— you overhear steve talk about the future and realize the version of it you imagined yourself in might not exist. turns out you were wrong. painfully, beautifully wrong.
☄️ 2.3k — steve harrington x fem!reader, mutual pining with a side of end-of-the-world stress, fluff, reader overthinking ( as a hobby ), tinesy bit of jealousy, feelings talk during a life-or-death mission, steve getting flustered constantly, kinda of rushed ending
author's note — okay so yes i know this took forever after the poll. i swear i had every intention of posting sooner and then studies decided to humble me. anyways, this fic kind of snuck up on me and i actually had no idea how to end it, so if it feels a little rushed at the end. . . no it doesn’t ( it does ). but i still think it turned out okayish. thank you so much for reading and for all the love you’ve been showing lately. it genuinely means more than you know <3
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gif by @yenvengerberg | divider by @/lavendergalactic
“Okay, but that’s exactly my point,” Robin said from beside you, hands flying. “What if Vecna doesn’t take the bait? What if Kate Bush stops working? What if he’s already figured out we’re onto him and he’s just sitting back like, surprise losers, thanks for the kid.”
You nodded and murmured a sound of agreement, but the words slid right past you. Your fingers twisted in the hem of your sleeve as you stared down at your feet. You wanted to focus. You really did. Max’s life depended on this plan. Everyone’s did.
But your attention kept drifting, traitorously, to the low voices coming from the front of the RV.
Steve was sitting on the driver's seat, Nancy beside him. You couldn’t hear everything over Robin’s running commentary, but you caught pieces.
“—dream,” Steve was saying. “I'm talking like, uh, a full brood of Harringtons. Like, five, six kids.”
Nancy laughed. “Six?”
“Six,” he said. “Six little nuggets. Three girls, three boys.”
Robin stopped in front of you then, snapping her fingers. “Hello? Earth to you. If this goes wrong, we all die horribly, so maybe jot that down?”
“Yeah,” you said quickly, forcing a smile. “Sorry. I’m listening.”
You were not listening. Your gaze flicked back to Steve before you could stop yourself. He looked different when he talked about the future. It hurt in a way you didn’t quite have words for.
You didn’t have a problem with Nancy. That was the worst part. You admired her, honestly. The way she never backed down, the way fear didn’t stop her from doing the right thing. She was brave and kind, and she had never once given you a reason to doubt her intentions. If anything, she had always treated you with respect, like she knew exactly where you stood.
And still, there was this small, ugly part of you that envied her.
Because when Steve talked about the future, his voice carried a familiarity that scared you. Like those dreams had been shaped long before you ever fit into his life. Like you were standing on the edge of something that already had a name, a shape, a person attached to it.
You pressed your nails into your palm and forced your eyes back to Robin who kept going like she could out-talk the end of the world if she tried.
“And also the timing,” she said. “Because if Kate Bush is even, like, one second off— boom. Bad. Very bad. No more Max. So, no pressure or anything.”
You nodded again.
It was almost funny, really. Robin had been the reason you and Steve even existed in the first place. She liked to take credit for it too, in that very Robin way, as if she’d personally aligned the stars.
She had introduced you with a casualness that felt intentional in hindsight, dragging Steve into conversations you were already in, finding excuses to pair you off on supply runs.
She had told you, more than once, that whatever had been between Steve and Nancy was done. Over. Ancient history. “Capital M moved on,” she’d said, very confidently. You’d smiled and nodded and absolutely not believed her.
You hadn’t asked him out because of it. Hadn’t even let yourself think about it too hard. You told yourself it was respect, that you didn’t want to step into something unfinished, that you refused to be the girl who ignored a history that big. Mostly, though, you were just scared of wanting something that wasn’t really yours to have.
So when Steve had walked up to you one afternoon, shuffling his feet like he suddenly forgot how legs worked, you’d been caught completely off guard.
He hadn’t been smooth about it. He rubbed the back of his neck, glanced anywhere but your face, and said your name like it was a question and he wasn't sure he knew the right answer. Then, in a rush, he asked if you maybe wanted to get ice cream sometime. Or food. Or just hang out. Like, on a date.
You remembered the way he blinked when you said yes.
Not the easy grin you expected, or the confident Steve Harrington smile everyone knew, but wide-eyed shock, like he hadn’t actually considered the possibility you’d agree. You’d laughed before you could stop yourself, and he’d laughed too.
“Wait, really?” he’d said.
You were pretty sure he’d been more surprised than happy in that moment, and somehow that had made it better.
The memory faded just as you glanced up, and for a split second, everything lined up wrong and right all at once. Steve was already looking at you.
You smiled before you could stop yourself.
His shoulders loosened. His mouth tipped into that soft, almost dopey smile he never seemed to have control over around you. He looked like he’d forgotten where he was, like the noise and the fear and the plan had all slipped out of his head at once.
Then the RV swerved.
“Steve!” Nancy shouted, lunging forward as the wheel jerked under his hands.
The whole vehicle lurched, everyone in the back yelling at once. Robin and Erica grabbed onto the nearest surface, Max swore and Lucas held her, Dustin and Eddie’s voice rose an octave. Steve snapped back to reality with a startled sound, fumbling with the wheel just long enough for Nancy to shove him aside and steady it.
“What the hell, Steve?” she shouted, eyes locked on the road.
“I’m good, I’m good,” he said quickly, hands up in surrender. “Everyone relax. It was, like, half a second.”
“That was not half a second!” Robin yelled. “That was a full ‘we almost died’ second.”
Steve shot a look over his shoulder. “Okay, but we didn’t die, did we?”
You couldn’t help it. You grinned, biting down on it too late to hide it. Steve glanced back at you again, sheepish now, cheeks pink, like he knew exactly why it had happened and couldn’t even pretend otherwise.
He mouthed sorry without sound, smiling anyway, and your chest warmed despite the fear.
Eddie and Dustin abandoned their seats a moment later, shuffling forward and dropping down behind you and Robin. You turned around at the same time Robin did.
Before you could say anything, you caught Max and Lucas a few rows back, heads bent together, their voices low. Max glanced up and met your eyes. You offered her a small smile and a quick wave. She returned it and you turned back around.
“So,” you said, resting an arm along the back of the seat. “What’s up?”
Dustin stared at you like you’d personally offended him. “What’s up?” he repeated. “Your boyfriend almost killed us all, and that’s what you ask?”
Robin nodded seriously beside you. “Yeah, maybe don’t smile at him for a while. For the sake of everyone’s continued existence.”
Eddie leaned in. “He swerved because you smiled at him?”
You blinked once and then shrugged. “Yeah. He’s adorable, isn’t he?”
“No. Idiot. That’s what we call him.”
Dustin pointed between Eddie and himself. “Smile at us. You won’t see us swerving off the road.”
You raised an eyebrow, then gave them a smile just to prove a point.
Eddie squinted. “Yeah, no. You’re cute. That’s unfair.”
You grinned wider, unapologetic.
“Would you stop it?” Dustin said, throwing his hands up. “We’re trying to make a very serious safety argument here.”
Robin snorted. “I don’t know, Dust. I think the data supports the theory that not only Steve Harrington is this whipped and compromised.”
“But,” Eddie said. “he's the only one who's got the structural integrity of wet cardboard.”
You laughed softly.
Then Nancy’s voice cut through the noise. “Hey, you.”
You looked up to see her already unbuckling her seatbelt, gesturing toward the front. “Your shift.”
“Oh,” you said. You nodded quickly, pushing yourself up. “Yeah. Okay.”
You slid into Nancy’s seat and turned to look at your boyfriend.
He was already smiling at you, that soft, helpless one, which told you he hadn’t learned his lesson at all.
“I wish it was your shift forever,” he said, leaning closer so only you could hear.
You smiled, hands finding the wheel. “Careful. You’ve already proven you can’t be trusted with that.”
He laughed under his breath, then tilted his head. “So. How do you feel after almost killing everyone with your smile?”
You pretended to think about it, lips pursed. “Honestly? Very proud of myself.”
“Unbelievable. I risk my life every day for this group and you’re the real threat.”
“You love it,” you said.
He didn’t even hesitate. “Yeah. I really do.”
The words felt more like a confession. Your grip tightened on the wheel for half a second.
He nudged your arm with his elbow. “Hey. You good?”
You nodded, glancing at him briefly. “Yeah. Just. . . you know. Trying not to crash the RV.”
“Yeah,” he said. “You’re doing great.”
The praise warmed you more than it should have. You rolled your eyes to hide it. “Don’t get all sweet on me now.”
He grinned. “What? I can’t compliment my girlfriend?”
The word still felt new sometimes. You smiled anyway. “You can. Just maybe wait until we’re not driving.”
Steve hummed. “No promises.”
You focused on the road, but you could feel him watching you.
“So, uh,” you started, voice casual in a way that absolutely fooled no one. “I kind of heard what you were saying earlier. About your dream.”
There was a beat of silence.
Steve’s laugh came out awkward and rushed. “You did?”
You nodded, fingers tightening slightly on the wheel. “Yeah. Not on purpose. I was trying to listen to Robin do her whole end-of-the-world podcast, but. . . you weren’t exactly quiet.”
“Oh my god,” he groaned, dragging a hand down his face. “I’m sorry. That’s— wow. That’s embarrassing.”
You glanced at him then. His ears were pink, eyes darting everywhere but your face, suddenly very interested in the cracked dashboard. It was strangely comforting, seeing him like this.
“You don’t have to be embarrassed,” you said quickly. “It’s a good dream. It’s. . . really you.”
He risked a look at you. “Yeah?”
“Yeah,” you said. Then, after a pause, you added, “I just didn’t know you still carried it around like that.”
Steve swallowed. He shifted in his seat, shoulders rounding in on themselves a little. “We haven’t really talked about that stuff,” he said. “You and me, I mean. I didn’t want to freak you out.”
You let out a small breath. “You wouldn’t have.”
“I know that now,” he said. “But I didn’t before.”
“It just. . . hurt a little,” you admitted. “Not the dream itself. Just that you talked about it with her before you ever talked about it with me.”
Steve turned fully toward you then. “Hey,” he said gently. “I wasn’t talking to Nancy because it was her. It was just. . . familiar.”
You nodded, even though your chest still ached. “I get that. I really do. I just didn’t want to feel like I was finding out who you are secondhand.”
“You’re not,” he said immediately. “I swear. You’re not second to anything.”
You risked another glance at him. “Then why didn’t you tell me?”
He huffed out a nervous laugh. “Because saying it out loud to you makes it real. And I didn’t want to mess it up.”
Something warm curled in your stomach at that, easing the sting.
“You could’ve told me,” you said. “I would’ve listened.”
“I want to tell you now,” he said. “If you want to hear it.”
You smiled. “Yeah. I do.”
Steve took a breath like he was bracing himself, then let it out slow.
“I always thought,” he began, eyes fixed on the road ahead even though you were the one driving, “that I’d have this really big family someday. Like. . . really big.”
You smiled to yourself, heart already thudding a little faster. “Big how?”
He glanced at you, a little shy. “I mean, a full brood of Harringtons. Five. Six kids.”
You laughed softly. “Six little nuggets?”
His face lit up instantly. “Exactly. See, you get it.”
“I always imagined three girls, three boys,” he said. “No idea why. It just felt right.” He scratched the back of his neck. “And every summer, we’d pack everyone into something like this. An RV. Just. . . driving.”
“We’d see the Rockies,” he continued. “The Grand Canyon. Maybe Yellowstone. Just stop wherever looked cool.” He smiled faintly. “And then we’d end up somewhere in California. Some beach town. Park right on the sand.”
You couldn’t help it. “You’d definitely burn on the first day.”
He scoffed. “Hey. I’d learn. For our kids.”
You laughed, shaking your head. “Okay, but only if they make too fun of you for it.”
“That’s fair,” he said. “And we’d stay there for a week. Maybe learn how to surf. Or at least try.”
You imagined it without trying. Steve surrounded by kids, sunburned and smiling.
“What about me?” you asked.
He turned to you fully this time. “You’re there,” he said immediately. “You’re. . . kind of the whole point.”
Your throat tightened.
“I always thought I’d be bad at that stuff,” he admitted. “The future. But when I think about it now, it’s you making lists and me losing them. You calling shotgun even though you’re driving. You telling me six kids is insane and then naming them anyway.”
You laughed, eyes stinging. “I’d absolutely insist on a dog.”
“Two,” he corrected. “Minimum.”
“Deal,” you said quickly. “And the RV has to stop for snacks. Constantly.”
He grinned. “I wouldn’t survive otherwise.”
Steve reached over and squeezed your knee gently. “I don’t need it to look exactly like that,” he said. “I just want it to be with you.”
You smiled, eyes back on the road, heart full in a way that scared you a little. “Yeah,” you said softly. “I think I’d like that future.”
i was thinking maybe shy reader who is really insecure about steve being so close with robin and nancy, but tries to push it all down until it bubbles up into an argument with steve 🫣❤️🩹
Ugly Little Thing
a/n: Thank you for requesting!!! I got so excited when I saw this one <3 btw I decided to just stick with reader being jealous of Nancy instead of Robin as well because I thought it might be too many dynamics to deal with
Steve harrington x shy!fem!reader, 1.9k words, divider by @cursed-carmine
You have a secret. A festering, ugly little thing that curls tight behind your ribs.
And it's that you're jealous of Nancy Wheeler.
It's a quiet jealousy, one that doesn't slam doors or yell or make scenes. It’s the kind that sits politely in your stomach during movie nights, acid-sour, when Nancy sits just a little too close to Steve.
It’s the kind that makes your throat close when she calls, and Steve’s voice slips into that easy, soft murmur that speaks of years of shared history that you're not a part of.
The secret has roots.
They dig deep, fed by hundreds of small moments. It's the way Nancy can ask him for help with a single, quiet look—research, a ride, a favor for one of the kids—and Steve will just go. No questions, no hesitations.
It's the shared glance across a crowded room that says remember that time? and you’re left blinking, outside the joke.
It’s the way she says his name, just “Steve,” and it carries a weight, a familiarity that makes your own “Steve” feel like you’re borrowing it.
Your breaking point is deceptively small.
It’s Steve’s laugh.
Not the one he gives you—that's a private, husky thing, breathed into the skin of your neck. Not the one he gives Robin or Dustin—that's a bark of a laugh, full of exasperated affection.
It's his Nancy-laugh.
It's a lazy Sunday at the WSQK. The kids are... somewhere. Around, you guess, it's the kind of day where nothing's really happening.
You're sitting on the floor in a patch of sun, fiddling with a loose thread on the rug. Steve's sprawled on the couch behind you, one hand dangling off the side, his fingers brushing your hair every so often.
He’s talking to you. His voice is a low, warm rumble against your head, telling you about his parents’ new, ridiculously small dog and how it tried to fight the vacuum cleaner.
“...And it’s like, this high,” he says, lifting a hand from your shoulder to gesture, his knuckles brushing your cheek. “A puff of angry lint with teeth. You should’ve seen it.”
You laugh. It’s a real laugh, easy and light.
You tilt your head back to look up at him, and he’s already looking down, a soft, smug smile on his face because he made you laugh. For a second, it’s perfect. The sun through the high windows, the quiet, him.
You're a warm, happy puddle.
The bell over the door jingles. Neither of you pull apart. You’re too comfortable.
"Hey," Nancy says. Not to you, really, to Steve. But you offer her a tentative smile anyways, just in case.
"Hey, Nance," Steve says, and his voice doesn’t change, not exactly. But the arm around your shoulders becomes just an arm. The focus that was solely on you diffuses, part of it shifting to her. The sun dims, just a degree.
You start playing with the loose thread of the rug so you don't have to watch them talk.
She leans against the counter, craning her head to look into the the backroom where Mike and the others are playing D&D. "I'm here for the gremlin. Are they done or what?"
Steve shakes his head. "They're in the final showdown. Dustin says the fate of the realm hangs in the balance. Or, you know, until someone's mom calls."
Nancy sighs, a sound of deep, practiced patience. "The realm's been hanging in the balance every Sunday for three years." She glances at Steve. "You owe me five dollars, by the way."
Steve's brow furrows. "For what?"
"The bet. Summer of '85," she says, her voice almost wistful. "You said they'd grow out of it by the time Will started high school. I said they'd still be at it when Mike could drive." She raises an eyebrow. "He got his license last month."
He grins. "Alright, fine. You win. I guess I should've known."
"Should've," she agrees, mirroring his smile. "I remember your exact logic. You said, and I quote, 'Once Will gets a girlfriend, this whole thing falls apart.'"
Steve barks out a laugh. “Oh my god, I did say that.”
“You did,” Nancy confirms, her own smile widening into something conspiratorial. “So. Not only did you lose the bet, your entire theory was fundamentally flawed.” She pauses, her head tilting just a fraction. Her voice is dry, amused “Because, I mean, Steve. Will? Getting a girlfriend?”
And then it happens.
Steve’s laugh.
His Nancy-laugh. The one that makes his whole face light up. You watch it happen in slow motion, the crinkles at the corners of his eyes, the way his head tilts back just so, the easy, open-mouthed smile that’s completely unguarded.
The sound fills the quiet room, and for those few seconds, you don’t exist. You are a ghost in the sunbeam, watching the living.
The thread snaps in your hands.
The sound is tiny, but it's enough. Steve's laugh dies, and his attention swings back to you. "Everything okay, sweetheart?"
His voice is gentle, concerned. It's the voice he uses for fragile things. For a second, you hate it.
You stand up abruptly, and the arm that was around your shoulders drops. Steve looks confused. "Yeah. Just remembered I told my mom I'd help with dinner."
Before you can even take a full step toward the door, Steve is on his feet. The movement is quick, almost urgent.
"Whoa, hey, hold on," he says, his hand gently catching your wrist. His earlier amusement is gone, replaced by a look of soft, aching concern. "I'll drive you."
His other hand comes up to brush your hair from your face, a gesture that would normally make you melt. Now, it just feels like he's trying to smooth over a crack he doesn't understand. "You sure you're okay? You got real quiet all of a sudden."
You can't look at him. You can't look at Nancy, who you feel watching this unfold with that quiet gaze of hers.
"I'm fine," you murmur quietly. "Just a headache. I'll walk home."
"No way," he insists, his voice firm but gentle. He's already grabbing his keys from the counter, his jacket from the back of the couch. He's in full Steve Harrington Babysitter Mode now, the mode that fixes problems and drives people home.
The mode that's a substitute for understanding.
"C'mon. I'm dropping you off. End of discussion." He throws a glance at Nancy. "See ya, Nance."
"Bye, Steve."
The silence in the car is a thick, heavy blanket. He keeps glancing at you as he drives, his brow furrowed.
"You wanna tell me what's really going on?" he asks softly, after a full minute of quiet. "Did I... did I do something?"
The ugly thing in your chest twists.
“You laughed,” you say, the words so quiet they’re almost swallowed by the rumble of the engine.
He glances over, confusion etching deeper lines on his forehead. “What?”
“You laughed with her.” You finally turn your head from the window to look at him. The streetlights wash over his profile in intervals—light, then shadow, then light again. “You have a different laugh for her.”
He opens his mouth, then closes it. The confusion doesn’t clear. If anything, it deepens. “What, with Nance? ...Sweetheart, it was a joke about a bet."
"It's not about the joke," you whisper, hurt welling up in your chest. "Or the bet. I don't care about that. It was the sound."
You don't even realise you've started crying until you realise Steve's pulled the car over to the curb a block from your house. He turns fully in his seat to face you. “What sound?”
“Your laugh,” you say, your voice breaking. “You have one for me. And one for Robin, and one for Dustin. But the one you have for her… it’s real. It’s the you that existed before I ever showed up. And I can’t ever get to that part of you, because she was there first, and I’m just… I’m just the one who gets what’s left over after you’re done being real with her, and it sucks!"
Steve stares at you. For a long, terrible moment, he says nothing. The confusion on his face slowly melts away, replaced by something so sad it steals your breath.
“Oh, baby,” he breathes, the words full of heartache. “No. No, no, no.”
He reaches out, his hands cradling your face, his thumbs brushing away your tears.
“Okay,” he says, his voice low and a little rough. “Okay, listen. Let’s… let’s talk about this.” He takes a deep breath, but his thumbs keep stroking your cheeks, a gentle, constant motion.
“That laugh,” he starts, his eyes searching yours. “The one you heard back there. You wanna know what that was? That was me being a total dipshit. A clueless idiot. And it’s the sound of Nancy Wheeler being right and me being a thousand percent wrong about something that was right in front of my face the whole time.”
He gives a little, helpless shrug, his eyes never leaving yours. "She gets that laugh. But you... you get the me that's trying not to be dumb anymore. You get the guy who has to think about what he says before he says it, 'cause it matters so much more with you."
Your breath hitches, a little, but he's not done. "The laugh I have for you... it's quieter 'cause I'm holding my breath half the time. 'Cause I still can't believe you're here. With me."
Steve tugs your head closer, just enough so he can press a kiss to the top of your head. "I'm sorry," he murmurs into your hair. "I'm so sorry I made you feel second to a... to a memory of me being a jerk. You're first. You're always first."
He inhales sharply. "I'm yours, okay? You get me. The real me, the one who's terrified of screwing this up with you."
A wet, shaky laugh finally escapes you. "You're not screwing it up."
He pulls back, just enough to look at you. A slow, wobbly smile touches his lips. "Yeah? Good. 'Cause I was gonna have to, like, write you a whole speech or something. I'm not good at speeches."
"You're doing okay," you whisper.
Steve lets out a breath that's half a sigh, half a laugh—his your laugh. "Okay." He brushes a final tear from your cheek. "C'mon. Lemme walk you to your door. Gotta make sure you get inside safe. Rule number one."
He gets out, comes around, and opens your door. His hand finds yours, his fingers lacing through yours automatically, like they were made to fit there. The walk to your porch is quiet, but it's a different quiet. Softer.
At your door, he squeezes your hand. "I'll call you tomorrow, okay? First thing. We'll... I dunno. Get ice cream or something. Something that's just us."
He waits until you're inside, the lock clicking behind you. Through the window, you watch him walk back to his car, his hands shoved in his pockets. He doesn't drive away until your bedroom light flickers on.
You're so focused on the warmth in your chest that you don't even realise that ugly little thing's finally gone.
Could I please request Maekerx2nd wife reader. Neither one really wants it, but you do your duty. She starts falling for him but doesn’t think he will ever return the feelings so she tries to avoid him as much as possible, he thinks she hates him until he confronts her and the truth is revealed.
Thanks so much!
Hi Anon!
Thank you so much for the request, this was so much fun to write and I hope I did it justice!!
This Was Not Duty For Me
Maeker Targaryen x wife!reader—in which, he fell first and he fell harder, you just didn't know.
TW: 18+ MDNI; there is a sex scene, not long, just the wedding night. The reader is straight forward, mention of losing her mother. Reader is a good mother. I don't know. I think that's it!!
You were daughter of a Lord, a daughter in a world of marriage and alliances and tasks. A daughter in a land that needed you for one purpose and one alone.
Children.
Fertility, a womb, a place for children to grow. That was what the world required of you, nothing more and nothing less. A mother who could raise the children with a gentle hand, curbing them and waiting for their lord father to make them what he needed them to be. A womb for the husband and a mother for the child.
That was what your world made you.
All it made you.
You had reconciled yourself to your purpose from the time you were a child, from the time you were told that you would one day marry. Told that as if it were the only thing witch which you should be pleased by. The only thing that truly mattered.
The best that you could do.
And you have been waiting, waiting to find which lord would choose you, wish to pluck you like a flower from the gardens, one to put on display in a vase, watered and loved only until it starts to wilt, wither and die, then replaced by the next.
You have been waiting to become the cut flower, the one that only lives so much longer. Because once a flower is plucked from the gardens, it does not have long to live.
It blooms, is cut and withers, fades away.
And you have been waiting to become another withered bloom in a kingdom full of dying flowers.
You just didn’t think it would be today. You had fooled yourself into thinking you had more time, more freedom. More life.
You were wrong.
So very, very wrong.
“Which Targaryen, Father?” you ask, throat thick with tears, the mucus feeling clawing from your throat up to your mouth, tongue becoming thick. “Which one am I to marry?” Your father looks at you now, apology for the first time seen in his eyes, those eyes which match yours, his lips twisting down in apology, hands folding together, gnarled, withered fingers twisting around each other, rings rattling at the touch.
“Prince Maeker, the fourth born son of our good King,” he tells you, tone striving to be imperious and powerful, but falling, failing. You know he wanted more for you, his youngest daughter. You know he wanted a young lord for you, one that would be fit to be with you, one that could grow into love, but one cannot refuse the royal family.
It matters not how powerful your father is: When the royals call, all lords must answer.
And in this answer, your father has had to trade you. His precious daughter.
“I see,” you whisper, your hands clasped in front of you as you look down, bowing your head, tears lining your eyes as your lips press into a thin line, chest constricted and breathing hard. It’s not that the idea of princess is not appealing, it is the fact that you are to spend your life with a man who will never love you.
A man who publicly vowed to never love again.
You had always hoped that in your marriage, you would find a form of love, a form of affection and attachment. That you would be lucky like your mother and father and your…betrothed and his first wife. That luck of finding love in that whom was chosen for you.
But like most girls, your hopes are crushed with an iron fist—in your case, iron throne.
***
“You would truly marry this girl just to spare her from your sons?” Baelor asks Maeker now, the two of them waiting, standing stiff and rigid outside of the Red Keep, awaiting your arrival, awaiting the sigil of your house on cloth banners.
“My sons are not fit for marriage,” Maeker hisses, body rigid, frown firmly set, hands clasped and eyes focused solely on the road ahead. “One is a drunkard, one is a scholar and one is a cruel bastard. I would not saddle any woman to them, let alone one as kind as she.” Baelor looks over at his youngest brother, the way his jaw is clenched so tight that it is a miracle he still has teeth at all and the way his fingers tap an anxious rhythm against each other.
“You swore—”
“I know what I swore,” Maeker interrupts, turning to look at his brother with a fury in his eyes, a fury that few see and survive. He earned the name of the Anvil, not by being kind and someone who listens; he earned it for his brutality and cruelty. “I also know that this girl deserves better.”
“This girl,” Baelor whispers, his voice dropping as your carriage crests on the horizon, “deserves someone who can love her. A service you cannot provide.”
Those words sink into Maeker, hitting him with the force of a thousand hits of war, the idea of his act of saving really being the harm having never have occurred to him. And he wonders if you would have been better suited to his sons, would have brought out the good in them, brought out something in them.
If he should have let you find a love your own age.
“Many marriages are loveless, brother,” he replies instead, doing his best to shove the worries aside, to push past them, ignore them. Pretend they do not exist, that they are not valid. “She will learn that this is better. I may not provide love but at least I shall give security.”
“Maybe this girl does not want security,” Baelor whispers, the final word soon to be his as your carriage stops before them, the design simple and sleek. “Maybe she wants magic. Something you have not been able to provide for many years.” And in his words, Maeker can hear his brother’s grief, his oft repeated line Dyanna died and even though you are still here, you act like you are dead too. I feel like I burned my brother along with his wife and am now haunted by his image, his ghost.
“Brother—” he begins, but the carriage door opens, your Lord Father stepping out, holding his hand out to you, a radiant bloom, one that is pristine and preserved, as if behind glass. A flower to look at and never to touch.
“My lady!” Baelor calls out, stepping forwards, a smile growing across his face, one that is kind and gracious and real. Realer than anything he has seen on his brother’s face in a long while. “I trust your travel was fair?”
“As fair as travelling in a carriage with only one’s father for company can be,” you answer, your voice soft and lilting, carrying through the air with warmth and humour and lightness and Maeker can feel something inside him crack and crumble at the same time because he has only heard warmth like that when his love was alive, was wandering the castle, filling the corridors with laughter and cheer.
With love.
“My poor daughter,” your father chimes in, a smile gracing his face, one that is as real as Baelor’s, “has been trapped with me in an enclosed space for days. I fear that she cannot wait to get married if only to get away from me!” He breaks into a laugh as you turn back to him, a menacing look on your face, one that only succeeds in making him laugh harder and it is not hard to see from where you have gotten your warmth, your easy nature.
“Your mother was not able to accompany you?” Baelor asks and Maeker feels that familiar chill, the one of grief, of sudden loss and he watches as you and your father still, smiles becoming tight, strained.
“My mother passed away a few moons ago,” you answer, smile drawing sadder yet no less genuine, shifting to another form of joy, one tinged by loss yet also gain. One that Maeker has never seen; he has withdrawn, become cold, Daeron a drunkard, Aemon a scholar, Aerion a monster, Daella a demanding princess always irritated by some imagined slight, Aegon a loud and reckless terror, Rhae a little girl who woke with nightmares every night wandering to his bed asking him where’s my mama? a woman she has no memory of.
A woman who died to give her life.
“I’m so sorry, my lady, lord, for your loss,” Baelor says and when you flick your gaze to Maeker, he realizes that he has not spoken to you once, not said a single word of greeting. Not even my lady.
Nothing.
Maybe he is a ghost in his own skin.
“It is fine, Your Grace,” you answer, curtseying as if you had forgotten and possibly you had, but it truly does not matter because not even Maeker worried over the loss of decorum. He had not cared.
And that is his first sign that you mean something.
To him, that is.
“My lady,” he calls out now, his voice too loud, too gruff for the environment now. He curses it, the sound of it, the loudness but he notices that you don’t look shocked, you just look at him. Like looking at him is just something not anything important or hurtful. “Would you tour the gardens with me? Stretch your legs after a long ride?” His question is gruff and he expects you to refuse but you surprise him by nodding.
“Of course, Your Grace,” you reply, a small curtsy the other response. And then you are beside him, your hand enclosing around his elbow, grip light like a faerie touch, the scent of you—old books and some sort of flower—overwhelming him, intoxicating in its entirety. Intoxicating in the way that it overwhelms him, so distinct from Dyanna, a woman so gentle, scented with jasmine and roses, distinct and solid scents, ones that spoke of both Dorne and King’s Landing.
Her land and her home.
“I am so—” he begins but he does not manage much before you cut him off, holding your hand up to silence him as the two of you step through to the gardens together, steps in sync.
“Let us not pretend, my prince,” you tell him, voice strong, made of steel, just the faintest hint of brittleness in your tone, “that this is anything but duty. I must marry and your family has made you remarry, so this was a pairing that happened but it is not anything more than that. You need a mother for your youngest child, someone to rein in your elder children while you do what princes do and I shall be that, but you insult me by trying to make a mockery of me.”
“I intended no insult,” he tells you, bristling at the abruptness, the rudeness of your words while also cracking at the raw aching and vulnerability in you, in your voice and tone. It makes him realize how little you want this but also what little choice you have—you are a woman after all.
“No and that is the worst part. You do not intend insult and yet it happens anyways. That is the thing with men raised in power, you do not know the struggle of the women and what you think is proper is really just insulting so pleasedo not try to reason with me or say that is more than duty when I know it is not.” You look away from him, glancing down at the ground, the cobbled walk through the green of the grass, the gardens emerging before you, servants caring for the lawns, boys training to be men fighting in the yard.
And Maeker wants you to look at him.
It’s respectful to look at him, is all.
“You are quite opinionated, my lady,” he says, his tone brittle, rigid, angered and you look up at him, eyes flaring with an emotion he does not know, has never seen before yet has a feeling it is all he will see.
“Opinions are not truth,” you reply, your lips pressing into a thin line, the appearance making him want to press his thumb to them, try to even them back to normal, help them heal from the pressure, “and what I speak is truth. Do not pretend, my prince, that will ever be love when I know it will not be.”
“You know this?” he asks you, his tone arch as the two of you depart, stepping from the green onto the garden path, a fountain ahead.
“You were the one who publicly vowed to never love another,” you remind him, turning your head, attention falling on the flowers, falling on the careful way they’re tended to look wild while reminding everyone that nothing wild lasts.
That everything is tamed.
Even if it requires breaking them.
“You are right, my lady,” he tells you, voice low and rough, teeth gritting at the admission. He doesn’t like assuring you of the fact that you are right, he knows somehow that you will be more insufferable about it. The fact that he cannot deny your knowledge. “But I can give you security and a good life; a title as a princess. Is that not enough?”
You look up at him, a faraway gaze in your eyes before you blink, focusing back on him, lips still pressed thin. “It is enough, it is just not what I wanted. I had hoped for love, but I know now…” you pause, sighing and looking down, the gesture not structured or planned, designed to bring him rage or anger, rather just you. “I know now that that was simply a little girl’s fantasy. Not proper for the real world, my prince.”
“You will be well-cared for, my lady,” he assures you, feeling the need to give you something since he cannot give you your girlhood dream, the wish you still cling to in your heart.
“I have no doubt, my prince,” you say and the words, while said softly and sadly, give him a form of peace. A form of happiness and it is strange.
You are strange.
But strangeness is not cruelty nor stupidity and in truth, it is refreshing. You are so blatantly you that he never has to fear you hiding from him. You will give it to him as you see it, hear it, feel it.
You do not hide.
“My lady,” he interrupts the silence of the walk, his voice cutting through the sounds of wind in the trees, in the flowers and leaves; the sound of birds and insects, the chitter and chatter of nature. “I do not intend a mockery or insult with my question, but would you at least consider that we could be…friends perhaps?” He waits, for once understanding the saying of bated breath because he holds his breath, waiting for your reply. Your answer somehow mattering to him.
“Yes,” you tell him, a small smile growing on your lips, the kind of shared mischief, “I think we could manage that.”
***
It is scarcely dawn when you are awoken by banging on your door. Loud, frantic knocks that terrify you, the sound not unlike the morning you were awoken when your mother died, your father on the other side, broken and crying, shattered. A man laid bare by loss.
“Open this door, now!” calls a young, imperious voice, accompanied by open-handed smacks on the wood. You sigh and roll from the bed, taking your dressing gown and belting it over your nightgown, shuffling to the door, one arm bracketed around your stomach, the other smoothing your hair as you reach the door, pulling it open to reveal a girl of olive skin, dark hair and the piercing violet eyes of the Targaryen blood.
The eyes that glimmer with a look like death.
“What do you want, Princess Daella?” you ask, leaning against the doorframe, arms crossed and one eyebrow arched. No curtsy, no deference. Nothing.
“You will come with me, now,” she says and you shake your head, sighing once and stepping back into your rooms, hand going to the doorframe, preparing to close it.
“No,” you tell her and you watch as those eyes lit with a cruel and venomous gleam, dim, confidence waning and confusion reining in its place.
“I am a princess,” she says as if you need a reminder of her place, her position. Of the fact that one word from her bloodline can cause any noble lord to bend his knee.
“I don’t care,” you tell her, moving the door again, preparing to close it but stopping just slightly, it in line with the middle of your body, one half of you visible to her and the other hidden.
“Please?” she asks you and in her voice, you can hear that of a child mourning, that of a child lost. That of a woman who learned to be one without a guiding hand.
A girl who formed herself into what she thought she should be.
A girl who learned the measure of her bleed from a man not a mother.
A girl who only knows how to demand, never measured by a guiding hand.
A girl trying to be a woman without any idea of what one is.
“You know,” you begin, voice quiet, slightly lilting in the still morning air, “I lost my mother just five moons ago. I was awoken just like this morning to loud knocks on my door but instead of a spoiled princess on the other side who has learned that by being demanding she gets what she wants, I saw my father. Broken. And yet, even though my loss is newer than yours, I was expected to get up and travel here and marry your father. So, no, Princess. I will not. You want someone to guide you to be grown, find a better way of asking than demanding for we all carry our own scars. Yours does not make you special, Princess. Come back tomorrow when you have a better attitude.” And then you close the door.
And go back to bed.
***
The next morning, you rise, silence your companion as maids enter and help you dress, only the rustle of fabric upon your body and your hair swept up and away. The sounds of being noble, the sounds of being alone.
Because even in a room full of people you are alone.
And that was when you heard it—soft knocks on the door, delicate and quiet but no less present. It was why you stopped the maid that went to answer the door, instead doing it yourself, revealing Daella, more subdued in a gown of black and grey, her hair braided tight but no circlet of gold upon her brow. Rather, she looked like the child that she was.
“Princess,” you greet her, nodding your head, conscious of the way her violet eyes glimmer not with a Targaryen gleam of cruelty and venom, but instead of worry. Nervousness. Innocence.
“Would you please accompany me today, my lady?” she asks you, tone quiet, that of the child which she is, scarcely more than fourteen.
“I would, Princess,” you reply and then you step from the room, walking with her, your voices rising and falling through the stone corridors, echoing around, laughter and joy and peace. You learn that she is a girl who misses her mother, who needed her and she was not there. A girl who is trying to grow up without knowing how.
And you promise her that you are here now, that you will guide her. As is your role. As is what the marriage creates. You tell her that never will she be alone again, never will she go through pain alone again. You tell her that while you may not be her mother, you will be there for what her mother cannot be there for.
You tell her that you care, that you are here.
You tell her that you are not leaving.
And that was what she needed to hear. Precisely.
***
The next time Maeker sees his daughter, Daella, he sees not the demanding, irritated princess filled with scorn and ready with a harsh word for anyone. Instead, he sees a young girl with flowers in her hair and laughter in her eyes with kind words and pleasant manners.
He sees the girl he always thought she would grow into.
And he notices your proud smile. Your attentions.
And that stirring inside of him that he felt when he first saw you, that cracking and crumbling grows more.
Because you are repairing that which he cannot.
He does not know how he feels about that.
***
“Mama?” calls out a small voice, a frail voice. One cut through with terror, a tone that awakens you, pulling you from sleep as if it were your own child even though you have none. Will never have any of your own truly.
“Rhae?” you call out and you hear the shuffle of little feet, feel pressure on the bed and you sit up, adjusting, blinking your eyes as you watch a small shape of a child no more than three crawls onto your bed, towards you, one hand clutching a small object shaped like a star.
“Mama?” she asks again and then she’s flopping on you and you know what she is asking you. Are you her mother? Are you the mother that died when she was born?
“I will be,” you whisper and that admission is all she needs, burrowing deeper into you, whispering mama safeover and over as sleep pulls her down, little hands holding tight to you as you tuck her in under your blankets, holding her close, holding her against the fears of the world that she holds.
The fears that your presence seem to have managed.
At least for a little while.
***
The wedding is only days away when Maeker catches a glimpse of you in the gardens, head thrown back laughing, a full-bodied laugh, Rhae tucked up in your side, little hands holding onto you, Daella seated beside you, laughing with you as Aemon—Aemon—gesticulates wildly before you, re-enacting a scene of something.
And Maeker is taken aback because in that moment, he realizes that he has not been awoken by Rhae in many weeks. That Daella has not insulted anybody since your arrival and that the Maesters have stopped complaining of Aemon and his need for books and only books.
And the common key is you.
Somehow, in the short time you have been here, in the Keep, as his betrothed, you have begun to repair what Dyanna broke with her death, the thing that Maeker has not known how to fix, too buried in his grief, in himself.
In his own loss.
You have seen to the heart of his children in a way that he hasn’t been able to and even if it is only duty, this marriage, to the both of you, he knows now that he will you give the world if only because you have brought smiles back to half of his children.
You have done what he could never.
And for that, he will give you everything he can.
***
“You idiot,” you hiss, catching sight of Daeron, slumped and drunk, shirt coated in his own vomit, hair loose and lank, draped about his face. You shake your head, signalling for a maid, who approaches you with a smile, the staff of the Keep having grown to love you, you and the way you always acknowledge them and their efforts. The way you treat them as people. “Would mind bringing me a bucket of water? Cold, preferably, if that is possible, miss?”
“Of course, my lady,” she tells you, curtseying before you and then scurrying off as fast as she can to get you what you need as you walk cautiously towards the mass of a man on the floor before you. You nudge him with your toe, watching as he stirs, mumbling about fire and death and dragons and a queen of flowers emerging unscathed, a queen that brings salvation.
A dragon dreamer, you remember hearing. Dreams told in riddles to conceal dangerous truths.
Enough to drive anyone to insanity.
“Here you go, my lady,” the maid says, voice quiet and kind as you turn, taking the metal bucket from her, thanking her and dismissing the curtsey, telling her there is no need and then she departs and you lift the bucket, tossing the water over him, the water cold, cold enough to shock him, his body jolting to awareness, hand reaching for a dagger, movements too drunken to grasp anything at all.
“Get up, you fool,” you hiss, dropping the bucket, the sound of metal on stone echoing and he whines, his hands going to his ears, violet eyes squeezed shut against the light of candles, of flame.
“Go away,” he whispers and in response, you reach down and tuck your hands under his armpits, hauling him to his feet, pulling him up with a strength most people would be surprised you possess.
“You make a mockery of your family,” you tell him, voice louder than normal but by no means a yell, yet still something that makes him pull away from you, your steps sure and his sluggish, stumbling. “And that ends now. You have dreams that scare you,” you say as you reach his chambers, nodding at the guard to open them which he does, accompanying you as you haul the prince into his rooms, letting him drop onto the bed, “while so do other people. You have a family that needs you and a family that cares. You will change because I will make you.”
And then you walk away, leaving him to sleep, mumbling a curse in his sleep, one directed at you while you go to the staff, instructing them to limit his wine, a little more each day.
You will wean him off the substance, slowly but surely until he need it no longer, withdrawal not a bitch when done slower.
You should know.
You’ve done it for your father.
***
The wedding came too fast for Maeker’s liking, he would have preferred to stay alone and sullen, locked inside his room, using the last of Dyanna’s oils on what once was her pillow, trying to hold her too him even while the scent of you, of flowers and old books seems to permeate his mind, not even what once was Dyanna enough to drive it from his mind.
And now he is here, vowing to you before the Seven, vows which he does not think he can maintain. Vows he has sworn before, vows which he meant then. Vows which he first swore and still means, vows to Dyanna.
His only love.
And yet, the press of his lips against yours, the seal of the marriage sends a shock through his body, his skin feeling alive, no longer numb rather electric and pulsing. Like he was a ghost truly and your kiss has made him flesh again.
He does not know what to make of these strange feelings, nor what to make of the way you avoid him, rather finding his children, his son Daeron. Seeking out the children that you have vowed to take on as your own. You are no older than Daeron, in fact, you are younger—Aerion’s age—and yet you mother all of them.
He notes that now your touch has reached Daeron, his drunkard son no longer drunk, his hand enclosed around a cup of water, turning down the wine that people offer him with strained smiles, a smile that reads fuck off.
He notes that his children close around you, Daella on one side, Aemon on the other, Rhae on your hip and Daeron in front, talking and laughing and Maeker can feel that crumbling in his chest intensify because it looks, for all the world, like you and Daeron are the couple, surrounded by your children.
That your family is not with him, but with his son.
He doesn’t know why he cares. Only that he does.
***
The hall seems to stretch too long, too much distance to cover, knowing what must happen, knowing neither of you wants it but it must happen. Blood must dot the white sheet.
Which is why you follow Maeker, hands folded in front of you, fingers knotted together, knuckles white from holding onto each other as you walk, your two sets of footsteps echoing off the stone walls, the rowdiness of the ceremony still ricochetting off the walls, reaching you even now.
It had been a beautiful celebration, your new family most welcoming. All except the bridegroom who pressed a chaste, brief kiss to your lips with eyes closed and held breath.
The same man you must now lie with.
“I shall cut my hand,” he says now, the two of you on opposite sides of the bed, his lip curled in a sneer as he reaches for the dagger.
“No,” you tell him and he pauses, the blade hovering above his palm. “You will make a mockery of me in this way too, my prince? A wife who cannot even consummate a marriage? What would the court ladies think of me?”
“They would not know,” he protests and you shake your head, tears lining your eyes, stinging and you bite your lip, working it between your teeth.
“But I would,” you whisper, the sentence ragged and torn, dragged from your throat as an admission you did not want to give. You can see the change in Maeker, your husband, the change from a man just disinterested, to a man who cares.
You did promise friendship before.
“I shall ensure it does not hurt,” he whispers, setting the dagger back on his table, walking around to you. He unlaces your hands, setting them by your sides, his touch gentle, dangerously slow as he unlaces your gown, helping you out of it and your small clothes, laying you gently upon the bed, thumb tracing over your cheekbone in a tender gesture as he undresses himself, positioning himself lower, hands spreading your legs wide.
You feel exposed, a strange feeling in your lower belly, skin too tight and lungs not quite working right as he presses kisses to your inner thighs, that strange feeling in your belly growing hotter, coiling in a way that is new.
In a way that is strange.
His beard scratches at the sensitive skin of your inner thighs, his mouth finding the place between your legs, kisses pressed there that feel sinful, a strange wet feeling growing, that coil winding, breaths hitching. The feeling of him there is sinful, strange, but not unwanted.
You can scarcely feel anything at all, can barely think as he licks from entrance to clit, tongue working at you, fingers helping, the stretching and rubbing and shifting new and strange and painful but no less wanted.
You are barely more than a pool of sensations, the feeling so strange, so much that you feel hot all over, the scratching of his beard echoing throughout your entire body as he licks and thrusts and you come undone, the feeling so sinful that you feel disgraced until he rises, pushing into you, his hands taking yours, pressing them into the mattress as you hiss in pain.
He moves slowly and then waits until you tell him to move, that it’s okay and he continues, shifting into you, moving in and out, your blood upon him and the sheets, your maidenhood taken, given. You chose to give it to him and as he whispers praise, encouragement, you find you do not resent him nor regret it.
And it is done far sooner than you thought and he is beside you, his arms moving as if to hold you, but you rise on shaky legs, pulling your clothes back on, the evidence of your blood and release and his seed dripping down your scratched and sensitive thighs.
“Where do you go?” he asks you as you move, steps shaky, unsure.
“To my chambers, Your Grace,” you whisper, a strange thickness in your throat at the smell in the room, the smell of jasmine and roses, a woman who is not you, but rather that of the woman who had a place in his bed first.
A place in his bed always.
You realize that when you lay with him, you hoped. You hoped that maybe, just maybe, he would change, that something would come of this marriage but you can smell her all around you and you know.
There is no place for you in this life.
There never really was, only a small foolish part of your heart believed.
***
Maeker can feel your absence in the room as assuredly as he can smell you on the sheets, your scent so strong that he cannot smell Dyanna, the oils he spread around the room just this morning. Instead, he can only smell you, taste you, the earthy flavour of you lingering upon his tongue.
And he likes it, likes you, more than he cares to admit.
He needs you, wants you here beside him. Wants to hold you in his arms because you wanted him tonight. Or maybe, you truly did not want to be mocked, but whatever the reason, you moaned his name in a breathy way that he can still hear now.
And he wants you here, wants to hold you, wake to you in the morning, but since you have left, he contents himself to your pillow (he already thinks of it as yours, since it is your scent that lingers, not hers), holding it against his body, pretending.
Pretending, for the first time in three years, that it is not Dyanna.
No, he pretends that it is you.
***
Over the months, every interaction with Maeker only solidifies that feeling within you more, the feeling that yes, you have found in marriage, what you always wanted.
It is simply one-sided.
You are second to a woman who no longer lives. A woman who took your husband’s heart with her when she went.
And you aren’t even angry because you are the idiot who fell for a man who said he would never love another.
And most definitely, not you.
***
Maeker is frustrated. Extremely. Because he sees you everywhere in the castle yet you avoid him. You speak with Daeron, you study with Aemon, you train with Aegon—the boy no longer reckless, but rather well-behaved, attending all his lessons and boasting of his mother to all who will listen (the mother in question, being you)—shop with Daella and are never gone from Rhae.
You have even seemed to fix Aerion, the boy no longer a monster, but rather a prince with diplomacy, just an undercurrent of venom.
“You are a prince! Act like it, you motherfucking fool,” you had told him. “You resent your cousin so fucking be better than him. Don’t break people’s fingers when they displease you. You act polite and simply destroy them in a political, civil way. Be someone to proud of.”
You had even gone to Maeker, the one time that you had willingly sought him out, giving his heart reason to sing for weeks because you had looked at him. You had told him to spend time with his idiot son, that he wanted attention and so he should damn well give it to him for when he does good, not bad.
And he has.
And Aerion no longer destroys that which he touches, rather speaking diplomatically, keeping his opinions of being a dragon to himself.
You have repaired all the breaks in his children, but have only created more within Maeker. You have shattered him completely with your avoidance.
Every time he means to spend time with you and his children, you find some excuse to leave. Every time.
And he. Has had. Enough.
***
“Stop avoiding me!” Maeker yells out now, pushing into your chambers, face red and contorted with anger and irritation. “You are my wife and you do not even look at me. You said we could be friends and yet you do not even give me that!” You stand, sighing and setting your book aside, rising from the couch, reaching for your dressing gown, meaning to belt it but then he is there, stalling you, taking your hands in his.
His grip is warm and soft and hard all at the same time. He holds you like he needs too. Like he will break if he lets go, like you will disappear and he cannot have that. You swallow, feeling the thickening of your throat because the Seven are often cruel, but this is a new level.
This is taunting you with the care of a man you can never have.
A man who belongs to a dead woman, her ghost holding the place her body once held in life.
“I do not avoid you,” you say instead, pulling your hands from his, mourning the loss of contact as you step away from him, crossing your arms over your body, feeling vulnerable and exposed. “I simply have my duties as you have yours.”
“You avoid me,” he whispers, voice cracking. “I enter a room and you leave. You take dinner in your rooms if I am to be at the table. You raise my children but leave if I attempt to do so with you. Do you…” he pauses and you turn, noticing the way his face seems to fold, fall in on itself, doubt reflecting in those dangerous violet eyes.
Those perfect, beautiful eyes.
“Do I what?”
“Do you love someone else?” he asks and the question is so strange that you cannot help but release a bark of laughter, a cruel sound, cruel and cold and brittle. Ever so brittle.
“Do I love someone else?” you cry. “It is not I that loves someone else, my prince. It is you! No, I am the one who loves you! You who love a ghost!” And then the cracking laughter gives way to choked sobs and then he is there, pulling you against him and you are sobbing too hard to resist.
“I feared you loved my son,” he whispers into your hair as you cry, his hand rubbing soothing circles on your back. “But since you don’t, I may as well be honest with you.”
“Be—honest?” you choke out, pulling back just enough to look at him.
“I love you. I have from the day you arrived, I believe. And, this was never truly duty for me. I sought to save you from my sons because I saw something in you I thought they would break and I did not want them to break you,” he pauses, looking down at you, a hand rising to cup your cheek. “Perhaps I loved you before I knew you. Perhaps I chose to marry you because I loved you even then.”
“You useless fool,” you cry, the tears still pouring and he sighs, smiling just slightly at you, his own eyes filled with tears.
“I deserve that,” he whispers before leaning down and pressing a soft kiss to your lips, one that tastes of salt and despair and love and new beginnings. “Now, I believe you said I love you, but I do not think I heard you.”
“You mean I must repeat it?” you ask and he nods, the movement serious, but he not as betrayed by his smile. “Very well, husband. I love you, I love you, I love you.” And then he is kissing you again and again and again, steering the two of you towards the bed, whispering his own confession of love you every time he presses his lips to yours.
And as he lays you on the bed, the two of you hear the door creak open and he has just enough time to roll off of you, pulling you against him to hide the sight of his desire before Rhae appears, holding the stuffed star and looking tired.
“Mama, Papa,” she whispers, climbing up and onto the bed, landing right in between the two of you, “I had a nightmare again.”
“Shh,” you whisper, drawing her against you, smoothing back her white blond curls, “we’re here now. And we plan on going nowhere.”
And so, the three of you fall asleep in the bed, Rhae’s small body curled into yours, her hand on her father’s chest.
And your hand laced tight with Maeker’s, the two of you unwilling to let each other go even for sleep, needing to know that the other is real.
That moment when Shane and Ilya use each other’s first names? Easily a suspended-in-air moment. Everything goes quiet - the kind of silence where something big is about to crack open. And the show just lets us sit in it.
Because the second Shane’s guard drops, you see something bloom in Ilya. Not lust — soft affection, maybe the first flicker of something he can’t admit yet. And that kiss? He doesn’t go for the mouth. He goes for the cheek, rubs his nose, the kind of affection when you want closeness, not just heat.
The way he lifts his chin, leaning in, trying to get closer to Shane? That’s someone who is starving for affection and quietly asking for more.
And then it just… shatters
The recoil - you can see it hit Ilya like a cold wave the second Shane panics. Shane is spiralling into his own crisis, convinced things are getting too real. But from Ilya’s side? It feels like he opened his chest for one second… and scared Shane away.
The devastation on Ilya’s face when Shane lies about the “team meeting” is brutal. He knows it’s an excuse. Responsible, rule-following Hollander does not forget meetings. And the look he gives him - this tiny, incredulous really? — hurts more than the lie itself.
And then the worst part: he tries to slam his walls back up. Calling him “Hollander” twice like he’s desperately rewinding the moment, trying to pretend everything’s fine — we can go back to normal, right? His little head shake, the attempt to reassure both of them… but he’s gutted, and trying so hard not to show it.
It’s their first true emotional collision - two young guys, both terrified, both vulnerable in completely different ways. Shane overwhelmed and unsure; Ilya convinced that showing even a hint of affection pushed Shane away.
It’s heartbreaking. It’s beautifully acted. And it sets up their entire emotional arc so perfectly that I cannot stop thinking about it.
Can you imagine the first time Simon tells Grace and Rocky his opinion on a matter?
Like he’s just watching both Grace and Rocky argue about a science matter and Simon comes up with a solution himself and he interrupts them and tells them it but he’s extremely nervous because the COI have their own way of doing things and if you think outside of the box or have your own opinions you will be punished.
Grace tells him that his idea is fucking genius and gets him to tell him more and Simon is like “you….really like my idea?”
“Of course! It’s perfect! I am a little upset I didn’t come up with it myself.” Grace chuckles but he’s shaking his head at himself mostly.
Simon takes the last part as Grace genuinely being upset and he apologises when Grace frowns a bit. “What are you apologising for? You have nothing to apologise for.”
pairing: avenger!bucky barnes x avengers fem!reader | word count: 3.8k
warnings: slight angst and feelings of loneliness; bucky is a man who yearns; reader is a hopeless romantic
prompt: sending/receiving love letters - day one of @wildflowersandvibranium and @pinksplace galentine's event!
summary: you receive a letter under your door — no name, no clue as to who it's from — just a sweet message and pressed lavender. the next day, there's another and then another — but they couldn't possibly be from the brooding man you'd been crushing on, right?
a/n: first Bucky fic ahhhh kinda nervous 🙈 i'm sorryyy this is like 3 days late but I wanted to still post it! (i had given up on this fic but then had motivation for it this morning)
“Oooh, what’s that? Looks fancy.” Nat snatches the letter out of your hand. You had walked into the kitchen beaming, scanning the room until you found Nat sitting at the table eating an apple, practically skipping over to her—letter in hand. It’s a simple enough envelope, paper worn thin like someone had held it too long before putting it under your door while you slept.
“Oh my god, give it backkk,” you whine, reaching for it as Nat holds it out of reach. It was half-hearted really. You had wanted to show her, in that silly girly way — squealing and jumping up and down, giggling about your secret admirer.
You couldn’t help the smile that came to your face, opening the letter to show her.
“So it could literally be anyone. There were hundreds of people at the party last night,” you sigh, folding the letter back into the envelope, carefully placing the lavender back in.
“Well I mean not anyone if it was left under your door this morning.” Nat looks around the room, eyeing out the potential prospects.
“What’re you looking at Barnes?” She spits out, chin jutting in his direction.
Bucky had been glancing over at the two of you, trying and failing to be discreet — barely listening to Steve sitting across from him. He squints at Nat, staring her down with the kind of intensity that would make anyone else wish the ground would swallow them. You give him a small smile and his face softens.
He’d always been softer with you than anyone else. When Steve had first brought him to the tower, you’d been first to greet him with a smile on your face — gentle, inviting. Where others had been wary, you’d been curious. Where they had been avoidant, you’d been caring — buying him his favorite tea, checking in on him, dropping off books you had read that you thought he might like. You had slowly become his confidant, his safe space and he yours.
“Nothing,” he grumbles, walking out of the room without another word, his heart pounding out of his chest, face hot and throat tight like he hadn’t drank water for days.
Fuck fuck fuck why did I leave the letter?
Bucky paces back and forth in his room, chewing his lip and raking his hands through his already messy hair.
But she looked so happy.
Bucky smiles to himself as he remembers your little jump, your bare feet hitting the floor, hair messy like you had just woken up. He remembers the way you hadn’t stopped smiling all morning, your voice high and excited as you showed Natasha the letter.
She doesn’t even know it’s from you, idiot.
He lets out a loud groan as he falls back onto his bed, landing with a soft thump, hands running down his face in frustration. He contemplates his desk — the envelopes laid out next to the scrunched pieces of paper (the letters he’d started and thrown to the side, exasperated), the sprigs of lavender that had fallen on the floor, his pens sprawled out, and sits down to write out another letter.
He ponders what to write, determined to sign his name this time. He decides to keep it simple, adding a poem he had read that reminded him of you.
Just write it. Just write your name. Just sign it. Bucky Barnes. Or just Bucky. Write it.
He doesn’t.
He folds the letter up, puts it into an envelope, adds another piece of lavender (you had seemed to like that — he had noticed you taking it back out of the envelope, pressing it to your nose with a smile). He waits until he knows you’ve gone to sleep, and slides it under your door.
“What’s that smile you’ve got on?” Nat eyes you out as you walk into the kitchen — the way you’re rocking back and forth on your heels, cheesy grin on your face, hands clasped behind your back.
“I got another letter,” you giggle, pulling it out from behind you.
You’d always wanted a secret admirer. A valentine. Always were a hopeless romantic in a way you hardly let show. Previous partners had never really indulged that side of you — always treating it like a burden that you wanted flowers and spontaneous gestures and planned out dates — so you had slowly let it go, convincing yourself it was too much.
“Ooh show me.” Nat reaches for the envelope.
“It’s just soooo,” you let out a squeal, before quickly covering your mouth, regaining your composure.
“It’s so sweet, the little poem he added. I love it. I wonder who it could be from.”
“Who even writes letters anymore?” Nat lets out a small scoff, before muttering a ‘sorry’ and handing the letter back when she notices your face fall.
Bucky’s sitting at the counter, eating breakfast when he chokes on his cereal and the two of you look over at him, questioning. Sam gets up and slaps him on the back — much harder than necessary, laughing as Bucky glares at him.
He’d been quietly eavesdropping, smiling into his bowl at your little squeal, his heart picking up when you’d said you love it.
You go about the next week as usual — attending meetings, training in the gym, working on your latest project and coming back from a successful mission — trying hard to not think about your secret admirer. You had received a new letter each day.
They were all simple messages. Sometimes they included a small gift — a small chocolate, a bookmark, more flowers. You had been giddy all week, however the excitement had started to die down once you realized they may never sign their name.
It’s Friday and you’re exhausted from the long week, showering the day off and settling into a soft pink t-shirt and matching shorts, tying your hair loosely behind you before making your way into the living room. Bucky and Steve are sitting on the couch next to the floor-to-ceiling windows, watching a movie, a bowl of popcorn settled between them. Bucky’s sprawled out in his black sweatpants and grey henley, smiling up at you when you enter the room. He shifts without realizing, making space for you — the way he always does.
Bucky can’t help the way his heart stutters when you curl up next to him, legs tucked under you, fuzzy socks resting against your bare thighs. Your knee presses against his — your body naturally gravitating towards his. The smell of your shampoo wraps around Bucky like a warm blanket — coconut and mango and something so you — he wants to drown in it. Wrap his arms around you and pull you into him. But he doesn’t. His fingers twitch at his sides instead.
He reaches for the popcorn, hand brushing yours when you reach at the same time. He’s focusing harder on trying to not look over at you than what’s playing on the screen. You lean your head on his shoulder like it’s the most natural thing in the world — because it is. Bucky feels something melt inside him when your hair brushes his neck and it takes everything in him to not reach over and brush aside the piece that had fallen into your eyes.
You sigh softly, eyes drooping as the tiredness of your day washes over you. You settle into Bucky’s side further, trying to not make it too obvious that you’re melting into him like that’s where you belong. The smell of his soap mixed with that warm smell that was so Bucky makes your head spin and your eyes flutter shut.
You don’t remember going to your bed before falling asleep. Don’t remember the way Bucky had carried you while you grumbled nonsense against his neck. The way he had placed you down gently, hovering over you like he wanted to kiss your forehead, but had decided against it in case you woke. Bucky looked at the letters placed out on your desk — open like you had been reading them over and over — and makes his mind up to tell you they’re from him.
Tomorrow. When you wake up.
Bucky gets dressed the next morning — a pair of sweatpants and a worn t-shirt he uses for the gym — brushing his teeth and fussing with his hair like it might change. He trims his beard slightly, never shaving it after he’d overheard you one day saying you like a man with a beard. Gives himself a pep talk in the mirror, taking a deep breath before shaking his head at himself. He paces back and forth a few times before mustering up the courage to walk down the hallway to your room.
Before he reaches your door, he notices it slightly open, your voice travelling under the door. He’s about to take another step when he hears Nat.
“So who do we think the secret admirer is?”
“I don’t knowww.” You pause, thinking to yourself before continuing, “maybe it’s Nate from research? He’s kinda cute and he seems like the romantic type, he asked me on a date last week.”
Bucky feels jealousy rise hot and fast in his chest, hands clenching at his sides. Fucking Nate.
“Did you say yes?”
“I said I’d let him know.”
“He didn’t mention the letters?”
“No… but maybe he wanted to wait until I said yes?”
You hear a crash from outside your door — Bucky having stumbled when Steve had turned the corner and bumped into him full force.
You hear a muttering of ‘Sorry man, didn’t see you there’ and ‘S’fine’.
“You lost, Barnes?” Nat questions with a smirk on her face, arms crossed over her chest as she pushes the door open to look at them.
“No I was just—” Bucky trails off, walking away before he embarrases himself further.
“Imagine it was Bucky.” Nat gasps, laughing.
Bucky stops in his tracks, heart speeding up as he tunes in to your conversation.
“What? No way.” You scoff, laughing louder at the suggestion.
Bucky’s heart drops. He feels the hope die in his chest, his dreams crushed in a split second. He drags himself away from your door, trying to swallow the raw feeling in his throat, heartbeat ringing in his ears.
He had mistaken your tone for indifference — your nervous laugh for humor.
Little did he know how hopeful you were — how your heart had skipped a beat at his name, flaring with hope at the thought of him sitting there carefully writing out letters, writing out your name. There was something so intimate about the thought of his hands carving your name out in ink, marking it like it was something important to him.
You had silently hoped it was him, your heart fluttering at the possibility that he liked you back. It was stupid. If he did — he would’ve said something. Would’ve hinted at it, shown some sort of sign. But he hadn’t. At least, in your mind.
So stupid Bucky, why would she want the letters to be from you? She probably thinks they’re from some great guy who’s right for her, someone who’s good. Not him.
His head drops to his hands, heart aching with a loss he didn’t quite understand. You weren’t his. Never had been. He thinks back to all the times you’d made him breakfast, all the times you’d offered him books like they were small pieces of yourself. The way your body rested into his like he was safe. Like he was yours. You were probably just being nice to him. Probably took pity on the guy no-one else bothered much with.
Yeah it had to be that.
So Bucky stops. He stops sending letters. He stops trying to impress you, hoping you’d turn around and notice him. He stops following you around like a lost puppy. He stops leaning on you when he’s tired. Stops coming to you when he needs to vent. The loneliness of it hits him harder than he expected. It hits you too, but you’d never been one to push Bucky — always letting him come to you, never wanting to scare him off or make him uncomfortable.
So you sit back quietly and watch as the man you care for so deeply pulls himself away.
With no explanation.
You had become accustomed to receiving the letters, disappointed when there isn’t one at your door. You treasure them — have a small stack of them carefully placed on your desk, your heart giving a giddy jump every time you see them. You admire the handwriting — something familiar about it in that way where you remember the tune to a song but not the lyrics — driving you crazy trying to figure it out.
The scent of lavender and something warm and comforting you can’t quite place your finger on. The soft smudges of ink, like he had been worrying over what to write next. The careful way the seal was pressed down, the way there was always a little pressed flower with each.
It had been weeks since the last letter. Weeks since your last movie night with Bucky. And the loneliness hits you hard. You scroll on your phone until there’s nothing left to look at, text friends that take hours to respond. Swipe through dating apps, answering messages like ‘wyd?’ and ‘u up?’
You miss the letters.
But you miss Bucky more.
“What’s going on with you Buck?” Steve sits across from Bucky in his room, watching as his best friend shrugs with a blank look on his face.
Steve probes further; asks about you, why Bucky hasn’t been talking to you much, why he’s been avoiding you like no tomorrow.
Bucky sighs, dragging his hand down his face. He’s tired. He feels it deep in his bones, the questions dragging through him like sandpaper. He winces at the sound of your name.
He misses you.
More than he cares to admit.
So he tells Steve about the letters, about how he’d overhead you with Nat, laughing at the thought of it being Bucky that had sent them.
Steve shakes his head in disbelief.
“God, you can be stupid sometimes Buck.”
Bucky looks up so fast, frowning at Steve in a way that could only mean he had no idea what Steve was talking about.
“She likes you. Anyone can see it. You know you’re the first person she asks about when we get back from a mission. The first person she runs to when she’s been hurt. She curls up to you like you’re the only thing that keeps her safe. I’ve seen it, Buck.” Steve places his hand on Bucky’s knee, punctuating his words.
Bucky feels like he could cry as he takes it all in. He’s looking at the floor, shaking his head in disbelief.
Keeps her safe.
He couldn’t imagine anyone thinking of him as their safe space. Not after everything he’s done. Everything he is. Was.
He remembers the way you’ve come to him late at night when you’d had a nightmare, trusting him to be the one to bring you back to reality. The way you’d call him when you felt unsafe on a night out. The way you’d tuck your face into his chest when watching a scary movie.
Bucky furrows his brow, head dipping to rest in his hands as he lets out a loud groan.
“Buck, listen, her laughing and saying ‘no way’ was probably at herself because she wants it to have been you, but she doesn’t want to get her hopes up.”
“You think?”
“Yeah I do.” And who couldn’t believe Steve when he nods at you all solemn and smiles like he’s got all the answers.
They talk for hours; Bucky finally starting to believe that maybe — just maybe — you feel the way he does. That you’d wanted the letters to be from him. That you wanted him to be yours. That the only reason you hadn’t said anything is because you wanted him to be ready.
You’re dragging your feet down the hallway to your room. You were supposed to be on a mission — a quick in and out — when Tony had insisted you take the day off. You had protested loudly but he wasn’t having it, sending you to your room to rest after your eyes had slipped shut for the fourth time during the briefing.
“Bucky?”
He’s standing at your door, back turned when he whips around at the sound of your voice.
“Doll— you’re— I um—” He scratches the back of his neck, eyes avoiding you like he might catch on fire if he looks at you.
Your eyes land on his metal hand.
Your heart stops.
A letter.
You feel as though you could fall over — a million emotions running through you at once.
Bucky’s frozen. Feet stuck in place like they’ve been cemented to the floor.
Say something. Anything.
“I was just—”
“Bucky, I swear to god if this is some kind of joke—” Your eyes tear up, blood rushing to your face fast.
Bucky’s head whips up at that, moving over to you so quickly, it knocks the wind out of you. You inhale sharply as his eyes meet yours. So blue and beautiful. He’s so close.
“It’s not a joke doll, I swear.”
“So…so they were from you? And you weren’t joking?” Your breathing picks up, eyes boring into his, heart slamming against your ribs as his scent washes over you, his warmth.
“I’m sorry. It was so stupid. I only meant to leave you one. But then I saw you grinning and showing off to Nat and you looked so happy…I just—” He trails off, flesh hand coming to meet yours, letting his finger hook into the bracelet on your wrist, as if to ground himself.
“I just— I just wanted to see you smile like that again. I wanted to be the reason you laughed. The reason you were so happy. I— I always…” his voice trails off, his head hanging like he’s ashamed.
“Bucky…” Your voice is warm, torn around the edges, limbs heavy and chest burning bright. Your right hand comes to rest on the side of his face and Bucky melts into it, eyes fluttering shut.
“Do you— do you want to read it?” He’s holding out the letter. You pull your hand away from him, stepping back slightly and Bucky involuntarily leans towards you. He wants to pull you back in by your waist — wants you to crowd his personal space like his and yours are one and the same.
You bite your lip, holding back a smile as you nod slowly, already reaching for the letter.
“Bucky I— I—” You let out a soft sniffle, wiping your nose with the back of your hand, hands shaking slightly as you grip the letter, creasing the edges.
Bucky’s eyes search your face frantically.
“Fuck sweetheart you’re crying. I knew I shouldn’t have—”
He’s cut off by your hands on either side of his face, the letter scratching his skin slightly.
“Bucky. I love it. I’ve loved every single letter.”
You fold the letter into your pocket, hands coming to rest on his face again, thumb stroking his jaw lovingly as you gaze into his eyes. His flesh hand comes to rest over yours, breath catching in his throat at how close you are. You’re so beautiful like this. All soft and teary and looking at him like he’s the most precious thing in the world.
Your arms wrap around his neck, hugging him close to you, hands tangling in the hair on the base of his neck as your lips come to rest at his ear. Bucky pulls you in closer, metal hand resting on the small of your back as his face molds to the shape of your neck.
“I forgive you Bucky. Thank you, I mean it. For the letters, for the flowers, the poem, the bookmark; for apologizing, for telling me how you feel. All of it. It was…perfect.”
You pull back to look at him, fingers still gently tracing the skin on the nape of his neck.
“And— and I’m kind of crazy about you too. You’re my safe space. The only person I want. I was…” Your head drops shyly.
“I was secretly hoping they were from you.”
Steve was right.
Bucky lets out a soft laugh, letting his forehead rest gently against yours. His fingers trace your waist softly, palms pressing into your sides.
“Yeah?”
“Yeah.” You can’t help the stupid smile on your face, grinning through tears as Bucky’s nose nudges yours in the softest, gentlest moment.
“Can I— can I kiss you?” He says it so softly, he’s worried you don’t hear him.
You nod.
Bucky’s lips meet yours — soft and sweet and full of every single feeling he’s been holding back — pouring everything he has into the way his lips move with yours. You taste like strawberry gum and cherry chapstick.
It’s intoxicating.
Bucky wants more, more, more. He kisses you harder, hand gripping your jaw, guiding your mouth along his. Your knees almost give out when his tongue softly traces yours, pressing yourself into him until there’s not a single part of you that isn’t consumed by him.
You pull back, lips swollen and breathless, forehead resting against his. You let out a soft laugh as Bucky’s lips chase yours, leaving soft pecks before he pulls back, grinning.
Your eyes meet his — soft like he can't quite believe this is happening.
“Yes, I’ll go on a date with you Bucky.”
a/n: i might post a version where the letters are just text because they're a bit hard to read as pics.
taglist: @quantumbarnes @daydreamgoddess14 (if you'd like to be added, please leave a comment on this post)
