#rated m

“Did I hear you say you remember having gay sex?” Steve calls from behind them.

Bucky glances over his shoulder at him. “Yeah,” he says, nodding. “You know anything about that?”

Sam looks at Steve, raising his eyebrows. Steve’s lower lip wobbles for a second and then he just smiles.

“I’m sure you’ll remember,” he then says quietly.

Bucky nods, turning back. Sam drops his jaw at Steve, who just lowers his gaze and sits down on a bench, hands in his lap and head down. Like a kicked puppy. Sam blusters, half gesturing between the two of them, but Steve shoots him a glare and Bucky doesn't notice. Sam looks between the two of them for over a minute, just watching these two idiots standing five feet apart because they’re not gay.

“Okay,” Sam declares, “that’s it! I’ve had it up to HERE with the homoerotic tension on this boat!”

Bucky looks up, frowning. Steve jerks his head up, too, his eyes wide. Sam points with both hands at Steve, but looks at Bucky.

“He knows somethin’ about you being gay for sure!” he snaps. “Frankly, I think he knows more about it than you do! Double frankly! I know that for a mothafuckin' fact!”

Bucky opens his mouth, looking bewildered, then glances between Steve and Sam. “Huh?”

Sam slaps himself in the face with the hand not holding his beer. Bucky frowns at Steve. Steve blushes and looks towards the stern of the boat. Bucky suddenly gasps, jerking a hand up to point.

“I fucked you!” he shouts.

Steve blushes harder, bright red behind his beard, as he look down into his lap, then he nods, seeming speechless.

Sam smacks himself on the forehead again, making a face at their stupidity. Then Bucky shoves his cigarette back into his hand, and he storms right up to Steve and hauls him off the bench by the back of his shirt. Steve squeaks adorably for a man of his large size, but Bucky starts dragging him off the boat.

“Okay?” Sam calls after them as Steve stumbles to keep up with Bucky. “Bye, I guess?”

“Thanks!” Bucky shouts over his shoulder.

“What’s going on?” Steve says.

“I’m fucking your face in that alley over there, sweetheart,” Bucky announces. "Then I'm coming all over your beard."

“I did not need to hear that!” Sam shouts back. “Didn’t need to hear that! I expect to be both of y’all’s best man at your wedding! And the officiant! And I’mma give both of y’all away, too!” He turns, then pivots, jabbing his finger in their direction. “And it better be a destination wedding, gay ass dumbasses! I wanna go to Bali!”

Steve waves his middle finger behind him as he skips, eagerly, along behind Bucky down the pier. Sam shakes his head, turns, and puffs on the cigarette again.

Katniss would be the first one to admit her and Peeta’s relationship never followed any normal timelines. She had noticed in school her schoolmates talking about boys. Choosing carefully their clothes, their perfectly timed blushes, their rehearsed shared glances across the hall and schedules being memorized to stage bump-ins.

Then it was the conversation.

A hello wasn’t quite enough. Greetings were for everyone after all. Even most merchant girls said hello to Katniss, of all people, in the mornings. What was key was, was when the boy lingered after class to catch up with the girl. The way they both brushed off their friends to walk home together.

And then the news would come in a squealing choir of girly cheers and wooing exclamations of boyish joy. The date, the hand hold, the kiss, the eventual visit to the slag heap.

That timeline was never Katniss’s to hold, never to taste or touch. Initially it was because of her responsibilities. How could she even fathom love, how could she even date when marriage lead to children, when children lead to death, pain and misery.

And then Peeta’s name was called in the reaping.

Their innocent beginning could’ve taken a form of its own - maybe Katniss would’ve eventually been brave enough to thank him for the bread - gift him something precious of her own in exchange. But it didn’t. Peeta put his crush into his tongue and weaved it into a story to pull on the Capitol’s heart strings. Katniss took his story and formed wolfish fangs out of them. Snarling and gnawing, trying to get her, get both of them, back home alive.

And their love became a spectacle. They packaged it perfectly, him and her, tying a bow at the top with a ring, a promise of a lavish wedding and a tragic baby.

Katniss and Peeta’s relationship never followed a timeline. Until it did.

In that first month of spring after Peeta came back to twelve, Katniss started combing her hair - making sure her nails were clean and trimmed and that she at least didn’t smell of sweat and blood - just to sit beside him at the kitchen table and eat Greasy Sae’s breakfast in silence. One day, while Sae was going on and on about some of the new folks residing in the Village, Peeta leaned in towards her and after clearing his throat – as if to alert her he was there – he simply said “Lavender right?”

“Huh?” she asked, pulling back slightly, putting distance between their heads. She could feel her cheeks warm up, her eyes not being able to choose which eye of his to look at. His fingers gently touched the hem of her yellow shirt, tracing the pattern of purple flowers embroidered at the bottom.

Lavenders.

She nodded, but when she opened her mouth to tell him her mother had decorated the fabric herself, no sound came out. Instead this whiny half sob, half whimper escaped her. Before she knew, she was already halfway up the stairs to her room.

Even though she wanted to stay in the upper floor and hide away forever, the next day, she came back downstairs five minutes to the dot before Peeta’s scheduled time to show. This time, she wore a different shirt with different flowers embroidered on the hem.

Lillies, she told him after she caught his eyes on her for the fourth time all morning.

And their rehearsed dance continued on, from the wetness of spring into the heat of the summer.

A specifically warm day in July, after Katniss had cooked dinner for herself, Peeta and Haymitch; after Peeta had helped clear up the table set up out in the garden and after Haymitch stumbled home semi-sober, Katniss walked Peeta to the door.

“When’s the next train shipment?” Katniss asked, only half caring about Haymitch’s next booze box. The other half was wanting to stall Peeta from leaving. Suddenly the heavy door that separated her from the outside felt like it could lock and never be reopened again.

“I think Friday. Me and the reconstruction guys will have some stuff coming so don’t worry about going down if you want to hunt,” he responded, leaning against the thick frame. Her hand fiddled with the rough wood, then settled on the door handle, before she became fascinated by the fabric of her shorts.

Peeta on the other hand seemed to be particularly transfixed at a woodchip. A beat or five of silence passed between, but before Katniss won the fight with herself to ask him to stay, Peeta spoke fast.

“Okay goodnight,” his voice half broke in an uneven tone.

“Oh… goodnight,” she said into the air, but Peeta’s heavy tread was long gone before her words were carried away by the breeze.

The next morning, Katniss was sat outside on her porch when Peeta walked past on his way to the construction zone. Or at least she thought so because instead of his usual work clothes, he instead was wearing a freshly clean pair of trousers and a somewhat tidy shirt. A loaf of bread, that she could smell from miles away, was tucked underneath his arm.

“Didn’t know you were coming for breakfast,” she wanted to say but instead she studied him. She looked at him, and he watched her back, antsy on his feet.

“Katniss,” he said her name before clearing his throat again, “Would you… if you have time… like to uhm… go on a walk with me?” he looked at anywhere else but her face. His cheeks were turning a soft pink. The loaf's crust crushed against his body and his weight was shifting from one leg to the other.

And that’s how it began.

On the second day of their walk, Katniss reached forward and squeezed his arm before her hand trailed down, giving his hand a second squeeze.

On the fourth, he brushed the back of his hand against hers as they took the long way behind the Victor’s Village. She quietly slid her hand into his, interlocking their fingers together. She felt the muscles in his body relax besides her and they both smiled like goofs the entire walk back home.

She could barely wipe it off her face the next day either, earning the annoying grunt of disapproval from Haymitch.

On their seventh walk, Peeta took Katniss round to the construction zone where the main bit of rubble clearing was currently under way. She listened in awe as he pointed where temporary homes would be set up, explaining that the repatriation of twelve’s citizens was the most important thing.

Katniss looked up at him as he talked, her hand already nestled safely into his. His cheeks moved and his eyes creased when he laughed at his own jokes. His eyebrows raised and furrowed and when his thumb came to wipe away a sweat drop from his forehead she became overwhelmed with the thought that she wanted to kiss his cheek. To put her lips on his skin like she had done a million time before. She had missed the way his dimples felt against her mouth.

“Woooooo,” a cheer was heard from behind them, breaking her out of whatever spell she had been put under. Peeta raised his free hand to wave hello to some of the construction staff. In return they whistled and wooed at them both teasingly. Peeta shooed them off, giving Katniss’s hand a reassuring squeeze before they moved on.

It wasn’t a surprise when towards the end of summer Peeta started sleeping over at her house and then eventually in her bed. She reminded him to eat when he got transfixed in a painting and his arms became a guard, once again, from the nightmares that plagued her. Strong and steady Peeta, anchoring her each and every night. Touching her hands, her arms, her waist and her face. Cupping her cheeks and brushing her hair off of her forehead and eventually peppering kisses on her eyelids. Her temples. Her cheeks. And on those bad nights that nothing seemed to work, he would kiss her, softly and carefully on her lips and the corner of her mouths.

It was comfort. It would always, without fail, break her out of the haze of screaming, dying children in sewers and she’d find herself in her bed, with a boy holding her close and whispering all the right things.

But those kisses didn’t count. They didn’t talk about them. Not how they worked. Not how she would reciprocate them. Not when he kissed her, and especially not when she kissed him during an episode.

Until one day.

Peeta was in the middle of clearing up the table after dinner. The air outside had turned cold very quickly and the wind was howling through the walls. The fire was crackling softly and they were both still laughing over Haymitch dropping his fork and then hitting his head on the table on his way back up.

It might have been the quiet, familiar evening, it might have been the old radio blaring a simple tune that Katniss easily followed, or maybe the warmth that radiated in the room like a hearth every time they bumped into each other.

It could’ve also been his hands on her hips, pulling her into him. Her hands trailing up his arms and around his neck. But if you asked them who first leaned into the first real kiss, neither Katniss nor Peeta could answer. What they knew was that their bodies were flushed against one another, mouths moving in an expertly rehearsed waltz. What they knew is that they were alone, together, even Buttercup had escaped out for the night, as if the entire universe and nature planned to give them this. As a gift. As an apology. As a redemption.

Allowing for the only witness to be the fire at bay in the fireplace, the soft song from the radio and the smell of roasted fowl still lingering in the air.

And as the nights became longer, the days darker and the seasons began to change, so did their relationship. It formed from this strange, shy, malleable thing to something strong, solid and blooming. In the darkest of days, when the sun hid behind the dark rolling clouds and the snow piled on, they huddled together, making a cave of warmth with blankets and their bodies. With voices low, as to not to disturb the ghosts lingering in the hallways, they spoke. They had nothing to hide and all the time in the world. So they shared and cried and comforted. And when they didn’t speak, clumsy hands – at first – would stir a fire within each other. Hungry mouths explored their flesh with a desperation that would’ve made even the most crazed audience member look away in shame. They clawed at each other out of love and lust and proof of life.

They were alive.

They were alive.

They were alive and okay.

On a particularly bad day, when the seconds seemed to tick away at snail’s pace and the spring rain didn’t stop to give the drowning earth a respite, Katniss and Peeta stayed in bed wrapped up in each other. They napped and nibbled on food and napped again willing the day to vanish from existence. Willing for gravity to stop pulling them down at the earth’s core. Wanting for the feeling of this numb emptiness to go away.

When Peeta’s eyes fluttered open groggy and stinging with tears, he was unsure of what time it was. The sun had stayed hidden all day, bathing everything in an oppressive darkness. It could’ve been the afternoon or well into the night – it was anyone’s guess.

What Peeta could tell however was Katniss’s lips soft and feverishly warm on his forearm. She peppered kisses along his skin and wrist.

“Katniss…” his voice came out groggy and strange.

She continued kissing him, focusing on each one of his fingers. Each knuckle and bone. First the front, before stretching his palm out and doing the same for the back.

From where he laid, he couldn’t see her face, just the back of her head and her dark braid sprawled on the pillow. For a moment he considered flipping her over, craving to see what expressions accompanied her heavy breathing and her slow, attentive kisses. But the moment went completely when she backed her hips against his.

“Fuu– ” he sighed into her neck. He hadn’t realized how hard and aching he already was from the simple act of her slow kisses on his hand.

She hummed, turning her hips upwards and grinding circles against him. He could’ve come undone, right then and there when he felt the bare skin of her leg against him. Only the thin fabric of her underwear separated him from her. His mouth found the back of her neck, peppering soft and lazy kisses against her. Letting the hot, heavy breaths that were escaping him glide down her skin.

“I need you, Peeta,” she whispered into the night. She arched her torso and Peeta could feel the shift of her sleep shirt inch higher. How much he craved to touch her. For his palms to cover her breast, for his hands to feel her wetness. For his lips to kiss her.

The thought of how dripping wet she probably was already and Katniss backing her hips back against him were too much for him. He let out a soft, breathy moan, head falling forward on the exposed skin of her shoulder.

“I want you,” she continued, guiding the hand that she had been previously kissing down her body.

“What are you doing?” he breathed out in between open mouthed kisses on her neck. He cupped one of her breasts with her hand covering his and guiding his movements.

“Everything,” She said with such conviction that made Peeta’s chest expand.

“Yes,” his hissed against her ear, pinching her nipple through the thin fabric of her shirt, “Anything,” his other arm came to circle her waist, aligning them completely against each other. He felt himself throb painfully against his boxers. “Anything you want.” He couldn’t help himself but sink his teeth into the exposed flesh of her shoulder. He paused for a second, petrified that the heat of the moment ruined things for them, but the way Katniss cried out in pleasure told him otherwise.

His hand quickly abandoned her nipple, now raw and pulsing, and she continued guiding him down between her legs.

“Holy f– ”

Even with his fingers barely grazing her underwear, he could feel how soaked her panties were.

“Do you see how much I want you?” she whined, circling her hips trying to find friction against his hand.

He swallowed hard, barely keeping his composure. Peeta buried his face against the crook of her neck, willing touch alone to be sufficient enough as he felt for her thighs, spreading them further apart. Her hand abandoned his for a moment, coming down between them to touch herself.

“Not now,” he breathed out in a tone slightly too harsh. Katniss paused her movements completely, whimpering in anticipation as Peeta trailed the edges of her underwear with his index. How much he longed to kiss her. He wanted his lips to find hers and drown out the mewls coming out of her mouth.

But this… this was too delicious. He would kiss her dead later, tomorrow and the day after that until he was gone. And if there was a life after that, he would kiss her then too. But this, this was something entirely new. He had never seen Katniss in such a state of deliriousness. He begged and clawed for him, her nails coming to dig into his other forearm with need.

“You feel amazing,” he said covering her core with his palm providing her with the friction she seeked. She rode his hand and for a second Peeta was content to just finish in his boxers from her hips’ movements alone until–

“I want you–” Katniss breathed out taking his hand in his again.

“You have me. I am all yours.”

Without saying another word, she hooked her finger underneath her underwear, moving them aside.

“I want you,” she repeated. There was an urgency in her voice. An edge that hurried him forward. His finger slid across her now-exposed wetness, and her body was practically inviting him in. She was too ready if that was even possible and all he wanted was to bury himself inside her.

“Please Peeta–”

Katniss whined painfully when he removed his hand from between her legs but it didn’t last long.

“Touch yourself, Katniss. I want to hear you,” he instructed, partly shocked with himself at the confidence. This was unusual, new and well… a bit strange. But Katniss followed through, her hand doing quick work on herself. The wet sounds mixed with her moans were enough to push the strangeness of not being able to see her aside. He wondered if anyone had even tried this and if they didn’t they really should.

He quickly freed himself from his boxers, and he sighed in relief. He was harder than he had ever been and he knew he needed to be fast before he completely ruined this. He tried to reach back for the condoms he kept him his drawer.

“No, in me,” she begged.

“Katniss–”

“I’ll fix it tomorrow, please.”

Fuck.

Nerves and excitement begun to pulse through him in the same burning fury as lust. His heart beat so quickly he felt like he was loopy off of his mind.

He steadied himself in his hand, adjusting her body so he was aligned with her entrance. Warmth was radiating through her and he slide inside with such ease like hot knife through butter.

His eyes rolled to the back of his skull and he felt a heaviness sit on his hips where Katniss’s behind met his body.

He sat there for a moment, letting the overwhelm of feeling her, all of her completely, before taking hold, or rather gripped her body, and began his slow movement. Even at the painfully slow pace, the sounds coming out of Katniss were beyond human.

He pulled his hips back before slamming them hard back inside her. She reached back and gripped at his arms, urging him closer, needing him deeper. Guttural sounds of undoneness were coming out of her.

“Like that?” he asked and she nodded frantically, trying to turn her head back to look at him. It was anguishing how much he wanted to kiss her, fast and hard and open mouthed, as he continued to drive himself inside her again and again and again.

With each stroke, his movements were getting faster and his attempts to keep any semblance of focus was becoming impossible. He could feel her, all of her, as her walls tightened around him in desperation.

“Peeta,” she called out his name, her releasing building and building and building. She could feel it from the tips of her being as her free leg stretched out in painful anticipation. Her entire body went rigid, almost in surrender, as she hit her release fast and hard, seeing shapes and stars behind her closed eyelids.

Peeta was quick to follow, panting against her shoulder so much that it would’ve been otherwise embarrassing. He slowed down his strokes, letting each aftershock of his own orgasm go through him wave after wave until he was completely spent.

For a while they laid in silence, still wrapped up in each other’s embrace as they both came down from their respective highs.

But when the comforting silence exited the room, an awkwardness filled the air.

“Are- are you okay?” he asked quietly.

She nodded, “Mmhmm.”

Peeta suddenly felt cold and his head couldn’t stop reeling. In the midst of it all, it was hot and exciting, but there was something eating at him.

It was… different. Too different.

It was rough andfast and thinking about the noise Katniss made alone, made another aftershock go through him. But there was that simple gentleness missing.

The same one that made them utter I love yous and kiss one another softly, drowning out their sounds as they came. Besides his hands and her back, he had not kiss her at all.

The wrongness sat on his chest like rocks.

“Peeta?” Katniss asked, her hands searching for his face. He hadn’t felt her slip around to face him, “Is everything okay?”

He nodded, taking her hands in his and pressing kisses all over them. A guilt settled uncomfortably on her chest.

Did he event want this?

It was sudden and so quick neither of them had time to think any of it through.

“I’m sorry,” she whispered which gave him immediate pause. Tears began to pool in her eyes.

“What? Why are you apologizing?” he asked reaching up to cup her cheeks. He avoided looking at him but he forced her to hold his gaze in the dark room.

“I can just go,” she said.

“Katniss…”

“It’s okay if you didn’t want it I’m so sorry– ”

“Wowww there,” the shock violently pulled him out of his own spiral, “Who said I didn’t want it?”

“I– ” she stunted herself. Despite of the feral nature of their previous actions, this suddenly was the most embarrassing thing in the world, “You looked… you seemed unhappy?” she trailed out slowly.

Silence filled the room once again but this time it was broken by a stranger sound than what Katniss ever expected. She could see him agreeing with her and walking out, or blaming her and asking her to leave. Obviously it had to be one of those two options. Right?

But instead, a laugh bubbled over Peeta’s chest that he tried to stifle immediately.

“Don’t laugh at me,” she said pulling her hands close to her chest. Peeta hurried up and scooped her entire writhing body to his before she could escape the bed. He took his chance, kissing every inch of skin his mouth could find until her annoyed humpfs turned into gentle giggles.

And finally, he pressed his lips fully against hers. She felt herself melt into him, her hands coming to hold onto his shirt. He was warm and tasted like home and never being alone again. She suddenly became too aware that she couldn’t remember the last time she kissed him.

“Katniss, will you listen to me now?” he asked once he broke the kiss apart, “I am not unhappy.”

“No?”

“Darling, that was… uhm, great,” his previous determination wavered slight but he steadied himself when he saw the twinge of uncertainty in Katniss’s grey irises. “No, it was amazing. It was too good. I didn’t – I never thought you could… do such thing?” He could feel his cheeks grow warmer as flashbacks and echoes rushed in his brain. He twitched with want again.

Greedy bastard.

“I guess… I guess me neither?” she shrugged. Peeta leaned forward and planted more kisses on her face, making sure her lips, that he missed so much, were not forgotten.

“Katniss.” Now it was his turn to be embarrassed, “I just,” he cleared his throat, “I just missed… kissing you.”

Suddenly his predicament felt childlike and small. He half expected her to laugh, and he braced himself for the retort.

Instead she reached forwards pressing her mouth against his.

He was shocked at first but her grip was firm around his neck, refusing to go anywhere but be there with him. He hummed against her mouth, draping an arm lazily over her waist and pulling her closer to him. They both melted into each other’s embrace, tasting the familiarity of their gentle closeness until they were satisfied. And even then, they still reached for one another again, finding each other's bodies in the complete dark.

“I did miss you too, in a way…” Katniss admitted, “You know… we don’t have to do it like that again.”

He chuckled, pressing a kiss to her jaw, “If you don’t want to, we don’t have to,” he said before nibbling softly on her ear, “But I think you do want to.”

A blush spread across her features. Her first instinct was to deny it all, but the sun was finally starting to peak through the blinds. For the first time in days, their room filled with soft golden and purple hues. Warmth filled her body, from the very tops of her head to the tips of her toes, and she knew if all their dark and gloomy days looked like this then she didn’t mind them at all.

“I do,” she admitted, holding his gaze in hers.