summary : nobody could disturb jason peter todd when he was knee deep in a dostoevsky. except you, of course, his hot neighbour who liked making his lips bruise up and brain fall out as a friday night hobby.
contains : heavy making out, well read!jason, post Lazarus pit!jay, whipped!jay, thighs man!jay, grinding, basically dry humping, forearm tattoo!jason, but he’s actually a softie, reader wears warm sweaters, bookish!reader but that means she’s a lil freaky, neighbour!jason, booksmart!jason, streetsmart!jason, he’s a moaner I’m calling it, baddie!reader
inspiration : she’s my collar (g + k.u)
It started with a smile.
He'd been carrying boxes from the moving van Bruce had hired, in the middle of the rare heatwave in Gotham. His luck really was something.
He’d been hauling boxes in, wiping his forehead with the hem of his tee, dropping the wet fabric to hang by his waist. Your figure framed in the light of the hallway, like some sort of halo.
He blinked. “Uh, hey?”
You just smiled. Like you knew something he didn’t. “Hey, neighbour.” You disappeared into your apartment, slamming the door shut. With a mutter of “people”, he kicked open his door, resting the box of all his childhood photos on his new dining table. The thing was made of fucking MDF.
He’d failed to notice the copy of Twisted Love tucked in your elbow.
You’d done it, somehow. Ripped through his defences, your will a fist in his wet sheet of paper.
The copy of Twisted Love should’ve been a sign. It should’ve told him that you’d show up at his door after a few weeks of knowing him with a rain cloud over your head and an irrational desire to turn him on like a fucking switch every Friday since.
He’d pull a Glock 19 on whoever disturbed him when he was reading Crime and Punishment, but the annotated copy lay open beside him, his brain was engrossed in something else. Kissing you.
His hands gripped your thighs, sleeve of his plush hoodie sliding up and over the ink on his forearm, tugging you closer. Your lips burned his, nape of his neck stimulated by the drag of your nails.
“Bad day, ma?” His words were muffled by your mouth, tilting his head back into the gentle pressure of your fingers. You took and you took, sucking oxygen from his lungs, rolling your hips down so you dragged across his dick.
He couldn’t suppress a moan at that.
You hummed in agreement, dragging his bottom lip down with your thumb. He should’ve read the signs. Now he scheduled make out sessions with you in avoidance of admitting he liked the way you used him. He ached to be your boy toy whenever you saw fit. He wanted you to push him down, tint his lips with kisses and gloss.
Your teeth snagged at his lip, tugging, moulding him to you. His hands sliding up your back made your sweater drag up, bunching, cold of his apartment pricking at your skin. “Dostoevsky?” You mumbled, between wet, obscene smacks, pornographic moans and following the string of saliva that connected your mouths.
“Mhm,” He nodded dumbly, hips jerking up to catch his dick on your clit, the slow grind in response melted his brain. “Crime and Punishment.”
You chuckled, kisses burning down his jaw till your teeth pressed against his pulse. Nipping, latching, sucking a bruise. Maybe you got how to do that from Twisted Love, cause his toes fucking curled. He’d come, no joke. Right here, fully clothed, he’d do it. “Great book. Read Atonement, I still wanna watch it.”
He would, but he was a little tied up right now. “Later, ma.” He breathed, hand slipping in your jeans’ back pocket to squeeze your ass. Jesus, maybe that thing owed him rent. “Later.” He kissed back up to your mouth, allowing you to siphon his thoughts again.
He was 6’ 2”, 225 pounds and you had him like this. If anyone thought he’d been taken hostage, fuck no, he was right where he was supposed to be. Yes, he had patrol in ten minutes. Yes, he’d texted Dick to take his place while he dealt with a personal matter. Yes, he gave no fucks.
✶ ― SYNOPSIS. bucky can’t help but wonder why they always come running to you,, or your living fossil of a roommate disapproves of your taste in men and its totally not because he wants a taste of you.
warnings.ᐟ mdni! no use of y/n, roommate!bucky, cocky+flirty!bucky, also guard dog!bucky (if that even makes sense) (it doesn’t), frenemies to lovers, smut (pwp, service dom!bucky, unprotected piv, oral sex - f receiving, clothed sex for like a sec, fingering, creampie, tummy bulge, dirty talk, dry humping, possessiveness, dumbification, praise, temperature play, food play, nipple play, pussy pronouns, hair pulling - m receiving, multiple orgasms, consent kink, implied competency kink and cum eating, bucky barnes begs agenda 2025™, both bucky and reader spend the whole fic towing the fine line between horny and pervy), angst, fluff, jealousy, pining, so much bickering, attachment issues, miscommunication bc these two combined have the emotional intelligence of a chihuahua, bucky’s hobby is baking bc i said so. bucky can pick the reader up (but he’s literally a super soldier so 🧍♂️), one mention of bucky trying to grab the reader’s hair, reader has a nut allergy and does not speak russian (neither do i, so please forgive the very small amount of google translated russian)
ᯓ★hyde's input. god bless sabrina for saving the summer again. also don’t let this flop, it’s my birthday tomorrow and i’m not above crying over poorly-received erotica (i’m joking) (no i’m not) (edit: wtf guys)
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Bucky Barnes is not someone you’d call a friend.
He’s more of a nuisance, really. A fossil, dropped off at your door by one Sam Wilson with a simple request: “Can he crash here for a few days?”
That was four months ago, and Bucky’s still living on your couch.
Which is exactly where he’s sat right now, head buried in a book you barely even remember owning. The pages, so full of neglect, give him hassle as he tries to turn them, catching on one another and refusing to be pried apart by vibranium fingers.
“How do I look?” You ask as you step out from your bedroom, hands fastening an earring into your right ear.
Unfazed by your appearance, he doesn’t bother glancing up from his book as he sardonically replies, “With your eyes, like the rest of us.”
You contemplate plucking one of your heels off and throwing it at his head. Knowing your luck, it will fly right past him and smash your coffee table into pieces. Just like your roommate, it’s vintage. Unlike your roommate, you willingly brought it into your home.
“Ha. Ha.” Rounding the couch, you swat his feet off the table before snapping his book closed. “Now if you’re done playing comedian, would you answer the fucking question?”
“That’s your generation's problem, you know? You swear more than you breathe.”
“Better than waging a world war every few years.”
“Considering the current state of the world, I wouldn’t rest too comfortably on that one,” Bucky rises from his seat and squeezes past you, irritatingly close in a way that makes sure you feel each defined muscle in his chest as it brushes against your shoulder. “Anyway, you look fine, as always.”
“I look fine?” You parrot his words and follow his footsteps over to the kitchen. “Careful Barnes, don’t get too excited, it’s not healthy for a senior citizen’s heart.”
“You know what I mean,” a heavy sigh slips out the soldier’s mouth as he busies himself filling the kettle, glancing back at you from over his shoulder as he continues speaking. “I don’t understand why you worry so much about all of… this.” He gestures at you, water splashing off the tips of his fingers.
“God forbid a woman cares about looking good on a date,” you’re becoming annoyingly aware of the pout on your lips and try your best to correct it, whilst prying open the fridge door and fishing out a bottle of beer. “Gee if only it were still the 40s, then I could slap some mercury on my lips and hit the town with a man ready to buy me off my daddy for the cheap, cheap price of two goats!”
The frustration within you only rises as you struggle with the bottle’s cap, the skin of your hand pinching as you put all your force behind removing it. Since when are twist-tops so damn hard to twist off?
Bucky’s by the kettle, pouring boiling hot water into a mug he’s wrongfully claimed as his and looking irritatingly fine surrounded by steam — which has your mind trailing back to a few weeks ago: an early morning, exiting your bedroom to find your lodger stepping out the bathroom with nothing but a towel around his waist and the remnant dew of a steaming hot shower trailing down his very naked, very defined biceps, and pectorals, and- He’s not even trying to mask the amusement on his face as he indulges in your failure.
“Don’t you think you’re being a little ridiculous?” He asks and pries the bottle out of your hold, effortlessly ripping the cap off with a twist of his left hand. A familiar warmth curls between your legs, awakening a response from you that you’ve sworn, under no circumstances, will happen due to Bucky Barnes. You barely want to exchange air with him, nevermind bodily fluids. “There’s no way you’re worth two goats.”
“Every day I wake up and resist the urge to smother you in your sleep.”
Your vitriol is met with a smirk taking over his lips. Watching as he brings the beer up to his mouth, you catch yourself forgetting to blink as the soldier engages you both in a staring contest, all the while he’s tilting the bottle up to steal the first sip. He presses the cold glass back into your hand. You try not to focus on his tongue, peeking out to swipe over his bottom lip and clean up a remnant drop of beer.
In a move that puts you even more on edge, Bucky shuffles closer to you. Delirium floods your mind as the smell of smoke, and musk, and a just a twinge of sweat floods your nose, a smell so masculine it has you debating setting feminism and your own self-preservation back hundreds of years by nuzzling your face into the pulse point of his neck, like you’re some damn animal being exposed to pheromones. Meanwhile, he appears none the wiser to the negative effect he’s having on you, too busy reaching his arm behind you and into the fridge.
“Those boys you entertain, do they ever pay you any compliments?” His voice is so gentle, you almost wonder if that’s how it would sound whispering in your ear. Luckily, you don’t actually wonder about that. Not at all, not even a little. “Or is that your job too, like the bill?”
As quickly as he caged you in against the fridge, he moves away and leaves the cool air to rush over your skin, dragging your mind back into reality and away from whatever thoughts it keeps trying to tempt you with. You track his movements towards the island counter as he sets down a glass bowl, marked by condensation and filled with a batter of some sorts.
It's becoming more and more common to catch Bucky pottering around in the kitchen, a recipe on his phone screen and a personalised ‘Kiss the Baker’ apron — which Sam bought as a joke for his birthday — tied around his waist. He’ll never admit it, but a part of you believes baking helps him relax, to shut off whatever thoughts are floating around in that disturbingly pretty head of his and let him focus solely on measuring, mixing, and making delicious sugary treats. You can hardly complain when he’s gifting you the privilege of an at-home bakery. Fortunately, he gives you plenty of other reasons to complain.
“Boys I entertain? Way to make me sound like a stripper,” you huff, sneaking over to dunk a finger into the batter as he turns to grab his coffee. “And I’ll have you know, they do pay me compliments.”
Licking your finger clean, you can’t fight the humm of approval that creeps up your throat nor the way your eyes slip shut as you savour the cold, tangy sweetness of the cake mix. Something warm presses against your left side as Bucky returns to the island, setting down his mug and a cake tin.
“Really? What kinda things do they say?” Just as you go to double dip, he smacks the top of your hand with a wooden spoon, and you nearly freeze at the contact. For a few short seconds, the factory in your mind goes into lockdown as every single one of your brain cells scramble to not conjure up the image of him smacking that utensil on a very different part of you. “Hands off. It’s a lemon cake, not a lemon and your-dirty-fingers cake.”
You silence your thoughts with a swig of beer before putting a safety distance between Bucky and you, unsure whether to be relieved at his obliviousness to the less than ideal affect he’s having on you, or offended by his complete lack of reaction to being so close to you while you’re all dressed up and waiting for another man to take you out.
Not that you want him to be affected by that, or you in general, though.
Your phone lights up with a text from an unsaved number: im hear, r yu coming down or shuld i com up? You shut it off and stuff it into your purse, deciding it's best to keep a man waiting anyway; he’ll appreciate your presence even more once you finally give him it.
Besides, you’ve yet to answer Bucky’s question.
“I’d tell you but I’m too sober to stomach you yelling ‘Heaven to Betsy!’ and giving me a lecture on your medieval dating ethics.”
You earn a genuine laugh, in which his knees bend a little and his head is thrown back, while his vibranium hand winds up splayed across his midriff. The sun is setting beyond the window, lingering shades of orange warmth frame a heavenly glow around Bucky, highlighting a slight curl in his hair and the piercing blue of his eyes. The view is uncomfortably pleasant, so you bring the bottle back to your lips and turn your head away, suddenly utterly fascinated with the eggshell colouring of the kitchen cupboards.
“I think there’s a leak under the sink,” the comment is absentminded, a meager attempt at steering your mind away from the man and his mixing bowl.
Bucky ignores it and drags you right back to the actual topic at hand.
“That’s funny,” there’s a shuffle of tin behind you. You glance back around to find him smoothing batter into the cake mold, wooden spoon clasped in metal fingers spreading the mix evenly. You’ve never noticed how good Bucky is at spreading things. “Cause I swear I remember Sam mentioning something about the last guy moaning his own name in your ear.”
Beer shoots to the back of your throat.
In a spurt of coughing, amidst the burning pain of the carbonated liquid dripping out your nose, you hurry over to the sink. Mouth dropped open in a dry heave, you lean into the basin and try to minimize the mess you make in search of a breath. Heat envelops you from behind and a pair of sock-clad feet come into view next to your maroon heels. You briefly register the cool brush of metal against the back of your neck as he tries to tidy back your hair and, while you appreciate the action, you can’t help note how completely unnecessary it is. Too distracted to care, your attention shoots straight to the weight of his flesh hand pressing into your lower back. Heavy, warm, large, it pollutes your mind with the knowledge of how it feels to have him soothe your skin — even if there is a layer of silk in the way.
The moment air returns to your lungs, you shoot up straight and ache to step away from him and his wandering-to-all-the-wrong-places hands. The battle against his touch is mute, not even one percent of his strength is put behind the way he grips your forearms and turns you to face him.
Bucky’s eyes scan over you, studying your features. You swallow back whatever feeling brings salivation to your mouth. His thumb reaches towards his own and you watch, transfixed, as a pink tongue darts out to greet it, licking a stripe over the pad of it. A splash of cake batter stains his ring finger. You swallow back more saliva; confusingly, your mouth feels drier than ever. Only when he delicately presses his thumb beneath your eye and swipes over your waterline do you realise you’re teary-eyed.
“See how clumsy you are?” There’s a chastising lilt to his voice that sends blood rushing to your face, and then immediately back down to the overwhelmingly empty space between your legs. “Can’t even swallow properly without ruining your mascara.”
You need distance.
You need to move.
You need to leave.
“He’s here!” The words are almost a gasp as you turn out of his hold. The weight of his gaze trails over your legs as you rush around the kitchen island, fishing your keys out of your purse and rambling out the nerves he’s summoned. “Okay, there’s some leftover pasta in the fridge if you’re hungry, and you’re welcome to the beers if you get thirsty. Big remote turns on the TV, the little one changes the channel. Behave and take care of the place while I’m away, okay?”
“Quit talking to me like I’m some kind of guard dog,” he complains as you pull open the front door and cross one foot over the threshold to safety.
“Oh, I’m sorry!” You cheer back, trailing the door behind you as you go. “I wasn’t aware you were going to start contributing rent, I’ll send you my bank details.”
With that, the apartment door slams shut and you head out for a date in which three things will happen: you’ll flirt, you’ll fuck, and you won’t think about your roommate.
Only one of those things ends up happening.
It’s not from lack of an offer that you wind up taking a cab back to your apartment. Your date had been nice… enough. He complimented your outfit, took a sufficient amount of interest in you, and he even bought you flowers — of course, he’d accidentally left them in his parent’s home. Where he lived. In the basement.
And the thing is, you’re not shallow. Time’s are tough, the economy sucks, and the world is still adjusting to the sudden return to half its population post-Blip. So you were more than game to play sneak-me-into-your-bed-without-waking-your-parents, but, as the pair of you waited on a taxi to arrive, his hand found your waist and your treacherous mind noticed something it shouldn’t.
Bucky’s hand was larger. And warmer. And more welcomed against your skin.
Sick to your stomach by your own thoughts, your night ended with you tip-toeing past the familiar figure sleeping on your couch — definitely not pausing to take in the sheer width of his naked shoulders dangling half-off the cushion — and crawling into bed alone, belly full of Thai and mind full of Winter.
When morning comes, the bedroom door creaks as you pry it open, a fist rubbing sleep out your eye and a yawn announcing your arrival.
“Did you eat my ice cream?” Bucky calls out from somewhere, voice muffled and full of accusation.
Despite barely finishing a glass of wine the night before, there’s a throbbing pain beginning in your temples and souring your already bitter mood.
“Wow, good morning to you too,” you stumble more than walk over to the kitchen, in search of the salvation of ice cold water.
That’s where you find him: laid out on his back, grey sweatpants clinging to bent knees, with everything from his shoulders up inside the open cabinet beneath the sink. His arms are inside too, tinkering away at something above his face.
“Good morning. Did you eat my ice cream?” If ever a thing such as a verbal eyeroll were to exist, Bucky would be doing it. From the lack of seeing his eyes, there’s every chance he is literally rolling them.
Your journey toward the fridge is interrupted by the troubling sight of a glass full of water, a plate hosting a slice of lemon sponge cake, and two miscellaneous white pills that anyone who suffers the unusually cruel punishment of a menstrual cycle is likely familiar with. A post-it note with your name written neatly across it sits next to the unexpected care package.
“So what if I did?” The painkillers go down effortlessly, though there’s a lingering chemical taste that has you gulping down an extra sip of water. “What are you doing, anyway?”
“I paid for it!” For all his outrage, he doesn’t care enough to poke his head out as he chastises you. “You said there was a leak, so I’m checking your pipes. I’m quite good with my hands, you know.”
Is he dense, or is he saying this shit on purpose? The double entendre in his words is glaring, yet you haven’t the confidence nor the will-power to address it, to poke the proverbial bear out of fear. Fear of him scolding your dirty mind, or fear of him doubling down on his suggestive wordplay, you’re not quite sure.
You choose to steer clear of the topic and, more importantly, the unexpected twinge in your chest in response to Bucky’s unrequested help.
“And I paid for the freezer you left it in, the electricity that kept it frozen, and the apartment you live in,” you don’t intend to sound so snappy, like a sulking child fighting against their own self-confessed crimes. “So I think you can spare me some goddamn ice cream.”
You’ve taken to joining Bucky on the floor, sitting across from him, cross-legged and back pressed against the cabinets that surround the kitchen island. In your lap lies the slice of cake, a mouthful already missing and melting its tangy sweetness onto your tongue. You almost moan, but it’s unclear whether the sugary treat just tastes that good or the visual of the soldier laid out on his back and tinkering away beneath your sink is just so stimulating.
If you mention the strange noise your car’s engine has been making recently, would he fix that too? You can already picture him slicked in sweat and oil, hands on his hips as he stands over the opened hood and assesses whatever the damage is. You’d have to watch over the whole thing, of course — not out of your own self-interest but on the off chance something goes wrong and Bucky needs help taking off his oil-stained shirt, or pants, or-
“Your date was that good, huh?” You almost jump out of your skin when he speaks.
“He bragged to me about how he and his college roommates used to play pool,” the pause in your sentences seems to capture Bucky’s attention, coaxing him out from beneath the sink. “Using a shotgun instead of cues.”
As he sits up, elbows finding rest upon his knees, you can’t help but note the five-o’clock shadow he’s sporting. For reasons that have nothing to do with the fraying seams of your sanity, you need him to shave.
To Bucky’s credit, he doesn’t laugh. Yes, his lips glitch somewhere between a cheeky grin and a serious frown, but he does not outright laugh like you expect him to. Instead, he nods down at the half-eaten cake and tilts his head — an unspoken question, is it good?, that only weakens his argument about not being a guard-dog. Between the puppy-dog blue eyes and the yearning for approval, you half expect him to sprout a tail and start panting.
Scratch that last thought, actually. Bucky and panting should not coexist in a sentence together, nevermind in your imagination.
“Mind feeding me a bite?” Yes, actually, you would mind, but one glance at his fingertips stained in whatever-the-hell is going on with your sink leaves you no choice but to tear off a corner.
Bringing the piece of cake to meet his awaiting mouth, you brace yourself for the tentative scrape of teeth stealing it out of your hold. The delicate brush of his lips enveloping your fingers throws you off your axis, and the challenge in his eyes as they hold contact with your own has your thighs involuntarily squeezing themselves together.
For a moment, you swear you catch him glance down at your lips.
Then you remember the health insurance your job provides does not cover the cost of being institutionalised, so you stop hallucinating and come back to reality where Bucky Barnes is not so much a flirt as he is a pest, a stray animal abandoned at your doorstep by a friend who decided to take advantage of your good-natured heart.
“Can you give me the exact phrasing your date used to describe this shotgun-pool?” The soldier is gone in the blink of an eye, flat on his back again and continuing his attempt to seal the leak.
“Why?”
“I’m making this list,” he says, and he must shift his hands higher above his head because suddenly the soft cotton of his white shirt has ridden up his torso, presenting your eyes with a golden platter of sun-warmed skin. “I’m calling it ‘the manchild files’.”
“That’s not even funny,” neither is the way he inches deeper into the cabinet, exposing not only the glaringly white tan-line delineating where the band of his boxers should be resting but also the beginning dark curls of a happy trail.
“Well ‘the stupid files’ sounds so simple, I was worried you’d try to jump into bed with it.”
“Are you seriously about to slut-shame me in my own fucking kitchen?” Whilst slutting yourself out on my floor like your name is Mike and you’re about to show me some magic? is the quiet part you don’t say aloud.
“I’m critical but I’m not hypocritical,” there he does again with that verbal eye-roll. “I wasn’t exactly the image of celibacy when I was your age-”
“Yay, more grandpa lore!” Your interruption earns you a nudge from his leg, but you know it made him laugh because his shoulders gently shake.
“I’m not slut-shaming you, I’m taste-shaming. I swear, being useless must be the precursor to having a chance with you.”
“It is not!” You gasp, yet you’re hardly surprised — Bucky’s not exactly subtle in his disapproval of the men you date.
If there is anything to be thankful for, it’s the alleviation that comes with Bucky shimmying out from the sink again, happy trail redressed and a hand diving into the pocket of his sweatpants. With a dramatic clearing of his throat, he brings his phone up to his face and starts reciting.
“After being told you have a nut allergy, Carter B. said Wait, like, you’re allergic to cum?” You’d always known showing him how to use the notes app would come back to bite you in the ass somehow. “Tommy L. walked into a lampost because he got distracted… watching a squirrel run up a tree. You almost got stood up by Steve K. because he accidentally locked himself inside his own car. Lee B. asked you-”
“Bucky B. is about to lose his other arm if he doesn’t shut up.”
“I rest my case,” and he still has the nerve to open his mouth, awaiting another bite of cake.
You cave with no fight and give it to him.
Because you’re a nice person, not because you want to feel his mouth on you again.
Something cool drips onto the bottom of your naked thighs after Bucky reaches over you and grabs at the glass of water, stealing an obnoxiously large gulp; or is it just exaggerated by your stare zeroing in on the way his Adam’s apple bobs as he drinks?
A thought pops into your mind.
“Did you leave these on the counter because you expected me to be hungover?” Your tone is inoffensive, and unoffended, a simple curiosity you need answered.
“You have a headache, right?”
“Uh-huh,” your eyes narrow skeptically.
“Yeah, I figured you would,” Bucky takes another sip, more condensation trickling down onto your legs. “You always have one after eating Thai food.”
Something inside of you stops.
Your heart, or your lungs, or your mind. Your goddamn liver, for all you know.
This is not supposed to be happening. Bucky is not supposed to fix things just because you mentioned it, once in passing and as a scapegoat from focusing too much on him. And he certainly isn’t supposed to notice things, useless little factoids that not even you know about yourself until he brings them to light. Hell, he’s not even supposed to still be here, sleeping on your couch and criticising your love life.
When the thing inside of you clicks back into place and starts again, a new weight rests atop your conscience.
Maybe it’s not so bad having a roommate, having Bucky be that roommate. Maybe you’re starting to get used to coming home to the smell of baked vanilla and the signature grouchy look he wears as he asks you about your day, about how your co-worker pissed you off, about why you’re home later than usual and not wearing a jacket out in the cold of winter.
“By the way,” he’s calling out from beneath the sink again. “You’ll be happy to know I’m touring an apartment next week.”
“Oh.” The bite you just took turns sour in your mouth. You struggle to swallow it down. “That’s great. Finally! You’re going, and I’m staying here, and I’ll have my apartment back to myself. That’s… Great. It’s great!”
No, really, it’s great.
“You’re joking,” a palm on your lower back guides you to the right, just in time to avoid being trampled beneath a cart.
“I wish,” you say, and saunter over to some colourful packaging that’s captured your eye.
After a moment of inspecting the product in hand from every angle, you put it back on the shelf.
“Let me get this straight,” Bucky pushes the cart along behind you, grabbing that same colourful packaging and dropping it in with the rest of the groceries. “You lean through his window, kiss him goodbye on the cheek and then he just… What, crashed his car?”
“Into a wall with street art of a cliff painted on it,” as you add the most important detail, laughter is already bubbling up your throat. “He literally crashed his car into a cliff without even getting to switch out of first gear!”
The pair of you make up quite the sight.
An entire morning of tiptoeing through the limbo of delirium, after an entire night spent trying to block out the relentless banging from the upstairs neighbours. The door to your bedroom crawled open some time past four and there was Bucky, head poking through the space and looking rather pleased to find you wide awake — despite his claims of just wanting to make sure you were asleep.
Seated on opposite ends of the couch, both of you found a quiet solace in the other’s inability to sleep. While a movie marathon played over the TV, the sex marathon above continued. When exhaustion took claim of your body, you drifted off with your arms resting on the armchair and your head resting on your arms. You awoke atop a pillow and beneath a blanket, legs stretched out over the couch and Bucky curled up on the floor by your feet — like any good guard dog would be.
After a botched attempt to sneak past the soldier, only to have him scare the living daylights out of you by grabbing your ankle as you tried to step over him, you both came to the shocking realisation that the fridge was void of any food.
Which brings you to here: standing in aisle 7, laughing an ache into your ribs over yet another one of your failed dates, with a half-filled cart and matching bags forming under your tired eyes.
“I think it’s time we had an intervention about where you’re finding these men,” Bucky says that last word like it's covered in poison, burning his tongue on the way out.
“They find me!” You say, as he reaches for the box of strawberries you just put down. “As generous as I am, do you want to maybe slow down on how much shit you load into our cart?”
His hand freezes, the box of red fruit clasped in a confusingly delicate grip of vibranium fingers
“You picked it up,” his tone is riddled with confusion. “Don’t you want them?”
“Contrary to popular belief, I’m not made of money.”
“Okay?” He replies, like it’s the most irrelevant piece of information you’ve ever given him — and you once spent an hour ranting to him about the inefficiency of the ink cartridges in your office’s printer. “I’m paying, so do you want it or not?”
“Since when do you have money? Did your pension finally come through? I mean… You are old enough. Also, aren’t you literally a vet?”
“You managed to say all that in one breath, yet you failed to answer a yes or no question.”
A bubble of silence surrounds you both. Bucky blinks, slowly, exaggeratedly. It’s the perfect opportunity to stare at his face and notice the five o'clock shadow has grown. A gruff ‘excuse me’, followed by a man shoving between you both to grab some strawberries, pops the bubble.
Without a word, you snatch the box and place it in the cart.
Half-way up the fruit aisle, Bucky gets the genius idea to open his mouth again: “You wanna know what my theory is?”
“Nope,” you say, popping the p and glancing back at him over your shoulder. “But you’re going to tell me anyway.”
He looks vexingly domestic like this, wearing a sweater and pushing your shopping around. Thoughts betray you, wandering off into dangerous territory as they begin to question how others perceive you from the outside.
What do strangers see: two roommates that quarrel like it’s a biological need, or a couple doing their weekly shop? Two strangers forced together by a circumstance named Sam Wilson, or two lovers unwilling to voice that the metal container between them is too much distance?
“I think you date idiots because they’re idiots.”
“Gee whiz, grandpa, that’s so insightful. I sure do hope I’m as wise as you when I’m your age, but I’ll probably just be dead.” You feel the cart meet your back in a gentle bump, a non-verbal warning to cut the teasing.
“Dating those incompetent men, it’s like…” he pauses, searching for the right words, and plucks a bunch of bananas from your hand, dropping them in with your mounting pile of fruit. “Jumping out of a plane! You get the thrill of falling but, the moment something a little too real and solid appears on the horizon, you pull out the parachute and, that’s it, you’re safe. No danger of falling flat on your face and getting your feelings hurt.”
“I don’t know when you last jumped out of a plane-”
“Remember that Karli situation a few months ago?”
“But not ejecting your parachute leads to a little more than just falling flat on your face.”
“So my metaphor isn't perfect,” Bucky trails off, eyes staring past you and mind lost in thought. You follow his line of sight and find a couple at the end of the aisle, hands intertwined and smiling at each other like they’re the only two people in the world. An unnamed emotion tugs at the soldier’s lips, but he won’t let it take over his stoic features. “But you get my point. If you were actually looking for something serious, you’d date someone better than those men.”
Unprompted and unwarranted, his words spear your heart.
Memories replay in your head, a kaleidoscope of the featureless faces you let take you out, dine you, wine you, kiss you. A handful of immeasurables: how many times you’ve brushed off mispronounced versions of your name, how many excuses you’ve made for the way they talk to you, how many times you’ve lowered your own standards to help a man feel desired. In your wake lies a graveyard of failed relationships, with no proper funeral nor mourning.
You swallow back the lump in your throat.
“Okay, psychoanalysing me aside, what’s left on the list?” You ask, making your way round to Bucky’s side of the cart.
“Well, I still need to write down Jeff G.’s cliff accident.”
“The other list.” You watch as he struggles to fish out the scrap of paper from his pocket.
“Eggs, pasta, feta, toilet roll,” his brows are furled, his eyes are glaring, and with each item he lists off, his words grow more unsure. “Grapefruit? Your handwriting is shit.”
“I was in a rush!”
“And sitting on a jack-hammer?”
“Gimme that,” you snatch the list, he yields it with no protest. As you scan over the scribbled ink, a frustrating truth comes to light. Bucky’s right, your handwriting is shit. “Is grapefruit even in season?”
“Huh,” it’s the sound of hollow amusement.
“What?”
“Just…” His presence looms over you, infecting your senses with the woodsy smell of his cologne and the arduous heat that radiates off of him. When he nods his head to the right, scoffing out a laugh and poking his tongue into his cheek, you find yourself wrestling between temptations of slapping him or pulling him closer. “You really don’t notice what’s right in front of you, do you?”
Lo and behold, on the right side of the aisle, grapefruits.
You make it through the rest of the shopping list in relative silence, with the occasional side-comment from the super soldier that either rouses a grin onto your lips or has your eyes rolling in faux disagreement. Little by little, you peruse the aisles and fill the cart; and, when Bucky picks out the only ice cream flavour void of nuts, you bite your tongue and choose to say nothing.
“I forgot to ask,” you finally speak, standing in the self-checkout zone and struggling to find something to do with your fidgety hands as Bucky scans each item — you insisted on helping and he insisted he’d get it done quicker alone. “How did the apartment viewing go?”
“Oh. Fine,” you grimace as he says your least favourite f word. “The current lease isn’t up yet, so you’re stuck with me a little longer.”
Are you supposed to feel this relieved?
In theory, you were never supposed to feel anything in regards to Bucky Barnes. In practice, it’s a lot more complicated, a pendulum that seems to swing in constant motion between red hot aggravation and red hot something else you refuse to give a name.
All you know is there are times where you wonder if his back is okay sleeping on the couch, and you contemplate asking him to come meet you during your lunch breaks, and you crave to have the anxious shake in your leg quelled by his daily check-in calls whenever he and Sam go off on another misadventure. Whatever reason lies behind your behaviour, the familiarity of ignorant bliss tempts you away from seeking the answer.
Besides, Bucky will be leaving soon. He’ll no longer be your roommate and you’ll both fall out of whatever routine convenience has forced upon you both.
A series of beeps capture your attention.
At the epicentre of the noise stands an elderly woman, grey hair pristinely curled and an outfit that screams Sunday-bests, struggling with the check-out machine. With no employee in sight and no do-gooder fellow customer stepping out of their way to help, the woman’s distress grows with each beep the machine makes at her.
Knuckles brush down your arm, and there’s Bucky at your side, waiting for you to pay him any mind.
“You mind handling the rest?” He asks, in that softly-spoken tone of his that would make anyone feel like swooning. Maybe that’s why it takes you a few moments to notice the wallet he’s holding out to you. “Cash is in the back pocket. I’ll be a few minutes, okay? Just finish bagging everything, leave the carrying to me.”
There’s no time to get a single word out before you’re staring at the back of his head and watching as he makes his way over to the elderly woman.
For every item you scan, you sneak a glance. The butter beeps onto the screen, and you peek how Bucky has effortlessly become the woman’s personal helper. You pass the strawberries through and reward yourself with the sight of Bucky’s cheeky grin — with the way the elderly lady laughs and swats at his arm, you can only assume he’s made some flirtatious comment. Clicking on the option to pay cash, you nearly give yourself whiplash as you turn to watch them again, Bucky’s just about finishing bagging her groceries while the woman opens her shopping-trolley bag.
Waiting on the receipt to print, your reflection stares back at you on the self-checkout screen: a hue of endearment glowing off your features. The smile quickly melts off your face when you realise that he… Oh no.
Bucky is charming.
Part of you has always known he was handsome — you’re stubborn, not blind — yet the sight of him now, all dashing smiles and twinkling eyes playing rescuer to a woman who, despite the difference in their physical ageing, is closer to his own age than you, it troubles you. The acid burn in your throat is not a manifestation of jealousy, no; it’s the queasy feeling of knowing you’ve never looked across at a date, caught him in a moment of content, and felt the unyielding desire to be the reason behind it.
Someone clears their throat beside you, a man with a wrinkle in his forehead and an agitated look upon his face, so you quickly excuse yourself and, with plastic handles digging into your fingers, you approach Bucky and the elderly lady.
Upon noticing you, Bucky’s quick to tug the bags out your grip, a scolding already falling off his tongue: “I told you to leave these to me.”
“Yeah, well, Mr. Frowny-Magoo over there didn’t appreciate me hogging up the cashier,” the comment is meant as nothing more than a lighthearted joke, yet you swear you see something shift in the soldier’s stance, his shoulders tensing and his jaw clenching as he glances back at the stranger.
Fortunately, the elderly woman interrupts whatever he’s contemplating doing to him.
“Она твоя жена?(Is she your wife?)” She’s looking between you both expectantly, speaking words you don’t understand. “У нее лицо ангела. (She has the face of an angel.)”
Whatever she says, it clearly has an effect on Bucky. His head turns to the side, to you, and a visible softness overcomes his gaze as it traces over your face. His shoulders are relaxing, his jaw is unclenching, and he’s switching the bags over to his metal hand, renewing his grip and freeing up the hand that now hangs right by yours, knuckles gracing over your own in a way that feels like a dare, a challenge, a temptation to lace your fingers together.
You clench your fist shut.
“Я знаю. (I know.)” He says, eyes lingering on you a few moments longer than necessary, before he’s back to smiling at the elderly woman.
Halfway home and doubling your pace to keep up with his effortless stroll, curiosity finally gets the better of you.
“What did she say back there, that lady you helped?”
A stranger rushes past you both, phone glued to their ear and stressing down the speaker. Bucky takes grip of your arm and tugs you closer to him.
“Do you spend your time getting bumped into when I’m not around?” His fingers give your arm a squeeze before releasing you. “And, if you must know, she said I was the most handsome man she’s ever seen.”
Little force is put behind the shove you give his shoulder.
You’re too busy agonising over how much you agree with her.
Bucky leaves.
Not forever, but three weeks away on some stealth mission with Sam sure begins to feel like it.
It happens on a Friday. After the week from hell at work, a friend’s mid-week engagement party, and the unexpected downpour of rain during the journey home, you walk into an unlit apartment and a note stuck to the fridge.
Sam needs me. Be safe, don’t bring strangers home. B.
The batch of freshly baked cinnamon rolls sweeten your night up, at least.
There’s a quiet that always seems to blanket the house whenever you lose Bucky to missions.
Before he was dumped on your front door, you’d been used to living alone and the peaceful silence that came with it. Independence, the ability to need no one and want nothing, a trait of yours that once brought pride, now brings you nothing but the static sound of a muted television and the hum of the microwave spinning a meal fit for one.
Mornings become a ritual of waking later yet leaving earlier, no one is there to distract you from drinking your coffee. Though the workload is the same, somehow the slow drag of hours still finds a way to pass quicker than ever, the revolving doors of the office building spit you back out onto the streets of New York before you’re fully ready. Your evenings waste away, starved of noise and company, while you run out of shows to watch and books to read, and count the hours down until all that silence becomes necessary for your eyes to close and your mind to rest.
It’s when darkness rules over the sky and the hour is a single digit that the phone finally rings. A blocked number, untraceable, pulling you out the hands of sleep and filling your room with the noise of your ringtone. He never speaks first, not until there’s an echo down the line of your own sleep stained ‘hello?’.
“You can go back to sleep now.”
You never stay on the line long enough to find out how quickly he hangs up after he speaks. Because it’s only ever meant to be a way to let you know he’s safe, alive, somewhere out there doing who-knows-what and stopping who-knows-who. It’s just an unrequested favour he’s granted you, after the incident in which both he and Sam fell-off the grid for five days and you were nearly rounding up a search party. He’s not missed a call since, once a day while he’s away.
So, when he doesn’t call, it’s only natural that you worry.
The alarm bell rings when you wake up to birds chirping, sun spilling through the crack between the curtains, and not a single missed call nor voicemail awaiting you.
It’s Saturday and there’s no work to occupy your mind, so you force down a bagel, toss a tote bag onto your shoulder, and head out to the local market. But there’s no joy in perusing fruit stands without a six foot soldier trailing your heels and muttering to himself about how exotic fruit has gotten, and how ‘back in my day you had your apples, your oranges, and your pears.’
You wind up home by noon, and the dwelling begins to grow, still no call.
There’s a weight on your chest, and a balloon of anxiety that grows in your throat, and an unwarranted agitation burning at your skin as you read over his note again, still very much stuck to the fridge and taunting you — Be safe, says a man who clearly can’t take his own advice.
Then, why should you?
You agree to go on a date, one you’ve been dancing around agreeing to for a few weeks yet reach for it the moment you decide you’re not pleased with the way Bucky’s lack of a call is ruining your well-earned free time.
And, hey, the guy’s not a complete loser this time. On paper, at least. He’s handsome, tall, and an athlete — ex-athlete, really, but you don’t bother to point that out while he talks about the gymnastic studio he runs. Most importantly, he’s eager to call a cab and get you home, screw Bucky’s warning. If you want to bring a stranger into your home, you’ll do it.
Brooding, uncalling soldier be damned!
After stumbling through the dark of your apartment into your bedroom, and fumbling with your bra long enough for you to grow tired and just take it off yourself, you and Mister Gymnast tumble into the sheets for a performance so lacklustre, it warrants taking all his medals away. At least your date seems to enjoy himself, spilling onto your stomach and falling asleep the minute his head hits the pillows.
“I finished,” last you checked, he hadn't even started.
You lie awake, staring at the ceiling, and try to will the phone to ring. Encased by a stranger’s snoring and a guilty feeling, you let Lady Sleep whisk you away. When your eyes open next, morning has broken and you’re alone in bed with a remnant trace of warmth on the sheets. But the silence is finally gone.
Beyond your door you hear the faint thud of footsteps, the ding of the fridge being opened, the whistle of the kettle. You almost trip in your rush to get dressed, and nearly rip the hinges off the door as you tear it open. Then the smile falls from your face.
“You’re up!” Everyone’s favourite gymnast is there to greet you, a mug in hand as he goes to pull you in for a kiss. The way you swerve is automatic, unplanned, leaving his lips to land on your cheek. “Uhh, I was hoping you’d sleep a little longer, I wanted to bring you breakfast in bed but-”
“He couldn’t figure out how to boil the kettle.”
And there’s Bucky, leaning back against the kitchen counter with his arms crossed over his chest and a smug look on his face. Aside from the butterfly stitches above his left brow, he looks unharmed. Fine, even. Dressed in all black, with a t-shirt that’s hugging his frame a little too tightly for your liking, the double-combo of his dog-tags and vibranium arm on display. Perfectly safe for a man who couldn’t call.
Your date laughs and sheepishly scratches the back of his head before you get the chance to speak.
“Your brother was kind enough to help me.” It’s unclear who laughs first: Bucky or you. “What’s so funny?”
“Oh, nothing, nothing, just…” Bucky says, shaking the laughter away with a nod of his head. “In what world do me and her look related?”
“Wait, if you’re not her brother then, are you-” Fifty shades of horror spill over the gymnast’s face, his head darting between looking over at Bucky and back at you. “Holy shit, is he your boyfriend?”
“Husband, actually,” the soldier’s all too quick-witted, pushing off the counter and reaching for a mug of brewing coffee. “But don’t worry, we’re open. What do you think of our kitchen lights, by the way? My wife here likes them dim.”
Dumb as he is, your date tilts his head up to inspect the light fixtures.
“Oh, they’re nice!”
That does it for you.
“Bucky, shut up!” You snap, finger pointed over at the menace who’s biting back a smirk and stirring away at his mug, face as innocent as sin. Is this some twisted version of revenge, a punishment for bringing a stranger home? You’d prefer the punishment to be a little more… hands on. Preferably in the form of your slapping that twinkle out of his eyes. “He is not my boyfriend, or my husband. He is the bum that lives on my couch.”
“You see how she treats me, Vince?”
“It’s Lance,” the gymna- Lance corrects him.
Moving towards the kitchen, your eyes check over your roommate once more, as though they expect some previously unseen injury to make an appearance on his skin. Come the end of your search, you’re left looking into a face that is sporting a split brow and a cruel level of entertainment from the situation at hand.
There’s a relief to having him back, and it’s wrestling with the exasperating emotions a single missed call conjured up.
“What are you doing here, anyway? Aren’t you and Sam still meant to be… I don’t know, on a homoerotic getaway, fighting crime?” The questions fire out of you as you slip into one of the island’s stools.
“We finished early,” Bucky appears by your side as though from thin air, hand clasping the back of your seat and pushing you in closer to the counter top.
“Aww, don’t worry, big boy, it happens to the best of you,” you tease, an empathetic pat against his shoulder.
The mockery backfires when you notice his brows shoot up and his stare shifts towards your date, who’s too busy trying to open the sugar jar to notice the dig at his own sexual inabilities.
Wait, when exactly did Bucky get home?
“How do you take your coffee?” One-Thrust-Lance asks you over his shoulder.
Before you can answer, a cup is nudged into your grasp and Bucky looks over you with triumph, metal fingers reaching out to drag over a plate of freshly-baked cookies. The smell of warm vanilla pairs well with the soft musk of his cologne, your eyes nearly roll back inhaling it.
“Mmm,” one sip of your coffee is all you need to know it’s perfect, made exactly to your taste. “Coffee and baked goods… I knew I kept you around for a reason.”
In lieu of any verbal response, the soldier takes to dunking one of the cookies into your mug before stealing a bite out of it. You watch as he chews on the sweet treat, head nodding in approval at his own skills. After he dips a second time, you expect him to take another bite, only to find him offering the chocolate chip goodness up to your mouth. Two eyes, blue as any winter, stare encouragingly while you sink your teeth into the cookie.
Heaven couldn’t taste any sweeter, you think, as the perfect blend of coffee stained dough and the sharpness of the dark chips flood your tastebuds.
“So messy,” Bucky tuts quietly, his right hand grabbing a steady hold of your chin while his thumb swipes away the crumbs dusting the corner of your mouth.
That thing inside of you stops again as you watch him bring his hand up to his own mouth, a pink tongue poking out to lick his thumb clean.
Arousal thrums through your blood, a pulsing rhythm that spreads straight to your clit. A squeeze of your thighs brings momentary reprieve, yet the ache fights back with renewed force, drying up your throat and knocking the sense right out of you.
Squirming where you sit, your legs switch position until one foot finds itself tucked beneath the opposite thigh, the heel of it sitting perfectly against your clothed core. You find no mercy, no chance to roll your hips forward in search of the balm only friction will bring to your burning skin. Instead there’s simply Bucky, eyes trailing down the length of you and settling on your short-clad legs. As though his behaviour is not cruel enough, he wets his bottom lip with his tongue
“You like that?” More than you’ll ever know, you almost scream until the logical side of your brain takes the wheel again and you notice him pointing down at the half-eaten cookie. Of course he’s enquiring about his baking skills, what else would this scrambled-egg-for-brains senior citizen be talking about? “Are you gonna make me wait all day for an answer?”
Something smashes behind Bucky, just in time to startle away the racy thoughts from your mind.
“My bad!” Your date — who you damn near forgot was even here — is apologising, bending at the waist and trying his best to collect the fractured pieces of a mug off the floor. “Where do you guys keep your dustpan?”
Bucky pushes away from the island counter, taking the smell of his cologne with him; if you weren’t fully back to your rational senses, you’d miss it.
“I’ll get it, Vince, you just stand there and look pretty.”
“Okay!” Lance, it seems, is just as eager to please the ex-assassin as you almost were a moment ago.
You decide you need to move, to stand up, to stretch your legs. This has nothing to do with the lingering effect of Bucky’s antics, nor the damp patch gathering against your panties.
Slipping off the kitchen stool, you work on chugging down gulps of coffee with every intention of dumping the empty mug into the sink, dashing to your bedroom, and conjuring up the best plan you can come up with to get not only yourself, but also the trash you brought in with you last night out of the apartment and away from an infuriating roommate.
Something on the floor derails you, however, dragging you away from the path to sanctuary. The tiniest red petal, lonesome and neglected upon the cold tile. Three steps over, and there’s another petal. One step until the next petal. You follow the breadcrumb trail all the way over to the garbage can where, with one gentle push of a button, the lid opens up to reveal the unexpected, thrown away like a dirty secret.
A crumpled bouquet of roses.
Everywhere you turn, there’s tension.
In your neck, from sleeping at an unfavourable angle. Within your stomach, where a queasy feeling keeps threatening to spew your guts out onto the bathroom floor. Between you and Bucky, a foreign energy that’s grown over the course of this last week, during which you’ve been avoiding eye contact and his stare is full of accusation.
Retracing your steps, they take you back to the moment Lance left the apartment and you found yourself drowning in Bucky’s company for the first time in weeks. He was barely half-way through poking fun at the choices you made in his absence — most of his focus being on the blubbering fool you brought into your bed — when your patience ran thin and snapped.
Now here you are, bearing the consequence of your own short temper, wiping lipstick off your teeth whilst mentally preparing yourself to go on a second date, planned sheerly out of spite and the need to prove a point.
Poor Lance is none the wiser to his role as pawn in your game of ‘Screw You, Barnes!’.
“Everything okay in there?” Think of the devil and he shall knock on the bathroom door, apparently. “Thought you had your big date at seven.”
The gymnast’s text thread stares back at you, a wall of grey bubbles. You have to swallow down the lump in your throat to speak, “He’s not answering my calls.”
“You’ve been stood up? By that loser?” There’s every chance your storm of emotions is impeding you from thinking straight, but you swear you almost hear a hint of disbelief in Bucky’s voice. Disgust, even.
There’s no point dwelling on the thought.
After a quick wash of your hands, you pry the door open and watch as the soldier leaning against it nearly topples forward before catching himself against the frame. He’s entirely too close for comfort, close enough for you to notice the different shades of blue in his eyes.
“Maybe he broke his phone?” The lack of assurance in your voice has you cringing, the fear of being called out suddenly doubling.
Bucky scoffs, arms crossing over his chest.
“More likely he forgot to charge it.”
Is that what happened to him? Is that why he left you to dwell in the dark over his whereabouts and wellbeing, rendering the usual distraction of a night-time companion useless? Only for you to find him the following morning, right as rain and as annoying as ever, standing in the kitchen and casting judgement-filled glances at your overnight guest?
Thinking about it, about him, brings on an onslaught of anger you’re not willing to address. Not right now.
“Shut up!” It comes across as less independent girlboss and more petulant child, but you’re too busy noticing how firm his chest feels under your palms as you push past him out of the bathroom to care.
Prying open the freezer, you hear the soft click of the toilet door closing. Good, you think, he’s gone away. Out of sight, out of mind. Even if it is only for the short time it takes him to do his business.
That time ends up being even shorter than expected, for only minutes after you’ve dug your spoon into the creamy, frozen goodness of vanilla fudge, the object of both your fascination and your torture is making his way towards the kitchen.
“Didn’t I tell you to stop eating my ice cream?”
“Didn’t I tell you to move out?” Mouth full of vanilla, you shoot him a toothy grin and relish in the grimace it earns you.
Satisfaction melts away when Bucky invades your personal space, metal arm reaching over head and pulling open a cupboard.
“Don’t do that,” you swat at the vibranium bicep, a futile fight that simply makes you all too aware of how smooth it feels beneath your fingertips.
“Do what?” Brain of a caveman, Bucky continues his rustling through the cabinet behind you, features as stoic as a rock as though he’s none the wiser to how your chests brush against one another with each exhale.
“That,” another swat at his arm, though this time he yields. The space between you doesn’t grow, however. It worsens, his attention fully falling onto you now. “Reaching over me like you can’t just ask me to move.”
“Fine, if it really bothers you that much,” are the last words you hear before you’re airborne, two hands squeezing at your hips and moving you two steps over and out of the way.
The soldier doesn’t struggle, not even for a moment, the serum that’s altered his DNA leaving him primed and ready to manoeuvre the most steadfast of objects. Manhandle them, too. Pick them up, turn them over, pin them down, make them scream… Objects, of course, or those big, bad guys he and Sam are always chasing after.
The anger in you is renewed, burning brighter than a star ready to die. You shove his hands off of you and secure another step of distance between you.
“Well aren’t you a ray of sunshine today.” With the rate he’s going at, one would think the soldier makes a living out of deepening the frown on your face. “Is this princess’ first time being stood up?”
You’d slap him, right here and now, if it didn’t mean moving closer and touching his skin; the current top two of your ‘Things To Not Do’ list.
Luckily, the tub of ice cream sits just within reach and your eager fingers take grip of it, sliding it over the counter towards yourself. A mouthful of coolness precedes the burning question on your tongue, “Why didn’t you call?”
“Are you serious?” Now he’s the one scowling and taking a step closer.
“Deadly,” you dig the spoon back into the carton. “Now answer the question.”
“You’re pissy with me for not calling, meanwhile I’m the one who came home to some asshole in your bed?”
He’s moving closer. You try to step backwards.
“Yeah, well, if you’d called like you were supposed to, I wouldn’t have ended up with said asshole.”
Bucky’s eyes narrow, “Oh, so now it’s my fault that you date degenerates?”
The cackle that escapes you could break the soundbarrier.
“Wow! Everybody, give it up for another original dig at my love-life from James Buchanan Barnes!” Voice dripping with seven layers of venomous sarcasm, you give three slow claps of your hands. The cynical smile that overcomes your face feels borderline deranged, something plucked right out of a horror movie. “Okay, yeah, I date losers! Happy? Jesus Christ, Bucky, what do you expect me to do? It’s not exactly like there’s anyone else lining up to date me.”
“I am!” His voice is raised, his eyes are wide, his chest is heaving. “Maybe I’m the biggest idiot, rushing home last week to surprise you. Even brought you flowers. I just… Fuck!”
You don’t move, don’t blink, don’t breathe.
Bucky runs a hand through his hair, knuckles going white as he pulls on the tresses.
There it is again in his eyes, the accusation.
Even though he’s shaking his head, he steps closer.
The kitchen counter is right behind you, there’s nowhere for you to run.
The heels on your feet almost give out beneath you, you try to steady yourself with your hands.
Bucky has other plans and grips both your forearms.
“I am,” he repeats, softer. Slower. The icy exterior of accusation melts away to reveal vulnerability.
A hand meets your cheek and holds you like you are glass, breakable beneath his touch. Your heart’s in your throat, and there’s a current of electricity running down to your toes, and that neglected hunger in your loins creeps in again. His eyes search your face, while his thumb gently swipes over your bottom lip, prying it out an involuntary capture from your teeth.
It’s unclear who reaches for who first, whether he dips and takes possession of your mouth, or you grab him by the collar of his shirt and lay your claim over him. In a matter of seconds, a tentative press of lips against lips divulges into loss of breath, tongues in mouths, and fevered kisses.
The soldier kisses with starvation, like he has walked through the desert of loneliness and at last stumbled upon an oasis, like a bee seeking every last drop of nectar from a flower dying off with the spring, like a body clings to sleep in the throes of exhaustion. It’s a necessity, a human need, a matter of survival to keep your lips interlocked.
The hand on your face holds you steady as he tilts himself deeper into the kiss. Noses brush against the swells of cheeks, eyelids rest close, feet shuffle closer in search of eradicating the crevice of distance between you two. Metal fingers curl around the nape of your neck, a gesture you reciprocate while your spare hand lays flat-palmed against his beating chest. One of his legs winds up between yours and, as he shifts weight from one foot to another, there’s the faintest relief of friction against your cunt and a whine gets caught between your throat and Bucky’s eager mouth.
Despite how you chase his lips, he pulls back and grants you the sight of pure endearment.
“Look at you, whining already. Where’s all that fire gone?” It’s practically a whisper, spoken with fascination. “Or were you just needing Old Bucky to touch you, huh?”
Second-hand embarrassment burns the tips of your ears, while your own unspoken agreement to his question has your stomach twisting up. Survival instincts, that have never been much of a friend, scream at you to flee this feeling, to throw away Pandora’s box before you risk fully opening it and having it consume you.
Bucky intercepts your attempt to push out of his arms.
“Ah, ah, get back here. Not done kissing you,” his words divulge into a barely coherent mumble as he reconnects your lips.
Beneath the heat of his kiss, the discomfort in your chest turns to ashes. Because, while instinct tells you to run from danger, this is Bucky.
Bucky who fixes cupboard hinges, and sleeps with both eyes on the door. Bucky who carries all the shopping, and holds every door. Bucky who calls to hear your voice while he’s away endangering his life, and brings home the silliest trinkets he finds on missions. Bucky who wakes you when you miss your alarm, and knows if you’ve had a bad day simply from looking at your face.
How could you possibly be in danger when it comes to him?
While you’re overcome with epiphany, he’s taken to tracing his lips over the slope of your jaw and mouthing at the skin of your neck. It’s when he lifts you up onto the kitchen counter that your wandering mind is reeled back in, to the physical present where your legs rest on either side of the soldier and the prized possession of vanilla fudge once again sits within reaching distance.
“Are you stealing my ice cream right now?” His lips tickle your collarbone as he speaks, barely a moment after you’ve scooped the spoon into your mouth.
“I’m warm, and it's melting,” his head pops up just in time to accept the spoonful of vanilla you deliver. There’s a glow in his eyes, one that has you questioning if it's been there all along or if it's a consequence of touching your skin. “Don’t want it to go to waste.”
His mouth is on yours again, a rush of three chaste kisses seared against you before he replies, “Then let’s cool you down.”
At a teasingly slow pace, you feel his fingers tug down your dress’ straps, leaving the silky fabric to slip down your frame and pool around your hips. Under the golden hue of the kitchen lights, his gaze studies your bare skin like it's a work of art, an eighth wonder of the world, the greatest poem never written woven into it. Yet it still manages to pale against the face that overcomes him as he removes a final layer of lace.
Unlike Vince, he has no trouble removing your bra.
“So responsive,” he talks as though only his ears are meant to hear it, his vibranium palm gently taking hold of your left breast and rolling the hardening nipple between two fingers.
He’s studying your reaction, bewildered by the goosebumps spreading over your flesh.
When was the last time he truly touched another person? Weeks, months, years, decades? The thought of his hands on a faceless shape makes you sick. First with envy, and then with hypocrisy, an amalgamation of all the men you’ve taken to bed flashing before your eyes. But none of them ever touched you like you were porcelain, and none of them looked at you like you held the key to eternal pleasure. None of them were Bucky.
A chill runs down your spine and a gasp rips out your chest as Bucky swipes the spoon over your skin, leaving a trail of ice cream atop your right breast for his tongue to follow. He plants a garden of kisses along the swell of your chest before pulling away to give the left side equal treatment, another creamy river along your skin for him to clean up.
Moving at their own volition, your hips grind gently against his steady figure as Bucky coats your nipple in vanilla, moaning into your chest as he lays claim over you with his mouth. Spoiling you in his kisses, the soldier begins to yearn for friction, meeting the careful roll of your hips with his own.
Your hand finds his hair and his stare meets yours, intense and all-consuming as he releases your nipple with a scrape of his teeth. You want to soothe his kiss-swollen lips but they’re already wrapping themselves around your other breast, not even patient enough to lather you in the vanilla goodness this time.
Instead, the coldness on your skin stems from metal fingers, perched on your thigh and creeping up the length of it, inch by tormenting inch. A hesitant hand wraps around a vibranium wrist, tightening its grip before you begin guiding his touch inwards, upwards, to where you need it most. Bucky's stronger, more resistant, and holds off your interceptance, left hand continuing its intended path beneath the skirt of your dress and grabbing hold of your naked waist.
He’s everywhere, all over you. Mouthing at your chest, gripping at your hip, rutting into your pussy. The sweet drag of his bulge over your clothed core sires a wet patch against your thong and has your fingers tugging on the roots of his hair, winning you the hair-raising hum of a groan against your breast.
Desperate to feel more, you renew your efforts to lead his hand to the space between your legs and are met with a shake of his head.
“No,” he mutters, and robs you of a hand beneath your dress, using it instead to cradle your jaw while his lips skim over the shell of your ear. “Wanna feel you.”
The warmth of flesh brands your thigh, Bucky’s right arm now leading the charge beneath the silky fabric. With bated breath, you brace yourself against his strong chest and try not to squirm in anticipation of his touch. With one final squeeze at your inner thigh, the soldier’s hand engulfs your clothed cunt and his breath cracks in your ear, a strangled out, feral noise that has your toes curling.
“She’s so wet, darling,” his voice has you delirious, breathy against your ear. His fingers flex against your pussy and a moan catches in your throat. “You gonna let me touch her?”
Something about the way he’s speaking to you, the words he’s choosing, makes you want to fall apart. Your sex-life has always been liberal, you know what it is to have a man’s hands all over you, trying to take ownership of parts of you he thinks belong to him. Men who take, and take, and take, until there is nothing left of you to give, and not once do they care to win your favour, to plead for permission. But Bucky…
“Please, say I can touch her, wanna give her what she needs,” he’s pleading for it, begging for you — wrecked and desperate, breath run ragged from no more than the relief of rolling his groin against your thigh. “Promise I’ll be real sweat, make you feel good.”
Too caught up in his own head, he doesn’t notice you nodding, until you’re granting him salvation verbally, “Touch me, Bucky.”
He doesn’t hesitate, doesn’t waste time on taking off your underwear, just moves it to the side and drags the tip of his fingers down the inseam of your pussy. You hear it, more than you feel it, the moment he touches your opening, a sharp inhale at your ear telling you he’s exactly where he wants to be.
As his middle finger slips in, it’s hard to tell which of you reacts louder, both a mess of guttural moans. Once it's fully sheathed within you, he curls it and presses against your soaked walls, grinning against your skin at the reaction it coaxes out of you.
“Don’t hold back,” he chastises you as you bite back another pathetic whimper, a second finger slipping into you. “Let me hear what I’m doing to you.”
He must have a magic touch, you’re sure of it. Thick fingers that fuck into you at a steady pace, curling and teasing at that world-bending spot inside you, while his thumb makes itself useful against your clit, a firm force for your bucking hips to grind up into while you chase the pleasure he’s unleashing on you. In a matter of minutes, the room is alive with your melodic moans, Bucky’s endless hums of approval, and the damn-right embarrassingly loud squelch of him fingering your drooling cunt.
You make the mistake of letting your eyes slip shut, relinquishing yourself to the way he touches you with the rough hands of a soldier yet the delicate stroke of a musician playing his favourite instrument. He must feel the shift in you, for he’s instantly prying his face away from your neck and tightening the metal grip on your jaw, fingertips digging into squished cheeks.
“Look at me,” his words are both a command and a plea. An order you follow and a prayer you answer, eyelashes fluttering open to find his face in front of your own. His lips are a hard line, his brows furrowed in disapproval, and there’s a vein threatening to split down the middle of his forehead, but his eyes. His eyes are affection incarnate, two pools of lust and worship that pose no threat of drowning. “Do you want to cum?”
Never has a more needless question been asked.
You nod into the force of his vibranium hand, but that’s not what he wants, frown deepening.
“Say it,” needy, helpless, spoken like he’s the one on the brink of ecstasy. “Please.”
“Bucky,” it feels good to say his name like this, brain melting into mush and heart racing in your chest. “I want you to let me cum.”
“Let you?” He’s offended by the word, fingers burying impossibly deeper inside of you while he continues to stare you down. “I beg of you.”
No warning precedes the coil in you snapping. The muscles in your core tense, your back arches into his broad figure, your pussy squeezes at Bucky’s fingers with a death grip. He guides you through it, ignoring the cramp in his wrist in favour of continuing to fuck his hand into you, a smile finally cracking over his face as he watches you fall apart atop the counter, nothing but Bucky, Bucky, Bucky surrounding you.
He tries to give you reprieve, a moment to breathe and savour the buzz in your veins, the hand around your jaw shifting to stroke at your cheek while the hand between your legs soothes you with featherlight touches.
You don’t let him, hand pawing down his torso and gripping at the belt of his jeans, delighting in the familiar clang of a buckle being undone, nimble digits that tear leather out its loop and tug down his zipper. Bucky’s bringing his lips back against yours just as you palm at his bulge, his tongue licking into your mouth when you finally release him from the confines of his boxers.
Fingers coated in your own slick grip at your thigh while the soldier makes it his mission to steal your breath, rendering you blind to the sight of his cock. But you can feel it. The weight of it in your hand, the burn of want ingrained in his skin. The width of it, and the length of it, and the perfectly mushroomed tip that has him keening into your touch as your pointer finger drags over the head.
“Is this what I do to you?” Still lost in the maze of your orgasm, you manage to gain back crumbs of your usual confidence watching Bucky fall mute. When he merely nods, you play him at his own game, fingers back in his hair and forcing him to look you in the eye. “Say it.”
He doesn’t.
He says something much better.
“D’you even realise how many nights I’ve laid on that fucking couch, hard as a rock and willing you to come out your room?”
“That’s your generation's problem, you know?” You whisper teasingly, incapable of fighting off your own laughter. “You swear more than you breathe.”
“C’mere,” he’s rolling his eyes and pulling you in, kissing you like it’s been a milenia and not a minute, hand nudging yours out the way to take a hold of himself.
Your teeth graze over his tongue as he drags the head of his cock through your folds, and he groans into your mouth before pulling back. Resting his forehead against yours, he’s teasing you both as his tip brushes over your hole before continuing its rutt up, bumping against your sensitive clit.
A wicked voice takes control of your mouth.
“Lance would have fucked me by now.”
“Vince would have cum by now, too,” he’s still rocking his hips, no sense of urgency behind the way he soaks himself in you.
Meanwhile, you’re a handful of seconds away from screaming at him to just stick it in already.
“You- Oh!” Prayers answered, hallelujah, his cock finally sinks into you. It’s a shallow thrust, barely more than the tip before he’s retreating, yet it's enough to mess with your head. “You heard us?”
“Unfortunately,” and he means it, the most subtle of pouts forming on his lips before he feeds himself a little deeper into your pussy. “I’m not great when it comes to timing.”
“I only slept with Lance because you-” Right on cue, he fucks into you even deeper and your words dissappear before they can reach your tongue.
“New rule,” a hand rests on your knee and encourages you to spread your legs wider. “No speaking another man’s name when you’re in bed with me.”
“Technically, this is the kitchen counter-” The bastard does it again, cuts you off with his dick — if it didn’t feel so damn good, you’d slap him.
He’s bottomed out at last, buried himself fully in your cunt. Hands snake around your waist, one palm flattening against your lower back while the other rests a little further up and guides your spine to arch into him, closer, like there’s anymore space left between you to devour.
His pace is still slow, teasing. A toe-curling drag of his cock out of you, letting you feel every ridge and vein before his hips promptly snap back into you and send your eyes rolling back, your head falling back — and smacking loudly against the cupboard door behind you.
Bucky freezes, one hand quick to cradle the back of your skull while his eyes scan over you.
“Jesus, doll, you okay?”
“Please don’t stop,” you plead, ridiculously unfazed by the faint ache when you’ve got him inside of you.
Even though he rolls his eyes, he complies.
“Might have just given you a concussion and all you care about is getting fucked?” He asks, like you could possibly care about anything else when his arms are hooking themselves under your knees and rucking you up off the counter, away from any rogue cupboard that means you harm.
If anything, you’ll gladly shoulder the burden of any possible injury, if it means being granted the sight of his biceps tensing as he effortlessly stands there and fucks you down onto him. Were you in any sane state of mind, you wouldn’t think it, but god bless that super soldier serum.
“You can give me a cockcussion for all I care,” head perched on his shoulder, you watch your nails sink into the fabric of his shirt and wish it would disappear and gift you the naked view of his back.
“Adding that to the list,” he whispers against your forehead, pressing a kiss against it.
Legs bent at the knee, you watch how, with one particularly deep thrust, they bounce at either side of him and one of your heels clatters to the floor.
The room pivots as Bucky turns, you still in his arms and your ankles locked behind his back. At first, you believe he’s aiming to move things into the bedroom, where the only thing your head will be hitting is the mattress when he lays you down. He proves you wrong, however, the cold press of marble against you once more as he settles you down onto the kitchen island.
Much to your chagrin, he slips out of you, cock now sitting pretty against his clothed abdomen and glistening with the sheen of your essence. In the blink of an eye, the soldier is sinking to his knees, metal finger reaching back for your fallen shoe.
The scene plays out like something stripped right out of a morally dubious, low quality pornography retelling of Cinderella, in which Prince Charming has his dick out, Cinderella’s gown is half-way off, and the infamous glass slipper is just a pair of heels you bought on sale.
Bucky is delicate and slow, mouth tickling at your inner knee as he secures the shoe in place. He rests back on his haunches and fully takes in the sight of you, perched upon the counter, hands splayed out on marble, a tangle of silk around your waist, lips parted in search of steady breathing.
There’s an intensity to his gaze, burrowing itself beneath your skin and becoming part of your bloodstream, spreading throughout your body. It makes you want to hide, flee like you do best, but Bucky has other plans.
“The shoes stay on, but this,” Bucky’s fingertips tug lightly on the hem of your dress, exposing a sliver of new skin. “I need this gone. Am I allowed to take it off?”
There he goes again, face the model of innocence while he asks for permission to your body. If you weren’t already dripping against your panties, you would be now. Luckily, he doesn’t push you to verbalise your agreement this time, more than eager to comply the moment you nod your head.
You wiggle your hips as he pulls the fabric out from beneath you, his grip snagging on the waistband of your thong and dragging it away alongside the dress. When your ass cheeks press back down onto the cool of the counter, reality hits you like a freight-train: you’re completely nude, with Bucky on his knees before you, in the middle of the kitchen.
“Buck,” the y of his nickname disappears as you feel him peppering kisses of your leg, inching that little bit higher each press of his mouth. Squeezing your eyes shut, you try to remember where your rational thoughts are stored, conjuring up images of friends, of Sam sitting at this very surface. “I don’t think we should… I mean, people eat off this counter!”
“Don’t worry,” reaching the threshold of your thigh, his kisses seem to speed up, that sauve and composed exterior chipping away to reveal a man who no longer wants to take his time with you. “I intend to eat.”
No sooner than the words reach your ears, Bucky swipes his tongue up your pussy and any fight left in you melts away as you turn to putty beneath his touch, soft and malleable, willing to sit there and take whatever he wants to give.
Give, he most certainly does. Lips latch onto your clit, hands hold your squirming hips in place, tongue dances over your most delicate areas before dipping into your entrance. He drinks from you like you’re the sweetest honey, the richest of red wines, the Holy Grail promising an eternal youth to a man whose time was stolen from him.
“You should see her, doll,” there’s a rasp in Bucky’s voice, a feral undertone to the growl that rests in the back of his throat. One hand tugs his shirt off while the other snakes between your legs, two fingers spreading your lips open in an obscene gesture that has you clamping down on your bottom lip. “She’s drooling for me, all pretty and wet.”
Dropping both your legs over his shoulders, he tugs you right to the edge of the counter and dives back in. You feel his nose bump against your clit and your hand grabs onto your thigh, nails piercing into flesh as your mouth sings a whined symphony.
Vibranium curls around your wrist, prying harm away from your own skin and silently imploring you to hurt him instead, nestling your fingers back into his hair. He’s renewing his effort, a touch that’s more determined than ever to make you fall apart, on his knees and worshipping the altar of your body — fealty and devotion seared into each lap of his tongue, each brush of his lips, each stroke of his fingers.
Who are you to reject his piety? You welcome it, with closed fist and glassy eyes. The soldier shudders — a full-body shiver that shakes down his spine — as the point of your heel digs into his back and your fingers squeeze at his scalp, no mercy shown as you lose yourself in the throes of lust.
When you cum, a silent scream rips through your chest and a burning-too-bright white light turns you blind. He doesn’t let up, tongue still buried in your convulsing walls as your thighs clamp around his head and your feet kick at his back, shoes flying elsewhere into the kitchen. He pays none of it any mind, content to prolong your orgasm for as long as you’ll allow him, slowly rising off his knees with two hands pinning you back against the counter while he continues to feast on your pleasure.
“Ja-mes,” a fractured call of his name is all it takes for him to stop, pupils more black than blue as they stare down at the picture you paint atop the counter: teary-eyes, swollen lips, heaving chest.
He’s hardly the image of composure either, red lines along the expanse of his back, hair a tousled mess, the scruff on his face covered in a sheen of your juices. And, yet, never have you wanted to kiss him so bad.
All you manage, after minutes of floating atop the cloud of your peak, is a cheeky grin and a comment that makes him roll his eyes: “For a fossil, you’re pretty kinky.”
“War camps aren’t exactly known for being fun,” as he speaks, he slowly lowers your legs off his shoulder. “You find ways to keep yourself entertained.”
“Bet you were quite the pleaser, huh?” Trying your best to play it cool, you lay your head fully back on the counter and stare up at the ceiling, praying he doesn’t notice the hypocritical pit forming in your stomach as you listen to your own words. “Probably had all the prettiest nurses fighting over who gets to tend to your poor, aching, throbbing co-”
“Jealousy looks cute on you,” he interrupts, amused, as his hands soothe over your hips.
“I’m not jealous!” You exclaim, barely believing yourself.
One hand reaching out for him, you watch your fingers intertwine with the prosthetic digits and let him tug you back up, chest to chest when his hand finds your cheek.
“I was,” his confession is crooned whilst staring right into your eyes, the tiniest up-turn to his mouth. “Everytime you walked out the door to go date a new loser.”
“Who knew,” your voice is as gentle as his own, nonchalant as a finger dances down the well-defined muscles of his abdomen and elicits a groan out of him. “All along I had my own loser at home.”
Bucky opts for silence as your hand reaches his groin and pays no mind to his cock, red-tipped and leaking, flushed against his stomach. You’re more interested in his jeans — in removing them, to be exact. It doesn’t take much, a sharp tug at the hem before they’re slipping off, meeting restraint as they cling to his muscled thighs and implore him to finish the job on your behalf, shucking them off blindly to where the rest of your clothes lie.
You must have saved a village in a past life to be rewarded with the view of a completely nude Bucky Barnes, skin stained by lust and laced with gold beneath the kitchen light. You must have saved the rest of the world, too, to watch how his eyes roll back and his mouth falls slack when you take his length in hand and give one slow pump of your wrist, releasing it just to watch it slap back against his abdomen.
As you reach for his dick again, his hand secures itself around your own and guides it up and down the length of it. Once, twice, thrice, till he’s breathing heavily and dripping in pre-cum.
“You must be close,” a statement you make with his own bodily reaction as evidence to back it up, yet there’s still room for doubt — to what extent does that soldier serum interfere with him?
“Put me back down on my knees and I’ll cum to the taste of you,” the soldier certainly makes a tempting offer, one that it almost pains you to refuse.
Almost, if you hadn’t already felt the sweet stretch of him inside you.
“Pretty sure putting you back down on your knees might be considered elder abuse, ole buddy.”
“My age may be a hundred and six but-”
“Exactly my point.”
“But my body isn’t,” he’s using that stare of his, the one Sam always warns you about, while you’re full-on cheesing, a rush of adrenaline shooting through your veins as you wind him up.
“Remind me, who threw their back out a few weeks ago pulling a tray of muffins out the oven?”
His flesh hand grips behind one of your knees and tugs you right to the edge of the counter, while his left one, still clasped over your own, drags his tip over your folds.
“I don’t remember hearing you complain when you drunkenly ate half the tray and then threw up over the rest,” admittedly, not one of your proudest moments.
“Shut up and fuck me, Barnes.”
“Yes ma’am.”
Just like that, you’re drowning in him again, gasping for breath as you lose yourself in a flood of lust. Bottomed out, stuffing you full, Bucky barely graces your pussy with the chance to adjust to his stretch once more before he’s moving, the sweet graze of every inch being dragged along your sensitive walls.
Your nerves are still reeling from his mouth, a quiet hum of electric pleasure reawakened by his throbbing cock and his vulgar mouth.
“She fits me like a fucking glove,” his hands are pawing at your waist, your breast, your face, never in one place for too long as he begins to settle into a rhythm of thrusts. “Doing so good for me, darling.”
The softness put into his term of endearment births an ache in your chest, one that will accept no medicine other than your arms around his neck and his lips on yours. Mouths tangled in kisses and sweat dripping down your skin, Bucky halts — your hips pressed together, the swell of his balls resting right against your swollen cunt, the head of his cock resting right against your sweet spot — and grinds.
Slow, deliberate, delicious. You whine into his mouth and feel how he swallows it, feasts on your ecstasy with a willing tongue, and a smiling mouth, and possessive teeth that tug at your lip as he pulls back. He stretches out the feeling, grinding a second time as your noses bump against one another.
“Bucky,” his name is an anchor, a paperweight, something to ground you amidst the floaty feeling of being two orgasms deep with a third approaching any time now.
“I know,” he says, and you believe him. Believe that he knows, that he’s known, that he always knows when it comes to you.
You lay your head to rest upon on his left shoulder when he returns to chasing a high between your thighs, a renewed vigor behind each thrust that has your hips rolling to meet his and your nails raking over the straining muscles of his back.
“I lied,” an unprompted confession stumbles out his mouth, fingers flexing into their grip on your waist. “About the apartment viewing. I didn’t go.”
“Bucky,” is all you can manage, branded into his skin with a kiss along his neck.
“Is that all you can say? Huh?” His voice carries a teasing lilt, paired to perfection with the pad of his thumb rubbing at your clit. “I’m giving pivotal revelations here, and you’re just gonna reply with that?”
Another echo of his name, walls fluttering around his dick.
“Bucky, Bucky,” he’s mocking you, a torturer’s laugh as he moans his name into your ear. “Keep going, you sound so pathetic it’s almost cute.”
Beyond words and beyond sense, you give in to the weight of his palm splaying against your stomach and guiding your back down onto the island. The soldier hooks your legs over his elbows, deepening the angle that his cock fucks into you, and you swear you see stars dance along the kitchen ceiling.
A hand smooths over your gut and you look back at Bucky to find adoration in his eyes.
“You see that?” You almost want to cry when his movement switches back to a slow drag — innnnn and outtttt — until you notice it: the smallest hint of movement beneath your flesh, a subtle visual of the outline of his tip bulging against your skin from inside you. “See how full she is, how good I’m making her feel?”
Pressing your hand against it, you can’t help but giggle as you feel him poke at your palm, only to fall back into a puddle of incoherent noises when he keeps pushing at that sweet spot, over and over. Harder and faster with each draw back of his hips, you feel rivulets of your own arousal roll down your ass and onto the marble, tainting the counter forevermore in the sins the soldier commits against you, the sins you welcome with open legs.
You’re near the edge again, and he feels it, pushing you closer and closer as he slowly spirals into a mess of phrases that barely begin before he’s cutting them off with something new.
“Don’t deserve this-” He catches himself, rips the insecurity in his voice out by the roots. “C’mon, let me see it one more time. Need to see you fall apart.”
“Want you to fall apart too,” you manage to beg, unwilling to watch him hold back or pull out before he finishes. “Please!”
Like any good soldier, he obeys.
Crashing over you like a wave, he’s doubled-over by the waist and sandwiching you between the counter and him. You feel him spill into you, hot ropes of cum painting your walls white as a third crescendo washes over your body.
Both of you seek out the other as his thrusts grow languid and your walls spasm, milking him for every last drop he’s got. When your mouths meet, it’s less of a kiss and more of you simply breathing into the other, exchanging air and body heat.
“So,” you croak eventually, exhausted and spent atop the counter yet completely unwilling to relinquish him from blanketing you. “Are you gonna do that every time I steal your ice cream?”
Somewhere between jello-ed legs and cold compresses, you wind up in bed.
Skin clammy, lips swollen, lust satiated, you practically melt into the buttery softness of your bed sheets as Bucky lays you down. Despite how you’re still basking in the glow of your third and final orgasm, the soldier seems to think, for a second, you can handle another.
With gentle hands prying open your thighs and a curious tongue diving in for a second helping, licking up the dribble of his own cum spilling out your hole, he’s quick to be corrected when you roll away from his touch with a whine and a plea, “think I might actually die if you make me cum again, Buck.”
He’s unbothered by the rejection, wholly embracing it as he curls up behind you and snakes his arms over your naked skin. It’s you who drags the sheet up and over you both, turning in his arms to plant your head on his chest. His heart races beneath it, but you hold off on teasing — your own isn't any better.
“Sam’s going to kill me,” you whisper out into the room, when moonlight is peeking through your curtains and both of your heartbeats have calmed down.
“I’m sorry,” you feel him shift beneath your head and, though you can’t fully see him, you feel that blue gaze land on you. “Have I not made it clear enough what name you should be saying in bed?”
“There’s a serious chance I’ll die and you’re thinking with your dick,” he squirms as you pinch at his nipple. “You’re no better than the men on your list, Barnes.”
Silence floats back in between you for a moment, peaceful as the slow stroke of his fingers dancing up your spine.
“Why would Sam kill you?” He pauses, hand pressing a little harder down against a knot in your shoulder. “He knows you have a crazy guard dog.”
Your crazy guard dog just pressed a kiss against your forehead, how frightening.
“He made me swear I wouldn’t get involved with you. He said you weren’t in the headspace for a relationship, that you needed to focus on inner peace first.”
“Turns out inner peace is being inside of you,” you pinch at his nipple again. This time, he doesn’t run from it. This time, you almost swear you hear a little moan creep up his throat. “So, Wilson’s to blame? I can get behind that.”
“To blame for what?”
His hand’s now running up and down the back of your arm, leaving goosebumps wherever its tender touch goes.
“Why it took you so long to jump my bones.”
“You think I jumped your-” Your head rises off his chest and you stare into the navy darkness of the room, trying to make a concrete shape out where you see shadows of his face. “Wait, so these past few weeks, I’ve not been hallucinating? You’ve been… flirting?”
“It’s been more than a couple weeks, sweetheart,” Bucky seems to have no problem finding you in the dark, hand cupping your cheek and dragging you up to press a chaste kiss against your mouth. “You don’t seriously think I waited until morning to check that sink without hoping to be caught, do you?”
“So you were slutting yourself out on the kitchen floor!”
“Think the kitchen’s seen worse,” worse might be the understatement of the century.
Clothes still lay discarded, counters unwiped, ice cream completely melted. Cleaning you up had been the soldier’s only priority, and you weren’t in the mood or the mindstate to argue with him on that.
A fingertip tickles down the slope of your nose.
“Stop fighting it, you’re tired,” you hear him whisper.
“I want to hear more about your desperate efforts to get my attention,” it’s nothing but a weak protest.
“We have all the time in the world for that. Sleep,” you don’t hesitate to comply when Bucky’s hand presses you back down against the warmth of his chest. “You’re going to need it. Our upstairs neighbours still need a taste of their own medicine.”
+ extra hyde !
· 70% of this fic is just dialogue, these two losers would not stfu!
· writing banter + sexual tension feels more exposing than writing literal porn.
· lore accurate photo of me whenever bucky barnes exists:
warnings: mdni, forced proximity, exes to lovers, grovelling, minor teasing, vague mentions of sex, kissing, light groping, all plot and feelings my bad, bucky is down astronomically bad, feelings realization, banter carries the first half, player!bucky turned loverboy!bucky, sam and joaquin for comedic relief, fluff, a little bit of angst with a happy ending!
author's note: this is my humble contribution to @artficlly's moodboard event! i ripped my hair out every step of the way!💞this is only about 80% proofread because it's 10pm and i'm tired; i've been working on this for three months. 😩
The air felt sticky. It wasn’t surprising, given the humidity was sky high. But that didn’t make it pleasant. Your thighs stuck together, sunscreen working somewhat like glue from your spot in your chair. The water glistened like a great, vast jewel, the sun overhead making white beams, the foam of the ocean looking like frosting with each crest. Small dots broke up the blue, in various bright colours, beach goers enjoying the gorgeous day. You could just barely make out the floaties of the little kids right on the surf, parents watchful and close by.
A few teenagers were clustered around the rock pool, poking into its depths with a long piece of driftwood. Umbrellas and towels covered the beach like litter. You’d be walking the beach soon, but right now, your post was up here on the chair. You’d only had one encounter so far wherein you’d had to scale the ladder of the chair and sprint through the sand, kicking it up behind you as it scalded your feet, ignoring the shock of cold water as you dove into a forward stroke to get to the little girl who’d gotten a bit too far into the waves. It had been an adrenaline pumping moment, even after you’d brought her back to safety.
You’d been a lifeguard at the local pool in your last year of high school, but this was a step up. Back from college, you’d known immediately how you wanted to pass the time. Though some found the heat stifling, you enjoyed it. You felt like you withered away in the winter, and you’d take all the summer air you could get until you were forced to hide away in the ivy covered buildings on your campus again.
You loved this job, actually. The other lifeguards ranged in age, but the ones you were on shift with the most, Sam and Joaquin, were your favourites. It was never a dull moment with those two, and you’d seen both of them in action. You’d thought you were fast, but you had nothing on either of them. Sam seemed to fly through the sand when he had places to be, Joaquin hot on his heels. It was very clear that they were some of the most perfect people for the job.
It wasn’t like you were always stuck on the chair, up high where only the seagulls could reach. You’d stay on your perch for a couple of hours at the most before coming down, walking a circuit on the beach, and then disappearing into the shack a little ways down. It was a rule, actually, to get into the shade every two hours. What good was a lifeguard with heatstroke? Bruce was normally in there, sitting at the shabby desk with his glasses slipping down his nose. He was always poring over the schedule and checking to see if he needed to order more life jackets, rafts, or anything else that was necessary to function as a busy, popular beach. And you’d sit in one of the rickety chairs, grab one of the paper fans on the side table, and try to remember what ‘room temperature’ felt like.
This job was a dream for you, aside from one glaring issue. It wasn’t something you could easily fix—you couldn’t just ban someone from the beach if they weren’t doing anything wrong except for to get on your last nerve.
Bucky Barnes came to the beach.
Every. Single. Day.
Bucky Barnes, your former high school sweetheart, who broke up with you at your graduation, when the plan had been to stay together. You went to sister schools, after all. It would have actually been quite easy to stay together. But he’d wanted to sow his wild oats, as it were. Starting with head cheerleader Natasha.
It shouldn’t have been a problem. You’d seen him a handful of times—you shared friends, after all—but you hadn’t had to speak to him, or look at him for longer than a minute. You didn’t want to see his stupid perfect face, to remember what it felt like when he kissed you. You would stubbornly say there was no love lost there, only a wound that had been hard to heal. You had cried all night, your first evening in your dorm. The original plan had been for him to help you move in, and for you to help him, and then to tour both of your campuses to see what buildings you would be in, where the best spots to wait for each other would be.
It would have been fine if he was just on the beach because he liked it there. Unfortunately you knew, with a sinking feeling in your gut, that that wasn’t the reason. He was simply there for your attention. The first time you’d been alerted to his presence, you’d been walking the beach, heading to the chair, or Overwatch, as you and the others liked to call it. You’d seen him from the corner of your eye, and started walking more briskly, hoping to get past without him noticing, but he fell into step with you easily.
You’d tried to put all your force into pushing him away from your side, but he just laughed, immovable, keeping your pace. “Will you just talk to me?” he finally said, though he sounded amused at your ire.
“No, fuck you. I’m working.” you said crossly, not bothering to censor your words. You weren’t about to scream and shout at him, but you were very much unimpressed by his lack of contriteness.
“Yeah, I know. I’m here because I know how good you look in a bikini.”
You cut a glare his way, annoyed beyond belief that he was looking you up and down. You were actually wearing a pretty conservative suit, the top a black band around your chest, not unlike a sports bra, the bottoms high waisted and full coverage. You’d worn skimpier for sure.
You ignored his navy blue shorts, his lack of shirt. He was already halfway to a decent tan, sunglasses perched on his head rather than over his eyes. You could see the twinkling, mischievous blue of them even when you weren’t looking directly at him. “What do you want?” you hissed, almost at your destination.
“I think we should talk.” he said simply, reiterating what he’d first claimed. But you knew that it wasn’t as easy a request as he made it sound. Because how could you talk to him while ignoring your shared history?
“I don’t think so.” If he was about to ask you to be friends with him again, something you hadn’t been since you were fifteen years old, when that that word had changed, the prefix of ‘boy’ and ‘girl’ added to the front of it, then he was in for a surprise.
“Come on,” he said, drawing out the words, arms spread wide. “You’re already doing it right now!”
“Fuck off, Bucky, I’m working.” At last, you reached Overwatch. You scaled it with ease, grimacing to yourself all the while, because you just knew he was checking out your ass.
“I’m gonna be here all summer, sweetheart.” he called up to you, cupping his hands around his mouth. You gave him a withering stare. He’d projected his voice loudly enough that a few heads turned in your direction. “Can’t avoid me that easily.”
Then he’d smiled at you, smug, like he thought he’d be able to corner you easily. Well, he was about to find out how wrong he could be.
You hadn’t expected him to actually come to the beach every day. The first two weeks, sure, you guessed. Bucky was one of the most determined people you’d ever met. But you thought that eventually, even someone as tenacious as him would get tired of it.
But no, he rolled up sometime after you, without fail, even going so far as to park in the spot next to yours when it was available.
He’d lay out on a towel, or join whoever was playing a spirited game of volleyball, or try his hand at surfing. You’d begrudgingly watched him, alert as ever, to make sure he didn’t get a lungful of saltwater and drown. You were not looking forward to the prospect of giving him mouth-to-mouth. You thought it would be much more entertaining if one of your male colleagues got that pleasure.
If you weren’t up at Overwatch, he was chasing you down, pestering you to take five minutes to talk, though you still didn’t know what exactly he wanted. You’d already complained to Sam about it at length. Nonplussed, he’d told you, “Just see what he wants, and if he’s being an asshole, I'll throw him in the sea,” to which Bruce had looked up from the desk disapprovingly, and said quietly, “I don’t want to hear about any threats to someone’s life.”
You didn’t want to talk to Bucky, though. You knew that if you did, he could easily swindle you into something in under five minutes. He was very good at that—he’d always excelled at turning your brain into mush with a few carefully persuasive words and a gleaming white smile.
You didn’t think that you had ever affected him nearly so much. If you had, he probably wouldn’t have broken up with you. Regardless, you continued to ignore him to the best of your abilities. Until…
Bruce liked to have meetings every two weeks to make sure everyone was still up to code, and to mention anything important like upcoming events that might make the beach busier, or harsh weather warnings. It was standard procedure, and everyone would trudge into the office, whether they were on shift or not, to listen in.
When you got there, canvas bag hoisted on your shoulder, you stopped short. Joaquin walked into you, not noticing you'd stopped, and let out a soft “oof!” You’d only come to a halt because standing in the middle of the office amidst a handful of the other lifeguards, was Bucky.
“Oh, you’ve got to be kidding me.” you muttered.
Bucky noticed you right at that time, and his pensive, distant expression melted into a charming grin. “Guess we’re coworkers for the rest of the summer. Isn’t that great?”
“You know that I can’t change the schedule to favour any of you over the other.” Bruce sat at his desk, watching you pace back and forth. There was sand caked into the worn floorboards. “You’ll be on shift with him at one time or another.”
Your hands were fists behind your back, your head down, looking at your flip flops. “But isn’t there some way we can look at it more strategically?”
“Look, I know that you have some kind of history with this guy—”
“Does he even have his certification?” you interrupted, unable to stay neutral any longer.
At this, Bruce frowned. He was very thorough of course, so it had been a silly question to ask. But you were grasping at anything, anything that could bar him from being around you 24/7. “Of course he does. And even if he didn’t, we’re doing the CPR drills on Saturday morning, remember? He would have got it then, if not.”
You stayed silent, trying to refrain from screaming.
Bruce said your name, quiet as always, and you looked over at him. “Did this guy… did he hurt you?”
You could see the concern on his face, and you sighed, defeated. “No, not physically. Just… emotionally.”
You both sat with that for a moment. “I’m sorry about that. But there’s nothing I can do. You know that I don’t tend to double you guys up unless I have to, but I can’t guarantee that you’ll never have to work with him. I know you’re professional, so I’m not worried about you,” he paused, pushing his glasses back up, “but if he goofs around or something, I’ll get rid of him. okay?”
You didn’t allow your shoulders to slump like they so wanted to. “Okay.”
It looked like your nightmare was about to begin.
Something you hadn’t anticipated, something far worse than what you’d imagined, was that Sam and Joaquin got along with Bucky like a house on fire. It had you spitting mad. Those were your friends, your work buddies, not his. At least Joaquin had the sense to look guilty when you caught the three of them laughing it up at the end of a shift.
You stomped to your car, shaking sand from yourself, as you cut past them. You didn’t hear footsteps jogging behind you until you were on the asphalt, just a few feet from the safety you were banking on.
“Hey, wait!” you scrunched your face up at the sound of Bucky’s voice and started to fumble blindly in your bag, looking for your car keys.
He caught up with you right as you fished them out. “Hey, I just wanna talk.”
“Yeah, so I’ve heard.” you said icily.
“Well, can you just hear me out?”
“No.” You unlocked your car, throwing your bag in the backseat. Once you’d slammed the door closed, you turned to face him. He was blocking the driver’s side. “Move.”
“Not until you talk to me.”
You crossed your arms. “Move right now, or I swear, I’ll—”
“I want to get back together.”
“Are you fucking joking?” You were incensed. The fact that he had the balls to say that to you…
His expression was serious, pleading. “Look, I know I made a mistake—”
“A mistake?” you screeched. “You broke up with me right before I took grad photos with my mother!”
You’d made her banish them to a cupboard behind all the other photo albums, unable to bear the sight of your red rimmed eyes and streaky makeup.
He winced. “I know. Shitty timing on my part, I’m sorry. But I regret it. I regret all of it. I miss you. I’ve been missing you.”
“What, Natasha not giving enough in the sack?” you said sarcastically, a vicious bite.
You thought he went a shade paler as you continued on. “Yeah, I know about that. We hadn’t even been broken up 24 hours before you slept with her.” You sounded hysterical, and for good reason. You’d never had the chance to scream and shout at him before. Now seemed to be as good a time as any. You didn’t care if you drew a crowd. Hell, the entire beach should know what a piece of work he was. “I gave you almost three years of my life, Bucky, and you stepped all over it like it was dirt. Why the hell would I take you back?”
“Well, you never dated anyone after me, did you?” he asked, though he knew the answer.
You flushed, your skin hot, and it had nothing to do with the sun beating down on you. “What’s your point? I was pretty busy studying.”
“Now, you and I both know that’s not why.” he said, leaning down and getting close to your face. You could smell his breath, peppermint. You knew he kept Lifesavers in his glove compartment—it seemed that hadn’t changed.
“You haven’t dated anyone because you still love me. And I still love you. And I’m not going to stop fighting for you.”
If he’d said it to you any other time, maybe it would have cracked your exterior, exposed your gooey center. Maybe. But right now, it was only proving to you that he didn’t even get it. That just because he said he still loved you, didn’t mean you’d drop everything. Because if he’d loved you even at all, he never would have broken up with you.
“The only thing you miss is having a girl sneak into your room at night and warm your bed.” you said, disgusted.
At this, he had the audacity to look wounded. “No, I—”
“Move out of my way, or I will scream.”
The wild look in your eyes told him you were serious, and he stepped to the side. You got in the car, shoving your key so hard into the ignition you thought you might have damaged it, and then tugged your seatbelt with enough force that it got stuck. You put the car in reverse and heard tap tap tap against your window. He was still there.
You rolled it down, just a crack. “Back up or I’m gonna run you over, I swear to God, Bucky.”
“I’ll show you how sorry I am. I swear. I’ll make it up to you. I’ll be good to you for the rest of my life.”
“Go fuck yourself, Bucky.” And then you were speeding out of the lot, feeling your eyes burn with unshed tears.
That evening, as you laid in your bed, the window wide open to let in the outside air, you closed your eyes and thought of drowning Bucky in the ocean. You were sure you could lure him out there late at night, with the promise of being understanding. You could play the game, lead him out into the water under the guise of being playful. He was stronger than you, but you thought your rage might be enough to hold him under water for long enough.
You felt a small stab of peace at the idea.
Of course, you couldn’t do it—it would be just your luck that you’d land in jail because of him—but thinking about it was nice.
Instead, you would do the next best thing.
You’d make him regret ever looking in another girl’s direction. If he wanted to play, you could play. He didn’t realize what the game really was. You just had to wait for the right moment.
You had the next day off, and thank God for that. There was no way you could face Bucky so soon after what he’d said to you—you hadn’t calmed down enough yet. But you did spend the day with a couple of girlfriends at the mall. You hoped he was disappointed to pull into the lot and not see your car. After all, he might have gotten the job just to bother you, but it still meant that he had to actually work when he was there, whether or not you were scheduled.
On Saturday morning, you arrived a little after sunrise. You weren’t working that day, either, but the drill was necessary, so there you were in light, loose clothes over your bathing suit, your hair a tousled mess, prepared to spend the next couple of hours in the sand. You weren’t the first one there, but you’d beat Bucky at least, so you had a few minutes of calm before he showed up.
The drills were meant to work as refreshers and to also help team building. After all, in a real crisis, you’d all have to be synchronized with each other well enough to administer help as quickly and efficiently as possible.
As well as standard CPR on the beach, you were being tested on pulling people from the water. It was harder for someone like you, not built like Bucky or Sam, but you still always aced that part of the drill. There were also some drills based on call and response times among yourselves, and when and how a two person job should be administered. It would be a piece of cake, you thought to yourself. You were never worried about tests like these.
Your sunny mood threatened to sour when you saw Bucky, long and lean, loping across the beach to where the rest of you were gathered. Bruce and one of the older lifeguards were off to the side, speaking quietly. The drills would start in the next five minutes, but you wished it would be in the next five seconds.
Taking a deep breath, you willed yourself to be calm when Bucky entered your orbit. You knew that he’d make a beeline for you. He stood by your side, hands on his hips, as he admired the ocean. “Missed you yesterday,” he commented.
“Okay.” You were plain in your response. There was nothing to say, really, and you figured that for now, one word answers were the best you could do.
“I remember you telling me about these types of drills when you still worked at the pool. Is it gonna be similar to that?”
You pursed your lips, eyes to the sea line. You didn’t want to think about last summer, or the one before that. “In the act of saving lives? Yes.” you said drily.
“I got my certification last week,” he admitted.
you bit the inside of your cheek. So he had definitely planned this, not just taken the job up on the fly. It had been his goal all along to force you into his proximity. “Okay.” you repeated, back to the safety of a single worded answer.
“I never told you before, but I think it’s really cool that you care about this sort of stuff.”
If he thought a compliment was going to get him anywhere, he was sorely mistaken. You were saved from saying “okay,” for the third time by Bruce striding forward and clasping his hands in front of him. It had been noiseless, but it may as well have been a clap, because everyone straightened and turned in his direction. “Alright, everyone. We’re going to get started now. You know how to do this, so we’re skipping the demonstration. Just show us that you remember the right protocols, okay?”
And with that, the drills were underway.
It had started out fine. You were quick, and you knew exactly where all the extra equipment was. You knew what you should have on your person, what should be secured at Overwatch, and where any emergency backups were. You knew the best way to get them without leaving your victim. Communication was key in this sort of situation. The walkie-talkies were waterproof, but you tended to know exactly what you were dealing with before you were too far out in the water, able to call and anticipate what you’d need, or if you would require assistance, before reaching your target.
For most drills, you used dummies, though some were with your fellow lifeguards acting as helpless swimmers. So far, you’d been able to keep well away from Bucky.
That was, until it came time for the last one. It was a two person drill, and Sam, despite his newfound friendship with Bucky, was still your number one for group situations when the choice was possible. You high fived each other as you got ready on the presumed start line, right by Overwatch. The idea was that in this particular drill, two people would be needed to bring the person back to land and administer CPR or anything more serious.
The only hitch in this was that you were supposed to be saving Bucky, who had eagerly volunteered to float in the ocean and wait for his rescue. It irked you, but you pushed it to the side, ready to show that you were worth your salt. Bruce stood off to the side with a stopwatch. “Alright, ready…?”
At your determined nod, he clicked the button of the watch. “Go!”
You took off in a dead sprint. You were in only your swimwear by now, your clothes discarded in a pile along with everyone else’s. The water was still cool at this time of morning, though you’d been in and out enough that it didn't slow you down. Sam matched your pace pretty evenly, his legs longer, but you had a killer breaststroke, and got to Bucky first. He grinned at you, flicking water from his eyes. “My hero.”
“Shut up and don’t make things difficult. If you screw this for me, I’ll kill you.”
Sam got to you both right as you finished the threat, and Bucky allowed himself to be pulled to land. Once you got him down on the sand, far enough away from the lapping waves, there was a brief, hesitant pause. You were already on your knees beside him. It had been automatic. The thing was, one of you was supposed to administer CPR while the other went for the first aid kit. You and Sam hadn’t discussed who would be doing what. Inwardly, you cursed. You thought maybe somewhere in your subconscious, you were anticipating mouth-to-mouth. What you wouldn’t have given to let Sam do it instead, to leave Bucky spluttering as you held in a laugh.
But you didn’t have time to switch now, because in a real situation, that wouldn’t be an option. Sam took off towards Overwatch, and Bucky blinked up at you innocently. “Save my life, angel. What are you waiting for?”
“Shut up!” you whispered harshly. “Drowning victims usually don’t talk!” Then you started with chest compressions. You were using a bit more force than you really needed, especially since Bucky could breathe, but you didn’t care if he wheezed a little. He deserved it.
Even still, his eyes seemed to sparkle when you stopped after the count. “Do not enjoy this,” you warned, before pinching his nose and covering his mouth with yours.
You weren’t supposed to actually breathe for him, but mimicking the motions was supposed to do the trick. Why, oh why did you not get to use a dummy for this? It was because all your other compatriots were currently performing the same drill, and there were no more left, but it felt like some cruel twist of fate to you, like the universe was having a laugh at your expense.
To your utter relief, he let you do the first set without issue. Then you went back to the chest compressions, where mercifully, he stayed quiet. It was when you did the second set of mouth-to-mouth that things went south. You felt the barest twitch of his fingers against your knee. Then he was snaking his hand up your thigh and to the dip of your waist. You sucked in a breath, moving to pull away, but not before you felt his tongue breach your lips and touch the inside of your mouth.
You stared at him, stunned by his boldness. How in the world had no one noticed the obvious violation of the drill? Instead, he only smiled at you lazily, head pillowed by sand. “You taste just like I remember.”
“Oh, I’m gonna kill you,” you glowered at him, putting your hands on his chest and pressing down with all your weight. He only looked pleased.
“Hey, don’t break our dummy. He’s not one that we can replace.” Sam’s voice snapped you out of it, the first aid kit dangling from his hand.
You sat back on the sand heavily. “Work away, Wilson. I did my part.”
“And you did it so well,'“ Bucky cooed, ignoring the daggers in your eyes.
You excused yourself as soon as you could, under the plea of a bathroom break. It was a short jog down to the cabanas where the stalls were. The lighting was dingy, the four by four room made up of blue tiles. You stared at yourself in the mirror. The drills were almost done, and it was still early in the day. After this, you could go home and put Bucky out of your head, at least until tomorrow.
You still couldn't believe that he’d kind-of-sort-of kissed you. It shouldn’t have been a shock—he’d made his motivations to win you back somehow very clear—but still, you didn’t think he’d put your job at risk in order to do it. Okay, maybe that was a bit dramatic… the most Bruce would have done would be to give you a deeply disappointed stare. But even still, that wasn’t something you wanted to be on the receiving end of.
When you walked back out, the sky had started to cloud over, just a little. You thought you could smell rain on the horizon. It didn’t matter to you. You’d already been in and out of the water a dozen times. You hoped the sky would open up and pour all over Bucky after you left.
The rest of the drills were a breeze. You stayed far away from him, choosing to stick with Ava instead, though you could feel Bucky’s eyes on you. At the end of the circuit, Bruce, pleased with everyone’s efficiency, began handing out coupons. They were a dollar off for the ice cream stand, redeemable any time during the summer. You usually gave yours to Cassie, the stand owner’s daughter, but you decided to keep it this time. You deserved the treat for dealing with Bucky all morning.
You stuffed it in the pocket of your shorts before throwing your clothes on and stealing away to your car while Bucky was distracted by pats on the back from Sam and Joaquin, glad to be away from him, though you had a feeling the memory of his mouth would plague you for the rest of the day.
You settled, reluctantly, into the routine of seeing Bucky often. If you weren’t filled with bubbling annoyance, you would have felt almost like you had in high school, being in his proximity all the time. From the way he kept finding excuses to be close to you, it really did remind you of high school. Back then, when you’d been surrounded by teachers and other students, he’d had to be subtle with his affections. You remembered your hands being linked together behind your backs, or his shoe touching yours, arm to arm. Him scooting his chair closer, or pulling yours across the tile until your knee knocked into his. Back then, you’d mooned over each other like any other lovesick couple. You’d frequently been told to ‘get a room’ even when all you’d been doing was sitting on the bleachers under his arm, leaned against him, or resting back against his chest under one of the trees outside.
It was different now, of course. He’d get close to you, kicking up sand and disturbing the pecking gulls, and you’d simply move away. You had the excuse of surveying the beach, at least. Being around others didn’t really deter him either—any time you were in the middle of a laugh with Sam and Joaquin, he’d join right in, and you’d abruptly stop your giggling and become stone faced for the remainder of the interaction.
You thought you’d at least get some peace and quiet when you ventured to the ice cream stand on your break. You liked Scott—he and his daughter ran the stand all by themselves, sometimes with a volunteer on really hot, busy days. He was always very silly normally, even more so to the little kids, and there was usually a line about a mile long to get a rocket pop or ice cream sandwich. You were lucky to be the last of a rush of customers, and stuck around as you started in on your vanilla cone. You were half leaned into the window, making conversation with Cassie and enjoying the cold that you could feel blasting from the deep freeze. The stand was really more of a little hut, decorated in a Hawaiian theme. Scott always wore the most goofily patterned shirts he could find.
Your fun was short lived when you felt the heat of a warm body at your side. You felt yourself stiffen, knowing exactly who would be that bold. You barely had to turn your head to see Bucky, looking innocently at Cassie. “Is this where I redeem my coupon?” He held the paper between two fingers, and it waved lazily in the breeze.
She grinned at him and took the coupon, and it was only a matter of seconds before Bucky was mirroring you, ice cream cone in hand. “I should have known this was where you’d be hiding.”
You straightened and pulled away from the stand, offering a half-hearted wave to the Langs. “And now I need to find a new spot.”
As you spoke, you felt the slow drip of vanilla curling over your fingers. It had started an instant melt the second you’d moved away from the window. Without thinking, you licked the offending melt away, grimacing at the stickiness you knew it would leave behind, and glanced back at Bucky.
The look on his face was comical. Eyes wide, mouth slightly open, completely ignoring his own melting ice cream. His eyes had been locked in on your hand, and more specifically the trip your tongue had taken. You snorted. “Oh, grow up.”
He tried and failed to school his expression. “That was hot.”
You wrinkled your nose and resumed eating, trying for bites instead of licks—you were almost down to the cone now, and you didn’t really feel like eating vanilla soup, but his eyes tracked your every move. “You’re so gross.”
“Do you remember that night… at that John kid’s party?” Bucky asked, eyes still on your mouth.
You rolled your eyes. “Seriously—”
“When we stole wine from his dad’s cellar and hid in the pool house, and you started hiccupping so much that you couldn’t breathe, but you kept laughing and laughing and laughing?”
You did remember, though it was fuzzy. You’d drank way too much that night. It had been about two months before graduation, and the nerves had been getting the better of you for weeks. But Bucky had convinced you to go, to try and get your mind off of it. “I remember. But I remember what happened after more than I remember that part,” you admitted.
He gave you a half-smile. “Yeah, me too.” The ‘after’ had been very rushed, very giggly sex, and your ‘B’ necklace had kept smacking you in the chin every time you’d moved. And then Bucky and you had snuck out, slinking behind patio furniture, hands tightly clasped, when another drunk couple had stumbled in there. And he’d taken you to a fast food drive thru, and you’d sat on the hood of his car eating ice cream and looking up at the stars.
You didn’t want to get sentimental. It was a road you’d already travelled far too many times, and you didn’t want to drive the familiar path to your dead relationship again. You didn’t want to eat your ice cream anymore, either. You threw the cone in the trash, felt the stickiness between your fingers, and looked at your hands in distaste. Your break was over soon, anyway. Bucky was still staring at you, with eyes as blue and warm as the Southern sea.
“Well, this was fun and all, but I’m gonna go wash my hands before I get back to Overwatch.” You moved to sidestep around him, but he moved with you, cutting you off.
“I miss hearing you laugh.” His voice was quiet, almost drowned out by the shriek of a gull.
You bit your tongue before saying, “Well, that’s a privilege only my friends get to hear. And you’re not my friend, Bucky.”
You left him there, with ice cream dribbling down his wrist, and a bitter taste in your mouth.
You were subject to moments like this all throughout the week. There were days where you almost reached salvation in the form of not being scheduled with him, but every time you thought you were free from Bucky’s pleading stare, he’d show himself. You really thought he’d have better things to do with his summer, but if you were at the beach, then so was he, without fail.
One of the hottest days of the year had approached. Bruce had scheduled many of your for that weekend, encouraging frequent breaks and eagle eyes on the beach goers to ensure that heatstroke was at a minimum. You’d worked days like this before, the sun no joke. The ocean shimmered like a disco ball. It was almost painful to look at, especially from your vantage point on Overwatch. Your stint up high was almost over, with only a few minutes before someone switched with you. Your little handheld fan was losing the battle with the heat, only serving to blow more hot air your way.
You caught sight of a group of girls around your age, a striped blanket held between them as they squealed at the burn of the sand on their feet. They set up not far from you, before pulling off their beach coverups. Obviously, they were intent on getting their tan on. If that hadn’t been clear already, their bathing suits were little more than floss and scraps of fabric. It left nothing to the imagination, that was for sure. You idly watched them lay out, before scaling Overwatch when one of the other lifeguards came to take over.
You were totally unsurprised to see Joaquin and Sam a little further down the beach, not hiding their ogling in the slightest. Joaquin’s eyes were so huge that they looked like dinner plates. You rolled your eyes. Typical men. You approached and lightly shoved Joaquin’s arm. “How about you look at the rest of the beach too, and not just the hot girls, hmm?”
“But—
“Oh, come on. Lighten up. It’s not every day we get to see girls that hot just laid out like that.” Sam complained, gesturing at them.
You gave him a look. “Actually, it is every day. This is the fucking beach, Sam. Hot girls are kind of a dime a dozen.”
You dragged them both along with you, hands firm on their elbows. “You’re just jealous that no one’s making eyes at you.” Joaquin muttered petulantly.
It wasn’t worth commenting on, so you just sighed and shook your head, but then Sam said, “Well, that’s not true… Bucky’s been checking her out all day.”
Your head whipped to the side to stare at Sam. Today had been a day that you’d mercifully not seen much of your ex. You’d covered up today. The UV was high, and you’d worn your rash guard, not wanting to risk a sunburn. Compared to the group of girls, you might as well have been furniture. Sure, maybe Bucky was doing his standard eye-fucking, but there was no way he’d be checking you out over those girls. You weren’t blind—even you knew they all looked like they belonged on the cover of Sports Illustrated.
You arrived at the cabana and immediately sat down on the floor in front of the dinky little air conditioner, letting it blow in your face. Sam fished in the cooler for some bottles of water and tossed one to you, which you caught with a grateful look before chugging half of it. Joaquin rounded Bruce's desk to look at the schedule, before letting out a whistle. “Well, good luck, because you’re walking the shoreline with Bucky in like, ten minutes.” He said to you.
You grimaced. “I know.”
You’d looked at what the day would bring for you when you’d first arrived. Walking the perimeter wouldn’t be so bad. And if Bucky really got on your nerves, you’d just push him into the surf and keep walking.
“Are you ready to forgive him yet?” Sam asked, slouching in one of the chairs.
You glared at him over your shoulder. “Why on earth would I do that?”
“I don’t know, maybe so we don’t have to hear him pining over you or whatever. Dude’s got a heart boner for you so strong that it makes me nauseous.”
“Shut up, Sam.”
“It’s true,” Joaquin admitted with a shrug of his shoulders. “He won’t shut up about you. I know things that I should never know.”
That gave you pause. “Like what…?” You were afraid of the answer.
“Like for your one month anniversary—lame, by the way—you made him a giant skillet cookie and stuck a sparkler in it. Why do I know that? I didn’t want to know that.”
“Or,” Sam added, “that your yellow sundress with the lemons on it is what shows off your legs the best. Why do I care? It’s gross. You’re like a sister to me. I don’t wanna know that.”
“Oh my God.” You groaned, covering your face with a hand.
“Yeah, think of how we feel.”
“Well maybe you shouldn’t have gotten so buddy-buddy with him, ever think of that?” you snapped, looking between them.
“When he’s not waxing poetic about how your eyes look like the stars, he’s a cool guy. But my God, he’s so down bad for you.” Joaquin laughed at your disgusted stare. “So either forgive him, or put him out of his misery. Seriously.”
But it wasn’t up to your friends to decide whether you should forgive and forget. They weren’t the ones that had had to nurse a broken heart between shifts at your part time job and 8am lectures. You sniffed disdainfully. “Sounds like it’s gonna be a long summer for you two, then.”
You spent the remainder of your inside time sitting back against the wall, finishing your water and reapplying sunscreen to your face and your legs, listening to Sam and Joaquin talk about something or other, before you stood with a sigh. “Off to serve my sentence,” you said, stretching your arms.
“Good luck out there.” Joaquin said with a mock salute.
When you pushed open the cabana’s door, you almost screamed in surprise, your hand flying to your chest to calm your racing heart. Bucky had been standing right outside. “Jesus Christ, Bucky. Were you lurking out here like a feral raccoon the whole time?”
He shrugged one shoulder. “No, only the last two minutes. I saw you guys come inside but I didn’t want to crash the party.” His eyes flicked over your form, before he said, “Are you ready to go?”
“I guess.” You blew hair out of your face, then started walking, not waiting for him to catch up.
You basked in miraculous quiet for all of three minutes, the walk around the shoreline barely started, before you noticed that you were the only one with your head on a swivel, watching the water and the beach. Bucky had been staring at you almost the entire time.
“Ugh, god, Sam was right.”
Bucky met your eyes. “Huh?”
“He said you kept checking me out. How about you check out the beach instead? You know, seeing as it’s your job.”
“I can’t help it,” he held his hands up, giving you puppy eyes. You were pretty sure he was pouting a little, too. “I only have eyes for you.”
You scoffed, turning to look at the sea, the group of kids splashing around nearby. “Yeah, right.”
“It’s true!”
“Pretty sure you’d be singing a different tune if Natasha was here.” You sounded bitter, and you knew it. You hated it. You didn’t want to keep bringing it up, to keep bringing her up, but the whole thing was like a splinter in your palm, one that had gotten so deep under your skin that you couldn’t remove it.
There was a moment of silence between you both. You felt the sand under your feet. You were closer to the water than he was, the waves lapping at your ankles as you walked. Your footprints were washed away after every step.
“What do you want me to do,” Bucky finally said, a heavy breath escaping him, “do you want me to beg?”
And to your embarrassment, he got on his knees right there, stopping you in your tracks in front of a large family, who all turned to stare. You looked left and right, mortified as any other surrounding beach goers started turning your way as well, keen interest in their eyes.
“Oh my God, get up.” You flicked your hands, beckoning him to stand, your voice strangled.
“I’ll beg, I’m not above it. I’ll do whatever it takes. I have no shame. I know how I feel about you.” He said steadily, looking up at you like you were the sun.
Oh, no… you had a terrible feeling that he was about to begin a whole speech. “Bucky—”
“I was a total idiot. I’m gonna be kicking myself for it for the rest of my life. I was stupid and scared and everything was changing, and you were my only constant. And instead of clinging to you like I should have, I did the dumbest thing I could possibly do, and I hurt you. And I’m sorry. I’m so, so sorry. I know forgiveness isn’t easy, but I’m asking you to consider it.”
You weren’t really listening, too focused on the heat under your skin, heat that had nothing to do with the warm weather and everything to do with being in the spotlight of a bunch of strangers.
“If you don’t get up right now, there’s no chance in hell.” You whispered harshly.
To your surprise, he stood immediately, latching on to hope. “So there’s a chance?”
“That’s not what I said.”
Bucky grabbed onto both of your hands, and you fought a shudder. It had been a long time since he’d touched you, and even something as innocent as this sent you into a tailspin. When you looked at his face, your eyes slow to move from where he’d been kneeling, you saw a horrible amount of earnestness there. You pulled your hands away from his, rattled. He didn’t usually let you see his true feelings, not when you were together. It had been pretty rare.
“Can we just… can we just finish the perimeter, please?” you asked. People finally started looking away, disappointed that there hadn’t been more of a spectacle.
“Okay. Whatever you want.” But Bucky stayed standing in front of you for a moment longer, before stepping to the side and falling in line next to you.
The rest of the walk was quiet, but his words kept echoing in your head anyway.
It didn’t take you long to notice, after that, that Bucky had started to switch shifts to see you. Even if he didn’t necessarily get to work with you directly, you had noticed names being scribbled out and switched with his. He was always working when you were, now. He was everywhere. Even for things as unnecessary as helping you down from Overwatch. You’d climbed that chair dozens of times without any need for assistance, but all of a sudden, there he was with an extended hand to help you down. You always ignored it, but he did it anyway.
Frankly, it was unnerving. You had to believe that was it, because if you thought about it further... you were worried a small piece of you would find it sweet.
You could no longer ignore him quite so easily. Not when he was being so nice. You could only be so much of a bitch, and it was getting harder and harder to do when he’d bring you water or a snack, or offer to take over so that you could have a couple of minutes inside. He was certainly doing the most to win you over. And you were just a little bit worried that you’d fold like a house of cards if he pushed some more.
Unfortunately, being around him so constantly also made you aware of things you didn’t really want to be aware of. Like the consistent sunburn between his shoulder blades. Bucky refused to wear a shirt, not on any of the days that he’d worked. He technically wasn’t required to, but you thought it was silly to risk a burn just to show of his Adonis-like figure. It was hard to look at him without remembering what it had been like to trace your fingers over his abs. But eventually, the perpetual red mark between his shoulders and up his neck had you taking pity on him.
The next time you were working together, you saw him wince when Sam clapped him on the back in greeting, before trading off. You’d just arrived yourself, your bag on your shoulder. Suddenly, it felt heavy with the weight of sunscreen. “Bucky, doesn’t that hurt?” You touched your own shoulder for emphasis.
He bit his lip, frowning. “Yeah, but I can’t reach there.”
You hesitated before biting the bullet. “Do you want me to—”
“Yes.” He answered before you could even finish the question, his eyes locked onto you.
You regretted asking. You fumbled with the lid of the sunscreen before squeezing some out onto your hand. Standing behind him like this made you think of all the times he’d given you a piggyback ride, walking you from his car to your house. You’d pepper the side of his face with kisses and he’d dig his fingers more firmly into your thighs, keeping you strapped to him like a backpack. You willed the memories from your head at the first gentle touch of your fingers to his skin. You could feel the heat of the burn and winced, imagining the pain. It only took turning into a lobster one time for you to always slather yourself in sunscreen and light layers of clothes, and you thought he’d do well to remember it too, but you said nothing as you rubbed the lotion in. Bucky let out a soft hiss of discomfort but stayed still otherwise. Even though it was overcast today, it was still worth the protection.
Once you were done, you gingerly patted his shoulder. “Okay, you’re good.”
You went to put the bottle back in your bag when he turned to face you. “Can I… return the favour?”
Your instinct was to say no, absolutely not, he was never getting his hands on you again. But the way he’d asked was so distinctly unlike him, it made you reconsider. There was no bravado, no cockiness. Just that same earnest look from the day he’d gotten on his knees, and a soft undertone of shyness that you’d never heard from him before. Usually, you got one of the other female lifeguards to help you with any spots you missed. But as you observed him now, his lack of flirtatiousness made you believe that he’d be on his best behaviour, for once. No lingering touches of heady stares. “Okay.” The answer left you on an exhale.
You had a racerback one-piece on today, meaning it was really only your shoulders on display. You’d done your arms and legs already. You turned away from him after handing him the bottle.
The first touch of his fingers on your skin had you fighting a shiver. This had been a bad idea. It was impossible for Bucky to touch you without your brain catapulting you to the past. All he was doing was rubbing sunscreen into your skin, and yet it was making you think of when you’d been hunched over textbooks for hours, making flashcards, and he’d sat behind you and massaged your shoulders, pressing kisses between your shoulders and to the side of your neck. You were glad that you weren’t looking at him right now—you were sure that your thoughts would be written all over your face. It was making you feel skittish, too self-aware of where your mind was spiraling. He carefully swept your hair to one side, his hand stroking against the back of your neck. You didn’t like how comfortable you felt, how easy it was to sink into the feeling of his hands on you.
When he was satisfied with his application, he let his hands linger on your shoulders before murmuring, voice close to your ear, “All done.” A flurry of butterflies exploded in your stomach. You didn’t want to turn around. You knew exactly how close he’d be.
“Thanks.”
And you both stood there for a moment longer, him behind you, hands still on your shoulders, and you staring down at your sand-filled sandals, suspended in a single stretch of time where he hadn’t hurt you and you hadn’t refused his apology, before someone called your name in greeting, and then it cracked like glass, and you were hastily shoving the sunscreen in your bag and striding across the beach like you were on fire.
Each time you found yourself alone with Bucky after that, it all felt compromising. He didn’t even have to necessarily be close to you, but you felt some sort of intangible spark between you that kept trying its hardest to flicker to life, despite your attempts to smother it. Keeping your distance wasn’t working, and almost all of Bucky’s earlier bravado seemed to have melted away in favour of more genuine connection. He’d stopped flirting with you like he had at first, stopped trying to take advantage of how he could fluster you. It made it worse when he’d stand right beside you, not touching, but only an inch or so away. The heat on your skin had nothing to do with the weather.
You started to wonder, as you observed him, if your time apart had been… good for him.
Not with the way he’d ended things, no, but he hadn’t had anyone in his corner, you believed, except for his best friend, Steve. You had always been the third person in that friendship, even before you’d started dating. And you had long since known that Steve had been the most studious of the three of you. It made you consider the long nights Bucky would have spent alone, without your company or Steve’s to keep him grounded. Something that Bucky had never done much of was stand alone. And whether you liked it or not, your break up would have forced him to do things by himself.
You found yourself thinking about it every time you saw him when he wasn’t aware of you. When he’d been getting off shift, but he’d stopped to help an elderly couple fold up their beach chairs and take them to the car. When he’d helped a lost kid find their mother, holding their hand and then wiping away their tears when they’d cried, accepting the mother’s profuse thankfulness with nothing more than a smile. The Bucky you’d known before wouldn’t have bothered with going out of his way to help people. He’d been totally absorbed in your bubble, your world with the population of two. Maybe he’d grown up more than you’d originally thought.
It was hard for you to reconcile the fact. The boy you’d loved, who’d been all of your firsts, who’d broken your heart, had changed. You wondered, if you were still together, if he’d have still become who he was now. If you’d love him more than you thought possible. But you’d changed, too. You weren’t so trusting, you weren’t so open to new things, like you’d been with him. When you’d been together, you’d felt utterly fearless. Bucky had always been good at entertaining your every whim. But you’d become a little more guarded in his absence. Your rose-tinted glasses weren’t so pink anymore.
Still, you weren’t quite ready to consider taking any steps towards anything more than a working relationship. You didn’t think you could be friends. It would never be just that, not to you. You’d always be thinking of before, when you’d been more. And he’d already made it clear that he wanted you back. You entertained the idea of telling him you wouldn’t take him back, that you could only be friends in the same capacity that you were friends with Sam or Joaquin. You didn’t know if he’d be able to respect your wishes or not or if he’d cross the line. All you really knew was that it would be too easy for you to fall under his spell if you gave in. That was the real reason for your continued distance. Falling back into Bucky would be as easy as wrapping yourself in an old, well-loved blanket, and snuggling so deeply that you’d fall asleep and never wake up again. And you couldn’t do that to yourself. Not now.
The bonfire happened every year, apparently. It was after hours at the beach, no swimming allowed, just the promise of a fire and food and music. It was always at the beginning of August. Almost everyone from the lifeguard team was going. You felt somewhat nervous at the prospect, like there was some sort of anticipation under your skin, but you couldn’t figure out why. After all, you’d spent most of your summer days with these people. You knew what to expect—Sam had filled you in, having attended these things with a cousin a couple of years in a row—but still, you couldn’t shake the feeling. It was just supposed to be a fun, lighthearted evening.
You’d heard through the grapevine that Bucky wouldn’t be attending. You felt a strange sense of disappointment, though you tried to convince yourself that it was actually relief. But when the night of the bonfire came, and your tires slid smoothly across the sand that had blown over the lot, you noticed that his car wasn’t there. You wiped your palms on your shorts, even though they were dry, a nervous tic that you had, and made eye contact with yourself in the rear view mirror. You were just going to have a nice evening, probably attached to Sam and Joaquin the whole night, indulging on hot dogs and popsicles and drinks, and then you’d go home. It sounded like a perfect summer memory to capture and keep like a firefly in a jar.
When you moseyed on over to the beach, you were greeted warmly by your fellow lifeguards. It was just after eight, the sun low in the sky, setting the entire beach ablaze. The last stragglers that had been out enjoying the day were departing, rolling up towels and gathering toy shovels and buckets into bags. You could just barely make out Bruce standing by Overwatch, having taken over so that the rest of you could start your night. You were handed a lemonade and hustled over to the metal fire pit. Some chairs were scattered about, as well as a wooden bench that had seen better days. One of these years, it would probably serve as kindling. The breeze was subtle, carrying the scent of the burning logs across the open air.
Everything was very relaxed, with no expectations but to have a good time. The stars slowly woke up over the course of the next hour, brightening up the darkening sky in soft blinks. Marshmallows were being roasted over the open flame, but you were content to sit on the bench listening to the idle chatter. The evening carried on lazily, most all of the lifeguards present, each of them weaving between each other. A Bluetooth speaker had been set up on a towel, music pumping steadily, a couple people swaying to the melody. The songs were all popular ones, whatever was trending for the summer. The chorus of one was broken up by the distant slam of a car door. You looked around the beach, but you didn’t think anyone had left yet. It was too soon, you thought.
And then you saw him, on the other side of the flames. First a long shadow, then more concrete, more real. Bucky, in a t-shirt and shorts, swinging the his keychain around his finger as he strolled up to the rest of you. He had a sweatshirt hanging over one arm. He was late, but he was here. You tried to tamp down the feeling spreading through your chest at the sight of him. He didn’t see you right away, sidling over to Sam and accepting a drink. They were hovering around the grill. You saw Bucky laugh, but you were too far away to hear him over the music, the roar of the flames, and the swish of the waves. He clapped Sam on the shoulder before turning to survey the rest of the beach, raising his red solo cup in greeting to whoever waved or shouted in his direction.
Then, predictably, his eyes came to rest on you. He stayed staring at you as he took a sip of his drink, and you broke the contact to stare into the fire. You weren’t surprised when he sat down beside you. Out of the corner of your eye, you could see him resting his cup against his knee. “I thought you weren’t coming,” you said, the words leaving the side of your mouth.
“I was always coming. I just had to drop off Becca at a sleepover first. And you know how long she takes to get ready. She ran back and forth from the car to the house like ten times before she was ready.”
With a pang, you silently agreed that yes, you did know how Becca got. She always forgot something. Dates with bucky had been interrupted dozens of times because she’d called him, begging him to bring her something she’d left behind. And he’d always say yes, and then look at you apologetically, and you’d only smile and kiss the tip of his nose before standing and offering a hand. Becca had sort of been like your little sister, too. You had been the one she’d always come to about boy troubles. You missed her.
“How is she?” you asked. It was easier to talk about someone other than yourselves.
“Oh, you know, same as always. Still taking her dance classes way too seriously.”
You hummed, remembering the recitals you’d attended with Bucky’s family. “She’s got the talent for it. Is she still thinking of going to Julliard?”
“‘Course. It’s on her wall. She made this, uh…” he trailed off, searching for the word, “vision board thing. I don’t know. A bunch of pictures all stuck together?”
You nodded. “Right. It’s supposed to manifest your hopes and dreams, remind you of your goals, that sort of thing.”
He snapped his fingers, pointing at you in confirmation. “Yeah, that. God, can’t believe she’s gonna be applying for universities this year.”
“I remember when she still had frizzy hair and braces,” you said, your voice wistful. If you closed your eyes, you could see her clearly. The summer she’d gotten blonde highlights and cried because she thought they were too chunky, you’d helped her dye her hair back to brown. You used to give her your old clothes, ones you’d outgrown or no longer thought suited you. She would raid your closet and call it thrifting.
“And now she’s got her learner’s permit and a part-time job.” Bucky sounded equally pensive.
It was easy to talk about Becca and the passage of time. Bucky filled you in on what she’d been up to. It was nice to hear. No matter what had happened between you and Nucky, you’d always have a soft spot for his family. “…And then her and my mom called me in tears. I was almost late for my mid-term.” he laughed, looking at you.
You smiled at the tale. It was a classic case of dramatic teenage girl versus worried mother. You tried to ignore the fact that Becca probably would have called you, if you’d been around. Bucky seemed to think of it too. He swallowed, and you watched the line of his throat. “You know, she was uh… she was really mad at me, when we broke up. She didn’t talk to me for two weeks.” You could barely hear him over the crackle of the fire, but the words seeped into your skin, regardless. “She would have picked you over me, if she could have.”
You looked away from him, crossing your arms. You didn’t quite know what to say. “Mom, too, actually.” Bucky added after a moment. “She slapped me upside the head.”
You bit your lip to keep from smiling at the idea. Wilhelmina was one of the gentlest women you knew, who only had to threaten to count to three to get her children to fall in line. The idea of her making Bucky see stars with a smack to the skull was admittedly funny. The words left you before you could consider them. “You know, that was almost the worst part for me. Not only did you break up with me, but I lost my second family because of it.”
He said your name then, and you heard the remorse laced in it, but you cut him off before he could say another word. “I wasn’t gonna be the ex-girlfriend that kept making your life hell by keeping up with your family. You might have deserved it, but any future girlfriends didn’t. But I missed them so much.” Bucky’s family had always been much more hands on than yours. They’d never been upset by your presence, they’d just wanted to know if you were staying for dinner so that they could get an extra plate out.
A cool breeze came in from the shoreline, and it made you shiver as your hair caught on it, blowing across your face. The weight of fabric pressed against your legs a moment later. “Here, take it.”
It was Bucky’s sweatshirt. I was a bad idea to accept it, especially when you were quickly approaching melancholy and introspectiveness, but another gust of wind hand you hastily pulling it over your head. The maroon fabric nearly drowned you, the sleeves hanging past your fingers. It smelled of him. His cologne had always had a little bit of a lavender smell to it. You resisted the urge to pull the hem over your nose, to breathe him in more. You could almost believe it was like old times. You’d constantly stolen his clothes. You liked them more than your own, the way they felt so lived in. The way he always felt close. You’d taken no less than three of his shirts with you when you’d gone to France the year before, away from him for spring break. It had made the time difference bearable.
You pushed your hair back behind your ears even though you knew another billow of wind would send it flying loose around your face again. You wished that someone else would come by, pull you into a more mundane conversation, save you from reliving the past. But it was just you and Bucky on that bench. Everyone else seemed oceans away. When you looked at him again, you regretted it. His eyes were dark in the night, but every time the bonfire flickered, you saw that telltale blue. His mouth was pursed in a line, his forehead creased. He turned to the side, resting his elbow along the back of the bench so that he could look at you with the full force of his gaze. “You know my mom would still love to see you, even if we’re not together, right?”
“I know,” you said softly. “But it’s too hard for me. I can’t… I can’t go into that house anymore. I can’t look at your picture on the wall. Because then I’ll remember that I was there when she took it, and all the others.” You sighed, your eyes fluttering closed for a second. “It’s all just a reminder of before. And I can’t keep looking back on it.”
His fingers touched his mouth as he considered, then nodded. “I understand.” For once, you thought that he actually did.
You both sat in the silence of what had broken you apart, before he nudged your knee with his. “Tell me about school. Straight A’s?” The subject was an abrupt, obvious change, but you grabbed it with both hands.
“Of course. like I'd ever get any less.”
He laughed. “Wish I could say the same. got a D- on a first year seminar.”
At your look of dismay, he held up his hands. “You made all my study guides for me. I tried to recreate them the way you do, but it just didn’t really work.”
“Did you colour code everything?”
“I tried. But orange and red kept getting mixed up.”
You shook your head. “Novice move.”
The smile on his face faded then, his eyes going serious. His hand paused in the air between you, before he followed through, brushing your hair back again from where it had, predictably, come loose. “I want to kiss you right now.”
It was the wrong thing to say. The tentative, easy spell of camaraderie broke, and you shied away, ignoring the sparks on your skin from where he’d touched you. You could see regret swimming in his eyes. You stood suddenly, placing your half-finished lemonade on the bench. “I should go. I wasn’t gonna stay long, anyway.”
You took a stumbling step backward when he tried to reach for you, his lips forming your name. There were no two ways about it, you were shaken. You’d thought for a brief, shining moment, that maybe you could just enjoy the evening as something close to friends. That you could just pretend, for one night. But your feelings had risen in you like an unsteady tide, threatening to spill from your mouth. You felt like you had salt water in your lungs, the way they burned. You patted at your pockets frantically, almost at your car. It was too much, it was too soon. You didn’t know what you wanted. For a second, all you’d wanted was him. You sat in your car for a full moment, both hands on the wheel, staring blankly ahead, before finally shifting into drive and backing out of your spot.
You just hoped you’d get to your room before you started to cry.
The country road ahead was dark, with only your headlights to guide the way. It was a ten minute stretch before you’d reach suburbia again. You drove with no music, only the sound of your breathing and the car rumbling over the road. Your fingers were tight on the wheel.
You supposed you should have expected him to say something like that. It was Bucky, after all. No matter how genuine he seemed, his goal had always been to get back in your pants. Maybe that was cheapening what your relationship had been, but when you had the foundation of your love crumbling because he’d wanted to chase down some tail that wasn’t you, what else were you supposed to think? You were sure it would take nothing at all to re frame every action he’d taken over the course of the summer and twist it into something that hurt.
A flash of lights caught in your rear view mirror. The road had been empty, but there was a car behind you now. If they wanted to overtake, they could. But the lights flashed again, and you could just barely make out the shape of it. it was Bucky’s car. He was following you. “Shit,” you murmured to the air freshener hanging from the mirror.
You couldn’t let him follow you all the way back to the house. Your mom was home, and she’d ask questions. Hell, she’d probably invite him in. He flashed them again, keeping pace. You slapped the indicator with your hand, letting out a resigned sigh, and pulled onto the shoulder. He copied you, pulling in neatly behind you. You parked but stayed in the car, one hand on the wheel, the other clutching at your seatbelt where it rested over your chest. You stared straight ahead, blinking away any glassiness from your eyes.
From the edge of your periphery, you saw him lean down by your window, observing you for the space of three breaths, before he knocked gently on the glass. Your hand left the wheel to push the door open, but you stayed in the car. “I'm sorry,” were the first words out of his mouth. “I shouldn’t have said that. I didn’t mean—I'm sorry.”
You chewed your lip, eyes flicking to him and away. “And to be clear, I don’t mean that I regret the fact that I want to kiss you. I still do. I always do. But I'm sorry for saying it and making you upset. It’s the last thing I wanted to do.”
His hand gripped the top of the car’s door. You wouldn’t even have to extend your arm the entire way to touch him. Belatedly, you realized you were still wearing his sweatshirt. “Do you want this back?” you asked absently, waving the long sleeve at him.
“What? Oh, no. You can keep it. Colour suits you more, anyway.”
“Bucky,” you said on a sigh, turning your head to look at him finally, “I'm not gonna keep it. It’s not mine, and neither are you.”
“You’re wrong. I'll always be yours. Even if you don’t want me.”
The admission left you in stunned silence. He’d already said to you in so many words that he was intent on getting back together. But to hear it like that… to hear him say it with honest eyes and no expectation… Your next breath was shaky. You refused to cry.
“What can I do? I’ll do anything. Anything to make it up to you. To start making it up to you.'“
You didn’t even know how to respond. Your mind had drawn a total, perfect blank, like someone had taken an eraser to the whiteboard that was your brain, any ideas completely gone.
“Do you know why I really failed that class?” A cricket chirped between the words of the question. “Yeah, it was partly because I suck at studying without you. But it was also because I missed you, so damn much. God, I was still so gone for you—I kept a photo of you on my nightstand.”
At this, your eyes went wide, a look he caught. He gave you a grim smile. “Yeah, that’s right. It’s you on that tire swing. You know, the one at my uncle’s lake house? And the sun was in your eyes, but you looked like you were glowing. Same one I keep in my wallet.” He pulled said wallet out of his back pocket and unfolded it, sliding a creased photo from its depths. He flipped it in his fingers to face you.
It had been warm that fall. So warm, unseasonably so, that his family had hosted Thanksgiving at the lake house that year, and you’d come along. The next day had been a complete and utter downpour. You remembered because he’d forgotten to roll up the windows on his car, and the drive back had been extremely soggy. Bucky tucked it back in his wallet. “You were the last thing I saw at night, first thing I saw in the morning. I wasted hours I should have spent studying just thinking of you, trying to remember your voice. Old videos aren’t the same. I was gonna come to your house over winter break, you know. I was gonna beg you to take me back then, but then I heard from Stevie you weren’t comin’ home.”
Yes, you and your parents had flown across the country to spend Christmas with your grandparents, instead. And you’d been relieved. You hadn’t wanted to come back to town, worried you’d bump into Bucky with some new girl on his arm. “I knew that for the last three summers, you’d worked at the pool, so I was planning to just show up there. But then I heard you were being a hero at the beach instead. And the first day I saw you, it took everything I had not to just run across the sand and hold you until you forgave me, until you told me everything was okay.”
His voice broke a little on the last word. “Stop.” you whispered.
He didn’t. “I miss you so much, baby. I miss you when you’re standing right in front of me. I miss when you used to tell me everything you ate in a day. I miss when you’d tell me what dumb thing your dad said. I miss all of it. I was such an idiot. I got cold feet and I didn’t think it through. I didn’t need other girls, or time apart. I just needed you. I'm so sorry.”
You felt his sadness like you were swimming in a sea of it. You felt his regret, his anger at himself. And even though he’d hurt you more than you’d thought he ever could… he wasn’t entirely right. Time apart, whether you liked it or not, had forced you both to grow without the other, instead of tangling your roots together and staying intertwined.
The click of your seatbelt coming undone went unnoticed.
His hands hovered in the air between you again, like they had on the beach. He settled his palms on the sides of your face gingerly, like he was afraid you’d duck away. This time, you didn’t. Looking into his eyes hurt, it burned. But you wanted to ignite, you thought. You wanted to smoke and smolder and disintegrate. “Please,” he whispered, “please give me another chance.”
Each word had brought his face closer to yours. Your head was tilted up to his. He was outlined by the silvery moon, you both were. You didn’t know which one of your closed the gap, only that your hands came to rest over his. You both tasted like lemonade, but underneath it was his distinct flavour, the one that awakened your senses like an ember sparking on dry leaves. Suddenly the forest of your memories was aflame. It was a kiss both delicate and searching as well as frantic and pleading, like Bucky was pouring every single regret and wish into the same shared breath. His forehead knocked against yours. Your teeth grazed his bottom lip. The sound he made, one you thought you’d never hear again was what made you come to your senses. You pulled back, breaking the connection of your mouths, but his hands stayed on your face. His eyes stayed closed for a long moment and you were free to admire the way his lashes embraced his cheeks.
“How do I know you won’t hurt me again?”
“You don’t. but I'll spend every day proving to you that I'm worth your trust.” His eyes were still closed, like if he didn’t open them, he wouldn’t have to see what you’d decided flying across your face.
He looked at you again when your silence became the clear answer. His fingers stroked across your temples. “I have to think about it.” you said honestly.
In truth, you were unsure. You weren’t ready to trust him yet, even though your nervous system was screaming at your to dive off the board and into the deep end without a life vest. You saw his chest deflate on a long exhale, his breath fanning across your lips. “Okay. Okay, take all the time you need. I'm not going anywhere. You know that.” He seemed reluctant to let go of you. “You know that, right?”
You nodded as much as you could with his hands on your face. “I know.”
That was what made him drop his hands. “I love you.”
You didn’t say it back, and you thought you saw a flicker of pain in his eyes, before he shook his head. He knew you weren’t about to reciprocate. “I'm sorry I ruined your night.”
Your laugh was born of nervousness more than humour. “You didn’t ruin it. I really wasn’t planning to stay long. You should go back, though.”
He shook his head again. “I think I got what I came for.”
“And what’s that?”
“A foot in the door.”
He stood up straight then, hand on the door. “Drive home safe, okay? I'll see you tomorrow?” The question was full of unrestrained, naked hope.
“Yeah. I start at 12.”
He moved to close your door, but ducked down at the last moment, leaving a lingering kiss on your forehead. “See you at 12.”
Then he closed your door, and you were alone in the car, the scent of him overwhelming, the taste of him even more so. It took a long time for you to buckle your seatbelt again and start driving.
It took Bucky even longer, staring at the empty space your car had been in, before he got on the road, too.
You didn’t really know what to do with yourself in the morning. You’d been on total autopilot the night before, after you’d gotten home. You didn’t remember crawling into bed, even, but you had woken up still wearing Bucky’s sweater. The faint trace of his scent was still on it. You’d let him kiss you last night, you remembered, but you couldn’t summon the strength to be horrified. You had never, never seen him so emotional before. You couldn’t believe, after that admission, that he was just trying to bed you. He had to be serious. There was no way he wasn’t.
But that didn’t mean you were ready to pick up where you left off. You needed time to wrap your head around it. You supposed you had a month before you were back on campus. You had to decide whether you wanted him haunting the hallways of your dorm or not. You didn’t want to hold onto hope only to be crushed by ‘cold feet’ again.
You didn’t remember getting ready for your shift. You only noticed as you were doing a final check of your bag that you’d gotten dressed and brushed your hair, and your teeth as well judging by the minty taste on your tongue. Somehow, you’d blown through the morning in a total fugue state.
You blacked out on the drive, too, only realizing where you were with sudden clarity as you pulled into your usual spot. Bucky’s car was already there. He’d started before you—your shift only overlapped with his for about an hour. You were nervous to see him. What if last night had actually been a cruel dream?
You drummed your fingers on the strap of your bag where it rested over your shoulder, striding over the sand and heading to the cabana. Bruce glanced up at you from over his glasses and murmured a greeting before turning back to whatever paperwork had graced his desk, and you sat heavily on one of the rickety chairs. You fumbled with your water bottle just for something to do. Even though you were wearing a loose t-shirt over your bathing suit, you felt like the fabric was pressing against you like a second skin. You couldn’t even blame it on the humidity.
You basked in the silence for all of five minutes before slinging your bag on one of the hooks by the door and heading back outside, throwing your hair into a ponytail. It was overcast today, and you had a feeling you’d get rained on at some point, but you found yourself welcoming the possibility. Maybe you needed to get in touch with nature a little more, despite the fact that you’d been spending your days surrounded by it. You were scheduled to walk the perimeter and then cover Overwatch for a while. The beach was fairly empty today. You understood—if you’d had the choice, you would have spent the day inside. Everything was awash in shades of gray, the waves looking choppy and rough.
Bucky was almost right in front of you before you noticed him, too lost in thought, too busy trying not to think of him, because if you did, you’d remember the feeling of his hands on your face and the way he’d kissed you and the sound he’d made, along with a million other tiny things he’d done last night. But then he was there in the light of day, hardly a foot from you. You stopped, narrowly avoiding kicking up sand. “Hi,” you already sounded breathless. You hated it.
“Hey,” he said with a nod. His expression was guarded, like he was afraid you’d come to your senses and decided not to take a chance on him.
You both observed each other. “Was it busy this morning?” you asked. It was a lame, easy out.
He shook his head. “The standard early morning swimmers, but otherwise, no. I’ve actually been bored out of my mind. It gave me too much time to think.” It was a leading statement, but you decided not to pull at that thread.
“It’ll probably be more of the same for you. It’s supposed to rain around three.” he added, glancing skyward.
You mirrored him, taking in the gathering storm clouds. “It’s been a pretty dry summer.”
You knew things were awkward when you were discussing the most basic of topics. You could almost picture an elephant there on the beach, a sign on its neck saying ‘address me!’
You pointed at the shoreline. “Well, I should probably get to it. Are you taking a break?”
“Yeah.” But you both stayed standing there for another few seconds, before you ducked your head and started to move.
Right as you were about to pass him, Bucky snaked a hand around your front, settling it on your hip, and kissed the side of your head. It was a small gesture, a simple one. He let go of you and walked away right after he did it, not keeping you there, but it was enough to send your heart ricocheting around your chest like it was taking a turn in a pinball machine.
For your sake, you hoped it would suddenly get very busy on the beach, just so you would have something else to focus on.
The month continued on in a slow crawl, and all of your interactions with Bucky felt like a tentative, shy dance. Sometimes he’d leave you alone, with nothing more than a cursory hello, a searching look, and a small smile, which you’d return. Other times, he’d hover in your orbit like a little lovesick fly. When you’d gone to check the schedule at one point, he’d stood right behind you as you leaned over the desk, not saying a word. You could feel his body heat radiating in waves. You wouldn’t have had to take even a full step back to lean back against him. You imagined if you did, he would have put his arms around you.
You’d started quietly pulling him to the side with no fanfare, turning him around by the shoulders, and slathering him in sunscreen without saying anything about it, though you’d only let him return the favour once, because he’d trailed his finger down your spine and your shiver had been so obvious, you couldn’t look him in the eye after.
The well of longing that you’d boarded up with nails and plywood had flooded, and it felt like it was pushing against the barrier of your skin with insistent, needy hands, begging to be let loose and consume. You were aware of the grains of sand running down on the hourglass. Your personal benchmark of the end of August was approaching, and you felt it looming over you like a vast shadow.
You were running out of reasons to deny Bucky. He’d continued to show up every day, continued to do his job as if he’d wanted to be a lifeguard all along. He was still coming to the beach on most of the days that you worked, though he’d started to give you a little more space. You’d unblocked his number from your phone, and there were now disjointed strings of texts between you. Short things like confirming each other’s schedules, even though you both new the other’s as well as you knew your own. Messages from him wishing you sweet dreams. But the ones that had you holding your phone to your chest with heated cheeks came in the middle of the night, when Bucky would send you things like, “I can’t sleep so I’m looking at your picture,” and “I think I was dreaming of you. I couldn’t see your face, but it was you. It couldn’t be anyone else.” Sometimes he’d tell you what Becca was up to, and pass on messages from you to her as well.
You had started to entertain what the fall might look like. If you took Bucky back, would it be exactly how you’d envisioned it the year before? Would you stop by each other’s campuses, have lunch and study dates together? Would you sneak him back to your dorm, tugging him along by the strings of his hoodie? Would you be one of those couples lazily making out in the quad? Or would you keep this strange tightrope of distance between you? You could picture it just as easily, telling him you still weren’t ready. Him nodding, swallowing whatever he wanted to say, but asking if he could still visit you. You had a feeling that would be worse. You’d be so distracted by the possibility, wondering if he’d make some sort of grand gesture or if he’d keep down this new path, respecting the distance and the time and your hesitation.
With two weeks to go before you needed to get packed up and head three hours away to your school, a couple of new lifeguards were being trained. The off-season was approaching, but the beach was still bound to be busy on weekends all through September and some of October. The heat loved to linger before the cold snap came closer to Halloween. Your hours had started to scale back, or else you’d be in the company of a newbie. Training Kate was somewhat of a challenge. She was good—quick, sharp, determined—but she was also akin to a dog seeing a new toy with the way her attention would shoot elsewhere. Oftentimes, you’d have to repeat yourself or try to get her to refocus. It left little time for Bucky and you, and whatever was going on there.
It was why you were so caught off-guard by Kate asking you one day, “So is that Bucky guy your boyfriend, or what?”
You dropped the bundle of life preservers that had been looped over your arm. “What?”
She pointed at the cabana. Bucky was outside of it, leaned against the wall. He was talking to Sam, but his eyes were on you. He didn’t look away when you made eye contact, and you felt your heart flutter at his open stare. “There’s something going on there, right?” she probed, crouching to pick up some of the preservers.
You joined her, knees in the sand. “We um, we used to date, yes.” You were doing a piss-poor job of picking the red and white rings up. Your fingers suddenly felt slippery.
“Used to date? How long ago?”
“A year ago, give or take.” you said mildly, hoping she’d drop it.
But Kate latched onto it like it was a bone. “A year? Then why is he looking at you like that? Oh! Are you the one that got away?” she sang the last part with enthusiasm, eyes twinkling as she looked at you.
You bit your lip and dusted sand from one of the preservers, a useless thing to do. “In a manner of speaking, I suppose.”
“Are you getting back together? No one looks at a person like that.”
“I know.”
“No, no, I mean… no one looks at a person like that.” she said, grabbing your arm. “My grandparents have been together sixty years, and I don’t think I’ve ever even seen them look so love struck. He’s looking at you like you’re keeping his heart held hostage in a box or something.” To make matters worse, she pointed at him very obviously, then at you. It couldn’t be clearer what you were talking about if she’d started twirling a baton and carrying a neon sign.
When you meekly looked up at him, he hadn’t taken his eyes off you. And damn it, Kate was completely right. You felt stripped bare under his gaze. “Well, it’s sort of complicated,” you muttered.
“What’s so complicated? He looks like he’d get down on one knee right now. It’s actually sort of gross.” She mimed throwing up. Then she looked at you. “And besides, you look equally struck by cupid.”
“What? No I don’t!” You touched your face as if you could confirm or deny her accusation.
She grinned at you, successfully collecting all the preservers and tying them together with a section of rope—the thing you’d been trying to do when you’d dropped them. “If you say so.”
As the rest of the day went on, you couldn’t help thinking about Kate’s question. What’s so complicated? Yes, you’d been hurt beyond belief when Bucky had broken up with you. Yes, it had also sucked extra hard to know that he’d boned Natasha that same night at one of the grad parties. You’d stuck your fingers to the edges of that seeping wound many times over, feeling it bleed over your hands, feeling the pulse of your veins, the hurt pumping through them. But with some level of surprise, when you put your palms over the wound now, you were met with a scar instead. It was puckered, marred, not pretty and clean. But it had healed over, nonetheless. You were sure you’d always feel the phantom ache of the slice, but you found it wasn’t something you were at risk of bleeding out over.
Did that mean you forgave him? You imagined that if you told the whole sordid tale to a council, there’d be varying levels of both outrage and passiveness. You’d seen how girls got ridiculed for going back to men that had done them wrong. But this was the only wrong thing Bucky had done to you, if you thought about it. Any argument you’d ever had, even at your immature ages, had been smoothed over. You had never been the high school couple that broke up every other week. You’d been solid. And it shouldn’t matter what other people thought of your actions, should it? If things went poorly again, you only had yourself to blame for making the choice. You didn’t want outside influence to muddy the waters of your thoughts.
And, you had to admit that as soon as Bucky realized that trying to be suave and charming in order to win you back wouldn’t work, he’d put a stop to it. Since then, he’d been nothing but sincere. He’d prostrated himself before you. He’d tried to meet you where you were at. Maybe it was something worth considering. If you were honest with yourself, you’d never fallen out of love with him, even when you’d had your heart broken, even when you hadn’t seen him for months. As soon as you had, all those feelings came rushing back in a tsunami.
You’d just stepped inside your house, shaking sand from yourself and throwing your keys on the table. At that moment, like he’d known you’d been thinking of him, Bucky sent you a text.
There was no expectation of anything, just an offer of help. and he was right—you were a serial overpacker. It was one of your more endearing qualities, apparently, or so he’d told you once. You considered the offer, considered him. And miraculously, you came to a decision.
You had a week to go, and four shifts left. You only had two days between your last one and your return date to school. You’d asked for it to be that way—you hadn’t wanted to haunt the house with your overthinking.
You had what was considered a closing shift, though it wasn’t a very long one. Four to nine, and the promise of a gorgeous sunset. You knew that Bucky was closing alongside you. After eight o’clock, you’d be on your own with him.
You managed to keep your distance for most of it—the beach was busy that evening, and you’d had to rescue some kids that had gotten a little too far from shore and started to panic. It had all been fine, nothing except for a few tears, some shaken pride, and some furious parents, but you’d kept a sharp eye on the water regardless. You were here to do a job, after all, not moon over your ex, no matter how great he looked with no shirt and dark red shorts that brought out his tan. You’d had the luxury of other lifeguards at the beginning of the shift, but as time went on, they dropped off one by one.
Ava was the last to leave, a couple minutes after eight. You had an hour to kill. You were staying up on Overwatch and keeping an eye on the dwindling beach goers while Bucky started clean up duty, making sure all the essential gear was in its right place, checking the batteries on the walkie talkies, and making sure none of the off-limits areas had been breached. You tried your best not to watch him, but it was hard when the beach was slowly emptying.
Right at nine, the soft clearing of Bucky’s throat alerted you to his presence. He stood next to Overwatch’s stilts, a hand extended up like he was a knight waiting to assist his princess down from her horse. You accepted his hand when you were low enough, your jump down the last remaining foot of the chair noiseless. “Did you lock up yet?”
“Not yet. I wasn’t sure if you needed anything else from there.” He’d already grabbed your bag and was holding it over one shoulder.
You nodded, waiting for him to pass you your bag, but he seemed utterly content to just follow along, continuing to hold it. “I just want to double check the schedule. I think my next shift is my last one with Joaquin.”
He fell into step with you easily, trudging through the sand in the twilight. The sun was gone but the sky was still a few shades lighter than black. You could see the outline of him from the edge of your sight. At least he’d put on a shirt now. It made him just a fraction easier to deal with. He followed you into the cabana and stayed hovering beside you while you ran a finger down the schedule tacked to one of the walls. The different times of day were highlighted in varying colours. You nodded to yourself. “Yeah, last one with Torres.”
“Mine was Tuesday,” Bucky said.
In the back of your head, you’d known he was going back to school, too, but it still jolted you to be reminded that you’d be drifting apart again if you didn’t do something about it.
You flicked the lights off and ushered him from the cabana, locking it and tucking the key in the mailbox, which latched when you closed it. Bruce would be able to unlock it with the master key in the morning. The walk to the parking lot was quiet. Only yours and Bucky’s cars remained, tucked side by side together. You both stopped at the edge of the lot, and he turned to you. You could see the moths thumping their tiny bodies against the street light above him. He was limned in warm gold as he handed your bag back to you. This wouldn’t be the last time you saw him, and you knew it, but you felt rooted to the spot like your brain was trying to trace his exact shape and height and leave it as an imprint behind your eyelids.
“Well, I guess I’ll see you,” you finally said.
He’d been doing the same as you, twirling his car keys in his hand but otherwise making no move to go. He nodded. “Good night.”
You turned to go, but you only got halfway to your car before stopping. You felt like you’d stepped into a thin pocket of time where only the two of you existed. There was no sound except the crash of the waves and the moth bodies against the street light’s glass. You turned, your flip flops skidding on the asphalt. He was still standing where you’d left him, still watching you. He didn’t say a word as you walked back over, right into his proximity.
It was time to be brave and take a chance, you supposed. You let your bag slip off your shoulder and down to the crook of your arm before letting it fall in a pile by your feet. There was the barest hint of a question in Bucky’s eyes, and they flared wide when you put your hands on his shoulders, before you slid your arms around his neck. This was the closest you’d been to him in over a year, barring the mouth-to-mouth incident. This was real. You rolled up onto your toes. Your vision was overtaken by his eyes, so dark in colour but so bright in a sudden gleam of hope.
“I’m not saying we can pick up where we left off,” you started, your voice hushed, “not like we were before. I’m not even saying I want to dive in headfirst. But I’m… I’m willing to try, if you can take it slow with me.”
There it was, your heart on a platter. You didn’t know if Bucky would readily accept it or if he’d have a counteroffer. He was slow to put his hands on you, like he was afraid that if he did, you’d pop like a bubble and disappear. You thought you felt one single tremor as his fingers landed on your waist, before the full weight of his palms branded you. “I’ll take whatever you give me. Even if it’s just phone calls and texts. I can’t do another year without you in my life.” You shivered under his touch, his words, his gaze.
“Can I just ask for one thing? It’s the only time I will, I swear.”
You tilted your head to the side just a little. “What is it?”
“Please, for the love of God, can I kiss you?”
You felt like you were going to be swallowed whole by those dark blue eyes. “Yes—”
The word wasn’t even fully out before your mouth was claimed by his. Your noses bumped together. The kiss was chaste, demure, even. The first one, at least. But each time his lips parted from yours, he came back, like he wasn’t satisfied with just one taste. Like he was parched and you were a full cup of water and he couldn’t resist chugging you. It wasn’t that you’d forgotten what kissing Bucky—really kissing Bucky—was like, but all your memories seemed to pale in comparison when you got to experience the real thing in full sound and colour again. There was the telltale taste of peppermint in the brush of his tongue. The slow exploration of your mouth felt like he was kissing you for the first time ever, not like he was revisiting an old haunt. It made you feel weightless.
When you really did part, your breaths fanned over each other’s faces, your heads bent together, your foreheads touching with each exhale. “Please don’t let that be the last one before we go back to college,” he muttered. The tiniest hint of the Bucky you’d known and loved before was threaded through the words, the smallest, softest whine of disgruntlement.
You couldn’t hold back your laugh. “Maybe not, we’ll see.”
As silly as it sounded, it felt like a weight had been lifted off your shoulders. You practically floated all the way home, a dreamy smile on your face—you’d seen it when you’d gone to brush your teeth. Your phone had been lighting up almost nonstop after you’d gotten into bed. It was all texts from Bucky, ranging between sweet messages he’d apparently been dying to say all summer and had kept in his notes app, and plans for the future. Those ones were more tentative, more shy. He sent you a couple of links to restaurants between your two schools, mentioned some of the events happening on his campus. He didn’t expressly invite you, but… the implication was there, and it was clear. Now that he had the chance, he wasn’t going to make light of it.
And it continued on, all through the week. He did end up helping you pack your things, throwing your last suitcase and storage box into the trunk of his car and promising to bring them to you sometime in the first week. In between packing and plans, you’d allowed him to steal some sweet, shy kisses. You couldn’t help it. Your resolve had officially crumbled. And you didn’t think you wanted it any other way.
Your days at work were dwindling down. You were right on the finish line. Unfortunately for you, when you got there for your next shift, Sam took one look at you and groaned before fishing out his wallet and slapping twenty bucks to Joaquin’s chest. “God damn it, Torres, you won.”
You’d frowned and cocked your head, confused. Sam had gestured up and down at you. “You forgave Bucky.”
“How do you know?”
“I can just tell. If you could see you right now, you’d know. It’s really obvious.”
You looked down at your clothes, your bag, your lotioned legs. You didn’t seem any different, you thought. You felt different, but that wasn’t visible to the naked eye… was it?
But it became impossible to ignore when Bucky came sauntering across the sand. He wasn’t working, but he held two ice cream floats in his hands, and handed one to you before slinging an arm around your waist. “What’s going on?”
You had been smiling goofily at him as soon as he’d come into your eyeline. And that was when you knew that your happiness was as clear and obvious as a stain on a white shirt. You gave Sam a look. “You placed a bet?”
He snorted. “Of course I did.”
Your last day on shift was bittersweet. Bruce had thanked you for your time, and asked if you’d consider coming back the next year, which had been an easy yes. You’d had one last ice cream at the Langs’ stand, chatted with Cassie and Scott, and joked about how the former would probably look totally different in a year’s time.
Bucky swung by in your last hour. He’d already been reprimanded the previous time when he’d corralled you into the showers. You’d admittedly been playing hard to get that day, revelling in the wild look in his eyes, but you’d ultimately been mortified when he’d pinned you to the shower’s wall, a handful of your ass in his grasp, and heard a small, disapproving, “Ah-hem…” from Bruce. You wouldn’t have been surprised if he hadn’t invited you back next year.
You were still fully intending on taking it slow. You didn’t want to burn too bright, too quick. You thought being on different campuses would help with that. You were doing your very last walk of the perimeter, Bucky in tow, his hand sweaty in yours, but you kept a firm grasp on him anyway. The sun was beating down on your head mercilessly.
You came to a complete, sudden halt, hand loosening from Bucky’s, when you saw a flash of copper ahead of you. Attached to the copper was the body of a model in a black and white striped bikini, doing what could only be described as a Baywatch-eqsue run into the water.
It was Natasha.
You went cold all over, despite the heat. You hadn’t seen her since your graduation. She still looked great, as always. You were fairly sure she could wear a garbage bag and still turn every head on the beach. But then you were pulled back to reality by Bucky tugging on your hand. “Why’d you stop, love?”
You looked between him and Natasha, 50 feet away. “Natasha’s here,” you said limply, gesturing to the waves.
He frowned, a look of genuine surprise on his face. “Huh, you know, I didn’t even notice.”
It seemed crazy—even you had been ogling her. The crazier thing was, you believed him. He really had been looking at you the whole time. As you resumed your walk, his eyes flicked over to her once, as you passed. But then they slid forward, to the next swimmer, and the next, and the next… Just a cursory glance. There was nothing there, no heat, no fire. And then when he looked at you again, he smiled. “Do you want to grab dinner when you’re done? Nothing crazy, just, I don’t know, burgers? At that one place?” Then he lifted your joined hands and kissed the back of yours.
bonus author's note: a special thank you to @pinksplace, who helped me cook up a plot/trope while i was floundering; you threw me the life raft, for real. um, in the end i didn't really work with any of our spicy, rated r for radical think pieces, and it ultimately came out much more yearning-forward and with none of the planned smut... i hope you're not disappointed, the place that is pink.
✶ ― SYNOPSIS. bucky can’t help but wonder why they always come running to you,, or your living fossil of a roommate disapproves of your taste in men and its totally not because he wants a taste of you.
warnings.ᐟ mdni! no use of y/n, roommate!bucky, cocky+flirty!bucky, also guard dog!bucky (if that even makes sense) (it doesn’t), frenemies to lovers, smut (pwp, service dom!bucky, unprotected piv, oral sex - f receiving, clothed sex for like a sec, fingering, creampie, tummy bulge, dirty talk, dry humping, possessiveness, dumbification, praise, temperature play, food play, nipple play, pussy pronouns, hair pulling - m receiving, multiple orgasms, consent kink, implied competency kink and cum eating, bucky barnes begs agenda 2025™, both bucky and reader spend the whole fic towing the fine line between horny and pervy), angst, fluff, jealousy, pining, so much bickering, attachment issues, miscommunication bc these two combined have the emotional intelligence of a chihuahua, bucky’s hobby is baking bc i said so. bucky can pick the reader up (but he’s literally a super soldier so 🧍♂️), one mention of bucky trying to grab the reader’s hair, reader has a nut allergy and does not speak russian (neither do i, so please forgive the very small amount of google translated russian)
ᯓ★hyde's input. god bless sabrina for saving the summer again. also don’t let this flop, it’s my birthday tomorrow and i’m not above crying over poorly-received erotica (i’m joking) (no i’m not) (edit: wtf guys)
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Bucky Barnes is not someone you’d call a friend.
He’s more of a nuisance, really. A fossil, dropped off at your door by one Sam Wilson with a simple request: “Can he crash here for a few days?”
That was four months ago, and Bucky’s still living on your couch.
Which is exactly where he’s sat right now, head buried in a book you barely even remember owning. The pages, so full of neglect, give him hassle as he tries to turn them, catching on one another and refusing to be pried apart by vibranium fingers.
“How do I look?” You ask as you step out from your bedroom, hands fastening an earring into your right ear.
Unfazed by your appearance, he doesn’t bother glancing up from his book as he sardonically replies, “With your eyes, like the rest of us.”
You contemplate plucking one of your heels off and throwing it at his head. Knowing your luck, it will fly right past him and smash your coffee table into pieces. Just like your roommate, it’s vintage. Unlike your roommate, you willingly brought it into your home.
“Ha. Ha.” Rounding the couch, you swat his feet off the table before snapping his book closed. “Now if you’re done playing comedian, would you answer the fucking question?”
“That’s your generation's problem, you know? You swear more than you breathe.”
“Better than waging a world war every few years.”
“Considering the current state of the world, I wouldn’t rest too comfortably on that one,” Bucky rises from his seat and squeezes past you, irritatingly close in a way that makes sure you feel each defined muscle in his chest as it brushes against your shoulder. “Anyway, you look fine, as always.”
“I look fine?” You parrot his words and follow his footsteps over to the kitchen. “Careful Barnes, don’t get too excited, it’s not healthy for a senior citizen’s heart.”
“You know what I mean,” a heavy sigh slips out the soldier’s mouth as he busies himself filling the kettle, glancing back at you from over his shoulder as he continues speaking. “I don’t understand why you worry so much about all of… this.” He gestures at you, water splashing off the tips of his fingers.
“God forbid a woman cares about looking good on a date,” you’re becoming annoyingly aware of the pout on your lips and try your best to correct it, whilst prying open the fridge door and fishing out a bottle of beer. “Gee if only it were still the 40s, then I could slap some mercury on my lips and hit the town with a man ready to buy me off my daddy for the cheap, cheap price of two goats!”
The frustration within you only rises as you struggle with the bottle’s cap, the skin of your hand pinching as you put all your force behind removing it. Since when are twist-tops so damn hard to twist off?
Bucky’s by the kettle, pouring boiling hot water into a mug he’s wrongfully claimed as his and looking irritatingly fine surrounded by steam — which has your mind trailing back to a few weeks ago: an early morning, exiting your bedroom to find your lodger stepping out the bathroom with nothing but a towel around his waist and the remnant dew of a steaming hot shower trailing down his very naked, very defined biceps, and pectorals, and- He’s not even trying to mask the amusement on his face as he indulges in your failure.
“Don’t you think you’re being a little ridiculous?” He asks and pries the bottle out of your hold, effortlessly ripping the cap off with a twist of his left hand. A familiar warmth curls between your legs, awakening a response from you that you’ve sworn, under no circumstances, will happen due to Bucky Barnes. You barely want to exchange air with him, nevermind bodily fluids. “There’s no way you’re worth two goats.”
“Every day I wake up and resist the urge to smother you in your sleep.”
Your vitriol is met with a smirk taking over his lips. Watching as he brings the beer up to his mouth, you catch yourself forgetting to blink as the soldier engages you both in a staring contest, all the while he’s tilting the bottle up to steal the first sip. He presses the cold glass back into your hand. You try not to focus on his tongue, peeking out to swipe over his bottom lip and clean up a remnant drop of beer.
In a move that puts you even more on edge, Bucky shuffles closer to you. Delirium floods your mind as the smell of smoke, and musk, and a just a twinge of sweat floods your nose, a smell so masculine it has you debating setting feminism and your own self-preservation back hundreds of years by nuzzling your face into the pulse point of his neck, like you’re some damn animal being exposed to pheromones. Meanwhile, he appears none the wiser to the negative effect he’s having on you, too busy reaching his arm behind you and into the fridge.
“Those boys you entertain, do they ever pay you any compliments?” His voice is so gentle, you almost wonder if that’s how it would sound whispering in your ear. Luckily, you don’t actually wonder about that. Not at all, not even a little. “Or is that your job too, like the bill?”
As quickly as he caged you in against the fridge, he moves away and leaves the cool air to rush over your skin, dragging your mind back into reality and away from whatever thoughts it keeps trying to tempt you with. You track his movements towards the island counter as he sets down a glass bowl, marked by condensation and filled with a batter of some sorts.
It's becoming more and more common to catch Bucky pottering around in the kitchen, a recipe on his phone screen and a personalised ‘Kiss the Baker’ apron — which Sam bought as a joke for his birthday — tied around his waist. He’ll never admit it, but a part of you believes baking helps him relax, to shut off whatever thoughts are floating around in that disturbingly pretty head of his and let him focus solely on measuring, mixing, and making delicious sugary treats. You can hardly complain when he’s gifting you the privilege of an at-home bakery. Fortunately, he gives you plenty of other reasons to complain.
“Boys I entertain? Way to make me sound like a stripper,” you huff, sneaking over to dunk a finger into the batter as he turns to grab his coffee. “And I’ll have you know, they do pay me compliments.”
Licking your finger clean, you can’t fight the humm of approval that creeps up your throat nor the way your eyes slip shut as you savour the cold, tangy sweetness of the cake mix. Something warm presses against your left side as Bucky returns to the island, setting down his mug and a cake tin.
“Really? What kinda things do they say?” Just as you go to double dip, he smacks the top of your hand with a wooden spoon, and you nearly freeze at the contact. For a few short seconds, the factory in your mind goes into lockdown as every single one of your brain cells scramble to not conjure up the image of him smacking that utensil on a very different part of you. “Hands off. It’s a lemon cake, not a lemon and your-dirty-fingers cake.”
You silence your thoughts with a swig of beer before putting a safety distance between Bucky and you, unsure whether to be relieved at his obliviousness to the less than ideal affect he’s having on you, or offended by his complete lack of reaction to being so close to you while you’re all dressed up and waiting for another man to take you out.
Not that you want him to be affected by that, or you in general, though.
Your phone lights up with a text from an unsaved number: im hear, r yu coming down or shuld i com up? You shut it off and stuff it into your purse, deciding it's best to keep a man waiting anyway; he’ll appreciate your presence even more once you finally give him it.
Besides, you’ve yet to answer Bucky’s question.
“I’d tell you but I’m too sober to stomach you yelling ‘Heaven to Betsy!’ and giving me a lecture on your medieval dating ethics.”
You earn a genuine laugh, in which his knees bend a little and his head is thrown back, while his vibranium hand winds up splayed across his midriff. The sun is setting beyond the window, lingering shades of orange warmth frame a heavenly glow around Bucky, highlighting a slight curl in his hair and the piercing blue of his eyes. The view is uncomfortably pleasant, so you bring the bottle back to your lips and turn your head away, suddenly utterly fascinated with the eggshell colouring of the kitchen cupboards.
“I think there’s a leak under the sink,” the comment is absentminded, a meager attempt at steering your mind away from the man and his mixing bowl.
Bucky ignores it and drags you right back to the actual topic at hand.
“That’s funny,” there’s a shuffle of tin behind you. You glance back around to find him smoothing batter into the cake mold, wooden spoon clasped in metal fingers spreading the mix evenly. You’ve never noticed how good Bucky is at spreading things. “Cause I swear I remember Sam mentioning something about the last guy moaning his own name in your ear.”
Beer shoots to the back of your throat.
In a spurt of coughing, amidst the burning pain of the carbonated liquid dripping out your nose, you hurry over to the sink. Mouth dropped open in a dry heave, you lean into the basin and try to minimize the mess you make in search of a breath. Heat envelops you from behind and a pair of sock-clad feet come into view next to your maroon heels. You briefly register the cool brush of metal against the back of your neck as he tries to tidy back your hair and, while you appreciate the action, you can’t help note how completely unnecessary it is. Too distracted to care, your attention shoots straight to the weight of his flesh hand pressing into your lower back. Heavy, warm, large, it pollutes your mind with the knowledge of how it feels to have him soothe your skin — even if there is a layer of silk in the way.
The moment air returns to your lungs, you shoot up straight and ache to step away from him and his wandering-to-all-the-wrong-places hands. The battle against his touch is mute, not even one percent of his strength is put behind the way he grips your forearms and turns you to face him.
Bucky’s eyes scan over you, studying your features. You swallow back whatever feeling brings salivation to your mouth. His thumb reaches towards his own and you watch, transfixed, as a pink tongue darts out to greet it, licking a stripe over the pad of it. A splash of cake batter stains his ring finger. You swallow back more saliva; confusingly, your mouth feels drier than ever. Only when he delicately presses his thumb beneath your eye and swipes over your waterline do you realise you’re teary-eyed.
“See how clumsy you are?” There’s a chastising lilt to his voice that sends blood rushing to your face, and then immediately back down to the overwhelmingly empty space between your legs. “Can’t even swallow properly without ruining your mascara.”
You need distance.
You need to move.
You need to leave.
“He’s here!” The words are almost a gasp as you turn out of his hold. The weight of his gaze trails over your legs as you rush around the kitchen island, fishing your keys out of your purse and rambling out the nerves he’s summoned. “Okay, there’s some leftover pasta in the fridge if you’re hungry, and you’re welcome to the beers if you get thirsty. Big remote turns on the TV, the little one changes the channel. Behave and take care of the place while I’m away, okay?”
“Quit talking to me like I’m some kind of guard dog,” he complains as you pull open the front door and cross one foot over the threshold to safety.
“Oh, I’m sorry!” You cheer back, trailing the door behind you as you go. “I wasn’t aware you were going to start contributing rent, I’ll send you my bank details.”
With that, the apartment door slams shut and you head out for a date in which three things will happen: you’ll flirt, you’ll fuck, and you won’t think about your roommate.
Only one of those things ends up happening.
It’s not from lack of an offer that you wind up taking a cab back to your apartment. Your date had been nice… enough. He complimented your outfit, took a sufficient amount of interest in you, and he even bought you flowers — of course, he’d accidentally left them in his parent’s home. Where he lived. In the basement.
And the thing is, you’re not shallow. Time’s are tough, the economy sucks, and the world is still adjusting to the sudden return to half its population post-Blip. So you were more than game to play sneak-me-into-your-bed-without-waking-your-parents, but, as the pair of you waited on a taxi to arrive, his hand found your waist and your treacherous mind noticed something it shouldn’t.
Bucky’s hand was larger. And warmer. And more welcomed against your skin.
Sick to your stomach by your own thoughts, your night ended with you tip-toeing past the familiar figure sleeping on your couch — definitely not pausing to take in the sheer width of his naked shoulders dangling half-off the cushion — and crawling into bed alone, belly full of Thai and mind full of Winter.
When morning comes, the bedroom door creaks as you pry it open, a fist rubbing sleep out your eye and a yawn announcing your arrival.
“Did you eat my ice cream?” Bucky calls out from somewhere, voice muffled and full of accusation.
Despite barely finishing a glass of wine the night before, there’s a throbbing pain beginning in your temples and souring your already bitter mood.
“Wow, good morning to you too,” you stumble more than walk over to the kitchen, in search of the salvation of ice cold water.
That’s where you find him: laid out on his back, grey sweatpants clinging to bent knees, with everything from his shoulders up inside the open cabinet beneath the sink. His arms are inside too, tinkering away at something above his face.
“Good morning. Did you eat my ice cream?” If ever a thing such as a verbal eyeroll were to exist, Bucky would be doing it. From the lack of seeing his eyes, there’s every chance he is literally rolling them.
Your journey toward the fridge is interrupted by the troubling sight of a glass full of water, a plate hosting a slice of lemon sponge cake, and two miscellaneous white pills that anyone who suffers the unusually cruel punishment of a menstrual cycle is likely familiar with. A post-it note with your name written neatly across it sits next to the unexpected care package.
“So what if I did?” The painkillers go down effortlessly, though there’s a lingering chemical taste that has you gulping down an extra sip of water. “What are you doing, anyway?”
“I paid for it!” For all his outrage, he doesn’t care enough to poke his head out as he chastises you. “You said there was a leak, so I’m checking your pipes. I’m quite good with my hands, you know.”
Is he dense, or is he saying this shit on purpose? The double entendre in his words is glaring, yet you haven’t the confidence nor the will-power to address it, to poke the proverbial bear out of fear. Fear of him scolding your dirty mind, or fear of him doubling down on his suggestive wordplay, you’re not quite sure.
You choose to steer clear of the topic and, more importantly, the unexpected twinge in your chest in response to Bucky’s unrequested help.
“And I paid for the freezer you left it in, the electricity that kept it frozen, and the apartment you live in,” you don’t intend to sound so snappy, like a sulking child fighting against their own self-confessed crimes. “So I think you can spare me some goddamn ice cream.”
You’ve taken to joining Bucky on the floor, sitting across from him, cross-legged and back pressed against the cabinets that surround the kitchen island. In your lap lies the slice of cake, a mouthful already missing and melting its tangy sweetness onto your tongue. You almost moan, but it’s unclear whether the sugary treat just tastes that good or the visual of the soldier laid out on his back and tinkering away beneath your sink is just so stimulating.
If you mention the strange noise your car’s engine has been making recently, would he fix that too? You can already picture him slicked in sweat and oil, hands on his hips as he stands over the opened hood and assesses whatever the damage is. You’d have to watch over the whole thing, of course — not out of your own self-interest but on the off chance something goes wrong and Bucky needs help taking off his oil-stained shirt, or pants, or-
“Your date was that good, huh?” You almost jump out of your skin when he speaks.
“He bragged to me about how he and his college roommates used to play pool,” the pause in your sentences seems to capture Bucky’s attention, coaxing him out from beneath the sink. “Using a shotgun instead of cues.”
As he sits up, elbows finding rest upon his knees, you can’t help but note the five-o’clock shadow he’s sporting. For reasons that have nothing to do with the fraying seams of your sanity, you need him to shave.
To Bucky’s credit, he doesn’t laugh. Yes, his lips glitch somewhere between a cheeky grin and a serious frown, but he does not outright laugh like you expect him to. Instead, he nods down at the half-eaten cake and tilts his head — an unspoken question, is it good?, that only weakens his argument about not being a guard-dog. Between the puppy-dog blue eyes and the yearning for approval, you half expect him to sprout a tail and start panting.
Scratch that last thought, actually. Bucky and panting should not coexist in a sentence together, nevermind in your imagination.
“Mind feeding me a bite?” Yes, actually, you would mind, but one glance at his fingertips stained in whatever-the-hell is going on with your sink leaves you no choice but to tear off a corner.
Bringing the piece of cake to meet his awaiting mouth, you brace yourself for the tentative scrape of teeth stealing it out of your hold. The delicate brush of his lips enveloping your fingers throws you off your axis, and the challenge in his eyes as they hold contact with your own has your thighs involuntarily squeezing themselves together.
For a moment, you swear you catch him glance down at your lips.
Then you remember the health insurance your job provides does not cover the cost of being institutionalised, so you stop hallucinating and come back to reality where Bucky Barnes is not so much a flirt as he is a pest, a stray animal abandoned at your doorstep by a friend who decided to take advantage of your good-natured heart.
“Can you give me the exact phrasing your date used to describe this shotgun-pool?” The soldier is gone in the blink of an eye, flat on his back again and continuing his attempt to seal the leak.
“Why?”
“I’m making this list,” he says, and he must shift his hands higher above his head because suddenly the soft cotton of his white shirt has ridden up his torso, presenting your eyes with a golden platter of sun-warmed skin. “I’m calling it ‘the manchild files’.”
“That’s not even funny,” neither is the way he inches deeper into the cabinet, exposing not only the glaringly white tan-line delineating where the band of his boxers should be resting but also the beginning dark curls of a happy trail.
“Well ‘the stupid files’ sounds so simple, I was worried you’d try to jump into bed with it.”
“Are you seriously about to slut-shame me in my own fucking kitchen?” Whilst slutting yourself out on my floor like your name is Mike and you’re about to show me some magic? is the quiet part you don’t say aloud.
“I’m critical but I’m not hypocritical,” there he does again with that verbal eye-roll. “I wasn’t exactly the image of celibacy when I was your age-”
“Yay, more grandpa lore!” Your interruption earns you a nudge from his leg, but you know it made him laugh because his shoulders gently shake.
“I’m not slut-shaming you, I’m taste-shaming. I swear, being useless must be the precursor to having a chance with you.”
“It is not!” You gasp, yet you’re hardly surprised — Bucky’s not exactly subtle in his disapproval of the men you date.
If there is anything to be thankful for, it’s the alleviation that comes with Bucky shimmying out from the sink again, happy trail redressed and a hand diving into the pocket of his sweatpants. With a dramatic clearing of his throat, he brings his phone up to his face and starts reciting.
“After being told you have a nut allergy, Carter B. said Wait, like, you’re allergic to cum?” You’d always known showing him how to use the notes app would come back to bite you in the ass somehow. “Tommy L. walked into a lampost because he got distracted… watching a squirrel run up a tree. You almost got stood up by Steve K. because he accidentally locked himself inside his own car. Lee B. asked you-”
“Bucky B. is about to lose his other arm if he doesn’t shut up.”
“I rest my case,” and he still has the nerve to open his mouth, awaiting another bite of cake.
You cave with no fight and give it to him.
Because you’re a nice person, not because you want to feel his mouth on you again.
Something cool drips onto the bottom of your naked thighs after Bucky reaches over you and grabs at the glass of water, stealing an obnoxiously large gulp; or is it just exaggerated by your stare zeroing in on the way his Adam’s apple bobs as he drinks?
A thought pops into your mind.
“Did you leave these on the counter because you expected me to be hungover?” Your tone is inoffensive, and unoffended, a simple curiosity you need answered.
“You have a headache, right?”
“Uh-huh,” your eyes narrow skeptically.
“Yeah, I figured you would,” Bucky takes another sip, more condensation trickling down onto your legs. “You always have one after eating Thai food.”
Something inside of you stops.
Your heart, or your lungs, or your mind. Your goddamn liver, for all you know.
This is not supposed to be happening. Bucky is not supposed to fix things just because you mentioned it, once in passing and as a scapegoat from focusing too much on him. And he certainly isn’t supposed to notice things, useless little factoids that not even you know about yourself until he brings them to light. Hell, he’s not even supposed to still be here, sleeping on your couch and criticising your love life.
When the thing inside of you clicks back into place and starts again, a new weight rests atop your conscience.
Maybe it’s not so bad having a roommate, having Bucky be that roommate. Maybe you’re starting to get used to coming home to the smell of baked vanilla and the signature grouchy look he wears as he asks you about your day, about how your co-worker pissed you off, about why you’re home later than usual and not wearing a jacket out in the cold of winter.
“By the way,” he’s calling out from beneath the sink again. “You’ll be happy to know I’m touring an apartment next week.”
“Oh.” The bite you just took turns sour in your mouth. You struggle to swallow it down. “That’s great. Finally! You’re going, and I’m staying here, and I’ll have my apartment back to myself. That’s… Great. It’s great!”
No, really, it’s great.
“You’re joking,” a palm on your lower back guides you to the right, just in time to avoid being trampled beneath a cart.
“I wish,” you say, and saunter over to some colourful packaging that’s captured your eye.
After a moment of inspecting the product in hand from every angle, you put it back on the shelf.
“Let me get this straight,” Bucky pushes the cart along behind you, grabbing that same colourful packaging and dropping it in with the rest of the groceries. “You lean through his window, kiss him goodbye on the cheek and then he just… What, crashed his car?”
“Into a wall with street art of a cliff painted on it,” as you add the most important detail, laughter is already bubbling up your throat. “He literally crashed his car into a cliff without even getting to switch out of first gear!”
The pair of you make up quite the sight.
An entire morning of tiptoeing through the limbo of delirium, after an entire night spent trying to block out the relentless banging from the upstairs neighbours. The door to your bedroom crawled open some time past four and there was Bucky, head poking through the space and looking rather pleased to find you wide awake — despite his claims of just wanting to make sure you were asleep.
Seated on opposite ends of the couch, both of you found a quiet solace in the other’s inability to sleep. While a movie marathon played over the TV, the sex marathon above continued. When exhaustion took claim of your body, you drifted off with your arms resting on the armchair and your head resting on your arms. You awoke atop a pillow and beneath a blanket, legs stretched out over the couch and Bucky curled up on the floor by your feet — like any good guard dog would be.
After a botched attempt to sneak past the soldier, only to have him scare the living daylights out of you by grabbing your ankle as you tried to step over him, you both came to the shocking realisation that the fridge was void of any food.
Which brings you to here: standing in aisle 7, laughing an ache into your ribs over yet another one of your failed dates, with a half-filled cart and matching bags forming under your tired eyes.
“I think it’s time we had an intervention about where you’re finding these men,” Bucky says that last word like it's covered in poison, burning his tongue on the way out.
“They find me!” You say, as he reaches for the box of strawberries you just put down. “As generous as I am, do you want to maybe slow down on how much shit you load into our cart?”
His hand freezes, the box of red fruit clasped in a confusingly delicate grip of vibranium fingers
“You picked it up,” his tone is riddled with confusion. “Don’t you want them?”
“Contrary to popular belief, I’m not made of money.”
“Okay?” He replies, like it’s the most irrelevant piece of information you’ve ever given him — and you once spent an hour ranting to him about the inefficiency of the ink cartridges in your office’s printer. “I’m paying, so do you want it or not?”
“Since when do you have money? Did your pension finally come through? I mean… You are old enough. Also, aren’t you literally a vet?”
“You managed to say all that in one breath, yet you failed to answer a yes or no question.”
A bubble of silence surrounds you both. Bucky blinks, slowly, exaggeratedly. It’s the perfect opportunity to stare at his face and notice the five o'clock shadow has grown. A gruff ‘excuse me’, followed by a man shoving between you both to grab some strawberries, pops the bubble.
Without a word, you snatch the box and place it in the cart.
Half-way up the fruit aisle, Bucky gets the genius idea to open his mouth again: “You wanna know what my theory is?”
“Nope,” you say, popping the p and glancing back at him over your shoulder. “But you’re going to tell me anyway.”
He looks vexingly domestic like this, wearing a sweater and pushing your shopping around. Thoughts betray you, wandering off into dangerous territory as they begin to question how others perceive you from the outside.
What do strangers see: two roommates that quarrel like it’s a biological need, or a couple doing their weekly shop? Two strangers forced together by a circumstance named Sam Wilson, or two lovers unwilling to voice that the metal container between them is too much distance?
“I think you date idiots because they’re idiots.”
“Gee whiz, grandpa, that’s so insightful. I sure do hope I’m as wise as you when I’m your age, but I’ll probably just be dead.” You feel the cart meet your back in a gentle bump, a non-verbal warning to cut the teasing.
“Dating those incompetent men, it’s like…” he pauses, searching for the right words, and plucks a bunch of bananas from your hand, dropping them in with your mounting pile of fruit. “Jumping out of a plane! You get the thrill of falling but, the moment something a little too real and solid appears on the horizon, you pull out the parachute and, that’s it, you’re safe. No danger of falling flat on your face and getting your feelings hurt.”
“I don’t know when you last jumped out of a plane-”
“Remember that Karli situation a few months ago?”
“But not ejecting your parachute leads to a little more than just falling flat on your face.”
“So my metaphor isn't perfect,” Bucky trails off, eyes staring past you and mind lost in thought. You follow his line of sight and find a couple at the end of the aisle, hands intertwined and smiling at each other like they’re the only two people in the world. An unnamed emotion tugs at the soldier’s lips, but he won’t let it take over his stoic features. “But you get my point. If you were actually looking for something serious, you’d date someone better than those men.”
Unprompted and unwarranted, his words spear your heart.
Memories replay in your head, a kaleidoscope of the featureless faces you let take you out, dine you, wine you, kiss you. A handful of immeasurables: how many times you’ve brushed off mispronounced versions of your name, how many excuses you’ve made for the way they talk to you, how many times you’ve lowered your own standards to help a man feel desired. In your wake lies a graveyard of failed relationships, with no proper funeral nor mourning.
You swallow back the lump in your throat.
“Okay, psychoanalysing me aside, what’s left on the list?” You ask, making your way round to Bucky’s side of the cart.
“Well, I still need to write down Jeff G.’s cliff accident.”
“The other list.” You watch as he struggles to fish out the scrap of paper from his pocket.
“Eggs, pasta, feta, toilet roll,” his brows are furled, his eyes are glaring, and with each item he lists off, his words grow more unsure. “Grapefruit? Your handwriting is shit.”
“I was in a rush!”
“And sitting on a jack-hammer?”
“Gimme that,” you snatch the list, he yields it with no protest. As you scan over the scribbled ink, a frustrating truth comes to light. Bucky’s right, your handwriting is shit. “Is grapefruit even in season?”
“Huh,” it’s the sound of hollow amusement.
“What?”
“Just…” His presence looms over you, infecting your senses with the woodsy smell of his cologne and the arduous heat that radiates off of him. When he nods his head to the right, scoffing out a laugh and poking his tongue into his cheek, you find yourself wrestling between temptations of slapping him or pulling him closer. “You really don’t notice what’s right in front of you, do you?”
Lo and behold, on the right side of the aisle, grapefruits.
You make it through the rest of the shopping list in relative silence, with the occasional side-comment from the super soldier that either rouses a grin onto your lips or has your eyes rolling in faux disagreement. Little by little, you peruse the aisles and fill the cart; and, when Bucky picks out the only ice cream flavour void of nuts, you bite your tongue and choose to say nothing.
“I forgot to ask,” you finally speak, standing in the self-checkout zone and struggling to find something to do with your fidgety hands as Bucky scans each item — you insisted on helping and he insisted he’d get it done quicker alone. “How did the apartment viewing go?”
“Oh. Fine,” you grimace as he says your least favourite f word. “The current lease isn’t up yet, so you’re stuck with me a little longer.”
Are you supposed to feel this relieved?
In theory, you were never supposed to feel anything in regards to Bucky Barnes. In practice, it’s a lot more complicated, a pendulum that seems to swing in constant motion between red hot aggravation and red hot something else you refuse to give a name.
All you know is there are times where you wonder if his back is okay sleeping on the couch, and you contemplate asking him to come meet you during your lunch breaks, and you crave to have the anxious shake in your leg quelled by his daily check-in calls whenever he and Sam go off on another misadventure. Whatever reason lies behind your behaviour, the familiarity of ignorant bliss tempts you away from seeking the answer.
Besides, Bucky will be leaving soon. He’ll no longer be your roommate and you’ll both fall out of whatever routine convenience has forced upon you both.
A series of beeps capture your attention.
At the epicentre of the noise stands an elderly woman, grey hair pristinely curled and an outfit that screams Sunday-bests, struggling with the check-out machine. With no employee in sight and no do-gooder fellow customer stepping out of their way to help, the woman’s distress grows with each beep the machine makes at her.
Knuckles brush down your arm, and there’s Bucky at your side, waiting for you to pay him any mind.
“You mind handling the rest?” He asks, in that softly-spoken tone of his that would make anyone feel like swooning. Maybe that’s why it takes you a few moments to notice the wallet he’s holding out to you. “Cash is in the back pocket. I’ll be a few minutes, okay? Just finish bagging everything, leave the carrying to me.”
There’s no time to get a single word out before you’re staring at the back of his head and watching as he makes his way over to the elderly woman.
For every item you scan, you sneak a glance. The butter beeps onto the screen, and you peek how Bucky has effortlessly become the woman’s personal helper. You pass the strawberries through and reward yourself with the sight of Bucky’s cheeky grin — with the way the elderly lady laughs and swats at his arm, you can only assume he’s made some flirtatious comment. Clicking on the option to pay cash, you nearly give yourself whiplash as you turn to watch them again, Bucky’s just about finishing bagging her groceries while the woman opens her shopping-trolley bag.
Waiting on the receipt to print, your reflection stares back at you on the self-checkout screen: a hue of endearment glowing off your features. The smile quickly melts off your face when you realise that he… Oh no.
Bucky is charming.
Part of you has always known he was handsome — you’re stubborn, not blind — yet the sight of him now, all dashing smiles and twinkling eyes playing rescuer to a woman who, despite the difference in their physical ageing, is closer to his own age than you, it troubles you. The acid burn in your throat is not a manifestation of jealousy, no; it’s the queasy feeling of knowing you’ve never looked across at a date, caught him in a moment of content, and felt the unyielding desire to be the reason behind it.
Someone clears their throat beside you, a man with a wrinkle in his forehead and an agitated look upon his face, so you quickly excuse yourself and, with plastic handles digging into your fingers, you approach Bucky and the elderly lady.
Upon noticing you, Bucky’s quick to tug the bags out your grip, a scolding already falling off his tongue: “I told you to leave these to me.”
“Yeah, well, Mr. Frowny-Magoo over there didn’t appreciate me hogging up the cashier,” the comment is meant as nothing more than a lighthearted joke, yet you swear you see something shift in the soldier’s stance, his shoulders tensing and his jaw clenching as he glances back at the stranger.
Fortunately, the elderly woman interrupts whatever he’s contemplating doing to him.
“Она твоя жена?(Is she your wife?)” She’s looking between you both expectantly, speaking words you don’t understand. “У нее лицо ангела. (She has the face of an angel.)”
Whatever she says, it clearly has an effect on Bucky. His head turns to the side, to you, and a visible softness overcomes his gaze as it traces over your face. His shoulders are relaxing, his jaw is unclenching, and he’s switching the bags over to his metal hand, renewing his grip and freeing up the hand that now hangs right by yours, knuckles gracing over your own in a way that feels like a dare, a challenge, a temptation to lace your fingers together.
You clench your fist shut.
“Я знаю. (I know.)” He says, eyes lingering on you a few moments longer than necessary, before he’s back to smiling at the elderly woman.
Halfway home and doubling your pace to keep up with his effortless stroll, curiosity finally gets the better of you.
“What did she say back there, that lady you helped?”
A stranger rushes past you both, phone glued to their ear and stressing down the speaker. Bucky takes grip of your arm and tugs you closer to him.
“Do you spend your time getting bumped into when I’m not around?” His fingers give your arm a squeeze before releasing you. “And, if you must know, she said I was the most handsome man she’s ever seen.”
Little force is put behind the shove you give his shoulder.
You’re too busy agonising over how much you agree with her.
Bucky leaves.
Not forever, but three weeks away on some stealth mission with Sam sure begins to feel like it.
It happens on a Friday. After the week from hell at work, a friend’s mid-week engagement party, and the unexpected downpour of rain during the journey home, you walk into an unlit apartment and a note stuck to the fridge.
Sam needs me. Be safe, don’t bring strangers home. B.
The batch of freshly baked cinnamon rolls sweeten your night up, at least.
There’s a quiet that always seems to blanket the house whenever you lose Bucky to missions.
Before he was dumped on your front door, you’d been used to living alone and the peaceful silence that came with it. Independence, the ability to need no one and want nothing, a trait of yours that once brought pride, now brings you nothing but the static sound of a muted television and the hum of the microwave spinning a meal fit for one.
Mornings become a ritual of waking later yet leaving earlier, no one is there to distract you from drinking your coffee. Though the workload is the same, somehow the slow drag of hours still finds a way to pass quicker than ever, the revolving doors of the office building spit you back out onto the streets of New York before you’re fully ready. Your evenings waste away, starved of noise and company, while you run out of shows to watch and books to read, and count the hours down until all that silence becomes necessary for your eyes to close and your mind to rest.
It’s when darkness rules over the sky and the hour is a single digit that the phone finally rings. A blocked number, untraceable, pulling you out the hands of sleep and filling your room with the noise of your ringtone. He never speaks first, not until there’s an echo down the line of your own sleep stained ‘hello?’.
“You can go back to sleep now.”
You never stay on the line long enough to find out how quickly he hangs up after he speaks. Because it’s only ever meant to be a way to let you know he’s safe, alive, somewhere out there doing who-knows-what and stopping who-knows-who. It’s just an unrequested favour he’s granted you, after the incident in which both he and Sam fell-off the grid for five days and you were nearly rounding up a search party. He’s not missed a call since, once a day while he’s away.
So, when he doesn’t call, it’s only natural that you worry.
The alarm bell rings when you wake up to birds chirping, sun spilling through the crack between the curtains, and not a single missed call nor voicemail awaiting you.
It’s Saturday and there’s no work to occupy your mind, so you force down a bagel, toss a tote bag onto your shoulder, and head out to the local market. But there’s no joy in perusing fruit stands without a six foot soldier trailing your heels and muttering to himself about how exotic fruit has gotten, and how ‘back in my day you had your apples, your oranges, and your pears.’
You wind up home by noon, and the dwelling begins to grow, still no call.
There’s a weight on your chest, and a balloon of anxiety that grows in your throat, and an unwarranted agitation burning at your skin as you read over his note again, still very much stuck to the fridge and taunting you — Be safe, says a man who clearly can’t take his own advice.
Then, why should you?
You agree to go on a date, one you’ve been dancing around agreeing to for a few weeks yet reach for it the moment you decide you’re not pleased with the way Bucky’s lack of a call is ruining your well-earned free time.
And, hey, the guy’s not a complete loser this time. On paper, at least. He’s handsome, tall, and an athlete — ex-athlete, really, but you don’t bother to point that out while he talks about the gymnastic studio he runs. Most importantly, he’s eager to call a cab and get you home, screw Bucky’s warning. If you want to bring a stranger into your home, you’ll do it.
Brooding, uncalling soldier be damned!
After stumbling through the dark of your apartment into your bedroom, and fumbling with your bra long enough for you to grow tired and just take it off yourself, you and Mister Gymnast tumble into the sheets for a performance so lacklustre, it warrants taking all his medals away. At least your date seems to enjoy himself, spilling onto your stomach and falling asleep the minute his head hits the pillows.
“I finished,” last you checked, he hadn't even started.
You lie awake, staring at the ceiling, and try to will the phone to ring. Encased by a stranger’s snoring and a guilty feeling, you let Lady Sleep whisk you away. When your eyes open next, morning has broken and you’re alone in bed with a remnant trace of warmth on the sheets. But the silence is finally gone.
Beyond your door you hear the faint thud of footsteps, the ding of the fridge being opened, the whistle of the kettle. You almost trip in your rush to get dressed, and nearly rip the hinges off the door as you tear it open. Then the smile falls from your face.
“You’re up!” Everyone’s favourite gymnast is there to greet you, a mug in hand as he goes to pull you in for a kiss. The way you swerve is automatic, unplanned, leaving his lips to land on your cheek. “Uhh, I was hoping you’d sleep a little longer, I wanted to bring you breakfast in bed but-”
“He couldn’t figure out how to boil the kettle.”
And there’s Bucky, leaning back against the kitchen counter with his arms crossed over his chest and a smug look on his face. Aside from the butterfly stitches above his left brow, he looks unharmed. Fine, even. Dressed in all black, with a t-shirt that’s hugging his frame a little too tightly for your liking, the double-combo of his dog-tags and vibranium arm on display. Perfectly safe for a man who couldn’t call.
Your date laughs and sheepishly scratches the back of his head before you get the chance to speak.
“Your brother was kind enough to help me.” It’s unclear who laughs first: Bucky or you. “What’s so funny?”
“Oh, nothing, nothing, just…” Bucky says, shaking the laughter away with a nod of his head. “In what world do me and her look related?”
“Wait, if you’re not her brother then, are you-” Fifty shades of horror spill over the gymnast’s face, his head darting between looking over at Bucky and back at you. “Holy shit, is he your boyfriend?”
“Husband, actually,” the soldier’s all too quick-witted, pushing off the counter and reaching for a mug of brewing coffee. “But don’t worry, we’re open. What do you think of our kitchen lights, by the way? My wife here likes them dim.”
Dumb as he is, your date tilts his head up to inspect the light fixtures.
“Oh, they’re nice!”
That does it for you.
“Bucky, shut up!” You snap, finger pointed over at the menace who’s biting back a smirk and stirring away at his mug, face as innocent as sin. Is this some twisted version of revenge, a punishment for bringing a stranger home? You’d prefer the punishment to be a little more… hands on. Preferably in the form of your slapping that twinkle out of his eyes. “He is not my boyfriend, or my husband. He is the bum that lives on my couch.”
“You see how she treats me, Vince?”
“It’s Lance,” the gymna- Lance corrects him.
Moving towards the kitchen, your eyes check over your roommate once more, as though they expect some previously unseen injury to make an appearance on his skin. Come the end of your search, you’re left looking into a face that is sporting a split brow and a cruel level of entertainment from the situation at hand.
There’s a relief to having him back, and it’s wrestling with the exasperating emotions a single missed call conjured up.
“What are you doing here, anyway? Aren’t you and Sam still meant to be… I don’t know, on a homoerotic getaway, fighting crime?” The questions fire out of you as you slip into one of the island’s stools.
“We finished early,” Bucky appears by your side as though from thin air, hand clasping the back of your seat and pushing you in closer to the counter top.
“Aww, don’t worry, big boy, it happens to the best of you,” you tease, an empathetic pat against his shoulder.
The mockery backfires when you notice his brows shoot up and his stare shifts towards your date, who’s too busy trying to open the sugar jar to notice the dig at his own sexual inabilities.
Wait, when exactly did Bucky get home?
“How do you take your coffee?” One-Thrust-Lance asks you over his shoulder.
Before you can answer, a cup is nudged into your grasp and Bucky looks over you with triumph, metal fingers reaching out to drag over a plate of freshly-baked cookies. The smell of warm vanilla pairs well with the soft musk of his cologne, your eyes nearly roll back inhaling it.
“Mmm,” one sip of your coffee is all you need to know it’s perfect, made exactly to your taste. “Coffee and baked goods… I knew I kept you around for a reason.”
In lieu of any verbal response, the soldier takes to dunking one of the cookies into your mug before stealing a bite out of it. You watch as he chews on the sweet treat, head nodding in approval at his own skills. After he dips a second time, you expect him to take another bite, only to find him offering the chocolate chip goodness up to your mouth. Two eyes, blue as any winter, stare encouragingly while you sink your teeth into the cookie.
Heaven couldn’t taste any sweeter, you think, as the perfect blend of coffee stained dough and the sharpness of the dark chips flood your tastebuds.
“So messy,” Bucky tuts quietly, his right hand grabbing a steady hold of your chin while his thumb swipes away the crumbs dusting the corner of your mouth.
That thing inside of you stops again as you watch him bring his hand up to his own mouth, a pink tongue poking out to lick his thumb clean.
Arousal thrums through your blood, a pulsing rhythm that spreads straight to your clit. A squeeze of your thighs brings momentary reprieve, yet the ache fights back with renewed force, drying up your throat and knocking the sense right out of you.
Squirming where you sit, your legs switch position until one foot finds itself tucked beneath the opposite thigh, the heel of it sitting perfectly against your clothed core. You find no mercy, no chance to roll your hips forward in search of the balm only friction will bring to your burning skin. Instead there’s simply Bucky, eyes trailing down the length of you and settling on your short-clad legs. As though his behaviour is not cruel enough, he wets his bottom lip with his tongue
“You like that?” More than you’ll ever know, you almost scream until the logical side of your brain takes the wheel again and you notice him pointing down at the half-eaten cookie. Of course he’s enquiring about his baking skills, what else would this scrambled-egg-for-brains senior citizen be talking about? “Are you gonna make me wait all day for an answer?”
Something smashes behind Bucky, just in time to startle away the racy thoughts from your mind.
“My bad!” Your date — who you damn near forgot was even here — is apologising, bending at the waist and trying his best to collect the fractured pieces of a mug off the floor. “Where do you guys keep your dustpan?”
Bucky pushes away from the island counter, taking the smell of his cologne with him; if you weren’t fully back to your rational senses, you’d miss it.
“I’ll get it, Vince, you just stand there and look pretty.”
“Okay!” Lance, it seems, is just as eager to please the ex-assassin as you almost were a moment ago.
You decide you need to move, to stand up, to stretch your legs. This has nothing to do with the lingering effect of Bucky’s antics, nor the damp patch gathering against your panties.
Slipping off the kitchen stool, you work on chugging down gulps of coffee with every intention of dumping the empty mug into the sink, dashing to your bedroom, and conjuring up the best plan you can come up with to get not only yourself, but also the trash you brought in with you last night out of the apartment and away from an infuriating roommate.
Something on the floor derails you, however, dragging you away from the path to sanctuary. The tiniest red petal, lonesome and neglected upon the cold tile. Three steps over, and there’s another petal. One step until the next petal. You follow the breadcrumb trail all the way over to the garbage can where, with one gentle push of a button, the lid opens up to reveal the unexpected, thrown away like a dirty secret.
A crumpled bouquet of roses.
Everywhere you turn, there’s tension.
In your neck, from sleeping at an unfavourable angle. Within your stomach, where a queasy feeling keeps threatening to spew your guts out onto the bathroom floor. Between you and Bucky, a foreign energy that’s grown over the course of this last week, during which you’ve been avoiding eye contact and his stare is full of accusation.
Retracing your steps, they take you back to the moment Lance left the apartment and you found yourself drowning in Bucky’s company for the first time in weeks. He was barely half-way through poking fun at the choices you made in his absence — most of his focus being on the blubbering fool you brought into your bed — when your patience ran thin and snapped.
Now here you are, bearing the consequence of your own short temper, wiping lipstick off your teeth whilst mentally preparing yourself to go on a second date, planned sheerly out of spite and the need to prove a point.
Poor Lance is none the wiser to his role as pawn in your game of ‘Screw You, Barnes!’.
“Everything okay in there?” Think of the devil and he shall knock on the bathroom door, apparently. “Thought you had your big date at seven.”
The gymnast’s text thread stares back at you, a wall of grey bubbles. You have to swallow down the lump in your throat to speak, “He’s not answering my calls.”
“You’ve been stood up? By that loser?” There’s every chance your storm of emotions is impeding you from thinking straight, but you swear you almost hear a hint of disbelief in Bucky’s voice. Disgust, even.
There’s no point dwelling on the thought.
After a quick wash of your hands, you pry the door open and watch as the soldier leaning against it nearly topples forward before catching himself against the frame. He’s entirely too close for comfort, close enough for you to notice the different shades of blue in his eyes.
“Maybe he broke his phone?” The lack of assurance in your voice has you cringing, the fear of being called out suddenly doubling.
Bucky scoffs, arms crossing over his chest.
“More likely he forgot to charge it.”
Is that what happened to him? Is that why he left you to dwell in the dark over his whereabouts and wellbeing, rendering the usual distraction of a night-time companion useless? Only for you to find him the following morning, right as rain and as annoying as ever, standing in the kitchen and casting judgement-filled glances at your overnight guest?
Thinking about it, about him, brings on an onslaught of anger you’re not willing to address. Not right now.
“Shut up!” It comes across as less independent girlboss and more petulant child, but you’re too busy noticing how firm his chest feels under your palms as you push past him out of the bathroom to care.
Prying open the freezer, you hear the soft click of the toilet door closing. Good, you think, he’s gone away. Out of sight, out of mind. Even if it is only for the short time it takes him to do his business.
That time ends up being even shorter than expected, for only minutes after you’ve dug your spoon into the creamy, frozen goodness of vanilla fudge, the object of both your fascination and your torture is making his way towards the kitchen.
“Didn’t I tell you to stop eating my ice cream?”
“Didn’t I tell you to move out?” Mouth full of vanilla, you shoot him a toothy grin and relish in the grimace it earns you.
Satisfaction melts away when Bucky invades your personal space, metal arm reaching over head and pulling open a cupboard.
“Don’t do that,” you swat at the vibranium bicep, a futile fight that simply makes you all too aware of how smooth it feels beneath your fingertips.
“Do what?” Brain of a caveman, Bucky continues his rustling through the cabinet behind you, features as stoic as a rock as though he’s none the wiser to how your chests brush against one another with each exhale.
“That,” another swat at his arm, though this time he yields. The space between you doesn’t grow, however. It worsens, his attention fully falling onto you now. “Reaching over me like you can’t just ask me to move.”
“Fine, if it really bothers you that much,” are the last words you hear before you’re airborne, two hands squeezing at your hips and moving you two steps over and out of the way.
The soldier doesn’t struggle, not even for a moment, the serum that’s altered his DNA leaving him primed and ready to manoeuvre the most steadfast of objects. Manhandle them, too. Pick them up, turn them over, pin them down, make them scream… Objects, of course, or those big, bad guys he and Sam are always chasing after.
The anger in you is renewed, burning brighter than a star ready to die. You shove his hands off of you and secure another step of distance between you.
“Well aren’t you a ray of sunshine today.” With the rate he’s going at, one would think the soldier makes a living out of deepening the frown on your face. “Is this princess’ first time being stood up?”
You’d slap him, right here and now, if it didn’t mean moving closer and touching his skin; the current top two of your ‘Things To Not Do’ list.
Luckily, the tub of ice cream sits just within reach and your eager fingers take grip of it, sliding it over the counter towards yourself. A mouthful of coolness precedes the burning question on your tongue, “Why didn’t you call?”
“Are you serious?” Now he’s the one scowling and taking a step closer.
“Deadly,” you dig the spoon back into the carton. “Now answer the question.”
“You’re pissy with me for not calling, meanwhile I’m the one who came home to some asshole in your bed?”
He’s moving closer. You try to step backwards.
“Yeah, well, if you’d called like you were supposed to, I wouldn’t have ended up with said asshole.”
Bucky’s eyes narrow, “Oh, so now it’s my fault that you date degenerates?”
The cackle that escapes you could break the soundbarrier.
“Wow! Everybody, give it up for another original dig at my love-life from James Buchanan Barnes!” Voice dripping with seven layers of venomous sarcasm, you give three slow claps of your hands. The cynical smile that overcomes your face feels borderline deranged, something plucked right out of a horror movie. “Okay, yeah, I date losers! Happy? Jesus Christ, Bucky, what do you expect me to do? It’s not exactly like there’s anyone else lining up to date me.”
“I am!” His voice is raised, his eyes are wide, his chest is heaving. “Maybe I’m the biggest idiot, rushing home last week to surprise you. Even brought you flowers. I just… Fuck!”
You don’t move, don’t blink, don’t breathe.
Bucky runs a hand through his hair, knuckles going white as he pulls on the tresses.
There it is again in his eyes, the accusation.
Even though he’s shaking his head, he steps closer.
The kitchen counter is right behind you, there’s nowhere for you to run.
The heels on your feet almost give out beneath you, you try to steady yourself with your hands.
Bucky has other plans and grips both your forearms.
“I am,” he repeats, softer. Slower. The icy exterior of accusation melts away to reveal vulnerability.
A hand meets your cheek and holds you like you are glass, breakable beneath his touch. Your heart’s in your throat, and there’s a current of electricity running down to your toes, and that neglected hunger in your loins creeps in again. His eyes search your face, while his thumb gently swipes over your bottom lip, prying it out an involuntary capture from your teeth.
It’s unclear who reaches for who first, whether he dips and takes possession of your mouth, or you grab him by the collar of his shirt and lay your claim over him. In a matter of seconds, a tentative press of lips against lips divulges into loss of breath, tongues in mouths, and fevered kisses.
The soldier kisses with starvation, like he has walked through the desert of loneliness and at last stumbled upon an oasis, like a bee seeking every last drop of nectar from a flower dying off with the spring, like a body clings to sleep in the throes of exhaustion. It’s a necessity, a human need, a matter of survival to keep your lips interlocked.
The hand on your face holds you steady as he tilts himself deeper into the kiss. Noses brush against the swells of cheeks, eyelids rest close, feet shuffle closer in search of eradicating the crevice of distance between you two. Metal fingers curl around the nape of your neck, a gesture you reciprocate while your spare hand lays flat-palmed against his beating chest. One of his legs winds up between yours and, as he shifts weight from one foot to another, there’s the faintest relief of friction against your cunt and a whine gets caught between your throat and Bucky’s eager mouth.
Despite how you chase his lips, he pulls back and grants you the sight of pure endearment.
“Look at you, whining already. Where’s all that fire gone?” It’s practically a whisper, spoken with fascination. “Or were you just needing Old Bucky to touch you, huh?”
Second-hand embarrassment burns the tips of your ears, while your own unspoken agreement to his question has your stomach twisting up. Survival instincts, that have never been much of a friend, scream at you to flee this feeling, to throw away Pandora’s box before you risk fully opening it and having it consume you.
Bucky intercepts your attempt to push out of his arms.
“Ah, ah, get back here. Not done kissing you,” his words divulge into a barely coherent mumble as he reconnects your lips.
Beneath the heat of his kiss, the discomfort in your chest turns to ashes. Because, while instinct tells you to run from danger, this is Bucky.
Bucky who fixes cupboard hinges, and sleeps with both eyes on the door. Bucky who carries all the shopping, and holds every door. Bucky who calls to hear your voice while he’s away endangering his life, and brings home the silliest trinkets he finds on missions. Bucky who wakes you when you miss your alarm, and knows if you’ve had a bad day simply from looking at your face.
How could you possibly be in danger when it comes to him?
While you’re overcome with epiphany, he’s taken to tracing his lips over the slope of your jaw and mouthing at the skin of your neck. It’s when he lifts you up onto the kitchen counter that your wandering mind is reeled back in, to the physical present where your legs rest on either side of the soldier and the prized possession of vanilla fudge once again sits within reaching distance.
“Are you stealing my ice cream right now?” His lips tickle your collarbone as he speaks, barely a moment after you’ve scooped the spoon into your mouth.
“I’m warm, and it's melting,” his head pops up just in time to accept the spoonful of vanilla you deliver. There’s a glow in his eyes, one that has you questioning if it's been there all along or if it's a consequence of touching your skin. “Don’t want it to go to waste.”
His mouth is on yours again, a rush of three chaste kisses seared against you before he replies, “Then let’s cool you down.”
At a teasingly slow pace, you feel his fingers tug down your dress’ straps, leaving the silky fabric to slip down your frame and pool around your hips. Under the golden hue of the kitchen lights, his gaze studies your bare skin like it's a work of art, an eighth wonder of the world, the greatest poem never written woven into it. Yet it still manages to pale against the face that overcomes him as he removes a final layer of lace.
Unlike Vince, he has no trouble removing your bra.
“So responsive,” he talks as though only his ears are meant to hear it, his vibranium palm gently taking hold of your left breast and rolling the hardening nipple between two fingers.
He’s studying your reaction, bewildered by the goosebumps spreading over your flesh.
When was the last time he truly touched another person? Weeks, months, years, decades? The thought of his hands on a faceless shape makes you sick. First with envy, and then with hypocrisy, an amalgamation of all the men you’ve taken to bed flashing before your eyes. But none of them ever touched you like you were porcelain, and none of them looked at you like you held the key to eternal pleasure. None of them were Bucky.
A chill runs down your spine and a gasp rips out your chest as Bucky swipes the spoon over your skin, leaving a trail of ice cream atop your right breast for his tongue to follow. He plants a garden of kisses along the swell of your chest before pulling away to give the left side equal treatment, another creamy river along your skin for him to clean up.
Moving at their own volition, your hips grind gently against his steady figure as Bucky coats your nipple in vanilla, moaning into your chest as he lays claim over you with his mouth. Spoiling you in his kisses, the soldier begins to yearn for friction, meeting the careful roll of your hips with his own.
Your hand finds his hair and his stare meets yours, intense and all-consuming as he releases your nipple with a scrape of his teeth. You want to soothe his kiss-swollen lips but they’re already wrapping themselves around your other breast, not even patient enough to lather you in the vanilla goodness this time.
Instead, the coldness on your skin stems from metal fingers, perched on your thigh and creeping up the length of it, inch by tormenting inch. A hesitant hand wraps around a vibranium wrist, tightening its grip before you begin guiding his touch inwards, upwards, to where you need it most. Bucky's stronger, more resistant, and holds off your interceptance, left hand continuing its intended path beneath the skirt of your dress and grabbing hold of your naked waist.
He’s everywhere, all over you. Mouthing at your chest, gripping at your hip, rutting into your pussy. The sweet drag of his bulge over your clothed core sires a wet patch against your thong and has your fingers tugging on the roots of his hair, winning you the hair-raising hum of a groan against your breast.
Desperate to feel more, you renew your efforts to lead his hand to the space between your legs and are met with a shake of his head.
“No,” he mutters, and robs you of a hand beneath your dress, using it instead to cradle your jaw while his lips skim over the shell of your ear. “Wanna feel you.”
The warmth of flesh brands your thigh, Bucky’s right arm now leading the charge beneath the silky fabric. With bated breath, you brace yourself against his strong chest and try not to squirm in anticipation of his touch. With one final squeeze at your inner thigh, the soldier’s hand engulfs your clothed cunt and his breath cracks in your ear, a strangled out, feral noise that has your toes curling.
“She’s so wet, darling,” his voice has you delirious, breathy against your ear. His fingers flex against your pussy and a moan catches in your throat. “You gonna let me touch her?”
Something about the way he’s speaking to you, the words he’s choosing, makes you want to fall apart. Your sex-life has always been liberal, you know what it is to have a man’s hands all over you, trying to take ownership of parts of you he thinks belong to him. Men who take, and take, and take, until there is nothing left of you to give, and not once do they care to win your favour, to plead for permission. But Bucky…
“Please, say I can touch her, wanna give her what she needs,” he’s pleading for it, begging for you — wrecked and desperate, breath run ragged from no more than the relief of rolling his groin against your thigh. “Promise I’ll be real sweat, make you feel good.”
Too caught up in his own head, he doesn’t notice you nodding, until you’re granting him salvation verbally, “Touch me, Bucky.”
He doesn’t hesitate, doesn’t waste time on taking off your underwear, just moves it to the side and drags the tip of his fingers down the inseam of your pussy. You hear it, more than you feel it, the moment he touches your opening, a sharp inhale at your ear telling you he’s exactly where he wants to be.
As his middle finger slips in, it’s hard to tell which of you reacts louder, both a mess of guttural moans. Once it's fully sheathed within you, he curls it and presses against your soaked walls, grinning against your skin at the reaction it coaxes out of you.
“Don’t hold back,” he chastises you as you bite back another pathetic whimper, a second finger slipping into you. “Let me hear what I’m doing to you.”
He must have a magic touch, you’re sure of it. Thick fingers that fuck into you at a steady pace, curling and teasing at that world-bending spot inside you, while his thumb makes itself useful against your clit, a firm force for your bucking hips to grind up into while you chase the pleasure he’s unleashing on you. In a matter of minutes, the room is alive with your melodic moans, Bucky’s endless hums of approval, and the damn-right embarrassingly loud squelch of him fingering your drooling cunt.
You make the mistake of letting your eyes slip shut, relinquishing yourself to the way he touches you with the rough hands of a soldier yet the delicate stroke of a musician playing his favourite instrument. He must feel the shift in you, for he’s instantly prying his face away from your neck and tightening the metal grip on your jaw, fingertips digging into squished cheeks.
“Look at me,” his words are both a command and a plea. An order you follow and a prayer you answer, eyelashes fluttering open to find his face in front of your own. His lips are a hard line, his brows furrowed in disapproval, and there’s a vein threatening to split down the middle of his forehead, but his eyes. His eyes are affection incarnate, two pools of lust and worship that pose no threat of drowning. “Do you want to cum?”
Never has a more needless question been asked.
You nod into the force of his vibranium hand, but that’s not what he wants, frown deepening.
“Say it,” needy, helpless, spoken like he’s the one on the brink of ecstasy. “Please.”
“Bucky,” it feels good to say his name like this, brain melting into mush and heart racing in your chest. “I want you to let me cum.”
“Let you?” He’s offended by the word, fingers burying impossibly deeper inside of you while he continues to stare you down. “I beg of you.”
No warning precedes the coil in you snapping. The muscles in your core tense, your back arches into his broad figure, your pussy squeezes at Bucky’s fingers with a death grip. He guides you through it, ignoring the cramp in his wrist in favour of continuing to fuck his hand into you, a smile finally cracking over his face as he watches you fall apart atop the counter, nothing but Bucky, Bucky, Bucky surrounding you.
He tries to give you reprieve, a moment to breathe and savour the buzz in your veins, the hand around your jaw shifting to stroke at your cheek while the hand between your legs soothes you with featherlight touches.
You don’t let him, hand pawing down his torso and gripping at the belt of his jeans, delighting in the familiar clang of a buckle being undone, nimble digits that tear leather out its loop and tug down his zipper. Bucky’s bringing his lips back against yours just as you palm at his bulge, his tongue licking into your mouth when you finally release him from the confines of his boxers.
Fingers coated in your own slick grip at your thigh while the soldier makes it his mission to steal your breath, rendering you blind to the sight of his cock. But you can feel it. The weight of it in your hand, the burn of want ingrained in his skin. The width of it, and the length of it, and the perfectly mushroomed tip that has him keening into your touch as your pointer finger drags over the head.
“Is this what I do to you?” Still lost in the maze of your orgasm, you manage to gain back crumbs of your usual confidence watching Bucky fall mute. When he merely nods, you play him at his own game, fingers back in his hair and forcing him to look you in the eye. “Say it.”
He doesn’t.
He says something much better.
“D’you even realise how many nights I’ve laid on that fucking couch, hard as a rock and willing you to come out your room?”
“That’s your generation's problem, you know?” You whisper teasingly, incapable of fighting off your own laughter. “You swear more than you breathe.”
“C’mere,” he’s rolling his eyes and pulling you in, kissing you like it’s been a milenia and not a minute, hand nudging yours out the way to take a hold of himself.
Your teeth graze over his tongue as he drags the head of his cock through your folds, and he groans into your mouth before pulling back. Resting his forehead against yours, he’s teasing you both as his tip brushes over your hole before continuing its rutt up, bumping against your sensitive clit.
A wicked voice takes control of your mouth.
“Lance would have fucked me by now.”
“Vince would have cum by now, too,” he’s still rocking his hips, no sense of urgency behind the way he soaks himself in you.
Meanwhile, you’re a handful of seconds away from screaming at him to just stick it in already.
“You- Oh!” Prayers answered, hallelujah, his cock finally sinks into you. It’s a shallow thrust, barely more than the tip before he’s retreating, yet it's enough to mess with your head. “You heard us?”
“Unfortunately,” and he means it, the most subtle of pouts forming on his lips before he feeds himself a little deeper into your pussy. “I’m not great when it comes to timing.”
“I only slept with Lance because you-” Right on cue, he fucks into you even deeper and your words dissappear before they can reach your tongue.
“New rule,” a hand rests on your knee and encourages you to spread your legs wider. “No speaking another man’s name when you’re in bed with me.”
“Technically, this is the kitchen counter-” The bastard does it again, cuts you off with his dick — if it didn’t feel so damn good, you’d slap him.
He’s bottomed out at last, buried himself fully in your cunt. Hands snake around your waist, one palm flattening against your lower back while the other rests a little further up and guides your spine to arch into him, closer, like there’s anymore space left between you to devour.
His pace is still slow, teasing. A toe-curling drag of his cock out of you, letting you feel every ridge and vein before his hips promptly snap back into you and send your eyes rolling back, your head falling back — and smacking loudly against the cupboard door behind you.
Bucky freezes, one hand quick to cradle the back of your skull while his eyes scan over you.
“Jesus, doll, you okay?”
“Please don’t stop,” you plead, ridiculously unfazed by the faint ache when you’ve got him inside of you.
Even though he rolls his eyes, he complies.
“Might have just given you a concussion and all you care about is getting fucked?” He asks, like you could possibly care about anything else when his arms are hooking themselves under your knees and rucking you up off the counter, away from any rogue cupboard that means you harm.
If anything, you’ll gladly shoulder the burden of any possible injury, if it means being granted the sight of his biceps tensing as he effortlessly stands there and fucks you down onto him. Were you in any sane state of mind, you wouldn’t think it, but god bless that super soldier serum.
“You can give me a cockcussion for all I care,” head perched on his shoulder, you watch your nails sink into the fabric of his shirt and wish it would disappear and gift you the naked view of his back.
“Adding that to the list,” he whispers against your forehead, pressing a kiss against it.
Legs bent at the knee, you watch how, with one particularly deep thrust, they bounce at either side of him and one of your heels clatters to the floor.
The room pivots as Bucky turns, you still in his arms and your ankles locked behind his back. At first, you believe he’s aiming to move things into the bedroom, where the only thing your head will be hitting is the mattress when he lays you down. He proves you wrong, however, the cold press of marble against you once more as he settles you down onto the kitchen island.
Much to your chagrin, he slips out of you, cock now sitting pretty against his clothed abdomen and glistening with the sheen of your essence. In the blink of an eye, the soldier is sinking to his knees, metal finger reaching back for your fallen shoe.
The scene plays out like something stripped right out of a morally dubious, low quality pornography retelling of Cinderella, in which Prince Charming has his dick out, Cinderella’s gown is half-way off, and the infamous glass slipper is just a pair of heels you bought on sale.
Bucky is delicate and slow, mouth tickling at your inner knee as he secures the shoe in place. He rests back on his haunches and fully takes in the sight of you, perched upon the counter, hands splayed out on marble, a tangle of silk around your waist, lips parted in search of steady breathing.
There’s an intensity to his gaze, burrowing itself beneath your skin and becoming part of your bloodstream, spreading throughout your body. It makes you want to hide, flee like you do best, but Bucky has other plans.
“The shoes stay on, but this,” Bucky’s fingertips tug lightly on the hem of your dress, exposing a sliver of new skin. “I need this gone. Am I allowed to take it off?”
There he goes again, face the model of innocence while he asks for permission to your body. If you weren’t already dripping against your panties, you would be now. Luckily, he doesn’t push you to verbalise your agreement this time, more than eager to comply the moment you nod your head.
You wiggle your hips as he pulls the fabric out from beneath you, his grip snagging on the waistband of your thong and dragging it away alongside the dress. When your ass cheeks press back down onto the cool of the counter, reality hits you like a freight-train: you’re completely nude, with Bucky on his knees before you, in the middle of the kitchen.
“Buck,” the y of his nickname disappears as you feel him peppering kisses of your leg, inching that little bit higher each press of his mouth. Squeezing your eyes shut, you try to remember where your rational thoughts are stored, conjuring up images of friends, of Sam sitting at this very surface. “I don’t think we should… I mean, people eat off this counter!”
“Don’t worry,” reaching the threshold of your thigh, his kisses seem to speed up, that sauve and composed exterior chipping away to reveal a man who no longer wants to take his time with you. “I intend to eat.”
No sooner than the words reach your ears, Bucky swipes his tongue up your pussy and any fight left in you melts away as you turn to putty beneath his touch, soft and malleable, willing to sit there and take whatever he wants to give.
Give, he most certainly does. Lips latch onto your clit, hands hold your squirming hips in place, tongue dances over your most delicate areas before dipping into your entrance. He drinks from you like you’re the sweetest honey, the richest of red wines, the Holy Grail promising an eternal youth to a man whose time was stolen from him.
“You should see her, doll,” there’s a rasp in Bucky’s voice, a feral undertone to the growl that rests in the back of his throat. One hand tugs his shirt off while the other snakes between your legs, two fingers spreading your lips open in an obscene gesture that has you clamping down on your bottom lip. “She’s drooling for me, all pretty and wet.”
Dropping both your legs over his shoulders, he tugs you right to the edge of the counter and dives back in. You feel his nose bump against your clit and your hand grabs onto your thigh, nails piercing into flesh as your mouth sings a whined symphony.
Vibranium curls around your wrist, prying harm away from your own skin and silently imploring you to hurt him instead, nestling your fingers back into his hair. He’s renewing his effort, a touch that’s more determined than ever to make you fall apart, on his knees and worshipping the altar of your body — fealty and devotion seared into each lap of his tongue, each brush of his lips, each stroke of his fingers.
Who are you to reject his piety? You welcome it, with closed fist and glassy eyes. The soldier shudders — a full-body shiver that shakes down his spine — as the point of your heel digs into his back and your fingers squeeze at his scalp, no mercy shown as you lose yourself in the throes of lust.
When you cum, a silent scream rips through your chest and a burning-too-bright white light turns you blind. He doesn’t let up, tongue still buried in your convulsing walls as your thighs clamp around his head and your feet kick at his back, shoes flying elsewhere into the kitchen. He pays none of it any mind, content to prolong your orgasm for as long as you’ll allow him, slowly rising off his knees with two hands pinning you back against the counter while he continues to feast on your pleasure.
“Ja-mes,” a fractured call of his name is all it takes for him to stop, pupils more black than blue as they stare down at the picture you paint atop the counter: teary-eyes, swollen lips, heaving chest.
He’s hardly the image of composure either, red lines along the expanse of his back, hair a tousled mess, the scruff on his face covered in a sheen of your juices. And, yet, never have you wanted to kiss him so bad.
All you manage, after minutes of floating atop the cloud of your peak, is a cheeky grin and a comment that makes him roll his eyes: “For a fossil, you’re pretty kinky.”
“War camps aren’t exactly known for being fun,” as he speaks, he slowly lowers your legs off his shoulder. “You find ways to keep yourself entertained.”
“Bet you were quite the pleaser, huh?” Trying your best to play it cool, you lay your head fully back on the counter and stare up at the ceiling, praying he doesn’t notice the hypocritical pit forming in your stomach as you listen to your own words. “Probably had all the prettiest nurses fighting over who gets to tend to your poor, aching, throbbing co-”
“Jealousy looks cute on you,” he interrupts, amused, as his hands soothe over your hips.
“I’m not jealous!” You exclaim, barely believing yourself.
One hand reaching out for him, you watch your fingers intertwine with the prosthetic digits and let him tug you back up, chest to chest when his hand finds your cheek.
“I was,” his confession is crooned whilst staring right into your eyes, the tiniest up-turn to his mouth. “Everytime you walked out the door to go date a new loser.”
“Who knew,” your voice is as gentle as his own, nonchalant as a finger dances down the well-defined muscles of his abdomen and elicits a groan out of him. “All along I had my own loser at home.”
Bucky opts for silence as your hand reaches his groin and pays no mind to his cock, red-tipped and leaking, flushed against his stomach. You’re more interested in his jeans — in removing them, to be exact. It doesn’t take much, a sharp tug at the hem before they’re slipping off, meeting restraint as they cling to his muscled thighs and implore him to finish the job on your behalf, shucking them off blindly to where the rest of your clothes lie.
You must have saved a village in a past life to be rewarded with the view of a completely nude Bucky Barnes, skin stained by lust and laced with gold beneath the kitchen light. You must have saved the rest of the world, too, to watch how his eyes roll back and his mouth falls slack when you take his length in hand and give one slow pump of your wrist, releasing it just to watch it slap back against his abdomen.
As you reach for his dick again, his hand secures itself around your own and guides it up and down the length of it. Once, twice, thrice, till he’s breathing heavily and dripping in pre-cum.
“You must be close,” a statement you make with his own bodily reaction as evidence to back it up, yet there’s still room for doubt — to what extent does that soldier serum interfere with him?
“Put me back down on my knees and I’ll cum to the taste of you,” the soldier certainly makes a tempting offer, one that it almost pains you to refuse.
Almost, if you hadn’t already felt the sweet stretch of him inside you.
“Pretty sure putting you back down on your knees might be considered elder abuse, ole buddy.”
“My age may be a hundred and six but-”
“Exactly my point.”
“But my body isn’t,” he’s using that stare of his, the one Sam always warns you about, while you’re full-on cheesing, a rush of adrenaline shooting through your veins as you wind him up.
“Remind me, who threw their back out a few weeks ago pulling a tray of muffins out the oven?”
His flesh hand grips behind one of your knees and tugs you right to the edge of the counter, while his left one, still clasped over your own, drags his tip over your folds.
“I don’t remember hearing you complain when you drunkenly ate half the tray and then threw up over the rest,” admittedly, not one of your proudest moments.
“Shut up and fuck me, Barnes.”
“Yes ma’am.”
Just like that, you’re drowning in him again, gasping for breath as you lose yourself in a flood of lust. Bottomed out, stuffing you full, Bucky barely graces your pussy with the chance to adjust to his stretch once more before he’s moving, the sweet graze of every inch being dragged along your sensitive walls.
Your nerves are still reeling from his mouth, a quiet hum of electric pleasure reawakened by his throbbing cock and his vulgar mouth.
“She fits me like a fucking glove,” his hands are pawing at your waist, your breast, your face, never in one place for too long as he begins to settle into a rhythm of thrusts. “Doing so good for me, darling.”
The softness put into his term of endearment births an ache in your chest, one that will accept no medicine other than your arms around his neck and his lips on yours. Mouths tangled in kisses and sweat dripping down your skin, Bucky halts — your hips pressed together, the swell of his balls resting right against your swollen cunt, the head of his cock resting right against your sweet spot — and grinds.
Slow, deliberate, delicious. You whine into his mouth and feel how he swallows it, feasts on your ecstasy with a willing tongue, and a smiling mouth, and possessive teeth that tug at your lip as he pulls back. He stretches out the feeling, grinding a second time as your noses bump against one another.
“Bucky,” his name is an anchor, a paperweight, something to ground you amidst the floaty feeling of being two orgasms deep with a third approaching any time now.
“I know,” he says, and you believe him. Believe that he knows, that he’s known, that he always knows when it comes to you.
You lay your head to rest upon on his left shoulder when he returns to chasing a high between your thighs, a renewed vigor behind each thrust that has your hips rolling to meet his and your nails raking over the straining muscles of his back.
“I lied,” an unprompted confession stumbles out his mouth, fingers flexing into their grip on your waist. “About the apartment viewing. I didn’t go.”
“Bucky,” is all you can manage, branded into his skin with a kiss along his neck.
“Is that all you can say? Huh?” His voice carries a teasing lilt, paired to perfection with the pad of his thumb rubbing at your clit. “I’m giving pivotal revelations here, and you’re just gonna reply with that?”
Another echo of his name, walls fluttering around his dick.
“Bucky, Bucky,” he’s mocking you, a torturer’s laugh as he moans his name into your ear. “Keep going, you sound so pathetic it’s almost cute.”
Beyond words and beyond sense, you give in to the weight of his palm splaying against your stomach and guiding your back down onto the island. The soldier hooks your legs over his elbows, deepening the angle that his cock fucks into you, and you swear you see stars dance along the kitchen ceiling.
A hand smooths over your gut and you look back at Bucky to find adoration in his eyes.
“You see that?” You almost want to cry when his movement switches back to a slow drag — innnnn and outtttt — until you notice it: the smallest hint of movement beneath your flesh, a subtle visual of the outline of his tip bulging against your skin from inside you. “See how full she is, how good I’m making her feel?”
Pressing your hand against it, you can’t help but giggle as you feel him poke at your palm, only to fall back into a puddle of incoherent noises when he keeps pushing at that sweet spot, over and over. Harder and faster with each draw back of his hips, you feel rivulets of your own arousal roll down your ass and onto the marble, tainting the counter forevermore in the sins the soldier commits against you, the sins you welcome with open legs.
You’re near the edge again, and he feels it, pushing you closer and closer as he slowly spirals into a mess of phrases that barely begin before he’s cutting them off with something new.
“Don’t deserve this-” He catches himself, rips the insecurity in his voice out by the roots. “C’mon, let me see it one more time. Need to see you fall apart.”
“Want you to fall apart too,” you manage to beg, unwilling to watch him hold back or pull out before he finishes. “Please!”
Like any good soldier, he obeys.
Crashing over you like a wave, he’s doubled-over by the waist and sandwiching you between the counter and him. You feel him spill into you, hot ropes of cum painting your walls white as a third crescendo washes over your body.
Both of you seek out the other as his thrusts grow languid and your walls spasm, milking him for every last drop he’s got. When your mouths meet, it’s less of a kiss and more of you simply breathing into the other, exchanging air and body heat.
“So,” you croak eventually, exhausted and spent atop the counter yet completely unwilling to relinquish him from blanketing you. “Are you gonna do that every time I steal your ice cream?”
Somewhere between jello-ed legs and cold compresses, you wind up in bed.
Skin clammy, lips swollen, lust satiated, you practically melt into the buttery softness of your bed sheets as Bucky lays you down. Despite how you’re still basking in the glow of your third and final orgasm, the soldier seems to think, for a second, you can handle another.
With gentle hands prying open your thighs and a curious tongue diving in for a second helping, licking up the dribble of his own cum spilling out your hole, he’s quick to be corrected when you roll away from his touch with a whine and a plea, “think I might actually die if you make me cum again, Buck.”
He’s unbothered by the rejection, wholly embracing it as he curls up behind you and snakes his arms over your naked skin. It’s you who drags the sheet up and over you both, turning in his arms to plant your head on his chest. His heart races beneath it, but you hold off on teasing — your own isn't any better.
“Sam’s going to kill me,” you whisper out into the room, when moonlight is peeking through your curtains and both of your heartbeats have calmed down.
“I’m sorry,” you feel him shift beneath your head and, though you can’t fully see him, you feel that blue gaze land on you. “Have I not made it clear enough what name you should be saying in bed?”
“There’s a serious chance I’ll die and you’re thinking with your dick,” he squirms as you pinch at his nipple. “You’re no better than the men on your list, Barnes.”
Silence floats back in between you for a moment, peaceful as the slow stroke of his fingers dancing up your spine.
“Why would Sam kill you?” He pauses, hand pressing a little harder down against a knot in your shoulder. “He knows you have a crazy guard dog.”
Your crazy guard dog just pressed a kiss against your forehead, how frightening.
“He made me swear I wouldn’t get involved with you. He said you weren’t in the headspace for a relationship, that you needed to focus on inner peace first.”
“Turns out inner peace is being inside of you,” you pinch at his nipple again. This time, he doesn’t run from it. This time, you almost swear you hear a little moan creep up his throat. “So, Wilson’s to blame? I can get behind that.”
“To blame for what?”
His hand’s now running up and down the back of your arm, leaving goosebumps wherever its tender touch goes.
“Why it took you so long to jump my bones.”
“You think I jumped your-” Your head rises off his chest and you stare into the navy darkness of the room, trying to make a concrete shape out where you see shadows of his face. “Wait, so these past few weeks, I’ve not been hallucinating? You’ve been… flirting?”
“It’s been more than a couple weeks, sweetheart,” Bucky seems to have no problem finding you in the dark, hand cupping your cheek and dragging you up to press a chaste kiss against your mouth. “You don’t seriously think I waited until morning to check that sink without hoping to be caught, do you?”
“So you were slutting yourself out on the kitchen floor!”
“Think the kitchen’s seen worse,” worse might be the understatement of the century.
Clothes still lay discarded, counters unwiped, ice cream completely melted. Cleaning you up had been the soldier’s only priority, and you weren’t in the mood or the mindstate to argue with him on that.
A fingertip tickles down the slope of your nose.
“Stop fighting it, you’re tired,” you hear him whisper.
“I want to hear more about your desperate efforts to get my attention,” it’s nothing but a weak protest.
“We have all the time in the world for that. Sleep,” you don’t hesitate to comply when Bucky’s hand presses you back down against the warmth of his chest. “You’re going to need it. Our upstairs neighbours still need a taste of their own medicine.”
+ extra hyde !
· 70% of this fic is just dialogue, these two losers would not stfu!
· writing banter + sexual tension feels more exposing than writing literal porn.
· lore accurate photo of me whenever bucky barnes exists:
StopNCII.org is operated by the Revenge Porn Helpline which is part of SWGfL, a charity that believes that everyone should benefit from technology, free from harm. Founded in 2000, SWGfL works with a number of partners and stakeholders around the world to protect everyone online
"Paninindigan kita, oo
Kahit alam kong tayo'y magbabago"
eng trans: "I will stand by you, yes / Even if I know that we'll change"
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— gris rubion x afab! reader
— gris is 30, while reader is 28-30
— tags: fluff, flirting, implications of sex, falling in love - kind of, strangers to lovers - kind of, soft and gentleman gris rubion because i said so, one-night stand, but no smut bc i can't write one (though, if i could, this would've been longer), gris is probably ooc but that's okay bc he's still hot, lowkey self-indulgent but when have i ever written an x reader that wasn't one lol
— i have never been in a bar nor experience this encounter so if it doesn't sound like something feasible, just pretend it is </3
— i was supposed to continue my hell guard trainee zanka x reader, but paninindigan kita by ben&ben played in my playlist and my mind automatically went to this husband of a man!
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GRIS KNEW THAT it was only a matter of time before he finds the woman he wanted to settle down with, and eventually have kids of their own. He was already thirty-years old, a little over his prime age, and he was slowly feeling it in the aches of his bones and tenson in his muscles. It wasn't like he was that old—despite what Enjin says, which was laughable coming from someone only two years younger than him—but he was also aware that thirty wasn't exactly the preferred age of single women he'd flirt with in bars and restaurant.
They'd pause, a flicker of shock flashing across their eyes as hunger became evident in their stare. Usually, younger women tend to flock around him after learning his age; though, he was well aware it was mainly for his experience with sex. Not to brag, but he considers himself a good sexual partner (his past flings can attest to this fact.)
But the older you get, the less exciting it was to keep entertaining one-night stands.
It was the same routine: drink, flirt, make-out as a test, go to a motel, have sex, sleep, quietly leave and pay for the room the moment he wakes up.
Gris was getting tired of it all. He wanted something more serious—he wanted a wife.
Then, enter you.
It was the usual celebration of the Cleaners at the pub. They had just successfully returned from another round with the Raiders, and this time, they actually managed to scare them off quite good. Hell, even Zanka (who'd usually sulk in his room) was there with them all smiles and laughter!
He was with the rest of the Supporters, mingling along with Follo and Tomme as they discussed the battle that had happened. He was in the middle of imitating the pose Enjin had struck when he felt a body pressed behind his back. Immediately, he turned around and was horrified to see he had bumped into you—causing you to drop the drink on your hand.
He lowered his torso, gazing down at you while hovering his hand just above your shoulder. "I'm sorry about that, Miss," he apologised, frowning. "If you'd like, I can get you a new one?"
You blinked up at him, surprised. Mindlessly, he noted how big and pretty they were. Then, you smiled—small and soft, like a delicate doll that has been taken care of. "It's alright," you mumbled, crouching down to pick up the fallen cup. "I was just about to finish this cup anyway."
"Let me buy you your next one, then. It's the least that I could do."
You stared at him with your pretty eyes, lashes softly bouncing on your skin whenever you blinked. Luckily, you agreed with his insistence and the two of you were off to the bar. At the edge of his vision, he could see Follo giving money to a grinning Tomme.
Ah, those brats.
They made a bet about him. Again.
Once you and Gris were sitting at the highchairs, he took the initiative to introduce himself. It was only proper, seeing as he was buying you a drink. Plus, who wouldn't want to know the name of the pretty woman they were talking to?
"Gris Rubion," you mumbled under your breath after saying your name as well, unknowingly sending a shiver down the man's spine. "That's a nice name. It suits you."
He rose a brow, curious. "Really? How so?"
"It sounds tough and manly—you look that part already," you giggled, taking a sip of your drink as you gaze at him under those pretty lashes of yours. He inched closer, glass of beer dangling on his hands with interest. "Plus, it rolls of the tongue smoothly." Leaning to his ears, you whispered, hot breath tingling his nerves. "Gris."
He flushed red, but didn't dare to move away from your warmth. Your hair fell from your ears, tickling the ends of his nose. You smelt like [favourite scent], a scent that he wanted to get more familiar with.
Weird.
Was it because it has been far too long since he had been with a woman? Or was it something about you?
Because a desire was bubbling inside his stomach, churning with excitement as you leaned back with the same smile you flashed him earlier. Like you hadn't just moaned out his name in his ear.
Gris chuckled, feeling the heat in his nape and chest. "So I've been told," he grinned, taking a sip of the beer to distract his thoughts. At the corner of his eyes, he could see Enjin giving him a thumbs up and miming something he rather not understand at all.
You raised a brow, amused from his words. "Oh? So, you buying me drinks isn't special? Ouch, and here I thought we could share a moment."
"It's the bar—everyone buys drink to someone," he countered, not really minding toning down whatever was between the two of you. He had never been the one to rush into things, liking to take it slow and get to know the person he was dealing with.
You blinked, obviously caught by surprise, before chuckling. "Yeah, that sounds about right," you mumbled. You pointed at the spot that he had accidentally bumped into you. The floor was now clean, the rest of the Supporters were chatting with another another, causing him to smile. "You're with them, right?"
He nodded. "They're my teammates."
"Teammates? Not co-workers?"
"No. We're part of the Cleaners."
Your mouth fell open into a sound of acknowledgement. "Those people who kill the trash beasts; I've heard of you guys," you told him, turning back to face him with a leg across another.
He did his best to avert his gaze. "Yeah. Although we aren't really the ones who exterminate them—that honour goes to the Givers," he informed you, pointing a finger towards himself. "We're Supporters; we specialise in aiding the Givers with everything we got. It ranges from visual sightings, to fighting alongside them."
Your eyes shone under the bar light, intrigued. You inched closer, to the point that your elbows sent a shock of electricity in his forearms. "Woah, so you're not a Giver?" you asked, titling your head to the side.
Cute, Gris thought, before answering, "No. All of us Supporters are non-Givers. Well, some of us are trying to become one, but they haven't awakened their jinkis just yet."
Whenever the topic of the conversation was about his job, the women he'd usually talk to were either faking interest or suddenly caught the charismatic charms of Enjin. Briefly, Gris wondered which category you would fall into. Would you try to pretend to listen to his rambles just to sleep with him, or change targets to the tattooed man, who'd be more than welcoming to the attention.
"That's so... cool...!" you squealed, clapping your hands as you all but close the distance between your faces. "So a non-Giver can actually fight alongside Givers? Is it hard to keep up with their jinkis, or is it a better position since you'll be fighting on the side?"
Gris's mind went blank, totally not expecting the genuine interest you were radiating. Your eyes were wide, shining brightly, as you used your arms to support your upper torso, which was dangerously angled to his direction. You were staring at his own eyes, unwilling to back down until you've heard the answer.
The older man can feel his lips tugging upwards, mentally sending a triumphant smirk to the tattooed man. "Yes, we certainly can keep up with them Givers," he answered, leaning back to give the two of you a respectable space. "Not to say that we're on par with them, but all of us can hold our own against a normal trash beast until a Giver permanently exterminates it."
"Woah..." you breathed out, dropping back to your seat. "I'd never really thought a non-Giver could do those." Before Gris could form a thought, you quickly shook your head, pressing your lips into a thin line. "I'm not saying that I think the Givers are superior or whatever! It just that—well, everybody keep saying that only Givers could kill trash beasts, so I assumed that Supporters were mostly medics and archivists."
Gris really couldn't take offense to that, because it was normal for everyone to assume the same. Even some Givers within the Cleaners thought of Supporters as lesser than them at the start; and he can only hope that their views had change or he would need to challenge them to a hand-to-hand combat again.
"It's alright. Almost everyone thinks that," Gris reassured you, placing a hand gently on your shoulder. He felt you tensed up, and for a second, he thought he had messed up. Luckily, you seemed to melt under his touch, even leaning to him. "And you're not exactly wrong either. Most Supporter opt to play those roles, especially if their combat abilities aren't that strong. But—"
You cut him off, nodding respectfully, "—that doesn't mean that Supporters are weak."
"Well, I was going to say 'But the roles we play are just as important too,' though, I wouldn't disagree with your statement."
Your cheeks flushed with embarrassment—the colour suiting your complexion, in Gris's humble opinion—as you chugged the remaining beer in your glass. He chuckled, doing the same with his beer and pushing the glass toward the bartender.
"I still stand corrected," you mumbled, pouting as you glared at him. "Supporters aren't weak. I mean, look at you—full of muscles and that scar just screams experienced and deadly strong!"
Gris smirked, the faint flush of alcohol loosening whatever filter he had set upon him moments before. He leaned in, matching the way you'd teased him earlier. His breath flushed your ear as he murmured, voice low and deliberately provocative:
"So, that's your theory? Wanna test if your correct?"
You jerked back, face turning beet red. But Gris caught everything—the hint of a smile tugging at your lips, the way your breath hitched and how your eyes widen from shock and excitement. He could practically feel the warmth rolling off your body.
After a second too long, you reached for him, fingers curling into his shirt. You pulled him closer, lips grazing his ear as you whispered, "I'd absolutely love to, Gris."
That was all it took.
He laced his fingers with yours, guiding you out of the pub and into the cool night air. The two of you walked hand-in-hand toward a quiet motel near the centre of the city—which was surprisingly bare from people. He took care of getting a room, guiding you to its direction and letting you enter first before closing the door behind him.
When Gris turned around, your lips were already on his.
────୨ৎ────
GRIS WATCHED THE slow rise and fall of your breathing, a quiet satisfaction settling in his chest. In the soft morning light, the marks on your skin looked almost artistic—scattered proof of how tightly you'd held onto each other through the night, with only the room as your audience.
He brushed a strand of hair away from your forehead, careful not to wake you. You shifted at the touch, instinctively leaning into his head, and something unsteady flickered through his expression, hands freezing just an inch away from your damp skin.
"...Cute," he muttered under his breath, almost shocked that the word slipped out of his mouth even when dirtier things had been exchanged by the two of you.
He leaned back against the headboard, blanket slowly sliding down to his abdomen as he rubbed his face with one hand.
He hadn't planned on having a one-night stand yesterday, all he wanted to do was enjoy the company of his team. Yeah, maybe he would've flirted with another woman if he hadn't bumped into you, but he wasn't exactly forming the thought of being with someone in a motel room, rather than sleeping the hangover away in the headquarters.
Yet, here he was with you.
A thump of his heart stirred a desire he had been long avoiding to face. You looked ethereal beside him, hair cascading down your face and body like the mythical waterfall he had read on ancient books, lashes lying on your cheeks, a subtle shade of pink adorning your cheeks, and your lips—gosh, your luscious lips. They were plump, evidences of a long and heated make-out session were evident on it.
He thought of how you looked under him last night. On how you moaned and something something i cannot write bro
Then, his mind flashed to the moment in the bar. How excited you were learning that not only was he a Cleaner, but a non-Giver Supporter as well. The genuine interest your eyes held as you rambled on and on about your theories with jinkis and how normal humans such as yourselves were still equal to the Givers, despite some arguing the opposite.
Finally, he let himself drown in your warm embrace, away from the pollution of the Ground, the horrors of his job, and the dawning realisation of his growing age.
The room was quiet, save for your steady breathing and the muffled city noise outside. Gris let his eyes wander—your clothes were loosely scattered across the floor, his own uniform piled up at the foot of the bed, and the bedsheets a mess from how restless you'd both been.
He exhaled a slow, conflicted breath.
"What did I get myself into..." he murmured, smiling softly to himself.
Despite his words, he didn't move away. If anything, his hand drifted closer, brushing his knuckles against your cheek like he wanted to memorise the warmth of you another round.
You stirred, eyes slowly blinking open as it landed on him.
For a second, you looked confused, then, you let your gaze wander to his face, body, the messy sheets, and the fact that you were naked underneath the blanket.
Your entire expression bloomed into a slow, shy smile.
"G'morning, Gris..." you mumbled.
Gris' smile widen an inch, butterflies awakening in his stomach. "Morning," he greeted back, voice rougher than he intended.
You stretched, wincing slightly as you fell back to the pillow. "Ugh... I can't move my body properly..."
He looked away, a smirk tugging at his mouth. "Wonder why that is."
You playfully slapped his stomach, laughing under your breath—soft, genuine, and even a little embarrassed.
Gris watched your hand softly fall back onto his stomach, both our laughter lingering in the air between you. You weren't shy anymore---well, you still were, but not enough to hide that pretty face of yours.
"You sound so cocky," you teased, nudging him with your knee under the blanket.
He snorted, nudging you back. "That because I know I gave you a good time."
You playfully rolled your eyes. "Cockiness isn't a good look on ya."
Gris chuckled, the soft sound vibrating in his chest like he had just been shot by a love bug. It was strange. Everything with you felt easier. Natural. Like he didn't need to have to hold his breath down.
You shifted closer, head resting on his thighs. "Y'know... I really don't regret last night."
He felt the words strike deeper than they should've. His breath hitched, stuck in his throat as he stared at your serious expression. "You don't...?"
You nodded. "You're not exactly the type I pictured myself with, but—" You paused, eyes scanning his face with warmth. "I think I'll have to change that now."
He titled his head, a small smile tugging his lips. "Oh, yeah? Just because I gave you one hell of a night, you're going to change your entire type in men?"
You grinned, poking his chest. "Not just because of that. I enjoyed our talk back in the bar and you were so gentle with me—even now. You don't have to stay with me here after our one night stand, but you did."
Gris's gaze softened as your words settled over him. He found himself resting his hand over yours, tracing your thumb with his, "...It just felt right to do so," he murmured, voice full of sincerity.
You blinked, momentarily stunned by his tone. "...Really?"
"Really," he confirmed, eyes holding your gaze steadily. "No games. No obligations. No one telling me to do this. I stayed because it felt right."
Your eyes widen at his honesty. For a brief second, he was scared that this would all be too much for you. That you weren't expecting him to be genuine and that you'd pull away, leaving him behind with only your shared memories.
Instead, you smiled, one small, yet genuine smile as you interlocked hands with his. "I...I like that," you whispered. "Like it a lot."
For a moment, the two of you just stayed there, wrapped in an unfamiliar kind of quiet. Not awkward. Not tense. Just... warm and peaceful.
Before his brain could even register his thoughts, Gris spoke again. "Would you give me the honour of courting you?"
You jerked up in shock as you slowly digested his words. Faint red blossomed across your face, leading you to bury it on the pillow as Gris cleared his throat, embarrassed by thinking his thoughts aloud.
"You're—wait—seriously asking that after we had sex?" you mumbled, squinting at him over the pillow.
He nodded, unwavering despite the rampant beating of his heart. "Yes. I know it's unconventional given our... situation but," he paused, gently tucking a loose strand of hair behind your ear, "it feels right. And I'm not the type to pretend something doesn't matter when it does."
He cupped your cheek into his hand, thumb brushing lightly as he continued, "I want to get to know you more. Not just the version I saw last night. All of you."
Silence.
You stared at him, wide-eyed, cheeks flushed, mouth slightly parted. His heart thumped hard in his chest, each beat so loud he was sure you could also hear it. He tried reading your expression, but it was still frozen in equal parts shock, warmth, and something unspoken.
Finally, you whispered, head hanging low, "You really meant... that?"
Gris nodded, slow and deliberate. "I do." Then, he added, "You don't have to answer right now. Just... know that I mean it."
You took his hands into yours, trembling slightly as you looked at him again, searching for any sign of jest, teasing, or trickery—but there was none. Your eyes softened, lips curving into a shy smile that made Gris feel something he rarely let himself have: a kind of peace he didn't want to let go.
"...I think," you whispered, leaning a little closer to his face, "I might just have to see where this goes."
Gris's heart stuttered, nearly choking his insides from your words. Without thinking, he pressed a gentle kiss to your temple, letting the warmth linger.
Yeah, he realised. He could definitely get used to this.
─ ⋅ ⋅ ⋅ ──── ♡ ─── ⋅ ⋅ ⋅ ──
sorry there were no smut. trust me, i really tried writing one but couldn't make it past the sloppy make-out session. im a freak in nature, but somehow, i cannot translate those into words </3
gachiakuta gris x reader; this is a part 1 and a trial for how this will go so I can do this for more characters!
Fluffy with some NSFW (female reader) under the cut!! Hopefully will get your tips on improving my nsfw writing (I can write better but trying to keep it a little vanilla oof); please enjoy!! ♡
Oh, this man was BORN to be a husband (my humble opinion ahem).
Gris isn’t big on public affection but his hand is always finding yours. Thumb brushing your knuckles. It's a grounding habit. A promise he doesn’t say out loud.
And it melts your heart every. single. time.
He always wakes up before you. Not because he has to—but because he likes watching you sleep. It’s one of the few moments where the world feels… safe. Like home.
Speaking of home, your home is modest, but Gris keeps it immaculately functional. Not sterile, more…intentional. Everything has a place. He is yet to give a reason for this but it's cute enough that you don't mind.
When you’re tired, Gris becomes quietly attentive. He won’t ask “what’s wrong?”, he’ll just bring you water, sit close, and let you lean on him.
He listens to you with his full attention. No distractions. No half-answers. When you speak, you matter. Period.
Gris doesn’t say “I love you” constantly… but when he does?
It’s low. Steady. Absolutely sincere. Like he’s choosing you again every time.
Especially after another mission, after the others have left or calmed down, he'd find someplace to be alone with you, his hands immediately seeking your waist. Forehead pressed onto yours, he whispers those three words rough, relieved and desperately.
It nearly breaks your heart each time.
He remembers tiny things: how you take your food, which side of the bed you like, what makes you go quiet instead of angry— he wants to know it all.
When you’re upset, he never raises his voice. Never at you, never at anyone else. Instead, he’ll say: “Talk to me. I’m here.” And he means it.
Gris is protective, but not controlling. He trusts you. And that trust? Sacred to him.
At night, he sleeps curled around you, one arm heavy over your waist. Like he’s anchoring himself to something real.
If you fall asleep somewhere else, he’ll carry you to bed without waking you. He’s careful—like you’re something fragile and priceless.
The world may be cruel and demanding of strength every time, but with you? Gris allows himself to be soft. Vulnerable. Human.
Marriage didn’t change him— it gave him something to come back to.
NSFW:
He's a big man. And incredibly strong.
On your first time, his hands shook as he held onto you, mumbling apologies at each move he made, eyes searching yours for any sign of discomfort or hurt.
After a lot of reassurance, he finally let himself off that tight leash he held himself with.
Besides, he wouldn't have been able to hold back much anyway with the look you were giving him—
Usually tries to be gentle with you but when he's rough, he can be ROUGH.
He has you arching off the bed with each thrust, his thick cock plunging into your sopping cunt, kissing your cervix until you were screaming into his shoulder.
“That's my girl… you're taking me so well…”
"Such a good girl... doing...ngh- so well..."
Those words with his fingers circling your clit nearly has you cumming on the spot-
Every time he thinks about slowing down, your pussy flutters so deliciously around him that he nearly loses his mind.
Forget about slowing down, he doesn't feel like he could stop.
That's another thing…man has STAMINA. He can go for hours even after a tedious mission.
Even as you're practically sobbing into the pillow torn between thinking about your aching core and the feeling of him filling you up for the umpteenth time, he still keeps going.
Absolutely has a safe word.
He knows his size and strength and would rather die than hurt you. Would stop immediately if you say the word.
AFTER-CARE KING. He treats you like a queen after each session, cleaning you up and carrying you to take a bath where you both definitely have another round in the shower—
Does love leaving love bites all around your body. Also loves kissing them after each session.
Flushes deeply if anyone sees it the next day though-
Thank you so much for reading! ♡
Though I've written nsfw and smut before this is the first time doing it in this blog and I really hope it's okay! Always open to any advice! Take care mwah!
The assignment turned out to be trivial. Gris wasn’t even worried, he worked calmly, methodically, keeping an eye on you with one eye. You were nearby, as always composed, serious, with that same businesslike attitude that made something inside him pull pleasantly tight. He loved watching you at work, loved your focus, that mode of “I’m a fighter, not a girl.”. He knew that behind closed doors you were different, warm, soft, sleepy, smelling like soap and ready to melt into his hands. But here, at work, you were a professional, and he respected that, valued it, took pride in it.
So when things didn’t go according to plan, he felt it before he saw it.
You were fending off a small creature, your movement precise and calculated, but something cracked, he heard it even through the noise of the fight. You didn’t even cry out, just froze for a second, clenched your jaw, and kept going.
Gris froze. Inside, everything snapped and dropped somewhere down, but you had already given him a short smile
— “I’m fine, keep working”— and he forced himself to keep breathing. If you say everything is fine, then it is. You never lie to him. Not about this. Or almost never.
By the end of the mission, when the last creature scattered into scrap metal, you took a step, then another, and on the third you simply folded and sank to the ground, your pale fingers gripping your shin.
Gris was beside you before he could even think. Dropped to his knees, forgetting about the dirt, about safety, about everything. His hands were already moving over your leg, trying to find a fracture, a wound, anything at all, while a lump stuck in his throat.
— “What? Where does it hurt? Let me see. Why didn’t you say anything?!”
You resisted, weakly, more for show. Grabbing his wrists, trying to push him away, soothingly stroking his tense forearms.
— “Gris, relax, it’s fine. I just strained it. Didn’t feel it on adrenaline, it’ll pass. Get up, people are watching.”
He didn’t care who was watching. He saw only your pale face, your lips pressed tight from pain, and the way you carefully held your leg up, afraid to move.
— “Don’t get up,” he snapped when you tried.
You flinched again, and he shut it down again.
— “Gris, I can manage, just let me—”
He didn’t let you. In one motion, sharp, practiced from years of handling things much heavier than you, he lifted you under your back and knees. You were in the air before you could even gasp.
— “Gris!” your voice shot up.
— “What are you doing?! Put me down! I can walk!”
He was already heading toward the car, wide, confident strides, not even out of breath. You looked so natural in his arms, as if you’d spent your whole life there, small, warm, blushing desperately.
— “You’re embarrassing me!” you kept going, hitting his chest with your fists. The blows were more symbolic than meant to hurt.
— “Gris! I’m not dying! I can walk! It’s just a sprain!”
The others were already approaching. Follo, Riyo, Rudo, and even Zanka, who usually pretended not to care about your nonsense. They stood with arms crossed, openly enjoying the show.
— “Oh, look,”
Riyo chimed in, her tone dripping with mockery.
— “Our combat unit is being evacuated from the battlefield.”
— “Safest transport method,”
Follo added, hiding a smile in his collar.
Zanka just snorted, and that alone was enough to make you want to disappear into the ground.
— “I’ll remember this, both of you!” you shouted, trying to twist around to glare at their grinning faces.
— “And you, Gris, if you don’t put me down right now—”
— “God, relax,” he said.
His voice was low, even, with that vibration that usually made your knees weak. He smiled, looking down at youyour flushed cheeks, your outrage, all of you, so alive, so dear, so ridiculously beautiful in his arms.
— “I’m ready to carry my woman in my arms. There’s nothing strange about that.”
You opened your mouth, closed it, opened it again.
Not a single thought. Not a single coherent phrase. Just that ridiculous warmth spreading through your chest, and the understanding that he meant it, seriously, sincerely, undeniably.
With your last strength, you thumped his chest and buried your burning face somewhere near his collarbone, muttering into his uniform:
— “I’ll talk to you later.”
He smirked, satisfied, and that smirk traveled through his body straight into yours. You felt it in every cell.
In the car, he set you down beside him but didn’t remove his hand from your shoulder. Just sat there, stroking the bone with his thumb, silent. And you stayed silent too, burning with embarrassment and happiness at the same time.
When you got back to base, you barely opened your mouth to say, “I can go from here,” but he was already out of the car, walking around it, opening your door and, without asking, lifting you again.
You jerked, squeaked, but he didn’t even sway. Walked toward the med bay like a tank, ignoring all your protests.
— “I’m going to kill you!” you hissed into his ear, wriggling like a snake.
— “Everyone’s watching!”
— “As if they didn’t already know,” he laughed.
— “Gris! This isn’t funny!” you kept squirming desperately.
— “Very funny,” he replied calmly and, without slowing down, leaned toward your face.
The kiss was short, but warm and sweet. He just pressed his lips to yours for a second, just enough to make you go quiet and kept walking as if nothing unusual had happened.
You froze, blinking, trying to remember how to breathe like a girl. And he carried you on, that quiet, victorious look in his eyes:
— “Well? Still going to argue?”
— “I…” you finally breathed out.
— “You… that’s not fair!”
— “I know,” he nodded. And leaning closer, added softly, just for you:
— “But you love me. Including this.”
You sighed, wrapped your arms around his neck, and hid your face in the curve of his shoulder. Because you had no argument, he was right. And because even in this ridiculous, embarrassing position, on display for everyone, you were the happiest woman in the world.
The others, of course, didn’t let you live it down for a week. But every evening, when Griss came back from duty, he carefully applied cooling ointment to your leg and kissed it, murmuring:
— “At least you’re alive. At least you’re mine. Everything else doesn’t matter.”
dededos
areudirty
janainaart
theartofmadeline
titsay
