#been told and revisiting it in text is cool but i tend to drag my feet bc. yeah even with changes. it is still pretty much the same

[middlingmay]

Request because I’m dying of near triple digit heart. Gale taking his shirt off and splashing himself to cool off and not realizing he has broken the rest of the 100th … especially Bucky

Hello! I don't know what 'dying of near triple digit heart' means, but I hope you're okay!!

I really enjoyed writing this one! It let me revisit my Recruiter!Gale and Student!Bucky AU, which is a very fun universe. Hope you like it!

John had spent the past few months in a sort of dazed acceptance of his unbelievable good luck. Not only had Major Gale Cleven of all people been chosen to do the recruitment drive at his college, but he’d actually said yes to John’s advances, more than delivered on the very high expectations John had set in his head, and had graciously accepted John’s number in the morning.

John had promised himself (not Curt; Curt knew he wouldn’t last) that he’d wait a whole three days to abuse the privilege of Gale’s number, but he’d cracked by sun down.

Not having as much fun tonight as I did last night. Thanks for making my college experience feel like a drag, now…

If he’d expected something flirtatious or raunchy in return, he would have been gravely disappointed.

You’ll survive.

Someone else may have been offended, but John just snorted into his pillow and gamely stuck his hand down his pants, reliving their night together.

They texted and and off; not every day, but a few times a week. John made increasingly ridiculous attempts to flirt to see if he could get Gale to break (he couldn’t), and Gale sent brief messages wrought with dry humour, and to John’s surprise, photos. He may not be a verbose man, but Gale always sent John a photo from his day: the front cover of a book he was reading, a seriously fancy dessert at some swanky joint, a particularly pretty sunset, and, a few weeks in, a photo of Gale in the mirror, focusing on his long legs with the message: Goddamn hate ironing. Are my seams straight?

John had nearly called off his night with Curt and the rest of the team after that one.

They escalated to phone calls once every week or two, depending on their schedules. Gale had trouble sleeping sometimes and John’s voice lured him to sleep more than once. And Gale had a way of pulling Bucky out his own head and making him forget all the stresses of college and the team just for a while.

He also had the single most delicious, sinful voice John had ever heard, and because he had very little filter to begin with, he told Gale that. He’d chuckled low and rumbling down the phone.

“Is that right?”

“Mhm.”

“Well what you gon’ do about it, then?”

John’s friends were sick of hearing about Gale, and only Curt’s assurances had them believing he was even real, he sounded so perfect.

“I’ve never been so single,” Crosby had lamented one day. “And you’re not even in a relationship.”

And that had been a thought. It had stuck with John for days until he next spoke to Gale on the phone.

“Hey, uh, can I ask you something?”

“You do. Frequently and often.”

“He’s hilarious,” he said as Gale laughed. “No, but, uh, what—um, what do you—oh for fuck sake John—”

“John.” Gale cut off his flagellating rambling. “I’ve never heard you struggle to say anything. Just spit it out.”

So he did. “What do you want? From this? Is it just like, flirting, or friendship, or…what?”

Gale gave a thoughtful hum on the other end. “Well we are friendly.” John’s stomach dipped in disappointment. “But I also don’t tend to listen to my friends come as I talk to them on the phone, so.”

John shoved a pillow over his face and moaned. “’uck ‘oo.”

“Right back atcha,” Gale drawled happy. “But I, uh…wouldn’t mind, you know. Taking you on a date, this time.”

John threw the pillow to the floor, revealing a beaming grin showing nearly all his teeth. “Yeah?”

“Yeah.”

So, whenever Gale had a pass from base or a day or two off, he and John would try to spend time together. Sometimes Gale travelled to him, sometimes John came closer to Gale, but they’d find some time to go on honest to God dates: the movies, long walks, dinner. When John learned that Gale loved animals, he arranged for them to go down to a local shelter to spend the day meeting the animals and helping out. Curt had looked at him like he was crazy (“That ain't a date, Bucky, that’s a shift.”). But Gale didn’t stop smiling the whole time and had looked at John like he was the stars in the sky. When Gale admitted he knew nothing about baseball and John had been legitimately speechless, Gale had bought them tickets to a game and let John narrate the whole thing to him, patient as a saint.

But, one thing they hadn’t done since that first night, was sleep together.

In a rare moment of insecurity, John had asked Gale if anything was wrong, and of all things, Gale got embarrassed. But he rushed to reassure John all the same.

“Nothing’s the matter, John, I promise.” He looped one of John’s curls at the back of his neck around his finger. “It’s just—”

“Just what?”

“Just, now this could really be going somewhere, I want to do it right. Court you proper.”

Curt would have laughed himself sick if he heard, but all John wanted to do was climb this man like a tree and kiss the life out of him. But he wouldn’t He couldn’t. He would be respectful, because he was being courted.

John had invited Gale for the weekend to his folks’ place on Lake Michigan. They were away for some kind of work trip, and he and his friends were travelling up there to relax and get away from campus. They’d teased John when they found out Gale was coming (“Sure you want us there, Bucky? Not prefer a romantic evening for two?” “Gonna cockblock the hell out of you, I promise.” “I still don’t think he’s real!”). But they all shut the hell up when Gale had walked through the door of the Egan’s summer house, all golden skin, swept back hair, a well-made, well-tailored linen shirt, shorts that hit well above the knee, and a set of aviators on.

“Fucking Christ.”

“That’s what I said.”

“Is he real?”

“That’s what I said.”

“Can I touch him?”

“Hey!”

Gale took it all in good stride, and was hastily introduced to everyone as they all scrambled to get ready to head down to the beach.

Gale, it turned out, loved the beach. Although shyer in front of others, he’d been almost solicitous on the way down. His hand brushed against Bucky’s back, he asked after his classes and practice. He even made sure John was happily situated on a towel with some shade to protect his pale, freckled skin when he’d demurred off heading into the water right away.

“You mind if I head in? Hot after the drive and the water looks nice…”

It cost Gale a quick peck, but John allowed it.

And because no man went into the water fully dressed, Gale made swift work of his shirt and his shorts, stripping down to a very nice set of pale blue swim shorts. He scrubbed John’s head once with his hand before diving into the water.

John was still recovering from the minor striptease when Gale emerged from under the waves. He watched the muscles in Gale’s strong back and broad shoulder flex and glisten as he glided through the water.

“Damn it, Bucky,” Crosby grinned next to him. “People literally write books about guys like him.” And being an English Lit major, Crosby would know.

Laying next to John, Brady had slid his sunglasses down his nose for uninterrupted viewing. “You kinda just want to lick him.”

Benny hummed, and at that moment Gale—who’d swam a bit further in—stood up so the water just tickled his waist. With both hands he swept the wet, clinging strands of hair off his face, showing off his biceps and the taught lines of his waist and stomach.

Curt whistled. "You lucky bastard, Egan."

Droplet after errant droplet tumbled down from those locks. They dripped off long golden lashes, over plump full lips. They ran a teasing line down his strong, angular neck and into collarbones that had no business being so damn biteable. They pebbled the skin of his chest and led down, down, down to that golden trail, and to…

“Oh my God. He needs to stop. Is that illegal? It has to be illegal?”

John had never agreed with Benny more. Maybe it was having that first taste of Gale and then going so long without it, but John didn’t think he’d ever seen anything so attractive and beautiful and brain-meltingly alluring in his entire life. The things he wanted to do.

“You coming, John?”

“Hm, what?” John snapped his eyes back up to Gale’s.

“Water’s real nice. Come join me.”

That damn smile. John wanted to leap off his towel and run full pelt down to the water and tackle Gale until they were both wet through. But, thanks to Gale’s display and John’s traitorous body, he’d have to wait. Because this was a public beach, and if he stood up, John would get arrested.

“Uh…” he crossed his legs, carefully. “Just gimmie, like, five minutes?”

They boys didn’t let him forget it for the rest of the day; wouldn't for the rest of the semester.

But the joke was on them. Because when they finally went to bed, Gale bunking in with John, and John had offered to take the little couch in the room, Gale had shut him up with a hand in his hair and a kiss so thorough he’d literally gone weak in the knees, and Gale’s other hand cinched around his waist was all that kept him standing.

Gale kissed his lips to John’s ear, placing tiny, sparking kisses all along the shell until he reached the lobe and traced it with his tongue and sucked on it and gave it a little bite, before he murmured, “Oh, I think we can share, tonight. Don’t you?”

[xueyangmybeloved]

i started reading ThousndAutumns and im only on chapter 5rn but wow they changed quite a bit in the first episode of the donghua so that ShenQia0 and YanWu$hi would get a chance to interact and they made it look like YuSh3ngyan wasn’t the one making shit up and interacting with SQ as he nursed him back to health (somewhat since his injuries have left him disabled and powerless and all that atm)