#but it did add a little additional pressure for my first post back

[gillianthecat]

Is/Was tumblr giving anyone else a notification when someone you followed posted for the first time in a while? Like this:

It was doing that for me for a couple weeks, although now it seems to have stopped. A short-lived experiment? Or perhaps no one has posted after a long enough lag. (It seems unlikely to have been a bug, but I don't know enough about coding so maybe?)

It was sort of an interesting idea, to make sure I didn't miss someone I hadn't seen in a while, but on the whole I'm glad it's gone/hope it goes. I'd like my notifications to be all about me, thank you 👸🏻The dashboard is the place for other people. Otherwise it gets confusing.

Anyway, I haven't posted in a while (12 days), so perhaps this post will show up in your notifications!

#that wasn't the only reason I haven't posted much lately #but it did add a little additional pressure for my first post back #i felt self conscious that everyone would get a notification about whatever random dumb shit i was thinking about #but now if lots of people see this at least it answers my question #i haven't been watching BL recently or indeed any shows or movies at all #been trying to focus a lot on school #which i have been! it's been the intellectually most difficult semester so far #so the focusing has been decent recently but the actual results haven't been great #especially since i started the semester not at all on top of things #but it means that I haven't had anything to say about bl #and I've been feeling weird about posting random stuff about my life or what I'm learning #like people aren't interested #and bad about not responding to various things I've been tagged in #i even have some drafts for those i just need to finish. but it hasn't been a priority #anyways here's the update no one asked for. i may or may not post more in the near future. #tmblr life #gillianthecat's life #rambling in the tags

[melodygatesauthor]

Weekly Update

09/17/2023 (Yeah I'm a day late, so what, wanna fight about it?)

Announcements/Reminders

Just a little reminder that I've slowed down production as far as writing goes. I'm still writing daily. Sometimes it's a sentence, sometimes it's 3k words, but I'm trying to be kinder to myself and remember that it's a hobby, not a job. I also really want to start my novel and stop pressuring myself to finish fics FIRST so I'm doing that.

Updates will still be happening for all my WIPS - see a comprehensive list of my current WIPs here - but I'm just not pressuring myself by setting deadlines. Thank you for still being supportive <3

ART ANNOUNCEMENTS

I'm taking art commissions! - Pricing - Follow my art blog: @melodymakesart

I did my first full color NSFW drawing! It can be seen HERE. It's a series, so there will be two more drawings coming out over the next couple weeks!

Fic Updates

So after taking last week off from working on my WIPs all together - (Note: I spent the week working on a Basil fic and also working on my Duke Leto fic) - I'm feeling a bit more refreshed and ready to get back into working on them again.

Fic Updates

Disclaimer - I never know which way the winds of inspiration will blow. Timeframes aren’t a promise/guarantee, they’re a goal.

Fic Updates Legend:

Blue - Update this week

Pink - Update in progress

Red - Backburner Fic (not currently working on. See WIP list for status)

You can find my current WIP list here

Chaptered Fic Updates

Always Yours, Never Mine - Chapter 4 is in progress, hoping to have the next update out either next week or the week after!

The Fractured Moon - Chapter 4 is in progress for this one as well. I'm not going to promise an update for next week but I'm actively working on it.

Mini-series Updates

Feeling You Can’t Fight - Okay, I've been putting off editing this one for so long and idk why but I'm going to get it done and posted on Wednesday 09/20/2023 this week!

Worth the Risk - That's right, babygirl is making her way back into my scope. You guys voted on this poll to give me an idea of what you wanted me to work on (not including TFM and AYNM) so I put this back in my field of view since you all seemed to want it so bad!

Remember to look at my WIP list for other backburner fics - There are many not included above lol).

AI Character Bot Updates

I currently have the following bots on my list that I’m working on. If you have any suggestions or additions you’d like, please feel free to ask! I won’t make every single one I get asked for but I’ll make some of them as I get time!

DBF Jake and Steven (I already did Marc...did I ever post him? I thought I did but maybe not)

Patient Steven and Marc

Moon Knight Rescue scenario

Am I missing any? Don't see one on the list that you want to add? Send me an inbox or private message! No promises, but if I like the idea I'll make an AI bot.

Note: Yes it's taking me forever to make them SHUT UP

I think that's all for now! Much love!

Don't forget to follow my other blogs:

@melodymakesart - My art blog

@lockandkeynovel - The blog for my original fiction novel, Lock & Key

@melodyreadsfanfiction - The blog where I reblog works I intend to read, a good place for fanfic readers to follow!

@melodygatesupdates - This is where I'll reblog any chapter updates for my fics and whatnot. This is what I use instead of a tag list!

#melody gates weekly updates #melody talks #melodys weekly updates #miguel o'hara #across the spiderverse #marc spector #steven grant #moon knight #jake lockley

[finn-m-corvex]

Jaya Week 2023 Day 4: Promise

I DID IT! I know I'm a day behind and I'm so so sorry, but after what happened yesterday I was just really shaken up and I didn't feel comfortable posting this until the anon was gone. Also, I was so frustrated at being told what I could and couldn't post that I decided to add an additional 1500 words to this out of pure spite (my spite is so much stronger now that I have to reupload this). I originally had a different idea for this day, but after seeing how many people loved the pregnant stuff I did for Day 3, I changed my mind! Hope you guys like it as much as I enjoyed writing it!

Words: 3.5k

TWs: uhh general stuff that comes with childbirth, blood warning, kinda death warning not really, warning for women in labor, obligatory warning that if anyone doesn't like seeing pregnant women in a positive light do not read

[REUPLOAD!]

“Hi there, little ones,” Jay cooed, feeling up and down Nya’s now very pregnant belly, “you’ve been giving Mama a lot of trouble today, you know that?”

“Jay,” Nya giggled, still not quite used to the feeling of something kicking inside of her, “cut it out. You’re making them excited, and excited means they kick!”

“Is that a bad thing?” but Jay relented, pressing two final kisses to her belly before standing back up and giving her a kiss instead. He was careful about wrapping her up in a hug, very aware of the precious cargo that she was carrying. Nya sighed, relaxing into her Yin’s hold and letting him rock them back and forth.

She listened to his heartbeat with her head on his shoulder; Jay always had a vaguely irregular heart rhythm because of his lightning, and at this point Nya had heard it so much that it sounded like a song one would put on the radio at the end of a long day. Jay rubbed circles into the small of her back, trying to relieve some of the pressure of the weight that her poor back had already been carrying for the better part of seven months.

Things had been quite busy around the monastery since Nya had learned she was pregnant. All of the boys had been doing their damndest to help her out, with Cole being an absolute sweetheart and waiting on her hand and foot when Jay wasn’t there to do it, along with Kai and Lloyd. Lloyd and Kai had also gone through the whole place to babyproof it (carefully checked by Pixal), and Zane had downloaded as much knowledge about anything to do with parenting ast he could. Pixal, when she wasn’t trying to make sure the others weren’t burning the house down with their efforts, was carefully designing toys and devices and baby monitors and other very fancy technology that Nya’s pregnancy-addled brain couldn’t wrap itself around. She would do her best to find out what everything did after she gave birth.

But the real star of the show had been Jay, as per usual. He had been running himself ragged transforming what had been his old room into the perfect nursery, building cribs completely from scratch and painting the whole thing a very light shade of blue. Nya had been a little concerned when she stepped in one day to find him about to swing a sledgehammer into the wall, but Jay had explained that it was only to make space for a window so the babies could have some natural light.

Nya didn’t know why she was so attracted to this silly man until she saw him take the first swing, muscles rippling, and then everything made perfect sense.

He had only built one crib at first, because that had been all they were expecting. Imagine their surprise when the ultrasound at their next appointment revealed that they were having TWINS!

Jay had to make the call to everyone else while Nya held onto his arm, sobbing her heart out onto the sleeve of his jacket. She was mortified when she finally got ahold of herself, but Jay had just kissed the top of her head and told her that she could keep crying if she needed to.

She did. For a long time afterwards.

The sound of Jay humming brought her back into the present, and Nya let her swollen feet rest on top of his so he could start walking them around the room in a strange waltz. Jay pressed a tender kiss to the side of her head, whispering in her ear, “everything okay, love?”

Was everything okay? They were scheduled to head into the hospital tomorrow for a c-section; it was the safest option and Nya wanted the absolute best for her little ones. She and Jay had elected to keep their genders secret until they had been born, but they already had names picked out and ready for whatever they turned out to be. In all honesty, the two were probably as prepared as new parents could be, and yet Nya still felt a little uneasy.

“I’m worried,” she confessed, and Jay didn’t say anything for a minute. His hands started tracing her spine, going up and down in a soothing pattern.

“Yeah, I am too,” he said, “but it’s going to be okay.”

Nya’s arms tightened around his waist. “Do you think we’re ready?”

“I don’t think anyone can ever be ready for something like this. But I promise you, Nya, that you’re going to be a great mom. I’m here for you and I’m not going anywhere.”

She opened her mouth to respond, suddenly overwhelmed with emotion, when a sharp pain rolled through her gut. Nya groaned, bending over as much as she could in his hold. Ignoring Jay’s cry of alarm, she cried out, feeling her muscles contract to a pain level high enough to make her vision white out.

“What’s wrong?” Jay asked urgently, the only thing keeping her standing, “Nya, what’s wrong? Do we need to go to the hospital?”

Her nails dug into his shirt, and both of them stilled when there was a sound of something plopping onto the floor with a wet splat.

Oh First Master, she was in labor.

“I’ve got you, I’ve got you,” Jay kept repeating, gently lowering her to the floor. Nya sobbed, clutching onto the front of his shirt as her stomach felt like it was going to turn itself inside out. Jay was panicking. “I don’t think I’m strong enough to carry you down the stairs!”

“Ah! Get Cole!” Nya spit out, pushing him away. “Get Cole!”

Jay ran out of the room, yelling his best friend’s name as he went. Pixal popped her head in after he ran out, immediately crouching next to her and giving the water ninja her hand. Nya squeezed it tightly with another cry of pain.

Pixal brushed the hair out of her face. “Don’t worry, Nya, Cole is on his way. We’re getting you to the hospital.”

“I’m here!” Cole yelled, running into the room with Jay right on his heels. Pixal showed him how to pick Nya up, and he hoisted her into the air with barely any effort. Jay had been making himself useful and clearing the path out of the monastery, now trotting alongside the earth ninja as he ran through the building as carefully as he could.

“You have to be twice as careful, Cole!” Jay was warning, and Nya could’ve slapped him silly. “Those are my kids you’re handling!”

“I know, Jay!”

“Boys!” Nya said harshly, digging her fingers into Cole’s shoulder as another contraction overtook her. “Can you shut the hell up and get me out of here?!”

“Yes ma’am.” They both quickly said, and Nya had barely any time to feel the satisfaction between the muscle spasms.

Thankfully, Pixal had a good head on her shoulders, pre-preparing a vehicle to get Nya to the hospital as fast as possible. Going down the monastery stairs was a special kind of hell for the water ninja, and she was very close to passing out from the contraction pains when Cole finally put her in the front seat.

It was only a couple hours later when Nya was laying in one of the hospital beds, strangling the life out of Jay’s hand; she could see the tips of his fingers turning black and blue from her grip cutting off his blood flow. He didn’t complain though, instead taking his other hand and smoothing her hair out of her sweaty face.

“I am going to put a knife through your eye for doing this to me,” Nya seethed, tears running down her face. “Jay Edward Walker, you will be lucky to walk out of this room alive!”

“Absolutely, whatever you say, dear,” Jay said calmly, cupping her face and pressing a kiss to her forehead. “You’re okay, Nya, you’re okay.”

He watched as the doctor came into the room with a couple nurses, walking right up to the foot of the bed where his Yang was exposed. The doctor gave them both a kind smile, and Jay did his best to give him the same thing.

Snapping on his gloves, the doctor took a look, putting on a serious expression. “Alright, miss, you’re pretty far along already so a good few pushes should be all that’s needed to get the first baby out. We can reassess the need for surgery after the first birth-”

“I am NOT having surgery after this!” Nya yelled. “Where the hell is my epidural?!”

“Did the nurse not give you any?” the doctor asked, and Nya could’ve popped a blood vessel.

“No!”

“We’ll get you some soon, sweetie,” one of the nurses said in a sickly sweet voice, and Nya could feel the water pressure building in the pipes as her anger rose. She wordlessly pointed to a small bracelet that Jay had left on the floor, and he understood.

Putting it on was the easy part; the hard part was the instant suppression of her powers, and Nya gasped for air as she felt it shoved forcibly back, caged. It hurt a little, but it was ultimately the best option unless she wanted to birth her children directly into a small lake.

“So, change of plans,” the doctor said amicably, and Nya could already tell that she was going to hate whatever was going to come out of his mouth, “it turns out that there isn’t time for an epidural. You’re doing this birth completely natural!”

Nya opened her mouth, and instead of the scathing remark she had planned she gave a short scream in pain. Jay’s hand was squeezed even tighter as she buried her face in his shoulder, sobbing. Her abdomen felt like it was on fire, and Jay was doing his best to comfort her and listen to the nurses at the same time.

One of them was telling him that he had to leave the room and Nya’s heart plummeted. She shook her head no, keeping Jay close. He wasn’t leaving her like this.

“I’m not going anywhere,” Jay said solemnly. “I’m right here, Nya. I’m staying right here, no matter what, I promise. You’re doing amazing.”

“I can see a head!” the doctor exclaimed, and Jay was quick to take a peek. Nya saw the way his face paled instantly, and watched as her Yin swayed on his feet.

She growled. “Don’t you dare faint on me, Jay Walker!”

Jay swallowed thickly. “Not planning on it.”

“Keep pushing, miss,” the nicer nurse said from Nya’s other side, “you’re almost there! Push!”

Nya pushed, alright. She kept going in time with whatever the nurse was saying, spurred on by Jay’s encouragement and praise. As embarrassing as it was, Nya couldn’t stop herself from crying, keeping her face in Jay’s shoulder so the other people wouldn’t have to see her tears. It was bad enough that she couldn’t contain her sobs.

All it took was one final push and the pressure relieved itself, Nya collapsing heavily against Jay as all of her strength left. Jay was stroking her hair, kissing away the tear tracks on her face and doing his best to get feeling back in his poor hand.

But something was wrong.

Dizziness threw her vision into disarray, and suddenly she was clutching onto Jay for a very different reason than giving birth. “Jay, Jay, something’s wrong.”

“What?” Jay asked, puzzled, and he turned to see the doctor turn as white as the sheets. “What’s wrong? What’s happening?”

It took just one look at the sheets under Nya to see what was wrong. The sterile white was quickly being turned crimson by blood at an alarming rate, and Jay couldn’t breathe. He barely even got to see the baby before the nurse was rushing it out of the room. Nya was trying to say something to him, but the only person he could focus on was the doctor reaching for some tools on the side table next to him.

“What’s wrong with her?” Jay asked urgently, squeezing Nya’s hand back and holding her close.

The other man grit his teeth. “She’s crashing is what’s happening!”

“Crashing?!” Jay whipped his head around to Nya. “Nya, Nya, you need to listen to me. You’re going to be fine, okay? I promise everything is going to be okay, I just need you to hold on for me. Can you do that?”

“Jay,” Nya whispered, and Jay’s heart stopped with how weak her voice sounded, “I love you, I love you so so much-”

“Stop it.” he said angrily. “No. No. You’re going to be fine. You hear me, Nya? Everything’s going to be okay.”

She tried to let his words give her some strength, but it wasn’t enough to keep her eyes open. The last thing she heard before she passed out was the rolling of a crash cart, accompanied by Jay’s frantic reassurances and the feel of his lips against hers.

Waking up was an experience. Her head was pounding like someone was striking a hammer against her skull, and her mouth was as dry as the desert where Jay had grown up. Feeling around her mouth with her thickened tongue, Nya opened her eyes, squinting. She immediately noted the time difference; it had barely been noon when they had arrived at the hospital, and now it looked well after sunset. The sun’s rays were still shining but only barely, glinting off of the metal equipment in the room.

There was an odd pressure on her arm, and Nya could feel her heart melting when she looked down to see her Yin fast asleep. He was drooling onto the now clean sheets, grasping at her hand, carefully avoiding the I.V. line that she was hooked up to (when had that happened?), and Nya giggled. She tried to take her arm back, only for Jay to tighten his hold and snuggle it closer.

“Jay,” she said softly, stroking across his cheekbone with her thumb, “it’s to wake up now, dear.”

“Five more minutes,” he groaned, and Nya could only sigh as she kept stroking with her thumb, tracing his cheekbone and down his jaw to wipe away the trail of drool leaking out.

“I think it’s been a little longer than five minutes, honey.”

She watched as his eyes slowly started to blink open, still heavy with sleep. The blue was deep and dark; his eyes tended to get brighter when he had more energy. Jay yawned, sitting up properly and lazily stretching his back to hear it give a nice pop.

He never let go of her hand, only taking it so he could kiss her palm. “Good morning.”

Nya raised an eyebrow. “I don’t think it’s morning, Jay.”

“Hmm?” he hummed, and finally he seemed to realize what was happening. “Nya! You’re awake!”

The water ninja was not prepared for her Yin to shoot forward and wrap her in a crushing hug, one hand going around her waist and the other tangling itself in her hair. Nya hugged him back, kissing his neck when she felt tears start to soak through the hospital gown from where he had tucked his face into her shoulder.

“You’re okay,” she soothed, rubbing his back in smooth motions, “you’re okay, Jay. I’m okay.”

“B-but you almost weren’t!” Jay sobbed, “I could’ve lost you!”

“I’m not going anywhere, love.” she said firmly, and then it hit her.

She had been in labor.

She was clearly no longer in labor.

Where were her children?!

“Where are the kids?” she asked urgently, not meaning to be so rough when she pushed him away, “Where are my kids?!”

“They had to go to the ICU,” Jay explained, “after they had to perform surgery to get him out. It-it was pretty scary. Here, I’ll call the nurse and tell her you’re awake so we can see them-”

Nya grabbed his arm when he started to get up. “Wait! What did we have?”

Jay gave her a watery smile. “A boy and a girl, just like you said we would.”

“Kai owes me a hundred bucks,” Nya said smugly. Jay chuckled, pushing down another watery sob as he left the room to find the nurse. She wasn’t left alone for very long; Jay must’ve said something, because soon the rest of her family was filing into the small hospital room.

Her big bad older brother had clearly been crying too, even if he was trying not to show it. Lloyd looked tired, like he had just run a marathon at four in the morning, and Cole didn’t look much better on his other side. Nya shook her head, smiling; these were her idiot brothers alright. Did they really think she was going to go out like that? Without even saying hello to her kids?

“C’mere guys,” she said as cheerfully as she could, holding out her arms. The boys piled in without hesitating, even though she could tell that they were still trying to be careful with her. That was totally fair: she had just given birth to a child, almost died from blood loss and had a major abdominal surgery in what she assumed was a four hour window.

Zane and Pix held back at first, waiting until Cole and Kai had pulled away before going in. Nya appreciated the sentiment. Lloyd kept hugging her well after everyone else had had their fill, and she was all too happy to hold him close and kiss the top of his blond locks while his shoulders shook with hidden emotion.

Lloyd gave her a stern look when he finally stepped back, making a beeline for the hard plastic chair on Kai’s other side and leaning his head on his older brother’s shoulder. “You’re never allowed to scare us like that again, you hear me? Never.”

Nya shrugged. “Hey, I didn’t ask to have a hemorrhage. At least, I’m assuming that’s what happened, right?”

“That is correct,” Pixal said, “although I agree with Lloyd. You cannot give us a scare like that.”

“You’re lucky Cole was here,” Kai said quietly. “He helped give you a transfusion.”

Cole looked sheepish when she turned to thank him, rubbing the back of his head. “Don’t mention it, seriously. What else are brothers for, right?”

“Also I would’ve killed him in his sleep if he hadn’t done anything,” Jay said jovially, walking back into the room with a new pep in his step. Nya could hear something rattling behind him, and watched in amazement as the two nurses from earlier rolled in two odd-looking incubators, each holding a baby.

Her babies. Jay’s babies. Their babies.

“Nya,” Jay said softly, “meet our two amazing and wonderful kiddos: Elizabeth and Noah Walker.”

“C-Can I hold them?”

Of course, the nurses told her, already making the preparations for her to do so, Nya felt the tears coming before she could stop them, and in an instant Jay was there to wipe them away.

Kai stood up to help, and Nya looked at the baby girl (her daughter) placed in her arms with absolute awe. She was so little, Nya noted, with only a couple scraps of brown hair on the top of her head. Jay helped her to support the baby’s head, and Nya watched as she curled her tiny hands into fists. With instincts that she didn’t even know she possessed, Nya let her hospital gown fall off of her shoulder, uncaring of who saw her do so.

It only took a second for the baby to start suckling. The tears in her eyes started coming even faster, and Nya leaned into Kai’s side once he had wrapped an arm around her shoulder.

“I made this?” she said faintly, cupping the baby’s head. She couldn’t believe that something so soft and precious could’ve ever been born from their rough and tumble lifestyle. More of her heart melted when the baby’s hand wrapped itself around her finger.

“You made her, alright,” Kai said warmly, placing his hand under Nya’s to support the baby’s head, “and she’s perfect.”

“My little spark,” Nya whispered, pressing a kiss to the baby’s forehead. “I’m so glad to meet you, Tessa.”

Jay walked over with the other baby, her little boy. He took after Jay far more than Tessa did, with a mop of curly brown hair so dark that it was almost black and the makings of Jay’s signature grin. Cole and Zane were both cooing over Noah, with Cole giving the boy his finger to play with. Jay had tears in his eyes just like she did, and she could taste them as they fell down his face and into their kiss.

“Hey Nya?” Jay said quietly.

“Yes, Jay?”

“I know we’ve made a lot of stuff over the years, but I think they’re the best thing we could’ve ever created. I can promise you that.”

#ninjago #ninjago jay #ninjago nya #ninjago jaya #jayaweek2023 #finn's writing #ninjago jaya week 2023 day 4: promise

[scabopolis]

you’re not the first stubborn, angry, rude physical therapy patient I’ve worked with and you won’t be the last, but you might be the first to get under my skin—VM/LoVe

Hello! Yes, it’s been 100 million years since I received this, but I am really making my way through prompts! At least...emotionally? Anyway, I believe this one was sent to me by @cubbiegirl??? And if not, I’ll go ahead and gift it to her anyway because she’s the best. 

Will likely be posted to AO3 at some point (and edited?! who’s to say?), but for now let it live here. 

*** Title: leap, land, and catch Rating: Pg-13 for swears (and some foreplay…did I just get blocked) (this is the exact text for the last time I posted a fic...but it still holds) Word count: ~1700 Relationships/Characters: Logan/Veronica Additional Information: Idk, I tried to do a sneaky little thingy? We’ll see if it works! Also...like most of my fics, it doesn’t have an ending as much as I just stopped typing words.  Summary: Logan is 4-months post-ACL surgey, but he’s 4-years into trying Veronica’s patience.  ***

“Good, good, good,” Veronica encourages. She points to her client’s knee. “Watch that rotation. Make sure your knee tracks right over your foot.” She nods in approval at the slight position correction her client makes. “Slow down. No need to rush this.” Her client smirks as he continues the exercise. Before he can respond she puts up a hand to stop him. “Whatever joke you’re thinking of making, you probably made it last week.” 

“I doubt it,” Logan says. “I stayed up late thinking of new ones.” 

“Sounds like a good use of your time. Go ahead and switch legs for me. Good. Just like that. Good.” 

“I like the way you say ‘good.’ This might be awakening a kink in me.” 

She rolls her eyes. “Something tells me your kinks don’t need any help in the awakening department.” 

He grins and continues with the series of single leg squats. 

Now that he’s been her client for more than four years, Veronica’s more than used to Logan Echolls’ particular brand of charm. Their appointments originally began to address the physical strain that went with his career as a former Naval aviator, specifically persistent low-level neck and back pain. From there they continued to work together to address the garden variety Southern California surfer boy ailments, namely surfer’s shoulder and lower back strain. Every Thursday, the final appointment of the day in the small clinic she runs, the two of them would work together while Logan also aimed to be a giant pain in her ass. 

That is until Logan thought it would be a good idea to challenge a former Division II player of the year to a pick-up game of basketball, planted his foot wrong, and tore his ACL. Idiot. 

“Two more on that side,” Veronica says. “Slow, slow, slow. And, done.” Logan lowers his right leg to the ground. “How’s that feel?” 

“Good. Secure.” 

“No pain as you extend?” 

“None.” 

“That’s what I like to hear.” 

Logan follows her to the area of the gym with the weight machines. She selects a 15 lb dumbbell from the rack and leads him back over to the line of plyo boxes near the edge of the gym. She catches him looking over his shoulder back towards the weight machines. 

She hands him the dumbbell. “I know how much you love power step-ups.”  

He looks down at the dumbbell and then back up. “I thought we were moving to weight training this week.” 

“We are.” She points at the dumbbell. “Hence the weight in your hand.” 

“You know what I mean.” 

“I want to give it another couple of weeks before we add additional pressure to your knee.” 

“I told you I’m good.” 

“Well, lucky for you I’ve cottoned on to your ‘the Navy equipped me to hike 15-miles in the snow, up hill, both ways’ hero complex which means I don’t plan to listen to you.” 

“Veronica.” 

“You’re just past 4-months post-op. Give it some time.” She points to the box. “Power step-ups. And if you don’t keep centered, I’m confiscating that weight.”

The dumbbell is a new addition, but the exercise is one Logan is familiar with. His form is, annoyingly, perfect, though that doesn’t stop Veronica from offering minor corrections and reminders. As they near the end of the final set of reps, she can tell Logan is getting fatigued. His breathing is heavier, and she detects a second of hesitation before he steps up onto the box. “Three more on that leg and then we’re done,” she coaches him. Except once he’s completed the final rep, he keeps going with the exercise. “All done, Logan,” she repeats. He continues with the exercise. 

Any doubt she had that he didn’t hear her vanishes. Veronica steps around the plyo box so she can more easily make eye contact. “Logan.” He returns his leg to the ground, briefly makes eye contact with her, and then switches legs to start another series of reps.

“Logan,” she repeats. “Stop.” She could try and wrest the weight from his hands, but there’s the very real possibility that she could knock him off balance and cause him to seriously hurt himself. Plus, the man is a head taller than her and all muscle. Unless she clipped the back of his bad knee, she doesn’t see that going her way.

She folds her arms across her chest and waits for him to finish whatever toddler inspired physical therapy tantrum of his this is. By the time he’s done, his forehead is slick with sweat and his breath comes out in uneven pants. He extends the dumbbell for her to take, but she shakes her head and walks past him. 

“Where are you going?” he asks. 

She turns back around. “I’m going to have Tina call all my post-op clients to tell them they’ll be working with you as their PT from now on. Seeing as you’re such an expert in post-surgical rehab.” 

“Veronica.” 

“No. Save me the Veronicas and the bushbaby eyes. You could have hurt yourself, Logan. Really hurt yourself. You realize that?”

“I wasn’t trying—”

“If you don’t want my input, go to Planet Fitness, pay $10, and they’ll let you do whatever superhero camp exercises you want and fuck your knee in the process. Is that what you want?” 

“Shit, Veronica. That’s not it!” 

“Then what is it?”

He drops the dumbbell to the ground and slumps down on the plyo box. He sighs. “I’m not good at…at…being idle.” He says idle like it’s a vile word. Which, for Logan, she supposes it is. “I don’t know what to do with myself, and it makes me--”  Then he folds in on himself. His shoulders slump and a crease forms between his brow. 

She takes a step towards him and then another. His eyes track her as she moves. “I never said you needed to be idle. I’m asking you to trust me.” 

“God, is that even a real question? Of course I trust you.”

“Okay, then.” She places a hand on his shoulder. His skin is hot, like always. Her skin prickles with the awareness of it. “There’s always knitting.” He tilts his head in question, his eyes wide and focused intently on her. “If you need to keep your hands busy,” she explains. “Cross-stitch? Buy yourself a pottery wheel?”  

“I can think of -- oof.” 

She clamps a hand over his mouth. “Enough of that. And what did I say about the bushbaby eyes?” 

He gently pulls her hand away from his mouth. He runs his fingers along the slight indentation on her ring finger. “You like them.” 

“No I don’t.” 

“You like me.” 

“Only when I can tolerate you. Which is hardly ever.” She gently removes her hand from his. “Now what are we going to do for the rest of the hour?”  

“Perform admirably and impress you with my male virility?” 

“No. Also, yuck. We are going to listen to Veronica.” She extends a hand. “Deal?” 

He takes her hand in a firm grip and shakes. “Deal.” 

“Leap and lands.” He groans. She points to a spot on the mat. “Both legs.” 

“You’re a cruel woman.” 

It happens quickly. Her back is only turned for a few seconds but then she hears Logan cry out. 

She chips back around and he’s on the ground, his hands on the mat and extended to cushion his fall. 

“Logan!” She rushes towards him. 

“I’m okay,” he says, but she can hear the waver in his voice. “I’m okay.” 

“Let me see.” She helps him sit down on the mat and uses her hands to slowly guide him to extend his knee.

“I’m okay. I promise. I moved before I set my feet.”

“How about I be the judge of that?” 

He’s right, it turns out. Most likely the added exertion from the weights he added, combined with the unsanctioned extra reps, and not setting his feet before he walked just caused his knee to buckle. 

She’s mostly quiet the remainder of the session. Given his fall, she amends her plan and focuses on range of motion exercises rather than adding more weight. He tries to make a few jokes as they work together. Every time she tries to respond with a quip, she sees Logan splayed out on the mat, and hears the slight quiver of his voice.

“Do not overdo it with the home exercises this week,” she warns. 

“You sound a lot like my wife.” He tosses the bands they used in the bin to be disinfected tomorrow.

“I mean it, Logan.” 

“Roger. Are we done?” 

“We’re done.” 

“Good.” He reaches for her hand and pulls her close to him. The move takes her by surprise, though it shouldn’t. “Does that mean you’re going to stop giving me the silent treatment?” 

“Would you rather I yell at you?” 

“Sometimes.” 

She rolls her eyes, and looks away. “You were doing extra reps on your own. Weren’t you?” 

“Veronica.” The gentle pressure of his thumb on her chin guides her eyes back to him. “I’m okay.” 

“You scared me.” 

“I kind of scared myself.” He kisses the tip of her nose. “But I’m okay.” 

The nights where he’s her last appointment of the night aren’t the worst thing ever. He’s got good shoulders, keeps her distracted through lock-up, and only complains a little when she suggests they pick up takeout from the Indian restaurant with the owner who flirts with her.

“Thanks to my brilliant physical therapy skills you mean?” 

“Obviously.” He hooks a finger in the small pocket sewn into the waistband of her leggings and removes the ring she keeps there. Past-her would have some strong, and likely unkind, words to say if she could hear the quick beat of her heart as Logan slides her wedding band back onto her finger. 

“We’re late for family dinner.” 

“Are you going to speak to Wallace at this one?” 

“I speak to Wallace every day.”

“Let me rephrase. Are you going to stop referring to your brother as ‘The Maimer of Husbands’?” 

“To his face? Or in general?” 

“Let’s start with to his face.”

#logan echolls #veronica mars #vm fanfic #lv fanfic #p: logan x veronica #tv: veronica mars #movie: veronica mars #never stories

[yougetoneshot]

Suicide Squad: Reversal

What if team 1 and team 2 switched missions?

Focus is on Team 1: Flag, Harley, Captain Boomerang, Savant, Mongal, Weasel, Blackguard, TDK, and Javelin

Everyone lives AU

Chapter One

Flag looked around at his team and lamented his choices in life. His eyes fell on Harley, the therapist turned supervillain with a penchant for hyenas and large hammers. She was clapping excitedly at the despair of the man across from her struggling with his seatbelt.

“This thing’s a werewolf?! Yo, I don’t mess with werewolves, get me outta here!”

Captain Boomerang’s roaring laugh filled the entire helicopter as he joined Harley in enjoying Blackguard’s panic.

“Sit down! He’s not a werewolf. He’s a weasel.” Flag snarled to quiet down the situation. Blackguard was his least favorite addition to his team which was saying something considering weasel, the beast villain he’d just believed was a werewolf, was equally as useless. He’d begged Waller not to add him but she insisted his strength would be an asset despite his low IQ. At least the weasel didn’t talk.

“Get ready for the drop.” The pilot called back to Flag who nodded and ushered the others to stand as the back of the helicopter opened over the water.

“Go!” He yelled as the first of his team leapt from the chopper. Javelin, whose name pretty much encompassed his entire personality aside from the added foreign accent, hit the water first. He was followed by TDK, a villain Flag actually didn’t know anything about but trusted Waller enough that he must have some strength of benefit to the team. Savant, the forgetful genius fighter, and Mongal, the alien tyrant, jumped next. They were followed by Harley and Boomerang who made a competition over who could do the best dive. Flag had to shove Blackguard out before he and weasel jumped. As they all hit the water they heard the sound of weasel struggling against the current.

“Did no one find out if he could swim?!” Flag growled into his communicator. The team back at base remained quiet as he moved to help Savant save the unsavory beast from drowning.

“Is he dead.” Waller’s irritated tone buzzed over coms as Savant shook his head.

“He’ll live.”

An explosion lit up another part of the island and Flag furrowed his brow. “Waller-“

“It’s fine. Keep on mission, Flag.” Her tone sounded knowing so he pushed any concern for it aside. He had to trust her. What other choice did he have?

The rest of his team trudged onto the beach and groaned about being wet. He once again lamented not having a proper military team as Harley and Boomerang began convincing Blackguard he was covered in leeches. The dim witted villain was frantically and a bit too loudly checking himself for the leeches as Flag moved towards them. “Shhh! Stop messing with him or you’re going to get us all killed! We don’t have much time before a patrol comes by. We need to get deep into the jungle and make camp.” He grabbed Blackguard by the shoulder to stop him from ripping his clothes off. “There are no leeches on yo-“ Flag’s sentence halted as he spotted it- not a leech but definitely something akin to it stuck to the back of Blackguard’s neck. “Don’t move.”

“What?! Why?!! What is it?!! There are leeches aren’t there?!-“

“I said don’t move!” Flag pulled a knife from a holster around his thigh and began prying the small mass from Blackguard’s skin. The criminal howled which prompted Flag to slap a hand over his mouth. “Shut up or I’ll let this thing stay on your neck.” He finally provided enough leverage to pop the creature off of Blackguard’s neck and send it careening into the sand where it dug down into the dune like a tremor.

“…what was that.” Harley’s eyes were locked onto the spot in the sand that the creature had sunk into.

“Just a leech. Now come on, we need to get off this beach.” He waited for his team to all make it off the beach before he noticed a light in the distance.

A sharp pain in his shoulder then another in his leg sent him sinking to the sand. He heard shouts down the beach and yelled at his team to run as Harley moved towards him. “Go! Stay on mission!”

Waller echoed Flag’s order into Harley’s earpiece.

“Come on. He’s right, Harls.” Boomerang tugged her back into the foliage as soldiers surrounded Flag. “They ain’t gonna kill him, right?” Harley looked up at her Aussie pal and he tugged her down to hide in the brush.

“I dunno but we’re dead if we stay here.” He whispered into her ear as they watched Flag be apprehended.

“This changes nothing. You will still need to find the Thinker and infiltrate Jotunheim.” Waller’s voice hissed through their earpieces. “Don’t take this as some opportunity to bail. I can still monitor you from here without Flag’s supervision. One wrong move and I’ll blow your heads off. Now move.”

As Waller finished her threat, Harley looked around at the group who were all looking at her. “What are you looking at me for? Do I got something on my face?”

“I think they’re looking at you to lead us.” Boomerang whispered in her ear.

“Leader? No. Uh uh. I ain’t a leader.” She turned to Boomerang to argue in a less than hushed tone. “Boomer, I don’t know the first thing about leading a bunch of idiots!”

“Hey!” Blackguard hissed. “We can hear you.”

“Oh sorry, I meant six idiots and a lummox.” She sassed but then quickly realized he thought she was complimenting him. Harley turned back to Boomerang. “We are so doomed.”

“I believe in you, Harls. What would you do if you didn’t have a team?”

“I dunno. Probably get disguises?”

“Then that’s a start. Let’s go find some disguises.”

-

The group had little issue getting into town and breaking into a department store. Even here on this tiny island, American corporations had made their mark in the most American way- overpriced apparel.

“Alright everyone. I want you to look your most Corto Maltese-esque-ian.”

“What?” Half of them chimed in and she shook her head frustrated.

“Just don’t look like a tourist, yea?” She shooed them away to pick their own disguises. After a while, Javelin approached her in bright plaid overalls with no shirt underneath and a vibrant pink hat.

“..that is… PERFECT!” Harley clapped excited then noticed weasel next to him with a large novelty mustache stuck to his face. “Oh my, I didn’t even recognize you. That’s so good. Keep it.”

“I dunno, Harley none of these clothes fit me.” Blackguard walked over in what was clearly a child’s tshirt that hugged him like a crop top. Harley suppressed some laughter but nodded. “No. You look great. Promise.” She nudged Boomerang as he was shuffling through some AC DC shirts to find his size. He lifted his head and spotted the very tight children’s clothing clinging to Blackguard. He was less than successful at containing his laughter.

“He loves it.” Harley nodded.

“Then why’s he laughing?”

“Oh it’s just a joke I told him earlier. Nothing to do with you.”

“..oh.. okay!” Blackguard joined the other two members who were done picking their disguises.

Mongal returned in a large fluffy red dress and Harley gave her two thumbs up. Savant came back in plain jeans and a white v neck. Harley stopped him and plopped a ball cap on his head that said “World’s Best Grandpa” before giving him approval. TDK finally returned dressed like a cowboy complete with chaps and a cowboy hat. Harley had chosen checkered black and red jeggings paired with a workout top that said “would rather be sleeping” and a red leather jacket. Boomerang had finally found the appropriate sized AC DC shirt- sans sleeves as he tugged them off and tossed them aside.

Harley looked over the group one last time before placing her hands on her hips confidently. “Let’s go catch a Thinker.”

-

Outside the club, Harley briefed the group in the small van they’d stolen from a very cooperative Pepsi delivery guy. “Okay, the plan is to blend in and wait for this Thinker guy to show up. He should be here anytime in the next three hours so we gotta stay alert. That includes you.” She gestured to Javelin.

“Why do you single me out?”

“Because that devilish accent of yours could get us caught. Best if you stay quiet.”

“But-“

“No. Your voice is now a precious gem that you must protect at all costs. Not another word.”

He nodded sadly as Harley turned to the rest of the group. “Let’s go.”

-

The group walked into the club and despite having a giant weasel with them, managed to get on great with everyone there. Most of the drunken patrons thought they came from a costume party and Weasel was wearing some kind of Halloween costume. Harley had the group split up to look for the Thinker. She paired them up with Mongal and TDK taking the back door, Boomerang and Savant at the pool table in the corner, Blackguard and Javelin on the dance floor, and she took the bar with Weasel by the entrance.

After about an hour, Harley started to become bored. As entertaining as it was watching Weasel get drunk, Boomerang lose at pool twice in a row to Savant, and Javelin teach Blackguard how to do the Cupid shuffle, she was getting antsy for a fight. Lucky for Harley, a fight was walking in as Corto Maltese soldiers walked in escorting the Thinker.

“I’ve got eyes on the Thinker.” Harley nodded over to Javelin who was by the jukebox. He then pressed a few buttons and Ballroom Blitz blared through the club. “Time to party, boys!”

Harley ran full speed at the nearest soldier and slid down between his legs to pop up behind him right next to the Thinker. She gave him a smile. “You might wanna duck.” Harley grabbed the back of his head and pushed it down as Javelin nailed the soldier posted behind the Thinker with his javelin from across the room. Boomerang took out the first two soldiers and Savant used his pool stick to prevent more soldiers rushing in from the entrance from getting closer to the group by targeting pressure points on their bodies with absolute precision.

At the back door, Mongal and TDK were having a blast letting a soldier walk in only to hang them by their vests on the tall coatrack mounted to the wall and knocking them out. Weasel ran around downing all the drinks of the patrons who’d abandoned them to leave the establishment. The entrance began to flood with more soldiers until Blackguard lifted the large jukebox and hefted it at the doorway with complete ease, halting the music and leaving the room in complete silence for a few moments.

“…you telling me you coulda done that the whole time?!” Harley choked out in shock. “I didn’t know he could that- did you know he could do that?!” Harley looked around at some of the rest of the group who shook their heads. “That coulda been very useful to know, just sayin.”

“Who are you people?” Thinker questioned irritably.

“Hey!” She shook him by his shirt collar. “We ask the questions round here!” Harley began shoving the Thinker towards the back exit as the team followed. They all squeezed back into the Pepsi delivery fan with Thinker placed in the middle of them.

“Okay, Bumble Ball Head, you listen good, you’re gonna take us to Jotunheim.”

“You’ll never make it past the front door. They already know what you’re trying to do. Your little friends on the beach have already been taken care of too.”

“..wait.. there were other people on the beach? Did we leave somebody else?!” Harley began counting the group as Thinker furrowed his brow confused.

“Are you not the Americans? The ones with the shark man?”

“Wait there’s a shark man?!” Harley squealed. “You mean to tell me Waller sent another team with a shark man and he wasn’t on my team?!”

“I don’t like sharks.” TDK brought up nonchalantly. “They could bite your arm off, you know?”

“Yea but not if you was friends with them, right?” Harley proposed and TDK shrugged.

“Fair point.”

“You’re all mad.” Thinker interjected.

“Well, that ain’t nothing new.” Harley chortled. “Now, tell me about the team at the beach. What happened to them?” Harley furrowed her brows as she raised a knife. “And if you ain’t telling me the truth, I’ll start cuttin off them pegs in your head.”

“They were apprehended and taken to the capital. With the exception of the shark man who is now a delightful new subject for me to experiment on.”

“Oh, you are just a piece of work, you know that?!” Harley waved the knife at him then looked at the group. “Listen, I ain’t much of a planner but seems to me like we could use all the help we can get getting into Jotunheim. We should go rescue the rest of the team to help us.”

“If they’re even still alive. El Presidente isn’t exactly keen on Americans. He’s likely already publicly executed them by now.”

“Well ain’t you just a bucket of rainbows!” She bonked him on the head with the back of the knife before looking back at the group. “It’s worth checking to see if any of em are alive.”

“I agree.” Savant nodded. “We got power in numbers, especially if the others are just as gifted in their abilities.”

“Right, anyone oppose?”

Mongal raised her hand slowly and Harley blinked a few times while pouting out her lips. “Yes?”

“I think we left the werewolf.”

Harley looked around at the group and sure enough the Weasel was not there. “Oh, fudge!” She sighed and nodded for TDK at the back to go back inside and fetch him. He returned with an unconscious and smelly Weasel, tossing him inside the van before it drove off towards the capital.

- Stay tuned for Chapter 2! -

#the suicide squad fanfiction #Rick Flagg #Harley Quinn #Captain Boomerang #Savant #Mongal #The Weasel #Blackguard #TDK #Javelin #Rick Flag #Suicide Squad Reversal #SSR Chapter 1

[preemshots]

johnny + the nomads lore

alright, i know this is a screenshots blog but i'm going to go ahead and start dropping some juicy lore tidbits as i dig them up. part of what i'm doing outside of just photo diarying is shard hunting, and BOY is there a lot the game likes to hide in those little shards for idiots like me who like to read so we can write unnecessarily accurate fanfiction! 

full disclosure, i know jack shit about the TTRPG/cyberpunk 2020 rulebook except what i read in the wikis. 

so here’s my lore roundup so far of everything i know about johnny joining the nomads

we know johnny likes to narrate v’s quest objectives. here’s the first mention where he says it himself: 

during the voodoo boys quest "transmission" there's a shard in the maglev tunnels beside the ice bath, presumably from brigitte's research into johnny in the first place:

okay, so the timeline is this: johnny joins the nomads after trying and failing to rescue alt. johnny hides out in the badlands for some years. then he and rogue come back to night city and nuke arasaka tower help alt escape the arasaka subnet by uploading liberator to their network once and for all.

this ultimately makes sense. in alt’s flashback, we meet santiago, who is a nomad/connected to nomads, joins rogue and johnny when they're trying to get alt back, and eventually becomes the leader of the aldecaldos. 

part of santiago’s TTRPG lore is that he, johnny, and rogue have to lay low in the badlands with nomads after they storm arasaka headquarters (i am aware the game takes many liberties with the original lore so who knows the full accuracy of anything from the original rulebooks)

ENDING spoilers: in the rogue+johnny storming AHQ ending, it's revealed that rogue has a son while they're prepping for the job. if you eavesdrop on her calling him while you're at the afterlife, you hear her tell her son to (paraphrasing here) "pull over and look at the stars", which immediately made my brain go to: nomad, badlands, santiago = dad? maybe. (santiago also canonically has a son according to the TTRPG lore)

this immediately reminded me of another interesting shard that i believe you can find in multiple locations around night city: “"what REALLY happened in arasaka tower?“

i love this dang shard. at first i thought it was just a cute conspiracy with some juicy gossip (and i love how 99% of the shards that mention johnny in this game are reminding us that he's not a real rebel, he's a poser) but it brings some interesting shit together

one: it tells us where johnny got his hands on the nukes! he and the nomads jumped a militech convoy and jacked some bombs! 

which is never directly explained, even as saburo arasaka is interrogating him shortly before using soulkiller. very nice of johnny to protect his homies like that. 

...or maybe he didn’t. saburo emphasizes that the dead don’t lie like the living do, and we don’t know what exactly arasaka did to johnny’s construct in mikoshi. 

it also explains why the obvious media narrative is that militech nuked arasaka, a nice neat political bow to the end of the fourth corpo wars, which is an entire section of the TTRPG lore that makes my eyes cross when i read it. 

it also makes the star/nomads ending extremely interesting, because i originally believed it was the ending where V’s journey deviates the most from rewalking johnny’s path... which also has weird implications if the johnny’s nomad era is being kept from v. 

(this also leads into my belief that the star ending/the devil ending are narratively two sides of the same coin, but that’s a WHOLE ANOTHER POST for another day.)

TWO, just straight up the fact that they turned the raid where they actually obtained the nukes into an action flick BD that pretty much ANYONE could watch. who the hell was doing that?? 

well, who else other than the guy who johnny (optionally) punched the shit out of for filming alt's death: thompson, media guy, and according to rogue, “bad luck”. because you know, recording your crimes is straight up evidence that can be used against you.

during the alt flashback we meet thompson, and just after that in cyberspace before meeting alt, johnny tells v that he has no idea what happened to him and that they never worked together again. 

oh, johnny, you lying bastard man

this is blatantly untrue, and if V even had two braincells and better memory than a goldfish they'd know this--in the first flashback sequence where johnny and rogue nuke arasaka tower, thompson is on the comms as they ride the AV towards AHQ, questioning their plans and use of violence. 

which leaves me with some questions, like where the fuck is thompson, why does johnny keep lying about this, why doesn't johnny say almost anything about how you interact with the aldecaldo clan nonstop throughout the game when he himself may have been a member of the family for some time?? is he continuing to protect the nomad clan that saved his ass? we know that a lot of his flashbacks are unreliable at best, that johnny changes shit up as desired when presenting V with his memories.

in 2077, you can also find that there’s a remake of “badlands raid” in the shard “new release braindances” that is pretty much everywhere. that shard doesn’t add much, but does mention something along the lines of “many people don’t know the ending of the original” which probably means johnny punched thompson out for filming again, or something. 

my running theories: rogue ditched santiago and the aldecaldos with johnny and thompson to nuke arasaka tower, and when johnny died she was stuck looking for (heavily implied by johnny here:) corpo sellout ways to survive.

adam smasher obviously has something to do with this since johnny/rogue's vendetta against the guy isn't entirely clear beyond the smokescreen of "he killed johnny and he sucks". i have done 0 research into this though i'm tired of typing okay

i obviously cannot be certain i have found everything related to this in the game as i’m not even done with this playthrough where i’m trying to pay attention, but i hope this is fun for someone else to dig into. 

enjoy, fellow silverhand freaks

EDIT: additional findings

ALRIGHT I HAVE DONE MORE DIGGING AND I AM BACK WITH MORE NOMAD/JOHNNY FINDINGS. these ones are kind of a bummer but VERY interesting.

there’s a shard called “excerpts from a history of the nomads by bb pires” that goes into detail about how nomads came to be

there’s an interesting quote in it: It's hard to imagine a group less inclined to wandering than farmers, but in fact they were the ones who sparked the age of nomads. Natural catastrophes, crops ravaged by bioplagues, armed conflicts and martial law allowing corporations to speculate and privatize land - all this forced them into a life on the road.

when you ask johnny why he wants to take down arasaka, he begins by referencing this himself!!

it’s a little awkward to imagine a nomad V doesn’t also know what he’s referencing, but hey, V is the fool because we are as players and that’s only one life path... so sure.

johnny also has unique dialogue during this scene about a nomad origin V, telling them that he’s been trying to understand how V thinks, and came to the conclusion that “their family was a crutch” and essentially made them stupid because they always had a safety net (lmao johnny calling v privileged basically)

BUT this also may reference why johnny would find it confusing as hell that V doesn’t immediately share the views he does when nomads, in terms of values, seem to be more aligned with johnny than V is. but once again V is the fool for a reason and this is all my own speculation so YOU KNOW.

MORE IMPORTANTLY, at the end of chippin’ in, when you ask johnny what he meant by letting down his friends... santiago is named directly

i thought this was interesting since the only glimpse of their relationship that we get is seeing johnny meeting santiago via the alt flashback for the first time.

so now it’s obvious that while johnny and rogue were with the nomads their friendship developed, and johnny went on to disappoint santiago in some way by being his normal dickhead self

but HOW? how did he disappoint santiago? is santiago even still alive?? did smasher kill santiago and is this why rogue mentions during chippin’ in that she wants smasher to “settle a score” moreso than avenge johnny??

the only additional hints i have are from this shard, which you can find at the aldecaldos camp: “nomads at ground zero”

i’m just gonna transcribe here and bold for emphasis:

It was no secret that Night Corp offered generous pay and, in some cases, free cyberware and biomonitor upgrades to anyone willing to help clean up the crater of radioactive rubble at AHQ ground zero. Some firsthand accounts recall the incessant ticking of Geiger counters, like the loud buzz of cicadas in summer. In retrospect, we can only guess how many "crater cleaners" lost their lives to radiation sickness shortly thereafter. Both the city government and Night Corp have claimed casualties were kept to a minimum, while providing no official statistics to substantiate the claim. That being said, they have never been under pressure to release such figures. After all, most rescue, engineering, and rubble cleanup teams were not local Night Citizens, but nomads. Surprised you didn't know? Don't be. It is a fact many history courses tend to overlook. The city employed hundreds of nomad mercenaries, primarily from clans in Aldecaldo nation. These nomads were hungry for gainful work and the city needed experts who were not only experienced but brave enough to knowingly put their lives on the line - all so Arasaka could one day erect another tower in its place. But history is not without its sense of irony. These nomads, who so deliberately live outside our so-called "system," came to its very rescue. Not for the first time. And not for the last.

a main theme we find in this game is the idea that the system of corps and exploitation cannot be stopped by grandiose rebellious gestures--no amount of samurai songs, assassinating mayors, or even planting nukes in towers will change things. yet johnny, his friends and mercs at atlantis in the 2020s, including rogue, chose to rebel any way they could, thinking it better than not. johnny criticizes her lack of rebellious spirit CONSTANTLY in 2077.

but ultimately, johnny, trapped in mikoshi, didn’t get to see the outcome of what detonating the AHQ nukes did to night city’s fragile ecosystem. rogue, however, did--and likely watched their former allies, the aldecaldos, be forced to take dangerous work at AHQ’s ground zero (from lack of other opportunities as detailed in this shard), then die from radiation sickness throughout the following decades, all as a result of what she and johnny did to try and fight the system. and she also watched all the former mercenaries of atlantis be hunted down by arasaka.

so rogue sees firsthand what the cost of rebellion is and johnny doesn’t. and nomads, considered the most free of any of the factions we encounter in the game, are the cost.

#lore post #johnny silverhand #cyberpunk 2077 #cyberpunk2077 #cp2077 #cyberpunk lore

[serotocin38]

Sparring Headcanon

So throughout the MXTX novels, there are scenes about the main couple fighting against some big bad together. And it’s always some epic teamwork that proves that they’re meant for each other, and it’s great.

But maybe it’s just me, but I want more scenes about them fighting each other, like sparring. I know there are a few instances of the main pairing fighting/sparring in pre-relationship times (very good for sexual tension, I approve), but it’s just not the same as post-relationship sparring. Hear me out:

I always have this nagging little thought at the back of my head about how post-relationship fighting/sparring would work with each couple:

BINGQIU

~SQQ would be the one to bring it up in some blunt manner (he’s been around Liu-shidi too much recently), maybe at breakfast one morning ~“Binghe, let’s fight.” *LBH stumbles and nearly pours a bowl of hot congee down his open robes* ~LBH has a hard time understanding why SQQ wants to spar with him. He’s very much afraid he will hurt his husband. ~SQQ was really only nostalgic while watching his disciples train and now that things have settled down, he hasn’t had much of a chance to really use Xiu Ya. ~He is also completely aware that there is no way he will win against LBH, but he doesn’t want LBH to hold back either. ~LBH definitely holds back. He gets hit by the fan several times when SQQ realizes. ~When LBH finally actually puts some effort into sparring (but still holding back a bit), he pins SQQ after a decent match (considering SQQ is sparring the protagonist) ~They’re lying on the ground, SQQ under LBH. Xiu Ya is embedded in the ground some feet away, and Zheng Yang is held near SQQ’s throat. And there is something hard poking at SQQ’s thigh. ~Almost every sparring match ends this way (even if SQQ takes care of that business first), and after a few days of being ravished in the middle of the day, SQQ doesn’t ask LBH to spar anymore. ~LBH asks hopefully a few times, but SQQ just tells him to go fight his Liu-shishu because he cannot have his students see his disheveled, post-sex face in the middle of the day again. ~Eventually they compromise and spar at night instead.

WANGXIAN

~It did not start as a spar. LWJ was correcting the juniors forms in the training yard one morning, and WWX had just woken up. He sat sleepily under a tree near the training fields, eating carrots meant for the rabbits.  ~After a bit, he got bored, so he decided to go play teaching assistant. He followed behind LWJ, giving additional tips. ~LWJ is fondly exasperated, and he tells WWX to stop teaching the juniors unconventional forms when they were supposed to be learning the Lan techniques. WWX argues that what he is teaching is Lan techniques. ~One of the juniors asked how WWX knows the Lan techniques. WWX boasts that he knows them very well, simply from observing LWJ. ~Not that LWJ doubts his husband’s abilities, but his Lan pride does not believe that someone can learn their family sword techniques simply by watching ~The juniors definitely add fuel to the flame by wanting see WWX put these techniques to use. WWX tries getting out of it with his usual excuses of how he can’t wield a sword as well without spiritual energy, etc. ~LWJ mentions that sword techniques don’t need spiritual energy to perform. He says that all the disciples are not allowed to use spiritual energy in their attacks until they are proficient in the techniques. ~WWX is eventually persuaded and digs Suibian out from some closet. He is definitely rusty with the sword, but after a bit of warm-up, the muscle memory kicks in. ~He performs the Lan clan sword forms almost perfectly. The juniors are amazed, and LWJ is pretty impressed as well. The juniors want to see if WWX can apply those techniques to a fight and they banded together to encourage a spar between LWJ and WWX ~Feeling confident with his ego boosted so much, WWX challenges LWJ to a fight, purely using the techniques, no spiritual energy. ~LWJ succumbs to the pressure (he can’t say no to WWX). ~They end up more or less evenly matched. LWJ strikes faster and is mostly on the offensive, but WWX is able to predict his moves in advance, so he’s able to block with incredible accuracy. ~They spend most of the morning sparring without one person having more of an advantage over the other. Eventually, it’s time for other lessons for the juniors. ~LWJ is a little bit embarrassed about getting so carried away, but he doesn’t say so. He just sends the juniors away. ~WWX is pretty gleeful, feeling like he won because he managed to hold off LWJ for so long. LWJ gives him the win, of course, because he’s both impressed and doesn’t care for winning or losing. ~WWX breathlessly says he’s happy to spar again anytime. From that day forward, Suibian sees the outside of its sheath more often. 

HUALIAN

~XL finds out one day that no one actually taught HC how to fight. He just kind of picked up a sword and swung it around and winged it this whole time. ~XL, a martial god with an obsession with martially talented youth, is both amazed and horrified. He takes it upon himself to teach HC. They spend a few hours every other day going over proper sword forms. ~HC likes these lessons much more than the calligraphy ones. But of course, he pretends not to know what he’s doing, “messing up” the most basic things so that XL would put his arms around him and wrap his hands around E-Ming to show him ~(E-Ming sometimes acts out a bit too just so that XL would hold him) ~(XL eventually finds out and puts E-Ming in time-out to watch while HC uses a non-sentient sword to practice. E-Ming behaves perfectly afterwards.) ~XL is not stupid either. He knows that HC is purposefully messing up (he does the same thing during calligraphy lessons, after all). So he eventually he tells HC to concentrate and to do it properly ~Of course HC listens. And when he actually puts in the effort to learn, he’s an incredibly quick study. Within an hour, he’s got everything down. ~XL tests him with a match, and he is very generous with his compliments during the match, and HC of course, has to reciprocate. ~”San Lang, your footwork is very good, just like I taught you!”  “It’s all due to Gege’s splendid teaching.”  “No, no, San Lang is just an incredibly talented student! You pick up on things very fast and your memory is very good too.” “Dianxia is too kind. I am only trying to match Gege’s martial skill to be somewhat of a worthy opponent.” ~It becomes more of a verbal battle than a physical one, swords clashing and literally being held there while they exchange words in close proximity ~It would be a ridiculous match to witness (not that HC would let anyone witness it and live to tell the tale) ~Eventually, HC’s smooth talking gets XL flustered and HC wins on accident ~XL jokingly accuses HC of distracting him to win, and HC immediately takes XL’s hand and presses it to his own chest, against his heart, which is beating much faster than it should even though they were “sparring” ~”You’re wrong, Gege. It was you who was distracting me.” ~It’s disgustingly cheesy and XL didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. He decides that he sucks as a teacher, or HC sucks as a student because there was no way they can get anywhere with any kinds of lessons when all they end up doing is flirting.

#bingqiu #wangxian #hualian #shen qingqiu #luo binghe #lan wangji #wei wuxian #hua cheng #xie lian #svsss #mdzs #tgcf #mxtx headcanons #writing stuff

[viviae]

The Red Plague: An Analysis

Ok, I’m to preface this that I am not at ALL a student of medicine or science I am just a humble blogger who really likes diseases, literary analysis, and the science behind death. This will also be a STUPIDLY long post so I am letting you all live by putting it behind a readmore this time

This goes without saying but there is a content warning to this. I’m talking about death, stages of decay, rotting, corpses, vomit, and other gross medical stuff. There will be NO images however. I subjected myself to viewing those images and I will not condemn you all to view them. 

I’m going to start this off making sure everyone is on the same page and post an image from the art book about the Red Plague itself

So let’s start with the canonical facts about the plague first

Average life expectancy was 3-7 days once symptoms show, Averages are also liars which means it could’ve taken a little bit more than 7 days or under 3 days to die. 

Spread by the plague beetles, exact method of transfer is unknown but Julian was force fed one and contracted the plague however they are safe to keep in containment.

Plague beetles also infected nonhuman objects like the water supply which is shown as a thick ichor. This ichor no longer possesses infectious properties at the time of the story

Julian believed that it had to do with a corruption in the blood hence the usage of leeches 

The Lazarus started as a containment center before becoming a crematorium, meaning people believed that it was spread from contact or things like that

HOWEVER This is not the first appearance of the plague as it would show up at locations Lucio stayed for too long but no note if it spread from these locations. 

It’s not a disease, its a curse.

So, this is one nasty plague on our hands. Most diseases that are this lethal would never be able to spread as much as it did unless it could spread from corpse contact or through other means like a carrier. I think that it could be spread through a combination of both which would add an additional need for cremation. 

Corpse Disposal & Spreading

Historically during plagues you would simply toss bodies into mass graves or ‘plague pits’. This would be, substantially, easier than what they do in Vesuvia. Cremation is not an easy process and is an art form. The heat needed for a cremation alone is incredibly hot and needs special methods to be contained. Not to mention the tedious cleaning process to make sure ashes don’t damage the heat element. So you are telling me that Vesuvia... went through the process of rowing away their dead to the middle of a lake to do mass cremations because it was the easiest? Yes they would’ve run out of grave space a while ago but no one is saying they can’t go make a plague pit out in the woods for half the work.

Now granted, I understand the imagery of making Asra wade through bodies of rotting corpses to find the apprentice’s bloated corpse is uh,,, graphic. Or making us stumble upon an open plague pit of bones in the woods with you LI is not what most people call romantic. (you’re welcome for that image) So they could’ve just made mass cremations on a separate island for tone reasons but that’s BORING.

Not a lot of diseases are actually capable of surviving in dead body simply because when we die our bodies lose the necessary high heats for them to multiply and survive. But this isn’t a disease in a traditional sense, its a curse to Lucio. And this is Lucio we are talking about, some one who is famously afraid of death and dying, which was grafted by a demon of pestilence who is obsessed with worms (cough maggot symbolism and death by disease cough). So I propose that the plague is spread in addition to plague beetles but by dead bodies themselves. This would put additional pressure on proper corpse disposal and the need for cremation. This fact would also explain why plague doctors were present at the boats leading to the Lazarus instead of simple plague carters (rowers?) as doctors would probably have to keep a closer eye on proper disposal of bodies.

As for how I think the beetles themselves spread the plague, I think it’s probably in a similar way as to how Lyme Disease is spread. I can’t name any disease that is spread by beetles themselves off the top of my head but ticks are pretty similar to beetles (I am not an entomologist). Lyme disease is spread by infected ticks biting into the hosts skin and regurgitating its stomach contents that includes the bacterium for the disease. 

This would explain why Julian got the plague pretty awful real quick. He consumed all of the plague beetle’s contents and Lucio didn’t have to try and force a beetle to bite Julian, which would’ve given Julian time to fight back. This is also working with the fact Lucio got bit by a plague beetle when running from Morga in his tale. He most likely contracted the plague, or perhaps he contracted the curse then and later on got re bit, in that bite. This would also explain the ichor that infects the water in the south end. Beetles are significantly larger than ticks, and so they might have a need to empty their stomach contents more and its more waste produced. 

Symptoms and Inspirations

The Red Plague is obviously, influenced by the Bubonic Plague in terms of symptoms and Tuberculous in treatment. I will list some of the common symptoms of Black Plague and signs and be comparing these to the Red Plague. I cannot stress enough that I do not have any knowledge in medicine but I don’t think the dev’s are all doctors so we are on even ground.

There are generally speaking three types of plagues; Bubonic (Most common type of The Black Plague and mainly targets your lymphatic system), Pneumonic (When the Plague enters and infects the lungs), and Septicemic (When the plague enters the blood stream, either form can lead to Septicemic)

Bolded Symptoms are what are obvious symptoms the Red Plague has taken from these three variations of plague. Italic is Lucio specific. 

High Fevers

Chills

Headache

Muscle Pain

Weakness

Seizures

Swollen black lymph nodes known as Buboes (Bubonic)

Internal Bleeding (Septicemic)

Gangrene (Septicemic)

Shock (Septicemic)

Vomiting Blood (Bubonic & Septicemic)

Coughing Blood & Mucus (Pneumonic)

Shortness of breath (Pneumonic) 

The Red Eyes

By far the most obvious symptom of the plague and its trademark. Consider this the equivalent of Buboes to the black plague. This is the first obvious symptom that marks you for dead and probably one of the first symptoms to show after a possible resting phase. 

Apparently it takes each eye individually as seen with Julian or it may not take both? The stage we see Julian in isn’t the clearest but I’m assuming he was rather early on with a pretty serious case. 

It’s also a debate of what exactly is going on with the red stringy bits under neath the eyes. For the sprite models it appears to be veins under the eyes that have been aggravated. While in the concept art above it has a more liquid and viscous look which is probably blood. And in Julian’s CG of him dying of the plague he has no marks around his eyes. So I’m saying its a fun combo of all of the above.

Essentially I think that the plague is causing the blood vessels in the eyes to pop and do serious damage. There can also be a foreign growth to occur behind the eyes or just magical nonsense, doing additional damage to the veins surrounding the eyes and cause bleeding from putting stress on the veins. 

The Arms and Lower Extremities

Ok, remember how I talked about Lucio’s fear of death and how its incredibly likely that the plague is manipulating his fear? In death there are various stages of decay, and different functions occur at each stage. And one of these functions is Livor Mortis. 

Livor Mortis is when your blood cells rupture out of your veins and die. These dead blood cells sink down to your body based off of gravity where they settle. This is seen as a purple color on the skin based on gravity, normally the back. This can be disrupted by any disruption to the body, but depending on time you are likely to receive lighter marks based on its previous position. 

What I think is going on all over the body is veins are rupturing and the body is going through an extreme form of living Livor Mortis. Just that it’s in red and not purple because this is the “Red Plague” and not the purple plague. And due to the patients still being alive when Livor Mortis is occurring it simply pools into the extremities instead of one specific location, with the fingers and bottom of the foot being the most severe. To add to the veins popping suddenly the subtle bruising through origin points to where the red vein-y look begins remind me of my own experience of having four veins burst in my arm. 

Julian had reason to believe he could use leeches to treat the plague and in typical plague doctor fashion of “They were right but not exactly” he was on the right track! Using leeches to drink the settled and dead blood would be beneficial to the patient. As likely leaving these areas to accumulate dead blood would put it at serious risk of rot, since maggots first grow on open wounds and areas affected by Livor Mortis. 

Julian might not have been curing the plague but what he was probably doing is preventing a lot of people from developing gangrene and needing amputations. A beneficial skill for a previous combat medic to utilize and what might have drawn additional attention to him. Julian’s uses of leeches could also explain why Lucio does not have any of these red marks since Julian is his personal doctor and Lucio would spare no expense for his treatment. 

Lucio’s Unique Symptoms 

Portia’s route mentions that due to Lucio’s longer surviving time he developed unique symptoms. We don’t know much details about this besides he was extra miserable and was confined to his bedroom most the time. From my provided list above I think that generally speaking the Red Plague is a combination of Bubonic + Septicemic plagues.

However, Pnuemonic plagues were considered especially deadly, but rarer. Lucio is described as having a cough when he has the plague and generally a wheezy voice. It wouldn’t be odd to think the plague had spread into his lungs due to the increase longevity he had. 

There is a dramatic irony in Lucio losing his lungs to sickness as well. Morga tells us about how when Lucio was very young he almost drowned and that instilled a fear of death in him at a young age. He’s also a man with a lot of stamina who can run in the freezing cold carrying a fully grown apprentice on his shoulder or run away from Morga who also possesses a lot of energy. Lucio has trained his lungs to be stronger more so than the average person, and now with his downfall he loses them. 

It goes along with his general want of having a new body as well. You can rebuild muscle mass although hard, but recovering from illnesses that target your lungs? You’ll almost never get back to the same degree you previously were. 

The imagery of the dead is also present in the animal itself used to spread the plague. Although the beetle comes from Lucio’s tribe, beetles play a role in decomposition. Beetles like to come after the body has been nearly completely rotten, after the maggots and wasps consume most of the dead flesh beetles come in and eat the scraps. Beetles are also used in skeletonizing items, one example I think of off my head is a man who had his amputated foot skeletonized by beetles for keeping.  So these beetles are coming in and spreading a plague that forces the body to go through stages of decay while living, for their own food. Just like Lucio’s tribe came in and slaughtered other tribes for their own need to eat.

The plague was handcrafted to torture Lucio for his inability to finish his end of the deal. That’s why it uses imagery of dead bodies, it steals Lucio’s lungs from him, and why even the dead can cause severe damage. 

Of course this is all my own theory and analysis of the plague but thank you for reading all of this. 

#julian the arcana #the arcana #julian devorak #lucio montag #lucio morgasson #count lucio #Eren.txt #the arcana mystic romance #the arcana red plague #the arcana theory #erens theory #the arcana anaylsis #the arcana angst #the arcana fanfiction #asra the arcana #asra the magician #asra alnazar #asra alzanar #those are the main three characters revolving around the plague #so #there #i said was going to do it #and i did #word count: 2100 #posting this at 2 am #it will flop #my writing #my analysis

[eldritchteaparty]

Chapters: 17/22 Fandom: The Magnus Archives (Podcast) Rating: Teen And Up Audiences Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply Relationships: Martin Blackwood/Jonathan "Jon" Sims | The Archivist Characters: Martin Blackwood, Jonathan "Jon" Sims | The Archivist, Tim Stoker (The Magnus Archives), Sasha James, Rosie Zampano, Oliver Banks, Original Elias Bouchard, Peter Lukas, Annabelle Cane, Melanie King, Georgie Barker, Alice "Daisy" Tonner, Basira Hussain Additional Tags: Post-Canon, Fix-It, Post-Canon Fix-It, Scars, Eventual Happy Ending, Fluff and Angst, I'll add characters and tags as they come up, Reference to injuries and blood, Character Death In Dream, Nudity (not sexual or graphic), Nightmares, Fighting

Summary: Following the events of MAG 200, Jon and Martin find themselves in a dimension very much like the one they came from--with second chances and more time.

Chapter summary:  Tim joins everyone at Elias’s house and pressure builds.

Chapter 17 of my post-canon fix-it is up! Read above at AO3 or read here below.

My tumblr master post with links to other chapters is here. 

***

The rest of the first full day ay Elias’s house passed in relative isolation; Martin had a feeling it wasn’t unintentional that Melanie, Georgie, and Sasha spent so long away from the house when they went to the store. Jon seemed intent on mulling over whatever thoughts their talk with Elias had put in his head that morning; Martin tried to break him out of with conversation a couple of times, but ultimately he felt like more of an annoyance than a help. He went back to their room and scrolled through social media until his brain couldn’t process posts anymore. When everyone came home from the store, he helped put the groceries away, but he couldn’t come up with much to say even when Sasha pulled him aside to ask him how he was. All right was the only thing he managed.

When it got late enough that he realized everyone was not likely to be eating dinner together, he made a sandwich for Jon and brought it to him in the great room. They were alone; he leaned over to set it on the table next to the armchair.

“Hey,” he said, lightly kissing the top of Jon’s head.

“Hm?” Jon looked up, and Martin redirected his attention to the sandwich. “Oh—thank you.”

“Take a bite, while I’m here.”

Jon did as Martin asked, still too distracted by his thoughts to make a fuss. “Did you eat already?”

“No,” Martin shook his head. “I’ll have something later. When I’m hungry.”

Jon gave him a look that Martin now understood well, but he simply squeezed Jon’s shoulder as he turned to leave.

“Wait, Martin—are you—” Jon grabbed his hand before it slid away. “I’m sorry. That I’ve been like this.”

“I get it,” Martin said, as reassuringly as he could. “I know this isn’t easy for you.”

“That isn’t the—” Jon sighed and let Martin’s hand drop, along with his thought. “What are you doing?”

Martin answered the question more generally than he knew Jon had intended it. “Waiting.”

“I think we all are,” Jon said. “But I was actually asking—”

“I know. And I don’t know what I’m doing. I was just going to head back to the bedroom, I guess.”

“All right. I’ll—I’ll be in before too long.”

Martin lay awake for a long time that night, even after Jon had fallen asleep.

***

When he woke in the morning, Jon was propped up on an elbow and looking at him.

“What’s going on?” Martin asked, slightly alarmed, trying to shake off the sleep.

“Nothing,” Jon said.

“Try again.”

“I just meant—nothing new.”

“Oh.” His eyes drifted closed, and he promised himself he wouldn’t let them stay that way very long. He felt Jon’s hand brush his cheek and travel gently up to his hairline; the feeling roused something in him.

“Wait,” he said. “Was I dreaming?” He had the vague impression he had been, although he couldn’t really remember it. He’d been looking for something, maybe. Trying to get somewhere, or find someone. Maybe someone had been lost. It was the kind of dream that made you feel like you hadn’t slept at all, and the more he tried to remember the more disquieted he felt.

“You were,” Jon said.

“But—wait, it wasn’t—”

“No,” Jon shook his head, pulling his hand back. “It was your dream.”

“Oh.”

“I’m sorry.”

“It’s fine.” They both knew it wasn’t fine, but there wasn’t anything to be done about it. Martin closed his eyes one more time, but his mind wandered as he felt Jon breathing next to him, and he opened them again sharply. He couldn’t believe he hadn’t thought about this before.

“Jon?”

“Hm?”

“Do you—you need the statements, right? You need to read them?”

“I—more or less.”

“So yes, then.”

Jon nodded reluctantly. “Yes.”

“And? How are you—doing that?”

“I brought a few with me when we left the archives.”

He sat up, prompting Jon to do the same. “I thought you were basically out of statements. I mean, they don’t really go back that far here.”

“There were—well, there were a few I’d just—skimmed before. I’m sure if I give them a proper read—”

“Jon.”

“I’m doing fine.”

“But what about when you’re not?”

Jon didn’t answer him.

“Jon.”

“Stop doing that.”

“Oh come on, you Martin me all the time.”

Silence fell between them again.

“Ok—what if—” Martin had to try several times to give voice to his thought. “If you need it—really need it—could you ask me to give you a—statement?”

To be fair, he hated the idea himself, and the pit he felt in his stomach was firmly reflected in Jon’s reply. “No.”

“Why not? You basically just asked Basira for one. I’ve given you one before. A few, depending on how you count. It—it wasn’t that bad.”

He ignored the part about Basira. “Absolutely not. That was—that was before. I don’t—I don’t even know that you can really give me a statement at this point.”

Jon was still a terrible liar.

“Look it’s—it’s not like I want to do it, ok? I really don’t. I just meant—what if you get really sick?”

“Then I get sick.”

“Jon—”

“It is not an option.”

“Look, I get that you don’t want—but we’re doing this together, and we need to weigh both—”

“No.” Jon slipped to the edge of the bed and was standing before Martin realized he was getting up.

“No what? We’re not doing this together?”

“Not that.” Jon pulled on the pants he’d worn yesterday, and grabbed a fresh shirt from the drawer he’d thrown them in.

“Oh,” Martin said, watching Jon head toward the bedroom door. “Good to know.”

Jon began to open the door, but then closed it. He did not turn to face Martin. “I realize that—” He stopped again.

“Go,” Martin said. He wished he was saying it for Jon—offering Jon time to gather his thoughts—but he knew he wasn’t. He knew was saying it out of hurt. Worse, Jon knew that was why he was saying it; he had to know. Either way, though, he supposed it achieved the same end.

After Jon left, he took a quick shower; Jon was not back when he was done, nor had he expected him to be. He got dressed and headed toward the kitchen. No one was in the hall or in the great room; Jon had probably gone for a walk, and it was just as well. He rummaged through a couple of cabinets and triumphantly emerged with a kettle. It wasn’t even electric, it was the kind that you set on the stove, and that was perfectly all right with Martin. It will boil water properly, he thought.

He had no intention of repeating the previous day; despite how big the house was, he had already started feeling claustrophobic. After his tea was ready, he left through the back door in the great room, walking across the relatively modest back porch to stepping down to the back lawn. Like the side lawn, it was expansive; unlike the side lawn, there were more than a few trees dotting the view. In fact, as Martin walked down and out on a dirt path cut into the lawn, he realized there was what amounted to a pretty legitimate wood behind the house. Not far in there was a small creek—so small that the little  bridge passing over it seemed ridiculous and unnecessary—but it was scenic, nonetheless. A wooden bench, upkept with enough frequency that it remained sturdy if not pristine, stood nearby.

I would have liked this, Martin thought, as he sat down on the bench. I would have written poems about this.

Spring was finally in effect. The trees weren’t green yet, but they were starting to sprout small leaves; a few had tiny buds with hints of pink and white protruding from their smaller twigs and branches. It wasn’t exactly warm outside, but it was comfortable as the light shown through the trees in a mottled pattern on the leaf-covered ground. He sipped his tea and watched how the sun hit the water in the little creek. In some parts it shone straight to the bottom, and he could see small rocks and pebbles and silt; in others, it seemed to dance as it reflected off the top of the water.

It helped, to sit and breathe. After a while, he started to notice birds chirping in the trees, and the sounds of small animals—probably squirrels—rustling in the leaves. It reminded him how when he and Jon had come here, the first sign that they were really somewhere, that there were things that mattered here, had been the sound of birds chirping.

He was glad they were here, he realized. He was glad they were here because they were alive—or more accurately, because Jon was alive, and Martin was with him. They were together. That was what Jon had given him when he’d told him how to end it, and despite himself and everything they had brought with them, he was still grateful for it. He couldn’t help it. He didn’t let himself think about it much further than that; he had a feeling there would be plenty of time for that when they all finally started talking. He could decide then what he’d be willing to do again, what he regretted. There would be plenty of time for regrets. It’s not like having a plan had really helped before. Jon had done what he had done; likewise, Martin had done what he had done.

At least now they knew what mattered to them.

He wasn’t sure if he dozed off or just got lost in his thoughts and the woods, but when he finally checked his phone he was taken back by how late it was. He’d come out mid-morning, and it was already mid-afternoon. He hadn’t meant to stay away for that long—what if Jon was—well, no, Jon could pretty much figure out where he was, and he supposed technically any of the rest of them could message him, but it just didn’t sit well with him that he’d stayed out there for so long.

When he got back in, he found Jon alone, on the sofa in front of the fireplace; like the day before, it seemed no one was particularly eager to tackle the big conversations yet. Martin was glad, for several reasons.

“Hey,” he said.

“Hey.”

“Mind if I join you?”

“If you’d like,” Jon answered, not looking at Martin.

Martin took him at his word and sat down next to him. The sofa was wider than he was used to, and he felt like he was just a little bit too far away; he moved closer to Jon, and awkwardly ended up straddling two cushions.

“I didn’t mean to push so hard this morning,” he said. “I’m not saying it’s settled, but—”

“Wait,” Jon said. “I’m sorry.”

“Don’t worry about it.”

“No, I mean wait. I’ve been thinking of the words to explain.”

“You don’t have to.”

“Martin—”

“Ok. I’m listening. Take your time. Just didn’t want to push again.”

“I—” Jon paused. “It’s difficult.”

Martin started to tell him it was ok, but changed his mind. Instead, he reached for Jon’s hand. Jon looked down as he did, watched their fingers intertwine, and seemed to find the words—some words, anyway.

“I—like—the statements. Or I don’t, actually, but—I do. Does that—do you understand?”

“Not totally,” Martin said honestly. “But I guess I really can’t. I’ve seen how they affect you, though. I know they help. I know you feel better after you read them. You—like feeling people’s fear. But I mean, I know you don’t, too.”

“Do you know how I felt after we spoke with Elias yesterday?”

“I—you seemed upset.”

“I was. What he was saying was terrible, and wrong. But also there was that part of me that felt—it felt—”

Martin hadn’t realized that. “Jon—you don’t have to say. Please. I—I get it.” It’s not your fault, he wanted to add, but he stopped himself.

Jon nodded and cleared his throat. “I never want to feel—I never want to feel that because of you. And if I don’t—if we don’t—I can still tell myself I wouldn’t. I can tell myself that it’s not so bad. That I’m not so bad. That I can still be—”

Jon’s next words caught, and Martin automatically wrapped his arms around him, the gesture made clumsy by the empty mug he was still holding. “It’s—it’s all right. You still—you heard him, you know—ok, this isn’t about that, really, but—I’m sorry. This isn’t helping. Let me—” Flustered, he somehow managed to set his mug down on the coffee table without entirely letting go; he turned his head to kiss Jon’s mouth, then kissed him again.

“I’m all right,” Jon said. He did not look all right to Martin.

“If I—if I got you some tea, would that—would you like it?”

“I—yes.”

Martin stood up, grabbed his mug to bring back to the kitchen, and then bent down to kiss Jon one more time. “Wait, did you—were you done? I don’t want to—”

“Martin, tea. Please.”

“Ok. All right.” The coffee machine that didn’t really boil water would have to do; in his heart, Martin knew Jon couldn’t really tell the difference anyway. It was the fastest cup of tea he’d made in a while. The supply of coffee cups that had been on the counter had dwindled, and Martin simply rinsed out the one he’d used rather than go searching for a clean one. It wasn’t like that had never happened at home.

As he walked back through the breakfast room, he heard a voice that wasn’t Jon’s, and based on volume alone he was pretty sure they weren’t happy. Just before he turned the corner, he realized who it was.

“—and here’s Martin with the tea,” Tim said. “Are you all on holiday? Having a nice time out in the country? Where is everyone?”

“Tim?” Sasha, who must have been in her room, had also heard Tim and spared Martin from having to answer him. “You didn’t tell me you were coming out today. I could have warned everyone.”

“What is going on? I thought you’d be at least halfway to figuring this out by now, and here everyone’s hiding. What are you all even doing?”

“Coping, Tim. Adjusting to the situation. Which is exactly what you’ve been doing, if you don’t mind me pointing it out. Welcome, by the way.”

Tim took a deep breath, looking as if he were going to resume at full rant volume, but then let it out again. “Ok, fine. That’s fair. But I’m here now. Get everyone. Come on.”

“Tim—”

“Look, is there a reason not to?”

Sasha sighed. “Fine. Hold on. I’ll go get Melanie and Georgie.”

Tim dropped the oversize bag he was carrying right where he was, and walked back in the direction of Elias’s room. “You two—stay.”

“Where would—” Martin was pretty sure Tim wasn’t listening, since he was already shouting Elias’s name in the hallway. He turned to Jon and pressed the mug into his hands. “Here. Sorry, I was hoping—”

“It’s all right. This is—this is good.”

Within a couple of minutes, everyone had converged on the great room. They stood, ignoring the awkward furniture. Georgie and Melanie stood back from the group a little way, Georgie’s arm over Melanie’s shoulder; Elias, in a t-shirt and a pair of gym shorts, seemed much more relaxed than the last time Martin had seen him.

“All right, Tim. We’re all here.” Sasha crossed her arms and implied she was waiting for Tim to speak.

“Well—don’t look at me. What are we doing about this?” He turned to Jon and Martin.

“Tim.” Sasha’s voice was stern, but Martin realized Georgie and Melanie had also turned to look at them.

“Oh, come on. Don’t act like the rest of you don’t feel the same way. At least I’m being honest about it.”

Sasha snorted. “I don’t feel that way, Tim. I think I can honestly say—”

“Sasha,” Melanie interrupted. “Tim has a point.”

Sasha closed her mouth as she turned to face Melanie; Martin instinctively took a half step closer to Jon.

“I’m just saying—they brought this here. We didn’t have anything to do with it. And if they aren’t fixing it—”

“What Melanie is saying,” Georgie said, with a quick look at Melanie before she turned back to Jon, “is that the two of you are the most familiar with—this. And if you don’t have any suggestions to stop them—it’s not likely that the rest of us are going to come up with something on our own.”

Melanie frowned. “That’s not exactly what I was—”

“Melanie, please.” Georgie squeezed her arm, and Melanie stopped, although she didn’t look happy about it. “Jon, is there—is there a point to this?”

Jon took a breath before he answered. “I’m—I’m not sure there is.”

“A point?” Tim broke into the conversation again. “You all want a point? Ok, here it is. I just went to go visit my brother. I had every intention of telling him about this, right after I figured out how, and—you know what? I didn’t. I didn’t figure out how. And I’m not going to. I’m never going to tell him about this. We’re going to fix it. You want a point? Danny’s the point. And—and Sasha’s the point.”

Sasha face softened slightly as Tim gestured toward her. “Tim—”

“Jon, Martin’s the point. Surely you understand that.”

Martin started to protest. “Tim, you’re missing the—”

“I’m not missing anything. You are. You’ve given up. Both of you have given up. And at some level, I can understand that. You got beaten, really badly, and I’m sure it hurts. But I can’t give up. I am not going to give up as long as I have Danny—as long as we have Sasha. I understand that you’ve been through this, and maybe you want to be done. But we’re here too, and we haven’t had a chance. And I hate it, but Georgie’s right, we can’t do this without you. For better or worse, Jon is the only one with any real power in this situation. You can’t just sit back. Give us our chance.”

Martin did everything but literally jump in front of Jon. “Hey. No one is sitting back and—”

“Martin,” Jon said quietly, touching his arm.

Unable to silence himself, Martin turned to Jon instead. “He has no idea—”

“They deserve to feel like they’ve had a chance.”

Martin had more to say, much more—but he wasn’t prepared to say it in front of everyone. Tim seemed momentarily surprised, but quickly recovered. “Thank you.”

“Where do we start then?” Georgie asked.

“I have a proposal,” Sasha said. “I don’t know about the rest of you, but I could use an actual meal. So—I’ll go start putting something together, and maybe we can have an early dinner after everyone takes a break.”

Georgie nodded. “What are you going to make?”

“I—” Sasha sighed. “I have no idea.”

“That’s what I thought,” Georgie said. “I’ll help. Melanie, want to come sit in the kitchen?”

Melanie looked pained. “I—I guess?”

As the three of them headed in that direction, Elias, who had really only watched everyone else talk, started back toward his room.

“Nope,” said Tim, grabbing his arm in both hands and redirecting him. “We are headed outside for some fresh air.”

Elias shrugged. “You know, I don’t really remember my mother, but I imagine you—”

“Funny, boss,” Tim said. “Move it.”

Martin thought this was extremely strange, until the two of them passed by him. Martin wrinkled his nose after they were gone.

“That smell—was that—”

“Yes,” said Jon.

“Everyone always has to tell me, I can never—never mind. Jon, what—what was that?”

“Um—weed? I though that’s what—”

“No. Back there. I know you don’t think we can stop the fears.”

“Oh. I don’t.”

“So then why—”

“What Tim was asking isn’t unreasonable. I wanted a chance—even if all I learned from it was that there never was one. Of course they want theirs.”

“And ok, I’m glad you’re considering them. I mean, I kind of asked you to. I just don’t like—I don’t want that pressure on you.”

“Hm.”

“What?”

“You mean you don’t want them pushing me, because you’re afraid of how that will end.”

“It’s—” Martin swallowed. “It’s both, all right?”

Jon was quiet for a moment, then moved toward the couch. “Sit with me?”

“Yeah,” Martin said. “Yeah.”

***

They moved the chairs and the couch out of the way and spread out on the floor. Martin had to admit it was a better use of the space. Now that some of the tension in the group had been so forcefully broken, there was again a sort of comfort in the conversation, in the company, at least at first. It didn’t feel so empty and dark.

“So… I was thinking about where to start,” Sasha said, after everyone was settled. “And maybe—we should start with the options you talked about before—in that other place—for what to do. Talk about them together, so there’s no misunderstandings.”

“Ok, but it’s important to keep in mind that—that was different,” Jon said.

“How?”

“There was—there was an apocalypse.”

“What about before the apocalypse?” Georgie asked. “Did you ever think about destroying the entities then? Getting rid of them or whatever?”

“No. Not really.”

“That’s weird, honestly,” Melanie said. “I would think that would be the first thing you’d consider. Why not?”

“A lot of reasons, I suppose.” Jon considered. “Mostly, they were just the way it was. We were much more worried about the people and the—things they acted through. And once we really understood, we were simply trying to avoid an apocalypse.”

“Think about a bad storm,” Martin added. “You don’t stop the weather. You just try to make sure there aren’t any trees that are going to fall on your house.”

Jon turned to look at him.

“What?”

“That—that’s a good metaphor, actually.”

“Why does that always surprise you?”

“I—”

“So,” Melanie said, “one option is to deal with it and just try to avoid the worst.”

“Yeah,” said Martin.

“No,” said Tim. “Danny, Sasha, Elias—all of that—that all happened before the apocalypse.”

“And you,” Jon added, but Tim did not acknowledge it.                                        

“But they didn’t know about the—entities,” Sasha pointed out. “We do. That could change things.”

“But some people knew about them. Jonah Magnus knew about them,” Tim said. “I don’t think knowing about them is points in favor of dealing with it.”

Georgie spoke up again. “Jon, you also said you tried to avoid the apocalypse—objectively the worst part, if we’re trying to avoid the worst—and well, obviously it happened. So what about that? Could it be avoided this time?”

“I don’t know.”

“What do you think, though?”

“My belief is—no. No, I don’t believe it can be avoided.”

“But it could take a long time,” Martin said. “And people might—might figure something out that we don’t know now.”

“So you do think it could be avoided?” Georgie asked Martin.

“I, um—” he glanced at Jon, whose face did not change. “Maybe.”

“All right,” Sasha said, redirecting the conversation. “So option one, live with it and try for the best.”

“No,” Tim shook his head.

At least Tim and Jon can agree on that, Martin thought.

“It’s an option,” said Sasha. “We’re just laying out options. So after the apocalypse—that’s when you thought about destroying the fears themselves.”

“Destroying them?” Jon said. “No, not really. I don’t think that was ever a possibility.”

“Then—what?”

“There were, in essence, two options. Open the door to the other dimensions, let them go—or don’t.”

“We’ll come back the first one. If you hadn’t let them out—then what?”

“Then Jon became god,” Tim interjected.

“That isn’t fair,” Martin responded. “What you have to understand is—”

“Wait, I have been wondering about that,” Melanie said. “How exactly would that have worked?”

Jon replied before Martin could continue. “Well—first, to be clear, there was another choice. We could have let things go on. Just let the apocalypse continue as it was. That—seemed bad.”

“Ok.”

“Otherwise, I—we—could kill Jonah.” Martin’s stomach twisted in a way he hadn’t anticipated, and he set down his fork. “The Eye would then choose me as a replacement.”

“Because Jonah was in charge before that?” Melanie asked.

“In charge? No.” Martin thought he could hear a slight scoff in Jon’s voice, although he could have been imagining it. “It was never his place.”

“But it would have been yours?”

“Yes. More so, anyway. I—I couldn’t stop it, but I could have—changed it. Redirected the suffering.”

“So you would have actually been in charge of—torturing people. Choosing which people to torture?” Georgie frowned. “Forever?”

“Not forever. It would have ended eventually. Death is one of the fears.”

“Well, that’s messed up.” Melanie wiped at her mouth with a napkin. “If you were going to do that, it almost seems like it would have been a kindness to end it faster.”

Martin almost choked.

“Food goes down the other tube, Martin,” Tim said, unaware Martin hadn’t been eating.

“Right. Sorry.”

“Ok,” Sasha said, “so another option you considered was—taking over from Jonah. Making the apocalypse—better, I guess.”

“Is that what you heard?” Tim asked.

“In any case, that’s not something we need to consider,” said Sasha. “There’s no apocalypse.”

Martin’s chest tightened.

“So the last option—also after the apocalypse—was to let them out.”

“Right,” Jon said quietly.

“And ultimately, that’s what you chose.”

“Yes.”

“No,” Martin said. “It’s what the rest of us chose.”

“In the end, I chose it too.”

Silence fell over the group; Martin realized they were waiting for one of them to say more. He willed the tightness in his chest to dissipate.

“So the thing about that is—we didn’t really know. At the time, we’d only just learned there were other dimensions. And we still had no idea—what was in them. Or if there were other entities just like ours already out there, and maybe what we did didn’t matter so much. All we knew for certain was that we could end the apocalypse in our world. This—sending them here—we really didn’t know.”

Next to him, Jon remained silent.

“I’ve been thinking,” said Tim slowly, “and—given the options—if we could send them somewhere else again—that really doesn’t seem like the worst thing.”

“We’re not making any decisions right now, Tim.” Sasha was firm. “We’re just laying out options.”

“And if the options we are laying out are do nothing, Jon becomes god, or we get rid of them—getting rid of them seems reasonable. Why should we be the ones to live with them?”

“For one thing, as Jon said, this is a different situation. For another, we are not done with the options. There—there must be others. We’re just starting with what they considered before.”

“Sasha, that—that’s hopeful,” Melanie said, choosing her words carefully. “But I’m kind of wondering if Tim isn’t right.”

“Melanie.” Georgie sounded slightly reproachful. “Think about that, though. It’s not like they just disappear into the air. They—they go somewhere else. That’s how they got here.”

“But maybe they’d go somewhere—I don’t know, somewhere where they couldn’t really do any harm.”

“No.” Martin felt them all shift their attention to Jon when he spoke, but he continued to stare down at his plate. “They wouldn’t go somewhere next time. They would go everywhere. An infestation of fear, affecting thousands of worlds. I won’t allow that.”

“Now, how do you know that?” Tim asked.

“I just do.”

“Through your creepy monster powers?”

“Yes.”

“Let me guess which option you want, Jon,” Melanie said.

Martin jerked his head up. “You really don’t get it, do you? I mean, of course you don’t, but—”

“Stop.” Sasha dropped her fork onto her plate with a deliberate clang. “All of you. We’re taking a break. Eat your food.”

Martin looked back down at his plate; his whole body was tense. He felt Jon touch his arm.

“Eat,” Jon said softly. “Come on.” He broke off a piece of a roll on his own plate, and chewed and swallowed in demonstration. Something about watching Jon do it helped, and he was able to relax enough to get down a few mouthfuls of the dinner that seemed to have turned to cardboard. He had been hungry when they had sat down.

Ten minutes passed in silence, except for the clinking of forks and glasses; eventually plates were emptied, and Sasha cleared her throat.

“Are we all—ready? Does anyone need a longer break?”

No one answered.

“All right. Then—I want to ask something. To Jon and Martin.”

Martin looked at Sasha and then at Jon.

“Go ahead,” Jon said.

“I think—I know a few of us have been—what actually happened? At the end?”

“Yeah,” said Tim. “I have been wondering about that.”

“Tim—”

“I’m being nice.”

“Good. Stay that way.”

Jon looked at Martin, asking permission with his eyes. Martin steeled himself and nodded.

“We—those of us who had survived—we talked. And it was decided that we would let them go. Martin would kill Jonah, severing the primary link between our world and the fears; Georgie, Melanie, and Basira would blow up the gas main underneath the panopticon, destroying the tower and what remained of the archives. That would release their power, and allow the fears to access the—the gateway to the other dimensions.”

“But it didn’t quite go like that,” Tim stated.

“Correct. I changed my mind.”

“Why?” Tim asked.

“Because I couldn’t live with it. It wasn’t right.” Martin was grateful he left out the part about his nightmares.

“So you snuck up by yourself, stabbed Jonah and—took over.”

“Yes.”

“But then you changed your mind again. Why?”

“I hadn’t accounted for everything. I didn’t realize that they could blow the gas main without my—help. There was—there was—” Jon stopped. “I don’t remember how they did it, honestly.”

Martin could never quite remember that part either. All he remembered was that he had told them to go ahead and do it. “It was my fault.”

“It wasn’t your fault.”

“Ok—just—what happened?”

“I told them to do it,” Martin said, “and then I went up after him. I didn’t think he’d—I thought I could stop him. I thought—I thought we could still leave. But we couldn’t. He couldn’t. He was part of it.”

“So they blew it up, and you lost control?”

“No. I could have kept them there. I could have. I was strong enough. If—” Jon looked at Martin and stopped. “I changed my mind. I let them go.”

Tim ignored the finality of Jon’s tone. “But why? How? And why was there so much blood? You said it was yours. Granted, you also said you didn’t kill anyone and you very much did—”

“He didn’t count,” Jon said disdainfully.

“Agreed, but that—that didn’t all come from Jonah. What happened?”

Jon sat back. “That is between me and Martin.”

“It’s ok,” Martin said. “You can—you can tell them. I just—I have to—I need another break.” He felt dizzy as he stood up; there wasn’t enough air.

“Martin?” Sasha started to get up too. “It’s all right, we don’t have to—”

“It’s fine. You should know why things are like this.”

He meant to go to their bedroom, he really did, but somehow he found himself in the hallway bathroom instead. Tears began to fall as soon as he closed the door; he sat on the toilet, the only real seat available.

“Jesus,” he said out loud to no one, as he wiped at his eyes with his sleeve, willing it to stop. For once he was glad that Jon knew how he felt; Jon would stay, and he would tell them.

You bastard. His own words. He understood now why Jon had done it, but it still hurt. Understanding didn’t undo the past and what he had felt then. The moment he had seen Elias’s body on the ground—the moments afterward as the realization had dawned on him—

You bastard. He still didn’t know how much of Jon had been left then, how much would be left again if it came down to it. Maybe less this time. Maybe none. How long could a person stand up to something like that?

You bastard. In his mind, he felt the pressure of a body giving way at the point of the knife, heard Jon gasp as it entered his chest. He was so tired of feeling it, so tired of hearing it, and it was always there—it was part of him now. He could ignore it sometimes, most of the time, even, but it was always there. It was always just below the surface, just waiting for a moment like this one. He would always know now what it felt like to take the life of a person, the person, who loved him. It was the only thing he had said he wouldn’t do, yet in the end it had been the only thing he could do.

It had just gone so wrong.

He breathed; he tried to breathe. Breathe in a square, he told himself. He didn’t know where he’d learned it—maybe the internet. Probably the internet. He breathed in, held it; breathed out; held it. In, hold; out, hold. Slowly, gradually, he was able to take full breaths. He almost had control again when there was a knock on the door.

“Hang—hang on,” he said. “Sorry, I should have—”

“Martin?” It was Melanie. “Can I—can I come in?”

“Um—”

“Please?”

“It’s unlocked.”

Melanie slipped in and closed the door behind her; she walked slowly to the edge of the tub and sat down. They looked at each other for a long moment.

“I’m so sorry,” she said.

“Don’t be.”

“I just—I didn’t know.”

“We didn’t tell.”

“But I should have known. I mean, not the details, but—of course it had to be terrible. I think maybe I didn’t want to think about it.”

“What do you mean? Think about what?”

“I think—I think it was easier to imagine that you were hiding things because—well, Georgie said Jon wasn’t like that, but—” She shook her head. “When it comes down to it, I just didn’t want to think about how bad it could be, how bad it could get. I wanted to think I’d already seen the worst. I can’t imagine if Georgie—god. I’m just so sorry.”

“Me too.” He went to take another deep breath, but this one hitched at the top.

“Wait—hang on. I’ll be right—just hang on.” Melanie slipped out again, but quickly reappeared, this time with a large ball of black and white fluff in her arms. “I know this might be a bit silly, but—I don’t know. He really helped me after I—I mean, it feels like nothing now, but at the time—”

“It wasn’t nothing. I mean, that’s kind of the thing. It’s all awful.” Martin watched as Melanie set the Admiral down on the bathroom floor. The cat was cautious for a moment; he sniffed at the edge of the tub where Melanie had resumed her seat, then at the cabinet under the sink. Then, with no warning at all, he plunged his face against Martin’s legs, running his whole body along them before turning around and doing it again.

Somehow, Martin smiled.

“See?”

“Yeah.” He reached out a hand, and the Admiral sniffed it before he began to rub his face against it furiously. “Is he—is he purring?”

“Yeah. He’s weird,” Melanie said. “It’s pretty great. I didn’t think I was a cat person before I moved in with Georgie, but—he’s changed my mind.”

“I can see that.” He dangled his fingers above the Admiral’s face, who swatted at them with a soft paw. “Is Jon—ok?”

“Oh, yeah. He’s fine. He had a moment, but—he was talking to Georgie when I came to look for you.”

“Good.” He pulled his hand back, and the Admiral quickly switched his attention to something in the corner of the room that Martin couldn’t see. “Listen—are they still—do you think I need to go back out?”

“Oh—no. Not if you don’t want to. I mean, they’re still talking, but I think everyone’s had enough of the serious issues for tonight. Even Tim.”

“I think—I think I might go to bed early. Do you mind excusing me to everyone?”

“Not at all,” Melanie said, gathering up the Admiral; he protested with a small squeak. “I think they’ll all understand.”

“Thanks, Melanie. Sorry for the trouble.”

“No trouble.” She opened the door, and they both stepped out into the hallway. “Goodnight, Martin.”

“Goodnight.”

He took one more deep breath, and headed back to their room. He was very, very tired.

#the magnus archives #tma #mag pod #tma spoilers #jonmartin #tma fanfic #my writing

[chayacat]

Devil’s Sweet Star (35)

Fandom: Dead by Daylight

Ghostface x Female Reader  

Rated M for Violence, Language and Smut  

***

5 days. The Roseville festival takes place in 5 days. Time flies too quickly. Far too fast. And the pressure on your shoulders is only growing. What if it doesn't work? What if the cake was ever missed at the last moment? Or that it falls on the way? Or that people don't like it? That would be a deep shame, and a deep disillusionment. But we must not be discouraged. We must remain positive and if it fails, so be it. It takes a first time to everything. And then we always learn from our failures, right? Failing is not a fatality, we must not give up at the first failure we suffer. Otherwise, we never move forward. On the contrary, every failure we suffer, every mistake we make, must push us to be better if the opportunity arises again.

For now, you have something else to do. Since the nebula’s attack, you had to have the damage repaired. Fortunately, by chance, your insurance covered the costs. But it will not be able to do so ad vita eternam. We will therefore have to increase security. Inspector Wilhelm offered you to post a policeman to monitor the establishment from the opening to the closing of the café. He will not be inside but on the sidewalk opposite, under observation. That way if there is ever a problem, he can intervene quickly.  

As for the apartment, it has progressed well. Mr Lawson has dealt with the problems of leaks; he now has to deal with the floor. On your side with Jed, you have repainted all the pieces according to your tastes. Even if there have been debates about certain rooms such as the chamber. But in the end, you always found an agreement. And mixing your two colours gives... impressive and original results in itself. Once the floor will be done. You can finally live together. You look forward to it.  

Today you were closed. But you're still working on the festival cake. Corey having returned to work after his few days off, Amy too, you had decided to close exceptionally to work on the cake as the festival approached. Even so, your young employee was still feeling some pain.

“Are you sure it'll be okay, Corey? You know if you're in too much pain, you can go home it doesn't matter, Amy and I can manage together.” you said worried to see Corey's slightly grimacing face.

“Don't worry about me! It's okay! the doctor told me that the pain would persist for a few days. I just have to take my painkillers when I'm really in too much pain. But for now, it's okay.” responds Corey with a smile.  

“Don't make the hero either. If it ever gets worse you may have more than pain. So don't force too much.” replied Amy.

“Oh, come on Amy! I'm not a kid now! I'm not in sugar either! If it really doesn't go well, I'll go home, it's promised.”

“Yeah yeah...if you say so. I’ll keep an eye on you anyway.”  

You smile as you look at them. They are so adorable, even when they argue. it shows how much they care about each other. Kind of like you and Jed in a sense. Surprisingly... you haven't heard from Ghostface. since... since you made your deal. He must be busy preparing everything. But he still finds a way to talk to you. By piece of paper that he deposits either at your apartment or at your café when it is closed. Sometimes the "letters" are accompanied by small gifts. Either a flower, once with a necklace, earrings ... You were wondering how he was able to buy them. If he bought them of course.

You're not really looking forward to honoring your part of the market. Because who knows how it might turn out? But you were able to turn this out to your advantage as well. He will tell you everything. He will show you his true face, tell you his name. And finally, you can put a face on the man who since your arrival, knows you much more than you know him. Finally, you can claim to be on an equal footing. Even if it's not really the case.

But deep down... do you really want it? Do you really want to destroy all the mystery around him? After all... it brought him a certain charm... even if he is a murderer, the mystery that surrounds him about his identity makes him more attractive, more... Take that out of your mind, pickle brains! You have a boyfriend! And given the night you spent the other night... Ghostface is just the appetizer. Under his shy mood, Jed is much wilder than you dared to imagine.

“Ok! let's see what this cake gives! if it is good then we can do it bigger for the festival!” you said with a smile.  

“Yeah but... It's a cake for 12 people. and we are only 3. We will not be able to eat everything... and it would have been a shame to waste it.” responds Amy with a worried face.  

“What are we going to do with the remaining shares?” ask Corey.

“Hum... I think I have a little idea. I know who would be delighted to have them.” You replied before you take out your phone to call Jed.

“Hello? Honey? Is there a problem?” asks Jed on the other line.

“Oh Jed... If you knew how much! It is a tragedy! I have here a test cake for the festival but unfortunately it is 12 parts! and there are only 3 of us! Unfortunately, I'm going to have to throw it away...” you answer in a dramatic theatrical way.  

“... Are you trying to make me fat? I know I can eat at will without gaining weight but still... if you did it... I can't say no. I came with Mattew and Melina. And we'll take a share of it for the boss. Keep it for us tonight.”  

“Thank you, my love! See you soon! I love you!” you replied with a smile, while Amy and Corey were laughing.  

“See you soon Honey. I love you too.” he responds before hanging up.  

You put away your phone with a satisfied smile. Definitely, talking about cake is a good way to get Jed to come. Despite his body certainly skinny but finely trimmed, Jed seems to be a big gourmand. And to say that he can eat as much as he wants, he will not take a gram... while you, you have to be careful. You are not fat on the contrary! You are as well-proportioned as your size! Amy and Corey were laughing, looking at you at the same time.  

“What?” you ask, raising an eyebrow.  

“You're both too cute! it's adorable a couple like yours!” responds Amy.  

“I could say the same about both of you. You are both equally adorable, I did well to take you both.”

Your two employees looked at each other, before looking away by blushing, which made you laugh. Jed arrived around noon with Melina and Mattew to taste the cake. These two do not lose an opportunity to eat. You prepare a share for the boss of the newspaper. And serve a share for everyone, and then one for yourself. You each taste your turn a slice of the cake, and all the faces lit up with a beautiful smile.

“It's too good! I love this mix! Mango, Pineapple and Passion Fruit, it's too good!” said Mattew.  

“I'm not a particular fan of the passion fruit... but I admit that the mixture is well find! I like it very much!” continue Melina.  

“Me too! (Y/N) we must absolutely make this cake for the festival! I'm sure the whole city will enjoy it!” said Amy cheerfully.  

“Yes, why not... what do you think? Do you think it could work? You ask, looking at Jed.  

“It is very good... But at the level of presentation and decoration ... you should make it more colorful. to do it only in white, it's too much marriage cake. I'd be you I'll add a mango coulis, or a chocolate coulis, something that makes the cake more colorful. And given that it is in honor of the city... you could make mini monuments out of sugar dough? With the town hall at the very top. After that is only my opinion.” responds Jed, putting his glasses back on his nose.

“You’re right. Thanks Honey!  You’re the best!”

“By the way, what about the guy who broke the windows of the café? Any news?” asks Corey.

“Wilhelm cooked him for hours, the guy refused to say who he worked for. But hey anyway he's going to be judged and he's going to pay for the damage he's caused, as well as for assault and battery on you. He will take a few months in prison as a bonus.” said Melina.  

You all chat for a few more minutes before everyone leaves, Jed taking the slice of cake for his boss. In addition, he informed you to keep the remaining shares for both of you for later, but also that he will return very late tonight. The work... always work. During the day, Mr. Lawson phoned you to warn you that the new floor was installed and that the apartment was officially habitable. Tomorrow you can start living there and moving your belongings. Jed too. Fortunately, you had started to make boxes. On the other hand, you will have to ask your neighbours to help you for furniture a little too heavy.

As Jed advised you, you had made a chocolate coulis and a mango coulis for the cake, as well as the sugar dough decorations. And indeed, the result is magnificent, it makes it much more colorful and much better taste level. It's time to go home. for once, for a long time, you will be alone tonight... normally. Tonight, it will be a small rice salad, with tuna, corn and thin slices of tomatoes. Simple but effective, fresh and light too.

You watch tv a little while eating, just to have news from all over the world. And the news is not famous. It's sad. Once the meal is finished, and the dishes are done, you change to get ready to go to bed. Suddenly you feel a fresh wind stroking your arm, taking a shiver from you. When you head to the source of this slight cool wind, which came from your room, you find that the window was open.

“Miss me Sugar ?” said a man voice.  

“Long time no see... I thought you had finally found a new victim to harass. Whatever you still find the time to send me messages.” you respond, facing Ghostface which was leaning against the wall of the room, chuckling.  

“Don't forget my little gifts. You see I spent some... complicated nights. stalking, conspiring, killing... avenge. it's not easy the life of a murderer you know. My life during the day is no better either. So, I take a little break. And what better way to relax than to see my beautiful and sweet star.”

He approached you, gently taking you by the waist, suddenly bringing you closer against him. You hear him humming your neck, like an animal smelling its prey. You hear a noise near his face, a sign that he lifted his mask slightly. Suddenly you feel his tongue licking your neck which made you react. You try to get away from him, but his strength was far greater than yours.  

“You don't respect our market. It had been said one evening once that Hoggins would have died. Not before.” you said frowning.  

“And I intend to respect it! but... I need to relax... and I must give you a... a taste of what awaits you. It will be nothing compared to what I would do during our little... private evening.” He responds chuckling.  

“Don’t you dare...”

You don't have time to finish your sentence as he took your assault lips. If at first you did not let yourself be done, astonishingly you must be more docile after a few minutes, letting his tongue enter your mouth to play with yours. He pushed you gently on the bed, putting himself above you, without letting go of you. You feel his hand gently go down along your body, stroking your thigh. You can't help but take out a little moan between two kisses. He backed up his face, sneering, with a sneaky smile on his lips.

“Finally, you like it huh... you hide your game well. I like that. I love when a woman reveals herself to my eyes. You are like packed treats, which you have to unpack, again and again until you can finally enjoy it. And I intend to savor every piece of your fragile little body down to the smallest detail.” he said before resuming his assaults.

He unbuttoned his pants to throw them to the side before doing the same with your clothes. He left your lips to attack your chest. His hand went to caress your intimacy making you moan and lightly arch your back. You didn't want, you only want to, kick him in the head, push him back violently and call the police. Or Jed. But in your heart, you enjoyed all this. You don't want it to stop. You want it to last all night. You still feel guilty for Jed. If he learns that... who knows how he will react? If he gets angry... you are afraid of the consequences.

“Don't worry for your little boyfriend... He will never know about this . That will be our little secret, just you and me.”

He smiled at you before slowly bringing his face closer to your ear.

“Enjoy my sweet little star. I promise you that I will fill you until dawn.

Strangely you believe him. And strangely... you love it.

***

(Phew this week has been busy! between my driving hours and the few appointments, I didn't really have time to rest! As for the next fanfiction I would write, maybe I'll do it on Re8 Village with our dear Heisenberg ~ I might also do an intro instead of starting directly with Chapter 1! I'll see when I start writing! I hope you’ll like this chapter like the others ones! Well, it's time for my brain to rest! Have a great weekend to you all!  See ya!)

#dbd fanfic #dbd #dead by daylight #ghostface #danny johnson #jed olsen

[cosplayingwitch]

A Study in Dirt and Stars

September 30 Day Writing Challenge

Prompt: cloud/star gazing

Part one of the five part as-yet-unnamed series. (If you think of a name, let me know in the comments!) Each part will take place a good amount of time apart from each other.

Summary Star Wars AU with fem!reader and Poe Dameron as best friends/roommates (more?) and grad students- reader in archaeology, Poe in history/library science. In this part, the two get stuck when Poe’s old truck breaks down and they have to wait for a tow truck.

Triggers none, unless you have an issue with waiting for tow trucks or dirt/dust. Oh, they do swear too.

Tags: @make-me-imagine

Other tags: light angst, two idiots in love, mutual pining, would this count as angst?

The sound of shovels clanging together startled you out of your focus. You’d been reading up on bioarchaological research methods- something so boring most would fall asleep even thinking about it. You, however, find the whole thing fascinating, enough to dedicate your life to it. That sound was the announcement by your students that the day was done. Normally you’d have let them know this, but in that focus you’d lost track of time.

You shout “Nice work today everyone! Same time tomorrow!” even though you didn’t even notice their actual work. Hey, as long as they didn’t fuck anything up enough that it can’t be fixed, no one would ever know. 

The university held a field school for archaeology students every year, mostly upper level bachelors students and the occasional early masters students. Given your status as almost graduating from the masters program, you were easily chosen by your favorite professor to GA the class. Which meant, per your professor, you’d be the one in charge for day-to-day goings on. But if you succeeded at this, it’d be a great addition to your work experiences. Very helpful for getting a job in this field.

Which leads you to look around, seeing that your slightly early dismissal was taken advantage of by the students- they left the equipment strewn about the site without regard for how long it would take you to clean up after them. They’d be in for definite trouble in the morning, you’d make sure of it.

You heard the sound of truck tires coming down the dirt lane that was the only access point for your site. You look up to see your friend coming to pick you up. With your car in the shop- all that dust was not good for the engine- he was your only choice if you were to get to and from work.

“Hey there, Indiana. Discover the ark of the covenant yet?” shouted Poe from the driver's seat. 

“Not yet. Did you manage to run out of books in the library yet?” you shout back.

It was always like this between you two. You’d been friends since your freshman year when you took intro to anthropology together. For him, it was a gen-ed class; for you, it was the start of your career path. He was a history major, now working on his masters, like you. He had managed to get a job in the university’s library, though he would probably describe it like he had gotten a job at the Smithsonian. But joking between the two of you was more natural than having normal conversations. One year, he decided to get you a hat for your birthday, one that was suspiciously like that worn by the movie archaeologist. From then on, he called you Indiana instead of your name as an inside joke between the two of you.

You wouldn’t ever tell him- but you kind of liked it.

“Can’t leave quite yet, Mr Librarian. The students left this place a mess, and if Professor Solo decides to pop by the site in the morning with it looking like this I’d lose all hope of ever getting a job.”

“So? I can help! As long as these aren’t some kind of state-of-the-art technology shovels.” he teased. You could tell, he just wanted to get home. And even with the both of you working together, this could take a while.

About two hours later, once everything was packed up for the night, Poe went to start the truck so you could get home to your shared apartment (who better to be roommates with than your best friend?). And it wouldn’t start. He tried again, and again. Nothing. I guess even momentary exposure to this dust could mess with an engine, you thought. Or maybe his twenty year old truck had just finally kicked the bucket. You’d teased him about that truck for a while now, always joking about it someday just giving up and leaving him stranded somewhere. 

Of course, you’d always imagine yourself as coming to his rescue, not being stranded with him. 

“I guess you were right about it up and dying someday.” admitted Poe. “So are we walking or what?”

“It is getting dark, but it will take forever to walk back to the university. We could call a tow truck? Sit around waiting until it gets here?” you suggest. “It gets so beautiful out here. Without as much light pollution, the stars really shine bright.”

Poe was never one to turn down an activity that involved astronomy. That was his ‘secret’ hobby. He told you once that his dream when he was a child was to travel among the stars, but with that not accessible to him, the best he could do was study those who made the advancements in astronomy. 

The tow truck would take at least an hour, the lady from the dispatch center told you. It was the bad luck of location and calling on a busy night. You didn’t mind, it was more time to spend with your best friend.

“It’d probably be more comfortable to lay in the back than in the dirt.” suggested Poe. You knew that wasn’t the only reason he suggested it. He also hated getting dirty, so the idea of laying directly in recently disturbed dirt had to be unthinkable to him. (This was another thing you teased him about often.) However, this time he did have a slight point. If anything, it would probably stretch your back out more than the ground could.

With both of you perched on the end of the truck bed, you watched the stars together. Poe pointed out the various constellations. Even though you knew most of them already, you let him continue because you knew how happy it made him. Not much of a sacrifice to keep your best friend/roommate, you thought. You zoned out while he started rattling off facts about famous astronomers. He’d be the one to know all this- astronomy+history would always mean Poe would know about it.

You thought about how nice this was. The two of you laying back, talking, nowhere to be until the morning. You could get used to this.

Every so often, you’d chime in with a fact about the mythology behind the names of the constellation. Poe assumed you knew these from your anthropology classes during your undergrad. Truth was, you’d learned them for him. That way you had something to add to the conversation when he was discussing astronomy, which was frequently.

It was inevitable that the tow truck did eventually show up, and your night of stargazing would end. It never seemed like two hours had gone by with just you and Poe laying there together. And just like that, your evening together was over.

When you eventually get back to your apartment, it’s past midnight and all you want to do is take a shower to get all the dust, dirt, and sweat off of you from that hell of a day you had yesterday. “Maybe I’ll call Professor Solo in the morning, see if he can take over for the day.” You think. After all, shouldn’t he be teaching his own class?

And maybe, if by some miracle your car was ready to be picked up before noon, you could return the favor by driving your boyfriend best friend to work.

You stop yourself in your tracks. God. Did I just think what I thought I did? 

Yeah. After a day like that, your brain had to be at least a little scrambled, right?

At least you didn’t say it out loud. Poe would never stop teasing you about that.

When the two of you got home after midnight, Poe was beyond exhausted. Luckily, he wasn’t scheduled to work until after noon tomorrow. Or, with it being after midnight, would that be today?

Whatever. I just need sleep, Poe thought.

But he couldn’t sleep that night. (Morning? Every time Poe thought about that it made his head hurt.) He was too wrapped up in thinking about the night you just spent stargazing together. Just laying there, talking, sharing space facts and constellation myths.

He just couldn’t get past the relationship the two of you had. No pressure, no one constantly asking when they’d get together already. Just two grad students, hanging out and having a good time together.

Maybe, Poe thought, he could even be glad his car broke down while picking up his girlfriend best friend from work.

Wait, Poe though. Not my girlfriend, my best friend. I’m not ruining our friendship because I had one thought about her that way. Besides, he continued, who knows if she’d even like me that way.

Poe did fall asleep a little while after that, but not before sending in a request to his boss for a sick day. There was no way he’d get enough sleep to go to work tomorrow.

Author Note- I appreciate any comments/likes/reblogs if you would! Also, this is my first fan fiction published on Tumblr, so please be nice (and leave constructive criticism if you have any). I’ll probably also post this to Archive of Our Own at some point, but for now it’s only on Tumblr.

I have to say, I do enjoy writing for my two idiots here. Next chapter/part will be published on 9/10, so come back for that if you like this. And if you really like this, message me to be tagged in the next part.

#meras30daywritingchallenge #star wars au #star wars fan fiction #Poe Dameron #fan fiction writing #writing challenge #still new to this #these two are idiots #angst? #i dont know

[calumrose]

A Second Goodnight || L.H

A//N: I finished this I can’t even remember how long ago but I just never got around to posting it. I’ve been getting quite stuck with writing recently and I’ve definitely fallen out of the habit of it, but I’m trying to get back into it before life starts to get hectic. Anyway, I hope you enjoy this little addition to my dad!sos universe with Luke, Elle and Kenzie! Let me know what you think, feedback and thoughts are always welcome and very much appreciated!!!

Word Count: 4.8k

“Baby girl, what do you think you’re doing up?” 

Elle’s head shot around to face her bedroom door, her eyes welcoming the sight of Luke standing there, blond curls framing his face due to his latest haircut, elbow resting against the doorframe as he watched the sight before him. She couldn’t hide the guilty expression that crept onto her face when their eyes met momentarily, her lips pouting ever so slightly as she looked down at her feet as they stretched out in front of her from where she was sitting on the floor. 

It was getting late — too late for Elle to be sitting on her bedroom floor, dolls spread out in front of her. She should have been in bed, happily snoozing away where Luke had placed her not even a few hours ago. But instead, she was distracted by holding her dolls upright, mumbling to herself as she made them interact and talk to one another in her own made-up language. 

Luke couldn’t stop the slightly amused chuckle that vibrated in his chest, pushing himself off the doorway and walking into his three-year-old’s bedroom. Elle naturally reached her hands up into the air, wiggling her fingers in Luke’s direction as she silently asked to be lifted and held. 

“Up we come,” Luke took easy hold of Elle, hauling her up into the air, causing her to release an excitable squeal before she was brought against his chest, her small arms wrapping around his neck while her legs wrapped as far around his torso as they could. She always naturally clung to Luke when he held her, her small impressionable fingertips gently moving back and forth against the skin at the back of his neck, feeling the small baby hairs that curled there, the soft strands smooth against her skin. 

She felt so relaxed against him, the way her grip was tight yet so loose as she held onto the fabric of his shirt, the way her heels dug into his ribs just enough to assure herself that she wouldn’t slip down him like he was a slide. Luke felt just as relaxed, feeling her chest rise and fall against his as she cuddled into him, her cheek pressing against his jaw as she looked over his shoulder. 

“You know you’re supposed to be in bed, honey,” Luke spoke softly, trying to keep his voice and smooth as a hope that it would help in the attempt to get her to go back to bed. He had already sung to her once tonight and quite frankly he wasn’t sure he could handle singing her song for her for a second or third time that night no matter how much she loved it. 

Who was he kidding? If she wanted it — he’d sing it. 

“But Millie wanted to play with Hannah, and she kept asking,” Elle began to quietly ramble about her dolls, head never lifting from Luke’s shoulder, “And— and she then asked if I would let her— “ 

She cut herself off with a yawn, turning so her face became hidden by her arm, scrunching up her face as she opened her mouth and released the tired breath. 

Luke felt her head drop a little, the weight falling against his shoulder as the pressure on his ribs from her legs slowly began to loosen. He could sense that sleep was slowly creeping up on her, her previous idea of staying up to play now coming back on her. “I think someone’s getting a bit tired, hm?” 

“But… But Millie and Hannah…”

Luke tried to hold back the amusement that threatened to break out in the form of a laugh at her little protest, resting a large hand on her back as he rubbed gentle circles against the fabric of her pyjamas, responding, “Millie and Hannah will still want to play tomorrow, but right now, baby, you need to go to bed because it’s way past your bedtime.” 

“But— “ 

“No buts, Elle, come on, let’s get you into bed.” Luke watched his footing as he maneuvered around the scattering of dolls that Elle had littered the floor with, making sure he didn’t stand on any or damage any of her other toys as he made his way back to her small bed in the corner of her room. 

Luke kept a steady hold of the sleepy toddler, pressing a kiss to the side of her head as he moved to stand above her bed, gently moving one of his arms so he could move her legs so he could place her down. He kept a hand on the back of her head — a natural instinct since he became a father, it only became even more primal when Kenzie made her appearance a few months prior, his hands acting of their own accord to make sure their heads were supported and protected at all times. 

Her curls fanned out against her patterned pillow case, her sleepy blue eyes slowly blinking up at him as he held himself up above her, a loving smile spread across his face as he stared down at the little girl who had his heart in the palm of her hand. 

“Now you stay in bed this time, okay?” Luke raised an eyebrow at her, a playful questioning glint in his eyes as he reached a hand down and pulled up her blanket, tucking her in for the second time that night. 

“But what if I can’t sleep?” Her question was accompanied by a pout, her brows slightly furrowed on her face as her little hands found a loose thread in her blanket, fingers beginning to fiddle with it as she watched herself twirl it around her left index finger. “Will you stay with me until I fall asleep? Please dad?” 

“You want me to stay here until you fall asleep?” Luke basically repeated her question, voice soft and gentle in the ambient lighting of her bedroom. She still had her nightlight on in the corner, the warm glow just enough for them to make out each other in the night. “Okay, I suppose so, but you need to promise me that you’re gonna try and sleep, alright? Can you do that for me?” 

Elle didn’t give a verbal response but instead just gave a simple nod, her eyelashes fluttering against her cheeks as her eyelids grew heavier with every blink. 

Luke adjusted himself so he knelt on the floor by the bed, resting a forearm against the sheets as he reached his other hand forward, using his fingers to brush a few stray curls out of Elle’s tired face. He found his hand going back to the same spot he removed the curls from once they were gone, allowing for his fingertips to gently glide against her soft temple, brushing back into her hair with a soft touch. He noted how Elle moved into it, her head turning up ever so slightly as if to somehow get closer to his hand, the soft graze of skin against her face soothing her. 

As much as Luke wasn’t exactly impressed to come into Elle’s room to find her awake, he wasn’t mad about the outcome of where he found himself to be right then — knelt down by his daughter’s bedside, soothing her to sleep. It was something he never tired of doing, enjoying the whole malarkey of taking her to bed and the attempts of getting her to settle down enough to fall asleep. He secretly loved it when she was a baby and he loved it even more now, especially when she asked if he would stay with her. 

There was never any reason why she wanted him to stay, not that Luke needed any to be convinced in the first place. It was always at the simplest of requests, Luke would find himself in her bedroom, sitting with her as she played, sitting with her as she tried to sleep, even gently singing to her as she drifted off like he had done since the day she was born. 

It was an instinct for him to sing to her, for him to gently start humming and mumbling the familiar words to the song that she had come to love and claim as her own since the beginning. He didn’t even realise he did it half of the time, too transfixed on the sight in front of him whenever he would unintentionally start the familiar tune in his head. 

And this time was no different. 

Luke hadn’t realised he had started humming, ocean coloured eyes focused on the gentle breaths that left Elle’s lips as she drifted off to sleep, the soft sound of his silent words providing her with a familiar nightly comfort that she hadn’t even had to ask for anymore and could still be assured that she would receive it. 

“And please don’t take my sunshine away…” Luke heard the tired mumble come from the three-year-old, his heart soaring at the sound of Elle’s sleepy voice as she sung the final words to the song she knew oh so well. 

She turned comfortably in her sleepy haze, moving closer to the edge of her bed, blanket still tucked securely around her. She moved her head up a little, tilting her chin towards Luke’s direction so her head tilted back, moving more into Luke’s hand that had moved to stroke her hair, the soft locks against his palm provided him with as much comfort as it did her. 

“Goodnight, baby,” Luke presses a soft kiss to her forehead, allowing for his lips to linger momentarily as he took a second to cherish that moment which he got to share with her. It was one to add to the collection, one he wished he could take a photograph of and add to the collection of memories that littered the hallway. 

And just like that Elle was out like a light, the blanket that lay over her rose and fell with every heavy sleep-induced breath she inhaled and exhaled.

Luke knew he had to move otherwise he would have stayed there the entire night, knowing fine well that he would comfortably have stayed knelt on the floor of Elle’s bedroom, eyes fixed on her as he watched her dream through the night. 

But Luke had to move. The crying baby down the hall wouldn’t soothe herself quite yet and Luke had told you to let him handle Kenzie during the night. He was only supposed to check in on the girls before joining you back downstairs, but it seemed like he was getting side-tracked.

His girls needed him. And that’s all that mattered. 

***

When one door closed another opened in its place, Luke leaving one bedroom only to enter another. The only difference in leaving the previous bedroom to entering the new one was the silence that was no longer there, the soft cry of the unsettled baby coming from the crib at the bottom of the bed tearing through the quietness of the late night.

Luke felt his heart ache at the sound, his face scrunching ever so slightly in grimace at the unpleasant sound, the shriek being painful for him to hear. Closing the door behind him, Luke made his way over to the wooden crib, the wooden floors cold beneath his bare feet as he took the few steps required for him to peer over the edge of the crib. The sight of the unhappy baby beneath him warmed his heart yet also made it twinge unpleasantly, the soft face of Kenzie always being a vision that made him smile except from when her face was bunched up, mouth drawn open to release an unhappy wail while her arms and legs kicked out in protest.

“Hey hey hey���” Luke kept his voice soft and quiet, not wanting to give the small girl a fright. One palm curled around the edge of the crib while the other reached down, knuckles grazing against her pyjama covered back in a soothing up and down motion, as Luke began his fatherly duties of attempting to comfort his youngest daughter. “What’s got you all upset, hm?”

Kenzie continued to wriggle in her crib, an uncomfortable whine escaping her small lips as she fought to get her legs free from the blanket that was gently laid over them. Her face scrunched up in distaste, nose bunching up as her eyes clenched shut, her gums becoming visible as her mouth opened to let the sound break free.

Luke hated hearing her cry, much like any parent did with their child, the sound going right through him like cutlery against a china plate. It was a sound he wanted to silence as quickly as possible, a sound he wanted to put to rest by providing as much comfort and assurance to little Kenzie as he could.

“Come on, sweet girl, up we go,” Luke reached down with both hands, keeping his voice just as quiet as before, not wanting to disrupt the semi-peaceful atmosphere that was lingering in the room. He took a gentle hold of Kenzie, sliding a hand beneath her so his hand was splayed against her back, while his other went behind her head to support her as he lifted her up and out of her crib, gently placing her against his chest so her face was resting against his neck.

When you had taken Kenzie up to bed previously, the bedroom was set up so it would soothe her; Luke’s bedside lamp was left turned on the lowest setting so it barely lit, giving some reassurance that Kenzie wasn’t left alone in complete darkness, a small night-light projector was set up on the dresser, aimed so the gentle cascade of moons as stars were scattered across the ceiling, accompanied by the gentle instrumental lullaby that the toy sung. Usually the combination worked to keep her asleep for the majority of the night, the only time she would wake up was usually for a night-feed, but tonight seemed to be the night that neither of his daughters were sleeping without a second visit from him.

Luke adjusted her in his arms, so she was resting comfortably against him, forehead against his neck with her cheek pressed against the top of his chest. Kenzie seemed to settle a little at the physical closeness she had gained, the familiar warmth of his body recognisable to her and bringing her as much of a comfort as it brought to Luke himself. His hand remained splayed across her back, thumb moving gently in a back and forth motion as Luke gently began to sway as he allowed for his feet to begin to walk around the room, smiling as the gentle weight of her head against his shoulder as he whispered to her, “There we go, is that better?”

If there was one-way Luke knew to get Kenzie to sleep when she was restless, it was to lull her sleep with motion. A simple movement worked wonders with the small blonde, the soothing motion of a moving car causing her eyelids to become heavy as the gentle hum of the engine rocked her to sleep with every car ride. But the motion that Luke conducted when he walked with her, a gentle sway in his step as he held her in his arms had nothing on the hum of a trusty engine, the warmth of his arms and chest against her mixed along with a soft whisper he hushed her with was the one true secret that worked almost every time.

He felt her small hand clutch onto the collar of his t-shirt, her grip a little loose in her tired state, the soft whines and whimpers continuing to slip past her lips although at a lesser volume than before.

“Shh… Shh…” Luke gently hushed her, lips gently pressing against the side of her head as he left a reassuring kiss against her soft skin, his palm beginning to glide up and down on her back. He glanced down at Kenzie from his position, noticing the missing splash of colour that could usually be found in her mouth, mentally cursing himself for not noticing at first that her favourite comfort was missing. She couldn’t sleep without it, always having the familiar lion-themed piece of rubber and plastic attached to her baby-grow on the little fabricated cord. Although it seemed that the cord had come undone during her slumber. “What’s wrong, sweetheart? Have you lost your paci?”

Luke gently rocked her, swaying in place as he bent his knees slightly to try and create a soothing rhythm as he stood on the spot and looked back into her crib, searching for the familiar brightly coloured piece of rubber and plastic that Kenzie adored. He didn’t understand how such a small baby in such a limited space could lose something that she barely let go of throughout the day. Whenever she would suck on her pacifier, she held it like a vice between her lips, her gums gripping it with all the strength her small frame could muster if Luke or you even attempted to take it from her against her will.

She was only young, but boy, was she stubborn. I wonder where she got that from…

“Where did you put it, huh?” Luke quietly asked, directing the question towards the unhappy baby in his arms as if he would receive an answer. His eyes were focused on the discarded blanket, removing his hand from its place on Kenzie’s back so he could use the limb in the attempt to search for her favourite orange pacifier. Luke knew it wouldn’t be the secret to settling her, but it would certainly help.

Luke’s eyes searched the dimly lit crib, leaning ever so slightly forward so he could get a better look, keeping a steady and secure hold of Kenzie while his fingers lifted the blanket up as he gently tossed it to the other end of the crib. A flash of orange caught his attention, eyes looking to the far side of the crib, spotting the brightly coloured plastic of the pacifier which had somehow become stuck between the crib’s cushion and the wooden frame. He wasn’t sure how it exactly got there, but with the amount of moving he knew Kenzie to do throughout the night, he knew he shouldn’t have been completely surprised about where it ended up.

“Would you look at what I found,” Luke added a bit of hushed excitement to his voice, reaching forward and grasping hold of the pacifier as he plucked it free from the tight space it was trapped in. He checked it over, making sure it wasn’t broken or damaged, assuring there were no cracks in the plastic for Kenzie to hurt herself with. You called him overcautious and overprotective, but you knew he was only looking out for his girls; the thought of one of them hurting themselves ultimately being his worst nightmare. Once he deemed that it was fine, he cleaned it off, ridding the rubber nub of any dirt or fluff before he lifted it to Kenzie’s face, a smile creasing his lips as he chuckled and gently rubbed the smooth material against her lips to encourage her to take it. “Here you go, baby.”

Kenzie blinked tiredly, her eyes spotting the familiar bright orange object in Luke’s hand. Luke watched as she clung onto his shirt, lips separating as she leaned forward slightly, head moving closer to where Luke was holding the pacifier between his thumb and index finger as she took the rubber between her lips before resting her head back against Luke’s shoulder. Her hand still gripped his shirt’s collar, cheek pressing against him as she nuzzled in, her soft skin sliding against the fabric of his shirt as she tried to keep as close as possible, the gentle graze of the fabric against her skin almost doing its own job of lulling her to sleep.

Kenzie’s soft whines and whimpers seemed to quieten down even more, the sound becoming muffled from behind the pacifier that was back in its rightful place, her cheeks moving ever so slightly as she sucked on the soft piece of rubber.

His hand found its place on Kenzie’s back almost instantly, resuming its previous gliding motion as if it were second nature to him. Luke had always been told his hands were a gift, that they were instruments in themselves that could strike the most beautiful sound when given the right tools, and he knew that to be true. But, there was nothing like the way his hands naturally found their position when holding his children, the way his fingers stretched, the way his palms curved, the way his hands manoeuvred so the young girls felt secure and comfortable when they were in his arms. He was forever grateful for the work his hands created and the talent he had been given, but the way he felt when he got to hold Kenzie like he did in that moment… There was nothing that came close.

“That’s better, isn’t it?” Luke spoke in a hushed whisper, resuming his gentle swaying motion from before as he stepped away from the crib and allowed for his feet to absentmindedly wander around the room, to step where they wished and carry the two of them across the room while he tried to settle Kenzie enough to get her to fall back to sleep, “You just wanted your paci and a cuddle, hm?”

Kenzie seemed to relax against Luke in that moment, her weight falling against him as her face gently pressed into his neck as her breathing began to slow and even out. Luke felt her blonde curls tickle the sensitive skin of his neck when she rubbed her cheek against him, her skin half rubbing against the fabric of his t-shirt and brushing against the skin above the collar, attempting to get comfortable. He swore he felt his heart ache when he heard the content little sigh slip out, the light-hearted sound containing just enough volume to cause a tear to spring to his eye at the simple realisation of contentment the young baby felt against him.

With one hand remaining splayed across her back, the tip of his thumb brushing the nape of her delicate neck with every slow swipe, Luke slowly continued to circle the room, humming quietly under his breath. Luke barely heard the creak of the bedroom door open, his head turning to glance over his right shoulder, Kenzie drifting off against his left, his eyes meeting yours as you popped your head through the gap, smiling at the sight in front of you.

Luke couldn’t hold back the smile on his face at the sight of you slipping in through the open door, his lips puckering out slightly as he whispered a quiet “shh” to you, the sound barely counting as audible, before continuing his gentle sway as he padded around the room in the attempt to lull the sweet baby to sleep. 

It was after a few more minutes, Luke made his way back over to the crib, gently rearranging his hold on Kenzie so he could lower her down. He kept a hand on the back of her head, leaning forward with his shoulder so he had a better hold of the sleeping child, allowing for her weight to fall against his arms, turning her slightly so her back was resting against his forearm. He kept a hand beneath her body, fingers gently tapping a comforting rhythm on her back with a featherlight touch as he continued to lower her back down into the crib.

“Shh…shh…shh…” Luke hushed her uncomfortable whimpers, the gentle noise he released breezing through the air as it comforted Kenzie and her whines slowly settled back down as she wriggled a little against the fabric of the cushion in her crib. Luke slowly and carefully removed his hands from beneath her, sliding the hand that previously rested under her back, fingertips sliding over her side to rest delicately on her stomach, slowly coming together as if they were almost meeting to form a fist but instead continuing to provide Kenzie with a comforting touch to keep her asleep. With his other hand Luke reached over with a free hand to grab her blanket again before placing it over her so she was protected from the cold draft he knew to sneak in through the night. “There we go, sweetheart, all nice and cosy.”

Luke hadn’t noticed you make your way over to him, your steps against the floor were practically silent, your presence only becoming clear to him when he felt an arm slip around his waist. The gentle squeeze you gave as you leaned into him was warm, the embrace being one he always looked forward to whenever you were around one another, it almost being guaranteed when you had the chance to hold one another without a toddler or a baby in between the two of you. 

“Night night, baby.” Luke spoke in the softest whisper, lifting his hand, pressing his index and middle finger to his pouting lips before lowering the limb back down. With the gentlest of touches, he allowed for the pads of his fingers to rest against Kenzie’s forehead, as if transferring the kiss from his lips to her skin through his hand. It was a soft gesture he had started doing for her as of late, the loving way of saying a final goodnight before he would carry himself back through the house where he could unwind. 

Elle had her sunshine song and Kenzie had her special goodnight kiss, both personal moments to be shared with Luke when he took them each to bed, a silent promise to them that he was there and he would always be there to give them those comforts. 

Luke found himself leaning against Kenzie’s crib just that little bit longer, gaze never breaking from the slumbering baby as she lay on her back, head tilted in Luke’s direction, with one hand out to her side while the other clutched onto the soft blanket that was splayed over her. He watched as the pacifier in her mouth slowly bobbed up and down, silently counting every small suck gave and timed them with her breaths, smiling to himself at the realisation of what he was doing. 

“I’ve always said you have magic hands, Luke,” You kept your voice low, as if any sound louder than that of a pin dropping would wake Kenzie. You rested your head on Luke’s shoulder, your arm remaining loosely wrapped around his waist, your other hand coming to rest against his bicep in front of you. You pressed a kiss to his shirt-covered shoulder, smiling to yourself as you inhaled the remnants of his cologne that still lingered on his clothes. “The same trick worked when she was nothing more than a bump and now look at her.”

The natural smile that spread across Luke’s face at your words was a knowing one, one that was also so full of love. He knew you were right, it seemed as though his touch was something to be considered magic. It was with the simplest of touches, he could make the girls calm down, make them fall asleep, he could soothe them in any case. You had always told him that his hands were gifted, especially when it came to your girls, that there was something that they provided which no one else could match, that they provided a warm comfort that came from him and him only. 

“I’m kind of hoping it’ll always work,” Luke tilted his head so it rested lightly against yours, turning ever so slightly so he could press a soft kiss to your hairline in the process. You knew he enjoyed having his own little knacks that had become nightly routine for his girls, understanding the sense of need and purpose that they provided Luke with. As long as the song and kiss worked, Luke and you both were assured that the girls would always ask for them, that they would always want them. “Hopefully, my girls don’t get sick of me too soon.” 

“Trust me, babe, I highly doubt that’s going to happen anytime soon,” You chuckled, squeezing his bicep slightly, the pressure your fingers provided was light, “You are their entire world, their everything, they love you more than they love anything in this world.” 

Luke knew you were right. It was a loving moment they shared every night, a moment so small yet so big that it meant the world to Luke as well as the little girls whom he shared it with. 

It was an individual moment he got to share with each daughter and that in itself was the greatest gift Luke could have.

---

Tag List: @steviemae​ @elsysoza @treatallwithkindness​ @oopsiedoopsie23​ @loveroflrh​ @another-lonely-heart​ @zhangyixingxing1​ @devilatmydoor​ @karajaynetoday​ @ophelia-enthusiast​

#5sos #5 seconds of summer #5sos imagines #5sos imagine #5sos blurbs #5sos blurb #5sos one shot #5sos fanfiction #5sos fanfic #5sos fic #5sos fics #5sos fanfictions #5sos fanfics #luke hemmings #luke hemmings one shot #luke hemmings imagine #luke hemmings imagines #luke hemmings blurbs #luke hemmings blurb #luke hemmings fanfiction #luke hemmings fanfictions #luke hemmings fanfic #luke hemmings fanfics #luke hemmings fic #luke hemmings fics #dadsos #dad!sos #dad!luke #luke hemmings x reader #reader x luke hemmings

[notespeed]

Mortgage Note Case Study With Eddie Speed - Real Estate Investing

PROPERTY overview: - Class D- property that was neglected and very distressed - termites, bad roof, no heat or AC, bad wiring and plumbing 

- Original plan was to remodel for a rental (would have lowered the rehab costs by perhaps $5k) but a visit in Jan '19 changed our plans 

- Upon joining NoteSchool in Jan '20 we flipped to selling this house and holding the note 

- We did the demo and gutted it and used our contractors to add a new roof, added HVAC, repair termite damage, new electrical, new plumbing) and remodeled the entire interior 

 - Highly stable workforce neighborhood with long term home ownership and few rentals 

- Low crime, excellent elementary and middle school within the community

- Purchased the property in 2017 using money out of pocket and a small 2 year note and which we paid off prior to closing

- At the time of sale (July '20) we were at $88,770 (in the property) = $58,250 (purchase) + $30,500 (rehab)

NOTE TERMS overview:

- Sales price of $145,000

- PBB Buyer, D-F Qualified, $4000 down, escrowed T&I

- Note Price $141,000 which we papered using a Title company as $98,750 (sales price to lower tax basis) + $46,250 (repair cost) @ 6.5% for 360 months

- PI of $891.22 - Secured a PLEDGE at the time of closing for $40,000 for 4 years at 6% to recoup the rehab costs and 10k above that

- We plan to secure additional Pledges when this one expires as well as consider Partials

FINANCING overview:

-$88770

- funds in the house+$4000

- down payment+$40000

- Pledge+$141,000

- 30 year Principal over time+$179,838

- 30 year Interest over time-$45091

- Pledge payments over time

======================== 

+$226,977 Profit 

Uncover Why Savvy Investors Use Proven Mortgage Note Strategies for Massive Monthly Profits In Today’s Ever-Changing Market… Risk-Free!

Discover more about Note School and profiting without Tenants, Toilets and by taking our FREE one day class: 

https://new.noteschool.com/TV/ 

 Latest Class Information: 

https://noteschool.com/3-day-classes/pop/ 

 Download a Brand-New eBook by Eddie Speed It’s A Whole New Ball Game With Creative Financing

https://lp.noteschooltraining.com/moneyball-getstarted 

Follow us:

https://youtube.com/c/noteschool

https://noteschool.com/

https://www.facebook.com/thenoteschool

https://www.linkedin.com/company/noteschool/

https://www.linkedin.com/company/colonial-funding-group-llc/

https://twitter.com/thenoteschool

https://www.instagram.com/thenoteauthority/ 

-------------------------------------------------------

Brian Lauchner (00:01):

Can you really be the bank versus being the landlord stay tuned.

Brian Lauchner (00:16):

That is the question, ever noticed that banks happen to own the tallest buildings in the cities? And sometimes being a landlord can come with some unique challenges I would say. And so we're going to talk about what that looks like to maybe make a shift from being a landlord over to being the bank and taking advantage of some of those things. Welcome to NoteSchoolTV. My name is Brian Lauchner I'm on the teaching team here. We're going to be here every single Wednesday. And if you're brand new to NoteSchoolTV, we are here Wednesdays at 11:00 AM, central time, every single Wednesday live where you can engage with us as we kind of dive into some of these topics and kind of go after some of the questions that I think a lot of people have in their heads, there's trying to figure out what those answers are.

Brian Lauchner (01:01):

If you're wanting to learn a little bit more about NoteSchool or NoteSchoolTV, even you can go to www.NoteSchool.com/TV, to learn a little bit more about what we do, what we're about, and even how you can get engaged moving forward from here. We would really love for you. If this video is of value to you, please like the video, subscribe to the channel. And probably most importantly for this show specifically, if you are someone who is wanting to get engaged and ask some questions, make sure you are clicking that notification bell. Down next to the subscribe button, that's going to alert you when we go live so that you can jump on with us, listen to what we're talking about, texting your questions, typing your questions there. And we're going to try and do our best to get those answers. We are actually going to have an after party at the end of NoteSchoolTV each week, where we take a look at all the things that have been posted on all the social channels and try to answer these, these questions almost like a Q and A but we're going to call it an after party because let's be honest, that's way more fun. And so we're going to get into the meat of today. It's going to be fun, and we're going to start by jumping straight into the news

Brian Lauchner (02:20):

And I am joined here by Mr. Joe Varnadore. And as he gets un-muted here, we will get him going. And how are you, Joe?

Joe Varnadore (02:29):

You know what? I am great, Brian, how are you?

Brian Lauchner (02:32):

Doing great, my man, what's going on in the market, man, fill us in. What's going on in the news?

Joe Varnadore (02:37):

Well, hot off of the wire service man. So we talked last week about Fannie, Freddie, Genie. They extended the moratorium on foreclosures from the end of December from the 31st of December out to January 31st, well hot off the presses here, FHA, HUD and the federal housing finance agency has just granted another extension. And they're extending that out to February 28th. So now we've gone from December 31st to January 31st, and now we're out at the end of February. So that is.

Brian Lauchner (03:20):

What does it mean? What does that mean for the average landlord? Well, for the average homeowner, what that means is the foreclosures cannot be started, right? If it is a loan that is insured or guaranteed by one of the GSE's, the government sponsored enterprises. And it, if it is a loan on a rental property, that is not that is in that there's a loan from one of those agencies that, that extends that moratorium as far as being able to evict as well. Right? So it literally is more pressure on the landlords out there.

Brian Lauchner (03:58):

Uh-huh.

Joe Varnadore (03:58):

So you also know that the big stimulus package is kind of popped out and there's some things going on with that. But the CDC, the center for disease control has also extended their moratorium out on evictions. And that's just basically CDC did that because of the, you know, the COVID thing. And so, and in that package, there is another $25 billion to help those folks there. And then the big news as well is that Zillow is predicting Brian a 21.9% annual growth in housing in 2021, which is the biggest since 1983.

Brian Lauchner (04:48):

Man.

Joe Varnadore (04:48):

Now that's just a prediction by Zillow in the National Association of Realtors is kind of jumping on board that as well, but that is the news for this week.

Brian Lauchner (05:02):

I love it. I love it. So tell us, what are we going to be talking about today? I already kind of gave a little bit of a teaser here, jumping straight into it. What do you got for us today, Joe?

Joe Varnadore (05:11):

Well, I'll tell you what, we have two very special guests today. They are from Houston, Texas, Lois Meyer and Cynthia Sterling. They are two of our rockstar NoteSchool members, and they well, Brian, they were very big on the landlording thing, right.

Brian Lauchner (05:31):

Okay.

Joe Varnadore (05:31):

And you know, your teaser was can you really be the Bay versus being, you know, versus being a landlord. And so Cynthia and Lois, Cindy and Lois joined us joined NoteSchool back in January of this year before the lockdown. Right. And so we've got a great case study, where they do what we've been teaching them, right? They were landlords, they were interested real passive income. So they had bought a property that was pretty trashed out that they were going to use fix it and use it as a rental. But after, and that was the last fall. But after joining NoteSchool in January of this year, they decided we really would start like to being the bank. Right. So we're going to talk about that as we, as we move forward, let's bring Cynthia and Lois on and maybe we'll bring on Mr. Eddie as well. Well, good morning, Cynthia and Lois. Thanks for being here.

Cynthia (06:35):

Hi.

Joe Varnadore (06:35):

Good morning, Eddie, How are you?

Eddie Speed (06:37):

I'm great. How are you ladies? By the way. Welcome.

Lois (06:41):

Excellent.

Joe Varnadore (06:42):

So you guys, you know, we love you. We love what you've done. We love the spirit, everything that you guys bring to NoteSchool, Lois, you're a retired recruiter for a big national company. I think you retired last year, right?

Lois (06:56):

Yes. About that. Uh-huh.

Joe Varnadore (06:57):

And you're trying to get Ms.Cindy here to retire as well. Right?

Lois (07:04):

That is our plan for sure.

Cynthia (07:08):

The last couple of weeks.

Joe Varnadore (07:08):

Good job with the company called Solar Winds as well.

Cynthia (07:16):

Yeah.

Joe Varnadore (07:16):

So very good. So let's talk a minute about the, you know, you guys, what you were doing prior to NoteSchool and learning how to be the bank, so tell us about yourselves.

Cynthia (07:30):

Oh, we started in rentals and land ownership about five to eight years ago. I don't remember the exact timeframe. And we had collected about what 12 rental properties and about five or six land properties. And we were pretty well going down that path when we were introduced to notes and NoteSchool about two and a half years ago, we bought our first note just to try it out and see how it works.

Cynthia (07:58):

And then when we'd set off on a course of a lot of due diligence to make sure that everything was a good investment for us to kind of switch our plans. And we sort of made a decision to do that last fall. And especially with this one property, we thought we'd try one property off. And we started going down that path instead of remodeling it for rental were remodeling it for resale, but we wanted to be the bank. So in January of this year, we joined NoteSchool with a commitment that that was how we were redirecting all of our real estate investments.

Lois (08:35):

And our retirement plans.

Cynthia (08:37):

Yes.

Joe Varnadore (08:37):

Yeah. That's very important today. Is it not?

Lois (08:41):

Yes.

Joe Varnadore (08:44):

So you did your due diligence on notes, right? I heard you say that you did your due diligence on NoteSchool and you found out we were good. Right. So.

Lois (08:51):

Yes, we were very impressed.

Cynthia (08:53):

Yes. We had some access to some of your titanium members, so that helped a lot too, but we wanted to do our own due diligence, not on buying a specific note, but on the process, the, just how would it work? Long-Term, so not a short term gain, but something long-term for us.

Joe Varnadore (09:13):

Right.

Cynthia (09:15):

We have found out that you a pretty trustworthy guy.

Eddie Speed (09:16):

Look at that face. How could you not say that? Right.

Lois (09:21):

That was our first thought.

Joe Varnadore (09:21):

I don't have a comment here.

Eddie Speed (09:27):

It's funny. They do do a great job. You know, we get to spend time with them because they come on these labs with us on a regular basis. And great bring great questions. And the particular case study they did today. I really appreciate it because you know, a lot of people look at seller financing and it's like, I'm going to take a house that is sort of in a substandard condition and I'm going to sell it to some buyer and I'm going to cross my fingers. They're going to go fix it up. And you wake up and realize that you really can't attract the right, the buyer you're looking for, or you can't attract you don't really own a bank. You own like more of a pawn shop when you're doing that. Is that a fair statement? And so I really appreciate the fact that you ladies really listened to us and listened to the direction. So I'm interested in kind of like how you went through that process and what you needed to do to fix the house up and what that sell that property with seller financing look like?

Lois (10:32):

We purchased the house for a 58,250.

Joe Varnadore (10:35):

Let's do this. And let's I'm gonna have let's, I've got a PowerPoint here, so let's go.

Lois (10:42):

Alright, sure.

Joe Varnadore (10:42):

Real quick. And so the first shot here really is you guys bought bluntly when you sold it and closed it to your penalty box buyer. Right. We'll talk a little more about that in just a second. That's your penalty box buyer, right. And she had had an a crazy you know, worked for the United States postal service. And she just had, she had some bad, bad medical issues, didn't she guys?

Lois (11:11):

Very much so. And it really put her in a position where she felt she would never be able to own a house on her own.

Cynthia (11:19):

And it was a, it was a goal she'd had for all of her life. And I she's in her fifties, but couldn't, isn't bankable. Wasn't at all. And yet she after all the medical issues and three years of not working and all of that, she was able to get us feedback underneath her. But by that time, the damage is done.

Joe Varnadore (11:39):

Right.

Cynthia (11:40):

Credit score. And we were able to help her achieve her dream and have us begin to achieve ours, quite frankly.

Lois (11:50):

Sure.

Joe Varnadore (11:50):

You know what I like to say, ladies, that you know, we can kind of help folks achieve the dream of home ownership, one person at a time, right.

Lois (12:00):

Exactly.

Joe Varnadore (12:00):

As we move forward. And just for our viewers out there this lady was, you know, she was just, she was unbankable, right? Because of a situation, it wasn't that she had, you know, bad credit or ugly credit or Eddie was saying we're selling an ugly house. And that kind of thing, as a matter of fact, this house has a current market value of $150,000. Right?

Lois (12:23):

Now It does. Yes.

Joe Varnadore (12:28):

Earlier, you said, well, you know, it was pretty nasty, so, let's talk just a little bit about this, right. As we kind of go through it. So you're the kind of the deal points, right? You guys tell us a little bit about that you had purchased this house and you were just going to rehab and fix it. And then that was kind of last fall, wasn't it?

Cynthia (12:47):

Yeah, it was last fall and we started to work on it and it's like, I mean, Eddie can tell more horror stories than we have, but every house we've ever bought in neighborhoods that are what we call working class neighborhoods, right? So they're more of the blue collar working class people, one to two, home, one to two jobs per, per adult living in the household. So these are, these are hardworking people, but their houses are not always in the best of neighborhoods. But one of the things we've always tried to do is take a house in a neighborhood like that and make it the best house in the neighborhood, and then get people into those homes. And this is historically one of the of the most, it's the highest voting percentage neighborhood in the state of Texas. Oh my gosh. And you've tried to find a house for sale or for lease in this neighborhood is difficult at best. And so when we found this opportunity, we jumped on it, but the house had been in some disrepair because of the age of welders. So.

Joe Varnadore (13:57):

So you found it, you totally gutted it. And again, you're going to rehab and flip it. So you purchased it for 58,250, and I think you use your own funds for that.

Lois (14:09):

Uh huh.

Joe Varnadore (14:09):

And then you rehab the property. And again, you had some funds and I think these were some funds that were in retirement account or something like that.

Cynthia (14:19):

No, not really. They were just funds that we had set aside actually to buy another property. And we just pulled them back from that to go into this property.

Joe Varnadore (14:27):

Got it. So you get it rehabbed and you would look like the picture before, right. So total out of pocket, you guys had in this was 88,750.

Lois (14:36):

Correct.

Joe Varnadore (14:39):

So once you did that and I, you know, when we were talking yesterday, you were saying that you guys had actually started advertising for a penalty box buyer prior to actually finishing the house, right?

Lois (14:57):

Yes.

Cynthia (14:58):

We had a couple of people that had already approached us initially about, did we have any rental rentals?

Lois (15:07):

Rentals right.

Cynthia (15:07):

And we just flat out said to them, have you ever thought about owning? And because the cost of a monthly lease versus an owning the house, there's not that much difference. And we've had several people go, well, I can't qualify to buy a house. And we said, well, put that aside for a moment. If you did qualify, would you be interested? Right. And they said, yes. And we pursued them. And this particular buyer went through all of the process, which we'll probably talk about, but we put them through a Dodd-Frank process because we wanted to make sure that they in fact were legitimate people to own the home.

Joe Varnadore (15:49):

So just for everybody that's out there. So you advertise this and you actually had people as you were redoing it or contacting you from the neighborhood as it was a real desirable working class neighborhood.

Lois (15:59):

Right.

Joe Varnadore (16:01):

You found the right buyer, and then one of the things you said there, I want to make sure everybody understands is you made sure that the borrower on this lady that was buying it you had her qualified under the safe act, which is Safe Act compliant, right. Safe Act compliant by using a vendor that checked her out and made sure that, you know, she could afford, she had the ability to repay on this.Right?

Cynthia (16:28):

Absolutely.

Lois (16:29):

And that came from, from NoteSchool and Eddie talking about, you know, you have to qualify them. And so we used a vendor from NoteSchool CTU and then they did the whole processing for us. And then we closed through a title company and we explained to her at the very beginning, you know, this, the everything was going to be done legally. And you know, cause she'd never bought a house before. And so every one thing was going to be done according to law and regulations so that she didn't have to worry that she was being taken advantage of either, which I think is important. And I think that's something we don't talk about is they need to know that this is legitimate as well as we need to know that they're the right people.

Joe Varnadore (17:15):

Right. Well, you know, it's like Eddie Speed says, right. He says, Joe you know, the loan that you don't make is not the one that'll keep you up at night. Make sure that everybody's good. Right?

Lois (17:27):

Yes. Right.

Joe Varnadore (17:27):

So you sold it. So you had, you guys had 88,750 and you were good with that, guys. You could have borrowed the money from you know, a private lender, but you guys were good. You had some money that you wanted to deploy, so you were good with that. So your buyer had a small down payment, but that was okay. Right. That was okay with you guys. That was your decision.

Cynthia (17:52):

We are, we feel confident that we could have gone and gotten a more traditional penalty box buyer that we could have asked for a higher down payment and all of that. But we there's a, there's an element of not only this being a financially solid thing for us, but we also wanted to do a community and, and a best work. We're blessed enough to be in the jobs and the careers that we've had. And if we can help people one house at a time, you know, we have this thing about having, helping one house on wall street on one block, in one neighborhood at a time, then we're good with probably not making as much as maybe somebody else might be making, but we're also, it's a business and we absolutely want to run our business smart, but we also want to feel good about what we do.

Joe Varnadore (18:46):

Well. and just for our viewers out there, typically when we're selling to a penalty box buyer, we're going to get somewhere between 10 and 20% down. That will show that, you know, over the last several months, the average penalty, the average buyer has a 750 plus credit score. Plus has, have been putting at least 19% down on their on the price here. So let's talk about this. So 145, $4,000 down. So you get seller financing of the 141.

Lois (19:17):

Uh huh.

Cynthia (19:17):

Uh huh.

Joe Varnadore (19:17):

At six and a half percent, which is a very good rate for this penalty box buyer, which made the payment $891 a month for principal interest. Now you did, she is escrowing the taxes.

Lois (19:32):

Absolutely.

Cynthia (19:32):

That's kind of our requirement we have for our properties, even the notes we're buying. And it's probably because we're fairly new. I mean, we're literally only coming up on our one year membership, but in the 20 plus notes that we own, that's the criteria that we kind of put in place.

Joe Varnadore (19:53):

So you guys have bought 20 notes this year.

Cynthia (19:55):

yeah a little, 20, 21, something like that, we could have.

Lois (19:59):

Right. Since May

Cynthia (19:59):

Since May, this year actually.

Joe Varnadore (20:02):

Because you said, I'm going to join in January, but we can't do anything until May. So.

Lois (20:07):

Correct.

Joe Varnadore (20:10):

Seven months. Very interesting.

Cynthia (20:11):

Yeah. Uh huh.

Eddie Speed (20:14):

Yeah. Well, one point I wanted to make is, you basically in your business called an Audible. I mean, you know that we say that you can get 10 to 20% down on a consistent basis.

Lois (20:24):

Uh huh.

Eddie Speed (20:24):

But the story of the customer and the stability of the customer said, I, as a business owner and the bank.

Lois (20:34):

Uh huh.

Eddie Speed (20:34):

I can call an audible, say, I'll take less than that down. And by the way, her payment, including taxes and insurance is less than a rent payment or it's is as equal to.

Lois (20:48):

Yes. Uh huh.

Eddie Speed (20:48):

It"s a win-win deal. You got 88,000 in this deal.

Lois (20:51):

Yep.

Eddie Speed (20:51):

You got 4,000 cash. And, now all of a sudden, here's the difference. If you would have owned a rental property, would you really be netting 900 bucks a month?

Lois (21:03):

No.

Eddie Speed (21:08):

Oh, So this makes more money than a rental?

Cynthia (21:12):

Quite a bit.

Eddie Speed (21:17):

Okay. Now.

Lois (21:17):

We're believers Eddie, No worries.

Cynthia (21:19):

We've been converted.

Joe Varnadore (21:25):

Hallelujah. So this is what the note looks like. You've got a payment track of 360. So let's talk about, let's tally up some of the money. Eddie. I've been talking a lot here. Why don't you talk about this a little bit.

Eddie Speed (21:38):

Well, I mean, the thing that we like about the first year, you make $14,000. Now you can take that off your cost basis of 88 right? Now you're in the low seventies, right? below 75,000. And then for 75,000 our investment, you have an in thing that throws off true income, not income minus expenses, but real income.

Lois (22:04):

Yes.

Eddie Speed (22:04):

Growing off of cash flow of 10,000, almost $700 a month. A year.

Lois (22:13):

Yeah.

Eddie Speed (22:15):

Probably economics says seven years, you get your money back in for the next, you know, 23 years after that is profit.

Lois (22:21):

Yep.

Eddie Speed (22:21):

Now, that's kind of pile boy economics, but it's pretty good economics.

Lois (22:27):

It is. And we can put pledges against it and everything. So I mean.

Cynthia (22:31):

Partials, we can do whatever we want. And that really works well for us given, building this retirement plan and what we need, because right now I'm still working. So that still works well. But in that, after that seven years, that's when we're really wanting these notes to kick in for us.

Eddie Speed (22:52):

So let me clarify what they're saying, because that's really important. Like you're like, you're looking at your current deal, but you're also strategizing about what could be done. What they're saying is they have a good first mortgage on a good piece of property and a good payer. They could take that note and just go borrow money against it. Just like you'd borrow money rent. I was thinking about your money against note. They said they can pledge the note, right? Teach this strategy a lot and how to do it. The other thing is they could just go sell a stream of payments so they could sell not the whole note, but they could sell a stream of payments. And what that would allow them to do is to recapitalize. So you heard them say something, a lot of you caught and they're like, Oh my God, these ladies have bought 20 over 20 notes this year already. And you're like, how do they do that? Because they understand when they run out of capital, whatever is, and have strategies that they can go recapitalize other private investors, money to go to go recapitalize the notes that they have. So they have more money to spend. And now they're walking themselves up the ladder. And that's what I love.

Lois (24:00):

Uh huh.

Joe Varnadore (24:02):

That's where you build your bank. Right guys?

Lois  (24:03):

Absolutely.

Cynthia (24:03):

Absolutely we love it.

Joe Varnadore (24:08):

We call that a NoteSchool, Eddie, coined that the Capital Recoupment Plan, let's do some quick math. And then I'm going to jump off the PowerPoint here. So you guys had 88,750 out, right? You received a $4,000 down payment, yearly income over the period of the loan, you know, for a long time is 320,760. So literally your total profit on this over time is 232 and a half thousand dollars basically.

Lois (24:37):

Uh huh.

Eddie Speed (24:39):

Yeah. That's well, you know what I like to say at that don't light your fire, your wood's wet. Right?

Joe Varnadore (24:48):

Alright, Scott, pull that down and let's, I'll go back on screen here.

Eddie Speed (24:52):

Listen, you ladies that I want to compliment you are you, for Joe and I and Brian who are on the training team and working at training people here's, there's, you're smart. You brought some real estate experience to it, and you applied that real estate experience that let you get going with your note strategy.

Lois (25:18):

Uh huh.

Eddie Speed (25:18):

But the most important thing that you did is you took action. You put massive action. And we talk, and you know, we talk about this a lot. Like we can be so smart, we can almost talk ourselves out of a deal. Right. We can just analyze it to death and you ladies are good. You're smart ladies. You you're really good at analyzing, but you have a good balance. And you've been highly coachable for us because you've not just done it, but you've taken action. And I salute you for that, really.

Lois  (25:51):

Thank you.

Cynthia (25:53):

We should rightfully salute you. I think that's you have to take the credit for some, a lot of this is because we just to remind you of what we said was we bought our first note two and a half years. We studied you and note school, and that's correct for two years. And, but once we made the commitment, because we had done that due diligence up front, we were all in, but that comes to you. I mean, you're, we didn't just invest in any notes. We had invested in NoteSchool and NotesDirect.

Eddie Speed (26:22):

Yes. Well, thank you for doing that. And I think you probably would tell people you could have pulled the trigger a lot quicker.

Cynthia (26:29):

We could. Yeah. I don't mean to discourage. We could have done it faster. It just happened to be where our careers were.

Lois (26:36):

Yeah. Our lives were far too stacked for that, but because we wanted to be able to concentrate on it and do it right. And so we told you when we joined that May was our time.

Cynthia (26:46):

Retirement.

Eddie Speed (26:46):

I completely remember that conversation.

Lois (26:51):

And I know that you say sometimes, well, you know, people tell me, Oh, I'm going to join and I'm going to do all of this. And you know, some of them do some of them don't. And so I thought, yeah, he doesn't really know what we're going to do.

Joe Varnadore (27:07):

22 notes in. We think you're doing okay.

Eddie Speed (27:13):

Let's just say the coach is happy.

Cynthia (27:15):

Good, cause we did our job too.

Lois (27:18):

Yes.The players are happy.

Joe Varnadore (27:23):

Stick around with us guys.

Lois (27:24):

We will.

Joe Varnadore (27:24):

Cause we're going to have a little after party here,

Joe Varnadore (27:26):

After this thing.

Lois (27:28):

Okay.

Joe Varnadore (27:28):

So guys Brian, why don't you jump on and let's talk about Feeding Frenzy Friday.

Brian Lauchner (27:38):

I like it.Thank you so much, ladies. Yeah, I think this is this is a great time transition. One of the cool things is that I think everybody needs to know is NoteSchoolTV is sponsored by NotesDirect and Feeding Frenzy Friday.

Brian Lauchner (28:02):

So each week we put together a little video kind of breaking down a note from NotesDirect on Feeding Frenzy Friday, you can go to NoteSchool YouTube channel. There's a playlist called Feeding Frenzy Friday. And if you're wanting to just learn more of the details and really learn how to master notes, that's a great place to get started. Just last week, we broke down a Michigan home that has a season note since 2002, the person has been living there for 18 years. What do you think the chances are? They're going to keep paying if they've been there for 18 years, right? It had a $19,000 balance with a loan value under 60%. So with a double digit interest rates. So just really, really great stuff. And we got to talk about the ins and out and the pros and the cons of these notes to again, to help equip you better, to learn how to buy something from notes direct and get a note in your portfolio.

Brian Lauchner (28:52):

As always, we're going to be here on Wednesdays live at 11:00 AM central time, so that we can dive into some of this content and get you more value for your business in this you know, in these market conditions make sure you are liking these videos, subscribe to the channel. And again, like I said, at the beginning, click that notification bell, because what that does is that alert you, that Hey, we're live. And that allows you then to jump on and putting your questions and things like that and engage with us. Cause we're going to have a little bit of a shindig here in a minute where we kind of go through some of those questions for those of you who, Hey, you're brand new, you're wanting to know how to get started. Here's two things I'll tell you, first of all, go to www.NoteSchool.com/TV. That is a great place to kind of take a next step. If you're trying to figure out what that next step is. The second thing is I want to invite you to join us next Wednesday

Brian Lauchner (29:42):

For a special new year's NoteSchoolTV of it, where Eddie speed himself is going to give a state of the industry type of an address. And so that kind of wraps us up for today. We're running a little bit out of time, but I tell you what, you know, what time it is, Joe, it's time for the after party. So bring it.

Brian Lauchner (30:15):

I love it. All right. Well, one of the things that I saw come up in the comment you, as you post in your comments on Facebook or YouTube or wherever it is, you are you're joining us from, we had several come in. One of the things that I saw, Eddie, that popped up right away was just talking about the best rentals to sell via seller financing. Why don't you kind of walk us through that a little bit?

Eddie Speed (30:40):

Well, one of the things that I see all the time, a lot of landlords end up at NoteSchool and the reason they end up at NoteSchool and Lois and Cynthia were great examples of this was that, how do you scale your business, right? I mean, could you really have bought 20 rentals?

Lois  (31:02):

No, I don't even want to think about that.

Eddie Speed (31:05):

And so the avail, the scalability being the bank is much different than the scalability of being the landlord. And we really, it means a lot to us because it means that, because you heard Lois and Cynthia talk about retirement, and what they want to be able to do is be the bank and be on the beach, not at Home Depot.

Joe Varnadore (31:31):

Well. Eddie, You didn't, want to, since you're the one that's already retired, You didn't want to be retired as a full time property manager. Right?

Lois  (31:40):

Right. But the other thing to think about is that this allows us to diversify our holdings. So instead of just having rentals basically in Houston, and we actually have one in another state as well, but this allows us to have diversification nationwide, urban and rural. So it, that I think is important in building a portfolio of any kind for retirement as well.

Eddie Speed (32:08):

Yeah. And we, one of the things that we talk about is like, what house is, it makes a good note house. So I tell landlords like Lois and Cynthia, when they get involved with us and they kind of get to know us. There's some, there's some training, there's some preparation for this that makes the answer make sense. Right, Brian? You can't just, you can't always understand a punchline answer if you have no base of knowledge to run. So we'll go lay out some math and we'll say, what house doesn't really, it was a good house, but it doesn't really throw off the income you're looking for. Right. And so we'll take that house and say, okay, then what if you noted it like this house that you just showed us, you're getting 900 bucks a month net income. That's impressive. And by the way, you probably could have, you could have probably carried it a little higher interest rate. You probably could've gotten a good bit better down payment. You made a, you made a social choice.

Lois (33:11):

Yes.

Eddie Speed (33:11):

Help somebody. You're still going to make really good money. And I just cannot tell you enough that, you know, I've probably spoken literally through the Seller Finance course. Listen, I've probably spoken to, gosh, no. I mean to over 200 Congress people in Congress, and we talk about the physical responsibility that people seller financing, do you provide home ownership to somebody that otherwise wouldn't have experienced it.

Lois  (33:37):

Absolutely.

Eddie Speed (33:39):

And you got to make really good profit helping them experience affordable home ownership.That's a win win.

Lois  (33:48):

Yeah. She would have never, ever gotten a loan from a bank or a traditional lender ever. Yeah.

Joe Varnadore (33:52):

Yeah.

Brian Lauchner (33:54):

I think too, when we're talking about the best kind of properties to seller finance, one of the things that Eddie said that it thinks is important to understand is that, there is a specific criteria that we're really looking for, but there are more of those houses than there are of the distressed homes that you might be thinking about as a wholesaler or a flipper or even a landlord. There is more opportunity in this space to find the deals than in the other space. And that's something that I think we take for granted because of how we've been trained to focus on these distress, torn up houses. Right?

Lois (34:24):

Right.

Eddie Speed (34:26):

Yeah.

Lois (34:26):

How did you, M asked how did you find this house in the first place? What was the source of this, this deal?

Lois  (34:34):

I think we just, we do a lot of driving in neighborhoods that we think have a lot of potential. So we have been buying properties and working class neighborhoods now for, as Cindy said, six to eight years and we drive the neighborhoods, we start on one street and we go up and down the grid pattern. And then when we find houses that we feel are you know, meet our criteria. So they have to be able to be standing, you know, they have good bones to them, but still in the distress price. And then we're able to go in and get it. So we've done that on in quite a few neighborhoods here in Houston. And like you've said Eddie, you don't make money on rentals from the rent, but you can make money on the rentals from than selling them if you've bought in the right neighborhoods. So we have purchased distressed properties in a lot of neighborhoods and lots, and we will be doubling and tripling our income on them just from the sale because of those locations.

Eddie Speed (35:36):

Yeah. So if somebody is listening and they're wondering, that's called a farming technique, right? Like it could be a highway or major streets and you say within that zone, that's my area. And you're just cruising for, you know, yuck houses, right. And or something that needs fixing and that's all a farming technique. So it's an kind of an old school tech, I don't know who you learn that from. I know some old guys and Houston has a long time, but that you don't hear many modern day new guys in the business talking about that, but that is, that's an old, effective technique.

Brian Lauchner (36:16):

And kind of to the other side of the coin, there was a question about how did you find the buyer? How did you pick the buyer? I saw a theme there and I will say, this is really the other side of the coin. There's not a farming technique necessarily here because of the people we're targeting. We call them penalty box buyers. We teach them all about who they are, but this is the underserved part of the community. And here's a little fun fact for you. I did the math on this. This is a trillion dollar marketplace of buyers, a trillion dollar marketplace. There are more penalty box buyers, especially today than there were this time, last year.

Lois (36:51):

Absolutely.

Brian Lauchner (36:51):

And so finding the buyer is not the hard part. You just need to kind of learn how to tailorin that criteria and then the marketing piece that Eddie teaches so well.

Lois (37:00):

Uh huh. Yes.

Brian Lauchner (37:00):

Let me see, we got time for one more question here. Oh, this is about Eddie, you had mentioned talking about some of the the difference between the Rental Cycle versus the Qwner Finance Cycle or the Seller Financing Cycle, Note Cycle. Tell us a little bit about that before we wrap up here.

Eddie Speed (37:21):

Well, I think it's relevant to a couple of things. So the one thing I would that one thing that I say is that from 2015, to around 2019 or 20, we were in a market where you couldn't really go wrong buying property cause it was going to have an escalation in value. And Joe, I totally got your headline while I go about Zillow. And I've heard a lot of other forecast and stuff, but let me just tell you this, I believe the next five years is going to be a lot more of a Note Cycle than a property is going to grow to the sky cycle. Right? And the reason that I say that when a Note Cycle is really good is when buyers, when there's a lot of people that otherwise could get a conventional mortgage that can't, they have a super big down payment and they're super qualified.

Eddie Speed (38:19):

And so we talk about this a lot, you know, as far as the mortgage banking calls it, the Mortgage Credit Availability. And right now that is about 35% of the people that can get a mortgage in February. Can't get one today. So, Lois and Cynthia can take a house and find a buyer with an inordinately high down payment. I know that their case study had where the, because of the variables we discussed that particular case that it wasn't as big a down payment. I can get 10 to 20% down if they can owner finance, that buyer who otherwise were probably just gotten a regular mortgage back in January of 2020, January, 2021. They can't do that.

Lois (39:02):

Right.

Eddie Speed (39:02):

Now. All of a sudden you got a win win. You put, you made home ownership that big down payment has let either let you get some money at closing, or it's reduced your cost base that you can apply, however you want to. So you didn't, you, you could even make theoretically some transactional money upfront running over time, just depending on what somebody's particular model is. So that's why I say that we've entered a Note Cycle is the market is so rich today to do seller financing. And then once again, Brian, you, the next piece of that puzzle is teaching people. Once you end up with a bunch of notes, somebody says, Oh, well, my money's tied up. How do you go recapitalize it? And boom, boom, boom. You just keep climbing that Hill and building your own bank. Hey, let me ask you a question. Would you rather be a landlord or the bank?

Brian Lauchner (39:58):

That is, well, thank you so much. Lois and Cynthia, thanks to Joe and Eddie. Another great NoteSchoolTV. We will see you all next week, again, stick around. We're going to be having these after parties. So join us, hit that notification bell so that you know, to join us and bring your questions so that we can engage with you and have you on the show. We'll see you next week.

#Real Estate #Real Estate Investing #Notes #Mortgage #Mortgage Notes #Eddie Speed #NoteSchool #NoteSchoolTV #Note School

[elizabear]

my home is your body, how can I stay away?

I WROTE MY FIRST FIC. And I was brave enough to post it. So, if you want to read a fake-friends-to-real-lovers Sam Wilson/Bucky Barnes post-Endgame AU where we pretend that Steve and Natasha are still alive and well in the 21st century, you can check it out below or read it on AO3.

Title: my home is your body, how can i stay away?

Rating: Explicit

Category: M/M

Relationship: Sam Wilson/Bucky Barnes (background Steve Rogers/Natasha Romanoff)

Additional tags: it’s like fake/pretend relationship, but it’s actually fake best friendship, fake friends to real lovers, post-Avengers Endgame, Epilogue What Epilogue, Natasha Romanoff Lives, Steve Rogers Stays, is everyone bi?, ambiguous barbershop quarter, bisexual Sam Wilson, bisexual Bucky Barnes, bisexual Steve Rogers, bisexual Natasha Romanoff, Captain America Sam Wilson

Words: 30,367

Link to AO3 here

Summary: "Anyway, I think if we team up, we can convince Steve that we’re best friends now. Then he’ll get jealous and remember how much more important we are to him than Natalia.”

Sam considers this carefully. He’s never been pressed so close to Bucky before, their faces only inches away from one another. From this distance Sam can see how long and thick Bucky’s eyelashes are. He can smell the pleasant scents of Bucky’s clean sweat and spicy aftershave. 

He wants to press his thumb into the cleft in Bucky’s chin.

“Yeah, that sounds like a great idea,” Sam hears himself say.

“Great!”

After they save the world, after Steve leaves and returns again with a smiling Natasha tucked tenderly underneath his arm, after all the happy and tearful reunions, after Tony Stark’s funeral, Sam Wilson takes a minute to sit his ass underneath a tree and freak the fuck out about the fact that he’s just been dead for the last five years.

He’s listening to a robot tell him for the fifth time that his mother’s number is “no longer in service,” his hand shaking as he presses redial on Steve’s borrowed cell phone. He wants to call his sister, wants to find out what happened to his niece, but he can’t remember his sister’s number and the only thing he can think of to do is just to keep calling his mom over and over again. He’s starting to really settle into the panic attack, gulping for air as his heart pounds wildly in his chest, when Bucky Barnes squats down beside him, perfectly balanced on those lean and powerful thighs.

“You OK?” Bucky asks quietly. Sam shakes his head silently, too overwhelmed to even begin to answer that question.

Like people are just OK after waking up five years in the future. Like people are just OK after turning to ash and then reforming into a human being. What is he even made of right now? Is he made of the same atoms and cells he was made of before he turned to dust? Is he even the same person? Did Sam Wilson die? Is he just a new Sam Wilson that Bruce Banner created out of thin air, a brand new body with the same memories as the first Sam Wilson? God, what is this Ship of Theseus nonsense, everything about this is so fucked up—

“OK, I need you to breathe,” Bucky says gently, interrupting Sam’s spiral into actual fucking madness. Bucky grabs Sam’s hand and pulls it to his chest. “Can you feel my chest moving? Feel me breathing in and out? Stop thinking, close your eyes, and match your breaths to mine.”

Sam squeezes his eyes shut and focuses on the feel of Bucky’s chest rising and falling underneath his hand. Bucky’s sternum is flat and bony underneath Sam’s palm, but he can feel the gentle rise of Bucky’s strong pectoral muscles underneath his fingers. Bucky’s skin is warm through his shirt, and Sam focuses on the solid feel of him as he follows Bucky’s slow and deep breathing. Bucky’s thumb presses firmly against the inside of Sam’s wrist. There’s an anxious tingling all over Sam’s skin, washing over him from head to toe, making Sam afraid that he’s going to buzz right out of his skin.

But Bucky is breathing deep and slow, and Sam lets himself relax into it, feels himself fall in sync with this not-quite-stranger, his best friend’s best friend, who is very considerately trying to keep Sam from falling apart.

“You’re doing great, Sam,” Bucky praises gently. “Just keep breathing, you’re doing great.”

“I hate this,” Sam mutters.

Bucky strokes his thumb over the sensitive skin of Sam’s wrist and leans closer, hesitating briefly before resting his forehead against Sam’s.

“Just breathe, Sam. You’re doing so good,” he murmurs softly.

Sam feels a warmth uncurling deep in his belly, reacting to Bucky’s closeness and his quiet praise. Is Bucky the most instinctually effective peer counselor in the world or is he actually seducing Sam right out of a panic attack? Sam absolutely cannot think about this now, he needs to focus on the original source of his practical and existential terror.

“I hate every part of this,” Sam admits, frustrated. “I hate that I can’t get in touch with my mom. I hate that I don’t know if my niece is OK. Bucky, who has been taking care of my niece?”

“Hey, it’s OK, Sam.” Bucky says, his tone gentle and reassuring. “We’ll find your niece. If she survived the Snap, Steve and Natalia would have kept track of her. They wouldn’t have just let her disappear into the system. You have friends.”

“Right,” Sam says, feeling that glacier sitting atop his chest begin to recede a little. “OK. Friends. Steve and Natasha will know how to find Michelle. I just need to ask Steve and Natasha how to find Sarah and Michelle.”

“Great! See, you have a plan now and everything,” Bucky says encouragingly. “Everything is going to be fine. You’re going to be fine, Sam.” Bucky leans back onto his heels, and Sam breathes a little deeper as the world comes into sharper focus.

Sam nods. This is all going to be fine. He’s alive, he’s breathing, and he has his hand on Bucky Barnes’s warm, firm chest. Bucky’s eyes are kind, and Sam can almost understand, maybe for the first time, why Steve cared so much about bringing Bucky home. Maybe Bucky isn’t so bad. Maybe everything is going to be fine. Sam can just about manage, now, to stuff all this panic inside his chest where it can’t hurt him. If he just stuffs it in there forever, he will never have to deal with it.

Sam takes a moment to congratulate himself on his healthy coping strategies.

“You’re not too bad at this, man,” Sam says. “Where did you learn to handle a panic attack like that?”

“Well, I mean, I had a lot of them after realizing that I was responsible for literally dozens of grisly murders,” Bucky replies dryly. “But also I spent like fifteen years obsessing over the state of Steve Rogers’s lungs and trying to keep him from dying of asthma so he could grow up and be Captain America.”

Right. Captain America. That’s the other thing he’s panicking about.

“Hey, what just happened?” Bucky asks gently. Bucky strokes his thumb over Sam’s wrist. “Your blood pressure just shot way up again.”

“Tell me you’re not some kind of human sphygmomanometer,” Sam says. “I don’t have the patience for that level of weird right now. Stop monitoring my blood pressure. That’s creepy.”

“OK,” Bucky says slowly. “Sorry. What’s going on?”

“Steve asked me to be Captain America. Says he’s not retiring, but he’s needed off-world for a while, and he thinks I should be the one to carry the shield.”

Suddenly, just like that, the strange, tentative peace between them shatters. Bucky’s face turns white, then flushes a deep red.

“Steve asked you to be Captain America,” Bucky repeats coldly. All traces of warmth are gone from Bucky’s face, and Bucky’s mouth settles into a grim line. “Excuse me a moment.”

Sam sighs as Bucky stalks off in Steve’s general direction.

Bucky returns a few moments later, Steve in tow, the two of them having some kind of whisper fight that Sam can’t really hear.

“Can’t believe you would do this—”

“—you know he’s a good choice—”

“—supposed to be your best friend—”

“—c’mon, Buck, you know I wouldn’t—”

Bucky yanks on Steve’s wrist as they approach Sam.

“OK, first of all, Steve, where the fuck is Sam’s family?” Bucky demands.

Steve pales, then looks genuinely contrite. “Oh, God, Sam, I’m sorry. I should have told you right away. Sarah and Michelle, they survived. They both survived the Snap. They’re living in your mom’s apartment in New York.” Steve hesitates for a moment, then adds, “Your mom was one of the ones who disappeared. She was at home watching Michelle when it happened. She should be safe. We’ll get a phone to her right away.”

Sam feels his stomach plunge at the knowledge that Michelle is five years older. He already missed two years of her life on the run with Steve after the Accords. Would she even remember him?

“Nat has your old phone stashed away. It should still have all your contacts in it. Natasha—she paid the bill. Every month you were gone. She never gave up hope we’d get you back,” Steve says, looking proud and a little teary-eyed.

While Sam works on processing the fact that his six-year-old niece is now his eleven-year-old niece, Steve rambles on about Natasha, and how brave she was, and what a rock she was, and how she kept everyone together, and how she sacrificed her life to save everyone, for kind of a while. Sam’s honestly kind of surprised. Steve and Natasha have always been close, but Sam’s never seen Steve as openly effusive about anyone other than James Buchanan Barnes Before The War, Steve’s most favorite person ever.

“OK, that’s great, Steve,” Bucky interrupts in a frosty tone. “But what’s this about Sam being the new Captain America?”

“Oh! Carol wants Natasha and me to go with her to a couple of planets that are struggling to organize after their populations suddenly doubled. Actually, I thought maybe you could come with us, Buck?” Steve offers. “I know how much you love space and—”

“No, Steve, I think I’ll stay here with Sam,” Bucky says stonily, glaring at Steve. Sam is a little stunned.

“What? Why?” Steve asks. He looks a bit like a confused golden retriever. “I thought you’d jump at this opportunity, Bucky, you really—”

“I really think I should stay here. Since I’m Captain America’s right hand man and all. And since Sam is Captain America now.”

Sam doesn’t really know what to do with all of this, because it seems like there’s really a lot going on here between Steve and Bucky that he doesn’t want to get involved with. And honestly, he’s not one hundred percent sold on the idea of working with Bucky at all, since they hardly even know each other. Today is the first time they’ve really interacted in a way that isn’t hostile or at the very least kind of pissy, and to be honest the uncomfortable sexual tension Sam felt earlier wasn’t exactly welcome.

But then a thought occurs to him, and Sam is instantly filled with delight. “So wait. What you’re saying is that you’re going to be my sidekick!”

“What, no, I’m not going to be your sidekick, I’m going to be your partner,” Bucky argues.

“Nuh uh, nope. It’s right there in the comics. Bucky Barnes was Captain America’s sidekick,” Sam says with a smirk. “Are you gonna wear the outfit?”

“What outfit?” asks Bucky, narrowing his eyes.

“Oh! The outfit with the little booty shorts?” Steve asks.

“I’m not wearing an outfit with little booty shorts,” Bucky says scornfully. “I’ll wear my regular outfit.”

“Leather bondage gear it is, then!” Sam replies. He feels more cheerful already.

***

“So what else did we miss?” Sam asks later, when they’re all settled in at one of the cabins on Tony’s property.

Steve and Natasha are tangled up together on the sofa, Natasha’s legs slung over Steve’s lap and her head resting against his chest. Steve and Nat have been trading inside jokes and finishing each other’s sentences all night, and it kind of seems like Sam and Bucky must have really missed a lot, because Sam doesn’t remember Steve and Nat being so telepathically linked before he got dusted.

Bucky is sitting alone, tense and uncomfortable-looking, in a chair near the fire. He must still be pretty pissed at Steve for choosing Sam over him as the next Captain America, because he keeps shooting murder glares at Steve through narrowed eyes. When Steve’s not gazing adoringly at Natasha, he’s busy having a silent argument with Bucky through a complicated series of expressions that include rolled eyes, pleading looks, clenched jaws, and prissy, pursed lips. Sam is honestly feeling pretty left out right now, because there’s a lot of unspoken communication going on here between basically everyone but him.

Steve heaves a frustrated sigh, tears his gaze away from Bucky, and responds, “Well, they built a giant wall between the United States and Mexico. It was a pretty big deal, lots of people were really unhappy.”

“Seriously? Half of the entire United States population disappears, and Americans are still freaking out about immigration from Mexico?” Sam asks incredulously.

“Oh, no, we didn’t build the wall. Mexico actually built the wall,” Natasha says. The wicked look in her eye suggests that this is going to be a good story.

“Wait, what? That stupid promise actually came true?” Bucky asks.

“Well, kind of?” Natasha says, giving a little so-so motion with her hand. “Mexico didn’t actually build the wall because of illegal immigration, though. They built it after a bunch of riots and border skirmishes in late 2020.”

“So, what? Gang violence? Drug cartels?” Sam asks.

“Nope. It was the season finale of a television show on the CW called Supernatural,” Steve explains, as if this doesn’t make the whole thing somehow even more confusing.

“You’re telling me that we were gone for five years and now CW shows are a source of tension between the United States and Mexico and they built an entire wall about it,” Sam says, raising his eyebrows.

Sam is dubious as hell about this new foolishness—he’s starting to feel a lot more sympathetic towards Steve’s frustration with all the impenetrable pop culture references people expected him to grasp—but Bucky visibly perks up at the mention of Supernatural. “Oh, how did that go? Is Destiel canon yet?” Bucky asks.

“No,” Steve responds at the same time that Natasha replies, “Si.” Then they both cackle wildly, as if this is some seriously comedic shit, and honestly, Sam’s getting a little annoyed with all their inside jokes. He sneaks a look over at Bucky to see how he’s responding to all this, and Sam is relieved to feel slightly less like an asshole when he sees that Bucky doesn’t look any more charmed by Steve and Natasha’s Abbott and Costello routine than Sam feels.

“OK,” Sam says slowly, really drawing the word out. “So I guess if I want to understand all of that”—here, Sam gestures broadly at Steve and Natasha, attempting to convey his incredulity at their unnecessary dramatics—“that you just did, and apparently also current U.S. foreign policy, I’m going to have to watch a TV show on the CW.”

“It’s fifteen seasons, it makes for great depression watching,” says Natasha, shrugging. Bucky nods in agreement. “And Steve was pretty genuinely moved by the relationship between the two brothers.”

Steve confirms this with a solemn nod. “They were brothers, but they were also best friends.”

“Anyway it was better than a lot of the junk we watched while you were gone,” Natasha continues. “Half the time Steve and I spent in bed together we were just binge watching trash tv and getting overly invested in the love lives of twenty-five year olds pretending to be teenagers pretending to be detectives.”

Bucky shoots Sam a significant glance at this, somehow communicating half the time they spent in bed together? with the tense raising of his eyebrows alone, and says, “Sam and I will watch Supernatural together. I’ll get him caught up.”

And yeah, maybe fifteen seasons sounds like an awful lot of time to commit to spite-watching a television show with Bucky just to handle how weird he feels about Steve and Natasha’s whole new bed sharing thing together, but then Bucky stretches his arms over his head and reveals a pale sliver of belly, little trail of hair drawing Sam’s eyes pleasingly downward.

“Yeah, all right,” Sam says. After all, this Supernatural show does sound pretty important to this sketchy new future Sam didn’t ask to find himself in.

Bucky turns to Steve. “So when do you and Natalia have to head out?”

“Probably in a week or two. We want to make sure everything’s settled here before we head out.”

“A week or two, Steve, really? You think Sam’s going to be ready to be Captain America in a week or two,” Bucky says flatly.

Sam thinks Bucky sort of has a point, but out of loyalty to Steve and his own sense of competence he keeps his mouth shut.

Steve’s shoulders hunch defensively. “It’s going to be fine, you’re going to do a great job supporting Sam.”

“I shouldn’t have to support Sam, Steve—”

“Bucky, c’mon, you know I wouldn’t have—”

“Not even a supersoldier, Steve—”

“Sam doesn’t have to be—”

Natasha is listening to this argument with a fond look on her face, like she actually missed this shit while they were gone.

“OK, listen,” Sam interrupts before Steve and Bucky get too distracted by their bullshit. “The Captain America thing is huge, yeah. But I feel like maybe we also need to be concerned about the world’s population suddenly doubling instantaneously? That’s kind of a big deal.”

“Oh!” Steve lights up. “Natasha’s had a plan set up for that since like a week after you guys disappeared. She’s spent the last five years preparing for every contingency, basically every scientific or magical possibility that might bring you guys back. In fact, phase one has already started, getting lines of communication open to reconnect families and arranging emergency housing.”

Steve beams down at Natasha, and then—Sam can’t even fucking believe this—Natasha actually blushes in response. Steve and Natasha are, respectively, the most repressed and tightly controlled people Sam knows, and now they’re acting like emotionally healthy people who express their feelings in front of other people? Sam is suspicious as hell, and when he looks over at Bucky, Bucky is bug-eyed, looking frantically and significantly at Sam with that unmistakable are you seeing this too, what the fuck expression on his face. Sam hates the fact that things are so weird now that he’s bonding with Bucky over this.

“Pepper Potts is coordinating everything through the Avengers Foundation,” Natasha says. “She needs something to do right now, and she’s basically the most frighteningly efficient person I know, so. Your only job right now is figuring out how to work together without killing each other.”

Natasha eyes them both a bit skeptically, and Sam is instantly offended at this implied slight to his professionalism.

“Bucky and I are going to do great,” Sam says. “We are definitely going to be absolutely fine at working together.” He shoots Bucky a hard look, daring him to disagree.

“Absolutely fine,” Bucky repeats dutifully, then hesitates. “You’re sure, though, right, Sam? You really want to do the Captain America thing?”

“Definitely,” Sam confirms. Bucky searches his eyes for a moment, then nods, apparently satisfied with whatever he finds.

“Great!” Natasha says with a pleased smile, and shares a satisfied look with Steve.

“Anyway,” Sam says, changing the subject, before they can figure out Sam has no fucking clue how to be Captain America and definitely doesn’t feel certain about working with Bucky Barnes. “What else did we miss while we were gone? How did Brexit go?”

“Oh, God,” Steve says.

***

The next morning, Sam walks down to the cabin’s kitchen for breakfast and finds a disaster.

“Is this a murder board?” he asks, aghast.

The wall next to the kitchen table is absolutely covered in papers that have been hastily pinned up, and there are at least eleven different colors of string stretched together in a complicated web over top of them, forming a bizarre rainbow of crazy. Where did Bucky even find that many different colors of string in the middle of the night? Did he break into a Joann Fabrics?

The kitchen table is littered with papers as well, and Sam counts six different green tea bags sitting on a napkin next to Bucky’s mug. “Have you been up all night?”

“No! And yes!” Bucky answers, his eyes red rimmed and wild, looking simultaneously exhausted and absolutely frantic with energy. He cards his fingers through his hair in frustration. “Do you know how much money Stark was spending on the Avengers Initiative after you guys blew up SHIELD? The litigation team! The insurance premiums! The property damage settlements! Weapons and technology! Research and development! Sam, the cost was astronomical!”

“Wait, this is all financial stuff? I thought this was more of, like, a traditional murder board situation here.” Sam pauses, then struck with sudden uncertainty, he asks, “Is financial stuff part of Captain America stuff?”

“Well, I mean, kind of, yeah,” Bucky responds. He stands up and restlessly paces the tiny kitchen. “You didn’t think you were going to just run off with the shield and, like, live off the kindness of strangers or something, did you?”

“Obviously, no,” Sam says, offended. Actually, though—not that Sam is going to admit it—Sam hasn’t had a real job in so long that he sort of forgot that this was going to be an issue. “Wait, did you get all this stuff by hacking Stark Industries?”

“Well, yeah,” says Bucky, defensive now. “I didn’t want to be rude and ask Ms. Potts in the middle of the night. Also I killed her daughter’s grandparents.”

Sam considers this for a moment, then shrugs. “Yeah, that’s fair,” he says. “So what about the funding we had before? Is that gone?”

“It’s not gone, but there’s no way the money in Steve’s and my bank account will be enough.”

“Wait, you and Steve share a bank account?” Sam asks, raising his eyebrows.

Bucky’s forehead wrinkles in confusion. “Well, yeah, of course. Why would Steve and I need separate bank accounts?” he asks, looking puzzled.

“Why would you...” Sam repeats faintly. “OK. Moving on from that codependent nonsense, you and Steve were the ones funding us while we were on the run? Steve never said.”

“Well, I mean, I did steal a bunch of money from HYDRA, and Steve had some backpay saved up. But there’s no way Steve and I have Captain America money. Stark barely had Captain America money. Sam, he was spending down his entire fortune on the Avengers Initiative. Did you guys know he was doing that?”

Sam closes his eyes, shaking off the waves of guilt and grief he felt at the mention of Tony’s generosity. “No, I didn’t,” he says quietly.

“Yeah,” Bucky says grimly. “It’s bad. Like, really, really bad. You aren’t an international fugitive anymore. If you want to be Captain America, you won’t be able to just save people, destroy a few buildings, then dash off to the next country before the police catch up to you. You have to actually deal with the fallout afterward. And, most importantly, and I cannot stress this enough, you need actual income. Was Stark seriously the only one of you with a real job?”

“I mean, yeah?”

“Of course he was,” Bucky says, deflating and leaning back against the counter with a thud. “God, you’re all idiots. I went off to war in the 1940s and I left one Steve back at home. Then I fell off a train, woke up seventy years later, and found out that Steve managed to find an entire team full of Steves, and each one of you is just as beautiful and heroic and stupid and utterly impractical as he is.” Bucky raises his metal hand to massage his temples, apparently fighting a headache so powerful that even his serum-enhanced regular arm isn’t strong enough to deal with it.

Sam carefully ignores Bucky’s insinuation that he finds Sam beautiful and heroic. Instead he pours Bucky a glass of water and slides it over to him. “OK, so what do we do?”

“Well, you’re not going to like it.”

“I’m not, huh? Just tell me.”

“We have to rebuild SHIELD,” Bucky states firmly. “We have to get in touch with Nick Fury.”

“Absolutely not,” Sam says.

“Sam, it’s the only reasonable choice. We can’t afford to privately fund your career as a superhero, OK? I mean, the insurance? The legal team? I’ve drafted fifteen different budgets and there’s no way we can get this off the ground. But if we rebuild SHIELD, there’ll be funding and qualified immunity. You won’t even have to work directly for SHIELD. You could be an independent contractor.”

“I don’t like this.”

“I know. But it’s the only way.”

“Is Fury even going to listen to us, though?” Sam asks skeptically. “Like, will he even hire you? You shot him, like, five times.”

Bucky grimaces. “Yeah, that wasn’t great. But listen, the man’s probably been waiting for this moment for years. If he can get Steve and Natalia’s public support behind SHIELD 2.0? He’ll seize the chance.”

“Shit,” Sam says.

***

When Steve and Natasha come downstairs, sleepy and happy looking, casually emerging from the same bedroom that Sam knows only has one queen size bed, like bed sharing is just a regular part of their regular lives now, Bucky introduces them to the financial murder board.

“So if you really want to do this, if you want Sam to be Captain America, we need to rebuild SHIELD,” Bucky concludes.

“SHIELD?” Natasha perks up. “We’re getting the old gang back together?”

“Natasha, like, 40% of the old gang were secret Nazis,” Steve says reproachfully. “And more importantly, Nick Fury didn’t notice they were secret Nazis.”

“He definitely started to suspect something was wrong near the end there, though,” says Natasha.

“Well, he’s our best shot at getting government funding, so unless you want to ask Tony Stark’s grieving widow for money, I think this is the best we can do.” Bucky turns to Natasha. “Natalia, you know how to get in touch with him, right?” he asks.

“I do. Pepper sent out working satellite phones via courier last night. They should have arrived by this morning. I’ll give him a call,” Natasha says. “He’s going to love this.”

“Your mom should have gotten a phone too, Sam,” Steve says. “I’ll text you her number so you can give her a call.”

“Thanks, man,” Sam says, relieved. While Steve works on sending Sam his mom’s contact info—does Steve’s phone have a holographic display? Does Old Man Steve know how to work a phone with a holographic display?—Sam asks Bucky, “How did you even pull all these records together, by the way? Are you like a secret accountant?”

“Bucky worked as an actuary before the war,” Steve responds absently, thumbing at some buttons on his phone screen. “He was getting his degree in mathematics before he dropped out to enlist.”

“An actuary?” Natasha asks thoughtfully. “I can see that. That actually makes a lot of sense.”

“It paid the bills,” Bucky allows.

When Sam receives Steve’s text with his mom’s contact info, he steps outside for a bit of privacy. Sam watches Steve and Natasha leaning together through the sliding glass window as he waits for his mom to answer the phone. Sam feels a pit growing deep in his belly, a black hole that’s been sucking in everything Sam could have lived and built and experienced in the past five years, leaving him empty and lonely and lost, missing parts of himself that he should have been gaining. Inside, Bucky is standing alone in front of murder board, his shoulders tense, while Steve and Natasha talk and smile and touch each other’s forearms.

“Sam? Sam, baby, are you OK?”

“Mom!” Sam exclaims. “Mom, I’m OK. I’m OK.”

“Thank God,” she says in relief. “We’re OK too. Sarah and Michelle, they’ve been living in my apartment. Michelle’s eleven years old now, Sam. We missed five years of her life. How did this happen?”

And Sam tells her how it happened. He tells her about the battle, and then the second battle, and then realizing that he had died and was resurrected by magical stones. He tells her about Bucky Barnes, standing there in disgruntled disbelief when Steve and Natasha explained that they’d woken up five years into the future, his only reaction to state flatly, “I was told that this wouldn’t happen to me again.”

When he tells her that Steve’s asked him to be the new Captain America, Sam’s mom gasps in surprise. “Captain America? Sam, are you sure?”

“Yeah, Mom. I am sure. I think I could really do some good,” Sam says softly.

“Do you have good people around you? Do you have people who will take care of you?”

Sam thinks of Steve and Natasha leaving for space in a few weeks, moving on to bigger and more complicated catastrophes, superheroes who’ve grown so powerful and competent and amazing that they’re needed elsewhere, on worlds larger than their own. And then he thinks of Bucky Barnes staying up all night to do superhero math so Sam can be Captain America, even though Bucky is apparently pissed that Steve chose Sam for the honor instead of him.

“Yeah,” Sam says. “I have people who will take care of me.”

***

That evening, Sam and Bucky sit at the table and watch Steve and Natasha put together the most disgusting struggle dinner Sam has ever seen. Steve is piling gross stacks of bologna onto bread and seems to think condiments are optional, while Natasha has dumped a bag of iceberg lettuce into a bowl and poured an entire bottle of ranch dressing on top of it. This, she insists, is a “salad.” Steve and Natasha move expertly around each other in the kitchen like they’re performing a choreographed dance, casually touching each other’s shoulders and hips as they slide past each other. Obviously they’ve created this sort of repulsive dinner situation more than once. What have these two been eating for the last five years? Sam can’t resist glancing up at Bucky to catch a look of horror on Bucky’s face, his nose scrunched up in disgust.

When Steve sets their plates of dry bologna sandwiches and the soggy bowl of lettuce onto the table onto the table, Bucky suddenly announces that he’s vegan.

“You are?” Steve asks suspiciously. “Since when?”

Sensing an opportunity, Sam rushes to support Bucky’s desperate ploy to avoid this dinner. “Bucky and I are both vegan, actually. It’s new.”

“Really,” Natasha says. “You and Bucky do stuff together now. Stuff like going vegan.”

“Uh huh,” Sam says staunchly.

The best way to handle Natasha is just to brazen it out. She’ll suspect that you’re lying, but she won’t actually say anything until she has proof. Unfortunately, she’ll stoop to any and all means—however invasive or conniving—to catch you out. Sam guesses he and Bucky are both vegan forever now.

“Go ahead and eat your dinner,” Bucky says. “I’ll just make Sam and me something while you guys eat.”

While Steve and Natasha eat and trade inside jokes and talk about a bunch of political events Sam does not understand—did Michigan actually successfully secede from the Union?—Sam watches in astonishment as Bucky prepares the most incredible looking burrito bowls Sam’s ever seen in his life. In like twenty minutes, the dude whips up some chipotle lime black beans, diced tomatoes, corn, fajita veggies, and quinoa, then proceeds to make pineapple mango salsa from scratch using a mortar and pestle. Where did Bucky even get these ingredients? The last time Sam checked, the fridge was almost empty.

Bucky looks relaxed and capable, and Sam watches the muscles in Bucky’s back shift and move as he chops and grinds and sautés. Bucky’s got a kitchen towel slung casually over his shoulder, and a few strands of hair at his temples curl a bit in the steam coming off the stove top.

“So what else did y’all get up to in the last five years?” Sam asks.

“Oh! Should we tell them about the—” Natasha begins, her eyes lighting up.

“You mean the dude with the—”

“With the plastic fangs!” Natasha finishes, wheezing with laughter. “What was that guy’s name? Oh, God—”

“—Baron Blood!” they exclaim in unison, cackling.

Sam can’t help but feel a little annoyed by how easily Steve and Natasha finish each other’s sentences. Sam knows, intellectually, that Steve and Natasha lived each one of the five years that went by in seconds for him and Bucky. He knows that Steve and Natasha have always been close and that it makes sense for them to, like, trauma bond after everything they’ve gone through together. But he’s never felt so left out by his own best friends before. He looks over at Bucky, relieved when he sees his own feelings of frustration and isolation mirrored on Bucky’s face.

“Wait, you fought the Bloody Baron from Harry Potter?” Bucky asks.

“No, it was Baron Blood, not the Bloody Baron.”

“Was the guy an actual baron, or were his parents just rich and tacky? Was his first name Baron?” Sam asks, fascinated despite himself.

“I think it was, like, a self-appointed title?” Natasha says. “I don’t think he was a real baron. Anyway, Steve decapitated him with his shield.”

“He was a Nazi vampire,” Steve explains.

“Like an actual vampire? Are we fighting actual vampires now?” Sam asks.

“I think so,” Natasha says doubtfully. “Steve had to soak his shield in holy water blessed by the pope first. It was a whole thing.”

“Wait, are you guys talking about Todd?” Bucky asks. “Brown hair, red eyes, ranted a lot about what an important superpower echolocation was?”

“Yes! Did you know this guy?” Steve asks.

“Eh, we weren’t close or anything. But there were some weird ass HYDRA experiments in the eighties and nineties. Most people these days think the Satanic Panic was a myth, but actually HYDRA really did have agents trying to indoctrinate daycare kids into supernatural cults. Todd was one of the evil brainwashed HYDRA daycare kids, volunteered to get some really hinky stuff done to him to try to create a master race of genetically pure vampires. Oh, and he was super obsessed with you, Steve.”

“Oh, God, was he ever,” Natasha says. “Let me tell you what he did when he got Steve tied up in his gross dungeon—”

***

While Natasha says goodbye to Bucky, squeezing Bucky and muttering something in Russian in Bucky’s ear, Sam is startled to feel Steve grab him tightly and pull him into an aggressive hug. Sam takes a minute to breathe in Steve’s familiar, comforting smell—still wearing Bay Rum even after all this time—and rests his chin on Steve’s strong shoulder.

“We love you,” Steve says, then hands him off to Natasha.

Natasha gives him a sweet kiss on the mouth. “We’ll miss you,” she says.

When Steve and Natasha disappear into the distance, Sam looks over at Bucky. “We, we, we,” Bucky says wryly.

***

Six weeks later, Sam and Bucky have formed a pretty solid partnership. They’re still living in one of the cabins on Tony Stark’s property in upstate New York for now, but they’re scheduled to report for duty at the new SHIELD headquarters in New York City on Monday.

Steve and Natasha are coming back to Earth this evening, scheduled for security briefings and press events promoting the resurrection of SHIELD, promising the public that Sam is going to make a great Captain America and that there definitely aren’t any more secret Nazis in the upper echelons of power at SHIELD.

As far as Sam can tell, Bucky’s still pretty pissed at Steve for asking Sam to be Captain America instead of him, but fortunately that grudge doesn’t seem to be carrying over to Sam. Instead, Bucky is perfectly pleasant and helpful as hell, which is pretty terrific considering the fact that Sam could use all the help he can get right now. Learning how to use the shield—especially while flying—is complicated as fuck and Sam probably would have lost patience pretty quickly without Bucky reassuring him that Steve was shit at math and definitely was not doing trigonometric calculations in his head while he fought.

“Does Steve seem like the kind of guy who’s doing a lot of thinking while he’s fighting? No, this is all practice and muscle memory,” says Bucky, clapping Sam’s shoulder. “C’mon, Steve and Natalia are scheduled to get here in like an hour. Let’s take showers and get ready to meet them for dinner.”

It’s humid as fuck outside and Bucky’s shirt is drenched in sweat, clinging so tightly to his skin that Sam can count each one of his abdominal muscles individually. Bucky raises a water bottle to his mouth and takes a long pull. Sam watches a drip of sweat slide down Bucky’s throat.

“Yeah, good plan,” Sam says. A cool shower sounds really refreshing right now.

***

When they meet Steve and Natasha for dinner, Sam nearly forgets that he and Bucky are pretending to be vegan until Bucky orders a wheatberry salad and then kicks Sam underneath the table. Sam grimaces and reaches down to rub his shin, looking regretfully at the shiny picture of the giant burger and fries that Steve ordered on his menu.

“I’ll have the wheatberry salad too,” Sam says, trying not to sound too sad about it.

Steve and Natasha are bursting with stories about space. They’re happy and full of excitement, and if anything, they’re somehow even closer than when they left. They have very strong feelings about Kree politics, and they tell a lot of stories about famous people from space that Sam does not know. They touch each other constantly.

The wheatberry salad is amazing.

“So what else happened while we were gone?” Bucky asks, mercifully changing the subject from the boring Kree legislative process. “How did the last season of Game of Thrones go?”

“Oh, it was incredible,” Natasha raves, her eyes lighting up. “David Benioff and D. B. Weiss were taken in the Snap, so they had to hire this fantasy author named Brandon Sanderson to write it. Everyone was really skeptical about how it would go—especially with half of the cast gone—but he did an amazing job. It’s now considered one of the strongest finales of any show in history.”

“You know, I never could get into Game of Thrones,” Sam remarks. “All those big-budget fantasy dynastic political dramas are just so unrealistic.”

“See, that’s what Shuri said when I told her I was watching it to research living in a monarchy after I moved to Wakanda,” Bucky says. “But then her secret illegitimate cousin traveled from across the sea to claim her brother’s throne in a trial by combat. And then her supposedly slain brother dramatically returned from the dead with the help of a magical herb in order to defeat the usurper in battle, so.” Bucky lifts his shoulders and raises his hands in a sort of smug, so who turned out to be right there? kind of shrug.

“Yeah, OK,” Sam concedes, tipping his head to acknowledge the point.

“It’s crazy that we’ll never know how much better it could have been with Benioff and Weiss at the helm, though,” Steve says, and Sam’s stomach drops a bit as he’s hit by another wave of wrongness, that same ears-ringing, tunnel-vision-forming wrongness he’s been feeling since he dramatically returned from the dead. Because what’s the deal with Steve being so literate in pop culture that he not only watches hit prestige dramas but actually knows the names of the writers? To Sam, it was just a few weeks ago that Steve declared Star Trek: The Next Generation “a bit too flashy” for his taste.

“Hey, did George R. R. Martin ever finish the books?” Bucky asks hopefully.

“No, he died,” Steve says.

***

Later that night, after Steve and Natasha have conspicuously gone to bed together, Bucky grabs Sam’s hand, puts a finger to his lips, quirks an eyebrow, and leads Sam silently into a small closet on the first floor of the house. The closet is full of thick winter coats that push Sam and Bucky right up against a wall, their bodies pressed tightly together. Bucky turns on the flashlight app from his phone to give them some light.

“What are we doing in here?” Sam whispers.

“It’s the only place in the house where Steve won’t be able to hear us. Just keep your voice down,” Bucky explains.

“Oh, shit. We’re not plotting to overthrow SHIELD again, are we?”

“No!” Bucky says. “It’s been like six weeks. HYDRA won’t have a secret majority interest in SHIELD for another twenty years at least. Look, have you noticed how Steve and Natalia are, like, obsessed with each other now?”

“Yes! What is with that? I thought I was Steve’s best friend!” Sam hisses.

“Well, you and Steve are definitely close friends,” Bucky says skeptically. “But best friendship is an exclusive relationship. It’s the closest and most intimate connection you can have with someone. And you can only have one of them. Your best friend is someone you would kill for, someone that you would die for, someone you would come back from seventy years of brainwashing for. Someone you would drop the very symbol of everything you believe in for. So, I think we can all agree that I was Steve’s best friend.”

Bucky looks pretty self-satisfied after that whole speech.

“I don’t think we can all agree that you were Steve’s best friend,” Sam says, tilting his head skeptically.

“Well, I was, but the point is that I don’t think I am anymore. I think Natalia might be Steve’s best friend now,” Bucky whispers, irritated.

“I know! I hate it,” Sam confesses. “Steve and Nat and I used to all be best friends. Now they have all these inside jokes and I feel left out all the time.”

“Again, Sam, you can’t have two best friends,” Bucky corrects. “Anyway, I know we haven’t always gotten along in the past, and maybe some of us have made mistakes like kicking people off helicarriers or wrecking their cars, but I think if we want Steve back, we might be able to work together on this.”

“I’m listening,” Sam says.

“OK, so I think we need to try to make them jealous.”

“I don’t think Nat gets jealous. Does Steve get jealous?” Sam says doubtfully.

“Oh, Steve gets jealous,” Bucky confirms. “Did you know that like five seconds after I admitted that I remembered growing up with Steve, he immediately started getting passive aggressive about some redhead named Dot that I spent three dollars on back in 1937? It was like the very first thing he brought up.”

“Oh, God, was Dot short for Dolores?” Sam asks. “Steve complained about her all the time while we were out searching for you.”

“That was her!” Bucky says. “Steve was so jealous of Dolores. Anyway, I think if we team up, we can convince Steve that we’re best friends now. Then he’ll get jealous and remember how much more important we are to him than Natalia.”

Sam considers this carefully. He’s never been pressed so close to Bucky before, their faces only inches away from one another. From this distance Sam can see how long and thick Bucky’s eyelashes are. He can smell the pleasant scents of Bucky’s clean sweat and spicy aftershave.

He wants to press his thumb into the cleft in Bucky’s chin.

“Yeah, that sounds like a great idea,” Sam hears himself say.

“Great!”

***

The next day, while Steve and Natasha are busy in meetings with Rhodey and Fury, Sam moves into his new apartment in Brooklyn. It’s not actually so much his new apartment so much as it is Steve’s old apartment, but apparently Steve doesn’t need it anymore since he’s spending so much time out in space with Natasha and he “can always just stay with Nat while I’m in town, it’s no trouble, Sam, Natasha and I are used to bunking together.”

Sam actually has a lot of questions about how used to bunking together Steve and Natasha are.

Sam’s unpacking his clothes when he hears the doorbell ring. His spine stiffens and his fingers twitch for a weapon. Steve and Natasha are both scheduled to be out for hours still, and Steve’s a pretty private guy. Sam doubts many people know about his apartment.

He grabs a gun from his safe, loads it, and walks silently toward the front door.

“Sam, I know you’re in there.”

The muffled voice on the other side of the door is thankfully familiar. Sam feels the tension in his chest release and he lowers his gun. It’s just Bucky.

Unfortunately, all that tension in Sam’s chest immediately returns when Sam opens the door to discover that Bucky is, for some reason, carrying a duffel bag and surrounded by cardboard boxes. Sam’s stomach sinks.

“What the fuck, Sam?” Bucky complains, shoving past him into the entryway and setting down his bag. “You didn’t even look through the peephole to make sure no one was holding me at gunpoint? If we’re going to live together you’re going to have to be a lot more careful about security. I have a lot of enemies.”

“I’m sorry, if we’re going to live together?” Sam repeats, horrified. He puts the safety back on his gun and sets it down onto the counter.

Bucky rolls his eyes. “Um, yes? Remember our whole fake-best-friends plan? You literally just agreed to it last night. Here, help me with these boxes.”

Bucky goes back into the hallway, where he bends over to lift a box labeled “pots and pans,” his skinny jeans stretching obscenely over his ass and thighs.

“Yeah, OK,” Sam says, and follows him out into the hallway.

***

“OK, so, explain this to me again: why does being fake best friends mean that we have to be actual roommates?” Sam asks later, passing Bucky a beer.

They’re sitting on Sam’s couch now, surrounded by fifteen boxes labeled, variously: “favorite grenade launchers,” “crossbows,” “guns (1 of 10),” “scopes and silencers,” “marijuana,” and “warm sweaters.”

“Is this beer vegan?” Bucky asks, checking the label. “Hold on, I’m gonna need to look this up.”

“Wait, are you actually vegan?” Sam asks, watching in astonishment as Bucky pulls up an app on his phone, types in the name of the beer Steve left in the fridge, frowns, and then gets up to put the beer back into the fridge. “I thought we were just pretending to be vegan to avoid Steve’s bologna sandwiches and that gross salad.”

“We were! But then I looked it up afterward to make sure I could pull this off in front of Natalia and I actually read a lot of really harrowing and kind of horrifying stuff about animal agriculture,” Bucky says, grimacing. “Anyway, if we want Steve and Natalia to believe that we’re best friends, we’re going to have to live together. Steve and I always lived together, and Steve moved in with you like five seconds after he met you.”

“To be fair to Steve, he did make it two very sad years living alone in the most depressing apartment I have ever seen, and he didn’t move in with me until you shot a man through his walls,” Sam says.

“That was just an excuse,” Bucky says, waving his hand airily. “Steve and I spent the entire winter of 1937 living in an uninsulated attic apartment with a broken window. If Steve didn’t want to live with you, he would have just slapped some duct tape over those bullet holes and gotten an extra blanket.”

Sam considers this and then reluctantly concedes the point. He’s seen Steve look unnervingly comfortable in some pretty horrific living situations over the past couple of years.

“All right, fine. But do we really need every gun ever made in our living room? I feel like surrounding yourself with this amount of weaponry has got to be an unhealthy coping strategy.”

Sam feels pretty confident about this—he’d been like three-quarters of the way through his Master’s coursework to become a licensed professional counselor when Steve Rogers bulldozed his way into his life.

“And what are we going to do if we need to take down SHIELD again, Sam?” Bucky demands. “How much do we really trust Nick Fury? Anyway, we aren’t storing these in the living room, Sam, that would be tacky.”

“Uh huh,” Sam says, his stomach sinking. “And where are we storing them?” He has a bad feeling about this.

“In the spare bedroom, of course.”

“What spare bedroom.”

“The spare bedroom-slash-armory! We only really need one bedroom, Sam. Steve and I always shared a bedroom.”

“Did you,” Sam says. “And I suppose you shared a bed too.”

“Of course we did. Why would Steve and I need separate beds? We were best friends.”

Bucky gives Sam an odd look, like he thinks Sam in the one being strange about this. As if indefinitely sharing a bed is just normal best friend stuff. Sam wants to believe that this is some kind of Depression era, growing-up-in-poverty sort of thing, but honestly Steve and Bucky are just so intensely weird about each other that Sam is pretty sure that it’s actually a Steve-and-Bucky thing.

Sam thinks about sharing a bed with Bucky every night. He wonders if Bucky wears a shirt to bed, or if Bucky slides into bed bare-chested, wearing only a pair of shorts or maybe even just some tightly fitted boxer briefs.

“All right,” Sam says, sighing.

***

Later that night, when they’re lying in bed catching up on Supernatural—he has got to know how this show somehow became relevant to international geopolitics—Bucky leans over to pull a huge bag of weed out of the nightstand. Then he slowly, carefully rolls the fattest joint Sam has ever seen. It’s somehow absolutely massive but still structurally sound and perfectly balanced. Sam puts the show on pause because he has a lot of questions about this.

“Where did you learn how to do that? Does marijuana even work on you?” Sam asks. “Did you learn how to do this as part of that whole Eat Pray Love thing you did while Steve and I were looking for you?”

“What? No. Steve taught me how to do this back in the thirties.”

“Excuse me, Steve Rogers taught you how to roll a joint in the thirties? Steve ‘Captain America’ Rogers knows how to roll a joint?” Sam asks, scandalized.

“Yes? I didn’t have any other friends named Steve—actually, Steve was always my only friend,” Bucky says offhandedly. “Anyway, Stevie started rolling his own asthma cigarettes when he was like twelve, had those perfect long-fingered artist hands even when he was little. Then when he started art school he started bringing home marijuana after class. He’d roll us a joint and we’d sit out on the fire escape and smoke before bed every night.”

“Steve Rogers,” Sam says, wonderingly. “What a little punk.”

“Right? I’m always saying that but no one ever believes me. Here,” Bucky says, passing the joint over to Sam. Sam hesitates for a moment—he hasn’t smoked pot since before he joined the Air Force—but then he gives a mental shrug, figuring that SHIELD probably isn’t going to drug test him. Yeah, Nick Fury is kind of a dick, but Sam doubts that he’d give a shit about a little recreational marijuana use.

Sam feels a little thrill when he raises Bucky’s joint to his lips, the paper still slightly damp from Bucky’s saliva. He seals his mouth around the end of the joint and sucks in deeply, sharing this wet vicarious kiss with Bucky, who watches Sam’s mouth with interest. Sam feels the sharp burn in his lungs as he holds in the smoke, then coughs violently when he exhales, passing the joint back to Bucky.

“Damn,” he says. “This stuff still works for you?”

“Yep,” Bucky says. “HYDRA wanted to make sure they’d still be able to drug the shit out of me when they were experimenting with their own version of the serum, so unlike some reckless assholes who actually volunteered to get the bona fide serum, I can still get stoned. Which is I guess some small consolation for spending seventy years on some pretty intense amphetamines and weird psychosis-inducing experimental drug cocktails.”

“Yikes. Well, that makes sense, I guess,” Sam says. “Sorry.”

“It’s fine.” Bucky pauses. “Well, it’s not fine fine. But I’m fine. Now.”

“I’m glad,” Sam says, and he realizes he means it.

***

The first time Sam fucks up as Captain America, he finds out the answer to a great personal mystery: why Steve Rogers was considered “the greatest tactician in American military history.”

It’s not because Steve is actually a great tactician—in fact, Steve is an instinctive fighter, brash and brave and most of all impulsive.

Apparently, the real reason Steve was considered the greatest tactician in American military history is because Peggy Carter was the greatest tactician in American military history, and Bucky Barnes was the greatest bullshitter in American military history.

When Maria Hill orders them to Fury’s office for debriefing after that disastrous mission, Bucky grabs Sam’s arm and digs his nails into the tender skin on the underside of Sam’s forearm.

“Whatever you do, do not say anything,” Bucky hisses. “Just shut the fuck up, and let me handle this. I mean it.”

“I need to take responsibility for this, Bucky. Steve would take responsibility for this.”

“Steve would absolutely not take responsibility for this,” Bucky states firmly. “Trust me, I’ve been bailing that little punk out of trouble for one hundred years. Do not say anything.”

When they get to Fury’s office, Sam witnesses an actual miracle. Fury begins by asking them a series of terse questions in a clipped tone that slowly grows more and more agreeable as Bucky’s answers—calm, thoughtful, and pleasant—make Sam’s actions sound both necessary and entirely reasonable. The tone shifts from an interrogation to a more customary debrief, and by the end Fury’s countenance is less thunderous and more just his sort of standard expression of grim disapproval.

The truly bewildering part is that Bucky’s explanations for Sam’s behavior are so convincing that Sam himself is now questioning whether he even fucked up at all. Nothing Bucky says is a lie, and Sam’s not even sure he would characterize anything as misleading, but nevertheless Sam slowly moves from the distinct impression that both he and Fury considered the mission a failure, to the cautious notion that maybe he’d actually made the best of a bad job after all.

When Fury dismisses them, he offers them a gruff, “Excellent work, gentlemen,” and then he actually claps Sam on the shoulder as Sam walks out the door.

What the fuck.

***

“Excuse me, are you some kind of hypnotist or sorcerer?” Sam hisses when they return to their office. “What the fuck was all that?”

“Should we get Thai food for lunch? I’m thinking pad see ew,” Bucky muses, scrolling through the menu on his phone. “What about you?”

“Get me the tofu pad thai,” Sam says. It turns out Bucky wasn’t wrong about the environmental impact of animal agriculture—that’s actually some deeply sobering shit, and Sam feels like he should probably try to be a good role model now that he’s Captain America. “Seriously, though, I did fuck up that mission, right? I wasn’t imagining that?”

Bucky sighs. “Sam, you made the right call. Maybe Fury wouldn’t have agreed immediately, but I didn’t spend my entire life justifying Steve’s aggressive self-sacrificing bullshit to people in positions of authority for no reason. Steve knew when to step up and do what was right, sure, but he also knew when to shut up and let me do the talking afterward.”

Everything about Steve’s career in the Army makes so much more sense now.

“Thanks, man,” Sam says, awkwardly. He hesitates a moment, then asks, “You really think Steve would have made the same decision today?”

Bucky gives Sam a long, considering look. His gaze is solemn and sympathetic, and his lips press together in a sad smile. “Sam, you’ve got to stop comparing yourself to Steve.”

***

Sam misses a lot about Steve, but he very specifically does not miss running with Steve. That’s because Steve is an asshole, and while Sam may enjoy the view from behind when Steve laps him for the fiftieth time, he definitely does not feel like Steve deserves to act as smug about it as he does when Steve is quite famously the recipient of performance enhancing drugs.

Sam and Bucky are running their usual route in Prospect Park, feet pounding together in rhythm as they listen to the dope ass Carly Rae Jepsen playlist Bucky made for them on their headphones. It turns out that Sam’s been putting up with a lot of shit from Steve that wasn’t actually necessary, because despite being a full year older than Steve—or is it four years younger, now, after the Snap?—Bucky has managed to develop some pretty cool taste in music. More importantly, Bucky seems mercifully content to run at a speed that is completely normal for unenhanced people who are still in fantastic shape and also have great legs.

Speaking of great legs, Sam’s having kind of a hard time handling the length of Bucky’s running shorts today. Bucky’s legs are long and strong, lightly muscled and flexing attractively as his steady stride eats up the pavement, and his thighs—

“So how come Steve won’t run like a regular person?” Sam asks, reluctantly dragging his gaze away from those lean, golden thighs.

“Did he try to give you some shit about how he has to run that fast to stay in shape as a supersoldier?” scoffs Bucky. “No, Steve runs that fast because Steve has anger issues and a high sex drive. Otherwise he’d be starting fights and jerking off four times a day.”

Sam’s breath catches a bit in his chest and he tries very hard not to stumble at that. “Oh?” Sam asks, trying to sound casual. “And you? You’re not jerking off four times a day?”

“Living with you, sweetheart?” Bucky says with a wink. “Of course I am.”

***

This isn’t actually Sam’s first time living with a Russian assassin, because he spent two years on the run with Natasha, so he’s used to a lot of weird ass habits. But one thing that confounds the shit out of him is why Bucky insists on navigating Brooklyn solely through a maze of gross alleyways that smell absolutely foul.

Steve and Natasha are finally home from their peacekeeping or worldbuilding or diplomatic journey through the stars—whatever the hell they’ve been doing for the past few months—and Sam and Bucky are on their way to meet them at a café for lunch.

“Man, are you sure we’re not going in circles? I could swear we’ve passed that blue dumpster at least twice already. Is this some kind of spy thing where we’re doubling back to lose a tail or something?” Sam asks.

“No. And this blue dumpster is the blue dumpster behind the hipster café with the oat milk latte that you hate, the one with too much cinnamon,” Bucky explains patiently. “The other two blue dumpsters are behind the artisanal pickle shop and the thrift store where the secondhand clothes actually cost more than they do when you buy them new.”

“Right,” Sam says with a heavy sigh. Then he perks up when he sees their favorite stray cat. “Oh, hey, it’s Steve the cat!”

“Aw! Hi, Steve!” Bucky coos. He reaches into his pocket to toss a few treats toward the skinny, ill-tempered cat, who eyes them suspiciously before hissing viciously, his scraggly hackles raising. Steve the cat ignores their treats, presumably offended by their insulting attempts at charity, and Sam and Bucky positively melt at this pointless and self-destructive display of spitefulness.

“He’s so cute!” Bucky says.

“I love him so much,” Sam agrees. “C’mon, let’s leave the treats here and keep going. Maybe he’ll eat them after we leave.”

“We should stop at the pet store on the way home and pick up a different brand. Maybe Steve has allergies,” Bucky suggests.

“Good idea,” Sam says, nodding.

As they head toward their lunch with Steve and Natasha, Sam’s surprised to realize that he feels pretty relaxed and confident about their whole fake-best-friends plan. Usually he’d be having some kind of heart palpitations at the thought of trying to pull one over on Natasha, an actual spy who actually lied to the actual God of Lies and actually succeeded at it, but instead Sam thinks that he and Bucky might really get away with this whole fake-best-friends thing. It helps that Bucky looks so cool and self-assured walking beside him, hips loose and easy and confident as those long legs lead them toward their whole best friends debut.

Eventually they weave their way out of Bucky’s trash labyrinth and make it to the café, where Steve and Natasha are waiting at a table along the sidewalk. Steve and Nat look happy, laughing and chatting animatedly, their body language intimate and relaxed. Sam feels a brief moment of apprehension, but Steve smiles broadly when he sees Sam and Bucky approach, and Steve and Nat both stand to offer hugs and kisses in greeting.

“We’re so glad to be home,” Natasha says, sitting back down with a sigh. “Do you know that after spending the past few months trying to navigate alien bureaucracy, I’ve actually missed filling out post-mission paperwork at SHIELD? Do not repeat that to Fury.”

“Fury’s already trying to convince Natasha to train as his replacement when he retires,” Steve brags, putting his arm around Natasha’s shoulders. The flash of envy Sam feels at Steve’s obvious pride in Natasha is swiftly overwhelmed by Sam’s genuine happiness for her. He can’t think of anyone he’d trust more than Natasha to be the next Director of SHIELD. Probably she wouldn’t let in any secret Nazis or mad scientist artificial intelligences at all.

“That’s great, Natalia,” Bucky says warmly. “How soon can you start? I already hate working for Fury.”

“Well, I’m pretty sure Fury has like three decoy replacements lined up and at least another decade of weird mind games in him before he’ll seriously consider retirement,” Natasha says, nodding her head approvingly. “And to be fair to Fury, he’s probably still pretty pissed about that time you nearly killed him.”

“Actually, Fury really likes Bucky,” says Sam defensively. “Just last week Fury even thanked him for giving him the chance to fake his own death—said he’d been looking for just the right opportunity for years.”

Bucky smirks and nudges his knee against Sam’s underneath the table. Sam deliberately doesn’t move his leg away, warmth spreading through him from the point of contact.

“I feel like I should be surprised that Bucky won Fury over that quickly, but honestly it makes sense. The nuns loved Bucky,” Steve says, rolling his eyes.

“Fury does have kind of a weird nun energy, doesn’t he,” Natasha says thoughtfully. “I’ve never really thought about it before but now I’m kind of obsessed with the idea.”

When they’ve finished ordering—bacon cheeseburgers for Steve and Natasha, falafel salads for Sam and Bucky—Natasha asks them how they’re enjoying their new vegan lifestyle.

“Have you been eating a lot of aquafaba?” Natasha asks, too innocent by half.

A surge of triumph wells up in Sam’s chest. He knows that Natasha is testing them, and he knows that they’re going to pass this test.

“Aquafaba’s actually more of a baking thing, sort of an egg white replacement,” Sam explains, biting his lip to resist shooting Bucky a smug grin. “And Bucky doesn’t eat anything with added sugar, so we don’t do a whole lot of baking.”

“And since when is Bucky such a healthy eater?” Steve asks incredulously.

“Some of us got hasty Nazi knockoff serums, Steve,” Bucky replies. “I’m like a hundred years old. How do I know if I can just eat whatever I want and still have perfect blood pressure and cholesterol like you? Also, do you know how much we’ve learned about nutrition since you and I were in school? When was the last time you even got a physical, Steve? Natalia ought to be making sure you take better care of yourself. I make sure Sam exercises and eats a sensible diet.”

“I stay fit,” Sam agrees.

Bucky smirks and lets his eyes travel along Sam’s biceps and shoulders. “Yeah, you do, sweetheart.”

“Hey, I’ve been meaning to get a physical, OK? But my primary care physician was taken in the Snap,” Steve says defensively. “I didn’t have time to find a new one. I’ve been very busy.”

“I’m actually finding this all very interesting,” Natasha says, her chin propped on her hand and her voice low and amused. “Has Bucky always been this fussy and meddlesome?”

“Only when it comes to my best friend,” Bucky explains with great apparent sincerity.

Steve chokes on his soda, coughing and sputtering violently, and Sam looks up from his salad to grin and catch Bucky’s eye. Natasha gives Steve a few strong thumps on the back.

When Steve recovers from his coughing fit, he narrows his eyes in disbelief. “I’m sorry, your best friend? Is Sam your best friend? Because I thought Sam was more like your best friend’s best friend.”

“We’ve gotten really close since we moved in together,” Sam says earnestly, slinging a friendly arm around Bucky’s shoulders.

It’s not even a lie, really. They’ve got a pretty great routine going, and Bucky’s an easy roommate. They wake up every morning and drag themselves out of their shared bed, sleepy and warm, and head out for an early run, letting Bucky’s bomb ass running playlist and the exertion of their run build up the physical and emotional energy they need for the day. They take Bucky’s weird secret assassin route through the alleys to and from the subway every day, and when they come home in the evenings they catch up on all the movies and music and weird political news they’ve missed in the past five years. They smoke a joint together in bed every night before they go to sleep, and they laugh and swap stories and usually make fun of Steve. It’s all very comfortable and cozy. It’s actually, Sam is startled to realize, the closest thing to home he’s felt in the past two-slash-seven years.

“So you moved in together,” Steve says, his voice awkward and high pitched. “That’s—so great!”

“Speaking of moving in together,” Bucky says innocently. “Have you guys decided where you’re going to live? We can move the weapons out of the spare room at our place if you want to move in with us.”

“I’m sorry, the spare room? It’s only a two bedroom apartment, Bucky!”

***

Sam is happy to be back in the field with Steve and Natasha, but he can’t shake the slight uneasiness that comes from thinking he’ll be able to predict their actions, that he’ll be able follow the rhythm of their fight together, only for the two of them to do something totally different than what he expects at the worst possible moment. It turns out that five years was just long enough for Steve and Natasha to fall perfectly in sync with one another and out of sync with Sam.

It’s Sam and Bucky’s first official SHIELD mission with Steve and Natasha, and everything is going mostly fine except for the fact that instead of turning into nice, clean piles of dust like in Buffy the Vampire Slayer, these gross ass vampires are exploding like giant bags of blood every time you slay them. It’s super nasty and definitely unhygienic.

The vampires are feral, mostly mindless leech-like creatures that don’t seem to have a lot going on in their probably decaying brains. So on top of dying in a rather revolting sort of fashion, they’re not even sexy or sophisticated or even European the way pop culture has promised him. The whole experience is a real letdown, and it isn’t even really dangerous so much as it is messy and tedious.

“Last one!” Bucky calls out, firing his crossbow straight into the heart of a vampire standing in front of Steve. The vampire explodes in a disgusting spray of borrowed blood, drenching Steve from head to toe in its recycled bodily fluids. Sam stifles a laugh.

“God damn it, Bucky,” Steve complains, his face twisting in distaste. “Just for that I’m taking first shower on the Quinjet.”

Sam gives Bucky a discreet fist bump when they climb aboard, whispering, “Nice shot, man.” Bucky snickers.

Steve is always so funny when he gets all prim and fussy, like some kind of stuffy Victorian schoolmarm. It’s kind of adorable.

In order to fit a full decontamination chamber and shower into the Quinjet, there’s only one of them, so they have to take turns showering. Sam and Bucky have a sort of medium amount of blood on them, while Natasha has somehow managed to escape the whole gory ordeal without a single drop of blood—or even sweat? Literally how is she so pristine?—anywhere on her. Since they’re only in New Jersey, not too far from home, Natasha decides she can wait until they get back to SHIELD headquarters to shower.

“So what’s the deal with all the vampires?” Sam asks. “I thought you and Steve killed that Bloody Baron guy.”

“We did,” Natasha replies, frowning. “It must have been a nest he left behind. Usually new vampires are too stupid or underdeveloped to feed themselves—they’re sort of like human babies that way—but I guess after their vampire dad guy died they must have gotten hungry enough to try to find something to eat on their own. I would have thought that they’d have all starved to death by now, though.”

When Steve finally exits the shower a thousand years later, he shoots them a smug smile. “Good luck fighting over who goes next, guys,” Steve taunts, in an irritating, self-satisfied sort of way. “There’s probably not enough hot water left for both of you.”

“Oh, that’s fine,” Bucky says casually. “Sam and I always shower together anyway. We can share. C’mon, Sam.”

Bucky grabs Sam’s wrist and tugs him along toward the shower, and Sam uses every ounce of energy he has left in his body to keep his facial muscles firmly under control, refusing to offer any kind of reaction whatsoever to that frankly shocking claim. What the fuck, Bucky? On the plus side, though, Sam has the pleasure of watching Steve’s eyes widen and his stupid smirk fade as horror slowly sets in.

Natasha’s face, of course, lights up in surprise and then sheer fucking delight at this unexpected turn of events, because Natasha loves drama.

“What,” Steve says weakly.

“Yeah, it’s no big,” Sam says, nonchalant as hell. “We’ll be out in a few minutes.”

Steve and Natasha whisper furiously at each other as Bucky pulls him out of the room.

When Bucky shuts the door to the decontamination chamber behind them, Sam falls back against it, running an open hand down his face and groaning. “Bucky, man, what are you doing?”

“What?” Bucky asks, eyes wide and guileless. He’s unbuckling the chest fasteners on his uniform, and Sam decides to take a moment to indulge his purely intellectual curiosity about how exactly Bucky straps himself into all that tactical fetish gear.

“Steve and I always used to take baths together,” Bucky says. “Do you know how long it took to heat up buckets full of water on the stove just to take one bath? And by the time one person was finished, the bath water would be dirty and cold! And Stevie was so little, it was just easier to bathe together so we’d both stay warm, especially in the winter—”

While Bucky prattles on about Depression-era plumbing, filthy shared tenement showers, cold water apartments, the potential dangers of cold baths for people with weak lungs, and how extremely normal it is for best friends to shower together, Sam watches Bucky methodically strip down to bare, sweaty skin.

“Do you need help, sweetheart?” Bucky asks, amusement in his voice.

“What,” Sam says absently. His eyes are intently following the path of a bead of sweat that’s sliding slowly down the hills and valleys of Bucky’s well-defined abs.

“You’re still dressed.”

“Oh! Right. Yes. I mean no! I don’t need help.”

As Bucky turns on the water and adjusts the temperature, Sam undresses hurriedly, tossing his bloody uniform into the laundry container marked “BIOHAZARD” and stepping into the shower with Bucky.

“Now, Sam, I just want to say: it’s OK if you get hard,” Bucky says sincerely, clearly trying but then utterly failing to hold back a grin. He looks directly into Sam’s eyes and claps him on the shoulder. “You know, Steve and I always—”

“Don’t say it,” Sam interrupts. “Do not say it or I will kill you, I swear to God.” Literally the last thing Sam needs, as he desperately tries to redirect the flow of blood running to his cock, is to think about Steve and Bucky showering together with erections. Jesus Christ. Sam is not made of fucking stone.

“I’m just saying, it’s perfectly normal—”

“I will kill you, Barnes,” Sam warns.

“It’s the beauty of nature!” Bucky proclaims with a shit-eating grin, then easily dodges Sam’s half-hearted blow to the face. “And if it makes you feel better, I will be making literally no effort to avoid ogling you, so.”

Sam rolls his eyes and suppresses a smile. “Whatever, man. Help me wash my back.”

***

After they shower together on the Quinjet, Bucky apparently decides that there’s no reason for them to stop showering together now that they’ve started. So every morning when they finish their run, Bucky follows Sam into the bathroom, stripping off his sweaty clothes and just stepping right into the shower, waiting for Sam to join him. And at this point it feels like maybe it would be weird if Sam said something, like maybe he should have said something the first time Bucky decided they were the kind of friends who took showers together, but quite frankly the first time Sam was so distracted by the shift and pull of Bucky’s muscles as he tugged off his shirt that Sam didn’t think to protest.

So now they shower together every morning, and they share the same body wash and shampoo too, because Bucky says that they already smell just like each other from spending so much time together that it doesn’t really make sense for them to use different products. Plus, Bucky explains, with two full grown men in the shower at the same time, there’s just not enough room to clutter up the space with a bunch of different bottles.

Sam is pretty sure that Bucky just likes it that Sam smells like him, though. Bucky’s weirdly possessive that way, and it turns out that maybe Steve is too, because every time Sam gets up close in Steve’s space during training, Steve’s nostrils flare, the briefest look of jealousy crossing his face.

So, on the plus side, their plan is definitely working.

On the down side, however, Sam has exactly zero opportunities to jerk off now, and he’s about to spontaneously fucking combust out of what is probably fatal sexual tension. Because every morning, Sam wakes up to a soft, sleepy Bucky pressed against his back, hips grinding gently against Sam’s ass. And every morning, Sam watches Bucky get sweaty and breathless on their run, thin t-shirt growing slowly more transparent, clinging to those perfectly sculpted pectoral muscles. And then, after all that, Sam has to actually get naked and shower with the guy, who is not at all shy about the way his erection springs up out of his running shorts as he pulls them down his hips.

And all of this—this whole fucking blue balls-inducing, brain-melting, sexually frustrating journey into madness—happens before Sam can even get a goddamn cup of coffee. It is eight in the fucking morning and Sam is about to die from his boner.

“Hey, Sam?” Bucky asks, giving himself a critical look in the bathroom mirror. “Can you cut my hair?”

“Do I look like a barber,” Sam replies flatly.

“No, but I feel like if we’re going to your mom’s today, I should probably look sharp, right? And I just don’t feel like the long hair goes with a suit.” Bucky frowns. “There are probably plenty of videos about hair cutting on Youtube, right? I’ll bet you could figure it out.”

Sam does not remember inviting Bucky to his mom’s house with him today, and he has no idea why Bucky is planning on wearing a suit, but he does remember how Bucky Barnes had looked in those old photos, with that classic haircut highlighting his sharp cheekbones and that perfect fucking jawline. He’d looked like an old movie actor, like Cary Grant or Gregory Peck, and Sam has always had a weakness for handsome men who look like they could take you to church and then take you straight to bed so you’ll have something to confess about next week.

“Yeah, all right,” Sam agrees.

It turns out there are actually a bunch of tutorials on how to cut hair on Youtube—apparently there was a whole thing that happened in 2020 where everyone had to cut their own hair for a while?—and after two or three videos Sam feels reasonably prepared for this potential disaster.

He sits Bucky down on a chair in the kitchen, because Bucky’s hair is thick and long, and Sam wants to make sure he can sweep everything up nice and easy when they’re done. When Sam runs his fingers through Bucky’s hair to start trimming the length, Bucky groans softly, his eyelids fluttering closed.

“Forgot how much I like having my hair touched,” Bucky murmurs.

“Oh, yeah?” Sam says, biting his lip. He wonders if Bucky also likes to have his hair pulled, and for a moment he regrets ever letting Bucky talk him into this hair cut, because he thinks he’d like to see Bucky’s long hair twisted around his fist as he guides Bucky’s mouth down onto his cock.

“I never had a professional haircut before the Army,” Bucky confesses. “My mom always cut it for me when I was a kid, and then when I moved in with Steve we’d do it for each other. We always needed money back then, couldn’t afford a barber.”

“Hold still for a moment,” Sam says, touching Bucky’s jaw and gently guiding his head into the right position. He runs the clippers over the back of Bucky’s neck, fingers pressing lightly against Bucky’s temples to move him where he needs him. Heat blooms deep in Sam’s belly at the way Bucky shivers under his touch. When Sam finishes trimming the sides and back of Bucky’s head, he leans down to softly blow the excess hair off the nape of Bucky’s neck. Bucky moans quietly, biting his lip and arching his back almost imperceptibly. Pretty little goosebumps rise on the back of his neck.

“Take a look,” Sam says quietly, handing Bucky a mirror.

Bucky turns his head left and right, preening a bit as he admires the tidy cut Sam gave him. He looks gorgeous, hair neatly trimmed in a way that draws focus to that devastating bone structure.

“Not too bad for your first try, sweetheart,” Bucky says, grinning. “Think your mom will like it?”

“Oh, I think she will.”

***

When Sam’s mom opens her door to see that Sam has brought a friend to visit, she looks delighted at this unexpected turn of events.

“Sam, baby! It’s so good to see you! Come in, come in!” she exclaims, pulling Sam in for a warm hug and a kiss on the cheek before leading them into the living room. “And who is this handsome young man?”

“This is Bucky,” Sam replies, shooting his mom a warning glare. Do not embarrass me, he communicates silently. She widens her eyes in response, giving Sam an overly innocent look and covering her heart a touch dramatically with her hands. Moi? her body language says. Sam is not fooled. “Bucky is my co-worker. And my roommate. And my friend.”

“Hello, Mrs. Wilson,” Bucky says, smiling like a goddamn choir boy. “It’s so nice to meet you. I hope you don’t mind that Sam invited me along today.”

Sam most definitely did not invite Bucky along today, but he feels like it would be rude to point that out in front of his mom, who looks very impressed by Bucky’s whole general existence. She looks even more impressed when Bucky presents her with the vase of lilacs he insisted upon buying along the way.

“These are lovely, Bucky! I’m always happy to meet one of Sam’s co-workers slash roommates slash friends,” she says teasingly. “And don’t you look nice! Sam, doesn’t he look nice?”

“You didn’t have to wear a suit to meet my mom,” Sam says with a sigh, rolling his eyes.

They already had this whole argument before they left, but Bucky was adamant about wearing the suit, and honestly Sam didn’t work that hard to try to talk him out of it. Sam didn’t even know that Bucky owned a suit, let alone one that was so perfectly tailored to those shoulders and those slim hips and those long legs. Once Bucky actually put on the suit, Sam suddenly felt like all of his objections were a bit trivial and unnecessary. So now, like an idiot, Sam is also dressed up, wearing a button-down shirt and a navy blue blazer to visit his own mother.

“It’s a Sunday, Sam,” Bucky says reprovingly, in a tone that suggests that the day of the week is somehow relevant to his sartorial choices. Sam’s mom nods approvingly at this, so maybe it’s some kind of weird older generation thing that Sam is too young to understand.

Sam feels a bit ill at the unwelcome realization that Bucky is technically older than Sam’s mother.

Sam’s mom serves them tea and cookies while they catch up, and Bucky is unfailingly polite, charming in a sincere sort of way that Sam should have expected from all of Steve’s stories about growing up together in the neighborhood. It occurs to Sam that Bucky probably developed this skill as a self-defense mechanism against the inevitable havoc that Steve wreaked in their lives, using it to keep the two of them out of trouble with mothers and teachers and, eventually, commanding officers.

When the subject of Captain America comes up, Sam’s mother frowns disapprovingly and says, “I just don’t know why that boy asked you to take on this kind of burden. Is he even retired? Why couldn’t he be Captain America?”

Sam’s mother always refers to Steve as that boy.

“That’s what I said!” Bucky exclaims. “I was furious when Steve said he wanted to pass the shield on to Sam. Why did Sam need to be Captain America? Sam was already a superhero. I mean, he was the Falcon! He could actually fly. How cool is that? Steve could never fly—Steve just fell, usually without a parachute. Being Captain America just meant doing the same thing Sam was already doing, but with an unfamiliar weapon and a lot more attention from bad guys. It seemed so risky and unnecessary.”

Sam is a little stunned at this revelation. He thought the reason Bucky was mad at Steve about the whole Captain America thing was because Steve hadn’t chosen him to be Captain America, not because Bucky was worried about Sam.

Sam’s heart thumps a bit in his chest, warmth flowing through his veins to thaw out a part of him that he hadn’t even realized had been just a tiny bit frozen, an icy chunk he’s been carrying around inside of him ever since he’d accepted Steve’s offer to be the new Captain America. Bucky looks soft and sincere, and Sam didn’t know how much he needed to hear that someone believed in him just as he was—that there was someone who didn’t just think that he’d make a good Captain America but that he was already a pretty great superhero all on his own.

Sam’s mom nods enthusiastically. “Exactly,” she says, then turns to Sam. “I like this one, Sam. He seems so much more sensible than that other boy. That one was always getting you into trouble.”

Bucky chuckles. “Oh, Steve is good at getting people into trouble. But the thing about Steve is that Steve attracts people who are just like him, people who are good and brave and ready to stand up for what’s right no matter what the cost. Sam was fighting for what he believed in long before Steve ever came along. You raised a good man, Mrs. Wilson,” Bucky says, smiling softly at Sam.

And Sam’s heart breaks a little in his chest at this, because he doesn’t think that Bucky realizes that Bucky is the very first person Steve attracted who shared his innate goodness and integrity, because Bucky doesn’t think he’s a hero like Steve and Sam.

Sam’s mom is clearly pleased by Bucky’s compliment, and she looks proudly over at Sam. “Sam is the best man I know,” she says, her voice strong, full of conviction. “I’m glad he has a partner who understands that his heart is just as valuable as his training.”

“Sam’s heart is exactly why Steve chose him as Captain America,” Bucky says. And then he tells her stories about Sam’s new job, stories that are carefully edited to minimize the danger they had faced and to maximize Sam’s capability and competence in dispatching various minor villains. He tells her about all of the countries they’ve traveled to, all the little boys and girls who’ve looked at Sam with stars in their eyes. Bucky makes sure to include Steve in these stories too, subtly but effectively touting Steve’s unflagging loyalty and care and dependability.

Sam remembers Steve telling him that Bucky was the first to shout “Let’s hear it for Captain America!” when they returned from Kreischberg, successfully distracting Colonel Phillips from any disciplinary action he might have been contemplating against Steve for going MIA. It’s hard to throw the book at someone who’s actively being celebrated by hundreds of grateful, cheering soldiers.

Bucky, Sam is beginning to realize, is the greatest hype man Sam has ever seen.

“Thank you so much for a lovely afternoon, Mrs. Wilson,” Bucky says with a kind smile. “It was really nice to meet you.”

“Come back next weekend!” Sam’s mom replies enthusiastically, giving Bucky a warm hug. “You can meet Sam’s sister Sarah and his niece Michelle. They’ll be sorry they missed you this week. Sam, dear, come give your mother a hug.”

When Sam pulls his mother in for a hug, she whispers, “I’m so proud of you” in his ear. Sam flushes a bit, feeling awkward and self-conscious.

“Thanks, Mom,” he says.

***

That night when they’re lying in bed, passing a joint back and forth, Sam makes a long overdue confession.

“I was mad at you, you know,” Sam says apologetically. “When you ran away. And when you didn’t come back after Peggy died. I thought you weren’t being a good friend to Steve. I don’t think—I don’t think I was being very fair to you. And I’m sorry.”

The thing is, Steve had told Sam a lot of stories about Bucky, about how charming and funny Bucky was, what a good friend he was, what a good sergeant he was. In Steve’s stories, Bucky was a giant, a larger-than-life sort of figure, a man who never gave up and never let anyone down.

And maybe Sam bought into all of that mythologizing, because when Bucky didn’t come back to Steve, Sam felt betrayed on Steve’s behalf. And he realizes now, with a sharp pang of regret, that this reaction was deeply unfair to Bucky, based on the legend of Bucky Barnes rather than the man. Because Bucky was supposed to be the loyal Howling Commando from Steve’s stories, Captain America’s Sergeant and Steve Rogers’s Best Friend, the hero who always rescued Steve when he needed it, even when Steve didn’t think he needed rescuing.

And Steve had so desperately, desperately needed rescuing, especially after Peggy’s death. Sam would never forget the sight of Steve Rogers, Captain America, tired and small and so very fragile, dipping under the weight of Peggy’s coffin as he carried her down the aisle.

When Bucky turns to face Sam, there are lines of grief in the corners of his eyes. “I was sorry about Peggy,” Bucky says quietly. “She was my friend too.”

Sam reaches out to brush his thumb along Bucky’s cheekbone, cupping Bucky’s face in his hand. Bucky raises his hand to cover Sam’s, cool metal against Sam’s skin, and Bucky shivers a little under his touch.

“You’re a good friend, Bucky. I’m sorry I thought you weren’t.”

“Thank you, sweetheart,” Bucky says with a tired smile.

***

When Steve knocks on their open office door, he looks with surprise at the sign on the doorway. “Sam Wilson and James Barnes?” Steve reads aloud, looking concerned. “Sam, they didn’t give you your own office? I feel like Captain America should get his own office. Do you want me to talk to Fury? Because you shouldn’t have to share with Bucky.”

“Nah, it’s cool,” Sam says casually. “Fury gave us two offices, but we just figured it was easier to share since we’re always together anyway. Bucky’s office is our murder board room.”

Steve looks disconcerted by this. “OK,” he says, frowning. “Well, I just came by to let you know that Nat picked up another HYDRA facility on her radar, right near where we found those vampires in New Jersey. She sent you an e-mail with the details.”

Sam doesn’t know why Steve needs to stop by to tell him something that Natasha already sent him in an e-mail, but whatever. There’s something a little bit hesitant in Steve’s expression, a little bit lonely, and maybe Steve just came by because he wanted an excuse to see them.

“Thanks,” Sam says, with a warm smile. “C’mon, let’s go over to the spare office to tell Bucky to put it on our murder board. Make sure you tell him how great it looks, by the way. We spent like thirty minutes at Joann Fabrics picking out just the right shades of yarn to tie everything together. He actually has a whole color-coded system for it, with a key in an Excel spreadsheet and everything.”

While they walk down to go see the murder board, Steve tells Sam all about Bucky’s job as an actuary before the war. Apparently all those years doing informal risk assessment calculations to try to keep Steve from killing himself while they were growing up led to an actual career. “He was actually in college for mathematics when he dropped out to enlist.”

“I wonder if he put that on his resume when he applied for the job,” Sam says. “Actually now that I’m thinking about it I wonder how Bucky fit like 80 years of experience as an actuary, a commando, a brainwashed assassin, an international fugitive, and then a goat farmer on a one-page resume.”

“Wait, Fury actually made you two submit resumes?” Steve raises his eyebrows.

“Nah, just Bucky,” Sam replies, grinning. “I think Fury just wanted to give him a bit of a hard time after he shot him. Bucky actually wrote one up for him too. Wouldn’t let me see it, but if Natasha just so happens to find it anywhere on SHIELD’s servers at some point…”

“I’ll let you know,” Steve says, chuckling.

When they get to the spare office and see Bucky tacking up some new papers on the vampire murder board, Steve’s laughter catches abruptly in his throat. Bucky’s newly short hair is styled today in an appealing combination of his old, neatly parted look and a more modern fashion.

“Bucky?” Steve says breathlessly, his voice thick with emotion.

“Oh, hey, Steve,” Bucky replies awkwardly, raising his hand to his newly cut hair a bit self-consciously. “How does it look?”

“Great!” Steve says fervently, eyes shining. “You look—God, you look so great, Bucky.”

“Thanks,” Bucky says, biting his lip shyly. “Sam cut it for me. Had to look respectable if I was going to meet his mom.”

Steve looks unexpectedly stricken for a moment, but then recovers quickly. “Well, it looks great,” he says. “And you met Sam’s mom! That’s—great. That’s also great.”

“She loved him, of course,” Sam says, rolling his eyes. “He wore a suit. And he brought her flowers.”

“Bucky always did bring my mom a flower when he came to visit, even if he had to steal it from someone else,” Steve says wistfully. “That’s—that’s so great that he still does that.” Steve looks dreadfully, deeply jealous right now, although Sam honestly can’t tell if Steve is jealous of him, jealous of Bucky, or jealous of Sam’s mom. Probably a weird combination of all three.

“Well, it turns out Bucky is great with moms. Even put in a good word for your sorry ass while he was there,” Sam says cheerfully.

“Wow! Good! That’s—that’s so good,” Steve says, his voice a little weak now. “Wait, does your mom not like me? Actually never mind. We can talk about it later. I’ll just—I’ll just be going now. I can see that you two have a lot of work to do, so I’ll just—go.”

When Steve leaves, Bucky raises an eyebrow at Sam. “You think maybe the whole make-Steve-jealous plan is actually working?” Bucky says wryly, the corner of his mouth tugging up in a crooked smile.

Sam stifles a laugh. “Yeah, just a bit.”

***

Sam and Bucky are just getting out of the shower after their run on Saturday when they hear an unexpected knock on the front door.

“I’ll get it,” Sam says, pulling on a t-shirt and a hoodie. Bucky’s still standing in front of the closet, clad only in a gratifyingly small towel as he takes his time deciding what to wear today.

When Sam gets to the door and opens it, he’s surprised to find Steve and Natasha standing in front of him. Steve looks a bit sheepish, but Natasha appears utterly relaxed, at ease in the way that she always is no matter what’s going on or how weird Steve is.

“Surprise!” Steve says awkwardly. He raises his hands briefly like he might be attempting some sort of jazz hands or something, then clearly thinks better of it and sticks his hands in his pockets where they can’t get him into trouble. “We’re here to take you guys out!”

“Sam, sweetheart, where’s our blue sweater?” Bucky calls out from the bedroom.

“Sweetheart?” Steve repeats thinly.

“Our blue sweater?” Natasha repeats gleefully.

Bucky emerges from the bedroom, hands smoothing out a few wrinkles in the aforementioned sweater as he tugs it into place. “Never mind, I found it,” Bucky announces. “Hey, guys.”

“Well, hello, Bucky. So you two share clothes now,” Natasha observes, the corner of her mouth curving blithely upward. “Isn’t that interesting?”

What’s particularly interesting, Sam thinks, is that he is ninety-nine percent certain that he saw Steve wearing that same white t-shirt Natasha has tied neatly at her waist just the other day.

“Of course we share clothes. Why would Sam and I need separate clothes? We wear basically the same size, even if Sam’s shoulders are a bit nicer than mine,” Bucky says, winking at Sam.

“Your waist is trimmer, though. You’ve got that nice lean look going on, it’s really working for you.”

“OK!” Steve interrupts, sounding a bit frantic. He and Natasha trade a few weird, indecipherable looks back and forth and Natasha rolls her eyes. “So we were thinking we would take you guys out this morning, have some best friend time.” Steve says this last part with particular emphasis.

“Great, where are we going?” Bucky asks.

“Actually,” Steve says, “we were thinking about splitting up. Sam, how do you feel about going to a ball game with me?”

“Sure,” Sam says, raising his eyebrows in surprise. “What are Natasha and Bucky going to do?”

Natasha and Bucky have a brief conversation in Russian, gesturing back and forth a bit before Natasha flatly states, “Bucky and I are gonna go to yoga and then get mani pedis.”

“OK,” Sam says, raising an eyebrow in skepticism. Honestly he probably doesn’t want to know whatever it is they’re really planning to do, if only for the sake of plausible deniability. Sam wonders if he and Bucky should think about getting married at some point so they don’t ever have to testify against each other. He should bring it up later, probably not in front of Steve.

***

Steve and Sam are sitting in the sun, relaxing at a Mets game, and Sam has missed this so much. It’s spring, still a bit chilly, but the sun is out and the day’s warming up quickly. Steve looks happy and relaxed, golden hair shining in the sunlight and a little bit of pink on his cheeks and forehead that will fade away before they’re even home from the game tonight.

“So you and Bucky are getting along well,” Steve says, glancing at Sam out of the corner of his eyes.

Sam hums noncommittally, taking a sip of his water. He’d checked the app on his phone to see if any of the beers they had on tap were vegan, but unfortunately none of them were. Which is fine, really, because Bucky’s been nagging him to drink more water lately. In fact Bucky’ll probably ask Sam about it when he gets home, so now Sam will be able to tell Bucky yes, he had a bottle of water today, he’s staying hydrated.

“You don’t think Bucky’s a bit—much?” Steve asks uncertainly. “Some people used to think he was a bit overbearing.”

“Nah, he’s cool,” Sam says mildly, then hesitates. “But, well, he doesn’t have much use for privacy, does he? I mean, he’s always so—around. And so attractive! And sometimes a man needs some time to himself, for personal, intimate things. You know what I’m saying?”

“You’re dying of sexual frustration, aren’t you.” Steve smirks, with a knowing little glint in his eye.

“God, yes.”

“Old Bucky Barnacle. So that’s still his move, huh?” Steve says, his voice wry. “Well, good luck with that. If history repeats itself, I’m sure the situation will eventually come to a head one way or another.”

Sam doesn’t know what to do with that ominous remark, but since it’s such a nice day he decides to let it slide.

“Bucky did say something to me once, kind of struck me as odd. He said that you were his only friend growing up. Which—that’s not true, right? I mean, he’s so handsome and charming and—surprisingly sweet. I feel like a guy like that would have a lot of friends.”

Steve laughs ruefully. “You’d think so, right? But Bucky never really seemed to want other friends, and honestly a lot of people thought there was something a bit—funny, about him. And about me.”

“Funny like maybe you two were a little too close?”

Steve rubs the back of his neck, looking a little flustered. “Yeah, maybe,” he admits. “We were always together. God, Bucky used to get so jealous when I’d make other friends. But he loved me, wanted me to be happy. I think he was happiest when we were a part of the Howling Commandos. He just wanted me to be around people who valued me and appreciated me, I think.”

“He liked Peggy a lot,” Sam says mildly, carefully.

“He talked to you about Peggy?” Steve’s eyes widen slightly in surprise.

“We talk,” Sam says, careful to keep his tone guarded. Sam doesn’t know how much Steve and Bucky have really had a chance to connect after Bucky came back from Wakanda, doesn’t know how much Bucky is comfortable with Sam revealing. He gets the feeling that Steve and Bucky have been dancing around a lot of things for about eighty-five years now. “He likes Natasha too.”

“Does he,” Steve says, with a small, speculative smile.

***

They’re sitting on the sofa, catching up on Riverdale, and Sam can’t believe how much better the show has gotten since the Decimation forced them to write out Archie Andrews. They’ve just finished the episode where Betty Cooper reveals that the murdered Jason Blossom was actually just a clone of the real Jason Blossom—who apparently was in the witness protection program the whole time—when Bucky suddenly announces, “I think we should practice kissing.”

“Yes, absolutely, one hundred percent,” Sam agrees immediately, then pauses. “Wait, why?”

“Well, Steve and I used to practice kissing all the time, so it’s obviously a pretty normal best friend thing to do,” Bucky reasons, gazing earnestly at Sam with wide, too-innocent eyes. “I feel like it would be suspicious if Steve found out I haven’t kissed anyone in almost eighty years and my so-called best friend didn’t help me get back into practice.”

Then Bucky pulls his right arm across his chest, casually stretching the strong muscle in his shoulder, the thin material of his t-shirt straining over his firm bicep. And wow, Bucky really should have been a lawyer or a politician or something, because Sam always finds his arguments extremely convincing. He’s honestly the most persuasive guy Sam has ever met.

“Yeah, OK,” Sam says. “C’mere.”

Bucky leans toward him, hand coming up to touch Sam’s face gently. Bucky’s so close that Sam can feel Bucky’s soft breath against his mouth, and Sam leans forward to rest his forehead against Bucky’s.

“OK?” Bucky murmurs.

Sam hums in response, leaning forward to touch his lips softly to Bucky’s. Bucky’s hand trembles a little on Sam’s face, nerves or anticipation, but then Bucky’s grip tightens and he pulls Sam closer, opening his mouth to capture Sam’s lips between his.

The kiss starts out soft and sweet, tentative, and then slowly grows more passionate. Sam gasps when Bucky’s teeth pull gently at his bottom lip, tugging his mouth open so Bucky can slip his tongue inside. Sam moans and strokes his tongue against Bucky’s, heating burning through his veins as their tongues slide wetly against each other. Sam can feel Bucky’s heart beating right against his own, through their shirts and their skin and their sternums, a pounding, frantic rhythm that matches the pulse of blood traveling directly to Sam’s cock.

Sam tangles his fingers in Bucky’s hair, gripping the short strands in his fist and tugging gently, pulling Bucky’s head right where he needs him. Bucky pitches forward a bit, off-balance, bracing his hands on Sam’s thighs before climbing eagerly up onto Sam’s lap. Bucky is making sweet, urgent little sounds that send a shiver of want down Sam’s spine, and Sam has to pull back for a moment, take a minute to breathe and let his racing heart settle in his chest.

“Sam,” Bucky says, pupils dilated and dark. “Fuck, sweetheart.”

“Yeah,” Sam breathes, panting and fighting to keep his hips still, trying to keep from shifting them up against Bucky’s. “That was—.”

“Good?” Bucky asks, lips curving into a crooked, cocky grin.

“It was all right,” Sam replies casually, feigning nonchalance. “I think you still need more practice. C’mere.”

***

They practice kissing a lot after that, which is great, and also lucky, because when Bucky hisses “kiss me” to Sam in the middle of a HYDRA raid, Sam doesn’t even hesitate.

They’re sneaking into that New Jersey HYDRA facility Natasha found near the gross vampire lair, and Steve and Nat are breaking into one end of the facility while Sam and Bucky creep through the other. They’re trying to be quiet, don’t want to be caught before Steve and Natasha have a chance to get the data off HYDRA’s servers, so when a HYDRA goon stumbles into the hallway with them, Bucky hauls Sam right up against him and kisses him fiercely.

The HYDRA goon makes a noise of surprise and confusion, clearly baffled by the two heavily armed men making out in the middle of a research facility, but Sam’s having a hard time paying attention to him over the feel of Bucky’s lips, which are spit-slick and firm and insistent against Sam’s. When Bucky starts grinding his hips against him—wow, Bucky is really selling this—Sam lets out a low moan that Steve and Natasha will almost certainly hear over the comms.

“What’s going on here? You’re not supposed to be here!” the goon says.

Bucky releases Sam’s lower lip from between his teeth with a loud pop. “Huh? Oh, sorry, guess we got carried away,” Bucky says sheepishly.

“That’s OK, just—hey, wait! You’re the Winter Soldier!” the goon exclaims, apparently catching sight of Bucky’s metal arm.

Steve and Natasha burst into the hallway at that moment, and when the goon turns back around to face them Sam pulls his shield from its harness and throws it at the man, who falls to the floor like a sack of bricks. Sam catches the rebound.

“Oh, hey, guys,” Bucky says with a grin, casually reaching down to readjust the lines of his uniform from where Sam’s fists had wrinkled it during their makeout session. “You didn’t have to come help out. We had everything under control here.”

“Had everything under control here,” Steve repeats. “We saw you on the security cams necking right in front of a guard!”

“Well, sure, but the guy caught us red-handed sneaking down the corridors. Thank God Bucky’s such a quick thinker or that guard would have thought something was suspicious going on,” Sam says, shooting Bucky a grateful smile. Bucky grins back at him. “Using the old pretend-to-be-a-couple-making-out scam was a great call.”

“A great call?” Natasha says, raising her eyebrows. “You’re dressed as Captain America and the Winter Soldier and you’re right in the middle of their facility. In what way did you appear to be two passionate lovers out for an innocent stroll?”

“To be fair, that guard would have no idea if Captain America and the Winter Soldier had a more than professional relationship,” Bucky points out.

“And are you questioning Bucky’s professional judgment as a master of covert operations, Natasha?” Sam says reproachfully, shaking his head in disappointment. “Bucky was a ghost for over fifty years. I think the man knows how to keep from blowing a cover.”

Steve sighs heavily, rubbing his temples in frustration. “Look, let’s just do a quick sweep through the basement, OK? It’s the only place left that we haven’t checked out.”

When they make it down to the basement, Sam is surprised to find that the whole thing has a very distinct incel-with-a-sex-dungeon vibe to it. Which is not really an aesthetic that he thought HYDRA would be embracing, but he’s learned to roll with it when it comes to the weird shit that HYDRA gets up to. The room looks moldy and kind of wet, with a clammy cement wall that has an actual, albeit cheap-looking, coffin propped up against it, right next to some rusted metal chains that look like a serious tetanus hazard. There’s also a microwave and a pretty expensive gaming PC down here, screen turned on to one of those gryphons and gargoyles MMORPGs.

“Is someone living down here?” Bucky asks, wrinkling his nose in distaste. “Or, even worse, is someone living in that coffin?”

There’s only one way to find out. Steve walks over to the coffin and yanks it open, jumping back in horror when a man wearing a neck brace and plastic fangs pops out and cries, “Steve! I knew you wouldn’t be able to resist coming back for me and my vampire babies. And you’ve found my new dungeon!”

His creepy red eyes are on fire with ecstasy.

“Ew, it’s Todd,” Bucky says, making a sour face. “I thought you killed that guy.”

“Yeah, me too,” Steve says with a frown.

“My name isn’t Todd,” Todd says peevishly. “It’s Baron Blood. How would you like it if everyone called you Bucky instead of the Winter Soldier?”

“Everyone does call me Bucky.”

When Todd has the nerve to look judgmental at this, Sam narrows his eyes and snaps, “Bucky is a great nickname.”

“It’s very cute,” Natasha agrees.

“I gave it to him,” Steve says, nodding proudly.

“Did you,” Todd says, eyes widening in alarm. “I didn’t mean to imply that Bucky was a bad nickname! Not at all! In fact, I love it. I was just—pointing out that it might be a tad unprofessional to use someone’s regular name in this kind of formal confrontation between a superhero and his archnemesis. I mean, this is really more like a work meeting, so I think it’s best if we just stick to titles, right, Captain America?”

“You called him Steve, earlier,” Natasha says.

“Well, the relationship between a superhero and his archnemesis really is such an intimate connection,” Todd purrs.

“Gross,” Bucky says.

“Anyway,” Steve says loudly, “Sam is Captain America now, I’m just a regular SHIELD agent. And I’m actually kind of in between call signs right now, so you can just—just call me Steve, I guess.” Steve looks a bit queasy at this.

“Wonderful, Steve,” Todd says smugly, his smile sharp and unnerving underneath those plastic fangs. Then he turns to Sam, looking him critically up and down before disdainfully stating, “I certainly won’t be calling him Captain America, though.”

“Why not? That’s pretty rude, Todd. We’re having a work meeting.” Natasha’s tone is disapproving.

“Well, for one, I’m racist,” Todd explains. “But also there will only ever be one Captain America, and that’s Steve Rogers. This guy’s just the Falcon.”

He says it scornfully, and Sam honestly might have felt a little insulted, but instead he remembers what Bucky said to his mother, that the Falcon was cool, that he could fly, that Sam was a superhero before he ever met Steve Rogers. And so Sam stands tall, raises his head high, and does his fucking job because he is a hero and a professional.

“Whatever, Todd,” Sam says. “I’m going to have to arrest you now.”

Unfortunately, Todd chooses this moment to reveal that he has the ability to transform into a swarm of bats, each of them wearing a tiny neck brace and plastic fangs as they form a small cluster and fly right out of the room and presumably away into the night.

Sam sighs in frustration. “You’re out there somewhere, Blood Baron, and I’ll find you!” he calls out after Todd.

“No, you won’t!” Todd shouts from a distance.

Sam puts his hands on his hips and narrows his eyes. “Yes, I will.”

“Nope!”

Bucky looks around the room, sighing in disgust as he takes in the mess and chaos from dozens of vampire bats flying about, leaving bat fur and guano everywhere.

“Great, now we’re all going to have to get rabies shots,” Bucky complains.

 ***

Sam and Bucky’s whole fake-best-friends plan is working phenomenally well, because ever since that Saturday Steve and Natasha had showed up unexpectedly to take them out, they’ve been regularly scheduling what Steve insists upon calling “best friend dates.” So long as they’re all in the same city, every Saturday they get together in pairs or as a foursome so that no one ever feels left out and everybody gets some quality time with each other.

When Steve and Sam hang out, they usually go to a game or to the gym—not to do any serious training, just to spar, getting sweaty and screwing around trying out new moves on each other. The best part is that for whatever reason the other SHIELD agents seem super reluctant to work out at the same time as them, so Sam and Steve always have plenty of room to wrestle and grapple around on the mats, pinning and taunting each other until someone gets frustrated enough to really slam the other one around a bit.

Sam has no idea what Bucky and Natasha do on their mysterious outings—they claim they’re going to drag brunches or yoga or spin class, but Sam can only guess what kind of sketchy shit a pair of formerly Russian former assassins might get up to together. Thankfully they’re always careful to mastermind their operations in Russian, presumably so that Sam will never be forced to reveal anything incriminating about them if he’s questioned. Bucky takes care of him like that.

Sam’s dates with Natasha are always super weird and fun—they usually end up going to see some kind of crazy conceptual art exhibit or avant-garde foreign film, then get coffee afterward and pretend to be fancy art critics. Or they’ll wander around old flea markets and antique stores and look for insensitive gifts for Steve and Bucky.

Sam is pretty sure that Steve spends his dates with Bucky doing something really homoerotic and intense like drawing semi-nude portraits of Bucky in 1940s military uniforms.

Actually, if they’re not already doing that, Sam should suggest it. He could probably try to pass it off as “healing” or “cathartic” or something, and maybe Steve will even show him the drawings afterward now that Sam has so much experience critiquing art with Natasha.

Today Sam and Natasha had planned on going to an outdoor art fair for their best friend date, because it’s funny to buy Steve tacky cat art and then watch him fumble for an appropriately gracious response, but this morning dawned with the sound of thunder rumbling ominously in the distance. By noon it’s pouring rain, a thick wall of icy water erupting from angry gray clouds, and Natasha is soaking wet when Sam answers the door.

“Jesus, Nat!” Sam says, ushering her into the apartment. “Let me grab you a towel for your hair. Do you want a change of clothes?”

“Sure, but don’t worry about the towel,” Natasha says with a careless wave of her hand. She opens the duffel bag she’s brought with her to reveal a barber’s cape and a pair of shears. “You’re going to cut my hair!”

“Oh, I’m going to cut your hair,” Sam grumbles, rolling his eyes. “Why does everyone seem to think I’m a barber?”

Sam leads Natasha into the kitchen and pulls out a chair for her before heading into the bedroom to try to find a pair of sweats that might fit. Natasha’s tiny, petite even when she wears heels, and it’s easy to forget that about her when she always stands so tall and confident. Sam wonders sometimes if that’s how Steve looked before he got the serum, all tiny and full of courage and swagger. Sam definitely does not think about how he and Bucky might have a type, and instead he grabs a t-shirt and the smallest pair of joggers they own, the ones that pull nice and tight over Bucky’s thighs and ass, before heading back into the kitchen.

Instead of waiting in the chair, Natasha’s standing in the nude, unselfconscious, wringing her clothes out over the sink. Her skin is pale and damp, glistening even in the dim, stormy light of the kitchen. Sam swallows and allows his eyes to trace the path of a drop of water sliding down the side of her neck only until it hits her collarbone, then looks away.

Sam clears his throat and tosses her the bundle of clothes. “Here, put these on,” he says, keeping his gaze averted while he grabs her wet clothes out of the sink. “I’ll put yours in the dryer.”

“Leave the bra out! If you put it in the dryer you’ll ruin it!” Natasha calls after him.

Sam rolls his eyes. “I have a sister, you know!”

Sam hangs Natasha’s bra up above the dryer, and damn, he can see why she doesn’t want him to ruin it. It’s gorgeous, black and lacy and expensive-looking—sexier than the three no-nonsense cotton bras that Natasha rotated between during those two years on the run. Sam smiles as he fingers the lace along the band, a gentle wave of happiness cresting over him at the thought of Natasha finally allowing herself to wear something beautiful.

When Sam returns to the kitchen, Natasha’s dressed, cozy and comfortable in Sam’s favorite t-shirt, joggers rolled up around her waist in an attempt to keep them from hanging onto the floor. Sam tries very hard not to feel any sort of way about how Natasha looks in Sam and Bucky’s clothing.

“So what am I doing here?” Sam asks. He flicks on the light and wraps the barber’s cape around Natasha, snapping it carefully at the back of her neck. Natasha’s hair is already damp, and Sam combs it straight, parting it just above her left eyebrow the way she likes. He’s lost track of the number of times he’s watched her straighten and style her hair this way over the years. “Do you want to keep any of the blonde?”

Natasha shrugs. “Nope, just lop it all off.”

“You’re lucky Bucky’s hair was long enough that I had to watch a bunch of videos on how to cut women’s hair too,” Sam says. He uses the comb to pull her hair taut and then trims off the bleached ends. “Actually, you’re lucky you’re beautiful enough that you can pull off an at-home hair cut from a dude with exactly one professional reference.”

Natasha rolls her eyes and reaches back to pinch Sam’s leg in response.

“Careful!” Sam warns, jerking back to dodge her unnecessarily strong fingers. “If I slip with these scissors, you’re gonna end up with the same haircut I gave Bucky. Do you want to be matching Russian murder twins? Steve and I won’t even be able to tell you two apart anymore.”

Natasha gives him a sly look from beneath her lashes. “Are you saying you and Steve would mind if Bucky and I switched places on you once in a while?”

Sam bites the inside of his cheek and ignores the massive trap Natasha has laid for him, all giant wooden spikes sticking out of a hole in the ground that Natasha’s barely even bothered to camouflage with leaves.

“You and Steve are nasty,” Sam says. “Don’t get me and Bucky involved in your business.”

“Sam,” Natasha teases in a sing-song voice.

Sam ignores her and focuses on trimming her hair, watching the blonde strands drift down to the tile floor. The kitchen is silent around them, quiet enough that Sam can hear the hum of the refrigerator over the soft sounds of the rain pitter-pattering outside, finally beginning to slow.

“Sam, ” Natasha says.

“I’m almost done,” Sam interrupts. He trims one last stray hair that’s escaped from the rest. “You like it just below your shoulders here? If you part it in the middle you’ll look just like you did when I met you.”

“Sam—”

“Here, take a look,” Sam says, handing over the mirror.

He unsnaps Natasha’s cape and busies himself with cleaning up, bringing Natasha’s scissors over to the sink to wash them. Sam soaps up the scissors and watches the storm move off into the distance through the kitchen window. There’s a ray of sunshine peeking through the clouds off to the west, just beginning to hint at the promise of a pretty day ahead.

When he’s done cleaning the scissors, he turns back to face Natasha and catches her smiling at herself in the mirror. “Sam!” she says, her eyes bright and sparkling. “I do look just like I did when you met me.”

“Yeah, Nat, you do,” Sam says with a fond smile, tugging on a lock of Natasha’s hair. “You look just like yourself again.”

The corner of Natasha’s lips tugs up in a wicked grin. “You think I’ve still got what it takes to bring down an entire secret government agency?”

“Nat, you don’t need to bring down an entire secret government agency. You’re gonna run one someday.”

***

The next Saturday Sam and Bucky are making their way through the alleys of Brooklyn on their way to lunch with Steve and Nat, and Sam can’t honestly say that the smell of dumpsters is really doing a lot for his appetite. He’s hopeful that they might run into Steve the cat, but otherwise it would really be nice to just go the regular way for once.

“Man, I don’t think we’re being followed,” Sam says. “Do we really have to go through the whole trash maze today? Can’t we just walk on the streets like regular people?”

Bucky looks concerned. “Wait, what do you mean being followed? Do you think we’re being followed?” Bucky’s spine stiffens and he looks alert, eyes darting back and forth to check the alley entrances for suspicious characters.

“No? But isn’t that why we walk through all these alleys every time we go somewhere?”

Bucky looks shifty for a moment, then embarrassed. “No? It’s really more like—OK, so the truth is—I don’t actually know my way around Brooklyn through the streets,” he mumbles.

“I’m sorry, you just said what now,” Sam says flatly. “Bucky, you grew up here.”

“I know, OK?” Bucky lifts his arm to scratch the back of his neck self-consciously. “But do you know how many fights Steve got into in these alleys? We didn’t have cell phones back then, Sam! The only way to make sure Steve was safe was just to take the alleys everywhere and hope I’d run across him before he got himself killed.”

“Oh my God, you really are the world’s best best friend,” Sam marvels. “No wonder Steve wouldn’t shut up about you.”

“Yeah, yeah,” Bucky says, rolling his eyes and trying to hide a pleased grin. “All right, sweetheart, show me how to get there the fancy way. Lead on.”

So Sam leads Bucky out of his weird little warren full of dumpsters and feral cats and into the sunny streets of Brooklyn. Their shoulders and hands bump a bit as they walk along, and Sam’s heart beats a little faster when Bucky briefly tangles their pinky fingers together and gives him a little squeeze.

When they get to the restaurant they find Steve and Nat sitting close together, grinning and laughing and looking fondly at one another, and Sam is surprised to find that he doesn’t feel even the slightest burn of envy at their casual display of intimacy. Instead his heart swells with affection for them, his best friends, and Sam feels thankful that whatever trauma and heartache they’ve suffered over the last five years, at least they’ve finally learned how to express all those emotions they’d been keeping locked so tightly inside of them.

Steve and Nat seem lighter, happier, quicker to offer smiles and physical affection and verbal assurances of love. It’s kind of sweet really, Sam thinks.

Steve and Natasha look happy when they see Sam and Bucky arrive, standing up to give them big hugs and quick kisses on the cheek or the lips. The four of them chat for a while about what else Sam and Bucky have missed over the last five years—they’re still catching up, working their way now through the four legendary albums Taylor Swift released after her boyfriend was lost in the Decimation. She dropped all four albums at the same time, received massive public and critical acclaim, then disappeared for the next four years. Sam is profoundly unsurprised by the revelation that he and Bucky share an appreciation for hot, artistic blonds.

When the subject turns to work and thus to Todd, Sam groans. “So what’s the deal with that guy anyway? I thought you literally beheaded him.”

“I did,” Steve says with a grimace. “But he had that whole neck brace situation going on? So I guess he’s using it to just sort of—hold everything together.” Steve looks a little nauseated at the idea.

“Todd is so gross,” Bucky complains.

“You soaked the shield in holy water blessed by the pope, though, right?” Sam asks, frowning. “Todd’s Catholic, so it should have worked.”

“We did,” Natasha confirms. “Steve took a trip to Rome and went to a special mass and everything.”

Steve turns to Bucky, looking displeased. “Oh! Did you know that they do the mass with the priest facing you now? So now he can see if you’re goofing off in church. And they don’t do it in Latin anymore, so they expect you to actually listen too.”

“Remember when Father O’Connell caught us sneaking comic books into our hymnals and Ma wouldn’t let me see you for a month?” Bucky says, shaking his head and letting out a low whistle. “She always did think you were a bad influence.”

“I honestly thought you were going to die every single night when you snuck up that death trap of a fire escape to my bedroom in the pitch darkness.”

“Well, c’mon, like I was really going to go an entire month without seeing my best friend?” Bucky says, scoffing. “Plus that was like the same month we discovered masturbation so forgive me for being willing to risk death to come see you every night.”

Natasha snorts a little at that, and Sam makes sure to look directly in front of him at Steve so that he does not catch Natasha’s eye.

“Anyway,” Natasha says loudly, clearing her throat. “I think our mistake was in getting holy water blessed by the wrong pope.”

“The wrong pope?” Bucky lifts an eyebrow. “There’s only one pope, Natalia.”

“Not anymore!” Natasha says cheerfully. “After the Snap, there was a huge schism in the Catholic Church between the ‘faithful’ and a group of people who thought that what we actually experienced was the Rapture. There was this whole conspiracy theory that the old pope and a group of cardinals—who were all taken in the Decimation—deliberately suppressed information about the Rapture because it conflicted with Catholic teachings. So the remaining ‘faithful’ cardinals elected one pope, but then another group of cardinals broke off and elected a different pope.”

“What,” Sam says.

“Yup!” Natasha says, eyes alight with amusement. “So the schismatics moved their Holy See back to Avignon in France, but before they did, they—get this—collected the old pope’s ashes and put them on trial.”

“What,” Sam repeats, mouth dropping open in disbelief.

“It was the most batshit insane Medieval farce of a trial I have ever seen, and I grew up in the Soviet Union.” Natasha tips her head in reluctant approval at this lunacy. “So anyway, now there are two popes, and they’ve each ex-communicated the other.”

“So if Todd is a follower of the schismatic pope, then I guess we need to go get some holy water blessed by that guy instead?” Sam says.

“Natasha and I can go,” Steve offers.

Bucky narrows his eyes at this and bumps Sam’s knee under the table. “Nah, Sam and I can go. The last time I was in Avignon, I was in the infantry and it was being bombed by the Germans,” Bucky laments. He knows how guilty Steve feels about the horrors Bucky witnessed in the war before Steve rescued him from Kreischberg. “Plus Avignon is really beautiful this time of year.”

“It will be a healing trip,” Sam says earnestly.

***

One of Bucky’s many mysterious superpowers is that no matter where they are in the world, no matter what part of any city, no matter what language everybody is speaking and whether Bucky can speak it too, Bucky can disappear for fifteen minutes and magically return with the best weed Sam has ever smoked.

They’re at their hotel in Avignon, relaxing after a pretty tense dinner with Pope Stephen X—known apparently to “regular” Catholics as the Antipope of Avignon—and his loony band of schismatics. Sam has already expended the majority of today’s allotted emotional energy pretending that everything this guy did wasn’t deeply weird.

“Do you think he’s actually going to release a papal bull against Destiel?” Bucky asks. He sucks on the end of their joint, cheeks hollowing out attractively as he inhales, before he exhales and passes it back over to Sam.

They’re on the roof of the hotel, where they’re probably not technically allowed to be, but Sam used his wings to get them up here anyway and he’s sure they have some sort of diplomatic immunity or something, right? Probably. They have a gorgeous view of the Rhone, painted dark purple in the setting sun, and the Palais des Papes looks Gothic and romantic as hell surrounded by Medieval ramparts.

“I don’t know, man,” Sam says, shrugging. He feels warm and lazy. “I tried to tell him it’d be political or religious suicide or whatever if he did. Like 40% of the world’s Catholics live in Latin America and they’re all Destiel believers down there.”

They lapse into silence for a moment, and then Bucky says, “Hey, Sam? Do you ever think about submarines?”

“I mean, occasionally, I guess,” Sam says thoughtfully. “Why?”

“I dunno,” Bucky replies, leaning back and looking up at the sky. “It’s just so funny thinking about all the submarines floating out there, hiding from each other. Like, what a ridiculous thing we all decided to do. We just send people out for months at a time and tell them to find other submarines but not to let other submarines find them. And like every major superpower does this, and it costs billions of dollars.”

“That’s a good point, but also you’re high as fuck,” Sam replies, stifling a grin. “Where did you even get this weed?”

“French Mafia,” Bucky responds blithely.

Sam shakes his head in disbelief, wondering when that became a thing. He pours another glass of wine from the picnic basket they brought up with them and takes a sip. “This is a nice ass spread, by the way. You really know how to make a guy feel special.”

Bucky grins in response, and oh, Sam knows that grin.

“C’mere, baby,” Sam says. “Let’s make out.”

***

It takes a while for Natasha to track Todd to his new lair, but eventually she finds it in the Free State of Michigan. Like everything else about the world after the Snap, everything about that situation is confusing as hell too, because when Michigan seceded from the Union, the Upper and Lower Peninsulas actually split apart from each other. It wasn’t even because one peninsula wanted to leave and the other wanted to stay either—they both wanted to leave, but the Lower Peninsula refused to let the Upper Peninsula tag along with them, arguing that they didn’t contribute enough to their tax base.

So now the Lower Peninsula is an independent country known as the Free State of Michigan, while the Upper Peninsula is still a part of the United States of America and is known simply as Michigan. They fought a lot over which peninsula got to keep the name Michigan, and the Upper Peninsula only narrowly won that battle after Ohio got its trashy ass involved.

Finally, after the Battle of Toledo and the total shit show that was the Second Michigan-Ohio War, the United States government finally agreed to let the Free State of Michigan leave so long as they got to keep the Upper Peninsula and call it Michigan. So now the Lower Peninsula is a libertarian hellhole called the Free State of Michigan and Sam has to use his passport to get there.

“Do you even need a passport?” Bucky asks. They’re in the middle of fighting Todd, who’s not actually that good at fighting but is very good at exploding into a group of bats every time they try to land a punch. “You’re Captain America. I feel like this is a situation like the Queen of England, where she doesn’t need a passport because all passports are issued by her.”

“I don’t think that all American passports are issued by me,” Sam says doubtfully. He should probably check with Nick Fury or maybe the President about that, though.

Todd re-forms back into a person just to be a dick and tell Sam he’ll never be the real Captain America.

“You’re an asshole, Todd,” Sam informs him. Then, before Todd can become bats again, Sam slings his shield, already coated in holy water blessed by the Antipope of Avignon, directly at Todd’s neck, busting through his brace and re-severing his head.

 “Nice hit,” Bucky says, whistling in admiration.

Unfortunately, this doesn’t seem to do the trick, because Todd just stands up, gropes blindly for his head, and once he finds it, he poofs into a swarm of bats, each one cradling its little head in its right wing, flying off into the night at a distinctly wonky angle.

“Damn it, Todd!” Sam calls after him. “What the fuck do you even believe in, man?”

***

They don’t stay at a hotel in the Free State of Michigan because it’s a dystopian nightmare where every hotel room is a smoking room and Sam is genuinely concerned about being hunted for sport, so they take the Quinjet back to New York.

They get in late, showering perfunctorily and climbing into bed nude together, too tired to bother pulling on pajamas. When Sam wakes up in the morning, he can see that it’s really more like mid-afternoon, the sun streaming in through their curtains, filling the bedroom with soft, diffused light. Bucky is pressed up against his back, too hot and just a tiny bit sweaty, his hard cock nestled up against Sam’s ass.

When Sam shifts a bit against him, reluctantly considering the prospect of getting up and starting the day, Bucky makes a discontented little noise and wraps his arm around Sam’s chest to pull him back.

“No, come back here,” Bucky mumbles, voice rough with sleep. He throws his leg over Sam’s, trapping him into place, and drops a warm kiss onto the back of Sam’s neck. Sam shivers at the feel of Bucky’s lips against the sensitive skin at his nape, and Bucky’s hand wanders down Sam’s chest and along his flank as he subtly grinds his cock into Sam’s ass.

Sam lets out a low chuckle. “Oh, that’s what you want?” he asks with amusement.

“Yeah, sweetheart,” Bucky breathes. “That’s what I want.”

Sam turns over to face him, capturing Bucky’s lips in a slow and dirty kiss. Bucky moans softly, and his hand slides down to blatantly grope Sam’s ass, fingers kneading into the hard muscle. Bucky’s cock is pressed against his, and Sam can’t resist grinding a bit against him.

When Sam pulls back from the kiss, he asks, “You sure about this? Sex changes things.”

“Sure I’m sure,” Bucky says, grinning. “I mean, it’s been awhile, but Steve and I always—”

“Do not tell me you and Steve used to fuck back in the day.” Sam groans, willing his brain not to indulge those mental images.

“Wait, did you and Steve not—”

“No!” Sam says defensively. “Steve and I were best friends, not boyfriends.”

“Sam, first of all, it’s totally normal to fuck your best friend, it’s called friends with benefits. I looked it up, and it’s a thing.” Bucky sounds placid, relaxed, his tone entirely too reasonable, his expression even and unbothered. “And second of all, you and I are only pretending to be best friends, so it’ll be even more fine for us.”

Bucky shifts his hips against Sam again, and Sam stifles a low moan. Sam is absolutely going to go along with this nonsense. God, all of his relationships with all of his friends have gotten so deeply weird ever since Steve came into his life. Steve’s boundary issues with Bucky are infecting the entire rest of the team.

“Yeah, OK,” Sam agrees, then gasps as Bucky leans down to lick and then gently bite Sam’s nipple. The sensation goes straight to Sam’s cock and he can’t resist thrusting his pelvis up against Bucky’s hard abs. “Fuck, baby.”

“Yeah, sweetheart,” Bucky says, licking his way down Sam’s chest, mouthing and sucking at the skin on Sam’s lower belly and thighs, soft and gentle and careful, like maybe he doesn’t want to leave any bruises. Sam wonders if that’s a leftover habit from fucking Steve, if Bucky hadn’t wanted to leave marks on Steve’s pale, delicate skin, still so quick to bloom purple even now that his bruises fade in a matter of hours. As Sam pictures Bucky’s mouth on Steve, licking and sucking at him the same way that he’s torturing Sam now, heat spreads through his entire body, his skin on fire.

Bucky spends an excruciatingly long time just teasing and kissing around Sam’s cock before he finally, finally runs his tongue slowly up Sam’s hard length.

“Fuck,” Sam curses, fighting to keep his hips still. Bucky looks up at him from beneath those long lashes, and Sam feels a sharp tug in his lower belly at the sight of those gorgeous gray eyes. “Fuck, please.”

“I’ve got you, sweetheart,” Bucky says soothingly.

He presses a soft kiss to the tip of Sam’s cock and then wraps his pretty lips around him and slides down, maintaining eye contact as he takes Sam deep into his mouth. Sam gasps at all that wet heat surrounding him, shocked by the fire racing down his spine as he feels Bucky swallow him down.

“Bucky,” Sam says helplessly, reaching down to put his hands in Bucky’s thick hair, soft and still messy from sleep.

Sam shifts restlessly, trying not to fuck Bucky’s mouth as Bucky leisurely drags his mouth up and down Sam’s cock, his pace maddeningly, frustratingly slow. When Bucky slides all the way down to the base of Sam’s cock, taking his entire length into his mouth, Sam’s hips jerk involuntarily and his fists clench in Bucky’s hair.

“Fuck, baby, I need—I need—”

Bucky pulls his mouth off Sam’s cock and Sam moans at the loss of that tight heat. Bucky’s eyes are knowing, his lips spit-slick and pink, so pretty and swollen.

“I know what you need, sweetheart,” Bucky says sympathetically, wickedly, his voice rough from Sam’s cock down his throat. “You gonna let me fuck you, Sam?”

“Yeah, God, yeah,” Sam says. Sam’s pulse leaps at the thought, and he takes a deep breath to try to force his racing heart to calm down, to steady his shaking hands.

Bucky kisses his way back up Sam’s chest, leaning over Sam to whisper in his ear, “So gorgeous, sweetheart. Gonna make you feel so good, Sam.”

Bucky reaches into the top drawer of the nightstand to pull out a condom and a bottle of lube. Sam starts to turn over, to bring himself up onto all fours, when Bucky stops him and says, “No, stay there, sweetheart. I wanna see you while I fuck you.”

Bucky grabs a pillow and slides it under Sam’s ass, pulling Sam’s knees up and spreading his legs apart so he can look at him. Sam trembles under Bucky’s gaze, his skin prickling as Bucky’s eyes roam greedily over Sam’s body.

“Fuck, Sam,” Bucky says reverently. “Are you ready?”

“Yeah,” Sam gasps, arching his back when he feels the slick press of Bucky’s finger at his hole.

He tries not to clench up, tries to relax his muscles as Bucky slides a finger smoothly inside him. Bucky is sweet and soothing, praising Sam as he works his finger in and out of him, telling Sam how beautiful he is, how good he feels, how much Bucky can’t wait to be inside of him. Sam’s poor, neglected cock is dripping precome onto his lower belly, and Sam reaches down to take himself in hand, giving his cock a gentle stroke.

“Jesus, sweetheart,” Bucky says, his eyes hot and admiring as they watch Sam’s fist moving over his cock.

Sam keeps at it, leisurely jerking himself off while Bucky works a second and then a third finger into him. Bucky’s eyes are dark and hungry, and Sam feels aroused and exposed and needy, desperate for more, ready for Bucky’s cock to fuck him open and fill him up. He’s panting and gasping, chanting, “Please, please, please” as Bucky’s fingers stretch and pull at his loosening rim.

“You want it?” Bucky says, ripping open the condom package, pulling out the condom and sliding it down the thick, flushed length of his cock.

“Please, yes, I need it,” Sam begs.

And Sam’s embarrassed by his eagerness, how desperate he is for it, but the humiliation only makes him more aroused, his cock hardening further under his hand. He’s always so quick to say yes to Bucky, so quick to be tempted even against his own common sense, and Jesus fuck is he grateful for that now because that is Bucky’s cock sliding into him, pushing past the tight ring of muscle at Sam’s entrance and filling him up.

Bucky grabs Sam’s legs and hitches them up around his waist, sliding another inch of his thick cock deep inside Sam, who’s gasping and panting beneath him. Sam’s knees tighten around Bucky’s sides, gripping him tight and using his leverage to pull Bucky deeper into him. Sweat begins to form at the small of Sam’s back and behind his knees, prickling at his overheated skin.

“Sam,” Bucky moans. “God, Sam, you feel so good, sweetheart.”

Bucky bends down to steal a wet, filthy kiss as he slides his cock deeper, pushing that last, final inch all the way into Sam. Bucky’s hips are flush against him, and Sam feels so connected to Bucky, with Bucky’s tongue sliding slickly into Sam’s mouth and Bucky’s cock thrusting deep into Sam’s ass, and Sam swears Bucky’s heart is beating in time with his, twin rhythms pounding faster and faster until Sam feels like they’ll both burst into flames.

“C’mon,” Sam urges. “I need it. Please, baby.”

“Yeah,” Bucky breathes, leaning down to give Sam one last kiss before he braces himself on his arms and starts moving, slow and deep and dirty, into Sam. Sam’s head falls back as his back arches, and Bucky’s teeth nip gently at the exposed skin of Sam’s neck. Sam reaches down to grab Bucky’s ass, and Bucky inhales sharply when Sam pulls him, hard, so far inside him that Sam feels like he’ll choke on Bucky’s cock.

“Sam—Sam, you—”

“Yeah, baby, please—”

“God, Sam—”

Bucky fucks him so slowly, so sweetly, that Sam feels like he’s going to float off into space, lost in the feel of Bucky’s cock hitting that sensitive spot before dragging back out against his tender rim. Sam moans every time Bucky hits his prostate, feeling his balls begin to tighten and draw up against his body. Bucky’s pace slowly shifts from controlled and relentless to wild and irregular.

“Sam, Sam, look at me,” Bucky groans. Sam opens his eyes to find Bucky looking wrecked, his lips swollen, eyes dark and dazed, looking beautiful and so utterly focused on Sam. Their eyes meet and Bucky holds the contact, biting his lip and moaning. “Sam, Sam, I’m gonna—”

“Yeah, c’mon, do it—”

Bucky comes with a choked cry, shuddering and thrusting his hips erratically against Sam. His body shakes and shivers, breath coming in heavy gasps against Sam’s mouth.

Sam groans and focuses his attention back to stroking his cock, his hand moving faster and faster as Bucky pants and recovers above him. Sam’s almost there, so close, when Bucky leans down to kiss him, teeth biting gently at Sam’s bottom lip, and stars explode behind Sam’s eyes as he spills over his fist.

Bucky is slow to pull out of Sam, kissing him lazily before removing the condom and then collapsing on top of him. Sam wraps his arms around Bucky as they breathe and let their hearts settle, pressed tightly against one another.

“God, Sam,” Bucky says, voice muffled by Sam’s neck, sounding happy and exhausted and overwhelmed.

Sam lets Bucky rest on top of him for a while until he begins to feel suffocated by the weight of an entire supersoldier resting on him. He nudges Bucky to the side a little, and Bucky rolls onto his back, pulling Sam over to rest his head on Bucky’s shoulder.

Sam wonders if Bucky understands that “friends with benefits” usually don’t make love to each other the way that Bucky just made love to him.

“Good, sweetheart?” Bucky asks, pressing a kiss to the top of Sam’s head.

“Yeah.” The corner of Sam’s mouth turns up in a grin. “You did all right.”

“You were pretty good yourself,” Bucky says appreciatively. “Thought I was going to die when I got inside you. Christ, sweetheart.”

They lapse into blissful silence for a moment, and Bucky reaches over to grab Sam’s hand and pull it onto his chest. He plays with Sam’s fingers idly, intertwining their fingers and then pulling back to stroke his thumb over Sam’s palm. Bucky seems utterly relaxed and content, and Sam hates to break the comfortable silence but he just has to ask.

“So,” Sam says casually, “is that always how you fuck? All slow and romantic and full of eye contact?”

“Well, I mean, I’ve only ever had sex with Steve, so I guess so?” Bucky says, frowning. Sam is a little stunned at this revelation, eyebrows shooting upward in shock, because Bucky is one of the most attractive men Sam has ever met and Sam now knows for a fact that Bucky knows how to seduce someone if he wants it. “I guess I’m not really sure how I’d fuck someone other than you or Steve. I mean, maybe Natalia—”

Sam decides to interrupt Bucky before he finishes that interesting thought. “Rumor has it that you were a real smooth operator back in the day, though, taking ladies out on the town and double dating with Steve and going out dancing all night. You’re saying you never seriously tried it on with anybody else?” Sam asks in disbelief.

“Well, I mean, there were girls,” Bucky says slowly. “But I sorta got the feeling that they didn’t really take me seriously? Like, they were happy to go dancing with me, and they’d give me a sweet kiss at the end of the night, but if I tried for anything more they’d just pat me on the cheek and tell me to say hi to Steve for them and I really should take out their friend Betty next week.”

Bucky shrugs, obviously baffled by this behavior, but Sam suddenly understands exactly why Bucky wasn’t very successful with the ladies, and Sam really should have been way less surprised by the fact that even the sheltered Catholic girls of 1940s Brooklyn could tell that Bucky and Steve were deeply weird about each other and Bucky wasn’t exactly available.

“Did you ever want to get married and have a family?”

“Sure, someday,” Bucky says carelessly. “But Steve and I were still young when the war hit. I thought we’d have more time together. And then we didn’t, and Steve met Peggy, and you know how everything went after that.”

“It didn’t bother you when Steve found Peggy?”

“No, of course not,” Bucky says, his eyes shining and earnest. “Peggy was a doll. And I’ve been in love with Steve my whole life. I knew we’d always be best friends. It never even occurred to me that I could ever really lose Steve, not in a way that mattered. After all, who can ever really come between someone and their best friend?”

And that—explains a lot about Bucky’s near fanatical devotion to the very concept of best friendship. Sam shakes his head at this, knowing that there’s probably no point in trying to shake Steve and Bucky out of the wacky coping mechanisms they’ve developed for 1940s homophobia. After over a hundred years that shit has got to be way too deeply entrenched in their psyches.

Sam resigns himself to embracing their crazy on this particular issue. At least Bucky is hot.

***

Sam and Bucky are visiting Sam’s mom, and Sam doesn’t know how his mom knows, but somehow she definitely does know that something is different between Sam and Bucky, and boy does she look thrilled about it.

“Thank you so much for the lovely flowers, Bucky!” Sam’s mom gushes. “And you thought to bring a dish for dinner! Sam never used to bring a dish with him to dinner.” She beams at Bucky, so clearly approving of all of the changes Bucky has brought to Sam’s life, then looks meaningfully over at Sarah and Michelle. “And don’t they look handsome!”

Michelle simply nods obediently at this, because she’s eleven and not particularly impressed by Sam’s too-formal attire, but Sarah gives him a quick once over and then raises her eyebrows in mild surprise at his tailored blazer.

Sam and Sarah have a quick conversation through facial expressions, communicating “What’s all this then, Sam?” and “Don’t make a big thing about it, Sarah,” and “Is he your boyfriend?” and “Shut up, Sarah!” through a series of suggestively waggled eyebrows and narrowed eyes and teasing smirks.

“I hope it wasn’t too much trouble for you to plan a meal without meat, Mrs. Wilson,” Bucky says with concern. “If it’s too much or you don’t want the hassle of meal planning, you’re all more than welcome to come to our apartment for dinner on Sunday nights.”

And the thing is, Bucky’s not being smarmy or insincere about it at all. He would be genuinely happy to have Sam’s family over for dinner every Sunday night, because Bucky likes cooking and he likes Sam and he likes families, and maybe Sam’s starting to feel some kind of way about all of Bucky’s effortless charm and openhanded generosity and muscular thighs.

“So you and Sam are living together,” Sarah says with interest. Even Michelle perks up at this, finally glancing up from her phone, where she’s been texting rapidly or possibly live tweeting this entire embarrassing conversation.

Bucky puts a casual arm around Sam’s shoulders, and come on, Bucky has to know how this looks to Sam’s family, right? “Yep, for probably around six months now, right, sweetheart?” Bucky says, smiling at Sam.

And suddenly Sam realizes that maybe Bucky doesn’t know how this looks to Sam’s family, because Bucky has such an extreme lack of awareness regarding normal friendship boundaries, and also because they’re so far deep into this whole fake-best-friends thing that this is just the way that the two of them act now, all the time.

And, really, Sam has to blame Steve and Natasha for this too, because the two of them are only encouraging this madness with all the “best friends dates” and the excessive physical affection and their own overly invested relationship. Literally no one in Bucky’s life is modeling basic relationship boundaries for him, no wonder he slipped through the cracks of normal human friendship behavior.

And Sam must be crazy too, because he just smiles back at Bucky and says, “Yep, that sounds about right, baby.” Because Sam isn’t really all that concerned about normal human friendship behavior when Bucky looks at him like that, gray eyes all warm and soft and pleased, like Sam’s the best thing he’s ever seen.

Sam’s heart beats a little faster in his chest, warmth traveling through his veins, and oh, this is a thing.

“You know, when you and Steve were living together, he never invited us over to your place,” Sam’s mother points out. Thanks to all of Bucky’s hard work rehabbing Steve’s tarnished image in Sam’s mother’s eyes, Steve has been upgraded from that boy to Steve, always stated with a faint moue of distaste.

“Steve and I were international fugitives, Mom,” Sam replies, his tone patient. “We didn’t have a stable place to invite you to.”

“And whose fault was that!” Sam’s mom says triumphantly.

“Mom, I made my own choices when it came to the Accords.”

“Sam’s not a follower,” Bucky agrees, and it’s sweet that Bucky thinks so but Sam realizes now that that is a complete lie, because Sam has done nothing but follow Bucky along in this foolishness ever since he felt Bucky’s body pressed up against him in a closet. “And if anything it’s probably my fault how everything went down. I was the one they blamed for that bombing—Steve and Sam were just trying to help me. They really are the best friends I could ever ask for, and I’m still not sure I was worth everything they went through for it.’”

And maybe it’s just a fluke of the phrasing, maybe Bucky didn’t really mean it, but Sam can’t help but notice that this is the first time Bucky has ever used the plural form of the term best friend.

“Oh, dear, that wasn’t your fault!” Sam’s mother protests. “You were framed for that bombing!”

“Well, it certainly wasn’t Steve’s fault either, Mom.”

Sam’s mother sniffs. “Well, I still think Steve could have made more of an effort to get to know your family.”

“I’m still friends with Steve, Mom,” Sam says, rolling his eyes. “Our friendship is not past tense, we’re not, like, broken up or something.”

“Then why isn’t Steve here for Sunday dinner with the rest of the family?” Sam’s mother gestures around the table at the five of them, and Sam’s heart skips a beat as he realizes that his mother is including Bucky in the family.

Sarah and Michelle are observing this conversation with ill-concealed glee, unabashedly enjoying Sam’s friendship-slash-relationship-slash-familial drama. Bucky’s arm is still wrapped around Sam, his thumb rubbing absent little circles on Sam’s shoulder, and Michelle is tapping away on her phone as she watches. Sam doesn’t have high hopes for this staying off the internet when he catches Michelle snapping a surreptitious photo of Sam tucked in snugly under Bucky’s arm.

It’s Bucky’s metal arm, too, so no chance of passing Bucky off as some random dude.

Well, in for a penny, in for a pound, Sam thinks. He leans over and gives Bucky a soft kiss on the mouth right in front of his family.

***

Sam and Bucky are fooling around on the sofa after finishing season one of The Mandalorian—apparently Pedro Pascal’s bedroom voice really does it for both of them—and Sam is finally getting the chance to trace Bucky’s abs with his tongue the way he imagined every single time he jerked off in the shower back before Bucky started taking showers with him.

Sam shifts down to suck a bruise into the sharp jut of Bucky’s hip bone, and Bucky moans underneath him. Bruises don’t last any longer on Bucky than they do on Steve, but Sam still likes seeing Bucky’s fair skin mottled with fresh marks, likes the possessive little thrill it sends through him to see Bucky’s perfect flesh marred by Sam’s mouth and teeth.

“Sam, please, suck me, sweetheart,” Bucky begs.

“Yeah,” Sam agrees, pulling Bucky’s boxer-briefs down his hips and watching in satisfaction when Bucky’s hard cock springs forward, flushed and thick and perfect. Sam is impatient tonight, wants Bucky’s cock in his mouth now, and he leans forward to swallow Bucky down in one long, slick slide.

“Fuck, Sam,” Bucky moans.

Sam grabs Bucky’s hips as he bobs his head up and down, fingers digging in tight, bruising, to keep Bucky from thrusting into Sam’s mouth. Bucky is strong enough that he could easily break Sam’s hold but he doesn’t, squirming restlessly underneath Sam, frustrated and needy and desperate.

Sam pulls off Bucky’s cock long enough to take in a big gulp of air before he slides back down, taking Bucky as far back into his throat as he can, and Bucky moans brokenly when Sam tightens his mouth and lips around him. Sam sets a steady rhythm, swirling his tongue around the head of Bucky’s cock and then sucking him back down again, spit slicking up the way. Sam reaches up to roll Bucky’s balls between his fingers, squeezing and tugging gently, admiring the heft of them in his hand.

“God, Sam, Sam,” Bucky chants, hands fisting in the sheets to keep from grabbing Sam’s head and fucking his face. “Sam, sweetheart, I love you. I love you so fucking much.”

Sam moans around Bucky’s cock, and Bucky cries out, tapping Sam’s shoulder in a desperate warning before he breaks Sam’s hold on his hips and thrusts forward, flooding Sam’s mouth with come. Sam swallows him down, bitter and salty, and then leans forward to rest his head against Bucky’s pelvis and catch his breath.

“God, Sam,” Bucky says, panting. He looks flushed and beautiful, and Sam’s heart feels like it’s going to explode in his chest.

“I love you too,” Sam says helplessly.

Bucky looks awestruck for a moment, then says, “C’mere,” in a rough voice.

He pulls Sam up and gives him a quick, hard kiss, then reaches down to unbutton Sam’s jeans and slide his hand around Sam’s cock. He strokes Sam firmly, a brutal pace that drives Sam half out of his mind. Sam’s already so hard from sucking Bucky’s cock, can still taste Bucky’s come in his mouth, and he won’t need much to get there.

“Baby, please, I need—”

“I know what you need, sweetheart,” Bucky says comfortingly. He buries his head in Sam’s neck, biting down on the thick cord of muscle that leads to Sam’s shoulder, and Sam’s back arches in pleasure. Bucky strokes him just a little faster, almost enough, thumb rubbing at that sensitive spot right beneath Sam’s glans. “C’mon, sweetheart, come for me.”

And Sam does, come splattering over his lower belly, mind going blissfully blank and toes curling in pleasure. While Sam comes down from his high, Bucky reaches up to cup Sam’s face in his hand, stroking his thumb tenderly over Sam’s cheek. “God, you’re gorgeous.”

Sam leans forward to kiss him, losing himself in the warm heat of Bucky’s mouth, their lips moving in a slow, gentle slide against each other. They make out lazily for a while, hands roaming appreciatively over each other’s bodies, until Sam reluctantly pulls away to clean up.

When Sam returns to the living room, Bucky is sitting in the dim light of the television, chewing anxiously at his lower lip. Sam plops down next to him, turning on his side to face him and putting his feet in Bucky’s lap.

“Did you mean it?” Bucky asks uncertainly. “It wasn’t just, like, a heat of the moment thing?”

“I did,” Sam confirms, his voice sure and steady. “Did you mean it?”

“God, yes, Sam. I love you.”

They look at each other dopily for a while, then Bucky tugs at Sam’s legs to urge him further down the sofa, closer to Bucky. They curl up together and enjoy the comfortable silence until Bucky says, “Tell me something you’ve never told Steve.”

Sam thinks for a moment, then groans. He covers his face with his hands, peeking embarrassedly through his fingers, and says, “OK, so I went through a phase, when I first got out of high school, where I told everybody to call me Snap Wilson.”

Bucky laughs incredulously, then claps a hand over his mouth to stifle it, mostly unsuccessfully. “I’m sorry, you told them to call you what now?” he asks gleefully.

“I told them to call me Snap Wilson,” Sam grits out. He is already regretting this, but Bucky looks so fucking elated that Sam can’t bring himself to care too much about the inevitable teasing he’s going to receive. And it’s Bucky, not Steve or Natasha, so Sam knows that the ribbing won’t be too savage.

Bucky is already trying to suppress his wild grin, pressing his lips together until they turn almost white. “So was this like a rough time you were going through, like trouble at home or something, or did you just think Snap Wilson sounded cool?” His voice is a mixture of genuine concern and barely concealed amusement.

“I just thought it sounded cool,” Sam confesses.

Bucky laughs in delight, and Sam gives him a sour look, poking him in the side. “Yeah, yeah, your turn now, buddy,” Sam says. “Tell me something you’ve never told Steve.”

Bucky sobers up, clears his throat and says, “I didn’t enlist in the Army.”

“What?”

“I let Steve think that I enlisted, because I didn’t want him to know that I had to drop out of college to pay for his medical bills when he got sick the winter of ’41. Got called up shortly after, told him that I enlisted.”

Sam’s heart breaks a little at that, for Bucky, because he would have done anything to take care of Steve, and for Steve, who never would have forgiven himself if Bucky had gotten drafted and sent home in a body bag on his account. To this day Steve still feels guilty about leaving Bucky behind in that ravine, even though he had no reason to believe that Bucky could have survived the fall, and anyway Steve drove a plane straight into the Arctic like a week later and couldn’t have rescued Bucky anyway.

“So wait, how does Steve think you paid for his medical bills?”

“I told him I got paid to pose for some dirty pictures,” Bucky says with a saucy grin. “Then he asked to see them and I had to beg one of his photographer friends to take some for me to try to sell the whole embarrassing lie. Honestly I was a little flattered that Steve had exactly zero questions about the whole thing, like of course someone would pay to see me jerking off wearing a pair of women’s stockings.”

Sam raises his eyebrows at that. “Any chance those pictures are still around somewhere?”

“I’m pretty sure Steve burned them all before he headed out on the bond circuit,” Bucky says with regret, then brightens. “But on the plus side, I think I just came up with a great idea for the erotic portrait series Steve’s been working on during all of our best friend dates.”

Sam grins cheerfully at this. “Nice.”

***

A month later, they’re in Eastern Washington with Steve and Natasha, fighting off a horde of formerly human white nationalist cult members who are now a group of largely mindless but probably still racist vampires.

The vampires aren’t much of a threat, but there are a bunch of them and they’re good at causing enough chaos that it’s hard to get close to Todd, who’s in a neck brace again and back on his bullshit.

Sam’s done a ton of research on Catholicism since the last time they met and he’s still not sure how to finally kill this guy. The holy water blessed by the Roman pope didn’t work, and the holy or possibly unholy water blessed by the Antipope of Avignon didn’t work, and Sam’s pretty much run out of popes to get holy water from. Out of a commitment to preparedness Sam’s brought along vials of leftover holy water from each pope, but he’s honestly not sure if they’ll be much help to them if neither of them even works.

Sam, Bucky, and Steve are all covered in blood from the vampires they’ve slain so far, but as usual Natasha still looks perfectly pristine as she lectures Todd on his many sins and hypocrisies. God, she even had the audacity to wear a white uniform to this. Sam’s heart swells with affection for her.

“I thought you were supposed to be Catholic, Todd. It’s not very pro-life of you to create all these vampires,” Natasha says, shaking her head in disapproval.

“I’m just trying to make humanity great again,” Todd snaps defensively through his ridiculous plastic fangs. “Society works best when there are a few strong leaders and many weak, dependent followers. HYDRA believes in order. The Catholic Church used to believe in order too—it used to understand the value of an authoritarian system of governing its followers.”

And just like that, Sam understands Todd’s belief system. “He’s a Sedevacant!” Sam announces, pointing a finger in triumph.

“What?” Bucky asks, firing a crossbow into a vampire trying to latch its fangs into Steve’s calf. The vampire explodes in a shower of red, and Steve wrinkles his nose in disgust but keeps fighting. At this point there’s not very much of Steve that isn’t covered in blood, and Sam hopes they aren’t all going to have to worry about bloodborne diseases from this whole gross situation.

“Remember all those changes in the Catholic Church since you and Steve were kids? Those all came about after the Second Vatican Council in the 1960s. Sedevacants believe that the church lost its way and fell into heresy when it embraced modernism. So according to them there is no valid pope—the seat of the pope is actually vacant,” Sam explains, tossing his shield off to behead a vampire looming over Bucky.

“Thanks, sweetheart!” Bucky calls, blowing him a kiss.

“Great,” Natasha says, irritated. “And how are we supposed to get holy water blessed by no one? Wouldn’t that just be regular water?”

Sam frowns in dismay at this terrible, zany loophole Todd has apparently discovered.

Todd cackles triumphantly. “You can’t! You’ll never be able to kill me—there’s no holy water on earth that’s been blessed by no one,” Todd boasts. “I’m invincible!”

“Not so fast,” Bucky says, a thoughtful expression crossing his face. “Sam, do you still have both vials of holy water?”

“Yeah, why?”

“Mix them together!” Bucky says. “Holy water blessed by the pope plus holy water blessed by the antipope will cancel each other out.”

Todd’s eyes widen in horror. “No, that won’t work!”

“It’s simple math, Todd,” Bucky says smugly. “Sam, do it, I’ll cover you!”

Sam’s hands are steady as he unscrews the tops of the bottles, sure in the knowledge that Bucky will have his back if any vampires try to latch onto him while he’s busy. He coats the shield in holy water from each of the vials, making sure to cover every square inch. Then, with a mighty throw, he launches the shield toward Todd, nailing him directly in the throat.

When Todd’s head is blown back off his body, he explodes into a bloody, disgusting mess.

“Gross,” Steve says.

The baby vampires stumble around, confused and lost without their leader, and it only takes about twenty minutes for Sam and the others to slay the rest of them now that Todd’s dead.

 Sam makes a mental note to use all of his influence as Captain America to get Bucky an honorary doctorate in mathematics from Harvard or Yale or something after all this.

***

Sam and Bucky spend forty-five long minutes showering off all the blood after their showdown with Todd and his racist vampire gang, the last fifteen of which are spent with Bucky pressed up against the shower wall with Sam’s tongue in his ass.

“Fuck, sweetheart, please,” Bucky begs. He’s trembling and squirming, spreading his legs shamelessly for Sam. “Fuck me, Sam, please.”

Sam reaches down to squeeze the base of his cock, liquid heat pooling in his belly at the thought of sliding his cock into that tight hole he’s been eagerly, methodically loosening. Bucky’s hands are pulling at his own ass, spreading his cheeks so sweetly, so obediently for Sam’s mouth. Sam traces a finger around Bucky’s wet rim, poking in just a bit to test him out, and Bucky’s thighs twitch and shake around Sam’s face.

“You think you can take it standing up?” Sam asks, giving Bucky an assessing look.

Bucky bites his lip and sobs a bit, panting and gasping, his face pressed up against the shower wall. Bucky looks wrecked already, so pretty, and Sam decides to take pity on him.

“C’mon, baby, let’s go to the bedroom,” Sam says, standing up and shutting off the shower.

He wraps Bucky in a towel and leads him to the hotel bedroom, and Bucky shivers prettily in the cool air, goosebumps rising on his clean, damp skin. Sam crowds Bucky against the mattress to warm him up, leaning his head down to dip into the wet heat of Bucky’s mouth, sliding his tongue against Bucky’s in a dirty kiss that leaves them both moaning.

Sam grabs the lube and Bucky spreads his legs eagerly, obscenely, and the sight is so erotic that Sam feels like he’s been punched in the gut, breathless with desire and desperate to plunge his cock into all that tight, willing heat. His hands shake a bit as he fumbles with the lube, and he coats his fingers until they’re nice and slick, ready to slide right in with just the slightest amount of pressure.

Bucky gasps when Sam slips one long finger into him, biting his lip and arching his back. “Sam, more—I need—”

“I got you, baby,” Sam says, sliding another finger in next to the first. Bucky’s mouth gapes open, his throat emitting a choked off little cry, and Sam’s cock is achingly hard at the sound, weeping messily against Sam’s belly, dripping little trails of precome. Bucky’s a quivering mess underneath him, and Sam presses wet kisses between Bucky’s thighs as he ruthlessly opens him up. “God, look at you, baby.”

Sam gives him another finger, and Bucky takes it, keening and begging. “More—please—Sam, I want your cock.”

“Oh, you think you’re ready for it, baby?”

“Yes, please, Sam,” Bucky whines, and Sam reluctantly removes his fingers, climbing up to settle his body over Bucky’s, letting gravity pull him down so they’re pressed tightly together. Bucky may be sweet and pliant underneath him now, but Sam knows how strong he really is, how easily he can bear Sam’s weight.

When Sam starts pushing his cock inside of him, Bucky gasps, mouth opening in a small o of pleasure. Sam fucks Bucky shallowly until he grows impatient, needs to go deeper, grabbing Bucky’s thighs to pull them up so he can bend Bucky in half underneath him. Bucky’s limbs are long and flexible, moving easily as Sam moves him right where he needs him. Sam bites his own lip, hard, as Bucky’s hole pulls him in, clutching greedily at Sam’s throbbing cock.

When Sam slides all the way home, Bucky gasps and says, “Sam, Sam, wait—”

Sam pauses, his cock buried fully inside Bucky, panting harshly at the effort of keeping his hips still.

“Yeah, baby,” Sam says, voice straining. “What do you need?”

“Sam,” Bucky says, and he sucks in a deep breath, closing his eyes and visibly working to control himself. “Sam, I need to tell you something.”

Sam looks down at Bucky and waits, letting Bucky take the time he needs to settle. Sam’s hips are flush against Bucky’s ass, his cock seated fully inside of him, and he feels so connected to Bucky, like they’re two parts of the same whole.

Bucky pants raggedly for a few moments, squirming and restless under Sam, until he calms again, opening his eyes to look at Sam. Bucky’s lashes are long and gorgeous and damp, his pupils dark and dilated.

“Sam, I have to tell you,” Bucky says, flushing prettily, his wide eyes so earnest and sweet. “I—somewhere along the way, I want you to know, everything became real for me. You—you really are my best friend.”

Sam closes his eyes, heart so achingly full in his chest.

“You’re my best friend too,” Sam says softly, seriously, because he knows this is important to Bucky. “I love you.”

“Love you too, sweetheart.” Bucky’s eyes are wet and shining.

Sam grinds his hips against Bucky’s ass, his lips curving up in a dirty grin. “You gonna let me fuck you now?” Sam asks. Bucky gasps, hands coming up to grip Sam’s back, fingers digging in bruisingly hard.

“Yeah, Sam, yeah, fuck me,” Bucky breathes.

Sam pulls out and then slams his hips back into Bucky, who gasps in surprise, spine arching in pleasure. Sam sets a hard and deep rhythm, letting loose all of the leftover tension and stress from the fight earlier, taking all that frustrated energy out on Bucky’s willing body. When Sam nails Bucky’s prostate, Bucky’s hands scrabble over Sam’s back, clutching and pulling at him frantically. “Yes, there, there,” Bucky says, voice desperate and breathy.

Sam drives his cock into Bucky faster, pounding harder as he feels his balls tighten and heat race up his spine. He’s close, so close, and he leans down to brace himself on one elbow so he can reach down to grab Bucky’s hard cock. He can tell from the noises Bucky’s making, those sweet, high whimpers, that Bucky isn’t far behind him. When he strokes Bucky hard, his fist sliding brutally up and down Bucky’s cock, Bucky arches his back and comes, spilling all over his sweaty chest.

The sight of Bucky’s come, pearly and glistening over his taut abs, sends Sam over the edge. Sam’s hips jerk and stutter, his thrusts erratic, shuddering as he feels his balls empty into Bucky’s tight hole. He wants to collapse, wants to let go and fall onto Bucky, let Bucky catch him and hold him, but instead he pulls out. Bucky whines quietly at the loss, and Sam can’t resist reaching down to rub his fingers against Bucky’s wet, puffy hole, admiring the slow trickle of Sam’s come dripping out of him. Bucky shivers at the touch of Sam’s fingers to his abused hole, probably raw and oversensitive, and Sam reluctantly drops his hand.

“Sorry,” he says, kissing Bucky’s knee in apology.

“S’ok,” Bucky slurs. “Like it when you get all vulgar and possessive on me.”

“Speaking of possessive,” Sam says, heaving out a heavy sigh and collapsing back onto the bed next to Bucky, hooking his ankle over Bucky’s. “Can we talk about the whole fake-best-friends thing? Like, where are we with that and what was our endgame there?”

“Well, I guess I was wrong about only having one best friend,” Bucky admits, looking at Sam out of the corner of his eye and grinning bashfully. “And I guess the plan was just—make Steve jealous.”

“And?” Sam prompts.

“And—I think that was it? I’m not really sure where I saw it all working out,” Bucky confesses.

“I feel like maybe you’re not all that great at planning without a murder board.”

“I’m a visual planner,” Bucky says defensively. “And it seemed kind of disrespectful to make a murder board about Steve given the fact that I did, in fact, try to murder him several times as the Winter Soldier.”

“That’s fair,” Sam concedes, tipping his head to acknowledge the point. “But we’re good now, right? I mean, we’re best friends with each other, we’re best friends with Steve and Natasha, Steve and Natasha are also best friends—and I’m kind of crazy in love with you.”

“What I’m hearing you say here is that my crazy plan worked.”

“Yeah, OK,” Sam says, hiding a smile. “Maybe it did.”

***

It’s a Saturday, and Sam and Steve are on their best friend date, and Steve is kicking Sam’s ass in the gym. Sam knows, intellectually, that he’s in fantastic shape and that there’s no shame in being beaten by a scientifically enhanced human being. That doesn’t mean that it doesn’t still hurt his pride—and his back, motherfucker—when Steve manages to take him down hard without even having the decency to break a sweat.

“I think that’s about enough for today. I feel like I’ve done a pretty good job wearing you out,” Steve says, smirking like an asshole, because he is an asshole. “Let’s hit the showers.”

When they get to the SHIELD locker room, it’s nearly empty, the way it usually is on Saturdays. There are still a few particularly dedicated SHIELD employees roaming about, mostly new guys. For whatever reason most of the seasoned employees stay away from the gym locker room on Saturday afternoons when Sam and Steve work out. Today, when people catch sight of Sam and Steve walking in, they blanch and immediately speed up with whatever they’re doing, hustling out of the locker room like it’s on fire or something. In under two minutes, Sam and Steve are the only ones left.

“It’s weird how everybody always leaves when they see us coming in to shower together,” Sam remarks, stripping off his sweaty shirt and tossing it in his locker.

“I wonder if they’re intimidated by us,” Steve muses, then takes a moment to admire Sam’s bare chest. Steve’s eyes are hot and appreciative as they travel lazily up and down Sam’s torso.

Sam shrugs in response, then winces as he feels a muscle tighten up in his back. “Ouch,” Sam hisses. “Man, I know I’m not twenty-five anymore, but damn, I really don’t need the reminder, you know?”

Steve’s brow furrows in concern. “Here, let me take a look at that when we get in the shower.”

They finish undressing and then get into the shower together. They share a stall, because Steve read an article about water conservation that he apparently found very inspiring, and also because sometimes it’s nice having a buddy with you. Sam lathers himself up, and then out of habit he reaches over to spin Steve around so he can wash Steve’s back too.

“God, that feels good,” Steve moans, the sound of it echoing in the strangely empty locker room. Sam spends a good few minutes really working Steve over as he scrubs Steve’s back, groping and kneading at Steve’s lats and traps while Steve moans and arches his back in pleasure.

When Sam finishes, he gives Steve a little pat and says, “OK, you do me.” Obligingly, Steve turns around to rub Sam’s back, massaging the tight muscles, his hands sliding easily over Sam’s skin with the slick of Sam’s body wash.

“This where it hurts?” Steve murmurs, digging his fingers into Sam’s lower back. “God, you’re really tight here.”

“Yeah,” Sam says, groaning at the pleasure-pain of Steve working at the sore point in his lower back. He huffs a frustrated, petulant sigh. “You know, sometimes I feel like the more I lift, the tighter I get.”

“Maybe you should start going to yoga with Bucky and Natasha,” Steve suggests. “Actually, they’re starting a class in about twenty minutes. If we hurry up in here, we could probably meet them there if you want.”

“Wait, Bucky and Natasha are at yoga today?” Sam asks in disbelief. “You’re telling me that Bucky and Natasha go to yoga? That’s what they’re doing on their best friend dates?”

Suddenly, Steve looks very anxious and very guilty.

“Wait,” Steve says slowly, apprehensively, “Bucky does tell you what he does on his best friend dates, right? He—I mean, you do know—”

“Yeah, Steve, I know,” Sam says, his tone dry. “I just thought yoga was, like, a cover for something. I didn’t think they were actually going to yoga.”

“Oh!” Steve brightens. “Yeah, it’s doing some really amazing things for Bucky’s flexibility. And for Natasha’s ass.”

Sam shrugs. “All right, then, let’s head over.”

Sam and Steve finish up in the shower, moving more quickly than their usual leisurely Saturday afternoon locker room shower pace. Sam’s skin is still a bit damp under his fresh gym clothes, but the air outside is warm, and he’ll be sweating again soon anyway once he starts working out in the humid yoga studio.

When Bucky and Natasha see Sam and Steve, their faces light up with big smiles.

“Hey, sweetheart!” Bucky says, coming over to give Sam a hug and a kiss while Natasha does the same to Steve. “You and Steve are done earlier than usual.”

“Yeah, he whooped my ass,” Sam admits, scratching his jaw.

Sam and Steve switch hugging partners, and Nat’s body feels small and strong in Sam’s arms when she goes up onto her tiptoes to give him a warm hug and a kiss on the lips. And when Sam sneaks a look downward, he notices that Steve was not lying about all the great things yoga’s been doing for Natasha’s ass.

Sam lets go of Natasha and turns back to Bucky. “So you and Nat really do yoga,” Sam says, shaking his head ruefully. “You know, all this time, I thought you two were doing some secret spy shit that you were trying to keep me from having to answer questions about? I was half-convinced that we should be thinking about getting married just so we wouldn’t have to testify against each other.”

Steve and Natasha raise their eyebrows in surprise, but Bucky looks pleased at that. “Well,” Bucky says, lips curving up in a crooked grin, “let’s not take that marriage idea off the table just yet.”

Natasha clearly aims for a sober expression, but the corner of her lip twitches and her eyes sparkle with mirth. “You know, I can’t say that we’ll definitely never get up to any secret spy shit, Sam. Maybe it’s not a bad idea to keep that in your back pocket.”

Steve raises an eyebrow and nods thoughtfully. “Plus, do we even know if Bucky’s still considered an American citizen?”

“I’m honestly not sure,” Bucky admits. “But being married to Captain American should grant me automatic citizenship, probably.”

Sam shrugs placidly and slings an arm around Bucky’s shoulders. “Sounds like a good plan to me.”

After all, Sam’s mom always did say that happiness was being married to your best friend.

#winter falcon #sam wilson x bucky barnes #sam wilson #bucky barnes #steve rogers x natasha romanoff #marvel cinematic universe #the falcon and the winter soldier #ambiguous barbershop quartet

[anjanettexcordonia]

Chapter 11: The Crash

Book: The Royal Romance A/U

Catch Up Here: The Spare Masterlist

Rating: Mature (18+); Character Death(s); language

Pairings: Liam x MC; Leo x Madeleine 

Word count: 1615 (+/-)

A/N: Please excuse any grammatical errors. I am sorry ahead of time. 

I apologize for the wait. This chapter has been completed for a little bit, just haven't had time to post. 

Disclaimer: Some characters & some scenes belong to Pixelberry. 

Tags: If you would like to be added or removed please let me know. 

PermaTags: @yourmajesty09​​​ @gkittylove99​​​ @kingliam2019​​​

Series Tags: @mom2000aggie​​​ @indiacater​​​ @sfb123​​​ @hopefulmoonobject​​​ @cordonianroyalty​​​ @texaskitten30​​​

Two weeks had gone by since Cami and Liam had called it quits. Two weeks since Drake had dropped the baby bomb that shifted Liam’s entire world. Two weeks since Cami had shut him out. Cami had cut off all contact other than information concerning their new addition. Liam had yet to speak with her about it. She sent him the confirmation via email of her pregnancy. She had made it clear the only contact between her and Liam would be about her medical care. Liam had sent flowers, chocolates and food. You name it, he tried it. Liam was coming to terms with his mistakes with Cami, but he was still at a loss at how to fix them.

King and Queen Madeleine would be heading off for their one year anniversary trip in Australia soon leaving Liam as interim monarch for three weeks. He wouldn’t be able to leave the country much less the palace. He had hoped the time away from each other would ease some of the tension between Cami and himself. 

“So no word yet?” Leo sat in his study with Liam on the other side of his desk. “Not yet. Her first prenatal visit is coming up soon. I’m hoping to be there when you come back.” Liam responded staring down at his phone in his hand. “Have you told Father and Regina yet?” “No, I doubt it’ll go over very well that I have a lovechild on the way.” Leo rolled his eyes at Liam. “They’ll be fine. Pissed but fine. It’ll just add more pressure to me producing an heir.” Leo scoffed. “Ever the selfless king.” Liam chuckled. “Better you than me.” Leo mumbled as he reached for the bottle of scotch on the desk, “Madeleine is the country's Queen and a freak in the sheets, but mother.. fuck that. She would be a terrible mother.” “Give her a chance. She might surprise you.” Liam smiled at the crassness of his older brother. Bastien knocked on the king's study door. “Your majesties,” he bowed, “the jet is ready.” 

“Safe travels brother.” Liam clapped Leo on the back. And headed out the study door to his quarters. Liam spotted Madeleine down the hall speaking with one of her ladies in waiting, Kiara. “Maddie!” Liam yelled out. Madeleine snapped her head in Liam’s direction. Immediate irritation ser in at his nickname for the Queen. “Prince Liam, and in the presence of others please call me Your Majesty.” “Uh, Your Majesty, May I escort you on your way to His Majesty?” “I’d be honored.” Madeleine spoke in her most regal voice. The two made their way to the palace garages where Leo and Bastien were waiting to take them to their private jet. “I actually wanted to speak to you about something.” Liam spoke softly. “Go ahead Liam.” Madeleine nodded. “I have some news I should break to Constantine and Regina, before the press get wind of it preferably.” “Press? What are we talking about here?” Madeleine stopped in her tracks. “Maddie, you have.. how can I put this..?” Liam paused, “you have a way with words when it comes to my father and Regina.” “What’s the news?” Madeleine raised a perfectly shaped blonde eyebrow. Her ruby red lips were pursed tight, “will this hurt mine and Leo’s reign?” Liam could see the fear in her eyes at his question. “No, I don’t think so. Camilla is pregnant.” Madeleine gasped. She took a deep breath before speaking. “What the fuck Liam? Do you know what this will do to Leo & I? The pressure now produce a fucking heir. We do not want children. We had planned to name your heir eventually.” Madeleine paced back and forth, she abruptly stopped and locked eyes with Liam, “Does Leo know about this?” “He does.” Liam diverted his eyes to the floor, his hands twisted and fidgeted together. “Of course he does. You are going to make this right Liam. Do not say a fucking word to anyone until our return. Who else knows?”

Madeleine snapped. “Drake and Maxwell.” Liam whispered. “Fucking Maxwell, you better make damn sure this doesn’t get out. The King is waiting.” Madeleine marched off.

Liam felt like a scolded puppy as he made his way back towards his quarters. The conversation with Madeleine did not go as he had planned. He had hoped she would understand and help him break the news to his father. Madeleine was right. He needed to make it right. If not for himself or for Cami, for his child. He had hurt her so many times, unintentionally but nevertheless he had hurt her. As she had hurt him. He missed her. He could still feel her touch on his skin, the smell of her coconut shampoo in her hair. God, I miss her. He sat down on the sofa in the living room and fired up his laptop planning to write Cami another email apologizing. Maybe she will respond this time. He popped the cork off his bottle of scotch and poured himself a generous amount.

“Sir, sir..” Liam was awoken from his sleep. He looked around not registering where he was. He was still on the sofa. He passed out on his computer without realizing it. “Come with me now.” The king's guard said. “What?” Liam asked confused. “I need you to come with me now.” Liam stood up and followed the guard into the hallway. There were more than usual guardsmen in the hallways. “What’s going on Tony?” Liam asked, still a little drunk from the scotch. “My orders were to get you to the bunker. That’s all I know.” “Where’s the King father and Queen mother?” “Safe house in Applewood,” the guard responded. 

Liam followed the guard to the bunker deep beneath the palace. The bunker was built in the height of the fighting in Europe during World War II to protect the a Royal family from Nazi occupation. The walls were steel reinforced concrete. It was built to withstand any terrorist attack. In fact the United States built a replica bunker following the war. Liam made it to the War Room as the Cordonian generals called it. He was the Spare so this type of thing wasn’t a familiar concept. He looked around taking in the busy guards tapping away at their screens. More guards talking into ear pieces. “The dove has landed.” The dove. Liam hated the guardsmen nickname for him. Leo was the eagle but he was the dove. 

“Sir we need you to take a seat.” Liam sat down. Olivia came rushing into the room. “Liam, what’s going on?” “I don’t know. No one has told me anything.” Liam walked around the room, confused by the commotion. The last time he had been here was during the terrorist attempt on his family's lives a few years ago. ”Sir, we need to brief you. If you’ll follow me.” Liam nodded his head. The guard led them to a small room, it almost looked like an interrogation room. Liam took a seat across from the guardsmen, Olivia took a seat next to him. The guard flicked on the large TV in the room. Liam looked up at the screen taking in the sight before him. A massive explosion replayed on the TV. “That’s not.. that’s not..” Liam couldn’t speak the words. “Sir, I’m sorry to inform you, King Leonardo and Queen Madeleine’s plane has gone down. It exploded as it made it’s ascent into the air. I’m sorry, Your Majesty, for your loss. And for the country's loss.” The guard bowed his head. Liam couldn’t breath. He felt like he had been sucker punched in the gut. Leo couldn’t be dead. Who would run the country? And then a crushing weight fell on him. The weight of the crown. Olivia gripped his hand trying to hold back her own tears. “This is a great loss to our nation.” Olivia calmly spoke. She watched the shift in Liam as he absorbed the devastating news. Liam went from a father to be dealing with his own insecurities to a king and a leader of a nation within hours. Only two hours ago was he sitting in his brother’s study and now he was gone forever. “What caused the explosion?” Olivia asked the guardsmen. She could see Liam was in a state of shock and in no way capable of asking any questions. “We aren’t sure yet, your grace. It’s under investigation. We will need you both to stay here until we know the cause.” Olivia nodded. “Was it a terrorist attack?” Liam interjected. “No one has come forward claiming responsibility. We will know more tomorrow once the wreckage is able to be investigated more thoroughly.” The guardsmen spoke. Liam lowered himself into the chair. I need you Leo. How am I going to do this without you? Father and now King. 

Five thousand miles away, Cami sat on her sofa sipping warm tea watching television when an alert came across the TV.

Cami dropped her tea cup to the floor. She jumped to grab her phone and scrolled to Liam’s name. Come on come on.. answer.. Voicemail. God damn it Liam. Answer your phone.

“The Cordonian Royal jet exploded during takeoff this evening at Cordonian Royal Airport. Casualties are unknown at this time.”

She dialed another number. “Drake?” “Wellington… you need to get here quickly.” “Where’s Liam? He’s not answering me..” Drake could hear the panic in his voice. “Camilla, listen to me. Leo and Maddie are dead. Maybe Bastien too. We don’t know. Liam’s not doing good. Is there any way you can get here?” “I’m on my way.” 

#theroyalromance #trr #choices #trrfanfiction #alternateunniverse #au #fanfiction #ff #thespare #liamxmc #leoxmadeleine #princeliam #kingleo