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peachesofteal · 3 months ago

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Raspberry Girl Previous + masterlist + AO3 Simon Riley/female reader CW: 18+ intoxication, sexual content, daddy kink, caretaking, blurry lines of consent.

You’re painfully unaware, though to you, he’s sure it's bliss.

In your own little world, you stand at the long wooden table, fingers moving across the trackpad of a laptop, a pair of too big glasses sliding down your nose. The left lens is smudged, the smear only getting worse every time you push them up with the back of your hand. There’s a whirlwind of stuff around you, bowls and bags and measuring cups, cracked egg shells and sprinkles scattered across the wood, multi colored icing separated into different containers, and you're so into your work you don't even realize he's in the doorway.

He almost feels bad for scaring you when he clears his throat. Almost.

“Oh my god,” you whirl, hand pressed to your chest, half ready to bolt. “S-sorry, I didn’t- I didn’t know you were there.”

Is that anyway to say hi to your daddy sweetheart?

“Good morning.” He eyes the twenty four ounce mason jar to your left. It’s one quarter full, coffee and cream swirling to the bottom. Too much caffeine.

“Good morning, hi.” You smile, sweet and shy but more emboldened. It’s been a few days since he fed you bites of lemon meringue pie, a few days since he went home and stroked his cock to the memory of your mouth parting for him, eyes half lidded looking up through your lashes.

Since then, you’ve a bit more brave, encouraged by his careful coaxing, text messages at night and throughout the day to check in, visits in the morning as he heads to base.

He’s leading his little lamb right into her shepherd’s arms.

“What’re you working on?”

“Funfetti birthday cake.” You slide your glasses back up your face. They’re a mess and he can’t resist fixing it, pulling them off, wiping the lenses with bottom of his shirt. You freeze. Little deer in his headlights.

“Didn’t know you wore glasses.” He places them back where they belong, righting them when they slip, and confirming what he already knew. They’re too big. You need new ones.

“Th-thank you. I do for reading. And… er, screens. Reading on screens, mostly, though I need them for books too so I guess just… reading in general.” He understands the pause now, the moments when you’ve become self conscious, embarrassed, or you’re looking for the words you need, anxiously trying to piece it all together, step into a skin that doesn't quite fit.

A rhythm the world doesn't understand. Too cruel, impatient, cold, it has no care for fragile things, too easily reflecting a mirror of his former self.

He files the bit about you needing to wear glasses when you read, another notation in the long list he’s already memorized, organized, and moves onto his next inquiry. “Who’s the birthday cake for?”

“Mara. It’s her birthday. They’re…” you make a face like you’ve sniffed spoiled milk, “we’re going out to a pub to celebrate.” He stiffens. On one hand, he’s proud of you. On the other, the idea of you in a pub raises the hair on the back of his neck, has him a bit out of his mind.

He’s not interested in clipping your wings, but going out to a pub with no one to watch over you? Not bloody likely. “Tonight?”

“Mhm.” You’re rubbing a stick of butter in a round pan. “Funfetti is the classic birthday cake. You know, the vanilla cake with the sprinkles?” He shakes his head. “Oh. Well, um, it is. It's mostly a kid thing now, but I think it's the ultimate birthday cake. Birthdays are supposed to be fun but you know... they kind of suck when you're an adult. Anyway... funfetti is fun so, that's why...”

“Maybe you can save me a slice. Where are you going?”

“Save you…" your brows crease as you try to process what he's said. "Doc’s.” You’ve dropped the stick of butter abruptly, greasy fingers gripping the edge of the pan. Doc’s. It’s a younger crowd, a bit posh, but still a bit dark. Has a bit of an edge.

It’s been a few weeks since he’s gotten a pint with Kyle and Johnny anyway.

He smiles, strokes the backs of his knuckles down your cheek, satisfied when you lean in for more, disappointed the few minutes he had to drop in are now over. “I’ve gotta go baby, be good for me.” Your mouth drops open so wide he thinks he might be able to fit his cock in it.

“Oh, okay. I- I will.”

What did you forget?

Daddy. I will, daddy.

“That ‘er?” Kyle motions with his beer bottle towards the table where you stand nervously at the edge, floral flecked dress swaying just above your knees. You've looped a white ribbon through your hair, the beacon of a gentle soul that seems to be calling out to every muppet in the building, every wandering eye fueling a fire burning in his blood.

“Yeah.” His stomach is sour. Even a neat pour of whiskey and pint didn’t settle him.

You’re trying so hard. Smiling and nodding and listening to everyone, clutching your drink like it’s a lifeline. Mara seems to understand the grace you need, but no one else in the group gets it, and some of them give you weird looks, or worse, look at each other when you’re not paying attention in annoyance. Your only friend at the table catches a few of them and shoots stern glares as she shakes her head, but it doesn’t change much.

“She looks uncomfortable,” Johnny grunts, his scrupulous eye never missing a thing. Someone asks you a question, and you stumble over your answer, looking away to the wall when a girl to your left blatantly smirks, and then sneers directly in your face. Simon’s blood boils.

“She’s different from them, it’s hard for her.” It's the easiest way to explain it. You’re one in a million. His one in a million.

The table laughs at something, and you frantically flick over each person’s face, trying to pick up on a joke you clearly did not understand. Eventually, you just settle for another smile, resigned to watch it all from the outside as conversation flows from person to person, but never towards you.

Sweet girl. He wants to take you home where you’re safe and happy and carefree, where you can be yourself and not have to worry about trying to keep up or facing everyone’s judgement. Where he can hold your perfect and precious heart in his hand and protect it. Where he can fuck the memory of this night right out of you, bounce you on his cock until the only thing you know how to do is come for him, over and over again.

He misses the exact moment the cake appears among the stacks of shot glasses. Your anxiety ramps up as everyone starts to eat their slices, shoulders high beneath your ears, fingers knotted together too tight. It’s an eternity before the first person looks at you, mouth half full and thrilled, their enthusiasm alleviating some of the weight that's been sitting on his chest, and yours. Whatever they say seems to lessen the weight because you’re smiling again, excited, and as more people turn your way, the smile turns to a full on beam, your words from the other night echoing in his ears.

I like feeding people.

Another hour passes before he decides to call it, the group now spread across the pub, scattered around different tables, at the bar, outside smoking. You’re in a corner with your back to the room talking to Mara, and when he appears in her line of sight, she spots him immediately, grabbing your arm, mouthing something he doesn’t catch.

You turn-

And light up like a fucking Christmas tree.

“Captain Riley!” The alcohol has made you bold, slow synapses firing less rapidly, providing a longer lead time, somewhat preventing you from second guessing or withholding yourself.

“Hi baby.”

“I’m just gonna…” Mara tries to move away but you reach for her.

“Happy Birthday Mar. Thanks for inviting,” you hiccup, “me.” She gives you a squeeze.

“Thanks for coming, and for the cake, it was amazing. Made me feel like I was kid, ya know? When birthdays really mattered.” Sadness flickers in her eyes, and then disappears in a glaze of intoxication. “Anyway, see you Monday?”

“Yep.” She gives you one more hug before slipping away, and you sigh.

“She loved her cake.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah.” You’ve got this dreamy look on your face, sleepy and sweet, a little kitten who’s ready to curl up for a nap.

Cast a line. See if you’re biting.

“How’re you gettin’ home?”

“An uber?” You lick your lips. “Or… uh. A Lyft?” You lurch to the side and he darts forward to steady you, movement too fast for you to track, all of it ending up as a surprise, like you weren’t even in your body for a moment. “Th-thanks.” You study his hand, where it sits on your arm. “You know you’re so big?” His lips twitch to the side of his mouth.

“Yeah sweetheart. I’m big.” You’re still staring at his hand. “D’you need a ride home?”

“Huh?” He's held this in the back of his mind all night as a possibility, built a tentative plan for this opportunity too golden to pass up. No fucking way are you going home in a rideshare or with anyone else.

“I’m taking you home.” You shrug at the declaration with little trepidation and take his hand.

So sweet and full of trust.

He never specified which home.

When the gravel of his driveway crunches under the truck’s tires, you don’t stir, and you don’t wake up when he turns it off or opens the passenger side door, your head lolling against your shoulder.

“Sweetheart,” He keeps his voice low, reaching across your lap to unbuckle your seatbelt, brushing against your breasts, soft exhales puffing little clouds across his skin. “We’re here.”

“Hmm?” you crack an eye open and then shake your head, “no ‘m sleeping.” Your cheek is warm in his palm, and he kisses it, trying to rouse you, gauge your reaction. Your awareness. Your nose wrinkles. “Stop.”

“C’mon, you'll be more comfortable inside.” You whimper when he jostles you, pinning a palm to your temple.

“My head hurts.” Poor baby.

“I know,” he pulls you up out of the seat and into his chest, carefully supporting your balance. He’s taking liberties now, wrapping an arm around your waist, curling his fingers along the nape of your neck, brushing his lips across your forehead when you whine, high pitched and crackled, broken under the weight of too much alcohol and need for more sleep. “I know baby, Let’s get you into bed.” You lay your cheek on his chest and sigh.

“Okay.”

“Spit.” He holds the cup under your lips and you do as he asks diligently, bubbly white toothpaste getting caught on the corner of your mouth.

Getting you upstairs and into his room went just as he anticipated. A little anxiety, a little uncertainty, all of it gently soothed until you were sitting on his bed and he was taking off your shoes, reassuring you, promising everything was okay and you were right where you belonged.

“You’re safe with me sweetheart. I’m going to take care of you.”

Now, you’re perched on the closed toilet lid in his bathroom as he finishes brushing your teeth, sleepy and serene, naked thighs peeking out from beneath the hem of his t-shirt.

You’re completely unguarded, vulnerable, another layer peeled back, another piece he lays claim to.

His sweet little fawn.

He knew all along this was underneath the weight you carried. That when you finally felt safe and cherished and cared for, you’d bloom, be yourself without the pressure of everything else. Deep down, beneath the expectations of how everyone thinks you should talk, or act, or behave, behind all the coping mechanisms you’ve taught yourself, buried under mountains of complexity, is his precious little girl who needs her hand held and her tears wiped. Who’s brilliant and beautiful and different, and has never had the space to just be.

Now, you'll be able to do just that while he takes care of the rest. He'll decide. You’ll have boundaries. You’ll have rules. You’ll have daddy and he’ll take away the endless pressure that closes in on you from all sides, he'll ensure you get what you need. There will be less worry, less fear and unlimited opportunities to be.

“My face.” You tilt your chin back with your eyes closed, and he chuckles.

“What about it?”

“My,” hiccup, “makeup.” He turns the tap on warm, testing the temp until he’s satisfied, and soaks a washcloth.

“Keep your eyes closed.” You sit still as he works, dabbing away everything on your eyelids and lashes, wiping underneath to catch anything he missed. “There we go.” You sway in his grip and slur.

“Bed now?”

“Last thing.” There’s a glass of water and naproxen on the counter, and you swallow them without question. He hides his grimace. That will need to be addressed in the morning. When you try to put the glass back on the counter, he shakes his head. “All of it,” you manage to get the rest of the water down, and he squeezes your hip. “That’s my girl.”

“You’re warm.” Your arm is slung over his middle, a cold foot tucked between his knees, mouth half open on his pillow. Completely uninhibited, nearly asleep.

His cock is hard against his stomach beneath the waistband of his sweatpants, aching with a fullness he can’t relieve. He’s been hard since he undressed you, peeled your bra off and held you to his chest as he unhooked it, felt your perfect, pretty breasts and nipples against him as he tugged his shirt over your head. You were bashful, buried your face into his neck with a trembling giggle, but refused to let go, sunk your fingernails into his biceps as your hands shook. His sweet, shy girl.

He rubs your back, works his fingers in the knots between your shoulders, watching your lashes flutter as you try to fight sleep.

“Tomorrow…” There’s a last minute flash of uncertainty, and he presses his lips to your forehead.

“It’s okay, we’ll talk at breakfast sweetheart. It’s time for bed.” Tomorrow. You'll be fighting a battle tomorrow, a hangover, anxiety, an endless spiral of confusion and doubt, but he'll be here to guide you through it.

The only way out is through.

It will be a lot easier on both of you if you're able to get some sleep.

“Yeah, ’s past my bedtime.” You whisper with a hazy, playful smile on the wisp of a giggle. "We should have pancakes for breakfast." Your easy, peaceful state encourages him to go a step further. Cast a line, see if you’re biting.

"If you close your eyes and go to sleep, Daddy will make you pancakes in the morning." You nod with a yawn, tucking your face between the pillow and his shoulder.

"Mmkay then. Night." It's not a protest, it's not a flinch, it's not a moment of disgust, and satisfaction roars, rips through him like bullet, this instinct and desire long honed finally settling in the place where it belongs. In you.

"Goodnight baby." He stares at the ceiling as you disappear into dreams and plans his mission. Plots his checkpoints, sets his objectives. Lead, decide, control.

Bring you home. Permanently.

#peaches writes #raspberry girl fic #simon riley #simon riley x reader #simon ghost riley #simon ghost riley x reader #ghost x reader

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mrsbarnesblog · 8 months ago

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just us

masterlist

summary: a situation between pogues and kooks at the beach made Rafe rethink his priorities

word count: 1.8k.

warnings: season 4 spoilers, established relationship, mention of the dead turtle, that hoe Ruthie, protective Rafe

a/n: i'm obsessed with season 4, y'all. absolutely in love with everything that's going on and especially with Rafe being in a better place with a girl that he actually likes 🥹 this scene at the beach with turtles just made me sob, so I really need someone to drag that bitch by her hair. sorry not sorry.

Your heart was beating with adrenaline from the scene that just happened at the beach, with Topper’s girlfriend almost running over the pogues and being the usual insane bitch that she was. Rafe stood beside you, silent but shaking his buzzed head in disapproval.

Kie was standing on her knees on the sand, in shock, with juice still dripping down her face and hair. She brushed off the help of her friends, instead standing and picking something up from the ground, without hesitation, going towards the group of people around you. They seemed absolutely delighted by the whole situation, laughing, fist bumping each other, and making you want to punch every single one of them in the face.

You didn’t even want to be here in the first place, not with a bunch of people with whom you shared mutual hatred towards each other. Rafe was your only connection with them, and it seemed like even for him it was a bit too much. A fun day at a beach with a little surfing competition, where even Topper and JJ seemed to have some fun together, took the wrong turn way too quickly.

“Look what you did! Is this okay?” Kie stopped in front of Ruthie, reaching out her hand to show something that you weren’t able to see, but by the look on her face it was obviously serious to her. “There was a turtle hatch, you idiots! You drove right over it!” Your stomach twisted at the realization, and you took a step closer to see it yourself.

“Oh my God.” You whispered, catching a glimpse of a tiny dead turtle with a crushed shell laying in the palm of her hand. So little and harmless that the picture of it brought tears to your eyes.

“Don’t look, baby.” Rafe’s deep voice mumbled near your ear, with a warm hand sprawled across your back to try to distract you, but you shook your head, unable to take your eyes off it.

“All right, but it was only one.” Ruthie said with her usual attitude, nonchalantly pointing to the rest of the turtles that, luckily, were perfectly fine. Your mouth opened in disbelief, and you looked at Rafe to see him uncomfortably rubbing the back of his head.

“I’m so sorry, Kie…” You whispered to her, stepping further away from the kooks, eyes drifting again to the dead animal in her hand. No matter how hard you tried to fit in with Rafe and his friends, you could never be one of them if it meant to be a bunch of pompous and cruel rich kids. You thought that, maybe it was time for you to finally admit that.

“It’s not your fault, Y/N.” She briefly looked at you, because despite not being friends, there never were any arguments between you and the rest of the pogues, always keeping cool and friendly with each other. “There’s something wrong with you, people.” Kiara looked back at the kooks with disgust written all over her face.

“I’m leaving, Rafe.” Barely holding back your tears, you looked back at your boyfriend, before picking up your beach bag from the sand and turning around. “I’m sorry again for them, Kie.”

“No, wait, Y/N.” He pushed through the crowd, wide-eyed, quickly approaching you and grasping your wrist. “This is not—“

“I don’t want to be here. I didn’t sign up to hang out with your friends when I started dating you, okay?” You groaned in frustration, attempting to move, but Rafe stopped you. “I don’t even know why we’re here, why you are here, when you clearly don’t enjoy it anymore.”

“Listen, this is not so easy, okay?” He rolled his eyes, but you knew it was not fully directed at you; Rafe was already struggling with trusting those around him, and the fact that you slowly but steadily made him reconsider his current surroundings did not help.

“You are not like them, they are not your friends, don’t you understand it?” The pure desperation was speaking in you, searching for the answers in his eyes. You overheard some people laughing at you, as they were too confident that Rafe would never listen to someone like you, someone from the cut, not even realizing the war that was currently going on in his head.

He was silent, thinking, making his already overwhelmed mind go hundred miles per hour to figure something out, because you were right. The more time had passed, the more the two of you were together, the less Rafe found himself enjoying the presence of his old friends, the less he wanted to do that childish bullshit.

“This dumb fucking bitch almost ran over people and killed an innocent animal because her big ego got hurt, do you understand?! So I’m leaving. Alone or with you.” You almost whispered the last part to him, too scared that he'd not choose you. At the end of the day, you were a pogue, and no matter how much you tried, you would never be good enough for Rafe.

“What did you just call me?” Ruthie arched a brow, now shooting daggers at you.

“I called you a dumb fucking bitch, didn’t you hear me?” You spat, finally having a good enough reason to tell the truth right in her face. “Or are you too stupid to get that through your thick scull?”

“That’s rich, coming for a pogue. It’s just a cycle of life. And if you, losers, are so offended by that, it’s not my problem.”

“A cycle of life? Getting flattened by a truck is not a cycle of life.” Kiara pushed Ruthie with her hand, and it nearly turned into a fight, with JJ standing by his girlfriend's side. You turned away from them, too frustrated and drained to bother listening to the rest of the conversation, your gaze shifting to Rafe, who still held your hand.

“I want to leave. Stay here if you want to, I don’t care. I’m done with them, Rafe.” Your teary eyes met his blue ones, and he shook his head, pulling you closer with your forearms. The mere thought of you leaving him, angry and upset, triggered a whirlwind of panic within him.

“Hey, no, I’m not staying, okay?” Rafe's hands, now much gentler and delicate, touched your cheeks, wiping away a few tears that you could not keep back. Rafe had never been too comfortable with the display of emotions, and he was pretty sure that it was the first time he had actually seen you cry. And he knew how much you had always carried for animals, how you petted every stray cat or a dog on the street, and how you hated any form of violence against them.

The pulsating and aching feeling in his chest at the sight of your tears made him want to drop everything, or rather, eliminate everyone who had upset you, and just hold you in his arms.

“Aw, look at you.” You heard that annoying voice behind you back again, pulling you out of the bubble in which you fell, and turning around, you saw that Kie and JJ were no longer there. Your eyes instantly rolled back as Ruthie looked at you with her usual fake sympathy, crossing her arms over her chest. “Go back to your side of the island, you’re not one of us. Don’t even know why Rafe bothers to bring you here when you’re just another dirty toy to—“

Rafe left your side before she could finish her sentence, looming over her with the most furious expression you had ever seen on his face. Everyone and everything seemed to fall silent for a moment, and you held your breath, unsure what he would do. “Wanna say some bullshit about her? Try to do it right in my face and see what happens.”

“You’re not seriously protecting the pogue. She’s not on our side.” Her smile faded, her eyes now nervously looking between Rafe and Topper, who was standing behind her back.

“C’mon, Rafe…” He started, but quickly shut his mouth as soon as Rafe turned his head towards him with a silent threat. You felt your heartbeat quickening as the atmosphere started to get even more intense. Everyone around you also started arguing and saying God knows what, but Rafe was awfully calm, and it frightened you even more.

You moved closer to them as you made your way through the warm sand, until you were able to place a comforting hand on your boyfriend's back. He was so tense under your touch that it amazed you how the hell he was not shaking because of it. The only times you had ever seen him behaving that way was when people whispered something about his father behind his back.

“It’s okay, Ray.” You whispered, kissing his shoulder and sliding your hand down his back to take a hold of his bicep.

“You’re lucky that I don’t hit women. But if I hear a single word about my girlfriend again, you will regret it, I promise you." Your stomach flattered from the way he protected you, from the way his friends opened their mouths in shock at his words. Even Topper and Kelce were too stunned to speak, sending each other weird glances. “Control, your crazy bitch, Top.”

As if nothing had happened, Rafe stepped back, throwing a protective hand over your shoulders and guiding you away from the group. He was silent for a whole walk towards his truck, only stopping near the passenger door and turning you to face him.

His worried blue eyes were almost shining under the bright and hot sun and you saw words forming in his head and sitting at the tip of his tongue. You waited another minute, while Rafe was focused on your necklace, thinking. His hands found a place on your waist, rubbing circles into your skin, until he finally took a deep breath and looked up.

“You’re right.” He said simply. “I’m not this person anymore. That shit with racing with pogues was fun and all, but I didn’t like what happened today.” You half smiled, nodding and encouraging him to talk. “If—if I want to be like my dad, I need to have my priorities straight. No more of this bullshit, no more fake ass people, yeah? You’re the only one who's been here for me for a long fucking time. You’re the only one who I can trust, baby.”

His hand cupped your cheek, eyes focused solemnly on you, before he lowered himself closer to you to place a kiss on your lips.

“This is the right decision. You’ve overgrown them, you’re a better man now. And i’ll be here for you whenever you need me, I promise. I guess it’s just us now." Your body sagged against his, too wrapped in the comfort of his presence to even care about anything else. Your lips brushed against his, making Rafe groan.

“Just us, baby.”

#rafe cameron imagine #rafe outer banks #rafe cameron #rafe x you #rafe fanfiction #rafe x reader #rafe imagine #rafe fic #rafe cameron x reader #rafe obx #outerbanks rafe #rafe cameron fluff #rafe cameron fic #rafe cameron fanfiction #rafe cameron x you #obx rafe cameron #rafe cameron x female reader #obx x reader #obx fanfiction

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joelsdagger · 3 months ago

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a love so fine || one shot

joel miller x f!reader

for my girl, @dinandwhiskey, happy belated birthday babe! ily so dearly. massive shout out to my beloveds, @phoeberidgers and @pedrospatch for being my eyes, my brain and my heart, without them, i am equivalent to the tin man (they also keep me sane) <33

pairing: jackson joel x f!reader summary: an evening in with your husband helps to quiet the brain noise. warnings: jackson era [around tlou part ii timeline], canon divergent [golfing doesn’t happen and everyone is happy and thriving bc i said so], implied age gap [no specific age for reader but joel is late 50’s], established relationship, HUSBAND joel, DOMESTIC JOEL, sickly-sweet fluff, reader can’t cook [i swear i can], pet names [baby, sweet baby, darlin’, (1) use of the word kiddo, an excessive amount of the use of the word “baby” bc i can’t seem to help myself], JOEL IN A THIGH HOLSTER, dirty talk, unprotected p in v sex, biiiiiiig breeding kink [ruh roh], joel says dagum bc he’s old, hint of a mama kink, praise kink, (1) (2) (3) uses of the word “daddy”, smidgen of begging + teasing, a bit of mocking, angst in the form of internal turmoil [duh it’s me what did you expect], feelings of inadequacy + guilt/shame, hurt/comfort, tinge of sex as a coping mechanism, soft emotional smut, finger sucking, oral [m!receiving], cock and ball worship [girl’s got a big oral fixation let her live], hand kink, blink and you miss subby!joel, switch reader, hint of dacryphilia, gentle–turned–semi–rough sex, soft dom!joel, mean!joel [but the sexy kind], prone bone, doggy style, hair pulling, light spanking, creampie, size kink [joel is huuuge and big and strong and at one point lifts reader onto a counter], & reader has hair long enough to grab. word count: 6.4k dividers by @saradika-graphics

masterlist || ao3 || follow @joelsdaggerupdates for notifs!!

gorgeous moodboard by @here-briefly

Cold air whimpers into the house as Joel steps through the front door when you’re pulling the semi-burnt meat pies out of the oven, the cold nip blanketed by the heat emanating from the cavity. You set them aside, and turn your attention to the pot of soup on the burner, your mom’s old family recipe, when you’re greeted by Joel’s figure materializing behind you. Broad palms splay across the expanse of your back, big, thick arms wrapping around your middle, shivering at the cold bite of his cheek against yours. You sink into his embrace, allowing him to feed off of your warmth.

“Was patrol okay?” you ask, unfocused as your eyes scan over the creased paper for what feels like the hundredth time in the last two hours.

His chin dips. Snow dusts from his head onto your shoulder. “Was fine. Couple of stragglers. Took care of them,” scruff of his face scratches at your neck as he nuzzles into your skin. “You’re home early.”

You hum, your free hand drifts to meet his.“Surprisingly slow day at the clinic. Closed up by six, the staff booked it to the bar afterward.” You tilt your head to rest against his, basking in the crisp scent of snow, pine, and gunpowder on him, one you’ve come to recognize as home.

“Y’didn’t wanna go with them?” he asks, thumb stroking over your stomach.

“Nah, the clinic kicked me on my ass today. Wanted to come home, make somethin’ nice for us,” you say, reaching over the stovetop, turning the rusted knob up a few notches, flame sizzling beneath the pot.

“Already got my something nice,” he purrs, dips his nose into your hair, reveling in the scent of your shampoo as he presses two kisses in quick succession to your temple, broad hands retreating and sneaking into your jean pockets over your ass, squeezing as he leans in to nip at your carotid.

You shrug him off in jest. “Alright, slow your roll, cowboy. You’re pulling my focus here.” His chest rumbles with a laugh against you.

“This one’s still giving you trouble, huh?” his lips pressed up against the shell of your ear as he peers over your shoulder.

You set the wooden spoon aside, opting to let the broth simmer, flavors marry that way. “I just don’t get how she did it. I’ve tried it about a million times. It never comes out right,” you sigh exasperatedly.

He chuckles. “Honey, you’ve been cooking all of what? Five seconds? This recipe’s been in your family for years. Cut yourself some slack here, baby.” He leans against the counter and crosses his arms.

You can’t help rolling your eyes because this isn’t your first attempt. You’re exhausted and hungry, and you know Joel is too. You’re more than capable at work, cleaning up blood from surface wounds, expertly wrapping the occasional tourniquet, extracting bullets lodged in patrollers without even blinking. But in this slice of your life, you know you could be doing more.

He doesn’t hesitate, head wobbles a bit, right shoulder tips, “I know it’s a lot to ask of ya,” he says softly.

You huff slightly. “Alright, alright, enough,” sparing him a quick glance, picking up the spoon again.

“Give it here,” he attempts, fingers motioning to hand over the spoon. You scold him in turn, reluctant to seek his help, something else you seem unable to forgo despite the world going to shit.

“Alright,” he starts, as he moves to wrap his strong arms around your waist. “You. Sit here,” he sets you down on the countertop beside the stove.

“Joooeeel,” you protest and begin shifting your weight in readiness to hop off the countertop.

“Nah–” Joel puts his palm up, intercepting your movements.

You roll your eyes but don’t fight him again, fingers curl under the countertop, legs dangling from the edge as you watch him swirl the wooden spoon in the soup. You bite your lip, a knot curling in your chest. Domesticity is a nice look on him. You often tell him as much, but this time you don’t. “Oh – don’t tell me you can cook now. Much less my own family recipe. You can do everything else, can I have this one damn thing.”

His eyes crinkle at the corners, and mouth tugs up. “Says the doctor who spends all her time fixin’ up everyone else in this town. Could probably do it in your sleep.” He spoons the soup, pinching a sliced carrot in the bowl of the spoon, testing its tenderness.

“Alright, but if you burn it, we gotta eat at the community hall again.” You lean back, your head resting against the cabinet.

He lifts the spoon to his lips, eyes closing as he savors the bite and swallows. “You even taste it? ‘Cause it’s pretty darn good, sweetheart.”

When you don’t respond, he dips his index finger into the pot, strides over to you, and slants himself in between your legs. He taps the bottom of your lip. “Open up,” he commands softly.

You do as he says and close your lips around the digit and hum.

A balanced blend of rich sweetness and delicious saltiness with a hint of tang on the finish dances on your taste buds.

He’s right; it’s pretty good. But you don’t revel in it. Your mind focused on Joel’s lips parting at the sight, his eyes trained on your lips around his finger. You watch him, your lips curving into a smirk as he removes his index finger, swiped clean, and replaces it with his thumb, pushing past your lips and onto your tongue.

One of your hands instinctively reaches up to wrap around his wrist, his head dips slightly lower, lips only a hairsbreadth from yours, woodsy-salty taste of him and the heat from the burner melding together, clouding your mind. You feel the hitch in his breath against your lips, black slowly taking up the hazel hues in his eyes as they stay trained on your mouth, sucking his thumb.

“Good girl,” he whispers softly, almost casually.

You preen at his praise. Teeth barely grazing the pad of his thumb. You can feel the bulge against your belly, sitting firm between layers and layers of clothing, growing more and more evident with every passing second his thumb stays pressed into your mouth.

You release his thumb with a soft pop, biting back a grin, your hand reaching up to card your fingers through his too-long hair, “tastes good.”

You both know you’re not just talking about the soup.

You tuck a curl behind his ear. The corner of his mouth tugs up, and his thumb traces the shape of your lips, lustful eyes focused on yours as his soft lips envelop yours, the hairs of his mustache tickling your face. You giggle into his mouth. Then both his hands cradle your face, the metal of his wedding band bitingly cold against your cheek, you shiver.

Your finger hooks into the holster on his thigh, drawing him in, grinning when you feel the tightness behind his jeans, rock solid, and throbbing. You grind upwards, rolling your clothed cunt against his bulge, a deep groan pours from his mouth into yours. Arousal clouds your senses as you fuse your body to his, nails digging into the leather of his strap, lungs fighting for air between heavy pants until—

A loud sputtering sound from beside you forces you apart, and your heads dart towards the stove.

Shit shit shit.

You hastily hop down from the counter, lunging for the knob, your other hand simultaneously pulling the pot off the burner.

You let out a sigh of relief, “Thank God. It’s not burnt. Think it’s ready if you wanna eat now, or do you wanna run through the shower first?” you ask over your shoulder.

Joel huffs out a quiet laugh, places a firm hand on the small of your back as he reaches for the tethered cabinet above your head, “let’s eat darlin.’”

—

You’d been glancing to and fro between your sketchbook and Joel propped up beside you with a book in bed for the last fifteen or so minutes. The soft glow from the lamp on the nightstand to your left, capturing his features just right for you to doodle them as accurately as you can.

His post shower hair combed back into soft waves, tucked behind his ears and down his neck. It’s getting quite long; curls threaten to slip into the collar of his sleep shirt. He’s long overdue for a trim really, but you love it this way. He won’t admit it, and you won’t remind him, so it stays.

A thin pair of old rimless reading glasses are perched on the scarred bridge of his nose. He’s got his free hand stretched out and resting on the top of your thigh beneath the covers, thumb slowly stroking your skin — always needing to touch you. The hour is quiet. Peaceful. You could stay like this forever with him; bellies full and freshly showered, in bed before ten. If he’ll still have you.

His other hand props up the book holding his attention. An Idiot’s Guide to Space, reads the broken purple spine. The book so small in his big hands. Heat blooms in your chest for the second time, the first when he pulled it out of his nightstand an hour prior. Something he does at the end of each night.

Joel found it on patrol one morning. He kept it to himself at first, tucked away in his top drawer, until you stumbled upon it while putting his folded clothes away. A freshly showered Joel emerged from the bathroom, Ellie’s always goin’ on and on about space. Ain’t got a damn clue about any of it, he admitted shyly.

Sometimes he’ll blurt out a fact or two while you’re in bed or padding out of the bathroom. His voice cutting through your reverie –

“Baby, says here you could cross the damn Milky Way in twelve fuckin’ years. Did you know that?” he chances a glance at you.

You chuckle at him. “Yes, I did know that, baby,” shaking your head a little.

“Shit. So it’s just me with the two of you experts?” he asks with a laugh.

You smile to yourself. You don’t tell him that Ellie's the one who told you that little tidbit.

You tuck your pen between the pages and close your sketchbook, laying it on the small table beside you, “We’ll get you there someday, baby,” you tease.

Joel snorts, reaching for your arm and tucking you into his side. You rest your head on his chest, his fingertips softly brushing the skin of your arm. “Quit yankin’ my chain, ‘cause baby, you got no idea what you’re playin’ at.”

Oh. But you do.

You peer up at him, studying the hard lines in his face and the soft gray shadows under his eyes from exhaustion, too much violence.

You shift to dip your head lower down the curve of his belly. Your hand traces a line down his middle, following the thickening trail of hair down his supple belly, slipping beneath the covers, fingertips grazing the outline of his length over gray sweats, hand cupping his semi-hard cock.

Joel flinches, glasses jolt. It spurs you on.

You palm him through his pants, and he hisses through clenched teeth.

“Whaddya doin’ down there, kiddo?” he asks tersely, his gaze lifting over the top of his glasses.

Heat rises to your cheeks. That damn pet name. One that he uses more often these days, when you’re being a pain in his ass. The one that reminds you just how much older he is.

Liquid heat pools between your thighs.

You gaze up at him, “I just wanna play with him a little. Is that okay?” Falsely innocent eyes sparkling, your fingers circling the head of his cock over his pants.

He makes a low sound, and stirs. “Darlin’ if I ever say no to you, you take my revolver n’ use it on me.” A hint of playfulness in his tone.

You giggle softly. “As fun as that would be, cowboy, that’d deprive me of my happiness,” fingers pulling the blanket and his sweats down in one fluid motion, revealing his hardening cock.

Deft fingers now stroking through your hair. “Lemme guess. That happiness got more to do with my dick than anythin’ else?” he asks, lips curling with a soft laugh.

You don’t respond, you suspect the smirk that quirks your lips is answer enough for him. Your head dips lower; grabbing the full length of him in both of your hands — so fucking big. Your lips close around the wide head, and you hum.

He rests the book on his stomach, tucks an arm behind his head, and watches you as you get to work on his length. You pull your lips off him. “You want me to continue? You better keep readin’ that book of yours, Miller,” you say firmly.

A blush creeps up his thick neck; watch as his Adam’s apple bops in his throat. “Yes, ma’am,” raising the book again and continuing where he left off.

Satisfied, you shift to move down the mattress, the sheets moving with you and bunching at the foot of the bed.

Your mouth gets back to work on his cock, now fully stiff in your grasp, head swollen and flushed red. Your lips curling around it, your other hand wrapped around the base, fingers barely wrapping around the thick girth of him. You lathe a wet kiss to the tip, and then suction the mushroom shape of him hard, an obscene sound filling the quiet of your bedroom. The heavy weight of him pulses and leaks onto the pink softness of your tongue. You lap up the salty precum leaking at the slit and in your periphery, catch Joel fisting the corner of your pillow. He’s panting, shaky breaths escape him while he attempts to read. You smirk around him. He likes it like this; slow, lazy – sloppy.

Your gaze drops back down as you pull off him and dip your head down to his low-hanging balls, heavy and already set to burst. You take one in your mouth, the tip of your tongue slowly draws circles along the thin, stretchy flesh, while your other hand slowly pumps the long length of him. You feel a strong hand meeting the back of your skull, fingers sewn through the strands of your hair, his muscles beneath you tightening.

You feel the heat of his gaze, almost impossible to ignore, it urges you on. Your other hand cups his other ball, gently fondling the heavy weight of it, fingers gently twiddling the skin. You suckle softly at his sac, eliciting a strained whimper from Joel, his hips cant upwards, cock twitching in your face.

“Fuckin’ love them,” you whisper, turning your attention to the other, laying a soft kiss on the underside of his ball. That one is just for you.

“Yeah?” he exhales. “Keep goin’ then, baby,” fingers curling around the back of your neck, instructing you with the faintest bit of pressure.

Your eyes glance up in time to find him dragging his other hand down his face, book now stacked haphazardly upon the others on his side table. His glasses sit low on the tip of his nose, eyes shut tight, dark brows pinched. All his features meld together in pleasure as he loses himself in you.

You asked him to continue reading but you can’t deny this is what you wanted all along. He looks beautiful like this; in the soft golden glow in the bedroom, tan sun-freckled skin all bare for you, mouth ajar and chest heaving with ragged breaths, veins in his neck thick and prominent as his chin tilts upward. The sight makes you ache.

You never minded this. Matter of fact, you love it. Giving. Taking care of him, encouraging him to chase after something he wants. You never used to enjoy it before but Joel Miller so rarely takes. So rarely selfish. And seeing strong, stoic men, your man, come apart for you just from your mouth makes you rub your thighs together to soothe the brimming ache.

Joel Miller – the man who despite the kinder, slower years spent in Jackson and never once hesitating to lend a hand to those in need, who still had a mean reputation, allowing himself to revel in the feeling of you taking care of him. The hard lines of his usual scowl gone from his face and replaced with twisted lines of pleasure. Letting himself take take take and being shameless in doing so.

You suck hard on the ball in your mouth and he moans loudly, feel it draw up between your lips. “Oh – fuck – that’s good,” his head topples back against the headboard with a hard thud, “so good,” he breathes.

Your clothed core tightens, feel the ruined material cling to your lips.

And because you can. You pull off him and give the head of his cock a little wet kiss.

You blink up at him to find him watching you with bated breath, hazel eyes blown completely black. You gather saliva beneath your tongue, let a strand drool, and land directly on his slit. Joel’s entire body shivers, hips thrusting upwards into the air on instinct, his fingers in your hair tighten, blunt fingertips digging into your heated skin. “Dagum you’re good at that, baby.”

You smile and pump the length of him slowly, twisting upwards and running your thumb over his tip. Your mouth retakes its place on his length, lips stretching open around the bulbous head as you ease your head lower and lower on his length, pushing him in, in, in past your gag reflex. Tears prick at your eyes, pushing him in until his cock coaxes the back of your throat; you gag around him, and Joel groans raggedly at the sound. He loves it. You lift your head and hum around him as you begin bopping your head up and down the length of him, your fist pumps what you can’t fit into your mouth. And Joel whimpers, and jerks, hips canting to meet every bob and every stroke, every lick and every kiss.

A tear cascades down your cheek when you swallow, the silken walls of your throat tighten around him, and at that, Joel makes a pained noise. “Get up here,” he growls, his hand drawing your mouth off him.

You prop yourself up, shove up his shirt to lay wet kisses up the trail of his graying hair. Your mouth dips left of his belly button, pecking the deep scar, an unwelcome reminder of his fall that nearly ended in fatality.

Your lips press a kiss south of his belly button before you tongue at it. You feel the muscles in his belly quiver beneath the softness of your tongue, goosebumps ghosting his skin, your hand still wrapped around the thick girth of him — it pulses in your grasp. “Fuck– You’re gonna make me come,” he tugs at your neck again, dragging you up to straddle his lap.

“That’s kind of the point here, baby,” you say as you pepper the whiskered corners of his mouth in little kisses. “I wanted you to come in my mouth.” You brush your lips against his, and he chuckles. The hand still at the base of your neck holds you there as his tongue sneaks into your mouth, licks along the line of your gums to taste the salty flavor of himself, you moan in unison.

He’s still panting when your fingers run through his tousled hair, feeling droplets of sweat at his temple. You kiss at the shadows under his eyes, glasses long forgotten somewhere. Joel’s tongue flicks the corner of his lips, thumbs away the tear beneath your eye then at the thin string of saliva clinging to the skin on your chin and he presses another quick peck to your lips, and against your lips.

“You look so goddamn sexy like this,” he whispers softly, before pushing his lips to yours once again.

You smile against him. “That mean I can continue?” you whisper.

You feel his lips twitch, he peels your shirt from your body, then his, and then his hands find your hips, swiftly flipping you over, his broad form towering over you. “Got another idea, little mama.”

“Like what daddy,” dropping your voice at the word “daddy”. You’ve never thought to try the nickname out but you know you’ve plucked a chord when you feel his cock twitch between your bodies and you’re mentally kicking yourself that you’ve waited this long.

Who knew Joel Miller, at the ripe old age of fifty-nine would realize he had a daddy kink.

A low growl slips from his lips, “say it again.”

You bite back a grin that threatens to pull over your lips, your chest blooming at the thought of Joel Miller growing so comfortable with you that he’s unashamed in asking you for things that make him feel good. You want nothing more than to give that to him, so you do.

“What are you gonna do with me, daddy?” you ask, feigning seriousness.

“Might need to stuff that slutty mouth of yours again,” the amber in his eyes so warm and filled with lust.

You shrug, exaggerate a sigh, “I wouldn’t complain.”

He shakes his head but you catch the creases around his eyes, feel the low chuckle reverberate through the slats of his ribs.

“No, you wouldn’t,” he begins and his fingers hook around the waistband of your panties, “but like I said, I’ve got other plans for you tonight.”

“And what exactly do those plans entail, daddy?” you ask, your fingers ghost over his shoulders, up his neck and into his dampened temples. A smirk tugging the corner of your lips at the slow drag of your underwear down your legs.

He doesn’t answer. His hand cups your mound, feels the sticky wet at your opening, your body jolts at the first fleeting sliver of attention your hungry cunt’s received all night. “Pussy’s this wet all ‘cause you blowin’ me, hm? You like it that much, baby?” He cocks his head, a smug grin plastered on his face.

A blissful sigh falls from your lips, he encourages you further when he guides the head of his cock to your messy pussy.

You arch and squirm and moan on instinct, the agonizingly slow drag of his cock through your puffy folds meticulous in measured movements. Your head falls back, fists clenching, pussy fluttering, and Joel just smirks.

“Yeah she likes that, don’t she?” he asks, his hazel eyes burning into yours.

Your heart falls. A wanton moan slips past your lips. You want to respond. You do. But you can’t ignore that sudden, all too familiar spike of fear beginning to flare in your chest.

His hand cups your chin almost immediately. Joel knows you all too well. Before you even know it yourself, he sees it in the storms in your eyes, the slight tremble of your fingers, the sudden rapid rise and fall of your chest. Joel’s observant, always functioning on high alert. He’s helped you through moments like this over the years, and both of you thought they were long gone. But the guilt and shame claw their way back tonight, decidedly paying a visit.

“Hey. Stay with me, honey,” he implores, brows pinching.

Unbidden tears prickle your eyes. Your eyes slip shut. I can’t. You want to say. It’s too much. The sharp blackening teeth of shame sinking into your skin, gnawing a hole low in your belly. How do you tell your husband that even after six years together you’re still afraid to put yourself first. Afraid that if you do, he’ll abandon you just as everybody else has. How do you tell him that even though he’s never shown you he has any intention of doing so, you’ve made yourself believe that he will. That small noise in your brain ugly, rotten. And no matter how hard you try you can never seem to quiet it. How do you tell him that all you want is for him to fuck you. So hard he brings you to tears. To quiet the noise. Stamp out the flame. But you can’t seem to form the words. Can’t bring yourself to tell him and maybe even worse, you still don’t understand why after all these years spent with him. I don’t know how.

He hinges forward, broad form crowding yours into the mattress, hands find yours beside your head, a soft clink ricochets in your ears when the metal of your wedding bands meet.

“Talk to me, baby, what is it?” he whispers, his cock still gliding through your lower lips.

“I–” your stammering cuts off into a soft whine, eyes flittering.

“What?” He cocks his head, warm breath fanning across your face.

Your guilt-ridden mind screaming at you to scramble for words. To get him to understand. Little do you know, he does. Has for a long time. Your past often makes you forget. Here. In the now, he reminds you.

“I can’t–” you sigh when he kisses the corner of your mouth, “Joel– I–”

“I– I– I–” Joel mocks above you. “Can’t use your words cause you’re only thinking of my cock ain’t ya?”

You keen at that, cheeks bloom. He’s right. Only you rarely ask for it.

“Always want it, but you never ask for it. Been your husband for two years and I still oughta show you I ain’t ever leavin’, is that it?”

You mewl all petulant and small.

He reaches to bring your left hand to his mouth, pressing a fleeting kiss to the cold metal of your wedding band. “Y’know m’all yours, sweetheart. Haven’t I shown you?” He presses another kiss to the band. “Or these mean nothin’ to ya?” A hint of smirk passes over his lips as he lays a third kiss to your fingers, your skin ablaze.

They mean everything to you. He means everything to you. The words die on your tongue but he knows. He’s only teasing you because he needs to hear it, needs to hear that honey sweet giggle to bring you back to him. And although you wish he didn’t have to, you can’t deny that his persistent efforts make you feel just as desirable as the day he slanted his mouth over yours and made you his forever. Long before solemn vows and makeshift wedding venues. Before ratty ‘his and hers’ bath towels and engraved silver bands. He claimed you as his and he as yours and even still, it doesn’t seem to be enough. Your mind slips and the pulp of his forefinger traces down your sternum, follows the line of your stomach, goosebumps rising in its wake.

“Joel–” you giggle quietly, and his eyes gleam.

“Ah. There she is,” he says so softly in that honey Texan drawl that makes your stomach fall away.

His hand flattens, broad palm drifts down the softness of your belly and settles beneath your navel, the cold bite of his wedding finger making you quiver.

His dark eyes flicker. “How about I really fill you up? Hm?” His hand drifts further south, grips the root of his cock between your bodies, glides the underside of his cock, featherlight, through your swollen lips, the angry red almost purple tip bumps your throbbing clit before he slides it back down through your folds, letting the head catch at your drooling hole. “You wanted to know what I plan on doin’ to ya? M’gettin’ my wife pregnant. Give my sweet baby a baby? Would you like that?”

The rest of what he wants to say lingers on the tip of his tongue, mulling around in his mouth, show you, I ain’t goin’ nowhere.

Your breath hitches, eyes go wide. Your thoughts are clouded by him. Your belly swelling, carrying your child. His child. Yes. Yes. Yes. You want it. You want it with him.

You breathe out a desperate moan, “God, yes. Joel. Yes.”

His cock, heavy and thick, still glides through your messy folds, the head of his cock catching, catching, catching at your hole, coating his length in webs of your slick. The sweet sound of your wet echoing loudly in your shared bedroom.

��That sound like I wanna leave you?” He asks gruffly.

You shake your head vigorously, your hips canting upwards, chasing after him.

You hiss when his tip bumps your clit. You pout at him. “Joel. You’re being mean–” your words tapering off into a soft sob.

He laughs at that, presses the incredibly wide head in, then back out and up again, “Not being mean, baby. Just tryna get you outta your head s’all.” And he says it like it’s the easiest thing in the world. Like breathing. Your chest swells. He’s right fucking there. Right in front of you. But it seems as if there is no end in sight for the longing you feel for him.

“You want it? You oughta ask for it nice, sweet baby,” he says simply.

Your pout grows more petulant, but you concede. You’re always the first to let up between the two of you. You’re easy for him that way.

“Joel, please fuck me. Need you to fuck me, please,” you plead, words slipping into a soft moan.

His eyes scan your face, feel his lashes flutter against your skin. He lines himself up at the opening of your cunt. “I will. I always fuck you well don’t I?”

You nod numbly, biting your lip and guiltily averting your gaze. Finger tracing up a line up his strong thigh, over his soft belly that protrudes over his still hard cock, circle the scarred tissue on his lower abdomen.

He takes your hand in his, lays a kiss to your palm before settling it to cradle his own face. “M’gonna fuck you real good, sweetheart. Remind you how good you are for me.”

You make a soft sound that halts his movements, fingers squeezing his. “I want it hard, Joel,” you say. And he nods in understanding. Always meeting you where you are. There’s no halfway with him. He sits back, gently taps the side of your thigh, turn around.

You do as silently requested and twist; your stomach and chest meet the sheets, body prone on the mattress — your favorite way of taking him.

He presses his body weight into you, his entire form enveloping yours while his hand dips south to line himself up. He thrusts forward, moaning in unison as he breaches and stretches you wide, quelling the ache when he fills your cunt in one sharp thrust. He bites your shoulder on instinct, and your eyes pinch shut in response. Joel sets a blistering pace that has your cunt constricting around him. His soft belly is flush to the small of your back, feel the sweat sliding between your bodies, welcome tears spill from your eyes, and the guilt that sat in the pit of your belly turns molten.

“That’s it, thatta’girl,” he grits into the dampened space behind your ear.

His words make you clench, and in response, his hand finds the nape of your neck, fingers curling and smothering your face into the mattress, and you practically sing for him in return. Your legs clamp shut, limiting the space he has to fuck into you and he groans so beautifully for you. His hand sneaks around your front, scrubs expertly at your throbbing clit, and your vision begins to blur, fists clutching the linens so tight you’re tearing them.

“Oh god, Joel,” you cry out, the intense pleasure beginning to overwhelm you.

“That’s it–fuck–” he grunts, “make–me–so damn–happy, baby–fuck, never—never–known it before you,” Joel rasps, punctuating every word with a sharp thrust.

You mewl and writhe beneath him in tandem, and then his massive hand grips your face, angles it towards him so your lips meet his, his index finger in your mouth, hooked behind the line of your gums to take take take. Your body jolts as his cock kisses your womb on every brutal thrust.

“Joel, harder, please, harder,” you beg against his lips. So fucking desperate for more.

He pulls out suddenly; a lewd, wet squelch of gaping emptiness escapes your cunt when it closes around his absence. He takes you with him, collecting you in his arms and moving the two of you up the bed and guiding you to your knees, facing the headboard. His chest fuses to your back again, knuckles brushing the globe of your ass as he parts the flesh to sink into you once more. Your head topples back onto his shoulder, buries his face into the crook of your neck, muffling the guttural moan that elicits from him as you take him deeper.

He lays a harsh slap to your ass, then firmly grips the plush flesh, soothing the sting with a rough squeeze. And then, his right hand finds a home on your hips, dull fingertips digging into your lush flesh. Your head turns, mouth meeting the hinge of his jaw. Your right hand reaches for his scalp, carding a hand through his sweaty curls to pull him closer as you babble breathlessly, fuck–I lo–I love you. I love you, Joel. Joel. Joel. Joel.

He chants in turn, I love you, baby, my sweet baby. I’m not goin’ anywhere. M’not. I swear it, branding each word with messy kisses to your temple. His left hand interlocks with yours, wedding bands clinking, kissing at the close. Your cunt flutters around him when he recites the same words he groaned into your waiting mouth on your wedding night, God, you’re so good for me. S’ you n’ me sweetheart. You n’ me. Always and forever.

His hand releases your right hip, fingers tangling painfully into your hair at the base of your neck, pulling on the strands to drag your mouth to his. He slants his plush lips to yours, a deep groan pours from his mouth into yours when you squeeze around him. His cock grazes that spongy spot he made his long ago, and your hips push back, meeting him thrust for thrust, wanting more. His thrusts grow harsher, faster, stronger, until pain and pleasure coalesce. The pressure of his massive, unrelenting length battering your wasted cunt makes the room spin, vision waning.

“Give it to me, baby. Come with me. I got you darlin’,” he chants as he pounds into you. “Let go for me, honey. C’mon. Show me you’re mine. Need to feel this pussy come for me. Let go, Let go.”

Your walls pulse and Joel moans, low and breathy, something deep in his chest crumbling. You feel his cock jerk inside you, desperate and holding holding holding for you to meet him there. His teeth nip your ear and it’s all it takes for you to fall apart. Your navel tenses, cunt fluttering around his length, as you come with loud broken moans of his name, and he swallows them with deep groans of yours. He breaks, his fist slamming against the oil painting above the bed while he empties himself inside you, his cock spitting his cum at the mouth of your womb.

Your body goes limp against the painting, thighs still trembling against his, his body going lax against yours. Your head drops forward; tacky skin of your forehead meets the sticky surface with a soft thud. Joel groans lowly against your neck, chest heaving as he sears wet kisses to the top of your spine as he comes down.

You stay like that for a while. When Joel’s chest stops heaving, he rolls off you, and when your breathing slowly returns, you flop to the mattress by his side.

You turn to face him, your chest sticking to his, tacky skin glistening with sweat in the moonlight from the window across the room.

He cradles the side of your face in his palm, the pad of his thumb wipes away the tears before pressing it into your mouth. You nip at it gently on instinct, and Joel laughs.

“I don’t got another round in me tonight, baby,” voice throaty and gruff. You giggle and call him an old man.

And he grumbles something that sounds a lot like, m’not that old. To which you quip, whatever you say, grumpy old man.

Joel scoffs. “Yet you still like suckin’ this old man’s cock, ain’t that right, sweetheart?” His hand tracing a line up and down your spine.

You hum blissfully.

A beat passes, and with a smirk on his lips, his hand wanders to your drippy slit, you whine when he dips two fingers inside your cunt — still sore and puffy, still gaping.

He presses deep, the cold nip of his wedding ring inside your cunt making you jolt. “Thought you said you couldn’t go another round, old man?” You say, a little breathless.

His wicked smirk broadens. “I did. That don’t mean the same for you though.”

A gush of his cum pours out of you, coating his ring in your joint mess as his fingers pump in and out of your gaping emptiness.

He grunts and pulls you on top of him. “I said I'd give you a baby, didn’t I? I intend on keepin’ my promise. We oughta make sure it takes”.

For hours, Joel made no effort to pull out of you. He fucked into your used, wet heat with his fingers. And he didn’t stop. Not until the snowflakes sprinkling outside your window turned into darts of rain that softly pelted against the glass. Not until the swirl of pale gray and muted blue in the sky washed away into a blush of dusty pink and petal violet, the sun splitting the clouds on the horizon, a sliver of sun peeking between the curtains and spilling across worn sheets, shrouding your silhouette in a soft golden light. And maybe just maybe, this time, it’ll finally take. And with it, maybe that flame of fear is snuffed for good. Always and forever.

#the way i rewrote this so many times it gave me carpal tunnel #so not cool #anyway ciao!#joel miller #joel miller x reader #joel miller x f!reader #jackson!joel x reader #husband!joel #game!joel miller #joel miller fic #joel miller smut #joel miller fanfiction #the last of us fanfiction #noelle's workshop

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jungwnies · 3 months ago

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F1 GRID (1/2) | being lifted onto a counter

୨ৎ : featuring : max verstappen, lewis hamilton, george russell, carlos sainz, & charles leclerc (click here for part two) ୨ৎ : synopsis (requested by anon 🫐) : your f1 boyfriend picking you up on the counter... or maybe even vice verse for shits and giggles ;)

୨ৎ : genre : comedic romance & slightly suggestive (for some drivers) ୨ৎ : tws : suggestive if you SQUINT ୨ৎ : word count : 1893

୨ৎ masterlist ୨ৎ

ᡣ𐭩 a/n : y'all it's freaking race weekend finally... i can feel the winter depression leaving my body 👻

ʚ・max verstappen

max was feeling smug.

not that it was unusual, but this time, he had good reason.

he had just lifted you onto the kitchen counter with zero effort, hands firm on your waist, placing you there like you weighed nothing. you had gasped, mildly startled, but it was hard to argue when his grin was so self-satisfied.

“there,” he said, standing between your legs, his hands still resting on your thighs. “problem solved.”

you arched a brow at him, trying not to melt at how good he looked with his post-workout messy hair and that stupid smirk. “oh? and what exactly was the problem?”

max shrugged, fingers giving a playful squeeze to your legs. “you were in my way.”

you scoffed, lightly smacking his shoulder. “you just like showing off.”

his smirk widened. “you love it.”

you rolled your eyes, but your fingers didn’t move from where they clung to the fabric of his hoodie. “i could lift you too,” you blurted out, immediately regretting it.

max paused.

his eyebrows slowly lifted, amusement twinkling in his blue eyes. “oh yeah?”

you hesitated for a split second but quickly doubled down. “yeah. i bet i could lift you.”

max chuckled, fully entertained now. “go on, then.”

and that was how you found yourself attempting to lift a nearly 6-foot, 160-pound world champion off the ground like you had something to prove.

you wrapped your arms around his waist, bent your knees, took a deep breath… and nothing happened.

max did not budge.

instead, you let out a strangled grunt, your arms barely managing to shift him an inch before your muscles gave out.

max was dying laughing, barely holding himself up as he leaned into you, his forehead resting on your shoulder as he shook with laughter.

“oh my god,” he wheezed. “are you even trying?”

you groaned, face hot, still stubbornly trying to heave him upwards. “you’re—way heavier than you look!”

max tilted his head, grinning. “are you calling me fat?”

“yes,” you gasped, dramatically collapsing against him, completely out of breath. “you’re made of bricks.”

he was grinning like an idiot now. “maybe you just need to train harder.”

“oh, shut up.”

max smirked, leaning in way too close, his hands firm on your hips again. “admit it,” he murmured. “you like when i do all the lifting.”

you narrowed your eyes. “you’re insufferable.”

his smirk widened. “still stuck up here, though.”

and yeah, you were. but you were never admitting defeat.

ʚ・lewis hamilton

the kitchen was warm with the scent of fresh coffee and something sweet, probably the pastries lewis had insisted on picking up this morning. you were barely awake, wearing one of his oversized hoodies, standing by the counter and lazily stirring your tea.

lewis, fresh from his morning workout, had already found his way behind you, arms loosely wrapping around your waist. his chest was firm against your back, radiating warmth.

“you’re in my way,” he murmured, but his hands were sliding against your hips, fingers pressing into the fabric of the hoodie that was very much his.

“you came into my kitchen,” you pointed out, sipping your tea.

“our kitchen,” he corrected smoothly, lips brushing against the shell of your ear.

you could hear the smirk in his voice.

before you could fire back with something equally smug, lewis’s hands suddenly gripped your waist, and before you knew it, you were lifted effortlessly off the ground. a surprised gasp left your lips as he set you down onto the kitchen counter, placing himself between your legs.

your heart stuttered at the sudden shift.

“lewis,” you laughed breathlessly, palms pressing against his chest. “what—”

he leaned in, his face dangerously close to yours, his hands sliding to rest against your thighs.

“you were making things difficult down there,” he murmured, his fingers teasingly brushing against your skin. “this is a much better angle.”

your breath hitched slightly, eyes flickering to his lips before snapping back to his teasing gaze. “you could have just asked me to move.”

lewis smirked, tilting his head. “where’s the fun in that?”

you narrowed your eyes at him. “you just wanted an excuse to put me here, didn’t you?”

he hummed, fingers still tracing slow, absentminded circles against your thigh. “maybe.”

your body betrayed you, warmth creeping up your neck at how easily he could make your knees weak.

lewis noticed. of course he did.

his lips brushed against your jaw, feather-light. “are you flustered?”

you rolled your eyes, trying to play it off, but your fingers instinctively curled into the fabric of his hoodie. “you wish.”

he grinned, hands squeezing your thighs slightly. “you’re right,” he murmured, voice lower now. “i don’t have to wish.”

and just like that, your entire morning plans shifted.

ʚ・george russell

you were standing by the kitchen counter, still wrapped in one of george’s oversized shirts, attempting to make coffee when two strong arms wrapped around your waist from behind.

a lazy smile spread across your face. “good morning to you too.”

george hummed against your shoulder, pressing a soft kiss to your exposed skin. “mmm… morning, love,” he murmured, voice still thick with sleep. his arms tightened slightly, pulling you closer into his warmth. “why are you up so early?”

you laughed softly, leaning into his hold. “it’s almost ten.”

“that’s early.”

you rolled your eyes, feeling his lips brush against your neck again. “you’re ridiculous.”

“i’m on vacation,” he reminded you, burying his face in your shoulder like he could melt into you completely. “and i don’t want to start my day without at least five minutes of properly cuddling you.”

you smiled, melting at how soft he was in the mornings. george was always composed, always put together—but here, in the quiet of a vacation morning, with the warmth of the sun on his skin and no race weekend stress in sight, he was nothing but yours.

you turned in his arms, wrapping yours around his neck. “what if we just stay here all day?” you suggested, voice teasing.

george lifted his head, a small smirk playing on his lips. “i love the way you think.”

and before you could even react, he effortlessly lifted you onto the kitchen counter, his hands firm on your waist.

you gasped, clutching onto his shoulders. “george!”

he grinned, stepping between your legs, his hands sliding up to cradle your face. “now i have your full attention.”

“you always have my full attention.”

his smirk softened into something sweeter. “good,” he murmured, pressing a slow, lingering kiss to your lips.

the coffee sat forgotten on the counter, the warm breeze from the open windows making the moment feel even dreamier.

“best vacation ever,” he mumbled against your lips, pulling you even closer.

and with the way he was looking at you, like you were the only thing in the world that mattered, you had to agree.

ʚ・carlos sainz

it started as a completely innocent idea.

you had seen carlos do it before—effortlessly lifting you onto the kitchen counter like you weighed nothing, always with that smug little grin. it was annoying how easy he made it look.

so, today, you decided to flip the script.

carlos was standing at the counter, absentmindedly scrolling through his phone while waiting for the kettle to boil. his posture was relaxed, completely unsuspecting. it was perfect.

you took a deep breath, squared your shoulders, and wrapped your arms around his waist from behind, attempting to lift him off the ground.

attempting.

because the second you tried to pull him up, you immediately regretted it.

carlos didn’t budge.

not even an inch.

if anything, you were pretty sure you moved yourself more than you moved him.

carlos, who had barely even reacted, finally glanced over his shoulder, an eyebrow raised in amusement. “what… exactly are you doing?”

your arms were still locked around his waist, your feet planted firmly as you tried one more desperate attempt. you groaned, using every muscle in your body to lift him.

nothing.

carlos grinned, setting his phone down. “are you trying to pick me up?”

you panted, feeling a bead of sweat forming. “yes. shut up.”

he laughed, shaking his head. “good try, amor.”

before you could even process his words, his hands were suddenly gripping your waist, and in one smooth motion, he lifted you clean off the floor.

a surprised yelp left your lips as he spun you around and set you down directly onto the counter.

carlos, still grinning, stepped between your legs, his hands still firmly on your waist. “that,” he said, tilting his head, “is how you do it.”

you scowled, crossing your arms. “unfair advantage. you’ve been training your whole life.”

carlos hummed, looking way too pleased with himself. “and you thought a sneak attack would work?”

“i thought you’d be caught off guard!”

he chuckled, leaning in closer, his voice teasing. “you think i don’t always expect your little tricks?”

you huffed dramatically. “one day, i’ll lift you.”

carlos smirked, pressing a slow kiss to your cheek. “mmm. looking forward to it, cariño.”

and somehow, that felt like an even bigger challenge.

ʚ・charles leclerc

the party was in full swing, music humming through the air, laughter spilling from different corners of the room. you were standing near the bar, chatting with a few friends, sipping on your drink when you felt a familiar warmth press against your back.

charles.

“having fun?” he murmured, his breath brushing against your ear.

you smiled, not bothering to turn around. “i was… until some guy started interrupting my conversation.”

charles chuckled, his hands casually sliding around your waist, his fingers pressing gently into your sides. “some guy, hmm?”

“mmm.” you took another sip, playing along. “he’s kind of annoying.”

before you could tease him any further, his grip suddenly tightened, and before you even had time to process, you were lifted effortlessly into the air.

a surprised gasp escaped your lips as he set you onto the bar counter, right in front of everyone.

“charles!” you smacked his chest, your legs dangling off the edge as he grinned up at you.

his green eyes sparkled mischievously, hands still casually resting on your thighs as he leaned in just a little closer. “what? you looked too nice standing there, i wanted you at my level.”

“you are so improper,” you scolded, fighting back a smile.

“maybe,” he murmured, his smirk turning softer as his fingers lightly traced circles against your skin. “but you love it.”

before you could retort, a dramatic groan echoed from behind you.

“oh my god, can you two not?”

you glanced over your shoulder to see lando, rolling his eyes, drink in hand, looking utterly unimpressed.

pierre, standing beside him, shook his head. “they do this everywhere.”

“i’m sick of it,” carlos added, taking a sip of his wine. “they don’t even care we’re here.”

charles, completely unbothered, grinned up at you. “jealous?”

lando scoffed. “of you? no. of her? maybe.”

you laughed, finally giving in and threading your fingers through charles’s hair, letting your other hand rest on his cheek. “fine,” you sighed dramatically. “i guess i’ll keep you.”

charles leaned into your touch, smirk fading into something sweeter. “good,” he murmured. “because i’m not going anywhere.”

and as much as your friends complained, neither of you moved.

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noirscript · 1 month ago

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bride of the abyss

Pairing: Yandere Siren x Reader Description: Years after you saved him, Zeiryn returns to drag you beneath the waves—where his love waits, fierce and inescapable. Warning/s: Yandere | Noncon/Dubcon Themes | Kidnapping | Possessive Behavior | Captivity | Obsession | Emotional Manipulation | Mild Violence | Body Morphing/Transformation Note/s: Commissioned on ko-fi! Thabk you for trusting me with your commission! Idk if you've received the email. I hope you enjoy this one! Tags will be added later!

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The first time you met him, the sun was so high it burned your shoulders through your shirt. Your sandals had long been discarded, the soles of your feet pressed against coarse, grainy sand, warmed by the afternoon heat. Vacation meant freedom, and for you—a curious child with scraped knees and untamed hair—that meant wandering far beyond the adults’ lazy eyes and picnic baskets.

You weren’t supposed to be near the cliffs. The locals had told stories, murmured warnings of tides that dragged unsuspecting feet into the undertow. But you were eight, and warnings slid off your ears like water. You’d chased a crab across slick rocks, nearly slipping once—okay, twice—before rounding a jagged stone formation and stopping short.

A glint of silver caught your eye. At first, you thought it was trash—a bit of foil or an abandoned soda can. Then it moved. Just slightly. Enough to catch the sun and reflect a brilliance so blinding it made your eyes water. You stepped closer, heart thudding, and gasped.

He was tangled in a net.

You didn’t know what he was—some strange fish, perhaps? But then he turned his face to you, and your world cracked open.

He had eyes like the sea after a storm—grey, but not dull. There was depth there. Sorrow. His skin, though damp and streaked with grit, shimmered faintly under the sun. Hair, long and tangled with bits of kelp and shell, framed a face that was almost too lovely for this world. And below the waist…

A tail. Silver-scaled, powerful, twitching weakly with every shallow breath he took.

You froze.

He didn’t speak. He just stared. His lips slightly parted. You noticed the way he held himself, cautious and ready to defend. His hand—webbed and claw-tipped—twitched when you shifted your weight.

“I won’t hurt you,” you said, holding out your hands to show you had nothing. No rocks. No spear. Just your palms, scraped and pink from climbing.

He blinked slowly, suspicious still.

“Are you stuck?” you asked.

No reply. But he didn’t back away when you stepped closer. You knelt beside him, the scent of salt and something sharper—like rotting seaweed baking in the sun—invading your nose. It made your stomach twist. But you pushed it aside and began working at the net.

The knots were tight. You pulled and untangled, ignoring the barnacles slicing your fingertips. Time passed, but neither of you spoke. It wasn’t silence. The waves talked, the seagulls screamed above, and your own breath came hard with effort. Still, it felt sacred—like speaking would shatter something delicate between you.

Eventually, the net slackened.

He let out a sharp sound—surprise? Relief?—and pushed himself forward, dragging the last threads free with a flick of his tail. Then, to your astonishment, he touched your arm. A light brush of damp fingers on your skin. He didn’t say thank you. He didn’t need to. The look in his eyes—raw and electric—said everything.

And then, he was gone. A splash, a spray of saltwater, and silver glimmering beneath the waves.

You never told anyone.

You convinced yourself it was a dream, a fantasy born from too much sun. But you visited that rock again. And again. Just in case.

Years passed. You grew up. He did not fade.

• • — ✦ — • •

Beneath the waves, he remembered everything.

Zeiryn had been young when you saved him, and even then, his mind was unlike the others. While his kin drowned sailors and split hulls for fun, Zeiryn watched the world above with a secret hunger. He had never known mercy—not until you. He thought you were an illusion at first. A sun-struck phantom, kindness shaped like a child.

But you were real. You touched him without fear. You saved him.

And he had never forgotten.

Seasons passed above and below. He grew stronger, his voice deeper, the gift of his lineage blooming in his throat. His tail thickened with muscle, the silver of his scales deepening to something more molten, almost iridescent. His hair, once wild and matted, was now woven with the treasures of the deep—rings of coral, braids of pearl, beads carved from whalebone. He was no longer a drifting child of the tide. He was a leader now.

Yet every dusk, he swam to the same stretch of shore, peering through kelp and coral, waiting for the only face that had ever haunted him.

And then—finally—he saw you.

You stood there, older, but still you. Your eyes held the same wonder, the same distant sadness. He watched from the rocks, heart hammering, the sea rising with every thrum of anticipation. You were holding a bottle. The scent reached him even through the water. Alcohol. Sour and sharp.

You stumbled closer to the edge, barefoot like before. He didn’t understand your tears at first. But when they hit the water, he tasted them.

Bitterness.

He had never tasted sorrow before.

He moved without thinking, cutting through the water with a predator’s grace. When you stepped into the sea—lost, maybe hoping it would take you—he was already there. His arms wrapped around you just before your knees buckled. He caught you. Held you. And for the first time in years, he felt whole again.

He turned to the shore. His eyes, once filled with awe, hardened. There were people there. A town. A world that had allowed you to suffer.

He would never forgive it.

The water closed over your head.

And he took you home.

• • — ✦ — • •

The cold hits you first. It pierces your skin like needles, forcing your eyes open.

Then the pressure—thick and heavy—presses against your chest. You try to gasp and choke instead. The world is liquid. Blurry shapes. Movement. Panic claws through you. You thrash—

Then you notice the shimmer.

Your legs—no. Not legs.

You scream, but no sound comes out. Just bubbles.

The tail is yours. You move, and it moves with you—powerful, golden, alien.

Your lungs don’t ache. You aren’t drowning.

You’re breathing. Underwater.

A presence approaches. You backpedal—awkward, instinctual.

Then he’s there.

The siren.

Older. Towering. Regal in a way that defies language. His eyes widen as you meet his gaze. He reaches for you like a lover, a prayer on his lips without sound.

You float, stunned, your heart racing in your chest.

"You're awake! Welcome home!" he says—somehow, impossibly, the words sliding into your mind like a current. His voice doesn’t echo in your ears. It resonates in your bones. Inside you.

Your lips tremble. “What... what did you do to me?”

He cocks his head, almost confused by the question. “I saved you.”

You glance around. Coral walls. Bioluminescent plants. Faint shadows darting beyond what your eyes can track.

“I didn’t ask to be saved.”

His face falters, just briefly. But then the soft smile returns. “You did, once. When I was dying. You touched me. You gave me your warmth. Your kindness.” He swims closer. “You were the only one who ever did.”

“That was years ago.” You try to back away, but your body is sluggish in this new form. “I was a kid.”

“You remembered me.” His voice is gentle now, like a lullaby. “You returned.”

You shake your head, panicked. “No. I—I was just walking. I didn’t know—”

His hand reaches forward, cupping your cheek. His touch is warm now. Familiar. Like seawater kissed by the sun. “You were hurting. They made you cry. But you don’t have to cry anymore.”

“I want to go back,” you whisper.

“There’s nothing there for you.”

He’s not angry. Not yet. Just... patient. Like he’s waiting for you to understand something you’ve missed.

“You belong here,” he murmurs. “With me.”

You remember the way he looked at you back then—curious and soft. But this is different. There’s devotion in his eyes. A fire born not of gentle affection, but of obsession that has steeped too long.

“You changed me,” you say, voice shaking. You look down at the tail. “How?”

“There’s a pearl,” he says, pointing to your side. You notice now—embedded near your hip is a small, glowing orb, barely visible beneath your skin.

“I couldn’t risk losing you again.”

You turn, frantic now. “No, no, this isn’t right. I can’t—this isn’t real.”

“You are real.” His voice is sharper now. “I dreamed of you so long I thought you were only in my mind. But you’re here. Flesh and spirit. And you’ll never have to suffer again.”

You shake your head. “I’m not your wife.”

Silence.

Then he leans close, his breath warm against your ear even underwater.

“Yet.”

• • — ✦ — • •

Back on the surface, a woman named Marina squints at the shore where she last saw you. She’s a local—grew up with the sea in her lungs and warnings stitched into her grandmother’s lullabies. When she saw you walk into the ocean, something in her gut twisted. She waited hours. You didn’t return.

Now, she’s standing with a fisherman and an old priest, their gazes following the waterline.

“No body,” the man mutters. “Currents here don’t drag far. Should’ve washed up if she drowned.”

“She didn’t drown,” Marina says softly. “She was taken.”

The priest mutters something in an old tongue. The fisherman scoffs.

“By what? Sea spirits? Merfolk?”

“No.” Marina’s eyes don’t leave the water. “A siren.”

“Those don’t exist.”

“They do,” she says. “And if it’s the one I think… she won’t come back.”

And deep beneath the waves, Zeiryn brushes a strand of hair from your face as you lie curled in coral-silk bedding. You’ve cried yourself into a stupor. But your skin is warmer now. The transformation is complete. Soon, you’ll forget what it was like to walk. To speak above the waves. To live without him.

He hums you a song—a melody he’s written over the years, just for you. It wraps around your heart like a net.

You stir in your sleep.

He smiles.

Tomorrow, you’ll love him back.

You have to.

After all… you’re home.

TBC.

Taglist: @hopingtoclearmedschool @violetvase @zanzie @neuvilletteswife4ever @yamekocatt @mel-vaz @vind1cta @greatwitchsongsinger @delusionalricebowl @nomi-candies @jsprien213 @kaii-nana33 @saturnalya @yandereaficionado @pinksaiyans@ivantillenthusiast @missybabes

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hayatoseyepatch · 11 months ago

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Description: Getting kinky with the windbreaker boys. I have so many thoughts about these men and I just needed to get them out of my system. Characters: Toma Hiragi, Ren Kaji, Haruka Sakura, Hayato Suo, & Yamato Endo. Word Count: 2.2k Tags: fem!reader, brat taming, praise, somnophilia, edging, mommy kink, dacryphilia, consent non consent, choking, degradation, oral (fem!receiving), penetrative sex, dirty talk.

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a/n: These are more like thirsts than headcannons but oh well. I might expand on some of these eventually and turn them into full fics if I can sit down and commit to it. It the mental illness, innit? Regardless, I hope you enjoyed these little blurbs! Special shout out to @foxyfiction & @to-eden for helping me with the prompts for some of these, you both are amazing. <3

I also have a masterlist now, if you’re interested that could be found : HERE

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Brat Taming

Hiragi had enough of you today, your skirt pulled up high, a constant switch in your hips while on patrol today with the Tamon team. Constantly teasing him, whether it was pulling him into an alley for an impromptu make out session, bending over in front of him letting him catch a glimpse of your already wet panties, or rubbing against his perpetually hard cock as you “just needed to slip past him real quick”. He was patient, tension building throughout the day coming to a fever pitch when you had both made it back to your shared apartment. He was on you in moments, lifting the back of your skirt to lay a harsh lap to you ass. Grabbing a fistful of your hair as he growls in your ear. “ I want you on that bed and I want you completely bare, do you understand?” He releases you hair, watching as you strip for him, climbing on the bed moments after you do.

Grabbing a hold of your cheeks with a rough hand he forces you to look up at him, eyes glazed over with arousal. Squishing your cheeks he props your mouth open, shoving a long digit past your lips. He grins as your mouth instinctively wraps around the digit, pumping the finger in and out of your lips, eyes rolling back as he feels your tongue wrap around the digit. Sucking his teeth as you shoot him a wink as he stuffs a second digit in your mouth. “Such a fucking brat, you know that?” He forces your thighs apart, free hand punctuating his words with a harsh slap to your dripping cunt.

His fingers sliding down, his fist two digits using your saliva that coated them to rub fast smooth circles against the sensitive bud. “Don’t forget your still getting punished baby.” He tsks giving you a sharp toothed grin. “Look at your pretty cunt, clenching around nothing, poor baby.” He coos, leaning down to your ear, lips grazing the shell to whisper. “You’re going to have to come from just my fingers before you can have my cock baby, think you can do that for me, hmm?”

Praise (Receiving)

Kaji had lost his temper once more, today a fight had broken out. One of the members of the opposing gang had harshly grabbed your arm, tugging you against him spitting extremities about the things he plandded to do to you. The words coupled with the fear in your wide eyes had Kaji seeing red. Completely blacking out in a fit of rage, he hated his, he especially hated you seeing him like this. The few times he had lost his temper in front of you, he ran, unable to face you. But not this time, you wouldn’t let him run from you. Grabbing the sleeve of his jacket you were quick to take him back to your apartment, silencing whatever apologies or exasperations with your lips against his.

Walking him backward toward your bedroom you wait for the back of his knees to hit the mattress. Pushing him to sit down as you climb on his lap. Mouths entangling in a heated embrace, clothes being pulled from each others bodies in a rush of passsion. Kaji trails kisses down your exposed body, lips wrapping arount a perked bud taking your nipple into his mouth. You rocked your hips against his, gronaing into the air. Your hands unfaten his pants, and with his help you pull his cock from his pants. You give him a smile, stroking his cheeks, eyes soft with fondness. “You're such a good boy Ren, always so good to me.”

You coo, the praise falling from your lips as you place one more kiss to his lips. Moving to grab him by the base, positioning him at your entrance, the desperate look in his eyes is all the confirmation you need to sink down on his length. You bite your lip, letting out a whimper at the feeling of his thick cock filling you to the brim. You tangle one hand in his hair, pulling lightly on his blonde strands, while the other moves up to his shoulder, nails digging into the skin. Pulling away only far enough to mumble into his lips. “Fuck, Ren.. Feel so good, you fill me up so good baby. I love you so much.”

Somnophillia

You wake feeling something warm between your legs. It isn’t long before your head is thrown back against the pillows you were once sleeping soundly against, voice crying out in pleasure as your boyfriend’s tongue draws slow patterns on your sensitive clit. You look down at him eyes lidded with sleep and now lust. “Haru.. what are you doing?” You mumble, blinking the sleep from your eyes. Between your thighs you can feel his cheeks heat up, a feirce blush on his features. He barely pulls from your cunt, mumbling against your center. “Couldn’t sleep, needed to taste you, ‘m want you so bad.”

He groans, hips rutting into the mattress, desperate for some friction to his aching cock. Any further arguments are silenced by a loud moan erupting from your lips, Sakura licks a fat stripe up your clit brfore reattaching his lips fully to your nub. He eats your cunt with such desperation, as if he needed to conume you to keep air in his lungs. His tongue is soon replaced by the rough pad of his thumb, head ducking lower to slide his tongue inside of your entrance, sliding against the silk walls of your pussy. He groans deep in his throat, the vibrations of the noise only enhancing the pleasure you’re feeling. ”Always taste so fucking good, need more..” He groans, pulling from your center, he slides up your body lips attacking yours with reckless hunger. He slid the material of his boxers down in one swift motion, grabbing himself by the base of his cock, collecting your wetness on the tip of his cock using it to ease himself inside your velvety walls.

He lets out a loud groan as he fully sheaths his cock inside you, head dipping to capture your lips with his own. The kiss is immediately laced with hunger, teeth clashing and tongues dancing in each others mouths. He pulls away, heavy breaths fanning against your lips as he sets a harsh steady pace from the start. “Fuck baby�� can’t even sleep without you consuming my thoughts. Need you desperately… constantly.. feel like I’ll lose it if I’m not inside of you.”

Edging/Mommy Kink

You place a delicate kiss to his lips, trailing your kisses down his body until you were situated between his thighs. Looking up at him with hooded eyes from your current position. “You weren't lying baby boy. Look at how hard you are.” You grin, not letting him answer as you gave a few experimental tugs to his cock. Leaning up to lick a fat stripe from his base to his tip, collecting the pre come that had been steadily dripping since you had begun. Pulling away and leaning up once again, you grab his face in your hand, forcing his mouth open before letting your saliva mixed with his precum drip from your mouth to his. Placing a hand over his mouth, you lean down to his ear. “Swallow baby, I want you to taste us.”

You take his shock as an opportunity to lower yourself back down between his legs, swirling your tongue around his sensitive mushroom tip, taking as much as your throat would allow, hollowing your cheeks. Beginning to bob your head up and down on his cock. Choji tugged at the cloth around his wrists, restraining himself as much as he could to not buck his hips. Failing miserably as his body writhed under yours He cried out as he felt your warm mouth around his cock, tears collecting by the corners of his eyes. Whimpers and cries falling from his lips as he found every ounce of restraint to not let his body betray him. The could in his stomach building once more for what seemed like the umpteenth time that evening. He didn’t want to fuck all of this up and receive punishment even further. “Mommy, please your mouth is so warm… be careful. I dont wanna come.. too soon.”

You grin around him, looking up at him through your lashes, nearly removing yourself from him before plunging back down, taking him until you feel him hit the back of your throat. You do this a few more times before pulling yourself off his cock with a 'pop'. You make your way up his body, getting impatient yourself, feeling your cunt clench around nothing. Straddling his abdomen, right above where he needed you most, pressing your lips against his in a heated kiss. Desperately trying not to show that you were just as affected by your actions. You grab a fistful of his hair, tugging harshly, effectively separating your lips as you speak against his lips. “Tell mommy what you want baby boy. Go on, use your words I want to hear you.”

Dacryphillia

Each one of your pleas fog his mind with uncontrollable lust. Wram brown irises drowning in it. “So desperate for me already, darling, we havent even begun the main event.” He teases, directly into your ear, as he finally lines the tip of his thick cock with your entrance. Suo had been teasing you for what seemed like hours. Pulling orgasm after orgasm from your overstimulated cunt. Having made you come undone on his fingers and tongue several times, your pussy having felt desperatly empty without his cock filling you. He grins as you whine, his head just barely probing your entrance. “Please, Haya.” You whimper desperate for him to do something, anything, tears blurring your vision as they collected at your lashline.

“Please?” He tiles his head in mocking obliviousness. “Please what princess? Gotta tell me what to do or I cant help you, tell me what is it that you want?” He coos, free hand sliding up your stomach, thumb circling a pert nipple. Grinning he leans down tugging on your earlobe with this teeth, breaths fanning against your ear as he continues to speak. “Want me to fill this pretty pussy up with my cock? Feeling you flutter against me, whimpering out my name from those beautiful lips. Is that what youre asking for my pretty little bunny?”

He grins eyes lithe with mischief as you continue to babble, words coming out in a jumbled mess of pleas and calls of his name. Fat tears stream down your cheeks, desperation for him consuming your entire being. Suo’s hand coming up to caress your cheek. Thumb swiping at the tears that cascaded down your face. “Oh, sweet baby” He purrs, slipping the same thumb past your lips, letting you taste the salty wetness of your tears. “Crying for me already? We’ve barely even started.” He giggles, hips lurching forward, slamming into you to the hilt with one swift movement of his hips. Groaning as your back arches from the bed, eyes rolling back with a scream of his name being forced from your lips. “As much as I’d love to hear you beg for it, ive been waiting for too long for you my princess.~”

Cat and Mouse/CNC

Your breaths come out in heavy pants, your heart racing in your chest, your feet slamming against the grassy terrain as you run as fast as your legs can carry you. The shadow of the figure on your tail looming behind you. You pushed further, weaving in and out of trees to shake your assailant. The dark wooded area was easy to get lost in. You had only paused your running for a moment, attempting to take in your soundings, looking for a route to escape. Attempting to catch your breath, you were sure you had lost him. Just as you were about to turn on your heel and take off once more your eyes shoot wide, feeling fingers of a large hand wrap themselves around your throat. Your attacker using their grip as leverage to shove you roughly against a tree, the larger figure looms over yours. Tattooed fingers squeezing just enough to make gaining air flow a bit difficult. Lips grazing your ear as he leans down to your height. “Gotcha~”

Endo’s piercing blue eyes lock with yours, leaning down to capture your lips in a heated kiss. Tongue invading your mouth, free hand coming up to cup your dripping cunt. Fingers circling your clit through the thin fabric of your panties. He smirks against your lips as you moan into his mouth. Pulling from you, he quickly removes your soiled panties, running his finger between your soaked slit. Bringing his finger to his lips taking in the way you taste, moaning around his fingers.

“Fuck doll, you taste so fucking good. Already so fucking wet for me.” He uses his thumb to force your mouth open, spitting a glob of saliva between your parted lips. “Go on babydoll, taste yourself.” He chuckles as you instinctively swallow, turning you in his embrace so your bent over. Flipping up your skirt, he leans back to take all of you in, eyes hungrily wracking over your exposed sex. Parting your folds with a thumb, watching as your entrance contracts around nothing a large grin splits across his face as he lands a harsh slap against your ass. “Gotta remind you who this belongs too huh? This cunt is mine princess.”

═══°∴,*⋅✲════〖✰〗════✲⋅*,∴°═══

Thanks for reading, I hope you enjoyed! I already have a part two in mind for this, so keep an eye out. Until then, see you later!

6K notes · View notes

bitterrfruit · 3 months ago

Text

iron tide [1]

fisherman price x reader cw: noncon undressing/bathing, dubcon touching. 11k words. 18+ mdni the crew aboard a deep-sea crabbing vessel rescue a woman adrift in the north sea. you wake up on a boat surrounded by men you don't know, with no memory of where you came from. or: john price rescues you from certain death and decides that you belong to him [masterlist]

Jonathan had long forsaken his godliness; but if he were to deify anything, it would be the Sea.

Great big blue, infinitely vast and infinitely deep. She was sweet when she was still, gentle, little ebbs like kisses against the barnacled hull — formidable when she was angry, titanic swells like mountains that crashed and shattered and sucked irreverent men down into the depths of her.

She took as much as she gave, demanded sacrifices for her gifts. Stole his father when he was a boy, swept off the deck of his ship by a rancorous wave and cast out into the expanse before she inevitably swallowed him. But what she purloined she returned in abundance — a cornucopia of life; fish, lobsters, molluscs — and enough crabs for John to make his living for the better part of his life once he retired from the Navy.

In more recent years, though, he had begun to lose faith in her, too.

The seas were violent and only getting rougher, warmer when they needed to be cold to let the crabs get meatier, colder when they needed to be warm so they could replenish their numbers.

A burgeoning resentment had rooted in his crew like a spreading cancer, minute at first but steadily swelling — every year they were paid a little less and damaged a little more, and who else was there to blame but their skipper?

Wrong spot, wrong depth, wrong time of year; he seemed to keep getting it wrong, despite decades and decades of seafare. As though the Sea was punishing him, as though he had taken too much — only a matter of time before it was his turn to give.

She made known her spite as he leaned over the paint-chipped railing of the deck-facing balcony, watching his crew haul in pot after pot from the raging ocean. Each cage more vacant than the last, the crabs smaller than he had come to expect from the once generous North Sea, soft brown shells where they should have been thick, ochre red, and thorny. Half of them too small to keep, so were begrudgingly tossed back into the deep.

The sun had set not ten minutes prior, hidden by black cloud and dense fog, the sea and sky smudged into a uniform shade of gloaming blue. The waves were tempestuous, whitecaps high and valleys low — the Iron Tide was a resilient girl, and she carved through the bulk of the swells, but even she could not avoid the plummets and climbs of an ocean this rough. He felt the mist of the cracking waves on his cheeks, the wind blistering cold and forcing him to squint.

As the Captain he had outgrown the need to get his hands dirty, he could stay in the comfort of the wheelhouse if he wished — but he still liked to venture down to the deck to pull ropes and haul pots when he could, if only to show his crew how it was properly done. He liked to ensure his callouses stayed thick and his mettle hadn’t turned soft.

“This’s a fucken’ suicide set, captain!” Roared Johnny from the deck, work-worn voice barely audible over the bellows of the waves on the hull. Lead deckhand with the attitude of a first mate.

The first mate himself, Simon, had begun ascending the rusty steel stairs with an uncharacteristic urgency, the hood of his fluorescent orange jacket around his shoulders, kept there by the wind.

“How many ‘ve we got?” John asked him, jaundiced, having to shout over the gale.

“Thirty-two,” Simon said rigidly, “from twenty pots.”

“Fuck’s sake,” John grunted, aggravated, smacking the rail with his palm. He cynically observed the next pot as it was hauled up, even emptier than the last one, and he made up his mind. “Alright, set ‘em back.”

“They’ve been soaking for twenty-four hours,” Simon disputed, but the pith of his irritation resided in the knowledge of how much labour had already been wasted. It was an inexorable fact, though — there was little point in retrieving them now, as empty as they were.

“It’s a waste of time to haul them all,” John barked. “What have we got, seventy to go? Set them back.”

Simon rubbed the bridge of his nose with a thumb, exasperated. “Alright.”

He echoed the Captain’s command in a roar down the stairs, deckhands looking up to listen before they obeyed — John watched, disenchanted, as they began launching the string of pots over the side of the deck one by one, throwing loops of yellow nylon rope and the bright red marker buoys out to follow them.

It was easy for John to fall into a sour mood, and after the abysmal stew Nikolai had thrown together for their supper, his fuse was cut even shorter. Seemed the Russian mechanic’s turn to cook always landed on the harshest nights, left everyone crotchety and indolent.

He needed nicotine.

He made his way back to the helm with a crease in his brow and his jaw in knots. The bolted windows spanning the length of the bridge were near impossible to see through, the battering of sea spray distorting the view of the dark ocean that extended unendingly past the bow. He glared out into the abyss for a beat, stoically watching the black waves, wondering what next the Sea would punish him with.

A blink of red pierced through the mist.

He almost ignored it, at first, rubbing his forehead as he twisted his spinning chair behind the helm — until it was there, again; a pin-prick of bright carmine, cutting through the blue sea fog and disappearing behind a wave.

Frowning as he leaned into the radar screen, his eyes scoured over the bright blue disk and immediately caught on a tiny yellow blip. Due north, twenty degrees west. It was faint, flickering every odd moment, and he stared at it vigilantly — a spot he would normally dismiss as sea clutter, if not for the blinking light he thought he saw on the horizon.

He reeled down the window by the seat and stuck his head out into the winds, squinting through the spray — at the top of a crest shone the little red light, blinking at half-second intervals, clear as day.

The realisation rinsed him colder than seawater.

A lifeboat.

He snatched the intercom radio from its hook by the wheel and held it to his lips.

“All hands—” He barked, “Secure the deck. Got a lifeboat up ahead. Prepare for rescue.”

Simon’s crackling voice quickly came back through the radio, from the call point on the deck. “D’you say a lifeboat?”

“That’s what I said.”

“Roger.”

John could hear the yelling on deck from the wheelhouse, all that fervour frothing up at the prospect of an emergency; a new challenge. He immediately spun the wheel to adjust the rudder, steering the boat in the direction of the blip on the radar. Gently pushed the throttle to catch up and felt the roaring engine quake through the boat, the sharp bow of his ship cut through the swells like a fist through a wall.

“See it,” Simon called through the intercom.

“What’ve we got?”

“Life raft.”

He tugged the throttle lever back to halt the boat on approach, aligning the vessel so that the lifeboat was portside, knuckles white on the wheel. He set the engine to hold station before marching out to the deck, bracing for the wind as he hurried across the steel balcony and down the ladder, knurled steel stairs clanging loudly with every thud of his boots.

“Any survivors onboard?” John shouted, joining his crew where they peered over the railing, as another wave cascaded over the gunwale, greenwater flooding the deck before gushing out of the scuppers.

There it was, neon orange and climbing up a steep swell. Hardly a lifeboat — an inflatable raft, little red light blinking atop a rounded corner. From the deck he could tell it was ancient, the bright skin of the raft peeling and blistering, exposing the ballooning black rubber within that kept it afloat. Modern regulations demanded modern lifeboats — fully enclosed boats with their own motors, search and rescue transponders equipped. He struggled to imagine the kind of vessel the raft had even come from; certainly not a cruise ship, or any legally operating fishing or passenger boat.

“Only one,” Alex answered, yelling over the roar of the ocean.

Nik let out a grunt, dismissing it all with a sweep of his hand. “That woman is dead.”

John squinted at the raft, and quickly determined that Nikolai wasn’t unreasonable for thinking so.

The woman aboard the raft lay face down in the orange bed, bare-footed, nothing on but a saturated ivory dress that clung to her skin like glue. Sodden hair webbed across her back, tresses floating in the inch of water that filled the basin of the boat.

Even if she were a corpse already, though, he wasn’t going to let the Sea digest her unchallenged.

“Alright,” he declared, chewing on his plan before he uttered it. “I’ll strap on the lifeline, jump in and grab her, then you lot can reel me back in.”

The disputes were quick to gush from his crew, all cursing and shaking heads.

“Get fucked,” Alex scoffed, appaled, “skipper jumping overboard? What world are you living in?”

“You gonna do it, then, Keller?” John retorted, lips in a line.

“I can,” Soap yelled, already shucking off his heavy jacket. Daredevil that he was.

John gritted his teeth. Wasn’t sold on the risk of losing his lead deckhand; but as he considered it, he would never be prepared to risk losing any of them.

“You sure?”

“Ah’m the best swimmer,” he boasted through a grin, now down to his thermals, shoulders raised in the cold and rubbing his hands together.

“Good man,” John nodded approvingly, and the crew quickly went to work strapping him in — hooked the harness over his shoulders and secured it in the front, fed the end of the long blue rope into the winch so he could be retrieved after the catch.

Came the thudding of boots on the deck, running towards the commotion; “Fuck’s going on? Why’s the engine idle?”

Kyle, the ship’s engineer, finally emerging from the engine room with a smudge of gear oil on his cheek. Must have had his earbuds in when the Captain issued the all hands directive.

John let out a huff, not prepared to give a long justification to the designated safety officer, conscientious as he was.

“Oh shit—” Gaz chirped, discovering on his own the gravity of the situation, as he glanced over the railing and spotted the raft. “Is she alive?”

“We’re about t’find out,” Soap said keenly, bouncing on the balls of his feet to warm himself up.

“You’re jumping in?” Gaz balked, “That’s — you’re fuckin’ mental.”

John let out a sharp huff. He didn’t disagree, but he thought it counterproductive to express any reluctance. “Got a better idea, lad?”

Gaz sighed anxiously as he clutched the guardrail, head hanging from his shoulders. He knew as well as John that this was the only option — it was that, or leave the woman adrift in the ocean to die, if she weren’t already.

John held fast to his pragmatism, but his morals were unyielding. Nobody gets left behind.

Men took turns giving Johnny good luck pats on the back as he climbed over the railing. He hung off the other side like a monkey with his fist around the bar, looking down into the furious ocean and taking an anticipatory breath.

The crew watched raptly and let loose a strident cheer as he launched off, diving into the waves with knife-pointed arms and sinking out of sight. Nik remained steadfast by the hydraulic winch, ready to set it off at any indication of either success or failure.

Soap reemerged from the water with a visible gasp ten-odd metres out, breaking through the white foam and powering ahead in a freestyle stroke. He reached the raft quickly, and climbed aboard like a wet dog, hauling himself up over the ballooning sides and almost pulling it under the water with him. He kneeled beside the woman once he was in, pulling her by the shoulder to assess her — he gave no indication to the crew as to her status before he hoisted her up and held her tight to his chest, arms hooked under hers so that she wore him like a backpack.

He pushed himself back into the water with an eager holler; “Got ‘er!”

Nik immediately pulled the lever on the winch and it zipped loudly as it began spinning, winding up the rope and hauling Johnny through the swelling sea. The crane arm of the davit extended far enough beyond the gunwale that he didn’t slam into the hull on his ascent, and he clung to the limp woman for dear life — John and his deckhands leaned as far over the railing as they could without toppling overboard, hooking the rope that suspended the swimmer and heaving he and his cargo onboard.

Soap coughed out a splatter of seawater as he gingerly lay the woman on her back, before rolling over and wiping down his face, dripping wet.

“Found yerself a mermaid, cap,” he sputtered, sniffing and shivering violently as he pushed himself to stand.

“Nicely fuckin’ done, Soap,” Alex lauded, smacking him on the back and earning a screech from the Scotsman.

“‘S too cold,” he bit, grabbing at his genitals through his sodden thermals. “Ma fucken’ balls are gone.”

“Go in and get dry,” the Captain barked, as he hurriedly crouched beside the woman, sweeping locks of drenched hair from where it stuck to her face.

“Jesus,” Gaz muttered concernedly.

Her skin was bitterly cold, but soft on her cheeks; some indication that resuscitation might have been possible, that her skin wasn’t as stiff and waxy as corpse skin would have been. Eyes were lightly shut, her thick lashes clumped together by seawater. He used a gentle thumb to lift up an eyelid, and her pupils were nice and black — blown out, but not clouded over. Laces of capillaries meshed through her white scleras. Blood still bright red.

“How’s she looking?” Alex asked, crouching beside John, pessimism in his throat.

“She’s frigid,” John said grimly.

“Could be hypothermic,” Gaz said from behind him, worry leaden in every word. “That water is barely higher than zero.”

“Mh,” John grunted in agreement, hastily pressing the palps of his fingers under her jaw into a spongy jugular, held there for a few seconds — no pulse. “We’ll worry about warmin’ her up once we get her breathing.”

He leaned back and interlaced his fingers, laying his hands knuckles down between her breasts. Pushed his weight into her sternum with a hard shove and her ribs sunk underneath him, bouncing back up when he released the pressure. Repeat. Over, and over, grunting with each desperate compression.

The heaving bodies of five men caging her kept the bulk of the angry waves from dousing her, the spray crashed over John’s back and dripped from him, beads landing on her body. Solemn silence hung heavy between them, as though fearful that expressing any hope would condemn her to certain death. Simon clutched John’s shoulder, grip encouraging.

He counted his compressions until he reached thirty, before he urgently keeled forward and pressed his mouth to her cold lips, pinching her nose and lifting her chin — pumped air from his lungs into hers with a forceful breath, then another, then another. Her chest rose as it filled up with his air, sunk again as he let it seep out from behind her teeth.

Returned to compressions. Push. Push. Push. He pressed so hard into her sternum that her ribs threatened to snap under the weight of him, but they were rubbery enough to withstand it.

Continued the next round until he reached twenty-one — when water began to rise up her throat, sloshing about in her open mouth and trickling out of its corners. He urgently halted his compressions to flip her onto her side and tip out the brine, hammering into the midline of her back with an open palm.

“C’mon, love,” John growled, teeth gritting. “Cough it up for me.”

As though she had heard him, a gurgle eked from her throat, torso retching as an eruption of water gushed out of her mouth and sprayed over the deck. A few weak coughs followed the first, and she shuddered — the men roared in shock and celebration as John returned her to her back.

Her eyes fluttered open for less than a second, shrinking pupils fixed on John for a heartbeat — wet, glittering under the beaming of the deck lights, carving straight through him and taking root in the marrow of his skull. Vacant and yet swollen, the glow of life anew, as though glaring right into the heavens — and with a little sigh, they feathered shut again.

He held a hand to her cheek, gave her head a soft shake; prepared to continue the chest compressions, but as he curled forward and held his ear to her lips, he felt her breathing, shaky and weak against the cartilage shell.

“She breathin’?” Simon asked bluntly, laden with apprehension.

“Yeah,” John huffed, relief potent as liquor flooded hot into his chest and made his temples throb.

“Good shit, cap’n,” Alex commended, releasing a puff of pent air, just as relieved as the lot of them.

John nodded dismissively, hands on his knees, before he pushed himself to stand. He stood over the girl and hoisted her up with his hands under her arms, before delicately draping her over his shoulder.

“Gaz, help me with her, will you?” He grunted, before marching toward the stairs up to the superstructure. “You three — fun’s over. Get back to setting the pots. I’ll send Soap back out once he’s in his dries.”

“Aye aye,” Alex said facetiously, shaking out his hands as he and the others returned to the stack they had just tied down.

“What’s the plan?” Kyle asked stiffly, in quick pursuit as John steamed up the stairs.

“Gotta get her warm,” John said.

“Yeah—” he agreed with a hesitant tone, “what d’you want me for?”

John’s eyes rolled into his skull. “You did a couple years of health science, didn’t you?”

“One year,” Kyle corrected.

John could have said that he wanted Gaz specifically because he was the ship’s assigned safety officer, or because he was the only man aboard with a university degree. But, in truth, he wanted him simply for the fact he was the least likely of all of his crewmen to make stripping the girl into something needlessly lascivious.

He carted her to the head in steady stride, passing Johnny through the narrow corridor as he dried himself off with a towel around his neck.

“She’s alive?” He asked hopefully.

“Uh-huh,” John rumbled.

Soap triple-smacked the veneer panel of the wall with a flat hand in excitement, all but bouncing off the ceiling with it. “Halle-fucken’-lujah! Need help warmin’ her up?”

“No. Get your skins on and head back out to deck, Johnny, y’got more pots to drop.”

Johnny groaned like a teenager, but he went off as he was told.

The head was small — enough room for a toilet, a shower, and a three-inch wide sink, not quite the floorspace to lay her down gracefully. John tore back the curtain and propped her up against the wall of the shower, nestling her into the corner so her head leaned against the perpendicular wall.

No sense in wasting time. He clinically peeled the sodden fabric of her white dress up her thighs, lifting her limp leg to tug the skirt out from under her.

“Christ—” Gaz grumbled, disquieted, he turned away.

“Will y’hold her arms up for me?” John monotonously requested, uninterested in the boy’s reservations.

Gaz sighed as he obeyed the order, taking her cold hands by the wrists and holding them above her head. John hiked up her dress without reservation, revealing the saturated bra and underwear she wore underneath, as he lifted it her arms up above her head.

“This’s fucked up,” Gaz mumbled.

“What is.”

“Taking her clothes off,” he said, reluctance poignant.

“You’d rather we let her freeze to death, eh?” John bit, not even dignifying the engineer’s aversion by turning to look at him.

He tugged her flaccid body towards him, and her head fell against his shoulder — he reached under her arm into the space between her back and the shower wall, unclasping her bra with a single hand.

“No,” Kyle acquiesced. “Do we really need to take off her underwear, though?”

“She’s not gonna get warm in wet knickers, is she,” John grumbled, frustration blossoming, releasing it in a sharp sigh. “Y’need to grow up, Garrick. Go and grab my jersey and a towel from the laundry, then.”

“Okay. Sure, yeah,” he agreed, marching out of the head like he might trip over in his haste.

John bit down on nothing as he pulled the straps of the girl’s bra down her arms, adding it to the pile atop her drenched dress. Didn’t help that she was a lovely thing — pudding-soft curves, pretty little face — might lend an explanation to the young engineer’s discomfort, couldn’t reconcile the attraction he felt to a near-dead woman while she was incognisant of her nudity.

John did not care, he had no qualms.

A pragmatist, through and through. He felt no shame for admiring her as he leaned her back against the laminate wall, nipples grey-purple and hard as pebbles by virtue of her palpable hypothermia. Soft lips were slack, not as blue as they had been when she was fished out of the ocean, now that her blood was pumping again.

He wasted no time ogling her, though, he was no reprobate. His only priority was getting her warm and awake. And that happened to involve hooking his fingers into the waistband of her knickers, saturated in seawater and cleaving fast to her skin.

He hooked an arm around her to lift her from the shower floor, used the other hand to tug her underwear over the swell of her bottom before he set her back down to reel them down her thighs.

Pretty cunt, too. Unshaven, how he liked them.

He reached up for the shower head, held it in a fist as he switched on the water. Already nice and warm, preheated by the engine-powered calorifiers. He held the stream of warm water over her chest, watching as it cascaded over her breasts and flooded between her thighs. Didn’t care if he got himself wet in so doing. Checked her pulse every odd moment with the pad of a finger on her wrist, ensured her chest continued to rise and fall.

Rubbed his free hand over her skin to scrub off all the salt; started modestly with her arms, shoulders, back — but was unhesitant in rinsing and scrubbing her armpits, down her belly, between her legs. Didn’t touch her pussy, though, even John felt that was a step too far. He simply rinsed it. Let the water run over her mons and channel down the cleft of her unaided.

He tilted her head back and ran the warm stream over her hairline, careful not to let too much water pour down her face. He combed thick fingers through the tresses, scrunching her hair into a ball to wring out the brine before rinsing it out again.

As he carded his fingers through her scalp, though, he felt a lump; just above her hairline, concealed by the locks. A squishy protrusion from the skull, with a frayed ridge through the centre of it. Only then did he see the diluted blood in the water that puddled at the bottom of the shower, originating from the ends of her saturated hair.

Add that to the list of ailments, he thought. Poor wee girl. They’d need to tend to that.

Kyle finally returned with a cautious knock on the door, a single knuckle.

“D’you fall overboard, Garrick?” John murmured — he had been gone far longer than it should have taken to find the items he requested.

“Sorry,” he said. “Couldn’t figure out which fleece was yours.”

John said nothing.

“She warming up yet?” Gaz asked tightly, likely not even looking in the direction of the shower, now that she was entirely nude.

The girl’s skin was now plush and pink under the heat of the water, and felt warm to the touch under the back of John’s hand; so with a satisfied nod he shut off the water and hooked the showerhead back into its fastening.

He reached backward with a gesturing hand, and Gaz handed him the crisp towel he had brought from the laundry without a word.

“Looks like she got hit in the head,” John commented, as he draped the towel over the girl's front, rubbing her down to get her dry. Arms, shoulders, armpits, thighs, feet. He was thorough.

“Shit,” Gaz said morosely, half-hearted. Soft young man, soft in a way John was almost envious of. Sometimes he wondered if he had grown too rough around the edges, too abrasive for his own good. “What the fuck happened to ‘er?”

“Not a clue,” John said. “Nothing good.”

“That life raft was — that was non-standard,” Gaz pondered aloud.

“Thought the same thing,” John replied, as he scrunched her hair in the towel, twisting it up to wring out the water. He was careful with the top of her head — dabbing her scalp gently, leaving dark red smears in the blue fibres.

“Ferry capsized, maybe?”

“We would’ve heard about a ship capsizing nearby,” John said. “‘Specially a passenger vessel. They’d have blasted the distress call out in every direction.”

“Mh,” Gaz agreed.

“She had no shoes on,” John remarked, tone sombre. “No gear, no jacket.”

“Running away from something?” asked Gaz, picking up what John might have been suggesting.

“Maybe,” John said, before hanging the towel around her back and hauling her up from the floor with an arm around her ribs.

He hung her floppy arms over his shoulder, kept her body tight to him, the towel just long enough to conceal her buttocks from Gaz, sensitive lad. He kept her up with a forearm under her rear, bounced her to adjust. She was impossibly easy to lift; John could have carried her one-handed, if he were less concerned about avoiding brandishing her nudity around the ship.

Gaz followed him out of the head, towards the galley.

“She had no belongings with her, eh?” Gaz asked, “no wallet, nothing?”

“No.”

Kyle let out a long sigh, worry oozing from his every pore. “Don’t wanna imagine how long she was drifting for.”

John nodded, as he sat her down on the bench seat of the dining table, the thin vinyl cushion squeaking underneath her. He dumped the towel, and grabbed his jersey from Gaz — one of his heavy Patagonia fleeces, fabric thick, plush like sheepskin, dark navy with a zip collar. He pulled it over her head, fed her arms through the long sleeves and adjusted it down her torso. It was long enough that it reached her mid-thighs, hands two-thirds of the way through the sleeves — big enough to conceal everything, and cozy enough to keep her warm. He pulled her hair out from inside the collar and lay it to one side over her shoulder.

“Grab me the first aid kit,” John ordered dryly, as he leaned her against the seat, holding her head upright with a hand at the back of her skull.

He fingered through her locks of damp hair, looking closely for the contusion that he felt ballooning out of her scalp — found it, eventually, dark purple and swollen, sticky burgundy blood coagulating around the open wound and gluing bits of hair together.

“Think she fell?” Gaz asked, as he returned with the red polyester pouch after rummaging through the galley cabinets, unzipping and unfurling it.

“S’there betadine in there?” John asked, before he had acknowledged the engineer’s question. ��Hard to say, it looks rough.”

Kyle handed him the little brown dropper of iodine solution, popping off the cap for him. “You don’t think someone hit her.”

John’s jaw tightened. “If they did, they hit her bloody hard.”

“Fuckin’ hell,” Gaz grumbled, upset, watching with his arms crossed as John tipped over the little bottle. He squeezed out several rust-brown drops, they landed squarely in the wound in her scalp, emulsifying with the tissue. “This’s all — just wrong.”

“Least she’s alive,” John murmured, through a huff, as he put down the betadine. No use in attempting to bandage it, the laceration was small enough that it would heal on its own if left unbothered.

“Wonder where her home is,” Gaz mused, tone dismal.

“We’ll ‘ave to see what the bird says when she wakes up,” John said, laying the girl down on her side, tucking up her knees.

“What if she doesn’t?”

“She will,” John asserted as he stood, rapping an appreciative hand on Kyle’s shoulder. “Keep an eye on her, will you? I need to get back to the bridge.”

“Okay,” Gaz nodded tightly.

“And get her a blanket,” John ordered on his way to the ladder. “Call me if anything changes, yeah?”

“Will do, Captain.”

You tasted salt on your tongue.

It was dark, and your body was so heavy — your neurons fired off to raise an arm, and all they mustered was the twitch of a finger. Skin felt warm and viscid, lacquered in a tepid layer of tar as though fully submerged in gooey black pitch, too thick to move around in.

Your eyes perceived nothing but deep, liquid burgundy, and the sparking of white-and-red stars that encroached on the borders of your vision, writhing and swirling in the abyss of your blindness.

Still, salt on your tongue.

It was foul, overpowering, all consuming — that brackish grit in every corner of your mouth, between your teeth, crystallising in the back of your throat. It filled your nose, stung where it adhered to the delicate mucosa of your nostrils, every breath hurt to take in.

You could feel it in your lungs, too. Shards of salt embedded in your bronchioles, saline glutted alveoli, trachea plugged with viscous brine.

Your diaphragm spasmed beyond your control, body seizing as you erupted into a coughing fit — wet and phlegmy, salty fluid gurgling in your chest and hucking out of your mouth with every ragged splutter, you almost choked on it as you heaved in as much air as your lungs could imbibe.

Your eyes shot open, then, vision so blurry that you had to wrench them closed a few times before the membrane over your corneas began to dissipate.

A rubbery cushion under the side of your head, fuzzy fabric enveloping your arms and chest, something scratchy and heavy over your legs. Warm, sore — you ached everywhere, every joint stiff, every muscle burning, every organ twisting and floundering inside you.

Dizziness wracked through your head, brain swimming free within your skull, spinning around in circles and bouncing against the walls of its cavity as though you were being tipped forward and backward and forward again.

Nausea swelled up quickly, filled you up to the ears and made your stomach cramp and contort — bile rose up your throat and burned on its way up, you leaned over the surface you lay on and let it spill out from your teeth. Hardly any vomit, merely an oozing stream of chartreuse bile that dripped in strings from the corner of your mouth.

You heard a voice, a man’s voice, at first too disoriented to understand it.

“Shit — oh my god, you’re—”

A hoarse groan escaped your chest in response, not a noise you made on purpose, as you tried to roll onto your back.

“Are you okay?” He asked urgently, and suddenly you noticed a pair of knees under a table beside you, only as they shifted when the person stood. “Hey — you’re okay, you’re—”

You moaned again, squinting under the bright light above you, vision distorted by vertigo and brine. Tongue too fat to form any words yet.

“You’re okay, let me — let me get you some water.”

You heard the hurried thuds of boots away from you, and you rubbed your eyes with the heels of your palms, finally able to see properly once you opened your eyes again. Shakily pulled yourself upright with a hand on the table, muscles quivering so violently that they could barely hold you up — but fired adrenaline began to kick in, thumping out from your chest and buzzing in your fingertips as you glanced around the room, utterly alien to you.

“Where…” you croaked, soaking in your surroundings. Panelled walls of honey oak, an ugly veneered table in front of you, you sat on its bench seat. A small circular window sat above the table, bolted around its borders, and a single light bulb hung from the ceiling.

The room smelled like dish soap and body odour, fetid with the scent of an unwashed sponge and a hovering note of fish carcass. A small kitchen, as you turned your head around to check behind you — the man towered over a sink, you heard the hiss of running water.

“Where am I?” You finally asked, finding your words, but your voice was as frayed as if you had swallowed glass.

The man turned then, and you did not recognise him. Not at all. A complete stranger, with a furrow in his brow, and an awkward smile tugging at the corner of his lips.

You bolted up from the seat then, tossing aside the blanket that rested on your knees, fight-or-flight reigniting your muscles and setting your heart into overdrive — your head spun with it, and your balance was completely off kilter, you had to continually readjust your feet to keep yourself upright.

“Hey — hey, easy,” he said edgily, voice soft.

“Who the fuck are you?” You barked, immediately defensive, you tried to keep your eyes pinned to him while you made note of your peripheral surroundings.

“I’m — I’m sorry, I didn’t — I’m Gaz. Kyle. I’m Kyle.”

You scowled at him, panting, hackles raised high as you shuffled away from the table. “I don’t know anyone called Kyle,” you hissed. “Or anyone called Gaz.”

“We haven’t met before,” he said, body twisting to face you as you inched around him.

He put down the glass of water he held in his hand, and that only further enkindled your terror. Now his hands were free. He could tackle you, if he wanted to. Tall man that he was, muscular under his black jersey, his big doe-eyes did nothing to soften you to him.

“We found you in the water,” he tried to explain, “we thought you were dead. But we rescued you.”

“The fuck do you mean, found me?” You spat, now approaching the kitchen, your eyes scoured around for something to grab.

He could detect your scheming, inched closer to you on quiet feet, attempting to flank you.

So you dashed — bolted towards the small cooktop, where a magnetic strip mounted on the wall held an array of kitchen knives.

“Fuck—” He cursed, through teeth, failing to grab you in time before you snatched one by the handle, and held the blade in front of you with both hands.

You jabbed it at him as you backed out of his reach, arms so shaky you almost dropped it — but you kept it tight, holding onto it with vicious devotion, as though dropping it would be your death sentence.

He held up his hands, not in surrender, but as if he were attempting to settle a wild animal. “Okay, love, take it easy.”

“Stay away from me,” you shouted, trembling, backing away cautiously.

“Captain!” The man roared worriedly toward the ceiling, and you flinched. “Look, love, I’m not going to—”

“Fuck you,” you bit, before you spun on a heel and flew towards an archway.

“Shit.” He cursed as you escaped, but he had not yet pursued you.

You scurried down the narrow corridor, bare feet aching with every step, knife extended in front of you and prepared to slash at anything that got in your way. You were wobbling all over the place, as though the ground beneath you was rocking back and forth; you toppled into the wall on your right, yelping as you tried to get yourself upright again.

You reached a great big industrial door, painted blue and with a tiny circular porthole too high for you to see through. It had a wheel in the centre of it, connected to a series of bars that spanned it from top to bottom. Not a door you had ever seen before, but you inexplicably knew to twist the wheel — left, first go, and the bars shrunk away from the top and bottom, the steel door unsealing with a clank.

Now you heard the thuds of running boots, fast, growing louder, closer — you shouldered open the heavy door and leapt over the lip at the bottom, immediately blasted with an ice-cold wind that made you shrivel up and almost retreat back inside.

The sky was stark black, and you were blinded by floodlights. You stumbled towards the railing, hanging onto it for dear life as you almost slipped over on the frigid metal grating under your feet — it felt like barbed wire on your soles, and you whimpered with every step.

Your fierce desperation to escape trumped any pain, though, you burned hot as a boiler, thundering adrenaline keeping you aflame. You spun your head around to determine where you were; a pitch-dark abyss surrounded you on all sides — no sky, no ground, no lights on the horizon, nothing. You peered over the balustrade and realised then that you were on a ship, now seeing the building-tall waves that cascaded over the floor below, bedizened in ropes and grates and metal cages and buoys, populated with a few people in neon jackets.

“Hey—” Came a bark from behind you, and you shrieked — immediately scurrying towards a steep staircase, pole-narrow, almost toppling down it as you bounced to every second step.

The floor of the deck consisted of slippery water-logged wood, and the soles of your feet struggled to find any grip as you sprinted across it. You weren’t even sure where you were running, just away, from the man who had followed you — but it became quickly clear you had no escape, and the orange-jacketed men on the deck had turned their heads to spot you.

“Oh, fuck—” One barked.

Another erupted in bewildered laughter; “She breathes, alright!”

“Oi — girl—” Called one.

“C’mere, hen!” Shouted another, Scottish. “We don’t bite!”

You sobbed as you ran, ravaged by a fear so potent it made your heart shrivel up like a raisin — you were sprayed by a crashing wave, blinded by the salt, and your feet slipped out from under you. Collided into the hard ground with a slam, a bounce, you skidded across the wood and your knife tumbled out of your grip, sliding out of reach.

Only as you flopped around on the greasy floor did you realise your nudity under the sweater you were wearing, bare thighs slick with cold sea water, ass bitten by the arctic wind. You scrambled to get yourself back up, crawling on your hands and knees towards your only weapon — until a thick arm hooked under your belly, swiftly hoisting you up from the ground with yank, and you squealed.

“Easy, now, woman—” Gritted the man, the hoarse growl of an old dog, and he held you flat to his chest. “In such a hurry to go back overboard, eh?”

You wailed, attempted to buck yourself free from him while your feet dangled off the floor, but he only secured his grip with another mammoth arm. The other men on the deck approached hastily, concern and confusion etched in their cold-ruddy faces, looking between each other as though waiting for somebody to decide what to do with you.

“Let me go,” you sobbed, paltry voice broken by hiccups, you spluttered and cried and kicked when you could muster it. “Please, please—”

“Put her down, Nik, for fuck’s sake.” Came the roar of another man, approaching from further away, an authoritative fury that your captor swiftly obeyed.

You landed on your bare feet onto the wet floor with a squelch, and a sob, but he kept a firm grip of your shoulder to prevent you from fleeing. You wouldn’t have, though — now, it was clear to you — there was nowhere to run.

“What the fuck is wrong with you?” Yelled the evident commander, “All of you? Christ, look, you’ve scared the shit out of her.”

You saw him, then, as he stood in front of you — towering, heaving, you felt the vibrations of his heavy feet on the deck with each step. Broad shoulders cloaked in a rugged navy jacket, the hood pooled around his neck, a pair of roomy yellow overalls strapped over the waterproof layer. A black knitted beanie sat on the top of his head, folded just above his furrowed brows. His lips were in a snarl under his dense beard while he addressed the other men, but they softened into a neutral line when he looked at you.

There was something familiar about him, not that you could place it; a face you might have seen in a dream, or crossing the street once. A face you could imagine with a glowing light beaming from behind it, as though the moon eclipsing a sun. You had no memory to tie to it, and yet, it settled you slightly.

“Y’alright, love,” he said, voice honey-warm and thick with gravel, he held a hand in your direction and gestured to follow him. “Come back in, will you? Too cold for you out here, eh?”

You sipped a shaky breath, shivering in the bitter wind, glancing at the men surrounding you from under your brow. Returning to the man that gestured for you, you gave him a feeble nod, and waddled in his direction.

“Tha’s it, c’mon,” he said gently, hovering a hand at the small of your back. He turned over his shoulder to shout at the others; “You lot have more pots to set, don’t you? Get back to fuckin’ work.”

He guided you gingerly towards the stairs, close behind you to ensure you didn’t slip over on the way up. Opened the weathertight door to let you in, but walked in front of you down the same corridor you had escaped through. You held your arms tight around yourself, left soggy footprints along the vinyl floor.

“Got yourself all wet again,” he said, an edge of irritation in his tone.

“D’you get her?” Came a call from the kitchen you had awoken in, and the man — Kyle — appeared at the end of the hallway. You froze.

“Go finish your work, Gaz, y’still got an hour on the clock.” He ordered flatly, and Kyle looked at you past him.

“Yes, Captain,” he grunted disdainfully, shouldering past the man in front of you, and squeezing around you where you pressed yourself into the wall. “Hope you’re feeling okay,” he mumbled sheepishly, before disappearing down a flight of stairs.

The captain looked back at you, flicked his head in the direction of the kitchen. “C’mon, let's get you dry.”

The kitchen was much smaller than you remembered it being not a few minutes prior — cozy, much warmer than outside but still not quite warm.

“Siddown,” he said from the kitchen, not as forceful as a command but just as compulsory. You gingerly sat yourself on the same bench you had woken up on, watching him carefully, lips sealed.

He approached you with a tall cup of water, held by the rim with the tips of his fingers. “Drink it.”

You took the cup timidly, but once it was in your grip you did not hesitate; tipped it into your mouth and skulled it down desperately, a dribble escaping the corner of your mouth. You had no idea how thirsty you were until fresh water touched your lips — fresh, not salty — you panted like a dog when the cup was empty, half-quenched.

He took it from you, filled it back up at the sink before bringing it back, and you drank the second cupful just as quickly.

“Better?” He asked, and you nodded, wiped your mouth with your hand.

“Thank you,” you said quietly.

You watched as he grabbed a light blue towel from the tabletop, and for a moment you thought he might hand it to you — instead he crouched in front of you, and took your leg by the ankle.

You immediately chirped and attempted to tug your foot free on reflex, but his grip was firm; entire hand wrapped tight around your ankle, he gave you a tut.

“Settle down,” he snipped, resting the sole of your foot on his collarbone. “I’m only dryin’ you off.”

Said with such certainty that you began to doubt your instinct that it was inappropriate for him to put his hands on you — tempered by the feeling that he knew what he was doing, that he was only taking care of you.

He looked at you impatiently until your tensed muscles eased, before he nodded in satisfaction. He hooked your foot over his shoulder so that your ankle rested on his trapezius, before he bunched the towel up in a fist and ran it up the length of your leg.

You leaned on your arms behind you, heart in your throat, beating so fast that you could hear it buzzing in your ears.

He was focused, wiping the seawater and muck off your skin, up and down your thighs, down the underside of your leg.

“Took a tumble, did you?” He asked plainly, dabbing a fresh graze on your knee with the towel, making you flinch with the sting.

“Yeah,” you said meekly; you were sure it would bruise eventually, but it was largely painless for the time being.

He tutted you, but continued, wiped down your calf and dried off your foot last; he was fastidious about it, pushed the fibers of the towel between your toes, engulfed your foot in the cotton, scrubbed it along the sole of your foot and your toes curled with the tickle.

He set that leg down once he was done with it, and wordlessly demanded the other with a curl of his fingers.

Confounding yourself, you did as you were told, and offered him your other leg; he repeated the procedure, resting your foot on his shoulder and scrubbing your leg with the crunchy towel, unabashedly wiping up to the top of your thigh, between your legs, under your knees.

It didn’t escape your notice that you were naked underneath the jersey, and if he were to look a little higher his eyes would be square with your pussy. The thought made you tighten, and he gave you a disapproving glance when he felt it — but he finished with the other foot, and set your leg free again.

“Thank you,” you muttered, tight-lipped, dizzy with confusion.

“D’you want a new jersey?” He asked as he stood, swiping a hand over the sleeve shoulder, where seaspray had beaded on the outside of the fleece.

“I’m okay,” you said timidly, tucking your legs together.

He nodded, dropping the towel back on the table. “Alright, pet,” he said. “Let’s get you a cuppa, yeah?”

You were quiet, but he busied himself in the tiny kitchen anyway — followed the rumbling of a water boiler and the slosh of hot water, the opening and closing of cabinets and drawers, the tinking of a spoon in a teacup.

“Hope you take it with milk and sugar,” he said. “You’re getting it whether you like it or not.”

“That’s fine,” you croaked.

“Good girl,” he said, as he returned with a brown glass mug and set it down on the table in front of you. “Gotta get some sugar in you. You remember the last time you ate?”

You shook your head.

“Mh, well, let’s get you fed.”

“I’m not — I’m not hungry right now,” you said hesitantly, and when a divot pulled in his brows, you clarified; “don’t think I can keep much down yet.”

He nodded. “No problem, love,” he answered, with a pacifying grin. “How’s the head?”

“Where am I?” You asked pointedly, cutting to the chase, unwilling to take a sip of your tea out of lingering suspicion.

He sat down across from you, landing in the bench seat with a grunt, interlocking his fingers on the surface of the table. His glare was scrutinising, albeit gentle, as though checking rather than inspecting.

“You’re aboard the Iron Tide,” he said candidly. “We’re fishing for crabs in the North Sea.”

“Iron Tide?”

“That’s the name of the ship, love,” he answered, a little patronising. “I’m her skipper, I’m Jonathan. You met Gaz, he’s our engineer — he gave you a fright, I bet, but he’s a good lad.”

You nodded edgily, looking askance at him. “Okay… but, how did I get here?”

He smiled sombrely at that, crow’s feet pinching in the corners of his tired eyes. An oceanic blue, you noticed, little round seas reflecting the light that bounced off the table beneath him.

“Was hopin’ you could tell me that, pet,” he gibed, nodding at your mug. “Drink your tea.”

You took a sip, as you were told. Just cooled enough to sip with a slurp, blanketing your salty tongue, warm and saccharine, hot as it went down your throat. Earl grey. The taste made you feel tucked in, as though a blanket were over your legs, a pillow behind your head — but the murky memory was as fleeting as it was vague. You swallowed it with a sigh, and he looked pleased.

“So?”

“So what?” You asked, with a frown.

“How’d you end up on the high seas, hm?”

“I—” You cut yourself off, as you stared into the steaming surface of your tawny-coloured tea.

Words danced at the tip of your tongue, amorphous and flavourless, nothing you could place. Notions that, if you were to reach for them, would drift away, or turn to smoke.

You didn’t have an answer.

“I don’t know,” you said, voice shaky, glancing at him with worry knitting in your brows as though he might be able to remind you.

“You don’t remember?” He asked carefully.

A piteous heat swelled beneath your eyes, tears welling from their ducts and pooling in your eyes, your vision went blurry with it. You shook your head.

“S’alright, pet,” he said, fixing a hand to your wrist across the table. “It’ll come back to you. Do you remember anything at all? If you were on a boat, what country you’re from?”

Again you shook your head, sniffling, you wiped an errant tear with the soft sleeve of the oversized fleece you have no memory of putting on. “No.”

Concern cracked through his stoic expression, and it only made you more upset.

“Do you know your name, love?”

You vacuumed in a slow and trembling breath, eyes bouncing between your hands, as if they might hold the answer. You could think of names — Jessica, Lucy, Nina, Anna, Rebecca — but they were only that, random names floating about in the air around you, and you could not pin any of them as your own with any certainty.

“No,” you eked, followed swiftly by a sob, despite your effort to swallow it.

He exhaled, long and beleaguered, stroking the back of your hand with his colossal thumb. Hands as big as saucers, calloused and molten hot to the touch. Made your hand look like a pixie’s underneath it.

“Don’t fret, eh?” He said, failing to comfort you. “Y’got plenty of time to remember. Just finish your tea.”

“What do you mean?” You asked weakly, plenty of time comment making you uneasy. “Aren’t you going to take me to — back to land?”

He smiled, bemused, as he released your wrist with a pat and leaned back against the bench seat, hanging an arm insouciantly over the back.

“Not heading all the way back to port yet, love,” he said frankly. “We only left a couple days ago. Got a lot more crabs to catch.”

“I’m — I have to stay on this boat until you’re done fishing?” You asked, fighting back the tears that threatened another cascade.

He tilted his head. “This’s my job. If I don’t get crabs, I don’t get paid. Neither do the other lads, ‘n they won’t be letting that happen.”

You pouted, lip quivering and face scrunching, and he let out a huff.

“Look, sweetheart, what would I even do with you if I took you back now?” He asked, tone rigid. “Y’got no ID, no passport, no papers, nothing on you but that bloody frock. We don’t even know what country you belong to. You’d get snatched up by the authorities and tossed around immigration services until your head is on backwards.”

You sniffled, wiped your cheek with your sleeve. You had no argument, and even if you had the energy to muster one, you had no knowledge of how such a system worked, or where you would possibly go if they allowed you free movement. You’re sure you’d have a house somewhere, a family, someone out there must be looking for you…

The thought made you cry again, head falling from your shoulders and landing in your hands, you sobbed unremittingly into the dense fleece.

Jonathan sighed at that, evidently growing impatient, but he pushed himself to stand — he was suddenly next to you, planting himself on the bench with his thigh against yours, and he draped an arm around your shoulder.

“S’alright,” he crooned, voice as deep and rumbling as an engine, and you found yourself curling into him on instinct. Tucked up under his arm, head on his chest, a warm hand rested on the side of your head and smoothed down your hair. “We’ll sort it out.”

“I don’t even kn-know where my home is,” you blubbered into him, muffled by his jacket, still speckled with beads of sea mist. “Or if — if I’ve got a family, or a husband—”

“Y’look a little young for one o’ those,” he remarked, with a chortle.

“What if I don’t remember anything? Ever?” You cried, and he stroked the shell of your ear with his calloused thumb, fingers woven in your hair.

“None o’ that,” he grumbled, you couldn’t determine if he was rocking you or if it was simply the motions of the boat tipping over the waves. “No wallowing on my ship. Keep your chin up, and you’ll be fine.”

You whimpered, but nodded, and he petted your head like a cat.

“We got another nine or ten days at sea,” he said, comforting hand retreating from you, resting on his lap. Kept his heavy arm coiled around you, though, and you were daftly grateful for it. He patted you on the far shoulder with a stiff hand. “You’re a tough girl, yeah?”

“I dunno,” you sniffled, sitting yourself upright and reeling away from him. He released you, then, arms crossing over his chest instead.

“Well you survived God knows how long floating around in the North Sea, pet, I’d call that pretty tough.”

You attempted to compose yourself, sucking deep a breath and wiping down your face with your sleeves. Hoped that whoever’s fleece it was didn’t care about tears and snot being smeared over the cuffs.

“Is there somewhere for me to sleep?” You asked cautiously, in an attempt to come to terms with reality — nine or ten nights of sleeping on a fishing boat. It made you sick to think about.

He curled his lips as he thought for a moment. “You can sleep in my bed,” he said. “Skipper’s cabin is a lot nicer than the crew berths, I’ll tell you that.”

You blinked at him, uncertain — it was unsettlingly vague whether that meant he was offering you the bed to yourself.

“Or you can ask one of the lads to share a bunk with them, I’m sure they wouldn’t mind.”

You shook your head hastily, and he cracked a grin. “No, thank you, skipper’s cabin sounds good, please.”

“Alrighty,” he concurred, with a nod, the deal done. “Sleepy already, eh?”

You nodded sheepishly — for the most part, you just wanted to be alone, somewhere quiet and enclosed, out of sight. But you were utterly drained, left ravaged by receding adrenaline, body battered and bruised. Curling up in a bed sounded luxurious, and heaven only knows how long it had been since you slept in one.

“Y’only been awake for twenty minutes,” he joked. “And you’ve hardly touched your tea.”

He flicked his head towards the mug, and his imperious expression made clear that he wanted you to finish it.

So, if only appease him, you clutched the mug and tipped it into your mouth, sucking down the now luke-warm tea in five hefty gulps. Licked your lips when you were done, and dumped the mug back on the table.

“Happy?”

He smiled wide, let out a haughty chuckle. “Nicely done,” he said. “Alright, then, let’s get you tucked in.”

He pushed himself to stand with a grunt, finally freeing you from behind the table, and you followed him.

“Y’sure you don’t want a bite?”

You shook your head. “Maybe in the morning, if that’s okay.”

He laughed as he made his way toward an upward staircase. “Morning’s fine, but I’m not having you starve yourself.”

“I won’t.”

As you climbed to the top of the stairs you reached the bridge — a large control station with many screens, all showing different radars and panels and numbers. The wheel was there, too, a spinning chair with a sweater thrown over the back of it tucked in front of it. Sea spray made pattering rain-like noises on the thick windows, but very little light came in from them. The air was thick with cigar smoke and terpenic air freshener, the everpresent ghost of saltwater lingering in between.

“Just through here,” he instructed, and you followed him around to the other side, through a door, and down a shorter staircase.

There you were met with a bedroom; it was intimate, stuffed full of bags and boxes and papers. A fold-out desk jutted out from an warm-wood wall, covered in maps weighed down by protractors and a drawing compass. Coats hung over hooks, boots lined up by the door.

A cot bolted to the wall, perhaps a king single, unmade — a thick duvet with a red-and-navy plaid blanket tossed overtop, heavy wool that you could ascertain would be itchy without needing to touch it. A single pillow in a navy pillowcase, cream-coloured fitted sheet likely toned off-white due to age or overuse.

It was rich with musk in there, the single porthole window not able to be opened, and the heady scent made you dizzy. You imagined it was only a marginally diluted version of the same scent you’d get pressing your nose into his armpit. It was only tempered by traces of toothpaste and cigarettes, and the potent smell of Imperial Leather bar soap. Daft that you remembered that, and little else.

“Not a five-star hotel, eh?” He gibed, nudging you with his elbow. You didn’t have a response, at first, and he chided you; “Don’t be a sourpuss. No room for being fussy here, love.”

“No — this is perfect, thank you, I’ll sleep anywhere.”

He smiled and crossed his arms, rocking on the balls of his feet. “Alright, well, you get yourself comfortable then,” he said. “Loo’s just through there, if you need it. Use my toothbrush if you like, just give it a wash after, eh?”

You almost grimaced at the thought of sharing his toothbrush, but the lingering bile and salt in your mouth had you looking forward to the taste of toothpaste.

“Need anything else, pet?” He asked, still gruff. “Paracetamol? I can get you something else to sleep in—”

“I’m okay, thank you,” you insisted, perhaps too plainly eager to get him out of the room.

“Alright, love,” he said. “G’night, then. I’ll just be up there, still got some steering to do.”

“Okay.”

With a firm nod, he turned around and headed out of the cabin, shutting the door behind him.

You let out a pent breath once you were alone, potent exhaustion suddenly crashing into you like a train. You stumbled into the tiny ensuite — a small toilet and a sink, the shower head jutting out from the wall above the commode — rinsed his frayed toothbrush under the tap and globbed on some colgate.

Brushing your teeth made you feel marginally human again, and you spent a good five minutes scrubbing out every crevice of your mouth. You washed it afterwards, like he said, and stuck it to the wall with the suction cup on the back of it.

There was no mirror, and you found yourself glad of it. You couldn’t yet confront the fact that you did not remember what you looked like, an existential dread that simmered in your belly, but too tired to churn up.

Only then, as you glanced at his bar of soap (it was Imperial Leather, as you had guessed), did you realise how clean you felt — you wondered if he had washed you, and now you were certain that he had changed you. The thought made you shiver, and you tried not to think about it.

His bed was squeaky underneath you, and the mattress so soft that you sunk deep into it; the weight of him permanently embedded in the springs, you settled into the divot like a cat, curled up towards the wall. It was bitterly cold in the cabin, much like the rest of the ship, so you tugged the blankets up your cheek, rubbing your icy feet together to warm them up.

The sheets reeked of him, of man and musk, the pillow smelt of scalp and salt. It was unusually comforting. Such a human smell, and as you tucked yourself under his layers of blankets it swirled around in the front of your head and made you dozy.

Sleep called to you, dark and ebbing, and you slipped willingly beneath the surface.

You were roused, only slightly, at the sound of a door handle.

Not alert enough to open your eyes, you still floated deep in slumber, soft and warm. Your consciousness ascended close enough to the shallows to acknowledge the opening of a door, the footsteps across a hollow floor, but the sounds conveyed no meaning to you.

Sleep pulled you downward but you floated languidly back up at each noise; the fizz of running water, the scrubbing of brushing teeth, the spit of toothpaste.

A zip being undone, velcro being ripped open, boot laces being untied. The clunk of a shutting door, a cough, a grunt, and you finally broke the surface.

Now entirely awake, you remained completely still — not out of fear, you didn’t think — perhaps in the hope that he would leave you alone to keep sleeping, absolutely not ready to get up yet. He made no effort to be quiet, as he dumped his boots by the door, rummaged around in his belongings for a moment, coughed again.

You kept your nose close to the wall, eyes barely open. He flicked off a light switch and the room was abruptly drowned in darkness.

The blanket was lifted from you, then, and you flinched — with the cold air nipping at your skin, you realised your long jersey had been hiked up in your sleep, and your bare bottom half was starkly exposed.

You froze, curled up, tongue in your teeth; until a sudden weight plummeted into the mattress, bouncing you up before sinking deep behind you, causing you to slide into the dip.

With a grunt and a huff the blanket was pulled back up over you, scratchy wool brushing your cheeks. A titanic arm hooked over your stomach, and you squeaked — he paid no mind, yanking you backwards until your back was flush with his chest, ass nestled into his lower belly, his thighs tucked up behind yours.

You held your breath, skittish, not yet daring to move; he let out a deep sigh into the back of your head, warm breath seeping through your hair and into your skull.

His entire body was a furnace, burning hot, and you felt yourself melting into him whether you liked it or not. A mammoth hot water bottle, wrapped around and behind you, keeping you soothingly warm.

His hand ventured nowhere untoward, arm only hanging listlessly over the divot of your waist, forearm tucked into your chest. He felt clothed against you, sweatpants and a thermal on.

There was something wrong about it — something off, a survival instinct that buzzed around you, humming like a mosquito, a ringing in your ear, annoying and persistent.

But his pyretic warmth made you lightheaded, so comfortable tucked into him that it felt like you were already dreaming.

With a heavy blink, and a deflating breath, you sunk deep into him and let slumber swallow you whole once again.

#cunty little beanie is here #john price x reader #captain price x reader #captain john price x reader #call of duty fanfic #cod fanfic #cod smut #bella-writes

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awxcoffeexno · 10 months ago

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ain't gon' ever deserve you

mutant!loganhowlett x human!reader one shot

fic masterlist | nsfw claw worship

summary: logan has a nightmare and hurts you by accident - or - the one where you worship his claws the way they deserve.

content: mostly family-friendly claw worship. logan believes in the animal accusations but reader fixes it. reader is human, logan and reader have an established and v loving relationship, lots of reassurance and comforting for logan.

warnings: logan has nightmares, mentions of blood, logan self-hate, family-friendly knife play??????.

word count: 2.1k

a/n: listen, claw worship has been on my mind for a looooooong time. I'm too chicken to put up any of my nsfw writing yet so here's an sfw version with affirmations for poor baby lo-lo. also this is super inspired by logan and kayla's relationship and even uses some quotes from them.

you're deep asleep, dreaming of everything and nothing when you feel the sudden sharp sting in your arm.

eyes flying open, you open your mouth to hiss in pain but logan's lips are at your ear, snarling and grunting in his sleep again.

you look down to find his claws out, the metal tips digging into your arm. you exhale sharply, watching the warm blood seep down your arm and onto the new white sheets.

"no! n– no!" he growls, and you're forced to bite your lip as you try to pull away from his vice grip. when that doesn't work, you sink your nails into his arm.

"logan–"

"victor, NO!" he screams and sits up, yanking his claws from your arm and stabbing at the air in front of him.

victor creed. logan's brother and the bane of his existence. victor who haunts his dreams every single night, victor whose name you can never forget, victor who is now the reason logan's hurt you.

you sit up with him, aching for him, wrapping your arms around his torso. the burning pain in your arm an afterthought, you hear him swallow and gently let out a breath. he's sticky with sweat and the dry radiator air in the room isn't helping, the moon glowing through your glass walls, creating a halo around his head.

"nightmare." you state, letting him catch his breath and take in his surroundings.

he nods even though what you said wasn't a question but a statement. he twists around and pulls you into his lap, hugging you like he does near every night – chin tucked into your shoulder, arms wrapped all the way around your torso. he smells of soap and cigar smoke and the faintest hint of your shampoo. you smile to yourself and press a kiss to his hair.

"you're so cute." you mutter and a small smile spreads across his lips.

"cute?" he repeats, amused. "that's new." he pulls you closer, further down his lap and you can feel his heartbeat start to steady again.

"you used my shampoo again, and don't you deny it this time."

he scowls at you but lets you kiss him anyway. "reminds me of you," he sighs when he realises you won't stop until he admits it.

"but i'm right here," you giggle, running your thumb over the shell of his ear.

he opens his mouth to explain further but that's when he smells it. the blood he's drawn from your arm in his nightmare-fuelled anger at victor. his jaw tightens as he looks for the source of blood, finding three uniform slices on the outside of your forearm.

"no," he gasps, a thousand emotions crossing his eyes.

you try to wiggle your arm out of his grip, the blood running down your arm now. "hey... i'm okay."

"like fuck you are," he snarls, angry at himself.

how could he have possibly hurt you?! was this a thing now?? was he a danger to you even in his sleep?! god, he'll have to put you to sleep and then figure out a way to declaw himself. maybe if he just slices the back of his palms open–

"james..." you break him out of his thoughts, hand on his cheek. "baby, i'm okay. really. it looks worse than it feels."

"i'm going to rip these out." he whispers, holding his fists up, the back of his palms facing you. his words are as much a promise to you as a command to himself.

you grab his fists and glare at him. he blinks at your expression, looking at you over his hands.

"don't you dare say anything of the sort. these are a gift."

"a gift," he scoffs, "you can return a gift."

"these are a gift," you repeat sternly. "and i will not let you do anything to them."

he opens his mouth to protest but you aren't done. how dare he even think of hurting himself, of declawing himself when you love his claws as much as you love every last part of him.

you run your fingers over the back of his palms and whisper, "take them out."

"sweetheart..."

"take them out, my love" you repeat, kissing his knuckles because you know it hurts every time he does.

he carefully and very very slowly bares them and you look at him from between the blades.

not breaking eye contact, you lean in and press a soft kiss to the base of the middle claw on his right hand. you catch him shuddering and your eyes widen in surprise.

"you felt that?"

you can see him redden even in the dark. "'course i did," he grunts.

"what does it feel like?" you ask, fascinated. everyday you learn something new about him and it never fails to delight you.

you kiss the base of another claw on the other hand and see him inhale sharply.

he groans deeply, humming to come up with the right words. "like... you're stroking every nerve in me to life."

that makes you sit up on your haunches and wrap your fingers around his wrists. he freezes, bracing himself to yank the claws back in the second he thinks you might hurt yourself on the sharp ends. you carefully lick along the length of the claw between his pinky and ring finger on his right hand, making him exhale shakily.

"tryna kill me, sugar?" he says through gritted teeth, every muscle in his body tense.

"trying to show you how much i love your claws, lo. even if they hurt sometimes."

you loop your right hand between both of his, gently pressing the tip of your thumb against the sharp end of a claw. you run your finger up the blade, making him whine in protest as you draw blood.

his eyes implore you, pleading, but you simply take your hand up to his mouth, pressing your bleeding thumb against his lips. he relents, sucking it into his warm mouth and licking it clean.

"logan?" you whisper and he hums around your thumb.

despite the heat in your core, pooling between your legs, you need him to hear this. you'll have time to fulfil that need later.

"every part of you means everything to me. but your claws, especially your claws, have the most special place in my heart. they protect me. they make you feel good. and most of all, they're fucking cool."

and that finally makes him crack a smile again.

"y'think so?"

"mhmm."

"c'mere." he says finally, pulling his claws back in and tugging you back into his lap.

he makes you straddle him and kisses you warmly. he looks into your eyes with such fondness, it squeezes your heart. carefully he pulls his first claw out on his right hand and uses it to gently push your hair out of your eyes. your eyes flutter shut in response, leaning into his metal touch.

he brushes the back of the claw across your cheek and your lips part prettily for him. the air doesn't feel so thick anymore, the quiet humming of the refrigerator in the kitchen not overwhelming him the way it was when he snapped awake.

ever so carefully, pushing his own boundaries, he turns his wrist and pushes the flat of his claw onto your tongue. it's warm and tastes of him, salty and musky and like metal.

"that okay for you, pretty girl?" he mumbles and you can hear the strain in his voice. he's terrified but he so badly wants to be brave for you.

you wrap your lips around the claws and suck softly in response, drawing a groan of pleasure from him.

he shudders beneath you, every inch of him tense and trembling with restraint. you slide your tongue along the metal, tracing the edge of his claw with reverence, savoring the taste of him.

logan’s breath catches in his throat, and you feel the warmth of his exhale ghost across your face. his other hand, free of the adamantium blades, finds its way to your waist, gripping you tightly.

"god," he breathes out, voice rough and filled with a raw vulnerability you hear only at night. "you have no idea what you do to me."

you slowly release his claw from your mouth, letting it slide out with a deliberate slowness that has him biting back another groan. his eyes are locked on you, dark with need.

you reach up, cupping his face with your now clean thumb, and brush your lips against his in a featherlight kiss. "i think i do," you whisper against his mouth. "i want you to feel how much i love every part of you, logan. even the parts that scare you."

his claws retract with a soft snikt, and he wraps his arms around you, pulling you impossibly closer.

"you're something else, darlin'," he murmurs into your hair, pressing a kiss to the crown of your head. you can feel the smile playing on his lips. "you make me feel... whole."

you nestle into his embrace, feeling the steady rhythm of his heartbeat against your chest. "and you make me feel safe," you reply, closing your eyes and letting the furnace heart of his presence envelop you. "always."

you feel his grip tighten, his hand trembling slightly against your waist. he's always been the warrior, the weapon, the animal, but here in your arms, he's just logan, just a man who’s been through more pain than anyone should endure.

"people see the claws and think i’m nothing but a beast," he murmurs, his voice thick with self-doubt. "like i’m more metal than man. they look at me and all they see is the damage i can do."

you pull back just enough to look into his eyes, your hands framing his face. he tries to look away, but you won’t let him. you press a soft kiss to his brow, then his cheek, and finally, to the corner of his mouth.

"they don’t make you an animal," you whisper, your voice even and filled with conviction. "they make you strong. they’re not just weapons, they’re part of what makes you you."

his breath hitches at your words, and you feel him struggle against the years of conditioning, the years of being told that he’s nothing more than a killing machine. but you won’t let those words hold power over him anymore.

you reach down, gently taking his right hand in yours. with care, you press a kiss to each knuckle, feeling the warmth of his skin under your lips. then, you look up at him and slowly, deliberately, coax his claws out again.

you run your fingers lightly over the metal, tracing the curves and edges with the same care you’d give to a delicate piece of art.

logan watches you, his expression shifting from uncertainty to something deeper, something like awe. "you don’t see me like everyone else does," he says, almost to himself.

"no," you agree, leaning in to press a kiss to the tip of one of his claws. "i see you, logan. the real you. and what i see is a man who’s fought for so long to protect the people he loves, even when it’s cost him everything. your claws, they’re not just about hurting or fighting. they’re about protecting. they’re about survival. and they’re about who you have been for so long."

his chest rises and falls with each breath, the tension slowly easing from his body as your words sink in. for once, he doesn’t feel like an animal. he feels like a man, just a man. and it's nice.

"besides," you say, tone lightening. "so you really think I'm such a baby i can't handle three little cuts?"

you both know you're underplaying it and though he would never admit it in the day, the moonlight across his face betrays his grateful expression. it's easier to believe that he hasn't hurt you too much when you're saying it yourself.

you lower his hand, resting it against your chest, over your heart.

he swallows hard, holding you as if he’s afraid to let go. "ain't gon' ever deserve you," he whispers, his voice thick.

"you deserve everything," you murmur back, holding him just as tightly. "and i’m going to keep reminding you of that, every day."

for a moment, he’s silent, just holding you close. then, in a voice that’s barely more than a whisper, he says, "you almost make me feel human, darlin’."

you pull back just enough to kiss him again, only because you know he'd much rather feel than hear. your kiss is slow and tender, letting him feel the truth in your touch.

he doesn’t say anything more, but the way he kisses you back, the way he holds you, tells you everything you need to know.

he'll be okay. you'll make him okay. you gently push him to lie down and rest your head on his chest.

you love him, you love how he wants so badly to believe you, and most of all, you fucking love his claws.

this stemmed from a very nsfw thought™ but here we are, all warm and fuzzy. a mostly non-angsty fic is new for me!!

hope you liked this x

love, d <3

edit: i wrote an nsfw claw worship fic too 🤠🤝🏽 >> unholy

#logan howlett #logan howlett x reader #logan howlett x you #logan howlett fanfiction #wolverine #wolverine x reader #wolverine x you #wolverine fanfiction #wolverine angst #logan howlett angst #logan howlett xmen #xmen #xmen fanfiction

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grenadehearts · 2 months ago

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drunk needy clingy kirishima??

Kirishima's drunk. You can tell by the warm, rosy flush blooming across his cheeks under the soft streetlight glow. His crimson eyes, glassy and half-lidded, blink slow and unfocused as he leans into you, words slurring just enough at the ends that the tang of alcohol clings to every breath.

And god, he's clinging. This big, broad, beefy man—pro hero, strong enough to level buildings—is latched onto his girlfriend like a needy puppy, Anyone passing by might do a double take, but luckily, the street is silent and empty at this hour. It’s one in the morning, and the city's tucked into sleep.

He whines softly, lips brushing against the shell of your ear as he drawls, “But babyyy, I missshhh you—hic.”

You laugh under your breath, amused and endeared. “Kiri, I’m right here.”

But he isn’t having it. He spins you around clumsily, his hands landing on your cheeks, fingers poking at the soft skin like he’s checking if you're real.

“Hmmm,” he hums suspiciously, nose wrinkling. “Don’t believe it.”

Then, after a beat, his expression breaks into a crooked grin. “Kidding. But I wanna hug you. And kiss you. Can we do that? Please?”

There’s such raw, eager affection in his tone, it tugs at your heart even as you bite back another smile. You turn your head slightly, dodging his attempts to plant a wet kiss on your cheek.

“Soon, babe. Not yet. I gotta call a cab first, ‘kay?”

He lets out a dramatic groan and crosses his arms like a sulking kid, swaying slightly on his feet as you pull your phone out. But as soon as you start dialing, he’s pressed up against your back again, wrapping you in a warm, clumsy hug. His face buries in the crook of your neck, lips brushing your skin as he mumbles,

“You smell so good… and you taste good too...”

The kisses start then—sloppy, uncoordinated little pecks peppered across your jaw and neck.

You laugh, startled, and gently push him off. “Kiri, no. You’re drunk. Save the love bites for when you’re sober, yeah? The cab’ll be here any second.”

He grumbles in protest, muttering something unintelligible, but he doesn’t fight it.

The cab ride home is another challenge. Kirishima immediately collapses into you, burying his face into your chest, arms wrapped around your waist like he’s afraid you’ll disappear. At one point, he even shoves his head up under your shirt in some misguided attempt to get closer.

“M’just love you so much, y’know that?” he murmurs into your skin.

You hum, combing your fingers through his messy hair. “I know, baby.”

“You’re so manly,” he mumbles next, and it’s so slurred it takes a second to process. “Like… so manly I gotta marry you or somethin’.”

You laugh, heart swelling at the raw honesty in his voice.

“You’re so pretty I—hic—I can’t even handle it...”

And then, without warning, the tears start. His head lifts from under your shirt just long enough to rest against your shoulder, sniffling. His voice cracks as he continues, a mess of intoxicated love confessions spilling out in barely coherent sentences.

“Just wish I could crawl into your skin and… and live there. You’re so warm. So soft.”

You don’t even try to suppress the fond exhale.

Later that night, you’re in the bathroom with him, kneeling on the cold tiles. One hand holds back his messy crimson hair, the other rubbing gentle circles on his back as he throws up everything he'd drunk. A bottle of aspirin and a full glass of water wait nearby.

masterlist link here.

taglist: @xoxojisu @candiiee @luvseraphh @cvnt4him @soundtrqck @chlosology @lotusstarr @cupkiki @wokasiv @badslittlemuffin @princessshnazzy @203steph @chitteringcicadaeyes @idk1187 @notartemis777 @chosostonguepiercing @chocolatedefendorbaa @t33th--r0t @3lenaatvt @the-faceless-bride @tuneinwlosers @badslittlemuffin @dreamcastgirl99 @gethexxed @moonstonejpg @pluto-9456

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yanderenightmare · 1 year ago

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♡ TW: obsession, obsessive thoughts

♡ FEM reader

Thinking about when the playboy finally falls in love…

It’s so silly, soft as it may sound, untrue even given his record of sleeping around, but sometimes all he wants is pure unadulterated love. A hug once in a while would be nice – maybe a chaste kiss on his cheek – or cuddles.

You hadn’t believed a lick of it. You’d only laughed in his face with a shake of your head, telling him that must have been the worst pick-up play you’d ever been the victim of.

It’s cliché, but he’s been obsessed with you ever since.

He feels like such a loser thinking about it – for real now – rolling his eyes with a hidden smile while looking at the candid picture he’d snapped of you.

Chewing on this tongue while fantasizing such ridiculous things – virginal nothings such as handholding or resting his head in your lap and feeling you play with his hair. Sleeping together with your clothes on – spooning each other all clingy and soft...

Whispering sweet little nothings against the shell of his ear – teasing him. Playfighting – making you squeal and giggle as he grabs you and pins you beneath him in the bed. Tickling – making you laugh. Or kissing your nose and head and hand.

Oh, and making breakfast together, eating lunch, and sharing dinner.

Don't get him started on showering – helping each other wash – backrubs and headscrubs. How good your hands would feel carding through his hair as you rub in soap and rinse it out. Or just face masks. A whole evening in the bubble bath.

Watching some stupid romcom in fluffy bath robes afterward with your dopey tired head falling to rest on his shoulder. Snoring and mumbling small sweet little nothings to each other.

Saying good morning. Saying goodnight. Have a nice day. Good luck. I love you. I love you more. I love you most.

And there’s more.

Baby-names.

You haven't even gotten his dick wet once – he hasn’t even scored a kiss yet, and he’s already thinking about knocking you up and putting a ring on it.

You would look too good with his brat on your knee…

Bouncing them, breastfeeding, playing peek-a-boo games, zerbert, and doing the Simba from The Lion King – all with a great big beaming smile on your face. A smile that even the sun would envy.

Not to mention the kid itself.

He would love the ever-living life out of a little baby version of you – pouty plump lips and mochi cheeks – spluttering and hiccupping on earth-shattering sobs when scuffing her dainty little knees on the pavement – asking for piggyback rides and candy before dinner.

Or a little miniature of him. Seeing you lull little devil-faced Junior to sleep.

Fuck it, you should get both. A truckload.

He’s shaken from his thoughts when his friend snaps his fingers.

“You’ve been staring at your phone forever. What’re you looking at that’s so important?”

He can’t believe how far down the rabbit hole he’d just spiraled. Thinking about a girl without picturing her naked. He must be losing it.

“… I’m not sure…”

♡ BNHA – Bakugou, Denki, Dabi, Hawks, Shinso ♡ JJK – Sukuna, Gojo, Naoya, Toji ♡ HQ – Kuro, Lev, Bokuto, Oikawa, Miya twins, Suna ♡ BLLK – Reo, Nagi, Rin, Sae, Yukimiya, Karasu, Shido, Aiku ♡ AOT – Eren ♡ WB – Suo, Kaji, Togame

♡ FEM x M INSERT masterlist ♡ GN x M INSERT masterlist

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sidollie · 2 months ago

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༉‧₊˚. Simon Riley having his way with reader cw// ᴍᴅɴɪ, sadistic simon riley, Dacryphilia, clit play, nipple play, overstimulation, creampie,

𐙚 Simon Riley has you in one of the most meanest mating press, your body bend in half while his fat cock is splitting you open against the soft bed. Your feet are hanging over his broad shoulders as he pounds into your pink puffy cunt.

But in the middle of it he just stops leaving his cock deep inside of your aching needy cunt , his fat tip buried against your cervix. he ignores your whines and protests and just focuses on your sensitive bud, rubbing and playing with your swollen clit.

"shh, jus' be a good girl 'nd le' me play with ya"

He loves to feel your gummy walls flutter around him, your cunt trying to pull his cock deep than it already is. And he takes so much pride in it and he's so mean about it too, one tatted hand working your clit and the other tugging on your puffy nipples. He’s pushing you closer and closer to a orgasm as he whispers against the shell of your ear.

"Such a good girl f'me, c'mon, I want t'feel yer sweet cunt wrapped tightly around me... mhm, there ya go.”

like on a command, your body gives in and releases an intense orgasm, making you scream and cry from the pleasure. You look up at him with teary eyes, expecting him to go back to pounding into you but all you see is a sadistic look on his rugged face.

"C'mon darlin' one ain't enough, give me more, we’re not stoppin' 'til I’m satisfied.”

his voice is laced with smugness and dominance, as his calloused fingers don’t stop their mean work on your oversensitive clit. While you're just laying underneath his huge body, whining and whimpering, trying to push him off but he ignores all of your pleas because he loves to overstimulate his sweet dovie , he wants to see your pretty eyes cry tears from the pleasure he's giving you.

He pulls another orgasm from your body, the feeling euphoric as your eyes roll back into your head and your hips buck up into him. He pulls orgasms after orgasms out of your helpless body underneath his muscular one.

"So good lovie, clench around me jus' like that, gonna make me cum in yer little cunt."

You have no idea how many times you've clenched and came around his fat throbbing cock while he just plays with your clit and nipples not even thrusting into you. he groans above you as his hips finally jerk into you, pushing deep into your womb as he dumps his cum into it

"Ah fuck, that fel' good swee'heart?"

"i hate you!"

@sidollie

༉‧₊˚. masterlist

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godmadeaterribleerror · 4 months ago

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It's Been Calling Me

Main Masterlist - Bucky Masterlist

Read on A03!

Tags: Bucky Barnes/Female Reader, light angst, shameless smut (oral f receiving, p in v sex), fluff, soulmates, dreams, told over many years, no use of y/n

Summary/Warnings: You've had these… dreams. Strange, realistic, detailed dreams of the same man, almost your whole life. But they're just dreams. You've been so sure, for so long, that they're just dreams.

So sure, until you're not.

Author's Note: I love this one. I love using fake Marvel science logic. I love putting sad men in situations where they can't escape love. I love semi-linear storytelling. Enjoy!

Word Count: 10.9k

“I get… dreams.” You mumble, staring at an odd point over Dr. Raynor’s head. It’s always better than looking her in the eyes. “They’re weird.”

“The very nature of dreams is to be strange.” You can see the shrug of Raynor’s shoulders, hear the neural expression that must be on her face. “Although if you feel they’re worthy of note-“

“They are.”

Raynor hums. She’s probably raising her brows. You still won’t look.

“You sound quite certain of that.”

“I am.” You tuck your knees up to your chest, frowning at the air. “It’s- They’re not new.”

“Ah.” Raynor pauses, then says your name. In the gentle but firm therapist way that you really hate. It makes you feel like a child. “This conversation may be easier if you would look at me.”

“No thanks, I’m-“

She says your name again. A little harsher. “We’ve discussed this. You’re here of your own volition-“

“That’s not true.” You mutter. “Court-ordered isn’t volition.”

“Well you could’ve chosen the inpatient ward.” Raynor’s shrugging again. “Look at me.”

You let out a long breath, and meet her gaze. You’d been right. She was raising her brows.

“Good work.” She gives you a tight-lipped smile and small nod of approval. “Tell me about these dreams.”

It takes a minute to find the words. Not because you don’t have them, but because you’d never expected to use them. You’ve rehearsed them in the mirror a million times, but they always sounded insane, and you didn’t need another reason to be called crazy.

“I’ve had them my whole life.” It’s easiest to start there. “But it’s- they’ve changed. Over time.”

“Changed how?”

“It’s hard to explain-“

“Try.”

You scowl. “I am trying, Christina, but there’s kind of a lot to say-“

Raynor sighs, giving you the patented look of disapproval that you might hate more than how she says your name. “How about telling me when they started. Is that do-able?”

It takes a long, deep breath, but you nod. “I was- I think I was ten. I fell asleep, and it was the first dream I’d ever had. The first one that I remembered when I woke up. It was…” You swallow, and there’s a sting in your nails as you rip more skin away. “Really vivid.”

——

This isn’t your body. It’s too big, too tall, and you’re not nearly strong enough to rip a door off its hinges. This body is sprinting across ice without ever breaking pace or falling flat with a crunch. You can’t even walk up stairs without tripping over thin air.

But this doesn’t really feel like a body at all. It feels like a shell, or tool. Hollow and pressed down, moving so mechanically you’d think it was a machine if you couldn’t hear its heartbeat in your ears. There’s a lot of pain in it. Strangely numb pain, as if the owner of this body doesn’t allow himself to dwell on it, shuttering it off to the side as he moves.

You’re pretty sure it's a he. There’s hair in your eyes, but men can have long hair, and when the body’s arms swing into view they’re big and muscular. You’re also pretty sure there’s something between your legs that wasn’t there when you went to sleep.

And you can feel him. Very, very deep in your head, he’s bellowing and scraping at his own scalp. He feels like a caged animal, but this is his body. He’s roaring things that are more like feral sounds than actual words, and every time he gets loud enough for you to make out a real voice something clamps down on your skull—his skull—and it all goes quiet.

You can see another man in your line of vision. He’s on his knees, trembling and begging, but the noise is muffled and static. As if there’s a filter pushing anything coherent out of your head.

A gloved fist that’s attached to your body—but not yours to control—reaches out and grabs the man by his throat. It squeezes.

He’s desperate. Locked down and furious, the ‘he’ who you’re possessing is almost pleading with himself to stop.

But he doesn’t.

And there’s a sickening snap that will echo in your ears for a long time after you wake up.

——

Raynor’s looking at you like you’re insane. You don’t love it.

“Did you…” She pauses, scanning over you with a small frown. “Did you see the hand?”

You blink at her. “Yeah, I just said-“

“Without the glove.” She clarifies. “The one that snapped the man’s neck. Did you ever see it without the glove.”

It’s an oddly specific question. And she seems to be looking for a certain answer, because in all your time of working with Raynor she’s never looked so obviously invested in a story.

“Not for a while.” You keep your words slow, watching her wearily. “He always wore the gloves. And when he didn’t, he wouldn’t look at his hands-“

Raynor frowns. “So how did you know he wasn’t wearing the gloves?”

“Because he knew.” You shrug. “I lived in his brain like, every night.”

“Every-“

“Night, yeah. That’s what I fucking said.”

Raynor hums, and you think she’s going to grab the notebook to write something along the lines of patient has lost her goddamn mind, but she just keeps staring at you. “You said you didn’t see the hand for a while. When did you see it?”

“When I was sixteen. The first time the dreams changed.”

“Changed from-“

“Being in his head.” You pull your lip between your teeth, weighing how much you want to reveal. Too much feels like a violation of his privacy, even if they’re your dreams. He’s a private guy, it took you years to get him to tell you anything, and if you’ve realized turns out to be the truth, you don’t want to ruin anything. “It’s- it was about six years of seeing everything through his eyes-“

“Everything?”

You wish Raynor would stop saying the word every like that. Like it’s a lie.

“All the murders.” You mutter. “There were a lot of murders.”

Raynor nods for you to continue, and you have to take a long, steadying breath.

“One night I went to sleep and he was… attacking some blond guy. We couldn’t really see his face. Then I fell asleep the next night, and it was different.”

——

You can see him. You’ve never seen him before.

He’d never looked in a mirror, or described himself in his head for you like he’s a Wattpad character. He’s only ever been a body that moves out of your will, and a pained voice deep in your brain that didn’t seemed thrilled with what was happening either.

But you’re not in his head, or his body. You’re standing in a bathroom—in your own body, wearing the same clothing you’d been wearing when you’d crawled into bed—and looking at him.

He’s a lot more attractive than you’d anticipated. And you’d anticipated attractive. You’d built an image in your head of your imaginary dream assassin, basing it purely on a level of hotness that would justify all the murders he’d been up to. It had been a little fucked up, but you’d also been so goddamn sure he wasn’t real. That this was just a really odd and worrying coping mechanism for all the messed up shit in your real life.

But he seems pretty fucking real right now. And almost impossibly handsome. Strong features that look like they’d been carved from marble, an almost hulking frame that’s somehow bigger when you’re looking at it from outside, and tangled, greasy hair that’s really working with the whole tortured expression on his face.

Because he does not look okay.

He’s gripping the sink and glowering at himself, scanning over his own face like he recognizes it less than you do. He’s bent like there’s a weight on his shoulders he doesn’t know how to shake off, and that’s impressive, because you’ve seen him pick up a car.

The porcelain of the sink cracks, and he flinches back, looking between his hands and the rubble with wide eyes.

His eyes are blue. A really pretty blue. You’d always thought blue eyes were overrated—big whoop, you’re more sensitive to light—but there’s something silver in this man’s eyes that you really love. It feels like a deep storm you’d like to chase.

He’s really pretty.

He doesn’t seem like the type of guy who would like being called pretty, but he is. In a natural and powerful way. Like something heavenly that’s burned through the atmosphere in a dreadful fall.

Pretty face, pretty eyes, pretty hands-

Metal hand.

One metal hand.

——

Raynor looks worried now. You wish she’d go back to thinking you’re just batshit crazy.

“Do you-” she clears her throat, sitting a little taller in her chair. “His name. Did you ever learn his name?”

It’s your turn to raise your brows. “Does that matter?”

“Yes.”

It’s a flat, tense answer. It makes something coil in your throat.

“I-“ You rub your own calves, soothing yourself in the careful way you’ve always practiced. “I didn’t, for a while-“

Raynor says your name, her tone short and clipped. “Stop telling me something didn’t happen for a while. If I ask a question, it’s because I need to know the answer. Not the buildup.”

You frown. “Need to know?”

“It’s…” Raynor sighs. “It is very important that you give me a name.”

“Why?”

“Therapist reasons.”

You give her a flat look. “That’s not a real thing.”

“Yes, it is. Name.”

“If you need the name,” you say, raising your chin slightly. “You have to sit through my for a while.”

Raynor gives you a look of disbelief, shaking her head and muttering something that sounds like God, I can’t take two of them, before raising her voice. “Fine. What was for a while.”

“I couldn’t talk to him.” You explain. “For like, two years after I got out of his brain, he still couldn’t see me. When I tried to talk to him it was like I was in a- sort of a one-way mirror? And it’s not like he was just walking around telling the air I’m Bucky-“

“Bucky?” Raynor looks downright distressed. “His name was-“

“It’s Bucky.”

He still is. He’s not a was, Bucky is.

That’s part of the problem.

“And how-“ Raynor swallows. “How did you learn this?”

“He told me.”

——

This is new. You’re not on a street or in a half-empty apartment—the two places you’ve grown most accustomed to seeing in your sleep—but in a field. A very big field with huts and brush and goats.

There are a truly staggering amount of goats.

And there he is. His hair isn’t greasy and unkempt anymore, but looks almost soft, pulled back in a half-up half-down situation that makes him look clean. His metal arm is gone, but he doesn’t seem that bothered by it. He’s standing taller than before, like the weight you’ve grown used to seeing finally has begun to lift.

His outfit is new too. It looks like something traditional and well-made, rather than the off-brand baseball hats—you too are a big fan of the American baseball team, the ‘Doggers’—and shitty polyester t-shirts.

You’re taking him and scenery in, trying to place where your brain could’ve possibly taken you this time, when he does something you’d never expected.

He turns and looks at you.

Not through you. Not around you. Not in your general direction.

At you.

He can fucking see you.

“Hello?”

You’ve heard him speak before, a few times. His voice has always been low and gruff and heavy.

It’s smooth and richer now. You don’t know if that’s because it’s directed at you—setting off small sparks over your ribs—or in relation to that vanished weight, but you like it. It suits him better.

“Hi.” You whisper, your body frozen in place as he moves forward.

He’s right in front of you. Staring at you.

He’s always gotten prettier every time you’ve seen him. This is different.

This is knocking the air out of your lungs with just the sight of him, because there’s a light in his eyes you’ve never seen before, and it makes something deep inside of you glow.

“I’m, uh, I’m Bucky.”

He holds out his hand, and you tilt your head at him.

“That’s a weird name.”

He blinks at you, his hand still frozen in the air. “I guess, yeah. Never thought about it. It’s just a nickname.”

“Oh.” That makes more sense. “Sorry. That’s- I just never thought you as- never mind.”

Bucky frowns at you, opening his mouth—likely ask you what you mean by that—but you say your name and shake his hand because he gets the chance.

He has a nice hand. It warm, and calloused, and fits really well in yours.

“Why can you see me?” You blurt, and there goes any pretense of containing the truth.

Bucky frowns at you. “Should I… Not be able to see you?”

“You’ve never seen me before.”

“Before? What do you mean-“

“It’s- It’s weird. And complicated.”

He just stares at you, waiting for you to continue.

You’re holding his gaze. You’ve never held anyone’s gaze before.

It’s kind of electrifying.

“I’ve dreamt about you before.” You mumble. “And you’ve never seen me.”

“About me?”

He doesn’t sound like he believes you. You get that. It’s not really a reasonable or believable statement.

“Yeah. But you had two arms. And there weren’t goats.”

Bucky nods slowly, and seems to reach a conclusion in his brain that you don’t get to be privy to.

It’s enough for him though. Because he gives you a small, almost nervous and apologetic smile.

“Do you wanna, uh, do you wanna meet the goats?”

You blink at him. You’d expected more questions, or some doubt. But he’s just looking at you, something in his pretty blue eyes almost hopeful.

“Are they...” You trail off, glancing at the goats over his shoulder. “Your goats?”

“They’re community goats.” He shrugs. “But Shuri says connection with life will help my recovery, and I don’t really want to connect with people.” His voice lowers, and it sounds like he’s mostly talking to himself. “They don’t really like connecting with me.”

You don’t know who the fuck Shuri is, but you nod anyway. “So goats?”

He gives you another odd look, like he’d expected you to say something else.

“Yeah. Goats.”

“Did you name them?”

He frowns. “They’re goats. They don’t need names.”

You click your tongue, shaking your head. “Wrong. Everything needs a name. I named my car, and my phone.”

“You named your phone?”

“Yep.” You grin at him, and it’s a wide, teasing grin you haven’t given anyone in years. “Bertha.”

“That’s…” Bucky’s still staring at you–he seems to do that a lot—but there’s something like amusement in his eyes. “Bertha is not a good name.”

“Better than Bucky.”

He chuckles at that, and it’s a beautiful sound. Deep and heavy, like a bass drum in your chest.

It’s the sort of thing that could be addicting, if you’re not careful. Worse, it’s the sort of thing you wouldn’t mind being addicted to.

“You’re kinda mean, doll.”

“Yep.” You shrug, ignoring how ‘doll’ makes you feel fuzzy in your gut. “And I’ll be meaner if you don’t let me name your goats.”

He hums, scanning you over with an intensity in his eyes that reminds you of that storm you’d see all those years ago in the bathroom. This time, you’d like to do a little more than chase it.

You think it could be really easy to get wrecked by it.

“Will you come back if I let you name them?”

He keeps saying things you don’t expect. Of course you’ll come back. You don’t have a choice.

But you nod, crossing your arms over your chest.

“Only if you promise to actually use the names.”

He nods, giving you another smile. “Deal.”

———

“Did you ever learn his last name?”

You shake your head. “I never asked. He mentioned his real name was James at one point, but then I asked why he was called ‘Bucky’ and we got off topic.”

“One… point?” Raynor’s words are slow, and you’ve really never seen her looked lost like this before. You’d be proud of yourself if it wasn’t a bad sign. “Exactly how frequently did these dreams occur?”

———

“You’re back!”

Bucky looks genuinely happy to see you. He does every night. The same surprised joy in his voice, shock always written over his face like it’s truly odd and lovely to see you here.

Like you’re not here every night, for three to four hours, standing in his little hut and wandering the fields.

You’ve worked out that you’ve put him in Africa. Wakanda specifically, likely because you’d seen it all over the news and it seemed pretty interesting. Shuri was the princess, and the guy T’challa Bucky had mentioned a few times was the King. You’d almost certainly heard their names during all those UN conferences—the ones you put on in the background just to hear some noise that wasn’t ringing in your ears—and your brain had just decided to run with it.

At least, you think it’s just your brain. You’ve always assumed this was all in your brain, because this feels like the exact kind of fucked up shit your brain would pull. And Bucky never aged. He’d never really changed, for six years. He’d had just been another way to cope for the longest time, but now—as you actually get to know him—he seems dangerously like a real person.

He looks like he broods less than when you see him hunched over a toilet or glowering at his reflection in a window. His appearance has started to shift in a way it never really had.

The metal arm has permanently departed. He seems fond of keeping his hair out of eyes, and his wardrobe finally has diversity. He talks to you, and he has a personality. An adorable, grumpy, endearing personality that would play into your idea of ‘made up in your brain’ if he couldn’t be so annoying.

He stares. He grunts a lot. He doesn’t get any of your references. If you made up an imaginary dream man to feel more loved, he would like all the things you like and hate all the things you hate.

But he doesn’t.

And it always draws you in further, because he truly does seem like just a perfectly insufferable asshole.

That’s cruel. He’d been right. You could be mean.

He never seemed to mind.

And he’s more like a dog anyway. One that escaped the pound and follows you around, not even bothering to beg for scraps because you offer them with a grin.

You like his company. You like his voice. You like that he’s annoying and you like more that it’s your exact type of annoying.

You like that he’s really fucking hot, and get hotter every time you visit.

You mostly just like him.

“Of course I’m back.” You shrug, kicking a rock with the tip of your foot, watching it bounce through the dirt. “I’m always back.”

“Yeah. So far.” You see Bucky shrug in your periphery, and when you look up, he’s staring again. “Could change.”

“Won’t change.” You counter, giving him a pointed look. “Sorry, Buck. You’re stuck here until I die.”

That’s the first time you’ve called him Buck. He tenses for a moment, seems to shake something physically off his body, and nods slowly.

“Should I be worried about you dying?”

“Not right now, no.” You hum. Another rock gets kicked. “Death doesn’t agree with me.”

He chuckles. “Don’t think it agrees with anyone, doll-“

“Shut up.” Third rock. This one hits a goat, and you cringe slightly. “Shit. Sorry, Bubble McBubbleface-“

“Bubs will be.” Bucky rolls his eyes, moving to your side. He’s standing really close. You can almost feel a phantom heat from his body. “And I still can’t believe you talked me into that name. I had to tell the king of the damn country that his goat was named Bubble McBubbleface.”

You giggle, and Bucky shoots you a glare.

“You think that’s funny? I had to like pretend it was my idea,” he grumbles your name, and you always like how he says it. Like it’s some sort of answer. “I had to look the council of elders in the eyes and tell them that Bubble McBubbleface got Lady Gaga pregnant-“

Your eyes widen. “You let the goats get pregnant?”

“Course I let them get pregnant, doll.”

“But-“

He gives you a dry, amused look. “Would you rather I interfere? You want me to cockblock Bubs?”

You blink at him. “You know what cockblock means?”

Your brain had given him the personality of an eighty-year-old man. You don’t know why, but you stopped asking questions like “why” and “what” a long time ago. You just know that he shouldn’t know what cockblock means, for consistency.

“Of course I know what it means. You taught it to me.” He winks at you, and you’re pretty sure you’re flushing.

This is meant to be a dream. You shouldn’t be able to flush, or feel a little flutter and hum in your heart, or something molten in your gut when he leans a little further forward to grin down at you.

This seems less like a dream every night.

You’d be worried about that if you had the energy, or foresight, or care.

“Are goats births gross?” You ask, and he chuckles again. The sound has started to inflict a sort of high on your brain, and every color in this dreamworld seems brighter.

“They’re fucking disgusting.” He leans a little further down. You have to stare at his nose to pretend the proximity isn’t going to make your fall over. “But if you let me show you one in here, I’ll let you name the babies out there.”

You nod kind of stupidly, the whole world shifts into a barn—goat births are disgusting, but Bucky gets a look of intense focus you’d like to see re-aimed in your direction—and four months later Bucky tells you little Oz The Great and Powerful, Donald Duck, and Pants McPantsface have been welcomed into the world.

———

“So you’d see him in… Wakanda.” Raynor takes another long breath. If you didn’t think it would make everything worse, you’d tell her to try some deep breathing exercises. “Did the location ever change? Did you witness any more of those murders from before?”

You feel something spark in your chest like an electric wire, and you sit a little taller. You haven’t seen Bucky kill anyone since you’d been trapped in his brain. He’s a good man. And, as far as Raynor knows, a figment of your imagination. She has no right to fucking imply-

“It’s important that I know,” she says slowly, and you think your oddly blinding and righteous anger had been painted all over your face. “So I better understand what’s been happening to you. Please,” she says your name, leaning somehow further forward in her seat. “Answer my questions.”

You nod, letting out a slow exhale. “No murders. But he did start coming into my brain.”

Raynor frowns at you. “Was he not always-“

“Not like this.”

———

“This is new.”

You whip around, taking a stumbling step back that would’ve landed you on the floor, had Bucky not looped his one arm around your waist.

“Hey, doll. Pleasure seeing you-“ He frowns, glancing around your apartment. “Where the hell am I?”

You don’t answer, only reaching up to touch his face. His beard is soft. His hair is softer. When you trace the line of his nose it does feel like a nose, and when you poke his cheek it seems pretty cheek-like-

“What, uh,” Bucky say your name, scanning over your face with concern. “What’s happening here.”

“You’re not supposed to be here.” You whisper, poking his cheek again. Just to be sure. “You’ve never been here before.”

“Yeah, figured that one out myself-“

“No.” You shake your head, placing one hand on his chest. It fits well there, slotting right over muscle and warm skin. Every part of him seems to fit perfectly against you, and you’ve never been this close before, but you don’t have any urge to move away. “You don’t get it, Bucky. You’ve never been here. It’s been ten years, and you’ve never been here.”

“I know, doll. Doesn’t seem like there’s much to-“ He pauses, giving you an odd look. “Ten years?”

“Yeah.” You mumble. There’s not much else to say.

He just stares at you, and shakes his head slightly. “Huh. You gonna tell me where I am?”

“My apartment.”

“Your-“ He starts slightly, but you never shake in his arms. “You live in this place?”

You nod, and he pulls you to your feet, scanning over your home.

The silence wraps around your heart and lungs, and the room is spinning slightly. You’re asleep. You’re pretty fucking sure you’re asleep. You locked the door, turned off the lights, and crawled into bed, so you’re asleep. Bucky’s never been here before, but he’s not really here because this is a dream and he’s not real.

You think.

You wouldn’t bet on that anymore, though.

And nothing has ever been as important as Bucky liking your room, because the longer he just scans over the space around you the more your skin heats, the more your eyes blur, the more your throat constricts and your heart aches and pounds-

“It’s very… you.” He finally says, and every bit of nerve vanishes into the air.

He’s right. You’ve been very deliberate in making sure your home is yours.

And you’re not sure why you bothered worrying at all. He fits here, just as well as he fits in every other part of you.

“Can I get the grand tour?” He raises his brows, and you nod, leading him through your space, making jokes and feeling your heart do a little flip and spin whenever he chuckles.

And things always do change. Frequently out in the real world, and carefully and easily in here.

And at least with Bucky, the change seems adaptive. You grow, he grows with you, until you’re twined and rooted into each other, and every color in this dreamscape is so vivid it’s the only thing that still tells you:

None of this is real.

———

“It was split after that.” You say. ”Half the dreams in Wakanda, half in New York.”

You’re watching Raynor carefully. Still on the edge of her seat, legs braced like she’s ready for a fight, a tight expression on her face that Bucky calls the moose in headlights expression.

———

“You got that moose expression again, doll.”

You frown at him. “Stop calling it that, it’s just my face-“

“No. Your normal face has a dimple here, and your brows rest like that.”

He’s touching you as he explains, moving your features to match his words. You’d smack his hand away if his touch wasn’t soothing and flaring all at once. If you didn’t really love the idea of him looking at you long enough to know exactly how to adjust your face, and how to be right about it.

“But it’s not like that now.” He finishes, giving you a pointed look. “You got moose-face.”

You wrinkle your nose at him. “Moose-face is worse, Bucky. And it’s still not a real thing-“

“Yeah it is. Most people got a moose face.” He shrugs. He’s staring again. It’s taking a lot of effort not to melt forward into him. “Tight expression. Like a deer in headlights, but they think they’re too good to be in the headlights. They’re gonna go down fighting.”

“Oh.” You tilt your head, giving him a sickly-sweet smile. “Can I see your moose face?”

“I don’t have a moose face-“

“Liar.” You poke his ribs, narrowing your eyes. “You said everyone has one-“

“I said ‘most people.’” Bucky shrugs. “Moose face means you’re gonna get hit, you just don’t believe it yet. I know how to not get hit.”

“Sounds like something someone with a moose-face would say.”

He chuckles. You’re sitting down, and you’re going to fall over. “No luck, doll. I got other faces, but no moose face.” He frowns at the air. “Never could afford to have one.”

There’s suddenly something heavier in his eyes, and it makes your whole body feel wired and heavy. It’s suffocating and crushing and rotten, and it’s just an expression but everything feels worse when you see it—when his shoulders hunch and his face becomes set like stone, just like all those years ago in the bathroom—so it needs to stop right now.

“What about a wolf face?”

Bucky blinks at you. “What.”

“You said no moose face.” You cross your arms, raising your chin slightly. “Do you have a wolf face?”

“I don’t know what that is-“

“So suddenly you’re the only one who’s allowed to make up expressions?”

You hold is gaze for a long second—you’ve gotten really good at doing that, but only when you’re dreaming of Bucky—until his lips twitch slightly.

And everything feels alright again.

———

“How much of New York appeared in your… dreams? Was is like Wakanda, where you wandered?”

You frown at the air. Raynor’s indulging in this, but not like you’d hoped. Not shutting you down or telling you that you’re crazy. You’d really hoped to hear some validation that you were just plain crazy.

“Not really. I mean, there was one night where we were at my job, a few at the coffee shop I usually go to, and maybe like, five at the park, but we were mostly my apartment when I was showing him stuff.”

“And what did you-“ Raynor’s whole body tenses, and the last part of her question is pushed through her teeth. “What did you show Bucky?”

You flush, your gaze dropping down to your hands. “Stuff. In my apartment.”

———

You don’t know exactly what gives. What straw completely desolates every single bone in your body, and ends with you here.

Maybe it was that you’d finally mentioned all the murders, and you’d never seem him look horrified before, but the sight has dislodged something along your ribs that hadn’t mended until he let you move his head to your lap. Stroking his hair as he stared at you, telling him about your day.

Maybe it’s that you always tell him about your day. That this—whatever this is—has shifted from trading teasing comments and trying to learn about each other, into pure and comfortable understanding, and now that’s how most nights are spent.

Bucky’s reports are short. The goats are being goats—that’s all they know how to do—he doesn’t like a song someone tried to make him listen to because it’s too loud, and Shuri brought him some food that made his face feel like it was going to fall off, but in a good way. You pretty sure he only gives them because you insist upon it, but he always puffs out his chest a little at the end, when you smile at him and start to tell him everything you can remember about your own day.

Maybe it’s how he always hangs onto your every word. Like it’s gospel or scripture, and to do anything but listen and watch would be a higher sin than any blood you’ve imagined on his hands.

And maybe that’s it.

Maybe it’s how you really don’t believe it anymore, when you remind yourself that he’s not real. That he’s just a figment of your mind, manifested to evolve as you do and always be exactly what you need.

You still tell yourself the lie, night after night.

But you’re certain it’s a lie. That Bucky is just like that. Meant to be here, with you, the exact same way you’re supposed to be wherever he is.

And now you’re here.

You’d started it. You’d slammed your mouth to his, and he hadn’t moved. There had been a brief moment where you’d been worried you’d made a mistake, but the second you’d tried to push back on his chest and apologize, he’d kicked into gear.

And wet dreams are supposed to be hazy. Cast in a misting light and more of a halo that brings your body high than an actual, nameable feeling.

But you can really feel this.

And it’s heaven.

You’d expected Bucky to kiss slowly. Deliberately. It’s how you’d always seen him move and speak, and you hadn’t been against the idea of being kissed in a methodical and careful way.

You’ve never been happier to be wrong.

Bucky kisses you like you’re air and water and every good thing in the world. All passion and spit and burning desire, where you can feel every bit of want in his movements. His mouth is demanding as he traces his tongue over your teeth and groans your name down your throat, his arm snaking around your waist to hold you steady against his chest. When his knee presses between your thighs you have to wrap your arms around his neck for balance, and it’s all you can do to return ever bit of want he throws at you as he walks to backwards to your mattress.

It takes effort to pry your mouth from Bucky’s. He doesn’t want you to go, even a few inches, and when you start to palm him through his pants—smiling against his lips and squeezing his bulge in a silent request—he hisses against your lips.

“You-“ He groans, nipping at your lower lip as you smile, repeating the movement. “You don’t- Shit, doll, you don’t know what you’re doing to me-“

You hum, bumping your nose with his and swaying in his hold. “Maybe. I’d like to do more.”

Bucky chuckles, and the sound rolls right into your core. “Think you could take more, sweetheart? Cause I’ve been a gentleman, but if more is on the table-“

It’s easy to cut him off with a heavy, deep kiss that has him half growling down your throat and his hips jerking against your movements.

“Want more.” You whisper, combing your free hand through his hair and trying to pull yourself impossibly closer. “Want you.”

Bucky tenses against you, and when you lean back to meet his eyes he’s staring again. Looking at you like you’re glowing, kneading your skin under his hand like he’s checking that you’re not going to vanish.

“You want me.” He mutters, scanning over your flushed face. “You sure about-“

“Yes.” You nod, giving him a small, soft smile. “Only if you do, obviou-“

Bucky cuts you off with another bruising kiss, and before you know what’s happening he’s lowering you onto the mattress, kneeling between your legs, and shoving your thighs apart with a wolf-like grin.

You don’t know when you ended up naked. You can’t really care though, because Bucky shoves his face right into your pussy, and your mind empties of all thoughts that aren’t his name.

It’s another point in favor of this being a dream. Bucky’s mouth against your cunt feels so amazingly real—licking and biting and eating you out like he’s been starved for a hundred years—but this has to be a dream, because no real man has ever made you feel this good. He knows every single way the plunge his tongue in and out of your pussy until you’re squeezing your thighs around his head and tugging at his hair, and his beard scrapes and tickles at your thighs in a way that’s driving you out of your mind, and fuck, he keeps moving his attention to nip at your clit, sucking it between his lips and letting his teeth graze against you, and-

“Bucky-“ You moan, grinding shameless into his face, trying hopelessly to remain upright with one hand, your fingers fisted into the sheets below you. “Please- I’m gonna- Fuck, I’m so close-“

He growls against you, flatting his tongue against your clit and squeezing his hand on your thigh, and that does it. You cum with a scream of his name, warmth washing over your body as your knees clamp around him and your eyes roll back in your head.

He’s ruined you. All Bucky did was eat you out in a dream, and you’re panting and flushed and drunk on him. You don’t know how you’ll manage to move on from this in real life.

You don’t really care. Not as Bucky runs his hand over your dripping, fluttering cunt with a look of open awe on his face, presses a kiss right over your clit that makes your hips jerk, and moves to his feet.

He’s naked now too.

And he’s perfect.

His cock is big and thick, standing at proud attention and jerking slightly as you run a hand up his thighs, your fingers trailing over his balls and a little drool falling out of your lips as you lean to take him in your mouth-

Bucky’s hand tangles in your hair, pulling you back to meet his eyes.

He looks just as wrecked as you feel. Chest heaving and eyes blown with lust. You’re going to lose your mind.

“Bucky-“

“Not now.” He mutters, pulling you a little further back. “Need to be inside of you, doll. Please.”

You’d have to be insane to say no.

You crawl back on the mattress, spreading your legs in silence invitation, and something hot and powerful flashes in his eyes as he takes you in.

“You-“

“I’m sure.” You squirm in the sheets, running your hand between your legs and starting to rub your clit in slow, strong circles. “God, I’m so fucking sure, please-“

He’s shockingly fast for such a large man. It might be the whole dream thing, but you barely register him moving to kneel over you, swatting your hand away with a darkened gaze a set jaw.

“I do that,” he grunts, running two fingers up and down your cunt, smirking at you high whine. “Legs open, doll, want to see how wet I’m making you.”

You nod, falling flat on your back, and pour all your focus into his order. “Fuck, Bucky-“ He shoves the fingers into your pussy, and your back arches off the bed. “Shit- I- Please-“

“You want my cock?” He drawls your name, and you can only nod dumbly at the ceiling. “Come on, tell me you want it-“

“Want it,” you gasp, hugging your body as he starts to pump his finger, crooking them at the exact right spot deep inside of you. “Fuck, Bucky, you said- You said you’d fuck me-“

He clicks his tongue. “I said I’d be inside of you-“

“But- But I want you to fuck me.” You start to roll your hips as his pace picks up. “Please, Bucky-“

You whine as his fingers vanish, leaving you clenching around only the air, but it’s a short-lived pain.

Bucky slams into you with one thrust, and you’d been wrong again.

He hadn’t ruined you. He’s destroyed you.

You’ve never been so full in your life. You’ve never been fucked like this in your life. With a fervor that should be painful, but just makes you feel wanted. Cared for. Bucky’s every thrust is brutal and rough, and his mouth on yours is that same feral kiss from before, but he’s pressed his body over yours like he’s trying to shield you from the world, and he’s groaning your name down your throat like it’s a hymn.

You’d say his name too, if you could remember how to speak. But Bucky’s hitting every right spot deep in your pussy, and you’re so high the world is just color and light and Bucky, and when he starts to suck and kiss a line down your throat, along your collarbone, and over your tits, you’re sure you’re going to fly out of your skin.

Then he takes your nipple into his mouth, and the sound you make is almost inhuman. Your release crashes over you like a wave, Bucky groans against your breast as you squeeze around his cock, and a burning warmth coats your thighs and cunt as he cums with a roar.

You make a small noise of content as Bucky pulls out, kissing a soft line back up your jaw before dropping his brow to yours and letting out a long, slow breath.

“That was…” He trails off, moving his hand to hold your hips, drawing firm patterns with his thumb that might drive you out of your mind.

“Yeah.” You whisper. “It was.”

He nods, and neither of you move for a really long time. Usually you’ve woken up by now, but no part of you is eager to go, eager to leave where there’s still a little buzz in your heart from the pleasure, where you can feel a perfect ache between your legs and you’re so happily trapped under the warmth of Bucky’s body-

Happy.

You’re happy.

This isn’t real, but under Bucky’s body you’re safe and warm and happy. And you don’t want to go.

Almost as if he can read your mind, Bucky clears his throat.

“Thank you.” He mutters, his breath hot and soft over your ear. “Needed this.” There a long pause, and his hand squeezes on your hips. “Needed you. And I know it’s dumb to thank you, because-“

“It’s not.” You cut him off with a kiss to his neck, rubbing your hand up and down his back. “And I needed you too.”

He lets out a dry laugh that you don’t understand, but doesn’t push on it. Just kisses your brow and rolls onto his back, taking you with him and clinging to you like you’re a tether to something a little more important than just a dream.

And you really don’t know why he’d laughed.

You do need him. You’re growing more and more certain every night that you need Bucky more than you need anything in real life. That he’s more than anyone else, and that he maybe, possibly, could be real.

He feels real, beneath you with a calloused hand squeezing at your skin and your finger tracing over the scars near his arm.

He sounds real, when you finally ask why he only has one arm, and he takes a very long breath but mutters that he fell off a train. When he tells you that bad people found him, and he wasn’t really the best guy either, for a really long time.

He tastes real when you kiss him for comfort, and smells real when you bury your face in his neck as he continues.

You know he’s not telling you everything, but you also know he’s not lying.

And you really do know that, in some strange and impossible way, this might be real.

———

“I see.” Raynor swallows, and she won’t stop staring at you. “Did those, ah, occurrences happen again?”

You nod, staring at your hands. “Pretty much every time after.” A smile tugs at your lips. “One time we used the barn.”

“I-“ Raynor sighs. “Understood. How long, exactly, did this continue?”

“They never stopped, not until-“ Your nails dig into your skin, and a heavy stone lodges itself in your throat. “The, uh, the blip.”

———

These have been the worst five years of your life. And they haven’t been amazing for anyone, but no one else has to feel this like you do.

And that’s selfish. A little narcissistic. Incredibly crude.

But it doesn’t make it any less true.

Because everyone lost people. Everyone watched loved ones vanish right in front of them, witnessed the world fall and crumble around them as half of humanity vanished, and got left in the rubble to pick up the pieces.

But no one else seems to feel this. Nobody else seems to be falling apart at the seams from nothing at all like you are. Because Bucky was probably never real. But he’s gone.

And you don’t know how to move on.

It’s odd to grieve a dream. It makes living impossible. You go to all the support groups and listen to everyone share their own pain, and it makes your heart ache for them but nothing in you ever seems to heal. It’s as if a piece of you had been ripped out and ground to ash, and mending over it would be blasphemous. You don’t want to fix it. You need to, because this is no way to exist, but it feels wrong every time you try. As if even your body can’t just admit he’s gone, and you need to keep going. But everything feels artificial. Every breath is mechanical, and every beat of your heart feels shallow and deliberate, like it’s only doing just enough to keep you alive.

What’s worse is that you can’t tell anyone why you’ve become a sunken, hollow shell. You’d sound insane. You’re already not winning any points in the sound of mind department, and you do have a record, so if you went to one of the countless therapists who have been making their living off of everyone’s loss and said ‘see, doctor, the person I loved only existed in my dreams, but he vanished with the snap and now it feels like I’ve been cleaved in half’, you’d be locked up in an asylum.

You hate that you’re only realizing it now. That the overwhelming sense of warmth and peace you felt in your dreams with Bucky was love. That you’d fallen in love with a piece of your own mind. You’d basically fallen in love with your reflection. Your annoying, handsome, grumpy reflection that you’d rip your spine out of your body to reshape it back into his form, to bring him back to your side.

And the dreams still happen. He’s just not there, and it’s the worst thing in the fucking universe. You keep coming back to a forest, and there’s a little ash that’s always drifting around in the air, that feels really important.

It all always feels like more than just Bucky being gone. It feels like you’ve missed a train, or taken a wrong turn, and lost a key that double as a compass, and now you’re stranded at the bottom of the ocean.

Alone.

You’ve spent your whole life with only yourself to rely on, but you’ve never felt more alone.

———

“And after the blip?”

“He came back.” You’re going to cry. You really hate crying in front of Raynor—she always tells you it’s going to be okay, and you fucking know that—but you can’t stop it. Because Bucky really did come back, and it’s still the best thing that ever happened to you.

———

During the past five years, your sleep has gotten fucked. You get about four hours a night, because that’s just long enough to keep you functional but too short to allow you to appear in the forest.

So it took a while to pass out. You’d curled up in your bed, drank tea, done yoga, followed every ‘how to fall asleep fast’ internet guide until your eyes drooped, and you were gone.

When the dream takes shape around you, you’re not in the forest, but in a sleek, hospital-like room that you don’t recognize.

And he’s there.

Bucky’s right fucking there.

You make a small, choked sound, and his eyes shoot to yours in an instant.

He’s moving in a second. Half launching across the room to grab you before your knees give out, holding you to his chest as you cling to his shirt and press your face into his neck.

“Hey,” he mutters your name, and you can hear the low horror in it. He’s putting together why you’re crying. Why you’re scratching at his neck and trying to half climb up his body. “You’re alright. It’s all good, doll, everything’s good now-“

You cut him off with a long, heavy kiss, and his hand moves to cup your head.

He has two hands again. You don’t really care why.

Because Bucky’s rubbing circles on the skin of your waist, and letting you cry without making a big fucking deal about it, and nothing mended. Nothing’s ever mended. You’ve been a little fucking broken for a long time, with or without Bucky. But it had been a kind of broken that had folded and shaped with him, and when he’d been gone it was like half your organs had been frozen and crumbled in your body.

But he’s back. And you feel real again.

———

There’s a long silence in the air, and you know what’s coming. The question. You’ve known she’s going to ask it the whole time—you’d honestly expected it a lot sooner—and you’ve been prepared. You have a very long speech about how Bucky had changed again—short hair, kept the new arm, appearing in his own, mostly empty apartment and trading the Wakandan clothing for jeans and jackets—and that he’d told you how much he hated some guy named John.

He’d said he despised the asshole. That he was everything Steve had hated—you’d had a pretty good idea who Steve was, based on context and a theory but you hadn’t be quite ready to it yet—and nothing sounded better than punching his lights out.

And you’re ready to explain that you’d had the news on in the background, a few words had broken from static background noise, and your whole world had shifted. John Walker had been announced as the new Captain America, they’d run a stupid little fluff piece on the life of Steve Rogers, and there was Bucky. Captain America’s best friend and ally, the assumed cause of that whole the Avengers are breaking up thing, and the former Winter Solider.

You’d mostly stared at the screen for a really long time as everything feel into place—you’d looked him up after, and it was a little embarrassing it had taken you this long given that he has a Wikipedia page—before calling Raynor, and preparing for the question.

But when she asks it, your mind goes blank, and all you can’t think to say is the truth.

“May I ask,” Raynor says carefully. ”Why are you only discussing this now?”

“Because he’s real.”

———

Bucky has dreams. Not nightmares.

Dreams.

He dreams about Her. She’s the only constant in his life, the only solace and purely good thing he knows, and She’s not even damn real.

Bucky’s pretty sure She’s not real. It wouldn’t make any sense for Her to be real. He’d spent most of the years assuming that She was simply a result of him being able to dream again, a trick of his mind that was both a comfort and a torture, because he needed those dreams—needed Her, in a strange way that lived in his chest and was soft on his skin—more than he’d ever needed anything, but they also reminded him of what he’d never have.

A life in a simple apartment, filled with his own presence in a way that was easy. He always loved that about Her apartment. How everywhere he looked, She was there. The colors and furniture and posters and trinkets on the shelves all screamed Her, and no one could ever replicate that if they tried.

He didn’t know how to do that anywhere. How to just be him in a way that didn’t feel like something was strangling him. His apartment was barren. Every time he spoke it felt like he should be apologize immediately after, because barely anyone seemed to like him, let alone want to hear him.

Bucky understood that. He wasn’t exactly his own biggest fan, and the only time there was no part of him trying to escape his own body was when he was asleep, and She was at his side.

He liked being himself with Her. It was simple, and natural, and never a labor. She never flinched away from him—She seemed to like being close to him—and Bucky never really wanted to wake up. Part of him always hoped that this time, when he fell asleep and She appeared once more, he’d wake up in Her apartment, and it would all be real.

A very small part of him needed this—needed Her—to be real. It would be really amazing if She was real. It wasn’t something he deserved to ask for, to plead with the universe about, but he did. He kept trying to come up with reasons She could be real.

She felt real, in his dreams. She spoke and acted like a person, and not a doll or shell his brain may have created to get him through his de-programming. She was always saying things and making references he didn’t get until she explained them, things he was certain he hadn’t heard in passing. She was way prettier than anyone Bucky had ever seen, which would contribute to Her being only a dream if he wasn’t so certain that he simply wasn’t that creative.

He could imagine a pretty girl.

He couldn’t imagine Her.

Smart and funny and gorgeous, fitting against him like She’d been molded to, teasing him in ways he’d never thought of and kind to him ways he couldn’t be kind to himself.

She was never disgusted by the arm, and Bucky was sure that—if She was only a part of his mind given shape—she would know about the whole Winter Soldier thing. But he’d had to explain all he could to Her, and when he’d left certain, darker parts out She hadn’t said but that’s not the truth, is it, James.

She seemed to like Bucky. That was the most concrete proof he had that She had to somehow be real. Nobody liked him. Not in to raw, unrelenting way She did.

So She had to be real.

Bucky really hoped, against all odds, that she was real.

It would fix a lot of problems if She was real. Sam kept trying to get him to date, and he didn’t want to. He always felt like he was betraying Her. It wasn’t sustainable or logical, but logic didn’t really matter here, because Bucky’s gut would wither and his hands would curl into fists every time he had to try and flirt with another woman. They didn’t fit against him as well as She did. Their teasing would either bite too hard or not bite at all, and the night would end with Bucky falling back into Her arms.

He asked Shuri—very vaguely, he didn’t want his brain to be poked and prodded again—what reoccurring dreams could mean.

“Reoccurring?” She’d frowned at him over the video call. “You’ll have to clarify, reoccurring can mean many things.”

“Uh,” Bucky had swallowed, glancing at his mattress across the room. “A dream you have every night. And it could change, but it’s always the same person in it?”

Shuri had given him an odd look. “Have you been having a dream like that?”

“No.” His answer had been too fast. He needed to keep it together if he was going to sell this. “Sam has. He mentioned that he kept seeing some lady in his dreams, and she felt real but he’d never met her before. Thought I’d do him a favor and ask about it.”

It wasn’t the best lie he’d ever told, if Shuri look of doubt had been any indication. But she bit, and kept moving.

“Well, it looks as if Sam,” she’d given him a pointed look, and Bucky had forced his face to remain completely neutral. “Has found his soulmate.”

Bucky had stared at her for a really long time. His vision had blurred, there had been a ringing in his ears, and time had seemed to still as Shuri’s words sank in.

Soulmate.

“I thought, uh,” Bucky had cleared his throat, his voice a little hoarse. “Soulmates aren’t real-“

“Of course they’re real.” Shuri had shrugged. “Soulmate is an archaic term for two brains that emit the exact same neuroelectricity, their nerve paths aligning completely. Often they will have differing personalities and lives, but the tie of the biology will link them in sleep, and they will experience incredibly vivid lucid dreams. Like this video conference, but if our minds and bodies were built to fall in love with each other. It is rare, but not impossible.”

Bucky had frowned. “But I- uh, Sam said he’s only had these dreams about four years-“

“Sam’s brain underwent severe rewiring and torment.” Shuri’s voice had been dry, her expression flat. “He would do well to remember that his connection may have been slightly mauled, and only after a certain genius princess fixed him would he have been able to reciprocate the bond fully.”

Oh.

The first time Bucky had appeared in Her apartment, She had said ten years. When She’d appeared to him for the very first time, She’d said she’d dreamt of him before.

Bucky had assumed that had been another way his brain was comforting him. Telling him he could be the type of person a pretty girl like Her dreamed about.

But when he thought about it—clenched his jaw and drew up the heavier, blood-stained memories of the Soldier—there had sometimes been someone in his body with him. Not the Soldier, but the third presence that wasn’t hostile. Wasn’t really foreign. Just was.

“Could the-“ Bucky had swallowed, watching Shuri carefully as he spoke. “Sam said he could sometimes feel the gal while he was awake. Is that a thing that could happen?”

“If Sam was not himself, and the soulmate was not of full maturity, yes.”

Bucky had felt himself pale. “What do you mean, full maturity-“

“You are a hundred years old, Mr. Barnes.” Shuri had raised her brows, and all pretense of Sam had dropped. “There would have naturally been a point where your soulmate was a child, as that is how most people begin their lives. It is likely that you were still under the control of Hydra in your soulmate’s youth, and she would have only been a growing presence in your mind until she was a full person, and you were no longer only the shell of a man I met after my father’s death.”

“So she- Would she have seen what I did? As the Solider?”

He knew She had. She’d told him She had.

Bucky still didn’t want it to be true.

Shuri had given him a sympathetic look. “Unfortunately, yes. She would have. But if she is what you say, she is a perfect match to you in every way. She will not care what you were before, under the control of Hydra.”

“But-“

“It is not something worth protesting, Bucky.” Shuri had sighed, leaning a little closer to the camera. “This is not something that can be severed or changed, so please do not bother to ask. And remember that she is real. Her own person, with her own pain. I would recommend you attempt to find her, but that is something you will have to decide for yourself.”

And now he was here. Staring at the dark screen where Shuri’s face had been moments before, his head still spinning around the word.

Soulmate.

She’d made is sound scientific. Possible. Bucky could have a soulmate.

He didn’t deserve a soulmate. Not one he’d likely trapped in his mind, forced to witness the brutal atrocities he’d committed as the Winter Solider.

And he wanted to find Her. Bucky wanted to touch Her and kiss her and keep her longer than just the night. To wake up and see Her next to him, tangible and all his.

He’d liked the idea of something being his in a way that wasn’t a curse. In a way he could throw his all right back to Her, and she’d catch it.

But there was still the sour, molding feeling over his heart that—since She was real, and probably had Her own issues to deal with—She wouldn’t want him in her life. Not Her real life, where everything was more complicate than just them in a literal dream.

He shouldn’t find Her. She’d be better off without him. Bucky would do nothing but make Her life more complicated, and he could get through this know that She was real and safe, far away from him but still haunting his dreams in the best way possible.

He was so lost in his head he misses the first phone call. And the second one.

It was the third one that got his attention—buzzing and ringing on the table next to his computer, Dr. Raynor flashing across the screen—and the fourth one he actually managed to pick up.

Bucky didn’t bother to hide the tension in his voice when he spoke. He really didn’t have the time or energy for this, not right now. “Doc, I’m not due back for another four days-“

“I’m aware, James, I keep a calendar.” Raynor sighed through the speaker, and Bucky had never heard her sound so tense. It was a little concerning. “However, I am going to have to request you come in today. It’s an emergency.”

He scowled. “What emergency, I haven’t done anything emergency worthy-“

“It’s not only about you.” Raynor snapped. “And I’m changing it from a request to an order. Office in twenty minutes.” There was a long pause, and then a whispered, “Please.”

That wasn’t good.

“Did I get in trouble?” Bucky asked, his grip on the phone tightening. “Cause I’ve been following all the stupid rules, and if Sam says I did something he’s just being a dramatic dick-“

Raynor sighed, and Bucky could picture the thin look of exhaustion on her face. “You are not in trouble, James. It’s not- I can’t explain over the phone. It may be better for you to see.”

“See what?”

“Just come to the fucking office.”

Bucky blinked, and the line went dead.

Raynor couldn’t make him go. But he also had never heard her swear like that. Or order him to come in before an appointment.

He was a little curious. And it wasn’t like he had anything else to do today but drown in the knowledge of what Shuri had told him, trying to work out how he’d face Her tonight.

So he went to the office. Chances are it was nothing. Bucky couldn’t imagine it would be something. He spent the whole ride trying to think of an idea, came up blank, and decided that Sam had mentioned something to Raynor about how Bucky had been brooding more than usual, and he was just going to have to explain the whole I’m not brooding, I’m just sick of Sam’s blind date bullshit and also maybe have a soulmate thing. Then he’s kick Sam’s ass, and everything would be fine.

Bucky entered to office with a whole speech ready. His chin raised high and his arms crossed, because he was already having a very weird and complex day, and he didn’t need this.

All the words were knocked out of him the moment he opened the door, glanced around the room, and saw who was on the couch.

Her.

In person.

Very, very real, and in Raynor’s office, and here.

Raynor said Her name. The name Bucky knew Her by, and her last name.

It was a nice last name. Barnes would suit Her better, but the idea that she was real enough to have a last name was already bringing Bucky to his knees, so he’d have to save that thought for later.

“Meet James Barnes.” Raynor was probably looking between them. Bucky couldn’t be sure though, because he couldn’t stop staring at Her.

She was moving to Her feet, and seeing Her in person was somehow even better. She was sharper around the edges, and more colorful in small, bright ways, and nothing about Her felt like it could ever slip between Bucky’s fingers.

She wasn’t mist. She wasn’t an illusion, or a coping mechanism.

She was real.

Walking towards him with wide eyes and an open mouth, reaching a hand up to poke at his face. Tracing his nose and running fingers over his cheekbones, Her eyes never leaving his.

Bucky caught Her hand right as it brushed over his lips, and She made the prettiest gasp he’d ever heard.

“You’re real.” He said, because it was all he could think of. Nothing about this was a dream. Bucky would not have a dream where Raynor was watching him restrain himself from kissing Her until she collapsed in his arms.

“I’m real.” She whispered, and Her voice was better in real life too. “You’re here.”

He nodded. “I’m here.” He paused, scanning over Her open features. “Don’t think I’m going anywhere, doll.”

Her face split into a wide smile, all teeth and light and joy. For Bucky.

There was adoration on Her face, and it was all for Bucky.

“Good.” Her smile grew, Her fingers tangling with his metal ones. “Because I’m not either.”

End Note: Save me Bucky Barnes raising goats. Bucky Barnes raising goats, save me.

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