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open-heart-open-container · 7 days ago

Text

this is so beautiful 😭

can you see right trough me?

pairing: robert reynolds x f!reader.

summary: you didn't think you'd ever love again, but you found a man who infiltrated every crevice of your wounded heart and made it a home once again.

word count: 10,3 k.

tags: post!thunderbolts, sentry is known as an avenger, bob can control his powers better, slow burn, angst, hurt/comfort, nightmares, pining, books, mentions of y/n, reader is heartbroken, bob is the sweetest person in the world, too many feelings, too many references to the sun (sorry, i had to do it).

a/n: english is not my first language so there might be grammatical mistakes. this fic got so looong, so I hope you like it :).

Someone once said that love wasn’t for girls like you.

Girls who loved too much and fell in love too fast. That their hearts weighed more than they did.

But you didn’t listen, because you were never one to back down from a challenge.

Love was never easy for you. You longed for it, yes, but it always ended up hurting you. Each scar, a stark reminder of the times you loved with every part of you, proved it wasn’t enough. That you weren’t enough.

Then you found a man, the one you truly believed would stay with you for the rest of your life, but he didn’t feel the same way.

You tried, you poured your entire being into that relationship, doing everything in your power to make him stay. But he wasn’t yours, and he never would be.

And when he left, he stripped you of everything: your hope, your dreams, your confidence. He took a part of you that you may never get back.

He left you in ruins, destroying something that had once been sacred. He left you bleeding over the scars he had once kissed.

He left behind the shell of what had once been a woman brimming with life.

He broke your heart, but this time, it wasn’t a deep wound; it was a terminal one. You didn’t think it could ever be repaired.

You didn’t scream, you didn’t cry, but the dull pain numbed you and extinguished the light inside you. You didn’t know how to cope with his absence.

It was no longer just about missing him, but about being in someone’s constant presence, about feeling seen, about coming home and knowing that someone was waiting for you. The extra cup of coffee on the table, the emptiness in your bed where someone used to lie beside you, having someone to talk to about your life. All that was gone.

Loneliness had invaded every corner of your home, becoming a silent companion you couldn’t get rid of.

You learned to accept it, to carry it with you like another burden. Soon, the devastating silence that invaded your home became a comforting presence. It became a refuge, a suit of armor; in solitude, no one could hurt you.

You had accepted that love, after all, wasn’t for you.

Not as an overstated declaration, but as someone seeking protection after having been terribly hurt. You sealed your heart, not to repair it, but to protect it. And perhaps, in this way, what little remained of it would heal.

Love ceased to be a reality for you; it became an idea, a memory of what you once had and lost. What you had most longed for, and paradoxically, what destroyed you the most.

You left it behind, promising yourself that you would never give yourself so completely to another person again, that you would never again be vulnerable to being broken.

To cope with the weight of a broken heart, you needed a new purpose. So, you devoted yourself entirely to your work. The overtime no one else dared to accept, the weekends, the impossible projects, you accepted them all to silence the noise of your own thoughts.

Amidst the chaos of organizing schedules, attending to customers and dealing with overly strict bosses, you found your place: you were in complete control. Your personal life disappeared, even if only for a few hours.

You quickly found yourself climbing the ladder, becoming the perfect professional. The one who always had everything ready, always arrived on time, and never complained when asked to do more than was expected.

You built such a perfect facade that no one could glimpse the broken woman underneath. And you didn’t let anyone see her.

You smiled when necessary, exchanged small talk with your colleagues, but never let them get too close. They saw you as a successful professional, perhaps too reserved, but never broken.

You built a wall between yourself and the rest of the world, for safety, out of fear. The wall became your fortress, loneliness your armour, and indifference your weapon. It was the only way you found to survive.

And so you ended up here, with a smile too forced to be real and a dress that wrapped uncomfortably around your skin. Another charity gala, full of people you would never see again, lights too bright and murmurs too loud. The perfect place to slip into the skin of the person you pretended to be.

Your boss, a whirlwind of demands, had finally freed you from your duties. A sigh escaped your lips, releasing all the tension you’d built up during the night.

You approached the bar, your throat dry and your lips trembling from all the smiles you’d faked. You ordered a drink, not for the alcohol, but for the simple fact of having something in your hands, a distraction. You sat in the corner where the shadows were more prominent and the world a little more distant.

You savored the champagne on your tongue, letting the liquid take effect and relax your muscles. You allowed yourself to relax the mask you’d so carefully constructed, not too much, but enough for the tired, sad woman underneath to breathe.

────・:✧∙✦∙✧:・────

Gala events and social gatherings were never Bob Reynolds’ thing. The crowds and deafening noise had always overwhelmed him, but since acquiring his powers, it had become almost unbearable.

His amplified senses picked up everything: every breath, every overly loud laugh, every clinking of glasses. He heard it all, a constant assault on his nerves, one that threatened to fray the already fragile edges of his self-control.

And he hated it.

He tried to avoid such events, but there were times, like tonight, when he couldn’t refuse. Valentina had forced the whole team to attend; the Thunderbolts needed to be seen, they needed to win the people’s affection.

And there he was, wearing a suit too stiff to be comfortable, surrounded by people who weren’t interested in him or his past, but rather in the influence someone with his power could wield.

He’d distanced himself from the team, from the people, seeking a moment of peace, the calm in the eye of the storm. Then a chill ran through his body, as if something were telling him to look up.

And there he saw her.

Her solitary figure stood out like a flame in the darkness, and he felt drawn to her. She was sitting in a corner of the bar; an aura of stillness surrounded her, completely oblivious to the lively atmosphere. Loneliness seemed to envelop her like a second skin. The melancholy expression on her face moved him, because he knew it all too well.

It wasn’t visible at first glance; it was hidden in her tense shoulders, in her eyes clouded by memories too painful to bear, in the weariness that showed through her fake smiles, the ones that said “I’m fine,” but it never was.

Someone approached her, and she smiled, straightening up with focused, attentive eyes. The image of the melancholic woman vanished in an instant, replaced by someone who seemed to dominate the place with just a glance.

Bob saw himself reflected in that woman. He knew (probably better than anyone else) what it was like to build a facade that hid inner demons, endless sadness, the weight of memories.

He felt, deep down, the desire to approach her. He didn’t know what he would say to her, whether his words or his presence would make any difference, but the need was there. Because he too had been alone and had needed someone to remind him that all was not lost.

He didn’t dare approach her, but his eyes didn’t leave her for the rest of the night. And even after the event was over, after taking refuge in his room, he was still thinking about her.

────・:✧∙✦∙✧:・────

Bookshops had become a safe place for you, a sanctuary; a place where the weight of the world became a little lighter. You lost yourself among the shelves full of stories, in the phrases that resonated so deeply with you, in the soft music and the unmistakable smell of paper.

You caressed the spines of the books affectionately when you saw him. He entered silently, like someone used to going unnoticed, but you did notice him. The way his shoulders slumped, the weariness on his face, that weariness that lingers over time.

Something about him caught your attention; your eyes followed him as he approached the poetry section, the book in your hands forgotten. You watched his broad, tense back and wondered what his story might be.

────・:✧∙✦∙✧:・────

Bob entered the bookshop with a sigh. He’d escaped from the tower, from Valentina’s constant surveillance. He needed a break; he was still overwhelmed by the previous night’s sensory overload.

He was still thinking about her.

As he wandered around looking for a book, he felt someone staring at his back. He’d grown accustomed to it; people always looked at him as if trying to figure out who he was. But this time something felt different, and even before he saw her, he knew: it was the same woman from the gala.

He pretended not to notice her, continuing to look at the books even though her gaze burned into him. Her curiosity about him was almost palpable. He wondered what she thought of him, what she perceived. It was a delicate game. He knew she was watching him, and that thought gave him a strange feeling in his stomach.

It wasn’t discomfort; it was calm. Being observed without prejudice.

After a moment that seemed like an eternity, he looked up. Their eyes met, and the world around them seemed to fade away. It wasn’t an explosion of fireworks or a cosmic encounter; it was a silent connection. An invisible thread connecting two souls recognizing each other for the first time.

A small smile, one of those involuntary ones, formed on his face. Her warm, bright eyes looked at him curiously before looking away, as if she were afraid he would see more than she was showing him.

They didn’t speak; it wasn’t necessary. Bob didn’t insist; aware of the fragility of the moment, he went back to looking for a book. He continued smiling even after she left, the memory of her gaze still fresh in his mind.

He wasn’t sure why, but something deep in his heart told him that it wouldn’t be the last time he’d see her.

────・:✧∙✦∙✧:・────

One week turned into two, but the image of that man in the bookshop remained etched in your memory. You thought about him more often than you’d like to admit: the deep blue of his eyes, the curve of his smile, the intimacy of that brief moment when your eyes met.

It was a curiosity that wouldn’t go away; in moments of quiet, you thought back to that encounter. You thought about his tired face, the strange calm his smile gave you, how, for once in years, you felt that someone had truly seen you: the woman hiding beneath all the pain.

And it scared you. You weren’t used to someone seeing through your defenses. Ironically, that made you even more intrigued by him, by his story, by that melancholy that seemed to accompany him.

Like you, he seemed to be someone struggling with the weight of the world. And you couldn’t stop thinking about it.

So you did what you always did: you lost yourself in your work again. Answering calls, replying to emails, attending meetings; a carefully constructed routine. But your boss had other plans.

He had partnered with Valentina De Fontaine, whom he was helping with her political campaign, which meant more work for you. That day, he had specifically assigned you to deliver some confidential files to the old Avengers Tower.

The building where you worked wasn’t far from the tower, so you decided to walk. The sound of your heels against the pavement calmed your nerves. You knew what kind of woman Valentina was, and her presence made you deeply uneasy, but you had to keep your composure. It was your job, and you couldn’t afford to fail.

The Watchtower towered above you. The building that once belonged to Tony Stark, a symbol of power and heroism, now looked cold and dark.

But you didn’t stop to think about it too much. You moved through the tower’s endless floors; at such a height, the world seemed a little quieter. An assistant showed you where the meeting room was where you were to deliver the documents.

Valentina herself opened the door for you. She had a smile on her face, just as forced as yours. You greeted her cordially and handed her the documents along with your boss’s instructions; the process took no more than a couple of minutes.

At last, you were free to leave that place. Just as the elevator doors were about to close, a man hurried in.

At first, you didn’t pay him any attention, too busy answering emails, but then you felt his gaze burning into you. You turned to look at him and discovered why.

It was him, the man from the bookshop, the one who had been on your mind for weeks.

His brown hair had small golden highlights that shone in the artificial light; his eyes analyzed you with the same precision as the last time, making you feel vulnerable. His smile, however, remained warm.

The realization unsettled you: you had seen him once on television, a memory too fleeting to last, but now, standing in front of you, you couldn’t deny it.

He wasn’t just a man whose melancholy had caught your attention. He was Sentry, an Avenger.

A man who wielded more power than you could ever imagine.

And he was smiling at you as if you weren’t just a passing presence in his life, looking at you with the familiarity that only someone who recognizes the pain and weight of the past could have.

Too nervous to say anything, you could only avoid his gaze. But it seemed that he wasn’t going to let you escape without saying something. When the elevator indicated that it was about to reach the ground floor, his voice prevented you from fleeing.

“Excuse me,” his deep voice made your skin tingle. He smiled, a smile that tried to appear casual but betrayed his nervousness. “I don’t think we’ve been formally introduced. I’m Robert Reynolds.”

He pronounced his name with a strange firmness that even surprised him. He always asked to be called Bob, a simpler, less imposing nickname. But for her, he wanted to be Robert, perhaps so she wouldn't take Sentry into account. Even so, she never mentioned him, even when he was sure she recognized him.

He extended his hand, and she shook it with a light but firm touch. He trusted his powers enough to know that a simple handshake wouldn’t trigger her worst memories.

“I’m Y/N,” she replied, her curious eyes watching him closely.

There was an awkward pause, the silence in the elevator made heavy by the unresolved tension. Bob scratched the back of his neck, trying to find something to say, but the words stuck in his throat. Finally, he blurted out the first thing that came to mind.

“You work here, right?”

She nodded. “Yes, my boss works with Valentina on her political campaign; I’m his assistant.”

“I see,” he said, not daring to mention that her job would bring her back to the tower, giving him the opportunity to meet her again.

The lift reached the ground floor and opened its doors with a mechanical hiss. She moved to exit, but before she could, his voice stopped her again.

“It was a pleasure meeting you, Y/N.”

“Likewise, Robert,” she said, a hesitant smile on her face. She gave him one last look, a mixture of curiosity and uncertainty, before disappearing into the crowd.

“I hope to see you soon,” he added, but she didn’t hear him.

He didn’t expect her to.

────・:✧∙✦∙✧:・────

Despite your initial reluctance, visits to the Tower became a regular part of your routine. Weeks turned into months. Your boss seemed particularly pleased with your efficiency, and soon you found yourself taking on more tasks that brought you back to the Avengers’ headquarters. You had encountered all of them at least once; to say it was unusual would be an understatement.

But the one you saw most often was Robert. You didn’t always talk. Sometimes it was a nod and a small smile as you walked down the hallways. Other times, a shared silence in the elevator. You grew accustomed to his deep eyes watching you. You memorized the deep marks of fatigue on his face.

That day you had a meeting at the Tower. Your boss was meeting with Valentina to discuss some important matters, and you had to be there to take notes. You arrived early, nodded briefly to Valentina’s assistant, and made your way to the waiting room—an area filled with armchairs, tables with a few magazines, and the aroma of coffee.

You were a little disappointed not to see Robert, but you knew it was unusual for him to be in that area. So you decided to sit down in one of the comfortable armchairs and kill some time by finishing organizing your boss’s schedule.

While you waited, something on the coffee table caught your eye. Among the worn magazines, there was a carefully wrapped package, as if someone had left it there for you. You looked around, hoping to find something, someone, but you found yourself completely alone.

You dared to pick it up; the paper crumbled easily between your fingers. You were surprised to see a familiar title, a book of poetry you had seen a few months ago but didn’t dare to buy because of the familiarity of its words.

There was a small note stuck to the cover.

“I thought you might like it.

Robert.”

How did he know? You didn’t remember mentioning it; you talked about books, yes, but not that one in particular.

Once again, it seemed that he had managed to see through your defenses.

Lost in your thoughts, you didn’t notice the watchful eyes observing you. Bob had made sure to leave the book in a place where you would see it. He had hidden himself in a safe place, too afraid that his actions might scare you.

He remembered perfectly the book you had in your hands when he found you the day after the gala. You had looked at it with interest, but as soon as you started reading it, you had put it down and picked up another one. He had bought it on impulse, because he wanted to know what had intrigued you, and he thought it would be a good way to show you that he saw you, that he saw through the mask.

He watched you take the book, anxiety tensing every muscle in his body. He absorbed every detail: the way you looked for someone else in the room; the curiosity that shone in your eyes; how you took the book as if it were something fragile; the delicacy with which you traced your fingers over its casual lettering.

A warm wave of affection washed over him when he saw the smile spread across your face, and he found himself smiling too at your pure, unfiltered reaction. That was what he wanted to achieve, after all.

It wasn’t about the book, the paper, and the ink, but the feeling of knowing that someone saw you, that you mattered to someone. He had decided to give you something personal and meaningful because he knew you would like it. Even if you didn’t tell him, he didn’t need to. Your expression was worth more than anything you could say to him.

With his heart racing, Bob realized how much he liked your smile. And that the connection he had with you was the most real thing he had felt in a long time.

────・:✧∙✦∙��:・────

You memorized every stroke of his handwriting; the note was written with the delicacy of someone who knows they are dealing with something meaningful. 'I thought you might like it.' Of course he knew, because somehow this man had the ability to see you as no one else could.

The need to thank him overwhelmed you, with words you dared not say stuck in your throat. You had to know why—why he had taken such an interest in you, why he was so selfless with you. Why he seemed so determined to reach your heart.

You looked for him: the familiar glint of his brown curls, his quiet, calm figure, but you couldn’t find him anywhere. You even dared to ask Valentina’s assistant, Mel, if she had seen him.

You were disheartened when she replied with a polite, “I’m sorry, I haven’t seen him today.” It seemed that you would have to save your gratitude for another time.

You felt the weight of the book in your bag for the rest of the day. Even when you should have been focused on your work, your mind kept returning to that note, to the book, to him. And without meaning to, you found yourself smiling at the memory.

When the day ended and you could finally relax in the tranquillity of your flat, you looked at the book again. You lost yourself in its pages, in the words that touched your heart, leaving a trail of tears on them. It was as if he knew exactly what you needed to hear, and perhaps he did.

The mere thought made your heart race, but it had been so long since anyone had genuinely cared about you that you couldn’t be scared. Instead, you felt grateful for Robert Reynolds’ presence in your life.

Lost in words, you didn’t realize that the sun was beginning to rise until it was too late.

────・:✧∙✦∙✧:・────

You didn’t see Robert again for two weeks. At first you thought he might be avoiding you, but you soon realized it was something else. You didn’t dare ask, but Mel kindly told you that he had been sent on a mission.

It gave you enough time to read the book over and over again; you clung to it like an anchor in a storm. You marked the paragraphs you liked. The spine began to crack from being opened so many times, and the pages began to bend at the corners. You had brought it to life, and you were surprised to find yourself waiting to talk to him about it.

The note was still intact; you had left it on your desk, too afraid to ruin it. Every morning, before going to work, you reread it.

You missed his presence, more than you’d like to admit. You missed that brief moment of calm in your day. Robert, for you, was like the rays of sunshine that appeared after the storm: warm, bright, and hopeful.

The two weeks turned into three. His absence was a constant reminder of how much his presence had changed your daily life. You were back to square one: an empty shell, a woman who preferred to live working rather than face the reality of her sad life.

You clung even more tightly to the book, to the memory of your encounters, desperate not to let that part of you that felt alive again disappear.

And then, after another stressful meeting where you could barely pay attention, he burst into the elevator that was about to close, just like the first time.

He looked different, his eyes darkened by fatigue. His hair was a little longer, falling over his forehead as if he had run his hand through it too many times. But his smile, the one you were beginning to believe was reserved just for you, remained the same.

His body relaxed when his eyes met yours; his gaze softened when he saw you. You knew without him saying it: he had missed you as much as you had missed him.

Your heart raced with a new urgency. He was there. And you, for the first time in weeks, felt like the sun had come out again.

“Hello,” he said breathlessly.

“Hello, Robert,” you replied with a smile, at this point impossible to contain.

There was an awkward pause, where both of you seemed to be thinking about what to say.

“I read the book.”

“You read the book?” they both said in unison, then let out a nervous laugh.

“I… uh… yes, I read it,” you fiddled with the straps of your bag. “I wanted to thank you, really. You didn’t have to do that.”

“It’s nothing,” his voice was barely a whisper, but it was still clear to you. “Do you have a free moment? I was wondering if… if you’d like to have a coffee. Only if you want to, you can say no, totally.”

It was the first time he had invited you to do something outside the Tower. At another time, you might have refused, but after weeks of not seeing him, you were eager to talk to him.

“I’d love to,” you managed to say, your stomach churning with nervousness.

He smiled at you with that genuine smile you were beginning to enjoy. He led you to a café just a couple of streets away from the Tower; your skin tingled at the touch of his hand as you walked together.

They ordered their coffees and sat down in a secluded spot, letting the silence settle between them. Robert was the first to break it.

“Did you like the book?” he asked hesitantly, as if afraid of your answer.

You decided it was best to show him. You took the book out of your bag, its spine worn and its pages dog-eared from reading it so many times over the past few weeks. You placed it in front of him so he could see it.

“I loved it,” your voice trembled a little at first, but the warmth in his gaze gave you courage. “I… I don’t know what to say, it’s perfect, I can’t stop reading it. I don’t know how you knew I would like it, but thank you.”

You saw the relief cross his face; his eyes returned to the book, looking at it with something akin to affection.

“I saw you pick it up at the bookshop,” he confessed. “You didn’t buy it, but I thought you might give it a second chance, I thought you might like it. I wanted… I wanted you to know that I see you.”

His honesty hit you like a bolt of lightning and completely disarmed you. When was the last time someone had shown so much interest in you? You couldn’t remember.

His words, sincere and full of understanding, had touched your heart. You blinked, trying not to let him notice the moisture that had formed in your eyes.

“Thank you, Robert,” you said, your voice heavy with emotion. “Really, no one has ever noticed me like this before.”

A small, sad smile formed on his lips.

“I know,” he murmured, his eyes fixed on the book. “Me neither.”

And with that sentence, you understood why he could see right through you.

The conversation flowed easily after that. You returned to the book, you showed him the verses you liked, and in return, he showed you his. The coffee grew cold as you continued talking for what seemed like endless hours.

Thus, under the dim lights and in that small, confined space where only the two of you seemed to exist, the walls you had built around yourself began to fall, brick by brick, with every word shared.

────・:✧∙✦∙✧:・────

Things began to change after that, a slow and silent process. In those small moments, away from prying eyes, they shared smiles laden with unspoken words. They stopped walking so cautiously around each other. Robert began to wait for you at the entrance to the building, accompanying you whenever you had a free moment.

Having coffee after work became a habit; they talked for hours, often being the last to leave, with the employees giving them dirty looks from behind the counter. They discovered they had much more in common than they thought: they talked about their passions, about books. Sometimes you complained about how tedious it was to work for your boss, and he told you what it felt like to be an Avenger and carry so much responsibility on his shoulders.

They laid the foundations for a friendship that continued to flourish against all odds. They exchanged messages frequently, sent each other photos of their days, and you found yourself smiling more often. You laughed at his silly jokes, the silence in your house was replaced by loud, cheerful music, the kind that made you nod your head to the beat.

Every day you saw him, every day you spent time with him, you returned home a little happier. You learned more about him: about his struggles, his sensitivity, his sarcasm at just the right moments. He was a sweet, attentive man who knew how to listen, who knew when you needed to laugh and when you just needed someone to stay by your side.

It felt like a monumental step for you. With every cup of coffee, every message, every shared book that reminded you of each other, you were letting him in. Correction: he was infiltrating your heart, and there was no way to stop him. There was no turning back.

You discovered that even with the caution that pain leaves behind, you still wanted him to stay with you. You opened the doors of your heart to him, and he, with his presence, began to illuminate the darkest corners of your life.

And that feeling no longer scared you as much as it used to.

Soon, afternoons at the café weren’t enough, and you started inviting him to your house. You made him homemade food, the kind made with love. You couldn’t remember the last time you set two plates for dinner instead of one.

Robert was excited about the idea. He hadn’t had a real meal in a long time either. None of the Avengers were good cooks, so most of the time they ordered takeout. Sometimes you gave him the leftovers to take to his teammates, and each time he thanked you profusely.

Other times, he would stay up late watching films with you. The experiments they had done on him had taken away most of his memories, so you decided to reintroduce him to classic films: your favorites and those you thought he might like.

The nights grew longer between you; the conversations became deeper. You told him about your life, your aspirations, even things you didn’t share with anyone else. There was something about him that inspired trust: his eyes never judged you; he just listened and was there for you.

He also talked to you. He told you about his past—not everything, but enough. He told you about the few happy memories from his childhood, he told you about his powers, about the constant struggle to control them. And you listened to him, without pressure, just with patience and understanding.

One night, as you were enjoying a film curled up on the sofa, you asked him something that had been on your mind for the last few days:

“Bob,” you called him, your gaze lost on the protagonists kissing after an emotional confession. “Have you ever been in love?”

He sat up straight on the sofa, sensing the change in your voice. You never called him Bob; to you, he was always Robert.

“Not really,” he replied, his eyes fixed on you. “With the kind of life I had, I could never… I just couldn’t devote myself to one person, not completely. Yes, I’ve liked other people, but love? I don’t think I’ve ever felt it.”

Your heart ached when you heard his words. You knew he’d had a difficult past, but hearing it from him made you finally understand how hard his life had been. You wished he hadn’t had to go through all that, but otherwise, you would never have met him.

“I used to fall in love easily,” you said with a bitter laugh. You felt Bob’s gaze on your face, but you didn’t dare look at him. “I was in love with love. I believed that one day I would find that person, you know? The one who is made for you.”

“And what happened?” he asked softly.

“For a moment, I thought I had truly found him. I fell deeply in love; I loved him with every part of me,” you lost yourself in memories. “He was perfect, or at least I thought so; he was everything I had ever wanted in a partner. And then it all fell apart: he fell in love with someone else. He decided that what I gave him wasn’t enough, that I wasn’t enough for him.”

Your voice faltered. The wound, however old it was, still hurt. Robert reached out his hand and cautiously placed it on yours. He gently caressed your knuckles, a silent comfort.

“Y/N… you don’t have to talk about this if you don’t want to,” he said; his understanding always managed to move you.

“It’s okay, I want to tell you this,” you replied, forcefully wiping away the tears that threatened to escape from your eyes. “He left me and for a long time made me think there was something wrong with me. What did she have that I didn’t? He made me believe I didn’t deserve to be loved. So I promised myself I would never be so vulnerable again; I shut myself off and became what I am today. And I hate it, because I miss how I used to be, but I can’t go back to being that person anymore, I just can’t.”

With those words, you finally broke down. Tears began to fall down your cheeks, first silently and then turning into sobs you couldn’t hold back. You were embarrassed for Robert to see you like this, but you knew he wouldn’t judge you.

His blue eyes looked at you with shared sadness, not pity, but with the pain of knowing that someone had hurt you and that there was nothing he could do to reverse it.

He gently pulled you towards him, his arms lovingly enveloping your body. He let you cry as you melted into the warmth of his body, focusing on the steady beat of his heart and the comfort it gave you. It was a completely selfless gesture on his part.

In his arms, you found a sense of security that you thought you had lost forever.

Bob wasn’t a balm for your wounds, nor did he pretend to be. He didn’t try to fix you because there was nothing to fix. He simply understood you better than anyone else. By his side, the weight of your pain seemed easier to bear. He reminded you that you weren’t alone in facing your problems.

Finally, you gathered enough strength to pull away from him. Bob held your face in his hands, frowning as he wiped away the tears that had stained your skin.

“Better?” he asked. Your heart skipped a beat when you saw the molten gold that had intertwined with the blue of his eyes, but you didn’t dare tell him.

You nodded, too weak to speak.

He sighed, a little more relaxed, before coming back to you. You curled up next to him, completely exhausted.

You didn’t even notice the silent struggle Robert was facing. He was equal parts sad and angry. He didn’t get angry often, but there was something about seeing the people he cared about hurt that ignited the protective instinct within him.

He wanted to know who had hurt you so badly, who had extinguished that light that sometimes, even when hidden, still shone within you. He clenched his jaw, aware that the last thing you needed at that moment was for him to lose control.

He decided to focus on the gentle movement of your chest with each breath; only then did he realize that you had fallen asleep on him. A small smile formed on his face, happy that you trusted him enough to allow yourself that vulnerability.

Careful not to wake you, he placed a blanket over your body and watched over you as you slept for the rest of the night.

Even when his phone was full of missed calls from the team the next morning, Bob didn’t care.

Taking care of you was worth it.

────・:✧∙✦∙✧:・────

You were right to trust him.

You knew it the next morning when you woke up wrapped in blankets carefully placed around your body. You knew it when you found him in the kitchen, with the sunlight illuminating every feature of his face and that kind smile that always touched your heart.

Despite all his responsibilities, he had stayed. He didn’t pressure you, he didn’t ask if you were okay, he just stayed by your side.

He made sure you had breakfast, washed the dishes they had used the night before so you wouldn’t have to, left you a glass of water and a headache pill, and left with the promise to return later.

And you, with a cup of hot coffee in your hands (one he had prepared), had never felt more loved.

Robert returned the following night, and the night after that.

By letting go of the weight of that confession, you were finally able to speak freely with him. You no longer felt so afraid to talk to him about your feelings, not when he had seen you at your most vulnerable and still decided to stay.

You allowed yourself to enjoy his conversations and encounters more. And you reached a point where you no longer remembered what your life was like before he came along.

Your friendship solidified. Afternoons spent drinking coffee became an unbreakable bond, dinners became more and more frequent, and movie nights became a tradition.

You incorporated him into your life: you looked for new recipes and prepared them for him, hoping he would like them, and you started buying boxes of his favorite tea to keep at home. You even put a photo of the two of you in your living room, and from the smile on Bob’s face every time he saw it, you knew he liked it.

You spent a lot of time together, perhaps more than expected. But it wasn’t about attachment, or feeling lonely; it was that you genuinely enjoyed his company.

Bob encouraged you to come out of your shell, to smile a little more, to talk to those colleagues who had tried so many times to befriend you. Your life didn’t stop when he wasn’t around; he made you happy, but you didn’t need him to be happy. He wanted to be your support so that you could be the version of yourself that you liked best.

And that, for you, meant everything.

But between the trust and friendship they shared, something else was beginning to develop. Something you hadn’t yet dared to name.

You don’t know when you first began to notice the electricity that ran through your body every time his hands brushed against yours, the warmth of his palms when they touched your lower back to guide you somewhere. The sound of his voice, hoarse and deep, and how your skin tingled every time he spoke to you.

You began to be hyper-aware of each of your reactions: how your heart raced every time you saw him, the warmth in your cheeks when he smiled at you, how you lost yourself in the blue of his eyes. Your laughter had become more genuine around him, the kind you couldn’t contain.

You found yourself thinking about him more often, eagerly awaiting your encounters, smiling every time he sent you a message. You missed him when he had to go on a mission, the days seeming endless without any news from him.

One night, while watching a film, curled up on the sofa as usual, you turned your head to whisper a comment to him. You hadn’t realized how close you were; his eyes were already fixed on you, the dim light from the television casting shadows across his face. Your breath caught in your throat; the intensity with which his eyes were watching you, with that hint of molten gold that always mesmerized you, made you blush.

The closeness, the warmth of his body, the electrifying tension; it was no longer just friendship, they both knew that.

They didn’t talk about that moment, but it lingered in their memories, the tension didn’t dissipate, it transformed into an acute awareness of everything they could be if they ever dared to take the first step.

────・:✧∙✦∙✧:・────

Bob didn’t know what to do. His friendship with you had become a beacon of light guiding him through the darkness. From the moment he first saw you, he knew you were different. You understood him like no one else did; you weren’t afraid of him, you didn’t shy away from his problems. You faced them with a smile, because you, too, knew what it meant to carry that weight.

They had forged a real, strong bond that was turning into something more. A palpable tension that both terrified and fascinated him in equal measure.

One he could no longer ignore, not when his eyes were lost in the movement of your lips, in the way your hair fell across your face and his desire to tuck it behind your ears, the warmth of your body against his. How you always fell asleep with your face pressed against his shoulder, how he avoided moving so as not to wake you. How his heart raced every time you smiled at him.

It was a kind of longing he had never felt before.

But he didn’t dare make a move, not when he knew how much love had hurt you. Bob was afraid of hurting you, not only with Void, who always lurked in the darkest corners of his mind, but with the intensity of his feelings.

Could a man like him, with his fragmented past and unstable power, afford to love someone like you? He wasn’t sure he wanted to know the answer.

────・:✧∙✦∙✧:・────

Of course, the team noticed. No matter how hard Bob tried to fool them, he would never succeed. They had been trained as spies, soldiers, assassins; of course, they were going to notice his absence. No one failed to notice Bob’s increasingly frequent smiles, the endless hours he would disappear for only to return with a happy expression on his face, his apparent attachment to his phone, and how he always seemed to be sending messages to someone.

Yelena, as the closest to him, was the first to see it. But no one wanted to say anything to him. He was happier than they had ever seen him, and they didn’t want to ruin whatever was happening there.

However, she was also very curious and wanted to know who the woman was who had won her friend’s heart (she already knew who you were; she just wanted to hear it from him).

So after a few months, she decided to approach him. It was one of the few afternoons that Bob wasn’t spending outside the complex. She found him in the kitchen trying to make a sandwich, without much success. Yelena leaned casually against the doorframe, watching him with an amused smile.

“So, our Bob has fallen in love,” she blurted out, getting straight to the point.

Bob almost choked on his bread; the tips of his ears began to turn red.

“What? No! What are you talking about?” He tried to sound confused, but his shaky voice gave him away.

Yelena raised an eyebrow, and that was enough for Bob to collapse, dropping his shoulders with a resigned sigh.

“How long have you known?” he asked. He knew there was no point in trying to fool the former Black Widow; she was too sharp, too intelligent.

“For months now, you’ve been disappearing for hours and coming back smiling, practically floating on air,” she said, sounding overly amused. “You bring us homemade food, Bob. Didn’t you think we’d wonder who makes it?”

Bob scratched the back of his neck, not knowing what to say. Clearly, he hadn’t thought that detail through; he was just excited to share your amazing meals with his colleagues.

“It’s… complicated,” he finally said.

“Love is always complicated, Bob,” she said, her voice full of empathy. “So? How do you feel about her?”

He smiled, with a sparkle in his eyes that she had never seen before.

“She is… light. She is one of those people who lights up a room when she walks in, even if she doesn’t think she does. She’s warm and kind, but she also knows how to stand up for herself; she’s lively and very brave. She has a big heart and has suffered a lot, but she keeps getting up every morning, keeps trying, because that’s who she is.”

He paused, searching for the words. “She makes me feel seen, not for my powers, not for my past, but for who I am underneath it all. She’s not afraid of me, she doesn’t make me feel like a lost cause, she smiles at me as if she doesn’t care about all the bad things I’ve done.” His eyes met hers, filled with sincerity. “I fell in love with her, with her smile, with her way of seeing the world, and it’s probably the most real thing I’ve felt in a long time.”

Yelena blinked, moved. She hadn’t expected such an emotional confession; she hadn’t expected Bob to be so in love.

“Wow,” he murmured, almost to himself. “You really love her.”

A shy smile formed on his lips. “I do.”

“Well,” he nodded slowly. “Don’t let her get away, she seems like a good one.”

Bob let out a stifled laugh, a mixture of relief and joy that was beginning to blossom in his chest. The conversation with Yelena had helped him realize how much he loved you; he had finally been able to verbalise his feelings.

Now he just had to pluck up the courage to tell you.

────・:✧∙✦∙✧:・────

The tension had become unbearable, almost suffocating. Every glance, every word, every shared silence had taken on a new meaning, one that neither dared to mention.

One afternoon, Robert accompanied you to your flat after a long day at work and a coffee that felt more like an exchange of prolonged glances than spoken words.

They arrived at your door and the silence, once comfortable, was now heavy with feelings that neither of you expressed. You fiddled with your keys, avoiding his gaze. He stood at a respectful distance, but you could still feel his presence, his warmth enveloping you like a blanket.

Both of you stood motionless in your places, not knowing what to expect.

“Y/N,” his voice was barely a whisper, uncertain. He took a step closer to you, then stopped.

You looked up; his eyes met yours. You lost yourself in the depth of his gaze, in the blue that reminded you of the ocean and the gold that shone like the rays of the sun. You saw through him: the fear, the uncertainty, the longing.

“Bob” his name escaped your lips like a prayer.

He took another step, closing the distance between you until he was standing right in front of you. You could smell his cologne, a scent you had come to associate with safety; the electricity that ran through your body every time he came near. Your heart was beating hard against your ribs, expectant, full of tension.

Robert cautiously raised a hand, his fingers caressing your cheek, soft, a touch that made you close your eyes for a moment. When you opened them, his gaze was already fixed on your lips, then he flickered back to your eyes, asking for permission without words.

He was so close you could feel his warm breath on your face. Your eyes fell to his lips and desire tightened your chest. You wanted, you longed for him to kiss you. But fear, familiar and paralyzing, prevented you.

You remembered the pain, every tear you shed, the deep longing to be loved. That promise you made to yourself and the sweet, lovestruck girl you had to leave behind to keep it. And you couldn’t.

You didn’t have to tell him, he had noticed: how you tensed up in his arms, the change in your gaze. Your heart ached when you saw his disappointed face; you wanted to apologize, you wanted to tell him it wasn’t his fault, but he stopped you.

His hand moved away from your cheek and you immediately missed its warmth. He kissed you on the forehead before pulling away, a kiss that said, 'I know, I don't blame you'.

“See you tomorrow,” he said, his voice a little hoarser than usual, but firm.

You nodded, clutching the keys tightly in your hands, not knowing what to say. You watched him leave, the weight of your decision weighing heavily on your heart.

You knew it was for the best, but that didn’t make it hurt any less.

The door to your flat slammed shut, and you leaned against it, breathing erratically. You were sure of one thing: you were hopelessly in love with Robert Reynolds. And the fear you felt in admitting it was almost as great as your love for him.

On the way to the Tower, Robert ran a hand over his face, frustration and fear still present. He had been so close, but then he saw you—saw the hesitation in your eyes. He saw your fear of being hurt again, and he knew he couldn’t be the one to hurt you.

His insecurities, his own fears resurfaced; he could feel Void mocking him in his mind, letting him know that he would never be worthy of your love. That he would only destroy you, because that was the only thing Bob knew how to do.

Good things never lasted long in his life.

Why would you?

────・:✧∙✦∙✧:・────

Despite seeing each other for the rest of the week, things were no longer the same. Glances lingered, silence became uncomfortable, every movement became calculated. The nights became more difficult.

You couldn't sleep, not when every time you closed your eyes you thought of him: his sad eyes, the curve of his smile, the ghost of his lips on your forehead.

You fell asleep thinking about what it would have been like to be kissed by him and woke up knowing that the tension that had built up between you was your fault.

But you didn't know what else to do.

You had let him in, but was that enough? Could you let him love you?

You had spent so much time alone that you forgot what it was like: having someone by your side, the smiles, the butterflies in your stomach. You had forgotten how to be loved.

And you wanted, God, you wanted with all your might to be able to love him back. But fear attacked you, even if he was someone important to you, and you didn't know how to stop it.

Bob wasn't much better off than you.

He had noticed how his eyes had darkened, how his dark circles had deepened. He hadn't been able to sleep in a week; every night was torture for him.

Void was taking advantage of his weakness, mixing memories with nightmares, pressing until he broke his will. And the worst part was that he was starting to believe it, every word.

Every time he reminded him that he was nobody, every time he reminded him that he would never be anything more than a broken man, every time he told him that you would never settle for him. He believed it.

But he hadn't done anything about it, not until that night.

The nightmare dragged him into the darkness, into the part of himself that he tried so hard to keep hidden. However, he was not alone. In the midst of his painful memories, of his fear, there you were. He saw you enveloped in darkness, your eyes filled with tears, screaming his name, begging for help.

And he could only watch as Void destroyed the light he had learned to love, saw you scream as darkness consumed you. Your eyes watched him, hurt, betrayed, and he could do nothing; he was paralyzed.

He had ruined you, and he couldn't do anything to stop it.

He woke up with a start, drenched in cold sweat, his heart pounding against his ribs. He knew at that moment that he had to see you, had to make sure you were okay, that he hadn't hurt you.

He left the Tower in a whirlwind of emotions, walking to your flat lost in his memories. He thought again about your face, how you begged for help, how he had let Void play with his mind to terrify him.

He couldn't let it happen again; Bob couldn't lose you. Not when you were one of the few good things he had in his life. You weren't a superhero, you hadn't been trained as an assassin or a soldier, but you understood him, you listened to him. You loved him without expecting anything in return.

He arrived at your building in the middle of the night, not thinking about the time, how late it was, only caring about you. He knocked on your door with an impatience he rarely showed. He knocked once, twice, three times, until his insistence interrupted your sleep.

You opened the door, your mind still clouded by sleep, your pajamas rumpled and your hair tousled. The dim light in the hallway revealed Robert's figure, his pale face, his wide eyes shining with that familiar golden color. You had never seen him like this before.

"Bob," you whispered, filled with concern. You took his hand, helping him into your flat. His body was shaking, and you could feel how sweaty his palms were. "What happened?"

At that moment, he collapsed, and you barely managed to catch him in your arms as you curled up on the floor together. He hugged you as if he were afraid you would disappear, as if he wanted to make sure you were real, that you were really there with him.

You returned his hug with a heavy heart, gently stroking the curls at the nape of his neck. His face was hidden in the crook of your neck, and you could feel his tears wet the fabric of your pajamas, but you didn't care. You just wanted to make sure he was okay.

"It's okay, I'm here," you said, trying to calm him down. "Talk to me, Bob."

His eyes met yours, filled with anguish. "I had a nightmare, I dreamed about the Void; I dreamed... I dreamed that I hurt you. It was horrible. I had to see you, I had to know that you were okay."

Your gaze softened, you reached out to caress his cheek, he leaned into your touch, closing his eyes.

"I'm here, Bob," you assured him. "You didn't hurt me, you're not going to lose me."

"How can you be sure?"

"I'm not, but I trust you, and that's a start."

And with those words, you showed him how important he was to you. You gave him your trust, something you treasured, and you knew you were making the right decision in doing so.

He pulled you close, cradling you in his arms. Then you heard his voice:

"You don't know how important you are to me. You accepted me, you let me into your life, you made me feel human again; not like a hero, not like Void, just Bob. And I can never thank you enough for that." His voice trembled, heavy with emotion. "I love you, and maybe it's not what you wanted to hear, but I needed to tell you."

His hands caressed your face, and this time he spoke to you, looking into your eyes. "You bring color to my life, you bring me calm, and it scares me because I'm not used to feeling this way. It scares me to hurt you, it terrifies me to lose you. But what I feel for you is real, and not even my deepest fears can change that."

Your heart sank, but not out of fear, but out of understanding. Because you, like him, were scared, and the fact that he opened his heart to you, allowing you to see that vulnerability, changed everything.

Driven by the love you felt for him, which you didn't know how to express, you leaned in and kissed him.

It wasn't soft or sweet. It was a kiss full of desperation, expressing the anguish of months of longing for each other. Full of hope, fear of hurting each other, pure and real affection.

You melted into him, into his warm arms, his gentle hands and his soft lips. You let yourself be carried away by that kiss, by the electric current that ran through your body every time he touched you. And you clung to him even tighter.

Bob kissed you as if your lips were a temple he wanted to worship. And you let him.

They kissed like two souls finally finding their way to each other.

They parted with a gasp, their limbs trembling and their cheeks burning. You smiled at him, your eyes shining.

Bob caressed your cheek tenderly, without loosening his grip on you. "Are you okay?"

You nodded, resting your forehead on his shoulder. "Just... hold me," you asked.

The moonlight shone on their embracing bodies, and you relaxed to the sound of his rapid heartbeat.

They didn't speak again; it wasn't necessary. The connection between you said more than words ever could.

────・:✧∙✦∙✧:・────

They couldn't sleep, not after a night like that. They decided to go out and watch the sunrise on the terrace of your flat. They sat together as the warm sunlight began to illuminate their features.

You moved closer to him, resting your cheek on his shoulder as you intertwined your hand with his. One of his arms wrapped around you, gently caressing your arm.

"Bob," you whispered, looking up into his eyes. "I'm scared, but... I want this to work. I really do."

"Me too," his gaze softened. "But as long as we have each other, I think it will work. We can learn together."

You smiled, leaving a kiss on his shoulder blade. "Thank you for not giving up on me," you said, your voice trembling. "I know I haven't made it easy for you, but you never stopped trying, and you don't know how much that means to me. You saw through me, when no one else had in a long time, and you loved me even after seeing my worst parts."

“That's because I love you on your good days and your bad days. I love you when you're fed up with the world and just want to cry yourself to sleep, I love you when you laugh out loud and when you hum a song thinking no one is listening. I love every part of you.”

Your eyes filled with tears, moved by so much affection. You didn't know what you had done to find a man like him.

"I love you, Bob. Thank you for being my light in the darkness, for making me feel alive again."

He smiled at you, a small, genuine smile. He leaned in and kissed you, gently, full of tenderness.

You had fallen deeply in love, without thinking about the risk. And that thought no longer frightened you, not like before.

Because the pain hadn't gone away, not completely, but the wound was beginning to heal. You had allowed yourself to cry, you had allowed yourself to feel, and you had learned to let go of what hurt you.

You had found someone who didn't see your scars as marks of your failures, but as reminders that you had tried, that you had loved, and even though it didn't always work out, it was real. He drew stars over your scars and made you feel proud of them.

And you loved that about him. You loved him because he had the kindest heart you had ever seen, because with his shy smiles and his gentleness he had given you back something you thought you had lost long ago.

His blue eyes looked at you, deep and sincere, as if he were aware of what you were thinking. You moved closer to him, closing your eyes as the sunlight shone down on you.

In that moment, everything else faded away, as if the universe belonged only to the two of you. There were no superpowers, no broken hearts, no painful pasts. Just two souls who had learned to love each other despite the burdens they carried, who had found peace and comfort in each other.

It was an unspoken promise that, no matter what the world threw at them, they would always have that sanctuary in each other. They would always have each other.

You thought with a smile that they were right: love wasn't for you, but Bob was. He was made for you.

thanks for reading!

#fic recs

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open-heart-open-container · 8 days ago

Text

this is perfect

to whom it may concern

clark kent 𝐱 𝐫𝐞𝐚𝐝𝐞𝐫 𝐭𝐚𝐠𝐬 / 𝐭𝐰 – 18+, MDNI, secret admirer au, slowburn romance, mutual pining, radical acceptance and love is the real punk rock, yearning, clark is a softie, smut, piv, oral sex (f!recieving), fingering, creampie, touch starved clark Kent word count: 18k Summary: You start getting anonymous love notes at the Daily Planet—soft, sincere, impossibly romantic. You fall for the words first, then realize they sound a lot like Clark Kent. And just when the truth begins to unravel, you start to suspect he might be more than just the writer… he might be Superman himself. notes – not proofread and my first full Clark Kent fic!

— reblogs comments & likes are appreciated

The first thing you notice isn’t the coffee—it’s the smell.

Sharp espresso. The exact blend you order on days when the world feels like sandpaper. Dark, hot, and just a touch too strong. But when you reach your desk and set your bag down, the cup is already waiting for you, balanced on the corner of your keyboard like it belongs there.

A single post-it clings to the cardboard sleeve, the ink a little smudged from condensation:

“You looked like you had a long night.”

No name. No heart. Just that.

You stare at it for a second too long. The office hums around you—phones ringing, printers whining, the low buzz of voices—but your ears tune it all out as you reread the handwriting. Rounded letters. Slight right slant. You can’t place it.

And no one in this building knows your coffee order. You made sure of that.

Across the bullpen, Jimmy Olsen drops into his chair with a paper bag in his teeth and two cameras slung around his neck.

“Someone’s got a secret admirer,” he sings, catching sight of the note.

You glance up, but try to play it cool. “Could be a delivery mistake.”

He snorts. “Right. And I’m dating Wonder Woman.”

Lois, passing by with a stack of mock-ups under one arm, pauses just long enough to lift a perfectly sculpted brow. “Who’s dating Wonder Woman?”

“Jimmy,” you and Jimmy say in unison.

“Right,” she says, deadpan, and moves on.

You feel a little heat crawl up your neck. You pull the cup closer. The lid’s still warm.

You’re still turning the note over in your hand when Clark Kent rounds the corner. His hair is a little damp at the ends, like he didn’t have time to dry it properly, already curling from the late-summer humidity. His tie—striped, loud, undeniably Clark—is halfway undone, the knot drifting lower by the second. His glasses are slipping down his nose like they’re trying to abandon ship.

He’s juggling three manila folders, a spiral-bound notebook balanced on top, a half-eaten blueberry muffin in his teeth, and what you’re almost certain is the entire city council’s budget report from 2024 spilling out of the bottom folder. It’s absurd. Kind of impressive. Very him.

“Clark—careful,” you call out, mostly on instinct.

He startles at the sound of your voice and turns a little too fast. The top file slips. He manages to catch it, barely, with an awkward swipe of his forearm, the muffin top bouncing to the floor with a quiet thwup. He rights the stack again with both arms now locked tight around the paperwork, and when he looks at you, he’s already wearing one of those sheepish, winded smiles.

“Morning sweetheart,” he says breathlessly. His voice is warm. Rough around the edges like he hasn’t spoken yet today. “Sorry, I’m late—Perry wanted the zoning report and the express line was… not express.”

You don’t answer right away. Because his eyes flick toward your desk—specifically the coffee cup sitting at the edge of your keyboard. And the note stuck to its sleeve. He freezes. Just for a second. A micro-hesitation. One breath caught too long in his chest. It’s nothing.

Except… it’s not.

Then he clears his throat—loud and awkward, like he swallowed gravel—and shuffles the stack in his arms like it suddenly needs reorganizing. “New… uh, budget drafts,” he says quickly, eyes very intentionally not on the post-it. “I left the tag on that one by mistake—ignore the highlighter. I had a system. Kind of.”

You blink at him, watching his ears start to go red. “…You okay?”

“Oh, yeah,” he says, waving one hand too fast, almost drops everything again. “I’m fine, sweetheart. Just, you know. Monday.”

He flashes you the smile again—crooked, a little boyish, like he still isn’t sure if he belongs here even after all this time. That’s always been the thing about Clark. He doesn’t posture. Doesn’t strut. He’s got this open-face sincerity, like the world is still worth showing up for, even when it kicks you in the ribs.

And you’ve seen him work. He’s brilliant. Way too observant to be as clumsy as he pretends to be. But it’s charming. In that small-town, too-tall-for-his-own-good, mutters-puns-when-he’s-nervous kind of way.

You like him. That’s… not the problem. The problem is— He turns to walk past you, misjudges the distance, and thunks his thigh into the sharp edge of your desk with a grunt.

You flinch. “You good?”

“Yep.” He winces, but manages a thumbs-up. “Just, uh… recalibrating my ankles.”

Then he’s gone, retreating to the safe, familiar walls of his cubicle, still muttering to himself. Something about rechecking source notes and whether anyone notices when hyperlinks are one shade too blue.

You’re left staring at the cup. At the note.

You run your thumb over the y again, the way it loops low and curls back. There’s something oddly familiar about the penmanship. Not perfect. Neat, but casual. Like whoever wrote it didn’t plan to stop writing once they started. Like they meant it.

You don’t say it aloud—not even to yourself—but the truth is whispering at the edge of your brain.

It looks like his. It feels like his. But no. That would be— Clark Kent is thoughtful, sure. He’s the kind of guy who remembers how you like your takeout and always lets you borrow his chargers. He holds elevators and never interrupts, and he stays late when you need someone to double-check your interview transcript even though it’s technically not his beat.

He’s the kind of guy who brings you a jacket during late-night stakeouts without asking. He’s the kind of guy who makes you laugh without trying. But he couldn’t be the secret admirer.

…Could he?

You glance toward his cubicle. You can’t see him, but you can feel him there. The way his presence always lingers, somehow warmer than everyone else’s. Quieter.

You tuck the note into the back pocket of your notebook.

Just in case.

You forget about the note by lunch.

Mostly.

The newsroom doesn’t really give you space to linger in your thoughts—phones ringing, printers jamming, interns darting between desks like caffeinated ghosts. It’s chaos, always is, and you thrive in it. But even as you’re skimming through edits and fixing a headline Jimmy typo’d into a minor war crime, part of your brain keeps circling back to that one y.

By the time you head back from a sandwich run with mustard on your sleeve and a half-dozen emails on your phone, there’s another cup on your desk. Same order. No receipt. No name.

But this time, the note reads:

“The line you cut in paragraph six was my favorite. About hope not being the same thing as naivety.”

You freeze mid-step, bag still dangling from one hand.

You hadn’t published that line. You wrote it. Typed it, then stared at it for twenty minutes before deleting it—thought it was too sentimental, too soft for the piece. You didn’t want to seem like you were editorializing. And yet… it had meant something. You’d loved that line.

And someone else had read it. Which means…

Your eyes flick up. Around.

The bullpen looks the same as always: fluorescent lights buzzing, keys clacking, the faint scent of stale coffee and fast food. Jimmy’s arguing with someone about lens filters. Lois is deep in a phone call, gesturing with a pen like she might stab whoever’s on the other end.

And then—Clark. Sitting at his desk, halfway behind the divider. Fiddling with his glasses like they won’t sit quite right on the bridge of his nose. He glances up at you and smiles. Soft. A little crooked. Familiar in a way that does something deeply unhelpful to your chest.

You stare for a second too long.

He blinks. Looks down quickly. Reaches for his pen, drops it, fumbles, curses under his breath. You see the top of his ears turning red.

Something inside you shifts. The notes are sweet, yes. But this is specific. This is someone who read your draft. Someone who noticed the cut line.

You never shared it outside your initial file. Not even with Lois. You almost didn’t send it to copy at all. So… who the hell could’ve read it? How could they have seen it?

You return to your chair slowly, like it might help the pieces click into place. Your eyes catch the handwriting again.

The loops. The slight leftward tilt.

Clark does have neat handwriting. You’ve seen his notebook, all tidy bullet points and overly polite margin notes.

You tuck this note into your drawer. Next to the other one.

You don’t say anything.

Later that afternoon, the newsroom’s background noise crescendos into something louder—Lois and Dan from editorial locked in another philosophical brawl about media framing. You’re not part of the fight, but apparently your latest piece is.

“It’s fluffy,” Dan says, waving the printed article like it personally offended him. “It doesn’t do anything. What’s the point of it, other than making people feel things?”

You open your mouth—just barely—ready to defend yourself even though it’s exhausting. You don’t get the chance. Clark beats you to it.

“I think it was insightful, actually,” he says from across the bullpen, voice louder than usual. “And emotionally resonant.”

The silence is sharp. Dan arches a brow. “Listen, Kent. No one asked you.”

Clark straightens his tie. “Well, maybe they should.”

Now everyone’s looking. Lois leans back in her chair, visibly suppressing a smile. Dan scoffs and mutters something about sentimentality being a plague.

You just stare at Clark. He meets your eyes, then seems to realize what he’s done and looks at his notebook like it’s suddenly the most fascinating object in the known universe.

Your heart does something inconvenient. Because now you’re wondering if it is him. Not just because he defended you, or because he could have somehow read the line that didn’t make it to print, but because of the way he did it. The way his voice shook just a little. The way he looked furious on your behalf.

Clark is soft, yes. Awkward, often. But there’s something sharp underneath it. A quiet kind of intensity that only shows up when it matters. Like someone who’s spent a long time listening, and even longer choosing his moments.

You make a show of checking your notes. Pretending like your stomach didn’t just flip. You don’t look at him again. But you feel him looking.

The office after midnight doesn’t feel like the same building. The lights buzz quieter. The chairs stop squeaking. There’s an eerie sort of calm that settles once the rush hour of deadlines has passed and only the ghosts and last-minute layout edits remain.

Clark is two desks away, sleeves rolled up, tie finally abandoned and flung haphazardly over the back of his chair. He’s squinting at the screen like he’s trying to will the copy into formatting itself.

You’re just as tired—though slightly less heroic-looking about it. Somewhere behind you, the printer groans. A rogue page slides off the tray and flutters to the floor like it’s giving up on life.

Clark gets up to grab it before you can.

“You’re going to hurt yourself,” you say as he crouches to retrieve it. “Or fall asleep with your face on the carpet and get stuck there forever.”

He offers a smile, crooked and half-asleep. “I’ve survived worse. Once fell asleep in a compost pile back in high school.”

You pause. “Why?”

“There was a dare,” he says, deadpan. “And a cow. The rest is classified, sweetheart.”

You snort before you can stop it.

It’s late. You’re punchy. The kind of tired that makes everything a little funnier, a little looser around the edges. He sits back down, stretching long limbs with a groan, and you let the quiet settle again.

“You know Clark, sometimes I feel invisible here.” You don’t mean to say it. It just slips out, quiet and rough from somewhere behind your ribcage.

Clark looks up instantly.

You keep staring at your screen. “It’s all bylines and deadlines, and then the story prints and nobody remembers who wrote it. Doesn’t matter if it’s good or not. No one sees you.” You tap the corner of your spacebar absently. “Feels like yelling into a tunnel most days.”

You expect him to say something vague. Supportive. A standard “no, you’re great!” brush-off. But when you finally glance over, Clark is staring at you with his brow furrowed like someone just insulted his mom.

“That’s ridiculous,” he mutters. “You’re one of the most important voices in the room.”

The words are firm. Not flustered. Not dorky. Certain. It disarms you a little.

You blink. “Clark—”

“No. I mean it, sweetheart," he says, almost stubborn. “You make people care. Even when they don’t want to. That’s rare.”

He looks down at his coffee like maybe it betrayed him by going cold too fast. You don’t say anything. But that ache in your chest eases, just a little.

The next morning, you’re halfway through your walk to work when you find it.

Tucked into the side pocket of your coat—the one you only use for receipts and empty gum wrappers. Folded carefully. Familiar ink.

“Even whispers echo when they’re true.”

You stop walking. Stand there frozen on the corner outside a coffee shop as cars blur past and someone curses at a cab a few feet away. You read the note twice, then a third time.

It’s simple. No flourish. No name. Just words—quiet, certain, and meant for you.

You don’t know why it lands the way it does. Maybe because it doesn’t try to dismiss how you feel. It just… reframes it. You may feel invisible, small, unheard—but this person is saying: that doesn’t make your truth meaningless. You matter, even if it feels like no one’s listening.

You fold the note gently, like it might tear. You don’t tuck this one into your notebook. You keep it in your coat pocket. All day.

Like armor.

By midafternoon, the bullpen’s usual noise has shapeshifted into something louder—one of those half-serious, half-combative newsroom debates that always starts in one cubicle and ends up consuming half the floor.

This time, it’s the great Superman Property Damage Discourse, sparked—unsurprisingly—by Lois Lane slapping a freshly printed article onto her desk like it insulted her directly.

“He destroyed the entire north side of the building,” she says, exasperated, as if she’s already had this argument with the universe and lost.

You don’t look up right away. You’re knee-deep in notes for your community housing series and trying to keep your lunch from leaking onto your desk. But the words still hit.

“To stop a tanker explosion,” you point out without much heat, eyes still scanning your page. “There were twenty-seven people inside.”

“My point,” Lois says, crossing her arms, “is that someone has to pay for all that glass.”

“Pretty sure it’s the insurance companies,” you mutter.

Lois raises a brow at you, but doesn’t push it. She’s used to you playing devil’s advocate—usually it’s just for fun. She doesn’t know this one’s starting to feel a little personal.

And then Clark walks in. He’s balancing two coffee cups and what looks like a roll of blueprints tucked under one arm, sleeves rolled up and tie already loose like the day’s been longer than it should’ve been. His hair’s a mess, wind-tousled and curling near the back of his neck, and he’s got that familiar expression on—half-focused, half-apologetic, like he’s perpetually arriving a few seconds after he meant to.

He slows as he approaches, catches the tail end of Lois’s rant, and hesitates. Just a second. Just long enough for something behind his glasses to tighten. Then, without warning or warm-up, he steps in like a man walking into traffic.

“He’s doing his best, okay?” he blurts. “He can’t help the building fell—there was a fireball.”

The bullpen quiets a beat. Just enough for the words to settle and sting. Lois doesn’t even look up from her monitor. “You sound like a fanboy.”

“I just—” Clark huffs. “He’s trying to protect people. That’s not… easy.”

He lifts his hand to gesture, but his elbow clips the corner of his desk and sends his coffee tipping. The paper cup wobbles, then crashes onto the floor in a slosh of brown across your loose notes.

“Clark!” You shove back in your chair, startled.

“Sorry—sorry—hang on—” He lunges for a stack of printer paper, overcorrects, and knocks over another folder in the process. Its contents scatter like leaves in the wind. He flails to grab what he can, muttering apologies the whole time.

The tension breaks—not because of what he said, but because of the way he said it. Because he’s suddenly in a mess of his own making, trying to mop it up with a handful of flyers and an empty paper towel roll, red-faced and flustered.

You can’t help it. You smile. Just a little.

Lois glances sideways at the scene, then turns to you, tone dry as dust. “Well. He’s… passionate.”

You arch a brow. “That’s one word for it.”

She doesn’t notice the way your eyes linger on him. She doesn’t see the shift in your chest when you watch him drop to one knee, scooping up wet files with shaking hands, his jaw tight—not from embarrassment, but from something quieter. Fiercer.

Because Clark hadn’t just jumped to Superman’s defense.

He’d meant it.

Like someone who knows what it feels like to try and still fall short. Like someone who’s carried the weight of people’s expectations. Like someone who’s watched something burn and had to live with the cost of saving it.

You know it’s ridiculous. You know it’s a stretch. But still… your breath catches.

He steadies the last folder against his desk, rubs the back of his neck, and looks up—right at you. Your eyes meet for a second too long.

You offer him a look that says it’s okay. He returns one that says thanks. And then the moment passes. You turn back to your screen, heart pounding for reasons you won’t name. And Clark returns to quietly drying his desk with a half-crumpled press release.

You don’t say anything. But you’re not watching him by accident anymore.

You’ve read the latest note a dozen times.

“Sometimes I wish I could just be honest with you. But I can’t—not yet.”

There’s no flourish. No compliment. Just rawness, stripped of any careful metaphor or charm. It’s still anonymous, but the voice… it feels closer now. Less like a mystery, more like someone standing just out of sight.

Someone with hands that tremble when they pass you a coffee. Someone who knows how your voice sounds when you’re frustrated. Someone who once told you, very softly, that your words matter.

You start thinking about Clark again. And once the thought roots, it’s impossible to pull it free.

You test him. It’s petty, maybe. Pointless, probably. But you do it anyway. That afternoon, you’re both holed up near the copy desk, reviewing your latest layout. Clark’s seated beside you, sleeves pushed up, his pen tapping lightly against the margin of your column draft. His knee keeps bumping yours under the desk, and every time, he apologizes with a shy smile that doesn’t quite meet your eyes.

You’re running on too little sleep and too many thoughts. So you try it. “You ever hear that phrase? ‘Even whispers echo when they’re true’?”

He looks up from the page. Blinks behind his smudged glasses. “Uh… sure. I mean, not in everyday conversation, but yeah. Sounds poetic.”

You tilt your head, eyes narrowing just slightly. “I read it recently,” you say, like you’re thinking aloud. “Can’t stop turning it over. I don’t know—it stuck with me.”

He stares at you for a beat too long. Then clears his throat and drops his gaze, pen suddenly very busy again. “Yeah. It’s… it’s a good line.”

“You don’t think it’s a little dramatic?”

“No,” he says too quickly. “I mean—it’s true. Sometimes the quietest things are the ones worth listening to.”

You nod, pretending to go back to your edits. But his pen taps a little faster. The corner of his mouth twitches. He’s trying to look neutral, maybe even confused. But Clark Kent couldn’t lie his way out of a grocery list.

And if he did write it, that means he knows you’re testing him.

You don’t call him on it.

Not yet.

Later that evening, he helps you file your story. Technically, Clark’s already done for the day—he could’ve clocked out an hour ago, could’ve gone home and slipped into his flannel pajamas and vanished into whatever quiet life he keeps outside these walls. But instead, he lingers.

His jacket is folded neatly over the back of your chair, sleeves still warm from his arms. His glasses sit low on his nose, catching the screen’s glow, one smudge blooming near the top corner where he’s pushed them up too many times with the side of his thumb.

He leans over the desk beside you, one palm braced flat against the surface, the other gently scrolling through your draft. His frame takes up too much space in that warm, grounding way—shoulder brushing yours occasionally, breath warm at your temple when he leans in to squint at a sentence.

You’re quiet, but not for lack of things to say. It’s the way he’s reading—carefully, like every word deserves to be held. There’s no red pen. No quick fixes. Just soft soundless reverence, like your work is already whole and he’s just lucky to witness it.

And his hands.

God, his hands.

You try not to look, but they’re impossible to ignore. Big and capable, yes, but gentle in the way he uses them—fingers skimming the edge of the printout like the paper might bruise, thumb stroking over the corner where the page curls, slow and absentminded. The pads of his fingers are slightly ink-stained, callused just at the tips. He smells faintly like cheap soap and newsroom toner and something you can’t name but have already begun to crave.

You wonder—just for a moment—what it would be like to feel those hands touch you with purpose instead of hesitation. Without the paper buffer. Without the quiet restraint.

He leans a little closer. You can feel the press of his shirt sleeve against your arm now, soft cotton against skin. “Looks perfect to me,” he murmurs.

It’s not the words. It’s the way he says them—like he’s not just talking about the story. You swallow, pulse jumping. You wonder if he hears it. You wonder if he feels it.

His eyes flick to yours for just a second. Something hangs in the air—fragile, charged. Then the phone rings down the hall, and the spell breaks like steam off hot glass. He steps back. You exhale like you’ve been holding your breath for three paragraphs.

You don’t look at him as he grabs his jacket. You just nod and whisper, “Thanks.”

And he just smiles—soft and private, like a secret passed from his mouth to your chest.

You don’t go home right away. You sit at your desk long after Clark and the rest of the bullpen has emptied out, coat draped over your shoulders like a blanket, fingers toying with the folded edge of the note in your lap.

“Sometimes I wish I could just be honest with you. But I can’t—not yet.”

You’ve read it enough times to have it memorized. Still, your eyes trace the handwriting again—careful lettering, no signature, just that quiet ache bleeding between the lines.

It’s the first one that feels more than just flirtation. This one hurts a little. So you do something you haven’t done before.

You pull a post-it from the stack beside your monitor, scribble down one sentence—no flourish, no punctuation.

“Then tell me in person.”

You slide it beneath your stapler before you leave. A deliberate offering. You don’t know how he’s been getting the others to you—if it’s during your lunch break or when you’re in the print room or bent over in the archives. But somehow, he knows.

So this time, you let him find something waiting.

And when you finally shrug on your coat and step into the elevator, the empty quiet of the newsroom echoes behind you like a held breath.

The next morning, there’s no reply. Not on your desk. Not slipped into your coat pocket. Not scribbled in the margin of your planner or tucked beneath your coffee cup. Just silence.

You try not to feel disappointed. You try not to spiral. Maybe he’s waiting. Maybe he’s scared. Maybe you’re wrong and it’s not who you think. But your chest feels hollow all the same—like something almost happened and didn’t.

So that night, you write again. Your hands shake more than they should for something so simple. A sticky note. A few words. But this one names it.

“One chance. One sunset. Centennial Park. Bench by the lion statue. Tomorrow.”

You stare at the words a long time before setting it down. This one’s not a joke. Not a dare. Not a flirtation scribbled in passing. This is an invitation. A door left open.

You slide it under your stapler the same way you’ve received every one of his notes—unassuming, tucked in plain sight. If he wants to find it, he will. You’ve stopped questioning how he does it. Maybe it’s timing. Maybe it’s instinct. Maybe it’s something else entirely.

But you know he’ll see it.

You pack up slowly. Shoulders tight. Bag heavier than usual. The newsroom is quiet at this hour—just the low hum of the overhead fluorescents and the soft, endless churn of printers in the back. You turn off your monitor, loop your coat over your arm, and make your way to the elevator.

Halfway there, something makes you stop. You glance back. Clark is still at his desk.

You hadn’t heard him return. You hadn’t even noticed the light at his station flick back on. But there he is—elbows on the desk, hands folded in front of him, eyes already lifted.

Watching you.

His face is unreadable, but his gaze lingers longer than it should. Soft. Searching. Almost caught. You feel the air shift. Not a word is exchanged. Just that one look.

Then the elevator dings. You turn away before you can lose your nerve.

And Clark? He doesn’t look down. Not until the doors slide shut in front of your face.

You tell yourself it doesn’t matter. You tell yourself it was probably nothing. A game. A passing flirtation. Maybe Jimmy, playing an elaborate prank he’ll one day claim was performance art.

But still—you dress carefully.

You pull out that one sweater that always makes you feel like the best version of yourself, and you smooth your collar twice before you leave. You wear lip balm that smells faintly like vanilla and leave the office ten minutes early just in case traffic is worse than expected. Just in case he’s early.

You get there first. The bench is colder than you remember. Stone weathered and a little damp from last night’s rain. Your coffee steams in your hands, and for a while, that’s enough to keep you warm.

The sky begins to soften around the edges. First blush pink, then golden orange, then the faintest sweep of violet, like a bruise blooming across the clouds. You watch the city skyline fade into silhouettes. The sun drips lower behind the glass towers, catching the river in a moment of molten reflection. It’s beautiful.

It’s also empty.

You wait. A couple strolls past, fingers laced, talking softly like they’ve been in love for years. A jogger nods as they pass, earbuds in, a scruffy golden retriever trotting faithfully beside them. The dog looks up at you like it knows something—like it sees something.

The wind kicks up. You pull your coat tighter. You tell yourself to give it five more minutes. Then five more.

And then—

Nothing. No footsteps. No note. No him.

Your coffee goes cold between your palms. The stone starts to seep into your bones. And somewhere deep in your chest, something you hadn’t even dared name… wilts.

Eventually, you stand. Walk home with your coat buttoned all the way up, even though it’s not that cold. You don’t cry.

You just go quiet.

The next morning, the bullpen hums with the usual Monday static. Phones ringing. Keys clacking. Perry’s voice barking something about a missed quote from the sanitation board. Jimmy’s camera shutter clicking in staccato bursts behind you. The Daily Planet in full swing—ordinary chaos wrapped in coffee breath and fluorescent lighting.

You move through it on autopilot. Your smile is small, tight around the edges. You’ve become a master of folding disappointment into your posture—chin lifted, eyes clear, mouth curved just enough to seem fine.

“Guess the secret admirer thing was just a prank after all.” You drop your bag beside your desk, shuffle through the morning copy logs, and say it lightly. Offhand. Like a joke. “Should’ve known better.” You make sure your voice carries just far enough. Not loud, but not a whisper. Casual. A throwaway comment designed to sound unaffected. And then you laugh. It’s short. Hollow. It dies in your throat before it even fully escapes.

Lois glances up from her monitor, eyes narrowing faintly behind dark lashes. She doesn’t laugh with you. She doesn’t smile. She just watches you for a beat too long. Not with judgment. Not even pity. Just… knowing. But she says nothing. And neither do you.

What you don’t see is the hallway—just twenty feet away—where Clark Kent stands frozen in place. He’d just walked in—late, coat slung over one arm, takeout coffee in the other. He had stopped just inside the threshold to adjust his glasses. He’d meant to offer you a second coffee, the one he bought on impulse after circling the block too many times.

And then he heard it. Your voice. “Guess the secret admirer thing was just a prank after all.” And then your laugh. That awful, paper-thin laugh.

He goes still. Like someone pulled the oxygen from the room. His hand tightens around the coffee cup until the lid creaks. The other arm drops slack at his side, coat nearly slipping from his grasp. His jaw tenses. Shoulders stiffen beneath his white button-down, and for one awful second, he forgets how to breathe.

Because you sound like someone trying not to care. And it cuts deeper than he expects. Because he’d meant to come. Because he tried. Because he was so close.

But none of that matters now. All you know is that he didn’t show up. And now you think the whole thing was a joke. A stupid, secret game. His game. And he can’t even explain—not without tearing everything open.

He stares down the corridor, eyes fixed on the edge of your desk, on the shape of your shoulders turned slightly away. He watches as you pick up your coffee and blow gently across the lid like it might chase the bitterness from your chest.

You don’t turn around. You don’t see the way he stands there—gutted, unmoving, undone. The cup trembles in his hand. He turns away before it spills.

That night, you go back to the office. You tell yourself it’s for the deadline. A follow-up piece on the housing committee. Edits on the west-side zoning profile. Anything to fill the time between sunset and sleep—because if you sleep, you’ll just dream of that bench.

The newsroom is quiet now. All overhead lights dimmed except for the halo of your desk lamp and the soft thrum of a copy machine left cycling in the corner.

You drop your bag with a sigh. Stretch your shoulders. Slide your desk drawer open without thinking. And find it. A note. No envelope. No tape. No ceremony. Just a single sheet of cream stationery folded in thirds. Familiar handwriting. Neat loops. Unshaking.

You unfold it slowly.

“I’m sorry. I wanted to be there. I can’t explain why I couldn’t— But it wasn’t a joke. It was never a joke. Please believe that.”

The words hit like a breath you didn’t know you were holding. Then they blur. You read it again. Then again. But the ache in your chest doesn’t settle. Because how do you believe someone who won’t show their face? How do you believe someone who keeps slipping between your fingers?

You hold the note to your chest. Close your eyes. You want to believe him. God, you want to. But you don’t know how anymore.

What you couldn’t know is this: Clark Kent was already running. He’d been on his way—coat flapping behind him, tie unspooling in the wind, breath fogging as he dashed through traffic, one hand wrapped tight around a note he planned to deliver in person for the first time. He’d rehearsed it. Practiced what he’d say. Built up to it with every beat of a terrified heart.

He saw the park lights up ahead. Saw the lion statue. Saw the shape of a figure sitting alone on that bench.

And then the air split open. The sky went green. A fifth-dimensional imp—not even from this universe—tore through Metropolis like a child flipping pages in a pop-up book. Reality folded. Buildings bent sideways. Streetlamps started singing jazz standards.

Clark barely had time to take a deep breath before he vanished into smoke and flame, spinning upward in a blur of red and blue. Somewhere across town, Superman joined Guy Gardner, Hawk Girl, Mr. Terrific, and Metamorpho in trying to contain the chaos before the city unmade itself entirely.

He never got the chance to reach the bench. He never got the chance to say anything. The note stayed in his pocket until it was soaked with rain and streaked with ash. Until it was too late.

It’s supposed to be routine. You’re only there to cover a zoning dispute. A boring, mid-week council press event that’s been rescheduled three times already. The air is heavy with heat and bureaucracy. You and your photographer barely make it past the front barricades before the scene spirals into chaos.

First it’s the downed power lines—sparking in rapid bursts as something hits the utility pole two blocks down. Then a car screeches over the median. Then someone starts screaming.

You’re still trying to piece it together when the crowd surges—someone shouts about a gun. People scatter. A window shatters across the street. A chunk of concrete falls from the sky like a thrown brick.

Your feet move before your brain catches up. You hit the pavement just as something explodes behind you. A jolt rings through your bones, sharp and high and metallic. Dust clouds the air. There’s shouting, then screaming, and your ears go fuzzy for one split second.

And then he lands.

Superman.

Cape whipping behind him like it’s caught in its own storm, boots cracking against the sidewalk as he drops down between the wreckage and the people still trying to flee. He moves like nothing you’ve ever seen.

Not just fast—but impossible. His body a blur of motion, heat, and purpose. He rips a crumpled lamppost off a trapped woman like it weighs nothing. Hurls it aside and crouches low beside her, voice firm but gentle as he checks her pulse, her leg, her name.

You’re frozen where you crouch, half behind a parking meter, hand pressed to your chest like it can keep your heart from tearing loose.

And then be turns. Looks straight at you. His expression shifts. Just for a moment. Just for you. He steps forward, dust streaking his suit, eyes dark with something you don’t have time to name. He reaches you in three strides, body angled between you and the chaos, hand raised in warning before you can speak.

“Stay here, sweetheart. Please.”

Your stomach drops. Not at the danger. Not at the sound of buildings groaning in the distance or the flash of gunmetal tucked into a stranger’s hand.

It’s him. That word. That voice. The exact way of saying it—like it’s muscle memory. Like he’s said it a thousand times before.

Like Clark says it.

It stuns you more than the explosion did.

You blink up at him, speechless, heart stuttering behind your ribs as he holds your gaze just a second longer than he should. His brow furrows. Then he’s gone—into the fray, into the fire, into the part of the story where your pen can’t follow.

You don’t remember standing. You don’t remember how you get back to the press line, only that your legs shake and your palms burn and every time you try to replay what just happened, your brain gets stuck on one word.

Sweetheart.

You’ve heard it before—dozens of times. Always soft. Always accidental. Always from behind thick glasses and a crooked tie and a mouth still chewing the edge of a muffin while he scrolls through zoning reports.

Clark says it when he forgets you’re not his to claim. Clark says it when you’re both the last ones in the office and he thinks you’re asleep at your desk. Clark says it like a secret. Like a slip.

And Superman just said it exactly the same way. Same tone. Same warmth. Same quiet ache beneath it.

But that’s not possible. Because Superman is—Superman. Bold. Dazzling. Fire-forged. He walks like he owns the sky. He speaks like a storm made flesh. He radiates power and perfection.

And Clark? Clark is all flannel and stammering jokes and soft eyes behind big frames. He’s gentle. A little clumsy. His swagger is borrowed from farm porches and storybooks. He’s sweet in a way Superman couldn’t possibly be.

Couldn’t… Right? You chalk it up to coincidence. You have to.

…Sort of.

You don’t sleep well the night after the incident. You keep replaying it—frame by impossible frame. The gunshot, the smoke, the sky splitting in half. The crack of his landing, the rush of wind off his cape. The weight of his body between you and danger. And then that voice.

“Stay here, sweetheart. Please.”

You flinch every time it echoes in your head. Every time your brain folds it over the countless memories you have of Clark saying it in passing, like it was nothing. Like it meant nothing.

But it means something now.

You come into the office the next day wired and quiet, adrenaline still burning faintly at the edges of your skin. You aren’t sure what to say, or to whom, so you say nothing. You stare too long at your coffee. You snap at a printer jam. You forget your lunch in the breakroom fridge.

Clark notices. He hovers by your desk that morning, a second coffee in hand—one of those specialty orders from that corner place he knows you like but always pretends he doesn’t remember.

“Rough day?” he asks gently. His tone is careful. Soft. As if you’re a glass already rattling on the edge of the shelf.

You don’t look up. “It’s fine.”

He hesitates. Then sets the coffee down beside your elbow, just far enough that you have to choose whether or not to reach for it. “I heard about the power line thing,” he adds. “You okay?”

“I said I’m fine, Clark.”

A beat.

You hate the way his face flickers at that—hurt, barely masked. He pushes his glasses up and nods like he deserves it. Like he’s been expecting it. He doesn’t press. He just walks away.

You find yourself whispering to Lois over takeout later that afternoon—half a conversation muttered between bites of noodles and the hum of flickering overheads.

“He called me sweetheart.”

She raises an eyebrow. “Clark?”

“No. Superman.”

Her chewing slows.

You keep your eyes on the edge of your desk. “That’s… weird, right?”

Lois makes a sound—somewhere between a scoff and a laugh. “He’s a superhero. They charm every pretty girl they pull out of a burning building.”

You poke at your noodles. “Still. It felt…”

“Weird?” she teases again, nudging her knee against yours.

You shrug like it doesn’t matter. Like it hasn’t been clawing at the back of your brain for three days straight. Lois doesn’t press. Just watches you for a second longer than necessary. Then she moves on, launching into a tirade about Perry’s passive-aggressive post-it notes and the fact that someone keeps stealing her pens.

But the damage is already done. Because you start thinking maybe you’ve just been projecting. Maybe you want your secret admirer to be Clark so badly that your brain’s rewriting reality—latching onto any voice, any phrase, any fleeting resemblance and assigning it meaning.

Sweetheart.

It’s a common word. It doesn’t mean anything. Maybe Superman says it to everyone. Maybe he has a whole roster of soft pet names for dazed civilians. Maybe you’re the delusional one—sitting here wondering if your awkward, sweet, left-footed coworker moonlights as a god.

The idea is so absurd it actually makes you laugh. Quietly. Bitterly. Right into your carton of lo mein. You tell yourself to let it go. But you don’t.

You can’t. Because somewhere deep down, it doesn’t feel absurd at all. It feels… close. Like you’re brushing against the edge of something true. And if you get just a little closer—

You might fall right through it.

Clark pulls back after that. Subtly. Slowly. Like he’s dimming himself on purpose. He’s still there—still kind, still thoughtful, still Clark. But the rhythm changes.

The coffees stop appearing on your desk each morning. No more sticky notes with half-legible puns or awkward smiley faces. No more jokes under his breath during staff meetings. No more warm glances across the bullpen when you’re stuck late and your screen is giving you a headache.

His chair now sits just a little farther from yours in the layout room. Not enough to be obvious. Just enough to feel. You notice it the way you notice when the air shifts before a storm. Quiet. Inevitable.

Even his messages change. Once, his texts used to come with too many exclamation marks and a tendency to type out haha when he was nervous. Now they’re brief. Punctuated. Polite.

“Got your quote. Sending now.” “Perry said we’re cleared for page A3.” “Hope your meeting went okay.”

You reread them more than you should. Not because of what they say—but because of what they don’t. It feels like being ghosted by someone who still waves to you across the room.

You try to talk yourself down. Maybe he’s just busy. Maybe he’s stressed. Maybe you’ve been projecting. Maybe it’s not your admirer’s handwriting that matches his. Maybe it’s not his voice that slipped out of Superman’s mouth like a secret.

Maybe, maybe, maybe.

But the space he used to fill next to you… feels like a light that’s been quietly turned off. And you are the one still blinking against the dark.

And yet, one afternoon, someone in the bullpen makes a snide remark about your latest piece. You don’t even catch the beginning—just the tail end of it, lazy and smug.

“—basically just fluff, right? She’s been coasting lately.”

You’re about to ignore it. You’re tired. Too tired. And what’s the point in arguing with someone who thinks nuance is a liability?

But then—Clark speaks. Not from beside you, but from across the room. You’re not even sure how he could have possibly heard the guy talking across all the hustle and bustle of the bullpen. But his voice cuts through the noise like someone snapping a ruler against a desk.

“I just think her work actually matters, okay?”

Silence follows. Not because of the volume—he wasn’t loud. Just certain. Unflinching. Like he’d been holding it in. The words hang in the air, charged and too real.

Clark looks immediately horrified with himself. He goes red. Not a faint flush—crimson. Mouth parting like he wants to take it back but doesn’t know how. He tries to recover, to smooth it over—but nothing comes. Just a flustered shake of his head and a noise that might’ve been his name.

The other reporter stares. “…Okay, man. Chill.”

Clark mumbles something about grabbing a file from archives and practically stumbles for the hallway, papers clenched awkwardly in one hand like a shield.

You don’t follow. You just… sit there. Staring at the space he left behind. Because that moment—those words—it wasn’t just instinct. It wasn’t just kindness. It was him.

The way he said it. The emotion in it. The rhythm of it. It felt like the notes. Like the quiet encouragements tucked into the margins of your day. Like someone watching, quietly, gently, hoping you’ll see yourself the way they do.

You think about the phrases he’s used before.

“The line you cut in paragraph six was my favorite. About hope not being the same thing as naivety.” “Even whispers echo when they’re true.”

And now:

“Her work actually matters.”

All said like they were true, not convenient. All said like they were about you.

You start to notice more after that. The way Clark compliments your writing��always specific. Never lazy. The way his eyes crinkle when he’s proud of something you said, even when he doesn’t speak up. The way he turns the thermostat up exactly two degrees every time you bring your sweater into work. The way he walks a half-step behind you when you both leave late at night.

It’s not a confession. Not yet. But it’s a pattern. And once you start seeing it—

You can’t stop.

It’s a quiet afternoon in the bullpen. The kind where the overhead lights hum just loud enough to notice and everything smells like stale coffee and highlighter ink.

Clark’s sprawled in front of his monitor, sleeves rolled to his elbows, brow furrowed with the kind of intensity he usually saves for city zoning laws and double-checked citations. You’re helping him sort through quotes—most of which came from a reluctant press secretary and one very talkative dog walker who may or may not be a credible witness.

“Can you check the time stamp on the third transcript?” he asks, not looking up from his notes. “I think I messed it up when I formatted.”

You nod, flipping through the stack of papers he passed you earlier. That’s when you see it. Folded beneath the top printout, half-tucked into the margin of a city planning spreadsheet, is a different kind of note. A loose sheet, scribbled across in black ink. Not typed—written. Slanted lines. A few false starts crossed out.

At first, you think it’s a headline draft. A brainstorm. But the longer you stare, the more it reads like… something else.

“The city is loud today. Not just noise, but motion. Memory. The way people hum when they think no one’s listening.” “I can’t stop watching her move through it like she belongs to it. Like it belongs to her.”

You freeze. Your eyes track down the page slowly, like touching something sacred.

The letters are familiar. The lowercase y curls the same way as the one on your very first note—the one that came with your coffee. The ink is the same soft black, slightly smudged in the corners, like whoever wrote it holds the pen too tight when they’re thinking. The paper is the same notepad stock he’s used before. The same faint red line down the margin.

You don’t mean to do it, but your fingers curl around the page. Your chest goes tight. Because it’s not just similar.

It’s exact.

You hear him coming before you see him—those long, careful strides and the faint jangle of the lanyard he keeps forgetting to take off.

You tuck the paper into your notebook. Quick. Smooth. Automatic.

“Hey, sorry,” he says, rounding the corner with two mugs of tea and a slightly sheepish smile. “Printer’s jammed again. I may have made it worse.”

You nod. Too fast. You can’t quite make your voice work yet. Clark hands you your tea—just the way you like it, no comment—and sits across from you like nothing’s wrong. Like your whole world hasn’t tilted six degrees to the left.

He launches into a ramble about column widths and quote placement, about whether a serif font looks more “established” than sans serif.

You don’t hear a word of it. You just… watch him. The way he gestures too big with his hands. The way his glasses slip down his nose mid-sentence and he doesn’t bother to fix them until they’re practically falling off. The way his voice drops a little when he’s thinking hard—low and warm and utterly unselfconscious.

He has no idea you know. No idea what you just found.

You murmur something about needing to catch a meeting and excuse yourself early. He nods. Worries at his bottom lip like he’s debating whether to walk you out. Decides against it.

“Thanks for the help,” he says quietly, as you shoulder your bag. “Seriously. I couldn’t’ve done this draft without you.”

You give him a look you don’t quite know how to name. Something between thank you and I see you.

Then you go.

That night, you sit on your bedroom floor with the drawer open. Every note. Every folded scrap. Every secret tucked under your stapler or slid into your sleeve or left beside your coffee cup. You line them up in rows. You flatten them with careful hands. And you compare. One by one.

The loops. The lines. The uneven spacing. The curl of the r. The hush in every sentence, like he was writing them with his heart too close to the surface.

There’s no room for doubt anymore. It’s him. It’s been him this whole time.

Clark Kent.

And somehow—somehow—he’s still never said your name aloud when he writes about you. Not once. But every letter reads like a whisper of it. Like a promise waiting to be spoken.

The office is quiet by the time you find the nerve.

Desks are abandoned, chairs turned at angles, the windows dark with city glow. Outside, Metropolis hums in its usual low thrum—sirens and neon and distant jazz from a rooftop bar—but here, in the bullpen, it’s just the steady tick of the wall clock and the slow, careful steps you take toward his desk.

Clark doesn’t hear you at first. He’s bent over a red pen and a half-finished draft, glasses low on his nose, the curve of his back hunched the way it always is when he’s lost in edits. His tie is loosened. His sleeves are pushed up. There’s a smear of ink on his thumb. He looks soft in the way people do when they think no one’s watching.

You speak before you lose your nerve. “Why didn’t you just tell me?”

Clark startles. Not dramatically—just a sharp breath and a too-quick motion to sit upright, like a kid caught doodling in the margins. “I—what?”

You don’t let your voice shake. “That it was you. The notes. The park. All of it.”

He stares at you. Then down at his desk. Then back again. His mouth opens like it wants to offer a lie, but nothing comes out. Just silence. His fingers twitch toward the edge of the desk and stop there, curling into his palm.

“I—” he tries again, softer now, “—I didn’t think you knew.”

“I didn’t.” Your voice is gentle. But not easy. “Not at first. Not really. But then I saw that list on your desk and… I went home and checked the handwriting.”

He winces. “I knew I left that out somewhere.”

You cross your arms, not out of anger—more like self-protection. “You could’ve told me. At any point. I asked you.”

“I know.” He swallows hard. “I know. I wanted to. I… tried.”

You watch him. Wait.

And then he says it. Not loud. Not dramatic. Just the truth, raw and shaky and so Clark it nearly breaks you. “Because if I told you it was me… you might look at me different. Or worse… The same.”

You don’t know what to say to that. Not right away. Your heart clenches. Because it’s so him—to assume your affection could only live in the mystery. That the truth of him—soft, clumsy, brilliant, real—would somehow undo the magic.

“Clark…” you start, but your voice slips.

He rubs the back of his neck. “I’m just the guy who spills coffee on his own notes and forgets to refill the paper tray. You’re… you. You write like you’re on fire. You walk into a room and it listens. I didn’t think someone like you would ever want someone like me.”

You stare at him. Really stare. At the flushed cheeks. The nervous hands. The boyish smile he’s trying to bury under self-deprecation. And then you say it. “I saved every note.”

He blinks.

You keep going. “I read them when I felt invisible. When I thought no one gave a damn what I was doing here. They mattered.”

Clark’s breath catches. He opens his mouth. Closes it again. He takes a slow step forward, tentative. Like he’s afraid to break the spell. His eyes search yours, and for a moment—for a second so still it might as well last an hour—he leans in. Not close enough to kiss you. But almost. His hand brushes yours. He stops. The air is heavy between you, buzzing with something fragile and enormous. But it isn’t enough. Not yet.

You draw in a breath, quiet but steady. “Why didn’t you meet me?”

Clark goes still. You can see it happen—the way the question lands. The way he folds in on himself just slightly, like the truth is too heavy to hold upright.

“I…” He tries, but the word doesn’t land. His jaw flexes. His eyes drop to the floor, then back up. He wants to tell you. He almost does. But he can’t. Not without unraveling everything. Not without unraveling himself.

“I wanted to,” he says finally, voice rough at the edges. “More than anything.”

“But?” you press, gently.

He just looks at you and says nothing. You nod, slowly. The silence says enough. Your chest aches—not in a sharp, bitter way. In the dull, familiar way of something you already suspected being confirmed.

You glance down at where your hand still brushes his, then look back at him—really look. “I wish you’d told me,” you whisper. “I sat there thinking it was a joke. That I made it all up. That I was stupid for believing in any of it.”

“I know,” he murmurs. “And I’m sorry.”

Your throat tightens. You swallow past it. “I just… I need time. To process. To think.”

Clark’s eyes flicker—hope and heartbreak, all tangled up in one look. “Of course,” he says immediately. “Take whatever you need. I mean it.”

A beat passes before you say the part that makes his breath catch. “I’m happy it was you.”

He freezes.

You offer the smallest smile. “I wanted it to be you.”

And for the first time in minutes, something in his shoulders unknots. There’s a shift. Gentle. Quiet. His hand lingers near yours again, knuckles brushing. He doesn’t lean in. Doesn’t push.

But God, he wants to. And maybe… maybe you do too. The moment stretches, unspoken and warm and not quite ready to be anything more.

You both stay like that—close, not touching. Breathing the same charged air. Then he laughs under his breath. Nervous. Boyish.

“I’m probably gonna trip over something the second you walk away.”

You smile back. “Just recalibrate your ankles.”

He huffs out a laugh, head ducking. “I deserved that.”

You start to turn away. Just a little. But his voice stops you again—quiet, sincere, something earnest catching in it. “I’m really glad it was me, too.”

And your heart flutters all over again.

Lois is perched on the edge of your desk, a paper takeout box balanced on her knee, chopsticks waving in lazy circles while you pick at your own dinner with a little too much focus.

You haven’t told her everything. Not the everything everything. Not the way your heart nearly cracked open when Clark looked at you like you were made of starlight and library books. Not how close he got before pulling back. Not how you pulled back too, even though your whole body ached to close the distance.

But you have told her about the notes. About the mystery. About the strange tenderness of it all, how it wrapped around your days like a string you didn’t know you were following until it tugged. And Lois—Lois has been unusually quiet about it. Until now.

“I’m setting you up,” she says between bites, like she’s discussing filing taxes.

You blink. “What?”

“A date. Just one. Guy from the Features desk at the Tribune. You’ll like him. He’s taller than you, decent jawline, wears socks that match. He’s got strong opinions about punctuation, which I figure is basically foreplay for you.”

You stare at her. “You don’t even believe in setups.”

“I don’t,” she agrees. “But you’ve been spiraling in circles for weeks, and at this point, I either push you toward a date or stage an intervention with PowerPoint slides.”

You laugh despite yourself. “You have PowerPoint slides?”

“Of course not,” she scoffs. “I have a Google Doc.”

You roll your eyes. “Lois—”

“Listen,” she says, gentler now. “I know you’re in deep with whoever this guy is. And if it is Clark… well. I can see why.”

Your stomach flips.

“But maybe stepping outside of the Planet for two hours wouldn’t kill you. Let someone else flirt with you for once. Let yourself figure out what you actually want.”

You press your lips together. Look down at your barely-touched food.

“You don’t have to fall for him,” she adds, softly. “Just let yourself be seen.”

You exhale through your nose. “He better be cute.”

“Oh, he is. Total sweater vest energy.”

You snort. “So your type.”

“Exactly.” She lifts her takeout carton in a mock toast. “To emotionally compromised coworkers and their tragic love lives.”

You clink your chopsticks against hers like it’s the saddest champagne flute in the world. And later, when you’re getting ready, you still feel the weight of Clark’s almost-kiss behind your ribs. But you go anyway. Because Lois is right. You need to know what it is you’re choosing. Even if, deep down, you already do.

The date isn’t bad. That’s the most frustrating part. He’s nice. Polished in that media school kind of way—crisp shirt, clean shave, a practiced smile that belongs on a campaign poster. He compliments your bylines and talks about his dream of running an independent magazine one day. He orders the good whiskey and laughs at your jokes.

But it’s the wrong laugh. Off by a beat. The rhythm’s not right.

When he leans in, you don’t. When he talks, your thoughts drift—to mismatched socks and printer toner smudges. To how someone else always remembers your coffee order. To how someone else listens, not to respond, but to see.

You realize it halfway through the second drink. You’re thinking about Clark again.

The softness of him. The steadiness. The way he over-apologizes in texts but never hesitates when someone challenges your work. The way his voice tilts a little higher when he’s nervous. The way his laugh never lands in the right place, but somehow makes the whole room feel warmer.

You pull your coat tighter when you leave the restaurant, cheeks stinging from the wind and the slow unraveling of a night that should’ve meant something. It doesn’t. Not in the way that matters.

So you walk. You tell yourself you’re just passing by the Daily Planet. That maybe you left your notes there. That it’s just a habit, stopping in this late. But when you scan your ID badge and push through the heavy glass doors, you already know the truth. You’re hoping he’s still here.

And he is.

The bullpen is almost entirely dark, save for a single desk lamp casting gold across the layout section. He’s hunched over it—tie loosened, sleeves rolled up, shirt rumpled like he’s been pacing, thinking, rewriting. His glasses are folded beside him on the desk. His hair’s a mess—fingers clearly run through it too many times.

He rubs at his eyes with the heel of his palm, breathing out hard through his nose. You don’t say anything. You just… watch. It hits you in one perfect, unshakable moment. The slope of his shoulders. The cut of his jaw. The furrow in his brow when he’s thinking too hard.

He looks like Superman.

No glasses. No slouch. No excuses. But more than that—he looks like Clark. Like the man who learned your coffee order. Like the one who saves all his best edits for last so he can tell you in person how good your writing is. The one who panicked when you got too close to the truth, but couldn’t stop leaving notes anyway.

And when he finally lifts his head and sees you standing there—still in your coat, fingers tight around your notebook—you watch something shift in his expression. A flicker of surprise. Panic. Bare, open emotion. Because you’re seeing him without the glasses.

“Couldn’t sleep,” you murmur. “Thought I’d grab my notes.”

He smiles, slow and unsure. “You… left them by the scanner.”

You nod, like that matters. Like you came here for paper and not for him. Then you walk over, slow and deliberate, and retrieve your notes from the edge of the scanner beside him. He swallows hard, watching you.

Then clears his throat. “So… how was the date?”

You pause. “Fine,” you say. “He was nice. Funny. Smart.”

Clark nods, but you’re not finished.

“But when he laughed, it was the wrong rhythm. And when he spoke, I didn’t lean in.”

You meet his eyes—clear blue, unhidden now. “I made up my mind halfway through the second drink.” His lips part. Barely. You move to the edge of his desk and set your notebook down. Then—carefully, slowly—you pull out the chair beside his and sit. The air between you goes molten.

Clark leans in a little, eyes flicking to your mouth, then back to your eyes. One hand moves down, like he’s going to say something, but instead, he reaches for the leg of your chair—fingers curling around it. And pulls you toward him. The scrape of wood against tile echoes, loud and deliberate. Your thighs knock his. Your breath stutters.

He’s so close now you can feel the heat rolling off him. The weight of his gaze. Your heart hammers in your chest. And lower.

“Clark—” But you don’t finish because he meets you halfway. The kiss is fire and breath and years of want pressed between two mouths. His hands come up—one to your jaw, the other to the back of your head—and tilt your face just so. Fingers tangle in your hair, anchoring you to him like he’s afraid you might vanish.

You moan into his mouth. Soft. Surprised. He groans back. Rougher. You reach for his shirt blindly, fists curling in the cotton as he pulls you fully into his lap—into the chair with him, your legs straddling his thighs. His hands don’t know where to land. Your waist. Your thighs. Your face again.

“You’re it,” he whispers against your mouth. “You’ve always been it.”

You know he means it. Because you’ve seen it. In every note. Every glance. Every moment he looked at you like you were already his. And now, with your bodies tangled, mouths tasting each other, breathing the same heat—you finally believe it.

You don’t say it yet. But the way you kiss him again says it for you. You’re his. You always have been.

His hands roam, but never rush. Your fingers are tangled in his shirt, your knees pressing to either side of his hips, and you feel him—all of him—underneath you, solid and steady and shaking just slightly. The chair creaks with every breath you share. His mouth is still on yours, slow now, like he’s memorizing the shape of you. Like he’s afraid if he goes too fast, you’ll disappear again.

When he finally pulls back—just enough to breathe—it’s with a soft, reverent exhale. His nose brushes yours. “You’re really here,” he murmurs, voice hoarse. “God, you’re really here.”

You blink at him, your hands sliding to either side of his jaw, thumbs brushing the high flush of his cheeks. He looks so open. Like you’ve peeled back every layer of him with just a kiss. And maybe you have.

His lips find the edge of your jaw next, slow and aching. A kiss. Then another, just beneath your ear. Then one lower, along the soft skin of your neck. Each press of his mouth feels like a confession. Like something that was buried too long, finally given air.

“You don’t know,” he whispers. “You don’t know what it’s been like, watching you and not getting to—” Another kiss, right beneath your cheekbone. “I used to rehearse things I’d say to you, and then I’d get to work and you’d smile and I’d forget how to talk.”

A laugh huffs out of you, but it melts fast when he leans in again, his breath fanning warm across your skin. “I didn’t think I’d ever get this close. I didn’t think I’d get to touch you like this.”

You shift in his lap, chest brushing his, and his hands squeeze your waist gently like he’s grounding himself. His mouth finds your temple. Your cheek. The corner of your mouth again.

“You’re so—” he breaks off. Tries again. “You’re everything.” Your pulse thrums in your throat. Clark’s hands stay respectful, but they wander—curving up your back, smoothing over your shoulders, settling at your ribs like he wants to hold you together.

“I used to write those notes late at night,” he admits against your collarbone. “Didn’t even think you’d read them at first. But you did. You kept them.”

“I kept every one,” you whisper.

His breath catches. You tilt his face back up to yours, studying him in the low, golden light. His hair’s a little messy now from your fingers. His lips pink and kiss-swollen. His chest rising and falling like he’s just run a marathon. And still, even now—he’s looking at you like he’s the one who’s lucky.

Clark kisses you again—soft, like a promise. Then a trail of them, across your cheek, your jaw, your throat. Slow enough to make your skin shiver and your hips shift instinctively against his lap. He groans quietly at that—barely audible—but doesn’t press for more. He just holds you tighter.

“I’d wait forever for you,” he murmurs into your skin. “I don’t need anything else. Just this. Just you.” You bury your face in his shoulder, overwhelmed, heart pounding like a war drum. You don’t say anything back. You just press another kiss to his throat, and feel him smile where your mouth lands.

The city is quieter at night—its edges softened under streetlamp glow, concrete warming beneath the fading breath of the day. There’s a breeze that tugs gently at your coat as you and Clark walk side by side, your fingers still loosely laced with his. His hand is big. Warm. Rough in the places that tell stories. Gentle in the ways that say everything else.

Neither of you speaks at first. The silence isn’t awkward. It’s thick with something tender. Like a string strung tight between your ribs and his, humming with each shared step.

When he glances down at you, his smile is small and almost shy. “I can’t believe I didn’t knock over the chair,” he says after a few blocks, voice pitched low with laughter.

You grin. “You were close. I think my thigh is bruised.”

He groans. “Don’t say that—I’ll lose sleep.”

You look at him sidelong. “You weren’t going to sleep anyway.” That earns you a pink flush down the side of his neck, and you tuck that image away for safekeeping.

Your building looms closer, brick and ivy-wrapped and familiar in the soft hush of the hour. You slow as you reach the front step, turning to face him.

“Thank you,” you murmur. You don’t mean just for the walk.

He holds your hand a beat longer. Then, without a word, he lifts it—presses his lips to your knuckles. It’s soft. Reverent.

Your breath catches in your throat. And maybe that’s what breaks the spell—maybe that’s what makes it all too much and not enough at once—because the next second, you’re reaching. Or maybe he is. It doesn’t matter. He kisses you again—this time fuller, deeper—your back brushing against the door behind you, his other hand cradling your cheek like he’s afraid you’ll vanish if he doesn’t hold you just right.

It doesn’t last long. Just long enough to taste the weight of what’s shifting between you. To feel it crest again in your chest.

When he finally pulls back, his lips hover a breath away from yours. “I’ll see you tomorrow,” he says softly.

You nod. You can’t quite say anything back yet. He gives your hand one last squeeze, then turns and disappears down the street, hands stuffed in his pockets, shoulders curved slightly inward like he’s holding in a smile he doesn’t know what to do with.

You unlock the door. Step inside. But you don’t go to bed right away. You walk to the front window instead—bare feet quiet on hardwood, heart still hammering. Through the glass, you spot him half a block away. He thinks you’re gone. Which is probably why, under the streetlight, Clark Kent jumps up and smacks the edge of a low-hanging banner like he’s testing his vertical. He catches it on the second try, swinging from it for all of two seconds before nearly tripping over his own feet.

You snort. Your hand presses against your mouth to muffle the sound. And then you smile. That kind of soft, aching smile that tugs at something deep in your chest. Because that’s him. That’s the man who writes you poems under the cover of anonymity and nearly breaks your chair kissing you in a newsroom.

That’s the one you wanted it to be. And now that it is—you don’t think your heart’s ever going to stop fluttering.

The bullpen is alive again. Phones ring. Keys clatter. Someone’s arguing over copy edits near the back printer, and Jimmy streaks past with a half-eaten bagel clamped between his teeth and a stack of photos fluttering behind him like confetti. It’s chaos.

But none of it touches you. The world moves at its usual speed, but everything inside you has slowed. Like someone turned the volume down on everything that isn’t him.

Your eyes find Clark without meaning to. He’s already at his desk—glasses on, shirt pressed, tie straighter than usual. He must’ve fixed it three times this morning. His sleeves are rolled to the elbow, a pen already tucked behind one ear. He’s doing that thing he does when he’s thinking—lip caught gently between his teeth, brows drawn, tapping the space bar like it owes him money.

But there’s a softness to him this morning, too. A looseness in his shoulders. A quiet sort of glow around the edges, like some part of him hasn’t fully come down from last night either. Like he’s still vibrating with the same electricity that’s still thrumming low behind your ribs.

And then he looks up. He finds you just as easily as you found him. You expect him to look away—bashful, flustered, maybe even embarrassed now that the newsroom lights are on and you’re both pretending not to be lit matches pretending not to burn.

But he doesn’t. He holds your gaze. And the quiet that opens up between you is louder than anything else in the building. The low hum of printers. The whirr of the HVAC. The hiss of steam from the office espresso machine.

You swallow hard. Then you look back at your screen like it matters. You try to focus. You really do.

Less than ten minutes later, he’s there. He approaches slow, like he’s afraid of breaking something delicate. His hand appears first, gently setting a familiar to-go cup on your desk.

“I figured you forgot yours,” he says, voice low.

You glance up at him. “I didn’t.”

A smile curls at the corner of his mouth. Soft. A little sheepish. “Oh. Well…” He shrugs. “Now you have two.”

You take the coffee anyway. Your fingers brush his as you do. He doesn’t pull away. Not this time. His hand lingers for half a second longer than it should—just enough to make your pulse jump in your wrist—and then slowly drops back to his side. The silence between you now isn’t awkward. It’s taut. Weightless. Like standing at the edge of something enormous, staring over the drop, and realizing he’s right there beside you—ready to jump too.

“Walk with me?” he asks, voice barely above the clatter around you. You nod. Because you’d follow him anywhere.

Downstairs, the building atrium hums with the low murmur of morning traffic and the soft shuffle of people cutting through the lobby on their way to bigger, faster things. But here—beneath the high, glass-paneled ceiling where sunlight pours in like gold through water—the city feels a little farther away. A little quieter. Just the two of you, caught in that hush between chaos and clarity.

Clark hands you a sugar packet without a word, and you take it, fingers brushing his again. He watches—not your hands, but your face—as you tear it open and shake it into your cup. Like memorizing the way you take your coffee might somehow tell him more than you’re ready to say aloud.

You glance at him, just in time to catch it—that look. Barely there, but soft. Full. He looks at you like he’s trying to learn you by heart.

You raise a brow. “What?”

He blinks, caught. “Nothing.”

But you’re smiling now, just a little. A private, corner-of-your-mouth kind of smile. “You look tired,” you murmur, stirring slowly.

His lips twitch. “Late night.”

“Editing from home?”

He hesitates. You watch the way his shoulders shift, the subtle catch in his breath. Then, finally, he shakes his head. “Not exactly.”

You hum. Say nothing more. The moment lingers, warm as the cup in your hand. He stands beside you, tall and still, but there’s something new in the way he holds himself—like gravity’s just a little lighter around him this morning. Like your presence pulls him into a softer orbit. There’s a beat of silence.

“You… seemed quiet last night,” he says, voice gentler now. “When you saw me.”

You glance at him from over the rim of your cup. Steam curls up between you, catching in the morning light like spun sugar. “I saw you,” you say.

He studies you. Carefully. “You sure?”

You lower your coffee. “Yeah. I’m sure.”

His brows pull together slightly, the line between them deepening. He’s trying to read you. Trying to solve an equation he’s too close to see clearly. There’s a question in his eyes—not just about last night, but about everything that came before it. The letters. The glances. The ache.

But you don’t give him the answer. Not out loud. Because what you don’t say hangs heavier than what you do. You don’t say: I’m pretty certain he’s you. You don’t say: I think my heart has known for a while now. You don’t say: I’m not afraid of what you’re hiding. Instead, you let the silence stretch between you—soft and silken, tethering you to something deeper than confession. You sip your coffee, heart steady now, eyes warm.

And when he opens his mouth again—when he leans forward like he might finally give himself away entirely—you smile. Just a soft curve of your lips. A quiet reassurance. “Don’t worry,” you say, voice low. “I liked what I saw.”

He freezes. Then flushes, color blooming high on his cheeks. His gaze drops to the floor like it’s safer there, like looking at you too long might unravel him completely—but when he glances back up, the smile on his face is small and helpless and utterly undone. A breath escapes him, barely audible—but you hear it. You feel it. Relief.

He walks you back upstairs without another word. The movement is easy. Comfortable. But his hand hovers near yours the whole time. Not quite touching. Just… there. Like gravity pulling two halves of the same secret closer.

And as you re-enter the hum of the bullpen, nothing looks different. But everything feels like it’s just about to change.

That night, after the city has quieted—after the neon pulse of Metropolis blurs into puddle reflections and distant sirens—the Daily Planet is almost reverent in its silence. No ringing phones. No newsroom chatter. Just the soft hum of a printer in standby mode and the creak of the elevator cables descending behind you.

You let yourself in with your keycard. The lock clicks louder than expected in the stillness. You don’t know why you’re here, really. You told yourself it was to grab the folder you forgot. To double-check something on your last draft. But the truth is quieter than that.

You were hoping he’d be here. He’s not. His desk lamp is off. His chair turned inward, as if he left in a hurry. No half-eaten sandwich or scribbled drafts left behind—just a tidied workspace and absence thick enough to feel.

You sigh, the sound swallowed whole by the vast emptiness of the bullpen. Then you see it. At your desk. Tucked half-under your keyboard like a secret trying not to be. One folded piece of paper.

No envelope this time. No clever line on the front. Just your name, handwritten in a looping scrawl you’ve come to know better than your own signature. A rhythm you’ve studied and traced in the quiet of your apartment, night after night.

You slide it free with careful fingers. Your heart stutters as you unfold it. The ink is darker this time—less tentative. The strokes more deliberate, like he knew, at last, he didn’t have to hide.

“For once I don’t have to imagine what it’s like to have your lips on mine. But I still think about it anyway.” —C.K.

You stare at the words until the paper goes soft in your hands. Until your chest feels too full and too fragile all at once. Until the noise of your own heartbeat drowns out everything else.

Then you press the note to your chest and close your eyes. His initials burn through the paper like a touch. Not a secret admirer anymore. Not a mystery in the margins. Just him.

Clark. Your friend. Your almost. Your maybe.

You don’t need the rest of the truth. Not tonight. Not if it costs this fragile thing blooming between you—this quiet, aching sweetness. This slow, deliberate unraveling of walls and fears and the long-held breath you didn’t realize you were holding.

Whatever you’re building together, it’s happening one heartbeat at a time. One almost-confession. One note left behind in the dark. And you’d rather have this—this steady climb into something real—than rush toward the edge of revelation and risk it all crumbling.

So you tuck the note gently into your bag, where the others wait. Every word he’s given you, kept safe like a promise. You don’t know what happens next. But for the first time in weeks, maybe months, you’re not afraid of finding out.

You’re not official.

Not in the way people expect it. There’s no label, no group announcement, no big display. But you’re definitely something now—something solid and golden and real in the space between words.

It’s not office gossip. Not yet. But it could be. Because you linger a little too long near his desk. Because he lights up when you enter a room like it’s instinct. Because when he passes you in the bullpen, his hand brushes yours—just barely—and you both pause like the air just changed. There’s no denying it.

And then comes the hallway kiss. It’s after hours. The building is quiet, the newsroom lights dimmed to half. You’re both walking toward the elevators, your footsteps echoing against the tile.

Clark fumbles for the call button, mumbling something about how slow the system is when it’s late, and how the elevator always seems to stall on the wrong floor. You don’t answer. You just reach for his tie. A gentle tug. A silent question. He exhales, soft and shaky. Then he leans in.

The kiss is slow. Unhurried. Like you’re both tasting something that’s been simmering between you for years. His hands find your waist, yours curl into his shirt, and the elevator dings somewhere in the distance, but neither of you move.

You part only when the second ding reminds you where you are. His forehead presses to yours, warm and close. You breathe the same air. And then the doors close behind you, and he walks you out with his hand ghosting the small of your back.

You start learning the rhythm of Clark Kent. He talks more when he’s nervous—little rambles about traffic patterns or article formatting, or how he’s still not entirely sure he installed his dishwasher correctly. Sometimes he trails off mid-thought, like he’s remembering something urgent but can’t explain it.

He always carries your groceries. All of them. No negotiation. He’ll take the heavier bags first, sling them both over one shoulder and pretend like it’s nothing. And somehow, he always forgets his own umbrella—but never forgets yours. You don’t know how many he owns, but one always appears when the clouds roll in. Like magic. Like preparation. Like he’s thought of you in every version of the day.

You don’t ask.

You just start to keep one in your own bag for him.

The third kiss happens on your couch.

You’ve been watching some old movie neither of you are paying attention to, his arm slung lazily across your shoulders. Your legs are tangled. His fingers are tracing idle shapes against your thigh through the fabric of your leggings.

He kisses you once—soft and slow—and then again. Longer. Like he’s memorizing the shape of your mouth. Like he might need it later.

Then his phone buzzes.

He stiffens.

You feel the change instantly—the way his body pulls back, the air between you tightens. He glances at the screen. You don’t catch the name. But you see the look in his eyes.

Regret. Apology. Something deeper.

“I—I’m so sorry,” he says, already moving. “I have to—something came up. It’s—”

You sit up, brushing your hand against his arm. “Go,” you say softly.

“But—”

“It’s okay. Just… be safe.”

And God, the way he looks at you. Like you’ve given him something priceless. Something he didn’t know he was allowed to want.

He kisses your temple like a promise and disappears into the night.

It happens again. And again.

Missed dinners. Sudden goodbyes. Rainy nights where he shows up soaked, out of breath, murmuring apologies and curling into you like he doesn’t know how to be held.

You never ask. You don’t need to.

Because he always comes back.

One night, you’re curled into each other on your couch, your legs thrown over his, your cheek resting against his chest. The movie’s playing, forgotten. Your fingers are idly brushing the hem of his shirt where it’s ridden up. He smells like rain and ink and whatever soap he always uses that lingers on your pillow now.

Then his voice, quiet in the dark, “I don’t always know how to be… enough.”

You blink. Look up. He’s staring at the ceiling. Not quite breathing evenly. Like the words cost him something.

You reach up and cradle his face in your hands.

His eyes finally meet yours.

“You are,” you whisper. “As you are.”

You don’t say: Even if you are who I think you are.

You don’t need to. You just kiss him again. Soft. Long. Steady. Because whatever he’s carrying, you’ve already started holding part of it too.

And he lets you.

The night starts quiet.

Takeout boxes sit half-forgotten on the coffee table—one still open, rice going cold, soy sauce packet untouched. Your legs are draped across Clark’s lap, one foot nudged against the curve of his thigh, and his hand rests there now. Not possessively. Not deliberately.

Just… there.

It’s late. The kind of late where the whole city softens. No sirens outside. No blinking inbox. Just the low hum of the lamp on the side table and the warmth of the man beside you.

Clark’s eyes are on you. They’ve been there most of the night.

He hasn’t said much since dinner—just little smiles, quiet sounds of agreement, the occasional brush of his thumb against your ankle like a thought he forgot to speak aloud. But it’s not a bad silence. It’s dense. Full.

You shift, angling toward him slightly, and his gaze flicks to your mouth. That’s all it takes.

He leans in.

The kiss is soft at first. Familiar. A shared breath. A quiet hello in a room where no one had spoken for minutes. But then his hand curls behind your knee, guiding your leg further over his lap, and his mouth opens against yours like he’s been holding back for hours.

He kisses you like he’s starving. Like he’s spent all day wanting this—aching for the shape of you, the weight of your body in his hands. And when you moan into it, just a little, he shudders.

His hands start to move. One tracing the line of your spine, the other resting against your hip like a question he doesn’t need to ask. You answer anyway—pressing in closer, threading your fingers through his hair, sighing into the heat of his mouth.

You don’t know who climbs into whose lap first, only that you end up straddling him on the couch. Your knees on either side of his thighs. His hands gripping your waist now, fingers curling in your shirt like he doesn’t trust himself not to break it.

And then something shifts.

Not emotional—physical.

Clark stands.

He lifts you with him, effortlessly, like you don’t weigh anything at all. Not a grunt. Not a stagger. Just—up. Smooth and sure. His mouth never leaves yours.

You gasp into the kiss as he walks you backwards, steps confident and fast despite the way your arms tighten around his shoulders. Your spine meets the wall in the next second. Not hard. Just sudden.

Your heart thunders.

“Clark—”

He doesn’t answer. Just breathes against your mouth like he needs the oxygen from your lungs. Like yours is the only air that keeps him grounded.

His hips press into yours, one thigh sliding between your legs, and your back arches instinctively. His hands span your ribs now, thumbs brushing just beneath your bra. You feel the tremble in them—not from fear. From restraint.

“Clark,” you whisper again, and his forehead drops to yours.

“You okay?” he asks, voice rough and close.

You nod, breath catching. “You?”

He hesitates. Not long. But long enough to count. “Yeah. Just… feel a little off tonight.”

You pull back just enough to look at him.

He’s flushed. Eyes darker than usual. But not winded. Not breathless. Not anything like you are. His chest doesn’t even rise fast beneath your hands. Still, he smiles—like he can will the oddness away—and kisses you again. Deeper this time. Like distraction.

Like he doesn’t want to stop.

You don’t want him to either.

Not yet.

His mouth finds yours again—slower this time, more purposeful. Like he’s savoring it. Like he’s waited for this exact moment, this exact pressure of your hips against his, for longer than he’s willing to admit.

You gasp when his hands slide under your shirt, palms broad and steady, dragging upward in a path that sets every nerve on fire. He doesn’t fumble. Doesn’t rush. Just explores—like he’s memorizing, not taking.

“Can I?” he murmurs against your mouth, fingers brushing the underside of your bra.

You nod, breathless. “Yes.”

He exhales, soft and reverent, and lifts your shirt over your head. It’s discarded without ceremony. Then his hands are on you again—warm, slow, mapping out the shape of you with open palms and patient awe.

“God, you’re beautiful,” he murmurs, more breath than voice. His mouth finds the edge of your jaw, trailing kisses down to the hollow beneath your ear. “I think about this… so much.”

You shudder.

His hands move again—down this time, gripping your thighs as he sinks to his knees in front of you. You barely have time to react before he’s tugging your pants down, slow and careful, mouth following the descent with lingering kisses along your hips, the dip of your pelvis, the inside of your thigh.

He looks up at you from the floor.

You nearly forget how to breathe.

“I’ve wanted to take my time with you,” he admits, voice rough and low. “Wanted to learn you slow. Learn how you taste. How you fall apart.”

And then he does.

He leans in and licks a long, deliberate stripe over the center of your underwear, still watching your face.

You whimper.

He smiles, just slightly, and does it again.

By the time he peels your underwear down and presses an open-mouthed kiss to your inner thigh, your knees are trembling.

Clark hooks one arm under your leg, lifting it over his shoulder like it’s nothing, and buries his mouth between your thighs with a groan that rattles through your whole body.

His tongue is warm and soft and maddeningly slow—circling, tasting, teasing. He doesn’t rush. Not even when your fingers knot in his hair and your hips rock forward with pure desperation.

“Clark—”

He hums against you, and the sound sends a full-body shiver up your spine.

“I’ve got you,” he whispers, lips brushing you as he speaks. “Let me.”

You do.

You let him wreck you.

He’s methodical about it—like he’s following a map only he can see. One hand holding you steady, the other splayed against your stomach, keeping you anchored while he works you open with mouth and tongue and quiet, praising murmurs.

“So sweet… that’s it, sweetheart… you taste like heaven.”

You’re already close when he slips a thick finger inside you. Then another. Slow, patient, curling exactly where you need him. His mouth never stops. His rhythm is steady. Focused. Unrelenting.

You come like that—panting, gripping his shoulders, thighs shaking around his ears as he groans and keeps going, riding it out with you until you’re trembling too hard to stand.

He rises slowly.

His lips are slick. His eyes are dark.

And you’ve never seen anyone look at you like this.

“Come here,” you whisper.

He kisses you then—deep and possessive and tasting like you. You’re the one tugging at his shirt now, unbuttoning in frantic clumsy swipes. You need him. Need him closer. Need him inside.

But when you reach for his belt, he stills your hands gently.

“Not yet,” he says, voice like thunder wrapped in velvet. “Let me take care of you first.”

You blink. “Clark, I—”

He kisses you again—soft, lingering.

“I’ve waited too long for this to rush it,” he murmurs, brushing hair from your face with the back of his knuckles. “You deserve slow.”

Then he lifts you again—like you weigh nothing—and carries you to the bed. He lays you down like you’re fragile—but the look in his eyes says he knows you’re anything but. That you’re something rare. Something he’s been aching for. His palms skim over your thighs again, slow and deliberate, before he spreads you open beneath him.

He doesn’t ask this time. Just settles between your legs like he belongs there, arms hooked under your thighs, holding you wide.

“Clark—”

“I know, sweetheart,” he murmurs, voice low and raw. “I’ve got you.”

And he does.

His mouth finds you again—warm, skilled, confident now. No hesitation, just long, wet strokes of his tongue that build on everything he already learned. And then—without warning—he slides two fingers back inside you.

You cry out, hips jolting.

He groans into you, fingers moving in tandem with his mouth—curling just right, matching every flick of his tongue, every wet press of his lips. He doesn’t stop. Doesn’t falter. He watches you the whole time, eyes dark and hungry and so in love with the way you fall apart for him.

You grip the sheets, gasping his name, over and over, until your voice breaks on a sob of pleasure.

“Clark—God, I—I can’t—”

“Yes, you can,” he breathes. “You’re almost there. Let go for me.”

You do. With a cry, with shaking thighs, with your fingers tangled in his hair and your back arching off the bed.

And he doesn’t stop.

He rides your orgasm out with slow, worshipful strokes, kissing your thighs, murmuring into your skin, “So good for me. You’re perfect. You’re everything.”

By the time he pulls back, you’re boneless—dazed and trembling, your chest heaving as he kisses his way up your stomach.

But the way he looks at you then—like he needs to be closer—tells you this isn’t over.

His hands brace on either side of your head as he leans over you. “Can I…?”

Your hips answer for you—tilting up, chasing the heat and weight of him already pressed between your thighs.

“Yes,” you whisper. “Please.”

Clark groans low in his throat as he pushes his boxers down just enough, lining himself up—his cock flushed and thick, already leaking, and you feel the weight of him between your thighs and gasp.

“God, Clark…”

“I know,” he murmurs, forehead resting against yours, hips rocking forward just barely, teasing you with the head of his cock, dragging it through the slick mess he made with his mouth and fingers. “I know, baby. Just—just let me…”

He nudges in slow.

The stretch is slow and steady, his breath catching as your body parts for him. He’s thick. Too thick, maybe, except your body wants him—takes him like it was made to.

You whimper, and his jaw clenches tight.

“You okay?”

“Y—yeah,” you breathe. “Don’t stop.”

He doesn’t. Not even for a second. Inch by inch, he sinks into you, whispering your name, kissing your temple, gripping the backs of your thighs as you wrap your legs around his waist.

“Fuck,” he hisses when he bottoms out, buried deep, balls pressed flush against you. “You feel—Jesus, you feel unbelievable.”

You’re too far gone to answer. You just cling to him, nails dragging lightly down his back, moaning into his mouth when he kisses you again.

The first few thrusts are slow. Deep. Measured. He pulls out just enough to feel you grip him on the way back in, then does it again—and again—and again.

And then something shifts.

Your body clenches around him in a way that makes his head drop to your shoulder with a groan.

“Oh my god, sweetheart—don’t do that—I’m gonna—fuck—”

He thrusts harder.

Not rough, not yet, but firmer. Hungrier. The control he started with begins to slip. You can feel it in his grip, in the sharp edge of his breath, in the tremble of the arm braced beside your head.

“Been thinkin’ about this,” he grits out, voice low and wrecked. “Every night—every goddamn night since the first note. You don’t even know what you do to me.”

You whine, rolling your hips up to meet him, and he snaps—hips slamming forward hard enough to punch the air from your lungs.

“Clark—”

“I’ve got you,” he gasps, fucking into you harder now, his voice filthy and tender all at once. “I’ve got you, baby—so fuckin’ tight—can’t stop—don’t wanna stop—”

You’re clinging to him now, crying out with every thrust. It’s not just the way he fills you—it’s the way he worships you while he does it. The way he moans when you clench. The way he growls your name like a prayer. The way he falls apart in real time, just from the feel of you.

He grabs one of your hands, laces your fingers with his, pins it beside your head.

“You’re mine,” he grits. “You have to be mine.”

“Yes,” you gasp. “Yes—Clark—don’t stop—”

“Never,” he groans. “Never stopping. Not when you feel like this—fuck—”

You can feel him getting close—the way his rhythm starts to stutter, the broken sounds escaping his throat, the way he buries his face against your neck and pants your name like he’s desperate to take you with him.

And you’re almost there too.

You don’t even realize your hand is slipping until he’s gripping it again—pinned tight to the pillow, your fingers laced in his and clenched so tight it aches. The bed frame is starting to shudder beneath you now, the headboard knocking a rhythm into the wall, and Clark is gasping like he’s in pain from how good it feels.

His hips snap forward again—harder this time. Deeper. More desperate.

“Fuck—fuck—I’m sorry,” he grits, voice ragged and thick, “I’m trying to—baby—I can’t—hold back—”

You moan so loud it makes him flinch.

And then he breaks.

One second he’s pulling your name from his lungs like it’s the only word he knows—and the next, he slams into you so hard the bed shifts a full inch. The lamp on the bedside table flickers. The candle flame bursts just slightly higher than before—flickering hot and fast, the wick blackening with a thin curl of smoke. It doesn’t go out. It just burns.

Clark’s back arches.

His cock drags over everything inside you in just the right way, hitting that spot again and again until you’re clutching at his shoulders, babbling nonsense against his skin.

“I can’t—I can’t—Clark!”

“You can,” he pants. “Please—please, baby, cum with me—I can feel you—I can feel it.”

Your body goes taut.

A white-hot snap of pleasure punches through your spine, and your vision blacks out at the edges. You tighten around him—clenching, pulsing, dragging him over the edge with you—and he loses it.

Clark curses—actually curses—and growls something between a moan and a sob as he slams into you one last time, spilling deep inside you. His body locks, every muscle trembling. His teeth scrape the soft skin of your throat—not biting, just grounding himself. Like if he lets go, he’ll come undone completely.

The lights flicker again.

The candle sputters once and steadies.

He breathes like a man starved. His chest heaves. But you can feel it—under your hand, against your skin. His heart’s not racing.

Not like it should be.

You’re gasping. Dazed. Boneless under him. But Clark… Clark’s barely even winded. And yet—his hands are trembling. Just slightly. Still laced in yours. Still holding on.

After, you lie there—chests pressed close, legs tangled, the sheets barely clinging to your hips.

Clark’s arm is slung across your waist, palm wide and warm over your belly like it belongs there. Like he doesn’t ever want to move. His nose is tucked against your temple, breath stirring your hair in soft little pulses. He keeps kissing you. Your cheek. Your jaw. The edge of your brow. He doesn’t stop, like he’s afraid this is a dream and kissing you might anchor it in place.

“Still with me?” he whispers into your skin.

You nod. Drowsy. Sated. Floating.

“Good.” His hand runs down your side in one long, reverent stroke. “Didn’t mean to… get so carried away.”

You hum. “You say that like I didn’t enjoy every second.”

He smiles against your neck. You feel the curve of it, his lips brushing the shell of your ear.

A moment passes.

Then another.

“I think you short-circuited my bedside lamp somehow.”

Clark freezes. “…Did I?”

You roll your head to look at him. “It flickered. Right as you—”

His ears turn bright red. “Maybe just… a power surge?”

You arch a brow. “Right. A romantic, orgasm-timed power surge.”

He mutters something into your shoulder that sounds vaguely like kill me now.

You grin. File it away.

Exhibit 7: Lightbulb went dim at the exact second he came. Candle flame doubled in height.

Later that night, long after you’ve both dozed off, you wake to find Clark still holding you. One of his hands is under your shirt, splayed low across your stomach. Protective. Possessive in the gentlest way. His body is still curled around yours like a question mark, like he’s checking for all your answers in how your breath rises and falls.

You shift just slightly—and his grip tightens instinctively, like even in sleep, he can’t let go.

Exhibit 8: He doesn’t sleep like a person. Sleeps like a sentry.

In the morning, you wake to the scent of coffee.

Your kitchen is suspiciously spotless for someone who swears he’s clumsy. The pot is full, the mugs pre-warmed, your favorite creamer already swirled in.

Clark is flipping pancakes.

Barefoot.

Wearing one of your sleep shirts. The tight one.

You lean against the doorframe, watching him. His back muscles flex when he flips the pan one-handed.

“Morning,” he says without turning.

You blink. “How’d you know I was standing here?”

“I, uh…” He falters, then gestures at the sizzling pan. “Heard footsteps. I assumed.”

You hum.

Exhibit 9: He heard me from across the apartment, over the sound of a frying pan.

You’re brushing your teeth later when you spot the mirror fogged from the shower.

You reach for a towel—and notice it’s already been run under warm water.

You glance at him, and he just shrugs. “Figured you’d want it not freezing.”

“Figured?” you repeat.

He leans against the doorframe, smiling. “Lucky guess.”

You don’t respond. Just kiss his cheek with toothpaste still in your mouth.

Exhibit 10: He always guesses exactly what I need. Down to the second.

That night, he falls asleep on your couch during movie night, head on your thigh, hand around your wrist like a lifeline.

You swear you see the movie reflected in his eyes—like the light isn’t just hitting them but moving inside them. You blink. It’s gone.

You look down at him. His lashes are impossibly long. His mouth is parted. His breathing is steady—but not quite… human. Too even. Too perfect.

Exhibit 11: His pupils did a thing. I don’t know how to describe it. But they did a thing.

The next day, a car splashes a wave of slush toward you both on the sidewalk.

You brace for impact.

But Clark steps in front of you, faster than you can blink. The water hits him. Not you.

You didn’t even see him move.

You narrow your eyes. He just smiles. “Reflexes.”

“Clark. Be honest. Do you secretly run marathons at night?”

He laughs. “Nope. Just really hate laundry.”

Exhibit 12: Literally teleported into the splash zone to shield me. Probably didn’t even get wet.

And still… you don’t say it.

You don’t ask.

Because he’s not just some blur of strength or spectacle.

He’s the man who folds your laundry while pretending it’s because he’s “bad at relaxing.” Who scribbles notes in the margins of your drafts, calling your metaphors “dangerously good.” Who kisses your forehead with a kind of reverence like you’re the one who’s unreal.

You know.

And he knows you know.

Because he’s hiding it from you. Not really.

When he stumbles over his own sentences, when his smile falters after a late return, when his jaw tenses at the sound of your name whispered too softly—you don’t see evasion. You see weight. You see care.

He’s protecting something.

And you’re trying to figure out how to tell him that you already know. That it’s okay. That you’re still here. That you love him anyway.

You haven’t said it yet—not the knowing, not the loving. But it lives just under your skin. A second heartbeat. A full body truth. You think maybe, if you just look him in the eye long enough next time, he’ll understand.

But still neither of you says it yet. Because the space between what’s said and unsaid—that’s where everything soft lives.

And you’re not ready to let it go.

The morning feels ordinary.

There’s a crack in the coffee pot. A printer jam. Perry yelling something about deadlines from his office. Jimmy’s camera bag spills open across your desk, and he swears he’ll fix it after his coffee, and Lois is pacing, muttering about sources.

And then the screens change.

It’s subtle at first—just a flicker. Then the feed cuts mid-commercial. Every monitor in the bullpen goes black, then red. Emergency alert. A shrill tone splits the air. Someone turns up the volume.

You look up.

And everything shifts.

The broadcast blares through the newsroom speakers, raw footage streaming in from a local news chopper.

Metropolis. Midtown. Chaos. A building half-collapsed. Smoke curling upward in a thick, unnatural spiral.

The camera jolts—and then there he is.

Superman.

Thrown through a brick wall.

You feel it in your bones before your brain catches up. That’s him. That’s Clark.

He’s on his knees in the wreckage, panting, bleeding—from his temple, from his ribs, from a gash you can’t see the end of. The suit is torn. His cape is shredded. He’s never looked so human.

He tries to stand. Wobbles. Collapses.

You stop breathing.

“Is Superman going to be ok?” someone behind you murmurs.

“Jesus,” Jimmy whispers.

“He’ll be fine,” Lois says, too casually. She leans back in her chair, sipping her coffee like it’s any other news cycle. “He always is.”

You want to scream. Because that’s not a story on a screen. That’s not some distant, untouchable god.

That’s your boyfriend.

That’s the man who brought you coffee this morning with one sugar and just the right amount of cream. The man who kissed your wrist in the elevator, whose hands trembled when he whispered I want to be enough. Who holds you like you’re something holy and bruises like he’s made of skin after all.

He’s not fine. He’s bleeding.

He’s not getting up.

You freeze.

The bullpen keeps moving around you—half-aware, half-horrified—but you can’t speak. Can’t blink. Can’t breathe.

Your hands start to shake.

You grip the edge of your desk like it might anchor you to the floor, like if you let go you’ll run straight out the door, out into the chaos, toward the wreckage and the fire and the thing trying to kill him.

A part of you already has.

A hit lands on the feed—something massive slamming him into the pavement—and your knees almost buckle from the force of it. Not physically. Not really. But somewhere deep. Something inside you fractures.

You don’t know what the enemy is.

Alien, maybe. Or worse.

But it’s not the shape of the thing that terrifies you—it’s him. It’s how slow he is to get up. How much his mouth is bleeding. How his eyes are unfocused. How you’ve never seen him look like this.

You want to run.

You want to be there.

But you’re not. You’re here. In your dress pants and button-up, in your neat little office chair, with your badge clipped to your hip and your heart breaking quietly.

Because no one else knows. No one else understands what’s really at stake. No one else sees the man behind the cape.

Not like you do.

Your vision blurs.

You wipe your eyes. Pretend it’s nothing. The bullpen is too loud to hear your breath catch.

But still—your hands tremble and your heart pounds so violently it hurts.

And you cry.

Quietly.

You cry like the city might if it could feel. You cry like the sky should. You cry like someone already grieving—like someone who knows what it means to lose him.

The footage won’t stop. Superman reels across the screen—his suit torn, the shoulder scorched through in a blackened, jagged arc. Blood smears the corner of his mouth. There’s a limp in his gait now, one he keeps trying to mask. The camera catches it anyway.

The newsroom is silent now save for the hiss of static and the low voice of the anchor describing the damage downtown.

You sit frozen at your desk, the plastic edge biting into your palms as you grip it like it might stop your body from unraveling. The taste of bile has settled at the back of your throat. Your coffee’s gone cold in its cup.

Across the bullpen, someone mutters, “Jesus. He took a hit.”

“Look at the suit,” Lois says flatly, standing by one of the screens. “He’s never looked that rough before.”

“Dude’s limping,” Jimmy adds, pushing his glasses up. “That alien thing—what even was that?”

Their words feel like background noise. Distant. Warped. You can’t seem to hear anything over the white-hot panic blistering in your chest.

You blink, your eyes burning, throat tight. You can’t just sit here and cry. Not in front of Lois and Perry and half the bullpen. But your body is trembling anyway. You clench your hands in your lap, nails digging crescent moons into your skin.

He’s hurt.

And he’s still out there.

Fighting.

Alone.

You can’t just sit here.

You shove your chair back hard enough that it scrapes against the floor. “I’m going.”

Lois turns toward you. “Going where?”

“I’m covering it. The attack. The fallout. Whatever’s left—I want to see it firsthand.”

Lois’s brow lifts. “Since when do you make reckless calls like this?”

“I don’t,” you snap, already grabbing your coat. “But I am now.”

Jimmy’s already halfway to the door. “If we’re going, I’m bringing the camera.”

Lois hesitates. Then sighs. “Hell. You two’ll get yourselves killed without me.”

You don’t wait for her to finish grabbing her phone. You’re already out the door.

Downtown is a war zone.

The smell of scorched concrete clings to the air. Smoke spirals in uneven plumes from the carcass of a building that must have been beautiful once. Sirens scream in every direction, red and blue lights flashing off every pane of shattered glass.

You arrive just as the dust begins to settle.

The battle is over but the wreckage tells you how bad it was.

The Justice Gang moves through the remains like figures out of a dream—tattered and bloodied, but upright.

Guy Gardner limps past, muttering curses. “Next time, I’m bringing a bigger damn ring.” Kendra Saunders—Hawkgirl—has one wing half-folded and streaked with blood. She ignores it as she checks on a paramedic’s bandages. Mr. Terrific is already coordinating with local emergency crews, directing flow with a hand to his ear. And Metamorpho—God, he looks like he’s melting and re-solidifying with every breath.

And then…

Him.

He descends from the smoke. Not in a blur. Not with a boom of sonic air. Slowly. Controlled.

But not untouched.

He lands in a crouch, shoulders tight, the line of his jaw drawn sharp with tension. His boots crunch against broken concrete. His cape is torn at one edge, flapping limply behind him.

He’s hurt.

He’s so clearly hurt.

And even through all of it—through the dirt and blood and pain—he sees you. His eyes lock onto yours in an instant. The rest of the world falls away. There’s no press. No chaos. No destruction.

Just him.

And you.

The corner of his mouth lifts—just a flicker. Not a smile. Just… recognition.

And something deeper behind it.

You know know.

And he is letting you know.

But he straightens a second later, lifting his chin, slotting the mask back into place like a practiced motion. He squares his shoulders, winces barely perceptible, and turns to face the press.

Lois is already stepping forward, questions in hand. “Superman. What can you tell us about the enemy?”

His voice is steady, but you can hear it now—hear the strain. The breath that doesn’t quite come easy. The syllables that drag like they’re fighting his tongue. “It wasn’t local,” he says. “Some kind of dimensional breach. We had help closing it.”

Jimmy’s camera clicks. Kendra coughs into her hand.

You’re not writing.

You’re just watching.

Watching the soot along his cheekbone. The split in his lip. The way he shifts his weight to favor one side. The way the “s” in “justice” drags like it hurts to say.

He looks tired.

But more than that—he looks like Clark.

And it’s never been more obvious than right now, standing under broken sky, trying to pretend like nothing’s changed.

You want to run to him. You want to hold him up.

But you stay rooted.

When the questions start to slow and the press begins murmuring among themselves, he glances over. Just at you.

“Are you okay?” he asks, barely audible.

You nod. “Are you?”

He hesitates. Then says, “Getting there.”

It’s not a performance. Not for them. Just for you.

You nod again. The look you share says more than anything else could.

I know.

I’m not leaving.

You don’t have to say it.

When he flies away—slower this time, one hand brushing briefly against his ribs—it’s not dramatic. There’s no sonic boom. No heat trail. Just wind and distance.

Lois exhales. “He looked rough.”

Jimmy nods. “Still hot, though.”

You say nothing. You just stare up at the empty sky. And press your shaking hand over your heart.

You fake calm.

You smile when Jimmy slaps your shoulder and says something about getting the footage up by morning. You nod through Lois’s sharp-eyed stare and mutter something about your deadline, your byline, your blood sugar—anything to get her to stop watching you like she knows what you’re not saying.

But the second you’re alone?

You run. It’s not a sprint, not really. Just that jittery, full-body urgency—the kind that makes your hands shake and your legs move faster than your thoughts can follow. You don’t remember the trip home. Just the chaos of your own pulse, the way your chest won’t stop aching.

You replay the scene again and again in your mind: his landing, the blood on his lip, the flicker of pain when he looked at you. That not-quite smile. That nearly imperceptible tremble.

You’d never wanted to hold someone more in your life.

And when you reach your door, keys fumbling, heart still hammering? He’s already there.

You pause halfway through the doorway.

He’s standing in your living room, like he’s been waiting hours. He’s not in the suit. No cape. No crest. Just a plain black T-shirt and flannel pajama pants, his hair still damp like he just showered.

He looks like Clark. Except… tonight you know there’s no difference.

“Hi,” he says quietly. His voice is soft. Familiar. “I didn’t mean to startle you.”

You blink. “Did you break through my patio door?”

He winces. “Yes. Sort of.”

You lift a brow. “You owe me a new lock.”

“It doesn’t work like that.” He says with a roll of his eyes.

A silence stretches between you. It’s not tense. Not angry. Just full of everything neither of you said earlier.

He takes a step toward you, then stops. “How long have you known?”

You drop your keys in the bowl by the door and toe off your shoes before answering. “Since the lamp. And the candle,” you say. “But… mostly tonight.”

He nods like that hurts. Like he wishes he could’ve done better. Like he wishes he could’ve told you in some perfect, movie-moment way.

“I didn’t want you to find out like that,” he says quietly.

You walk to the couch and sit, your limbs finally catching up to the adrenaline crash still sweeping through you. “I’m glad I found out at all.”

That’s what makes him move. He sinks down beside you, hands on his knees. You can see it in his profile—the exhaustion, the regret, the weight he’s been carrying for so long. You’re not sure he’s ever looked more human.

“I’ve been hiding so long,” he says, voice barely above a whisper. “I forgot how to be seen. And with you… I didn’t want to lie. But I didn’t want to lose it either. I didn’t want to lose you.”

Your throat tightens. “You won’t,” you say. And you mean it.

His head turns then, slowly, eyes meeting yours like he’s trying to memorize your face from this distance. You don’t look away.

When he kisses you, it’s not careful. It’s not shy. It’s like something breaks open inside him—softly. The dam finally giving way.

His hands cradle your face like you’re something he’s terrified to shatter but needs to feel. His mouth is hot and open, reverent, desperate in the way it deepens. He kisses like he’s anchoring himself to the earth through your lips. Like everything in him is still shaking from battle and you’re the only thing that still feels real.

You reach for him. Thread your fingers into his hair. Pull him closer.

It builds like a slow swell—hands tangling, breathing harder, heat coiling low in your stomach. He pushes you back gently against the cushions, his body moving over yours with careful precision. Not to pin. Just to hold.

You feel it in every motion: the restraint. The effort. He could crush steel and he’s using that strength to cradle your ribs.

He undresses you with reverence. His fingers tremble when they touch your bare skin. Not from hesitation—but because he’s finally allowed to want. To have. To be seen.

You undress him too. That soft black T-shirt comes off first. Then the flannel. His chest is mottled with bruises, a dark one blooming across his side where that alien creature must’ve hit him. Your fingertips trace the edge of it.

He exhales, shaky. But he doesn’t stop you.

You’re straddling his lap before you realize it, chest to chest, foreheads pressed together.

“Are you scared?” he whispers.

Your thumb brushes his cheek. “Never of you.”

He kisses you again—slower this time. More control, but more depth too. His hands glide down your back and settle at your hips, thumbs pressing into your skin like he needs the reminder that you’re here. That you chose this.

The rest unfolds like prayer. The way he touches you—thorough, patient, hungry—it’s worship. Every gasp you make pulls a soft, broken sound from his throat. Every arch of your back makes his eyes flutter shut like he’s overwhelmed by the sight of you. The way he moves inside you is deep and aching and full of something larger than either of you.

Not rough. But desperate. Raw. True.

And even when he falters—when his hands grip too tight or the air warms just a little too fast—you hold his face and whisper, “I know. It’s okay. I want all of you.” And he gives it. All of him. Until the only thing either of you can do is fall apart. Together.

Later, when you’re curled up on the couch in a tangle of limbs and quiet breathing, he rests his forehead against your temple.

The city buzzes somewhere far away.

He whispers into your skin: “Next time… don’t let me fly off like that.”

Your smile is soft, tired. “Next time, come straight to me.”

He nods, eyes already fluttering shut.

And finally, for the first time since this began—you both sleep without secrets between you.

You wake to sunlight. Not loud, not harsh—just soft beams slipping through the blinds, spilling across the floor, warming the space where your bare shoulder meets the sheets. You blink slowly, the weight of sleep still thick behind your eyes, and shift just slightly in the tangle of limbs wrapped around you. He doesn’t stir. Not even a little.

Clark is still curled around you like the night never ended—his chest at your back, legs tangled with yours, one arm snug around your waist and the other folded up against your ribs, fingers resting over your heart like he’s guarding it in his sleep.

You don’t move. You can’t. Because it’s perfect. You let your cheek rest against his arm, warm and solid beneath you, and you just listen—to the steady rhythm of his heart, to the rise and fall of his breathing, to the way the silence doesn’t feel empty anymore. You don’t know if you’ve ever felt more grounded than you do right now, held like this. It isn’t the cape. It isn’t the flight. It isn’t the power that quiets the noise in your chest.

It’s him. Just Clark. And for once, you don’t need anything else.

He stumbles into the kitchen half an hour later in your robe. Your actual, honest-to-god, fuzzy gray robe. It’s oversized on you, which means it fits him like a second skin—belt tied loose at the hips, collar gaping just enough to make you lose your train of thought. His hair is a mess, sticking up in soft black tufts. His glasses are nowhere to be found. He scratches the back of his neck, blinking at the cabinets like he’s not entirely sure how kitchens work.

You lean against the counter with your arms folded, watching him with open amusement. “You own too much flannel.”

Clark glances over, eyes squinting against the light. “I’ll have you know, that robe is a Metropolis winter essential.”

“You’re bulletproof.”

“I get cold emotionally.”

You snort. “You’re such a menace in the morning.”

“And yet,” he says, opening the fridge and retrieving eggs with the careful precision of someone who’s clearly trying not to break them with super strength, “you let me stay.”

You grin. “You’re lucky you’re cute.”

He burns the first pancake. Which is honestly impressive, considering you weren’t even sure it was physically possible for someone with super speed and heat vision to ruin breakfast. But he flips it too fast—like way too fast—and the thing launches halfway across the skillet before folding in on itself and sizzling dramatically.

You raise an eyebrow. Clark stares down at the pancake like it betrayed him. “I didn’t account for surface tension.”

“Did you just say ‘surface tension’ while making pancakes?”

“I’m a complex man,” he says solemnly.

You lean over and pluck a piece of fruit from the cutting board he forgot he was slicing. “You’re a menace and a dork.”

He pouts. Full, actual pout. Then shuffles over and kisses your shoulder. “I’ll get better with practice.”

You roll your eyes. But your skin’s still buzzing where his lips brushed it.

Later, you sit on the counter while he stands between your knees, coffee in one hand, the other resting warm on your thigh. It’s quiet. Not awkward or forced—just soft. Full of little glances and sips and contented silence. There’s no fear in him now. No carefully placed pauses. No skirting around things. He just… is. Clark Kent. The boy who spilled coffee on your notes three times. The man who kept writing to you in secret even when you didn’t see him.

“You’re not what I expected,” you say, fingers brushing his arm.

He lifts an eyebrow. “Oh?”

“I don’t know. I guess I thought Superman would be… shinier. Less flannel. More invincible.”

“Are you saying I’m not shiny enough for you?”

“I’m saying you’re better.”

He blinks. And then—just like that—he smiles. Not the bashful one. Not the public one. The real one. Small and warm and honest. The kind of smile you only give someone when you feel safe. And maybe that’s what this is now. Safety. Not the absence of danger—but the presence of someone who will always come back.

His communicator buzzes from somewhere in the bedroom. Clark lets out the most exhausted groan you’ve ever heard and buries his face in your shoulder like it’ll make the world go away.

“You have to go?” you ask gently, threading your fingers through his hair.

“Soon.”

“You’ll come back?”

He lifts his head. Meets your eyes. “Every time.”

You kiss him then—slow and deep and familiar now. The kind of kiss that tastes like mornings and memory and maybe something closer to forever. He kisses you back like he already misses you. And when he finally pulls away and disappears into the sky outside your window—less streak of light, more quiet parting—you just stand there for a moment. Barefoot. Wrapped in your robe. Heart full.

You’re about to start cleaning up the kitchen when you see it. A post-it note, stuck to the fridge. Just a small square of yellow. Written in the same handwriting you could spot anywhere now.

“You always look soft in the mornings. I like seeing you like this.” —C.K.

You read it three times. Then you smile. You walk to the cabinet above the sink, open the door—and stick it right next to all the others. The secret ones. The old ones. The ones that helped you feel seen before you even knew whose eyes were watching.

And now you know. Now you see him too.

All of him.

And you wouldn’t trade it for anything.

tags: @eeveedream m @anxiousscribbling @pancake-05 @borhapparker @dreammiiee @benbarnesprettygurl @insidethegardenwall @butterflies-on-my-ashes s @maplesyrizzup @rockwoodchevy @jasontoddswhitestreak @loganficsonly @overwintering-soldier @hits-different-cause-its-you @eclipsedplanet @wordacadabra @itzmeme e @cecesilver @crisis-unaverted-recs @indigoyoons @chili4prez @thetruthisintheirdreams @ethanhoewke (<— it wouldn’t let me tag some blogs I’m so sorry!!)

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open-heart-open-container · 13 days ago

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now what? part one - bob floyd x reader

description: Y/N and Bob work in the local aquarium. It's their summer job - all set up by Y/N's mother, a long-time college friend of Bob's mother.

That being said, growing up together doesn't mean you have to like the person who is always there are your birthday parties and new year's celebrations. Even if you didn't want him there.

But there is a fine line between love and hate; a fine line between what others can see and what you can't

ao3 link!

word count: 2.5k

tags/warnings: college!au bob floyd - enemies to lovers (hehehe or are they a secret worse thing?), eventual smut? angst etc. appearance of other top gun maverick characters.

a/n: ok i am back with another fic - this was abandoned idea i had back in 2021 so i just jotted this up on the train home so its not proof read so idk hope u enjoy and please tell me if you want more!!!

CHAPTER ONE - The Cause

JUNE

‘Just because I’ve graduated university doesn’t mean that I’m not free all summer, Rooster. I have so much to prepare for - applying for postgrad, looking at trainee jobs at firms…’

‘But it is also your last summer of freedom, Y/N - live a little!’

‘I know, I know, but I need the money to spend on the amount of pints I will be drinking and the clothes I’m going to need if I get a job.’

‘But-’

You interrupt, ‘can we please just pick whatever shitty drink you are planning on getting yourself blocked on tonight and get out of this 7/11 please.’

‘Ah, not even a minute to think here, Y/N, you’re killin’ me!’

‘We’ve been here for 20 minutes.’ You deadpanned. ‘15 of those you’ve spent convincing to quit my job at the aquarium so I can get drunk with you, on money I would not have if I didn’t have my job.’

‘Alright, alright!’ Rooster laughed, picking up a cheap bottle of white rum. ‘How do you feel about rum and lemonade tonight?’

Shoving him in the shoulder, you laughed.

‘Your liver will thank you in the years to come, Bradshaw.’

He grinned, brushing past you to pay.

Standing in the linoleum aisle, you try to hold on to the feeling that this isn’t your last summer of freedom. Your inner monologue of years of late nights in a law firm and endless phone calls, meetings and emails flood your mind. Quitting has crossed your mind before; not just because you want to live more but because of your co-worker, Bob, sworn enemy, tormentor and your best friend’s other best friend.

The 7/11 was pretty busy for a Tuesday night, you were used to the quietness of North Island; the few students that would drift in for a late-night snack stash or alcohol stash depending on the type of student, and the occasional business person sneaking in after a long day.

Being home for just two days, somehow you were heading to the Bradshaw’s for ‘drinks’. Drinks meaning Bob’s parents were out of town and Bob had pulled together some of his friends from university, school and his younger sister’s friends to drink into the early hours. Whilst you were never one to turn down a night of music, sweaty bodies, and the burn of alcohol down your throat, nerves flooded your body any time you thought about spending any more time than you already do with the eldest Floyd and those nerves made it pretty easy for you to want, to need, to turn down the plans. But, who could say no to a face like Rooster’s or Nat’s.

Anyways, your recent break-up needed a little bit of substance therapy. Or substance abuse, as Jake would call it. Hangman always had a way with words.

‘Okay so are you really going to tell me what’s bothering you or am I just going to have to guess?’

The cold, early evening breeze sent goosebumps up your arms and legs. You turned to face him, cursing yourself silently for wearing a skirt - should’ve known better that tonight was going to be a cold one.

‘Nothing, truly. I’m okay. Just tired - unpacking is the most exhausting thing.’

You knew he didn’t believe you but he didn’t push, just nodding and grabbing your arm and pulling you along.

The walk from the 7/11 to the Floyd’s wasn’t long but it was so familiar. Things had changed, sure, new houses replaced the old and the once bright white lines demarking the road had weathered and were barely there, but it was familiar. It was home. But it had changed. A funny feeling, you mused.

You heard the house before you saw it. The beat of whatever shitty early 2000’s club tune pulsed the ground as you waited for Bradley to hurry up, stop blethering and unlock the door. A cheeky grin flashed your way as he pulled open the door and you were met with the humidity of the Sahara and the smell of cheap beer and Victoria Secret’s perfume. Then you were met with the sight of him - catching his eye while a sycophantic, pretty blond followed him around like a lost puppy dog.

Home was a fickle thing. One minute it’s beautiful, the next the most infuriating thing you have ever seen.

Smiles and greetings exchanged to familiar faces and new ones alike. The cold taste of the rum and lemonade slipped down your throat as you stood in the kitchen, just observing. Not participating, just watching.

Some Franz Ferdinand song blared from the speakers as people mingled, flirted and drank their way around the room. The sun hadn’t set yet - but with the curtains drawn, it didn’t really matter. The early summer house parties were the best ones - before the heat of July and early August, before reality could set in you could enjoy June for what it was.

As the night passed on, he hadn’t talked to you once. Strange. Another funny feeling.

Funny feeling, that. Home wasn’t the only thing that was fickle it seemed. What was more fickle was every time you caught his eye it was as if Bob was already looking and as soon as your eyes met, his darted away as if you had never been there in the first place.

—

The Smashing Pumpkins were playing. To Sheila, you thought, what an odd choice for an aquarium.

The soft tones of the acoustic guitar floated through the corridors, swirling blue lit the ceilings as multi-coloured fish raced through each tunnel and turret. It was a comforting feeling - nothing changed in here, except for new life and the end. There wasn’t a need to be something you weren’t in here - pure magic and fascination coats the walls, you could be a child all you wanted all day and once you left it was back to reality.

‘Hey, boss is calling.’ And then the peace was interrupted.

Bob. You truly didn’t know where to start with him. In the beginning, it was just childish teasing, pulling hair and name calling, but as you got older it became different; constantly fighting for the attention of your parents - he always stole the spotlight, he could truly do no wrong. You just sat in the shadows, while he could tease and taunt you all he wanted with no repercussion it seemed. No chance to defend yourself against the blue-eyed boy. It didn’t help that you both were book-smart, had that same ‘wise-beyond-their-years’ countenance about you both. So alike yet so different at the same time. Where you could be extroverted, Bob’s introverted, shy persona made you seem crazy each time you’d rise to his taunts.

Anyways, any chance of ever reconciling with Bob flew out the window when you were seventeen. Years later, the knife is still stuck in your back.

With a short nod, you followed him through the doors.

‘What no bitchy comment, darlin’?’ He shoved you lightly.

‘Not the time, nor the place, asshole.’ You whispered back fervently, briskly walking ahead to shake him. Trying to shake the lightning strike in your abdomen from his touch. No such luck.

‘Ah right, I forgot that you get on your high horse when we’re at work.’ He murmured back.

‘No, Bob, you’ve forgotten that my Mom, your godmother, of all fucking people, owns this aquarium. You wouldn’t have a job if it wasn’t for her and neither would I - so I’m sorry that I think there’s a certain amount of respect that you owe her to not start shit here.’

‘You know, Y/N, I’d appreciate it if you didn’t argue with your co-workers on your first shift back.’ The voice of your mother called from behind you.

The shit-eating grin on Bob’s face filled your body with rage. That prick. To make matters worse, you know how much your Mom loves Bob. She was the son she never had. And you, the daughter she wasn’t too sure what to do with.

‘Mornin’ Mrs Y/L/N.’

Still such a suckup. It took so much out of you not to roll your eyes at his “do-goodery.”

She gave him a smile, ‘Alright you two, you’re in the gift shop today. I decided to put Nat and Jake on tickets so-’ Your glare cut her off, a tense stare she matched. ‘You better be on your best behaviour.’

The stare became pointed at the boy bouncing on the balls of his feet beside you. He had a persistent itch to be moving all the time, something he’d put down to anxiety and something you’d put down to something he does to purely annoy you.

‘Both of you.’ With that, she turned and walked towards an exhibit.

Sighing, you faced Bob. ‘Right well. We better set up, don't you think?’

Raising his brow, he nodded. ‘Lead the way, princess.’

You huff. ‘Don’t call me that.’

‘What?’ There was that quiet smirk on your face that you wanted to punch (no, kiss) off. ‘Thought you enjoyed getting the princess treatment.’

Rolling your eyes, you spare him a quick dirty look. ‘I’m not dignifying that with a response.’

‘Wow, what a wonder! I’ve rendered you silent, darlin’.’

You hated how he called you darling; the timbre of his southern accent dropping the ‘g.’ You hated how sometimes the sound echoed at night when you pretend to not be lying awake thinking of him.

You really have nothing to say to him right now. Too busy thinking about the hordes of children begging their parents to buy them some overpriced shark teddy. You quite liked the kids that would buy rocks. Something so innocent about a child picking up a very obviously fake amethyst, marvelling at its beauty, then begging their poor, unsuspecting parent that they must have this rock even if it costs 5 dollars. They always reminded you of… well, you. But you grew out of that childish desire to own rose quartz or anything else after Bob told your fourth grade class that you collected rocks. Safe to say you weren’t entirely popular in middle school.

There was stock to be put out, toys to arrange and a cash register to organise. At least you weren’t on tours for today. Fanboy almost always volunteered for them. And, in all fairness, he was good at them - you had to give it to them. It was almost smart putting Jake and Natasha on tickets, drawing parents in with two incredibly beautiful people then letting Fanboy rile their kids up instead of giving the parents something to look at (not the fish, Jake and Nat) and instead of tiring their kids out.

The gift shop wasn’t all bad. It’s peaceful in those first 15-20 minutes when the aquarium has just opened - not a single family makes it past the ‘petting pool’ for a good while. Then at closing time. Usually no one is there for the graveyard tours; the last one starts at 5pm. Then it's just mostly kids, high on whatever edible they’ve taken, and they don’t really care for stuffed animals when you’re seventeen and trying to escape this place. Yet, you can’t enjoy the peace because Bob is here. His presence is enough to irk you and there’s rarely been a time where his presence hasn’t pissed you off.

You’ve known him your whole life - he’s followed you everywhere and you can’t shake him. It pains you to admit that you wouldn’t know what to do if you had to shake him.

‘Whatcha thinkin’ about?’ Bob looks at you with those big, bright blue eyes with a hint of concern.

You glare and he almost shifts back to normal.

‘Jeez, forget I asked.’

How do you tell the one person you swore long ago you’d spend eternity loathing that you were scared about the day he would leave. Which could be soon. Considering that every single one of your close friends were signing up to become naval aviators; that’s what most people did around here. Top Gun was located so close. Those pilots were legend and almost every teenager or college-aged kid from around here wanted to be them. So many of those pilots were mythical beings. Except Rooster’s Dad - even though he wasn’t here, he almost was because Rooster was here. Which told you all you needed to know - the risks were too high and death was inevitable. Yet, Bradley was signing up, Jake was too, Nat, Bob and Fanboy. Every single one of them had their callsigns already figured out - no need for them to blessed upon them when they got there.

And soon you’d be alone. Probably still at this aquarium with no Bob to annoy you with his perfectly slicked hair, how nice his back looked when it was turned and how unbelievably frustrated he made you.

‘You have fun at the party? Ma said she didn’t see you.’ He’s trying, or at least he’s trying to convey that he’s actually nice to her sometimes.

‘Your Mom was at the party? Wow didn’t realise we all still had to be chaperoned.’ You still felt bad that you didn’t get to say hi to her if she was there.

‘Low blow, sweetheart. She was there for a bit, wanted to say hi to Rooster and you.’ He pauses as if he’s thinking of what he’s about to say, weighing it up.

‘Y’know she thinks of you like one of my sisters.’ The words come out heavy from his mouth. You blink at him in surprise. You’d never addressed how close your families were and how distant you both were.

‘Well, my Mom considers you the son she never had so,’ she meets his eye, ‘I guess we’re even then.’

‘Was it even a competition in the first place, Y/N?’ He says it so softly, and his eyes pour into yours - a depth of emotion you weren’t sure he had.

‘I-’

It stunned you, slightly. What was admitting to? What did he mean by that?

It didn’t matter though as kids came hurtling through the doors of the gift shop and the conversation was slowly forgotten. You never looked in his direction and, to the best of you knowledge, he never as much even looked at you.

Bob who always been so shy, so sweet to everyone else was a chip on your shoulder. The biggest baggage you carried around was his teasing, his want to be one-up-on-you. The standard you could never quite measure up to was your Mom’s best friends’ son. And everyone loved Bob. His quietness allowing him to fly under the radar. Yet, you spent all of high school and college at each others’ throats. And he could say what he liked, slightly hummed in the noise of a frantic classroom or college dining hall where no one would hear and it drove you crazy how no one saw Bob for what he is. An antagoniser, a smart-ass.

That sweet boy you used to play in the sandbox with and playfight over who got the last ice-pop at the family barbeque had grown up to be a hard ass. The boy whose surname you used to attach to your own and imagine your wedding was someone you swore you’d never feel anything but simmering loathing for. And somehow, someway he was admitting defeat?

This was going to be a long summer.

#bob floyd #robert floyd #bob floyd x reader #bob floyd x you #bob floyd imagine #bob floyd angst #bob floyd fluff #bob floyd smut #top gun maverick fanfiction #lewis pullman characters #lewis pullman fanfic #robert floyd x reader #robert floyd x you

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open-heart-open-container · 16 days ago

Text

ego death - robert 'bob' reynolds x reader

months after bob disappeared, he was on her television. he was here. in new york. months after they both suffered ego deaths and she didn't really know who she was anymore.

word count: 13.7k

post divider

read on ao3

cw: mentions and descriptions of drug addiction, grief, derealisation; friends to strangers to a secret third thing. trying to make bob as accurate as i possibly can but probs failing. rushed ending :/ reader uses she/her pronouns and no use of Y/N.

a/n: lol so i have not written anything since the pandemic (yikes). this could possibly be the worst thing ever and i perhaps may never write again after this but i watched thunderbolts a while ago and it unlocked something deep within myself that said i must venture back into writing so here we are. this was fully inspired by jensen mcrae's 'my ego dies at the end' so please listen (amongst other songs; i might make a playlist who knows). anyways, enjoy and please be nice.

If she had seen it at the time she should have known that he had suffered an ego death. But now she’s looking at him on her TV with the New Avengers. He’s wearing those corduroy trousers she bought him months before he disappeared without a word. She thought he was dead.

Then, there were many times she thought he was dead. Like that one time she finally allowed herself to leave that dingy apartment they shared and venture out into the world with her college friends. The “world” meaning some run down bar with a pool table and a measly dart board with so many holes in it the darts stopped sticking. Her friends pulled her into some rowdy game of pool with these random men (at least ten to fifteen years older than them) and somehow got stuck listening to how John is going through his second divorce and he was only 42. She’d left the bar in a fit of giggles with her friends, laughing at each of their feeble attempts to try and get them to sleep with them (each of them had a wedding ring they tried to sneak off their fingers). The memory would almost make her smile if she had not returned home to find Bob, relapsing on their bathroom floor.

It always tended to go this way. He’d get better, for a while. Then he would disappear. Not physically, but within himself. He’d hear a song, or someone would call him Bobby and a few days later she’d find him on the side of a road or in their bathroom. She didn’t know how tired she was until he left that day.

She couldn’t ever be sick of it, she wasn’t sick of it. Or at least she tried to convince herself of that a long time ago.

He was so still she didn’t know if he was breathing or not and it terrified her that she wasn’t sure she was willing to check.

‘I’m sorry.’

It came out so weak she almost didn’t hear it.

‘It’s okay. I’m home now,’ she whispered and she began to slowly make her way down to him on the cool tile. He was so pale and so cold, yet so warm at the same time. A furnace in the middle of winter and a cool blast of the AC in the summer.

She had tried so many times to pull him out. She didn’t think she could change him, per se. But she definitely thought she could prove to him that the way she cared for him, the way she saw him for every piece of him could be enough to show him that he should and could feel the same way about himself. Then he wouldn’t need it. Then he wouldn’t have to hide. Then that darkness that would descend over his face, his hands, his body when he felt a storm brewing inside would dissipate.

She knew it was not that easy and she knew that some people thought she was just having delusions of grandeur. But they weren’t delusions of grandeur to her when she’d known him so long. When she got to selfishly hold him when he was like this knowing she’d never get to hold him any other way.

A delusion of grandeur would be believing that Robert Reynolds loved her back. Wanting Robert Reynolds to get better was not a delusion of grandeur, it was simply hope.

And there he was, on her screen. Looking healthy. His smile was still as crooked as ever and it reached his eyes this time. And his hair. It looked so soft. She wanted to reach through the screen and run her hands through it one last time. He looked almost peaceful. What on earth was her Bob doing with the New Avengers?

She had no idea where he went. She had resigned herself to the fact that he was probably dead. He had relapsed again and he wasn’t coming back. She mourned him. She kept having this dream that she was at some random college party she went to as a freshman and he was in the corner. She would soon learn that he was always in a corner somewhere. Hiding as if he never wanted to be found. Observing like he could pick everyone apart in the room with just a glance.

Your worst nightmares don’t tend to come true. But she woke up that day and he was simply gone as if he wasn’t even there before. As if he had not caused a shift in her cosmos.

She’d see his face and she’d wake up. She knew it was only a matter of a few hours before she would be back in bed, having the same dream again. When he left, when he died, she changed everything she could to try and rid her body of the feeling of him. He was everywhere and nowhere at the same time. She left Florida. She couldn’t go home to her family - she’d left for a reason. She tried so hard to be so many things for everyone else and for Bob, she was just her and she just gave and gave and it never felt as though that resource of help for him would ever cease. It just kept flowing and flowing and then it had nowhere to go so she left.

She gave the notice on the lease. She thought about moving to Nashville. She thought about moving to Boston. They’d talked about Boston once. But she settled on New York. Something fast, something unknowable about the vast skyline of buildings, a void she could get lost in. It was one she was hoping she’d never come out of. She didn’t want to be a corporate sell out but she at least put her pre-Law major to use. She could read and read until the words blurred on the page but at least, here, in New York, she wasn’t turning corners and seeing his face.

So why on earth does it feel like he’s in her living room?

She shut it off, letting the static of the screen burn her hand. So she mourned for nothing? So she cut her hair, changed all but her name and he’s still the same Bob. With his hands covered by his sleeves and those damn corduroy trousers she had to convince him that he’d grow to like while he mumbled something about mustard ‘not being his colour.’

That thought almost made her smile.

And he’s in New York. Of course he’s in New York.

She fell in love with him the minute she made eye contact with him. It was freshman year. It was oppressively hot. She wasn’t used to it yet - the short skirts, the tank tops and manicured nails and hair. She was begging her body not to run back to the comfort of the climate of her hometown. She left for a reason. So at this random frat party her roommate had dragged her to, she saw him. Looking around the room vacantly for some reason to stay when she caught his gaze her body was shocked back to life. He didn’t seem like he belonged here. He seemed like he belonged beside her, in her, with her.

Maybe it wasn’t fair to single him out like that but in a crowd full of college boys wearing the same polo neck tops and khaki shorts, he was different. The minute he gave her that shy smile of his she was a goner.

‘So I guess you also don’t come to parties that much, huh?’ His voice was low, cautious. It sent lightning bolts straight to her stomach.

‘No,’ she swallowed the lump in her throat, willing her hands to stop shaking. ‘I just moved here. For college. Pre-law.’

‘Cool, cool.’

A beat of silence passes between them.

‘Oh, oh well I know a few of the guys here. I don’t go to college. I dropped out of high school. I know these guys from middle school’

She hummed. ‘Well, nice that you guys stayed in touch.’

‘Nah, they just keep around for…’ he trailed off.

Oh. Oh. He’s the pot dealer, she thought.

Some remix of some classic noughties pop song came on and that familiar yells and chants of drunken college kids surrounded them.

‘I’m Bob,’ he smiled, ‘by the way.’ She smiled and gave him her name.

She couldn’t tell if it was the drugs or the lights but could have sworn his eyes lit up at just knowing her name.

‘It’s really nice to meet you, Bob.’ She was being sincere, she could tell he didn’t think so. She reached out to touch his arm. ‘Do you know anywhere around here that we could just…talk somewhere else?’ He nodded quickly.

From that moment on, they were inseparable. At the beginning, all she knew about Bob was that he could talk for hours about books and music and film and, underneath it all, she knew he was someone with such empathy and compassion he’d go so far. She did feel like she had to play a game of chess to find out how he was feeling. He would just recede into himself when he would go to visit his Mom. She never really asked why. She told him everything that night they met. She still wonders if it was the kindness in his eyes that made her tell him why she’d never go home or if it was the universe tying them together. Some cosmic event that she would spend many, many years trying to recover from.

The first night she knew it wasn’t just pot, he had told her everything. And she felt guilty. So guilty. He was overwhelmed, he didn’t know what he was doing and he forgot that he told her. And so she held onto all of it. Every single little aspect and room of his mind that he told her. He sat on her bedroom floor - so out of it, so manic - and just talked and talked. Until his eyes started to close and they didn’t open til the next night.

She’d witnessed every second of the heights he’d reach and the rock bottoms he’d crash to on her bedroom floor. He lost his job and his apartment. She would tell people they rented together but he would blow most of that rent money on drugs. It never angered her. She knew why but she just couldn’t stop it.

Her college friends stopped calling about a month before he left. Maybe it was apparent she wasn’t coping too well wondering if he’d come home alive or not. She’d been rejected from most law schools she’d applied for. And the ones she did get into didn’t offer enough financial aid for her to get through. So she willed for him to get better, get on his own two feet so she could try and do better for the both of them, together.

Maybe subconsciously he knew she was starting to wane. She desperately tried to not let him know - not let him know that she was in love with him and that she was only keeping herself alive for him.

It was a cliche she kept repeating to people - you don’t know him the way I do, you don’t understand him the way I do. Like when he was clean and they’d lie on the floor eating shitty takeaway pizza with cherry coke and watching terrible romcoms, there were times she was almost certain he felt the same way about her. When they would lie back laughing and for a moment it would still and his eyes would stare into hers and she could see the cogs turning, the flicker of his eyes down to her lips and lightning would strike in her stomach. Then he would turn, stare at the ceiling and he wasn’t there anymore. Like he had thought too much and he was just gone. The moment was gone but so was he. She wasn’t even sure he lived in any of the discomfort or in any of the comfort she tried so hard to give him.

No matter if it wasn’t enough, no matter if she couldn’t give anymore than she wanted - he was enough. He was all she wanted. When he would wrap his arms around her after a long shift and she’d let her think for a split second the domesticity wasn’t a lie and she’d picture his hands fiddling with the ends of her t-shirt, getting ready to lift it off and take care of her the way he did in her dreams.

It takes the soft whine of her dog to pull her out of her reverie. She fills his bowls up, one with kibble and one with water. She sets them down and then she sits down, beside her favourite companion and watches as he scarves up his food like he was starved. She knows it's going to be a long night; a long night of reminiscing, remembering and trying to forget how it felt to be held by Bob, kissed by Bob, touched by Bob. All before he disappeared.

‘Do you ever think-’

‘Of course, I think, Bob. I’m a thinker by nature, a yearner by heart.’

He laughs. It stops abruptly. His posture is straight. She can tell he’s being serious.

‘Do you ever think about us?’

The six words suck the air straight out of her lungs and right out into the muggy Florida night.

‘W-what do you mean?’

‘I mean…’, he pauses as if he’s weighing up if he should really be saying any of this out loud, ‘do you ever think about that party? Because I do. I think about when you asked if we could leave and all I could think about was wanting to kiss you. But then it didn’t seem as if you wanted to do that. So I didn’t. And I think about what it would be like, now I mean, if I had just had the balls to do it. But then I kept ruining it all. I can see so much of myself so much more clearly when you’re here and I can see none of myself clearly when you’re sitting so close to me. It’s like I could just stop forever and the thought of it could be enough but it’d kill me.’

She didn’t think, she just did. So she kissed him. It was like the day they met was what she always thought it was, a cosmic event. Leading to this one moment where she’d feel his lips against hers, the slight swipe at her bottom lip with his tongue and she knew that somewhere in amongst the cosmos this moment was written, it was destined.

She cannot let herself get swept up in the storm of him anymore, she promised herself. But as she feels the warmth of her dog, Charlie, beside her in bed, as the AC whirls and the blinds gently slap against the window, she lets herself have just one more night of reliving that moment when he touched her before the alarm screeches at 6:30am and she knows, he is gone. He was gone before that moment, she knows that now. And the girl she was then withered and died along with the two seasons that had passed between them.

Her typical routine distracts her for a moment. Her usual morning walk in the same park along the same route gets her thinking less about the blue eyes she dreams and more about how still a city can be this early in the morning. The subway is the same as always. The monotonous walk into the office remains the same and the vacant smiles she gives her colleagues in the break room will never change. They don’t know her. Maybe she doesn’t even know herself now.

It's not as though life in the city has been lonely. She has friends. She met them through this guy she briefly dated when she moved to the city. That was a meager attempt to move on. But they had their own shit going on and none of them needed to know about her addiction to an addict, one was so much more than just that.

She had to stop thinking about how he was in the city. She had to let go of the urge to march five blocks away to Tony Stark’s old tower and beg, on her hands and knees, beg to see him. She turned on her screen, typed in her password and resolved that this was the last time she was ever going to think about Bob Reynolds.

She was being followed. She could feel it.

She changed her and Charlie’s route. She started walking to work, she even risked a bike. She started going to the gym before work, on her lunch break. She stopped going to Pilates with Aubrey on a Sunday and convinced her to go on a Tuesday instead ‘just in case they wanted to have a drink on a Saturday night’ - they never did.

She couldn’t pinpoint exactly when she figured it out but she knew it had to have been about a month after that random black out in New York and Bob appearing on the news. She didn’t dwell on the Bob of it all. She tried to nestle into her podcasts, books and endless playlists of music she could never share with him. If she was deluded, she would think that it was the guy who works at the desk in her office building, with his vacant stare that followed her through the lobby of the building right to the elevators. But she wouldn’t really think that some prepubescent looking, college-aged kid was able to somehow follow every single thing she did. If she was even more deluded, she would think it was Bob. Whilst he was skilled at observing, he wasn’t entirely skilled at being the most secluded in a room. Or maybe he just stuck out like a sore thumb to her. He shone from every corner of a room they were ever in together.

Somehow, she still knew she was being followed. Maybe it was the months of observing everyone else instead of herself that taught her the signs. In looking for him everywhere and in everyone, she’d grown quite attuned to understanding and following everyone else's movements.

She’d agreed to go out tonight. She could put the mask on of who she was before Bob for a while. For the sake of Natalie’s birthday and the kindness she’d shown her when she first moved to the city. At work, she tried to busy herself with the thoughts of what she was wearing, what she was going to eat before she left and whether it was appropriate for her to have a drink before she left.

She knew she needed to leave the house, also. Walking Charlie, going to the gym and grocery shopping could not be classed as social interactions if she spent most of that time with her head down and her headphones in. Avoiding everyone and anyone that could possibly meet her eyeline and give her that sad, pitying look when they see someone who just looks lost walking down the aisles.

She’s too young to have lost the love of her life, she thinks. Then she brushes the thought aside and tries to pull on those too-tight-jeans she loved in college and a top that lets her pretend she’s someone new. Someone who doesn’t need Bob Reynolds.

She knew she was being followed the minute she stepped out of her apartment building into the heat of the night. If it was her from before she would be scared, now she’s apathetic to the many scenarios which would have run through her head before. She shakes the feeling of eyes on her and keeps going until she’s on the subway, she’s in the club, she’s unaware of how many drinks she’s in until she’s stumbling outside and waiting for an uber. And that’s when she finally sees her. The eyes that have been on her all week.

Her cobalt blue eyeliner catches on the streetlights. A perfectly groomed pixie cut lies on her head. And she smiles like a cat who just caught her prey. If she was sober, she would have avoided all eye contact, looked straight at her phone and tried to pay no mind to the very pretty assassin who was stalking across lanes of traffic to reach her. Instead, she held her eye. This is what apathy is - to look death in the eye and not to fear it, not to hide from it but to welcome it with open arms.

But now she’s alone. Now, she’s face to face with imminent death and all she can think about is that she never told him how she felt. Feels.

‘You know Bob.’

It’s said matter of factly. An Eastern European accent with an emphasis on the ‘ub’ of his name.

Suddenly, the several vodka sodas have evaporated from her body.

‘Yes. I do.’

A beat of silence.

‘Well, I did.’ There is a weight to her words that she can see Yelena recognises, some emotion she can’t quite place rippling in her opponents eyes.

‘Whether you do or did doesn’t matter to me.’ It’s cold. It cuts her right in between her ribs.

‘So what does matter to you?’

A flicker of amusement passes through her eyes. Yelena Belova finds her funny, she thinks. Was it really that funny or have the seven vodka sodas re-entered her body?

‘I’ve been watching you.’

‘I know.’

‘Oh, you know. How did you know?’

‘I just do.’

‘Okay so you’re as off putting as Bob when he wants to be.’

‘He’s not off putting.’ Something about calling Bob off-putting irks her, even though she knows he can be difficult when he wants to be. He was an addict. The highly functioning ones, which at times Bob was not, can be both charming and off-putting at the exact same time.

‘What is he to you then?’

‘What do you want from me?’ She checks her phone. ‘My Uber is five minutes away and I need to get back to my dog.’

‘Charlie, yes.’ Yelena nods.

‘You have followed me here. You know my dog’s name. You probably know what desk I sit at work. You definitely know that I don’t usually leave my home other than to go to work, walk my dog, get my groceries,’ she takes a breath, ‘Why me?’ There’s nothing aggressive about her tone, she’s just tired. She is trying to avoid how much Yelena may or may not know about her. She’s trying to avoid how kind-of-not-sober she is.

‘You know Bob.’

‘That explains absolutely nothing. Thank you for such clarity.’

She barks out a laugh. ‘You’re funny, I like you.’

‘I don’t know you.’

‘I’m a…friend of Bob’s.’

With the hesitation in Yelena’s voice, she feels her heart drop to her stomach. She feels a knife twist in her heart and get pulled out. Bob’s mere existence in New York with the New Avengers makes a lot more sense once Yelena is standing in front of her and she says ‘friend’ so softly, so gently she understands that now there is someone else. Someone else who sees the kindness in Bob. And then she knows she has to let go.

She begs Yelena with her eyes to let her go. She feels them well up with tears. She can blame the alcohol tomorrow. She watches a black Hyundai pull up. She feels like she’s drowning in headlights and vodka sodas and there’s a headache forming right at her temple.

‘Please, I-’ she stops herself. ‘I have to get home. I can’t leave Charlie any longer.’

She walks over to the car, gives her name to the driver and when he nods she opens the door. She looks back just once. Maybe in the hopes Yelena will offer her something else that won’t make her feel as though her gut has been twisted inside out.

‘I will find you again, you know that.’

She nods. She can’t stop her and the alcohol running through her veins stops any objection slipping through her lips. Yelena disappears into the night and, despite her better judgment, she looks forward to the next time she sees her again.

–

‘I didn’t think you’d knock.’

‘You think little of me.’

Yelena is at her front door. She’s holding Charlie back with one hand, knowing if she let him go that Yelena would become his best friend.

‘Well, I thought you’d use the fire escape. I left the window open for a reason.’

‘I wondered if you were too warm.’

She hums in response. ‘Are you coming in or not?’ It’s curt, it’s less-than-friendly but not cold.

‘Wow. What a warm reception. Not at all how Bob described you.’

She tries to ignore the pit forming in her stomach.

‘Your apartment is nice,’ she can tell Yelena is zero-ing in on the photo of Bob and her cello-taped to the fridge.

A picture from a happier time. Her head is on his shoulder, his smile is brighter than the sun and he was clean and he was happy. She was happy. She knew who she was then and he knew who he was too. Before the ego deaths, before the two of them became ghosts to each other.

‘Why are you here, Yelena?’

‘Bob.’

‘I know that but why? After all this time.’ This time she can feel the cracks in her resolve slipping and she’s scrambling to disguise the anger, the grief behind her words.

There’s a lingering sadness in Yelena’s eyes when she asks. Like she knows everything and nothing at the same time. Like she has observed her life enough to know that she barely remembers how to make small talk, like she doesn’t know she is without the person who knew her the best.

Yelena clears her throat and she knows she’s about to hear something she doesn’t want to hear. ‘Do you remember when New York went into a bit of a black out?’

She nods. Where was she going with this?

‘Well, that was Bob.’

‘What?’

‘Do you know where Bob went after he left?’

She has to stop herself from vomiting over the small linen carpet she has that separates her kitchenette and the small couch she’s standing beside.

‘No.’ Her voice is shaky. She straightens her spine to stop her knees from going out from underneath her.

‘I’m not sure I- I really need to hear this. I don’t think I’m ready to know anything.’ She’s panicking. She’s being dragged further underwater. She feels herself leave her own body and she’s watching from above.

Yelena nods.

‘Are you sure?’

‘Is he okay?’ She feels so timid asking.

The silence that passes between them nearly kills her. She can feel her heart giving way.

‘Please.’ It comes out so quietly she doesn’t even hear it herself.

‘If you are not ready to know then I can’t answer that without you knowing everything else.’

‘That seems unfair, I-’

‘I know it seems unfair. But I see you. You’re not even trying to live. The only time I have seen you smile is at your dog. You don’t smile at strangers. You don’t even look before you cross the road. You exist as though there is not a soul out there who cares about you.I know you want to know why I followed you but the first time it was just to let him know you were alive. After that… Well it became a lot more about keeping you alive than telling Bob you were out there.’

‘I-’

‘I’m not finished. Bob is a lot of things. One thing he is not is ready to face a world without you in it.’

She lets it sit in the air between them, she lets it sting her between her ribs and she doesn’t try to fight the feeling anymore. She doesn’t try to fight the way he has wormed his way into everything and everyone that she is and has been.

So she lets it all go.

‘I won’t try and wax poetic about Bob,’ she starts, ‘but if he’s safe, that’s all I need to know. He left me and everything behind for a reason. Sometimes I begin to understand why he did.’ The air between them is solemn. She never wanted to admit that she is beginning to see why he left her - maybe she suffocated him, maybe she didn’t give him enough room to grow without her, maybe she treated him too much like a child instead of the man she was hopelessly in love with.

‘I only met Bob a short time ago but I can tell he cares very much about you. You were the first thing he asked me about after… well, you know.’

Oh. Oh.

‘W-what did he say?’

‘Not much.’ She pauses. She looks as though she’s holding back. Approaching with some trepidation, ‘Do you want to know what happened to Bob?’

Yes, she does. And her mouth betrays her before she can say no. She doesn’t know how long it takes Yelena to tell her about how Bob was shot a ridiculous amount of times in the abdomen, survived, started flying and is now some kind of hybrid God-man-Void that pulled people into rooms of their trauma and he doesn’t remember any of it. How this happened to him.

‘Who did this to him?’

‘Well,’ Yelena hesitates, ‘it was a program called the Sentry Project. Valentina ran it. Most of the other test subjects were killed.’

‘So, he went to Malaysia on a suicide mission?’ Her skin feels like it’s on fire. Her dog licks her hand as if he knows what she’s thinking.

‘Well, not exactly. I don’t think any of them knew what they were signing up for. Just a drug trial that would help them get better. Bob wanted to get better.’ For you, were the only two words Yelena never said out loud.

She can’t wrap her head around why he would leave her for this. Without telling her what it was. And where did he even get the money to go to Malaysia? She should be angry. She should cry for him. For herself. But she can’t. Even now, she’s holding the flood water back behind a dam she doesn’t want Yelena to see. But something in the way her emotions are running through her veins she knows Yelena can see right through her.

‘Look,’ Yelena calculates her next sentence, ‘I can’t answer why he did it. Only he can do that. You will only get the answer you want if you meet with him.’

She finally looks at Yelena straight in the eye. Maybe it’s okay to let the dam burst, she’d been holding on for so long.

‘What makes you think I would ever want that? To see him again?’

Yelena grunts.

‘I only know what I’ve seen. You have no pictures of anyone other than Bob in your apartment. You spend all your time with a dog. The first time I saw you interact with anyone was yesterday and even then you looked as though you’d rather be anywhere else. Have it your way. Don’t see him if that’s what you want.’

She doesn’t want to ask but she does it anyway.

‘Has he even asked to see me?’

The answer is soul crushing.

‘No.’

‘Then why are you here if he doesn’t want me there?’ She feels herself go underwater again, all that grief bubbling up to the surface.

‘Like I said, Bob wanted to know if you were alive. I checked for him. But I came back to keep you alive. We don’t know what would happen if…’

‘If he knew this is how you’re living your life, he would be crushed. He does not need any more reasons…’ She sighs, ‘He doesn’t need a reason to be consumed by the Void again. I don’t know what happened between you and Bob. I followed you because I care about him. And I followed you because I can see it in your eyes that you’re ready to give in and that would just about seal Bob’s fate. I don’t want that.’ Her eyes snap up to meet Yelena’s. ‘And you don’t want that either.’

She looks back down at her feet. She cannot meet Yelena’s eye. She cannot yield that she’s given up. The right toe of her sock has a hole in it. Maybe if she kept staring at it, she would wake up and this would all be some kind of morbid dream that never happened and she’d back in the muggy heat of Florida in that sweaty frat house and they could start over. But the longer she stared at that hole in her sock, nothing changed.

‘I think-’ she weighs it all up ‘I think you should leave.’

Yelena takes two steps back. Charlie goes to follow her. Hunching down, reaching her hand out to pet the top of Charlie's head, she gives Charlie a pat. She tries to smile at the wag of his tail but her lips don’t, won’t curl upwards.

Yelena stands. She places her hand on her shoulder.

‘If this is what you want, I won’t come here again. But if you want to see him, you can call me.’ She reaches into her pocket and pulls out a scrap bit of paper with a number on it.

‘Don’t wait too long. This is my tenth burner phone.’

Her brows furrow.

‘Don’t ask.’ She barks out a laugh in response. She hadn’t heard herself laugh in…well, months.

And she’s gone. As quietly as Yelena had entered her life weeks ago, she exited it with ease. She had seen her more clearly than she had seen herself in weeks. And it unwound something in her.

She took Charlie for his walk. Ditched her headphones this time. Listened to the people. Looked at the skyline. Did everything she would have done before any of this had ever happened.

When it was quiet. When the sun had finally set and the only thing between her body and the noise in her brain was the soft hum of the AC she took it all in. Everything Yelena had said. All the feelings she had been shutting out for weeks, for months.

She didn’t want to be a WebMD warrior, or a google search nurse for herself. But she’d settled upon her own ego death. She’d never gotten high, except those few occasions she was passed a blunt in college or when she’d take an edible with Bob after a few beers. She thought that you could only achieve ego death through psychedelics. That’s not strictly true.

But she lost the girl that she was, the one that she knew. That he knew. Somewhere along the way she lost the thread.

Something had to change. Something had to give way and it should not have been her sense of self. Yet, here she was standing in front of a mirror wondering when her cheeks became so sunken in and her eyes so hollow. She finally saw for herself what the rest of the world must have been seeing for the last god-only-knows how many months and she knew it had to change.

It had to change. It had to change. It had to change.

She slept through the night and her dreams were only filled with the hope that she would see him again. And this time, she promised to herself they would be happy.

‘I honestly did not think you’d call.’

She had to smile. She hadn’t even said hello. She was growing fond of Yelena Belova.

‘I thought about it.’

‘I guess you did, huh.’

‘How does this work? How can I see him?’

‘Well, not immediately.’ Disappointment rings in her ears. Sensing this Yelena continues, ‘He’s been placed in decompression. He’s been there for the last month and a half after… well, y’know.’ She did know, she’d spent all morning reading about it on her phone.

‘So, he’s locked up in a cell?’

‘No, no. Not a cell. He’s in a safe room where he can be monitored. He hasn’t started training yet-’

‘Training?!’ They were going to weaponize him?

‘Training to control his powers, yes. So I am a little hesitant to bring you to him when we don’t know what kind of effect you’re going to have on him.’

‘I doubt little.’

The way Yelena says her name makes her feel like she’s a little girl in trouble in school again. ‘You have a severe hand in Bob’s mood. He’s only started to mention you and when he does he gets all love-sick. It's disgusting and then he remembers how he left and he just…’

‘Disappears?’

‘Yes, yes. He disappears. We cannot risk the void again.’

‘So then what can I do? You’ve told me he’s alive, he’s somewhat well in a decompression room and now you’re saying you’re not even sure if I can see him?’ She avoids the ‘lovesick’ comment. It’s just Bob, she thinks, his eyes always make him seem as though he holds a candle to anything.

‘There is one thing we can try.’

‘Which is?’

‘I sneak you into the tower. We go to his room and you don’t leave until you’ve kissed and made up, capsish?’

‘Yelena. That’s not us, we were friends.’

‘If you were just friends, why do you both insist on downplaying the very obvious codependency thing you’ve got going on. I’m here as his friend, not a matchmaker. I want Bob to be better as much as you do. We just have to think about this.’

‘And you didn’t think about this before-’

‘Before I stalked you across the city and showed up at your front door, no. I didn’t think you’d call so soon.’

She sighs. ‘I’m calling now.’ She hesitates, ‘I miss him.’ I miss him. I need him. I want him. I love him. So many other ways of expressing how much she cares for him.

She can hear Yelena shifting around through the phone.

‘I know you do. He misses you too.’ Yelena is trying to be kind. The admission hangs in the space between them - almost as though it’s the most obvious thing in the world to Yelena, and the least obvious to her.

‘Yelena,’ It comes out as though she is pleading with her, ‘How can I possibly see him if there’s a high chance I could send him back to a place he doesn’t deserve to be in?’ The thought shudders through her. That same sickening feeling she felt when she saw him on the news rises through her veins.

‘I understand where you are coming from. But we have to try. If not for you, why not for him? The team and I can only help him so much and the others don’t really know what to do with him. Bucky has tried to get through to him,’ The Winter Soldier is his friend? ‘I know somewhere within you knows he didn’t abandon you-’

‘He did, Yelena. I cannot trust that he wants this. Especially when it sounds as though he’s not ready.’

‘No one is ever ready to face the past. But if we don’t face it we get stuck in it, and we keep going round and round in circles - never truly owning up to whatever skeletons we have in our closet. They will come back to haunt us again and again. That’s what loneliness is. Those are the things that drive us to push away the ones we love - can you not see that maybe what Bob needs - what Bob desires - is to make things right?’

It sounds like him. It is him. All she’d ever known for those years they spent with their souls tangled together - never their limbs - was that Bob wanted to protect. He wanted to fight, he was just held back by that voice in his head that told him that he couldn’t, that he wasn’t strong enough. There was a voice within him that just never ceased. A voice which beat him down to a pulp. To a point where we continually left her for the plains of a high. And he left her for the thing that led him to this.

‘I want to see him,’ she heard a sigh of relief through the receiver, ‘but only if it’s on his terms. I am not bombarding him now. I need time to forgive him. I need time to forgive myself.’ She looked at her face in the hallway mirror, she was run-down. Her own voice in her head that told her that she wasn’t good enough - of course he left you, all you ever did wasn’t enough - had led her to wander the world as a ghost of herself. In abandoning herself, she abandoned him.

Even though they weren’t face to face, she could feel Yelena’s disappointment. ‘Okay, I respect your decision. I understand it. I will try and talk to him but I can’t promise you that he’ll come around.’

‘It’s okay, Yelena. He might not need me now.’

‘He will always need you. I can tell.’

‘If that’s the case then, he can choose to see me when he wants. When he’s able.’

‘Alright.’

‘Thank you.’

‘I don’t know why you are thanking me.’

She couldn’t explain it to her. She didn’t have the words. Charlie whimpered at his feet. She looked out the window and all she saw was sun.

‘Yelena, I need to take Charlie out for a walk.’

‘Okay then. I will call you when he’s ready.’ The line went dead.

For the first time, in a long time, the wounds of the past were still open but they were healing. Yelena was right. She’d spent so long with her back against a closet door, holding up all the skeletons she was hiding inside of it. There was really only one skeleton in that metaphorical closet - Bob.

So she let herself remember and she tried her very best to choose not to forget. Because he had his reasons to go - she knew him. He wasn’t selfish. It wasn’t selfish. He didn’t choose what happened to him. None of us do. She didn’t choose to fall in love with him. All of him. Not just when he was clean, not just in the good moments. She knew he didn’t want to. She knew he couldn’t help and, by God, he had tried to help it.

But you can also choose to not give in to the voices. She’d let them consume her for so long now that she didn’t even know herself. Now she just had to start following the thread which had gotten loose for so long until she came back to herself, until she knew herself the way she used to. The way he used to.

She looks at the photo taped on her fridge, knowing that he will come get her when he’s ready but she’s not going to wait for that day to complete her. Attaching the leash to Charlie’s teal collar, she opens her door and knows that somehow this walk will be different than the rest. Instead of blocking it all out, she forces herself to remember everything the way it happened when it happened to her.

Like when he’d decided that he wanted a dog. Or when they’d resolved to move to Boston because their AC broke and the heat was unbearable and they thought that they’d prefer the chill of a Boston spring than the swamp heat of Southern Florida. Or the night they’d kissed. A night she’d prefer to save for the latter hours of the day, when it’s dark and cold and there is no one but her and her pillow (and Charlie) to see and hear her cries. Today, she remembers waking up with the hope he’d felt the same, that it wasn’t just a drugged up decision he’d made. She lets that be born anew. She remembers that he stopped replying to her texts that day when he’d disappeared an hour before she’d woken up. She remembers going to the police station, begging them to file a missing persons report three days later and being told We don’t file for druggies, darling.

She chooses a different path than they’d usually take. She texted Aubrey asking if she wanted to go for a walk. She has a feeling she can trust her. Maybe not with the whole the guy-I’ve-been-in-love-with-since-forever-is-now-kind of a demigod thing but she could always twist the truth. And that’s what she did.

‘So he just left and now he’s back?’

She nods.

Aubrey waits for her to say something, anything before continuing, ‘And it’s not even him it’s his friend doing this for him?’ She’s calculating something in her head. ‘For so long you’ve been so closed off. At first Natalie and I just thought that you were just like that, you didn’t have much to say other than the funny things Charlie did or which Pilates instructor you liked best or how busy you were in-work.’

‘I get why you’d be guarded after all of this.’ Aubrey sighs. ‘Do you still love him after all of this? Is it even worth it? Forgiving him?’

She gets it - if her friend of a couple of months told her that the will-they-won’t-they, love of her life, addict came back into her life via Yelena Belova (she told Aubrey she was his friend from rehab) she would also think it wasn’t worth the struggle or the pain or that she shouldn’t still love him but when it was her… Well, that was different.’

‘I don’t want to fall into the “he’s different” trap, Aubrey. But he is. He’s special. In those moments and stretches of time when he was clean, that friendship we had was something I didn’t want and don’t want to ruin. I fell in love with him the minute he opened his mouth and the second he gave me his jacket and he was wearing this old, ratty Star Wars shirt and he looked so excited to talk about all his favourite things about it.’

She takes a breath.

‘When my brother died,’ she begins, eyeing up Aubrey to see if it was okay to continue, ‘Bob was the only person in the world I felt I could tell. I don’t ever want to go home. I haven’t seen my parents since I left for college when I was eighteen. Bob is the only person who understood why I never looked back and he’s the only person who hasn’t judged me for it or made me feel insignificant.’

‘When I flunked an important class in college, he stayed up late every night coming up to my re-take final to help me study. He brought me coffees and cooked me dinner. He let me cry on his shoulder when boys broke my spirit. They never broke the heart I gave away a long time ago to him. He made me laugh. Every day. I never wanted to shy away from his coping mechanisms, nor could I judge him for it. But that’s his story to tell.’

After a while, Aubrey smiles. ‘Being understood by someone, being known is the most special feeling in the world. We can’t help where life takes us - sure, we can make it better if we can. I’m just really happy to see you looking like you belong-’ she corrects herself, ‘remembering that you belong here. When I first met you I knew you were lost. I just thought it was because you had just moved here, you didn’t know anyone. Now I know it’s because you lost both yourself and him when you left New York.’

‘Forgive him or don’t forgive him. Keep loving him or stop loving him. It’s all the same to me if you’re happy. I can’t say I fully trust this Bob guy but,’ Aubrey stops and turns to her, grabbing her hand, ‘we have all lost someone and we usually don’t get second chances to make things right or to even allow them to make things right. Make things right for yourself. I wish I’d made things right with this guy I’d met in college. Kind of similar to Bob and you but y’know, without the drugs.’

This was the most she’d ever known about Aubrey other than her desire to retire at 40.

‘He was so gentle and so shy. But could also cut you down when he needed to. I suppose we were similar in that way. I never knew love before him. I lost him a couple of years ago. That’s why I moved here - I couldn’t deal with the pitying looks and the sorry’s, I just didn’t want to be known anymore. When I met Ben, that changed. Because he saw me and he knew me and he took me for what I was - someone very broken - and he gave me a second chance at love but not with the person I truly, at that time, wanted the second chance with.’

They’d looped back around to Aubrey’s apartment building.

‘I can’t stop you from taking back or going back to someone who might hurt you again but I like to believe that the universe gives us back what we want and sometimes, it’s even better the second time around.’

She smiles at her. She feels so much lighter now that someone knows, that someone who might not even understand how she stuck by him for so long but understands that second chances can be a good thing at the right time.

‘Thanks, Aubrey. I really appreciate this, I hope I didn’t put too much on you.’

Aubrey lightly bats her arm. ‘Don’t be silly! I really like this you. The one that actually tells people things.’ She laughs, properly laughs. ‘Don’t be a stranger girl, my door and shoulder are always open. We should do this more often!’

‘We should.’ It’s sincere. She asks her to finally grab a drink on Saturday and on her way home texts Natalie for her to join too. Something she never really ever had, people she could rely on for fun and for comfort.

On her walk home she saw the city open up toward her. All along everything she needed had been right in front of her face to get her out of this mess. Yelena had given her a hand to stand on her own two feet, now she just had to keep going.

–

It had been weeks since she’d last heard from Yelena. She felt better, she felt more fresh. Yet, she stopped herself every time she went to call Yelena’s number. Partly because that number was probably long gone to the once-assassin, now-Avenger. Partly because she had accepted that he might not want to see her, and for once she was somewhat okay with that. Partly because she knew Yelena had been watching over her, she’d felt that.

She’d asked Natalie to look after Charlie tonight. She had some work fundraiser event she was being forced to go to for office morale and networking. Something about weapons assistance. She wasn’t really paying attention in the meeting.

Before she would have done anything to get out of going to something like this, preferring to be hiding from the rest of the world at home with a book and with Charlie and with thoughts about Bob, his hand in hers, his lips on hers. Now, she still would prefer to stay in but she doesn’t feel consumed by the what ifs and whereabouts she used to wallow in. Now, it is more about living rather than just merely surviving.

‘Thanks so much for looking after him, Nat. I promise he’ll be such a good boy.’

Natalie laughs, ‘It’s no problem really. You need to let your hair down girl, have some fun with those.. Corporate bros?’

The two share a look and laugh.

‘Hmmm, I don’t know if coked up politicians and finance bros are my idea of fun but if it gets me a promotion in work I’ll go for it.’

Natalie gives her a soft smile and ushers her towards the door. ‘I’m glad to see you coming out of your shell more. You look incredible! Now go, leave me and Charlie in peace!’

She walks out of the door with a quick goodbye to Natalie, a rub behind the ears for Charlie and she has to face the long night ahead. This particular summer in New York was a hot one, that kind of muggy, claustrophobic heat that radiated between the buildings. She started noticing the seasons a bit more since she’d talked with Yelena. Noticing how she didn’t mind the rain but hated the wind, especially when it would catch her coming out of the subway. She didn’t mind the heat, it reminded her of happier times in Florida with him and those memories didn’t come with the usual sting they used to carry. Sure, it was hard to remember him, remember that he was alive and that she grieved him as though she was dead. But something in the encounters with Yelena almost gave her permission to stop dwelling within the grief. She didn’t think she had missed much, but finding friendship and finding herself again in the last few weeks has made her realise what she had missed. None of this means that she doesn’t miss him.

And what they had.

If he was here right now, he’d unabashedly tell her that no one deserved her but he would stutter out a compliment. She’d blush. Their hands would trail beside each other, never entwining but each brush of their fingers would send lightning into her abdomen. But he’s not here and maybe he wouldn’t say those things. She would, if she was brave enough. If she was brave enough then she would have told him how much she loved it when he would squint his eyes while he talked or how she found how he moved completely mesmerising. If she was brave enough now, maybe she wouldn’t still jump every time her phone rang or buzzed with a new message.

But there was some semblance of peace building within her.

She didn’t have to walk very far before she was at the gala, greeting her higher-ups and marvelling at the opulence of this whole evening. Glasses of champagne and canapes were shoved into their faces by young waiters at the door, their coats were taken immediately from them and a ticketed number, probably from some raffle ticket book, was shoved into her purse, beside her lipstick and wallet. The lights were overwhelming from the chandeliers above. She wondered how she was going to stand all night in these heels. Regretting her choice of footwear, she follows the partners further into the room and gets passed around like a monkey to perform for prospective new clients.

It's so loud she almost can’t hear the sneer jokes they make; she laughs along anyways. She feels the hush fall over the room when Valentina Allegra de Fontaine makes her way to the podium. She commands so much power over one room, filled with a lot of men who think they’re more powerful than her.

‘Tonight, we are here to celebrate the wonderful advancements we have made in weapons assistance across the globe. The United States is beginning to cement itself as the most powerful weapons producers in the world, surpassing all other nations.’ Valentina begins. There’s something conniving in the way she holds herself. Manipulation written in her eyes.

Valentine drones on about different weapons she doesn’t quite understand, their efficacy rates and how they’ve been used globally. She can see the sea of nods and looks of approval on so many peoples faces. Something she could never understand is the desire to brutalise others with just the click of a button but surviving can be a dirty game.

She’s tuned out once she had the thought of sacrificing her morals. She guessed her apathy started when he left. She went into law to do good, help the people who needed it…not this.

‘As the world changes, humans change. We may have forgotten our own strength, our own ability to fight. With the Avengers gone, a new group takes their place. We must remember the ability to create our own weapons of destruction. Esteemed guests, I’d like to properly introduce you to The New Avengers.’

Her heart almost stops. She definitely knows she’s stopped breathing. They’re standing in a row - starting with Bucky Barnes looking as though he’d desperately rather be anywhere else but here. She knew the feeling. Yelena and Ava looked checked out. Alexi and John take in all the attention and then there he is. He looks so small. But so healthy. So real.

Did he dye his hair? Why does it look kind of blond?

‘The others you know,’ Valentina starts as the applause dies down, ‘but I know you’ve been wondering who this is.’ She points to Bob. Her Bob.

‘This is The Sentry. Our newest Superhero.’

Despite the rapturous applause that surrounded her, her entire world went completely silent. She felt like she was dreaming - one of those dreams where you’re falling and then you wake up. Except, she’s awake and her legs feel like they’re about to give way underneath her. The claps of others become the pounding of heart in her ears. She feels as though she’s in paralysis, she can’t move, she can’t breathe. This is how she sees him again after all this time?

They’d turned Bob into a weapon? They’d sold him a lie?

She felt her boss nudge her arm and give her a look. She began to clap because what else could she do. You always have to play along even if your entire world is crumbling all around you.

He looked small. Like when he would bundle himself up in the corner of a room and just shrink himself down. But there was a glint in his eye, a glimmer that she caught which shone a bit differently. Like he liked the praise. He was only ever like that when he… oh.

He looked fuller, she thought. His arms filled his blazer out nicely, she could make out the swell of a bicep which definitely wasn’t there the last time she saw him. The last time she saw him, he barely fitted into the corduroys she bought him. And here he was, looking as beautiful as ever. She’d never seen him in a suit. Only in her dreams and even then she couldn’t quite picture him all dressed up.

She tried so hard to keep her eyes off of him. She let her eyes drift to Yelena, only to find her stare already on her with her eyebrows slightly raised. Yelena’s eyes saying you’re here? And all she tries to convey back, helplessly in this silent conversation (confrontation?) is that she had no choice. She had no idea he would be here.

Valentina went back to her speech, pontificating about the greatness of this new team. The words were drowned out by her anxiety. This was not how this was supposed to go. It was supposed to be on his terms. Not like this. Not when she felt so back into a corner. Circled by people who wanted to use him, use his mania as a tool of destruction.

She found solace in a small back corner of the room. Not that anything was small in a massive hall but somewhere where she wouldn’t be spotted by hawkeyed clients. She lied and said she was going to the bathroom but she knew Yelena would corner her in there, probably demand an explanation and her explanation would be that she didn’t listen properly in a work meeting because she was too busy imagining all the different scenarios in which she would finally see him again and agreed to go to this because she really needed that promotion in work because she had vet bills, and rent to pay, and now that she’d actually started to enjoy New York, she found she couldn’t afford New York. And the spiral continued like this. Over and over again. That this wasn’t right. She needed to leave but didn’t have a good enough excuse too; Charlie was being taken care of, she hadn’t eaten anything that could give her food poisoning because she wanted to fit into this stupid dress (which now she wanted nothing more than to rip it off her body, burn it and find somewhere to exorcised). So no excuses whatsoever. These people didn’t know her. She couldn’t say - see that guy. No, that guy. The Sentry? Yeah, he broke my heart because he disappeared months ago. I thought he was dead and now he’s here alive but he’s a superhero but also kind of not because he sent lower Manhattan into a dark void of trauma rooms a month or two ago. So I need to leave because he probably doesn’t want to see me, he hasn’t tried to see me and I’ve left it up to him and-

‘Now we wouldn’t want you having a panic attack and making a scene here, would we?’ The lilt of Yelena’s Russian accent filtered into her ears.

She shook her head. She didn’t know what to say.

‘No, I suppose we wouldn’t.’ Her tone isn’t icy, it’s actually quite warm. ‘You look good. Healthy. I’m glad.’

‘You’ve seen me before now, Yelena.’

She snorts, ‘Yes I suppose I have. Maybe you should be the spy in the New Avengers; better observation skills than me.’

She smiles at her. ‘I don’t know how you guys do it. Their whims…’

Yelena frowns. It’s quiet but she hears it anyways over the loud roars in the room, ‘We don’t want to.’

She nods in understanding. No one is free from the control of others nowadays.

‘Are you here for him?’

‘N-no,’ she can tell Yelena doesn’t believe her. ‘I swear I had no idea any of you were going to be here. I’m here with work.’

Yelena looks confused at her answer.

‘You were asked to come? With your work?’

‘Well, it was decided for me. By my boss. I wasn’t really listening, all he said was that I was going. I don’t ask any questions.’

A slight smirk starts to form on Yelena’s face. ‘Your firm doesn’t specialise in weapons, though. Mainly commercial disputes? Unless my intel was incorrect.’

It’s still strange that Yelena knows so much about her and she knows nothing about her. She wouldn’t dare google her; afraid Yelena would show up and ask why she was interested and why she didn’t just ask her to her face.

‘No, you were correct. Just… maybe we’re expanding?’

‘I doubt a firm which primarily deals with the selling of houses and property and wills is particularly interested in arms dealing, given your entire pro-bono practice is dedicated to helping victims of The Blip and the prevention of the wider impacts of Avengers missions in New York city.’

‘I didn’t think of it like that.’ She truly didn’t. She wasn’t that much interested in the firm when she applied, she just wanted to get by. Get through the torture which was losing Bob Reynolds.

‘Hmm.’ Silence falls between the two women. She didn’t really know what to say to her - she seemed so sure of herself and so strong. Yelena Belova was a sight to behold.

‘How are you feeling now?’ For someone so strong, the gentleness in Yelena’s tone shocked her. She wasn’t used to it.

‘Fine.’ Yelena crossed her arms, unconvinced. ‘Okay, fine. I’m good.’ She meant it - she did feel good. The best she’d felt in a while. A long way off from how happy she was over a year ago with her feet on his lap and the AC blaring and some random wildlife documentary on in the background. They soothed him on his come downs and her when he’d laugh at the random animals.

‘Well, I’m glad to hear that. I’ve seen it in you.’

‘You have?’

‘Yes - less like a ghost, more like a human being. Good for you.’ Yelena gives her a proper smile now.

A confession is on the tip of her tongue - this is not how it was supposed to be. I wasn’t supposed to be happy without him and he wasn’t supposed to be some show pony. This isn’t how I wanted to meet him again. This is all just wrong.

Yelena places a comforting hand on her shoulder. ‘He wanted you here. I asked for you to be here. We had to get John to ambush Valentina to put your firm on the guestlist which was less than easy I might add. Since I told him that I’d been following you…’ she pauses, glancing around the room as though he might hear, ‘well all he has done is ask how you are doing, why you left it up to him to call. I didn’t have the answers. When Valentina told us we would be here we spent hours trying to get your firm here.’

‘None of us wanted The Sentry or the Void here. We knew this could overwhelm him, we tried to stop it but he seemed so sure that this is what he wanted.’

‘You. Here.’

So it was on his terms after all. She felt no immediate relief.

‘Why here?’

‘I don’t know, I cannot answer that because I don’t know myself - he wouldn’t tell me. Or any of us. All I know is that he cares for you - he hasn’t let you go. And neither you as I can see. So I guess, I’ll leave you both to it.’

That’s when she felt him standing there. Fuck, he still runs hot. The heat is radiating off of him as if he’s the sun.

‘Hi.’

Suddenly she’s face to face with him. Fuck, why do you have to be so pretty. His eyes are so blue and his face carries less stress than it did before. The more time she takes to respond, she can see the hope dissipating out of his eyes and shoulders and his mouth has started to bend downwards.

‘Hi.’

His mouth turns up into a gentle smile and all she can remember is their last night together before he disappeared. They had just moulded together, a soft swipe of his tongue on her bottom lip and she let him in. She’d never been kissed like that before. With such reverence as if she was the only thing that mattered. He had held her so gently as if she would shatter if he let go. They separated and said hi and the world shifted on its axis.

The world has shifted on its axis again, right now. In the middle of New York, the Earth flipped upside down in the space between them.

‘Yelena told you everything.’

‘Mmm.’ she nods, not willing to have her voice betray her.

‘And you’re…okay?’ The question comes out with so much trepidation that thought of him being terrified of her nearly breaks her resolve.

‘Yelena said you were doing well.’

And the resolve is broken.

‘You’ she points a finger into his surprisingly solid chest, ‘left. I-l thought you were dead. And you thought this place was the right place for me to see you again?’ It’s accusatory. She’s angry. She’s so angry the room feels like it's spinning.

‘I-I didn’t mean for any of this’ he’s begging now. ‘I just want to explain it all. What I am now, what I was then.’

‘Bob.’

He’s spiralling now, almost as if she can see a dark mist descending over his body.

‘I just wanted to fix it… For you.’

‘Fix what, Bob?’ She reaches for his hand and he pulls away as if he had been scalded by the brief grazing of their fingers. She starts taking a few steps back. This is exactly why it shouldn’t have happened like this.

‘No-no, I just,’ he’s stumbling over all of his words, ‘I can’t touch you. I don’t want to trap you.’

The Void. Yelena had mentioned the trauma backrooms he sucked everyone into. She looks at him expectantly, trying to mask the absolute panic underneath her eyes. All she has wanted to do since he walked into this room was touch him. Make sure he was actually real.

‘I wanted to fix me for you. You have to know all of this was you..’ Bob notices the fear in her eyes. ‘I didn’t know it was going to turn out like’ he gestures to himself and the room, ‘this. I thought it was a medical trial to help me, make me a better person. Someone worthy of you.’

She almost softened. Almost.

‘So you left me - alone, not knowing whether you were alive or not - because you thought you didn’t deserve me?’

‘You didn’t deserve a mess. A recovering addict. An idiot. I’m still an idiot for doing that, I know that. The amount of times you took care of me and I didn’t take care of you. I just wanted to be whole for you - not someone who did everything he could to get high to run away from it all. I put so much on you and you never ever pushed back. I hated the thought of you shrinking yourself for me. I didn’t want you to be with someone like that. I was so aimless. I had no direction in life and the only direction I did have was you - I would have followed you anywhere and some selfish part of me knew you would have followed me anywhere. But that wasn’t right, it wasn’t fair.’

‘I choose to follow you, Bob.’

‘Well, you shouldn’t have.’

That stung her right between her ribs. She could feel her eyes swelling up with tears.

‘No-no, this is coming out all wrong. Please, please don’t cry.’ He steps towards her and she steps back.

She’s so quiet now, she feels herself turn in on herself, all desires to return to her old way of life coming back. ‘Please, Bob. I can’t listen to this anymore.’

‘I choose you. I saw you from the beginning, I know you. We all have reasons to run away but running away because you thought you didn’t deserve me is the stupidest thing you've ever done.’

‘I am so stupidly in love with you and I just wanted to make myself right first. So I could be someone you would love back. Someone you could love who wasn’t addicted to drugs or-or someone who couldn’t hold his own.’ Every word is spilling out of Bob’s mouth like an avalanche he cannot stop. Maybe he doesn’t want to stop. The planet stops spinning and nothing else matters because he loves her.

Her heart is aching at the thought that he left because he didn’t feel good enough for her. Something pulls her back into her body, where she is, what she’s supposed to be doing. He can feel his eyes searching and scanning her entire body for some reaction, something. She’s holding it all back. She’s aware of the wandering eyes on the two of them in the corner; they’re more exposed now. He’s more noticeable, especially here.

‘Bob, do you know anywhere else where we could talk?’

The light in his eyes somewhat dims at the suggestion. Before he can even move to answer, she grabs his hands. ‘Nevermind. I know somewhere we can go.’ He doesn’t object as she pulls him towards the exit. With her free hand, she fumbles with her purse, pulling out her phone and texts her boss that she doesn’t feel well and she’s heading home. There’s probably a typo in that text but she doesn’t care. Her mind becomes one track, there’s only one direction she’s heading in and that’s home. With Bob.

‘Where are we going?’ He sounds scared. The sounds of taxis and cars flying past, horns blaring almost drowns it out. The noise of the city hitting them as they pass through the doors of the gala and into the heat of the night. She pauses at his question.

‘I just thought we could go to my apartment… It would be quieter than in there. Less crowded. Less… attention.’ She starts to explain, ‘We can go back if you want. If you need to.’ Her eyes widen as if she’s silently begging him to stay with her.

He looks back once. He looks at her again and lightning strikes in her abdomen. That same soft, gentle look in his eyes and his shoulders start to relax. As his eyes wash over her face, she’s reminded so much of how easy it is to be in his company and she wonders why she was so terrified of this exact moment. Maybe it was the terror of not knowing whether she had driven him away or he left because he just didn’t want her anymore. But she remembers the perpetual nightmare she was living when he had left and she wasn’t so sure it could be so easily forgiven.

He loved her then and he loves her now but words can’t cover a wound that is only beginning to heal.

‘Okay.’ There was no air of uncertainty in how he was carrying himself. He looked determined as if her doubts were spilling out of her veins. They walked in silence from then. There wasn’t much to be said. She thought about mentioning how her apartment was five blocks away and was currently occupied by her golden retriever. But then it would require how the existence of both of those things were predicated on her running away from Florida and running away from what she had built there with him.

Her thoughts occupied her the whole way through the lobby of her building and to her front door. Reckoning with the cause and effects of Bob being in there. What it would mean, what it did mean. Unlocking the door, she called out for Natalie and Charlie came pounding to the door.

‘You got a dog?’ Bob looked bewildered.

‘Yeah, this is Charlie,’ his eyes lit up. He’d always loved that name for a dog. Bob hunkered down to greet him - in that position he looked so childlike and free. So much healthier than before. Still so much guarded behind those eyes of his, she thought.

‘Hi Nat, this is Bob.’

If Natalie was shocked, she didn’t show it. She just gave her a sly smile and said she’d get out of her hair.

‘I owe you for looking after him!’ She called after her.

‘No, you don’t. Just buy me a coffee tomorrow. It was nice to meet you, Bob.’ As she was leaving, that sly smile had grown into a full blown grin. She knew for a fact that as soon as that door closed Aubrey would be receiving a litany of texts about The Bob. And soon enough her phone would be buzzing with expletives from their newly founded group chat.

Anxiety ripples through her now as she knows this isn’t going to be the fairytale reunion she hoped for. A small part of her hopes that he knows this too. That he’s maybe abandoned ship for a smooth recovery.

‘I’ll just put him to bed so we can talk.’ She waits for him to disagree. ‘Do you want tea, coffee, or water?’ She’s putting it off for as long as possible. He shakes his head no and continues to pet Charlie as if he’s the best friend he’d always wanted. Removing Charlie from Bob felt like a sisyphean task.

‘You know I always wanted a dog.’ He’s so soft spoken it makes her heart melt. She can see him analysing her apartment, trying to see where he fits within it. Making judgments of where he might not fit in her life anymore. He still hasn’t sat down despite her gesturing to her couch. Then again she hadn’t sat down either. It didn’t feel standoffish but the tension between them was thickening as each second passed.

‘I know.’

‘I wanted to name it Charlie. And I wanted a big dog.’

‘I know.’

He looked at her expectantly.

‘I guess, when I came here I was running from the grief of losing you.’ She was being cautious in what she was saying. Yelena’s ominous warnings about The Void firmly at the forefront of her mind. ‘To be honest, Bob, I was ruined. It ruined me. At first I thought I’d done something wrong and that you were high when we kissed and that it meant nothing.’

You can’t stop a freight train from going 100 miles an hour.

‘Then when you didn’t return my calls or my texts and when I first heard that user-not-recognised voicemail, I had already accepted that you were dead and you weren’t coming back. You left without an explanation and the one you’re giving me now is, honestly, bullshit.’

Her brutal honesty shocked him. And it shocked her too. Her mouth was moving faster than her brain.

‘You went halfway across the world to become a better person for me yet you didn’t think to involve me in that decision?’

What she really wants to say is on the tip of her tongue. Years of dancing around it, saying it in ways that didn’t quite convey the depths of what she felt for him.

‘I love you. But you hurt me.’ She sees the flash of worry in his eyes, ‘I know you didn’t mean to. It’s really important to me that you know that.’ He gives her a slight nod and she feels somewhat relieved. ‘I would never have asked you to change. Sure, I wanted you to get better. Be healthy, exist without them. Being an addict does not make you any less deserving of love. We don’t choose who we fall in love with, Bob, and I fell in love with every single part of you. I wanted to be there for you throughout everything, good and bad.’

‘I thought you knew how much I loved you, I thought it showed,’ she can tell by the look in his eyes, hints of regret masked by rising tides of tears, that he didn’t know, ‘You left me without warning and grieving you has been the hardest thing I have ever done.’

The room became blurry as she let her tears flow freely. He was blinking back his.

‘All I can really say is that I’m sorry.’ Bob is weary, dejected. There isn’t much fight left in either of them. ‘I want to take it back but I can’t. I don’t expect you to forgive me or to still… keep me around.’

It hurts her to think that he believes that she wouldn’t forgive him.

‘Bob…’ he looks up at her and the world shifts, ‘I forgave you a long time ago.’

‘Oh, that’s…that’s good?’ She lets out a small laugh.

‘You just seem to be doing so well, I don’t want to…disrupt that.’

‘I’ve been waiting for you. You wouldn’t be disrupting anything, you would be making everything feel whole again.’

He smiles ever so softly at her and her heart feels as though it could take flight.

‘How can I make any of this up to you?’ He takes a brief step towards her. ‘I don’t want to just waltz back in as if I didn’t hurt you irreparably.’

‘Bob, if you hurt me irreparably, I would have told you to fuck off.’ He laughs. ‘Hmm, I guess you would’ve.’

She beams at him and it feels good to let it all go. She’s accepted the uncertainty of the future in many ways and how strange it is that he’s so god-like now. But he hasn’t lost that boyish charm that hides in his eyes and comes out to play when they’re both alone. How magnetic he feels as he stands in front of her, his shoulders so broad and chest pushed out as if he can feel the effect he has on her, as if he can feel her heat and how fast her heart is beating.

‘Would you tell me to fuck off if I kissed you right now?’ It comes out so timidly, in such stark contrast with the way he is standing in her living room. His bold-faced confidence nearly knocks her off her feet, her knees feeling oh-so-weak. ‘Well,’ she feels a smirk creep onto her face, ‘have I told you to fuck off yet?’

Bob is glowing as he steps towards her, closing the slightest of gaps between them and places his hand on her cheek. ‘Everyday I wonder how I got so lucky that night we met… that the most beautiful woman I’d ever seen talked to me. Little old me in the corner.’

She smiles at him, ‘I fell in love with you the moment I saw you, y’know.’

‘Ah, yes - love at first sight with a meth-head in a denim vest.’ She bats his chest. Again, the firmness of his chest surprises her.

‘Stop it. You know I had a punk phase in high school. Old habits die hard.’

He looks at her with such intensity, it nearly wipes the teasing smirk off of her face. His features soften into quiet determination as if he is shaking his fears away.

‘I’m going to kiss you now.’

‘Please.’ It comes out pleading and soft and desperate. Then he kisses her and the axis of the world shifts and it’s almost as though she’s stepping into the sun for the first time. Feeling his lips against hers, the swipe of his tongue on her bottom lip, how his hands slowly move down her side. It’s so soft, not desperate but she can feel his longing and pining for her in every movement.

When he pulls away, a soft whine leaves both of their mouths, not wanting to be separated. Opening her eyes into his, he grins and says hi. Suddenly, the axis shifts again and everything is as it should be and as it once was.

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