Hey all! Before you send a request my way, I’d appreciate it if you took a moment to read through this.
Characters I will write for include :
Bucky Barnes (the most popular character I write for)
Benjamin Poindexter
John Walker
Bob Reynolds
Yelena Belova
Sam Wilson
Carol Danvers
Agatha Harkness
Natasha Romanoff
Joaquin Torres
If the Marvel character you’re thinking about isn’t on this list, shoot me a message, and I’ll let you know if I’m open to it!
Pairings :
I write in x reader stories in 2nd person POV.
I do not write for ships unless the reader is part of the dynamic.
I will write throuple/poly relationships if the reader is involved (Sambucky x Reader, WinterAgent x Reader, SentryAgents x Reader, GhostWidow x Reader, etc. If you're unsure, just ask.)
All my readers are fem!readers, just because that’s what I know best. There are plenty of other very talented writers who write for male!reader or gn!reader, so show them some love!
I do not write parent!character x child!reader dynamic as the main plot. I write romantic or platonic dynamics.
NSFW content :
I love writing intimacy, but I do not do graphic smut.
I’m very comfortable writing sensual, emotional, and R-rated or suggestive stories. I like focusing on tension, steamy scenes and emotional connection rather than graphic details. (references for these type of stories: Siren and Unholy Trinity)
I won't write :
Incest
Anything that romanticises substance abuse (that’s a very personal boundary for me as someone who struggles with that myself).
Non-con (but I’ll write power dynamics and dub-con to a limited extent)
How to Request :
You’re more than welcome to send in requests through my Tumblr asks. Just know that while I read every message, I can't guarantee that every request will be written. I get a lot of asks, and I choose what to write based on what clicks with me creatively.
If you’d like a guarantee of having your request written...
I’m starting to be active on Ko-fi again, so any requests made through my Ko-fi will be prioritised and written within a month as long as they follow these guidelines as my way of saying thank you for the support and helping me keep this hobby sustainable.
buy me a ko-fi here!
At the end of the day, this is something I do for love, not profit. It’s free labour, and I’m writing because it brings me joy, and this community keeps that joy alive.
I may not always be able to respond to every comment or ask, but I love y'all, and I’m grateful for this fandom ❤️
Summary : Dex tries to leave you for your own good. You both know it won’t last.
Pairing : DDBA! Benjamin Poindexter x reader (she/her)
Warnings/tags : FREAK4FREAK, makeup sex, no anatomical detail but still explicit, angst-ish jealous!Dex, stalking-ish, kidnapping mentioned, injury, murder, blood, car sex, morally dark romance, not a healthy relationship but then again both Dex and Reader are batshit insane, food, brief mention of suicidal ideation. (let me know if I missed anything!)
Word Count : 7k
Notes : I think I’m currently on a jealous!Dex mindset. Enjoy!
Dex broke up with you like he was doing you a favor.
He stood in your kitchen with his hands folded in front of him, shoulders stiff, eyes fixed somewhere over your head because he knew if he actually looked at you, he wouldn’t be strong enough to do it.
So, even though it felt like putting a gun in his mouth and pulling the trigger, splattering brain matter all over the white wall, he said it anyway.
“I’m not good for you.”
It was shaky, but it was a good effort. He had been thinking about how he would say it all morning, the second it left his lips, it tasted like poison.
You blinked at him.
For a second, Dex thought you might cry.
Instead, you laughed.
It was jarring, too bright in your cute little apartment, with your pink mugs drying beside his perfectly arranged knives by the sink and one of his shirts hanging over the back of your chair because you had worn it to bed the night before. The whole place was full of him: his order tucked into your chaos. His clean routines stare against your glitter and mess. His life was already so carefully arranged around yours, it was funny to think he would ever walk away.
“Oh, baby,” you said, pressing a hand to your chest, fake-hurt and saccharine in nature. “Is that what we’re doing? You’re saving me?”
Dex flinched.
Because yes! Yes, he was. He was a good guy now, and as selfish he might be, he would rather have you alone without him then dead with him. He could stalk you, watch you, keep you safe from a distance, even if you broke up. He couldn’t do it if you were fucking deceased now, could he?
“They took you last night to get to me,” he said, fidgeting with nothing in his fingers. “You’re in danger because of me.”
He was right, of course. Some rogue task force agents had figured out Bullseye had a girlfriend and decided you would make good bait. They bound, gagged, bruised, shoved you into the back of a van and drove you to an empty warehouse.
They didn’t tell their superiors, of course. They said get Bullseye first, kill him, bring the dead body to Powell, and get a promotion. That way, nobody else got to take the credit for their work right?
Dex had gone supernova and found you an hour later.
And you had been so sweetly delighted to see him, even like that. He was your beautiful, blood-soaked rescue dog with murder in his eyes and hands that killed your captors.
He had held, cradled, and unbound you, asked you if you were okay, and all you did was smile at him with blood trailing up your mouth and asked “what do you want for dinner baby?”
Fuck.
He had carried you back and watched you sleep. He was awake all night with a pistol in his grip, watching the door, the windows, the hallway, the rise and fall of your chest. Every breath you took felt like a reprieve he hadn’t earned.
By morning, he had convinced himself that leaving you was the only good guy option he had left.
Your smile dropped.
Because that, unfortunately, was the thing about Dex. He could be cruel by accident. He could stand there with those sad eyes and talk like loving you was a crime, talking down on you as if any man could tell you what to do for your own good. Please.
You frowned, stepping closer. “You don’t get to decide that for me.”
“I already did,” he sighed.
There it was. He felt like he had slit himself in the wrist saying that.
For a second, you looked genuinely wounded.
Dex saw it, he wanted to move toward you. His hands wanted your face, your waist, your bruised wrists, wanted to hold every hurt place and swear he would drown every task force officer in the city before anyone touched you again.
But that was the problem, wasn’t it? Dex loved you like a weapon. He loved you so much it made enemies out of strangers. It turned you into a target.
The spiralling thought crawled through him, sick and relentless: if he stayed, they would come back. If he stayed, someone would use you to get to him again. If he stayed, one day he wood be mate and you would be dead and you death was the one thing he cannot be responsible for, he can’t, he can’t, he can’t, he fucking can’t!
But then your frown disappeared.
It turned… glossy. Your mouth was pressed into a right pretty line, and you tilted your head as if you had just remembered you were supposed to be the fun one in the relationship.
“Okay,” you said sweetly.
What?
Dex’s eyes narrowed. “Okay?”
“Yeah.” You patted his cheek once, almost condescending. “Go be noble, handsome.”
He looked confused then, even when he was heartbroken beneath it. He had expected some emotion. A fight maybe.
Your anger would have made sense. Your grief would have made sense. Some sick part of him had pictured you crying so hard you couldn’t breathe, hands fisted in his shirt, nails scraping his skin as you begged him not to leave you. He had imagined you shoving him, cursing him, maybe even dragging a chair across the kitchen and threatening to tie him to it just to keep him there.
But you only smiled.
And fuck, the rotten, possessive monster in him was insulted.
Like how dare you let him do exactly what he said he’d do? How dare you stand there calm and pretty while he was ripping himself out of your life with his bare hands? How dare you not make him bleed for it? Dex wanted punishment. He wanted proof. He wanted you to lose control so he could feel your undying love.
Instead, you gave him permission.
You even grabbed his wrist and walked him to the door.
Dex followed because he had started this and because stopping now would mean admitting the truth: that every step away from you felt wrong.
His eyes dragged on everything as he moved: The mug he always used. The little smear of red polish he hated on the counter from when you had painted your nails there. The chair where he had sat last night cleaning blood from under his fingernails while listening to you rant about your kidnapper’s bad manners.
He had spent so long trying to root himself in your life.
Now you were opening the door like he was nothing but a guest.
“If you want to leave,” you said, still smiling, “then leave.”
Dex stopped in front of you.
He wanted you to make it impossible. He hated himself for that. He wanted the door slammed shut, he wanted any proof that this wasn’t as simple as walking out. But you only stood there, beautiful as even m in his shirt, looking at him like you had already decided what came next for the both of you.
His chest felt too tight, his throat felt raw. He told himself this was good. This was better. You were letting him go, so that should’ve been mercy.
So why did it feel like punishment?
He looked down at your mouth, at your split lip. He had kissed you so carefully there just hours before. You caught the front of his shirt and pulled him down into a kiss soft enough to make him sigh.
It was a goodbye kiss, he realised. At least you wanted him to think that.
For one breath, Dex tried not to kiss you back. Then he failed, because he was Dex, and you were you, and there had never been anything normal about the way you loved each other. His hand came up to cup your face, careful around the bruise on your cheek, careful around the split in your lip, careful even now while he was leaving you.
When you pulled away, he followed for half an inch before catching himself.
You smiled against his mouth.
“There,” you whispered. “Now go be noble.”
Dex stepped into the hallway like every inch of distance cost him his sanity.
You didn’t stop him.
You only stood there in the doorway, bright-eyed and terrible, watching him leave like this was not killing you, too.
At the elevator, he looked back.
You smiled and waved at him.
The doors closed between you.
Dex stood there with empty hands and a heart that would not stop clawing at his ribs, telling himself this was right. This was love. This was what a good man would do.
At least you were making it easy… right?
—
Three days later, he found a package of all of his stuff on his doorstep, though he didn’t know how you found his new address so quickly.
He was sure he’d been subtle, and yet, you continued to surprise him.
It had been left exactly in the blind spot between the hallway camera and the stairwell mirror, where no one would have seen you drop it off. Smart girl, he thought, then immediately hated himself for thinking it.
He opened the box to see that you had wrapped his knives individually, blades oiled, handles cleaned, each one placed parallel to the next. His spare ammunition case was taped shut with some strawberry washi tape. His toothbrush was sealed in a little plastic bag. His socks were folded the way he folded them, which felt more intimate than if you had thrown them loose into the box.
Dex crouched in the doorway for a moment, staring down at the package like it might bite. Like you might be hiding inside it somehow, waiting to laugh at him for flinching.
There was no note, though you had never needed a note to make a point.
He carried the box inside and unpacked it thoroughly, every item coming out like evidence. These were all proof that he had lived in your apartment. Proof that you had let him. Proof that, for a while, he had been stupid enough to believe he could have nice things. A world's best boyfriend mug, a box of tea you bought him, a book he had read just because you had written little comments in the margins and he liked hearing your voice in his head.
Then he found the shirt. The one you had been wearing when he broke up with you.
It was his shirt, technically. It was grey and soft from too many washes, still creased in the shape of your body. You had folded it carefully and placed it there like a final insult.
Dex picked it up.
He should have put it away. He should have washed it. He should have thrown it out if he was really as noble as he had tried so hard to be.
Instead, he pressed it to his face before he could stop himself.
It still smelled like you.
Like cinnamon, sugar, the faint trace of your shampoo. He missed you so much and so stupidly that for a second he forgot he was standing alone in a studio apartment he hated, holding a box of proof that you had accepted his leaving better than he had.
At the bottom of the package, beneath his things, was a burner phone, fully charged, with one number saved.
Dex stared at it.
Fuck.
He should crush it and throw it away. Instead, he puts it on his bedside table.
—
That night, he tried to sleep with the lights off and failed. The apartment was too empty. There was no sound of you moving around in the kitchen, no music playing low from your phone, no drawer half-open because you had taken out a bread knife and forgotten to close it. You weren’t there to cuddle up to him. No evidence of anyone alive but him.
He told himself this was good. This was the whole point of leaving, right?
You were away from him, and therefore away from the target on his back.You were alive. You were safe. Maybe you were angry, maybe you were already plotting something awful but you were breathing somewhere he couldn’t ruin you.
Still, Dex laid on his side with your unwashed shirt gathered in his hands. He hated himself for it. Hated the way he pressed his face into the fabric and inhaled desperate lyrics like an addict. Hated that his body relaxed when he did. Hated that even after walking away, some animal part of him still believed your scent meant home.
He must have slept eventually, because the burner phone lighting up felt like a gunshot in the dark.
Dex opened his eyes and reached for it before he could talk himself out of it.
The first thing you sent was a photo of yourself in that red dress.
Oh.
The dress was obscene. He had always loved it, but he pretended to disapprove of it. He said it was too tight. It showed too much of your cleavage, your shoulders. This time, your lips were painted to match.
He remembered standing behind you once, hands on your waist, looking at you in the mirror and saying, very calmly, that you were not wearing that outside.
You had laughed then and called him possessive.
He hadn’t denied it.
Now you were wearing it for someone else.
Underneath, your message read:
date night!!! don’t worry he’s probably only committed tax fraud and like, three white collar crimes. character growth for me xoxo
Dex stared at the photo until the edges of his vision sharpened.
The room seemed to narrow around the screen and your bare collarbone and the curve of your smile.
He fucking hated the the idea of some man sitting across from you, looking at you in that dress, thinking he had earned the right.
Then the phone buzzed again.
You had sent a location, followed by a screenshot of a Tinder profile.
Dex clicked it before he could stop himself.
The man was too old for you, and definitely too smug. He had an expensive suit in the first photo, dead eyes, a bio full of words like entrepreneur and traditional values and looking for someone feminine.
Dex could see exactly what you had picked him for. Obviously, this man was designed in a lab to make Dex want to put his fist through a wall.
Twenty years older than you, at least.
His thumb hovered over the screen when the message came through.
trying soooo hard to date normal men now that my scary ex boyfriend dumped me for my own good :(
Dex sat up, your shirt was still in his lap.
The stupid, rational, noble part of him tried to tell him not to answer. It told him this was bait. It told him you had always been clever enough to turn his own jealousy into a leash.
Then Dex stared at the phone until it buzzed one more time.
he keeps looking at my chest btw. very empowering for me as a single woman
Ugh.
Dex got out of bed.
—
He didn’t go to seek you out.
Pfft.
That was what Dex told himself.
He didn’t grab his coat because of you. He didn't take the burner phone with him because of you. He didn't go across the city with his teeth clenched so tight it hurt because you were sitting pretty, smiling at a man old enough to know better and stupid enough not to.
He was just passing by.
That was all.
He just happened to end up outside the restaurant while going on a walk. He just happened to cross the street with his hands in his pockets with head down.
He didn’t go inside.
That was progress.
That was him being so fucking noble it made his him wanna vomit.
Dex stopped by the window.
Inside, the restaurant was dim and expensive in that hollow, tasteless way. You sat near the back, of course you did, angled just enough that he could see you.
And there you were, beautiful as the day he left you, which was like, last Tuesday.
Your date leaned toward you, talking at your mouth instead of your face.
Dex’s hand twitched.
You looked bored, actually. You had your chin in your hand, eyes dull, smile fixed in that polite little shape Dex knew meant you had mentally killed someone six different ways and found all of them uninspiring.
Then your eyes flicked toward the window, and you saw him.
You smiled, knowing there was an audience now.
And suddenly, magically, you were interested in your date.
You sat up straighter and twirled a piece of hair around your finger. You tilted your head at the man like whatever he had just said was fascinating instead of probably criminally stupid. You even laughed the kind of laugh Dex had once heard against his own throat in bed.
The man smiled wider, encouraged. He leaned closer.
Too fucking close.
Dex’s hand furled into fists, nails digging into his palms. He didn’t even realise he had bled until he heard a little drip on the pavement. He wanted to fucking out his head through a mirror, but he didn’t.
Because killing him would give you exactly what you wanted.
And Dex might have been a psychopath, but he wasn’t stupid.
You wanted him to make a scene. You wanted him to walk in and ruin your date and prove, in front of everyone, that he had never really let you go. You wanted blood on the white tablecloth and his hand around your wrist and that furious voice telling you that you were done.
He knew you.
He knew the trap because he wanted to step into it so badly.
So before he did something stupid, he left.
He walked back down the street, breathing evenly.
Then he saw the man’s car. He recognised it from his dating profile.
Dex stopped.
It was parked near the curb, glossy and obnoxious, exactly the kind of car a man like that would own. He looked at it for one long second.
No.
He was not going to kill him.
That would be unreasonable.
Instead, Dex took out his knife and slashed his tyres.
There.
Now the man couldn’t take you home.
Dex wiped the blade, folded it away, and walked back to his car feeling almost sane.
—
Two days later, the burner phone lit up in the dark while he was sitting on the edge of his bed, still awake, still pretending he was not waiting for it.
He picked up the phone pathetically quickly, and a photo loaded.
Dex went very still.
It was a rooftop bar, with city lights behind you, gold light on your skin. You were perched beside a man in a suit too expensive to be tasteful, eyes glittering toward the camera like you knew exactly what you were doing to him.
Worse, you were kissing the man on the cheek.
You weren’t really kissing him. Dex could tell. Your mouth barely touched his skin. It was theatrical, a pose, a cute little murder weapon aimed straight at Dex’s ribs.
It worked.
The man was handsome in that dead-eyed finance way. He had an empty smile and hair. He had an expensive Cartier watch on his wrist. He looked like the sort of man who looked like he laughed too loudly at his own jokes and gave waiters weird nicknames even after reading their name tags.
Dex hated him immediately.
Then he read the message underneath.
this one said vigilantes are bad for the economy :( thought you’d hate him
For a moment, all Dex could hear was his own breathing. It was controlled, but not controlled enough.
He texted back before his pride could stop him.
Go home.
Your reply came almost instantly.
you don’t get to tell me what to do anymore, Dex. you broke up with me, remember?
Fuck, he remembered.
He remembered your kitchen. Your pretty face, the pretty smile you had when you had decided not to beg. He remembered your mouth on his. He remembered walking out while every devoted part of him screamed to turn back.
He remembered thinking you were making it easy. He had been an idiot.
Then another message came through.
unless you wanna come get me?
Dex turned the phone face down. He stared at the back for five seconds.
Then ten.
Then he picked it back up.
He wasn’t going to give you what you wanted, he thought as he pulled on his jacket, and checked the address you had very helpfully attached to the next message. He wasn’t going to storm in. He wasn’t going to put his hand around your wrist and tell you the date was over. He wasn’t going to break the man’s nose against the bar just because his cheek had your lipstick on it.
He was better than that, even if he fantasised about it all the way there.
When he arrived, he didn’t go inside. He stayed near the service entrance, where the light was dimmer and the staff moved too quickly to look at him for long.
Through the glass, he saw you.
You were laughing, but not your real laugh. Dex knew the difference, and somehow that was worse. You were performing now, all sweet tilt of your head, slow fingers tracing the rim of your glass.
Your date said something, and you smiled like it amused you. Then your gaze slid past him, toward the service door, toward the shadow where Dex stood.
He knew you saw him when your smile changed.
Then, because you were evil, you turned back to your date and touched his arm.
Dex’s hand flexed once at his side.
Dex really didn’t want to give you the satisfaction of killing him so Dex only looked harder.
The man had a badge clipped carelessly to his belt, half-visible beneath his jacket when he stood to order another drink. Corporate, he saw, at a finance firm. He was too proud of it and too stupid to hide it. His watch flashed under the bar lights every time he moved his hand, begging to be noticed.
Men like that always had something to ruin.
Dex only had to find it.
It didn’t take long for him to find his name on the reservation. The name on the reservation led to a company profile. The company profile led to a Facebook profile. The Facebook profile led to a wife not nearly half as beautiful as you, Dex thought, so that was understandable. Then came the corporate card attached to the table, and the Hinge profile that shouldn't have existed.
Dex stared at all of it, and sent the proof where it needed to go.
Less than a minute later, the man’s phone started buzzing.
Dex watched him check the screen. He smiled when the colour drained out of his face.
You leaned forward, all pretty concern, chin in your hand, lashes fluttering like you hadn’t built the entire night to end exactly here: proof that Dex cared.
The man stood too quickly. His chair scraped against the floor. His hand went to his hair, then his watch, then his phone again as if touching enough expensive things might keep his life from falling apart in public.
Dex watched you bite your lip before realising that you were trying not to laugh.
Then, because he was still Dex, because restraint had limits and his limit was apparently a smug man wearing a watch that ugly near you, he made one more small adjustment to the evening.
He took a cocktail stick from a service cart and aimed.
A second later, the clasp of the man’s watch snapped, slipped from his wrist and dropped neatly into his glass of red wine.
The splash was small, but the humiliation was not.
The man stared at it as if he was going to lose it.
You looked toward the service door again. Your smile widened because you knew Dex was proud of himself.
—
He finally snapped three days later, when you sent him a photo from a date with an anti-vigilante task force agent.
Not a finance guy. Not some smug older man with a LinkedIn bio full of lies. Not someone Dex could ruin with an email or a slashed tyre.
A task force agent.
Fuckin’ one of them.
One of the very same people who had taken you.
Dex stared at the photo for a long time, so still he barely looked alive. You were smiling at the camera from the passenger seat of a sleek black car, wearing a little black dress and vicious amusement. Beside you was a man Dex didn’t know by name yet, but he knew the type immediately. He had dark hair, a leather jacket, a thin mouth, the kind of face made for press conferences and bad decisions.
You had your cheek pressed near his shoulder, his task force badge clearly visible.
The agent had one hand on the wheel.
Dex’s stomach twisted, and not just from jealousy.
No, this was worse.
This was you going on a date with danger on purpose. This was you putting your pretty little hand back in a bear trap and smiling when it closed. This was you looking at the same tribe of man who had violently gagged you, bound you, bruised your wrists, and deciding, with horrifying cheer, that they would make excellent bait.
Dex knew you were a freak before, obviously. He had known from the way you treated murder like flirting when it came from him. But this was insane, even for you.
And the worst part was that it worked.
It fucking got to him.
The burner phone buzzed again.
look baby!!!! i’m dating someone age appropriate and employed by the government. healthy choices :)
Dex bit the inside of his cheek until it bled but did not answer.
Then, you send another message.
he says vigilantes are unstable men with hero complexes. thoughts?
Dex’s teeth clenched.
The room around him seemed to tunnel until there was nothing but the phone in his hand and your stupid, delighted little face glowing up at him from the screen.
Then, he felt another buzz.
he keeps asking if i have any exes. should i tell him you’re shy?
Dex stood even before the next message came through.
he says he’s gonna take me home! do you think i should let him come inside me too?
Dex’s fist closed around the phone so hard the screen cracked. No. No no no no no! How dare you fucking say that? How fucking dare you even suggest such a vile thing?
The final message buzzed in.
i mean, you were the only one who ever got to. but you wanted to be noble, right? gotta learn to share if you wanna be a good guy.
And that was the moment the monster in him shifted from jealous to possessive. Not because he thought you were helpless. Not because he thought you were stupid. You were on the pill; he knew that, but that wasn’t the point. The point was that until now, he had been trying to tell himself he had no claim over you anymore. That leaving meant letting go completely. That loving you from a distance was still love.
Then he read those words, and every decent, self-sacrificing thought in him went out the window.
Because no.
He did not want to share.
He did not want to be good.
He wanted you to be his.
So he read it again.
Then again, until fire burned through him
By the third time, his hand was already around the keys.
He found you twenty-three minutes later in the parking garage beneath a hotel too expensive for an agent’s salary. It was the kind of place with cameras in all the wrong corners and concrete floors that reflected the fluorescent lights in pale, ugly strips.
He found the car on level four.
The engine was still running.
Music played low through the speakers, bass muffled under the soft mechanical hum of the car. The windows had fogged at the edges, turning the back seat into a blurred confession booth. Dex saw you through the glass first, perched over the agent’s lap, still fully clothed, thank fuck.
Still, your dress had ridden up just enough to be suggestive. His jacket was still on. Your hands were planted on the leather seat on either side of him instead of touching his chest, like you were holding yourself there because you didn’t touch him anymore than you had to.
The agent didn’t notice.
He had one hand at your waist, fingers too sure, too familiar, his face tilted up toward yours as he tried to kiss you, hungry in a way that made Dex’s jaw lock. The man kept chasing your mouth, and you kept giving him just enough to keep the act alive.
You looked bored, thank god.
Dex could see the little glaze behind your eyes, glossy and false. He knew you were uncomfortable by the stiffness in your shoulders and the way your knees pressed into the seat instead of settling against him. He knew from the way your fingers dug hard into the leather, not his hair, not his coat, not anything that would make this real.
The agent thought you were teasing him.
Dex knew you were enduring him.
Your body stayed half an inch away every time the man tried to pull you closer. Your mouth turned at the last second when he went for a real kiss. Your lashes fluttered like flirtation, but your eyes flicked once toward the window because you were waiting.
You were just trying to sell every ugly second because you knew Dex would come.
And because some terrible, freaky little part of you wanted him to see exactly what happened when he tried to leave you unclaimed.
And it worked, because now his blood was boiling like a volcano before an explosion.
Dex harshly pulled the car door open like he wanted to rip it off its hinges.
The agent turned, irritated first, then confused. “What the—”
Dex dragged him out by the collar and slammed him against the side of the car hard enough to make the frame jolt. The agent’s head snapped back. His mouth opened, ready with some badge-brave threat or official little command.
That was when he saw Dex properly. The colour drained from his face.
You watched it happen from the back seat, lips parted, eyes glittering.
Imagine his face, really. Imagine being this anti-vigilante task force golden boy, handsome and government-funded, thinking you were taking some gorgeous girl home for the night. Imagine realising, way too late, that her ex was none other than Bullseye.
“Fuck,” the agent breathed.
Dex smiled, but it was most definitely not a nice smile.
“You asked about me?”
The agent’s hand twitched toward his weapon, but Dex reacted.
He slashed his throat as the agent made a choked sound, more shocked than loud, and then Dex let him drop beside the car, limp like he deserved to be.
For a second, there was only the engine humming.
Then you gasped. It sounded so fucking fake.
Dex looked at you.
You were still in the back seat, dress riding high, lipstick smudged, one hand pressed to your mouth like you were horrified. But your eyes betrayed you, because they were bright and thrilled.
“You killed him,” you whispered.
Dex stared at you, breathing hard through his nose.
Your mouth trembled, but not from fear. You were trying not to smile.
Dex stepped closer to the open door. The garage lights cut his face into harsh lines, made him look even more ruined than he already was. He looked furious, heartbroken, and possessive all the same.
“Why the fuck,” he barked, “did you go out with a task force agent?”
You blinked up at him, feigning innocence. “I’m broadening my horizons.”
“He was one of them.” And what he meant by that was that one of them hurt you, one of them kidnapped you, one of them had harmed you.
“You left me single,” you pouted. “What was I supposed to do?”
His eyes went dark, and that was when you knew he had snapped.
All that faux-noble restraint and self-punishing distance, All those nights alone with the shirt that still smelled like you, all of that pretending he could walk out of your life and call it love? Gone.
Dex leaned into the car, one hand gripping the doorframe, the other reaching for your chin. He held you still, firm enough to make your breath hitch.
“You could have gotten hurt.” This time, though, he sounded genuinely worried.
You only batted your pretty lashes, though. “I knew you’d come.”
That was almost worse than the date. Worse than the photo. Worse than the agent dead on the concrete, because you were right.
You had known.
You had known exactly how to pull him back. You had known jealousy would get him halfway there, but fear would finish the job. You had known Dex could barely survive seeing you with a bad man, but he could not survive seeing you in danger with one.
“You’re sick,” he said.
You smiled then, soft and awful. “Yeah.”
Dex’s thumb brushed your cheek, gentle and comforting. Because you should know better. In fact, you did, but chose not to care.
That scared you more than the rage. You knew he was genuinely upset with you. He was disappointed.
“We’re going home,” he said.
You gave him a little pout, your stomach filling at the mention of your shared home. “Are we?”
“Yes.”
You didn’t move.
Dex sighed. “Get out of the car.”
“No.”
Oh?
Suddenly, this stopped being about the task force, the breakup, the game you had both been losing on purpose. It became much more honest.
Dex looked at you like he wanted to shake you. Kiss you. Lock you in a cabin forever to keep you safe.
“You don’t get to do this,” he said.
“You broke up with me.”
“You don’t get to make yourself bait.”
“But you left!” Your voice was softer now, the bratty edge thinning out. “According to you, I’m not bait anymore, am I?”
Dex went still, because fuck did you have a point. That was the whole reason he left you, right?
You looked up at him, still glittering, but there was a crack now, a wounded thing peeking through the performance.
Dex’s mouth tightened as your smile flickered.
His shoulders dropped, as he frowned, ruching his thumb over your cheek. “I don’t wanna see you get hurt, baby.”
Aw. How cute.
You stared back, mouth trembling, the whole act finally splitting open enough for him to see the hurt underneath.
Not fear or guilt. Hurt, that you had refused to show him at the door. Hurt, the whole reason you were acting out and apparently, borderline suicidal for.
Then, very softly, almost small, you said, “Then don’t leave me.” You shook your head. “Please.”
Dex closed his eyes for half a second. When he opened them, the noble man he tried to be was fucking gone, never to return again.
Then he climbed into the back seat with you and slammed the door shut.
He kissed you like he had finally stopped lying to himself.
Oh, how you’ve missed his lips.
The windows fogged quickly at the edges, blurring the parking garage into streaks of white light and concrete shadow. Outside, the agent’s body was still slumped against the side of the car, a problem for later. Every faint shift of the vehicle knocked the corpse, every soft rock making a dull little sound.
Dex felt it too. He had a sudden awareness of where you were, what he had done, what you had made romantic because neither of you had ever known how to love in a way that did not look a little like a crime scene.
For one second, you thought he might stop.
Then your fingers slid into his hair and you whispered his name.
Whatever. He’ll just kill anyone that walked in.
He kissed you again, gentler this time, like your mouth was the only place in the world that had ever known what to do with him.
“There you are,” he whispered against your lips. “There’s my girl.”
All the glittering cruelty drained out of you. All the bratty little texts, the bad dates, the cute dresses, the performance. It fell away under his hands until there was only the aching truth: you had missed him so much it had made you mean.
Of course Dex knew from the start. It didn’t mean he was unaffected.
His hand slid to your waist, the dress bunched high. Your leg was hooked to the side, your back pressed into the leather, your hands trailing against his shoulders. Dex shifted his weight so he wouldn’t crush you. He even tucked one hand beneath your head so you would not hit the door. He kissed the corner of your mouth, then your cheek, then the sensitive beneath your ear, lingering there like he had spent eight days starving and had finally been allowed to taste home again.
“Missed you,” he breathed.
You closed your eyes.
Dex’s mouth brushed your skin. “Missed you so much. Couldn’t sleep. Couldn’t breathe right without you.”
Your fingers tightened in his hair, and the sound you made was small, broken, and you would have been embarrassed if it had been anyone else. But it was Dex. Your Dex, who could kill a man for touching you and then sigh like he was the one being saved when you pulled him closer.
He had lasted almost a full eight days before he completely lost the plot, and in some ways, you were proud of him. That man missed you after two hours of you in the gym.
But this time, he had lasted a whole week and one day of him pretending he could be good without you. A week and one day of him sleeping badly, eating worse, telling himself you were safer while his body mourned you. A week and one day of you smiling at other men because if Dex was going to leave you, then you were going to make it hurt.
And now he was back, kissing you like an apology, holding you like a vow.
“Don’t leave me,” you whispered as you felt Dex hook your black lace panties aside and undo his own belt just enough to do the job.
His forehead rested against yours, all the anger stripped out of him until only the love was left. “I won’t.”
“You promise?”
His free hand came up to your face again. His thumb brushed your cheek so gently it made your heart ache.
“I promise,” he said. “Never again.”
You believed him.
Maybe that was stupid. Maybe you were both stupid. Maybe that was the whole point.
And then he pushed in and stretched you out, and suddenly you were too drunk on him to even think.
You kissed him, needy, and Dex made the most helpless little sigh, almost a whimper, into your mouth. His hand gripped your waist. Yours slid down his back to trace his scar over his shirt, pulling him closer until there was no space left for either of you to pretend you had survived time apart.
The car rocked faintly under you, the windows going completely white now.
“Mine,” he whispered, but it didn’t sound like ownership this time. It sounded like relief.
Dex kissed the words out of your mouth before you could say anything cruel. He kissed your little mewls quiet. He kissed your wrist, too, the place where the bruises had been days ago, when they took you.
“I’m sorry,” he whispered against your skin.
You shook your head.
He kissed the inside of your wrist again.
“I’m sorry,” he said anyway, more of an apology to himself than to you, “For making you feel like I wanted to leave.”
You hated being seen that clearly, so you just pulled him down and kissed him until his apology turned into another broken sigh.
Finally. Finally.
When Dex reached his high with you, he did it quietly, almost sweetly, his face hidden against your neck, arms locked around you like he was afraid the world might still try to take you if he loosened his grip. He breathed your name once, and then held you through the shivering aftermath like I got you, baby.
You stroked his hair as the car settled beneath you and your heartbeat calmed with his. Dex’s breath warmed your throat, his body still curled protectively over yours.
Then, very carefully, he lifted his head.
His hair was a mess, mouth swollen. His eyes were still dark and a little wild, as kissed your cheek once.
Then your nose.
Then your mouth, so tenderly it made a terrible night feel almost normal.
“Do you wanna get dinner?” You asked dreamily.
He blinked at you, then scowled when he realised. “The dickhead didn’t feed you, did he?”
You huffed, breathless and offended now that he just knew. “He took me to some stupid fancy small plates restaurant. I’m still hungry.”
Dex’s eyes gentled so much it made you want to cry.
There he was.
Your psychopath boyfriend. Your man, sitting with you in a fogged-up dead agent’s car, still bloodied, still ruined, and yet still thinking about whether you had eaten enough.
He brushed your hair back from your face.
“Anything for you, baby,” he said.
So he got you your favourite takeout, kissed the sauce from your lips with a fond laugh, and by morning, his toothbrush was back in your apartment as if he had never been stupid enough to leave at all.
i will be requesting after, but first: just know that i love your writing so much. from what i’ve seen, i’m not the first or will be the last to say it. your writing has gotten me back into writing after a really bad writers block. your characterization is something i strive for !! never stop writing and i would love to be added to your tag list for dex and his family series !! much love <33
this is so kind!! I’m glad I’ve managed to inspire and help you to create! I’ve added you to the taglist and tysm for reading my fics, mwah😘
Ok but im lowkey getting married at the end of next month so ill probably only write drabbles starting July 20-ish until late August bcs I’m having two weddings (our families are from different continents lol) and uhhh yeah. I’m trying to write full fics now while I have the time lol.
I think it’s really cute that Bucky and Dex have their respective little families in your fics. Bucky with Jamie and Dex with Leo. It’s really nice to read, especially with your writing.
Aaaa thank you! I haven’t set a timeline for Bucky and Jamie yet, so maybe I should make an Elevator, Baby Masterlist similar to my What Makes a Good Man? Masterlist? Thoughts?
(Also, send me more asks about Bucky and Jamie please!!! I love them and miss them so much but a bit stuck on Bucky atm)
virgin dex who’s also the best sex you’ve ever had?
The Best You’ve Ever Had
TW virgin!Dex, size kink (?), obsessive jealousy, possessive/territorial!dex, Dex is a little pathetic in this one, switch!Dex, murdering your exes, interrogation, implied torture of your exes, explicit sexual content (no anatomical detail as per usual) (lmk if I missed anything)
WC 1.2k
Dex, who admits he’s a virgin at the worst possible moment.
He doesn’t admit it the first time you kiss him. He doesn’t admit it when you guide his shaking hands against your thighs. No, Dex admits it when you’re already on top of him, when he’s already inside you, when his face is flushed against your skin and his body is trembling under yours.
“I’m sorry,” he blurts, eyes going wide with panic as he tries not to orgasm too soon. “I’m sorry, I don’t— I don’t know what I’m doing.”
And fuck, he really doesn’t.
You didn’t know for sure, but you did have a feeling that this was the case. He’s so sloppy, so eager, so desperate to be good fuck for you that he keeps losing the rhythm every time you moan. Every time you roll your hips just right, his eyes go glassy.
You just smile and kiss him and say, “It’s okay, baby,” as you groan while being stretched out, “You have— ahh— n-nothing to worry about.”
And he doesn’t! After all, you continue to fuck him even months later. You even make him your boyfriend, and Dex doesn’t even have to beg like he originally planned to.
Sometimes, though, he spirals so badly during sex that you have to stop.
“Dex,” you whisper, taking his face in both hands when you notice his eyes are unfocused. “Baby, are you with me?”
He blinks up at you, dazed and ruined, his hands locked around your hips like he’s scared you’ll disappear.
“Who taught you that?”
Your breath hitched. “What?”
“That,” he says, voice raw. “The way you move your hands. The way you— fuck. Who taught you how to make me feel that good?”
Poor jealous, pathetic Dex.
You don’t answer him. You never gave him a name, never soothe him with details, never say it didn’t matter. You only kiss him until he stops asking, which of course means he has to find out for himself.
Dex, who stays late to research your past.
Dex builds a timeline. Dex finds addresses. Dex memorises faces.
And then Dex goes to work.
He knocks your exes out, ties them to a chair, and sits across from them in some dark room, gun resting loose in his hand as if this isn’t personal.
“What did she like?”
They always thought he meant in your day-to-day life at first. “She liked— she liked coffee, I don’t—”
Dex would tilt his head, and sigh. “In bed.”
Sometimes they cry.
Dex hates that. Crying wastes time.
“What did you do in bed that she liked?” He rolls his eyes, already irritated.
Dex wouldn’t need to shout. Dex is patient.
One of them says he remembers you liked being handcuffed.
Dex goes still, visibly enraged.
Yes, he asked for the info, but now he was seeing it. He’s imagining you in bed, trusting this stupid man with restraints, and it hits him so hard his vision narrows. Eventually, at the end of the night, he pulls the trigger.
He buys handcuffs on the way home. The first time he uses it on you, you squirm and whine. Music to Dex’s ears.
Another ex says he remembers you like blindfolds.
Dex has to look away for a second, breathing through his nose, because the image of you blindfolded for this man makes his blood boil.
He slits his throat and buys one anyway. When he uses it on you, he’s pleased with the mess you made.
Another one says you like shower sex.
When Dex comes home that night, he's determined to test the theory of the man he just killed. You could barely get his name out before he grabs you by the wrist and pulls you into the bathroom.
He was right, Dex thinks an hour later, as he wraps a towel over you in the over-steamed shower, watching your legs wobble a little, you do like shower sex.
And then there’s the other question, the one right before he kills them. The one that proves Dex has gone fully insane.
He would crouch in front of them and ask, “How big are you?”
Imagine that from your exes’ point of view.
Bullseye has a gun between your eyes. Point blank. He’s standing there with that dead calm on his face, head tilted slightly, like this is a work meeting and not the last conversation of your life.
The man tied to the chair stares at him like he has misheard him.
Dex presses the barrel in a little closer.
“Show me with your hand.”
Fuck. Imagine having Bullseye standing over you, asking for your dick size because once, years ago, you fucked his girl before she was his girl.
The man’s hand comes up, trembling, thumb and forefinger spreading in the air.
Dex looks at it, then his eyes go cold.
“Don’t lie,” he rolls his eyes. “I’ll know.”
And no, Dex will never actually know.
It’s an empty threat. He would rather gouge his own eyes out than make them prove it. They were disgusting to him by default, because they were not him.
One ex actually started to desperately shift his tied hands to his zipper like he was actually going to show him.
Dex shot his foot.
“Ugh,” he scoffs. “No.”
That was not the point.
The point was that Dex knew men exaggerated. He knew the first measurement was ego, not truth.
So he waited and watched the answer get smaller.
Dex smiles to himself then, like the fucking psychopath he is.
Because he remembers the first time you sank down on him, breathless and squirming, nails digging into his shoulders, so pretty when you whispered, “Baby, wait— slow down, I need to adjust— ah, Dex, you’re s-so much bigger than I’m used to.”
He had believed you then because he wanted to.
Because he needed to.
Because he was a virgin and pathetic and so in love with you that one little sentence from your mouth could rearrange his entire brain chemistry.
But now, he knows for sure you were telling the truth. He knows he is the biggest you ever had. He knows he was not just your sweet, nervous, pathetic virgin boyfriend that needed to be comforted by white lies. He knows you were not being kind.
You were being honest.
And boy, does it make him unbearable.
After all, his little extracurricular activities did wonders for his confidence!
He stops touching you like he’s asking permission to exist inside your body and starts touching you like he finally believes he belongs there. He's still needy, still pathetic in the sweetest way, but now there’s this ego in the way he pins your hips down.
He gets meaner about it, too, smug enough to murmur, “Too much?” with his mouth against your throat with a smile. “Need me to slow down, baby?”
And you smack at his chest for being arrogant, but you’d be lying if you said it didn’t turn you on.
Because he’s your Dex.
Dex, who got there last and made himself the only one that counted.
Dex, who can hold a gun to a man’s face and ask the most humiliating question imaginable.
Dex, your pretty little psychopath.
Dex, who comes home and melts the second you kiss him, because all that proof, all that blood still means nothing compared to you cupping his face and whispering, “You’re the best I’ve ever had.”
Because he’s attentive. Because he cares more about your pleasure than his own. Because he worships you.
And Dex believes you now.
—
Note : I will be responding to comments and more kind asks tomorrow. Love you guys, mwah 😘
Summary : Dex realizes his son is trying to copy his aim.
Pairing : DDBA! Benjamin Poindexter x reader (she/her) | you and Dex have a son called Leo
Warnings/tags : dad/husband!Dex x mom/wife!reader, fluff!!! domestic!Dex, brief mentions of blood/violence (let me know if I missed anything!)
Word Count : 2.3k
Requested by : anon
Notes : Thank you for all the kind messages recently!!! Feel free to send more ideas for the series while I make my way through what’s already been sent. Enjoy!
Could be read as a one-shot, but you can read more stories in this universe here!
At first, you thought Leo was just making a mess.
Which wasn’t exactly shocking. He was a toddler, and that meant the house existed in a constant state of almost-clean. Yes, Leo was very specific about his toy dinos, but only that and nothing else. You would tidy the living room in the morning, put every plush animal back into the basket, rescue every tiny car from under the couch, collect every crayon from the floor, and by lunch, somehow, it looked like a toy shop had sneezed. Dex would clean it up, but it was still a teeny tiny bit annoying.
Still, Leo didn’t destroy things. He just had a way of spreading himself across every room he entered, like proof that he was there, that he was happy, that he was loved enough to leave things behind.
So when a stuffed giraffe flew across the living room and hit the side of the toy basket, you looked up from your book with a tired sort of fondness.
Leo stood in the middle of the rug in his mismatched socks, one green and one covered in little yellow stars (his choice. Dex dressed him up and told him he shouldn’t but Leo frowned and said “okay daddy,” so of course Dex sighed and told him it was fine). Leo’s hair was messy from rolling around on the couch earlier, his cheeks still sleepy from his nap. He stared at the giraffe lying on the floor with disappointment, his little brows drawn together like he had expected better from it.
Then he picked it up, walked back to the exact same spot, planted his feet, and threw it again.
This time, it landed closer.
Not inside, and not even really near enough to count. But it was closer.
You lowered your book slightly.
“Leo, honey,” you said, gently but suspiciously. “Why are we throwing toys?”
“I’m not throwing,” he said immediately, adorably offended in the way only small children could be offended. “I’m ayiming.”
From the kitchen, Dex stopped swiping.
Dex had been cleaning the counter for twenty minutes, but there had been a crumb by the toaster, and apparently that was unacceptable.
“What?” you asked.
“Ayiming,” Leo repeated, slower this time, like the problem was clearly your listening and not his pronunciation.
You looked at Dex. Dex looked at you.
Leo huffed, impatient now, and pointed toward the little bowl by the door. “The thing Mommy say Daddy does with the keys.”
Your eyes followed his finger to the key bowl.
Then Leo pointed at the laundry basket. “And the clothes.”
Then toward the kitchen sink. “And the spoons.”
Dex’s expression shifted.
Oh.
Oh.
“Do you mean aiming, honey?” you said softly.
Leo nodded, relieved that you had finally caught up. “Yes. Ayiming.”
Dex went very still, because he understood it at the exact same second you did.
Leo had been watching him.
Dex always put things away from a distance. Not because he was showing off, though sometimes you accused him of exactly that. He just casually tossed keys into their bowl without a glance. Socks flicked into the laundry hamper. A pen into a drawer. A fork landing in the sink with a clean little clatter that had made you stare and chuckle, “do you really need to use the sink as aim training?”
He kissed the back of your neck and whispered, arrogantly, “Don’t need the training.”
So yeah, Leo had been watching.
He had been studying Dex, collecting the pattern, learning that Daddy didn’t just put things away. Daddy aimed.
Dex realised it at the same time you did.
His face barely changed, but you knew him too well to pretend he wasn’t affected. His eyes were fixed on Leo now.
You could see a small, startled pride behind his eyes. Your son had watched him do something and wanted to do it, too. Your son, with his sleepy face and sticky fingers and endless questions, had looked at him and thought, Daddy can do that. I want to do that.
For a second, Dex looked like he could barely stand the sweetness.
Aw. My son wants to be like me.
And then, almost immediately, he frowned.
Oh no. My son wants to be like me.
Dex’s hand tightened around the cloth.
You could see a spiral forming, quiet from the outside, violent from the inside. You could almost hear the thoughts piling on top of one another behind his still face. Leo wanted to copy him. Leo was watching. Leo was learning from him. What else had Leo seen? What else had Leo absorbed? The anger? The detachment? The wrongness? What, what, what?
You had normalised so much of Dex that sometimes he almost forgot that people were scared of him. His precision, under your fond little eye-rolls, had stopped feeling like evidence against him and started feeling… domestic. You had even held his face between your hands and told him that wrong didn’t mean unlovable, that being deadly didn’t mean doomed, that love didn’t require him to become someone else entirely before he was allowed to receive it.
He is who he is, and nothing will ever truly change that. And it has always been easier to be himself around you, when you excused half of what he did.
But of course he thought there was something wrong with him. There had to be. Normal fathers probably didn’t feel the ground split open because their son wanted to copy the one part of him that had always felt closest to a weapon. That had always been the reason he was used.
Leo was different, because Leo was good.
So Dex stood there, proud and horrified at once, while Leo hugged the stuffed giraffe to his chest and looked up at him with absolute trust.
“I want to do it like Daddy,” Leo said.
You closed your book halfway and smiled fondly, pinching his cute little cheeks.
“Fine,” you said.
What?
Dex’s head snapped toward you before he could stop it.
No. No, no, no. Absolutely not. Leo was four. Leo was small. Leo still got jam in his hair and tried to put stickers on your work laptop and once cried because his banana had “too many lines.” His kid didn’t need to be learning aim. His kid didn’t need to be standing in the middle of the living room copying the part of Dex that had always felt the most like a loaded gun.
Had you lost your mind? Had you finally gone insane?
“But fluffy toys only,” you added simply.
Dex stopped.
Oh.
Your voice stayed light, almost amused. You didn't look at Leo like he had become a monster by wanting to be like his father. You didn’t look at Dex like this was the beginning of a tragedy. You only pointed toward the toy pile calmly.
“No dinos,” you said. “No blocks. No cars. No food. No cups. No forks.”
Dex blinked.
Huh.
Dex’s view on everything was never black and white. It was always grey and dull and somewhere in the middle unless you told him otherwise. When it came to you and Leo, though, he only thought in absolutes. Safe or unsafe. Threat or not threat. Yours or not yours. Protect them. Keep them safe. Don’t let anyone touch them. Don’t ruin them.
But you didn’t go there.
You didn’t see Leo copying him and jump straight to blood, violence, fear, knives, bodies, every nightmare Dex had ever had about being a father. You didn’t see the worst version first.
You saw your son throwing a stuffed giraffe at a basket and thought it was cute.
You thought that Leo copying him didn’t have to mean an awful thing was blooming in the middle of your living room. It didn’t have to mean Dex’s damage had found its way into his son’s little hands. It didn't have to mean every wrong thing inside him had become inheritable.
It could just mean… playing.
Dex swallowed.
“Yeah,” he said quietly. “That’s okay.”
Leo lit up. “Daddy can show me?”
Dex looked at you again.
He was checking on you. He still needed your approval to be absolute.
You smiled at him, “of course.”
He nodded once, as if you had given him a manual of the world.
Then he set the cloth down and stepped onto the living room carpet.
The mess was already spreading. There was a giraffe near the basket, a rabbit by the couch, a foam ball near your slipper, one of Dex’s socks, stolen from the laundry pile, lying on the rug like evidence. You watched Dex notice every single thing out of place. You could feel the part of him that wanted to fix it.
But he didn’t. He crouched beside Leo instead.
“Show me,” Dex said.
Leo planted his little feet, concentrating so hard his tongue poked out slightly, and threw the giraffe again.
He missed.
Dex nodded. “Too much power on this arm.”
Leo looked at his arm, betrayed. “This arm?”
“Yes.”
“What do I do with it?”
“A bit less, sweetheart.”
You pressed your book over your mouth.
Dex glanced at you, and despite everything, despite the spiral still lingering behind his eyes, his mouth twitched upwards.
He shifted behind Leo and adjusted his stance with two fingers at his shoulder. He was always so gentle with him. It made you melt, seeing those hands, hands that could be terrifying, become careful enough to guide a child’s balance without startling him.
“Look first,” Dex said.
Leo glared at the basket.
“Don’t be angry about it,” Dex frowned nervously.
“I’m thinking.”
“You don’t have to think about it, you just have to feel it,” Dex said encouragingly, using the tone you usually used with him.
You made a small sound behind your book, almost like a giggle..
Leo threw again. This time, the giraffe landed closer.
“Almost!” he gasped.
Dex smiled. Big, helpless, ridiculous pride moved through his eye before he could help it. Not because Leo had done anything extraordinary to anyone else, not because the throw was perfect, but because Leo had adjusted.
Leo had listened. Leo was trying to do something Dex had taught him.
“Better,” Dex said kindly.
Leo turned to you immediately. “Mommy, did you see?”
“I saw, baby.”
Then he turned back to Dex, waiting.
Dex nodded. “Good job, buddy.”
Leo beamed, and Dex looked like he might never recover.
After that, the living room became a small battlefield. The giraffe missed. The rabbit missed. The elephant missed so badly it bounced off Dex’s foot. Toys landed by the coffee table, by the basket, on the edge of the rug, once almost in the laundry hamper by accident. Leo picked each one up, cheeks flushed, little chest rising with effort, determined in a way that looked painfully familiar.
Dex let the mess stay.
Dex, who needed everything in the right place, who needed rituals and order, let the mess stay if it meant he was having fun with his son. If it meant he got to experience something he never got with his own father.
Every miss was just there where it fell, until Leo went to collect it. Every mistake remained visible. Dex, who lived by putting things where they belonged, sat in the middle of disorder and allowed it to have no purpose at all but play. Even if you could see it bothering him. His eyes flicked once toward the sock. His fingers flexed when the foam ball rolled farther under the table.
But he didn’t pick it up. He watched Leo. He let his son learn.
Once, Leo picked up the rabbit and went still. His mouth wobbled before his arm even let go of the toy.
Sure enough, he missed.
He was getting upset, you realised, because he was starting to feel that his toys would miss before it even landed.
“I’m bad at ayiming,” he whispered.
The room quieted.
Dex didn’t deny it. Of course he was not great at it. Not everyone can be Bullseye, not to mention, his hand-eye-coordination was still being developed. Still, your husband looked at the rabbit, then at Leo.
Then he picked it up and placed it back in his hands.
“Try again,” he said.
Leo sniffled. “But I know.”
He knew he was going to miss.
“Maybe,” Dex said. “Try anyway.”
Leo looked at him for a long second, but tried again
The rabbit missed.
And then it missed again.
And then, finally, it hit the inside of the basket, wobbled on the edge, and fell in.
Leo screamed. “I did it!”
You laughed, clapping before you could stop yourself. “You did!”
Leo ran into Dex like a tiny comet, and Dex caught him immediately, one arm wrapping around his back. For a moment, Dex just held him there, his face pressed briefly into Leo’s messy hair, eyes closed like the hug had knocked the breath out of him.
“Good shot,” he murmured.
Leo glowed.
Then he ran to you, climbing into your lap and grabbing your face with both hands.
“Mommy saw?”
You melted instantly, pulling him close. “‘Course I did, honey.”
Dex sat beside you after that, close enough for his knee to touch yours. Leo settled between you, one hand in your sweater and one foot pressed against Dex’s thigh, holding both of you in place like he needed his whole world within reach.
Leo peeked up. “Again after snack?”
Dex answered immediately. “If you want to.”
You stared at your husband, then at your son, both of them excited and already thinking about the next throw.
“Oh my god,” you said jokingly. “There’s two of them.”
And Dex only chuckled and kissed your temple, because he now understands that being like him in some ways and not others didn't have to be a bad thing.
After reading Dex interaction with Leo, i thought about Leo watching Dex aim; throwing away the dirty clothes at the cleaning basket, the keys at their holder/basket, and Leo is trying now with his toys.
ughhh this is so cute! this fic will be posted soon <3
Greek Myth AU | Demigod! Bucky Barnes x Nymph! Reader where Bucky has a forge near the woods where you live.
TW battle trauma, magical prosthetic metal arm, food, theft, grumpy x sunshine, son of Hephaestus! Bucky
Bucky Barnes hasn't gone to battle since he encountered the Hydra.
He still remembers the marsh and the screaming and the sound of teeth closing around bone. He remembers how the monster dragged him down into the mud by the arm and the whole world went white with pain. The poets say he fought bravely, that he stood his ground, that the son of Hephaestus didn’t break, even beneath the jaws of a beast older than most kings.
Bucky knows better.
There was nothing noble about it. There was blood in his mouth, poison in his veins and hands clawing uselessly at the wet earth underneath. And then there was pain, and then there was nothing.
When he opened his eyes, his father was standing over him in the red light of a fire.
Hephaestus made him a new arm.
What else could the god of the forge do to repay his son for running his errands? Console him? Talk to him? Say son, I’m proud of you and I’m sorry this happened? Ha!
No, gods aren't really known for their stellar parenting. Instead, his father built something out of it.
It was state of the art, if such a mortal phrase could be used for something made by divine hands. It was made of bronze and celestial iron, gold-threaded mechanisms beneath the plating, joints so fluid they moved like water. His father carved protective spells into the inner frame and fitted it to him so perfectly that Bucky could still feel heat, pressure, texture, weight of everything.
It didn't feel so different from the arm he had lost, and that made it worse.
Because men saw it and thought it was a miracle. Kings saw it and thought it was weapon. Heroes saw it and thought it was an advantage. They stared at the shining metal and forgot there had ever been flesh beneath it. They forgot a monster had taken something from him before his father gave anything back.
So Bucky stopped going to war.
He let other men chase glory while he stayed in Lemnos.
His father gave him the forge there, the greatest forge on the island, built deep into black volcanic stone where the heat rose from the earth itself. The whole place breathed fire. The walls glowed at night.
Or, at least, everyone said it did.
The son of Hephaestus in a forge, the man with the metal arm making metal things. Very poetic. People loved when suffering became useful.
And Bucky was useful. That much, no one could deny.
He made swords for kings who wanted their enemies to slain before sunset. He made armour for heroes who spoke of destiny as though destiny had ever once done the washing up after a war. He made arrowheads for hunters, axes for warlords, helmets for princes, daggers for queens who pretended they had no use for daggers at all.
His work was legendary. A blade from Barnes’ forge did not dull. A shield from Barnes’ forge did not crack. Chainmail from Barnes’ hands could turn aside a spear thrust, a lion’s claw, sometimes even a god’s temper.
Men came to him asking for things that could cut, pierce, crush, defend, maim, conquer, survive.
And Bucky gave it to them.
Because that was what all his hands were good for.
At least, that was what he believed.
And then you come in.
You are a wood nymph, Bucky realises, because no ordinary girl walks into a forge with leaves in her hair and moss on the hem of her dress. You look too kind for all the heat and smoke here, too green and alive for a room full of fresh weapon.
For a second, Bucky forgets to be rude.Then he remembers.
“Forge is closed,” he says.
You blink at the swords on the wall, the armour hanging from hooks, the coals burning bright enough to turn the whole room gold. “Oh,” you say with a frown. “I just… I heard you fix things.”
Bucky froze.
Nobody… has ever said it like that before.
They say he makes weapons. They say he forges armour. They don’t say fix, like his work made people happy.
You open your palm and show him a broken anklet, thin gold, little leaves dangling from the chain. “It caught on a root.”
“A root,” Bucky repeats.
“A rude one,” you say, as if you have a personal vendetta against the tree. You probably do.
He should send you away. He has a sword half-finished for a king and a shield waiting for Ares demigod. He doesn’t mend pretty little things for pretty nymphs with sunlight in their eyes.
But you’re looking at him like he can help.
So Bucky sighs, reaches for the anklet, and mutters, “Fine.”
Your smile blooms so quickly he has to look down.
It is the first time anyone has asked his hands to make something that wasn’t meant to hurt.
He pretends that doesn’t matter.
But the. you keep coming back.
At first, Bucky assumes it is coincidence. Wood nymphs probably break things all the time. You live in forests. Forests have branches, rocks, rude little animals with grabby mouths. So when you return three mornings later with a bent hairpin, he only grunts and takes it from your hand.
“Another root?” he asks.
“A bird,” you say.
Bucky huffs despite himself and fixes it in less than five minutes.
Then you come back with a clasp from your dress. Then a little bronze bell. Then a ring made of twisted copper that you swear belongs to a dryad friend, though Bucky notices it fits your finger perfectly when he gives it back.
You don’t have gold or silver, and Bucky knows that, so he insisted you don’t pay him. You said nonesense! And only ever pay him in flowers.
He’ll never admit it but it’s… sweet.
You gave him small white blossoms, bluebells, white thyme, and tiny yellow things you say grow near the river. Sometimes you bring fruit wrapped in leaves, because apparently you’ve decided he forgets to eat and apparently you’re right.
The first time, Bucky says, “This isn’t payment.”
You look genuinely worried. “Do you not like them?”
“No, I—” He stops, because saying I like them feels impossible and saying I like you feels too vulnerable. He looks down at the flowers in your hands, too bright for his forge, and mutters, “They’ll die in here.”
You smile. “Then I’ll bring more.”
And you do.
Soon there are flowers everywhere, tucked into old jars, hanging upside down from the rafters where the heat dries them beautifully. One little daisy sits in a crack on his workbench for three days before he realises he’s been carefully moving around it.
He tells himself he is only being polite.
Except he starts saving pretty scraps of gold and copper and stone because maybe you’ll bring him another broken little thing and maybe he can make it better than it was before.
You ask him to fix a chain, and he adds tiny leaves to it.
You ask him to mend a pin, and he shapes the end into a flower.
You ask him if he can make a clasp stronger, and he makes it so beautiful you stare at it with no thoughts for a full second.
Bucky looks away every time.
He’s not making pretty things because he thinks you’re pretty. That would be ridiculous. He makes swords for kings and armour for heroes. He doesn’t sit in his forge at night thinking about what different shades of gold would look like against your skin.
Ugh. Fine. He does.
One day, Bucky realises you have not come by in too long.
The forge feels too quiet without the little chime of your anklet, without you leaning over his workbench and asking if something hopelessly broken can still be fixed.
So he goes looking, until he realizes he doesn’t actually know where you live.
He asks a fisherman near the cliffs says he saw a wood nymph by the olive groves that morning. He asks an old woman carrying figs and says she thinks you keep to the trees by the river when you are upset, though she doesn’t explain how she knows that and Bucky doesn’t ask. A shepherd points him farther inland.
By the time Bucky finds you, he is already in a temper, but not at you. At the world, mostly. At whatever has kept you away. At himself for caring enough to come all this way.
Then he sees you, sitting by the riverbank with your knees drawn up, your face turned away, shoulders hunched so small The whole grove is green and dappled with afternoon light, lovely in the way nymph places always are.
You are crying.
Oh.
He clears his throat.
You look up, startled, and then your eyebrows softened when you see him. You are relieved.
“Bucky,” you say, and your voice wobbles.
He hates whoever caused that.
He comes closer. “What happened?”
You wipe at your face with the heel of your hand and laugh a little, embarrassed. “It’s silly.”
He waits.
You glance down at the grass. “I made a flower crown this morning.”
Bucky says nothing.
“I know,” you say quickly. “It sounds ridiculous.”
“It doesn’t.”
You look at him then, something in Bucky’s chest goes tight.
“I spent all morning on it,” you murmur. “I made it from river jasmine and clover and the little blue flowers that grow by the reeds. It was very pretty.”
He can imagine it.
You make a face that is halfway between misery and indignation. “A local river god stole it.”
Bucky blinks.
“He said it was the prettiest thing he’d seen in a long time,” you continue, clearly offended all over again, “and then he just… he just took it. Put it on his own head and disappeared back into the water.”
For a moment, Bucky can only stare.
That little river bastard.
Bucky knows a little of what that’s like. He has spent his whole life making beautiful things only for someone else to walk away with them. At least, though, he’s beautifully compensated for it.
“Come to my forge in three days,” he says.
When he gets back to his forge, three men are waiting with commissions. And enough money to last him many months.
Bucky looks at all of them and says, “No.”
Then he shuts himself inside the forge and begins to make the most intricate thing he has ever made.
He bent gold into branches and shaped silver into tiny blossoms. He embeds blue stones like river flowers, set like dew. Each leaf was made by hand, each petal delicate beneath his metal fingers.
He has made a flower crown that will not wilt.
The, you come to his forge.
Bucky hears the anklet first, that soft little chime he has grown helplessly fond of. He pretends to be busy, pretends he has not spent three days thinking of you.
Then you step inside, and the forge feels warmer for reasons that have nothing to do with fire.
You have flowers in your hair again. Little white ones this time, tucked messily behind your ears, already wilting from the heat.
Bucky unwraps the crown after you say hi.
And it’s clear it’s not a crown for a queen. It’s not meant for a throne. It’s simply little piece of your grove, shaped by fire.
For a moment, you only stare.
Then your hands come up to your mouth. “Oh, Bucky,” you whisper.
“If the river god tries to take this away,” His chest goes tight. “Tell him a son of Hephaestus will come for him.”
You look at him like that is the most romantic thing anyone has ever said to you.
Maybe, from him, it is.
You take it so carefully it makes his heart ache, setting it on your head with delicate fingers. Firelight catches in every petal, every leaf, every little stone, and Bucky forgets all the clever, gruff things he might have said to survive the sight of you.
You look like spring wandered into his forge and decided to stay.
You touch the edge of the crown, shy all at once. “Does it look pretty on me?”
Bucky’s answer comes without a filter. “Everything’s pretty on you.”
Oh, Bucky.
So you rise onto your toes and kiss him.
Bucky freezes because he’s not expecting it, startled still as stone, both hands hovering uselessly in the smoky air. But you are warm and gentle and careful with him, and when you start to pull away, he finally wakes up and chases another kiss.
His human hand finds your waist, his metal one touches your cheek.
He kisses you softer, deeper, like he is learning how to love again for the first time since the Hydra nearly killed him.
When you part, you look away shyly and rest your forehead against his chest. Bucky tries to ignore the patch of green growing by your feet magically, your emotions are bursting from the ground, but he can’t help but smile anyway.
The crown glimmers in your hair.
Bucky finally looks down at his hands, one flesh and one bronze, and thinks of every weapon he has ever made. All those years, he believed that that was all his hands were good for.
But you’re standing in his arms, wearing metal spring on your head, and for the first time in his life, he thinks maybe that was never true.
Maybe his hands can make beautiful things, too.
Maybe they were meant to hold you.
(You come back in a few days with a freshly made flower crown, of course. When it dries, he casts it in iron 🫶)
I wanted to contribute to some heartwarming comments from others, because your writing truly deserves it.
Among your great skills, I wanted to praise your ability to preserve character's real nature. When it comes to problematical characters, some writers like to sugarcoat their flaws, which is truly sad. Afterall we have eyes, and have fallen for those wicked individuals anyway. But never you — as far as I see — not only you keep character feeling alive and just like we remember them from the show, but also, somehow, made them very enjoyable! Wow, lot's of praise to you!
(btw, your last story made me realise that I forgot to check my locks. Thanks for keeping me safe, Bullseye)
You are too kind, Anon!
It’s been a while since I went through all my asks that aren’t requests, simply because I don’t have the time, but I don’t regret doing it now! Honestly, I love this little community so much and I love all the overwhelming love. You are the best!!
and don’t forget to check your locks every night, anon!
Hiya! Just came to say thank you for writing principles! While dad, family dex is cute - I miss the psycho dex. Like wym he is jealous of toys, ofc he is. What a good read. Ty for all you do !
I did find it difficult to switch between the two but I got there! Thank you so much for reading, dear anon 🫶
bro I just read Principles and I got so turned on but then I remembered you don’t write explicitly anatomical smut and I’m like there’s no way you didn’t do that. Anyway I re-read it and you were right, noting is ever super graphically detailed. They’re mostly just talking about the toys and exes and detailing Dex’s internal thoughts. You write sex so vividly without making it full-on p🌽 I really don’t know how tf you do it. Thank you for making your smutty stories character studies YOU ARE VERY TALENTED!
I feel like I keep repeating myself but the reason I don’t is because lowkey I can’t lol. There’s so many talented writers writing anatomically explicit Dex smut out there, go give them some love, too!! I’m definitely super interested in the character aspect but sometimes some people just wanna be horny haha!
anyway. You are so so kind for sending this. Much love, anon!!! 🫶🫶🫶🫶🫶🫶🫶
