in the midst of a makeover !!!

A/N: This chapter to me dragged. Writing it was soooo hard. DWWW next chapter will be fun, not much Dennis will be included but it'll be more happy def. That will be out soon probably the next few days if I dont proofread.

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You stared at him for a moment, then folded your arms slowly across your chest. “I might ask you the same. You caused quite enough trouble without needing help from me.”

He took a step further into the room, gaze fixed on you in a way that made it clear he was not here to be dismissed.

“I remember pieces,” he said, measured. “Not everything. But enough to know I was not in my right mind. I was...” He exhaled sharply, almost disgusted with himself. “Clinging. Begging. Speaking nonsense.”

You said nothing.

His eyes narrowed. “You will explain.”

You considered lying. You did not.

Perhaps because it no longer mattered. Perhaps because you were too tired to construct something neat and palatable. Or perhaps because, for all his faults, Aerion had already suffered enough humiliation without being left in ignorance of it.

“You drank a love potion,” you said plainly.

Silence followed.

“…what?” he asked incredulously, after a moment.

“One Rhae made,” you continued, your tone steady even as your fingers curled slightly against your arms. “She meant it for someone else. It was never intended for you. You took the goblet before I could stop you.”

“The goblet,” he repeated slowly. “The one I took from your hand.”

“Yes.”

“And that was...what?” His gaze lifted back to yours, something keen and probing behind it now. “Meant for whom?”

You hesitated. Only for a second. But he noticed.

“…Valarr,” you said.

That did it.

It was subtle, but unmistakable, the shift in him. Not anger, not outright, but something far more cutting. Something almost…offended. A short, disbelieving breath left him.

“So,” he said, pacing once across the room before turning back to you, “I was not even the intended fool. I merely…stumbled into the role.”

“You took it from my hand,” you snapped, irritation flaring. “Uninvited, I might add.”

He gave a short laugh, though there was little humor in it.

“And you paid for it,” you added. “You were sick enough to rid yourself of it.”

He studied you for a long moment after that.

Then he glanced around, taking in the half-packed trunks, the folded gowns, the disarray that spoke not of leisure but departure.

“You are leaving,” he said.

“Yes.”

“When?”

“In the morn.”

His eyes flicked back to yours.

“And you intend to go quietly?” he asked. “After all this?”

“What would you have me do?” you shot back, the fury you had been holding in your chest surging up at last. “Stay? Smile? Pretend I was not offered and dismissed like a passing inconvenience? They have made their priorities quite clear. I will not remain here to be pitied.”

“No,” he said thoughtfully. “You would not.”

Silence stretched again. Then: “I will make you a proposal.”

You stiffened. “I am not interested in...”

“You should hear it first,” he cut in, not unkindly, but firmly enough to stop you.

You pressed your lips together. “Speak, then.”

“We restore the betrothal,” he said.

You stared at him. “…what?”

“We renew it,” he continued, as though discussing something simple, something practical. “Publicly. Before your uncle leaves. Before the court has time to settle on a version of events that does not favour you.”

“You refused it,” you said flatly.

“I did,” he agreed. “Under the impression that my previous…condition had made the decision for me.”

“And now?”

“Now I am making it consciously.”

You threw your hands up in exasperation. “This is absurd.”

“No,” he said calmly. “This is useful.”

You turned away from him, running a hand over your hair in frustration. “You expect me to simply agree? After everything? After your father dismissed my uncle’s anger as though it were nothing?”

“My father dismissed the threat of rebellion because he believes it will not come to pass,” Aerion replied. “You and I both know your uncle would burn half the realm before bending easily, but he will not start a war without cause that he can justify to others.”

“He has cause,” you snapped. “His niece was insulted.”

“His niece was inconvenienced,” Aerion corrected, though there was no mockery in it, only blunt truth. “And inconvenience is not enough to rally banners, no matter how loudly he roars.”

That stung. Because it was true. You hated that it was true.

He watched your reaction carefully before continuing.

“But a renewed betrothal changes that,” he said. “It removes the insult. It restores your standing. It gives him what he came for.”

“What of you?” you asked sharply. “What do you gain from this arrangement, aside from further entangling yourself in something you already wished to escape?”

“Several things,” his mouth curved. “For one, it allows me to correct the spectacle I have already made of myself. For another…” His gaze flicked briefly toward the door, as though aware of unseen ears, before returning to you. “It offers certain…satisfactions.”

“Such as?”

“Such as watching my dear cousin come to terms with the fact that what he overlooked is now beyond his reach,” he said lightly.

You held his gaze. You could not deny that something in you responded to that. Vindictive. Baratheon.

“And the court?” you pressed. “They will not simply accept that you changed your mind twice in as many days.”

“They will accept whatever story we give them,” he replied. “People prefer a narrative that makes sense of discomfort. We provide one, and they will cling to it.”

“What story would that be?”

“That you were overwhelmed,” he said, watching you carefully now. “That my proposal came too suddenly, that you felt…cornered. That you withdrew, and I, in my pride, took it as an insult and withdrew in turn.”

“And now?” you asked.

“Now we reconcile,” he said simply. “Privately first. Publicly soon after. A misunderstanding. A quarrel. Nothing more.”

You were quiet for a long moment. It was a good plan. Too good.

“And you will take the blame,” you said slowly.

“If necessary,” he replied without hesitation. “It will cost me less than it costs you.”

That, too, was true. You exhaled. “…fine,” you said at last. “We will do it.”

Relief did not show on his face. He nodded once. “It will be done, then.”

You turned back toward the trunk, reaching for a folded gown with more force than needed, as though the conversation had settled something cleanly.

It had not. There was a pause behind you.

Then: “There is something else.”

You stilled, your fingers tightening slightly in the fabric. “What?”

He did not answer immediately. When you turned back, Aerion was watching you again, but differently now.

“I remember it,” he said.

Your stomach tightened.

“The way I felt,” he clarified. “Not all of it. But enough.”

You swallowed.

He took a step closer, slower this time, as though approaching something uncertain.

“It was…” He exhaled, searching for the word. “Intense. Yes. Overwhelming. But also...” He frowned faintly, as though the admission irritated him. “Good.”

You looked away.

“I remember wanting to be near you constantly,” he continued. “Wanting to touch you. To speak to you. To…” He stopped himself, jaw tightening slightly. “It was not entirely unpleasant.”

“It was not real,” you said, colder than intended.

“I know,” he replied. There was no argument in it.

“I know,” he repeated, softer now. “That does not mean it was not...something.”

Silence stretched.

“I remember you, as well,” he added after a moment.

Your almost took a step back to escape.

“You were not cruel,” he said. “Not entirely. You were…careful. Even when you did not wish to be.”

You did not know what to say to that. You had not realized he had noticed.

“I remember your hands,” he went on, almost absently now, as though the memory had taken hold of him despite himself. “You touched me as though I might break. As though you were…” He trailed off, then shook his head once, as if dismissing it.

You forced your voice steady. “You were ill.”

“That is not the point.”

“No,” you said quietly. “It is not.”

“I would not mind,” he added, almost casually, though his eyes betrayed something else entirely, “if you did not hate me quite so much this time.”

Your breath caught.

He turned away then, as though the admission cost him more than he would ever allow you to see.

The betrothal was renewed before the court had quite decided what to make of the first disaster. There was no room left for whispers to grow teeth. Aerion Targaryen spoke with a clarity that bordered on insolence, as though the reversal were not a reversal at all but the correction of a trivial misunderstanding. You stood beside him, still as carved stone, aware of every eye in the hall and yet refusing to give them anything they could feast on.

Your uncle watched. That was the worst of it. Lyonel Baratheon did not shout, did not laugh, did not storm out in outrage, he simply watched, weighing the thing like a man deciding whether to split a table with his bare hands or leave it standing out of sheer spite.

When it was done, Maekar Targaryen summoned Aerion away from the hall. You did not follow, but Maekar’s voice carried through the half-open doors.

“You will not make sport of this again. You will not dangle alliances as though they were baubles to be picked up and dropped when you tire of them.”

Aerion did not answer immediately, and in that pause there was something unfamiliar. When he did speak, it was lower than you had ever heard him, stripped of ornament.

“I will not repeat it.”

It was not apology. Maekar would not have cared for one. But it was something like acknowledgement, and that seemed to suffice, for the door shut and the matter, outwardly, was settled.

Outwardly.

It left other things to fester.

Valarr Targaryen did not rage. That would have been easier to bear. Instead, he watched you with an attention that grew more suspicious by the hour, as though he had misplaced something and could not remember where he had last set it down.

You felt it at your back, across tables, in corridors where chance encounters began to feel less like chance. He lingered in conversations that did not concern him, appeared too quickly when you withdrew, dismissed explanations that might have satisfied anyone else. There was something strained in him now, something pulling tight.

You might have endured it longer if not for Rhae Targaryen, who had never learned the discipline of silence.

She did not confess outright. It slipped from her sideways, dressed in half a joke, a careless remark that would have meant nothing to anyone without context. Unfortunately, Egg Targaryen had context. Years of being the unwilling subject of her concoctions had given him an ear for precisely that sort of mistake.

Valarr found you in one of the smaller passages, where the tapestries swallowed sound and the court felt far away. He did not bother with courtesy.

“Tell me it is not true.”

You knew at once what he meant, though you tried, out of reflex more than hope, to evade it. “You will have to be more specific.”

“The potion,” he said, and there was something raw beneath the words now, stripped of the careful composure he usually wore so easily. “Rhae’s foolishness. Aerion drinking it. All of it, tell me it is not true.”

You hesitated.

He drew in a breath that did not quite steady him. “You should have come to me.”

“And said what?” you exploded instantly, worn thin by repetition and scrutiny and the slow erosion of patience. “That your cousin made a spectacle of himself under something he did not understand? That I was dragged into it? What would you have done with that?”

“I would have stopped this,” he said, and now he stepped closer, urgency overtaking restraint. “You would not have had to accept him again.”

“I was not forced...”

“You were,” he insisted, more quietly, and that quiet was worse. “You always choose the path that preserves your dignity, even if it binds you to something you do not want. You would rather endure than be pitied. I know you.”

The familiarity of it stung.

“We can undo it,” he pressed. “We will speak to them again. Properly this time. There are ways...”

“There are not,” you said, and you meant it, though saying it felt like closing a door you had not quite examined.

“There are,” he repeated, but now there was something else threading through his insistence, something less noble. “If you stand with me...”

“And what shall that look like?” The question did not come from you.

Aerion Targaryen leaned in the archway as though he had been there long enough to hear everything that mattered. There was nothing languid in him now, nothing of the careless prince who provoked for sport; his attention was fixed.

Valarr turned sharply. “This is not your concern.”

“It is precisely my concern,” Aerion replied, pushing himself away from the stone and stepping into the narrow space between you. “You are advising my betrothed to dismantle her own standing. I am curious what you intend to offer in its place.”

“I intend to offer her a way out.”

“From what?” Aerion’s tone did not rise, but it sharpened, each word set carefully. “A marriage that restores her position? That silences the insult you allowed to stand when it first mattered?”

Valarr’s expression darkened. “Do not twist this into something it is not.”

“I am not twisting anything,” Aerion said. “I am asking a simple question. What do you offer her?”

Valarr opened his mouth, then closed it again.

Aerion did not look away. “Exactly. You offer her indignation and nothing else. A grand gesture that leaves her to bear the consequences alone.”

“That is unfair.”

“Yes,” Aerion agreed softly. “But it is accurate.”

He shifted then, not quite placing himself between you and Valarr, but close enough that the intent was unmistakable without needing to be stated.

“She will not leave this court diminished,” he said. “Not while I can prevent it.”

Valarr looked at you, and for a moment the anger stripped away, leaving something else, something that might have been regret if it had come sooner, if it had not arrived amplified by the sight of you standing beside another man.

“You do not have to stay,” he said.

The simplicity of it nearly undid you.

But before you could answer, Aerion spoke again, far more cutting. “She has already chosen.”

It was not true entirely but the way he said it made it feel settled.

“Go,” Aerion waved a hand. “Attend to your own betrothal. Leave mine alone.”

Valarr did not argue again. There was nothing left for him to use that would not unravel further under scrutiny. He stepped back, the tension in him coiling inward rather than dissipating, and left without another word.

Aerion did not look at you immediately. When he did, it was brief, as though confirming something to himself, and then he turned away as well, leaving the corridor feeling suddenly too narrow.

The dress arrived the following afternoon. It was not the sort of thing you would have chosen, it was unflattering but it refused modesty. The fabric was rich without being ostentatious, dark enough to make the gold threading at the seams stand out. The neckline dipped lower than was strictly proper, softened only by the structure of the bodice, which held everything precisely where it ought to be.

You ran your fingers over the embroidery, recognizing the pattern without needing to think: stags worked subtly into the design. Baratheon, reshaped.

When Aerion appeared later, you did not bother to hide your suspicion. “You are aware this will be noticed.”

“That is rather the point,” he said, as though it were obvious.

The certainty in it should have irritated you more than it did. You wore it.

At supper, Valarr's gaze found you quickly and lingered without disguise, drawn to the unfamiliar lines of the gown, the way it altered your shape, the way it made something that had always been present suddenly impossible to ignore.

It should have satisfied Aerion.

That had been the intention, after all: a small, petty victory carved neatly out of a larger, more complicated situation.

Instead, he found himself distracted by something far less convenient. By you.

It was not new, exactly. The memory of the potion still lingered in him in unwelcome fragments: the pull toward you, the restless need for proximity, the disorienting certainty that everything else was secondary. He had dismissed it as an aberration, a chemical imposition that had nothing to do with him.

Watching you now, he was less certain.

It was quieter, what he felt. Less consuming. Yet no less persistent.

You shifted in your seat, adjusting the fabric at your waist, and his attention followed the movement before he could stop it. When you laughed at something Rhae said, the sound caught him off guard, familiar in a way that unsettled him. He looked away. It did not help.

Later, in your chambers, you turned slightly before the mirror, fingers fussing with the neckline. “It sits oddly,” you murmured, though the complaint lacked conviction.

“It does not,” Aerion said from where he leaned against the doorframe.

You glanced at him through the reflection. “You would say that.”

“I would not, if it were untrue.”

You studied your reflection a moment longer, then, in a small voice, “Do you like it?”

It was a simple question, but it held more weight than it ought to have. There was something in the way you asked, as though his answer mattered in a way that had not been the case before.

“Yes,” he said at last.

You nodded, satisfied, and turned back to the mirror, smoothing the fabric once more.

He pushed himself away from the wall without quite deciding to do so, drawn forward by something he had not named and could not easily dismiss.

He reached for you before the rest of the thought could form. His hand came up, fingers brushing along your jaw with a familiarity that might have startled you if it had not already existed somewhere beneath the surface. He tilted your face toward him, just enough to meet your gaze fully, and for a moment he simply looked at you, as though measuring something he had resisted too long. Then he closed the distance.

The kiss was nothing like the fevered grasping the potion had driven from him before. There was no urgency to it, no desperation clawing at the edges. It was slower, steadier, shaped by awareness rather than absence of it. That made it far more difficult to dismiss.

Rhae’s careless words returned to you then, unwelcome and impossible to ignore. It only amplifies what is already there.

part 4: pending...

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He was kept to his chambers, pale and shaking, his body rejecting whatever had been forced upon it by Rhae's witchery.

Poor Aerion. He did not deserve this, even if he brought it on himself, snatching the spiked drink from her

“And now,” he said hoarsely, reclining against his pillows as Maekar stood nearby, his expression darkening with every passing moment, “I will not marry her.”

Yeah that's going to be trouble. Lyonel will not take this lightly, having travelled to Kings Landing just to for the betrothal to fall through. Better prepare for the storm that he will bring with him when he finds out.

“I was under some…influence,” Aerion said, his gaze flicking briefly, very briefly, to you. “It has passed.”

He knows???? Did he catch on or was the potion a bit like his consciousness was awake inside him and knew something was wrong but he couldn't act against it?? I'm so curious ahh

This had not been the love match he had hoped for. This was pure embarrassment.

And it's going to get even more embarassing and uncomfortable the moment Lyonel arrives..

And when he learned that the match he had ridden hard to secure was now dismissed, that his niece had been all but tossed aside, his temper broke.

Oh he is furious. I love it haha.

“I do not want another match,” Lyonel snarled. “I want the one that was offered. Or I will take my own crown and be done with this mummer's farce.”

OH DAMN. He means business, whoopsie.

You had been humiliated. Overlooked. Used as a convenience, then discarded. And there was nothing you could do. Nothing but leave.

From Valarr? Yes. From Aerion? Ehh, it's more complicated then that. That part really is kinda also her own fault for agreeing to use Rhae's love potion (even if they could not have anticipated for it to actually work)

“Have the carriage be ready by morning,” you had ordered. “I shall return to Storm’s End.” Alone. You would not stay here another moment, you had already decided. That was the only thing holding you upright. Not dignity, not after being bartered and dismissed like some ill-fitting arrangement, but sheer, stubborn resolve. The kind that had been carved into you long before you knew what court politics even were. The kind your uncle had raised you on between laughter and blood and storm-winds.

I do love how she stands up for herself though. She won't take the insult eitherway, as she should. As much as I adore these particular Targaryens they aren't above consequenes

“What did you do to me?” he asked. “I remember pieces,” he said, measured. “Not everything. But enough to know I was not in my right mind. I was…” He exhaled sharply, almost disgusted with himself. “Clinging. Begging. Speaking nonsense.”

Ohohoho! Now this is getting interesting. There isn't really a lie she can tell him, but I do wonder how he'll react to being drugged essentially.

Or perhaps because, for all his faults, Aerion had already suffered enough humiliation without being left in ignorance of it.

Hard agree!

“…Valarr,” you said. That did it. It was subtle, but unmistakable, the shift in him. Not anger, not outright, but something far more cutting. Something almost…offended. A short, disbelieving breath left him. “So,” he said, pacing once across the room before turning back to you, “I was not even the intended fool. I merely…stumbled into the role.”

Well that part you did to yourself dear. You snatched the drink out of her hand after all

Silence stretched again. Then: “I will make you a proposal.”

OH??? I'm listening

Wait so now he wants to get betrothed again??

“You refused it,” you said flatly. “I did,” he agreed. “Under the impression that my previous…condition had made the decision for me.” “And now?” “Now I am making it consciously.”

I'm screaming! So there was some underlying attraction that made the lovepotion so potent on him ahhhh. This is getting so interesting omg

You turned away from him, running a hand over your hair in frustration. “You expect me to simply agree? After everything? After your father dismissed my uncle’s anger as though it were nothing?”

It's a damn good deal. Especially considering what might happen. It might not be outright rebellion but it will create conflict and troubles. And I understand she is hurt, I'd be too in that situation. But ignoring emotions this is the best solution

I really like this scheming between the two of them. Can it be called a truce too? Aerion seems rather calm and nice. Of course there is something in for him as well, he'd love to see Valarr suffer, I'm sure it brings him great satisfaction. I also assume that when he speaks of satisfactions he also might be hinting at being able to sleep with her? When they would be husband and wife, after all they'd be expected to have children at some point

“And you will take the blame,” you said slowly. “If necessary,” he replied without hesitation. “It will cost me less than it costs you.”

I'm really surprised how willing he is to take the blunt end. I love that!

I'M SCREAMING HE REMEMBERS??? OH HE SO FELL IN LOVE WITH HER AHH

“I would not mind,” he added, almost casually, though his eyes betrayed something else entirely, “if you did not hate me quite so much this time.”

OH MY GOD YESSS. Oh this is so good

Your uncle watched. That was the worst of it. Lyonel Baratheon did not shout, did not laugh, did not storm out in outrage, he simply watched, weighing the thing like a man deciding whether to split a table with his bare hands or leave it standing out of sheer spite.

I truly wonder if Lyonel is taking it. Does he believe it? It feels like he doesn't completely trust this yet. Which, understandable, totally understandable.

Ahahaha of course Rhae would spill and to no other than egg?? And of course Egg immediately runs to Valarr to tattle too. Oh this is so entertaining hehe

“There are,” he repeated, but now there was something else threading through his insistence, something less noble. “If you stand with me…”

Of course now he tries to jump in and be her saviour!! Valarr this is a tad bit too late dude. Omg and Aerion is now part of the convo too? Are they going to fight over her? Oh please do

“She will not leave this court diminished,” he said. “Not while I can prevent it.”

I'm bowing to Aerion. He stands on business and I love that he is thinking more of her and what it would mean than Valarr does. Valarr right now is upset that he can't have her and he doesn't want anyone else to have her either if he can't. But what the consequences are for her? He either doesn't care or is to oblivious to realize. Only one of them is a pampered prince that gets what he wants and the heir of the heir. And a man at that, who have it easier everywhere in live anyways. So I do applause Aerion for being aware of what that would make her look and that Valarrs "solution" would only aid and satisfye one.

The dress arrived the following afternoon.

And Aerion got her a dress made?? I fear I am sold. Even if it apparently shows a bit too much. He is staking his claim and I love how petty it is.

It should have satisfied Aerion. That had been the intention, after all: a small, petty victory carved neatly out of a larger, more complicated situation. Instead, he found himself distracted by something far less convenient. By you.

Oh I'm so living for this!

He reached for you before the rest of the thought could form. His hand came up, fingers brushing along your jaw with a familiarity that might have startled you if it had not already existed somewhere beneath the surface. He tilted your face toward him, just enough to meet your gaze fully, and for a moment he simply looked at you, as though measuring something he had resisted too long. Then he closed the distance.

AHHHHH egspgnepgnawnagsoneognoan!!! He is so down bad for her, I LOVE IT! I was waiting for this to happen

Rhae’s careless words returned to you then, unwelcome and impossible to ignore. It only amplifies what is already there.

YES YES YES YES

“Sorry to make you wait,” Day greets as she opens the door and bustles in from the hallway. You hear laughter from somewhere outside her office, but then she closes the door again and comes around the desk, taking her seat in the rolling office chair across from you. She smiles and sighs as she sits. Day sets the teal file folder in her hand beside the computer keyboard, but keeps it closed.

“No worries,” you reply, giving her a polite, closed-lipped smile. You truly don’t mind, especially since you know that she and the other Searchers are busy. The waiting room had been packed when you came in, and it had gotten even fuller by the time you’d been led back to Day's office. The holidays are a busy time for Searchers.

Cuffing season, you think, remembering the words of your oldest cousin at last year’s Christmas party. She’d found her soulmate only days before the dinner, and she’d been the one who’d given you the idea of getting professional help with your search.

Day smiles a little wider, and her almond eyes crinkle at the corners before she looks down at her screen and taps at the keyboard. You glance down at her hand, immediately clocking the gold band on her ring finger. It brings out a richness in her dark skin, like sunlight does on a balmy summer afternoon. You hadn’t noticed it the last time you were here.

“You’re married,” you dumbly say, then quickly backtrack, “I mean, I assume that most Searchers probably are. It’s probably easier to find other peoples’ soulmates if you’re not distracted by finding your own. Not that your staff is distracted, they’re great—“

She chuckles good-naturedly and opens your file, mercifully interrupting your rambling. “Most Searchers are married, yes, but you’d be surprised at how many are still single. Some by choice, others not.”

You can’t imagine why someone would choose to be single if they had a soulmate. The whole point is having a partner who’s perfect for you in every way.

Why would someone choose that for themselves?

Forcing an awkward smile, you shift a little bit in your seat and glance out the window. The rain has lessened since you first arrived, and a steady drizzle is now coating Manhattan and filling the air with a thin gray mist. It’s not quite cold enough for it to turn to ice or snow, but they’re saying it will within the next few days.

“Alright,” Day sighs, and you drag your eyes away from the gray sky. She flips another page in your file before looking up at you. “I take it that you listened to the voicemail we left you last week and that’s why you made this appointment, yes?”

You nod. “Yeah. Yes. I mean, it was pretty vague. You said that you haven’t found them, but that you might know why they haven’t shown up?”

She nods and taps at her keyboard again, then swivels the computer monitor so that you can see it. The preferences screen you’d first filled out during your first appointment has been pulled up.

“Yes. We have yet to find your soulmate, but I wanted to ask… Have you considered broadening your pool? It looks like so far you’ve only been meeting with men. Would you like for met to check the other boxes listed so there are more matches?”

“Oh…” You can feel the blood rush to your face, and you resist the urge to squirm in your seat. “No, that’s not… really my thing. I don’t want to be rude, but I’m really only into guys…”

Day’s expression softens in understanding as she regards you from across the desk. “Soulmates can be platonic, too, you know. I can make a note that if you’re matched with someone who’s not male, you aren’t meeting with them romantically.”

“You can do that?” You hadn’t even known that soulmates could be platonic. “I didn’t even know that was a thing. Is that common?”

“Not particularly, but it’s been known to happen. We have more records of it nowadays than in the past, though, so it’s hard to tell.”

Nodding slowly, you stare at the screen for a long moment before asking, “So if I get matched with a guy, it’ll be a romantic pairing, but if it’s anyone else, it’ll be platonic?”

“Not necessarily. You may have a platonic soulmate who’s a male.” She shrugs. “Usually if it’s your ideal gender, it will be romantic, but I’ve seen a few cases where it hasn’t been.”

You consider Day’s offer for a moment, then nod. “Okay. Will that cost extra?”

You’re already scraping the bottom of the barrel. Your savings are mostly gone, and your minimum wage paychecks are barely getting you by, but you pull out your wallet anyway. A large part of you is screaming to put it away, and yet you can’t. You’ve lived your whole life wondering why you haven’t met your soulmate yet, and now you have a possible answer—you were just looking for the wrong kind of soulmate. You’ve been clinging to the possibility and the hope of finding them ever since you met Day for the first time, and you can’t let go of that hope now, even if it means missing some meals or lowering the heat in your apartment even further.

Smiling, Day shakes her head. “All I have to do is click a few boxes.” She does just that, ticking off the boxes on the computer screen for all the genders before scrolling down to the very bottom, where you notice a box labeled “platonic” that you hadn’t seen during your initial appointment. She ticks it off with one final click before saving the changes and swiveling the monitor back to its original position.

“There,” Day says, satisfied with the changes she’s made. “It’ll probably be a few days before we start getting any matches, since there are so many profiles in the system it will have to re-sort through, plus all the ones you haven’t been checked against, but you’ll get an email with any positive results, just like you have in the past. It will specify if it’s romantic or platonic, so you know what to expect.”

You nod and quietly tuck your wallet away, your mind suddenly whirling with questions. As if reading your mind, Day says,

“The match is never one-sided. If it’s platonic for you, it will be platonic for them.”

“You mentioned before that there are lots of Searchers that remain single by choice. Is that because their soulmates are platonic?”

She nods and folds her hands in front of her, resting them on top of your open file. “Sometimes. Other times it’s because there is something about their soulmate that they don’t like, enough so that it affects their willingness to be partners.”

You frown and clutch your bag in your lap. “I thought soulmates were supposed to be a perfect partner. What kinds of things would deter someone from that?”

Day considers your question for a moment, and when she speaks, she’s a bit hesitant, as if she’s afraid she’ll say something wrong. “We have very few restrictions when it comes to who can become a client here. There are people in the system who have things in their past that are not publicly disclosed, but that they might tell their soulmate when the opportunity arises.”

“Things in their past? Like… bad things?”

“Sometimes, yes.”

You let out a slow exhale and look back out the window at the rain. The drizzle has turned back into a steady downpour, likely flooding the street of your apartment building. It’s a good thing you chose to wear boots and a jacket.

“We can choose to exclude those people from your results…”

Your stomach lurches at the thought and you frown deeper. The thought of that gives you an aching feeling that claws at the inside of your ribs, as if to tell you that excluding those people is the worst decision you could possibly make. You feel a bit breathless as you shake your head and look back at her.

“No. No, it’s okay.”

Day searches your face with a curious expression, her hand now hovering over the mouse. “Are you sure? It’s just another box to tick, it’s not a big—“

“No. Keep them,” you tell her, forcing yourself to sit taller in your seat, though inwardly you’re trying to figure out why her suggestion has knocked you so off-kilter.

After a moment, Day nods and pulls her hand away from the mouse. “Okay. Well, then I guess we’re done, unless you had any more questions for me?”

You shake your head and she closes your file, then stands. You mirror her, slinging the strap of your bag over your shoulder as she gestures for the door behind you. The waiting room proves to be just as full as it was before your appointment, and when you make your way out of the building, you pull your hood up over your head and start the walk toward the nearest subway station, intent on making it home at least mostly dry.

The first set of results lands in your inbox two days later, and you stare at the notification for a solid ten minutes before actually opening the email. Your mouth feels like it’s full of cotton as you silently read through it once, then twice.

Day has found you two matches. The first is platonic: a girl roughly the same age as you. She works at an insurance call center in Brooklyn, but it lists her hobbies as crocheting, baking, and puzzles. Her name is Janiya, and she seems nice enough. You briefly consider not even scrolling any further, and instead messaging her right away to set up a meeting, but your thumb seems to move all on its own.

The second match is a romantic one. As you read through his information, you wonder why he hasn’t shown up before. Day had mentioned in the voicemail before your last appointment that you’d gone through practically every profile in the system with no success.

His name is James, and his profile isn’t as detailed as the others you’ve been matched with. There’s no picture. It says he works in security and that he’s from Brooklyn, just like Janiya. There are no hobbies listed, but it does say he has a cat.

“I like cats,” you mutter to yourself as you scroll back up to look at Janiya’s profile. Your head is telling you to meet with her first. You know more about her, and it seems like she’s genuinely interested in meeting someone. James’ profile is so empty that for a second, you’re suspicious.

Who tries to find their soulmate with so little information?

Still, your heart is stuck on him. You hesitate, your thumb hovering over the messaging icon in the email. After a few seconds, however, you close the app and instead dial Day’s office.

The receptionist puts you on hold and you transfer the call to speaker phone while you make yourself dinner. You’re just pulling your leftovers from the microwave when the hold music stops and Day’s voice rings out from your phone.

“Hi there. What can I do for you?”

You hurriedly set down the bowl on the stove and grab your phone, taking it off speaker to wedge it between your shoulder and ear.

“Hey! Hey, Day.” You try to sound as casual as possible, as if that will somehow hide the way your heart is suddenly hammering in your chest. “I have a question about the matches you sent me.”

“I was wondering if that’s why you were calling,” Day replies. You can hear her typing in the background, no doubt pulling up their profiles. “Is this about one of them in particular?”

“Um… yeah, kind of.”

Grabbing your food, you carry it back to the living room and sit down on your normal side of the couch, carefully cradling the hot dish in your lap.

“Alright then. You know I can’t tell you specific details about them, but if it’s a general question, I can definitely help. Which profile did you have a question about?”

“James?”

The line goes quiet. Day doesn’t say anything. There’s no typing on her end of the call and you sit up, moving to hold the phone against your ear with your hand.

“Day? Are you there?”

She clears her throat. “I’m here. What would you like to know about him?”

The way she’d gone silent so suddenly makes your stomach twist and you set your food aside. Your heart is still racing and you pull a blanket over your lap so you have something to fiddle with.

“I couldn’t see very much about him in the email—just his work, where he’s from, and that he has a cat. Is that… correct?”

“That’s correct,” Day answers. There’s a hint of exasperation in her voice, which makes you frown.

Is she irritated with me? Or him?

“So I’m just supposed to decide if I want to meet him or not based on that? I mean, I can tell you more about the people on the subway last night than I can tell you about him!”

On the other end of the call, Day chuckles, and you relax a little bit. You feel your shoulders drop and your grip on the phone loosens ever so slightly, thankful that your attempted humor has landed.

“I can promise you that James is a good man. I’ve met him myself. He’s just… private.”

“You’ve met him?”

“I have. I’m the one who set up his profile,” she tells you.

“It seems a little strange that someone that private is using a service like this. I mean, they had to know that people would want to know more about them than just the basics, right?”

“Everyone has the right to make their profile as open or as private as possible. Most people choose to disclose more details to make it easier for prospective matches to get to know them a little bit before they choose to meet, but people also have their reasons for putting only the basics.”

Reasons like what?

You reach forward to grab your food again. Steam is still rising from the bowl and you hold the phone away from your ear for a second to blow on your meal, as if that will immediately make it cool enough to eat.

“I thought I’d already been tested against all the profiles,” you say, changing the subject before you can feel guilty for questioning his right to privacy. “His is new then, right?”

“That’s correct. He’s only been in the system for a few hours.”

You pause, unsure if you’ve heard her correctly. “A few hours?”

“He was in earlier today.”

“That’s… fast.”

The call is quiet for a second again, but then Day says, “Y/N, I’m not supposed to tell you anything that’s not in the email you received, but I promise you that James is a good man. Your match with him is…” She trails off and you shift on the couch, waiting for her to continue. She doesn’t.

“Day?” you ask. When she doesn’t answer, you repeat a little louder, “Day? Are you there?”

“You should message him,” she finally replies.

“What were you going to say about my match with him?”

“That’s all I can tell you.”

“Day—”

“Is there anything else I can help you with?” she asks, her tone suddenly more professional than it has been the entire call. “I have a patient waiting on me.”

You pause, then relent. “No. No, that’s it.”

“Promise me you’ll message him?”

It’s strange to hear those words from a Searcher, especially one that you don’t know very well, but you recognize the heaviness of it all the same. Searchers are well-regarded, and their known for being impartial. Their job is an important one, and one that affects the entire world, even if they largely live quiet lives. To have one invested in your match like this, rather than simply matching you and moving on, is a rare occurrence.

“I promise,” you hesitantly agree. “I’ll message him.”

“Good. Have a good night, Y/N.”

“You too.”

You hang up the phone and toss your phone onto the opposite cushion, then stare at the dark TV. When you’d called the office, you’d been hoping for a little bit of information on James—maybe a hobby or his favorite band. You hadn’t been expecting the strange nervousness that sprung to life inside of you as soon as Day answered the phone, and you certainly hadn’t been expecting her to emphasize your match with James as much as she had.

While the promise you’ve made to her thrums in your chest, you force yourself to eat your food before it grows cold, but the phone sitting on the cushion beside you is like a physical presence that you can’t ignore. Finally, you can’t stand it any longer. You set aside the mostly-empty bowl and unlock your phone. You go straight to the email and thumb the messaging icon before you can think twice.

You: Hey. I’m Y/N.

You send the message, then immediately regret it and think of a thousand things you could’ve said instead. Each and every option would have made you seem cooler and more put-together.

James: Bucky.

Frowning, you read his message and type out three replies before you finally send the final draft.

You: I thought your name was James?

“Stupid, stupid, stupid,” you mumble. You grab your dish from where you’d set it on the coffee table. After eating the last few bites on the way to the kitchen, you stuff your phone in your pocket and grab a sponge. You’re setting the bowl on the drying rack after scrubbing it clean when your phone dings again, then twice.

James: My friends call me Bucky.

James: Do you want to meet?

You blink at the text bubble. Before you can even process the message, another one comes through.

James: I’m not great at texting, I’d rather talk in person.

Smiling a little, you reply quickly, hoping it will make it through before he can send anything else and before you can chicken out.

You: I’d love to meet, Bucky. Can I call you that? I know we’re not friends yet.

His reply is simple: Yes.

An hour passes, then two, and you find yourself messaging Bucky with one hand while brushing your teeth with the other. You’ve set up a coffee date for tomorrow afternoon, and while he says he’s not great at texting, his messages prove otherwise. Bucky is funny, and he’s good at asking questions. Finally, however, he wishes you goodnight, and your phone’s notifications clear for the first time since dinner.

You lay in bed and stare at the wall, wondering what Bucky looks like. You’ve created a mental picture of him in your head while you’ve been talking all evening, and you’re hesitant to hold onto it.

What if he’s ugly? What if I’m totally wrong and he’s not attractive?

You squeeze your eyes shut. It would be easy to look him up online. How many people named James have the same nickname as him? There’s bound to be a couple, but you know he lives in Brooklyn and he works in security. You could find him in less than an hour, maybe even less.

Go to bed, you silently chide yourself. It doesn’t matter what he looks like if you’re actually soulmates. You repeat this to yourself a few times before you start to drift off, and when you open your eyes again, the room is brighter and your alarm is ringing, reminding you to drag yourself out of bed so that you can clock in on time.

Your workday moves slowly, and your schedule is jam packed. The only redeeming part of the day is that it’s Friday, which means you get to work from home. Despite this, every meeting you have feels like it takes hours, and you barely get through your daily tasks before it’s time for you to log off for the weekend.

The project that’s been looming over your head for the past three weeks gets pushed out of your head as you close your laptop and hurry to your closet. Bucky had agreed to meet you at your favorite coffeeshop shortly after four o’clock, which means you only have thirty minutes to find something to wear and catch the train.

You settle for a pair of jeans, boots, and a newly favorited shirt, then exchange your jacket for an actual coat as an afterthought. The city is quickly descending into its nighttime December chill, and you know you’ll regret it later if you don’t have a heavy outer layer.

Slipping your arms into the sleeves, you hurry down the stairs and down the street to the subway, where you catch the train right as it pulls up. It feels like a miracle, and when you get to the coffeeshop and there’s an open table, it feels like you’re destined for some luck. On a Friday in December, finding a table is usually next to impossible.

The cozy interior of the cafe is one of the reasons you’d picked this shop to meet up with Bucky. It’s been one of your favorites since moving to Manhattan. It’s nearby one of the city’s older parks. You’d found it by accident one day when you were exploring. The smell of espresso and pastries had lured you inside, but it was the art and the overstuffed chairs that had held you captive all the way until closing that day.

The owner has clearly leant heavily into the holidays. String lights are strung around the room and someone has tucked garland above the windows, tucking the lights into the branches. It’s warm and comfortable inside, and the scents of cinnamon, peppermint, and chocolate wafting through the air make you jittery and excited, as if you’re a kid coming home to a table full of sugary treats. Some vaguely familiar singer is crooning over a speaker somewhere as you tuck yourself into a corner seat where you can see the entrance.

This is a good sign, you tell yourself. Maybe he’s the one.

There’s a finality in those words and you have to pause and breathe for a second. You glance up at the door again, feeling a little like someone’s watching you, but everyone is looking down at their devices or talking to the people at their tables. There’s only one person not doing either one of those things—a short woman with a frizzy white perm—and she’s telling the barista about her granddaughter’s dance recital. She even has her phone held out over the counter so she can show off the pictures she’d taken.

You stifle a smile at the way the barista is nodding along as the woman continues to add more and more details to her store, then pull your own phone out of your jacket pocket. There’s a message from Bucky. Your smile droops a little when you see it.

James: I’m sorry, I can’t make it today. Work emergency.

You stare at it for a minute, then glance up at the entrance again, as if the message will disappear and he’ll miraculously be standing near the glass doors. Slowly, you look back down at your phone and type in a response. It feels like your brain is full of static and you have to hold back tears as you press send.

You: It’s okay. We can find another time. Hope everything’s okay.

Much to your surprise, he replies right away.

James: I was looking forward to meeting you.

You: Same, but at least I still have coffee. :)

The smiley face at the end feels entirely too fake, but you keep it. You’re tucking your phone in the pocket of your coat when you sense someone standing nearby.

“Y/N?”

Lifting your head, you meet the eyes of a tall black man in a leather jacket. He smiles warmly when you see him, and something about him seems oddly familiar.

“Can I help you?” you ask, a sitting up a little taller. Though you don’t sense anything threatening about him, you’re not about to admit to anything unless you know he means absolutely no harm.

“Bucky sent me. He’s sorry he couldn’t make it, but he wanted to make sure you got this.” The man holds up a small bouquet of flowers. They’re pink and dainty, and you wonder if Bucky picked them out for you specifically or if this man had. “He also wanted me to tell you that he called and gave the barista his card information, so anything you want is on him. Go crazy.”

You blink at him in surprise. It’s a thoughtful gesture, and your brain is still trying to process the fact that you’re not meeting your soulmate, but rather a stranger sent on his behalf. “What?”

“I’m Sam.” He holds out his free hand for you to shake, and you do after a second, when your brain starts to catch up with what he’s saying. “Bucky and I work together.”

“Oh. Were you not needed for the emergency?”

Sam winces a little. “No. Not yet, at least,” he adds. “If we’d had any say in it, I would’ve stayed back to care of things, but they specifically asked for Bucky.”

“So he sent you to give me flowers and tell me I could order coffee on him?”

Nodding, he replies, “And to make it very clear that he’s sorry he couldn’t be here. Emergencies in our line of work can’t really be ignored.”

“I mean, I guess, yeah. Security emergencies probably have to get fixed right away before the issue gets any bigger, right?”

Sam’s eyebrows shoot up and he gestures to the chair. When you nod, he sits down and sets the flowers between you on the table, then folds his hands.

“Security,” he repeats, a bit questioning, and you nod again.

“Yeah. Isn’t that what you two do? You said you were his coworker, right?”

“Yeah. Our job is… complicated, but I guess security’s the best word for it.” Sam leans back in the chair and crosses his arms over his chest. His eyes search your face for a moment before he asks, “How did you and Bucky meet?”

His expression is neutral, but you can tell when you’re being scrutinized, and you fight the urge to make yourself small. Something inside of you is saying that in order to win over Bucky, you need to win over his friends. You need to prove yourself.

“Through a Searcher.”

Sam raises his eyebrows again and lets out a long whistle. “A Searcher? Bucky didn’t say anything about that.”

Shit, you think, inwardly cringing. You hadn’t realized that Bucky wasn’t as open as you when it came to your plans. Then again, you probably should’ve guessed based on how locked down he kept his profile.

Wait, why is he keeping it a secret? Why wouldn’t he want people to know that he’s looking for his soulmate?

“That would make you the pretty girl he’s been texting,” Sam says, and a slow smile spreads across his face. He lets out a chuckle. “We didn’t realize you guys were soulmates.”

You can feel your face and ears growing warm, and you shift uncomfortably in your seat underneath his gaze. His eyes are twinkling with excitement and pleasure at finding out his coworker’s secret. There’s a pit in your stomach now that you know you should have said as little as possible.

“Well, we’re not— I mean, we haven’t—” you splutter, searching for the right words. “We don’t know for sure yet.”

“You mean that you haven’t met up yet? This was the first?”

When you nod, Sam straightens up again. The merry look in his eyes is quickly fading and you pull your hands from the table to fidget with the zipper on your coat. You haven’t even had the chance to take it off yet.

“Would you excuse me for a second, Y/N? I gotta check in with work real fast.”

Hesitantly, you nod again. “I’ll… get something to drink. Do you want anything? Since Bucky’s paying?”

That earns you a grin, and you feel your anxiety ease when his expression lightens. “I knew I liked you. Yeah, get me one of those peppermint mochas. My girl told me I’d like ‘em from here.”

You catch yourself glancing down at his left hand before you can stop yourself. There’s a gold band on his ring finger, and when you flick your eyes back up to his face in hopes that he didn’t notice you looking, his smile softens, enough that you can’t help but think that his wife is a lucky woman. In just a short amount of time, he’s proven himself to be a kind, genuine person.

If Bucky’s anything like him, I’ll be the luckiest person in the world, you think, allowing yourself to smile at the thought.

“It’s only been a few months,” Sam tells you. “I still can’t believe it.” He chuckles and shakes his head in amazement.

“Is she your soulmate?”

He nods. “Yeah. I’m lucky I found her. Well, she found me.”

Normally, you’d feel jealous. Every time you’d sat through people telling you the story of how they found their soulmate, you’d leave feeling like your face must be an unnatural shade of green. You’d go home seething with envy and cursing the universe over your lack of a present soulmate, and then you’d sulk on the couch for the rest of the evening. Now, however, you smile wide. You just feel happy.

As he heads outside, already typing on his phone, you join the short line at the register, your smile still lingering. The sun outside is setting quickly, casting a syrupy, golden glow throughout the cafe as the light slips between the buildings and spills in through the windows. The string lights twinkle merrily and the heat is working hard to keep it warm, however, and for a second, you can ignore the fact that you’ve been halfway stood up tonight.

You’re sipping your drink back at the table when Sam comes back inside. He picks up the red to-go cup you’d gotten for him, then nods at the one in your hand.

“I’ve gotta go, but you should stay here and finish that.”

You tilt your head, opening your mouth to ask why, but he shakes his head in response.

“Work thing. It was nice to meet you, Y/N. I’ll see you soon,” Sam says, and then he’s walking back out the doors to the street again, leaving you sitting alone at the table in the corner.

Though it’s a little strange that he left so quickly, you can’t hold it against him. He’d said it was work-related, and if Bucky was working an emergency situation, maybe Sam was too. Still, you stare at the door for a second before picking up your drink to take another sip. The coffee is warm and buttery and you close your eyes, trying hard to enjoy it.

You’re setting your cup back down on the table and reaching for the danish you’d purchased when there’s a loud explosion outside. You scramble out of your chair and away from the shop’s glass windows as an SUV rolls down the street, banging into a light pole and a bus stop in the process. The light explodes at the top of the pole and sparks rain down as the last of the sun slips below the horizon. People run screaming in the opposite direction, looking for safety as another explosion rattles the building. Furniture wobbles and tips around you. The lid on your coffee cup pops off, spilling the coffee when it hits the floor, the table only inches beside it. The danish is crushed.

You and everyone else in the coffeeshop watch in horror as pieces of buildings, cars, and items on the sidewalk go flying by, illuminated by streetlights and the colorful strings of holiday lights strung up in windows. Something hits the cafe’s window, cracking the glass, and you back up even further, bumping first into the wall beside you and then the person from the table between you and the counter. They steer you around them before you can apologize, and then the baristas are shouting, directing everyone into the back of the shop. You have no idea if it’s any safer there, but at least then you’re hidden from whatever or whoever is causing the chaos and destruction outside.

As you head toward the storage room, you take one last look out the windows. A man with dark hair in a black leather jacket is standing on the other side of the street. His figure is shrouded with shadows, enough that you can’t quite make out where the darkness ends and where he begins. You meet his eyes and a shiver runs up your spine. You rub at your wrist, wincing at the pain flourishing there. The man is staring at you with a look of utter horror and dismay, but before you can process what’s happening, you’re being pulled back by another customer and the man turns just in time to duck out of the way of an assailant dressed in dark red leather. You manage to grab your jacket and bag from the floor before you’re herded to the back of the store for good.

“What the hell is happening?” somebody asks as you enter the storage room. You’re the last person, and one of the employees shuts the door behind you. A man pushes a table in front of it and you move out of the way as another comes to stack boxes on top of it. They’ve already blocked the exterior door that leads into the alley with a set of metal shelves.

Several people are sitting on the floor—a woman dressed in business professional who clutches a laptop with both hands, two men sitting side-by-side and murmuring to each other, a college student texting frantically—and you join them in silence, waiting for an answer to the question that you were all thinking.

“Some kind of attack,” the college student says after a few moments. You glance over to see them scrolling through social media. “Captain America is out there, though.”

“More aliens?” asks the woman, and you feel the air of the storage room electrify at the word. Since the Snap, everyone has been on edge when it comes to extraterrestrials. Every single person on earth, not just New York, is painfully aware that another attack could come at any moment. Life is excruciatingly fragile, which is part of what convinced you to connect with Day. If you’re going to live a life that could be cut short in a split-second, you want to live it with your soulmate.

“It doesn’t say.”

You look around and then scoot back until you’re leaning against a box of pre-packaged coffee. There’s no telling how long you could be here. Another explosion makes the building shake and the lights flicker once, then twice, before finally turning off entirely, plunging the storage room into darkness. The building goes silent after that. There’s no hum of refrigerators or freezers, just the noise from the fight out on the street. If not for that, you could hear a pin drop in the storage room. Everyone seems to be holding their breath, as if you’re all waiting for the other shoe to drop.

I can’t die before I’ve met my soulmate. That’s not fair, you muse, closing your eyes when there’s another loud boom, this time farther away. It’s hard to keep yourself from spiraling, but you have to. The back room of a coffeeshop is no place for a breakdown. Nonetheless, your wrist feels like it’s on fire and your head is pounding. You can feel your pulse right behind your eyes.

The college student keeps track of the time and the battle for you, and the light from their phone slices through the darkness as they scroll through various apps, gathering information. When the noise outside starts to fade, they report that the battle has moved south, but that the city has ordered everyone to shelter in place until they’ve stopped the attackers and contained any major fires or damaged buildings.

After a half hour, you hear noise in the coffeeshop. It’s the closest anything has been since the start of the attack, and your heart thuds against your sternum once, then stops for several beats. Everyone freezes, and you look up from your phone. You’ve been trying to stay off of it and save the battery in case you’re here all night, but you wanted to see if Bucky had messaged you again. He hadn’t. You run your fingers over the letters on your wrist, which are red and irritated from the stress of the day. The sensation of your own touch sends pins and needles up your arm and you wince. It’s abnormal that the skin is affected at all by what’s going on in the world, but then again, you’ve never been caught in the middle of a potential alien attack. You hadn’t even been near the epicenter of the Snap when it happened—you’d been on a cruise off the coast of Alaska.

You lock your phone again and strain to listen past the heavy door. All you can hear are footsteps on shattered glass, but then the door handle jiggles. It’s locked, and after a second, the person on the other side starts knocking.

“Hello? Is anyone in there?”

Looking around at each other, one of the men who’d originally blocked off the door shakes his head. He stands slowly from where he’d been perched on the edge of a folding table, and the other man does too. One of them has a pocket knife, the other has a long-handled broom. You can’t imagine how they think those will last long in a fight against anything, but you’re grateful for their courage all the same. The college student points their phone flashlight at the door.

“It’s safe to come out now,” the voice says from the other side of the door. You frown, staring at the tile for a long few moments.

Why do they sound so familiar?

“Y/N, are you in there?” they ask.

Jerking your head up, you stare at the door with wide eyes. Whoever’s on the other side, they know you, and they know you’re here. You hadn’t told anyone else you were coming to the coffeeshop today.

“Y/N, it’s Sam Wilson.” The door handle jiggles again. “Everything’s contained, it’s safe for you guys to come out now.”

You get to your feet slowly, wincing at the stiffness in your legs from sitting in the same position for so long.

He came back to check on me? Did Bucky send him?

“Do you know him?” the woman whispers.

You’re still trying to process the fact that you’d been smack dab in the middle of an Avengers-level threat to acknowledge her question. Carefully, you step over the legs of one of the baristas that had moved to sit on the floor only five minutes before.

“Y/N?” Another knock.

You swallow against the dry, sandy feeling in your mouth that always comes when you feel anxious. “I— I’m here,” you call back.

There’s a moment of silence on the other side of the door, and then Sam asks, “Is anyone hurt? Can you open the door?”

The two men exchange glances, then look over at you. When you realize they’re waiting for you to say if it’s actually safe enough to open the door, you nod.

“We’re okay. We’re opening it now.”

All around you, the rest of the baristas and customers start to stand, stretch, and gather their belongings. The storage room stays eerily silent as you watch the two men deconstruct the barrier they’d created. When the way is finally clear, they unlock the door and pull it open.

Sam Wilson stands on the other side of the doorway, but you wouldn’t have recognized him had he not told you who he was.

The college student behind you speaks up first, and he says what’s going through everyone’s heads. “Dude, it’s Captain America!”

He offers polite nods and reassurances to the people around you, but when he finally sees you standing near the center of the storage room, he holds out a hand.

“Bucky asked me to make sure you got home safely,” he says.

You blink at him and it’s like your brain has finally started firing on all synapses, because you’re putting together the pieces of the puzzle you’ve been missing all day.

Sam Wilson. Captain America. James. Bucky. Bucky Barnes. The Winter Soldier. The Avengers.

“Holy shit,” you mumble, and then you step forward, letting him take your hand to lead you safely out of the destroyed coffee shop. Your boots crunch over glass as Sam helps you step through the rubble. Your headache is edging toward a full-blown migraine.

“Is he—”

Sam glances back at you when you stop mid-question. You want to ask where Bucky is, if he’s safe, and why he didn’t come find you himself, but you can’t bring yourself to pull the word from your thoughts. There’s a nagging fear in your mind that you may not like the answers. Your chest aches.

“He’s helping clear buildings farther south,” Sam answers, as if he’d been waiting for you to ask the whole time. “I’m supposed to be there too, but he asked me to come check on you first.”

Your mouth betrays your mind when you ask, “Why didn’t he come himself?”

That question earns you an irritated huff, and you immediately loosen your grip on Sam’s hand. He stops walking to look back at you.

“Do you want my opinion or what he’d want me to tell you?” he asks.

“Your opinion,” you reply, surprising yourself. You don’t know why, exactly, but you feel that you can already trust Sam to tell you the truth.

“He’s afraid that you’ll think of him only as the guy in the reports,” Sam tells you, glancing back into the coffeeshop, where the others are now traversing the remains of the shop and making their way out into the hazy city street.

Sirens blare somewhere behind Sam and there’s smoke sifting into the air from half-crushed cars and destroyed storefronts all around you. The smoke and fumes stings your eyes and makes them water, and you pull your shirt up over your mouth and nose. More people have started to venture out from their hiding places when your phone’s emergency alert goes off. Looking away from Sam, you read the notification telling you that it’s safe to head home, and that emergency shelters are open for those affected. You shiver, suddenly realizing that it’s still cold out and you’re not wearing your coat. You’d taken it off in the storage room when the close proximity of the others had been heat enough. Sam takes it from your hands and holds it up so you can slip your arms in.

Captain America is helping me put my coat on, you think as you do just that. Bucky Barnes was my date. How much more bizarre can this day get?

“We can talk more later, okay? I gotta get you home and safe so I can go help him.”

You nod in agreement and let Sam lead you down the street and around the corner, where a black SUV with tinted windows sits at the curb, eerily pristine in the wake of all the carnage and damage around you.

Sam approaches it easily and opens the back door, revealing a dark leather interior and a woman in the driver’s seat who turns around to smile at you. She’s beautiful and seems friendly, and her voice is chipper when she says,

“You must be Y/N.”

“Uh.. Hi?”

“This is Jen. She’ll take you home from here.” He reaches for your bag and you hand it over reluctantly.

“Do all Avengers have… chauffeurs? Just… on hand?” you ask, staring into the backseat of the car. There are water bottles in the cupholders and a little trash can attached to the back of the front console.

You really did trust Sam, but the day was getting weirder and weirder by the minute. You half expect Hawkeye to climb out of the passenger seat at this point. Silently, you peek over the backseat headrests, but there’s only empty trunk space.

He shakes his head and holds out a hand to help you into the car. “No. I called in a favor with a friend of mine. Believe it or not, we usually drive or take the subway.” Sam hands you your bag and you stare at him through the tinted window as he closes the door and waves. You’re too shocked by what’s happening to even try and picture Thor riding the subway, though you vaguely think that you’ll have a good laugh about it later tonight.

Jen starts driving and you sit back against the seat, then think twice and buckle your seatbelt. The car ride is silent except for the low drone of the car and whatever music Jen plays over the radio. It’s barely audible in the backseat, but she bops her head along to the beat and mouths the words as she navigates the crowded streets of Manhattan, which are made even worse by emergency vehicles, road closures, and mobs of people and cars evacuating away from the worst of the fight.

“Do you know what happened?” you ask, staring out the window at a woman on a stretcher being loaded into an ambulance. Flashing red and blue illuminate the crowd of crying people standing on the curb, watching the EMTs work.

“No idea,” Jen answers, her earlier bright tone dimmed slightly. “The first six blocks were only partially damaged—that’s where you were—but further south it’s…” She trails off, looking for the right word. You understand before she can find it.

“I’m glad that they’re there, then,” you murmur.

Jen hums in agreement and smoothly turns onto your street. It’s oddly quiet, given all that’s happened. You’d expected some of your neighbors to be outside the building, but the sidewalk is empty. The power is still on—holiday lights blink on balcony edges and in windows, and your downstairs neighbor’s Christmas tree is visible through the gauzy curtains of her living room.

“This it?” Jen asks as she slows to a stop, then parks against the curb. You nod and meet her eyes in the rearview mirror. “Stay safe, Y/N.”

“You too,” you tell her, and you mean it. “Are you going home after this?”

Jen nods and you grab the door handle, then pause. As nosy as it is, you have to know. “Sam said he called in this ride as a favor?”

“Yep.”

“Must’ve been a pretty big favor. I wouldn’t have gone out in these conditions unless I absolutely had to.”

She grins at that, turning around to look at you over her shoulder. “I used to be a Searcher.”

You pull your hand from the handle to look at her properly. “What?”

“I quit when I realized I didn’t like the pressure everyone put on me, but not before I met Sam and helped connect him with Day.”

“Day?” you ask.

How many Days live in New York? It can’t possibly be the same one…

“It was love at first sight.” Jen chuckles at your shocked expression. “But it always is for soulmates. She and I both worked at SLMTS. She’s your Searcher, if what Sam told me is correct.”

You nod, trying to connect the dots. “So when Sam said he called in a favor…”

She shrugs. “It was Day’s favor, technically, but she shared it with him. When she told me it involved soulmates, I couldn’t say no. I’ve always had a soft spot for true love.”

“He’s not my soulmate, or at least, I don’t know if he is or not. I’ve never even met him,” you admit. “We were supposed to meet for coffee today, but he didn’t show up. He sent Sam instead, and then…” You gesture toward the window and the chaos that lay somewhere behind it.

“Are you sure you’ve never met?” she asks, frowning slightly. “Bucky seemed pretty certain he’s at least seen you.”

“Yes, I’m—” You pause, remembering the man you’d seen from across the street before you’d hidden in the storage room. Pulling out your phone, you go to search up a photo of him, but it’s dead.

Another phone appears in your line of vision. “Here,” Jen says.

You take it and immediately open the internet, looking up pictures of Bucky Barnes. Your breath catches in your throat as soon as they load. It’s been a long time since you’ve seen a picture of him that isn’t from a courtroom or from his past, but the first result is crystal clear. Your heart leaps in your chest and tears prick at your eyes.

“It’s him!” You look up at Jen, who’s smiling fondly. “I have seen him! He was across the street from the coffeeshop before the baristas had us all hide in the storage room and block the doors!”

“And his initials?” She takes the phone from your hands.

Pushing up your sleeve, you hold out your wrist for her to see. Your heart is in your throat as she tenderly takes your wrist in her hands and turns it from side to side, inspecting the red, puffy skin bordering the thin black letters.

“It show all signs of a match,” Jen confirms. “The irritation and all other symptoms will lessen once you’re together again.”

“All other symptoms?” you ask, pulling your wrist back so you can look at the mark yourself.

“Your body’s adjusting to being near them. Having a soulmate affects every part of you, from your gut to your brain to your skin, and everything in between. It’ll take some time for your body to settle down again, but having him near will make it easier. That’s why most companies have soulmate leave.”

You swallow and nod. The headache makes sense now. “I should call them. My boss, I mean. I remember them saying something about that when I first started.”

“Get inside where it’s safe and get all of that sorted out now. You won’t want to have to worry about it once Bucky’s free to come find you.”

“You think he’ll know where to find me?”

That makes her chuckle. “Go upstairs, Y/N. He’ll show up eventually, I’m sure.”

Unable to stop yourself, you smile wide at her and grip the door handle again. “Thanks, Jen. It was nice to meet you.”

“You too.”

You head upstairs to your apartment with a new sense of purpose and a family of butterflies making their home in your stomach. You can’t remember ever being this excited for anything, and the fact that you don’t even know when Bucky will arrive make it all the more nerve-wracking.

Though all you want to do is wait by the door, you force yourself to go through your daily routine of tidying up your apartment, doing laundry, making dinner, and going through your workload for the next day, though you message your boss and explain the situation in case Bucky comes back tonight. They respond immediately, telling you that they’re glad you’re safe and that they’ve noted your time off in your team’s calendar.

The anticipation builds all evening, and as it gets later and later, you try to keep yourself busy. You adjust the ornaments on your Christmas tree three times before you put them back the way they were to start. You pop a pain pill when your headache worsens again, then sit down to watch a news report about Sam and Bucky helping with evacuations and clean-up. The sight of him, even digitally, makes the pain lessen and sends the butterflies back into a flurry.

As it nears midnight, you start to give up on the idea of Bucky finding you tonight.

I might as well head to bed, you think, trying not to feel too upset, though the word “heartbroken” comes to mind when the butterflies pound against your sternum, then fall flat at the bottom of the pit in your stomach. Maybe he’ll come by tomorrow. Or maybe I should go find him?

There’s a clattering noise out on the street as you pull open your dresser, and you pause, listening. Someone shouts, and against your better judgement, you peek out through your bedroom curtains.

Bucky is standing outside, still dressed in black. If it weren’t from the colored lights on the balconies and the singular streetlight on the corner, you wouldn’t have seen him. He meets your eyes immediately, like he’s been waiting for you to look out all night.

Frantically, you run to your living room and open the sliding door to the balcony, then step outside into the cold night air. Bucky has his hands in the pockets of his leather jacket. His breath comes out in small white clouds that crowd around him, then float up into the city.

“What are you doing down there?” you call, hoping he can hear you despite the fact that you’re eight stories above him.

He watches you for a long moment, making you wonder if the internet had been wrong about his enhanced senses. When you open your mouth to repeat yourself, this time louder, he speaks up.

“I’m wondering if it’s a good idea for me to come up,” he calls back.

“Why?”

“Because you’re a very beautiful girl, and I’m not so beautiful right now.”

You squint down at him, trying not to smile at the compliment. There’s a smear of red on his face, and you can tell even in the poor lighting that his clothes are covered with dust and dirt. His eyes are tired.

“Would you believe me if I said I didn’t care?”

Bucky stares at you for a long moment, searching your face from far below. When he finally replies, his voice is softer, and you have to strain to hear him when he says,

“I’ll always believe you.”

Before you can reply, he starts toward the entrance to your building. You stand on the balcony long enough to watch him go inside. When the exterior door swings shut, you launch yourself back into the apartment and slam the sliding door shut hard enough that you think it might shatter. After a second, you close the curtain, too. You don’t want anyone looking in and spying on your first meeting with your soulmate.

The apartment is clean and cozy from your earlier cleaning, but now you stand in the middle of your living room, turning in a circle and wondering if Bucky will like it. You’re contemplating lighting the gingerbread-scented candle on your coffee table when there’s a knock at the door and you freeze. Your heart thuds heavily in your chest and the butterflies flutter back to life, sending a burst of energy through you, like you’d just had a shot of espresso.

Carefully, you cross the room to the door and look through the peephole. Bucky is standing in the hallway, looking entirely out of place against the light gray paint and drab carpet.

“You’re here,” you say as you open the door. “Like, actually here.”

He nods and searches your face. There’s a cut above his right eyebrow, though it looks like it’s healing, and he’s covered with a sheen of dust and sweat. The red smear you’d seen on his jaw is dried blood, but it doesn’t look like it’s his.

“I was worried you wouldn’t come,” you admit, trying desperately to fill the silence.

“I was worried you wouldn’t want me to,” he murmurs.

You frown and step aside, motioning for him to enter. He steps inside your apartment, being careful to stay on the square of vinyl tile right inside the door. You look the door with both the deadbolt and the chain, then turn. With both of you on the tile, you’re almost nose to nose, and you can feel the heat coming off of him. It makes your heart skip a beat and you swallow nervously.

“We’re soulmates. Of course I want you here.”

Bucky licks his lips and then briefly looks away, taking in the quiet of your small apartment. It’s a one-bedroom that you’ve lived in for years now, since moving back to New York when your mom disappeared during the Snap. You’d wanted to be close to where she had lived, and when she reappeared, you stayed. The previous tenants had decided to move away from the city—and the Avengers—after reappearing themselves, and they’d graciously allowed you to stay without a legal battle, unlike some of your neighbors. Your mom decided to move out of the city, saying something about wanting to enjoy a quiet life. Since then, you’ve made the place your own.

“You know about my past,” he says, more of a statement than a question, and you nod in response. “And?”

“And…” You begin, knowing that your next words are critical. You hadn’t thought up an answer to this question in advance, though you’d thought up the answers for a thousand others, so you’re slow to reply. “And I know that you’re a good man despite all of the bad things you’ve been forced to do.”

“Forced?” There’s a trace of self-hatred in the word and it makes your heart ache. The idea of him hating himself makes you want to cry.

I don’t want anyone to hate him, you think.

A surge of protectiveness wells up in your chest, making you stand a little taller. You grab his hand, immediately realizing that it’s his real one when the skin gives under your grip, and squeeze.

“Would you do those things today? If somebody asked you to?”

He looks you in the eye and answers immediately, “No.”

“Then you were forced. You’ve more than made up for everything, at least in my book. You brought my mom back after the Snap.” There’s a lump in your throat at the memory of being suddenly without her for so long.

Much to your surprise, Bucky squeezes your hand. “I’m sorry you lost her.” He pauses. “My friends were the ones who brought her back. I was gone, too.”

“But you fought Thanos. If you’d lost, who knows what would have happened. Whether or not you were gone for those five years wouldn’t have mattered then.”

He nods in agreement, then takes another look around your apartment. You fall silent, watching and waiting for some kind of reaction. You want him to like it—you want him to feel as much at peace here as you do. It’s your sanctuary, and you hope that he’ll feel that way too.

“Can I—?” He gestures toward the living room and you nod quickly, stepping out of his space, though it’s more difficult than you’d like to admit to be out of arm’s reach of him.

“Yes, sorry. Come in.”

He toes off his boots without being asked and nudges them into place next to yours. Then, Bucky steps further into your apartment. You wait for him to move, not wanting to intrude on his train of thought as he takes in the photos on your walls, the furniture you’ve collected over the years, and the trinkets you’ve picked up on your travels and received as gifts from your friends and family. He lifts a gloved hand to touch the plastic needles on your Christmas tree, then rest a glass ornament in the palm of his hand. The contrast of the glittery, fragile glass in his hand is striking, and you watch with bated breath.

“You’ve made it a home,” he finally says, meeting your eyes.

Your heart lifts and you smile wide at him. When he smiles back with a cautious, unsure kind of smile, you’re struck by the vibrant blue of his eyes and the crinkles that form at the corners. You’re distracted by just how handsome his is for just a moment, and then you clear your throat and divert your gaze, feeling the blood rush to your cheeks when he says your name.

“I was staring, I’m sorry,” you say.

“It’s okay.” He shakes his head and re-enters your personal space, making you look back up at him. “I'm used to it.”

You furrow your eyebrows at him. “That doesn’t make it okay.”

He hums quietly and you watch him quietly as he looks over the living room again. His eyes catch on the dirty pan on your stove. You’d left it there after dinner, unwilling to stay away from the door long enough to properly wash it. When you’d decided to go to bed, you’d fully planned on leaving it to soak in the sink all day tomorrow.

“Let me make you something to eat,” you find yourself saying, realizing that he’s probably starving after the fight and, consequently, the aftermath.

Bucky shakes his head. “I’m okay.”

Narrowing your eyes, you cross your arms over your chest and stare until he sighs and relents. As soon as he gestures toward the kitchen, you drop your arms and hurry to the fridge to find something for him.

“You’re not allergic to anything, are you?”

“I’m… lactose intolerant. At least I used to be, before HYDRA. I still eat that way sometimes.”

“Do you like eating lactose intolerant?” you ask.

He pauses, then shrugs. “It’s not… a conscious thought. Sometimes I just find myself making or eating something without dairy out of habit.”

“That’s nice,” you reply after a second. “That your body remembers that, even if you don’t really need to anymore.” He hums in response.

Opening the fridge, you stare at its contents for a second before you start to pull out containers and packages. Bucky takes them from you before you can protest, and he arranges them on the counter beside him.

You straighten up and close the fridge. After a second, you let your eyes trail down over Bucky’s clothes, which are still covered in dirt and grime. It looks even worse close up, though the cut near his eyebrow looks like it’s healed a little bit since he’d first knocked on the door.

“You probably want a shower, and to get out of those clothes,” you say. “At least, that’s what I would want if I were in your shoes. If you want, you can shower while I make you a plate.”

“Are you sure? I can stand while I eat.” Bucky searches your face for any sign of trepidation or lying, but you know he won’t find any.

“I’m sure,” you tell him, nodding. “If you hand me your clothes through the door, I’ll put them in the wash while you’re in the shower. Unless… they can’t be washed?”

You’re lucky enough to have a washer and dryer in your apartment, which would come in handy if he was wearing regular clothes, but you look over the leather jacket and tactical pants skeptically. Making their gear machine washable probably wasn’t something the Avengers ever had to consider, nor was it probably one of their top priorities.

“I’m not sure,” he answers with a small frown.

“Better not, then. My neighbor’s husband is roughly your size. I’ll see if they have anything you can borrow while you’re in there and I’ll just knock and leave it right outside the door if they do. Otherwise, my towels are really big, so… That should work until we can find something else. The bathroom’s the second door on the right, okay?” You gesture toward the short hallway that leads from your living room to your bedroom.

He nods, then hesitates.

“Is that okay?” you ask. “If you’re not okay with just the towel, maybe you could shower and then come right back?”

Bucky shakes his head. “I don’t want to leave. I just… You’re really okay with me being your soulmate? After everything?”

It hurts to think that Bucky doubts your connection with him. Slowly, making sure he can back out if he wants to, you take both of his hands in yours.

“I’m your soulmate, and you’re mine. We can’t argue against that, Bucky. I have waited for you and I have looked for you for years, and you’ve been doing the same thing for even longer, even if it wasn’t always conscious act. I want you. I want you more than anything in the world, and I’m going to fight for this with everything I’ve got for as long as I live. Nothing could convince me that you and I weren’t meant to be together. Okay?”

His eyes are shiny as he nods, then looks up at the kitchen cabinets behind you. He blinks a few times, trying to stave off the tears that have formed. Before he can do anything else, you release his hands and lean in, wrapping your arms around him in a tight hug, dust and dirt be damned. You know there’s more blood on his jacket—blood that doesn’t belong to him—but you don’t care. Showers and washing machines exist for a reason, and you’ve waited decades to hug your soulmate.

Bucky seems to have a similar idea because he hugs you back, but then you find yourself being pulled out of his grasp and picked up by the hips. You squeak in surprise, grabbing onto his arms for support as the floor disappears from beneath you. Almost as soon as he’s lifted you up, however, Bucky places you down on the edge of your kitchen countertop, in between a jar of salsa and a package of tortillas, and he crowds close. Your legs bracket him on either side and he threads his fingers through your hair. His metal hand rests on your thigh, a heavy presence that simultaneously calms your racing heart and stirs up the butterflies in your stomach. With one thumb near your jaw, he tilts your head back ever so slightly, then presses his lips to yours.

The world disappears from beneath you, and it feels like the butterflies have somehow lifted you up from inside. Bucky’s a good kisser, and you grip his jacket with both fists, clinging to what little extra fabric there is. He kisses you long and hard, only pausing to let you catch your breath, and by the time he finally pulls away, your heart is pounding again, your lips are swollen, and you’re likely only a few degrees away from a full-blown fever. On the other hand, your headache has long since disappeared.

“Too much?” Bucky asks, his breath hot against your face as his blue eyes search your expression.

You shake your head and grip his forearm with one hand. “No… No. That was… That was great.”

You’re dazed, embarrassingly so. It’s as if Bucky kissed all common sense out of you, because you lean forward and rest your forehead against the dusty shoulder of his jacket. He chuckles and runs his hand up and down your spine in long soothing strokes. You shiver underneath his touch.

“You sure you’re okay?” he asks again. You can hear the pride in his voice and if you’d been any more put-together, you would’ve teased him about it, but you’re still gathering your wits.

“I don’t think I’ve ever been kissed like that. Is that a 40’s thing?”

Bucky huffs out a quiet laugh and helps you sit upright again. “I don’t think so. It’s just a you thing, sweetheart. You bring out the best in me.”

“I should bring out the best in you more often,” you reply, feeling a bit cheeky now that you’re sitting upright on your own now.

He grins and gives you a peck on the cheek. “I have to shower, still. You probably should change clothes, too.”

Glancing down at yourself, you realize that the filth from his clothes has transferred to yours. You can’t help but laugh. Carefully, Bucky helps you down from the countertop. You hold onto his hand even after your feet are firmly on the floor again, and when he walks down the hallway, you trail after him.

“One more,” he says, and you find yourself being pressed against the wall outside the bathroom door. Bucky kisses you gently, though his grip on you is firm, and you melt against him.

“If you keep kissing me”—you tease in between kisses—“then we’re never going to get clean, and you’ll waste away from hunger right here in my hallway.”

“I can think of worse ways to go,” Bucky replies.

You know that he can—literally—and you put your hands on his chest, pushing gently until he takes a step back.

“Shower, soldier. Let me clean up and make you something to eat, alright?”

“Y/N…”

“Let me take care of you. You’ve been taking care of people all day.”

The guilt in his expression melts into something new, and you can’t help but smile at him.

“When your initials started burning outside the cafe, I was worried that it meant something bad,” he admits, and your smile falters. “Now I know that it’s the opposite. You’re one of the best things to happen to me.”

The butterflies flutter again. “You hardly know me.”

“I know enough,” replies Bucky.

Smiling a little bit, you open the small linen closet beside the bathroom and pull out your biggest, softest towel, then hand it to him. He takes it gingerly, purposefully brushing his fingers against yours.

“Take as long as you need,” you tell him, and he nods, then steps into the bathroom and closes the door.

Silently, you change into your second set of clean clothes since coming home, then you head to the kitchen and brace your hands against the counter. You close your eyes and take a slow, deep breath to try and calm your galloping heart, but you only succeed in letting out a giddy laugh. You press your hand over your smile to try and keep quiet. Though you know he’s your soulmate and that logically, he shouldn’t be bothered, you don’t want Bucky to know just how excited you are. It feels silly and girlish.

I’ve waited forever for this, you think, turning around so you’re leaning against the cabinet. I can’t believe I finally found him.

Pushing up your sleeve, you look down at the inside of your wrist where the letters “JBB” are permanently etched into your skin. The letter are black and small, and you’d once spent hours in middle school comparing them with different fonts on the computer until your best friend had decided that “Didot” was the closest match. Only days ago you’d thought that going to SLMTS was a waste of time, energy, and money, but now you knew otherwise. The pink, itchy skin around the letters was proof, as was the man in your bathroom. The hero in your bathroom.

You stand in the kitchen for several long minutes, staring at the letters and rubbing your thumb over them with a stupid grin on your face, until the sound of the shower squealing to life in the bathroom brings you back to the task at hand.

Dinner for Bucky.

It’s a little nerve-wracking to think that you’re making dinner for both your soulmate and an Avenger combined, but then a snippet from your middle school history class stored deep within your brain reminds you that Bucky was alive during the Great Depression, and then you remember that he was also a soldier. The knowledge that he’s probably had a lot of truly terrible food in his life eases the pressure, so you push your sleeve down and get to work.

The door to the bathroom opens as you’re piling reheated grilled chicken onto the tortillas you’d warmed for him.

“I hope tacos are okay, I figured they’ve got lots of pro—”

You stop speaking as soon as Bucky appears at the end of the hallway. The towel is wrapped around his waist. He’s tucked it into itself near his hip. His metal arm gleams in the dim light of your apartment and you swallow thickly when you see the planes of muscle that had been hiding underneath his protective gear.

“I forgot to check with my neighbor,” you dumbly tell him, unable to take your eyes off his bare skin for a moment. When you finally look up to meet his gaze, he’s grinning at you.

“You’re staring again,” Bucky replies.

Your face feels hot and look away to flip off the stove burner, moving the pan away from the heat. You busy yourself with finishing his plate, and when Bucky approaches you, you keep your eyes down.

“Hey.”

Cautiously, you look over at him, pointedly looking straight at his face so you don’t get tripped up by his bare chest again.

“I don’t mind. I’m just teasing,” he says. “I’m sorry if I made you uncomfortable.” His smile is gone, replaced with worry, and you shake your head.

“No.” You clear your throat. “No, you didn’t. I’m just… adjusting. To having you here, you know?”

He nods. “I do. Not just to having you here, but being here. It’s a lot different from where I live.”

You hold out the plate and he takes it. “Tell me about your house?”

Bucky follows your lead back into the living room and he sits down on the couch, setting the plate on the coffee table in front of him. You grab your water bottle from earlier and curl up on the other cushion.

As he eats, he describes the various places he’s lived, starting with the apartment he grew up in. He pointedly skips over the places where HYDRA kept him prisoner, but you know better than to press. He’ll tell you when he’s ready.

It’s long past midnight by the time Bucky finishes his food and his stories. By then, you’re leaning against the back of the couch, blinking drowsy-eyed at him and reveling in the warmth of his hand on your knee. His thumb rubs a soft arc over your sweatpants, back and forth, over and over again.

“Pretty girl?”

You blink your eyes open to find Bucky leaning in. He chuckles when you squint at him, then grunt a little.

“You fell asleep. I think it’s time you head to bed.”

A yawn escapes and you bring your hand up to cover your mouth. You screw your eyes closed and duck your head in a poor attempt to hide it, but the yawn is a jaw-splitting one. Your ears pop and you shake your head. When you finally settle back down again and open your eyes, Bucky is disappearing into the kitchen. His empty plate and your water bottle are both gone.

“Bucky?” you call, biting back another yawn. You push yourself up with one hand just as he comes back around the corner. He’s found a gray t-shirt and pair of navy sweatpants and you frown, rubbing your eyes with a fist and pinching grit out of the corners.

“D’you go next door?”

He shakes his head and sits back down beside you, though he stays on the edge of the couch. “Sam dropped some stuff off for me,” he replies.

Nodding, you scoot forward until you’re seated on the edge of the couch, too. “I’m sorry I fell asleep.”

“S’okay. You held out until the very end.” Bucky pauses, glancing at the curtains behind you before looking back at you. “Would it be alright if I spent the night? I don’t know how fast this soulmate thing is supposed to go…”

You nod again. “It’s okay. You can stay as long as you want, James.”

He stares at you, his expression unreadable. “James?”

“I was just trying it out,” you quickly explain, shaking your head. “I must be more tired than I thought. It’s just… your initials have always been JBB to me, so I—”

“James Buchanan Barnes,” he murmurs. He looks down at his hands, then turns his wrist over to reveal your initials.

You smile a little. “Bucky for short.” You keep your voice low as you reach out and touch your fingertips to the tiny black letters on his skin, saying your full name for him.

“You can call me James, if you want. Not many people do.”

“No?” you ask, taking his right hand in yours. You stand and he copies you.

“My ma, mostly. Steve, if he was really mad at me. Drill sergeants, when they felt like being casual.”

“Did they feel that way often?”

He chuckles and shakes his head. “No.”

A beat passes and you smile at him, then squeeze his hand and step around the coffee table. Bucky follows you down the hallway to your bedroom, quietly letting you lead him down the path you’ve taken every night for years.

You drop his hand once you’re both inside. “This is it,” you announce, nervously clasping your hands in front of yourself. You hadn’t realized just how personal it would be to let your soulmate see your bedroom until now.

He surveys your tiny room—your haven, your retreat away from the world outside, including the living room, where you often work from home—and smiles softly.

“I like it,” replies Bucky.

Exhaling heavily, you nod and smile when he looks over at you in surprise. “Sorry, I’m just… I’m a little nervous. I don’t know.”

“It’s okay to be nervous.”

“Is it? You don’t seem nervous at all. You seem to be taking this whole soulmate-thing in stride. Not that I’m not,” you quickly add. “I’m— I'm ecstatic that we’re soulmates. To find the one person who’s supposed to complete you, the person I’ve been searching for my whole life is a big deal, and I’m thrilled! But it’s…”

“It’s a big change,” Bucky finishes. “I may not seem nervous, Y/N, but I am. I’m nervous as hell.”

“Really?”

He gives you another small nod. “This is new territory for me, too. I’ve faced a lot of scary things, but the prospect of my soulmate not liking me or being upset that I don’t like her…”

You grab his hand again and squeeze. “I like you, Bucky. I promise. I meant what I said before.”

“I know that, in my head. It just might take me a while to believe it.”

“Then I’ll remind you as many times as you need me to.”

Smiling, Bucky pulls you in for a hug. You close your eyes as he tucks you against himself, holding you securely in his arms. It feels right to be close to him like this. After a long while, he pulls away to look you in the eyes.

“You’re sure you’re okay with me staying here overnight? We could take things slow. I probably won’t sleep anyway, I’ve got insomnia, so I tend to watch TV or read at night.”

You nod. “I’m sure. Besides, it’s just like a sleepover right now. Nothing has to happen, and I’m a heavy sleeper. You won’t wake me up.”

“Nothing has to happen,” he confirms, and then he releases you all the way.

You step back and go around to the opposite side of the bed to start your nighttime routine, though you’re ultra aware of the fact that Bucky is watching you. As you gather up your pajamas, you glance at him.

“I’m gonna shower. You can… There’s books, if you want, and the remote for the TV is on my nightstand. Watch whatever you want, okay?”

He nods and before there can be any more pre-bedtime awkwardness, you duck into the bathroom and shut the door behind you. You feel the butterflies stirring as you shower and get ready for bed. All you can think about is how your soulmate is in your bedroom waiting for you, and though you’ve both already agreed that nothing will be happening tonight besides sleep, it’s the first time you’ll be able to fall asleep next to someone you’re certain loves you, and to wake up beside them again in the morning.

When you finally emerge, feeling clean and cozy in your pajamas, you pause in the doorway. The TV is on, playing an animal documentary at a volume so low you can barely make out what the narrator is saying, but Bucky isn’t watching it. He’s fast asleep under the covers. He’s tucked himself underneath the covers on the side of the bed you don’t normally sleep on—clearly he’d made a note as to which nightstand had all your things on it and which one was mostly empty—and he’s snoring softly.

I should’ve figured he’d fall asleep right away, you think as you tiptoe into the bedroom and finish your routine in silence. He was out fighting the bad guys earlier today. I’m exhausted and all I did was hide.

You crawl under the covers, being careful not to bump into him, and curl up. The bed is already warm, a testament to the benefits of soulmates that you hadn’t thought of before now. You smile to yourself when Bucky rolls over to face you, his eyes opening just a sliver as you reach over to turn off the bedside lamp.

“You gonna sleep?” he asks, more a slurred mumble than an actual question. When you hum in response and snuggle further under the blankets, he reaches out for you and pulls you against him so that your back is pressed up against his chest. His arm drapes over your side and you can feel his breath on the top of your head when he exhales.

“This okay?” he asks.

“Yes. Goodnight, James,” you whisper.

“Goodnight, pretty girl.”

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It was a brand new, extremely experimental, highly sensitive project. The kind you certainly didn’t write home about, and the kind that definitely found its way into your consideration for the promised cash payment. All you had to do post-signing-up was show up, let them say a spell or two, and then you’d simply say yes or no if you could feel each test they administered. 

So you sat in the cold, white research room while over half a dozen of those working on the project milled about. You knew what the project was for. Knew exactly what the $10,000.00 cash tucked into the envelope in your purse was for. But it was just a few tests. Easy, fully clothed, verbal confirmation tests.

They rolled the sterilized metal table to face you more, the objects neatly aligned on their stands. The spells they'd said were distant words you couldn't recall, but you'd already nodded when they'd asked if you could feel the tingling connection when they'd finished. You could–it was a warm hum underneath your clothing that already had a bit of sweat forming at your brow. But that could've also been the anticipation. 

The silicone facing you was highly detailed. Granted, for what they were, toys had already gotten far in looking real. They were soft and giving, and they replicated what they generically needed to replicate. Breasts, nipples, vagina, clit, an asshole, and a mouth. Still, you swallowed hard listening to the murmured conversation, and you gripped the edge of that metal table they'd seated you on. 

“You will be blindfolded to prevent any phantom sensations by merely watching,” one said before a thick black strip of fabric was tied over your eyes. “We will begin momentarily, so we just need you to speak when you begin to feel something. We have a series of tests to run through, some a bit more invasive to test the maintained connection, then you will be finished. Okay?”

“Okay,” you breathed.

And you braced yourself against that metal edge warmed by your touch. In blistering, stomach-flipping anticipation, you waited. $10,000.00. You swallowed hard. It was so worth it for $10k cash.

Just a few tests. Ones that might not even work–

Beneath your thick sweater, underneath your bra, you felt it. The warm, gloved touch. A brush of fingers underneath your breast, following the curve up. A jolt at the touch had you pulling back from nothing. Nobody was in front of you, magically slipping underneath your shirt. It wasn't lifted. Your bra didn't magically vanish. No, as you leaned back from nobody's touch, the gloved fingers went higher, and they brushed over both nipples.

“Yes,” you stuttered, eyes wide behind the blindfold. Not that you didn’t think it was possible–surely if they were offering so much money, they had some semblance of a success they needed to recreate, but still. Actually experiencing the slow connection of their fingers pinching your nipples without actually touching you? “Yes, I feel that.”

“Good, human contact is successful. We need to test artificial,” he stated.

Artificial…? 

Oh.

Oh.

The actual coldness of the metal was somehow there and faraway at the same time. It didn’t entirely make sense how you were able to process it. But magic was magic, so. One tight metal clamp closed around one nipple, and the rip of pinching pleasure shot through to your spine and went lower.

“Yes–”

A second clamp closed on your other nipple. 

Tight, there, but not. A low throbbing bullied its way beneath your shirt. It was…strange. The sensation of the sharp pinching that was there but wasn’t. Squeezing the table’s edge, you fought the urge to reach up just to feel yourself through your sweater. The throbbing acted in tandem with the clamps, but there was more to it. A necessity you couldn’t fully put to words–that you wouldn’t put to words for them–that you ached to touch yourself beyond the means of just…checking. Your nipples ached, that’s as plain as it got, and they ached for contact.

“Yes, I can…I can feel both,” you breathed.

“Good.”

The clamps released. 

The ache remained.

The metal was a soft clack on the table, and with a little tilt of your head to listen to what the blindfold was now painfully keeping hidden, there was a brush against your lips. A gloved finger, unmistakably. It was a subconscious response. Again, you reared back from nothing. There wasn't anyone or anything but you and the air around you. But there, again, fingers touched your lips, pushed past with just a little bit of force, and you could feel two pressing down on your tongue.

“Mhm,” was all you managed to get out. Muffled yet…not. They weren’t actually in there, but the pressure kept your tongue down and mouth closing around their fingers.

“Okay,” came as a distant murmur, and then fingers retreated. 

There was only a half-second pause before your mouth went from swallowing empty to taking in a wooden tongue depressor, pushing your tongue down as the fingers had. The woody taste was flat and bitter, but not entirely direct. You made the same muffled mhm sound as best as you could, fighting back the urge to push up on what wasn’t actually there. 

It retreated. 

"We will be moving on," someone else said. Her voice came in from the left as adjustments were made to your right. The soft scratching from pencils carried across papers. More papers rustled, and your pulse was through the roof. With a held breath, you waited for what exactly moving on meant.

A quiver in your thighs traveled down to your toes. 

It’d be just a few more tests.

Sensitive ones, but $10k. Yeah.

You fought the subconscious need to nod.

In all but seconds, as you listened to the air conditioning run through the vents above you, while pencils scratched against papers, you felt it underneath your jeans. Beyond the thick seam and the awkward inadvertent touch of your thighs together. Past your belt, button, and zipper. Underneath your underwear came the warm, gloved touch over you. Just a stroke over your folds. Like the graze of a paintbrush on a canvas. 

Tension shot through from your hitched breath down to your curling toes.

“I can feel that.”

You breathed through your teeth.

Higher up the finger went. Light as a feather still, parting your folds in the process, you sat in wait. A heart-stopping, grip-tightening wait. They were going to test every spot, weren’t they? It was important. It was about making sure the pleasure connections were there. What good would it serve if there was just minimal connection? They had to test–

The finger brushed over your clit.

“Yes,” you cracked out. It was a rash reaction, but the pad of their finger ran over your clit directly. Back and forth. They were idle touches and nothing more, but sweet hell. It continued. With a bit more pressure behind the strokes. “Yes, yes, I…I can feel that.”

The touch retreated. The air conditioning hum battled with the flicker of your pulse. The thrumming in your ears found your head. They were just tests. Important tests. This was what you signed up for. You knew it was coming. You’d prepped yourself for it.

Still, when the cold silicone touched your clit, you jolted so hard you gasped. It was a perfect circle that came with a soft touch at first, then a second long brought more pressure. Not hard or even remotely uncomfortable, but as you nodded, the person applying it seemed to settle it firmer against you. 

“We will conduct a quick test just to test external stimulation success,” one said. 

The words drowned in the sea of ambiguity that suddenly made a whole lot of sense when that firm press wasn’t just a tongue depressor equivalent. A near-silent click caught your attention before it was suddenly eviscerated. All focus fell into a pinpoint on your clit. Where the hum of the air conditioning and the thrum of your heart had been in your head, all that encapsulated it was an abrupt vibration against your clit. Low in intensity, but it was still a vibrator to your clit. Directly to your clit.

“Oh my god.”

A quiet laugh echoed out to your right.

“I would say she can feel it,” someone said.

“We need to test the varying levels, but we can return to that,” another said. Click. The vibrations kicked off just as your clit began to ache. Not that general ache of stimulation, but when the sensations cut, you felt the slight release in tension that only came in slight. The seam of your jeans pressed up against your clit, and it pulsed against the thick material to ask for more attention. A pulsing that sank deeper than just surface level.

Your cunt clenched. A dampness in your underwear turned your senses up a notch.

“We will conduct another external test, and then two internal ones,” someone said. “Then, the general testing will be complete.”

“Okay,” you muttered.

One more external and then two internal?

A flash of the objects laid out on the table came up.

One more external and two internal…that could only mean….

There was a gentle pressure against your asshole. Warm, gloves, and slick with lube. It was just one slender finger running slow circles. Careful, delicate circles. Much like the touch against your clit. Just rubbing. Yes, you could feel that. You started nodding frantically, hardly able to find the single word yes. But the scratching pencils told you they'd gotten your answer. The pressure still pushing against your asshole, however, came with a gradual increase. More and more and more. 

Oh.

Your breath caught in a sharp gasp.

Their finger pushed into you. Stretching. Bit by bit, you gave way with an ease only possible with the toy they had their finger in. It seemed to correlate with you, even if you weren't lubed. Knuckle by knuckle, they pushed in. Oh, god. You didn’t mean to clench around them, but you could feel their hand against your bottom. Bottomed out. Wiggling–Jesus Christ–they wiggled their finger.

“Yes. I…. Yes, yes, I can…feel…that,” you said through careful breaths. 

“Good,” some said, her voice static and unaffected. 

A gradual pull left you empty and feeling partially gaping. But it wasn't a long sensation. Cold and lube silicone roughly the same size as the finger came to replace it. As gradual as the finger had entered and left, the thin rod-like thing pushed into you. Deeper–it went deeper than the finger, and you…. Keeping still and casual was a fight. How were you supposed to sit on that table, nodding your head and sputtering that you could feel it not be anything but awkward? 

A part of you wanted to fall back, but it was general testing!

So you gripped the edge of the table until your knuckles went white and clenched your jaw until it hurt. Casual. Professional. Click. The rod hummed to life, and your gasp brought more notes to pages. Wait. Pages fluttered. The rod stayed on and pulled out, then pushed back in. Oh, god. You nodded. And nodded. And nodded.

“Good.”

Click.

Off.

Out.

Empty.

The darkness of the blindfold blurred. How, you had no idea. But when the tension released from your shoulders and you slumped, everything felt a little blurry and off-kilter. No hair stood on end. No discomfort. But your asshole pulsed and you were…so empty. Tests, they were just tests. Ones meant to simulate sex and foreplay, so it made sense to get a little aroused. It…it was fine.

It was totally and completely fine.

One warm, gloved finger was back on your cunt. A pass over your clit made you twitch, and the path lower was a mark for the final test. A light ringing hit your ears as more fingers spread you, and the tip of one finger touched your entrance. Pushing back to get a better position on the exam table, right as you sank down to really sit, the finger sank into you.

Just like in your ass, knuckle by knuckle, it pushed in. So, so slowly. Filling you up with a curl. A nice, careful curl. A curl that brushed right over your sweet spot. Oh, fuck. It wasn’t stagnant. While you sat there, thighs spreading involuntarily, it pumped. And curled. And pumped and curled in slow, almost teasing strokes.

“Yes,” you threw out there on a cracked moan. You hadn’t said you could feel it. “Yes, yes, I can feel that. Yes.”

Their finger pressed all the way back in, and there was a quiet hum. 

“Good.”

Then, you were empty again.

Then, the cold, roundish tip of something silicone touched your entrance.

It was wider than the finger, but nothing abhorrent. Lubed up, it pushed into you and filled you right on up. The slight stretch was a sudden tease, and you couldn't help it. Your elbows hit the table with a thud. Equilibrium was off, and for a moment, you worried you might tumble to the floor. Just for insertion! This was bad. But the scribble of pencils said they took that as the necessary answer. 

You were fine.

This was just research.

Click.

“Oh, my–”

That vibration test echoed to life in your cunt. Right against your sweet spot, your head fell back, and you had to grit your teeth and bear the pleasure. Couldn't moan. Couldn't gasp. Just had to bite the bullet that you'd already thrown your head back, you couldn't do more than that. Had to fight it. Had to face it. Had to nod your head. 

“I can feel that, yes.”

In and out. 

They pulled the toy in and out, practically fucking you on it.

“Yes,” you pushed out. 

In and out. In and out, all the way to the vibrating tip. And….

Click.

“Good,” someone said.

“Great,” from another.

That tension faded into obscurity and embarrassment. Shaking like a leaf in the breeze, you just lay there. Your underwear was soaking wet and your cunt…. Parts of you were throbbing that shouldn't still be throbbing and clenching that shouldn't be clenching. But it…they…. Whatever. That was the preliminary testing done. 

You managed to get back upright like normal after a minute or so, the blindfold still intact. Pencils scribbled down notes. Papers fluttered. Footsteps came closer, but not entirely near. 

“Given how well you’ve reacted to the tests and the success with each, we would like to offer you another $5,000.00 to advance the next set of tests we were already going to complete. They will just be a bit more…intensive than originally planned. Nothing will be confirmed without prior consent. We just have not had a compatible subject with such success yet, and we wish to take advantage of such a case. If you are willing.”

Your hands twitched on the table’s edge. An extra $5k? For…a higher intensity, huh?

“What do the tests entail?” you asked softly. There was a rough edge in your voice that hadn’t been there at the start. What were you doing? You didn’t let yourself answer the question.

“Well, we need to essentially test that all connections remain intact while in use. Simple touch tests can provide the simple responses, yes. But it would be great to test higher intensity activities together to make sure all can remain working properly without conflict. We would hate for connection to be lost during the moment.”

…

You swallowed hard.

Incense activities?

“We will have to simulate various activities in repeated tests to check the maintained connection. We will require verbal confirmation throughout to make sure all is correct. Really, it is not much different. The initial tests are simple finger stimulation and insertion. This would be additional stimulation of a higher intensity, that is all.”

So…it…. Okay….

“We will offer $7,000.00 if you are willing to strip for the tests so we can see any bodily reaction,” someone said behind the woman talking to you. 

$7,000.00? $7k. You’d be walking away from the tests with $17,000.00. Sweet fuck. 

What else were you supposed to say to that? Seriously. Seriously, $17,000.00. 

That would cover multiple months of rent and help you pay off the last of your car. So then…. Then.

Then, you cleared your throat and nodded slowly.

“Okay. $7,000.00. I consent.”

Behind the blindfold, you could still see the room light up.

“Fantastic,” the woman said. “I will help you out of your clothes and back onto the table.”

****

Truthfully, the tests were simple but invasive. You were laid out stark naked on the metal table, blindfolded, and shaking uncontrollably. Stripping you down was nothing but necessary for the tests. But eyes still wandered. Seeing the peaks of your nipples in the cold air and the glistening over your cunt was definitely a great sign. And sight.

You kept your thighs together and scrunched up a little, but it wouldn’t last. 

If the tests remained successful, you’d be begging them to keep running them.

But $17,000.00 was an okay price to pay for success. 

They’d all be making ten times that when this hit the market.

The group of researchers watched you with eagerness. Anticipation was a curse upon the room amongst them and you, but patience had to be called for. The next cart was wheeled in, and more gloves were pulled onto the hands of assistants. They'd be stimulating every sensitive part of your body for the next…three hours? Maybe more. They couldn't just jump up to the highest intensity just to make sure it worked. Longevity was part of it.

There was already another stack of $10,000.00 waiting for you when this was over to allow them to check for distance after you left. Within that testing, yes, there came another intensity level check. If they sent you on your way with a thrusting dildo in you and a vibrator on your clit, would the sensations remain just as strong a step outside the building as it would while you slept in bed? Would it remain for hours on end, or would it eventually fade into the background to be ignored?

And more importantly, as these tests in-house would also test, would the participant cum?

If yes, would they be able to repeatedly? Would they be overstimulated if their body wasn't actually experiencing the direct contact, or would the sixth orgasm feel as incredible as the first?

What if there was stimulation on the toys and on the person? If someone was fucking your cunt through means of the toy and in-person, what would you feel? What if a vibrator was strapped to the clit on the toy and someone knelt between your legs and sucked it into their mouth? Questions. Endless questions. And you were the perfect guinea pig; you just had to be worked up to the point of agreeing to work with them. But those were such intense tests…. These early ones had to be conducted first.

So, with everyone gathered in the proper places, it was time to begin.

Test One: simply touching. In your mouth, where you muffled around the two fingers. On your nipples, where they were pinched just enough. Down where one finger pushed into your asshole while one entered your cunt. Then, up on your clit, pressure. Just a little bit of pressure on the silicone bud.

Notes were written as you seemed to stall out a little on the table. It was quite a lot to endure at once. But as your hands fell to the sides of the table to squeeze, your thighs pressing and rubbing together, it was obvious before you even muffled a yes. 

Good.

Test Two: All fingers retreated, and the same was recreated without pause with the silicone toys.

The arch in your back came through nicely. The researchers all reacted in tandem. The clamps added to your nipples were tugged, and the toys between your legs all clicked on at the same time.

Test Two already made you moan. Much like a broken, gasping sound, it cut through the silent research room with success written all over it.

The lead researcher held up her hand. The way your back continued to arch said you could orgasm if they simply decided to leave you like that. But this wasn’t about that yet. And any denial prior to then was considered helpful, so she just gave you those few extra teasing seconds before lowering her hand.

All were removed. More notes were written.

“Tests from this point forward will be with movement,” she said plainly. They would be. This wasn’t some malicious research study. They had to run each test to be sure. You’d agreed. You’d taken the payments. “And repeated penetration. May we continue?”

A hitch in your breath was all that the next pause was, then you nodded.

Test Three: Fingers closed around your nipples in place of the clamps and pinched hard. Not painfully, but as you gasped at the touch, three fingers pumped into your mouth. Two found your cunt and pushed in very, very slowly, two found your asshole and did the same, and up on your clit, attention was given. Light and slow, in gentle circles. Barely there, but looking back….

One hand went over your head, and your thighs parted. Enjoyment was a positive sign. Not inherently an important one, so long as the stimulation was noted, but enjoyment worked in their benefit. Your cunt was dripping onto the table, and you outright writhed as more pressure was applied to your clit.

“Contractions,” two said one right after the other as their fingers pumped into you.

“Oh, so you can feel them?” the lead asked. You breathed through your teeth behind them, and out came a whine. “Good. That’s really good.”

Test Four: Was the same with merely added intensity. You propped your feet up on the table and let your legs fall wide open for everyone to see you jerk with every thrust of the fingers into you. Taking them like someone was practically fucking you right there on the table. Your initial awkwardness upon arrival dripped out of you right down onto that table. Good. Comfort made this better.

The lead researcher nodded, and more attention was given to your clit. Direct, unrelenting attention. Tight, faster circles that made your hips lift up off the table. Your orgasm impending. But not yet. It wasn’t the right time just yet. But that meant you could cum quickly, and that was also perfect. Just short of walking into the research building and offering yourself up naked and willing to do it for free, you were turning out to be the perfect participant. 

Test Five: Silicone returned. A small dildo was pushed past your lips and you choked on nothing but air behind them. Vibrating clamps closed around your nipples. A thick vibrating plug was pushed in right to the thickest part, pulled out, pushed in, pulled out, and then pushed right back into your ass while you writhed on the table. On your cunt, the circular vibrator was pressed back to your clit directly, and lower, lubed up, an average-sized vibrator gradually pushed inside of you.

“We will run the next test with simulated sex with these,” the lead researcher said upon your initial consent. You nodded to both.

Click. You had to be held down. None moved inside of you outside of the low vibrations, but the way you jerked, four assistants had to rush over and pin you to the table. Hands back by your head, ankles and legs held against their stomachs, they pinned you properly so others could take the necessary notes. The position provided the perfect view for such required notes. There was a physical reaction. There was no hint beyond your arousal that you had every hole filled. Your clit didn’t so much as twitch when the vibrator was lifted and someone rolled it between their thumb and forefinger. 

Yes, you lurched and lashed. Yes, your cunt dropped and clenched. But as they moved onto Test Six–thrusting the toys in every hole–you were subsequently empty in your sudden squirming. 

The lead researcher stood over you, watching. How you pulled and whined, rocking your hips before stopping, clearly trying to act professional. The test would only last about another ten seconds, but she could see it. You could feel her watching you, and you knew as well as she did that you were close to climaxing. 

But….

Click.

You threw your head back. Sweat sheened, and your body went limp. 

She walked around to stand beside you, bending over with new ideas popping in at a dangerous speed and with questionable ethics.

“Can we apply dual stimulation?” she asked beside your ear. “For an extra $10,000. In accordance with our testing the distance between here and your home, I want to apply stimulation to the toys directly and to you.” She looked over your aching nipples. “Think about it. While we finish this round of testing.”

Test Seven: Before you could answer, she held up her hand to begin. Click. The next level of intensity shot through the toys. Pumping in and out of you, the lube squelched like you yourself were getting fucked in both holes. Your scream was partially muffled, and your hips lifted again. Tried to, at least.

“Can you feel it in your mouth?” the lead researcher asked, pointlessly. She knew you could.

You still nodded.

“Can you feel it on your nipples?”

Again, you nodded.

“Your clit?”

Your whine said yes.

“Your asshole? Do you feel the vibrators inside your asshole? Inside your cunt?”

Two more whines that said yes, yes. You did. You most certainly did. You did because there, pulling at those pinning you down, you started squirming again. Pulling and pushing, back and forth, trying to get yourself back to wherever you were trying to go, but there you were arching your back off the table and choking on a dildo that wasn't actually in your mouth.

There, you screamed out a broken moan, and your orgasm came over you violently. The exact way they’d needed it to. Violent, unforgiving, and just perfectly. The pleasure erupted improperly because nobody was actually touching you, and your body twitched and shifted. You took the thrusts of the toys with your head back and pussy dripping. Fucked in all holes–barely, they’d barely started giving you real thrusts and strength–you clenched empty and aching. And yet?

Yet, you still came.

Click.

“Test Eight,” the lead researcher declared with a hint of amusement in her voice.

You flinched at the words, but there was no denial.

Click.

The next of five intensity levels. The lead researcher bent over the table and whispered in your ear. We have so many more tests we need to run. Will you help us? Seeing how many ways we can reach an orgasm with these is imperative. If you’re willing. 

Test Nine.

The penultimate intensity was locked in. You came again. Thrashing on the table, more were called in to hold you down. The lead researcher watched from between your legs when your climax hit. Hardly any evidence that you were being fucked senseless. If you could keep yourself together, nobody would know. A good selling point for the exhibitionists. Sort of.

Interesting.

Test Ten.

Test Ten was quite a lot for you. The toys drilling into you harder than before whilst on the highest settings? The one on your clit was turned on last out of courtesy, and when that click came through, it was immediately silenced by your shriek. 

It only took seconds.

Literal seconds. Successful seconds. 

Whatever words you'd been aiming to speak were immediately torn to smithereens. Your cunt gushed empty and aching in the sudden burst of your orgasm. It ripped through you as violently as your first one had, but this one…. The lead researcher didn't hold up their hand, and the panic came across your face immediately when the stimulation didn't stop. It was a good testing point.

The way you fell into the pleasure was visible. From the rush of your orgasm into the mind-shattering pleasure that remained, it was a partial answer. You were overstimulated, but differently. Sobbing, but barely begging, your hips lifted and your back arched, and just like that, you came. Again.

Came with another shriek and came with such a successful force, it was fantastic.

All while you lie completely untouched. Your poor clit was swollen, but it wasn't from touch. It wanted. 

How fascinating. You were multiple orgasms in, and your body technically hadn’t had a real one yet. Just a brush against your clit said you’d cum. But at the wave of her hand, the test finished. It was unethical to touch you without permission. And the way you collapsed when the clamps were removed and the toys were pulled out, you were in need of a break she didn’t entirely want to give. But….

She walked over to you slowly. Everyone took the notes she didn't need to take. Left in a sweaty, gushing mess, she just bent over you. Your chest heaved, and tears dampened the blindfold just enough to be visible, but she was undeterred.

“Will you walk out of here $27,000.00 richer for just a few extra tests?” She paused. You wanted that $27k. Badly. But…. “We need to test simultaneous stimulation. I will raise it to $30,000.00 if you roll onto your knees and chest and allow us to penetrate you.”

$30,000.00. Holy…. It….

Your chest stuttered on your next breath.

Notes were still written. Your body still hadn’t fully relaxed.

$30k. 

Fuck it. 

Fuck it!

Your nod was barely there, but it was a nod.

And with a careful, moaning roll, the tests continued.

****

They had to tie you down. You drooled onto the metal table, the minutes ticking by into hours. How a little stimulation test turned into this, you had the answer as cash in your purse, but sweet fuck. They’d started with the toys first, pushing beads one by thickening one into your ass there and using the same toy on you. Literally on you. Lubing you up and working you open with a slender finger first, then giving them to you.

In together. Out together. Then alternating. Magically, they were pushed in, while literally, they came out. Being stretched at different sizes while being filled and emptied at the same time made no sense, but it felt so out of the world incredible, you couldn’t breathe.

They did the same with their fingers in your cunt. Gloved fingers pushed into the toy, then out, then two more ran over your aching cunt like a torturous tease before pushing in. And when they pushed in, sweet hell, it was a whole other ballgame. The difference between the toys and the real thing was felt then. Prominently. 

But as they pulled out of your cunt and pushed back in whilst those in the toy did the same, there was no time to linger on such a thought. They fucked you together, making you whine onto the table. 

The tests weren’t stated anymore. They just started touching and didn't stop until you were quivering and clenching. The bindings on your ankles and wrists kept you pinned clean to the table. One strap went higher over the backs of your knees to keep you steady, and another went over your shoulders. 

They gave you earplugs so you couldn't hear any comments or commands. 

Blindfolded and deafened, you just listened to the beat of your pulse while you drooled and moaned. Gloved fingers alternated in fucking your cunt with a not-so-gradual increase in intensity. 

You didn’t hear them when the lead researcher said to rub your clit on you while directing one of the assistants to lick the one on the toy. Didn’t have to, though. You felt their tongue drag over you the second before the finger touched you and rubbed. Pleasure spiked in an instant. Your clit was finally given attention, and it came with a phantom wrap of lips around it and a suck that made you scream.

It happened so fast. Clenching around the fingers. Spasming and twitching. The rush of pleasure rippling from the contact on your clit and the curl of the fingers in your cunt. You sobbed uncontrollably when your orgasm hit you like it was the first of the night, and you gushed. Sprayed. 

All over the table and the person behind you.

You came.

Their fingers, their mouths–they continued without pause. Even literally on you, they continued. It was so much. So, so much. You said as much against the table, but they continued. They pushed and pushed and pushed until you were there again. Again! Tears dampened the blindfold in your second, powerful, overwhelming orgasm.

You dripped down your thighs.

The tests continued.

When a signed contract to act as their official test subject for $30.50/hr was in your purse with your messy signature on it, your throat was raw and scratchy as hands gripped your hips. The table was lowered, and your position was changed just enough to fit someone underneath you. The hours ticked by. The earplugs were changed to noise-cancelling headphones, and the blindfold stayed on. Your hands were bound behind your back then, with a harsh grip holding onto the rope keeping them together.

On the table, alternating thrusts, two assistants fucked you, and one stood next to the table with her skirt up. Both holes were stuffed full with alternating rough thrusts. Out of sight, your orgasms were tallied on a whiteboard for you to see when you were finished. Behind you, however, the test found its second important layer.

Three more assistants and the head researcher stood with the toys. One played with the silicone nipples in varying-strengthed pinches and pulls. Two more mimicked those at the table with you, their pants down, the toys off their stands, fucking into you slow at first, then they matched the rhythm of the other two. A small vibrator was taped to the toy just at your clit.

The mouth one came underneath the head researcher’s skirt, locked there where she felt every motion you did to the assistant standing beside the table.

It was for research. To see if you could really feel everything. When they put their fingers inside the toys, they could feel you warm and wet and clenching. And now they could say that oral could be reciprocated that way. It could even be done so efficiently that orgasm could be reached.

She locked the toy against herself in proof of that.

And….

And orgasm could be reached multiple times while clearly overstimulated with multiple cocks penetrating you. Granted, it was one in each hole, and there was a vibrator on your clit. But you were being fucked senseless in four ways, and you spasmed and screamed with orgasm after orgasm.

Until cum dripped out of both toys, and the assistants were pulling their pants up.

Until the condoms were full and you were left with a glistening mouth and gaping, clenching holes on the table.

The head researcher set the mouth replica aside. 

“We will be running various tests of this nature every night for the foreseeable future,” she said beside you, lifting up the headphones. Water, towels, snacks, and a robe were brought next. Those who had to wait their turn for next time to…run the test…took very gentle touches to you to clean you up. “Do you have a short, casual dress?”

You barely nodded. You did. 

“Good. Bring it tomorrow. We will be testing how prominent the spell remains while you complete other tasks. It requires frequent checks, and a dress makes it easy.” She gave your back a small pat. “My assistants will help you. See you tomorrow at 9:00 AM. Oh, and fill out this sheet if you feel anything during the night or experience any reactions in the morning.” 

A folder with a dozen sheets was set aside for you. To note symptoms, to write about what you’d thought they’d done to you via the toys during the night. All set up neatly for you to fill out and them to check. Ones that’d be handed out to countless others if they could perfect the product and bring in other participants. Then, they could have you test the products on each other at will and randomly.

"Thank you for signing on with us. You'll see an additional $500.00 be deposited into your account as a sign-on bonus."

It felt laughable compared to the $40k in your purse, but comparatively…. You'd taken a small chunk of the fortune awaiting them. It'd take about a year of testing, and they'd be the most successful product of its kind on the market. With you as their top tester and advocate. 

But…you had to get through that year first, and in that year came a lot of tests.

It made incredible money, and with all the orgasms attached?

"Huh?"

You jerk forward over the mattress, chin digging into it, and the pussy- your pussy- bumps your lips. You feel it, a soft brush against your folds, and gasp.

"I said, eat it. Until I say done," Ghost answers, and forces his cock into your ass with a brutal snap of his hips. You moan, body sliding again, and one hand holds your wrists as the other grips the back of your head, briefly forcing you down, lips parting across your own pussy, tasting your slick, clit throbbing on your tongue.

Fuck, oh fuck, hard fat cock in your ass and the musky-sweet taste of yourself, not licked off Ghost's fingers or cock but straight from the source, and you moan as your tongue curls over your clit. The matching sensation spurs you on, needing more, sucking at yourself as Ghost sets a fast, hard rhythm, taking your ass for himself while you feast on your pussy.

Each lick and suck hits you twice over, the mindfuck of it all, eating out a soft, wet pussy but feeling it on your own body, learning how to make yourself feel good from a new angle, no fingers to help you, just your own tongue wriggling into your hole, fucking yourself on it, drool and slick smearing across your cheeks. You suck your clit hard and lose the rhythm immediately, eyes rolling at the dual sensations, as Ghost keeps steadily gaping your ass open around his cock.

"Fuck, oh- I can't," you gasp, and lick across your pussy from hole to clit, shuddering. You know what you need to come but you can't do it, too lost in the pleasure of your tongue and lips, and Ghost takes the back of your head again and shoves you down into your pussy again, this time holding you there as you pant and squeal. Your ass burns around his cock, the clenching muscles only making it worse, pussy so sloppy wet it's obscene, feeling the spasms on your tongue as you moan, clenching around your tongue like a toy.

You can feel Ghost, you realize, the relentless pound of his cock rubbing against your tongue through the thin barrier between pussy and ass, and your tongue curls and your pussy gushes, his hand on your head and the powerful motions of his body forcing you to- grind against yourself, tongue rubbing up and down, in and out, you can't stop it and can't move against or for it, just riding the pressure and heat as it builds in your belly.

Your pussy clamps down, spasms building, and you pant and whine as your tongue is dragged over your clit again. Oh fuck, fuck fuckfuck, gonna come- "Baby, fuck, gonna come," you slur, sloppy with your own gushing fluids, and Ghost grunts behind you, picking up speed.

His cock splits your ass open, and you start to come as he pulls all the way out and shoves back inside, making you take it, and your clit grinds across your tongue as you lap over it, a little throbbing pulse, and oh god, the way your tongue is so wet and hot on your pussy, feeling your breath stutter, you can just barely suck at it and wriggle your tongue into your hole and fuck- oh shit-

"Cum, cumming," you moan, and the squeezing clench of your pussy echoes between your thighs and on your tongue, wet smears sticking to your cheeks and chin as Ghost groans, feeling your orgasm in your ass, as you milk at his cock. The musky scent of your come fills your nose, the soft folds swollen on your cheeks, your own sweet, precious little pussy, eaten and sucked, you know what it feels like now, to make yourself come on your tongue, and you moan and shudder when your lips rub over your clit again.

Ghost pants, his hips slapping hard to your ass, and you muffle a shout into your pussy as he puts his weight on you, crushes you into the mattress, hips forced flat. The angle of your pussy in the portal changes, and your clit rolls between your lips, scraping your teeth, and a sharp burst of slick fills your mouth as a hard clench burns through you.

You squeal, breathless, and Ghost sighs pleasure into your ear as he comes, the hot bursts in your ass, his cock slipping back and forth in the mess he's making of your insides. You gasp when he lets up, releasing your wrists and head properly, leaving you to roll your cheek away from the portal, your pussy all soft and slick in your blurry vision.

His hand slides between your legs, and abruptly the portal is moved up, pussy vanishing from sight, instead replaced with a swollen little pucker- your asshole, gaping just a little, with thick creamy come dripping out to the rhythm of your pounding heart.

Ghost drags the portal back to your face, and sets your lips against it, his cock now notching at the tender entrance to your pussy.

Some nights Adrian gets really antsy. Can't really contain all of his energy and bursts of random emotions. Most of the time, it's a moral or violent outburst, and he takes to the streets as Vigilante.

Sometimes it’s a type of antsy that vigilantism can't fix. It's the type of antsy that makes Adrian lock his bedroom door and fuck himself into his hands, imagining his hand was you.

He’d been crushing on you for years, but he kept his morals in higher regards than his lust for you. So he kept fucking his hand. But when Adrian was with you he would pretend like he would never want you in any way other than platonic. But in the past few months something in him had gotten worse, something that went against his morals.

It started the night that you needed a ride home, and Adrian so generously offered. You shared your address with him just the once, but it saved under your contact forever. It was surprising that it took so long for him to get your address considering how long you two knew each other, but you had your reasons.

And of course, like a truly caring friend, Adrian had made sure you had made it into your house completely safe. He made sure you went to bed sweetly and comfortable. He didn't tell you he was keeping an eye on you, considering he was checking in on you through the window of your bedroom and some may consider it a little creepy to do so. But he reassured himself that it wasn't like that, and he was just making sure his close buddy’s night went smoothly. No different from when he would make sure Peacemaker’s nights went smoothly. It was Adrian’s weird way of expressing his care towards his loved ones.

Unbeknownst to you, you had awoken something in Adrian that night. When you were lazily switching from day clothes to pajamas, too tired to bathe, he caught a sight of your bare back. You were faced away from the window, and all Adrian saw was your naked backside with your ass still clothed from your underwear.

Just from the slight peepshow, his dick had never gotten so hard so quickly in his life. Seeing the real thing was nothing compared to the old bikini photo he savored from a pool trip together two years ago. He wondered how much better it would be to see the full view, right in front of him instead of through the window pane of your bedroom and the foliage in front of that window.

Adrian returned home that night feeling guilty, but also dedicated to making sure you get to bed nicely every night from now on.

So he did. He watched you tuck yourself into bed every night. You didn't always immediately fall asleep, most of the time you’d scroll on your phone before bed and that was fine, because at least you were always physically in bed by ten.

If you knew that Adrian had been watching your nightly routine, then he'd feel okay scolding you for how late you stay up just playing on your phone. But you don't know, so he doesn't mention it.

Adrian felt less like a creep as the days went on. You never seemed to be naked in your room, doing all of your changing in your bathroom where he couldn't (or more accurately, wouldn't) spy on you. That helped reassure him that what he was doing was morally sound.

Tonight you didn't shower, wanting to save it for the next morning.

Adrian sat in the dark watching as you started by slowly taking off of your shirt. Then your pants. Then your bra and panties. And this time he could see it all. You were still facing away from him, but you had moved your full-length mirror to a point where he could see your full front.

Rock hard and not thinking straight, Adrian tugged his glove off with his teeth. He then lowered his pants just enough to expose his cock. The cold night air nipped at his skin, and his balls slightly tensed up to the cold. He didn't quite mind it though.

Spitting into his hand, he quickly began stroking his length. Adrian was worried that you'd get into pajamas quickly and the moment would be over quickly, so he wanted to make himself finish quickly.

But you didn't get dressed so quick. You stayed there, kind of staring at your own naked body in the mirror. Not checking yourself out, just kind of analyzing yourself.

Noticing that you were zoning out and just standing there, Adrian slowed his pace. Slow strokes while gripping extra on the base of his shaft was an abrupt and welcome change. Adrian let out soft and muffled whimpers, enjoying the view.

He started with your bare ass and the frontal view of your cunt. It wasn't the full view of your pussy, but it’ll do just fine. He thought of your ass cheeks bouncing against him while he rough fucked you from the back. Maybe he’d grab the nape of your neck and shove your face into some cushioning below you.

Adrian liked the thought of rough fucking you from behind. He fucked his hand harder at the thought, regaining some of his lost speed.

While your ass was perfect to him, he shifted his attention to something he loved even more that was just above ass. Your lower back.

He had seen it while swimming with you or if you had worn the occasional crop top with low cut pants. Safe to say, he was a fan. The arch of your lower spine, your dimples of venus, and the extra flesh that built up your hip dips. Adrian would fantasize about grabbing that fleshy part on your side, pressing his thumb into the dimples. He liked to think that his hand would be held there comfortably, the perfect fit. Whenever the two of you hang out, he constantly wishes to hold you by his side with his hand in that position. The image feels sweet and domestic in his head, a complete opposite to the actions he was committing right now.

You seemed to have the same section of your body in mind, flipping around to look at your lower back in the mirror.

Adrian was hidden in the dark, so even as you turned to face him, he could see you but you could not see him. It helped that his vigilante suit was so dark and the red visor of his mask was a similar color to an LED light in your neighbor’s yard.

Turning around had caused Adrian’s focus to change from your back to the front of your chest. The image in the mirror was fine, but this view was better, more defined.

Adrian choked out a horrendous moan at the sudden sight of your tits. He released some of the grip on his penis, scared he might spill all over himself a little too early.

Thankfully you didn't hear his moan, your window fully shut. After he was assured he wasn't heard and that he wasn't going to prematurely ejaculate, he resumed jerking off to the sight of you.

Now at a steady, slightly fast pace, he relished his first real view of your breasts. Adrian thought about how you should really start going braless, thoroughly pleased with the current size and shape of your tits as well as the way they sat, full gravity included.

Adrian was guilty of staring at your chest pretty frequently. Any shirt you wore that showed a little cleavage or tummy was his favorite. Sometimes the two of you will be running or roughhousing together and he couldn't help but notice the way your tits would jiggle at turbulence.

This view was far, far better than any bounce of your tits covered by your clothing.

You stayed turned towards the window for quite some time, Adrian sucking in all the precious seconds that he got to view your front side, similar to how he wished to actually suck on your tits. He wondered how sensitive your nipples would be to his teeth and tongue. He visualized the bounce of your tits while he fucked you missionary as opposed to the visual of your tits bouncing while you sat on top of him, riding his cock. He couldn't decide what image he preferred.

As Adrian’s fantasies got rougher, so did his strokes. Harder and faster, he kept fucking into his fist while all you had to do was stand there. Just stand there and look pretty, that's all Adrian needed as he jerked himself off. It was way better than any other view of you that he'd jerked off to.

He could feel his peak coming near.

Just as he felt himself starting to tip over, you grabbed the bottom of your ass and swipe up. You had also been on your tippy toes, then dropped to your flats as your cheeks began to jiggle for the ultimate effect. You seemed to also be a little curious of the jiggle physics of your own body, but you were nowhere near as enchanted by the image as Adrian was.

And it was perfect. With the drop of your feet, your breasts also recoiled with the movement. Adrian came at the sight of your whole body moving.

His cum didn't seem to spill, instead it erupted onto his suited stomach. The load was large and thick, two times Adrian believed it had stopped before it sputtered out more semen onto himself. It was the best orgasm he had had in years.

It took him a couple moments to come down from his high, huffing greatly after thoroughly fucking himself. He had to use his spare, clean hand to readjust his glasses. By the moment he had regained his breath you were still standing in front of the mirror, this time turned back around with your back towards the window.

Adrian waited for his dick to soften as you continued to stare at your own figure. You were putting your pajamas on by the time he had returned his dick to his underwear and pants.

As you slipped soundly into bed for the night, Adrian used the glove he had earlier pulled off to wipe off the mess he had made on himself. As you turned off your bedroom light, Adrian made his way out of the foliage and back home.

It was only when he got home and began washing his suit when the reality of the situation sat in. He had just jerked off to one of his closest friends through the window of their house as you stood there unknowingly. He was a stalker.

‘Our Father, who art in heaven.’

You know the Lord’s Prayer. You know it like you know the back of your own hand. Like you know the color of the sea and the gentle feel of your mother’s embrace. It can be heard anywhere in the world. Recited in a multitude of languages, and yet it always sounds the same.

‘Hallowed be thy Name.’ 

It doesn’t surprise you to hear it anymore. It did, once. Back when you were a child and your powers were only just coming in. It surprised you that the first thoughts you ever heard were that of your neighbors – devout Catholics, and some of the kindest people you’d ever met. You were home alone. Your family was away at the grocery store when it happened for the first time. When you first felt the agony sprouting from your back and heard the murmurings of someone else's voice in your mind.

There was a moment in which you thought the voice was God. When you looked in the mirror and saw the black, feathered wings like a shadow on the wall. There was a terrifying moment when you thought the Lord your family never really believed in was beginning to speak to you.

You were raised agnostic. Raised with respect toward religions but with no concrete belief of your own. That was why it was so startling. Because, at that moment, the only thought you could have was why me? Of all people, the God who held the faith of billions aside from you had chosen to plant His voice in your head. A child who didn’t believe. Who couldn’t even if she wanted to.

A million different thoughts flew through your mind, in that moment. First, there was excitement – some part of you believed you were important, in some way. Then, there was elation – God’s voice in your head must mean there is an afterlife. If that is the case, that means this life isn’t all there is. You will get to see your family again, when all is said and done. Finally, there was horror – demons, hell, monsters. It, too, must exist. 

It was a horrifying couple of moments. Up until the Lord’s Prayer shifted into thoughts about an upcoming football game, and you were left even more stunned than you already were. Were it not for the incredibly physical sensation of wings sprouting from your back, you would have believed you were crazy. 

Only, no. You didn’t think that. You heard the thoughts in your head begin to converge with more voices – the football game, a hair appointment, a girl’s first kiss with a boy named Tommy Lee – and you… understood. The wings at your back. The voices in your head. How loud everything was, and how your body suddenly felt so inextricably different. 

You weren’t human. Not anymore, at least. That realization was, of course, the most terrifying thing of all – you knew even then that mutants weren’t exactly welcome. That even in a family of some of the most accepting people, you would be the outlier. You would be… reviled.

And you were particularly unlucky, in that regard. Even as agnostics, even as some of the kindest people you’d ever known, your family didn’t want you. They came home and saw your coal-black wings and recoiled. Your father’s once lively skin shifted into a greyed hue at the sight of you, and your mother’s kind eyes widened in horrified shock. Your siblings screamed. Your cousins and aunts and uncles and grandparents were revolted. 

They removed you from the equation – and within the span of a few short hours, you were alone. On the streets, hiding away in the shadows because you knew how people would look at you. Your unfortunate telepathy didn’t exactly help, either. Especially given the fact that you had no idea how to control it. All you could do was listen. Wait. Cry at how… sad so much of it was.

You could only weep at how lonely your life had become, even given the visage of an angel. There was no God that would answer your desperate prayers. Not a single religion that could offer any solace. And oh, how you begged. How you cried to empty skies asking for some sort of deliverance. Asking for a reason. A sign. Raging on about the irony of your angelic appearance.

That last part had only gone on to inspire you, however. Perhaps it’s the slightest bit strange given all the unkindness the world had shown you, but you then decided to… be better. To be the kindness that you had missed out on. 

It would have been easy, too, to be anything else. To be resentful. Hateful. To be like the mutant they called Magneto, or any of his Brotherhood. Only… no. You chose something different. You looked up to the sky, realizing that there was only an empty void staring back at you.

And you decided to take matters into your own hands. Nobody answered your prayers. No one heard your every plea. No so-called Gods listened as you sobbed into the vacant air. But you were going to take what you were given, and you were going to be the answer you once desired. 

The telepathy became a gift. You could hear the unending, pained thoughts of those around you, and you chose to do something about it. You began to listen. To hear. To understand. You answered those whose prayers otherwise would have received nothing in response. 

You have lost count of how many times you have stepped in. How many you have helped. How many you’ve harmed in the process. You only remember the faces, both fearful and hopeful. Or both in equal measure. You only remember eyes looking on at you with a reverence that is sickening. Gazes holding the belief that you are something more than what you are. 

You remember a young girl’s thoughts once echoing out into the night. Her father was hurting her. He would put his hands on her and her mother. The child prayed for an end to the suffering. For some semblance of relief. The answer to her prayer was a police officer at her door, informing her mother that the father had been found dead a few blocks away. Hearing her thoughts again after that, she seemed… calmer. She was grieving, of course, in her own way. But she understood that the absence of her father meant peace. That his absence meant only brighter days ahead. 

Her voice, once broken and consumed with fear, had become something so much softer, more befitting a little girl. That alone had proved it was all worth it. It proved that you needed to be what the gods refused to be. You needed to be something good. Something that listened.

Which is why, on this night, you perk up as soon as the familiar tone of the Lord’s Prayer sounds through your head like the chime of a dinner bell. 

‘Thy kingdom come, thy will be done.’

The voice is melodic. It carries with it a German accent, lilting with every word. The tone, however, seems desperate. Pained. Everything you had once been, only carrying far more terror. Perhaps if you were only a telepath, it would have been difficult to seek out this voice in your head – but your mutation gifted you with wings. 

Taking to the skies, you begin to soar over Boston’s skyline, eyes roving every single corner. Every single little haven for darkness in search of the faithful individual who prays so fervently to a false idol. God will not answer their prayer – but you will. Perhaps it is what you were made for. 

‘On Earth as it is in heaven.’

In the same voice, uttered in the same desperate intonation, another prayer leaps in alongside the one that is already being spoken. New words. A newer despair. Layered underneath the familiar words.

‘Give us this day our daily bread.’ 

Please, my Lord, if you can hear me– 

Your wings beat faster at the sound, eyes scanning every crevice that may hold what you’re looking for. In the distance, among a sea of thought, you see a lonely and abandoned church. The stained glass glints sadly in the moonlight, and the prayer grows weary. The voice becomes a little more desolate. A bit more… accepting. 

They’re going to kill me–

You blink in the onslaught of wind, eyes tearing up at the cool sweep of it. Listening for some semblance of anger in the prayer, you latch on to what you can – hoping against all odds that this voice finds the will to survive just a little bit longer. Just enough for you to swoop in and save them. You can, you will! The prayer is coming from the church, located somewhere inside, as if the voice had thought it to be a refuge.

The idea only angers you further. God does not linger within that church. He does not listen. He does not care. Still, He does not matter – only the one whose prayer reverberates through your mind on a loop does in this moment. 

With a violent cry, you hurl your feet up and crash your way through the stained glass, shards embedding themselves in your legs, in your wings. The pain is an afterthought when you see what lies before you. Enraged tears well up in your eyes. It is a scene that is horrifically familiar these days. 

A group of men in uniforms. They surround a lone, cowering figure. The one whose prayer you received. At the sound of your entrance, their eyes shoot up to you, and you’re startled by their appearance. Though only for a mere second.

Eyes of yellow-gold, with the coloration of the sunrise glinting off the ocean. Blue skin like that of a twilit sky, shadowed by the darkness of what's been done to them. You know from the moment you see the figure that they are a mutant – and this is only confirmed further by the sight of a collar locked around their neck, red light glowing.

A power inhibitor. You’re unfortunately familiar with that sort of thing. The mutant – a man, by the look of their stature – gazes up at you with eyes like his prayer has been answered. He merely glances at the void-black wings attached to your back, because he seems far more interested in the expression that warps your face. Perhaps it’s anger. It could very well be sadness. Melancholy. Whatever it is, it brings him a small bit of hope. You can see it in his eyes. 

Even as the perpetrators scream, you school your expression. You keep it calm and collected as you swoop in and swiftly steal one of their guns. Then, you lay into them, firing into the night with a reckless abandon, blinded by rage even though you do everything you can not to look the part. Still, you ensure the safety of the strange man by standing in front of him, unfurling your wings to block the line of sight of the ones who hurt him. Keeping him safely tucked away in the darkness behind you. Shrouded in shadows. 

One by one, they fall in droves, though you notice with a small disappointment that no blood blooms beneath their bodies. Tranquilizer guns. There’s very little comfort in knowing that they did not intend to kill this mutant. It was more likely that they meant to experiment on him. Draw his blood. See what makes him tick. It sickens you. It disappoints you further that they are only unconscious rather than dead.

More and more these days, you understand where Magneto is coming from. Why he does what he does. You try not to let it get to you. 

Though, still, the fuckers fall, and you and the mutant behind you remain blessedly unharmed. A bead of sweat trickles down the side of your face as you pant. Harsh breaths tumble from your mouth as you examine the bodies. There are no conscious thoughts that you can hear aside from your own, and aside from that of the man behind you. 

The Lord’s Prayer continues, though it takes on a different tone now. It’s almost blocked out by the barrage of grateful, awed murmurings in that strange lilting tone, but you hear it regardless. You’ve learned after all these years to latch onto the prayers. It feels like what you’re meant to do. You attempt to block out everything else, in favor of latching onto your own helpless confusion – wondering why he keeps thinking it. Why he hasn’t given up.

‘And forgive us our trespasses.’

Your heart thuds as it does its best to settle. Slowly, silently, with an expression you hope shows your good intent, you finally turn around. His eyes meet yours, and the rage within you amplifies tenfold as you witness a rivulet of blood oozing from his forehead. 

‘As we forgive those who trespass against us.’

Brows furrowing, you quickly tear off a patch from the bottom of your shirt as you approach him. You kneel, hands lifting cautiously as he mutters something in German. 

“Ein Engel. Bist du ein Engel?”

You smile softly as you press the fabric to his wound, and his own hand comes up to join yours in applying pressure. His eyes flick back and forth between your own. The desperation is gone, replaced only by awe. You finally notice that he only has two fingers and a thumb on each hand. Two toes on his feet. A tail wooshing back and forth behind him. 

“I’m sorry,” You say delicately, plainly admiring him, “I don’t speak German.”

He smiles, though it's a startled sort of thing. It's shaky. Incomplete. It's an expression you share, for the most part. 

“You…” He begins, breathless. “You saved me.”

Chuckling, you leave him to keep the pressure on his own, hands moving now to the collar around his neck. It’s funny, almost. He looks almost… demonic. Only without the horns. Without the fear factor. He’s more beautiful than anything. 

“I did my best.” You mutter, fiddling with one of the controls. Slowly, ensuring he can easily watch your every movement, you pull a knife from your pocket. “Is it okay if I use this? We should get this thing off.”

“Ja, ja. It’s okay.”

“Alright.” You reply with an attempt at a confident smile. Yes, you’ve done this before. Yes, you’ve succeeded in doing this before. Though, still, there’s always a note of worry, a thought that they’ve changed the technology and installed a failsafe of sorts. One that senses when the collar is being tampered with. You’re afraid he could end up hurt. 

He lets you work, flinching only slightly as you bring the knife up to the device. You move as slowly and as precisely as you can, and silence falls. The only sound within the vast emptiness of the building is your shared breathing. It’s… unsettling. As such, you break the quiet.

“What’s your name?” You question, quickly glancing toward his eyes.

“Kurt. Kurt Wagner.”

“Kurt.” You echo smoothly, testing out the feel of it on your tongue. “It’s nice… to, uh, meet you.”

Despite everything, he chuckles. “I wish it could have been under better circumstances.”

You share his laughter, notching the sharpened end of your blade into one of the cracks of the collar. Kurt quickly pulls away the fabric he holds to examine the blood, though you respond by shoving it back onto the wound. He winces, and you offer a low hum in apology before continuing with the collar.  

“Me too. Just seems like this sort of thing is a little too common these days, huh?”

“Ja.” He says. Then, he looks back at you almost shyly. “What is your name?”

As you answer, you keep your eyes trained onto the red blinking light that stares right back at you. Your name is uttered in a quiet voice, as shyly as he asked his question. People don’t really ask anymore. And you don’t tend to tell them. 

He repeats it in that honeyed accent of his, and you hear the faint murmuring of the Lord’s Prayer once more within the vastness of his thoughts. It would be annoying were it not for the fact that his voice is… strangely soothing. It eases the tremble in your hands, at least. 

‘And lead us not into temptation.’

He says your name once more. “How… How did you find me?”

At your back, you feel the familiar tickle of your wings, the feathers brushing against the sliver of bare skin. They flinch at his question, because it tends to be followed by a slew of more. Are you an angel? Did He send you? Did you hear my prayer? It can be difficult to give people those same disappointing answers time and time again; No. No. Yes, but not for the reason you think.

It can be easier to just let people think you’re an angel. It’s certainly better to let their faith remain assured. To allow them to go on believing that there is a God and he actually cares. It’s… better than the alternative, at least. You know the pain of unanswered prayers. You know the agony of realizing that there is nobody looking out for you.

With a sigh, your knife clicks into place, and the collar comes undone. It falls from his neck.

“I heard you.”

His eyes widen. “Do you… Do you have heightened senses?”

Your sudden laugh shifts into a considering hum. “In a manner of speaking, maybe. But… No. I heard your thoughts.”

“Mein Gebet?” He whispers in barely concealed awe, and you don’t need to speak German to understand what he’s saying. His thoughts were a prayer. A plea. A cry to a God who isn’t listening. He thinks that you were sent, probably. “You… heard my prayer?”

“Your thoughts.” You correct as gently as you can. “You just… happened to be praying.”

His face doesn’t fall as you expect it to. No, instead he looks down to the collar which lays listless on the floor. Then, he disappears in a puff of smoke, the scent of sulfur drifting into your nose.

You're left stunned in his sudden absence, and perhaps a bit disappointed that you’re newly alone. That is until you hear his voice from behind you. You startle, swinging around to give him a considering, half-annoyed glare.

“I can teleport.” He says, finally casting his eyes to the wings behind you. 

Giggling, you stand, allowing your wings to fold inward. “I can see that.”

“What else can you do?” He questions, tilting his head as he regards your own appearance. 

It’s almost funny. A faithful man with the visage of a devil, and a staunch disbeliever with the appearance of an angel. It’s… ironic, is what it is. Almost sad. Still, you shrug, replying with a friendly smile that’s still a little too shaky for your liking.

“I fly.” You murmur. “And I read thoughts. That’s pretty much it, as far as I know.”

He turns, flicking his tail downward. The pointed, demon-like appendage slowly picks up a gun from the ground and lifts it to his waiting hands. When he smiles widely, you spot the pointed glint of his teeth. He can teleport. He has a prehensile tail. And he’s… blue.

“Prehensile tail.” You say. “And you can teleport. Anything else?”

He shakes his head. “Nein. As far as I know.”

Then, he goes quiet, once more examining your wings. Black as the night sky. Forboding as a gnawing abyss. Shyly, slightly embarrassed, you edge your way to a nearby pew to sit down. One of the mutant-hunting bastards lays at your feet, and you prop your feet up on his chest just because you can. Just because he’s a piece of shit and you want him to see the mark of your shoe tread when he wakes up. 

Kurt disappears once more, only to pop back into reality right next to you. The scent of sulfur follows him, but you’ve smelled far worse in your years. Silently, he sits a foot or two away from you, casting his gaze downward to the men on the floor.

“How long do you think they will be asleep?”

You hum, biting your lip as your brows furrow downward. “Dunno. Probably a while. Don’t worry, though. I’ll hear their thoughts if they wake up too soon.”

From the corner of your eyes, you see Kurt blink as he looks back up at you. His tail flicks slowly behind him. Like a cat watching something vaguely entertaining. It brings a hesitant smile to your face, and you turn to look at him.

“I’m sorry they did this to you, Kurt.” You murmur.

He shakes his head. “Sei nicht. Perhaps this was meant to happen, ja?”

Huffing, you gaze listlessly at the large cross hung on the far wall, depicting Jesus Christ in all his tragic glory. You bring one knee up to rest your chin on, keeping your eyes trained on the symbol before you. Sadness flickers in your chest, coupled by a strong wave of resentment.

“Lord works in mysterious ways, huh?” You ask, predicting his thoughts.

He nods, though a sympathetic glimmer lights up his eyes. “He does, Engel. I believe He does.”

You can’t help the bitter question that leaps from your mouth. “Then why didn’t He help you tonight?”

You regret it as soon as you say it – because this isn’t what you do. You don’t kick people while they’re down. You don’t deny their own beliefs, or question their faith. Even as you struggle with your own. Even as the resentment becomes too much to bear. There is no part of you that believes in a god, but you will not disregard the belief of others just because of your own abandonment. 

Still, Kurt does not seem offended. If anything, his eyes shift into something so deeply understanding.

“Perhaps He put me on your path.” He echoes your name with a soft tone, and it’s the first time in years that you’ve heard it uttered with such kindness. “So that you would find me, so that I could find you.”

“It’s a nice thought.” You concede, looking back up to the ruined stained glass. It litters the floor, shards glimmering a whole myriad of colors.

Kurt pauses. He allows silence to fall. Allows you to recede into your thoughts. Until he speaks once more, voice taking on a hopeful tone.

“Do you have anywhere to go?”

Your brows furrow. “Do you?”

He smiles, and it’s a gentle sight. It soothes the unending ache in your chest. The bitter caress of loneliness. You look into his eyes and allow your thoughts to meld with his own. You see a mansion. A man with kind eyes in a strange, floating wheelchair. Children running around, laughter echoing in the hallways. You see a woman with a white streak in her hair, with green eyes and strong arms. The thoughts are shrouded in a feeling of safety, of comfort, of home. All the things you haven’t known in years.

“Ja. I do. I have friends that could help you, Engel. If you need it.”

All the feelings in his head, the thoughts of those people he considers his family. It’s… almost too much to bear. Tears well in your eyes as you think of years spent hiding away in the shadows, only seeing the light when a desperate prayer sprung forth through the chaos of thought. A home sounds nice. Too good to be true, certainly, but nice.

“Maybe I do need help.” You murmur, eyes wide as you stare at him. Gold stares right back at you.

He smiles, and it’s probably the most beautiful thing you’ve seen in years.

“Ich hatte recht. Come with me, Engel.”

He holds out his hand, and you take it as hope blooms in your chest for the first time in decades. 

The luminous trail led you past rows of cars as your eyes remained firmly fixed on those ghostly green prints. The trail ended, or began rather, at a dark green pickup. It wasn’t new, but it seemed to be clean and well maintained. On the back window, a simple Army decal caught your eye. Something in you loosened. Your soulmate was no longer a theoretical possibility but a real person who drove this truck and had served in the Army.

You circled the truck once, then panicked as your gaze fell on the trail to find the nearest footsteps fading from view. Shit. You followed them in the other direction, moving quickly to stay ahead of their disappearance. The trail led straight to the ambulance bay entrance. Your steps slowed as you approached and noticed the sign. No Public Admittance—Authorized Personnel Only.

The prints continued past the warning and through the doors. Of course they did. Your soulmate must work at the hospital. You approached the door, hand tracing the warning etched on the glass. You could see the footsteps continuing down the hall and around a corner.

“Damn it,” you muttered, stepping back.

The glow on the ground beside you faded away. You debated just going in anyway but decided that probably wasn’t the first impression you wanted to make. Hey, I know this is your job and I just violated all protocols meant to keep people safe, but I’m your soulmate. No thanks. You began to pace outside the bay, leaving a trail of your own, vibrant purple footprints that only your soulmate would be able to see, should they happen to look outside.

What were you supposed to do now? Walk into the ER claiming chest pains so you could stare at the floor looking for footprints? Call the hospital and ask for the soldier with a green pickup? You could wait by the truck but that read more stalker than soulmate. Besides, it could be hours if they were just starting their shift.

You bit your lip and continued pacing. The universe had dangled your soulmate in front of you but failed to provide instructions on what to do now. You were excited, but also terrified. What if this person took one look at you and felt nothing but disappointment. What if the footprints were wrong? You don’t think that had ever happened before but still.

Your pace remained steady as you waked back and forth. You checked the time. Nearly half an hour had passed since you first saw the footsteps. You were mid-stride when the ambulance bay door slid open. A tall man with a salt-and-pepper beard stepped out, his black scrubs and faded hoodie were rumpled.

He paused just past the doorway, eyes narrowing slightly as he took in your restless movements. You froze, suddenly aware of how suspicious you must look pacing outside a restricted entrance compulsively checking the time on your phone. Yep, nothing to see here.

“Can I help you?” he asked, his voice carrying a hint of caution beneath the professional courtesy.

Your gaze darted to the ground behind him, searching for the telltale glow of green footprints. Nothing. You shifted your weight from one foot to the other. “I, um…” You faltered, uncertain now that the moment was here how to ask for help finding your soulmate.

The man’s brow furrowed as he stepped closer and the door slid closed behind him. His eyes, though tired, remained alert and assessing. A glance at the badge hanging around his neck identified him as M. Robinavitch, doctor.

“Are you waiting for someone?” he prompted when you said nothing further. “Do you have a family member being brought in?”

You took a deep breath. “Actually, I was wondering…do you know someone that drives a dark green pickup with an Army sticker?” The words tumbled out before you could reconsider.

His posture changed instantly, shoulders stiffening, gaze narrowing. He stilled. “Why do you want to know that?” The words were careful, measured.

You swallowed hard. “I followed their footprints like half an hour ago.” You gestured toward the parking lot, then at the door. “They led from that truck through that door.”

Confusion flickered across his face as he processed your words. Then his eyes widened, gaze darting to the ground at your feet. “Oh.” Then his expression brightened. “Oh!” A smile spread across his face, crinkling the corners of his eyes. “You saw his footsteps?”

You nodded. “Yeah. Bright green. Leading right through that door. I couldn’t follow them, obviously. I’ve been debating what to do.”

He chuckled. “Right. Well, you wait right here. Don’t leave. I’ll be right back.”

Before you could respond, he disappeared through the door with one last nod in your direction and a verbal reminder to “Stay.”

You exhaled slowly. Someone believed you. Someone who obviously knew your soulmate and was bringing him to you. Oh shit. He was bringing your soulmate to you. You weren’t ready for this. You wiped your hands on your pants then shook them out. Why did it suddenly feel like all your nerve endings were on fire? Maybe you were having a heart attack. No. That was stupid.

You huffed out another breath. Stop freaking the fuck out. Gah. You thought about calling your best friend but since they were in a bed upstairs that seemed kind of self-centered on your part. You shifted your weight unable to stay still with all the nervous energy coursing through you, but also afraid to move too far. Dr. Robinavitch told you to stay put after all.

What would your soulmate be like? Kind? Intelligent? Funny? You hoped so. And you hoped they wouldn’t be disappointed when they saw you. What if they hated everything about you? You glanced at your feet and wondered what your steps would look like to your soulmate.

The minutes stretched and you checked the time on your phone for the third time. Almost twenty minutes had passed. Was that normal? Was Dr. Robinavitch having trouble finding your soulmate? Or maybe they were refusing to come out. What if he’d gone to get security instead? You didn’t want to go to jail.

You were about to give up and leave when the door slid open again. Your heart leapt into your throat when you spotted the doctor in question, another man following him through the doorway leaving green footsteps in his wake.

“You’re being weird, Robby, even for you.” His exasperation was clear in his tone. “What the hell are we doing out here? I was in the middle of—” He stopped mid-sentence as he spotted you standing in the middle of the ambulance bay.

The man, shorter than Dr. Robinavitch, had reddish-brown curls scattered with gray, pushed back from his forehead as if he’d been running his fingers through it. His brow furrowed as he looked between you and the doctor.

“See? Told you it was important,” the doctor said, rocking back on his heels with a smug expression on his face. His beard did nothing to hide the smile spreading across his face.

Your soulmate turned toward you, eyes taking in every detail of your face before softening slightly. His gaze ran down the rest of you and back up. His annoyance didn’t vanish entirely but it was partly replaced by something else. Curiosity maybe. Or perhaps, dare you hope, interest?

Dr. Robinavitch’s was still grinning like an idiot as his gaze moved between the two of you. “Why don’t you come here and meet Jack…I’m sorry, I didn’t get your name.”

You gave it and took a tentative step forward, then another. Jack’s gaze dropped to the ground, his expression shifting from confusion to shock. He took a half step back as if needing more distance to process what he was seeing.

“You see them, too?” you finally managed to ask, voice small and uncertain.

His eyes snapped back to yours. “Purple. Bright purple.”

You licked your lips. “Yours are green.”

Robby cleared his throat. “Aren’t you going to introduce yourself, Jack?” He waggled his eyebrows suggestively.

“Shut up, Robby,” Jack said without heat. “I’m Jack Abbot,” he said, making no move to step closer or even extend his hand. “Night shift attending.”

You offered your full name followed by your occupation. The simple exchange felt like everything and not enough all at once.

“How did you know? About me, I mean.” His gaze flickered to the ground again.

“I followed your steps from your truck to the doors.” You gestured to the other doctor. “I asked him if he recognized your truck, and here we are.”

Behind your soulmate, the man in question was backing toward the door. “I’ll just leave you two to cosmically connect or whatever.” The door hissed shut leaving you and Jack alone.

He took a step forward. Then another. You mirrored him until you were less than a foot apart.

“I don’t put much stock in soulmates,” he said abruptly, his honesty catching you off guard. “Just so you know.”

“Neither did I until about an hour ago.”

His expression softened slightly. He studied you with an intense focus that had you shifting your weight again.

“I get off at seven in the morning if you wanted to talk. I could take you to breakfast.”

You smiled at the invitation. “Yeah, I could do breakfast. Should I meet you here?”

He nodded and hummed as he took half a step closer. He fished his phone from his pocket. “Maybe you should give me your number in case I get held up.”

You watched him more than the screen as you entered your number under the contact Soulmate. You handed it back and his lips lifted in a smile so quick you almost missed it. The two of you stood there a beat longer before you took a step away. “Have a good night, Dr. Abbot. I’ll see you in the morning.”

You’d almost reached your car when your phone buzzed. You pulled it out to find a message from an unknown number.

IN BED

COURTING YOU

DEFENDING THEM

DREAMER WIFE > DREAMER WIFE CONT.

FAKING IT

HELPING YOU COPE

HOMESICK

SICK AND INJURED

VIEWS ON SEX

GONE TOO LONG

LOVELESS MARRIAGE

GIRL DAD

SEX AND TATTOOS

HEAVILY INJURED

A PARTING GIFT

MOODY WIFE

PANIC ATTACK

PREGNANT SEX

YOUR SICKNESS

SENSORY ISSUES

ALWAYS COLD

HURT BY ANOTHER

DOM OR SUB

BEDDING CEREMONY

ESSOSI!WIFE

WATER WORKS

SAFE WORD

UNKIND WORDS

ON THEIR NERVES

CRYPTIC PREGNANCY

ASS OR TITS

WIFE OR BABY

THE BREAK UP

SLEEPYHEAD

RESTING BITCH FACE

CONNECTED TO THE LAKE

PANTIES IN THE MOUTH

BELLY BULGE KINK

CUM EATING

SILK OR LACE

MONSTERS

TIED UP

CHEF

BREAKING THE BED

SOCIAL CLIMBING

A COMMONER

A YOUNGER THEM

PLUS SIZE!WIFE

OVERPROTECTIVE

WITCH!WIFE

KNIGHT!WIFE

BED RANKING

CHARMER