ACCEPTING AVENGERS REQUESTS

﹏﹏

AVATAR: THE LAST AIR BENDER ﹏﹏

→ Katara

☾ Season’s Chances

→ Mai ☾ Flushed Cheeks

﹏﹏

AVENGERS ﹏﹏

→ Natasha Romanov ☾ Learn To Take A Break  PT. 1 | PT. 2 | PT. 3

☾ Blankets & Brunch ☾ Switched Roles

→ Kate Bishop: ☾ I Don't Want To Be Your Friend(I Wanna Kiss Your Lips)

→ Valkryie:

→ Carol Danvers:

﹏﹏

AVENGERS: THUNDERBOLTS ﹏﹏

→ Ava Starr: ⋇☾ I Want It (You Know I Can't) PT. 1 | PT. 2 | PT. 3

→ Yelena Belova: ☾ Interesting Humor ✩

﹏﹏

HAIKYUU! ﹏﹏

→ Kiyoko ☾ Fruit Loops

﹏﹏

HORIZON: ZERO DAWN ﹏﹏

→ Aloy ☾ Cool Off ☾ Two Peas In A Pod(Sibling!Reader) ☾ Face Paint ﹏﹏

K-POP DEMON HUNTERS ﹏﹏

→ Rumi:

→ Mira:

→ Zoey: ☾ Best Friend!Zoey Headcanons

→ Polytrix: ☾ A Return To Normalcy: Friday Night Hangouts (NOT xreader)

﹏﹏

LEAGUE OF LEGENDS: ARCANE ﹏﹏

→ Jinx ☾ “You’re Mine Now” ☾ Someone Better ☾ Wrapped around a Pinky Finger ☾ Arcane Ladies W/ A Touch-Starved Reader Headcanons ☾ "I Got You." | Arcane Ladies Headcanons

→ Vi ☾ Random Headcanons (Lesbian Week Special)  ☾ Class Is In Session ☾ Arcane Ladies W/ A Touch-Starved Reader Headcanons ☾"I Got You." | Arcane Ladies Headcanons

→ Caitlyn ☾ When Rains Falls On Your Window, I’ll Be There ☾ Random Headcanons (Lesbian Week Special)  ☾ Arcane Ladies W/ A Touch-Starved Reader Headcanons ☾ "I Got You." | Arcane Ladies Headcanons

→ Mel ☾ Arcane Ladies W/ A Touch-Starved Reader Headcanons ☾ "I Got You." | Arcane Ladies Headcanons

→ Sevika ☾ Arcane Ladies W/ A Touch-Starved Reader Headcanons ☾ "I Got You." | Arcane Ladies Headcanons

→ CaitVi/Reader (Click for the whole page!)

﹏﹏

LEGEND OF KORRA ﹏﹏

→ Korra ☾ Freezing ☾ Nails ☾ Ways Of The Wind ☾  Water Is Hard As Concrete ☾  Childhood Best Friends ☾ Don’t Mess With The Avatar  ☾ “You Were Her Rock And She Was Yours.”  ☾ Dating The Avatar ☾ Jealous Thing ☾  Kiss It Better ☾ Fire Comes From Within PT. 1 | PT. 2

☾ Shy Until You're Not → KorrAsami ☾ Jealous or Attracted? PT. 1 | PT. 2 | PT. 3

☾ The Green-Eyed and Blue-Eyed Monsters

→ Lin ☾ Trouble

﹏﹏

RAYA AND THE LAST DRAGON ﹏﹏

→ Raya ☾ Unforgiving Elements ☾ When I Looked Into Your Eyes, I Saw Stars For The First Time

→ Namaari ☾ Stars | Galaxy (Stars PT.2)

SHE-RA ﹏﹏

→ Adora ☾ Arm Wrestling  ☾ The Guide to Confidence (You Must Have a Guitar)

→ Perfuma ⋇ Yoga and Meditation

﹏﹏

STRANGER THINGS ﹏﹏

→ Robin ☾ “Okay, I Guess She’s Cute” ☾ Random Headcanons (Lesbian Week Special)  ☾ Cuddling With Robin (Blurb) ✩

﹏﹏

THE LAST OF US ﹏﹏

→ Ellie

– also, the girls don't care if you're bigger than them, they want you on their lap! (if you're a lapsitter)

– Vi's always patting her lap for you to sit on while Caitlyn is gently pulling your legs on top of hers.

– when you three lounge on the couch together, they'd purposely sit close to each other so your frame could lay across them.

– they'll run their fingers through your hair, play with your protective hairstyle, or give you a scalp massage if you let them.

– when you three are in bed, sleeping, you'll typically wake up to Vi lying on top of you like a kid clinging to their mother. -

"Vi... why are you laying on top of me?" you sleepily groan.

"because you're my favorite thing to lay on and," she buries her face between your chest. "i like doing this!" she mumbles into your skin, soft laughs ripping out of her in the meantime.

-

– Caitlyn would like to scold Vi about climbing on top of you when you're sleeping, but if she's being honest, she wants to do that too.

– she doesn't out of her own pride, but when she wakes up in the middle of the night to find Vi drooling on your chest, a little pang of envy pulls at her before she goes back to sleep.

– why Caitlyn doesn't do the same is probably because Vi always beats her to it, but also because of her long limbs, she'll feel like she's suffocating you or adding extraness to your cuddle position so she swallows her wants and holds you next to her instead.

– if you prefer to be like Vi, lying on top of someone, they welcome it.

– they treat you with open arms and backrubs. sometimes squeezes in certain "squishy" areas(mostly vi), but they can't help it. unless you're uncomfortable with that, then they don't do it at all.

– when you guys go shopping and you can't find anything in your size, they're more than accommodating.

– they'll suggest going to different stores, asking employees if they had extra sizes for you if you're too shy to ask, or they'll even request a personal tailor/seamstress to create you a wardrobe of clothes in your size(cait)

– when you do find something in your size but the designs are ugly, totally not your style, or purposely cover up parts society thinks you should cover up, they are outraged.

-

"why don't they have anything cute?" vi huffs, holding up a garment one could describe as Victorian-era jester clothing.

"and what's up with all this floral?" caitlyn grimaced, upper lip curled in disgust. "are you 40? do they think you're going on a cruise with your three adult kids and lazy husband?"

-

– it's safe to say they research cuter stores for plus sizes or invest in small businesses to get you the clothes that you need because you deserve to feel beautiful too <3

at first, it was cute that she shared something that made her laugh with you... then, it got concerning when she was getting tears from a video with a horrendous, obnoxious laugh track that spanned over the duration of the video, and finally, when she would burst into your room at ungodly hours to show you dumb videos at full brightness, it just became a nuisance.

you had to set rules:

no barging in when dead asleep to show videos.

no more videos of people throwing cheese slices on their babies and animals.

and finally, if alexei found it funny, would you?

yelena didn't really care about the rules. she thought it was cute you tried to set them in the first place. admittedly, she knew the barging into the room thing was a little over the top, she assumed you were still up! you usually were.

and if you guys are with each other, mindlessly scrolling next to each other, she'll turn down her brightness when showing you a video, but other than that? everything was free rein.

-

-

yelena didn't give you another minute to answer. as soon as your fingers readied to type a response, your girlfriend in question barged into your room and did a flying squirrel onto your bed.

"yelena," you groaned, flopping around on your mattress as she crawled on her knees to settle herself right in front of you.

"what?" she beamed, phone clutched tightly in her hand. "you said not to barge in when you're asleep. you texted me back. you're obviously not asleep."

a heavy sigh escaped your lips and she took it as an oppertunity to snicker and settle herself under your covers. "look," she shoved her phone in your face to watch a video of a guinea pig running on his wheel agressively for two seconds, flop into his bed for another two, and then hop back in the wheel completing the vicious and never ending cycle of working out and resting.

with your face blank, dryly blinking at the screen in front of you, yelena cackled from your side with her blonde hair all tussled from her earlier antics. "isn't that hilarious? he's just running and running with his short little legs until he goes," she paused to match her describing with the video. the guinea pig floofed onto his bed of fiber. "ploof! like that!"

"riveting," you only snort from how excited and entertained she is from the video, not the video itself. it's amazing how animal videos always seem to crack her up, even in the dead of night. "you know, i was doing something."

she perked her head up from her pillow to notice your laptop halfway-open on the other side of your body. "oh, what were you doing?" she settled herself back into your bed with her hand already reaching into the bucket of snacks she keeps for herself on your nightstand. "searching up super hot and cool photos of me?"

"no," you laughed. you stole a popcorn ball from her bucket and sat straighter against your headboard. "i was working. finishing up last-minute documents from this morning."

"if they're from this morning, why didn't you finish them this morning?" without a beat, "procrastination. i got it, i got it." she waved you off, already hearing your excuses you've told her many, many times. "you should work on your time management. if you do things you're supposed to do in the day, you'll have time to do what you want at night."

"ha! you mean like watch mind-numbing videos on social media all night long? yeah, no, thanks. plus, this is extra work. stuff that's going to be good for us." yelena rolled her eyes from behind her screen and stole back her popcorn ball. "hey– what?"

"popcorn balls are for people deserving of them." she finished the snack in one bite. "you can get another one when you close your latop and watch funny videos with me."

"but, i don't think they're funny, yena," you whined to her, fingers furiously typing away on your laptop. "lemme finish this one thing and then we can—"

yelena snatched your computer off your lap and tossed it to the foot of the bed. before you could ask her, "what gives?", she dragged you down to your back by your shirt and turned on a Youtube video. "watch," she demanded as she forced her phone into your hands.

another whine almost slipped out, but you closed your mouth once you realized she turned on a video about one of your favorite topics. eyes already locked onto the screen with wonder sparkling in them, you spoke through a smile on the side of your lips. "why...?"

"i'm holding you back from achieving things by forcing you to lay down and watch this." yelena yanked the sheets over your body and tucked them around your sides. "you work too much, peanut. you gotta relax every now and then."

with a fond roll of your eyes, you set the phone down to smile warmly at her. "you're only saying that because you want me to spend more time watching compilation videos with you."

she grinned, wide and knowing. she snuggled herself against your body and held the phone up so you could hold her as you watched.

"and stop calling me 'peanut'. i don't like what it insinuates."

"it's only insinuating one of the best pictures ever taken on this Earth. it's not my fault the peanut butter and jelly filter that makes your eyes huge-ass yellow stars and your cheeks all puffy like you had an allergic reaction, made you look cute."

you groaned at her reminiscing. that photo she took of you—you were blissfully unaware!—was the group chat's picture for weeks and would've been your contact photo in her phone for months if it wasn't for you secretly changing it. "i hate that picture."

"i love it. now, shut up and watch the video, peanut." from beneath your groan, yelena could hear your smile. she smiled too, because finally, she got her picky-humored partner to sit down and watch a video with her.

When the harder feelings arose during the exercises, you let them. If tears formed at the corners of your eyes, you let them stroll down your cheeks. If you felt like you had to take a bigger breath than normal, you did so. You jotted down your emotions in a journal, as susggested by both Tenzin and a few other folks in your meditation class, and found that expressing your emotions on paper was an easier way to release them from your body as opposed to talking them out.

With your newfound way to express your emotions, it was easier to practice the airbending techniques. Your arms moved similarly to a monks, the actions constantly flowing and easygoing like watching water effortlessly fall from a fountain. With your improvement, Tenzin often compliment and tell you over and over how you should’ve been an airbender, how the spirits were laughing when deciding who would or wouldn’t be an airbender after Korra opened up the spirit world.

His compliments filled you up with warmth and gratitude, replacing some of the uglier emotions like anger and jealousy that once was there.

That tightening feeling in your chest, the forming ball of hot anger that would rise when you watched Korra and Asami engage with each other was no longer there. You wanted to experience some of that, holding their hands and kissing their cheeks, but you knew that wasn’t in the cards for you. You’ve accepted. You’ve learned to adapt and now you’re moving on. Well, trying to anyway.

Because you were freer with them and made the effort to hang out with just them more, Bolin fell under the impression that you confessed and were finally dating them. Yay! You, however, were oblivious to his ways of thinking until he took you out one night to celebrate your emotional and spiritual recovery.

"Let me just say, you are glowing, Ripper," Bolin laughed into his straw, his ice clinking against the glass as he raised it for a toast. "To a healthier, happier, two-girlfriend-having you!"

You clinked your glass with his, sharing more laughs. "Thanks, Bolin, but I don't have any girlfriends."

"What?" the boy pouted through a sip, "but I thought you confessed. I thought that's why you three are all cute and couple-ly now!"

"Nope." You took a bite out of a pink frosted treat. It was round, the color of it smiliar to an almond cake, and its texture was a crunchy coating on the outside but a perfectly crumbly and soft inside. "We're just friends but I'm okay with that now."

"Oh," frowned Bolin. "Did they reject you?"

"No."

"Not want a third in their relationship?"

"Isn't that the same as rejecting?"

"Well, excuse me for trying to find out why you're not dating the two girls you've been crushing on for ages now!" Bolin threw his arms up in defeat. His wide chest heaved with radical confusion.

A few customers in the cafe glanced at you two. Most confused by his outburst and others disgusted by his sheer volume.

You hid the side of your face from onlookers and glared at Bolin. "Please. Say that a little louder," you gritted.

With a pout still on his face, Bolin apologized as he took another sip from his glass. "Wait, but, I still don't get it. If you weren't rejected, why aren't you dating?" He gasped dramatically before you could continue. "You fell out of love with them. Oh, man!" he whined, setting his glass so hard on the table that it hit the surface with a deep thump. "I was really hoping to see you guys act all cute and couple-ly soon. Watch you hold hands."

"You were gonna watch us hold hands?" you snickered. "That's a bit strange, Bolin."

"Not like, watch watch," he laughed, "but look over randomly as you three and see you holding hands or clinging onto each other during scary movers. That's what I mean."

"Well, that's very sweet but I didn't fall out of love with them."

"Huh?"

You took a sigh and a sip from your glass, the fresh tea soothed the scratchiness behind your throat and coated your nerves with a refreshing fruity ease. "I still like them. I just haven't confessed."

"What? But you should!" He slapped his palms on the table and urged forward. "You have to! You guys would be the greatest couple after Opal and I! You guys would look so cute together. You've liked them for so long!"

"Yeah, Bolin," you pushed him back with the butt of your palm to his forehead, "I know. But where we are right now with all the Avatar stuff and our personal lives, I just see my confession as something that's not a priority."

"But you could lose your chance," he dramatically wailed.

You laughed. "That's insinuating I ever had one."

-

Another week's past since your and Bolin's outing. Since then, every time you would interact with Korra and Asami, personally or within the group(it didn't matter), Bolin would make sad puppy-dog eyes at you and protrude his bottom lip.

It wasn't annoying but it defiately a challenge to stop him from making the face so the two wouldn't notice and ask what was up.

There had been a few close calls. One when Mako was giving a boring debriefing, another when you five shared blimp ride and were reminisincing about earlier times, and then this time, where you had to swat at Bolin for him to finally get the hint to stop making the face.

"Ow, stop-stop it!" he complained from your side, pushing at your fast swatting hands.

"You stop it," you scolded. "Quit making that face like it's going to change anything."

"Uh, guys?" Asami called out from the makeshift circle you stood in. "Everything good?"

You two pulled yourselved off each other, retracting like the same sides of magnets being forced together. "Yeah, everything's great." You smiled brightly at Asami, which she returned.

"You sure?" Korra chuckled. "Because you guys have been doing that a lot lately. Secret glances from Bolin, scowls from you, and now the swatting--"

"--which isn't exactly new!" claimed Bolin. "I have the brusies to prove it."

You went to punch Bolin in the arm, but a mysterious gust of wind pushed your hand aside before it could make contact with his arm.

"Yeah, actually, I've been noticing that too. Is everything okay between you two?" Asami asked.

You shrugged. Another whoosh of wind swept past your ear, the air tickling your skin and whistling as it sped by. You shot Korra a suspicious glance and the airbender in question only grinned at you innocently.

"Yeah, everything's fine!" Bolin's arm wildly swung around your shoulders, pulling you into his wider frame and engulfing you with whatever cologne those movers bought him. The stench was laced with wood and something that tried to be a mix of wet forest and, well, just something that was wet. Damp, even. It wasn't the best smell that ever passed your nostrils but Bolin liked it so you didn't say anything about it.

Korra and Asami shared a sideways glance, matching eyebrows perked on the left sides of their faces. You and Bolin, mostly you, forced an innocent smile on your faces while they assessed whether or not they believed you two.

They didn't, but they'll chat with you later.

"Can we please get a move on?" grumbled Mako as he dragged his hand down his face. "We barely have enough time to sit around here and talk, let alone conspire whether or not they and Bolin have a huge, definitely ‘well-hidden’ secret up their sleeves."

You and Bolin shared an offended gasp, which Mako ignored, and Korra nodded in agreement. "Right. Let's get back on track, shall we?"

After your brief Team Avatar meeting, thanks to Mako and his important duties to Prince Wu, you gathered your things and left. Even though you were getting better at having a personal life outside of work, you still kept some aspects that intertwined your work life with your social life. For example. Once meetings were done, you would return to your previous duties or went to attend more airbending classes. You only hung out with Team Avatar after long missions, meeetings that bled into dinner time, or the rare occasion where you had the day off. It was easier for you that way.

Keeping them close but still an arm’s distance away helped keep your feelings in check. It helped you remember that you’re supposed to get over Korra and Asami, not wanting to cling onto them or spend every extra hour you could with them.

"Hey, wait up!" Korra called from across the hall. The heels clacking from behind you let you know that she wasn't alone.

You turned over your shoulder to smile at them, the two of them catching up to you fast. "Hey. Everything okay? Did we forget to talk about a certain point or?"

"No, nothing like that," Asami assured. "We've just noticed something was different today. Well, things have been different, a lot different, since that night. We're glad to have you back as a stable part of the team and we all see your growth but, we couldn't help but still miss you."

Your brows knitted together in confusion. "Miss me? What do you mean? I'm still here. I'm back, just like you said."

"Yes," she let out a chuckle that seemed more tense than she let on, "you are. But we mean in a closer sense. You're here and you're with us but it still feels like there's a wedge between us. Liking you're holding something back."

Your brows continued to push toward the center of your brow bone. Korra, sensing your confusion by the twist of your lips, spoke up with a tiny snicker. "What she means to say is that we miss you, Sharp Shooter." She swiped her fist against your shoulder. "As a friend. Not just a teammate."

"Oh, well, if you want, we can go to dinner after I finish up some paperwork? Let's plan for something later during the week, too."

"What about our impromptu hangouts?" Korra suggested with an easygoing smile. "We miss the times when you would barge into a room and make your presence known. Or times us three would sneak out midday to go eat."

"Not that I ever endorsed that," Asami piped up with an accusatory finger. Korra rolled her eyes and pushed her shoulder with her own, smile still spread across her lips.

"And yet you always seemed the most relaxed."

Asami laughed, the sweet sound releasing into the air, reminding you of shared pink lemonades and treats you picked up on the way to your picnic spot.

You have missed them. The dull ache in your chest was proof. You missed the hangouts, the sleepovers, the secrets you three would share underneath the midnight moon, but that was before Korra and Asami got together. Before seeing them share cookies made you queasy, and falling into the shadows made you feel safer. And that was before the disastrous dinner of Bolin calling you out on your feelings.

"Yeah... I've been distant. Not as much as before, but still not enough to be where we were," a soft chuckle left your lips, "Honest, the whole distant thing was because I was getting over a crush I had on the two of you."

Korra and Asami shared a glance, their expressions unreadable as they soaked up the information you dropped on them like a grenade, before their eyes lit up.

Korra was the first to speak. "You have a crush on us?" Her eyes grew more excited with each passing second, her aggressive lip-bite doing nothing to reel the buzzing feeling in.

"Had," you corrected. "I had a crush on you."

"Oh." Korra's face fell. With her eyes no longer sparkling, she turned to Asami, whose face was now scrunched with confusion—no, curiosity— No... calculation?

"You don't have one on us now?" she reiterated.

You shook your head and adjusted the heavy bag on your shoulders. "No. Not really."

"I don't believe you."

"Asami." Korra hit her with the back of her hand.

"I don't believe you. If you don't have a crush on us, then why does Bolin always make those faces around us? You're constantly giving him glares and fighting with him about something you can't seem to tell us." She kept her tone cool, piecing more bits of the puzzle as she spoke. "You're doing all of that for 'nothing'? A crush that doesn't exist anymore? Yeah, sorry,"—she didn't really mean it—"but I don't believe you."

You could try all you wanted. Give Asami all the excuses in the book, ones you thought of in dreams, and simply lie your way out of this but you knew better than that. You knew no matter what you told Asami, she would sniff out your lies and you would dig yourself a deeper hole.

You let out a defeated sigh. "Okay, so, maybe it's still a little bit there, but I swear, it's tiny." You waved your hands in defense. "That's why I'm still a bit distant. I don't want to mix my personal life with my work life so that means, I need to get over these feelings. I hope you guys—"

"—Don't get over it."

"What?"

"Asami..." Korra dragged out her name in a warning tone. "What are you doing? You're handling this like I would," she whispered.

Tilting her chin down at Korra, Asami spoke out the side of her mouth. "Maybe that's what this situation needs. I'm tired of beating around the bush and waiting for something to happen." What else was she supposed to do when the second person she loved was telling her they were trying to get over her? Get over her and her girlfriend, who only talked about them late at night?

She had to at least try something.

"We want to be a part of your personal life," Asami continued, "Even during that weird time we thought you didn't like us anymore. We still love you, as a person and your company, and now, you're trying to take that away from us? Just because you have a crush?" Asami grabbed your hands, her thumbs rubbing over your knuckles. "Who cares about that? It's not going to make anything worse because," an embarrassed laugh rippled out of her, pulling one of her hands from yours to grab Korra's, "Korra and I have a crush on you too."

The crushing weight on your shoulders from your bag didn't matter anymore. It didn't feel like it was there at all because how could you be weighed down when you feel like flying and gliding across the sky whilst dancing on a rainbow?

Korra took your stunned silence as a chance for her to speak. "Yeah, I know. Crazy," she snickered. "We're obviously better at hiding it than you are, and I'm definitely getting better at ignoring random impulses, unlike Asami..."

"...Oh, come on," she laughed at her girlfriend. "This is a one-time thing. Everything else will be further thought out from now on."

Korra gave her an assuring pat on her shoulder. "Sure, babe."

Your slackened jaw turned into a smile as you laughed at their exchange. That fuzzy feeling that consumed your body didn't leave, but redirected itself to your hands with tingles as Korra grabbed one of yours.

The three of you stood in a circle around each other with smiles spread so wide across your faces that it would leave any passerby feeling uncanny. "There's no war in Ba Sing Se" would be the phrase someone would use to describe your overly giddy smiles.

"So," chimed Korra, giving your and Asami's hands a squeeze. "How about taking a rain check on that paperwork, and we all go out to eat? As a date. If that's okay with you?"

"Sure," you beamed at them. "I'm sure I can spare one night of not doing work."

"Oh, goodie. We're spared." Korra took the bag off your shoulder and slung it across her own, her snark not going unnoticed by you. "How grateful are we."

"Oh, shut up," you laughed. The three of you resumed your walk down the hallway. "And I can carry my own bag. Give it here."

"Absolutely not." She swung the bag and her arm, which Asami swiftly dodged, away from your grabby hand. "It was killing me watching you carry it. This thing is almost double your size. What are you doing carrying it?"

You gave a lienant shrug as you still reached for the bag. "I don't know. I was going home from a meeting when these two girls asked me out. That ring a bell?"

"Plenty," she scoffed. "But our first order as a couple is giving you a bag better for your workload."

"Oh!" Asami beamed, a proud gleam shone across her features. "I could design one. One with many pockets, durable vegan leather with a deluxe shine that combats and repels moisture and oils. We could even get your initials engraved or embossed in the fabric for an extra personal touch."

"Who said we were already a couple?" you teased. Your lips grew into a grin as Asami and Korra's faces scrunched and curled. "I don't remember being asked, and this is only our first date. Do you think I'm someone who doesn't like to be wooed?"

With a "gentle" flick to your ear, Korra snorted. "Touché, Sharp Shooter. We'll woo you first and then ask you to be our partner, but either way, you're getting a new bag."

Satisfied, you three loaded into one of the docked boats off the coast of the island. "Sure. That sounds like a plan to me."

"Good," sighed Asami as she began to prepare the boat for departure. "Because we weren't going to take no for an answer."

Now settled against the cushy backings of the seats, you draped your arms over the tops of them while Korra and Asami began the departure for your personal boat.

It wasn't easy getting here, and it took a lot of emotional growth to, but you finally figured out the answer to the question that hung over your head for years now.

Korra and Asami, were you jealous or attracted to them?

Attracted. You were, without a doubt, attracted to both of them, and luckily, they were attracted to you too.

They were having their weekly emotional debriefing about whatever stressed them out that week or how their mental state was when he spilled the beans.

"Yeah, and it felt suffocating, y'know?" he confessed to Yelena in the dimly lit corner of his room. "Like I was putting on a face to conceal my happiness like Ava does with—" he cut himself off, but Bob was too late. Yelena was already grinning with her arms wrapped around her knees.

"No, no," the Russian woman's grin only grew, "continue. Continue with what you were saying."

Lips pressed tight, Bob rapidly shook his head and pushed himself from the ground. He wasn't going to hear the end of this, not from Yelena and definitely not from Ava if she ever found out.

So, the following morning, Bob made Yelena swear not to relay what he almost told. Well, "made" as in profusely begging and offering to do something for Yelena in exchange for keeping her mouth shut.

She was going to regardless, already aware of the oogly eyes Ava and you make at each other, but getting Bob to do some extra things for her in the meantime never hurt.

And that's how Bob found himself organizing all different kinds of hot sauce and sugary cereals in the New Avengerz pantry at three AM. Prime time.

"What in the world are you doing?" questioned Ava, phasing out of the wall just beside the pantry. Bob yelped, almost losing his balance on the step ladder in the process. Ava shushed him.

With his balance regained, Bob moved to catch her gaze. "Wh-What does it look like I'm doing?" the startled boy gestured to the shelves of food. "I'm organizing."

Ava sighed and pulled a jar of peaches from beside him, reaching around his legs. Bob scolded her for almost making him lose his balance again but she ignored him and opened the jar. "No, shit, Robert. I meant why are you doing this at 3 am? You got another exisential crisis?"

Bob scoffed as Ava grabbed a plastic utensil. "No." Bob fiddled with the box of cereal in his hand, his eyes suddenly finding interest in the colorful bubble letters of the title. "I reserve those for Wednesdays."

"Healthy," she commented with a snort, taking a bite of the peach she stabbed with her fork.

"Yeah," he scoffed, "just like that peach you're eating."

Ava glanced down at the glass jar held protectively under her arm. The syrup of the peaches was thick and sweet, laced with both natural sugars from the fruit and artificial sugars from the preserving liquid. Biting into the peach was like biting into an oversized, soft piece of candy that gushed out its flavor with each bite. "Touche."

Bob took pride in her comment, an invisible point added to his scoreboard with a chuckle. "Thanks. Why are you up? Adding sugar to your already anxiety-ridden diet."

A sigh only to be described as deep, overwhelming, and probably residing deep within Ava's body poured out of her. With a blink, Bob found her slumped against the only bare wall in the pantry with her peaches still under her possession. "You're one to talk."

He shrugged. "Maybe. You seem like you're one who needs to talk, though. You know, if you want. I'm not gonna push you or anything. That's rude and totally against my character." He gave a lighthearted and awkward chuckle, but her smile resumed as it had been before: nonexistent.

And so, Bob returned to his chore of organizing and alphabetizing. Not that he needed to alphabetize, he just wanted to. Why not?

Ava remained on the floor, occasionally munching on her peach. If he were anyone else, Ava would've left the pantry altogether once she saw someone was inside, but that someone was Bob. Someone who often sat in her company with you in the common room.

She watched Bob work diligently in silence, well, besides the occasional and totally embarrassing slurp of her peach. Despite her chews and eased sighs, he continued working and rearranging the cereal by height and thickness. Then watched as he moved the same type of hot sauce bottles over and over.

Because they were all the same brand, they were all the same size. She easily assumed he was organizing by their "sell-by" date. Otherwise, what was the point of organizing something and its twin?

Ava groaned to herself. Was she really conspiring about his organizing methods?

She should leave. Let him continue to work while she moved to eat her peach in her room, where she didn't have to worry about looking like a toddler with peach syrup dripping down the sides of her mouth, but for some reason, she didn't care. She didn't have that fleeting feeling in her chest.

Bob climbed down the ladder, a short but satisfied smile on his face. He gave Ava another glance, acknowledging her presence as he folded up the stepladder and put it in its spot. And right before he left the pantry, she called out to him.

He whipped around at the sound of his name, his expression clear of his previously eased smile and replaced with something more attentive, something that said he was still holding onto a tether even after she told him to let go.

"I couldn't sleep."

Bob nodded, his fingers tapping on the doorframe. "Yeah, I figured. Sorry, was it me? Was it my pantry digging?"

She blew breath past her sticky lips, avoiding his gaze and instead taking notice of the cut of her sweats. "Partly." She could hear the deflation of his shoulders. "No," she added swiftly. "No, actually. Not at all."

"Oh." Bob peered closer to her, his steps barely making a sound on the floor. He didn't want their closer proximity to scare her off. Bob learned you had to treat Ava like a wild bear. Well, really, anyone on the team like a bear.

They shouldn't really be approached, but if you do, your steps should be quiet and calculated. If you want to know more of the bear, you shouldn't ask probing questions right away. You need to approach questions creatively and skip around, flat-out asking. You need to make them answer a question they didn't know they were answering.

Or, if your bear was smarter than average, and let's be honest, they all were, you needed to let the bear confess first. Give them the platform and space to be vulnerable.

The silence from Bob told Ava she should continue. Even though that voice in her head said she should do anything but. "I have insomnia, shocker. But I couldn't sleep, and I heard someone in the pantry, so I wanted to see who it was. I was hoping it was you."

"Yeah?" Bob was sat across from her now, legs stretched in front of him. "Any particular reason?"

A sideways glare from Ava typically meant "shut up", "you're stupid", or that you were crossing a line, depending on the context, but this glare? This glare was saying, "you know me too well and as much as I don't want to admit it, I'm glad you do." That's what Bob got anyway.

"You know, it won't kill you if you actually liked our company. If you found even the slightest bit of comfort from us," Bob teased with a gentle smile. Her glare didn't break but he could see the twinkle in her eye she wasn't trying to hide. "Even admitting that wouldn't send a lightning bolt down from Zeus himself to strike you."

A sigh escaped her lips but it wasn't as heavy as her previous. There was a hint of playfulness, Bob could feel it and see it in the corner of her mouth, tilting her head back to hide a smile.

"Look," he scooted forward so their bodies were parallel with each other. "My name is Bob, and I like your company, Ava." She snickered in response.

"I'm not admitting that."

"You don't have to but as you can see," he spread his arms out with a proud smile. "I said it and I didn't die." Ava used her foot to push at his arm, stifling her laughter but failing to do so. "See?" Bob pointed at her smile. "It's okay to let yourself smile, Ava."

She guessed it was technically to smile now. Things are getting better despite how much she hates the new attention she gets as a superheroine. She didn't even feel like she could call herself that yet. She wasn't doing anything that wasn't assigned to her.

She wasn't extraordinary. She was just her.

"I guess," she began her confession, "I was hoping it'd be you because you're easy to be around. There," she gave a lazy attempt to spread her arms like he previously did, but she ended up looking like the half-assed version of the shrug emoji instead. "I said it."

He grinned triumphantly. "That wasn't too bad, was it?"

"It was hell."

Bob snickered. "I'm sure it was. Regardless, I'm happy to be that rock for you. To be that space of comfort in a less than comforting world. You and ___ do that for me, too. Especially whern we're sitting around in silence, doing nothing but reading. Or when we watch TV on low and you're trying not to fall asleep but we all know its a lost cause."

Ava pulled at the sleeve of her shirt and chewed on her bottom lip, peaches forgotten by her side, yet the taste remained on her mouth. She didn't realize how much you two paid attention to her during your time together.

She would purposefully turn her body away from you both, pull a blanket so far over her head that you couldn't see her face. All these efforts to hide, to shield herself away from you two, and despite her efforts, you still saw her. The her she tried so desperately to hide.

"I-I'm sorry," Bob held out his hands, his fingers trembling. "Did I say something? I overstepped. I'm sorry—"

"—You don't have to apologize, Bob." Her light eyes found his.

For the first time tonight, Bob couldn't see any sense of her hidden self within them. She was finally breaking down her walls, letting herself be seen by him in a tender moment.

Ava figured, in this moment, what was the point of hiding everything? Hiding from Bob when he sees everything, ergo hiding from you, the person she's terrified to show everything to, yet longs for it anyway.

Bob was right. Letting the team know how much she liked them wasn't going to kill her. Especially if she started with you.

"Thank you," she resumed. Bob, face ridden with gentle confusion, tilted his head. She spoke before he could question. "You didn't overstep. In fact, you've helped me. I don't feel as anxious anymore and knowing that you're still around, wanting to talk to me even after seeing what I don't want you to... I don't know. I found comfort in that."

Gentle, Bob reached a hand for her knee. He kept his eyes locked on hers, nonverbally asking for permission, and when it was granted with a nod, he carefully grabbed the bone and gave it an affirming shake. "I know this is going to be hard to believe, and it's ironic coming from me, but you don't have to hide anymore or carry things on your own. The world might be scary, and putting your life on the line every day isn't exactly ideal, even if you get good karma from it now," they both shared a quiet laugh, "but you're safe within these walls. And us? Your team? We got you. And we're going to support you in any way you'll let us."

Ava opened her mouth to thank him, but just like she did before, he cut her off. "You just have to let us in first."

"I know." She returned the squeeze to his knee. "I can't guarantee I'm going to do it all the time and definitely not all at once, but I'm going to try."

"Good." Bob gestured for the jar of peaches, which she gracefully handed over. "Can I suggest starting with the person you stare at all the time?"

She scoffed, kicking his hand off her knee. "I do not stare."

"You do. And it's always at them. They stare too. Not that you two catch each other to ever notice it." Bob's comment was casual, like a shrug of the shoulders or swat of his hand, but it hit Ava like a truck.

She did notice your staring. Maybe it was about time she let you know that.

To Be Continued. | WC: 2,267

"She's tried to kill me before and failed so I really don't have anything to worry about."

That made you laugh. "Didn't she say she wasn't trying to kill you? That you were just an obstacle in her way and that if she was trying to put you six feet under, you would've been there already?"

With the new top on and posing in the mirror, Kate playfully scowled. "You talk a lot of smack for someone who boo-hoo's for hours on end when I don't return a text."

The jacket that was previously taken off smacked against her shoulder with a whack! The zipper's metal handle brushing against the bare skin of her shoulder. "Ow!" she whined, her hand going to brush reddening skin.

"Oh, sorry! I didn't know--since when does your suit expose your shoulders?"

"Since I changed the design!" she whined again.

Okay, you had to give it to her. This liner was actually different than the other one. Instead of covering her shoulders, there were cutouts that exposed them. The cutouts were long, but not too long that they exposed the top of her bicep, and oval-shaped, which complimented the oval cutouts of the gloves she usually wore.

With her hand on her shoulder, you could see she wasn't wearing gloves, though. Instead, her sleeves came all the way down to the base of her fingers with another cutout for her thumb to peek through.

The silhouette of the shirt was sleek and long, much like the rest of her limbs.

With her sleeves going so long, wouldn't it difficult to move her hands and fingers with the gloves on? Would she wear this liner with the gloves on? Did she make this one to get rid of the gloves altogether?

"Hey," Kate's voice shook you out of your gloved-sleeved dilemma. "I know you think I look really good in this thing, but can you focus, please?"

You pushed Kate on her shoulder, getting an earnest laugh in response.

"Hey, don't hurt the player because you can't stop your attraction to her! It's not my fault you have a crush on me and think I'm pretty and can't stop thinking about how my hand would fit in yours–" She got a pillow to her face in response.

You wished that was the only time she would tease you about your crush on her but, no. That definitely wasn't the first and it won't be the last.

Some of her teasing is subtle. Like a wink when she catches you staring at her or the careful play of a smirk on her lips when she can see your brain malfunctioning only in a way a fellow sapphic could understand.

Most of her teasing, though, wasn't subtle.

Most of it was full out, in your face, "I like watching you squirm" teasing.

That could be trapping you between her body and the counter when you're both in the kitchen and she needed to get something out of the cupboard above you. Another one would be straight up asking you, "Hey, you thought that was attractive, right?"

And your least favorite would be when she grabbed your hand. Or whispered to you. Or kissed your hand. Or your head. Or let her lips tickle the skin of your ear when she whispered to you again. Or those playful thigh squeezes and taps when you two laid on the couch, legs tangled with another, during movie nights.

If she wasn't your best friend, this would be annoying. Manipulative even. Purposely acting a way or doing things just to make your cheeks warm and your insides gush.

But you knew she wasn't doing this to be facetious. You were sure that word wasn't even in her vocabulary. This was Kate just being Kate.

A little shit.

"Heyo!" Kate greeted, entering through the fire escape of your bedroom. You were lying on your bunk bed, dangling halfway off the bed as you scrolled on your phone. You could be reading, you could be on social media. Kate didn't care. All she cared about was—"Hey!" she called out again, more stern than her previous greeting. "What did I say about dangling off your bed like that? You're more than 4 feet up in the air. One mishap or accidental movement and you're toast!"

You barely give her a glance behind your phone. "You mean like my best friend barging into my apartment unannounced and then yelling at me randomly for living my life the way I want to?"

Kate's already crossing your room in determined fury and grabbing you at the waist to pull you down. "I don't care what the reasoning is. Just stop doing that. You could get hurt.

You grunted as you're brought to your feet and she's already adjusting your shirt. Her fingers are cold from the breezy New York air and you try not to dwindle on it but before you can fix your face, Kate's already caught you.

"What?" she asked with a growing smirk. Her fingers continued to move around the hem of your shirt, pulling it down to cover your sides and middriff. "Are my fingers distracting you or something?" You pushed at her shoulders but she didn't back away. "What?" she asked again, dragging out the word. "Were they cold?"

"You're an asshole." All you can do is laugh it off. She's too aware of your thoughts, anyway. What's the point in vocalizing them?

"Yeah," Kate shucked off her boots and holster, "but you like me."

"And I'm regretting ever inviting you out that night." You sat at your desk underneath your bed while she remained getting unready for the night. By the way she's searching through the drawer you dedicated for her in your dressser, you guessed that she was spending the night.

"Daw, you mean the night you invited me to go to the bar with you and your friends and they ultimately thought we were girlfriends?" You huffed in your chair as she continued, now facing your with her clothes in her hands. "You mean the night I saved face by telling them that I was the luckiest girl in the world and I covered our first round of drinks and your friends continued to gush on and on about how much you talk about me, how much you like me, and how many times you would bring me up at sleepovers?"

You opened your mouth to retaliate, but the words weren't forming. At least, for you anyway. Kate seemed to find herself a second wind.

"You mean the night that ended with me kissing your cheek in front of your friends, again to save face and I asked you if it was okay, to which," she was grinning now, "you said yes to, but then, when everyone went home and we walked back to your place together, you got all awkward and avoidant and didn't speak to me for a few weeks before I showed up at that very fire escape and told you that we needed to talk?"

Your face was hot, fingers and palms sweaty, and your clothed feet crossed at the ankle and pushed against each other in a terrible attempt to distract yourself from your fast beating heart. "I wouldn't say it in many words, but yes," you finally managed to get out, "that night. Must you bring up that awkward break every time?"

She snorted. "Yup." She had already changed into her pajamas. You don't remember seeing her change into them. "I have to bring it up every time because I will always remember that night. I was having fun playing your girlfriend. You know, the hand holding, the kissing of cheeks, the avoidant glances.

"You tried so hard not to look at me all night, but with the temporary title of being your girlfriend, I knew I could get it back. Not command it per se because you're your own person, fake girlfriend or not, but being the only person in the room you wanted to look at but refused to? I don't know, man. It struck me with something."

You opened your mouth to interrupt her, but she continued with her rambling. "And I remember being so ready to tell you, 'Hey, dude. Really liked the whole fake relationship thing we had going on, wanna do it for real?' but you were chicken," she gave you a teasing glare through her monologue. "And quickly stated that you didn't want tonight to go this way and while you do have a crush on me, you didn't want me to know. You decided that I was weirded out for me without letting me actually tell you how I felt about it," she laughed.

You shook your head up at her, an embarrassed smile playing on your lips as your fingers fidgeted with the arm rest of your desk chair. "Why didn't you stop me?"

"You think I could've?" she guffawed. You snickered after.

"Fair point."

"I just knew I had to give you your space. Let you process your feelings and come back to me when you were ready."

Now it was your turn to guffaw. "When I was ready?"

"Okay, you took too long to get ready!" she claimed with the wild wave of her arms. "It was nearing a month without my best friend and I wanted you back, however way you'll have me, so I went to your place and we talked about it. Granted, you said you didn't have a crush on me anymore. Ouch, by the way," she narrowed her eyes. You gave her an inncocent shrug. "But when I kept catching you staring at me or doting on me after I had the tinest of scrapes on my face, I knew it wasn't gone. And thank God because mine didn't go away either."

With her leaning against the lower support bar of your bed, you stared up at her with your mouth agape.

She was standing here, wearing a random gray, oversized t-shirt and neon freaking orange shorts, confessing that she still liked you, even after all that, like the statement itself didn't turn your whole world upside down and on its opposing axis.

"I'm sorry... what?"

"Yeah, you dork!" Kate laughed. She pushed two fingers to your forehead, your chair rocking and then doing a full 360º after. "I've liked you since before then, after, and now. Why do you think I flirt with you all the time? Try and make you flustered and put my hand on your thigh when we're riding the trains together?"

"I thought you were messing with me, honestly. I thought you found my crush on you funny," you confessed, facing her again. She shrugged, a cheeky smile on her lips but it was replaced with a bark of laughter when you swatted her arm. Again.

"Hear me out, hear me out!" It was too late. You weren't hearing her out, and she was trying to scurry past you to flee your room. Unluckily for her, to get from underneath your bed, she had to walk past your desk.

Brisk legs speeding past, you leaped from your chair and tackled her to the ground. "What the hell, Kate? That's so mean!"

She could only laugh from under you. She moved and shuffled around with your body on the back of hers, grunts crossmixed with laughter steadily hurling out of her. "It's not mean if you just let me explain!"

She found the strength in her body to whip herself around. You were straddling her, knees bent at her hips and feet hooked under her legs. She was panting from her previous struggle, and you were glaring at her like she had offered you the last cookie, and as soon as you took a bite, she told you she had licked it. All of it.

Which actually happened once. Just not with a cookie, fruit.

Safe to say, Kate's still recovering from the wrath you served her.

You didn't need to talk for her to know that she had a limited amount of time to explain before this pinning became a full-on wrestling match.

"Okay, I didn't find your crush on me funny. I found you trying to hide your feelings from me funny. Like–" she held out her hand to stop you from talking, "like literally days after we started talking again, you wouldn't stop staring me down in the mirror as we got ready to go out with your friends. Similar to that night, you wouldn't stop staring at me, and when your friends said something about us, you avoided my gaze again. You're my best friend. You have signs and tells that I know about that you're not even aware of!"

You opened your mouth again to talk, but she shook her hand for you to stay quiet. "So, after that, and telling your friends the truth about us later and asking around, my suspicion of your crush was proven true, so I flirted wth you. And not because I wanted to mess with your head or take advantage of your feelings, but because I wanted you to finally get the hint that I liked you back."

You sighed, removing your weight from her body to sit by her legs. "Why didn't you say anything?"

Sitting up, she chewed on her bottom lip. "I thought you would get it eventually. I damn near did everything but kiss you on the lips."

"Well, sorry. I thought it was all a joke."

"Why would I ever joke about your feelings?" Kate grabbed your hands. They weren't cold. They were warm and similar to yours; they were clammy too. You should be grossed out by that, but instead, you were comforted. She was just as nervous as she made you. "Seriously. If someone ever messes with your feelings and head like that, you have full permission to swing on them and report them to the authorities."

"Oh, yeah," you laughed loudly. "Because the police are gonna care that some girl found out I have a crush on her, and she's using that to her advantage, so they're gonna arrest her."

"No, not them!" She let go of your hands, matching your laugh. "Me! Report to me."

"And what if this girl were you? What then, hm?"

"I would never," she held up a finger, lips twisted in lighthearted disgust. "But if I did, you should still tell me and then kick my ass. I deserve it."

You shared another laugh, bellowing out together and wrapping your arms around each other as you rested back on the floor.

The rest of the night consisted of movies and cuddles, nothing out of your best friend norm, but there was a significant weight that was lfited off both of your chests. And this time, instead of both of you aching to grab the other's hands under the covers, you do.

No stolen glances needed.

WC: 2,749

Ghost didn't have to do much to make you smile. Hell, she rarely did anything at all.

Sometimes, watching her jab Walker verbally or physically did the trick. Or walking in the common room to find her reading a book on the couch instead of her room, where she swore she would be all the time.

Your favorite is when she joined you all for breakfast. She usually didn't talk, deeming the early morning her "out-of-office hours to use her vocal cords", but for you to deem breakfast enjoyable, she didn't have to.

You admired how she would sit in silence and eat, and how her eyes would dart between whoever was taking the lead in the conversation.

She wouldn't admit to this, of course, she wouldn't—you guys were barely a team for six months—but you would even catch the corners of her mouth upturn into a smile whenever Yelena made a joke at Walker's expense or when Bucky came in either disheveled from a curious night out or Bob with his gracious attitude of still being made a plate despite not being a part of the team.

He was. Everyone knew he was. Why he never felt that way was going to have to be a late-night conversation with ambient lighting on blue with green swirls and sad music playing on the speaker; all while lying on the floor in starfish.

"Oh, my god," Walker grumbled as he sat in the seat next to you. "Stop staring. You look like a stalker."

Your eyes narrowed on his figure, fingers tightening around your utensil. "Excuse me?"

Walker used the side of his fork to cut his pancakes. Protein pancakes, packed with fiber and a whole bunch of BS. "I said, 'stop staring'. What, are you deaf too?" Shoving the piece he cut into his mouth, your ears rang in what you weren't sure was rage, annoyance, or embarrassment. He was lucky he finally knew how to talk at a decent volume; everyone else in the kitchen would've heard him.

"That's incredibly dense of you to say, Walker," you seethed, "and I wasn't staring. I was chewing. Eating like a human, unlike you, who eats like a barbarian."

"A barbarian is a human, dumbass."

"Whoa, whoa," laughed the blonde who cut in before you could get a word. Yelena sat herself at the table across from you and Walker. "What? Is it not too early for you two to start with the shenanigans? Jesus, the sun's barely up."

The two of you simultaneously rolled your eyes. You shoved your respective utensils into your meals and scarfed down the food.

You hated Walker, and not just for the obvious reasons.

One day, the failed Captain of America caught you mid-admiration for Ava, and he would never let you hear the end of it.

She was patching herself up, sitting on a curb with cuts on her bottom lip and blood oozing from her hand. The paramedics were there, but she didn't want their help. She was determined to stop the bleeding and wrap herself up.

You were leaning against the side of the ambulance, a few feet away from Ava, with a pounding head and aching ribs. But despite the pain, there was nothing else you could do but wait your turn to be seen, and so, with her on the curb, you against the truck, she was in your line of vision, and you weren't complaining.

That was, until Walker came around with his loud ass mouth, asking why you were staring at Ava. She caught your gaze, you looked away, but Walker continued to persist.

"I may be dense, but I'm not stupid,"—you begged to differ—he claimed after you pulled him aside for definitely no reason.

After that, Walker's been stupidly observant. He's caught you every time you looked at her and made faces of disgust or gave you knowing, teasing glances.

"You should really do something about your obvious, annoying crush you have on Ava," he told you one random night. It was your turn to do the dishes after dinner, and he, the gracious chef, refused to leave the kitchen until you finished. He claimed it was because he was still eating; you knew he stayed because he wanted to talk to you.

Unfortunately.

"I don't have a crush on her," you stated as you scrubbed a plate.

He scoffed, fork picking around the green beans he made. "Yeah, okay. Tell that to the gross puppy eyes you give her every time she talks to you during a mission. Honestly, it's disgusting the way you look at her, and it's not doing us any favors with you distracted by whatever the hell you see in her."

"Wait," your scrubbing hands take a pause, "that's why you always look at me like that? Because you don't like that I'm getting distracted, and not because I like a girl?"

"What? No. Jesus! I'm a questionable person, sure, but I'm not a homophobe." With a scoff from his mouth, he picked up his plate and moved to the trash. "God, what do you take me for?"

"A pain in my ass." But you said that in your head.

Since that night, you and Walker were less than subtle with the newfound secret you shared.

You were hitting him more than usual. He would find himself gravitating towards you naturally, just to better his chances of calling you out when you stared again.

The others took notice and man, were they weirded out, but something in Bucky told them it was nothing to worry about. Something in Ava knew that was the exact case.

Your longing, your puppy eyes, your obvious gawking and glances at her, she knew of them. She could see you out of the corner of her eye. She would always see your figure mirroring hers or angled towards her.

They say the eyes don't lie and Ava knows that the body doesn't either.

If she was creeped out by your staring, hidden advances, she would've cut that shit in the bud ASAP. But, she wasn't.

Something tingly in her chest arose when you would look at her. She would get that urge to flee, disappear into the abyss, but if she did that, then you would know that she knew about your glances.

You would get embarrassed. Too humiliated to show your face at breakfast or look at her with those sparkling eyes every time she gave a command or talked to you about anything. She didn't want to lose that, and no matter how many times her brain said she shouldn't care—shouldn't involve herself, she didn't want to lose you.

Ava didn't know what her feelings for you meant. If that's what she could call them anyway.

Having crushes, a romantic other, those things weren't typical for her. She didn't know how to act so she didn't.

When you stared, she focused her eyes elsewhere and busied her hands. When you would talk about her vaguely with Walker, she would pretend not to hear but eavesdrop nevertheless.

She would sit in the common room when it's empty and pray it would remain that way until you came in.

You never spoke to each other during. She would sit on one end of the couch and you on the other. She would read, you would watch the TV on low or scroll through your phone if you weren't reading too.

Most times, Bob came and joined you two. He would sit in his chair on the far side of the room and after some coaxing from you and polite glances from her, he would eventually sit himself on a chair closer to the couch.

You and Bob would often talk. Talk about what, she really had no clue, but you would talk and talk, and while it should bother her that you two are talking while she's trying to read, she came out here to be beside you and hear your voice anyway. It would be hypocritical.

She loved hearing you and Bob talk about whatever interests occupied your minds. She loved peeking up from her book to see you talk so animatedly with your hands and body like it was an art. Sometimes, she would catch herself smiling and she would immediately shove her focus back into the book.

Now, when Ava went to the empty common room, she expected you and Bob to be there shortly after.

With all the time you spent taking stolen glances at her, she thought you would catch her taking some of you, but you never did.

She preferred it that way.

You don't want to know the true her. The person she really was under her black suit or black and grey loungewear. You weren't ready for the flaws, the exhaustion, the days that felt like years, the mornings that took her hours to roll out of bed; she didn't want you to see that.

She put up a front, not to protect herself, but to protect you, too.

Did it hurt her to go stone-faced when she felt your eyes on her, to pretend the fleeing feelings didn't exist and it was all in her head? Maybe. But it was better this way. It was safer.

And one day, you'll be thankful for it.

Sat in her pjs and on the couch, Zoey continued to laugh as the liquid in the bright pink can in her hand fizzled and settled. “What were you expecting me to do?” she asked her older members. “Take a swig of this soda and not—“ The violent sound of Mira ripping one herself interrupted the start of Zoey’s lame excuse.

Rumi gasped from beside the taller girl, sat crisscross on the floor herself but not surprised.

A sly smirk played at the corner of Mira’s mouth. She shrugged, indifferent to her noise and Zoey’s previous comment. “ If you’re going to do it, at least do it right. Your burp was lame.”

“It was not!”

“Okay!” Rumi laughed, holding out her hands as if the option would stop them. “We are not about to have a burping contest right now. The penthouse already smells different with all the foods and scents we've got going on.” She gestured to the coffee table and then the counter in the kitchen.

Both surfaces were covered with various instant ramen noodle bowls, plastic wrappers from convenience store goods—both savory and sweet—, many empty bowls of microwaveable rice, and, special for the coffee table, two large, halfway-eaten bowls of popcorn.

As for the kitchen counter, four candles of various note scents were lit or were under the candle warmers thanks to Mira’s comment of the place smelling like popcorn kernels, gochujang cupcakes, and burnt spaghetti sauce, thanks to Rumi exploding a package of instant spaghetti from the states.

Zoey said to remove the lid and add a paper towel on top but what she didn’t provide was the time appropriate to use when using her method.

The red sauce exploded everywhere.

“Again, not my fault!” Zoey claimed.

Mira snickered, grabbing a tiny cookie from the opened plastic container Rumi and Zoey just had to get because tinier food is cuter.

… it is but she won’t tell them that.

“It’s partly your fault. If you’re going to give us your tried and true methods on foods you used to eat in your childhood, you shouldn’t leave anything out. Especially when the queen of overheating is cooking it.” Mira gave a pointed half-glare to Rumi. Her narrowed eyes of judgment held just as much warmth as her teasing lips.

Rumi scoffed, the soft glow of her patterns underneath her hoodie glowing brighter. She also reached for a tiny cookie, the satisfying crunch of the pastry settling her rising embarrassment. “It’s not my fault either. The instructions were on the lid Zoey told me to throw away. This was my first time cooking that— how was I supposed to know where the instructions were and what not to do and what not to listen to in regards to Zoey’s advice?”

“Because you’re supposed to read the instructions beforehand, Rumi!” laughed Mira. Rumi only shook her head beside her with her cheeks puffed up and her lips pressed into a tight, thin line. “That’s what you’re supposed to do any time you cook something new. Read the instructions, keep the instructions. Refer to them as you’re cooking the food, refer to them as the food is cooling; that’s common knowledge.”

“Actually,” chimed Zoey from the couch, who was sprinkling crushed-up and dry instant ramen noodles into her mouth, “that sounds like the Mira-Way. Exact tee when cooking, go with the flow, and hope for the best in every other aspect.”

“No,” countered Mira with an accusatory finger. “That sounds like the Zoey Way.”

“Pah-lease! I make plans. I have a whole notebook of plans!”

“Which you then disregard when your planned plan doesn’t go exactly as planned,” Rumi teased with a mutter, stealing a few more of those tiny cookies because wow. They are really good and are the kind of cookies that don’t get stuck in the divots on your teeth because of their crunchiness.

Zoey scoffed. She turned her back to Rumi and Mira, who only watched with amused eyes and snacks in their hands. Zoey huffed. Then she “hmph”ed. Then she crossed her arms over her chest like a dramatic ten-year-old before showing her bare face back to the girls. “You guys are mean.”

“Mhm.” Mira patted her upper thigh, to which Zoey crawled off the couch and finally sat with Mira and Rumi on the floor, by the edge of the couch instead.

Zoey settled herself against the short edge of the L-shaped part of the couch, her back to the cushion and her legs over Mira’s lap. She held out a cupped palm to Rumi, who was about to sprinkle a couple of cookies into her hand, but Mira blocked her off with a bladed hand. “No.”

“What?” Zoey pouted up at her in protest.

“No. You’re not going to get cookies after you just called us mean.” Mira didn’t give her another glance. She grabbed her own soda that was previously forgotten on the other side of her body and took a quiet sip.

Zoey’s eyes caught Rumi’s puzzled gaze. Her mouth was ajar from randomly being stopped, but her eyes were searching Mira for a sign of teasing, mischief, pulling Zoey’s leg just to see her squirm, but when she couldn’t find any, her eyes found Zoey’s.

Rumi shrugged meekly from Mira’s opposite and plopped cookies slowly in her mouth, as if eating some could get her in trouble, too.

“Plus,” Mira added a satisfactory sigh as the cool liquid went down her throat. “I told you to sit in my lap, and you’re sitting next to me. What am I supposed to make out of that, hm?”

The muscle pumping in Zoey’s chest stopped when Mira’s honey-brown eyes met hers. Mira’s gaze held a seriousness in them, not the one she would use when she gave her playful deadpan remarks or the one she used during practice when a move wasn’t manifesting in the way she wanted it to. This gaze was different.

This gaze told Zoey that Mira could smell her nerves coming off her split-colored pjs. This gaze told Zoey that whatever lie or excuse she mustered, Mira could call her out on it.

A single twitch of Zoey’s arm told Mira what she wanted to know; if she was successful in her teasing, it would knock Zoey down a few pegs and get her to someplace calmer. A place she could hold and foster her.

Not because Zoey was too much, she could never be, but because Mira really wanted to hold Zoey as the day began to fade outside their windows while the three of them were in their comfy pajamas. Of course, Mira couldn’t admit that out loud, not out of the blue, when Zoey and Rumi were off giggling over failed Just Dance levels and singing random English songs.

She could only ask and give her request when the mood was right, and as it turns out, if she didn’t create the mood herself, she was never going to get the opportunity to. That was driving her mad.

A coy smile broke Mira’s poker face, and the two girls beside her could swear they heard a quiet giggle from her, too. “I’m kidding,” laughed Mira. “But seriously. Come here.” She pulled Zoey onto her lap so now the smaller one was resting against her chest, and her feet dangled onto Rumi’s legs. “You too.” Mira didn’t give Rumi a chance to respond or react before she wrapped her arms around her shoulders and pulled her flush to her side.

With the girls invading Mira’s space, as they now suspected what she wanted all along. Mira grinned and nudged her head towards Zoey. “You can give her some cookies now.”

A chuckle rippled out of Rumi. She shook her head as she grabbed the tub of mini cookies and held them out in Zoey’s direction, internally deciding the cookies in her palms were too warm and maybe a little damp from anticipating Mira’s next move earlier. “You’re a piece of work, Mir.”

“What?” She laughed. Zoey grumbled from her lap, taking a few cookies and eating them. “Why? Because I like to mess with you guys?”

“No,” Rumi responded with a few floating chuckles, “because you think you have to mess with us and walk around a suspiciously placed bush to get what you want.” Rumi didn’t have to see Mira’s face to see the slight falter in her cocky facade, the sudden tightness of her lips, and the way her fingers played with the waistband of Zoey’s pants. Rumi often didn’t need to look at her girls to know their reactions or to gauge what they’re feeling or thinking; she just knew.

When she mentioned this “skill” of hers in an interview, the fanbase described her behavior as just being a leader or having “leader” duties, and while that may be some of it, it wasn’t all of the reasons.

Rumi loves her girls, way more than she thought she did at least six months ago. She watched them because she wanted to get to know them, to see what made them tick or what made them smile to themselves. She wanted to know how they acted when they thought no one was watching.

She could see the slightest change in the glossiness of Zoey’s eyes and knew that meant she was upset with something she wasn’t allowing herself to feel at the moment. She could tell when the middle of Mira’s eyebrows creased that she was either in deep thought or couldn’t fathom the new information given to her or revealed in her head.

Rumi knew the girls and their hidden behaviors so well, she almost forgot she had hidden behaviors too. She wasn’t aware of the girls watching her when she thought no one was, until a few months ago. But that’s a different revealing and unpacking of emotions for another time.

“If you want us close to you and you want to cuddle or something, you can just say that,” Rumi continued as she placed the container of cookies back on the table. “You don’t have to wait for the right time or convey your need in a joke because that’s when you think we’ll be the most receptive.”

Mira scoffed in quiet amusement, her eyes flickering to anywhere but Rumi’s and Zoey’s eyes—even if Zoey is looking up at her with those dark brown eyes and cheeks so full of cookies. Her heart clenched to not witness the sight. “That’s rich coming from you, Rumi.”

“Oh, why?” She hummed, resting back on her palms with a smirk she’s not trying too hard to hide. “Because I did the same? Yeah, so I’ve struggled with saying things at certain times and want things to be perfect when I’m revealing information, but if last year taught me anything, it taught me that there’s no perfect time and to say what I want so, yeah,” she hummed again, eyebrows raised in a sweet challenge as Mira’s eyes locked onto hers. “Maybe it is rich coming from me, but at least I’ve grown from it. I can say, ‘Zoey, I want some cuddles. Come sit on my lap'.” She held out an arm for Zoey, her lackluster effort of hiding her smirk forgotten as the younger one with crumbs on her face lit up at the demand.

Zoey’s eyes sparkled between Rumi and Mira, an amusement only Zoey can foster as she watched the two girls go into a playful toe-to-toe together. And an additional plus, Rumi was winning. She could tell by the twisted, flustered purse on Mira’s lips and the warmth growing on her cheeks that she was trying so hard not to show by pulling her shoulders to her ears.

Zoey crawled out of Mira’s lap and sat on Rumi’s with a mischievous chuckle that one would describe as “gremlin-like”.

“See?” Satisfied, Rumi patted Zoey’s thigh twice. “I just asked, and look, Mir. She’s right here. On my lap.”

Curses ran through Mira’s mind as Zoey snuggled up to Rumi, giggles flowing through her like water, and Rumi holding her like she’s her everything, which she is, but the smug look in Rumi’s eyes, the eye contact she refused to break, stirred something dark and competitive.

Smug Rumi wasn’t a rare sight to see. She’s often found in variety shows while they’re doing games, in the shadows of demon-hunting, and seen on her face when she tells the demons how everything’s going to go down if they’re the talkative type. However, Smug Rumi during romance, that’s a sight Mira’s not exactly used to .

Rumi’s still figuring out her role with the girls in a romantic sense. Heck, they all are. At first, Mira and Zoey took the lead in instigating romantic movements or conversations like handholding and asking each other out on dates, but now that it’s been at least six months, their prior roles are evolving, changing. Changing into different dynamics that haven’t yet been explored. At least, until now.

Zoey, ever the lover of romantic tension and wanting to see what happens next without intervention, felt the need to intervene. Maybe it was a part of her that didn’t want this playful banter to turn into an actual argument or maybe it was the sort-of welcomed uneasiness stirring within her since she seemed to be the topic of conversation, but she didn’t want this conversation to go to a place neither of them had explored or felt comfortable exploring yet.

Mira’s scowl, something that wasn’t exactly angry or pleased, ticked off her need.

“Hey,” Zoey gave a lighthearted chuckle. “I know where we can put this energy. We can put it into a game of Twister!”

Rumi shrugged, smug smirk nestled into a smile on her face. “That sounds okay with me.” Her gaze remained unchanged from Mira’s.

“I’m not moving,” seethed Mira. Her face grew uncomfortably warm, she wanted to peel the skin off her face and replace it with a more stoic, cool expression, but in trying to do so would confirm that Rumi got—was—getting under her skin. She wasn’t. She couldn’t. Not in this way.

“Daw,” Rumi playfully mocked Mira with a feigned pout. “Why not? Afraid I’ll win?”

Zoey rose a brow. Win? Was there anything to win at this point or did she miss something? Or was this her girlfriends’ twisted way of exhibiting tension because one of them(Mira) had difficulty saying what she wanted, and the other(Rumi) wanted her to, yet the first one(Mira) refused to prove anyone right, even if it meant falling on her butt like a fool in the process?

“Of course not,” Mira replied. Her effort to save face was being betrayed by the bright pink on the top of her cheekbones. “I don’t feel like moving.”

“Oh, really?” Rumi wrapped her arm around Zoey’s waist, pulling her up higher on her lap while Rumi sat up herself. Zoey turned around so her back was pressed to Rumi’s chest, an accidental but grateful new seating position to admire the view of a blushing Mira. “Then what do you want to do, Mira? You can use your words this time. Tell us what you’re truly feeling, and I promise we can grant it for you.” Rumi’s tone, at first, was complacent and teasing, like the hare poking fun at the tortoise, but as her sentence continued, her voice and eyes softened. She wanted Mira to express herself in any way she could. She wanted her to know that she and Zoey were a safe place to express vulnerable needs and wants, just like they did with her last year and earlier this year.

Mira hated it yet couldn’t help but be thankful for it all at the same time.

With her sweaty palms rubbed against the thighs of her fuzzy pajama pants, the same pants she didn’t want to put on earlier, yet is thankful for in this moment, she took a stilling breath. “Okay.” The sound of her quiet voice somehow drowned out the sound of the growing nightlife below them, the breaths of the two girls beside Mira even quieter as if they were afraid their own noise would startle her into silence. “I would like us to…”

Zoey and Rumi sat straighter in their seats, leaning forward to hear what their beautiful visual had to say.

“…I would like for us to cuddle, maybe. Have a cuddle pile sort of thing,” Mira admitted, palms rubbing over her clothed knees. “I don’t know why I do— okay, that’s a lie. I know why I do, but I’m embarrassed to say it.”

Zoey found herself crawling off of Rumi’s lap, the other girl removing her arm around her for a more seamless transition. “Mira.” Zoey’s hand found her arm and rubbed her fingers over the smooth fabric. A sensory win for her, a comforting win for Mira. “You don’t have to be embarrassed about anything. We’re here for you, no matter how silly you think your reason may be. Remember when you caught me crying on the balcony and you were scared something bad had happened?” The other stifled a nod, Zoey continued. “Well, nothing bad happened, remember? I was crying over this kid laughing over oranges in the grocery store, and even after teasing me, you didn’t call the reason I was crying stupid. You comforted me and helped me through it either way. That’s what we’re going to do for you.”

It was hard to have walls up around Zoey and Rumi when they have the ability to tear them down faster than they were put up. They both have that skill; they all do for each other. No secrets yet, still respecting privacy and knowing each other deep and long enough to know when a secret has to come out for the greater good of the secret holder.

Mira guessed that was her role at the moment: Secret Holder. Although withholding the reason why you want to cuddle your girlfriends as the sun goes down, watching some sappy drama isn’t exactly a secret. More so, an unfulfilled wish that the girls are trying so desperately to fulfill. Plus, if Mira looked at it this way, revealing the why behind what she wants now may help her in the future when she gets into another of her withdrawn, or dare she even say shy, moods. It could get easier with time… maybe.

Rumi joined Zoey on Mira’s opposite side, also using her hand to help her coax through. “Okay,” Mira stated once more. She moved her hands from her knees to theirs, a deep breath releasing itself from the bottom of her belly. “I want us to cuddle because I miss you guys”—she held up her hands before the two could interject questions on “how she could miss them if they’re right here”—“I miss prolixity and the innocent touches and skinship. We haven’t had that in a while and it’s not like us. Zoey’s always clinging onto our arms and Rumi, you’re always searching for our hands when we’re sat together alone, but with our schedules, we haven’t been alone, just us three, in a good while.”

Zoey nodded, her hand crawling up to Mira’s shoulder to give her a reassuring squeeze. “See, that wasn’t stupid at all. I’ve noticed the physical distance between us, too,” she admitted, chin now resting on Mira’s shoulder instead. “That’s why I was so excited tonight about our sleepover. We missed it a few times this month, and even when we did have that impromptu one two Thursdays ago, we all went to our own rooms before the sun went down! I mean, that’s not us. We stay up so late that not even trademarked Leader Rumi can guide us back to normalcy.”

Rumi let out a low snicker. Mira can’t tell when, but Rumi had mirrored Zoey’s positioning and had her chin on her shoulder too. “Delirious Zoey and Mira are quite hard to rein in on a good trademark Leader Rumi day, but you throw in my own deliriousness? Yeah, it’s not a pretty picture.” Mira had found an easiness in her body. A snicker of her own helped release the self-inflicted tension.

“Yeah, she’s like a drunken pirate.”

“I am not!”

Zoey laughed. “Drunken or not, going to bed before 7 isn’t like us on the days we reserve to hang out with each other. I missed us, too, Mira, and I’m sorry I didn’t say anything about it earlier. I didn’t have the words.” A soft, slightly crumby kiss was placed on Mira’s cool cheek and sent butterflies to her stomach. Rumi did the same with an apologetic hum, both hands giving squeezes to her shoulder.

“So, cuddle-bug,” Rumi couldn’t help but tease and ignore the grumble that came her way, “where do you want us to cuddle-pile at?”

“Couch.” Mira stood, dragging her girlfriends by the wrist. “Duh.”

Mira plopped herself in the middle. She didn’t give the two a chance to think or ask any questions about positioning before she pulled them directly on her, Zoey on her right and Rumi on her left. “Get the blankets,” she told Zoey, her head making a pointed nod to the two throw blankets crumpled by her feet. “And could you get the remote?” Mira asked Rumi. Both obliged, getting their respective items for the girl who wanted all the body heat and weight a human could possibly withstand on her.

With the drama selected and blankets pulled over bodies, Mira laid down. Zoey did too, Mira’s head resting on the top of her hip which caused Rumi to do the same with her head on Mira’s hip. In a sense, one would describe them as a cuddle train, not necessarily a cuddle pile, but the couch wasn’t big enough, and again, neither of them felt like taking the dreaded walk down the hall and into the closest room.

“Hey, look,” Rumi’s head turned towards the glass-paned wall. The sun had completely set behind the skyline of Seoul and leaving behind thick, rugged ribbons of dark blue clouds across the graying sky. “It’s past sundown and we’re still here.” Her lips spread into a warm smile that brightened up her cheeks and eyes, the growing dimness of the living room softening her features.

“Yeah,” Zoey decided to add, “on the couch. Watching a drama.”

“In a cuddle pile no less,” Mira hummed in content. She reached over to kiss the top of Zoey’s head before bending down to kiss the top of Rumi’s head. “Thanks, guys.”

“For what?” chimed Zoey.

“For the cuddle pile. For helping me say what I needed to say.”

“Oh, Mira.” The girl could hear the confidently sly smile from Rumi, “That was going to happen anyway. Both the cuddle pile and you learning how to say exactly what you want when you want it.”

Normally, Mira would say something snarky back. Ask a few questions about her plan, reasoning, and the motive, but right now, she didn’t care. In the end, all three of them got what they wanted: to be open with another, to have a cuddle pile, to stay together at least until after sundown. Although the three of them were sure they weren’t going to find the energy to get off the couch. Not after seeing Zoey struggle to keep her eyes open.

And so, Mira gave Rumi a respectful flick on her ear and bit back a grin when the other exclaimed in pain.

This is what she missed: holding her girls so tightly, there was no denying that they were hers and she was theirs.

– Exhibit A: "OMIGOSH DID YOU SEE THAT NEW VIDEO ABOUT THE PUPPIES BEING BEST FRIENDS WITH THAT PENGUIN?!?/9@ HOW CUTEEE" "i am so tired. did you knows thaght 10pm in this country is the buttcracjm of dawn in Korea? yeah... I DIDN'T." "HELPMEMIRAANDRUMIARETRYINGTOKEEPMEAWAKESOWECANFINISHSHOOTINGBUTALLIWANNADOISRESTTTTT SAVE MEEE"

– Oh yeah, Mira and Rumi know about you too.

– How couldn't they? Zoey never shuts up about you.

– "Oh, yeah! Me and my best friend tried this shop once. The drinks are sooo good but we got kicked out one time for laughing so hard that my coffee shot out my nose."

– Mira and Rumi aren't jealous of your relationship because tbh, why would they be? Yeah, they're bandmates and yeah, they're close enough to consider each other best friends too, but what you have with Zoey is special. Sometimes... maybe a little too special.

– When they first heard about you, the girls were convinced Zoey was dating someone because she only mentioned your name and not your relationship status when she was going out. It was always, "Bye! Gonna hang out with ___!" "Gonna get drinks with ___!" "Gonna go shopping with ___!"

– One time, they even sat Zoey down to talk about your relationship. Not because they're concerned... no. but because they're nosey and if there's an opportunity to tease their maknae, they're going to take up that chance.

– Zoey clears up your relationship ASAP. Stating you're only friends and have been for a while. You're more like siblings or cousins if anything.

– They still have some suspicious eyes(Mira) but they let her off the hook nonetheless

– Being Zoey's best friend obviously means you get backstage passes when you want to support her concerts.

– You're always in the wings, dancing alongside her group with Bobby, and taking backstage content if she isn't already for her group's Youtube channel.

– If you're okay with being posted on socials, and not minding having a few fans of your own, Huntr/x fans eat your interactions with Zoey UP.

– Anytime you're in her vlogs or seen in the background, they scream about ___ and Zoey crumbs in the comments or how they're being fed with this content or how they adore your friendship.

– They even follow your socials to support you. You have your own fanbase and it's cute since they keep it respectful and don't ask where Zoey is all the time when you post without her.

– If you don't want to be shown on social media, your face is blurred out in videos if you're in the background, only your hand or arm is shown in photos with Zoey, or you blatantly have an emoji on your face in photos.

– Some fans speculate who you are, friend or family to Zoey, or maybe even more.

– Just like how fans of the Saja Boys eat up the literal mystery behind Mystery, they eat yours up too. You're the "Mystery" of Huntr/x if you will.

– Zoey finds that thought a little disturbing since she's had a crush on Mystery and not you and oh, because he's a literal DEMON she had to slay but, y'know kpop stans and their theories.

– Also, if you thought you could be Zoey's best friend and avoid having a sleepover with her, you are sadly mistaken my guy.

– Zoey thrives off sleepovers. In fact, if she didn't have the spiritual ability to see demons and protect her country from them, she would say her superpower is having and hosting sleepovers because she's never had a bad one and they "fuel her energy".

– Whether the sleepover be at your place or hers, she always has the best snacks. Even if you're a foodie yourself, she always outdoes you with creative snacks and ideas.

– She once made chewy caramel and chocolate-covered mini pretzels with roasted marshmallows for a sleepover. Just to have "something to chew on" while you watched movies. Like popcorn isn't widely available for purchase.

– You guys talk about everything under the Honmoon when you have sleepovers. From work, to changes in your day-to-day life, to your past memories together, and even to romance if you're into stuff like that.

– If you have a crush, personal or celebrity, Zoey is always down to wingwoman you or to tease you about how much you "light up" when you talk about them. All so you can shove her and tell her to shut up because Zoey is Number One Ragebaiter™.

– When Zoey has a crush, either one on Mystery or some random person(or even Rumi or Mira or BOTH(yes im a ploytrix fan. im gay, what do you expect from me?)), you're ragebaiting her right back.

– You'll tease her worse than she's teased you. Making kissy faces, telling her "oh, totally don't think about them holding you all night long and kissing your cheek then" just to see her face grow ten shades of pink, and if it's the girls she has a crush on, you'll make googly eyes at her when they're around only for her to tackle you and playfully wrestle you until you apologize for messing with her.

– You never do. Even when the girls are looking weird in your direction and wondering why the heck Zoey just tackled you to the ground in the kitchen, you never back down.

– Okay, that's all I have for now! Let me know in the comments if you guys want more or want to see more headcanons with Zoey or the girls!

You peered into the cupboard, the white shelves filled from ceiling to floor with all kinds of snacks. You had your classic chips, your wacky flavored chips, sweet treats, healthy treats, all the cereal you could imagine, and some Trader Joe's specials Wanda liked to dabble in from time to time.

What that woman finds in that store is amazing. You were always asking for her snacks whenever she came walking by eating.

At the top shelf resided your favorite snack of all, your secret pleasure, Zoom O's. They were bite-sized pockets of goodness that had a sweet yet not overwhelming taste to them, with the perfect amount of salt to combat the sweetness. The texture, at first, has a satisfying crunch from the thin icing layer before it turns into chewy goodness.

You had no clue where the Avengers found this snack. You tried every store within a 100-mile radius and even checked online but you haven't had any luck. Given the box's slim yet geometric design with a futuristic blue color and flashy font, you could guess that this snack wasn't found on this world. Or maybe even, this universe.

Turning to the door where there was typically a step-ladder to reach the highest shelf, you found yourself staring at a blank wall instead. Your brows furrow in confusion as you search the pantry and even close the door to see if the step-ladder was on the other side but to no avail.

Where was this step-ladder, and why wasn't it in its rightful spot?

You could stand here and blame every single person that resides in the Compound for not putting the item back where it belongs, or you could take the initiative and do some out-of-the-box thinking.

You nod to yourself, a short smile on your lips.

Yeah. You were gonna do some out-of-the-box thinking.

The shelves are sturdy enough to withstand the weight of a god and the strength of a genetically modified green monster; it could definitely take your weight.

Your socked feet find the lip of the bottom shelf as you pull yourself up to grab onto a higher one. You grunt, eyeing the contained snacks by your feet and making sure you weren't touching them. Once your space from the food was as far as you could get it without slipping off, you reached your arm up to the box of Zoom O's only to find that you're still a few inches short.

The back of your throat possesses a grumble before you step onto another shelf and repeat the same steps as before. Currently, you feel as if you are rockclimbing, which wasn't too bad unless you count the lack of harness and mats to be "dangerous", but you're fine!

You're in the Avengers Compound, for Pete's sake, the safest place on Earth!

Reaching your arm once more, you still find yourself a few inches short from the box. The arm gripping onto the small shelf at your chest was screaming from a sort of break from all the muscle tension you were currently possessing.

Come on... Almost... Almost...

The slam of a door a few feet away and the loud arrival of Tony Stark and the others startles you out of your concentration. Your arm and hand finally gives up on keeping you steady on the shelf and your feet slip out from under you, sending you falling back onto the floor way faster than you indented.

You brace yourself for a long fall but because the fall was shorter, you land wrong on your knee and almost end up twisting your ankle. Thank goodness you didn't, otherwise--

The sudden tripping over a plastic jar of jam sends you tumbling into the pantry door. Your only hope to catch yourself is the handle, but you try and stand yourself up, the handle moves and you lose your grip.

You nearly faceplant the floor before using your hands and knees to catch yourself. The only downside to falling hands and knees is that now the palms of your hands sting and the knee, the one that you landed wrong on before, banged against the floor. You groan out in pain, the feeling of hitting your knee familiar to hitting your funny bone.

You could see the bruise now.

This is what you get for trying to sneak snacks from places you weren't supposed to. You should've been an adult and gone to the store like everyone else. It's not your fault the store was at least an hour away from the Compound. You chose to live on campus; that was your issue.

"Whoa!" Scott commented as he entered the kitchen. He wore a blue flannel, regular jeans, and he smelt of regular soap not like must and sweat like the Avengers did when they returned. There's no way he showered that fast. "You okay?"

You pull yourself up to your feet with a hobble, an embarrassed smile at your lips as you try to reassure him. "Yes, I'm fine. Just misstepped. How long have you been here? Did you not go on the mission with the others?"

Your attempt at redirecting the conversation was successful but trying to play off your aching knee and now ankle you swore was blowing up in your sock seemed to be the challenge.

You didn't know that mentioning Scott not being on a mission with the others and him not even knowing about the mission was going to be the cause for a never-ending conversation about his feelings.

You didn't talk to Scott much due to conflicting schedules, but boy. When this man speaks, he speaks. It took Natasha coming into the room with Tony to get him to stop talking.

"Hey, Miniscule Man," Tony called out to him, much to Scott's frown. "Could you not talk my nurse's ear off? Thanks. We need them down in their office, where they should be–" Tony gives you a pointed glare to which you innocently whistle and look away. Natasha chuckles softly at your action before Tony continues, "–to do an after-mission check-up and analysis to make sure none of my guys are hurt."

"Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah." Scott waves Tony off in an apologetic way. "Totally. I was just making sure they were alright and then we started talking and– am I not a part of the team, by the way?" He gestures questioningly towards Tony. The other man only groans in response. "Because I heard that you guys were on a mission and I was like, 'hey, I'm a part of this team too so I should be on the mission', right?"

As Scott continues to ramble on in a conversation Tony can't seem to get away from, Natasha steps over to you with a playful smile on her face. "Come on, My Nurse. Let's get you downstairs and talk about why you're up here in the kitchen and not in your office during hours."

Her voice had a teasing hint in it, her lips trying to suppress a smile but only for Tony's sake. If he wasn't already peeved off from how today's mission went, she wouldn't care about sparing his feelings and making the occasional joke.

You smile warmly at Natasha, your eyes meeting each other's as you both snake away from Tony and Scott and make your way back to your office.

As you two begin your journey down, your girlfriend can't help but notice how you're favoring your right side and trying to keep your face stoic when you're in obvious pain.

She'll mention it to you later, but for now, she wanted to see how far you were going to go in masking your pain.

Just weeks ago, you called her out for doing the very same thing you're doing. She couldn't help but find the irony and humor in this otherwise serious situation.

"So, you gonna talk to me or are you going to let us walk the entire time in silence?" Nat chimed from beside you. "Because I'm perfectly fine with walking in silence. However, you typically ask a lot of questions when we come back from assignments."

You bite the tip of your tongue, both out of embarrassment and suppressed pain. "I do not," you croak.

She raises a brow at the delivery of your sentence but doesn't say anything about it. "Oh, you don't?" She chuckles to herself. "You always ask how it was, if we're okay, if the people are okay, and if anyone needs immediate attention. Actually," Natasha's head tilts in amusement while a snarky smile sits on her face, "I don't seem to remember a time where you didn't ask us questions."

You would be defending yourself and indulging in this witty conversation with her if you couldn't feel your literal knee plate move with each step you make and your ankle pulse.

"Ha ha. You're so funny, Natasha," you dryly express.

Natasha hummed, satisfied with your answer. Out of the corner of her eye, she can your face twist with pain. Her green eyes travel down your legs, more specifically on the leg you're not favoring, and she takes notice of your hand just barely covering the bad knee.

"Okay," Natasha exhales. She stops her movement to look at you with her arms crossed over her chest like a mom. You stop moments after, barely masking the soft hop you had to do to face her. She makes a gesture to your knee. "What did you do?"

"Nothing." You shrug at her. "I didn't do anything."

She scoffs a chuckle, though there was no humor behind the exhale of laughter. "You expect me to believe that? You're limping and holding your knee like a high school football player after a tough game."

You snort. "I don't think that's a fair comparison."

She shrugs. "Doesn't need to be. You're hurt." She steps closer to you, carefully analyzing your legs and how you move as you step—er, hobble—further back.

"Natasha," you mutter, trying to give her actions awareness. Your words fall upon deaf ears. She keeps walking towards you, your proximity threatening to close each time until you hobble backwards. Eventually, she had you backed against the hallway wall. Her eyes remained glued to your legs.

You grunt in slight pain.

Your back pressed against the concrete wall. Your heel and Achilles now throbbing since you scuffed them against the wall as you were backed into it.

"You're hurt." Natasha's voice sliced through the air, her tone firm. Her green eyes flicker up to hers, and while you expected some sort of disappoint in them, you couldn't find that at all. Instead, you found concern and a hint of frustration. "Why would you try to hide that you're hurt?"

You give her a weak shrug. "I didn't think it was anyone's business. It literally just happened a few minutes ago."

Natasha opened her mouth to scold you but decided to listen to your full story before assuming the worst and so, she took a deep breath. "Okay," she strains. "Why didn't you say anything before our walk?"

"Again, I didn't think it was anyone's business. It's just my knee and ankle, okay? I gotta get these evaluations done and then I can tend to my needs if I still need to."

The redhaired woman sighed, pinching the bridge of her nose while the other hand rested on her hip. "Should I remind you that you're a nurse? You, out of all people, should know some things can't be ignored."

"Okay, well, this one thing can. I have a job to do."

You understand Natasha's concern, but you couldn't bring yourself to listen to her statements. You were embarrassed by the way you injured yourself. If someone were to see you icing your knee or walking in somewhere with a wrapped ankle and/or crunches, questions would arise. Questions you really, really didn't want to answer.

Imagine how much of a fool you'd look like telling literal superheroes who survive aliens, falling buildings, and who knows what else that you hurt yourself by trying to get a snack. It was humiliating. Your best bet right now is to ignore the cries of pain your body's making and tend to them later.

After dark.

When everyone, especially your girlfriend, is fast asleep.

"How can you expect to do your job when you literally can't walk?" Natasha retorts. You snort at her, hands on your hips and an interesting smug smile on your face for someone who was in pain mere seconds ago.

"I have a really cool swirly chair."

Natasha deadpanned and met your eye only to find a playful glint in them. The same playful glint you gave her when you made a terrible pun in the examination room the first day you met.

She hated yet loved how your smile made her feel. How she wanted to cup your cheeks or pinch at them teasingly as if she was a grandma. How she wanted to shake her head with a smile she failed to hide, even despite her best efforts. Or how she wanted to place kisses on your cheeks just to make you smile wider.

The training she endured in the Red Room did nothing to prepare her for your smile. Nothing at all.

You know Natasha too well to not notice her own smile trying desperately to break through while she averts her gaze to the side with a snort. The apples of her cheeks puff up just ever so slightly, the beauty mark on her cheekbone making her look cuter than she already was.

"You're a dork," she finally says while letting a smile seep through.

"Yeah, I know. You like it, though."

She can't help the laugh that escapes her. "So," she says, laughter at the end of the word as she crouches down to your knee and applies a gentle pressure around the bone. When you wince, she eases but continues to feel around. "I'm going to ask you again, and I want an actual answer this time. What did you do?"

Her persistence wasn't going to go away. When Natasha Romanoff wants to know something or get something done, she gets it done.

It's an admirable quality until it's used on you.

You groan slightly as she presses a tender part on your knee. She mutters a "sorry" before adjusting so you can sit on the floor with your legs in front of you.

She slowly bends your bad leg and straightens it as she watches you both for an expression of pain and an answer to her question.

"I may or may not have landed wrong when trying to get something. And then tripped, maybe rolled my ankle, and banged my knee against the floor as I tried to grab the door handle for stability."

Natasha shakes her head fondly at you. "You should be more careful. Why would you grab onto a handle to support you? All the handles here are janky."

Your knee eases as she lets the leg lay flat on the floor again, and you let out a breath you didn't know you were holding. She slides across the floor, not caring if she was getting her pants dirty since they were already dirty from the mission. She didn't have time to shower once they came back.

When Tony asked Friday if you were in your office and the AI said no, she immediately volunteered to go find you. Well, more like she told Tony that she was coming with him to find you, even after Friday told him about your exact whereabouts shortly after saying you weren't in your office.

She wanted to see you. She wanted to see what you were up to and to be evaluated first while everyone else took showers because she loved the way you looked at her when you were doing your necessary examinations. It may be selfish, but being selfish isn't a crime.

And yeah, maybe she should've showered so she didn't smell like city buildings, sweat, and ash and have dirt marks on her face, but she didn't care about that. Thank goodness she didn't; otherwise, who would be here to take care of you in this hallway?

"Yeah. All that money and Stark still can't invest in good things like doorknobs," you snicker. Natasha also snickers, now by your feet and just now noticing that you don't have any shoes on.

"Where...?"

"Oh," you chuckle a little. "I had to take my shoes off to get something. Don't worry about it."

Her face squishes in confusion, head tilted and brow raised. "You had to take your shoes off to get something in the kitchen?" she incredulously asks.

"Yeah," you give her an infuriating vague answer with an "innocent" smile. That same smile Stark calls you out on when you try to play the innocent nurse. "As I said, don't worry about it."

All this vagueness that surrounded your answers was really getting on Natasha's nerves. The "maybe's", the "I'm fine's" when you're totally not fine; it was all ticking her off, and all she wanted was a clear answer from you.

"You know," she said as she peeled back some of your sock to expose your bare ankle. "Even if you don't tell me what happened now, I can ask Friday to give me footage from when you fell, and I would find out then."

As you suspected, your ankle was swollen, but that was the least of your worries at the moment.

"So," she moves her head in a way that would fling her braid to the other side, "you can either tell me now and spare yourself the embarrassment, or I can find out through video where I wouldn't hold back my reaction and share with the team." Her eyes narrow towards you, as if she dares you to choose the latter. "Your choice."

Well, with an ultimatum like that, how could you choose the latter?

You let out a sigh of defeat, and Natasha grows giddy on the inside.

Finally, after all the huffs, puffs, and beating around the bush, she was going to get the answer and hear how all of this went down.

When you tell her how you received such injuries, she deadpans again, her face unreadable this time. You couldn't find the hint of a smile, the processing of information, nada. Just green eyes staring back at you with hooded lids.

The silence as her eyes bore into yours felt like forever. Like you were frozen in judgement and you wouldn't be released into the present time until Natasha deemed you as ready.

She puts the sock back around your heel and ankle, nodding to herself as her tongue pokes the inside of her cheek. "Okay."

You lean forward, hanging onto the words you were expecting her to say, but they never come. "'Okay'?" you echo. "That's it? That's all you're going to say?"

Natasha wraps your arm around her shoulder, and she pulls you to your feet. She moves your body so you're leaning onto her as you two continue your journey to your nurse's office. "Well, what do you want me to say, Nurse?" she chimes. You can basically taste the tease coming. "That you were so smart for that 'out-of-the-box thinking' you called yourself doing just to fall and bust your butt? All over a box of Zoomieo's I might add?"

You whine. "They're called Zoom O's. What the heck is a 'zoomieo'?"

She snorts. "I don't know. You tell me since you wanted it so badly." Natasha can't help the laugh that comes from her belly. She tried to be polite and not laugh about your injury to your face, but the situation was too funny not to.

Besides, she's not laughing at you. She's laughing with you.

You know, for when you look back and laugh about this situation in the future? Yeah. She's just getting a head start.

Luckily, the rest of the journey to your office wasn't as far and leaning onto her side definitely made time go by faster, so you don't have to listen to her laughing and endure the embarrassment for long.

She sits you down on the examination bed despite your pleas to sit in your chair. You watch as Widow effortlessly moves around the room, going into the correct cabinets and drawers for the medical supplies she needs.

"How many times are you in here?" you ask, astonished at how well she knew your system.

"Not much at all." She shrugs with a single-use ice pack and ankle wrapping tape in her hands. "I'm just very observant." Taking her seat in the chair, she scoots forward until she's right in front of your legs. "And when I like something, I tend to keep my eyes on it." She gives you a flirty smile you don't dare to look away from before she moves your sock again and tends to the injury.

You don't know where she learned how to tend to someone like this, but you were grateful she did. Although your job is to tend to people and you could tend to your own injuries in your sleep, it felt nice every now and then to be cared for. You were sure Natasha felt the same.

"Okay, now I need you to ice this until the swelling goes down and keep this compressed." She gestures to your now-wrapped ankle with a wide smile. She twirls across the office, still in your chair, to where you keep the ice packs and comes back with another one. "Same with your knee. Ice it. I didn't feel or see any swelling, but that doesn't mean you're not going to be sore."

"And what about yourself, Miss. Widow?" You hum as she comes back to you. She pops the single-use ice pack and shakes it to get the fluids moving. Once the sounds of liquids sloshing around turns into ice sloshing around, she presses the pack to your knee.

"What about me?"

"Well, don't you and the team need some tending to? I can't do that if I'm icing."

"Oh," she chuckles through a smirk, "so now you listen to me." You playfully roll your eyes before she continues. "Don't worry about us. No one is really hurt from today. Tony's just a little pissed off and wanted to make sure we didn't have smoke in our lungs. That's something all the robots around here can detect and fix. Right now, I'm all about taking care of you."

Smitten and bashful, you smile to yourself. "Okay... and that smell of smoke in your hair?"

"Ain't nothing a shower can't fix, sweetheart." She pats your good knee twice before rising from the chair and cleaning up the mess she made. "I'm gonna take you to your room and then after I shower, I'm going to check up on you."

Again, Natasha moves around your office as if she was the one that built it brick-by-brick and organized it from medical supply to medical supply. You knew Natasha had a nurturing nature to her, yet you never thought you would be the one to receive it. Not in a million years, not even in daydreams.

As she finishes up her cleaning and sanitizing, her back to you, your heart can't help but swell by the gestures and the things she did for you today.

You knew your relationship was more than nurse/patient, and being each other's partner definitely aided in that, but after what she did today, your relationship status finally felt real.

You were Natasha Romanov's girlfriend and she was yours.

"Do you need anything else from me in here?" she asked, removing her jacket to reveal the black tank top she had on underneath. You had to pull your gaze away from her toned arms, not wanting to get caught staring as you did once before, though seeing them was always a treat.

"No," you reply, voice barely above a grateful whisper. "Thank you."

She slings her jacket over her shoulders before doing the same with your arm and helping you off the exam bed. "No problem. Just don't pull a me, okay? If we're going to be partners and work together, there's only enough room for one of us to hide our injuries, and I prefer it not to be my cute nurse."

You can't help but snicker as joyful fleeting feelings fill up your stomach as the two of you walk to your together. "Yeah, yeah."

After feeling like you had to keep your injuries to yourself and convincing yourself that you would be the one doing all the nurturing in your romantic relationships, Natasha took no time in proving you wrong, and that was something you didn't dare to complain about.

FIN.

– Vi and Caitlyn get you whatever snack you need when you're on your period.

– Let's say you're a huge fan of chocolate, on and off your period, so the girls get you a small basket of all the chocolate they could find or your favorite just because they know it soothes you.

– Maybe you like spicy food instead on your period. Caitlyn finds that a bit strange since spicy foods typically make cramps worse... but they get you spicy food anyway.

– If you're the type of person who gets really emotional on their period, Vi and Caitlyn understand and try not to rock the boat too much or lend an understanding ear.

– Maybe a commercial with a puppy in it made you burst into tears or maybe the kitchen cabinet didn't close the right way so you exploded into a rage and cussed the cabinet out. Either way, they don't judge and always try to talk you down from your rage or ease you when you're crying.

– Of course, the two of them look at each other in a mix of fear and concern when you get ridiculously angry over inanimate objects, but they keep their comments to themselves. (Or at least wait till you aren't in the room to talk about it).

– When you three are out and about or working and your period comes unexpectedly, somehow, they're always prepared.

– Caitlyn never leaves the house without some period products on her. One time a cute girl needed a pad the day Caitlyn didn't have one in her bag and she's regretted it ever since. So in addition to pads, she keeps tampons and liners in her bag too.

– If you're the one to use a cup, she'll only have a brand-new one still packaged in her bag but only when you guys aren't home for days at a time. Otherwise, you gotta deal with the pads and tampons.

– If you're out and you bleed through, Vi is the first to see (if you don't spot it first) and will guide you to a different room to change. The girl will literally give you the pants off her legs to help you out. She doesn't care.

– Obviously, she can't walk around in public with no pants on, no matter how much you and Caitlyn loved her legs, so you would decide on using her jacket as a coverup instead.

– Around shopping centers or stores, they won't hesitate to buy you a new pair of underwear, pants, and more period products when you bleed through.

– If you're at their workplace, they already have a few extra pair of clothes because sometimes, they bleed through too

– And if you're at home, they'll just tell you kindly if you didn't spot it first.

– If your period stained the sheets, hey it happens sometimes, they'll clean the sheets without a problem.

– Honestly, CaitVi are really understanding about periods and won't ever judge. (Unless you're being a little mean to the sink faucet because it's not getting hot quick enough).

– Another thing they like to do with you is cuddle up with your favorite snacks and what whatever movies you want to see. If you have no movies in mind, then you three would find movies that sound interesting.

– You always fall asleep first if the pain isn't too much to bear. You couldn't help it.

– You were warm, fed, well cared for, and cuddled in the comfort of your bed surrounded by your girlfriends who would do anything to make sure you're happy.

– Furthermore, the girls love to attend your rehearsals to watch you dance or to get familiar with your dance studio/school. Sometimes they come during late-night practices with dinner or during early morning practices so they can take you out for brunch later.

– When the time comes for pointe shoe fitting, trust that Lady Caitlyn and Vi are right there at your appointment. The two of them are astonished with how pointe shoes work and never knew how much care and preparation goes into them.

–––

"What do you mean you have to sew them yourself?" Vi asked after her first fitting with you, appalled to hear that the ribbons and elastic come separately.

"Some teachers and dancers prefer different styles of ribbon, elastic, cut, and placement so to make things easier on the pointe shoe makers, the dancers sew the shoes themselves," you informed Vi but Caitlyn was nearby taking notes.

–––

– On days when you forgot a certain pair of shoes or tights, one of the girls would rush home to grab them for you. Even if they were in the middle of work.

– And on the off chance that they can't leave work to help you out, Caitlyn either finds or hires someone to purchase a new pair of shoes for you and then deliver them to your location.

– Safe to say you have many pairs of canvas ballet shoes and even contemporary/jazz shoes if you dabble in those genres too.

– Upon supporting you through your practices and giving you motivation on hard days, Caitlyn and Vi are always there at your shows and performances with flowers or a stuffed animal if you don't like flowers.

– They've told their family and friends about the show too so you have at least two rows, or one really big row, of supporters at every one of your performances.

– Caitlyn would get her family, Jayce, Mel, maybe even Viktor while Vi gets her crew (Yes, including Vander, Mylo, and Claggor), and her sister to attend. Even some of the coworkers Vi got close to attend your shows sometimes.

– After every show, they make sure to feed you. So if you're in between shows, for instance you finished a morning show but you still have an afternoon and evening performance, they would quickly get you food from a nearby restaurant if craft services wasn't provided or good.

– If you only had one show that didn't cut too late into the night, they take you to whichever restaurant you want.

– It could be a restaurant you saw on the way to the venue that you wanted to try or your favorite one back home. Either way, you're getting fed and they're happy to pay for whatever you want.

– On days when practice was an absolute ass and your body was a mess and too sore to function, Caitlyn offers to draw you a warm bath while Vi offers to draw you an ice bath.

– Sometimes they get into petty arguments about which bath is better and what you truly need at the time but usually, they come to a decision on their own.

– After your bath, warm, ice, or both, a meal would already be ready for you and the bed open for your laying.

– If you were too tired to eat, one of them would feed you in bed while the other massaged your sore muscles and applied muscle repair cream.

– If you're one to enjoy adult activities, sometimes the massaging gets carried away. Especially if you're just in your towel. But trust, it's all consensual and if you're not in the mood for such activities, the girls don't even encourage it.

– Okay, that's all! Hope you guys enjoyed <3