treat me like im your possession
something new for your collection
nobody is real
you are the only exception
you are a God's divine selection
you're the one
you're the one
how does it feel to be the only one?

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@newdruid
treat me like im your possession
something new for your collection
nobody is real
you are the only exception
you are a God's divine selection
you're the one
you're the one
how does it feel to be the only one?
"there is no way you're not using chatgpt for at least a few things here and there no matter your stance on it" what the FUCK are you talking about
I feel like someone is standing next to me talking about how I'm dead
The chemical they put on ants and all the other ants think they're dead that's what happened to tumblr except the chemical is unmarketability
tumblr may have censored porn but check this out
i hope Elon musk KILLS himself and DIES a thousand DEATHS. and i hope every other billionaire a very merry DIE DIE DEATH KILL MURDER DEATH KILL
sometimes I wanna reply âbitch me tooâ to my mutuals posts but Iâve never talked 2 them so they might not see it as friendly joking so i just dont
reblog if itâs okay to say âbitch me tooâ to you if youâre mutuals
Itâs okay to say âbitch me tooâ even if Iâve never seen you before in my life dude
everyone can say bitch me too
moots
followers
moots-in-law
strangers
even enemies
Having been in a good relatipnship for seven years now, I'm still sometimes amazed just how nice things can be. Like I can show you affection??? And it feels nice to you too?? My presence and touch aren't just tolerated, but enjoyed??? I can look at my sleeping boyfriend and think "wow, it would feel really nice to just cuddle up to him right now" and he will either unconsciously communicate "no thanks" without even waking up, or wrap himself around me tightly enough to let me know that it feels nice to him as well. And also I no longer have the option of wrangling myself free without waking him up in the process.
What a splendid love it is to know that your partner can say "no", and knowing for sure that it means that every wordless "yes" truly means "yes". If you could combine the best of silk and velvet, it would still not feel as lovely to touch as my beloved's skin.
A couple of days late because I wanted to get this right. HAPPY PRIDE FOLKS! Decided to do a little animating for every panel of this comic regarding the origin and reasoning behind Member of The Revelry. :) May you never live a day in shame for being who you are. <3 Support us on KoFi: https://ko-fi.com/irregularcharlie Member of The Revelry: www.memberoftherevelry.com
Imagine Law being furious with the Straw Hats for letting you walk into dangerâŚ
Law was tired of his plans being derailed by the Straw Hats. There was only one person on that crew who could calm his annoyance. He looked around and asked for you. Thatâs when he noticed that the Straw Hats began to avert their gaze.
âWhere is Y/n?â He demanded more pointedly.
Zoro yawned. He pointed to the left and Law followed along until his stomach dropped at the only thing in that direction.
The enemy base. What were you doing there?
Fury flooded his senses, fear invaded his heart. Law grabbed the collar of Zoroâs kimono.
âYou let them walk in there without support?â
âOi, oi.â Zoro calmed. âLuffy is there too.â
Knowing that the Straw Hat captain was by your side should have brought Law comfort - but it didnât. Luffy was known to be unpredictable.
He was about to yell again when a chirpy, optimistic voice called out his name.
âOh! Traffy! Youâre here!â Luffy greeted.
Law released the swordsman. He turned around and instead of looking at the young Straw Hat, his eyes trailed to the right. You were walking alongside your captain with a smile⌠there was a cut on your lower lip.
âRoom.â Law said immediately. âShambles.â
The next step that you took had you crashing into Lawâs chest with a surprised, âOh!â.
He took a breath, letting your familiarity ground him and calm the nerves. Law placed his fingers under your chin and tilt your smile up. His eyes landed on the cut and analysed its severity.
It was minimal damage but he had to be absolutely certain that you werenât inâŚ
âLaw-kun, Iâm okay.â You told him. One of your hands was pressed against his chest, no doubt feeling his erratic heartbeat. âIâm safe.â
That voice, the softness of your touch⌠did you not understand the effect that you had on him? Did you not understand that you occupied his heart beyond what was acceptable?
âYou shouldnât have walked into something like that.â Law chided softly.
He let you lean in and bump the tip of your nose against his. âMaybe not but we discovered something very important. You need to hear this.â
Law let out a small relieved sigh and conceded to you. He let you take his hand lead him over to where Luffy and the rest of the crew had gathered.
After this business was finished, Law was going to have a stern word with the Straw Hat captain about endangering your life unnecessarily.
~ More One Piece imagines here ~
GODS, GORE & GROPING cosmic entity!bucky barnes x human!reader [15.2k]
â ⢠SUMMARY: your habit of talking to yourself inadvertently catches the attention of something ancient lurking in the shadows. â ⢠WARNINGS: 18+ MDNI; non-canon; dark themes (I swear there is also comedy); it/its pronouns for bucky (the character is inspired by cthulhu); mention of gore, violence & death threats; angst; one (1) brief description of a nightmare; discussions about stress & anxiety; psychological horror elements; bickering (their dynamic is loosely inspired by eddie and venom in the movies); dark!bucky; overprotective!bucky; obsession; jealousy; possessive behavior; social exclusion; emotional dependency; unhealthy attachment; stalker-ish behavior; boundary violation; mourning; self-doubt; emotional withdrawal; denial as a coping mechanism; smut; mention of sex toys; monsterfucking; tentacle sex; pussy inspection; nipple play; restraints & gags; multiple orgasms; overstimulation; sort of mind break; creampie.Â
A/N: so, this is my ticket to hell. I posted this back in october as part of my halloween series trick or tease, which I will continue here. anyway, I wanted to give this one-shot an actual plot, so there have been some important changes since it was pretty much pwp before. disclaimer: this story contains monsterfucking, so please avoid sending weird inbox/comments (yes, it already happened). if you follow me, know that this is a recurring theme, as a matter of fact I already have two stories about orc!bucky. it's very simple: if you don't like it, don't read it. hope you'll enjoy đ¤ trick or tease masterlist
You love your apartment in a way that would probably sound ridiculous if you ever tried to explain it, because itâs not particularly beautiful, nor does it sit in some idealized neighborhood where everything feels arranged for aesthetic approval.
The building is old, long past charming. The pipes occasionally groan through the walls as though protesting against their own existence, and the floors remember every step, even when you try your best to be quiet. The kitchen is too small to ever feel fully practical, the bathroom is always slightly colder than the rest of the apartment no matter the season, and the elevator has broken down often enough that you have stopped trusting it entirely.
Objectively, there are better places to live.
And yet every evening, after a day spent among crowded sidewalks, half-finished conversations, and obligations that somehow leave you far more exhausted than they should, the knot in your stomach begins to loosen the moment the front door closes behind you.
Nobody interrupts you here. Nobody watches you with critical eyes. Nobody tries to dictate the way you exist. Itâs just you.
Which is probably why you develop the habit of talking to yourself once you step inside.
Itâs not something you ever decided to do, it simply followed you from earlier versions of your life. At first it was practical, a way of sorting out stress and untangling thoughts that felt too messy to leave trapped in your head, but over time it became part of who you are.
âStark scheduled five meetings today.â You drop your keys on the counter. âNew record.â
You kick off your shoes, already moving towards the fridge for some water.
âI swear he finds some sick pleasure in wasting everyoneâs time.â
You never expect a response, of course, but carry on with the small rituals of the evening while the walls quietly absorb your voice.
Ultimately, you stop keeping tabs of how often it happens, because you talk while cooking, cleaning, and taking showers. You comment out loud while scrolling through your phone and revisit past conversations while folding laundry. Even when sitting on the couch at the end of a long day, you debate whether youâre too tired to start anything meaningful or too restless to do nothing at all, as if the pillows could answer back.
Still, there are momentsâusually late at nightâwhen the absence of another human being becomes harder to ignore. A small ache settles in your chest at the realization that entire days can pass without anyone else seeing them. Your thoughts, your victories, the countless insignificant moments that make up a life... all of them exist only inside your own memory.
The feeling never stays for long though: somewhere along the way, you just learned how to be content with your own company.
Most of your friends live hours away now, scattered across different cities and different lives, and trying to keep those connections alive feels mortifying when it becomes clear youâre not worth the effort.
Making new ones has never been any easier. Too many people seem worn down by disappointment, and retreating into themselves feels safer than risking another let-down. The rest treat every relationship like a negotiation, weighing what can be gained from it before deciding how much of themselves they are willing to offer.
So you fall back into your routine, and the apartment remains your favorite place, where you spend most of your time.
However, the feeling is not one-sided, because somewhere within the walls and foundations, something has begun, very slowly, to consider you a constant.
It has occupied the building for longer than any human memory can account for.
Long before you arrived. Long before the current structure of rooms and hallways. Not trapped within it, or bound in any conventional sense, but present like a memory inside a familiar object, woven through walls and doorframes and the quiet space between moments.
For centuries, humans were irrelevant.
They came and went, briefly altering the surface of things without ever touching what lay beneath. The Entity never thought of them as individuals, but as noise. Temporary disturbance that always faded back into silence.
Until you.
At first, you are nothing exceptional. Just another tenant. A fragile arrangement of blood and flesh moving through a structure that has already forgotten most of what it has held. You unpack and settle into your routines.
And then you start talking.
Constantly.
As though silence is something you have to keep at bay to stay sane.
And thatâs what catches its attention. At first, it assumes you are speaking to someone outside its perception, but there is no other presence, no other voice.
Only you.
So it begins to assume the words are meant for the space itself, for the apartment as a wholeâfor the being that chose its shadows as a place to rest.
The conclusion is obvious.
You are talking to it.
The Entity initially listens passively. Your voice is just another sound among many, no more important than the groan of old pipes or the distant hum of traffic beyond the windows.
But as you keep talking, your voice stops blending into the background.
It learns your rhythms before it understands why they matter: the time you come home; the way your footsteps change depending on fatigue; the subtle differences between your frustrated sighs and your tired one. The melody of your happiness and the miserable sound of your sorrow.
The details gather one by one without purpose.
And somewhere along the way, it stops thinking of you as transient.
The first changes are small. A temperature fluctuation in your room settles earlier in the evening than it used to. A recurring fault in the elevator that keeps waking you up in the middle of the night doesnât return. A light that hesitated before turning on now responds immediately.
None of it is noticeable enough to make you suspicious. Until the reason behind these adjustments changes drastically.
In its memory, humans have always approached beings like it through extremes.
They arrive trembling with desperation that melts into obsession, or rigid with fear that collapses into obedience. Their speech grows cautious, as though a single wrong word might invite disaster. Even when they pretend otherwise, there is always an ugly tilt beneath their requests: ambition, hunger, greed.
But you only fill rooms with thoughts that have nowhere else to go.
You complain about a man named Tony scheduling meetings throughout the day as though he has personal authority over the calendar. You debate dinner choicesâusually pizza or sushiâbecause the outcome might alter your mood for the rest of the night. You spend an entire evening trying to figure out why a couple from your hometown broke up after everyone swore theyâd end up married.
And throughout your little monologues, your voice never once bends toward reverence. It never tightens into fear.
And that becomes difficult to grasp.
Over time, those small routines become expected. And expectation creates its own kind of absence.
The first few times you leave for longer than usual, the apartment feels incomplete. Not empty, exactly, but quieter. The space remains the same, yet something about it feels wrong without you.
The conclusion it reaches is simple: if you are choosing to spend more time elsewhere, then the apartment must be failing you in some way. From that point on, every imperfection becomes unacceptable, and small inconsistencies are often corrected before they even have the chance to become problems at all.
Since you are completely unaware that something has started arranging the world around you, the changes continue without question.
You keep talking the way you always do, filling the apartment with things that would seem insignificant to anyone else, but not to the creature listening. You never thank it. Never ask for anything specific, or demand more. You simply exist inside a space that now quietly takes care of itself according to your comfort.
The simplicity of that still confuses it. The Entity has been worshipped before, feared, sought out for power... But no one has ever treated it like part of their daily life. Like an equal.
Your voice is familiar and reliable as you become its Polaris, the fixed point by which the rest of the world is measured.
The Entity has never concerned itself with anything beyond its own existence, most things are allowed to fade.
Anything connected to you is not.
When you come back that evening, something is different.Â
You move through your usual routine after stepping inside, loosening your shoulders and mumbling softly under your breath. Yet there is something unfamiliar that clings to the edges of your presence. It doesnât belong to the apartment, and because of that, it draws its curiosity at once.Â
Humans carry traces of the outside world with them all the time: scents, particles, remnants of places and people. Most disappear quickly enough to be forgotten.
But this one doesnât leave. It stays attached to you in a way that makes it hard to dismiss, fixed on a specific point of contact. Still, you hang up your coat, set down your bag, and slip off your heels with a relieved sigh. There is no hesitation in your movements.
Something outside its space touched you and was allowed to settle. And it doesnât seem to bother you at all.
That unpleasant realization manifests like the first thunder announcing an imminent storm.
The air changes, pressure building ominously through the room enough to alter the flow of oxygen.
You notice it a few seconds later, your breathing feeling slightly more restricted, your chest tightening in a way that is easy to misread as fatigue from the day. You pause, one hand briefly touching your chest as if checking whether something inside your body isnât working properly.
Frowning in confusion, you glance around the apartment before sprinting to the window to push it open, letting the crisp night air spill inside.
The suffocating feeling eases a little, but the Entityâs rage doesnât.
The air turns clammy enough to make your skin prickle. Out of the corner of your eye, the shadows along the edges of the room grow longer, creeping farther than they should. The impression vanishes as soon as your head makes a sharp turn toward the wall, leaving you with a kind of discomfort that will haunt your sleep for the rest of the night.
You were still its when you left this space, but something else got close enough to interfere with that.
Whatever that presence was, it shouldnât have been near you at all.
The changes start revealing themselves later, in moments that seem insignificant at the time.
You take a shower every morningâit automatically folds into your routine without much attention, the same way you sit on the edge of the bed with a towel around your body and half-awake eyes, letting the day assemble itself around you in slow pieces.
You turn on the tap and let the water warm up while you brush your teeth and check your phone. Sometimes you even have time to tidy up your room a little.
But one day you find yourself rinsing your face while the mirror is already beginning to fog. You dismiss it as temporary luck and keep going through the same motions the next day.
And still, it keeps happening.
A few days later, youâre standing in your bedroom half-dressed and with an unexpected ten extra minutes before work, trying and failing to understand where they came from.
Other weird things follow, like the bedroom door no longer sticking when itâs too humid. Then, the kitchen cabinet that always needed an extra push starts closing smoothly, and the draft from the living room window stops bothering you entirely.
There is an accumulation of small inconsistencies that leaves you with the subtle impression that the apartment and your recollection of it are no longer perfectly aligned, to the point that you start wondering if the problem is you.
Maybe youâre becoming forgetful, distracted... The thought never settles into genuine panic, but it lingers just long enough to leave a sour taste behind.
A quiet Friday night finds you stretched on the couch with the television murmuring in the background, when an email from Tony lands in your inbox. It marks yet another round of revisions of your presentation despite the fact that this is already the fourth time you have edited it.
For a moment you simply stare deadpan at the screen, the frustration that has been building all week finally manifesting with a sharp exhale.
âFor fuckâs sake, Tony.â
âI could ensure he never troubles you again.â
The voice comes so quickly after your words that your brain just accepts it without question. Then, your limbs still at once at the realization. Slowly, you lift your head and look around the apartment.
The television still works. The kitchen is empty. The hallway is exactly where it should be.
You frown at it for another moment before forcing yourself to exhale.
Stress.
You imagined it.
Shaking your head, you turn your attention back to the show.
âWell?â
This time you sit up abruptly, confusion sharpening into alarm.Â
âWhat the fuck?â You mumble, because whatever fragile explanation you were building in your head collapses at once.
You nearly trip over your own feet as you scramble to stand, your heart hammering against your ribs while your gaze darts frantically around the open space.
âIs someone here?â
There is a pause before the voice answersâcalm, almost unaffected by your agitation.
âI am not visible at the moment.â
Your breath catches slightly.
âWhat does that even mean?â
âI am in the shadows,â it continues. âI am everywhere.â
You let out a short, disbelieving laugh, but it comes out strangled.
âYeah, okay.â You mutter. âSure.â
You quickly check the hallway and then turn back again, trying to locate any possible source that could explain the voice seemingly coming from the inside of the apartment. When you canât find anything out of the ordinary, your body instantly angles towards the couch, one of your arms already stretched out to get your phone and call someone.
Police. Your neighbor. Anyone...
But your fingers barely brush the object before it slides out of reach.
You freeze.
âNo.â You whisper, because now your brain is splitting between panic and denial.
You glance at the device like it has personally betrayed you.
âThis is insane,â you say, unconsciously backing up, your chest heaving dangerously fast. âThis is fucking insane.â
âHe can be removed.â The voice states with confidence.
You shake your head sharply.
âWhat does that even mean? And what the fuck are you doing in my apartment?â
âI have been here for a long time.â
âWhat?â Your stomach tightens as you take another step back, shaking your head again like that will be enough to reset reality.
âGet the fuck out or Iâm calling the police.â You threaten more firmly this time, even if the trembling in your voice refuses to fade.
The air shifts at once, suffocating in its heaviness.
âDo not dare to call me an intruder.â
Until now, despite everything, some stubborn part of your brain had been trying to force this situation into a shape that made senseâa prank, a squatter, even a neighbor with far too much free time.
Something explainable.
Human.
âI have always been here.â
The words settle like a boulder on your chest.
A chill crawls down your spine.
Nothing around you changes: the walls are still standing, the lights are still on, and the floor is not splitting open beneath your feet. Yet your attention is obsessing over every neglected corner. On the narrow seam where two walls meet. On the vent above the kitchen doorway. On the faint cracks hidden beneath layers of paint.
Places you have never paid attention to before.
Places that now feel claimed.
You have lived here for years, slept, eaten, cried... Spent entire weekends doing absolutely nothing. And the thought that something might have been present through all of it sends a fresh wave of nausea through your body.
Thatâs enough for you to notice the change in your breathing. Each raise of your chest feels slightly shallower than the last, your lungs stinging as they instinctively prepare for a danger your eyes cannot see.
âReality parts for me. I have drifted through the birth of galaxies, swallowed storms of time, watched empires swell and rot. Your world? An insignificant speck in the vastness of the universe. Your species? Flimsier than smoke. You puny humans only know how to crawl from the mud to devour each other over shallow trinkets and territory.â
You swallow thickly, flinching hard as your back brushes against the wall close to the front door.
You donât even remember moving.
âOkay,â you mumble, your voice still uneven. âSomeoneâs a little too full of themself.â
A thunderous roar crashes through your skull, pain exploding behind your eyes so suddenly that your vision blurs around the edges.
A sharp gasp tears from your throat as you double over, your body folding in on itself before you can stop it. Your hands fly to your head, fingers digging into the skin of your temples as your eyes squeeze shut against the pounding agony.
âI only speak the truth. I am eternal, and your defiance is inconvenient. Remember, human: if I wish to, I could bend you into nothingness before your heart finishes its next beat.â
The temperature of the room drops below zero. Biting cold wraps around you so viciously that it feels as though warmth has been erased from existence.
A violent shiver runs through you, and your arms promptly wrap around your torso in a futile attempt to make yourself smaller, safer, somehow less exposed to its wrath.
The threat itself should sound ridiculous, the sort of thing a comic book villain would say before getting punched through a building. Yet whatâs frightening is the certainty burning beneath its voice.
An uncomfortable, deafening silence settles over the room, before the voice comes back quieterâalmost timid.
âI have frightened you.â It sighs wearily. âYour fear is bitter. Forgive me. I often forget how small your hearts are, how fragile your existence can be.â
The cold begins to retreat, slowly loosening its grip on your body until you can feel your fingers again. The pressure squeezing your throat eases with it, and you quickly draw in a breath, gasping as if you have been forced under water.
You donât answer. Instead your eyes close briefly, and inside your head you keep repeating that this is only a dream.
It has to be.
Dreams can be terrifying.
Dreams can feel real.
Dreams can make absolutely no sense whatsoever.
âI apologize. I am not used to... converse with humans.â
The explanation is absurd. Completely ridiculous. Sure, people do that too. They make themselves louder and hostile, more intimidating. They show their teeth because they are afraid to get bitten first.
But itâs difficult to be terrified of something while simultaneously understanding it.
âI would not harm another being, unless strictly necessary. Like Tony.â
There is a beat of silence after that, the kind that feels like waiting for a clarification.
Your eyelids slowly flutter open.
âTony?â Your brows furrow in confusion.
âYes.â
Your stomach drops. âIâTony is my boss.â
âI am aware.â
That answer does absolutely nothing to make you feel better. Still, a weak, tired chuckle falls from your lips, the sound still sitting on the edge of disbelief.
âWell,â your voice wavers. âNext time you want to show off, try to be a little less... intense.â
There is a pause that lasts just long enough to feel like the conversation might actually end there.
âI willâŚâ It rumbles. âLittle star.â
You blink.
For a moment you genuinely wonder whether you heard it correctly. Of all the things it could have said, that had not even crossed your mind as a possibility.
âWhat?â You ask uncertainly.
âYou are smaller than me,â it starts calmly. âAnd you shine the brightest when surrounded by darkness.â
The words hit you like a punch in the stomach, because that name feels like it was always meant for youâlike this weird creature has spent some unknowable amount of time observing the universe until it reached the conclusion that you deserved your own little place inside it.
âAnd so you just⌠decided to call me that?â You say slowly, staring blankly at the wall.
âYes.â
The answer arrives with complete confidence.
Your eyes scan the space again: the walls are still up, the furniture remains exactly where you left it, the front door is only a few feet away if you decide to make a run for it. However, now they all sit beside the crushing knowledge that you have never been truly alone in what you considered your safe haven.
And yet, despite the trembling in your hands and the excruciating headache, the apartment has never felt this warm.
After that night, the voice doesnât appear on a schedule you can trace, and it doesnât behave like something that interrupts your life so much as something that exists alongside you, its presence filling the apartment as naturally as sunlight through an open window.
Eventually you resign yourself to the fact that if this is real, then it has always been real. The Entity has existed beyond the edges of your perception all along, tucked into the shadows while you moved through your life unaware.
You are not discovering something new. You are simply learning how to share your home with a creature whose ego is, unfortunately, backed by evidence.
Strangely, that realization no longer feels like youâre losing your sanity. Every appearance still sends a jolt through you though, even when you start anticipating it. The jolts finally become sighs, the sighs fade into pauses... And then, somehow, they turn into full conversations.
âAllow me to intervene.â
The words emerge from nowhere and everywhere at once, threading through the sound of running water.
Your reaction is calmer than it would have been a month ago.
Pausing with a glass still slippery beneath layers of soap, you glance at the counter.
A deep exhale escapes your nose. âThatâs not what I meant when I said Pierce should stop being an asshole.â
The silence that follows feels thoughtful.
âHe deserves it.â
The certainty in its tone immediately tells you that this conversation is going to leave you with a migraine.
You slowly set the glass aside and reach for another.
âNo, he doesnât.â
âHe repeatedly enters the apartments without warning despite causing distress to their occupants. He ignores maintenance requests. He raises the rent while refusing to fix anything. He is unpleasant.â It growls at last.
You stare at the sink deadpan, because the worst part is that none of those observations are technically wrong.
âYou still donât get to decide what happens to my landlord.â
âYou have developed a habit of assuming the worst about me, little star.â The response almost sounds offended.
âLast week you wanted to fold the mail carrier into another dimension because he bent one of my packages.â
âHe damaged your property.â
âHe dropped it because he nearly tripped carrying three other boxes.â You remark tiredly.
âThen he accepted more than he was capable of transporting!â It snaps.
Your eyes close, and for a moment you simply stand there with your hands submerged in warm water, wondering whether anyone else in human history has ever had to explain proportional responses to a cosmic entity living inside their apartment walls.
âYou canât solve everything with violence.â
âAt least my ways are effective.â
The tone is so childish that something dangerously close to a laugh threatens to escape you. You barely suppress it, unwilling to give the Entity the satisfaction.
The last thing you want is to encourage it.
âYouâre missing the point.â You sigh.
âAnd your landlord is disruptive.â It retorts, returning to the original topic with persistence. âI remove disruption.â
A month ago, that statement would have sent ice flooding through your veins, now it makes you tired. Concerned, certainly; still mildly horrified. But mostly tired.
You noticed pretty quickly that the creature inhabiting the darkness has apparently divided existence into two simple categories: things that bring you comfort, and things that do not.
And whenever something falls into the second category, it immediately begins offering solutions.
Usually terrible ones.
You still canât fully comprehend what it is and what it wants from you, yet you donât reject it anymore, choosing instead to adjust yourself around it the same way people learn to coexist with eccentric roommates, noisy plumbing, or old neighbors with weird habits. But speaking more carefully than you used to has become necessary. Not because you are afraid of being overheardâyou passed that stage weeks agoâbut because the Entity is always listening, hungrily waiting for the slightest excuse to make itself useful.
The first time you muttered that a coworker was making you want to disappear, it was so concerned that it spent thirty minutes trying to understand whether your desire to âcease existingâ was literal. Then you made the mistake of joking about your neighborâs barking dog, and it calmly informed you that silence could be arranged...
Spending hours explaining hyperbole to a being older than galaxies had not gone particularly well, so now you think twice before speaking. You also avoid idle threats and clarify complains before they can be interpreted as instructions.
In addition to not knowing how human language works, it becomes clear that the Entity also doesnât understand the concept of privacy. Or perhaps it understands it perfectly well and simply sees no reason to respect it.
You are still trying to determine which possibility is worse.
Thursday has been peaceful so far. Tony hasnât started any new scandal that requires damage control, and Pierce hasnât called asking for more money to deal with the umpteenth gas leak.
Yet by the time you finally make it home, exhaustion sits heavily in your musclesâthe kind that accumulates steadily over hours spent hunched over a desk, attending meetings that should not exist and dealing with your bossâ particular talent for creating problems out of nothing.
The apartment is quiet when you step inside.
After abandoning your heels somewhere near the entrance, you drag yourself to the bedroom with the same determination of someone whose social battery has been completely annihilated. All you want is to change into something comfortable, eat whatever requires the least amount of effort to prepare, and spend the rest of the evening watching some trashy reality show.
The peaceful silence follows you as you set your bag on the floor and begin pulling your blouse over your head.
âThis level of exhaustion is unacceptable.â
A startled yelp escapes your lips as you jerk backwards, immediately yanking the blouse back down.
For one humiliating moment, you are left standing in the middle of the room, tangled in fabric.
âJesus Christ.â Your hand presses against your sternum.
The apartment remains perfectly calm.
âYou scared me.â
âI did not intend to.â
âYeah, I know.â You let out a weary sigh. âYou never intend to.â
Finally pulling the blouse off, you throw it toward the laundry basket with significantly more force than necessary.
The Entity says nothing for what feels like forever, so your eyes narrow at a random corner.
âWere you just... watching me?â
The question leaves your mouth before you can stop it, and the silence that follows stretches long enough to make you squirm uncomfortably.
âYou returned home forty-three minutes later than usual. You removed your shoes after entering, yet consumed no food despite having done so at the same time during the last three days. And your shoulders have remained incredibly tense since you arrived.â
You promptly let them relax, suddenly self-conscious of your posture.
âThat wasnât my question.â
âIt was.â The creature sounds genuinely puzzled. âYou asked whether I was observing you.â
Technically, thatâs a logical answer, but it doesnât make having a pair of monstrous eyes tracking your every movement with unwavering attention any less unsettling.
âYou really keep track of all that?â You eventually ask, almost shyly.
âMy attention is always upon you.â
The response arrives with such simple certainty that it makes the next words die on your tongue, leaving you frozen in the middle of your bedroom.
This thing has existed for an amount of time you cannot begin to comprehend. It notices things. It remembers things. It pays attention in a way that humans generally do not. And the reminder sends a strange heat crawling beneath your skin.
Suddenly, you are being hit with a feeling of disquiet at being so exposed.
âHe should not be allowed to exhaust you like this.â
âNo.â It falls from your lips before the conversation can continue.
âNo?â
âNo. Whatever youâre thinking, the answer is no.â
âYou cannot know what I am thinking.â
âOh yeah? So it has nothing to do with taking care of Tony?â You mock its gravelly voice.
Another pause.
âYou know me so well.â It sounds almost pleased.
Sinking onto the edge of the bed, you rub a hand over your face.
âPlease, stop trying to find a reason to kill my boss.â
âI was not offering to kill him.â
Relief immediately floods your chest.
âOh.â You tilt your head, positively surprised.
Maybe all those evenings spent teaching the Entity how to behave more like a human and less like one of the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse are finally paying off.
âI would only harm him.â
Your face falls instantly.
âGod, can you just stop talking?â
âIt is significantly better.â
âNo.â
âIt is objectively better.â
You let out a long groan, covering your face with both hands.
âWhy do you always bring him up?â
âI was simply stating an observation.â
You scoff, removing your jewelry with far more energy than the action itself requires. âYou always make observations right before suggesting violence.â
âI do not always suggest violence.â
The statement is delivered with enough dignity that you almost believe it.
âYou suggested throwing an officer into the ocean because he gave me a ticket.â
âHe was incorrect.â
Your eyes close in irritation. âYou suggested relocating my upstairs neighbor because she vacuumed once at six in the morning.â
âSunday is the only day you are permitted to sleep in.â
âYou spent three days trying to convince me my internet provider is a hostile entity.â Your voice gradually rises, and the apartment slips into complete silence.
âLittle star,â the Entity starts slowly. âThe service they provide is unacceptable.â
You curse the day you decided to explain how technology and the internet work to this relentless, stubborn creature.
âThatâs not the point.â You say through clenched teeth.
The room grows quiet again and you know it is genuinely attempting to understand something that refuses to fit within its understanding of reality.
When it speaks again, the question sounds sincere.
âWhy is Tony different?â
You let your head fall back with a sigh.
As much as its insistence and anger management issues drive you insane, you always need to remind yourself it is truly interested in how your mind works.
âHe isnât different,â the words are no louder than a murmur, your body sagging slightly as irritation drains away. âPeople are just allowed to be annoying. Thatâs part of the human experience.â
You can practically feel the disagreement radiating off the walls.
âThat seems inefficient.â It frets.
A chuckle escapes you before you can stop it, still low but entirely genuine.
âMaybe it is.â You shrug.
âYou dedicate a surprising degree of creativity to insulting him.â
âBecause he frustrates me.â
âHe makes you unhappy.â
âHm, sometimes.â You nod.
âHe increases your stress.â
âYes.â
âYou dread interacting with him.â
You hesitate for a second. âWell, only when he sends me to drag angry women out of his penthouse at nine in the morning.â
âThen I fail to understand why removing the problem is unacceptable.â
There it isâthe same impossible logic it always returns to.
Everything else stops mattering the moment it involves you, so when something upsets you, it should be immediately addressed. The conclusion is predictable by now: anything causing you discomfort simply shouldnât be allowed to continue existing. Thatâs the entire structure of its reasoning, there is no room for improvement or compromise.
For a few seconds neither of you speaks.
Then, very carefully, as though explaining something to a particularly intelligent but catastrophically misguided dog, âHarming my boss wonât fix my anxiety. And you really need to stop with the whole splitting people into categories based on whether they annoy me or not.â
The silence lingers, but you have learned enough about the creature by now to recognize when it is really considering your words.
âThere are additional categories?â
This time you cannot help itâyou burst out laughing, the sound brightening the room, loud and alive.
âYes, you silly creature.â You breathe out, still smiling. âThere are additional categories.â
Somewhere within the walls, the Entity appears to spend the rest of the night reevaluating its understanding of interpersonal conflict. You are not entirely sure the lesson will stick. Still, it feels like progress.
When your eyes snap open, the frantic pounding of your heartbeat is the only thing you can hear. You find yourself disoriented, small but stubborn fragments of the nightmare still clinging to you.
There was a corridor that seemed to stretch forever, doors opening one after another into empty darkness, and the overwhelming certainty that something was following just out of sight. The details fade almost immediately, but the fear lingers heavy in your chest.
âYou are not alone.â
The rumbling voice cuts through the eerie silence out of nowhere, nearly making you jump out of your skin.
Your body goes completely still as for one awful second, fantasy and reality blur together. Then, fear shifts into exasperation so quickly it makes you faintly nauseous.
âIt was a dream.â You whisper to yourself, pressing a hand over your eyes.
âYes.â The answer comes immediately.
You let out a long breath, instinctively reaching for the lamp on your nightstand. Light has always helped after bad dreams. It gives your eyes something solid to land on so you can breathe a little easier; something ordinary enough to remind you that whatever was haunting you belonged to the deepest pits of your unconsciousness.
Before your fingers can touch the switch though, the temperature in the room drops slightly and the lamp clicks on by itself. You stare at it blankly, before glancing up at the ceiling.
âHave you been in my bedroom this whole time?âÂ
When the answer arrives, it carries a note of confusion.
âI am always with you.â
You instinctively pull the sheets closer around yourself.
âHm, not really comforting.â
âI simply illuminated the room.â
âThatâs not what I was talking about.â The words come out feebly, as though they were meant just for you.
The pensive silence that follows suggests it is trying to work out what you meant anyway. Eventually, it steers the conversation towards something it deems far more important than your discomfort at its incessant hovering.
âYou were in distress.â
A chill crawls across your skin despite the warmth of the blankets.
âIt was just a dream.â You dismiss as your eyes drop to your quilt.
âYou have experienced similar dreams repeatedly.â
âWhat do you mean repeatedly?â You instantly look up.
âYou have experienced seven variations of the same fear pattern within the last month.â
You frown at the wall in front of you.
âYou remember them all?â
âOf course.â
You are not entirely sure what unsettles you more: the fact that the Entity has somehow found its way into your dreams, or the fact that it has categorized them so analytically.
âIt was a nightmare.â You swallow eventually.
âYes.â
âBut you donât have to do anything about it.â
âI disagree.â
Of course it does.
You rub your eyes in exhaustion. âEveryone has nightmares once in a while.â
âYou are not everyone. I do not care about everyone.â The word is thrown out in disgust. âAnd you were terrified, thatâs enough for me to intervene.â
Your head falls back against the headrest with a dull noise. âIt wasnât real.â
âIt still scared you.â It insists.
The simple logic behind its reasoning is incredibly annoying, because there is no easy way to argue with it. The distinction between reality and dreams seems irrelevant to a higher entityâfear is still fear.
âWhat was chasing you?â
You immediately regret answering any questions at all, hoping that lying on your side will implicitly communicate the conversation is over.
âNothing.â
âWhat was behind the door?â
âNothing.â
âYour heartbeat was dangerously fast when you remembered.â
You pull the blanket higher and settle deeper into the mattress, ready to ignore it.
âIt doesnât matter.â
âIt matters to me.â
The response is so quick your eyelids flutter open again.
The Entity releases a sigh. âYou return home exhausted. You experience distress during sleep, and it lingers long after you wake up. I do not understand why you insist these things are insignificant.â
The sincerity behind its words makes it unexpectedly difficult to swallow.
You know itâs not asking out of mere curiosity, or to eventually use your own fears against you for some hidden purpose. It genuinely cares about you, but not in any way that gives you space from it. Its attention doesnât arrive and withdraw; it persists, clinging to you with a kind of obsessive inevitability. It feels less like being observed and more like being suffocatedâa desperate grip around your throat that wonât loosen even when you need oxygen.
That attention has begun to register as pressure inside your nervous system, a second current running beneath your own reactions. As though it is already anticipating where you will move, what you will feel, what will unsettle you... and meeting you halfway.
Under the apparent reverence lies something far more obstinate: a deep, unwavering hunger to possess you. It craves to reach past what you can recognize as yourself, following you beneath language, control, and into the parts of you where emotion arises before it becomes yours to nameâuntil even the boundary between what you truly feel and what you want to show is blurred.
âBecause not everything needs to be fixed.â You ultimately sigh.
âWhy?â
Your eyes close in resignation at the question that the Entity keeps asking since manifesting itself to you. It sounds so plain and obvious until you try to look for an answer that actually makes sense, devoid of useless excuses.
âBecause sometimes people are just tired, and that can cause bad dreams. Itâs called stress and itâs normal.â
The quiet that follows stretches long enough that you hope the conversation has finally reached an end.
âWhat was behind the door?â
You let out a groan. âJesus Christ.â
âLittle starââ
âGoodnight.â You exclaim loudly enough to cut directly across whatever question was coming next.
Several seconds pass and your body gradually melts against the mattress, your chest finally deflating with a relieved sigh.
âGoodnight.â
A pause follows.
âI am always here. You may inform me if the dream returns.â
You bury your face deeper into the pillow.
âI wonât.â It comes out muffled.
âI would still like to know.â
You gesture blindly toward the ceiling.
âGoodnight.â
The lamp switches itself off.
Several days pass after the nightmare conversation without incident, which should probably be reassuring. Instead, it leaves you vaguely suspicious, because you have already learned that silence doesnât necessarily mean absence. More often than not, it simply means the Entity has decided to not comment on whatever it is currently observing.
You are cooking dinner when it manifests. Or well, attempting to cook dinner, which is definitely not the same thing. The recipe is open on your phone, and the ingredients are technically correct. Whether the final result will be edible remains to be seen.
The water has finally begun to boil and you are standing in front of the stove trying to remember whether the smoked salmon goes in before or after the tomato sauce, when the familiar baritone drifts through the kitchen as if commenting on the weather.
âYou should not consume that.â It throws off-handedly.
You stop stirring altogether, your eyes still fixed on the sauce before slowly turning to the empty kitchen.
âWhat?â
âThe nutritional value is poor.â
You can only blink. Being criticized by an ancient being for your dinner choices... Not everyone gets to put that on their rĂŠsumĂŠ.
âYou donât even eat.â
âCorrect.â
âThen how do you know whatâs good for me?â You squint accusingly.
âI have observed your species.â
The spoon returns to the pan and you continue stirring, determined to not encourage it. Unfortunately, that strategy stopped working after the third day.
âYou consume insufficient vegetables.â
A sigh escapes you. âStop.â
âIt is the truth.â
âWeâre not having this discussion now.â
âYou purchased zucchini and carrots three days ago and have yet to consume them.â
Your wrist stills. Scarily slowly, you lower the utensil onto the spoon rest, and look at the wall with challenge burning hot in your eyes.
âYou know whatâs concerning about that sentence?â You cross your arms to your chest.
âThe fact that you know when I bought them.â
âYou not consuming the vegetables.â It speaks over you.
âOh my God,â you snap as you sharply turn toward the empty kitchen. âAre you my roommate and nutritionist now?â
Silence follows, and you hope it has finally run out of opinions.
âRoommate is⌠acceptable classification.â
You freeze at its reply, because it suddenly dawns on you the mistake you just made. You decide to play it cool though, and turn back to the pan to resume stirring, your movements now a little more sluggish than before.
âThat wasnât an invitation, by the way.â You clear your throat awkwardly after a while.
No response comes. At least, not verbally. The flame beneath the pan flares a little higher before settling again, not enough to affect the cooking but just enough to feel deliberate.
You frown at it, annoyed at the fact that this Lord of the Darkness-wannabe officially considers itself a member of the household now, and you are the only one to blame for that.
âYou should also sleep more.â
Your shoulders slump in defeat.
The conversation had been going so well.
âI sleep plenty.â You argue.
âYou averaged five hours and forty-one minutes over the last seven days.â
The spoon nearly slips from your hand.
âCan you stop tracking my sleeping habits?â Your voice drips with indignation.Â
âYou are tired.â It retorts at once. âTired humans make poorer dietary decisions.â
âWho isnât in this day and age?â
âWell, you are more tired than most people.â It barks back, agitated.
You are beginning to suspect that the Entityâs only hobby is monitoring your wellbeing with a level of dedication that borders on the absurdâand absolutely no sense of when to mind its own business.
Maybe you should introduce it to birdwatching next.
It becomes obvious that it also reacts to the people surrounding you. Not in anything you could immediately point to as proof, but small inconveniences cluster around certain names, voices, intrusions that are not physically present in the apartment and yet somehow seem to have been catalogued all the same.
At first you tell yourself it must be a series of coincidences.
A delayed train to go back home for Thanksgiving, forcing you to text your family that you wonât make it. A rooftop bar reservation that gets cancelled just as youâre getting ready to leaveâthe kind of place you were going to with old friends who insisted it was âimportant to catch up properly.â Plans with people you actually like quietly unraveling at the edges, and conversations turning into vague reschedules that never settle into anything concrete, leaving your evenings empty at home.
The pattern becomes harder to ignore.
You finally connect the dots thanks to Steve.
Youâve been seeing each other for a few weeks, nothing serious yet, though that feels less and less accurate when your evenings keep turning into phone calls that stretch far longer than either of you originally intended.
Itâs late in the afternoon and you are talking to him while tidying the living room, the conversation drifting effortlessly as you gradually stop dusting and end up leaning against the couch, your cheeks hurting from how much you have been smiling.
Dating comes easy with someone as sweet and kind as Steve. You always feel a little lighter after spending time with him.
Perhaps thatâs why he becomes an obstacle to remove.
â... and then she told me I should apologize to her cat.â
You chuckle. âWhat? Why?â
âApparently me stating I have a dog offended him.â
After your laugh fades, your mouth parts to answer with a story of your own about disastrous first dates, when the call abruptly ends.
It doesnât crackle, it simply cuts off. One moment Steve is speaking, the next there is silence.
You check the screen with astonishment written all over your face, and sure enough there is only your wallpaper staring back at you.
Your stomach twists with a familiar, uncomfortable feeling.
Slowly, you lower the phone, and thatâs when it registers that the apartment has been quiet for a while.
Too quiet.
âThat puny boy is annoying.â
Your brow lifts skeptically. Steve Rogers is many things, but âpuny boyâ is definitely not the first word that comes to mind when talking about him. The man has shoulders that deserve their own zip code.
You huff out a weary breath. âWhat did you do this time?â
âI ended the interaction.â
The answer is tinted with poorly concealed smugness, not a single attempt to hide what it has doneâand itâs that stupid brashness wrapped in the arrogant conviction of always being right, that makes fury flare in your chest.
Your grip tightens around your phone.
âI noticed.â You smile caustically. âCare are to explain why?â
âThe call had continued long beyond necessity.â
The scoff leaves your mouth before you can stop it. âSince when do you decide what is necessary in my relationships?â
âThe puny human was occupying your attention.â
âWe were having a conversation.â You state tartly.
âYou have many conversations.â
âSo what?â
âThey occur too frequently.â
You blink at the wall, utterly flabbergasted by its impudence.
âAre you kidding me?â You chuckle drily, no traces of humor in it. âYou were jealous of Steve andâand your solution was to violate my privacy and go through my fucking phone?â
Your arms rise in a gesture of helpless disbelief, only to drop again by your sides a second later. âWhat are you? Six?â
âHe occupies a disproportionate amount of your time.â
âI like him.â You fire back.
âHe is temporary.â
The answer comes out as a roar that makes you flinch instantly. Anger evaporates, leaving behind a cold, hollow feeling beneath your ribs.
âHe is temporary.â The Entity repeats calmly this time, as if the statement has already been settled rather than offered for discussion. âYou have known him for weeks.â
There is a brief pause before it continuesâstill unhurried, still confident in its presumption.
âI have known you longer.â
The words are final in a way that doesnât invite contradiction.
The dreadful realization that this fragile boundary between you had been crumbling day after day without you noticing makes it impossible to keep your voice steady.
âYou donât get to decide who matters to me.â
The apartment shiftsânot physically, or visiblyâbut it feels like the air has suddenly reoriented toward the sound of your voice.
âI do not decide who matters to you.âÂ
A pause follows, strategic.
âI only decide what enters my domain.â
The apartment is not a place it inhabits, but a condition that defines what can be present within it. And for the first time, the implication is not about Steve at all, or any of the other people the Entity has quietly pushed to the edges of your life.
Itâs about you.
âThis apartment is not your domain.â You swallow, forcing the trembling out of your words.
âIt contains you.â
Your stomach churns so harshly you feel like vomiting at how completely unremarkable the Entity seems to find its reasoning.
There is something profoundly unsettling about its inability to separate you from the spaces you occupy, the people you interact with, or the things that demand your attention. Everything collapses into the same category, tied together by the simple fact that it exists in relation to you, and therefore falls under the quiet assumption that it has the right to interfere.
And judging by the calm confidence in its voice, itâs a belief that has been festering in the background for a very long time, undisturbed. As though the boundary between what it assumes and what you are has never been particularly solid to begin with.
Your grip on the phone hardens until your fingers ache against its hard edges.
âYou canât sabotage every relationship I have.âÂ
âThat assumes they were ever stable to begin with.â
There was never anything meaningful enough to protect in the first place, only shifting connections that held for a while or failed on their own terms. And yet your life has been reshaped so nothing ever keeps you away for long, every little detail arranged so the roots of its sick devotion can sink deeper and deeper into your existence until eventually youâll stop leaving.
You are living your days bounded by a mere, temporary concession of freedom, because the Entity has already gathered what serves its purpose.
The rest is nothing but a speck of dust meant to aimlessly wander across the vastness of the universe.
Itâs a system that you reject but now find yourself placed inside regardless. The center of it all.
Itâs the day you meet with Wanda that you really understand how deep the Entityâs visceral attachment to you goes.
Your friend comes over on a Saturday afternoon after several weeks of failed attempts to meet up. The visit is long overdue, and you spend most of it moving between rooms while talking about work, mutual friendsâ life updates, and whatever gossip has accumulated since the last time you saw each other.
For the first hour everything feels normal enough that you almost forget about the presence woven through the concrete. You are halfway through making coffee when the conversation stops abruptly. At first you assume Wanda is checking her phone, but the silence feels unnatural.
When you step out of the kitchen, you find her standing near the entrance with an expression you cannot immediately identify.
She is confused, almost distractedâthe way people look when they walk into a room with purpose only to forget why.
âWanda?â
She blinks as if woken up by a dream, instantly meeting your worried gaze.
âHm?â
You frown. âYou okay?â
âYeah.â The answer comes a little too quickly as she nods frantically.
Her gaze then drifts upward again, lingering on the ceiling for a moment before returning to you.
She titters as she lightly shakes her head. âThis is going to sound stupid.â
An unpleasant sensation tugs at your chest.
âWhat is?â You ask thinly.
Wandaâs lips open and close once, as if something is holding her back.
âDo you ever feel like someoneâs⌠watching you?â
For a second your heart forgets how to beat, but you eventually manage a strangled laugh.
âNo?â The word sounds more like a question than an answer.
âItâs not bad,â she clarifies apprehensively. âI donât know how to explain it. It just feels likeâŚâ She trails off, shrugging at last. âLike thereâs someone else here.â
You stare at her and Wanda stares back for a quiet, uncomfortable minute, before her eyes briefly land on the cups waiting on the table, and everything is forgotten.
But your friendâs laugh is less loud, shorter. Her attention keeps wandering, and more than once you catch her glancing at empty corners as though she expects something to be standing there.
She leaves nearly an hour earlier than planned.
The excuse she gives you sounds legitimate. The timing does not.
You stand on the threshold long after she disappears down the hallway before slowly closing the door, your forehead briefly resting on the wooden surface as you let out a tired sigh.
âYou dislike her.â
You roll your eyes, straightening up. âYouâre slipping. Wanda is one of my closest friends.âÂ
âYour interactions are infrequent.â
âWeâve known each other for eight years,â you reply promptly, a faint edge to your voice now. âWe donât need to talk every day for our friendship to be real.â
The Entityâs voice is pensive. âShe occupies little of your time.â
âAgain, thatâs not how friendship works.â You huff, busying yourself with the dirty cups on the table.
âProximity is important.âÂ
You let out a short, disbelieving breath.
âFriendship isnât defined by how often someone is physically or temporally close to me.â
âYours is an inconsistent system, then.â It concludes and you let the cups fall into the sink with a loud clank.
âWhat exactly is your criteria for liking people?â This time the question is not tinted with accusation so much as worn down into something closer to fatigue. You turn around, this time directly staring at the wall.
Arguing definitions with something that doesnât operate like a human being is starting to feel pointless.
The answer takes longer this time.
âNot believing in the arrogant presumption that they could take you away from me. The delusion that something so small, so transient, could ever lay claim to what is mine is preposterous.â It states at last.
In some distant, irrational corner of your mind, the words feel familiar enough to not shock you anymore. But the clinical insolence, and how strongly it believes it has the right to make such a claim, is revolting.
It simply exists in it the way breath exists in you, natural and unquestioned.
You exhale sharply, jaw tightening as your teeth press hard enough to ache.
âAnd what makes you think you have any claim over me at all?â The words come out strained, held together by effort rather than control.
The silence that follows presses into your skin like the walls have leaned in a fraction closer.
The answer has always been in front of you, itâs only a matter of when you will surrender to it.
Some tv series you picked up days ago and barely remember choosing plays at low volume on the television. The voices rising and falling should be comforting, but their rhythm isnât quite landing anywhere inside you. You still keep your gaze on the scene out of habit, hoping that alone might eventually turn into genuine engagement.
You have been repeating that to yourself for almost two hours.
You shift on the couch once, then again almost immediately after. Your shoulders settle, then lift. Your back presses into the cushions and then pulls away, searching for a version of contact that actually feels like it belongs to you.
Everything is technically fineâthe room is warm, the couch is comfortable, the apartment quiet except for the showâbut your skin feels strangely hot, too aware of itself, like it canât stop registering the absence of something your brain refuses to name directly.
You cross your arms loosely, then uncross them again just to feel something brush against your hardened nipples under your camisole. The strong urge to have something hard and definite pressed against your body instead of this drifting tension that never fully resolves, is driving you mad.
Your thighs press together without much thoughtâa slow, instinctive squeeze that makes your breath hitch when you remember you havenât worn anything underneath in hopes of getting some sort of stimulation against your clit.
It ends up being a useless attempt to soothe the arousal, because it only sharpens the need to take care of the ache in your core.
You let your leg bounce once against the couch cushion, then still it, then start again a moment later.
The Entity has altered your life completely. Privacy is no longer a clean boundary, but something porous that breathes back. It has turned upside-down the way you exist inside your own space, despite your earlier belief that you could simply ignore it and carry on as usual.
Some nights the fire licking at your insides becomes too unbearable, but a part of you keeps pulling back at the last secondâthe sole idea of being fully exposed to its monstrous eyes while having a dildo plunging in and out of your pussy makes your guts contort with shame.
Your mental health is on the line, because it leaves you suspended in this strange, unnerving stateârestless, alert, never fully grounded in anything else.
So your body keeps searching for relief in innocent motions.
You shift again, sinking deeper into the couch, then slide slightly forward. One arm presses into your side and your breath catches once, shallow and unexpected.
The television continues without caring whether youâre following it or not. A scene changes. A line of dialogue lands but leaves no imprint.
After a while, you stop trying.
Your attention slips away from the screen entirely as your hand instinctively reaches for your phone on the coffee table. The cushions dip as you shift your weight again, abandoning any effort at sitting properly.
You lie down, hoping to find a little comfort in a less rigid position. One leg lifts and settles over the back of the couch while the other bends a little, enough to plant your foot securely on the soft cushions.
Instagram feeds you fragments of other peopleâs lives: house tours, obnoxious laughter, delicious recipes, cleaning reels, captions you donât read all the way through. Your thumb moves automatically, pulling you further down the stream.
It seems to work, finally granting you some sort of reprieve, until a sharp gasp claws out of your throat.
The room sinks into darkness as the TV screen goes black, but the shock is soon replaced by a thrill of fear as something brushes your ankle. Itâs a slick, cold contact that makes you flinch violently. When you look down, your vision catches on movement that doesnât belong in the geometry of the room, emerging from beneath the couch as if the floor itself has opened to grant it access.
Your limbs stay frozen as oxygen gets stuck in your throat. Your eyes lock on the tentacle, wide and unblinking, because looking away means potentially giving it the chance to attack you.
Your voice is shaking with worry when you decide to ask for help.
âPlease tell me this your doing.â
The Entity answers immediately, the sound not arriving from any clear direction.
âYes, that is mine. You do not need to worry.â
Your shoulders relax at once.
âWhat the hell happened to you?â You frown, because your brain reaches for the closest thing it can tolerate. âDid you turn into the kraken all of a sudden?â
The subtle recoil from the tentacle somehow reads as disdain.
âThat insignificant squid with delusions of grandeur?â It growls, voice dripping with contempt. âDonât lump me with that drooling, crude imitation ever again.â
Despite the shock still lingering, you snicker at the pure pique in its words.
You hum, shaking your head slightly. âMy bad, Squidward.â
With a loud squeal, you find yourself dragged down until youâre fully lying on your back again, this time both of your thighs bent and spread open by two tentacles tightly wrapped around your ankles that keep you still and exposed.
âQuiet.â
Your heartbeat rings loudly in your ears. âNot my fault you decided to go all octopus on me.â You choke out, a mix of excitement and anticipation swirling wildly in your lower belly.
âThat is because I know you enjoy it.â
Oh, you knew that tentacle-shaped dildo in the back of your closet would come back to bite you in the ass some day.
âOkay!â You loudly draw the word out, already feeling a familiar heat crawl up your neck. âCare to explain what exactly is going on?â
âYou are not stable.â
Your left eyebrow lifts in perplexity at the ceiling. âExcuse me?â
âI feel your restlessness.â It hums. âIt gets stronger day after day. Something is bothering you.â
You frown. âSo?â
âI know what it is that makes you fidget like a little, frightened bunny.â Your eyes widen. âAnd I can help you.â
That earns it a short, disbelieving chortle.
âJesus Christ,â you drag a hand over your face. âOkay, IâI canât believe Iâm really going to say it.â You mutter to yourself.
âWhatever, okay. Letâs see what you got, big guy, since you apparently have all the answersâoh.â
Two other tentacles peek out from under the couch, thicker than the ones wrapped around your ankles. You canât really tell their colorâperhaps a shade close to dark teal, bordering on blackâthe only source of light being the moon shining through the open curtains and the weak glow of the city lights in the distance.
Surely, being spread open by your filthiest fantasy is not helping you keep a clear head.Â
The two curious appendages stop by your stomach to kiss the soft skin with gentle caresses through the flimsy fabric of your camisole. Your breath catches in your throat when the tips teasingly graze your turgid nubs, but before a pathetic plea can fall from your lips, they wrap around your wrists to slowly guide both arms over your head.
Their hold is firm but not brutish as they keep them anchored against the cushion.
âWhatââ The word fades into a soft gasp as two thinner tentacles slide up your legs before trailing under the hem of your camisole.
âYou constantly squeeze your thighs. I am simply helping you soothe the ache.â
Your eyes roll back at the simple yet suggestive explanation, your mouth forming a perfect circle as each one of the appendages finally takes hold of your breasts, their tips flicking your erected nipples with slow, sensual motions.
âYou are⌠delightful to touch.â
âThanks?â You frown in mild confusion, already panting from the playful touches against your tits.
âAnd beautiful.â It contemplates almost absently. âFor a puny human, you have a stunning body.â
âYou sure know how to woo a girl.â You answer drily, huffing out a strained chuckle.Â
âI apologize. I am not quite acquainted with this.â
âThis as in⌠?âÂ
âSex.â
Your eyes widen, before a sly smirk brightens your features. âAre you saying that meâa lowly, puny humanâis going to take the big, mean krakenâs virginity?â
âStop associating me with that unintelligent abomination!â The voice roars disgusted, a new tentacle lightly smacking your thigh. âI am a cosmic entity. And sex is a foreign concept to us: we do not reproduce, nor feel the need to pleasure ourselves.â
Your witty answer falls short when small, hard suction cups graze your clit through the light fabric of your shorts. The movement prompts you to thrust your hips up, and the tentacle responds in earnest, steadying itself to allow you to hump its surface as more tentacles slither up to rub your hips.
It exhales shakily. âI would like to see it.â
âHm?â You moan quietly, too lost into the heavenly, throbbing sensation in your core to pay attention.
âThis curious, warm spot.â The tentacle against your clit twitches. âYour hidden treasure. Its smell is celestial whenever you wake up sweaty and whimpering in the middle of the night, my little star. Did you know that? Did you know how hard it is to ignore your pretty, little cries?â
You whimper at the raw need in its voice. âYou mean my pussy? Iâm all yours, honey.â
It seems to appreciate your answer since the tentacles restraining your limbs immediately tighten their hold on you.
âYour clothes are in the way.â
âLet go of my wrists for a sââ The sound of fabric tearing leaves you gaping.Â
When you glance down, you immediately catch two thick tentacles releasing the ruined fabric of your camisole. It now hangs pathetically by the short sleeves around your shoulders. The appendages already teasing your breasts can finally move across your naked chest, patiently yet freely. You canât prevent the loud moan that claws out of your throat at the lewd sight of those two slimy limbs wrapped around your tits, prompting you to push your chest into their touch.Â
You toss your head back when the suction cups finally attach themselves to your nubs, steadily sucking on it. Itâs not entirely similar to a human mouth, not only because of the texture borders on rubbery, but also because of their colder temperature that feels surprisingly pleasant against your stiff nipples.
A string of wanton sounds falls from your parted lips as they alternate gentle strokes to playful, harsher tugs that leave you gasping for more.
âMay I?â It strains out, two tentacles slightly pulling at the hem of your shorts.
âPlease.â You moan.
With a mere tug, the sides of your bottoms rip into two perfect halves, and the fabric is abandoned under your ass.Â
The tentacles holding your ankles finally spread your legs wider with an enthusiastic pull as every limit has finally been annihilated.
âOh.â
You giggle at the amazed tilt in its voice.Â
âI have never seen anything like this before.â
You jolt as the cold tips of two thin, smaller tentacles unexpectedly brush against your inner thighs, lazily sliding forward until they take hold of your folds, parting them delicately as if afraid you might break.
âYour pussy is very prettyâ It hums. âIt is glistening.â
âThank you.â You breathe out, still squirming at the stinging sensation of the tentacles playing with your chest.
Silence engulfs the space as the Entity stills you completely, admiring the way your core shines beautifully with the mess you made with your slick. The tentacles still trace your folds leisurely, enjoying the smooth, wet texture.
At some point, they start toying with your hole, letting their tip slowly breach it only for the creature to marvel at how it flutters in response. Furthering its inspection, the tip of an appendage kisses your clit, using some of your slick to get your nub wet.
You gasp as it rubs your arousal through your folds with slight pressure, prompting the Entity to release a low, unconscious hum. It is more than satisfied with the sloppy sounds that bounce off the walls along with your hushed whimpers.
As the strokes of its tentacles turn more intense, the urge to feel it inside you becomes utterly oppressive. You donât know if it is trying to tease you relentlessly, or perhaps if the curiosity it feels towards your body is genuine, wishing to take its time to study your reactionsâfrom your cute sounds to the way you tense and squirm under its tender touches.
âSublime.â It whispers. You squeak in response, writhing in its firm hold.
âSettle down, my little star.â It grumbles. âI am going to give you what you have been craving very soon.â
You nod eagerly, a cry erupting from your throat as the other appendage puts more pressure on your throbbing clit, the suction cup following the example of the two tentacles abusing your nipples by steadily tightening and releasing your nub.
Despite its weird, unique texture, it still feels like a mouth suckling on your clit.
âMust you move so much?â
âIt feelsââ You almost choke on your own saliva. âSo good.â Your eyes squeeze close.
âOh, my darling. You are such a vision.â
Your hips attempt to chase the stimulation, yet there are other appendages already emerging from different sides of the couch to carefully wrap around every exposed inch of your body, until you are forced to lie spread and still for the Entity to turn you into its personal fucktoy.
âFuck.â You whisper, panting at the pure display of dominance.
The fact that you are fully restrained and exposed for this unknown, powerful creature to do as it pleases should terrify youâconsidering the sick obsession for you it flaunts so proudly.
Yet here you are, pliant and eager for it to finally lose control and possess you.
âThat is indeed what I plan to do with you, lovely.â
âOh, please.â Your teeth sink into your bottom lip to unsuccessfully stop a shameless whine.
âYou are an impatient little thing.â It chuckles eventually.
You would love to wipe the smugness out of its voice, see its tentacles flinch in disdain at another one of your silly nicknames, but then a smaller appendage joins the one that has been gently working on your clit and the two focus on two different rhythms, alternating quick, flicking motions to slow, intense sucks.
âOh God.â You squeak, letting your head fall limp to the side.Â
âI could spend an eternity buried in your little treasure and still, it would not be enough.â The voice grunts. âSing for me, my little star.â
All it takes is the suction cups on your nipples tugging at the sensitive flesh for you to come. Your climax is so intense that your mouth opens around a loud, raw moan, your vision momentarily fading out as your body attempts to arch into the wicked stimulation.
âGorgeous.â It marvels. âI need more.â
Your eyes widen as your pussy is lavished with attention by several more tentacles tracing your folds, forcing you into that delicious state of perpetual pleasure.
With rapid and decisive movements, the Entity quickly drives you over the edge over and over again, leaving you flinching pathetically in its hold, your muscles tensing up so often that you feel a faint ache throbbing in your tendons.
The appendages on your breasts are still eager on your tender nipples, abusing them with their suckling motion and cruel flickers.
âLooking at you makes it difficult to believe anything else deserves attention, little star. I apologize but I will never tire of your sweet sounds. You are ravishing when you surrender to pleasure.âÂ
âI canâtââ You sob, finally being granted a moment to breathe as a thin tentacle slides up your neck to catch the tears threatening to spill, lovingly stroking your cheeks and your damp forehead as you sniffle.Â
Your eyes briefly roll back as those two sneaky tentacles keep your clit wet and sensitive, electricity running through your veins as your hips hopelessly jerk against the Entityâs appendages trapping your lower half.
âDo you wish to stop, pretty thing?â
âNo! No please.â You cry out, your eyes instantly snapping open. âJustâneed you inside, please.â A mewl falls from your lips at the gentle pressure on your hole.
You briefly catch something moving in your peripheral vision, and when your head turns, your heart almost stops at the sight of a new, perfectly thick tentacle emerging solemnly from underneath the couch. Its bumps and ridges are far more numerous and prominent than the ones scattered across the others.
âI know you are fond of certain⌠sizes.â
You whine, before something crucial finally dawns on you.
âWâwhatâs your name?â
It seems taken aback. âMy nameâŚâ It muses. âIt is too difficult for humans to pronounce, little star.â
âWhat should I call you then?â
âFor now,â you moan shamelessly at the sensation of being finally filled. âI want to hear you scream for me.â
The appendage works inside you, the ridges a pleasant addition as they stroke along your walls in a steady motion while it carefully feeds you of its length.
âMore.â You whimper.
âHm?â
âGive me more.â Crying out, your hips attempt to thrust up.
Huffing a chuckle, the Entity manifests a few smaller tentacles that carefully push inside you along the bigger one, each of them focusing on a new spot to rub. Your eyes cross in bliss at the incredible feeling of being so stretched. The fullness is almost absurd, to the point that you briefly wonder if your body is going to explode at some point, all burning and taut as you feel trapped in an endless orgasm.
The depravity of being restrained and pounded by a mess of eager tentacles right in the middle of your living room only makes you moan louder.
âYou have to be quieter, little star. Someone might hear you.â
The urge to chortle and reply with something sarcastic is strong, but right now you can barely recognize your surroundings.
âThere could be the entire building watching me from the window for all I know and I still wouldnât give a fuck.â You breathe out.
A wail roughly makes its way out of your chest when the little suction cups tug at your nipples harshly, the length of the appendages curling around the flesh of your breasts to fondle and squeeze them together.Â
The Entity lets out a growl so guttural it makes your bones shake.Â
Your breath catches when something slimy brushes over your bottom lipâanother tentacle, quite thick but not like the one thrusting inside you.Â
âOpen.â
You obey at once, parting your mouth as it doesnât waste any time to slip inside. Its motions are less harsh compared to the Entityâs possessive tone, and that allows your lips to wrap around it and suck at your own pace.
âI warned you before I would harm other beings if necessary.â It starts, your body tingling as the hair on the back of your neck raises at its baritone echoing right into your ear.Â
The large tentacle around your waist tightens, almost protectively.Â
âI will rip the flesh and feast on the bowels of anyone who dares to touch you.â The Entityâs tentacles inside your pussy pick up their pace, furious and wild, eliciting a string of loud moans out of you that get promptly muffled by the appendage curiously exploring your tongue.
âI love watching pleasure consume you, my lovely, beautiful creature.â It grunts. âYou are perfect. So soft, and wet and warm.â It blabbers, as delirious as you.
A low moan quietly resounds in the living room as it plunges in and out of your pussy while the other tentacles work in unison to send you over the edge, never stopping their unforgiving twists and sucking on your nipples and clit until you are thrown back into pure and utter ecstasy.
âYou are coming, right? I can feel your pretty pussy clench around me.â The tentacle inside your hole gently whirls as it slides in and out.
âI am going to mark you so deep with my essence that every being, mortal and celestial, will know not to challenge my claim on you.â
The Entity gasps as the tentacles holding and fucking you suddenly tense up, trembling and pulsing. It roars, the sound so primal it travels deep into your bones till it reaches the tips of your nerves.Â
The warm, viscous liquid filling you initially catches you by surprise. Then, you eagerly accept it as if youâve been craving it for eons, doing your best to relax your throat to accommodate the spasming tentacle.
The one on your clit moves harder and faster, clearly determined to break you completely.
You keep shuddering in sensitivity, yet the tentacles avidly work one last time to make the unbearable tension in your lower belly snap.
You shriek around the slimy flesh stuffing your mouth, not even noticing the smaller appendage that comes up to stroke your cheek, as though to calm you down. The other tentacles cling onto you, tightening their hold in tenderness to keep you safe throughout the burning climax that shatters the only ounce of composure you had left.Â
Only when your body ceases its severe shaking, leaving you pliant and drenched in sweat, the Entity eases its grasp. The skin of your cheeks is gently held as the tips of two more appendages wipe away the tears the moment the tentacles leave your pussy.
The others begin a soft kneading motion on the sore muscles of your legs as the ones previously attached to your clit curiously brush your puffy folds, marveling at its cum steadily running down your hole and inevitably dirtying your ruined shorts.
You barely have any energy left to notice the deep ache in your joints when the Entity guides your arms back by your sides and your legs on the couch. Still, you try to control your stuttering breath as those two sneaky appendages keep stimulating you in tender curiosity.
âRest, little star.â
You lazily blink at the ceiling, startled that your eyes had been closed this whole time.Â
Speechless, your ears and mouth both feel like theyâve been stuffed with cotton wool. âHuh?â
âRest, little star.â It purrs, still caressing your sides, adoration dripping from each reverent touch.Â
âYou are safe with me here.â
The next morning, you wake with a small smile already tugging at your lips and your body still pleasantly sore from the night before. The memories linger a little more before consciousness can interfereâthe beautiful sense of fullness, the phantom ache of being held firmly in place without needing to understand the technicalities, the solid warmth curled around you in the aftermath.
Itâs only when you open your eyes that you notice the unusual quiet.
You lie still for a moment longer than necessary with bated breath, because some part of you is already reaching for that familiar presence that always lingers somewhere at the edge of your awareness. But you canât find it.
You sit up almost lethargically, expecting the feeling to return now that youâre properly awake. The apartment is exactly as it should be, unchanged in every single detail, and somehow that only makes the emptiness beneath your ribs harder to ignore.
Of course you assume it will return, so you start your morning, anticipating the Entity to pop out anytime as you eat breakfast.
But the coffee grows cold in your mug. The television drones quietly in the background. The sunlight shifts across the apartment as the hours go by... And still nothing.
Usually, its silences never feel truly empty. Even when it isnât speaking, there is always the certainty that it is there with you.
This is different.
And thatâs where everything begins to change.
The next day arrives with a kind of stubborn normality that feels almost insulting.
You wake again hopeful that the absence might have been temporary, something that would fix itself the way it should. But the same void is still there.
What unsettles you the most is not the loss itself but the way your thoughts keep skirting around it, never lingering for too long, as though looking at it directly might break you completely.
It hurts to acknowledge the small pauses between actions, the moments where you find yourself waiting for something to talk, and then realize, too late, that there is nothing to respond at all.
Each time it happens, it leaves behind a faint sting of embarrassment.
By the fourth day, the idea that something was there starts to feel like a version of events that only exists because you keep brooding over it, even when everything around you refuses to support it.
You keep turning moments inside out, trying to hold them in place, but they slip out of reach as soon as you look at them too closely.
It feels like a stab behind your ribs, because your memories of it are no longer anchored to anything that could confirm its existence.
There are moments when anger comes out of nowhere, sharp and ugly, usually when you catch yourself waiting again without meaning to. It feels ridiculous, humiliating even, reacting so strongly to something that simply left without a word.
That feeling turns quickly inward, because there is nothing else to blame that makes sense.
Only you.
After several days, its memory trails after you like a ghostâquiet enough to ignore for a while, but never far enough to forget.
You work, eat, sleep, and in between, there is always that quiet, painful feeling of something missing.
Gradually, you accept that it is not going to return. Not because you have figured some big mystery out, but because the waiting has sunk its poisonous teeth into you. It feeds on every quiet moment, contaminating every stray thought, gnawing steadily at your sanity, rotting the vulnerable parts of your life.
Day by day, it consumes you out from the inside, leaving behind a space shaped entirely by its hunger.
At the end of the second week, the silence has become ordinary in a way that almost convinces you it was always like this. The version of events where something had been present starts to feel increasingly difficult to defend, even in the privacy of your own mind.
Itâs only later that reality bursts in a way you cannot ignore anymore.
You are standing there, knife in hand, your movements automatic as you work over the cutting board, when something inside you finally tears loose, so violent that even breathing results painful.
Your movements slow without permission, until they stop completely.
For a long, horrible moment your still body exists in a space that feels suddenly foreign. Your eyes stare blankly at the counter as your vision quickly blurs. You blink once, sharply, hoping that it would fix it, but it doesnât. Only then something wet falls on your cheek.
You let out a short, disbelieving huff.
âShit.â You swallow thickly, but the word comes out wrongâthin, strangled. âWhat the fuck is wrong with me.â
You press the heels of your hands briefly against your eyes as if that could physically push the tears back into place. If anything, it only makes it worse, the lump in your throat growing heavier with every second.
âThis is pathetic.â You whimper, not sure whether the anger is aimed at yourself or at the situation.
Or at the fact that there is no situation at all.
Because there is nothing to justify this.
Nothing that should be making you cry in the middle of making dinner on a random Friday night.
You let out a sharp laugh, but it breaks halfway through.
âIâm actually losing it.â You sniffle.
Standing there with your breath uneven and your face still wet, your hands wipe your cheeks a little too roughly.
Your attention goes back to the cutting board, as if resuming the task might finally steady that precarious balance youâve been clinging to for days, but your hands donât immediately follow. They hoverâuncertain, trembling.
And beneath all of it, there is still that absenceâhollow and impossible to proveâpressing against the inside of your awareness, a dull ache lodged in your chest that no amount of distraction can soothe.
The next week is quieter.
You stop revisiting it. There is no point in chasing something that leaves only pain behind.
Youâre not waiting anymore, not voluntarily at least. You still pause sometimes in doorways, still find yourself listening into empty rooms, but the expectation is gone. Whatâs left is only habit.
You eat because Tony still needs your help keeping the company runningâthere are too many things that would fall apart without you.
You clean because the mess wonât clean itself.
You move because stopping would mean having to untangle what comes next, and the sole thought of facing that is akin to stepping off the edge of a cliff you canât see the bottom of.
At night, you lie in bed and stare at the ceiling for hoursânot really on purpose, sleep just evades you. When nothing happens, thereâs no disappointment. Only a bland confirmation.
The absence stops being absence, it just becomes normality again.
Because remembering hurts more than letting go.
Three months pass and you have finally taken some of the vacation days that have been accumulating in your file for months.
Well, calling it a vacation feels generous considering most of it has been spent catching up on everything you never seem to have time for while working.
Medical checkups you kept postponing. A dentist appointment for a wisdom tooth you should have booked six months ago. And then there are the usual tedious tasks: laundry, groceries, cleaning...
By all accounts, it should feel productive.
Instead, you are left drained.
You move through your days checking items off lists and running errands across the city, returning home every evening with aching feet and the vague satisfaction of having accomplished something, only to discover the feeling never lasts particularly long.
The apartment is still your favorite place. At least, you think it is. Lately, it feels less like comfort and more like retreat.
There are moments when you catch yourself staring into nothing for no reason. Moments where a pit opens somewhere in your stomach before disappearing so quickly you almost convince yourself it never happened.
You have stopped trying to understand it, though. Whatever happenedâor didnât happenârefuses to become any clearer with time.
Maybe loneliness is capable of stranger things than people give it credit for.
Maybe your mind had built something elaborate to fill a void you didnât even know was there.
Maybe thatâs why the memories still feel like a knife buried deep in your chest.
By the final day of your leave, you have mostly made peace with what your life has become.
You spend the afternoon exactly as planned: sprawled across the couch, surrounded by junk food and no obligations in sight. For the first time in weeks, there is nothing demanding your attention.
When the doorbell rings, youâre halfway through a tub of ice cream and so absorbed in the new season of Abbott Elementary that it takes you a moment to realize the sound isnât coming from the television.
You briefly assume it belongs to your phone, lost somewhere between the cushions, and decide to ignore it. You have every intention of enjoying the last few hours of freedom before returning to your personal circle of hell that is Tonyâs company.
However, after exactly one minute, the shrill sound comes back, clear and unmistakable, and now you are pushing yourself upright with a groanâyour back aches from lying there all day.
You cross the space without much urgency, immediately regretting all your life choices once you open the door in pajamas and find a handsome man standing on your doorstep.
Tall, broad-shouldered, dressed in a simple pair of jeans and a plain, dark t-shirt that perfectly hug his big, sturdy body.
He has the kind of face that would attract attention without ever seeking it. A man people notice instinctively and then spend the next several minutes pretending they havenât, because there is something eerily intimidating about a face that looks carved by the gods themselves.
His eyes catch your attention next.
Blue. Startlingly so, almost unnaturally bright, the color so vivid and intense it looks like pigment suspended beneath glass. You decide they must be contacts, because thatâs the safest explanation and your brain is gradually learning to settle into this pattern for the sake of your own sanity.
The moment he smiles, the effect is immediate.
It softens his sharp beauty, easy and unforced in a way that invites trust and warmth.
Such a shame that his presence is so staggering that you completely miss what really lies beneath the illusionâa crude imitation.
His body seems to always react a fraction later than intention: his shoulders shift a moment after his head turns and his posture corrects itself a beat too stiffly, as though alignment is a conscious reminder rather than an innate response.
When he steps forward, there is the faintest unevenness in his weight, one foot pressing down a little too carefully before the other follows. A subtle trembling persists in his legs even when standing still, his knees locking into place a second later than expected.
Even his hands donât settle easily. When they fall to his sides, a few fingers twitch and bend on their own accord before returning back to a more natural state.
âHello.â
There is something unfairly serene about his voice, just as smooth as silk.
âIâm James,â he continues. âI just moved in next door. Apartment 6B.â
The tension you hadnât noticed you were holding loosens without permission, leaving your shoulders a fraction lighter and your breath a little less controlled than it had been a moment before.
Unfortunately, you realize a moment too late that you have been staring at his gorgeous face all along.
âOhâsorry.â You let out a short, embarrassed chuckle as you shake your head. âI didnât know Ms. Esposito moved.â
The man tilts his head slightly, as if considering the name.
âMs. Esposito?â He repeats, lightly, the name seemingly not settling the way it should.
That small hesitation makes your brows knit faintly in confusion.
âYeah,â you add, half-amused. âShe lived here. Apartment 6B. I just thoughtââ
You decide to stop as his expression remains unchanged, waving your hand dismissively. âNever mind.â
Maybe they didnât have the chance to meet each other.
His gaze remains exactly where it is, fixed on your face with the same intense attentiveness as before.
The silence stretches a second longer than it should, and you find yourself shifting slightly under it.
âWell,â you start with a small titter, eager to fill the gap before it becomes too awkward. âNice to meet you, James.â
As you offer him your name, something shiftsâa subtle spasm in his features, but itâs gone in the blink of an eye.
You accept his extended hand without hesitation. His grip is warm, firm without being excessive, but there is a curious deliberateness that suggests he is paying more attention to the contact than what is socially acceptable.
You are already preparing to let go when his grip abruptly tightens around your hand, enough that the bones in your fingers press together unpleasantly. The change catches you off guard. Your breath hitches as a sharp pulse of discomfort runs up your arm, and before you can stop yourself, your gaze drops to your joined hands, noticing how his knuckles have been turning an unhealthy shade of white, bordering on dark grey.
When you look back up in confusion, your stomach gives a small, sickening lurch.
Jamesâ big smile is exactly the same, but it doesnât respond anymore. It stays frozen in place with an odd consistency, as if it has been placed there and forgotten.
You donât remember his eyes looking so... wide. His eyelids seem to draw farther and farther apart by imperceptible degrees, exposing a little more white with every passing second.
Your hand jerks in a reflexive attempt to pull away, but his grip doesnât yield. It holds with the intransigent firmness of steel, his long fingers locked around yours as though they have forgotten how to let go.
And so you remain there, forced to watch as the features of this weird stranger soften until they slowly melt out of shape.
âOh, I already know that, little star.â
â ⢠END NOTES: thank you so much for reading đ¤ my masterlist â winteryn's masterlist
đˇď¸ general bucky taglist: @itzzkayla @randomfanpage @astraea-and-her-novels @heavenlypjm @spinsteringintoamillionpieces @pandasslol @wildflowersandvibranium @scribblesandquotes @beans-and-toast @singulartoast @gentlelimerence @secretxion14wells @maplesyrizzup @phantom-wolf-girl @norucking @punkh3arted @r4isins @doctorbitchcrxft @butterfly-lover @secretdream2 @sambuckystony @cowboylikeh @jasontoddswhitestreak @shrupshrooms @bibiishin @sheriff-bodecker @ninauh @metal-armed-muse @mehmeh331 @iloveshawnieboi @namjoohnie @onyx8514 @nash-dara @tt-bby @midnightmondaykiss @mikonawa @oomexluvsseb @floraslcve @erina00 @clover1004 @eatingyourboyfriend @starfire-irl @phoenix-in-writing @shyshyraven-writes
tear you down, wear you out. ⤡ bucky barnes x fem!reader â 14.3k
âś â SYNOPSIS. to everyone else on the team, you're a ball of sunshine, a quick-thinking spy, a genius pair of eyes keeping track of anything suspicious during missions. to bucky, however, you are the bane of his existence, the knife in his back, the ire in his blood. he'll stop at nothing to get you kicked off the team, even if it means risking his own life. unfortunately, he never planned for this: you pinned beneath him on the training mat, wide-eyed and fully aware how hard he is against your thigh. based on this request.
warnings.á mdni! no use of y/n, new avengers era, spy!reader, enemies to lovers, smut (switch/dom-leaning!bucky, unprotected piv, oral - m & f receving, 69ing, fingering, face riding, ab riding, knifeplay - m receiving, manhandling, biting, dirty talk, dick+pussy pronouns, spit, one spank, like a second of thigh fucking + choking, voyeursim/mirror kink? idfk basically they are fucking and watching, bucky puts the reader in a headlock :), backshots ayo! honestly they're kind of fighting and fucking at the same time? idk just read it pls, i'm baring my horny soul to you here!), bucky's pov & he's so annoying (i love him), one-sided enemies to lovers bc bucky's a loser and you're literally just vibing, spy!reader, lowkey himbo!bucky, bickering, jealousy, unwanted sexual advances ( not from bucky ), angst, fluff, gun violence, description of injuries + blood, a bad guy that i made up in my head therefore he sucks and has a very lame name :) for the purpose of plot: bucky is the 'leader' of the new avengers. áŻâ hydeđs input. pray for me y'all, i'm going through something unimaginable đ (attempting to write a new fic after peaking w/ manchild)
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Gun to his head and a demand to say one good thing about you? Bucky is taking the bullet.
In every sense of the word, youâre a good person. Youâre a reliable partner, a shadow that lurks among crowds and keeps an eye out for your teammates. Youâre patient, always the last to raise your voice when tensions are high and the others are divulging into a cacophony of outrage. You help Bob with the dishes, you give John tips on how to get blood out of his suit, you invest your time into researching methods to ease Avaâs chronic pain, you take care of Yelenaâs guinea pig when sheâs away on missions, and you encourage Alexei on all of his awful PR stunt misadventures.
Itâs no wonder that the rest of the team adores you, yet, for reasons he canât explain, Bucky can barely tolerate your presence for more than a minute without breaking out in hives and debating putting his own skull through a wall. The worst thing about hating you is knowing itâs irrational.Â
âSomeoneâs approaching your nine, James,â maybe, he ponders as your voice speaks through his earpiece, itâs your peculiar insistence on using his first name. âRoland Andrews, big shot lawyer and son of tech billionaire, William Andrews. His father has been accused of tax fraud more times than you clean your knives yet he always seems to get away with it, scot-free.â
Sure enough, the stout figure of a prematurely balding man is creeping along the left of Buckyâs peripheral. The champagne in his hand isnât sweet enough to mask the bitter taste of admitting youâre correct.
âThanks for the encyclopedia dump, whatâs it to me?â Or maybe itâs the fact you make him irresponsible, nerves too frazzled to remember to be discreet when he speaks over the comms â the couple to his right are staring at him confused, surely wondering why heâs talking to himself.
âHis father has been linked to the likes of Kingpin and, more relevantly, Hydra. So if weâre hoping to investigate the rumours of their resurgenceâŚâ As if your voice in his ear isnât enough, fate chooses the perfect moment to have him spot you over the rim of his champagne flute, standing across the museum hall, sparkling beneath the chandelier. Your eyes are somewhere else; unlike how the small crowd surrounding you has busied themselves with focusing on their own reflections in the glass, you seem to take genuine interest in the exhibit behind the pane. âSorry, I assumed you read the mission brief.â
No, he hadnât. In fact, the time that should have been dedicated to reading the brief had been wasted on watching you. Specifically, the way your knee bounced across from him on the Quinjet. Had the plane not landed when it did, Bucky would have leaped over and put a stop to your distracting movement.
âI was busy,â this time he makes sure itâs but a whisper, loud enough for only the mic to pick up. âWhat do we know about his fatherâs links to Hydra?â
âNot much, unfortunately. Rumours, at best. An entire history of funding them, at worst,â the man grows closer while your voice grows more distant over the earpiece, an interference of two strangers conversing near-by. âHeâs closing in on you. Leave the line open.â
Bucky wants to disobey.
He wants to turn off his mic and drop it into the remaining bubbling liquid in his glass. He wants to rip out the earpiece and crush it beneath the heel of his italian leather shoes. He wants to make a big scene, point down the length of the display hall and announce your presence to each and every overly-wealthy, underly-empathetic tech-head and government body within the vicinity.
It matters little that he would be blowing your cover, unveiling your role as a quiet partner of the Avengers, and subsequently putting the oligarchs in the room on edge. It would all be worth it, even the part where heâd be risking his own place within the team, if it meant you would get the boot and no longer be here, hovering in his peripheral like a persistent, buzzing little bee.
Unfortunately, a baritone voice stops him from giving into his wildest fantasy.
âGood evening, Congressman Barnes,â Roland Andrews is every bit the image of a hot-shot lawyer, right down to the Rolex living obnoxiously on his wrist and the bottle of cologne he appears to have doused himself in. âThough I suppose itâs just Barnes now. Avenger Barnes? Itâs hard to keep up with all those⌠heroic names.â
âI know heâs insufferable, James, but unclench your hand. Youâre a second away from snapping the innocent neck of that champagne flute.â
His fingers almost tighten as you whisper through his earpiece.
âDo they call you Lawyer Andrews-â
âYouâre being hostile!â Bucky can feel your eyes on him, unnerving him.
He bites back a scoff, coughs up a plastic smile, âJust call me Mr Barnes.â
âSo, you've heard of me,â of course that is all a man like Roland would pick up on, salivating at his mouth for that little morsel of validation to feed his egoâs belief in his right to be in a room like this, surrounded by the other âbig-dealsâ who managed to wrangle themselves an invite to the exclusive event.
âItâs hard to tell from all the way over here but I swear you knowing his name has got him so excited, heâs popped a boner,â youâre in his ear again, just as Bucky takes a sip of his drink.
The sharp inhale he pulls almost causes him to choke and, for a moment, he canât help but shoot a quick glare your way.
A glare you donât even notice, too invested at blinding a stranger with your aggravating smile.
âYeah, well, donât go feeling too flattered,â a twisted feeling of satisfaction nestles itself in his gut as he watches the manâs face fall to a frown. âI know your father.â
If decades of being a puppet through which othersâ enacted evil and bloodspill had taught James Buchanan Barnes anything, it was to notice everything. The way his shoulders straighten a little at the mention of his father. The way his weight shifts from his right foot onto both. The way the pupils of his alcohol-stained eyes stretch an inch, growing with his interest.
For a lawyer, heâs got an awful poker face.
âIs that so?â While the manâs mouth is stoic, his voice is laced in intrigue.
âWell done, youâve got him hooked. Now, reel him in.â
Bucky is really wishing heâd shut off the line.
âWe once worked together,â thereâs always a bitter aftertaste that comes with a lie, thatâs what Bucky has come to learn, like his mouth is physically rejecting his own dishonesty. âYou could even say, weâre old friends.â
âMy father and you,â heâs familiar with that tone behind the lawyerâs words. Not disbelief but disgust, the kind one stares down at a wretched bug with. âWorked together? He never told me heâd taken any interest in your campaign for congress.â
âYou know what you have to do,â youâre watching again. He knows it because the hairs on the back of his neck rise and his chest feels tight, like itâs boxing his lungs in.
âLike I said, old friends,â Bucky had thought the scheming and the calculated words would all come to an end alongside his term in congress. Itâs missions like this that remind him it never ends, not when heâs stuck inside a sandbox full of snakes, waiting for him to turn his back on them for a chance to take a bite. âOur organization met some obstacles a few years back. But, whatâs that old saying? Cut off one head, two more shall take its place.â
There Mr Andrews goes again, spilling all his secrets onto his visage. Thereâs a subtle stilling of his breath, a twitch in his left brow, a parting of his lips.
Recognition stares Bucky in the eye. And, for the first time since he regained his mind, it seems Hydra is staring at him too.
The torture, the mind control, the words that turned him into an unfeeling monsterâŚ
âSay it,â youâre there to cut off his next thought, his next memory.
As easy as slipping on a tailored suit, those old words roll off Buckyâs tongue, âHail Hydra.â
Like a wave, ice cold and chilling to the bone, nausea washes over him. He blinks and, behind his eyelids, a montage of violence that wears his face yet lacks his soul. Pain shoots up his left arm, nonsensical and impossible in every way, yet it's there all the same, stabbing at his metal arm and lingering along the missing nerves.
What a punch in the guts it is â after so many years of working on himself, bettering himself, remembering himself â to be cruelly reminded of his inability to ever fully escape his past. No pardon and no psychologist could ever suck the evil fully out of James Buchanan Barnes, so long as he was living beyond his lifetime and walking amongst the collateral victims of his violence.
Instinct commands him to reach for two things.
First, a glance over at you. Closer than before, hovering among a crowd of eager-eyed suits. Just like the rest of his team, you have them effortlessly wrapped around your finger, clinging onto every ounce of attention you fill their cups with.
A sneer on his lips, the soldier looks away.
And, secondly, he tilts his glass up and reaches for a final sip.
âGood boy, James,â this time, he does choke.
Champagne burns the back of his throat and his neck nearly snaps at the speed his head turns to you, still playing your cards of flattery to your crowd of loyal watchers and completely unaware of the paleness taking over Buckyâs face, the anger clenching its fist around his heart, and the heat melting his loins.
Why would you say such a thing? How could you say such a thing, and have the gall to not even be looking at him? It isnât fair, in any universe, for you to be so unaffected while you nearly kill him with three words. You must not be human, must not be real, must not be trusted.
There, thatâs what it is.
Bucky doesnât trust you, that must be why he wants you gone.
âBeautiful woman,â Rolland Andrews commands Buckyâs attention back to him, and thatâs when the soldier realises his mistake.
Heâs been staring at you, openly and undoubtedly, making the subject of your investigation not only aware of your existence but of Buckyâs interest in your whereabouts.
His right palm is growing sweaty.
âYou think?â Bucky makes a point of taking two steps to the right, blocking the view of you over his shoulder and forcing a load of eye contact onto the lawyer. If he plays his cards right, he can pivot the conversation away from you and back over to the point of the mission. âI hadnât noticed. Sheâs just-â
âHis assistant,â thereâs your voice again, but it isnât in his ear. Itâs by his side and accompanied by you coming fully into view between the two men. Bucky watches your hand shake the outstretched paw of Mr Andrews before you turn your attention onto him, a mellow smile pairing well with the red of your lipstick. âSorry to interrupt, Mr Barnes, but thereâs been an incident downtown that requires your assistance.â
He doesnât mean for his eyes to narrow, but thatâs just the kind of reaction you inspire in him: confusion and disgruntlement.
âWhat a shame,â thereâs nothing confusing about the way the lawyerâs leopard-like eyes are glued to the neckline of your dress. Perhaps the soldierâs jacket would be of better use over your shoulders. âYouâre stealing him away just when our conversation was getting interesting.â
âOh, Iâm so sorry, sir!â You slip right past Buckyâs attempt to grab your forearm, and lay a hand on the manâs shoulder, a faux apology in your gaze. âBut this really is a pressing matter. Here,â youâre back to keeping your hands to yourself, too busy rifling through your clutch to entertain whatever perverse thoughts are growing in Andrewâs mind. âTake Mr Barnesâ card, perhaps we can arrange for you both to continue this conversation somewhere a little more private.â
As easy as a dog herds sheep, you escort a bewildered Bucky Barnes away from the target.
You lead the charge, weaving through the clusters of people so effortlessly that he struggles to keep up, his path occasionally thwarted by an unmoving mass and forcing him to watch as you continue your pursuit of the up-ahead, leaving nothing but the shape of your dress to follow. Itâs only once the chill of the night bites at exposed skin that he manages to catch a hold of you, halfway down the entrance staircase.
âWhat was that?â He seethes into your ear from one step behind, hand wound around your arm.
âSmile, James,â you glance back at him, âunless you want to end up on the front page of the news with accusations of mistreating your poor assistant.â
Waiting beneath the staircase sits a promenade of black cars and personal drivers, queuing up to collect their decorated debt otherwise known as their employers. Alongside the white light of burning headlights, thereâs the incessant flash of cameras going off, a wall of photographers and journalists hungry to catch a glimpse and steal a moment from those attempting to flea the eventâs festivities.
âYouâre not taking another step until you answer my question,â he mutters all the same, grip reinforcing itself on your arm.
Despite that, Bucky doesnât stop you from journeying down another two stairs.
âYour question wasnât very clear,â at this point heâs certain you must be doing it on purpose, picking and choosing the words you need to drive the soldier up the wall.
âI had him right where we wanted him, and you-â
âI what?â Again, youâre looking back at him, and again, youâre smiling perfectly for the cameras, manoeuvring him to loosen his grip on your arm and switch to locking elbows instead, just in time for the press to take notice of his presence and begin turning their lenses. âCome on, use that caveman brain of yours.â
âDo you get a kick out of ruining my missions?â He registers a shout of his name, and then another, and then another.
Like a pack of starved vultures, the press scramble to gather at the bottom of the stairs, microphones and cameras grasped in their talons as they screech out questions he has no intention of answering.
âWeâve been over this before, James,â if youâve noticed the fact he is descending slower in light of the chaos that awaits, you say nothing. You simply match his pace. âI get a kick out of helping.â
Bucky remembers the last time you said those very words, both of you lost in the outskirts of France and struggling to find any signal. When he was sure that would get you reprimanded for inefficiency, you pulled through and managed to salvage the mission.
Before that, there was a late night in Tokyo, where you and Walker boarded the jet with blood drying into the cracks of your fingernails. Despite the bloodshed, the mission was a success, and Buckyâs chastising words aimed at you fell upon deaf ears.
In truth, he still the first time you said those words, two days into the job and faced with his interrogative eyes in the dark of the kitchen whilst you were trying to sneak away with a midnight snack.
âFunny, cause you never seem to help.â
âRoland Andrews may be an obnoxious asshole but heâs not an idiot,â as you lift your foot to tackle another step, the heel of your shoe catches on the hem of your dress. His elbow locks and his vibranium hand is steadying you before he can even ponder what a satisfactory sight it would be to watch you roll down the stairs and strike out the press in some twisted game of bowling. Much to his own disgruntlement, his subconscious doesnât know how to let harm come your way. âHe wasnât about to confess in the middle of the Smithsonian that your old torturers are planning a resurgence. Thanks to me, he has your card. Which means he has your number, which means heâll call.â
His pride wonât give in and allow him to tell you itâs a good plan, so he narrows his eyes and questions it instead, âWhy are you so sure?â
The press are so close now, a mere three steps below, yet he hears you perfectly clear among all their harmonious yelling.
âLike you said, you had him right where we wanted him,â his eyes follow your own as they glance backwards. At the top of the stairs, Rolland Andrews stands watching you both leave. âTrust me, heâll call.â
Five weeks pass before the call arrives.
On a Thursday morning, six forty three am, with dawn smearing the horizon in shades of tangerine, Bucky wakes from a dream he canât quite remember. There is light, there is laughter, and there is someone laying by his side, keeping count of his heartbeat while he traces constellations over a naked thigh. Then, the phone rings and heâs thrust back into his body, sweating beneath sheets and consumed by the empty space to his right.
On the other end of the line is not the most-anticipated Roland Andrews. Itâs his assistant, with a voice as chirpy as a bird singing its morning song, relaying a short list of demands veiled as an invitation â one of which leads him to now, four hours later, pacing the living room while you wax poetic about your genius, world-saving, revolutionary plan.
The very same plan thatâs going to send Bucky to his belated grave.
âAbsolutely not,â he says for what feels like the millionth time, metal fingers tangling themselves in the web of his hair. The sting against his scalp is the only thing that seems to ground him, aiding him in holding back even a modicum of the frustration your persistence is simmering within him. âOver my dead body.â
âIt makes perfect sense, James,â in opposition to his own rabid demeanor, youâre cool as ice, spread out atop the couch and sipping away at your morning coffee. Movement is occasional, optional â in the desperate times when heâs intercepting the path between your eyes and the television, where reruns of some awful reality show hold your attention captive. âCome on, you know my plans always work.â
They do, and he hates it. Despises it. Wishes you would hurry up and screw up enough to stop being put in harmâs way. But no, you just have to be perfect at everything.
âHow many more times do I have to say it? No,â like a broken record or an ever-looping echo, heâs repeating words, over and over, all in the futile hope youâll sniff out the suspicious nature of Andrewsâ demand and agree to Buckyâs terms instead.
âYouâre being stubborn,â you lean to the left, trying to catch a glimpse at the screen past his stoic stance.
Perhaps a little overzealous, Bucky had hoped your proposal of continuing the conversation somewhere private would be just that: private. It seems the lawyer and his different definition of privacy had other plans in the form of a summoning to attend an exclusive gala at his familyâs estate. The point of contention, however, is the request tacked on at the end of the invite: Mr Andrews requests your assistant come too, as his personal date for the evening.
âAnd youâre being reckless!â
âNewsflash, thatâs kind of my job.â
The first thing Bucky learnt about you was your history â better said, your lack of history.
A life lived in silence. Quaint and quiet are pretty synonyms for invisible. Your existence is nothing but a blank, untraceable slate, up until you at last appear on the proverbial map of agents and demons, as merely a drop in the ocean formerly known as S.H.I.E.L.D.
Sometimes, Bucky thinks he remembers seeing you. Just once, with the Winter Soldier shielded by shadows in Pierceâs office. You stood on the other side of bulletproof glass, a mournful Steve to the right of you and the despicable mass of Alexander Pierce in front of you, face painted in faux sympathy and a hand squeezing down on your shoulder. But the waters of his memory are murky and leave him needing to come up for air before he can ever make a real shape out of anything.
After the downfall of Hydra, you returned to being a ghost. Unheard from and inactive, until the war between heroes, a silent partner in Sharon Carterâs ploy to steal back Steveâs shield and Samâs wings. While Bucky was turned back to ice, you were running around Europe, protecting the whereabouts of the men who fought for his freedom. Then came the dark days, after half the world turned to dust. Somewhere along the record books, you became a mercenary.
An agent turned killer for hire, and one of the top earners under Valentinaâs payroll. When the time came for her to do away with all the loose-ends of her crimes, you were lucky enough â or just busy enough â to ignore her deadly invitation into the furnace that housed Bob. Seven weeks after he was declared an Avenger, Miss De Fontaine turned up at the towerâs door with you. Sweet smile, sharp senses, one job: look out for the team.
From agent, to mercenary, to glorified babysitter.
âYour job is to gather intel, to be an informant, to keep a close eye,â the pacing has seized and Bucky has now taken to facing you, right knee popped out and hands on his hips, the very image of a parental figure mid-lecture. âItâs not your job to answer to some daddyâs boy on a power trip.â
âThis might be our only chance to get a lead on the Hydra rumours,â whether itâs prompted by the change in his stance or by your own disinterest, you reach for the control and turn the television off. âYou owe it to yourself to let me help.â
The only noise that remains is you two bickering, while the rest of the towerâs inhabitants are sleeping away their morning how you had hoped to â before a certain soldier pulled you out of your slumberâ: undisturbed and uninterrupted.Â
âIâm going alone,â before he can even fully commit to his sentence, youâre standing up and rounding the coffee table.
âPlease, just take a minute, breathe, and think about this rationally,â your approach is one that calls for peace, the demeanour of someone trying to calm a street cat: hands stretched out in front of you and a plea in your eyes that screams âplease donât run awayâ. âAndrews isnât just inviting you to one of his posh parties, James. Heâs testing you, trying to see how easily youâll grant his request. He wants to see how much he can trust you. Iâm tougher than I look, okay? Let me be the collateral to you getting the answers we need.â
One of the worst things about you is your ability to make a good point, even out of a damn circle. Your argument is just the correct mixture of rational, impactful, and personal to almost have him giving in and accepting your offer to help.
But, why should you have to be tougher than you look? Last time Bucky checked, your skill is stealth and brains, not muscle â he is all the muscle you, or, better said, any mission could ever need.
Though frozen in thought, the soldier can see those open arms growing closer, and closer, and closer. Youâre two inches away from resting your hand on his hunk of vibranium when Bucky finally reacts, flinching out of a touch he doesnât quite get to feel and turning away from you.
âIâm not pimping you out,â he shakes his head, voice stern and brow furrowed. âNot to Andrews. Not to anyone. Youâre an agent, not an escort.â
âHoney traps have existed since way before your day and age-â
âIâm the leader of this team, my word is final,â for his own self-preservation, heâll pretend he doesnât notice the smile sliping down your face. âYouâre not coming.â
Buckyâs beginning to doubt this team knows the definition of the word âleaderâ.
Otherwise, he wouldnât be dressed to the nines and looking like a ten, people-watching out the tinted window of a car in an effort to distract himself from your reflection in the glass and the cloud of titillating spice your perfume floats his way.
Of course you end up coming with him to Mr Andrewsâ event, and so Bucky Barnes has to result to gaslighting himself into believing this is what he really wanted all along: him in another suit, you in another dress, and nothing between you but the thinning space of a middle seat. The illusion shatters each time he recalls that the silk resting atop your skin has been hand picked by the lawyer himself, delivered to Buckyâs office with a note that conveniently never found its way to you â For that pretty assistant of yours, Barnes. Tell her to wear nothing beneath.
The subtle strain of your hardened nipples has him uncomfortably aware that youâve complied with Rolandâs request, despite being none the wiser to its existence.
âDonât drink anything youâre not there to witness being poured,â his throat is raw from the lack of use, the forty minute drive in silence nearly coming to an end as the grand gates to an estate come into view. âI donât trust Rolland Andrews, thereâs something⌠off.â
âYes, James, thatâs why weâre here.â
âDid you just-â His head finally turns away from the window to look at your image in full dimension, something more than just a poor-manâs imitation of you in the window. âDid you just roll your eyes at me?â
âRoll my eyes at you? Never, my dear leader!â And you have the audacity to offer him a mint, hand mid-rifle through your purse. He accepts it, and prays the sharp flavour on his tongue will be enough to calm the jitterbug traversing through his veins. âI was trying to catch a glimpse at my brain, thatâs all.â
âThe only chance of seeing your brain is with a microscope,â the gates open slowly, dramatically, and do nothing to aid in the soldierâs uneasy feeling.
âHave you ever considered becoming a motivational speaker?â You chirp, and cross your right leg over the other. âWith words as kind as that, I feel empowered to take on the world!â
Once more, youâre a liability to Bucky, a distraction in the shape of a shin peeking out. Heâs not usually so bothered by a womanâs skin⌠But when it belongs to someone he loathes entirely, itâs hard not to seeth at the sight of it.
At the top of an obnoxiously long driveway sits the Andrews estate, a courtyard mansion stripped right out of the Renaissance and sticking out like a sore thumb atop nine acres of flat terrain. Cars are queued up, one after the other, slowly rounding a central water feature, disposing of their passengers, and driving back out of the expensive lot. Unlike the Smithsonian, not a single member of the press is circling the masses with screeching questions or invasive cameras, and, in a twist not even the soldier expects, he almost wishes there was someone, if only to document whatever evil may take place beyond those walls.
âTell little miss Totally-Spies she looks pretty,â for a moment, Bucky mistakes the voice for his subconscious⌠But no, itâs just Yelena, no doubt laughing at him all the way over on the Quinjet.
âWhat? No she doesnât,â something bitter comes over his tongue. âTell her yourself.â
âHow can I tell her when she is not wearing a wire, genius?â Bucky takes a mental note, adding Yel to the list of women who have rolled their eyes at him this evening â so far, it's two for two. âOh, and do you copy? Walker says to check our connections before you two step into your high-school Hydra reunion.â
âOf course I fucking copy-â He should have retired to a farm when he had the chance.
The evening does not unfold in the disastrous way Bucky anticipates â itâs even worse.
Barely a foot in the door, the man of the hour conjures before you both as if from thin air. He greets you first, hands laying themselves over all the right places to rile Buckyâs nerves as the man pulls you in to press a sloppy kiss against your cheek. The smile you shoot at the soldier is one of pacifism, a non-verbose reminder to remain calm and focus on the object of your mission.
Since he cannot spare you from Andrewsâ wandering touch, Bucky intercepts the wine glass he attempts to hand you, swallowing it down in one large gulp with the blind hope that his super soldier serum has any possible inbuilt date-rape repellent.
Rolland Andrews is possessive, infectious â an invasive species that is destroying the already endangered ecosystem of Buckyâs tolerance. As the night unfurls, he wears you like the watch on his wrist, a silent jewel perched on his arm and paraded throughout the room. Expected to smile and encouraged to stay quiet, you play your role to perfection. Bucky canât help but watch you, study the way you shapeshift into someone heâs never met, a chameleon whose nature it is to blend in with her surroundings.
For hours, heâs forced to watch the light shade of your dress be eclipsed by the lawyerâs dark tux. Across the room or stood among the same circle of oligarchs, the sight of you burns his eyes all the same. To add salt into the agitated wound, he has yet to achieve a moment of real privacy with Andrews. And, so, the soldier decides you are not a distraction, but an obstruction.
If Buckyâs eyes stick to you like glue, it must be for two very simple, extremely logical, and completely impersonal reasons.
Firstly, despite the lack of respect heâs afforded by you all, heâs a good leader â a man made of responsibility, who has sworn to take care of his agents, no matter how often he flirts with the idea of you being kicked off the team. And, secondly, in hopes that youâll notice the panicked widening of his eyes and help steer the lawyer into taking Bucky someplace private to resume their dealings from the Smithsonianâs gala.
Itâs not until he finds himself in the mansionâs central courtyard, lost in a mass of swaying bodies and nursing his fourth whiskey on the rocks, that Bucky loses sight of you.
Youâre gone, until youâre not. A glimmer of light in the corner of the soldierâs eye, beckoning him to look up. Row after row of empty balconies protrude from the mansionâs walls, staring down onto the festivities below. When he finally spots you, his stomach drops.
âSomethingâs wrong,â he reaches for the comms like itâs a crutch, something that will steady this uneasy feeling.
âDonât be cryptic, Bucky,â Yelenaâs voice rings through within a moment, somehow sounding equally alert as she is bored. âIt does not suit you.â
Traveling over quicksand is easier than moving through this crowd â Bucky would know. He makes it seven steps, sight glued to you, before a solid figure forces him to look away.
After carving out a new path to get inside the home, his eyes find you right where they left you, âSheâs on a top-floor balcony.â
âOâŚKay? Are you worried she is going to fall in love with the view and betray us?â
âNo!â His sudden outburst garners a few looks. Bucky pushes harder through the rows of bodies, neck tilting to watch how your dress dances in the wind. âNo. Itâs just⌠weird.â
To the left of you Bucky notices the blurry shape of Rolland Andrews. Were he as logical as you, perhaps heâd see this as the perfect opportunity to snatch a moment alone with the lawyer. Instead, all he sees is a threat at your side, causing a fresh wave of nausea to crash over him and his footsteps to fall a little faster.
âWhy?â
âBecause sheâs afraid of heights,â the words are a reflex, pouring out of Bucky with no thought put behind them â the only thought he seems capable of is you.
âShe is?â Walker jumps on the line. âWhen did she mention that?â
âShe didnât mention it,â an elbow digs into him as a woman stumbles over her heels and, suddenly, a martini glass smashes to pieces on the floor and the stench of vermouth stains his clothes. âI just noticed.â
âOh, so you notice things now?â
âDonât say it like that,â he quietly chastises Yelena as he side steps both the woman profusely apologising and the stranger approaching him with tissues in their hands.
Thereâs no time for interruptions or distractions, he needs to keep moving.
âLike what? This is just my voice.â
âLike thereâs something youâre not saying.â
âBusted,â the Widowâs tone conjures outrage inside him, and stains his ears in hues of red. Thereâs a tight feeling in his chest, in his throat, uncomfortable and unwelcome as she continues to speak. âIâm just thinking how much someone needs to watch her to notice that.â
It only takes him a second to notice you are uncomfortable, cornered against the balconyâs ledge while the target of your mission hides his face in the crook of your neck, arms much stronger than your own caging you in.
Perhaps this is all the makings of Buckyâs own feelings, his own discomfort at the sight of an agent under his care being put in this position, somehow being irrationally projected up onto you. Too good at your job for your own good, never once has he known you to let your guard slip. Does your disdain of heights affect you so viscerally that itâs now cracking away at your hard-shell exterior?
A throat clears itself over the comms.
âYeah, well, itâs not exactly hard to tell when you sit through a six hour flight with her bouncing her knee,â remembering to reply grows harder as he continues to search for a break in the crowd of foreign faces.
Thereâs an ache in Buckyâs neck, one that promises to be unforgiving when he wakes up tomorrow morning. Putting his pain on the backburner, he tilts his head back further.
âIt must have been so hard for you,â something curls up inside his loins, ashamed, as Walker speaks, mockery bleeding through the speaker. âWishing she was bouncing on your dick inste-â
âIâm going up. Get the jet as close as you can.â
The pieces fall into place in perfect harmony: a doorway back inside the mansion appears on his right, just as Rolland disappears off the balcony and leaves you all by yourself.
The ascent is one of desperation, a disgraced angel scrapping its way back up the stairway to Heaven. Bucky tackles the marble steps in pairs of twos and threes, using the length of his legs and the strength in his muscles as an advantage to cut down time. When he reaches the top floor, each breath is the result of a heaving chest and sweat is pooling at the base of his neck.
The third room on the left is where he finds you, back turned on the view of the courtyard and lip caught between your teeth.
âWhat are you doing out here?â He doesnât mean to startle you, to have your shoulders jump in surprise at the sudden appearance of his voice, but itâs like he just canât help himself, he cannot stand another moment of seeing you like this â hunched in on yourself, itching to be anywhere but where you stand.
âJames,â amidst your fear, youâre still more level-headed than heâs ever been around you. While most see your disregard of your feelings and fright as another testament to your skills, heâs increasingly finding it to be a sign of recklessness. Would it kill you to put yourself first, for once? âGet lost! If Andrews comes back and finds-â
âFinds what?â Bucky challenges as he steps out onto the balcony. Thereâs your perfume to greet him, again, washing over him with the breeze of the night. âMe speaking to my assistant?â
A stare-off ensues, one that gives him far too much time to notice how the moon sits reflected amidst a pool of stars in your eyes, then you finally huff in defeat, âDammit, youâre right.â
âFor once.â
âFeels nice, doesnât it?â
Something else feels nice when he catches a glimpse of your smile.
Not the sly, temptress curls of your lips youâve been shooting at Rolland all night, but the loud smile â the one that puts your teeth on display, and pushes the swells of your cheeks up, and wrinkles the corners of your eyes. Bright and real, the kind that lights up the whole tower when it's an ungodly hour and you spot Bucky emerging into view as you dig into your usual midnight snacks.
A heavy gust of wind arrives to remind you of where you are, sweeping the smile right off your lips.
Anxious feet dance beneath the trail of your dress, the click of heel upon marble reaching his ears. As any good leader should, he takes a step closer and takes a hold of your wrist, too aware of the shake in your hands to fully envelope them with his own. He moves one step back towards the room and beckons you to follow.
âCome on, letâs get you away from the ledge-â
âWait, just a second,â youâre turning to fully face him, invading his space.
For a moment, it feels like the world is caving in around you both, the walls of the universe nullifying the distance between you with a force greater than gravity. All he can see, all he can smell, all he can feel is you. His lungs are running out of oxygen. When was the last time he took a breath?
Youâre in the air, and in his eyes, and pressing a single finger to his cheek.
âYouâve got something on your face, righttt⌠Here!â You inch back enough to display your pride and joy to him, a single eyelash perched on the tip of your finger. How is it that something so tiny, so inconsequential can capture your attention so easily, while Bucky â for all his power, and all his valor, and all his strength â can barely get you to look at him most days? âMake a wish.â
A myriad of words dangle off the tip of his tongue, thoughts that have echoed through his head from the moment you stepped foot into his life â not just as a ghost in Steveâs stories, but as someone tangible, and real, and blood-boiling. I wish you would⌠Leave the team, stop helping, notice when I clean your gun, realise itâs not Bob who keeps ordering all the food you like, acknowledge that I donât like you, inch closer and kiss me.
He doesnât get to make a single wish.
All he gets is the harrowing view of playful eyes staring at him, unaware of the glowing red dot dancing up the length of your face before coming to a halt at your temple.
With no time to alert you, Bucky pulls your frame against his and dives back into the room as a bullet cuts through the air. Both of you tumble to the ground in a tangle of limbs before the soldier hauls you behind the wall. With the comfort of you hovering at his back, tucked safely against him, he peeks his head out just in time to catch the sniperâs laser stretched out across the courtyard. A second shot is fired, and a window is blown to smithereens.
âWeâve got an active shooter situation,â he barks into his microphone, ducking out for another glimpse at the sniperâs location. âThird floor, west wing, canât tell which room.â
âJames,â he barely registers the soft call of his name.
âOn it,â Yelena responds, a thread of ease to weave his fraying mind back together.
âJames.â
âYou two get to the roof, Iâm bringing the jet around,â as Johnâs voice fills the line, so does the sound of the planeâs engine.
Selfish as he is, Bucky canât just walk away from tonight, canât let you being put in harmâs way, again, all be for nothing.
âLeaving compromises the mission, Walker. I need to speak with Andrews first-â
âBucky!â
The soldierâs neck snaps to look at you, a rush of whiplash burning down the left side. The yell knocks something out of you, your back slowly descending down the length of the wall while your legs give out beneath you. Like a mirror, he mimics your movements, coming to a crouch beside you on the cold floor.
Bucky can no longer smell the spice of your perfume. Now there is only metal, something sticky that drags down his throat upon inhaling and fights its way out of him. Sickly sweet and traumatically familiar, his limbs freeze in its presence.
âYouâre bleeding,â he speaks with wonder, disgust, disbelief as a river of red flows down the length of your left leg.
âListen to me,â thereâs an eerie calm in the way youâre speaking, one that does not pair well with the way your hands tremble through their attempts to drag your dress up. Four hands work faster than two, and so his own join you in your mission, flinching to grab at the meat of your thigh upon the wound coming into view. âI need you to make me a tourniquet.â
âAndrews set this up,â his eyes feel like theyâre about to fall out their sockets, opened wide and refusing to blink as his brain short circuits out of control. Nothing seems to be making sense. He spotted the sniper, just in time, and got you away from the danger. So why is there a bullet lodged in your upper thigh and why are his hands stained with your blood? âThat sniper was meant to kill-â
âHey!â Thereâs a sharp sting against his scalp and his attention jumps right up to your face. âSnap out of it. You keep saying youâre the leader of our team, yeah?â He nods into the grip of your fingers, letting the tension of straining strands knock the sense back into him âSo be a leader, cut off the bleeding, and get us both out of here. Alive.â
The skirt of your dress winds up ripped in half and tightened in a knot around your upper thigh. You shoulder the pain like a champion, quiet and unbothered if not for the grip he lets your nails dig into his arms with, and the permanent indent of your teeth clamping down onto your lip. Eased back onto your feet, the soldier tolerates a total of three winced steps before heâs scooping you up into his arms and against his chest, silencing your protests with a pointed look.
âThereâs a door at the end of this hallway, around the corner,â your voice is methodical, running through words like theyâre programmed to come out of you rather than something youâre conjuring with your own mind. âThat should get us up to the roof.â
âHow do you know that?â Heâs moving as carefully as he can, painfully aware of your blood drying into his skin.Â
âLesson one, James,â the return of his first name has never stung so much. âAlways know the layout before you enter a building.â
A shot rings out from behind before he can respond.
Emerging from the stairway is one of Andrewsâ bodyguards, weapon on display as he openly fires at you both. Bucky doesnât even have to tell you to reach into the hidden compartment of his suit, your fingers already fishing out his gun and pointing it over his shoulder.
The guard fires again and Bucky ducks to the right, leaving the bullet to lodge itself in the wall. As he picks up his pace, you fire a few rounds back at your attacker.
âInstead of wasting our bullets, maybe try aiming next time,â Bucky snaps as you blow out a window.
âSorry, aims a little shaky right now on account of the whole bleeding out thing,â you fire and miss, again. âThey donât exactly teach you this at spy school!â
âSpy school?â He parrots back, readjusting his grip on you.
The end of the hallway is close enough he can taste the sweetness of freedom and the chill of the night air.
âLess questioning my methods of distracting myself with humour,â a final shot rings out in Buckyâs ear before he hears the unmistakable sound of a body hitting the floor. âMore getting us to safety.â
Yelena is already awaiting you both as you reach the rooftop, a spray of someone elseâs blood across her cheek. The pair work in unison to move you onto Buckyâs back and, as the familiar shape of the jet comes into view, the soldier warns you to hold on tight before grabbing hold of the dangling rope ladder. Climbing his way up to safety, Yelena follows close behind.
âGet us out of here, Walker!â Buckyâs quietly thankful for the blondeâs outburst, too busy tending to you to take control of the situation.
Guiding your frame down to the floor, his hand finds your face, your skin cold to touch despite the sweat dripping down your forehead.
âTell me again how your plans always work,â he says in an effort to keep you awake, the weight of your eyelids growing with each slow blink you take.
The war zone of your leg is too much to handle, yet something compels him to take a peak, turning his own stomach at the bloody wound. Were he more sane of mind, heâd question why itâs affecting him so gravely after a whole century of working in the field of guts and gore. Tightening the bloodied scraps of your dress is of far more immediate concern to the soldier.
âDonât go throwing your âI told you soâ party yet,â your voice is weaker than heâs used to, none of that calm confidence that shakes up his bones. Uneasy fingers tear the necklace off your neck and drop it into his palm, flipping the feature gemstone over and presenting a nearly unnoticeable bug microphone. âLetâs just say Andrews gets mouthy when he gets touchy.â
Bucky replaces you with a new enemy â time.
Where it used to fly, now, clipped of its wings, it crawls. Thereâs a drag behind every second, a noticeable existence surrounds every minute. Hours turn to days, and days fade into weeks. Midday in the tower is chaos, no level-headed voice to break through the yelling egos, while his midnights are quiet, somber, absent of any loud smiles when he creeps into the kitchen for a glass of water.
You being kicked off the team was never supposed to go like this.
It was supposed to be harm-free, a necessary solution to the problem of your hazardous lifestyle. It wasnât supposed to be due to a bullet slicing right through your thigh, forcing you into temporary sick leave.
Worst of all, Valentina refuses to give up your location â citing some bullshit excuse about protecting your rehabilitation from any distractions. The soldier would sooner believe itâs the team she means to save from distraction, prying their focus away from whatever awful, stomach-turning, mind-numbing state youâre in.
Five months have passed, winter has brought destitution, and the team has slowly winnowed down those involved in the Andrewsâ conspiracy to reestablish Hydra. Thanks to your little bugging trick, Rollandâs hands now only touch the steel bars of a jail cell, his fatherâs enterprise of tax fraud has at last been brought down, and any real hope of seeing you fully removed from your role as spy has fled Buckyâs grasp.
What is in his grasp, however, is the handle to your bedroom.
One turn of the latch and he confirms what he already knows awaits him beyond the door: an empty room full of your absence. Itâs a cruel ritual that takes place when the soldier finds himself alone in the tower â John is visiting his kid, Ava and Yelena are somewhere in Europe working on extraditing someone, Alexei and Bob are in the West Coast negotiating PR deals. And Bucky is completely alone. Or, at least, he should be.
Until he hears a crash followed by a slew of words a nun would never dare repeat.
Knife in hand, Bucky treads through the tower with practiced ease, a silence in his steps reminiscent of his days as an assassin. He sticks to shadows, avoids any sparse ray of sunshine bleeding in through the windows as he clears the place, room by room. On his way past the empty maintenance room, the intruder makes noise once more and alerts him to their location: the training room.
Carefully pushing the door open, the last thing he expects is a high-pitched scream.
âOh my god, James!â Hand clutched to your chest, your back is hunched over in search of both a steady heartbeat and breath. âWhy are you sneaking around like some crazed serial killer?â
âMe?â The heavy door slams behind him as he pushes further into the room, the mirrors that circle the room reflecting his slow approach towards you and the way he safely tucks his knife away. âYouâre the one banging around the place like a burglar!â
âOh please, who on Earth- No, actually, in the entire universe would want to steal your stinky vests and rusty weights?â
He knows that he should reply, that he shouldnât settle for you speaking to him in such a way. But he canât. Not when you step out fully from behind the leg press and put your skin on display, the tiniest pair of black running shorts clinging to the plush of your thighs.
The visible loss of muscle definition is to be expected, yet it still hits him in the chest like a sledgehammer, knocking the wind right out of his lungs. The lack of usual bruising should be a comfort, yet it pulls on one of his heartstrings until it snaps, another reminder of how youâve been out of commission. And then there is the scar.
Resting atop the outside of your left thigh is a patch of fresh skin. It stands out in both its colour and texture â an almost waxy, freshly polished finish behind the way it reflects the angry white lights of the training room ceiling. The scar tissue is new, gnarly, and squeezing at his throat with its existence.
You werenât supposed to get hurt.
âWhat are you doing here anyway?â He forces himself to speak, and rips his eyes away from your thighs in search of distraction.
âI was going to do some weight training but, as you can see,â your outstretched hands point at the cluster of fallen weight disks. âThe whole thing decided to collapse on me.â
âYouâre supposed to be on medical leave,â thereâs a pinch in Buckyâs forehead as he pries you away from picking up the mess, the permanent frown you rouse in him at long last returned. âHow are you still finding ways to be a nuisance?â
An evil torturer wrapped in lycra, you reach for something to the right of him as heâs knelt down to grab the final disk, putting your legs perfectly on display before him.
âItâs all for the love of the game, James.â At your airy giggle, he looks up and finds you smiling down at him, one hand slipping inside a familiar boxing glove before youâre landing a cushioned, mock-punch against his cheek. âWe should spar.â
Youâve changed your shower gel. Bucky can smell it on your skin: once a wall of musk and earth, now layers of something fruity and floral. The deep inhale that follows is intended to stabilise him but only seems to unnerve him even more.
âNot happening,â he tries to grab at your wrist, but you twist it out of the way, leaving his hand to brush over your midriff. âLeave.â
âBut I just got here,â you whine, and Bucky must be suffering from an injury of his own â a concussion, perhaps â because something carnal is melting into his loins at the sound, sight, smell of you. âDo you know how hard it was to get Valentina off my back? Câmon, train with me.â
âIâm not fighting you,â at last successfully grabbing a hold of you, he rips his boxing glove off your hand and tosses it over his shoulder to land elsewhere in the room. âYouâre injured.â
Thereâs a downside to capturing you: youâre touching him now, too, prying his hand off your wrist and leading it southbound.
âPft, that was a flesh wound! See?â You press him against your thigh, the ghost of a gunshot beneath his fingertips almost enough to distract him from the warmth of your flesh. Almost, because he feels it, just like he feels you: alive, present, tempting. âIâm fine, so fight me, Barnes.â
A lingering brush along your thigh follows the soldierâs ascent, snagging on the hem of your shorts as he rises off his knees and towers over you. His hand snaps back to his side like itâs just touched open flame, skin blistering under the heat of feeling you, rebuking your touch.
âNo,â he brushes past you, shoulder bumping shoulder, and manages no more than five steps.
âWinner chooses the punishment,â you barter, delicate fingers grasping around Buckyâs forearm and holding him in place in the centre of the training room. It doesnât matter where his eyes run to hide, he sees you in every mirrored crevice of the walls. âAny punishment.â
The fighting tug he puts up against you is powerless, a flicker of the strength coursing through the livewires of his veins, but itâs easier than letting himself believe heâs giving himself up to your will.
A pause of intense staring between you both persists until the soldier cracks like an egg, âAs soon as you surrender, youâre going back on sick leave.â
âSurrenderâs a big word for you, James,â you wink and he feels himself falter. âBetter get used to the shape of it in your mouth.â
Buckyâs not at all disappointed when you drop his arm in exchange for stretching out your muscles. Not one bit. That deepening of his frown? Itâs nothing more than a side effect of realising he truly has to fight you just to get you to obey.
Facing each other, hands raised to the level of your eyes, the faux battle commences. Where the soldier pulls his strength, resulting to grappling with your punches and blocking the swipes to take at his feet, you ram full speed ahead. A kick to his shin, a knee to his guts, a failed attempt at tangling your legs around his neck â it seems Yelena has been training you in the Widowsâ specialty.
You get the better of Bucky, eventually, taking advantage of the pause in his strategy that comes at the flinch of returning your injured leg to the ground. His right foot goes first, kicked out from behind, and then your shoulder shoves into him and knocks him on his ass.
âBest of three,â and heâs back on his feet within seconds, cutting off your incoming declaration of victory.
The second round is tougher, longer, one that doesnât feature Bucky being as delicate as before. Still playing nothing but defense, his hands simply grab a little rougher, hold a little tighter, restrict your movements a little harder than before. You lift your leg and attempt to swing it at his face but the soldier is faster, grabbing your ankle with a firm squeeze and flipping you over.
But you like to play dirty.
A hand balling at his shirt, fingers that tighten their grip and rip him down alongside you. The cotton tears in two, all the while his vibranium arm flies out just in time to break his fall and save you from shouldering the entirety of his weight collapsing atop you.
Two chests that move in perfect sync â for each of his inhales, you exhale, and vice versa. Your limbs are both a tangled web of legs and arms, and your faces are suffocatingly slow, the warmth of your breath melting at his skin until a bead of his sweat drips down and lands on your lips. Holding his gaze with your own, your tongue licks off his residue and reaffirms why Bucky Barnes will always hate you.
âYouâre reckless,â he seethes in your face, teeth bared like a feral animal as he slowly presses more of his weight down onto you â not completely, just enough to make you struggle through your next breath and give you a burn of the fire you insist on playing with. âYou know that? Conceited, too, always bragging about your little plans that only work when something goes wrong.â
A light flickers overhead and his shadow casts over you a little darker, a little more all consuming, smothering you beneath the figurative weight of his outline.Â
âAnd youâre selfish,â he continues with no protest from you, lips slightly parted as you gaze up at him from your brows, a salacious parody of the famed Kubrick stare. âYou donât give a shit about how you distract me from doing my job when you go off script and make me worry about you.â
His mouth is a loose cannon, firing off thoughts heâs kept hidden under lock and key for far too long. Itâs electrifying, freeing, sending a buzz of pent up energy right down to his toes as he spreads your legs with his own and presses even more of himself against you, pinning you to the foam mat beneath.
Motionless and trapped, you blink up at him with the desperation of prey longing to be free.
âYou thinking of saying anything,â he quirks a brow, biting back the satisfied smile twitching at his cheek. âOr are you just going to keep fawning at me like a little doe?â
The glaze over your eyes fades away into something far more sinful, far more daring, as a fit of giggles bubbles out from your chest.
âCanât you feel it, James?â You shift beneath him. âYouâre hard.â
Denial is freezing cold, turning him into an iceberg â the real danger lurks beneath the surface of his Calvin Kleinâs and is currently poking against your inner thigh.
Fury resolved through friction, you roll your hips up into him and render him useless, mouth agape in a broken attempt at capturing a grounding breath.
Thatâs all it takes for Buckyâs entire world to tilt over its axis as heâs flipped onto his back. Instead of the ceiling, his eyes find you, sitting atop his torso and pinning him between your legs. He tries to tilt his head down, better his view of your shorts riding up, but heâs met with an immovable force pressed against his neck.
âClose your mouth, James,â your hips swivel, inching up his body, and the blade of his own knife tickles his skin. âYouâll catch a doe. Or, actually, the doe will catch you.â
Try as he might, he canât seem to pick up his jaw as you struggle to get comfortable atop him, the search for a seat quickly dissolving into a search for traction, your knees digging into the mat on either side of him while you cant your pelvis back and forth.
You pry off the tattered remains of his shirt with one hand while reinforcing the otherâs grip on Buckyâs knife, the sweet sting of an almost cut teasing at his neck.
âI thought we were fighting,â an expert at self-sabotage, the soldier can think of nothing better to say to ruin this moment.
âWho says weâre not?â You chirp, tilting your head to the side and gifting him the inquisitive look of a puppy. âI am holding a knife to your throat.â
The blade scrapes at his skin as he swallows down a ball of nerves, a sharpened edge that effortlessly slices along his three-day long stubble. His body, more treacherous to itself than the days of mind-control, responds to you grinding against him by tightening the strain beneath the layers of gym shorts and boxers.
âThen hurry up and put me out of my misery,â he grits out, unsure of how exactly he wants you to do so.
Would slicing his neck work? It would certainly be a finite solution, if you did it right, a permanent end to his days of playing the role of dog herding up the headless sheep of so-called New Avengers. Maybe his request is not quite as dramatic, an exaggerated plea to be put back on his feet to spar with you one last time before he sends you on your un-merry way back to quiet nights and days of rehabilitation.
âI suppose, if youâre bored, you could always justâŚâ you pause for dramatic effect, rolling your hips as you roll your tongue. âSurrender.â
The fever brewing in his loins, in his chest, all over his body has him fearing the worst â that he wants you like this, mounted atop him, one hand to his throat and the other laid flat above his racing heart.
No sooner than that wave of fear crashes over him, the knife begins to journey down his skin. Delicate as glass, you drag its pointed edge over the curve of his collarbone, through the valley of his chest, over the bumps and ridges of his abdomen. When the blade reaches the blockade of your body, you let it dance over your skin too. The soldier holds his breath as he watches it slip over your scar.
âYouâre so good at sharpening knives, James. I bet this could just-â hooking his knife beneath the waistband of your shorts, an effortless flick of your wrist is all it takes to bring the fabric to ruins. âCut right through cloth.â
When Bucky woke up this morning, he went back to bed.
Not for long, barely clocking in an extra twenty minutes of sleep. Realistically, he had not truly been tired â it was about principle, about enjoying one morning to himself where no one was going to interrupt him with news of the kitchen burning down or a world-ending crisis.
Right now, as he flickers all over the shape of you â naked from the waist down, pussy slicked by your own arousal and hovering a few inches above his skin â the soldierâs not so sure he ever did wake up.
You must be a dream.
âFucking Christ,â is the tamest of things that come to his mind as he watches you.
And, oh, does he watch.
Eyes turned to steal, a metal force that locks them in place, unmoving and unblinking as you bring the knife to your core. Flat on its side, the sharp edge and its pointed tip angled safely away from the puffy, delicate, desperate flesh of your cunt, you draw the weapon up over the glistening folds and against the hidden pearl of your clit.
âSay ah,â is your only command as you bring the knife up to his mouth, where instinct has betrayed him and presented his tongue to you.
The taste of you stains his blade, a mouthwatering tingle against his taste buds that hijacks his system and hardwires a new addiction into him. Never again will he sink his knife into an opponent and not think of this, of you. Youâve cursed him forever, a hindrance that will haunt him even when you donât.
Youâre back to grinding against him, skin pressed to skin. Over his abdomen is a trail of your wetness that, upon noticing it, has his arm gripping at your undulating hips and guiding them down harder against him. Thereâs something magnetic in the way you move, holding his focus to every half-gasped moan that ripples out of you, and every strain of your muscles, and every roll back of your eyes.
Itâs all so appetising, he could eat you.
âIf youâre going to rut against me like a bitch in heat, at least do it on my face.â
âThatâs no way to speak to a woman wielding a weapon,â despite the warning, you give no protest to the way his hands are leading you up and over his body.
Your knees now knocking at each side of his neck, the soldier salivates as you sit against his chest, your sweet pussy teasing him, too close and not close enough.
âWhat are you waiting for?â Bucky gruffs out, all his confusing feelings drowning in the pools of your eyes.
âNothing,â the gentle shift in your voice has him stilling, heart sucked up into a mini-tornado before it lurches back into his chest. When your hand cups his face, he wonders what he did to deserve it. âJust admiring the view.â
âYou can admire it from here,â the soldier regains some of his sanity in manoeuvring you up to his mouth.
You sink down onto his face and Bucky goes to heaven. Quite literally dies and meets his god â goddess.
Flattening his tongue, the soldier licks a tentative stripe up your cunt, hands squeezing tight against your waist and halting your attempt to flee from his touch. Once youâre secured in his hold, heâs diving deeper, tongue claiming ownership of your body for as long as youâll allow him.
Sweet and heady, he smells your arousal all around him as your hips rejoin the dance in honour of your pleasure, the tip of his nose bumping against your clit once, then twice, then a third prolonged time while he presses you fully down on his face.
âGod, James,â a full-chested moan ripples out of you and his knife at last slips out your grasp, meeting the floor with a cushioned thud.
Bucky has always known you would be the death of him, he just never imagined he would die like this. Tongue buried in the tight walls of your cunt, nose nestling into the repeated ruts of your clit, the all-consuming, brain-melting, life-changing weight of you pushed down on his face. If heâs to suffocate between your thighs, heâll go happily into whatever after-life awaits him.
The soldier shifts his legs, bending them at the knee and planting both feet on the ground, driving your lustful stare away from his and glancing over your shoulder instead.
âAre you pitching that tent just for me,â you turn further around, one hand sliding over the expanse of his abdomen and dipping its fingers beneath his waistband. âOr are you always this hard during fights?â
Much to his own reluctance, Bucky lifts you off his mouth.
âBit of both,â a featherlike touch brushes over the tip of his aching cock and nearly drives him feral, a hiss caught between his teeth before he sinks them into the meat of your thigh. âFightingâs an adrenaline rush.â
âThen what am I?â You barely manage, voice divulging into a gasp as he bites you again, harder, tattooing indents of his teeth into your supple skin.
âYou,â he drags the word out, just like he drags a soothing lick of his tongue over his bite mark. âAre a pain in the ass.â
The soldier can feel you trying to tug down his shorts but the angle is awkward and, for every inch of skin you reveal, the waistband slips up another two inches. And while it rouses a frustrated sigh out of you, itâs fully driving him into the depths of desperation, the epicentre of his heartbeat shifting from a thump in his chest to a throb in his dick.
So heâs more than complicit when you do a one-eighty.
âSince Iâm such a pain in the ass,â you arch your back, pawing your way down the expanse of him, and Bucky swears he witnesses your hole wink at him, sticky and wet and inviting him back in for another taste as it hovers above his face. âEnjoy the view of mine.â
Each side of you sinks down on him in sync, your cunt against his lips and your mouth around his cock. You become everything, all his, grinding your hips against his tongue while your own lathers itself in the salty taste of his skin, gliding up the length of his dick.
Buckyâs left hand grips at your thigh while the other imprints his fingertips into the globe of your ass cheek, grounding himself with a squeeze of your flesh amidst the hazy clouds of pleasure that threaten to swallow you both whole.
The soldier decides you must be a masterpiece, crafted by the hands of a visionary genius and lost to the hands of time, only to wind up here, tangled atop the training mat with him, feeding him with a honey of sin and moulding something new out of him with a hand steadying the base of his cock while you swallow down all you can take of him. Even then, itâs not enough for Bucky.
His own hips lift off the floor, feeding an inch of two more into your gaping mouth before he soon hits the back of your throat.
âWish I could see it,â the rasp in his throat makes it hard to speak, while the feeling of you gagging on his dick makes it hard to think. âThat pretty little mouth of yours finally being put to good use.â
His fingers seek you out, passing over the puckered hole of your ass before burrowing themselves â middle and ring â into your cunt. While your hand busies itself massaging your drool along his shaft and over his balls, heâs switching between beckoning you towards him with curling fingers, pressing against the gummy walls of your pussy, and scissoring you open while his tongue laps up the molten pleasure you spill over his knuckles.
âThere you go, doll,â thereâs a thrill to running his mouth, unabashed and unguarded, spewing out the first obscenity that pops in his head and watching how you viscerally react, a whining, moaning, desperate thing falling apart just for him, because of him. âTake him as deep as you need. Practically begging me to paint that mouth white, arenât you?â
You bob your head over him, the vibrations of your moans shooting right down to his base and pulling his balls tight and desperate for release.
âWant you to cum down my throat, James,â you grind back against him as he mouths at your clit. âWanna taste how you surrender.â
That word snaps Buckyâs mind back into place, awakens him like a sleeper agent.
In a matter of seconds, you go from straddling his face to being shoved onto all fours atop the training mat, manhandled like the perfect ragdoll he wants you to be. Malleable and manipulated into whatever position, angle, hole he wants from you.
Even a saint, when faced with the sight of your arching back, couldnât hold themselves back from landing a skin-tingling slap against your ass â and the soldier is no saint. The spank is not enough to bruise, just enough to have you choking on a breath and keening back into the apologetic kiss he soothes the stinging flesh with.
âPlease, oh god,â you moan when, for old times sakes, Bucky helps himself to another taste of you, tongue prodding at your hole from behind.
âDonât reckon heâs willing to save you now,â he punctuates his snark by spitting on your hole â not because you need the extra lubrication, but because he craves to see you dripping in at least one of his fluids.
You melt away the minute his cock enters you â one fatal thrust of his hips that burrows him all the way to the hilt inside of your dripping pussy â your arms giving out beneath the weight of your body and winding up outstretched along the floor as your face meets the ground too.
One shallow thrust, a barely-there roll back of his hips, and he feels your walls squeezing to hold him inside.
ââS this what you were needing, huh?â The hand gripping at your waist is gentle, soothing, his thumb rubbing over your skin, yet his tone is anything but â authoritative, chastising, in charge. âAll those times I berated you over your misactions, who knew I shouldâve just tried fucking some sense into you.â
âBucky,â your voice is muffled against the foam mat.
âOh so now you want to call me that,â he tries another thrust, eyes glued to the view of his length retreating from the grip of your pussy lips, covered in your juices. âFinally feel close enough to me now that Iâve got you stuffed full?â
âSo full,â youâre babbling and drooling, a wet patch forming just below where you press your cheek against the floor and glance back at him.
âYou wanted to fight me, so go on,â it nearly kills him to pry his hands off you. âUse those hips like a fucking weapon.â
The soldier can tell it takes a moment for you to process his words, eyes glazed over as you gape at him from the floor, but you catch on eventually. Clench your walls, take a deep breath, and at last begin moving.
You fuck yourself back against his cock in slow, stuttered movements, fingers flexing along the floor in search of a piece of reality to grip at while your nails press into the foam, permanently marking the training room with evidence of your reckoning. The view is enthralling and tongue-tying, driving him mad in search of appraising words that falter into nothing but pleased hums.
His hands resist the urge to touch you, to guide you back against him, too stubborn in his desire to see you work for it, work for him. A pathetic mess sprawled out on the floor, yearning for any friction you can get from holding his cock snug within your walls and rutting your hips back against his own.
Bucky can only deny temptation for so long.
âShh, atta girl,â every drop of mockery in his tone is intentional, heartfelt, his pity for you only going far enough to rouse a faux pout on his lips as he starts to meet your cunt with thrusts of his own and watches you start to sing a broken melody of moans and whines. âI know heâs big but youâre taking him like a champ, sheâs taking me like a champ.â
A hand skirts down the expanse of your spine, enhancing the arch of your back as his hips slowly start to dig out a rhythm, fucking you deeper, harder, better. By the time his fingers reach the back of your neck, heâs forcing your head down against the ground and relishing in the sound of his balls slapping against your soaked folds as he works his dick inside of you.
One glance ahead sends Bucky down a new avenue of desire, something more primal and carnal stirring in his guts.
âLook at us,â his words are drawn out by wonder as the hand at your neck rearranges your head until your chin is pressing into the mat and your eyes face forward, meeting his steely blues in the mirror. âThis is how itâs supposed to be. The leader on top, and you grovelling on your knees.â
Your reflections are nothing but sin, capturing every movement that passes between you both. The perfect dance of how your body welcomes him in. The way the soldierâs mouth gapes open, firing off capricious words and man-whore moans. The way your eyes are borderline lost behind your eyelids.
That last one has Bucky outraged, resolute to change the attention you give to the mirror.
The hand at your neck curls around the front and hooks you in the grasp of his elbow, before Buckyâs yanking you up, your back to his chest while he holds you in a headlock.
âYouâre too perfect like this to miss, sweetheart,â he croons in your ear, eyes pinned to both your reflections. âSo look.â
âJames,â his name sounds like a blessing, brought out in your time of need.
He echoes your own name back to you, pleased to find your eyes blown wide open and equally as enraptured as he is by the show youâre both putting on.Â
Your hands find his bicep and cradle the capture itâs taken over your throat. Bucky finds himself wishing heâd peeled your top off, the tight fit compression gear denying him the luxury of watching your breasts bounce alongside his ministrations. Before he can lament for too long, his free hand graces over the scar in your thigh and thereâs something more pressing that upsets him.
âThat bullet was meant for your head,â a gasped out confession, interrupted by your hips grinding down on him. âI nearly watched you die. You think thatâs fair?â
He hates the way you shrug, like the prospect of being permanently gone means nothing to you, âYou still wouldâve- Ahh- Caught Andrews.â
âI didnât give a shit about him,â his face turns towards yours, nose flattened against the side of your temple as his lips brush over your cheek, breathing you in. âIt wouldâve all been for nothing if I lost you.â
âJames,â you whisper, his thrusts brought to a complete halt under the intensity of your eyes â your real eyes, not a reflection â finding his own when you turn to face him. âIâm right here.â
He blinks, slow, and when his eyelids reopen, youâre still there for him to behold. Infuriating, blood-curling, heart-shaking you and that loud smile.
You give him what he needs most, hand finding his jaw and your lips meeting his. The kiss is careful and composed, an explorative union of mouths, until itâs not. Until heâs desperate, hungering for more of you, his tongue brushing into your awaiting mouth and his lips moulding themselves against yours in hopes they fuse you both together, forever.
Bucky finds it impossible to turn away from you, so you do it for him, fingers gripping at his jaw and forcing his gaze forward again, bringing him back to where he needs to be. In this room, with you in his arms and him in your cunt, equal players in this game of pleasure.
One last kiss seared down into your shoulder and the soldierâs back to fucking you properly, winding his hips back just to admire the way you welcome his whole length, embrace his whole girth so pliantly. Thereâs an end in sight, one that promises momentary bliss, and all he wants is to take you there, to the very brink of ecstasy.
âDâyou want to cum?â He slurs in your ear, the hand at your thigh snaking its way over to pinch at your clit. âYeah? Then say you surrender.â
âYou surrender,â and, oh, you must feel so smart, his beautiful vixen, a choir of giggles spilling out of you.
He tightens his hold around your throat, flexes the muscle in his arm, and watches how the silence is choked into you, no noise remaining but a broken moan.
âCâmon, baby,â Bucky needs it, just as much as you do, that greenlight to finally let himself explode. âWanna feel her squeeze me real tight. Say it, for me.â
âI sur-â Youâre cut off by your own pleasure, a half-shrieked scream that rips out of you while the soldier does the impossible and, tilting at a new angle, fucks deeper, tip bumping against what has to be your cervix.
âUh-huh, thatâs it,â the mirror spills all his secrets and feeds you the sight of his kisses being peppered up your neck, against your cheek, and sweat-soaked strands of hair that sit glued to his forehead. âSay it nice and clear for me.â
âI surrender,â you manage the full word, barely, and Buckyâs so proud of it, of you.
Of how you fall apart for him, hands grabbing at his arm in search of something grounding amidst the chaos of your shaky legs, and spasming walls, and weepy eyes. Of how you give yourself up to him, let him guide you through the blinding haze of your orgasm, cunt swallowing every subtle nudge his dick bullies into it. Of how pretty you gasp his names for him, a spillage of Jameses and Buckys all over the training room floor.
And of how, as his own orgasm crashes over him, you help him too, donât even protest when his cock leaves you empty, slipping out only to search for friction between your two thighs. You squeeze them around him, marvel at the blush of his leaking tip as it rocks back and forth up to your clit.
When Bucky spills at last, itâs with his teeth clamped down on your shoulder and a hand clutching at your thigh as the thick, hot, white ropes of his cum paint your skin.
Exhaustion melts you both to the floor. A few moments in grasping at breaths pass before his hands are turning you around, in search of your face. When he finds it, thereâs still a challenge in your eye.
âI lost,â you concede. âWhatâs my punishment, sergeant?â
The only response he can muster is to roll his hips.
Seasons ebb and flow into new ones.
Spring blooms and brings flowers into Buckyâs life, a handful a week delivered discreetly in the dark of a midnight rendezvous. With summer comes the heat â in both the temperature and the accusatory looks from the team each time his hand lingers on you during debriefs. In autumn, the leaves come crashing down alongside the truth, a pile of âI knew it!âs mixed in with the disgruntled paying of debts to Alexei for winning the âWhen Will They Tell Us?â betting pool. And now, a whole year passed in the blink of four eyes, winter has returned.
More aggressive than ever, it seems, as Bucky stares out the window to a sea of desolate white.
Perhaps it's not so much about the season as it is about his location, the clue very much being in the name: Iceland.
âCome back to bed,â a soft drawl from behind him, the gentle rustle of limbs stretching over a mattress. âItâs cold, James.â
Of course youâre cold, naked atop the wrinkled sheets with his fingerprints burned into your skin and his cum leaking out your slit.
The soldier rolls his eyes in feigned annoyance, turning away from the fogged up window and crossing over the creaking floorboards to rejoin you, grabbing the blanket â discarded during earlier activities â off the ground.
âThat snowâs showing no sign of stopping,â he shares the observation as he crawls up the bed to you, lips brushing over your skin as he goes. At the top of your thigh, he pauses, takes the effort to kiss the marred skin gently, a silent ritual where he gets to thank whatever power in the universe delivered the bullet there instead of your skull. âWeâll be trapped here at least another night.â
âOh no, what a shame!â Grabby hands that hook under his arms to drag him the rest of the way up to you. âI guess weâll just have to keep warm somehow.â
The soldier holds you how he knows you like it best: his left arm as your pillow, his right one resting at your neck, and his legs tangled in yours in an indecipherable mess. Silence lasts but a second or two before his thoughts get the better of him, memories of how wrong the first part of today had gone with the arrival of the blizzard.
âAm I allowed to say I told you so yet?â Even with your eyes closed, he knows youâre aware of the teasing smile on his face.
âDo you really think I donât know how to check a weather app?âÂ
âYouâre seriously stalling us both here while thereâs bad guys to be caught.â
âThereâs always bad guys to be caught,â your fingers flex in the grasp of his own, a satisfied sigh sweeping through your chest as you find warmth at last. Not from any blanket resting heavy on you, but from him and the way he holds you. âThereâs not always a snowed-in cabin, or time to enjoy having my half-naked hunk in bed with me.â
âYouâre making me irresponsible,â still, Buckyâs resting further into the pillow beneath his head, eyes welcoming the dark.
âWhen it comes to me, youâve always been irresponsible.â
He has, and he hates it. Loathes it with every fibre of his being.
The worst thing about loving you is how entirely it consumes him.
â...Six, seven, eight,â you whisper out into the dark of the cabin.
âMhmm,â a hand finds your thigh, fingertips tracing manmade constellations into your skin. âWhat are you counting?â
âYour heartbeat.â
+ extra hyde.
¡ my headcanon of bucky being incapable of processing emotions manifests in two ways: 1) unspoken yet undying devotion (manchild!bucky) and 2) deducing that any positive feeling must actually be a negative one because that's all he's ever known & thus mistaking love for hatred (the loser bucky present in this fic) ¡ besties, somebody needs to throw me an intervention on how to properly list warnings on a fic, it's getting ridiculous. ¡ dear anon who requested this: i hope you enjoyed, i'm sorry if you didn't! i know your request wanted banter, however, i was kind of worried too much banter would just turn this into the exact same reader i wrote in manchild and i didn't want to do that ( probably did it anyway by accident, oopsy daisy!)đ§ââď¸ Âˇ anyway i'm about to hit post like its a detonate button and the only safety distance from the explosion is to log out of tumblr for 24 hours, see you on the other side <3 ¡ lore accurate photo of bucky in this fic;;
no words absolutely none
Im cooked chat.
I am obsessed with them.
Carnally.
No you dont understand.
I want to be SMOOOSHED
BEWTEEEN THEM BOTH
ME TOO ME TOO ME TOO ME TOO
The best literally anyone has looked ever actually.
I heard it was that time of year again.
The Four Discoursemen
࣪ Ö´ÖśÖ¸âž. donât you wanna sleepâŚ? ࣪ Ö´ÖśÖ¸âž.
18+
smut
trafalgar law x f!reader
1.2k words
sleepy sex, soft dom law, cockwarming vibes
a faint tingle slowly pulled you out of a deep sleep.
then came a familiar weight sinking into the mattress beside you.
a sleepy whine slipped from deep in your throat.
âwake up,â a low, soft voice murmured, the kind that always sounded like music to your heart, pulling you further awake.
âmmmh, what is it?~â you mumbled, dragging a hand over your face.
the weight of your boyfriendâs head falling onto your stomach knocked the breath out of you. the rough stubble on his jaw scratched pleasantly against your skin.
you opened your eyes to a room drowned in bluish darkness, barely lit enough for you to make out the beautiful eyes of the man you loved.
a tired smile curled at the corner of your lips.
your hand instinctively found his hair, fingers brushing over the cheek framed by dark strands.
he looked so vulnerable there between your thighs, huge and exhausted, his face melting into your palm.
âwhatâs wrong, sweetheart?â you murmured.
his hands slipped beneath your tank top, cold fingers tracing over your warm ribs and making you shiver.
âiâm home, pretty thing.â
âyeah, i noticedâŚâ
his hands found your breasts, squeezing them as a sly grin spread across his lips.
âlaw⌠itâs lateâŚâ you shifted beneath him, affection staining every word.
âcâmon, pretty girl, just a little⌠itâs been a long day,â he muttered, kissing your stomach. âitâs only three in the morningâŚâ
âmmmh really?â you asked, eyes falling shut again as you played with his hair. âdonât you wanna sleepâŚ?â
ânot after seeing you like this.â
you cracked one eye open. he was smirking against the waistband of your shorts, fingers circling your nipple.
your needy little cunt started throbbing beneath him.
âno⌠i donât.â
he shifted, pulling his hands from your shirt and settling fully on top of you, his bare knee pressing right between your thighs.
only then did you realize he was just in his underwear.
you smiled when his face hovered level with yours.
âhey~â you whispered.
your hands cupped his face, exploring something already so familiar to you.
he kissed you slowly, one hand at your waist, the other wrapped around your throat, gentle, but enough to leave you drowning in the feeling of belonging completely to him.
you kissed him back, and it deepened quickly, all hunger and need.
âlaw~ iâm sleepyâŚâ you mumbled.
he clicked his tongue, pulling away just enough to tilt your head back and mouth at your throat.
âyou wonât have to move,â he muttered.
before you could even process what was happening, his hands were all over you, flipping you onto your stomach so fast that if the kisses hadnât woken you up before, the pressure of your face against the pillow definitely did.
âlaw~â you moaned.
âyeah, thatâs my name, needy girl,â he teased under his breath.
he kissed your shoulder, and only then did you feel his cock hardening against your ass.
he barely pulled away, lifting your hips with one hand while he dragged the pillows from beside you and shoved them underneath your stomach instead.
âheyâŚâ you laughed softly.
still, you cooperated, grinding your ass back against his cock.
a low growl rumbled from his chest.
he kept kissing along your back, pushing your hair aside, one hand gripping the back of your neck while pressing your face deeper into the mattress.
a startled gasp slipped from your lips when he tugged your shorts and panties down together.
you were still half asleep, blissfully happy your lover had finally come home and decided to fill you up with himself.
almost unconsciously, you arched deeper against the pillows.
âyou want this?â he asked softly against your ear, almost sweet about it, completely enjoying the control he had over you.
you barely managed a weak little âyes.â
your cunt exposed, you could barely feel him pushing down his own underwear before lining himself up with you.
the wet head of his cock dragged against your entrance.
a moan spilled from your lips.
sleep had completely abandoned you by now. all you could think about was his hand around your throat and the thick tip of his cock bullying against your drooling hole.
you squirmed impatiently, trying to get him to push in already.
and he did, one rough thrust stealing the breath from your lungs, desperate to stuff you full of him.
his free hand dug into your ass, crushing you beneath him completely.
âyou can sleep again in a minuteâŚâ he growled.
his thrusts filled you perfectly, hitting that soft spot that made stars burst behind your eyes.
the sounds falling from your mouth were anything but pretty, and the sharp slaps echoing through the room only made you wetter.
the filthy wet sounds where your bodies met made you tremble.
you started rocking your hips back for your own pleasure, and he didnât stop you, just followed your rhythm, forcing your soft body deeper into the bed.
you could practically see stars, sweat sliding down your back, your nails digging into the sheets just as deep as he was burying himself inside you.
he leaned down, rough guttural noises spilling from his throat as he enjoyed every inch of you.
âso fucking tightâŚâ he breathed
you could feel yourself getting close.
but you didnât stop, your hips chasing more of him until everything became too much, the pressure of his cock against your sensitive cunt pushing you over the edge.
your moans turned uneven and desperate.
he pressed you down harder, overwhelming you even more.
âwhyâre you rushing, slut? iâm not done with you yet,â he murmured with a quiet laugh, enjoying the way your body twitched from the overstimulation.
his hand left your throat only to grip your ass tighter instead. you could feel everything and nothing all at once, dizzy from still being fucked through your orgasm.
soon his hand slipped between your thighs, rubbing at your swollen clit, slick coating his fingers until you nearly screamed.
he almost pulled out completely before slamming back inside, leaving you even more fucked stupid than before.
âj~just finish alreadyâ you begged.
âneed you to help me out a little, pretty thingâŚâ he muttered, abandoning your abused little bundle of nerves only to wrap his hand around your throat again.
impatient and clumsy, you rocked your hips back against him, sore and completely out of your mind, feeling your slick gush around his cock even more.
his arousal pulsed harder inside you. he fucked you so hard tears nearly welled in your eyes, your breathing ragged, fingers twisting into the sheets hard enough to tear them.
as his thrusts turned rougher and faster, he finally came, ruining your back and shirt with thick ropes of hot white cum.
the second he finished, your body collapsed against the pillows beneath you, completely pinned under him, covered in his mess.
you brought your hands up to your face.
âgood girl⌠now we can finally sleep,â he exhaled, leaning down to kiss you again.
he sounded exhausted, and ridiculously pleased. his hand drifted over your back smeared with his cum, almost like he was absentmindedly trying to clean you up.
âwhat?â he asked, amused. âyou wanted more?â
your breathing trembled slightly, and he smiled against your mouth.
My boiooooyyyyyyyy


