THIS IS MY FAV FUCKING SCENE LMAO HAHAHAHAHA

HAHAHAHA I'm definitely more android than human because I can't talk about my feelings too <3

Shy

Connor x Reader

Summary: Connor is curious as to why you act so uncomfortable around him.

Mutual Pining

Connor is whipped

Gender neutral reader

Deviant! Connor

Pretty chill, no warnings ❤️

💫💫💫

Connor had caught feelings for you.

He wasn't completely sure what those feelings were or what they meant, but they were certainly there.

It was a new kind of feeling. Sure, he had developed a fondness for Hank and for Sumo, but this was different.

Understanding his emotions was a constant struggle. He wasn’t sure what was going on, but he did know that he wanted to be around you,

like, all the time.

He couldn’t say that you felt similarly. Connor had begun to notice how nervous you’d get when he approached you or made small talk.

He had considered many possibilities as to why you were so panicked by him. Perhaps you were afraid of him. Maybe you valued your personal space and time, and didn’t like him interfering with it, or maybe you simply didn’t like him.

Either way, all he knew for certain was that his presence made you uncomfortable.

It was a little bit upsetting, if he was being honest, considering the fact that all he wanted to do was be around you.

Nevertheless, he tried to be polite and smile a lot. Hopefully, that would make you feel more comfortable.

“Good morning, y/n,” He nodded gently, pausing at your desk.

Your face reddened as you looked up at his smiling face, “Oh- Hi- Goodmorning!”

Stress levels rising...

35%^

40%^

45%^

Connor gave you another happy nod and continued on his way, knowing that it was best not to make you freak out.

Once you were out of sight, he huffed, sitting next to Lieutenant Anderson.

“Oh, someone’s not having the best day, huh?” He scoffed, shaking his head.

“Lieutenant,” Connor said sternly, “is there a reason why y/n doesn’t like me?”

Hank cocked an eyebrow, “What do you mean?”

“Y/n doesnt seen to enjoy my company.” He mumbled. “How can I- What would make them less uncomfortable around me?”

“They’re... Uncomfortable?” Hank repeated.

“Yes. Extremely so,” Connor nodded, “Their stress levels rise whenever I come near them.”

“Uh huh,” Hank nodded slowly, immediately understanding what was going on, “and this upsets you because...?”

“Because I want them to like me.” Connor deadpanned.

“Mhm, yeah,” Lieutenant Anderson fought a grin, “and why is that?”

“What?...” He mumbled, looking off, “I don’t know.”

“I see,” Hank nodded, pretending to be deep in thought, “well, you should probably ask them.”

“What?”

“If you’re wondering why you make them uncomfortable,” he said, “you should just ask.”

Oh, yes. He hadn’t even thought about that.

That would solve his question quickly and affectively.

“Thank you, Lieutenant.” He stood up.

“Oh, you’re going right now.”

“Yes.” Connor nodded, turning away.

He was fairly nervous that you’d freak out by his asking, that your stress levels would rise quickly and you’d panic.

If that happened, he’d back off.

Asking was worth a try, at least.

“Hello,” He deadpanned, standing in front of your desk.

You blinked, eyes wide, “Hey, what’s up?” You flushed.

He swallowed and pulled a chair over to sit beside you, making your stress levels rise substantially.

Connor turned to you with narrowed eyes, “I was wondering why you dislike me.”

You blinked, face red, “Dislike?”

“Yes,” He said, looking away, “whenever I come near you, your heart rate increases to nearly double its original state.”

“O-oh,” you avoided eye contact, “that’s not really...”

“We’ve been friends for quite a while.” Connor said, frowning, “And I like you very much. I just want to know what I did to make you hate me so much.”

“Woah,” You said, holding your hands up, “no, no I don’t hate you, Connor!”

“Oh,” His LED turned yellow, “Could it be that I frightened you?”

“No,” You sighed. How could you possibly tell him the truth?

It’s cuz I’m in love with you

“I just get embarrassed easily around you.” You said. Well, it wasn’t a lie.

“Is there something I do in particular that embarrasses you?” Connor asked. “If so, I’ll stop right away.”

“No,” You reached out, touching his arm. You felt a nervous jolt pass up through your hand and your heart pounded harder, “No, it’s not you, Connor.”

The android frowned, feeling defeated. He’d learned next to nothing, and you seemed to be withholding the real reason why you were anxious around him.

“What would make you feel the most comfortable, y/n?” He asked, tilting his head at you with a sorrowful expression, “If my being around you makes you nervous, then... I’ll stay out of your way. It’ll be like I’m not even here. I really like being around you specifically, but-”

“Me specifically?” You asked.

“Yes,” He nodded, “when I talk to you or sit near you or look at you, I get a pleasant feeling.” He looked up at the ceiling in thought, “In fact, I’d rather be around you than anyone else.”

“Connor,” Your face became red. He looked off into space, thinking about his emotions, “Connor, that’s how I feel too.”

“It is?” He asked, whipping his head to look at you, “but I thought-”

“I get nervous because... I don’t know, because I’m embarrassed.”

“You don’t have to be embarrassed to feel that way,” Connor insisted, “Especially since I feel the same about you.”

“I’m not sure if it’s... Exactly the same, Con...” You smiled softly, “I think about you all the time.”

“So I do.” He said quickly, “I’m not sure why, but you’re among my thoughts all day. You specifically. When I’m working or... When I’m walking Sumo, or when I’m powering off for the night, or when I walk into work... I always think about you, pleasant thoughts.”

“You do?” You asked quietly.

“Yes,” Connor opened his mouth to speak and his cheeks turned light blue, “I’m sorry. I don’t mean to be creepy.”

“You’re not!” You insisted, smiling, “In fact, it makes me happy hearing about it.”

Connor smiled back. Your stress levels were dropping substantially.

“What kind of things do you think about me?” You asked.

“What kind of things?” He repeated, “Well, all sorts of things, I suppose. Things like... Wondering what your favorite color is or looking at you and wondering what you’re thinking or,” He paused, cheeks blue.

“What is it?”

Connor shook his head. “It’ll sound strange.”

“I’m sure it won’t,” You smiled.

“I... Wonder about the feeling,” He admitted, avoiding your eyes, “I wonder what it is. I’m not very good at identifying my own emotions, so anything new is quite puzzling. I suppose... It’s happiness? But it’s stronger than that, broader. I just want to be around you all of the time,” Connor finally met your gaze with a shrug, “I suppose that’s sort of bizarre.”

“No,” You shook your head with a smile, feeling a budding warmth in your chest, “No, it’s not bizarre at all.”

NSFW

"What are you doing? It's two in the morning, doll," Toji's voice drawls out, sleep morphing his voice into something quiet and gravelly.

You pause the show you have playing on your phone and look up at Toji, who's leaning against the dining room entryway. He has two random clumps of his hair sticking out, his eyes are slightly puffy with sleep, and there's this pout on his face that just pieces it all together.

"I woke up and wanted something sweet. I had a bite of cake and an orange. Well, two oranges," you say, giving him a glimpse of the progress you've made on the second one. He hums and goes quiet, groggily watching you continue to eat the fruit. "Go back to sleep, baby," you coo. "I'll head back in a few minutes."

"Come back, now. I'm tired," Toji says, crossing his arms over his chest. He really looks like the grumpiest of bears.

You chuckle at the almost whiny sound in his voice. "Five minutes."

"No. Too long."

"Three minutes?" You counteroffer.

Toji shakes his head. "No, baby. Now."

"But..." you hold up your remaining two pieces of orange.

"Finish up. I'm waiting on you."

You sigh and stuff the two pieces of orange in your mouth, before standing up to wash your hands.

You follow behind Toji as he leads you through the dark hallway, back to the bedroom. He waits for you to walk in before shutting the door and joining you on his side of the bed. Immediately, he tries to steal all your warmth, because the sheets and the blanket feel cold on his naked torso and his legs. He buries his face in the crook of your neck and throws an arm over your chest, while his legs trap one of yours between them. He's all consuming.

"Why'd you get out of bed?" You murmur, stroking the back of his head. Toji lets out a quiet grunt, falling silent, again, after. You smile and stop talking so that he can go back to sleep. You bring your phone up and start scrolling through your socials, only to earn another quiet, but more disapproving grunt. "Sorry," your whisper, turning down the brightness of your screen.

"Turn it off, ma. It's too early for you to be awake," Toji chides.

"But I can't go back to sleep. I'm not tired," you explain.

"I can put you down. Just turn it off, alright?"

You sigh, defeatedly, and turn your screen off, before setting it on your nightstand.

"Turn onto your side," Toji tiredly mumbles, instructing you so that he can turn as well and spoon you. His arm goes over your waist and below your shirt to caress the bare skin of your tummy. His thumb slowly strokes your soft skin, moving back and forth in a soothing manner. "Relax," he says, coaxing a relieved sigh out of you. "There you go. You've got sugar in your system, now, ma. It might take a little longer to get you to sleep."

"Sorry," you mumble into your pillow. Your eyes don't feel heavy and you don't feel the least bit sluggish. It always feels nice to have Toji rub your tummy, and this method of getting you to sleep is ninety-nine point nine percent effective, the point one percent being this time.

"I don't think me rubbing your stomach is gonna save you this time," Toji says, pressing a kiss to your shoulder. He gets a quiet, disappointed sigh from you, followed by silence. He doesn't want you to feel bad. You're not the first person ever to wake up craving something so badly that it doesn't let you stay asleep, and tummy rubs aren't the only method he uses to help you get to sleep. "Want me to go down there and make it all better?" He murmurs.

"You need to sleep, too," you say, considering his own tiredness.

"I'll sleep just fine without you tossing and turning all night. Let me help you."

So, you do. You let him go under the blanket and pull your shorts and underwear down, both in one go. You feel his lips on your thighs, slowly making their way towards the part of you that very quickly grew needy, and once his tongue makes contact with you, your first instinct is to bend your knees and plant your feet on the mattress.

"Relax, baby," Toji says, under the blanket. His hands push on your thighs so that your legs go down, again. "Don't tense up too much. We're getting you to sleep, 'kay?"

"Sorry," you mumble, shutting your eyes to allow yourself to focus on the way Toji's mouth works on you. His hands stay on your thighs and rub your skin, soothingly, with the same gentleness he uses for the tummy rubs he gives you.

All that can be heard as Toji builds you up through the quietness of the night, are your soft breaths and the rustling of sheets, as you squirm and slightly arch off the bed. His tongue offers gentle licks to your clit, before he envelops the sensitive bud with his lips and starts suckling on it. Every time your legs go up, he hums against your cunt and pushes them back down, and it keeps going this way until he's had enough. You don't listen and he's corrected you multiple times, so he had to resort to locking your thighs in place with his arms.

"T-Toji," you whimper out, writhing under him and the relentlessness flicking of his tongue. "Please- Please?"

"Shh... I know, baby," he murmurs, pressing a soft kiss to your cunt, before continuing.

Your legs are quivering and it's so hard to lie still when you've been edged and denied of your orgasm three times, now—all work done by solely his mouth. His soft, warm tongue has been lapping at you for long enough to have thin strings of your arousal and his saliva connecting you to him, even for a mere second, before those strings snap.

It doesn't take much more than Toji sucking on your over sensitive clit for a couple seconds, for you to finally get that powerful orgasm you've been grasping, but never fully reaching. Your toes curl, your hips roll against the mattress as your back arches off the bed, and you gasp sharply, a sound that leads the rest of your sounds of pleasure out, as Toji helps you ride out the sensation. While, normally, he would be a little mean and overstimulate you, even just the slightest bit, he opts out of it, this time, because the purpose of this from the start was to get you to sleep, and based off the sounds you made, Toji knows you're going to sleep so good.

Once you've calmed down, your breathing steadied and your body still on the bed—now entirely relaxed—Toji cleans you up with his tongue. Slow, gentle strokes, because despite this act of kindness being for you to achieve rest, he can't—doesn't want to—waste your sweet essence.

When he's done, he slides your underwear back on and uses your shorts to wipe his face, before tossing them somewhere behind him on the bed. Toji peeks out from under the blanket and takes in your peaceful expression. Your eyes are shut, not a crease in your brows, and your breaths come softly through your nose. This is it.

He tries to be as careful as possible when crawling back up to his side of the bed, not wanting to wake you up after just getting you to sleep. It seems like the coast is clear when his head hits his pillow and he carefully shifts so that he can watch you until he falls asleep. Then, he sees you stir and he starts thinking that maybe the orgasm didn't fully wear you out, but just left you dazed. He doesn't say anything when you briefly open your eyes to look at him, but when you lean in to leave a chaste kiss on his lips, he's furthermore silenced. Immediately after, you bury your face in his chest and doze off for sure, this time. Toji coils around you and instantly returns to his all consuming way of sleeping with you.

how to crash a date

summary: friends are the best thing in our lifes, with a big talent for crashing dates.

with: Tsukishima Kei, Akaashi Keiji, Iwaizumi Hajime and Kenma Kozume (and their respective "besties").

⊛ tsukishima kei: be oblivious!

Kei has been planning this date for a week already. Take you to the carnival, walk with you hand in hand, buy you some sweets, win you a teddy bear and maybe get some kisses on the way, the perfect plan. Even if he doesn't enjoy going outdoor, he's feeling excited for tonight, knowing he’ll have plenty of time to spend with you alone.

At first, things were going so well that he actually pondered going more to those carnivals.Though his main motivation wasn’t the colorful scenario, or the funny attractions over the booths; his eyes could only focus on your bright smile, luminescing the place better than those lanterns hanging above your heads.

Everything was great. Until two morons noticed your existence.

“TSUKI!” His body automatically stiffens after recognizing the voice of his two teammates, Tanaka and Nishinoya. Grimacing, he slowly turns sideways, hoping that he’s just hallucinating and the two annoying boys waving at him aren't actually real. Of all places in Japan, they had to be at the same place as him? Really?

It didn’t take long for them to approach and introduce themselves to you. “It’s nice to meet you,  ______. Tsukishima didn’t tell us he had a girlfriend. Not that we thought he could date someone.” Tanaka humored, making Noya chuckle along and Tsukishima’s face reddened with pure loathe. Before he could protest, Noya excitedly pulled you towards a game booth, breaking Kei’s hold on your hand, which made him even more annoyed. First they interrupt his date, and now they steal his girl? Tanaka rested his hand on the blonde’s tense shoulder.  “Thanks for the invite, man. We’ll have a great time together!”.

It was the worst two hours of his life.

He had to watch and control his boiling temper as his teammates spent the entire time playing and chatting with you. At least, you seemed to be having some fun with them by your expression and non-stop smile, and that only made Tsukki even more grumpy. It was his time to make you smile, not theirs.

By the time they left, it was too late for him to have a quality time with you there, so he ended up taking you home. He was already planning to punch the boys the next morning for ruining his date, but to his surprise, the night wasn’t a complete failure.

“Thank you for tonight Kei. I know it wasn’t what we planned, but I had a lot of fun.” You said genuinely, embracing him and giving his cheek a gentle peck. And for the rest of the night, Tsukishima smiled like a fool in love.

⊛ akaashi keiji: be clingy!

Akaashi and Bokuto are lifelong friends. They go to school together, have the same classes, eat at the same time, play on the same team and even return home on the same path. Literally five of the seven days of the week, Akaashi has Bokuto’s company. But as every human being, he needs an amount of time for himself and others. Especially time for you, his girlfriend of almost a month. On your days, he plans to spend time with you only, dismissing his other obligations; however, it is easier said than done when it comes to dismissing Bokuto.

Bokuto doesn’t quite understand that his friend needs space sometimes, so he gets sad when he receives a ‘no’ as an answer to his invites. Don’t get him wrong, he doesn’t mind if you’re going to be with them, he adores you. He just doesn't get why he can’t tag along with you guys.

He doesn't like to feel left out, so he decides to follow the two of you on a coffee shop date one day, to express his feelings. Yes, he was not invited, but what’s the harm, right? He’ll just sit at a table closer to yours, and wait for the right moment to make himself noticed.

Meanwhile, you and your boyfriend are chatting about your weeks, his right hand intertwined with yours on the table. Keiji’s so focused on you, that you’re the one who noticed the white-haired boy trying to hide his face behind the menu two tables from yours. 

“Kei, isn’t that guy Bokuto?” He goes mute as soon as you pronounce his best friend’s name, turning his head dreadfully in the direction your eyes indicated. Finding the noisy owl, he sighs in frustration, raising from his seat and walking toward his friend. “Bokuto-kun, what are you doing here?” He hisses to not make a scene, but his friend, emotional as he is, reacts oppositely and raises from his chair with his arms crossed and pouting like a three-year-old toddler. 

“I wanted to spend time with my friends…” He confesses gloomy, making even you feel a bit conscious at the same time amused by the scene, as Akaashi rolls his eyes. Before the brunette could reject his friend again, you decide to invite the ace to join you, receiving a confused look from Keiji in return. You simply couldn’t resist his sad puppy face. Without thinking twice, Bokuto lifts up a chair and puts it between your seats before sitting down with a huge smile on his face — much to Akaashi’s dismay.

It’ll take a while before Akaashi finally gets some time alone with you.

⊛ iwaizumi hajime: be overbearing!

Even though he’s quite popular at school for being an athlete, Hajime isn’t a flirtish guy like the rest of his friends. That doesn’t mean he can’t win a girl, it’s simply the fact that there weren’t many girls he found interesting. And after finding you, he doesn’t see himself with anyone else. But regardless of that, his friends always thought he had difficulties with romance, especially Oikawa: which explains why the brunette got so concerned when Hajime told him he asked you out on a date.

Toru didn’t want things to go wrong on this date, especially since his friend is clearly smitten by you, something that doesn’t happen often with Hajime. So he offered (imposed) his help, giving tips and tricks to turn his friend into the king of romance. The problem is that Oikawa’s a very intense teacher, wanting to give lectures every day and every time, making the brunette go crazy for good. It didn’t take three days before Iwaizumi refused further assistance, assuring his friend that he’s capable of handling a date. 

Did Oikawa listen though?

The night was going so well. Hajime took you to a friendly pub, which helped to dissolve the awkwardness of the first minutes, and made you both feel more intimate as you spoke about multiple topics. You two got along so well through the afternoon, that you already looked like a long-term couple, laughing and enjoying themselves. While Hajime told you one funny story of his childhood, he noticed something unusual through the pub’s round window, in front of him.

It’s Oikawa, waving at him while holding a sign written in bold blue letters: “Say she looks beautiful, and don’t forget to clean your teeth!”

“Can you excuse me for a second, sweetheart?” He was so nervous that didn't notice the pet name coming through his mouth, nor the way you got bashful when he said that. He just wanted to finish Oikawa’s life right there, and as soon as you nod at him, he quickly walks out for that. 

“Yo-hoo!” His captain waves as he exits the pub, smiling like a proud dad. “Iwa-chan, thought you needed a-” He doesn’t finish the last sentence since Iwaizumi hits his arm hard with the cardboard sign, making Oikawa yelp. “WHAT? WHAT DID I DO?”

⊛ kenma kozume: be noisy!

Almost all of nekoma’s volleyball team sees Kenma as someone who needs to be taken care of, even if he’s perfectly capable of doing that. When they find out that their setter started dating from other sources, everyone gets curious to know how things are going with the new couple, even if it had nothing to do with their lives, as Kenma “gently” reminded them once. Some even followed you around school sometimes, just to get to know the girl who stole the mechanic heart of their friend.

They immediately took the hint when Kenma announced one day that he needed to leave practice early for something important: it must be something involving you. Ten minutes after he left,  Kuroo, Yaku, Yamamoto, and Fukunaga initiated a secret mission to follow their teammate to his destination. Throughout the journey, Yaku kept whispering how bad spying on Kenma was, but still continued to follow the path, just as curious as the others. Kuroo didn’t waste the chance to snicker at him. 

The path leads them to a public park not too far from school, and they get just in time to witness the most surprising scene only a few bunches away: Kenma and you sitting on a red towel on the grass, having a cute picnic together. Kenma was chuckling so carefree, while you were throwing small cubs of apple into his mouth,  and no sign of his console beside him. 

The boys quickly hid behind a large bush near the spot, spying on the couple’s moment with a content smile on their faces. “Own, look how happy our Kenma is. He’s so hooked.” Kuroo says, a prideful grin taking on his expression. It’s good to see his best friend having that type of experience. 

“What are you guys doing there?” Out of nowhere, Levi appears near them, his loud voice attracting the couple’s attention and revealing their hiding spot to everyone around. The boys grimace as soon as they’re discovered, all of them feeling Kenma’s fulminant gaze. “Oops… my bad.”

n/a: i promise they had good intention 😂

© asunflowerana 2024 — all rights reserved.

Megumi Imagine where...

You were sitting with your friends, laughing at something Yuuji said. The group was loud and lively, everyone talking over each other. You reached for a bottle of juice, twisting the cap, but it wouldn’t budge. You tried again, frowning a little, hoping no one noticed your struggle.

Megumi, beside you, was talking to Maki. His voice was calm as usual, discussing something serious. You thought he wasn’t paying attention to you, so you kept trying to open the bottle quietly.

Then, without a word, Megumi's hand reached over, taking the bottle from your grip. He kept his gaze on Maki, still deep in conversation, and with one easy twist, he opened the bottle for you.

You blinked, a bit surprised, as he handed it back, his fingers brushing yours for a second. You smiled softly, murmuring a quiet “thanks,” but Megumi only nodded, still talking to Maki.

You thought he wouldn't notice, but the small smile tugging at the corner of his lips told you he saw everything. He always did. Even in the middle of the noise and chatter, he always paid close attention to you.

some more!! hehe

just two dark-haired, blue-eyed capricorn, born on the 22 of December, socially inept and unable to properly express emotions people communicating

This was so funny for no reason

tweets w/ jjk boys

© yuiiiriii

My cute bear

Miss You Already

"Toji, you do this every time." You have your massive bear of a man clinging to you, watching you through the mirror on your vanity as you apply lipstick. He watches your fingers mold around the cylindrical make up product, before his attention shifts to the dark, bloody shade of red that you're smearing on your lips.

"Do you really wanna go? You don't have to. You can stay in with me," he suggests, wrapping his arms tighter around your waist.

You smile at him through the mirror, already noting the subtle longing expression on his face, though, you haven't even left, yet. "I'll be back, baby." You drop the lipstick into your make up bag and zip it up, taking one final look at yourself in the mirror to see if anything needs to be adjusted or tidied up.

"You don't have to go," Toji repeats, slowly dragging a hand up your body to cup your breast. Almost instantly, he feels your nipple harden and press against the material of your dress. "Stay and look pretty, just for me," he murmurs, rubbing the stiffened peak. His other hand pushes up your dress and makes its way between your thighs to tease you over your panties. "I'll take such good care of you. You won't even be bummed about ditching your friends."

You let out a soft sigh, when Toji's fingers apply pressure to your clothed clit, the sultry sound followed by an equally seductive laugh, as you gently pull his hands off of you and turn around to absorb the neediness he's doing a poor job of hiding.

"It's just a couple hours," you assure, but clearly, that's not enough of a reason for Toji to relent, because he wordlessly takes your hand and puts it on his clothed hard on. He moves your hand back and forth over the bulge, not breaking eye contact with you for a second. "I know, honey," you coo. "I'm sorry. I swear, i'll let you do whatever you want to me when I come back, okay? I'll make it up to you."

"No, doll. Please," he almost whines, walking into your embrace and burying his face into your neck. "Stay," he pleads, brushing his lips over your delicate skin. "I want you."

"Baby." You laugh, letting your hands settle on his back.

He's nosing at your neck and your jaw, getting strong whiffs of the pretty scent you spritzed on. "Need you, pretty. Please don't."

You don't know what it is about going out, that turns Toji into the clingiest man ever. Your friends tell you that their partners practically push them out the door and say that it's fine for them to go out, as long as they act responsibly, and yet here you are, fighting for your night out.

"Alright, Toji. Come on," you say, patting his back. He pulls away from you and follows you to the bed. "Sit, baby," you instruct, when he just stands there, staring at you like a dog that's about to be abandoned. He does as you say and sits down on the bed, watching as you climb up and sit on your knees. "Pull it out. Come on, let me see it," you say, with a sly little grin.

He lifts his hips and pulls down the waistband of his sweatpants and boxers, freeing his drooling cock. He then wraps his hand around the length and smears his oozing precum over it, eliciting a few quiet, low groans. You crawl over to him and straddle his lap, holding his gaze with a soft smile on your face, when his hands go under the skirt of your dress to move your panties aside.

"I know you don't want me to go, baby," you start. His leaking tip meets your warm, soft skin and instantly, a chill runs down his spine. He pushes the tip in and you begin to slowly lower yourself onto him. "I-I know," you utter, trying to keep it together as you take in more and more of him. Once you're fully seated, you let out a sigh, and wrap your arms around his neck, leaning forward to speak softly into his ear. "I'll be back in a couple hours. Before midnight, love." You raise your hips and lower them again, luring a small, but needy groan from him. "You have my location, so you'll be able to see where I am."

"Mhm," Toji hums, dragging his blunt nails up and down your back.

"And you'll know when I'm on my way home," you murmur, kissing his earlobe and giggling at the sight of the lipstick that transferred onto his skin.

"Yeah... That too, mama," he replies. His hands go lower, beneath your dress, again, to rest on your ass for a mere second before he starts rubbing and squeezing it.

"And—fuck, baby—you'll see when i'm right around the corner."

"Twenty s-seconds," he says, breathily, as you leave more kisses on his ear.

"Right, twenty seconds," you say, pressing a kiss to his temple, knowing it'll leave a red lip print behind. "Twenty seconds, and the car-" you cut yourself off with a sharp gasp, lured out by the feeling of his fingers reaching your clit and rubbing it. "Fuck," you moan, when he bucks his hips up to meet your movements. "Twenty seconds and the... the car, will be parked in our driveway."

"And then you'll be home," Toji says, certainty riddling the statement.

"Then, I'll be home," you confirm, pressing a kiss beneath his eye, then another one on his cheek. You hear his low chuckles and when you lean back to look at him, he has the most lovestruck expression on his face. "What? You like my kisses?" You ask, reciprocating his loving gaze.

"Your lipstick is smudged," Toji says, his eyes pinpointed to the color that escaped the lines of your lips. You still look gorgeous, even with that slightly messy detail. His breath catches when you roll your hips on him a little faster and lean in to decorate his face with more a your warm, affectionate kisses. "Fucking love your kisses, ma." He can see hints of the color you left on his skin through his peripheral vision and he notices that each time you pull away, you have less color on your lips. By the time you finish covering his face and the side of his neck with kisses, the pigment that once was on your lips, remains as merely a faded blush.

"It's all gone, doll," Toji groans, breathing a little more heavily as you up the pace of your hips one more time. He sounds like he's just as close to his peak as you are.

"I know... It's okay. Do I still look pretty?" You ask, your breathy laugh mingling with the sweetness of your sultry sounds. Without a warning, Toji leans in and kisses you in a manner full of affirmation. He's guiding your hips, assisting you in quickly bouncing up and down his cock, now. Every sound you make is sealed in the kiss and greedily devoured by him, and when you both cum, the kiss gets sloppy and you lose synchronization, leaving both of you to just moan, groan, and pant into each others mouths. The overly tight grip he uses to still your hips to avoid overstimulation, would be painful if you weren't so blissed out by your orgasm.

"Fucking gorgeous," Toji mumbles. He tilts your head slightly to expose the side of your neck and presses gentle kisses along the area, just before sucking on the delicate skin and leaving his own longer lasting mark on you. "There you go, pretty baby. Gave you a little peck, too," he says, after rubbing the small patch of his saliva into the mark.

The sight before you makes a lazy smile curl on your lips. Toji's entire face is scattered with your red kiss prints—even his lips have a slight tint to them. He looks loved, and by the looks of the soft expression on his face, he must feel like it, too.

You slowly lift yourself off of Toji and he fixes your underwear, patting the front, before letting you get off the bed. You head to the bathroom to fetch him a towel, and once you hand it to him, you make your way over to your vanity and use a make up wipe to remove the previous layer of lipstick, so you can reapply a new layer on a clean slate.

You see Toji looking at you from his spot on the bed and smile at him before zipping up your make up bag. Once you feel satisfied with the way you look and you finish buckling the ankle straps of your heels, you go over to Toji to say goodbye.

"You look like Valentine's Day incarnate," you tease, running a thumb over one of the kisses on his cheek. He wants to smile, but all he can think about is how in a minute, you'll be gone and he'll be spending the next few hours alone. You see that same longing look from before return. He looks so soft and it's chipping at your heart, but you can't fall for it. He does this every. time. It's only a couple hours. You'll be back with him before you know it.

"Take a nap or try to sleep through. When I get back and finish dressing down, I'll slide right into bed with you, alright?" You offer him a soft smile, and wait for him to respond so that you can go.

Toji sighs, like it physically pains him to watch you leave. It's not going to be as easy to get to sleep without you. Getting a taste of your loving just made him want you to stay even more, but he knows he can't keep you from spending time with your friends. They don't see you every day, and he does. He wakes up to you every morning, he spends the rest of his day with you when he comes home from work—with the exception of those few times he accepts invites to hang out with his colleagues. Even on those rare occasions, he's never experienced you trying to convince him to staying home, because you know, at the end of the day, he'll take his place next to you in bed. Plus, it's not like you're sleeping over at one of their houses. When you're done hanging out with your friends, you'll come home, and you'll sleep next to him, as always.

"Yeah, okay," Toji says, finally letting up, to avoid holding you back any longer. "Call me for whatever reason. You know you don't need one."

You lean down and leave a dark red kiss on his forehead, then wait for him to meet you halfway for a peck on the lips. "Love you," you murmur.

"Love you, ma," Toji responds, catching one more sweet smile from you, before you leave the bedroom and set out for your night.

nerdy boyfriend!takuma who you managed to pull by being a little weird and unhinged

boyfriend!takuma who adores your quirks. you balance his ungodly amount of “negative aura”

boyfriend!takuma who has never been with another girl besides you :( he’s a lil inexperienced and nervous, but he means well

boyfriend!takuma who’s a soft dom with a golden retriever personality. he really just loves you and wants to see you smile

boyfriend!takuma who can only be mean sometimes when you really ask for it

boyfriend!takuma who’s gotten pretty good at starting things when he’s horny… it only took a few years to build his confidence

boyfriend!takuma who only just now started to understand your “signals”.. you’re too shy to flat out start things with him, but you know you want it. this usually results in you just standing next to his gaming setup awkwardly, hoping he’ll just understand your unspoken rizz

boyfriend!takuma who looks up at you and raises his eyebrow with a small smirk. “you need something, baby?”

boyfriend!takuma who knows damn well what you need, but he likes to tease you — he loves seeing you get all awkward and shy, playing off your intentions

boyfriend!takuma who takes his headset off and hangs it up, standing up from his chair with a small stretch. his shirt raises up a bit so you can see his sinful happy trail seeping down into his boxers

boyfriend!takuma who merely chuckles when you try to turn the tables on him by saying, “oh, you think that you’re going to get some every time i come in here and just stand here?”

boyfriend!takuma who responds with, “yeah princess, i do.” before he bends you over the bed, yanking your pants and panties down to rail you from behind as mean as you want him to <3

boyfriend!takuma who can go for hours, holding your pretty face into a pillow as he gives you just what you need — a good fucking to fix your attitude

boyfriend!takuma who presses kisses all over your face, doting on you after you both have finished multiple times. aftercare is one of his favorites because then he can yap to you about how he shit on a whole lobby of 13 year olds in cod

15K OF PURE FANFICTION DON'T TELL ME THIS DOESN'T HAPPEN IN ONE OF THE MULTIVERSES

No Strings Attached

Ex!Steve Rogers x Reader

Summary: “Every time you’ve called me, I’ve come,” Steve says, voice thick with hurt, and you clench your teeth. “Every. Time.”

Warnings: smut! language, hurt, exes to lovers <3

Notes: this is one of my fave oneshots i've ever written tbh. i really love the trope of people breaking up, because of xyz issue, and then the person with xyz issue actively works to resolve or change it, but with no expectation of reuniting, just because they want to be a better person. so ye, that's basically this whole fic lmao

Words: 15,849

You make a sort of doe-eyed blank expression as you listen, that makes your building’s security guard duck his head a little lower into your line of sight and wave his hand.

“Ma’am?” You blink suddenly, snapping out of your spiralling thoughts and focus back on the man’s face.

“Huh?”

He smiles sympathetically and repeats himself.

“I asked if you had anybody who might come stay with you tonight? Super said he can’t get a hold of anybody who can change your lock…” You sigh and look around him at your door, it’s lock busted and breaking through the wood of the door.

You’d arrived home to find it like that, although the cops the security guy had insisted on calling said that it looked like no thief actually made it inside, probably got spooked. Seeing as none of your stuff was stolen or out of place, you’d have said they were right.

You run a hand over your hair and sigh.

“Uhm. Yeah. Yeah I do.” You nod your head, not actually coming up with a name off the top of your head, but you’re sure you’ll think of someone once you have a moment to breathe. The security guard nods.

“Do you want me to wait until they get here?” You smile and shake your head.

“Oh, no, no… it’s fine! I’ll be okay until then!” You assure him. You know he got paid for every hour he spent on the door, and not for any he didn’t.

He checks with you twice more before he leaves, and you shut your busted door behind him, slipping your side table in front of it in the meantime before you fumble through your bag for your phone.

You stare at your home screen for a solid two minutes, mind going over the people you’d feel comfortable calling, who you’d actually feel safe having stay with you overnight, and for the life of you, you can only come up with one name.

Unfortunately, this name belonged to your ex.

It wasn’t as if you and Steve Rogers hadn’t broken up amicably, or at least, you hadn’t ended badly, but for a moment you debate with yourself on if you really need to call anyone at all. You think about sleeping, knowing your apartment door was basically open.

You bring up his contact.

The first thing you see is a list of past calls and texts, the date signalling that the last time you’d called him had been almost seven months ago, and for a moment your eyes linger on that.

Seven months? It hardly felt like it, really.

You and Steve had met through work. You worked in the forensics at Avengers Tower, and so you’d occasionally see each other when the team had lab work to be done. It had been a slow progression for him to ask you out, and when he had, the two of you dated successfully for an entire year. Things were always slow with Steve, due in part to his schedule making it hard to really get anything done. If he wasn’t on a mission, he was resting from a mission, and the times you did go out or see one another were a lot less than you would have liked.

It’s why you broke up.

Steve was a great guy, the best you’d ever dated, but his work was his first true love and honestly? You required more attention than he could give. You weren’t needy exactly, but when you made a plan, you tended to expect to follow through. Steve’s last minute missions, or his cancelling and rescheduling was understandable in his line of work, and if had only been every so often, you’d have been just fine.

But it wasn’t, and you weren’t.

And so… you’d broken up. You’d explained to him that while you really liked him, you just didn’t mesh well together. He’d been understandably upset, but had told you he got it. You’d parted on good terms, with only a residual sadness lingering behind. Even now, you felt a small jolt of angst at even seeing his name written. Really, Steve was your perfect guy, and if he’d ever been around, you might’ve been able to experience more of that perfection.

You shake your thoughts aside and tap the call button, bringing the phone to your ear and waiting as the dial tone rings out. You can’t help but chew your lip as you wait, anxiety beginning to well up.

What if he didn’t answer?

What if he was on a mission?

What if he saw your name, and then didn’t answe—

“Hello?” You nearly gasp at hearing his voice, seven months suddenly feeling longer than before and you swallow thickly to remember why you were even calling in the first place.

“Steve… hey, it’s uh, me…”

“Yeah, I… I have caller ID on this phone.”

“Finally switch from the flip, huh?” You can’t help but shoot back, smile covering your features when you hear his warm chuckle on the other side.

“Yeah, it was time to change things up… Is everything okay?” Maybe he can hear it in your voice, or maybe he’s just that confused as to why you’re randomly calling him at ten on a Tuesday night, but you hear a note of concern in his reply that makes you want to curl up into a ball.

“Um… not really, no… I got home a little while ago and someone had tried breaking into my place—”

“—What? Are you okay? Did they take anything?!” You chuckle awkwardly at his immediate worry.

“Yeah, no— I mean, yes I’m okay, no they didn’t take anything.” You assert, and can practically see him letting out a breath.

“Uhm… I do have a favour to ask though, and I wouldn’t call if I had anybody else, but—”

“—Of course, whatever it is, just let me know.” You let out a shaky sigh and swallow again.

“The lock on my door is busted, and my super can’t get anybody in to fix it until tomorrow… I just… really don’t want to sleep here alone, with a broken door…” On the other side of the line you can hear keys clinking, and feel your tummy flop in dangerous ways.

“I’m coming out now. You want me to stay on the line?” You could fall to your knees and praise every god in existence for the special kind of beautiful Steve Rogers was.

“No, I’m okay, I just don’t wanna be alone later…” You cringe a little at how that might sound like a proposition, but Steve only hums.

“‘Course. I’ll see you in ten.”

When you hang up, you stare down at your phone for a few seconds.

And then you promptly drop it, head whipping around your messy living-kitchen space and quickly get to work tidying it to a presentable degree.

—-

Steve arrives almost exactly ten minutes later, the light knocking on your door followed by his voice.

“Hey, it’s just me!” He says, and you hurry to slide your end table out of the way, your door pretty much swinging open by itself.

For a moment you can only stare at him, dark blue jeans, white t-shirt, brown leather jacket. He’d grown his beard out since you saw him last, thick and golden and groomed just right to hit you in the lady parts. He seems fixated on you as well, though recovers far more gracefully, eyes dipping to look at your splintered door and he whistles.

“When you said it was busted, you meant it huh?” He asks, and you laugh, a little awkwardly, pulling the door wider as you usher him inside.

“Yeah… cops said they must have gotten scared off before they got inside. None of my stuff is missing or moved.” You explain, closing the door behind him, and when he sees you move for the table, steps forward to help you, looking at your makeshift barricade up and down for a moment when you’re done.

“Good. That’s good.” You look up at him again as silence falls upon your apartment, and find he’s already looking back at you. Realising you hadn’t even changed from work yet, and you’d cried a little bit after discovering the break-in, you attempt to smooth your hair down and wipe any potential makeup from under your eyes.

“Jesus, I must look like a mess.” You sort-of apologise, trying to play it off with a chortle, but Steve shakes his head, smiling kindly.

“Not at all.” Is all he says, and you hate the fact the completely non-committal sentence makes your belly flop again.

“Oh, uh, can I get you anything? Coffee, tea? I think I have a six pack in the fridge…?” You gesture to your kitchen, but move for your fridge anyway, Steve shoving his hands in his pockets as he follows, shrugging his shoulders. You find the beer behind your salad, and pull it out.

“Well, I’m having one.” You tease, setting the pack on the counter as you attempt to pull a bottle from the plastic rings. Maybe you’re just too exhausted, maybe this particular plastic was just stronger than you, but it doesn’t budge and Steve steps forward, hands already out.

“Let me…” He offers, even as you let him take your chosen bottle from you, tearing it out as if it were nothing. It likely wasn’t, for him, and you swallow, the room feeling warmer suddenly.

“Thanks. Help yourself.” You nod to the pack, a little thankful he takes one too, placing the rest back in your fridge.

“I uhm, I might go shower and change, I haven’t even thought about that yet…” You gesture down at yourself again, and Steve nods.

“Whatever you need.” He tells you, and then points to your couch.

“Mind if I watch the game?” You frown, but nod anyway.

“Who’s playin’?” You both move over into your living room, and you quickly find and toss him your remote.

“Mets vs Giants.” He says, and you ‘ah’, watching for a moment as he flicks to the right channel, your eyes finding the score and you wince, turning back to him.

“Hope you don’t have any bets on your boys.” You say, faux-sympathy dripping from your voice. Steve gives you an unimpressed eyebrow, pointing at you.

“We’ll come back.”

“If it makes you feel better.” You tack on, but burst into a laugh as he rolls his eyes, making himself comfortable on your couch. You note with mild amusement he takes the same spot he would always take up, before you’d broken up. Apparently one of your couch cushions was just comfier than the rest.

You leave him there to go get cleaned up at last, and relish in the hot water as you do little more than just stand under it for ten minutes. Despite your stress from the past few hours, you feel oddly light, Steve’s sudden reappearance back in your life, in your apartment making you feel a little woozy, but only in a good way.

You try to tell yourself that it was only because your breakup had been so amicable, if he were any of your other ex’s you wouldn’t be feeling the way you do…

You dry off and dress quickly, throwing your hair up before stepping back out into the living room. Crossing your arms over your chest in some subconscious way of shutting yourself off to how damn good he looked, you take a seat on the opposite end of the couch, grabbing your beer again and tipping it back.

“Cops get the security footage from the hall?” He asks, one hand around the neck of the bottle he rests on his thigh, the other thrown over the back of the couch toward you, almost invitingly. You blink for a moment as you process his question and hum.

“Yeah. But it’ll probably get written off if the guy didn’t, you know, look straight into the camera or something. You know how they are.” Steve tears his eyes from the TV and looks at you with a frown.

“You get a case number? I’ll follow up tomorrow, make sure they—” Before you can really stop yourself, you cut him off.

“—Steve you don’t have to do that.” The blond shuts his mouth, and you can practically hear the words unspoken.

‘Because you aren’t my boyfriend’. For a moment you can both only stare, until Steve nods and looks away, his brow smoothing out as he relaxes, but the tick in his jaw tells a different story.

“Well, let me know if you need to…” You can’t help but smile a little, behind the rim of your beer, and you take another sip before turning back to the game.

The Mets make a comeback and you finish the night cursing under your breath. You weren’t a Giants fan by any means, but you made a habit of rooting for anybody going against the Mets.

Steve helps you pack away the light snacks and empty beer bottles, all the while wearing a smug grin, and you can’t even stay too annoyed. Smug and playful was always a good look on him.

As you put away the last of the rubbish, you yawn a little and check the time.

“I might head to bed… I’ll get you some pillows and stuff…” You announce, and ignore when he looks up at you in favour of making for the linen closet. You do however grab the pillow from your bed that you know he used to favour, and lay it all out on the couch. When you look up again, Steve is pulling his jacket from his shoulders, and laying it over the back of the opposite couch.

“Uhm, if you need to leave, could you just wake me up?” You ask, stepping back, and Steve frowns deeply, cocking his head.

“Leave? Why would I need to leave?”

“I don’t know… if you’re needed, I guess…” You shrug, shifting awkwardly and for a few seconds Steve’s face filters through a few emotions. Confusion, concern, offence, and then some sort of resignation.

“I— you know if you really needed me, I wouldn’t leave… right?” He asks, and you feel something stir in your chest. It isn’t exactly positive like all the other feelings you’d been having tonight, more like a sting of annoyance, of hurt and you purse your lips, shrugging again and looking to the side.

“I don’t know. You’re important, I’m sure people would need you a lot more than me.” You don’t mean to sound so passive aggressive, but you can’t help it.

He’d never made a point of making sure he’d be around before, the fact you even caught him on an off night is surprising to you. Steve’s brow dips and he opens his mouth, but you cut him off once again, pointing to the kitchen.

“Feel free to take whatever you want from the fridge, I’ll make sure not to sleep in too much… goodnight, Steve.”

You turn on your heel and don’t wait for a reply, shutting your bedroom door behind you. You know he can still hear whatever you do perfectly, so you don’t let out a sigh, or groan at your own fat-headedness, instead you switch off all your lights and settle under your covers.

In seven months you hadn’t felt out of place once in your room, but now, with Steve sleeping in the next room, your bed suddenly feels all too big.

—-

Strangely, despite your pass-agg comments, after that night you and Steve actually begin speaking again. At first it was just his texted check ups, making sure your door got fixed, making sure you were alright, making sure the cops did their jobs… it was sort of nice actually, to be friends with Steve again. He’d even shown his face down in forensics. You know his lack of attendance, Nat, Sam or Bucky showing up in his place, hadn’t been coincidental post your breakup, but the first day he shows up to deliver evidence for testing, you almost sigh at how much you’d missed seeing his face down there.

You actually think you become closer than you had been before, platonically that is. Steve doesn’t seem to make any moves toward rekindling your romance, and honestly? You were just fine with that. Steve was a great guy, but you couldn’t deal with his schedule… even if he did seem to be around more these days.

You don’t ask. You don’t even really think about it, instead chalking it up to good timing and coincidence.

You were wrong though.

Steve clinks the top of his glass with Sam’s as the man passes him his refilled drink, and the three men, including Bucky, settle back down around their seats on the Tower’s balcony.

“So, hey, can I ask you something?” Sam clears his throat some, and Steve cocks his head, gesturing for him to go ahead.

“You and Doc… are you guys like… getting back together, or…?” The blond squints, his face scrunching up a little as he looks off, sighing some.

“We’re just friends.”

“Yeah, but I mean, you went from not talking at all to hanging out again.” Bucky chimes in, and Steve shrugs, eyes finding his shoes.

“I don’t think she’s interested anymore. If friendship is all she wants, it’s what I’ll give.” Sam and Bucky make eye contact, sharing a frown between them and Sam leans forward slightly.

“Sure, but man, you changed up your whole shit for her… You don’t even wanna try again?” Steve sighs and finally looks back up at them.

“It wasn’t necessarily for her… but she was right. How am I supposed to foster any sort of relationship if I don’t make time for it? What we do is important, but I have to be able to prioritise other things. It’s not fair on anybody in my life.”

Bucky hums. He for one was glad Steve had taken a slight step back from the Avengers. Not only did it mean Sam and Rhodey were given more chances to lead, but it had upped the pressure on everyone slightly, in a good way. Previously Bucky would have felt anxious going on a solo mission with another member who wasn’t Steve or Sam, but now he regularly went on ops with Wanda, his bonds with other members growing immensely.

He clears his throat and reaches out to squeeze Steve’s shoulder some.

“I know how you felt about her, but I think you did the right thing.” Steve gives the dark-haired man a long look and a soft smile, ducking his head.

“What was that thing your Ma used to say?” He asks, and Bucky frowns a moment, before his face lights up again in recognition.

“‘Some folk only bless your life so you can learn from them’.” He says, and Steve hums, raising his glass.

“I’ll drink to that.”

—-

It’s late, you should really be asleep by now, but you’ve been lying awake for hours now. Springtime in New York made the night air warmer than you were used to, and the slightly hot feeling of your body was not helping.

You growl in annoyance and switch your vibrator off, tossing it lightly into the open drawer of your bedside table. Between your thighs your clit still throbs slightly, but you hadn’t been able to make yourself cum in the almost two hours you’d been trying, and your hand was going numb from all the vibrations.

You were damn near desperate. You needed to be fucked, good and proper and thoroughly. With only a moment's hesitation, you reach for your phone and tap out a text.

You up?

Steve: Is everything alright?

It’s fine. Come over?

There’s a minute or so where you see the three dots appear as Steve begins typing, before they disappear, and then reappear, only to disappear once more. You almost smile to yourself. He was unsure.

Come over, pleeeaaaseeee?

Steve: … Are you alright?

You huff this time, and purse your lips. You could be forward here and now, giving him an out, or you could wait till he arrived, which might be far less convenient for your pride if he rejected you.

I need you… please…

This time Steve doesn’t type and then retype his messages, instead you’re forced to stare at your read receipt for a full two minutes before a reply comes back, your body lighting on fire the second you process the four little words.

Steve: Be there in ten.

Anticipation builds in you like a storm, and you quickly straighten your sheets, spritz some perfume, fix your hair a little, and pull on a gown, all in time for the knock on your door. The sound is curt and tense and you swallow thickly as you hurry to answer it, sliding your locks back before swinging it open.

Steve stands once again in dark jeans, this time with a dark grey sweater on. His hair was slightly damp still, messy, and you figure he must have just gotten out of his the shower when you’d texted. His eyes find you quickly, a little wide, a little confused, and with all the desperation from the past two hours fueling you, you pounce on him.

You’re lucky he’s as stable and strong as he is, you throw yourself bodily at him, arms wrapping instantly around his neck, your lips pressing to his own hungrily and he returns in kind, one hand steadying you around your middle, the other tangling up into your hair at the back of your head. You almost mewl at the way his hand clutches at your scalp, and you let him walk you back inside, his foot kicking your door closed behind you.

You keep moving, until your back hits your kitchen bench, and you take the moment to pull open your gown, letting it fall to the floor as your hands move for his own sweatshirt. The fabric is quickly discarded, and you’re a little surprised to hear Steve’s groan at your skin on skin contact, his hands beginning to roam more adventurously now. You weren’t keen on messing around for too long, and you make quick work of his belt, letting him kick his shoes off before he shucks the jeans down himself, stepping out of them, all without pulling his lips from yours.

You sigh into his mouth as he captures your tongue with his own, bearing down on you intently, his hands holding you tightly against his own body like he was trying to pull you into himself. You let a hand drop from his face to the hardness against your abdomen and allow yourself to relish in the soft gasps Steve lets out when you pump your fist over him several times, before increasing your pressure, making him all out moan.

His lips fall away from yours, instead he trails sloppy kisses along your cheek and down your neck, pausing to adjust, widening his legs some. With your mouth free, you find the time to speak.

“This… this is just sex, alright? It’s not… it’s just sex…” You tell him, feeling how for a moment he pauses, and you dread it for a second when he pulls away a little to look down at you. His expression is unreadable, but he’s nodding soon, and you breathe out in relief.

“Gotcha.” Is all he says, and you’re forced to release his length as a moment later you’re hoisted up. Your legs wrap around him, even as you’re set on your countertop, and his mouth moves back to yours. It’s your turn to gasp when his hand drops between your thighs, fingers immediately dipping into the dampness at your core, a touch you’d been craving for too long.

“You really needed it that bad, you had to call me?” His voice is low, and you shiver. Steve’s bedroom talk was always amazing, and now, for some reason, the fact you weren’t even together makes it better. It felt dirtier, more obscene, and you nod, panting as he pulls his lips away from yours, his eyes falling to watch his hand slide from your folds.

You swallow, leaning back on the counter as he becomes more purposeful, two fingers prodding at your entrance, his thumb gravitating to your clit, already overstimulated. When he pushes his two fingers inside you, you let your head fall back and your eyes close, widening your legs even more to give him room to work as he begins slowly pumping back and forth.

“F-fuck…” You breathe, toes scrunching as his fingers move a little faster, curling them slightly to run along your g spot and you feel your legs start to quiver already. He seems to anticipate your squirming though, and uses his free hand to hold one leg, the other he keeps open with his own thigh, moving quicker now. A slower moment lets him insert another finger, and soon you’re clutching around his neck again, needing something tangible to hold on to as he strokes you to finish.

“Steve! Steve, fuck, don’t— please don’t— ah!” You try to catch your breath before you even lose it, but you only swallow down more air as you cum, your hips shaking involuntarily against his hand as he continues to ride you through it, thumb never letting up over your clit until your head lolls back once more.

You’re about to speak, praise him perhaps, when his fingers pull away, taking your hips instead and any words you have are punched out of you with the feel of his hands drawing you onto his cock. You scramble for a hold again, gasping and moaning at the same time as you wrap your arms tightly around his neck.

“Holy fuck…!” You whimper, Steve already curling his hips up and into you, all the while lifting you from the counter itself to bounce you against his standing lap.

He liked this, you remember, liked being able to hold you up all on his own, control the pace, control his movement and yours.

“That okay?” His lips move against your cheek and you nod vehemently, a hand carding through the back of his hair.

“Yes! Fuck, fuck, I need it!” You squeeze your eyes closed as he really starts setting a pace, and you feel that deep spot inside of you that hadn’t been touched in months begin to light up. Regardless of your relationship issues, Steve had always been good in bed, his body fitting into your perfectly, his desire matching up with yours similarly so.

“Yeah? You need it, baby? … shit, I’ll give it to you, sweetheart.” His voice is like molten honey, running over you warm and sticky sweet, and you can’t help it, you pout a little, nodding at his words.

“Please… please!” You whine. You know how much he loved to feel needed, in and out of the bedroom, but that didn’t mean your mewling was all for show. You’d finished once, yes, but you were so pent up you were still rearing to go and Steve’s cock pounding into you hurriedly was only spurring you on. You needed release and he was going to give it to you. Your mind always went a little hazy, a little blank when he’d have you like this, you’d do practically anything he asked, and he knew it.

“Come on, sweetheart, one more, wanna feel you squeeze me…” You whine again with his added words, his lips nipping your ear and you nod, face falling into the crook of his neck as he continues to pant and puff with effort. Your sounds start becoming shorter, more gasped and as he slows to level you with long, deep strokes, your orgasm rolls over you, gentler than the last, though powerful still, amplified by the feel of your cunt actually clutching, gripping onto something as your muscles tense and flutter.

Steve groans, keeps up the longer, slower strokes until you begin to relax again, and with little warning, pulls out. He presses his cock against your inner thigh, but pumps with one hand until he’s sighing airily, thick hot streams of cum streaking over your thigh and abdomen as you watch.

For some reason, all you can think about for a few seconds is how he’d never come on you before. Always inside you, condom or raw, and the change in behaviour confuses you for a moment, but you don’t intend on asking.

You both pant heavily, still partially leant against one another as you catch your breath, and you feel a slight awkwardness settle over you. Would things be weird now? Would he expect more from this? For a moment you have to admit it was nice being back in his arms, nice to pretend he was yours, but reality sets in and you cool off.

Even if he was still your boyfriend, he would never really be ‘yours’. Not while he shouldered so much of the world’s responsibilities.

Steve settles you back on the lip of the counter, and you jump slightly at how cool it feels against your bare skin. As you finally make eye contact, a pit opens in your gut. Steve after sex was always a sight to behold, his hair hanging in his face, his cheeks flushed red and his lips swollen and parted… it makes your stomach lurch in longing, and you quickly clear your throat, gently pushing him back so you can stand.

Finding your robe on the floor, you quickly pull it on despite the sweat covering your skin, and look back toward Steve, though you avoid his eye contact.

“Uhm, do you want to wash up before you go?” You know if sounds a bit harsh, but you’d made it clear to him before you’d properly gotten started that this was just sex. You couldn't bring yourself to expect anything more from him, and risk another broken heart.

Steve blinks, and you see a brief moment of hurt flash across his features before they harden somewhat, and he straightens, tucking himself back into his pants gingerly and collecting his sweatshirt.

“It’s alright, I… I’ll clean up at home.” He says, and you have to cross your arms over your chest at the tight feeling that begins constricting you.

“Okay.” Steve hesitates, looks at you a moment too long before he nods to the door.

“I’ll get out of here.” He says, sounding far more casual than he had a moment ago, as if nothing at all had just transpired between you, and you latch onto that ease, making it easier for you to play along too.

“No worries…” You trail him to the doorway, holding it open behind him as he steps through and turns around. His mouth is open, poised to say something but for some unknown reason you decide to cut him off, a hand shooting out to land on his arm, and you squeeze just a little.

“Thank you, Steve.” You want to cringe at the sound of thanking somebody after sex, but really, it was more about the fact for the second time in a row he actually came when you’d needed him… even if the second was a far more rival affair…

Steve blinks at you slowly from under his long lashes, in that dreamy way he does when he’s thinking something sweet or mushy, and again your insides twist. He only ducks his head further and swallows, a small smile pulling at his lips, far too innocent for the acts you’d just committed barely inside your doorway.

“Of course, uh, anytime…” You snort a little bit, rolling your eyes, but he gives you a final little wave before you shut your door behind him.

You’re left staring at your living room and kitchen counter, eyes fixated on the spot you’d been hauled up against just minutes ago. Your mind immediately begins the playback and you groan, remembering the mess still on your thighs and between them, suddenly more bothersome and uncomfortable than it had been previous, and you retreat to your shower, questioning yourself on if sleeping with your ex, who you’d only just begun talking to again, was a good idea.

—-

You walk in on Steve almost kissing someone.

It’s one of Tony’s parties, the big ones, where he invites everyone and absolutely insists everybody comes, even if he’s only on face-name basis with them. It was actually the first gathering you’d been to with the Avengers since you and Steve broke up, certainly the first since you’d started fucking again. It was good to see Sam and Bucky and the others outside of a work environment, and you think from their genuine smiles and the way Sam keeps talking you into one more round of pool, that maybe they missed you too.

You finally manage to duck out from under Sam’s arm, in search of a bottle of water, when you stumble into the private kitchen, where you’d been told the fridge was stocked full. At first your brain lights up.

Steve was in here! You’d hardly spoken to him all night! But then his hand registers, more specifically, the hip his hand is on registers, and your eyes suddenly piece together the scene before you.

A young woman, pretty, you think you know her from HR actually, leans with her back against the counter, her hands both wrapped around Steve’s biceps. One of his arms is around her waist, the other on her hip and they’re both smiling softly, if not shyly, heads so close their lips are barely apart when you accidentally squeak in surprise.

Steve pulls away instantly, even before he’s seen it’s you, and you realise that whoever this woman was to him, it was new. Steve was always a little skittish with PDA with new relationships. You’d seen it with Sharon, before yourself, and then again with your own relationship… and now with this.

“Oh! I—!” You feel your face go warm and you mouth wordlessly for a moment as you point to the fridge. The woman ducks her head in slight embarrassment and awkwardness and you do feel terrible, despite the wave of grief that overcomes you at the fact Steve was actually moving on.

Not that he wasn’t allowed to… you just hadn’t thought he’d do it first.

“Uh, just, water…” You stutter, suddenly feeling rather sick. Steve follows your pointing, even as you begin to move, avoiding his eyes. It shouldn’t be so weird! The situation the two of you had was strictly no strings attached! Steve was allowed to start dating, so were you! Still… that didn’t mean you wanted to walk in on him about to lay it on a woman that wasn’t you.

You rush out of the room with your water before anybody can gain enough sense to actually talk, and you tuck yourself back between Sam and Nat quickly.

You spy Steve and the woman leaving the kitchen a short while later, and though you don’t see even a bit of smudged lipstick or beard burn, your mind starts to whir in anger. But you know it's unjustified, and you curse yourself for being nearly a year out of your relationship, and still jealous. You consider breaking it off with Steve in the coming week, but your mind wanders back to the way he’d tipped his head back in a moan only days before, the thick column of his throat bobbing as he swallowed, his hands bruising on your hips as you rode him hard.

You decide instead that you’ll just act as if you’d never seen anything at all in the kitchen.

—-

Moving on is… hard.

Not necessarily out of some romantic idea that Steve was ‘The One’, in fact you’re more resolved against anything romantic with him now than you were before, more so because you were… picky.

Even if you lower your standards, every guy you seem to give a chance ends up firmly in your ‘no’ pile after a few dates or less. Most of the time it was because your interests didn’t align, you found them boring or you just weren’t attracted to each other, but occasionally one slips through.

Tom, his name was and Tom was nice. He was polite, handsome, you could talk about both shared interests and your jobs (he worked for the city morgue). Tom was good. You were still unsure of anything long term, or anything serious at all for that matter, but for someone to hang out with and occasionally be kissed by, you could do a lot worse than Tom.

He takes you out almost like clockwork every Friday or Saturday night since you’d met (that was four dates so far), you’d get dinner, maybe some drinks, walk around for a bit, and then he’d kiss you goodbye at your door. It was sweet. Tonight though, tonight you aren’t after sweet at all.

A SHIELD agent you know has her birthday, or maybe it’s a joint party? You aren’t sure, all you know is that it’s at a club, you look hot as hell, and if Tom doesn’t put his hands on you later you’ll burst at the seams.

The club is dark and loud, meant for dancing and drinking, not conversation and polite small talk, and the moment the bouncer sees you inside, you grab Tom by the hand and drag him along, a wicked smile thrown over your shoulder. You do the customary rounds, saying hello to people you know, introducing Tom. You even manage to figure out who the birthday girl is, and give her a hug. You’re aware when you lean over the table to do so that your already short skirt rides up further, and you’re aware tom is standing right behind you, watching.

You make sure not to drink much, you had plans for later after all, but you act a little giddier than you are, letting your hand linger on Tom’s thigh, holding on to him more than normal. You coax him out to the dance floor and that's where you get him. Hot bodies writhe to a beat, pressed up against one another, it doesn’t seem as obscene in the dark. You grind your hips back into Tom’s, his hands snaking their way around your hips and you smile, because you know.

In the dim light and through the throng of bodies, a flash of familiar stops you for a moment. Blonde hair, wide shoulders, beard, beer in hand, untouched… You swallow for a second as you make eye contact with Steve. He must have been invited too, must not have had a mission to go on to get out of it either. Before he can lift an eyebrow or do anything at all, you look away, wrapping your arms around Tom’s shoulders, you lean into his ear.

“Let’s get out of here.”

This… this had not been what you’d had in mind.

Your bedroom is lit only by a spare few candles that flicker your shadows against the wall, and you watch them absently for a second longer, before dropping to rest on your elbows, your body moving in the rythmeric back and forth each time Tom’s hips gently buck into yours.

He can’t see your face since he’s got you on your hands and knees, and you’re glad for it, because you’re not sure you could fake it even if you tried. It wasn’t that it didn’t feel good, it was just… you aren’t sure… he touched you like he wasn’t supposed to, and if you’re honest it felt less like he was having sex with you and more like he was just having sex. You could be anyone right now, and he probably wouldn’t care.

Tom pants and moans and then stops, his hips stuttering gently before he pulls out and away from you.

“Bin in the bathroom?” He asks, and you plaster on your best post-sex look, and nod, rolling over in time to see him disappear into your ensuite to dispose of the condom. When he returns, you go about cleaning yourself up.

“That was great.” He chimes, and you offer him a smile. At least somebody had fun, though you note a little bitterly how he hadn’t even asked about you. Maybe Tom wasn’t so nice.

“Yeah!” You enthuse. You already knew he wasn’t going to stay the night, he’d made sure to tell you as much before you’d begun. You pull on a gown and help him dress and gather his things.

At the front door he kisses you chastely, and tells you he’ll call in the morning. Mentally, you cross him off your list, and close your door.

You seeth while you change your sheets, getting angrier and angrier over your situation. You should have known from the start there was no spark with Tom, you shouldn’t have tried to kid yourself! And he should have at least tried to make you cum!

A quick glance at the time tells you it's not too late, and you send off a text, expecting a gentle refusal.

What you don’t expect however, is Steve arriving at your apartment twenty minutes later, angry as all hell, and he all but pushes past you when you’ve opened the door, coming to stand in your living room with his hands on his hips, his brow low and his lips in a thin line.

“Are you serious?” He asks at last, when you’ve stood staring at one another for long enough. He gestures absently, but his hand comes back to his hip.

“Wha—”

“—Don’t.” He says sharply, and you shut your mouth. This was different… you’d never really seen Steve angry before, let alone angry with you… it doesn’t at all help your current situation though, and you swallow, adjusting your stance.

“You know damn well I saw you leave with him earlier! I can smell the sex in the air. You haven’t had enough already tonight?” The words are harsh and hurt lances through you momentarily, before defensiveness takes over and you cross your arms over your chest, lifting your chin a little.

“Excuse me? Who I spend time with and how is none of your business!” Steve scoffs and looks off for a moment, a mirthless smile on his face.

“Right. But you still want me to fuck you after anyway.” The vulgarity is new as well, and it occurs to you in the back of your mind, that he must be really pissed with you.

“If you didn’t want to come, you should have just said no!” You say, your voice sounding a little more shrill and a little more crackly than you want it too. All your bravado aside, Steve was imposing when he was angry, and the fact that anybody yelling at you, let alone him, was enough to make you cry, gives your voice a shake you didn’t ask for. Not to mention that you really hadn’t expected him to show up at all, especially angry.

Steve looks back at you, his fuming expression not exactly subsiding, but it softens some, and he drops one hand from his hip to rub at his brow before he looks back up at you, more exasperated now than anything else.

“Why did you call me?” He sounds tired, but you know an olive branch when you see one, and you snatch it, stepping closer, ducking your head.

“Why do you think…?” You shrug and purse your lips before looking up at him again.

“He was shit. You aren’t.” His shoulders square just a little at your words, and you know it's a bit of a low blow, any guy was likely to be more inclined to having sex with you if you compared him positively incomparison with another man. Steve cocks his head, lids dipping slightly and you know you’ve got him hook, line, and sinker.

“Is that right?” You’re right in front of each other now and you let your hands wind up around his neck, playing demure as he fixes you with a knowingly amused look, his hands landing firmly at your waist.

“Mhmn.” You hum, nodding, shrugging once again.

“He didn’t know how.” You say, pouting as Steve dips his face closer to yours, and again you find yourself pretending that this wasn’t just sex, that these arms where ones you could be wrapped in whenever you wanted.

“Didn’t know how to what?” Steve asks, voice deep and rumbly in his throat, his breath coasting over your lips, and you lean in quick, nipping at his mouth chastley, feeling his hands tighten at your waist.

“Didn’t know how to take care of me.” Magic words, really. Steve is on you in seconds, mouth devouring your own, the warmth of him engulfing and you let yourself sink into the fever.

Perhaps some of that anger still simmers under the surface, because he fucks you hard, his thrusts just a little more pointed, his fingers digging a little deeper into your skin. His teeth nibble at your lower lip making you keen for him with another gasp as his hips snap against yours once again.

He’s covering you completely, chest to chest, his arms rest around your head, caging you in, and you grasp onto him wherever you can, hiking your thighs higher around him as he drives into you quickly.

“You know, if I wanted to make a point,” Steve begins, his voice raspy and puffed slightly, and you peel your eyes open to look at him, his face so close to yours it almost makes you cross-eyed.

“I’d not make you cum either.” He finishes, and you start, a slight wave of panic setting in, and you open your mouth to preemptively beg, but then he’s shifting, a hand sliding between your sweaty bodies, fingers pawing until they find your clit, and you suck in air sharply.

Steve wears a lazy but wicked grin, and he begins swirling his fingers over your bundle of nerves, dropping his face low enough that when he speaks his lips brush over yours.

“But I like watching you cum while I fuck you.” As your breathing shallows, Steve seems to swallow down each short breath, eyes never leaving your face as you quickly feel your release creep up on you, his harsh, deep strokes combined with the rough pads of his fingertips rapidly spinning circles and you’re falling.

Steve uses his body to hold you down, prevent you from shaking or jerking too much as you topple over the edge of release, your pussy clutching onto his cock even as he grunts, continuing to grind into you as you call out his name over and over.

He drops his face to your neck as your senses come back to you, your brain feeling light and your eyesight a little dimmed from the sensations. You know any second now he’ll pull out, jerk himself until he spills on your stomach or thigh like he always seemed to nowadays, but something ticks in your brain, raw and primal and you hook your ankles as best you can behind him, raking your fingernails over his back in marks that will disappear by morning.

“She tighter than me, Steve?” You feel his head start to lift a little, but you gently bite at his earlobe, stopping him.

“Does she feel this good when you’re fucking her?” Something switches then in the atmosphere of the room, he picks up his pace again, and you jump when one hand fists in the back of your head, pulling your neck back and away. Steve glares down at you, though his game is half given away by the grunt he gives a second later.

“Shut up.” He says, though it isn’t half as harsh as you expect, and he rolls his eyes some, dropping his lips down to your exposed throat now and you feel a thrill run through you.

“Does she let you fuck her like this or is it gentle missionary only?” You press on, yelping a little when teeth scrape at your skin warningly, and the hand in your hair tightens, pulling.

“Because you know I’d let you have me any which way… on my knees, under you, over you… fuck,” You pause, panting a little with effort as he fucks you even harder, each word punched out of you.

“Fuck, I’d let you have my ass if you brought the lube…” Triumph colours you as Steve  groans, gasping almost, his fist at your scalp a little painful as he curls his hips deep once, twice, three times more before you feel him finish, and he stills.

Your bodies are hot and sticky with sweat against one another, and you can feel him shake a little in his come down as he finally relaxes.

Like always, in the aftermath you’re both silent for a few moments before Steve lifts his head, his chest heavy against your own, and he fixes you with a unconvincingly unamused expression.

“Thought I told you to shut up?” He asks, shifting to hold up more of his own weight, and you pretend to not hear him, cocking your head.

“Towel?” He seems to relent, rolling off of you and sinking into your mattress as you hop up, moving to your bathroom to grab a spare towel.

When you return, you almost falter for a few seconds in the doorway, swallowing thickly. Steve lies on your bed, one arm hooked under his head, naked as anything, looking like he belonged there. Your chest lurches, and your stomach falls to your knees as you force yourself to keep moving, gently tossing the towel at him as you gather your gown once again.

You’ll shower when he’s gone.

“Really that bad, huh?” He asks when he’s drying his hair, his underwear now pulled up around his hips, and you sigh, smiling slightly.

“Honestly… I think I’m pretty forgiving, but he didn’t even try. I’m the one who had to suggest we change positions even!” It’s easy to fall into this routine with Steve, especially after you’ve both been satiated, but it’s not really a dynamic that exists anywhere else at any other time.

At work you were friendly but professional, around friends you were polite but never seemed to stray too close (neither of you wanted a particular redhead in your business), and you made a point of not hanging out outside of that. You were already sleeping together, that was more than enough. Anything more would just make you hope, and hope would only let you down.

Steve was still Steve. He was still the guy everyone turned to in a crisis, he was still the man on the ground nine times out of ten. You broke up for a reason, and you needed to keep that in mind.

Steve shoots you a wince and scrunches his nose as he pulls his shirt over his shoulders and pops his head through the hole.

“I’m sorry for… yelling.” He says after he’s pulled on his pants, and you frown, looking away.

“Don’t be… I probably shouldn’t have called you.” You say, missing the dip in his brows when you don’t look away from one of your flickering candles. Steve purses his lips as he threads his belt through his pants, but shrugs.

“You should just tell him, if you like him”

“Nah… I don’t think there’s much there for me anyway. I don’t know.” You wave him off and stand as he pulls on his jacket. This part was always the most awkward.

“Whatever you want.” He readies his keys and you move with him to the door. You always felt like you were missing something in your goodbye’s, but a hug or a kiss or a thank you was the exact last thing you wanted to do.

Keep it casual.

Steve pauses at your door, his expression unreadable and you fold your arms over your chest, flashing him an easy smile.

“Drive safe, Steve.”

“Goodnight. Sleep well.”

—-

“Wait, what?” You turn in your seat to look at your coworker Lucy, who nods, and finishes her mouthful of yoghurt.

“Yeah, right! Two in the morning and I’m getting calls to analyse samples as if I’m at the off—”

“—No, I meant…” You trail off, mind whirring, trying to think over the details you knew already.

“I didn’t know they’d gone on a mission…” You finish with instead, sitting back in your chair.

It wasn’t like you knew the Avengers schedule off my heart, or that it was your job to know everytime they left the tower. It made sense as to why Steve hadn’t been talkative the past few days though… Still, he’d confirmed that your ‘meeting’ was still happening this afternoon, even though you’d just gotten word that the team was landing in two hours.

Lucy chitters on until your half-day ends, at which point you quickly pack up your things and make your way to the elevator. You consider calling in to the upper floors, the residential ones, to speak with the man himself, but you decide against it. It wasn’t like you were a regular up there, it would be weird and raise questions, not to mention that given his recent return from a mission, he was likely in debriefings or writing up his reports.

You pull out your phone instead and send off a quick text.

‘Just heard you got in from an assignment… Do you want to reschedule this afternoon? I know you’re probably tired as hell…?’

Steve doesn’t reply right away, and honestly you don’t expect him too. You make it all the way home before your phone buzzes, and you find yourself staring for several minutes at the words on the screen.

S: ‘I’m happy to come over, if you’re still free. I’m totally fine.’

You send him a quick confirmation, but can’t help but chew on your lip. Part of you wonders why he’d bother. You know he was lying about being fine, super soldier or not, everybody liked their downtime after an extremely stressful few days, and coming to your ex-girlfriend’s house for a hookup wasn’t exactly that… then again, maybe he really needed his itch scratched. Who were you to judge?

You’d finished your day at two, which was nice, and you do a quick clean up of your apartment before Steve was set to arrive at four. You shower and change and throw a little bit of makeup on, finishing just as your doorbell rings.

When you open the door, you can see right away that he’d been lying about being fine. Maybe nobody else would notice, but you had spent a considerable amount of time around Steve, and you could pick out his undereye bags straight away. To anybody else he’d look completely normal, but his shoulders slump just so, his smile just a little too tight.

“Hey.” He greets as you step aside, letting him kiss your cheek as he enters. You don’t know when that became a thing, but it was something you’d seen him do with a few of his female friends, so you let it slip, knowing it wasn’t just you.

“Hey…” You shoot back, suspicion slightly etched on your words. Steve immediately rolls his eyes, shaking his head as he hangs his jacket on the back of your couch.

“I’m fine.” He tells you pointedly and you decide that you can’t be bothered arguing. It was his choice to come, if he didn’t really want to, then he’d have to deal with that like a big boy.

Casual conversation ensues, he asks about your week, you tell him the hot goss in the forensics lab, and then somehow from that very enticing subject, you end up on your bed, Steve hovering just over you, lips pressed hotly against your own. Despite yourself, not all your hook ups with Steve were hot and heavy and quick. You missed making out with someone, the build up of it all, and even though you told yourself it was dangerous territory, you went there anyway.

Steve’s hands trail slowly up your body, feeling you over your clothes, and then under. You get rid of his shirt fairly quickly, his shoes kicked off already, and not for the first time, you just relish in being held, the fantasy that this was real, and you weren’t casually sleeping with your ex-boyfriend. Steve plants his knee between your legs when you scratch at the back of his head, a groan following shortly after as his fingers work to find the bottom of your shirt and get it up. You part for only seconds when he pulls it over your head, throwing it to the edge of the bed. You hadn’t bothered putting a bra on, leaving you already exposed. Steve may be Captain America, a symbol of a nation and whatever else, but he was still a man, and the second he can, he’s got his lips pressed to the skin of your neck and rapidly descending, hands groping appreciatively at your breasts.

His mouth leaves hot kisses down your throat, over your chest, and you’re so ready to feel his lips take over from where his thumb brushes over your nipple when the doorbell rings.

You both pause a moment, Steve lifting his head and you groan, scrunching up your face as the bell is joined by rapid knocking. Steve smiles, cheeks a little pink, and shifts off of you, already reaching for the nearest shirt. It’s his, but you don’t think he’ll mind much as you slip it over your head and shoot him an apologetic glance as he makes himself comfortable on your pillows, placing an arm behind his head.

“Sorry, just… give me a moment…”

“It’s fine.” Steve waves off your apologies as you jog from the room to your front door.

It’s a package you have to sign for, but the courier brings up the wrong electronic form, and you’re forced to wait impatiently as his slow device loads the correct one instead. You’re trying to remain polite, trying not to tap your foot or your fingers, but by the time you’re closing your door again, you don’t even stop to look at what the package is, chucking it onto your couch and all but racing back to your bedroom.

“Just a courier, but while I’m up, do you want a be—” You cut yourself off, coming to a stop in your doorway, eyes landing on the sight laid out before you. Steve lays against your decorative cushions, shirtless, his arm no longer behind his head, instead now he’s curled on his side, another pillow stuffed between his arms where he squeezes it, eyes shut tight, mouth slightly ajar.

Your heart skips several beats, the urge to squeal at how adorable he looks only overruled by the odd stirring in your stomach at how much you missed seeing him in your bed. And then that thought is cancelled out by your guilt.

For Steve to actually fall asleep unintended, he must have been exhausted. You really should have insisted on rescheduling…

He stirs a little, humming softly and adjusting his hold on the pillow he was cuddling and you start. You should wake him up and send him home. You weren’t dating, you were only tentatively friends. You were just sleeping together, nothing else.

But you don’t.

Instead, you move to your laptop in the living room. You had stuff you could stand to get done. It wasn’t that big of a deal.

You end up logging back into your work server and ticking off several tasks on your to-do list, losing track of time in the process. It isn’t until nearly seven when you notice, at which point you send a glance back to your bedroom doorway, before pulling up your local pizza places’ online ordering site.

Steve wakes not too long after, his footsteps purposefully loud, and you turn again to look at him as he exits your room, scratching his head and looking for all the world like an embarrassed child.

“For someone who wasn’t at all tired and was totally fine, you sure did take a midafternoon nap.” You tease and he gives you a thin, apologetic smile.

“I’m sorry… I—”

“—It’s fine, Steve. Besides, I ended up clearing off my schedule for the week, so that’s nice.”

He still looks bashful, even as he takes a seat opposite you at the table.

“Do you want me to head out?” He asks, and you wave him off, standing up to move to your fridge.

“Nah. Unless you want to. But I ordered pizza a little while ago. Figured you’d be hungry. Beer?”

Steve blinks and you see him processing his choices, but he eventually nods, and you pull two bottles, cracking them open and handing one to him as you take your seat again.

“Beer and pizza isn’t exactly how I’d expected tonight to go, but you know, it’s up there.” You shrug, and Steve chuckles, shaking his head.

“I’m never going to live this down, am I?” He asks.

“I’m just saying, I’ve had some interesting sex in my time, but I’ve never actually had a guy fall asleep on me before…” You both laugh, and trade jabs until your food arrives.

Steve offers to get it, which you don’t protest, grabbing some plates and moving your drinks to the couch instead. You realise, when you take a look back at him handing some cash to the delivery guy, that you’re still wearing his shirt, and groan internally.

You change quickly, pulling on your own clothes, and chucking Steve back his own when you return to the living room. He’s sat in ‘his’ seat once again, and he only lifts an eyebrow at you when he catches his shirt, before pulling it on. You don’t even pretend to not stare at the way his body stretches and moves when he does, and he doesn’t pretend not to notice.

“You know, I was gonna ask for it back when I woke up.” He tells you as you both start grabbing slices to put on your plates.

“Oh?”

Steve ums, and settles back in his seat as you search for something to play on the tv.

“But I kinda miss seeing you in my clothes.” He says, and you pause.

You fight the urge to look at him, and even though your heart beats loudly in your ears at his confession, you try to go on as if what he’d said was totally normal.

“Um, have you ever seen this one?” You point to the screen, displaying the rundown of a show you’d heard some of your coworkers talking about, and Stev shakes his head.

“Clint talks about it, but I haven’t had the time.” He shrugs and you press play.

Eventually, you find yourself relaxing again, one of you occasionally piping up to chat some shit about how unrealistic or contrived the show was, and eating your fill (and then some) of pizza. It’s weirdly casual, in a way you truly haven’t felt around Steve in a long time, but just like when you’re doing far less casual things together, it’s easy to just pretend for a while.

You fall asleep on your couch sometime after midnight, and in the morning wake up in your bed, your living room devoid of beer bottles and pizza boxes, all the remains plated and covered in your fridge. You want to be angry at yourself for allowing your interactions with Steve to go beyond the physical, but you can’t.

For the rest of your day there’s a lightness in your steps and a softness to your thoughts, as you permit yourself this one, silly, selfishness.

—-

One pizza and netflix night turns into two, and then somehow your hookups with Steve become less about sex and more about the company. You still sleep together, of course, but more often than not, you’ll find yourselves too tired for anything. Steve sits on your bed and borrows your laptop to type up reports, and you beside him, a friendly distance away, scrolling through your phone or finishing the latest book you’d started.

You don’t think about it.

But it’s nice.

Natasha and Bucky stop by your lab on a friday night and subsequently invite you to join the rest of the group for drinks that evening. You don’t even feel hesitant to accept, and you don’t think about that either.

You can’t be bothered going home to change and then come back, so you head right up when you clock off. The team is already in good form, lounging around a set of coffee tables on the upper level, several empty bottles already littering the space. The huge glass sliding doors that lead to the balcony have been pulled wide open, and Sam and Clint stand at the grill, trying to out-fry each other.

“You look nice.” Steve tells you, greeting you with a casual half-hug. He foregoes the kiss on the cheek this time, and you don’t think about it.

“Really?” You ask, genuinely amused.

“I came straight from work and I feel like I’ve been sweating in this dress all day.”

Steve grins and shrugs.

“You look nice.” He repeats, eyes not leaving you until Nat calls your attention away.

“Geez Rogers, she’s been here for five seconds and you haven’t offered her a drink?!” The redhead teases from behind the nearby bar, and you laugh, playfully shoving Steve in the arm.

“Yeah, where are you manners?!”

Steve holds up his hands in defeat, still smiling, and you move with him to the bar.

“Don’t you worry. I’ll take care of you.” Natasha winks, and you wave a hand, letting her mix you some concoction you don’t catch the contents of.

“I may regret this in the morning but; I trust you.”

Nat only laughs again as Steve reaches over the bar to grab himself another beer, and you watch, unconcerned with who could be watching you. When your drink is made, you clink glasses, and move to where the others all sit. His hand grazes your lower back as you walk, but you don’t think about it.

Night falls and food is served. More drinks and more laughs, and when you’ve returned to the bar to fetch a couple more martinis for the fellas now crowding around the pool table, one Sam Wilson slides against your side.

“Good to see you make it tonight.” He nods, his signature grin spread across his face. You chuckle and shrug.

“I really needed to take a load off.”

Sam nods and looks over his shoulder as several cheers erupt from the ongoing game, before he’s staring back at you once again.

“You and Steve back on or…?” The question doesn’t totally shock you, but you still give a friendly scoff, and shake your head.

“No… Definitely not.”

Sam’s brow furrows and he cocks his head.

“We’re just friends again. That’s it. Steve’s a great guy, but…” You trail off, and shake your head once more. Sam shifts to face you and lifts an eyebrow.

“You guys aren’t subtle, you know that right? And I know you ain’t calling him to come fix your sink every other night.”

Your face grows warm and you roll your eyes.

“So what? Doesn’t mean we’re together. We just know each other. It’s comfortable.” You shrug and Sam hums in a disbelieving way.

“Look, Steve is… Steve. He’ll always be more tied to his work than anything, or any one else, and that’s fine. I just know I can't expect more from him than… this.”

Sam watches you for a moment, eyes searching your face until he looks away, nodding his head, relenting.

“Whatever you say. I’m just saying maybe you should give it another go… with the three of us now rotating leadership, things might be different.” 

You frown at that, as Nat finishes with the drinks you’d asked her for, and cock your head.

“What do you mean ‘the three of you on rotation’?”

Sam sideyes you.

“Steve stepped down as our sole guy, like, a year ago now. Rhodey, he, and I take turns. We got a week each on rotation.”

You blink at the information, and wonder why Steve had never mentioned it before.

Him stepping down as the Avenger’s go-to leader was… a pretty big deal. Actually, you’re kind of shocked by it. Steve had always been, as long as you’d known him, unable to walk away from a fight. If a situation was going down, he had to be there, at the front taking charge. It was literally the reason you’d broken up. He didn’t know how to take a break, and in his life, you’d always be second, maybe even third priority.

Sm nicks one of the drinks in front of you, and you half-heartedly scold him for it as you attempt to carry the other three back to the pool table, Steve putting his cue to the side and stepping up to help you when he notices.

Sam’s words continue to spin around your brain as you settle back in to watch. It isn’t until Bucky elbows you gently in the side that you realise you were being spoken to, and you blink around.

“We were saying that we forgot to set a prize for the game.” Sam re-explains, and you hum.

“I said maybe you’d give the winner a kiss.” Bucky adds, his face clearly joking, but in that ‘only joking if you are’ way.

You scoff and roll your eyes.

“Jesus, what is it? 1955?”

Bucky shrugs and sips at his drink. He’d always been a flirty drunk, not that he was drunk-drunk, but his serum seemed to affect him in slightly different ways to Steve. If he really tried, he could get a pretty decent buzz.

“And besides, I doubt Steve would see that as much of a prize, and last I checked, he was wiping the floor with you chumps.” You wave a hand and Sam cackles. Steve lifts an eyebrow at you, catching your eye.

“Don’t be so sure, sweetheart, a prize is a prize.”

You hardly hear his words, it's his expression that draws you in, makes you forget about the company around you. The air feels hot all of a sudden and you really wished you could drag him off. You shrug.

“Well maybe I’ll give you something else if you win.” 

If the others pick up on anything other than friendly banter, they thankfully choose not to mention it, simply laughing and moving back to the game. Steve’s cheeks tint a little pink, but he throws you a wink when he takes his next turn, and you have to laugh, shaking your head at the absurdity.

Steve holds the lead for two rounds, but Bucky, fuelled by Nat’s martinis, makes a comeback, and as the final scores are tallied, he leans in, tapping his cheek expectantly. It’s all in good fun, and you roll your eyes for the hundredth time, but make good in your promise of a prize and instead grip him gently by the chin and plant a quick kiss to his lips. Bucky lifts his drink in achievement, and you playfully shove him away.

“I’m sure Freud would have something to say about that.” Steve says teasingly, plopping down beside you, and you scoff.

“Nobody listens to Freud, and you and Bucky aren’t actually family.” You almost add that you and he aren’t actually dating either, but you stop short. Steve throws you a grin and relents.

“You finish that book yet?” He asks, referring to the Freud book in question that you’d been halfway through the last time he’d been over.

You shake your head.

“No. And I don’t think I will. I can put up with a lot of batshit crazy things, but I draw the line at him.”

Steve laughs, and takes a swig of his beer. A thought occurs to you then, and you turn to face him, squinting.

“Did you lose on purpose?”

“What?”

“The game. Did you lose on purpose?”

Steve blinks sheepishly at you in the same way he did when he was formulating some kind of believable lie, and you roll your eyes, smacking his arm.

“You’re so full of shit!” You laugh, watching him shrug and shift awkwardly.

“I didn’t want you to feel awkward.”

You sideye him with another huff of laughter.

“I mean I offered, in front of our friends, mind you, to give you a blowjob if you won… how awkward did you think I felt?” You watch Steve’s cheeks light up again, and he shakes his head, rolling his eyes at you this time.

“Was that what you meant?” He asks, as a sort of recovery, but you can see he’s still a little flustered. You chuckle, and lean into him, resting your hand on his upper thigh and squeezing just slightly.

“Maybe next time.” You wink, and watch his expression shift, his eyes flickering down to your lips briefly, and you just know he’s imagining what would be happening right now if you weren’t surrounded by at least ten other people.

Again, you feel the urge to drag him away, but you keep your cool, leaning away from him and removing your hand as Tony and Rhodey make their way over to the couches.

As the night wanes on, Steve’s arm ends up over the back of your seat.

You don’t think about it.

—-

“Are you sure you don’t have anything better to be doing?” You ask, a little exasperatedly.

It wasn’t that you weren’t thankful, but Steve was too good to know when to say ‘no’. Not that you’d even asked him, he’d offered and then showed up at your door bright and early anyway, regardless of your non-committal answer.

He just shrugs and shoves his hands in his pockets.

“Day off.” He tells you. You squint. You know now thanks to Sam that he wasn’t lying, but it still makes you squirm a little.

“Well, whatever. Don’t come complaining to me about splinters.” You snark, moving ahead to inspect the branches of the next pine tree along.

Steve pouts.

“But you know those tweezers are too small for my fingers…”

“Oh, what a hard life, Steven! You never get sick and are basically invincible… except for those damn pesky tweezers!”

Steve nudges you in the side, as you laugh.

“Don’t let the bad guys know about that.” You side-eye him and he gives you his best puppy-dog eyes.

“You’re the only one who knows my secret.” He says, with over-the-top sincerity.

“I trust you.” He adds a moment later, and you snort.

“Well, that sounds like a ‘you’ problem.”

You continue to sass and snark at each other as you walk down the rows and rows of trees, not even really looking at the pines, until you realise that an hour is probably too long to spend tree-shopping, and pick out the nearest half decent one.

Steve carries it to his car, as he’d offered to do in the first place, and you strap it up tight before getting in.

The conversation flows easy and light on the drive back, and when Steve’s phone rings, you switch instead to staring out the window at all the Christmas lights and decorations the city had put up in preparation.

“Hello? Oh, yes…?” You can only hear Steve’s side of the conversation, not blessed with super-hearing like he was, but you turn your head, intrigued when he seems to falter.

“Today? Well I… in twenty minutes? Oh, um…” He looks over at you, a frown pulling at his brows.

“If you need to stop somewhere…” You whisper, waving a hand to confirm you were okay with the detour, and he shoots you a tight smile, before setting his eyes back on the road.

“I can do that, no problem. Okay. Thank you. Bye.”

“What was that about?” You ask immediately, curious now that you were seemingly being dragged along.

“I had to get a suit altered— for Tony’s christmas party on the weekend…” He begins and you ‘ah’. Tony had declared all attendees go all-out. No jeans were allowed, it was supposed to be a strictly formal event.

“But the owner of the store just realised my appointment clashed with her flight out of the city this afternoon.”

“So we’re going to pick it up?”

“Yeah.”

You hum, and nod, fiddling with the radio now as you drive past the turn off for your place. Steve had promised to help you carry your tree inside, and given the time, it would probably take too long for him to make his appointment if he took you home first. You didn’t mind though.

The tailor he’d chosen wasn’t some fancy, high end retail store, but you never expected it would be. Instead, Steve holds open the door to a small, mom-and-pop type shop, with dark wooden interiors that just screamed old-school class. You enter and promptly take a seat in the showroom as Steve is whisked away to try on his suit for a final inspection.

You’re staring mindlessly at your phone when he steps back in, a little awkward, clearly asking what you think.

“Well, well, well Rogers… So you do clean up nicely after all!” You tease, standing and moving closer as he rolls his eyes at you and faces the mirror. You watch him smooth down the suit jacket, looking a little self-conscious if you’re being honest, but then his eyes find yours again in the mirror.

“You’re going, right?”

You nod, shrugging your shoulders a bit.

“I think Tony would have my head if I made up an excuse… and I kinda like christmas parties… dressing up, mistletoe and all that.” You wave a hand, and Steve turns back around to face you.

“Come with me.” He says, breathily, like he’d been holding the words in for so long he just couldn’t keep them anymore. You freeze, staring up at his hopeful expression, feeling for all the world like your veins had suddenly turned to ice.

“What?” You can’t help but ask, and the blond shifts on his feet, lifting his chin a little more confidently this time.

“Come with me. To the party.”

You aren’t sure how you hear him so clearly when your heart beat thunder loudly in your ears, and suddenly, the walls in the room begin to close in on you. You shake your head with a frown and take a step back from him.

“W-what? No, Steve, I…”

Steve straightens a little, his brow furrowing now and you struggle to speak, panic rising in your chest.

“Steve, we’re— we’re just friends. This isn’t— we aren’t dating!” You stress, still shaking your head, and still stepping away from him. Steve ‘s jaw sets a little and he gets that look on his face like when he had something to say, but he knew it would be incendiary.

“Maybe not, but I don’t think we’ve been just friends for a while now, and you know that.” He says instead, voice tight, and you suck in air sharply.

You knew this was a mistake.

You knew doing anything outside of your agreed-upon interactions was dangerous, and yet, like an idiot, you’d gone there anyway.

“Steve— I am—” You lower your voice somewhat, remembering where you are, and hold out a hand.

“This, what we’re doing now, this is fine. Nobody gets hurt, it’s fun and—”

“—Who's getting hurt exactly?” Steve cuts you off, and you barely refrain from yelling at him.

“Me! I am not going to sit around, waiting for you to find the time to see me! I’m not doing that again. I’m not playing second fiddle to your job!” You explode, immediately pulling back at the flash of grief that lances across Steve’s face.

You look away from him and rub at your temple.

“Every time you’ve called me, I’ve come.” Steve says, voice thick with hurt, and you clench your teeth.

“Every. Time.” He repeats, and you finally bring yourself to look at him.

“I am sorry that the lines got blurred. But I am not—” You stutter a little, choking on your words, but you clear your throat.

“I cannot do this again.”

And you leave.

You run away, because it was less scary than whatever Steve wanted from you. Less scary than opening yourself up and getting hurt like before.

And you were an idiot for it.

You hate yourself for crying when you get home, sans christmas tree now, and a big part of you is glad Steve doesn’t follow you, or try to call. A bigger part of you cries that he doesn’t, and at the fact that despite trying to keep things casual, keep him at arm's length, you’d gone and gotten all tangled up anyway.

It was a mistake.

You knew from the start, but you can’t even revel in your own self pity for too long, because soon enough you’re coming to your goddamn senses.

You were a complete and total bitch.

Steve had hurt you, yes, and maybe springing a date on you like that wasn’t the best way, but even you aren’t dumb enough to not notice his change. He had hurt you, and then he’d changed. He’d taken a step away from leading, to be more present, to be more around, and he was right, he had come every time you’d needed him, for whatever reason. He’d kept your scheduled meetings, even when he was dead tired and really could have called them off. 

He’d done everything you could have asked for.

And you hadn’t even asked for it.

—-

Your nerves nearly consume you when you step through the doorway and into the open space of the residential floors. Tony had gone just as nuts with the decorating as you’d imagined. Not a single corner of the room looked like Christmas hadn’t thrown up all over it. Yet, even your love of this time of year couldn’t trump the anxiety that rolls back over you as you look around the room.

You’re actually glad that you can’t spot him right away. It lets you relax, greet other people, ease into the nerves you feel. Besides, if your little meltdown had sent him back into the arms of whatever-her-name-was, you might just be sick.

The jig is up however, when Sam Wilson slings an arm around your shoulder, bright smile betrayed only by the knowing glance he gives you.

“Didn’t think I’d end up seeing you tonight.” he says casually, leading you toward the bar, and you shrug as best you can.

“I’ve got to grovel at some time. Christmas party seemed dramatic and cinematic enough.”

Sam gives you a sympathetic look and squeezes your arm.

“He isn’t upset with you.”

“He should be.” You say, shaking your head and dropping your gaze.

Sam sighs and removes his arm from you so that he can signal the bartender.

“He’s upset with himself.”

You roll your eyes.

“Of course he is. Cause he’s so damned good.” You kick the bar lightly in frustration, and sink a little more into self-hatred. Sam slides a shot of clear liquor toward you.

“Courage.” He says, tipping his own back seconds later, and you relent, plastering on a tight smile before pouring the contents of the glass down your throat.

It burns, and fills your nose with the distinct taste of vodka, and you scrunch up your face, Sam laughing at you when you put your glasses back.

“I’d like less courage next time.” You tell him, and he shrugs.

“I doubt you’ll be saying that in five seconds.” His eyes skip over your shoulder and you frown.

“Wait, why?” A quick glance behind you makes you panic, wide eyes finding a grinning Sam once again, who is already slinking off.

“Sam!”

It’s useless though, he’s gone in seconds, and quickly you become very aware of the man who’d come to stand a small distance away from you at the bar. Biting the bullet, you swallow thickly, and turn to look at him.

Steve looks much like he had the last time you’d seen him, which really only makes your stomach churn more in memory of the way you’d acted.

“Hey…” You greet, worried perhaps he might ignore you, even though you know damn well he could hear you over the crowd. But he doesn’t, eyes swivelling to find your like it was what he’d been waiting for. He gives you a conservative smile and nod.

“Hey.”

The one word alone, filled with so much simple sadness makes the damn break, and before you even realise what you’re doing, you’ve stepped right beside him, hands wringing in front of you.

“Steve, I am so sorry. What I said— I was just— I was a bitch.” You finish lamely, but he only looks down at you, slightly bewildered, as if he really hadn’t expected you to say anything about what had happened.

He turns in to face you, feeding off of your distressed body-language, one hand coming up to touch your arm, and he looks around concerned for a moment before back at you.

“You wanna go somewhere else…?” He asks, and again, you wallow in self-hatred at the way that he so quickly seemed ready to defend your clear anxiety. You swallow, and nod, letting him lead you away from the bar.

He guides you through familiar rooms just as decked out and just as full with people, until you reach a small, quiet staircase, one you know leads up to the private floors.

You’re well aware of how long it had been since you’d last stood in his apartment, and it only spurs your nerves on more. Maybe you should have waited… maybe the christmas party wasn’t the ideal time…

“As far as I’m concerned, you have nothing to apologise for.” Steve says, which only makes you scoff, rounding on him where he stands.

“Steve, you’ve got to be kidding!”

He only shrugs, sad eyes turning down and you sigh.

“Everything I said was… I shouldn’t have said it. You were right. Things haven’t exactly been ‘casual-hookups-no-strings-attached’ for a long time.” You fiddle with the hem of your sleeve and shuffle on your feet.

“I… I like what we had. Just… hanging out. You’re… you’re so easy to be with, and I like that, Steve. I never feel like we’re on different pages, you always get me, you’re great in bed… I— I like being with you, so much…” You pause and take a shaky breath.

“And I know that you’ve been trying. You’ve… frankly, you’ve changed more than I was even asking for back when—” You cut yourself off and shake your head.

“My point is. I’m sorry. I was a bitch because having you in my life in some way is better than not at all, and if things ended the way they did last time, I wouldn’t be able to even look at you— Am I even making any sense?!” You drag a hand over your hair and sigh. Steve moves toward you, slowly, and you force yourself to look at him.

“Yes.” He says, stopping just in front of you.

“I think.” He adds a moment later and you can’t help but laugh. You shake your head.

“I’m sorry.” You say again, and watch him stare at you, before nodding.

“Thank you. I’m sorry too.” He says, though you can’t even imagine what for right now.

“Is it too late to retroactively accept your invitation to the party?” You joke, and his face breaks into a smile, a light chuckle leaving him.

“I think so… Didn’t get to pick you up or anything…”

You click your fingers in an ‘oh shoot’ gesture, and Steve grabs your hand before you can drop it again. You watch as slowly he brings it to his lips, kissing the backs of your fingers.

Your breathing gets shallower at the action, and you wonder if him bringing you here, to his private rooms, was really a good thing after all. You rescind your earlier thoughts. You’re glad you didn’t wait, you’re glad you decided to do this during the Christmas party.

He pulls you closer in a way that feels only natural, and for the first time in a long time, you don’t have to pretend that any of this is real, you don’t need the fantasy.

Steve kisses you long and sweet, his hands firm and secure where he holds you, a silent promise. You think it feels different to how he normally holds you, but you think it’s probably just in your head. You bite at his lower lip, pulling on it just slightly, and his chest rumbles, his hands moving then, squeezing and pawing at you, feet blindly guiding you, moving towards his bedroom.

Clothes are peeled off and set aside, when you try to move atop of him, he only grabs your wrists, trapping you in place against his mattress, and you don’t even care. Steve was here, with you, in his room, and it was real.

He has you face down, pillow raising your hips slightly, his body draped over yours warm and heavy, sweat slicked and firm. Your thighs are only just parted, enough for him to slip inside you, so close, so deep you think you see stars with each thrust. He moves slow, arms caged around your own, hand splayed out against your throat, lifting your head up and back so he can kiss you as he moves, taste each moan he creates as he creates it.

You feel overwhelmed and utterly saturated in him, picked to pieces and pulled apart, his cock sheathed so deep, his weight bearing down on you, you’re drowning in him.

He kisses the back of your neck and shoulders, resting his forehead against you as he picks up his pace, driving faster and deeper, your desperate words of filth and want muffled into the pillow you hold tightly. You think your nails might’ve ripped a hole in the fabric, but you aren’t sure.

You come together, heady cries filling the air before dissipating into heavy, breathy sighs. He doesn’t leave you, stays right there atop of you, still inside you as you both come down. He kisses along your spine again, sweeps some hair out of the way to reach your neck, and that place behind your ear.

“Am I too heavy?” He asks a moment after, voice muffled in the skin of your shoulder, and you laugh, shaking your head, and peering up at him as best you can. He was atop you, sure, but his arms still held most of his weight, never too rough, always just enough.

“No. I like it.” You say, feeling a little shy. All the times you’d slept together, in a relationship, and out of it, this felt real, like all else before was just practice. Steve shifts his hips a little and you suck in a sharp breath.

“Yeah?” He asks, eyelashes fluttering just slightly. You nod.

“I like when you’re here… like this. And you don’t hold back on me.” He lifts his head a little and raises an eyebrow.

“I don’t think I’ve ever held back on you, when you’ve asked.” He reminds, and you hide your face, laughing into the pillow.

“Well maybe sometimes…” He admits, likely referencing all the times you’d beg him for ‘harder’ and he’d adjust his angle instead, already fucking you as hard as he felt comfortable with.

After a few seconds, he lets up a little to allow you to roll over, though he still hangs over you, chest to chest.

“I never liked leaving after.” He admits, dropping his lips to your cheek.

“I hated going back to my own bed, knowing you wouldn’t be with me in the morning. I don’t think I’ve ever said it but,” He lifts his head again and you stare up at him.

“Waking up with you in the mornings after we’d stayed together, it always felt like a battle to get up and leave. I always thought ‘today I don’t need to run. You can take a break’.”

“But you never did?” You wonder, and see the regret flash over his features.

“I should have. Maybe not all the time, but… I should have.” You purse your lips and try to catch his guilty eyes.

“Steve… I never wanted you to completely overhaul your life. I still don’t want you to do that. That part of you, the part that wants to help people and be there for them, I love that. It’s what fundamentally makes you you.” You push back the hair that hangs on his forehead and sigh, tracing the edges of his face now instead.

“I don’t care if six out of seven days a week you need to get up before me, as long as I have that seventh day…” His face softens from the self-judgement you could see reflected in his features and you smile.

“I just… I don’t know, I want to feel like at least a bit of a priority. I know that’s not always going to be possible, I get that… but…”

“I know. I’m sorry I ever made you feel like you weren’t.”

“And last-minute cancellations should be the exception not the rule!” You joke, and he hangs his head again, but chuckles against the crook of your neck.

“Understood.”

You lay like that for a while, just relishing in one another's presence, feeling your chest’s rise and fall against each other. When he moves next, it’s because his phone buzzes loudly on the bedside table, and you watch him reach blindly out to grab it.

You play with the hair on his arm as he checks the message, the amused sigh he gives off a second later heavy against your chest.

“It’s Buck,” He tells you.

“Says the fellas are getting ready for a round at the pool table…” He trails off as another message comes through, and this time you see him roll his eyes, and chuck his phone to the side.

“He wants to know if you’re going to kiss the winner again.” Steve’s voice is amused still as he finally crawls off of you, and helps you up. You both know you can’t, and shouldn’t stay locked up here all night.

“Well, I tell you what, Rogers, you don’t go easy on Barnes again, and I’ll give you what I promised last time.”

For a moment Steve just frowns in confusion, but as it slowly dawns on him, a challenging, determined glint fills his eyes.

“Better start keeping score then, sweetheart.”