Summary: Annie still has reservations about Ben, and you dating him for that matter…until she sees it.
AN: Surprise drabble! Dipping back into the BMD-verse for a sec. Chronologically, it's set sometime after In the Dark.
Prompt from @lifeonawhim: The reader is physically affectionate. (BMD) Ben sees this, tries to give her that comfort, and it just surprises everyone—how Ben is a source of comfort for her, even though he’s quite literally the strongest man.
Originally posted on Patreon: 1/01/25
Word Count: 600
Tags/Warnings: Angst, hurt/comfort, fluff
Break Me Down Masterlist
Annie was loyal to a fault. For that reason, she was still skeptical about Soldier Boy—about Ben, even after Vought Tower collapsed.
You might’ve been living with him now, but that didn’t mean he was safe, or even a good enough man for you.
She watched you closely in concern while the team filed onto the small private plane. It was set to take you all from northern Pennsylvania back down to New York. You weren’t injured, but in a way, you were still walking wounded.
The rogue supe that the Supe Affairs team was called in to catch had destroyed an office building. You, M.M., and Frenchie had saved a handful of people while Ben and the rest of the team handled the supe. But a young woman slipped right through your fingers off a balcony, falling to the pavement from three stories high.
You still remembered the look of shock cross her face. It was frozen there, even after her body lay prone on the cement. Her blue eyes, perfect mirrors of didn’t see that coming.
That was the picture you couldn’t get out of your head.
Now, you were moving slow, your face tired and drawn. Annie was about to ask if you were okay, even though she knew the answer full well.
Ben reached out his hand to you first. He was ahead of you in the aisle, having put his carry-on bag and yours in the overhead bin. You looked at his hand, and then up at him.
“Come ‘ere,” he said, his voice deep and steady. It steadied you, along with his hand around yours. He guided you not into the seat next to him, but onto his lap. By now he’d changed out of his suit, leaving him in jeans and a dark gray sweater you picked out for him, rolled up to his elbows.
Annie sat with Hughie across the aisle, but she had you and Ben in the corner of her eye. She marveled at the way he was holding you, seeming to know you needed the contact. With a sigh, you allowed yourself to lay against his chest while his warm hand ran up and down your back. A simple touch was all you needed to relax in his arms.
“Don’t mind me. Just gonna sleep for about ten years,” you murmured against his chest. You laid a hand over his heart, silently thanking him as your fingers drifted back and forth.
Ben’s lips quirked upwards. “Just try not to drool on me. New shirt, you know.”
Despite yourself, that managed to make you smile, huffing a laugh. You shoved his shoulder in retaliation. “I don’t drool.”
He knew for a fact that you did, but he just smirked. He sunk his fingers into your hair and inhaled the familiar floral scent of your shampoo.
“Get some shut-eye,” he rumbled. “We’ll be home soon.”
His thumb brushed your cheek, encouraging you to rest. So you did. Your eyes closed on you after you let go of a deep, even breath.
In the grand scheme of things, it was a nothing moment. This was a man who had crumbled two skyscrapers and scarred Hughie for life. (He’d never be able to listen to Air Supply again, pretty much for as long as he lived.)
And yet, maybe it meant Annie could stop worrying so much about your judgment where Ben was concerned.
Only much later, she would realize that this was the moment she actually started to trust him.
AN: I want to get back into BMD world for a longer visit, hopefully soon. 💚💚
Keep Reading in the BMD-verse:
Next in line, we have a fun, fluffy, angsty, smutty, 3-part Christmas special, Love Actually:
Summary: Ben gets in late on Christmas Eve with a Grinch-like attitude, but you’re determined to force some holiday cheer into his system. At least, you hope you can, before he meets the rest of your dysfunctional family on Christmas Day.
▶️ Next Story: Love Actually
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The desire. That feeling that scratches, that burns, that hurts, like a virus, from the entrails and spreads throughout the physical body, but it is born in the mind.
Frank Herbert says that fear is a mental executioner, but desire is more so.
Perhaps in a society that represses feelings, where with no more life than the beating heart, the birth of desire could make the most virtuous of those new beings in the world fall without emotion?
Without desire the calm born of the soul prevails.
Values like honesty, chastity, loyalty, and purity would prevail.
From the most primitive point of view in the human being, the total absence of desire deprives of suffering. Budha showed it.
But its presence alters vital functions, breaks the chain of artificial perfection created and drags him towards the hidden, the forbidden, the loathsome intimate lover that he has to hide. And the hatred for himself grows, as does the shame, but the desire to satisfy it increases at the same time as the hatred.
Desire is dangerous because it attracts hatred.
Because he doesn't want it, and yet he feels it. Day after day, although he tries to kill him.
But like a good devil, the more it is pursued, the more it curls, in the soul, and therefore enslaves him to serve it.
The more he tried to kill him, the more desire overcame him, and the more he had to feed him. To the point that the tyrant was not satisfied with anything.
The desire kills the love.
Brings the pain, the sensations, the longing.
Desire is physically a terminal illness with no cure.
Spiritually a tyrant who devastates everyone, who enslaves.
Morally a being without form or color, insatiable. The end.
Prompt: 34. The feel of fingers brushing together by accident.
A/N: This is a request from the sensory prompt list.
“This isn’t exactly what I was expecting when you asked me to help you sort your paperwork,” you said, eyeing the rather large pile of folders and papers stacked messily on Kyle’s desk.
“Thank you for being willing to help me,” Kyle said, giving you a soft smile. You couldn’t resist when he gave you a look like that.
“I like being able to help around here. More than making snacks and tidying up a bit, at least.”
“I appreciate it. If you’ll start by sorting the paperwork by type and collecting them into different folders, I’ll start picking up.”
You looked around Kyle’s room again and decided that despite the mess that was his desk, his room overall was much worse. Stacks of books were scattered around, some open and bookmarked with random reminder notes or other scraps of paper he picked up from someplace. There was even a small potted plant that was set on top of another ill-balanced pile, keeping it at a perfect height to gather the sunlight from the window throughout the day.
With a nod, you sat in the desk chair, getting right to work and starting by separating the individual pages from the folders, making neat stacks before looking at them closer. Kyle had said that there wasn’t anything confidential in his room--he kept all of that information in the infirmary in a locked drawer--but the seemingly random bits and pieces of his personality shone through as she sorted.
Folders filled with labelled anatomy charts, both animal and human, loose pages pictured all kinds of flowers and plant life and their medicinal uses, papers filled from top to bottom with notes and thoughts and forgotten reminders in his lazy scrawl. These things and more filled your heart with warmth. They were all part of what made up Kyle, and you were silently thankful for the opportunity to learn more about him.
“Will you put this one on the desk, please?” Kyle said behind you, distracting you from your task. He tapped a book on your shoulder and you turned to take it from him. Glancing around the room, you were surprised to see how quickly it had been cleaned, though you felt a grin tug at your lips to see that the plant had been moved to a slightly more organized stack of books next to Kyle’s bed.
“That was fast,” you commented, tucking the book next to the row of others lined up along the back of his desk.
“You’re doing the hard work,” he said, looking over the neat, categorized piles you had made. “You were pretty fast, too!”
“I have a few things that I wasn’t sure where to put,” you sighed, picking up the last couple pages. “What would you like to do with these?”
“Let me take a look,” Kyle said, reaching over your shoulder. His fingers brushed over yours as he took the sheets of paper from your hand. You felt a shock jump up your arm at the warm contact and you tucked your hand on your lap, staring at the desk in front of you as you felt a blush rise on your cheeks.
Kyle hummed and moved to stand next to you, looking closer at the way you separated his paperwork before tossing the pages one after the other into different spots. He collected all the papers into one stack, tapping the ends until they were even, setting them carefully to one side of the desk.
“Perfect,” he said with a long sigh. “Thank you again for your help.”
“Mm.” You looked up at him, hoping your blush had subsided.
His olive eyes were as warm as his hand had been, a dimpled smile slowly overtaking his face. “How about we go see what’s for lunch?”
“Okay,” you said, pushing back the chair and getting to your feet, straightening out your skirt and facing him again.
“Hmm.” He reached out to brush his thumb along your cheek, sending your heart racing. He looked at his thumb and blew on it. “Eyelash.”
“Oh,” you breathed.
“Let’s go,” Kyle said, turning and making his way to the door, holding it open and waiting for you to go through first.
You followed behind him and nodded your thanks as you passed by, not knowing if you could speak in a level voice. Kyle closed the door behind him and led the way down the hall to the kitchens, keeping up a light conversation with you even as you merely nodded or hummed in affirmation.
You knew it was an overreaction to be embarrassed by his simple touches. But his hands were always so warm, as though his very being was meant for comfort. You weren’t sure if this feeling would develop further, but you knew you wouldn’t regret following him wherever he would go.
