#cap coded

You had no passage of time. But knowing Steve, it had been at least an hour. Sixty minutes since your clothing fell to the floor and he began exploring every inch of you with his fingers, his lips, his sweet words.

He felt it. He felt everything. The scent of your perfume, the softness of your skin, the tiny creases in your forehead as his teeth grazed your shoulder. Every one of his senses was heightened. A side-effect of the serum and a sure-fire guarantee during alone time with you.

Increased sensitivity wasn’t torture during sex. For Steve, he savoured it. He enjoyed the feelings. He lived for the delayed gratification, the moment when finally, eventually, he felt he had worshipped you enough to deserve the feeling of your warmth around him.

He was hard. He had been for quite some time. You could feel his length pressing into your thigh. It was only when you whispered to him that he removed his boxers and tossed them to the floor.

“Steve. I need you. Please.”

“Okay honey.” His forearms were either side of you, his face above yours. “Keep your eyes on me.”

His blue eyes pulled you in, drawing you into a hypnotic calm. You watched his mouth subtly open and his eyelids flutter shut for a fleeting moment as the feeling of entering you washed over him. Within the beating of a butterfly’s wings, his eyes were back on yours. They remained there as he slowly thrusted, the intensity of his eye contact making your limbs go weak.

“Is it okay, honey? The pace?”

Yesterday, he had thrown an adversary from a roof. Last week he left a hole in the wall when he turned a corner at pace, chasing down a rogue agent, thrusting his shield into concrete and making it crumble like drywall. Shattering glass as he jumped through windows was a regular occurrence. He was durable. Sturdy. You weren’t. He used all of his concentration to use only a fraction of his strength on you. None, if possible. You were a civilian. He had to be gentle.

Dumbly, you nodded your response. The languid pace was perfect.

He continued to slowly rail you. He broke eye contact only to lean down and kiss your lips. He closed his eyes, the softness of your lips coaxing a moan from his. Whispers and sweet words replaced soft kisses, his voice low and raspy in your ear.

You’re so beautiful.

I love you so much, honey.

You feel so good.

He cycled through rounds of kisses, whispers and intense eye contact, his thrusting gratuitously slow. Indulgent, even. The deepest kisses gave you shivers. The ones where his tongue did the talking, where it felt as though he was attempting to kiss your soul. The whispers following these deep ministrations were simple.

I’m lost for words, honey. God.

It wasn’t about climax for either of you. Steve figured the longer it took to fall over the edge into bliss, the better. He wanted to draw it out. Make it last as long as possible. It was the same reason he ate slowly. Why it took him weeks to finish a book he loved. He didn’t want the pleasure to end. His life hadn’t always been filled with so much tenderness. Maybe that’s why he savoured it.

He couldn’t be selfish. It wasn’t in his DNA. The very moment he saw a flicker of frustration, a sense he was taking too long, his fingers would cease their faithful trail over your skin and inch their way down to your inner thigh, writing love letters in their wake as he reached your most sensitive spot. His fingers applied gentle pressure, slow circles, picking up his thrusting slightly, bringing you towards climax safely. Less like a freight train hurtling past an abandoned Midwest station. More like a passenger carriage coming to a gentle, rolling stop. If he thought about it too much, even he had to admit it was incredibly on-brand.

The soft moans from your lips and the way your mouth opened, your neck arching back into the pillow, your hands gripping fistfuls of Egyptian cotton.... the mere sight of your pleasure was enough to tip him over the edge. He would climax slowly, the pleasure coursing through his arteries like the serum did all those years ago. Your eyes were on him, watching him press upright onto his palms, arching backwards, the hard lines of his face softening into pleasure.

He bathed in the ecstasy. But he never allowed himself to become lost to it. He remained in control enough to lower himself down gently. He couldn’t afford to lose it and collide his body into yours. He could hurt you.

His face would nuzzle into your neck post-coital, sweet kisses peppering your shoulder as your hands tangled in his hair. He was soon back on his forearms, intense in his gaze, brow creased as he checked you were alright. His expression softened, the tense muscles in his jaw relaxing when he realised you were safe. Of course you were. You were underneath him. It was the safest place to be.

“That was… wow.”

He chuckled, cheeks flushing just slightly. He said the same thing every time but it never got old. He was here, fully present and absolutely entranced by you and unable to connect words together. He was articulate. He gave commands. You rendered him dumb-struck.

Aftershocks of his pleasure varied. Sometimes he would offer his hand and pull you up, inviting you into the shower with him. Other times you would stay just like that, kissing and starting up another round. Often you would remain wrapped in each other and fall into a brief slumber, napping for half an hour before a particularly loud truck honked its horn on the streets below and jolted you awake. In these moments, Steve rarely slept. He would lay awake, his arm around you as you snoozed on his chest. His hands ran through your hair. He smiled, his gaze soft and focusing on nothing in particular.

Today, you simply put your clothes back on and talked about food.

Steve looked towards the window. “I don’t know about you but I could really go for a hot dog.”

At a leisurely pace, you picked up the street food, glancing up at Steve’s apartment five floors up and wondering just how much was audible at street level. You walked around the local park hand-in-hand, connecting with an elderly couple sat together eating ice cream. They gave you a nod before their gaze returned to each other.

Steve felt a warm sensation in his chest. Some days, he wasn’t sure if he trusted the gifts he had been given. In his cloudier frames of mind, he imagined losing it all again and facing the prospect of processing immeasurable grief. Thankfully, those days were becoming passing storm clouds in an otherwise sunny disposition.