Hi loves, I'm Carmen 🫶🏽✨
I currently write for John Walker and Bucky Barnes, but I’m always open to requests and will do my best to write for other characters too.
A little about me: 🐼
I love pandas, my favorite colors are pink and green, and I have three cats and four dogs. This blog is meant to be a safe, cozy space. Please keep the drama away and don’t be shy to say hi!
Current Obsession: Fault Lines and KATSEYE
Requests: open
AO3 | Buy me a coffee ☕
No pressure at all, comments, reblogs and likes are just as loved!
C's corner: I swear, writing this while I’m at work is becoming a genuine occupational hazard because I’ll just be sitting at my desk giggling like an idiot at my own screen. I’m pretty sure the girls at work think I’m fucking crazy, but honestly, trying to hide how much this ridiculous team makes me laugh is impossible. 😂 Anyway, here’s chapter two of the magnetic chaos. Enjoy, my loves! 🫶🏽
WARNINGS: chaotic Thunderbolts behavior, fake mechanical sabotage, relentless teasing, flour-related revenge, mutual pining, suggestive flirting, Bucky invading your personal space respectfully, Bob experiencing extreme criminal anxiety, and an irresponsible number of clicking pens.
WC: 5.3K+
SUMMARY: When it’s Bob’s turn to decorate Bucky’s vibranium arm, the Thunderbolts launch an elaborate fake maintenance scheme involving an unreasonable number of clicking pens. Bucky may be suspicious, but between Bob’s tiny soccer cleat magnet, your terrible acting, and a little flour-based revenge, he might be enjoying the game more than he’s willing to admit.
🏷️: @getgo-snow, @lenticularis
By the fifth day after Ava's successful attack, Bucky Barnes has become impossible.
Not dangerous impossible. Not Winter Soldier impossible.
Worse.
Suspicious impossible.
He watches every person who walks into the kitchen. He checks the dishwasher before using it. He checks beneath the counter, inside the silverware drawer, and once, inexplicably, behind the toaster.
He refuses to detach his arm anywhere outside the privacy of his bedroom.
He's even started rolling his sleeves down whenever Alexei enters the room carrying anything remotely colorful.
"This is paranoia," Alexei tells him one morning.
Bucky looks at the collection of magnets bulging from Alexei's jacket pocket. "This is pattern recognition."
Alexei presses a hand over the pocket. "These are unrelated."
One of the magnets falls onto the floor. Bucky looks at it. Then at Alexei.
Alexei bends down and picks it up. "Personal item."
Bucky walks away without responding. His silence somehow feels more judgmental than words.
The problem is that Alexei isn't next.
Bob is.
Bob has been next for four days, and in those four days, the tiny soccer cleat magnet has not left his possession.
He carries it everywhere.
It's in his sweatshirt pocket during breakfast. It's in his jeans during training. It's tucked inside a transparent plastic sandwich bag when he goes outside, apparently to protect it from the elements.
You've asked Bob why it needs weather protection.
He hasn't given you a satisfactory answer. "It could rust," he'd said.
"It's coated in plastic."
"Still."
"The bag is clear."
"I know."
"Bucky can see it."
Bob had looked down at the magnet visible through the bag. "Oh."
He'd moved it into his other pocket.
The bag makes a faint squeaking sound whenever Bob walks.
Bucky has noticed. Bucky notices everything.
He notices when Yelena steals fries from his plate while maintaining direct eye contact.
He notices when John changes the thermostat by one degree.
He notices when you wear a new shirt, though he pretends he doesn't until several hours later when he casually asks where you got it.
There is absolutely no chance he hasn't noticed Bob approaching every room with the soundtrack of a nervous mouse.
This should make Bob's turn impossible. Instead, it makes everyone else determined.
"We need a plan," you announce.
The team is gathered around the dining table after Bucky leaves for a morning run.
The second the elevator doors close behind him, you pull the official committee notebook from beneath the couch cushion.
John looks at it. "Why was that under there?"
"Security."
"It's a spiral notebook."
"It contains sensitive information."
"It contains the words 'put shoe on Bucky.'"
You flip the notebook closed. "Exactly. Highly sensitive."
Bob sits across from you with the soccer cleat magnet resting in front of him.
It's small, black and white, with tiny painted laces and a bright green stripe along the bottom.
Yelena picks it up. "This is adorable."
Bob smiles. "Thanks."
"She did not say you were adorable," Alexei tells him. "She said tiny shoe."
"I know."
"I am only clarifying."
"No one asked you to," Ava says.
Alexei leans back in his chair. "I provide clarity freely."
John taps the table. "Can we focus?"
You open the notebook again. "Bob needs Bucky to voluntarily detach his arm."
"I could ask him," Bob says.
Everyone turns toward him.
Bob immediately shrinks into his chair. "Or not."
"No," Yelena says. "It must involve strategy."
"Why?" Bob asks.
"Because asking is boring."
"It would work."
"Probably," Ava says.
Yelena looks betrayed. "You cannot simply walk up and ask man to remove arm for secret magnet attack."
"Why not?"
"Because we have standards."
John looks around the table. "We absolutely do not."
You tap your pen against the notebook. "We need something believable. Something that makes Bucky think there's a problem with the arm."
Ava lifts one shoulder. "We could tell him it's making a noise."
The table goes quiet.
John sits forward. "What kind of noise?"
"A clicking sound."
Yelena's mouth curves.
You look toward Bob.
He stares back.
"A fake maintenance issue," you say.
Bob slowly shakes his head. "I don't think lying to him about the arm is a good idea."
"We're not lying," you say. "We're manufacturing concern."
"That's lying."
"It's collaborative storytelling."
"It's definitely lying," John says.
You point your pen at him. "You're helping."
"I didn't say I wasn't."
Within ten minutes, Operation Tiny Shoe is established.
The plan is simple.
Every time Bucky moves his vibranium arm, someone clicks a pen. Eventually, he'll become concerned enough to inspect it.
Then he'll detach it.
Then Bob will place the magnet.
Clean. Efficient. Almost intelligent.
John retrieves a box of pens from the office supply cabinet and places it in the center of the table.
Everyone chooses one.
John tests his with three quick clicks.
Yelena picks a silver pen and examines it like she's checking a weapon.
Ava chooses a plain black one.
Alexei takes four.
"One pen," John says.
"I need backups."
"You need restraint."
Alexei reluctantly returns three of them.
Bob picks a blue pen, clicks it once, and immediately looks guilty.
You choose a red one.
Yelena watches you click it.
"You are too loud."
"You clicked yours louder."
"I have natural subtlety."
"You threatened a vending machine yesterday."
"It took my money."
John raises both hands. "We need a pattern. One click every time he moves the arm."
"What counts as movement?" Bob asks.
"Any movement," you say.
"His fingers?"
"Yes."
"His wrist?"
"Yes."
"His shoulder?"
"Yes."
"What if he's walking?"
The table goes silent.
John looks at the box of pens. Then at the hallway. "That's too many clicks."
"We'll focus on obvious movements," you decide.
Alexei raises his hand. "What if I click twice?"
"You don't."
"What if arm has two problems?"
"It doesn't."
"We do not know this."
"You're not diagnosing him. You're clicking a pen."
Alexei clicks his once. The sound echoes through the room.
Everyone winces.
Yelena reaches over and takes it from him. "You are not ready."
"I am extremely ready."
"You clicked with aggression."
"It is tactical clicking."
"No tactical clicking," John says.
Alexei takes the pen back. "This committee fears talent."
Bob looks around the table. "What am I supposed to do?"
"You click too," you say.
His eyes widen. "I thought I was placing the magnet."
"You are, but everyone having a pen makes it less obvious."
"It makes it more obvious," Ava says.
You ignore her. "You just have to match the timing."
Bob looks down at the soccer cleat. Then at the pen. "I'm going to mess this up."
You pat his arm. "Probably."
"That wasn't reassuring."
"I'm being honest."
The elevator hums.
Everyone freezes.
Bucky is coming back.
Pens disappear beneath the table, inside sleeves, behind backs, and, in Alexei's case, into his mouth.
John looks at him. "Take that out."
Alexei removes the pen. "Bucky is almost here."
"You're going to choke."
"I do not choke."
Yelena snatches it from his hand and slides it across the table.
Bucky steps off the elevator wearing a gray shirt darkened with sweat along his chest and spine, his hair pulled loosely away from his face.
He's breathing hard, cheeks flushed from the summer heat.
You forget the plan for approximately three seconds.
Bucky catches you staring. His brows lift.
You immediately look down at the committee notebook.
Unfortunately, the notebook is still open to a page titled: BOB'S MAGNET CRIME.
You slam it shut.
Bucky slows. "What're you doing?"
"Team meeting."
"About?"
"Morale."
John picks up the newspaper beside him. It's upside down again.
Bucky notices. His gaze shifts to you. "Why does morale require a notebook?"
"Documentation."
"And why did you hide it?"
"Confidentiality."
"What's confidential?"
"Morale."
Bucky looks around the table.
Ava is checking her phone.
Yelena is drinking water.
Alexei is sitting with both hands flat against the tabletop, visibly resisting the urge to reach for his pen.
Bob has shoved the soccer magnet beneath his thigh and is sitting at an unnatural angle.
John is pretending to read the upside-down newspaper.
Every person at the table has a pen sticking out of their pocket.
Bucky's eyes narrow. "You're planning something."
"No," you say.
Five other voices answer at the same time. "Yes."
You turn toward them.
John winces. "That was poorly coordinated."
Bucky shakes his head and heads toward the kitchen.
The operation begins ten minutes later.
Bucky reaches into the cabinet for a coffee mug.
John clicks his pen.
Bucky pauses.
Everyone pauses.
Bucky lowers the mug. He looks at his arm. Then around the room.
You're leaning against the counter, scrolling through your phone.
John is reading.
Yelena is slicing an apple.
Ava is seated near the window.
Alexei is holding his pen with both hands, his face pinched with concentration.
Bob stands near the refrigerator with the expression of a man who has accidentally joined a hostage negotiation.
Bucky dismisses the sound.
He pours coffee.
You click your pen.
His head turns.
You keep scrolling.
Bucky slowly bends his vibranium wrist.
No one reacts quickly enough.
Silence.
He bends it again.
Yelena clicks her pen.
Bucky stops moving. His gaze lands on her.
She takes a calm bite of her apple. "What?" she asks.
"Nothing."
He lifts his mug.
Ava clicks.
Bucky lowers it.
Ava examines the pen as though surprised to find it in her hand. "New pen."
Bucky stares at her. "The sound happened when I moved my arm."
"Coincidence."
He looks toward you.
You lift your eyebrows. "Don't look at me."
"I didn't say anything."
"You're thinking loudly."
His mouth twitches, but he turns away.
The plan continues.
He opens the refrigerator.
Click.
He closes a cabinet.
Click.
He reaches for his phone.
Click.
He scratches his jaw.
Click.
The final sound comes from Bob.
Unfortunately, Bob clicks three times.
Click. Click. Click.
Bucky freezes with his metal fingers against his cheek.
The room goes silent.
Bob lowers the pen. "I panicked."
Bucky turns toward him. "About what?"
Bob glances at you.
You shake your head.
Bob glances at John.
John makes a subtle cutting motion across his throat.
Bob looks back at Bucky. "The clicking."
Bucky's eyebrows lift. "What clicking?"
Bob's face drains of color. "The clicking you haven't noticed."
Bucky looks at every pen in the room. Then at Bob. "Right."
Alexei clicks his pen from the dining table.
Everyone turns toward him.
He smiles proudly.
Bucky slowly approaches.
Alexei clicks again.
Bucky bends his elbow.
Alexei clicks twice.
Bucky straightens his arm.
Alexei clicks three times.
John takes the pen away from him. "You've lost clicking privileges."
"This is sabotage."
"You are the sabotage."
Bucky looks down at the vibranium. Then toward you. "You hear that?"
You widen your eyes. "Hear what?"
"My arm."
You tilt your head as though listening.
Bucky bends his wrist.
John clicks his pen.
You nod solemnly. "Definitely something."
Bucky's gaze moves to John.
John immediately begins writing something on the newspaper.
"You don't look concerned," Bucky says.
"I'm concerned internally."
"Internally, you're laughing."
"You can't prove that."
Bucky flexes his fingers.
Ava clicks.
He looks toward her.
She clicks again by accident.
The room freezes.
Ava slowly places the pen on the table. "Reflex."
"This is the dumbest thing you've ever done," Bucky says.
Alexei looks offended. "This does not even reach top ten."
Bucky turns away, but his eyes find you again.
You smile sweetly.
His narrow.
The fake clicking follows him for the rest of the morning.
Bucky goes into the common room.
Six people follow him with pens.
He stops walking.
Everyone stops.
He turns.
Everyone pretends to be doing something else.
John studies a lamp.
Yelena examines the curtains.
Ava looks out the window.
Bob stares at a blank television screen.
Alexei holds his pen behind his back.
You look at Bucky. "What?"
"Why're you following me?"
"We're not."
"You all came from the kitchen."
"We also live here."
"You were sitting down."
"We changed our minds."
"About sitting?"
"It happens."
Bucky continues toward the couch.
The moment his metal hand reaches for the remote, six pens click at once.
The noise cracks through the room like a tiny firing squad.
Bucky stops.
Everyone stops.
He slowly turns around.
Six pens vanish.
Bucky looks from one face to another. Then he glances down at his arm.
You press your lips together.
His gaze settles on you. "You."
You place a hand over your chest. "Me?"
"You're behind this."
"Behind what?"
"The clicking."
"I haven't heard any clicking."
Bucky bends one metal finger.
Alexei clicks.
John smacks the back of Alexei's hand.
Bucky keeps his eyes on you. "Interesting."
"Very."
"Almost sounds like a pen."
"Could be a tiny mechanical woodpecker."
"Living in my arm?"
"Nature finds a way."
Bucky walks toward you.
The rest of the team quietly begins retreating.
Traitors.
You remain beside the kitchen island, holding your phone in one hand and the red pen in the other.
Bucky stops in front of you.
Up close, there's still a faint trace of dampness at the base of his hair from his run.
He smells like soap, coffee, and the clean summer air that followed him in from outside.
His gaze drops to the pen in your hand.
You slide it behind your back.
"Planning to write something?"
"Maybe."
"With the pen you were holding like a detonator?"
"I have an intense grip."
"I've noticed."
Warmth crawls beneath your skin.
Bucky's mouth curves faintly.
Then his attention shifts past you to the open bag of flour still sitting near the mixing bowl.
You'd abandoned the cake project after the previous week's sabotage.
Nobody has been brave enough to ask whether you plan to finish it.
Bucky looks at the flour.
Then at you.
Something changes in his expression.
You recognize it immediately. "No."
His eyebrows lift. "I didn't say anything."
"You made the face."
"What face?"
"The face you make before doing something irritating."
"That's rich coming from you."
"You promised to get me back for the flour."
"I did."
"And you've been waiting."
"I'm patient."
Bucky reaches past you.
You turn quickly, but not quickly enough.
His flesh thumb dips into the open flour bag.
"Bucky."
"Hold still."
You take one step backward.
The counter presses into your lower back.
Bucky follows.
His metal hand settles on the counter beside you, not touching, but close enough that the cool vibranium nearly brushes your hip.
Your heart leaps.
He notices.
His eyes flicker across your face before returning to the flour coating his thumb.
"Don't," you warn.
"I told you I was getting you back."
"I thought you meant something terrifying."
"This seems terrifying."
"To a five-year-old."
"You assaulted me with half a cup."
"It was strategic."
"You said it was an accident."
"It was a strategic accident."
"That's not a thing."
"It is now."
Bucky leans closer.
You could move. He isn't trapping you. There's plenty of room to slip away.
You don't.
His eyes hold yours as he drags his flour-covered thumb slowly across the tip of your nose.
The touch is soft. Far softer than revenge has any right to be.
Your breath catches.
Bucky steps back just enough to admire his work. "There."
You stare at him. "Did you just put flour on my face?"
"Looks that way."
"That was your revenge?"
"That was the beginning."
The low promise in his voice sends heat curling through your stomach.
You reach for the flour bag.
Bucky catches your wrist before your fingers make contact. "No."
"You started this."
"You started it last week."
"You threatened me with retaliation. I assumed there'd be dignity involved."
"You assumed wrong."
His thumb slides once over the inside of your wrist before he releases you.
The touch is brief. Probably intentional.
It still leaves your pulse stumbling beneath your skin.
Bucky notices that too. His gaze drops toward your wrist. Then back to your face. "Now we're even."
You wipe the flour from your nose with one finger. Before he can stop you, you flick it at his chest. A small white mark lands against his gray shirt.
Bucky looks down. Then up.
The room goes silent.
You glance past him.
Every member of the team is watching from various hiding places.
John is peering over the back of the couch.
Yelena is standing in the doorway.
Ava has half her face visible through the wall.
Bob is crouched beside the refrigerator.
Alexei is holding both fists beneath his chin, delighted.
You give Bucky an innocent smile. "Now we're even."
His tongue presses against the inside of his cheek. "You really don't know when to stop."
"Not when I'm having fun."
Something shifts in his expression. Softer than annoyance. Warmer than amusement.
His metal hand remains on the counter beside you.
His flesh hand comes down on the other side, leaving you bracketed between his arms without either one touching you.
Your breath catches again.
Bucky leans close enough that his voice doesn't need to travel beyond the narrow space between you.
"Good."
Your smile falters. "Good?"
"I'd hate for this to end too quickly."
Behind him, Alexei clicks his pen.
Bucky closes his eyes.
The moment cracks apart.
You bite your lip to stop yourself from laughing.
Alexei clicks again. Then again.
John grabs the pen. "What did I tell you?"
"I was creating atmosphere."
"You ruined the atmosphere."
Bucky pushes away from the counter. He looks at the team gathered behind him. Then at the pens in their hands. "This is embarrassing."
"You are imagining things," Yelena says.
Six people click their pens at once.
Bucky stares at them.
Yelena looks down at hers. "Bad timing."
Bucky mutters something beneath his breath and walks toward the common room. His gaze catches yours once more before he disappears.
You remain against the counter, trying to convince your heart to behave.
Yelena waits exactly two seconds. Then she approaches. "Your face is red."
"There's flour on it."
"Flour is not red."
"It's warm."
John glances toward the thermostat. "It's sixty-eight."
"Both of you shut up."
By early afternoon, Bucky starts testing the arm.
He sits at the kitchen island and slowly flexes each finger.
John clicks his pen.
Bucky bends his index finger again.
John clicks again.
Bucky shifts to the middle finger.
Yelena clicks.
He rotates his wrist.
Ava clicks.
He bends his elbow.
You click.
Bucky's eyes narrow. He repeats the movement.
Everyone clicks at different times.
Click.
Click-click.
Click.
Clickclickclick.
The room fills with chaotic pen snapping.
Bucky stops moving.
The clicking continues for several seconds before everyone realizes.
One by one, the pens fall silent.
Bucky looks around the kitchen. "That wasn't even close."
"We may have a coordination issue," John admits.
"You think?"
Bob raises his hand. "Should we practice?"
"No," Bucky says.
Alexei clicks once.
Bucky points at him. "Stop."
Alexei clicks again.
John confiscates the pen.
"This is oppression."
Bucky turns his attention back to the arm.
He rotates the wrist.
Nobody clicks.
He looks up.
You click too late.
The sound comes several seconds after the movement.
Bucky looks directly at you.
You lower the pen. "Delayed mechanical response?"
"Sure."
"It could happen."
"Could it?"
"I'm not Shuri."
"No," he says. "You're definitely not."
There's something irritatingly fond beneath the words.
You pretend not to hear it.
Bucky stands. "I'm checking the elbow joint."
Bob's posture goes rigid.
Bucky catches the movement. "What?"
"Nothing."
"You've said that five times today."
Bob tries to smile. "I don't have much going on."
Bucky looks at the blue pen in Bob's hand. Then at the clear bag protruding from his sweatshirt pocket.
The tiny soccer cleat is visible through the plastic.
Bucky looks at it. Then at Bob's face. Then toward you.
You smile.
His eyes narrow.
But instead of saying anything, Bucky reaches up and detaches the arm.
The vibranium releases with a soft mechanical sound.
Everyone stares.
Bucky looks around the room.
Six heads immediately turn in different directions.
John checks his watch.
Yelena inspects the pen she's been using for several hours.
Ava studies the wall.
Alexei stares openly at the detached arm.
Bob looks close to fainting.
You whistle.
Bucky sets the arm on the kitchen counter.
"I need my maintenance kit."
"I can get it," you offer.
"No." Bucky points at you with his flesh hand. "Don't touch the arm."
You lift both hands. "Wouldn't dream of it."
Bucky looks at everyone else. "Nobody touches it."
Yelena nods solemnly. "Of course."
"No magnets."
"We understand."
"No committee business."
"There is no committee," Ava says.
Bucky looks toward the spiral notebook on the table.
Ava follows his gaze. "Officially."
Bucky leaves the kitchen.
The second he disappears, everyone turns toward Bob.
"Go," you whisper.
Bob doesn't move.
The tiny soccer cleat is clutched in his palm.
"Bob."
"I'm going."
"You're standing still."
"I'm preparing."
John checks the hallway. "You have maybe thirty seconds."
Bob approaches the arm very slowly, far too slowly. He looks like he's trying not to startle a wild animal.
"It's not alive," Ava says.
"I know."
"You're sneaking up on it."
"I'm being careful."
Yelena waves impatiently. "Put tiny shoe on assassin."
Bob pulls the magnet from the sandwich bag. It squeaks.
Everyone winces.
He reaches toward the arm. Then stops. "What if I scratch it?"
"You won't," you say.
"What if it gets stuck?"
"It's supposed to get stuck."
"What if he gets mad?"
"He will."
Bob looks at you. "That didn't help."
"You wanted honesty."
"I really didn't."
Footsteps sound in the hallway.
John's eyes widen. "Now."
Bob tries to press the magnet onto the forearm.
His hand slips. The magnet falls.
Clink.
Everyone freezes.
Bob picks it up. It falls again.
Clink.
"Bob," you hiss.
"I'm nervous."
"We noticed."
The footsteps grow louder.
You grab Bob's wrist.
His eyes widen.
You guide his hand toward the arm. "Stick the shoe on the assassin, Bob."
The magnet clicks into place.
It's crooked.
You reach to fix it.
Ava smacks your hand away.
"No time."
Bob retreats so quickly he walks backward into the refrigerator. The magnets covering the door rattle.
Bucky enters the kitchen carrying a small black case in his flesh hand.
His eyes immediately land on Bob.
Bob is pressed against the refrigerator, breathing too quickly.
Bucky looks at you.
You're standing beside the arm.
John has his hands clasped behind his back.
Yelena is watching with open interest.
Ava has gone perfectly still.
Alexei is vibrating with excitement.
Everyone is still holding a pen.
Bucky sets the maintenance kit on the counter.
Then he notices the soccer cleat. He closes his eyes. "No."
You lean against the counter. "Something wrong?"
Bucky opens his eyes. "There's a shoe on my arm."
You look down. "Huh."
"Don't."
"Don't what?"
"Do the fake surprise thing."
"I'm genuinely surprised."
"You're a terrible liar."
"That's subjective."
Bucky picks up the arm and examines the magnet.
The little soccer cleat looks absurd against the dark vibranium.
His gaze moves across the room. It passes Bob first.
Bob looks seconds away from confessing to crimes nobody has accused him of committing.
The clear sandwich bag still hangs halfway out of his pocket.
Bucky sees it. You know he sees it.
His eyes flick toward yours. Something amused flashes through them. Then it disappears.
Bucky turns toward John. "Walker."
John blinks. "What?"
"You did it."
John glances at the soccer cleat. Then at Bob. Then back at Bucky. "You sure?"
"Yes."
"Is that your official guess?"
Bucky holds your gaze. "Official."
You press your lips together. Then you make the loud buzzer noise. "Wrong."
Bob stares at Bucky.
Bucky looks at him.
Bob slowly raises one hand. "It was me."
Bucky's brows lift. "You?"
Bob nods. "Sorry."
"Stop apologizing."
"Sorry."
Bucky gives him a look.
Bob presses his lips together.
Bucky attaches the arm.
The little soccer cleat sits proudly on the outer forearm.
Bob's entire face lights up. "I won?"
"Apparently."
"You have to keep it on until midnight," Ava reminds him.
Bucky looks at the clock.
"It's two in the afternoon."
"Yes," Yelena says. "You have many hours of soccer."
"I don't play soccer."
"You do today," Alexei says.
John steps forward to inspect the magnet. "It's crooked."
Bucky moves the arm away. "Don't touch it."
"Just trying to help."
"You helped enough."
Bob is still smiling.
Bucky catches the expression. His irritation softens around the edges. "You picked this?"
Bob nods. "It reminded me of when I played as a kid."
Bucky looks down at the tiny shoe again. "It's not bad."
Bob brightens further.
You notice Bucky notices.
He adjusts the magnet himself, straightening it against the vibranium. Then he reaches for his maintenance kit. "The rest of you are still terrible."
Alexei wraps an arm around Bob's shoulders. "This is historic victory."
"It's a magnet."
"It is sport."
"It's shaped like sports."
"Exactly."
The team follows Bob into the common room, already arguing about whether the soccer cleat makes Bucky an honorary athlete.
You remain in the kitchen.
So does Bucky.
He opens the maintenance case and pretends to inspect the arm, though the mysterious clicking sound has completely disappeared.
You lean against the opposite side of the counter. "You knew."
Bucky doesn't look up. "Knew what?"
"That it was Bob."
He rotates his wrist. The tiny cleat shifts slightly.
"Did I?"
"He nearly passed out when you walked into the room."
"Could've been guilt."
"It was guilt."
Bucky reaches for a small tool. "Then maybe I'm losing my touch."
"You saw the bag."
"What bag?"
"The clear sandwich bag hanging out of his pocket."
Bucky finally looks at you.
You smile. "He's been carrying that magnet around for four days."
"Has he?"
"It squeaks when he walks."
"I hadn't noticed."
"You notice when John moves the thermostat."
"Walker has no respect for energy costs."
"You notice when Yelena steals food from your plate."
"She takes the best fries."
"You noticed my new shirt last week."
Bucky pauses.
Your mouth goes dry. You hadn't meant to say that one out loud.
His eyes remain on yours. "I did."
The answer is quiet. Too quiet.
You glance down at the soccer cleat. "So you knew it was Bob."
Bucky closes the maintenance case. "Maybe."
"And you deliberately guessed John."
"Maybe."
"Why?"
He leans one hip against the counter. The movement brings him closer.
Near enough that you can smell coffee, soap, and the faint metallic scent that always clings to the vibranium.
"He wanted to win."
Your smile softens. "That's sweet."
"Don't call me sweet."
"You let Bob decorate your arm."
"I let him win one round."
"Sweet."
Bucky steps closer. His vibranium hand settles on the counter beside yours.
The soccer cleat sits inches from your fingers.
Your heart leaps so sharply it feels traitorous.
Bucky notices. His gaze drops to your hand, then slowly returns to your face. "Don't tell him."
"Your secret's safe."
"Good."
You reach over and straighten the magnet where it has shifted again.
Your fingertips brush the cool metal.
Bucky watches the movement.
"This one's kind of cute," you say.
"Careful."
"Why?"
His fingers flex against the counter. "You keep complimenting me, people might start thinking you like me."
You glance up. "I complimented the magnet."
"It's attached to me."
"Temporarily."
His mouth curves. "We'll see."
You turn your hand over.
A faint trace of flour still clings beneath one fingernail.
Bucky notices it immediately. "You missed some."
"It's flour, Barnes. Not evidence from a murder investigation."
"You'd be terrible at hiding evidence."
"I hid an entire magnet operation from you."
His eyebrows lift. "You think you hid this from me?"
"You took your arm off."
"Maybe I wanted to see what you'd do."
"You spent all morning glaring at everyone."
"I'm good at multitasking."
Your gaze drifts toward the tiny soccer cleat. "You let Bob win."
"I did."
"And you let me think the clicking worked."
"I did."
Understanding slowly settles over you.
Bucky hadn't been fooled. He'd played along.
Every suspicious glance. Every question. Every moment he'd caught you watching him.
He'd known.
"You could've stopped us whenever you wanted."
"Could've."
"But you didn't."
His hand shifts on the counter. His smallest metal finger brushes lightly against yours.
The contact is barely there. It sends warmth racing all the way up your arm.
"Maybe I was having fun," he says.
Your eyes meet his. "With the game?"
Bucky's gaze drops briefly toward your lips. "With something."
Your breath catches.
Before you can ask what that means, his flesh hand lifts.
There's still a faint dusting of flour on his thumb.
Your eyes narrow. "Don't."
Bucky smiles. "You missed a spot."
"I don't have any flour left on my face."
"You do now."
His thumb brushes gently across your cheek, leaving a tiny white streak behind.
You stare at him. "That's cheating."
"I told you my revenge wasn't finished."
"You're dragging this out."
His hand lowers, but he doesn't step away. "That bother you?"
The words sit between you, warm and dangerous.
Your pulse jumps beneath his gaze. "No."
Bucky's smile turns softer. "Good."
A noise comes from the doorway.
Bob is standing there.
His eyes drop to Bucky's arm. The soccer cleat is still attached. "You kept it on."
Bucky steps back from the counter, but his metal finger drags softly against yours before the distance opens.
"It's the rule."
Bob smiles. "Right. The rule."
Behind him, the rest of the team pours into the kitchen.
John points at Bucky's arm. "Still wearing the shoe."
"You can see that."
"Just checking for compliance."
Yelena raises her phone.
Bucky immediately points at her.
"No pictures."
She takes one anyway.
Alexei shouts something about preserving team history.
Ava reminds everyone that Bob's victory was only possible because the clicking plan was executed perfectly.
John strongly disagrees. "You clicked when Barnes wasn't moving."
"So did you."
"I was correcting your timing."
"You cannot correct clicking with more clicking."
Within seconds, the kitchen fills with arguing, laughter, and several conflicting accounts of who made the most convincing mechanical sound.
Alexei retrieves another pen from his pocket.
John sees it. "Where did you get that?"
"I told you. Backups." He clicks it repeatedly.
John reaches for it.
Alexei runs.
Bucky catches your eye across the room.
You lift your red pen and you click it once.
His gaze narrows.
You smile.
Bucky lifts his vibranium hand and curls one finger toward you in a silent promise.
Your heart jumps.
This time, it has nothing to do with the magnet.
And when the room erupts over the tiny soccer cleat stuck to his arm, Bucky looks suspiciously close to smiling too.
could you please write for John Walker x girlfriend thunderbold reader where her villan ex shows up fighting them and aggressivly flirting with her.
John goes of the rails.
Sorry of it doesn't make sense 🙈
Lots of love 🙏🏻😘
Thank you so much for this request, anon! 🫣🔥 You really planted the seed for jealous, possessive John Walker completely losing his temper .
I may have shown some restraint and kept this one from turning into full-blown smut, but I’m already considering branching off from it for a future Kinktober prompt. Because naturally, my first thought after finishing was, okay… but what happens when they get home?
C’s corner: This was an anon request, and let me just say… I showed an impressive amount of restraint by not turning this into full-blown smut. 😌 Because jealous, furious John Walker? A villain ex deliberately pushing every single one of his buttons? John going completely off the rails before you have to pull him back? The material was right there, your honor. I behaved this time, but there’s a very real chance I’ll branch off from this request and turn all that leftover jealousy, possessiveness, and barely controlled anger into a Kinktober prompt. Because apparently my brain saw “emotionally accountable John” and immediately whispered, 'okay, but what happens when they get home? 'Thank you, anon, for planting the seed. It’s already growing teeth. 🫣🔥
WARNINGS: canon-typical violence, blood and injuries, gun violence, toxic/abusive ex, sexual harassment and crude sexual remarks, references to a past controlling relationship, jealousy, possessive behavior, John Walker losing his temper, excessive force, emotional confrontation, brief relationship conflict.
✍🏽WC: 3.3K+
SUMMARY: When your villainous ex crashes a Thunderbolts mission and starts aggressively provoking you, John’s jealousy ignites into a dangerous temper. But while John is ready to destroy the ghost from your past, you remind him that loving you means standing beside you, not fighting your battles for you.
John Walker trusted you. That was the thing people always missed.
They saw the arm around your waist in briefings, the way his hand found the small of your back when the room got crowded, the way his jaw tightened any time a threat got too close to you, and they assumed it was ownership.
It wasn't.
John didn't keep you on a leash. He let you run. Hell, most days, he was the one trying to keep up.
You were Thunderbolts through and through. Dangerous, sharp, reckless in a way that made Valentina sigh like she had stock in migraines. You could turn a room into a battlefield before anyone finished blinking, and John loved you for it.
Loved the chaos. Loved the fire.
Loved the fact that you kissed him in elevators like the cameras weren't there and called him "Captain" only when you were trying to get under his skin. Which was often.
Which was why, when the mission went sideways, John didn't panic at first. Sideways was practically your team's natural habitat.
"Contact left!" Bucky barked through comms.
Ava phased through a concrete pillar and reappeared behind two armed men, dropping them before they could fire.
Yelena slid across the hood of a black SUV, kicked someone in the throat, and yelled, "I hate rich criminals. They all smell like leather and bad choices."
"I smell gunpowder," Alexei announced proudly.
"That's because they're shooting at us," Bob said.
John slammed his shield into a man's chest and sent him sprawling across the wet pavement. Rain slicked his hair against his forehead. His eyes cut across the square, scanning for you.
He found you near the fountain. You were fighting beautifully.
He would never admit how much he loved watching you in the field. Not because you needed admiration, but because you moved like you'd made a private deal with danger years ago. Fast. Fluid. Ruthless when necessary. Graceful in a way that didn't soften the violence, only refined it.
You ducked a knife, caught the attacker's wrist, and drove your knee into his ribs.
John grinned despite himself. "That's my girl," he muttered.
Then the fountain exploded.
Water erupted into the air, stone cracking outward in a violent burst. John lifted his shield on instinct, blocking the worst of the debris. His boots skidded back across the street.
Through the spray, someone stepped into the square. Tall. Black coat. Too calm for the amount of bullets flying around him.
The men around him stopped fighting. That was John's first warning.
Your body went still. That was the second.
The man smiled. That was the third, and by then John already hated him.
"Well," the stranger said, voice carrying through the rain. "There you are."
You didn't lower your weapon, John noticed.
He noticed everything about you. The way your fingers tightened. The way your shoulders lifted half an inch. The way your mouth parted, not in surprise exactly, but recognition.
Bad recognition. The kind that crawled up from somewhere old.
Bucky's voice dropped through comms. "Who the hell is that?"
You didn't answer.
The man looked you over slowly, his gaze dragging in a way that made something hot and ugly snap behind John's ribs.
"You look good, sweetheart. Still look like you'd drop to your knees if I asked nice enough."
John's head turned.
Sweetheart? No, absolutely not.
Your face hardened. "Don't call me that, Riven."
Riven's smile widened, eyes lingering on your lips.
John's grip tightened around the shield.
"Riven," Yelena repeated. "Like the weapons trafficker Riven? The one who disappeared after Madripoor?"
"Not disappeared," Riven said, eyes still on you. "Heartbroken."
You scoffed. "You sold stolen alien tech to warlords."
"And you used to say my ambition was sexy. Used to climb into my lap and tell me how wet it made you when I talked about power."
John moved before he realized it. One step. Then another.
Bucky caught his arm. "Walker."
John didn't look at him. "Let go."
"Not yet."
Riven's gaze flicked to John then, amused and openly dismissive. "This him?"
You didn't answer.
Riven laughed softly. "Oh, that's adorable."
John's eyes narrowed.
The square seemed to shrink. Rain hit his face, cold and steady, but under his skin everything burned.
You raised your gun higher. "You need to walk away."
"From you?" Riven put a hand over his heart. "Never."
"From this fight."
"I didn't come for the fight."
"Then you're stupider than I remember."
That made him grin.
John hated the grin.
Hated how familiar it was.
Hated that this man knew your expressions before John had ever earned the right to memorize them.
Riven stepped closer.
John did too.
Bucky's grip tightened. "Walker."
Riven ignored them all and looked at you like the rest of the world had been built for background decoration. "I missed that mouth. The way it used to wrap around my..."
"Stop!" you cut him off before he could finish.
The air changed, every Thunderbolt in the square seemed to feel the exact moment John Walker's last thread of restraint frayed.
You saw it too. "John," you warned.
He didn't stop.
Riven's eyes lit up. "John." He said it like he'd tasted something sour. "Captain America's angry little replacement."
John's jaw flexed.
You shifted in front of him. "Don't."
Riven tilted his head. "He always this obedient, or is that just when you're watching?"
John smiled. It wasn't a nice smile. It wasn't even a John smile. It was sharp, empty, and mean enough that Bucky's posture changed beside him.
"You got a problem with me," John said, voice low, "you can stop talking to her and start talking to me."
Riven's gaze dipped to the shield. "Cute toy."
John lunged. You barely had time to curse before he crossed the space between them like a bullet with a pulse.
Riven moved fast. Too fast.
He pulled a blade from his sleeve, black metal humming with some kind of charged energy. John blocked the first strike with the shield, sparks spitting blue against it. He drove forward with a brutal shove.
Riven laughed. "Temper," he said. "She always did like them unstable."
John slammed the edge of the shield toward his head.
Riven ducked, twisted, and kicked John hard in the ribs. John staggered half a step, then came back swinging.
Not tactical. Not clean. Furious.
"John!" you snapped.
He didn't hear you. Or he did and couldn't reach the part of himself that listened.
Riven struck again. John caught his wrist, twisted, and headbutted him hard enough to split skin. Blood flashed bright against Riven's mouth.
The smile vanished.
There he is, you thought. The real one. The monster under the charm.
Riven spat blood onto the pavement, then looked past John at you. "He doesn't know, does he?"
Your stomach dropped.
John froze for half a second.
Riven noticed. "He doesn't know what you were like before all this shiny redemption nonsense." Riven grinned through the blood. "You tell him how pretty you looked with my knife at your hip? How sweet you sounded when you begged me not to leave you behind?"
Your finger tightened on the trigger.
John turned his head slightly. Not enough to take his eyes off Riven, but enough that you saw the question in his profile.
Pain flared under your ribs.
Riven's voice softened into something obscene. "Or did you only tell him the parts where you got to be the hero? Not the nights you let me ruin you. Not how wet you got when..."
You fired. The shot hit Riven in the shoulder. He stumbled back, laughing again, wilder this time.
John's head snapped toward you.
You walked forward through the rain, gun raised, eyes locked on the man who used to know exactly where to cut you.
"He doesn't need your version of me," you said. "And neither do I."
Riven's smile twitched. "You always did get mean when you were scared."
You shot his thigh. He went down on one knee.
John stared at you. So did everyone else. You kept walking until you were close enough to see the fury in Riven's eyes.
"There she is," he hissed.
You crouched slightly, gun still trained on him. "You don't get to flirt with me like we're sharing an inside joke. You don't get to say my name like you own the syllables. You don't get to crawl out of whatever hole you've been hiding in and act like I'm something you misplaced."
Riven's breathing turned ragged. "You loved me."
You smiled. Small. Cold. "No," you said. "I survived you."
John moved behind you. You felt him before you saw him. Heat at your back. Rage still rolling off him in waves.
Riven looked up at him and made one last mistake. "She always liked it rough, Walker."
John hit him. The sound cracked across the square.
Riven's body hit the pavement hard, and John followed him down, one knee planted beside his ribs, fist already drawn back for another strike.
"John!"
He punched him again.
Riven coughed blood.
Bucky started forward, but you were faster.
You grabbed John by the back of his tactical vest and pulled with everything you had. "John, stop!"
He didn't.
His face was terrifying. Not because you were afraid of him. Because you knew exactly what grief, jealousy, and violence could do when they got braided together too tightly.
"John!"
His fist lifted again.
You shoved yourself between them.
That stopped him instantly. His whole body locked, fist suspended in the rain, breath tearing out of him.
You stood over Riven, staring down at John.
His eyes found yours. Blue and furious. Blue and scared. "Move," he said.
"No."
His jaw clenched. "He touched you."
"A long time ago."
"He hurt you."
"And I'm still standing."
John looked like the words hit harder than Riven ever could.
Around you, the square had gone quiet except for sirens in the distance and Alexei loudly whispering, "Should we do something?"
"No," Yelena whispered back. "This is relationship violence therapy."
"That is not a thing," Bob said.
"It is today."
John's chest rose and fell fast.
You lowered your voice. "Look at me."
He did. Rain ran down his face. Blood smeared his knuckles. His shield lay a few feet away, forgotten.
"You don't get to lose yourself over him," you said.
John swallowed hard.
"He doesn't get that much of you."
Something in his expression cracked.
Your anger softened, but only at the edges. "You hear me?"
John nodded once.
You reached for his hand, the bloody one, and wrapped your fingers around his fist until he loosened it. One finger at a time.
"There you are," you whispered.
His breathing shuddered.
Riven groaned behind you.
John's eyes flickered down.
You squeezed his hand hard. "Don't."
"He doesn't deserve to breathe near you."
"No," you said. "But I deserve to decide what happens to the ghosts that come crawling back."
John stared at you. Then, slowly, he nodded. The fight left his shoulders in pieces.
Bucky stepped in and hauled Riven up by the back of his coat like he weighed nothing. "I'll take this one."
Riven groaned, barely conscious. "She'll get bored of you, Captain. She always does when they stop making her scream."
John surged half a step forward. You caught his vest. This time he stopped.
Riven smiled weakly. "There's the temper."
You stepped close to him.
Bucky held him steady, metal hand clamped around his collar.
"You want the truth?" you asked.
Riven blinked blood from his lashes.
You leaned in. "John doesn't scare me."
His smile faltered.
"You did." The words landed quietly. Brutally. "And that's the difference."
Riven's face emptied.
You stepped back. "Get him out of my sight."
Bucky dragged him away without another word.
For a second, nobody moved.
Then Yelena raised her hand. "I would like to say, for the record, that was extremely attractive and deeply unhealthy."
Ava nodded. "Seconded."
Bob lifted a finger. "The unhealthy part or the attractive part?"
"Yes," Yelena said.
Alexei clapped John on the shoulder hard enough to make him wince. "You have passion. Very good. Also maybe therapy. Also very good."
John didn't answer. His eyes were still on you.
You jerked your chin toward the alley. "Walk with me."
He followed.
The alley was narrow, damp, and half-lit by a flickering sign from the closed shop beside it. The noise of the team faded behind you.
You stopped beneath the awning. John stood a few feet away, stiff as a live wire.
You crossed your arms. "Are you hurt?"
He gave you a look.
You lifted a brow. "Don't start."
His mouth twitched, but it died quickly. "I'm fine."
"You're bleeding."
"It's not mine."
"John."
He looked down.
There was a cut across his cheek. Small, but bleeding. His knuckles were split.
You sighed and stepped closer.
He didn't move. That, more than anything, told you how shaken he was. John Walker was never still unless something inside him had gone very, very loud.
You reached into one of your vest pockets and pulled out gauze.
His voice came rough. "Why didn't you tell me?"
You paused.
"About him," John said.
You pressed the gauze to his cheek. "Because I don't like giving him space in rooms he isn't standing in."
John's eyes shut briefly. "I'm not mad," he said.
"You look mad."
"I'm mad at him."
"I noticed."
His eyes opened, there was shame there now, creeping in around the edges of the adrenaline. "I lost it."
"Yeah."
His mouth tightened.
You didn't soften the answer. He didn't need you to lie to him.
"You scared the team," you said. "You scared yourself."
His voice dropped. "Did I scare you?"
You held his gaze. "No."
His breath caught.
"But I need you to hear me when I tell you to stop."
He nodded immediately. "I know."
"I mean it, John."
"I know."
"I love you," you said, and his face crumpled just slightly, "but I'm not asking for a guard dog."
His eyes dropped.
You caught his chin gently and made him look at you. "I'm asking for my partner."
He nodded again, slower this time. "I can be that," he said.
"I know you can."
His hands hovered near your waist, hesitant. That hurt more than the fight. You stepped into him and took his wrists, guiding his hands to your hips.
John exhaled like he'd been punched. "I wanted to kill him," he admitted.
"I know."
"I hated the way he looked at you."
"I know."
"I hated that he knew you before me."
Your chest tightened.
There it was. The ugliest part. The most human part.
You let your hands slide up his arms, feeling the tension locked beneath the suit.
"He knew a version of me that was trying to survive," you said. "You know me now."
John's eyes searched yours.
"You know how I take my coffee. You know I steal your socks because they're warmer. You know I pretend not to cry at dog rescue videos. You know I sleep better when your hand is on my stomach. You know I hate being called fragile, and you know exactly when to stop arguing and just bring me food."
His expression softened.
"You know me, John."
Rain drummed against the awning above you.
"The real me," you said.
His forehead dropped to yours. "I'm sorry," he whispered.
You closed your eyes. "I know."
"I'm not sorry I hit him."
A laugh slipped out of you before you could stop it.
John's mouth brushed yours, not quite a kiss. "I'm working on that part," he murmured.
"You'd better."
His hands tightened on your hips. "I love you," he said.
You smiled faintly. "Even with the villain ex baggage?"
His face darkened at the phrase, but his voice stayed soft. "Especially with the baggage. Means I get to help you carry it."
You poked his chest. "I don't need you to carry it."
"No," he said. "But I can hold the door while you throw it out."
That made you smile for real.
John noticed. He always noticed. His thumb brushed your hip. "There's my girl."
You narrowed your eyes. "Careful, Walker."
His brows lifted. "What?"
"You're hovering dangerously close to caveman territory."
A little bit of John came back then, smug and warm beneath the bruises. "Pretty sure I passed caveman territory fifteen minutes ago."
"You launched yourself at my ex in the middle of an active mission."
"He was flirting with my girlfriend."
"He was baiting you."
"It worked."
You rolled your eyes, but you couldn't stop your smile.
John leaned closer. "He called you sweetheart."
You hummed. "That bothered you?"
His jaw ticked.
You rose onto your toes, mouth close to his ear.
"You know I like it better when you call me love."
John went still.
Then his hands flexed.
"Don't do that," he said, voice suddenly rough.
"Do what?"
"Make me want to kiss you while I'm still trying to be emotionally accountable."
You laughed against his cheek.
He turned his head and caught your mouth.
The kiss wasn't gentle. Not at first. It had too much leftover fury in it, too much fear, too much relief. His hand slid up your back, pulling you against him, and you let him have one second of it. One second to taste the fact that you were there, alive, his, not in the way Riven had meant it, but in the way you'd chosen.
Then you pulled back and tapped his chest. "Accountable first."
John groaned. "Cruel woman."
"Alive woman."
His expression sobered instantly.
You softened and cupped his face. "And yours. Because I chose that. Not because you won a fight."
His eyes burned into yours. "Say it again," he whispered.
You smiled. "I chose you."
John kissed you again.
This time, it was softer. Still hungry, still John, but softer.
Behind you, someone cleared their throat.
You and John turned.
Yelena stood at the mouth of the alley with her arms crossed. "Very moving," she said. "Disgusting. We have to leave before Valentina arrives and asks why Walker turned the mission into a jealous soap opera with blood."
John sighed.
You patted his chest. "Come on, Captain."
He gave you a look. "Don't call me that right now."
You grinned. "Why? You sensitive?"
His eyes dipped to your mouth. "Love," he said quietly, warning and promise all tangled together.
Heat curled low in your stomach.
Yelena made a gagging sound. "I can still see both of you."
John didn't look away from you. "Good," he said. "Then you can see she's fine."
You slid your fingers through his. "No," you corrected softly.
John looked at you.
You squeezed his hand. "We're fine."
His thumb brushed over your knuckles.
The alley light flickered overhead. Rain kept falling. Somewhere behind you, Riven was being dragged into custody, bleeding and furious and finally irrelevant.
John lifted your hand to his mouth and kissed your bruised knuckles.
Then he looked at you with all that fire still inside him, banked but not gone.
Hiii, I love your fics so much!! I was wondering if you could do a John or Bucky (or just anything with the Thunderbolts) x reader, where shes has ADHD and is happy/joyful person all around but when she takes meds they suppress her emotions & appetite, and there's just an overall change in the way she acts, becoming more distant and quiet? I know this isn't the most fun request, but if you don't want to it's all good!!
Hi!! 🥹 First of all, thank you so much! I absolutely loved this request. It ended up becoming a soft little found family comfort fic with Bucky as the love interest, and I really hope I did it justice. ❤️
You can read Still You 👈🏽 here
Thank you again for trusting me with this one. I hope it brings you a little comfort. 🫶🏽✨
C’s corner: This one is for anyone who has ever felt like they weren’t fully themselves for a while. Medication changes can be weird, frustrating, and honestly kind of scary sometimes, especially when it feels like someone turned the volume down on everything that makes you you. Thank you to my lovely anon for this request, hope this brings a little comfort to you and whoever needs it. You’re still you, even on the quiet days. 🫶🏽✨
WARNINGS: ADHD medication dosage changes, emotional suppression, appetite suppression, not eating much, feeling disconnected from yourself, crying, comfort, worried team, soft Bucky Barnes, found family feels, gentle emotional vulnerability
✍🏽WC: 5K+
SUMMARY: You’re usually the bright, chaotic heartbeat of the Thunderbolts, always laughing, teasing, and making the team’s lives a little louder. But when a change in your ADHD medication dosage leaves you quiet, distant, and struggling with your appetite, everyone notices
You’re usually a problem.
Not a serious problem. Not a “call legal before Valentina finds out” problem, although there was that one incident with Alexei, three smoke bombs, and a PowerPoint titled Why We Should Be Allowed To Keep The Goat.
You’re more of a bright problem.
A loud laugh in the kitchen before sunrise. A sock-sliding menace in the hallway. The person who labels John’s protein powder America Dust and waits three days for him to notice. The one who teaches Bob how to cheat at Uno and then gasps with betrayal when he uses your own strategy against you.
You’re chaos with a pulse. You’re warm. You’re everywhere.
Until suddenly, you’re not.
At first, nobody says anything.
The Thunderbolts are not exactly a team built on emotional literacy. Most of them process concern the way a microwave processes metal, badly and with sparks.
So when you stop bursting into rooms like a glitter grenade, everyone notices, but nobody knows what to do with it.
You still show up to training. You still answer when spoken to. You still do your job.
But the light is dimmed. Just… tucked away somewhere no one can reach.
It starts on a Monday.
You walk into the kitchen while Yelena is stabbing a banana with a fork because, in her words, “it looked at me wrong.”
Normally, you’d gasp, clutch your chest, and defend the banana’s honor until Yelena threatened to stab you too.
Instead, you open the fridge, stare inside for ten seconds, then close it without taking anything.
Yelena pauses mid-stab. “Are you not going to make funeral speech?”
You blink at her. “For what?”
“For the banana.”
You look down at the mangled fruit. “Sorry.”
Then you leave.
Yelena slowly lowers the fork.
Across the kitchen, Ava looks up from her coffee “That was weird.”
Yelena points the fork toward the hallway. “Extremely.”
On Tuesday, John tosses a granola bar at you from across the room.
You catch it automatically, because despite everything, your reflexes are still annoying.
“Eat,” he says.
You glance at the bar. “I’m not hungry.”
“You skipped breakfast.”
“I had coffee.”
“That’s not breakfast.”
You shrug and set the granola bar on the counter.
John stares at it like it has personally betrayed the military. “You’re supposed to argue with me,” he says.
“About what?”
“About coffee counting as breakfast.”
“It doesn’t.”
John’s mouth opens. Closes. His eyes narrow. “I don’t like this.”
“Okay,” you say quietly. Then you walk away again.
John watches you go, arms crossed, jaw tight.
From the couch, Bob whispers, “Is she mad at us?”
Ava shakes her head. “No.”
Yelena leans against the doorway. “Worse. She is polite.”
Alexei, who has entered the room holding an entire rotisserie chicken with his bare hands, gasps. "Polite? Our little firecracker?”
Bucky looks up from where he’s been cleaning a knife at the table.
He hasn’t said much but he's noticed everything.
The way your laugh has gone missing. The way you keep pulling your sleeves over your hands.
The way you don’t sit in the middle of the couch anymore, wedged between whoever will let you steal body heat. You’ve started taking the armchair instead. The one near the window. The one that leaves space around you.
Bucky notices space. He knows what it means when someone starts building it.
On Wednesday, you don’t come to movie night.
That’s when the team officially panics.
Not loudly at first. Well... not everyone.
“She has been kidnapped,” Alexei announces, standing in the common room with great seriousness and a bowl of popcorn tucked under one arm.
“She’s in her room,” Ava says.
“This is what kidnappers want you to think.”
John pinches the bridge of his nose. “Nobody kidnapped her inside a secure facility.”
Alexei points at him. “That is quitter talk.”
Bob is sitting cross-legged on the floor, holding the remote with both hands. “Maybe she’s just tired.”
Yelena glances toward the hallway. “She is tired all the time now.”
The room goes quiet.
Bucky doesn’t look up from the book he isn’t reading. He’s been on the same page for twenty minutes.
John’s gaze slides toward him first.
Then Yelena’s.
Then Ava’s.
Then Bob’s.
Alexei turns too, slower than everyone else, popcorn crunching loudly between his teeth.
Bucky finally looks up. “What?”
“You talk to her,” Yelena says.
His brows pull together. “Why me?”
Ava gives him a look so flat it could sand wood. “Seriously?”
John crosses his arms. “She listens to you.”
“She listens to all of you.”
“No,” Bob says gently. “She hears us. That’s different.”
Bucky hates that he's right.
He looks down at his book again, thumb pressed against the edge of the page. "We’re not together,” he mutters.
Yelena snorts. “Nobody said you were.”
Alexei leans toward Bob. “They are spiritually dating.”
Bob nods. “Emotionally engaged.”
John sighs. “Tactically insufferable.”
Bucky closes the book. “Keep talking and I’m not doing it.”
Everyone immediately shuts up for three whole seconds.
Then Alexei whispers, “He is doing it.”
Bucky stands. “I can hear you.”
“I know,” Alexei says. “This is why I whisper loudly. For intimacy.”
Bucky ignores him and heads toward the hallway.
He passes your room first.
The door is closed.
No music. No TV.
No muffled laughter from whatever video you’re watching on your phone. No dramatic commentary. No little gasp followed by, “Bucky, come look at this dog.”
His hand lifts toward the door and stops. Instead, he keeps walking. He finds you outside.
You’re sitting on the back steps in an oversized sweatshirt, knees drawn to your chest, staring into the dark like it might explain something if you glare long enough.
The night air is cool. Quiet. The kind of quiet that presses itself against windows and waits.
Bucky steps out carefully, letting the door click shut behind him so he doesn’t startle you.
You don’t turn around. “Team send you?” you ask.
Bucky pauses. Then he exhales through his nose, almost a laugh. “Yeah.”
You nod once. “Figured.”
He walks down two steps and sits beside you, leaving a little space. Not too much. Not enough to feel like distance. Just enough to let you decide.
For a while, neither of you talks. Bucky is good at silence. Usually, so are you, but not like this. Your silence feels locked.
Finally, he says, “They’re worried.”
You pick at a loose thread on your sleeve. “I know.”
“I’m worried.”
That makes your fingers still. You don’t look at him.
Bucky rests his elbows on his knees, hands hanging loose between them. His metal fingers flex once, soft clicks in the night. "You don’t have to tell me anything,” he says. “But I need to ask if you’re okay.”
Your throat works.
For a second, he thinks you’re going to give him the easy answer.
Fine.
Tired.
Just a weird week.
But then your face crumples so quickly it looks like it surprises you. “I don’t know,” you whisper.
Bucky turns toward you fully.
You press your palms to your eyes, laughing once without humor. "I hate this.”
He keeps his voice low. “Hate what?”
“This.” You gesture vaguely at yourself. “Me. Whatever version of me this is.”
His chest tightens. “Doll.”
“No, I know. I know that sounds dramatic.” You sniff and wipe your cheek with your sleeve. “I’m changing dosages. For my ADHD meds. My doctor warned me it might feel weird for a while, and I thought weird meant, like, maybe I’d be a little tired or my brain would stop trying to climb the walls for five minutes.”
You swallow hard. “But it’s like someone turned the volume down on everything.”
Bucky doesn’t move.
You stare down at your hands. "I’m not sad exactly. I’m not happy either. I’m just… there. And I can’t eat because nothing sounds good, and I know I should, but the thought of chewing feels exhausting, which is stupid.”
“It’s not stupid.”
“It feels stupid.”
“It’s not.”
You breathe out shakily. “I can tell everyone’s noticing. I can feel them watching me, and I want to be normal about it, but I don’t have enough energy to perform myself right now.”
That one hits him hard.
Perform myself.
Bucky knows that feeling too well. The exhaustion of trying to look like the version of yourself other people recognize. The quiet terror of not being able to find that person when you reach inside.
“You don’t have to perform,” he says.
You laugh softly. “You say that because you’re naturally broody. Quiet is your brand.”
“My brand?”
“Mm-hmm. Haunted lumberjack. Emotionally unavailable murder cat. Very strong aesthetic.”
A tiny piece of you flickers through.
Bucky grabs onto it like a match in the dark. “Murder cat?”
“You do stare at people like you’re deciding whether they deserve furniture privileges.”
“They usually don’t.”
Your mouth twitches.
There, there you are. Then it fades again.
“I miss feeling like me,” you admit.
Bucky’s expression softens. “I miss you too,” he says.
You finally look at him.
His eyes don’t flinch away from yours. That’s the worst part about Bucky Barnes. He looks at you like he can survive whatever you hand him. Like your mess doesn’t scare him. Like he’s already decided he’s staying and the rest is just weather.
“You do?”
“Yeah,” he says. “But I don’t need you to be loud for me to know you’re still you.”
Your eyes sting again. “I don’t want the team to think I’m being rude.”
“They don’t.”
“John looked like I kicked his dog when I didn’t argue about the granola bar.”
“John always looks like that.”
You huff.
Bucky nudges your shoulder with his. Barely. A question disguised as contact.
You lean into it.
His whole body stills for half a second before he relaxes.
“They love you,” he says. “In their weird, criminally unsupervised ways.”
You stare out into the yard. “Yelena murdered a banana in front of me.”
“She was trying to provoke you.”
“I know.”
“She was disappointed.”
“I know.”
“Alexei thinks you’ve been replaced by a very polite clone.”
You close your eyes. “Of course he does.”
“Bob asked if you needed a weighted blanket, soup, or a small frog.”
That gets a real laugh out of you.
It’s quiet and thin. But real.
Bucky smiles before he can stop himself.
“A frog?”
“He panicked.”
“Sweet Bob.”
“John’s been leaving snacks in places you usually sit.”
You blink. “That was him?”
“Yeah.”
“I thought the building had mice with nutritional goals.”
Bucky’s smile widens.
You let your head fall against his shoulder.
He goes still again, but only because he’s Bucky and every soft thing you do to him rewires something ancient and grumpy in his chest.
Then he carefully shifts closer. "Have you eaten today?” he asks.
You groan. “Bucky.”
“I’m not scolding you.”
“Sounds scoldy.”
“It’s a question.”
“A scoldy question.”
“Doll.”
You sigh, rubbing your face. “I had half a protein shake.”
His jaw ticks.
You lift your head just enough to glare at him. “Don’t make that face.”
“What face?”
“The ‘I’m about to carry you into the kitchen and feed you rice’ face.”
“I wasn’t thinking rice.”
“But you were thinking carrying.”
He says nothing.
You point at him weakly. “Barnes.”
“You need to eat.”
“I know.”
“Does anything sound okay?”
“No.”
“Toast?”
You make a face.
“Soup?”
Another face.
“Fruit?”
Your mouth twists.
“Smoothie?”
You pause.
Bucky notices. “Smoothie?” he repeats.
“Maybe.”
“Okay.”
“I don’t want everyone hovering.”
“I’ll make them leave.”
“You cannot make Alexei leave a kitchen. He senses appliances turning on.”
“I’ll handle Alexei.”
“That’s bold.”
“I’ve fought aliens.”
“Alexei is louder.”
“Yeah,” Bucky says. “But aliens had better survival instincts.”
You laugh again, and this time it stays a little longer.
Bucky stands and offers you his hand.
You look at it. Then at him.
His expression remains steady, but his hand is gentle. Open. Waiting.
You take it.
His fingers close around yours, warm flesh against your palm, metal cool along your knuckles. He pulls you up like you weigh nothing, but he doesn’t let go right away.
Neither do you.
The kitchen is not empty when you get there.
Ava is pretending to read on the couch, holding her book upside down.
Yelena is standing by the counter, peeling an orange with the intensity of a bomb technician.
Bob is near the sink, doing absolutely nothing and somehow looking guilty.
John is leaning against the fridge with his arms crossed.
Alexei is wearing an apron that says Kiss the Cook or Face Consequences.
The second you and Bucky enter, everyone tries to act casual.
It's horrible.
Ava flips her upside-down book to the next page.
Yelena drops half an orange peel.
Bob waves, then immediately stops waving.
John clears his throat.
Alexei beams. "Little firecracker! You have returned from the shadows.”
Bucky points at him. “Out.”
Alexei’s face falls. “But I am making emotional support potatoes.”
“You are holding a spoon.”
“Yes. For potatoes.”
“There are no potatoes.”
Alexei looks down at the spoon. Then at the empty counter. "This is early stage.”
Bucky gives him a look.
Alexei slowly backs away. “Fine. But if smoothie is bad, do not come crying to me.”
Yelena grabs his sleeve and drags him toward the exit. “Come. We are being normal elsewhere.”
Ava follows, but not before giving you a small look. Not pity. Not pressure. Just something quiet and knowing.
Bob pauses beside you. "I have a frog video,” he says softly. “For later. No pressure.”
Your lips part. Something warm tugs at your chest. "Thanks, Bob.”
He nods and hurries out after the others.
John is the last to move.
He reaches into the cabinet, pulls out a jar of peanut butter, and sets it on the counter.
“Protein,” he says.
You stare at him.
He shifts, uncomfortable. “Don’t make it weird.”
“I wasn’t.”
“You were about to.”
“I was about to say thank you.”
John freezes. Then he points at you. “That’s worse. Don’t do that.” He leaves quickly.
You look at Bucky.
Bucky looks at the peanut butter.
“Emotionally constipated golden retriever,” you murmur.
Bucky coughs into his fist.
“Don’t laugh,” you say.
“I’m not.”
“You are internally.”
“Maybe.”
He makes you a smoothie. Or he tries to.
Bucky Barnes can field strip a rifle blindfolded. He can throw a knife with terrifying precision. He can survive falling from heights that would turn most people into tragic soup.
But he approaches the blender like it owes him money.
You sit on the counter despite his mild protest, sleeves pulled over your hands, watching him squint at frozen berries.
“How many of those go in?” he asks.
“A reasonable amount.”
He looks at the bag. “That means nothing to me.”
“You know, for a hundred-year-old assassin, you’re very dramatic about fruit.”
“I respect fruit. I don’t trust machines with blades.”
“Your arm is a machine.”
“My arm doesn’t scream at me while liquefying strawberries.”
You smile.
He sees it and turns back to the blender quickly, like he’s giving you privacy.
The smoothie turns out too thick. Then too thin. Then somehow both.
You drink half of it anyway because Bucky watches you with those worried blue eyes, pretending not to watch too closely.
When you lower the glass, he doesn’t comment on how much you’ve had.
He just says, “Good?”
You nod. “Good.”
He leans against the opposite counter, arms crossed loosely.
“Can I ask you something?”
Your stomach dips. “Okay.”
“When it gets like this, what helps?”
You stare into the smoothie. “No one really asks that.”
“I’m asking.”
You take a slow breath. “I don’t know yet. I think… not making a huge deal helps. But also not ignoring it completely. Which is annoying, because that’s a very specific middle.”
Bucky nods like this makes perfect sense. “I can do middle.”
“You? Mr. All-Or-Nothing?”
“I’m expanding.”
“Character development.”
“Don’t tell Sam.”
That gets another smile from you.
You tap your fingers lightly against the glass. “Maybe reminders to eat, but not in a bossy way. Maybe quieter hangouts. Maybe someone sitting with me without expecting me to entertain them.”
“I can do that.”
“I know you can.” The words come out softer than you intend.
Bucky’s expression changes. Not a lot, just enough.
Your heart, which has been moving through syrup for days, suddenly kicks once against your ribs.
Bucky looks away first, jaw flexing. “I don’t need you to be entertaining,” he says. “For the record.”
You swallow. "No?”
“No.”
“What do you need me to be?”
His eyes return to yours.
The kitchen gets very still.
“You,” he says.
It’s ridiculous that one word can do that much damage.
Your eyes burn. “Bucky.”
He steps closer, slow enough that you can stop him.
You don’t.
He stops in front of you, close but not crowding, hands braced on the counter on either side of your knees. Not touching you. Just there. Warm and steady.
“I know things feel wrong right now,” he says. “I know it’s probably scary as hell. But you’re not gone.”
You look down at his hands. Metal on one side. Flesh on the other. Both holding the counter like he needs something solid too.
“You sure?”
“Yeah.”
“How?”
His voice drops. “Because I’d know if you were.”
Your breath catches.
Bucky looks almost embarrassed by his own honesty, but he doesn’t take it back.
That cracks something open in you.
You reach for him slowly, giving him the same chance to say no that he gave you.
Your fingers touch his wrist. He turns his hand over immediately. You slide your palm into his.
“I feel muted,” you whisper.
His thumb brushes over your knuckles. “Then we’ll be quiet until the volume comes back.”
You close your eyes. The first tear slips before you can stop it. Then another.
Bucky moves closer, and this time when he lifts his arms, you go into them without hesitation.
He holds you carefully at first, like he’s afraid too much pressure will make you bolt. But when your hands fist in the back of his shirt, he tightens his grip.
Not crushing. Not trapping. Just enough.
You press your face into his chest and cry. It’s the kind of crying that feels wrung out of you. Quiet, exhausted, almost confused. Like your body found a release valve before your brain could object.
Bucky rests his chin lightly on top of your head. “I’ve got you,” he murmurs.
You shake your head against him. “I hate being like this.”
“I know.”
“I hate that they’re worried.”
“They can handle being worried.”
“I don’t want to disappoint anyone.”
“You’re not.”
“I’m not fun right now.”
His hand moves slowly up and down your back. "You think that’s why we keep you around?”
You sniff. “My sparkling personality and excellent snack-based crimes?”
“That’s part of it.”
Despite yourself, you laugh against his shirt.
Bucky’s voice softens even more. “We keep you around because we care about you. All versions. Loud. Quiet. Hungry. Not hungry. Sock-sliding menace. Haunted blanket burrito. All of it.”
You pull back enough to look at him. “Haunted blanket burrito?”
“That one got away from me.”
“No, no. Stand by your poetry, Barnes.”
His mouth twitches.
You wipe your face with your sleeve, embarrassed now. "I’m sorry.”
“Don’t.”
“I got your shirt wet.”
“It’ll live.”
“You hate when people cry on you.”
“I hate when most people cry on me.”
You raise an eyebrow.
He looks at you, unblinking. “You’re not most people.”
Your face warms. “Careful. That almost sounded charming.”
“Don’t spread it around.”
“Your secret’s safe.”
For a moment, neither of you moves. His hands stay at your waist. Yours stay against his chest.
You can feel his heartbeat under your palm. It’s steady. Real.
Bucky glances at your mouth. So fast you almost miss it.
Your breath changes.
His does too.
Then something crashes loudly in the hallway.
Alexei shouts, “I DID NOT LISTEN AT DOOR. I FELL WITH PURPOSE.”
Yelena’s voice follows. “You are the size of refrigerator. Move.”
John groans. “Why are all of you like this?”
Bob says, “I brought the frog video.”
Ava adds, “This was supposed to be stealthy.”
Bucky closes his eyes.
You stare at the doorway.
Then, for the first time in days, you laugh. Really laugh. It bursts out of you suddenly, rusty and uneven but bright enough to startle the room quiet.
Bucky opens his eyes.
The look on his face almost makes you cry again.
The team peeks around the doorway in a ridiculous stack.
Yelena at the bottom.
Ava above her.
Bob over Ava’s shoulder.
John trying very hard not to be involved while absolutely being involved.
Alexei on top, somehow wearing the apron backward now.
You wipe your cheeks, still laughing weakly. “You guys are terrible at spying.”
“We were not spying,” Yelena says.
Ava nods. “We were conducting a wellness surveillance operation.”
“That’s spying.”
“With a better name,” Bob says.
John points at the smoothie. “You drank some.”
You look at him.
He looks away. “Good.”
Alexei clutches his chest. “My emotional support potatoes worked.”
“There were no potatoes,” Bucky says.
“Spiritually, there were.”
Yelena steps into the kitchen, holding something behind her back.
You narrow your eyes. “What is that?”
She reveals a banana with a tiny face drawn on it in marker. “I brought a replacement banana. For funeral redo. Whenever you are ready.”
Your throat tightens. It’s so stupid. It’s so them. It should not make you emotional, but it does.
You look at the banana. Then at Yelena. "I can’t do a full speech tonight.”
She nods solemnly. “Small eulogy is acceptable.”
You take the banana from her. You clear your throat.
“Gerald was… yellow.”
Bob nods, deeply moved.
“He had potassium,” you continue.
Alexei sniffles loudly.
John mutters, “Unbelievable.”
You look down at the banana’s little marker face.
“And he died doing what he loved.”
Ava raises a brow. “Which was?”
“Being emotionally useful to a room full of unstable people.”
There’s a beat.
Then everyone starts laughing.
Even John, though he turns away like that somehow makes it not count.
Bucky stays beside you, his shoulder brushing yours.
You lean into him again. Just a little.
He leans back.
The team doesn’t magically fix it.
Your appetite doesn’t return overnight. Your emotions don’t snap back into place because everyone loves you aggressively and one super soldier looks at you like you hung the moon with a bent paperclip.
The dosage change is still hard.
Some days, you’re still quiet. Some days, you barely manage toast. Some days, the team catches themselves waiting for a joke you don’t have the energy to make, and you see the worry flicker across their faces before they hide it.
But things change. Gently.
Yelena starts sitting with you in silence, peeling oranges and leaving slices near your elbow without comment.
Ava stops asking what’s wrong and starts asking if you want company.
Bob sends you one frog video a day. Only one. He calls it “reasonable frog distribution.”
John keeps leaving snacks in places you’ll find them, then pretends he has no idea how they got there.
Alexei begins referring to quiet movie nights as “low-volume chaos,” which mostly means he whispers at the same volume other people use to address a courtroom.
And Bucky?
Bucky stays.
On the couch. In the kitchen. On the back steps. Beside you in the soft, strange middle.
He learns which foods feel easiest. He learns when to talk and when to let the silence breathe. He learns that sometimes you want a distraction, sometimes you want pressure, sometimes you want him to sit close enough that your knees touch but not ask anything at all.
And one night, when the team is gathered in the common room for a movie, you walk in wearing fuzzy socks and Bucky’s hoodie.
Everyone looks up.
You stop in the doorway. "What?”
Yelena’s mouth twitches. “Nothing.”
Ava hides a smile behind her mug.
Bob looks delighted.
John stares at the hoodie, then at Bucky, then at you.
Alexei gasps so loudly he nearly inhales popcorn. “Spiritual dating has become textile sharing!”
Bucky, sitting on the couch, goes very still.
You look down at the hoodie. Then at Bucky.
His ears have gone pink. It’s adorable. Devastating, actually.
You shuffle over to him and drop onto the couch at his side.
“Your team is weird,” you tell him.
“Our team,” he corrects.
You lean your head against his shoulder. "Our team is weird.”
Bucky’s hand finds yours under the blanket.
The movie starts.
Alexei whispers too loudly.
Yelena throws popcorn at him.
John says he’s not cleaning that up.
Ava says no one asked him to.
Bob offers everyone gummy worms from a bag he definitely was not supposed to bring into the common room.
You don’t laugh as loudly as you used to. Not yet. But you do laugh.
Bucky’s thumb moves over your knuckles.
Quiet doesn’t suit you forever.
But for now, while the volume is low and the world feels far away, you’re still here.
Still loved. Still held. Still you.
And when Bucky leans down, lips brushing your hair as he whispers, “There you are, doll,” you believe him.
C's corner: Apparently we're just building an entire extended universe of Thunderbolts being absolute disasters... and honestly? I couldn't be happier. 😂 This is another Thunderbolts Shenanigans request, I genuinely loooove writing these idiots. They're chaotic, dramatic, somehow incredibly competent on missions, and then immediately lose all sense the second they're back at the tower. It's one of my favorite little corners to write.
A huge thank you to my lovely anon for sending in this request! 🫶🏽 I had so much fun with it, and I really hope it lives up to your expectations. Thank you for trusting me with your ideas and for giving me another excuse to unleash complete Thunderbolts nonsense.
As always, thank you to everyone who's reading, liking, reblogging, commenting, and screaming alongside me. You all make writing these stories so much fun.
WARNINGS: Nothing but Thunderbolts chaos and absolutely no respect for normal team communication.
✍🏽 WC: 4.1K+
SUMMARY: When one ridiculous handshake turns into an entire secret language, you and John Walker accidentally create a communication system made of looks, noises, phrases, and pure nonsense. Naturally, the rest of the Thunderbolts refuse to be left out.
It starts because John Walker can't stop looking at you. Not in the normal way. Not in the romantic, soft-eyed, forehead-kiss way that usually makes your stomach do something embarrassing behind your ribs.
No. This is worse. This is tactical staring.
Across the training room, John lifts his chin exactly two centimeters.
You narrow your eyes.
He narrows his back.
You tilt your head toward the weapons rack.
He glances at it, glances at Bucky, then glances back at you.
You blink once.
John's mouth twitches.
Then, without saying a word, he steps behind Bucky, reaches around him, plucks the foam training knife off the rack, and tosses it underhand across the room.
You catch it without looking.
Bucky, who has been standing directly between you and John the entire time, goes still.
Slowly, he turns his head toward you. Then toward John. Then back toward you. "What was that?" he asks.
You look down at the foam knife in your hand. "What was what?"
"That."
John grabs his water bottle from the bench. "Knife transfer."
"With eye contact?"
"Situational awareness," you say.
Bucky's jaw tightens. "You two are getting worse."
"We're getting efficient," John says.
"We're developing as professionals," you add.
Bucky points between you. "You made eight facial expressions and committed theft."
"It wasn't theft," John says. "It was logistics."
Bucky stares at him.
John drinks his water.
You toss the foam knife back at Bucky. He catches it, annoyed that he catches it well, which somehow makes the entire thing better.
That should've been the end of it.
Unfortunately, you and John have never once let anything be the end of anything.
The handshakes were bad enough. Now, apparently, you and John have evolved.
You don't just have handshakes anymore.
You have looks. Sounds. Phrases. Small, stupid little bits of language that mean nothing to anyone else and everything to you.
It happens naturally.
A hum means come here.
A double click of the tongue means look left.
A sharp inhale through your teeth means absolutely not, Walker.
John's little "mm" means I'm listening, but I'm about to do something dumb.
Your "hm" means I know, and I'm deciding whether to stop you.
A slow blink means get me out of this conversation before Alexei explains his squat-based greeting again.
Two fingers tapped against your own wrist means food theft.
One eyebrow up means we're not telling them.
Both eyebrows up means we should absolutely tell them, but in the worst way possible.
And then there are the phrases.
"Ceiling weather" means the vibes are terrible.
"Blue fork" means someone's lying.
"Parking lot rules" means nobody panic, but definitely prepare to panic.
"Soup is armed" means you've both lost the plot and there's no returning from it.
You don't know how it started.
You're pretty sure John said it once during a mission when an informant served suspicious stew with a gun hidden under the table.
Now it means everything. It means danger. It means awkwardness.
It means Bucky looks like he's two seconds from throwing someone through drywall.
It means Valentina has entered the room wearing sunglasses indoors.
It means Alexei is about to say something that'll require a team apology.
It's a system. A perfect, terrible, deeply stupid system. And for three blissful weeks, nobody notices.
Then Bob ruins everything.
You're in the common room with John, Ava, Yelena, Bucky, and Bob. Alexei is somewhere upstairs, allegedly "resting," though the thuds in the ceiling suggest he's either exercising or fighting furniture.
Valentina stands by the windows, reviewing mission details from her tablet. "The target will likely attempt to escape through the east corridor."
John makes a small sound beside you. "Mm."
You don't look at him. You keep your eyes on Valentina. "Mm-hm," you answer softly.
John shifts his weight.
You tap two fingers against your thigh.
He clears his throat.
You hum once.
John nods.
Bucky's eyes move between you. Ava's tea pauses halfway to her mouth. Yelena stops eating chips.
Valentina doesn't notice, which is probably the only mercy left in the room.
Bob, sweet Bob, kind Bob, Bob with the survival instincts of a scented candle, raises his hand. "Sorry," he says. "Are they talking?"
Valentina looks up. "Who?"
Bob points at you and John.
The room goes silent.
You and John slowly turn toward Bob.
Bob's hand lowers. "Was I not supposed to say that?"
"No," you say.
"Definitely not," John adds.
Valentina removes her sunglasses.
Ava sets her tea down with the delicate precision of a woman preparing for war. "I knew it."
Yelena sits forward. "I knew there were noises."
"There aren't noises," you say.
John nods. "No noises."
"You literally just hummed at each other," Bucky says.
"That was breathing," John says.
"You said 'mm.'"
"That's a natural human sound."
"You answered it," Ava says to you.
"I'm also human."
Yelena points a chip at you. "Debatable."
Valentina closes her tablet. "Explain."
You smile politely. "No."
John smiles too. "Can't."
"Classified," you both say together.
Alexei bursts into the room at exactly the wrong moment wearing gym shorts, one sock, and the expression of a man who heard gossip through concrete. "Who has classified thing?"
Nobody answers.
His eyes widen. "It's handshakes again."
"It's not handshakes," Bucky says.
Alexei gasps. "Worse?"
Yelena nods gravely. "They've developed a sound language."
"It's not a sound language," you say.
John leans closer to you. "Ceiling weather."
You snort.
Every head turns.
Ava's eyes narrow. "What does ceiling weather mean?"
"Nothing," John says.
"It means something," Yelena says. "Write it down."
"There's nothing to write down." You insist.
Yelena grabs the whiteboard marker from the side table like she's been waiting for the universe to hand her purpose.
She writes:
WEIRD LANGUAGE
Under it, she adds:
Mm = suspicious
Ceiling weather = unknown
Knife transfer = crime
"That wasn't a crime," John says.
Bucky mutters, "It was close."
Valentina looks at the board, then at you. "How many of these are there?"
You and John look at each other. Terrible mistake.
Because John raises one eyebrow.
You raise both.
He presses his lips together.
You tilt your head.
He lets out the smallest laugh.
Yelena screams. Not loudly, just one sharp little "Ha!" of triumph. "You are doing it right now!"
"We're not," you say.
"You are!" Bob says, delighted. "That was a whole conversation."
"What did it mean?" Ava asks.
John folds his arms. "Wouldn't you like to know."
Bucky points at him. "That means it meant something."
Alexei looks betrayed all over again. "First, secret handshake. Now secret face?"
"It's not secret face," you say.
"It is face espionage."
John nods once. "That's actually pretty good."
"Don't encourage him."
Alexei marches to the whiteboard and writes FACE ESPIONAGE in massive letters.
Valentina pinches the bridge of her nose. "I'm not approving this."
"You don't approve team culture," Yelena says.
"I absolutely do when team culture becomes mouth Morse code."
John looks at you.
You look at John.
You both click your tongues once.
Valentina's head snaps up. "No."
"What?" you ask.
"No clicking."
John points at himself. "I didn't click."
"You clicked."
"I have teeth."
"That's not a defense."
Ava leans forward. "What does the click mean?"
"Nothing," you say.
"It means something," Bucky says.
"Why are you so invested?" John asks.
"Because I'm apparently surrounded by human walkie-talkies."
Bob raises his hand again. "Can I learn it?"
"No," everyone says.
Bob lowers his hand.
You immediately feel guilty.
John does too, because he's tragically soft under all that military-grade smugness. He sighs. "Okay. Bob can learn one."
You turn to him. "John."
"What?"
"We talked about this after the handshake incident."
Bob perks up. "You talked about me?"
"No," you say.
"Yes," John says at the same time.
Bob looks pleased anyway.
Yelena draws a new column.
AUTHORIZED STUDENTS
Bob: pending
Alexei: denied
Bucky: pretending not to care
Ava: already spying
"I am not spying," Ava says.
Yelena doesn't look at her. "You're memorizing blink patterns."
Ava takes a sip of tea. "That's not spying. That's threat assessment."
Bucky closes his book. "Fine. What's 'blue fork'?"
You freeze.
John freezes.
The room sharpens.
Bucky smiles very slowly. "Interesting."
Ava points. "That one's real."
"Everything's real," Yelena says, scribbling.
John looks at you.
You look back.
One blink.
A tiny hum.
Two fingers tap against the table.
John nods.
Bucky groans. "Stop doing that."
"We're not doing anything," you say.
"You just had a board meeting with your eyelashes."
Valentina looks deeply tired. "I need every phrase on that board by end of day."
You laugh.
She doesn't.
"You're serious?"
"Very."
John slips his hands into his pockets. "Can't. It's organic."
"It's nonsense."
"Organic nonsense."
Alexei slams a fist against his palm. "Then we make our own."
The room stills.
Ava says, "No."
Yelena says, "Yes."
Bucky says, "Absolutely not."
Bob says, "I'd like a phrase."
Valentina says, "Nobody is making a phrase."
Alexei lifts both arms. "Too late. Revolution has begun."
It does, in fact, begin.
By dinner, Yelena has invented a noise system consisting of three clicks, a hum, and one sharp whistle that makes Bucky flinch every time.
"What does that one mean?" Bob asks after she whistles at him across the kitchen.
"It means you are standing in front of the drawer I need."
Bob steps aside. "Oh. That's useful."
"It's also awful," Bucky says.
Yelena whistles again, this time at him.
He doesn't move.
She whistles louder.
He turns slowly. "Do it again and I'm eating your chips."
She gasps. "You wouldn't."
John leans toward you. "Blue fork."
You choke on your water.
Ava's head snaps up. "That means lie."
"No, it doesn't," John says.
"Yes, it does," Bucky says.
You look at him. "How would you know?"
"Because he said it when Yelena told Bob she didn't steal his pudding."
Yelena points at Bucky. "You have been collecting data too."
"I have eyes."
"And feelings," you add.
Bucky's stare goes flat.
John murmurs, "Ceiling weather."
You lose it.
Ava looks furious that she doesn't understand. "This is intolerable."
So Ava builds her own system.
It's not fun. It's not silly. It's terrifying.
One eyebrow shift means move.
Two blinks means duck.
A slow turn of her mug means shut up right now.
A gentle tap of her spoon against the table means if you don't stop talking, I'll phase my hand into your snack and ruin your day.
Nobody knows how they know this, they just do.
During breakfast the next morning, Alexei begins explaining the emotional symbolism of his proposed "solidarity grunt language." Ava taps her spoon once.
The entire table goes silent.
Alexei frowns. "Why did everyone stop?"
Bob whispers, "Spoon."
Alexei looks at Ava's spoon.
Ava smiles pleasantly.
Alexei sits down.
John leans toward you. "Parking lot rules."
You nod. "Soup is armed."
Bucky pushes his chair back. "Nope." He leaves.
Yelena writes:
SOUP IS ARMED = escalation
PARKING LOT RULES = possible disaster
SPOON = Ava has seized control
By the end of the day, Bob has invented his own form of communication.
It's mostly thumbs.
Thumbs up means good.
Two thumbs up means great.
One thumb sideways means confused but supportive.
Two thumbs sideways means confused and afraid.
No thumbs means he's gone nonverbal because the room got too weird.
It's surprisingly effective.
John respects it. You respect it. Ava respects it.
Yelena studies it like Bob has accidentally rediscovered an ancient language.
Alexei hates it because it doesn't involve enough yelling.
Bucky becomes fluent immediately. This annoys everyone.
"How do you understand him?" Yelena asks when Bucky passes Bob the salt after one sideways thumb and a small nose scrunch.
Bucky shrugs. "He's clear."
"I'm clear," Alexei says.
"No, you're loud."
"I'm loudly clear."
Ava taps her spoon.
Alexei sits down again.
Then Bucky, because he's the worst kind of hypocrite, develops his own system without admitting it.
It's grunts. Not random grunts. Specific grunts.
A low one means no.
A shorter one means absolutely not.
A sigh through the nose means I heard you, and I'm ignoring you.
A soft hum means maybe.
A barely audible "hm" means yes, but I'm annoyed about it.
John figures it out first.
You catch him standing beside the fridge, watching Bucky stare into it.
Bucky grunts.
John hands him the leftover pasta.
Bucky grunts again.
John gives him a fork.
Bucky hums.
John nods. "You're welcome."
You stare.
Bucky shuts the fridge.
You point between them. "Did you just speak Barnes?"
"No," John says.
Bucky says nothing.
"That was Barnes."
"It wasn't."
"He grunted and you provided pasta."
John shrugs. "Context clues."
Bucky walks away with the pasta.
You follow him with your eyes. "He said thank you."
John nods. "Yeah."
"He did not say thank you."
"He did."
"He hummed."
"That was thank you."
You stare at him.
John smiles. "You're jealous."
"I'm not jealous."
"You're jealous I speak Barnes."
"I speak Barnes."
From across the room, Bucky grunts.
You point at him. "See?"
John tilts his head. "That meant 'stop involving me.'"
Bucky grunts again.
John nods. "And that meant 'especially you.'"
Your mouth falls open.
Bucky leaves the room.
You turn slowly toward John. "How dare you."
He grins. "What? I'm multilingual."
You flick his shoulder.
He catches your hand automatically.
Palm.
Backhand.
Fist.
Roll.
Then you both pause. The whole team isn't there. It's just the two of you in the kitchen.
John's thumb brushes yours, the private little last step of the new handshake.
Your chest softens.
He smiles at you.
Then, from behind the pantry door, Alexei whispers, "I knew there was romantic thumb."
You scream. "Son of a...!"
John yanks the pantry door open.
Alexei is crouched inside with a bag of pretzels and the expression of a man who has witnessed history.
"Why are you in the pantry?" John demands.
"Research."
You press a hand over your heart. "You almost killed me."
Alexei points at your joined hands. "You have secret romance language too."
John looks down at your hands. You do too. Neither of you lets go.
Alexei's eyes get wetter. "Beautiful."
"No," John says. "Not beautiful. Illegal."
"You can't call emotional discovery illegal."
"I can, and I will."
Yelena appears behind Alexei. "Did he find something?"
You narrow your eyes. "Were you both in the pantry?"
Yelena holds up a finger. "Different reasons."
"That doesn't make it better."
She looks at your hands. Her face lights up. "Ah. Romantic thumb."
John points at her. "Don't name it."
"Already did."
By the next morning, romantic thumb is on the whiteboard.
John tries to erase it. Yelena slaps his hand away with the marker. "Documentation matters."
"Our privacy matters," John says.
"You lost privacy when you communicated soup danger in front of the group."
"That's not legally binding."
Ava walks by, glances at the board, and says, "Romantic thumb sounds like a medical condition."
Bob gives two thumbs sideways.
Bucky grunts.
John points at him. "Exactly."
You look at John. "What'd he say?"
"That he agrees."
Bucky grunts again.
John's mouth twitches. "Okay, fine. He said, 'Stop translating me.'"
"You're enjoying this too much," you tell him.
"I'm finally good at languages."
"You know English and Barnes."
"And you."
Your expression softens before you can stop it. John realizes what he said at the exact same time you do.
The kitchen goes very quiet.
From the table, Bob slowly gives two thumbs up.
Ava taps her spoon once, but gently this time.
Yelena whispers, "This is cinema."
Bucky sighs through his nose.
John clears his throat and looks down at the counter.
You nudge his boot with yours. He nudges back. A tiny thing. A private thing.
Naturally, everyone notices.
Alexei walks in carrying a bowl of cereal, sees the room, sees your feet, and gasps. "Foot language!"
"No," you and John say together.
"Too late," Yelena says, writing.
Things devolve from there. The team develops too many systems.
Yelena's whistle language becomes impossible because she keeps changing meanings based on "emotional texture."
Ava's spoon code spreads outside meals. She starts carrying one in her jacket pocket like a weaponized utensil.
Bob's thumb system becomes official enough that Valentina asks him for a mission status and he responds with one thumb up, one thumb sideways, and a nervous smile.
Bucky's grunts are translated by John against Bucky's will.
Alexei creates a full-body communication system that involves poses.
His "danger" pose looks like stretching.
His "snack shortage" pose looks like grief.
His "team unity" pose looks like he's about to throw a couch.
Nobody likes it, but everybody understands it. That's the problem.
During one mission briefing, Valentina pauses mid-sentence when she realizes nobody has spoken for almost four minutes.
Yelena whistles.
Ava taps her spoon.
Bob gives one thumb sideways.
Bucky grunts.
Alexei strikes a pose by the window.
John makes a small sound.
You murmur, "Ceiling weather."
The entire team shifts positions at once.
Valentina lowers her folder. "What just happened?"
"Nothing," John says.
"You all just had a staff meeting without words."
"That's efficient," you say.
"No. That's unsettling."
Alexei holds his pose. "It's unity."
"It's a communications hazard."
Bucky grunts.
John says, "He disagrees."
Bucky points at John without looking.
John says, "And he'd like me to stop."
Valentina stares. "You can understand him?"
"Unfortunately," Ava says, "yes."
Valentina looks at you next. "And what does ceiling weather mean?"
You shrug. "Depends."
"On what?"
"The ceiling."
She closes her eyes. "I hate this team."
Yelena whistles twice.
Bob gives two thumbs up.
Ava taps her spoon.
Alexei changes pose.
Bucky grunts.
John leans toward you. "Parking lot rules?"
You glance at Valentina's slowly tightening grip on her folder. "Parking lot rules."
Valentina points at the door. "Everyone out."
Nobody moves.
Ava taps her spoon once.
Everyone gets up.
Valentina looks horrified. "Did the spoon just outrank me?"
"Yes," Yelena says.
"Absolutely," you say.
John nods. "Clean chain of command."
Valentina throws the folder onto the table. "No more nonverbal communication during briefings."
Bucky grunts.
John opens his mouth.
Valentina points at him. "Translate that and I'll assign you to Wilson for a month."
John shuts his mouth.
You lean in and whisper, "Sam's squad."
John shudders. "Don't joke."
The ban lasts twenty-two minutes.
It breaks because Alexei tries to ask Bob to pass the potatoes at dinner without speaking, using only his "snack shortage" pose.
Bob misreads it as "emotional injury" and tries to hug him.
Ava taps her spoon.
Yelena whistles.
Bucky grunts.
John translates Bucky.
You say, "Soup is armed."
Valentina walks in, sees everyone frozen around a bowl of mashed potatoes, and walks right back out.
For a while, it's just funny. Stupid funny. Tower funny.
The kind of funny that sticks to the walls and makes the place feel less like a government-funded mistake and more like something almost warm.
Then one night, after a bad mission, it becomes something else.
Nobody talks much after you get back.
There's blood on John's sleeve that isn't his. Dirt on your cheek. A bruise blooming along Bob's jaw. Bucky's left hand keeps flexing like he's still waiting for a fight to come back.
The common room is quiet. Not peaceful, just tired.
Ava sits on the floor with her back against the couch. Yelena is beside her, knees pulled up, a bag of chips unopened in her lap. Alexei stands at the window, arms crossed. Bob is curled in the corner of the sofa, both thumbs tucked into his fists.
John stands near the kitchen.
You're by the table.
His eyes find yours across the room.
No smugness. No joke. No performance.
Just John.
He lifts his chin slightly.
You breathe in.
He taps two fingers once against his wrist.
Not food theft, not this time.
You know what he means.
You okay?
You give him one slow blink.
Not really.
His jaw tightens.
Bucky grunts softly from the couch.
Everyone looks at him.
Then tilts his head toward you.
John understands before anyone else does.
Go.
John crosses the room.
No one jokes. No one writes it down. No one whistles.
He reaches you and holds out his hand.
You take it.
Palm.
Knuckles.
Thumb.
He doesn't kiss you yet. He just holds your hand between both of his and rests his forehead against yours.
You close your eyes.
Behind you, Bob gives one small thumbs up.
Ava doesn't tap her spoon.
Yelena doesn't write anything down.
Alexei sniffles loudly and pretends he doesn't.
Bucky grunts one more time.
John exhales a soft laugh against your forehead. "He says we're annoying."
You laugh too, but it comes out shaky.
Bucky mutters, "That one was obvious."
The room loosens just a little.
Later, when everyone starts drifting away, you and John stay behind in the kitchen.
The city shines outside the windows, all glass and gold and late-night traffic.
John leans against the counter beside you. "You okay?" he asks.
You look at him. "You already asked."
His brows pull together. "No, I didn't."
You tap two fingers against your wrist.
His expression softens. "Oh."
You bump your shoulder against his. "I like that one."
He nods. "Yeah?"
"Yeah."
He looks down at your hands, then holds his out. "Think it needs an answer."
You slide your palm against his. "An answer?"
"For when you aren't okay."
Your fingers curl around his.
His thumb brushes your knuckles.
You think about jokes. About soup. About ceiling weather. About all the ridiculous, cobbled-together ways you've learned to find each other across rooms and chaos and bad days.
Then you press your thumb gently against the inside of his wrist.
Once.
His breath catches.
"There," you say quietly.
John looks at you like you've handed him something fragile and glowing. "That means stay?" he asks.
You nod. "It means stay."
His thumb settles over yours. "Okay," he says. "I can do that."
You smile. "You're good at that."
"I'm good at you."
Your heart does something ridiculous again.
From somewhere behind the couch, Alexei sobs, "Beautiful!"
John's head drops forward.
You close your eyes. "Why is he always hiding?"
Yelena pops up from behind the couch beside him. "He's not hiding. We're observing."
Ava appears from the hallway holding her spoon. "I told them this was weird."
Bob peeks over the back of the couch with both thumbs up.
Bucky stands in the doorway, arms crossed. "I was dragged into this."
"No, you weren't," Yelena says.
He grunts.
John points at him. "That means yes, he was."
Bucky glares.
Valentina's voice calls from down the hall. "I swear to God, if anyone has invented another language, I'm transferring all of you."
Alexei whispers, "Workers' rights language still pending."
Ava raises the spoon.
Everyone shuts up.
You look at John.
John looks at you.
One blink.
One hum.
A tiny smile.
He squeezes your hand.
You press your thumb to his wrist.
Stay.
He leans down and kisses you softly.
From the hallway, Valentina sighs. "I heard that."
John pulls back just enough to murmur against your mouth, "How do you hear a kiss?"
You grin. "Face espionage."
Yelena gasps. "She said it!"
Alexei cheers.
Bob gives two thumbs up.
Ava taps her spoon twice, which apparently means applause now.
Bucky grunts, which John wisely doesn't translate.
And because the room is already lost, because this team has never once known when to leave well enough alone, because John Walker is still unbearable and you're still no better, you point at him.
He points back.
Palm.
Knuckles.
Thumb.
Kiss.
Then you both turn toward the others and click your tongues once.
If you are not reading @vampypandalover ‘s fics, you are seriously missing out. They are humor filled, lighthearted, original, and just absolutely delightful.
This is so kind, I don’t even know what to do with myself 😭💖 thank you for hyping up my fics like this, this is the kind of love that keeps me writing. 🫶🏽✨
C's corner: I keep sitting here wanting Em to just grab Bucky and kiss him already, but I have to physically restrain the author part of my brain. 😭 The hardest part is remembering that, for Bucky, only seconds passed. For Mara, it was five years. Five years of grief. Five years of surviving. Five years of becoming someone neither of them expected. She never lost her love for him. She just kept living after losing him. Now the timelines have finally collided... and they're anything but simple. Poor Bucky. 😭 Please bear with me while I continue emotionally torturing all three of them.
As always, thank you to everyone following along, I love you guys.
This is written in second POV, but reader will have a name, Mara Hart, it won't be used often, but will pop up every now and then, especially her nickname, Em, and from here on out Hart.
WARNINGS: Endgame aftermath, grief and mourning, mentions of death, survivor’s guilt, emotional reunions, injury and medical treatment, jealousy, complicated relationships, abandonment fears, trauma, angst, and difficult conversations.
✍🏽 WC: 9.5K+
SUMMARY:
You spent five years learning how to live without Bucky. Now he's back, the world has moved on, and your heart is caught between the life you lost and the one you built.
TAGS: @iwritefanfictionsnottragedies, @quantumlethe, @qvicksilversass, @daylightandthedreamer, @mencantaleer, @amnatreal, @sebastians-love, @spectralexiletrace, @weasleyswizarding-wheezes, @lilulicious (to be added to the tag list CLICK HERE)
You wake in your old room at the compound, but for a moment, you don't understand that.
There's a ceiling above you that you know too well, a white stretch of plaster cut by clean lines and soft recessed light. Too quiet. Too sterile. Too familiar. The curtains are half drawn, letting pale afternoon spill across the floor in thin rectangles, and the air smells like antiseptic, clean sheets, and ghosts.
Not the apartment. Not John's bed. Not the bathroom with the bad yellow light and his bandage beneath your thumb.
The compound, your old room.
The same one you slept in after Wakanda. The same one where you learned how wide a mattress could feel without Bucky beside you. The same one where you spent five years waking up with your hand around the wolf charm, waiting for the split second before memory returned and gutted you all over again.
This room mourned him with you. It watched you become quiet. It watched you stop eating unless Nat brought food and stood there until you took a bite. It watched you sit on the floor with your back against the bed, knees pulled to your chest, listening to the whole building breathe around the absence of half the universe.
This room knows too much.
Your eyes burn before the rest of you catches up. Then pain arrives. Not all at once. It's too organized for that. It reports in from different places like an awful roll call.
Your shoulder first, deep and hot beneath bandages and a sling. Your ribs next, tight and bruised, every breath scraping against something tender. Your temple throbs in a slow, ugly rhythm, and when you try to turn your head, the room tilts slightly before correcting itself.
You blink hard. There are flashes behind your eyes.
Gold sparks. Smoke. A battlefield under a broken sky. Wanda's hands glowing red. Bucky's voice.
Sweetheart?
Your breath catches so sharply that it hurts.
John.
You sit up too fast. Pain rips through your shoulder and side, white and immediate, and a strangled sound slips out of you before you can stop it.
The chair beside the bed scrapes against the floor.
"Easy."
Steve's on his feet before you fully register him, crossing the room in two long strides. He looks worse than he did on the battlefield, which shouldn't be possible. There's bruising along his jaw, a healing cut near his temple, and a hollowness beneath his eyes that no serum's ever been able to touch.
He reaches for you, then stops just short, hands hovering like he's afraid of choosing wrong. "Take it easy," he says, voice low. "You took a few bad hits."
You stare at him.
Steve Rogers. Alive. Here.
"John," you say.
His expression shifts.
"I need to call John." You push at the blanket with your good hand, searching without knowing what you're searching for. "Or Lemar. Where's my phone?"
"Em."
"Where is it?"
"Your phone was destroyed in the battle."
That doesn't make sense at first.
Then you remember the blast. The ground tearing open. Fire raining down between you and Bucky. Your body hitting earth. Your shoulder slamming into metal. The awful, bright silence afterward.
Steve reaches toward the little table beside the bed and picks something up.
When he places it in your palm, your chest tightens. Your phone's almost unrecognizable. The screen is spiderwebbed from corner to corner, black glass splintered over a body bent slightly out of shape. One edge is scorched. Dirt sits in the cracks. It looks like it survived a war because it did.
You stare down at it. This was the only thing that connected you to John after you stepped through that portal. The only thread between his apartment and the end of the world.
You press the dead screen with your thumb, nothing happens.
"I'm working on getting you a replacement," Steve says. "Communications are a mess right now. Everything's overloaded. Stark systems, military channels, emergency networks, all of it."
You try to swallow, but your throat feels full of smoke. "Lemar?" you ask. "Have you heard anything?"
Steve's mouth presses thin. "Not yet. But that doesn't mean anything bad. It's chaos everywhere. Military units got pulled into every major return site. Hospitals, airports, highways. Sam's been trying too."
Sam.
Something in you loosens and aches at the same time. You nod, but the motion makes your head pulse.
Steve notices immediately. "Slow."
"I'm fine."
"You're not."
"I'm conscious."
"That's not the same thing."
You'd normally argue. It'd be easier than feeling whatever's crawling up your chest now with cold hands.
Instead, your eyes drift to the window. Pale daylight, too much of it. You look back at Steve. "How long?"
His face tells you before his mouth does. "Two days."
The words land strangely. Not heavy. Not sharp. Strange. Two days where John could've called. Where Lemar could've looked for you. Where Bucky could've stood outside this room wondering why you didn't want to see him. Where the world could've changed shape ten more times without asking you to witness it.
Your hand curls around the broken phone.
Then memory shifts again.
Tony on the ground. Pepper's hands on him. The light in his chest going dark.
Natasha.
You look at Steve. His face stills.
No, no, no.
"Steve," you say, and your voice is already breaking. "Nat?"
He closes his eyes. That's all it takes. You know before he says it.
You knew on the battlefield, somewhere deep down. You knew in the silence after you asked the sorcerer her name. You knew in the empty space where she should've been standing beside Clint. You knew when Steve looked at you with grief already gathered in his face.
Still, knowing isn't the same as being told by the person who loved her too.
Steve opens his eyes. "She's gone," he says.
Something inside you drops out from under your ribs, a trapdoor opening beneath every fragile piece of hope you hadn't realized you were still holding. "No," you whisper.
"I'm sorry."
"No." Your voice cracks this time.
Steve sits on the edge of the bed carefully, and when you fold forward, he catches you.
The movement hurts. Your shoulder screams. Your ribs protest. Your head throbs hard enough to make the room blur. You don't care. You collapse into Steve's chest with a broken sound that doesn't feel like it belongs to you.
His arms close around you. For a second, he's too gentle, and that makes it worse. Then his hold tightens, solid and familiar, and you break open against him.
Nat...
Nat in the compound kitchen at two in the morning, sitting on the counter with a mug of tea she never drank. Nat beside you on the couch, muting some terrible old movie so the two of you could talk about nothing because nothing was safer than everything. Nat knocking on your door without waiting for an answer.
Nat looking at you like she understood the exact shape of not wanting to survive and surviving anyway. Nat standing in John's apartment, promising as long as I can.
You sob harder.
Steve's hand comes to the back of your head, careful around the bandage near your temple. His chin rests briefly against your hair, and you feel the shudder move through him too. Not loud. Not visible to anyone who doesn't know him.
But you know Steve. You know the way he grieves like he's trying not to take up space with it. "I should've gone," he says, so quietly you almost miss it.
You pull back just enough to look at him through blurred eyes. "No."
His jaw tightens.
"Don't do that," you say, even though your own voice is wrecked. "Don't you dare do that to yourself."
Steve looks at you, and for a second you see him five years ago, standing in that same doorway after Bucky dusted, trying to be a pillar in a building that had already fallen. "I'm tired, Em," he says.
The honesty hurts worse than the pain in your ribs. "I know," you whisper.
He wipes at his face quickly, like the grief can be managed if he catches it before it becomes evidence. Nat would've called him out for that. The thought nearly breaks you again.
You inhale shakily, one hand still tangled in Steve's shirt. "Yelena," you say.
Steve stills.
You lift your head. "Nat mentioned her. Her sister."
"I know."
"Have you contacted her?"
Steve lets out a long breath. "Everything's saturated. Half the communication networks are still crawling back from collapse, and the other half are drowning under everyone trying to reach everyone at once." He rubs a hand over his face. "Even if I could get through, I don't know where she is. Nat kept pieces of her life protected for a reason."
"Of course she did." The words come out bitter and fond and devastated.
Steve's eyes soften. "I'll try to find out about her where abouts" he says.
You shake your head. Pain flares behind your eyes, but you keep going. "No. I'll take care of it."
"Em."
"I'll take care of it," you repeat.
"You're injured."
"I'm aware."
"You woke up ten minutes ago."
"And now I have a task."
His mouth tightens, almost a smile, almost pain. "Nat would hate that I agree with that logic."
"Nat would pretend to hate it," you say.
Steve looks away.
For a moment, neither of you speaks. Then another memory claws up through the fog.
Bucky.
Firelight on his face. His hair tangled around his cheeks. His rifle in his hands. His eyes finding the charm at your throat. The way his expression broke right before the sky ripped the moment apart.
Your fingers close around the wolf charm without thinking. Steve sees it.
"Bucky," you say.
"He's okay."
The relief that hits you is so sharp it almost makes you nauseous. You close your eyes, and the room sways behind your lids. "He's okay?" you ask, because once isn't enough.
"He's fine," Steve says. "A little disoriented. We all are. But he's okay."
Your breath leaves you in pieces. Bucky's fine. Bucky's alive. Bucky's fine. The words try to settle inside you and can't find a clean place to land.
Steve watches you carefully. Too carefully.
"What?" you ask.
"He wants to see you."
The air leaves the room.
Steve's face is gentle, which is somehow worse than if he'd tried to push. "He's asked a few times," he says. "I told him you were still unconscious. That you needed time."
You stare at the broken phone in your lap. Bucky wants to see you, of course he does.
The Bucky who lost only minutes. The Bucky who saw you on a battlefield with blood on your face, John's gun in your hand, and five years carved into your bones. The Bucky who reached for you through fire like no time had passed.
Your chest tightens until breathing becomes work. "I don't know if I can," you admit.
Steve nods once. No disappointment. No surprise. Just understanding. "You can say no."
The permission almost undoes you. You look at him, you can see he means it.
Not later. Not with conditions. Not with that old Steve Rogers ache to fix what can only be survived. He means you can say no to Bucky Barnes, even after five years of mourning him, even with him alive and waiting somewhere inside these walls.
You're so grateful for it that you can't speak.
Steve reaches over and squeezes your good hand once. "You don't owe anyone a reunion before you're ready," he says.
Your throat closes. You nod because it's all you can manage.
After a moment, Steve shifts. "There's something else."
You brace yourself.
"Tony's service is tomorrow."
The words sit beside Nat's absence and make a terrible pair. Time is behaving cruelly again, stacking grief in layers and asking everyone to keep walking.
You stare at the curtains. "I'll be there," you say.
"Em, you don't have to decide right now."
"I'll be there."
Steve studies you, then nods.
Before he can say anything else, there's a knock at the door.
Both of you look toward it.
A familiar voice comes from the other side. "Nobody shoot. It's me, and I come bearing technology."
Your heart stutters.
Steve exhales, something almost amused passing across his ruined face. "Come in."
The door opens, and Sam Wilson steps inside holding a phone box in one hand and a plastic bag in the other.
He looks alive. That's all your body understands at first.
Alive, standing in your doorway. Looking at you with those same warm, sharp eyes, like he's already clocked every injury and every emotional disaster in the room and is deciding which one to insult first.
"Wow," he says. "You look terrible."
A laugh breaks out of you so suddenly it hurts. Then you're crying again.
Sam's expression changes instantly. "Oh, hey," he says, softer now.
You try to move. Your body argues. Steve helps before you can pretend you don't need it, steadying you as Sam crosses the room.
He sets the phone and bag down on the chair, then leans carefully over the bed. You wrap your good arm around him as best you can. Sam hugs you back, firm and warm and real.
For a second, you're back in another time. Before the Accords. Before airports and prisons and Wakanda. Before dust. Before the world learned how to vanish.
"You're here," you whisper.
"Yeah," he says, voice rougher than before. "I'm here."
"You were gone."
"For me, it was more of an aggressive blink."
You choke on a laugh against his shoulder.
Steve mutters, "Sam."
"What? I'm coping."
You pull back enough to look at him. "You're annoying."
Sam's smile flickers, then softens around the edges. "Good to see you too, Hart."
Your mouth trembles.
He sees it and immediately looks at Steve. "See? This is why I insult people. The second I get sincere, everybody starts leaking."
"I'm concussed," you say.
"Convenient excuse."
"Want me to throw up on you?"
"I withdraw my statement."
Steve lets out the quietest laugh. It's small. Almost nothing.
But in this room, after two days of unconsciousness and five years of grief and one battlefield full of ash, it sounds like a match being struck in the dark.
Sam picks up the phone box and holds it out. "Temporary replacement," he says. "It should work, mostly. Old number's being transferred when the network stops misbehaving. For now, Steve loaded in the numbers we could recover."
You take it with shaking fingers.
The box feels too clean. Too new. Wrong in your hand after the broken, scorched thing still sitting in your lap. "John?" you ask.
Sam's eyes flick to Steve.
Your stomach drops.
"His number's in there," Steve says quickly. "Lemar's too. We just haven't gotten through yet."
"Because something happened?"
"Because the world's on fire," Steve says, gentler than the words should allow. "And a lot of people with uniforms got thrown straight into the worst of it."
You nod, even though panic claws under your ribs.
John's trained. Lemar's trained. They're together. They're watching each other.
You grip the phone tighter.
Sam's gaze drops to the smashed phone in your lap. "That yours?"
"No, Wilson. I collect battlefield garbage now."
"There she is."
Steve gives him a look.
Sam ignores it with the confidence of a man who's made ignoring Steve Rogers a personal discipline.
"I'm serious," Sam says. "Had me worried when you weren't yelling at anybody."
"I was unconscious."
"Lazy."
You almost smile.
It hurts. Everything hurts. But the banter slides into place like an old song with missing notes.
Sam reaches into the plastic bag and pulls out a bottle of water, a packet of crackers, and a bruised apple.
You stare at the apple.
"What is it with men bringing me fruit lately?"
Sam pauses. "Do I want context?"
Steve shakes his head, but there's something in his eyes that looks almost like gratitude.
For a few minutes, they stay.
Steve tells you what little he can. Emergency relief is swallowing the country whole. Returned people are being processed anywhere with electricity and enough floor space. Hospitals are overflowing. Governments are scrambling. The compound's full of movement, Avengers, allies, medics, people trying to put names to the returned and bodies to the missing.
Sam tells you he's seen Bucky. Says it lightly, but not carelessly. "He's okay," he says. "Quiet. Asking about you. Pretending he's not asking about you."
Your fingers tighten around the new phone. "Sounds like him."
"Yeah," Sam says. "It does."
Something settles between the three of you then. Not silence exactly. More like everyone standing at the edge of a room they're not ready to enter.
Bucky alive. Nat gone. Tony gone. John unreachable.
The world beginning again with blood still drying under its fingernails.
Finally, Steve stands. "You need rest."
"I need to make calls."
"You need both," Sam says.
You look at him. "Bossy for a dead man."
He points at you. "Aggressive blink."
Steve picks up the plastic bag and places it on the bedside table. "Eat something before you try to start saving the world from bed."
"I'm not saving the world."
Sam snorts.
You glare at him.
"Sorry," he says. "Just hearing you say that out loud was a rich experience."
Steve moves toward the door, then pauses. "If you want to see Bucky," he says carefully, "tell me. If you don't, I'll handle it."
You nod. "Thank you," you whisper.
His face softens. "Get some rest, Em."
Sam lingers a second longer. The teasing drops from his face. "I'm glad you made it," he says.
Your eyes burn again. "Me too."
He nods once, then follows Steve out. The door closes behind them with a soft click.
For a few seconds, you sit there in the quiet.
The compound hums around you. Footsteps pass in the hall. Somewhere distant, someone calls for a medic. Somewhere else, a door shuts. Life moving inside a place that had spent five years feeling like a tomb.
You look down at the new phone. Your thumb hesitates over the screen. Then you turn it on.
The brightness hurts your eyes, but you don't look away. You fumble through the setup with one hand, slower than you want to be, jaw clenched against the ache in your shoulder. Steve's already done most of it. Contacts sit there like small, fragile promises.
John Walker.
Lemar Hoskins.
Your breath catches at the sight of their names.
You tap John's first.
The call tries to connect. For one breath, hope rises so violently it makes you dizzy. Then the line fails.
Call could not be completed.
You stare at the message. "No," you whisper.
You try again. Same result. Your hand starts to shake.
You call Lemar. The phone rings once. Twice. Then cuts to a generic automated message. Network congestion. Try again later. Useless words spoken in a calm voice that makes you want to throw the phone across the room.
You don't. You can't afford to break another one. You press the phone to your forehead and breathe through your teeth.
John's trained. Lemar's trained. They're together. They're watching each other.
You lower the phone and open a message to John. For a long moment, you don't type. What's there to say?
I'm alive. Are you? I saw Bucky. Nat's gone. Tony's gone. The world ended again and then didn't.
I woke up in the room where I mourned the man who came back, and all I can think about is whether you made it through the night.
Your vision blurs. You type with your thumb.
I'm alive. At the compound. Phone was destroyed. Please call me when you can. I love you.
You send it. The little status wheel spins. And spins. And spins. Then finally, mercifully, the message marks as sent.
You let out a breath that breaks halfway through.
You send the same to Lemar, minus the I love you, because if he ever sees that message, he'll never let you live.
I'm alive. At the compound. Phone was destroyed. Call me when you can. Keep him out of trouble.
This one takes longer. For nearly a minute, it hangs there, suspended between you and whatever chaos he's standing in. Then it sends.
You slump back against the pillows, exhausted by two messages. The room tilts again, soft at the edges. You turn your head toward the window.
Somewhere in this building, Bucky Barnes is alive and waiting.
Somewhere beyond it, Natasha Romanoff is gone.
Somewhere tomorrow, Tony Stark will be laid to rest by the people he saved.
And somewhere in Brooklyn, if the universe has any mercy left, John Walker's still breathing.
Your hand finds the wolf charm at your chest. For the first time in five years, it doesn't feel like proof of death.
It feels like a question.
You close your eyes, the new phone held tight in your hand, and wait for it to ring.
By morning, your phone still hasn't rung. Not once. You know because you haven't really slept.
The new phone spends the night on the pillow beside your head, silent every time you jolt awake and check it with your heart halfway up your throat. No missed calls. No new messages. No voicemail fighting its way through the wreckage of the network.
Nothing from John. Nothing from Lemar. You call them both anyway. Again.
John's number fails before it rings. Lemar's gives you the same calm, automated voice about congestion and unavailable service, and by the sixth time you hear it, you start to hate that voice with a purity that feels almost useful.
You send John another message just after dawn.
Still at the compound. Tony's service is today. Please call me when you can. I love you.
The message takes almost four minutes to send. You watch the little wheel spin and spin, your thumb pressed too hard to the side of the phone, like you can force the words across state lines by sheer need.
Finally, it goes. You send one to Lemar next.
Tell me you're both alive, Sergeant Sunshine.
That one takes longer. You stare at the screen until your vision blurs. Then it sends too.
The compound is too awake around you.
Footsteps pass your door. Voices drift down the hall, low and exhausted. Somewhere, a cart squeaks over tile. Someone laughs once, too sharply, then goes quiet like they remembered where they were.
Tony's service is today. The thought sits in your chest like a stone.
You should stay in bed. Steve told you to stay in bed. Sam told you to stay in bed with the theatrical seriousness of a man who knew you wouldn't listen and wanted proof later.
You still get up. It takes longer than it should.
Your body has become a negotiation conducted entirely in pain. Your shoulder is strapped close, your ribs complain with every breath, and your head throbs in a slow, mean rhythm that makes the floor tilt when you move too quickly.
You move slowly. Because if you pass out in the hallway before Tony Stark's funeral, Sam will never let you hear the end of it, and you refuse to hand him that kind of material.
There are black clothes folded on the chair near the bed.
Steve, probably, or Sam.
You dress with one hand and a lot of quiet swearing. The shirt is loose enough to fit over the sling. The pants require a level of patience you're pretty sure should qualify as a spiritual trial. By the time you're done, you're sweating and a little nauseous, but upright, that counts.
You grab your phone, check it again, find nothing, and tuck it into your pocket. Then you leave your room.
The hallway outside feels the same and completely different.
You know these walls. You know the quiet hum of the lights, the shine of the floor, the turns that lead to the kitchen, the med wing, the training rooms, the offices no one really used after the snap unless they needed somewhere to pretend they weren't falling apart.
You walked these halls for five years with Nat. Sometimes in silence. Sometimes with mugs of coffee gone cold in your hands. Sometimes because neither of you could sleep and the building was too big to be awake in alone.
Now every step feels like trespassing through a memory that hasn't realized she's gone yet.
Your hand drifts to the wolf charm beneath your shirt. "No," you whisper to yourself.
If you start thinking about Nat properly, you won't make it down the hall.
So you give yourself a task.
Yelena.
Natasha had a sister, and that sister deserved to know what happened before the world twisted the story into something sterile and official. Before some government file reduced Nat to a line item. Before someone said sacrifice in that careful voice people used when they didn't want to say died.
Yelena deserved better than that. Nat deserved better than that. So you walk.
You don't go to the common rooms. You don't go toward the garage, where Steve is probably waiting to drive you to Tony's lakehouse. You don't go looking for Bucky, even though you know he's somewhere inside these walls.
You go to Nat's room.
The door is closed. You stand in front of it for a long moment with your hand hovering near the handle, every part of you suddenly unsure.
It feels wrong. That's the first thing. Not dramatic. Not forbidden. Just wrong in the quiet, awful way that touching the belongings of the dead feels wrong because their absence hasn't given you permission.
Nat's things are Nat's things. Her clothes. Her weapons. Her notebooks. Her half-finished water bottles. Her careful secrets tucked under layers of sharper secrets.
You can almost hear her voice in your head.
Don't snoop through my stuff, Hart.
Your mouth trembles. "I'm sorry," you whisper. Then you open the door.
The room smells faintly like her. Clean soap. Leather. Something floral she would've denied owning if anyone asked.
The bed is made. Of course it is. Natasha Romanoff could be living through the collapse of the universe and still make her bed like discipline might keep the walls from caving in.
There's a jacket over the chair. A pair of boots by the closet. A book open facedown on the nightstand, spine bent, because for all her control, Nat had always treated paperbacks like they owed her money. The sight of it nearly takes you out at the knees.
You brace your good hand against the dresser and breathe through it. "Focus," you tell yourself. Your voice sounds too small in her room.
You start with the desk. It feels like theft.
Every drawer you open feels like crossing a line. Receipts. Old mission notes. Pens. A knife strapped beneath the underside of the drawer because of course there's a knife strapped there.
You laugh. It comes out broken.
There are no obvious files. No neat little folder labeled Yelena because Nat would rather haunt the building personally than make anything easy.
You check behind framed photos. Under loose drawer liners. Inside an old toiletry bag. You find passports with names that aren't hers, cash in three currencies, a tiny lock-pick set, a cracked photo of Clint's kids, and a sticky note that says Steve still owes me twenty dollars.
You sit back on your heels and press your lips together. "Nat." It's half accusation, half grief.
The phone in your pocket stays silent. You pull it out anyway.
Nothing.
You call John. The line fails. You call Lemar. The line cuts out.
You close your eyes. "Fine," you whisper. "Fine." You shove the phone back into your pocket and keep looking.
The closet is worse.
There are black jackets and old boots and a red scarf you remember seeing her wear once during a winter supply run, when she'd stood beside you outside some diner in upstate New York and told you that gas station coffee tasted better when the world was ending because expectations had finally died.
You had laughed. She'd looked so pleased with herself.
You press the scarf to your mouth for one second before you can stop yourself. Then you put it back carefully.
You search the small safe in the bottom of the closet next. It takes you longer than it should with one hand and a headache, but you know Nat. You know enough of her patterns. You know the numbers she wouldn't use and the ones she might if she wanted someone specific to find it.
The safe clicks open on the third try.
Your chest tightens.
Inside, there's a slim file, a small drive, and a stack of photographs wrapped in a rubber band.
You take the file first.
Most of it is coded, or half coded, or written in the kind of shorthand Nat used when she didn't want anyone else invited into the sentence. Locations. Dates. Names that might be aliases. Arrows that probably mean something if your brain wasn't full of cotton and skull-thunder.
Then you see it. Y.B. Written in the margin beside a string of numbers and a location that's been crossed out twice. Below it, in Nat's handwriting, small and tight: Don't drag her in unless there's no choice.
Your throat closes. "Oh, Nat." You sit there on the floor of her closet with the file in your lap, surrounded by her shoes and secrets, and for the first time since waking up, you feel angry.
At the universe for making this your job. At death for being so greedy. At the fact that Natasha Romanoff saved the world and still didn't get to choose who told her sister she was gone.
You touch the ink with your thumb. "I'll find her," you whisper. "I swear."
A knock sounds against the open door. You flinch hard enough to make your shoulder spark.
Steve stands in the doorway, already dressed in black. His face softens when he sees you on the closet floor with Nat's file in your lap. He doesn't ask what you're doing. That might be the only reason you don't fall apart.
"It's time," he says quietly.
You nod. Your fingers tighten once around the file. Then you put everything back exactly where you found it. Not because Nat will know. Because some part of you hopes she might.
Before you leave the room, you pull out your phone again. No missed calls. No messages. You stare at John's name until it blurs. Then you set the phone to silent.
The screen asks if you're sure. You almost laugh. No, you're not sure about anything.
But Tony's service is at his lakehouse, and you can't let the whole world hear your desperation ringing through the middle of someone else's grief.
So you silence it. You tuck it into your pocket. Then you follow Steve.
He drives you there himself.
You don't ask why.
Maybe because you're hurt. Maybe because he doesn't trust you not to leave the second his back is turned. Maybe because neither of you wants to walk into Tony Stark's funeral alone, and pretending this is about your concussion is easier than saying that out loud.
The car smells like leather, old coffee, and Steve's quiet. It's a specific kind of quiet. Not empty. Not peaceful. Heavy with things he's refusing to put down because if he starts, he might not be able to stop.
You sit in the passenger seat with your sling tight against your ribs and your phone in your lap.
Silent. Black screen. Nothing.
The world outside the window looks wrong for how normal it is.
Roads still exist. Trees still stand. Sunlight still falls across the hood of the car. Somewhere, people are learning their loved ones are alive. Somewhere else, people are finding out the house they left behind isn't theirs anymore. Somewhere, hospitals are drowning in miracles. Somewhere, soldiers are trying to keep the returned from dying twice.
Somewhere, John Walker still hasn't called you back.
You press your thumb against the side of the phone.
Steve glances over once. "He'll call," he says.
You don't look at him. "You don't know that."
"No," Steve says. "I don't."
You appreciate the honesty. You hate it too.
After a while, Steve says, "Bucky asked about you again."
Your breath catches before you can stop it. You stare out the windshield. "What did you tell him?"
"That you were awake. That you were hurt. That you needed time."
You close your eyes. "Thank you."
"He understood."
Of course he did. That makes it worse.
Steve turns onto a quieter road, trees pressing in on both sides. The lakehouse appears through the green a few minutes later, warm and still beneath a sky that's too blue for grief.
That's what you hate first.
It should be gray. It should be heavy. It should be split open and ugly. It should look like the world understands what it lost.
Instead, the lake gleams beneath the morning light, soft ripples carrying the sun like nothing happened. The house stands beyond the lawn, quiet and beautiful and impossible to look at without thinking of Tony inside it.
Alive. Annoyed. Brilliant. Loud.
Now there are people gathered in black across the grass.
Too many familiar faces. Too many people who should be dead. Too many people who are.
Pepper stands with Morgan close beside her, one hand resting protectively at her daughter's shoulder. Happy is nearby, face drawn and pale. Rhodey looks like someone scooped the center out of him and left the uniform behind. Peter stands with May, too young for the grief sitting on his face.
Thor is there.
Clint. Wanda. T'Challa. Shuri. Okoye. Ayo. Sam. Carol. Bruce. So many others.
And Bucky.
You feel him before you let yourself look.
He stands near Sam, dressed in black, hair loose around his face. His eyes find you almost instantly.
Your breath catches.
For one second, the world forgets to move.
Then Steve's hand presses lightly to your back, guiding you forward before your knees can make their own catastrophic decisions.
You don't go to Bucky. He doesn't come to you. But his eyes stay on you like a hand held out across the distance. That almost hurts more.
The service begins. You're aware of pieces. Pepper's face. Morgan's small hand in hers. The little wreath being set adrift across the lake. The arc reactor resting among flowers, carrying words you can't look at too long without feeling something inside you tear.
Proof that Tony Stark had a heart.
As if anyone here needed proof now. As if the whole universe wasn't breathing because of it.
You stand between Steve and Sam, your sling tucked close, your ribs aching with every inhale. Sam's shoulder brushes yours once, grounding you without making a show of it. You're grateful enough that you almost hate him for it.
The lake carries the small arrangement away.
No one speaks for a while. That silence feels different from the silence after the snap. The snap had left an absence so large it swallowed sound.
This silence is full.
Full of names. Full of faces. Full of every person Tony saved and every person who won't get the chance to thank him.
Your hand finds the wolf charm beneath your black shirt. You think of Nat. You think of Yelena's initials on a page hidden in a closet.
You think of John somewhere unreachable. You think of Lemar standing beside him, hopefully alive, hopefully annoyed, hopefully telling him to stop being stupid in that flat, steady voice.
You think of Bucky standing only a few yards away, breathing the same air as you after five years of being dust in your memory.
Your phone stays silent in your pocket.
The service ends, but nobody really moves at first. Grief keeps everyone rooted in place.
Eventually, people begin to drift. Small clusters form across the lawn. Quiet voices. Gentle hands on shoulders. People touching each other like they need proof that bodies still hold.
You stay near the water.
Steve steps away to speak to Bruce. Sam follows after him, but not before giving you a look that says he knows exactly how many bad ideas your body is trying to commit to at once.
"Don't wander off and collapse dramatically," he says.
You glance at him. "I'll collapse tastefully."
"That's not better."
"It's a little better."
Sam points at you like he wants to argue, then gives up because grief has stolen the appetite for it. "I'll be right over there."
You nod.
He leaves you by the lake.
For a moment, you're alone. Not really. There are people everywhere. Voices behind you. Footsteps in the grass. The soft sound of water touching the shore.
But alone enough.
You stare at the lake until the sunlight fractures across it. The phone in your pocket feels heavy. You don't check it. You're afraid there'll be nothing. You're afraid there'll be something.
Then footsteps approach from behind. You know it's Bucky before he speaks. Your body knows.
It knew him in Wakanda. It knew him in smoke. It knows him now, on the grass near Tony Stark's lakehouse, with the wind moving softly through the trees and grief standing everywhere like another guest in black.
"Mara?" His voice is quiet, careful.
Your eyes close for half a second. Then you turn.
There's no battlefield between you anymore. No smoke. No falling sky. No blast tearing the ground open before he can reach you.
Just him.
Black suit. Loose hair. Tired eyes. One hand hanging at his side like he doesn't know what to do with it unless you tell him.
He looks exactly like he did in Wakanda. No, that isn't true. He looks exactly like he did, but not completely. There's something in his face now that wasn't there before. Something raw. Something awake and wounded. Not five years. Not your five years. But enough to say he knows he's come back into a world that kept moving without him.
His eyes flick over your sling, your bruised temple, your face. Then he looks away like looking too directly might hurt you. "I'm sorry," he says.
Your throat tightens.
He takes your silence as an answer and steps back. "If you don't want to see me, I can go."
The words are too careful, too gentle. Like he's holding himself at the edge of your grief and waiting for you to decide whether he's allowed to exist inside it.
You stare at him.
Bucky Barnes... alive. Standing in front of you after Tony's funeral at the edge of a lake that's carrying another goodbye away from shore.
John's silence sits like a bruise under your ribs. Nat's absence presses at your spine. Yelena's initials burn in the back of your mind.
You should say something. You don't. You walk to him instead.
His eyes widen just a fraction.
You don't stop until your good arm is around him and your face is pressed into his chest.
For one terrible second, Bucky doesn't move. Then his arms come around you. Careful at first. Like you're glass. Like you're injured. Like you're a ghost he isn't sure he's allowed to hold.
Then his hand settles between your shoulder blades, and the weight of him lands. Familiar. That's the cruelest part.
Five years should've changed the shape of this. Five years should've made your body hesitate, should've taught your nerves not to recognize him, should've made him feel like someone from a dream you'd outgrown.
But it remembers. The width of his chest beneath your cheek. The way his metal arm stays cautious until you lean closer. The warmth of him. The sound he makes when his breath catches and he tries to hide it.
You grip the back of his jacket and close your eyes.
Bucky lowers his face to your hair. "I'm here," he whispers.
Your chest caves around the words. "I know."
"No," he says, rougher now. "I'm here."
A broken sound slips out of you. You hold him tighter, and pain sparks through your shoulder bright enough to make you gasp.
Bucky pulls back immediately. "You're hurt."
"I'm fine."
His eyebrows draw together.
You almost laugh because that look is the same. That disbelieving, unimpressed, quietly furious look that used to appear whenever you lied about sleeping enough or eating enough or bleeding less than you were.
"Don't look at me like that," you say.
"Like what?"
"Like you know I'm lying."
His mouth shifts. Almost a smile. Almost grief. "I do know." The words land too tenderly.
You look up at him and forget, for half a second, how to survive it.
Bucky's eyes move across your face slowly, searching. Trying to line up the person he knew with the person standing in front of him, bruised and bandaged and holding secrets he hasn't even learned how to ask about yet.
"I saw you," he says.
Your fingers twitch against his jacket.
"On the field," he continues. "You had blood on your face."
You try to make your voice work. "Everyone had blood on their face."
"Not like that."
You look down.
Behind him, the lake moves softly. People speak in low voices near the house. Somewhere nearby, Morgan laughs once, small and sudden, and the sound nearly destroys you.
Your phone lights up once in your pocket. You don't see it.
Bucky's thumb shifts once against your back. "You had a gun," he says.
"A lot of people had guns too."
"Mara."
You hate the softness of it.
You hate that it's your name in his mouth and not sweetheart, because sweetheart would've ruined you, but Mara might be worse. It sounds like he's trying to meet you where you are now instead of dragging you back to where he left you.
"I changed," you say.
Bucky doesn't answer right away. When he does, his voice is careful. "I figured."
A laugh leaves you, humorless and thin. "Did you?"
"I'm trying to."
You look up at him. His face is open in a way you aren't prepared for.
"I don't know how to do this," he admits.
The honesty knocks something loose inside your chest. "Do what?"
"Come back." His throat works. "Find out everyone lived five years without me. Find out Steve's older in places he won't talk about. Find out Nat's gone. Find out Tony's gone. Find out you…"
He stops.
You hold your breath.
His eyes search yours. "Find out you had to keep going."
Your vision blurs.
The phone lights up again. Silent. Ignored.
John Calling.
But the name glows unseen from the darkness of your pocket while Bucky Barnes stands in front of you with five years missing from his hands.
For a second, you think about lying.
You think about telling him it wasn't that bad, that you survived because that's what people did, that the five years were ugly but manageable. You think about trimming the truth into something he can hold without cutting himself.
But then you remember your old compound room.
Five years of waking up with his charm pressed into your palm like proof that love could become an artifact.
You remember Nat leaving food outside your door. You remember Steve's support group. You remember the first man you killed because the world had taken Bucky and spared monsters.
You remember John's hand closing around yours in a church parking lot. You remember Lemar calling you Trouble like the word could pin you to the world.
You remember too much. "It wasn't living at first," you say.
Bucky goes very still.
"It was just... not dying."
His face shifts. "I'm sorry," he says again.
You shake your head. "You keep saying that."
"I don't know what else to say."
"Me neither."
His eyes glisten, but he doesn't look away. "For me, it was minutes," he says. "Wakanda. Then the field." His voice thins around the confession. "I remember looking at you. I remember falling. Then I was back, and Steve was yelling, and Sam was there, and everyone was running."
You close your eyes. "I know."
"I didn't know it'd been five years until someone said it."
Your hand curls against his chest.
"Five years," he says, like he's testing the shape of the words and hating them. "For me, I lost you for five minutes."
You open your eyes.
Bucky's face breaks in the smallest way. "But you lost me every day."
The air leaves your body.
Your phone vibrates again. Then again. The call keeps coming. You don't hear it. You don't feel it.
Bucky's hand lifts slowly, giving you time to move away.
You don't.
His fingers touch your cheek, warm and hesitant, his thumb stopping just beneath the bruise near your temple. "I'm so sorry," he whispers.
You break. Not loudly. Not all at once. Your face crumples before you can stop it, and then Bucky is pulling you back into him, careful of your shoulder, one arm around your back, the other hand cradling the base of your skull like he remembers exactly how to hold you when the world has teeth.
You press your face into his chest and cry. You cry for Wakanda. For the hut. For the test hidden in a box. For dust on your hands. For the old room that taught you how to mourn him.
For Nat's empty bed. For Tony's wreath disappearing across the water. For John's silence. For Lemar's unanswered phone.
For Bucky alive and solid beneath your hand, when some sick, wounded part of you had started to believe grief was the only faithful thing left.
The phone lightd up one last time. Then stops. You still don't notice.
Bucky holds you tighter. "I've got you," he says. The words land wrong and right at the same time.
Because he used to. Because he does. Because someone else does too. Because you don't know what any of that means yet.
"I don't know who I am anymore," you whisper into his jacket.
Bucky's breath shudders. "Yeah," he says softly. "I know that feeling."
You pull back just enough to look at him.
He gives you a tired, aching almost-smile. "Not the same. I know it's not the same."
"No," you say. "But maybe close enough."
His thumb brushes once beneath your eye.
The lake shifts behind him, sunlight breaking across the water in little pieces.
Bucky's gaze drops to your chest, to the wolf charm where it rests against the black fabric of your shirt.
His expression changes. "I didn't think you'd still have it," he says.
Your fingers close around it instantly. "I thought if I took it off," you say, voice thin, "it'd mean I was letting you go."
His jaw trembles once before he steadies it. "And did you?" he asks.
You look at him. The answer should be simple.
He's alive. He's here. He's Bucky.
But John's name is under your skin. John's apartment is still the place your heart calls home. John's hand had closed around yours and let you go through a portal because the world needed him too. John still hasn't called.
You can't answer Bucky's question without splitting yourself open. So you tell the truth you can survive. "I don't know."
Bucky nods slowly.
It isn't disappointment that crosses his face. It's pain. But he doesn't step back.
He doesn't punish you for the uncertainty. He just breathes through it. "Okay," he says.
Your brow furrows. "Okay?"
"Yeah." His voice is rough, but steady. "Okay."
You stare at him.
"I was gone," he says. "You weren't."
The sentence is simple. It still feels like being cut clean through.
"I didn't want to be," you whisper.
"I know."
"I would've waited forever if forever had just been missing you."
His eyes shine.
"But it wasn't," you say. "It was waking up. Eating. Fighting. Bleeding. Trying not to become something Nat and Steve couldn't look at."
"Mara."
"I wasn't good, Buck."
His face tightens.
"I got angry," you say, the confession scraping out of you. "At everyone. At the world. At people who were still here when you weren't. At monsters who survived when good people didn't."
Bucky listens without flinching.
You wish he would. It'd make it easier to stop. "I did things," you whisper. "Things I don't know how to explain yet."
He's quiet for a long moment. Then he says, "You don't have to explain them today."
Your breath catches.
"You don't have to give me five years beside Tony's lake," he says. "You don't have to make it make sense because I showed up."
You look at him, stunned by the mercy of it.
Bucky's mouth twists. "I want to know," he says. "I do. I want to know everything I missed. Even the ugly parts. Especially those, probably." He swallows. "But not if it tears you apart just because I don't know how to wait."
A sound leaves you, broken and small.
He looks down at you. "And I can wait," he says. "I'm good at that."
It almost makes you laugh. It almost makes you cry harder. "Don't joke about seventy-year trauma naps," you whisper.
His mouth flickers. "There she is."
The words are to much. Too much like before. Too much like home.
You wipe under your eyes with your good hand and breathe in carefully. Your ribs protest. Your head throbs. Your heart feels like it's trying to hold too many names at once.
Bucky glances toward the house, then back to you. "Steve said you were looking for something earlier."
Your stomach tightens. You don't answer right away.
Bucky doesn't push.
"For Nat's sister," you say eventually.
His eyebrows pull together. "Natasha had a sister?"
"Yeah." Your throat tightens. "Yelena."
He says the name quietly, like he's making room for it. "Yelena."
"Nat mentioned her. Not a lot. Enough." You look toward the water. "She needs to know."
Bucky nods. No hesitation. No question.
"She shouldn't hear it from a file," you say. "Or a report. Or whatever polished version someone puts together so they don't have to say the words."
"No," Bucky says softly. "She shouldn't."
"I found initials. Maybe a direction. I don't know yet." You swallow. "Nat didn't make things easy."
His mouth shifts faintly. "Sounds like her."
The almost-smile hurts.
You glance at him. "You knew her differently."
"Yeah," he says. "I did."
For a moment, the two of you stand there with Nat between you. Not as a wound exactly. More like a hand on both your shoulders, keeping you upright and furious about it.
"I owe her this," you say.
Bucky's eyes soften. "You loved her."
It isn't a question. That makes it harder. You nod. "She kept me alive," you whisper. "More times than she probably knew."
Bucky looks down. "I'm glad," he says.
The words are quiet. Devastated. Honest.
You look at him, and for one strange second, you understand that Bucky has to be grateful to the people who kept you alive while also grieving that you needed keeping alive at all.
There's no clean place for that feeling to go. So it stays between you.
Bucky lifts his gaze again. "We'll find her," he says.
You freeze. We. Such a small word. A knife disguised as shelter.
Bucky seems to realize it a second after he says it, because his expression softens with caution. "I mean," he says, "if you want help."
You look down.
You think of Nat's handwriting. Don't drag her in unless there's no choice.
You think of Steve saying he couldn't locate her. You think of communication networks choking on the weight of the returned. You think of Nat's voice in the kitchen at two in the morning, telling you that family was complicated and then refusing to elaborate.
"I don't know what I want," you admit.
Bucky nods. "Okay."
"You keep saying that."
"Because I mean it."
Your eyes lift to his.
He looks tired. Sad. Alive.
"You can tell me where to stand," he says. "That's all I'm asking for right now."
"What?"
His gaze holds yours. "If you want me close, I'll stay close. If you need space, I'll give you space. If you want me where you can see me but not touch me, I can do that too."
Your throat tightens until breathing hurts. "Bucky."
"You don't owe me a version of you that makes this easier."
You close your eyes. The mercy of him is unbearable. Because part of you wants to step back into it. Into the old shape of your life.
And part of you is still standing in John's apartment, hearing him say, Don't make me come back to an empty apartment.
Your eyes open. "I don't know where I need you," you say.
Bucky takes that in. Then he nods. "Then I'll stay where you can find me."
Your chest aches.
The phone in your pocket lights up once. Not a call this time. A voicemail notification.
A text message follows after it, delayed and silent.
Em? Please pick up.
You don't see it. You're looking at Bucky. Bucky is looking at you like every second he gets might be borrowed.
His gaze drops to your hand.
You realize you're still gripping his sleeve, barely. Just two fingers caught in the fabric near his wrist.
You start to let go.
Bucky doesn't move. Doesn't grab. Doesn't ask. But something in his face goes so carefully still that you stop.
Your fingers stay where they are. It's barely anything. It's enough.
Around you, people continue to drift away from the lakehouse in quiet clusters. Cars start in the distance. Doors close softly. The world keeps moving because it always does, even when it shouldn't.
You turn back toward the water.
Bucky stands beside you. Close enough to touch. Careful enough not to.
For the first time in five years, you don't have to imagine him there. For the first time in almost a year, you don't know how to get back to John.
Your phone sits silent in your pocket.
Three missed calls, one new Voicemail, one text message waiting.
You don't know yet.
For now, there's only the lake, the fading sound of Tony's service behind you, and Bucky Barnes standing close enough for your fingers to remember him.
Could you please write John Walker x f thunderbold reader where they secretly hook up and the girls try to Set Reader up with some guy Resoluting in jealous John?
Btw. Your writing is amazing 😍✨
After an interrupted quicky, things get weird between you and John. When the ladies set you up on a date, he finally makes it right between the two of you.
A/N: John's texts are in red, his sister's are in blue, reader's are in orange.
Rating: 18+ MDNI
WC: 3.6k (complete)
CW: PWP, no use of y/n, reader is afab, reader is a thunderbolt/new avenger, john is down bad, john is jealous, john is a munch, sexting, light angst with HEA, pinv, flirting, dirty talk, pussy pronouns, oral (f receiving), light hair pulling, semi-public sex (locked bathroom).
His name was Peter and he worked in biotech. That was as much information as John allowed himself. If he dug any deeper, turned over the wrong rock and learned the wrong thing, he would do something genuinely irrational.
Or something more irrational than waiting up until you got back from your date.
Your date with Peter. Who worked in biotech.
Ava and Yelena had set you up with this guy, and it remained to be seen if you were genuinely into him or just doing your friends a favor.
John had also seen a picture.
That was a mistake, the feeling that flared in his chest at the sight of this dude was what warned him that he was charging up to a precipice with a slippery edge. Because Peter wasn’t bad looking. In fact, Peter was probably quite good looking—symmetrical face, strong jaw, full head of curling dark hair, skewing Barnes but with Bob’s guileless eyes. Maybe you didn’t even like blondes, maybe--
John stared at his phone, the screen too bright for the dark room, but the shadows suited his mood, even if sitting there waiting for you to get back to the Watchtower in the gloom did project a menace that was mostly unintentional.
Mostly. If Peter came out of that elevator with you, the menacing was going to become extremely intentional extremely fast.
And in the unhealthy glow of that too bright screen, John made another critical error. He couldn’t help himself. He texted his sister, attaching the picture of Peter he had scraped off of social media. Ava and Yelena had said the guy’s last name, and that was all John needed to go on a manic, ill-advised Internet hunt.
weird question, but is this guy hot?
John waited on the couch, hunched, bare feet scrunching against the rug, every part of him trying to fidget while Katie’s typing dots popped up. If the dots persisted for that long then it wasn’t going to be a flat “no”, so he was already stewing.
I guess? Yeah. Not my type but I’m sure he isn’t hurting for dates. Kind eyes. Looks like he smells nice. Why are you asking?
Grimacing, John sniffed his own arm pit. Not bad. Yelena had complimented him once (once) by congratulating him for not smelling like a beast in the jet after missions. And you… you had seemed pretty fond of the oil he used in his beard, pressed up against him, face in his neck, breathing in his scent during your regrettably brief intimacy--
John’s hand shook around the phone. Fuck.
Another text from her came through before John got up the courage to reply.
You’re more attractive than he is. Is that what you were looking for?
He gave a dry snort. yes. thank you.
Come back to visit, J. plenty of my friends want to take you out.
John was flattered, but he didn’t want to date any of his sister’s friends. It would be too weird. And anyway, if he did, he’d just fuck that up, too, let another perfect woman slip through his fingers, fumble them the way he’d fumbled you.
Sighing, he wrapped both hands around his phone, slumped forward even more, pushed the edge of the device against his forehead and tried, really tried, not to think about that night. But it always came back. There was no outrunning it when you were the only thing he wanted to run toward.
The spark felt like something you had been building toward for months. He noticed your hot little looks, the way you subtly changed your training schedule to line up more and more with his, how your jokes got softer. Still mean, but not quite so mean.
So, the night it finally happened, he should’ve been honest, should’ve used his words as his fucking therapist reminded him ad nauseum. He should’ve told you he was excited. Nervous. He should’ve been honest that he hadn’t been with a woman in over a year, that his relevant systems were enthusiastic but perhaps out of practice. And the opportunity had landed in your laps so fast, unexpectedly, and John was thinking with one head and not the other, never slowing down to consider it might just be better to wait until conditions were optimal and a conversation could be had.
But you had looked so beautiful that night, and after a few drinks during the gala, you had brushed John’s hand when nobody was looking, and he had skimmed his fingers across your lower back. You had dodged into him, and that felt like the sign he had been waiting for.
He had never seen you dressed up before. It was killing him. And you had shot him one blistering look that enticed him to follow, so he had, trailing you back to your hotel room, letting you stay a few steps ahead, playfully hunting you, then catching up once you reached the door. You had tumbled inside on top of each other, mouths hungry, fingers clumsy.
It was the end of the night, your roommate—Yelena—could come back any second. The benefit was wrapping up, and it was all being held in one hotel. John knew that. He didn’t care. He wanted you in that perfect, flirty dress, so he charged in like a numbskull, like he always did--results now, consequences later.
“John.”
His name sounded beautiful on your lips, rushing out as he shoved you up against the wall three feet from the door. With trembling hands, he reached for you, cupping your jaw, tilting your face up toward him, swallowing his own name as you arched against his body. Just that kiss was enough to make the heat rising between you get in his head, make it spin. Dizzy, he rolled his tongue against yours and groaned, reaching down to find the bottom of your thigh, cup it, lift it high enough to hook around his waist.
You clawed at the front of his trousers, breathing hot and heavy into his open mouth. The second he touched between your legs, you moaned and dropped back against the wall, eyes blinking rapidly before you leaned into him again, wedging your face against his neck.
“Mm. You smell incredible,” you whispered.
“You taste incredible,” he teased back, laughing. His fingers hooked around your thong, knuckles grazing the slick folds he was desperate to get to. You were so wet he could hardly believe it; you wanted him, you wanted him as much as he wanted you— “Feel incredible.”
Whatever words might have come next were obliterated when your bare hand closed around his dick, your grip faltering and then tightening as you felt the size of him. John flattened you against the wall, vision blurring, senses throbbing, concentration narrowing to the soaked furrow between your thighs and the way you seized up as he pushed inside you.
Holy shit.
He didn’t last long, he couldn’t, not when you were that hot and wet and willing, whispering John’s name against his neck, whimpering and shaking and begging him for more. His hand slammed against the wall next to you hard enough to shake the room. He wanted to hold back, fuck he wanted to, but you felt too good. It hit him fast, right in the gut, and before he could think a single sobering thought, his vision silvered and he tasted burning metal in his mouth, and he was coming so hard it felt like he was going to fall to his knees.
You clung to him, fingers digging into his shoulders. And John had every intention of staying there, making you feel good, but his senses sharpened up again at a harsh sound just down the hall outside the door. Yelena. She and Bob weren’t far off, laughing together.
You must have heard it, too, your eyes widening in alarm as you whispered: “Shit.”
John tore himself away, shoving his dick back into his pants and swearing as he tried to make himself presentable. You let your dress fall back down and opened the door just a crack, peering out. John slipped by you without a word, hurrying down the hall and disappearing into an alcove with ice and vending machines.
When the coast was clear, he skulked back to his room, trying to come up with something appropriate to text you. Not an apology, because he wasn’t sorry for what happened, only frustrated with himself that it had been truncated. Nothing seemed right. He froze up. He didn’t text you anything that night, embarrassed by every version of “sorry you didn’t cum, maybe next time” he came up with.
Days of awkward silence turned into weeks of it, and John felt you grow colder, quieter, and then the conversation seemed impossible to broach.
Across the common room, the elevator chimed.
John shot up off the couch. Finally.
Except Yelena stumbled out, tipsy, clinging to Ava’s arm. Everyone stopped, the women pausing, inspecting him before dissolving into giggles, picking up whatever conversational thread had started in the elevator. Before disappearing down the corridor, Yelena shot him a confused look.
Dropping back down, flames high in his cheeks, John considered his phone.
Maybe it was finally time to compose that humiliating text he never sent.
Peter had gone to the bathroom five minutes ago, which seemed like a long time if the guy just needed to pee. The restaurant he had chosen wasn’t too upscale or pretentious, and you liked that. It was just meant to be a casual thing, and from your perspective it was going well. He asked questions and follow up questions, he had an interesting job, and he was familiar enough with high tech labs to not be weirded out by your unorthodox job or the people you went to work with.
But if you were being honest with yourself, there was no spark.
You didn’t feel anything when his eyes met yours across the warmly lit table. Most of your jokes went right over his head, but then, your sense of humor was an acquired taste. Dark. Occasionally macabre. Your friends punched and shot at people for a living, what did he expect? He had nice eyes, but you could tell they didn’t light up when they grazed your face. And if you were being extra honest with yourself, you liked a man with a little more…edge. Perhaps more size, someone who could throw you across the bed and push you into the mattress, thick and hunky and—
You sighed, leaning onto the table with a miserable sound, checking the front and the back of the restaurant, becoming reasonably confident that Peter was not coming back.
Ghosted. Again.
It didn’t hurt nearly as bad this time. The last one had stung like hell, a fact you were concealing from everyone, especially the man who was to blame.
Your phone vibrated across the table, and you flipped it over, expecting to see Peter’s name; maybe he had fallen in or something and desperately needed a superhero.
Nope.
Speak of the devil.
You couldn’t understand why John Walker, the man who had fucked you for three glorious minutes only to vanish, was waiting up for you. He had gotten what he wanted, hadn’t he? So, what could he possibly need at 11:32PM on a Thursday? If it was an emergency, he would’ve used the dedicated app and sent out a team-wide alert.
come back to the tower, i want to eat you out
Surely, he had sent this message to the wrong person. You allowed thirty seconds to go by, giving Peter that much.
I think you sent this to the wrong person, you typed back, the restaurant suddenly so hot you could feel sweat bleeding through your bra.
no, i didn’t.
Thirty more seconds. Breathe in. Breathe out. Straitlaced John was not sexting you. It wasn’t possible.
Are you drunk?
would you like me to be?
Your hands shook around the phone, your eyes sliding up to scan the restaurant one more time. Peter was long gone, you could just feel it, the empty glass where he had been sitting mocking you in the sweaty silence.
John texted again without waiting for your response.
how’s Pete?
God, this was embarrassing.
I think he ghosted. Went to pee, never came back.
jesus. did he at least pay the bill?
He did not.
where are you?
You groaned and licked your lips, fidgeting, pride demanding you tell John to fuck off and fuck off forever for the insecurity you were still wrestling with after he jizzed and dashed. At least this way, you might get him to pay for your dinner and get an explanation, which was more than nothing, more than you had at the start of the night. You linked the address.
After a few minutes, you felt like an idiot. Double ghosted. Yiiiiiikes. John didn’t text again, and you were left to wallow in self-pity while the waiter checked in with increasing urgency, his palpable sympathy making your ears burn.
The restaurant wasn’t terribly far from the Watchtower. John showed up fifteen minutes later, hands in his pockets, eyes shifty and darting as he scanned the place for you. The jagged coil of shame that had been tightening in your chest unwound, but you tried not to let John see how relieved you were that he had actually shown up.
Now that it was just the two of you, neither of you knew where to look or what to do.
John elbowed Peter’s empty glass toward the edge of the table with a grimace, never letting his bare skin touch it.
“I’d say I’m sorry the night didn’t turn out how you wanted it to,” he said, clearing his throat, stretching his neck. “But I’m not. Because…because I was waiting up for you.”
Your next breath didn’t go down so easily.
It was freezing cold out, deep winter, and the thick, navy blue cable knit sweater enhanced his military physique perfectly. The little peak of white t-shirt near his neck made it sweet, boyish, like he had thrown it on in a hurry to get to you. His hair was finicky, stuck up from his hands being in it too much.
He signaled to your floating waiter, ordered a beer, cutting you a searching glance, like any second you were going to tell him to get lost.
“Did you mean this?” you asked, pushing your phone across the table toward him.
John’s cheeks turned a lurid pink at the sight of the text. But to his credit, he didn’t look away, he nodded, once, then pushed the phone back. “Every word.”
“Where?”
His brows shot up. “In the…isn’t that usually the…”
You snorted, covering your mouth. “Are you trying to say pussy?”
You both ducked your heads as the waiter returned, as if on cue, to hear you say just that.
“Sorry,” you muttered, smiling awkwardly as John accepted his beer, got out his card, and mumbled at the guy to put everything from the table on it. “He, um, he lost his cat.”
“Uh-huh.” The waiter had clearly heard worse, and shot you both a knowing glance before running John’s card on their POS. “You two have a good night. Hope you find that kitty.”
John downed half of his beer in one slug, then stared up at the ceiling. “Wherever you want.”
“What inspired this…offer?”
He scratched his beard idly, shrugging, eyes high flame blue as he raked them across the table and up to your face. “It’s what I should’ve done. I was…fucked up after that night. At the hotel. Felt…felt like a god damned teenager. Horned up. Stupid.”
Things were starting to make an annoying kind of sense. He did seem like the type to suffer an existential crisis after something like that. Still. Now that you knew the truth, you weren’t sure if or for how long you wanted to punish him.
“I was just that good, mm?” you asked. Purred. “And you got too…you know, too…”
“Are you trying to say excited?”
You reached across the table and pinched the skin just under his knuckles. John snorted, swore, humored you by pretending it hurt and shook out his hand.
“Yes.” He lowered his head and his voice, eyes eating you up as he took the last swig from his beer, wiped the foam off of his mustache with the back of his hand, the one you had pinched. “Yes, I got too excited. That’s what you do to me.”
His voice was a shivering rasp, almost inaudible above the louder tables on either side of yours.
He made a convincing argument.
“And what is it you want to do to me?” you teased, tapping the top of your phone, resting one hand in your palm, enjoying his discomfort as he glanced around again.
This time the waiter wasn’t hovering, but apparently John wasn’t taking any chances, swinging around the table, taking you by the arm and tugging until you tumbled into his side, right hand landing on his chest. “Always preferred action to words.”
“Mm, I like both,” you said, letting him lead you to the back hallway. It was dark, a little drippy, not romantic or particularly sweet smelling, but good enough for what he had in mind. It was in your mind now, too, and it felt like that night at the hotel, the spark between you was too bright to ignore. You didn’t know how you had managed to avoid each other for weeks, not when it felt so right to be back in his arms, his big, strong fingers wrapped tightly around your wrist, that hunched, hunting quality to his shoulders as he spun you and trapped you against the wall just next to the co-ed bathroom door.
Surprise leaked out of you in a squeak, all the air flattened out of your lungs as he shoved his chest into yours and sucked your left earlobe between his teeth. “I’m going to drag you behind that door and eat your fucking pussy until you scream, is that what you wanted to hear?”
“Yes.”
John hooked his arm around you, pulling you into the bathroom and kicking the door shut in one smooth motion. He locked you inside, jamming your back up against the door and dropping to his knees.
No sooner had his knees hit the tiles than his fingers were in your waistband and you were wiggling until your tight jeans were down around your ankles. John shoved his face into the damp front of your panties, gasping, a shudder ripping through him as your hands slid into his hair and urged him closer. You ground against him shamelessly, lifting your thigh and draping it over his left shoulder.
“Fuck, she’s so wet, needs me, doesn’t she?” he murmured, voice rough with need as he peeled your panties away from your slick, humid sex. John glanced up at you, the laser blue of his eyes the purest thing in the dingy bathroom. The green lights draped you both in shadow, the music pumped in fading to the edges of your consciousness as he held your gaze and licked hungrily at your slit. “It’s okay, sweetheart,” he whispered, to you, to your aching pussy, “I’ll stay close, not going anywhere now.”
His fingers pushed inside, big and rough and greedy. You whimpered, offering more of yourself, arching against his face as he thumbed through your folds to tease out your clit, another eager swirl of his tongue sending lightning skipping up your abdomen.
Someone banged on the door, grumbling, the wood creaking and rumbling against your back.
“Busy!” John thundered back, shooting an apologetic look up your body with a smirk. “Isn’t that right?” he asked, softer, kissing your inner thighs before going back to work.
“Mmhm.” You didn’t know what else to say or what other noises to make, mouth hanging open, brain emptying rapidly as John’s chin rasped against you. He was going to be washing you out of his beard for days. “Y-Yes,” you said, managing to whimper out encouragement, eyes squeezing shut as he sucked your clit into his mouth and hummed gently. “Busy. So busy. Busiest…busiest I’ve ever been, actually. Come back never.”
John laughed into your body, nuzzling, fingers stroking back into you, one then two, curling, teasing along the upper walls of your channel until you clamped down and rocked, hard, into his face.
“There she is,” he whispered, shivering again. “That’s what she needs.”
John found his rhythm, sticking to it when you were reduced to sweet, slurring gasps. Stars, stars bursting across your eyes and then liquid fire shrieking up your middle, coalescing there and holding you hostage until the stars bled and the whole sky behind your eyes was silvery white. You didn’t mean to make that sound in a semi-public place, but the risk and the naughtiness just made the explosion linger. Fuck.
You crumpled back against the door, but John caught you, wiping his face off on his sleeve while he tugged your jeans back up, but you cupped his jaw, shaking your head, smiling as his brows went up and he sank back down.
“One for every week you kept me waiting,” you said, petting his hair back. John leaned into you, eyes dark and focused as he looked you up and down. “Unless you’re getting too excited?”
He cut you a warning look, wrapping his fist around the hip of your panties before tearing them clean off. Someone else knocked on the door.
“Busy,” John shouted, slamming his fist against the door between your legs, scraping his chin up your thigh, his gaze shining and hungry. “Come back never.”
WARNINGS: chaotic Thunderbolts behavior, relentless teasing, mild language, weaponized magnets, sabotage, Bucky being aggressively decorated, mutual pining, suggestive flirting, and an alarming lack of respect for unattended vibranium.
SUMMARY: When Bucky leaves his vibranium arm unattended, the Thunderbolts turn it into their newest source of entertainment. What begins as one harmless magnet quickly becomes an elaborate team competition involving ridiculous distractions, wrong guesses, and far too much flirting between you and one increasingly suspicious super soldier.
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Hi handshake anon I’m so greedy I’m really sorry but I love the thunderbolts that I had to request another shenanigans.
But this time it’s overdone and it features Buckys metal arm + fridge magnets ( no there isn’t a pattern ) . I think it’s done in the past but I love this trope so much.
I don’t know exactly when he puts the arm in the dishwasher and when he exactly puts it back , but it’s now a tradition to bedazzle the arm with fridge magnets + at press conferences. And Bucky has to guess who chose what magnet to avoid this- so go bears is actually Ava , a soccer shoe is bob , I love Russia is walker , yelena places a barn magnet , and Alexie an alligator magnet . Reader places a Bucky arm magnet in his arm . He knows by third day but he just is a fake anti tom foolery and they really suck at being sneaky especially with Barnes .
Idk if you have ever written dialogue for Sam but I think it would be funny if Sam’s in on it as well . And he just puts one of buckys campaign magnet at a high profile event.
Fluff romantic dealers pick .
My handshake anon! You have unleashed a whole chaotic Thunderbolts universe, and this time, a simple one shot was not going to be enough for Bucky's arm being bedazzled by the Tunderbolts. So you can start reading chapter 1 of Magnetic Attraction here. Thank you for your request
C's corner: So this request was originally supposed to be a short, silly little fic about the Thunderbolts sticking magnets all over Bucky’s arm. Naturally, I took that idea, shook it violently, and somehow turned it into a chapter series. 😂 Because apparently one chapter of magnet-related nonsense wasn’t enough. Now every chapter is going to revolve around the team finding increasingly ridiculous ways to convince Bucky to voluntarily remove his arm so they can strike again. Thank you so much for this request because I’m having way too much fun with it already. Poor Bucky is about to spend several chapters being suspicious, annoyed, flirted with, and aggressively decorated. As he deserves. 🫶🏽
WARNINGS: chaotic Thunderbolts behavior, relentless teasing, mild language, weaponized magnets, flour-related sabotage, Bucky being aggressively decorated, mutual pining, suggestive flirting, and an alarming lack of respect for unattended vibranium.
WC: 4K+
SUMMARY: When Bucky leaves his vibranium arm unattended, the Thunderbolts turn it into their newest source of entertainment. What begins as one harmless magnet quickly becomes an elaborate team competition involving ridiculous distractions, wrong guesses, and far too much flirting between you and one increasingly suspicious super soldier.
Bucky Barnes has made several questionable decisions during his lifetime.
He's jumped out of airplanes without parachutes. He's fought aliens with nothing but a rifle and a deeply concerning amount of confidence. He once trusted Sam Wilson to choose a restaurant without checking the reviews first.
But putting his vibranium arm in the dishwasher? That might be the worst one yet. In Bucky's defense, the arm needs cleaning.
Missions get messy, the tiny seams collect dirt, and someone, probably Alexei, spilled maple syrup directly into the elbow joint during breakfast.
Alexei maintains that the syrup attacked him first.
Bucky removes the arm, places it carefully on the top rack, and starts the dishwasher while the rest of you pretend not to stare.
It isn't unusual anymore.
The first time Bucky detached his arm in the kitchen, Bob screamed. John instinctively reached for a gun. Alexei asked if he could borrow it.
Now, nobody pays much attention. Or, at least, that's what Bucky thinks.
He leaves the kitchen to shower while the machine runs.
The moment his footsteps disappear down the hall, Yelena slowly turns toward you.
You slowly turn toward her.
Ava looks up from her coffee.
John lowers the newspaper he hasn't actually been reading.
Bob blinks.
Alexei's eyes widen with the delighted horror of a man watching civilization collapse in real time.
Yelena whispers, "He has left it unsupervised."
The dishwasher hums innocently.
You glance toward the hallway. "That feels legally significant."
"It is abandoned property," Alexei declares.
"It's not abandoned," Ava says.
"He walked away."
"He lives here."
Alexei shrugs. "Details."
John folds the newspaper and sets it on the counter. "What exactly are we discussing?"
You point toward the refrigerator.
More specifically, toward the collection of magnets covering its stainless-steel doors.
The tower's magnet collection has grown without anyone admitting responsibility. There are souvenir magnets from missions, tacky slogans, animals wearing sunglasses, miniature landmarks, several letters from an alphabet set, and one shaped like a glittery cowboy boot.
John follows your gaze.
His mouth twitches.
"No," Ava says immediately.
John stands. "I didn't say anything."
"You made the face."
"What face?"
"The one you make before doing something that ends with Valentina sending a legal memo."
Yelena is already opening the dishwasher.
Steam rolls out dramatically.
Bucky's arm lies on the top rack, clean, polished, and completely defenseless.
You place a hand over your heart. "Beautiful."
"Majestic," Alexei agrees.
"Guys," Bob says nervously. "Are we sure we should touch it?"
"No," Yelena says.
She reaches for the refrigerator anyway.
Three minutes later, Bucky's arm is resting on the counter beneath an arrangement of magnets that looks like a souvenir shop exploded across it.
A smiling sun sits on the shoulder.
A glittery cactus clings to the forearm.
Someone has spelled HOT DOG using mismatched alphabet letters.
Alexei adds the cowboy boot.
John moves it two inches to the left.
"Composition," he explains when you look at him.
Ava puts a tiny magnet shaped like a knife on the wrist.
Bob, after several minutes of moral conflict, adds a smiling cloud.
You place a red heart directly in the center of Bucky's palm.
Then all six of you retreat to different parts of the kitchen and pretend to be engaged in completely normal activities.
Yelena starts peeling an orange.
Ava stares at her phone.
John picks up the newspaper upside down.
Bob opens an empty cabinet and peers inside.
Alexei whistles with all the subtlety of an air-raid siren.
You lean against the counter, biting the inside of your cheek.
Bucky enters wearing sweatpants and a black T-shirt, his hair damp from the shower.
He makes it three steps into the kitchen before stopping.
His gaze lands on the arm.
The room falls silent apart from Alexei's continued whistling.
Bucky looks at the magnets. Then at all of you. Then back at the magnets. "What," he says slowly, "the hell is this?"
You gesture toward the arm. "You left it unsupervised."
"It was in the dishwasher."
"Exactly."
"In my home."
"Location doesn't cancel negligence."
Bucky stares at you.
You stare back with an expression of perfect innocence.
His eyes narrow.
It's annoyingly attractive.
"You did this," he says.
You gasp. "That's a serious accusation."
"You're smiling."
"I smile all the time."
"Not like that."
"Like what?"
"Like you're about to get tackled."
Your stomach gives an embarrassing little swoop.
John clears his throat loudly. "For the record, Barnes, this appears to have been a group effort."
Bucky looks at the upside-down newspaper.
"Walker."
"Yeah?"
"You're holding that wrong."
John glances down. "Experimental reading technique."
Bucky exhales through his nose.
He removes the magnets one by one, placing them in a pile on the counter.
When he reaches the red heart in his palm, he pauses. His gaze flicks toward you.
You suddenly become very interested in the ceiling.
Bucky peels the heart away and drops it with the others. "This stops now," he announces.
Yelena takes a bite of her orange. "Of course."
"I mean it."
"We hear you."
"No more magnets."
"Crystal clear."
Bucky looks around the kitchen.
Every face is solemn. Even Alexei has stopped whistling.
Bucky attaches the arm, tests his fingers, and leaves the room.
The moment he disappears, Yelena turns to you.
"Tonight, we establish rules."
By dinner, the Thunderbolts have formed the International Committee for the Decorative Enhancement of James Buchanan Barnes.
Bucky doesn't agree to the name.
He also doesn't agree to the meeting, which is being conducted around the dining table while he tries to eat his pasta.
You sit at the head of the table with a notepad.
"Rule one," you announce. "Magnets may only be placed when the arm has been voluntarily detached."
"No," Bucky says.
Yelena raises her hand. "Clarification. What if arm is dramatically removed during combat?"
"It isn't."
"Hypothetically."
"No."
You write beneath the first rule. "Combat-related exceptions require committee approval."
Bucky drops his fork against his plate.
"There is no committee."
John raises his hand.
You point at him. "The chair recognizes Captain Walker."
Bucky's glare moves to John.
John wisely keeps his eyes on you. "I propose a limit of one magnet per person, per round. Otherwise Alexei's going to cover the whole arm before anyone else gets a turn."
"This is discrimination," Alexei says.
"You used eleven magnets this morning."
"I have large ideas."
"Seconded," Ava says.
You write it down.
Bucky leans back in his chair, looking genuinely betrayed by society.
"None of you are putting anything else on my arm."
Bob raises his hand tentatively. "How does Bucky get rid of the magnet?"
Everyone goes quiet.
You tap the pen against your chin. "He has to correctly guess who placed it."
Bucky looks around the table.
"That's it?"
"That's it."
"And when I guess correctly?"
"The magnet comes off."
Bucky nods slowly, clearly convinced he can identify each of you within seconds.
"And if he guesses incorrectly?" Yelena asks.
Your smile widens.
Bucky's narrows.
"If Bucky guesses wrong, he has to keep the magnet on his arm for the rest of the day."
John immediately sits forward. "No removing it. No covering it. No pretending it fell off during training."
"What if it actually falls off?" Bob asks.
"It gets put back on," Ava says.
"Same location?"
"Same location."
Alexei raises both hands. "Can we add more magnets after incorrect guess?"
"No," you and John say together.
Alexei lowers his hands. "This committee fears innovation."
Bucky looks from one face to another.
"So you put a magnet on my arm, I guess who did it, and if I'm wrong, I have to walk around with it all day?"
"Correct."
"That's ridiculous."
"It creates stakes," John says.
"It creates consequences," Yelena adds.
"It creates visual joy," Alexei says.
Bucky turns toward you. "You understand this is my arm, right?"
You reach across the table and pat the metal hand resting beside his plate.
"Yes. Our canvas."
His fingers close around yours before you can pull away.
The movement is quick, warm despite the vibranium, and far too gentle for the glare he's giving you.
Your breath catches.
Bucky's thumb sweeps once over your knuckles.
"If I wake up with something glued to this," he says quietly, "I'm holding you personally responsible."
You recover enough to smile. "Threatening me with personal attention isn't the deterrent you think it is."
John chokes on his water.
Ava looks toward the ceiling.
Bob whispers, "Wow."
Bucky's stare sharpens, but there's a faint flush rising along his neck.
He releases your hand and pushes his chair back. "You're all insane."
"Noted," you say, writing it down.
"That wasn't another rule."
"It is now."
Bucky grabs his plate and stalks toward the kitchen. "This stops tonight."
"Of course," Yelena says.
"I mean it."
"We can tell."
"No magnets."
"Perfectly clear."
Bucky disappears into the kitchen, muttering something under his breath about transferring towers.
The moment he's out of earshot, everyone leans toward the center of the table.
"Who goes first?" you whisper.
"Me," Alexei says immediately.
"No," John says. "You have no restraint."
"I have tremendous restraint."
"You put eleven magnets on him this morning."
"I could have used twelve."
Yelena points her fork at Ava. "She should go first. Bucky will never suspect her."
Ava looks around the table. "Why wouldn't he suspect me?"
"You have very calm face."
"I always have this face."
"Exactly."
Bob raises his hand. "Shouldn't we draw names or something?"
You tear several small pieces from your notepad.
"Fine. Everyone writes their name down. We draw for the order."
John takes one of the slips. "Are we including Sam?"
"He doesn't know about it yet," Ava says.
Yelena smiles. "He will."
Alexei scribbles his name in enormous letters, folds the paper once, and drops it into the empty breadbasket.
Bob folds his into a tiny square.
John folds his with crisp military precision.
Yelena doesn't fold hers at all.
Ava watches everyone with open suspicion before adding her name.
You toss yours in last and shake the basket. "Moment of truth."
You reach inside and pull out the first slip.
Everyone leans closer.
You unfold it.
"Ava."
Ava closes her eyes.
Alexei slaps the table in celebration. "Yes! The quiet assassin begins!"
From the kitchen, Bucky shouts, "I can still hear you!"
The entire table goes silent.
A beat passes.
Then Yelena whispers, "Tomorrow morning."
Bucky's exasperated groan carries through the wall.
You write Ava's name at the top of the official rotation.
The game has begun.
A week passes.
Seven full days without a single magnet.
No one mentions the committee. The rotation chart disappears from the refrigerator. Alexei stops carrying magnets in his pockets, or at least stops letting them fall out whenever he sits down. Yelena doesn't make any suspicious comments about "decorative opportunities."
Even you behave.
By the fourth day, Bucky starts watching all of you with the narrowed eyes of a man who knows peace is usually followed by property damage.
By the seventh, he decides the idea has finally died.
It's a ridiculous team game. The Thunderbolts possess the collective attention span of a puppy inside a fireworks factory. Of course everyone forgot.
That afternoon, he finds you in the kitchen making a cake.
Or trying to make a cake.
There's flour on the counter, flour on the floor, and somehow flour on the cabinet behind you. A bowl sits beneath the mixer, filled with something that resembles wet cement.
Bucky stops in the doorway. "What happened?"
You look up from the recipe on your phone. "I'm baking."
"I can see that."
"It's a cake."
"Can't see that."
You point the wooden spoon at him. "I'm still in the early stages."
"It looks like you fought the flour and lost."
"The flour cheated."
Bucky moves closer, surveying the kitchen with growing concern. "Why're you making a cake?"
"Bob said he wanted one."
From the common room, Bob calls, "I said cake sounded good!"
"You see?" you say. "A direct request."
"That's not what direct means."
Bucky reaches around you to examine the batter. His metal hand settles on the counter beside the bowl while he leans over it.
You glance toward the hallway.
Ava is waiting just out of sight.
Bucky doesn't notice.
He dips the wooden spoon into the bowl and lifts it. The batter clings to it in a dense, stubborn lump.
"This isn't cake batter."
"It's rustic."
"It's resisting gravity."
"It has character."
"It has structural integrity."
You snatch the spoon from him. "You came in here to criticize me, or are you going to help?"
"I came in here for coffee."
"Congratulations. You've been promoted."
Bucky sighs, but he washes his flesh hand and moves beside you.
You hand him the bag of flour. "Half a cup."
"You already put flour in."
"It needs more."
"How much did the recipe say?"
You quietly turn your phone facedown.
Bucky stares at you. "You're not following a recipe."
"I'm following my heart."
"Your heart's making concrete."
"Half a cup, Barnes."
He mutters something about ordering dessert like civilized people, but reaches into the cabinet for a measuring cup.
You watch him scoop flour from the bag. Then you look toward the hallway again.
Ava's face appears around the corner for half a second.
You give her the smallest nod.
Bucky turns back toward the bowl.
You reach for the sugar at the exact same moment, swinging your elbow directly into the measuring cup.
Flour erupts between you.
A white cloud explodes over the counter, the bowl, your shirt, and most importantly, Bucky's metal arm.
You gasp with enough force to qualify for community theater. "Oh my God!"
Bucky stands perfectly still. Flour coats him from his shoulder to his fingertips. There's even a white streak across his cheek.
You clamp both hands over your mouth.
His eyes close. "Tell me," he says slowly, "that wasn't on purpose."
"It wasn't on purpose."
His eyes open.
You widen yours.
Bucky looks at the flour covering his arm, then at the nearly empty measuring cup in his hand. "You hit me."
"It was an accident."
"You swung your elbow at me."
"I was reaching for the sugar."
"The sugar's on the other side of the counter."
"I got turned around."
"You've been standing in the same spot for twenty minutes."
"I panicked."
"Before anything happened?"
"I'm intuitive."
Bucky stares at you for another long moment.
You give him your most apologetic smile.
It's the same smile you use whenever you've done something that may require repairs, stitches, or intervention from human resources.
His eyes narrow.
You grab a dish towel and begin wiping at the vibranium.
"Here, let me clean it."
"You're making it worse."
"I'm helping."
"You're pushing flour into the seams."
"I'm emotionally helping."
Bucky catches your wrist before you can scrub more flour into his elbow joint. "I'll clean it."
"You sure?"
"Yes."
"I feel terrible."
"No, you don't."
"I feel a little terrible."
"You're smiling."
"I smile when I'm nervous."
"You smiled when Alexei broke the training simulator."
"That was different. The robot called him an outdated Soviet appliance."
Bucky shakes his head and reaches up to detach the arm. The vibranium releases with a soft mechanical sound.
Your pulse leaps.
There it is. Voluntarily detached. Exactly according to the rules.
Bucky carries the flour-covered arm to the sink.
"I'm going to rinse this before it turns into paste."
"Great idea."
He looks over his shoulder at you.
You're standing very still beside the mixing bowl. Far too still.
"What?"
"Nothing."
Bucky looks toward the hallway. It's empty. He looks back at you. "You're acting weird."
"I spilled flour on a ninety-year-old assassin. I'm processing."
"I'm a hundred and nine."
"That doesn't make it better."
Bucky rinses the arm beneath the faucet while you pretend to rescue the batter.
Once the flour is gone, he sets the arm on a clean towel beside the sink.
Then he notices the flour streaking across his shirt. "Great."
"You can use the bathroom downstairs," you say immediately. "There're towels in the cabinet."
His suspicion returns. "Why're you trying to get rid of me?"
"I'm not."
"You just gave me directions to a bathroom I've used for six months."
"You seem disoriented."
"I'm standing in my own kitchen."
"Without an arm. That has to affect your balance."
Bucky studies you.
You smile.
He points at you with his flesh hand. "Don't touch it."
You lift both hands. "Wouldn't dream of it."
"Don't let anyone else touch it."
"Who would do that?"
His stare turns flat.
You press your lips together.
Bucky leaves the kitchen, still watching you until the wall blocks his view.
You wait.
One second.
Two.
Three.
Then Ava slips through the wall beside the refrigerator.
You jump even though you knew she was coming. "Jesus!"
Ava looks unimpressed. "Keep your voice down."
"You came through the wall."
"You told me to."
"I didn't tell you to emerge directly from the drywall like a ghost."
"We have maybe thirty seconds." She pulls a magnet from her pocket.
It's blue and orange, with bold block letters printed across the front.
GO BEARS!
You stare at it. "A sports magnet?"
"It's perfect."
"You don't watch football."
"Exactly."
Ava moves toward the sink.
Bucky's arm lies peacefully on the towel, unaware that it's about to become the centerpiece of an extremely stupid conspiracy.
She presses the magnet against the outer forearm.
It clicks into place.
You lean closer. "It's crooked."
Ava adjusts it.
"Now it's too low."
She moves it again.
"A little left."
Ava turns her head slowly. "Do you want to do this?"
"No. It's your turn."
"Then stop art-directing the crime."
Footsteps sound in the hall.
Ava's eyes widen.
"Go," you whisper.
She steps backward and disappears through the wall just as Bucky enters the kitchen.
He's changed into a clean shirt, though there's still flour dusting his hair.
You're standing beside the mixing bowl, stirring with exaggerated concentration.
Bucky looks at you. Then at his arm. Then back at you. "What did you do?"
You gasp. "Nothing."
"That was too fast."
"What was?"
"Your answer."
"I'm offended you'd accuse me after I've already apologized for assaulting you with flour."
"You didn't apologize."
"I expressed regret."
"You said you felt a little terrible."
"That's huge for me."
Bucky approaches the sink. His gaze lands on the magnet.
He stops.
You bite the inside of your cheek.
He picks up the arm.
GO BEARS! beams cheerfully up at him.
Bucky closes his eyes. "No."
You lean against the counter. "Something wrong?"
"You've got to be kidding me."
"I don't know what you're talking about."
"The magnets."
"What magnets?"
Bucky holds up the arm.
You squint at it. "Huh."
"'Huh'?"
"That's strange."
"You spilled flour on me."
"Accidentally."
"You made me take the arm off."
"I didn't make you do anything."
"You sent me out of the room."
"You had flour in your shirt."
"And while I was gone, you put this on it."
You glance at the magnet again. "Go Bears," you read. "Interesting."
Bucky points the arm at you. "It was you."
Your heart jumps. Not because he caught you. Because he didn't.
You slowly smile. "Is that your official guess?"
Bucky hesitates.
The rules come rushing back to him.
If he guesses correctly, the magnet comes off.
If he guesses wrong, it stays on his arm for the rest of the day.
His eyes sweep over you.
You've still got flour on your nose. You're standing beside the abandoned cake batter. Nobody else is visible.
Everything points directly at you.
Which is exactly why Ava picked the magnet.
Bucky's jaw tightens. "Yes," he says. "Official guess. You did it."
You press your lips together, savoring the moment.
Then you make a loud buzzer noise. "Wrong."
Bucky's expression goes blank.
From inside the wall, there's a muffled thump.
You cough to cover it.
Bucky's eyes shift toward the sound.
Ava emerges through the wall with her arms crossed. "It was me."
Bucky looks at her.
Then at the magnet.
Then at you.
"You spilled the flour to distract me."
You place a hand over your chest. "Ava acted alone."
"You hit my arm with half a cup of flour."
"Unrelated baking incident."
"You told me where the towels were."
"Hospitality."
"You stood there directing her."
Ava glances at you. "He heard that?"
"I have enhanced hearing," Bucky says.
You turn toward Ava. "We may need to revisit our whispering protocols."
Bucky exhales slowly through his nose. Then he attaches the arm. The cheerful GO BEARS! magnet sits proudly against the dark vibranium.
You grin. "Looks good."
"I hate all of you."
Ava walks past him and picks up her coffee from the counter. "You guessed wrong."
"I'm aware."
"So it stays until midnight."
"I remember the rule."
"No covering it," you add.
Bucky looks down at the sleeve of his clean shirt.
Then at you.
You point at him warningly. "Don't even think about it."
"This is my shirt."
"And that's a regulation violation waiting to happen."
"There are no regulations."
"There's a written charter."
"You wrote it on the back of a takeout menu."
"It's legally binding."
Bob wanders into the kitchen. He spots the magnet. His entire face lights up. "Ava did it?"
Ava takes a sip of coffee. "He guessed her."
Bob looks at you.
Then at Bucky.
Then back at the magnet. "Oh, no."
Bucky's eyes narrow. "Why do you sound happy?"
"I don't."
"You're smiling."
"I smile when I'm nervous."
Bucky slowly turns his head toward you.
You shrug. "It's catching."
John enters next, takes one look at Bucky's arm, and doubles over laughing.
Alexei hears him from the common room and comes running.
Yelena follows at a calm walk, already holding her phone.
Within thirty seconds, Bucky is surrounded.
"Go Bears!" John shouts.
"You don't even like the Bears," Bucky snaps.
"Today I do."
Alexei places both hands on Bucky's shoulders. "You look magnificent. Strong. Athletic. Midwestern."
"I'm from Brooklyn."
"Today, you are from Chicago."
Yelena takes a picture.
Bucky turns toward her. "Delete that."
"No."
"Yelena."
"It is for official committee records."
"There is no committee."
You step beside him and brush the remaining flour from his hair.
Bucky looks down at you, exasperation written into every line of his face. But he doesn't move away.
Your fingers linger near his temple. "You really thought we forgot?"
"I hoped."
"That was your first mistake."
"No," he says. "My first mistake was walking into this kitchen."
You smile sweetly. "Your first mistake was leaving your arm unsupervised."
Bucky leans closer, lowering his voice until the rest of the kitchen seems to blur around the edges. "You understand I'm getting you back for this."
Warmth slips through your chest. "Is that a threat?"
His metal hand comes down against the counter beside you, close enough that the vibranium brushes the fabric near your hip, trapping you between him and the counter without actually trapping you at all.
Your heart leaps anyway.
Bucky's eyes flick briefly toward your mouth. "A promise."
Behind you, John makes an exaggerated gagging noise.
The moment shatters.
Bucky doesn't look away from you.
He only lifts his metal hand from the counter and raises his middle finger toward the team.
Unfortunately, that puts the GO BEARS! magnet on full display.
The entire room erupts into laughter.
Bucky closes his eyes, looking like a man reconsidering every decision that led him here.
I disappeared for the weekend on purpose. 😂 I needed a full brain reset, so I gave myself permission to step away, touch some grass, and let my brain recharge.
I've jumped right back into Kinktober after taking a little break because... let's be honest... writing that much smut back to back is mentally exhausting. 💀 I love it, but wow, my brain was waving a tiny white flag.
I'm also working through your requests again, so keep an eye out because those are finally making their way out of my drafts and into the queue. I seriously love reading all your ideas. You all stay keeping me employed. 😂🤍
As for Fault Lines, Chapter 32 is sitting safely in the queue, ready to cause emotional damage on schedule, and Chapter 33 is completely finished! It just needs one last polish before it's ready to join the lineup.
So yes... I'm back, caffeinated, refreshed, and once again staring at my keyboard while sipping on my homemade iced coffee. (Starbucks who? 💅😂)
Also, a huge welcome to everyone who's started following me recently! 🥹🤍 I'm so happy you're here. Whether you found me through Fault Lines, the Thunderbolts chaos, the fluff, the angst, or the completely unhinged shenanigans, I hope you feel right at home. We've got emotional damage, laughter, a questionable amount of coffee, and apparently enough handshakes to qualify as a second language.
As always, thank you for every like, comment, reblog, and message. You all make this little corner of Tumblr such a fun place to be.🫶🏽✨
Officially petitioning for ‘Fluent in Nonsense’ to be its own series because I love our Highly Trained Idiots 🥰 (and Walker & Y/N being a hot couple who also happen to be best friends who share one singular brain cell 😂🥰)
Listen love, this whole Thunderbolts shenanigans and chaos has completely taken over. I never knew I would enjoy writing chaos that much. I even had to make a dedicated masterlist just for them! So yes, after Fluent in Nonsense, expect more chaos in the future. 🫶🏽✨🤣
C’s corner: This fic is loosely inspired by Mean Girls by KATSEYE, because sometimes the internet can feel like a glitter-covered battlefield where people forget there’s an actual person behind the screen. So if you’ve ever been belittled, picked apart, talked down to, or made to feel small by someone online, please know you’re not alone. Their words do not get to decide your worth. Their bitterness does not get to dim you. Keep shining like the queen you are. Fix your crown, take up space, and remember that you were never too much. They were just too small to hold all that light. 👑✨
WARNINGS: online hate, hate comments, cyberbullying, mean girl behavior, insecurity, self-doubt, reader feeling belittled, loss of appetite mentioned, emotional distress, crying, hurt/comfort, soft angst, protective Bucky Barnes, Thunderbolts found family being emotionally nosy.
✍🏽WC: 5K+
SUMMARY: You’re the Thunderbolts’ sunshine behind the camera, always capturing the team’s softer, chaotic moments for the public. But when cruel comments start tearing you down, your usual spark begins to fade, and Bucky is the first one to notice. What starts as quiet concern turns into soft comfort, found family protection, and feelings Bucky can’t keep hiding anymore.
The Thunderbolts were not easy to photograph. That was the polite way of saying it.
The honest way was that trying to make the team look approachable for the public was like trying to put a sweater on a raccoon with diplomatic immunity.
“Do not make me look friendly,” she warned from the couch, arms folded, legs crossed, expression flat enough to iron shirts on.
You lowered your phone. “You’re literally holding a juice box.”
“This is for intimidation.”
“It has a cartoon penguin on it.”
“Exactly. Nobody expects violence from penguin.”
Across the room, John Walker was attempting to look heroic near the window, which would’ve worked better if Alexei hadn’t been standing behind him with two thumbs up and a grin wide enough to qualify as federal infrastructure.
“Move,” John said without looking back.
“I am making you look powerful,” Alexei said.
“You’re making me look adopted.”
Bob drifted past in the background, holding a bowl of cereal at three in the afternoon, completely unaware he was about to become a blurry cryptid in another official Thunderbolts post.
Ava, sitting at the kitchen island, glanced up from her coffee. “You know you don’t have to post us every day, right?”
“Yes, I do,” you said, framing the shot. “The public needs to know you’re more than government-funded property damage.”
Bucky, who had been leaning quietly against the far wall with his arms crossed, lifted his brows.
You pointed at him. “You especially.”
“I don’t do property damage.”
“Barnes, you ripped a car door off last week.”
“It was locked.”
“That’s still not how doors work.”
His mouth twitched.
Not a full smile. Bucky Barnes didn’t give those away for free. His smiles had a waiting list, references required, possibly a background check. But you’d gotten good at catching the small ones. The corner of his mouth. The faint crease near his eyes. The little duck of his head when he tried to hide amusement and failed by half an inch.
You took the picture before he could stop you.
Bucky saw the phone go up and sighed. “Delete it.”
“No.”
“Please delete it.”
“No. You look broody and expensive.”
“I look tired.”
“You always look tired. This one has dimension.”
Yelena leaned over to look at your screen. “Post it. Caption should be, ‘Man allergic to joy survives another day.’”
Bucky pointed at her. “Don’t help.”
“I am helping the brand.”
The brand, according to Valentina Allegra de Fontaine, needed softening. The team had too much baggage, too much blood on their boots, too many government meetings where people said words like optics and rehabilitation while avoiding eye contact with the people they were talking about.
That was where you came in.
You weren’t a soldier. You weren’t enhanced. You weren’t a spy, assassin, super-soldier, disgraced captain, ghost, god-adjacent being, or whatever category Bob fell into depending on the hour.
You were PR.
Which meant you spent your days following the Thunderbolts around with a phone, a camera, a tablet, and the constant exhausted hope that nobody committed a crime before lunch.
And you loved it.
You loved the chaos. The noise. The accidental tenderness hiding under all the sharp edges. You loved showing people the little things. Yelena labeling everyone’s leftovers with increasingly specific threats. John making coffee exactly how everyone liked it but pretending he only did it because he was already there. Alexei falling asleep during movie night with his mouth open. Ava fixing the flickering hallway light because maintenance had taken too long. Bob leaving sticky notes on the fridge that just said things like, “Good morning. Sorry if I floated.”
And Bucky.
Bucky standing slightly outside the frame, always pretending he didn’t want to be included. Bucky holding doors open with his metal hand because he forgot he was doing it. Bucky looking at you when you laughed. Bucky watching you with a quiet focus that made your stomach trip over itself and land face-first in a field of wildflowers.
You told yourself it was harmless. A tiny little crush. A barely-there, totally manageable, definitely-not-consuming-your-entire-nervous-system crush.
Then one day you posted a picture of the team after a briefing.
It wasn’t even special.
John was mid-rant about scheduling. Yelena was stealing one of his fries. Alexei was wearing sunglasses indoors. Ava was half in frame, unimpressed as always. Bob had somehow ended up with three napkins stuck to his sleeve.
Bucky was behind you. Not really posing. Not really smiling. Just standing close enough that his shoulder almost touched yours, his eyes angled down toward you instead of the camera.
You didn’t even notice until after you posted it.
The internet did.
At first, the comments were normal. Cute. Funny.
A few people calling the team unhinged. A few people asking if Yelena’s jacket was thrifted. Someone demanding John drop his arm workout. Someone asking whether Alexei was single, which made you shut your phone off for twelve full seconds to recover.
Then the other comments started.
Not all at once. Just one here. One there. Tiny little knives wrapped in pink ribbon.
Why is she always in the pics?
She’s trying so hard to be one of them.
Does she actually do anything or just follow them around?
The way she’s standing near Bucky is embarrassing.
Some girls will do anything for attention.
You stared at the screen, smile fading before you even realized it was gone.
You told yourself not to care. You knew better. You worked in PR. You knew comment sections were little haunted forests where logic went to die wearing glitter lip gloss.
Still, your thumb moved. You kept reading.
She’s not even pretty enough to be acting like that.
Bucky would never.
Imagine being that desperate.
The words sank under your skin before you could stop them.
You turned off notifications. Then turned them back on. Then checked again. More comments. More usernames with cute profile pictures and cruel little hearts in their bios.
Girls with glossy hair and sharp opinions. Girls who didn’t know you. Girls who had never seen you coax Bob through a panic spiral, never watched you sit with Yelena in silence after a nightmare, never helped John fix a statement after an interview went sideways, never noticed Bucky leaving the room when cameras got too close.
They didn’t know you. But they knew exactly where to cut.
By dinner, you weren’t hungry.
By the next morning, you wore a hoodie and kept the hood up.
By the end of the week, you stopped putting yourself in pictures entirely. You stayed behind the camera. That was where you belonged anyway. At least, that was what the comments kept telling you.
The team noticed in pieces.
John noticed when you stopped stealing fries from his plate.
“Okay,” he said one afternoon, narrowing his eyes at you across the kitchen. “Who are you and what have you done with our tiny snack criminal?”
You forced a smile. “I’m just not hungry.”
He frowned like he wanted to argue with your entire digestive system.
Ava noticed when you stopped humming while editing.
“You’re quiet,” she said from the couch.
“Busy.”
“You’re never too busy to make that little victory noise when you fix lighting.”
“I don’t make a victory noise.”
“You absolutely do.”
Bob noticed when you didn’t laugh at the sticky note he left on your laptop that said, “You are doing a good job. Unless this is not your laptop. In that case, sorry.”
Yelena noticed because Yelena noticed everything. She watched you delete a draft three times, then leaned against your desk. “Who needs stabbing?”
You blinked up at her. “What?”
“You are sad. Someone caused this. I am offering solutions.”
“No stabbing.”
“Fine. Psychological warfare.”
“No.”
“Mild haunting?”
“Yelena.”
She held up both hands. “You are impossible to support.”
You laughed a little. It sounded wrong. Thin. Temporary. Paper pretending to be glass.
Bucky noticed that too. He noticed everything about you, apparently.
You found that out late on Thursday night, sitting alone in the media room with your laptop open and your untouched tea cooling beside you.
Everyone else had gone to bed. Or wherever people like the Thunderbolts went after midnight. Possibly vents. Possibly rooftops. Possibly government-mandated emotional containment chambers.
You were editing a new post. No faces this time. Just a picture of the conference table after a briefing. Coffee cups. Notebooks. A sunbeam across the polished wood.
Safe. Boring. Empty enough that nobody could accuse you of wanting attention.
You stared at the caption box until the words blurred.
Then a voice came from the doorway. “You’ve been hiding.”
Your fingers froze over the keyboard.
Bucky stood there in a black shirt and sweatpants, hair loose around his face, metal hand catching the dull light from the hall. He looked soft around the edges, sleep-warm and tired, but his eyes were awake.
“I’m working,” you said.
“You always work.” He stepped inside. “You don’t always disappear.”
“I’m not disappearing.”
“You haven’t posted yourself in eight days.”
You swallowed.
Bucky took another step closer. “You stopped taking pictures with us,” he said quietly. “You stopped eating lunch in the kitchen. You stopped making fun of Walker’s tactical pants.”
You tried for a smile. “That last one was personal growth.”
“No.” He pulled out the chair beside you and sat, turning toward you. “That was a warning sign.”
Your throat tightened.
It was ridiculous. You knew it was ridiculous. You were grown. You had survived worse than strangers on the internet. You’d handled crisis statements, hostile press, mission leaks, Valentina before coffee.
But something about Bucky noticing made all your careful stitching come loose.
“I’m fine,” you said.
His eyes softened.
You hated that.
Not because it was bad, but because it was kind. Because he didn’t look unconvinced in a dismissive way. He looked patient. Like he already knew the lie had thorns, and he was willing to wait until you stopped gripping it.
“Who said something?” he asked.
You looked down at your laptop. “Nobody.”
“Doll.”
That did it. One word, low and gentle, and your eyes burned. You pressed your lips together hard.
Bucky’s posture changed instantly. Not dramatic. Not panicked. Just focused, every piece of him shifting toward you like you’d become the only signal in the room.
“Hey,” he said softly. “Talk to me.”
You gave a small, miserable laugh. “It’s stupid.”
“I’ll decide that.”
“Bucky.”
“I’ve got a lot of experience with stupid.” His mouth twitched, but his voice stayed careful. “Try me.”
You stared at the screen. The post was still open. You hadn’t meant to click the comments again, but there they were, stacked beneath the picture from last week like mold blooming on something clean.
You turned the laptop toward him before you could talk yourself out of it.
Bucky read.
You watched his face change.
It didn’t twist into anger right away. That would’ve been easier. Louder. Something you could push back against.
Instead, he went very still. Winter still. The kind of still that made the room feel suddenly aware of him.
His jaw tightened. He scrolled once. Then again. Then he stopped.
You reached for the laptop. “Don’t.”
He let you close it.
For a second, neither of you said anything.
Then Bucky exhaled through his nose. “Those are children with Wi-Fi and no home training.”
A laugh broke out of you before you could stop it. It cracked halfway through.
Bucky’s expression softened again, and somehow that was worse.
“I know I shouldn’t care,” you said quickly. “I know that. I tell the team not to care about this stuff all the time. I literally build public strategy around ignoring noise, but then it’s about me and suddenly I’m twelve years old again wondering if I’m too much or not enough or standing wrong or smiling wrong or breathing in a way that looks desperate.”
Your voice shook. You looked away, embarrassed.
“I just wanted people to see you guys the way I do,” you whispered. “That’s all. I didn’t think they’d look at me and decide I was the problem.”
Bucky was quiet for a long moment. Then he said, “You’re not the problem.”
Your eyes stayed on your hands. “You don’t know that.”
“I do.”
“You’re biased.”
“Extremely,” he said.
That pulled your gaze back to him.
His face was calm, but there was something naked in his honesty. Something that made your heart trip again, softer this time, less wildflower field and more candle flame in a dark room.
Bucky leaned forward, elbows resting on his knees. “You know what I see when you’re around us?” he asked.
You shook your head.
“I see Walker stop talking like he’s on a podium. I see Yelena let somebody take pictures of her without threatening murder every five seconds. I see Ava stay in the room longer. I see Bob smile more. I see Alexei try harder to be gentle.” His gaze held yours. “And I see myself wanting to be where you are.”
Your breath caught.
Bucky glanced down, almost shy for half a second, before looking back at you. "So no,” he said. “You’re not desperate for standing near me. I’m usually the one finding excuses to stand near you.”
The room went quiet. Your pulse was suddenly everywhere. Throat. Wrists. Fingertips. The hollow behind your ribs.
“That’s not funny,” you whispered.
“I’m not being funny.”
Your eyes searched his.
Bucky didn’t look away.
He looked nervous, though. That undid you a little. The great James Buchanan Barnes, former Winter Soldier, current professional brooder, sitting beside you at midnight looking like your answer could crack him open.
“You like me?” you asked.
His mouth lifted faintly. “That what you got from that?”
“I’m in a fragile emotional state. Be direct.”
That made him smile for real. Small, but real.
“Yes,” he said. “I like you.”
Your heart flopped over like a fainting couch actress. “Oh.”
“You don’t have to say anything back right now.”
“I like you too,” you blurted.
His eyes widened a fraction.
You looked horrified with yourself. "I mean, obviously. Terribly. Annoyingly. I’ve been very normal about it.”
“Have you?”
“No.”
His smile warmed, and something inside you loosened so quickly it almost hurt.
Then the comments came crawling back.
Your smile faded. “But they’re going to keep saying things,” you said.
Bucky’s expression settled. "Probably.”
You laughed weakly. “Comforting.”
“I’m not gonna lie to you.” He reached out slowly, giving you enough time to pull away. When you didn’t, he covered your hand with his. His right hand. Warm. Calloused. Careful. “People like that don’t stop because they find truth. They stop when they get bored. Or when they find someone else to bite.”
Your fingers curled under his. “So what am I supposed to do?”
“Don’t hand them the keys to your life.”
You swallowed.
Bucky looked at your closed laptop.
“You taught us that publicity isn’t the same thing as permission,” he said. “You get to decide what people see. You get to decide what they don’t. But don’t erase yourself because some mean girls got loud in a comment section.”
The phrase stung.
Mean girls.
It sounded so small. Almost childish. But cruelty didn’t need to be big to bruise. Sometimes it wore lip gloss and heart emojis and knew exactly how to make a person fold inward.
You looked down at your joined hands. His thumb brushed once over your knuckles. Soft. Barely there.
“I don’t want everyone to know,” you said.
“They won’t.”
“I don’t want Yelena to go hunting.”
“She might.”
“Bucky.”
“I’ll talk her down to light intimidation.”
Despite yourself, you laughed.
He looked pleased, like that one tiny sound had been worth digging for.
Then he squeezed your hand. "Come on.”
“Where?”
“Kitchen.”
“I’m not hungry.”
“I know.” He stood, still holding your hand. “You’re gonna sit there while I make toast badly.”
You blinked. “Badly?”
“I’m trying to set expectations.”
“You’re over a hundred years old and can’t make toast?”
“I can make toast. I said badly because last time I used the toaster, it smoked.”
“Bucky, that’s not making toast. That’s starting a tiny appliance rebellion.”
He tugged gently until you stood. “Good. Insult me more. You’re coming back online.”
You followed him into the kitchen, wrapped in your oversized hoodie and the leftover ache of a bad week. Bucky moved around the cabinets like he knew where everything was because of course he did. He pretended not to care about domestic spaces, but he learned them. Memorized them. The coffee mugs, the tea you liked, the snacks Bob panic-bought, the bowl Yelena always stole.
He put bread in the toaster with theatrical suspicion.
You sat on the counter.
“That thing has personally wronged me,” he said.
“It’s a toaster.”
The toast popped up two minutes later, slightly too dark on one edge.
Bucky looked at it.
You looked at him.
He sighed. “Don’t start.”
“I didn’t say anything.”
“Your face did.”
“My face has freedom of speech.”
He buttered the toast, added cinnamon sugar from the container John claimed nobody knew about, then handed you a plate.
You took a bite. It was fine. A little burnt. A little too sweet. Perfect in the way midnight food could be perfect when someone made it because they noticed you hadn’t eaten.
Bucky leaned against the opposite counter, watching you with a careful softness that made your chest ache again.
“What?” you asked around a small bite.
“Nothing.”
“That’s a very intense nothing.”
“I missed you,” he said.
The words landed gently, but your breath still caught. “I was here.”
“No,” Bucky said. “You were around.”
Your eyes burned again. You looked down at your toast. “I didn’t know anyone would notice.”
“I noticed first day.”
“Why didn’t you say anything?”
“Thought maybe you needed space.” He paused. “Then you gave Walker your fries and I knew it was serious.”
You snorted. “Medical emergency.”
“Near fatal.”
You sat there together in the kitchen, eating toast under the low light while the tower slept around you.
At least, you thought it slept. Until the fridge opened.
You and Bucky both turned.
Yelena stood there in pajama pants, holding a spoon. She looked at your joined hands.
Because at some point, Bucky had reached for you again. Because at some point, you had let him.
Yelena’s eyes narrowed. "Finally,” she said.
Your face went hot. “Go away.”
“No. I am getting yogurt.” She grabbed a cup from the fridge, then pointed the spoon at Bucky. “If you make her sad, I’ll put you in the wall.”
Bucky nodded solemnly. “Fair.”
“And if internet gremlins make her sad again, I would like names.”
“No names,” you said.
Yelena looked offended. “You’re very controlling about my hobbies.”
“Your hobbies are crimes.”
“Some are misdemeanors.” She left with her yogurt, muttering in Russian.
Bucky watched her go. Then he looked back at you. “You okay?”
You nodded, but it wasn’t entirely true.
He seemed to know. “Come here,” he said quietly.
You slid off the counter.
He opened his arms, giving you a choice.
You stepped into him.
Bucky held you carefully at first, like you were made of cracked porcelain and stubbornness. Then your hands fisted in the back of his shirt, and he tightened his arms around you.
Solid. Warm. Real.
His chin rested lightly on top of your head.
You closed your eyes.
For the first time in days, your body unclenched.
“I hate that they got to me,” you whispered into his chest.
“I know.”
“I hate that I believed them.”
“I know.”
“I hate that I stopped being myself.”
Bucky’s hand moved slowly up and down your back. "You’re still yourself,” he said. “You just got quiet for a minute.”
That made the tears come.
Not dramatic, no cinematic sobbing. Just a few hot tears against his shirt while he held you in the quiet kitchen, one hand on your back, the other cradling the back of your head.
He didn’t tell you to stop crying. He didn’t tell you they didn’t matter. He just stayed. That was the thing about Bucky. He didn’t always know what to say, but he knew how to stay.
Eventually, you pulled back and wiped your face with your sleeve. “I’m sorry.”
His brows drew together. “For what?”
“Crying on you.”
“Doll, I’ve been shot at by aliens.”
“That doesn’t make my tears less gross.”
“They’re very polite tears.”
You laughed wetly.
Bucky smiled again, and this time he didn’t hide it.
The next morning, you woke up to chaos. Not regular Thunderbolts chaos. Organized chaos. Which was worse.
You came into the common room to find John standing in front of a whiteboard with the words OPERATION COMMENT SECTION written across it in aggressive blue marker.
Ava sat at the table with coffee.
Bob looked concerned.
Alexei wore a blazer over his pajamas.
Yelena was sharpening a knife with no clear reason to be doing that in a PR meeting.
Bucky stood near the window, looking deeply guilty.
You stopped in the doorway. “No.”
John held up a hand. “Before you say anything, this is a measured response.”
“Nothing about this room says measured.”
Alexei nodded gravely. “We are defending honor.”
“My honor does not need a war room.”
Yelena lifted the knife. “Agree to disagree.”
“Put that down.”
She did not.
You turned to Bucky. “You told them?”
Bucky winced. “Not exactly.”
Ava raised her hand. “I figured it out.”
“Yelena eavesdropped,” John added.
“I gathered intelligence,” Yelena corrected.
“Bob saw you crying,” Ava said gently.
Bob gave you an apologetic little wave. “I didn’t mean to. I was trying to find cereal.”
“And I,” Alexei announced, “felt disturbance in little family.”
You blinked. The room blurred slightly. Not from hurt this time. From something warmer.
“Oh,” you said softly.
John cleared his throat, suddenly awkward. “Look, we’re not gonna make it worse. We know you know this stuff better than we do.”
“That has never stopped any of you before.”
“Correct. Growth is happening.” He tapped the whiteboard. “But we thought maybe today’s post could be about you.”
Your stomach dropped. “No.”
“Not like that,” Ava said. “Not forced.”
“Absolutely not,” you said again.
Bucky stepped forward. “Not your face if you don’t want,” he said. “Not your name. Nothing you don’t approve.”
You looked around. They were all watching you.
Even Yelena, knife lowered now.
Bucky continued, “But maybe people should know the team doesn’t happen without you.”
Your throat tightened.
John scratched the back of his neck. “I was thinking a behind-the-scenes post. Your desk. The camera. Some of the pictures you’ve taken. Caption about the person who keeps us from looking like a felony lineup.”
“That’s actually not terrible,” you said.
John pointed at you. “Thank you.”
“Don’t ruin it.”
He lowered his hand.
Alexei leaned forward. “Can I say you are tiny brave captain of image machine?”
“No.”
“But it is true.”
“You may not say that publicly.”
He looked devastated.
Yelena slid a paper toward you.
You glanced down. It was a handwritten caption draft.
The first line read: Our PR person is scarier than us.
You looked at her.
She shrugged. “Compliment.”
Your lips trembled. Then, somehow, you started laughing. Not the fake laugh you’d been wearing all week. A real one. Messy. Bright. Yours.
The room seemed to breathe again.
Bucky’s eyes stayed on you, soft and relieved.
You spent the next hour building the post with them.
No pictures of your face.
Just your camera strap on the table. Your color-coded folders. A shot of your hand holding a marker beside the whiteboard. A carousel of photos you’d taken over the last few months, each one catching the team in moments no official press photographer ever could.
Yelena asleep with Lucky the pizza dog’s head in her lap.
John burning pancakes while insisting the smoke alarm was too sensitive.
Ava laughing at something Bob had said, blurry because you’d taken the picture too fast.
Alexei crying during a nature documentary.
Bucky standing in the doorway with a mug in his hand, smiling at someone outside the frame.
You.
He had been smiling at you.
You stared at the picture for too long.
Bucky leaned beside you. “Use it.”
Your cheeks warmed. “It’s a good photo.”
“Not why I said it.”
You looked up.
He was close. Close enough that his shoulder brushed yours.
“Why did you say it?” you asked.
“Because that’s how I look at you.” His voice dropped. “And I’m tired of pretending I don’t.”
The room behind you went suspiciously silent. Very suspiciously.
You turned.
Every Thunderbolt suddenly became fascinated by something else.
John studied the ceiling.
Ava looked into her empty coffee cup.
Bob pretended to read a napkin.
Alexei covered his face with both hands, delighted.
Yelena whispered, “Kiss, kiss, kiss.”
“Yelena,” Bucky warned.
“What? I am boosting engagement.”
You covered your face. “I hate all of you.”
“No, you don’t,” Ava said.
You didn’t. That was the problem. You loved them.
This strange, dangerous, badly adjusted group of people who had somehow become your favorite place to land.
The post went up at noon.
The caption was simple.
Behind every mission, interview, briefing, and public disaster we barely survive, there’s someone making sure the world sees more than the damage. Today’s post is for the person behind the camera.
John insisted on adding: Also, she keeps us from looking like a felony lineup.
You let him.
Alexei was allowed one comment from the official account.
He wrote: TINY BRAVE CAPTAIN OF IMAGE MACHINE.
You regretted many things immediately.
The comments came fast.
Most were kind. Some were funny.
Some people recognized your work. Some thanked you for showing the human side of the team. Some said the photos made the Thunderbolts feel less untouchable. Less frightening.
And, of course, a few mean comments still slipped through.
Because the internet was the internet.
But this time, before the words could sink their claws into you, Bucky sat beside you on the couch and took your phone gently from your hand.
“Break,” he said.
“I have to monitor engagement.”
“You’ve monitored enough.”
“That’s my job.”
He set the phone on the coffee table, then slid it out of reach with two fingers.
“Your job gets boundaries today.”
You stared at him. “Did you just PR my PR?”
“Maybe.”
“That was hot.”
He froze.
You froze.
Across the room, John made a strangled noise.
Yelena slowly lowered her book.
Ava whispered, “Incredible.”
Your face burned hotter than a server room fire.
Bucky recovered first. He leaned closer, eyes bright with quiet amusement. “Yeah?”
You covered your face. “No.”
“No?”
“Yes.”
“Which one?”
“I’m walking into traffic.”
He laughed. Bucky Barnes laughed, warm and low and almost surprised by itself.
Then his fingers circled your wrist gently, pulling your hands away from your face.
“Don’t hide,” he murmured.
Your breath caught.
The room faded a little.
Still there, unfortunately, because the Thunderbolts had the collective subtlety of a marching band in a library.
But softer around the edges.
Bucky’s thumb brushed the inside of your wrist.
“You don’t have to be happy all the time,” he said. “You know that, right?”
You swallowed. “I don’t?”
“No.” His eyes moved over your face. “You’re allowed to have bad days. Quiet days. Angry days. Days where you don’t sparkle for anybody.”
Your chest tightened.
“But don’t let people who don’t know you convince you the sparkle was fake.”
You stared at him. “That was very poetic for a man who fights appliances.”
His mouth twitched. “I contain multitudes.”
“You contain burnt toast.”
“And affection.”
Your heart stumbled.
He looked nervous again.
You loved that too.
“So much affection,” he added quietly, “that it’s getting inconvenient.”
Your voice softened. “For who?”
“Everybody, apparently.”
“Finally,” Yelena muttered.
Bucky didn’t look away from you. “Mostly me,” he said.
You reached for him before courage could abandon you. Just your fingers at first, touching the edge of his sleeve. Then his hand.
Then you leaned in.
Bucky met you halfway.
The kiss was soft. Careful. Sweet in a way that made your ribs ache.
Not dramatic. Not movie-perfect. No swelling music. No rain against the windows. Just Bucky’s hand at your cheek, his thumb gentle near your jaw, his breath catching like he’d wanted this longer than he knew what to do with.
Behind you, Alexei made a sound that was suspiciously close to a sob.
John whispered, “Do we clap?”
“No,” Ava hissed.
Bob clapped once.
Yelena threw a pillow at him.
You pulled back laughing against Bucky’s mouth.
He smiled at you, real and unguarded, and for a second the ugly comments felt far away. Still out there, maybe. Still buzzing somewhere beyond the walls.
But they weren’t in the room.
In the room, there was Bucky.
There was his hand holding yours.
There was Yelena threatening to delete the internet.
There was John pretending he wasn’t emotional.
There was Ava smiling into her coffee.
There was Bob apologizing to the pillow.
There was Alexei declaring that love had saved public relations.
And there was you.
Not behind the camera. Not erased. Not too much. Not desperate. Not whatever strangers had tried to make you believe.
Just you.
A little bruised. A little brighter. Still here.
Bucky leaned close, his lips brushing your temple. “Post whatever you want,” he whispered. “Hide whenever you need. But don’t disappear on me again, okay?”
You looked up at him.
His eyes held yours, blue and steady.
You squeezed his hand. “Okay.”
Yelena raised her phone from across the room.
You pointed at her immediately. “Don’t you dare.”
She paused.
Bucky turned slowly.
Yelena lowered the phone with the expression of someone making a great personal sacrifice. “Fine,” she said. “But for the record, this would’ve healed the nation.”
You laughed, tucking yourself against Bucky’s side.
He wrapped an arm around you like it belonged there.
Maybe it did.
Maybe tomorrow there would be more comments. Maybe next week you’d have another bad day. Maybe the world would always have girls with pretty profile pictures and sharp little teeth.
But tonight, Bucky’s thumb moved lazily over your shoulder.
Tonight, the team argued over whether your first couple photo should be tasteful or “deeply humiliating for brand authenticity.”
Tonight, your phone stayed face down on the table.
And for the first time all week, you didn’t reach for it. You reached for Bucky instead. He was already reaching back.
