#cleganmarge

[sluttyhenley]

The very soul of Romanticism

MASTERS OF THE AIR Part One | Part Nine

[middlingmay]

I have missed them so.

John’s return to their lives came with the same bluster and pink-red cheeks as were usually gifted by the Wyoming winter winds. There was no knock, or ring of the bell—only a quiet afternoon punctured by the smack of the front door against a thin wall they hadn’t gotten around to taking down yet, and a sheepish “Ope,” as bags were fumbled and dropped onto the plush carpet. “Uh, Clevens? I might need some spackle.”

[oneawkwardcookie]

I'm afraid I never loved him Sweetie, he'd be better off with you I could never make him happy

Here's some messy Cleganmarge for @angelfruittree!

[angelfruittree]

Listen Here: Part 4 by Phlegmatic

“I never would’ve thought—” Marge starts, close to Gale’s mouth as well, and then, “I didn’t know what to hope.” One of her hands is trailing over John’s back. “You alright, Bucky?”

John huffs, a quiet chuckle. “Thought I was headed toward somethin’, my whole life—thought if I kept moving, I’d find it. Ran to an adventure, found you instead.” His mouth is moving against the corner of Gale’s lips, until he pushes himself up a little. He blinks slow, and looks at Gale plainly, placid. It’s not a smile, but it’s not anything sad either. It’s just John’s face, nothing held over it. “You’re some kind of destination, babydoll.”

“Hell,” Gale croaks.

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My first completed long fic. My If that isn't love fic ,MY ITIL, MY ITILUNE.

Thank you so much to @irregularcollapse for writing something so beautiful, so daring, so full of love. I'm so happy i kept sending you MOTA stuff two years ago I'm so happy you believed me (finally)

PARTS 1-3

[irregularcollapse]

Painting at left is 'Costume Surprise' by Frederic Stanley for The Saturday Evening Post (1921)

I saw the above painting this morning, was gripped with a mighty urge, spitballed a few things with darling @angelfruittree, and then bing bang bong a certain number of hours later, vomited this out.

Buck/Bucky(/Marge?), pre-relationship and pre-canon, 2.3k words

-

It's 1934 and Gale is 15 years old, and since moving to Casper he hasn't left the town, so even though he knows it's a little bit of charity when the Spencers offer to take him with them to Green Bay on Mr. Spencer's business trip, Gale works on his dad until it's agreed that he can go. He'll be making himself useful anyway, helping out with Mr. Spencer's meetings and carrying what needs carrying. There's a college in Green Bay too, and Gale still has some schooling left but it's something that people his age are thinking about.

The hotel in Green Bay is the swankest place that Gale's ever been in, and he gets a cot on the floor between Marge's bed and the wall, and her parents are very clear about them not being alone in the room together. The days are fine, and Gale carries Mr. Spencer's blueprints and folios all over town, and the nights are fine as well; they eat dinner in the hotel, and Mr. Spencer gives them a quarter each to go to the pictures. Casper might not exist at all any more, with its scrimping and dust and water-thin meals.

When Marge gets wind of the hotel's Halloween party, she grips into Gale's arm and says, "Oh, wouldn't that be swell?”

She’s wistful for her sewing machine, and for more time to get their fancy dress organised, but compromises with a pair of moth wings and a mask from a five-and-dime. She thinks that Gale should be a Spanish matador in black and red, or an Old West outlaw with a bandana over his face, or a Roman centurion in a tunic and sandals, and he can’t meet her eye as he murmurs, “I don’t know I can afford all that, Marge.” She doesn’t miss a beat, and her pretty smile doesn’t even flicker, and she’s bracing and sweet as she tells him, “We’ll pull something together.”

Marge orders him to close his eyes, hiding something behind her back, and he’s got no reason not to trust her; he thinks it’s a hat at first, when she fits the wig on his head.

“Look at that,” she says, laughing and impressed. “You make a fine girl, Gale.”

It’s always been the way, that when Marge says jump, Gale says, how high? and it’s an easy option, one that more than a few fellas have fallen back on at parties Gale has been to, because all it takes is a dress borrowed from a sister or a friend. Always gets a few laughs, which might be nice because although Marge giggles at all Gale’s jokes, not many other people seem to. They aren’t in Casper anymore, anyhow.

Mr. and Mrs. Spencer do chuckle at seeing Gale all dolled up, and Mr. Spencer says, “Now you girls look after yourselves, and watch out for those boys trying things they shouldn’t.” Walking down to the party, Marge links their elbows together the way Gale has seen her walk with her girlfriends, but once they’re in the ballroom, kisses his cheek just below the domino mask which matches her own.

She goads him into dancing because they don’t know anyone there, and both of them are gasping laughter as they try swapping the lead and Gale can’t give it up properly, and the wig almost knocks off his head when he doesn’t duck enough to spin under her arm. Marge orders them a couple of Cokes at the bar, and both the bottles have straws poking from the top, which sets them off laughing all over again.

Gale is leaving the bathroom when he collides with the clown. He’s tall and broad and wrapped up in black-and-gold polka-dots with a big silly ruff at his neck, and even with his own mask, his costume is somehow lower effort than Gale’s.

“Holy—My mistake, miss. Gotta look better where I’m goin’,” the clown blurts, steadying Gale with a hand on his arm. He blinks, eyes stormy-blue and squinting as he grins. “I mean, look what there is to look at.” His leering is obvious, definitely drinking his fill, and Gale’s snorting a laugh before he can stop it. That only gets the clown’s grin stretching, opening like he’s seen something he can’t quite believe. “Hey, get a look at that dress. What do they call a pretty thing like you?”

“Gale.” There’s a chuckle in it, and a surge of fluttering in Gale’s lungs, the kind that comes whenever there’s a chance to do something a little dumb and dangerous.

“Gale.” The echo comes not from the clown, but from Marge, leaving the women’s powder room just a door down the hallway, and the clown looks three places seemingly all at once: Marge, then the door behind Gale with the sign Gents painted on it, then back at Gale in his pink satin and pearls.

“When you gotta go,” Gale says to the clown through the bubbling laughter, and takes Marge’s hand to tug her back to the party.

“Gosh, he looked ready to drop to one knee,” Marge hisses at him, delighted, and when Gale turns to check over his shoulder, the clown is watching them walk away with a slack jaw, bathroom urgency all forgotten.

The clown finds him later sitting on the wall drinking another Coke while Marge takes a turn with a wooden soldier who started stuttering when Marge asked Gale if he’d mind her dancing with another man. The soldier’s hands are definitely staying where Gale can see them, and even from a distance he can tell that Marge is getting a kick out of making a stranger nervous. Smelling whisky first, then smoke, Gale turns as the clown plops into the chair next to his own and says, “Wouldn’t have picked you for a wallflower, Gail. ‘S that a nickname? Is it Abigail, for company?”

“Who’s askin’?”

“John Egan. I just want to know what name to put on our marriage certificate, dollface.” Gale can’t hold in the guffaw, because it’s one thing knowing how other boys try pitching woo, but a different thing entirely to hear how stupid it is up close. He’s never been this ridiculous with Marge, surely. The laughing doesn’t turn John off, evidently, because he just leans in a bit closer and keeps on smiling under his patchy teenage moustache, and leers, “Say, you got a great laugh. Best laugh of any girl I’ve met.”

“That so?”

Quickly, Gale learns that John is 19 years old and up from St. Paul, where he goes to college and is on the baseball team—him and the shortstop, second and third base, the catcher, and centre fielder snuck out of where they were staying because they’d heard this band was hot and the girls would be pretty.

“I think the guys who told us that were selling things a bit short, though,” he says, and Gale knows he’s supposed to be flattered by the compliments and impressed by the sports talk, but all he can think to say is, “Uh huh.” All he can think to say is, “Uh huh,” when John asks him to dance as well, and when Gale can’t give up the lead properly, they’re both laughing just how him and Marge did. Gale catches Marge’s eye as they spin past each other, giddiness and giggles sparking in the pretty brown and around her lipsticked mouth too, and he snorts a little when she winks at him. Gale hasn’t had liquor before, but when people talk about getting jazzed and squiffy, maybe this is some of the feeling: like there’s bubbles all inside him, like everything is funny, like he could lift off the ground and fly. It’s a game, a dangerous one, but John seems to like him and keeps on talking, not talking at Gale but talking to him and taking it in stride that Gale doesn’t have much to say in return.

They dance a few numbers, and Gale sees Marge with a pirate and a cowboy and a sailor—she blows him a kiss as she twirls past with a devil—and the crowd is thick and pressed close around them, bumping along with the beat, when John leans in a bit too close to Gale’s mouth. The punch is a reflex, and connects hard enough given the limits on the space, meeting square with John’s jaw and deflecting his attempt at a kiss.

“I got a girlfriend,” Gale says stupidly.

“And a helluva right hook, for a little lady.” He’s taken his hand from Gale’s waist to rub at the blooming red spot on his face, and Gale can see what he said gaining meaning behind John’s eyes, and his whole throat starts tasting like the smell of oil. “Huh?” is what John says next, squint of his eyes this time because his brow is furrowing, and then the band leader is calling a countdown and a drumroll and the horn section is blowing and everyone around them is taking off their masks. Gale sweeps off his mask and wig in one, and John is still holding his other hand. He drags up from his punched jaw to his own mask, pushing it back into his hair, and the face he reveals isn’t any of what Gale had been starting to think, has seen on other boys and men around Casper and his own dad—John’s face is all screwed-up confused, mouth-open astonished, but there’s not even a fleck of anger.

“Christ,” he says, and gives a whistle. “And to think, I was fallin’ in love.” Gale’s grin comes back so wide he thinks his face might be splitting with laughter.

“Sorry to disappoint, John.”

“Are you kiddin’? This is terrific. You could be a goddamn spy! Workin’ undercover to bust crooks; you sure convinced me. Fuck, is there egg on my face.” He’s swearing now, and drawling broader, and there’s an ease in his stance that wasn’t there a second ago, but he’s still holding Gale’s hand. “I’m sorry, for tryin’ to—but hey, that’s some dress you got on there.”

“It’s my Sunday best.” John guffaws at that, leaving his mask pushed into his curls to chuck Gale on the shoulder. “It was last minute, I borrowed it from—”

“There you are.”

“Marge.” Gale wraps his arm around her shoulders, wig and mask still dangling from his fingers. She’s smiling up at him with a raised eyebrow and an unspoken question, so Gale says, “This is John Egan. He’s bein’ a real good sport.”

“Madam Butterly herself.” Marge trills a laugh at that, and counters, “Moth.” John whistles again, an impressed sort of note.

“Shakespearean. You got Mustardseed and Cobweb floatin’ around as well? Hold on,” he breaks in, dropping Gale’s hand to snap his fingers at them like he’s remembered something, “maybe this is why they made us read all those old plays in high school—to warn us not to talk to pretty girls at masked balls. It might turn out to be a fella with a great-lookin’ kisser.”

“See?” Marge rasps, knocking her hip against Gale’s, their skirts whispering together for a moment. “I told you that you make a fine girl.”

John is shocked to learn they’re still in school, and starts calling them you crazy kids. He tells them a bit about the town, things to see and do, but they’re hitting the road tomorrow, Gale explains to him. John thinks that’s too bad, but then remembers that he’s headed back to St. Paul on the bus in the afternoon anyhow. He buys them a couple more Cokes, and tells them stories about pulling all kinds of pranks at college, and dances with Marge for the last song of the night, and starts to invite them on to somewhere else before he checks his watch and says, “Ah, nuts. I’ll turn into a pumpkin if I don’t make tracks now.” There’s someone yelling, “Bucky,” and John turns to look who, sending back a wave before saying to Gale and Marge, “You kids look me up if you’re ever in St. Paul. Or Manitowoc—who knows, could be another semester and I blow the whole thing and flunk out. See ya, dollface. Thanks for the kiss.” He taps Gale’s jaw with his fist, a lot sweeter than how Gale hit him, and then he’s gone in the crowd.

“Wowee,” Marge says, and Gale has to agree.

It’s 1940 and Gale is 21 years old, and all his possessions fit inside the single suitcase that he’s unpacking in an Air Force Flight School dorm room in Texas. He has an address in his pocket, for a ladies’ dorm at a local college, home to Marjorie Spencer. Gale had been thinking he’d never see her again, after the Spencers moved away during his senior year. His roommate’s name is John C. Egan, and Gale is telling himself that John is a common enough name. It’s too many coincidences. Too many dangerous, hopeful things.

“Gale W. Cleven,” someone says while Gale is stacking books at the edge of the lone desk in the room, and when he turns around the clown is standing in the doorway, only he’s wearing the same flight cadet uniform that Gale is and he’s a lot more grown than he used to be. His moustache has filled in more, but only a little bit.

“John,” Gale says. John holds out his hand and crosses the room in barely three strides.

“Call me Bucky. Good to meet you, Gale. Say,” he rolls on, dropping Gale’s hand after shaking it and snapping his fingers like he’s remembered something, “you look sort of familiar. We haven’t met somewhere before, have we?”

“I—”

“No, Christ, you know what it is? You look just like a guy I used to know back home—Buck, we called him. You ever been through Manitowoc, Wisconsin?”

“Can’t say that I have.”

“Ah, that’s too bad. Hey, you can still be Buck. Need an Air Force nickname, don’t you?” He chucks Gale in the shoulder, and doesn’t know that it’s an echo across six years. “What kind of a name is Gale, anyway?”

[meyerlansky]

what are some fics you think characterize either bucky best?

...am i allowed to say all my own fics here? because obviously i like my own characterization best 😤 an answer from beyond the wood is my favorite take on gale and moon’s low, can’t say no is my favorite take on bucky, because i deliberately dug in on the flaws that make them interesting to me in their respective fics. aafbtw!gale is terrified of his own desires and of disrupting the status quo, to the point that he’s a powder keg of repression and denial and hypocrisy and also you cannot convince me gale’s biggest kink is anything other than voyeurism, and ml!bucky is mercurial and selfish until it’s pointed out to him.

as for other people’s buckies, @redbelles’ gale in the chimneys hardly ever fall down is great—moments of impulsive decision-making that he then ruminates on and beats himself up over to the point that his inaction in the aftermath causes even MORE problems than the impulse did in the first place, which is a refreshing change from the wider fandom interpretation of gale being able to do no wrong and needing to be taken care of as if he’s not A Whole-Ass Air Force Colonel—and belle’s bucky is even better. the GUILT and the SHAME and the YEARNING and the SELF-HATRED and covering all of it by being the most charming son of a bitch west of the mississippi. ruining poor clara’s LIFE!!!

@sweaterkittensahoy’s bucky is also fantastic; the charm and the subbiness and especially the vulnerability laying under the surface that he only lets a few people see. these three fics are smutty curtbucky and these two are crankbucky with a little more plotmeat, and they all have that fragility to bucky, with curt before he’s really broken down by everything and with crank putting the pieces back together with the care and compassion bucky deserved in the stalag.

Whisper We’ll Be Ghosts Again by @searchingfortheuniverse is short and bittersweet and gets a shout out for BOTH the buckies' grief over curt manifesting in exactly the ways i think it would: bucky lashing out and drinking and still reeling himself back from hitting hard enough to make gale drop him, and gale not being able to verbalize something beyond his capacity to handle emotionally without an external push to manage it.

for a... darker, i guess? entry on the list, @shipstorms’ crawl, baby, crawl is also great on both buckies’ characterization but in a Not Charitable way for either of them OR marge, which is, again, A Refreshing Change! fics that address that gale causes problems by being withholding and critical and secretive and dismissive and opaque are few and far between, and because cbc is marge POV, gale’s flaws aren’t front and center, but it’s like a riptide at the beach, driving the whole plot. bucky lashing out in response to gale being withholding hits the nail on the head for me, as does the way he goes about it by being a mean little cunt AND tries to shuck his own responsibility for his actions.

AND FINALLY i would be remiss without mentioning last resort is edge-first into the airstream, which is, hands down, my favorite characterization of bucky AND curt that i didn’t write myself, and i know you didn’t ask for curt characterization but you’re getting it anyway because his POV on bucky in this one is Literally Perfect: “He's selfish in his grief the same way he's generous with his cheer. Whatever it is, he just needs to be at the center of it.” ao3 user TyroleanSpa where are you. ao3 user TyroleanSpa do you know that i love you. save me ao3 user TyroleanSpa.

[avonne-writes]

Cleganmarge first time headcanons inspired by this post by @middlingmay

After Gale and Marge get married, Bucky finds himself in a funk. His growing trepidation that he’s going to lose Gale pushes him to be bolder than before in his attempts to be close to him.

Imagine lots of touching, flirting, leaning close, trying to make Gale laugh and to be alone with him.

Inevitably, he ends up spending a lot of time with Marge as well, and they both find out just how well they get along and like each other. They talk and joke and dance together, and they find comfort in each other's company.

Meanwhile, Gale's blind to the growing connection between his wife and best friend because he’s grappling with his demons - feeling desire for Bucky is something he can’t reconcile with what he thinks is acceptable. It doesn't help either when Marge starts mentioning Bucky in a seemingly idle manner while she and Gale are in bed, even during foreplay.

So, sometimes, when Bucky gets too close or Gale feels overwhelmed, Gale gets extremely awkward and leaves under some bullshit excuse.

After one of these occassions, Marge goes up to Bucky and tells him that she knows what Bucky's doing. Bucky tries to play innocent, but she goes on. She tells him that Gale wants him too, she can see it in his expressions when Bucky touches him, but that he needs to be eased into it. She tells him about how hers and Gale’s relationship progressed.

Bucky's quiet for once, trying to make sense of her motives, then says he’s no homewrecker. Marge nods and tells him she knows. The home doesn't need to be wrecked to include another person. They stare at each other, then Marge strokes his arm. Then his face. After a moment, she says she'll go find Gale, but before she can leave, Bucky catches her hand. She smiles at him, gives him a kiss on the cheek, and says she'll talk to Gale.

She finds Gale pacing and agitated in the bedroom, fiddling with a toothpick. She has to grab his hands to make him stop. She puts them on her waist, draws him close and starts talking about how much she loves and accepts him. And then she takes the plunge and tells him she knows how he feels about Bucky and that she also feels the same. She talks it through with Gale, pushing through his attempts at denial and resistance, until Gale agrees to let Bucky join them in the room.

Bucky comes in silently, searching both of their expressions before focusing on Gale. They stare at each other, then Bucky takes a resolute step forward and kisses him square on the mouth. Gale almost crushes Marge's hand, completely frozen.

When Bucky pulls away, panting, Marge turns Gale's face towards herself gently and gives him a sweet, comforting kiss. Then she looks at Bucky, breaks into a smile. Bucky smiles back and kisses her too.

It takes a few more kisses and touches before Gale snaps out of it - but once he does, he takes over the whole thing and gets them all into bed. Bucky's so surprised by the sudden change that it makes Marge laugh. She tells Bucky that once he knows what he wants, Gale likes to be in charge.

After lots of kissing and touching and trying to figure out how to share, they end up in this position (amazing nsfw art by @johnbottoms ).

[brotherwtf]

cleganmarge threesome because... um

Marge who secretly knows that Gale may or may not be seeing John, and instead of getting mad, she sees this as an opportunity

maybe Marge is very much in charge in the bedroom, and so she goes to Gale and proposes something, they're both gonna fuck John, and oooo, Gale is definitely interested

and so they go to John's apartment and propose the theory to John, and John of course fumbles because how the fuck did he get so lucky to have to beautiful blondes wanting to fuck him?

Gale kissing John's lips and Marge kissing John's neck, their hands tucking into John's pants to pull his cock out, wrapping their hands around it and pulling perfect sounds from John's mouth

both of them falling to their knees and looking up through long blonde eyelashes as Gale wraps his lips around the head of John's cock, Marge kissing the rest of John's length before taking it in her own mouth, swapping his cock between their lips until John is a moaning, whimpering mess

and when they eventually get John to bed, they push him down and strip him naked, kissing up and down his body, Gale biting teeth marks into his chest and arms, Marge leaving her pink lipstick marks all over his thighs

maybe Marge rides him, moaning filthily as she grinds back on John, flipping her curls over her shoulder with her mouth hung open, fuck maybe Gale's riding John's face and kissing Marge, John's arms wrapped around Gale's thighs and holding onto him desperately, maybe Johns fingers leave bruises in the flesh when they're done

oh my God and when they're done, Gale and Johns lazily making out while Marge runs her perfectly manicured fingers up and down John's arm, damn they do live to spoil their boy