s passed since then is just as fresh and new as the last.

Breath fans against your lips as his fingers creep beneath the fabric of the blue sundress that hikes up when you lift your leg to bring him closer, his touch slipping up the outside of your thigh. Pressing fingertips into your skin as he squeezes, but even that is gentle, like his tongue against yours.

He was warm, and despite the summer heat, you pull him closer, needing to be as close as two people could possibly be. Needing that feeling of him above you to somehow suppress the ache in your chest, throbbing with how hopelessly you’ve fallen, head over heels for him. How desperately you hope he realizes that.

The class of 1986 won’t ever know how much they never deserved him, but you know it. You’re acutely aware of how much you’ll never deserve him, and how eager he is to love you.

He deserves more than this town, and everything you have to give him. You wonder if he knows that the sun rises and sets on him for you, because I love you doesn’t feel like it explains the way you feel for him with quite a thorough enough accuracy.

Loving him was as easy as breathing, despite all his flaws, and all of your own. You wouldn’t change a minute of it, and not even the hard times could cast a shadow on all that was good when it came to him.

You like to think he knows. You hope he can tell by the way you kiss him, that he has you so perfectly wrapped around his fingers that you might as well be just another ring of his.

Those fingers that wrap around the swell of your hips, digging beneath the strap of your underwear on either side, starting to tug them down before you have a chance at protesting. You shift your hips, and he takes the opportunity to continue his journey, dragging his lips from yours to lay his mouth along your throat.

“Eddie,” you’re breathless already, and he’s barely got your panties to your knees. Trying your best to think with how he’s scrambled your mind, “Wayne’s gonna’ be back soon with supper—”

“Nah, we’ve got time,” his tongue is hot, just like the rest of him, as he kisses along your collarbone. “He’s gotta’ drive thirty minutes to the diner and back, at least. Besides,” inching his way down your body, he leans back, dangling your cotton panties off the end of his fingers triumphantly before letting them fall onto the bed, “I’ve been wanting to unwrap my graduation present since the minute I saw you in this dress, baby.”

The things he says always make you burn for him, so it’s no surprise you give into him once more, “I’ve just gotta’ be presentable enough to eat dinner with your uncle later.”

“‘Presentable,’” he huffs, pushing your knee to the side as his hand hikes the skirt of your dress around your waist. “Don’t worry. I won’t get you too messy.” Bending, his kiss-stained lips murmur against your inner thigh with a hint of sarcastic mischief, “I promise.”

Why don’t you believe him?

In all honesty, he could leave you in pieces, and you wouldn’t complain. There’s just something about how he takes you apart. Even when it’s a quick, desperate thing, it still makes you feel like the most important girl in the world, but when he touches you like this? With this slow meticulousness that he rarely reserves for anything other than the things he truly, deeply cares for?

It’s something else entirely.

The way he spreads you apart on his bed, parting your legs until he fits perfectly between them, you’ll never get tired of. Trailing his way down your thigh with open-mouthed kisses that you know will leave blemishes in their wake, he treats you like something delicate. Slender fingers caressing your skin, he takes his time to reach where you need him most, the tease of his lips setting your skin aflame with his every touch.

All you can think when he finally gets there, tongue flattening against your core to kiss through your wetness as he glances up at you, is how pretty he looks. With the way his sleeves are rolled up, you can see the dark etching of his tattoos along his forearm. His fist in the fabric of your dress holds you down from the urge to arch into his touch. Relaxing, he moves to brush his hair back before he splays his fingers over your abdomen, the chain on his wrist settling into your skin.

Brown eyes close when he hears you softly whimper at the feeling of his tongue at your clit, and he hums in turn, dragging your mind into the depths of the pleasure that he spreads between your thighs. The sound of his name as it falls from your lips is meant just for the two of you, dipped in all the intimate devastation of the lust he has drowned you in. Sinking further into it until it feels difficult to breathe, like the air’s gone thin around you, but you know that can’t be the case.

It’s him, that’s made you feel this way. Utterly enraptured by the lull of his tongue against you, pressing firm as he laps at your skin like loving you is the only thing he was ever made to do. Your fists catch at the quilt, squirming beneath the sensitive touches he directs you with.

He’s a quick learner when he wants to be, and just like that time he’d learned to play Master of Puppets in three weeks flat, he’d learned your body in no time at all. After all this time, he knows how to touch you to set you on edge, but when he sinks his fingers into you, you gasp like it surprises you anyway.

His smile spreads with your arousal, desire evident in the heavy way he blinks up at you when you arch into his touch. Curling his fingertips into the drag of skin on skin, he fills you up to the knuckle before retreating. Wrenching the moan you pitifully try to muffle with the back of your hand, Eddie hums a dissatisfied sound.

Lifting his head, “No, let me hear you, sweetheart. I want to hear.” The low rasp to his voice only serves to make you even more lightheaded, as you pull your hand away from your mouth, “You look so pretty like this. You should wear dresses more often, I think.” You clench down on the repetitive drag of his fingers within you, and Eddie groans, “You drive me crazy, y’know that?”

Dipping his head, he returns to his efforts at entirely destroying you, and you can’t stop yourself from reaching to bury your fingers into the mess of hair along his scalp, “Yes, Eddie— me, too. You drive me crazy, too.” You try not to tug, but when he moans against you, sparking pleasure at his fingertips, you can’t help it. The hand he isn’t using to steadily finger you catches at your forearm, squeezing gently as his head bobs slightly.

You weren’t going to last at this rate, not when he’s so tenderly stoked the embers of your arousal into this all-consuming thing blazing through your veins. The thundering of your heart in your chest sounds off in your ears, and you were freely crying out in a way that you never would’ve done otherwise. All but begging him to keep going, you were falling to pieces on his tongue, in the safety of his arms.

You could spend the rest of your life like this with him, if it were possible. It’s the only place you want to ever exist, in these moments you spend with him.

There’s nothing but the two of you, as you crumble into the blinding nothingness that he leads you to. Toes curling with the hypersensitivity of his consistent pace, drawing out the feeling until it threatens to be too much for you, until you do tug at his hair, gasping on your fall back to earth.

He surges up your body before your consciousness can hit the ground, covering your open mouth with his while his fingers slow, pumping into you only a few more times for good measure before you’re whining into the kiss with how overstimulating it felt. You can taste yourself on his tongue, and when he leans back you see the evidence of your wetness glistened on his chin.

Wiping his jaw with one hand, he slips the other from inside of you, “That feel good?”

“Uh-huh,” you can barely speak, swallowing thick with the dryness in your throat as you watch him lift his fingers to see your wetness trail between his index and middle fingers.

“Yeah,” he chuckles, “sure looks like it to me.” You reach out, taking hold of his wrist to guide his fingers to your lips, relishing in the way he whimpers, “Oh, fuck,” as your tongue cleans him of you. “Please tell me you wanna’ keep going,” palming at the obvious erection in his jeans, he confesses, “or else I’m gonna’ have to handle this myself.”

You shoot him a shallow glare as you finish with his fingers, straining to reach the box of trojans he left on his nightstand, “If you don’t keep going, Eddie, I’m going to press charges—”

His laughter at your sarcastic joke dissolves into giggles when you all but dig into the box to grab a condom, as he hurries his hands at his belt buckle, “I wouldn’t be upset with you getting me in cuffs.” Tearing at the packaging, you watch him moan as he takes himself into his own hand, freed from the jeans and plaid boxers he’s pushed down just enough in his haste.

Propping yourself on your elbow, you offer him the condom, “Maybe next time, if you’re lucky.”

He takes it, humming as he rolls it down the length of his cock, “I always get lucky when it comes to you.” And anything you could possibly have shot back at him dies on your tongue when he positions himself against you, sinking into you slowly as you press your hand against his abdomen, hiking his shirt up. Catching sight of the scars on either side of his waist, is something you simply haven’t gotten used to yet, but they don’t make you desire him any less.

His mouth falls open, curses falling that are drenched in a sort of pleasure that was all his own, and you bite your bottom lip at the stretching fullness that he carves inside of you. No matter how wet you were, you’re glad that the condoms he uses are lubricated, because you need the extra help. His length would be past the point of comfort otherwise, as his hips press into yours, the feeling so oppressive that your breathing comes out shallowly.

You’re too consumed by him to speak clearly, let alone think, and the sounds he makes when he starts to move only further decimate any ounce of you that was left. It’s a slow pace that has you far too embarrassingly close to another release to admit, the feeling of his fingers digging into your thigh to settle you against his hips’ every thrust. It’s his words, though, that always strip you apart.

Eddie makes a mess of his pleasure, jumbled together with all the loose-tongued verbiage he can muster. It’s like his mind has no filter, when he gets like this. Any and every spontaneous thought escapes him, only to be lost among breathless whimpers and moans in a way that you’ve never witnessed from anyone else.

You can tell neither of you are bound to last long, when he chokes, “Oh, my god—” Reaching to press his hand against your stomach, thumb flexing to roll the nub of your clit above where he continuously buried himself deep within you, “Mmm, I love everything about you— Take me so god-damn well—”

“Eddie—” mewling into his touch, your eyes flutter shut as the curve of his length hits you perfectly. Fitting together into this cohesive unit of desire was something you have never become used to, just as needy for him as you ever were. “Like that— You’re doing so good—”

He needs you, too, and the way he nearly collapses over you, shifting his hips in order to drive you both through his steady pace only accentuates what you know in the deepest parts of your soul. The arm that isn’t between you snakes around your waist, urging your arch against him, holding you closer in order to slip himself into this pattern of torturously grinding against you between each thrust.

“Please,” he buries his face into your shoulder, begging for something and nothing at all. The sounds of your increasingly desperate love-making filling his bedroom and dragging you even closer to the edge, when his voice dips low in his throat and he murmurs, “You make me— ah,” his thought trails off into, “Don’t I take care of you so well? You— You’re mine, yeah—? My girl—”

And you’ll tell him anything he wants to hear at this point, dissolving into an agreeable mess that can do nothing more than repeat confirmations back at him and dig your fingernails into his back. Pure, unrestrained pleasure bubbles from his throat, chuckles sounding into your ear as his pace slips into something slightly quicker, and less intentional.

“Yeah, that’s right,” Eddie groans, voice hitching, when an edge laces his tone, “Oh, shit— fuck— I need you to cum. Are you gonna’ cum? Fuck me—” Dragging his teeth along your shoulder, he buries his moans there, and you nod your head as if he can see it, because honestly you’re barely thinking at all at this point.

It’s like your whole body has been turned to putty in his hands. He can remake you into whatever he pleases so long as his hips keep up this pace, and his fingers keep tenderly setting into motion your utter ruination.

The mess he makes of you is hardly one-sided, because almost as soon as you stumble into the peak of your pleasure, he follows you at the feeling. Swallowed up by the mind-numbing bliss that only he could invoke in you, lost in the sound of his voice in your ears, which is the single thing you manage to focus on in this moment— how pretty the sounds he makes are when he’s coming apart at the seams.

When he says your name, it’s hitched on the most painful-sounding whimper that you think you’ve ever heard, but it melts into a sound of satisfaction that eats at you from the inside out, burning you up with his hurried final thrusts. Melting into one another with the impact of it, until you’re both so tangled up in each other that separating is hardly an option.

“Jesus Christ,” he finally says, sighed against your jaw with exhaustion, “Talk about a graduation gift.” He laughs at his own jokes, chest shaking with yours, and you giggle with him in the aftermath of it. Stroking his back beneath the weight of him, and the overstimulated feeling that comes when he attempts to shift enough to slip from you, to no avail as a sensitive gasp comes from him, “I can’t— uh, I might have to just sit here for a second, to be honest.”

“That makes two of us,” you agree, turning your head to kiss him softly. You don’t mind laying in his arms, and as much as you’d told him not to make a mess of things, you honestly don’t care if you find out he has. If you looked every bit as wrecked by him as you felt, it’s still worth it to know what his answer will be when you say, “I love you, Eddie.”

“I love you so much, you don’t even know—”

“Tell me, then.”

He hums in thought, smile subduing into something more neutral as his eyes seem to look through you for the moment it takes him to decide on something, “I… was gonna’ do this in a better way, but…”

“Do what?” your interest is piqued, wondering just what this boy had up his sleeve.

Shifting his arms, he releases his hold on you just so he could bring his hands up to your face, looking down at you with a look of contentment that you don’t think you’ve seen before, “I wanna’ wake up to you every morning.” Your heart skips a beat, “These last couple months… they gave me some time to think. About everything. About us. I told myself that if I managed to graduate, I’d ask you…”

The words almost come out mute, but you ask, “Ask me what?”

“Like I said, I wanted to do it better than this,” he pauses, brow raising as he smiles a little wider, a nervous excitement settling into his voice, “but, I’m sick of wasting time.” Letting go of your face, he reaches onto his right hand, tugging the single ring there off to observe it between you, pinched between his index and thumb, “Now, this is just temporary, okay? I know it’s too big, but I’ll get you a proper one when I get the money for it,” and you think you’re hallucinating, losing your mind, imagining every second of this, because he can’t be possibly saying what you think he is, “I just love you, okay? And I’m tired of spending every day of my life knowing what I want, but being too scared to do anything about it.”

“Eddie…” you whisper, but he shakes his head at you, holding up a finger for you to wait.

Eddie takes a breath, “Life’s too short for me to not tell you all about how all I can think about is me coming home to you. You’re what I want, and I don’t care if it’s here, or anywhere else. As long as I’m with you, I know I’ll be happy, and I like to think that maybe you’d be, too.” You’re trembling, as he holds that too-big ring out to you that you can’t remember him ever not wearing, “Marry me. I know it’s a stupid idea, and I don’t have enough money for a place of my own, let alone a ring like the one you deserve, but tell me you’ll marry me anywa—”

He doesn’t get the chance to finish, with how quickly you throw your arms around his neck, pressing lips, teeth, tongue into his. He makes a surprised noise that morphs into a muffled chuckle, before kissing you back with just as much fervor. There are tears budding in your eyes, and you can barely breathe as you taste his own trembling joy. It’s enough to convince yourself that you’ve heard him right, and that his words were true.

Eddie Munson had just, in fact, asked you to marry him, and you wouldn’t care if it was with a piece of rope tied into a bow to place along your finger, you knew your answer either way.

You’re crying when you pull back for air, and his thumb wipes along the tears as he grips the ring in the palm of his hand, “I didn’t mean to make you cry—”

“No, it’s—”

“No?!”

“No, yes— Wait!” you struggle, forcing yourself to calm down with the deep breath you suck in, “Yes, I’ll marry you! I want to spend the rest of my life with you, Eddie. There’s nothing else I’d rather do.”

“Fuck, sweetheart,” he lets out a shaky breath, relief flooding his eyes, as his grin widens and he takes your hand in his, pushing the ring onto your thumb, “you had me scared for a second there.”

“I’m sorry,” you try to force your breathing to become even, but it’s in vain, so you simply confess, “Honestly, I’m freaking out a little bit.” The silver of the ring sits on your thumb, spread against his hand in yours, and you can’t help but to think that it’s the only ring you ever want.

“I did kinda’ spring it on you, huh?” squeezing your hand, he sounds jittery when he starts to ramble. “I saw a job hiring over at Thatcher Tire the other day. I’m thinking they’ll take me on, since I’ve spent so much time there fixing up the van, and it’s not like they have many options right now with everyone who ditched Hawkins, right? And then I’ll start saving for us. We’ll get us a little place of our own, so we don’t have to worry about my uncle when I make love to you every day, and—”

“Every day?” you can’t help the bark of a laugh that escapes you, and he purses his lips cheekily, placing quick pecks on your cheek.

“Every, single, day,” Eddie laughs, “and you’ll come to all my gigs—”

“I already come to all your gigs—”

“Well, yeah, but by then I’ll be able to point out to you in the crowd of five drunks, and dedicate a song to my wife,” and that makes you almost combust right then and there from the unbridled happiness thrumming away in your chest.

Dragging him down to your lips again, you can’t subdue your smile when you say it, “Your wife, huh?”

“Mhm,” his voice hums with his own excitement, “my wife.”

“I think I could get used to that.”

“I sure know I can,” being Eddie Munson’s wife had a nice ring to it, and you know that whatever comes, as long as you’re together, you’ll overcome it.

Maybe 1986 is turning out to be his year, after all.

#eddie munson fanfic #stranger things fanfic #stranger things female reader insert #female reader insert #fanfiction #fanfic by me #author meg #newstuff female reader insert #nsft #smut #spoilers #stranger things spoilers

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thranduilsperkybutt · 2 years

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Lamb Among Wolves ♠️ Part IV ; Wild Card

Photo sources: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8

| Part 3 | Part 5 (WIP) |

Imagine: Imagine owing mobster!Bucky a lot of money after your deadbeat brother bails with it, leaving you with his debt, and you offer yourself as payment that he is more than happy to collect himself.

Pairings: Mob!Bucky Barnes/Reader

Series Warnings: NSFW unprotected smut; phone smut; fantasy description & oral mention; teasing; dark!fic; dubcon themes; mobster/mafia AU; mentions of blood, guns, violence, murder, drugs, gambling, etc.; mentions of character injury which occurred in the previous part & IEDs; nightmares/trigger behaviors; not quite PTSD but it’s PTSDesque; brief mention of choking (not the sexy kind); it gets worse before it gets better but dont tell nobody mama aint never fed ya

Word Count: 22k words

Reader Gender: Female

Author: Meg

Summary: The stakes are higher than you could have ever known, and the comedown from the events leading up to now feels like it will kill you, if Bucky doesn’t first. Just when the numbness sets in, an unexpected and unwelcome visitor comes to call, bringing more trouble on the horizon.

A/N: This has taken a thousand years, I know. I’m sorry about that, but with the pandemic, it’s been very overwhelming. Either way, I hope you enjoy this part! Thank you all for hanging in there with me and sending such kind messages. This has not been proofread. I’ll do that later.

The smell of rubber burning is what you remember most. It stuck in your mind and clung to your memory as vividly as if you were still sitting there on cold concrete, watching the Jaguar burn in the sparking lamplight.

The heat had cast a sickening glow, slicing through the chilly air like a knife, and warming your face with a caress that was much too welcoming for the horror that played out before your eyes.

The wailing, you realized, was coming from you when the strong force of Sam’s hands on your shoulders kept you from scrambling up off the ground. If he hadn’t, you’re certain you would have attempted to run towards the burned, bloodied body of the boy resting on the sidewalk, regardless of the staggering vertigo that would have surely hit you far sooner than it did.

He’s only seventeen, you thought, over and over again, Peter’s only seventeen.

“Don’t look,” Sam ordered, voice tight and militant, but his hands were gentler than you would ever have thought them to be as he pulled you into his chest. You don’t know if he’d done it in an effort to keep you from escaping his grip, or if it was his attempt at calming you down, but his repeating of, “Just, don’t look,” hadn’t helped soothe your terror as much as he probably intended it to.

That was your blood still staining Sam’s shirt, you notice as your head throbs despite the medicine they’d given you for the pain. It’s the only part of you that doesn’t feel numb.

“The doctor thinks you might have a concussion, huh,” Sam’s voice carries in the small space of the curtained observation bay, accompanying the distant beeps and groans that define the emergency department’s sterile atmosphere. “At least that cut on your head wound up looking worse than it really was. Don’t think it’ll scar up too bad, since you only needed a couple stitches.”

Your hand reaches up instinctively, ghosting over the bandage on the side of your head. It was near your hairline, barely creeping down the northernmost edge of your forehead, and you know you must look as much the mess you felt right now.

Blood still stuck to the hairs there, though dried with the time that’s passed since your bleeding stopped. It all felt like a blur, though you’re certain that’s from the shock of it all. Fresher in your mind was the memory of the haze of fear that overcame you when the stitches were being placed, and the emergency doctor’s attempt at conversation throughout the process.

She’d talked about how your scar should mend into your scalp rather unnoticeably; that head wounds bleed more than in other places. There was an attempt at a joke at one point, about how this was why you and Sam looked like you had just walked off a horror movie.

You don’t think she was aware that you might as well have.

God, you need a shower, but the exhaustion that’s seeped into your bones with the tapering of whatever adrenaline remained in your bloodstream protested any thought that didn’t involve collapsing into your bed the first chance you got. Hell, you might could pass out right here, if your head wasn’t throbbing like this.

Sam hasn’t left you, not since you hit the pavement, except to have a hushed conversation beyond the range of your curtain with the physician. Whether it was due to some worry that if he left you unattended you would take the opportunity to tell the nearest medical professional in earshot everything you knew--- which was practically nothing--- or a genuine decency buried somewhere deep inside this man, you couldn’t figure out. You didn’t want to try. Your head hurts too much for complex thought, right now.

Even laying it down on the pillow makes you wince. You just want to go home. You want all this to be a bad dream that you can wake up from in the morning.

“Did you find out if they’re going to keep me overnight?”

“They aren’t. You get to go home,” he probably doesn’t mean it this way, but you can’t help to hear the, when Peter doesn’t, at the unspoken end of his sentence. Forcing your eyes away, you focus on the provided chair for visitors in the small space beside the bed, but you haven’t seen Sam sit down in it once. He just hovers around the part in the curtain, shifting his weight, sometimes moving beyond it. You wonder if he’s unable to sit down. If maybe he doesn’t, because the same nerves that were jittering under your skin had gotten under his, too. It’s about the only indication you get that he’s just as antsy for news as you are.

“I’m sorry,” you try to swallow it down, this feeling of dreadful worry. Focusing on the dark stain draping over the chest of his shirt. There’d be no getting it out; you’ve ruined it, “For bleeding on you.”

Sam stares at you for a moment, as if he can’t quite wrap his head around what you’re saying, until he scoffs, “Why are you apologizing for bleeding? Not like you could help it.”

Your mouth clamps shut at that, because silence is easier than trying to explain the habit that has followed you since childhood. You’re saved from needing to when Sam’s phone beeps. He reads the waiting text immediately, brows drawn together. Concern, in the way the endless abyss of his dark eyes seems to somehow widen, encapsulating his once-friendly posture with the stiffening cold within them.

“What is it?”

“You should rest. You’re pretty beat up.” Even his voice sounds tense.

“Sam,” your own shakes with the change in his mood, worry creeping up your throat, “is it Peter?”

This kid, he’s gotten under your skin. Or, maybe you’re too empathetic for your own good. Too soft, because you know what he is wrapped up in— has been wrapped up in, long before you ever entered the picture— but seeing that boy on that pavement had broken some small piece of you. No matter what life he chose, this was something you couldn’t believe anyone deserved. Let alone a boy with his whole life ahead of him.

You’re worried sick, and it only makes the sharp pain in your skull ring. Gritting your teeth, on the verge of praying for the pain pills to soon start kicking in.

“Look, you don’t need to get all worked up right now,” Sam’s voice is softer, undoubtedly with the pain he’s noticed along your face, but you cut him off with one last, pleading sound.

“Sam.”

He sighs deep, running his hand over the short crop of his hair, and relents much more easily to your pleading than a man like him probably should, “They’re taking the kid back to surgery.” Your breath catches in your throat, as Sam explains, “He’s bleeding, on the brain. They’re going to put in some kind of tube to help relieve the pressure.” None of that could be at all good, and your breath catches as he continues, “Steve went to go get Peter’s aunt.”

“Is he,” you dare the question, even though you know it’s a stupid one, despite how terribly hopeful you sound as you say it, “going to be okay?”

Sam’s eyes flicker with anticipatory grief, looking back to his phone when he clears the emotion from his throat, but you can still hear the lie there, “Of course, he’s gonna’. That kid? Knowing him he’ll probably be running circles around us all by next month.”

Fuck, Peter’s in bad shape. You have a sneaking suspicion that it’s even worse than what Sam will tell you. He’s minimizing whatever it is, maybe for your sake, maybe for his own. Maybe it’s too hard to say out loud, without bursting into a million pieces. Maybe it’s too much for even a big, bad mobster like him to fathom.

Or maybe it’s just none of your business.

The nurse pulling back the curtain breaks you from the verge of dissolving into tears, as she moves towards you with a stack of paper in hand, “Okay, so if you’ll just sign these, you’ll be good to go. Now, you’ll need to be watched for the next twenty-four hours, in case you get any worse. If you do get worse, you’ll need to come straight back to the Emergency Department, okay?”

“Watched?” you sit up, trying not to groan at the stiffness in your bruised bones, “I live alone---”

“That’s already handled,” Sam cuts in, drawing both yours and the nurse’s attention, as he addresses her with a smile that’s all assurances, but doesn’t meet his eye, “She’ll be well taken care of. Don’t you worry.”

“Alright then, sweetie,” the nurse smiles at you, flipping through the papers you return to her after signing them, separating the back pamphlet, “these are yours to take with you. There’s a list of symptoms to watch out for, a summary of your visit, and when you’ll need to go back to the doctor to get those stitches out.” You’re too busy dwelling on Sam’s assertion that you were going to be well taken care of to do anything but stare at the papers in your hands.

He makes up for your distant state when she passes him, “Thanks a lot.” Near asking him about it, you don’t get the chance when he offers you a wide, open palm to rise from the hospital bed with, “Come on, Bucky’s waiting for us upstairs.”

Right, Bucky.

There’s a clenching in your chest, which would be way too easy to blame on your currently injured state. It would be a lie, though, if you told yourself that this feeling wasn’t caused by the thought of seeing him again. The desire to do so. You haven’t seen him since he was pulled from your bedside by a rather determined nurse, intent on assessing him in his own designated trauma bed. His face had been bloody then, and as much as you wanted to not care, you hoped he was alright.

That was over two hours ago, and you don’t blame him for not returning to your bedside. You figured his prolonged absence was due to more important matters, upstairs.

Mainly, Peter.

Your suspicion is proven right, as you let Sam lead you up and down hallways, to an elevator, and beyond. Neuro Intensive Care Unit, sprawled in bold block-print on the sign pointing in the direction he walks down, glancing over his shoulder to make sure you were still keeping up with him. There’s a waiting room which catches Sam’s attention for the split-second it takes to note that noone recognizable sat among the sleeping, crying, or reading people within, and so he leads you further, until you reach a set of double-doors that require him to press a button on the wall in order to gain entry.

A quiet that was too peaceful for your raging soul seeps into every inch of the space beyond the locked double doors, broken only by the rhythmic beeping of monitors and airflow of ventilators. Lining the walls on either side of the nurse’s station Sam guides you to are glass doors leading into exposed rooms, the curtains hanging within them clearly only have been placed for a momentary privacy.

“Ma’am, I’m here for--- oh, there he is, nevermind,” Sam begins, and the nurse sitting beyond the desk nods as she registers the room you’re heading for.

He sits in an empty room, leant forward so that his hands could support the weight of his head as he rested his chin upon intertwined metal and flesh knuckles. The hospital bed was missing, you notice, as Sam ushers you forwards until the movement catches Barnes’ attention. From a distance, he had looked almost peaceful, or at least exhausted, but in the brief moment after his eyes landed on you, you knew that initial observation to be incorrect.

Glaring anger, worry, grief, and something almost hauntingly vacant swirled in the blues of his eyes. It’s replaced with something nearby relief almost as soon as you’ve noticed it, but just as quickly, that’s schooled into the unreadable mask of nothingness he loved to wear.

He’s cleaner, now, in regards to the blood that had once stained his cheekbones and jaw, but a hint of it crept against the collar at his throat. A bruise blossomed along his jaw, having the time to settle its pink threat beneath the hairs there, aside from which a few minor scratches trailed up over his left temple. Overall, he looks like he’s been in a fight, with the worst of his injuries being a cut against his forehead, secured with two butterfly-like strips of bandage. At least, from what you can spot at first glance.

Sam’s voice keeps you from freezing in the doorway under the weight of Bucky’s stare, “Hey, man.”

“There you are,” his voice is almost hoarse, but not quite, as he stands from the chair to make his way towards the two of you.

“Shit,” he sighs as he reaches up familiarly, catching your chin by the tips of his metal fingers, tilting your head to the side to get a good look at the bandage against your skull, “bet that smarts. They give you something for it?”

“They gave me some Tylenol. Apparently, it’s all I’m allowed to have,” you try not to sound too pitiful, but Bucky raises his brow regardless.

“Yeah,” he hums in a way that almost sounds sympathetic, “sounds about right for a concussion.” You don’t know why it surprises you that Sam’s apparently kept Bucky in the loop on your medical condition, with all that texting he’s been doing, but it does. Moreso, it surprises you that Bucky would want to know about it. Everything about this is surprising, down to the gentleness with which he smooths his hand along your jaw, and asks, “You hurtin’ too bad right now, doll? You should sit down.”

The flip of your stomach has you recoiling from his grip, away, to look at Sam in a way that you hope isn’t completely dominated by the embarrassment at Bucky’s open affection, “I’m fine, thanks.” Maybe it was a little clipped, your tone, but you don’t dwell on it in favor of trying to refocus on Sam. Anything other than your pendulum of consciousness, swinging from Bucky to Peter and back again.

Sam’s eyes are trained on Bucky, though, as he leans against the pane of the glass door, suggesting with a wave of his cell phone, “We should take this outside. Cap’s on his way up.”

When you look back to Bucky, you find his jaw’s set, agreeing, “That’s probably a good idea.”

It takes you halfway across the ICU to realize the dread mirrored in their posture is due to the fact that with Steve, would come Peter’s aunt.

And it’s all you can think of, by the time you’re standing in the waiting room with them. Who were you, to be here right now? To witness one of the worst moments in a person’s life?

A stranger is what you were, and the thought only makes you all the more guilty when the low back-and-forth conversation between Sam and Bucky trails off into low silence. The vision of a woman catches your eye, emerging from the extended hallway to march across the waiting room, towards your group, with Steve quick on her heels.

For an instant, you consider making your escape to the restroom on the other side of the waiting room, but you’re too frozen to even move.

She was strikingly beautiful, in a way that only became more distinguished with the years between her youth and older maturity. Brunette, donned in the pastel yellows of a coffee-stained, aproned uniform dress that came down to rest just above her knees. Her petite frame made her no less of the hurricane she was when she rears her hand back and slaps Bucky straight across the jaw so quickly that it knocks the breath out of even you with the pure shock of it.

Steve was quick, but not quick enough to stop her, “May---!” Steve tries to grab her by the shoulder, but she’s already too upset. Too easy to escape his first, initial grasp.

“You promised!” furious tears escaped her then, as Bucky caught her next swing, weak beats dissolving against his chest more feebly, but she continued her distraught accusations, “You promised to--- to look after him!”

“May,” his voice is tight, as he wrestles with little effort to pull her against him by his grip on her forearms, repeating the soft, near broken, plea of her name, “May---”

“Why didn’t you look after him?” and it’s not fair; it’s not something anyone can ever level on one person, but the words that spill from her mouth are wracked with sobs as she finally lets herself crumble into Bucky’s grip.

He holds her tight, and it’s the first time you’ve seen him close to tears as he clutches her to him, promising, “We’re gonna’ find who did it. Hear me? We’re gonna’ find them, May. I promise—”

All you can do is exist, stock-still, as the scene unfolds before you. Much the same as the few others who lingered around the edges of the waiting room, attention drawn when she pushes Bucky away roughly, and he lets her go just as quickly.

“Don’t you dare touch me right now, Barnes,” she sobs, all grief and anger, moving away until she collapses, exhausted, into a chair. “The last thing I need is more of your empty promises.”

Sam crouches down before her, watching her hands wipe at her eyes in an attempt to compose herself in vain, “May, listen, Peter’s got the best doctors money can buy.” She looks at him, weary through the veil of anguish that nearly consumes her, and he glances at Steve, “Steve, you already tell her everything?”

“Couldn’t really get down to specifics,” Steve rubs the back of his neck, stiff, as he catches May’s watery glare. He excuses his omission with, “You’ve been pretty upset since I told you what happened.”

She takes a deep breath, steadying herself, “Well, tell me everything. Now.”

Steve and Sam move back-and-forth between explaining the situation of what occurred outside Galereya Romanova to her in detail, and attempting to comfort her as best they can. Talking of Peter’s condition, you’re surprised to find, does not turn her into a mess of sobs again. Instead, she remains somewhat collected through the news of it all, and your eyes wander back to Bucky.

He wouldn’t look at her, fixated on the floor with his hands in fists at his sides, but anything else to suggest his emotional state was closed-off to you. A blank expression set upon his face, almost too calm for the detailing of Peter’s condition to his most beloved aunt. It looks as if he’s in another world, anywhere than right here, and your heart aches regardless of your better judgment.

It’s somewhere between Sam explaining the mild flash burns and Steve mentioning the broken ribs, that you move towards Bucky before you think better of it. Reaching out to brush the warm skin of his fingertips with yours in a way that you hope is at all comforting. Anything to pull him back from that haunting vacancy that’s overcome him. When his eyes cast upwards to find yours, they’re softer, if not minutely surprised, at the feeling of your fingers beside his own.

You’ve been through a lot tonight, and you’re too tired to think past the basest implication of what your hand reaching for his could mean.

Just this once, you can let whatever he’s done slide, because you need to feel okay in some small way, if it was at all possible. Any shred of comfort you could find, you were chasing right now. You know he needs it too, when his fingers flex, and he catches your hand with his own. Holding tight, as if you would disappear if he let go.

He looks like he’s going to speak, eyes searching yours for whatever there is that he needs to hear from you, but another, firm voice catches your attention with a call of, “Are Mister Parker’s family members in here?” A man in navy scrubs stands tall, glancing about the waiting room for the instant it takes to look up from the charting tablet he carried.

“Yes!” May all but leaps from the chair she’s in, Sam rising just as quickly, “I’m Peter’s aunt--- his legal guardian.” Her voice is rushed, in the same way that most people become when they’re on the verge of desperation. Sam and Steve flank her, as the doctor reaches to tug the scrub cap from his head.

“Ah, yes,” dark hair falls messily along his forehead, gray hair framing his cheekbones as he offers his hand for May to shake, “I’m Doctor Stephen Strange, your nephew’s neurosurgeon.” His arms cross in front of his chest, as he explains, “We’ve just finished in surgery, and you’ll be able to visit once he’s stabilized in Recovery. You are aware that your nephew had a subdural hematoma?”

“Um, yes, I’ve been told. There’s some kind of… tube you had to use?”

“Right, well, we had to go in, and place a Burr Hole in his cranium, along with a tube to drain the fluid, but it looks like most of the bleeding has stopped on its own, so that’s a good sign. We’ll keep him sedated and on the ventilator as the fluid continues to drain. He’ll be returned to the ICU after the recovery period is over. That should take a few hours,” the way he explains it is direct, as if he can’t quite figure a way to say it in layman’s terms or simply doesn’t care to, but May nods along regardless.

It’s Steve that asks directly, “You think he’s going to be okay?”

Dr. Strange’s attention slides towards the blonde, raising one eyebrow as if the answer should be obvious, “Brain injuries are somewhat unpredictable, so we’ll be watching and waiting to see how he progresses over the next several days. That said, if you’re asking for my professional opinion on his prognosis, I do think his chances are much improved with the drain placement than without it.”

An answer without an answer, and you’re certain Steve’s thinking the same thing with the way he smiles, dripping with sarcasm, “Thanks for your professional opinion, Doc.”

“Will I be told when I can go see him?” May fidgets with her apron when she’s worried, and her hands have balled into fists along the edges of the off-white fabric.

“I’m sure the nurse can help you with all that at the nurse’s station,” he gestures towards the double doors leading back into the ICU, before turning with a non-negotiable, “Now, please excuse me,” and briskly walking back down the hallway, probably towards the O.R. from whence he’d came.

Steve’s hand finds May’s shoulder comfortingly, ushering her towards the ICU, “Come on, we’ll go ask the nurse, okay?”

“Yeah,” May breathes, moving a few steps forward only to finally glance back at Bucky, and you feel his hand in yours clench ever so slightly. She looked hurt, but even more than that, she looked angry, with all the commanding authority of a mother in her tone as she said, “Barnes, you make this right.”

He doesn’t say a word, just stares back into the unspoken suggestion of her words. Giving a short nod, before she turns back to make her way towards the nurse’s station.

Even to your ears, her words had sounded like, “You make them pay for this.”

When he does speak, it’s to catch Steve with a call of his name, “I want extra security with the kid when we’re not here.”

“You read my mind, Buck,” Steve nods, reaching into his pocket to toss his car keys towards Sam, who catches them easily. “Sam, you need a change of clothes. It’ll take a while, handling stuff here, so you should take my car.”

Sam plucks at his shirt, scrutinizing it with a sigh as Steve follows after May beyond the double doors, “He’s right. This one’s history.” The urge to apologize again is quickly stamped out when Sam half-heartedly teases, pointing his finger at you, “You know, she apologized for bleeding on me? Who apologizes for bleeding?”

“You’re still on that? Excuse me for being polite. Won’t make that mistake again,” you defend as Sam’s eyes flick to where your hand rested in Bucky’s. It was stupid, to feel so self-conscious at your age, but you retrieve your hand, choosing instead to shove it into the pocket of your jacket, alongside the folded discharge papers you’ve tucked there.

The small quirk at the corner of Bucky’s lips appears for only an instant, yet doesn’t brighten his mood as he leans towards you, scrutinizing with only the barest hint at teasing, ”Maybe it’s that hit to your head.” His attention shifts to the bandage, then back to hold yours, “How ya’ feeling, doll?”

“Tired,” you admit, “sore, but my headache is a little better than it was.” Nodding towards the cut on his own forehead, “You?”

“I’ve had worse,” is all the answer he gives you, shrugging slightly, before his head turns towards Sam, “Give us a ride on your way?”

There’s no question, and you’re certain there’s only one answer, but Sam jokes anyway, “What? No, ‘please.’” Part of you is thankful for Sam’s attempts at lightening the overwhelming mood around you. It’s something you’re sure is for his own benefit, but the sliver of lighter conversation helps to soothe the worry in your own soul.

Bucky stares at him, deadpan for a moment, before dryly stating, “Sam,” like he doesn’t have the energy to banter with his friend right now.

Shaking his head, Sam calls your name, “You need less manners, he needs more.”

“Says the guy who won’t offer a ride before I have to ask,” Bucky starts, as if he can’t help himself, but any budding back-and-forth is soon stamped out when his attention catches beyond Sam, on two approaching figures. You can feel the tension rolling off him in waves, and when Sam catches sight of them, his demeanor changes as well.

A man and a woman approach the three of you with purpose, like they know who you are, but you’ve never seen either of them in your life. The man is older, dark-skinned, with a beard kept close to his chin, but even the simple suit he wore couldn’t hide the distinct impression that he was a threat. What’s jarring, though, is the eye-patch covering his left eye, and you have to force yourself to look away before you linger on it for an inappropriate amount of time.

The woman at his side wears dress slacks and a dress shirt, replacing the typical blazer that would accompany such an ensemble with a brown leather jacket that complimented her paler skin tone. It framed her shoulders in a way that suggested she was well-muscled beneath it, as blonde hair fell haphazardly from her ponytail against the sides of her jaw. Nowhere near as put-together as her male counterpart, but just as unnerving, because you make them for cops before they even open their mouths.

“Special Agent Nick Fury, FBI,” the man begins, reaching into the breast of his blazer to retrieve the badge he flashes at the three of you. “This is my partner, Agent Danvers,” he gestures to the woman, who flashes a similar badge with less enthusiasm. “Would you mind answering some questions regarding the explosion you were involved in earlier this---”

“I already told the cops everything that happened when they came through,” Bucky interrupts, tone solid, cold. Dismissing them with a shrug of his shoulders.

Sam chuckles dryly, “Don’t you guys compare notes?”

Agent Fury’s smile is tight, and his hands slip into his pockets, “We have reason to believe this bombing may be related to several others.” He speaks slowly, as he stares towards Bucky with an almost smug expression on his face, “Possibly even terrorism.”

“Unless you have a reason to believe someone would want to kill an upstanding businessman such as yourself, Mister Barnes,” Agent Danvers says it in an innocent enough tone, but your stomach drops at the sound of it. It was anything but an innocent question, that’s clear enough.

Bucky doesn’t bother looking at her, instead asking Fury, “Which department did you say you were from, again?”

“They didn’t say,” Sam crosses his arms.

“Criminal Response,” Danvers holds out a business card, and only then does Bucky glance at her. First her hand, then back to her face. He makes no move to take the card from her offering fingertips.

Sam takes it, scrutinizing the card as he comments, “If you think the bombs are terrorism, why isn’t counterterrorism standing where you are instead?”

“Possible terrorism,” Fury corrects, like the distinction is obvious, but you know a lie when you hear one, “but that’s still under investigation. What do you think is going on here, Mister Barnes?”

“It’s not really my job to figure out what’s goin’ on, is it? All I know is, my intern got seriously injured tonight,” comes, clipped, from Bucky. When Agent Fury’s uncovered eye casts his attention on you, Bucky clears his throat, “Look, Agents, now’s not really a good time. I’m still pretty shook up after everything, y’know. Maybe I’ll be more up to answering your questions at a later date.”

Trying your best not to visibly shrink under Agent Fury’s scrutiny, you know you’re not the poker player Bucky is. Before you think better of it, you murmur something about needing the restroom, and escape towards it before they can blink twice in your direction.

You were going to be sick.

The feds?

What were the feds doing here?

Bucky said he spoke to the cops, but you sure as hell hadn’t seen any of them since you’d been wheeled into the hospital. Would they come to ask you questions? It made sense, considering you were a witness, but what could you possibly say—?

Nothing, you’d say nothing, of course—

And you’re pushing a stall open, collapsing to your knees, dry-heaving into the toilet before you can continue that train of thought. Your head felt like it was going to explode, and you don’t know if it’s from the concussion or the borderline-hyperventilating state you’ve dissolved into in that brief moment it takes your stomach to realize there’s nothing there for it to expel.

Doing your best to collect yourself once the worst of it stops, you grip the stall door as the world spins ever so slightly, before leveling out again, and make your way to the sink to clean yourself up, even a little bit.

Harsh paper towels are all you have to work with, as you wash your face as tenderly as you can in the motion-activated tap, trying not to moan with the relief of the cool water on your overheated skin.

The sound of the bathroom door opening, and boots approaching the sink beside yours is what opens your eyes to the intrusive presence of the blonde federal agent— Danvers. You do your best not to tense up at her approach, as she leans towards the mirror to apply her chapstick.

Play it cool, play it cool, play it cool—

“You look pretty banged up, yourself,” she says, casting a sideways glance your way as you continue to drag the paper towel along your cheek.

“Wow, you sure know how to make a girl feel pretty,” you shoot back, hoping in vain your standoffishness would be enough to have her leave you alone, but she just cracks a smile.

The bathroom door opens again, just enough for you to hear Sam’s voice call your name, “You almost done in there?” There’s an edge to his tone. Something that sounded more like insistence than anything else.

“I’m coming,” tossing the paper towel into the trash, you move to pass Agent Danvers, but she holds her hand out.

“Hope you’ve got an umbrella,” caught by her index and middle fingers is her business card, and in her eyes is a suggestion of some deeper meaning you don’t quite understand, “It’s a little misty out there tonight.”

You don’t want to take it, but Sam was calling your name again, more insistent this time, and you needed to get her out of your way. Silently, you take it from her, shoving it deep into your coat pocket alongside your discharge paperwork before finally leaving the restroom.

“You good?” Sam stares down at you, moving you across the waiting room towards where Bucky waits near the hallway leading out of it.

“I just was feeling like I might be sick, but I think I’m okay, now,” is your answer, and it’s only half of the truth, because you feel the furthest from okay.

It’s only when you’re in the elevator, on the way to the parking level, that Bucky finally asks, “What did that agent say to you?”

Glancing up at him, you know he’ll see through anything but the truth, so you get as close as you can to it, “She said I looked banged up, then told me to watch out for the rain outside? I think she was just trying to intimidate me, or something.”

Sam huffs in annoyance, “They usually do. Bastards.”

“You don’t gotta’ worry about them,” Bucky begins as the elevator finally opens, and you all make your way towards the exit. “Their kind just like to flash their badges around, act all authoritative— it makes them feel like they’re doin’ something.”

“Yeah, nothing to worry about,” Sam agrees, as the sliding double doors open out into the night, but you’re not stupid enough to believe the lie they’re trying to sell you.

How can you, when you finally realize what Agent Danvers had meant? The meaning of it was literally staring you straight in the face from the other side of the road, begging to be noticed by the only person who would: you.

Dark brown eyes peer from beyond a rolled-down window, almost black in the dead of night, but there she was. Watching you for just long enough to know you’ve seen her. Only then does she turn her car from her park to pull out of the deck, but not before getting the message across.

Misty Knight was working with the feds, and the feds were watching Barnes— therefore, you. The walls were closing in, and you were going to find yourself stuck if you didn’t find a way out.

There’s a tinge of regret on your tongue at how you had left things with Misty last week, nerves spiking at the remembrance of the wire you’d abandoned beneath your bathroom sink at home. You can’t risk giving away how the sight of your old friend here truly shakes you, though; not with these two men at your side.

Something bigger was going on here, and you’re certain Bucky knows that, despite his attempt to minimize it in front of you. And, God, from the bottom of your heart, you want nothing to do with any more of this, but you feel entirely powerless to keep yourself from getting dragged deeper into this rabbit-hole of a situation you’ve found yourself in.

You’re so tense, so wound up, that as soon as you sit down in the back of Steve’s borrowed Cadillac Escalade, a wave of exhaustion practically melts you into the leather seats. This day’s been too much for you to handle, and your brain simply can’t take anymore with the stress it’s already been under. If it weren’t for Bucky sliding into the space beside you, you’re certain you would have slumped over and passed out in the backseat, right then and there. His shoulder is a welcome alternative, considering.

“I’m so tired,” you remember saying as Sam drove out onto the highway, and the feeling of warmth that radiated from the arm Bucky draped over your shoulders. You’ll blame it on the concussion, why you let yourself relax there, against him, when every logical part of your being would usually demand otherwise.

It’s later, and you’re groggy, when you’re jolted awake, hearing him murmuring softly beside your ear, “Sorry, doll, didn’t mean to wake ya’.”

“Ameye ‘ome?” you slur, before blinking into a more firm plane of consciousness at his next words.

“You’re at my place.”

His place? As in his home?

A sharp intake of air accompanies your squinting blink at your dim surroundings, and only then do you realize he’s carrying you, not unlike you would a sleeping child, through the hallway you remember leading towards his bedroom.

“Why?” is all you can manage, the blanket of sleep luring you more than the unease that comes with every moment spent alone with him.

Bucky’s chest, flat against your own, rumbles when he speaks, “You can’t be left alone with that concussion of yours.” It’s the only explanation you get, before he’s moving into the darkness past his bedroom doorway. It makes sense, but it also doesn’t. He didn’t have to do this. There are probably a hundred other options out there, aside from him watching you personally.

You’ve long since come to the conclusion that James Barnes doesn’t do anything he doesn’t want to do. Maybe there was a time when he once did, but he’s fought hard to be in the position he’s now in. Killed for it, even—

Fists catch in the fabric at his shoulders when you lean back in his arms, just enough to get a better look at him. Hallway light illuminates his jawline, the cuts along his face and the bruise that’s only darkening with the passage of time, but he doesn’t shy away from your stare. You catching a hint of what he’s feeling seems to be the least of his worries tonight.

All it takes is the soft murmur of, “Please, put me down,” for the hands at your thighs to do just that. Easing you down until you find yourself standing along the side of the very bed you’d found yourself tangled up in not so long ago. Only as your feet rest softly along his floor do you realize that you’ve lost your shoes and coat somewhere between here and the car, but he has, too.

He looks different, in the lowlight and solitude of just the two of you in this room. More worn down than he had at the hospital, if that were possible, but with that same haunted vacancy in his eyes as he watches you. There was a carefulness in his eyes you aren’t familiar with, almost like he expects you to move away from him, further than you already have.

The familiarity of the situation, however, does not escape you. The closeness of his body to yours has come to be expected, but the moments of passion you shared hours ago had been separated by the horror of the night, until that felt like miles away to you, now. There’s no denying that the exhausted desolation of his stare is a stark contrast to the way he had looked at you in the redlight of the darkroom. It’s too tinted with grief for you to mistake this for want.

“There’s a room at the other end of the hall… you could stay there instead,” he splits the silence, as if it’s a revelation that he probably should have come up with the offer far sooner than he has.

“I…” you begin, hesitant to admit the truth, because as terrible as it is, the idea of being left alone in this foreign, vacant house after what’s happened creeps a fear up your spine that’s even more terrible than that of the man standing before you. The fact that, in this moment, you feel at all safer by his side than you would at the other side of that vacant hallway is almost impossible to accept.

The part of you that wants to run far, far away from him is no match for the side of you which wants anything but the cold loneliness that will allow you to dwell on what you’ve both gone through.

Only when you avert your eyes from his, can you finally say, “I don’t want to be alone… tonight.” It’s certainly early morning by now, but that technicality doesn’t really matter, because when you dare to look back at his eyes, darkened by the shadows across his face, you still make out how softly he looks at you. For a moment, you can almost trick yourself that you’re simply two people in need of comfort, rather than the truth of everything between you, “Do you want to be alone tonight, Bucky?”

His lips part, hesitancy on his own tongue, before he breathes a solid, honest, “No.”

“Okay,” you say, like it’s that simple, and crawl into his bed, clothes and all. Exhaustion capturing you and dragging you down into the mattress that was still too soft for a man like him, but is perfect for forgetting why. He just stands there, watching until you’re buried beneath his irritatingly soft duvet. Calling to him with that same drowsy airiness of someone on the verge of sleep, “Come to bed, Bucky.”

Your eyes are already shut by the time the bed dips with his weight, and you’re too tired to worry past the feeling of cool metal dragging along the hitch of your exposed waist, pulling you against the warm expanse of his clothed chest.

You have no idea where this falls in the context of your debt to him, or if it even counts at all, when he murmurs his own breathy exhaustion at the nape of your neck, “Night, doll.”

⤜♚⤛

James Barnes looks less threatening when he’s sleeping. It’s almost like, in full consciousness, he’s never truly relaxed, even when he appears to be. His apparent laid-back confidence doesn’t carry over in his sleep; when the actions and conversations and expectations all fall away into the pit of unconsciousness.

You don’t know what you’d expected. For his side of the bed to be empty, again, maybe? Or perhaps for him to appear just as much the icy-hot threat he was when awake? Something other than the simple, normal vulnerability of a man lost to the world at this current moment.

Part of you wonders if he’s dreaming, or if it’s one of those blissful periods where nothing at all disturbs the blackness of the mind. When the peace of it is as close as you can come to death.

The clock on his nightstand announces almost midday, now, but you figured as much with the strong sunlight shielded beyond the curtained windows. Even still, it’s too early to pick apart your every action or choice for the day before; micro-analyzing your time with him was a habit you struggled to break.

No, that… that would have to wait until after coffee, and another dose of tylenol for the throb in your head. It isn’t as bad as the night before, thankfully, and you have a sneaking suspicion the ache is more due to stress than your physical wound itself. Truthfully, your whole body aches to a certain degree, and you’re certain that it’s littered with bruises from hitting the pavement as hard as you had.

A lull of your head to the side reaffirms your proximity to the sleeping gangster, the part of his lips, the mess in his hair. Not even the scratches along his face or the purpling bruise on his jaw can keep you from staring. Your breath catches alongside the skip in your chest, and the guilt at the feeling washes over you only an instant too late for the thought of his attractiveness to blossom at the back of your skull.

He sleeps pretty well for a killer.

But perhaps the bitter thought comes too soon, because Bucky’s brow furrows and his body tenses. Discomfort spreads across his features as quickly as your brain can process them, and before you can think better of it, your voice parts the morning quiet with a murmur of his name. A brush of your fingertips at the scruff of his jaw and—

Metal digits wrap tight around your wrist so quickly you think it startles the both of you with how you gasp and he inhales, blinking wide-eyed like he doesn’t quite recognize you until his eyes focus. Whatever had been there before dissolves with the relaxation of the grip at your wrist. Bucky blinks, but even then it takes a minute for the startled look in his eyes to dissipate.

“Bucky,” even to your own ears there’s a hesitancy to it, a sobering concern in the back of your throat. You don’t care if you shouldn’t ask, if it wasn’t your place, “Bad dream?”

He releases you just as quickly, rolling onto his back with a groan, “What time is it?”

You don’t know why you ever expect him to give you a straight answer, literally ever, “Almost noon.”

“That late?” his fingers wipe the exhaustion from his eyes. “I overslept.”

He looks like the only thing he needs right now is to oversleep, you think, as you supply with a dry sarcasm, “I think the Queen of England will understand your tardiness.”

Bucky rolls his eyes, casting a glance towards you that is more unreadable than it is threatening. Irritation, maybe, you could expect, but the subtle curiosity there is something else entirely. You don’t know if he finds what he’s searching for by the time it melts into something closer to compassion.

“How’re you feeling? Any numbness? Nausea?” it takes you a second to realize he’s assessing you like a soldier would, straight to the point as his attention settles on the side of your head, and the bandage there.

“Just dandy,” you sigh into the pillow. You weren’t about to complain about the soreness, when you had yesterday’s throbbing pain to compare it to.

“Yeah, tell me that again when you get up, and maybe I’ll believe you.”

“What about you?” you question, and there’s that curious look again. You point towards his purpling jaw, “That’s bruising up nicely.”

He reaches for his jaw, a gentle caress over the affected area, and his eyes finally look away from you, as if the memory is somewhere far off, before repeating what he’d said last night, “Had worse, doll.”

But you’re tired of him avoiding you, and just this once, you decide to push it, “That’s not an answer. How bad does it hurt?”

“What? You gonna’ kiss it better for me?” Bucky’s teasing deflection cuts with his smile, until he flinches from grinning too widely, and you huff at him.

“Bucky.”

He grunts, and you thank your lucky stars that he looks too tired to keep this round of cat and mouse going, because he simply groans and deflates into the sheets, “Yeah, it’s kinda’ sore.” He’s minimizing, and you know it. The man can’t even smile naturally without flinching.

“That settles it, then,” Bucky glances towards you at that. “First order of business, pain meds for the both of us, and then I’ll head home—” Before he can say anything, you maneuver yourself to push off the edge of the bed. Standing straight only lasts for a split second, before the lightheadedness sets in and you’re falling back to the bedside once again.

Bucky makes a quick, “woah,” sound before you find his hands at your waist just as you hit the bed, the small effort to keep you from falling onto the floor being greatly appreciated.

“Fuck,” you groan with a soft defeat, trying not to look as embarrassed as you felt, but you can hear the man behind you start to chuckle as the bed shifts when he sits straighter. You can’t even stand up without fucking it up.

“Well, that didn’t go to plan,” his joking breath ghosts over your skin, perhaps genuinely enjoying your struggle or simply trying to lighten the mood. It could go either way at this point; you don’t know what to think of him, not when he leans his chin onto your shoulder, the tight grip at your waist easing with your steadiness.

Tensing up with his sudden proximity, you shouldn’t want to lean into him like you do. Your heart shouldn’t speed up like it does, hammering away in your chest like he’d just released a million butterflies there. Heat creeping up your neck from where the prickly set of his jaw leans into you, catching your breath from your near-fall seems easier said than done.

“Want to try that again, or maybe I should get you a parachute first—”

“Shut up—” comes out weaker than you intended it to, with less edge, and he’s chuckling again. Leaning further into you until he’s practically draped himself over your shoulders, trapping you in the cage of his arms, the prey instinct to run is nearly as powerful as the impulse to melt there. To accept your fate.

Your only saving grace is the sound of your stomach growling, alerting you to just how hungry you were, and subsequently making you wish that a hole would simply open up in the ground and swallow you whole right then and there.

You can hear the sound of the smile in his voice, coaxing in a way that makes you want to agree before he’s even finished his thought, “How about this, Sam’s probably starving, too. Let’s grab a bite, and then I’ll take you home, if you want me to.”

If you want me to has you wondering if he wants you to stay. If it was some kind of invitation. If perhaps you erupted the same borderline uneasy desire in him that he had set alight in you—

You fight to forget that train of thought, instead settling on, “Sam’s still here?”

“Yeah,” he hums, “he had to stay. After last night…” Bucky trails off, and you try your best to avoid the feelings that threaten to come rushing back all over again at the slight mention of it. “Well, let’s just say that Sam and Steve are the only ones I can trust right now.”

In the light of day, after the immediate shock of it has worn off, and enough time has passed for you to somewhat separate in your mind the pieces of what happened last night for appraisal, you can understand the implications of what he’s saying. You should have realized it sooner, but the rushing intensity of the moment coupled with your concussion had slowed your thoughts.

Someone wanted to kill him.

That in itself is probably nothing new, knowing him, but the fact that someone had so brazenly attempted to achieve it shocked you. Maybe you’re naïve to think of it this way, you don’t know for sure, but the idea that someone would simply try to kill him in such a public place was baffling to you. There was no finesse about it, no attempt at hiding their intent.

The thought of his attempted murder should have left you with some kind of relief. Your problems would be solved with him out of the picture, right? Shouldn’t you be hoping whoever it was would achieve their purpose?

The one thing you do know right now was that the idea of him being killed gave you a very different feeling than relief. This anxiety simmering within you was an unmistakable worry. You could try to excuse it, to say that you don’t want anyone to be killed. That this was simply a compassion for your fellow man and nothing else.

But you know that’s not true.

He’s under your skin now, and as much as you wish you could claw him out, or even feel some sort of indifference towards him, you can’t.

Turning your head slightly, you dare to look at him, catching his questioning eyes with yours. Reaching up to feel the warmth of his arm, caging you against his chest.

It slips from you before you can help it, “They placed that car bomb to kill you?”

You don’t care if it’s a stupid question. You already know the answer to it, you just need him to confirm that this is real. That this othered they you speak of exists.

Bucky’s jaw sets, before his arm slides in your grip to catch his hand at your own, “You’d think people would know I’m harder to kill than that.” And he’s slipping from you, pushing himself away and taking the warmth that has radiated through your clothes with him. Leaving you with a chill that was more than just the room temperature.

This was real. This was real, and someone was really trying to kill him—

Mind racing, you almost miss when he rises from the bed to stand before you, stretching for the moment it takes before he offers you the cool metal of his prosthetic hand, “Let’s go eat, doll.”

You take his hand with less hesitancy than you expect of yourself, using his strength to guide you to your feet slowly. Thankfully this time, the lightheadedness doesn’t follow you, so much as the aches in your bones do.

“Still feelin’ ‘just dandy?’” Bucky shoots at you, but lets you keep your pride and his assisting arm as you roll your eyes at him. When you finally let go of him on your steadier legs, he continues, “I’ll go see if I can find where Sam’s at.”

“Alright,” you try to breathe even, to focus on the small smile at the corner of his lips. Watching him leave the sanctuary of his bedroom, only one thought dominates your thoughts, coming to a head when he shuts the door behind him.

That someone who had tried to kill him last night had failed, and you doubted that whoever it was was going to give up so easily. They’ll try again, you’ll bet money on it, and anyone in their way is fair game. They’ve made that clear enough with what happened to Peter. Wrong place, wrong time had just turned into a life or death situation for anyone in a ten yard radius to James Barnes, and you’re already standing far too close.

That futile urge to run creeps up the back of your throat again. You swallow it down as you push into the ensuite bathroom instead, going through the motions. If you hadn’t liked the girl who looked back at you in the mirror the last time you were here, then you hated the girl who stares back at you now.

Damn, you look rough. The scrapes along your body from the pavement are nothing compared to the bandage on the side of your head. The bruising along your temple on that same side of your face maps where your head had hit the ground, and you hiss as you pick through the dried blood against your scalp. You need a good shower. The sooner you get back to your place, the better.

Aside from your clothes being wrinkled from having been slept in last night, your shirt has dots of blood on it, though it’s nowhere near as terribly marred as Sam’s had been. Wiping at it with a wet rag only seems to make the stains worse, and you sigh with defeat before meticulously removing the shirt entirely once you’re done freshening up as best you can.

Stealing is the least of your crimes, you suppose, intruding upon Barnes once more when you emerge back into his bedroom to toss your shirt upon the bed. That dresser with the picture from his army days upon it is your target, and by the time you pull out the second drawer from the top you hit gold.

Immaculately folded plain t-shirts stare up at you, and you reach for the black one. You’re in enough debt as it is with him, so what’s another twenty dollars?

Besides, this was more like borrowing.

The shirt is comfortably generic, if perhaps a bit inappropriate for the chillier weather, but when you find wherever Barnes has put your jacket and shoes, you know it’ll be fine. Scooping up your crumpled shirt from the bed, you haphazardly fold it as you make your way into the hallway, deciding to be lazy and take the elevator rather than the stairs.

Bare feet pad along the hardwood, as the elevator dings, door smoothly sliding open to expose the white walls within it, contrasting the light grays of the hallway. Leaning against the rail, you take the opportunity to scrutinize the operation panel after clicking the corresponding button to the first floor.

Scoffing in the silence of the moving elevator, your suspicion that this place was entirely too large for its own good is confirmed with the denoting B, 1, 2, 3, 4, R that are labeled on the panel. Four floors, plus a basement and roof space? You’d be terrified if you were living here all alone; it was much too big for your liking, but you guess that this was just another piece of evidence that Barnes had no fear whatsoever, and more money than God.

You’re torn from your mute appraisal of the elevator when it dings once again, alerting you just before the door opens and you find yourself walking into the vacant formal living room. The dim memory of when you had walked in on Barnes conducting business with Cornell Stokes scratches in the back of your skull, but the faint sound of voices drifting further into the home. Following the sound, you’re led down a short hallway until you can hear the sound of running water.

“---is handling the hospital, and Steve’s going to swing by here tonight after he checks out the car. I’m thinkin’ the two of us will alternate your security.”

“Sounds good to me, Sam,” the water turns off as you round into what you realize is the kitchen, catching the attention of Sam and Bucky with your presence.

Sam whistles, shooting off at the mouth before he brings a glass of water to his lips, “Even all beat up, she’s still prettier than you, huh, Barnes—” Bucky glares, as Sam grins with the opportunity to tease the two of you, “I mean you look rough—”

“Fuck off,” but it seems to be in good fun, this teasing, and judging by Bucky’s reaction and Sam’s low chuckling, it’s nothing new to either of them. Sam’s wearing fresh clothes, but not even his bright smile can distract you from the holster at his hip. It’s clear he’s not just here to hang out with an old friend.

“Bucky,” you move closer to the marble-topped island counter Sam leans upon, “where’d you put my coat and my shoes? I can’t find them.”

Sam looks pointedly towards Bucky, something playful in his tone that is so much like schoolyard teasing that you almost want to melt with the embarrassment of it, “Hmm, where did you put her things, Bucky?”

“They’re in the coat closet,” Barnes replies with only a hint of annoyance at how much Sam seemingly enjoyed goading him.

“Man’s a neat freak,” Sam sighs. “That’s a red flag.”

“You know what? Let me just show you where your stuff is,” rounding the counter, Bucky catches you by the forearm and all but drags you from the kitchen, shooting one last glare towards Sam. You have to bite down on your bottom lip to keep from reflexively giggling at the bizarre exchange, keeping up with Bucky’s long strides until he inevitably releases his hold on you to open a door at the end of the small hallway you’d initially come down on your way to the kitchen.

It’s a walk-in, lined with a myriad of men’s jackets and coats, wherein your feminine ensemble sits on a wooden hanger as if it were at all meant to hang among the expensive fabrics there. Bucky plucks it from the hanger while you slip your feet into your shoes.

“Here,” when he hands it to you, the weight of it reminds you of its pockets filled with discharge paperwork and your personal belongings.

“Thank you for taking care of it for me,” politely draping it over your shoulder, you look back up at him, only to be rendered immobile by the hand that finds the side of your neck. His thumb caresses your jaw as he tilts your head under the more pointed closet lighting. It takes you a moment to realize he’s scrutinizing the bruising along your temple, with something akin to regret.

“Sam was right. You are pretty beat up,” you’re about to supply a sarcastic comment about how beautiful that reminder makes you feel, when his eyes refocus. Staring into your own with a weight in them that silences you completely, but it’s what he says that leaves you speechless, “I’m sorry. I got you hurt.”

He was apologizing. As if the entirety of your relationship with him hadn’t been spent with his constant disregard for your comfort or wellbeing. As if you weren’t near-constantly teetering between desire and outright fear of what he could do to you.

This confounding, terrifying man was apologizing for something he didn’t even do, and it makes about as much sense to you as the gentleness of his hand at your jaw does. You’re sure you could study him for the rest of your days, and still not have figured him out.

Because why does he care? Aren’t you simply his most recent object for amusement?

There’s the possibility that, in some way, you may have misjudged him.

It takes a second, before your tongue catches up with your mind, and you weakly supply, “You weren’t the one who did this to me.” You don’t know why you feel the need to absolve him of the guilt he rightfully has in this situation, but you’re starting to accept you don’t know much of anything at all.

“Still,” he murmurs, and when he tears his eyes from yours, they settle at your lips. His own promise, “I’ll find who did.” His promise to make it right shouldn’t leave you as indifferent as it did. You knew who he was, you knew his implied methods for dealing with these people would be less than above board, and yet… it doesn’t matter to you. The promise of his threat to the people who had tried to kill him, subsequently injuring both Peter and you, was perhaps the only time when a threat from those lips didn’t scare you.

In some sick, twisted way, it makes you feel a little safer in his arms.

“I know you will,” for a moment you think he might kiss you again. There’s something similar about this closet and the darkroom back at Galereya Romanova. Something intimate about being alone with him.

You’ll never know if your suspicions are correct, because the sound of footsteps strips whatever veil that had descended on you away, along with Sam coming into sight beyond the doorway, “Hey, we going to eat or not? I got that Tylen— Oh, am I interrupting something?”

Bucky rolls his neck, fixing Sam with another annoyed glare that’s a little more genuine this time before you move away from his touch, “Yes.”

There’s no remorse from Sam, who simply grins back at him while you try to melt into the floorboards beneath your feet. Clearing your throat, you pull your jacket on, gesturing towards the pill bottle in Sam’s grip in an effort to quickly change the subject.

“Mind if I grab some of those.”

“Course,” taking the bottle and the opportunity to escape the coat closet, you down the appropriate dosage of pain medicine as quickly as you can, before supplying Barnes with a matching dose.

By the time you make it into the garage, you find that Steve’s Escalade has been replaced with a black Mercedes G-Class which Sam unlocks before you even reach it. Sometime in the night it seems Bucky’s men had been coming and going while you slept, evidenced by the exchange of cars.

It’s a little diner in Brooklyn that Sam and Bucky finally settle upon, but hole-in-the-wall places like these are typically the best kind. Somewhere between deciding on if you wanted breakfast or lunch, you thank your lucky stars that you had decided upon only bringing your wallet and keys with you yesterday to work. They were still tucked into your jacket’s deep pockets by the time you found yourself searching for enough cash to cover your meal, only for Bucky to nearly laugh in your face at the notion that you were paying for your own brunch.

“I already owe you too much money as it is,” you huff, trying your best to snatch the receipt he’d cornered from his grip.

“Isn’t letting me do what I want part of you working off your debt, doll?” he playfully bit back at you, and you had settled into your seat with nary a grumble after that.

You half expected Sam to just dump you out at your place like he had the last time, but instead you realize Bucky’s quick behind you when you slide out of the Mercedes’ back seat.

“I’ll walk you up,” is all he says, and you know better than to argue with him, but part of you doesn’t want to. Calling back to Sam, “Won’t be too long.”

This time, you supply Sam with a proper good-bye, but any chance at hearing his reciprocation is obstructed by Bucky’s quick shutting of the back door.

“You really don’t have to,” there’s a hint of awkwardness in your voice as you begin the trek up to your apartment.

“Sure I do,” Bucky shrugs. “What would I be if I didn’t make sure you got in safe?” There has to be more to it than that, but you do have a terrible habit of overthinking.

Keys in your lock, you push your way into your quaint apartment, but your tension doesn’t fade like it usually did upon returning home. It lingers, like he does, on the precipice of your threshold when you look back towards him.

Wracking your brain for something to say, he cuts through the silence before you have the chance, “I’ll be back by tonight.”

Your brow furrows, evidencing your confusion, “Tonight…?”

“Yeah, I got that meeting to go to, remember? Though, with everything that’s happened, it’ll probably run a little later than I told you yesterday,” and that’s when it hits you. He had asked you to meet him afterwards for dinner. Truthfully, you’re surprised that he still wants to, considering.

“I… don’t know if I’ll be good company,” you begin, leaning into the doorframe with crossed arms. “I’m all sore, and my head’s still hurting—”

Stepping closer, Bucky shakes his head, “No, it’ll be lowkey. Don’t worry about it.”

“Bucky—” for once, you’re about to protest. The last thing you felt like doing was going out God knows where to be the thing on his arm like you’d been at his poker club. A girl can only take so much stress, and you don’t care if you sounded whiney, if it meant the chance at getting out of it.

Even if it meant turning down the first date he ever asked you on.

You’re about to go further, but he silences you when he steps into your space, leaning to ghost at your lips, “I said, don’t worry about it,” before capturing them entirely. He may as well have captured you, too, because your attention is completely short-circuited by the gentle leisure of this kiss.

It’s not the same hasty passion of that time in the darkroom, or the explorative touch from the time before that. No, this is something else entirely. A soft, delicate kiss that drips warmth down to your toes, and only after that do you feel the brush of his fingertips at your neck. Not to trap you there, but rather to almost steady himself against you.

It doesn’t last long, and you’re damned for wishing it was longer than it was, because when he pulls back he takes his hand with him, and you’re left only with the crooked smile on his bruised lips, “Better shut and lock that door, doll, or someone’s bound to walk right in.”

Flushing under the intensity of his flirting, you step back, away from his proximity, and grip to your front door for dear life, “Yeah, I ought to do that.”

You don’t bother telling him good-bye, because you’re afraid that if you linger too much longer with him staring at you like he was, the weaker, supid part of you would invite him inside. Locking and bolting the door, you take a deep breath, allowing one, two, three long seconds to pass before you dare look through your peep-hole to see if that action alone had been enough to keep the wolf from your door.

Forehead thumping against the door at the realization he’s gone, you take a deep breath in the hopes that it will cure you of this tension he’s set in your shoulders.

Your apartment looks too similar for the shifting in your stomach. Too much has changed too quickly, and in your efforts to maintain your life as closely as you could to what it was before these events were set into motion, not even your unaffected home could save you from this feeling that things would never be the same again. That you would never be the same again, once the chips fall where they may.

Focusing on putting one foot in front of the other, you push yourself from the door, and this spell he’s cast over you. Emptying your coat pockets on your kitchen counter, you put your wallet and keys aside in order to sort through the discharge paperwork from the hospital, reading over the vague home-care instructions they had given you which amounted to little more than you already knew. You’re on the third page when the business card falls from between the papers, and you’re left staring at the name printed there.

Carol Danvers

Picking it up with your nails, you flick the card absentmindedly, wondering if it was even smart to hold onto it at all, or if throwing it into the trash was the dumbest option you could take. Misty had tried to get through to you as a friend, and it hadn’t worked, so now she was sending in the big guns.

Really, did she even have a say in what the FBI did? You remember from that fragment of a conversation you never should have heard that Bucky had told Stokes something about a task-force out in Harlem making trouble for him. Were Agent Danvers, Agent Fury, and Misty all part of that same task force he mentioned?

You refused to believe it was a coincidence.

But you have no idea what to do about it right now. You don’t think there’s anything to be done about it, at least not by you.

So, you decide to tuck the business card in your wallet among the gift cards you still haven’t used since your last birthday. Squirreling it away just as you had the wire that Misty left you with.

Out of sight, out of mind.

The rest of the midday consists of peeling off your over-worn clothing, and throwing everything into your wash, along with the shirt you’d successfully stolen from Barnes. Scrutinizing every scratch and bruise on your body came next, and then changing the dressing on your skull as you carefully washed the hair around the stitches there.

By the time you’re through, it’s near five o’clock, and while you would love nothing more than to crawl onto your couch and veg out, there’s something more pressing you feel you have to do.

⤜♚⤛

The gift shop is more like a highway robbery. Fifty bucks for flowers, balloons, a card, and a stuffed bear? Ridiculous, but you’re either a schmuck or a sucker, because you fork it over nonetheless when the receptionist rings you up.

The bear isn’t even a bear. It’s a panda, and you sigh as you look down at the items you’ve acquired when you find partial solitude in the elevator. Was it too much? You were second-guessing yourself, now.

But when the floors ding off, you have only a split second to decide if you truly want to do this before the doors threateningly begin to slide shut once more. Catching it just in time, you push your way out, along with your myriad of presents.

Fuck, you didn’t even know if they allowed gifts like these in the ICU. You hadn’t thought that far ahead.

You feel like a damn idiot as you walk the same path as last night once again, tunnel vision only easing when you’re standing out front of the push-button double doors. Deep breath. You reach out and push it.

The beeps are just as familiar as they are foreign, breathing whooshes of the ventilators accompanying the atmosphere of this place, but in the setting daylight, you notice it’s busier than it had been the night before.

“Can I help you, ma’am?” asks an older nurse with pulled back box braids from beyond the counter at the central nurse’s station.

“Oh, yeah, I’m visiting Peter…”

“Last name?”

It takes you a second, “Parker. Peter Parker. He is still here, isn’t he?”

“That’s right. Technically, we’re only supposed to allow two visitors at a time during visiting hours, but if you’re going to be quick, I’ll let you go back,” she offers kindly, and you nod. You didn’t need long. You just wanted to make sure he was okay.

“I’ll only be a second,” you agree, before she points you around to the same room he had been stationed in the night before. As you move around the ICU, you spot the room, now curtained, and the large hulk of a man standing beside the door to it.

He squints at your approach, before recognition eases his brow, “Oh, you.”

“Drax, wasn’t it?”

“That’s me,” Drax nods towards the items in your hands. “Boss send you down with those?”

“No, actually, I was just hoping to deliver them myself, for the kid… if that’s alright.”

He grunts, frowning, “Not supposed to let anyone in that the Boss hasn’t approved.”

“Oh, that’s okay, I guess. Can you just put these things in there for me, then?” you offer him the get-well-soon items, and Drax raises a brow. “I just… don’t want him to wake up to an empty room when he does, you know?”

“I don’t know. The boss said—”

The sound of metal against metal catches your attention when the curtain is pushed open, the same petite woman from last night staring out at you with a questioning gaze, before realization dawns upon her, “You’re that girl from last night. You were there when it happened, weren’t you?”

“Uh, yeah, I was,” you supply awkwardly, and Peter’s aunt sighs with all the exhaustion it takes to wave off the guard at the door.

“Oh, let her in, Drax. She wouldn’t have blown herself up, now, would she?”

“I… guess not, Aunt May,” he concedes, and she waves you into the room.

“That one doesn’t have a whole lot going on between the ears, but he’s just a big teddy bear when you get to know him,” May moves around the bedside, returning to a small packet that she uses to produce lubrication for the boy’s lips. Glancing towards where you linger along the outskirts of the bed, she nods to the corner of the cramped room, “You can put all that near the window. That way he can see it when he wakes up. I know he’ll love it. Thank you.”

“It’s nothing, I just… wanted him to know people were thinking about him,” you supply weakly, gingerly placing your various items on the small windowsill there. May was still carefully treating his lips around the endotracheal tube, and if the various wires and low rhythm of the ventilator weren’t there, you could almost believe Peter to be sleeping.

His head is bandaged, but from beneath the bandage comes another tube, hooked to some sort of draining mechanism on the other side of the bed. It must be the product of that surgery he had last night. One thing stood out to you, more than anything else, and that was how small he looked laying there. He was nowhere near the man he so desperately wanted to pretend to be.

May breaks you from your solemn observation of the boy, “I’m sorry, do you mind if I ask you something?”

Catching her brown-eyed stare, you nod, “Sure.”

“The other boys… I know they won’t give me an honest answer, but… was it— do you know if he was in a lot of pain, when he was on the street?” her question punches you in the gut, pushes all the air from your lungs and leaves you empty.

You gape like a fish for the moments it takes to collect yourself, and you avoid her stare when you reply, “Honestly? From what I remember of it, he was already unconscious. No… I don’t think he even saw it coming.”

She hums, tucking the blanket around him like a mother would her child, smiling weakly when she confesses, “That’s good. He wasn’t scared, then.”

Trying your best to swallow the lump in your throat, you aren’t ashamed when your voice shakes, “I’ve heard that sometimes people in comas can hear what’s going on around them, so right now, he might know you’re here with him. That you’re taking care of him. I might not know him as well as everyone else does, but I do know that kid loves you with his whole heart. There’s no way you can’t know that, if you’ve met him at all. I’m sure it makes him happy, having you here with him now.”

May looks towards you once more, hopeful, as if she wants to believe you, “I hope he can hear. He needs to know how much he matters.”

Silently, you nod, before reaching out to offer her the card, “This is for when he wakes up, but if you need anything, my number’s in there, too. I live in Hell’s Kitchen, but I’m just a call away, okay?”

“That’s awfully nice of you to offer to someone you barely know,” she begins, somewhat skeptical, but takes the card from you anyway.

“I know what it’s like to try to make it on your own.”

“You don’t know what I’m going through.”

“You’re right. I don’t. I’m only offering what I can, if you figure you need some extra help, aside from that big lug at the door,” a bittersweet smile cracks on your face. “But, I better go before the nurse comes in here and shoos me out. There’s only supposed to be two visitors at a time, technically.”

Before you’re past the curtain, her voice catches you, and you turn to find her reading your name from your signature at the bottom of the card, “Thank you for coming by to check on him. You didn’t have to do that.”

“Something told me I did.”

The path back through the hospital is something you’re starting to remember automatically by your fourth time through its curving, winding halls. It takes three stops by subway to get back to Hell’s Kitchen, and when you do, you find yourself taking your time down the brisque city streets.

The air’s getting colder as the hour passes, the threat of winter looming ever closer, and by the time you’re once again standing in front of your building, the sun has gone all the way down.

Barnes had said not to worry about tonight, but you weren’t sure if that meant you were off the hook or not. You wished he would leave and never come back, that he could take this uncertainty swirling in your chest along with him when he did, but it’s too late for that now.

The on-edge feeling returns as the evening hours tick by, until you’re barely able to enjoy the reruns you’ve taken to watching on your couch. Tension seeping into your skin until the way you constantly check your phone every thirty minutes to check the time gives away your anticipation of his possible arrival.

It’s past nine when you hear the rap at your door, and the way you nearly jump out of your skin is enough reason to thank the heavens that no one is around to see you do it. It might not even be him—

A glance through your peep-hole proves that thought incorrect, because there he stands in a leather jacket. More casual than you expected him to be with the jeans along his hips. Fuck, you’re still in the sweats you threw on after your shower, having been too ambiguous about his arrival to decide on a proper outfit—

Hesitantly, you unbolt and unlock the door, swinging it open just enough to catch a glimpse of the plastic bag he holds in his hand.

Barnes still looks like sin when his teeth cut in a grin at the sight of you, even with the bruising and cuts on his face. It makes him look somehow even more dangerous than he already did, in the low fluorescent lights of your building’s hallway. Lifting up his hand to dangle the plastic bag between you, you make out the unmistakable shapes of the to-go boxes nestled within.

“Told you it would be low-key,” he juts his chin upwards slightly, motioning for you to open the door wider. “Let me in.”

You do as you’re told, but mostly because whatever he’s carrying smells heavenly, “Didn’t you want to eat out, though?”

“Nah,” brushing past you, he spots your kitchen easily enough, placing the bag on the counter like he owns the place, “could barely stand to sit through the full meeting, with how long it wound up taking. Besides, you said you were sore, right?”

Upon re-locking your door again, you meet his raised brow, “Yeah.”

“Hope you like shawarma, ‘cause that’s all we got,” he grins, pulling the boxes out of the bag as you come closer to examine the food. You should be more uneasy with his presence here, but maybe you’ve become numb to the feeling. Perhaps it’s simply your new baseline, now, and you’re unaware of it.

Or, maybe, you don’t mind him as much in this moment as you used to.

He offers you a plate, “This one’s yours, doll,” and you take it from him like he doesn’t completely baffle you at every chance he gets. Looking towards the television, he asks, “What’re you watching?”

“Oh… reruns of some old show, but I wasn’t paying much attention, I’m afraid,” moving towards the couch while he finishes up grabbing his own plate, you tuck your legs under the box of food. You can’t help but wonder, “Aren’t you supposed to be under, like, constant guard or something, after last night?”

“Yeah, Steve’s sitting out there watching the place.”

“He’s just sitting in the car?” there’s no hiding the amusement in your voice. “Isn’t that kind of mean to just leave him there?”

“I could invite him up here, if you’re so worried about him, doll,” Bucky grins back at you, watching you lean back into the cushions with a snort.

“I didn’t say that.”

“So she does have a mean streak,” sitting his plate down on your coffee table, he sinks into the couch beside you. “Who would’ve guessed?”

“I’m not the one who left him in the car.”

Bucky’s shrugging off his jacket, draping it over the arm of your couch, “He’s not a dog on a hot summer day. Plus, the car’s on. I think he can handle himself for a couple hours while we eat.”

“Two meals in one day,” the smile on your lips is as genuine as they come, peeling open the plate of food to properly appraise it. You had to admit, it looked good. He’s begun to pick apart his own plate when you decide to tease him a little, “If I knew all I had to do to pay off my debt was let you feed me, I’d have sent you a grocery bill sooner.”

The initial bite of your wrap silences you and he shoots back, “If I knew all I had to do to keep that smart mouth of yours quiet was to stuff it full, I’d have done that sooner, too.” The mischievous glint in his eye is all it takes for you to know that he’s exactly aware of the double entendre in his words. It takes all you have not to choke on your bite before you wash it down with your drink.

“Gross,” you huff around a giggle when you catch a breath of air.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he chuckles, taking his own bite of his wrap.

The evening dissolves like this, and you hate to admit that it’s… pleasant. Talking and occasionally joking back and forth with him is dangerous, because he seems almost likable. As if he’s just a regular guy on a laid-back date. As if he didn’t have a disproportionate amount of control when it came to every interaction you had with him.

As if this weren’t the cost of a debt beyond your control, but as the night wears on, you start to wonder if that’s really the reason he was sitting here with you now. Surely there are other women he could be with. Women who don’t owe him practically anything he wants from them.

You should be thankful that all he wants from you right now is your company. That should be enough, but in the back of your mind, the thought crawls up your neck, planting the seed of uncertainty there. Of questioning.

And you know asking questions will only serve to get you even deeper into this mess.

The only question you should want to ask him is how much longer until your debt is paid, but that one— perhaps the most important question in your life right now— is far away from you tonight. Instead, a far more treacherous question eats at your thoughts.

Is there some part of him, perhaps the part that made him come here tonight, that might care a thing about you?

You shouldn’t wish for it. You shouldn’t want it. You shouldn’t want him, or want him to want you, but damn it if you haven’t become a complete mess in the head, ever since you first met him.

And when the dinner’s over and done with. When he’s leaning against your couch with you settled into his side, the reason you let him kiss you again is more than just the score you have to settle.

That realization is more terrifying than he ever could be.

His lips, his hands, his body pressing you into your couch— he’s all consuming. Burning away every shred of good sense you have left, and the butterflies in your stomach scream out how you’re in too deep for your own good— drowning in him in more ways than one. The Devil is supposed to be charming, though, isn’t he?

If he’s the Devil, you’re already falling.

Metal and flesh have become so familiar to you that you think it would be strange for two warm hands to touch you at the same time. The scrape of his beard is a map that you’re certain you could trace with your eyes closed. It’s already certain to you that he’s utterly ruined you, in just the short time you’ve known him.

Is it possible for a week to feel like a lifetime? Maybe you are completely insane.

His breath is warm as he kisses you into the couch, gasping into your lips when you tug gently at the dark hair of his head. You’re on the verge of doing anything he asks, when his lips part from yours to trail across your cheek, gently avoiding your bruised temple.

“Ask me to stay,” he murmurs into your ear, and you try to hang onto the last shred of your dignity at the sound of it.

“You can’t,” pushing against his chest, you’re desperate to distance yourself. To try and breathe a single breath of air that doesn’t smell like him, “Steve’s outside. He’ll be sitting out there all night if you stay. I’m mean, but I’m not that mean.”

He has checkmate when he counters, “Then pack a bag, and come home with me.”

Your eyes flutter open, staring up at him in the dim cast of light from the television and your kitchen light. There’s no teasing smirk on his lips, no evidence that he was simply trying to pull another one of those reactions he liked to get from you. He’s serious, and while it’s an offer, it’s not a question.

You’re nearly sobered by it, “What did you say?”

His hands find your thighs, still flanking his hips, giving you a squeeze to punctuate, “Grab a duffel, throw what you need in it, and let’s go.”

A refusal buds in the back of your throat, but what falls from your lips is, “Only for tonight.”

His noncommittal, “Sure,” convinces neither of you, but when he kisses you again, you’re too distracted to care.

He waits on the couch as you dump out your gym bag’s random contents onto your bed. Not wanting to stay for too long to start overthinking this more than questionable decision on your part, you hurry to sling some clothes in your bag, along with the bare necessities you would need to keep your third walk of shame less shameful.

Pausing in your bathroom, you glance towards the cabinet, the thought of Misty’s wire coming to mind once more, but you shake that off almost as soon as it comes. You were not going to get involved.

Flipping the light off, you grab your phone and wallet to stuff into your duffel, and by the time you’re back in the living room he’s standing in front of your door. Staring at you with an expectation that you’ll follow him from the safety of your home, into the night.

“Ready, doll?”

You’re already too involved with him as it is.

“Ready.”

⤜♚⤛

James Barnes has a way with manipulating his way into getting what he wants, and before you know what’s properly happening, one night has turned into two, and a lazy weekend spent between his home and accompanying his visits to the hospital flies by you in a way that’s strangely comfortable. As if bending to his whim is becoming somewhat natural with the passing days, and any discomfort at the idea of that dissolves when you think that maybe your increased time spent with him will absolve you of your debt all the more quickly.

The most baffling part of all of this is that, over those two days, save for a little hot and heavy kissing or teasing, Barnes hadn’t initiated anything more intimate than that. You don’t know if it’s because he was more injured from the explosion than he let on, or what, but it left you with time spent… unpressured. Less performance anxiety, at the very least, followed you through the weekend, lulling you into a state that was… almost, relaxed, in a way.

Truthfully, you’re satisfied with wasting the weekend away with him, refusing to question the moments he’s pulled away by either Sam or Steve for some sort of business not meant for your ears. Still, it’s clear they’re still working through the weekend, and even when one is keeping watch of their boss, the other is doing something. Your guess is on them investigating who was after Bucky, but you have no concrete evidence of what they were truly doing.

It’s just past noon on Sunday that he finds you in his bathroom, shoving your toiletries back into your gym bag, “Going somewhere?”

“Just getting ready to go home,” you say as if it’s obvious. This was already a day longer than you had initially agreed to, and on top of your seriously diminishing wardrobe which currently consisted of another of his stolen t-shirts and your recycled pants, you had other matters to worry about, “I have work in the morning.”

“Wait, wait, wait,” he says quickly, somehow entertained by your announcement, “so you literally almost get blown up, and you want to go back to work on Monday?”

“Some of us don’t have the luxury to not go to work on Monday, Buck,” you sigh, tugging your bag onto your shoulder once you zip it up. “I’ve got bills to pay legitimately. I can’t just miss work, or they’ll fire me, and I worked hard to get this secretary job.”

“Okay, I hear you,” his hands come to rest on your shoulders as if to calm your insistent tone. Raising one finger between you to pause your thought, he continues, “Hear me out, though. I’m sure they’ll understand if you need a few days off after going through what you did.”

“My boss isn’t the understanding type—”

“I could pull some strings—”

“Oh, really?” raising a brow, you place your hand on your hip in disbelief. “What kind of strings are you going to pull in an elementary school, Bucky. Gonna’ start strong-arming third-graders?”

“I have all kinds of strings I can pull, if you want me to… all you have to do is ask nicely.”

The taste of skepticism on your tongue, you search his amused gaze for an answer, “And what is this going to cost me?”

“Not anything that you can’t make up to me,” he grins, and you’re left chewing the inside of your cheek to keep from smiling reflexively.

“You won’t hurt any of these strings you’re gonna’ pull, right?”

Bucky’s metal hand comes to his chest, as if he’s hurt you’d accuse him of such a thing, “What am I, a common criminal?”

“No, you’re worse,” you step into his teasing with equal strides, in a way that you’ve come to realize is safe to do. The man who was once entirely unreadable to you had somewhat become understandable, at least at times like this, when his smile reached his eyes.

“Ouch,” he calls after you as you slip away from him, following not far behind your stride into the bedroom to search for any of the items you might have missed. He halts your scrutiny with a blatant step into your line of sight, “I still haven’t heard you ask me nicely, doll.”

Testing the water, you dare to be bold— to throw some of this tension he’s wound in you over these past two days back at him.

Slipping close, just a breath away from him, you all but purr, “Do you want me to get on my knees for you first?”

His grin falters, lips parting, and for once you relish in genuinely shocking this man who consistently seemed prepared for anything you could ever do. You even think you see a hint of a blush, before he clears his throat.

“Doll, you can’t go around just saying things like that to me…”

“And here I thought you wanted me to ask you nicely,” you hum, edging closer.

“You’re still a little too bruised up for all that, don’t you think?”

Oh, so that’s what this was about. Some sort of twisted guilt that he had for your injuries? Or… did he not find you as attractive with the healing bruises along your face?

Either option stings your pride, and has you leaning away from him, “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Just wouldn’t want to tear open your stitches.”

Swallowing down the urge to verbalize the insecurities jumbling around in your head for fear of genuinely irking him, you blandly ask, “Will you please help me get off work this week?” If there’s any evidence that your change in tone is deeper than the act of it you put on, he doesn’t acknowledge it.

Bucky taps beneath your chin with his index finger gently, “Hey, try to sound at least a little enthusiastic about it.” Forcing a smile, he buys it just enough to allow you out of this conversation, “Let me go make a call, then I’ll get you home.”

You don’t know who he called, but it must have been one hell of a person with pull, because it’s barely eight on Monday morning when you’re woken up from a dead sleep in your own bed by a call from your boss, gushing about how terrible an ordeal you’ve been through. Better yet, you suddenly had enough PTO that your whole week off would be covered.

Thanking your boss as professionally as you could considering the groggy haze you were in, you dissolve back into your empty bed and try not to think about Barnes’ comments on your face. It might sound vapid, but it’s been bothering you ever since he left you at home last night. Sure, he’d taken the chance to kiss you senseless again before he left, but still.

You’d never had a problem being left untouched before now, but nearly every second you spent with him was a constant tease, and after his rejection yesterday, your mind was going down the path of worst-case-scenarios. What if he was starting to find you boring? Unattractive? What if he was getting tired of you entirely? What if that made it harder to pay your debt off? What if— What if—

Distance, that’s exactly what you need right now. Space to clear your head once again from him like you had last time. Everything would be just fine after a couple of days spent alone—

Easier said than done, when he’s calling you right now. You contemplate ignoring the vibrating phone when you see his name there. You could wallow in your own private self-pity a moment longer, if you did.

Just when you’re about to answer, it goes to voicemail, and you’re left relieved that the universe has chosen your fate for you.

Until he starts ringing you again. This time you answer.

“Mmm, Bucky?” you know you sound groggy. You don’t particularly care.

“Doll, did your work call? They’re supposed to let you off—”

“Mhm,” you sigh into the phone, stretching your tired bones and letting out a slight whimper in response. “My boss just did. I’m off the whole week. It’s even paid. Lucky me.”

“Lucky you,” he chuckles low into the phone, and you’re left wondering if he’s still in bed like you are, or is he doing that early-riser thing he seems to favor?

You hate that you know that about him.

“Yeah,” it comes out a sigh again, “thanks to you.”

“You’re welcome, by the way,” he sounds so proud of himself. “Feel free to show your appreciation the next time you see me.” How dare he say things like that. He’s nothing but audacity, making your mind race with ideas fed solely by the memories he’s provided you with, only to turn you away like he doesn’t want you anymore.

You dare to ask, if only for a chance at reading his meaning, “And how should I do that, do you think?” He’s silent for longer than it should take to answer you, so you call his name. Had you been disconnected?

“I’m here… uh,” he breathes into the phone, softening his tone even lower as if to keep the conversation private, “I can think of a few ways.” If he didn’t want you, then what’s with that tone?

“Tell me.”

“It can wait until you’re better—”

Rolling your eyes, you huff into the phone, settling your other hand along your stomach, “When I do get better I’m just going to write you a thank-you note and call it a day at this rate.”

The sound of his chuckle settles into your chest, “That’s not quite what I’ve got in mind, doll.”

“Spell it out for me,” you taunt, using his own words against him. “You gotta’ tell me what you want, or you’ll never get it.”

“Now, where have I heard that before?”

“Some tight-lipped jerk told me something like that, once.”

He sighs into the phone, like he’s exasperated with you, but there’s also a hint of something electric there. Some kind of excitement that carries through the phone when he finally gives into your temptation.

“You really want me to tell you, huh?”

“Yeah.”

“This early in the morning?”

“Mhm…”

“I don’t know, I’m a busy man… might not have time to detail everything to you.”

“Bucky, I’m this close to hanging up on you—”

There’s his laughter again, and it cuts right through you like butter. The man was a tease. That’s what he was, and you were falling for it. Hook, line, and sinker.

“Hold on.”

You groan at the sound of his order, utterly fed up with him, but you don’t dare hang up. Not when the possibility of him spelling out exactly what he wants from you is within your reach. Staring at the ceiling, you lick your lips, and listen to the muffled sounds that you can’t make out on the other end of the line.

His breathing returns, closer this time, “I’m back.”

“And I’m still waiting,” you whine. You can practically taste the anticipation.

Bucky hums into the phone, “I don’t know, I can get pretty creative when I want to be.”

“Give me an example.”

“I’d like to see you on your knees again, just like you offered to.”

You have to bite down to keep from making some silly noise of excitement into the phone, “Oh? Here I thought you didn’t like that.”

“Doll,” it sounds chastising, nearly a growl, “you should know better than that.”

“And when I’m on my knees for you, then what?” your fingertips move along your stomach, southward at the sound of his voice. You don’t care if it’s selfish, the sound of the slight breathlessness in his voice is twisting the knot in your stomach.

“You looked so pretty with my dick down your throat, so I figured we could start there.”

“I wish I could taste you right now,” you confess quietly into the receiver, pushing your fingers beneath the elastic of your sleep shorts when you hear a responsive murmur in return.

“Yeah? I bet you’d take it all, wouldn’t you? You did so well last time,” his voice is getting lower, more raspy, and it’s making you insane as you drag your fingers through your wetness like he had in the past. Shutting your eyes, it’s almost like you can imagine him there with you now.

“You wanna’ get me messy again, huh, Bucky?” your voice hitches as you roll soft circles on your clit. “I’ll be good for you.”

“You’re always good for me,” there’s a groan in his voice. “I want you to beg me to make you cum, doll.” His words have you flushing from head to toe, heat pulsing through you in time with your increasingly hasty fingers between your thighs, and you can’t help the moan you try to muffle against the pillow. “I want to watch when you do. Do you know what seeing you walk around all weekend in my shirts did to me, knowing I couldn’t touch you?”

“Why not?”

“I didn’t want to hurt you worse.”

His words sober you, but only just enough to murmur into the phone, “I’m not that easy to break, Bucky. I would’ve let you have me.”

“I know you would have. You like it, yeah? You like when I touch you?”

You grit your teeth. It shouldn’t be hard to say it. It’s not like it wasn’t entirely obvious by now. It’s not as if you weren’t actively exchanging your fantasies of him with your hand buried between your legs right this instant.

Bucky doesn’t let up, “You’d like me to fuck you right now, wouldn’t you?” A swipe of your thumb puts him on speaker, and then your other hand dives beneath the sheets to join the first. This time, you can’t muffle your whimper.

“You’re touching yourself right now, aren’t you, doll?” the way his endearment for you rolls from his tongue should be illegal. It sounds as close to a purr as you’ve ever heard him, and you can hear the satisfaction in his voice at having caught you red-handed. “C’mon, you can tell me.”

“Y-Yes,” you breathe around a whimper, and your lungs nearly close up entirely when you hear the faint sound of a zipper in the background.

“Shoulda’ told me sooner,” he pants, and you know he’s doing it too. “You’re so lucky I’m not in Manhattan right now. You’d really get it for starting without me.”

God, he’s completely melted your brain. That’s the only explanation for the reason his words alone are getting you so worked up.

“I can’t help it,” you turn over onto your stomach, hoisting yourself to your knees until your face is tilted towards the phone from the pillow it rests upon. “I need you so bad right now.”

“I know you do. Fuck your fingers like it’s me,” his breathing is speeding up, and you can’t stop the mewl that escapes you when your fingers dip into your entrance. Stretching yourself in as closely a mimicry of his own ministrations, you’re going mad here by yourself.

“I want to sit on your lap,” the thoughts spill from you, as you desperately chase the end of this moment with him, relishing in the moans that are spilling from his own lips at this point. “Ride you like that time… when we were on my couch, I wanted it then, too.”

“Doll, ah, fuck,” he trails off.

“And the way your beard feels on my skin— whenever you’re kissing me, I’m only thinking about what you feel like inside me,” this time you’re certain he whimpers. “Bucky, I don’t care who sees—” His breath hitches, a soft moan spilling from his throat before there’s even a chance at biting it back, before he dissolves into heavy breaths, and you can’t help but to ask, “Did you cum? Did I make you cum?” You don’t care how needy you sound, or if he can possibly hear how wet you are as your fingers desperately try to compensate for the lack of him.

His voice sounds utterly wrecked when he finally responds, “Yeah, you did. Fuck’s sake, you’re driving me crazy over here.” He’s closer to the phone now, voice coming in clearer beside your ears, “Tell me you’re close, doll. You go ahead and cum for me.”

You’re near drooling as you whine, “I can’t— I can’t take it—”

“You’ll take it,” he murmurs, and it sounds so low, so dangerously close, that you can nearly imagine him right behind you as he says it. “You’ll take it all. I’ll make sure of it—”

His name breaks in the back of your throat, bit down against a pillow as you try your best not to scream your way through the grind of your fingertips at your clit. You all but collapse with the weakness that settles over you in the immediate aftermath of your orgasm, and by the time the ringing in your ears dulls, you realize he’s coaxing you through it on the phone.

“---did so well. I knew you would. I bet you look amazing right now—”

“Bucky,” it’s nearly a whisper, and that’s all you can do to alleviate the confession in your chest, “I wish you were here.”

His laughter is more breathless this time, and there’s a dark promise that sends arousal seeping through your skin once again when he hums, “Trust me on this, no you don’t.”

There’s no energy left in you to argue with him, “I’ll take your word for it.”

“Do that,” he lingers, probably in just as much a stunningly blissful state as you were right now. It clearly takes a second for him to gather his thoughts, “Damn, I’m supposed to go help Steve and Sam with something, but you’ve completely derailed me.”

“This early?”

“It’s the city that never sleeps.”

“Well, the city may not sleep, but I sure do,” you don’t think you’ll be getting up any time soon after that.

“Then, I probably should leave you to it, huh?”

“Mhm… I guess so…”

He sighs into the phone, “You enjoy your time off, okay? I’ll see you in a day or two.”

“Busy, busy, huh?”

“Hmm, yeah. Business and pleasure don’t mix, unfortunately.”

You raise your brow, “Well, sometimes they do…”

You can practically hear the gears in his head turning, until you hear the amusement that accompanies, “Touché.”

“Hang up, Bucky. Steve and Sam are waiting for you.”

“Right… yeah, I probably should. I’ll call you later,” you don’t dare think that he sounds like he wants to linger longer, even if there’s barely a single thought in either one of your heads right now.

“Bye, Bucky,” you sigh, swiping your phone off the bed to hold closer.

“Try to not miss me too much,” he manages, and before you can get the last word, the line goes dead. Groaning, you toss your phone to the other side of the bed. You know you’re playing right into what he wants, but it was starting to become damn enjoyable.

Turns out, “a day or two” was more appropriately described as several days, because when Barnes showed up again, three days had passed. That’s not to say you spent the entirety of those days waiting listlessly by the phone. That time off was spent with you finally doing the things you enjoyed, as well as some errands here and there. Your bruises were starting to yellow, some of your scratches were nearly healed, and the stitches along your forehead were bound to come out any day now. The calls you did happen to receive from him had been shorter than the one on Monday, and less filled with pent-up frustration, but that didn’t mean that by the time you saw him you weren’t wound up.

Barnes shows up out of nowhere, not long after six in the evening, and when you wrench your front door open upon realizing it was him knocking, it takes only a split second to realize he was staring at you like a man starved. You barely have the time to breathe his name past your lips before his hands find your jaw, dragging you up to his lips with a haste that would have had you collapsing, were it not for the long form of him against you.

Walking you back into your apartment, he kicks the door closed with his boot before abandoning one side of your face for the breath it takes for him to fumble blindly behind himself and click turn the lock. The bolt would have to wait, it seemed.

He leaves you lightheaded, as his lips and tongue drag one kiss out into another, one of his hands migrating into your hair only to tug your head back, allowing him the access to your neck he desires. You’re pliable, putty in his hands.

“Bucky,” rips from your lungs, “what—?”

“Doll, I’ve been thinking about you all week,” is all the explanation he supplies before you shiver in his hold, the drag of his lips down your throat just as good as if he’d set you on fire personally. You thought you’d cooled off some with the days spent apart, but just like that you’re consumed with him all over again.

“If you don’t throw together your bag in the next minute, I’m going to take you right here, and if I do that, then Steve’ll be waiting all night in the car, and I know how much you worry about him,” Bucky teases, straightening up just enough to brush his lips against yours before releasing you entirely. For a moment, you stand there staring at him in a daze, trying to process what he’s just said, until he lifts his wrist and begins counting, “One, two—”

“Wait, like an overnight bag? Like last time?” you try to clarify and he smirks.

“Yeah, exactly like last time,” part of you wonders if he’ll keep his word were you to stall him, but at the sound of his pointed, “nine, ten… you better start packing… thirteen, fourteen,” you know he’s entirely serious.

“Gimme a minute—” you squeal before turning on your heel, trying your hardest to remember where all your crap is as fast as you can.

Bucky calls after you, a hint of laughter on his tongue, “You have forty-five seconds.”

You barely make the timer, but you’re certain that you’ve forgotten something important in your haste to meet him back at the door in the nick of time. He drags you back into his arms, kissing you deeply once more, before gesturing you out the door.

“Let’s go. You’ve got a long night ahead of you for that little stunt you pulled on Monday.”

He was right, too, and the worst part was trying your hardest to keep from letting Steve— and then Sam, when he switched out security at eight— from hearing every little cry or whimper that Bucky mercilessly wrenched from you. You’re certain he was working out more than just the pent-up result of your phone sex, because you may as well have been left entirely boneless by the time he was through with you. There had to be more to it than that, and you had a gut feeling it was due to a week’s worth of investigating the bombing with little progress, because if there had been progress, wouldn’t Sam and Steve be off security detail by now?

Bucky doesn’t tell you anything about it, and you don’t ask. You doubt he’d answer even if you did.

Instead, you settle into his side, and content yourself with your simple lot in life… for now.

It’s nearly five in the morning when you’re jolted awake. There’s a pitiful, soft groaning that sounds throughout the bedroom, and it takes you a moment to realize it’s coming from the man beside you.

“Nnn… Rebecca…” has you sitting up, flicking on the dim bedside table lamp to get a better sight of him. “No,” he struggles, slurred and smudged between his lips as he fights through whatever dream— or rather, nightmare— had claimed him. There’s a cold sweat on his brow, and while you’ve seen him in the midst of a nightmare before, this time it’s different.

His whole body is clenched, wrestling with the sheets at random as pained murmurs pass his lips before another, barely audible call of a name, “Becca…”

You reach for him before you think better of it, calling his name as you try to shake him awake, but instead of catching you by your wrist like last time, this time vibranium fingers catch you at your throat. You’re beneath him before you even realize what’s happening. Blinking up, at the confused, wild eyes of the man above you. Struggling to breathe. Choking around his grip.

“It… Bucky—” you barely manage around his closing grip, before the glassy stare in his eyes fades as he blinks down at you, realizing what he was doing. He releases you like he’s been burned, pushing himself off of you nearly as fast as he had pinned you down with a sharp gasp. Trying to catch your breath, you hear his shocked repetitions of an apology, before you manage to push yourself up on the bed.

“I’m sorry— God— Fuck— I’m sorry— I’m sorry—”

You’d gotten too comfortable, too complacent in whatever façade he had shown you over this past week, but that shaking, icy fear that chased up your spine now was as close to the truth of him as you can believe. He reaches for you, and you flinch towards the headboard before you can school your emotions. There’s no burying the terror in your eyes this time.

Bucky all but scrambles away from you until he’s reached the edge of the bed, recoiling from your reaction. Turning to sit his whole body off the edge of it, as if that will give you both the time it takes to compose yourselves.

Your throat is sore, by the time your breathing slows from its desperate wrenching of oxygen through your mouth. The threat to run slips through your addled mind before you manage to calm yourself enough to not shake entirely when you move away from the headboard.

Bucky is still tangled in the sheet, his head in his hands, and he is trembling.

“Bucky,” you try, but there’s a somewhat hoarse edge to your voice, and he tenses at the sound of it. You’re hesitant to touch him again, so you ghost around the edges of his space. “Bucky,” you clear your throat, and that almost fixes your tone. “C’mon, Bucky, look at me.”

His head tilts slightly, and with the dark shadow cast over it, you can’t help but think he looks like a fallen angel. A peculiar, foreign brand of terror that you’re entirely unequipped to handle stares back at you, nearly as deep as the pit of regret that, for once, is openly exposed for your perusal. You don’t know if it’s because he doesn’t want to hide it in this moment, or if he’s completely lost all control of his ability to do so.

His mask is gone, for the moment you ask him, “Are you okay?”

Irritation flashes, then he scoffs, “I hurt you,” with all the venom it takes to push another person away.

Still, you sit there, “You… didn’t mean to… right?”

“Fuck, you aren’t even certain about it,” he shakes his head, and once again his eyes are shielded in his hands. Anger radiates from him, but there’s a hurt, defensive edge to it. Ready to lash out like a cornered animal, when given no other option but to fight their way out.

You’re silent for too long, and when you do finally speak, the wrong question comes tumbling from your clumsy lips, “Who is Rebecca?”

He almost stops breathing entirely, before glancing towards you, “What?”

“Rebecca?” you stupidly blunder onwards, thundering all over the eggshells laid between you when you continue, “You were calling for her in your sleep.”

“She’s no one,” it’s a lie, and for once you hate that you’re able to read him so openly, when all this time you’ve been begging for the ability to do just that.

“I was just—”

“Just drop it!” his voice raises, biting at the person who’s cornered him in. Screaming, “Damn it! Can’t you just mind your own business for once?!”

There’s a specific kind of defeat which washes through you so quickly that it’s somehow faster than the immense regret that swells in his eyes when he dares to look at you again. You fight to keep the tears from welling up, but they’re blurring your vision before you can even escape his bed entirely.

Bucky reaches out as you try to stand, catching you by your forearm, voice heavy with grief, “Wait—” but you snatch away from him, despite knowing that if he had truly wished to keep his grip, he could have done so far easier than you could have broken away from it. He calls your name softly, like a wounded creature would cry out for help, and you try to keep the tears from falling, but they have a mind of their own, and an intent to blaze their way to the floor with one destructive streak along your face.

“No,” you step away from him, from the bed, backing towards the door. Before he can fully evoke whatever words are forming on his parted lips, that traitorous reflex to run creeps into your very soul, and this time you have the good sense to listen to it. Darting down the hallway, you don’t stop at the stairs, or the living room, you don’t tuck yourself into the coat closet, or pause in the small hallway that your feet lead you through.

You don’t stop until you find yourself cornered in the kitchen, choosing to fall to pieces against that beautiful marble-topped counter, sinking to the floor. Knowing you’ll look nothing near as pristine by the time you’re through.

You just need to cool off. To collect yourself. To fit these feelings back into the box they crawled out of, but you can’t possibly do that sitting by his side. You barely can regulate your own emotions, let alone that of one of the most dangerous men in Brooklyn.

The violence, the yelling, the uncanny similarity of the upheaval of that same feeling of walking on eggshells that had followed you most of your childhood— it turned out to be too much, and now you were sobbing your eyes out on this spotless tile floor.

You’re still trying to piece yourself back together— grasp one shred of composure— when the sound of someone approaching takes your breath away. Forces you to reflexively minimize yourself, but hoping whoever it is will move along without noticing you is too much wishful thinking.

“Shit!” Sam jumps like he’s been startled, upon rounding the corner of the island counter, not having expected you there, “What are you doing on the floor?” It takes him all of two seconds to roughly appraise your emotional state, and his voice changes accordingly, kneeling slowly with a hesitant, “Hey, woah, what’s goin’ on?”

“N-Nothing,” you try your best to keep it in. But when Sam reaches a finger out to carefully push away your hair from obstructing his view of your neck, the tears well up all over again.

“What happened?” it’s firmer this time, that same authoritative voice he had used when you were lying in the middle of the street after the car bomb, and all your resolve crumbles under the weight of it.

“I don’t think he meant to,” is your hiccupped excuse, before the whole story gushes from you through the blubbering expression of a hysterical woman. Sam listens, sitting on the floor beside you throughout it.

When you finish, he settles his chin in his hands, and sighs, “Rebecca, huh? Now that’s a name I haven’t heard in a long time.”

“Who… is she?” you carefully ask, and Sam frowns at the question.

“Don’t know if it’s my place really, but it’s not exactly a secret, either…” rubbing his hands on his sweats, he sighs, “I figure you deserve to know, considering…” Leaning against the cabinets, he explains, “Rebecca was Barnes’ older sister.” Was lingers heavily in the air, but you’re too worried about evening out your breathing to question him on it, “He doesn’t talk about her anymore. At least, I haven’t heard him talk about her in years. Steve says he still visits her grave on her birthday, and during Hanukkah, but other than that… Bucky isn’t really an open book when it comes to things like this.

“Steve knew ‘em both, back before the army. That’s where I wound up meeting them, though. From what I understand of it, they had a hard time as kids, and when she aged out of foster care the army was pretty much her only viable option. Bucky signed up more to keep tabs on her, rather than because he wanted to,” Sam goes on, and you don’t know why it surprises you that Bucky lied… or at least omitted some pretty important details, but it does. “Becca was… well, she was special. She’d do anything for the people she cared about. We were quite a unit back then, the four of us.

“And for a few years it was going good, y’know? The army is different from civilian life, your squad is your family. They’re the ones who keep you alive out there. No one else is going to risk their neck for you like that,” Sam picks at the fuzz on his pants, wetting his lips as he tries to find a way to say the next part. “We were on a mission— we didn’t know it was a suicide mission until after— and getting separated would’ve been no problem if it weren’t for the mines.

“The enemy was ready for us before we even got there, and we didn’t realize we were being used as a distraction by our commander until it was too late,” Sam blinks, avoiding your gaze to stare at the cabinets across from you, as if it’s the only way he can get through the story. “Becca realized before the rest of us that we were being led into a kill box— a place they’re leading you to die. She saved our lives that day, but an IED exploded when Bucky reached for her.”

Sam tries to remain steady, but you hear the quiver in his voice that he tries to fight back, you see the weight of his dark eyes when he fixes you with them, “That grave Barnes goes to, she’s not in it. There wasn’t enough left to even bring home.” Your breath hitches at the terrible dread that sinks through you, “On top of his sister, Bucky lost an arm. Mentally dealing with what goes on over there is hard enough without all that. I’m not surprised he still has nightmares about it… and with that bombing last week, I’m surprised he’s handling it as well as he is.”

Straightening up, Sam makes to stand, “That said, it’s not an excuse for how he handled you tonight. I’m sorry you were caught up in the middle of it.” He offers you a hand to help you up, but you don’t take it. You can’t. You’re not ready.

“I’ll just… stay here a little longer,” you breathe, trying to process everything he said. “If that’s okay?”

“Stay there as long as you like. I’ll go check on Barnes,” when Sam catches your questioning look, he shrugs, “I used to do some counseling to veterans after my time serving.”

You’re left sitting there, sorting through the pieces you knew about the man you had shared a bed with until you have some fractured, kaleidoscope picture settled in your mind. Just when you were starting to think you could possibly know something about him, you find you never knew anything about him at all.

Everything was the façade— it had to be. You have to believe that, in order to do what has to come next.

You didn’t learn by example from Pandora, or even Icarus, because the only thing you’re stuck with now is this box of frayed, torn feelings, longing to burst out of your chest at any moment, and the evidence of his metallic fingertips, burned along the column of your throat. The ultimate destruction of your very being was, perhaps, the fact that you can no longer deny that, good or bad, there were feelings in you for James Barnes.

And those are the last things you need.

Pulling yourself up, catching your footing on the cold kitchen floor, you wish you could leave these collected pieces of yourself there. Abandon them, like a changeling in the night.

The more time you spend in this irritatingly large house, the more claustrophobic you feel. Maybe this house was big enough for him. Maybe, it’s just too small to hold the devastation you construct here together.

Your jacket resides in the coat closet, alongside your shoes, just as before. Your bare necessities of personal effects were stuffed well enough in your pockets, and you sacrifice the rest to him at this very moment. You can’t go back.

It’s dark and dangerous on the streets of New York at night, but no moreso than it was in this brownstone, and you know your way around the city you were born and raised in to find your way home. One glance back, catching the dimly lit, deceptively beautiful sight of this empty palace, which you now realize reflects him perfectly.

A push of your hand to unlock the door, it beeps. The quiet denotation of your exit, and your lingering items on the second floor, are the only evidence that you were ever here.

Running seems to be the only option that was ever worth taking in the first place.

⤜♚⤛

The cold night air whips your long coat around your legs, but there’s no turning back now. Sleep shorts and another stolen t-shirt are all that accompany your coat and sneakers, but you make do with it, and by the time you reach the subway, it hardly matters.

The air does little to clear your head, consumed by the toxic swirl of longing, regret, uncertainty, and fear that follows you all the way back to Hell’s Kitchen. Truthfully, you don’t know how long you have until they realize you’ve gone.

Will Barnes even try to come looking for you, in that vast manor of his? Will Sam think you’re still sitting on the kitchen floor?

The adrenaline is the only thing keeping you warm by the time you finally find yourself on your own street, and you’re intent on abandoning it all. The sympathetic response to run is all that drives you when you turn your key in your lock. Thinking through it requires slower thought than the racing of your mind allows when you push yourself into your dark apartment.

You’re breathing heavy, relishing in the warmth of your home for the split second it takes you to dump your keys on the kitchen counter. The sun’s rising slowly beyond your drawn blinds, and you’re so focused on stripping yourself of your coat that it takes a moment for the eerie feeling of being watched to creep up the back of your neck.

You freeze. Hoping it’s only a lingering fear response from earlier. Peering through the melting darkness. You catch sight of a void in it. The shape of a person.

The urge to scream swells in your lungs. You don’t dare do it. Caught between the choice to turn the light on or not, and praying that it’s some collection of furniture playing tricks on your mind, you round into the kitchen.

Reaching for a knife just in case, you choose.

Light swims in your vision, and you almost scream at the sight of the man sitting in the chair across the room, only for the sound to choke off in your throat when you recognize him.

“Donnie?!” you gasp with all the heightened exhaustion you can muster at seeing your brother for the first time in five years, “What the fuck is wrong with you, sitting in the dark like some psycho?!”

He’s just as you remember, a spitting image of those old photos your mom showed you of your grandpa, if only he had been a degenerate rather than a coal-miner. A grin cuts along his teeth, and you suddenly recognize the dread swirling inside you for what it is— a premonition— because nothing good ever came from Donnie being in your life.

“What? Aren’t you happy to see your big brother?”

#bucky barnes fanfic #winter soldier fanfic #the winter soldier fanfic #marvel fanfic #marvel female reader insert #female reader insert #newstuff female reader insert #author meg #trigger warning #nsft #smut #au fanfic #mob au

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thranduilsperkybutt · 1 year

Link

|| Part 1 || Part 2 ||

Fandom: Marvel

Pairings: Bucky Barnes/Reader

Imagine: Imagine you accidentally get sent back in time to 1940’s Brooklyn, thanks to something you were helping Tony work on, and you meet Bucky, who you have never met before, and he helps you get out, then when Tony finally comes to get you and bring you back home, you meet Bucky a few months later and he remembers you.

Warnings: Mentions of homelessness and the affects of it, mild language, ‘40s-type misogyny and sexism

Word Count: 2619

Reader Gender: Female

Author: Gabby

#bucky barnes fanfic #marvel female reader insert #winter soldier fanfic #marvel fanfic #the winter soldier fanfic #submission #submitted fanfic #female reader insert #fanfiction #newstuff female reader insert #author gabby

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thranduilsperkybutt · 2 years

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he’ll never stay, they never do

Gif source

Pairings: Walker/Dutton!Reader [Yellowstone]

Warnings: CONTAINS SPOILERS FOR THE ENDING OF S3 & S4X01. Angst-comfort smut (the best flavor lol); in the stables because I have no self control; brief mentions of the canon-typical violence, murder, emotional abuse, and child abuse in the show; age gap; secret relationship; unprotected sex

Word Count: 4,588 words

Reader Gender: Female

Author: Meg

Summary: Being a Dutton had never been easy, and being the youngest of your siblings made it even harder. The latest attack on your family has you starting to think that maybe Monica is right. Maybe your family is cursed. All you know for certain is that comfort isn’t something you find at home anymore. These days, you can only find that in the arms of the one other person on this god-forsaken land who doesn’t want to be here either. You’re both prisoners, but something about him makes you hope for freedom.

A/N: IF YOU’RE SEEING THIS NO YOU’RE NOT 🔫😩 I’m sorry it’s not my fault that Walker is so foine and sad all the time. I’m in love with one (1) yeehawlternative boy.

“Awful late to be saddlin’ up, don’t ya’ think?”

The familiar country drawl interrupts you from your overwhelming thoughts, and only then do your fingers still on the straps of the saddle. Walker comes into view past the stall gate, leaning on it, and you shouldn’t be as relieved to see him right now as you are.

In his flannel shirt and jeans he looks the same as ever, nodding towards where you’ve nearly half-way finished saddling your mare, a question on his furrowed brow, “Goin’ somewhere?”

God, where were you even going?

You hadn’t even thought any of it through in the dead of night, with the chirp of the wildlife and your racing thoughts dragging you into the siren’s song that led you out to the stables, where all you knew was the desperate sense of needing to escape. That guttural instinct inside you to go anywhere but here right now, because when was the last time you had felt comfortable in your family home, let alone safe?

Any chance of finding that feeling again was lost to you forever when those men had come two months ago, and almost killed everything left on this ranch that you gave a damn about. Would have killed you, if it weren’t for the very man standing before you, now.

You had known Walker was a killer since the moment you met him, fresh out of prison for it and stepping foot onto your father’s ranch like it was going to be anything other than more of the same. He reminded you of it once again when he, along with the other ranch hands, helped to string up the attacker he’d dragged off of you from outside the bunkhouse in a pure, adrenaline-fueled rage. They didn’t have to hang that man the way they did, and you didn’t care enough at the time to stop them with the initial shock of it, but what was your excuse, now? The shock has long since worn off.

And maybe the things Monica was saying these days were true. Maybe your family is cursed, along with this blood-soaked land, because you were still grateful for what he’d done, in the days after it.

You were glad he killed that man— that assassin, because it meant one less nightmare to haunt you past your dreams.

“I’m…” your mouth feels dry when you speak. Can Walker see the ghost in your eyes? The hyperaware look that marked you a cornered animal? You think he can, because he opens the gate between you to move further in, running his hand soothingly along your mare’s neck with his approach. It may as well have been your own, because it gets harder to breathe with every step he takes closer, “I just wanted to go. Ride her to the fence and keep going.” Focused on the trail of his tattoos up his exposed forearm, your gaze is stopped where his sleeve starts in the crook of his arm, but you still don’t meet his stare.

“You know it’s two in the mornin’, right? It’s pitch dark out there,” his voice is a smooth reminder, but all you can manage to think is that this must be the reason he doesn’t have his hat on. Fuck, you’re all jumbled up. He straightens you out when he calls you on it, reaching up to catch the curve of your jaw, refocusing you, “You hit the ground runnin’ from those dreams of yours again, didn’t you?”

It’s like his touch melts you, and you’re leaning into him just as easy as the breath you take. He’s as good as a valium, because you’re cured by his touch for just as long as he gives it. Drifting into the bittersweet smile he gives you, soft on his lips, and that pained look of his, telling you he wishes for an escape off this ranch just as badly as you do.

You murmur, “I wish I could leave, for real, this time.”

It isn’t a lie. Maybe months ago, it would have been. You know you wouldn’t have admitted to this feeling if he had asked you to go with him that first time he tried to leave this place. If he asked you now? Well…

Part of you wishes he’d stayed gone. You know he wishes that, too.

Most of you wishes he had a reason to stay, but you can’t be sure.

“You ain’t never gonna’ leave this place, Miss Dutton. You and me both know that,” is the half-humored counter of a branded man who has been pulled back to this place against his will. Work or die, that had been the choice he was given by Kayce and Rip, wasn’t it?

You’re both hopeless, “I could,” if it were with you.

You leave the confession half-spoken, too scared of the truth of whatever this was that has been going on between you since even before the first time he left. Too much of a coward to confess that you were completely, utterly terrified of being left alone. Too desperate for your family’s love and acceptance to admit that it’s exactly what you would be, without him.

The truth is, your family is so fractured and broken that even the slivers of affection that you had scraped for over these past few years of your life have withered up entirely, and the possibility of his rejection is nearly as terrifying as your father’s.

“Mm-hm,” hums at his lips, and you’re not surprised Walker doesn’t believe you. When have you given him a reason to?

Beth was the favorite child, and you had made your peace long ago that the spot of Daddy’s-Little-Girl would always exclusively be hers. She’d won it before you were even born, and guarded her position ferociously. Her viciousness had toned down, if only towards you, with the passage of time and, more recently, with Rip at her side, but tolerable-at-times was a longshot from a healthy relationship.

With Lee’s death, Kayce became the prodigal son. Your father had never allowed himself to truly dote on Jaime, but at least Jaime had a purpose, up until this recent rift between them.

You, though? You were a footnote, it felt like, at the end of a list of children, just like you had been on your mother’s obituary. The easily forgotten youngest Dutton.

Perhaps this hierarchy amongst his children wouldn’t have existed at all, if John Dutton himself hadn’t trained each and every one of you to crave his attention like it was the most precious commodity on earth. The worst part is, you still wanted it, even after your self-awareness had grown with your increasing age. You wanted them to love you so much that it hurt.

You want him to love you, too, and it hurts just as much.

“I’m serious,” you breathe, moving closer to catch your fingers in Walker’s suspenders. Pulling him with a soft encouragement that he doesn’t need in order to find himself tangled up in you again, “I’d leave right now.”

“Leavin’s one thing,” Walker is warm, radiating a surprising amount of heat in your closeness for the cool evening between you. “Stayin’ away is more tricky than that. This place drags you back.”

“I could stay away,” you’re determined, and you let the fantasy catch your good-sense by surprise, because you do confess. “Maybe you could help me to.”

Walker takes your hand in his, guiding it over his chest and the flannel there, until you can feel the brand that announces itself, scarred and puckered even beneath the fabric, “This says otherwise.” It isn’t bittersweet this time, just plain bitter, when he says, “I’m stuck here.” Eyes softening just a little, he adds with a half-hearted smile, and a pointed gaze, “At least the view is nice.”

There’s more to it than that. There has to be, by now.

Proximity isn’t enough reason for the way he seeks you out nearly every chance he gets to be alone together, or the way he’s confessed just as much as you have that he’d rather be anywhere else at times like these. The way it’s implied around the edges of his fantasies that you’d be in that imaginary place with him. On the nights when the fear and doubt, the memories and the nightmares steal away too many pieces of yourself, that he has to be the one to help you find them again. And the nights when he takes you apart like it’s a distraction, and you take him apart like you’re sorry to do it, because this ranch is just another cage to him, with fancier bars.

People don’t do this for one another, over and over again, just because of something like proximity or loneliness.

But you’re too damn afraid to call him on his lie.

He’s either wiser than you are with the years he has on you, or just as afraid, because he doesn’t call you on the lie beneath your sarcasm, “Of all the people you had to be stuck with… bet you’re happy it’s me.”

Something in the way he kisses you, with a slow tenderness that shouldn’t come so easily after all your family’s done to him, tells you that the brand left on his chest isn’t what’s keeping him from trying to leave again. Something in the tightening of his hand over yours, holding it atop the brand, but also his heart, keeps you in that hopeful, dreamlike state. A wish that he might stay, when all the others have been chased away. Wishing for him to be yours, as much as you know secretly that you’re his.

Because you are, undeniably, his.

You wonder if he’s figured that out yet.

“Let me help you put the saddle up,” he murmurs against your lips, and just like that, the demons that had followed you into this place have been chased away, back to the main house.

“I don’t want to go just yet,” you begin, watching the way his lips quirk upwards.

“Well, hell, I sure ain’t gonna’ make you head back up to the main house, even if I could,” Walker’s fingertips smooth down your jaw, before releasing you entirely. “You just can’t stay in this stall, is all.” He’s right; you know he is, but your feet are reluctant. As if leaving will mean abandoning the fantasy of your mutual escape altogether. You’re planted to the spot until he makes the first move, a soft encouragement in his voice, “C’mon.”

He steers you into action like you were the very horse he’s helping to unsaddle. He always had a way of doing it— coaxing you down from your most disturbed moments, into the calm. Treating you with the same gentleness that he did the animals you helped care for, this way about him was something that was so foreign to you, so rare, that you truly never expected to find it in a man like him. Still, there it is.

And with every movement of his hands, the undoing of buckles and straps, he takes apart the tension of your shoulders, along with the saddle on your mare’s back. If you know one thing, you know that when he hurts you, breaks your heart in two, it won’t be by those hands. No, it’ll be gentler than that, and not so easily healed as bruised knuckles or split lips.

Part of you suspects one of these days, you’ll find he’s left without you, but you try not to dwell in premature grief. For now, you relish in the times when he’ll take you apart with the precise intimacy that predicates his intention of putting you back together whole afterwards.

Times like this.

Once the saddle’s back in its proper place outside the stall, atop its stand, and Walker has you in the same position you have a habit of finding yourself in with him. The length of his body pressing up behind yours. Lips biting into your neck just as much as the shadow of his beard does, while his hand down the front of your jeans keeps your own firmly leveraged on the saddle in front of you. Holding tight against the seat, because you’re certain you’ll collapse where you stand if you don’t grab hold of something.

Craving more than the grind he gives you through the denim covering your ass, the drug of his lust in your veins isn’t enough to satisfy, but it’s just enough to distract you from the thoughts that had sent you running here to begin with.

His fingers, though, have a history of getting you close to satisfaction.

“Need me, yeah?” his voice in your ear has you arching back, just as much as his middle and ring fingers pushing between your legs do. Careening your hips into his touch, you bite back your whimper and instead manage a nod that seems to satisfy him, “I know. I can feel you.”

“Walker---” his name comes softly, pleasured surprise lacing your breath as he kicks your feet apart just enough to dip his fingers within you despite the restricting space of your undone jeans. The heel of his hand presses against your clit and you’re forced to grind into it, chasing the cramped thrusting of his fingers within you.

“That’s fine with me,” he groans softly at the feeling of you clenching around his fingers, sending a heat burning underneath your skin with his smoothe tone. Soothing you with the promise in it, “Need you, too. Right here.” There’s no pretense to the way he says it, no foreplay. You’ve both fallen too deep for that, “Needed you since this mornin’.”

“Hurry up, then,” you know it sounds bossy as soon as you say it, but you don’t care. You’re restless for this feeling only he can give you. This wanted thing you become with him.

Walker’s chuckle is strained, as his fingers between your thighs become more precise in their torture, “Yes, ma’am.” Giving your hip a squeeze with his other hand, it migrates upwards, over your stomach until he finds his leverage just beneath your breasts to pull you back, flush against his chest.

A glance down shows the desperate situation he has you in, but you’ve both become increasingly desperate with each passing day since the attack on your home, so it almost seems fitting. The way he wants you right now is the only honest thing left on this ranch, and the gasps of pleasure he rips from you might as well be confessions in their own right.

As much as you want to have him properly one of these days, in a place where you don’t have to hide this thing between you, where you had all the time in the world--- you can’t bring yourself to begrudge the way he has leant you against him in his urgency. Time was something that was never on your side, but for once the hasty intent that laced his fingertips works in your favor as he pulls them from within you to press feverishly against your clit. He wants you, that much is blazed clear along your skin with the soothing encouragement of his lips.

Delicious circles melt into something more intricate yet equally as breathtaking as he plays you until you’re dissolving into a mess of his making. Soft whines and moans escape your lips, despite how quiet you try to be in the night. The low rock of his own impatient hips against yours does nothing to help quench the heat he lights deep within you by his fingertips.

He’s going to make you come undone at this rate, and you know that’s exactly his goal, when you feel yourself clenching up around nothing thanks to the overstimulated bundle of nerves he abuses, gasping his name at the end of a whine, “Walker, I--- I’m---”

You can’t even speak, but he murmurs compassionately where he claims your throat with his lips once more, soothing the perfect agony, “I know.” The graze of his teeth leaves a shiver of pleasure, pressing down between your thighs, “You like it, darlin’? Show me how much.”

The sound that breaks in the back of your throat is no less desperate than the position he has you in, the sharp intonation smothered into a withering hum behind the palm of a tattooed hand. The lingering smell of cologne at his wrist, the taste of his skin— you drown in it, against him. Dissolving into the touch of his hands and the lean of his body, it’s a way of losing yourself that you’ve become addicted to, ever since this entanglement started.

You’re addicted to him, and even the breathless, shivering bliss he’s sparked through your veins isn’t enough to leave you satisfied by the end of it.

Walker’s thumb drags along your bottom lip with the shifting of his hand, and the grip he catches at your chin; turning your head just enough to allow him to cut off your needy, “Please,” with his lips. It’s as much an answer as anything he could have said, licking into the open moans he drags out with each slowing stroke of his fingertips within your throbbing core.

You’re trembling, a small vibration that leaves you on unsteady legs, by the time he lets you pull his hand from it’s oversensitive torture. Turning in his arms, you face him, only to drag him back to you by the grasp you find at his flannel. His fingers push at your hips, insistent on stripping you of only what’s necessary in your mutual haste to have each other. Managing a few of his shirt’s buttons before he’s urging you back onto the saddle stand, your hitch into the seat is aided by the man intent to slot himself between your thighs.

Fingers carding through dark hair, watching the way he watches you through a lidded gaze, the dark mood in his eyes only threatening to drag you deeper into him than you already are. You want to drown in the abyss of them, bury yourself alive in the browns of hazel eyes, be born anew in the ring of green. You’ve had a taste of it already, this feeling, because you always seem like a different person when he’s looking at you. Like he knows the depths of your soul.

Silver streaks of graying hair sift along his temple with a shift of your hand, the gentle press of your palm to his jaw met by the prickly scrape of a low-trimmed beard. Watching his lips part with words you barely understand until they’ve left him, evaporating in the space between you despite how heavy they were. Nearly as heavy as your heart feels with each passing second.

“I wish I was younger when I met you. Before…” he trails off, but you can guess the end of the thought that dies at his lips.

Before prison. Before this ranch.

Maybe then he’d have a choice in staying here. Maybe then you’d be sure you were the reason he did.

Your voice is a low secret between you, unsure if you’re trying to convince him or yourself, “If you met me then, things wouldn’t be any different than they are now.”

“I reckon you’re right. Trouble does have its way of findin’ me,” Walker agrees too easily; too hopelessly. Acceptance had never sounded so much like giving up as it did when he spoke. It’s probably why the music strummed by those hands always seemed to sound so melancholic, this misery running through him.

You want to be free of it, almost as much as he does.

Urging him closer, drawing him in with your legs and the hand his jaw leans into, “If that’s the way it is, I guess that makes this trouble, huh?”

“Don’t act like you didn’t already know that from the get,” tattooed knuckles brush your hair back, the tips of his fingertips brushing past the shell of your ear. “You ain’t as clueless as you want people to think you are.”

You’re as hopeless as he is, when he dips his head to catch your lips once more. Slower, fiercer, like whiskey down the back of your throat, he punctuates the truth of your secret affair. It burns, the way he kisses you. Hands cupping your jaw, your neck. Blazing his path into your heart in a way that is so uniquely his, until you’re left singed. You might as well be branded.

His breath hitches when your fingertips dip beneath his belt buckle. Hips directed by your tugging at its belt blindly until you feel the familiar loosening of his clothing. It takes you longer, but neither of you dare separate. The need for each other, for this closeness, and the lingering vulnerability in the night air, keeps you here. Orbiting around each other, destined to inevitably collide.

You’re crashing down with the low groan at his teeth, nipping your bottom lip just enough to make your heart skip a beat. Hand releasing the hard length of him over his undone zipper, he parts long enough to breathe in the feeling of your fingers, and the sure stroke of your hand.

“I want you,” catches his attention at your lips, and it sounds breathy even to your own ears. Too honest, too close to what you really want to tell him, but are too afraid to. Too scared to say, “I love you,” because what if it pushes him away?

Compromised words are all you have to offer him, right now. Carefully curated feelings bandaging the cracks of your truth that spills over your every pore.

You feel like you’re burning up from the inside out, flushed all over, as he runs the palms of his hands up your feverish thighs. Walker curses under his breath at the feeling— the sight of you, allowing your hand to guide his hips into a leisurely grind over your clothed core. You know he can feel how wet you are by now through the fabric, even if he couldn’t see it.

“You got a habit of gettin’ what you want, Miss Dutton.”

You wish it were half as true as he thought it was.

His skin is warm— maybe even warmer than you are, when his fingers reach to brush your underwear aside just enough to allow him the unobstructed view of you. The touch of your body to his when his hips piston forward and your hand guides the length of him to grind into you. It takes all the presence of mind you have not to lean into temptation and fall backwards off the saddle. The feeling of him, the warm friction of his length against your clit, returns the twitch to your thighs, an arch to your back.

The chuckle under his breath when he takes over flips the butterflies in your stomach. Deft hands pushing your legs further open, hiking them up his waist as he drags his cock leisurely down your slit. Teasing you is nothing new to him, but it leaves you just as wrecked all the same. You don’t have to worry about being interrupted, and that itself is a blessing that doesn’t come often.

You’re near begging for it when he decides to split you open just as deliberately, and the relieving stretch that comes with trying to fit him perfectly within you is nearly overwhelming with each ensuing curve of his hips into yours. He’s barely in a better state than you are, folding you up in him as well as possible while your hands clutching at his shoulder-blades attempt to drag him closer.

The gentle lovemaking he settles into is debatably more effective at taking you apart than the times you have him hard and fast. More dangerous is the pleasure that has the time to blossom in your chest in a way that is more than carnal, leaving you gasping for air with the suffocating pressure it settles there, swelling up until every nerve is slowly consumed by it. Leaving you to focus on nothing other than him, and the temptation dancing at his fingertips. Lips loose with your hushed moans and the whimpers of his name that dissolve at the coaxing of his tongue.

He’s left you to boil slowly, and by the time you realize he’s picked up his pace from its once-leisurely torture it’s far too late to keep yourself from becoming the writhing mess he’s made of you. A desperate hand abandons your thigh in search of the arch of your back, pressing you flush against his chest, burying teeth and tongue in your neck.

Grinding down to his pelvis on almost every quickened thrust, the feeling of him is making you lose your mind. All sense of yourself escaping onto his lips and hands until there’s nothing left of you at all other than this blazing, destructive pleasure.

Losing yourself in the safety of the man against you and this feeling, for a moment you’re unafraid. For right now, nothing matters more than this.

Nothing matters more than his voice in your ear, murmuring your name low between the heated trail of his kiss on your throat, or the feeling of his chest, solid beneath your fingertips. Not the memories, or the nightmares. Not your father, or this ranch.

You may as well be the only two people left in this place, because that’s what it feels like. It feels like the ghost of running away. The mirage of hope, running free.

And when you fall apart against him it’s not the same as being broken. Held close enough that you can feel his heart in his chest, thundering just as hard as yours is. It’s as close to unconditional happiness as you’ve ever known, being with him.

Mind wiped clean of everything other than the white-hot bliss of how he can make you feel, you only comprehend the trembling breath he takes as he pushes you through your undoing. Gripping tightly to your skin in the come down, sparking pleasure through your veins with his increasingly erratic pace as it devolves into a selfishly gratifying entity of its own.

Walker’s forehead falls against your shoulder as his hips falter, ecstasy shuddering down his spine. You rake your nails over the flannel-covered expanse of his back, feeling the wrath of it. The sounds he buries against your skin are nothing short of broken moans, as he loses himself in the entanglement of your body in his.

Two sides of the same coin, splitting apart once more when he leans away in that mildly drugged state that comes with the deep end of bliss. You can see your own mirrored loneliness in his eyes— in the way they slip down to your lips, before he decides to lean in for one last taste of free will. Blinking muddied lust from beneath dark lashes, his hand reaches up to drag his fingers gingerly along the burning curve of your cheek.

It’s messy and raw, this silent moment in the aftermath of your mutual destruction. You’re too alike for your own good. Not even the poet in him can bring himself to say what he means in this moment.

Maybe he’ll be able to put it to music one of these days, when his songs aren’t laced with sadness, and you’re the last fond memory he has of this place.

#yellowstone fanfic #yellowstone walker fanfic #walker yellowstone fanfic #yellowstone female reader insert #female reader insert #newstuff female reader insert #fanfiction #fanfic by me #author meg #nsft #smut #trigger warning #just in case

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thranduilsperkybutt · 3 years

Photo

where good girls go to die

Photo sources: 1 | 2 | 3

Pairings: Tommy Shelby/Reader

Warnings: NSFW; canon-typical language; adultery? (leaving a fiancé at the altar); oral sex; unprotected sex (don’t do as they do); light choking/breath play; overdramatic love confessions; scanty “proofreading” lmfao; plot? what plot?

Word Count: 4,880 words

Reader Gender: Female

Author: Meg

Summary: “Go on, then. Walk out that door! See how much Thomas Shelby will want you when you’re penniless!” Not even the threat of losing everything could keep you away. Family forbiddance, be damned.

A/N: Uhm?? Y’all I don’t know what to say 🤷‍♀️ other than Tommy Shelby could ruin my life any day of the week, please. I hope y’all enjoy! Keep in mind I’m only familiar with the first season so far, and this is based on that.

⤜♚⤛

I’ve heard recently that love makes fools of us.

“You let me in this instant, young lady!”

Tears, streaming down your face. You rip the diamond from your finger. Throwing it in time for your father’s servants to open the door for him.

It hits him square in the chest.

“Give it back to whoever it belongs to! Tell him I’ve changed my mind!”

Your father is red-faced fury, the twin to your mother’s wide-eyed panic at the scandal that erupted in her own home. Servants could talk, and this was the story of the year.

It had started twenty minutes ago, when you found the post waiting for you on your vanity. Buried beneath the letters of a friend in London, and then down the street, was that deceptively delicate, swirling penmanship that made your heart stammer in your chest.

His letter had changed everything.

If that’s true, I must be the dumbest bastard walking around Birmingham.

“Who gave this to you?” your father wrenches it from your grip, crumpling paper as you jump after it when he tosses it into the flames of your fireplace.

Heartbreak and rage, when you turn on him, betrayal, dancing in your eyes, “Have you been keeping his letters from me?”

You whirl on your mother, when she orders the maid waiting silently in the doorway, watching the worst day of your life unfold before her, “Unpack that suitcase, Suzette.”

“No!” you scream.

They say you are engaged to be married.

“You are not going anywhere. Your wedding is in the morning!” she snaps back at you, as your father joins in.

“You won’t throw it all away for a scoundrel!”

Sobbing, “I can’t marry that man!” Begging, you grip your father’s lapel, but there is nothing of the man who had sung you lullabies as a child right now, only outrage, “Please, don’t make me marry him, Daddy! I don’t love him! Please!”

That doesn’t sound like the woman I know. Save me from this hell. It isn’t true, is it?

“That ‘man’ to whom you so flippantly refer, is your fiancé! You are promised to him, and I won’t have you making a fool of him or this family for the likes of Thomas Shelby!” it felt like the floor shook, as your father shouted down at you. Recoiling, you back into the bed post of your four-poster bed.

“I’m not going to get married tomorrow. I don’t care what you say about Tommy. I love him.”

“Love him?” your mother scoffs, as if it were the most foolish notion she’d ever heard, “Don’t be silly.”

“I do.”

Yours regardless, T.S.

“Shelby has made you no promises, and even if he had, you couldn’t marry a man like him! Any reputation our family has left will be ruined,” your father stalks towards you, grasping you by the arm hard enough to bruise. Shaking roughly, as if to force his way of thinking into you, “I thought you would come to your senses when I called you home from Birmingham and kept his letters from you, but look at you! ‘Love Thomas Shelby?’” He laughs, dry and bitter and full of hatred at the thought, ordering, “I forbid it!”

Daring, for the first time in your life, to defy your father, you grit through clenched teeth, “You can’t stop me from going to him.”

“Is that what you want to be?” he growls, “Thomas Shelby’s whore?”

“At least Tommy Shelby has never tried to sell me for money, which is more than I can say for you!” you bite back, because that’s what this marriage felt like. Just a way for your old-money father to keep his failing estate in business with the larger fortune your fiancé would offer.

The older man’s nostrils flare as he glares down at you, before throwing you roughly onto the bed, beside where your luggage lay open, “Go on, then!” Your father points towards the door as your mother lets out a sound of protest, “Walk out that door! See how much Thomas Shelby will want you when you’re penniless!” Your tears were blurring your vision, wretched sobs keeping a single word from passing your lips as your fists bunched in the quilt along your bed. Your father reaches forward, catching you by the chin to force you to look at him through your tears, finger and thumb harsh in their grip along your jaw, “But if you do not marry your intended tomorrow, girl, you will no longer carry this family’s name.”

He all but throws you away with the flick of his wrist. Moving across the room towards the bedroom door while your mother hovers in shock for but a moment, before ushering Suzette along with her.

Your diamond ring is left on your vanity, where Tommy’s letter had once been.

The night before your wedding, you had cried yourself to sleep, remembering the few words he had written in that solid, assured cursive.

Come home, won’t you?

He felt more like home than the entirety of this manor you had grown up in.

⤜♚⤛

Evening rains pour over Birmingham, making it dank and dreary. A fitting state for today, he thinks, as he takes another swig of whiskey, straight from the bottle. He had been in a mood since the morning, and only when he had forced The Garrison to close early just for him did he feel a second of relief.

“She’ll be Missus So-and-So by now,” he groaned, head leaning back as his jaw clenches. Spread out in the pub chair, the whiskey bottle taps the wooden floor as he dangles his arms with angry defeat, “Almost… Almost had fucking everything.”

Everything he wanted, always seemed to go tits-up for him.

The sound of wind whooshing into the room, disturbing the pitiful heat in his cheeks, accompanies the creaking sound of the front door. The bartender had forgotten to lock it in his haste to escape that mood of his, apparently.

“Can’t you fuckin’ read? Pub’s closed,” comes, growling through his teeth, and god help him, if whoever was at the door still stood there when he lifted his head back up—

“Even for me?” feminine, familiar, and something he hadn’t heard in months— his mouth goes dry, as his head snaps up.

You were soaked to the bone. Dripping on the floor from your dress to your boots, carrying only the purse in your hand. He would have thought you a drunken hallucination, if he hadn’t noticed your coat, in just as wet a state as the rest of you, dripping from where it hung on the rack near the door.

Out of breath as if you ran to get here, you say softly, “Hello, Tommy.”

There’s no ring on your finger. His heart stammered in his chest. Whiskey bottle left on the floor, forgotten.

“Supposedly, there was to be a wedding today,” his voice is as deep as you remember from your memories of that summer you spent falling in love with him, but there’s a raw undertone to it. A cautious curiosity there, “I wasn’t invited though, so I don’t know how it went.”

You step forward, boots squeaking in the deafening silence between you.

Rainwater on your lips, your tongue tastes them and the confession there, “Neither do I.”

He lets out a sharp breath, a bizarre sort of relief flickering in his eyes alongside the dark emotion swirling, bottomless. How terribly he tries to hold himself together with every step you come closer. Silence is all he can manage to give in this moment.

Stomach churning with anxiety at the thought that even a fragment of it is true, you say, “My father expects you to turn me away when I tell you he has disowned me for this.”

Tommy clears his throat, giving no hint into his thoughts by way of his casual tone, “Is that what you think I’ll do?”.

“To be honest,” you’re breaking, crumbling before his dress shoes like the water dripping off your fingertips. Breathing out an exhale that takes with it all the worries in your heart, you make to stand before him. What if he had changed his mind since he wrote that letter? Worse, what if your father was right? Even sitting down, he looks intimidating with the way his ice blue eyes study your own, searching for something, and you’re sure you’re more of an open book than he’s ever been, “I’ve never quite been able to tell what’s going on in that head of yours.” He hums softly, as if thinking, and you whisper— as close as you can come to begging right now, “I’m afraid you’ll have to tell me what you’re thinking, Tommy.”

“Didn’t you read my letters?”

“I only received the last one by a servant’s mistake, or pity— I still don’t know,” you can feel the anger flaring to life inside your chest at the thought. “They were under my father’s orders to keep them secret otherwise. I never got to read any of your letters, besides that one.” Trying not to shiver at the biting chill of the room through your wet underthings, it feels as if you were standing bare before him. You might as well have been, with how raw the yearning you’d kept secret for him remained, “I wrote to you, so many times, but any letter of mine was probably intercepted, too, unbeknownst to me.”

There’s the question of your suspicion in your eyes, and Tommy breathes slowly, as composed as he can possibly be when confirming it, “I didn’t get a one.”

“I thought you were set on ignoring them, for the longest time,” tearing your gaze from the intensity of his own, the burn in the back of your nose accompanies the tears that you try to keep from falling at how you’d been mistreated, “I thought you had forgotten about me, until… I saw your letter, and knew it couldn’t be true.”

He’s silent, for as long as it takes you to look from your observation of the bar-top, the bottles of liquor beyond it, back to him. His last letter getting overlooked, was akin to some sort of a miracle, or a gift.

You’re close enough that you could reach out and touch him, should you like to, but you don’t dare. Frozen to that spot, not from the creeping cold of the room around you, but by the look in his eyes.

“And so, what?” Thomas wonders, with an edge of thick caution in his throat, “I’m supposed to believe you left it all… your family, station, fortune— for me, did you?” He wants you to say it, with every breath he breathes, and every beat of his heart. He needs to hear it.

How you need him, as much as he’s needed you.

“There’s nothing left for me there,” and you were welling tears now, blinking them back with damp eyelashes as your voice hitches. “None of it matters, without you.”

“You’re a lovestruck fool,” it isn’t cruel, his observation, breathed between the part of his lips as if he can barely believe it.

“Well,” your voice shakes, remembering the words of the letter which had drawn you here, “I have been told love makes fools of us all.”

Standing there, shaking and on the verge of tears, is the state you’re in when he finally reaches for you. Catching you by a firm hand on your hip to drag you closer, until you stand between his knees. Looking up at you with a fire dancing within the cool blue of his eyes, you leave one last confession at the altar of your lips.

The hand that finds your cheek is warm, burning you from the inside out, and your own comes, steadying, to his shoulder, “There’s nothing I have— no connections, no family— but, I’m so in love with you, Thomas Shelby.” Your voice, barely above a whisper, suffocating in your throat with the desperation in it, “I love you so much that I can barely stand it.“

His own is rough, growling in the pouring silence of this pub, accented by the thunder of the storm beyond it, “Fuck your family’s connections. Fuck them.” Simple, was his honesty. A solution to your tormented heart. Your knees are weak, breath stammering in your chest alongside the throbbing, harsh beat of it. Drowning you in his eyes, “You have me— you’ve always had me.”

The grip he has on you is possibly the only thing that keeps you from collapsing into his arms with the beaming relief that floods your system in that instant.

Your father was wrong about him— so very, very wrong about everything.

“And you’re mine. There’ll be no sending you away.”

With what little control you have left, you grip your skirt, lifting it just enough to ease yourself into his waiting lap. A position he freely accepts without any concern of your clothes soaking into his, brushing a watery lock of hair behind your ear. You can barely think, looking at him, a smile growing along your lips, and for an instant, you don’t realize you’ve yet to say anything.

Insistent, edging impatience, in the tilt of his head toward yours, and it’s as close to begging as he’s ever been when his lips graze your jaw, his first kiss, “Tell me you’re mine, love.”

“I’m yours—” you breathe in a sharp exhale, cut off as quickly as the words escape your lips by the press of his own.

Ardent, passionate need laced his tongue, his lips, his hands— like a drug. Dragging you further and further into the depths of him, until nothing else existed but this feeling, here and now. He tastes like the whiskey on his breath. The scent of tobacco on his clothes, a faint undertone compared to the rainwater that clung to your own body.

“I love you,” whispered softly against your waiting mouth, between one kiss and the next, melting into one another, until all you can think of is a staggering, repeated declaration.

He loves me, he loves me, he loves me—

There was no longer any doubt of his feelings or your own, and that in and of itself was enough to bubble pure, unrestrained happiness from your very soul. Completely, wholeheartedly, embarrassingly head-over-heels for him, you had felt like the sun and the moon for too long, but nothing could keep you apart any longer.

No more were the days of that clandestine, vibrant summer in which he had dazzled you so thoroughly with his blunt wit and dangerous stare. No longer did you have to find secret places and inventive ways to steal what precious moments you could with one another. That terrible, lonely winter had passed, and with the budding of spring had come this.

This glorious feeling of his hands against you.

This was something to believe in. To live for.

His fingers find the buttons of your dress, grazing against the curve of your spine. Breath hitching against your tongue when your hips roll into his, encouraging. Too long since you’d last been like this, and the feel of him, lean and firm beneath the fabric of his shirt, was enough to drive you mad with want.

Time apart had left you both impatient, if the speed with which his hands worked along the arch of your back was anything to go by. The pads of your fingertips drag against his scalp, through the buzzed trim of his hair, and he squeezes your thigh through the skirt of your dress. His hand travels upwards, catching you by the nape of your neck as he abandons the buttons at your back, of which he had only released the top four.

“Fuck,” he growls when you say his name, a whining, urging lilt to your tone. Fingers grazing the shaved angle of his jaw, you rock into the insistent hardness growing between his thighs, meeting the piston of his own hips. A silent request.

Hurry up.

You’re grateful the floor wasn’t filthy, when he eases you both onto it. Even if it had been, he would have likely taken you apart there, anyway.

There are few words that come from him, past the reverent murmurs of your name and slight curses that accompany your haste to shed what offensive fabrics there were between you. Little else obstructed you from pulling him down by the shirt to your lips once again, every moment apart setting a deep, molten heat in your abdomen.

Your stockings were escaping the ribbons keeping them up your thighs, and you’re certain you looked quite the mess, lying on that floor beneath him when his fingers pressing against the flesh of your thigh moved ever upwards to release you from the laces and ties of your chemise undergarments. Well, as much as was possible with his haste, and with you pawing at him to come closer, but he avoids it until he’s thoroughly satisfied with your state of undress.

Heels scraping against wood, your hips move involuntarily when he dips his head, strong arms catching your thighs in their grip and effectively pinning you down to the floor as you whine, “Tommy—!”

His thumb against your clit almost scrambles your brain as he knelt above you, murmuring privately, as if you didn’t have this place all to yourselves, “I’m going to worship you, and then I’m going to fuck you, and fuck you again to make up for lost time.” Simple, blunt words which could make your whole body burst into flame, with the heavy promise in his voice. The stare he affixes you with could swallow you whole with the hunger in them for you.

“Yes,” is all the breathy permission he needs, dragging your hips towards him and catching his palm on the slip of your thigh. When he kisses you there, it’s a slow drag of lips, teeth and tongue down your inner thigh, towards the glistening need you displayed for him even between your legs. Every part of your body was screaming for him, aching, anticipating his every want and whim.

This man could tear you to pieces, and the ashes of your bones would sing his praises to the heavens.

His fingers are there, long before his lips, but it’s his lips that have you gasping out, struggling to breathe— to do anything other than moan his name far too loud until it fills the empty spaces between you and reminds you that you’ll never be alone again. Tongue, breath, warm and soft between the folds of your most private of places, to which he was intimately familiar. Second nature it had become, loving you. He was a master; far too good at stripping you down to nothing and building you back up again for it not to have been a dangerous game you were playing, in the first place.

You can do nothing other than grip the fabric of your dress, dead center on your chest, and try not to writhe too desperately in his solid grip when he takes you to heaven and back. Your leg rested on his shoulder, draped down the length of his back as he spread you just as he pleased, the other parted on the floor. A lidded stare, peering at you every so often to catch the pleasure he erupts as it shivers, white-hot, down your body.

Breathing was a luxury, you realize, trying your hardest to catch your breath when he pushes one long finger into your dripping cunt, replacing his touch at your clit with his tongue. Groaning there, as your legs start to shake, incomprehensible pleas and mewls of his name tumbling from your lips. Only a few languid, dragging pumps, and he’s splitting you open with another finger added to the first.

How prettily you come undone for him, when your back arches at the curve of his fingers and your breath catches in your chest. Stars behind your eyelids as your brows push together in frozen, momentary ecstasy.

He had earned your scream.

Pleasure saturated the air, dripping down your body and mixing with the slow-drying of rainwater and sweat that still clung to it. Breathing it in, overcoming you, the feeling was as oppressive as the hypersensitive acknowledgement of the sudden emptiness that accompanied the slip of his fingers from within you.

No one had ever made you feel like this.

So overcome with the mixture of lust and love and need that it became an overwhelming mixture which could only be cured by his touch alone, your fingers card through his hair as you urge him back up the length of your body. You can smell yourself on him, when he kisses you just as fervently as you return it, dripping his own aching lust onto your tongue with the way he breathes you in. Consuming you with the press of his lips as his hands wandered between you, the hasty rustle of fabric meeting the breathless urgency of your kissing as he frees himself from his trousers as quickly as he can with the distraction of you against him.

Greedy hands, a greedy mouth, searching for whatever was left to take of him, and make it yours.

He gives it to you, with the kiss of his length through your slick folds, and you feel him shiver against you at the feeling. Any chill that was in the air had turned sweltering, with the fever he’d set into you, and you were certain that, should you get any hotter, you were near to steaming. Burning up, when his hips piston again, pushing himself within you with a low, indulgent groan.

The time apart from him keeps him from rushing it, but rather, forces the coaxing, insistent press of him within you. Splitting you open until you felt perfectly full, and then some past that, with the way his abdomen brushed against yours, and the grip you clawed into his back. Relishing in the feeling of your fluttering, velvet warmth, he drags your hips up with his own in an unhurried grind against you.

Lips down your throat, hand in your hair, his pace starts with that slow wonder. Pleasure bursting and shimmering with every gentle rock that sent him spearing to the hilt back into you. You were buzzing with it, gasping and squirming in the heady warmth of his infinite closeness. Dragging you toward the edge of your satisfaction with each indulgent thrust, until it twined into an overwhelming coil of desire.

You don’t think he’d ever been like this with you. This gentle, reverent thing before you, holding you so tightly to his chest and brimming with untold desperation that threatened to snap.

It’s almost surprising, when he lets you shift your hips, turning until he rolled beneath you.

His dress shoes tap against the floor as he gets his footing, pushing his hips up into yours with every roll of your own down to his. The image of him that you get when you sit up properly, will be burned into your mind forever.

Tommy watched you with that love-drugged stare like he didn’t want to miss a thing— not a second of you riding him, as his head leaned back onto the wooden floor beneath you. Sharp jaw and parted lips, the incantation of your name drenched in his thick accent, hanging on the end of a moan.

Your hands travel up his chest, bunching the fabric of his shirt where it still clung to his body, splotchy in the areas which had been dampened by the wetness of your own clothing. His neck, his jaw, bare skin flushed and hot beneath your own, when you rest your fingers against it. You feel him swallow at the feeling, as your pace picked up, and his hands came to your wrists, not to keep you from choking him, but to keep you from letting go. You give him a little squeeze, in time that you clench the muscles of your core, and his eyes nearly roll back in his head.

The broken, strangled moan that erupts past his lips is something you want to remember, for the rest of your life.

Hips stammering as they slam up into you, you feel a shift in the air as you nearly lose your rhythm, an edge is his voice, when he orders, “Fuck me—”

Anything further than that is cut off, when you lean forward against his windpipe, ever so briefly. Just enough to stop him short, have him reeling at the feeling of your weight above him, as he’d done to you before.

The sounds he was making were worth the little violence of your lovemaking.

You were no better, dissolving above him with every thrust, every drag of your clit against him, like another hit of your favorite drug. His grip on your wrists is biting, tight strength there as his biceps flex beneath the straining arms of his white shirt— it would be ruined, on this floor.

Neither of you cared.

Your voice was hitching, an ache setting into the muscles of your thighs, and you’re barely coherent at all when you feel him squeeze your wrists, barely registering the weight you had on his neck as you crash, unexpectedly, into your release once again. He drags your hands to his collarbones, as you force yourself to look at him through the shivering, blinding explosion of it, and he groans deep and hoarse beneath you at the feeling of it wrecking your body.

You have to keep yourself from collapsing atop him, when the woozy end drops you back to earth.

His pace has become feverish, a desperate means to his own blossoming end, and you mewl and whimper with each plunge into your hypersensitive body. You have to make an effort to stay upright, arms shaking as he hits you so beautifully even in the midst of his shallow, selfish pleasure. Clutching to your hips so tightly you think his fingers will leave their evidence there in the morning.

It’s with a hoarse, wrecked moan that he signals to you his downfall, reaching up to find a grasp along your jaw to drag your lips down to his as he leant up to meet you halfway. Stealing your kiss, his hand shifts to fist in your hair, open and needy as his tongue moans the last of his shivering pleasure with the final rocks of your hips in his. Clinging to him in the spent bliss of this afterglow, and the taste of his lips, it takes a long moment for you to let each other go.

⤜♚⤛

You’re barely presentable, when he drags you out of the rain and into his home. Not even the assistance of the clever Thomas Shelby could piece back the bits of your outfit which had ripped and tore in your desperate lovemaking along the pub floor.

The Shelby Parlour was dark with early-morning quiet by the time he led you across its floors and up the stairs. You wondered if the rest of his family were asleep, or out, but either way, you’re almost certain you had likely been loud enough to wake at least one of them up with your giggling upon him impatiently crushing you against the hallway wall just before his room to steal another kiss.

“Get in there,” he nods when he’s good and ready to release you into the safety of his bedroom, and you dart into the darkness just as soon as he does.

His silhouette disappears into blackness when he shuts the door behind him, lost in the swirling darkness until the blinking of your eyes adjust enough to make out his advance upon you.

Warm, he is— just as warm as you remember him being on the floor of the Garrison, when his hand slips along the dark outline of your neck until he can catch you by the curve of your jaw, murmuring, “Those wet clothes— you should get them off.”

Leaning into his touch, your hand finds his wrist, and you leave a slow, gentle kiss against the palm of it, next to his thumb, “I should, shouldn’t I?”

“You should.”

By the time his hand drops from your cheek, you can turn to see enough through the drizzling moonlight to make out the shapes of his bedroom. This place, he had welcomed you within, was his own. None of the decorative touches his family had undoubtedly had their hand in beyond these four walls, only what he deemed necessary. What he thought was worthy of placing among his most private of things.

The place he was now telling you was as much your home as it was his, with the slip of his arms around your waist, and the dip of his chin onto your shoulder.

Pulling you into his chest, you feel him say it, as well as hear it. The soft, short utterance which was as much a request as a statement.

“Marry me, love.”

They will say you were just another thing he stole, but really, you were stolen away from him first.

⤜♚⤛

General + Longer Fic Taglists: @im5-tw @hanoi15 @thatbitchann @genericbrowngurl @badbitsh13 @wayward-sociopath-221b @abisexualsailormoon @thatsjustdamncrazy @breadsquash @mydelightfultigerbouquet @midnightzonzz @stylebydesignxo @otassbek @a-pigeon-is-spying-on-me @mysecondcarisa67chevyimpala + @beamingbisexual @karasong

#thomas shelby fanfic #tommy shelby fanfic #peaky blinders fanfic #peaky blinders female reader insert #female reader insert #newstuff female reader insert #author meg #fanfiction #fanfic by me #trigger warning #trigger: choking #trigger: breath play #trigger: adultery #smut #nsft

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thranduilsperkybutt · 2 years

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Ruby Red Nights (Part 4)

| Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 |

Imagine: Imagine Olivia and Elliot being turned into vampires and as their sire, you teach them how to live as creatures of the night. It gets hot and heavy one night as they give into their new urges and before long it turns into a threesome between you nightly.

Warnings: Blood, Vampire AU

Word Count: 1,333 words

Pairings: Olivia Benson x Reader x Elliot Stabler

Universe: Vampire AU, Law and Order SVU

Reader Gender: Female

Author: Ilariya_Lavoro writes

Tension hung heavily in the air, as you crossed the threshold of your nest, with Olivia and Elliot closely trailing a few steps behind you. Whilst your mind was lost in the past, reliving the heart-breaking memory of that particular night. One moment in your many decades of life that you truly regretted. You wanted to simply forget.

Attending such gatherings previously had been strained, as you awkwardly mingled only showing your face to silence rising rumours of your demise, which had sprung up after avoiding many a social gathering. You had no thoughts on advancing through the ranks of the inner circle. You just wished to live out your eternal life in peace. You sighed, as you paused in your bedroom’s doorway. You could easily slip away into the welcomed embrace of a deathlike slumber but yet, you couldn’t.

You waited for the click of a closing door before speaking. “I know that you have questions, I can feel it through our connection” You started, your tongue felt like lead. A heavy weight in your mouth as you struggled on.

“I don’t want both of you to feel as if I am pushing you away, this is far from it. I had never intended to turn another after….”You paused, for it had been an age since you had last spoken their name. You were old but you would never be able to forget Emma, no matter how hard you tried.

Neither Olivia or Elliott spoke, they listened as you spoke. On the job training that they both had helped in a situation such as this. Even if this was not how it was meant to be used. “I have not told you about my own sire, there is a good reason for that. It was not a moment in my long life that I wish to re-experience”

You turned to face them, their facial expression gave everything away. You could easily read it. “It was not what you believed occurred. Yes, it was not my choice. I was chosen to replenish numbers after my sire in a blood induced rage slew one of his nest mates. I was kidnapped out of my bed and turned” You explained, as concern and sorrow rushed through the tether. It washed over you, wrapping itself around you holding you in an emotional embrace.

“It was a long time ago little ones, I have found peace with how I came to be. I have accepted what had to be, my sire was punished and I was the result” You could easily recall the burning agony as his fangs carelessly tore through your flesh. He had not cared for your wellbeing. His frustration and pride had not made it a pleasant experience as he mauled your neck as he thoroughly fed from you. Draining you to an inch of your life before shoving his bleeding wrist into your mouth.

The memory of his rough, commanding angry voice barking at you. One word that was all that he deemed that you were worthy of. ‘Drink’ It had been laced with layers of temptation. It was a command that you found almost impossible to ignore. Once you had drunk enough for the transformation, darkness had consumed your vision. He had snapped your neck and flung your corpse in the waiting grave.

“Mere moments after I emerged from my grave, I was whisked away to stand before the area’s elder and presented. Barely a few hours old and covered in dirt and blood. Unsure and afraid” As you spoke, it was as if you were back in that moment. That meek mouse terrified, quaking like a lamb about to be devoured in a den of wolves. As you stood before the elder who looked down at you with such pity.

My sire was blunt and straight to the point when we next were alone, explaining what I now was. However he had no intent of being tied down to his mistake. He broke the sire bond a month after my siring. I had been taught the basics to stand on my own two feet and thrown out to find my own way”

It was a hard topic to breach and you had barely scratched the surface. Once you had crossed that line, there was no going back. As tension melted away, leaving behind an empty, heavy void that would change everything.

The force of your violent push shook the entirety of the apartment. It had been as if an earthquake had struck the city at this exact moment in time, reflecting your emotions flooding through your veins. Your nails penetrated the bare flesh of Elliot’s arms, as your white knuckled grip held him in place. Blood slowly flowed from the wound coating your fingertips in his life force. You couldn’t hold back the moan as the rich, delicious scent of his blood reached your ever so sensitive nose. It was inviting, tempting you to devour. To drink each precious drip that escaped.

How easy would it be to simply give into your base, animalistic instincts. You groaned louder than before. Knowing fully well that Elliot had heard that, Olivia too who lingered mere feet away. Her humanity was fresh, still lingering close to the surface. It was most definitely stronger than your own but she was still such a young vampire. In time that would change. Of this, you were certain of.

You on the only hand no longer struggled with your own, it was pushed so far down in the very depths. Almost completely forgotten. Olivia still quaked, fighting her very instincts as they worked against her almost enviable moral compass. She was firmly standing strong in the fight for the voiceless. Elliott was rather simpler but there was a hint of darkness that lurked dangerously beneath the surface.

Adrenaline surged as soon enough your position were switched in a blink of an eye, with your back slammed into the hard concrete wall which dented on impact. A pleasure filled gasp escaped your lips as his sharp, deadly fangs pierce the soft flesh where your shoulder meets your neck. It had been years since you had been the one to be bitten and fed upon in such an intimate fashion. The mix of both pleasure and pain was delectable, it had been lost to your memory of how it felt to be on the receiving end of such an action that could easily be savage as well as pleasurable joint enterprise for both parties. This lingered on that fine line.

Elliott could devolve and give into the monstrous hunger that lived within all vampires, patiently waiting for the one moment to strike, and wrestle control away. Let the animal out and reign. He would not fall that low. You would not let him but tonight he would hoover over the edge then again so would you and even Olivia would find her way closer than before as she broke free of her own mental prison inched forward. Maybe this was the start of something more, something special. You were fine with that if things did carry on down that path. You hiss as Elliott returned the favour by digging in his nails into your sides holding you in place, pinning between his body and the wall.

Let blood run free and pleasure reign as king of the night as the animal within shook hard, waiting to escape its cage. Your eyes flashed, it would get it’s wish on this eve. You would let it slip through the bars but come the morning it would be forcibly caged once more. You doubted that this would be the last time but never say never. There would always be a chance of a next time.

Such was the way when blood freely flowed, drenching the night in a ruby red tinge. As the feral nature rose claiming all that it came upon as it hunted in the name of a deadly thirst.

#olivia benson fanfic #elliot stabler fanfic #law and order svu fanfic #law and order svu female reader insert #submission #submitted fanfic #author ilariya lavoro #female reader insert #newstuff female reader insert #au fanfic #fanfiction #trigger warning #trigger: blood #nsft #tagging just in case

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thranduilsperkybutt · 3 years

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Killer

Gif sources: 1 | 2 | 3

Pairings: Baron Helmut Zemo/Reader

Warnings: TFATWS Spoilers! Hurt/comfort, slight angst but hopeful ending, a little bit of spice 🤏 but it’s still solidly SFW and mostly near the end; insignificant character death; canon violence; Zemo being a menace not only to my heart but my mental health

Word Count: 11,932 words

Reader Gender: Female

Author: Meg

Summary: While tracking the Flag Smashers across Europe alongside Sam and Bucky, you suddenly find yourself in need of a hero. The man who comes to your rescue, however, is the villain of too many people’s stories to ever be mistaken for one. The lines between what is and what should be become blurrier, making it too easy to forget that you aren’t supposed to like Baron Helmut Zemo at all.

A/N: Based on a simple sentence my friend said in the middle of us both simping over Zemo together, which inspired a novel lolol 😂 Whoops! Sorry I’m so long-winded, but I hope you guys like this anyway!

Oh, this was not good.

So very, very not good.

A twisting grip on your arm, pain shooting up your shoulder and from the side where the knee of the supersoldier atop you digs into the flesh of your hip, pinning you down. Cement bites into your cheek like a taunt of the predicament you’ve gotten yourself into when he slams you into the ground. Wind knocked out of you, you feel the painful strain in your joints, and know that if your arm is pushed too much further at this sharp angle, it’s likely your shoulder will come out of socket.

A whimpered yelp that you can’t bite down escapes just as the supersoldier’s grip tightens when you struggle beneath him, desperate panic lacing your blood as you realize you can’t escape his grip. You remember the sight of the back of Sam and Bucky’s heads when they went off towards the east side of this warehouse, and for a brief moment you wonder if that’s the last you’ll see of them. Splitting up had been the last thing you wanted to do, but the maze of this place made it a necessity if you were to do the thorough sweep of the area for the group of Flag Smashers rumored to be taking shelter here.

Well, you found them, alright.

Why did you have to be the one to get stuck searching the west side with Zemo?

The reluctance you’d displayed when Sam initially split you up with Zemo wasn’t exactly one-hundred percent truthful, though, was it? God, maybe it made you stupid and foolish, but a secret, cursed part of your stomach had flipped with nervous anticipation at the thought of being entirely alone with him. Something which had only been accomplished briefly over these past few days of tracking the Smashers all over Europe.

A subtle glance in Zemo’s direction had revealed no such similar reaction on his part, his stare meeting yours. Distant and unreadable, is what he was.

Except for when he wasn’t. Distant, that is.

Except for when he treated you with a modicum of civility. No, you couldn’t even fool yourself into believing it was simple civility, or even whatever traditional ingrained gentlemanliness that a Baron of Sokovia would have been taught in his youth.

Zemo had treated you with something more than that, especially when no one else was looking.

Sometimes, even if they were, and you still hadn’t decided if that dangerous toeing of the line between animosity and flirtation was a manufactured tactic to manipulate you or not. Uncertain if you should be offended that Zemo figured you the weakest link of your companions, or if, in the case that his interest was genuine… it wasn’t, so no use dwelling on what you would do in that case.

What you should do, when he set upon you with that look in his eye, like he knew something about you that you didn’t.

Like at the end of Sam’s introductory speech detailing the plan of the warehouse sweep, where that lingering glance in Zemo’s direction had ended with a slight curve of his lips upwards. Looking bizarrely satisfied with the announcement of Sam’s plan, and you couldn’t tell if it was at the thought of hunting supersoldiers, or the strange, treacherous feeling swimming in your own gut--- that Zemo’s pleasure was even minimally at the truth of another opportunity to have you, all to himself.

It had been enough to make you tear your eyes away, but not enough to get his lingering stare to stop itching the back of your neck. Enough to make Bucky raise a brow at you, a wary look in his eyes as he observed the one member of your party who seemed at all pleased with the fact that you were all likely heading into a fight, or worse, nothing at all, in mere moments. A warning simmered in blue, Bucky’s unspoken, “be careful,” resting on the solemn line of his frown.

You’d been told it enough in the past few days, to be careful of Zemo. Terrorist, criminal, killer--- a portion of the words they’d used to describe Zemo.

At first, you were acutely aware of the warnings you’d been given, of the story they’d told you. The same one you’d heard pieces of from different sources. What had happened in Bucharest was national news, but to think that the man who had sat across from you on his private plane, tension thick in the air while a smile rested on his own lips, had been responsible… it had churned your stomach at first. Sitting there in his finery, attended by a footman, he seemed a strange visual for the description that predated your formal introduction to him.

And you had excused yourself to the bathroom, if only to escape the feeling. The animosity of Bucky’s conversation and the tension in Sam’s shoulders, the weight of curious eyes, which always seemed to glance back towards you.

He was unnerving, if only because of how peculiarly normal he seemed in certain moments. Approachable. Amiable, even. A predator’s façade, meant for you to wonder if he had truly been the kind of man capable of terrorizing Bucharest and your friends the way he had.

Which was how he looked at you, just like a predator sizing up new prey.

The quaint jet washroom could not be your solace forever, and you were inevitably forced to emerge, or face the embarrassment of worrying your companions with an abnormally long bathroom break. When you emerged, however, you found the murmured conversation to be of a slightly lighter tone, and soon discovered the reason for it when you nearly walked straight into the chest of the man you’d gone to the restroom to escape.

“Apologies,” he had said, as if you were not the one who almost ran straight into him, amusement dancing in his eyes as his body easily blocked the narrow aisle towards where Sam and Bucky sat further in. They’d not yet noticed your emergence from the restroom, and your hoped your quick glance towards them had not looked too desperate. Torn back to Zemo with the startling shock that he would even offer, “Would you enjoy a drink? I was just on my way to get a refill, you see,” he raised the short glass in his hand, ice clinking, empty otherwise. Your pause was pregnant enough that he eventually teased, “I promise not to poison you, if that is your concern, my dear.”

“No, thank you,” had been your curt answer, pushing down the heat that threatened to burn your cheeks at his familiarity with you when you attempted to move around him, forced by the narrow aisle to graze his chest with yours in order to return to the attention of your companions, ignoring the additional attention which had followed you from the aisle.

The outfit you discovered he had chosen for you upon landing on the outskirts of Madripoor was… just another reason to dislike him. The one relief was that it was comfortable enough to fight or run in, if need be, but nothing about it was sensible in the least. What the outfit lacked in cleavage, it made up for in its form-fitting style, leaving little to the imagination otherwise. You felt as if every inch was on display for the perusal of whoever simply cast their eyes upon you, regardless of how you would tug and pull at the fabric in an attempt to make certain areas less focal.

And then there was what he’d said about it, humming appreciatively when you emerged from the jet just after Bucky and Sam to be offered a hand by Zemo at the last step, if only to scrutinize you in this ridiculous outfit as you equally scrutinized him, donned in a fur-trimmed jacket that you reluctantly had to admit made him look… handsome, “Good. In that, you shall make a believable lover.”

You’d almost tripped that last step at his words, despite the firm grip keeping you upright, eyes wide as you heard Bucky choke on his own spit before collecting himself.

Zemo paused long enough that you think he simply enjoyed watching whatever conclusions you were jumping to flash upon your face until he clarified, just as you opened your mouth to demand an explanation, wishing there was some way to wipe the smirk from his lips, “Not my lover, of course,” a gesture towards Sam, “but that of our friend, the Smiling Tiger.” His smirk broke out into a proper grin as you snatched your hand from his, realizing your form complimented Sam’s own ridiculous outfit, as Zemo addressed him, “The source of your alias is known for philandering various women. Seeing the Smiling Tiger with another woman has become somewhat expected.”

“He takes different women with him, even to do business?” Sam raised a brow.

Zemo chuckled slightly, “Certainly not.”

“What am I supposed to be doing tonight if I’m not going to meet the contact with the rest of you?” jutting your chin out, you cross your arms over your chest, if only to attempt to appear as if Zemo didn’t utterly disarm you with the slip of his attention back to you, “I’m not here to stand around and look pretty, you know.”

“Although I’m certain you would excel at that,” Zemo had purred, your poker face almost breaking under the shock of his forwardness, wondering if he simply enjoyed toying with you--- if perhaps you were an easier read than you thought, “Madripoor is full of dangers, but no one would dare bother a woman who belonged to the Smiling Tiger. It is typically assumed that these women pose no threat in and of themselves, considering his habit of picking shallow, frivolous women who rarely realize they are not the only of their kind in his orbit. This assumption will offer you the perfect position to scout the outskirts of our interaction for anyone unsavory, who might try and interrupt us during our business tonight.” He reached out, pushing your hair from your shoulder, and you took effort not to flinch back at the ghost of a touch on your bare skin, “While you will undoubtedly draw the eyes of many, none who are searching for a potential threat will linger on you long.” Zemo’s teeth flashed with his smile, his hand returning to his side, delving into the pocket of his coat leisurely when he shrugged, “You are simply another beautiful woman on the arm of a dangerous man tonight. That is nothing new in Madripoor.”

“And just how loving is Smiling Tiger with his girlfriends?” Sam huffs, and you wondered if the apologetic look he cast your way was for Zemo’s behavior, or what would undoubtedly be his own tonight.

Striding forward towards the waiting car, Zemo glanced over his shoulder as he passed your companion, “Very. You might want to warm up to each other rather quickly, if that is to be an issue.”

But you’d done worse undercover before, and a night of flirting on the arm of Sam Wilson was the least of your worries, so you mimicked the shrug Zemo had given you, and fell into step beside Sam, “No problem.”

Sam nodded, “None for me, either.”

“Let’s just get this over with,” Bucky agreed with a clench of his jaw, marching after Zemo towards the car, and you remembered that whatever you had to endure tonight, would probably be only a fraction of the discomfort Bucky would feel at reliving his Winter Soldier days.

Even if it wasn’t real.

Part of you yearned for the weight of Sam’s hand in yours, his breath tickling your neck where he had kissed it for show, upon being left alone at the bar in this strange Babylon that was the Low Town of Madripoor. Not that you were incapable of defending yourself, but you were outnumbered--- really, you all were.

And you preferred for your only intel on the region to not have come from the single man in your company who you knew you couldn’t trust. Zemo’s word that no one would bother you, alone, in this ridiculous outfit, simply because they’d seen Sam--- or, the Smiling Tiger, as he was tonight--- all over you? Well, it wasn’t enough to put your mind at ease.

You tried to hide that unease behind the drink in your hand, thankful that you’d been given something fruitier and less daring than the drink Zemo had ordered for Sam, as your eyes scanned the bar, catching where the three of them had disappeared into the unknown of the one area you could not enter.

Technically, you could, but you’d have to take out the four--- no, five--- guards lingering in the main chamber of the bar, before doing so. You couldn’t do that without starting a scene, though, and there was no reason to do so until absolutely necessary.

Pushing away from the bar, your only indication of what was going on past those burly statues of guards flanking the way beyond was the sound of the earpiece in your ear, shaded from view by your hair. A whisper, compared to the throbbing music around you, but just loud enough with its closeness to make out the conversation you weren’t otherwise privy to. It was going well enough, as you moved throughout the bar, ensuring your counted five guards remained in their positions, with their relaxed posture, and counting a sixth one as he returned from the direction of the restrooms.

Some tried to stop you, to get you to dance with them, but a simple name of your alleged lover had sent them on their way easily enough. So perhaps Zemo had not been entirely untruthful, it seemed.

Then, the meeting had turned sour. Going south fast, and you watched as the two guards flanking your companion’s escape tilted towards their bulky earpieces, but you were on them before they could go further within, to where you now heard fighting in your own subtle earpiece.

Doing your best to sound like a bubbly drunk, you draped yourself between them, obstructing their path, “Oh, is this the way to the bathroom?” You were two steps into the hall, when one grabbed you by the arm, the other attempting to walk around you, but you easily blocked the way as you tumbled yourself into his arms, apparently losing your footing at the tug on your arm, “You don’t have to be so rough!”

“Get out the way, lady, this isn’t the bathroom,” the one whose arms you were haphazardly steadied with grunted, and you watched as the other slipped past you towards the beyond, his partner following close behind.

But by then you were halfway across the bar in a quick stride, hearing the hushed, “Meet us outside, we’re going out the back,” that Bucky murmured, just for you.

“No weapons,” Zemo added curtly. “We are not ready to cause a scene, my dear.”

The threatening chime of the phones around as you hit the front doors and pushed beyond, only to find that the clinging followed you even there, lifted up by the chill and stink of Madripoor’s Low Town air, had you growling out, “Looks like that scene’s already started, whether or not you want it to, Baron.”

You caught sight of them up ahead, walking just as briskly down the side-street, and nearly had to run to catch up to their pace. By the time you did fall into step beside Sam, the neon glow of the bar at your back went black with a heart-stopping shunt, right before the gunfire started.

Your only relief as Sam pushed you down with his ducking, was that whoever was firing the automatic weapon was not a good shot. Then, you ran.

But, from the corner of your eye, you saw the flap of a long coat, the swivel on firm calves, as Zemo turned to the side, and escaped beyond the adjacent alley, and, right then, you thought that would be the last you saw of him. Yet, you couldn’t be concerned with hunting him down, what with the gunfire coming from all directions, straight at you, Sam, and Bucky. Allowing the perfect moment for Zemo to slip away.

As you ran, heart pounding and barely registering the sound of your companion’s voices, you almost laughed bitterly with the hysteria of the chaos around you, and the thought that maybe Zemo had created it just to escape. Whether he did or not, it certainly worked to his advantage, and the rev of motorcycle engines biting at your heels reminded you that, like it or not, you couldn’t worry about where he had gone, down that side-street, at the current moment.

Blindly following Sam, who was blindly following Bucky, down the alleys of Low Town, you turned the next corner as a shot rang out. Not the same, quick bursts of an automatic, but rather, the loud, resounding hollowness of a sniper’s bullet.

Air brushing against your cheek, the deathly kiss of wind as the bullet moved past your head, and straight into the motorcyclist behind you. You barely breathed as the second, then third shot rang true, and your pursuers fell dead on the slick, black wetness that was Madripoor’s alley streets.

Just as Zemo emerged from the opposite end of the street, catching your bewildered stare as his own, matching confusion, accompanied a breathless, “You seem to have a guardian angel.”

Even by looking at her, you could tell Sharon Carter was anything but your guardian angel.

Madripoor had changed her. The events which had trapped her here had done even worse. Something bitter and estranged lingered under each word the former agent of S.H.I.E.L.D. said as she presented her story for the four of you. Enough to make you wary of her intentions, regardless of how helpful she may have seemed.

Despite the fact you had known her, when you, too, once worked for S.H.I.E.L.D.

“Well, this is just too perfect,” were her first words, when she’d come upon the four of you in that alleyway.

Too perfect, was right. Her High Town home, her art gallery full of stolen things, the undisclosed clientele she apparently kept, and expected, resulting in your hasty changing of clothes. It all was too perfect, even down to her tragic story of exile from the States. Something was off, but you had too much to worry about to concern yourself with picking apart the story of your host, your momentary refuge provided by her hand.

You wondered if Bucky could sense it, too, when he said, “She’s kind of awful now,” following her abrasive callousness in detailing the hypocrisy of heroism.

If not him, then perhaps the look Zemo sent your way could confirm your suspicions, but he buried it down behind the glass of whatever hard liquor he had acquired in her too perfect home. Nagel, Wilfred Nagel was who you should have been focusing on, rather than the question you nearly dared to ask Zemo right there, as Sam offered Sharon a pardon that you all knew relied on too many bureaucrats to ever be a certain promise.

The longer Zemo held your gaze, the less you concentrated on the conversation around you, until something of a party was mentioned, and the low promise of the, “Trouble,” that Sharon would find parted Zemo’s lips. You could believe that, more than whatever Sam had promised her.

The art gallery had taken on the atmosphere of a club, rather than some simple party. Music throbbed, louder than that of the bar earlier in the night, pulsing bodies to move in tandem with the beat of the sound. Veins, stretching out from the same, beating heart.

But further in, past the stage and the DJ, was a viewing of priceless art, which was certain to be priced and sold tonight. The business Sharon was conducting, the contacts she’d said she would work for information on Nagel’s location, were undoubtedly among the people gathered there.

Waiting around was rarely enjoyable.

Your group moved towards the open bar, but none of you looked to the bartender for a drink. Zemo’s eyes affixed along the dancefloor, surveying, as much as Sam or Bucky were. If someone were to look closely enough, in that moment, that simple glance would give away their training. Your eyes, however, traveled past them, catching the questioning glance Bucky sent your way as you moved to separate and disperse into the crowd of writhing bodies around you.

“I’m going to dance,” was your only explanation. If the three of them had not seen some potential threat in those few moments of surveying, then it likely wasn’t there.

Either way, Sharon had said, “Lay low, blend in, enjoy the party,” before sending you on your way.

That much, you could oblige her with.

Considering the dancefloor was a great percentage of the party, dancing also allowed you to survey the room without looking like you were gawking. Thankful to be back in your own clothes, the black on black and buckles of your light tactical wear fit in appropriately with the variety of party-goers around you. Tempo flaring, sweat and alcohol, adrenaline rushing your veins, for a moment you found you were enjoying yourself, after the initial sweep of the dancefloor had come up empty of threats. Or, well, anything that was immediately threatening to you.

Which is why you could have kicked yourself for letting what might have been the biggest threat in the room creep up on you, in that brief moment of thrumming ecstasy.

His hand caught in the buckled strap at your waist, pulling you into a firm back, not unlike other dancers around you had, but his breath smelled of bourbon as it ghosted your cheek, and the accented voice at his lips was enough to have you whirling in his arms, “Do you mind if I dance with you?”

In your defense, the last you’d seen of Zemo had been moments ago, across the bar as he perused the artwork with Sam and Bucky. You could hardly believe he’d crossed the room as quick as he had--- quick enough to catch you off-guard.

“What?” you question blandly, the mixture of unease and shock churning into something else that you wouldn’t dare admit as he offered a dazzling smile, and you suddenly realized you were still standing far too close, with the growing crowd around you.

He mistook your confusion for difficulty hearing over the blaring music, and leaned closer, to catch you by the ear, “Dance with me.” Not a question, this time.

He was close enough you could smell his cologne--- a rich scent, peppered with cinnamon, which had you wondering just how much he had paid for the bottle of whatever it was, or if it had been something Sokovian from before the fall. It was unlike anything you’d scented before. He even smelled expensive.

For a second time, you almost jumbled his question, though not from shock. The heat rising to your cheeks and the skip in your chest, you couldn’t convince yourself was entirely from the dancing or the light drink you’d had earlier in the evening.

His own cheeks were faintly pink, upon closer inspection, but otherwise there was no evidence in his smooth posture of the multiple glasses of liquor he’d had tonight, yet it’s enough to make him look warm--- perhaps not as cold as he once had appeared.

Human.

“We are to enjoy ourselves, are we not?” he suggested, as if that would push you toward one answer over another, and it worked.

“Yes,” your lips said it before your mind caught up with them, and his smile widened into a grin, as brief as it was.

“Then, dance, my dear.”

His own dancing was rigid, but he kept beat. Small movements which would not draw attention from anyone, yet were somehow the barest ability required to be considered dancing. As if he had little experience dancing to club music like this, though you couldn’t be sure. It was almost comical, yet no-one could laugh at him, since he miraculously managed to pull it off.

Well, you, at least, were able to bite back a chuckle at the sight of him. Something about it, about him, in that moment, dancing so awkwardly yet with so much confidence, brought a genuine smile to your face, as you danced alongside him.

And when he gestured in a round motion with his hand for you to spin, you did that, too, without a second thought. It was easy to forget, for only a second, when your eyes caught his in the strobing light and the smile upon his face, his hands coming together to clap for you in time with the pulsing beat between you, just who he was, and what he’d done.

Far too easy to forget.

But one glance towards the edges of the dance floor has you remembering, as you caught the movement of Bucky and Sam following after the slip of Sharon’s form. Bucky’s eyes bored into you, his jaw clenched. Displeasure written on his face, and you don’t think the sake of blending in would be enough to excuse your dancing with Zemo, or the enjoyment with which you’d done it.

“Perhaps, she has found our missing Doctor Nagel,” Zemo’s form was too close, all over again, and this time you do step away from him, if only a single step. It’s enough to breathe, to clear your head of whatever had overcome you moments before. He’s too busy looking after their three retreating forms to notice the guilt catching at the back of your throat, suffocating you for barely a second.

You ensure any proof of the feeling settling in your gut was gone by the time he cast his eyes towards you, the brown of his irises nearly black in the lowlight of a High Town party, but you didn’t keep his stare long, “Let’s find out.”

The sun was dawning when you emerged onto the street, and reached over your heads by the time you made your way to the water-side lot filled with shipping containers. Sharon’s intel had led you to it, and container four-two-six-one had come to your knowledge with little questioning on Sam and Bucky’s part, if only because she was an old friend.

You still wondered who would give her the location of such a prize as this, and what it had cost her, since you were slowly learning that nothing in Madripoor came free. Regardless of where she had received the information, it had been where Nagel was hidden, along with the remainder of his serum research.

It had also been where the bounty hunters of Madripoor descended upon you.

Dr. Nagel was a young, lanky man who had barely finished his exposition of where to possibly find the Flag Smashers who had stolen his serum when the very man you had danced so happily with not two hours before shot a bullet right through his heart. All you could think, in the stunning moment of realization that Nagel had been dead before he even hit the ground, was how stupid you were to ever let your guard down around this man--- this killer.

“What did you do?” Sharon’s cry rang in your ears as the gun clattered to the ground from Zemo’s hand, jolting you into action from staring at Nagel’s body to turn on them. Catching Zemo’s cold eyes--- no remorse within them--- as Sam and Sharon struggled to pin him to the grated shelves of Nagel’s lab. You think you might hate him, just in time for the blast of an explosion to push you face first into the metal slatted floor of Nagel’s bunker.

That hate was all you had left to fuel you from getting up off the floor, bones creaking as flames danced in your peripheral, a hole blown through the side of the crate. That anger, and the grasp of Sam’s hands on your forearm, pulling you up after he got his own footing.

Zemo had been gone by the time you had enough sense to scan the area, but there would be no searching for him this time, either, as the bounty hunters descended upon your location with the ease of wolves circling their prey. Shooting out from cover, you knew the bullets of your pistol weren’t enough to last you for all of them, and they had you pinned.

Part of you still hated him, even when he saved your asses. Another part wondered why he even bothered.

You hoped you radiated that hatred when you got into the back of that getaway car he’d found, too sullen to even wish Sharon a farewell, let alone offer a smile at the cheeky attitude Zemo had pulled up in it with. After everything, it only made you stew more--- his nonchalance. If you were being truly honest, you were angrier still at yourself, and the thought that he’d played you like a fiddle. If you had kept your guard up and kept an eye on him, perhaps Nagel would still be alive. Perhaps you wouldn’t feel like Zemo was playing this two steps ahead of the rest of you.

Even on the plane out of Madripoor, you had sat in sullen silence, refusing so much as to look at Zemo, even when he offered you food.

You hoped your sharp, “I’m not hungry, thanks,” cut deep, as childish as it may sound. You didn’t bother to look long enough in his direction to see if it had. Speaking exclusively to Sam and Bucky, even when Zemo changed your course to Latvia, you had not spoken a word to him until you landed in Riga, and his conversation turned towards Sokovia.

“Erased from the map,” he clicked his tongue, but his pace didn’t slow, when he spoke in what was as much an accusation as a question, “I don’t suppose any of you bothered to visit the memorial?” Met with silence when he looked upon Sam, he turned his eyes toward Bucky, then you, and it was the longest you’d dared hold his gaze since he killed Nagel, when he scathingly said, “Of course not. Why would you?” Nodding towards an old set of double doors, he drops the subject as suddenly as he’d brought it up, “We are here.”

Your traitorous heart clenched as you watched him disappear beyond them, Bucky remaining by your side while you lingered at the bottom of the steps leading into the residence.

“I’ll be back,” Bucky murmured, glancing your way, to which you silently nodded, too troubled by the fact that you felt anything at all akin to pity for that horrible man to worry where your friend might have to wander to in the middle of Latvia. Zemo was, undeniably, horrible, wasn’t he?

A huff of annoyance blew past your lips as you marched the steps towards where Sam and that man had disappeared beyond. Maybe you were just getting soft in your old age, or something.

Yeah, that had to be it.

What you hadn’t expected was for Sam to meet you at the doorway to Zemo’s… loft? Loft.

“I’m gonna’ hit the corner store, if you’re alright to watch you-know-who,” Sam murmured low, and you scrambled for words to say aside from the hell no which threatened to spill from your lips. “He’s in the shower, so maybe he’ll be a while anyway.” Glancing over your shoulder, Sam’s brow furrowed, “Where’s Bucky?”

“Said he’d be back,” you looked behind yourself, as if expecting to find him there. “Don’t know where he ran off to, though.”

A questioning breath was sucked through Sam’s teeth, before he let it out in a sigh, affixing you with a, “You good?”

With babysitting Zemo?

No.

“Yeah, go,” you had ushered him out the door despite your current feeling towards the subject, and by the time you shut the door behind him and rummaged into the kitchen area to ransack the refrigerator, you realized why Sam was going to the corner store. This place was positively barren of the necessities. Groaning in disappointment, you lean your head back in a silent cry to the heavens. Why was nothing going right on this mission? You were starving, and hadn’t gotten a wink of sleep on the plane over.

Standing there for a moment, you let the cold air hit your skin, daring it to keep you awake.

The door to the washroom pushing open grasps your reluctant attention, head lulling to the side slightly as you shut the empty refrigerator. There he was, the bastard, clad only in a robe and lounge pants, pushing a folded towel along his neck, catching the water there which dripped from his semi-dry hair.

Footsteps softened by the slippers at his feet, he asks upon taking a look around the room to find only your presence there, “And where have your soldiers run off to?”

You grit your teeth, forced to answer him, “Sam went to the store, because you don’t keep your safe houses stocked with food.”

“This is not a safe house,” he murmurs, coming close enough that the sun streaming through the floor-to-ceiling windows catches along something gold glinting at his throat. Large hands lower the towel and fold it neatly, as your gaze lingers, observing the necklace where it delves into his chest, a view allowed by the robe’s relaxed fit, just open enough to reveal the soft hairs there. You snap your eyes back up before you can stay there for too long, and Zemo is smiling slightly. Bastard caught you.

“What is it then?”

“A vacation home.” For a pitiful instant, your mind sent you images of the family he’d lost in Sokovia. The last thing you needed was to feel sorry for him, so you clear your throat, shaking off the thought of what was missing. What had led to who he’d become. Your pity thankfully didn’t show as he moved ever closer into the kitchen, feet stopping just before your own so that he could look you down. You couldn’t help but grasp the counter you leant yourself upon until your knuckles blanched under his scrutiny, nearly on the verge of demanding he explain what his problem was, until he nodded to the cabinet beside your head, “Excuse me.”

You almost jumped out of his way.

Watching, desperately clawing for the anger that had been so comfortingly oppressive in your chest earlier in the morning, because anything was better than lingering on the cut of his jawline, or the way his robe dipped as he reached for that very cabinet you had been standing in the way of a moment before. Anything else, focus on anything else.

When he opened it, your eyes snapped to the few jars within. Olives and fruit lined the shelves in twistable jars, flanked by large bottles of that same dark liquor he seemed to favor, and a tin of coffee beans. In the back, nestled away for a rainy day, was a box of Turkish delight.

“Ah,” he breathed pleasantly, shooting you a cheshire grin, “so it is not entirely as empty as you thought.”

Bastard, bastard, bastard---

The word rings in your head like a mantra as you feel the anger crumbling, fading away with each second he looked at you like that. What was wrong with you, to be this easy? Something had to be.

His eyes were thankfully torn away when he looked into the cabinet once more, plucking the fruit--- peaches, looked like--- from the shelf, along with the coffee and candy, “I doubt you would like to eat pickled olives alone.” He says it, right before he closes the cabinet, and reaches out with the jar of peaches towards you.

Blinking up at him, you don’t dare take them, genuinely curious, “They’re not for you?”

“You did not eat on the plane, and it has been hours, now; you must be starving.”

You’re surprised he even cared, or made the appearance of caring, but that shrivel of spiteful anger you clutched onto with all your might refused to take them from his hand, despite the growl in your stomach, “Sam will be back soon enough with food.” Turning on your heel to keep yourself from going back and snatching them away like a starving animal, you move to the other side of the kitchen.

His jaw is set when you look back at him at the sharp tap of glass and metal along the countertop. Zemo’s fingers clutched the jar and coffee tin with a fury that was only revealed in the depths of his dark eyes, watching you move across the living room without so much as a word.

Until you sat down, and he breathed calmly, so calmly, that you knew it was the calm before the storm, “Am I to expect you to act as a petulant child for the remainder of the mission, or shall I ready myself for you to come to your senses?”

You scoffed at him, “Excuse me?”

“Please do not make me repeat myself, my dear.”

“I’m sorry, Baron,” you grit with as little remorse as possible, that once-simmering anger nearly boiling again, “that I don’t want to trade peaches with a man who murdered someone not two feet from where I stood.”

“Try again.”

“What?”

“Try, again,” he breathed slowly, as if he had to do so to keep himself from breaking into some fit of rage. You’d never seen him enraged, even when he fought and killed, he was always a deathly calm, and some sick, twisted part of you wanted to see him truly, frightfully angry, “You don’t treat Wilson and Barnes with this childish disdain, despite them killing countless people in your presence.”

“Don’t even compare yourself to them. You killed an unarmed man!”

“I do not wish to litigate the details of what may or may not have happened---”

“‘Litigate?’” you rose to your feet from the couch, not even realizing that he had half-way crossed the room by the time you did, “Do you even hear yourself? You put a bullet in his heart! What is there to litigate?”

“He was a threat.”

“He could have been arrested, or---”

“Criminals can escape prisons,” he bit, nearly in each other’s faces by the time you laughed at your own bitter answer.

“What? Like you?”

“Precisely,” he agreed, and you met his glare with one just as heated, until something shifted in his gaze. A sort of dawning understanding that muddled his glare, until a raise of his brow accompanied the easing tension in his shoulders, and you already knew you weren’t going to like what he was going to say before he’d even said it, “Is that what bothers you?”

“What?” you ask warily.

“That I am considered a criminal.”

“You’re a killer.”

“My question stands, regardless.”

“I’ve worked with criminals before,” you shook your head, making to turn back to the couch, but a fast grip at your upper arm stopped you in your tracks, and he was far too close all over again. Suffocating you with his closeness, with the oppressive cleanliness and water his scent still carried from his recent shower. Ungloved, his fingers were warm, radiating through the sleeve of your shirt, digging firmly into the pliant flesh of your bicep.

His breath carried the faint smell of mint that comes after a fresh brushing as it wafted past your skin alongside his demanding amusement, and your stomach dropped dreadfully when he teased, “Ah, but you danced with me.”

Have you ever let someone you didn’t trust get too close?

The question seemed to dance in the black endlessness of his dilated pupils, rimmed with the deceptive warm brown of his irises. You were so close that you could notice the gold flecks in them which caught in the sunlight streaming from the window, something you otherwise would have missed. A dare in the dangerous flick of his lashes, he glanced to your lips and back; was he all too aware of your closeness, too?

The reflexive dart of your tongue to wet your lips gave you away, face burning hot with anger and embarrassment, and you ripped yourself from his grip, “I don’t know what you’re implying.”

“I’m sure you’re clever enough to figure it out,” is his sarcastic counter, a satisfied smirk which said he had all the answer he needed already left you wishing there were some way to rip it from his face, because were you really that obvious? Or was he just that good at reading people?

This time, when you headed to sit back on the couch, he simply stood there, allowing you to be unobstructed. You plopped down upon the couch with all the defeat you felt at his satisfaction, lying down in the hope that if you ignored him, he’d simply go away.

When you hear the sound of his slippers along the floor, signaling his departure from your side, the distant shuffle paused in their tracks when you couldn’t help yourself from asking, “Why did you come back?”

“Hmm?”

“When we were in Madripoor,” you breathed slowly, curiosity overcoming your anger, “you had escaped us twice. It was the perfect chance to run for your freedom. Why come back?”

You don’t dare open your eyes, even with the length of his pause, before he answers, a solemn honesty in his voice, “This is not a mission which I can abandon. I must see it through.”

You almost asked him why, once again, but thought better of it. Something told you he wouldn’t have given you a straight answer, either way.

Just when you think he’d gone on his way, the shuffling sound of his slippers closed in once more. Tempted to look, your curiosity at his approach was answered with the sharp sound of glass clicking against the wooden coffee table.

“Feel for me as you will, but eat,” his voice is low, soft. You don’t know if it was the straining of your ears to make up for what you would not see, but you could have sworn you heard an apologetic tone when he added, “You’re no use if you lack the strength to fight your enemies. As you are now, anyone could overpower you if they wished.”

That earns him a peek of a glare from out of the corner of your eye, and you earn a stern look in return as he nods towards the canned peaches on the table.

You couldn’t help yourself from asking sarcastically, before cracking a small smile, “So, are the Flag Smashers about to propel from the ceilings to catch us unaware, or is it you I should be worried about overpowering me?”

No apologies, from either party, but his dark chuckle is enough to set your soul aflame when he teases, sounding too much like a promise, “I would only overpower you, should you to ask me to.”

And that was when you realized how your question had come across. The burning in your face only increases as you sat up sharply at his words, about to protest that it had not been what you meant by them, but the doors to the loft opened, saving you the embarrassment of that conversation.

“Where’s Sam?” Bucky asks, and Zemo leans away from the coffee table, freeing you from the sweltering scrutiny of his gaze.

“I’m afraid we are running low on groceries, and he was so kind as to do the shopping for us,” Zemo explained innocently enough, but Bucky’s eyes narrowed at him regardless.

“Speaking of going out,” you reached for the jar of peaches, feeling Zemo’s glance upon you as you popped the top open, “where’ve you been?”

“I saw an old friend,” Bucky grumbled, shrugging off your question as he moved towards the washroom, “I’ll tell you when Sam gets back.”

The door closed behind him with a certain finality on the subject, at least until Sam returned. By the time you looked back towards Zemo, he was fiddling with the box of candy.

“I shall put the coffee on,” he announced, glancing to catch your eye with the flick of a candy wrapper glinting between his fingertips, offering, “Turkish delight?”

Upon Sam’s return, the news that Bucky’s old friend had been a warrior of Wakanda was a bad one, at least for Zemo. But with bad news came good news, and soon enough you were following the trail of the Flag Smashers once again, even if that meant the Wakandans were following your trail.

Hours turned to days, and by the end of a weeklong trek across Europe filled with close-quarters and even closer encounters with your Sokovian prisoner, you were standing in front of the dingy warehouse which had found you in this final, terrifying predicament.

Wondering if it had all been pointless, to be snuffed out at the hand of the supersoldier above you, pushing you into the dirty concrete. He wouldn’t need a gun to end you, and you both knew it. So you might have been panicking, with how savagely you pulled in his grasp. A trapped animal, fighting to get free.

Blood rushing to your head fills your ears, catching the first sight of the man pushing you into the ground just barely out of the corner of your eye, and the dark mask covering his face with a handprint. You could make out that he was light-skinned, dark hair pushing down past his chin, young enough to make you wonder just how old he was, and if yours would be the first life he’d take.

His voice is softer than you expected, for someone who sounded so terrifying when he began his order of, “Stop struggli---”

The bullet that rips through his neck tears his grip away from your body, ringing off the hollow echo of the room for just the moment it took the eyes beyond the frame of his mask to widen and dilate as they looked into your own. Green.

His eyes were green.

Silence far too sudden for the adrenaline of the close gunshot not to shake you to your core.

The supersoldier is dead before he hits the ground, and you’re pushing yourself up on aching joints to get on your feet as quickly as possible, until the familiar voice of your companion meets your ears in a thick, Sokovian accent, “He did not hurt you.” It’s flat, not hitching into a recognizable question at the end, but the dark eyes of your savior seem to question you despite the cracking disinterest of his tone.

There was no denying you were happy to see him.

“Zemo,” it’s breathless, and sounds too much like a hoarse relief for your own liking, so you focus instead on rolling your bruised shoulder and avoiding the searing gaze upon you, trying not to appear as shaken as you truly were, “Not anything I can’t walk off.” The sound of something muttered in Sokovian under his breath brings you to look upon him again, finding that his gun lingers along his hip, locked in the tight, leather-gloved grip. He looks displeased, lips set into a tight line that suggests he’s angry, even, but not in the same way he had been in Latvia. This was worse, a colder, solemn anger that threatened the fire behind his eyes, threatening to burn this whole place to the ground, and you can only question, “What is it?”

“Undoubtedly any others remaining here have been alerted by the noise,” Zemo says curtly, turning towards the hallway from whence you came. He is angry, you manage to confirm, when he bites across his shoulder, “Mind your surroundings this time, so that you don’t find yourself pathetically helpless again.”

His words were scathing, but they’re meant to be. Even worse, you know he’s right. This dead one, whose blood was splattered over the top half of your tactical gear, had crept up on you too softly, and was too strong to shake off once he’d gotten hold of you.

Constructed to kill, thanks to the serum.

Even going into a fully aware fight, you were at a disadvantage, especially in close quarters. It was something he understood. Something he used repeatedly in his own strategy against opponents which were physically stronger in every way.

Your only hope of an upper hand had to come from either distance, or subterfuge. At least, if you weren’t accompanied by Bucky or Sam.

You’re lucky, despite the burning ache in your side and back, that it hadn’t been worse than it was, and that Zemo had come upon you as he did.

“Remain close,” he murmurs, as you emerge out into the hall, and you don’t dare to argue with him on it, even if you might have had the situation which just transpired not done so. Clearing the upper west floors were methodical, swift, and it became apparent by the third that whoever had been here was gone, either before or after Zemo’s gunshot had rung true.

Bucky and Sam appeared winded when you regrouped at the designated meeting point, and you didn’t have to wait for Bucky’s explanation to guess what had occurred, “We tangled with a few of them. They got away, but we got another lead from what they left behind…” Bucky trailed off, swapping a glance with Sam at the sight of your disheveled state.

“What happened to you two?” Sam’s eyes dart between your torn clothes and the scrapes along your skin towards Zemo’s tense, rigid frame.

“I was jumped by one,” you grit, embarrassed enough that he’d caught you off-guard without even verbalizing it, “he had me on my stomach, but Zemo, he---” you clear your throat, remembering the vacant green stare and splash of deep, vibrant red that had accompanied your rescue.

“It has been handled,” Zemo supplies for you, and before Sam could question him further, he adds, “the man is dead.”

The blood along your black tactical gear has dried by now, but it’s black stickiness must be ever apparent for them now, as Bucky sighs a weary, “Well, shit.”

“Are you okay?”

You open your mouth to answer Sam, but Zemo gruffly responds, “She’ll live,” before brushing past the two of them towards where the car which would take you back into the heart of the city was waiting.

“What’s wrong with him?” Sam wonders, when Zemo is far enough ahead that he can’t hear the question.

“You want a list?” Bucky grumbles dismissively, stretching his metal arm in a wide circle that suggested it had set peculiarly after his last fight.

Your throat tightens, and you try your best to keep from remembering that helpless, desperate feeling which had drenched your soul as the supersoldier pinned you to the concrete.

Forcing a humorless laugh, you offer up a half-hearted explanation, daring it to sound as unbothered as you wished you truly were, “Maybe he regrets the bullet he spent saving me.”

Bucky’s exhale is somewhere between a bitter laugh and sigh, “Who knows, with him.”

As much as you wished for it, you couldn’t be sure if those words you’d spoken didn’t ring true.

“Whatever,” Sam agrees, dismissively rubbing the back of his neck. Redirecting back on the target of chasing the Flag Smashers, you hoped you’d get a step ahead of them soon when Sam instigates your following of Zemo to the car, “We’d better get back to the motel and regroup. Got an early day ahead of us tomorrow.”

The, “yeah,” you supply the back of their heads with, finding yourself following after them, is almost as distant as you felt. Internalized, and thrumming with the melting adrenaline which made way for exhaustion to settle into your bones and take hold.

Yet, you can’t get that deathly, dilating green out of your mind, or the ghost clinging to the ache in your back, where murderous weight had been.

Zemo did not meet your eye the whole ride to the motel--- and it was nothing like the dazzling vacation home Zemo had introduced you all to in Riga. Complete with plain walls and shuttered windows, the view of Prague you received from the window set in the dead center of the narrow bedroom was that of the wall of the building opposite. Utility, over luxury, but privacy had been key, as well.

He had retired to his own room just as soon as you’d set foot before it, bizarrely silent in that same way that you had come to realize could never be a good thing, because it meant Zemo was lost in his own head. Neither Sam nor Bucky made note of it, at least aloud, and so you held your tongue as well, rather than acknowledge the dark cloud which seemed to follow the man as he disappeared beyond the click of the motel room door.

“We can trade,” breaks you from your intense scrutiny of that door, key card clutched firmly in hand as you glance towards where Bucky stiffly supplies, “I don’t blame you if you’re not okay with it. You can stay with Sam instead.”

Your heart clenches, and for a moment you’re brought out of your remembrance of the Flag Smasher’s body atop your own by the offer, somewhat touched that he would take your place as Zemo’s keeper tonight at the sacrifice of his own comfort. Even after all that Zemo had done to him, he would take the bed which you had agreed to sleep in earlier, when the motel owner had explained the issue of limited capacity.

You can see the apprehension behind his eyes, despite his generous offer. He was still unsettled by Zemo, and, if you were being honest, so were you. You won’t make him do that for you, all so that you can avoid whatever tension lingering between you and Zemo.

Instead, you pat Bucky in the chest gently with the palm of your hand and swallow down the nauseous churn of your stomach, forcing a light tone, “I’m a big girl, Bucky, but if he gives me any trouble, I’ll shout for you guys. How’s that sound?”

“If he gives you a chance to shout,” Bucky frowns.

“Well, if he suffocates me in my sleep, I’ll haunt him forever,” it’s meant to be teasing, but it comes out dry.

“Our side will be unlocked, just in case,” Sam mentions, lingering in the open doorway of the adjoining room, “might wanna’ unlock yours, too.”

“Or else I’ll just have to break through it if anything happens,” Bucky’s tone is just as dry. Tired. This chase was wearing on you all, and you could only hope that tomorrow would be different than today.

Slipping the key card along the door, it whirs to life with a click. The acceptance of your entry indicated by the green glow of the lock’s internal light. Slipping into the room, you rest your back against the shut door, willing the green remembrance of your attacker’s eyes to shake from your head.

Your death-grip on the key card doesn’t ease as the bathroom door opens, and you catch sight of Zemo. He’s shed his jacket, left in that dark turtleneck and slacks. His hair had fallen, ever so slightly, from its perfected part against his forehead. The tips of a few strands there are dark with a dampness which evidenced the water he must have splashed his face with before emerging from the restroom.

His hands are free of his gloves as he flexes them at his sides, pausing for but a moment of acknowledgement at your presence before he goes further into the room, towards the full bed near the window which he must claim as his own. The jacket lies there, until he retrieves it to hang in the closet on one of the wooden hangers provided within.

Not a word. You don’t know if it should make you relieved or concerned, but truthfully, it makes you feel nothing. Because you’re still standing at the door by the time he turns from the closet, staring unfocused at the floor before you and screaming internally to pull yourself together when he does it for you.

“Are you going to stand there for the remainder of the night?” Curtly, “If my presence has you so paralyzed with fear, you may as well take up your soldier’s offer to switch rooms.”

His voice holds an edge, despite the deceptively smooth calmness to it. A taunting, instigating bait hung there. As if he were still angry at you.

And for what? For getting attacked?

The thought sends white-hot, simmering rage swelling in your own chest. Did he think you a nuisance, after having to save you from that brute of a supersoldier this evening? It had been a sneak-attack! You doubt even having your wits about you would have helped catch the silence with which you’d been crept up on in that warehouse, now that you’d had time to replay every second of it in your mind twofold.

Glaring at him with that fire in your eyes, was better than that frightfully distant look you’d held a moment before, he thought.

“What do you want from me?” comes biting from your teeth, bared at him as you bristled under the cold anger of his own stare.

“There is nothing you could possibly offer me that I would want,” he strikes back.

Snake, meet wolf.

“As if I would offer you anything at all after the way you’ve acted,” it’s an effort to keep your voice from rising. You want to fight; to feel something other than the crippling terror that had nearly killed you this evening--- that panic, which had gripped your heart until it felt like it bled.

“The way I’ve acted?” Zemo’s demeanor changes, flaring rage in his eyes as he stalks across the room. It takes everything you have not to wilt in his approach, but to instead glare right back at him, even when he crowds you up against the door, palm coming flat against where your head resides. His voice doesn’t rise with his seething fury, but rather, lowers into a tone that turns your blood cold as it rushes through the heat his closeness spreads through you, “I am not the one who almost got myself killed.”

“Well,” you struggle to remain even, as you breathe all the disdain you can muster into your words, “I’m not going to apologize for you having to save me.”

His head tilts to the side, snarling through his thick accent at the thought, “I do not want an apology for that.”

Standing straight from your leaning on the door, if only to feel as if you were invading his space rather than the other way around, you find that he leans away ever so slightly when you snap, “I’m not going to thank you for it, either.”

“Thank me for---?” he stops himself with a clench of his jaw, breathing slowly through his nose, as if to calm the crackling fire behind his eyes as his glare burns into your own. Too close; he’s still standing much too close.

And he moves so quickly you have zero chance of escaping his path. The hand he didn’t have laid flat on the door pushes you roughly by the shoulder, into it. By the time your mouth is open to even yelp in surprise, it’s suffocated by the hasty press of his lips against yours. Searing, pressing the length of his body firm against your own as he kisses you with all the wild fury his eyes betrayed. Nothing was left of the collected calmness of his posture or voice from before, as his hand on your shoulder digs into the hair at the nape of your neck, tugging you into him.

Not that you needed to be coaxed, with the way your fingers dig and scrape into the fabric along his chest, his shoulders, his throat, his hair. Digging in, his part is destroyed as you nip at his lips, teeth and tongue distracting you from any fragment of sense that was left screaming at you to remember it. To remember who he was, and how things are supposed to be between you.

Which was definitively the opposite of this. His hands were never supposed to find themselves fistfuls of your hair, your hip, your flesh, as they did now. You were never supposed to know that he tasted like something sweet, or felt soft beneath the hard lines of his turtleneck.

He was dragging, pulling, tumbling with you away from the door, as anger and fury melted into a complex, sweltering mixture of something else entirely, heat burning through your core when he tugged at the buckles of your tactical gear.

The world turns sideways, and then you’re falling upon something soft--- the mattress creaking beneath your weight and the weight of him kneeling atop you as you dragged him down to your lips once again. Rough, not gentle, as you arched into him and tugged at his hair, a breathy groan escaping into your mouth from his own.

He inhales sharply, as if suddenly realizing the position you were both in, as his fingertips grazed the bare skin of your waist, where your shirt had become untucked from your pants.

Breaking, parting, breathless, he stares down at you. Brown eyes blown wide and dilated, staring at you like a deer in the headlights--- perhaps the most honest expression you’d ever seen on Zemo’s face.

You were no better, sprawled along the comforter and trying to catch your breath. A single question ringing around your brain in search of an answer, any answer.

What are you doing? What are you doing?

“I,” he breathes softly, in a lilting apologetical tone, and you realize he’s between your legs, hooked along his hips precariously. Your anger dissipates, evaporating like it had been burned away with the roaring flames he’d ignited within you, and he clears his throat slightly. Troubled is how he looks, when his eyes become incapable of holding your own, “I can’t do this.”

No apology, though it may as well be there, in the way he said it.

Though you know he’s keeping you from a terrible mistake, part of you is lying when you murmur, “It’s okay,” back up to him.

“Yane mogu etogo sdelat,” he leans down, as if collapsing under the pressure of whatever he was feeling, right into the curve of your stomach. Sokovian, you register faintly, as another reverent, “I can’t do this,” falls from his lips to be muffled in the fabric between you.

Your hand finds his head, fingers carding through his hair reflexively, and you don’t know if it’s from the shock of your situation or a genuine desire to comfort him, when you repeat, even softer, “It’s okay, Helmut.”

It’s the first time you’ve called him by his first name, you realize.

Maybe it’s the fact that he was still tangled up in you, or the fact that you’d been mere moments away from letting him have his way with you, but you don’t dare move from this spot. From pushing your fingertips against the crown of his scalp, or the weight of him against you. Neither does he, as he breathes raggedly for a moment against your stomach, face buried there.

Breaking the silence almost feels wrong, but you do it anyway. A compulsive, desperate need to do so crawls up your throat, until you can’t contain the words any longer.

Reaching down, finding the curve of his jaw, you pull, until he lifts his head enough to peer over the curve of your chest to meet your eye, questioning after a moment of peering into the lingering want, and tragic grief of his stare, “Are you okay, Helmut?” But you already know the answer; you finally understand that this man is far more broken than you’d ever realized.

“Is anyone ever just, ‘okay?’” is his evasive answer.

You say it before you can think better of it, offering him another piece of you with which you probably shouldn’t have, but you were already neck deep in possible regrets, so what was one more?

“People’ve said I’m a good listener before, if you need to talk about whatever it is that’s troubling you.”

You liked to think he owed you some kind of explanation for all this, but if he’d asked you for the same, you don’t know if you could give him one, either. It had just… happened. No rhyme or reason, but some bizarre, broken part of your own soul had called out to whatever was cracked and frayed in his own. It was all the answer you could think of, for why you were flat on your back beneath him still.

“I would not bother you with my troubles,” Zemo starts, attempting to piece back that calm, collected mask which kept this fragment of him that you had bore witness to hidden.

“If not me, then you should bother someone with them.”

And maybe it’s the soft, bittersweet smile with which you look up at him, or a deep craving to be understood by just one other human being in this world, but his chin remains firmly planted against your chest as he says quietly, sadly, “I have no one left. They are all gone.” He doesn’t flinch away when you brush the hair from his forehead, out of his eyes, catching sight of the confusion, the trouble in his soul.

Trouble, indeed.

Stormy, dark, he stares a hole into your soul, and you ache with the hollow tragedy of it, when he murmurs as firmly as he can, almost worse than if his voice had cracked with emotion, “I have lost them all.”

You want to tell him the reflexive compassions that come at times like these, but sorry feels cheap, and you could never understand the pain he must feel. You hope you never do.

So you breathe out slowly, one word at your lips, “Sokovia?” as if you didn’t already know. As if you had not read his file, years before he joined you for this mission. Back when he had terrorized the Avengers and murdered diplomats at the United Nations hearing. You tried not to think of it, now, when he looked so vulnerable, and sad, as the slight nudge of his chin into the flesh of your skin is all that’s required to acknowledge your question.

“You already bother me enough, Zemo,” you try to add a joking hum to your voice, as you sigh beneath him, but even that sounds bittersweet, “so feel free to bother me more with your troubles, if you like.”

There’s quiet for what feels like a long time after that. Your words permeating the space between you, and you don’t know if he watches you like he does to gauge your sincerity, or because he simply likes looking at you like this.

He gives you a fragment, when his body shifts, and his weight moves up just enough to catch your eye from where you were left staring at the ceiling in this thrumming silence, your fingers slipping from his hair to his shoulder, “I…” he clears his throat softly, “saw you underneath that supersoldier, and I just… could not lose one more.” Zemo doesn’t say he cares about you, not explicitly, “He was going to kill you.”

“I know,” it tastes hollow in your mouth, as you do your best not to go back there, to how he’d found you.

“It,” he breathes, searching for the right word, “frightened me, and so I was furious. Not entirely at you, but because…”

He trails off, and you supply instead, the similar feeling which had buried itself in your own chest, “Because of how it made you feel?”

Zemo nods, his hands smoothing down your back, catching at your waist, “I did not like the way it made me feel,” his gaze flicks along the planes of your face, before returning to your own, that want-mixed-grief once again swirling within them. “The way you make me feel. It is like… a betrayal.” His voice does shake this time, when he breathes, “It is too soon since… I lost my whole world.”

A betrayal, he had called the feeling.

It felt like that for you, too. This swirling, guilty want in your bones for him, when you know it’s the last thing you should want. That he should be the last thing you want. If Bucky or Sam saw you like this--- you think they might hate you for it.

For wanting him.

Your hand rests at the curve of his neck and shoulder, thumb close enough to feel the short stubble which threatened to peek through at his jaw with the late hour of the day, and you agree, “I was angry, too, because of this feeling.”

“The feeling of wanting something you cannot have,” he chuckles, a truce, offered from his body to yours in the vibrations of it which resound in your chest.

“You could say that.”

Perhaps, in a different world, things could be different.

Maybe, if you’d met him at a different time.

But as things were, you were just two broken people, seeking solace in one another when every fiber of your being told you not to. That it was wrong--- despite how comfortably right he felt against you here and now, lingering between your thighs and against your body for as long as he possibly could, despite the guilt that you’d shared, without even knowing it.

It’s not your place, but when he sits up finally, his weight lifting off of you and somehow leaving you feeling more suffocated than when it had been there, you catch his attention with the sound of his name, “Helmut?”

“Hmm?” he wonders, knees pressing into the mattress as he’s halfway detangled from between your legs.

Catching his eye, you hope you look as sincere as it felt within you, the ache in your chest for him, “Anyone who could have loved you, would have wanted you to be happy.” It sounds cliche and generic, but you don’t dare mention his wife specifically, or the terrible emptiness that comes with the loss of a child. Still, you see it in his eyes, in the way he observes you with increased curiosity, that he knows it to be true, despite that desperate, clawing pain you know he must feel within his chest.

Zemo’s smile doesn’t reach his eyes, “That is a sweet sentiment.” And he’s gone, leaving you spread there to watch after him as he crosses the room, towards the restroom, probably for a moment of privacy. Stopping in his path, he glances at you, hand resting on the doorframe, “But they do not have to go on living without them.”

The bathroom door shuts behind him with a definitive click, and you’re left reeling as you piece together the facts of the night. The pieces of his grief, and want, which you’d witnessed. The fragments of yours which only seemed to swell with his own.

A miserable, self-pitying groan slips past your lips.

You were truly in trouble, now.

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