#iti

Dream remembers when George and Sapnap got the UTV.

He's not the greatest at keeping up with Sapnap's streams, but he tries to catch as many as he can. And when both his roommates are participating, he thinks it'd be rude to miss even with all the code he still needs to get done.

When they had gotten home, Dream had asked why they'd gotten a car they wouldn’t use.

“Bro lacks the vision,” Sapnap had said, making George cackle into his hands.

“I don’t lack anything,” he had retorted, which had made George wolf-whistle and Sapnap laugh. “No, shut up. George needs a car he can actually drive so he can learn.”

“He’s stupid too,” George chimed in, and if Dream had chucked a pillow at his head, that’s his business.

“No, no, listen,” Sapnap said. “It has all the shit a regular car has, brakes, steering wheel—”

“Wow, dude knows what’s in a car,” George drawled.

“—and it has a speed cap, so George can get all his fucking driving experience without being a menace to society.”

It had taken some convincing (because UTVs are fucking dangerous according to Dream), but Dream had come around to the idea, even if it was mostly lies so they could have a UTV. And even then, it had been a good source of happiness for them in the following rougher months, which Dream only saw as a positive.

It was a random day in May when George asked if he’d watch them ride it.

“You’re so boring, we’ve been at this all day, and you want to keep working,” George laments.

“It’s not that, I’m almost done—”

“You’ve said that already. Four times.”

Dream pauses and glances away from the monitor to where George sits. There's a computer now in the gym so they can fix code as they work. George is turned toward him in the office chair, and Dream notes the tiredness in his hunched-over posture. They’ve been at this for hours, he will admit, and George has been a great help the whole time. Has been for a while actually. “I have?”

George rolls his eyes, but he smiles. “Idiot,” he says. “Break for tonight. We can start again tomorrow.”

Dream looks back at the monitor. He is really close, he just has to adjust the rendering a tiny bit and—

“Dream.”

He glances over again. George is still smiling, but there’s a no-nonsense look in his gaze. “Please? Just for tonight?”

Dream looks again at George, at the days-old stubble, the hoodie he’s been wearing for two days just so he didn’t have to abandon Dream while he’s been working, and thinks he deserves a break.

He makes a show of rolling his eyes as he gets up.”You just want me to get you food.”

George’s eyes light up, but he still scoffs at Dream. They each have to play their parts. “That’s not true.”

“Is true.” He stretches up, feeling the cracks in his shoulders and spine. “Fuck.”

George laughs. “Bro’s getting old."

“Like you’re one to talk.”

George hunches over and makes a groaning noise. “Oh, I’m Dream, and my poor back hurts from all the dicks in my ass—”

“George!” he exclaims, scandalized, and George laughs again, bright and loud in the space.

“We should do something,” George says.

“Like what?”

“Like, go out, do something active. I’m too tired to sit.”

Dream walks toward George, and the two make their way out of the gym. “How does that even work?”

“Dunno, but my butt’s gonna fall off if we don’t do something.”

“Well, we wouldn’t want you to lose your best asset.”

“Asset. Ass-et. Get it?” He elbows Dream’s side.

“You’re so dumb.” They’ve reached the kitchen, and George beelines for the fridge. He pulls out a bottle of water and (quite dramatically) drinks it all in one chug. “We have a fridge in the gym,” Dream reminds him.

George shakes his head. “Doesn’t taste right.”

Dream doesn’t get it, but he knows George has his quirks, like only wearing a specific brand of sock because it’s “just right” or the way he tidies his sheets but not the pillows when making his bed. “Well,” he says, “since you’re no longer dying of thirst, what do you wanna do?”

George thinks for a minute before he brightens. “Have you seen me drive the UTV yet?”

He hasn’t. Every time George and Sapnap went to mess around with it, he politely excused himself. Although he likes that George is getting "driving" experience, he has his reservations about the safety of it.

Then again, George has been quite accommodating for his antics, so maybe it’s time he returned the favor.

“No, you wanna grab Nick?”

“Yeah!” George runs off, and Dream hopes Sapnap isn’t busy and George isn’t about to terrorize him.

Even if it’s fruitless.

An hour later, Dream sits watching his idiot friends drive up sandy hills on their UTV. The off-roading park allows members to keep their vehicles there, fueled and ready, and since it’s not on Dream’s bill, he’s happy to watch them goof off all night long.

Just then, he sees the UTV careen over a hill and come crashing down thirty feet away.

“Holy fucking shit!” Sapnap yells from the driver’s seat, a wide grin plastered across his face. George whoops beside him, clearly gleeful.

A few seconds later, he sees George and Sapnap undo their seatbelts and make their way over to where Dream is sitting.

“Impressed?” Sapnap asks, breathing heavily.

Dream hums. “Thought George would be driving,” he says, “since it’s his car after all.”

“Am I not good enough for you?” Sapnap gives him a puppy-eyed look.

Dream laughs. “You’re a good driver, Nick.”

“Hell yeah!” he shrieks. George pouts at Dream.

“I’m a good driver too.”

“Not from my point of view,” he says. George meets the challenge with a blaze in his eyes. He smirks.

“Alright.” George walks off, and this time, climbs into the driver’s seat.

Sapnap plops down next to Dream and pulls out his phone, aiming it toward George. “Woo!” he screams. “Kitten’s driving!”

He can see George scoff from where he sits. He takes off, doing a tight turn before hurdling up a hill.

Sapnap cheers beside him, and Dream thinks, This isn’t so bad.

“Dream, look!” he hears. He shields his eyes and looks to where he heard George.

The UTV is now on top of the biggest hill. George is standing next to it, waving.

“I’m gonna go down it!” he yells.

“Do it, pussy!” Sapnap yells back. Dream nudges him for the comment, but he joins the cheering.

George slides into the driver’s seat and straps himself in. Dream hears the motor roar from where he sits, and he watches the UTV gun it down the hill. Sapnap raises his phone higher, most likely to get a better angle as dust billows behind the truck. It speeds down the hill, toward the ground, and—

It happens.

The UTV catches on a rock. It flips.

One.

Two.

Three times.

It slams into a hill.

It stops.

Then, silence.

“GEORGE!”

Dream takes off running toward the UTV. He was wearing his seatbelt, he’s gonna be fine. "GEORGE!"

But then why hasn't he answered yet?

“George, are you good!?” He’s at the UTV. He climbs the hill to get closer. “George?”

George is hanging awkwardly in the harness, barely sitting in the seat anymore. His eyes are open, gazing forward. He's breathing, though. Dream can hear it. He reaches out a hand and presses it against George’s face. It’s an awkward angle, the UTV is slanted on the hill, but he needs to see, needs to feel that George is alright.

George’s face is sticky with dirt and sweat when he presses a hand to his cheek. But it’s still warm and soft like Dream always imagined, and he can feel the breath on his arm.

George blinks, and Dream breathes.

“George.” His other hand brushes the hair out of Georgge’s eyes. “You alright?”

George is still hanging in his harness. Dream leans over to unbuckle him and accidentally nudges George, causing him to hiss.

“Wha—did I hurt you?” Dream asks, pulling back a step.

“Head,” George groans, and something bad curls in Dream.

“Your head...hurts?” George tries to nod but groans again.

“I don’t—didn’t hit it,” George says. Dream gently, ever so gently, cards his fingers through George’s hair to feel for bumps or blood.

He finds nothing, but when Dream looks to George to tell him, he notices something.

Dream looks at people. A long part of his career was watching his friends on streams, and, since his face reveal, he has spent a lot of time memorizing what people’s faces look like outside of a screen. He knows what George looks like, can tell how long his stubble has been growing, when he needs to take George to get a haircut, what he looks like when he's tired, upset, in pain.

As he’s looking into George’s eyes, there’s something wrong. They aren’t focusing on Dream; they’re dazed and unfocused.

And the bad feeling inside Dream gets worse.

“Let’s get you out of there.” He’s careful this time as he leans over and unbuckles George, carefully distributing George’s weight onto him as he pulls him out onto the sand.

At that moment, Sapnap appears.

“I called for help, they’re getting another vehicle to come pick us up and take us to the road,” he says, and Dream loves him.

“Thank you, Nick.” He looks back at George, who’s squinting at Sapnap.

“Look funny,” he says, and Dream chokes.

“And you look stupid.” But there’s a tenderness to Sapnap’s gaze, and Dream understands he’s equally as worried as he is.

A vehicle comes over the hill and stops next to the UTV. With a bit of maneuvering, they get George secured into the back alongside Dream. Dream has his arm slung around George’s shoulder for support as they navigate back to their car.

“We’re gonna get you checked out,” he promises. “We’ll drive straight to a clinic.” George doesn’t respond, but he presses closer to Dream, and that's enough for now.

Time both moves fast and slow as they get George to a doctor. Fast in that it's a blur. Slow as in every bump that makes George wince makes fear twist inside Dream.

He was wearing a seatbelt, he thinks. He’s gonna be okay.

The nurse checking out George is thorough. She asks questions, flashes lights, and writes her findings on a clipboard. She gets George’s details from Dream (he has George’s insurance card saved into his phone) and tells them the doctor will be in soon before she leaves.

George lays on the hospital bed. They turned down the lights in the room, so George isn’t squinting anymore. But, his face still conveys pain.

“My head’s still hurting.”

“The nurse says she can’t give you pain meds just yet.” If he didn't know already that giving pain medication would only slow the nurses down, he would’ve gone to the pharmacy himself to grab some for George. But, his mom’s voice reminds him that pain is often a good symptom of where the hurt is, and so he stays put.

“Don’t worry, George,” Sapnap says. “When we get back, I’ll let you have some of my special gummy bears.” He wiggles his eyebrows, and George snorts.

“Thanks, I guess.” There’s silence for a second. “Did you get it on video?”

“What are you—oh yeah!” Sapnap pulls out his phone and taps in his passcode. “It was kinda sick actually.”

“Can I see?” George tries to sit up, but Dream (ever so gently) pushes him back down.

“No. The nurse said no light until the doctor returns.”

“Oh, c’mon Dream,” Sapnap whines.

“Oh, c’mon, remember? He used to say that.” George has his stupid grin on his face, and Dream is only a bit relieved that he’s at least feeling well enough for mockery.

Just then, the nurse comes back in with what Dream supposes is the doctor.

“Hi everyone!” she says, focusing her attention on the figure in the bed. “You must be George.”

“Yes ma’am,” he says. Out of the corner of his eye, he sees Sapnap muffling a laugh.

“I am Dr. Smith. I’m the resident neurologist for this floor.”

“Neurologist,” Dream says. “So it is a brain problem.”

She nods, but there is no tightness to her face when she looks at George. “You seem to have a minor concussion. I was told he was in a car accident?” She looks toward Dream at that.

He clears his throat. “Well, yes and no,” he starts. “He was messing around with our UTV, but he was wearing a seatbelt though, so we didn’t—I didn’t think he’d get hurt?”

She hums. “Concussions don’t necessarily occur because of impact. They occur when the brain bounces around inside the skull.”

“The UTV flipped a bunch,” Sapnap says. “Could that’ve caused it?”

“Yes, that would explain the bruising. I would still be very glad you were wearing a seatbelt, for I’m sure we would be having a very different conversation if he was without it.”

George is still hurt though, Dream’s brain adds. He shakes it off.

Dr. Smith is talking again to George. “We’ll be giving you a list of what you can and can’t do during your recovery. You’ll most likely want to avoid computer screens, TVs, anything with bright lights. You’ll also want to avoid doing anything mentally strenuous for the first few days. We saw a lack of concentration in your testing, so we want to keep on top of that.”

George speaks up: “But, my work—it's all computers and screens.”

Dream turns to George. “We can figure stuff out or take a break,” he assures. “We can pause the project for now.”

George’s face looks pained again. Dream wishes they could give him medicine. “No,” he says, “I can’t, you—”

“We can provide a doctor’s note if necessary, but using electronics will stunt your recovery. For at least two weeks, you need to stay away from screens.”

Two weeks, Dream thinks, as Dr. Smith goes on about migraine recovery. George is gonna hate this.

George looks like he’s hating this. His lips are pressed together in a thin line, and his brows are furrowed. For a moment, Dream wants to smooth the lines out from his face, but he knows now is not the time.

“We’ll be keeping you overnight for observation.” Dr. Smith gives Dream a form. “We’ll get George to a room as soon as a gurney frees up.” She hands him a pen as well. “If you need help, press the call button.”

And with that, the two leave the room. George turns to face the wall.

Dream looks over the form. It’s various medical jargon and information. He starts filling it out while Sapnap goes over to George.

“So, concussion,” he states. Dream hears George scoff.

“Glad you were paying attention,” he snarks over his shoulder.

“Well, since I’ve actually been concussed before, I was going to offer to grab all the usual shit you need, but since you’re being a little bitch—”

“Nick,” Dream interrupts. He would usually let them fight it out, but Dream sees the tense lines in George’s back, and thinks this isn’t the time. Sapnap glances over to him and must see something too because he huffs and backs off.

“Got it,” Sapnap grumbles. He turns back to George. “Want me to grab anything else while I’m out?”

George turns his head back over. “Sushi?” he asks, and Dream can see a glint of mischief.

Sapnap must see it too, because he softly laughs. “Should’ve guessed that.” He grabs his phone and stands up. “I’m assuming you’ll be staying too?” he says to Dream.

Dream nods. It isn’t a question in his mind, but it makes sense why Sapnap asks.

“K, see you at home.” With that, Sapnap walks out, making sure to shut the door quietly behind him.

Dream continues to work on the form while George stares at the ceiling. A few minutes later, a team arrives to help George get up to the observation room. Dream follows dutifully behind, carrying George and his phone.

Once they’re settled in, with George in the bed and Dream sitting in a chair beside him, finally done with the forms, he finally asks the question.

“How are you feeling?”

George continues fiddling with the sheets. The hospital provided pajamas for him, as it was long past the early evening it was when they took the UTV for a spin. The lights are dimmed low, shadows casting across the room and across George’s face.

“Could be better,” he mumbles. “Head still hurts.”

“The nurse gave you pain medication, right?” He’s sure at some point a nurse came in and gave George pills.

“Yeah,” he says. “Still hurts though.”

Dream nods and scoots his chair closer. There’s a beat of silence, then George says, “I’m sorry.”

Dream looks at his face. “For what?”

“The pause—it was only for tonight.”

“The pause,” Dream says again. “You mean…for the project?”

“Yeah,” George mumbles, hunching over slightly as he continues to fiddle with the sheets.

“George, I don’t—I’m not thinking about that right now,” he says. “I’m just so glad you’re okay and that it’s going to be okay.”

George rolls his eyes. “I’m not gonna be able to work for weeks, Dream. How is that okay?”

“Because—okay, look.” He reaches out and grabs George’s hand to stop him from tearing the blanket to shreds. George’s hand falls still under his touch. “The project’s been delayed so many fucking times. One more time is not going to kill us.”

He feels George’s hand twitch under his palm. “But it’s not—it was stopped before because of the code,” he starts. “Not because of—not because I couldn’t help.” He hasn’t met Dream’s eyes yet.

Dream moves and sits on the bed. George’s hand twitches again in his grasp. Dream squeezes it, gentle, soft. “George,” he says, “two weeks is not the end of the world. This stuff, this technology, it’s gonna change the world. It can wait two weeks while my best friend recovers.”

He sees a ghost of a smile flash across George’s face. He presses on: “The nurse says no screens or bright lights for at least two weeks. So, you can’t code. But you can help me render shit, set stuff up once your doctor clears you, or we can sit in bed for two weeks. But all that really doesn’t matter, because I’d rather you get better quicker than you hurting yourself because you want to help me.”

“And I’m fine waiting for you,” he adds. “We’ve already gotten this far, and we’re this close. A two-week break isn’t going to change that. Plus.” He turns to smirk at George. “Weren’t you the one before now who was asking for a break?”

George groans, but he’s smiling now, and that’s all that matters. “Alright,” George says. “If you insist, I guess I could take a break.”

“I’m glad.” He’s smiling now too. George turns his hand over to squeeze Dream’s. Once. Twice. Three times. Dream’s smile grows wider.

“I love you.” Even in the darkness, he can see George’s blush, and it makes Dream’s heart flutter.

Reaching down, she softly traces her fingers over the cotton crotch of the underwear, noting the damp heat. Ever since Bucky had shed his pale t-shirt under the warm glow of the fairy lights, Toni had been wet. When she finished stomping her way through the woods after Wanda’s interruption, she’d had to disappear off to the bathroom to wipe away her own slick before it could drip down her thighs. Sitting there on the closed porcelain toilet seat, two fingers pressed flat against her clit, she’d been tempted to finish herself off. 

To use the two fingers Bucky had sucked clean (God, she could still see his face burned behind her eyelids, the way his stormy eyes had rolled back like he was licking ambrosia off of her instead of cum). 

But Toni didn’t like to do anything in halves. She would cum with Bucky tonight, or not at all. 

Creeping on silent, bare feet over to the door, she twists the doorknob and pulls the door inward. The hinges don’t squeak, nor does the floor as she slips out of the guestroom, careful to close the door behind herself less anyone pass in the night and see she isn’t there. When Natasha had directed them all to bedrooms, she had told Bucky to take his ‘usual room’, the one at the end of the hallway. That’s where Toni creeps, past Sam, past Clint. She holds her breath as she takes the cool doorknob in her palm.

Is he asleep already? She wonders. It would be thrilling to slip between the sheets with him, to wake him with her body pressed against his hard one. Maybe he’s awake like her, though, trying to convince himself to slip his way into her room. Toni only opens the door as wide as she needs to get inside. Then, she stares at the bed, eyes widening because—

Bucky isn’t there. 

Dread coils in her stomach. Had he left? He hadn’t been drunk like the others. What if he had decided to avoid any more interaction with Toni altogether, to slip out of the house and off into the night like some womanizing vagabond from her mother’s romance novels? He had gotten his, after all. Isn’t that all men ever want? Maybe with the blood back in his brain instead of his cock, he realized that he was out of Toni’s league.

Toni shuts Bucky’s door and nearly returns to her own room. But then she remembers the way he had wandered off outside, how he had seemed like he needed to put distance between himself and the others. With expectations low, she pads silently to the stairs, feeling her way down them carefully in the dark. 

She isn’t disappointed. 

There he is, seated in one armchair, his head leaned back and one tattooed arm thrown over his eyes. An afghan that had been draped over the back of the couch is in a heap on the floor. Either Bucky is an insomniac like Sam or there is something keeping him from sleeping. 

Toni must make some noise on the stairs because Bucky’s arm jerks away from over his eyes and he is staring at her with wide, bloodshot eyes. At the sight of her, he makes a noise in the back of his throat and returns to covering his eyes. 

“Shouldn’t you be in your room?” he asks. His voice is low but not a whisper, and Toni can’t help the way her heart jumps into her throat, turning to glance back up the stairs as if expecting one of the others to come bursting from their room to inspect the noise. When no one comes, she takes a steadying breath and takes the last few steps down the stairs. Sightless in the armchair, Bucky adds: “That sounds like the wrong direction for your room.” 

“I’m not going to my room,” Toni says, matching the low pitch of his voice. 

Sighing, Bucky sits up. He has shed his shirt again for comfort while he attempts to sleep. His skin looks carved from marble in the moonlight, the pale expanse only interrupted by the ink that divides him up and decorates him. His jeans have ridden low, belt off and left by his shirt, and it gives Toni a few more precious inches of the tattoos that rest at either hipbone: bold, encircled stars. 

“If you were smart, you would,” says Bucky, his eyes glued to her legs. 

“If I were smart? I solved the Kepler Conjecture when I was six.” 

Bucky winces, seeming to understand his insulting words. “I mean, I know you’re smart. Doctorate in engineering—goddamn you’re smart. But there’s more to being smart than numbers.” 

All his talk, but he isn’t working to get away from her. He doesn’t lift a finger to stop her while she takes slow, purposeful steps towards him until she’s standing inches from him, their knees nearly touching, bare skin to denim. Still, he stares at her legs, at her tanned thighs. She wonders what would happen if—

Letting her arms raise in a stretch, the shirt rides up and up. Bucky’s eyes open wider and wider until he’s staring at her white cotton panties with a stricken expression, the shadow of her well-trimmed pubic hair just barely visible. His throat bobs with a painful swallow as her arms fall back to their neutral position. Toni feels infused with power, drunk with it. While she didn’t doubt the existence of feminine sexuality (she lives with Nat, doesn’t she?), Toni had never considered her own ability to wield it. The way Bucky looks at her makes her slick between her legs, makes her head feel light.

Makes her bold. 

“Do you not want to have sex?” she asks. “Because I want to have sex.” 

“It’s not about what I want,” he rasps. “It’s about what’s right. You don’t know what you’re getting into, and it’d be wrong of me to take advantage of that while you’re drunk.” 

Toni places her palm in the center of his chest over his pounding heart and pressing him firmly back into his seat. She plants one knee beside him, wedged between the chair and his thigh, and then climbs fully onto his lap. His breath comes full and slow, like he’s counting them. The rasp of his jeans against her sensitive inner thighs has her clit aching. 

“First of all,” she says. “I’m not some sort of child; I’m a virgin. There’s a difference, believe it or not. I don’t know what I’m getting into? Unless you have a second cock which I somehow missed, I know exactly what I’m getting into. Or rather what I’d like to get into me. Second, I had two beers, and one shot before I followed you. That was five hours ago. If you’re scared and trying to come up with an excuse to keep from fucking me, you’ll need to think harder than that. The only thing wrong about this situation is that I haven’t cum yet. So let’s talk about solutions.” 

After her monologue, she is left panting, their faces so close that their breaths mingle. 

Bucky reaches out and cups one of her jaws, pulling her face down towards his own. Her eyes flutter shut on instinct, preparing for a kiss (their first, she thinks with a giddiness that is downright embarrassing), but instead he holds her face there inches from his own. When her eyes open, she narrows in on the furrow of his brows and the frown of his mouth. Beneath her, there is a growing bulge in his jeans that makes her thighs clench around his own. 

His eyes rake across her face with an intensity she could never hope to match. 

“You really are sober,” he murmurs. His thumb traces the line of her chin with tenderness.

“You know what else I am?” Toni asks. With a trembling hand, she reaches down between her legs. The shirt has ridden up dangerously high on her thighs and her wrist pulls it up the rest of the way while she cups her sex over her underwear. “I’m wet.” 

In an instant, Bucky grabs her hand and drags it to his face, breathing in like he’s smelling her (thank God she has showered, she thinks breathlessly, even though he had done more than smell her—he had fucking tasted her just hours ago out in the woods). The groan he lets out has her heart skipping. 

“If you want me, I’m yours,” he says, nuzzling against her palm. “Can’t say no to you. Don’t want to say no to you, ever.” 

His consent overwhelms her. She lowers herself the last few inches until her cunt is pressed flush against his jean-clad erection, and God it feels so good. Reaching out to steady herself with his shoulders, she lets her body lead the way, back arching on instinct so that she can grind against his hardness. Bucky’s hands ghost up her thighs before taking her hips in his broad hands, encouraging her to make long, hard strokes. Her body sags forward as she buries her face in his neck, breaths shaking. 

Already, she feels the heat inside her building. 

“I—I could cum like this,” she admits into the junction between his shoulder and neck. “Should I stop?” 

Bucky groans. His fingers tighten their grip on her. “The hell should you stop for? Show me, honey. Show me how you can cum like this.” 

“Bucky,” she gasps, body shivering at his words. 

Using his feet on the floor as leverage, he drives his hips upwards. If his jeans and her underwear weren’t in the way, they would be fucking. But even this is good, so good, so much better than her fingers. Even better is his voice in her ear muttering the filthiest things: “There you go. Chase yours, honey. Your body knows what to do, doesn’t it? Come on, Toni, tilt your hips, oh yes, there you go. That’s right against your clit, isn’t it? That feel good?” 

The coil inside her winds tighter and tighter, throat constricting until she feels like she can hardly breathe much less answer his questions. His hands slide from her hips back towards her ass, fingers slipping beneath the fabric until he’s digging his fingers into the flesh where the curve of her ass becomes the curve of her vulva, pulling her apart until the lips of her sex spread and her clit has to take the brunt of the thrusts. 

The coil snaps. For a moment her entire body goes still, frozen in time. Then the pressurized ball of pleasure that’s been condensing bursts, all her muscles stiffening and unstiffening as if she’s in the throes of a seizure. Bucky whispers the dirtiest encouragement to her, his hands drifting back to her hips to help smooth her jerky, desperate thrusts. She hardly recognizes the sounds that pour from her mouth and feels helpless to stop them as the sweetest pleasure floods from her pelvis outward, washing over her in waves that she feels helpless against. 

“—so good, Jesus, Toni, the noises you make drive me insane. Come on, lean back, show me your face—” 

And she can’t imagine what he could want to see her face for, but she does as he asks anyway, tipping herself back into a seated position so that he can look at her. She’s too busy looking at him to wonder what he might be seeing, to think that her expression might be mimicked on his face, the glossy heated eyes, the flush that’s trailing down his inked collar bones. 

Suddenly she is overcome with the need to feel that inked skin with her mouth, to trace it with her tongue, to rub her lips against the smooth skin until they are raw and swollen. Still overcome with twitching aftershocks, it feels good to keep rubbing against his cock so she does, the simplicity of chasing feel-good sensations overwhelming her higher functioning. Parting her mouth, she places a wet kiss to the honeycomb on his throat. Above her, he makes a tortured sound, trailing his hands gently from her thighs over her flank and up the arch of her back. 

His skin is warm and clean, tasting faintly of the scent of whatever masculine body wash Nat keeps stocked in the guest bathrooms. A helpless noise slips past her lips as she lets her mouth drift up to the wasp just beneath his ear to suck. 

“God,” he rasps, voice buzzing the skin beneath her mouth. “You gonna mark me up? Suck harder, honey, I can take it. I’m gonna be covered in you before the night’s through, in more ways than one.” 

Harder? she thinks. A tendril of righteous fury unwinds in her belly—he kept her waiting for so long, wielded his morals like a shield against her obvious affection. And while there is a sensible part of her that sees these are good things, a part of her that is even glad he did those things, she feels overcome with the need for pleasurable vengeance. She opens her mouth wider and bites him, sinking her teeth into skin, body thrumming when he jerks and groans. 

The sounds of him, his smell, his flesh against her tongue stokes the fire that had just been smothered, igniting coals inside of her. 

“Can I have your cock now?” she asks. “I feel—empty.” 

Bucky’s head tips back until it rests against the headrest of the armchair. His face catches the moonlight, and Toni can just barely see the blooming mark on his throat outlined by the crescents of her teeth. 

Then he is shaking his head. “Not yet,” he says. “Need to get you naked, first. Here, get up—” 

Toni stands coltish in front of him. His eyes scan her from head to toe, stopping where her nipples are visible through the thin shirt. He reaches out and fists a hand in the fabric and tugs her forward until he is nuzzling against her sternum. Then he gathers the excess and tugs it tight across the modest swell of her breasts. Suddenly she is hyper-aware of how her breasts ache, nipples tight desperate points. Then he leans forward and takes one clothed tip into his mouth, sucking at her through the cotton. 

She slaps a hand over her mouth to keep from crying out and waking the house. His other fingers toy with the neglected peak, strumming the pad of his thumb over it. It feels like there is a direct connection between her nipples and her clit and that when he teases one, it teases the other. 

When he pulls his mouth away, the cotton of her shirt is damp and see-through. She shivers as it cools, leaving goosebumps on her skin—but then he is switching to the other breast and he lights her on fire all over again. 

“Bucky,” she whines. 

He parts his mouth from her reluctantly, lapping at the cotton one last time. His hands skim down the curve of her hips until his palms reach the hem of her shirt. Pale eyes flash burning hot when he glances up in question. Toni barely manages to keep from rolling her eyes; instead, she reaches down for the hem and in one simple motion strips it from her body. 

Bucky groans. Beneath the shirt, she is naked except for her soaked panties. Toni has no illusions of her physical appearance: she is average at best. But Bucky still looks at her like he wants to eat her whole, one of his hands reaching down to rub at his erection. Emboldened, she reaches down and slides the panties off too, lets them pool at her ankles before stepping out of them delicately. 

“Lookit you,” Bucky murmurs. 

“I hope you’ll do more than look.” 

When he stands from the armchair, he towers over her, but any intimidation she felt for him was left in the woods outside, was shed from her the moment he shed his shirt just to let a naive young woman sate her curiosity in his body. His hands ghost over her form, giving her phantom tingles. He turns his hand over and lets the back of his fingers brush against the dark curls between her legs. 

“Spread them,” he says. 

“What?” 

“Your legs, spread them.” 

Flushing, Toni does. Then he drags one knuckle up the seam of her cunt. It’s electrifying, brushing over her clit in a touch that has her gasping, parting her lips around his finger so that he can nestle it against her opening. God, it makes her realize just how hungry it feels. Seeing no reason to deny her instincts or what feels good, Toni lets her hips jerk forward, his knuckle just pressing past her entrance, a stretch that has her whining. 

Bucky pulls back, ignoring her noise of displeasure. Even in the moonlight, it glistens, wet with her cum. 

“That all for me?” he wonders. 

Toni snorts. “I don’t see anyone else here.” 

“Wouldn’t put it past you to have better eyesight than I do,” he teases, smiling. Then he lifts his hand to his mouth and licks her wetness from his finger. 

Toni is suddenly struck with the knowledge that she has never tasted herself. Reaching down, she uses one finger to mimic the path that Bucky had taken, shivering at the slick heat and the roughness of her curls. Then she brings it to her own mouth, brows furrowed. It is almost tasteless, probably from her thorough shower. There’s a hint of musk, but she kind of likes it. More than anything, she likes Bucky’s reaction to her, his eyes going wider than she’s ever seen, his mouth parting in surprise. 

“It’s not bad,” Toni says. Her eyes fall to his lap. “When do I get to taste you?” 

Bucky groans. “Jesus, can’t believe you’re just asking me questions like that—” 

“What, am I breaking sex-etiquette?” 

His lips ghost into a smile. “No. There isn’t really any etiquette, except for the kind we decide on together, I guess. I like your mouth—the things you say, I mean, the, the way you say things without caring how they sound.”

“We’ll see how long that lasts,” she says somberly. Toni knows the effect her mouth has on people—and to date it has mostly been negative. There was a disastrous date (one Toni had been far too embarrassed to admit was her first) between herself and one of Nat’s classmates. By the end of the night, every time Toni opened her mouth, she saw the exasperated roll of her date’s eyes and spent the rest of the date in complete silence. 

He didn’t deserve my mouth, Toni thinks. But Bucky does. 

As Bucky presses her back towards the couch, Toni twists and slips from his grasp. 

“Stop,” she says. When Bucky freezes, she feels the thrill of being obeyed. He is like marble as she reaches out and runs her fingers down the hollow of his sternum. His piercings catch the light that streams in through the window and she feels like a magpie with how drawn she is to the tiny barbells. “Tell me if I hurt you.” 

Bucky exhales shakily, the only response. When Toni drags her thumb across his nipple, nudging the metal bead at one end and then the other, his head tilts back to bare his honeycomb throat, mouth parting. It’s a strange sensation to feel the metal beneath his skin, and she knows that she must be being far more cautious than she needs to as she rolls either nipple between her fingers. But he doesn’t seem to mind. His chest heaves with the breaths he takes and she follows the rapid rise and fall, refusing to give him a moment of reprieve. 

When it feels more like she’s teasing herself than teasing him, then she drags her fingers down between his pecs, down over the bare skin of his abdominals and down to the waistband of his jeans. The zipper is distorted obscenely by his erection, and he hisses and groans as she works the button free, giving him inadvertent stimulation. 

He isn’t wearing boxers beneath—maybe he abandoned them after the woods, maybe he threw them away in Nat’s guest bathroom. His cock springs free and it is bigger up close, a very decent length, an intimidating thickness, cut and flushed dark. The head is sticky, and when she traces a thumb over it, Bucky gasps. In her grasp, his cock jerks: an adorable bob that has her fighting a smile.

Bringing her thumb to her mouth, she wastes no time in pressing it past her lips and sucking it clean. His taste isn’t much like hers; instead it is stronger, muskier and with a hint of salt. All at once, she needs him in her mouth. 

“Let me suck you off,” Toni asks. 

“Toni,” Bucky groans. His cock jerks again in her hand. “You don’t have to do that.” 

“I want to. Do you want me to? You said you liked my mouth. Would you—like it on your cock?” 

If he thinks that the dirty talk rolls stilted from her mouth, he doesn’t show it. All he does is mutter expletives and nod jerkily. Bucky strips himself of his jeans and sits on the center couch cushion. 

Bare to her. Completely. 

With reverence, Toni kneels, running her palms across his thighs. The hairs there are fairer and more sparse. His legs are inked as well, pictures that she traces with her fingertips. Above her, he sits patient and still, only twitching when she presses her mouth to the sensitive skin of his inner thigh. With a hand on either knee, she coaxes him to spread wider. Her eyes rake over him eagerly. It isn’t the first cock she’s ever seen (though it is the first in-person). If only the lights were on, she would be able to explore him better. In the dark, she can only really rely on one exploratory sense: touch. 

The skin of his cock feels like hot silk when she runs her fingers down the length of him. It has ridges that are perfect for her tongue to trace, veins running paths from the flared head down to his sac. Bucky must prefer to keep himself well-groomed, because he is hairless here the same way he is on his chest. She presses his cock up towards his stomach, noting the way precum leaks from the tip at her firm touch. Her other hand cups his balls, tracing one and then the other, running her fingers gently over the soft, wrinkled skin. 

“You’re gonna kill me,” says Bucky brokenly.

Leaning forward, she presses her closed lips to the very base of his cock. Beside him on the couch, his hands tighten into fists, knuckles standing out white. Encouraged, Toni begins to press gentle kisses up the shaft, gradually letting her mouth open so that she can stroke her tongue along the silken skin. When she reaches the head, she takes it past her lips and lets it rest on her tongue. Her eyes fall shut so that she can concentrate on the smoothness of his skin, the sharp taste of his cum. When she suckles at the head of him, Bucky groans, the muscles of his thighs clenching and unclenching. 

“Dear god,” he rasps with a voice like sandpaper. “This won’t last long at all, sugar, I, oh fucking hell, your mouth—” 

She startles at the feeling of his fingers touching her hair. When he sinks them deep into the damp tresses and takes hold firmly, something inside of her positively burns. Opening her jaw so wide it aches, she takes more of him into her mouth. If he stretches her open here, what will it be like when he sinks his cock inside her sex? The thought makes her whine around him, spit running down the inches of his shaft she can’t swallow down. It makes the slide of her hand easier when she wraps her slim fingers around the base and begins to jerk off the excess. 

“You sure you’ve never done this before?” he breathes. “Because you’re a natural. Thirty seconds in and I want to shoot down your throat. Goddamn, Toni—” 

Toni is sure that her own slick must be dripping down her legs at this point. As curious as she is to explore his body and reactions, she has never been patient: she wants him inside her. Pulling off of his cock, she says, “I don’t want you to cum down my throat. I want you to cum inside me.” 

Bucky hisses. He has to reach down and grip the base of his cock to keep from cumming, eyes squeezed shut in concentration. “I can’t do that. I don’t have any condoms.” 

“What good would it be for you to cum in me if you’re wearing a condom?” Toni snarks. “I want it dripping down my legs when I go up the stairs back to your room. I’ve had the implant since I was fifteen years old, neither of us need to worry about any souvenirs.”

“You don’t even know if I’m clean,” he says. He looks down at her with his jaw clenched and eyes narrowed, high on his moral outrage. “That’s what I mean about smarts being more than just numbers. You should never fuck a guy bare unless you’ve seen that he’s clean.” 

“I know you’re clean,” she snaps. 

“How the hell do you know that? Read a book on STD’s?” 

“You let me put your cock in my mouth. You think that can’t spread disease? Yeah. You weren’t thinking about it then, were you? Because you know you’ve got nothing bad to give me. I know that you’re clean because if you weren’t, you would have stopped me.” 

Now he looks downright tortured, staring down at her with his face twisted in sadness and anger. “You don’t know that. There are people out there who don’t care if they hurt you as long as they can stick their dicks inside of you. You can’t go thinkin’ the best of everyone.”

“I’m not thinking the best of everyone,” Toni admits. “I’m thinking the best of you. In science, theories are accepted as true until proven false. The only thing you’ve done since we’ve met is try to protect me. An infuriating though noble motive. You are a good man, and until you prove otherwise—I’m going to believe in you. In the good in you.” 

Bucky’s head tilts back to rest against the couch. His throat works as he takes several slow breaths. Much like when playing chess, Toni knows when to press and when to let pieces alone; she lets him turn over her words without any more fuel from her. Instead, she leans her cheek against his knee and waits, refusing to breathe lest she vibrates out of her skin with impatience. At last, he lets his head fall forward again and he nods with comical graveness. 

“Come here,” he says. “Up on my lap.” 

Her heart pounds, blood thrumming with anticipation. The size difference between them is only emphasized as she straddles his thighs. Elevated as she is, they can look at each other eye-to-eye. Toni is struck all over again by how handsome he is, the perfect symmetry from his face, the low brows that give him an intensity that threatens to take her breath away. 

“Can I kiss you?” he asks. When his hand reaches for her, thumb ghosting along the line of her jaw, it trembles.

“Yes,” she whispers. His fingers make contact, and he brings her forward.

It’s her first kiss. While there is an instinctive fluidity to it, the mechanics aren’t as simple as her erotica novels made it out to be. It helps to be hungry for him and to feel his thinly veiled hunger in return. His lips are soft and eager, and when they part to adjust the angles of their faces, his mouth returns to her parted, tongue lapping at the seam of her lips until she opens. A soft aching sound slips past her lips, and she’s glad that both of their eyes are shut so that he can’t see the embarrassed flush that burns her face. 

Wait, his eyes are shut, right?

She peaks. 

They are shut. She shuts hers quickly lest he catch her looking, but then he takes her entire bottom lip between his own and sucks at it softly and the thoughts leak from her ears. Bucky kisses with a dual nature; sometimes he is prone to long moments of softness as if he is sipping sweetly from her mouth. Other times, she can’t help but feel like he wants to split her open, drink deeply and sate his thirst of her. A quick learner, she mimics his actions. The noise he makes when she nips at his full bottom lip goes right between her legs. 

It is much like taking a poker to the softly smoldering coals of a fire. Toni burns. Thighs trembling from the effort it takes to hover over his lap, she lowers herself only find that his hard cock brushes against her curls. Bucky pulls away, hissing. 

“Sorry,” Toni murmurs. 

“Feels good,” he pants. He looks debauched, mouth red and swollen. From me, she thinks. “Remember what I told you in the woods? About you rubbing yourself off on me? Feels good for the both of us, honey.” 

“Put it inside me.”

He laughs too loud. Toni glances up towards the stairs, still dark and empty. 

“Fingers first,” says Bucky. “Put your arms around my neck and let me know if anything hurts.” 

Toni buries her face in his neck. With one large hand, he cups the entirety of her naked sex. Just the warmth of his hand has her mouth parting, when he lets two middlemost fingers press forward to touch her opening, she groans. 

“You play with yourself here?” he asks her. His fingers make no move to enter her, just rub and circle around her entrance. Toni is beyond words, chest tight with anticipation, so all she can do is nod in confirmation. Bucky groans, cock jerking where it is pressed flush between their naked bellies. 

For a long time, all he does is trace the line of her: fingers gathering the slick at her entrance and dragging it up to her swollen clit. Most passes, he avoids touching that knot of throbbing nerves, but sometimes he takes it between his two fingers and applies the slightest pressure until she is gasping and her hips are trembling in his grasp. 

“Relax,” he says. 

She bites his neck.

“Jesus,” he groans, flinching away from her teeth. “I should spank the hell out of you for that.” 

Toni arches her back until the hand steadying her hip slips back and takes a firm hold of her ass. He must feel as if she is panting in his ear, her breaths are coming so fast. Usually, Toni skimmed over spanking scenes in erotica or watched with ambivalence, eager to get to the good parts. Why the thought of Bucky doing that—of disciplining her—turns her on so much, she won’t even begin to guess. Her degree is in engineering and not psychology; leave the soft sciences to the soft scientists. 

“Is that supposed to scare me?” she mocks. 

“No,” he says. His fingers press with more firmness at her entrance, stretching her just barely. “I don’t need to scare you to get you to behave.” 

With slow and steady movements, he lets one finger slip inside her. Toni sighs happily. In a rare moment of penance, she kisses the bruise left on his throat in the shape of her mouth. 

“God you feel good,” Bucky says. “That hurtin’ you?” 

Toni rolls her eyes. “No. I usually use two fingers, anyway.” 

“I’d die to see that,” he sighs. “Is that what you were doing up there in your room for so long? Working two fingers in an’ out of this pretty pussy?” 

“No. I wanted to wait—for you.” 

It’s Bucky’s turn to lean in to her, his lips pressing against her throat. His voice is wrecked when he says, “There isn’t a single part of you, not a single thing you say or do that doesn’t drive me insane.” 

Without another word, he withdraws from her and then two fingertips are nudging at her entrance. The stretch makes her suck in a breath even though there is plenty of wetness to ease his way. 

“Okay?” he asks. His breathing has picked up, either mimicking her unconsciously or noticing the tension in her form. “You feel—real tight.”

“Your fingers are bigger than mine,” she theorizes. “It doesn’t hurt though. Keep going.”

Bucky presses in to his last knuckle. He uses his thumb to rub at her clit and when she clenches around his fingers, they both groan. Impatient, Toni draws her hips back to feel the slide as his fingers come free, dragging against the sensitive rim of her entrance. 

“Go ahead,” he pants. “If it feels good, go ahead honey.”

She keeps her thrusts slow. Her hips are unused to the movement, and when he spreads his fingers to open her wide, it almost hurts. 

“How the hell am I going to get inside you,” Bucky mutters. 

Toni hopes that’s rhetorical. 

More and more, he opens her up. She never stops the rolling of her hips, but sometimes he pins her to him so that he can focus on her clit, strumming his thumb back and forth over it until she feels liable to cum and more slick drips out of her. Then he stretches his fingers again. It goes on forever, the slick sounds growing more and more obscene until there is no more ache. When he slips a third finger inside, it doesn’t hurt at all, just burns in a deeply satisfying way. 

“I want you on top, just like this,” he says. “That way you’re in control and if somethin’ hurts, you can stop right away. Got it?” 

“Got it, it’s gotten,” Toni answers. Her thighs tremble, cunt pulsing emptily when he pulls his fingers free and goes to lick them clean. Toni stops him with a hand around his wrist. His eyes stare at the way her fingers can’t touch for the thickness of him. Without thought, she says, “That’s mine.” 

He blinks. “I—know?”

“So it’s mine,” she says, tugging his hand towards her mouth. When he realizes that she means to lick her slick off of his fingers, his eyes fall shut, cock jerking between them. 

His throats clicks when he swallows. “But, you’re a good girl, right? You’re gonna share, aren’t you?” 

“If you ask nicely,” she whispers, buzzing on the high of his submission. 

His eyes are so heated, they pin her in place. Never has she been so thankful for her eidetic memory. He’s the most beautiful person she’s ever seen, and the sight of him with his swollen mouth and inked skin and burning eyes is one that she commits to memory again and again. Unwilling to part from it. 

“Please,” begs Bucky. 

“Do better.” 

“Please share. Two tastes tonight aren’t enough. I’d gladly spend the rest of my life with my mouth to your pussy, that’s how bad I want it. Even just one finger, honey, let me have one.” 

She is positively shaking when she brings his wrist towards her—and takes all three fingers into her mouth. Bucky makes a sound like he’s been punched, but he bites down on any protests, gritting his teeth. He presses down on her tongue, the barest bite of his nails until she shuts her teeth around his fingers in warning. When any semblance of her essence is gone, she lets go of his wrist. 

“You’re cruel,” he rasps. 

“That’s what you get for thinking I’m a good girl.” 

“I take it back.” 

Toni shifts up, her hand reaching between them for his cock. It is slick with precum that has smeared against his abs. As soon as the flared head rests against her entrance, she realizes the discrepancy between three fingers and his cock. 

“Just take it slow,” he says, breaths unsteady. “For both our sakes.” 

She lowers herself just an inch. The stretch as the head slips past her entrance burns in the best way. Once she doesn’t need to guide him anymore, she lets her thin arms wrap around his shoulders, the fingers of one hand burying themselves in his hair in a grip that must be painful even if he doesn’t mention it. Another inch disappears inside her, and it pinches in a way that has her wincing. Instead of pressing forward, she raises her hips up until he nearly slips free from her before taking him back in. 

“Jesus,” Bucky whispers as she fucks herself on the tip alone. 

“Don’t rush me,” she laughs. 

“I’m not, I swear,” he says. “Just trying not to blow my load, you’re so tight—fuck, I felt that. You squeeze my dick like that again and I’m finished, honey, holy shit.” 

“I can’t help it,” Toni gasps. It feels so good to use those muscles, feels so good to clench against him as he’s filling her up. The next inch comes easier, and the next after that. She lets herself lower those last few inches until he’s completely inside of her. It doesn’t make sense: how it feels so foreign but how it feels so right. He’s touching places inside of her that her fingers never could, that even his fingers never could, filling her in a way she’s never been full. It’s overwhelming all at once. Whining into his throat, she says, “God, it feels like you’re in my throat.” 

Inside of her, his cock twitches and makes her squeak—an altogether indignant sound that she will take to the grave. 

“Just sit there for a minute,” Bucky pants. “Please Joseph, Mary, and Jesus, don’t fucking move.” 

“Don’t tell me that; now I want to move even more.” 

He tightens his grip on her hips, unrelenting. Now, even when she shifts against him, she can’t move an inch. The knowledge stokes the heat inside her higher, pulling a moan from deep in her chest. She feels his lips press to her shoulder, a soft and sweet touch that maybe she wasn’t even meant to notice. A smile blooms where no one can see it, and she forces herself to relax and wait for him. 

After an endless minute, he finally releases his bruising hold of her hips. “Okay,” he says. 

“Okay? I can move?”  

He nods. “Do whatever feels best.” 

In for a penny, in for a pound. Toni lifts herself up, lamenting the loss of him just so that she can bring her hips down hard in a thrust that shakes her to her core. If she had any breath in her lungs, she might have shouted; even Bucky seems shattered, groaning expletives that are far too loud. At the apex of his thrust, he touches a spot inside her that feels so sensitive it nearly hurts. She wants to feel that hurt again and again and again. The pace she sets nearly breaks the both of them. She has never been able to cum from internal stimulation alone, but when he hits that spot deep inside, she feels like maybe she could. 

When her legs begin to shake from overexertion, he shifts them until he lies flat on the couch, coaxing her to lean forward and let some of her weight be borne by her palms on the armrest his head lays on. It changes the angle, and she leans forward and then backward to experience every sensation.

“Look at you,” Bucky breathes. “Taking my cock so well. Just chasing what feels good, aren’t you honey? Tell me how it feels.” 

“Good,” Toni whines, digging her fingers into the fabric of the armrest. He thrusts his hips up like a reward and she cries out. When she leans forward, she finds that she can grind her clit against the base of his cock. 

“Do better,” he says, mocking her earlier words. Another sharp thrust upwards, that sharp, bright ache—my cervix, she thinks with a thrill. That’s what that is. He’s just long enough to touch it. 

“If cumming means that you won’t be able to keep fucking me like this, then you’re never allowed to cum,” she says. “Ever.” 

Bucky laughs so hard he wheezes. “Yeah?” he says when he catches his breath. “You want to put a ring on me, use my cock like it’s a toy for your convenience? How many times could you cum on my dick before I blow my load even with the ring on, huh? Nothing could keep me from cummin’ inside you. A pussy this sweet? Let’s be glad I’ve lasted this long.” 

Toni clenches her muscles tight until he hisses. 

“Let’s start counting,” she says. “Make me cum, Bucky, please.” 

He groans. One of his hands goes to her breast, taking her pebbled nipple between his fingers while the other drifts down to where they’re connected. For a moment, he ignores her aching clit and instead lets his fingers trace where she’s stretched around his cock. He mutters something foul, filthy, hot and then he presses the pad of his thumb against her clit, rubbing briskly, working to follow her thrusts even as they stutter and grow erratic. 

“Oh God,” Toni breathes, toes curling. “Please don’t stop, please don’t stop, please—” 

When she cums, it’s explosive—never has she cum while so full, while being filled. Hypersensitive to his cock, it feels huge where he thrusts in and out of her, cunt gripping him tight. Every thrust drags her orgasm on and on, his thumb never growing lenient where it toys with her clit until she feels like she could cum again, which has never happened, never—

The second is slower and deeper, her entire body seizing up above him. Both of her legs cramp, but it doesn’t matter. Nothing fucking matters. Nothing except for his thumb on her clit and that burst of pleasure so deep inside her so keen that it almost hurts. 

When her brain finally begins to function again, her lashes are wet, her throat is raw, and Bucky has a hold of her hips, gently humping upwards into the cradle of her hips. The wet sounds of their sex almost make her flush, but then she realizes that he is whispering to her frantically: 

“—please, I’ve got to cum, can’t hold off anymore. Did you mean it, that you want, you want it inside?” 

“God, yes,” Toni says, voice wrecked. “Inside me, please. Do it inside me—” 

He grows still beneath her, the music staff across his chest expanded from the force of his inhalation. His eyes are squeezed shut, the expression on his face looking almost pained. Then she feels it: his cock twitching where it’s buried deep inside of her, a flush of warmth and wetness. He groans, teeth clenched tight. 

“I can feel that,” she says in wonder. 

And when his eyes open, misty and dazed and looking for her own so that he can smile up at her, all she can think is, I want to feel that again. 

-

Nat creeps back up from where she had crouched on the stairs low enough to catch a glimpse of the living room below. A noise down the hallway draws her attention, but it is just Wanda, her head poking out questioningly from one of the guest rooms. Wanda points a finger towards the stairs and then takes that same finger and thrusts it into a hole loosely formed by her other fist. 

Nat makes a circle with her thumb and forefinger. 

Yes! Wanda mouths, pumping her fist. She holds up her hand and Natasha gives her a phantom high-five before disappearing back into her bedroom, taking extra care to close the door without a single sound. Steve is sound asleep where she left him, but when she crawls back into bed, he reaches for her even in sleep to wrap an arm around her. 

All in a day’s work. 

-

Hours after the sun has ridden, Natasha is the first awake. The living room is empty with no sign of any late-night scandalous activities. She hadn’t checked Toni’s guestroom, but she would guarantee that it was empty. It puts her in a good mood, and she hums while he starts an extra-large pot of coffee. In the quiet early morning, Natasha is struck by a rare moment of complete contentment. So many of the people she loves under one room, safe, happy, sated. 

If only life could be like this all the time, she thinks.

One by one the others begin to wake and come down. Bucky arrives first. Natasha passes him a mug of coffee without a word, ignoring the sight of the vivid bruise against his neck. They must have staggered their arrivals to avoid suspicion, because Toni arrives only a few minutes later, hair wet from a shower. 

“Are you hungover?” Natasha asks, letting her face crumple into a concerned expression. “God, T, you look like you didn’t sleep a wink. Was it the bed? Those guest rooms—” 

“The bed was fine,” Toni says primly. Her face barely twists when she sits on the stool at the kitchen island. 

“Gimme that,” Bucky mutters, taking the mug meant for Toni from her hands. Looking her dead in the eye, he says lowly enough so that only she can hear: “You aren’t slick, Nat.” 

“Toni sure was,” she says, barely moving her lips. 

Bucky snorts, turning away to take Toni the coffee. Natasha turns her back to them, making herself busy with breakfast on the stove so that no one can see her smile while she listens to them bicker over the best way to take their coffee. Steve is suddenly there, pressed flush against her back so that he can place a kiss at the crown of her head. 

“Everything okay?” he asks under his breath.