Reddie

“Has anyone ever told you that you’re very untrusting?” She raises a brow playfully. 

Your eyes narrowed, already preparing another comeback when the heavy grated iron door groaned open from the other side of the room. Years of training settled over you before you even realized it had happened, your gaze snapping toward the entrance before flicking immediately to Yelena.

“Were you expecting company?”

She made an exaggerated show of thinking about it, lips pursed and finger tapping thoughtfully against her chin before her expression broke into an impossibly smug grin.

“Oh. Right.”

A figure in bright red stepped hesitantly through the haze, stopping just inside the doorway as though he wasn’t entirely convinced he’d walked into the correct room. Spider-Man looked between the two of you, then back toward the hallway as if debating on running. As if seeing two naked widows was the biggest threat he’d seen all day. 

Yelena didn’t give him the chance. “Take off your clothes.”

“W-what?” 

“You don't wear clothes in the banya, ditch the leotard.” She ordered. 

“This is not a leotard.” He shuffled awkwardly, his arms moving around his sides aimlessly. “Uh, your tech told me this was your office?” 

Yelena’s arms went up, “This is my office. Get in.” 

His entire body tenses, “I’m fine thanks-“ 

“Waa, waa.” Yelena laughs, “My office, my rules.” 

He’s not biting, which makes you stifle a laugh. The silence stretched just long enough that you had to bite the inside of your cheek to stop yourself from laughing.

Yelena leaned forward conspiratorially, as though she were making him the deal of a lifetime.“You get to enjoy a very nice, relaxing soak..“

You finally took pity on him, and picked up where she intentionally left off. “And we get confirmation you aren’t carrying any weapons. Everybody wins.” 

His masked head turned toward you, the eyes on his suit getting animatedly larger. 

“…Seriously?”

You smiled sweetly. “Seriously. I’ve learned to stop fighting her on it, it’s very nice in here.” 

His shoulders sagged in the unmistakable posture of someone realizing resistance was entirely pointless. With a defeated sigh, he shuffled toward one of the wooden stalls. The stall door clicked shut behind him, and almost immediately the muffled rustle of fabric echoed through the room. At the same time, Yelena lazily stirred the water with one hand, looking altogether too pleased with herself.

“He said it was some small potato problem,” she murmured, effortlessly slipping into Russian. “Figured two Avengers could help him with intel.” 

You hum, “Why didn’t you tell me he was coming by?” 

“I forgot.” 

“I don’t believe you.” You rolled your eyes, earning another satisfied grin from her just as the wooden stall creaked open. Spider-Man stepped out clutching a white towel around his waist with both hands like it was a lifeline. His shoulders were tense enough to rival a man walking into an execution, his face hidden behind the mask he’d somehow insisted on keeping despite surrendering the rest of the suit.

You had expected him to be lean, scrawny almost. 

Instead, you found yourself staring for half a second longer than intended.

The suit had done him absolutely no favors. Beneath it were years of relentless training, packed onto a frame that looked carved from stone, broad shoulders tapering into a narrow waist, every muscle defined by years of keeping the city safe. His arms alone looked capable of lifting a car without much effort, his biceps so absurdly large you were fairly certain one of them rivaled the size of his own head.

You caught Yelena watching your expression from the corner of your eye. The smug little smile spreading across her face told you she had noticed your momentary lapse immediately. 

Yelena burst into laughter, which stopped abruptly when she realized he was in fact not actually going to take the mask off. 

“Wait, you’re serious? You’re not going to take it off?” 

He slips into the water, “It would defeat the whole anonymous thing.” 

“Even for your girlfriend, or boyfriend, or whatever.” She trails off, “You know there’s fanart-“ 

You tuned her out almost immediately, letting the words fade into meaningless background noise while she enthusiastically listed the bizarre piece of online fan art she’d stumbled across. You had long ago accepted that Yelena somehow found herself on the strangest corners of the internet imaginable, usually against her own will and yet somehow always with enough curiosity to constantly send links to the group chat. Bucky had blocked her long ago. 

The first night she downloaded Twitter, she had run into the common room, her tablet clutched in her hand her eyes searching for Bucky as he very innocently was eating his popcorn. “Barnes, have you ever heard of Sambucky? Or a website called AO3?” 

You’re pulled out of the memory when Spider-Man speaks up again. 

“- Look, I don’t have anyone. I kinda keep to myself.” 

“All by yourself? All the time?” Her voice falls. “No wonder you’re so sad.” 

“I’m not so sad.” He lies, his voice rising a pitch. 

“A little bit.” She mumbles, then her shoulders straighten as if she just got the idea of a lifetime. “You know, my sister here is very lonely too. She says she is not, but yet every weekend she is with me or eating ice cream pretending we cannot hear her watching those horrible American movies through the walls.”

You turn your head to her, expression blank. “Yelena.”

“Can we talk about what I came here to talk about? The attack on Damage Control. ” Spider-Man buts in, making you nod in agreement. 

“Yes, can we?” 

“Right,” The shit-eating grin is still wide on her face, “So that is more your area. Like small potato, whereas the New Avengers are focusing on big potato stuff.” 

“Right, there’s more to it than that.” He adds. Going on about what he had learned the past day and giving details of the incident that had not been made public yet. 

The warmth of the water settled around you as you absentmindedly dragged your fingers across its surface, watching small ripples spread between the three of you while you pieced together everything he was saying. After a long moment, you glanced toward Yelena.

“So you think it’s something like what they used on us?” you asked quietly. “The conditioning. Whatever they did to the other widows.”

“That was my first thought,” Spider-Man admitted, looking toward Yelena.

“It’s not,” She replied without a second’s hesitation.

Spider-Man frowned beneath the mask. “You’re sure?”

”It is more like possession."

You hum, your hands still moving the water around in front of you as they talk, letting Yelena fill the two of you in on what she knew. Unfortunately, every road ended exactly where it had begun. The New Avengers had no additional intelligence, no active investigation, and no plans to divert resources toward Damage Control while larger threats occupied their attention.

Spider-Man didn’t argue, but disappointment settled visibly across his shoulders all the same. The hopeful energy he’d arrived with slowly disappeared beneath the weight of another dead end, and after sitting quietly for a moment, he let out a long sigh before pushing himself up from the water.

“Fine,” he muttered, reaching for the towel he’d left folded on the bench. “I’ll just go ask Damage Control myself.”

You very intentionally kept your eyes fixed somewhere above his shoulder, refusing to acknowledge the beads of water slowly tracing paths over abs that the suit had done an excellent job of concealing. Or the way the veins in his muscles flexed when he pulled himself up. Or the way his boxers clung to his thick thighs. 

“You know,” Yelena said with far too much innocence to be trusted, “you’re not completely anonymous anymore.”

Spider-Man paused in the middle of grabbing his clothes. “What?”

“I’ve seen your belly button.”

All you could do was sigh, letting your body sink further into the water until your chin was covered. 

“…Uh,” Spider-Man finally managed after several painfully long silent seconds, “okay.”

“Goodbye, Yelena,” he said, already halfway through the doorway before remembering to glance toward you. “And… goodbye, Y/N.”

The heavy iron door barely had time to swing shut behind him before he was gone, leaving a trail of wet footprints stretching down the hallway outside. You waited until the echo of his footsteps disappeared before leaning over and bumping your shoulder against Yelena’s.

”You’ve scared him off.” 

“Hmm, something is telling me you’ll see him again.” She smirks.

Before you had the chance to ask what exactly that was supposed to mean, Yelena slipped beneath the surface without another word, disappearing completely beneath the rippling water while you were left staring after her, equal parts amused and unconvinced.

News of the attacks seemed impossible to escape days later. Every television hanging in an airport terminal, every radio crackling through military transports, every phone notification carried another version of the same story, each one somehow more unbelievable than the last. 

 The majority of your updates came from Yelena, whose texts arrived at all hours of the day with the urgency of someone who had remembered a detail halfway through another conversation. It was a lot of, “Just talked to Spider-Man;)))))) u wish this was u huh?????” 

You and Bucky had spent the better part of the week chasing leads that dissolved into nothing before you could ever get close enough to investigate. Reconnaissance, surveillance, more reconnaissance, another anonymous tip that turned into an abandoned warehouse with little more than stale coffee cups and dust to show for it. By the time your transport finally touched back down stateside, you felt like you’d spent more time staring through binoculars than actually accomplishing anything. 

“Remind me why people still choose to live in New York,” you muttered as you dropped a thick stack of mission reports onto Val’s desk with enough force to make the folders slide apart. “

“I’ve stopped wondering.” Bucky admitted, “It was nicer in the 40s.”

You sighed, rubbing absentmindedly at the side of your neck where the edge of your Kevlar vest had spent the last several days digging relentlessly into your skin. The movement earned an immediate wince as the irritated patch protested beneath your fingertips.

“You should put ice on that,” Bucky said, noticing before you’d even finished reaching for it. He shrugged off his own tactical vest with considerably more irritation than necessary before tossing it onto the chair beside him. “Couple more days in these things and it’s going to rub you raw. These vests are garbage.”

“They’re definitely not sized correctly.”

“They’re not sized correctly because procurement buys whatever’s cheapest.”

A tired laugh escaped you. “I think Val just hates us.”

“I’ll have her order us different sizes,” he continued, already looking toward her office despite knowing she was deliberately never here. “These are shit.”

You smiled despite yourself, unfastening the last strap before setting your own vest aside. “Thanks, Bucky.”

“So what’s next?”

“I think…” You stretched your shoulders until your back gave a satisfying pop. “I might stop by Yelena’s office.”

He raised an eyebrow knowingly. “Checking on your sister?”

“And Spider-Man.” You said casually, “Heard he got shot, she’d know how he’s doing” 

“Oh? That’s it huh?” 

“I just want to know how his Damage Control adventure went.” You defended yourself, despite there being no reason to. 

Bucky laughed quietly through his nose. “Good luck with that.”

“Yelena?” you called as you nudged the heavy iron door open with your shoulder, expecting to be greeted by either an insult or something thrown in your general direction.

Instead, silence answered you.

The bath sat empty, steam lazily drifting through the room while the familiar scent of cedar, herbs, and eucalyptus lingered in the warm air. The water rippled softly beneath the lantern light, untouched except for the occasional drip falling from the ceiling into the pool below. You still wondered how this building managed to keep up with the humidity. 

You frowned, pulling your phone from your pocket.

I’m at your office. Where are you?

The typing bubble appeared almost instantly.

running 2 get food

Another notification popped up before you could even lock your screen.

do u want blini

wait no dumplings

there's an ice cream cart do u want 

of course u want why do i ask

Then another.

I'll get them all brb

there's new vodka stashed under the third bench, landlady got a new bottle from home country 

You couldn’t help smiling. 

thanks. I’ll warm the bath for you. bring me a tea 

Her reply came so quickly you wondered if she’d been holding the phone the entire time.

yayyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy girly time 

Chuckling to yourself, you slipped your phone onto one of the dry benches before slipping your clothes off in an untidy pile until all that remained was the comforting humidity wrapping around your skin.

You eased yourself carefully down the stone steps until the water climbed past your ankles, your knees, your waist, every aching muscle loosening a little more with each inch. The heat seeped deep into your bones, unraveling tension you hadn’t even realized you’d been carrying since boarding the quinjet days earlier.

By the time the water reached your shoulders, the exhaustion finally caught up with you.

A quiet, involuntary moan escaped your lips as you leaned your head back against the smooth stone edge of the bath, your eyes slipping closed while the warmth wrapped around every sore joint and bruised muscle. For the first time in what felt like days, your breathing slowed, your shoulders finally relaxed.

So completely, in fact, that you never heard the heavy iron door slowly creak open behind you.

”Uh, Ms. Y/n?” A timid voice spoke, making the tension rise back in your shoulders as you jumped. The bright red suit made your heart race out of shock and a weird sense of nervousness at being here alone with him.

“G-God, I’m so sorry,” he blurted, spinning around so quickly he nearly lost his footing on the damp stone. His back was to you before you’d even managed to respond, his hands raised awkwardly as if surrendering. “I didn’t mean to walk in on you. Yelena said she’d be here today and I just… I thought…” He groaned quietly to himself. 

You couldn’t help the small laugh that escaped you.

“It’s okay,” you said, your voice softer now as the adrenaline finally ebbed away. “Really. She’s just getting food. She should be back any minute.”

“I’ll just wait here.” 

“Spidey,” You pout playfully, splashing the water to beckon him in, “Join me.” 

“Are you sure?”

”Yes.”

“I was actually…” He hesitated, sounding almost embarrassed to admit it. “I was kind of looking forward to the soak.”

That pulled a genuine laugh from you. “Right?”

He glanced over his shoulder just enough that you caught the sheepish grin tugging beneath the edge of the mask. 

“I wasn’t sure if it was weird that I was, I’ll just change.”

“It took me a while too,” you admitted, as he disappeared into the stall, “The first time Yelena dragged me down here I thought she’d finally lost her mind. Now I’m her after almost every mission.”

”Man,” He says through muffled fabric, equipment dropping on the wood bench, “I’d love to come and soak after a long day.” 

“I’m sure Yelena would allow it, as long as you don’t throw a party in here or tell anyone or make a mess.” You drag on, smiling as he came into view. This time with no towel wrapped around him, just his boxers clinging expertly to him as he stepped inside the water.

He leaned back against the stone edge with a contented sigh, finally allowing his shoulders to drop. For the first time since you’d met him, he looked… peaceful.

It was then your eyes caught the scar.

Angry red tissue stretched across his side just beneath his ribs, the wound still fresh despite already being sealed shut. The edges remained inflamed, the skin surrounding it slightly pink from rapid healing that no ordinary body should have been capable of.

He followed your gaze and instinctively looked down at himself. “Oh, that.”

One hand brushed lightly across the mark before he flexed experimentally, watching the skin pull without discomfort.

”I was going to ask, how you were doing. Yelena was giving me updates.” 

“Doctor’s said it will leave a nasty scar, but I heal faster than most.” His voice is quieter now, reflective as you stare at him. “I can barely feel it.” 

“This was a gunshot that almost killed you, just days ago?” 

He nodded, sensing your hesitation. “You can touch it.” 

He wasn’t entirely sure why he’d offered. Maybe because it didn’t hurt anymore, or maybe because the concern written so plainly across your pretty face made something warm settle in his chest. There was something strangely comforting about it, enough that he found himself hoping you would say yes before he’d even realized he’d been hoping at all.

You held his gaze through the mask for a brief moment, silently asking if he was certain, and when he gave another small nod you pushed gently through the water until barely a foot separated the two of you. The movement sent soft ripples across the surface, brushing against his shoulders as you lifted your hand. Instead of pressing your palm directly against the wound, the backs of your knuckles grazed lightly across the newly healed skin, careful enough that it almost wasn’t a touch at all.

“I heal faster due to a diluted version of the serum they give us widows, but nothing like this.” Your fingertips traced lightly around the edge of the injury without putting pressure on it, fascinated by how smooth the tissue already felt. “But nothing like this. This shouldn’t even be closed yet.”

“Y-Yeah…”

The word caught somewhere in his throat.

A visible shiver rolled across his shoulders, one that had absolutely nothing to do with the temperature of the water. It was the realization that you were standing impossibly close now, naked underneath the murky water, and close enough that he could count the droplets of water clinging to your shoulders, close enough that every sensible thought he’d had moments earlier evaporated into steam.

His eyes betrayed him.

For only the briefest second, they dipped downward before he caught himself, snapping immediately back to your face with an expression that could only be described as horrified with himself.

“I’ve…” He cleared his throat a little too forcefully. “I’ve been having some issues with my DNA and the spider thing.” 

“The spider thing.” You echo, urging him to continue.

He rubbed the back of his neck, grateful for the excuse to look anywhere but directly at you.

“It sounds ridiculous when I say it out loud, but my arachnoid DNA started climbing way higher than it’s supposed to. I was acting… not exactly like myself for a while.” He gestured vaguely with one hand, struggling to summarize weeks of bizarre mutations. “I’ve started shooting webs out of my actual wrists instead of using web shooters, and apparently that’s only one of the side effects. Everything is stabilizing now, though. I’m… mostly normal again.”

Your expression shifted from amusement to fascination almost instantly. “Out of your wrists?”

Before he could answer, your hand had already slipped from his side to his forearm. Your fingers wrapped gently around his wrist, turning it over in the warm water until the small opening nestled against his skin came into view. 

“I used to make web fluid, but now it’s all homegrown.” He jokes, but goes silent when you don’t laugh instead you’re too fascinated. 

“Do you shoot webs from other places?” 

“Oh, no. Absolutely not. No, no.” He shook his head so quickly a few damp curls escaped the edge of the mask. “Just… just the wrists. I’m very normal everywhere else.”

A small hum escaped you, thoughtful more than anything else.“That’s a shame.”

“…I’m sorry.”

“I said that’s a shame.”

“No, I heard you. You sound… disappointed.”

“I’m not disappointed,” you corrected with a sheepish smile, finally releasing his wrist. “I just think it would’ve been kind of interesting.”

For a long second he simply stared at you.

“What? I like spiders too, you know?”

Then a laugh escaped him, bright and completely unrestrained, echoing warmly off the cedar walls. He shook his head, still smiling to himself as he looked down at the water between you.

“You widows,” he shook his head, “You guys are something else.” 

“Hmm, and what about you, Spidey? What are you?” 

He pauses for a moment, his mind going back to the first night he officially met you in this bath, the towel clutched around him while Yelena spoke enough for the both of you. 

“I am lonely,” he admitted at last, the confession coming softer than he’d intended. There wasn’t any self-pity in his voice, only a quiet sort of acceptance. “It’s… gotten better lately. A lot better, actually. But your sister was right.” He laughed weakly to himself, shaking his head. “I hate giving her that satisfaction.”

Your smile widened despite yourself. “So do I, but alas she keeps being right.” 

He shifts a little closer, either consciously or subconsciously you don’t know. Close enough that you could make out the constellation of freckles scattered across his shoulders. Close enough to hear the steady rhythm of his breathing over the gentle splash of water against the stone. Close enough that every time either of you shifted even slightly, your knees threatened to brush.

For reasons neither of you could explain, the room suddenly felt much warmer than it had a moment before.

“I’m not very good at… this,” Peter admitted with a nervous smile, gesturing vaguely between the two of you. “Talking to people, getting close to people. I mean I think you’re the first person to touch me in years. Is that depressing?” 

“A little.” You admit with a playful smile. “But I understand. Our lives, it’s impossible to have normal relationships.” 

“You don’t know the half of it.” He breathes out, and neither of you move. You both just sit there, relaxing against the concrete wall. The tension between the two of you is electric, it’s like every drop of water is drawing you closer to him.

The silence is only broken when he decides to speak up, “She sure is taking a while.” 

“She sure is…” You turn to him, “You really never take the mask off for anyone?” 

He shakes his head, “I try not to.” 

You watch the fabric strain against his lips, and you yearn to see how plump they are. What shade of pink, how they’d feel against your own. You wanna see his nose, feel it pressed against your skin, to watch his eyes as you touch him.

“Not even a little?” You ask, your palms moving up to cup his cheek. 

“It’s easier this way.” He says and he’s not sure if he’s telling you, or trying to convince himself. His body ignites with each rub of your fingers against the fabric. 

You sit up, your hands falling to his shoulders.

“Is this okay?” 

“More than okay.” He whispers, in awe as you practically tangle yourself in his lap. He holds you gracefully, and respectfully as you straddle him. You can feel his boxers against your inner thigh as his hands hover respectfully on the outside of your ribcage to keep you balanced. 

Your fingertips trace the outline of his face, trying to memorize the feel of his cheekbones. 

“I’ve spent so long wondering what you look like under there,” you admitted, your voice barely louder than your own breathing. 

“Just like anyone else.” He managed to get out, his mouth going dry as he all but melted underneath your touch. 

“I find that,” You lean forward, pressing a kiss to his fabric-covered forehead, “Very hard to believe.” 

He shivers, fingers digging into your skin as you press long kisses down his cheeks right to where the mask ends and his skin begins. 

“Would you,” The warmth of your breath makes the hair on his neck stand up, “Be willing to move the mask up about, an inch or two?” 

“I-“ 

“You don’t have to.” You remind him, leaning back to catch his eyes again. “I don’t wanna make you uncomfortable-“ 

One hand leaves your skin, pulling the mask up just enough to expose his plump and waiting lips. There’s barely enough time to stare at the new part of him before he's pulling your lips into his. It’s a little clumsy at first, awkward with the bunched-up mask rubbing against your nose, but you make it work. His lips were warm against yours, opening his mouth at the first swipe of your tongue against it. 

He pulls away with a gasp, “Can I touch you?” 

You’re nodding before he can get it out, letting his head drop down so his mouth could suck and bite at your chest. Your nipples are pebbled by being exposed to the cool air, only warming once he pulls one into his warm and waiting mouth. 

One of his hands is already guiding your legs apart, his fingers slipping in between your folds. 

“You’re so wet.” He whispered against your tits. 

“We’re in water.” Your eyes were closed, relishing the feeling of the gentle circles he was rubbing into your aching clit. 

“And I’ve been able to smell you since I walked in, you can’t hide from me.” 

Your heart rate picks up, and he no doubt feels that too as he slips a finger inside of you. You’re all but grinding against his fingers, your clit brushing against the raised spot on his wrist. 

“F-fuck,” You cry out, “Can feel your wrist throbbing against me.” 

“It wants to shoot webs at you, wants to wrap you in them. Keep you all for myself,” He whispers, “You’d like that wouldn’t you? You want me to fuck my webs into you.”

There’s no shame to be had at the fire that licks in your lower belly at his words as you nod frantically. 

In a split second you’re being pulled up from the water, and laid down on a towel. Your head propped up by his discarded suit bunched up as he hovers above you. 

He leans down and licks a strip of water droplets from your tits, before his hand travels back down to your cunt. 

There’s a soft hiss as his webs disperse onto you, they’re warm and sticky and practically dissolve into your wetness as he slides two fingers inside of you. With each brush of your clit against his wrist, he dribbles out fluid that only makes him fuck into you faster. His fingers curl expertly, and the sounds bouncing off the walls of the bath are lewd. 

“You’re so dirty,” He growls against your skin, feeling every nerve on his body stand up. The inhibitor did little to quell just how feral he felt pressed against you. His cock was hard in his boxers, rutting against the soft skin of your leg to dull the ache. “You know, this is how spiders mate. They roll their sperm into webs and fuck them into the female.” 

Your moan is broken off into confusion as you watch him, a small smile on his lips. “Yeah?” 

“Sorry,” He whispered, his fingers still prying the nastiest sounds from your heat. “This is really hot.” 

“You know, widows kill their mate after sex.” You manage to stutter out. 

“Are you gonna kill me?” He asks, pressing harshly against your clit with another messy ooze of his webs. 

“G-god no, I’m gonna cum.” You’re all but gasping as he pries an orgasm out of you 

Your legs are shaking, chest heaving by the time you come to. He’s still sitting between your legs, boxers still on as he presses gentle kisses to your thigh. 

You try to take him off guard by flipping him over onto his back, as gently as you could. He lands with a huff, and you pretend he didn’t see that coming. The view of you on top of him has him reeling, your tits bouncing as you tug briskly down at his boxers, pressing your lips to his.

“I can’t,” He pulls away from your lips reluctantly, “I can’t take the mask off.” 

“I don’t care.” You sigh pressing your lips harshly against his again. 

When he pulls away this time, a thread of spit connects your mouths. “I'm sorry, I don’t wanna make you uncomfortable if you can’t see me-“

”I don’t care,” You echo, “I just wanna feel you.” 

“The mask stays on.” He asks, once more to confirm. 

“The mask stays on.” You agree, digging your nails into his shoulder blades as you reach down to guide his aching cock to your entrance. You slide down on him with a satisfying hiss, gasping at the stretch of him. His cock is so thick, you have to pace yourself before your hips meet his.

“God.” He seethes through his clenched jaw, his eyes rolling back into his head. You wished so badly to see the pathetic, fucked out look on his face. “You feel so good.” 

“You’re huge.” You sigh contentedly, rocking your hips lazily against his as his tip presses gently into your sweet spot each time. 

You ride him slowly, relishing the moans leaving his glossy lips. Or the way his abs tense every few seconds as you bounce and grind against him. It’s frantic, but intimate as you fall apart above him. 

“You’re so beautiful.” He pants, watching your thighs shake as the thick curve of his cock pressed against the deepest parts of you. 

“Spidey.” You moaned, your palms heavy on his chest as you tried to keep up your rhythm, failing when the pleasure overtook you.

“Right there, baby. Fuck.” The term of endearment leaves his mouth recklessly as he leans up, the soles of his feet hitting the ground as he fucks up into you. His hands are on your tired hips, picking you up and fucking yourself on his cock as if you weigh nothing. He hit every single spot inside of you, the bulge of him pressing deep against your stomach as you cried out for him. 

“I’m gonna- I’m gonna-“ 

“I got you,” He cooed, “Cum for me, let me feel you.” 

He felt every second of it, as you spasmed and came around him. It wasn’t too long before he followed behind you, letting your cunt milk him for every drop of his cum. It was warm, and thick. You’ve never felt this full before, it felt like he was coating your insides, claiming you as his. 

“Spidey,” You mumbled, “That was…” 

“I know…” He sighed dreamily, rubbing gentle circles into your hips from where he still lazily held you.

You pull off of him with a lewd pop, his release dribbling down your inner thighs. 

“It’s so thick.” You stare in amazement, a finger gliding through the thickened cum.

He sits up quickly, head tilting in confusion. “That’s- it’s not webbing.” 

“Definitely not normal.” You giggle like a schoolgirl,. “Don't worry. I’m into it. Majorly.” 

He shakes his head in disbelief, watching each sway of your hips as you slide into one of the shower stalls. He just lays there, chest still heaving in disbelief that the past twenty minutes have even happened. 

“You not gonna clean me up, Spidey?” You speak through the haze of the shower spray and a smirk falls on your face when you hear his feet frantically slapping against the wet concrete.

That’s how Yelena finds the two of you, your back pressed against the metal of the stall door. The water long gone cold as Spider-Man had your eyes shut in pleasure while he fucks up into you harshly, blubbering out pathetic moans of your name. 

You’re still sensitive and so full from his last release by the time he slides into you again. He leaves no stone unturned as he urges you to come apart around him again, and again. 

“Yes, yes,” He grunted, “Is this okay?” 

“Yes.” You cried out, your legs locking around his ass to prevent him from stopping, as if he’d ever dream of it, “Please don’t stop. I’m right there, right fucking there.” 

The metal stall was shaking with the ferocity of it, the sound of his hips slapping against yours drowned out by your cries. 

“Are you gonna cum?” He panted, his fingers already rubbing at your swollen clit, “I need you to cum for me.” 

“I’m gonna cum,” You nod, “Just keep going. Yeah, like that fuck. Fuck, Spidey I’m cumming.” 

“M’behind you.” His hips stuttered as your cunt suckled him in and drank in every drop of thick cum he released deep inside of you. 

“Fuck.” You laughed lazily, pressing your sweaty temple against his shoulder. He shuddered when he tried to pull out, his cum plopping out of you and clinging to his cock like glue. “Guess you gotta stay inside of me.” 

“There’s worse places to be.” He laughed, pressing a gentle kiss to your head. 

The blissful afterglow was interrupted by a loud throat clearing, Yelena’s voice carrying through the steam.

“Alright, Spiderman. There’s a bank robbery going on at 30th Avenue. Suspect is—uh, hello? Is this thing on?”

Peter laughs, already swinging through the tall buildings of New York City, zipping and flying through them faster than you can even say ‘Spiderman.’ While one arm is busy slinging out webs from building to building, his other arm holds onto a thick communications radio that looks like an amateur concoction of a walkie-talkie accompanied with old thick wires he found in a junkyard.

“Yep, I hear you loud and clear,” Peter says from his end. “I’m already a few blocks away. What does the suspect look like—”

“Spiderman? Hellooo?” Your voice cuts him off in a burst of static that makes his ears ring. “Ugh—is this radio even working? Are you still there?”

He needs to make a mental note to figure out a way for your voice to come through clearer—and preferably not through a brick of what feels like a tenth-century sad excuse for a cellphone that he has to clutch every time he wants to talk to you.

“I’m here!” Peter shouts through the mic, swinging around a corner.

“Ah! There you are!” you say, sounding like you’re smiling, if only Peter could picture what you looked like. “Missed your voice for a second.”

Peter’s face flushes under his mask.

“Detecting a sudden increase in body heat—specifically around the facial region—and a spike in heart rate despite no intense physical activity being performed—”

“Shut up, Evie,” Peter mumbles, hoping you didn’t hear him from the other end of the line.

He hadn’t gotten around to fixing the background noise integration yet, so the shitty microphone attached to the radio picks up almost everything. He hears you laugh on the other end, and he has to force down the rapid thumping of his heart before Evie calls him out on it again.

“Are you blushing, Spiderman?”

“What—no!” Peter immediately interjects, landing on top of a tall building on 30th Avenue. His eyes scan the windows of the bank directly across the street. “Just tell me what the suspect looks like, alright?”

You chuckle again. “Okay, the suspect is tall, wearing dark clothing, and probably handsome—if it weren’t for the ski mask covering his face.”

Peter rolls his eyes underneath his goggles.

“Now’s not the time to play around,” he says, already swinging through the entrance as innocent bystanders and employees run out in a panic.

He swings above the crowd in a perfectly prone position mid-air until he lands on his feet in the center of the bank. He doesn’t need your comms in here—he can handle whatever gets thrown at him at this point. His ears tingle with a warning that tells him the enemy is to his left. He turns his head to that direction, and…

“Spiderman!” A tall man in dark clothing and a ski mask holds up a rifle, pointing it directly at Peter. “You’re dead, kid!”

“Oh, jeez,” Peter says, slowly raising his hands in surrender.

“Oh, and I forgot to mention,” your voice statics through. “He’s heavily armed.”

“Yeah, good comms,” Peter scoffs sarcastically.

“Who the hell are you talking to?” the man shouts, pointing at the radio in Peter's hand. “Is that a bomb? Drop it!”

Peter furrows his brows, glancing at the object in his hand. A bomb? Seriously? The radio really looks that bad?

The man’s grip on the gun tightens, holding it in a way that lets Peter know he has clearly never held a gun before in his life. The panic among the people remaining in the building surges at the sight of the weapon, everyone shoving past each other toward the entrance.

“Come on, man. Don’t shoot—there are innocent people in here!” he tries to interject.

“Innocent dead people soon, if you don’t put that weapon away!” the man barks back.

“The police are on their way,” you explain, serious this time, through the radio. “Take care of that gun now, or he’ll start shooting like a madman once he sees the sirens. You have less than two minutes.”

“Okay,” Peter says. “Time me.”

“Starting now?”

“Starting now,” he confirms before switching off the radio’s microphone input.

The man takes the loud clicking sound as a threat, his finger hovering over the trigger with every intention to shoot—but Peter moves faster.

Extending his left hand, a thick layer of web covers the muzzle, trapping any potential bullet in the barrel. The poor man doesn’t even have time to react before Peter webs the gun, yanked it out of his hands, and tosses it aside. Just as the man turns to make a run for it, Peter pins his ankles together with a thick strip of webbing, sending him face first onto the floor before securing his wrists behind his back with another band of webs.

From where he still stands in the center of the room, Peter unclicks the microphone. “You got it, Static?”

He can practically feel you rolling your eyes at the stupid nickname. “That was fifteen seconds. Good job,” you applaud. “And are you seriously still sticking with Static? I hate that nickname.”

Peter chuckles, scanning the area for any signs of injuries, but finds none. The police finally arrive, pulling up with sirens blaring as they assess the crowd and begin scouting the area with weapons drawn. Seeing the suspect already bound by webs on the floor, they immediately move in with handcuffs.

Knowing the police will take it from here, Peter zips out of the building as if the entire fight—if you would even call it that—was just a quick pit stop.

“Well, that’s just what I’m gonna have to keep calling you, because your voice always comes through staticky,” he says, the wind picking up through the microphone and making it harder for you to hear him. “Unless… you wanna give me your actual name. Then maybe I can call you that instead.”

You pause at the other end of the radio, the silence between you filled only by the harsh wind and the snap of spiderwebs on his end.

As Peter swings his way back to his apartment, his heart pounds wildly in his chest with anticipation.

This isn’t the first time he’s teased you to get you to give up your name, and you’ve asked for his name more times than he can count on his fingers.

“Very funny,” you muse from the other end, your voice drawing out with a teasing tilt. “I could say the same thing to you.”

Peter smiles, landing on his apartment rooftop with a huff. “I don’t know—I think I like the way Spiderman rolls off your tongue.”

For the very first time since you two found each other through a stroke of pure luck—when Peter spent a night building a radio to hijack police comms and accidentally connected to you, a woman doing the exact same thing—you find yourself completely at a loss for words.

He doesn’t even know where the sudden boost of confidence came from to blurt out a flirtatious comment like that. Maybe it’s the suit, or maybe it’s that flutter of excitement he gets every single time he talks to you.

But that confidence slowly teeters away the longer you stay quiet. He grimaces, feeling like he overshot his mark big time.

Finally, he hears a slow draw of breath from the other end.

“That’s a shame,” you tease. “I would’ve loved to hear the sound of my name in your voice.”

Peter sucks in a sharp breath, his body tensing as your words travel down his spine and straight to his heart. It was the way you said it—that sultry little rasp that even the static couldn’t mask. An awkward silence takes over the both of you, and for once, Peter is grateful for how poorly he configured this radio, since he can use it as an excuse for a faulty mic.

“Dramatic increase in heart rate detected. Body heat has increased an additional two degrees, and your suit—specifically around the groin region—appears to be tighter. I am also detecting a heightened state of arousal—”

“Evie!” Peter barks suddenly. He hears your laugh come through the other end, and the sound definitely doesn’t help his situation at all.

“Got you to blush twice today.” You taunt. “I think that’s a record, Spidey.”

“I wasn’t blushing,” Peter lies. “Anyway—enough of that. Are you seeing any other criminal activity in the area?”

You hum, and he hears a faint clicking noise on your end. “Nothing,” you say. “But what’s the rush? You’re given the opportunity to relax. You should take it, considering how hard you’ve been pushing yourself.”

Peter hops onto the ledge of his building and starts idly pacing back and forth, smiling under his mask as he holds the radio close to his ear. “Aw, you don’t have to worry about me. I have Evie for that.”

You blow a raspberry, and Peter’s smile widens.

“Yeah—well, Evie is an artificial intelligence. She can only care so much. Plus, she can’t make as many good jokes as I can.”

Peter’s tongue pokes the inside of his cheek as he kicks a tiny stray pebble off the ledge, watching it fall ten stories to the ground. “Are you getting jealous of my assistant now?”

A garbled noise leaves your lips, and he chuckles as you stammer over your own words.

“God—you’re so full of yourself, aren't you?” you huff. “I’m your partner—so it’s only natural for me to look out for you.”

“We’re partners?”

“Haven’t we been this entire time?”

Peter pauses, glancing up at the sky, where the orange sun is starting to set behind several towers of buildings.

Partners. He hasn’t had anyone he could call a partner since everything happened—since he made the whole world forget who he was. He hasn’t had a real, caring partner since… them. Ned and MJ.

And now, after all that time spent in solitude, he’s finally found someone to call his partner again. Someone he’s never even seen, whose name he doesn’t even know. All he knows about you is that you’re smart—smart enough to build a radio and link up to his frequency—and that you live in New York. He could’ve passed you on his way to buy groceries, or seen you on the subway. Hell, you might even live in his building. Maybe you’re even that girl he accidentally swapped laundry with the other night.

“Spiderman? You still there?” you ask, snapping him out of his daze.

Despite your usual spunky attitude, in that moment, you sound so… small. Like you don’t want to hang up, even if there aren’t any crimes to report.

“I’m here,” he breathes, his voice coming out softer than he expected. “I’m not going anywhere.”

You smile at that. He can hear it. “Okay. Good.”

The microphone picks up shuffling noises on your end—judging by the sound, he pictures you rolling over in bed and getting comfortable.

“How about we play a game?” you ask before the radio falls into silence again.

Peter raises a brow under his mask. “A game?”

“Yeah—every time you complete a successful mission, we trade a fun fact about each other.”

He hums, taking a seat on the ledge and letting his feet dangle over the edge. “Okay, sure. And since I just finished one—does that mean the game starts now?”

You chuckle softly at his enthusiasm to play along. “Sure. Want to go first?”

Peter cranes his neck back to look at the sky. Although neither of you has ever brought it up, he has a feeling you’re both on the exact same page when it comes to secrecy. Neither of you wants to give away too much and blow your identity, but you share just enough to keep things interesting.

And by letting him go first, it feels like you’re giving him the chance to set the tone.

“Hm. Let me think.” He rubs his chin through his mask. “Okay—I’m ready. My favorite coffee is a hot Americano.”

You snort. “The first fun fact you want to share is your coffee order?”

“Hey—coffee can be fun!” Peter interjects. “Now tell me yours.”

A little laugh escapes you, and he can hear you shaking your head. “Fine. I get an extra-hot almond milk latte, with one pump of sugar-free vanilla, one pump of regular hazelnut, and two scoops of vanilla bean powder.”

The white lenses of Peter’s goggles widen, and he lets out a brief, disbelieving laugh. “Oh—so you’re pulling my leg because I started us off with a lame fun fact? Is that it?”

“What?” You giggle along. “I’m not! That’s my actual order—especially on chilly days. You should try it sometime.”

Peter imagines it: a girl—a pretty one, judging by your voice and personality—ordering that ridiculous concoction at a coffee shop while the barista rolls their eyes at how long it takes to recite. For some reason, the visual warms his chest.

“Sure. And I’d tell you to try a hot Americano—but based on the order you just gave me, I don’t think you’d like it very much,” he jokes.

You chuckle. “No, probably not.”

Silence fills the space again, and Peter kicks his legs over the edge of the ledge, trying to think of something to say before he loses you.

He clears his throat. “So, uh—”

“Can I ask you something?”

You both talk over each other, and his face warms with embarrassment. “Sorry. Go ahead.”

“Okay,” you continue. You let out a shaky breath, and he instinctively braces himself for whatever you’re about to ask. “I’ve noticed that your receiver is always on. Do you forget to turn it off?”

Peter pauses, confused by the question. “No. It’s on twenty-four seven—just in case something happens, you know?”

You hum softly. “I get that. But I guess what I’m trying to ask is… don’t you have other things in your life to worry about, instead of fighting crime behind a mask?”

Peter stays quiet for a moment.

In truth, there’s a bigger reason he keeps the radio on besides his duties as Spiderman. He could easily listen in on reported crimes just fine without your help, but he keeps it on twenty-four seven in the hopes of hearing your voice ring through—just in case you might… need him.

There have been several nights since meeting you where he tosses and turns in bed, reaching for the radio to see if your receiver is on. It usually isn’t during consistent parts of the day—meaning you’re either at work or in class. It’s usually off at night, but sometimes around three in the morning, he’ll see your receiver light up and you’ll call in, your voice completely wide awake, proving you can be a real night owl.

Ever since meeting you, it feels like he finally has a friend to talk to. The worst part of it all is that he doesn’t even know your name. And he can never meet you, no matter how badly he wants to.

Peter finally found someone he cares about—and he isn’t going to risk losing you.

“I… I guess I do,” Peter says, trying his best to tread carefully. “I always keep an earpiece in, just in case something happens. You can never be too careful.”

You hum again, and Peter knows that answer wasn’t enough to buy it.

“And I guess I also keep it on… just in case you ever want to talk.”

Shit, Peter curses to himself. If his half-assed answer just now wasn’t enough to make you switch off the line, this one definitely takes the cake. You’re quiet on the other end, and each passing second makes him want to do you both a favor and turn it off himself.

“In that case,” you speak softly, “I’ll keep my receiver on in case you want to talk to me.”

His heart stutters in his chest, feeling as though all the air has been sucked straight out of his lungs.

Peter hasn’t felt this way since high school. He’s grinning ear to ear—a smile so wide it hurts the muscles in his cheeks. He lets out a chuckle, a raspy, disbelieving sound at the realization that there’s a chance you might feel the exact same way about him.

“Don’t say that,” he says before he can stop himself, trying to inject some humor to cover up his flustered state. “You’re gonna get annoyed with me.”

“Who’s to say I’m not already?” you joke back.

And for the first time in a long time, Peter feels like the happiest man on Earth.

He looks up at the sky, watching birds fly across the orange hues as he kicks his feet like a high schooler who just scored a date with the prettiest girl in class. His heart is racing so fast in his chest and he feels so giddy that he’s actually surprised Evie hasn’t called him out on it yet.

He wants to make this last—to say something, anything, to keep this moment from ending.

Suddenly, a series of sharp beeps emits from your end of the radio. It's a sound he knows all too well, a reminder that duty calls before anything else.

“Oh, God,” you mutter quietly.

Every hair on Peter’s arms stands on end. He leaps to his feet, ready to launch himself toward whatever is happening. “What is it, Static?”

“There’s an alarm triggered at Grand Central Terminal,” you explain. “NYPD comms just flagged it—there are a bunch of hostages. It looks bad, Spiderman. Multiple armed men have barricaded the main concourse.”

Peter wastes no time, shooting a thick web line toward the nearest building and flinging himself into the sky. “How many hostages are we talking?”

“At least fifty. Commuters, staff—they were trapped during rush hour,” you answer, the clack of your keyboard clattering over the staticky connection. “I’m tapping into the security feed right now. They’re holding guns, and… it looks like there’s a heavy grade explosive right in the center, attached to the information booth.”

The wind roars through Peter’s mic as he accelerates through the air. “How much time is on the clock?”

“I’m trying to zoom in—eight minutes,” you say. “They’ve blocked all the major exits with deadbolts and wired the perimeter. It looks pretty half-assed, Spidey. If SWAT breaches the doors, or if even a piece of rubble hits that rig, the whole thing will blow.”

“Alright, no breaches,” Peter takes a mental note, his mind racing through entry points as the massive arched roof of Grand Central comes into view. “You’re my eyes in there, Static. Find me an entry point that skips the doors.”

“The skylight above the west balcony has an old grate,” you reply instantly. “It leads directly into the ventilations—high enough to keep you out of sight, but close enough to drop in.”

“Got it,” Peter replies, landing silently on the glass roof. He peers through the skylight, his eyes adjusting to the interior where dozens of terrified people are huddling on the floor, held at gunpoint by masked men with automatic rifles.

Right in the center, duct-taped to the information booth and blinking with a harsh red timer, sits the bomb.

“Okay, I’m in position,” Peter breathes through the radio. “Time me?”

He hears a soft click on your end, signaling that your timer is already running.

“Be careful, Spiderman.”

He tucks the radio against his thigh, securing it with a thick band of web.

Peter moves exactly in the direction you tell him to—he wedges his body into the dusty vents, moving with the practiced speed of an arachnid that takes him from point A to point B in the blink of an eye. He slowly lifts the grate, the poor thing held up by only a flimsy screw, and sets it down softly beside him to avoid any loud noises.

He lands gently right in the center of the terminal—but his plans for discretion don’t last when a hostage looks up and yells, “We’re saved, everyone! It’s Spiderman!”

Immediately, all the armed threats spin around, several barrels abandoning the hostages to point straight at the man in the red-and-blue suit.

“Oh,” Peter smiles. “Making my job a lot easier. Thanks.”

Before giving them the chance to shoot, Peter fires off thick strings of web into every single barrel, clogging up the firearms. With every weapon bound, he tangles the web lines together into one big knot and yanks them all out of their hands.

The guns crash into each other in a tangled mass of spiderwebs and steel. With the firearms rendered completely useless, he tosses the mess aside to focus on the men—who are now charging at him with combat knives and sidearms.

Peter quickly makes short work of the pistols, disarming the men with his webs before a stray bullet can even graze the bomb. One by one, he takes them down, firing webs with every intention of keeping them bound and completely immovable.

When Peter gets down to the last guy, slinging a thick web to pin him flat against the wall, your voice rings out from where the radio sits tucked against his thigh.

“SWAT is moving in—mind the doors and tripwires!”

“Shit,” Peter curses, whipping his head toward the exits—but it’s already too late.

The SWAT team breaches fast, shouting and gesturing for the hostages to run. Panic surges through the crowd, and every frantic step from the civilians echoes like thunder in Peter’s ears. One misstep, even one piece of falling debris, could set this entire place off. Peter snaps his head back to the bomb. Four minutes remain on the digital clock, but suddenly the numbers freeze—and a sharp high pitched frequency fills the room.

It’s quiet to everyone else, but to Peter's heightened senses, it might as well be an air siren.

“Wait!” Peter shouts, turning to vault himself away before the bomb sets off.

But it’s too late.

“Spiderman! Get out of there!” you cry out through the radio—right before a brilliant flash of red and white blinds the entire building.

Pressure and heat slam right into Peter’s chest, throwing him backward through the air and showering him in flying stone like a ragdoll. Glass shatters overhead, raining down thousands of sparkling fragments as the information booth detonates into a massive cloud of fire and smoke.

Peter crashes hard against the far wall, the impact knocking every last drop of air from his lungs. He coughs up blood, staining the inside of his mask, before sliding down a broken slab of marble. He wheezes violently as dense gray smoke fills the room. His ears ring loudly, drowning out the shouting SWAT officers, the screaming crowd, and the creaking support beams above.

Evie’s voice sings in his ear like a taunt.

“Detecting bone fractures near the lower hip. Internal bleeding. Labored breathing—”

Then, your voice comes cutting through the static.

“Spiderman! Answer me!” Your voice cuts in and out, and despite being crushed under rubble with smoke filling his lungs, he reaches for the radio at his thigh.

He lifts it with a trembling hand, and his heart stops. It’s broken, snapped open with electricity sparking near the wires.

“Please—are you there? Spiderman! Check in!”

“Time, Static,” he manages to croak out.

Even through the static, the sheer panic in your voice is unmistakable. “The ambulances are on their way. Just hold on for a little longer—”

“What’s the time, Static?” he repeats with a wet cough.

You suck in a sharp breath. “Four minutes and twenty-three seconds. Now save your breath and stop talking!”

“Peter,” he croaks, coughing up more blood.

“W-what?” you stammer through tears. The sound makes his chest hurt more than the slab of concrete resting heavy on his ribs. “You’re breaking out.”

“Our little game—remember? Every successful mission, we exchange a fun fact,” he wheezes, fighting for air. “My name is Peter Parker.”

A broken, sobbing gasp escapes you. He glances down at the radio, watching the little light that indicates his microphone is working flicker in and out.

“Static? Are you still there?”

“I can’t hear you, Spiderman.”

The blue glow of your television screen is the only source of light in your dim apartment. Outside your window, New York City keeps moving, but inside, time feels like it has been frozen for seven agonizing days.

On the screen, a news anchor stands outside Queens Hospital Center, her face grave under the studio-lit broadcast.

“…we return to our top story tonight regarding Spiderman,” the reporter’s voice echoes through your quiet room. “It has been one week since the explosive incident at Grand Central Terminal that left the vigilante in critical condition. Authorities and medical staff at Queens Hospital Center have kept tight-lipped about his recovery.”

You pull your knees tighter into your chest, your fingers trembling as they wrap around a lukewarm mug of tea you haven’t touched.

“In a shocking turn of events earlier this morning, hospital administrators confirmed that Spiderman is no longer in their care,” the reporter continues. “According to sources, when attending nurses entered his private room to adjust his IVs and monitor his severe injuries, they found the hospital bed empty. There is no security footage explaining how or when the injured hero managed to slip past guards, leaving NYPD officials baffled—and deeply concerned given the extent of his internal trauma.”

Your eyes widen, and you press a hand over your mouth as a shaky exhale spills past your lips.

He woke up.

He survived.

You keep watching, waiting to see if the reporter will expose his identity. A part of you is already annoyed that these attention-hungry journalists would stoop so low now that he’s been admitted to a hospital. But another part of you desperately wants to know—because you felt like that might’ve been what he was trying to tell you over the radio right before the line cut out.

A heavy breath escapes you when the reporter doesn’t mention a name, and the broadcast switches to a story about local stray animals. You’re not even sure if the sigh you let out is one of relief or frustration.

You glance over at the radio resting on the couch beside you.

Your receiver light blinks green—it has been on this entire time.

For the past seven days, you’ve been sleeping with the radio clutched in your hands in hopes that you’ll hear his voice one more time. Even as you walk through the hallways of your university, moving from lecture to lecture, you keep an earpiece tucked in your ear so you won’t miss him if he calls.

A few more days pass, and you’re sitting at your desk with heavy eyes. A lamp at the corner of your desk emits a warm glow over the pages of your notebook. You feel like you’ve been awake for days, running on far too little sleep and not nearly enough caffeine to keep you going.

Your head rests heavily in your palm. A quick glance at the clock tells you it’s 3:41 in the morning.

With a tired sigh, you start to push your chair back—but the sudden sound of familiar static stops you in your tracks.

A sound that is usually so grating to your ears suddenly sounds like heaven.

You quickly scramble back to your desk, your hand swiping up the radio and lifting it to your ear.

“Hello?” you say, your heart racing. “Hello? Is someone there?”

The static cuts out for a second, and you pull the radio back to check the lights. Both indicator lights are glowing green, showing that you—and whoever is on the other line—are connected. The static crackles through again, and you press the receiver tight against your ear, holding your breath as you wait for them to speak first.

“—atic?”

That voice—so familiar, so gentle—rings out. You feel your heart leap straight into your throat. You’ve been waiting for days to hear him again, but you aren't prepared for what to say now that he's actually here.

“Sta—t—ic,” Peter’s voice cuts in and out before suddenly coming through crystal clear—clearer than the very first time you ever connected with him. “This is Spiderman. Are you there?”

Your heart swells with a profound wave of relief. Tears prick at your eyes, spilling down your cheeks before you can even stop them.

“Oh my God,” you breathe, your hand trembling as you press the radio against your forehead. “You’re okay. You’re here. Thank God. I—I thought I lost you. I was keeping up with the news, and when they said you fled the hospital—I hoped you were okay. I’ve been waiting for your call all week. I—”

“Hey, hey,” Peter coos softly on the other end. “It’s okay. I’m here. I’ve been here the whole time. I’m not going anywhere.”

You hear him rustling around on the other line, the soft friction of sheets sounding like he’s lying in bed. The thought of him resting comfortably in his own room rather than trapped in a sterile hospital bed makes your heart melt.

“Where have you been?” you ask, your voice cracking as you wipe a stray tear from your cheek. “Why didn’t you call sooner?”

“I know, I know… I’m sorry,” Peter says softly, his breath catching in a faint, painful wince that he tries to cover up with a dry laugh. “My suit was pretty much trashed, and the radio got crushed in the blast. It took everything in me just to crawl over to my workbench, and a few more days to rebuild the transmitter from scratch.”

A shaky breath leaves his lips. “With the radio broken, I was terrified I wouldn’t be able to find you again. I spent all this time rebuilding it—I even fixed the signal integration so both our voices would come through clearer.”

You let out a wet, teary laugh. “So that’s why you sound like that.”

You can picture him grinning on the other end. “A lot better, huh?”

That familiar, teasing tilt in his voice sends a wave of butterflies straight to your stomach. A soft laugh escapes you, and he chuckles in return. Then, as if savoring the sound of your joy, he breathes out softly.

“I missed hearing your voice.”

Your feet carry you over to the comfort of your mattress, and before you even realize it, you’re collapsing onto your bed, kicking your feet like a giddy, hopeless romantic.

“I missed hearing you, too. You’d better not let that happen again. If I can barely handle losing you for a week, I definitely can’t bear losing you forever,” you say, trying to pass it off as a joke, but the tremble in your voice betrays you.

Peter’s grin widens where he lies in bed, staring up at the ceiling. “I’ll make sure to be extra careful from here on out, just so you don’t lose me.”

You smile into your pillow. “Good.”

A comfortable silence settles between you two—not the awkward kind from when you first met, but a warm one, wrapping around you both like a blanket despite the distance. You set the radio down on the empty space beside your pillow, and he does the same. With the microphone improvements, you can hear his steady breathing on your end, and he can hear yours.

“Were you able to hear anything I said... the last time we spoke?” Peter asks softly.

You shake your head, the friction against your pillow rustling over the mic. “You were cutting out too much.”

He pauses, the soft sound of sheets shifting as he pulls his blanket up over his shoulders.

“It was about our game—the fun facts one,” he says, his voice careful, like he’s walking on eggshells.

You couldn’t catch much before the line broke down completely. Pet... That was all you had managed to hear. But a deep feeling in your gut tells you that whatever he said was a precious piece of himself—a piece he wanted you to have in case he didn’t make it.

You hold your breath, waiting to see if he’ll offer it up again.

“And since I completed a successful mission,” he continues, swallowing hard. “I thought I’d continue with that trade.”

You brace yourself, your heart clawing in your chest as you wait for the confession—for him to finally drop his guard and lay his identity on the line, just like you plan to do with yours.

Peter draws a slow, quiet breath.

“Do you… have a boyfriend?”

You blink.

The silence stretches for a long second, the sudden change in direction catching you so off guard that your mind does a hard reset. Of all the things you expected him to say—a big secret, a superhero revelation, a tender confession about his life—that was not on your bingo card.

“What?” you squeeze out, your voice squeaking slightly.

Over the line, Peter clears his throat awkwardly, a sudden rustle of sheets betraying how fast he just sat up to bury his face in his hands.

“O-or girlfriend! Sorry—I shouldn’t have assumed! I mean, you don’t have to answer! It’s just—it’s a fun fact! A personal fact! That’s how the game works, right? You tell me something, I tell you something… or—”

A helpless, snickering laugh bubbles up from your chest, breaking off his ramble.

“Spiderman,” you giggle, burying your blushing face deeper into your mattress.

“Yeah?” he yelps, sounding like a man standing on trial.

“No,” you answer, a wide grin spreading across your face. “No boyfriend. No girlfriend.”

A long, almost dramatic exhale breezes through the speaker, followed by the soft thud of Peter flopping back down onto his mattress.

“Oh, thank God,” he mutters, trying to keep it quiet enough so the microphone doesn’t catch it—but you hear it anyway. “I mean… cool. That’s cool.”

You snort. “Okay. You know how the game goes. Now it’s my turn to ask.”

“Do I have a girlfriend?” he prompts.

You shrug, taking the opportunity to tease him. “Or boyfriend. I don’t judge.”

A playful scoff leaves his lips, and you can already imagine him rolling his eyes. He’s quiet for a few seconds, making you think he’s just too flustered to answer. But when his voice comes through shaky, almost hesitant, you feel an unfamiliar tug at your heart.

“I—um… I used to have this girl,” he murmurs. “We were dating for a while—but it didn’t work out.”

The tone of his voice sends a shiver down your spine. He speaks like a man who’s been broken again and again, carrying a profound heartache you couldn’t even begin to measure. A small, selfish twinge of jealousy tugs at you, but you know it’s not your place.

“What happened?” The words spill out before you can stop them.

Peter sucks in a sharp breath, and you wince with regret for pushing too far.

“Well, that’s something you’re gonna have to ask the next time I complete a successful mission,” he says, trying to ease the tension with a playful tone, and you’re more than happy to fall right back into it.

You roll onto your back, looking up at your bedroom ceiling. Across the city, Peter does the exact same thing.

“Deal. But let’s not jump back into all that too soon, okay? Whatever crime happens out there, let the police handle it,” you say, pulling your blanket up to your chin. “I just want to keep you all to myself tonight.”

You want to slap yourself for how ridiculous you sound. He just opened up about a painful past relationship, and you immediately turn around and sound like a clingy girlfriend.

But Peter laughs—a full, rich sound that doesn't sound at all like he just survived a traumatic experience a week ago. It’s a laugh that never fails to make you smile.

“Usually, I’d oppose the idea of ignoring crime,” he says softly. “But for you? I’ll stay. For as long as you want me to.”

You smile, nuzzling your nose into the soft fabric of your blanket. “Good. Goodnight, Spiderman.”

“Goodnight, Static.”

And for the remainder of the night, neither of you switches the radio off, letting the quiet and comforting sound of each other’s breathing lull you to sleep.

It’s a brand new day, and Peter is running around New York getting his errands done. Laundry run, check. Grocery run, check. The last thing on his list is to pick up some flowers for Aunt May.

Right next to the small bodega where he always buys his flowers sits a busy coffee shop.

The front window is large enough to see everything and everyone inside—which is exactly why he has to do a double take at the person standing near the cashier.

He stops dead in his tracks, causing a hurried pedestrian to bump into his shoulder.

“Sorry,” Peter mumbles, but the man just shoots him a dirty look and keeps walking.

Standing inside the coffee shop is a face that’s all too familiar—someone he hasn’t seen in a long, long time.

Ned.

Peter’s feet are moving before he even realizes it. He hovers near the entrance, stepping aside for a few exiting customers before pushing the door open. Slipping into an empty seat near the front, he watches Ned chat with the barista. But Ned isn’t alone.

He’s standing next to a girl—a pretty girl, at that. And one he doesn’t recognize.

Peter smiles to himself, a swell of pride washing over him seeing his best friend doing well, and scoring a pretty girlfriend to date.

“And for the missus?” The barista holds up a paper cup, pen hovering over the cardboard as she waits.

You glance up at the menu board, though you don’t really need to. You know your order like the back of your hand.

“Can I get an extra-hot almond milk latte with one pump of sugar-free vanilla—”

Peter’s heart stops.

“—one pump of regular hazelnut…”

That voice. That familiar, sing-song cadence he hears every night through a staticky radio. The last voice he listened to when he nearly died just a few weeks ago.

“And two scoops of vanilla bean powder,” Peter mumbles to himself like a mantra.

“…and two scoops of vanilla bean powder?” you finish, flashing the barista a harmless, innocent smile.

The barista gives you a disbelieving look, and you chuckle awkwardly, tucking a strand of hair behind your ear. The movement gives Peter a clear view of a small earpiece nestled right inside. Everything playing out before his eyes matches the picture he’d built in his head—except for you. You being this stunning was far beyond anything he could have imagined.

The barista finally finishes jotting your order down, and you and Ned turn to search for an open table. Peter holds his breath, watching your easy smile and the natural way you interact with his once best friend.

The pang in his chest is a feeling he wouldn’t wish on his worst enemy. Two people he cares about more than anything... so close, yet entirely out of reach.

His heightened spider-sense gives him the ability to hear almost anything, even from across the room. Yet right now, the ringing in his ears and the heavy thumping of his heart drown out every other sound. You and Ned approach an empty table with only a single chair, but you glance around and spot the unused chair across from Peter.

“Hey,” you smile politely—a soft, courteous tone reserved strictly for strangers, not your partner in crime. “Are you using this chair?”

This is it.

Finally, for the first time, he can introduce himself to you properly. He could bring both you and Ned back into his life with a single, simple greeting.

Hi, I’m Peter. Peter Parker. The guy you’ve been talking to over a flimsy radio these past few months.

Peter looks up at you, completely frozen where he sits. Your smile fades into a faint frown when he hesitates. Then, your eyes flicker briefly to the earpiece resting in his ear—identical to yours, worn for the exact same reason.

Just in case either of you calls in.

Before he loses you, Peter clears his throat. His hand subtly moves up to scratch his ear, hiding the earpiece with his knuckles before slipping it into his palm. When he finally speaks, he deliberately drops his voice a few pitches deeper—adding a slight rasp for good measure.

“No, go ahead.”

That polite smile returns, and you pull the chair away from his table. “Cool, thanks.”

You slide the chair up to the table you’re sharing with Ned, and just like that—unaware that you’ve completely flipped his world upside down and inside out—you fall right back into conversation with him.

The barista calls out your order with your name, and the sound of it is like music to his ears.

He repeats it quietly under his breath. It sounds natural, like a name that was always meant to be spoken in his voice.

Peter squeezes his eyes shut. He can’t reveal his identity to you. Telling you his real name that night—when he was trapped under rubble and bleeding out—was just a lapse in judgment brought on by desperation. But now that he’s here, looking at you and his best friend in broad daylight, he knows he can’t risk letting you into his world.

Anyone who knows Peter Parker is Spiderman is a person bound to be lost. And Peter can’t afford to lose you.

Yet as he watches you sit across from him, tossing your head back with a laugh that is painfully familiar, it feels like he’s already lost you anyway.

“So, tell me more about this party.”

“Well, it’s a housewarming party,” you explain, tucking your hands into your pockets as you walk through the night streets of Queens. “Two of my friends moved into an apartment recently—so we’re celebrating tonight.”

Peter hums, leaning back in his chair and staring mindlessly at his screens. He folds a piece of paper, fiddling with it as his mind wanders to who those friends could be. Ned? And if so, he wonders who else he could be moving in with—if not him.

“That’s… cool,” he finally answers in an indifferent tone.

You round the corner, the sounds of the bustling city nightlife picking up on your microphone. “Yeah. And since I’ll be busy socializing tonight, I won’t have my receiver on all night. But I’ll try my best to check in with you.”

Peter huffs a laugh through his nose. “I’m a big boy. You don’t need to check up on me.” He glances at the window. “I’m more worried about you, though.”

You step aside for a pedestrian who’s rushing past. “What for?”

Peter pushes himself out of his chair with a grunt, stepping up to the small window and looking down at the city street below. “Well, you’re a woman walking all by yourself at night. I hope your friends at least know where you’re at.”

You chuckle, pulling open the door of the small corner grocery store and being welcomed by a soft bell jingle.

“Don’t worry your head, Spiderman. If I constantly worry about my well-being just because I’m a woman, then I’ll never get anything done in this city.”

You’re greeted by a frail, older lady behind the counter, and you offer her a polite smile as you walk past. Making your way to the coolers in the back, you weigh your options between beer and seltzers.

“Do you think two cases of Budweiser is enough?” You ask Peter.

The bell chimes again, and a large man with a dark hoodie pulled over his face enters. You glance at him, and he holds your stare. You look back down.

Peter’s cackle draws you back in. “And you’re drinking?”

You can’t help but grin at the worry in his voice. Grabbing two cases—one in each hand—and shutting the refrigerator door, you head to the front counter. “Yes, because I’m an adult and should be enjoying myself. And you should be, too, Spiderman. It’s Friday night.”

A bitter smile dances on his lips. He should be enjoying himself—a night out with you, instead of being cooped up in his apartment, worrying about you getting wasted at a house party surrounded by men your age with grimy hands and bad intentions.

You set the cases on the counter, and the lady begins to ring you up. The man in the dark hoodie falls in line right behind you, holding just a pack of gum in his hand.

“Okay, I gotta head out. I’ll check in with you later tonight—”

The lady at the front counter has her attention locked on the man behind you, and she sharply gasps, ducking down immediately. Your head whips around, and you find yourself face to face with the black metal of a handgun.

“You know Spiderman?” the man before you asks in a deep gravelly voice, finger poised right above the trigger.

A pathetic, broken sound escapes you. You still have Peter on the line, and you hear the sudden panic in his voice the minute your microphone picks up your heavy breathing and whimper.

“Static? Who is that? What’s happening?”

“You must be mistaken,” you raise your hands in surrender, shoulders timid, as a bead of sweat rolls down your temple. “I—I don’t know Spiderman—”

“Bullshit!” the man shouts, backhanding you with the grip of the gun.

You cry out in pain, your body collapsing hard onto the floor as your hand flies to your cheek. Your earpiece falls out, Peter’s voice ringing out loudly in sheer panic. The man huffs an incredulous laugh as he crouches down to pick it up and lift it to his ear.

“Tell me your location—where are you? I’m coming—!”

“103rd Street,” the man answers with a grin. “That’s where your little lady is at—on the floor, bleeding outta her lip.”

The wind whips loudly through the earpiece, audible even from where you’re prone on the ground.

“Don’t lay a fucking hand on her,” Peter’s voice crackles through the wind and speaker. “What do you want from me?”

The man only chuckles, turning the small earpiece in his fingers, unfazed by the threat of a friendly neighborhood superhero.

“That’s the thing with people like you who try to play hero,” the man says, his tone dripping with bitter resentment. “You stop guys like us, but what you fail to realize is that we aren’t the bad guys at all, Spiderman. While you sit in your fancy little apartment, the rest of us are out here fighting for scraps just to survive—and it’s people like you who keep stopping us.”

He looks down at you, lying on the cold floor with a trembling hand pressed against your bleeding lip.

“We’re just trying to eat,” the man spits into the receiver. “So if a guy like me has to take a little collateral to get your attention, or to get a quick payday—that’s not evil. That’s just survival. There’s a lot of money on your head, Spiderman. Money that can help an average person like me tremendously.”

The sharp thwip of a web fires through the speaker, followed by the harsh gust of the open night sky.

If it were anyone else being held hostage, maybe Peter would extend the courtesy of hearing him out. But he’s not holding just any person. He’s holding you—the only person Peter has opened his heart to in years. The only voice he looks forward to, the one that gives him hope to push through to a brand-new day. Right now, there isn’t a single shred of restraint left in Peter’s mind—not when your life is on the line because of him.

“I don’t give a shit about your excuse,” Peter spits, whipping around a sharp corner as he flies onto 103rd Street. “If you hurt her again before I get there, I swear to God—”

“It’s too late, Spiderman.”

From high above, Peter spots the grocery store below. The white lenses of his mask widen as he peers through the large front windows, catching sight of you scrambling backward in fear, hands raised in surrender.

The man above you stands straight and lifts the gun. Peter’s eyes lock onto the finger resting against the trigger. With one launch off the side of a building, he catapults himself straight through the glass windows.

The explosion of glass shatters in time with the gunshot. As the bullet travels through the barrel of the gun, Peter collides into the man, sending him flying sideways and the gun tilting upwards. The bullet hits the ceiling, the fluorescent lights exploding with electricity as the roof panel falls. You quickly scramble away so it doesn’t hit you.

Peter sends the man flying from one window to another, rolling around on the pavement outside until he lands on top. There is no amount of webs he can use to convey his anger—so he settles with his fists.

One punch after another, one hit after brutal hit. Blood flies out of the man’s face, tainting Peter’s suit with red. It splatters across his knuckles, and he delivers a hit so violent that it sprays right over the white lenses of his mask.

“Spiderman, stop!”

You shout, but the ringing in his ears is louder.

Tears prick at his eyes behind the mask as he continues raining down punches. The man lost consciousness long ago, but Peter isn’t done. He can’t rest knowing anyone who threatens to hurt you is free to walk these streets.

He can’t rest until he knows, for certain, that you’re safe from danger.

He cocks his fist back one last time, with every intention of putting this guy down for good—until your body crashes into his, your arms wrapping tightly around his shoulders. His arm freezes mid-air, suddenly weighing a ton.

“Stop! It’s over—it’s done,” you try to reassure him but your voice comes in a panicked and rushed tone. Sirens sound in the distance. “The police are coming.”

Peter looks around, his chest heaving.

Several bystanders have stopped to stare, hands covering their mouths after witnessing such a brutal act by a man who was supposed to be a savior to all.

He curses under his breath, one arm wrapping tightly around your body.

“Hold on,” he says, before slinging a web to the highest point of the building next to you and launching you both into the night sky.

You bury your face in his chest, legs wrapped tightly around his waist as you hold on to him for dear life. You’re too terrified to look down. So instead, you glance up at the man holding you—the very man you’ve dedicated your life to assisting these past few months.

He doesn’t look like the friendly Spiderman you see on television or in the newspapers.

Blood lays over his mask like a veil, and you can feel his heart racing against yours from how tightly you’re holding him.

He doesn’t say a word until he finds a discreet alleyway. Then, finally, he sets you down gently.

Your eyes don’t leave his face even as you release your grip on him. You stand in front of him, eyes wide and lips parted as you stare at the man you’ve been dying to meet for what feels like years. But while this is your first time seeing him, it isn’t his first time seeing you.

There are so many things you wanted to say, but none of them come out. You never expected your first meeting to be like this—under circumstances where he tarnishes his reputation and your face bloodied and bruised.

“I…” your voice wavers, desperate to say anything, terrified he might swing away at any second.

Peter swipes his bloodied hand against his thigh to clean it before stepping forward, gently cupping your face in both hands. The lenses of his mask are so expressive, shifting with every furrow of his brow. Even behind it, his expression is wrecked.

“Look at what he did to you,” his voice cracks, sounding so broken, like it’s all his fault.

You huff a soft laugh, resting your palm over his knuckles as you lean into his touch. “If I’d known I was going to see you tonight, I probably would’ve worn more makeup.”

You try to joke, but he doesn’t laugh. His thumb gently brushes over the torn skin at your cheekbone, then down to your busted lip.

“I can’t believe you’re right here,” he breathes. “And I’m holding you.”

Peter should get your injuries fixed up, take you somewhere safe, or even take you home, but doing that means he’ll have to say goodbye—and he doesn’t know when he’ll give himself the chance to be this selfish again.

For the first time in years, it feels like he’s found salvation. After everything, he tries to convince himself he deserves this—even if it's just for a few minutes.

“You know what I look like,” you smile painfully. “Yet, I still don’t know a single thing about you.”

Peter bites the inside of his cheek to keep from breaking down. “I’m sorry.”

You step closer, your hands slowly finding the hem of his mask resting around his neck. With trembling fingers, you slowly lift it up—giving him every opportunity to pull away if he wants to—holding your breath as you raise it over his nose. Brown curly hair decorates the nape of his neck.

As you try to tug it up higher, his hands find your wrists, gently stopping you. “I can’t.”

With a quiet nod, your hands fall back down to his cheeks, cupping them softly. Your thumb traces the curve of his cheekbone, his jawline, and the plump of his bottom lip.

The press of your thumb against his lower lip makes his breath hitch. He closes his eyes, leaning into your touch—the first grace of warmth he’s felt in forever.

His white lenses open again, and his gaze drops to your lips—bruised, bleeding, and parting softly. The tension between you two suffocates him, and without waiting another impatient second, Peter tilts his head down and kisses you.

His lips press against yours, gentle and soft. And when you return the kiss, he feels like he’s in heaven. He takes his time with you, his lips exploring yours and savoring the quiet sweetness of the moment. Your hands are warm against his cheeks, and his hand finds your waist, respectfully holding you close as his heart beats as one with yours.

You kiss until you both run out of breath, finally pulling away to rest your foreheads against each other.

Peter shuts his eyes, breathing in your scent. “I wanted to do that from the moment I first laid eyes on you.”

“I am detecting a sudden increase in heart-rate and body warmth—”

“Shut up, Evie.”

You chuckle, your teeth catching your bottom lip while heart beats wildly in your chest.

“A successful mission,” you smile up at him. “You know what that means.”

He chuckles at that, the sound sending butterflies to your stomach now that you’re hearing it up close for the first time.

“You’re right. You go first.” He prompts.

You tell him your name, but he doesn’t react the way you thought he would after hearing it for the first time. He smiles—almost boyish, with kiss-swollen lips. It feels as though he’s known your name all along.

Peter repeats it softly. “It’s beautiful,” he says.

Warmth fills you from head to toe. You were right. You loved hearing the sound of your name in his voice.

You tilt your head, leaning in until your nose grazes against his. “What’s yours—”

Frantic footsteps echo just outside the alleyway.

Peter’s senses tingle and reverberate through his entire frame. Everything in his body is screaming at him to do one thing: run.

Two people turn the corner, and he freezes at the sight.

“Oh my god, there you are!” Ned shouts frantically, catching his breath. “We were wondering why you weren’t answering our calls—then someone at the party said there was an accident happening on 103rd Street—which is where you were going—and wait, is that Spiderman?”

Standing right behind him is MJ.

“You scared us!” she yelps, running to you with a hug. You turn around with a weary smile and a relieved sigh.

“I’m okay, you guys shouldn’t have left to come find me. It was dangerous back there, and yes,” you motion behind you, “this is—”

Peter doesn’t even let you finish. He pulls his mask down and, without another word, zips up and out, moving through the dark like a ghost in the night. All the warmth vanishes like the gust of wind he leaves behind as he disappears into the air.

“God,” Ned breathes, the three of you standing dumbfounded in the alleyway as you watch him disappear around the corner. “See! It’s like I told you, MJ! He’s like Peter Pan—if you really believe in him, he’ll show up!”

“Okay—you know, your fanboying really freaks me out,” MJ says, making a face. She looks back at you. “Anyway, I’m glad you’re okay—”

A shudder passes through your body.

My name is Peter Parker.

“Peter,” you whisper with a sudden realization.

📝 first time writing for peter parker kinda nervous !! "all these things that i've done" by the killers was on repeat while writing this. for the first time in a while, i've had a lot of fun and passion writing a marvel fic again, and i hope you can feel it when you read this fic. if you've made it this far, as always thank you so much for taking the time to read my work. interactions are always appreciated, I love reading every bit of them! I do not have a tag list. to get notified for fic updates, please follow @notify-superbassbuck and turn on notifications.

↳ Arachnid!Spidey who: presses you down against the bed, caging you in by his arms, because he needs you to feel consumed by him. He needs you to be completely at his mercy whilst he turns you into a blubbering mess.

↳ Arachnid!Spidey who: will whisper the filth in your ear that peter parker would never.

↳ Arachnid!Spidey who: will tease you when you try to arch away from the pleasure "awww," he says without an inch of sympathy, "my pretty girl can't handle my dick." or "weren't you just begging for this?"

↳ Arachnid!Spidey who: keeps bringing you to the brink of orgasm only to back off, black eyes shining with delight when frustrated tears well in your eyes. he'll threaten to, and probably will, web your hand to the bed when you keep trying to touch yourself. Every bit of your pleasure needs to come from him.

↳ Arachnid!Spidey who: finally lets you cum, and then doesn't stop, pulling multiple orgasms out of you. his calloused fingers feeling rough as he circles your swollen clit again and again.

↳ Arachnid!Spidey who: is so sensitive that he'll cum all too easily when he feels your walls tighten around him, it's thick and warm and sticker than usual, clinging to your insides like it doesn't want to let go.

↳ Arachnid!Spidey who: while being sensitive, gets hard again within seconds, able to go so many rounds that you end up falling asleep on his dick as he continues rutting into you.

↳ Arachnid!Spidey who: uses every thrust to send a statement. your tits bouncing and bed creaking with every posessive reminder.

↳ Arachnid!Spidey who: expects you to mark him as best as you can. whether that's with your nails dragging down his skin, your teeth biting into his neck, or a stinging slap across his face.

↳ Arachnid!Spidey who: loves to see your reaction to him, how your hands curl desperately into the sheets, how your heart rate sky rockets, how your tongue falls out of your mouth, how your head lols

↳ Arachnid!Spidey who: cares about your pleasure too, so he'll never go beyond the limits of what you've discussed before.

↳ Arachnid!Spidey who: becomes a balanced peter after, and gives you the aftercare your body needs.

At the end, you had decided never to speak a word about it. Telling him you had read his deeply personal letter to the love of his life wasn’t an option. Besides the fact that he still had the letter was a good sign. It meant that he hadn’t given it to her. It meant that he was not in contact with MJ and that was all you needed.

But watching him walk in that evening with two cups of coffee from the same café, from mj’s café had destroyed all resolve you had spent all day building.

“Do you still love her?” the words rolled off your lips before you could stop them.

Peter knew who you were talking about. It also wasn’t difficult to figure out how you found out. Knuckles whitening around the cups he slowly turned to face you.

He had looked at you with utter disgust and disbelief. He couldn’t believe you would betray his trust like that; how could you intrude on the very last piece of MJ he was allowed to keep?

What followed was an ugly fight full of bitter accusations and shouts over tears until he decided he has had enough of you and stormed out shutting the door behind him in a loud rattling bang.

Fwb!Peter who wouldn’t pick up your calls, who didn’t read your texts. No matter how hard you tried to apologize he just wouldn’t let you; it was like he had suddenly decided that you were not worth his time, like he was done with you for good.

Guilt and regret were mixing venomously inside you. You never should have found that letter. You never should have said anything to Peter. Memories of that night haunted you, soiling every thought you had, following you everywhere you went.

Deciding to drown in alcohol induced amnesia you walked in the first frat party you could spot.

The music was so loud it rolled off the walls. The beats pulsed down your spine in their rhythm as you stood leaning against the corner you picked the moment you entered. Red cups were scattered in every hand. The crowd laughed and danced as if relaxing more and more with every passing second.

You couldn’t have felt more out of place if you tried

The guy who approached you had spent the last twenty minutes talking about the recent updates in his favorite video game.

Maybe under different circumstances you would have actually been interested in what he had to say. Maybe he wouldn’t be a faceless man hurling words like higher pixels and better ping and you wouldn’t be having a hard time remembering his name or how he ended up here.

A decent person would have politely excused themselves from the one sided conversation and left. But you couldn’t do that. Not when you could still picture the look of disgust on Peter’s face.

You desperately needed the distraction. Without thinking much, in the deafening crowd you leaned in to whisper in the guy’s ear, asking him to bring a refill. Before you could finish the sentence cold fingers snaked around your elbow and jerked you off your spot.

When you turned and saw Peter’s face, you thought you were hallucinating. Had the drinks finally caught up to you? Was this just your life now? Pathetically thinking of Peter even when you were wasted?

With every passing second that he didn’t vanish you assured it really was him. You tried to release your arm but he wouldn't budge, an irritable glare etched on his face, as if the situation was so obviously beyond him he couldn't even bring himself to say anything.

Peter was here, standing right next to you refusing to let go of your arm. Everything instantly dissolved in an unfocused blur around you. You wanted to reach up and trace a finger along his eyebrow. You had spent the last two weeks wishing for a chance to see his pretty face again. There was so much you wanted to say.

Before you could start your apologies, you were being pulled away from the scene towards the stairs.

Fwb!Peter who couldn’t understand what was happening to him. It was like something was taking control over him. He couldn’t even remember why he was walking in this party when there was so much he had to do.

But when he saw you corned along with some guy, making no efforts to push him off, it was like something had snapped.

Watching you lean into his ear, he could feel the anger pulsating and boiling his blood. He didn’t think twice before crossing over and snatching you physically off of that man who clearly wanted nothing more than to get inside your pants.

Fwb!Peter who pushed you inside the first empty room he could find. You knew this was your chance to say everything you had in your mind before he decided to shut you out of his life again.

“I really shouldn’t have read your letter, I should have left it alone. I’m so sorry Peter” You blurted out. When he stayed silent you continued.

“You were right; we shouldn’t care about what the other person does. What you do with other people is none of my business, it was wrong of me interrupt.”

His nose flared. “Is that what was happening out there?” the words spat out like the taste of it nauseated him.

Confused you shook your head “No what?”

He started slowly walking towards you “Did I interrupt you guys? Would you be here with him instead of me if I hadn’t walked in and stopped you?”

Animosity waved off with every livid step he took. Alarmed by his sudden behavior, you started pacing back in defense till you hit the wall. “Peter I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

He smiled when had you positively cornered he asked in mock whisper “Now you want to play dumb. Is that how you got his attention by playing the lost little whore?”  

Heat flooded your cheeks. Gone was the sunny warmth radiating Peter who had helped you with your jammed car door the first time you met him. Heart hammering in your ribs, you placed a hesitant palm on his chest half hoping it would stop him.

“Two weeks and you’re running off with the first man that talks to you. I mean I knew you were needy but acting like this?” His breath fanned the shell of your ear, hoarse voice shooting straight down your spine.

Impatience colored his eyes black when you didn’t respond. He bent down till his teeth grazed the smooth skin of you neck and sucked on the familiar spot. Hovering there with his lips brushing near your collarbone he murmured a quiet I missed you so much.

Fwb!Peter who clawed the base of your skull, pushing your face as deep as he could into his face like he could finally breathe.

Fwb!Peter who frantically lifts you on his hips against the wall. “I know you want someone to catch us like this.”

Fwb!Peter who clamps your mouth with his hand, every thrust making it difficult to be quiet. “I missed this”

Fwb!Peter who takes his sweet time as if wanting to memorize every micro second with you.

Fwb!Peter who kisses your forehead when he is done and makes a mental promise to never let you go again. He won’t make that mistake ever again; even if you get on your knees and start begging.

"I can't. I have toー"

"Bed."

"Just let me finish this report, it's due tomorrow and the formatting is fucked and my boss is being a dick about the projections—"

You close his laptop.

He makes a sound like a kicked puppy.

"Hey—"

"No. You're done."

"I'm fine."

"You're shaking."

He looks down at his hands. They are, in fact, shaking. He shoves them under his thighs like that'll hide it.

"I'm fine," he repeats, stubborn, stupid, infuriating.

God, he's such a liar.

He's not fine. He hasn't been fine in months. He's running on coffee and cortisol and some deeply pathological need to provide, to protect, to make sure you never want for anything even if it means grinding himself into dust. He does all the cooking. All the cleaning. All the grocery shopping, the bill paying. the appointment scheduling, the car maintenance. He won't let you touch the dishes. He physically removes your hands from the laundry basket. You tried to vacuum once and he looked so genuinely distressed you thought he might cry.

"l just want you to have a good life," he said once, when you confronted him about it. "I want to give you everything. The nice things. The expensive things. You deserve— you deserve so much, and I can't— I have to—"

He couldn't finish the sentence. His throat closed up. You held him for an hour.

That was six months ago. He's gotten worse since then.

Now he's sitting in his office chair at four in the morning, vibrating with exhaustion and the desperate, delusional belief that if he just works hard enough, he'll finally be worthy of you.

As if he isn't already. As if he hasn't been since the day you met him.

You take his face in your hands.

He freezes.

His eyes go wide and wet and immediately. instantly. all the fight drains out of him. His shoulders drop. His jaw unclenches. His breathing hitches and then slows, and he's looking up at you like you're the sun and he's been living in a cave for a thousand years.

"There you are," you murmur.

He makes a soundーa tiny, broken thing, half sigh, half whimper一and leans into your touch like a cat seeking warmth.

"Baby," he whispers, and his voice cracks on it.

"I've got you. Come on. We're going to bed."

"But the report—"

"Fuck the report."

He blinks. You never say things this... aggressive.

"Okay," he breathes. "Okay."

You take his hand and pull him to his feet. He stumbles. He actually stumbles. Your strong, capable, hyper competent boyfriend can't even stand up straight because he's so depleted. You have to hold him. And when you do, his forehead drops to your shoulder and he just... stays there. Breathing. Just breathing.

"I'm so tired," he whispers, so quiet you almost miss it.

It's the first honest thing he's said all week.

"I know, love."

"l just— I want to give you— want you to have一the necklace, the blue one, I saw you looking at it, and I've been saving, I've almost got enough, l just need to finish this project and then I can—"

"You think I want a necklace?"

"..."

"You think I want anything more than I want you alive?"

He doesn't answer. But his hand clenches in your shirt.

Fuck.

He always have to make you emotional.

"Alright, we're going to bed."

He follows you.

Of course he follows you.

In the bedroom, you sit him down on the edge of the bed. He's still in his work clothes—button down wrinkled, top two buttons undone, tie somewhere lost in the office. He looks up at you with those huge, exhausted eyes, and you can see him trying to figure out what you want, what he should be doing right now to make you happy.

You peel his shirt off. He hold out his arms to help, even now, still trying to make it easier for you. His pants come next, then his boxers.

Such a beautiful man.

Your boyfriend is such a beauty.

So lucky he's going to be your husband.

"Do you trust me?" you ask.

His brow furrows. "Of course I trust you. I trust you more than— more than anything, more than—"

"Then lie down."

He lies down.

"On your stomach."

He rolls over. Hesitates for half a secondー just confusion一and then settles onto his stomach, cheek pressed to the pillow, hands fisted loosely in the sheets.

You run your hand down his spine.

He start shaking. Full body. Like he's been electrocuted. A tiny, punched out sound escapes his throat, and his back arches into your touch before he can stop it.

"When's the last time you slept?" you ask.

"..Tuesday?"

"It's Friday."

"...Oh."

"Mmhm."

You keep stroking his back, slowy, tracing the knots in his shoulders, the tension that's been there for god knows how long. He's so tight it's like touching hot rock. He's been barely holding himself together and his body is screaming.

You lean down and kiss the back of his neck.

He sobs.

"Shh," you murmur against his skin. "I've got you. Let me take care of you. Just this once. Let me."

"I don't— I'm supposed to— you shouldn't have t一"

"You do everything for me. Let me do this for you."

He's crying now. Quietly, shamefully, face pressed into the pillow so you won't see. His shoulders are shaking and he's trying so hard to be quiet, to not be a burden, to not make this about him—

Fuck, he's such a mess.

Such a beautiful mess.

He's lying there naked and trembling and so vulnerable it gives you butterflies.

"Good boy." you whisper.

He whimpers. Actually whimpers. Like a fucking dog.

You reach for the drawer in the nightstand. The one he never opens because he's too busy taking care of you to even think about sex.

He hears the click of the lube cap and his breath catches.

"Baby—?"

"Shh. You're going to let me do this. You're going to let me take the stress out of you. And then you're going to sleep. Understand?"

"...Yes."

"Yes what?"

"Yes— yes, I understand— please—"

Please. There it is. The word he never says because he's too busy being the provider, the protector, the one who never needs anything.

You slick your fingers and then your strap一the one you bought specifically for this, for him, because you knew this day was coming, knew he'd eventually run himself into the ground and need someone to pull him back out.

Or maybe you just wanted to fuck him. But that's not important right now.

He's so tight. Damn, he's so tight.

Your first finger slides in and he gasps, back arching, hands fisting in the sheets.

"Breathe," you remind him.

He breathes. Shaky. Wet. Still crying a little.

"You're doing so well."

Another whimper.

You work him open slowly一so slowly. Because he deserves it, deserves gentleness, deserves to be handled like something precious instead of a machine that just runs and runs and runs.

He's making sounds you've never heard from him before. Little broken moans. Desperate, needy sounds. His hips are twitching, pushing back against your fingers, and he's babbling into the pillow.

"please—"

"I love you ughh—"

"Ahh fuck don't stop—"

By the time you're three fingers deep, he's a mess. Tears and pre cum and a flush that goes all the way down his chest. He's stopped trying to be quiet. He's just making noise—open mouthed, broken, gorgeous noise.

"Ready?" you ask.

"Uh-huh?"

He looks confused. So out of it already.

How cute :)

You position yourself behind him. Press in.

He keens.

A high, desperate sound that goes straight to your own core (of course you're wet, but tonight is just about him)一and his whole body goes taut for one second before it melts. All the tension, all the stress, all the months of holding himself together—it all dissolves as you push deeper.

"Oh— oh fuck— baby—"

You start to move. Slow at first. Letting him feel every inch of it, letting him adjust, letting him remember what it feels like to be taken care of instead of taking care of.

His hands are white knuckled in the sheets. His face is pressed into the pillow, mouth open, tears and drool soaking the fabric. He's moaning your name over and over like a prayer.

Y/n. Y/n. Y/n.

So hot.

"You're so good." you tell him, picking up the pace. "You're so good to me. You work so hard. You take such good care of me. Now let me take care of you."

He sobs again. Nodding frantically into the pillow. His hips are pushing back to meet your thrusts now, desperate and uncontrollably, and he's so hard it's leaking onto the sheets but he hasn't even touched himself, hasn't even tried. He's just letting you use him, letting you fuck the stress right out of his body.

"Let go. I've got you."

He comes with a cry of your name. Ropes of it, hot and thick, painting the sheets under him. His whole body clenches around you一around the strap, around this moment, around the feeling of finally, finally letting someone else hold the weight.

You fuck him through it. Gentle. Lovingly. Until the last tremor runs through him and he goes completely limp.

And thenー finallyー he passes out.

Just like that. Face down on the bed, tears still wet on his cheeks, body finally relaxed for the first time in months. He's breathing deep and even, the way he hasn't breathed in weeks, and his pulse is slow and calm under your fingers when you check his wrist.

You clean him up. He doesn't stir. You wipe the tears from his face, the cum from his stomach, the lube from his thighs. You change the sheets around him—carefully, so carefully一and pull the blanket up to his chin.

He murmurs something in his sleep. Your name, maybe. Or l love you. Or both.

You kiss his forehead.

"Sleep well, honey."

He sleeps like a baby.

When he wakes up, the sun is streaming through the windows and the bed is empty and he panics.

What the fuck??

Where are you???

Fuck, he didn't made you breakfast—

He's on his feet before his brain catches up一stumbling, sore in a way that makes him pause for half a second...

Oh, right, last night, oh god—

And then he's moving again, grabbing the first thing he finds (your robe, pink, too small, he doesn't care) and following the smell.

Bacon.

Eggs.

Pancakes.

And you, standing at the stove in your pajamas, flipping pancakes like it's the most natural thing in the world.

He stops in the doorway.

"...Baby?"

You turn around. Smile. The smile that he loves more than anything in his miserable life.

"Morning, sleepyhead. Sit down. Breakfast is almost ready."

"But I— you— I always—"

"Yeah. I know. Today it's me. Sit."

He sits at the kitchen table and watch you cook.

He's confused. He's wearing your robe. He's sore. He doesn't know what the fuck is going on.

You set a plate in front of him. Pancakes. Bacon. Eggs over easy, just the way he likes them. A glass of orange juice. A cup of coffee—JUST ONE— fixed exactly the way he takes it.

He just... stares at it.

"lt's not going to eat itself."

"I—" His voice breaks. He tries again. "You made me breakfast."

"I did."

"But I always make you breakfast."

"I know."

"I'm supposed to— you shouldn't have to—"

You immediately rush to him, take his face in your hands, and kiss him. Soft. Sweet. Syrup from your lips sticking to his.

"l love you," you say against his mouth. "l love you and you're running yourself into an early grave and I'm not going to let that happen. So here's what's going to happen. You're going to eat this breakfast. Then you're going to take a shower. Then you're going to tell me what's been going on at work. And then we're going to figure out a schedule that doesn't involve you dying of sleep deprivation. Okay?"

"But the chores—"

"We'll split them."

"The bills—"

"We'll look at them together."

"l just want to give you everything," he whispers, and his eyes are wet again, and god, he's so tired of crying but he can't seem to stop. "You deserve the world. And I can't— I can't give you anything if I stop一"

You kiss him again. Harder this time.

"You are the world, you idiot. You're my world. And I need you alive in it. So eat your pancakes."

He laughs. It's wet and snotty and a little hysterical.

"Okay."

"Okay?"

"Okay." He picks up his fork. Looks at the pancakes—perfectly golden, just the way he taught you一and his heart just skip a beat. "But I'm doing the dishes."

"Fine."

"And tomorrow I'm making you breakfast."

"Obviously."

"And tonight..." He pauses. Cheeks flushing pink. "Tonight can we... can we do that again? The... the thing. With the..."

You raise an eyebrow. Smile.

"You want me to peg you?"

He buries his face in his hands, "Oh my god."

"Is that a yes?"

"...Yes."

"Then sure. But only if you promise to sleep at least six hours every night this week."

"l promise."

"And eat lunch."

"l promise."

"And let me do the vacuuming sometimes."

"...I'll think about it."

You laugh and ruffle his hair and he leans into your touch like a starving man offered bread.

He's still a mess. But he's eating. He's sleeping. He's sitting at the table in your too small pink robe with syrup on his chin and a soreness in his body that's painful in a good way.

And when you sit down across from him with your own plate and your own coffee and your own smile, he looks at you like you're a miracle.

"Thank you," he says.

"For what?"

"For..." All of it. For not leaving him even when he's disgusting. "Everything."

"Eat your pancakes."

"Yes ma'am."

He eats his pancakes.

He's going to be okay.

You'll make sure of it.

If you want to be in my taglist let me know :)

He barely lifted his head when he heard you gasp, the lens of his mask focusing on your figure standing there with wide eyes, wearing only an oversized shirt.

“Wrong window,” he choked, then tried to hold himself up but immediately collapsed again. “Dammit,” he cursed, waiting for you to freak out any second now. 

You could have, but instead you rushed to him and knelt beside him.

“Oh my god, are you okay?” Your hands hovered helplessly over his body, trying to see how bad the damage was in the dark. “You need a hospital–”

“No!” He snapped, trying to turn away but failing miserably. “I’ll be fine, I heal quickly.”

“You still need to stop the bleeding,” you countered, folding your knees under your body so you could rest on your calves. “Listen, I can help you. I took some medical courses last year and I have a kit somewhere.”

You looked at him with pleading eyes. He’d saved the city so many times, the fucking world, it was the least you could do to give something back. 

He considered his options for a second, and to be honest he didn’t have many. His body was betraying him, and he couldn’t even get up to fix it himself like usual. 

The blood loss made him nod, and you wasted no time in getting up and finding said kit. The blood loss also made him drift in and out of consciousness as you tended to the wounds on his ribs as much as you could. 

It did not make him less cautious of you though. When you noticed the rip on his mask over a nasty gash on his neck and reached for it, his hand closed around your wrist and even half conscious, his grip was strong. 

“Please,” he whispered. Pleaded. “Keep it on.” 

The fear in his voice made you promise you would. Even if you couldn’t get to that gash properly. Even when he fell asleep on your floor and didn’t wake up for six whole hours. 

The next morning, he opened his eyes and found you sitting on your bed, still staring at him. 

His hands patted his chest, and confirmed his arachnid powers had done its job and healed him mostly. But most importantly, his mask was still in place. With no warning from E.V of it being removed. He learned that you’d spent the night making sure he was still breathing without seeing his face. 

That had been one year ago. 

After thanking you profoundly for helping him, he’d repaired your window, apologized several times, and disappeared into the apartment next door. He then considered moving into another building, but the thought was brushed away very quickly when he remembered the balance in his bank account. 

So he acted more careful instead. For a while, he only turned back home when your curtains were already closed, or he only left the apartment when you had already left for your job (because yes, he absolutely researched the hell out of you after that night.)

Then he moved to the attic of the building. Bigger space, no neighbors, no risks. No you. Or at least he thought. 

Because some nights…some delirious nights he still found your window a few stories down, and the accidental visits became less accidental. When he was too badly injured to care for himself, he came to you, even after you confessed your degree had nothing to do with medicine. 

When he noticed you understood about his equipment malfunctioning, he’d bring it for you to inspect. When he became too reckless with himself you talked his ear off about how being difficult to kill did not make him immortal.

Somewhere along the way, you became spiderman’s friend. 

Spiderman was safer. With you, spiderman was the only part of him he could let you see. Because that was the thing, you only knew the masked superhero. 

He’d spent so much time blocking away his identity, making peace with the fact that there was no longer anyone in the world who would call him Peter and know exactly who that person was. That name only belonged to the people that once knew him, and no longer existed, so he never gave it to you.

Never showed you more than a sliver of skin when his mask rode up or glimpses of his abdomen when you tended to his wounds. He always kept that barrier and you respected it, even on those nights he was too weak to stop you. Even if sometimes not knowing the color of his eyes kept you up at night. 

A promise was a promise. 

Maybe that’s why he kept coming. Why he trusted you with a certainty he couldn’t understand. Why he eventually showed you his new living quarters in the attic and let you spend time with him. Why half a year ago, he added another chair next to his desk so you could work together, or help him when he was out patrolling and needed an extra set of eyes.

“I’m officially the girl in the chair, spidey,” you joked that time as you sat next to him, spinning around in your chair.

He’d gone quiet immediately, his body tensing up enough to make you frown, but then managed a small smile and said you were. You pretended you didn’t notice him being too quiet as he worked on his inhibitor after that. 

He was wearing a hoodie, sweatpants and the mask. Always the mask that didn’t quite let you see through him. After a moment of quiet, you rolled your chair closer to his and nudged his arm playfully. 

“You know I can’t keep calling you spidey forever, right?” 

He snapped out of his trance, and the chuckle that came from under the fabric was unmistakable. 

“Why not?” He nudged your arm back, but still focused on the device he was hunched over. “I like spidey.”

You put your elbow on the desk, resting your cheek on your hand so you could lean a little closer. 

“I like it too, but it feels ridiculous after having my hands all over your body almost every night.” 

The moment the words left your lips, you realized how bad that sounded. He straightened up, turning toward you.

“Wow.” Even if you couldn’t see the smile on his face, the lenses of his mask were quite expressive sometimes. He was amused. 

“That came out very wrong,” you said immediately, before he bursted into laughter. He had been laughing more since you entered his life. “You know what I meant,” you whined, laughing too with heat flooding your cheeks. 

“I think I know,” he chuckled, making you roll your eyes. 

“I’m being serious though,” you added, a little more quietly. “You don’t have to say your real name. Just give me something.”

“Mmm…” he acted like has considering it, going back to tinkering with the piece of metal between his fingers, but then his eyes drifted to the flowers he’d bought that morning, and the name came out of his lips before he could think twice about it. “You can call me Maynard.” 

“Maynard?” You repeated, suppressing a chuckle. “You don’t sound like a Maynard. That’s like an 80 year old man’s name.”

“That’s all I can give you,” he shrugged playfully. 

You had a feeling it went deeper than that, but you’d also learned not to push it with him. 

“Alright. Maynard,” you nodded, “but don’t expect me to use that name unless you’re dying. Guess I’ll stick to spidey for now,” you chuckled, going back to your own work as he hummed in agreement. 

The conversation ended there. With him trying not to think about your hands all over his body in…different conditions. 

Peter didn’t know exactly when his gratitude became longing. He could not identify the moment the friendship, the closeness, or just your smile, shifted into something he craved everyday. 

Despite the mask and the fake name, he knew that after years of being no one to everyone, he had become someone to you. And you had become everything to him. Even if it was behind walls he’d built, you were the person who knew him better than anyone alive.

Which is why, the night he lost control of himself after an unknown dust was thrown at him in a fight, he chose not to crash land into your room. 

Peter hit the floor of the dark attic with a loud thud, as his senses went overboard. His suit was sticking to his body uncomfortably due to the sweat coating his feverish skin. The fabric was intact, with no visible wounds in his body, just that burning sensation of something running through his veins. 

And that dark part of him he’d managed to lock down with the inhibitor, trying to claw its way out. 

“What the…what the fuck is going on,” he cursed, clutching his heaving chest as he panted against the worn wood floors. “I can’t–I can’t breathe…” 

The computer’s monotone voice broke through the silence. 

“You have arrived injured. I’m letting her know–”

“NO!” He cut the AI off, “EV, don’t tell her–”

“Message already sent.”  

He glanced up at the digital clock on his desk. 2:18 am. 

He groaned, grabbing his head when a wave of migraine hit him. He knew what came after that. The black eyes. The desire to break. To take. But this time something felt different. It was like a pull, looking for something or someone…for…for you? 

Oh fuck. 

You were going to come in and you were going to see him like this. No, no–

“Spidey?” You asked from behind the door, knocking exactly twice before opening it anyways.

The air changed the exact moment you walked in, and that something inside him shifted too. It became aware that the only thing it craved to survive was in the room now. 

He needed to get to you. He needed to pin you down and– 

“Don’t!” He managed to scream, holding his hand up weakly when you scrambled toward him. 

You stopped right in your tracks, eyes wide and running all over him, searching for torn fabric, blood, or anything that would explain why he looked like every breath was painful. 

“What happened?” You frowned, when you couldn’t find any source. “Did you get hurt?” 

You instinctively stepped forward, but he waved his hand in front of him again. 

“Stop, stop, stop,” he said quickly, “don’t come any closer.” 

The harshness in his voice caught you off guard, but what sealed the deal was him dragging himself further away from you. It was barely more than a clumsy, desperate crawl, but he managed to put a decent distance between you before collapsing against the side of his thrifted couch. 

He avoided looking at you. The oversized shirt covering your body, the comfy shorts you were probably wearing, the way your hair looked messy from rolling out of bed as soon as you got EV’s warning even if you had work the next morning.

You stayed right where you were, watching him. His suit had always fit him like it was painted on his skin, but every pant made his chest rise and fall beneath the fabric so violently that you wouldn’t be surprised if it ripped at the seams. 

This reminded you too much of the changes that happened in him months ago. 

It started with a sharpened temper, then the heightened sensitivity to everything, the black covering his eyes, and moments during patrol when his reactions became simply frightening for someone who had as much strength as he did. But you were supposed to have stopped it. 

“Is it the inhibitor?” You asked, crossing your arms over your chest, “is it failing?” 

“I–I don’t know…I was hit with some dust out there,” he breathed. “I think it’s tampering with it…my head is killing me. Everything is too much.”

You nodded, turning toward the workstation. 

“I will check the programming. Just hold on.” Not your best attempt at reassuring him, but he groaned in acknowledgment. 

“EV?” 

The computer woke when you touched the keyboard, illuminating the dark attic in a wash of blue light. 

“Online.”

“Please run a diagnostic on the inhibitor and any possible interference.” 

“Beginning diagnostic.” 

You waited impatiently for the results, tapping your fingers on the desk while you watched him from the corner of your eye. 

Over there, he…he was doing his best trying to breathe. 

This obviously wasn't his first time having sensory overload. When the animal tried to take over the human part of him, everything in the city became impossible to escape. Not a single movement, or sound, or simple existence within miles was unnoticed by him. 

But this time? The rest of the city had disappeared. There were no sirens in the distance, or voices coming through the walls, or every heartbeat in the building pounding in his head. 

There was only you. 

Your rapid heartbeat echoing inside him. He felt every tap of your fingers against the wood, every slight catch in your breathing each time he made another involuntary and pathetic sound from his spot on the floor. 

Your scent…God, your scent filled the entire apartment. 

The scent he found himself coming back to so often that it scared him. He didn’t want the attachment. The possibility of having someone again only to risk losing them again. 

That same scent was making every muscle in his body react in a way he didn’t understand. It made him, and the other him, wanna do things to you he had only dreamed of in his wildest fantasies. Things he wasn’t proud of, things he wouldn’t dare to say out loud, even if he looked at you through the lenses of his mask and you couldn’t see the black in his eyes. 

He pressed the back of his head against the couch harshly. 

This was wrong. So wrong. 

His senses were supposed to consume everything when the change came. Instead, they had fixed themselves entirely on you.

He could feel the heat of your body from across the room as though you were still in front of him. Could remember with sickening detail how soft your hands looked when they reached for him. Could almost feel the burn of the touch that had never landed because he stopped you. 

What if he’d let you? What if he’d felt the way your hands ran all over his body? What if you’d moved them lower, and lower, as your mouth–

“Diagnostic complete.” 

Your heads snapped toward the screen. 

“There’s no external damage affecting the integrity of the device. I detected a foreign biotoxin in the bloodstream that may be bypassing the inhibitor, activating the suppressed arachnid hormones.” 

“What biotoxin?” You frowned. 

“Unknown. No matches found in available databases.” 

Great. He thought. He had no time to take a bath with Yelena Belova to find out what the stupid dust was. 

The screen changed, displaying a model of his nervous system. There were yellow bright lines pulsing quickly, running all the way from the base of his brain down the length of his spine. Something unknown was moving through his blood, altering the part of him he had spent months forcing into submission.

He sucked in a breath as he watched you read the screen. Your eyes were focused, and a bead of sweat made its way down the side of your forehead. 

He suddenly felt the need to lick it off. 

Wanted to run his tongue from the base of your neck to the back of your ear. Wanted to fist your hair and make your heart beat out of your chest from how good he knew he could make you feel–

“The effects remain within his enhanced tolerance. However, prolonged exposure to certain hormones can cause extreme distress without relief.” 

“What hormones?” Your voice, worried and unknowing of his thoughts only made him feel guiltier. 

It took him a second to realize what you asked, but EV threw him under the bus before he could say anything. 

“There’s a significant rise in reproductive hormones. The unknown toxin is inducing a strong mating response in him.”

Mating response. He stopped breathing. 

Your eyes slowly moved from the monitor to him, and he saw the moment your attention dropped lower to the tent of his pants. 

That suit concealed nothing on a good day. On one like this? Fuck. Fuck. Fuck–

He shifted almost immediately, but the movement only worsened the pressure, pulling a helpless groan from his throat that made your pulse jump. You looked away at once, turning back to the computer. 

“Is there a way we can…umm…stop it?” You asked hesitantly. 

“The subject is experiencing severe sexual arousal with a fixation on a nearby individual,” she explained, because fuck him if he wasn’t the unluckiest individual on earth. “Acting upon it can be a positive option to relieve sexual tension.”

He wished the floor would open beneath him, swallow him, and never ever EVER spit him back out again.  

Your pulse was absolutely hammering after that. He caught the sudden change in your scent. There was a sharp spark of surprise, nervousness, and something else beneath it that his altered senses fed on immediately.

You kept your eyes fixed on the monitor, although the data had stopped meaning anything the moment you heard fixation on a nearby individual. 

“Is that what you really feel?” You asked softly after a moment. 

His head fell forward, catching it between his gloved hands. He didn’t know how to answer without making everything worse.

Although, after what EV said, could it really be worse? 

“…Yes.” The word came out rougher than he expected. Yet still not enough for what was happening inside him. “It’s like…I can only feel you. All of you.”

Heat rose to your face once again. 

“What does that mean?” 

Don’t say anything, don’t–

“I can smell you.” Great start, idiot. He cleared his dry throat before continuing. “I can smell your shampoo…the lotion you use…the ink on your hands from your favorite pen.” 

He chose not to mention he could also smell the adrenaline on you. The heat gathering slowly beneath your skin. 

Your eyes dropped to your hands, and under the dim light of the computer, you caught the ink stains in them from your journaling session before bed. 

“I can hear your heartbeat changing every time I speak,” he added. Okay, that one slipped out.  

You swallowed. And god, he felt that in his own throat. 

The suit was suffocating him at this point. He wanted to rip it off as much as he wanted to rip off the fabric covering the goosebumps on your skin. 

“Is it only because I’m nearby?” You asked, gathering the courage to turn your chair to him.

White lenses met you across the room. He dragged in another shaky breath of oxygen made of you as he thought about his next words. He could’ve lied. He should’ve lied. But instead, chemically overwhelmed and stripped of every defense he possessed, he gave you the truth. 

“No.”

His voice was firmer this time. No hesitation in it despite the thousand red alarms pounding in his head telling him to shut up. 

“It picked you–no, I picked you for a reason,” he added. “And it’s not just me. The other…the other me wants you too.” 

His voice went lower on the last part, that told you how much it cost him to admit that. 

The silence following his confession was heavy. For a moment he wished he could read your mind. For all he could feel of you, your thoughts were unreachable. 

His own mind was a mess. The impulses didn’t feel like thoughts anymore, just his body feeding him instructions. 

Get up. Cross the room. Touch her. Breathe her in.

His palms shook with the urge to close around you. His teeth ached with the need to graze your skin. His eyes burned with the desire to see beyond fabric. 

Every part of him seemed convinced that the small distance between you was a mistake he needed to correct. That he needed to breathe you in until his lungs burned. Drag his mouth along the inside of your wrist and taste the pulse there.

He hated it.

He hated that something inside him could look at the person he cared for the most and reduce her to an answer for his pain. 

“EV, how long is this state going to last?” He asked the computer, followed by a weak cough as he clutched his side. 

“Your enhanced physiology is struggling to break down the toxin’s structure. I estimate a time between ten to twelve hours before it’s metabolized. However, neurological collapse is expected before that timeframe.”

“What?” You looked at him. “There’s no way we’re letting that happen. Maybe I can–”

“Don’t even start,” he cut you off, shaking his head profusely. 

“So what? I’m supposed to sit here betting on whether your body collapses on hour three or hour six?” 

“I’ll just pass out, big deal. I’m not putting you in danger because of this. I can handle it.”

“You’re barely handling it now. There’s no danger in trying–”

“You don’t understand what’s happening inside me right now,” he argued, raising his voice. “This other thing, the one the inhibitor controls it’s…awake. That part of me doesn’t think like I do. It doesn’t care if you're scared, or hurting–”

“You wouldn’t hurt me–”

“You don’t know that!” He snapped, his fist struck the floor next to him, hard enough to make the worn wood crack beneath his knuckles. 

The sudden noise made you flinch. He smelled the flash of fear moving through your body for only a second. 

One second enough. 

“Fuck–that is what I mean,” he cursed, covering his lenses with his hands. “I don’t…I don’t know if I’d be gentle. I can’t risk this, I can't…shit, I can’t risk you.”

The words, said with so much pain, and honesty, seemed to settle somewhere deep in your chest. 

“Okay,” you nodded, settling deeper in your chair. “But I’m not leaving you like this. I can’t risk you either.”

He shuddered a painful exhale. His head dropped to the couch again, shutting his eyes in preparation of what the next hours of torture would be. 

Except…he didn’t even last ten minutes. 

The suit was killing him, so he decided he’d be better without it. He reached desperately behind his back, clumsily undoing the zippers that tied the suit together.

He could feel your wide eyes on him as he tugged the fabric off his shoulders, peeling it off his sweaty arms. He groaned when he lifted his hips and the suit grazed his swollen crotch. In a matter of seconds that felt like eternity he managed to break free from the spandex, and threw it away somewhere in the room. He’d undressed down to his dark boxers, mask still in place, revealing the marble sculpture of his body.

You let out a shaky breath from your spot, eyes raking over a body you’d only seen partially. He was covered in wounds most of the time, but this time, he only had faint bruises from the night before decorating his chiseled abs. 

His tight muscles flexed with every rise of his chest, his bulge straining harder the more you devoured him, pressing against his pants, making him curse quietly. 

You noticed, and returned your eyes to the screen to track his vitals. 

He felt grateful that you’d given him that grace, but just you being in that room made it very hard for him to think of anything other than your existence. 

Too hard. 

Before he knew his hand drifted down the growing ache in his crotch, trying to feel some relief, but every rub he made over the fabric of his boxers sent a jolt of pain through his body instead of pleasure. 

It only made it worse when he realized you were tense at the desk, trying very hard to keep your focus on the screen and not on the whines he was letting out. 

“…I’m sorry,” he apologized instantly, breathlessly, moving his hand away. “I didn’t–”

“Don’t apologize,” you shook your head quickly, eyes still on the screen. “You…you can do whatever you need.” 

He didn’t say anything, just whined in pain again, so you took it as a chance to say it before you regretted it. 

“But my offer still stands, spidey.” 

What a polite way of saying ‘I’d let you fuck me into next week so you can control your horny arachnid hormones, spidey.’

Fucking hell. 

“I’m okay I just–God I didn’t–I didn’t think it would feel this way…” He laughed humorlessly, staring at the ceiling. “But I–I got this. Yes.”

You kept quiet, hearing him mumble to himself about a hundred times about how he had this.

“I’m okay…I’m good…it’s fine…” 

He wasn’t. 

“Fuck I don’t…I’m going to die…”

For God’s sake. 

“I think I can help.”

By the time he registered the words and looked back at you, you had already moved from your chair and shortened the distance between you, kneeling in front of him. 

His senses went from one thousand to one million. He forced his hands behind his back, trying to keep the animal from grabbing you and getting it over with. 

“What–what are you doing?” He stammered nervously, the lenses of his mask going wide. 

“Maynard,” you said quietly, ignoring the way his body tensed up at that name. “Would it make you feel better if I put my hand here?” 

You placed your hand right in the center of his chest, and your cold palm met his overheated skin. He gasped, feeling every individual fingerprint on his skin. He wanted them marked on him. Tattooed. 

His back arched from the couch, with a strangled gasp breaking from beneath the mask. The relief hit him all at once, through a simple contact that felt like salvation. 

Your hand steadied him for only a glorious second, but now that you had touched him, his body knew precisely what it had been denied.

It wanted more.

His own hand closed around yours so suddenly that you almost pulled back, but he loosened his grip the instant he realized how tightly he was holding you. 

“Sorry–”

“Don’t apologize.” You pressed harder. 

He was burning.

The heat beneath your palm scared you, but what scared you more was the violent pounding of his heart beating against your hand so so quickly. 

“Better?” You asked quietly, trying not to bite your bottom lip at the image of him crumbling under your palm. 

“So fucking better,” he said breathlessly, pressing your hand tighter against his chest. “I…dammit–”

“Breathe,” you reminded.

His head fell back against the couch. Chest rising up and down, up and down, up and down. 

Just take her, man, she’s right there–

Your free hand accidentally brushed his neck, right where the border of the mask started, snapping him right back. He grabbed your hand, not harshly, but firm enough to make your breath hitch. 

“Please.” Was all he said. 

Leave it on. 

It brought you back to that first night he’d crashed into your life. 

“I wasn’t planning on removing it,” you whispered, leaning closer. “You can keep it on. But let me help you…I really want to.”

See? She wants it. She needs it so bad. 

He hated that the other guy was right. He knew you meant what you said because he could smell the proof pooling between your thighs.

Fuck it.

In a sudden movement he reached for your waist, dragging you forward so you were straddling his lap. The bulge you landed on made you gasp, hands instinctively grabbing onto his sweaty biceps for balance when he let out a broken groan that vibrated against your core. 

His hand cupped your jaw, bringing it closer to his face, and your dilated pupils reflected on the white of his lenses. 

“I can feel that you want this,” he mumbled, tilting his head to the side. “Please, say it again…”

You shifted your hips, barely, so minimal yet he felt it travel through his whole body. He hissed, tightening the grip on your jaw. 

“I want this,” you repeated firmly, moving your head closer to his ear. “You can take whatever you need…”

You moved your hips again, more deliberate this time, pulling a broken whine from him. The toxin made every contact feel like electricity racing down his spine, straight to the heavy, aching weight of his cock under you. 

“Yes…yeah just like that…” he panted. “Just let me…”

His hands landed on your waist, moving you back and forth at a quicker pace over his bulge. You gasped at the friction, fingers digging into his shoulders, while he let out a collection of muffled words you could barely understand. 

“...M–more…” he whined, throwing his head back against the couch. “I can’t–I need…”

“What do you need? More what?” 

“More contact.”

His hands left your waist to grab the hem of your shirt. 

“Can I?” He whispered.

You nodded eagerly, gasping when his hands shifted to the collar of your shirt instead, ripping it off your body with a sharp pull. 

“Oh fuck,” he cursed when he realized there was nothing under that shirt, and saw your nipples hardening instantly under the cold air. 

He resisted the urge to bite them through the mask. 

His hands, however, wasted no time to cup your breasts with a broken whine. His thumbs played with your nipples, tugging at them as hard as he could allow himself to without hurting you. 

“Fuck you’re perfect…you’re so perfect…” he whispered, more to himself than you, pulling some soft whimpers out of you when he tugged a little harder. His hands drifted to your lower half, to the hem of the last piece keeping your body from his greedy eyes. “These too,” he said, “please, can I? I want to feel you.”

“Yes,” you nodded, already out of air. 

You didn’t even know why you tried to get off his lap to take the shorts off properly, when he just did the same as the shirt: ripped it in half where it rested on your hips, yanked it off from your body and threw the ruined pieces far away. 

You weren’t wearing anything underneath. 

“I can smell you. God, I can smell you. You’re so–oh God…”

Now he could feel your wetness drenching his boxers, dripping onto the fabric. He could almost taste it in his mouth. He wanted nothing more than to drown in it for hours. 

“Can–can I–?”

You didn’t even let him finish, you grabbed his hand and placed it right between your legs. 

Water. He found water in the middle of the dessert. 

His hand moved carefully through your wet folds once, twice, delighting in your warmth, the way you felt, the way you let out the prettiest sound he had ever heard in his miserable life. 

“Fuck…” you cursed softly, moving your hips eagerly when he kept stroking slow. Too slow. “Touch me, please.”

He obliged, fingers finding your clit in movements that had you gripping his shoulders tighter, eyes fluttering shut so beautifully he had to bite his lip to not let out a pathetic sound. 

“Been wanting this,” he mumbled. “Longer than today. Longer than tonight.”

His finger slid inside of you, making you moan when he curled it just right. 

“There were…there were nights I thought about you riding my hand,” he kept going, voice cracking as he added a second finger, stretching you more. “I’ve wanted you for so long–not just because of this shit in my blood. Because it’s you.”

Every word made you clench around his fingers. Every admission pulled another shaky moan out of your throat. You were a mess already, breathless, hips rolling down to meet the thrust of his fingers. 

“Oh my God–don’t stop, please don’t stop–”

“Not stopping, baby.” 

He kept working you open, the white lenses of the mask never leaving your face. His free hand slid up your chest, settling between your breasts. 

“I’m–I’m close,” you managed. “I’m so close–”

“Come on…you’re perfect. You’re so fucking perfect like this.”

The heel of his palm lifted to press against your clit. You were right there, right on the edge, about to come on his hand and drip down his boxers–

“Please,” he begged, unable to keep it in. “Let me fuck you after this…please. I need to be inside you. I’ve needed it for so long–just let me, after you come, please, please–”

The plea undid you.

You came with a broken cry, stopping your movements as your walls pulsed around him. The sound you made against his shoulder nearly finished him right there. 

It took you a second to just breathe again, your chest synching up with his in the search of oxygen. He kept rocking his hand slowly, not just to work you through the aftershocks, but because the friction of your pussy in his hand brought the tiniest relief to him. 

You just stayed there as the last soft waves rolled through you. 

Once you were able to see clearly again, you let out a breathless chuckle and straightened back up. 

He needed you. He needed you so badly you really thought he was going to die if you didn’t help him. 

You placed one hand on his chest as the other reached under you, slipping inside the fabric of his boxers without breaking eye contact. 

The second your bare fingers brushed him, his hips jerked hard under you. 

“You said please,” you whispered breathlessly. 

You wrapped your fingers around him and pulled him free.

His cock sprang out, heavy and flushed between your bodies, so thick and hard and painful. The head was red and shiny, with precum dripping down the vein that ran along his length. The tip brushed the skin of your stomach, leaving a warm, wet patch that made the hair on your arms go up. He could smell the small flicker of intimidation sparking inside you, but the want that followed was stronger. 

You stroked him a few times, slowly just as he’d touched you at first. 

“Oh my God, your hand–your hand–”

Another thick bead of precum welled up and spilled over your fingers. Whether it was the toxin or just his enhanced physiology, he was dripping for you.  

Flustered wasn’t enough of a word when you had his leaking cock in your hand. 

His hands slid down to your hips, gripping tighter, guiding you up as if he was about to lift you then pulling you back down immediately. 

Fuck her. Fuck her right now. 

“Please, I need–I need to feel you…” he cried out. “Let me…let me…”

You nodded just as desperately, lifting yourself up as he helped, steadying you with shaking hands until the thick head of his cock nudged against your entrance. You both exhaled hard at the same time when you started to sink down, taking him inch by inch.

He was big. Almost too much. The burn of it made your breath hitch, but the way he cursed under his breath multiple times, completely at your mercy, made you keep going until he was buried balls deep.

You sat there for a moment, breathing heavily, and so full of him. 

When the initial sting faded away, you started moving. He let you set the pace as you adjusted, holding back his need of thrusting up. His fingers dug on your skin, not lifting just holding you, but the more that you moved, the more that control started to waver. 

He could feel it coming. The change. 

You kept moaning, bouncing on top of him, completely unaware of his self restraint crumbling away. 

His grip slowly tightened when his eyes began turning completely black under his mask. That careful, pathetic boy who’d been begging disappeared beneath something more…primal. 

Fuck. Whatever had been holding him back finally snapped.

The next thing he knew, his hands slid under your thighs with sudden strength. He lifted you up in one motion until only the thick head of him remained inside you, held you there for a second as the last part of him tried to remember how to be gentle–then snapped his hips up hard.

That first thrust pulled a sharp moan out of you, but there was no chance to adjust this time. He set a relentless pace almost immediately, using pure strength to bounce you on his cock while he drove up to meet every drop of your body, buried so deep it stole your breath every time he bottomed out. 

“Oh my–May…Maynard–” the name you barely used on him slipped out in the middle of the frenzy, but his hand reached behind your head to pull your hair back slightly as he kept thrusting up. 

“Don’t call me that,” he snapped, his voice so different from just minutes earlier. “It’s Peter. Call me Peter when I’m inside you.” 

He didn’t even give you time to process, still lifting and dropping you onto his cock at the exact hard rhythm he wanted. The only one that satisfied the need inside of him. Your hands instinctively reached for the edge of the arm of the couch he was leaning against, fingers digging into the worn fabric as he hit that spot inside you over and over again. 

“Of fuck…Peter–fuck…yes…”

“That’s better,” he approved. “I was right, you’re so so perfect…taking every inch like you need it as bad as I do…”

A desperate sound slipped out of you at the praise, he could feel your walls clenching tight around him as your body went for that second orgasm, your eyes were fluttering shut, almost there–

“Nuh–uh,” he denied immediately, stopping mid thrust, holding you pressed against him as you gasped, surprised and confused. 

“What–what happened? I was about to–”

“I want you to hold it for me. I know you can.”

That twisted part of him enjoyed the slow realization on your face. 

Even if you couldn’t see his eyes, you knew the same spiderman he’d been without the inhibitor, was the one with your body at his mercy now. 

Good. 

He stayed buried to the hilt for a moment, breathing hard behind the mask. When your breathing finally slowed down and accepted that the high never came, he stood up. Still inside you, he walked you to the bed in the corner of the room. 

His bed.

He pulled out with a wet sound that made both of you groan, then laid you down roughly near the edge of the mattress. He kneeled down, strong hands hooking behind your knees and dragging your legs over his shoulders, folding you open for him completely.

“Look at the ceiling,” he ordered. “Don’t look at me.”

You obeyed, staring up at the wood beams high above you while he tugged the bottom of the mask just high enough to free his mouth. 

Peter leaned down and pressed a few soft kisses to your swollen folds. He wasn’t necessarily eating you out, just giving a few loud smooches that felt good enough to make you grip the sheets. 

“M’sorry, you were so perfect there…” he mumbled condescendingly against your most sensitive spots. “But I need you to hold on a little longer. Can you do that for me, sweetheart?” 

You nodded, eyes still fixed on the ceiling. Maybe too eager. Maybe too pathetic. Just like he’d been. Had he pumped that toxin into you? 

Either way, you didn’t care. You’d be lying if you said you didn’t like this version of him. 

He laughed right over your clit when you moaned loudly, after he moved his tongue in a slow, torturous swipe over it. 

“Was back there too much?” He cooed. “Maybe I just need to stretch you more...”

Two fingers slid inside you, so easily, but the sudden stretch still dragged a whine out of your throat. He curled them immediately, finding the spot that made your hips jerk. 

“Peter…” 

“Huh?” He acted coy, pumping his fingers with a rhythm that kept you right on the edge without letting you tip over. He added a third finger, making your back arch from the mattress. “Keep holding it in.”

Every shake of your body fed the stupid toxin inside him. Having you like this…really trying to keep your body from coming apart because he said so. 

God. He was never going back. 

“You just took my cock. I think you can take three fingers with no problem.” 

He kept the same relentless pace, chuckling when your body started twitching again. 

“Shhh, you’re perfect, absolutely perfect…”

“Peter…” you called out again, hand dropping the sheet to find his shoulder instead. “I need…need…”

“Need what?”

“Need you inside me…please I won’t–I won’t hold for much longer just–fuck me.”

He stopped altogether, a smirk you couldn’t see stretching the corner of his mouth. He pulled his fingers out with a wet pop, licking them clean before tugging his mask back in place and standing up. 

“Yeah?” 

Your legs dangled off the edge of the bed for a moment before his hands gripped your hips and turned you over. He moved you higher up the bed, grabbing one of the pillows, and shoving it under your hips, tilting your lower body up for him. 

He then climbed onto the bed behind you and knelt between your spread thighs, the mattress dipping under his weight as one hand stroked down the length of your spine. 

But something made him stop. 

“This fucking mask–” he cursed under his breath. “It’s suffocating me.”

The sweat on his forehead had pooled under the mask, making it so sticky over his eyebrows that it was affecting the lenses he was trying to see you through. 

“I need you to be a good girl for me,” he added breathlessly, yet still commanding enough. “Keep your head on the mattress. Ass up. Don’t turn around.”

You nodded. Too eagerly again. Couldn’t care any less again. 

He didn’t think twice, just yanked the mask off and tossed it aside. It landed near you, making you bury half your face on the sheets as if staring at the mask alone would be disobeying his commands. 

The sound he made when the cool air hit his face was pure relief. He swiped the sweat off with his forearm, finally seeing you clearly. Face down. Eyes squeezed shut. Already clutching the sheets. 

“You look so pretty like this,” he mumbled. “All spread out for me…waiting.”

“Peter…” you whined, lifting your ass slightly from the pillow. 

“I know, I know. You’re okay.” He couldn’t keep the smirk away when he added, “you said please.”

He reached between you, guiding the thick head of his cock between your thighs until it nudged against your entrance. You were still soft and ready and perfect. 

Peter pushed in slowly, letting you feel every inch as he sank deep and deep and deeper. 

He braced one hand beside your head and kept the other on your hip, pushing you into the mattress as his thighs hit the back of yours. Slap. Slap. Slap. The position left almost no space between your bodies, with Peter pressing his chest against your back. 

“Fuck…you feel so good like this…so pretty taking me.”

He kept going, making the mattress creak and the base of the bed hit the brick wall repeatedly. Your desperate moans ran through his body like electricity, making something inside him crack open again. 

What? What is–

The moment his rhythm stuttered, he shook his head, trying to clear it. Beads of sweat flew from his hair to your back. 

“God–you…you’re making me–” The roughness of his thrusts slowed down immediately, inhaling a sharp intake of air as he felt the change again. “I can’t, I can’t…”

He lifted his gaze to the window behind the bed and noticed his eyes had turned back to its original color. 

“Oh my god,” he gasped, stopping altogether. He straightened up, still kneeling and inside you, but panicking. “I’m…I’m so sorry. I don’t know what happened I–“

“Peter!” You cut him off, pushing yourself back, closer to him, without turning around. “Shut up and fuck me.”

The order left your mouth breathless, pushing back against him even more to make the point clear. His hands twitched when they gripped your hips again. 

“Okay, okay…” he panted, groaning when you dropped back on the bed and his cock almost left the warmth of your pussy. “I’m sorry–if I was too rough, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to…”

He picked up the pace again, but the words tumbling out of him now were pure pleading Peter again. 

“Don’t turn around–don’t turn around–fuck, fuck…” slap, slap, slap. “You can come now. Please. Please, I want to feel it–you’d come apart so pretty on me, I know you would…pleasepleaseplease–”

His final permission and the desperate way he said it made you crash harder than the first time, crying out into the mattress. The second he felt you coming around him, he knew he couldn’t last much longer either.

“Can I–inside…please, can I??…let me fill you up–”

“Yes–inside, Peter, do it inside me…” 

He buried himself to the hilt with a strained groan and finally came. The orgasm tearing out of him was harder and longer than anything he’d ever felt, holding you there, filling you up. 

You gasped against the sheets, breathless, as the waves of cum seemed to go on forever, flooding you with warm and thick ropes in every spurt as he emptied himself inside you. 

“Thank you…thank you…” His forehead dropped between your shoulder blades, sending broken gasps against your skin as he kept coming. “You are so perfect–fuck…so perfect…thank you…”

The pollen wrung him dry until he could barely breathe, and even then he kept rolling his hips weakly, chasing the last of it while he slowly softened inside you. 

When it finally eased, the pain, the need, the hunger…he pulled out slowly with a whine, and half collapsed over you. His arms held most of his weight as he planked above you, but you could feel every ridge of his muscles brushing your sweaty skin. 

Peter’s eyes fluttered shut, feeling exhausted and aching in the best way, almost lulled by the sounds of your agitated breaths. 

You both felt the warm trail of liquid leaking out between your bodies and neither of you moved or said anything for a while. He could’ve stayed like that forever, really. With your naked body under him, no masks, no barriers, just your swollen pussy leaking out his seed–

“Successful ejaculation brought down the arachnid hormone levels immediately. Inhibitor working within regular parameters now. Congratulations, Peter.” 

EV’s monotone voice cut through the silence. 

It took two seconds of shock before you both broke into breathless laughter. His teeth grazed your back as your bodies vibrated in sync from the amusement and overall flustering after everything that happened. 

“Thank you, EV,” Peter muttered. 

“You’re welcome. I gathered data and the released semen volume exceeds standard parameters by two hundred and twenty six percent due to the high hormonal concentration. Hydration, clean up and rest are advised.”

“For fucks sake…” Peter cursed under his breath. 

“Oh god…” you mumbled against the sheets. 

That was your call back to reality. 

Peter felt you move under him, reaching blindly to the side until your hand found the mask. You lifted it over your shoulder, offering it to him without looking. 

“I don’t want to,” he said, too quickly, then cleared his throat. “I…I don’t want to put it back on.” 

“Then I’ll close my eyes,” you offered instead. 

“No–I mean…you don’t have to. I don’t want to wear it around you anymore. Not after…all of this,” he admitted sheepishly. 

“But you told me to not turn around,” you reminded him, dropping the mask on the mattress again. “And that was you, not the darker you.”

He chuckled, nodding even if you couldn’t see him yet. 

“Yeah, because if I saw your face while I was balls deep inside you I would’ve busted before you came.”

There it was. He said it. No turning back now. 

At least it got a chuckle from you too. 

“Listen I…I meant everything I said. Everything. The wanting, the nights I thought about you,” he confessed. “I don’t want you to feel like I just used you when…when there was always a reason why I needed you like oxygen tonight.”

Your breath hitched, and his hand found your waist, pulling you closer to him, and when you didn’t push away…he exhaled in relief behind you. 

“So maybe…you can turn around now. If–if you want to. Know the real me.”

“I would really like that,” you whispered without hesitation. 

You tried lifting yourself up to turn around, but he did most of the job, moving away the pillow he had placed under you and helping you roll onto your back. You closed your eyes, at least until you were facing him completely, and took a deep breath. Holding onto his biceps for moral support, you finally opened them again. 

Seeing his face for the first time felt so intimate, even after everything you just did. 

There he was. The same guy who just fucked you into next week, looking more shy and boyish than you could’ve ever imagined. 

Brown eyes. Dark, curly hair sticking to his forehead. A nervous smile tugging at the corner of his gorgeous mouth. 

So young. So earnest. So yours. 

Not spidey anymore. Just Peter. 

Your Peter. 

Thank you so much for reading 🤍 I used to write Peter so much back in the day (shoutout to my starktonyx era) and I’ve missed him dearly.

Feedback is always appreciated 🕷️

Divider by @andromeda-graphics

He barely lifted his head when he heard you gasp, the lens of his mask focusing on your figure standing there with wide eyes, wearing only an oversized shirt.

“Wrong window,” he choked, then tried to hold himself up but immediately collapsed again. “Dammit,” he cursed, waiting for you to freak out any second now. 

You could have, but instead you rushed to him and knelt beside him.

“Oh my god, are you okay?” Your hands hovered helplessly over his body, trying to see how bad the damage was in the dark. “You need a hospital–”

“No!” He snapped, trying to turn away but failing miserably. “I’ll be fine, I heal quickly.”

“You still need to stop the bleeding,” you countered, folding your knees under your body so you could rest on your calves. “Listen, I can help you. I took some medical courses last year and I have a kit somewhere.”

You looked at him with pleading eyes. He’d saved the city so many times, the fucking world, it was the least you could do to give something back. 

He considered his options for a second, and to be honest he didn’t have many. His body was betraying him, and he couldn’t even get up to fix it himself like usual. 

The blood loss made him nod, and you wasted no time in getting up and finding said kit. The blood loss also made him drift in and out of consciousness as you tended to the wounds on his ribs as much as you could. 

It did not make him less cautious of you though. When you noticed the rip on his mask over a nasty gash on his neck and reached for it, his hand closed around your wrist and even half conscious, his grip was strong. 

“Please,” he whispered. Pleaded. “Keep it on.” 

The fear in his voice made you promise you would. Even if you couldn’t get to that gash properly. Even when he fell asleep on your floor and didn’t wake up for six whole hours. 

The next morning, he opened his eyes and found you sitting on your bed, still staring at him. 

His hands patted his chest, and confirmed his arachnid powers had done its job and healed him mostly. But most importantly, his mask was still in place. With no warning from E.V of it being removed. He learned that you’d spent the night making sure he was still breathing without seeing his face. 

That had been one year ago. 

After thanking you profoundly for helping him, he’d repaired your window, apologized several times, and disappeared into the apartment next door. He then considered moving into another building, but the thought was brushed away very quickly when he remembered the balance in his bank account. 

So he acted more careful instead. For a while, he only turned back home when your curtains were already closed, or he only left the apartment when you had already left for your job (because yes, he absolutely researched the hell out of you after that night.)

Then he moved to the attic of the building. Bigger space, no neighbors, no risks. No you. Or at least he thought. 

Because some nights…some delirious nights he still found your window a few stories down, and the accidental visits became less accidental. When he was too badly injured to care for himself, he came to you, even after you confessed your degree had nothing to do with medicine. 

When he noticed you understood about his equipment malfunctioning, he’d bring it for you to inspect. When he became too reckless with himself you talked his ear off about how being difficult to kill did not make him immortal.

Somewhere along the way, you became spiderman’s friend. 

Spiderman was safer. With you, spiderman was the only part of him he could let you see. Because that was the thing, you only knew the masked superhero. 

He’d spent so much time blocking away his identity, making peace with the fact that there was no longer anyone in the world who would call him Peter and know exactly who that person was. That name only belonged to the people that once knew him, and no longer existed, so he never gave it to you.

Never showed you more than a sliver of skin when his mask rode up or glimpses of his abdomen when you tended to his wounds. He always kept that barrier and you respected it, even on those nights he was too weak to stop you. Even if sometimes not knowing the color of his eyes kept you up at night. 

A promise was a promise. 

Maybe that’s why he kept coming. Why he trusted you with a certainty he couldn’t understand. Why he eventually showed you his new living quarters in the attic and let you spend time with him. Why half a year ago, he added another chair next to his desk so you could work together, or help him when he was out patrolling and needed an extra set of eyes.

“I’m officially the girl in the chair, spidey,” you joked that time as you sat next to him, spinning around in your chair.

He’d gone quiet immediately, his body tensing up enough to make you frown, but then managed a small smile and said you were. You pretended you didn’t notice him being too quiet as he worked on his inhibitor after that. 

He was wearing a hoodie, sweatpants and the mask. Always the mask that didn’t quite let you see through him. After a moment of quiet, you rolled your chair closer to his and nudged his arm playfully. 

“You know I can’t keep calling you spidey forever, right?” 

He snapped out of his trance, and the chuckle that came from under the fabric was unmistakable. 

“Why not?” He nudged your arm back, but still focused on the device he was hunched over. “I like spidey.”

You put your elbow on the desk, resting your cheek on your hand so you could lean a little closer. 

“I like it too, but it feels ridiculous after having my hands all over your body almost every night.” 

The moment the words left your lips, you realized how bad that sounded. He straightened up, turning toward you.

“Wow.” Even if you couldn’t see the smile on his face, the lenses of his mask were quite expressive sometimes. He was amused. 

“That came out very wrong,” you said immediately, before he bursted into laughter. He had been laughing more since you entered his life. “You know what I meant,” you whined, laughing too with heat flooding your cheeks. 

“I think I know,” he chuckled, making you roll your eyes. 

“I’m being serious though,” you added, a little more quietly. “You don’t have to say your real name. Just give me something.”

“Mmm…” he acted like has considering it, going back to tinkering with the piece of metal between his fingers, but then his eyes drifted to the flowers he’d bought that morning, and the name came out of his lips before he could think twice about it. “You can call me Maynard.” 

“Maynard?” You repeated, suppressing a chuckle. “You don’t sound like a Maynard. That’s like an 80 year old man’s name.”

“That’s all I can give you,” he shrugged playfully. 

You had a feeling it went deeper than that, but you’d also learned not to push it with him. 

“Alright. Maynard,” you nodded, “but don’t expect me to use that name unless you’re dying. Guess I’ll stick to spidey for now,” you chuckled, going back to your own work as he hummed in agreement. 

The conversation ended there. With him trying not to think about your hands all over his body in…different conditions. 

Peter didn’t know exactly when his gratitude became longing. He could not identify the moment the friendship, the closeness, or just your smile, shifted into something he craved everyday. 

Despite the mask and the fake name, he knew that after years of being no one to everyone, he had become someone to you. And you had become everything to him. Even if it was behind walls he’d built, you were the person who knew him better than anyone alive.

Which is why, the night he lost control of himself after an unknown dust was thrown at him in a fight, he chose not to crash land into your room. 

Peter hit the floor of the dark attic with a loud thud, as his senses went overboard. His suit was sticking to his body uncomfortably due to the sweat coating his feverish skin. The fabric was intact, with no visible wounds in his body, just that burning sensation of something running through his veins. 

And that dark part of him he’d managed to lock down with the inhibitor, trying to claw its way out. 

“What the…what the fuck is going on,” he cursed, clutching his heaving chest as he panted against the worn wood floors. “I can’t–I can’t breathe…” 

The computer’s monotone voice broke through the silence. 

“You have arrived injured. I’m letting her know–”

“NO!” He cut the AI off, “EV, don’t tell her–”

“Message already sent.”  

He glanced up at the digital clock on his desk. 2:18 am. 

He groaned, grabbing his head when a wave of migraine hit him. He knew what came after that. The black eyes. The desire to break. To take. But this time something felt different. It was like a pull, looking for something or someone…for…for you? 

Oh fuck. 

You were going to come in and you were going to see him like this. No, no–

“Spidey?” You asked from behind the door, knocking exactly twice before opening it anyways.

The air changed the exact moment you walked in, and that something inside him shifted too. It became aware that the only thing it craved to survive was in the room now. 

He needed to get to you. He needed to pin you down and– 

“Don’t!” He managed to scream, holding his hand up weakly when you scrambled toward him. 

You stopped right in your tracks, eyes wide and running all over him, searching for torn fabric, blood, or anything that would explain why he looked like every breath was painful. 

“What happened?” You frowned, when you couldn’t find any source. “Did you get hurt?” 

You instinctively stepped forward, but he waved his hand in front of him again. 

“Stop, stop, stop,” he said quickly, “don’t come any closer.” 

The harshness in his voice caught you off guard, but what sealed the deal was him dragging himself further away from you. It was barely more than a clumsy, desperate crawl, but he managed to put a decent distance between you before collapsing against the side of his thrifted couch. 

He avoided looking at you. The oversized shirt covering your body, the comfy shorts you were probably wearing, the way your hair looked messy from rolling out of bed as soon as you got EV’s warning even if you had work the next morning.

You stayed right where you were, watching him. His suit had always fit him like it was painted on his skin, but every pant made his chest rise and fall beneath the fabric so violently that you wouldn’t be surprised if it ripped at the seams. 

This reminded you too much of the changes that happened in him months ago. 

It started with a sharpened temper, then the heightened sensitivity to everything, the black covering his eyes, and moments during patrol when his reactions became simply frightening for someone who had as much strength as he did. But you were supposed to have stopped it. 

“Is it the inhibitor?” You asked, crossing your arms over your chest, “is it failing?” 

“I–I don’t know…I was hit with some dust out there,” he breathed. “I think it’s tampering with it…my head is killing me. Everything is too much.”

You nodded, turning toward the workstation. 

“I will check the programming. Just hold on.” Not your best attempt at reassuring him, but he groaned in acknowledgment. 

“EV?” 

The computer woke when you touched the keyboard, illuminating the dark attic in a wash of blue light. 

“Online.”

“Please run a diagnostic on the inhibitor and any possible interference.” 

“Beginning diagnostic.” 

You waited impatiently for the results, tapping your fingers on the desk while you watched him from the corner of your eye. 

Over there, he…he was doing his best trying to breathe. 

This obviously wasn't his first time having sensory overload. When the animal tried to take over the human part of him, everything in the city became impossible to escape. Not a single movement, or sound, or simple existence within miles was unnoticed by him. 

But this time? The rest of the city had disappeared. There were no sirens in the distance, or voices coming through the walls, or every heartbeat in the building pounding in his head. 

There was only you. 

Your rapid heartbeat echoing inside him. He felt every tap of your fingers against the wood, every slight catch in your breathing each time he made another involuntary and pathetic sound from his spot on the floor. 

Your scent…God, your scent filled the entire apartment. 

The scent he found himself coming back to so often that it scared him. He didn’t want the attachment. The possibility of having someone again only to risk losing them again. 

That same scent was making every muscle in his body react in a way he didn’t understand. It made him, and the other him, wanna do things to you he had only dreamed of in his wildest fantasies. Things he wasn’t proud of, things he wouldn’t dare to say out loud, even if he looked at you through the lenses of his mask and you couldn’t see the black in his eyes. 

He pressed the back of his head against the couch harshly. 

This was wrong. So wrong. 

His senses were supposed to consume everything when the change came. Instead, they had fixed themselves entirely on you.

He could feel the heat of your body from across the room as though you were still in front of him. Could remember with sickening detail how soft your hands looked when they reached for him. Could almost feel the burn of the touch that had never landed because he stopped you. 

What if he’d let you? What if he’d felt the way your hands ran all over his body? What if you’d moved them lower, and lower, as your mouth–

“Diagnostic complete.” 

Your heads snapped toward the screen. 

“There’s no external damage affecting the integrity of the device. I detected a foreign biotoxin in the bloodstream that may be bypassing the inhibitor, activating the suppressed arachnid hormones.” 

“What biotoxin?” You frowned. 

“Unknown. No matches found in available databases.” 

Great. He thought. He had no time to take a bath with Yelena Belova to find out what the stupid dust was. 

The screen changed, displaying a model of his nervous system. There were yellow bright lines pulsing quickly, running all the way from the base of his brain down the length of his spine. Something unknown was moving through his blood, altering the part of him he had spent months forcing into submission.

He sucked in a breath as he watched you read the screen. Your eyes were focused, and a bead of sweat made its way down the side of your forehead. 

He suddenly felt the need to lick it off. 

Wanted to run his tongue from the base of your neck to the back of your ear. Wanted to fist your hair and make your heart beat out of your chest from how good he knew he could make you feel–

“The effects remain within his enhanced tolerance. However, prolonged exposure to certain hormones can cause extreme distress without relief.” 

“What hormones?” Your voice, worried and unknowing of his thoughts only made him feel guiltier. 

It took him a second to realize what you asked, but EV threw him under the bus before he could say anything. 

“There’s a significant rise in reproductive hormones. The unknown toxin is inducing a strong mating response in him.”

Mating response. He stopped breathing. 

Your eyes slowly moved from the monitor to him, and he saw the moment your attention dropped lower to the tent of his pants. 

That suit concealed nothing on a good day. On one like this? Fuck. Fuck. Fuck–

He shifted almost immediately, but the movement only worsened the pressure, pulling a helpless groan from his throat that made your pulse jump. You looked away at once, turning back to the computer. 

“Is there a way we can…umm…stop it?” You asked hesitantly. 

“The subject is experiencing severe sexual arousal with a fixation on a nearby individual,” she explained, because fuck him if he wasn’t the unluckiest individual on earth. “Acting upon it can be a positive option to relieve sexual tension.”

He wished the floor would open beneath him, swallow him, and never ever EVER spit him back out again.  

Your pulse was absolutely hammering after that. He caught the sudden change in your scent. There was a sharp spark of surprise, nervousness, and something else beneath it that his altered senses fed on immediately.

You kept your eyes fixed on the monitor, although the data had stopped meaning anything the moment you heard fixation on a nearby individual. 

“Is that what you really feel?” You asked softly after a moment. 

His head fell forward, catching it between his gloved hands. He didn’t know how to answer without making everything worse.

Although, after what EV said, could it really be worse? 

“…Yes.” The word came out rougher than he expected. Yet still not enough for what was happening inside him. “It’s like…I can only feel you. All of you.”

Heat rose to your face once again. 

“What does that mean?” 

Don’t say anything, don’t–

“I can smell you.” Great start, idiot. He cleared his dry throat before continuing. “I can smell your shampoo…the lotion you use…the ink on your hands from your favorite pen.” 

He chose not to mention he could also smell the adrenaline on you. The heat gathering slowly beneath your skin. 

Your eyes dropped to your hands, and under the dim light of the computer, you caught the ink stains in them from your journaling session before bed. 

“I can hear your heartbeat changing every time I speak,” he added. Okay, that one slipped out.  

You swallowed. And god, he felt that in his own throat. 

The suit was suffocating him at this point. He wanted to rip it off as much as he wanted to rip off the fabric covering the goosebumps on your skin. 

“Is it only because I’m nearby?” You asked, gathering the courage to turn your chair to him.

White lenses met you across the room. He dragged in another shaky breath of oxygen made of you as he thought about his next words. He could’ve lied. He should’ve lied. But instead, chemically overwhelmed and stripped of every defense he possessed, he gave you the truth. 

“No.”

His voice was firmer this time. No hesitation in it despite the thousand red alarms pounding in his head telling him to shut up. 

“It picked you–no, I picked you for a reason,” he added. “And it’s not just me. The other…the other me wants you too.” 

His voice went lower on the last part, that told you how much it cost him to admit that. 

The silence following his confession was heavy. For a moment he wished he could read your mind. For all he could feel of you, your thoughts were unreachable. 

His own mind was a mess. The impulses didn’t feel like thoughts anymore, just his body feeding him instructions. 

Get up. Cross the room. Touch her. Breathe her in.

His palms shook with the urge to close around you. His teeth ached with the need to graze your skin. His eyes burned with the desire to see beyond fabric. 

Every part of him seemed convinced that the small distance between you was a mistake he needed to correct. That he needed to breathe you in until his lungs burned. Drag his mouth along the inside of your wrist and taste the pulse there.

He hated it.

He hated that something inside him could look at the person he cared for the most and reduce her to an answer for his pain. 

“EV, how long is this state going to last?” He asked the computer, followed by a weak cough as he clutched his side. 

“Your enhanced physiology is struggling to break down the toxin’s structure. I estimate a time between ten to twelve hours before it’s metabolized. However, neurological collapse is expected before that timeframe.”

“What?” You looked at him. “There’s no way we’re letting that happen. Maybe I can–”

“Don’t even start,” he cut you off, shaking his head profusely. 

“So what? I’m supposed to sit here betting on whether your body collapses on hour three or hour six?” 

“I’ll just pass out, big deal. I’m not putting you in danger because of this. I can handle it.”

“You’re barely handling it now. There’s no danger in trying–”

“You don’t understand what’s happening inside me right now,” he argued, raising his voice. “This other thing, the one the inhibitor controls it’s…awake. That part of me doesn’t think like I do. It doesn’t care if you're scared, or hurting–”

“You wouldn’t hurt me–”

“You don’t know that!” He snapped, his fist struck the floor next to him, hard enough to make the worn wood crack beneath his knuckles. 

The sudden noise made you flinch. He smelled the flash of fear moving through your body for only a second. 

One second enough. 

“Fuck–that is what I mean,” he cursed, covering his lenses with his hands. “I don’t…I don’t know if I’d be gentle. I can’t risk this, I can't…shit, I can’t risk you.”

The words, said with so much pain, and honesty, seemed to settle somewhere deep in your chest. 

“Okay,” you nodded, settling deeper in your chair. “But I’m not leaving you like this. I can’t risk you either.”

He shuddered a painful exhale. His head dropped to the couch again, shutting his eyes in preparation of what the next hours of torture would be. 

Except…he didn’t even last ten minutes. 

The suit was killing him, so he decided he’d be better without it. He reached desperately behind his back, clumsily undoing the zippers that tied the suit together.

He could feel your wide eyes on him as he tugged the fabric off his shoulders, peeling it off his sweaty arms. He groaned when he lifted his hips and the suit grazed his swollen crotch. In a matter of seconds that felt like eternity he managed to break free from the spandex, and threw it away somewhere in the room. He’d undressed down to his dark boxers, mask still in place, revealing the marble sculpture of his body.

You let out a shaky breath from your spot, eyes raking over a body you’d only seen partially. He was covered in wounds most of the time, but this time, he only had faint bruises from the night before decorating his chiseled abs. 

His tight muscles flexed with every rise of his chest, his bulge straining harder the more you devoured him, pressing against his pants, making him curse quietly. 

You noticed, and returned your eyes to the screen to track his vitals. 

He felt grateful that you’d given him that grace, but just you being in that room made it very hard for him to think of anything other than your existence. 

Too hard. 

Before he knew his hand drifted down the growing ache in his crotch, trying to feel some relief, but every rub he made over the fabric of his boxers sent a jolt of pain through his body instead of pleasure. 

It only made it worse when he realized you were tense at the desk, trying very hard to keep your focus on the screen and not on the whines he was letting out. 

“…I’m sorry,” he apologized instantly, breathlessly, moving his hand away. “I didn’t–”

“Don’t apologize,” you shook your head quickly, eyes still on the screen. “You…you can do whatever you need.” 

He didn’t say anything, just whined in pain again, so you took it as a chance to say it before you regretted it. 

“But my offer still stands, spidey.” 

What a polite way of saying ‘I’d let you fuck me into next week so you can control your horny arachnid hormones, spidey.’

Fucking hell. 

“I’m okay I just–God I didn’t–I didn’t think it would feel this way…” He laughed humorlessly, staring at the ceiling. “But I–I got this. Yes.”

You kept quiet, hearing him mumble to himself about a hundred times about how he had this.

“I’m okay…I’m good…it’s fine…” 

He wasn’t. 

“Fuck I don’t…I’m going to die…”

For God’s sake. 

“I think I can help.”

By the time he registered the words and looked back at you, you had already moved from your chair and shortened the distance between you, kneeling in front of him. 

His senses went from one thousand to one million. He forced his hands behind his back, trying to keep the animal from grabbing you and getting it over with. 

“What–what are you doing?” He stammered nervously, the lenses of his mask going wide. 

“Maynard,” you said quietly, ignoring the way his body tensed up at that name. “Would it make you feel better if I put my hand here?” 

You placed your hand right in the center of his chest, and your cold palm met his overheated skin. He gasped, feeling every individual fingerprint on his skin. He wanted them marked on him. Tattooed. 

His back arched from the couch, with a strangled gasp breaking from beneath the mask. The relief hit him all at once, through a simple contact that felt like salvation. 

Your hand steadied him for only a glorious second, but now that you had touched him, his body knew precisely what it had been denied.

It wanted more.

His own hand closed around yours so suddenly that you almost pulled back, but he loosened his grip the instant he realized how tightly he was holding you. 

“Sorry–”

“Don’t apologize.” You pressed harder. 

He was burning.

The heat beneath your palm scared you, but what scared you more was the violent pounding of his heart beating against your hand so so quickly. 

“Better?” You asked quietly, trying not to bite your bottom lip at the image of him crumbling under your palm. 

“So fucking better,” he said breathlessly, pressing your hand tighter against his chest. “I…dammit–”

“Breathe,” you reminded.

His head fell back against the couch. Chest rising up and down, up and down, up and down. 

Just take her, man, she’s right there–

Your free hand accidentally brushed his neck, right where the border of the mask started, snapping him right back. He grabbed your hand, not harshly, but firm enough to make your breath hitch. 

“Please.” Was all he said. 

Leave it on. 

It brought you back to that first night he’d crashed into your life. 

“I wasn’t planning on removing it,” you whispered, leaning closer. “You can keep it on. But let me help you…I really want to.”

See? She wants it. She needs it so bad. 

He hated that the other guy was right. He knew you meant what you said because he could smell the proof pooling between your thighs.

Fuck it.

In a sudden movement he reached for your waist, dragging you forward so you were straddling his lap. The bulge you landed on made you gasp, hands instinctively grabbing onto his sweaty biceps for balance when he let out a broken groan that vibrated against your core. 

His hand cupped your jaw, bringing it closer to his face, and your dilated pupils reflected on the white of his lenses. 

“I can feel that you want this,” he mumbled, tilting his head to the side. “Please, say it again…”

You shifted your hips, barely, so minimal yet he felt it travel through his whole body. He hissed, tightening the grip on your jaw. 

“I want this,” you repeated firmly, moving your head closer to his ear. “You can take whatever you need…”

You moved your hips again, more deliberate this time, pulling a broken whine from him. The toxin made every contact feel like electricity racing down his spine, straight to the heavy, aching weight of his cock under you. 

“Yes…yeah just like that…” he panted. “Just let me…”

His hands landed on your waist, moving you back and forth at a quicker pace over his bulge. You gasped at the friction, fingers digging into his shoulders, while he let out a collection of muffled words you could barely understand. 

“...M–more…” he whined, throwing his head back against the couch. “I can’t–I need…”

“What do you need? More what?” 

“More contact.”

His hands left your waist to grab the hem of your shirt. 

“Can I?” He whispered.

You nodded eagerly, gasping when his hands shifted to the collar of your shirt instead, ripping it off your body with a sharp pull. 

“Oh fuck,” he cursed when he realized there was nothing under that shirt, and saw your nipples hardening instantly under the cold air. 

He resisted the urge to bite them through the mask. 

His hands, however, wasted no time to cup your breasts with a broken whine. His thumbs played with your nipples, tugging at them as hard as he could allow himself to without hurting you. 

“Fuck you’re perfect…you’re so perfect…” he whispered, more to himself than you, pulling some soft whimpers out of you when he tugged a little harder. His hands drifted to your lower half, to the hem of the last piece keeping your body from his greedy eyes. “These too,” he said, “please, can I? I want to feel you.”

“Yes,” you nodded, already out of air. 

You didn’t even know why you tried to get off his lap to take the shorts off properly, when he just did the same as the shirt: ripped it in half where it rested on your hips, yanked it off from your body and threw the ruined pieces far away. 

You weren’t wearing anything underneath. 

“I can smell you. God, I can smell you. You’re so–oh God…”

Now he could feel your wetness drenching his boxers, dripping onto the fabric. He could almost taste it in his mouth. He wanted nothing more than to drown in it for hours. 

“Can–can I–?”

You didn’t even let him finish, you grabbed his hand and placed it right between your legs. 

Water. He found water in the middle of the dessert. 

His hand moved carefully through your wet folds once, twice, delighting in your warmth, the way you felt, the way you let out the prettiest sound he had ever heard in his miserable life. 

“Fuck…” you cursed softly, moving your hips eagerly when he kept stroking slow. Too slow. “Touch me, please.”

He obliged, fingers finding your clit in movements that had you gripping his shoulders tighter, eyes fluttering shut so beautifully he had to bite his lip to not let out a pathetic sound. 

“Been wanting this,” he mumbled. “Longer than today. Longer than tonight.”

His finger slid inside of you, making you moan when he curled it just right. 

“There were…there were nights I thought about you riding my hand,” he kept going, voice cracking as he added a second finger, stretching you more. “I’ve wanted you for so long–not just because of this shit in my blood. Because it’s you.”

Every word made you clench around his fingers. Every admission pulled another shaky moan out of your throat. You were a mess already, breathless, hips rolling down to meet the thrust of his fingers. 

“Oh my God–don’t stop, please don’t stop–”

“Not stopping, baby.” 

He kept working you open, the white lenses of the mask never leaving your face. His free hand slid up your chest, settling between your breasts. 

“I’m–I’m close,” you managed. “I’m so close–”

“Come on…you’re perfect. You’re so fucking perfect like this.”

The heel of his palm lifted to press against your clit. You were right there, right on the edge, about to come on his hand and drip down his boxers–

“Please,” he begged, unable to keep it in. “Let me fuck you after this…please. I need to be inside you. I’ve needed it for so long–just let me, after you come, please, please–”

The plea undid you.

You came with a broken cry, stopping your movements as your walls pulsed around him. The sound you made against his shoulder nearly finished him right there. 

It took you a second to just breathe again, your chest synching up with his in the search of oxygen. He kept rocking his hand slowly, not just to work you through the aftershocks, but because the friction of your pussy in his hand brought the tiniest relief to him. 

You just stayed there as the last soft waves rolled through you. 

Once you were able to see clearly again, you let out a breathless chuckle and straightened back up. 

He needed you. He needed you so badly you really thought he was going to die if you didn’t help him. 

You placed one hand on his chest as the other reached under you, slipping inside the fabric of his boxers without breaking eye contact. 

The second your bare fingers brushed him, his hips jerked hard under you. 

“You said please,” you whispered breathlessly. 

You wrapped your fingers around him and pulled him free.

His cock sprang out, heavy and flushed between your bodies, so thick and hard and painful. The head was red and shiny, with precum dripping down the vein that ran along his length. The tip brushed the skin of your stomach, leaving a warm, wet patch that made the hair on your arms go up. He could smell the small flicker of intimidation sparking inside you, but the want that followed was stronger. 

You stroked him a few times, slowly just as he’d touched you at first. 

“Oh my God, your hand–your hand–”

Another thick bead of precum welled up and spilled over your fingers. Whether it was the toxin or just his enhanced physiology, he was dripping for you.  

Flustered wasn’t enough of a word when you had his leaking cock in your hand. 

His hands slid down to your hips, gripping tighter, guiding you up as if he was about to lift you then pulling you back down immediately. 

Fuck her. Fuck her right now. 

“Please, I need–I need to feel you…” he cried out. “Let me…let me…”

You nodded just as desperately, lifting yourself up as he helped, steadying you with shaking hands until the thick head of his cock nudged against your entrance. You both exhaled hard at the same time when you started to sink down, taking him inch by inch.

He was big. Almost too much. The burn of it made your breath hitch, but the way he cursed under his breath multiple times, completely at your mercy, made you keep going until he was buried balls deep.

You sat there for a moment, breathing heavily, and so full of him. 

When the initial sting faded away, you started moving. He let you set the pace as you adjusted, holding back his need of thrusting up. His fingers dug on your skin, not lifting just holding you, but the more that you moved, the more that control started to waver. 

He could feel it coming. The change. 

You kept moaning, bouncing on top of him, completely unaware of his self restraint crumbling away. 

His grip slowly tightened when his eyes began turning completely black under his mask. That careful, pathetic boy who’d been begging disappeared beneath something more…primal. 

Fuck. Whatever had been holding him back finally snapped.

The next thing he knew, his hands slid under your thighs with sudden strength. He lifted you up in one motion until only the thick head of him remained inside you, held you there for a second as the last part of him tried to remember how to be gentle–then snapped his hips up hard.

That first thrust pulled a sharp moan out of you, but there was no chance to adjust this time. He set a relentless pace almost immediately, using pure strength to bounce you on his cock while he drove up to meet every drop of your body, buried so deep it stole your breath every time he bottomed out. 

“Oh my–May…Maynard–” the name you barely used on him slipped out in the middle of the frenzy, but his hand reached behind your head to pull your hair back slightly as he kept thrusting up. 

“Don’t call me that,” he snapped, his voice so different from just minutes earlier. “It’s Peter. Call me Peter when I’m inside you.” 

He didn’t even give you time to process, still lifting and dropping you onto his cock at the exact hard rhythm he wanted. The only one that satisfied the need inside of him. Your hands instinctively reached for the edge of the arm of the couch he was leaning against, fingers digging into the worn fabric as he hit that spot inside you over and over again. 

“Of fuck…Peter–fuck…yes…”

“That’s better,” he approved. “I was right, you’re so so perfect…taking every inch like you need it as bad as I do…”

A desperate sound slipped out of you at the praise, he could feel your walls clenching tight around him as your body went for that second orgasm, your eyes were fluttering shut, almost there–

“Nuh–uh,” he denied immediately, stopping mid thrust, holding you pressed against him as you gasped, surprised and confused. 

“What–what happened? I was about to–”

“I want you to hold it for me. I know you can.”

That twisted part of him enjoyed the slow realization on your face. 

Even if you couldn’t see his eyes, you knew the same spiderman he’d been without the inhibitor, was the one with your body at his mercy now. 

Good. 

He stayed buried to the hilt for a moment, breathing hard behind the mask. When your breathing finally slowed down and accepted that the high never came, he stood up. Still inside you, he walked you to the bed in the corner of the room. 

His bed.

He pulled out with a wet sound that made both of you groan, then laid you down roughly near the edge of the mattress. He kneeled down, strong hands hooking behind your knees and dragging your legs over his shoulders, folding you open for him completely.

“Look at the ceiling,” he ordered. “Don’t look at me.”

You obeyed, staring up at the wood beams high above you while he tugged the bottom of the mask just high enough to free his mouth. 

Peter leaned down and pressed a few soft kisses to your swollen folds. He wasn’t necessarily eating you out, just giving a few loud smooches that felt good enough to make you grip the sheets. 

“M’sorry, you were so perfect there…” he mumbled condescendingly against your most sensitive spots. “But I need you to hold on a little longer. Can you do that for me, sweetheart?” 

You nodded, eyes still fixed on the ceiling. Maybe too eager. Maybe too pathetic. Just like he’d been. Had he pumped that toxin into you? 

Either way, you didn’t care. You’d be lying if you said you didn’t like this version of him. 

He laughed right over your clit when you moaned loudly, after he moved his tongue in a slow, torturous swipe over it. 

“Was back there too much?” He cooed. “Maybe I just need to stretch you more...”

Two fingers slid inside you, so easily, but the sudden stretch still dragged a whine out of your throat. He curled them immediately, finding the spot that made your hips jerk. 

“Peter…” 

“Huh?” He acted coy, pumping his fingers with a rhythm that kept you right on the edge without letting you tip over. He added a third finger, making your back arch from the mattress. “Keep holding it in.”

Every shake of your body fed the stupid toxin inside him. Having you like this…really trying to keep your body from coming apart because he said so. 

God. He was never going back. 

“You just took my cock. I think you can take three fingers with no problem.” 

He kept the same relentless pace, chuckling when your body started twitching again. 

“Shhh, you’re perfect, absolutely perfect…”

“Peter…” you called out again, hand dropping the sheet to find his shoulder instead. “I need…need…”

“Need what?”

“Need you inside me…please I won’t–I won’t hold for much longer just–fuck me.”

He stopped altogether, a smirk you couldn’t see stretching the corner of his mouth. He pulled his fingers out with a wet pop, licking them clean before tugging his mask back in place and standing up. 

“Yeah?” 

Your legs dangled off the edge of the bed for a moment before his hands gripped your hips and turned you over. He moved you higher up the bed, grabbing one of the pillows, and shoving it under your hips, tilting your lower body up for him. 

He then climbed onto the bed behind you and knelt between your spread thighs, the mattress dipping under his weight as one hand stroked down the length of your spine. 

But something made him stop. 

“This fucking mask–” he cursed under his breath. “It’s suffocating me.”

The sweat on his forehead had pooled under the mask, making it so sticky over his eyebrows that it was affecting the lenses he was trying to see you through. 

“I need you to be a good girl for me,” he added breathlessly, yet still commanding enough. “Keep your head on the mattress. Ass up. Don’t turn around.”

You nodded. Too eagerly again. Couldn’t care any less again. 

He didn’t think twice, just yanked the mask off and tossed it aside. It landed near you, making you bury half your face on the sheets as if staring at the mask alone would be disobeying his commands. 

The sound he made when the cool air hit his face was pure relief. He swiped the sweat off with his forearm, finally seeing you clearly. Face down. Eyes squeezed shut. Already clutching the sheets. 

“You look so pretty like this,” he mumbled. “All spread out for me…waiting.”

“Peter…” you whined, lifting your ass slightly from the pillow. 

“I know, I know. You’re okay.” He couldn’t keep the smirk away when he added, “you said please.”

He reached between you, guiding the thick head of his cock between your thighs until it nudged against your entrance. You were still soft and ready and perfect. 

Peter pushed in slowly, letting you feel every inch as he sank deep and deep and deeper. 

He braced one hand beside your head and kept the other on your hip, pushing you into the mattress as his thighs hit the back of yours. Slap. Slap. Slap. The position left almost no space between your bodies, with Peter pressing his chest against your back. 

“Fuck…you feel so good like this…so pretty taking me.”

He kept going, making the mattress creak and the base of the bed hit the brick wall repeatedly. Your desperate moans ran through his body like electricity, making something inside him crack open again. 

What? What is–

The moment his rhythm stuttered, he shook his head, trying to clear it. Beads of sweat flew from his hair to your back. 

“God–you…you’re making me–” The roughness of his thrusts slowed down immediately, inhaling a sharp intake of air as he felt the change again. “I can’t, I can’t…”

He lifted his gaze to the window behind the bed and noticed his eyes had turned back to its original color. 

“Oh my god,” he gasped, stopping altogether. He straightened up, still kneeling and inside you, but panicking. “I’m…I’m so sorry. I don’t know what happened I–“

“Peter!” You cut him off, pushing yourself back, closer to him, without turning around. “Shut up and fuck me.”

The order left your mouth breathless, pushing back against him even more to make the point clear. His hands twitched when they gripped your hips again. 

“Okay, okay…” he panted, groaning when you dropped back on the bed and his cock almost left the warmth of your pussy. “I’m sorry–if I was too rough, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to…”

He picked up the pace again, but the words tumbling out of him now were pure pleading Peter again. 

“Don’t turn around–don’t turn around–fuck, fuck…” slap, slap, slap. “You can come now. Please. Please, I want to feel it–you’d come apart so pretty on me, I know you would…pleasepleaseplease–”

His final permission and the desperate way he said it made you crash harder than the first time, crying out into the mattress. The second he felt you coming around him, he knew he couldn’t last much longer either.

“Can I–inside…please, can I??…let me fill you up–”

“Yes–inside, Peter, do it inside me…” 

He buried himself to the hilt with a strained groan and finally came. The orgasm tearing out of him was harder and longer than anything he’d ever felt, holding you there, filling you up. 

You gasped against the sheets, breathless, as the waves of cum seemed to go on forever, flooding you with warm and thick ropes in every spurt as he emptied himself inside you. 

“Thank you…thank you…” His forehead dropped between your shoulder blades, sending broken gasps against your skin as he kept coming. “You are so perfect–fuck…so perfect…thank you…”

The pollen wrung him dry until he could barely breathe, and even then he kept rolling his hips weakly, chasing the last of it while he slowly softened inside you. 

When it finally eased, the pain, the need, the hunger…he pulled out slowly with a whine, and half collapsed over you. His arms held most of his weight as he planked above you, but you could feel every ridge of his muscles brushing your sweaty skin. 

Peter’s eyes fluttered shut, feeling exhausted and aching in the best way, almost lulled by the sounds of your agitated breaths. 

You both felt the warm trail of liquid leaking out between your bodies and neither of you moved or said anything for a while. He could’ve stayed like that forever, really. With your naked body under him, no masks, no barriers, just your swollen pussy leaking out his seed–

“Successful ejaculation brought down the arachnid hormone levels immediately. Inhibitor working within regular parameters now. Congratulations, Peter.” 

EV’s monotone voice cut through the silence. 

It took two seconds of shock before you both broke into breathless laughter. His teeth grazed your back as your bodies vibrated in sync from the amusement and overall flustering after everything that happened. 

“Thank you, EV,” Peter muttered. 

“You’re welcome. I gathered data and the released semen volume exceeds standard parameters by two hundred and twenty six percent due to the high hormonal concentration. Hydration, clean up and rest are advised.”

“For fucks sake…” Peter cursed under his breath. 

“Oh god…” you mumbled against the sheets. 

That was your call back to reality. 

Peter felt you move under him, reaching blindly to the side until your hand found the mask. You lifted it over your shoulder, offering it to him without looking. 

“I don’t want to,” he said, too quickly, then cleared his throat. “I…I don’t want to put it back on.” 

“Then I’ll close my eyes,” you offered instead. 

“No–I mean…you don’t have to. I don’t want to wear it around you anymore. Not after…all of this,” he admitted sheepishly. 

“But you told me to not turn around,” you reminded him, dropping the mask on the mattress again. “And that was you, not the darker you.”

He chuckled, nodding even if you couldn’t see him yet. 

“Yeah, because if I saw your face while I was balls deep inside you I would’ve busted before you came.”

There it was. He said it. No turning back now. 

At least it got a chuckle from you too. 

“Listen I…I meant everything I said. Everything. The wanting, the nights I thought about you,” he confessed. “I don’t want you to feel like I just used you when…when there was always a reason why I needed you like oxygen tonight.”

Your breath hitched, and his hand found your waist, pulling you closer to him, and when you didn’t push away…he exhaled in relief behind you. 

“So maybe…you can turn around now. If–if you want to. Know the real me.”

“I would really like that,” you whispered without hesitation. 

You tried lifting yourself up to turn around, but he did most of the job, moving away the pillow he had placed under you and helping you roll onto your back. You closed your eyes, at least until you were facing him completely, and took a deep breath. Holding onto his biceps for moral support, you finally opened them again. 

Seeing his face for the first time felt so intimate, even after everything you just did. 

There he was. The same guy who just fucked you into next week, looking more shy and boyish than you could’ve ever imagined. 

Brown eyes. Dark, curly hair sticking to his forehead. A nervous smile tugging at the corner of his gorgeous mouth. 

So young. So earnest. So yours. 

Not spidey anymore. Just Peter. 

Your Peter. 

Thank you so much for reading 🤍 I used to write Peter so much back in the day (shoutout to my starktonyx era) and I’ve missed him dearly.

Feedback is always appreciated 🕷️

Divider by @andromeda-graphics

---

“You two are such liars.”

“Why are we liars?”

“You are obviously a couple and you’re just lying to mess with us.”

“What makes you think we’re a couple?”

Natasha gave you two a look, like she was asking whether you were being serious, while Sam started to gesture widely at you and Bucky. He looked down at the position you two were in and he almost understood why your friends would have misunderstood your relationship. You were practically in his lap, your legs swung over his, your shoulder leaning against Bucky’s chest, while one of his arms rested behind you on the back of the sofa.

But then he remembered how often you two had told your friends that you were, in fact, simply good friends and he couldn’t help but roll his eyes at them. He moved the arm from behind you to support his cheek against his hand as he shook his head lightly.

“We are not a couple. We’re just friends.”

“Yes, Bucky’s right.” You nodded wisely but didn’t move away from him and he couldn’t help but cherish the comforting weight of your body against his. “Can’t two friends cuddle with each other from time to time?”

“They can.” Joaquin piped up from next to Sam, grinning at him and shaking his head. “I mean, sometimes I cuddle my friends, too. But you two are practically attached at the hip.”

You just shook your head at all their speculations. “Bucky and I are not a couple.”

“If you say so.”

“Don’t you all have something else to talk about?” Bucky interjected as he brought his other hand down to rest atop of your leg, fingers absentmindedly running over your shin. “This can’t possibly be the most interesting thing to talk about.”

Sam narrowed his eyes at the movement of Bucky’s hand before he shrugged. “Fine, have it your way. Anyways, did you guys hear about the new exhibition at the Museum of Natural History? It’s about space travel and all the planets that we’ve made contact with in the last decades. I thought of going there to see how many of those planets I know through fighting with their people against Thanos.”

“You’ve probably heard about it before, Doll. You love space.”

“I did hear about it.” You nodded with a smile, leaning a little more into Bucky as you began talking about it. “But you love science and space, too. We should go see it together.”

Bucky smiled at your words, always happy to spend time with you and if it was about a topic that he was interested in, then that was just a bonus. He’d loved science ever since he’d been a child and he was glad that in you, he’d found a friend that was also interested in it. “I’d love nothing more than that.”

“So, you two are basically going on a cute museum date?” Joaquin piped, grinning widely at the two of you. “And we’re supposed to believe you when you say you’re not dating?”

Bucky watched you roll your eyes at Joaquin’s words before you gave him an amused look. “Because friends can’t spend time together, I guess.”

“Come on guys, they clearly don’t want to talk about this.” Natasha piped up, surprising Bucky because she was usually all up in her friends’ business. Then she threw him a big grin and he mentally smacked himself upside the head for thinking she’d actually drop the topic. “I mean, if they want to keep their obvious relationship a secret, let them.”

“We are not in a relationship.” You groaned out before pushing yourself up off Bucky’s lap and he couldn’t help but mourn the loss of your warmth. “That is my cue to get myself something to drink. Does anybody want anything from the kitchen?”

“I’ll come with you. I want to see if you guys have any interesting snacks.”

You nodded at Joaquin’s words and the two of you left for the kitchen, leaving Bucky with Sam and Natasha. As soon as you were out of earshot, Sam turned to Bucky with one eyebrow raised at him and a small lopsided smirk on his lips.

“Come on now, be honest with me, Buck. You two are really not a couple?”

“Sam, how many times do I have to repeat myself? We are not a couple.”

“I still don’t believe you.” Natasha chimed in, backing Sam up before waving her hand around to gesture at Bucky. “You’re like her boyfriend without the benefits.”

Bucky was so taken aback by her words that he physically withdrew a little. “What is that supposed to mean?”

“That you two are acting like a couple but without actually being one or doing things most couples do, like kissing, going on actual dates and the like.” Natasha explained as if it was the most obvious thing in the world and Bucky couldn’t help but feel a little irritated, though he wasn’t sure why. “I don’t mean it negatively either. I’m just saying that the two of you basically act like a couple already.”

“I don’t think we do.” Bucky mumbled, a strange feeling building in his chest as her words settled over him. “We’re just close, but in a platonic way.”

Sam gave Bucky a knowing look before he shrugged a little. “I’m not trying to pressure you; I just think Natasha makes a valid point. Think about it.”

---

Natasha peered up from the soup she was stirring to look at you and Bucky entering the kitchen, talking amongst each other and you laughing at something he’d said. As soon as Bucky caught the playful glint in Natasha’s eyes, he stopped and rolled his eyes, crossing his arms over his chest. Her words from a few days prior were still running through his head as if following Sam’s suggestion to think about them. It left him analysing every little thing you two did together and that irritated him even more than her words originally had, although he didn’t really know why.

“Just say it.”

“I wasn’t going to say anything!”

“You’re smirking at me.”

“I am not smirking at you. My lips haven’t even moved, Barnes.”

“With your eyes, I mean.” He defended himself but when he heard you giggling next to him, he felt himself smile despite his irritation, turning his head to look at you. “You could back me up here, you know?”

You gave him an amused look. “Back you up on what? Natasha was giving you a strange look but she wasn’t smirking.”

“See? You were giving me a strange look, Nat.”

“I was just going to ask if you guys wanted to have lunch with me.” She said in amusement before stepping to the side and gesturing at the pot on the stove. “It’s tomato-crème soup. Would you like some?”

You quickly nodded with a bright smile. “Of course, we’ll have lunch with you, Nat.”

“But we’ll pass on the soup.” Bucky said matter-of-factly and when he caught Natasha’s confused look, he simply shrugged his shoulders and pointed at the empty containers of ingredients on the counter. “You put crème into the soup and she’s lactose intolerant, so she can’t have that.”

Natasha put her spoon down on the counter and looked up at Bucky. “And you say you’re not her boyfriend?”

“No, I am not her boyfriend.” He defended himself, glaring at Natasha for bringing this topic up again. These constant reminders that always led to him having to tell her that you two weren’t together made a strange emotion rise in him that he still couldn’t quite place. When he heard you chuckle from next to him, he snapped out of his thoughts to turn to you. “What’s so funny?”

“I’m not laughing at either of you, I promise. I’m laughing at myself for immediately agreeing to eat tomato-crème soup with Natasha.” You shook your head at yourself and placed a hand on his arm, making his gaze snap toward where you were touching him. “I didn’t even clock that Natasha probably used regular crème and not the dairy-free one I usually use, so thanks for remembering.”

Bucky covered your hand with his own, ignoring Natasha wriggling her eyebrows and pushing away the question that had crept into his mind about why your touch was immediately making him feel better. Instead, he just smiled at you. “Of course, Doll.”

---

The wind howled around you as you all walked back toward the car you’d driven to the gala hours earlier. It was hosted by Valentina, so everyone had been a little suspicious at first but you had all soon realised that the gala was nothing more than a publicity stunt to better her image in the eyes of the public. While that made you all feel more at ease, everyone was a little annoyed about being shown off, too.

“It was a nice gala, though. The music was good, the food was nice and we had a lot of fun dancing.” You said, obviously trying to lighten the mood as you walked down the cobblestone street and Bucky couldn’t stop himself from smiling at how you were always trying to cheer everyone up. He also couldn’t help the warmth that spread in his chest at the reminder of how you two had spent hours dancing together, though he quickly ignored it so he could pay attention to what you were saying. “It’s just a shame that she only hosted it to boost herself up after the whole Void incident.”

“Yeah, but at least we got to have a bit of fun and enjoy ourselves.” Sam shrugged as he swung his suit jacket over his shoulder. “Even if she showed us off like a brand-new car or something.”

Joaquin piped up then, his hands in his pockets as he leisurely strolled alongside Sam, in front of you and Bucky. “And it gave us a reason to dress up.”

“That’s true, it’s been a while since I’ve had a reason to wear a dress like this one.” Ava mused from behind you and Bucky, bringing a hand up to run it through her hair. “I also really liked getting my hair done professionally for this.”

“I did mine myself.” Natasha threw in before giving you an interested look. “Who did your hair, by the way? The braids look super intricate. Did you get it professionally done?”

“No, Bucky did it for me.”

John couldn’t hold back a snort at that. “Bucky knows how to braid hair?”

“I grew up with three sisters, John. Of course, I know how to braid hair.”

“He’s really good at it, too. He braids my hair all the time. If you see me with pretty-looking braids, there’s a ninety-nine per cent chance Bucky was the one who braided them.” You commented matter-of-factly before giving Bucky a beaming smile, making his face light up in return. “He even helped me decide what jewellery to wear with this dress.”

Ava looked you up and down before giving Bucky a thumbs up. “Good job, Buck. It really matches her dress. But can I use this as a segue into telling you that I’m still upset you didn’t go dress shopping with us?”

“I’m sorry, Ava, I had this dress still around from the last gala I went to and I really wanted to wear it again because it’s so pretty.”

“You do look beautiful in that dress, Doll.”

As you thanked him bashfully, Bucky realised that he’d just said that out loud. He’d been thinking it all evening, unable to take his eyes off you for more than a few seconds and his mind had been running rampant thinking about what that could mean. But he wasn’t able to dwell on that because you stumbled next to him, the heel of your shoe getting caught in the cobblestones of the street, and he quickly grabbed you around the waist to keep you from falling.

“Careful, Doll.”

Natasha watched as you moved to grab onto his arm for leverage and held up the heels she was carrying. “I am so glad that I managed to cram a pair of flats into my purse, especially since Sam parked the car so far away.”

“How is this my fault now?”

Yelena chuckled from next to Natasha. “He’s right, Nat. It’s not his fault there were no closer spots. I’m just really glad that I refused to wear heels altogether, even if it caused a bit of an argument with Valentina.”

“I should have taken that chance.” You bemoaned and Bucky watched as you staggered along next to him, trying to walk without getting your heels caught in between the stones again. “As if my feet didn’t hurt enough already, this street is also really terrible to walk on in heels.”

Without even thinking about it, Bucky stopped dead in his tracks, making you do the same. Before you could even question him, he had already shrugged off his jacket and turned around, so his back was facing you. As everyone else stopped to wait for the two of you he spoke up, looking over his shoulder to give you a small smile.

“Hop on, Doll.”

“I can’t make you carry me.” You argued softly but the look on his face told him that you already knew he wasn’t going to back down on this. “It’s still a long way to the car.”

“I would carry you to Alaska if you needed me to.” Bucky said in slight amusement, although he was serious about his words. “Come on now, Doll. It’s not like I can’t carry you. I’m a supersoldier, in case you’ve forgotten.”

“You’re not going to let up on this, are you?”

“Absolutely not.” Bucky said in determination and then extended his suit jacket toward you. “And put this on, so you won’t get cold.”

With a thankful smile, you grabbed his jacket and pulled it on before grabbing onto his shoulders and jumping up on his back. Bucky quickly grabbed your thighs, so you wouldn’t fall down and pulled you a little higher, until you could comfortably wrap your arms around his neck and rest your head against him. Immediately, he felt warmth flooding his body at feeling you so close to him and a small part of his brain kept asking why he was always so ready to do practically anything for you. He wasn’t stupid; he was a smart man, but he was also stubborn, so he shoved those thoughts away.

“You’re the best, Bucky. Thank you.” You whispered and tightened your hold on him as he began walking again, holding you securely by the legs. “I don’t know what I would do without you.”

“Continue to stagger along this street like a newborn fowl?”

“Probably.”

Bucky chuckled at your words but when he caught John’s raised eyebrow and Bob’s small smirk, his expression quickly turned into a frown. “Not a word.”

“I wasn’t going to say anything, man!” Bob defended himself before grabbing John by the arm to pull him along before the other man could say anything. “And neither was John. Come on, John, let’s go.”

---

“I’m really not interested, so please leave me alone.”

Bucky’s ears picked up the distressed tone of your voice and immediately he was drowning out everything else. Alexei’s voice kept droning on in the background, Ava and Yelena kept singing along to the song they’d chosen for their karaoke performance at the bar they’d forced everyone to go to, Sam and Joaquin kept making jokes, but he ignored all of them because you were in distress.

When he spotted you across the room, you were just outside the bathrooms and attempting to get past a seedy man who was trying to talk to you. He was cornering you and refusing to let you pass despite your repeated attempts to tell him to leave you alone.

Without a hint of hesitation, Bucky crammed past everyone else to get out of the booth. The few complaints about being shoved around from John died down quickly as he saw the look on Bucky’s face. Within the next five seconds, Bucky was at your side, just in time to grab the man’s wrist when he tried to reach for you.

“She told you to leave her alone!”

Bucky watched you take a step toward him, relief clear on your face, as the insistent and admittedly creepy man raised his hands in defeat. While Bucky knew he would have done this for any other person being harassed at a bar, he knew that for you he would gladly go the extra mile of dragging that man outside and teaching him a lesson about never approaching you again.

“Sorry, I didn’t realise she had a boyfriend.” The man defended himself, looking at Bucky in slight fear. “Had I known she had a boyfriend, I would have backed off sooner.”

“Oh no, absolutely not!” Bucky hissed and his hand wandered up to grab the man by the collar. “You think the only reason to leave her alone would be her having a boyfriend and not her telling you that she’s not interested?”

Your hand found its way to his arm. “Bucky, let’s just go.”

“Yeah, man, let me go. I’ll leave your girlfriend alone. I’m sorry.”

“You won’t just leave her alone, you’ll leave any woman that tells you ‘No’ alone, got it?”

“Yes, I got it!”

Bucky let the man go and he immediately went to grab his things and leave the bar. When he turned to check on you, Bucky found you looking back at him with a few stray tears in your eyes, though your face showed nothing but relief. Quickly, he took your face into his hands and locked eyes with you.

“You’re alright, Doll, he won’t ever bother you again.”

“Thank you, James.” Bucky pointedly ignored the way is heart leapt like it always did when you used his first name. You were in distress and that was much more important. “Can we go back to our booth?”

His thumb ran over your cheek, face drawing into a frown as you took a deep breath to steady yourself. “We can leave if you want to. Would you prefer that?”

“Yes, please.”

“Alright, let’s just grab our things and tell the others we’re leaving. Then we’re out of here.”

While Bucky went to grab his jacket and explained to everyone else that the two of you would be leaving, Sam eyed the way you were still holding on to his arm in interest. You were practically clinging to him and when Sam opened his mouth to speak Bucky knew that he was going to make a teasing comment.

“Leaving so soon? Got more exciting plans?”

Bucky rolled his eyes at the wriggle of Sam’s eyebrows. “No, we’re leaving because she just got harassed by some creepy guy and wants me to take her home.”

“Oh, fuck, I’m so sorry! I didn’t see that!” Sam quickly exclaimed and his face immediately changed into a serious expression as he looked at you. “Are you alright?”

“Yes, Bucky got the guy to leave me alone.”

“He intimidated that guy enough that he probably won’t ever come back to this place again.” Ava commented as she walked over from the karaoke machine, Yelena right behind her. “We were close by and stopped our wonderful rendition of ‘Don’t Stop Believing’ as soon as we saw what was going on. But Bucky seemed to have the situation under control.”

“Yeah, when we saw him pull out his Winter Soldier glare, we knew he got it covered.” Yelena joked a little before looking at you in slight worry. “Are you sure you’re alright?”

“I’ll be fine, I’m just really shaken up and to be honest, it really put a damper on my mood, so I want to go home. Bucky is sweet enough to take me.” You explained before you gave them all a small smile, undoubtedly to lighten the mood a little. “It also gives me some time to work on my costume for the Halloween party. I mean, I only got like three more days.”

“It also gives you an excuse to hold onto Bucky when he drives you home on his motorcycle.”

“Very funny, Sam.” You said but it seemed like you couldn’t help chuckling at his words. “But I've got to admit, I like riding on the back of his motorcycle.”

Bucky smiled a little, glad to see you smiling again and placed a hand on your upper back. “You’re still not going to tell me what you’re dressing up as for Halloween, Doll?”

“Absolutely not, it’s a surprise.” You grinned playfully, making Bucky’s stomach flutter in a way he was still stubbornly ignoring, before grabbing your purse. “Let’s hit the road.”

Before you two could leave, Ava leaned in to give you an interested look. “I just have a quick question before you leave.”

“Sure. What is it?”

“Did you notice that Bucky never corrected that creepy man when he referred to him as your boyfriend?”

---

For the next few days, all Bucky could think about was how he had not corrected that man at the bar. At first, he’d written it off to the heat of the situation, to how correcting that man about the nature of your relationship was the last thing on his mind when you were being harassed. But then, slowly he started to realise that maybe he wouldn’t hate the idea of being your boyfriend – on the contrary, he would really enjoy it.

It made him wonder how you felt, whether you’d feel the same way or if you simply saw him as a friend. The thought of you not feeling the same way made him feel all kinds of upset, so he kept his thoughts to himself. Thankfully, the Halloween party hosted at the Watchtower was a welcome distraction and as he walked the floor of the main living area, he could almost ignore his confusing feelings. But not completely because all he was looking for was you.

Unfortunately, he had yet to find you amongst the costumed people. He’d spotted everyone else, despite their costumes and the masks or helmets some of them were wearing. Alexei in his old Red Guardian suit was easy to recognise; John dressed as Westley from ’The Princess Bride’ was a little harder with his black eye mask and headscarf, and he only recognised Ava who was a mummy with bandages around her head by her voice. He had even found Redwing who Sam had draped a bedsheet over and was steering around to make it look like an actual ghost.

“Hey, Bucky!” Joaquin exclaimed, running over to him with the helmet of his Mandalorian costume underneath his arm. “Your Han Solo costume is so cool! It’s so funny how we accidentally match, isn’t it?”

“Yes, what a coincidence that we both dressed as ’Star Wars’ characters. But your costume’s looking really good, too.” Bucky said with a small smile, though his eyes continued to wander away from Joaquin to look for you. “But I can’t believe Sam brought that damn bird thing here and even put it in a costume.”

Joaquin chuckled as he watched Sam fly Redwing around. “You got to admit, it’s a pretty funny idea. And don’t pretend that it didn’t startle you when it flew up to you at the buffet earlier. I heard your shriek.”

“I did not shriek.” Bucky mumbled in amusement, craning his neck to look around the room again. “But it is a funny idea, yes. I just can’t believe that he got that damn thing repaired in time for the party after it got pretty much blown to shreds on our last mission.”

“Oh, he was very adamant about having it repaired in time for the party. Now I know why.” Joaquin laughed before he narrowed his eyes. “What’s with you looking around the room like that?”

“I’m just looking for—”

“Your special friend?” Joaquin sing-songed, grinning up at Bucky before he shook his head and looked around, too. “Speaking of which, I haven’t seen her all evening but there are a lot of people in masks and helmets. Maybe she’s also wearing one. She could be that Jason Vorhees by the buffet or the Boushh that’s currently talking to Yelena. Both of them are her size.”

Bucky rolled his eyes at his teasing. “Thanks. I’ll go looking for her.”

“Good luck. If you see her, tell her to come find me. I want to know what she’s dressed up as. She kept it under wraps for weeks and I need to know!”

After quickly agreeing, Bucky left and made his way across the room again, taking in the other guests in the hopes of catching something that would give you away – your voice, your laughter or the smell of your perfume. But when he went another twenty minutes without finding you, he decided to take a break and get something to drink.

Unfortunately, Sam had spotted him at the buffet and had stirred Redwing over to make it circle him. While he tried to swat it away, Sam cackled in the background not far away. Thankfully, he was rescued by the aforementioned person in the Boushh costume. They got between Bucky and the drone to shoo it away before flipping Sam off. The other man threw his hands up in defeat and left, but not without cackling to himself some more.

“Thanks for shooing the ghost of Redwing away.” Bucky chuckled softly, eyeing the mystery person in the Boushh costume. “Who are you?”

The person took their helmet off to reveal that it was you underneath, grinning up at Bucky with a proud expression. “Someone who loves you.”

Bucky felt his heart stop for a second for a whole plethora of reasons. For one, he was delighted to have finally found you. Then there was also the way his brain so kindly reminded him that in Return of The Jedi, Leia kissed Han after saying that and for a second, he almost dared to hope that you would follow the example. He didn’t even have to question why he wanted you to kiss him and why hearing you say that you loved him made his heart beat faster. By now, he knew that he was in love with you.

“You good there, Bucky?”

“Your costume’s amazing, Doll. I get why you wanted it to be a surprise. And before I forget, Joaquin wants to see your costume, so you should show it to him later.” He said, trying to cover up how his stomach was fluttering and his heart was pounding in his chest at what you’d just said, even though he knew you’d only done so to quote the movie. “I bet you’re so happy you got to use that quote.”

“I totally am! I love that we’re both dressed as Star Wars characters.”

“You two are Han and Leia!”

Both of you turned to find Bob approaching, dressed as a vampire and with a giddy smile on his lips. Behind him followed Yelena, dressed as one of the twins from ’The Shining’ which was part of a double costume she was doing with Natasha. As she came over, she gave Bucky a wide grin.

“You two go to a Halloween party dressed in a couple’s costume and then wonder why people think you are a couple.”

“I swear, it wasn’t on purpose. You know I was planning my costume in secret, Yelena.” You exclaimed in amusement and Bucky felt his heart sink a little at how vehemently you were refuting the idea of dressing in a couple’s costume with him. Perhaps, you really only saw him as a friend. “It was a coincidence.”

“Coincidence or fate?” Came Natasha’s voice as she also decided to join the conversation, standing right next to Yelena which made them look straight out of the movie scene. “I mean, if you two really didn’t plan this, which I am not totally convinced of, then isn’t it a sign from the universe that you two just happened to show up in a couple’s costume?”

But your words were still ringing in Bucky’s head, leaving him doubting that you would ever reciprocate his feelings and unable to ignore that ache in his chest any longer, he shook his head at them all. “How many times do we have to tell you guys that we’re just friends? We are not a couple, no matter what we do or say or dress up as.”

“Exactly.” You agreed but the tone of your voice sounded strangely dejected which made Bucky’s head snap toward you. Although you were still smiling at your friends, he saw the hint of sadness in your eyes. Unfortunately, before he could say anything, you continued. “Now stop harassing us. I got to go find Joaquin and show him my costume now anyway.”

“I just found you.” Bucky protested weakly even though he didn’t know what his plan was should you actually decide to stay. Everything was confusing. Now he was wondering why you’d sounded so sad about him vehemently refuting the claims that you were a couple. He didn’t know if he should apologise, confess his feelings to you or try to distract you. But what he knew for sure was that he didn’t want you to leave. “Let’s get something to eat.”

“I see Joaquin just over there. Let me talk to him really quick and then I’ll be right back.” You promised and gave Bucky a soft pat on the chest. “Just give me a few minutes.”

With that, you hurried off, leaving Bucky with Yelena, Natasha and Bob who all looked a bit unsure of what to make of the situation. While Yelena and Natasha looked somewhat guilty, Bob just averted his eyes uncomfortably.

“All jokes and teasing aside, I think there are some unresolved feelings there.” Natasha said softly and Bucky turned to find her looking at him with a worried frown. “You looked upset when she denied being your girlfriend and now, she was upset when you basically did the same thing. Maybe you two like each other more than either of you realise.”

Bucky was quiet for a few seconds, wondering if he should tell Natasha the truth, but then he quickly decided that he should because she was one of his best friends. “Trust me, I’ve realised. I just-- I think I’m in love with her. I mean, I want to be close to her all the time, when she quoted ’Star Wars’ and told me she loved me I was so happy, and I hoped she would kiss me like-- like Leia does in that scene and I know I wouldn’t mind being her boyfriend-- Scratch that, I would actually love being her boyfriend. That means I’m in love with her, doesn’t it?”

“Yes, it means you’re in love with her!” Natasha exclaimed before she could stop herself, eyes wide and looking a little overwhelmed with her normally so closed-off friend having gone on a rant about his feelings. “James, you’re so in love with her it’s unreal.”

“For real?” Bob exclaimed excitedly, earning himself an elbow to the side from Yelena as she realised that they were drawing attention to themselves. So, Bob lowered his voice. “You have feelings for her? Alexei owes me fifty-- I mean, I’m so happy for you!”

And as if the conversation couldn’t get any more uncomfortable, Sam had heard the commotion and was now making his way over. “What are you talking about?”

“Bucky just realised that he’s in love with his best friend.” Yelena explained matter-of-factly before she nodded over to where you were talking with Joaquin. “Too bad, the two of them just vehemently denied being a couple five minutes ago and she got really sad about it.”

“Seriously, man?” Sam groaned and ran a hand down his face before placing a hand on Bucky’s shoulder. “You have to tell her.”

“I can’t. Five minutes ago, she was so adamant about us not being a couple. What if she doesn’t feel the same?”

Natasha huffed softly at that. “Did you not see how absolutely heartbroken she looked when you agreed that you two weren’t a couple?”

“And besides that, even if she doesn’t feel the same, it’s still better to have it out in the open.” Sam said softly, thumb rubbing Bucky’s shoulder as he tried to comfort his friend. “If she says she doesn’t feel the same way, you two can move on. And if she says she is also in love with you, you can finally be together.”

“How do I do this? I mean, we’re dressed in Star Wars costumes at a party full of people. Isn’t this the least romantic way to do this?”

Sam shrugged his shoulders at that. “You’re both nerds who love space, so I think it fits. I also don’t think it really matters how and where you say it, as long as you mean it.”

“Surprisingly good advice from Sam over here.” Natasha commented, earning herself a scowl from Sam, before she gave Bucky a genuine smile. “Tell her you want to talk to her and take her to the balcony. Then just say exactly what you said to me about wanting to be close to her, to kiss her and be her boyfriend. I’m sure she’ll love it.”

“You can do it, Buck.” Bob said with a small, awkward but encouraging smile. “I mean, you’ve fought aliens, saved the universe and faced the Void. Surely, this is way less scary.”

“It’s not. I’m actually way more scared.”

“Now you’re just being dramatic!” Yelena complained before she grabbed him by the shoulder and shoved him in your general direction. “Go and tell her!”

Bucky was quiet for a few seconds before he decided that the truth was the way to go and he gave his friends a small nod as he set out to talk to you. His heart was pounding in his chest, his head was swimming and when you turned upon hearing him approach, he almost bolted. After everything he’d been through, getting so nervous and scared about confessing his feelings to you seemed almost ridiculous to him.

“Hey, Doll.”

“Hey, Bucky, I’m sorry I kept you waiting for so long. Joaquin wanted to know how I made the chest straps and--” You explained but when you saw his expression, your face fell. “What’s wrong, James? Are you alright?”

His heart once more leapt into his throat at you using his first name but he willed himself to speak. “Can I talk to you for a second? Just the two of us? We could go onto the balcony. No one’s there.”

“Sure.” You nodded quickly before giving Joaquin a small smile. “I’ll talk to you later.”

Joaquin eyed Bucky for a second and then gave you a strange look he couldn’t quite identify. “I’m sure this is more important than your costume. I’ll see you later!”

The walk to the balcony was nerve-wracking, as well. Bucky was distinctly aware of all his friends watching from across the room and when he held open the door for you to step outside, his hand shook on the glass. Once outside, you turned to him with a concerned expression before reaching out to take his flesh hand and give it a tight squeeze.

“You look scared. Do we need to leave?” You asked but Bucky felt himself unable to speak out of the sudden. “James, talk to me, please”

“I have something to say.” He blurted out before swallowing thickly against the lump in his throat. “You know how everyone always assumes we’re a couple but we tell them we’re not? Well, a few weeks ago Natasha said something about that, telling me I was basically your boyfriend without the benefits and-- and it got me thinking. I’ve been thinking about it for weeks now.”

Your eyes had grown wide as you’d listened to Bucky talk and he could distinctly feel your hand shake in his. “My boyfriend without the benefits?”

“It made me realise that we already pretty much act like a couple and I don’t want that to change but I realised that I want the benefits, too.”

“The benefits? Like getting it on or--”

“No! I mean, if you want to! I mean, I-- Fuck, I used to be so good at this. I’m sorry, let me try again.” Bucky grumbled, taking a deep breath and closing his eyes for a second to gather his thoughts. “Natasha’s words and all the teasing from our friends made me think. I want to be with you, hear you say you love me without it being a joke about our costumes and when I didn’t correct that man who called me your boyfriend, I realised I would really like being your boyfriend. And I’m in love with you, Doll.”

“You’re in love with me?” You asked, voice barely there as you stared at him in utter disbelief. “You want to be my boyfriend?”

“More than anything in the world. Being your boyfriend would be the benefits. I’m so in love with you, Doll.” Bucky confessed before averting his eyes. “I had to be honest with you but if you don’t feel the same, then--”

Before Bucky could get another word out, your hands were on his cheeks and you were pulling him into a fierce kiss. The feeling of your lips against his, your body pressing closer to his chest and your hands cradling his face had his eyes slipping close, arms wrapping around your waist to hold you close. Seemingly emboldened by his actions you deepened the kiss, sighing contentedly against his lips, until you sadly had to separate to catch your breath. Bucky couldn’t help chase the kiss for a second, leaning forward to keep his lips on yours for as long as possible which made a huge smile spread on your lips.

“I feel the same way, James. I’m so in love with you it’s unbelievable. I’d be so happy if I could be your girlfriend.” You confessed, keeping yourself close to him and placing your hands on his shoulders as you pursed your lips in amusement. “You know, Joaquin actually called me your girlfriend without the benefits and it got me thinking. I realised I’m in love with you, too. I’m so glad you feel the same.”

“Does that mean we can tell our friends that we really are a couple now?”

“Absolutely.” You smiled, eyes flickering toward the glass doors to the balcony before flickering down to his lips in a way that made his heart leap. “I really want to kiss you again but all of our friends have gathered behind that glass door to watch us and it’s quite frankly a little uncomfortable.”

Bucky hadn’t even realised that you had an audience. A quiet chuckle escaped his lips as he saw his friends behind the glass door and he couldn’t help but full-on laugh when most of them quickly scattered to pretend that they hadn’t been spying on you two. The exceptions were Natasha who clapped her hands with an excited smile and Sam next to her who gave Bucky a thumbs up.

“Maybe we can continue this later on.”

“I’ll hold you to that.” You sighed softly, leaning your head against his chest and squeezing him tightly. “I’m so happy you’re my boyfriend.”