𝑳𝑰𝑵𝑮𝑬𝑹𝑰𝑵𝑮 𝑾𝑶𝑼𝑵𝑫𝑺 Patching up Sergeant Barnes in the middle of the war turns into stolen touches and a desire you can’t shake and from the moment he saw you in that uniform, you were his.
1940s!bucky barnes x fem!medic!reader
word count : 8,9k
warnings 18+ : no use of y/n, explicit sexual content, smut, angst, porn with plot, filthy/dirty talk, oral (f receiving), unprotected sex (wrap it before you tap it!!), war violence, injuries, medical treatment, breeding
author’s note : I just listened to everything is romantic remix on tiktok and immediatelly thought of 40s bucky. I hope you enjoy this as much as I enjoyed writing it <333 also tysm for 700 notes on my dilf!bucky blurb ily!!
The night was bitter, the kind that seeped through canvas walls and made every breath sting your lungs. Your tent groaned against the wind, lantern light flickering across polished steel instruments as you scrubbed them clean. With the day finally ending, you allowed yourself a sigh, already reaching to snuff the flame.
Until a voice cut through the storm outside.
“Go inside. She’ll know what to do.”
Another voice answered, this one unfamiliar, low, and a little too smooth. “All right, all right, calm down.”
The flap of your tent flew open with the wind, and in stepped a young man. Not younger than you, but younger in the way trouble always looked, reckless, smug, alive. His uniform clung to him, dusted with snow, and he wore his wounds like decoration: a bullet graze burning across his arm, his nose bloodied, lips twisted in something far too close to a grin.
You set your cloth down. “Well, what do we have here?”
His eyes met yours immediately striking, steady, and so intent it almost felt indecent. He didn’t look like a man walking in for treatment. He looked like a man who had just found his evening’s entertainment.
“Sit,” you ordered briskly, turning to your stack of medical records. “Name?”
He barked a laugh. “Really? You need a name?”
Your head snapped up. Tired as you were, you weren’t about to be played with. “Excuse me?”
He leaned back slightly, grin widening. “Easy, doll. The name’s Bucky. You know? Cap’s best friend?” He winked like it was meant to mean something.
You arched a brow, unimpressed. “Cap has many friends, Mr. Bucky.”
That one landed. His cockiness faltered just enough for him to clear his throat before replying, quieter this time. “James. James Buchanan Barnes.”
“Thank you.” Your voice softened only a fraction as you pulled his file, flipping it open. Not much there. Solid results. A soldier with no obvious weakness, at least not on paper.
You set the folder aside and stepped closer, reaching for his arm. His skin was warm, his pulse quick under your fingers. He didn’t flinch. He didn’t look at the wound. He just watched you, like your every move was more fascinating than the blood seeping through his sleeve.
“Let’s take a look at this, shall we?”
The wound didn’t look serious, but it was still worth a closer look. “Roll up your sleeve for me,” you ordered.
For once, he didn’t argue. Quick fingers pushed the fabric up, baring a strong forearm dusted with grit and dried blood. Your gaze caught on the definition of his hand, the veins across his skin, and for just a fleeting moment, you felt sorry that it would be marred by another scar.
“Nothing to worry about,” you said with a small smile, reaching for your tools. “Just a scratch.”
He hummed, almost amused by your calmness, while you worked. First disinfectant, the sting made his jaw flex, though he refused to make a sound. Then, with steady hands, you threaded the needle and began stitching. The gash wasn’t wide, but it was deep enough to demand care. You leaned close, the lamplight catching on your hair, and for once he went quiet.
When you glanced up, his blue eyes were already fixed on you, unwavering, curious in a way that made your chest warm.
“All right, Mr. Barnes,” you said, clearing your throat softly, “lift your head for me.”
“Sure thing, pretty,” he replied smoothly, tipping his chin up like he was surrendering to you, though the grin never left his face.
You examined the bridge of his nose. Thankfully, nothing broken, just bruising and a shallow cut. A little clean-up was all he needed. You dabbed carefully at the dried blood, and even then, you felt his stare, sharp, unrelenting, as if you were the one under inspection.
Finally, you pulled a small tin of ointment from your kit and pressed it into his hand. “Apply this on your nose every morning. If anything gets worse well, you know where to find me.”
His fingers brushed yours as he took it, slow, deliberate. “Of course, doll. Thanks for patchin’ me up.” His smirk lingered as he stood, a little too confident for a man who’d just been stitched together.
And then he was gone, leaving the tent colder than before.
The peace didn’t last long. Barely twenty-four hours after you’d stitched him up, your tent flap flew open again, this time not with the lazy swagger of a man looking for attention, but with the rough shove of someone being pushed inside.
“Doc, you’re gonna wanna look at this one,” a soldier muttered, half-laughing as he gave Bucky a shove toward your cot.
“Relax, pal, I’m fine,” Bucky grumbled, but you could already see the crimson blooming through the bandage on his arm.
Your eyes widened. “You have got to be kidding me.”
He gave you that same infuriating grin, even while blood trickled down to his wrist. “What can I say? Fella didn’t like the way I played cards.”
“Cards?” you snapped, moving to drag your kit closer. “You ripped open your stitches over a card game?”
“Don’t make it sound so bad, doll. I won.”
You glared, setting to work with sharp, practiced hands. He didn’t even flinch when you pressed the wound, though you noticed the muscle ticking in his jaw.
“You think this is funny?” you muttered, threading a needle again.
He leaned back against the cot, unbothered. “Not funny. Worth it.”
“Worth?!" You stopped yourself, shaking your head. “You’re impossible, Mr. Barnes.”
His smirk softened just enough to show he’d been listening, even if he’d never admit it. “Guess you’ll just have to keep patchin’ me up, sweetheart.”
You tightened the stitch a little harder than necessary. He hissed, but the grin never left his face.
In the afternoon, you finally allowed yourself a moment of peace. The mess tent smelled faintly of weak coffee and overcooked bread, but at least it was warm, and the chatter of the other medics filled the space. You sat with two of your colleagues, nursing a tin cup between your palms, when the words tumbled out before you could stop them.
“Barnes is going to drive me insane.”
One of the girls raised a brow. “Barnes?”
You sighed. “Tall, dark hair, blue eyes, thinks he’s God’s gift to women.”
Recognition dawned, followed by laughter. “Oh, him. I stitched him up last month. Came in grinning like it was a date.”
“Exactly!” you said, exasperated. “He ripped open perfectly good stitches over a card game. A card game! Who does that?”
“Soldiers,” the other medic said dryly, spooning her soup. “They think they’re invincible until they drop.”
You pinched the bridge of your nose. “Well, this one seems determined to make me his personal nurse. He doesn’t even pretend to be sorry.”
Your friend smirked. “Sounds like someone’s got a crush.”
Your head shot up. “A crush? Please. The only thing I feel when I see James Buchanan Barnes is a rising blood pressure.”
The table broke into laughter, and that was when you noticed the sudden shift in the air. A shadow lingered just past the flap of the tent. You turned your head, only to catch a flash of dark hair and broad shoulders disappearing out the door.
Your stomach sank.
“Tell me that wasn’t-" one of your friends whispered.
You groaned, dropping your forehead into your hands. “Oh, it was.”
A few hours lates the flap rustled and in walked Bucky Barnes, every inch of him radiating trouble despite not having a single visible wound. He leaned lazily against the tent’s entrance like he was posing for a photograph, arms crossed, a grin tugging at his mouth.
“Well, if it isn’t my favorite medic,” he drawled, eyes glittering.
You didn’t even bother to look up from your notes. “Barnes, unless you’re actively bleeding, I don’t want to see you.”
“Oh, c’mon, doll,” he said, stepping inside. “You wound me. Thought you’d be thrilled to see your… what was it again?” He tapped his chin, feigning thoughtfulness. “Oh right. Your personal nurse case.”
Your pen froze mid-stroke. Slowly, you lifted your head to find him smirking like the cat that got the cream.
“You were eavesdropping.”
“Me?” He pressed a hand to his chest, mock-offended. “Never. Just happened to walk by while you were tellin’ half the camp how I’m God’s gift to women.” He leaned closer, voice lowering with wicked amusement. “Didn’t know you thought that highly of me.”
Your cheeks burned. “That’s not what I said.”
“Mm, maybe not word for word,” he conceded, dropping into the chair across from you uninvited. “But you did admit I raise your blood pressure. I’ll take that as a compliment.”
You groaned, rubbing your temple. “You’re insufferable.”
He tilted his head, pretending to inspect his shoulder. “Speaking of, it’s been aching somethin’ awful. Guess I oughta let my personal nurse take a look. Wouldn’t want to disappoint her.”
“You don’t even look hurt.”
“Maybe it’s internal,” he quipped, peeling off his jacket at a deliberate pace. The muscles of his arm flexed under the thin undershirt as he rolled his shoulder, putting on a show. “Better safe than sorry, right?”
You crossed your arms. “Do you ever stop performing?”
“Not when you’re watchin’,” he said easily, meeting your glare with a grin.
You sighed, finally standing and grabbing your kit. “Fine. Sit still.”
He obliged, but only just, keeping that infuriating smirk plastered across his face. “I’ll try not to squirm… too much,” he teased, rolling his shoulder slightly toward you.
You pressed your fingers against the muscle, palpating carefully. Warm, taut, and perfectly fine, but he didn’t flinch. Instead, he let out a low hum, leaning just a fraction closer, so your hands brushed against his chest as you examined him.
“Careful,” he murmured, voice low, eyes flicking up at you. “I might start enjoying this attention.”
“Don’t be ridiculous,” you muttered, though your fingers lingered just a second longer than necessary, adjusting his shoulder. His warmth radiated through your touch, and you had to remind yourself to focus on the assessment.
“Mm, that’s good,” he said softly, tilting his head, letting you stretch the muscles slightly. “See? Told you my personal nurse has magic fingers.”
You rolled your eyes, trying to hide the flush creeping up your neck. “Stop talking. I’m not here to entertain you.”
“Not talking,” he said smoothly, leaning back a fraction, enough that your hands had to hover just a bit closer to his chest than strictly necessary. “Just… letting you do your thing. Can’t help it if it feels good, right?”
Your penitent glare was met with a teasing wink, and you muttered under your breath, “God, he’s unbelievable.”
You finished your inspection, brushing your hands off carefully. “All done. Shoulder’s fine, Mr. Barnes. No injuries worth mentioning.”
He flexed experimentally, watching you closely. “Guess that means my personal nurse did a good job, huh?”
“Don’t push it,” you muttered, trying not to let the smile tug at your lips.
He leaned back, still smirking, and gave a little bow as if tipping an invisible hat. “I’ll let you have your victory… for now. But don’t be surprised if I need my magic fingers checked again soon.”
You rolled your eyes, trying to appear stern, but your heart betrayed you with a quick skip. “Get out, Mr. Barnes. Some of us have real work to do.”
He laughed softly, the kind of sound that made your resolve weaken a little more than it should. Standing, he gave one last mischievous grin, leaning just close enough to catch a hint of your scent.
“See you tomorrow, pretty girl,” he said, voice low, teasing, confident.
And damn it, you already knew he meant it, and that you’d be waiting, whether you liked it or not.
The next day passed in a blur of bandages, shouting soldiers, and endless paperwork. By the time your shift ended, exhaustion weighed on your shoulders like a lead blanket. You grabbed your coat and headed toward the small sleeping quarters the medics shared, eager to collapse into the warmth of your cot.
The camp was quieter than usual, the wind whispering between the tents. As you rounded the corner near the edge of the medical tents, a thin plume of smoke curled in the air. A familiar silhouette leaned casually against a post, a cigarette glowing faintly in his hand.
“Barnes,” you muttered, frowning. “Smoking is bad for you. You’re going to ruin those lungs before the war even gets the chance.”
He glanced down at you, lips twitching into that infuriating grin. “And here I thought my personal nurse liked me just the way I am.”
You groaned. “Don’t be ridiculous. Put that out.”
He shrugged, the cigarette dangling carelessly between his fingers. “Not a chance. Unless…” His grin widened, wicked and teasing. “You come closer.”
You stopped, heart thudding as he took a step forward. “Bucky-”
His hand reached up, cupping your cheek, tilting your head toward him. Before you could protest further, his lips were on yours, gentle at first, then demanding enough to make your knees go weak. His other hand rested on your waist, pulling you closer, silencing your scolding with that trademark smirk.
When he finally broke the kiss, he leaned his forehead against yours, eyes sparkling. “See? Much easier than listening to you lecture me.”
You blinked, still trying to process the warmth lingering where his lips had been. “You’re ridiculous,” you whispered, more breathless than you intended.
He chuckled low, taking a slow drag from the cigarette anyway, then exhaling and flicking the ash into the wind. “And you’re exactly the reason I’ll keep coming back. Goodnight, pretty girl.”
You watched him melt into the shadows between the tents, a mix of exasperation and something far more dangerous swirling in your chest.
Morning came too quickly, though it hardly felt like morning at all. You woke to the roar of chaos outside your tent: shouting soldiers, boots pounding against frozen ground, the sharp crack of gunfire mingling with the distant thrum of artillery.
Your heart lurched as you scrambled upright, blankets slipping from your shoulders. Medics were rushing past, their faces tight with urgency, and wounded men were being dragged into nearby tents. Every nerve in your body screamed, and for a moment, you froze, fear clutching at your chest like a vice.
Stepping into your own tent, your eyes immediately caught something out of place amid the disorder: a glint of silver on the table. Bucky’s dog tags, scratched and worn, lay beside a small scrap of paper. His handwriting, crooked but unmistakable, scrawled a simple message:
“Don’t lose yourself in the chaos. Come back to me.”
Your hands trembled as you picked them up, the warmth of his thoughtfulness momentarily grounding you in a world that had gone mad. Gunshots rang out nearby, but for a heartbeat, the war outside faded, replaced by the weight of his words and the metallic chill of the tags in your palm.
Bucky’s chest burned with exertion as he sprinted through the mud-slicked field, Steve’s voice shouting orders in the chaos around him. Bullets whipped past, explosions rattling the ground beneath his boots. Every sense screamed alert, every muscle tensed for the next strike.
Through the chaos, he felt the weight of something tucked in his breast pocket, a small compass, worn and scratched. He had pressed it there before leaving, hiding a folded photograph inside: your face, framed in a smile that had nothing to do with war and everything to do with home.
He stole a glance at it now, heart aching. The world around him threatened to swallow him whole, but for a second, he wasn’t a soldier, he was just a man who couldn’t afford to lose you.
Then a sharp pain seared through his side. He stumbled, coughing, and looked down to see the dark stain spreading across his uniform.
“Bucky!” Steve’s voice cut through the chaos. He was at his side in an instant, hand gripping Bucky’s shoulder, trying to steady him. “Hold on, I’ve got you.”
Bucky gritted his teeth, refusing to give in to the pain. He could feel the warmth of blood seeping through his fingers, but all he could think about was that photo, pressed against his chest, a reminder of something pure amidst the carnage.
A flash of movement, an enemy soldier aiming, Bucky tried to twist, to protect himself and the others. Pain flared in his arm as another shot grazed him, and he went down, teeth clenched, mind focused only on survival.
He could hear Steve shouting, the distant cries of the men around them, and through the haze of pain, he felt the steady pull of the photo against his chest.
Home. You. Somehow, he had to make it back.
Bucky barely had time to register the sounds around him. Reinforcements, enemy soldiers, swarmed the field faster than they should have been possible. Shouts, gunfire, the sharp cracks of rifles, it was a storm he couldn’t fight through.
“Steve! Move!” Bucky yelled, stumbling over mud and debris, blood soaking his uniform.
Steve’s hand gripped his arm, tugging him toward cover, but they were outnumbered. Bullets tore through the air, and men around them fell, some screaming, some silent.
Bucky tried to push through, tried to keep moving, but another blow sent him to his knees. Pain exploded in his side and shoulder, sharp and unrelenting. His vision blurred, rain, or blood, mixing on his cheek.
He could hear Steve cursing, dragging some of the men to safety, but it was no use. More soldiers closed in, and then, hands grabbed him, rough and unyielding. He struggled, kicking, twisting, but there were too many.
“No! Let me go!” he shouted, trying to break free, but a rifle butt caught him across the back of the head, and everything went black.
When he awoke, it was not in a field, not near the men he knew. He was bound, surrounded, and the cold walls of a makeshift cell closed in. The compass was still in his pocket, still pressed against his chest, but even that small comfort could not erase the sinking dread: he hadn’t made it home.
Some of the men with him had escaped, Steve among them, but not him. Not Bucky.
And for the first time in a long time, the thought of you, the photo, the note, his dog tags in your tent, cut sharper than any wound.
It had been two weeks.
Two excruciating weeks since the morning chaos, since the gunfire swallowed him whole, since his dog tags and note were the only pieces of him left in your hands.
Every day blurred into the next, blood, bandages, screams, and the endless shuffle of wounded soldiers stumbling into your tent. And every time the flap opened, every time someone shouted for help, your heart leapt in your chest with the same desperate thought: please let it be him.
But it never was.
There were men burned, broken, barely breathing. You stitched, you cleaned, you whispered words of comfort you didn’t even believe anymore. But none of them had those sharp blue eyes or that ridiculous grin. None of them called you pretty girl.
At night, when the tents grew quiet and you were finally allowed to fall apart, you’d slip your hand beneath your uniform, fingertips grazing the chain around your neck. His tags rested there now, pressed against your skin like a secret. They weren’t yours to wear, not really, but you couldn’t bring yourself to let go. Not when they were the last part of him you had.
You hadn’t meant to miss him. Not like this. He’d been cocky, insufferable, constantly teasing you until you wanted to scream. But now, in his absence, the silence was worse than his smirks, worse than his smug laughter. The quiet gnawed at you, hollowing you out.
Some nights, you swore you could still hear him, low voice cutting through the storm of your thoughts. See you tomorrow, pretty girl.
Tomorrow had come and gone, and you were still waiting.
Your fingers had just brushed over the chain at your collarbone, thumb worrying the worn metal of Bucky’s tags, when the flap of the tent ripped open.
“On your feet.” Steve’s voice was sharp, carrying the weight of command. He stepped inside, posture rigid, uniform still damp with sweat and dirt.
You straightened immediately, pulse quickening.
“There’s a briefing in five.” His tone left no room for argument. “The men who made it back from the Hydra raid, we’re moving on intel. Some of our boys are still trapped inside. We’re getting them out.”
The words hit like shrapnel. Trapped. Hydra. You knew exactly who he meant, but your throat locked around the name.
Steve’s gaze flicked over you, sharp and assessing. “Medics are to be on standby. When we hit that base, we’ll be pulling wounded. You’ll have minutes to get them stabilized, understood?”
“Yes, sir,” you managed, your voice tighter than you wanted.
“Good.” He gave one curt nod, but his eyes lingered a moment longer, softer than his tone allowed. Then he turned, already half out the door. “Gear up. We move at dawn.”
The flap fell shut, cutting you off from him, and from the only hope you’d clung to in two unbearable weeks. A mission. A chance.
Maybe, just maybe, you’d see Bucky Barnes again.
The camp was alive with noise before the sun had even burned through the mist. Boots pounded the frozen ground, vehicles roared to life, rifles clattered against straps. Medics and nurses were already hauling crates of bandages, morphine, and rations toward the transport trucks. Orders barked across the yard mixed with the clamor of soldiers gearing up, the kind of chaos that made your skin prickle with adrenaline.
Steve stood at the center of it, a map spread across a makeshift table. His jaw was set tight, eyes scanning the names scrawled in rough ink. When the last stragglers gathered, his voice cut through the noise.
“We’ve got confirmation. The men Hydra didn’t kill outright, they’re holding inside that base.” His eyes flicked to the map, then back up. “We’ve identified some of them, Carter, Ramirez, Foster…” He read name after name, each one landing like a weight.
You held your breath, waiting, dreading.
“...and James Buchanan Barnes.”
The ground seemed to drop from under you.
Steve didn’t pause, just started dividing tasks. “Infantry with me. Tech team with Stark. Nurses, you’ll be stationed at the perimeter when we pull our men out. Every one of you will be responsible for stabilizing someone until they can be moved.” He looked around, sharp and sure, assigning pairings with the efficiency of a man who couldn’t afford hesitation.
Finally, his gaze locked on you. He pointed without flinching.
“Barnes is yours.”
For a second, you forgot how to breathe. Around you, the others were already nodding, shifting, scribbling names on slates, preparing. But you were frozen, Steve’s words echoing through the chaos like a brand.
Barnes is yours.
The Hydra compound loomed like a beast carved into the mountainside, metal and stone bristling with turrets and searchlights. The night sky cracked open with gunfire as Steve led the charge, shield raised high. Bullets pinged harmlessly off the vibranium, his men rushing behind him with battle cries that drowned out the howl of the alarms.
“Move, move!” he barked, his voice cutting through the chaos. Explosions shook the ground as Stark’s toys tore open outer defenses, but inside, it was steel and shadows, Hydra soldiers spilling from every corridor like ants.
Steve cut through them, shield slamming, fists breaking jaws. His eyes scanned every hallway, every cell, his heart pounding harder with each empty bunk he passed.
And then, there.
“Barnes!”
The name ripped from his throat as he spotted the familiar figure slumped in a corner cell. Bucky’s uniform was in tatters, his arm torn and bleeding, his face half-swallowed by shadows. But his eyes, those sharp, restless eyes snapped open at the sound.
“’Bout damn time, Rogers,” Bucky rasped, trying for bravado, but his voice cracked.
Steve smashed the lock with his shield and hauled the door open. “You look like hell.”
Bucky gave a breathless chuckle, leaning heavily on the wall. “You should see the other guy.”
“Yeah, well, we’re leavin’. Can you walk?”
“Can I walk? Pal, I’ve been sittin’ in here long enough. Just get me out before they-” His words were cut short by the rattle of gunfire. Steve shoved his shield up, sparks exploding as the bullets ricocheted.
“On your feet, Buck!”
They moved together, old rhythm, old instinct. Bucky may have been weakened, but his fists still knew the weight of a fight. He staggered but didn’t fall, following Steve down corridors lined with smoke and bodies.
In the middle of it, something slipped from Bucky’s tattered jacket pocket, fluttering to the floor. Steve bent to grab it on reflex, even as he raised his shield against another shot. His eyes flicked down and froze.
A photograph.
Your face. Clear, even in the smudged ink.
For half a heartbeat, Steve forgot the battle.
He glanced up at Bucky, a slow, incredulous grin tugging at his lips. “Well, I’ll be damned. Barnes, you-”
“Don’t,” Bucky snapped, his face flushing even under the grime. He snatched for the compass, but Steve held it just out of reach, eyes alight despite the danger pressing in on them.
“You carry her picture?” Steve teased, voice low and rough with disbelief.
Bucky scowled, jaw tight. “Shut up, Rogers.”
Steve slid the compass carefully back into Bucky’s pocket, still grinning as he helped him forward. “Oh, I won’t. Trust me, I won’t.”
The two of them pushed onward, side by side, smoke and fire swallowing the path behind them. The war wasn’t over, not by a long shot, but for the first time in weeks, Steve knew he hadn’t lost his oldest friend.
The corridors shook with the fury of Hydra’s defense. Bullets whined overhead, sparking against steel. Steve shoved Bucky low, his shield raised, forcing them both into a crouch as they ran.
“Keep your head down!” Steve barked, dragging Bucky with a firm grip under his arm.
“Yeah, I’ll try not to get shot, thanks for the tip,” Bucky gritted out, breath ragged but his grin stubborn as ever.
They ducked around a corner as the wall behind them exploded in a shower of concrete and smoke. Steve raised the shield over both of them, the force rattling his bones. He felt Bucky’s weight sag against him but didn’t slow, pushing forward with sheer determination.
“Almost there!”
Through the smoke and chaos, the frigid night finally broke into view. The compound’s outer gates had been blown wide open, the path back to Allied lines jagged and littered with debris. They half-ran, half-stumbled across the open stretch, both men bending low as tracer fire streaked the sky. Bucky coughed, the sound raw, but he matched Steve’s pace, refusing to falter.
And then, finally, beyond the battlefield, the dim glow of lanterns flickered in the distance. Makeshift tents lined the frozen earth, silhouettes of medics and nurses rushing between them, shouting over the din.
“Hold on, Buck,” Steve muttered, his voice tight but urgent. “We’re almost there.”
The moment they crossed the threshold into the perimeter, chaos took on a new form: organized urgency. Medics were already darting forward with stretchers, hands reaching, voices barking orders. The stench of gunpowder gave way to antiseptic, the battlefield to triage.
Steve eased Bucky down carefully, gripping his shoulder before letting go. “Gotcha out, pal. You’re safe now.”
Bucky’s eyes fluttered shut for a moment, exhaustion dragging at him, but his hand tightened briefly around Steve’s wrist, silent gratitude, brother to brother.
Steve exhaled, chest heaving, his shield finally lowering as nurses rushed in.
The war still raged in the distance, but here, in the circle of canvas and lantern light, James Buchanan Barnes was alive.
“Clear a path!” one of the medics shouted as Steve lowered Bucky toward the nearest cot.
You were already moving before you even realized it, your boots skidding in the mud as you pushed past the others. At first, all you saw was the battered uniform, the dried blood, the half-conscious slump of his shoulders, and then his face.
Your heart stopped. For two agonizing weeks you’d convinced yourself you’d never see him again, and now, he was here, broken and bruised but alive.
“James,” you breathed, dropping to your knees at his side.
His eyes flickered open at the sound of your voice. Even through the haze of pain, they locked onto you, sharp and startlingly blue. And then, his mouth curved, the ghost of that cocky grin you knew too well.
“Knew you’d still be waitin’ on me, pretty girl,” he rasped, voice weak but laced with mischief.
You huffed, blinking hard against the sting in your eyes as you tore at your satchel for supplies. “You’re an idiot. You’re bleeding all over my floor.”
But your hands trembled as they pressed against his chest, searching for the worst of the wounds. You tried to focus, to be the professional you’d trained to be, but his gaze never left yours, heavy and intent.
And then, before you could stop him, his hand caught your wrist.
“Barnes, don’t-”
He pulled you down just enough, and suddenly his lips brushed yours. Warm, cracked, desperate. The kiss was clumsy, awkward, half a breath and half a plea.
You froze, only for your heart to betray you, slamming against your ribs as you leaned in without thinking, kissing him back for one fragile moment.
A chorus of whistles and hoots broke out behind you, soldiers and medics alike catching the scene. Heat rushed to your cheeks as you jerked back, flustered, shoving him gently but firmly against the cot.
“You’re delirious,” you muttered, grabbing gauze to hide your shaking hands.
Bucky let his head drop back, a smug, tired smile tugging at his mouth despite the blood on his teeth. “Maybe. But I’d do it again.”
You rolled your eyes, cheeks burning, but you couldn’t fight the small, traitorous smile that curved your lips as you bent to work on him.
The noise outside was deafening, orders shouted, boots stomping, the groans of the wounded as they were lowered onto stretchers, but inside the tent, the world shrank to just him.
Bucky lay back against the narrow cot, sweat cutting tracks through the grime on his face. You pressed a firm hand to his shoulder when he tried to lift himself.
“Down,” you ordered, pushing gently but firmly until his head rested against the thin pillow.
He let out a short laugh, though a wince betrayed the pain. “Commanding, aren’t you?”
“Someone has to keep you in line,” you muttered, reaching for the shears to cut through his tattered uniform. Your hands moved with practiced precision, masking the storm of emotions rising in your chest.
The fabric fell away, revealing bruises darkening his ribs, streaked cuts along his arms. Despite it all, his smirk was intact, eyes glinting with mischief.
“Damn, doc,” he drawled, voice rough but playful. “Didn’t realize you were this eager to get my shirt off.”
Your jaw tightened as you pressed gauze against a fresh gash. “Hold still, or I’ll make it worse on purpose.”
“Ow! Hey!” he hissed, yet the grin never left.
“You never quit, do you?” you murmured.
“And you… you’re far too captivating when you’re flustered,” he teased, voice low, eyes darkening with a heat that made your chest tighten.
Your cheeks burned, but you forced your focus back to the wound. When you bent lower to wrap the bandages around his ribs, he leaned closer, voice husky.
“You know, if you wanted me flat on my back, you could’ve just said so.”
You froze, hands tightening on the gauze. “Really…”
Then his gaze flicked down, catching the silver glint beneath your uniform, his dog tags.
“You… you’ve been wearing these?” His voice was thick, almost reverent.
Caught off guard, your chest tightened. “I-” Words failed you.
Bucky leaned forward deliberately, ignoring the ache in his ribs. “Tell me.”
“B-Bucky, you need to rest,” you stammered, pressing a hand to his chest.
“I don’t care right now,” he murmured, sliding his hands around your hips, pressing you closer. “I care about this.”
His lips brushed your collarbone, teeth grazing lightly. You gasped.
“Shh… just let me,” he murmured, pressing you gently back against the cot. Your hands tangled in his hair, trying to anchor him, but he was insistent.
With slow, deliberate pressure, he pressed you fully onto your back, one hand on your hip, the other sliding along your side, guiding your body flush against his. “Relax,” he whispered near your ear. “I’m only getting started.”
His hand slipped under the edge of your skirt, brushing the lace of your red panties. The touch was feather-light, teasing, enough to make your breath hitch. His lips traced your jawline, over your neck, teeth grazing lightly, leaving a trail of goosebumps.
“You feel like I’ve been starving, huh?” he murmured, voice low, warm, teeth grazing your ear.
“Yes…” you breathed, trembling under his heat.
He captured your lips briefly, shallow, teasing, making your knees weak. Then, with a smirk, he pressed closer, chest molding to yours, every inch radiating warmth and tension.
“You should be resting,” you whispered again, trying to push him gently back.
“I don’t care,” he murmured, fingers grazing your hips, tracing slow circles over the lace, over your skin, teasing, never fully giving in, just enough to make you ache.
His lips drifted to the tops of your thighs, kissing and nipping through the fabric, eyes drinking in every hitch of your breath, every shiver.
“Huh… red’s my favorite, and you knew that?” he murmured, lips brushing your panties.
You trembled, gripping his shoulders. “B-Bucky…”
He chuckled, lips and teeth teasing, holding you steady while his mouth traced slow, deliberate lines over your skin. The rhythm, deliberate and magnetic, pulled every shred of restraint from your body.
“God… you’ve got me undone,” you whispered, breath ragged.
“Mmm… and you’re mine,” he murmured again, lips gliding along the lace. “Not yet, but I’ve got you. Every inch. Right here, right now.”
He pressed kisses along the skin just above your underwear, teeth grazing lightly, teasing, never fully claiming every brush, every touch, every heated whisper igniting a fire inside you.
“I’ve been starving…” he murmured, lips teasing the lace, “…and now I’ve got you.”
You gasped, fingers clutching his shoulders, knees trembling, body alive and quivering, utterly undone under his teasing.
His eyes, dark and playful, locked with yours. “All mine.”
A shiver ran through you, the chaos outside fading to nothing. Slowly, you pushed him back just enough to catch your breath.
“I… I need a second,” you murmured, standing and tugging your skirt down, smoothing your shirt, fixing your uniform.
Bucky leaned back slightly, arms braced on the cot, watching you with wicked, hungry eyes, a smirk tugging at his lips as you adjusted yourself.
“You look… perfect,” he murmured, voice low, edged with desire.
You shot him a glare, cheeks flushed, but your fingers still trembled from the lingering heat.
“Don’t get any ideas… yet,” you warned, stepping back, trying to reclaim control.
His grin widened, eyes fixed on you, dark and teasing. “Oh, I’ll be patient… for now,” he said, voice rough, full of promise.
And in that moment, the tension between you lingered, electric and unbroken, a storm waiting to erupt.
The aftermath was chaos. Medics and nurses moved with practiced precision, patching up wounds, checking vitals, and keeping the injured stable despite exhaustion, dirt, and the smell of smoke in the air.
You knelt by Bucky’s cot, cleaning the grime and blood from his torso, pressing a damp cloth to a shallow cut. His blue eyes met yours, a spark of his usual teasing still lingering despite the ache in his muscles.
“Hold still,” you muttered, hands steady. “I need to make sure you don’t get infected.”
“I’m not exactly built for waiting,” he murmured, letting you work, lips quirked into that half-smile you knew all too well.
“Then maybe try,” you snapped lightly, pressing the bandage tight. “I’m not letting you make this harder than it needs to be.”
Once you finished dressing his wounds, a medic approached. “We’re moving the soldiers back to the camp for further care. Some of the more critical cases are going straight home, but the rest, including him, need proper rest and monitoring. You’re coming with him.”
Bucky raised an eyebrow, smirk teasing the edges of his exhaustion. “With you?”
“Yes, with me,” you said firmly, helping him to his feet and wrapping an arm around his waist for support. “You’re not going anywhere else until you’re steady.”
He allowed himself to be guided toward the trucks, leaning lightly against you, still giving that effortless, cocky grin. “Guess I can survive being bossed by you for a little longer.”
The ride back to the camp was quiet, the hum of the engine a backdrop to the pounding of your own heart. Bucky stayed close, occasionally letting his hand brush against yours, teasing little touches that made your pulse spike despite the exhaustion and chaos.
When the camp came into view, you felt a rush of relief. He was here, safe, for now and under your watch. The tents, the makeshift beds, the organized chaos of the medics, it wasn’t home, but it was safe enough, and it was enough to keep him close.
You helped him down from the truck, hands firm on his shoulders. “Here we are. Let’s get you settled.”
He looked at you, tired but mischievous. “I owe you one… but don’t expect me to be quiet about it.”
“Just get rest,” you said, guiding him toward a cot. “We’ll see about the rest later.”
And as he settled down under the blankets, you took a moment to watch him, fingers brushing over the scars you’d tended to, heart tightening with something you couldn’t name yet, but knew wouldn’t let you look away.
The days blurred together in camp, filled with the constant rhythm of tending to wounds, managing supplies, and keeping soldiers stable. Despite the endless noise of war just beyond the tents, a fragile sense of routine began to take root.
Bucky, of course, made that routine anything but simple.
“You’re hovering,” he drawled one afternoon as you checked the neat line of stitches at his side. His voice was low, threaded with amusement. “Haven’t you got other men to fuss over?”
You shot him a sharp look. “Maybe I don’t trust you not to rip them open by trying to be a hero too soon.”
“Hero?” he echoed, eyes glinting. “Careful, doll. Say it like that and I might start believing you think I’m one.”
You rolled your eyes, but the corners of your lips betrayed you, curving upward. He saw it immediately, smugness warming his features like fire in the cold.
When he wasn’t taunting you, he lingered too close, brushing against your arm as you passed, leaning into your space when you wrote in your notes, letting his fingers ghost over yours when you handed him water. Each touch sent sparks of heat through your chest, but you hid it beneath your practiced professionalism.
The nights were worse. In the dim glow of lanterns, when the camp finally quieted, you found yourself stealing glances at him where he lay on his cot blue eyes half-lidded, a faint smile curling as if he knew you were watching.
And then the news came.
Captain Rogers had pulled off the impossible. A mission turned victory. A celebration was to be held back at base, an official acknowledgment of bravery and sacrifice.
The night of the ceremony, the camp transformed. Lanterns hung from poles, casting warm light across the clearing. Soldiers gathered, laughter mingling with the faint hum of music carried over a crackling radio. Relief buzzed through the air, like everyone was trying to pretend, just for a moment, that war hadn’t hardened them.
You stood near the edge of the crowd, still in your nurse’s uniform, exhaustion softened by the atmosphere. When the commanding officer announced new promotions, the cheer that erupted nearly drowned out his words.
“Sergeant James Buchanan Barnes.”
Your head snapped up just in time to see Bucky step forward, shoulders squared, uniform crisp. He accepted the stripes with that devil-may-care grin, pride tempered by something softer when his gaze found yours across the crowd.
Later, after the speeches and the toasts, you slipped back toward your tent, the echo of music still following you. You barely had time to take a breath before the flap rustled open.
“Well,” came that familiar drawl, deeper now, threaded with smugness and something darker. “If it isn’t my favorite personal nurse.”
You turned, heart skipping, only to find him standing there in his new uniform, the fresh insignia gleaming against his chest. He leaned casually against the tent frame, but his eyes were anything but casual, they roamed over you, slow and deliberate, like he was already undressing you without lifting a finger.
“Hey, Bucky.” You smiled, stepping closer, though your pulse spiked the moment his eyes locked on yours.
He smirked, straightening, exhaustion long forgotten. “It’s Sergeant Barnes now, doll.”
Before you could retort, his mouth was on yours, hot, demanding, hungry. His hands gripped your waist, then slid lower, greedy fingers squeezing your ass as he lifted you effortlessly. You gasped into the kiss, clinging to his shoulders as he carried you across the tent.
In one sharp sweep, he cleared your desk, medical supplies clattering to the floor. He set you down on the surface, caging you in with his body, his breath ragged, eyes burning like he’d been starving for this.
You sprawled back against the desk, skirt riding high on your thighs, hair tumbling wild. His gaze roamed over you, dark and possessive, drinking in every inch.
A teasing whine escaped your lips. “Hmm… I don’t think this is proper behavior toward your nurse, Sergeant Barnes.”
His grin widened, wicked and wolfish, as he tugged your hips to the edge. “Good thing I’ve never been much for rules.”
You pulled him down to you, lips crashing against his, muffling your breathless laugh as his hands slid up, unbuttoning your uniform with rough, eager fingers.
Buttons popped open under his impatient fingers, exposing the flushed skin beneath. His mouth broke from yours just long enough to drag hot, wet kisses down your throat, over your collarbone, his teeth grazing enough to make you gasp.
“You drive me insane,” he muttered against your skin, sinking to his knees before you. Rough palms slid your skirt higher until it bunched at your waist. His breath hit your thighs, hot and deliberate, making your legs tremble before he’d even touched you.
“Bucky-” you tried, but your voice faltered as his lips brushed the edge of your panties, his grin wicked against the lace.
“God, you’re already shaking,” he rasped, hooking his fingers in the thin fabric. In one sharp tug, he dragged it down your legs, tossing it aside. For a second, he just looked, hungry eyes fixed on your soaked core, chest rising heavy with anticipation.
Then his mouth was on you.
A desperate moan tore from your throat as his tongue swept through your folds, slow at first, savoring, then firmer, hungrier. His grip locked around your thighs, holding you open as his mouth worked you, hot, wet, relentless. Every flick of his tongue was precise, deliberate, like he wanted to memorize the way you shook under him.
“Fuck! Bucky!” you gasped, fingers tangling in his hair. He groaned against you, the vibration sending sparks through your body as his tongue pressed deeper, lips sucking, teasing, worshipping.
When your hips bucked up, chasing him, his laugh was low, smug. “That’s it, doll… let me taste how much you want me.”
Your thighs trembled around his head, heat pooling sharp and fast in your core as he devoured you, greedy and unrelenting, like he’d been starving for this moment all along.
Your body was twitching, breath coming in sharp, ragged gasps as Bucky’s tongue worked you to the edge. Every nerve felt strung tight, ready to snap, then suddenly, maddeningly, he pulled back.
“Fuck!” you gasped, hips chasing him in desperation.
He wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, smirking up at you, his lips glistening. “Not yet, doll. I want you coming on me when I’m inside you.” His voice was rough, dark with hunger.
Before you could protest, he was on you again, surging up your body, his weight pressing you into the desk. His mouth crashed against yours, letting you taste yourself on his tongue, hot and messy. You clutched at his shirt, tugging at the buttons until he tore it off himself, tossing it aside.
You barely had time to breathe before his belt clattered open, trousers shoved down enough for him to free his cock, thick, hard, already dripping. He pressed the tip against your soaked entrance, teasing, smearing your arousal across his length.
Then he slammed into you, the desk creaking under the force. His mouth dragged against your ear, breath hot, voice low and ragged.
“God, doll… do you know how long I’ve wanted this?” he growled, thrusting hard enough to make you cry out. “The second I saw you in that little medic uniform, fuck, I wanted to rip it off you. Wanted to bend you over one of those cots and fuck you stupid.”
Your nails dug into his shoulders, the sheer filth of his words shooting straight to your core. “Bucky-”
“Wanted to see you like this,” he cut you off, his hand sliding up your stomach to cup your breast through the half-unbuttoned fabric. He tugged roughly, the buttons popping, exposing more skin. “Spread out… begging for me. Your skirt hiked up, your pretty little panties soaking ‘cause of me.”
He punctuated it with a brutal snap of his hips, making your moan choke into his mouth when he kissed you, deep and filthy.
“Bet all those nights you were patchin’ me up, you were thinkin’ about it too, huh?” he rasped, teeth grazing your jaw. “Thinkin’ about what my cock would feel like inside you… stretchin’ you, makin’ you mine.”
“Y-yes,” you gasped, broken, your back arching off the desk as his pace grew faster, relentless.
His hand slid under your ass, gripping you tighter, pulling you to meet his thrusts. “That’s it, doll. Say it louder. Tell me you wanted me to ruin you in that tight little uniform.”
Bucky’s groan was guttural, his thrusts turning punishing, his lips dragging down your neck, biting and sucking marks into your skin. “Fuck...hearin’ you say that, makes me wanna tear this uniform right off you, leave you bare under me every damn night.”
His fingers found your clit, rubbing hard and fast in sync with his thrusts. The added friction had you sobbing, your body trembling around him.
“That’s it, sweetheart,” he whispered, voice filthy, raw. “Come on my cock, show me how much you love bein’ fucked by your Sergeant.”
Your climax hit like lightning, ripping through you in waves that had you screaming his name, nails clawing his back, thighs clenching tight around him.
Bucky didn’t stop, he fucked you through it, chasing his own release, his thrusts rough and desperate. He kissed you hard, swallowing your cries, before pulling back to growl against your lips:
“Mine. You’re fuckin’ mine.”
With one last thrust, he buried himself deep, groaning as he spilled inside you, hips jerking against yours. His forehead dropped to yours, sweat dripping, breath ragged as he pressed every last inch of himself inside.
For a moment, the tent was filled only with your combined gasps and the sound of the desk creaking beneath you.
He finally pulled back just enough to smirk, lips brushing your cheek. “Told you, doll. That uniform never stood a chance.”
Bucky’s chest heaved against yours, his weight pinning you deliciously to the desk. For a long moment, neither of you moved, just clung to the other in the haze of your release. His lips trailed slow, gentle kisses down your cheek, your jaw, the damp hollow of your throat.
“God, doll,” he murmured, softer now, voice still wrecked but tender. “Never… never wanted anyone the way I want you.”
You threaded shaky fingers through his damp hair, tugging him closer, grounding yourself in the heat of his body. “You’re impossible,” you whispered, but there was no bite in it, only warmth.
He chuckled low, brushing his nose along your temple. “Yeah, but I’m yours.”
Slowly, he pulled out, both of you groaning at the loss. He caught the edge of your torn uniform jacket, tugging it back together clumsily before smoothing your skirt down. The soldier who had just fucked you raw and filthy a moment ago now touched you with careful reverence, as if afraid to break you.
“Hold still, doll,” he said, echoing your earlier words with a smirk, gently fastening the top buttons of your shirt. “You patched me up… guess it’s my turn.”
You laughed breathlessly, brushing his cheek with your thumb. “That was hardly patching up.”
“Mmh,” he hummed, stealing another kiss, this one soft, lingering, no urgency behind it. Just him, just you.
When you finally slid off the desk, your legs wobbled, and he caught you instantly, strong arms steadying you against him. “Easy, sweetheart,” he teased, kissing your forehead. “Don’t want my favorite nurse collapsing on me.”
“You wore me out,” you muttered, but your lips curved despite yourself.
Bucky only grinned, guiding you toward his cot. He pulled you down with him, not giving you the chance to protest, wrapping himself around you like you were the only anchor he had left in the world.
The chaos of celebration still carried faintly through the camp, but here, inside the tent, it was quiet. Safe.
You curled into his chest, his heartbeat steady under your ear. He stroked your hair, slow, soothing, his lips brushing the top of your head as his breathing evened out.
“Sleep, doll,” he whispered, voice fading with exhaustion. “I’ve got you.”
And with his arms tight around you, warmth sinking into your bones, you let yourself drift with him, both of you finally giving in to rest, tangled together in the aftermath of passion and something deeper neither of you could yet name.
Morning seeped in slowly, a pale wash of light slipping through the canvas seams of the tent. The sounds outside were quieter now, boots crunching on dirt, the occasional murmur of soldiers starting their day.
But inside, you were warm, cocooned in the solid weight of Bucky’s arms. His chest rose and fell steady against your back, the heat of him sinking into you, his arm heavy across your waist. For the first time in weeks, you felt… still. Safe.
You shifted carefully, trying to slip free, but the arm around you tightened immediately.
“Mm. Don’t even think about it,” Bucky rasped, voice still thick with sleep. His lips brushed the back of your neck, sending a shiver down your spine. “You’re not goin’ anywhere, doll.”
“Bucky, I need to-” you started, but he rolled you onto your back with infuriating ease, pinning you to the cot beneath him. His hair was messy, his grin lazy, and his eyes, God, his eyes burned with that same mischievous glint as last night.
“You look good like this,” he said, gaze raking down your body, his smirk widening. “All rumpled and flushed. Never thought I’d get to see my prim little medic like this. Been drivin’ me crazy since the first time I saw you in that damn uniform.”
“Bucky...” you warned, cheeks heating.
“What?” He leaned down, lips hovering just over yours. “You have any idea how many nights I laid awake thinkin’ about tearing it off you? Ripping it open just to see what you were hiding under there? Couldn’t think straight with you walking around like that, patching me up all sweet and innocent.”
Your pulse spiked, but you tried to roll your eyes, forcing a weak glare. “You’re insufferable.”
“And you’re mine,” he shot back instantly, pressing a slow, claiming kiss to your mouth before pulling back just far enough to see the dazed look in your eyes. His grin turned positively wicked. “God, I like that look on you.”
You shoved his chest lightly, though the heat in your face betrayed you. “You’re supposed to be resting.”
“Oh, I am,” he teased, flopping back onto the cot beside you and dragging you with him until you were once again tangled up in his arms. “Best damn rest I’ve had in months. Think I’ll keep you right here.”
You sighed, though your lips betrayed you with the smallest smile. “You’re impossible.”
He nuzzled against your temple, utterly unbothered. “And you love it.”
And with that, Bucky Barnes closed his eyes again, cocky grin still firmly in place, while you lay there against his chest, knowing, despite everything, he was right.
• ‘come home to me’ - during the rise and ruin of the second world war, a sharp-tongued brooklyn girl falls for james buchanan barnes—only to lose him to the battlefield, a presumed death, and the silence that follows. but almost two years later, when the war is long over and the wounds have scarred over, he comes back through her door, proving that some promises do survive the fire. (14.7k) @danysdaughter
! • ‘promise without ceremony’ - Bucky Barnes gave up on marriage a long time ago. But then, somewhere deep in a storm-soaked safe house, he pulls a bullet from your leg and accidentally proposes in the process. (3.9k) @cheekybarnes
• ‘lessons in lovemaking’ - You and Bucky Barnes go undercover as a married couple, but when a fake kiss gets too real, he unexpectedly finishes in his pants—leaving you both stunned. (smut masterlist) @artficlly
• ‘this is (not) fine’ - personal assistant rules: don’t crush on bucky barnes. definitely don’t misinterpret a flower purchase and spiral into silent heartbreak, and absolutely never ever get stuck alone with him in an elevator. (smut - 9.1k) @artficlly
• ‘take me home’ - the team discovers bucky's relationship with you when bucky searches for you in the hospital after hydra attacks new york (secret marriage - 1.7k) @parkers-gal
• ‘jackass’ - Everyone is horrified that Bucky is flirting with a married woman, but then they realise there's a reason why. (secret marriage - 3k) @aquaticmercy
! • ‘lumberjack!bucky series’ - Roots and Branches is the main story, Hardwood the follow-up, and the rest are one shots that you can read -or not- in the order you desire. (oh my god i love this) @vunblr
• ‘moving in’ - You're moving into your brand new apartment with Bucky. (beefy!bucky smut) @brunchable
• ‘movie night’ - You come home exhausted from another day of work, not expecting Bucky to surprise you with a little heart-warming gesture to show you how much he appreciates you. (fiance) @brunchable
• ‘my neighbour is a p⭐️’ - Things have turned awkward. You and Bucky hasn't spoken with each other for a few days now. But is the much needed space making things better or worse? (part 3/3 - other parts are in their masterlist!) @brunchable
• ‘all the apple cider and no more haunted houses’ - you and bucky barnes have a love-hate relationship—you love him and you believe he hates you—but when your friends insist on going to the scariest haunted house attraction in the area, the experience ends up forcing your real feelings for each other out into light. (smut - 11.1k) @witchywithwhiskey
• ‘the forever third wheels’ - it's the weekend of your town's annual valentine's day carnival and you go with your group of friends, though you can't help but be sad you don't have someone special in your life. your friend, and fellow third wheel, bucky barnes makes it his mission to give you a valentine's day you won't soon forget—and show you how special you are to him. (6.6k) @witchywithwhiskey
• ‘the day after’ - Your new roommate introduces you to her brother, but you met him last night. (implied smut - 2.3k+) @navybrat817
! • ‘like he means it’ - You can’t take another night of hearing Bucky fuck a girl who isn’t you. (oh my god 😭😍 - mentions of sex - 13.6k) @marvelstoriesepic
! • ‘summer surprise’ - You've been looking forward to kicking off the summer with a week on your dads new boat. You decide to have one last night of fun before committing to a week on the sea with your family. But you're thrown into a world of shock when you realize the older man you slept with, only days prior, is not only friends with your dad, but also joining you for the trip. (age-gap! - 21k) @pome-seed
! • ‘we couldn’t stop’ - During a sweep of a forgotten HYDRA lab, you, Steve, and Bucky trigger an old aerosol dispersal system. No one realizes what hit you until it’s too late. Now stuck in quarantine- burning, aching, and caged in with two dominant, unraveling super soldiers- you’re forced to ride out the drug’s effects together. (Bucky & Steve - 7k) @societyfolklore
• ‘fractured light’ - In this emotional slow-burn romance, you, Steve Rogers’ best friend, find yourself homeless and jobless, seeking refuge in the Brooklyn apartment he shares with Bucky Barnes. While Steve welcomes you with open arms, Bucky is wary, his distrust rooted in a painful past tied to a silver ring from the 1940s. (oh my god - sobbing 😭 - 30k+) @onlyforsebastianstan
! • ‘captain, stg, grumpy, and their doll!’ - (poly!relationship, Steve x Reader x Bucky | Stucky x Reader - 1.5k) @mercurial-chuckles
• ‘a favour’ masterlist - The team is close, obviously. They thought they knew everything about each other… until Y/N drunkenly admits to the team that she’s never had sex. And she’s eagerly waiting for that to change. Everyone is happy to step up to the plate, regardless of Bucky’s feelings for Y/N. Can he confess before it’s too late? (4 parts - 7.5k+ total) @buckysbabygorl
! • ‘tied in trust’ - You only asked for something light—just a little teasing, some rope, a blindfold. But Bucky Barnes never did anything halfway. Not when it came to you. (literally my dream scenario with Buck - 7k) @buckyseternaldoll
! • ‘manchild’ - bucky can't help but wonder why they always come running to you,, or your living fossil of a roommate disapproves of your taste in men and its totally not because he wants a taste of you. (smut - funny & adorable - 16.3k) @houseofhyde
! • ‘best guess’ - You and Bucky are keeping it quiet. Courting, technically—his word, not yours, though you’re not exactly arguing. It’s slow and soft and secret, tucked into corners of the Watchtower where no one’s looking. The problem is: everyone starts looking. (30-35k estimate) @rosesaints
• ‘the prince with the metal arm’ - your daughter asked for a bedtime, not unusual. But she asked for yours and buckys story (so cute and funny omg - 2.7k) @byhuenii
! • ‘my angel of life’ - Bucky tries to get your daughter to say 'mama' for the first time. (awwww - 3.3k+) @mcrdvcks
! • ‘electric touch (part 1)’, ‘be my, be my baby (part 2)’ - You technically aren't a member of the New Avengers, but you live at the Watchtower and help the team out during missions. The most interesting part? Bucky seems to have a crush on you, the quiet, brooding, mysterious woman. & Now that the team knows you and Bucky are married, they learn very quickly about your strange marriage. (i fkn love this holy shit - 20k+) @mcrdvcks
• ‘ours to keep’ - 4-part found-baby trope fic series. Full summary in each of the parts. (oh my god this was so beautiful, so excited for the future parts! 24k+) @knowledgeableknitter
! • ‘it’s just labor’ - You begin experiencing early labor while Bucky unravels in a mix of panic and protectiveness. Your quiet strength and composure grounds him, and he returns the favor, grounding you when you need it. Once your child is born, Bucky holds the baby, overwhelmed with love. After the birth, you take a quiet moment for yourself while Bucky stands in absolute awe of you. (3.6k) @knowledgeableknitter
! • ‘when days blend to one (part 1)’, (part 2) - What started as a fake relationship to survive a wedding quickly spirals into something far more complicated. It was supposed to be simple: pretend smiles, playful banter, one weekend of acting like they were in love. But between long drives, one hotel room with only one bed, and stolen glances that linger too long, the lines blur faster than either of them expected. Soft touches, lingering stares, and kisses that don’t feel like pretending at all—suddenly, it’s harder to tell what’s real and what isn’t. (eek! can’t wait for p2 13.5k) @byhuenii
• ‘slow burn’ - bucky’s still finding his footing in the new avengers—getting into a relationship is the last thing he has time for. it’s a good thing that you’re alright with a slow burn. (9.6k) @myladybelle
! • ‘solitary love’ - being a single mom wasn’t exactly one of your top three life goals, but shit happens. now all you want is to do the best you can for your son, which consists of working 24/6 and spending the rest of your free time with him. that leaves little room for anything else these days, especially going on a date with your beloved regular from work. (series - 8.6k+) @juniebjonesin
! • ‘blurred lines’ - When choosing a female agent to send back in time to gain young Sergeant Barnes's trust, everyone's in agreement that it should be Sharon. Until Bucky, the man that you barely get along with, speaks up and lets everyone know that it could only be you. (loved this fic for ages and forgot to add it to this list smh - 43.2k) @ellemj
• ‘against the rules’ - Bucky's trying to fuck you senseless so you'll have to sleep over. Isn't that how a friends with benefits situation is supposed to work? (smut - 18+ only - 2k). @ellemj
! • ‘bucky recs 1’, ‘bucky recs 2’, ‘bucky recs 3’ (lots of great fic recs from some amazing writers!) @rosierecs13
*! • ‘a love letter to stone’ - You were Bucky Barnes’ fiancée, a love left unfinished by war, spending decades at his grave, never moving on. But when Bucky finally comes home—broken, free, too late—you’re already gone. (the angst oh my.. - 7.7k) @cheekybarnes
*! • ‘grade-a pain in my ass’ - Bucky Barnes is a single dad who doesn’t do love. He’s got everything he needs: a steady job, cozy home, and his whole life wrapped up in one little girl, his daughter Rebecca. No complications, and absolutely no room for romance. After a rude and not-so-pleasant first encounter, he finds out you're the elementary school teacher of Rebecca's class. He would make it his mission to avoid you at all costs and to absolutely not fall in love with you. How could he? Especially since you're a grade-A pain in his ass. (masterlist - 64.2k) @superbassbuck
*! • ‘the scientist’ - brooklyn, 1937. bucky barnes is nineteen, cocky, and absolutely doomed the second he lays eyes on you. the girl with the mean stare and the pretty eyes. too bad you want nothing to do with him. (oh my god one of my favourite fics ever 😭 - 8.4k) @danysdaughter
*! • ‘the woman you are’ - Sam sets Bucky up with you, a human ray of sunshine. (this is the sweetest thing ever omg, more please! seriously check out this amazing creator if you haven’t already! - 6.2k) @aquaticmercy
*! • ‘shotgun’ - a marriage born out of premarital sex with a man you thought you loved, has since spun into something barely worth holding onto ten years later. if it wasn't for your son, you and bucky wouldn't be living under the same roof, but somehow, you find your way back to each other. (married!au - oh my gos i loved this 😭 - 7.7k) @kittyminion
*! • ‘the quiet side of thunder’ - When a visit to his office leaves you shaken, Bucky becomes determined to take care of you. (this is one of my foat 💞 - 4.4k)
RAFE:
! • ‘daily cycle’ - (with countryboy!Rafe x citygirl!Reader - i absolutely adore this writers work) @calypso-rt
! • ‘dilf!rafe and milf!reader’ - dilf!rafe possessiveness - @rafesteddy
! • ‘baking hour’ - When Rafe stumbles downstairs still tangled in sleep and mischief, he finds her exactly where he likes her best — barefoot in his kitchen, wearing too little and humming to herself like she owns the place. She’s trying to bake brownies; he’s trying to get under her skin (and her apron). Between stolen kisses, crude jokes, and a mess of chocolate batter, they bicker and banter their way through a morning that’s half domestic bliss, half delicious chaos. He’s impossible, infuriating, and never keeps his hands where they belong — but she wouldn’t have him any other way. (suggestive, domestic fluff yippee!!) - @palevcr
! • ‘whipped before breakfast’ - (req) just a slow morning between Drew and reader. Maybe reader wakes up first and starts kissing his chest/back or whatever and admires him until he wakes up. plus a lil more fluff :) (0.7k) - @sc3ptre
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warnings: enemies/rivals to lovers, fwb, slowburn(?) smut, dirty talk, pussy pronouns if you squint, more plot than porn, suggestive themes, reader is sort of ambiguous, also SHIELD is still active but they're good again bc i said so??? this is NOT proofread, i did the outline a few days ago and i just sat down and locked in all day today to get this written on time.
author's note: can you believe this…? the final chapter of devil is here. when i posted the first chapter in august, i had no idea if anyone would even read it. i thought i’d maybe get a couple of likes on the post, and that would be it. and here we are, nine months later. thank you to anyone who’s been reading since day one, and anyone who’s picked it up along the way and binge read what’s up so far. thank you for your patience as i’ve gone back and forth editing and posting things in between. i rewrote the last chapter because i wanted it to be a special send off. the original final chapter was about 5k words, and it was so lackluster, it made me sad. it was not the ending i wanted for these two. i would say this is still not very grand, but it’s an ending that feels right. this is undoubtedly the most fun i’ve ever had with a writing project—the way they were always under each other’s skin has always been so delightful to write. please enjoy, and thank you for reading. <3
part eight
With the newfound discovery of those three little words actually meaning something real to Bucky, he began to test the waters. It still felt foreign, alien, like he’d learned a new language, or perhaps found himself remembering one he’d long since thought he’d forgot. Bucky had love in his life, sure. Steve, Sam, this whole network of people he’d fallen in with that consistently stayed in his life, checked in with him, listened to him. It was as close to the past as he could get, in some ways.
But this love, this romantic love, this want to be with you all the time, the satisfaction of making you smile, of seeing your expression change just slightly when you caught sight of him… It was a love altogether more strange. Bucky knew with a certainty that he’d been a lady’s man once upon a time. Dinners, dancing, you name it, he’d done it, apparently. But there was no one woman he could recall—not any women, really—that had made him feel the way you did. It was something he’d asked Steve months ago, when he’d felt more comfortable asking for clues to his makeup as the Bucky Barnes he was today. But even Steve had shrugged and said, “To be honest, Buck, I never really knew what your goal was. If you were looking for a wife, or… just a bit of fun.”
It was something to ponder. Because Bucky didn’t think he knew how to be a boyfriend. The word felt way too juvenile for someone who’d passed the centennial of his birth. In fact, he couldn’t imagine either of you saying it. Felt people would think he was joking if he ever introduced himself that way.
But he was getting ahead of himself anyway. You clearly weren’t ready to say the words. He was surprised that he was at all. But the only way you’d be leaving the team would be through death. There was no danger of abandonment aside from that, and each of you walked along that tightrope every day. And a small part of Bucky really didn’t think that he’d be able yo scare you off too much. Maybe to pull back, maybe to fight with him, maybe to give him the cold shoulder, but something he’d learned over months and months of being around you was that you would always come back eventually.
Bucky tried to be careful and precise when he started to drop the words between you like offerings. He was alarmed with the lack of alarm he felt when he would murmur, “I love you,” into your skin when you were too far gone from an orgasm. He had expected resistance within himself, an abject fear that regardless of his inner reckoning that he did in fact, love you, something in him would want to snatch the words back, to bury them somewhere that no X marks the spot map would be able to find.
But it was scarily easy. When you slept together, you would stay the night, though not every time. And he would always wake up when you’d quietly slide out of bed, thinking him asleep still. On those nights, when you’d been utterly exhausted by pleasure, it was easy to wrangle you into his arms, to smooth your hair back against the pillow, and to whisper it to you as you were falling asleep.
You hadn’t seemed to catch on quite yet. He was unsure if the words were melting into your skin and bones when they left him, diluting into your bloodstream, or if you were deliberately reshaping them in your head. Not ‘I love you’ but ‘I love this’, ‘I love how you look right now, ‘I love the sound you just made’. Either way, Bucky wanted you to get attuned to it, to recognize it as easily as you would the taste of vanilla over chocolate, the smell of citrus over earth.
Selfishly, it was a little bit of a self-test, too. He was testing the waters. He wanted to make sure he meant it. He doubted he would ever be the type of guy to do a sweeping declaration, given the first time had been a complete mistake, like he’d walked into the wrong room. But he believed that he did. That somehow along the way, he’d become capable of it.
As for you? Bucky didn’t want to brag, had no one to brag to, but he was fairly certain that by this point you did like him for more than just sex. But you were just as stubbornly closed off as him, most of the time. He remembered when you’d bottled your emotions up, punching at that bag until he’d told you to stop, until he’d folded you in his arms and you’d cried over the loss of your friend, the other agent. You hadn’t wanted to break then. Hadn’t wanted anyone to see. And he doubted you would now. Matters of the heart, to you, were a territory he and anyone else were banned from. But maybe with time…
And Bucky got it, to an extent. He’d been wiped clean every time he’d shown some sort of emotions, something other than standard compliance that had been drilled into him by HYDRA. He understood that emotion felt dangerous and like it could be used against you at your weakest moments. But still, he felt good about it. It was freeing, actually, to be able to acknowledge what he felt, and not have to face any repercussions about it. It was what made him feel so bold. He was confident that with time, he would get you to the same point. But he would just be the open one for the both of you until then.
The next time he was with you, you were flat on your back on your bed, which had no less than four different throw blankets on it (his had a lonely gray comforter and nothing else). Your legs were wrapped around him like a vice. He kept touching your breasts, licking into your mouth. “Hate you.” you gasped between thrusts.
“I could never hate you.” He said against your neck, right into your skin.
He didn’t know if you heard him. He kept at it, giving in to the rhythmic glide of you. Right before you were about to come, he pulled his head back so he was looking you in the eye. He was about to do something brave. Or stupid. “You know that, right? You could never make me hate you. Ever. Not really. Not in a way that would change things.” He was tender, something he never was in the past, something he felt he always was now, when he tucked your hair back from your face.
You blinked up at him, wide-eyed, caught between pleasure and confusion, your lips parted, breath catching in your throat. For a heartbeat you looked almost uncertain—unguarded, the walls down, the game forgotten. Your fingers flexed against his back, holding him close as your thighs trembled around his hips.
“Barnes—” you whispered, but whatever words you were going to say scattered when he thrust in again, slower this time, rolling his hips, letting you feel every inch. He held your gaze, thumb stroking your cheek, his other hand splayed wide over your ribs.
He kissed you, and the heat of your usual fury was replaced with something aching and raw. “You piss me off every day,” he murmured against your lips, “but I don’t care.” He could feel your pulse jump beneath his palm, see the way your eyes went glossy, your teeth worrying your bottom lip.
You let out a shaky laugh, not mocking, just stunned. “You’re such an idiot,” you said, but your voice broke halfway through, all vulnerability and no bite.
“Yeah, maybe,” he agreed, grinning crookedly, thrusting deeper, holding you tighter, “but I think that I’m your idiot.”
You squeezed your legs around him, arching up to meet him, your head thrown back as a moan tore out of you. He fucked you slow, savouring every sound, every shiver, the way your hands slid up into his hair, holding on like you were afraid he might disappear. You gasped, nails raking down his back, and he could feel you getting close again, your body trembling under his, every muscle straining toward release.
“Say it again,” you whispered, voice barely more than a breath. “Tell me.”
He brushed his mouth over your cheek, your eyelids, the tip of your nose, then hovered just above your lips. “I don’t hate you, angel. I couldn’t. I—” His voice caught, and he hesitated for just a second. Not because he was afraid of the words, but he was afraid of letting you see the truth, naked and ugly and perfect, when you were still so coherent. “I love you.”
You whimpered, body clenching, your orgasm crashing through you, dragging him right over the edge alongside you, a pair of cliff divers seeking the ocean floor. He groaned your name into your mouth and saw sparks behind his eyelids when he closed them, his body locked to yours, every inch of him imprinted on your skin.
For a long time, neither of you moved, tangled together in the mess of your blankets, sweat cooling, breaths slowly syncing. Bucky brushed his knuckles along your jaw, letting himself just look at you—flushed, spent, beautiful and untouchable to anyone else, but his, somehow, for now.
You ran your fingers through his hair, eyes searching, hesitant, but soft. You looked like you wanted to say something, like you were searching through your arsenal for the right weapon, but instead, your tongue darted between your lips to wet them, and you stayed staring at him, mystified.
He smiled, his thumb tracing your lower lip. He settled beside you, pulling out at the same time he pulled you close. You were always softer, much more unguarded, after sex. It just depended on how long it took for you to be firing on all cylinders again. For now, you burrowed into his arms, your own loose on his waist. You could have just this, for a little while. And Bucky would take it all, if it meant you stayed for a little longer.
It was getting harder to fight against the current of ‘casual’. Bucky wanted nothing more than to hold your hand, to kiss you when he walked past you in the hallway, or to put his arm around you when you were with the others in some shared laugh. But he had to refrain from it, for you. He could imagine your hissed, “What are you doing?”, could almost feel the sting of you slapping his hands away, your head darting left and right to check that no one had seen the obvious PDA.
Bucky thought he could handle any of the teasing that would inevitably come from the team, from the prying eyes and the dozens of questions. But he thought you would shrink away, get defensive, when you should be able to puff out your chest proudly, and not take shit from anyone. That was usually your way, at least. But the scrutiny of a choice you might make to let him into your heart wasn’t something that you’d be so quick to face, he believed. If you’d managed to hide even the most basic of details from Wanda and Natasha, there was no way in hell that you’d be willing to offer up any knowledge to the group at large, and certainly not about your deepest feelings.
That was okay. Bucky would wait. He felt like he was playing one of those claw machine games. People were often unlucky, either getting the wrong toy from it, or missing completely, and getting nothing at all. Well, he’d put all of his coins in, and the prize was you, and he would very carefully manoeuver that claw until he was completely sure he could grab you. He wasn’t going to miss.
An area that you were still wildly confident in was work. The only emotional decision you had to make was if you were able to pick your own team, and who was going to be on it. Most of the time, it was assignment, but others, when the choice was in your hands… With vague, faint surprise, you had started to pick Bucky first, and to assemble the rest of the team based on what the two of you would be doing. He remembered a time when he’d see your name on a mission objective list and scowl, bitching to Steve about it to no avail. And he also remembered, with perfect clarity, hearing you do the same. And poor Steve had been stuck in the middle, helpless to appease either one of you.
Sometimes, Bucky still didn’t want to work with you, but not because he didn’t want to be around you, not anymore. It was more out of concern. He knew you could handle yourself. That had never been a question, even if your methods tended to differ from his. But the fear of you being in the line of fire was real all the same. It was something he’d just have to live with, even if he didn’t like it. He tried not to let it get in the way of letting you do real work. He knew how much you hated to be benched.
Your teamwork had begun to become more seamless. He’d still fight you on choices you made, but it was less to provoke and more to make sure that every single avenue had been explored, that there would be no surprises that you had neglected to consider. If you were alone, he’d lean close, speak the words slow, soft, to show you that he wasn’t questioning your idea, but rather to encourage you to be thorough. He didn’t know when it had happened, but somewhere along the way of sneaking into empty rooms to steal time with you, he’d begun to trust you in a way that meant if you told him to walk into fire, he would do it, because you undoubtedly had a good reason for it.
It was unfamiliar. An absence that had formed, no hackles raised, no shouting and pointing of fingers. Well, there was always a little of that from you, along with your nail poking him firmly in the chest, but now he’d just give you a lopsided grin and put his big hand over yours rather than glare icy daggers at you. But the vacuum wasn’t bad. Bucky knew that you’d throw down with him immediately if he provoked you. That, at least, hadn’t changed. But he wanted to see how far he could go without pushing your buttons over semantics. If you could exist together without it, or if it would become boring without the bickering.
The Amazon. More specifically, the smaller bit of it that crossed into Peru. That was where you were on this evening. The safehouse wasn’t really a safehouse. It was a shack. It didn’t even have a bathroom. It was humid, the loud sounds of the rainforest all around. There had been no sight of toucans or macaws, the bright colours of their beaks and feathers, but they certainly made themselves known, calling to each other through the thick foliage. Beetles the size of golf balls had scuttled along as you and Bucky had trudged through the undergrowth. A dragonfly so large it made a loud thud against Bucky’s arm when it made contact was actually not the worst thing he’d seen today. Every vine that he’d stepped over on the poorly maintained path had potential to be a snake instead. The gun he’d held over his torso had been more for apex predators than human enemies. Jaguars were known to roam around here.
The bed, when you’d both fallen into it, exhausted, was little more than a rickety pallet. Your hair had long since begun to frizz with the humidity. Bucky remembered how it had looked 42 hours ago, slicked back and tidy. Your suit was sticking to your skin, and so was Bucky’s. He wished he didn’t have to be so clad in leather. His sweat had been rolling from his skin down his metal arm.
It was a fairly standard item retrieval request, but he couldn’t help wondering if someone else could have done the job this time. They’d only sent in the two of you, but with enough firepower to take down a decent amount of opposition, of which intel had told you there would be plenty. Supposedly, a covert base had been carved into the forest of the Amazon. Bucky couldn’t imagine much more than a series of treehouses strung together by bridges that would coast through the forest, but he wasn’t sure. Any drones that had been sent had been shot down. So you didn’t really have the element of surprise.
Neither of you were all that bothered, though. You were laying together on the pallet. It was night, the rainforest black as pitch, the nocturnal creatures skittering through the underbrush. Bucky could hear every move they made. If this had been a year ago, he would not have been laying beside you. There would have been a fight that probably would have left him bleeding and you fuming, and the pallet blown to smithereens, with the pair of you sullenly sleeping curled against opposite walls. Now, though, you were in a light sleep beside him, and all he had to do was touch his fingers to your hip for you to mumble, “mmm…?” and roll towards him.
The roof had holes in it. If it had been raining, pools of water would have gathered around you. There were no holes directly above him, though, as he stared up at the wooden ceiling. But he could still picture the vast midnight blue of the sky. The perfect, round diamond moon. The smaller, scattered rhinestones of stars. Despite the heat, you tucked yourself against him. Bucky shifted his arm only to drape it around you. He’d take the heat, both of the forest and of you, your hair brushing against his jaw, and what he was sure was a spider the size of a hamster in the corner of the shack. He’d take it all. Despite his exhaustion, he stayed awake, basking in your warmth, listening to your breaths, and marvelling at how easy it had been to get you to curl into him.
The roll of the jeep’s tires on the earth wasn’t exactly silent, but it was fairly well disguised by the other sounds. The rattle of a snake’s tail. The chatter of small, leaping monkeys. The sloth Bucky slowly drove past turned its head with patience and stared. It had a passive, pleasant smile on its face as it hung from a branch. You were hooked over the side of the doorless car, your gun smacking lightly against the roof with every bump Bucky crawled over. He wanted to tug you back into the seat by looping an arm around your knee, but he knew you wouldn’t be balancing so precariously like that for no reason.
It had taken some time, some wrong turns, and a horrifying moment where you’d both encountered a python as thick as Bucky, but he’d been able to ease the jeep down a narrow path eventually. He’d gotten only a little bit of whiplash from some low hanging branches. By all accounts, you should be on the site soon. It was why you were hanging outside the car like you were. Your head was on a swivel. You had no idea how close you were, and neither of you wanted to find out by getting riddled with holes. Just as Bucky thought it, though, there was the telltale ping, ping, ping! of gunshots against the metal of the trunk. Pi—the sound stopped. You’d taken out that shooter.
But then, right as the next chorus of gunfire rang out, the trees seemed to open up, impossibly, and a ramshackle base of operations greeted you both. And so did about a dozen men, rifles of staggering size much more obvious than they needed to be. It seemed that the element of surprise was out.
Bucky jerked the jeep sharply to the side and you both dove from it, using its body as a shield. Bucky was very lucky that you’d given him such a thorough pat down before leaving. It had only been to see what other surprising places you could sneak extra bullets into. Your own suit didn’t have quite so many pockets as his. There was no telling how many men were waiting in the wings after the first wave, but Bucky had always been a perfect shot, and you weren’t so bad yourself.
You were firing with twin pistols. Bucky had his rifle, and then a pistol like yours strapped to his back. He stuck with the rifle. It was grim satisfaction that flooded his veins, coupled with adrenaline, that kept his aim true. It was times like this that he was also somewhat grateful for the metal arm. The men here seemed to only have primitive weaponry at best—no high tech gear that SHIELD and your other compatriots had. No fear of his arm being disabled. It meant that he could have it in the line of fire without worry.
You darted into the trees at some point, leaving him at the car. He didn’t move until you’d both mowed down half of the men, before he stood and started his bold descent. It had been with a bit more luck that you’d both stopped near the top of a slope. The men were like fish in a barrel, some ten feet down. One by one, they went down, with Bucky taking glancing blows. Maybe the leather and additional bulletproof padding wasn’t so bad, despite the fact that he felt like an oiled pig underneath.
By the end of it when you reconvened, you were out of breath, bent at the waist, hands on your thighs. You had smudges of dirt on your chin and cheeks from a barrel roll—that had been your showy exit from the car. Hair was plastered to your temples. A hot, steady drizzle of rain had begun near the end, slicking Bucky’s armour. He felt it dripping down the back of his jacket. If he wasn’t careful on the drive back to the safehouse, and then the subsequent one to the extraction point, you would both be in danger of getting stranded. He could tell already, with the way the ground sucked at his boots with every step, that the paths would become muddy and impossible to navigate without slow consideration.
Bucky checked over you without touching you, scanning only with his eyes. “You okay?”
You were less winded, but no less exhilarated, confirming with a nod of your head. “Are you?”
He twisted his left arm out, and you both looked at the slight dents in the vibranium. It was nothing some careful maintenance couldn’t fix, and really, the bullets had mostly pinged off. It was only when he’d gotten closer than he should have that any surface damage had been taken.
You both split then, intent on your search and recovery. He could hear the occasional shot, which he guessed was you clearing out any surprise henchmen, and he did the same. There were, in fact, some treehouses littering the canopy above. But mostly it was a series of decently crafted bungalows. He had a feeling more had been done underground than he could really see. The rainforest had stayed loud around the clearing. He supposed whatever wildlife lived here had gotten used to the human subjects dwelling in this spot. Your comms stayed mostly quiet, between you. There wasn’t much to report yet. Once you’d cleared your side, you murmured down the line about checking in on the SAT phone.
Bucky’s scan so far had brought up nothing. You regrouped in the middle, guzzling down water and rations, confiscating what had belonged to the men you’d taken out. Eventually, thinking maybe you would have to traverse underground, you came upon a slab of cement. It was out of place in the rainforest. It was also mostly hidden by four of the men you’d taken out. They’d been nestled there behind sandbags, a sort of outlook to try and keep intruders out. It was an interesting place, to say the least, for them to hide a safebox. Bucky pried it from the ground with some effort. You had searched the men and tucked the key you found on one of them under your suit. It might not be the key, but it didn’t hurt to grab it.
You scanned the safebox doubtfully with one of Stark’s fancy devices. It didn’t do much—the box was quite obviously lead-lined. But it was about the right size for what you’d been sent to retrieve. Only time would tell, when you’d brought it back, if it was indeed the right thing. Bucky looked at you then, flushed, sweaty, dirty. You’d been chewing your lip and the useless readout on the device after smacking it a few times against your palm, but you looked at him then, sensing his gaze. “Ready to move out?” He asked.
You nodded. “They’ll have to send us back with another team if this isn’t it. And we don’t have the support to go under… even though I bet they have all sorts of toys down there. Let’s go.”
But before you could turn to the jeep, Bucky placed his hand on your cheek and gave you a soft kiss. It was against protocol to do something so sentimental and stupid, but he’d wanted to in the moment, and so he did, and you’d accepted it without any hesitance.
As you stepped over bodies, he put an arm around your waist, the other holding the safebox, and you headed back to the car together.
After the success found among the lush forests of the Amazon, you were pulled apart again. You were never able to drift in each other’s orbits for too long, but every time you came back together, it felt better to Bucky than the previous one. He couldn’t believe he’d started to become so sentimental. He would see things when he was out and think of you. Down in the thumping heart of New York, passing boutiques and restaurants alike, a loose, flowy skirt on a mannequin, the exact same shade of blue as the dress you’d worn at that restaurant. Anything with angel wings or cherubic faces made him think of you at Halloween. Even scrolling past an. advertisement for the zoo on his phone, the animal in question being a flamingo, had him thinking about the dusty, barren road you’d been driving down in that horrible old car in search of a man you needed to bring back to SHIELD, the trailer park with the faded plastic birds strewn over the grass.
Bucky found that he didn’t mind. Because what was love, if not the memory of all the times you’d been together, times that meant something to him, and the promise of all the future times that would mean just as much, if not more? Bucky supposed he had done all of this backwards with you. He’d experienced a little of the traditional courting atmosphere in the 40s, still lingering around the edges from the turn of the century, but it had been cut short by war and a fate worse than death. He didn’t quite know how well a date would fly, if you’d laugh it off and invite other people to keep it casual, but he let the idea stay in the back of his mind anyway. Maybe one day.
Bucky hadn’t let himself focus completely on the way your eyes and your body seemed to inevitably soften instead of tense up when he was nearby. He tried to only pay attention to it post-sex. And you were still pretty good at locking away your emotions. It was a shame, really, that you still felt like you needed to guard your feelings. Bucky was ready to lay his across a table set for two, each one ready to be devoured under a silver dome. He hoped that you would be able to do the same, at some point.
Usually, Bucky weaseled his way out of charity events when possible. Everyone knew he wasn’t the conversation starter, or holder, for that matter. It was better to let him stay back at the Tower or put him on assignment. In fact, Steve had done so more than once, even under express directions to make sure Bucky was free for appearances.
This was one that neither soldier could keep Bucky out of. So there he was, with his hair slicked back, making him think of a younger, not quite so jaded version of himself. The suit fit but it still felt tight around his shoulders, though he didn’t know if it was more because of his discomfort in general rather than the jacket. And there you were, in a devastating dress. Floor length black silk that flowed like inky water. It hugged your body like a lover might, like Bucky wanted to. The back of it was entirely open, save for the string of pearls that hung down your spine. It was clearly the focal point. But Bucky didn’t care about the pearls.
You’d been wining and dining all the important people while he’d lurked in the corner, as was the usual fashion. You were good at this. You would cut in at just the right time, seamlessly replacing Wanda or Tony with your own presence when they were ready to move on. He could hear your light, tinkling laugh bouncing off the walls. Your eyes were bright, your smile a gleam.
He hadn’t gotten close to you the entire night, but that was by design. He thought that if he did, he’d get one whiff of your perfume and then he’d be resigned to following you around the rest of the night like a puppy on an invisible leash. But eventually, like fate had predicted, you approached his corner of the room. The string quartet on the raised platform had been playing all night, but now people were dancing in pairs. And so to, where you and Bucky, a few minutes later.
It was a rare time where you were both soft around the edges instead of rough. The room was warm, the lights yellow and dim, though not too much. Your lips were painted red, only just barely beginning to feather at the edges. Bucky could have smudged it across your face with a swipe of his thumb. Could imagine how gorgeous you’d look, tantalizing ruination. But he was too transfixed by every word that fell from your silken mouth. You were only talking about each of the figureheads you’d met with, keeping him apprised. You knew he never remembered much about them anyway.
Bucky’s flesh hand was on your bare back, under the line of pearls. They grazed against his knuckles as you swayed. He wondered, if he took his hand away, would he see an imprint of it, seared into your flesh like a brand? Your eyes were scanning the room as you talked, never settling on him for too long. It was a typical move for you, to know the room, to see how it changed, but he got the feeling that it was something else keeping you from making more than flickering eye contact. Your hand was clasped in his metal one like it belonged there, like they were a well-made pair. He moved that hand so that he could kiss your fingertips, quick and succinct, in such a manner that no one would see. Your eyes darted back to his then, framed by your lashes. He wondered if your heart skipped a beat at the action. It was too noisy for him to focus on it.
“Barnes, you’re looking at me like you’re gonna sneak me into one of the balconies and split me open. I know we’ve cut it close with the voyeurism a time or two, but that seems a bit much, don’t you think?” You were teasing, trying to lighten the mood, he thought.
He knew he wasn’t giving you just bedroom eyes. He knew that you knew there was something infinitely more deep in his stare tonight, and you didn’t want to face it. But you needed to get used to it some time. He didn’t see it changing anytime soon.
“No, I wouldn’t take you here. I’d want to take my time. I wouldn’t want to rush. I’d want to enjoy it. Enjoy you.” It was thoughtful. It wasn’t exactly a non-answer.
In reality, he wasn’t thinking about sex at all. He wanted to be alone with you, yes. He always did. But not to just get out any pent-up frustrations. You didn’t have anything to say to that. You just readjusted your hand on his shoulder, like you had no quick rebuttal. Spitfire reduced to quiet, uncertain embers. Bucky pulled you an inch closer, and admired the way the light from the chandelier coated your skin.
You were split up for a few weeks again, separate missions dragging each of you halfway around the world. Bucky held onto what he had as a memory. It was true what they said. Absence made the heart grow fonder.
He got back first, after a nice and easy data extraction a few states away. He’d fallen asleep on the couch in the early evening, and everyone had left him to it. The sun had cast over him in a slow crawl, painting his hair, his face, his shoulders gold, until it had gone to sleep too, sending the moon out as a sentinel. He was only woken up by a soft thud, followed by a harsh whisper that said, “ow, fuck!”
He blinked awake. It was black, the only light coming in slivers from the other skyscrapers outside. It was probably midnight, he’d slept so long. He sat up, looking over the back of the couch. He could just make out your silhouette in the light as you winced, holding your hand to your chest, next to the kitchen island ten feet away. “You’re back?” He said around a yawn, standing with a stretch.
The kitchen’s sensors came on when he moved close enough to the cabinet, the soft glow of the cupboard’s overhead lights illuminating the room just enough that he could see your features. You nodded, cradling your hand. “Yeah. I just hit my fucking hand on the corner of the island. Hurts like a bitch.” You shook your hand out, scrunching your nose up.
He followed the line of your hand to the island, to the box sitting on it. It was a pastry box with a clear plastic top. He frowned at the triangular shape, trying to parse it out. “Are those… scones?” He asked.
Your hesitation was an ocean, and Bucky felt a prickle on the back of his neck, like he was about to be swept into the tide. “...Yeah. Blueberry. They’re your favourite.” You said quietly.
You’d never done anything nice for him before, not like this. The box looked much more familiar, suddenly. The red squiggle outlining the plastic top confirmed that it was from Lazlo’s. That was halfway across the city. It was also Bucky’s favourite bakery. The name and ownership had changed a few times over, but it had been a bakery in the 40s, and it still was now. And the blueberry scones, as boring as they were, were his favourite. It was like you sensed it, the fact that he’d put this line of thinking together. Your voice got a little louder, a little higher, like if you spoke with enough defensiveness, enough determination, it would negate the thoughtful gesture. “It’s not—I didn’t—I didn’t think you’d still be awake. Or in here. I was just gonna… leave ‘em on the counter.”
“I’m so fucking in love with you.” He said simply.
You froze, your hand hovering in midair, the scone box halfway between you. For a second, your eyes went wide in the gentle kitchen light, your mouth parted as if you’d forgotten how to breathe. Then, almost as if you couldn’t help yourself, you laughed—a quick, soft, startled sound, shaky with nerves and relief and something warmer beneath.
You shoved the box toward him, as if it might shield you from the enormity of what he’d just said. “You’re so goddamn weird,” you whispered, but your voice trembled. “They’re just scones. Pepper does this kind of thing all the time.”
He took the box from you, setting it down gently on the island, and closed the distance between you, hands bracketing your hips. He saw the protest brewing—your mouth already opening, probably to scold or argue or deflect—but he cut you off, his voice quiet and certain, thick with sleep and honesty.
“I mean it,” he said, staring you down the way only he could, as if he could will you to believe it. “You don’t have to say it back. Hell, you can punch me for it if you want. But I love you.”
You just shook your head, swallowing, your tough shell slipping for once. “You’re an idiot.”
“I think we’ve established that already. The new information here is that you brought me scones from across town, in the middle of the night. They close at six.”
“I had a standing order. This is not a thing. I’d do it for anyone.”
Yes, maybe you would. But the fact was, you’d done it for him.
“You hate blueberry scones.”
“Whatever,” you said, rolling your eyes, but he saw you bite down on a smile, felt the way your hands hovered between you before settling on his chest, twisting at the fabric of his t-shirt. “Can’t believe you’re such a sap, Barnes,” you muttered. “All I wanted was to drop off some food and go to bed.”
He ducked his head, brushing his lips over your forehead, over your cheek, over the tip of your nose. “Consider the first half of your mission accomplished.”
You huffed, but your arms slid around his waist, anchoring yourself there. You didn’t say the words, but Bucky felt them in your actions. He’d take that as gospel. It was enough. He squeezed you tight, breathing you in, all the tension of weeks apart draining away in the feel of you pressed against him. He pulled back only to grab at one of your hands, the one you’d smashed into the counter’s nefarious corner. He kissed your knuckles, holding your hand to his mouth for longer than he needed to, before murmuring, “Let’s go to bed.”
And to his surprise, you let him lead you to his room, and under the blankets, without so much as a single protest.
Morning following the events of the previous night was a gorgeous, soft thing. Almost as gorgeous and soft as you. Bucky had woken up first, squinting at the sun. Everything looked a little blue, the light cast through his curtains giving everything a vague hue. His blanket was low on his waist. You were half curled over him, your leg hooked over his hips, your head and one of your hands pillowed on his chest, right by his heart. His fingers tangled in your hair.
The shift of him waking up was what brought you to the surface, and you snuggled against him all the more, like his flesh could keep the light from penetrating your vision. Your fingers curled into his shirt. You groaned, the heat of your breath a warm puff. “What time is it?”
Bucky didn’t care to reach for his phone. He considered the light again, the angle it seemed to sweep in from. “You could stand to sleep a little more.”
You nestled again, like you were seeking an entrance to a safe, hidden place. Like you could burrow into his ribs and come out the other side. “You need blackout curtains.” When you said this, you tilted your head, cheek brushing against him, to peer at him. You were frowning.
“I’ll put it on the list.”
“What else is on the list?”
“I don’t know. What else do you think I’m missing?”
You did a slow assessment of his room. “One blanket is not enough.”
His laugh was a steady rumble beneath you. “Okay. I’ll just take one of yours. You only have like, a million.”
“That’s a million and one, thank you very much.” You pressed down on his chest to push yourself up a bit more. Now your face hovered over his, your eyes filling his vision.
He only needed to tilt his head a little to capture your mouth in a slow kiss. “Good morning,” he murmured, though the time for pleasantries had sailed already.
You sank into him, and his arms came up around you. “Good morning,” you muttered back, nipping at his bottom lip.
The minutes melted together, a honey sweet blend, tinged blue. He took his time, and you didn’t seem to mind. It was a natural progression to you being astride him, hands braced against his sternum. You were doing all the work. Bucky was helpless to stop you. All he could do was run his palms up your thighs to your waist and back again. What he wouldn’t give to stay suspended in time with you. Nothing else mattered. Just you, your eyes glazed with pleasure, the warmth of your body, your nails piercing his skin. His shirt had landed on your pillow. Yours… Well, it was halfway across the room somewhere.
His hands travelled up again, trailing your spine. He pulled you flush to him, chest to chest. You weren’t close enough. You’d never be close enough. You could fuse together and still feel too far apart. You met him where he wanted you, the angle changing. It made you shudder. Or maybe it was him. He couldn’t tell. But each time your body moved, he kissed you. He whispered I love yous against your mouth and you sighed like each one was a separate caress. He could see your end coming in the reflection of your eyes, your lips parting on a gasp. “Let go, baby. Let go.”
And you did, with Bucky following suit. Like your allowance was his allowance too. That time, it was both of you shuddering, your mouth falling open, a sound stuck in your throat, Bucky muttering out a string of profanities against the side of your neck, one of his hands cupping the back of your head, pulling you as close as he could.
You drifted in liminal space for a time. Hate fucking had always been great. Of course it had. It was how Bucky had gotten to this place, after all. But this? What he got to experience now, without you flinching from his honesty, with you matching him beat for beat in your own way, with you draped lazily on top of him like a kitten in a sunbeam? This was what he was hoping for. He wished he could bottle the moment up. He wasn’t going to let you go.
Even after, when your eyes had refocused, when the sweat on your body had cooled, when your legs had stopped trembling on either side of his waist, he held on tighter to you each time you tried to slide away. He was keeping hold of whatever he could reach, his fingers on your ribs, your arm, your thigh. He trailed them across your skin lightly, a tickle more than a grasp, once you’d decided to stay put, all to hear your involuntary laugh. Your lips grazed his neck lazily. “Maybe I like you too, Barnes.”
It was perhaps as close to an admission of feelings as he could get from you. He waited until you looked up at him with a teasing smile, before saying with mock surprise, “Hold on. Let me get my phone. Can you say that into the camera?”
You both laughed. He wasn’t serious. He would have given his other arm to hear you say it a thousand times over, but he didn’t expect you to. But to his astonishment, you sat up, sitting on top of him like you had nowhere else to be, and plucked up his shirt before pulling it over your head, letting the hem pool over your thighs, before reaching over him to the nightstand to grab it.
With wild bed head, sleepy eyes, and a seductive smile, you turned the screen to you, and said into the recording, “You’re not the worst person in the world to spend all my time with,” you looked off-camera to him, then back to the phone, “I guess.”
The recording was cut off when he pulled you back down again, your giggles the last thing on tape.
There was a change now. The beginning of one, at least. When you and Bucky were alone together now, without others around, you seemed to more readily accept his affections. You didn’t always say anything—you didn’t even always react—but you accepted, leaning into touches without hesitation. He could touch your face and pull you into a kiss and you would comply. It was thrilling. However, that didn’t mean you’d simply turned into some sugarplum fairy, some sweet, delicate thing overnight.
No, you were still yourself, combative and grumpy at the best of times. Only now, there was no real heat to it. Working with you when you were in that state was never the most fun. Being stuck in a nondescript SUV for six hours on a stakeout with you was even less so.
You were both sitting in the front, obscured from the outside by the tinted windows, staring at a warehouse. You had been mostly silent the entire time, because your nerves were shot. Even when Bucky had tapped his thumb against the steering wheel, bored, you had sighed and asked him to stop.
Bucky was fairly certain he knew the reason for your mood. Despite the newfound affection between you both, something that was more than just taking your frustrations out on each other, you were still separated a lot of the time. The only downside to being in your bubble was now, selfishly, Bucky wanted all your time. He had grown used to it. So being apart was worse than it had once been, and he knew that you were feeling the effects of it, too. Even now, over the last week, when both of you had been grounded. That should have meant plenty of chances for alone time, of the sexual variety or not, but you’d both been go go go anyway. You’d been tied up in meetings, paired with Steve on something or other, and Bucky had been yanked in the other direction by Sam. Every time he thought you had a moment to steal away, somebody, whether it was a real person or FRIDAY, had something pop up that needed your undivided attention immediately. It was beginning to be a real cockblock.
Bucky had been watching you shift restlessly for about half of the stakeout, and he didn’t think it had anything to do with the mind-numbing task. You had been keeping notes on your tablet while you watched, tracking movement, anything suspicious, anything worth noting. When you hit hour seven, you sent off the update, shifting again in your seat. Yeah, sitting still for that long was no fun, either.
Your phone rang a minute later. “Hey. I think you guys are good to clear out for now, come on back. We’re going to analyze this information along with what we already had to form a plan to storm it.” Steve said on the phone.
You sighed heavily, glad to be done with the thankless job. It really could have been handled by rookies instead. “Got it. See you in a bit.”
You hung up then, turning to Bucky. “We’re clear. Let’s get the hell out of here.”
He patted your leg. You slapped his hand away with a glare. He gave you a tired, but amused look. “You’re really grouchy today.”
You crossed your arms. “No I’m not.”
He looked you up and down. “Baby, you just smacked me.”
You shifted again. “Don’t touch me right now unless you’re planning to take me in the backseat.”
Surprise passed his face before it split into a grin. He didn’t think you’d so readily admit to the problem. “Are you telling me you’ve been acting like this all day because you’re horny?”
You stared down at the gear shift. “...No.”
His cock twitched in his jeans. You were unfathomably cute when you got like this. “Get in the backseat.”
Your head snapped up. “I was kidding.”
“I’m not.” He said simply.
Your mouth parted, staring at him for a moment, before you were all but diving over the middle console and into the back.
Bucky didn’t waste a second. He followed you, heart pounding, already half-hard from the days of anticipation and interruption, the endless hours of watching you fidget and squirm in that seat beside him. You were still pretending to pout, arms crossed as you sank into the old, squeaky upholstery, but he saw the flash in your eyes, the tension in your jaw, the way you tracked his every move.
He crowded in close, knees braced on either side of your thighs, the car’s ceiling forcing you both to hunch together in the too-small space. His hands slid up under your jacket, over your ribs, and he pressed his mouth to your ear, voice rough, low. “You could’ve just told me, you know.”
You snorted, biting back a grin, your cheeks flushed with heat. “Yeah, right. Like you’d ever let me live it down.”
He grinned, nosing along your jaw, letting his breath fan over your skin, teasing. “Maybe not. But I’d make it worth your while.”
You shivered, the fight draining from you, hands fisting in the hem of his shirt as you pulled him in for a kiss—hot, hungry, all your frustrations at being apart laid plain. Bucky vaguely wondered if you were the possessive type. He groaned, sliding his hand down to cup your ass, dragging you up against him until you could feel exactly how badly he wanted you.
“You gonna stop being so grumpy after this?” he murmured, lips brushing yours.
You rolled your eyes, but your hips rolled too, searching for friction. “I hate you.”
He grinned, nipping at your bottom lip, already undoing your jeans, his fingers slipping under the waistband with practiced ease. He felt his muscles jolt at how wet you were. You really had been jonesing for it. “You just keep on saying that, baby.”
You arched into his touch, head thumping back against the seat, eyes fluttering closed. “Shut up, Barnes. Just—shut up and do me.”
He did, fast and frantic, clothes tangled around your knees, the old SUV rocking on its wheels. His mouth never left yours, swallowing every moan, every gasp, every curse. Your hands clawed at his back, his hair, anything you could reach, desperate to keep him close. He took great joy in the fact that your eyes seemed to keep rolling back with consistency. He knew he was hitting the spot.
When you came, it was with his name ripped raw from your throat, Bucky, I— flung around the car’s interior like a grenade. It was all you said. But he thought he could imagine the end of the statement. Your nails dug crescents into his back, your whole body clenching tight around him. He followed, biting down on your shoulder, groaning into your skin, spilling inside you as the world narrowed to the heat and pulse of you, the slick, perfect clutch of your body.
Afterward, you just lay there underneath him, not complaining at all about his weight over you. You finally sighed, satisfied. “I’m never waiting that long again.”
He kissed your forehead, laughing, feeling light as air. “I’m right there with you. But angel, next time you feel needy, just tell me. You know I’d be on my knees anytime, anywhere.” He paused then, before grinning down at you wickedly. “I think maybe being in the car just makes you wanna get your rocks off. Remember the first time?”
You punched his arm, but your hand was gentle. It was affection over violence. The windows were fogged up.
The conversation was admittedly a silly, lighthearted one. It was a rare moment of quiet in the kitchen. The subject matter? All the public places you still had yet to defile together. You were talking about where you’d still like to go. Bucky tapped his chin thoughtfully. “We haven’t done it outside yet, have we?”
“No. But we’ve had nice views. Remember Greece?”
“Of course I remember Greece. Remember that bathroom that one time?”
“I remember you feeling me up in the closet beforehand, yeah.”
He snorted. “Yeah, well, you can’t blame me. My balls were so incredibly blue.”
You laughed, before considering him. “What’s your favourite place been?”
There were so many. It should have been hard to pick. Each time you’d collided was memorable. But the answer came to Bucky as clear as day. “Your bed.” Your fingers tangled together. He’d already been holding your hand, but your fingers locked together all the tighter. You were both thinking of Halloween, he thought.
You, on the other hand, didn’t have an answer when he turned the question back to you. You claimed you couldn’t settle on just one. You smiled like you were trying to hold in a laugh as he needled you, poking at your side with his free hand. “Maybe my favourite time has yet to happen. Ever think of that?”
He pretended to be offended for the space of a second, only long enough for you to laugh, but then you sobered up, suddenly honest. “Each time becomes my favourite time. They overwrite each other. I can’t just pick. It’s too hard. You can’t have just one, not with someone you love.”
Bucky straightened, muscles locking, like a dog scenting a rabbit. You didn’t notice, distracted by sounds in the hallway. By the sound of it, it was a spirited argument between Sam and Steve, the topic of which being baseball. You turned back to him. “Anyway, should we go? I really don’t want to get stuck in the conversation of ‘Best Plays of All-Time’ again.”
Bucky agreed, following alone, keeping your admission a secret just for him, for now. But he kept holding your hand.
Just like the earth was destined to continue revolving around the sun, Bucky was destined to part ways with you. He was going. You were staying. He wasn’t supposed to be gone that long. He’d been on much longer, more complicated missions than this one. And so, it stood to reason that the goodbye between you would be short and sweet. He was leaving late at night, so there was no one to see him lingering in the doorway of your room when he came to say goodbye. All through the day, whenever he’d seen you, he’d gotten the distinct feeling that you kept almost reaching for him before thinking the better of it. He’d seen your hands hovering listlessly in front of you before dropping to your sides, or fidgeting with the zip of your sweater, rather than whatever they so clearly wanted to do.
He kissed you on the mouth, then on the forehead, before his departure. It felt good to know that he had something to come back to—someone. Someone who drove him a little crazy sometimes, but someone that dragged him to her room and laid on him for hours on end, nonetheless. Earlier that morning, you had stripped him of his t-shirt and put it on. You were wearing it now, having claimed it as a pajama shirt for the night. He saw you turn your head and breathe into the collar, even though he was still there, still in the flesh right before you. But he had a warm feeling that you were going to sleep with it on every night until he came back. “There’re more shirts, you know.”
You glanced up at him, like you had forgotten he was there during that intake of breath. “Hm?”
“There’re more shirts. You can just go into my room and take one. If you want.”
“But I like this one.”
It was light gray, a little stretched at the collar. It threatened to hang off one of your shoulders. It was just a shirt. He had a dozen more like it. “Why do you like that one?”
You paused. Your fingers toyed with the hem. He saw something in your eyes, like you were debating whether to lie or not. “You um, you were wearing it the time you, uh… The time you threw all my coffee cream out.” Then your mouth closed in a firm line, unwilling to say more.
The time he’d…?
Oh.
When he’d riled you up, then had his way with you. But more importantly, when he’d accidentally spit out those three little words that had since become as normal to him as the change of season or the expectation of sunrise and sunset. It took everything in him not to throw you back onto the bed right now, to mutter the words into your skin, to breathe them into your mouth right now. Instead, he kissed your forehead again, his hand on the back of your neck. “I’ll see you in a few days,” he said, unable to keep the warmth from his voice.
It was routine, or it was supposed to be. He’d been gone for a few days, just like he’d said, but on the tail end of it, he’d accepted another. It was in the same general area, off the coast of France rather than in the city like he had been. He was largely at sea for this one. The ship was disguised as an oil tanker. The team he was with blended in with real workers seamlessly. The base he needed to infiltrate was somewhere well below sea level. Bucky didn’t love the idea of descending my submarine, the idea of the enclosed space with millions of tons of water above his head, but he’d done worse.
Communications were short, but he was grateful to even have them.
As the mission wrapped, he was nursing a headache and a pretty decent slash on his forearm, a crude set of stitches keeping it closed. But the first thing he did, upon being told they were setting course back to land, was call you. You answered despite the time. He knew it was coming on two in the morning for you. “I’ll see you in maybe twelve hours,” he said, after filling you in on the basic details, leaving out the injury. “Did you pick up any assignments?”
“No. Well—yes, but it’s not starting for a few days. Apparently it’s taking awhile for them to build me a decent profile.” He could imagine your shrug. “Undercover, Morocco. I’m looking at a three week operation.”
His lip curled in distaste at the confirmation that you’d be apart, yet again. He didn’t know how Tony and Pepper could stand it. He understood now why Stark always did his best to go behind Pepper’s back and try to get her to come along to things that were supposed to be less dangerous. An agent hovered in his periphery with a tablet, a questioning look on her face. His eyes flicked up, and he gave a small nod, waiting until she was out of earshot to respond to you. “Well I’ll see you soon. I plan to use up all your downtime before then. Consider this your only warning.”
You laughed. He’d missed the sound. “Okay, heard.”
“I love you.”
“I love you, too.”
The shock was palpable, like a string connecting you both from worlds away. He was stunned that you’d said it. You were stunned that you’d said it. You abruptly hung up, nothing but dead air left on Bucky’s side of the phone. It wasn’t when he’d expected you to say it, not at all. And judging by your hasty mobile exit, it hadn’t been your expectation, either.
The migraine melted away on the ocean waves, replaced by a buzz of impatience.
The knocking was insistent, loud, and unapologetic. Bucky was exhausted. He knew he probably looked like shit. But he’d crossed all the t’s, dotted all the i’s, and strode down the hall to your room as quickly as he could. He’d dumped his bag in the hallway next to your door, not so much as wanting to pause at his own room. He couldn’t. What a waste of time it would be. He switched to knocking with his metal hand, hearing the plates in his arm flexing. He heard the softness of your footsteps a few seconds before the click of the knob, and then the door was opening, you hesitantly peering at him from the other side.
Before you could even say a word, your mouth half-open to speak, probably to deflect and deny and make another scone-based excuse, Bucky’s arms were around you, his hands flying up and down your ribs like twin hummingbirds in search of nectar. He crushed you in a kiss. “God, I missed you,” he didn’t even know if his words were coherent enough for you to understand, unwilling as he was to stop. “I love you, I love you.” He couldn’t decide if he wanted to say the words to you, to tattoo them into your brain, or to show you with his body more.
Your own hands fluttered at his jaw, a staccato beat of your fingertips against stubble. “I love you, too. I love you, too.”
It made his ears ring. He finally got to hear it, straight from you, in person. There was no worry stitched between the words, only perfect clarity. How did he get here? How did he go from not understanding what everyone else liked about you, from thinking if he only saw the back of you, if he never got stuck in conversation with you again, he could breathe easy, to feeling like he actually couldn’t breathe unless you were right there beside him? It was a complete mystery. But maybe it was one he didn’t need to solve.
He walked you backwards, kicking the door closed behind him. His bag was forgotten outside. “Say it again.”
You reared back then, peering up at him. “Ugh, do I have to? I feel like I just said it so much. You’re gonna think I’m a softie if I keep saying it.”
His laugh was a rich, warm thing. Like a blanket over your shoulders. “Come on. We have a 10 to 1 ratio. I think I should get to hear it at least a few more times, spitfire. It’s only fair.”
“For the record, I wasn’t planning to say it. Before. On the phone. Tech records our calls sometimes, you know.”
“They record them every time.”
You groaned. “Great. Now they know I have stupid feelings for you.”
He pressed his lips to your cheekbone. “Yeah, well, I said it on the phone too. So I guess we’re in the same boat.” Then he poked you in the ribs. “Now say it. Or do I have to resort to more seductive means to hear it again?”
You half shrugged. “I mean… Probably wouldn’t hurt.”
He shook his head, sighing loudly. “The things I do for you…” He hooked his arms under your legs and lifted, until your ankles crossed at his back.
You smiled. “I love when you decide to be all business.”
He leaned you back on the bed, hovering over you. “Me going down on you is considered business?”
“Well, I think so. You certainly work for it like you have to close a deal.”
He pinched your waist and you yelped, before pressing an open mouthed kiss to your neck. “You’re killin’ me, angel. Say it, for the love of God.”
You twisted your fingers through his hair. “Fine, you devil. I love you. I suppose.”
But you couldn’t keep a straight face, beaming at the way he nuzzled against your throat before looking at you again. “I love you, too. You better get real used to saying it. I expect nothing less. I’m a words of affirmation type of guy.”
It was bullshit, and you both knew it, but you pulled him down to you again. “I’ll take it under advisement. But enough talking, I’m tired of waiting. Undress me already. I might have missed you, but she missed you more.” You wriggled beneath him for emphasis.
“‘Course she did. She loves me, too.” He teased, hands coasting down your body.
“Against all odds, yeah.”
Against all odds. That was really what it came down to, between you. Against all odds, you’d wormed your way into each other’s orbits, and now, stubbornly, you were both there to stay. And Bucky wouldn’t have it any other way.
I’m so sorry this took so long oml I wa STRUGGLING with that fisheye lens. Never again lmaooo but it was fun for my first try. I recognise some of the prompts from you fics 👀👀 love them btw!!!!
summary: 10 things you hate love about frank langdon
pairing: fem!reader x frank langdon
warnings/tags: abby and kids do not exist in this universe, enemies to lovers!!, frank is a bit of a dick in this (but in a hot way), mention and description of a patient death and the events of pittfest, mysoginistic interns!, reader gets black out drunk in this, swearing, fluff, angst, usual medical descriptions that you’d expect from the pitt!
notes: i love the concept of this fic sm, I haven't written enemies to lovers in a hot minute
likes, reblogs, comments are very much appreciated!
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Enjoy my work? Tip me! 🤍
one.
Frank Langdon was arrogant.
Every doctor and surgeon had a little bit of an ego, sure. It was practically a job requirement.
But Frank Langdon had somehow mastered the ability of getting under your skin in a way no one else did, possessing a particular kind of arrogance that crawled in and nested there.
The kind that smirked at you across lecture halls.
The kind that leaned too close over your shoulder during labs.
The kind that always, somehow, knew exactly which buttons to press.
It had started in med school.
You’d been paired together for a semester-long assignment during your second year, a fact that had nearly made you consider dropping out on principle alone.
"I graduated summa cum laude, you know."
Frank said it casually, leaning back in his chair like the statement was an objective fact rather than an insufferable introduction.
"That's nice."
You didn’t look up from your textbook spread across the library table between you. Highlighting and neatly scribbled notes littered the pages in organised colour-coded sections. Frank’s side of the table, meanwhile, looked like a tornado had swept through it.
His brow furrowed slightly.
"Oh yeah? What were you, valedictorian or something?" He drawled.
"Actually yes." You answered smoothly, flicking over the page. "I just don't feel the need to announce it to anyone that will listen."
He blinked, staring at you for a moment before he let out a low whistle.
"Geez, alright Ace."
You finally glanced up at him at that, irritation pulling at your brow.
"Don't call me that."
The words left your mouth before you could stop them.
And judging by the way his lips twitched, Frank knew instantly he’d struck gold.
The nickname stuck.
It followed you through the rest of med school like a disease. Across lecture halls and internships and far too many crowded house parties.
Sometimes it was murmured under his breath when you answered a question before everyone else. Sometimes it was tossed across a room with an infuriating grin. Sometimes, rarely, it softened into something almost fond when the two of you were the last ones left in the library the night before an exam.
And like the nickname, you couldn’t seem to shake Frank Langdon either.
You thought graduation would finally free you from him.
And for a short, glorious period of time, it did.
Until the two of you matched at PTMC. Both in the emergency department.
"Long time no see Ace."
You looked up from the chart in your hands and felt genuine despair shoot through you.
"You have to be fucking kidding me."
Frank’s grin widened immediately, blue eyes bright with something dangerously close to delight.
You felt like you were right back at med school, the two of you instantly competing over everything. In particular, the attention of Dr Robby, who seemed to have decided that one of you could be his favourite, he just annoyingly refused to pick who.
And as your residency dragged on, Frank Langdon's arrogance never waned. He never got a humbling that you so desperately hoped for.
If anything, it only got worse.
Because -
two.
Frank Langdon was good.
Like, really good.
The kind of good that made senior attendings pause to watch him work. The kind that made nurses trust him instinctively during traumas. The kind that made you grit your teeth every time he pulled off something impressive with that smug look still plastered across his face.
Which only made his arrogance more unbearable.
Because the asshole actually had the skill to back it up.
"Did you hear about Langdon's intubation today?"
You barely glanced up from your chart as Samira fell into step beside you.
"No, but I'm sure he'll find a way to tell everyone himself before the end of the shift."
Samira ignored the jab entirely, completely unphased due to the volume of them she'd heard over the years.
"There was so much swelling you literally couldn't see anything."
You paused, your pen stilling against the chart. "So what, you're saying he did it blind?"
"Completely." Samira nodded. "Robby said he did it perfectly too."
A reluctant pulse of admiration twisted in your chest before you shoved it back down where it belonged with a small huff.
"Nice."
The word came out clipped.
You dropped the chart onto the counter and headed toward the break room before Samira could catch the grimace on your face.
Hour ten of your shift was always when the headaches started.
Like clockwork, tension coiled up the back of your neck and settled at the base of your skull. The fluorescent lighting suddenly became too bright. The overlapping conversations too loud.
You shut the break room door behind you with a quiet exhale and reached for the medicine cabinet.
The door opened again just as your fingers closed around the Advil.
"You hear about my intubation today Ace?"
You rolled your eyes automatically before even turning around as you shut the medicine cabinet.
“I did.”
You grabbed a mug from the cupboard, acutely aware of his gaze following you across the small room.
“Nice work.”
The words were stiff, rolled unnaturally off your tongue, said with an attempt at forced casualness which instead resembled something pained.
Frank blinked.
Then slowly, his mouth curved into a grin.
“Wow.”
You finally looked over at him at that.
He was leaning against the doorway with his arms folded across his chest, scrubs stretched tight over his forearms, a smirk present on his face.
“Was that a compliment I just heard? Are you feeling ok?”
This time you rolled your eyes openly as you threw the Advil down your throat.
“I’m mature enough to acknowledge when a peer does something impressive, Langdon.”
His brows lifted slightly. “A peer? Is that all I am to you after all these years?"
He placed a hand over his heart. “You wound me.”
Your eyes narrowed. “Describing you as a peer is my way of being nice.”
You could see that a laugh was threatening to spill from his lips.
You turned toward the sink before your own expression betray you. You rinsed the mug beneath lukewarm water, missing the way his eyes tracked down your figure.
“Or maybe you just don’t want to admit that you’re jealous I practically performed a miracle.”
You let out a humourless laugh.
“Don’t worry, I perform miracles too.”
You set the mug down harder than necessary before glancing back at him.
“I just don't feel the need to announce it to anyone that will listen."
You saw his jaw tick slightly, indicating that you’d finally penetrated his thick ego shield.
“You’re a real ball of sunshine today Ace.”
You smiled sarcastically. “Only for you Langdon.”
three.
Frank Langdon loved to rest his arms on things.
Whether it was one arm leant lazily against the nursing station, both folded across his chest when he was thinking, or both braced on either side of your monitor as he loomed over you while you dictated.
His arms were always….there.
It was irritating and more importantly, it was distracting.
Like right now, as a team of you prepped a trauma patient for transport to the OR.
Frank stood on the other side of the gurney, his gloved hands curled around the metal rails as he leant forward. His forearms flexed as he adjusted his grip, the veins there straining, just visible in the harsh fluorescent lighting.
Your gaze lingered, traitorous and immediate, tracking the movement of his hands as he tightened his hold on the bed frame. Your eyes ghosted upwards at the shift of muscle beneath fabric, his biceps straining slightly with the motion.
A flurry of images hit you.
His arms around your waist.
His arms flexed as he held his weight above you, steady and controlled, while he-
“Think she’ll make it?”
His voice cut through your thoughts cleanly.
You blinked, snapping your head up too fast.
He was already looking at you, with that infuriating, calm focus fixed directly on your face like you were the only thing in the room that required dissecting.
His tongue brushed briefly over his lower lip. A habit you first observed in med school and had never successfully un-noticed since.
You despised how your body reacted to it.
You turned away too quickly, hiding your burning face under the guise of discarding your gloves into the bin.
“50/50.” You answered, praying your voice was even as you spoke.
You shook your head slightly as you tried to shake yourself out of whatever this was.
You could not find Frank Langdon attractive.
That was not an option. Not a consideration. Not a thing your brain was allowed to do.
You wanted to slap yourself.
“I’m thinking more 70/30.” You heard him remark.
And just like that, mercifully, the fantasy collapsed.
four.
Sometimes, it felt like Frank Langdon could read your mind.
“Incoming trauma, two minutes out.” Dana announced in the middle of the pitt, red phone pressed to her ear. “MVA involving a single car and a motorcycle. The rider’s in a bad way.”
“What’s free?” Robby asked.
“Trauma one.”
You glanced up at Robby as he called out your last name.
“-and Langdon, with me.”
Frank didn’t answer - he was already following you.
You were already scrubbing in as the ambulance bay doors burst open. The gurney rattled violently over the polished floors.
“What have we got?” Robby asked.
“Rider unhelmeted. Found unconscious on scene. Hypotensive en route, tachycardic. GCS eight.” The paramedic answered as they wheeled the patient into the bay.
The room shifted and swelled around you - fluorescent lights too bright, the hum of equipment, the controlled chaos snapping into place like muscle memory.
“C-spine?” Robby asked.
“Immobilised.”
The patient was a young man. Early twenties. Dirt and road rash smeared across his face and chest, chest rising unevenly beneath cut fabric and exposed skin.
“Alright, transfer in three, two-“
Everyone moved together, sliding the patient onto the bed in one practiced motion.
“Airway appears patent but compromised.”
You leaned forward, placing your stethoscope on his chest.
“Reduced breathing sounds on the left.”
Frank was already there on the opposite side, his hands steady as he moved his fingers across the rib cage.
“Subcutaneous emphysema.” He said. “Likely pneumothorax.”
“Pulse-ox is dropping.” Perlah announced. “Eighty-eight and falling.”
“Alright get ready to intubate.” Robby ordered.
“Wait.”
The word left your mouth before you could second-guess it.
Every head turned slightly.
You leaned closer, eyes moving over the monitor, then the uneven rise of his chest, the subtle shift in breathing effort.
“He’s compensating.” You said. “This isn’t primary airway failure yet. If we intubate now without addressing the thoracic injury he'll drop further.”
“Ace is right.” Langdon agreed. “We should do needle decompression first.”
“Left second intercostal space, midclavicular line.” You added. “If it’s tension physiology, that’s what’s driving the instability.”
Everyone turned to Robby, waiting for his call.
The smallest of nods, the slightest flicker of approval.
“You heard them.”
You moved instantly, prepping the site, antiseptic swab snapping across skin, fingers precise as you located the rib landmarks through trauma and swelling.
Frank held the patient steady as the needle went in.
The hiss came instantly.
The patient’s chest expanded easier this time.
“Stats stabilising.” Perlah confirmed.
“Better.” Frank observed.
You exhaled through your nose, already shifting focus. “We still need definitive imaging. He’s not out of the woods, we’re likely dealing with associated haemothorax or pulmonary contusion.”
“Agreed.”
Frank didn’t look at you when he said it.
But somehow, the two of you were entirely in sync anyway.
“Chest tube tray.” Robby ordered. “Let’s move.”
The rest of the procedure blurred into controlled motion - scalpel, incision, blunt dissection, the familiar gravity that settled over a trauma room when everyone locked into the same rhythm.
And through all of it, Frank moved instep with you.
When you moved, he made space like it was instinct. When you reached for instruments, they were already halfway to your hand. When you spoke, he didn’t interrupt - he simply factored your words into the next step.
It was infuriating how seamless it felt, dangerous how easy it was.
“Tube’s in.” Frank said finally.
“Bilateral breath sounds confirmed.” You spoke.
A beat.
Then Robby stepped back, stripping his gloves off.
“Good call both of you.”
You looked up as he pushed open the swinging doors.
“You aren’t staying?”
He gestured between you and Frank.
“I know when I’m not needed.”
Your eyes met Frank’s briefly.
A smile flickered between you before either of you could stop it.
-
The ambulance bay was quieter than the pitt, but not by much. The afternoon sun glared off the cracked bitumen, the distant echo of monitors still lingered in your ears like a phantom rhythm.
You rolled your shoulders back, trying to shake off the adrenaline that always persistently lingered after a trauma.
“Good work in there.”
You glanced out of the corner of your eye to see Robby.
“Thanks.”
Silence stretched between the two of you.
His gaze shifted between you and the doors leading back inside.
“You know.” He said slowly after a moment. “You and Langdon work well together.”
You scoffed lightly. “When we’re not at each others throats, you mean.”
Robby’s eyes twinkled with amusement, dipping his chin down to conceal it. “Yes, that’s exactly what I mean.”
You exhaled, leaning back against the brick wall.
“Yeah." You admitted. "We do.”
It came out quieter than you intended.
You knew immediately that Robby noticed.
“But if you ever tell him I said that, I’ll deny it completely.”
Robby’s mouth twitched.
“Noted.”
“And, I’ll tell everyone about the time I caught you nearly in tears over a cockroach in the break room.”
Robby turned to you. “It had wings.” He said flatly.
"You still screamed like a little girl.”
five.
Frank Langdon could be thoughtful, when he wanted to be.
It was never loud. Never performative. It didn’t announce itself the way everything else about him did. No smug commentary, no pointed remarks, no expectation of recognition.
It was quieter than that, easy to miss if you weren’t paying attention.
You saw it in fragments over time, tucked into the spaces between the chaos.
The way his voice would soften when he spoke to patients. Or the way he’d comfort them when he thought no one else was listening.
You’d seen him pay for taxi fares out of his own pocket. You’d seen him quietly remove hospital cafeteria food from a patient's tray and replace it with sandwiches from the deli over the road.
None of it fit easily with the version of Frank Langdon that lived in your head.
And that was the problem.
Because the longer you worked with him, the more difficult it became to keep those versions separate.
You were on hour nine of a shift.
School holidays had transformed the ER into something louder, hotter, more chaotic than usual. The kind of chaos that didn’t spike cleanly, but accumulated in layers until the entire department felt stretched too thin.
The air carried a constant noise of beeping monitors, overlapping voices, crying kids, the scrape of gurney wheels against linoleum.
Like usual, your shoulders had started to tighten without permission, creeping up to your ears no matter how many times you tried to square them.
A slow, familiar clamp at the base of your neck. The kind that crept upward until it turned into something debilitating behind your eyes.
You half-heartedly tried to do your physio exercises in the breakroom before eventually giving up and opening the fridge instead, reaching automatically in for the Red Bull you knew was stashed behind someone’s abandoned lunch bag.
You paused.
A ziplock bag sat neatly on top of your lunchbox.
A plain glazed donut stared back at you through the plastic, alongside two Advil.
You stared at it.
You’d heard that upstairs had sent their usual trolley of unethical donuts down earlier. You’d been drowning in back to back traumas, only resurfacing long after all of the plain glazed, your favourite, were gone.
Or so you'd thought.
You looked over your shoulder. Was this meant for you? Surely not. Someone must have just accidentally chucked it on top of your lunchbox.
Your stomach grumbled.
Although, it looked intentionally placed. Maybe you could eat it and if the owner came asking for it later you could just-
You turned slightly at the sound of your name to see Perlah standing in the doorway.
“Robby’s looking for you.”
You hesitated only briefly before placing the bag back into the fridge, all thoughts of the donut dissolving as you heard the trauma code ring out over the loud speaker.
An hour later, the headache had settled in fully.
You leaned against the desk, elbows planted either side of the computer as pain pulsed behind your eyes. The words on the screen blurred at the edges.
You blinked rapidly, rubbing at your temples as you tried to massage some of the thrumming away.
“You need to take your Advil earlier.”
The voice came from above you.
You looked up to see Langdon towering over you.
“What?”
He slid something towards you.
The donut and Advil now sat on a napkin, a cup of water beside it.
"Your shoulders always start tightening around hour nine." He said. "Which means the headache peaks around now because you never take the Advil early enough."
You stared at him for a moment, then your eyes flickered down to the napkin.
"What's the donut for?"
His mouth twitched, almost imperceptibly.
"Increased blood sugar helps stabilise headaches." He answered smoothly. "And you haven't eaten lunch today."
You surveyed the donut suspiciously.
“Jesus Christ I haven’t poisoned it.” He huffed as he nudged it closer to you.
“Eat.”
You hesitated for a moment.
"...Fine." You relented as you pulled it in front of your keyboard.
"...thank you."
His eyes lifted sharply at that.
"Don't thank me. This is entirely for my own benefit."
You frowned.
"When you've got a headache you're somehow even more annoying than usual."
Your eyes narrowed immediately.
"You're welcome."
He was already stepping away before you could respond.
You stared down at the donut for a second longer, your stomach tightening hopefully at the smell of sugar.
What you didn’t see was Frank lingering at the end of the corridor just long enough to make sure you actually took the Advil.
Just long enough to watch you finally take a bite, observing the small act of compliance like it mattered more than it should.
You didn’t know that he’d had to almost physically fight Donnie for the last plain glazed donut because he knew they were your favourite.
You didn't know that he'd been buying the double strength Advil and sneaking it into the medicine cabinet for the last six months because he'd noticed your headaches getting worse.
What you did know, was that it was irritating when he did shit like this without explanation.
Because it reminded you that there was more under all of the bolstering and ego. Something softer, something complex.
Something that made you want to peel him apart layer by layer just to understand what lived underneath.
Even when you absolutely shouldn’t.
six.
You couldn’t escape Frank Langdon’s eyes.
It wasn’t just that he looked at you often, it was the timing of it. You would glance up from a chart, be mid-sentence in a handover, reach for a new pair of gloves, and there he would be. Already looking. Already watching.
Those piercing blue irises never seemed to settle on you for long, but they always found you again. It was infuriatingly precise. Like some internal compass had been set to your presence without your permission.
“Are you going to knock off drinks tonight?”
The voice pulled you back into the present. You blinked, realising you’d been staring blankly at your tablet for long enough that the screen had dimmed.
Holland was leaning against the edge of your desk, casual in a way that was unique to interns, half confident, half desperate for approval.
“Oh uh, I don’t know. Maybe.” You said half heartedly.
“Oh c’mon doc, it’ll be fun.” Holland’s grin widened as he studied you, searching for a crack in your resistance. “Especially if you’re there.”
You huffed a small laugh.
“Nice try Holland, but this one here likes to be in bed by 9pm.” McKay smirked as she walked behind you.
Your brow furrowed. “What’s wrong with that?“
“Nothing, if you’re like 80.” Holland shot back, making you roll your eyes.
“I do go out.”
McKay let out a snort that was entirely unconvinced. “Sure you do.”
You straightened slightly, feigning offence. “I just like to keep my work and personal life seperate, so I can avoid doing things like oh I don't know..." You trailed off, pretending to ponder.
"Falling off a table in front of my coworkers in the middle of a drunken rendition of Mamma Mia?" You suggested, raising a brow pointedly at McKay.
McKay flipped you off cheerfully without even slowing down.
Holland, undeterred, was still hovering like a persistent shadow over your desk.
“So… is that a yes?”
“You interns are nothing if not persistent.” You grumbled.
“I prefer passionate.”
You studied him for a moment.
“If you leave me alone to let me finish my charting, I’ll consider it.”
“I’m taking that as a yes.” Holland grinned, tapping the table once triumphantly, like the matter was closed. “See you tonight doc.”
You exhaled through your nose in reluctant amusement as he finally backed away.
Only then did you look up properly.
And, like you always seemed to do, your eyes met Langdon's from across the room.
Something unreadable flickered across his face - too fast to catch, too controlled to decode. It vanished before you could even decide whether you had imagined it.
-
Later, you found yourself alone with him in the trauma bay.
You were halfway through de-scrubbing when his voice cut through the sterile hum.
“Didn’t realise you had a thing for interns.” Langdon remarked as he yanked off his gloves, the latex snapping softly against his wrist.
You glanced over at him as you united your gown.
“Huh?”
“Holland.” He clarified, like it should have been obvious.
You frowned. “What about him?”
“He was flirting with you.”
You scoffed immediately. “No he wasn’t.”
Langdon stopped mid-movement, staring at you like he couldn’t believe what he was hearing.
“There’s no way you’re that oblivious.” He said flatly.
Your brow knitted. “I’m not oblivious.”
“You are if you don’t notice the way he looks at you.”
You tilted your head slightly. “How does he look at me?”
“Like-“ Langdon cut himself off. His jaw tightened once before he looked away.
“Never mind.” He muttered, scrunching his gloves into a ball and lobbing it into the trashcan with practiced aim.
“Well if he’s flirting with me, maybe I can wrangle a free drink out of him.” You said lightly.
Frank stilled. Not dramatically, but enough for you to notice the tension settling across his shoulders. The brief curl of his fingers before he forced them open again.
You weren’t sure what reaction you were expecting, but it certainly wasn’t the one you got.
When he looked back at you, his expression had hardened slightly around the edges.
“So you’re going tonight?”
You lifted one shoulder in a half-shrug. “I might.”
He shook his head slightly.
“What?”
“Nothing.”
He pushed open the glass doors, holding it open for you to pass through first. “Just thought I’d be free of you in a few hours.”
Your eyes narrowed as you stepped past him.
“Don’t worry." You shot back, "I’ll make sure to sit at the opposite end of the table.”
-
The bar the pitt crew frequented was already too crowded for your liking by the time you arrived.
It was loud in a way that pressed against your skin. The kind of place where conversation blurred into overlapping noise and every surface felt slightly sticky.
You’d been nursing a wine for the better part of an hour, perched on the edge of the booth, perfectly content listening to everyone else talk.
"I'll be back." You murmured to Samira beside you, sliding your unfinished glass toward her.
"Don't get lost." She teased.
You threaded your way through the crowd toward the bathroom, shoulders brushing strangers, the air growing hotter the further you moved from your group.
“I can’t believe she’s here.”
“Who?”
You froze when you heard the sound of your last name.
It wasn’t spoken loudly, but it cut through the noise anyway.
“I know, Holland actually managed to convince her.”
You slowed instinctively.
A cluster of interns stood near the bar, half-leaning into each other, already loosened by alcohol and confidence. All oblivious to the fact you were only a few feet away.
“It wasn’t hard, just had to smile at her and call her doc.”
A few of them laughed.
“She definitely has cat lady energy."
"In all fairness." Someone else said. "She is hot. Just way too fucking uptight."
"Seriously." Another voice added. “You can tell she’s never relaxed a day in her life."
The laughter swelled again.
The words landed like barbs in your chest.
The air felt suddenly too thin, too sharp. Your fingers curled instinctively around nothing.
“Holland, honestly, do everyone a favour and take care of her tonight so maybe she chills the fuck out next shift-"
You turned before you could hear the rest, not sure if you'd be able to bear hearing more.
Heat burned behind your eyes as you pushed through the crowd, swallowing the emotion down so aggressively it turned sharp inside your chest. You rerouted, diverting your course to the bathroom back to your table.
There were plenty of other doctors at PTMC who had sacrificed their social lives for this job. Robby and Langdon were self professed life long bachelors because of their obsession with work. But the difference was, they were men.
By the time you reached the booth again, anger had replaced humiliation almost entirely.
As you approached your table, Samira glanced up at you.
"Hey, you ok?" She asked.
"Never better." You answered smoothly, sliding back into the booth as you let the anger spark into something different.
You gestured to the bar.
"Want to get wasted?"
-
What neither you or the interns had realised was that Frank had been standing further down the bar waiting to order. And he had heard every word.
"Hey."
The interns turned.
Frank stood there holding two untouched beers, expression unreadable.
“Maybe be careful of how you talk about your seniors.” Frank said, too calmly for it to be genuine.
Holland, who’d already had one too many, snorted.
“Come on man, you of all people know what she’s like.”
Frank’s jaw ticked.
“I know that she’s a brilliant doctor who deserves your respect."
"Respect?" Holland laughed. "We all see the way you talk to her." Holland continued, the alcohol flowing through his veins hindering his ability to realise that he was walking into a death trap.
Frank stepped forward just enough that the space between them shifted.
"Don't ever try and conflate your working relationship with what her and I have." He spoke evenly, his voice lowering just enough.
A hush descended over the interns.
"And from now on I suggest you watch your fucking mouth." He continued, his eyes moving from Holland to flit over the group. "Because if I hear any of you breath another bad word about her, I'll personally ensure that none of you make it through this internship."
No one dared to speak or move.
"Are we clear?”
Holland swallowed. “Crystal.”
-
You had never been one to hold your alcohol well, and tonight was no exception.
Three shots and four drinks in and your vision was blurring at the edges. You and Samira had managed to convince Dana and a few of the other nurses to join in, the group of you giggling and slurring like a bunch of underage teenagers.
And still, every so often, despite the bodies and the noise and the light, Frank's eyes would find yours.
You had no idea what time it was when you stumbled out of the bar.
The night air hit your face like relief and exhaustion all at once. You dropped onto a bench without fully deciding to, legs slightly unsteady, head tipping back toward the night sky. The music from the bar seeped out into the quiet street, carried by the faint breeze.
You could hear foot steps approaching.
You didn't need to look to know who it was.
"How's your night going?"
You blinked slowly up at him.
"Was going great until about two seconds ago."
Frank studied you carefully. "How much have you had to drink?"
"You tell me." You squinted.
His eyes narrowed slightly, but he sat beside you anyway, close enough that you could feel the warmth that radiated off his body.
"I'll answer for you." You continued, hiccupping as you folded your arms over your chest. "Not enough."
"You should have some water."
You let out a fake a gasp. "Is Frank Langdon worried about me?"
Despite himself, a small smile tugged at his mouth. "Worried about dealing with you hungover tomorrow? Definitely."
That pulled a laugh out of you. "Don't worry." You said as you leant back. "I've got the next two days off so you'll get a break from me."
He didn't answer you as you looked back up at the sky, your eyes settling on the full moon hanging above the two of you.
Instead, he watched you for a moment longer than necessary, like he was trying to place something unspoken.
"Do you think I'm uptight?" You blurted out.
Frank's brows jerked upward.
"Is that a trick question?"
The teasing disappeared immediately when he saw your expression shift.
"Maybe I should just go adopt some cats and embrace it." You mumbled, barely audible as you hugged your arms around yourself.
"Hey." He said, making you look up at him.
"So what if you're uptight?" Frank asked. "It means you care. Means you don't half-ass things."
A pause.
"Because uptight implies...I don't know.." You let out a small sigh as you glanced down at your hands. "That I'm boring or annoying, or both."
"You're definitely not boring." He said immediately.
"But yes." He added after a beat. "You are definitely annoying."
That loosened a real laugh from you this time.
Frank watched it happen carefully, something softer flickering across his face.
"But I like that about you." He added quietly, almost like he hadn't meant to say it out loud.
You shot him an incredulous look. "Sure you do."
"I do." He insisted.
"Uh huh." Your lips pursed in amusement. "Don't pretend like you wouldn't give me a personality transplant if you could."
"I wouldn't." This time he sounded firmer, too focused on proving you wrong to realise that he was giving away too much.
"I wouldn't change anything about you." He repeated, his eyes locking onto yours.
"I like you. Just as you are."
The words hung between you for a moment.
You stared at him as your body suddenly completely still.
And then the espresso martinis and tequila shots reminded you that they were still swirling around in your stomach, causing a wave of nausea to rip through you.
The colour drained from your face as the alcohol, the heat, the exhaustion - everything surged through you at once.
Frank noticed it instantly.
"Come on, let's get you home."
-
The walk up to your apartment was a blur of stairs, half-coherent instructions, and Frank’s hand steadying you at your elbow whenever you swayed too far.
By the time he guided you inside, you were well beyond the point of being able to remember anything.
Too drunk to notice the way Frank's eyes trained on the interior of your apartment, gaze lingering on family photos, books, decorations, anything that provided him a glimpse of who you were outside of work.
He got you into bed, moving around your space with a familiarity that made it feel like he'd been here a hundred times before.
You watched as he placed a glass of water and a packet of painkillers on your bedside table.
Then he paused.
Your pink bedspread was patterned with tiny cherries.
A smile tugged unexpectedly at his mouth.
"Try not to vomit all over your fancy bedspread." He remarked.
You looked up at him blearily.
There was something dangerously fond in his voice now.
You watched him hover for a moment, like he was trying to convince himself to leave.
"Thank you."
A smile, small and private, broke through.
"Don't mention it Ace."
He turned to leave when your hand caught his forearm lightly.
He stopped immediately.
"Hey." You whispered.
"What's wrong?" He asked, already shifting back toward you instinctively.
You studied him for a long moment, as if something about his face had changed shape in the quiet. Frank suddenly became aware that your hand was still on his arm.
"Your eyes have a little green in them."
Frank froze.
The words had been spoken so softly he almost thought he imagined them.
He swallowed, glancing down at the floor as he tried to reconcile the emotions flooding his nervous system, tried to formulate a response.
But when he looked at you again, you were already gone - head tilted slightly, lashes fluttered close, breath even, asleep mid-thought.
He stayed there for a moment longer than he should have.
Then he left quietly, closing the door behind him like he was afraid to disturb whatever had just changed between the two of you.
seven.
Frank Langdon could make you laugh like no one else could.
It wasn’t just the words he said. Like everything else, it was the timing of them.
The way he seemed to sense the exact moment your thoughts started tipping somewhere too heavy and quietly redirected them before you could sink too far into yourself, like he refused to let it stay there too long.
Ever since that night out at the bar, things had shifted between the two of you.
Not dramatically. Not in any way anyone else would have been able to point at and name.
But there had been a change in the space between interactions. Less friction. Less sharpness for the sake of it. The edges of your usual back-and-forth softened into something that almost resembled ease - like both of you had, without discussion, agreed to stop pressing on eachother’s bruises.
You couldn’t remember much from that night. Couldn't even remember how you'd gotten home. You only had fragments to analyse - warmth, noise, Frank’s voice close enough to feel like it belonged somewhere under your skin.
"I like you. Just as you are."
That part, unfortunately, you remembered perfectly.
The words had settled somewhere deep and stubborn inside you, resurfacing at the worst possible moments. Mid-shift. Mid-sentence. In the brief seconds before sleep when your brain stopped pretending it wasn’t still at work.
And now, weeks later, you were still carrying them around like something you hadn’t figured out how to put down.
The unspoken truce between you and Frank held anyway.
Sharper jabs were replaced with quieter ones, almost always softened with half-hearted eye rolls and almost-smiles neither of you acknowledged.
If anyone else noticed it, they didn't say it out loud, careful not to disrupt whatever delicate peace treaty had been formed.
You’d been having a good shift, until hour eleven.
Your patient, a young woman with a soft, girlish face that made her look even younger. She’d come in complaining of vague chest discomfort with a documented history of anxiety. No other significant past medical history. Stable vitals on arrival.
She'd been sweet, telling you all about how she had finally worked up the courage to book flights to Italy for the summer.
Then she crashed.
Chest compressions were already underway when you arrived, the rhythm of them loud and brutal in the confined space. Someone was bagging her. Someone else was calling out time intervals.
"Epi’s in." Jesse confirmed.
You were already moving, hands automatically checking rhythm on the monitor, eyes scanning for anything reversible.
Nothing.
Still PEA.
"Again." You said, voice steady in a way you didn’t feel as you swapped in for compressions.
The bedframe rattled faintly beneath the force of it.
Time stretched in that strange, distorted way it always did during arrest, both too fast and painfully slow at once.
You all paused again, stepping away to look at the monitor for another rhythm check.
"Call it."
Robby's voice cut through the room.
"We can still try-" You began.
"You've been going for twenty minutes." Robby voice stayed calm, firm. "Call it."
The room shifted like it always did when a resuscitation failed. That invisible collective acknowledgment that the line had been reached.
You reluctantly moved your hands away from the patients chest, your gaze lingering on her glassy eyes that would never blink again.
You felt your chest tighten.
You glanced down at your watch. "Time of death, 5:17pm."
Your voice remained clinical despite the way your throat had started closing around the words.
Silence settled over the room.
The monitors still beeped softly in the background, almost offensively alive compared to everything else.
"Does she have next of kin listed?"
Robby glanced down at your hands that had started to tremor slightly. Something soft flickered across his face.
"I'll do it."
You shook your head before he even finished the sentence.
"No." Your voice tightened slightly. "She was my patient. I can do it."
A pause.
Robby studied you for a second longer than necessary, then nodded once.
"Ok."
The room began to reset around you, people stepping back, lowering their voices, the clinical transition from emergency to aftermath already beginning.
But your hands wouldn’t stop trembling.
-
The wind up on the roof of PTMC was colder than expected. Sharp against your skin, grounding in a way that almost hurt.
You sat curled against the wall with your knees tucked to your chest, staring at your shaking hands.
“Heard you had a rough one.”
You turned your head.
Frank was standing a few steps away, hands tucked into his pockets.
“She was only 19.” You murmured, shaking your head. “I just had to tell her parents that their daughter isn’t coming home.”
You turned your head away as he sat down beside you, wiping at your face quickly before he could fully register it.
“I’m sorry.”
"I should have checked for a PE risk or a structural issue or-"
"She presented exactly like most young patients with anxiety do. None of us would have done anything differently." Frank interrupted gently.
You inhaled sharply. "But if I'd just-"
"Ace."
Your nickname, said like that, cut through the spiral before it could finish building.
You looked at him.
His gaze dropped briefly to your hands.
Then, slower, like he was deciding rather than acting, he reached forward and wrapped his hands around yours.
"This wasn't your fault."
The contact grounded you in a way that felt unfair.
The warmth of him grounded you instantly in a way that felt deeply unfair.
You swallowed hard and nodded once.
"I don't know how Robby and Dana are still here." You admitted quietly. "How they just keep... showing up."
Frank raised a brow. "Have you met them? They're both completely unhinged."
Despite yourself, a small sound escaped you - half laugh, half broken exhale.
"I didn't realise unhinged was an official medical diagnosis."
"It is according to me.” He nodded solemnly. “Right alongside basketcase and whacko."
That got another laugh out of you, sharper this time. More real.
He tilted his head slightly, watching you like he was checking whether it had actually worked.
"There we go." He said quietly.
You looked down then.
His hands were still around yours.
"I’m scared to know what you'd diagnose me with." You said after a moment, voice steadier now.
A corner of his mouth lifted slightly.
"You're your own medical condition entirely." He answered. Pausing as he tried to think of the best way to describe it.
"Ace-itis."
That made you laugh again, properly this time, breath catching slightly at the end, the heaviness in your chest loosening just enough for you to breathe deeper.
Frank watched it happen like it mattered more than it should.
When the laughter faded, the silence between you felt strangely easy.
After a moment, he shifted slightly but didn’t let go of your hands.
“You want to go get a drink or something?”
The question was casual, but it didn't feel like it.
You blinked at him once, processing it slowly through the fog of adrenaline and exhaustion.
A joke rose automatically to your tongue, something defensive, something sharp, but you swallowed it as you studied him.
“Only if the first rounds on you.”
He smiled faintly.
“After the day you’ve had, I’ll even get the second.”
eight.
Frank Langdon could also make you cry in a way no one else could.
Because when he turned on you, it felt like being shut out of something you hadn’t realised you were standing inside of, something that you suddenly didn't want to leave.
It was the day of Pittfest.
It was also the day for new interns and residents, which meant a whole slate of fresh faces trying too hard while the rest of the ER oscillated between mentorship and survival mode.
The halls were louder than usual. Too many voices overlapping, too many unfamiliar footsteps echoing off the linoleum floors.
And through all of it, there was Frank.
You noticed it within the first hour.
Something was off.
He moved like his body was running half a step ahead of everything - conversations, people, decisions. His voice came too quickly, clipped at the edges. His attention snapped between patients and staff with an intensity that didn’t feel controlled so much as driven. Like his nervous system had been turned up too high and forgotten how to come back down.
His pupils were slightly too wide under the fluorescent light, sweat gathered faintly at the back of his neck despite the air conditioning.
And worst of all - his arrogance, usually carefully calibrated, was unfiltered.
Loud.
You caught yourself watching him repeatedly throughout the shift.
Each time, you told yourself you were imagining it.
Then another hour passed.
Then another.
Eventually, you found yourself avoiding him entirely, because something about the way he looked today made you think of a system running too hot right before it failed.
You just hoped that whatever was going on with him would settle and he wouldn’t sweep up too many people in his chaos.
That hope lasted until you heard raised voices coming from trauma two.
You were already moving before you consciously decided to.
Even from the doorway, you could tell the atmosphere was off. A room holding its breath in the wrong place.
Frank was at the centre of it.
One of the new interns, Trinity, stood across from him, her body rigid, eyes wide. You had a brief thought that she resembled a frightened lamb.
Frank’s voice cut through everything.
“-stupid or arrogant, you need to realise that you are a beginner.” His voice was loud and unforgiving.
“Which means your job is to shut up, listen, and learn, because so far today the only thing you have been successful at is proving repeatedly that you know nothing.”
Trinity’s eyes widened slightly when she spotted you over his shoulder. You couldn’t decide if it was a silent plea or a warning.
Frank turned slightly at that movement.
For one brief second, his expression faltered when he saw you, like seeing you had been pulled back into himself.
Then immediately it hardened again, too fast to hold onto.
You swallowed, attempting to regain your composure as you glanced between them.
“Santos.” Your voice was level as you tilted your head towards the exit. “Dr McKay needs help in Room 4.”
Relief crossed Trinity’s face so quickly it was almost painful.
She nodded once, eyes darting between the two of you before escaping the room like she’d been given permission to breathe again.
The moment she left, the air changed again.
You turned back to Frank slowly, taking a few steps toward him so you were fully enveloped by the room.
He was still standing there, hands half-curled at his sides, like he’d been interrupted mid-impact and didn’t know what to do with the energy still in him.
“What the fuck was that?”
His eyes snapped to yours.
“What the fuck was what?”
His tone made you bristle.
“Don’t do that.” You said sharply. “Don’t stand there pretending you don’t know what you just did was completely out of line.”
“Have you worked with her yet?” He shot back, words tumbling out too fast. “She’s arrogant and-and completely incapable of-“
“It doesn’t matter.” You interrupted. “That is not how we talk to rookies. Actually, it’s not how we talk to anyone.”
Frank scoffed, sharp and humourless.
“Didn’t realise you were the tone police.”
The agitation radiating off him made you instinctively want to step back.
Your gaze sharpened.
“What is going on with you today?” You demanded. “You’re all twitchy and acting completely fucking manic-“
You stopped when you caught it.
Because you saw it properly now you were up close. His pupils were too dilated, not situational, not lighting, not stress.
Something else.
Something your brain immediately started assembling pieces around before you could stop it.
Sweats at his hairline, restless movement in his jaw, the uneven pacing of his breath.
And then the memory surfaced - uninvited, unwelcome.
Back pain from when he’d helped his parents move. Been too cheap to hire movers, he’d joked.
A prescription.
You remembered him mentioning it offhand weeks ago - something about weaning off them, something about not needing them anymore.
The realization hit so hard it almost made you feel sick.
You went still.
Frank noticed immediately.
Something defensive shifted across his posture like he’d followed your thoughts to their conclusion before you even spoke.
“Frank.” You said slowly.
Your voice softened involuntarily. Careful in a way that didn’t match the argument anymore. Weeks of quiet moments and softened edges bleeding into the argument without permission.
“Are you having withdrawals?”
There was a beat of silence.
Something flickered across his face.
Not denial first, not anger.
Something closer to pain, mixed with a semblance of something like surprise, maybe at the sound of his first name leaving your lips, or being caught, you weren’t certain.
And then it vanished.
“What?” He said, voice sharp enough to cut, “are you seriously trying to ask me if I’m a drug addict?”
“No, I-“ You started immediately, stepping forward again.
But he was already unraveling faster than you could catch.
“You’d love that, wouldn’t you?” Bitterness curled through every word now. “Get your competition shipped off to rehab so you can be the only golden child of the ER.”
Your breath caught painfully.
“That’s not fair.”
"Isn't it?" He studied you for a moment, his eyes intense and unblinking. "This place isyour whole life, it makes sense that you'd be dying to have Robby's attention all to yourself."
The words, slung like arrows, found their mark with deadly accuracy. They penetrated your thick skin, embedding themselves somewhere deep behind your rib cage.
Not because they were true, but because they were thrown like they were, like they were designed to hurt you.
Your throat tightened.
“I don’t know what has gotten into you.” You said quietly, voice shaking now despite your efforts. “But I seriously suggest you stop talking before you say something you can’t take back.”
For a moment something in him wavered. A crack.
Like he could suddenly see you again instead of whatever he was fighting.
Your bottom lip was quivering now.
For a second, he looked horrified by it.
And then his expression closed again, like a door slamming shut.
“Don’t worry.” He said flatly, void of any emotion as he stalked past you. “I was just leaving.”
You stood there frozen for a few seconds before the tears finally came, sliding down your face in hot, fat tracks.
Anger crashed through you almost instantly afterward.
Not just at Frank, but at yourself.
Because you hadn’t cried when you heard interns say horrible things about you, hadn’t cried when you’d lost a patient. You’d been on the brink, but never quite fallen off the ledge.
But somehow, Frank Langdon was the one to push you off it.
And that terrified you more than anything.
Because it meant you’d let him get under your skin in a way that you never thought he would. And now, you didn’t know if you could ever scrub yourself clean of him.
nine.
Frank Langdon left without saying goodbye.
You stood in the descrubbing bay long after your gloves had been peeled off and discarded, staring at nothing in particular. The curtain that separated you from the trauma bay still fluttered slightly, like the room itself hadn’t settled yet.
You didn’t want to move. Didn't want to pull back the curtain and see the blood soaked floor beyond it.
Because if you did, it would become real in a different way. Not just something you survived, but something that stayed.
A dull headache pulsed steadily behind your eyes. Your shoulders ached with tension. Your body felt disconnected somehow, like part of you was still moving even though you’d stopped minutes ago.
Your mind was struggling to process what you'd just witnessed. How many people you saved. How many you didn't.
You swallowed hard against the tightness in your throat.
For one strange second, you genuinely thought you might pass out.
The curtain shifted. You flinched before you could stop yourself.
“Sorry.”
The voice was quiet and all too familiar.
Your stomach dropped before you even turned.
Blue eyes met yours.
Frank stood in the doorway, still in scrubs. Hair slightly dishevelled. Exhaustion carved into his face in ways that you were sure mirrored yours.
The mass casualty had left no room to think about him as anything other than another set of hands beside you. But now, standing here with him again, every emotion you’d shoved aside came flooding violently back.
“What do you want, Langdon?”
Your voice came out flatter than intended as you turned away again, like movement alone might protect you from whatever this conversation was about to become.
"I came to apologise... about earlier." He said quietly. "That was fucked up."
"Yeah. It was." You said.
A humourless breath escaped you.
"Although now it feels kind of trivial after-" You stopped yourself before your brain could drift back toward everything you’d all just witnessed.
You turned back properly then - freezing when you saw the raw emotion on his face.
"I'm really sorry."
This time, you weren’t entirely sure he was only talking about the argument anymore.
You took a step towards him.
"What happened Frank?" You asked quietly.
His jaw tightened.
For a moment, he didn’t answer.
"I fucked up Ace." He admitted, his voice cracking slightly, like it cost him something to say it out loud.
"Really badly."
Your expression softened before you could stop it, and that seemed to break something in him further.
"I think I need help." The confession came out barely above a whisper as tears pooled in the corner of his eyes.
You took a step toward him instinctively.
"Ok." You said immediately, nodding slowly. "Ok. We can get you help."
"Jesus-" He cut himself off, squeezing his eyes shut for a second like he was trying to physically reset himself. "Don't look at me like that."
"Like what?"
"Like you... like you pity me."
"Jesus Christ Langdon, I don't pity you I-" You stopped yourself, breath catching slightly as you realised what you were about to say.
"I care about you."
The honesty of it startled even you.
Frank went still.
"You do?" He asked.
There was no teasing in his voice now. No arrogance. Only something small and uncertain underneath it that made your chest ache unexpectedly.
"Yeah." You said, softer now. "Even though it pains me to admit it."
That got the smallest flicker of something, his eyes never leaving your face.
"Which is why we're going to figure this out." You continued, stepping closer again without thinking about it. "Whatever this is, we can sort it out, we can-"
You never got to finish your sentence.
Because Frank Langdon kissed you.
It was sudden - like something inside him had snapped beneath the weight of everything he’d been holding back.
You froze completely at first. Hands half-raised, breath caught, brain refusing to process the shift from conversation to collision.
Frank pulled back abruptly, eyes wide, mouth parted.
“I- oh my god." He breathed heavily. “I’m so sorry. I don’t know why I-”
You grabbed the front of his scrubs and pulled him back down before he could finish.
The second kiss wasn’t hesitant.
It was years of tension collapsing all at once into something sharp and immediate and impossible to take back.
Frank made a quiet sound against your mouth like he still couldn’t quite believe this was happening. Like he couldn’t quite believe you were kissing him back.
Then, just as suddenly, he pulled back. His breathing uneven, chest rising too fast.
"I'm sorry." He shook his head as he took a step away from you, like he needed the physical distance to stop himself. "I can't- I can't do this."
"Frank-"
But he was already gone.
You didn't see him again after that.
Not in passing, not in corridors, not in all the strange little spaces where the two of you had somehow built an entire relationship out of arguments and eye contact and timing.
You found out a week later from Dana that Frank had admitted himself into a treatment program that same night.
And then he disappeared from your life for ten months.
ten.
The thing you hated the most about Frank Langdon was that you didn't hate him.
Not even a little bit, not even at all.
You’d known it long before you admitted it to yourself. But that moment - that kiss- had made it undeniable in a way you couldn’t pretend to ignore anymore.
And that was the problem.
Because hatred would’ve been easier than this constant, aching awareness of him existing somewhere just beyond your reach.
Fourth of July shifts were universally hated at PTMC.
Too hot, too loud, too many fire-work related disasters waiting to happen.
You could already feel a faint film of sweat start to coat the back of your neck as you opened your locker that morning.
Footsteps approached behind you.
You peered around the locker door out of habit, ready to say good morning to whichever poor colleague was stuck with you on this shift.
Your brain short circuited.
Frank Langdon stood there.
Cap on. Backpack slung over one shoulder. Like he belonged somewhere casual, somewhere outside of this building entirely.
Like he hadn’t disappeared from your life for ten months without a word.
You stared at him for a moment.
Then he opened his mouth, your name formed silently on his lips.
You slammed your door shut with finality, then walked straight past him without saying a word.
Your pulse roared in your ears, your heart bashed against your ribcage.
You knew he’d be coming back, you knew you would have to see him again eventually - you just didn’t think it would be today.
You didn’t think it would hurt this much either.
-
The shift was unbearable in the quietest possible way.
Every time you turned a corner, you expected him to be there. Every time you reached for a chart, you expected his voice behind you.
Every time someone called your name, your body reacted before your brain caught up - a stupid, pathetic flicker of hope you immediately hated yourself for.
And then there were the moments he was there.
Hands steady, voice controlled, face carefully neutral in the way only Frank Langdon could manage when he was actively trying not to look at you.
Even then, you could feel his eyes on you wherever you moved.
It made your skin feel too tight.
By hour four, you had already done two traumas with him. Your body slipped back into your old rhythm together so naturally it made you feel sick.
By hour eight, your scrubs were starting to cling to you in a way that felt suffocating.
By hour ten, your tension headache had made itself home again.
By hour fourteen, you thought you might scream if you stayed in the same room as him any longer.
The stairwell was empty when you found it.
Quiet in the way hospital spaces rarely were - concrete walls absorbing sound instead of reflecting it. The air was cooler here, industrial and slightly damp, smelling faintly of disinfectant and metal.
You pressed your back against the wall and closed your eyes for half a second.
Just one breath.
Just one moment where you didn’t have to think about him.
Your eyes snapped open when you heard the door open.
Frank stood in front of you, his chest rose and fell slightly faster than usual, like he’d decided to follow you on impulse and was only now catching up with the consequences.
You straightened immediately.
"I just want to talk." He spoke, taking a step toward you slowly like you were a wild animal he didn't want to spook.
"There's nothing to talk about Langdon."
He paused. "You know that's not true Ace."
"Don't call me that."
Your voice came out sharper than you intended.
His expression flickered.
“Please Ace just-"
"I said stop." You cut him off again, stepping back slightly without meaning to. "You don’t get to call me that anymore. Not after-"
You stopped.
The words jammed in your throat.
Because saying it out loud meant making it real in a way you weren’t sure you were ready for.
His gaze didn’t move from yours.
"Not after what?" He asked quietly.
Something in your restraint finally cracked, frustration pouring out of you.
"I wrote to you in rehab." You said, voice tightening. "Even after everything, I wrote to you. And you didn't write back."
Pain flashed openly across Frank's face.
"I'm sorry."
You shook your head.
"You kissed me Langdon. And then you disappeared without a word and then you just - just appear without any warning, like nothing happened." Your voice grew louder as you spoke, trembling despite your best efforts.
"I didn't want you to get caught up in any of this."
"That wasn't your call to make." You snapped back. "I can make my own decisions."
"You don't think that I know that?" He answered, his own tone sharpening. "There's more to this then my addiction."
"I know."
Frank's eyes flared in surprise.
You exhaled shakily.
"Robby and Santos have been glaring at you all day. And I saw the way he looked at you last year before you left.” Your jaw clenched. “It doesn't take a genius to figure it out."
Frank watched you for a moment, his surprise morphing into one of disbelief.
"And you're saying what? You wouldn't have exiled me too?”
"No. I would have been there for you, if you'd given me the chance to."
His expression faltered as he shook his head slightly.
"What?" You challenged, taking a step towards him. "You don't believe me?"
"You hate me." He countered.
You stared at him, then let out a breath somewhere between exhaustion and disbelief.
"Jesus Langdon, I don't hate you.” You snapped. “And that's precisely the problem."
A pause.
He took a step closer.
"I didn't plan on kissing you like that."
You swallowed as you looked at him, all your frustration seeping out of you.
"Then why did you?" You murmured.
For a moment he didn't answer.
"Because I don't hate you either."
This time when he looked at you, there was something different. Like he wasn’t looking at you as competition, or a colleague, but something more exposed than either of you had ever allowed before.
"You're all I thought about in rehab."
Your heart stuttered violently.
Frank laughed softly under his breath, humourless.
"You're all I've thought about since med school, really."
"That can't be-"
"It is." He cut in gently. His eyes dropped briefly toward the floor.
“Ever since you sat across from me with your colour coded textbooks and looked at me like you wanted to kill me.” A small smile tugged briefly at his mouth.
Your breath caught.
“That's probably why I was always such a dick to you.” He glanced back up. “Because it was the only time you ever really looked at me."
The stairwell felt too small suddenly. Too warm, too honest, too vulnerable.
"It's always been you Ace.” His voice softened. “I just didn’t know what to do about it.”
You swallowed hard.
"You left." You said quietly.
"I know." He said immediately. No defence. No excuse. Just truth.
“I panicked. I wasn't thinking straight."
A beat.
"And I’ve regretted it every day since."
He took another step towards you.
"The kiss, or you leaving?” You whispered.
His eyes heals yours steadily.
"You know which one."
Now he was close enough that you had to tilt your head slightly to keep eye contact. Close enough that you could see the small flecks of green scattered through his eyes.
"I don't think I can keep pretending that I don't want you anymore." He admitted.
Silence hung between the two of you.
"Say something." He said quietly. "Please."
The space between you was nothing and everything at once.
"Frank.." You breathed out.
"Yeah?"
"I don't want to pretend anymore either."
Frank swallowed, his eyes flickering down to your mouth.
"I'd really like to kiss you again.”
Whatever restraint you still had left finally broke.
You fisted his scrubs in between your fingers, guiding him down to your mouth.
The kiss wasn’t careful this time.
It wasn’t confused.
It was real in a way that almost hurt.
Like years of wanting each other had finally run out of places to hide.
Frank’s hand came up immediately to cradle your jaw, anchoring you there like he was afraid you might disappear if he let go.
You pulled him closer against you, one hand threading through his hair. You felt your back hit the wall, a small breath escaping your mouth at the impact.
The stairwell door creaked somewhere nearby.
You both broke apart instantly.
You turned, but there was no one there.
Frank looked back at you, breathing unevenly now, a grin slowly pulling at his mouth.
"You know what I just realised?”
"Oh god.” Your fingers scraped lightly against the back of his neck. “What?”
“I never got to tell you I performed a closed cervical reduction like thirty minutes ago.”
Your eyes widened. "Are you serious?"
"Completely." His smile grew as he ghosted his thumb over your jaw. "Guess that's two miracles I've performed today."
You snorted despite yourself. "That was terrible, even for you."
"I know." He smirked as he leant forward, his mouth hovering over yours. "You love it though Ace."
Your smile widened helplessly as you rolled your eyes.
"Just shut up and kiss me Langdon."
-
Robby glanced over his glasses to see Abbot making his way towards him, his face slack like he was trying to process something.
“Why do you look like you’ve just seen a ghost?” Robby asked.
“Because I’m traumatised.”
“I think we all are.”
“No.” Abbot shook his head gravely. “Somehow this was worse than anything I’ve seen in here.”
Robby raised a brow as Abbot shuddered.
“I just caught your two protégées making out in the stairwell.”
“Huh.”
Robby glancing down casually at his watch.
“Well I'll give them credit."
Abbot's eyes narrowed. "For what?”
Robby shrugged as he turned back to his screen.
"They lasted longer than I thought they would.”
As always always always, feedback is always appreciated because I thrive off praise. Please give it back here and consider tipping me! 🤍
PERHAPS NOT. I'LL HAVE A FORCED PROXIMITY, ENEMIES, SMOTHERED IN THERE'S ONLY ONE BED, THEN LUSTERS, LOTS AND LOTS OF PINING, AND A RACK OF ANGRY CONFESSION TO LOVERS.
im so freaking tired of azriel x reader fics where the reader js has no agency or wishes of her own and hes always showing her things and flying her everywhere like
they're always written as the same archetype
can we please have an azriel x reader fic where the reader is a tinkerer or like an engineer and shes making all sorts of cool stuff like the tony stark of prythian and hes wearing her makings to battle or something omg
