#sugarshocked

[glencoburn]

Moon Pies Unite! #moonpies #delicious #sugarshocked https://www.instagram.com/p/B3qcBKtl8YEmyzRkpHkE0b0hPQhE3lg4PE_AK00/?igshid=3y06qnnyw4ng

[scaredykate]

sugar-shocked, chapter ten.

it's time for ~*halloween edition*~

forgive me my angst/crack. 

Halloween rolls around quicker than anything and Peter hasn’t slept for what looks like days, up all night with recipe books and there are post-it notes all over his bedroom. 

Each morning at some ungodly hour he drags himself out of bed and Gwen tries to sling one arm across him, tries to pin him down, keep him there for a little while longer, only half-serious but Peter just smiles soft and sweet, presses kisses to her wrist, to her elbow, to any skin he can reach, and slips away. She sleeps again because the morning is cool but the bed is warm and she smiles into sheets that smell like him and smell like them and, and. When he comes back, she’s asleep, lulled by the sound of the rain outside and him singing faintly in the shower—he thinks he doesn’t, but he does. But she wakes again when he kneels beside her, arching over her, his smile a sunrise.

“C’mon,” he says, almost every morning, arching over her, all long lines and messy hair and that bright, bright smile. “if Aunt May catches you sleeping here again, she’ll have my ass.” It’s a lie, every time, they both know it, but Gwen still tumbles out of bed. And her hair is a mess, too, but she’s smiling, two idiots in love, sort of, somehow, and something else entirely at the same time. She’s pulling her clothes on, trying to stay quiet, treading lightly on the too-cold wood of his floor, her fingers reaching out sometimes to curl in his hair or tug on the corner of his shirt for a moment because she can, because they have this, because, because. “You look tired,” her voice is hushed and sincere, and he ducks his head when he smiles, pushing his suit into his backpack like always, and she loves him for it and she also aches.

They’re just two kids with the vast expanse of pain that should only belong to adults, or no one at all. They go to school, and they go to work, and they swallow it all down or keep it humming just beneath their skin and if there’s a hollow look in Gwen’s eyes sometimes, she can’t help it. Because there are things that still hurt, things that still wake her in the middle of the night, eyes burning with tears she’s been shoving back and back and back. And on nights like those, she curls against his back until their breathing matches up, her fingers running patterns up and down his rocky spine because when he sleeps, he sleeps like the dead. Soon, he’ll shift in sleep, turn to her, and she will pull him against her so she can feel his heartbeat and know she’s safe, at least for now. There aren’t words for the things they’ve buried, but they try to spill them out, try to keep each other afloat. It’s not all bad. It’s not all good. It just is.

 Halloween is hard because her dad used to take her out Trick or Treating, and when she grew out of it, they both took the boys out because Halloween was sugar and simplicity and happiness and she holds onto memories like lifelines. She’s not angry at Peter. She’s not angry at anyone, but sometimes she’s just angry. And sometimes, she’s just sad. When Peter’s sad he tries to shut her out, tries to shut everyone out because he feels like the sadness in him is his responsibility and his burden. She calls bull every chance she gets. Halloween is different types of pumpkin bread being shoved into her face past laughter, and Halloween is eighteen different kinds of candy wrappers strewn across her bedroom floor as they sit cross-legged testing them all out like children, the chocolate tingeing the in-between kisses that are anything but child-like. Halloween is full of memories but now it’s full of memory-making and it’s sugary sweet and she loves him more than ever.

 She’s in a coffee shop full of superheroes and everyone is dressed up for Halloween like they’re kids again, and Peter’s laughing and laughing and laughing. Tony’s got on Steve’s Captain America Suit and is strutting around with a plastic painted shield. Steve’s got this frown on his face but everyone knows he’s just trying not to laugh, his cowboy hat tipped back on his head. Bucky’s dressed as the Mad Hatter, and he can’t keep his hands to himself (after-effects of the spiked pumpkin spice latte). Clint is in the corner, sipping an Americano, blond Legolas wig shimmering in the light. Nat, of course, is nearby, dressed as a vampire, and she periodically reaches over to tug on Clint’s wig. Bruce is dressed as Frankenstein, drinking tea and sharing a muffin calmly with Pepper, who is dressed as Rosie the Riveter. Thor brings Jane and they’re matched as Beast and Beauty, respectively. Jane smiles, demure, shrugs, says, “It’s his favorite film.” Everyone likes her immediately.

And then there’s Peter, leaned against the counter, all long lines and messy hair and that bright, bright smile, his Where the Wild Things Are crown on but tipped lopsided and Gwen flashes him her brightest smile because he’s worth every bit of the pain they’ve felt together. She looks down at her 50’s I Love Lucy dress and she looks at her hands and remembers how she felt, what feels like forever before, asking the stupid boy out because he couldn’t work up the nerve. She remembers the shy, slow burn of his smile and she leans across the counter to kiss him hello. She is in a coffee shop full of superheroes and there is not enough pain in the world that could keep her from being right where she is. 

[scaredykate]

sugar-shocked, chapter nine. 

(yeah it's one of those days i go to a coffee shop and write sappy fic)

A particularly nasty cold snap hits in full force in October, and Tony Stark finds out Peter Parker’s secret. 

It happens on accident, of course, not the way that Peter told Gwen. Because while Peter knows he’s in a coffee shop full of superheroes seventy-five percent of his life, he can’t seem to wrap his head around actually coming out and saying, “hey, look, on top of doing homework, taking the most lovely girlfriend in the world on dates, and working at this wonderful little coffee shop, I also fight crime. Surprise!” He just can’t, so he keeps his mouth shut and serves them coffee because having is better than not having and he’s experienced both and never wants to again. He’s not scared of judgment, he’s just scared in general. Responsibility is hard and the fact of the matter is that secrets are necessary sometimes.

 It happens on a Thursday, when his police scanner in the back room is still on the fritz and Gwen has to call him to tell him that the kidnapping ring had a resurgence. He doesn’t have time to put up the closed sign, but it’s almost midnight and the shop is dead empty anyway, so he rummages through his backpack for the suit, already pulling his apron and shirt off, unbuckling his belt. That is, of course, when he hears the bell of the front door ring. Frozen, half-dressed in clothes, half-dressed as Spider-man, eyes squeezed tightly shut, he waits with his breath held tight inside his chest. “Peter, I’m twenty seconds from a break through but I needed a pastry, where are you?” Tony calls, casual, his voice coming from somewhere near the counter.

 “Could you—” Peter starts, then stumbles over his feet, tripping on the ends of his jeans, has to rebalance himself. “Could you give me just one second?” His voice comes out too strained and he flinches because Jesus Christ, please don’t let Tony come back and see. “Are you okay, kid?” Tony says, voice closer, and Peter feels himself go cold, unable to process or think fast enough to aver the inevitable as Tony pushes the back-room door open and peeks in. “H-Hi,” Peter says, stupidly, tries a smile for good measure, his arm still half in the suit. He doesn’t know how to think or what to think, he just stares, and Tony stares back, blinking. “Holy shit,” he says. “Yeah,” Peter says, apologetic. “Holy—”  he starts again, but Peter just says, “yeah,” again as well and they keep staring, both incapable of words. 

 “You’re Spider-man,” Tony states, very slowly. “At least, I’m pretty damn sure that’s not a Halloween costume.” Suddenly, he’s in Peter’s close proximity, lifting one arm, eyeing him up and down, as if measuring his body type mentally. “No, no, you are. Same body type, same suit-style, too accurate, oh my god,” he’s muttering under his breath now more than actually talking, and Peter looks anxiously at his broken police scanner and the back door. “Yeah,” he says, voice very soft, unsure of how to proceed. “Yeah, I am. But we can, we can forget this ever happened and I can get you that pastry and I can close the shop and then I can go stop a kidnapping ring, right?” Tony stares, blinks, then starts to grin, wild and almost ferocious. “I’m not forgetting anything, Peter Parker. Let’s go stop a kidnapping ring, shall we?” Peter is already pulling on the rest of his suit but he stops to snap his head in Tony’s direction. “We? What, no, Tony, I’m getting you a pastry and then—” Tony puts one hand unceremoniously over Peter’s face, which clearly is meant to express God love you, kid…but no chance in hell. 

[scaredykate]

sugar-shocked, chapter eight. 

It took Pepper Potts a grand total of three minutes to notice the vast expanse of Steve and Bucky’s heart-breaking story of unrequited love—it would have taken her less, but she was busy with paperwork at the time, seeing as she runs a company essentially on her own. But she still saw it, still catalogued it into her memory, smiled sadly at Steve because she could see all his raw edges underneath the strong exterior, just like she had seen Tony’s. She’s a good reader, and if she’s given enough time she can tell you anyone’s story.

Of course, mostly she’s concerned with one story, Tony’s, because he’s always on the edge of some sort of chaos, some sort of danger, and she used to worry, but now she can shoot a forty-five and has heels that could impale someone, so she can protect him if she needs. Not that she’s planning on impaling anyone—just that she could.

She watches them across the coffee shop, the small, strange, lovely little place that seems to have brought an unpredictable family together. She watches Steve miss all the times that Bucky’s hand lingers on the table near his, watches Bucky laughing at Nat and missing the way Steve’s eyes follow him like he’s drawn to him (which he probably is). She watches all the intricacies of their friendship because she can see them, she watches the series of almost-interactions, almost, but not quite. She watches and wonders how two people with so much connection can be so disconnected. Tony is, of course, distracted, animatedly discussing proton bonds with Bruce, because they can, and Pepper curls her bare feet underneath her legs and smiles because she doesn’t miss the way Tony’s hand finds hers. She doesn’t miss the way his hand always finds hers. She watches Steve, watches Bucky, then looks at Tony and wishes that they too could just touch, wishes their dissonance could resolve.

“Painful, isn’t it?” Peter asks, sinking onto the arm of the sofa, apron slung over his shoulder, smiling like he knows all the secrets of the universe. Maybe he does, Pepper wouldn’t really be surprised at this point. She smiles back, takes another small sip of her chai, says, “What do you mean?” Peter gestures vaguely towards Steve and Bucky, sighs this wistful sort of sigh. “Don’t you want to just push them together?” He punctuates his words with undecipherable hand gestures and pulls his lower lip between his teeth, bites, as if anxious for their fate. “I can’t imagine what you mean,” she replies, playing coy, but smiles sad and warm because she knows and he knows and it’s heart-wrenching and frustrating and it’s practically unfixable from the outside, and it goes so tragically unnoticed on the inside.

Peter sighs, wistful, as they both watch the way Bucky misses Steve passing him the last of his croissant. “Hurts,” he breathes, tapping his heart lightly with one hand before pushing himself off the couch and away again, like the flighty, lithe thing he is. Pepper watches him go and the slow warmth of a realization creeps into her, how one kid can hold together so many contradictions—he sees everything and understands everything. He listens and learns and loves, and this is what makes him irreplaceable. “Peter?” Pepper calls him back, gentle, slipping her hand out of Tony’s briefly to stand up. “Peter Parker, you are spectacular, has anyone told you that recently?” Peter stands there, head tilted to the side as if confused, as if her words were lost in translation.

“Geez, Pepper, I think you broke him,” Tony quips, but Pepper just keeps her eyes on Peter, who blinks quickly for a second or two before smiling, disarmed, wide, honest, and stupidly pleased. Next thing Pepper knows she has a thin-as-a-whip, messy haired barista-shaped body wrapped around hers, all long limbs and a warm heartbeat.  There are words spilling out of him and onto her, an endless litany in varying shades of, “that’s so nice, wow, thank you” and she laughs because he’s sweeter than sugar and warmer than sunshine and it sounds stupid but it’s also true. He pulls away soon, but only to plant a swift kiss on her cheek for which Tony starts to berate him for, but Peter just grins bright and wide and darts away quicker than anything.

Pepper’s left, then, to her thoughts yet again, as she sinks back down onto the couch and curls her fingers around her mug. In the lull left in the conversation by Tony’s Peter-shaped distraction, Bruce turns to ask her kindly why she’s barefoot when it’s almost winter out and she has to laugh, eyes crinkled up, because she doesn’t really know why she made that particular choice. “I’ve been in the tropics for a few weeks, I haven’t readjusted to the weather yet, I guess,” she replies, her phone beginning its familiar, incessant ringing of the afternoon hours. She glances towards Bucky who’s constantly cold, and then towards Peter who’s sunshine-warmth could light up a room, and she wonders at the impossibility of the people in the same room together, and wonders if Peter isn’t, in fact, a secret superhero also. 

[scaredykate]

sugar-shocked.

(because i am the most predictable human being alive, warning for bucky barnes sap???)

seven |

It’s really not that Bucky Barnes is a coffee snob—in fact, it’s sort of the opposite, because after being raised on two cent coffee from the man on the corner before working much-too-long shifts for a much-too-young kid, and then being shipped off war where it’s shit coffee or no coffee at all, Bucky can down just about anything if you call it coffee, as long as it’s strong enough that he can make it through the rest of the day without dragging his heels. 

So, the fact of the matter is that Bucky could probably go anywhere and be fine, so it’s not really the coffee that has him curled up on that old, faded couch in the corner of Marvel Café, though he has to admit, it’s pretty damn good. The fact of the matter is that Bucky has ulterior motives, and Peter is enabling him. “You’re enabling me,” he groans one day, muffled because he’s speaking into one of the couch cushions, high top converse curled up underneath him. Peter huffs a sound somewhere between a laugh and a scoff, half amusement and half disbelief. “As if I could really kick you out. Even if I wanted to, you have a metal arm and could probably break me in two or something,” he’s laughing for real now, wiping down the tables with his easy, loping grace. Sometimes, Peter doesn’t really make sense: he’s got long lanky legs that should make him awkward and coltish, and he is, occasionally, but mostly he’s just fluid, which is entirely unfair, because Bucky remembers a half a dozen times that he’d been teased for his lanky figure when he was younger.

 Two minutes, Bucky counts the seconds and milliseconds in his head as they pass, because it happens like clockwork. He has two minutes before Steve walks through the door, headphones around his neck, just the faintest sheen of sweat on his neck as hint to the fact that he’d just been bench-pressing trains or some ridiculous thing like that, because, well, because he can. Natasha laughs from the table by the window, distracts him, and he misses a count, lets out a breath he’d forgotten to exhale. It’s rare, he thinks, Natasha laughing, and he wonders at this, glances towards her. Her eyes are soft when they’re fixed on Clint and suddenly, there’s an inexplicable ache in Bucky’s chest. No, he thinks coldly, harshly, to stop himself, thinks, I’m too damn old to be jealous of someone else’s happiness. He feels entirely too old and entirely too young all at once, because there are jitters in his stomach like it’s first love all over again, but Steve will always be his first love, no matter how hard he tried to forget that. He picks up the count again, but mostly he’s just counting heartbeats now, and he feels stupid, feels small, feels ashamed.

 They were kept apart at first, for safety reasons, because Sergeant James Buchanan was a liability, and Captain Steve Rogers was an asset and those sorts of things are incompatible. Mostly, it was Natasha who brought him back, slowly, surely, with a few setbacks and a few breakdowns, but mostly he just wanted Steve, always asked for him, even in Russian. Even with his lips pressed to hers, there was this ache in him and it was cruel of him, but he thought she could fill it. He thought she could fix everything—she was less cruel, she knew she couldn’t. “We have to be broken before we can be remade,” she always said, smile dark and rueful on her face, because she knew how painful the process could be, would be, inevitably. “I’ve already been unmade once,” he replied, eyes as dark as her smile, his breath short in his lungs, fists curled in on themselves almost involuntarily. Her smile is staccato, ferocious in a way that only Natasha can make look beautiful. “Haven’t we all?” she says, and it’s soft, and he doesn’t mention it again because there’s a story behind her words that she doesn’t ever talk about, because some things they don’t ever talk about.  

 He looks across the coffee shop now and watches her steal one or two or three of Clint’s donut holes and smiles because he’s the one who saved her in the end, not Bucky. Bucky wasn’t ever whole enough to save Nat—she needed Clint Barton, in the end, because he had Bucky’s mouth but Cap’s steadiness, and she needed both of those things. Clint was the first to save Natasha, years and years before Bucky ever met her as himself and not the Winter Soldier. He was the first to save Natasha, and he would be the one to save her in the end, it was only right. Bucky doesn’t hate him for this, or hate her, or hate himself. He just smiles down at his hands because she was right in the end, also. He needed to break to be remade. But more than anything, he just needed Steve. His two minutes are almost up and he doesn’t feel ready—he isn’t ever really ready for the bright light of who Steve is, was, and will continue to be. He looks up only to find Peter sort of staring and smiling awkwardly, shyly, at him before flitting away to his next job, and Bucky fights the flush on his face. He knows, he thinks, and this is stupid.

 In comes Steve and the world is blinding again. He blinks a few times, adjusting to the dimmer light inside, and when his eyes refocus, they’re focused on Bucky, so he lets slip the grin he’s been holding inside because why the hell not, it’s Steve. Automatically, Steve’s face lights up and he crosses the shop in two strides to drag him into a hug—Bucky had been on a mission in Scandinavia, it had been weeks since they’d seen each other at all. It took months before they were even allowed in the same room together, let alone able to talk, let alone able to touch, so then there are moments like these and they are actually miracles. His arms around him are just a hair too tight, but Bucky doesn’t mind because it’s something that he has, that they have, and that’s a good thing. He catches Peter watching them over Steve’s left shoulder and glares until he stifles a laugh, mouths, “just tell him already” and meanders away. “I missed you,” Bucky breathes, because he can, and he feels Steve’s body sort of tenses and then rolls into relaxation as he hums some sort of noise of approval. He’s always looser and happier after his runs, and Bucky feels stupid knowing that, like how he feels stupid knowing that Steve brushes his teeth for exactly five minutes every morning, or that he prefers two percent milk to any other kind, or that he hardly tosses and turns when he sleeps but he definitely snores. He feels, generally, very stupid around him, as it turns out.

 “Coffee, Steve?” Peter calls from behind the counter, smile wide and easy and a little bit amused, a little bit teasing, and Bucky wants to kill him, except he doesn’t, not really. There’s something so simple about Peter, not that he’s simplistic, just that he’s soft and gentle and kind and doesn’t need an excuse to touch people—he uses his touch like words, just the smallest brush of his fingers against people’s skin like key-strokes, as if he’s typing across the white, blank parchment of someone. It’s easy for him, it seems anyway, and Bucky envies this because he has to rationalize why he can’t let himself near Steve, and it’s unfair to be so close to someone he loves without touching, because touch is a miracle that they didn’t use to have, and Bucky feels like hoarding them until he knows it’s secure again—that he can still reach out and mess up Steve’s hair and watch his eyes crinkle up, happy. He misses this and doesn’t let himself see it enough, starves himself of the affection he craves because what if, what if, what if. But he died once before and he lost him once before and he doesn’t want to go through all that again. Grow some balls, Jesus, he thinks, tightens his arms around Steve once more before letting him go.

 “Please,” Steve says to Peter, countering his body away from Bucky’s again, and Bucky feels the absence like a punch to the gut. Selfishly, he wants to push everyone away and drag him back close to him, scream, “I’ve been away for too long, and I need this, so go to hell!” but he swallows this animal instinct and ducks his head, smiling, because touches are miracles and he’s so happy to be home. He takes a second to recall that this city used to be home, a long, long time ago, and it can be home again, it is home again, and Peter’s glancing his way with those warm brown eyes, and he knows everything, and it’s nice to let that go, to let someone else share the burden he cannot ever speak out loud. Steve returns, hands curled around his traditional American flag mug, grinning, and Bucky’s back on the streets he grew up in with his best friend at his side, and yeah, that’s it, that’s all there is to it. Just like that, Bucky's home. 

[scaredykate]

this next chapter of mine got a little out of hand on the feelings department

sorry for the melodrama folks, it's a bit heavy for a fic about sugary snacks

sugar-shocked. 

Peter Parker didn’t know what he was expecting to happen. He was sort of only expecting to run a potentially successful shop, to bear the responsibility well, like Uncle Ben would have wanted, like maybe his dad would have liked also, if he had stayed, lived. But, really, how could he have known or expected things to have played out as they have?

Because, at the moment there are a bunch of superheroes congregated amongst his armchairs and tables, and he’s not sure how he’s supposed to respond or react because, superheroes. It’s almost laughable, because of the uniform he wears when he isn’t at work, because of the secret he keeps close to him at all times, the secret only one person in all the world knows now. He thinks of her, smiles to himself because there are normal things in his life and there are bright things in his life, and she’s one of the brightest people he knows. 

And honestly, she’s still glowing when Peter finds her in the shop with Tony pinned, squirming helplessly, against one wall using nothing but her fierce gaze to keep him there—but it’s a different sort of light, it’s a spark, it’s a fire, and he wants nothing more than to cross the space between them and kiss her right on the mouth, but there’s the problem of Tony being trapped, unprepared for her onslaught of righteous indignation. “If you hurt him at all, you will have me to answer to,” she’s saying, as if reprimanding a child—she’s actually wagging her finger at him, and Peter suddenly wants to sink into the floor. “do you understand me, Stark?” Tony’s blinking vigorously as if this shows his acquiescence, which it really doesn’t, so when she leans in a bit closer, he holds up both hands, says, “easy, tiger,” but he’s not at all sarcastic or defensive or condescending and Peter stops to sort of blink at him, brain functions still sleep-slow, and tries not to notice the gentle sort of look that Gwen gives him at that.

“Would you like a coffee, Tony?” he asks inanely, just to say something, then squeezes his eyes shut in shame as soon as the words exit his mouth because that’s irrelevant and needless—but his girlfriend is giving a world-famous billionaire the Spanish Inquisition. His head hurts, suddenly, but there’s also a feeling curling around his stomach that feels a lot like pride, and a little bit like fondness. Sometimes (always) Gwen still astounds him. Tony shoots him a glance that screams “help, do something” but Peter can’t help laughing, and it eases out of him like water as he presses a soft kiss to Gwen’s temple. “She means well,” he offers a bit helplessly, as explanation, though she doesn’t necessarily need justification, and he’s stupidly, stupidly, stupidly pleased. “I do,” she says, face softening again and though her voice is still antagonistic, there’s a smile tugging on the edge of her lips. Tony looks a little less cornered at this, starts to smile also, and all is well again.

“You remind me of my assistant,” Tony says to Gwen, turns to Peter as he slips back behind the counter, says, “she reminds me of Pepper.” Peter glances up, another easy laugh blooming on his lips unbidden. “If he hits on you, you have my permission to hit him,” he says to Gwen, and she glows in affirmation, shoulders her book bag. Peter doesn’t know what he was expecting when he offered to renovate the old coffee shop, didn’t know what was going to happen, just acted on impulse as he is (sometimes unfortunately) wont to do. He didn’t expect superheroes, didn’t expect Tony Stark to like him (let alone come to his coffee shop every day), didn’t expect, before, long, long before, for Gwen to ever like him, and sometimes, his expectations are dashed to pieces, and sometimes this is a good thing. Still, though, there are expectations that he never wanted to have, never asked for, and these are not productive or good in the slightest.

Peter’s life is darker underneath the surface, dark like the night sky is. There’s still a gaping hole in him where he should have the love of his father, had the not-so-fleeting chance to replace it with Uncle Ben, couldn’t hack it, and lost this chance forever—a hole that grows and grows and grows and he feels hollow inside, sometimes, when he looks at families crowded about the shop on holidays, fathers holding sons. He feels indistinctly, faraway, the ghost of his father’s hands on his shoulders, his voice saying, “be good,” before he went away forever, and it hurts—but there’s Tony and there’s Gwen and there’s this secret hiding in him that he loves and hates and accepts because it’s real and it’s there and it’s right. It’s ironic, he ended up just like the dad he lost—full of secrets, held close to his chest. He’s still so angry, but Tony is an unexpected kindness, the way that Gwen was a kindness, who met him at a very strange time in his life. There’s still a hollowness there, though, where he shovels down his guilt because he could have saved her father, or maybe he couldn’t, or maybe he shouldn’t dwell on that too much, because it makes his skin itch. But regardless of the pain, of the fear that’s followed them since that night, Gwen leans across the counter, lips parted slightly, her eyes twinkling and if Peter’s life is the night sky, Gwen is the North star, leading him home, home, home.

"Love you, kid,” she murmurs, smiling, and Peter reaches for her like a lifeline, like he’s drowning, presses the wrecked line of his mouth against hers like he’ll lose her, and there’s that brokenness in him, too. He’s so tired of losing people, so tired of the darkness it throws him into, that empty, vacant place full of insecurity and guilt and, and. Tony’s tossing out mild insults across the room, none of them heated or hurtful, because mostly he’s just missing Pepper, and Peter knows this. He’s missing that he can’t kiss her like this right now, can’t feel her close, and Tony isn’t used to not getting what he wants, except that he is, really. He’s trained himself to take it in stride, but he expects loss, expects abandonment because that’s all he’s known—and Peter knows that hurt, too.

"It’s like you’re raw around the edges sometimes,” Gwen told him once, gently, as if breaking hard news to him, keeping her distance because she’d just tried to hold him and he’d flinched away. It ached in him, and as this realization dropped like a stone in the well of his heart, it echoed, haunting. He was overwhelmed by the truth of it—how when he’s hurting, he’ll pull away, retract himself when all he wants to do is sink into someone else’s warmth instead. It’s constant and it’s consistent, he does the opposite. He’ll separate himself because that’s what he feels will protect him, because being alone cannot possibly be worse than being abandoned—at least in the former, he has a choice. “I’m not leaving you,” she whispers later, fingers tangled in his hair and he bites back a broken sort of sound that threatens to come out of his mouth. “I’m not ever leaving you,” she breathes it again, then again, then over and over, pressing her warmth and her glow against him until he feels it all over, the tingle and the burn—the sparks of her setting him on fire. He’s so in love with her it hurts.

He never expected Gwen to stay, but she did. He never expected the first superhero to come traipsing in every day after his morning run, with a smile like sunshine. He never expected some of the world’s best assassins to be putting their feet up on his coffee tables, kissing each other on the couches. He never expected a man full of rage to be laughing at his jokes. He never expected a demigod to break one of his mugs, this time on accident, smile sheepishly at him and ask if he could pay him for it. He never expected Tony Stark to be staring at him with admiration and a pride he used to see pressed into Uncle Ben’s worn features, something he didn’t realize he’d missed until he did, and he feels so unreasonably happy, he wants to cry, right there in the middle of his store, in the middle of the day, because expectations can be met and not met, and expectations can be good and they can be not good, but sometimes, life throws curveballs, and sometimes, things just come together in the right way to be brighter than sunshine. He brushes his fingers over Gwen’s cheek, sees her eyes flutter and her mouth smile in response, and he does feel raw all over, feels vulnerable and tenuous, but this time, just this once, against all odds, he knows it will all be okay. 

[scaredykate]

okay, so for those of you a bit unfamiliar with deadpool's background, i'll divert you to this page. this is the starting point i had with the character (because i knew next to nothing about him) but i've also diverged a bit and sort of made him my own because i really didn't like the cinematic version at all. 

so, yes, i have to give fair warning for this chapter: it's different than anything i've written in fic, ever. deadpool/wade has a really unhinged psyche, so i tried to keep that in mind while writing his chapter. with that said, he has a history of being incredibly flirtatious and not gender-picky at all (at least in my headcanon, sorry folks). also, a mouth like a sailor, to be quite honest. so, boy-flirtation and language warnings i guess? also inconsistent but intentional switches between first and third person (as deadpool often breaks the fourth wall in the comics). alright, enjoy!

sugar-shocked. 

five |

There’s a boy with scars as wide as the Texas sky across his face across the counter from Peter Parker, and, wait, hold on, can I go back, try that again? Let me start all over, from the top, five six seven eight: Okay, so there’s this boy. There’s this boy across the counter from Peter Parker and no one knows his face because they never quite made a film about him. Peter has never met him, but may have seen him, once or twice, but maybe not, because people who see him usually remember him, unless they don’t. Unless they avert their eyes and try to forget because there’s a boy with scars as wide as the Texas sky across his face and his name is Wade, or was Wade, and sometimes he’s not really sure about that anymore. Peter blinks at him once, twice, valiantly tries not to stare, asks him if he wants anything, and for a second he’s torn between asking for a coffee and asking for a kiss. Not that he’s usually so forward, except that, well, he sort of is (I wouldn’t really be me if I didn’t push the boundaries a little bit, or a lot a bit).

 But as things turn out, he asks for a coffee instead, shit-eating grin on his fucked-up face and he’s met with saucer-eyes and somehow, this is a sad thing. Somehow, this makes his stomach muscles clench—but he should be used to that look by now, likes a good mask because some things should never really see the light of day. But, well, he hasn’t really been one for social etiquette, after all, so he doesn’t see why it should matter. So he stares back into Peter’s face, direct, glowering, smoldering, and Peter blinks back at him again, then smiles, and that’s it, that’s fucking it, he’s asking for a kiss next time. But he’s got blood caked under his fingernails and a laundry list of wrongs he’s done, and this kid is smiling like an idiot (albeit a gloriously attractive idiot) and there are some things that are just a little too out-of-this-world to be believed. “This is like a work of fiction,” he says, slapping money on the counter.

Peter’s smile falters, tempered with confusion. “Sorry, what?” he asks, pours a cup of coffee, and his face does this weird fidgety thing like he can’t stay still, his mouth twitching sideways, his lips pushed forward. Well, this is an odd one, he thinks, or feels, because these things are different and sometimes he’s thinking and sometimes he’s feeling and sometimes there’s a little bit of both and maybe that’s the case, or maybe it isn’t, he isn’t sure about that anymore either—isn’t sure about lots of things except that this boy has a smile wider than a Texas sky and he wants to kiss those fidgeting lips because he’s smiling, because he’s looking at him (really looking, too, not half-assing it the way most people do), because, because. There’s a distant sound as the front door opens and closes, the faint ring of a bell, and it seems like it’s forever away even though it’s close, because there’s noise outside and there’s noise inside and there’s noise in his head and sometimes it’s hard to tell the difference.

“Hiya Tony,” Peter says, manages an awkward, stupidly charming wave around the baked goods he’s juggling, trying to place them decoratively in their case. The boy with the scars turns to glance at the man walking towards the counter and he knows exactly who he is, almost everyone with a television would. Tony Stark is pretty damn legendary, pretty damn memorable. He wears a mask, too, and they have that in common, but he’s never had to work a day in his life to make ends meet, and that just makes him angry—he’s had to work and work and work, been alone since sixteen, has had everything ripped from his hands, innocence lost, paradise lost, if you could call where he used to live paradise. But that’s a sob story for another time, or possibly never, or possibly it’s none of your fucking business. Ease up, tiger, no need to get excited, remember the last time that happened? Blood on the tiles and blood on the ceiling, and the sickly-sweet smell of it all over you—this is a coffee shop, cool your jets. “Hey,” Tony shoots back, lackadaisical. “Who’s this?” Peter blinks, looks at him, me, the thing with the scars, smiles this slow sort of smile that burns in Wade’s gut.

“I completely forgot to ask your name,” his voice has gone soft and sort of shy and it’s stupid and it’s lovely. He offers his hand across the counter, says, “I’m Peter.” Wade’s gloves cover enough of the scars that he doesn’t mind too much reaching over to shake his hand, feeling all in a rush the warmth of Peter’s wrist beneath his bare fingertips. “I’m Wade,” he says, summoning his confidence, smiles like his smile is winning instead of terrifying. And that’s it, it’s done, and he moves on, there’s nothing inherently special about it, just the warmth of his smile still tingling in Wade’s stomach, but that he can tolerate, that he can ignore. And the coffee shop returns to its normalcy that Wade assumes is always there without him in the equation: Tony asks for a white mocha, Peter looks pleased, another person comes in, Peter knows them, too. It’s like a family, if Wade knew what that even looked like anymore, but whatever it is, he likes it, likes to leech off the second-hand happiness of it.

He takes a seat in the corner, inconspicuous for once, coffee in hand, tries not to stare too long or too longingly because there’s a difference but there’s a convergence and sometimes he does both. He forces his eyes away, scans the coffee shop for anything, everything, because once a mercenary, always a mercenary and sometimes he can mix business and pleasure. But there doesn’t seem to be much business here, mercenary or otherwise, as the place is mostly empty but for a few people hanging out by the counter talking to the barista—at this, he smiles inexplicably. There’s a man sitting nearby, broad-shouldered, menacing. “Don’t I know you?” he asks him, the man, side-burns and an old leather jacket. The man doesn’t turn, doesn’t look up, says, “go fuck yourself."

[scaredykate]

sugar-shocked.

four |

When Thor Odinson meets Peter Parker, it’s a veritable hurricane outside, which seems almost fitting—he is the god of thunder, after all. He’s dripping gallons of rainwater on the old wood floor and the boy in front of him is blinking up at him, his face almost blank except for a slight twitching at the corner of his lip: a movement Thor notes is one of amusement. “Thought you might stop by,” the boy across the counter says, stunned, before his face finally breaks itself open and into a full smile and Thor is struck, as he always seems to be, with how surprising these tiny humans can be. And this human is exceptionally tiny, though not necessarily short—he looks twig-like and breakable, and he reminds Thor vaguely of the small animals Loki would often chase around the woods in Asgard: this is a thought that stings a little, so he ignores it, asks for a coffee, says, “you know my face?" 

Thor tries to remember all the things Jane Foster taught him, all the things his team taught him, the things that help to make him seem ordinary, that blend his face with the rest of the people in a crowd—as if that feat were entirely possible, as if his height and size and difference weren’t as isolating as they really were. There’s something of Jane in the boy’s face he notices, realizes, staring longer than is normally socially acceptable, but he can’t seem to care. There’s a softness there and Thor is tired and he misses his brother and Jane and his father and home. Peter ducks his head, breathes out this funny little laugh, says, “of course I do, you’re the resident Norse god, after all.” Thor blinks, mind suddenly shorting out, because, because, because there’s a boy in front of him with eyes like Jane who knows exactly who he is and what he is, and nothing is really making sense.

“Ah, I see you’ve met Parker,” Tony says from the doorway, hood still up to block the rain and an old leather bag slung over his shoulder like he’s working which he hardly ever really does, and Thor just feels the weight of confusion sink heavier on his shoulders. Tony pats one of his confusion-and-muscle-heavy shoulders sympathetically before stepping up to the counter and ordering a white mocha like he owns the place, which Thor is almost positive isn’t true, but sometimes he gets disoriented because Tony could own anything he wanted to, and sometimes he does own small hotels or casinos or whore houses—or, at least, he says he does. Sometimes Thor doesn’t know when he’s telling the truth: he’s only ever been good at picking Loki’s truths out of the sea of lies, white or not so white. He takes a moment to breathe here, not wanting his expression to match the sudden sour taste in his mouth because he wasn’t very good at it after all.

“You’ve finally decided to give sugar a try,” Peter is grinning whilst ringing Tony up, hasn’t really stopped grinning since he stepped inside, actually, says, “I’m so proud,” and Tony rolls his eyes, sticks his tongue out like a petulant child. This makes Peter laugh, which Thor thinks is irrational and probably unwise because Tony should never be encouraged. “This is only a trial run, so it better be good, or I’m swearing off sugar in favor of alcohol.” Peter laughs at this again, says, “so, how long until Pepper gets back?” but Tony just waves him off, collapses onto an armchair by the window, placing his bag down by his feet. “See to our demigod, will you? He looks concussed.” Peter blinks once, twice, returns his steady gaze to Thor, who stares back, fidgeting with the corner of his very wet jacket and, well, rain reminds him of so many things, but mostly just things he loves, Loki and home and thunder, thunder, thunder. Peter smiles a small, knowing smile, like he can read his mind, and hands him a towel across the counter. Thor is struck again with his simplicity and his magnetism—this human is fragile and he is kind, and there are people worth saving in Midgard after all, he catalogues this within himself as if by doing this, he can convince his father of the same. Loki is so far past convincing, he thinks, and at that the bitter taste returns to his mouth.

 “I’m sorry,” Peter says with trepidation, glancing around him. “Does it smell bad in here and I don’t know it? Your face just went all…” he waves his hands around in a manner that Tony is wont to do, meaning to convey something with gestures that isn’t quite understandable. It’s so familiar, so sweet, so genuine, sort of young, in a way that doesn’t quite make him feel old as it does make him feel warm, and Thor has to let a smile spill onto his face as he shakes his head. He can picture in his mind’s eye the look on his face, and it is the look of brokenness that he tries so desperately not to notice is there, the betrayal that still stings beneath the surface. As the phrase goes, you always hurt the one you love, and it’s true and Thor knows this, but it goes both ways. There’s plenty of hurt involved in love, but he just can’t help loving anyway. So it hurts and it hurts and it hurts, but he smiles at this human because this human is a kindness he never asked for, the way Jane was so long before.

"Apologies, my friend,” he says, searching his jeans pockets for their strange paper money, and Peter nods, his brows knitted together, furrowed like he’s thinking, while he punches in the corresponding keys on the register. Thor pays and Peter smiles and pours him a cup. That’s when they all begin to trickle in, fugue-like in the slow build. After Tony comes Bucky and Steve, practically inseparable these days, then Clint, arm slung around Bruce’s shoulders, then Natasha, finally, stamping rain onto the welcome mat. And so by the time Thor has his mug of coffee firmly in his hands, he’s surrounded by his teammates and now he’s the one blinking, dumbfounded. He glances at Peter who looks like a strange mixture of shy and proud and thinks what did I just step into? But Peter’s smiling slow now, as if it took him a second to realize that his friends were there, and as if he still hasn’t realized what Thor took seconds to catch on to: that they’re there for Peter, not the coffee. Thor just smiles because humans have such a huge capacity for brilliance, and he’ll never stop being amazed by this, drinks his coffee in content silence.