#if you’re a ghost… and I’M a ghost… | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

brookghaib-blog · 2 days ago

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The Dying Love of a Super-Soldier

Pairing: Robert 'Bob' Reynolds x reader

Summary: After moving to Florida to live a normal, Y/N had manage to achieve everything she wanted. Even after Bob and her being a complete failure that made her rot from the inside, making her heartbroken to never fully recover. Only a new unexpected event would make her snap.

Warning: Very angst, depressive thoughts, heartbreak, betrayal, alcoholism, drug addiction, attempt murder, toxic behaviour, past-trauma, toxic relationship, bipolar disorder

Word count: 19,1k

Note: Based on this request!

Florida smelled like salt, oranges, and artificial calm — and that’s exactly why she chose it. A place where nobody knew her name. A place where the ghosts might stop clawing at the inside of her skull long enough to let her breathe.

She had a house now. Small. Quiet. White walls, cold tile floors, and a porch that faced the water. She never turned the TV on. Her phone stayed in a drawer. And every morning, like clockwork, she sat with her coffee in trembling hands, watching the sunrise like it might one day burn her clean.

But nothing ever did.

Y/N Ivanov— or whatever name the world gave her now — had once been the Red Room’s most perfected weapon. A ghost in combat boots. Better than Natasha. Sharper than Yelena. Not because she wanted to be — because she had no choice.

They stole her childhood before she could understand what having one meant. And then, when she was still just fourteen, they gave her something else: the serum. A gift, they called it. A reward for her "obedience." She remembered the needles — thick, cold, and shoved deep into her spine. She remembered screaming.

Then… she remembered nothing.

They had taken her memories. Cleaned her mind like a chalkboard. All traces of laughter with Natasha. The warmth of Yelena’s arms after a nightmare. Gone.

In their place, they inserted lies. They told her that Natasha was a traitor. That Yelena had abandoned her. That they had left her to rot. They gave her a mission: kill the defectors. The ones who had run from the cause. And Y/N did what she was told. Not out of hatred — but because she didn’t know any better. Her hands moved like machines. Her eyes didn’t blink. She was their prize soldier. Their wolf in the skin of a girl. But wolves remember.

She wasn’t sure when it started — flashes at first. A laugh she couldn’t place. The scent of blackberries in a dream. Then faces. Yelena’s face when she was seven, scolding her for scraping her knees on the training mat. Natasha holding her after her first kill, whispering “You’re still human.”

She broke the programming the same way she’d always survived: with rage. The Red Room called her a miracle. But miracles don’t scream until their throats bleed or wake up choking from dreams of blood-soaked hands and crying children.

When she escaped — truly escaped — it was with Natasha and Yelena beside her. Not as enemies, but sisters again. Family again. She wept in their arms like the world had ended. Maybe, in some ways, it had.

Natasha died not long after. Y/N still hadn’t forgiven the world for that.

Yelena tried to help her heal. They’d cook together. Laugh sometimes. But it wasn’t long before Y/N realized she was unraveling inside. Every mission was a trigger. Every news broadcast a reminder of how many people she’d hurt. How many she couldn’t remember. So she told Yelena she was done.

“I can’t fight anymore,” she said. “I don’t know who I am when I’m not fighting… but I need to try.”

So Yelena hugged her. Told her she understood. That she loved her.

And Y/N left.

Now she lived by the ocean, where the water could swallow her guilt a little at a time.

But the silence wasn’t kind. It was cruel. Every quiet night was filled with the hum of old nightmares. Her hands still shook when she washed the blood that wasn’t there. She kept a box under her bed: photos of Natasha, a letter from Yelena she couldn’t bring herself to read, and a bullet she had pulled from her own thigh in a mission she couldn’t forget.

She never went to therapy. She didn’t think anyone could fix a brokenness this deep.

Sometimes, on cold nights, she whispered apologies into the wind. To the children she’d left behind. The mothers she’d scared. The sisters she betrayed when she was nothing more than a weapon in someone else’s hands.

And sometimes — when the sun dipped just right over the horizon and everything glowed red — she thought she saw Natasha. Leaning in the doorway. Arms crossed. Smirking.

"You're still human."

Y/N would close her eyes and let the wind sting her cheeks.

Maybe, in another life, she could have believed that.

Florida nights could feel like nothingness — humid, slow, like the air itself refused to move forward. Y/N had started drinking again after three months sober. It wasn’t a dramatic fall. Just one glass of cheap whiskey after too many nights spent listening to the waves and her own thoughts crawling like insects under her skin. Then two. Then four. Then not bothering to count anymore.

That night, she didn’t plan to go to the bar. She never did. It just happened, like most things in her life now — accidental, numbing, slow suicide disguised as routine. Her reflection in the bathroom mirror had barely blinked before she slid on jeans, a worn tank top, and pulled her hair back. No makeup. No purpose. Just the quiet ache of needing to be somewhere that wasn’t her own head.

The bar was local. Ugly. Dim. Neon lights humming above tired faces. It smelled like sweat and spilled beer, with just enough silence between the country songs to remind you of how alone you really were. That’s what she liked about it.

She’d taken a booth in the corner. Sat sideways, one leg bent beneath her, the other stretched out like she owned the place. Nobody bothered her. Nobody ever did. Maybe it was the look in her eye — that flat, glassy nothingness she had perfected in the Red Room. The kind that told people not to try.

She had her second drink when she noticed him.

At first, he didn’t look like much. Just a man nursing a beer at the bar, hunched over like the world had cracked his back. Hair a mess, knuckles raw, jeans dirty like he hadn’t cared in a while. But there was something in the way he sat — still, deliberate, as if staying upright took every ounce of energy.

She didn’t remember who looked first. Or who crossed the space between them. It didn’t matter. They were pulled together by something beyond logic — two stars already collapsed, orbiting the same black hole.

He smelled like rain and ash. His voice was quiet. Gentle in a way that didn’t make sense for a man with hands like those — scarred, twitchy, like they wanted to tear something apart.

She didn’t ask for his name.

He didn’t ask for hers.

He said something stupid. She laughed too hard. Slurred her words, then covered her mouth, embarrassed. But he didn’t flinch. Didn’t judge. Just looked at her with eyes so sad she felt like someone had cracked open her ribs.

And for the first time in forever, she didn’t feel watched. She didn’t feel analyzed. She just felt seen.

They didn’t talk about their pasts. People like them didn’t need to. It was all there — in the way they held their drinks too tightly. In the haunted pauses between words. In the way their eyes never stayed in one place for long.

She leaned her head on his shoulder eventually. He let her. His shoulder was strong, but it trembled slightly. She didn’t ask why. She could smell the meth on him — sour, chemical, ugly. But she didn’t flinch. She knew addiction. Knew what it meant to crave something that hurt you more than it helped.

She wasn’t sober either. Her blood was warm and slow, her head swimming. The room tilted. But his arm came around her waist and anchored her. Gently. Like she was something precious. That scared her more than anything.

They ended up back at her place. Not for sex. Not for anything people like to call “normal.” Just... because they didn’t want the night to end. They sat on the porch. Shared a bottle of something she didn’t remember buying. Talked in slurred pieces — about the stars. About what music sounded like when you were high. About what it felt like to lose yourself.

At some point, she turned to him. Really looked at him.

He was beautiful. Not in a clean-cut way. Not like the men she used to seduce and kill on missions. But in a ruined way. Like a statue cracked down the middle but still standing. His smile was sad. His eyes were oceans she didn’t know how to swim.

“You’re a wave,” she murmured.

He blinked. “What?”

“A wave. You came in and just... washed over me. And I didn’t know how much I needed that.”

His smile faltered. “Waves don’t stay.”

She didn’t say anything. She knew that better than anyone.

They fell asleep on the floor. Her curled into his side, like a child. His arm draped over her protectively. She didn’t dream. For the first time in years.

In the morning, he was still there. Hair messier. Shirt crumpled. She found a half-eaten granola bar in his pocket when he dozed off again on the couch. She ate it. It made her laugh.

And then the fear crept in.

She wasn’t supposed to feel this. Not comfort. Not connection. Especially not with someone like him. Someone whose hands shook more than hers. Someone with veins that pulsed with poison and guilt. Someone who looked at her like she was soft — when she knew there was nothing left inside her but steel and scar tissue.

But Bob — that was his name, she learned later — didn’t ask her to be soft. He didn’t ask her to be anything. He just was. A presence. A silence she could rest in. A broken thing that didn’t try to fix her.

And in a world that demanded she keep proving she was worth saving, that was the kindest thing anyone had ever done.

They weren’t lovers. Not then. They were strangers clinging to the same wreckage. Addicted to the quiet between them. Two ruined people who didn’t know what life was supposed to be — only that they didn’t want to spend it alone anymore.

And maybe that’s what made it so dangerous.

She’d built walls her whole life. Bob didn’t knock them down. He just leaned against them with his soft smile and tired eyes, and made her want to open the door.

She didn’t know then what he really was. That he wasn’t just broken — he was shattered beyond human comprehension. That his mind carried monsters. That one day, he’d vanish just like every other good thing.

But that night? That night was theirs.

They never meant for it to happen. Love wasn’t in the cards for people like them — not when your hands remembered blood more than touch, not when your mind was more familiar with silence than comfort. But it happened anyway. Quietly. Slowly. Like water soaking into cracked soil.

It started with the mornings.

Bob stayed over more often. At first, it was an unspoken agreement — neither of them wanted to be alone. Then it became routine. He’d make coffee while she watched him from the couch, her head heavy on the pillow, eyes tracing the curve of his shoulders in the morning light.

“Milk or sugar?” he asked once.

She blinked at him. “Do I look like a sugar-in-coffee kind of girl?”

He chuckled. “You look like someone who’d throw the mug at me if I asked again.”

She smirked. “You’d deserve it.”

There was always something playful in their mornings. Something soft. But beneath it was this ache — a knowing that the warmth they were building had to be temporary. Nothing good ever stayed for people like them. They were waiting for the storm, even when the sky was clear.

Still, they tried.

They went on walks — strange, meandering ones through Florida’s weather-worn streets. Bob would hold her hand, but only when she let him. Y/N wasn’t used to touch that didn’t hurt. But with him, she began to crave it — the grounding warmth of his fingers, the way his thumb would brush against hers without meaning to. Or maybe he meant to. She never asked.

There was a night in late October — humid, still, full of stars. They were lying on a blanket in the back of Bob’s truck. She had snuck a bottle of wine from the gas station. He’d brought a melted bag of marshmallows he found in the pantry.

They didn’t talk much. Just looked up.

“You ever wonder what it would’ve been like… if we were normal?” she asked.

Bob turned his head toward her, slow and careful, like even moving too fast might scare her away. “Yeah. Every day.”

She swallowed. “Do you think… we’d still find each other?”

He didn’t answer right away. His eyes were so blue, even in the dark. Then: “I don’t think anyone else could understand me like you do.”

Her chest ached. He said things like that without knowing what they did to her — how they broke her open in places still healing.

They kissed that night. Not urgent. Not desperate. Just… full. Heavy with everything they couldn’t say. Her hands in his hair. His hands on her waist, holding her like he thought she might disappear. She almost did.

He whispered her name like a prayer. She let herself fall.

They moved in together two months later.

It wasn’t planned. Bob just… stopped leaving. His toothbrush ended up in her bathroom. His T-shirt in her laundry. He never said he was staying. He just stayed. And she never told him to leave.

They made a home out of chaos. Patching each other up in ways neither of them understood. When Bob had bad nights — when the trembling got worse and the shadows in his mind whispered things he wouldn’t repeat — Y/N would sit on the bathroom floor with him, her legs wrapped around his, whispering back until the voices got tired.

“You’re here,” she’d say. “You’re safe. I’m not going anywhere.”

When she woke up from a nightmare — soaked in sweat, heart racing like she was still dodging bullets in the Red Room — Bob would pull her into his chest, rock her gently, and hum. He wasn’t a good singer. But she never told him to stop.

They were addicted to each other. Not in the toxic, burning way — but in that slow suffocation kind of way. Like if one of them left, the other would forget how to breathe.

Bob started calling her “angel.” Soft, reverent, like she was something divine. Y/N never corrected him, though she knew she was far from it. Every time he said it, she almost believed him.

“You’re the only thing that makes sense,” he told her once, his voice cracking, his pupils blown wide from the edge of another high.

She held his face in her hands. “Then stay with me. Stay clean. Stay here.”

He tried. He tried so hard.

She started cooking. Badly. Burnt eggs. Undercooked pasta. But Bob would eat everything with a grin and a wink. They danced once in the kitchen, barefoot on the cold tile, her hair in a messy bun, his T-shirt hanging off her shoulder.

“I’m gonna marry you one day,” he whispered against her temple.

She laughed. She didn’t believe in marriage. But she believed in him. And that was terrifying enough.

But with love came the cracks.

Bob had dark days — days he’d vanish, or stare at the wall for hours, mumbling about voices, about the Void, about not feeling real. Y/N would shake him sometimes. Cry. Scream. But he’d just look at her, hollowed out, and say, “I don’t know how to stop it.”

She understood. She’d been there too.

There were nights they fought. Nights where the house felt too small and the world too loud. Y/N would slam doors. Bob would disappear down the block with clenched fists and red-rimmed eyes. But they always came back to each other. Always.

One time, after the worst of their fights, Bob returned at 3 a.m., barefoot, shivering, clothes soaked in rain. He collapsed at her doorstep.

“I don’t want to be without you,” he said, voice cracking like porcelain.

She dropped to her knees and kissed his forehead, tasting salt and desperation. “Then don’t be.”

It was beautiful, that was the worst part.

Because from the outside, it looked like love. The kind of love you saw in movies where two broken people found comfort in each other, where hands shook but still reached, where silence didn’t mean distance. The kind of love that people romanticized because they didn’t know any better.

But it wasn’t a movie. It wasn’t a poem or a love song or a neatly tied ending.

It was real. And real love — love soaked in addiction — was ugly.

Y/N had been drinking again. Not just the occasional buzz. Not just the glass of wine after dinner.

This was deeper. Darker.

It started with a bottle left on the counter. Then one hidden in the bathroom. Then one in the car, tucked under the seat, clinking when she made a sharp turn. She didn’t mean to spiral. But the mornings came heavier. The days got colder. And Bob…

Bob wasn’t getting better.

He was losing.

Some days, he’d try. He’d sit in front of her and cry, eyes wide and helpless, begging her to hide his stash. “Flush it,” he’d whisper. “Please… please… I don’t want to be this anymore.”

And she would. God, she would. She’d sit with him for hours, cold compress against his burning forehead, whispering stories from her past to distract him from the voices. She’d sing, she’d read, she’d cry with him — do anything just to keep him grounded.

But then there were other days.

Days when he’d vanish for hours. Days when he’d come back shaking, eyes dilated and teeth grinding, too fast, too angry, too loud. He would slam doors. Break plates. Scream into pillows. One night, he punched the wall so hard the plaster caved in and blood ran down his wrist like war paint.

Y/N patched it up with trembling hands.

“You can’t keep doing this,” she whispered, voice hoarse with exhaustion. “You’re killing yourself, Bob.”

He looked at her like a stranger. “You think I don’t know that?”

Then he walked out.

She didn’t follow. Not that time.

Their fights weren’t the kind you could write off. They were wars.

Things were said. Terrible things. Things that clung to the walls like smoke, long after the shouting stopped.

“Maybe you want me to die. That way you don’t have to carry me anymore.”

“Don’t you dare make this about me. You think I like watching you disappear?! I am doing everything I can to keep you here!”

“Then why are you always drunk?!”

Silence. Cold. Crushing. Because he was right, she was slipping, too. And she hated him for noticing.

She had always been the strong one. The weapon. The one who didn’t cry, didn’t break. But Bob unraveled her. Not by hurting her — but by needing her. All the time. Too much. And she was running out of things to give.

Still, she couldn’t let go.

She told herself it was love. That’s what love meant — enduring. Fighting. Staying.

But in truth?

She was scared.

Scared that if she left him, he’d die. And if he died, then she’d have to live knowing she didn’t save him.

She had failed before — failed to stop the Red Room, failed to save the girls who screamed in their cells, failed to run soon enough when her own memories were stolen. She couldn’t fail this, too.

Even if it meant drowning with him.

There was a night — one of the worst — when Bob came home high out of his mind, twitching, muttering nonsense about the Void, eyes unfocused. He looked haunted. Like something inside him had died.

Y/N tried to touch him. He flinched.

“Don’t,” he growled. “Don’t look at me like that.”

“Like what?”

“Like you’re disappointed.”

She didn’t answer. Her hand fell back to her side.

That was all it took.

He stormed past her, knocking a chair to the floor. “You don’t get it,” he snapped. “You never got it. You look at me like I’m this project. Like I’m someone you can fix. But I’m not.”

She followed. “I know you’re not. You think I’m not broken, too? You think I wanted this?”

“You chose this,” he spat. “You stayed.”

That one hit. Hard. She froze.

Bob’s chest was heaving, face red with rage. But even in that moment, she saw it — the way his hands trembled, the shame underneath the fury, the way his mouth quivered like he was about to break down. He hated himself. And she couldn’t save someone who hated themselves more than they loved her.

So, she walked away. This time, she was the one who slammed the door. But they always came back.

No matter how bad the fight. No matter how ugly the words. The mornings still came, and with them came the apologies.

“I didn’t mean it,” he whispered into her hair one morning, voice raw. “I was scared.”

She was still crying. “So was I.”

He kissed her. They held each other. And for a few minutes, they could pretend it would be different this time.

That they wouldn’t fight again, that love would be enough. But it wasn’t. Because the addiction was always louder.

So, she isolated. Drank more. Cried in the shower. Hid bruises — not from violence, but from where Bob had grabbed her too tightly during one of his spirals. He never meant to hurt her. He never knew what she was, he didn't know how she could crush his skull with one kick because no matter how bad she was, Bob was her everything, she would kill herself if it meant he would live safe and happy, and never let her state overtake her to the point of ever hurting him physically. His apologies always came with tears. And she believed him.

Because she had done things she didn’t mean, too. Said things. Chosen the bottle over him.

They were a mess. A beautiful, tragic mess.

They loved each other so much. But that love lived in a house full of ghosts — and they couldn’t keep pretending it wasn’t haunted. Sometimes she looked at him — really looked — and wondered what would’ve happened if they’d met in another life. If Bob had never touched meth. If she had never been turned into a weapon. If they’d both been whole.

Would they have had a house with white curtains and sunflowers in the windowsill? Would she have come home from work to find him reading on the couch, glasses slipping down his nose, telling her about some science article he’d found fascinating? Would she have worn a ring? Would he have remembered her birthday without her having to remind him? Would they have been safe?

But that wasn’t their life.

Their life was stained bedsheets and empty bottles. Screaming matches and shattered plates. Apologies written on sticky notes. Hugs that felt like lifelines. Eyes that couldn’t hide the truth.

Their love was real. But it wasn’t enough.

The decision didn’t come like a lightning strike. It wasn’t some grand moment of clarity or a dramatic vow shouted into the night.

It was quieter than that. Softer.

It came one morning, when the apartment was still and heavy, when the sun crept in through the slats in the blinds and painted Bob’s sleeping face in gold. His chest rose and fell slowly. Peacefully.

He looked young when he slept. Gentle. Not the man he’d become — all tremors and tension and muttered voices in the dark — but the man she knew was still in there. The man who used to read to her in bed. Who would trace patterns on her back until she fell asleep. Who told her she made the world feel a little less heavy.

She watched him sleep that morning, her head aching from the night before, and her body screaming for another drink, and she whispered something barely audible to herself.

“I want to stay.”

It wasn’t the first time she’d said it. But it was the first time she meant it like this. She wanted to stay. To be here. To build something. To be better — not just for herself, but for him. For them.

And for the first time in years, she realized she didn’t want to just survive. She wanted a future. A real one.

She wanted to be his wife. She wanted to be the mother of his children. She wanted to build a home that didn’t feel like walking on glass. She wanted morning coffee on the porch and pottery in the backyard. She wanted to live.

And she was ready to try.

The first few days were brutal.

Her body rebelled in every possible way. The migraines were endless. The shakes were unbearable. The craving whispered to her every second, like a ghost wrapped around her spine.

“Just one drink,” it would hiss. “Just to take the edge off.”

But she didn’t.

She journaled instead.

Pages and pages of pain and guilt and hope and anger. She wrote until her fingers cramped, until the ink bled through the pages, until the crying stopped and the silence settled.

She made a list.

Things That Make Me Feel Alive Without Drinking:

The sound of Bob breathing when he sleeps.

Warm coffee in the morning.

Pottery videos on YouTube.

The smell of fresh soap.

The idea of painting a mural in the bedroom.

Buying gifts for Bob. Even small ones.

Imagining a future where we are both okay.

She stuck the list on the fridge with a magnet shaped like a tomato.

She started pottery first.

It was messy and frustrating and humbling. The first bowl she made collapsed like wet tissue. But the second one held. And the third one had a little curve, a personality. She started keeping them on the windowsill.

Bob noticed.

“You’re making things,” he said one day, tracing the edge of a misshapen cup with his finger. “Like… actually making things.”

She smiled. “I’m trying.”

He kissed her then. Long. Slow. Like he was proud of her, even if he didn’t know how to say it.

That made her cry in the bathroom later. Not from sadness, but from how good it felt to be seen again.

Whenever she felt herself spiraling, she’d leave the house.

It didn’t matter where she went — a bookstore, the pier, the dusty art supply store run by an old woman named Marta who talked too much but always smiled.

She would walk. Breathe. Touch walls. Smell flowers.

And then she’d come back.

Always with something for Bob.

A pair of socks with Saturns on them. A tiny notebook with gold edges. A cracked keychain in the shape of a star. A ceramic frog that looked so ugly it made her laugh.

Bob collected the gifts without question. He put them all on the bookshelf beside his science journals. He never said “You shouldn’t have.” He never asked why.

He just kissed her on the forehead and told her, “Thank you for coming home.”

There were relapses.

One night, after three weeks clean, she had a panic attack so severe she couldn’t breathe. Her hands shook as she unscrewed the bottle of vodka she’d hidden in a sock drawer weeks ago, “just in case.”

She poured it into a cup and stared at it, dumping it down the sink. Then she curled up on the bathroom floor and cried until Bob found her. He didn’t say anything. Just held her. Rubbed her back. Pressed kisses to her neck like prayers. They didn’t talk about it the next day.

But she knew he knew what she’d almost done. And that he was proud she didn’t.

She painted, too, nothing professional, nothing good, but it helped. The colors. The control. The freedom.

She painted skies. Hands. Faces. Things she didn’t remember seeing, but had probably dreamed about. Once, she painted them — her and Bob — in a field full of red poppies. She wasn’t sure why, but it felt right.

She hung it above the bed.

Bob stared at it for a long time. “Do you think that’s where we go when we’re okay?” he asked.

“Maybe,” she whispered. “Maybe we’re already there in another life.”

He didn’t respond. Just squeezed her hand.

She started cooking.

Burned rice. Under-seasoned chicken. Exploding eggs. But there were a lot of improvements.

But she laughed through it all. And Bob, to his credit, always ate whatever she made.

They started having “dinner dates” in the living room with a blanket on the floor and candles in mugs. Sometimes they would pretend they were strangers meeting for the first time.

“Hi, I’m Y/N,” she’d say, extending her hand like they hadn’t kissed that morning.

Bob would take her hand. “Hi, I’m Bob. God, do angels just walk around on earth now?”

They’d laugh. But it always ended with tears.

Because underneath it all, they both knew how fragile it was.

And yet… there was peace. Little moments.

Bob planting lavender in a pot on the balcony. Y/N making playlists called “Songs for When We’re Better.” Them dancing slowly to music no one else could hear. Falling asleep with limbs tangled, dreams soft and quiet.

She was doing it.

Not perfectly, but honestly she was staying sober, becoming someone new.

Not for the world. Not for redemption. Not even for her sisters. But for him. Because she wanted to be the woman he could count on. The woman who wouldn’t disappear. The woman who could love him without losing herself. She was becoming better.

And for the first time in her life — really, truly — she believed that maybe, just maybe…

She deserved to be. And so did he.

He didn’t know when the cracks started to show again. Maybe they’d never fully healed.

Maybe he was never meant to be whole in the first place.

There were good days. God, there were good days. Days when Y/N came home with paint on her fingers and bright eyes, holding some little treasure in her hand — a rock shaped like a heart, a used book with notes in the margins, a stupid mug that said “World’s Okayest Boyfriend.” Days when she laughed freely, without the weight of yesterday clinging to her voice.

She was healing.

He could see it in the way she carried herself. She was lighter. Braver. Trying.

But he was still stuck in the mud.

Still shackled to the same rot in his brain. Still battling the shadows in the corners of the room. Still waking up sweating and shaking, teeth grinding in his sleep, dreams full of static and whispers and himself — distorted and screaming and hollow.

Bob hadn’t been clean. Not really. He lied. Told her he was “tapering.” Told himself he just needed one more hit to stay steady, one more to keep the void quiet, one more to function.

But the truth was cruel: he was using. Still.

Every few days. Some nights when she was at pottery. Or reading. Or watching the rain through the window like it could forgive her.

He'd stash it in the back of the toilet. Under a floorboard in the closet. In an old book jacket he knew she’d never touch. He wanted to stop. But he didn’t know how to be okay without it. He didn’t know who he was without the numb. The day it all fell apart started like any other.

He woke up before her. Watched her sleep. Touched the edge of her shoulder like a prayer. She looked peaceful — almost girlish in the early morning light. She mumbled something in her sleep and rolled toward him. He smiled. Almost.

But there was a tremor in his jaw. His teeth ached. His skin felt like it didn’t fit. He needed it.

He told himself he’d just take a little. Just enough to stop the noise in his head.

Just enough to get through the day.

So while she made breakfast — humming to herself in the kitchen, the scent of burnt toast curling through the air — he excused himself and went to the closet.

Floorboard. Right corner. Fingernail crack. The pipe was still there. Still calling. And he smoked.

And for a while, everything was quiet.

But the thing about a high is that it ends.

And when it crashes, it burns.

That night, they were watching a movie on the couch. She leaned her head on his shoulder, a blanket tucked around them, her fingers playing with the hem of his shirt.

“You smell like smoke,” she said softly.

He froze, tried to play it off. “Must’ve been from outside.”

But she sat up, looking him in the eye.

“Bob,” she whispered. “Are you using again? You told me that you hadn't use it in weeks.”

And something in him — something small and mean and scared — lashed out.

“I said it was from outside,” he snapped. “Can you back off for one fucking second?”

She blinked. Hurt flaring in her eyes like a matchstick.

“You don’t have to lie to me,” she said, quieter now. “You don’t have to pretend.”

“I’m not pretending!” he barked. He was on his feet now, pacing, hands running through his hair. “Why do you always think I’m lying? Why do you—why do you always look at me like I’m broken?!”

Her voice cracked. “Because you are.”

Silence.

The words hung in the room like a knife between them.

She hadn’t meant it like that. He knew she hadn’t. But it didn’t matter. It had been said. And it landed exactly where it hurt the most.

Bob stormed out of the apartment that night.

He didn’t take his wallet. Just his keys and the leftover rage boiling under his skin.

The street was cold. Empty. The kind of lonely that echoes in your bones.

He ended up in a bathroom stall of a gas station off the highway, shivering, crying, using again — harder this time. Deeper. Hoping it would shut everything off.

He didn’t want to feel.

Didn’t want to remember the look on her face. The way her mouth trembled. The tears that welled but never fell.

He hated himself. He hated his addiction.

He hated how he could never be enough for her — not really. Not clean. Not good. Not stable.

She was trying so damn hard. And he was ruining it. Again.

The come-down was a nightmare.

He stumbled home past 3 a.m. — pale, sweating, his hands shaking like leaves in the wind. Y/N was asleep on the couch, phone in her lap, her eyes swollen and red. She’d waited up. Of course she had.

He sat on the floor beside her, and didn’t say a word. He just cried. Ugly, broken sobs that racked his chest, his fingers clutching the hem of her pajama pants like a child begging for forgiveness.

She woke up. Reached for him, pulling him into her lap. “Bob,” she whispered, over and over, like saying his name might save him.

“I’m sorry,” he choked. “I don’t know how to stop. I don’t know who I am without it. I—I’m ruining this. I’m ruining you.”

She kissed his hair, “I’m not ruined. I’m choosing to stay,” she said.

“But why?” he asked, eyes swollen. “Why the hell would you stay with someone like me?”

She didn’t answer right away.

Then she said, “Because I know what it’s like to be poison and still want to be loved. And you loved me through it. Now I’ll love you through this.”

The next morning, she made coffee. They didn’t speak much.

But they sat side by side on the couch, his head on her shoulder, her hand on his knee.

He told her everything.

The stash. The closet. The lies.

She didn’t cry. She just listened. And when he was done, she said, “Let’s start again.”

It had been a long day.

The kind of day that crawled under her skin and stayed there, heavy and slow. Y/N had come home in a haze — work had been exhausting, her shoulders stiff, her hair tangled from the wind, the sleeves of her jacket damp from an afternoon rain. All she wanted was to curl into Bob’s chest and fall asleep to the sound of his heartbeat — warm and steady, that sacred rhythm she could always trust to be there, even when nothing else was.

She unlocked the door, expecting him.

Expecting to see the flicker of the living room lamp he always forgot to turn off. Expecting his shoes by the couch, that old hoodie of his thrown over the backrest. Maybe he’d be cooking — not well, but trying — or maybe he’d be sprawled out watching some stupid late-night special.

But the house was quiet. Too quiet. No lights. No soft hum of music. No smell of his cologne. Just the tick of the wall clock and the creak of the floor under her shoes.

“Bob?” she called gently, half-smiling, slipping off her coat. “You home?”

No answer.

She wasn’t worried at first. Maybe he went out. Maybe he was grabbing groceries or air or that soda he couldn’t live without. It wasn’t like him to not text, but... he was impulsive. Messy. Chaotic in a way that sometimes made her laugh, sometimes made her sigh. Still, she wasn’t alarmed. Not yet.

She walked to the kitchen.

His mug was gone, the one with the cracked rim that he swore made coffee taste better.

She opened the fridge. His leftovers were missing. So were the beers he said he’d quit.

The couch looked... untouched. Neat. Wrong.

Her stomach tensed.

She moved faster now — checking the bathroom. The closet. The bedroom. It hit her when she opened the dresser. His clothes were gone. All of them. The top drawer that used to overflow with wrinkled t-shirts and rolled-up socks was empty. The hangers that held his jackets were bare. Even the drawer where he kept old receipts and crumpled paper sketches of her face — all gone. Every trace of him, erased.

And then she saw it.

A piece of folded paper, sitting on the center of the bed like a coffin lid.

Y/N’s fingers trembled as she reached for it. Her name was written on the front in his handwriting.

Y/N,

I’m sorry.

God, I’m sorry.

I don’t even know how to write this right. I’ve been trying for days. I rewrite it and burn it and start again and it still doesn’t feel like it says enough. Or maybe it says too much.

I love you. That’s not the lie here. Please don’t ever think it was. I’ve never loved anything the way I love you. Not a person. Not a place. Nothing. You’re the only thing in my whole life that’s ever made me feel like maybe I could be better. Like maybe I could be good.

But I’m not good.

I keep waking up waiting for the moment you realize it. The moment you look at me and see what I see — this thing I keep trying to hide under the smiles and the kisses and the breakfasts in bed. This hole inside me that you can’t fill, no matter how hard you try.

I can’t keep letting you bleed yourself dry trying to fix me.

You deserve a life. A real one. Not one where you have to keep looking over your shoulder to make sure I’m still breathing. Not one where you keep sacrificing your sobriety to catch me when I fall. Not one where love feels like walking on glass.

So I’m leaving.

I don’t want to do this to you anymore.

I don’t have a good reason that’ll make it hurt less. I’m not leaving for someone else. I’m not leaving because I stopped loving you. I’m leaving because you were starting to believe in me more than I ever could. And I was going to drag you down with me.

Please don’t look for me. Don’t waste your time hating me or chasing ghosts. Just live. Please. For both of us.

You were the only light I ever knew. But I wasn’t meant to stay in the light.

I love you.

-Bob

She didn’t move for a long time.

The letter lay in her lap, her fingers frozen around the edges, smudging the ink. Her eyes didn’t even water — not yet. They just stared, blank and aching, like they were trying to make sense of the words over and over again, hoping they might rearrange themselves into something else.

Something kinder.

But they didn’t.

Bob was gone. He’d really gone.

She checked the apartment again — tore it apart, heart thudding, breath ragged. Opened drawers, looked under the bed, clawed through the trash.

Nothing.

Every trace of him — gone. Even the damn mug. Even the sketches.Even the tiny doodle he’d once made on the inside of the pantry door. A stick-figure of the two of them with “Home” written under it.

She crumpled to the floor of the bedroom and screamed.

A sound so broken, so primal, it echoed off the walls and bounced back into her chest like shrapnel.

This was abandonment. Not the kind that slammed doors and yelled cruel things in parting. The quiet kind. The cruelest kind. The kind that left without letting you say please stay.

She lay on the bed that night, curled into herself, clutching his pillow to her chest like it could still hold his warmth. Her eyes stayed open. Her heart beat slower. Numbness began to settle in her limbs.

All those nights she’d held him while he cried. All those mornings she packed his cigarettes with tiny notes to remind him she loved him. All the books she read to understand addiction. All the therapy. The hobbies. The art. The sobriety. All the hope. And he left. No fight. No goodbye. No explanation she could hold onto. Just a letter and a void.

The days blurred together.

She didn’t remember what day he left. Thursday? Saturday? It didn’t matter anymore. The clock ticked just the same — relentlessly, mercilessly — dragging her through morning after morning without him.

The letter stayed on the bedside table, folded and unfolding like a wound she couldn’t close. She tried to put it in a drawer once. It felt like betrayal. She brought it back out after twenty minutes and held it again until her hands went numb.

That first night, she didn’t sleep.

She just sat on the bedroom floor, leaning against the nightstand, surrounded by a silence so thick it pressed into her chest like water. It felt like drowning in the dark. She played one of his old voicemails over and over — one where he was teasing her about some movie she hated. He was laughing.

She hadn’t realized how much she missed the sound of his laugh until it was gone.

She told herself she’d be fine. She’d get through it. She had before — through blood, through pain, through war. She was trained for survival. She could take this. She had to.

But heartbreak wasn’t something you could outfight.

It crawled in through the cracks and rotted everything from the inside out.

The second day, she couldn’t get out of bed.

Not because she was tired, but because it felt like she didn’t deserve to move.

What was the point?

She lay there staring at the ceiling, still in her work clothes from the day before, still wearing the necklace he’d given her — the one with the tiny gold charm shaped like a moon.

He used to call her that.

“Moonlight,” he’d whisper, high and trembling and soft in the aftermath of another breakdown. “You’re the only thing that makes the night less scary.”

She ripped it off.

Threw it across the room.

It hit the wall with a dull clink and fell behind the dresser.

By day four, her stomach had shrunk. Nothing stayed down. The coffee turned cold in her hand, untouched. The groceries in the fridge started to rot. She avoided the kitchen entirely. That’s where he used to wrap his arms around her waist and mumble about breakfast even when he didn’t know how to cook.

Everything reminded her of him.

The arm of the couch still had the dent where he’d sit. The bathroom mirror was still streaked from when he shaved in a rush. One of his long hairs was still caught in the corner of her pillow.

She couldn’t breathe.

It felt like he was everywhere — except here.

She started writing him letters.

One a day.

Long, angry, sobbing letters that never got mailed. She’d rip them up afterward, throw the pieces in the trash, only to dig them out again because she couldn’t bear to let go of his name in her handwriting.

"You lied to me." "You promised you’d never leave." "I was getting better for you. I was trying." "Was I not enough?" "Was loving you not enough?"

The worst part was not knowing. Not knowing why. Not knowing if he was safe. If he was even alive. If he still thought of her or if he was high somewhere with someone new, forgetting her name with every hit.

Sobriety became a razor’s edge. She clung to it with bleeding hands. Not because she wanted to — not at first — but because she had to. If she didn’t, she’d fall, and if she fell, there’d be no one left to catch her. Not anymore.

The first real temptation came on a Tuesday. She’d been up for 48 hours, her hands shaking, her head pounding, her eyes so swollen from crying she could barely see. She found an old bottle of wine at the back of the pantry — a gift from a neighbor she never drank. She held it for thirty minutes. Sat on the floor in front of it like it was a bomb she didn’t know how to defuse, her fingers trembled on the cap. Then she screamed. A scream so loud the windows rattled. She hurled it against the wall. Glass exploded. Red liquid ran down the white paint like blood. She collapsed. Sobbing. Screaming. Hating herself. Hating him. Hating this. But she didn’t drink.

She made lists.

Things To Do Instead of Drinking:

Go for a walk

Break something (cheap)

Write a letter you won’t send

Watch the sun set and pretend he’s under the same sky

Count the days you were successful

She found herself doing everything and nothing. She tried pottery again but broke the first three bowls. She picked up painting — made a portrait of him in charcoal, then tore it apart.

She went to a meeting. Once. Sat in the back with her hood up and didn’t speak. She didn’t want pity. She didn’t want advice. She wanted him. And he was gone.

Nights were the worst. Nights stretched like endless black highways — full of memories, full of shadows.

She lay in bed clutching the side where he used to sleep, remembering the way he curled around her like armor. The way he’d breathe out her name like a prayer. The way their broken pieces had once fit like something sacred.

They weren’t perfect. But they were theirs. Now she was just herself.

Just one half of something that would never be whole again.

She passed a man on the street once who had his build — tall, messy hair, broad shoulders — and her heart stopped. She chased him for two blocks before realizing it wasn’t him. She sat on the curb and cried.

People passed. No one stopped.

Three weeks passed. Four.

She started eating again. Lightly. She cleaned the apartment. She threw out the broken glass. She even took down the photos of them on the fridge — not because she wanted to forget him, but because she couldn’t look at them without shattering all over again.

She told herself: This is survival. Not healing. Not moving on. Just surviving. Breathing. Drinking water. Fighting the urge to slip. Some days she still screamed into pillows. Some days she stared at the door hoping he'd walk in and say, “I was wrong. I’m sorry. I’m home.”

But he didn’t. And she didn’t drink. Not once.

It had been months since he left.

Time moved like molasses — slow, bitter, sticky. Some mornings were quiet victories: brushing her hair, taking a walk, even smiling at a dog on the street. Others were brutal. Violent. Not in action, but in feeling — the kind of ache that settled behind the ribs and refused to loosen, no matter how much she screamed into her pillow or held herself under scalding water just to feel something different.

She was still sober. Barely. But she was not okay. Every day was a fight. Every night, she’d imagine him walking through the door again. Sometimes she hated him in those fantasies. Other times she fell into his arms, crying, as if nothing had ever gone wrong. That’s what love does when it turns into grief. It confuses you. It colors even your delusions in half-truths and memory. She’d built a life around surviving. Small steps. Walks through downtown. Coffee shops. New routines. She spoke to no one. She was a ghost in a city that never asked questions — which suited her just fine.

Then it happened.

She was standing in front of a bakery window — watching a cake being frosted with delicate roses — when the TV in the corner caught her attention.

The headline read: "America's Newest Avengers — Thunderbolts or Traitors?"

At first, she didn’t care. Heroes. Politics. Marketing. It was always noise in the background.

Until they said his name.

Bob Reynolds.

And then the camera panned. And she froze.

There he was. On TV. Smiling — a smile she hadn’t seen in so long she forgot it had dimples. His hair was shorter. Cleaner. His posture straighter. His arms folded in a suit that looked expensive. He was standing beside a group: U.S. Agent, Ghost, Red Guardian—

And Yelena. Her sister.

Y/N stumbled backward like she’d been shot.

The display behind her toppled, glass shattering across the sidewalk. The bakery staff shouted. A stranger tried to help her stand. She couldn’t even answer. Her ears rang. Her stomach twisted. Her hands trembled so violently she dropped her phone twice before calling a car. She didn’t stop shaking until she was back in her home. And then, she started digging. The internet gave her more than she asked for. Too much, really, there were interviews. Clips. Montage videos with dramatic music posted by fans. Fan edits. Titles like “Yelena x Bob | teammates to lovers” with slow-motion stares and soft lighting. Tweets speculating about their chemistry. Rumors. Jokes. Whole Reddit threads. TikToks.

“I ship them so hard.” “They’re perfect together.” “That smirk Bob gives her in the press tour? Yeah, they’re screwing.”

Y/N wanted to throw up.

Bob — her Bob — the same Bob who once cried in her lap, who carved her name into a tree, who promised he’d marry her someday even if it was in a junkyard — was now being shipped with her sister.

Her. Own. Sister.

The words blurred on the screen as tears burned down her face. She clicked faster. Her heart beat louder. Her breathing grew shallow. She couldn’t stop. She needed to understand. She needed a reason. A why.

Yelena never knew about Bob. That was the most soul-shattering part. Y/N had shut herself off the moment she moved to Florida. She wanted peace. Distance. Space to fall apart in private. She didn’t tell Alexei or Yelena about Bob — not because she didn’t trust them, but because it felt like hers. Like her only thing. Her only secret not born from blood or war. She thought she had time. Time to explain. Time to introduce him one day. Time to tell Yelena about the man who saw her not as an assassin or a weapon, but a woman with bruised knuckles and soft eyes who brought him strawberries when he couldn’t get out of bed.

But now? Now Bob was hers too. Now he smiled beside Yelena at press events. Now fans talked about them like they were the next power couple. Now they shared jokes and missions and inside glances. And Y/N was nothing. Not even a footnote.

She stared at a photo on her screen: Bob and Yelena laughing during an interview. He had his arm around her chair.

That was the moment something in Y/N cracked. Something deep. Something she’d been holding together with tape and whispered promises — the idea that maybe he loved her, that maybe he left because he was sick, or scared, or broken, but not because he didn’t care.

That lie was all she had. And it had just been ripped away.

She didn’t eat for three days.

She sat on the floor of her living room, surrounded by old polaroids, ripped letters, a broken pottery bowl she’d made for him. She stared into space. Sometimes she’d laugh. Sometimes she’d sob until her lungs gave out.

She picked up a bottle of vodka in the back of her cabinet and held it to her lips. It smelled like everything she had fought so hard to kill inside herself. She didn't drink it. But it stayed next to her on the floor. Like a threat.

She wrote Yelena a message. Deleted it. Wrote another. Deleted it. She didn’t know what to say. How do you tell your sister — the one you fought to find again, the one you used to braid hair with on missions, the one you loved with a kind of loyalty deeper than blood — that she was sleeping beside the man who once whispered I’ll never leave you and left you shattered on the floor? How do you tell her, without falling apart?

Y/N crawled back into bed wearing one of Bob’s old shirts. It didn’t smell like him anymore.

She curled into a ball, eyes red, throat sore from silence. Outside her window, the world kept moving. People cheered for Bob Reynolds. They speculated about his romance with the blonde Widow. They painted him as a hero. As a survivor. No one remembered the girl he left behind. No one saw the battlefield she lived on every morning. No one knew what he meant. Not even her sister.

Rage was the only thing keeping her alive.

It came in flashes. In silence. In screams so guttural her throat bled. In the shattered plates she forgot she threw. In the heavy breathing she couldn’t calm. In the red-hot visions of Bob — of Yelena — of the life they now shared while she drowned under the weight of their silence.

Y/N had been abandoned before. But this? This wasn’t just abandonment.

This was betrayal.

She paced her apartment like a caged wolf. Fists clenched. Skin slick with sweat. Her heart always pounding — too fast, too loud — like it was trying to break out of her chest.

“I’ll never leave you,” Bob had once whispered.

“You’re my calm,” he said, forehead to hers, one hand over her heart.

Now she couldn’t even touch that part of her chest without feeling a hollow ache.

Every time she thought it couldn’t hurt more, it did. Every day, it hurt differently.

Some days, it was missing the way he used to wake her up with lazy morning kisses and coffee brewed too strong. Other days, it was seeing his name trend on social media beside Yelena’s. Sometimes, it was hearing a stranger laugh the way he used to.

But the worst pain? The worst was not knowing why.

She kept rereading the letter. It was still under her pillow — tear-stained, creased, weak from the number of times her fingers had grasped it in the middle of the night. There was no closure. No reason. Just half-hearted apologies and the kind of love that pretends to be noble.

He left because he loved her? Then why didn’t he say goodbye? Why didn’t he give her the truth?

She screamed into towels until her throat went raw. She hit the walls until her knuckles split open. She sobbed into her bathtub fully clothed, over and over again, the cold porcelain hugging her like a coffin. The world outside kept moving. She didn't. The anger was venomous. It infected everything.

Y/N saw red when she looked at photos of Yelena on missions beside Bob. Red when she heard Alexei talking about how proud he was of the Thunderbolts. Red when she saw their names trending, their faces smiling, their victories applauded.

She ignored their calls. Their messages. Their attempts to reconnect. She blocked Yelena’s number. Left Alexei on read. She couldn’t speak to them. Not without trying to tear their throats out. She wanted to hurt them. She wanted to go back to the assassin she used to be — the version of herself that didn’t care, that could slip into a room and kill without blinking. That girl would’ve handled this.

But that girl died the day she fell in love with Bob. Now she was just... broken. She talked to no one. But in the dark, when the sun dipped below the horizon and the silence crawled in, she whispered to him. To the ghost of him. To the memory.

“Why’d you leave me?” “Was I not enough?” “Did you love me at all?”

Sometimes, she begged. “Please come back.”

Other times, she threatened. “I’ll kill you if I ever see you again.”

And sometimes — most nights — she lay still in bed, staring at the ceiling, wondering how many pills it would take. How fast it would be. If it would feel like floating or falling.

The alcohol bottle still sat in the cabinet. Unopened. But it whispered to her like an old friend. Every time she passed it. Every time she survived another day. She didn’t touch it. But she wanted to. There was a moment — one afternoon — when she caught her reflection in the mirror. She didn’t recognize the woman staring back. Hollow cheeks. Red eyes. A face carved in fury. Her fists were clenched so tightly her nails dug into her palms. It terrified her.

She whispered, “I want to kill him.” Then she said it louder. “I want to kill him.” Then, “I want to kill all of them.” She wasn’t even crying. She felt numb. There was no shame in her chest. Only fire.

A small part of her wondered what would happen if she let that version of herself loose again — the one trained to kill, bred to obey, sculpted by the Red Room to be vengeance incarnate. She could do it. She knew she could. No hesitation. But another part of her — the part Bob once touched, the part that still remembered what love was supposed to feel like — that part sobbed in the silence.

Because she didn’t want to be this person again. But no one else gave her a choice. She wanted to scream at Yelena. How could you? You’re my sister. You knew I was alone. You saw me go quiet. Did you ever ask why? Did you care?

And Bob? Bob who once held her when her hands wouldn’t stop shaking. Bob who used to whisper dreams of marriage and kids and building a life away from the darkness.

He walked away. He joined a team. He built a new life. And he chose Yelena.

She never hated her sister before.

Not even during the Red Room years, not when they were pitted against each other like bloodstained chess pieces moved by men who didn’t know their names. Not even when Yelena went to the Avengers and Y/N ran to Florida, trying to disappear into some version of normal.

But now? Now she hated her with every cell in her body. With every scar she’d ever hidden. With every soft part of her heart that used to beat for Bob.

It was irrational. She knew that. Yelena didn’t know. She didn’t do this on purpose. But logic didn’t matter when you were staring down the barrel of your stolen future.

The dreams started as mercy. She would close her eyes and there it was — her life. A house with a wraparound porch, white with green shutters. Flowers spilling from window boxes. Wind chimes dancing in the breeze. The smell of summer and clean laundry. She stood barefoot in the grass, wearing a soft, cream-colored dress. One hand shielding her eyes from the sun, the other holding a baby — their baby. A little boy with his nose. Her eyes. His curls.

And there he was. Bob. Not broken Bob. Not high Bob. Not trembling-in-a-dark-room Bob. But healthy Bob. Sober Bob. Bob in a button-up shirt, sleeves rolled, a tie around his neck, briefcase in hand, laughing as he walked up the driveway.

He kissed her. Kissed their son. Whispered something about traffic, groceries, how he missed her all day. The kind of life they used to whisper about at 2 a.m. when the drugs wore off and the lies were too tired to keep going. She could feel it in the dream. The warmth. The love. The way it was supposed to be.

But right before she woke up — right before the memory could settle in her heart — the image twisted. His face blurred. The baby vanished. And in the mirror hanging by the front door…

Yelena’s reflection stared back at her. Wearing her dress. Holding her son. With Bob kissing her like Y/N had never even existed.

She would wake up drenched in sweat, sheets twisted around her legs like restraints. Her chest would heave. Her nails would dig into the mattress, into her palms, into herself, trying to scrape the image out of her brain. But it never left. It was seared into her.

Every time she closed her eyes, she saw her dream being lived by someone else. And it broke her.

Because that was the hardest part. Not that he left. Not that he didn’t explain. Not even that he was on TV now, celebrated, loved, powerful.

No. The hardest part was that the Bob she had suffered for — the one she stayed sober for, built a life around, waited up for while he disappeared for nights on end — that Bob was finally better. Just not with her. He was someone else’s now. He became everything she prayed he would be… just too late for her to have him. And it made her sick.

Y/N started to believe something was wrong with her. Truly wrong. Like her soul had rotted somewhere along the way and no one had noticed.

She looked in the mirror and asked herself:

“What is it about me that makes people leave?”, “Why do I only ever get the broken version of things?”,“Why wasn’t I enough?”

She had endured the screaming. The addiction. The hunger. The withdrawals. The nights she held his face and told him he was still human. Still worth saving. She stayed when no one else did. She chose him when he didn’t even choose himself.

And for what? To be replaced. To be erased. To be the ghost haunting the edges of someone else’s happily ever after.

There was a knock at the door. It was soft, hesitant — like whoever was on the other side wasn’t sure if they should be there. Y/N barely registered it at first, her thoughts tangled in the thick fog of the day. Her apartment was dark, the curtains drawn tight against the world, and she was still in the oversized hoodie she’d worn three days in a row, curled up on the couch like a bruise that wouldn’t heal.

The knock came again. Slower this time. Careful.

She blinked, staring at the door, her heartbeat stalling. No one came here. No one knocked. She’d made sure of that — avoided neighbors, blocked every number that mattered. No visitors. No reminders.

So who the hell—?

She stood, hesitant, dragging herself up with the weight of a hundred sleepless nights clinging to her spine. Her hands trembled slightly as she reached for the door. Her nails were bitten down to the quick. Her eyes were hollow. She opened it.

And the last person she ever expected to see was standing there in the hallway.

Yelena.

Y/N didn’t speak. Her throat closed up like a trap.

Yelena smiled gently. “Hey,” she said, her voice light, like this was normal. “Can I come in?”

Y/N blinked. She wasn’t sure if she was dreaming. If her mind had finally cracked under the pressure and this was some sick hallucination. Yelena? Now?

“…What are you doing here?” Her voice was sharp. Dry. She didn’t move.

Yelena’s expression faltered a little. “I… you weren’t answering. Calls, texts. Alexei’s worried. I’m worried. It’s been months, and I thought— I don’t know. I thought maybe you could use some company.”

Y/N stared.

Company. After everything. After everything.

She slowly stepped aside without a word, letting her sister pass into the apartment. Yelena glanced around as she entered — the dishes in the sink, the scattered clothes, the half-empty bottles of energy drinks and untouched food. There was a smell. Not foul, but stale. Like time had stopped moving in here.

“Jesus,” Yelena murmured under her breath, eyes scanning the space. “You’ve really— been hiding, huh?”

Y/N shut the door. And locked it. The click of the deadbolt echoed like a warning. They sat in the silence for a long moment. Yelena took the armchair, her fingers laced nervously in her lap. Y/N sat across from her on the couch, arms crossed, back rigid. The air between them was heavy — not just with time lost, but with something else. Something much darker.

“So,” Yelena said carefully. “How’ve you been?”

Y/N scoffed. “What the hell kind of question is that?”

Yelena blinked. “I just— I don’t know. Trying to start somewhere.”

“You think this is a fucking catch-up?” Her voice cracked at the edges, brittle like glass. “After all this time?”

“I thought you needed space—”

“I didn’t need space, Yelena,” she snapped, sitting forward. “I needed my life. My family. But I guess you were busy on TV, weren’t you? With him.”

Yelena frowned, confused. “With… who?”

“Oh, don’t fucking do that.” Y/N stood now, pacing. Her hands ran through her hair, erratic. “Don’t play dumb. Bob. Sentry. Whatever name he’s going by now.”

Yelena looked taken aback. “You mean— Bob? What about him?”

“You know exactly what,” Y/N hissed.

“I don’t—”

“Don’t lie to me!” she screamed suddenly, turning on her. “Do you think I haven’t seen it? The videos? The interviews? The little side glances, the smiles, the fucking flirting? You think I don’t know how this goes?”

Yelena stood too now, defensive. “Whoa, what the hell are you talking about? I barely know him!”

“Liar.”

“I’m not lying!”

“You always do!” Y/N’s voice was feral now, eyes wide with rage and hurt and something so much more raw it didn’t have a name. “You always take. That’s what you do. You take. I got out. I made it out of that hellhole. I found something. Someone. I built a life, Yelena. And then— and then you. You come along, and you fucking take it. Just like everything else.”

Yelena’s expression was horrified. “Wait— you and Bob? You two— you were—?”

Y/N laughed. It was a broken sound. Hysterical. “Of course you didn’t know. Why would you? No one ever sees me. They only see you.”

“Y/N…”

“Don’t Y/N me.” Her voice dropped now, a low growl. “You know what I see every night when I close my eyes? I see the life I should have had. I see a home. A family. Him. And our son. And then right before I wake up, every time, I see you. In my place. Wearing my dress. Holding my baby. With him.”

Yelena was speechless.

“You have everything now,” Y/N whispered, her voice trembling. “Dad’s proud of you. The world loves you. Bob loves you. And I’m nothing. I’m the ghost you all stepped over to get to your perfect little lives.”

“I don’t love him. I don’t— I swear to God, I didn’t know, I didn’t—” Yelena was panicking now, trying to reach her sister through the crackling wildfire of delusion and grief.

But Y/N was too far gone.

“GET OUT,” she screamed. Yelena flinched.

“Get the fuck out of my house. Out of my life. Go back to your team. Go back to him. Just— don’t you dare pity me, Yelena. Don’t you dare.”

Y/N stood in the wreckage of her own living room, chest heaving, knuckles bleeding, rage boiling beneath her skin like lava. The silence after her outburst should have been final—should have signaled the end of this nightmare. But when she turned, Yelena was still there.

She hadn’t left.

Y/N’s breath caught in her throat.

Yelena stood in the doorway, rain-slick light washing over her, a tremble in her voice as she stepped forward, slow and cautious.

“I’m not leaving you like this,” Yelena said softly. “You’re not well. I didn’t know about you and Bob—I swear I didn’t. But if it hurts you, I’ll fix it. Just let me fix it.”

“Fix it?” Y/N’s voice cracked, her laugh manic. “You can’t fix me, Yelena. You broke me.”

“That’s not fair—”

“Fair?” Her head snapped toward her sister, expression twisted. “Fair is for people who didn’t get turned into weapons when they were kids. You think you know what the Red Room did to us? You don’t. I was made into something worse. Something even you couldn’t understand.”

Yelena’s face softened with something like fear now. “I know what they did. We survived it together—”

“No. You survived it.” Y/N took a step forward. “I’m still living in it.”

Something inside her was unraveling.

The rage she’d tried to bury, the grief that rotted her insides—it was rising now, a tsunami crashing past the last crumbling walls of her sanity. And Yelena, standing there in her self-righteous glow, trying to save her like she was some stray animal—

It only made her hate her more.

“You came here to help?” Y/N’s voice dropped low, a growl. “You want to save me? The way you saved Natasha? The way you saved yourself?”

“Y/N—please.”

“You think you’re a hero now, huh?” Her hands were shaking with the need to lash out. “You stole my life. My love. My fucking future. And now you’re here, acting like you’re innocent. You’re not innocent.”

Her eyes locked on Yelena’s, and something ancient and broken ignited behind them.

“You’re dead.” Without warning, Y/N lunged.

Y/N’s fist came like lightning—brutal, fast. It clipped Yelena in the jaw, sending her stumbling back, crashing into a bookshelf. Before Yelena could react, Y/N was on her again, slamming her through drywall like a battering ram.

Yelena rolled as a fist cratered the floor where her head had been.

She barely got her footing before Y/N was there again—she moved like a ghost, faster than Yelena remembered. Her Red Room training hadn’t prepared her for this level of strength.

Y/N had super soldier strength.

Yelena countered with a textbook leg sweep—Y/N leapt over it, caught her mid-spin, and hurled her across the living room into the kitchen counter. Dishes shattered. Yelena groaned, back arching in pain.

“You wanna fix me?” Y/N snarled. “Then bleed for me sister!”

She grabbed a serrated kitchen knife and lunged again.

Yelena blocked with a stool, snapping it in half under Y/N’s force. She ducked the next blow and kicked her sister back into the wall—but it was like trying to stop a freight train with a paper shield.

Y/N’s hand snapped forward, catching Yelena by the throat. She slammed her hard against the window.

Glass cracked.

“Every dream I had,” Y/N whispered, face inches from hers, “You infected it.”

Yelena elbowed her, kicked, used every trick she’d learned from Natasha—but nothing was working. Her sister was stronger. Angrier.

Y/N wasn’t fighting to disable.

She was fighting to kill.

Yelena’s lip bled. “This isn’t you,” she gasped. “You’re not like this.”

“I was always like this,” Y/N hissed. “You just never looked hard enough.”

She headbutted Yelena, then flung her across the apartment. Yelena landed with a crash, coughing, vision blurry. She reached for her belt—threw a flashbang.

Y/N shielded her eyes too late.

Yelena scrambled for the window, kicking it open as rain poured in. She turned back, breath ragged.

“I loved you,” she shouted.

Y/N roared, rage bursting like wildfire, lunging through the smoke and wreckage.

Yelena jumped.

She hit the fire escape, barely catching herself. Her leg twisted on impact, but she moved. Fast. Down the stairs, through the alley, into the night.

Behind her, Y/N stood at the broken window, staring down at her fleeing sister.

Her face was wild. Her knuckles bloody. Her breathing fast and erratic. And yet—tears spilled down her cheeks.

Somewhere, deep down beneath the violence, the child who once idolized Yelena screamed.

But no one heard her.

Yelena collapsed behind a dumpster, heart thundering in her chest.

She wiped blood from her lip. Looked down at her trembling hands.

She’d faced monsters. Gods. She’d survived the Red Room.

But nothing in the world had prepared her for the moment her own sister tried to kill her.

Tried to murder her.

She looked up at the rain, swallowed the lump in her throat, and whispered—

“What did they do to you?”

Y/N sat alone on the shoreline, salt drying on her cheeks. Not from the sea—she hadn’t been in the water.

She hadn’t been in anything lately.

Just skin and bone. Just barely enough of a person to keep breathing.

Her knees were pulled up to her chest. Bare feet dug into the cold sand. The wind tangled her hair as the tide clawed closer. The sky above her was bruised with clouds, gold and violet smudges painting the horizon, stars trying to pierce through the thick dusk.

Her fingers fidgeted with a small, sharp shell—pressing it into her palm again and again until the skin broke.

Tiny, invisible punishment. Something to make her feel.

Because feeling had become harder than hurting.

"I know you’re not here," she whispered.

The sea answered with a howl.

"Or maybe you are," she said to no one. Her voice was so small. "I see you in my dreams, Nat. You always look so... peaceful."

She pressed the shell deeper. Blood bloomed in her palm, slow and warm.

"I’m not okay," she said to the waves, to her dead sister, to the ghost she could only summon through pain and memory. "You knew how to live through the pain. How to stand. I don’t. I don’t know who I am without it. And now I just want it to stop."

She looked up to the darkening sky. The wind picked up.

“I tried,” she whispered. “I really tried. I stayed clean. I made a life. I fell in love.” Her voice cracked. “And he left me.”

Tears streamed down her face. Her body shook, her chest hiccupping with emotion too big to contain.

“I tried to be good. I really did.”

She hugged her knees tighter, curling into herself.

“And now I dream of a family that’s not mine. A house I’ll never have. A child I won’t get to hold.”

A beat.

Then a whisper.

“Take me with you, Nat.”

A sob escaped.

“I don’t want to be here anymore. I don’t want to be me anymore.”

The wind howled louder, like something answering.

And then—

A voice.

“Y/N.”

It was rough. Deep. Familiar.

Her heart stopped.

She didn’t even need to look.

She already knew who it was.

She turned slowly, her face stained with salt and blood and sand.

There stood Alexei.

He looked older. Tired. His eyes softened when he saw her, broken and small on the shore. He took a step forward, boots crunching the shells.

“I’m here to help you, dochka,” he said gently.

The word snapped something in her.

She stood.

Suddenly very still.

Very silent.

Her fists clenched.

"You’re here to help me?" she said, her voice eerily calm. “Now?”

Alexei hesitated. “Yelena told me what happened. We didn’t know about Bob. About how much he meant to you. We didn’t know he left you.”

She flinched like he slapped her.

“You. Didn’t. Know.” Her laugh was cold, sharp. “You all didn’t know because you never asked. Because I was the broken one, right? I was the one you kept tucked away like a dirty little secret while you raised your other daughter to be a hero.”

Alexei’s face fell. “That’s not true.”

“It is true!” she screamed, her voice breaking. “You all wanted me gone. Out of sight. Away. You wanted peace, so you sent me away to rot while you played family with Yelena and wore your stupid suit and smiled for interviews.”

He stepped forward again. “I thought you wanted peace—”

“NO!” she roared. “I wanted a life! I wanted someone to love me. And Bob—he was it. He was everything. But now? Now he’s a goddamn Avenger and you’re all just playing pretend like I never existed.”

Her hands were trembling.

“I was there, Dad. I built something real. And you all took it away from me. And now you come here. Acting like you care.”

“I do care—”

“You should’ve cared then!” she shrieked. “You should’ve cared when I was waking up in cold sweats, screaming from the Red Room memories. You should’ve cared when I begged you not to let them inject me. You should’ve cared when I held Bob’s letter and wanted to die.”

Her eyes locked on his. Wild. Ferocious.

“But you didn’t. And you won’t. So now—” she took a breath, trembling “—I’m gonna make you feel what I feel.”

Y/N charged like a shadow breaking free from the night, faster than Alexei expected. Her fist slammed into his gut, lifting him off the ground and sending him crashing into the sand dune behind them.

He groaned. Spit blood.

She was on him again in seconds.

Fists collided. Sand erupted with every hit. Alexei blocked, countered, tried to reason—but she didn’t want to talk.

She wanted to punish.

“You left me to rot!” she screamed between punches.

“You were strong enough!” he shouted back.

“No, I wasn’t!!”

They tumbled toward the shoreline, their silhouettes locked in a dance of blood and violence. Y/N swept his legs, slammed her knee into his chest. Alexei tried to grapple her, but she elbowed him hard—once, twice—broke free.

“You made me a killer,” she seethed. “And then punished me for being one.”

He staggered back, clutching his ribs.

“You’re not a killer,” he said breathlessly. “You’re my daughter.”

Tears mixed with blood on her face. “Then why didn’t you love me like one?”

She rushed him one last time.

He didn’t fight back.

He just stood there, arms half-raised, breathing ragged.

Her fist cracked across his jaw—and he dropped to his knees.

Rain began to fall.

And she just stood there.

Above him.

Hands shaking.

Chest heaving.

Staring down at the man who helped make her, and never came to save her.

Alexei looked up at her, lip bleeding.

“I didn’t know how,” he whispered. “To love you the way you needed. But I do love you.”

Something inside her broke.

She collapsed into the sand, knees buckling.

And screamed.

Screamed until her throat was raw.

The sound of waves crashing was no longer calming.

Not when her heart was screaming louder.

Y/N’s chest heaved from exertion. Blood caked her hands, her knuckles bruised and raw from striking the man who once called her his little girl. She barely felt the cold rain anymore. It soaked her hair, clung to her lashes, blurred the red on her skin as if it could wash away the damage she’d done—but it couldn’t.

Nothing could.

She stared at Alexei crumpled in the sand, breathing but unmoving. Her own father. Another person she’d broken.

She’d barely noticed the shift in air behind her until it was too late.

Footsteps.

Boots, soft on the sand.

She froze.

They were here.

The new team. Valentina’s soldiers. She could sense it in the way the atmosphere tensed. Like the air itself had held its breath. She didn’t turn at first. Her fists clenched, her breath uneven, eyes still on her father. She thought: Of course Yelena brought them. Of course she did.

She imagined them standing behind her, watching like spectators. Come to see the last broken piece of the Red Room project tear herself apart. Maybe they thought it would be entertaining—put her down like a wild animal if needed.

Maybe they came because they didn’t think she could be saved.

Her jaw clenched.

Then—

A voice.

Soft. Familiar.

Shattered.

“Y/N…”

She turned.

Slowly. Hesitantly.

And when she saw him—

Her heart almost stopped.

Bob.

Her Bob.

Her whole world, standing in the rain, drenched like a ghost.

He was dressed in civilian clothes, not the shining uniform of a weapon. He looked nothing like the being of light and power she once saw hovering above the world.

He looked like a man. A broken man.

His eyes were red, tears tracing down his face like rainwater. His lips parted, like he had a hundred things to say but couldn’t force a single one of them past the lump in his throat.

Time stopped.

The beach, the wind, the world—faded.

It was just them.

Two people with shattered dreams and bleeding hearts.

Her arms twitched—part of her wanted to run to him. Bury herself in his chest. Ask him if any of it was real. Ask him why he left. Ask him if he knew how hard she fought to live through it.

But she didn’t move.

Because the rest of her wanted to kill him.

She hated him. She loved him. She hated how much she still loved him.

Her face crumpled. She blinked back tears, every emotion she had shoved down for months roaring back to the surface.

Then she saw the others.

Bucky. Yelena. Walker. Ava.

Weapons.

All ready.

All watching.

She was the target.

Yelena stood behind Bob, her arms at her sides, tense and afraid. She didn’t speak. She didn’t need to.

The message was clear: They weren’t here to help her. They were here to stop her.

She laughed bitterly, her voice hoarse from crying, from screaming.

“So this is what it takes to get you all to care,” she said, not looking at anyone but Bob. “One broken girl on a beach, and now you all show up to ‘fix’ me.”

Bob took a step forward.

“Y/N—”

“Don’t,” she snapped, voice cold. “Don’t say my name like it still belongs to you.”

He flinched. His throat bobbed.

"I—I didn’t know how to come back," he said quietly. "I didn’t know how to look at you after what I did."

Tears welled up in her eyes again.

“You shouldn’t have come back at all,” she whispered. “Not like this. Not with them.”

She took a trembling step toward Alexei’s limp body in the sand. Her fingers curled into fists.

“I should end it here,” she murmured, barely audible over the wind. “End all of this. You, him, me.”

Bob’s eyes widened. “Y/N, please…”

She crouched and pulled the sidearm from Alexei’s holster. Her hands shook as she held it.

Every fiber of her being screamed against what she was doing—but the storm in her chest was stronger. Her tears blinded her, but the hatred lit her up from the inside like wildfire.

“Put it down,” Bucky warned gently. “You don’t want to do this.”

She didn’t even look at him.

“I didn’t want any of this.”

Her eyes stayed locked on Bob. Tears ran freely now. She looked like a woman drowning on dry land.

“I just wanted a life. You know? A stupid little house. A baby. A partner. That’s it. And you took it all away and gave it to her instead.”

Bob shook his head. “Yelena isn’t—”

“SHUT UP!” she screamed, voice cracked and raw. “You think I care what’s true? You think it makes a difference?!”

The grief in her voice silenced them all.

She turned the weapon toward Alexei—arms trembling.

Her finger brushed the trigger.

Then—

They moved.

Bucky lunged. Silent, fast, skilled.

He was on her in an instant, arms wrapping around her from behind like iron.

She screamed, thrashed wildly, her strength unnatural. But Bucky was strong too. Too strong. It was like a cage slamming shut.

“No—NO—LET ME GO!!” she wailed, her voice pure panic now.

She twisted, elbowed him hard—but he didn’t loosen. She could barely breathe. Her eyes locked on Bob’s—desperate and furious.

“HOW DARE YOU COME HERE!” she cried. “YOU DON’T GET TO WATCH ME BREAK!”

Then she felt the sharp sting in her neck.

She froze.

Her pupils dilated.

Bucky held her tighter as the tranquilizer entered her bloodstream.

“No—no—no, no please—please—not again,” she begged, sobbing, her voice cracking into childlike pleas.

Her limbs weakened.

Her legs collapsed.

And the world began to spin.

Bob stepped forward—arms instinctively outstretched—but Bucky held her protectively, shaking his head.

Y/N blinked up at Bob one last time, her vision blurring.

“You were supposed to love me,” she whispered.

Then her eyes rolled back.

Her body went limp in Bucky’s arms.

Warm light painted the ceiling above her in soft amber tones, the kind of light that tried too hard to feel like daylight. It flickered gently with the subtle hum of the old overhead fixture, barely audible above the quiet in the room. The air was cool, sterile but not cruel. Soft linen cradled her aching body, and for the first time in what felt like centuries, she didn’t feel the weight of sand, or blood, or rage on her skin. But she felt everything else.

Her eyes fluttered open, lids heavy, lashes damp from sleep or tears—she wasn’t sure. She didn’t move. Just… stared at the ceiling, letting herself breathe in the unfamiliar quiet.

Then it hit her.

Where was she?

Her heart stuttered. Her fingers twitched. She tried to shift, to sit up—but—

She couldn’t. Her wrists were gently restrained. Not tight. Not cruel. The soft fabric cuffs were secured to the bedframe. She wasn’t a guest here. She was a threat.

And then she remembered.

The screaming. The gun. Bob. Yelena. Alexei. Pain speared through her chest as the memory flooded her in a single crushing wave. Her own voice screaming in her ears. The look in Bob’s eyes when she crumbled. The way Yelena flinched. The way Alexei bled into the sand.

“Oh God,” she whispered, her voice cracked and barely recognizable.

Tears stung her eyes, hot and shameful. She let them fall, unable to lift a hand to wipe them away. She had snapped. No—that wasn’t strong enough. She had descended. The side of her that had been carved in the dark halls of the Red Room—the ghost of the girl she used to be—had won. She had become every nightmare she fought so hard to rise from. I’m a monster. She didn’t notice the faint movement at first, the soft rustle of fabric.

Then—

A quiet, theatrical cough. Not aggressive. Not angry. Just… a little awkward.

Yelena.

She sat quietly at the end of the bed, legs crossed at the ankle, arms loosely wrapped around herself. Her green eyes were bloodshot, her face pale and raw. There were faint bruises around her temple—bruises Y/N had left. One eye still a little swollen. But she smiled, slow and tired and heartbreakingly gentle.

“I was wondering when you’d wake up,” Yelena said, her voice hoarse but calm. “You sleep like a rock. That part hasn’t changed.”

Y/N’s eyes widened. Her lips parted in shock. Her breath hitched in her throat, and the words tumbled out before she could stop them—choked, frantic, ashamed. “I’m sorry,” she sobbed. “Yelena—I’m so sorry—I didn’t mean to—I didn’t want to hurt you—I didn’t—God, I’m so sorry—”

Yelena stood and leaned forward, her hands coming to gently cradle her sister’s face, ignoring the restraints, ignoring the tears, ignoring the bruises Y/N had left behind. “No,” Yelena whispered, pulling her into a slow, careful hug.

Y/N froze, her body stiff with guilt, her breath shallow and frantic. She tried to pull back, tried to protest, but Yelena just held her tighter. “No more apologies.”

“I almost killed you.”

“You didn’t.”

“I wanted to,” Y/N cried. “I—I was going to—”

“But you didn’t,” Yelena said again, firm this time. “And I know that wasn’t you. Not the real you.”

Y/N finally broke. Her head dropped forward, her body trembling as she sobbed uncontrollably into her sister’s shoulder.

“I don’t know who I am anymore,” she choked. “I don’t know how to come back from this. I don’t know if I can.”

Yelena pulled back just enough to look her in the eyes.

“You’re my sister,” she said. “That’s who you are. And I’m not going anywhere.”

Y/N’s eyes burned. Her lips trembled. “I’m dangerous.”

“I’m not afraid of you.”

“You should be.”

Yelena smiled, even through her own tears. “Maybe. But I’m not.”

There was a beat of silence. A moment where the weight of everything—the past, the pain, the blood between them—hung in the air like a ghost. Y/N stared at her hands. Her wrists still bound, like some poetic punishment for the sins she couldn’t undo.

“I don’t deserve this,” she whispered. “Your kindness. Your love. After what I did… after what I became…”

“You became someone who was hurting,” Yelena said gently. “Someone who had everything stolen from her. Again. And again. And again.”

She wiped a tear from Y/N’s cheek.

“You don’t need to deserve my love, Y/N. You already have it.”

Y/N let out a small, broken noise. The kind that wasn’t quite a sob, wasn’t quite a laugh. Just pain, raw and unfiltered.

The sisters stayed there like that, wrapped in a fragile embrace, one restrained but free for the first time in years, and the other covered in bruises but stronger than anyone had given her credit for.

Y/N whispered, “I thought I lost you.”

“You didn’t,” Yelena said. “And now we’re going to fix this. Together.”

She reached for the restraints. Y/N flinched. But Yelena just unbuckled one cuff. Then the other. Slowly. Gently. Like she was undoing chains made of more than just fabric. Y/N’s arms fell to her sides, limp. She didn’t move. She didn’t run. She just let the silence settle again.

The door creaked open gently.

Bob stood in the frame like a ghost afraid to enter its own home, shoulders slouched, hands trembling at his sides. His eyes were bloodshot, not from lack of sleep, but from the weight of sorrow. He didn’t speak right away. He looked at her like she was a piece of glass cracked in too many places to count—terrified that even breathing wrong would shatter her completely. Y/N didn’t look at him.

She sat up in bed slowly, spine hunched, fingers tangled in the bedsheets like she was holding herself together. Her eyes stayed down, unable to meet his. Her chest was heavy with guilt, shame, heartbreak. The silence stretched between them like a bridge they were both too afraid to walk.

“…Can I come in?” Bob finally asked, his voice rough, barely above a whisper.

Yelena, who had been sitting quietly at the edge of the room, glanced at Y/N. Y/N nodded faintly. Yelena stood, gently brushing a hand over her sister’s shoulder before leaving the room without a word. She paused just long enough at Bob’s side to give him one final look — one that said: Please, don’t break her again.

And then it was just them. The door clicked shut behind him.

He stepped forward slowly, like every movement hurt. Like every step was a prayer.

“I’ve been out there,” he said, eyes flicking to the door. “Since they brought you in. I didn’t leave.”

Y/N’s voice was a ghost, barely audible. “Why?”

His breath caught. She finally lifted her eyes to him — and he saw it. The wreckage. The ruin. The pain. All of it, etched into her face, bleeding out of her eyes like ink across fragile paper.

“I wanted to make sure you were okay,” he said, voice cracking.

She blinked.

“Okay?” she repeated, a bitter laugh curling into her tone. “You think I’m okay?”

He didn’t answer.

Instead, he asked, “Can I… hug you?”

For a moment, she just stared at him. Silent. He could see the fight in her. The war. The part of her that wanted to scream, and the part of her that wanted to collapse.

She nodded. Just once. He moved forward slowly, like approaching a wounded animal, and then—he knelt at her side. His arms wrapped around her carefully at first, but then tighter. And tighter. Like he needed to physically hold her together. Like he was trying to keep her from vanishing. Like he had been waiting lifetimes just to feel her heartbeat again. She didn’t move. Then—her body began to tremble. And she broke. A sob ripped through her, raw and sharp and desperate. And then another. And another. She clung to him with everything she had left, burying her face into his shoulder like it was the only place she could hide from the world. He held her through it. Tighter. Always tighter.

“I’m so sorry,” Bob whispered, voice cracking like glass. “Y/N… I’m so sorry. For everything. For leaving. For not asking. For not knowing. For making you go through all of this alone.”

“Why?” she cried. “Why did you leave me?”

His hands were shaking against her back.

“Why did you give up on me?” she sobbed. “I needed you. I needed you to fight for me, Bob…”

“I know.”

“I needed you to love me.”

“I did!” he cried, his voice breaking completely. “I do! I never stopped, not for one second. But I was broken—I was so broken and I didn’t want to take you down with me.”

“You already did,” she whispered, her voice like ashes.

Silence.

She pulled back just enough to look at him, her hands curled in the collar of his shirt, her face wet with tears. “I would’ve taken every hit. Every storm. Every goddamn explosion if it meant we got to live that life together. The one I dreamed of. You. Me. A life. That’s all I ever wanted.”

Bob cupped her face like she was the most fragile thing in the universe. “You were everything. I looked at you and saw something pure. Someone good. You had your life together. You had purpose. You had a job, a name, a home. You—” His voice caught again. “You were the kind of person who made people believe in something better.”

“And I loved you. God, I loved you.”

He rested his forehead against hers, both of them shaking now.

“But me?” he whispered. “I was a drug. I was a monster. I was this… this parasite, wrapped in skin and lies. And every day I looked at you, I wondered how long it would take before I ruined you.”

She shook her head.

“No,” she whispered. “You were sick, Bob. You were in pain. I knew that. I stayed because I loved you. And you—you let me love you—and then you ran.”

“I thought I was protecting you,” he whispered. “But I was just protecting myself. From the guilt. From the shame of watching the best thing in my life waste away because of me.”

“I did waste away!” she snapped, crying harder. “I begged for you. I screamed for you. I built a future around a man who disappeared before I could even show him what he meant to me. And you never came back.”

His thumbs brushed her cheeks, catching the tears that wouldn’t stop.

“You deserved someone who could stay,” he said. “And I was still chasing my next high. My escape. You got clean—for me. You faced your demons. But I—” He swallowed. “I let mine eat me alive. I let them turn me into something violent. Something ugly. I would scream. Break things. Scare you. I remember the way you used to flinch and it kills me.”

“I never stopped waiting for you,” she whispered. “Even when I hated you. Even when I blamed you. Even when I hurt everyone because of you.”

He rested his head on her shoulder.

“I’m not the man you deserve.”

“You’re the only man I’ve ever wanted.”

Silence. Only their breathing, tangled and shaky.

“I’m sorry,” Bob whispered again. “I was a burden. A mistake. A nobody.”

She pulled his face up to look at her. “No. You were everything.”

And just like that, they sat together, two broken people clinging to the pieces, sobbing into each other’s arms. No future plans. No promises. Just pain. Just honesty. Just them. And for the first time in what felt like eternity, Y/N wasn’t crying alone. The quiet after the storm hung heavy. Bob hadn’t moved. Not really. His arms still wrapped around her like a shield. As if he thought letting go would mean losing her again. He held her like a man who knew he didn’t deserve to—grateful, reverent, afraid. Y/N’s tears had long since soaked through his shirt. Her voice was hoarse from sobbing. Her body, exhausted. But neither of them could stop holding on. She rested her head against his chest, hearing that familiar heartbeat—steady, slow, alive. Proof that he was really here. That after everything, he was here.

Bob took a breath. Shaky. Hesitant. Then another, deeper one. And then, finally:

“Y/N…” he whispered, voice trembling. “Can I ask you something?”

She nodded against his chest.

His hand gently, shakily brushed through her hair. “Can you ever forgive me?”

She stiffened just slightly—not out of anger, but out of the weight of the question.

“I thought…” he said, voice breaking again, “I thought I was doing you a favor. Letting you go. I thought if I disappeared, I’d… free you from me. From the burden. From my addiction. My anger. Everything.”

He leaned back, just enough to look into her eyes. His were red and swollen, glistening with tears that hadn’t fallen yet.

“I was never good enough for you. Not before. Not during. Not after. You gave me your heart and I… I broke it. I left it bleeding on the floor. You were the only light I had, and I left you in the dark.”

She was quiet, watching him, jaw trembling slightly.

“I never truly understood,” he said, voice raw, “how someone like you… someone strong, brilliant, good… could love someone like me. I always thought there had to be something wrong with you for wanting me.”

Her throat tightened.

“But there wasn’t. God, there wasn’t. You were just kind. And I was a coward.”

He dropped his head, shame rippling off him like heat. “I didn’t realize how much I needed you until you were gone. And even then, I told myself I was doing the right thing. That staying away was noble. That I was protecting you.”

He laughed bitterly. “What bullshit. All I was doing was hiding. And hurting you in the process.”

Y/N blinked hard, her eyes stinging again. But she didn’t cry. Not yet.

She reached out slowly, placing her hand on his cheek. He leaned into it like it was a lifeline.

“I don’t need you to be perfect,” she whispered. “I just need you to stay.”

He nodded, eyes closing under her touch. “I won’t go. Not again. I swear it.”

Her voice cracked. “Don’t let me go.”

“I won’t.”

“Just… hold me. For as long as you can. Just—don’t let me feel alone again.”

“I’m here,” he whispered fiercely. “I’m here. I’ll stay. Always.”

She hesitated. Then: “Can I ask you something now?”

His eyes met hers again, frightened but open. “Anything.”

Her lips parted, voice softer than before. “Were you ever with her?”

He blinked. “Who?”

“…Yelena.”

A silence fell between them. He understood what she meant. Not just with in proximity. But with. As in—did you love her? Did you think of her when you should’ve been thinking of me?

He answered without hesitation.

“No,” he said. “God, no. Never.”

She nodded slightly, swallowing, but the pain was still there.

“Did you ever think about it?” she asked.

He sighed. “Y/N, I thought about you. Every. Day. Every time I woke up. Every time I hit bottom again. Every time I looked at the sky. I never stopped thinking about you.”

“Then why didn’t you come back?”

His voice broke. “Because I didn’t feel like I deserved to. Not after what I did. After what I put you through. I thought… if I came back, it’d be unfair. Like I was asking you to relive all of it. To open those wounds again.”

“But you were all I wanted,” she whispered. “Even when I hated you for leaving. Even when I cursed your name. You were still… home.”

He shook his head, tears finally falling. “I was a monster.”

“You were sick,” she said. “You were hurting.”

“I was dangerous.”

She leaned closer.

“I never wanted safe,” she said. “I wanted you. All of you. Even the broken parts.”

He looked at her, disbelief and awe mingling in his expression. “I only ever loved you, Y/N. I always will.”

Their foreheads came together, slow, breathless. They just stayed like that for a moment. Breathing the same air. Holding the same silence. Two hearts syncing again after too long apart. She looked up at him, her eyes swollen, red, and full of something unspoken.

And then—she kissed him. It wasn’t rushed. It wasn’t frantic. It was slow. Soft. Gentle.

But underneath it—ache. A deep ache. Like a wound finally closing. Like years of longing finally being answered. Like two souls that had fought wars just to find their way back to each other.

His hands cradled her face. Her fingers clutched his shirt. They kissed like survivors. Like people who’d come too close to the edge and were still afraid of falling.

And when they pulled away, they didn’t speak.

They didn’t have to.

Because that kiss said everything.

They lay there, still wrapped around one another, letting the storm of the past finally settle in the quiet.

His breathing had slowed, but his hands trembled faintly, like the weight of memory refused to leave his bones.

Bob hadn’t spoken for several minutes. He just watched her face. Her swollen eyes. Her tired but steady breaths. The way her lashes fluttered when she blinked, like she was still scared she might wake up and find none of this real.

But then he asked it.

His voice was soft. Almost broken. The kind of question someone asks after holding it back for too long.

“…Why didn’t you stop me?”

Y/N stirred. “What do you mean?”

He sat up slightly, supporting himself on one elbow, and looked at her with a vulnerability that split him wide open.

“All those times,” he said, almost afraid to speak the words. “Back then. When I was sick. When I… when I shouted. When I punched the wall an inch from your head. When I—” He choked. “When I was someone else.”

She didn’t look away. Her eyes softened.

“You just… took it,” he whispered. “You stood there and took it. You never fought back. Not once. You could’ve. You should’ve.”

He swallowed hard. “And today… I saw what you can do. I saw you fight Alexei. You nearly killed him. You could’ve crushed me like I was nothing. You were stronger than me all along.”

He looked down at their intertwined hands, her fingers relaxed against his palm.

“So why didn’t you?”

There was no judgment in his tone. Just pain. Just shame. Just disbelief.

Y/N sat up slowly, pulling her knees to her chest as her gaze drifted upward—past the ceiling, past the walls. Like she was remembering a thousand moments all at once.

“I could’ve,” she said quietly.

“I know,” he whispered.

“But I didn’t.”

“Why?” he asked again, desperate this time.

She took a breath, long and slow.

“Because if I used it… if I let myself use that strength, I knew I wouldn’t stop,” she said. “I knew I could hurt you. Maybe kill you.”

Her voice trembled. “And no matter how much you hurt me… I never wanted to hurt you.”

Bob broke.

The words hit like bullets, each one sharper than the last. His shoulders curled inward. His hands covered his face. And for the first time since the injections, since the lab, since the Void, since everything—he sobbed.

Ugly, gut-wrenching sobs that came from the very center of who he was. He collapsed forward, arms wrapping around her waist, face buried into her lap like a child seeking comfort.

She didn’t flinch. She didn’t pull away. She just cradled his head, fingers gently stroking his hair as he cried like a man grieving a version of himself that could’ve loved her better.

“You should’ve run,” he said into her skin. “You should’ve left me. I was… I was horrible to you.”

She didn’t speak.

“I pushed you away. I threw things. I screamed at you. And you—God, Y/N, you stayed. You stayed and loved me when I was poison.”

She closed her eyes, holding back tears of her own.

“I was so weak,” he whispered.

“No,” she said softly, firm. “You were sick.”

“I was a monster.”

“You were lost,” she corrected. “And I loved you. I never stopped.”

He looked up at her, broken, tear-streaked, eyes desperate. “You loved me when I didn’t deserve it.”

“I still do.”

He let out a cry at that—soft, ragged.

And then, as if the truth was finally bursting from inside him, he grabbed both her hands and clutched them to his chest.

“I have so much to tell you,” he said, his voice urgent. “So much I need you to understand. I know it doesn’t erase what happened. I know it doesn’t make me innocent. But I need you to hear it. Everything. Why I disappeared. What I thought I was doing. What I really did. How scared I was. How much I missed you. How I imagined your voice when I was breaking down. How I saw you in every dream and every nightmare.”

She was silent, watching him come undone.

He breathed out, shaky. “I want to start over. With you. With all of it. I want to be the man who’s strong because of you, not in spite of you. I want sobriety, real sobriety, with you by my side. I want the Watchtower to be ours. I want to see you wake up in the morning and smile and know you’re safe. I want a new life. A real life. With you.”

Her throat closed around the lump rising there.

“I need you,” he said. “Not just want. Need. Like breath. Like light.”

He leaned in, his forehead pressed to her chest now.

“I need you to believe I can be better.”

She gently tilted his chin up, her eyes meeting his. Her own expression trembling from holding in her emotion.

“I already do,” she whispered.

He stared at her like she was the sun, like she was the reason he hadn’t disappeared completely.

Then she leaned in, pressing her lips to his temple. A kiss of forgiveness. Of memory. Of salvation.

“I’ll stay,” she murmured. “But you have to promise me something.”

“Anything.”

“Don’t give up. Not on me. Not on yourself. Not ever again.”

He nodded fervently, tears still falling. “I won’t. I swear, I won’t.”

“And if you slip—”

“I’ll tell you.”

“If you hurt—”

“I’ll let you hold me.”

She smiled sadly. “Then I’ll stay.”

He kissed her then. Gentle, slow. A thank you. A lifeline.

And when they pulled back, he held her tighter than ever, whispering into the quiet.

“I’ll never let you go again.”

The Watchtower Common Room – Three Weeks Later

The sun dipped lazily through the tall windows of the communal living room, casting a golden haze over the couch, the mismatched furniture, and the scattered takeout containers from what had turned into a very chaotic brunch-slash-strategy meeting-slash-Alexei-having-an-identity-crisis.

Y/N sat curled into the corner of the oversized couch, practically glued to Bob’s side. Her legs were draped over his lap, arms wrapped around his chest like a koala bear, her head tucked into the crook of his shoulder.

She wasn’t going anywhere.

And, judging by the peaceful look on her face, neither was her need to be close to him at every moment of every day.

Bob, for his part, looked a little... wilted. In a good way. The kind of wilted that comes with someone who’s been deeply loved on all day by a clingy, affectionate, newly-healed girlfriend who had absolutely zero shame about PDA in front of their makeshift team.

He was red in the face. Again.

“I don’t get it,” Alexei grumbled from the floor, half-buried under sketchbooks, empty energy drink cans, and three poorly-sewn prototypes of what might’ve been uniforms. “We’re technically Avengers now, yes? We saved a facility. We stopped a Void. We got a Bob. We have matching trauma. That is qualification.”

Yelena, seated on the arm of the couch, rolled her eyes. “No one said we’re not. But it’s not ‘Avengerz.’ With a Z.”

“But the Z is modern. Youthful,” Alexei insisted, holding up a tattered piece of paper with what looked like a lightning bolt... stabbing a bear. “You have to think branding.”

Y/N snorted into Bob’s chest. He felt it before he heard it—her nose pressed to his shoulder as she tried to muffle the laughter.

Bob glanced around the room, looking mildly panicked. “Can I take back my resurrection and go die again real quick?”

“No,” Y/N said without hesitation, arms tightening around his middle. “I just got you back. You’re not going anywhere.”

He glanced down at her, lips twitching. “Can I at least breathe?”

“Nope.”

Yelena laughed under her breath. “Honestly? You’re lucky. This is the happiest she’s been in years.”

“I can tell,” Bob muttered, turning even redder as Y/N unabashedly kissed his jaw in front of everyone. “She hasn’t let go of me in like, six hours.”

Y/N looked up, mock-offended. “Wow. I cuddle you once for six hours and suddenly I’m clingy?”

He gave her a flat look. “You’ve followed me into the bathroom.”

“I missed you.”

“I was in there for three minutes.”

“Three long, heartbreaking minutes.”

The room burst into laughter—except Alexei, who was too busy measuring Bucky’s shoulders with a tape measure and mumbling about “proportions for aesthetic justice.”

Bucky swatted at him half-heartedly. “Get that thing away from me.”

“You want to be symmetrical or not, soldier boy?”

Y/N giggled and turned her face back into Bob’s neck, inhaling deeply. “You still smell like coffee.”

“Because I made coffee an hour ago.”

“I love coffee.”

“You love me.”

“I do.”

Bob sighed, defeated, though there was nothing in his expression but soft, dazed affection. He leaned back, letting her cling to him like a warm, stubborn barnacle.

“You’re like a weighted blanket,” he muttered. “But emotionally terrifying.”

“Thank you,” she replied proudly.

Across the room, Ghost (Ava) snorted into her drink. “It’s like watching a golden retriever try to date a feral cat.”

“Except the cat’s ex-Red Room and could snap my spine if she wanted,” Walker said, not looking up from polishing his gun.

Y/N’s gaze lifted then, her eyes drifting to Alexei—who was, inexplicably, wearing one of his own design sketches pinned to his chest like a Girl Scout badge.

She hesitated. Then smiled. After everything… after almost killing him, after breaking down in the sand, after being held down by Bucky with a syringe while screaming her regrets—Alexei had forgiven her.

No. He’d understood her. She didn’t have to say anything to him. Not really. Because when he met her gaze, he gave her a single proud nod. Not smug. Not goofy. Just real. Like he knew how hard it had been to unlearn the Red Room. Like he saw her—his daughter—not as what she’d done but what she’d survived. And honestly he was kinda proud of her for beating him so easily. He could brag about it.

She blinked away tears and turned back into Bob’s chest, hiding her face.

“Y’know,” Alexei said suddenly, sitting up straighter, “Y/N would look amazing in one of these suits. Maybe dark red. Gold. With like... a phoenix on the back.”

“No,” Y/N groaned into Bob’s shirt. “I want a normal life. I want grocery shopping and bad TV and laundry and staying in bed.”

“You live in a flying tower with six weapons of mass destruction.”

“And I can where an expensive robe walking around it, with a sexy husband, that's as normal as I can get.”

“Please,” Alexei begged, flopping toward her on his knees. “I will make you leather gloves. Like the ones from Blade!”

“No.”

“A grappling hook arm!”

“Alexei—”

“A grappling bear!”

Yelena chucked a pillow at his face.

“Can we not push her into vigilante work while she’s literally snuggling the man she almost died for?” she said dryly.

“I’m fine,” Bob mumbled, caught between arousal, humiliation, and existential peace. “I’m... warm.”

“You look like she’s draining your soul through osmosis,” Walker muttered.

“She is,” Bob agreed. “Lovingly.”

Y/N pressed a kiss to his cheek. “I’m happy.” And she meant it.

304 notes · View notes

wbbfannnnnn13 · 22 hours ago

Text

Motion Sick // Chapter 11

A/N: had a lot of fun writing this chapter! definitely a much lighter tone than previous chapters because we're getting somewhere ;) we aren't completely angst free for the series, but considering how things have been the past few days, i just wanted to end on something hopeful.

Warnings: sexual content (like a good chunk of this chapter... i didn't mean for it to happen lol)

WC: 5.9K+

**** Chapter 11 ****

“Careful,” she murmured, low and smug. “Keep staring like that, and I’m gonna start thinking you miss me or something.”

Azzi didn’t move. Didn’t flinch. Just stood there, heart lurching forward like it recognized something before her brain had the nerve to admit it.

Because Paige was too close. Too warm. Too intentional.

That voice—low and teasing—settled right in the middle of Azzi’s spine and lit a fuse. And the worst part? She didn’t even have time to respond before Paige pulled back with that stupid little smirk on her face like she hadn’t just set fire to the whole damn room.

Azzi blinked, breath caught in her throat.

She could still feel it. The ghost of Paige’s words pressed behind her ear like a brand.

Lexi noticed. Of course she noticed.

The way Azzi’s body stiffened. The flush blooming high on her cheeks. The tilt of her head, like she didn’t know whether to lean away or fall straight into it.

Lexi slid in fast, her arm wrapping tightly around Azzi’s waist. Kissed her cheek. Too hard. Too late.

“Everything okay?” she asked, sugary-sweet and loud enough for Paige to hear.

Azzi nodded. Mechanical. “Yeah. I’m fine.”

A lie so obvious it practically begged for a fact-check.

But Lexi wasn’t letting it go.

She kept her body close, her grip a little too tight, voice a little too bubbly as she tried to act like nothing had happened. Like Paige hadn’t just walked right up and licked a match.

And Paige? She didn’t even pretend to behave.

Her hand grazed Azzi’s lower back when she passed by on the way to the bar. Just a brush—barely there—but Azzi felt it like a matchstrike across her spine. And it didn’t seem to matter that Lexi still had her arm around her, fingers idly tracing patterns on the sleeve of her jacket like she was trying to stake a claim.

Because all Azzi could focus on was that fleeting touch. And the fact that Paige didn’t even look back.

She reached for the same cup Azzi was holding, fingers brushing hers with slow, unmistakable purpose. Then, like it was the most natural thing in the world, Paige plucked the cup from her hand and turned to the bar.

"Let me get you a fresh one," she said over her shoulder, already walking away.

Azzi blinked, thrown for half a second. Lexi was still beside her, arm draped casually around her waist. But none of it seemed to register—none of it seemed to matter—because all she could do was watch Paige. The way she moved. The quiet confidence. The fact that she hadn’t even asked what Azzi was drinking.

Like she already knew.

The night had twisted itself into something awkward before Azzi even realized what was happening.

It started with Nika calling for teams. “Let’s make it interesting,” she’d said, waving a cue stick like a baton. “Losers buy the next round.”

Lexi, ever competitive, jumped in fast. “Us versus them?” she asked, nudging Azzi with her hip. “You good with that?”

Azzi nodded automatically, not realizing what that entailed until Paige sauntered up behind Nika with two drinks in hand and a smirk already forming.

“Guess that makes me your partner,” Paige said to Nika. Then, eyes flicking to Azzi, “Hope you’re ready to lose.”

And somehow—somehow—they were all playing. The four of them.

It was happening again. Just like at the bowling alley. Same shit. Different game.

Paige and Nika. Lexi and Azzi.

One cue ball. Too many unspoken rules.

Azzi tried to keep her head in the game, but Paige wasn’t making it easy.

Paige had just taken her shot—sunk a clean corner, because of course she did—and stepped back to let Lexi take hers.

Azzi was chalking her cue, eyes down, trying to ignore the heat still radiating off her skin from earlier. That whisper.

Paige sidled up next to her again, slow and smug, voice pitched for her alone.

“You always been good with your hands,” she murmured, nodding at the stick in Azzi’s grip. “But you know how good I am at lining things up...”

A beat.

Then a lazy smile.

“Especially when it comes to finding the sweet spot.”

Azzi’s fingers fumbled on the chalk.

It slipped out of her grip and hit the edge of the table with a soft clack, rolling just out of reach. Her brain stalled for a second. She stared down at it like it might give her something to focus on, anything other than the way Paige’s voice had dipped on “sweet spot.” That deliberate pause. The look that came with it.

Her whole body went hot, then cold, then hot again. Like her nervous system couldn’t decide whether to fight, freeze, or completely melt into the floor. She bent to pick up the chalk, mostly to avoid eye contact—but even that felt loaded. Too slow. Too obvious. Like her limbs didn’t belong to her.

Focus. It was just a line. A dumb, flirty, borderline dangerous line.

But it was also Paige. And Paige never played fair.

Lexi turned at the sound, watching her. Watching them. She slammed her stick on the table. “Okay, what the fuck is this?”

Paige blinked. “What’s what?”

“Why don’t you go flirt with someone else?” Lexi said, sharp. “Seriously. It’s not cute. You’re not slick—you’re just being a dick.”

Paige blinked, then straightened up like she had all the time in the world. “Aw. You worried or something?”

Lexi scoffed. “Worried? No. Embarrassed for you? Kinda.”

Paige’s smile curved, slow and lazy. Dangerous. “Or maybe you’re just scared of a little competition.”

“Scared of you?” Lexi stepped in, chin lifted. “Please. I just don’t love it when insecure girls pick fights to feel relevant.”

Azzi felt the floor tilt.

She opened her mouth to say something—anything—but before she could step between them, a voice cut through the tension like a knife.

“Well, this is awkward.”

Kathryn.

Of fucking course.

She appeared like smoke—leaning against a nearby stool with a vodka soda and a perfect view of the wreckage.

“I mean, I did say Paige was still obsessed with Azzi. But hey, I’m just here for the show.”

Azzi turned on her heel, ready to bite.

“What the fuck are you still coming around for?” she snapped. “Nobody asked for your commentary.”

Kathryn raised her glass. “Touched a nerve?”

“No, you’re just a parasite,” Azzi seethed. “You only show up when something’s bleeding.”

Paige moved behind her, hand brushing the small of her back like a warning. But Azzi shook her off—too far gone, already closing the space between her and Kathryn.

“Say it again. Say something else. I dare you.”

Kathryn didn’t flinch. “Careful, Fudd. Don’t want people to see how quickly you’re willing to fight for a taste of your best friend.”

Azzi didn’t even realize she’d lunged until Nika’s arms were around her, dragging her back.

“Absolutely not,” Nika snapped. “Both of you—go now.”

“Gladly,” Paige muttered under her breath, grabbing Azzi’s wrist and tugging her down the hall.

****

They crashed through the bathroom door and just stood there. Breathing. Fuming.

The second the door clicked shut, the tension cracked wide open.

Azzi didn’t wait. She backed Paige into the counter, fingers already curling into the hem of her shirt.

“Tell me to stop,” she breathed.

Paige didn’t say a word.

So Azzi kissed her—hard. Like she’d been waiting months to.

Their mouths collided in a tangle of heat and months of not-enough. Paige’s fingers were in Azzi’s hair, tugging, anchoring, needy.

Azzi dropped her hands, dragging them over Paige’s waist, slipping under the fabric of her top to find skin, warmth, want.

Paige groaned, bucking forward, grinding against her with a sound that hit Azzi square in the chest.

Azzi kissed down her jaw, slow and hungry, until she reached the curve of her throat. She lingered there, breathing her in, then sank her teeth in—gentle at first, then harder. Just enough to sting. Just enough to bruise.

She wanted it to show. Wanted Paige marked. Claimed. Hers.

Paige gasped, head tipping back with a soft, broken sound that did something dangerous to Azzi’s self-control.

She was panting now, chest rising fast, lips parted like she couldn’t catch her breath. Her hands fumbled at the hem of her shirt, trembling slightly as she helped Azzi shove it over her head and toss it aside.

There was nothing tentative anymore. Just heat. Want. History. And all the things they’d never said, suddenly right there between them—louder than words.

Azzi kissed her again, harder this time, pinning her against the counter as she rocked into her.

Then she reached down.

Found Paige’s hand.

Laced their fingers together for a moment—and then guided it down, slow and certain, pressing it between her own legs with a soft gasp.

She was soaked through her underwear, hips already rolling into the contact without thinking.

“Right there,” she breathed, voice cracking with need. “Feel that? That’s for you.”

Her thumb brushed against the seam of Azzi’s jeans, teasing pressure through the denim.

Azzi’s head dropped against her shoulder, a helpless sound slipping from her throat.

Paige kissed the side of her neck, lips dragging up to her ear. “You know I love it when you beg.”

And just when Azzi’s body arched into her—right when she was sure Paige was about to touch her, really touch her— Paige stilled.

Her breath hitched. Hands pulled back.

She stepped away like she couldn’t trust herself another second.

“Shit,” Paige said, barely audible. “I can’t.”

Azzi’s eyes flew open.

Her body was still burning, still open, still aching from the way Paige had touched her like she meant every second of it. Her breath caught somewhere between confusion and panic.

“What?” she whispered, voice raw.

Paige had already pulled away, putting space between them like it might undo what just happened. She was pacing now—both hands in her hair, eyes wild, chest heaving like she couldn’t breathe past the guilt choking her.

“I want to,” she said, more to the floor than to Azzi. “God, Azzi, I do. But I can’t. Not like this.”

Azzi just stared. Skin flushed. Shirt half-on. Heart in freefall.

Paige

Her voice caught. She could still taste her. Still feel the way Azzi had guided her hand, the way her body had opened up, the way it felt like time stopped for a second.

And maybe that was the problem.

Maybe it would’ve been too easy to fall into that moment. To forget the rest of it. To lose herself in something that would’ve felt perfect for five minutes—and wrecked them both for weeks.

Her body was still lit up like a fuse, but her mind was louder.

Because she knew Azzi. Knew her heart. Knew how this would play out.

Azzi would feel guilty. She’d wake up tomorrow with that tight ache in her chest, the one that made her question everything. She’d overthink it, pull back, call it a lapse in judgment. Just heat. Just history. Just a moment they weren’t ready for.

And Paige would become a step backward. A detour. Something they’d have to untangle all over again. Paige had already lived that version of their story too many times.

She couldn’t do it again.

She didn’t want to be a moment. She wanted the whole thing. Azzi’s hand in hers in public. Azzi choosing her, out loud. Azzi saying yes without conditions or disclaimers or backup plans.

Paige looked up at her and almost said it. The truth. The real thing.

That she still loved her. That she never stopped. That every girl since had been a cheap imitation of what they had. That it hadn’t been about the sex—wasn’t about the sex—it was about the way Azzi made her feel like maybe love didn’t have to be scary if it looked like this.

But the words got stuck.

She opened her mouth, and they caught in her throat. Too big. Too raw. And Azzi was still watching her like she didn’t understand what just happened, like she was trying to read between lines that Paige hadn’t spoken yet.

So Paige tried again.

“I just…” she started, voice barely audible. “I need it to be different this time.”

She glanced at Azzi’s hand—still curled slightly where Paige had held it, guided it. Her fingers flexed.

Say it, Paige told herself. Say you want to wake up next to her. Say you want to be hers, really hers. Say you want the hard conversations, the quiet mornings, the grocery store Saturdays, the everything.

She stepped forward, brushing a strand of hair out of Azzi’s face. Her fingers lingered longer than they should’ve.

“I’m not saying no,” she whispered. “I’m just saying…” Her voice cracked. “Not like this.”

Azzi’s lips parted. Her eyes softened, just a little. Paige felt herself tip toward her again—on the edge of falling completely.

Now, her heart whispered. Say it now.

“I want—” Paige started.

But the door burst open.

“Azzi?”

Lexi.

The door cracked open fast—then paused like whoever was behind it wasn’t sure they were allowed in.

A beat later, she stepped inside. Her face was flushed—not with anger, but something closer to embarrassment. Her hands were shoved into her pockets, and she hovered near the door like she might leave again if no one said anything.

“Sorry,” she muttered, glancing between them. “I’m not—I didn’t mean to barge in or whatever.”

Neither of them said anything.

Lexi cleared her throat.

“I just… wanted to say sorry. For earlier. To both of you.”

She looked at Paige for half a second—long enough to register it, but not long enough to feel threatening. Then her eyes flicked back to Azzi.

“I shouldn’t have tried to make it a thing. The jokes, the shots—it got in my head. I overreacted. I think I just… got a little insecure. Which is on me.”

Azzi’s posture shifted, almost instinctively. The tension in her shoulders eased just slightly.

Paige just blinked.

The apology was… unexpected. Honest, even. There was something kind of disarming about how Lexi said it—not defensive, not trying to earn points. Just simple and human and maybe a little scared.

Paige felt the tiniest pang of guilt.

But not much.

Because the truth sat steady in her chest like it had always been there.

Azzi was hers.

Not officially. Not publicly. Not yet. But still—hers.

Lexi might’ve gotten the late nights. The flirty laughs. The version of Azzi still learning how to take up space in a new kind of way—brave, but unsure.

But Paige? Paige got the real thing.

They’d grown up together. Through injuries and pressure and too many headlines that never asked how either of them was actually doing. They knew each other in a way stats and scouting reports couldn’t touch.

Azzi had always shown up for her, even when she was barely holding herself together. And Paige had done the same—quietly, fiercely. With bracelets and check-ins and late-night texts that never made it into the group chat.

This wasn’t just heat. It wasn’t some unresolved tension.

It was years. It was them. And Paige didn’t want to lose that just because the timing was off.

So she just nodded.

“It’s okay,” Paige said, voice low. “Thanks for saying that.”

Lexi gave her a small, tired smile. Then looked back to Azzi.

“I’ll be outside,” she said gently. “Whenever you’re ready.”

She slipped back out just as quietly as she’d come.

The door clicked shut behind Lexi, leaving only the quiet and the weight of everything they didn’t say.

Paige didn’t move. She couldn’t.

Her heart was still thudding like a warning. Her body still buzzed with want and regret and some tangled feeling in between. But more than anything, she just felt tired.

Not physically. Emotionally. Like her heart had been running a marathon and finally hit mile twenty and realized there were still six more to go.

Azzi was looking at her.

Not angry. Not apologetic. Just… open. Bare, in a way Paige had only ever seen a handful of times. It made her chest ache.

Paige shifted on her feet, thumb rubbing the inside of her palm—something she always did when she was trying to find the right words and couldn’t.

She could’ve said a million things in that moment. Could’ve blurted out I love you, or I’m still yours, or please don’t go back to her. But none of those things felt fair. None of them felt complete.

So instead, she said the only thing that made sense.

“Maybe we should talk. Later.”

Azzi blinked. “Yeah?”

Paige nodded, voice quieter now. “I mean like… really talk. When we’re not in a bar bathroom. When we’re not… tipsy and pissed off and tangled up in everything.”

Azzi didn’t respond right away. But she didn’t pull away either. She just stood there, watching her, like she was letting the words settle.

Then she gave the smallest nod. “Okay. Yeah. That sounds… good.”

Paige let out a slow breath she didn’t realize she’d been holding.

It wasn’t closure. It wasn’t clarity. But it was something. A door that hadn’t closed yet. A maybe.

Then she turned, slowly, and slipped out of the bathroom.

And Paige stayed there, leaning back against the counter, hands in her pockets, the buzz of the music creeping back under the door like the real world trying to catch up.

She wasn’t sure what had just happened. She only knew what hadn’t. And maybe—for once—that was the right call.

Azzi

She hadn’t recovered.

Not from the bathroom. Not from Paige’s mouth on hers. Not from the hand she’d pulled back.

It had been hours, technically—time enough for things to return to normal. Time enough for the music to fade, for Lexi to loop back around with an awkward apology and a half-hearted kiss on the cheek, for the walk back to campus to feel like silence stretched too thin.

But Azzi still felt like her skin was buzzing.

Not just from Paige.

From everything.

From the tension still coiled in her chest. From the way her fists had clenched in that bathroom, not sure whether to pull Paige closer or go find Kathryn and finally do what her body had been begging her to do since her true intentions were revealed—knock her out.

God, she still wanted to kick Kathryn’s ass.

Not just for what she said, but how she said it—like she knew she could get under Azzi’s skin. Like she’d been waiting for a moment to throw a grenade and smile through the explosion. Azzi had wanted to lunge. She could still feel the phantom pull in her muscles, the way her body had surged forward before Nika stepped in.

And now she was back in bed, barely breathing, vibrating with anger and ache and the unbearable echo of Paige’s mouth on hers.

Like her body hadn’t figured out they’d stopped.

And maybe worse than that—she still wasn’t sure she wanted them to.

Because yeah, Paige had said all the right things. She had pulled back, been mature, tried to do the noble thing. And Azzi wasn’t mad. She wasn’t.

She got it.

Paige didn’t want to be a secret again. Didn’t want to be the guilt she carried like a backpack she couldn’t set down. She wanted to be chosen.

But God—she hadn’t been this turned on since before they called it quits. Before the boundaries. Before the late-night promises to “stay friends” and “take space” and “figure things out.”

Back when touching each other didn’t come with consequences.

Which sounded good in theory. Until Paige was kissing her in a bar bathroom and Azzi was forgetting her own name.

Here she was, lying flat on her back in the dark, Lexi long gone after a quiet “You good?” and a quick kiss on the forehead.

Azzi hadn’t answered. Just nodded and mumbled something that sounded enough like “yeah” to pass.

But she wasn’t good. Not even close.

She was still tasting her lips. Still aching from how close they’d gotten—how close she’d gotten.

Her body hadn’t come down from it.

And now the room was too quiet, her sheets too warm, her thoughts too loud.

She hadn’t touched herself in months. Not like this. Not with intention.

But tonight, after everything—after the bathroom and the kiss and the almost—her body wouldn’t let it go.

Her legs shifted beneath the covers, restless. Her fingers curled into the sheets, then slipped down.

At first, it was just curiosity. Muscle memory. An ache too loud to ignore.

But the second she grazed herself—just barely, over the cotton waistband of her pajama shorts—her whole body stuttered. A soft, involuntary gasp escaped her lips.

She was wet. Dripping, honestly.

For Paige.

Paige in the bathroom. Paige’s voice in her ear, whispering things Azzi hadn’t let herself imagine in months. Her hand on Paige’s, guiding it down, pressing it right where she needed it most—then pulling away like it broke her to do it.

God, it was embarrassing how ready she still was.

And then the memory hit her. Not just a flash, but a full return. Like a second heartbeat.

The first time she ever touched herself.

She’d been lying in bed then too, home for a few days for Christmas break. Away from Paige for the first time in months. One knee bent, her phone pressed to her cheek. The room had been dark, just like now.

And Paige’s voice had been in her ear.

It started as teasing—flirty, casual, Paige being Paige. Something about a dream she’d had, something about Azzi’s mouth.

Azzi had been quiet. Flustered. Nervous, maybe.

Paige had asked, low and unfiltered: “Have you ever touched yourself while thinking about me?”

Azzi had choked on her own breath. “What?”

Paige had laughed, soft and warm and amused. “That’s a yes.”

Azzi had groaned into the receiver, hiding her face even though no one could see her. “Shut up.”

“I’m just saying,” Paige teased. “That was a very guilty silence.”

Azzi rolled onto her back, heart already racing for reasons she didn’t fully understand. “I don’t know. I mean, I’ve thought about it. I’ve… started. But I wouldn’t even know what I’m doing.”

There was a pause on the line. Not uncomfortable—just heavy. Charged.

Then Paige’s voice came through, lower now. Calmer. “Have you ever touched yourself at all?”

Azzi hesitated, breath catching. “Not really,” she admitted. “Not like… all the way. I kind of don’t know where to start.”

Paige didn’t laugh this time. She didn’t make it weird or clinical or even overly sexy. She just got quiet. And then, after a beat:

“Can I help you?”

Azzi froze. Her fingers tightened around her phone.

“You mean, like—right now?”

“I mean if you want me to,” Paige said. Her voice had dropped again, softer now. More serious. “You don’t have to. I just thought… you sounded kind of curious.”

Azzi blinked up at the ceiling, heart thudding. “I am.”

“Okay,” Paige murmured. “Then let’s figure it out together.”

Now, lying alone in her bed, Azzi mimicked the way Paige had talked her through it that night.

“Start slow,” Paige had murmured, her voice warm and close, like she was lying right next to her. “Over your underwear first. Just enough to feel the pressure.”

Azzi’s fingers followed the memory. She pressed down gently through the soft cotton, right over the aching heat between her legs, her breath hitching at the contact. Even through the fabric, it made her pulse jump. Her hips lifted slightly—like her body was reaching for more before her mind had time to catch up.

“Don’t rush,” Paige had said, low and steady. “Just breathe. Let it build. You’re not trying to win anything—just feel.”

That night, her hands had been shaky. She’d been so nervous. One part of her terrified of doing it wrong, the other half terrified of how right it already felt. She hadn’t known what she was doing. But Paige had. Paige had known exactly how to speak to her, how to coax her through it.

“Circle your hips,” Paige had whispered. “Slow. Like you’re dancing, but just for me.”

Azzi let out a quiet whimper into her pillow now, mirroring that same movement, rolling her hips into her hand as the pressure built. The friction made her gasp—pleasure buzzing up her spine, low and pulsing and real.

Her fingers slipped lower, beneath her waistband, then past the lace of her underwear—finally, bare skin to bare skin. She wasn’t prepared for how wet she already was.

Soaked.

Paige’s voice echoed again, thick with want: “You feel that?” “That’s mine.”

Azzi groaned. Her fingers found her clit and pressed down with aching slowness, hips jerking at the jolt of pleasure that shot through her.

Her free hand clutched the blanket above her head, fisting the fabric to stay grounded.

She could see Paige in her mind. On her knees between Azzi’s thighs, eyes dark, cheeks flushed, smirking like she knew exactly how to ruin her.

“You’re so fucking pretty like this,” Paige would say, voice wrecked. “Bet I could make you fall apart just with my mouth.” “Bet you’d let me keep you like this all night—just begging.” “Come on, Az. Let go for me.”

Azzi moaned again—louder this time, not caring. Her fingers were moving faster now, sliding through slick heat, circling, pressing, her whole body straining toward release.

Every nerve in her body was screaming. Her jaw clenched. Her back arched. Her legs trembled.

She was close—so close it made her dizzy.

And in her mind, Paige was watching her. Kneeling over her. Eyes dark, steady. That little half-smile that always made Azzi feel seen and wanted all at once—like she’d been waiting for this, for her.

“Come on, baby,” Paige whispered in her head, low and coaxing. “I know you can.”

Azzi’s breath hitched.

Because even in her imagination, Paige wasn’t just touching her—she was rooting for her. And somehow, that undid her more than anything else.

Her hips bucked, breath caught in her throat—

And then she came.

Hard.

“Paige—” It tore out of her in a broken gasp, raw and breathless and involuntary.

Her thighs clenched around her hand as the climax hit, hard and fast. Her fingers kept moving through it, chasing every last bit of it as wave after wave surged through her—sharp and full and overwhelming. Her whole body trembled, coming apart in the dark, the sheets twisted under her, her heart pounding like it was trying to say something she couldn’t.

And even after the last shudder passed, she lay there with Paige’s name still hanging in the air—soft and sacred and impossible to take back.

The air was warm. Her heartbeat loud. Her skin still buzzing.

And for a moment, the world went still.

She lay there, chest rising and falling, the sheets twisted beneath her, one arm flung over her face.

Her body felt hollow and full all at once. Her heart was still pounding.

And she didn’t feel guilty.

Not even a little.

Because Paige had always made her feel safe in her skin.

Even now. Even in the ache of it. Even in the silence after.

She let out a slow breath.

We really need to talk, she thought.

Then, softer:

I think I’m ready.

Paige

The dining hall was louder than usual for a Saturday morning. Everyone was crammed into two long tables, still half in sweats and messy buns, laughing too hard at nothing. Pancakes, bacon, a suspicious-looking fruit bowl. Caroline was already on her second cup of coffee and trying to convince Nika that she’d seen their assistant coach on a dating app.

Paige sat near the middle, half-listening, chin in hand, staring at the entrance more than she cared to admit.

Azzi wasn’t here yet. Which—fine. No one was exactly clocked in for roll call. But Azzi was always early. Always there before her tray hit the table. Always the one who saved her a seat even when they weren’t speaking.

And today? Nothing.

Paige stabbed at her eggs and tried not to read into it.

Maybe she was sleeping in. Maybe she was with Lexi. Maybe she was avoiding her.

Paige had barely slept. Her body was still tight with everything that didn’t happen last night. Her mind had been running loops since they split apart—what she could’ve said, what she almost said, what Azzi might’ve said if Lexi hadn’t interrupted.

And then came Caroline.

Paige didn’t even notice her until her chair scraped loudly across the floor and she flopped down beside her with the subtlety of a marching band.

Caroline plopped her smoothie onto the table, took one long sip, and gave Paige a look.

Not a casual look. A look look. Smug. Knowing. Too pleased for 9:30 in the morning.

Paige side-eyed her. “What?”

“Nothing,” Caroline said, clearly lying. “Just… how was the rest of your night?”

Paige blinked. “Fine?”

Caroline nodded. Sipped. Waited.

Paige narrowed her eyes. “Why are you being weird?”

Caroline shrugged. “No reason. Just… interesting how the world works. One day I’m telling you to ‘go get your girl,’ and the next…”

Paige tilted her head. “And the next what?”

Caroline leaned in, lowering her voice dramatically. “I’m walking past Azzi’s room and I hear your name, clear as day, being moaned like someone just hit the winning buzzer.”

Paige choked on air.

“I—what?” she said again, completely blank now. “She—what?”

Caroline just shrugged. “Thin walls, Bueckers. You should know that by now.”

“You—heard—she—” Paige couldn’t even finish the sentence. Her brain glitched somewhere between moaned and your name.

Caroline raised her eyebrows like she was enjoying a front-row seat to the most entertaining internal meltdown of the year.

“Oh yeah,” she said breezily. “Real breathy. A little desperate. Like, if I didn’t know better, I’d have knocked to offer her a glass of water.”

Paige’s whole face went hot. Like full body blush hot. She felt it crawl up her neck, behind her ears, all the way into her scalp.

She didn’t even know what to do with that information.

Paige covered her face with both hands. “Oh my God.”

Caroline sipped her smoothie like it was tea. “Guess you got your girl after all.”

“I didn’t get anything,” Paige muttered through her palms.

Caroline just grinned. “Could’ve fooled the building.”

Before Paige could fire back—or die on the spot, whichever came first—a shadow fell across their table.

Azzi.

Tray in hand, ponytail up, oversized UConn hoodie hanging off one shoulder. Her expression was unreadable—but her eyes flicked immediately to Paige like she knew.

Like she felt it. The timing. The tension. The heat Paige was suddenly radiating like a furnace in January.

“Morning,” Azzi said, calm, unbothered. Cool as hell.

She sat down across from Paige like nothing was happening. Like Caroline hadn’t just dropped an emotional nuke and walked away.

Paige blinked at her. Her blush flared back up so fast it could’ve powered a small city.

“H—hey.”

Caroline scooted three seats down, all exaggerated sighs and self-sacrificing best friend energy—like she was the quirky side character in a rom-com giving the leads their Big Moment.

She raised her smoothie like a toast and shot Paige a look. “Have fun,” she mouthed, all too pleased with herself.

Paige looked back at Azzi.

Azzi looked… fine.

Suspiciously fine. And that made it so much worse.

Because Paige’s brain was now hosting a full-volume loop of Paige. Moaned. In bed. Last night.

She stabbed at her eggs and tried not to explode.

****

It was almost midnight.

The kind of midnight that hummed with leftover adrenaline and unspoken things. The kind of midnight where even the hallway lights felt dimmer and the blanket around her shoulders suddenly wasn’t cutting it.

She was lying in bed, phone balanced on her stomach, thumb hovering over the screen like it had something important to say but no real plan for saying it.

They hadn’t talked—not really. Not after breakfast. Not after the world’s most awkwardly hot non-conversation. Not after Paige spent the rest of the day pretending she wasn’t rewatching the movie reel of Azzi licking syrup off her thumb like it was a personal attack.

She sighed. Deep. Dramatic. Practically audible.

She’d told herself she was being mature, or whatever. Waiting until they could have a real, honest conversation.

But here she was. Still thinking about the bathroom. About Azzi’s hand guiding hers. About that gasp.

About her name echoing through the dorm walls, apparently, because Caroline had no boundaries and the memory had been haunting Paige all day like a ghost with perfect cheekbones.

And somewhere in all that chaos, her fingers kept drifting to the bracelet. The one Azzi made her. Threaded with the word purpose like it meant something—like she meant something.

So. Maybe space was overrated.

She opened her texts.

Paige: hey, I meant it when I said I wanted to talk, like really talk soon. maybe tomorrow if you're up for it?

She hit send, stomach already tying itself into a thousand polite knots. Immediately regretted every word. Immediately wanted to throw her phone into the nearest body of water.

A minute passed. Then two.

She sat up in bed, re-read the text like maybe it had auto-corrected into something horrible. Did “I want to talk” secretly translate to “I’m in love with you and spiraling hourly”? Because it felt like it did.

Still nothing.

She flopped back down and stared at the ceiling, heart jackhammering. Cool. Cool cool cool. This was fine. She’d just bared her emotionally fragile little soul like a casual Wednesday night check-in. No big deal.

She should leave it there. Let that be the responsible, non-chaotic version of herself. The one who didn’t follow up vulnerable texts with… whatever this next impulse was.

But she didn’t.

Because she was Paige. And when it came to Azzi, “responsible” had never really been her thing.

Paige (again): also… this might be entirely out of line, but Caroline told me something earlier and I haven’t stopped thinking about it all day

Okay. There was still time to backspace. Still time to pretend she was talking about literally anything else. Something casual. Something sane.

She did not.

Paige (third text): she said she heard you last night moaning my name??

Her thumb hovered for maybe half a second.

Then: screw it. Sent.

And then, just to double down—because for once, she wasn’t going to overthink it. She was in it now, heart first, no helmet, full send.

Paige (fourth text): if you're gonna scream my name at least give me the chance to earn it next time

She hit send. Threw her phone onto the pillow beside her like it was on fire.

Her heart was pounding. Her face was burning. Her brain was chanting WHY DID YOU DO THAT in all caps.

But underneath it all, if she was being honest? She hoped Azzi laughed. Hoped she blushed. Hoped she remembered everything.

Hoped she hadn’t stopped thinking about her, not even for a second.

The phone buzzed back almost instantly.

#pazzi fics #pazzi #paige x azzi #paige bueckers #azzi fudd #paige and azzi #paige bueckers x azzi fudd

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slockblue · 1 day ago

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Sometimes I feel like Harry Potter monopolised its demographic and genre. Now that the Author is widely understood to be extremely nasty I feel although people have gotten stuck in a trap, where their anger at the horrible politics of the author have caused people to be lash out at people not reading other books - Even if they were hard to find at the time and even now (some google search deterioration anyone?). Giving JK money is destructive, yes, but lets be constructive. Well. I’d rather be, doing something constructive is much more fun.

Jk is nasty. Rubbish, chuck it out. Yes. Now. There’s some amazing overlooked stories out there! How awesome is that? Lets pay attention to some of these, because there is a lot of joy and whimsy in stories that you may not have touched, so lets let these stories breathe to their own merit instead of prop up some fetid scarecrow of transphobia… There are things that deserve way more attention. Since we have some wonderful book selections provided already lets keep that ball rolling. Let me give you a wonderful recommendation from my expertise: comics!

Want a great comic about an english boarding school with magic, heartfelt characters, and politcal intrigue? Well you asked the right nerd. So let me reccomend Gunnerkrigg Court - by Tom Siddel... Wait! Did I mention its also free?

Gunnerkrigg court is a magnificent comic. It is one of my top 5 of all time, but maybe I’m biased.

The story takes place in a Liverpool based fantasy world, with the race of industrial man on one side of the gorge, magical nature on the other, and the supernatural tugging at every corner. A thin bridge connects the two. Our main character walks up to her new steel fortress of a boarding school, pauses, then notes a fake shadow has attached itself to her. A supernatural creature. This doesn’t urk her. Its a wonderful opening. The lead is an outskirt character, she is cold, methodical, and completely unphased by the occult when others faint at the sight. She is a wonderful protagonist who wades through this rich world of factories, magic, monsters, and ghosts with a non judgmental lense.

The world itself is vivid, based of the authors childhood in Liverpool with its claustrophobic industrial pipes, Polish immigrants (one character only speaks Polish), and cluttered skyline. You could feel the care and warmth and care he brings to all of his locations, breathing life into what would otherwise be a harsh industrial wasteland.

Also tonnes of queer characters and a magic system that deals with gender? What a bonus!

The art work starts off a little rougher, but honestly it still has its charms right at the beginning. So don’t let that deter you. In my opinion it still perfectly expresses the scene even at its roughest.

Gunnerkrigg court is a fantastic comic. For anyone looking to pick up a heartfelt fantasy story where the characters grow up alongside the volumes, this is my suggestion. Below is the archive by Tom Siddel to read it for free.

I could talk more about this comic, but I’ll cut it short. There are plenty of comics and books that have been overshadowed by harry potter. And most of them don’t try and kneecap trans people going about there day. So if you’re looking for readings that don’t support that, good on ya’. Hopefully, this is a good recomendation.

Cheers fuck-ios, out. 🏳️‍⚧️

"the best way to screw jkr over is by making her characters queer!" actually. The best way to screw jkr over is to stop engaging with the property she still profits off of and read a different fucking book

#gunnerkrigg court #anti jkr

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quarterlifekitty · 9 hours ago

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going to the carnival with soap like “if you get me that giant cow i will blow you on the ferris wheel”

What you’re doing at the carnival

Soap is winning every stuffed animal you so much as glance at. It is ritual at this point. Because he knows filling up the car with new friends is the best way to encourage you to get sweet on him, it turns you all cuddly and affectionate for the rest of the evening, clinging to his arm as you walk, and of course, palming his bulge on every ride that allows it.

Carnival night is Gaz’s night to be bad. He will be visiting every single food stall and getting two of everything. You guys share an ungodly amount of fried food and spend the next day nursing tummy aches. But it’s so worth it, and you still discuss all the things you’re going to try next year.

I’m going to tell you a story. Once, when you went to a carnival, Ghost accidentally won a goldfish for you. He was aiming for a different prize, but they didn’t offer exchanges so he was left awkwardly holding a bag with a sad little fish in it. So you left almost immediately— you didn’t want to jostle it around in a bag all night. So you went to a pet shop. Got a 50 gallon tank, gravel, live plants, filters and bubblers, flake food, bloodworms, and methalyne blue, cleaner snails. Ended up spending like 300 quid and 5 hours setting up this luxurious tank for this single, tiny goldfish. You went back to the carnival the following night and got another on your way out, because you thought it was cruel to have just one. He won it first try.

Price doesn’t care much for a lot of carnival offerings, but he’s happy to just accompany you. What he does like is if they have rowboat or swan boat rentals— taking you out into the middle of the lake on a cool evening with the lights and excitement in the background while he coos at you and kisses you senseless away from prying eyes.

Nikolai loves an occasion to dress you, and this is perfect. A new dress with sleeves off the shoulders. Ribbon in your hair. Takes you to the face painter so you have cute little kitty whiskers and stripes. Wins you a few cheap little rings, full of colorful glass stones. Carves the sight of you smiling on the merry-go-round deep into his mind and heart. Pays the Ferris wheel attendant so you’ll be stuck at the top for half an hour. He feeds you cotton candy by pinching bits off with his fingers, having you suck the sugar clean off of them. Loves kissing you and tasting your stained, sweetened tongue.

#cod fanfic #writing #cod #john soap mactavish #simon ghost riley #john price #john soap mactavish x reader #simon ghost riley x reader #john price x reader #kyle gaz garrick x reader #kyle gaz garrick #gaz x reader #soap x reader #ghost x reader

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angelx · 22 hours ago

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Get Even - Chapter 1

word count: 1.8 K

cw: frat prez!katsuki x fem art sudent!reader, college AU, frat culture, alcohol consumption, suggestive dialogue, reader panic response, katsuki being petty, foreshadowed angst, strong language/frat boy profanity, Mentions of drink spiking awareness (reader expresses fear of being drugged, no actual drugging occurs), this fic will have multiple chapters!

You didn’t wake up this morning planning to go to a frat party.

You woke up planning to cry over your art history paper and maybe eat a bowl of cereal straight from the box. But fate—or more specifically, your extroverted menace of a best friend—had other plans.

“YOU’RE COMING WITH ME,” she said, barging into your dorm room like the Kool-Aid Man with lashes. “No, I’m not,” you said, barely looking up from your sketchpad. “Yes, you are. Sigma Vex is throwing the party of the semester tonight and I scored us an invite.”“I don’t even know what that means,” you replied. “Is that a frat or a metal band?”

That’s when she hit you with the kicker: “Sigma Vex. As in, the frat. The one run by Katsuki Bakugou.”

You blinked. “The scary blond guy from the engineering major?”

“The hot scary blond guy. Yeah.”

She dangled the invite in front of your face like it was a golden ticket to Wonka’s chocolate factory. Only in this case, the factory was filled with alcohol, sweat, questionable decision-making, and people with abs.

So naturally, you said no. Then she hit you with the guilt trip combo pack: —You never go out. —You’re gonna die single in a cardigan. —You owe her for the time she covered for you when you ghosted class. —And “just come for an hour. You don’t even have to talk to anyone. You can wear black and stand in a corner like a sexy funeral ghost.”

And so now—it’s 8:27PM.

You’re standing in front of your mirror, wearing a bodycon dress that you already regret. Ribbed modal fabric. Soft as sin. Hugs your body like it has a vendetta. Not scandalous—nothing’s spilling out—but you’re not exactly blending in with the wallpaper either.

You pull at the hem. Tug at the neckline. Rethink every decision that led to this moment.

Your stomach is a war zone. You feel like you’re about to be thrown into an arena where hot, drunk gladiators flex for sport and girls get called “shawty” without warning.

Your friend, meanwhile, is in your room with her hair in curlers and a glitter highlighter in one hand. “It’s gonna be fine,” she says. “Sigma Vex isn’t like the creepy frats. They don’t even allow hard drugs. The president’s a total control freak. It’s practically a regulated orgy.”

You nearly drop your eyeliner. “I beg your what?”

She grins. “He has rules. The party ends exactly at 2AM. Pledges clean after. I swear he probably makes them mop in rows. But the house is hot, the guys are hotter, and the drinks are strong.”

You don’t trust this. Or her. But you go.

Because you’re tired of saying no. Tired of playing safe. Tired of wondering what it’s like to be the main character in someone’s story instead of the silent background artist in your own.

So you step into the Uber. Adjust your dress for the tenth time. Take a deep breath.

You’ll just hide in a corner. You’ll sip something fake and sugary. Watch your friend flirt. Go home in an hour. No one’s even going to notice you. At 10:32PM, you walk into the Sigma Vex house, and the party has just begun

The Sigma Vex house doesn’t smell like weed and piss like the other frats.

It smells like cedarwood, expensive cologne, and testosterone. The hallway lights are warm and moody, the alcohol’s not watered down, and the bass is so clean it feels like it’s massaging your organs. Everything is too coordinated. Too put together.

The house hums like a hive. Controlled chaos. All neon lighting, heavy bass, and clean floors that should absolutely not be this clean for a frat house. No drugs, no vomit-stained rugs, no weird stains on the couch (well… not until later). Pledges clean with military precision, and the house parties? Legendary.

This is a party run by a man with a schedule. A mission. A code of conduct.

You’re not supposed to be here. You're very sure of that.

Now, standing here in the corner of the living room clutching a soda in a death grip, you’re watching chaos unfold with terrifying precision. Shirtless guys shouting over pong. Music blasting. People dancing in the dark like they’re in a music video. And not a single illegal substance in sight.

You hug the red Solo cup tighter in your hands—not because you plan to drink it, but because it gives you something to hold. Something to do while you stand awkwardly in the corner of the Sigma Vex living room.

The music is loud. You can feel the bass in your chest like your ribs are its personal drum set. The lights are dim and tinted gold-red, bouncing off bottles and glitter eyeshadow. It smells like sweat, spilt vodka, and expensive cologne that’s fighting for its life.

People are dancing in the middle of the room—no, grinding. Writhing. Some are already pressed so close you wonder if their zippers are about to declare war. There’s a girl literally straddling a guy’s thigh to the beat of a Drake remix. Someone in the kitchen yells “CHUG!” followed by a violent round of coughing and cheering.

You see a game of beer pong in the back. Someone’s making out on the damn couch. Like heavy. His hand’s already under her top and nobody around them cares.

You feel… Like a deer in a frat-lit headlights. Like you accidentally walked into the wrong simulation.

Just you, standing awkwardly in a dress that hugs a little too tightly in all the right places, abandoned by your friend who disappeared somewhere upstairs to swap spit with a tall dude in a backwards cap who looks like he says “bro” unironically, who called her “shortcake” three minutes into meeting her.

You're alone, and you're ready to leave. And then—you feel it.

That static prickle across your skin like the air shifted. Like someone just flipped the tension dial in the atmosphere to oh no.

You glance up—and that’s when you see him.

Blond. Piercing, scarlet eyes. Broad-shouldered. Wearing a black fitted Sigma Vex shirt like it was custom-sewn to worship his muscles. He’s walking through the crowd like a lion who knows the other animals will move.

Katsuki Bakugou.

The legend. Sigma Vexes frat president. The reason half the campus has a gym membership they don’t use.

You’ve seen him before—at a distance, walking out of the engineering building like he owned the sidewalk—but you’ve never been this close. And now he’s looking at you. Like really looking. Your brain short circuits.

He steps up, casual like he wasn’t just stomping through the house like a general five seconds ago. Hands in his pockets. Piercing eyes trailing over your dress like a scan. Not lewd—calculating. Intrigued.

And then, that voice—low, scratchy, voice smooth like gravel and whiskey, way-too-good-for-this-world voice—slips out of his mouth like it’s got intentions:

“Didn’t think I’d see a pretty little thing like you at one of our parties.”

You swear your soda fizzes louder.

“Um,” you say. Your voice is already doing The Thing—that high-pitched, I-don’t-know-how-to-talk-to-hot-people thing. “Thanks?”

He smirks. “First time here?”

You nod, then stop, then try to explain. “Y-yeah. My friend dragged me. I wasn’t… planning to stay.”

His eyes flick toward the dance floor, like he’s clocking the friend you clearly came with. “Lemme guess. Ditched you?”

You blink. “How’d you—”

“You’ve been standin’ here for fifteen minutes,” he says. “Lookin’ like you’re tryin’ to mentally disassociate from the dubstep remix of ‘Seven Nation Army.’”

You let out a panicked laugh, because—he’s right. You are.

And now Katsuki Bakugou is standing way too close. Not crowding, but definitely not respecting standard “hot stranger” protocol. He leans just a bit toward you, glancing at your sad soda. His grin goes sideways. Ferally amused.

“Lemme get you a real drink,” he offers. “Don’t worry—I’ll pour it myself.”

Your heartbeat jumps. Not because it’s romantic. But because alarm bells go off. Every girl-in-college instinct yells: Stranger! Danger! Drink! Frat house! BAD!

You freeze. “Oh—no, thank you. I’m… good. This is fine.”

You gesture awkwardly to your soda like it’s an award-winning vintage instead of whatever off-brand cola someone handed you when you arrived.

He raises a brow. Just one. “You think I’m tryin’ to drug you?”

You panic. “N-NO! Not like that—I just—I mean I don’t know you and—uh—I’m sorry—”

He chuckles. It’s a low, rough sound, like gravel being dragged across velvet.

“You’re cute when you stammer.”

You squeak. Then—his tone dips, smooth and syrupy, casual but too sharp to be an accident. “Wanna go somewhere quieter? You look like you’re gonna combust if the bass drops again. We can go upstairs.”

Your eyes widen. He doesn’t touch you. Just watches. Calm. Patient. Too patient. Like he knows what he’s doing.

You swallow. The walls are closing in. The lights are too hot. His face is too much. “I-I actually… have a thing tomorrow. Early. So. I’m just—gonna go. Sorry.”

And then. You bolt. Turn and walk away.

Like a coward.

Like you just rejected Katsuki Bakugou.

You don’t look back. But Katsuki stands there, still. Jaw tight. Pledges laughing too close to his ear like they’ve just seen their invincible warlord get pantsed by a kitten.

“Yo—did you see that?” “She rejected him?” “Bro, the Prez got ghosted in real time!” “I didn’t know that could happen?!”

A few of them start clapping. The disrespect is palpable.

Katsuki takes a slow sip of his drink. Doesn’t react. Just locks eyes on your retreating form like he’s uploading your soul into a kill list. His silence only makes it worse.

That’s when Yamada—one of the newer pledges, all cocky smirk and zero brain cells—decides to grow a pair.

“Dude,” he calls out, grinning like an idiot, “if you can’t get in her pants and fuck her in the next three months, you’re officially stepping down from your heartthrob throne.”

Silence. Everyone freezes. You could hear a pong ball drop.

“And we get to take your precious baby for a spin,” he adds. “Two weeks. Full keys. No chaperone.”

A hush falls over the room like someone just mentioned Voldemort.

Sero drops his beer. “Bro. You did not just bring up the Porsche.”

Kirishima looks physically pained. “Yo, that’s—dude, that’s kinda too far.”

“Yeah, man,” Kaminari adds, eyes wide. “You tryna die or something? That car's his literal child.”

They’re talking about the car. The black 911 GT3 Porsche. Custom specs. His dad helped him import it from Germany for his 21st birthday. That thing growls like a beast and costs more than all of Sigma Vex’s pledges combined. Katsuki doesn’t even park it near other cars. He parks it under a cover and wipes down the tires like it's a deity.

Kirishima steps forward. “Kats, bro—come on. Don’t—don’t entertain this. She’s just a girl.”

“She’s just a girl,” Katsuki echoes quietly.

He downs the rest of his drink in one go.

Then he turns toward Yamada with the slow, sharp grin of a predator who was just handed a valid reason to destroy someone—emotionally, spiritually, academically.

“You’re on.”

Kirishima groans. “Bro—”

“She wants to play shy?” Katsuki says, voice cold now. “Fine. I’ll play too. But three months?”

He scoffs, already calculating.

“I’ll have her begging in two.”

And just like that, the game begins.

-ˋˏ✄┈┈┈┈ -ˋˏ✄┈┈┈┈ -ˋˏ✄┈┈┈┈ -ˋˏ✄┈┈┈┈ -ˋˏ✄┈┈┈┈ -ˋˏ✄┈┈┈┈ -ˋˏ✄┈┈┈┈

Part 2 is in the making! will be finished and posted in 2 days!

check out my other works here!: MHA MASTERLIST

TAG LIST: @d4wnyjlk @lillyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy @greeeaaattt @oogieboogiesbugs0724 @dienamiight @urmom2bitch @kalulakunundrum @pastelbakugou @missdynamighttt @lotusstarr @bakug0uzb1thc @fr6giledoll @urfavangelss @witchy-karma @kelisewrites @gamblersdoll @cathnospam @wonubby @writeriguess @proburfavblonde @mrsbakuqo @xoxogospgirl

some of the people i tagged here are the writers i've been following for quite a while and i love so many of their works. and they have inspired me to write and start my own blog here. im hoping we can all be friends <3

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yungistiny · 2 days ago

Text

flannel

[ J. Yunho ]

╚═════════

summary: in which your boyfriend goes absolutely crazy seeing you in his favorite flannel shirt

warning: dom yunho, sub reader, possessive yunho, size kink, slight bondage, double penetration, unprotected sex, creampie, edging, over stimulation, yunho has a filthy mouth

genre: smut

pairing: yunho x afab reader

word count: 2k

note: this was requested by @ecriggs1990

masterlist

═════════ ═════════ ═════════

The morning light barely peeked through the curtains when you padded into the kitchen, sore in all the best ways, yawning and tugging down the sleeves of a flannel that was very obviously not yours. You were swimming in it, drowning in his scent, and the way the hem brushed the tops of your thighs made you shiver in ways that had absolutely nothing to do with the chill in the air.

Yunho’s flannel.

You could still feel the ghosts of his hands on your hips, the ache in your thighs from the night before, the way he’d groaned when he buried himself in you like he’d waited years for it. So yeah, wearing his shirt while munching on toast felt just the right amount of filthy.

You were mid chew when you heard the low rasp of his voice from behind.

“Baby.”

That voice. Still heavy from sleep. Still ruined from growling into your ear while he was rearranging your insides.

You turned, cheeks puffed slightly from your bite of toast, and that’s when you saw it, his eyes dark, jaw clenched, and something absolutely dangerous lurking behind his sleepy gaze.

“You really thought I was gonna let you walk around like that?” He asked, voice dropping low, already moving toward you like a storm.

You swallowed hard.

“It’s just your shirt.”

“Exactly,” He muttered, taking the plate out of your hand and tossing it onto the counter. “My shirt. On you. With nothing under it.”

His hands were on you in a flash, one gripping your hip and the other dragging slowly up your thigh, under the hem of the flannel, finding bare skin and making a noise that sounded like a prayer and a curse all in one.

“Fuck, you’re killing me.”

You opened your mouth to tease him, but the words didn’t make it past your lips because he was already lifting you, strong hands under your thighs, lips crashing into yours as he walked you right back into the bedroom like a man possessed.

“I haven’t even had breakfast yet,” You whispered against his mouth.

“Oh, I’m having it right now.”

He tossed you on the bed with one smooth motion, crawling up between your legs as the shirt rode high around your waist. He groaned like he was in pain seeing the way you sprawled beneath him in nothing but his shirt, already breathless, already needy.

He didn’t even bother taking it off you. Didn’t have to.

Just shoved it up until it bunched around your ribs, exposing the curve of your waist, the swell of your chest. His hand wrapped around your thigh, dragging you closer until your legs were hooked over his shoulders and he was staring at you like you were his favorite meal.

“Yunho…”

“Shut up,” He growled, voice shaking with how badly he wanted you. “Shut up and let me eat.”

And he did.

God, he did. Tongue slow, deliberate, cruel. Hands holding your hips still as your back arched and your moans got louder, needier, until you were clawing at the sheets and begging, “Please… please, Yunho, I can’t” Knowing well enough it’s all you wanted but you liked feeding your boyfriend’s size kink.

“Yes, you can,” He said, lips slick, eyes wild. “You took all of me last night, baby. Thought you liked how big I am.”

You whimpered, legs trembling.

“Gonna make you come like this,” He murmured, kissing up your thigh. “And then I’m going to fuck you in this damn shirt again, because seeing you like this? Makes me want to wreck you all over again.”

You couldn’t even answer.

Didn’t need to.

Because the next time he kissed you, it was from above his chest pressing to yours, still fully clothed while the flannel stayed bunched between your bodies. He sank into you slowly, making you feel every thick, heavy inch until you were gasping, clutching him like he might disappear.

“You like that?” He whispered, nose brushing yours, hips grinding deep.

You nodded, biting back a moan.

“Say it.”

“I love your shirt,” You whimpered, teasing.

His eyes flashed.

“No,” He grunted, thrusting up so deep your toes curled. “Say what you really mean.”

You moaned, louder now, desperate and unashamed. “You’re so big, Yunho… fuck… I love how you stretch me out”

That did it.

He groaned, forehead pressed to yours as he started moving harder, faster, wrecking you just like he promised. And all you could think, over the gasps and the praises and the sound of skin against skin, was that next time, you were wearing nothing but his flannel to bed.

Because nothing made him hungrier than you in his clothes.

And you? You were starving for it.

Your moans had barely started to quiet, your chest heaving beneath the flannel bunched between your bodies, when Yunho pulled back, just enough to make you whimper at the loss.

But then his hand was on your waist, his voice low and rough right against your ear.

“Turn over.”

You barely had time to register it before he was flipping you with a firm grip, face down, ass up, gasping at how effortlessly he manhandled your body like you weighed nothing. The flannel shifted with you, sliding slightly off one shoulder as you scrambled to your knees on the mattress, legs trembling from how hard he had already taken you.

“Look at this view,” He muttered, voice wrecked, one hand dragging slowly up the back of your thigh, to your hip, squeezing possessively. “Still wearing my damn shirt. You’ve got no idea what that does to me.”

You felt the weight of the bed dip behind you as he knelt, his body heat right against your back. One large hand gripped your hip, the other sliding up, not to your waist, not to your shoulder, but curling around the back of the flannel still hanging off you like sin.

And then he yanked.

The front buttons gave out with a violent little, pop pop pop, scattering like warning shots across the sheets. You gasped as cool air rushed against your exposed skin, but it didn’t last long, not with Yunho’s chest flush against your back and his grip fisting the fabric behind your shoulders like he owned you.

Because he did.

“Still mine,” He growled.

And then he was inside you again.

Deep. Devastating. The stretch somehow even more intense from this angle as he buried himself to the hilt, one hand holding your hip in place, the other gripping the damn shirt like it was the only thing tethering him to sanity.

Your mouth dropped open, but nothing came out, just choked gasps as he started to move, hips snapping forward, filling you again and again with brutal, punishing thrusts. The sound of skin meeting skin echoed through the room, wet and slick and shameless.

“Yunho… fuck…” You tried, but your voice cracked, barely coherent.

“You hear that?” He panted behind you, voice dark with hunger. “That’s you, baby. That’s your pussy sucking me in like it never wants to let go.”

The filth that poured out of him, so different from the sweet, soft boyfriend that carried your bag and kissed your forehead, lit you up from the inside.

And that grip? On the shirt?

It never let go.

Not even as your arms gave out, collapsing onto the mattress while he kept thrusting into you from behind like a man starved, like you were the last meal he’d ever get. He leaned forward, pressing down against your back, his body blanketing yours, his hand still tangled in the shirt where it hung uselessly from your arms.

“You look so fucking good in this,” He growled into your ear. “But you look better like this. Ruined. Crying for me. Wearing nothing but my name.”

That was it. That pushed you right to the edge.

Your orgasm crashed over you like a storm, your entire body shaking, mouth open in a silent scream as you clenched around him, dragging a raw groan from his throat as he thrust through it.

“Gonna fill you up,” He hissed. “Stretch you out and stay there. You want that, baby? Want me to fuck my cum so deep inside you, it doesn’t matter what you wear? Everyone’ll smell you’re mine.”

You could barely nod, tears slipping down your cheeks, your body trembling as he was so close to his own release.

You could feel it in the way his rhythm faltered, the way he buried himself to the hilt and ground his hips against yours like he wanted to live inside you. His grip on your hip was bruising, the other still clutching the back of his flannel like it was a lifeline.

But just when you thought he’d fall apart, right there, buried inside you, panting your name like a prayer, he pulled out.

You whimpered, hips pushing back automatically, needy and wrecked and desperate for more, but all you heard was the soft sound of him breathing heavy behind you.

A soft rustle. Fabric sliding. The shirt, his shirt, being peeled off your body.

“What…”

“Shh,” He muttered, voice rough, almost trembling with restraint. “You wanna wear my shirt like a little tease? Then I’m gonna use it.”

Before you could question it, your wrists were tugged gently behind your back, crossed, and then wrapped tight in that ruined flannel. The sleeves bound them together, soft but snug, knotted with care and practiced ease. You gasped, cheek pressing to the sheets, body arching involuntarily from the thrill of it.

“You trust me?” Yunho asked, voice quieter now, closer to your ear.

You nodded. “Always.”

“Good,” He breathed, and then, he was sliding back inside you.

It was slow this time. Cruel. His dick nudged deep, stretching you out all over again, dragging a moan from your lips. But before you could lose yourself in it, he stopped.

And then you felt it, his fingers. Two thick, slick fingers slipping inside you along with him, the double sensation making your whole body seize up. You moaned brokenly, fingers twitching in their binds, but he only chuckled low and kept going.

Thrusting in slow, deliberate strokes. Letting his fingers curl just right. Drawing you so close to the edge you were practically shaking.

“God, you’re so full,” He groaned. “You feel that? My dick and my fingers inside you, baby? You gonna come like this? Huh?”

“Yes,” You sobbed. “Yunho, please…. please don’t stop!”

And he did.

You cried out at the loss, frustration bubbling up as he pulled his fingers out and thrust all the way in, grinding against you but not giving you what you needed.

“Oh no,” He whispered, teasing. “Not yet. I wanna see you fall apart. Wanna feel you break for me.”

Then he was thrusting again, deeper, harder, grinding his dick against every spot inside you that made your body tremble, but now it was different. You were bound, exposed, trembling. And he was losing control.

He reached up, grabbed your tied wrists, used them to anchor you back onto him, pulling you into each thrust like he was chasing something wild and feral.

“You gonna come now?” He panted. “Gonna soak me, sweetheart?”

Your body answered for you. You came with a shout, messy and full body, clenching so hard around him that he cursed, deep, low, desperate and finally gave in.

He slammed into you once, twice, and then came with a sound like a growl, pouring into you, not letting go. His hips kept moving even as he came, small thrusts that fucked his release even deeper, dragging out every last drop.

He stayed buried inside you, breathing hard, palms gripping your hips, and when you finally slumped forward with a whimper, wrists still tied in his ruined flannel, you barely managed to whisper, “I should wear your shirts more often.”

Yunho pulled out with a soft, wet sound, groaning at the sight of his cum dripping out of you. His fingers dipped between your thighs again, pushing it back in before he flopped onto the bed beside you, utterly wrecked.

He looked at the flannel. Then back at you. Then pouted, actually pouted.

“That was my favorite one.”

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permanent tag list: @straycat420 @autieofthevalley @dejatiny @hannahlilibet411 @xh01bri @jintastic-yuyu @maddycline @ultrapinkvoidbouquet @wooyoungsbrat @lucid-galaxys-world @ecriggs1990 @straytiny127 @sannies-tiddies @hannahstacos @jiminthestreets-bonesinthesheets @love--in-stayville

#I went crazy with this one #yunho #jeong yunho #yunho smut #yunho x you #yunho x reader #ateez #ateez fic #ateez fanfic

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seitmai · 3 days ago

Text

Many thoughts

Within his chest, the pain ebbs, more of a crawl than biting, soothed by your presence. He doesn’t know what you are — you and him, but he knows that he’s comforted when you’re near, as if you possess some supernatural ability to console him.

That's a powerful ability

“I’m here for you,” Solemn, your oath to Bob is a promise, and you’ve kept it, never straying from the meaning of your words. The sheen of sweat seems to cool, and his body no longer feels coiled into a thousand knots. “Still tired?” It was a poor habit he’d developed, not going back to bed once he’d awoken from a bad dream. Though, you’d been rather diligent about ensuring that he got proper rest — and you always stayed with him until the sun came up. Bob nods, and the two of you make your way back to his room.

Getting a good rest can make such a difference 🥺

There’s a gentleness that radiates from his soul, burning brighter than the sun; it’s good, he’s good. He doesn’t fully know it, but he’s healing you, too.

🥹🥹🥹

“You don’t have to keep doing this,” He mumbles, fearing that he’s wasted enough of your time on his troubled mind. Bob notices the flicker of fire within your eyes, a certain determination. “I …” Before he can conjure up some apology, you begin to shush him, a gentle croon that is a placating gesture, intended to soothe. “We’re here for one another, Bob. You know that I don’t mind. It’s just as important to me as it is to you.”

This clearly is not one-sided, Bob just needs to understand that

“This comforts me, too,” Your confession is laced with underlying melancholy, one that he shares, understands. Bob understands it better than himself, and he feels your digits tense around his hand; it’s a pleasant feeling. “You comfort me.” It feels strange, to be important to someone; to matter in a way that transcends a simple human connection. His body heat warms the icy chill of your hands, sending a brief shiver throughout your spine. “All of you, then. You are comforting to me,” The sincerity within your cadence is incredibly soothing to him, hanging upon every word. “Even the parts that are still healing.” You assure, and his breath catches within his throat.

🥰🥹🥰🥹🥰

There’s plenty of mending left to do — learning, adapting, trying to find himself again. However, Bob knows for certain that he’s beginning to love you, in a way that he’s never experienced himself. Whatever parts of him are still scattered, you’re there to help pick up, no matter how dark.

That's beautiful 🥰

“Everything about you is perfect,” Bob utters, scarlet permeating his cheeks, flush snaking toward his jaw. Bewilderment crosses your features, eyes widening, throat thick as you swallow down a slight lump. “All of it.” Biting back a retort, you reluctantly accept the compliment, digits idly twisting into the pillow beneath you. You are far from perfect — the sum of many flaws, self-esteem still tattered from your past. Bob understands, insecurities marrow-deep, gnawing away at him. “Thanks,” It’s all you can muster, grappling with the bewilderment of it all, being called perfect. You’ve never been labeled as anything other than a mistake — but not to him. “No one’s ever told me that before.”

Oh baby 🥹😭

Bob feels your digits still across his knuckles, akin to silk, still somewhat icy. “I’ll tell you,” His voice is disarmingly gentle, the ghost of a smile fluttering over his face. “You’ve helped me, more than you know. I can return the favor.

and he happily will do so

“I like you,” He whispers, as if he’s just revealed some earth-shattering secret. Despite the sudden excitement that washes through you, he seems anxious, as if this news is something you’d detest. “But I don’t know if I’m good enough.”

He is very brave to say it out loud 👏🏻

Offended on his behalf, your brows furrow together, caressing his visage with lingering strokes of your fingertips. “You are more than good enough,” You know it’s a struggle for him to have faith in such words. “You’re so good, Bob — you’re resilient, you’re perfect.”

He truly is

“I have a lot of low days,” It’s almost as if he’s giving you reasons not to be with him, to avoid acting on this pull that you feel towards him. “Some good days.” Bob whispers, voice hoarse, as if he’s been scraped too thin, choked by swimming tears. “I’ll stay with you — no matter what kind of day it is,” Something wet coats your thumb, inklings of salty droplets rolling from his eyes. “Low or high, you mean so much to me.” The softness of your cadence is unmistakable, his hand gliding to rest over yours.

No matter what day it is 😭🥹🥰

Tears flow freely now, most of them born of an elation he hadn’t experienced in such a long time. He’s happy — joy tastes foreign, something new and unfamiliar, but it’s liberating, all the same. Your voice washes over him, curling around him; tranquil, serene.

Crying can be so freeing

His smile is shy, chest bubbling with gentle laughter, as if he can’t comprehend what happened. It evokes a giggle from you, too; his hand never strays from your jaw.

🥰🥰🥰

You’re asleep before he is, digits curled into the back of his sweater, something to hold onto. Shallow, relaxed breaths stretch through your diaphragm, a melody that brings him peace; the pain subsides into a dull ache. Bob exhales; it’s even, steady — the sensation of your digits carding through his tresses lulls him into submission. Rest is much easier to find this way, caged within your arms, a sanctuary that he crawls into without hesitation.

They find peace in each other 🥹🥰

❝ 𝐨𝐡, 𝐬𝐜𝐚𝐥𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐚𝐥𝐥 𝐲𝐨𝐮𝐫 𝐬𝐡𝐚𝐝𝐨𝐰𝐬. ❞

┊ 𝐬𝐲𝐧𝐨𝐩𝐬𝐢𝐬: plagued by nightmares, bob takes comfort in the one person who’s pulled him from the shadows time and time again — you.

𝐩𝐚𝐢𝐫𝐢𝐧𝐠: robert reynolds (sentry) / fem!reader.

𝐰𝐨𝐫𝐝 𝐜𝐨𝐮𝐧𝐭: 4K.

𝐰𝐚𝐫𝐧𝐢𝐧𝐠𝐬: mentions of past depression, substance abuse, and working through trauma. talk of insecurities and feelings of inferiority. no smut in this one. purely fluff and angst. kissing, confession of feelings. slightly suggestive towards the end.

𝐚𝐮𝐭𝐡𝐨𝐫’𝐬 𝐧𝐨𝐭𝐞: first time writing for bob but I really wanted to make sure that I got the mental health aspect right and didn’t minimize his issues. I am working on a part 2 with some very soft smut!

Perspiration clings to clammy flesh, flesh that crawls with gooseflesh, chest unusually tight, crushed beneath the weight of nightmares.

It’s the darkness — creeping, sinister, bleak — curling around the fringes of his room, kept at-bay by the soft illumination that hangs over his bed. Strangled gasps rip through his diaphragm, as if he’s swallowed water, pulled beneath the current.

He’s alone, surrounded by vicious mockery, by a cacophony of voices that claw at him, tell him he’s insignificant, tell him he’s nothing. Their rancor screams from the void, and he’s helpless, powerless against them.

It feels like drowning, falling into an endless pit of a ceaseless penumbra, the shadow that he keeps at-bay. A familiar pain blossoms from within his ribcage, and he’s desperate to be free from whatever nightmare he’s trapped in.

Bob startles awake, clutching at his sternum, brown tresses disheveled from a perilous slumber. Muscles ache, taut from a clenched fist, as if he’s being stretched too thin.

The nightmare disintegrates, carried away upon the wind, and the shadows slither to a mere lull.

Sweat glistens on his temples, strands of hair matted against his forehead, brows furrowing together. Tears wet his eyes, unshed, roused to the surface as he regains a shred of composure. Outside, the New York cityscape greets him — he’s home, in the Watchtower.

The skies have lost their pallor, no longer the hue of bruised violets, an inky atmosphere speckled with thousands of stars. Skyscrapers glisten through the haze, reflected against tinted windowpanes, and he begins to adjust to his surroundings again.

A dryness permeates his mouth, sitting uncomfortably upon his tongue, and he shuffles out of bed. The sheets are somewhat damp from perspiration, his body running inhumanly hot, hotter still from the nightmare.

The nightmares don’t get any easier — the pain sits raw within his chest, as if his heart has been spit over a searing flame. Bob exhales, reminding himself of where he is, they’re here, he isn’t alone, he’s safe.

Bare feet smooth over the cool flooring, making his way from his room to the tower’s lounge, greeted by dusk, pooling in through tinted windows. Starlight dances through a clear night, silvery whisper of the moon enough to bring him some semblance of comfort.

Wandering towards the sink, he’s quick to turn the faucet on, shoveling handfuls of water into his mouth to sate his thirst. The dry burn within his throat slowly diminishes, temperature beginning to regulate as he pulls away from tormented dreams.

A cool draft floats through the room, a soothing balm against his scorching flesh, smoldering with the temperature of the sun. A drawn-out, ragged sigh inhabits his lungs, and he begins to drift down from his state of panic, of fear.

“Bob?”

Nonplussed, Bob swivels, droplets of water rolling down his chin as his gaze finds you, standing there in your robe, groggy from the fringes of sleep. It’s as if you’re cast in some divine glow, the moon at your back, blanketing you in blanched light.

He knows that you are a sanctuary, that you’re kind, you’re safe; and Bob knows that he feels something for you. It’s nearly overwhelming, whatever that sentiment is — he thinks it’s affection, or maybe it’s something else, something stronger.

Fisting his palm within the hem of his sweater, he forces a smile, threadbare; it dances along the line of genuine and despairing. “Hi,” He greets nonchalantly, as if he weren’t distressed. “What are you doing?”

Perplexed, you can tell that he’s had a nightmare again; a weekly ritual, wrought with melancholy, and yet you’re there with open arms, without question. “I heard your heartbeat.” It’s little more than a whisper, and you watch his smile waver.

“Did you?” Bob averts your gaze, digits twisting into fabric until it accidentally tears. He winces, shaking his head back and forth, brows drawing together as he attempts to navigate through the momentary swarm of emotions.

It’s been four months — he’s trying.

Unraveling the tangled web of trauma that blankets his life is easier said than done, and he’s put in the work, but it never seems enough. The nightmares don’t recede, still a haunting constant, a plague nipping at his heels without pause.

Silence fills the gap between, and the sting you feel never lessens when he’s had a nightmare. Affection pulls upon your heartstrings, a dull ache within your chest that blossoms into concern. Wordlessly, you step closer, hand seeking his own.

It’s an anchor; there’s a weight to it that grounds him, flesh to flesh, and Bob feels the unearthly chill that clings to your skin. Through a warbled exhale, he finally looks to you again, his smile threadbare yet easier, appreciative.

It was a poor habit he’d developed, not going back to bed once he’d awoken from a bad dream. Though, you’d been rather diligent about ensuring that he got proper rest — and you always stayed with him until the sun came up.

Bob nods, and the two of you make your way back to his room.

Hands flex and pull away from one another, kissed by fire, and you feel it, warmth spreading over the back of your neck like tendrils. It’s innocent, whatever you share with him — pure, clean. You don’t recall the last time you’d felt this about anyone, for anyone.

There’s a gentleness that radiates from his soul, burning brighter than the sun; it’s good, he’s good. He doesn’t fully know it, but he’s healing you, too.

As you cross the threshold into his room, the door shuts, met with the soft glow of his nightlight, the sparkling cityscape. Bob is visibly relieved, grateful to you for everything — he wonders if he deserves it, but the thought is fleeting.

There isn’t a shred of awkwardness as the both of you climb into his bed; you abandoned that a long time ago. Instead, there’s a peculiar tension — but it’s sweeter, more of a tenderness than anything else.

Curled atop the sheets, Bob’s gaze finds you, unknowing, enticed by the glitter within your eyes, the characteristic amiability that he clings to. If he didn’t know any better, he’d think you were some angel, a savior, pulling him back from the brink.

Facing one another, the hush of his room is comforting; the hum of New York drones on outside, save for the minuscule thrumming of the light above his headboard. Tucking an arm beneath your head, you feel yourself grow a touch flustered beneath Bob’s stare.

There is a sense of incredulity there, an amalgamation of gratitude intermingled with warmth, mesmerized, affectionate. He nearly shrinks when your gaze finds his own, mustering up a smile, one that quirks at the corner of his mouth.

Before he can conjure up some apology, you begin to shush him, a gentle croon that is a placating gesture, intended to soothe. “We’re here for one another, Bob. You know that I don’t mind. It’s just as important to me as it is to you.”

That surprises him, bewilderment crossing his features, settling within his visage as he clears his throat. He wants to inquire, ask about why this matters to you so much, consoling him, but he’s quiet, absorbing every detail of your countenance. His memory is hazy, but he always remembers you.

“Why?”

A brief pang of ice stabs at your stomach, recalling a slew of past memories, none of which are pleasant. His loneliness is something that you empathize with more than he knows, the burden of nothingness.

Bob can see the ripple of pain that passes through your face, and he reaches out, hands interlacing once more. It’s innocuous, grounded; you tether one another to reality. For a moment, he’s standing in your memories — needles, a thousand jagged pricks of ice, threading themselves into your veins.

It feels strange, to be important to someone; to matter in a way that transcends a simple human connection. His body heat warms the icy chill of your hands, sending a brief shiver throughout your spine.

As he involuntarily wades through your memory, he sees you again, alone — begging, sobbing for help, for someone to rescue you from the misery inflicted at the hands of zealous scientists. Like him, he realizes, and he wants to help you in the way you’ve helped him.

“I don’t know how.” Bob admits, but you’re swift to counter him with a smile. There’s an easiness to you, something kind, something secure, a home that he’s made, the heart where he has roots.

“You’re just you,” As the words slip from your lips, warm breath plumes between, tinged with sweetness. He finds it difficult to fully believe your words, but he hangs onto them nonetheless, heart lurching within his chest. “You’re Bob.”

If only things were that simple, he thinks, knowing that there’s much more to him than that. Darkness, a malignant shadow, constantly slinking around within the recesses of his mind — and something golden, a brilliant light, blinded by his own hubris.

His silence is telling, and you know he doesn’t fully believe you. You don’t press the matter, the pad of your thumb ghosting over his knuckles. Gooseflesh ices his spine at the brief contact, prompting him to exhale, nearly relaxed.

“You know that’s not true,” Bob stammers, wrestling with himself. Sometimes he wonders if you like all of him — even the tarnished, broken parts. His eyes briefly flutter shut before he shakes his head. “I’m sorry.” He murmurs, feeling your fingertips dance over his palm.

“All of you, then. You are comforting to me,” The sincerity within your cadence is incredibly soothing to him, hanging upon every word. “Even the parts that are still healing.” You assure, and his breath catches within his throat.

His lips split into a smile — brighter this time, fully reaching his eyes. Grogginess hazes the fringes of his gaze, exhaustion beginning to seep into his bones, attempting to drag him back into the throes of sleep.

Still, he fights it, wanting to stay up with you and talk — it’s what you’ve done every time. Sometimes the conversation is light, airy, sweet — and sometimes it’s raw and poignant. Whatever way it goes, he’s content to converse, to better understand himself, understand you.

You want to blame it on the sleep deprivation, and you do, forcing a brief laugh, wrought with a sense of shock. “You must be really tired,” Attempting to pass off his remark as nothing more than kindness, you notice his sudden streak of embarrassment.

“I mean it.” Shrewd, he tries again, insistent as his teeth catch on the inside of his cheek. Earnestly, he sits up enough to look at you fully, cerulean hues glistening through dim illumination.

Biting back a retort, you reluctantly accept the compliment, digits idly twisting into the pillow beneath you. You are far from perfect — the sum of many flaws, self-esteem still tattered from your past. Bob understands, insecurities marrow-deep, gnawing away at him.

He sees you — glimpsing through whatever guilt and sorrow plague you, seeing the light that emanates from within. With bated breath, your lips part, enough to make room for a soft exhale, attempting to decide on your next words.

“Thanks,” It’s all you can muster, grappling with the bewilderment of it all, being called perfect. You’ve never been labeled as anything other than a mistake — but not to him. “No one’s ever told me that before.”

There’s still pain left inside, ashen remnants of a fire that nearly engulfed him, but it’s more manageable. Most of his life was one of isolation, of longing for a purpose — he’d found the team, and he’d found you.

He still remembers meeting you for the first time, even if the memory is clouded, faint. It’s you that breaks through the veil, piercing sunlight through his own shadow. It was the softness of your touch that lingers still, guiding him from the dark.

“It’s only fair if I tell you, too,” Through a murmur, you shift atop the mattress, the distance between bodies slimmer than before. You can hear his heartbeat begin to climb, notice the way in which he shuffles closer, too. “We’ll remind each other.”

Bob smiles again, eyelashes fluttering, accidentally bumping his knees against yours. “Sorry.” He mumbles, but you shake your head, able to savor the proximity. There’s something else he wants to say, stuck upon the tip of his tongue.

Words simmer to ash within his throat, struggling to vocalize the turbulent storm of inner thoughts that wage war within his head. He wants to tell you how much you mean to him, how much he likes you, how you burn away any lingering darkness.

“It’s okay.” Assuring, you absentmindedly untangle your hand from his, much to his disdain, only to card your fingertips over his brow. Brushing aside sweat-laden tresses, you feel the heat of his flesh, like that of an open flame.

The gesture is sweet, and he craves your embrace with a pathetic desperation. Bob’s eyes widen, pads of your digits ghosting toward his cheek, until your palm is nearly flat against the side of his face.

His hand finds your wrist, his hold disarmingly delicate, as if he’s cradling something precious, fragile. Bob is fearful of his own strength, letting it fester just beneath the surface. As your thumb traces over his cheekbone, his gaze doesn’t stray from you.

Floating within a wordless silence, you’re unusually content, feeling the pang of tension that crackles between, embers stoked to a low flame. Everything about him is warm, inviting, gentle — his heartbeat jumps again when you smile at him.

Bob laughs; a subdued, nervous sound as his own compliment is thrown back in his face — he should’ve suspected you’d do something like that. Foreheads ghost against one another, and he realizes how close you are, bodies nearly entangled.

His divulgence of his affections dawns upon you, realization raw and palpable. However, you don’t let it swallow the remark he made, of not being good enough for you — he’s everything, he’s more than enough.

“I like you, too.”

Disbelief, as sharp as a blade, cuts through him effortlessly — he knows you mean it, but it’s difficult to let the feeling sink in fully. His thumb caresses over the heel of your palm, tears burning his eyes, a wet sheen that he continues to fight off.

Somewhere within the recesses of his mind, he hears the voice again — the Void, some festering spectre that looms still, as black as ink. Bob’s jaw tenses as he staves off insecurity, finding a steadfast adoration within your eyes; your gaze softens, consoling.

“I’ll stay with you — no matter what kind of day it is,” Something wet coats your thumb, inklings of salty droplets rolling from his eyes. “Low or high, you mean so much to me.” The softness of your cadence is unmistakable, his hand gliding to rest over yours.

It’s as if the voices are squashed, momentarily snuffed out as he looks to you, the center of everything. Wiping at bleary eyes, he regains his composure, enough to plant a kiss against your palm. The gesture is chaste, sweet — your lips part slightly, smitten.

Still holding your hand against his countenance, Bob gawks, stars swirling within his dark-blue hues, the look of something more. His heartbeat thrums within your ears as it jumps again, jumbled and erratic in your newfound closeness.

“You can hear it,” Bob murmurs, a reddened flush crawling over his neck, settling within his cheeks. “My heartbeat.” He knows it’s quick, knows the way you make him feel — beloved, comforted, some semblance of normalcy.

“It’s fast,” Your observation only furthers his twinge of embarrassment, but he smiles — your heartbeat quickens, too. “Never noticed the flecks of green in your eyes.” Muddled by the growing grogginess, your voice tapers off, nothing more than a hushed whisper.

“Reminded her of moss,” He recalls, forlorn, as if he’s miles away. Bob doesn’t talk much about his past — only the naked ugliness of it, but this is something lighter, something good. “My mother.” His throat stirs with a soft hum.

“They’re pretty.” Again, your fingertips brush above his brow, nudging brown tresses aside. The change of subject is all a ploy for Bob to gather his courage to kiss you — it’s building, the tension. You’re content to let it simmer.

Bob relinquishes his grasp upon your hand, enough to touch you, too. He’s hesitant, the way he reaches for you, trembling digits warm against your lips, chapped and scabbed from you constantly biting at the thin flesh.

Exhilaration swirls within your stomach, a thousand butterflies dancing around, gooseflesh crawling across your spine. His fingers skirt toward your cheek, palm large enough to cradle your countenance, and you let him.

You cannot recall the last time someone had touched you with a gentle hand, as if you mattered, as if you were worthy of such kindness. His touch is incendiary, fire to ice, eyes searching his own for something else, something unspoken.

As if urged by invisible strings, your movements are sluggish, deliberate; the closer you get, the louder Bob’s heartbeat gets — yours too, joined in-tandem. He doesn’t recoil or push you aside, doe-eyed and mesmerized, though still somewhat nervous.

His gaze flickers over your visage — ethereal, gravitating, and he’s pulled in. He’s asking, you realize, hushed yet expectant, lips parted and flesh plagued by scarlet. Bob’s hand remains steady, caressing your jaw, characteristically shy as you lean forward simultaneously.

Lips brush against one another, slow to start, perhaps agonizingly slow. It doesn’t bother you in the slightest, allowing yourself to merely bask in the pleasantness of it all.

Kissing isn’t something foreign to him, but he’s inexperienced, stumbling over himself, still clumsy in his ministrations. He drowns his anxiousness, throat bobbing as he swallows, finding some tranquility in the shape of your mouth.

Velveteen, just like the rest of you; his heartbeat crescendos before it begins to steady, fingertips pluming over the dip beneath your jaw. Nothing ever moves faster than it needs to be, lips growing accustomed to a sweeter embrace.

Noses brush together, warmth of his tremulous exhale feathering over your features, a heat that eases whatever chill holds you still. Bob’s mouth shifts just slightly, brows creased in concentration, your stray tresses tickling his cheek.

This is real, a blissful reality that he merely grasped at, once upon a time. You’re flesh and blood in his grasp, scent an amalgamation of something floral, coupled with the clean smell of your bathrobe.

Bob withdraws, only to marvel at the sight of you, picturesque, flustered as you struggle to maintain your composure. The distance is still slim, almost nonexistent, limbs tangled, hearts galloping together, a tandem of exhilaration.

His smile is shy, chest bubbling with gentle laughter, as if he can’t comprehend what happened. It evokes a giggle from you, too; his hand never strays from your jaw.

“Was it that bad?” The teasing nature of your cadence flusters him, but he knows that you don’t mean anything by it. Bob shakes his head, extinguishing the gasp that nearly floats from his lungs as your palm rests over his collarbone.

“No,” Breathless, he steels himself, flesh beginning to burn when he fully realizes how close you are, intertwined at this point. “The opposite.” Bob remarks, shivering as your fingertips lightly graze against the bare flesh near the collar of his sweater.

Neglecting to press him further, you’re content to simply swim within your shared affections. It’s quiet for a moment, and he stares at you as if you’ve moved mountains. “I’m rusty.” You utter, eyes half-lidded, sleep nipping at your heels.

A glint of pearlescent teeth shimmer from behind his lips, brief; Bob nearly says something cheeky, but cringes at the mere thought. Instead, he concedes, shifting slightly beside you. “Me too.” He concurs, swallowing the growing lump within his throat.

“It might be worthwhile to practice,” A soft snort escapes you, followed by laughter. You’re being playful again, partially serious, but you’d never force Bob into something he didn’t want. “Sorry.” You mumble, nose crinkling.

“No, hm,” Bob’s smitten, and he’s agreeable — though, he prefers if you were more awake. You’re fighting slumber with both fists, shoving it away, but it keeps chasing after you. “Maybe when you’re not tired.” He hums, and you open one eye.

“Okay,” You’re smiling and he’s falling, as if he’s soaring through the skies, crashing down on solid ground. “M’holding you.” Slurred, a mere wisp of a grumble, your arms flex and adjust, making space for Bob to rest his head against your shoulder.

He’s much taller, larger, but you don’t seem to mind, arm extended beneath his head, the other splayed somewhere else. His arms tangle around your middle, feverishly hot, but the warmth is more welcoming than the cold.

Bob exhales; it’s even, steady — the sensation of your digits carding through his tresses lulls him into submission. Rest is much easier to find this way, caged within your arms, a sanctuary that he crawls into without hesitation.

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