#mandatoryfunday

They all laugh.

Clint opens up the top box, gives the pizza inside a quick appraisal, then leans over and runs his tongue over the biggest piece. “Ow! Is hot!” he says, frantically searching for his drink.

The guys are all making overexaggerated retching noises. “Why, Clint? Why?” Sam asks.

Shrugging, Clint says, “It’s the biggest piece. I licked it--it’s mine now.”

Sam sighs. “Didn’t anyone ever teach you to use your words?”

“You could have just pulled it out of the box,” Steve says.

“Nah. Too hot.” He winks at Bucky, who stares back, unblinking.

But inside Bucky’s reeling. What had that been about?

Steve groans. “You are such a child, Barton.”

“Maybe. But no one’s gonna eat my pizza.” His grin is smug.

*

Clint’s newest example of childish behavior goes on for weeks. He licks forks, bacon, coffee cups, cupcakes, the tv remote (which Tony immediately sprays with some kind of industrial strength disinfectant), and--oddly enough--his arrows.

“Do you really think someone’s going to steal your arrows?” Natasha asks wearily.

“I saw Barnes eyeing them. Didn’t want him to get any ideas.”

Bucky freezes but he doesn’t see anyone looking at him; they’re all pleading with Clint to start acting like the adult his birth certificate says he is. He outwardly relaxes, but inside he’s having an argument with himself.

Because he hadn’t been looking at Clint’s arrows. He’d been looking at Clint.

Honestly, he’s been looking at Clint for awhile now. When they sit together drinking coffee in the morning, when they’re playing video games or watching movies, when they’re all just hanging out together, laughing. But especially when Clint is shooting. Because Clint shooting his bow is a fucking work of art. How could he put his eyes anywhere else? Those arms, he wants to feel them around him, to let his cheek rest against those…

He shakes himself out of his thoughts, actually giving his head a single, sharp shake. This is not the time, definitely not the place.

“Alright there, Buck?” Steve’s hand falls onto his shoulder, gives a squeeze.

“Fine,” Bucky says, a little too fast and a little too loud. Steve gives him an odd look but drops his hand. Then Clint’s eyes flick in his direction and Bucky spends entirely too much time wondering about the look on his face. Clint had only looked for a fraction of a second--what had he seen?

*

After that it gets both better and worse. It seems like Clint starts waiting for Bucky to arrive before he licks something. So while Clint seems to be everywhere, it also means that Clint is making Bucky absolutely crazy. Once again, just before he licks his favorite playstation controller, he even winks in Bucky’s direction. Bucky thinks. He’s pretty sure it had been a wink. But Tony, Nat, and Sam are in the room too, and no one else reacts at all. (And he knows if Tony had seen anything as overt as a wink he’d have a lot to say on the subject.)

He nearly chokes on nothing when Clint winks at him. (Again. Winks again.) Somehow he manages to turn it into an odd, clearing his throat kind of noise. When he regains himself he looks at Clint and says, “You’re going to catch some awful disease if you keep licking everything, Barton,” in a bland voice.

“You’ll just have to take care of me then,” he teases.

Bucky somehow manages to hold his face completely still. He can feel the heat rising in his neck, though, and hopes no one notices.

*

Bucky’s alone in the kitchen again, this time drinking coffee, when Natasha comes in and sits on the stool next to him. He just sits, drinking his coffee, attempting to think about nothing at all. After a few minutes Nat clears her throat. Bucky doesn’t react, curious how far she’ll go to get his attention.

It’s not long before he finds out.

“Fine,” she says, as if she’d known all along it would go this way. And in one fluid movement she’s off her stool and on to his lap, straddling his legs, her face directly in his.

She tends to get what she wants. Now he can’t avoid looking at her, unless he closes his eyes; for a fraction of a second he considers it, but then just gives in. Sighing heavily he says, “What do you want, Natasha?”

“He’s daring you. Either accept his challenge or back away. The rest of us can’t take it anymore. I think Tony’s going to have a breakdown, worrying ‘has Barton’s tongue been here?’ about everything.” She takes his face in her hands and kisses him on the forehead. Then, before he can find a response, she’s gone.

“Wait, the rest of us?”

Of course there’s no answer. She’d probably heard, though. He can picture the smirk on her face.

So everyone’s already--

Wait. She’d said--

Well. If it’s a challenge, then challenge accepted.

*

Of course, now that Bucky’s made up his mind he can’t seem to find Clint anywhere. He doesn’t come down for breakfast--not even for coffee, he must be getting his fix elsewhere--and he doesn’t go to the range at his usual time. Bucky gets wrangled into helping Tony with something in his lab (which actually means “stand here and hold this, just like that. It’s too heavy for the clamps”) so he misses lunch on the common floor and throws together a couple sandwiches before he gets cornered by Sam and ends up playing video games with him for the rest of the afternoon. By the time he gets to the common floor for dinner (a mandatory team dinner called by Steve, as if they don’t spend enough time together already) he’s mostly talked himself out of saying anything at all.

But then he walks in and there’s Clint, perched on the back of his chair, laughing along with everyone else at something or other. Bucky doesn’t pay much attention, because right then Clint turns his way, and when he sees Bucky his eyes light up and he grins and Bucky instantly forgets all his arguments for staying quiet.

He wants Clint to smile at him like that every single day. Over and over again.

His plan had been to get Clint alone, or as alone as they could get on the common floor, and just get his feelings out in the open. But seeing Clint like that, laughing and carefree and oh-so-beautiful he dumps the plan and turns off his brain. He strides over to Clint, puts his hands on Clint’s chest (he can feel Clint’s heart beating so fast in his chest, and he wonders how he hadn’t heard it even on the other side of the room) and licks up Clint’s jaw, from his chin to his ear.

“I licked it,” he says, in a strong voice, loud enough that everyone in the room can hear. “I licked it, so now it’s mine.”

“Yeah?” says Clint. His eyes dance with mischief.

“You gonna argue with me?” Bucky glares, but he’s holding laughter just below his skin and he’s sure Clint can see it all over him.

Clint’s arms slip around Bucky, and it’s far better than anything he’d ever imagined, but he doesn’t have long to think about it because Clint’s tongue darts out of his mouth and across Bucky’s lips. He pulls back, grinning. “I’m not really the arguing kind,” he says, “but I’m definitely laying claim to that mouth of yours.”

And then he’s not thinking at all, because Clint’s lips are pressed against his, and then Clint’s tongue is in his mouth.

“Finally,” mutters Natasha.

“Are you kidding me?” Tony shouts. “I’ll never be able to unsee that!”

“What just happened?” says Steve.

Everyone laughs. Even Bucky and Clint separate enough to laugh (just enough) before they find each other’s lips again.

“Come on, Steve. You must have noticed these two making googly eyes at each other. Even Bruce noticed.” Nat is incredulous.

“I did!” Bruce says.

“We’ll let them work that out on their own,” Clint murmurs, low enough that only Bucky can hear. (Steve can probably hear it too, but he’s too distracted to notice). “Wanna go for a walk?” And then he winks. Again.

Clint’s hand slides down Bucky’s arm until their fingers are intertwined. They’re walking toward the elevator when Steve shouts, “Mandatory dinner!”

“Stevie. We could stay and make out on the sofa if you’d rather we didn’t leave,” Bucky says, not looking away from Clint.

“Have a good time!” says Natasha. She sounds almost gleeful.

“Oh, we will,” Bucky says, but only for Clint.

***

Bucky huffs angrily as he picks up his plastic container of laundry soap. Mostly he’s glad that his relationship with Natalia has leveled out to the point where she can ask him for favors, but sometimes, it’s really frustrating. He can’t read her much, anymore, and so the point where she’s asking a serious favor versus asking an amusing favor is a line Bucky hasn’t quite learnt to see, yet; and he’s still working on earning Avenger goodwill, no matter how many times Stevie says he doesn’t need to.

And even if this is some kind of Natalia joke, Bucky thinks, it isn’t like it’s a hardship for him to go help out Clint. He hopes Natalia hasn’t figured it out, cause he’s tried to put every ounce of his ill-begotten training into hiding his own interest cause the part of his brain still stuck back in the 40s thinks he still has to. And if that ain’t messed up - using seventy years of brainwashing training to block out a notion he knows is old-fashioned - Bucky ain’t sure what is, but messed up is still better than Natalia, or Stevie, or Clint figurin’ out that he has some kind of notions towards their archer teammate.

With all of that in the back of his head, though, Bucky still ain’t sayin’ no to the chance to go catch Clint outside of normal hours. They hang out plenty, but it’s gettin’ regular: one of them finding the other in the shooting range, or in the shared theater room watching something at 0200 hours, or even sitting down after a mission to watch some kinda crap Clint always comes up with. It’s a good habit, great habit even, but Bucky’s gone enough that he’ll take any kind of jump that gives him extra time with Clint outside that habit. If that’s pathetic, well, at least he’s hidden it from Natalia for this long.

Or so he thinks -- until he shoves the door to the laundry room wide open, and his enhanced eyes spot Clint in the dark -- totally fuck naked, sitting on top of one of the machines, humming to himself.

“Fuck!” Clint yells, and in that spasm of gesture Bucky realizes he ain’t entirely naked: no, Clint’s wearing these black briefs that soak up all the light, not that he’s lookin’ or anything. “What the fuck!”

“Jesus shit,” Bucky replies, his heart racing, trying to make it calmer than Clint’s; he wins, if only by a small margin and only cause Clint’s literally curling in on himself. “What the fuck. Natalia sent me down here with your goddamned laundry detergent.”

“Aw, Tasha, no,” Clint moans, shoving his face into his hands momentarily before remembering that those hands have something more embarrassing to cover; they hover over his hips, awkwardly, until Clint just crosses his arms and slumps. “I told her I had to do, like, all my laundry.”

“Wait,” Bucky squawks, which is embarrassing enough; “did she send me down here knowing you were naked.”

“She kind of goddamn did!” Clint yelps, jumping off of the machine. He seems to realize what a bad idea that is the second his feet hit the floor, cause it gives Bucky yards of skin to look at, with only a few inches of dark fabric blocking his view onto that, um, particular area. And Bucky’s blown away enough with this much of Clint on display; he’s seen the bits and the pieces, sure, but with all them bits and pieces bare at the moment, Bucky isn’t even sure he’s gonna be able to hold it together.

Clint’s hands sort of hover around, up until the point where he decides he has nothing to be ashamed of, and Bucky watches in a haze as those hands come to rest on Clint’s hips.

“Well,” Clint says, and it’s a little self-righteous but a lotta unsure, “for your information, I stole Cap’s detergent, so I should be able to, uh, have some pants, in like an hour and a half or so.”

“I still feel like you need somebody to be the doorman,” Bucky says, his mouth working before his brain does. He really didn’t mean it to be so flirty, but it was, and it is, and it’s out there now. So he sets the bottle of laundry soap down on the nearest counter and leans up against the doorjamb, crossing his arms over his t-shirt and settling in.

To his surprise, Clint grins, and those hips come to rest leaning up against the nearest machine. “Well, shit,” Clint drawls, “if I knew I had a bouncer I could have washed everything.” The look Clint gives him is nearly filthy - is it filthy? Bucky can’t tell; Clint has most of the lights still off, and Bucky knows he could easily be imagining things.

“Do you need this or not,” Bucky manages to get out, and it’s barely a question. The thought of all of Clint’s bare skin flirting back has Bucky momentarily stunned, which is usually a sign to abort and get the hell out of the situation, except that this scene is specifically relevant to Bucky’s interests and he ain’t all that concerned with leaving right now.

Clint’s eyes seem to trace him down to the bottom and then back up, but he can’t really be sure.  “Yeah,” Clint says eventually, gesturing with one hand. “Bring it.”

And now Bucky has no choice but to wander over there, cause the second he makes some kind of protest with regards to Clint’s lack of attire, he knows Clint will be all over him.

So instead he takes the opposite approach and stalks over there with a determined swing to his own hips, settling the bottle down directly on top of the machine Clint’s leaning against. “Here,” he says, grinning. “If you need it.”

Clint bites his lower lip, which makes Bucky want to lick at it. “Why, thank you,” he murmurs. “My hero.”

This bit of a moment’s extending between them, and Bucky wants to recoil cause it could go really, very, super wrong, except the look in Clint’s eyes from over here - from this lighting - is low and amused, almost encouraging, and sort of hints that Clint knows something Bucky doesn’t at this point.

He goes to say something, but to his surprise, Clint jerks a thumb over his shoulder. “I’ve still got another load,” he says, and Bucky’s eyes can’t stop staring at his mouth. “You got anything to throw in?”

And, well, that’s a leading line if Bucky ever heard one, but in case he wasn’t exactly clear Clint reaches a hand out to clutch at the hem of his t-shirt. “Like this, maybe?” Clint asks, innocence and spice in his tone.

Well. Bucky may be a bit hesitant, but he ain’t dumb, and he ain’t gonna waste the opportunity.  He fists his own hands in the shirt and helps Clint tug it off, over his head, and once his face is clear he leans in -- until he’s a breath, maybe two breaths, away from Clint’s mouth, and says, “I guess you’re probably right.”

And that’s all he can manage to say because Clint’s mouth turns up in a smile and his eyes flutter shut and Bucky isn’t even sure which one of them moves first but they’re kissing, right there, Clint’s lips softly demanding on his like even that’s a question. Bucky swallows the sigh he makes and gets his fingers into Clint’s hair, tilting Clint’s face down onto his until the angle’s just right for his tongue to sweep through Clint’s mouth. Clint makes this groaning sound and pulls Bucky closer so that skin’s on skin, and they press together until Clint’s own hands come up to tug Bucky’s hair and Bucky cedes, willingly, letting Clint dip down onto his mouth with an urgency he hasn’t felt in decades.

Bucky can’t stop the noise he makes, and he kind of doesn’t want to once it makes Clint’s fingers tighten in his hair. Clint pulls his mouth away only to lick along Bucky’s jawline, and Bucky nearly keens as Clint’s lips stop to suck just under his ear, his fingers tangling in Clint’s messy hair.

Clint breaks away to pant into Bucky’s mouth, their noses brushing, his pupils blown. It’s the hottest fucking thing Bucky’s seen in a long goddamned time. His head is still tilted backwards by Clint’s hands in his hair, and normally he’d hate seeing anyone above him, but Clint’s entire expression is so goddamned gone that it’s almost like Bucky could say a single word and shatter this. Not that he would, fuck; he’s wanted this for so long that it hurts, below his sternum, and even this distance is too far away from Clint right now.

Bucky pulls a hand from Clint’s hair and slowly traces it down Clint’s back - fingers outlining shoulderblade, then spine, then sinking to trace hipbone before settling at the very top curve of Clint’s ass. Clint shudders, and Bucky’s breathing is erratic, shivering right back into Clint as his fingers twitch against all that skin. Their eyes meet, again, and Bucky slowly fastens his fingertips into Clint’s skin to tug the other man’s hips forward into his. When Clint realizes what he’s doing, a groan catches in his throat unlike anything Bucky’s ever heard, and he remembers a few clear moments of Clint’s wanting eyes on his before Clint’s mouth descends and everything turns hazy.

Clint’s mouthing at him, tongue making a counterpoint against Bucky’s lips, and he doesn’t even have a chance to rub his hips up against Clint’s before Clint’s fingers are at the fly of his jeans. Bucky fucking groans, sighing into Clint’s mouth, now with one hand clutching at Clint’s ass and the other in Clint’s hair, tugging those lips back down onto his every time Clint seems to need a breather.  

“Let’s throw these in as well,” Clint murmurs as his quick fingers unfasten the button, unzip Bucky’s jeans, and Bucky’s murmuring something in agreement as he shifts to let Clint wrap his fingers over the hem and pull the jeans down to the floor.

“Shit,” Clint hisses, and Bucky turns his distracted gaze up to Clint’s face. Clint’s eyes are raking down Bucky’s own abdomen and over his boxers almost greedily, focused on where Bucky’s mostly-hard dick is trying to make an appearance, pushing up against the fabric. “Buck,” Clint whines, and Bucky hears too much in it -- something nearly akin to his own weeks of wanting, and the small portion of his mind that isn’t entirely absorbed by Clint’s briefs wonders whether Natalia knew what she was doing with this favor.

He pauses, and then even that section of brain gives itself over to feeling, because of course Natalia knew what she was doing, and he can thank her later.

For now, Bucky backs Clint up against the nearest machine and tugs Clint’s face down onto his, pressing their hips together, frantic and needy. The noise Clint makes is low, hot, deserves to be enshrined somewhere, and Clint shifts his thigh between Bucky’s such that Bucky - only slightly shorter - is leaning forwards on it, thrusting up against it, and trying to rub his hipbone against Clint’s hard cock with every move he makes until they’re both moving against each other, uncontrolled and wanting.

This is good, this is better than good, but Bucky wants to see Clint’s cock, wants to taste it and feel it in his hand, in his mouth, and his fingers tug at the band of Clint’s briefs like a question.

“Shit, Barnes,” Clint breathes into his mouth, but he shifts so that there’s enough of a gap for Bucky’s fingers to work the fabric down and away. “You’re gonna kill me.”

Bucky chucks the fabric away and then lets Clint pull his own boxers down over his thighs, and knees, and kicks it away once at his ankles. “Fuck, Barton,” he says as Clint’s long fingers wrap over his hips and pull them up against each other. Clint’s cock is hot and hard against the skin of his hip and Bucky hisses as his own dick presses into the curls of Clint’s pubic hair, the heat of the crease between crotch and hip, and these sensations are gonna fucking kill him if he doesn’t come soon.

He’s about to shift his weight when Clint pulls his mouth away to breathe against Bucky’s collarbone, lips and teeth and tongue working a rhythm on the skin there, and when Clint breathes, “Shit, Buck, can I?” Bucky has no better response than a nod before Clint sinks down onto his knees on the floor of the laundry room.

The goddamned view is rich enough that Bucky almost comes all over Clint’s hand as he reaches up and softly grabs Bucky’s cock. Clint’s looking up at him, eyes wide and blown, his mouth reddened and rough as he lips at the head of Bucky’s dick. Bucky’s gone, watching it, Clint’s tongue flicking out against the slit, and he has to grip at the edge of the machine behind Clint to keep his balance as Clint licks up his length before sucking the tip into his mouth.

“Fuck,” Bucky blurts out, “fucking hells, Clint,” and Clint works his tongue against Bucky’s slit again and Bucky can’t help it when he thrusts his hips forwards against the flat of Clint’s tongue. Clint makes a noise that’s pleased and wanton at the same time and Bucky’s pressing farther, and Clint lets him, until Bucky’s deep in Clint’s mouth with Clint’s whole throat swallowing around him and his world turns white until Clint backs off, slightly, giving Bucky breathing room.  

“Oh, god,” Bucky says except that it’s a whine, needy and wanting and weak; “don’t stop,” he says, and Clint surges forward again to swallow Bucky’s cock down, and it’s really minimal movement and motion until Bucky’s eyes smash themselves shut and Bucky comes with a twisted howl down Clint’s throat.

“Fuck, fuck,” Bucky’s saying when he comes back into himself, his hips still working a low stutter of aftershocks into Clint’s mouth. “Fuck.” Bucky pulls back, and shudders as his dick pulls out over Clint’s soft lips, but then he’s pulling Clint upwards and pressing him back against the machine again, tugging his head down and licking into his mouth. That salty taste must be his, and it has Bucky making some noise deep in his throat as he pulls Clint hard against him, tongues working hard against each other as Bucky enjoys the hardness of Clint’s dick up against his own sensitive flesh.  

He pulls away and slams Clint’s hips back up against the edge of the machine. “Stay there,” he hisses, and Clint makes this whining noise as Bucky bends down to lap pressure against one of Clint’s nipples before lowering down to his knees on the cold floor.

He barely notices, though, between the hot hardness of Clint’s cock against his cheek, the scent of Clint himself - sweat, and some woodsy tang - up against his nose as he licks into the dip of Clint’s skin between groin and hip. Fuck, but it’s delicious, topped with the noise Clint makes, absolutely no restraint in his throat as he moans loudly. Bucky sucks at the skin and hair until there’s a mark there, one he knows will look purple-dark against the light, and then turns his face into Clint’s dick, slowly mouthing his way up its length.

“My fucking God, Buck,” Clint gasps out, and Bucky looks up to note that Clint’s hands are gripping hard at the edge of the machine behind him, knuckles almost as white as the appliance.

Bucky responds by pulling the tip of Clint’s dick into his mouth. He tongues at the bottom, then brings a hand up to hold Clint’s shaft in place as he pops his lips forwards and then backwards over the bottom edge of the head. He loves feeling that, the pressure of the swollen ridge against his mouth, and Clint makes this noise like he’s being strangled that Bucky interprets as encouragement. He sets his lips right below the rim, so that it’s just the head of Clint’s cock in his mouth, and then sucks hard, loving the way it fills his mouth, loving the sound Clint’s making as he does so.

Bucky pulls off, grinning up at Clint, and gets a split-second view of Clint’s face - lax, surprised, overwhelmed - before he sinks back down and works Clint’s dick all the way to the back of his throat.

Bucky’s maybe not as good at this as Clint - and fuck, that had been a surprise - but Bucky knows how to work between his fist and his mouth to make up for the fact that he can’t deepthroat someone for days, and that’s what he does. His fist is slick, now, spit and sweat and precum letting him glide tension all the way to the tip before sliding the pressure back down all the way to the base, his hungry mouth following. He loves the taste of Clint’s dick, the weight against his tongue; he can feel it as Clint gets closer, his dick swelling until Clint’s hands are in Bucky’s hair and he’s gasping a litany of words and curses as Bucky hollows his cheeks to suck Clint down as he comes.

He swallows the hot liquid and then keeps swallowing, his hand working Clint in slow pumps until he’s sure the other man is done, aftershocks shuddering against Bucky’s lips, and Bucky moves to mouth the line of Clint’s hipbone instead, waiting for Clint to be here and coherent and suddenly almost a little embarrassed.

What he gets is Clint sliding down, his back against the washing machine as his body collapses to the floor, until his arms are around Bucky’s shoulders and he’s pressing messy, wanton kisses against every surface he finds: Bucky’s cheek, his neck, his shoulder; the hollow of his throat.

Bucky pulls him forward until they’re kissing again, again, and again, tongues just brushing as they dissolve into something that’s breathy and sloppy and not laughing but not tears, either.

“Fuck,” Clint breathes, finally, breath gusting against Bucky’s cheekbone with a hitch that might be a laugh. “Shit, Buck, did that really just happen?”

“I’m pretty sure I’m bare-assed on the floor, Barton.” Bucky leans in to mouth at Clint’s throat, that fucking tender skin he wants to mark up with his teeth.

“Oh my god,” Clint says, and his hands are all over Bucky as if he needs to remember: up Bucky’s back, then one into his hair as the other one sinks to grab his ass, then fingers working their way over his hipbone just so that Clint can drag knuckles up his abs and chest to his shoulder. “Oh my fucking god, Buck.”

Bucky laughs into Clint’s neck, suddenly happy and light with it, licking against the skin there before he kisses the spot tenderly.

“Do you have any clothes left?” Bucky asks, slowly tilting his head until he’s looking up into Clint’s face. “Like, enough that we could make it up a couple floors in the elevator without a disaster happening?”

Clint grins down at him, filthy and fond all at the same time. “I’m not sure,” he murmurs, leaning forward again to kiss along Bucky’s temple. “It’s not like I do laundry all that often.”

Bucky snorts. “Obviously, if you’re always stealing someone else’s detergent.”

Clint freezes, and then snorts, reaching over into a laundry basket and pulling out his mobile. “You know what? She owes me.”

“Natalia?” Bucky asks, surprised, and when Clint nods confirmation while hastily typing away, Bucky huffs a small laugh. “I think I might owe her,” he admits.

Clint’s eyes flick over to Bucky, and his face lights up with this crooked little smile Bucky’s never seen before. It makes something twist in his chest.  “Yeah,” Clint says, “I know she did this on purpose.” And that tells Bucky somethin’ about Clint’s feelings, don’t it, and the warmth in his chest flips over again.

He’s about to say something sappy and stupid, but then Clint continues cheerfully, looking back down at his phone. “That being said, I’m pretty sure she’s tired of seeing my bare ass in public. Bet I can get her to run interference long enough for us to head… somewhere?”

Clint glances back up at him, question in his eyes.

“My room,” Bucky says decisively, and catches a flicker of that smile on Clint’s face again. “I have clean clothes I can lend you.”

“Hmm,” Clint hums, typing away. “Bold of you to assume we’ll need clothes.”