#i trimmed the long fur on his legs (& between his toes) because he kept dragging large ice balls around and he looked like

[hedgehog-moss]

This week was fairly mild and we had to climb higher and higher to find a layer of snow that Pandolf deemed satisfying, but the effort is worth it.

[hereticpriest]

Powdered Sugar Chapter 2

Warnings: Kinda nsfw I guess? Nothing actually happens, it’s just thoughts and not super descriptive. Descriptions of domestic violence. Reference to past rape.

Duncan changes before going over to Margaery’s for dinner, though he can’t necessarily nail down the reason why. He puts on a black sweater he hasn’t worn yet and a pair of trim black pants, fixes his hair, and grabs his bottle of retirement whiskey in case Minnie feels like indulging. With such a short walk between houses, he can’t imagine why not. He’s surprisingly fond of his new neighbour, which may have something to do with his instinct to protect kicking in, and perhaps something to do with the fact that he wants her. Both feelings often lived together, as did his insufferable interest in women far younger than him.

When he approaches Margaery’s cabin, he notices her through the window singing while her dog, Theo, dances around her feet and howls along with her. From what he can hear, her voice is beautiful, but scratchy with disuse. He heads to the door and knocks gently, listening to her hush the dog and call out that she’s coming. He hears a crash and almost instinctively opens the door but stops himself.

“Are you okay?” he shouts, and he hears muffled cursing before a response.

“Yes, yes, I’m fine, sorry, I just kicked my gun safe on accident.” Minnie says just before opening the door hunched over with her left foot crossed over her right knee, her hand squeezing her toes. She smiles wryly at him, adjusting her cozy socks, “Sorry, I was going to wear normal socks, but the floor is cold unless you’re by the fire.”

Duncan simply nods, stepping past her into the house when she moves aside for him. He removes his shoes and holds up the bottle he’d brought, smile tugging at his lips when she cheers. The house smells amazing, and he finds himself drawn towards her kitchen. She’s dressed comfortably in a pair of black leggings and a navy sweater dress with pockets in the front, a metal lighter in one pocket and a pack of cigarettes in the other. He likes it. He’s used to his flashy world of bright colours and women dressed in tiny clothes. It is surprisingly sexy to see a woman dressed comfortably. Is this what happens when you retire? You get old and suddenly cozy socks and leggings are sexier than miniskirts and backless dresses?

Minnie smiles as she watches Duncan breathe in the smell of their dinner, Theo hot on his heels for pets. When he bends down to pet the dog, she eyes him appreciatively for a moment before heading over to check the lasagna.

“Hey, Duncan? Can you set the table while I finish the salad? Don’t worry, it’s not a boring salad. I put some effort into it actually being worth eating.” Minnie laughs to herself, slicing grapes into halves with practiced ease. She feeds a couple of slices of apple to Theo as she goes, listening to the gentle sounds of clinking as Duncan puts down plates and cutlery.

“Thank you.” Minnie’s voice is low, almost a purr. She finds it comforting that Duncan is so quiet. He fits into the comfortable hum of her cabin, the only sounds usually the crackling of her fireplace, Theo panting, and the occasional record on her old record player. She sometimes sings, but that is a recent development. She hasn’t felt comfortable or happy enough to sing in a long, long time.

“Are you a hunter?” Duncan asks, his voice quiet and rumbly, and she can’t help the shiver that runs down her spine.

“Oh, no. I mean, I can… I know how. My dad was a hunter. They’re for… self defense.” Minnie swallows around the lump in her throat, “I should… actually tell you this. As my neighbour. I just… I just don’t w-wanna ruin the mood before we eat.”

“It won’t.” Duncan replies simply, opening the bottle of whiskey and picking up the two glasses she had laid out. He pours them both two fingers and slides the glass across the island to her.

“Thank you. Uhm, I… I moved out here for a reason. I was dating a guy and it… I mean, it was the typical abuse story, you know? He was nice and then he began verbally abusing me, and then gaslighting me, and then punching my teeth in. Then, he’d soothe me and apology and say it was never going to happen again. Eventually, after he got drunk one night and raped me when I refused him, I broke out of things and decided to leave. He duct-taped my mouth, tied me up in the basement and kept me there for a week before I managed to get free. He raped me while he had me down there, but he didn’t hit me. I was tied up, so he didn’t feel the need, I guess. The police were fucking useless, as there were no reports of abuse and no evidence of him holding me hostage. He beat the shit out of me again, but a neighbour got me out while he was sleeping and brought me to a women’s shelter. Lived there for a while, got better, got an apartment. Got Theo. And then he found me.” Minnie isn’t looking at him, but she can feel his eyes on her. Theo lays at her feet, comforting her with his presence.

“I got away again, packed up all my shit, and found this cabin. I had been training with my gun since I got away from him the first time. It’s been… Nearly a year, actually, since I left him. Hard to believe.” Minnie licked her lower lip, finally looking up at Duncan. He looked murderous, but she wasn’t afraid of him in that moment, oddly enough. She felt safe, surprisingly.

“What does he look like? And his name.” Duncan asks, and Minnie finds a picture on her phone for him. He looks around Minnie’s age, broad chested and shouldered, maybe the same height as Duncan. His hair is brown, cut short military style, and his eyes are a cold blue.

“His name is Cody Grant.” Minnie informs him quietly, setting the salad on the table and taking the lasagna out to rest and cool before they eat. Duncan sits after she gently touches his shoulder, the contact drawing him out of the dozen imaginary murder scenarios going on in his head. They eat in relative silence, both being quite quiet people in general even without the emotional story. Minnie serves the lasagna when they finish their salad, with Duncan giving soft praise of the salad for being a good mix of vegetables and fruits that actually tasted good instead of tasting like bland lettuce. The lasagna goes down with the same silence followed by quiet appreciation, and the two down the rest of their whiskey nearly in unison.

“Dinner was nice.” Duncan says as he leads Minnie out onto the porch to smoke. Minnie smiles in return, putting her hand over his when he begins to take a cigarette of his own out.

“We can share, Duncan. I don’t know if I want a whole one right now.” Minnie hums, flicking open her lighter and lighting one of her own. She takes a long drag off of it, then hands it over to Duncan, shivering as a gust of wind bit through her clothes. A warm jacket is placed around her shoulders, and she sighs contently, bumping her hip against Duncan’s.

“Thank you, cher.” Minnie hums, taking the cigarette from his lips and taking another deep pull from it. She can feel Duncan’s eyes boring into her, but she doesn’t feel scared. Another puff, and she lifts the cigarette to Duncan, her fingertips brushing his lips as she slid the cigarette between them. It almost felt like he was leaning in to the touch.

“D-do you w-wanna stay for a movie? Uhm… uh unless you’ve got plans, of course?” Minnie hesitated, but Duncan merely nodded.

“I was just going to watch one at home. Company would be better.” Duncan replies, taking a puff from his cigarette, then stubbing it out and walking back into the cabin with her. They watch a romantic comedy together, tucked onto her little sofa together. It surprises her how quickly she finds herself comfortable with Duncan, but he is just a very easy person to be around. Theo lays at their feet, dozing away in the light and heat of the fire. Minnie falls asleep just before the credits, curled up against Duncan’s side. Duncan joins her moments later, the warmth of a body against his lulling him to sleep.

When Minnie wakes, Duncan is gone. His jacket is still draped around her, and she’s tucked under a blanket. The fire has been fueled again so that it wouldn’t die on her, and Theo has only moved a couple of feet through the night. She sighs, surprised to have slept without nightmares, and stretches until a series of pops in her joints break the silence. She makes breakfast, letting out Theo partway through cooking when he wakes up to the smell of bacon. In a particularly good mood, Minnie decides to go into town after breakfast to return her DVDs and perhaps rent a couple more. Her day is dull, but she sees Duncan when he goes outside to smoke, and she waves at him from her own porch, a smile tugging at her lips.

They spend the next couple of days together in one way or another. On Monday, Duncan goes out to chop wood while Minnie is out for a run, and by the time she returns, he’s lost his sweater and his undershirt. She watches for a moment, feeling somehow like she’s seeing something she shouldn’t be seeing, especially when she notices his vast collection of scars. She had noticed the first time she had seen him shirtless, but this was a longer view, and she wasn’t nearly as shocked. When Duncan notices her, he gives a little wave, so she approaches and tries to look at anything but his chest. He’s got a lovely coat of fur on his chest and belly, and she has an awful itch to see how thick it is around his dick. The thought of which immediately has her blushing, taking a not-so-subtle look at his crotch, and stammering about needing to check something at her house. Duncan watches her go, partly because he’s questioning what the hell just happened, and partly because she’s wearing yoga pants that hug her ass so tightly it looks like they’re painted on.

Tuesday, Minnie brings Duncan some croissants and muffins, claiming they are extras from the batches she made and that she’ll never be able to eat them all on her own. Duncan does not complain and is very pleased when the sight of him in his reading glasses has her blushing and stammering again on her way out.

Wednesday, they meet in town for lunch at the local diner and then have dinner at Duncan’s cabin, where they once again drink too much and fall asleep watching a movie. Minnie wakes from a nightmare to Duncan holding her against him, petting her hair and shushing her. She takes advantage of the moment to snuggle in close, enjoying the gentle human contact after so long without. Duncan lulls her to relaxation again, then carries her back to her cabin and tucks her into bed. He lets Theo out for her, then puts him back in the house and heads home to find rest for himself again.

Thursday, his accountant calls to arrange an appointment to look into some issues with his other properties, and he agrees to a meeting on Monday. He spends most of the day trying to decide whether or not it is a good idea to ask his neighbour to go with him. He waits until after dinner, knocking at her cabin door and asking if she minds company. He’s brought a book, and she understands his intentions, so they end up sitting on the couch together with quiet piano music in the background. Her feet are under his thigh, and he occasionally takes a break from reading to rub her ankles and calves when his eyes get sore. It feels right, and good, and neither of them say it, but they both wonder if there’s such a thing as ‘meant to be’. Duncan doesn’t ask her about Seattle until he’s about to leave, and he’s shocked when Minnie agrees to spend Saturday to Tuesday with him. She doesn’t complain when he says he’ll pay for Theo to be boarded, and for her flight, and for the hotel. Minnie just thanks him sweetly and presses a kiss to his stubbly cheek.

Friday, Duncan arranges the trip. He shells out, because he can and because he wants a little bite of what his life used to be. He wants to make Minnie feel special, part of him hoping his actions can speak louder than his words since he can’t seem to find the right ones to tell Minnie how he feels. They’ve known each other less than a month, but he feels at home with her, and his retirement is beginning to feel quite good. He checks in with Minnie in the afternoon to find her packed and cheery, cupcakes littering every counter and her table. She gives him one, and when he gets icing in his moustache, she wipes it away with her thumb, then leans in to kiss away another smudge of icing on the corner of his lips. He melts into it, tilting his head and kissing her as if she were as delicate as a butterfly wing. Minnie feels safe, and warm, and home. Once the kiss is broken, she presses her forehead to his and brushes her nose against his with a smile.

Duncan thinks for a moment that maybe this is what peace feels like.

[imaginetonyandbucky]

Bucky leaving his cat at Tony's place for a few days and when he takes the cat back it takes every opportunity to run away to Tony's house. Tony spoiled it buying expensive toys and food during the days he took care of it. Solition: move in together.

A/N: Title and idea taken from Old 97’s song bythe same name. Dear prompter, sorry I switched the character relationshipsaround, but @27dragons recently wrote a story with Bucky’s cat that liked Tony,so I didn’t want to copy that. Also, the idea got away from me, so this story will be divided in three parts (like all of Rome)

Murder (or a Heart Attack)

Part One

When Bucky Barnes ran out of food, he did it in style. There wasliterally nothing in his pantry that wasn’t an ingredient (chicken stock orflour or sugar) or a condiment (capers, pimentos, mustard, vinegar) but nothingto make an actual meal with. Even the half empty boxes of pasta were gone,sacrificed to a careful array of timers as he added different sorts of pasta tothe pot and dosed the whole thing with butter and grated cheese and called itfood.

“Fuck,” he said. He was going to have to give up, put on pants andshoes and go to the fucking store.

The worst thing was, he was actually freaking hungry. Like,stomach crawling out of his throat to go hunt down the wild cup o’ soup, can’twait for take-out hungry.

He couldn’t possibly go to the grocery like that, he’d end up withfifty boxes of Twinkies and a 20-pack of ramen. And an apple, if he was feelingparticularly guilty about his terrible life choices, that he wouldn’t rememberhe had and would go bad in his fruit bowl.

Oh, wait. Apples.

Bucky bounced up onto his toes and shoved the bag of flour out ofthe way. He’d had some plans – he always made plans, and he just never fuckingfollowed through – of making an apple tart. Which meant– Aha! Yes! Score! Acan of apple-pie filling.

He didn’t have the time or inclination to actually make a piecrust, although he did know how, and he had some butter in the fridge. Maybenext time. He dug around in his utensil drawer and opened the can of piefilling. He was still chasing the overly sugary and cinnamon-spiced fruitaround the bottom of the can when the doorbell rang.

Bucky shuffled over to the door. No one ever came to visit andrang the bell; Steve had a key. The UPS driver often did a ring and run, andwhile Bucky couldn’t remember ordering anything off the internet recently, hehad been known to do depression-based insomnia-fueled Amazon Prime therapysometimes. That was always kinda like Christmas, because Bucky never remembereddoing it until the banana slicer or whatever it was actually arrived.

So when he opened the door to a man wearing a three-piece suit,Bucky didn’t quite know what to do.

“Um…”

The man looked him up and down. And then up again. Bucky might…not have been wearing pants. Yeah. Bathrobe with the long sleeves that coveredhis scarred left arm, tee, boxers, and his stuffed animal shark slippers thathis sister gave him as a joke and he wore specifically to piss her off.

Bucky leaned against his doorframe. “Yeah?”

“Look, okay, probably a bad time, but my normal pet-sitter is outof town, and I don’t have anyone else I can ask, and um, I don’t have time tomake arrangements for kenneling, and I was wondering – it really is anemergency – if you could just feed my cat for a few days while I’m out oftown?”

Bucky stared at the guy. He was gorgeous, in an upper crust sortof way, with a fancy-trimmed little goatee and a pair of pale orange sunglassesthat should have clashed with the three-piece button up he was wearing andsomehow didn’t.

Mobile readers, more below the break. You can read all of tisfan’s stuff on A03 eventually

“Do I know you?” That probably wasn’t the best question in theworld, because no, of course Bucky didn’t know this guy. Bucky didn’t… dopeople for the most part.

“Um, probably not?” the guy said. “I’m Tony. Tony Stark. I live inyour neighboring unit.” He pointed to the door next to Bucky’s. There weretwelve units total in Bucky’s building, but Bucky usually kept his ball cap onand his head down whenever he left the building at all, so he mostly didn’trecognize his neighbors, except by their footwear. Speaking of… he let his gazedrift downward. He didn’t know those shoes, but he’d recognize those legsanywhere. Yep. Next door neighbor. The one with the great ass.

“Bucky Barnes,” he introduced himself, because that’s what you didwhen someone gave you their name. It was automatic. Instinct.

Shit. Now he’d actually spoken to a neighbor, which meant saidneighbor would probably want to talk to him again, and while this particularneighbor didn’t seem too bad – especially when Bucky could watch him walk away– that would mean other neighbors might start talking to him and… well, maybeSteve could help him get a new place.

Bucky deliberately didn’t think about the fact that Steve wouldprobably not help him get a new place if he said he wanted to avoid talking tohis neighbors. Steve had been adamant that Bucky wasn’t going to leave the cityand live somewhere as a hermit out in the middle of nowhere where Stevecouldn’t at least ocme drag him out of the house once a week.

Not to mention the fact that wanting to move just so he didn’thave to talk to the neighbor – the incredibly hot, exactly Bucky’s typeneighbor – was just pathetic.

Bucky wasn’t quite willing to admit, even to Steve, that he’dmoved all the way from bad-coping mechanisms to pathetic.

“So, can you? I mean, feed the cat?”

“You’re gonna let a perfect stranger into your house,” Buckycommented idly. “What if I turn out to be a psycho?”

“First, you are a perfect stranger,” Tony said, and Bucky was leftblinking trying to figure out what that meant. “Second, if you were a psycho,you probably wouldn’t have brought it up. Third, and maybe you missed thispart, but I know where you live.”

“Well, yeah,” Bucky said, reasonably. “And there’s probably notenough stuff in your place to make it worth the effort of robbing you and thenmoving out.” Wasn’t he just thinking about moving out, though, because he wastalking to the neighbor? Except there was something kinda nice about talking tothis guy. Not quite like talking to Steve, but nice. Not nerve-wracking,weirdly enough.

Tony checked his watch, then grinned. “Just the fact that you’vealready thought of that should worry me.”

You shouldn’t be worried. Bucky didn’t say that.“Okay, so what do you want me to do?”

“Come on, come over,” Tony said. He reached out and grabbedBucky’s wrist, which under most normal circumstances would have had Buckyyanking backward to retreat into his unit. He might even have pushed the deskin front of the front door for a while; forget food, retreat into his sanctumand shudder.

But Tony didn’t set off all those alarms in his head, and just thefact that it didn’t made Bucky’s breath come a little faster.

Bucky got the fastest tour of Tony’s place imaginable. “Here’s thekitchen, there’s the food, here’s feeding instructions. Don’t worry about thelitter, I have an automated scooper, a total piece of shit, ha ha, that was apun, but I did some upgrades to it and now it’s quite efficient and doesn’tscare her.”

“Does she need company?” Bucky asked. He didn’t know much aboutcats, but Steve’s boyfriend had a dog, and the dog got lonely enough during theday that Clint had eventually had to get a pet-walker to come by the apartmenttwice a day while the two of them were at work, and on date night, Clint tookthe dog to a doggy day-care.

“Well, U won’t mind. She’s a lap kitty, but if you don’t want toget covered in orange fur, she’ll be okay for a few days on her own.”

“You named your cat… You?”

“U, like the letter. I dunno, when she was a kitten, I just calledher Hey You while I was waiting for something to occur to me. She’s got anofficial name on her vet records and stuff – Butterfingers – but I just stillcall her U most of the time, so… eh, what can I say?”

“Fair enough,” Bucky said.

“Anyway, here’s a copy of the key, here’s my cell phone number.Text me or something right away so I have your number. Not sure when I’m goingto be back, business can be tricky sometimes, but it shouldn’t be more than aweek, okay? Okay. Thank you very much.”

Tony had said the cat was orange, but what Bucky was expecting andwhat he got were two entirely different things.

Bucky was expecting an orange tabby, what his Ma had calledmarmalade, like Garfield was, theoretically.

What he got was a plush, red Abyssinian cat with huge green eyesand fur the color of the edge of sunset, dark orange, almost red, with blacktips. The cat pounced on him almost immediately when he entered the house byhimself, grabbing hold of his calf with fat, soft paws, claws absolutelynowhere in evidence and a throaty, rusty sort of meow.

“Hello,” Bucky said to the cat. “Hungry?”

The cat gave an answering meow, which seemed like a good enoughanswer, so Bucky went in the kitchen and attempted to figure out the food.There were a lot of instructions written down on a sheet of paper, which Buckyread slowly. U did not appreciate the delay at all, batting at the end ofBucky’s bathrobe and yowing piteously at the delay.

Finally, directions interpreted, Bucky gave the cat her half canof food, plus two treats and a shake of “food seasoning and vitamins” on top.“You eat better than I do,” Bucky commented, putting the bowl down. The cat wassoon eating noisily, but when Bucky turned to leave the kitchen, she cried andchased after him, following him all the way back to the door.

“What? I fed you,” Bucky protested.

“Yow!”

Bucky took a picture of the cat and texted it to Tony. Your catdoesn’t want to eat.

U got between Bucky and the door, stropping against Bucky’s legsand nipping at his ankle whenever he tried to open the door.

New Text from Tony:

She’s a social eater. Go keep her company while she eats, if youhave time. Otherwise, she’ll eat when she gets hungry.

“You want me to sit with you while you eat? Seriously?”

“Yowwwwww.”

Fine, whatever. Bucky trudged back into Tony’s neat little kitchenand pulled out a chair. Satisfied, the cat went back to her bowl and startedeating, making little pleased, purring noises.

Your cat is weird.

New text from Tony:

Like owner, like pet, I imagine.

You’re a social eater? Bucky texted back.

New text from Tony:

I eat with my cat almost every night, so yeah, I guess? Peppersays it’s good for me, I wasn’t eating much before I got the cat. Therapy, Iguess.

Bucky looked around Tony’s kitchen, then curiosity got the betterof him and he found himself peeking in the cabinets and fridge. You could learna lot about people by what they kept in their kitchens and medicine cabinets.

Unlike Bucky, Tony was stocked for some unknown zombie outbreak.Tony had tinned varieties of just about everything, including tinned chickenand tuna, peaches, pears, and jars of chunked pineapple, canned slicedpotatoes, jars of pickles, a veritable mountain of jarred spagetti sauces,plastic containers of individual servings of pudding (chocolate andbutterscotch), multiple packages of bread-maker breads, individual microwavablemug-cakes, four flats of bottled water.

Okay, I know I’m being nosy, but what the hell? Are you expectinga shortage in tinned tuna?

New text from Tony:

I have anxiety. Buying food seems to help. There’s some leftoverpizza in the fridge, if you want it. It’ll probably go stale before I’m home.

Well, so there was. Bucky grinned, delighted.

You eat pineapple on pizza.

New text from Tony:

Yeah, I’m a heathen, I know.

You’re my new best friend and I love you. He probably shouldn’t send that, so Bucky contented himself with, Nah,I like it. My favorite.

Bucky helped himself to the rest of the pizza while U finished herdinner. Then washed her paws and face. Then jumped in Bucky’s lap and turnedaround a few times, eventually falling asleep with her head on Bucky’s knee.

He took another picture and texted it to Tony. Help. I’mtrapped.

New text from Tony:

Ask her if there’s a squirrel at the window.

“Um U,” Bucky said, hesitant. “Tony wants to know if there’s asquirrel at the window.”

The cat was up and out of his lap the instant the word squirrelcame out of his mouth. She raced across the kitchen and over to thedouble-window in the living room, making a little chut-chut sort of noise, taillashing.

Huh. Neat trick.

New text from Tony:

You should see it when there’s actually a squirrel there.

To Be Continued