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cherryblossom-heart · 1 year

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I loved you once B.B

Bucky Barnes x Reader

Masterlist

Summary: Loving Bucky Barnes was never easy but breaking your heart seemed to come naturally to him. A love story about your heartbreak,his betrayal and a chance at redemption.

19.1 k words

Content Warning: ANGST, heartbreak, cheating, mature themes, +18 SMUT, MINORS DO NOT INTERACT (Pussy job, penetrative sex p in v, sad/angry sex? Rough sex mixed with a little pain. It will make sense once you read it) . Fluff, mentions of bad mental health from both Bucky and reader, graphic violence, character's death, mentions of women trafficking as well as assault.

A/N: Wow 19k words. Im sorry this took so long to finish but as you can tell it is super long as I promised. Buckle up y'all, this is sad. Also this is my first time writing a proper cheating fic so if you can/want let me know if you like it or not. You're welcomed to send me an ask with any comments, questions, etc., you have on this 😊

Post dividers by @firefly-graphics and @cafekitsune

Now

"Fuck you," you spat the words.

Tears fell from your eyes as they made their way down your neck, making dark spots in the collar of your red turtleneck. Even when pain was drowning you, beauty never left you. Bucky felt as if he were watching a beautiful Renaissance painting—a tragedy of sorts.

"Is that all? I really don’t have time for this."

He didn’t recognize his own words or the indifference they came out with. He didn’t mean to say them, but it was as if his own body was working on autopilot, and he was only a spectator to the shitshow it was causing. He wanted to stop. He wanted to apologize. He wanted to say so many things, but the only thing he was capable of was hurting you.

"Are you kidding me? That’s all you’re going to say?"

"What else do you want me to say? You know what happened, you saw her with your own eyes. Anything I say is either going to make you angrier or make you cry even more. Let’s just be done with this, you’ll eventually get over it."

The sound of your hand connecting with his face put an end to his sentence. The hit didn’t feel as such, his skin barely processed it as anything more than a simple graze, but once the initial shock wore off, the sting came along. But it didn’t compare to the pain he felt in his heart when his eyes connected with yours once again.

"I always knew you were capable of many things, but not once did I think you would ever be this cruel."

Your eyes drifted to your hands, your right hand playing with the ring you wore in your left. A sigh left your lips, and more tears fell before you finally slid it off your finger, placing it on the table next to you.

A bucket of iced water. Painful, burning, scorching coldness— that’s how Bucky would describe looking at you while silently breaking your engagement. His mind was telling him to get on his knees, beg, and try to fix everything he had broken. But the darkest part of him, the one that had taken over his life was assuring him you were bluffing. You couldn’t leave, you always stayed. You always fought for him, even when he didn’t deserve it.

"What are you doing?" he asked, his eyes rolling with the uninterested façade he had perfected.

"I’m done, I can’t keep doing this anymore." You turned your back, strong and determined steps leading to his apartment door.

Please, fix this.

His trembling hands made their way to your wrist, anything that could mend the cracks in your heart that seeped with pain, the cracks he had caused with his own selfishness. Before his fingers could even graze your skin, your hand quickly swatted away his pathetic effort to stop you.

"God, stop being so goddamed drama—"

"Don’t fucking touch me. Don’t try to contact me ever again, I won’t answer."

"Can you just—"

"If I ever see you again I swear I’ll murder you. I didn’t kill you the first time we met but I swear I’ll do it if you even dare to breath in my direction."

Your words hurt, it seemed as though each one stabbed him right through the chest in a taunting way, a reminder of how much he had screwed up. Bile rose to his throat when you recoiled at his proximity, and the hate in your eyes burned him with such force that he was sure you wouldn't wait until the next time you met.

He deserved it either way.

Bucky's eyes opened just as the car jolted, his heart racing against his chest, his ears buzzing. For a fraction of a second, he's confused, not remembering why he was in the car, but the fogginess of his thoughts was replaced with anxiety when he heard the tracker beeping on Sam's thigh.

"Good, you’re awake. I think we’re almost there." Sam kept his eyes on the road, occasionally glancing down at the device that told him where to go. Judging by his demeanor, his friend didn’t seem as nervous as he did, if at all. It wasn’t like Sam had a reason to, he was the only one who had fucked up.

He looked out at the vehicle, and the passing trees in the darkness of the night numbed his mind while he tried to forget about his dream. No, it wasn’t a dream, it was his worst memory to date. Usually, his nightmares were about the crimes he had committed while being the Winter Soldier, and he could blame them on his consciousness not being there with him. His own body didn’t belong to him, so he couldn’t keep blaming himself for the things HYDRA had forced him to do.

With you, on the other hand, he could not blame anyone else but himself. His mind wasn’t tortured by a secret organization in hopes of ruining his relationship, nor was he forced to hurt the person about whom he cared the most to save thousands of lives. He did it all by himself, and now the nightmares have not only scared him but hurt him all over again.

You started to show up in his dreams more frequently once Sam told him they needed your help. As expected, the super-soldier's first reaction was total and complete refusal. His friend thought it was a childish reaction the former winter soldier was having to avoid the awkwardness of meeting you again, only knowing your relationship had ended on bad terms without hearing the specifics. But the blue-eyed man wasn’t doing it for himself, he was doing it for you. The night you left, you made it clear you didn’t want anything to do with him, or even anything related to him, your resignation from the Avengers Team and subsequent evaporation from the face of the earth was a strong message to leave you alone.

After a few hours of arguing, with both men going back and forth on why they did or didn't need you, Bucky finally agreed to go look for you. Lives were at stake, and no matter how hard he tried to look for a solution that avoided you, there seemed to be none. Before he could ask where to even start looking for you, Sam pulled out a device that seemed familiar to a phone. You had given Sam, and only Sam, a tracker that could find you anywhere in the world and could only be unlocked by a password you had whispered to him

The depth of his tormenting cycle of thoughts didn’t let him register they weren’t on the road anymore until his partner stopped the vehicle. They were surrounded by tall, dense trees, and the crickets and cicadas that hid in the dark made an orchestra that filled the emptiness of the night. Sam grabbed his gear, the sound of a duffle bag being opened broke the rhythm of nature.

"Why are we stopping here?" Bucky asked with a frown. His own duffle was placed across his back, the tinkering of the metal inside it annoying him slightly.

His friend threw an annoyed look at him before rolling his eyes and scrambling through his belongings. "As I said like twenty minutes ago while you were brooding and having your own pity party, this thing shows her inside a building in the middle of the woods. I’d like to take a look around the area before going in blind."

"Oh."

Normally, the super soldier would’ve had a comeback for the annoying yet harmless insults his friend and partner would throw at him, even a snide comment. But this was different, no matter what Sam would say, he could only think of what was about to happen. So he let it slide, submerging himself in his own thoughts while Sam threw the little flying robot he nicknamed "Red Wing" into the air. Once it was hovering above them and Sam made sure to have full control of it, they began a walk that would last about thirty minutes before the device would find any signs of life.

Sam and him were waiting somewhere near the alleged building, Sam's robot scanning the surroundings.The thumping in his chest returned, and his fingers became ice cold.He was so close. Close enough to see you, close enough to talk to you, and perhaps close enough to apologize.

How would you react to seeing him? Would you be happy to see him? Probably not, considering the last thing you said to him was that you would kill him if he ever came near you. He knew he deserved it, but hopefully time changed your murderous resolution. Maybe even forgave him.

Could you ever forgive him?

A slight swat from Sam brought him back from his thoughts, silently letting him know they were ready to go. Bucky could sense it before the place was even visible, the vibrations of the music resonating through the ground. The smell of smoke, alcohol, and humanity reached his nostrils right as they saw the line of cars parked in a plain field next to what resembled a warehouse.

To an untrained eye, it would look like a normal, unsanitary, and probably unsafe rave done by stupid people. But the polarized windows of the cars, the shine coming from the inside of the guards' jackets, and the lot of security cameras installed in the building told another story. Whatever or whoever was in there was dangerous, and as usual, you had gotten yourself in the middle of it.

Bucky wasn’t an idiot. He knew you couldn’t stay away from helping people, no matter how hard you tried. He saw the breadcrumbs, microscopic, little clues that he could recognize as your style. A missing girl suddenly returning to her family, a kidnapped journalist in the middle of war returning to their respective embassy. A child trafficker falling from his hotel room in the twentieth floor. You had always been... effective when it came to missions, sometimes going overboard with your methods, but Tony, Steve, and himself had always guided you towards the good and righteous path that a person with your abilities was supposed to take.

You lost all three of them in the span of a year.

They were lucky that it was relatively easy to get inside, and even luckier that their clothes didn't draw too much attention to them. Sure, they seemed to be wearing more clothes than needed, as most people seemed to enjoy themselves topless and/or pantless, but with the darkness of the room barely being lit by the flashing blue and red lights, no one really noticed them.

Guys, girls, and people he wasn’t sure how to label were grinding against each other. Hands touched him, pulling his jacket, and he had to push them all away, trying to make his way through the sea of people. The inside of the warehouse could pass for a functioning club, with couches, dance floors, and screens accommodating everyone inside.

Bucky wasn’t sure he had ever seen anything like this; the debauchery that people showed shocked his old-fashioned ways. He was sure he had seen several people inside each other, whether it was fingers, tongues, or dicks, no one seemed to mind that everyone else could see them. How had you gotten yourself into the middle of this disguised orgy? What were you even doing here?

Both men made their way to the front of the place, where a private section was installed looking over the dancefloor. Two large guys guarded the stairs that connected the lower and upper levels, allowing mostly attractive girls to ascend. Both men agreed that if you were to be found somewhere, it would undoubtedly be there. They scanned the room, looking for any way they could access the VIP level without having a pair of tits and long legs.

He had never understood scenes in movies where they showed time slowing down. Every time he had been in a fight, whether it was as himself in the forties or as the winter soldier, everything seemed to happen too fast to process. Even the night you left, time had seemed to go at an abnormally fast pace, and by the time he could finally react the way he wanted, it had been too late.

He never understood those scenes until he saw you walking to the protective railing surrounding the edge of the private section. Above the deafening music, the moans, and the music, he could hear your voice talking to someone else.

It was as if he was seeing you for the first time. Your beauty had remained the same your hair, your eyes, and your lips all looked the same, yet his heart started racing just as it did all those years ago. You weren’t dressed like everyone else dancing around him, your black dress with a dangerous deep cleavage was sensuous, but it held a certain level of class that made you stand out from the crowd.

Thump, thump, thump.

Time moved at a slow pace, the slowest he had experienced. He was grateful for it, as it allowed him to appreciate every detail from you. The way your lips came close to the drink you had in your hand, the drumming your fingers did on top of the railing, the glint in your eyes—he knew it meant you were lost in your thoughts.

Bucky had never been more grateful for the way time passed. Until he saw a pair of hands sliding across your waist, fingers gripping your hips so roughly, he was sure they would leave a mark on your skin. A semi-attractive man whispered words in your ear, his beard scruffing against your skin. You smirked, turning around to plaster your lips against his in a kiss that could make a pornstar blush.

He knew you'd moved on; nearly a year had passed since the last time he saw you, and you'd probably found someone to sleep with, but he wasn't ready to watch you become someone else's. His mind was prepared to face your happiness, but his heart wasn’t. And even now, he was sure you were just tagging along with the man, using him for information for whatever mission you had gotten yourself into, yet he felt as if what remained of his heart had been ripped out of his chest.

With strong, rough movements, the man turned you around, pressing your body against the railing. As his hand grabbed your neck, your hips grinded against his, your mouth open as you licked your lips.

The super soldier couldn’t take it anymore, his heart begged him to stop the torture. He wasn’t even sure where Sam was, nor did he care. He cared about you, and he could only think about what he had lost. With the last of his dignity, he began to look away from you and your companion, who had leaned over to your ear once more. Except this time his eyes found Bucky’s, his fingers tightening around your neck.

He knew. Somehow the man knew who he was and, most importantly, who you were.

Your eyes widen slightly, searching through the sea of people dancing downstairs. But it didn't take you long to find those blue eyes you once adored. He was there, looking exactly the same as the night you left him, along with your heart.

"I know who you are." The man whispered in your ear—a threat not so subtly hidden behind every word.

But you couldn’t dwell long on his words because ice-cold eyes looked back at you. Ice cold eyes brought back the pain you thought you left behind, and the rage surfaced once more as you remembered the promises you made him.

Cold metal was pressed against your neck, the edge of it grazing your skin. Bucky’s eyes widened in alarm, and his hands turned into fists, making him look like he cared. Like he actually had a heart.

He barely took two steps in your direction when the wicked smile you wore stopped him. It was sinister. It was deadly. And when you turned to the man to say something, his grip faltered as one word left your lips.

"Good"

Your head connected against the man’s nose, a crack let you know it was most likely broken. You barely heard the man’s yells when bullets made their way to you, a couple of them grazing your skin. The room that was once filled with hips swaying, alcohol, and moans had transformed into a frenzy of screams and people running to get out of the building.

The crowd tried to take Bucky away; their desperate attempts at escaping dragged him away as he fought his way through the sea of people. Seconds passed, and he could hear your grunts as well as more shooting coming from the upper floor, with girls running down the stairs, some of them with splashes of blood staining their clothes.

He didn’t know whose blood it belonged to, and that frightened him.

Sam’s voice pulled him out of his trance. "What the hell happened?"

His friend had managed to make his way to him, both of them still getting pushed around. Bucky offered him a quick glance before resuming his previous task of making his way to the stairs.

"Her cover is blown," was all the explanation Bucky offered, and somehow it was enough. Before any of them could add anything, screams came from the front door, three bulky men were making their way there while carrying very large and dangerous guns. "Take care of them, I’ll go help her," the super soldier said without leaving any room for discussion.

When his fingers finally grabbed the banister of the stairs, Bucky was close to losing his mind. Climbing two steps at a time, he finally found himself a scene that froze him in the spot.

You were there, your black dress ripped in some places, your makeup ruined by mascara running down your cheeks, and blood splashes tainted your flawless skin. Bucky had managed to get there just in time as you twisted a man's arm to an unnatural angle, the crack of his joint popping out of place was followed by his screams. You had managed to kill/knock out everyone except for the guy who had previously had a knife to your throat, and Bucky knew better than to think that was just a mere coincidence.

After the last man fell to the ground, blood sputtering out of his neck, you lifted your gaze towards him. He couldn’t read you as easily as he had once been able to and he hated it. Before, he was sure he knew you better than you knew yourself, more than once already sure of your likes and dislikes before you asked him for an opinion. He had treasured those times in his mind, and the memories were as comforting as they were painful. A constant reminder of what he had lost.

He was right there, right in front of you. The man you fell in love with when you still had a heart. The man who still had a tight grip on it and who would probably always own it. He could keep it for all you cared, your heart was tainted with memories you didn’t wish to keep.

It was the first time both of you were this close, every scream gone as you were absorbed by your own bubble. He looked so familiar that your own body reacted the way it used to whenever you saw him. Your heart stammered in your chest, and even after so long, the butterflies in your stomach appeared for a millisecond. He was the man you had once loved, he was the man with whom you imagined a future together.

Then, you remembered why all your hopes and dreams had been destroyed.

Bucky noticed the hurt flashing through your face, your jaw tightening right before you made your way to him. For a moment, he thought you were about to hug him, your desperation to reach him in your long strides mirroring his as his body begged him to touch you. He wanted to apologize, beg for forgiveness at your feet, and profess the love that he wasn’t able to forget.

Perhaps if his mind hadn't been plagued with all the things he wanted to do, he would’ve noticed your foot rising to give him a solid kick on the chest.

The force and unexpectedness of your attack launched him back to the railing, throwing him over it. His back landed with a loud thud on the floor, fortunate enough for him, everyone else seemed to have dissipated and his fall wasn’t that high up. A second later, you jumped from the banister, landing on top of him with your knife in hand. Your knee found it’s place on his chest, feet pressing his hands flat on the surface. Before Bucky could even muster a word, the blade was pinned against his throat.

"I told you if I ever saw you again, I would fucking kill you."

Then

Steve had changed so much in the years they had spent apart. His friend, who had once been the fragile little Brooklyn boy he would protect with his life, was now a fully grown man with a strength that could crush a person if he wasn’t careful enough. He was also now his protector, not from bullies that would harass him because of his own stubbornness but from a secret organization that wanted to take over the world. That and his own fractured mind.

He had lost control once the man had given him the commands to bring back the deadly assassin they had turned him into. He remembered it all, but it had felt as if he was under water the whole time, falling deeper and deeper the more he tried to fight against it. His own body didn’t belong to him, no matter how hard he tried to control it.

For a year, he had thought it was possible to lead a normal life; his time spent in Romania had given him false hope that he had gotten away from his captors. How foolish he had been, thinking he could ever be far away from his grasps. He wasn’t the man he was before, just a weapon designed to hurt people.

He supposed he was lucky Steve still saw good in him, at least enough to turn against his teammates and friends to help him clear his name. And now, as they drove to one of Steve’s friends' hideouts, he couldn’t help but feel guilty about everything that was going on. If he hadn’t lost control, Steve wouldn't be a wanted criminal. If he wasn’t captured, a shit ton of innocent, good people would still be alive. If his mind had been stronger, he could’ve broken free of HYDRA's mind control.

Maybe it would’ve been better if he had actually died when he fell from that train.

Steve parked outside an abandoned apartment complex, it seemed no one had lived there in years. He threw a questioning eyebrow at Sam, who just shrugged before getting out of the vehicle. Another of Steve’s friends had decided to help him out of loyalty to Steve, not because he particularly liked Bucky or entirely believed in his good side.

All three men walked inside the building, not a sound inside other than their footsteps and heavy breathing. Steve looked around for a couple of seconds before making his way to the second floor, his intuition telling him where to go. He stood in front of a door with a big C plastered on it, his friend's hand hesitating before knocking on the wood.

After the third knock came back without an answer, Steve decided to open the door. He had called a name while crossing the threshold, looking around for any signs of life inside the apartment. Bucky was surprised to find the apartment filled with computers, blueprints, documents, and lots of military-grade equipment. Everything gave away the signs of someone working there, yet there was no one who took ownership over them.

It was too late when Bucky heard you standing behind him, with his feet being swept by your leg and effectively knocking him down. The wooden floor amplified the echo of his fall, catching Steve and Sam’s attention. Your frame landed on top of his, gun aimed directly between his eyes.Bucky's hand reached to grab your ankle in an effort to destabilize you, but the barrel of your weapon was pressed right on his forehead.

"I wouldn’t do it if I were you," you said coolly. "I promise you, I’ll blow your brains out before you can even land a hit."

After your words filled the room, Bucky’s eyes finally took their chance to look at you, actually look at you.

God, you were beautiful.

Maybe it was only your physical beauty that had taken him by surprise, or the fact that you had taken him down so easily with just one leg movement. Or even the fact that you seemed to have no fear towards a man who was being marketed as a "dangerous and armed terrorist." Whatever it was, Bucky couldn’t deny the fact that you were the most beautiful human being he had seen.

After a few explanations from Steve’s part and some begging for help, you released the super soldier from your hold, weapon holstered in your back. Your hand extended to help him get off the floor, and you offered him a charming but wary smile.

You told the three men to make themselves at home and take anything they needed. Bucky had chosen to keep guard, being by himself in the top floor while looking out through a window that hid him from everyone else. He was stewing in his own complicated thoughts when he heard a knock on the wall. You were there, standing a few feet away from him with a shy smile on your face as you extended to him a cup filled with hot coffee.

Thump, thump, thump.

"Sorry about the whole thing holding you hostage," you said as he welcomed the cup.

His fingers accidentally grazed against your own, and it was as if he had touched electricity itself. Heat extended from his hands all through his body, and his ability to think was thrown out of the window. He looked at you, and he couldn’t tell if you felt the same or not, but he could feel how your eyes burned him, with a curiosity behind them that was so easy to read that he was surprised you were the black ops/spy Sam had told him.

"It’s whatever, I would’ve done the same thing if I were you." Bucky answered after a few seconds.

He turned to look through the window again, trying to keep his thoughts in order. You settled down next to him, the warmth of your skin reaching his own. Nothing could be heard other than your breathings, not even the cars outside or the sound of the busy city that hid you. And for the first time in a long time, Bucky felt relaxed with someone he didn’t know from the past.

"I’m James."

He could’ve sworn he heard you smile before you gave him your name.

Now

"What the fuck are you doing here, Barnes?"

The music was still on, as were the blue and red lights that lighted up the darkness in the room. Bucky could feel the breeze of your breath on his face and the smell of expensive whisky and tobacco in every word you said. He wasn’t surprised, the man that you knocked out probably tried to impress you with them.

But behind the traces of blood, alcohol, and gunpowder, he could smell your shampoo. The same peony smell mixed with lavander filled his nostrils, and it brought him back to the many nights you had spent together. Your fingers were drawing circles on the skin of his back, and his nose was buried in your hair.

You, on the other hand, were reminded of the suffering he caused you with every passing second.

"I told you to stay away from me," you muttered.

Your hand pressed the edge of the blade on his skin, and you were sure if you kept going you were going to start drawing out blood, but you couldn’t care less. Bucky Barnes had always been an expert at instilling unwanted emotions in you, and it was difficult to keep those emotions at bay right now.

You felt anger. You felt resentment. You felt pure, long-lasting hatred.

"Maybe I should slit your throat right now, that’ll make you stay away from me permanently."

Your words were intimidating, filled with the same promise you had made him that fateful night. This was his chance, his chance at the apology that had died out in his throat when you closed the door behind him. This was the chance he had chased in his dreams for almost a year.

But he couldn’t say anything.

He loved you. God, he loved you so much. He missed seeing your face other than in the few pictures he kept or in the memories that did no justice. Because even now, as you threatened to kill him, you were a dream come true, just like the first time he saw you.

"Say something!"

"You’re beautiful."

Your grip faltered on the knife, your eyebrows slightly furrowing at his words.

No, he couldn’t do this. He couldn’t come back out of nowhere, say some cheesy, basic compliment, and make the walls of hate you had built crumble. Even if he had only managed to knock down one brick, he didn't deserve it. You knew it, he knew it, and everyone else who knew what happened between you two knew it.

Then why did your heart flutter at his words?

"Hey," Sam said, breaking the silence, your head snapping in his direction."I know he’s an asshole, but I would appreciate it if you didn’t kill my partner."

You look back at Bucky for a few seconds before giving up, throwing your knife to the floor. Sam leaned over, his hand extended to help Bucky get up.Your murderous eyes went from Bucky to Sams, your gaze softening at his friend.

"I told you to only contact me in emergencies," you grumbled.

A hiss left your lips when you touched your arm, one of the bullet wounds was still seeping blood. Bucky thought about telling you something, but this time he listened to the rational part of his brain that told him to shut the fuck up.

"Believe me, if we had a choice, we wouldn’t have come," Sam said.

Your eyes flickered between both men, not convinced about helping them. Well, on helping the blue eyed super soldier. A pathetic excuse for why you couldn’t help them died on your lips once you saw his blue eyes. Please, help us they begged.

You didn’t owe him anything. You shouldn’t help him, but in the back of your head, Steve’s voice rang through. Good ol’ Steve Rogers and his everlasting moral lessons. That's what we have to do, he said.

So you put aside your feelings because helping people mattered more than an idiot who broke your heart.

"What do you want?" You sighed.

"We’re looking into something... odd. A bunch of pregnant women missing, still in their early stages of pregnancy. Most of them show up dead after giving birth, but the babies are nowhere to be found."

You shrug. "They take the kids, so?"

It was cold, you were aware of it. But after the things you had seen, the things you had done, you were aware that people kidnapping woman for their babies wasn’t something out of the ordinary, let alone something that required Captain America to look into it. Things like that were always forgotten, pushed back into a slew of cases alongside more missing women.

"They had traces of the super serum."

Fuck.

You laughed. A joyless, cynical type of laugh. Destiny, of course, had to be a jerk.

"Well, you’re in luck. I think we’re tracking down the same people." Sam raised an eyebrow at you with a simple request for you to elaborate. "A girl showed up dead in México a couple of months ago, she’d been missing for almost a year. Autopsy showed she had a miscarriage before dying, the bleeding killed her. The remains had traces of the serum too."

"Are you saying that—?" Sam couldn’t finish his sentence, the thought sending chills along his spine.

"Yeah."

The air is somber between the three of you. Sure, the flag smashers were a problem when they appeared, as you knew from all the news reports you'd seen.People with ten times the strength of a normal human being were dangerous, especially if they were associated with a terrorist organization.

This was different, though. This was sinister.

Groans coming from the top floor broke the eeriness that surrounded you, making you finally remember why you were here. You tore apart part of the black dress that was once pristine and wrapped it around your arm.

"Look at this guy over there," you said, motioning behind you. "He has intel on this, he’s the one that gets the girls and delivers them."

"Well, let’s take him in and—"

You cut Sam off. "No. Look, you came looking for me because this is my specialty. I know how to handle guys like him, and I sure as hell know he won’t tell us shit if we take him to a precinct and threaten him with some jail time. He’s a big fish. A few phone calls and he’ll be out in no time." They knew you were right, but they didn’t like your arguments. "We do this my way, or you better pray you find them before I do."

Sam looked hesitant. He knew what you were going to do to the man, and his good conscience chastised him for even thinking of letting you torture someone. But the rational part, the part that knew that in this case there wasn’t much of an option, knew that they needed you, and perhaps you also needed them.

"Just, don’t kill him." Sam said before walking away.

Compromise. You could do compromise.

"Fine," you said, rolling your eyes.

After Sam slammed the door shut on his way out, you were reminded of the fact that you weren't alone. Bucky’s eyes were already looking at you, the same apologetic eyes you had seen before you kicked him in the chest.

"Thanks for helping us." He spoke, thinking it was an appropriate way to break the ice, but it only managed to make you scoff.

"Let’s make something clear, I’m not doing this for you." you spat. "I’m doing this because Sam needs my help and so we can save those innocent girls and stop any more from being taken. This doesn’t change anything between us, as soon as this is over, you go back to leaving me the fuck alone, got it?"

Say something. Fight for her. Explain what happened, his mind begged him.

But he couldn’t, because even if it had been almost a year since he last saw you, he was still the same coward who let you walk away without a fight.

So he agreed.

"Yeah."

"Good. I’ll meet you outside."

Then

"Thanks for the coffee." Bucky said before taking a sip.

Droplets of water fell from his forehead, a strand of unruly black hair was hanging on the side of his eyebrows. The towel that hung from his waist, showing his torso all the way down to that sculpted V of his abdomen, made it too difficult to concentrate on the files you were trying to organize.

The man was hotter than the sun.

"No problem." you smiled at him.

You had no idea it would be the best and worst decision you'd ever made when you suggested Bucky stay with you while Steve went to rescue the others.You liked Bucky, and the few days you spent with him while Steve and the others gathered everything they needed so they could go find Zemo had been nice. Sure, he was a man of a few words, but it didn’t bother you. It was weirdly comforting to be able to enjoy someone’s company in silence. And the times he spoke, he did it out of pure curiosity, curiosity about the world, about what had happened while he was in the ice, but mostly about you.

He asked about your cases, how you met Steve, and how you came to partner with some of the most powerful people in the world. He asked about your life, about your childhood in the orphanage, and what made you choose to help people. He asked so many questions, yet he still respected you when you didn’t want to answer some of them. He asked, not to pry, but to get to know you, and in return, when you asked him something, he was as honest as he felt comfortable being.

And that was the problem. No matter how much you tried, you knew your days with Bucky Barnes were numbered. Ever since you were young, you knew that being in this line of work would prevent you from having a normal life. You couldn't have a normal relationship. You weren’t meant to have the love story your favorite movies portraited, the white picket fence and the family of five wasn’t in your future.

Neither was he, maybe in the forties he would’ve came home from war and found himself a pretty girl to marry. But now, after everything he had seen and everything he had unwillingly done, he probably wouldn't want a relationship any time soon. Or maybe not at all.

But after three weeks of being cramped up in the same little apartment, you were getting used to him. You had developed a little routine together that always ended up with a cup of coffee at the end of the day. Sometimes both of you would just sit in silence, taking in each other's company while you sipped on your cups. Other times, just like now, he would sit next to you as you watched whatever movie you had decided to put on.

You had to cut this at the root before it became too hard to let go.

"So, you’re going to Wakanda?"

He sighs. "Yeah. Steve says they have someone that might be able to help with... help with my..."

"I know." You finished for him, suddenly placing your hand on top of his. He tensed at your touch, both of you looking down at your hands before you took away yours, embarrassed at your own lack of control. "Well, if you’re not too busy there, I could go visit you sometimes."

"You would?" he questioned.

"If you want me, too," you shrugged, trying not to reveal your excitement.

He looked at you, his thoughts unreadable through his face. For a moment, you thought he was going to reject your offer, but something changed in his eyes. He smiled, the faintest, littlest hint of a smile you had seen, but it was there.

You made him smile for the first time.

"Yeah. I’d like that."

If someone were to ask Bucky when he first felt he could love you, it would be right now. With the dim light of the TV lighting up your face and a shy smile on your lips as you told him you were willing to travel such a long distance just to see him.

And as you lay next to him, your head against his shoulder, you thought to yourself that maybe you could be selfish for once and allow yourself to enjoy his company a bit more.

Now

There were drops of water leaking out of a pipe, he could hear them from the other side of the room. Everything around him was dark, it seemed the only source of light was on top of him and the woman on the floor pleading for her life.

"Please don’t do this," she begged with a Spanish accent. "I don’t want to die, please."

He wanted to move, he wanted to throw away the gun in his hand, but it was like he was a spectator of his own life. His body was not his, or his breathing. Not even his heartbeat listened to the inner panic attack he was having. Nothing belonged to him.

"Kill her," a distorted voice told him. His eyes glanced at him quickly, and he noticed the man had no face. No one around them had one.

Everything felt like it was in slow motion. His finger moved, pressing the trigger of the gun, but he refused to give up. He had to try, even if his own consciousness was trying to kick him out, sucking him into the pool of darkness he had been resting in for a long time.

But even if he tried for years, he couldn’t win. He was powerless.

Broken.

He could only witness how the other "him" obeyed. The woman's eyes changed from scared to lifeless in less than a second. A splash of crimson staining his combat boots kept his attention. He couldn’t hear what the other people in the room were saying, he didn’t exist anymore, or he didn’t want to. The sound of the water leak was deafening now. Growing louder and louder until it consumed everything around him

He didn’t want to be awake. Not like this.

And as he felt himself disappearing, he hoped this was the last time he came back to the surface. He would rather be surrounded by emptiness.

Yet something interrupted him, pulling him back up.

A woman's voice, so familiar it made his heartbeat change.

"Bucky!"

Bucky's eyes opened wide. His head was spinning, his breathing was rapid, and his heart felt like it was going to burst through his chest. The adrenaline in his system made him dizzy, and he could feel his hands shaking. And he was feeling. A lot. Scared, angry, hopeless. So many emotions constricted his chest, burying him under their weight.

"Bucky," you repeated. His head snapped at you, showing you a pair of wide, terrified eyes.

Your feet almost moved. A pure protective instinct filled you with dread at the fact that you couldn’t help him anymore. Your head and your heart were in conflict. In one hand your heart begged you to go to him, stroke his back as you peppered kisses along his shoulder. Then you would lie back in bed while your hands surrounded his body, your front pressed to his back in a way to say, I’m here, I love you, and everything will be alright.

On the other hand, your brain told you to turn in the other direction. Walk away from the night terrors that plagued his mind and let him suffer in silence. He wasn't your responsibility anymore, and you shouldn't be concerned about helping him with whatever was wrong with him.

Was it possible to hate and care about someone at the same time?

"Nightmares?" you couldn’t help yourself from asking.

His left hand rubbed his eyes, a sigh leaving his lips. "Yeah. Sorry if I woke you up."

"You didn’t."

You sat at the table in front of the couch he was lying on, a steaming cup of lavender tea between your hands. The cling of the spoon clashing against the ceramic filled the uncomfortable silence between you.

"Where’s Sam?" he asked, sitting straight as a couple of droplets of sweat fell down his forehead.

"He has a contact in the city. He left to meet them."

"Oh."

Whatever else he was about to say died on his lips. You noticed he seemed to do that often since meeting again, his eyes speaking the words he would never say. Sometimes you would catch him looking at you, the frown on his forehead deepening with the passing of time. It made you wonder if he would now be open to answering your questions.

"He said you’re going to therapy."

He was taken aback by your question. It probably was the first time you said more than the necessary to him. Also, it was the first time that you showed any sort of interest in his life.

"Uh, yeah. Court mandated."

You hummed, sipping on your tea.

"Does it work?"

You saw the hesitance in his eyes. The way his jaw clenched and his grip on the couch made his knuckles white made you think he was about to change the subject with a witty, bitter, or sarcastic remark, or maybe even just ignore the question at all. You wouldn’t be surprised if he did, by the end of your relationship, he was an expert in it.

Bucky didn’t change much after all, you thought to yourself

But he broke the silence.

"In some ways." he started, his gaze dropping to the floor. "The nightmares don’t come as often anymore, and I don’t feel the need to shoot every asshole that drives a shitty car with a shitty exhaust pipe." You chuckled at his confession, making a slight smirk show on his face. "But she’s too much."

"What do you mean?"

He sighed. "She pisses me off. I hate that she keeps trying to make me feel better by just saying my life is better now and I shouldn’t feel like shit anymore. But it’s not that easy. Just like it’s not easy to follow the stupid set of rules she gave me."

He looked up to see your reaction to his words, expecting to see the same hardened look you’ve given him the past couple of weeks. And it was just that what greeted his eyes, your lips slightly pressed together and your eyes decorated with a slight scowl that only showed up for him.

But behind the tough exterior, he could see your eyes had softened. For a brief second, your eyes showed care and understanding to what he siad before going back to the usual void stare you gave him.

"She sounds like a bad therapist." He shrugged in agreement, he couldn’t say anything against the truth. "She also sounds like a bitch."

He laughed. The type of laugh that caught him off guard and made his lungs run out of air. Granted, your joke might’ve not been as funny as his laugh was giving it credit for, but he had always been fond of your bluntness.

You couldn’t help but laugh with him too.

Laughing with Bucky felt foreign yet so familiar at the same time. It felt like reminiscing on a memory you didn’t remember you had, a bittersweet memory that brought back the same good feeling of the memories you built together

But moments like that couldn’t last forever. Your heart couldn’t afford to remember.

A text message from Sam lit up your screen, saying his contact had useful information. You stood up from the table after texting him back and drank the rest of the cup's contents.

"You should try to get some sleep, we have a long day ahead."

His shoulders dropped slightly.

"Yeah, you’re right. I’ll try to."

With nothing left to say, you walked away, leaving Bucky in the loneliness of the night.

You didn’t go right away to the room you had adopted as your own, though. He heard you going through the kitchen, a dim sound of clinking and pouring reaching him due to his enhanced hearing. He didn't think anything of it; maybe you needed more tea before going to bed.

Your steps brought you back to him before you placed an object on the coffee table right beside him.

A cup of lavender tea.

Then

"It’s kinda late to be outside, huh?"

Bucky jolted at the sound of your voice, your presence taking him by surprise. He was completely sure that when he left a couple of hours ago his house was empty and you hadn’t sent a message of your arrival.

Something had happened? Was someone injured? Were you in trouble?

His questions died on his lips as you cut the space between you and him short, your arms tightly embracing him. Your head found its place in the crook of his neck, his long hair falling on your face. His hands took a second to respond, but they eventually wrapped around your waist, bringing you closer to his chest.

You stayed like that for what felt like ages, just taking in each other's warmth. He missed you, even if he tried to deny it every time his thoughts would wander to you. He tried to convince himself that his reclusion made him miss everyone he considered a friend, and in a world where everyone seemed to want him dead, you were one of the few people he trusted.

He had been staying in Wakanda for nearly six months, and out of those six months, you had visited him at least once every month. The duration of your trip would vary, sometimes you would stay only a few hours, with most of your time spent in his hut while sharing stories of the outside and his progress. Other times, you'd stay for days, with the longest stay being a week and a half. In those cases, he would show you the surroundings, the forest that surrounded the back of his hut or take you on a long walk alongside the river that crossed his home. Sometimes you'd sit outside and stare at the stars, your only company being the animals and the flora.

He also came to hate every time you would leave, feeling like a part of himself was leaving with you.

One of his hands landed on the side of your hips, the other searching for your face.Your grip on him grew tighter once his fingers brushed the skin on your face but you eventually let go, allowing his hand to guide you slightly away from him.

"What happened?" he asked, his voice barely above a whisper.

You didn’t respond, but one look into your eyes, and he knew the answer. Whatever it was, it had affected you to the core, the broken look in your eyes could only be compared to the one he saw every time he looked at his reflection in the mirror.

His forehead rested on yours, both your eyes closing at the contact.

"It’s ok. I got you."

His hand found yours as he guided you toward his bed. It wasn’t until then that he noticed you still had your tactical gear on, dirt and crystals still hiding in some places. He grabbed the buckle of your vest, his eyes asking for permission to get it off. A slight nod gave him the confirmation, beginning the process of somewhat freeing you of the events you had seen. He got rid of his own garments too, leaving you both standing in front of yourselves with only underwear covering you. He dragged you into bed, your frames covered by the light white sheets on his bed.

Not many times had he allowed himself to think of you in a sexual manner, knowing how his body would react in a lustful way. But as he found himself looking at you with barely any clothes on, the desire was left on the back burner of his brain. You needed him. You needed his comfort, and he was more than willing to give it to you.

He would give you anything you asked for.

His hand rested on your face, tracing circles across your cheek, your eyes closed at the soothing action.

"I’m sorry." Your voice trembled. He could see you wanted to say more, but words failed to come out of your mouth

Bucky’s heart ached. He had never seen you in such a vulnerable state, and his mind was going cray at the thought of not being able to do anything to help you.

"It’s ok, sunshine. You don’t have to talk about it."

So you lay there, head against his chest, as he kept you between his arms, with nothing other than the sound of the crickets outside his hut surrounding you. And for the first time in a long time, you felt what being loved felt like.

That night, you kissed him for the first time. You didn’t stop, not even the next morning when he woke you up with breakfast already made and a cup of lavender tea.

Now

"Bring him to the table!" you yelled.

Your hand swept across the surface, knocking over every piece of paper, pencil, and piece of equipment. The vibrations of the heavier objects on the concrete floors matched the beating of your heart.

Bucky dropped Sam on the table. The man had gone unconscious on the ride to the safe house, the bullet wound that oozed liquid crimson was most likely the cause.The same crimson color now stains Bucky's clothes, and his leather gloves were also covered in a thin layer of it.

You brought your knife to slash through his clothes, the sharp metal cutting through them as if they were butter. The hole on his shoulder seemed to have no exit, the bullet was still inside him. You were glad Sam wasn’t conscious for the next hour.

The super soldier hovered over you for the entirety of the time you spent cleaning through the fragments that splintered from the bullet. Everything went relatively well until Sam started waking up, his body contorting in pain as you dug through his wound. Bucky brought him a bottle of vodka while you injected him with some local anesthesia.

Hours later, the wounded man was now resting on the only bed the safehouse had, his breathing bringing great comfort as it meant he was still alive. After half a bottle of vodka and a some painkillers diluted on his IV, you were sure he wouldn’t wake up until tomorrow.

The faucet sprayed cold water onto your palms. Your nails desperately tried to scrape away the traces of blood that still lingered in your skin, leaving red marks all across your knuckles. Dirt and dried blood were trapped underneath your fingernails, and no matter how much you tried to dig it out, it would stay right there.

Bucky’s footsteps brought you out of your trance, the heavy sound of his combat boots felt deafening with each step he took. You tried to tune him out, focusing once again on the sound of water, but it seemed as if Bucky had made it his purpose to be as loud as possible. You held onto the sink so strongly that you were sure it would snap.

A deep rage came from your stomach, spreading all over your body. The anger constricted your chest in such a way that you weren’t sure if somehow you were buried under a collapsed building, its weight invisibly crushing you.

It was his fault. It was all his fault.

You didn’t remember walking outside the bathroom, nor did you remember walking up to him and slapping away the cup of water his hand held.

"What the fuck is wrong with you?" you barked at him.

"I—"

"I gave you one task. You had to wait until I gave you the signal so you could come in. Not guns blazing, not punching everyone that comes your way, not drawing everyone's attention to us. Your only fucking job was to wait for the distributor to show up and wait for my goddamn signal."

"What did you want me to do? Just stand there and do nothing?" he argued.

You were taken aback by his response. Part of you expected him to just let you scream at him and give you the same soft eyes he always gave you when you spoke to him.You weren't expecting him to snap back at you or to defend himself.

Maybe if things hadn’t gone sour between you two, you would’ve listened to what he said, and in return, he would’ve listened to you. But the anger was too strong to be subdued.

"I wanted you to follow the fucking plan."

"He was about to torture you!"

Bucky's thoughts returned to the old factory turned whorehouse.The way you had purposefully gotten caught and how they had tied you to an exposed pipe line. He could still hear the sound of the man’s hand smashing against your cheek.

"I can handle myself! I told you guys to stay put until the distributor was there. He knows I’m after him, and this was our only chance to catch him. And now he’s god knows where and Sam got fucking shot."

A heartbeat passed before Bucky came close to your face. His big frame towered over you, and his breathing hit your face.

"You’re fucking delusional if you think I was just going to let anything happen to you."

You scoffed, "Oh, so now you care?"

"I’ve always cared."

You pulled away from him, your eyes rolling at his pathetic words.

"Sure."

Perhaps it was the fact that you had been in danger no longer than a couple of hours ago, or maybe it was the heat of the fight that had left some residues on him. Whatever it was, it made Bucky courageous enough to reach for your arm.

"Look at me."

You swatted him away.

"Don’t fucking touch me."

But this time he wasn't going down without a fight.Not again.

"I know I was an asshole at the end of our relationship, but that doesn’t mean I don’t care for you anymore."

A bitter laugh came out of you. All of this had to be some sick joke. "When you care about someone, you don’t treat them like that. You didn’t care about me, and you sure as hell didn’t love me."

His hand tried to touch you again, and this time you let him. You were tired. Tired of fighting with him. You closed your eyes as soon as his skin came in contact with yours, his touch consuming all of your senses.

You opened your eyes to find him staring back at you, the blue eyes that once hurt you shining the same way they did the first time you kissed him.

"I did love you," he whispered into your lips. "I still do."

His words burned you like someone had branded you with hot iron in the chest.Even after all this time, he could still hurt you, Why couldn’t he just leave you alone? Why did he have to bring back the past you so fiercely tried to leave behind?

"Don’t." Your lower lip quivered. "Y-you can't just break my heart and then come back into my life and just say you still love me."

"I never stopped loving you."

Those five words were all it took to tear down what little control you had over yourself. A year ago it would've broken you to hear them but now they only brought a deep sense of indignation.

With a quick move, you pulled his hand away from you, your hands pushing against his chest until he hit the wall. You wanted him to hurt. You wanted to carve his heart out of his ribcage and throw it far away, maybe then he would understand what it felt like.

"Where was your love when I needed it, huh? Where was your love when I had no one else? Where was your love when I reached for you every night but you were already gone? Where was your love when I begged you to love me, to be there for me?" Your hands were clutching his jacket, and your vision was blurred by tears."Where the fuck was your love when you brought that girl to your apartment?"

Bucky never saw you like this, not even when he stomped on your heart with his indifference. Under the anger, the hate, and the surface indifference you showed him, he could see how broken you were. He could see how you were constantly struggling to put the pieces of yourself back together that he had torn apart.

He hated himself for extinguishing parts of you.

"I’m sorry."

A lapse of judgment.

That’s what you would tell anyone who asked you why you kissed Bucky that night. You would say that you had been blinded by the pure rage his mere presence would bring you. Or perhaps you would take the easy route and you would say that with everything that happened that night, almost being tortured and Sam getting hurt, you had acted in a primitive instict of searching comfort.

The truth was different. You could lie to yourself and say that you didn’t needed Bucky, not after all the things he had done. You lied to yourself constantly when you told yourself you were over him. You also lied to yourself when you claimed that your one-night stands had fulfilled you in the same way that Bucky had.

You couldn’t feel anything, not ever since you walked out of his apartment. You had tried different people, different cities. You had tried different alcohols and different drugs. You had tried anything that could help you fill the emptiness that had found a permanent home inside you. You felt nothing, not until you saw those cerulean eyes again.

Your kiss was aggressive, your lips smashing against his with strength and your hands finding their place in the back of his head. It took a second for Bucky to kiss you back as he thought his mind was playing tricks with him. But after you pressed yourself against his chest, his body reacted on muscle memory alone, his arms surrounding your waist.

It wasn’t what you expected, though. You thought that the specks of love that remained between you would be enough to bring back whatever it was that you were missing. Instead, you were met with the most intense hatred you've ever felt, mixed with the melancholy of what could've been.

He tasted like the past, but he still hurt like the present.

So you made a decision.If you couldn't bring yourself to love Bucky Barnes anymore, you would hate him with all that remained of your soul. You would hate him until both of you burned in the flames of your agony. You'd despise him until you'd ripped every part that matched the ones he'd so easily broken.

"I hate you," you whispered between kisses. "I fucking hate you."

Your words were daggers to his heart. His chest tightened, and his grip on you faltered for a second before he snapped out of it. This wasn’t about him. If you needed to tell him how much you despised him, he would gladly let you kill him with your words. It was the least you deserved.

"I know," he mumbled against your lips.

He felt your body guiding him through the room until the back of his legs hit against the couch where he would sleep. Your hands pushed against his chest, making him sit on the couch while you straddled his lap.

Clothes flew across the room, and you found yourself tearing his shirt apart in two while he only pulled yours off.You'd worry about that later; right now, nothing was more important than feeling your skin against his.

Your hands traveled over his chest, fingers grazing every part of his abdomen as you trailed down to his zipper. You palmed him over his jeans, his cock already hard, and you felt it twitch against the fabric with every touch you gave him. Groans left Bucky’s lips.

"I hate you," you repeated as a mantra.

He shouldn’t make you feel this way, but as you see his head going back when your hand opened his fly and found it’s place around his cock you felt your own desire pooling in your lower belly and the aching in your core became unbearable.

With swift movements, Bucky got rid of his pants and his underwear while you remained on top of him. With your frame still covered by a black lace bra and your black tactical pants on, he couldn't help but feel exposed when he looked at you.Deciding he didn’t wanted to be the only one naked his hands went to the side of your hips in efforts to get you rid of the fabric but your hand swatted him away.

Beg me, your eyes said.

For a moment, he considered tearing your pants apart the same way you had done with his shirt. However, the seriousness behind your eyes warned him that he might end things too soon if his stubbornness got in the way. So he gave in.

"Please, Sunshine." His hands gripped your waist, his hips grinding against your still-wrapped core, sending shivers down your spine."Please, let me see you."

You relented, unbuttoning your pants and throwing them away with your panties. In what were the longest seconds of Bucky’s life, you unclasped your bra, finally getting rid of the last barrier your body held on to.

You stood there, completely naked, staring at Bucky.He remembered the way your breasts felt when he held them. He remembered how soft your skin was. He remembered that if he bit on the skin of your neck, right where the jugular is, you would clench around him. He remembered. In the lonely nights when he needed some release, he would close his eyes and imagine your lips around his cock as he fisted himself in the solitude of his apartment.

All those memories didn’t compare to watching you in the flesh, with hungry, hateful eyes on him as you walked back to straddle him again.

His cock twitched once your legs fell to his sides, the heat of your body settling on his crotch. You sat on top of him, your wetness welcoming him once you lowered yourself. His length placed itself right between your lips, and a groan left him.

"Fuck."

Your hips began rocking in slow but sharp motions as he felt his cock coated with your slick. Slowly, you built up a rhythm that made both of you moan. His hands landed again on your hips, his fingers pressing on your skin in a way that was certain to leave bruises the next day. Your own hands gripped on Bucky’s biceps for stability, and you squeezed them every time you would feel him brushing against your clit.

You felt amazing on top of him, but that wasn’t what made his heart pound against his chest.

It was your eyes. Your eyes never left him, no matter how much pleasure you were pulling from both of you and how badly you wanted to roll your eyes as the coil inside of you tightened. Your eyes, which once showed him what love could look like, now looked at him with a simmering hatred he could not shake.

His chest tightened at the thought of never seeing them again. The electricity that ran through his body was replaced by a deep sense of hopelessness, and the more he kept his gaze on you, the more it amplified. You must’ve sensed the change in him because your movements stopped.

Broken eyes now stared at you with the ghost of tears in them. The anger that had driven your actions and your thoughts through all this had now subsided, allowing itself to mix with melancholy.

I love you. I’m sorry. I miss you. His eyes said.

I hate you. I’ll never forgive you. I wish I never met you. Yours answered.

And in the middle of the lust that was taking place right on the couch, both of your hearts broke again.

You pulled him back for a kiss that tasted of desperation and sorrow as tears fell from both your eyes. The saltiness of the tears bled into the kiss and mixed with it.Quickly, your hand guided his tip to your entrance. You needed him inside you like a person lost in the desert needs water. You craved him with every cell in your body, and it tore your heart apart.

"So tight." He moaned in your mouth as you sank into him.

The stretch of his length burned as you forced yourself to take him fully. It hurt, and even with your arousal completely covering him, you weren't prepared to take his thick length.You didn’t care though, you hoped it would make you forget your heartbreak. Bucky tried to stop you as he felt you struggling to take him in. His hands held your waist, but you shook your head before you started bouncing on him.

You didn’t want love from him. You didn’t want tenderness or care. You wanted roughness. You wanted strength and aggressiveness until the only thing you could feel was the ache between your legs.

The super soldier gave you what you wanted.

Bucky’s pace was brutal, his cock hitting the sweet spot only he could reach. The sound of his hips colliding with yours filled the room, bouncing off the walls and echoing through the hallway outside.In the back of his mind, Bucky was thankful Sam was knocked out with meds so he could be spared from the obscene orchestra your bodies played.

The pain quickly turned into pleasure. Your walls hugged him tightly, each thrust carried a strength that left you breathless. At some point your legs had given in, the only reason why you kept bouncing was the snap of his hips pushing you. He didn’t let go of you though, instead he pushed you against his chest in an embrace that surrounded you tightly.

Your head rested against his while your hands stayed on his chest. The sadness that mixed with the pleasure numbed everything else except for the bubbling up of your release. It pained you to admit that no one else could make you feel like Bucky, you had tried to find someone who could replicate what his touch could do for you, but no one ever came close.

You hated how much you missed him and how much you needed him.

"I wish you would’ve stayed dead." you panted. The poison behind your words shredded his heart. He knew you were saying it to hurt him, he knew you didn’t mean it, but the conviction behind it felt like a kick in the chest. "I wish we never brought you back."

"Me too." he finally admitted.

Bucky felt your walls constrict around him, and he could tell you were close. He drew you in for one last kiss, the kind that took your breath away. The type of kiss that was a solace in a world of agony. The type of kiss that meant a promise that carried forever.

You tightened around him as you came, and his thrusts slowed down as he rode you through your high. As you closed your eyes, more tears fell from the corners, so he reached out to wipe them away.Once you had recovered a little, his brutal pace came back, this time chasing his own release. You brought your lips to kiss his neck, feathery, soft kisses, and he felt his balls tightening. He was so close.

He tried to pull out so he could fist himself to the end but you didn’t budge, instead whispering in his ear.

"Inside."

He came harder than he had done in the last year. You felt his cock twitching inside as he covered your walls with his cum, the mess between your release and his own dripping out of you. You kept bouncing on top of him, making sure to return the favor by guiding him all the way through the end.

You stood up, the feeling of emptiness making you shudder when his cock left you, and his cum started leaking out of you. You turned to go find something to clean yourself up, but his metal hand stopped you. He guided you back to the couch before he walked towards the bathroom. A few minutes later, he came back with a towel, and he positioned himself right between your legs.

He cleaned you up just like he had done for so many years before.His other hand caressed your thigh as he made sure to wipe everything. And just as he always did for years, once he finished, he kissed your inner thigh, a couple of inches away from your pussy.

Bucky threw the towel to the floor, he would worry about it in the morning.As for right now, the only thing he wanted was to hold you close. So he did. He thanked the couch was big enough to fit you both as you layed together. He pulled the blanket he used to warm himself every night over you, and his arm surrounded your waist, his grip making your back settle against his front. His left hand traced lazy circles over your stomach while the other was used as your pillow.

For a few seconds, both of you allowed yourselves to reminisce in the past. He kissed the top of your head as you snuggled against him like you usually did. And as you felt his warmth behind you and inhaled his scent, everything seemed to be alright once again.

Except they weren’t. Bucky wasn’t the man who made you feel secure anymore, and you weren’t the woman who trusted him with all her heart. Both of them belonged to the past.

"I don’t love you anymore. I will never love you again." you broke the silence.

Bucky held you tighter as his heart broke once again.

"I don’t deserve your love." He whispered. "But I’ll still love you forever."

Then

Loving Bucky Barnes was never easy.

It wasn’t all bad, though. For many years you had been together, three and a half to be exact, where you could imagine a life with. Three years where there was no one you trusted more or preferred to be with.Three years that were the happiest of your life.

Those were a few of the reasons why he had asked you to marry him. And those were also a few of the reasons why you had said yes.

You had told yourself at the beginning that you couldn’t get attached to him for the safety of your heart. It didn’t matter that his touch felt like home or that during the times you spent apart, his eyes would be the only comfort you would find in your dreams. He would bring more heartbreak than love.

Oh, how right you had been.

Unfortunately for you, the heartbreak would come in a way you couldn’t have prevented.

The snap came and took him away from you. One second he was standing next to you, the next he was turning into dust that flew into the wind. The last thing he had said was your name and after that half the population was gone.

The years went by in a blur. Between nights filled with drugs and alcohol and days spent cramped up in your apartment, you were wallowing in the type of sadness that the rest of the population could understand. You kept your ring in your finger, it reminding you that what your memories craved for were real.

Bucky had been real.

With his departure, he had also taken your heart.

After a particularly bad night where you crashed your vehicle into a contention bar, Tony had taken it upon himself to help you, offering you a home close to his secluded one. You took it, not because you wanted to get better but because you wanted solitude. But if life had taught you anything about Tony Stark, it was that he was as stubborn as they come.

Every morning he would bring you breakfast along with a visit from a certain little baby that always wanted to be held by you, and sometimes she would be able to bring a small smile to your face. With time, the little baby turned into a little girl that would ask for a sleepover every once in a while, and you would gladly accept the offer to allow Tony and Pepper a night alone.

Things got better. You visited Steve and Natasha at the compound and even allowed yourself to go in missions of your own, as it turned out not even The Snap could make criminals take a break. You even went to one of Steve’s depressing support group meetings, never returning for the next one.

You couldn’t be strong all the time, though. Some nights, when the pain was so strong that it drowned you and the grief was too powerful to keep at bay, you would find yourself staring at the hundreds of pictures you had taken of him. Most of them were of you together, but there were a few you took when he wasn’t looking. The sunset behind him as he breathed in the clean air of Wakanda, or the small smile on his face as he tasted the food he cooked for you both.Even when he was reading some of the books he kept under his bed and a few wrinkles would show on his forehead as his whole focus remained in the text, he always looked beautiful.

With time, everything felt like a routine. Waking up alone, eating alone, going outside alone. Sleeping alone. Everything seemed to be stable, not good or bad, but just stable. You were sure this was the best you could do, or at least the best it could get.

That is, until a ray of hope appeared.

Time travel was the answer. Taken as a whole, it seemed like something out of a science fiction film, but it made sense.Bring the stones back and along with them everyone that had died. Surprisingly, it had worked, everyone that had been snapped away came back just as they had left. It should have been a moment of joy. It should've.

The thing about hope is that it comes with a price. Natasha and Tony were the price to pay.

Steve left shortly after.

You understood him. You understood why he left everything and everyone behind to go live a life with the woman he had always loved. You would be a liar if you said you wouldn’t have done the same if you were in his position. You understood why he did it but it still hurt to know you weren’t enough of a reason to stay and live a life together.

It seemed like you were on a streak of losing people. Wherever you turned, more people kept leaving your life. Wanda was gone, turned into the madness that grief could bring. Thor left to save other planets that needed him. Bruce... well, you weren’t sure where Bruce was, but he didn’t try to contact you.

Everyone was gone but Sam and Bucky.

Bucky. Your Bucky. The man you had spent the past five years crying for. The man who made you the happiest you'd ever felt.The man who felt like home.

But he wasn't your Bucky any longer.

This Bucky didn’t kiss you with the same tenderness he did so many years ago. Instead, he'd barely move his lips once yours touched his in what you'd call a mediocre peck.He also never initiated a kiss, it was you who always reached out for him.

This Bucky didn’t held you at night. Instead, he'd turn around, his back to you, and even if you reached for him between dreams, he'd guide your hand back to your side of the bed.Some nights, he would even choose to sleep on the floor of the living room when he thought you were asleep. It was as if the thought of touching you seemed appalling to him.

This Bucky never hugged you.

This Bucky never talked to you with love only with annoyance and indifference.

This Bucky never woke you up with breakfast.

This Bucky never tried to sleep with you.

This Bucky never said I love you.

Because this Bucky didn’t love you.

But you held hope, foolishly. Every day you tried to talk to him, show him in every possible way that you were still here with him. Every day you tried to make things better between you, you poured your heart and soul to try to fix what you didn’t even know was broken.

Things got worse a couple of months later.

As it turned out, time had taken a toll on Steve’s body, and one night he went to bed and never woke up. You found it a bit ironic the man out of time had finally run out of time.

His funeral was held on a sunny spring afternoon. People from all over the world showed up to say their final goodbyes to the man who had saved the world so many times. Friends, people he had saved, and heroes paid their respects to him. The first super soldier had finally been put to rest.

After everyone had cleared out, you went back to drop one last token for his departure. It was a picture of the both of you. Steve’s arm hung over your shoulders while both of you held a couple of beers. It had been the first time you had seen Steve outside of work related situations. That was the beginning of your friendship.

As you got back to his tombstone, you saw Bucky standing in front of it. His eyes were void of any expression, and he didn’t seem to be talking to Steve’s grave either. Bucky was just there, staring at the place where his best friend was buried.

He didn’t seem to notice when you stood next to him, nothing in his body gave any signs of acknowledgement. You gave him a couple of minutes before you reached for his hand. You knew that, even if he didn’t show it, he was in great pain. He had lost his last connection to the life he had once lived.

You wanted to be there to help him through his pain.

The contact only lasted a few seconds. Your touch surprised him, as he had jolted once your skin grazed his own. He turned his head to the side to give you a glare that you’ve never seen before. His eyes had been filled with pain, as you guessed, but they also carried hatred and disdain. He must’ve seen your expression, because a second later his eyes changed to a neutral expression.

"What are you doing here?" he muttered.

The shock of his stare lingered in you for a moment, but you quickly returned to yourself, a friendly smile on your face."I came to leave a little parting gift."

He hummed in acknowledgement, not sparing another glance at you as you put the photograph against the headstone, right in between the dozens of flowers that decorated it. Both of you stayed silent after that, the sounds of the birds and the faint rumbling of cars were the only sounds keeping you company. It was peaceful. It was good. Just the two of you enjoying a moment's calmness in silence.

For a few moments, you felt comfortable next to him. The first time in months since he came back. But good moments like that never lasted long.

Without notice, he turned around. Long, desperate strides guided him towards the exit of the graveyard. He wanted to create distance between you and him, find somewhere that was as far away from you as he could be. You felt how you were losing him.

But you fought for him, even when he seemed to not deserve it.

"Bucky." You called for him. He stopped in his tracks, but he didn’t turn around, so you took that as a sign to keep going. "I know you’re hurting right now, I am too, but I’m here for you. I’ll always be here for you."

He didn’t answer for a few seconds, and you thought you had made a breakthrough. Maybe this was the time when things went uphill. This was the little push he needed to start healing and perhaps to try to rebuild the bridges that had burned. This was the little thread of hope you'd hung up on.

You were wrong.

"You have no idea how I feel," he said before leaving.

That night you came back to your cabin, and Bucky’s things were gone. The only thing left was a note that rested in the middle of the bed.

I found an apartment in the city. I need space.

You didn’t see him for a couple of months after that. You considered tracking him down but ultimately gave up as he had asked for space. He needed time on his own, and you could give it to him. You would give him anything he asked for.

You kept your word until Strange came to visit you, announcing news about Wanda. She was dead.

You barely remembered tracking down his address or making your way there. It wasn’t until you were facing his door that you realized what you had done. He asked for space but in that moment, you couldn’t give it to him. You needed your Bucky.

Knock, knock, knock.

It was late in the night, and you could hear the TV going on in the living room. He had to be home. After a few minutes without an answer, you knocked again, but the only thing that welcomed you was silence.

"Bucky," you called. Your voice was broken, you tried to fight the tears away, but saying his name broke what little self-control you had left. "Please open the door."

You rested your forehead against the door, finally allowing yourself to feel everything you had been pushing back ever since the fight with Thanos. Pain, grief, loneliness, hatred, sadness, despair. A cocktail of emotions ran through you in an overwhelming way and seemed to want to drown you.

"I know you’re in there." You cried. The tears that ran down your face landed on the floor. "I just— I know I said I could be strong for the both of us, but... I need you."

You knocked on the door again, this time with the side of your fist. The desperate sound of your knocking bounced through the walls of the deserted hallway.

"Please Bucky, please open the door. Wanda is dead." Your own cries stopped you from talking, the hole in your chest seemed to get bigger and bigger with each passing second. "Nat, Tony, Steve, Wanda. All of them are dead, and I—I can’t. I can’t keep losing people. I can’t lose you."

You couldn’t do this alone, not anymore. Your heart couldn’t take it anymore.

"I love you. God, I love you so much. I know you want space, but right now I need your love, Bucky. I need you to love me like you used to. Please love me." You begged.

And you waited. You waited for what seemed like hours, but it probably was just thirty minutes until you accepted he wasn’t coming out.

You left with half a heart that night.

Two weeks later, you came back to his apartment, ready to demand an explanation. Your love for him was strong, but you needed him to talk to you. You were ready to fight for your future. You were ready to fight for your love.

"Bucky!" you yelled as you knocked aggressively. "Bucky, open the fucking door!"

The door didn’t take long to open. It surprised you, your confidence and anger faltered for a second. This was a sign, perhaps it was him being ready to fight for you too. This was him showing you he still loved you.

Except the person who opened the door wasn’t Bucky.

It was a girl. A short brunette that was covered by Bucky’s black T-shirt and nothing more.

"Hi."

You wanted to scream. You wanted to burst into tears. You wanted to burn the world and leave everything behind. You wanted to die. But the only thing you could do was stay there and stare at the girl.

"Umm, Bucky is not here." She said awkwardly, your intense stared made her uncomfortable.

"Do you know where he is?" You questioned her. The words came out rougher than you intended, but as the heartbreak and despair set in, you couldn't care less.

"No. I, um, when I woke up he was already gone." She pulled the hem of the t-shirt down in an effort to convey her nervousness, but it only infuriated you more. "Are you a friend of his?"

You wanted to laugh. God, this couldn’t be happening.

"Yeah, of sorts."

"I can let you in so we can wait for him, but I have to leave in like twenty minutes."

"You can’t call him?" you asked, bitterly. You knew Bucky had gotten a new phone but he never gave you his number.

Her face blushed before she answered. "No, uh. We met last night, and he didn’t give me his number.

"Oh."

You didn’t know what would be worse, if he had seen this girl ever since he left your cabin or the fact that he had a one night stand with a random girl. It didn’t matter, though, Bucky Barnes had crushed your heart.

The girl, whose name was Clara, kept her word, leaving minutes later as she had to go to work. She seemed like a nice girl who had no idea the man she had slept with was engaged. And perhaps in another world you would’ve been nicer to her if your heart hadn’t collapsed in on itself when she opened the door. Maybe she was a little naïve, as she let you stay inside the apartment so you could wait on Bucky. She had also asked you to give him her number, the digits scribbled on a piece of paper.

You broke down the moment she closed the door behind her. You thought of trashing the place, breaking every piece of furniture he owned, and burning all his clothes in a pit in the middle of his living room. You imagined yourself hurling the stupid leather jacket he seemed to be fond of lately.You also thought about settling for burning everything to the crisp, wanting to see the look on his eyes once he saw his apartment consumed by flames.

You didn’t do any of those things, though; instead, you waited. This time, hours actually went by, the once bright morning turned into the darkness of the night, and you never moved from your spot on the couch, not even to turn on the lights.

Bucky came back to his apartment around 11 p.m. When he noticed the apartments' lack of lightning, he felt relieved not to have to deal with the girl he had taken home the night before. By the looks of it, she left a while ago.

He turned on the light before taking of his jacket, placing it on the coat hanger next to the door.As he walked to the kitchen to get a glass of water, he tossed his keys on the counter.He had to change the sheets on his bed and do laundry tomorrow. The glass was half full when a voice behind him spoke.

"You have a nice place here."

The glass dropped from his hands into the kitchen sink. His head snapped quickly towards you, finding you seated in the middle of his couch. He turned off the sink, before making his way toward you. You couldn’t be here, not today of all days.

"How the hell did you get in here?" he barked.

He didn’t mean it like that, not in the way it sounded. He wasn’t angry at you being inside his apartment, he was scared. Scared that you had arrived at the wrong time and seen something you weren’t meant to see.

He finally stood in front of you and saw it. Your nose was slightly puffy and red, like you had been crying for some time. Your shoulders were slumped, defeat washing over your posture. But the thing that hurt the most to see was the pain behind your eyes. It wasn’t the normal type of pain of loss or grief as you had experienced these past months. No, it was something else.

It was the pain of heartbreak and betrayal.

It couldn’t be.

You couldn't have been here when she was still in his house. There was no way, life could not hate him this way. It had to be something else that broke your heart, he had hurt you many times this past couple of months, and today was probably the day it all crashed down. It had to be that.

"Clara let me in."

No.

"Nice girl, she left her number for you."

You knew, you had seen the girl who was apparently named Clara, he didn’t really remember it. Bucky knew he had to do something, anything that could save your relationship. Perhaps if he begged you not to leave him, to let him explain everything that had been going on with him, and if he spent the rest of his days making it up to you, then you would stay. Maybe you could forgive him.

He didn’t do any of that, though. The same thoughtless attitude washed over him like it had done ever since he came back. It was as if his brain forced him to act this way in order to protect his own heart in the long run.

Instead of doing everything he could to fix this, he shrugged and crossed his arms over his chest.

"How long?" you asked. Bucky could see your eyes watering as you tried to keep yourself together. He hated himself. "How long have you been cheating on me?"

His mouth answered without his permission.

"Does it even matter?"

Maybe he was right. Maybe it the answer wouldn’t change the way you were feeling; if anything, it was bound to hurt you more. But a part of you wanted to know the truth, to extinguish the other half of your heart.

You didn’t budge, so Bucky finally answered, not before rolling his eyes. "She’s the only one. I met her yesterday in a bar. "He shrugged. "It just happened."

You knew the answer, yet it still hit you with the force of a thousand bricks. He admitted it. He fucking admitted it and he didn’t even show a single morsel of remorse. There weren't any apologies or begs, no promises, or big romantic and sorrowful speeches. You could feel your own love being smothered, the flames that had once brought so much warmth to your soul were replaced by cold and emptiness.

Bucky Barnes didn’t love you anymore.

Now

Bruises covered your body as well as new injuries that would probably give you more scars. Dirt and blood slid down the drain, exhaustion settling in as your muscles relaxed. The droplets of water fell against your body, washing away everything that had happened today.

You found the intel, you knew every single name of everyone involved with the heinous experiments you were chasing.

You had almost died, one of the guys Bucky and you had cornered, had a bomb attached to his chest. You tried to stop him, your gun pointing at his head, but you were too slow. The explosion shook the entire structure, causing a chain collapse of the floors around you.

Bucky had jumped to protect you, his body acting as a human shield, deflecting some of the impact.His flesh arm had a large metal piece embedded in it, as well as some burns on his back. The explosion had knocked you both out of the air, and the resulting wave had thrown you both across the room.

As you tried to shake away the confusion and the ringing from your ears, you felt his hand find its place along your face and travel to your stomach. As he scanned you, blue eyes looked at you with fogginess but also deep concern.

"You ok?" he had whispered.

You nodded, but your mind was still fuzzy, perhaps you had hit your head, but you couldn’t remember much.

But you remembered the desperation. You remembered everything crumbling apart as you tried to make your way to the exit. You remembered Sam’s voice screaming through your earpieces to get the fuck out of there. You remembered Bucky's hand always keeping you safe, guiding you through the clouds of cement and smoke.

You also remembered how Bucky’s steps faltered before collapsing. Neither of you had noticed he had a second piece of metal scrap buried between his ribs. If he had removed it, his enhanced healing would have taken care of it, but the extenuating movements had caused damage to his lungs, bleeding, and a lack of oxygen, causing him to pass out.

You remembered screaming for Sam’s help, begging him to help you save Bucky. You remembered the tears falling from your eyes as you tried to pull Bucky to safety, begging him not to die, begging him to wake up. You remembered the fire catching up to you, it’s warmth burning your skin. You wanted to kill Bucky, you would be happy if you never seen his face again, dance on top of his grave as you celebrated the end of his existance.

Then why were you fighting so hard to save him?

"Wake up. Wake up. Wake up. You can’t do this to me!"

"Bucky wake the fuck up!"

"Please! I can’t lose you like this!"

Fortunately, Sam came for you, him and all his Captain America glory had saved both of you, his wings protecting all three of you as you carried Bucky outside. You had barely gone a few steps ahead when the building finally set one last explosion, ending with everything on it's way.All three of you landed on the floor with a thud as the shock wave reached you.

You focused your attention on Bucky's wound, which was already healing, but his lack of response worried you.His breathing was barely existent, and his heartbeat was decreasing. You had straddled his lap and began performing CPR on him while asking Sam to go fetch the adrenaline shot you stored in the vehicle. You had punctured Bucky's chest with it, and after a few seconds, he had woken up.

You remembered clinging to him as he tried to sit straight, the desperation finally gone from your body.

The body behind you wrapped his hands along your waist, pulling you out of your memories and spreading the soap he had covered you with. Bucky's fingers traced all the way down your body, removing every trace of stress.

After everything happened, Sam told you to go back to the safehouse while he met with Joaquin to try and start locating people with the intel you had gathered. You thought about fighting him, but one look at Bucky and any fight you had left was done.

A knowing look from Sam told you this wasn’t just to let both of you rest and get cleaned up. It was a second chance. A second chance at the talk you had avoided to had with Bucky ever since that night you slept together.

You drove back to the safehouse, and once you had gotten inside, everything crumbled apart inside of you. As you reached out to Bucky, your tears had fallen, your hand lingering in his fleshy arm, right where his wound was.His hand cupped your face, his thumb tracing the stream of blood that fell from your eyebrow. In the silence of the room, no words were exchanged, but both your hearts understood.

Just for today, you would allow yourselves to comfort each other.

His lips peppered kisses along your shoulder as he cleaned you, his lips sometimes finding your neck or your lips when you would press yourself against him. As you spread the shampoo over his head, your fingers massaged his scalp with the tenderness he had missed, his eyes closing every time you hit the right spot.

After drying yourselves and changing into new clothes, you both layed on the bed, covered over the head with the thin white sheet you had. You faced each other, blue eyes meeting yours. Your fingers found his face as you traced along every crevice and line you hadn’t seen before. Bucky appeared to have aged years in the time you hadn't seen him, but he remained as beautiful as ever.

Your heart ached in your chest, and you couldn’t fight it anymore. You had denied yourself the other feelings that remained inside of you other than hate and betrayal, but today, as death seemed to call for both of you, it was clear you didn’t want Bucky Barnes to die. A part of you hated him so deeply you weren’t sure you would be able to stop, but no matter how strong the hatred was, you were sure a part of you still loved him.

However, that part of you was broken. Battered and bruised to death by his own doing but it was still there. It was locked inside the thousand-foot wall you had built around it to keep it safe. Refusing to ask questions, refusing to talk to him, and refusing to admit the pain you were in. But in doing so you hadn’t given yourself the opportunity to heal. To move on.

So you allowed yourself to feel and to talk. For both your sake and his.

"Why did you do it?" you broke the silence. His breathing faltered as your hand retracted back to your side. "Why did you hurt me like that?"

Bucky struggled to find the right words. You were asking him the same question he had asked himself for many, many nights. He asked himself that question when he wouldn’t reach for you at night. He asked himself that question when he didn’t open the door for you.

He asked himself that question when you walked out of his life.

You deserved the truth. The whole, unapologetic, heartfelt truth. So he gave it to you.

"The first time I came back to myself, after fighting Steve in the helicarrier, I realized the world had moved on without me. My plans, my family, and the people I knew were all left in the past. They all moved on without me, everyone was gone except for Steve. I had a plan, after the war I would go back and find myself a beautiful girl to marry." A sad smile posed on his lips as he reminisced. "I wanted the white picket fence and three kids package. Cookouts with my family and friends while I was still a war hero. But all of that was gone the moment I woke up in a time that wasn’t mine. My dreams were gone."

He paused before reaching for your face, his eyes closing before opening again, tears streaming down his cheeks."Ever since I woke up, I was a man drifting in a time that wasn’t mine, in a life that wasn’t mine. I didn’t have any dreams, or aspirations other than to survive and perhaps discover the truth. Nothing made sense to me, not until I met you." His thumb wiped away the tears you didn’t know they were falling. "You were the very first person, aside from Steve, that was kind to me. You talked to me, listened to what I had to say. You showed me what this new world was about, how to survive in it, and above all, you never doubted my innocence. It wasn’t because you knew me like Steve did, or because he had asked you as a favor. You were my friend, the very first I made when I was lost. And along the way, you turned into more, you were my new dream. I fell in love with you, and suddenly it didn’t matter that I wasn’t supposed to be here, or what it could’ve been because with you, I finally felt like I belonged somewhere."

A sob escaped you, his words burning your heart, branding them with the love you once felt for him. The heartbreak and the pain came once again, but it felt different. It was comforting in a way that scared you, terrified you. You knew he had loved you once, but you had stored those memories far away where they couldn’t hurt you. Because it was easier to tell yourself that Bucky had never actually loved you than to think he had loved you and had still betrayed you.

"But no matter how much time passed or how loved or comfortable I felt, I was still scared. I was terrified. Terrified of the same thing happening again. Every day, I'd tell myself, 'Something is going to happen, something is going to take me away from you, and when I come back, another hundred years will have passed.' And it did happen. When Thanos snapped me away, I came back, and to me only seconds had passed, but for you it was five years. Everything had changed again, even you. There was this sadness that seemed to have nested behind your eyes every time you looked at me. And every time I looked at you, I could see how much you had suffered because of me, it was my fault, and I couldn’t do anything about it."

"It wasn’t your fault." You tried to argue, but his words interrupted you.

"I felt like it was. I felt like I must’ve had some sort of curse that would always take me away from what made me the happiest, and in return, I would hurt everyone around me with it. I had died once again and the world kept going, once again. And I tried really hard to fight those thoughts, but it was as if a cloud of darkness would whisper to me that I didn't belong here anymore.That everything had changed once again, and it would happen again and again and again until I finally died. And I didn't know what to do; it was as if this voice was drowning me, washing away every ounce of happiness I had left inside me until all that remained was anger and resentment."

His voice had broken, as had his ability to hold back the tears.He had buried this for so long, too embarrassed to say them aloud, to admit how he had messed up everything because he was afraid.He wasn’t the man who had sworn to protect you against everything, he was a coward. A coward who had let his own fear hurt you in ways he could never fix.

"I’m sorry. I’m so sorry." Bucky kissed your forehead. "You didn’t deserve any of what I did to you, and I don’t think I could ever forgive myself for doing that. I’m sorry I wasn’t there for you when you needed me, I’m sorry I pushed you away when all you did was trying to help me. I’m sorry I slept with someone else. I'm sorry I messed everything up because the truth is, you have been the best thing that has ever happened to me, past and present, and if I had to go through all of the pain, torture, and heartbreak all over again just to meet you, I would."

You stayed there in silence for minutes. Neither of you dared say anything else that would break the silence. Both your hearts had been through a lot today, from the threats of death to the realizations of love and pain that had been confessed. But amongst the suffering and the torment, both of your hearts began to heal, and the pieces that had been ripped apart came back to where they belonged.

You took his hands into yours, your lips kissing his knuckles. "I don’t know if I could ever forgive you for what you did." Bucky’s eyes closed in ache, he knew it was a possibility, but it still hurt to know there was no hope, but your words stopped him from spiraling. "But I would like to try."

Hope. A tiny silver of hope.

"Do you think there is a chance for us in the future?"

You considered it. Your mind and your heart still pulling towards different directions but none of them letting you decide. Would you be willing to risk your heart once again for Bucky Barnes, or has the damage been too great to be fixed and covered? "I don’t know."

"That’s ok. I'm not going to ask about it again unless you want me to."

He kissed you one last time. His lips still had a subtle taste of smoke and burned, but above it was something overpowering, something both of you felt as he deepened the kiss. You both tasted redemption and forgiveness.

Forever

"Thanks for helping me."

"Don’t thank me, I’m only doing it for the beer."

Bucky and you chuckled at his poor attempt at a joke, your footsteps echoing in the half-empty apartment. A couple of seconds later, your mattress landed with a loud thud in your bedroom, making you happy to be finally done. You threw yourself on the bed, Bucky following you close behind, his heaviness bouncing you off. You turned to your side, resting your head on your hand, and he replicated your pose.

It had been a year and a half since you decided to bring Bucky back into your life, and things had changed dramatically since then.You stopped doing solo missions and moved to New York, where you split your time between assisting Sam and Bucky with their shenanigans and volunteering at the woman's shelter Sam had connected you with.

In the beginning, it was difficult to adapt to a tamer lifestyle than the one you had lived in the past year, but listening to all those women, the things they had been through, showed you that sometimes the thing people need to start healing is to have someone along the way.

Bucky and you had become friends, just as you had been when you first met. It took time to get back to the beginning, but soon you found out how much you needed him as a friend, not a lover or a soulmate but just someone with whom you could talk. And, over the course of the many nights you spent talking, forgiveness found its way into your heart.You didn’t forget the past between both of you, but along the way there was understanding and care.

"How was your date?"

You shrug. "It was ok, not that great to be honest."

During this time you had gone on a couple of dates, even went out with a guy for a couple of months, and since you and Bucky were ‘just friends’ you thought it would be uncomfortable to talk to him about them. But he had developed a habit of surprising you, and as it turned out, he was okay with it. When you asked why he was okay with it, his response surprised you.

"I love you, I’ll always love you. But if you need me as a friend and nothing more, then I’ll be your friend."

Your heart was still reluctant about him, after all, pain is a thing you can hardly forget. That had been the reason why you had tried to find someone else. Someone who could make you laugh as hard as he did, someone who could make you blush with just a cocky smile, someone who could calm you down and make everything better by simply holding you close at night.Someone who could make you happy. But all of them failed, because they weren’t Bucky Barnes.

No one ever compared to Bucky Barnes, because after all the lies, heartbreak, and death surrounding you, he was still the only person who felt like home.

Blue eyes stared at you and all you could feel was your heart racing. He was the man you had once loved and he had betrayed you, but time had mended your heart. The part of you that hated him was gone, and instead the love you felt for him came back, maybe not as strong as it once was but it didn’t matter. Your love was willing to build itself up, your love was willing to let him in one last time.

"Ask me" you uttered. Your voice was so quiet that you thought he wouldn't hear you, but his puzzled expression told you otherwise.

"What?"

Your hand grabbed his, your thumb was drawing circles on his skin.

"Bucky, ask me."

Bucky’s heart stopped. A part of him had always told him that you would never want him back, and he couldn't blame you. He had hurt you in so many ways that he could never forgive himself. He had been sure the best he could have from you was friendship, and he had made his peace with it. Having you as only a friend was better than not having you at all.

But you were giving him an opportunity, and he would be damned if he didn’t take it.

"Would you—" he paused, clearing his throat.The nervousness inside him erased his ability to speak. "Would you like to go out for dinner? As in a date?"

You made it seem as if you were thinking about it, but he didn’t worry about it. He knew your answer already.

"Yeah, I guess I can make time for one date."

You smiled. You gave him your biggest, most genuine smile in a long time.He smiled too.

Loving Bucky Barnes hadn’t been easy. But as you both lay in your beds, his hands caressing your face and new hope brewing between you, your heart told you that this time would be different.

He wasn't the same tormented man from another time you'd fallen in love with, and you weren't the same broken but hopeful girl he'd loved with all his heart.You both had hurt each other, but you had also grown, both of you in your own ways, and yet destiny had brought you back together.

This time, neither of you was scared.

This time, loving him would come as easily as breathing.

If you like the story please interact: reblogs, likes and comments go a long way. Feedback is always appreciated! Feel free to message me about it.

Tag list: @wintasssoldier @fallenoutofrose @cjand10 @nouk1998 @smplymrvl @littlemiss-yeehaw @magnificentsvn @kentokaze @gostodosopa @musicgirl44 @rebloggingmyrecs @mbindzus-blog @pampeop @buckystwilight @blackhawkfanatic @miss-i-ship-it @bibliophilewednesday

#bucky barnes angst #bucky barnes smut #bucky barnes fluff #bucky barnes fanfic #bucky barnes x reader #bucky barnes fic #bucky barnes fanfiction #bucky barnes x female reader #bucky barnes x you #bucky barnes x y/n #marvel fanfiction #marvel cinematic universe #avengers fanfiction #avengers fic

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nailisaa · 4 months

Text

love transforms

(announcement at the end)

fear was the cause of most of my problems. now that i've discovered this as the root, its a lot easier to deal with now. i can imagine some of you do as well which is why i wanted to share this. part 3 of edwards's series is truly incredible, we don't speak of it enough despite some of us truly needing it right now. you and your feelings are valid, but because no one deserves to live in fear ever, we should know how to manage it.

THROUGH LOVE.

i know. this may not make sense at first. most people would just say "flip the thoughts" or do something to regain control. but truthfully there is no reason flip fearful thoughts first. you are much greater than them... and more importantly: that isn't the root.

if the root is fear, remove the feeling of fear entirely by first taking responsibility for what you're conscious of being. i understand that most struggle to, but if you can acknowledge the harm this cycle has done, you can also break it by ALLOWING yourself to experience lovelier thoughts instead. meaning, that if you've created fearful thoughts that means it HAS NO POWER ON ITS OWN. NONE. this should be the best news, to realize you are more than your thoughts.

CHOOSE LOVE OVER FEAR.

"Second, when you take responsibility for that fearful thought as your creation, ask yourself this simple question, 'What is it that I would LOVE to think?' From here as the Creator, you can start to go towards LOVE. LOVE is the most powerful 'thing' if you will, within you. Why? Because it never fails to TRANSFORM 'SELF.' Fear can stagnant, but LOVE TRANSFORMS. Why is this important? Remember the reason we are doing this. We are NOT trying to manipulate reality or force some change upon this physical world That will happen NATURALLY. Why? Because your world is REFLECTING SELF. Since it is reflecting 'SELF,' then how can we transform 'SELF' in the most efficient and best way possible? Through LOVE. By actually going within our minds and doing what we LOVE, having what we LOVE. This changes us at our very core. From this new feeling of freedom and love, you will find it incredibly easy to think what you want. You will even find it harder to feel fear. This ease and love starts to become your natural State. People will start treating you in a better way. You won't even have to imagine every little thing going your way, it just will. Things you wanted months ago, start appearing in your world. Things that bothered you deeply, literally has no effect on you anymore. Why? Because you are no longer DESIRING, no longer FEARING. You are living in FULFILLMENT. Fulfillment in Love. You are actually living what you LOVE within, and this love expresses itself without. To reiterate, when you are doing these meditations, and you get the 'resistance' which is just fear, remember the words of Neville: 'To repent to simply man's ability to entertain the nature of the opposite." Can you entertain the opposite of the nature of fear? Can you entertain Love? Is that not what you want?" - Edward Art

end.

IMPORTANT: this is my last post before i go on break. i am not sure when i will be back, but it definitely won't be for too long?

before i go, i wanted to share some advice. everyone interprets things differently, which is why reading directly from source is probably one of the best things you can do in your journey. (it is very easy to find misinfo on any app.) when i say this i don't mean skim through the whole thing, no. but read it slowly. you don't have to finish these books all in one day (i am saying this because i tried that once, and that was not it y'all😭💀). do it at a pace where you will be able to grasp what is being said. if you don't understand something, read the sentence or previous paragraphs again and you'll usually find the answer on your own. you may find new pieces to the puzzle if you just took the time, or even sat with yourself in silence (you may even come to new realizations, not from teachers but from you). there is no rush, seriously.

now anyway, about my break, my goal is to come back having read other authors and books, to share with you guys, and hopefully return with a new and stronger perspective on consciousness/awareness. recently i have been feeling as if something within me is missing, despite me knowing what i do. about Self. maybe it is time to explore what that is. i'll still be active on tumblr, but i'm not posting and my inbox will be closed. and i won't be answering dms about loa advice. i wish you all the best, truly. and i love u all, bye!

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witchwyfe · 7 months

Text

cruel summer ii - rc

pairing - (non-canon) Rafe Cameron x female reader

précis - part two of cruel summer !!

content/warnings - mentions of food, mentions of eating, language, kissing, i think that's it

word count - 1,331

a/n - the long-awaited sequel! thank y'all for being so patient i really hope it was worth the wait :)

“Okay, so I have Diet coke, Oreos, and the breadsticks from The Wreck, that you love.” You list of the items that are neatly packed away in your lunchbox from high school, gesturing to the backseat, where said lunchbox is sitting.

“You’re the best.” Rafe flashes you a shiny smile as he hauls himself into your passenger seat. You wait for the click of his seatbelt before pulling out of Tanneyhill’s driveway.

Ever since you and Rafe had talked and acquired your new friendship status, you’d been spending quite a bit of time together—as in the whole summer. You have a week before you’re heading back to school, and it pains both of you more than you’ll ever admit. Tonight’s event is a beach picnic, hence the old lunchbox and blanket in your backseat.

Instead of your usual chatter and occasional banter, Rafe is glued to his phone, a frown etched onto his lips. You glance over once, at a red light, but he doesn’t appear to notice.

“So,” You start, somewhat awkwardly. “How was your day?”

Rafe clicks his phone off, looking up as he clears his throat, the sound husky as it reverberates throughout the car. “My day?” He coughs, red rising on his cheeks. Your foot pushes against the gas pedal so you don’t notice the blushing boy beside you. “Was okay. Worked with my dad.”

You grimace on instinct, wrinkling your nose in a way, Rafe doesn’t want to admit, is cute. “Was he nice to you?”

He laughs half-heartedly. “He was okay. Just the usual.” You frown again and lean over to pat his shoulder, ignoring the uncomfortable twinge in your arm as you bend it back.

“S’fine.” He shakes his head. “Seriously, nothing I can’t handle.”

“You shouldn’t have to handle it.” You murmur, more to yourself than him, but he catches it anyway.

“Well, enough about me.” He pauses to shift in his seat, swallowing down the hesitation that engulfs him. It’s such a simple question—one you’d already asked him—but he can’t help but feel how domestic it is, how sweet that you care enough to ask, to ask and mean it, rather than throwing out a meaningless sentiment. “How was your day?” He croaks out, covering it up with a cough that does nothing to stop more heat from rising on his cheeks.

“Pretty good.” You smile. “Better now. I get so lonely during the summer, I should’ve gotten a job or something. I did go shopping though, on the mainland, had to get up early.” You frown. “Sorry for talking your ear off.

“You’re not!” He expresses immediately. “I like hearing what you have to say.” He could listen to you talk for hours and never get bored, you could say the same sentence a hundred times and he wouldn’t mind, he’s sure your sweet timbre would make it more than bearable.

“Oh,” It’s like the heat has spread from his cheeks to your own. “Thanks Rafe.”

“D’you find a new duvet?” He inquires. “I know you said you wanted a new one before you go back to school.”

“Yeah, I-I, did.” You smile, swallowing over the stutter in your words. “Didn’t realized you remembered.”

“I do actually listen when you talk, ya know?” He teases.

“Could’ve fooled me.” You retort, giggling when he gasps in mock offense.

“Oh right, because you totally listen to everything I tell you.” He argues, playful sarcasm tinting his words.

“Shut up, I do!” You’re laughing again when you pull into the beach parking lot and see Rafe’s pout and crossed arms.

“Oh yeah?” He challenges. “What game was I telling you about yesterday?” He taunts.

You’re silent for a few seconds before he’s shaking his head in disappointment. “See, I knew it!”

“S’not my fault Rafael!” You shriek in attempt to defend yourself. “Baseball’s so boring, I was listening but I forgot.”

“Oh, you forgot?” He eggs you one. “Nice try, sweet girl.”

He processes the nickname two seconds after it fell easily from his lips. You don’t seem to notice so he doesn’t make a deal about it. Seem is the key word, because you didn’t think it was physically possible to want someone so badly, a simple term of endearment sending you into a frenzy. It’s different than the princess, he’d always called you, even now that you’re friends. This wasn’t a tease or a nickname you give to bother someone, it’s sincere and real.

“Okay whatever,” You sigh, reaching into the backseat for the lunchbox and the large beach blanket. “I promise, next time you talk baseball, I’ll take notes so I don’t forget.”

“Gonna get you into baseball someday!” He sing-songs, sidling up to you as soon as you’re both out of the car. “Want me to hold on to your stuff?” He wonders softly, noticing your lack of tote bag.

“Hm, yes please.” You murmur, handing him your wallet and keys. “Thank you.”

The beach as is crowded as you expected, late evening in early August, still hot but cooled just a bit for the incoming sunset. Rafe helps you lay out the blanket before settling right beside you on it.

You pull out two cans of Diet Coke and Rafe’s eyes light up. Surprisingly, you and him also shared an obsession for the soda. He cracks a can for you, then one for himself. You take a generous sip, the crisp carbonation sliding down your throat, deliciously.

As the sky melts into orange and pink sherbert, snacks and diet cokes demolished, you and Rafe sit silently, shoulder to shoulder, his body heat radiating against your skin, even through his t-shirt and your crewneck.

You sit, gathering your nerve, wanting, needing to say something, anything.

“Hey Rafe?” You wonder softly, clearing your throat.

“Hmm?”

“Is it gonna be different?” You’re spitting words out before you can even think of what you mean but you keep going. “Like, since we’re friends now like, are we—“ You cut yourself off with a sigh. “I guess what I mean to say is, will it still be like this when I go back to school?”

“Like, us hanging out? And talking?” He wonders slowly and you nod.

“I just, I’ve had a really good summer with you and I don’t want it to end just because I’m leaving.”

He nods knowingly. “It doesn’t have to.” He assures. “I’ve had a great summer too, and you know, UNC isn’t that far, we can hang out whenever we want.”

You nod. “Cool.”

He nods again and the silence returns, this time charged with something different, unfamiliar, something that’s been building the entire summer, finally enough that you can feel it.

“And one more thing,” You start, building your nerve. When he turns to you, you set your hands on his shoulders and press your lips to his, just once, soft, and delicate.

“Fuck,” You hiss, eyes widening as you search his expression. “I’m so sorry, I shouldn’t have assumed, we can just act like it never happened and—“

There’s a magnetic pull between your lips and his, a sigh of relief leaving you when his mouth finally covers yours. Your fingers scramble for purchase on the collar of his shirt, before dancing up to thread through the hair at his nape. His hands are on fire at your sides, skimming underneath your sweatshirt, rough palms meeting smooth, soft skin.

“That was more than okay, sweetheart.” He grins crookedly when you pull back, lips wet and swollen. “Long time coming I think.”

“Yeah.” You sigh, curling into his side. “I’m gonna miss you.”

“I’m gonna visit you.” He promises with a kiss. “As much as you want. You’re going to be sick of me.”

“Not possible.” You shake your head. “I think I had enough of that the last ten years of my life. I want to get as much of you as I can.”

“You have me sweetheart, all of me.”

#mine #my work #my writing #witchwyfe writing #rafe cameron #rafe cameron x you #rafe cameron x female reader #rafe cameron oneshot #rafe cameron fanfiction #rafe cameron fanfic #outer banks fanfiction #rafe cameron blurb #cruel summer pt 2 #rafe cameron obx #rafe cameron fluff #rafe cameron imagine #rafe cameron x reader

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froggyfics · 7 months

Text

The Deadliest Poisons Are The Sweetest - 5

Your wedding day arrives.

Note: (09/15/23) PLEASE READ THE PREVIOUS CHAPTER. If you have read this series before this date, please note that I have combined chapters 1 and 2 together. This may seem confusing, but I have decided that as a creative approach, I would like the chapters to be longer. Therefore, the original chapter 4 is now chapter 3. Chapter 4 is new. This chapter and beyond are up to date.

Btw y'all it's gonna get saucy in the next chapter lmao

Feedback is always appreciated. Feel free to message me privately or comment below to let me know what you think. Constructive criticism is always welcome!

Word Count: 4,844

This is the closest you’ve been with him in weeks. The intimacy of the moment is warped however, with underlying feelings of inadequacy.

This is your wedding day. Yet, you feel as though you are imposter. You can feel the red-hot glares of the jealous maidens in the crowd. After all, you are marrying the most eligible bachelor in the entire realm. If only they knew that you felt sick to your stomach, and you wished that they were in your place.

You don’t even look him in the eyes. You stare at his mouth, as if you needed to do so in order to understand the vows.

“I promise to be true to you in good times and in bad, in sickness and in health. I will love you and honor you all the days of my life.”

No, you won’t, you say to yourself. You led me to believe that we could be more, but you tricked me!

He places a ring on your finger. Your hand suddenly feels like it’s weighed down by a ton of bricks. You nearly choke on your vows as they stumble out of you. When you arrived in Gotham a month ago, you were admittedly excited for this day. However, Damian’s icy demeanor as of late has left you bitter. How could it be possible to be so close with someone one day, and then completely cold the next. It befuddled you. Damianbefuddled you.

Your vows were sealed with a chaste kiss. Cheers and whoops erupted from the crowd. Through the noise, you could distinctly hear your father’s booming claps and mother’s animated laughs. Of course they were happy! Their daughter was married off – to a prince no less. Your marriage ensured a lifetime of stability and wealth for them. Not bad for a baron and baroness.

You wobble to the great hall for the wedding banquet with Damian’s hand clasped in your own. It wasn’t your choice to make physical contact – he was the one that initiated.

“Weddings are the end of their lives as they know it. The beginning of a prison sentence. The end of youth.”

This is an act. You must admit, if acting was a respectable career choice, Damian would be a top-notch performer. The vows meant nothing. The kiss was expected. The hand holding was necessary for the performance.

You sat right next to your husband. Aristocrats, both strangers and now familiar faces, approach to wish glad tidings upon you and Damian. You accept their kind words as politely as you can. All the while, you twist your ring, round and round, underneath the table.

You light up when Rachel approaches the table. A genuine smile finally crosses your face.

“Lady Rachel!” you call out excitedly.

You jump when you feel Damian’s presence near your ear.

“How do you know of Lady Rachel?” he asks.

You gape at him while Rachel curtsies shyly. His question is not shocking – you chalk it up to mere curiosity. It’s the fact that he’s talking…to you! Willingly. And the conversation does not revolve around simple greetings or pleasantries.

You can’t even answer him. Anger bubbles inside of you. He almost completely ignores you for four weeks and now suddenly acts like you should be receptive to his conversation. You have half a mind to ignore him in favor of speaking to Rachel. However, the ring sits heavy on your finger, and you suddenly remember your place.

He is now your husband. He is the heir to the throne. If there is anyone you should hold your tongue towards, it’s him.

“We met one week ago,” you reply. Rachel beams at you while you recount how you met her.

“We’ve only become closer and closer, day by day.” You hold your hand towards her, and she takes it affectionately.

“The princess is right,” Rachel adds. “It is almost like we have known each other our entire lives.”

Damian speaks only after he gulps his entire drink quickly. “Well, wife,” he emphasizes when he grabs your hand, “I am glad you have made a friend in Gotham.”

He smiles menacingly. You can tell by the way his lips unnaturally stretch over his teeth and the reddening of his face.

Rachel glances at your conjoined hands and clears her throat. “Well, I just wanted to say that I wish for the two of you to be happy.” She raises her cup and you raise yours with your other hand in support.

“To the happy couple,” she concludes. The edge of the cup reaches her lips, but she does not drink. She instead curtsies once more and disappears among the crowd of people.

As soon as she leaves, Damian releases your hand, wiping his palm on his pants as if you were a leper. You clench your teeth so hard that they squeak in retaliation. You manage to take deep breaths to calm yourself – in and out, in and out, in and out. It’s truly an act for him.

Everyone looks to be so happy. Not for you, of course not. They are happy for their own selfish reasons. Guests are fed the most delicious food and drink that the realm has to offer. Your parents rub elbows with highly ranked aristocrats. Your siblings dance merrily along the aisles. King R’as laughs heartedly a few seats away from Damian while speaking to his friends. Even Talia seems to be in a cheerful mood, scarfing down her food.

Perhaps you can attempt to be happy, too. It is your wedding day after all. You inhale deeply to gather confidence.

“Husband.”

Damian doesn’t acknowledge you.

You clear your throat and repeat yourself once more.

He doesn’t even look up from his plate.

“Damain!” you half-shout.

His head shoots up immediately. “Yes, wife?”

You want to punch him in the throat. His polite tone seems genuine, but it sounds fake to your ears.

“Are you…” You scan the great hall. “Are you enjoying the festivities?”

He nods his head slowly like he has trouble understanding your question. “Quite.” He returns to his plate.

You growl, but say no more. After all, there is no point making a concerted effort at conversation now when you apparently have the rest of your life to do so. You might as well take what little enjoyment you have now and ignore the glaring loneliness that dwells within you.

The wedding took place at noon, but the reception continues well past sunset. You did not even know that there existed so much food in the entire city. Drinks flowed like a river all night long. Some people fell asleep in their seats, despite the rambunctious behaviors of others. Some people danced and danced until you thought their feet would fall off.

You remain glued to your seat nearly the entire reception. There were a few moments where you stretched your feet, such as when the guests stacked cakes on top one another, so that you and Damian could kiss over them. You managed to peck each other’s lips without the cakes collapsing to the ground, which made the audience break out into cheers. After all, if the cakes fell, it symbolized bad luck for your marriage.

As if you needed any more of that already.

The reception seemed like it would never end. Your posture slowly deteriorated over the hours, until you were slumped in your chair. Muscle aches began to surface for sitting for so long. You wanted the night to be over.

“Damian!” R’as called.

Damian pushes the table to make room to get up. He travels just a few feet farther to his grandfather who whispers something in his ear. Whatever was said made Damian stiffen and glance at you.

You suddenly develop that prickly feeling when you feel like someone is talking about you. Damian’s glance made you certain that you were the subject of their conversation. The realization made you shift in your seat. You decide to study the wooden table to distract yourself from your insecurity.

A tap on your shoulder breaks your concentration. You find Damian looking down at you with a stoic expression. As usual, you can never determine what he’s thinking.

“Follow me,” he bluntly says.

He doesn’t move an inch and you don’t realize until a few moments later that he expects you to get up first. You push yourself from the table and slowly stand up. You’ve been sitting for so long that your knees crack upon straightening.

Damian maneuvers you so that you remain in front of him. He’s mere inches behind you and his hands fix themselves to your waist. He pushes you forward, directing you towards the door.

The once lively room suddenly quiets down, until cheers are erupted once more.

You peer behind you to see that nearly everyone is looking directly at you. Men are jeering, throwing their hands in the air. Your father kisses your mother’s forehead while she blows a kiss towards you. Women are clapping obnoxiously. You face forward once again in mortification when you realize that they are cheering for your consummation. Everyone knows that you are walking out the hall a virgin – only to become a true wife by tomorrow.

You look back again, scanning the crowd for Rachel. She has been one of the few sources of support you’ve had as of late. You just want to look at her, to search for comfort in her eyes. You find her violet eyes eventually, only for your humiliation to turn into sadness. Her eyes do not necessarily brim with tears, but they are certainly glossy.

You give her a comforting smile as the door to the hall opens.

Don’t be sad for me, you want to say to her, but the door of the hall closes before your message can be relayed through your eyes.

Damian continues pushing you from behind through the castle. You are eventually brought to an all-too familiar, yet unfamiliar room.

It certainly has changed since you were in here last, all those years ago. Damian’s room still exudes extravagance, worthy of an heir. However, small details have changed.

There are several arms-related items laying around. A full armor suit sits at the corner of the room. Several weapons – swords, axes, morning stars – are hung on the walls. Papers are strewn across the room. They’re on his desk and dresser and end tables. Most importantly, the room feels larger than it did when you were a child. Well, that was probably due to the fact that you felt smaller now than you did then.

The door behind you slams shut. You jump in surprise at the loud noise and see Damian leaning on the door.

You hate it. You hate that you feel so nervous. It’s all too much. This room brings back happy memories that you cannot – should not – dredge up in fear of living in the past. You stand in a room, alone, for the first with someone known as your husband. Someone who is actually a stranger to you still. You can’t help but look down. It may be due to submission or shyness; you’re not entirely sure. All you know is that your girlhood has officially ended, and adulthood is crashing upon you.

You see his shoes from your peripheral. He stands toe-to-toe with you. You can’t bear to look him in the face. No good could come from falling for those green eyes.

He cautiously raises his hands to your waist. You grow numb as he removes your belt. Your dress puffs out into a shapeless blob.

He grabs your shoulder and turns you around, your back facing him. You can feel your dress loosening as he undoes your corset, one string at a time. Your breathing quickens at the intimacy of the act. You’ve had maybe two decent conversations with this man, and now, he has full access to your body. The discomfort makes you twitch.

“Raise your arms,” he commands. And you listen. He reaches down to hem of your dress, and pulls upward. You become blind momentarily until your dress is fully removed, and all that remains is your paltry smock. You feel overexposed. Your shoulders, arms, and legs are bare. Bare! You instinctively cover yourself the best you can with your arms, but Damian, while still behind you, firmly grabs your forearms to place them at your side. You gasp when he places a quick kiss on the back of your head.

You remain stuck in place despite hearing the crumpling of clothes behind you and await for Damian to direct you. There’s a creak, and several more creaks, and the crinkling of sheets.

“Come.”

You turn around and are met with a shirtless Damian, already beneath the sheets. He pats the unoccupied space next to him, and you follow his orders. You slink underneath the sheets and lay flat on your back, burning holes into the ceiling. The only sounds that could be heard is your breathing and the crackle of the fireplace.

You await for his orders once more. And wait. And wait. And wait some more, even as he slips completely underneath the sheets completely. From your peripheral vision, you can see that he turns his back towards you. You bite your lips nervously and you dare lift your arm up in an attempt to touch him.

“Good night.”

His words make your arm drop back down onto the mattress. The finality of his words make you close your eyes. There is nothing to do, nothing to expect. He is an actor, and you are at the whim of his play.

The extinguished fire from the fireplace doesn’t wake you. Neither does the blearing sun peeking from behind the curtains. What does wake you are the stomps of your ladies-in-waiting.

Your eyelids instantly open, the crust that developed during the night making it difficult at first.

“Princess, it is time to wake,” Matilda says in a voice that it all too loud this early in the morning. She wretches the curtains open and sunlight streams in. You hiss at the light, still walking the line between unconsciousness and alertness.

Joan grabs your shoulders and heaves you into a sitting position. In a militaristic approach, Joan, Matilda, and Honora perform your morning routine. You’ve had a month to adjust to their “help”, but it has only become slightly easier to tolerate their grubby hands and rude shoves. You can only say – Ouch! – so many times until you realize they do not care if they cause you pain. You are a job for them. They may be your household staff, but they are certainly still Talia’s minions.

The hubbub of the morning almost makes you forget where you are and what had happened the night before. You glance at the spot Damian was sleeping just a few hours prior. In his place is the outline of his body on the mattress.

“Where has my husband gone?” You wince when Joan tugs your hair particularly hard while brushing it.

“You have been summoned by Lady Talia.”

It hangs in the air, but you don’t expect them to answer your original question. It’s the nature of your relationship with them. It only reminds you to formally add Rachel to your household staff. Perhaps an ally in the mornings would improve your days.

You’re prodded and shoved and squeezed until you are dressed. A green and black gown once again. An emblem of the house that you married into. You are no longer a daughter of a baron – you are now a princess of the House Al Ghul.

You’re led to Talia’s room within the castle. A guard stands upright outside her door, and opens it for you and your brood. Within, you find your now mother-in-law with a table full of assorted small plates. Fruits, cheeses, bread. Your stomach grumbles in hunger, but you doubt you’ll be able to enjoy your meal. Not with Talia.

“Lady Talia,” you politely greet.

She waves you over without looking up. As you approach her, she finally glances at you, but now before grunting in disapproval.

She is now your mother-in-law. You must remain polite. You repeat the mantra to yourself several times as you become situated in the seat across from her. Your ladies-in-waiting stand off the side, along with Talia’s servants.

A moment passes. Then two. Then several. Talia says nothing and continues to eat. You recognize that she will not speak to you first, and that you must initiate the conversation. You desperately want to your roll your eyes, but you remember your mantra.

“Ahem, Lady Talia,” you start. “I have heard that you summoned me. Might I ask why?”

She sharply glares at you. “Do I need a reason to call upon you? After all, you are now my daughter.”

“Of course not.” You smile as sweetly as you can while simultaneously wanting to burst. You stomach rumbles again to remind you that it is empty, so you swiftly gather some items to make your plate full.

“Will Damian be joining us for this –”

“No,” Talia interjects.

“Oh.” Silence befalls the room except for the occasional chewing of food. “Is it possible for my mother to come join us? She will be leaving –”

“No. Is my presence not satisfactory to you?”

“Of course it is, Lady Talia,” you grit. She feigns a smile at you, and her eyes sparkle.

She knows that she’s irking you. She loves it.

“Are you close with Lady Rachel of House Azarath?” you inquire. The best use of your time here with Talia is to at least introduce the idea of Rachel as an additional lady-in-waiting.

Talia sips her tea generously before answering. “Yes, she used to be quite close to my son.”

“Well, her and I have only recently met, but we have become incredibly close. She honestly feels like a sister to me –”

“You’re talking about Lady Rachel?”

You gulp and shakingly nod your head. “Yes, I am. Erm – like I was saying, she has become a true friend. Since my family will return to my birthplace soon, and I have left behind my childhood friends, I was thinking about having Lady Rachel join my household staff. As a lady-in-waiting.”

Talia stares blankly at you, her green eyes burrowing into your soul. Her façade soon begins to break as her lips twitch and her eyes crinkles. Soon, she releases out a howling cackle. She laughs and laughs, holding her stomach to support herself.

Joan, Matilda, Honora, and the remaining servants in the room look to one another curiously before they begin to laugh as well. Their laughs start as awkward chuckles until they are bellowing to match their master.

You sit in utter disbelief at the situation unfurling in front of you. There’s a joke hidden in Talia’s laugh, but you remain oblivious to it.

“Oh, oh, my.” Talia wipes a tear from the corner of her eye. “Why, yes, of course! Lady Rachel is free to join your household staff.”

Your face is red with embarrassment as the laughs finally die down. You’re not sure what the joke was, and you so desperately want to know.

The food no longer looks appetizing to you. The measly few bites you had appease your stomach for the time being. Desperate for the attention to be off of you, the course of the conversation is redirected.

“Erm – thank you, Lady Talia. Say, how did you enjoy the festivities yesterday?”

“Ahem, yes, it was fine.” Her joyful tone suddenly reverts to its malicious nature. “I presume you enjoyed your wedding night, especially. How very lucky you are to bed a prince when you are…” She points in your general direction. “Well, when you are…you.”

A forced chuckle exits your mouth. Never have you ever met someone as blatantly, yet simultaneously subtly, rude. It dawns on you that her status allows her to speak however she wants, and that social graces are only for those inferior to her.

“I am eternally grateful that Prince Damian chose me to be his wife.”

She waves your pleasantry off. “Yes, yes. After all, he chose you out of…every maiden. I am certain you will do your duties as a wife to ensure his happiness. As long as you bear him heirs, I suppose that is all I can ask for.”

The conversation feels unpleasant to you. After all, shouldn’t your marital relations with Damian be kept between you and him? Admittedly, you’re not sure whether you should alert Talia to the fact that you did notbed Damian last night. Sure, you slept in the same bed, but you are certain that is not what she cares about.

The question that she was dancing around finally is brought to the forefront. “Last night was…successful, correct?”

Your hunger has not yet returned, but you abruptly feel the urge to stuff food into your mouth to avoid answering her.

“Mmhm.”

She leans in dangerously close. She remains across the table, but it seems like she will pounce on you if you dare utter one wrong word.

“Did you bed Damian?”

You breathe in deeply, having had enough of the intrusion. “Lady Talia, I feel as though my relations with your son –”

“This is a yes or no question, dear,” she seethes. “Did you or did not do your duty as the wife of Prince Damian?” She slowly stands as she asks you her question, her anger palpable.

“Does it matter?” you counter. “Why is that any of your business?”

“So, you did not bed him.”

You eye twitches in annoyance. “Lady Talia, I did not say that.”

“You don’t have to.” She slams her hands on the table, shaking it. You jump in surprise and grab hold onto the arms of the seat. The other women in the room hold their breath in frightened anticipation.

“What was the point then? What was it?” She places her hands on her waist and circles you. “There were so many others – richer, prettier, friendlier. Some of them he grew up with. Why you if he doesn’t even want to bed you?”

You remain glued to your seat. Talia looks down at you with rage in her eyes, while you look back with confusion. You don’t know how to answer her question, because ultimately, you’re unsure of the answers yourself. If she had asked you a month prior when you first arrived in Gotham, you probably could have answered that you and Damian shared a sweet encounter from many years past, and that encounter led to your marriage. However, with Damian’s aloofness, you also are uncertain as to why you were chosen to be his bride.

Talia groans in frustration at your muteness. She stomps towards the door, but not before a servant rushes over to open it for her. You watch as she disappears into the hallway, presumably to confront Damian.

You let out a shaky breath that you didn’t know you were holding.

“Take me back to my quarters,” you order your ladies-in-waiting. “And send for Lady Rachel.”

You pace back and forth in your room, practically burning a hole into the floor. A loud knock disrupts your fervent strides, and in comes your rescuer, Rachel.

“Rachel,” you whimper as your nearly run into her open arms.

Her arms wrap around you tightly, like how a snake suffocates its victims, except her hug was full of love instead.

You’re shaken up by your encounter with Talia, but the culmination of the previous 24 hours bears down upon you. You sink to the floor, Rachel helplessly attempting to lift you back to your feet, but the energy is no longer within you.

“Everything is wrong.”

“What is?” Rachel finally sinks to the floor next to you, holding your head to her bosom, holding you like a mother would do to console her child.

“Everything. This cursed family has brought me nothing but misery. I will be miserable until the end of my days, I fear.”

Rachel gently quiets you and strokes your hair. “No, that will not happen. I will not allow that to happen.”

“It will!” you exclaim. “Damian hates me!”

“He does not hate you.”

“Yes, he does!” Embarrassment sinks into your bones when Rachel asks you to explain.

“Last night was a disaster,” you murmur into her chest.

Rachel stops stroking your head momentarily. “Hmm? How so?” She starts once more playing with your hair.

“I am…still a virgin.”

She pulls your head backwards so that her eyes meet yours. “Do you mean…he has not bedded you yet?”

You cringe in embarrassment. Her shock has only solidified your insecurity – something must be wrong with you. That’s the only explanation!

“No, no, darling,” Rachel clucks. “Do not hide your face from me. It is not your fault – hey – look at me. It. Is. Not. Your. Fault.”

“Then, what is wrong?” You swiftly get to your feet and resume your pacing. “If not me, then what? It’s silly to think that there is another issue at play here.”

Rachel grabs hold of your shoulders and firmly shakes you. “Listen to yourself! You sound mad.” She looks around the room as if it isn’t empty and leans in close to whisper. “Understand that there may be other factors at play. The emotions of man can certainly affect his…libido. Take it from me, I should know.”

She releases her grip, but remains planted in front of your face. “I have had…prior relations.”

You nod at her wide-eyed. This is the first you’ve heard of Rachel speaking about her romantic life.

“Certain emotions can make it hard for a man to perform his husbandly duties. I do not think it wise to push the issue, as to not cause any embarrassment for him.”

You nod your head emphatically, whole-heartedly internalizing her speech. “But – what if he doesn’t bed me tonight either? Lady Talia is already speaking about heirs.”

“Again, do not push the issue. You would rather not face Damian’s wrath.”

A singular, harsh knock interrupts your discussion. In stomps in the subject of the conversation, the man of the hour, your lifeline and your ruin – Damian.

Rachel immediately curtsies out of respect and lowers her head. He opens his mouth to speak, but is seemingly stunned by the presence of another human in your room. He looks back and forth between you and Rachel.

“Husband,” you greet.

The sound of your voice brings Damian back from his trance. He nods his head towards the door and several servants, including your ladies-in-waiting, pile into the room.

“Wife,” he starts. He strides over to you and plants a kiss on your forehead. His lips leave a burning sensation on you, as his sudden display of affection jars you. “Pack your essentials. We leave soon for my father’s.”

“Damian,” you whisper. His face reveals his agitation: his lips are stretched into a scowl and his forehead wrinkles deeply. “Is everything alright?”

His palm reaches to your face, his thumb stroking your cheek. You want to believe he does it lovingly, but your heart can’t take that risk.

“You should have called upon me,” he murmurs. “As soon as my mother disrespected you, you should have come to me.”

You look down in shame. So, he’s heard of your interaction with Talia earlier that day. “I did not think that was an option. I did not even know where you were.”

He lifts your head up with his index finger on your chin. He bends as best as he could to meet you at eye-level. “Of course, that is an option. You are my wife.”

You swallow hard. The way he’s looking at you, and comforting you – it’s too much. It’s too sudden. You shimmy your way out of his grasp and look to Rachel for support, only to find her back facing towards you and Damian.

“Lady Rachel has been consoling me.”

Damian stiffens and his jaw tightens. “Thank you, Lady Rachel,” he starts. He looks over his shoulder her, and she does so too ever so slightly. Neither face each other completely, however. “You may now take your leave.”

Rachel nods her head and without turning to say goodbye to you, she starts heading towards the door.

“Wait, no!” you call out. You circle around Damian to reach Rachel’s arm. “Lady Rachel is to be my lady-in-waiting. She must remain by my side.”

Damian’s eyes bulge out of his head. “Your lady-in-waiting?” he repeats brashly.

You huff in irritation. You’re not sure why everyone seems to be so astonished that you want Rachel to be a part of your household staff. “Yes,” you reply.

Damian clicks his tongue in disapproval. The amorous façade he performed just moments prior is now gone. It’s been replaced with the real Damian – the stoic one.

“Fine.” He pushes back you to reach the exit before stopping by the door. He doesn’t even turn around. “Remember, just the essentials.

#dc comics #damian wayne x you #damian wayne x reader #damian wayne x fem!reader #damian wayne x y/n #league of assassins #loa!damian wayne #damian wayne

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dykeomania · 11 months

Text

ellie williams deserves to go to a pride parade,

a run-on-sentence-ramble it's corny liiike i'm not even writing i'm just daydreaming and giggling oh my god i love queer joy we oooouuutsssiiiiiiiiiideeeee

and to wear the ugliest fucking adam-sandler-ass-outfit that the world has literally ever seen. i'm talking like.. reebok club c's. nike socks, rolled all the way up. oakley sunglasses on her head that she stole from that one abby bitch who rows crew. jorts, with a carabiner, looped on her outermost left belt buckle (a big ass contradiction if ykwim because mind you, she's also wearing an oversized ass t-shirt that reads in the largest lettering known to man: quote, I LET FEMMES TOP ME!, end quote). she deserves to be grumpy while riley takes forever to get ready (she's like almost done, she's just doing her edges) and to vehemently protest against cat who promises that she won't draw a dick on ellie's face but that she just really really wants to put glitter on her cheeks 'cause she thinks it'll look cute. she deserves to have her eyes light up at the sight of her lover, and sit up straighter from the comfort of her manspread once she realizes that she's coming this way. deserves to reel her in by her matching carabiner (also on the left side -- someone's llyiiinnnggg), and tell her that she looks cute. deserves to grin up at her and coyly ask her if she looks stupid. deserves to have her face cupped, her nose softly nudged against, and to have a small ..mmnnn..nnyyyeah murmured against her lips. deserves to tell her lover to shut the fuck up through a snicker and to -- amidst the disgust of the audience behind y'all -- take a second to just swim in the remnants of jello shots left behind on each other's tongues -- the ones you both took earlier (at like.. 11?am?) that left hers, red, and yours, orange.

she deserves to be the first one of your group to begin walking backwards down the beginning of the parade. nevermind the seemingly infinite spawn of white gay twinks and fashion choices that are somehow.. worse! than hers -- she's facing her friends. she's giving them a look. her arm is outstretched, and her hand is holding that of her girl's who she thinks, this time, she might actually really love. she deserves to hold some $5 lemonade above her head while annoyingly shuffling her shoulders to rain on me by lady gaga, and to be clowned (mercilessly) because 1) she's catching no beat, not one and 2) i thought you didn't even wanna come, what happened? deserves to shrug her shoulders at y'all because.. well, she doesn't know. there's something about it all -- being outside, being surrounded by the energy and screams of pure happiness down the streets -- like maaaybbeee.. it warrants a change of heart. she deserves to struggle to twirl her girl over and underneath her shoulder. deserves to kiss the question clean off your cheek, and to have her chuckles blend in with your giggles while she grits the lyrics, off-key as ever and this time, directly in your ear.

she deserves to make the hike all the way to the greenery that holds drag shows, free stickers, face painting, educational pamphlets on lgbtq+ sex education, free food, outnumbered preachers, fucking larpers?!, you name it -- deserves it all. deserves to venture towards it with something cheshire on her face. with her friends by her side, and her girl against her ribcage. deserves to wonder why she is so fucking into it now. maybe she's just tipsy, or sundrunk. maybe it's the exhaust in the air, or the vibes in the streets, whatever. but honestly? maybe she's smiling so fucking hard because this is just, plain and simple, right where she's supposed to be.

#ellie williams x reader #ellie williams #the last of us #lesbian

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abbysbunny · 7 months

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NEW STUDENT PT.2

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part one

plot: the big school field trip is finally here and you hazel share a room

warnings: none, not proofread but I don't think I made any errors:)

word count: 0.9k

notes:thank you fruity ppl for the attention on pt.1🌚this is again boring so:3 anyways this if the last chapter y'all but I'm write smth else soon!! anyways I hope you enjoy this lame follow up🔥🙏🏼

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for every senior class there was a special school trip, this year your school saved up money for it instead of taking you guys to a cheap motel an hour away like they've done the other years.

this year you guys are going to Venice. I mean sure you're staying at a hotel with no heater or locking doors but it's better than what they did last year. the flight was an excruciating 12 hours of students screaming, singing and trying to keep each other entertained, but when you got there it was sorta worth it...

when you got to your hotel everyone rushed out of the bus making your bag fall into a puddle of water, already off to a great start. inside it was very fancy looking...but also old looking, the walls were cracking and it smelled like a creepy old neighbor. the guides explained how the rooms would work, they were dividing it in boys and girls with each room having a king sized bed.

"okay so everyone is going in twos so partner up!" the teacher explained, everyone quickly chose their partner, you looked around and saw hazel alone, the only time you guys talked was her first day of school, sure you guys did exchange numbers but no one actually texted first. walking up to hazel you were building up the confidence to ask her to partner up, you tapped her shoulder and she turned around looking you in the eyes before dropping her gaze down to the ground.

"hey do you wanna stay in a room with me?" she looked up at you and nodded with a smile, you both went to your room and settled down, there was a knock at the door before the teacher peeked in telling you guys everyone was going out to dinner in an hour, after accepting the invite the door closed leaving you guys alone once again, "so are you going hazel?" you questioned hoping you had an excuse to sit by her and talk more.

"i don't know, I mean are you going?" she asked her voice cracking mid sentence, "yeah I am, if you don't wanna go that's fine I'll just tell the teacher tha-" you were quickly cut off by hazel, "if you're going I'm going so uhm..." you swear you could see her blush just a bit. after a good twenty minutes of getting ready, it was time to go, you and hazel walked out and met everyone else down stairs.

the restaurant was again fancy but old, is everything here fancy and old? you all sat down at your assigned seats, you obviously next to hazel, the waiter came by and you ordered something simple nothing too expensive. as people started talking and things got a little louder you thought it would be a great time to actually have a full conversation with hazel.

you turned to hazel and spoke,"how are you hazel? you know you never texted me" she turned to face you and got eyes slightly widened at what she would call your boldness, "oh sorry I forgot I guess...but uhm I'm good, how are you" hazel let out a breath she didn't even know she held in, you were shoked at her full not very awkward phrase.

"well I'm pretty good, life is pretty boring but I think this trip is gonna be fun" you smiled at an attempt to add some positivity to the conversation, so it's not just awkward lesbians trying to talk. "oh yeah they have some cool art museums here you know? I think we're going to some while we're here" you were not surprised by hazel's interest in art, you chuckled at hazel's enthusiasm about museums.

"well maybe you could tell me more about your interest mh? you thought letting her rant about things she likes would keep the conversation going and well it did! for the rest of the dinner she talked about her skills and other cool things about herself, you learned she can build a very "small" bomb and knew taekwondo, who knew she was so interesting?. when you got back to the hotel somehow it was already 10pm, you both got ready for bed and got into your guys shared bed.

you kept thinking about wanting to do something, like maybe kiss her? or maybe just share your feelings with her? you didn't know what exactly but you just had to do something, "hey haze?" you thought maybe using a silly nickname would maybe show her you've loosened up, she looked away from her phone and looked straight into your eyes, suddenly you wanted to back out but you couldn't, I mean what were you gonna tell her If not that you like her.

you put your knees to your chest and wrapped your arms around them, "I think I like you" you quietly blurred out, her eyes widened before relaxing them, "oh well...I think I like you too" she couldn't contain the smile on her face and she felt her face get hot, you smiled back at her and moved closer to her, "can I kiss you" you said so quietly it was almost not even a whisper.

she moved closer to you and gently put her hands on the sides of your face, "yes, please" she whispered back, you leaned in and finally connected her lips to yours, her lips were soft and warm against yours, after a few more seconds of a sweet kiss she pulled away, you couldn't help but giggle a bit and smile, "does this mean we're like girlfriends now?" she asked you, you thought about it for a moment before responding, "yeah it does".

#hazel callahan x reader #hazel callahan #bottoms 2023 #bottoms movie #bottoms fanfic #hazel callahan oneshot #hazel callahan fanfiction

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jeongwife · 2 years

Note

hi so i'd like to request prompt "no ones here. we can be as loud as we want." with chan 😩

also congrats on 2k followers <33 this blog played a big part in me becoming a chan stan lmao <33 love y'all keep it up

thank you so much for the well wishes 💗💗 i’m happy to hear i’m converting some into dinonaraism 😮‍💨 and i’m so sorry this took so long </3 both of us have been busy with school but we will do our best to keep up with asks/our 2k event requests!! anyways this prompt works so perfectly with a chan thought that’s been stewing in my head so without further ado……..

it starts off fairly innocent, a simple makeout session in chan’s room with you straddling his lap, your hands roaming each other’s bodies as he pushes his tongue into your mouth. you feel his hands trail lower, past the curve of your waist until they rest over your ass and squeeze gently.

a muffled squeal escapes you when he pulls you even further onto his lap until you’re sitting directly over his growing bulge. wearing only one of his shirts with panties, you can feel his hardening cock press against your clothed core as he continues massaging your hips, encouraging you to grind down on him.

chan groans into your mouth when you start palming him over his sweatpants, one of his hands leaving your hips to cup your pussy, rubbing circles on your clit over your panties until he feels your arousal seeping through the thin material. a gasp escapes you when he pushes the material aside to drag a finger through your soaked folds, collecting your juices before slowly pushing a finger into you.

“fuck,” he hisses, feeling your warm walls clench around his digit as he pumps it in and out of you, “so wet for me, hm? do you want more, baby?”

your head is buried in the crook of his neck when you nod frantically, whimpering against his skin, “yes, y-yes—please, more. i want more, channie…”

a demure moan rasps from your throat when he inserts another finger, and within seconds he’s thrusting the digits into you faster and harder, the sloppy sounds of your dripping pussy echoing through his bedroom.

your thighs tremble when chan’s thumb pushes against your throbbing clit and starts rubbing rough circles on it. worried the others are home, you stifle your loud whine by biting down onto his shoulder as the coil in your belly wounds tighter and tighter.

chan quickly picks up that you’re trying to muffle your sounds. displeased, his fingers still inside of you and your walls impatiently try to suck them back into you. you grind yourself down onto his fingers, but he stops your movements with a strong arm around your waist.

another gush of arousal runs down his fingers when you meet his eyes, finding them narrowed and darkened with lust. “why have you gone quiet, baby?” he hums, “am i not making you feel good?” it’s a rhetorical question; he knows he’s making you feel good, just like any other time you’ve had sex.

desperate for your release, you shake your head, hands finding support on his broad shoulders as you try lowering yourself onto his fingers again to no avail, and you realise that he’s not going to keep going unless you answer.

“n-no, you make me feel s-so good,” you mumble, cheeks hot with embarrassment before you hesitantly glance back at his locked bedroom door. “just don’t want the others to hear u—oh!”

chan doesn’t wait for you to finish your sentence. his fingers resume their brutal pace as he pounds them into you, feeling your juices gush onto his hand while your orgasm approaches. his other hand fists into your hair, gently yanking your head back as you can’t help the sounds that spill from your lips.

his warm breath fans across your ear gently when he leans in, and even with your loud moans you still manage to hear his command.

“no one’s here. we can be as loud as we want. so let me hear you, baby. let me know who’s making you feel so good, yeah?”

— admin lily (his live did things to me……sorry guys but that’s my man <333 /j)

#seventeen smut #svt smut #seventeen scenarios #svt scenarios #lee chan smut #dino smut #chan smut #lee chan scenarios #dino scenarios #chan scenarios #seventeen dino smut #svt dino smut #seventeen chan smut #svt chan smut #answered!#🌷 answers!#strawberrysohn

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tripleyeeet · 6 months

Note

*makes sure its tuesday* *puts on a suit and takes the microphone*

HELLO AND WELCOME BACK EVERYONE TO TUESDAY INTERVIEW!

I'm your host Annie and today we are here once again with the amazing and talented author Summer!!! Let them hear your love, guys!!!

So, Summer. There aren't many news to report for these week. I've heard from trustworthy sources that you've taken a small break from writing, which I'm very glad to see and that I hope you are enjoying to the fullest. But I do have a couple questions in my notes, if you don't mind answering them.

First of all. We all know why most of the people are here for. "A Lover's Folly". One of - if not the most successful fics of yours. If I'm not wrong, next chapter will be a little sweet thing that will make our heart overwhelm with joy but I was wondering: what awaits Tav and Astarion after the next "slice-of-life" chapter, if you will? Pain? More joy? Illithids?

Of course, I can't talk about your fics without mentioning "Curse You"! And talking about the Zaystarion fic, how would you describe the next chapter that will come out in one sentence? And how would you describe in three words the beloved "knife fight" ship that has all of us in a chokehold (👀) ?

Now... since I've already asked you about your wips already last week, I've thought about a little game: it's easy, just a simple top 10 of BG3 characters, including both characters from the main party and NPCs. However, the twist is, you decide the theme of the top 10. It could be best characters based on their backstory, on looks, on how badly you want to be with them (biblically or not speaking) and so on.

AND THAT IS ALL FOR TODAY!!! GOODBYE EVERYONE AND HAVE A GREAT DAY!!!

tuesday interview on a wednesday!!! (wow who would've thought!!)

apologies for missing a couple of weeks, but you're right, i am taking a bit of break! at least for me. i'm still posting here and there but definitely not as frequently. will still be posting some curse you content and the lover's folly chapter this weekend! the latter might not necessarily come out on saturday as planned because the next few days are expected to be a bit insane but i'll try my best!

as a treat though (and to answer your question) the chapter is definitely going to have a fluffy vibe. a lot of comforting themes to make up for all the angst i've been giving everyone. mostly it's just a chapter where tav and astarion get some much needed relaxation before all the chaos starts up again.

for curse you, uh, i've decided to switch things up. initially i wanted to write a full fic that was very structured and chronological but i've since decided to just kind of write little snippets here and there to give myself more freedom to create what i want! with that being said though, i have a couple one shots planned, specifically ones about the first time astarion meets zayis and also the scene where she first allows him to drink from her! so hopefully y'all enjoy those. :')

for the best question though i'm going to do a top 10 npcs based on who i'd bring to a wedding because for some odd reason that was the first thing that popped into my head. however, i’m not going to tell you why because i am lazy!!!

rolan

wyll

karlach

alfira

dammon

gale

astarion

shadowheart

gortash

raphael

#tuesday interview #asks

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brightgnosis · 1 year

Text

Someone brought up the idea that maybe it's not that people are pulling away from me intentionally because I've been talking more openly about the explicitly religious parts of my being ... But maybe that they're doing so unintentionally because they're genuinely unsure of how to safely or respectfully engage with that content.

And, like ... I want people to engage with me as a whole being- including my religious self, and my magical self, and my religi-magico self. Even if it's as simple as just liking a post, I'm fine with that. Because it lets me know you're not pulling away from me because of my explicitly religious nature- and it's literally heartbreaking to think that my friends are pulling away because suddenly I'm "too religious for them" now that I'm finally being comfortable with myself enough to be open with / about it ???

And, also, like ... It's okay to ask me questions about it! You're not going to offend me- even if it's because you think that something I do is really odd or just weird, or you don't quite understand something that I do. Not unless you're intentionally trying to be offensive, anyways ... But since most of the people here are mutuals and have been mutuals across multiple accounts for years, and I consider you friends? I really don't see that as being much of a frequent problem except from outsiders who stumble across me anyways.

And I know a lot of my responses to Asks probably typically feel very formal, too- and they are a lot of the time. I'm sorry for that. It's just how I am, and I genuinely don't know how to answer questions otherwise a lot of the time. And sometimes I can't answer a question about what I do at all, other than to tell you to seek out a Rabbi- because it's not something I can or even feel comfortable answering. It's just how it is.

But I'll tell you when that's the case. I'll also tell you when I'm uncomfortable answering something you ask me! But just because any of that's the case, I want y'all to know that doesn't mean I'll be mad at you for asking in the first place (not unless I've already told you and you keep pressing it; no does mean no and is a complete sentence, after all).

Anyways, yeah. All of this is really just to say that "Treat me like a Human and interact with me like one" extends to also mean "please accept all the parts of me as a fully realized and complex Human Being" as well. And that you don't have to be afraid of interacting with my religious content, or scared to ask me about my religious or magical things. I promise.

Any accidental missteps that may happen aren't an abomination to cancel someone over or scream at them for in my eyes- though yes, you will get chastised for it in a reasonable manner that's dependent on the severity ... But ultimately I find the general practice of treating people like the worst form of complete and utter trash because they may have accidentally said something wrong, or phrased things incorrectly, or unintentionally said something offensive while in the pursuit of genuine attempts at Human interconnectivity and understanding outside of their knowledge or comfort zone to be absolutely abhorrent.

So as long as you come to and treat me with respect? It will always be returned to you in kind- even if you accidentally "botch it" or mess up ... Because we're all Human, and you deserve kindness and room for growth and learning too.

#Keepsakes #Personal #2023 #Religion & Magic

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mickeytheticklee · 1 year

Text

Tickle hcs: Andi and Emilia

Will I make a tickle fic out of this? Find out soon idk

Warning: Tickling

I only watched S1 I don't want to go thru pain watching the second season

Let's get started y'all

Let's be honest this started when they were kissing at Jana's party

Andi found out Emilia's ears were ticklish, then Emilia found out Andi was ticklish

They have a short tickle fight and then kissed again

It was all simple pokes until Emilia announced they were gfs by kissing Andi in front of everybody

Now they're just switches tickling the hell out of each other

They're so cute but when one annoys the other they get tickled

Like how Emilia needs to focus on work and Andi is kissing on her softly

And Andi is listening to music and Emilia is asking so many questions

A long ass tickle fight until someone gets hurt and usually it's Emilia

“Are you okay? Here, let me kiss your head."

Andi

She's usually a ler, since she loves to cheer up MJ with tickles

But yk her, as soon as she sees Emilia's eyes she's a full on softie

It's good that Emilia knows she's ticklish because she has the cutest laugh ever

The deep voice to a high pitched laughter when her stomach is tickled pipline must be studied

Maybe tough but as soon as Emilia's fingers get close she's suddenly having a big ass smile on

And the smile she has when she's tickled and her gums are showing lawrd

Loves to have her stomach tickled but she's insanely ticklish on her armpits

Mostly upper body tbh

Her main weakness is when Emilia's hands slides under Andi's shirt

Turn she's in a tickle wreck and she can barely speak in full sentences (which Emilia loves a lot)

Ler Andi...LOCK UR DOORS

No seriously lock them tight Andi is a completely different person when she's a ler

Anyone who starts an evil revenge plan by giving Emilia raspberries at 3am in the morning is a menace

Plays a good part in being a tickle monster

“I should look in the closet...no...that'll be too easy."

Then drags and tickles Emilia out the closet

With Emilia she knows which spots turn her into mush and make her surrender

Good at interrogation tickles

After all the tickling she'll kiss Emilia

Then they fall asleep in her bed

Emilia

Don't let that cute ass smile fool you she can be a good ler

Can never spare Andi with any mercy

Andi would be in a ball of tears almost crying of laughter and Emilia would still tickle her

And the voice she has whenever she's teasing Andi with tickles...yep that's her other persona that isn't Emilia

Most of the time is very soft and loves to give cheer up tickles to Andi

Always teases Andi with tickles whenever they kiss bc her hands always land on her waist

Loves poking Andi in class, loves it when she can distract Andi with tickles

Emilia isn't that intimidating, which is why it's scary that she's a worse tickle monster than Andi

After a long amount of tickling she's kissing Andi all over

So clingy after being a tickle monster

Lee her is very opposite

So cuddly and tries to kiss her way into letting Andi tickle her

Loves tickly kisses, especially on her neck

Emilia getting tickle compliments from Andi will make her melt by 100000x

As much as Emilia is evil she is afraid of Andi whenever she's in tickle monster mode

Loves to skip classes just so Andi can tickle her

Sneaking out late at night to get tickles as well

Ticklish spots would probably be her neck, sides, ears

Maybe the older one but has more sensitive tummy than Andi (in which Andi loves)

Can never win tickle fights

#I've been watching back to back gay shows i won't be surprised if i make tickle hcs about santana and Brittany from glee #i still haven't watched s2 i need my mental health to be okay #but I've been too obsessed like i wish they would've been endgame #tickle #tickle hcs #endi #Emilia andi

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digitalmarketingservices7 · 9 months

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#content writing #content writing tips

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rollforjackass · 9 months

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i'm gonna go ahead and answer all the questions from this fic writer ask game here, because. why not! i'm bored and i'm not used to talking about my own writing. gotta cut the cord on that shame game sometime.

(and if y'all wanna answer some yourself, the post is linked above! absolute guarantee i will send some if you do bc i'm nosy like that)

💘 - Is there any posted fic you want to rework/re-edit/re-write?

oh god yes, a lot of them. i've got chronic perfectionism.

if i were to be kind to myself and narrow it down to one, my poor little Person of Interest fic deadman's switch was my first venture into the fandom i would come to adore, and it could definitely do with some tuning up. with a few rare exceptions, i've never liked post-episode fics that just recap the events of the episode with a few extra sentences of meta thrown in the mix, and unfortunately, i think that's exactly what i did with this fic. i don't think it deserves a complete do-over, but a re-work with a new direction and a concrete destination would do it good.

💫 - what is your favorite kind of comment/feedback?

any and every, but the ones where people share their favorite quotes and tell me what it made them think of and expound on their personal theories and thoughts, AGH!!!! i adore those!!!! go off about all the things you love about the characters and your scenarios for missing scenes, i promise you i am enjoying it immensely!!!!!

🌈 - is there a fic that you worked *really fucking hard on* that no one would ever know? maybe a scene/theme you struggled with?

i mean, by default i feel like i'm a bit of a tryhard with my writing and i feel like that's fairly obvious a lot of the time (for better or for worse 😬). but i guess the one that's outwardly the most relaxed bit of writing and was actually really difficult was the burning question, because. how the hell am i supposed to translate a groupchat format into a fic and keep all the nuances of technology, i.e. nickname changes & people sending walls of text, that are meant to be funny??????

it took me Forever to settle on formatting that i felt maintained the spirit of the jokes, and there's so many folks that think groupchat fics are cringe that i don't think anyone would consider how much effort i had to put into it for a now quite outdated joke lmao. i love groupchat fics myself, though, so i am content with the cringe.

🦋 - what are you most insecure about when you post a fic?

always always ALWAYS characterization. i have the fandom attention span of a mayfly and the combination pizza hut/taco bell that is ADHD/autism to boot, so i pick up strong attachments to characters/media quickly and write my feelings almost as fast as i feel them. which means lots of one-offs that are barely two seasons into a series/one movie into a trilogy. i'm always worried that i'm missing the mark by a mile because i was too impatient to reach a Big Backstory Reveal, or that i've latched onto a single trait not indicative of the whole.

🌻 - what makes you want to give up on writing? what makes you keep going?

what makes me want to give up: the Mortifying Ordeal of Being Known. i used to be super confident in putting myself out there, but i haven't always had support for my special interests and i've rarely had anyone willing to read my writing when asked. makes it hard to enjoy what i'm doing when i've got that annoying little earworm asking me what people would think if they ever eventually read it, even when it's a self-indulgent little thing that i don't plan on posting.

what makes me keep going: i love writing, plain and simple. i love to borrow people's habits, their thoughts, their dreams and hopes and fears and nightmares; i love to see the world from new perspectives. and the idea that what i have to say might connect with people, that people might recognize parts of the characters and stories that they care for in my writing, is pretty damn intoxicating, too.

🌿 - how does creating make you feel?

there's a book series i loved as a kid called The Secrets of Droon, which is about three kids who discover a staircase to another world in their basement, and writing has always felt like that to me. i open the door, and i am somewhere else. these other worlds don't need me to be there for events to unfold, but i can still try to change the things that i don't like if i wanted to. and nobody needs to know that i've been to these worlds, but if i mentioned 'hey i've been to another world', someone somewhere might be interested in what i saw.

idk if that makes sense shdjk but i just!! i like writing. i like seeing what would happen if i changed something. and it feels amazing when something i care about deeply connects with people i don't even know, and who don't know me. it's scary to venture into other worlds, but there's always the chance of finding yourself - and finding new friends - down that magic staircase!!

🍉 - in what ways has writing helped you process trauma and/or navigate through your own life?

whoof, i mean. how hasn't it.

i had a very difficult upbringing that left me absurdly angry with the world and only able to conceive of living as fighting for survival. i wrote stories where i could escape and be free, and i wrote stories where the fight was all there was so i could feel less alone. hell, my first favorite character on tumblr was gabriel from supernatural, running away from his family and still loving them even when it hurt, and writing stories where he was happy or angry or sad felt like validating those feelings in myself. i could fix his problems, even if mine weren't that easy.

these days i struggle with a lot that's out of my control, like PTSD with a very hard-to-avoid trigger. but writing is something that i can curate, that i can tailor to a situation. it's completely in my hands. so when i'm going through something, i can always pick up a pen and scribble out the strong feelings in a way that makes sense to me, if not to anyone else, and then i can close that book or tear the page out or burn it, whatever i want to do with it. i can shuffle through the life of a fictional character and find the times when they felt the way i did, and wonder how they got through it, and sometimes in doing so, i find ways that i can, too.

it certainly helps that i've found myself a good number of favorite characters who go through a lot but still remain hopeful. ones who make a place for themselves in the world that is safe and good, who manage to find the best in people even when being shown their worse.

🎀 - give yourself a compliment about your own writing

i like that i'm willing to try my hand at pretty much anything and give it every ounce of passion i've got, no matter how short a time i may have been in a fandom or how different a character might be from the ones i'm used to writing. tech geek with conflicting superiority/inferiority complexes? sure thing. prim and proper angel who's secretly a bitch? give it a whirl. chain-smoking self-sabotaging magician who's a time capsule of the 80s? devoted dad with apeshit anxiety? codependent gay cannibals? fuck it, we ball.

🎈 - describe your style as a writer; is it fixed? does it change?

mmmm depends on how you define style. i want to say that it's generally all the same, but i do think i change tone A Lot, based on who i'm writing about. partially because i bounce between a lot of british and american shows and i tend to try to adopt the vernacular of the culture the media is based in to make the story more immersive, but also based on the tone and overall themes of the piece, i.e. who's hurt and who's comforting and what their relationship looks like, if one's more comedic or they both are or neither of them are.

i'm a bit of a metaphor & simile hound, for sure, that part's pretty fixed. i tend to like comparing simple things to grandiose ones, if only because i write 90% hurt/comfort and the things i always remember most about times when i've been hurting are the gestures that the comforter doesn't even remember making later on. i think i have consistent struggles in certain areas and consistent strengths in others. but i almost never want the version of me who wrote for, say, Good Omens, writing for Mission Impossible, because to me those are two wildly different atmospheres with wildly different stakes and baseline truths. if that makes sense? so i do try to switch up my style when i feel like it's appropriate.

🎉 - how often do you celebrate completing & posting a work? how often do you give yourself the credit/validation that you seek from others when you post? (if you don't, you should!)

i don't think i celebrate much at all, per se. it's always more of a relief that i've gotten all of the most pressing ideas out of my head for the moment than it is an accomplishment, i guess? i'll probably start trying to celebrate now, though.

as for credit/validation, i don't really know how to measure that. i'm able to acknowledge that i've sent something out into the world to bear scrutiny, and i'm usually able to like what i've written once it's out there, so i guess i give myself credit that way??

💞 - what's the most important part of a story for you? the plot, the characters, the worldbuilding, the technical stuff (grammar etc), the figurative language

characters. always the characters. sometimes to the detriment of the rest of the story.

idk, i tend to start stories because something about a character's reactions/choices grabbed my attention, and flesh out a scenario around how those reactions/choices would be seen by others vs how the character would see it themselves, so the character is always at the heart of my storytelling. i'm always thinking about the faces we put on for different people vs the ones we wear when we're alone. i usually find that as long as i follow a character's patterns of behavior, priorities, and methods of self-expression, the story writes itself.

💝 - what is a fic that got a different response than you were expecting?

i don't really have expectations when i post, but the outpouring of love i received for Red Witness was definitely a shocker!! i mean, i'd never even heard of The Mentalist while it was airing from 2008-2015, so i was definitely a latecomer to the fandom, but apparently a lot of folks either rewatched it when the pandemic started or remembered it fondly enough to be excited about me writing for it, so that was a lovely surprise!!

🤍 - what's one fic of yours you think people didn't "get"?

i mean, one of the things i love about writing for fandom is all the variation in opinions and the different takes on what parts of canon are rock-solid vs which should be different, so i don't think it's possible for people to not "get" a fic. it's just one lens through which a set of events and people can be viewed.

that said, i suppose waiting for the hammer to fall didn't land the way i'd hoped it would, as far as my investment in the ideas i was trying to convey vs audience engagement goes, but i can definitely see why it wasn't "gotten". i spent a lot more time trying to mimic the style and feel of Good Omens and relying on that style to convey my ideas for me than i did figuring out how to explain what, exactly, those ideas were.

my intention was to explore "how does someone as buttoned-up as aziraphale, who has lived millennia in peaceful denial, come to terms with an impending confrontation that he absolutely can't avoid or weasel out of?", and that's still something that is very enticing to me, but the fact that he had been in denial his whole existence wasn't something that aziraphale would have been able to recognize on his own. so the execution fell far short of the mark, and i ended up with a few snippets of passable wit and imitative texture that couldn't have connected with a reader even with an operator on the line.

so, as far as the message of the fic goes, i suppose people didn't "get" that one, but it takes reliable postage to deliver a message and i left off all the stamps. (do we think there's been enough methods-of-communication metaphors for one day? everyone's knees sufficiently slapped?)

🕯️ - was there a fic that was really hard on you to write, or took you to a place you didn't think it would take you?

come together (over me) was a BRUTAL undertaking for a number of reasons, which is also why it hasn't been updated in two fucking years, for all my vain intent to finish it.

not only was it my first ever attempt at a multi-chapter fic, but it was also a long and involved discussion of the many different ways that grief can affect people that i started writing less than a year after losing a friend of mine to a tragic accident (which was also the way the mighty nein lost mollymauk). i started writing it in the first place in an attempt to comfort my partner at the time, for whom molly was an all-time favorite, so i was pushing myself obsessively to meet the perfect balance of canon-accurate and partner-approved characterizations, and giving myself a lot of grief about it.

at the same time, the outpouring of shock and despair from the Critical Role fandom was like nothing i had ever experienced before. this was the first PC death of their 2nd campaign, under circumstances that meant it would be a permanent one, and on top of that, mollymauk was - at the time - the only openly queer character in the party. people had become understandably attached.

unfortunately, though, IMO, this meant a large portion of the fandom deified him to unrecognizable extremes. to a lot of new enthusiasts, he became a saintly sacrificial lamb unjustly slaughtered, or worse, "bury your gays" in action (it was a random encounter at a time when the party cleric was away giving birth. just saying). people who disagreed or people who didn't like him all that much were met with outrage. wars of righteous indignation were waged. lines in the sand were drawn. it was a mess.

all this to say, a fledgling fan trying to be as canon-accurate as possible in my characterizations of people who'd known mollymauk, and of mollymauk himself, for this fic centered around what was now the most controversial fandom event i'd ever seen firsthand, had a higher-than-usual chance of getting me absolutely obliterated on the internet. the horror.

so overall, while i did get a lovely response from what i did end up posting, the circumstances of writing it were unexpectedly exhausting. i had a lot of great ideas, still have a solid outline for the rest of it, and i like what i managed to get done, but just thinking about continuing it (especially so long after it was relevant and after so much has been revealed in canon since) is. haunting

💥 - find your least kudos'd fic - say something wonderful about it.

oh Time Doesn't Stop. (but it should), we're really in it now.

my dear, sweet, first ever foray into posting on ao3, i'm still quite proud of you. it's one of the few times i've felt like i could say more with absence than with explanation. it's a time capsule of confidence in myself and in my skills, and i think i did a pretty good job depicting the ways that constantine both self-destructs and lashes out when faced with a situation that he can't worm his way out of. i like the fact that i let each section in the 5+1 format have room to breathe, rather than trying to blend them together into a seamless narrative; it feels more authentic to me, like time has actually been passing.

🍭 - why did you start writing?

re: writing in general, i genuinely can't remember. i've been writing stories since i was old enough to read them. maybe i've always wanted to create something that thinks the same way i do?

re: fanfiction, because i was an insatiable bookworm as a kid and there were never enough stories about the characters and settings i loved to satisfy me, so i decided to start making them up myself. it ain't a party until obi-wan kenobi is helping a larvitar set up a picnic for every legendary pokemon plus dustfinger from Inkheart.

💎 - why is writing important to you?

i don't really have a good answer for this, because i can't think of a reason it wouldn't be, honestly. i guess the closest thing would be: it's important because i've never been good at speaking my thoughts and feelings out loud, but on paper i can say exactly what i mean and have a better chance of being understood. no need for facial expressions that might be misconstrued, no way for anyone to misread my tone of voice, just uncomplicated self-expression.

it also means that i get to share my passions with folks who are just as passionate as i am, and that i have a less awkward social avenue for expressing my appreciation of their candor. integrating and crediting headcanons you adored into your personal interpretation of canon, writing something inspired by a one-off post because it made you feel something...there can be such confounding social rules around complimenting people when you do it verbally or in person, it's nice to be able to say "thank you for caring as much as you do!" by just. applying your craft.

📡 - why is writing and sharing your writing important for fandom?

because of what i said for the last question, it's all a way of sharing how you feel!!! people write because they feel strongly about a subject, whether they love canon or despise it, whether they want to refute a popular characterization they disagree with or expand on an AU that's been making the rounds. not to quote spongebob, but there's love in every stitch, whether you love the way you think about a character/a story or you love the way somebody else does.

it's also a way of preserving fandom over time, as well as the present moment! fan fiction started because of Star Trek fans in the 70s and they're still making trek shows today, the critical receptions of which are strongly influenced by fan interpretations so time-honored as to become gospel!! (snw you know what you did.) writing fics and sharing them with each other is a tradition of story-telling that will outlast us by centuries, and it is damned wonderful to know that what we leave behind are affirmations of love and dedication.

🪄 - what is your post-writing/sharing aftercare? How do you take care of yourself or celebrate yourself when you've finished a fic?

my aftercare is closing out the tab and running away from my computer sdhjk. i'm always very anxious about posting my work, and that's before sharing links or putting it anywhere else, so i usually post any writing i've gotten done right before i go to bed, and then in the morning i can read it with fresh eyes and a calmer brain and pat myself on the back for getting it done. that's a celebration in its way. other than that, drinking water is probably what i do the most after completing something.

🎙️ - which one of your fics would you like someone to make a pod-fic of?

actually, somebody already MADE a podfic of my groupchat fic the burning question, which would have been my answer!!!! the wonderful frecklebomb absolutely made my life when they put that together with their friends, i've never felt anything less than absolute joy remembering it.

🤲 - what do YOU get out of writing?

catharsis, baby! i write a lot of hurt/comfort to fill in gaps that i find myself thinking about between episodes/movies/chapters, and it often ends up being very therapeutic. i get the double pleasure of comforting someone and imagining being comforted, with the cherry on top that is narrative completion (at least by my standards).

💋 - when you leave comments on a fic, do you want to hear back from the writer?

i wouldn't call it a priority when i'm leaving those comments, but it's always lovely when they do reply. i'm a collector of joy, knowing with certainty that i've "repaid" someone for their labor of love is never a bad thing, but i definitely don't expect or seek it. hoard all those compliments for a rainy day, y'all deserve them!!

☯️ - how do you think engaging with each other through tumblr, twitter, comments, kudos, creates healthy fandom experiences? How do you deal with that if you're not a social person/experience social anxiety?

"healthy" really comes down to your point of view in fandom, but i do think that multi-platform engagement for fic authors lets you exercise a level of boundary-setting on social media relationships that the rise of tiktok has sort of blown out of the water.

i'm very tired so i'm not sure i could explain my thought process properly if i tried, but basically, going from an author's works on ao3 to their tumblr/twitter often feels like a delightful sneak peek into the mind behind the magic, while going from an author's tumblr/twitter to their works on ao3 can be like walking into a neighbor's studio and realizing they're michelangelo reincarnated. either way, multi-form engagement makes you value them as a person as much as you value the fruits of their labors.

on a less labyrinthine note, getting a message or comment from someone who read your stuff and loved it can be really comforting! someone who liked your work is among the followers who see your fandom theories and wildly thirsty tags. no matter how self-conscious you may get about Being Perceived, you now have at least one person who liked what they perceived.

that's what comforts me, anyway, as someone who is frequently anxious about making bad impressions and bothering people. it also encourages me to send off that complimentary message i've been thinking about sending for ages, even if i only do it anonymously. if i think i would appreciate getting a message like that, then it's worth doing.

🧿 - what steps do you take to not take things personally if a fic doesn't do well, or if your writing/posting/sharing experience isn't going how you'd like it to?

i really can't stress enough how much i write and post for myself more than for a potential audience. i tell the story that i want to read, not the one i've seen people wishing for. if the two end up being one and the same, that's the best feeling in the world, but it's not the motivating factor behind me writing/posting/sharing.

sometimes i do get less engagement on a fic than i thought i might and it makes me worry that i misread a character, or i write something that i find really funny that never gets commented on, but then i have to remind myself that i only post in the first place when i like it enough to post. if it's up, i've decided i liked it. i didn't decide it was perfect, and i didn't mind-read the fandom to figure out what they're looking for in a fic, and i don't need to as long as it's good enough for me. that's really the only step i take, i guess.

💌 - share something with us about an up-and-coming work (WIP) that has you excited!

rubbing my grubby little paws together because OH BOY, i have a Mission Impossible benji & ilsa hurt/comfort dawning-friendship fic coming down the pipes that is very soft and sweet to me, and involves benji braiding ilsa's hair because she's failed miserably at doing it on her own and she's never had anyone to do it for her. it's my sweet angel baby right now, at least until good omens comes out in 24 hours and my synapses misfire to permanently sear the word 'GAY' behind my eyes.

#enter at your own risk this shit took forever #cool ass questions tho #oxly hollers

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