#this will clear up tons and tons of area

[butchaholic]

finally bought some actual storage. had to choose between a dresser or some shelves (because shelves would also be good for other things) but determined a dresser so that my underwear won't be displayed...

[creaturetap]

read a review for arctic eggs (video game) that was like "at first, launching eggs into the stratosphere is funny, but it gets old after a while" which, first of all, is a hysterical thing to read about a game you haven't played and know almost nothing about yet. like what do you mean. you can do that.

anyway now that i have played the game a bit, yes that does happen, and no it has not got old yet.

[elainemorisi]

if it's not immediately obvious that the hobby is a kink it's totally tasteful to give it space in the literal entryway of one's house right :|

[sheliesshattered]

I can't believe it's somehow Friday already, and I haven't posted yet about Sunday's May the Fourth Star Wars Nite at Disneyland. After my last post about my Batuu Bounding projects a little over a week ago, I finished sewing the clasps onto my vest, gave it one last press, and called it done. I'm so pleased with how the vest turned out, with the improved fit and length over the first version, and I'm glad I didn't have to cut any corners to get it done in time.

With the vest finished on Thursday afternoon, that gave me a little bit of time to work on some of the accessories I wanted to add to the outfit: a remake of my kyber crystal necklace:

And a matched pair of magnetically-attached lapel communicator badge greeblies:

I did a lot of reading up on lapel greeblies and communicator badges that appear in official Star Wars media, as well as looked around a bunch of fan-made ones. Most fan-made ones are 3D printed these days, but I don't have access to a 3D printer, so I rounded up some craft foam and a bit of plastic from an egg carton that had a cool texture, and checked my aging paint supply to see what colors I could make work. Lapel greeblies seen in Star Wars are almost always silver metal colors, with red, yellow, and blue accent colors, so I stuck with those.

I used some of the leatherworking tools I bought when making my belt to punch holes in some thinner craft foam, to make something that looks like a speaker grill. It's not perfect, but I'm really pleased with how these turned out, especially for a first attempt at making a Star Wars greeblie.

Sadly the one thing I did mess up was the polarity of one of the magnets I used (out of the 16 I glued on, four each on the interior and exterior portion of each greeblie), which I didn't discover until we were just about to walk out the door to head to Disneyland. Without enough time to glue it back on the right way, I just peeled the magnet off and left one upper corner without a magnet at all -- and at some point in the night, it snagged on something and fell off without either of us noticing. But the other one did survive the night (and is now being used as a fridge magnet lol), and we did manage to get this one photo of me wearing the greeblie on my vest:

I debated bringing my lightsaber and carrying bag again this year, but in the end I'm glad I did, as I was able to take it out and spin it around a few times throughout the night (including getting to jam out to the Modal Nodes at the end of the night). Besides that, we spent the evening eating yummy themed food, people watching (so many people in costume!) and riding a few rides.

Having now gotten to wear my Samæni Ray outfit to Disney on three very different days -- a random Tuesday in February for my birthday, a weekday Star Wars Nite in April last year, and Sunday May the Fourth Star Wars Nite this year -- Jack and I had some interesting discussions comparing and contrasting each of our Batuu trips.

This year's Star Wars Nite was much busier than last year, and I heard that the May the Fourth night was the only one that sold out. The costuming from other attendees was an order of magnitude better than last year, so we got to do more people watching, but the trade off was that the lines for everything were a lot longer. We did have a few moments of being in Batuu and not having anyone in our direct line of sight that wasn't in costume, which was particularly cool.

But at the same time, there's something really special about going to Galaxy's Edge on a slow day in the park and being the only ones Batuu Bounding. We got a lot more personal attention from Cast Members and were able to take our time since we stayed in that one area of the park all day long. The night we went for my birthday didn't have fireworks or a projection show, but that's the one thing I might want to try to schedule around if we were to do this again in the future.

As for future trips, we don't currently have anything planned, and I think we might be on a cooldown for Disney trips in general for a bit. It looks like the next Star Wars Celebration, in 2027, will be in Los Angeles, and if we were somehow able to go to that, I could see breaking out this outfit again (along with some more traditional cosplay), but other than that I think I may just try to incorporate some of the pieces into my wardrobe when I'm feeling particularly Star Wars-y.

And as for next sewing projects, once I cleaned up the mess I'd left on my craft table with all the last minute greeblie work, I got straight into drafting patterns for the next few things I want to sew. I've got one, maybe two more patterns I want to draft before I shift gears into actually sewing, but I'll make a post about each of those projects as they start to come together.

[seat-safety-switch]

One of humanity's greatest contributions to the art of creating chaos is the humble U-Haul rental van. All over this great country, people who have never driven anything larger than a minivan are now asked to operate a full-ton vehicle that's about as aerodynamic as an enormous cube on skinny tires is.

This wouldn't be a big problem, except U-Hauls, to a vehicle, are barely maintained. Here's why. When you are fleeing the depressing post-industrial city of your birth to move to a new, shiny town in order to get a job in theatre, you don't bring the U-Haul back to that cesspool. You just drop it off in the New Shiny Town U-Haul lot, and it stays there for awhile. The ownership of that U-Haul truck is sort of ambiguous, and so too is the responsibility for its maintenance.

Maybe it didn't belong to Trauma Town U-Haul, either, and nobody feels much like doing an oil change on it if it only benefits some asshole in another state that they've never met. After all, that truck could very well never make it back to its hometown before it is retired by way of a haggard father of two putting it into the ditch at 4am. They certainly aren't going to do something like replacing ball joints, or fixing that worn steering coupler, or replacing the cracked tires when the guy before you stole them for his Super Duty.

Learning how to drive an enormous, poorly-handling, badly-maintained vehicle in unfamiliar areas wouldn't be so bad if you weren't also stressed out at the time. Moving is hard, even when things are going great. Trying not to run over a Geo Metro when you're on your fourth run, haven't had a meal with vegetables in it since last week, and have exactly fifteen minutes to clear out before the landlord sets your coffee table on fire is significantly harder.

The next time you see someone in a U-Haul van, give them a bit of extra room. Let them know that you've got their back, and we're all aligned against the evil forces of capitalism that made this interaction as hellish as it needed to be. Maybe stay a little further back than that, in case they decide to pop a u-turn in the middle of the highway and end up firing an entire Ikea kitchen set through your windshield.

[sega-saturn-arcade]

Last night I got curious over what exactly happened between me and Medkit and why it escalated. I’ll be walking through this in chronological order as MUCH AS I CAN, with of course the gaps of memory of the exact happenings.

This is a long one so i’m going to preface this by saying I am not entirely sure what happened yet and I can’t for sure say “this feels 100% right” which leads me to believe there’s something else to it? It’ll come in time, I am sure

GREEN is CONFIRMED MEMORY.

ORANGE is UNSURE.

PINK is THEORY.

MEMORY GAPS are in [BRACKETS]

Another Important Note is that not all unsurety is entirely true as I misremember details sometimes, and not all theory is false—it is merely speculation upon what might’ve happened. If this makes sense

Memory under the cut. CW/TW for violence and description of eye trauma.

Medkit and I enter the lab that day. It’s early in the morning, so not many people are there. Yesterday we might have had a breakthrough on the crystals in some way that showed us that there was something that could change the entire world, that they were more than simply stupid powerful. We decide to sleep on it, and come back the next day to discuss and do whatever we had to in the lab that day. We begin talking about what the crystals can do, both standing bc at our usual station. I start the conversation with wonder. I cannot remember my exact words, but I said something along the lines of how the crystals were amazing and could change the world. He agrees, and I continue.

[There is a gap here of how exactly we got onto this topic as to what was said.] I say something about how the faction’s militaries could utilize the crystals to protect its citizens and fairly have defenses, something of that sort. He disagrees with me and says that he doesn’t trust the governments, and especially Blackrock’s. He wants something better for the world in a way to utilize the crystals, something about the people personally. [I GENUINELY cannot remember what exactly he wanted however I do know it was anything BUT the government.] Maybe he perhaps wanted to keep our work away in some way, MAYBE destroy some of it? Regardless, we started arguing over it. The fight escalates very badly, and I push him and he pushes back, which sets me off and makes me go after him by pushing him again but harder.

[Memory gap, I do not know what exactly happened to get to this point.] I was on top of him, and we were struggling with each other. I clawed out his eye somehow, either with my bare ass fingers or gloves or whatever or a sharp object. I did not cut his eye out meticulously as I was too angry to consider doing that. (also, he was a childhood friend, I think the maximum amount of violence is whatever managed to occur during this fight. I also had morals despite it all.) If anything, the reason i clawed it out was because i was swatting at him with one arm and I managed to get his eye. He then (I would obviously assume) got mad at me for this and [does something to get up and turn the tides in his favor] clawed out my eye the same way? If not, he might have grabbed something sharp like a lab scalpel and specifically sliced at me.

I don’t think we had ever seen each other that mad at each other before. We weren’t thinking straight at all, or at least I wasn’t. I don’t think I ever truly intended the fight to start to begin with.

(Here’s where things start to turn into gaps and bits and pieces. I’ll try to connect them the best I can.)

I think it’s important to note neither of us had our gears—they were left at home.

We punch at each other and throw things [details unremembered and muddled]. At one point, Medkit grabs a scalpel. He slices at me and gets me pretty good in some places. He ends up stabbing me a few times in non fatal places (but they were still deep cuts that hurt—I remember retaining scars on my body from some of those slashes and stabs) This was kind of ignored by me in the long run because of adrenaline, but this fight went on for a long while and I was moving around a lot which I don’t think helped the bleeding.

As I am writing out this memory I remember him with a lab scalpel in his hand, I was on the other side of the lab and I was bleeding, but I know I was not focused in the slightest because adrenaline was doing things to my brain. We’d known each other all our lives, but I have never seen such anger and spite in his eye (this was after he took mine, judging by the conscious realization of a void on my left side of my vision).

It felt like there was only negative emotion in that expression and thought. Someone who had such gentle expression usually and tone had shown a fierce, driven-by-anger expression. I think I would have thought on it more if I wasn’t in the moment of anger myself, but I think a part of me paused to think about that. It wasn’t scary, but there was an emotion I couldn’t and cannot describe to you that was in the back of my mind.

[Memory gap. The fight continued for a while but I don’t remember the details.] Regardless, I started getting weak from the wounds I sustained and the blood loss. I remember feeling tired and a little sick, and I wasn’t thinking clearly. [Memory gap again between that, though this was a bit closer] I know at one point we grabbed each other and with his full body at full force shoved me backwards. I remember slipping on the shattered glass on the floor and falling backwards. There was a cabinet island table thing there, and I remember the adrenaline wearing off at this point. I don’t think I could physically get up. I might’ve blacked out from blood loss and gone into medical shock/hypovolemic shock.

[Large memory gap between then and the time of which I was aware I was in the hospital] I am genuinely unsure how much I faded in and out of consciousness, or if I even did because once again there’s a big memory gap. However I do know that my recovery took longer than I assume Medkit’s did, because when I was able to fully recover he had fled Blackrock entirely. I blamed myself for starting that fight and blamed myself for him fleeing Blackrock for the period of my life that I remember from that point. [Note: Assuming it was critical, it could have taken anywhere up to a week or two, to at max a month. I cannot remember what time period or how long it took.]

That is about as much as I remember of that fight, and while it is still a lot of detail I still have yet to remember it entirely as again there is a TON of missing detail. cool awesome i love memories. Yippee!

[xazse]

I don’t know if you’re into it but liiikkkeee cow!hybrid reader x bull!hybrid jjk men or just any one of them! she’s a heifer ready for milking and breeding and the bulls have been reaaaally itching to get their hands on the only cow in the farm. like what if she tried going through the gaps in the fences chasing a butterfly or something and got stuck, left vulnerable to the bulls…. HQHSJWJNE I’m so mentally unwell I NEED FARM SEX

INTRESTED?

Synopsis: Being ignored isn’t something you like so why not disobey your owner altogether?

Notes: Oh wow this… this is true peak I love this. I took a different route with this! I still hope you enjoy it. If you still want me to do a version exactly like yours send me an inbox! No harm done

Pairings: BullHybrid!Toji x BullHybrid!Suguru x CowHybrid!Reader

Warnings: Hybrids + smut + bigboobed!Reader + milking + lactation + fem!reader + shy!VirginReader + implied chubby!reader + squirting + blowjobs + lots of typos sorry! + surprise at the end<34

PT2: HERE

I can imagine farmer!Gojo allowing you free roam of the farm as long as you stay away from the bulls that’s the only thing he takes seriously. He expects such a ditzy thing like you to listen and obey this one simple rule.

Farmer!Gojo has been extremely busy tending to the other animals on the farm that he completely neglects to milk you, even when you come to him whining that your boobs hurt he really can’t offer the time, even if you emphasize how heavy they feel, that you can’t milk them yourself.

In retaliation or at least to get some of the attention off the other animals you start wandering near where the bull!hybrids reside. You can see them but they can’t see you and damn are they big, they look ruff with messy faces that look like Gojo has been putting them to work.

BullHybrid!Toji is the first to spot you peering at them, he alerts BullHybrid!Suguru to check out the little cow seemingly lost.

Toji clicks his tongue to get your attention, you perk up, oh he’s got you now. He quietly ushers you to come closer. Suguru watches on as you do start taking little steps towards them, you look on alert: so Satoru has been spreading lies about them. That just won’t do, you need to come closer so they can clear their name!

You’re only a few big steps away from them, you won’t get any closer than this.

Suguru takes a minute to admire you, he hated Satoru for constantly keeping you locked up in your area, only he himself was allowed to see you. Even when he and Toji practically begged to meet you all answers were instantly met with a no. So getting to see you up close makes him excited.

Toji thinks you’re cute but far too innocent looking, you need to ruined and rebuilt what better man to do that than himself.

“Tits are a little full don’t you think?” Tojis the one who bluntly says that out loud. Suguru hadn’t looked but when he does they really do look full and heavy, it looks almost painful: poor poor thing.

“Want some help with em? I know you do.”

“Cmere, Satoru clearly hasn’t been doing his job too busy messing with the other female hybrids”

You feel a twinge of jealously at that statement but wanting to get back at Satoru outweighs that by a ton, so you step closer and take Suguru’s open hand whilst Toji puts his hand on the small of your back and lead you to their cabin.

You’re not sure who slips off your tank-top all you can feel and think about is big hands running all over your body, much larger and thicker than Satoru’s delicate hands. You do know that Toji is prying your thighs apart and filting himself in between them, those little shorts that leave too much of your pudgy ass and thighs leaking out immediately come off. Suguru takes your hand and has you feel up his cock, you’re damn near frightened at the size of the bull. His eyes look so lusty as they bore into yours, he knows he won’t get to have your cunt today so he’ll settle for your mouth.

Toji takes off your too tight shorts that show off the pudge of your ass and the thickness of your thighs, he takes the panties off as well, a moment of solace passes through as he stares at your glistening cunt, he’s waited far too long for this, too many attempts with Satoru at getting the chance to meet you and way too many no’s.

Toji is the reason you aren’t allowed near them, the day you got here he couldn’t stop staring, the next week he couldn’t stop staring it got to a point where ever cautious Satoru started only allowing you to roam the front, never the back. He prods at your sticky cunt with his tip, nudging your clit that elicits a soft moan out of you.

Everytime he touches your hole it’s already trying to suck him in, you’re a greedy one he can already tell. And he isn’t one to not let you have it, he can acknowledge that you won’t be able to fully take him without hours of prep so he’ll only give you a little past the tip. When he begins pushing inside he already feels how hot and warm you are.

You gasp when you feel him, your needy little body trying to explore that bit of pleasure from the stretch. He spreads your legs further holding them down on either side of you. Suguru taps the tip of his cock on your pretty lips, signaling for you to open them, you obediently listen and begin sucking the pre off.

“Fuck.. just like that..” he groans, his pretty black hair cascades around his body so beautifully, why was Satoru keeping such men away from you?

Suguru grabs a your boob and squeezes it rather hardly, a spurt of milk leaks out enticing him to do it again, a sigh of relief can be heard slipping calmly from you.

In a whiny tone you urge Suguru to keep doing that, it feels really good.

Toji is using all his restraint not to filt himself to be balls deep in your pussy, the creamy feeling of him only being able to push in a certain amount and pull away is driving him crazy, but he isn’t going to stop in fear that this will be over too soon, no they’re going to savor this and savor you.

Toji leans down and takes the other boob not occupied in his mouth, sliding the honeyed taste all over his tastebuds.

“Ah-mnnhh..” you push his head deeper, coaxing him to drink you till your dry. The other bull is making sure you’re paying extra attention to his sensitive slit, making sure you’re lapping up every drop that comes out.

Toji leaning down has his chest sometimes bumping against your little sloppy clit, it pushes you over, a loud yelp rippling through the air as you squirt just a little, that clearly won’t do! They’re sure they can pull even more from you, it seems you’ll be here for a while :(.

BOUNS:

When you come back to the main house with a shirt that isn’t yours, smelling like sweat and sex Satoru is fucking livid. He gave you simple orders to not mess with those bulls and you choose to disobey? He’s also baffled that his sweet girl would do something like that, he thought you were better than that.

“Toru, I had been asking you for over a week to help me!”

Attitude? Raising your voice at him? Who the hell are you and what have you done with his girl?

You move past Satoru and go to your shared bedroom, his breath hitches in his throat when you come out dragging the cover and a pillow and head towards the spare room.

“I-“ he attempts to get a word out before the door is slammed right in his face.

[nochepsicodelica]

"Good morning, baby," you greet, disrupting the early morning stillness that Toji had immersed himself in. You stand behind him, wrap your arms around his shoulders, and lean in to pepper a barrage of kisses on his temple.

Toji uses his fork to cut out a bite of his little pancake stack for you and brings it up to your mouth. The smell of breakfast suffocates the kitchen and already had you salivating the second you left the bedroom, so without hesitation, you take the bite and savor. Savor the sweetness of the syrup he doused his pancakes in and the buttery softness of the texture.

"God, you're amazing," you say, muffled by the food in your mouth. You swallow the bite before leaning in to press a few more sticky kisses on his cheek. "I love you."

Toji chuckles at your clear, genuine appreciation. "What's got you in such a good mood this morning?" He doesn't say it like he's starved of good mornings from you, more like he just wants to know what is so great about this one.

"I don't know. I'm rested and it's early." You exhale, lips curling contently. "We should go on a walk—no, a run. And then after--"

"Baby, sit," Toji instructs, pushing the chair beside him back with his foot. "That's for you," he says, nodding at the plate of breakfast he fixed for you on the center of the table. "No coffee, 'cause you clearly don't need it," he says, pulling your mug in his direction.

"But, but... Toji, please!"

"No," he responds, grinning smugly before taking a sip of his caffeinated delight, like he's mocking you.

"I'm gonna crash out, baby," you warn. "And it's gonna be a bad morning. The floor is gonna crack open and we're gonna be able to see straight down all the way to hell."

"How 'bout some orange juice?" He suggests, attempting to calm you down before you throw your overdramatized, premeditated fit.

You hum, thinking for a few seconds. "Mm... no, I want coffee. Look, you prepared it just the way I like it and it's right there," you say, pointing at the full mug. Toji doesn't look because he knows he did exactly that.

"I didn't. I put a fuck ton of creamer in it. You wouldn't like it," he lies. "Let's get you some juice, yeah?"

With a sigh and a defeated look in your eyes, you nod. "Okay."

"There we go." A soft smile plays on his lips. "I got it," he murmurs, getting up from his chair. He places a kiss on the top of your head before continuing on to the little kitchen area to grab the orange juice bottle from the fridge and then a glass from the cupboard. The second he sets the glass and bottle down on the counter, he sees you, not so sneakily reaching for the mug of coffee.

You're trying so hard to chug the hot coffee, burning your tongue and lips. His footsteps only make you more nervous as they get closer but you try to drink even more. Your eyes grow glassier from withstanding the burning sensation on your tastebuds.

"Whatcha doing?" He asks, gently pulling the mug away from your lips before taking it out of your hands. You don't even try to hold onto it, handing it over without a fight. A satisfied sigh leaves you, like you were parched and those scorching sips of coffee were a nice glass of water.

"It's really good," you utter, licking the sweet remnants off your lips. "Which is conflicting because the coffee was made by a liar."

Toji rolls his eyes, but the amused grin that makes it's way onto his face is inevitable. "What are you talking about now, ma?"

"You said you put too much creamer in it, but it was perfect—as always. Let me have the rest of it, yeah?"

"No. I'll put it in the fridge and you can have it cold later. You have enough energy right now," he says.

"Why did you get to have coffee?" You argue.

"'Cause I woke up a little earlier to make the breakfast that's getting cold right in front of you," he bites back.

You roll up one of the pancakes on your plate and take a big bite out of it, turning to him with puffed up cheeks.

"Thank you. Happy?" You mumble, wishing you had that cup of juice to wash down your food.

"You're welcome, and yes," he says, leaning forward to peck your overstuffed cheek, before heading back to the kitchen to pour that cup of juice for you. He catches the way you make grabby hands at the mug, and utters a simple "no" as he keeps walking.

The juice is poured out, the juice bottle and your forbidden coffee in the fridge, and Toji is finally making his way back to you.

"Here." The cup is set down beside your plate and Toji takes his seat, again.

"It's so good," you mumble, through bites of food.

"Yeah?" Toji responds, wiping a crumb of pancake from the corner of your mouth with his thumb.

"Mhm, it's a lot, though."

"You're just used to your itty bitty portions. That's a good serving right there, so you're gonna finish the whole thing."

"Yes, sir, Mr. President, sir!" you say, with mock seriousness, expression and all, before continuing to chow down.

"God, you're such a dork sometimes," he mutters under his breath. Still, the edges of his lips turn upward as he picks up his fork again.

You talk about everything and nothing. Lunch and dinner are planned out together, while you occasionally utter compliments about how good the food he made is.

"How did you even learn to make this?" You ask, taking a sip of your orange juice.

"Memorized your movement," Toji responds, casually. He didn't expect your face to light up the way it did, in such a precious manner. It's almost as if he made you shy with the revelation.

"What? You know how often I'm around while you cook?"

"Almost every time," you answer, with a giggle. "Clinging to me like a koala."

"Exactly," he says, shamelessly. "So... are you impressed or what?"

"Mhm," you hum, taking the final bite of your breakfast. "Very much so," you assure, locking eyes with him as he takes the final bite of his meal.

"So impressed that I get a fat smooch for my hard work?"

"Yes, please," you say, all too eagerly, causing the table to shake and the tableware to clatter slightly.

It's one of the things Toji loves most about you—how excited you get over the simplest things. It's as if you're about to start bouncing off the walls over some kisses. "Then, come here," he commands.

You almost knock over your glass of juice and his coffee mug from how quickly you stand up and make your way to him. Toji barely has time to drag his chair back to make room for you on his lap before you plop down on him and make yourself comfortable. He thinks you're going straight for his lips, and he's ready to feel the softness of your own against them, but you take your time and savor. Savor the way he hums when you leave a trail of kisses on his jaw and how he squeezes your hip as you greedily riddle the rest of his face with more.

"Can I buy you one of those 'Kiss the cook' aprons?" You murmur into his ear, biting his earlobe after.

A small groan accompanies his chuckle as you continue nibbling on his ear. "Depends... is there a limit or will I be spoiled?"

"You know the answer to that," you respond, letting him pull you in even closer.

"Tell meee," he grumbles, against your cheek, luring an amused chime of laughter from you.

"That apron will become a kiss magnet," you say through unrestrained giggles, withstanding the quick burst of pecks he scatters along your cheek, until he reaches the corner of your lips. "Instead of--" you're cut off by a direct, chaste peck to your lips, but pick up again immediately after. "Instead of saying 'oh shit, where's the salt?' while we're cooking, i'm gonna say 'oh shit, where's my handsome bobansome? Gotta give him a fat smooch.'"

He chuckles, something low and comforting to your ears. It's the sound equivalent of having warm soup belly on a cold, cold day.

"You're crazy, mama," he responds.

"Mhm," you hum. "So, can I order the apron or...?"

"Fine. Gimme-"

"Yay!- Oh sorry," you mumble, earning an irrepressible snicker from Toji, as you lean in to give him the fat smooch you promised him.

-

A week later, the apron is finally delivered and it's nearly impossible for you to contain your excitement. You giggle to yourself as you scurry back to the bedroom, where Toji is sprawled out on the bed, like a sunbathing cat about to fall asleep.

"Baby! Baby, baby, look," you call, enthusiastically, unfolding the black apron. It says 'Kiss The Cook' in bold, white lettering, and it has a single, red kiss print to add a dash of color. Toji merely cranes his neck to look at what you're fussing about, and when he sees the item you so proudly hold in your hands, he instantly turns away with a lazy grin and a shake of his head before letting his eyes fall shut, again.

[writeriguess]

neemaaa

can i request a katsuki x reader where they are secretly in a relationship? they get caught making out by their friends and then get teased the whole time

Unveiled

Your heart was pounding in your chest, a mix of excitement and nervousness thrumming through your veins as you pressed yourself against Katsuki Bakugo. His lips were hot against yours, moving with a fervor that sent a shiver down your spine. One of his hands was gripping your waist, pulling you impossibly closer, while the other cradled the back of your head, fingers threading through your hair. Your arms were wrapped around his neck, nails grazing the nape of his skin, earning a low groan from him that you felt reverberate through your entire body.

This was risky. So damn risky.

Your friends could walk in at any moment. Hell, they were supposed to be here already! But the adrenaline, the sheer thrill of sneaking around, made it impossible to care. You had been keeping your relationship with Bakugo a secret for months, slipping away in between training sessions, sneaking into each other’s rooms at odd hours, exchanging heated glances across the common area when no one was looking. It was exhilarating, having this little secret between just the two of you.

"Tch, you taste good," Bakugo muttered against your lips before diving back in, deepening the kiss. You couldn't help but melt into him, fingers tightening against his skin as you pulled him closer.

That was when it happened.

The door to the empty common room slammed open with a loud BANG.

"OH MY GOD!" Mina’s voice practically echoed through the room, followed by the distinct sound of Kaminari’s laughter and Kirishima’s deep chuckle. You barely had time to react before the two of you jerked apart, but it was too late.

You were caught.

Bakugo's face was a mix of horror and absolute rage, his entire body tensing as if he was about to explode—not figuratively, but literally. You, on the other hand, were frozen in place, eyes darting between your very smug-looking friends.

"YOU HAVE GOT TO BE KIDDING ME!" Kaminari wheezed, clutching his stomach as he doubled over with laughter. "I THOUGHT YOU HATED EVERYONE, BAKUGO!"

"Shut the hell up!" Bakugo barked, his face turning an alarming shade of red.

Mina smirked, her arms crossed as she leaned against the doorway. "Secret relationship, huh? Oh, this is juicy. You guys have been sneaking around this whole time? How long?!"

"None of your damn business!" Bakugo snapped, but his reaction only seemed to fuel their amusement.

Kirishima grinned, slinging an arm around Bakugo’s shoulder despite the clear and present danger of being blown to smithereens. "Man, this explains so much! You've been way less of an asshole lately."

"The hell I have!"

You groaned, burying your face in your hands. "Can we just pretend you guys didn't see anything?"

Mina gasped dramatically. "Oh, absolutely not. This is the best thing that's happened all week!"

"Yeah, we're never letting you live this down," Kaminari added, grinning wickedly. "So, tell me, Bakugo, how long have you been secretly making out with our dear friend here?"

Bakugo twitched, his fists clenched, and for a moment, you genuinely feared for Kaminari’s safety. "You wanna die, Dunce Face?"

"Relax, man, I think it’s kinda cute!" Kirishima piped up, and Bakugo turned his death glare toward him instead.

Mina was practically vibrating with excitement. "Oh, I can’t wait to tell the others! You know this means the whole class is going to grill you, right?"

"Don’t you dare," you warned, but it was futile.

"Oh, I dare," she teased, winking. "I give it five minutes before everyone in 1-A knows."

Bakugo groaned loudly, dragging a hand down his face. "I swear to god, I will kill all of you."

But the teasing didn't stop there. By the time the rest of your classmates found out, it was pure chaos. Sero and Kaminari wouldn't stop making exaggerated kissing noises every time you and Bakugo were in the same room. Todoroki, in his usual deadpan tone, commented, "I always assumed Bakugo was incapable of romance. This is surprising."

Momo and Iida, on the other hand, seemed genuinely happy for you both, though Iida did remind you that public displays of affection should be kept to a minimum.

It was insufferable. It was embarrassing. It was never-ending.

And yet, despite all the teasing, Bakugo still found ways to sneak you away, to press you against the walls of empty hallways, to steal quick, heated kisses when no one was looking.

"They can tease all they want," he muttered one night, his lips brushing against yours, "but that doesn't change a damn thing. You're mine."

And honestly? You wouldn’t have it any other way.

[madamechrissy]

Silent Serenades

♔ An arranged Marriage with Duke Gojo ♔

♔ Pairings: Satoru Gojo x you

♔ Warnings: Mentions of sex, infidelity, Cruelty from Duke Gojo. OOC. So much ANGST. Gojo is TERRIBLE you're warned

♔ Word count this chap: 2.4k

♔ Summary: you are the diamond of the season, he is the charming Duke, it’s the marriage of the decade. Prominent families joining, and it so happens that Duke Gojo is gorgeous. But, he doesn't want you at all, leaving you a crying mess on your wedding night, alone. Now you're trapped in a loveless arranged marriage that destroys you from within. Royal AU, Cruel Duke Gojo x reader. OOC Set in 1800s England. Gojo is awful in this. You'll hate Satoru, warning you now. HEAVY angst Basically- Gojo is a royal dick and doesn't wanna marry you

♔ Playlist - ♔ Masterlist

part one

The grand hall of the Gojo manor was adorned with elegant flowers, a mix of blue and white lilies, strewn amongst the endless aisles of those gathered to watch you marry the Duke Gojo. Yes, you were arranged to marry Satoru Gojo, the most eligible bachelor there was, your parents had set this up, the match of the season, as you are the daughter of a most prominent Earl.

As you step up slowly, your beautiful white beaded gown clinging to you, there are whispers of your beauty. You were the jewel of the season, the ton had declared it so, yet there was one man who clearly disagreed, and that’s the white haired, blue eyed Duke you’re headed straight for.

The soft glow of the lights above, glittering chandeliers, are flickering against the ivory walls, as a cacophony of murmurs and music fill the area, mixing with your racing heart. You had dreamed of this day with Duke Gojo, for his charm and handsome looks had captivated you from the moment you met. He’d been so different, when you were courting, putting on his show.

But just an hour ago, right before you were to be wed, as you were walking through the beautiful gardens, lush and green, admiring the statues, you heard it, moaning.

****

“Oh, your grace, yes, there! Mmn!” You had paused, your heart in your throat as you walked by Duke Satoru Gojo, donned in his elegant white wedding suit, with his hand between one of the servant’s legs, kissing down her neck.

You stumble back in shock, smacking into a statue in your haste and huffing as you trip, catching their attention. The servant gasps, running off, her maid dress swishing, but Satoru wipes his full lips, glaring over at you. Your breasts heave up and down with the effort it takes to breathe, your corset is suddenly so tight that it is strangling you.

“What on earth are you doing here?” He demands, running a hand through his tousled white hair, his deep voice so… cruel? You gulp, looking down shyly.

“I was checking the gardens… I…” You look up at him then, at those cold blue eyes that you found so beautiful, as he’s adjusting his jacket over his lithe body. “What were you doing?”

He scoffs then, stepping closer, leaning down as he towers over you, he was taller than any man you’d seen nearly, and what once was charming was intimidating. “Just because we’re forced to marry, does not mean I will not continue to do as I please.”

You gasp again, at his twisted smirk. “I am so confused, your grace, I had thought we had at least a friendly connection, that could perhaps grow-”

Satoru Gojo places his big hands on your shoulders then, laughing, and it’s got such malice behind it, that it hurts to hear even. “I have absolutely no interest in you, I guess now is the time to make it clear.”

Your heart sinks, as your eyes fill with tears, looking down, away from his cruel gaze. “I don’t understand, I thought you said I was beautiful-”

“Everyone says that, don’t they? Everyone in the bloody ton sings your praises, the diamond, the crowned jewel, the greatest catch, even for a Duke. But guess what?” He tilts your chin up with two long fingers, and watches tears make your eyes glassy. “You’re not who I want, you could never be.”

You choke back a cry, blinking rapidly as you try to speak. “So what, you want the servant?”

He chuckles darkly. “I want anyone but you. And I’ll have them, any time I want, and you’ll endure it, because that’s what this is. A false partnership, forced on me.”

“It was forced on me too!” You smack at his hand then, scowling, earning more of his laughter, sharp white teeth glinting.

“Do stop lying, my Lady, you surely always wanted to marry me. Marry the Duke. But go ahead and pretend.”

“As if women have a choice.” You speak through gritted teeth, and now he’s scowling at you.

“Everyone wants me.”

“Well guess what, everyone wants me too.”

His white lashes lower over those cerulean eyes. “Not I. Never would. You’re nothing to me.” Satoru speaks softly, like a fucking caress, and you turn on your heel and run.

****

But still, the ceremony must continue. As you step forward, the murmurs of the crowd fade into the background. You could feel the weight of his presence beside you when you step up next to him, but the warmth you had once hoped for with Satoru had turned cold. He’s looking at you with clear disinterest in his perfect features as the priest says your vows.

When the moment came and he leaned down to kiss you, your first kiss you have ever had, it was merely an icy brush of lips, that left you feeling hollow. Before he slid a disinterested gaze back to the room. As the ceremony goes on, and friends and family congratulate you both, he plays his part, the elegant Duke, so charming and witty. So gorgeous that everyone loves him.

You play your part, the beautiful belle of the ball, the dainty little lady that had just become a Duchess. You’d prepared your whole life to be a wife, and you’d dreamed of the charming Duke since you were naught but a child, and now? When you think about it, the walls close in, everything is too noisy, and the weight of his words and actions kill you.

You watch as he dances with every woman there is, as he starts to drink and act brazen, foolish, but you must hold it together, it is your duty, is it not?

When a tall, handsome man with long dark hair comes, bowing to you, you recognize him as Duke Gojo’s best friend, Lord Suguru Geto. He is a prominent Earl, and one that you had become quite friendly with, for once he had courted you, however your family had pushed and pushed for the Duke. Now, as he holds his hand out, his chocolate eyes glimmering, you cling to his hand like a lifeline.

“You’re a vision, my Lady. May I have a dance? I’ve noticed you’ve been quite a wallflower.” He says softly, and you nod, your gloved hand clutching his tightly.

“I should love to, my Lord. And thank you.” He smiles, and takes you to the floor, where you all dance elegantly, to the soft quadrille playing. People watch and many smile, as you both were skilled dancers.

“I’m very sad that you’re taken, I wish I could say otherwise. But I do wish you the best, even if I’m so very selfish.” Lord Suguru says softly, and you tense a bit, making his cheeks flush. “I should not say such things. I’m sure Duke Gojo will be a very good husband to you.”

You scoff, before covering it up, clearing your throat. “I am sure he will be, thank you Lord Suguru.” You feel it then, Duke Gojo’s blue eyes, staring daggers at you both as you’re in Lord Suguru’s arms, making you shiver.

Suguru smirks a bit. “Ah, he seems possessive of his new bride, as he should be, you’re the most beautiful bride there could be.”

Possessive, ha!

You want to scream, you want to cry, as you remember him up that maid’s skirts, blatant, even now he’s dancing with some woman who���s whispering in his ear. “Thank you, you’re too kind though, my Lord. I surely am not.”

“You absolutely are.” He smiles down, and his smile is so soft, so sincere, then you wish that you never got stuck in this. That you could be with someone who looks at you like this, not like how Duke Gojo glares like he just despises you.

****

Soon, it’s the night of your wedding, and you’re wearing a pretty silk nightgown, it’s sheer and white and nearly see through, along with white garters and stockings with little bows on them. You’re brushing your hair nervously in the gilded mirror, the silver brush making crackling sounds along with the fire that blazes in your new chambers, surely fit for a queen.

But why do you feel so depressed here?

The door opens, and you jerk, to see Duke Satoru Gojo, shirtless and merely wearing sleep trousers, you’ve never seen a naked man, and you can’t help but stare. Every inch of him is chiseled to perfection, his pale skin glistening like marble, the fire casting shadows on every worked muscle. You gulp, struggling to hide the flush of your cheeks, looking down.

“Have you never seen a man?” You shake your head, as he walks to you now, dominating, looming over you. “You’re afraid.”

“Y-yes. I know what is expected of a wedding night.” You whisper, earning a snicker of laughter.

“Stand up. Let me see you.” You do as he says, trembling legs standing as you set your brush next to its matching silver comb and mirror. They were your treasured gifts from your mother.

Your eyes look up to him, as he runs his fingers down the edges of the thin satin straps, as he then slides his fingers down your curve of your breasts, making your nipples taut, goosebumps raising. There is some odd feeling in your core. The Duke smirks as they show, and you feel so embarrassed you can’t even think, hating your body’s wicked reactions to him.

“I bet everyone has always told you how beautiful you are. How perfect you are. Haven’t they, Duchess.” You nervously bite a lip, as he walks around you in a slow circle, taking you in like a predator. “You have the perfect hips for child bearing they all say, you have the tiniest waist, so fashionable. You have such delicate features too, don’t you, and such lovely hair.”

He runs his hands through it, as he’s behind you, then he pulls your hair, making you cry out. “What do you care, I’m of no interest.” You bite out, making him chuckle, his hot breath tickling your ear.

“Perfect body, perfect face, perfect posture… oh, perfect speech, and you’re talented at everything aren’t you? Piano forte, singing, dancing… bet you’re trained to be the perfect wife too.”

“What does any of that matter? I am not perfect at everything.”

“That’s what everyone tells you, don’t they?” You look down, as he lets your hair go, letting you exhale before he’s back in front of you. “Don’t look so afraid, Duchess.” That word from his lips is like a curse word, he spits it out.

“Just get it done, I don’t want it anymore than you.” You say with a scowl, sliding down your straps then, making him tense, his eyes flicker for just a moment, before he shoves them back up.

“You’re so desperate, you think I want you at all? In any way?” You can only take so much, now you’re close to sobbing, and tears trickle down your cheeks, making the Duke’s lips quirk up, as he brushes one away with a long finger. “You crying, my lady? That won’t do. You have to be a good Duchess.”

“We must consummate the marriage, have heirs, just get it done. I don’t want this to go on longer than it must.”

“I have no intentions of consummating anything.” You blink in confusion, looking up, and you’re far too close, you can feel his body heat, but inside Satoru Gojo is cold, so cold you’re freezing to death.

“But, the marriage…”

“I’ll not lay with you. I will lay with who I wish to, you’ll be my wife in all the ways you’re supposed to be, but not that. Did you want my cock so desperately? Aw… you poor thing. Crying over it.” His mocking tone infuriates you as he brushes a finger over your cheek.

You smack his hand now, glaring. “Oh, so then I’m free? To be with whoever I want, hmm?”

Satoru scowls, twisting his pretty features. gripping your wrist with a brutal grasp in a big hand, making you wince. “Excuse me? You’re not the man here, you’re the woman, the wife.”

“Then I’ll get an annulment, let you marry who you wish-”

“You’ll stay my wife.”

“Then I’ll do just as you, except I won’t rut in the gardens like a pig.” Satoru slaps your cheek then, and you gasp as it stings you, looking up at him with shocked, pained eyes, and for a moment his thin white brows go together, and he opens his pink lips, as if to speak, then shuts them.

“I didn’t… I…”

You haul back and smack him as hard as you can, you smack the Duke right in his pretty face, making him glare now, trembling with rage. “Excuse the impropriety, but fuck you, Duke Gojo.”

“You wish I would fuck you, but I’ll never want you. Why would I?” He keeps staring at your cheek now, frowning, but then going back to glaring at you, and you smirk as you see the hand print you left on his own, raised and pink.

“Good, I don’t want you either. Go have your fun, Duke, never worry, I’ll keep up appearances. I have been trained, as you said.” You turn away then, your heart thudding in your chest, your tears threatening to burst from your eyes.

“You enjoy the lie, you know you want it, it’s why your nipples were rock hard. I bet you’re wet too.” He’s sliding his hands down your hips, far too close, and you jerk away quickly, earning his anger.

“I don’t even know what that means, but I do not want you, so never fear, I will never, ever try.” He pauses at that, white lashes blinking.

“You’ve not even had a talk about sex, and yet you meant to consummate the marriage?”

“What does it matter? We’ll have no children, and not lay in bed together. If that’s what you wish.”

His jaw locks. “It is.”

“Then leave.”

It’s as if he expected you to beg him, to want him, as if he expected you to fall to his feet. But you will not waiver, though his words and looks are so painful, though the world is shattering around you, you’re stubborn enough to not show him, to not reveal the truth. He’d just use it as a weakness.

“Enjoy the wedding night, Duchess.” He says finally, leaving with a slam that echoes in your chambers, and you sink to the hardwood floor, sobbing, hugging your knees and burying your face in your folded arms.

Your wedding night, alone, married to a man that hates you. A man that will never want you, that will lay with others, and you’re just going to be stuck, playing your role, aren’t you? The loneliness sinks in, the hopelessness, until you sob yourself to sleep right there on the cold hard floor, as cold as Duke Gojo.

Part 2 here!

[sortagaysortahigh]

Juno | James 'Bucky' Barnes

A/N: Heyyyyy, here's part 2 to Lovefool, can technically be read as a stand alone if you're a fluff kinda person. This is the most fluff I've written in YEARS, some angst is thrown in as well! They're getting MARRIED! ugh my babies <3, also writing joaquin was so much fun in this fic, love his comedic timing as readers bestie! Anyways I hope you all enjoy! This is definitely also named after the sabrina carpenter song, so just GUESS WHERE THIS FIC GOES. Also everyone say thank you to @love-chx for beta-ing most of this, and to @anxietyandtacos for encouraging my bs <3

Summary: In the early stages of your relationship with Congressman Barnes, you swore he was kidding anytime he mentioned the idea of being his wife, however, it is apparent that he wasn't kidding. It's also obvious that there's nothing more that you want in the world.

Warnings: 2nd PERSON POV, use of Y/N, spelling and grammar errors fr (I am who I am), angst, hurt/comfort, mentions of bucky sleeping on the floor, mentions of insecurities, mentions of vomiting/throw up, pregnancy (AHHH), cursing, anxiety, Joaquin being an amazing bestfriend (he's so annoying i lvoed writing him), kissing, SMUT: unprotected p in v, praise kink if you squint, choking, smacking/spanking, spitting, squirting, somewhat rough sex, BREEDING KINK, wife kink, hair pulling, oral (f receiving), creampie, getting absolutely railed fr, honestly theres not a ton of smut but it's there fr and they're freaks.

Word Count: 14.8k Part One

Congressman!Bucky Barnes x Secretary!Reader

UGHHHH LET ME AT HIM GOD DAMNIT IM FERAL!

The past eight months have been a whirlwind. 

In the early stages of your official relationship with Bucky, you swore he was kidding anytime he mentioned his ‘bright idea’ of you being his wife rather than his secretary. 

He was still a Congressman and you were still his bossy secretary, but behind closed doors, you were much more than that, and the both of you were irrevocably in love with one another.

It was obvious that you two were more than just professionally involved. Bucky would pull you closer to him in large crowds, his arm wrapped around your waist as if he was safeguarding you from the public. You’d both hold hands on your walks through Capitol Hill, and he’d even pull you into shaded areas to plant quick kisses along your jaw and neck, a series of giggles leaving your lips accompanied by ‘Bucky! Stop it’. 

Not to mention the way he’d sit back and let you speak during committee meetings, not a single argument or glare exchanged between the both of you.

Some journalists even reported that he’d been doing a much better job as a congressman, stating that it was clear something had changed in his life that brought Bucky more satisfaction and genuine joy. That joy clearly spread into all aspects of his life—publicly and privately.

You also didn’t shout at him as much. Sure, you’d still argue with him, and in the first few months of dating, it was obvious that you knew how to separate your professional relationship from your romantic one, but that didn’t stop him from fucking you in his office or workspace in both D.C. and Brooklyn. 

That usually only occurred after an argument on the principle that Bucky knew how to put you in your place. He’d always known, but prior to being romantically involved with you, he would’ve never crossed that boundary.

Slowly but surely you’d let your guard down, easing into being in a publicly known relationship with him. There was still an element of controversy surrounding dating your boss, but the bits and pieces of media coverage on the two of you focused on your relationship prior to his Congressional career, then segueing into the career, and even focusing on the future regarding the New Avengers.

Truthfully, Bucky didn’t care about what the future held, as long as you were with him. He even considered running for re-election after you helped him get his first major bill passed that addressed homelessness in New York and other major urban metropolitan spaces.

You moved in with Bucky one month after the night of the fundraiser. It made sense to live with him—he had two residencies, one in New York and Washington D.C., and you were pretty much always with him regardless. It also alleviated the financial stress of paying rent in two different states. 

Plus you’d be lying if you said you didn’t enjoy being around him all of the time. Especially when your predominant residence was in New York, and now it was with him in a cozy apartment in Brooklyn. Although his lack of furniture in his Brooklyn apartment was shocking.

You were used to seeing his furnished apartment in D.C.. Sure, you knew that it came furnished, but you thought with him having the same place of residency in Brooklyn for so long, that he’d have more than a worn couch and a few bar stools. His bed also looked almost untouched, as if he never slept in it.

Then two weeks into living with him, you found out that he didn’t sleep in his bed. 

The two of you would usually go to sleep at the same time and you were always a heavy sleeper, so when you’d wake up in the morning and he was already up brewing coffee, you didn’t think much of it.

Not until the night that you’d woken up around two in the morning from a nightmare. You jolted out of your sleep, eyes wide, hand to your chest as you caught your breath. Then you looked around the room, squinting, eyes adjusting to the darkness as you used your right hand to feel around—looking for Bucky.

He wasn’t there. 

You thought that maybe he was in the bathroom, so you waited a few minutes, grabbing your phone from the bedside table, looking at the time, letting a few minutes pass as you read through the missed texts from your group chat with Joaquin, Kate, and Peter.

After ten minutes had passed and he didn’t come back, you got out of bed, wrapping a blanket around yourself as you padded out of the room, down the hall a bit, noticing there weren’t any lights on, and into the main living room space. Then you saw him, the faint yellow glow from the overhead stove light illuminated the space just enough for you to make out the sight of Bucky on the floor, his head against a couch pillow, and your thin pink throw blanket overtop of his figure.

You were confused at the sight of him on the floor. 

He clearly wasn’t sleeping peacefully, not when his chest was rapidly rising and falling and a sheen layer of sweat coated his skin. It was evident that Bucky had been tossing and turning, the sheet beneath him wrinkled and tangled around his lower body.

The sight of him like that made you tear up. You knew he still dealt with the nightmares, he’d told you about it a few weeks ago, said that they weren’t common anymore, but they hadn’t exactly disappeared overnight.

Bucky had spent a while in Wakanda working on coping with them as well. Once he was finally free of the Hydra brainwashing, it had gotten easier to manage the nightmares. He knew grounding himself usually helped, but after seventy years of being tortured, brainwashed, and constant cryopreservation, sleep didn’t come easily. 

You slowly kneeled beside him, placing one hand on his chest, and the other gently caressing his face as you whispered, “Buck, baby it’s me.”

He stirred at the sound of your voice, taking in a deep inhale while squeezing his eyes a bit tighter, then slowly opening them. His eyes met yours in the dimly lit room as he blinked a few times, adjusting to the light.

“You weren’t supposed to know about this,” his voice was groggy, laced with sleep as he whispered. His vibranium hand met yours on his chest, giving it a reassuring squeeze. “You sleep like a rock, didn’t think you’d find me this soon.”

You shook your head, sniffling slightly, bottom lip quivering a bit as you tried to hold in your tears. “I don’t like seeing you like this Buck.” You slowly moved your thumb along his cheek, caressing it ever so slightly as he leaned into your touch.

“I should’ve told you, I know.” He sighed, taking the chance to wipe away a few of your tears. “It’s hard for me to fall asleep sometimes, it’s just easier on the floor—bit of a bad habit.” He wasn’t telling you everything, and he knew you saw right through his bullshit.

You nodded, leaning closer to him, kissing him slowly, sincerely, pouring every emotion into the moment. He easily kissed you back, hand now on the back of your neck as you focused on deepening the kiss, tongue sliding along his bottom lip.

Bucky pulled away first, blinking a few times while looking at you, faces inches apart. 

“This your plan? Kiss me until I feel better?” He was clearly joking, but it came off a bit harsh. It wasn’t that he was upset with you for finding out, he didn’t know how to cope with someone caring so deeply about him. Even in the dark, he could see the emotion and concern evident on your face. Your heart was practically racing, and it was clear that he was making you upset.

“No, actually, I was gonna kiss you until I felt better. Don’t think there’s anything I can say to convince you to come back to bed.” You sounded so defeated.

He felt as if he’d broken part of your heart.

“Doll, I’ll come back to bed with you.” His voice was soft as he spoke, peppering kisses along your cheek and jaw. 

You shoved him back a bit. “Not if you think I’m forcing you to come. I just want to know that you’re alright, if you’re more comfortable out here, that’s okay with me—it just hurts to see you like this. To know that you’re still dealing with the nightmares and that I can’t help fix it.” You sounded so small, eyes leaving his to look down at your intertwined fingers.

He lifted your intertwined hands, kissing the back of your hand. “Sweetheart, I’m coming back to bed with you, won’t sleep out here anymore. It’ll just take some getting used to ‘s all.”

You nodded your head, still avoiding his gaze, feeling as if you were pushing him, pressuring him into something that he didn’t want to do. This wasn’t work, it wasn’t something that you could fix for him or something you could save him from. All you could do was be there for him, and that in and of itself wasn’t enough for you.

But it was more than enough for him.

Bucky took the time to stand up, pulling you up with him, then he was grabbing the throw, tossing it onto the sofa before picking you up bridal style. He kissed the top of your head as he made his way back to the bedroom, placing you down onto your side before climbing back onto his.

It wasn’t that the bed was uncomfortable, quite the opposite really. Especially considering you’d added two mattress toppers to it, claiming that you needed to ‘sleep on a cloud’. Then, with you next to him, it added another element of comfort that he hadn’t anticipated. 

Maybe his problem was that the bed was too comfortable. 

He felt too safe, and that scared him. It terrified him. He hadn’t gone a single night feeling nothing but comfort in decades, and so, each night for the past two weeks, after you’d fallen asleep, he’d ease himself out of your hold, and snuck away, finding familiarity in the discomfort of the hard wooden floors.

That familiarity also welcomed the nightmares in a way, he hadn’t had them much anymore, but maybe it was the fear of him hurting you that had the negative memories and emotions resurfacing. Bucky knew that it also had to do with his own personal fear of being genuinely unlovable.

He was scarred, physically, mentally, and emotionally, and he was very self-aware of that. He’d managed to land the woman of his dreams, but he thought you could do better, that you’d be a better fit for a man that hadn’t been through hell and back, someone who wasn’t scarred and jagged.

The two of you laid in silence before you finally turned to face him, shifting even closer, slipping your leg between the both of his, one hand on his abdomen while you propped your head up with the other arm, now looking at him in the moonlight.

“Tell me how to be there for you,” your words were quiet, but they were full of emotion. You needed to be there for him, you wanted nothing more than to show him how much you truly cared for him.

He bit his bottom lip, gaze leaving the ceiling, eyes landing on you. “You already are there for me.”

His response made you blink a few times, brows knit together, “Then why are you leaving in the middle of the night?”

“Because I’m afraid of hurting you.” There was so much raw emotion in Bucky’s voice as he spoke, he’d never been more sure of anything. He was terrified of hurting you, terrified of showing you the worst parts of himself, terrified that you’d leave the second you got to see who he truly was.

You shook your head, “You’d never hurt me James. I know that. I trust you with my life, I don’t think I’ve ever trusted or loved someone more than I trust and love you.”

Bucky smiled, eyes tracing every detail of your face, you’d never looked more serious.

“I don’t care about your scars, physically, or metaphorically. I want to be there for you, I want you to let me in, I want you to know that I’m here—I don’t want you leaving in the middle of the night when I’m asleep—” your voice cracked “—I love all of you. I want you to know that you’ll never, ever hurt me. Even if you did hurt me, I’d kick your ass.”

You sniffled again, blinking away your tears, “If I have to tell you that every night, I will. I love you—all of you.”

That night was the first night that he’d slept in his bed in years. 

Every night following, he was in bed, right beside you. Even when he’d wake up in the middle of the night in a harsh panic, you were right there, right beside him, curling into his side, whispering sweet nothings to him, calming him down and reassuring him. 

Even on days that you two would fight over work, you never went to bed mad at one another. It was an unspoken rule, someone had to swallow their pride and apologize, going to sleep upset wasn’t an option. 

Your shared bedroom was a place of peace, a place of genuine solace for the both of you.

If you hadn’t already been in love, two months into living with one another, you and Bucky were definitively truly, madly, and deeply in love.

James Barnes proposed to you six months ago, on a rainy day in D.C. under the awning outside of 54 after carrying you in his arms while sprinting through a storm.

The neon glow from the signs in the window reflected against your skin in a way that made his breath hitch and head spin. You looked so beautiful, splotches of color along your damp face as you looked at him with a wide smile, followed by a series of contagious laughs and giggles at the sight of his soaked attire. 

The umbrella he’d brought had broken when a large gust of wind hit, leaving the both of you to sprint to your destination, or rather, he picked you up bridal style and ran down the block until you were both fully shielded from the rain.

Both of your outfits were soaked, your hair was a bit of a mess as you scooped it into a claw clip, and he had to shrug off his suit jacket because the material was weighing down on his shoulders. 

He hadn’t planned to propose at that moment. Bucky actually wanted to propose to you by the Cherry Blossoms. He was going to wait a month until they were in full bloom, but he always carried the small red heart-shaped box in his pocket, squeezing it slightly anytime he felt anxious or irritated.

In a way, it grounded him. The thought of you grounded him.

But you looked so beautiful and joyous in that moment. He couldn’t help himself.

You were utterly confused as you watched him get down on one knee, your brows knit together as you glanced around, trying to figure out if maybe he’d dropped something, or if he was trying to adjust his shoe. Then you glanced through the window of the restaurant, watching Ms. Minh’s eyes widened as she shot up from her seat behind the counter.

You were too focused on her actions to notice Bucky placing his briefcase on one of the chairs outside of the restaurant, then fishing through his pocket for the ring box. Ms. Minh was quick to grab her phone, holding it up as if she was recording something while rushing through the front door and standing a few feet away from the two of you.

Then, you were looking back at Bucky, confusion quickly shifting into shock as he ran his hand through his wet hair, looking up at you, then with one hand he opened the heart-shaped ring box where a beautiful golden ring with a princess cut diamond sat. 

“Bucky what are you doing?” You tried to laugh it off, biting into your bottom lip as you stared at him.

He smiled at you, icy blue eyes full of nothing but pure adoration and love.

When Bucky said your full name—middle name included—your jaw dropped, this was really happening. He was actually proposing to you.

“I’ve loved you since you kicked my ass on top of a moving vehicle in Germany when we were both technically war criminals—” You laughed, shaking your head, eyes welling up with tears. “—and I don’t think I’ll ever stop loving you and everything about you. I love your good qualities and the uh—not so pleasant ones—” He laughed a bit while shaking his head. 

“I’ve lived a thousand lives and the one thing that I’ve ever really wanted is to spend the rest of my life with you by my side. So, will you do me the honor of marrying me?” He watched as you sniffled, nodding your head, red teary eyes blinking several times as if you were trying to stop crying. 

Then you gave him your left hand, and he slid the ring onto your finger.

“I’d be an idiot to say no to you James Buchanan Barnes.”

He was off the ground in seconds, right hand intertwined with your left as he pulled you into a kiss. His left hand on your cheek, gently caressing your face while he kissed you under the awning of the Vietnamese restaurant that you two had been frequenting for years. 

The first place that you’d genuinely bonded at was now the place you’d gotten engaged at. It made you laugh, smile, and cry as you kissed Bucky under the old rusted awning. The world around you frozen, and in that moment, all you cared about was James Buchanan Barnes.

Breaking the news of your engagement to everyone had been stressful to say the least.

Sam was the easiest person to tell, he was already in D.C. on base, so when you strolled into his office at the Airforce base with Bucky in tow, he was somewhat surprised. You’d visited the base a few times in the past, having the top secret clearance to do so, but never with Buck.

You sighed, hoping that Joaquin would’ve been there, but you knew he’d probably cry so maybe it was better to wait on telling him. 

“Care to explain the impromptu visit? I know this isn’t to talk about anything work related—we already had that call this week. So, what’s going on with Capitol Hill’s hottest couple?” He wiggled his brows, looking between you and Bucky. Your arms are crossed in front of your chest, hands tucked into your sides as if you were hiding something.

“Don’t tell me you’re here with bad news.” Sam clearly braced himself, jaw clenched as he took a deep breath. “Okay, lay it on me, I’m ready.”

You couldn’t hold your laugh in as you elbowed Bucky, smiling up at him before approaching Sam. When you were a few feet away you paused, now leaning against Joaquin’s messy desk, looking around at his different trinkets and small gifts that he’d clearly gotten from his girlfriend.

Then, you glanced back at Sam. “I’m pregnant with Joaquin’s kid.” You deadpanned.

Your poker face had Sam in a clear panic, and that made you crack as you shook your head. “I’m kidding! Sam please! Oh my god!—” Then you looked over at Bucky who was shaking his head, hands in his pockets “—told you it would get him! Dinners on you tonight, Congressman,” you winked at him.

Sam had a hand over his chest as he caught his breath, a disappointed look on his face as he spoke, “Don’t do that shit to me again! You had me worried that Bucky was here to kill Joaquin. Or even worse, you were in a weird throuple and I’d never hear the end of it! You know he never shuts the hell up!”

You were smiling, shaking your head at Sam, then you glanced over at Bucky before nodding. He walked towards Sam, handing him a smaller blue box with a velvet finish.

Sam raised a brow, taking the box, then walking towards his desk, taking a second to open it, seeing the silver custom watch sitting in it, followed by the small folded note. His eyes widening as he read it, gaze snapping to yours, then Bucky.

“Excuse me? Be your best man?! You two are engaged?!” he smiled as you flashed your left hand.

“So, what do ya say? Will you be my best man?” Bucky smiled as he asked Sam, who pulled him into a hug immediately.

“Of course I’ll be your best man, what the hell kind of question is that?!”

Telling Joaquin wasn’t easy, not when he’d found out from Sam first and had blown up your phone in the middle of the night, calling you six times before you finally answered him, a bit hazy from being asleep.

Your head was still resting against Bucky’s bare chest as you held the phone to your ear. “Hello?”

“What the hell do you mean hello?! You’re engaged and I had to find out from Sam?! What kind of best friend are you! Have you no shame?! I get it that Sam’s clearly the best choice for his best man! But you didn’t think to tell me first?!”

He was moving a mile a minute, practically yelling into the phone. From your end, you could picture him pacing back and forth in his girlfriend’s apartment, phone in hand while you were on speaker.

“Joaquin, it’s like two in the morning—can we talk about this tomorrow?” 

He scoffed. “Talk about this tomorrow?! I was overseas in Cambodia on some mission with Sam, just for him to ask me if I was part of your wedding party on our flight back? Y’know he made a joke about me being your maid of honor! I was so confused! Then he lays it on me that you’re engaged!” 

You sighed, Bucky now stirring from his sleep at the sound of Joaquin’s voice. He wasn’t on speaker, and he was still the loudest in the room.

Then you sat up, now placing him on speaker after realizing Bucky was awake. “To be fair, I tried to tell you the day we told Sam, but you weren’t there. If I’m not mistaken, you were out living your life with your girlfriend. Who by the way, shouldn’t you be with right now? Instead of shouting at me at 2am?!”

Joaquin clearly let out a ‘tsk’ sound, and based on the silence following, you knew he was rolling his eyes. “I am with my girlfriend thank you very much, and she agrees that you were wrong as hell not to tell me!”

In the background you heard the muffled ‘No I didn’t say that! I said you were overreacting! He told his best friend first, she just happened to be there with her man!’. Followed by “Seriously baby?! Whose side are you on! Hers or mine! I’m the one who’s been wronged here!”

Bucky sat up next to you, rubbing one of his eyes as he processed the sound of Joaquin’s voice in the room. “Hang up on him.” 

Joaquin gasped again “Seriously Bucky?! Now you’re saying to hang up on me! I have every right to be offended right now! Besides, it’s not like I called at five in the morning!”

You sighed, pinching your nose bridge while taking a deep breath. You looked over at Bucky who was shaking his head, glancing from the illuminated phone screen to you. 

“What time is it, Sweetheart?” His sleep-laced voice made you smile, but he was clearly glaring at your phone, considering going to the base in D.C. next week and kicking Joaquin’s ass.

“It’s 2:33 in the morning. Also, Joaquin, just because you didn’t call at five doesn’t make it any better. You know damn well I’m asleep by one!” You yawned, rolling your shoulders back, scooting a bit closer to Bucky who was now sitting up and leaning against the headboard. He wrapped an arm around your waist while you rested your head against him.

“Okay but I couldn’t wait! What was I supposed to do?! Not sleep and be bothered all night by this betrayal!” 

You groaned again “Joaquin, can you go to bed, or go eat something, or go have sex?! Please, get off of my phone right now before Bucky kicks your ass the next time we see you.” 

Bucky laughed at that, the low rumble in his chest vibrating against you. His chin now resting on the top of your head slightly. 

“Wow! So this is it, huh? Now you’re hanging up on me?...Baby you’re being dramatic, let them go back to sleep. I don’t think you’d win a fight against Bucky Barnes…So now you’re doubting me too?!” Joaquin sounded hurt as he gasped, and you knew for a fact he had a hand over his chest right now, jaw dropped, and brows knit together while he looked at her.

“Goodnight Torres. I’ll call you tomorrow.” With that you hung up the phone, ignoring his protests before double checking that your phone was set to ‘do not disturb’.

“What the hell is wrong with him?”

You laughed at Bucky, shaking your head before moving to face him, planting a firm kiss to his lips, then straddling his lap. One hand on his jaw, the other on his shoulder as you smiled at him. “Since we’re awake, you wanna kill some time?”

He nodded his head, pulling you into another kiss as you rolled your hips against him.

It’d taken two days for anyone and everyone to find out that you were engaged. Joaquin sent an over dramatic text about how hurt and heartbroken he was in your shared group chat with Kate and Peter. Peter replied with a quick ‘That’s great! Congrats!’ 

Kate had also called, but she was squealing in excitement for you. Then Kate told Yelena, and she’d sworn to you that she had her girlfriend promise not to tell anyone else. That promise clearly didn’t apply to her father, who called you from Yelena’s phone to give you a long winded speech about how happy and proud he was that you were getting married.

He’d even thrown in a few bits and pieces about how strong your children with Bucky would be, and how ecstatic he was for the wedding. Which you hadn’t even started planning yet, and he volunteered to help plan it, stating that he was an excellent decorator and knew his way around a good celebration. 

After Alexei’s phone call, you received several texts from unknown numbers, which were also followed by everyone stating their names, and adding you into a group chat titled ‘The New Avengers’. It included Yelena, Bob, John, Ava, and Alexei. They’d mentioned that they had tried to add Bucky, but he left each and every time.

From there, it all spiraled. 

Eventually you’d gotten a call from Clint, who you hadn’t spoken with in years following his somewhat psychotic break during the Blip when he decided to be a hitman assassin to grieve his family. 

You’d even gotten a video call from Thor Odinson himself, who was squinting at the large screen, calling you through one of Bruce Banner’s intergalactic communication devices that you only had access to at the Avenger’s tower. 

He was all smiles and laughs, telling you how happy he was to know that Bucky would be marrying ‘such a beautiful human!’ You hardly knew the God of Thunder, so to say it was strange was an understatement. But you did find out that Thor was a lot friendlier than expected, and that he was really sweet, and had a daughter! 

Bruce and Thor had spent more time talking to Bucky and looping Sam into the call as if it was some kind of reunion. 

The weirdest call you’d gotten was from a talking raccoon, some guy named Peter Quill, an alien woman with antennae, a large blue man, a talking tree, and a blue cyborg woman. Bucky had to spend an hour explaining how he knew all of them, and he even mentioned something about giving his previous metal arm to the raccoon as a Christmas present.

The next few weeks passed by in a blur, with an ongoing impeachment trial, several rising intergalactic threats, and a constant debate on the sanctuary agreement regarding Celestial Island, the last thing you and Bucky had time to think about was a wedding.

So you focused on work, at least you tried to focus on work until Joaquin had practically broken your door down on a Tuesday afternoon, bursting into the penthouse with the box that you’d left on his desk two days prior.

He didn’t bother acknowledging you and Bucky’s closeness, the both of you sitting on the sofa together, your legs in his lap as you read off important bullet points in preparation for tomorrow’s major Foreign Affairs Committee meeting. He nodded his head as you spoke, answering and asking questions, ensuring he knew his stance, and knew it well.

“What the hell?! You guys didn’t even bother to call me about this—” He held the forest green box up. “I haven’t been in the office in a few days! I was busy running drills with Sam! He didn’t even tell me you dropped this off?! You mean to tell me you want me in your wedding party?!” 

You and Bucky both stared, shocked expressions on your faces as the two of you stared at Joaquin. How did he even get a key to the penthouse? You had no idea. Should you have expected him to barge in as if he owned the place? Absolutely.

“Oh shit—one second I forgot my girl’s coming up!” he rushed back towards the door, opening it again, looking down the hallways “—Baby speed it up! I didn’t mean to ditch you! I was excited!” 

“What the hell is wrong with him?” Bucky leaned closer to you, whispering the question.

You laughed at him, shaking your head, “I told you, Quino’s special. There’s a reason he’s my best friend.”

Then Joaquin was back in front of you both, this time with a girl beside him. She had an awkward smile while she waved at the two of you.

“For the record, he dragged me here. We were supposed to be going to get dinner, he said this was a pit stop.” She said her name, glancing at Joaquin who was now pacing back and forth, holding the card that you’d left in the box, a long hand-written note on it with a major question on the bottom of it. 

You smiled, introducing yourself to her. “So you’re the doctor right? Tell me, what motivated you to choose Joaquin of all people to be in a relationship with? He’s uh—well. He’s who he is.” 

Joaquin gasped at that, now looking at you, then at his girlfriend, then back at you.

“Okay! Let’s not make this into the Joaquin hate club. I came to say that I’d be honored to be your Man of Honor! Kate and Peter are gonna be so jealous! Oh my god! I love you guys so much.” He smiled, nodding his head, eyes clearly tearing up at the sight of you and Bucky together.

You shared a look with his girlfriend, who now made herself comfortable on the other couch, shaking her head while she watched Joaquin’s emotional moment.

“Can I just say, I always knew you two were perfect for eachother. Even though you still intimidate the hell out of me Bucky—can I call you Bucky? Well, it’s too late, I already did so here we are. Wow. You two are a beautiful couple.” He sniffled, wiping away a stray tear. “I always told her to just jump your bones man, she used to angry text me everytime Mel would breathe in your direction. Oh by the way, Kate told me to tell you that Mel said congratulations! She tried to text you, but I guess you blocked her.”

You shushed Joaquin, jaw clenched and eyes wide as you slowly looked over at Bucky, whose brows were both raised, and you knew he’d be making fun of you for that later.

He then moved around the coffee table, pulling you into a bone-crushing hug, then he hesitated when he looked at Bucky. Against Joaquin’s better judgement he also pulled Bucky into a hug.

The shock on Bucky’s face had you bursting into a fit of laughter, then you nudged him slightly with your foot, laughing even harder as Bucky awkwardly hugged Joaquin back.

“I love you man. We’re family now.” 

You blinked a few times, looking at Joaquin. “We’re not even related?” 

He shushed you “We don’t need to be related! You’re like a sister to me! I love you! We’re family god damnit! And as your man of honor, we need to start planning your wedding. I’ll call you tomorrow. Lots of details to sort through, and don’t even think about wearing a black dress. This isn’t a goddamn funeral.” Then he looked back at his girlfriend, “Okay baby, thanks for stopping by with me, we can go now—also you guys know a good place for dinner around here?”

You and Bucky shared a look, and a smile, speaking at the same time “54.”

Once they were gone, you sighed, placing your laptop on the coffee table before stretching.

“We really do need to start planning our wedding,” Bucky spoke as you yawned, his hands massaging your feet. “I’m thinking we should get married in the late Winter, January sounds nice.”

You blinked a few times “Buck, January’s less than a year away…you really wanna get married that soon?” your brows knit together as you waited for his response. Eyes trailing along his features, watching as his brows knit together, then he rolled his lips inward, nodding a few times.

“If it was really up to me we’d go to the courthouse tomorrow. But I know you want a dramatic wedding.” He sounded so serious, and that had you moving across the couch, pulling him into a frantic kiss. 

“We can get married in January—hell December if we find a place.” Then your lips were back on his, hands in his hair as you kissed him until you were lightheaded.

Planning a wedding was a level of stress that you hadn’t fully anticipated. Sure Joaquin, Kate, Peter, and Yelena were helpful when you needed them to be, but you were quite the Bridezilla. It wasn’t even a purposeful development, you just wanted the day to be perfect, to the point that you’d argued over the kind of chairs at the wedding venue. 

Peter and Joaquin had gone with you to tour venues, and you settled on a renovated winery. It was a beautiful building in Upstate New York, each and every single detail had you in love. From the custom woodwork along the walls, to the stained glass windows, to the field of iceland poppies outside, all in full bloom during the peak winter months with a thin layer of snow around them.

Picking the venue was just the first hurdle, you also had to figure out a color scheme, find the right kinds of flowers, pick the song for your first dance, find someone to walk you down the aisle, and focus on not murdering Joaquin everytime he made a suggestion you didn’t agree with.

Then, there was the issue with finding a dress—something most brides-to-be did first—but you were dreading it. Mostly because you thought you’d never find the perfect dress, or maybe the dress would be perfect to you, but Bucky would hate it and think you looked like a sack of potatoes, and suddenly he’d be running away and leaving you at the altar. 

So what if you were being dramatic? Picking a wedding dress is difficult.

That didn’t stop everyone from ambushing you, letting you think that you were all going to lunch together, instead you ended up in a bridal boutique in Manhattan. They practically dragged you into the shop when you refused to go, more specifically, Peter and Yelena had dragged you inside while Joaquin and Kate cheered them on.

Three and a half hours later you’d tried on sixteen dresses, some too big, some too small, some too short, some too tall. 

You felt like a children’s book.

At least you did until the sales associate walked out with a dress you hadn’t noticed prior. You were currently sitting on the ground, brows knit together in frustration while you were practically swimming in a large poofy dress fit for a princess. There was too much fabric, too many sequins, and it was irritating you.

“I like that dress she is holding. It’s much better than the fabric disaster you’re sitting in.” Yelena spoke as she looked at the Ivory dress the associate held. It had a sweetheart neckline and thin off the shoulder straps that would sit perfectly against your arms. The dress was simple, the fabric smooth, bodice fitted, and the skirt flared out.

Honestly it reminded you of a longer pin-up dress without the halter straps.

“Try that one on.” Yelena motioned to the dress, Kate nodded in agreement.

So you huffed, reluctantly following the associate back to the changing rooms, letting the older woman help you out of the fluffy disaster you’d been in. Then she was helping you into the much simpler dress.

“It’s a timeless piece, simple yet elegant, I think your Fiance will love it.” 

You nodded at her as she zipped you up. It needed a bit of tailoring, but you liked it much better than any of the other dresses, and honestly you could imagine yourself walking down the aisle in it.

Kate gasped as she saw you, eyes watering a bit, Peter smiled and nodded his head, Joaquin whistled as he clapped, and Yelena let out a shocked ‘oh my god!’

Once the dress debacle was settled, you had time to focus on planning everything else out. Eventually, after months of stress, arguments, and threatening to kick Joaquin and Kate’s asses, the wedding was officially here.

You were set to get married in six hours.

There were six hours until you’d be walking down the aisle and marrying the love of your life. Even if he was over a century old and could be quite the grouch at times. 

Things were not going as smoothly as they should’ve, not when Joaquin was chasing down the florists, letting them know the arrangements weren’t perfect, Peter was busy with an electrician after he noticed half of the lights in the reception hall weren’t working properly, Kate was going back and forth with the makeup artist, and Yelena had to remind Alexei several times that he was not your wedding’s bouncer. 

There was a distinct list of guests that would be let in, and only some got a plus one. Everyone else who wasn’t supposed to be there, shouldn’t have shown up. Although, it was nice to know that Alexei had taken it upon himself to escort several people off of the property…and to argue with them until they finally left the vicinity.

Your head was pounding and you were fighting the urge to drink until you blacked out.

Getting black out drunk before your wedding is a terrible way to go into a lifelong commitment. 

“Can you leave her alone Kate! Jesus Christ she’s just doing her goddamn job!” Your shout left the room silent. You blinked a few times, processing that you were much louder and meaner than intended.

“Okay, sheesh, I just want today to be perfect for you.”

You sighed at her, shaking your head, “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to scream at you. I’m just stressed out okay. I’m not feeling very bubbly and happy or however the hell a bride-to-be is supposed to feel. And I’m worried about Bucky, he was so distant last night when we were on the phone. He’s never like that with me. It was all ‘mhmms’ and ‘okay Sweethearts.’ Then I told him I loved him and he said ‘love you too’ but without the ‘I’ and maybe I’m overthinking it, but he never just says ‘love you’.” You took a deep breath, now glancing at yourself in the full-length mirror, running your hands along your robe.

Initially, you were just supposed to be looking at your hair, making sure you liked it. It was the vision that you initially had, large curls and waves, two braids pulled back, hair cascading down your shoulders. The extensions in your head were a bit uncomfortable, but you told yourself beauty is pain. 

You were supposed to have a few blue flowers in your hair, however, they weren’t here, which is also another reason you’d sent Joaquin to find the florist. You hated how the centerpieces turned out, not because the flowers were wrong, but because the arrangement was off, and that was also making you mad.

“I’m having a shitty morning, and has anyone heard from Sam?! Is he even here?” you spoke as you walked towards the seat that you were supposed to be getting your makeup done in. 

“Yeah, Peter said he’s here, you want me to call him?” you nodded at Kate, a silent thank you.

Then you were told to close your eyes and relax. So you sat stiffly with your eyes shut, mind focused on Bucky and why he was acting so off last night.

One floor below where you were, Bucky was. He wasn’t dressed, rather he was pacing back and forth in his dress pants and undershirt, hands on his hips while he tried to remind himself that today was a joyous occasion.

Sam shook his head, watching Bucky pace back and forth. He’d been doing it for about ten minutes now.

“I’m not understanding what the problem is, Buck? You love her, don’t you? Today’s supposed to be a good day for you two, the best day of your life actually.” Sam’s eyes followed Bucky’s movements, studying his figure. It was clear the wedding stress was getting to him. This was a stressful time overall, as he was coming up on the end of his Congress term, and the ongoing public debate about whether or not he would be running for re-election was prominent.

He was also dealing with the stress from being an Avenger, even if he wasn’t in practice on missions. Sam and Bucky had come to the agreement to continue helping one another, and anytime a large threat surfaced on either side, they’d make one another aware, and their teams would work vigilantly.

But this stress—this stress was a different look on Buck. Sam had known him long enough to understand how stress impacted Bucky. He didn’t look irritated, annoyed, or even bothered in the slightest. Instead he looked worried and anxious, the fact that he was pacing back and forth said enough.

“I love her, of course I love her. She’s everything to me, I just—I don’t know. What if this doesn’t work out? Y’know her parents are divorced? Actually, she doesn’t even speak to her parents. What if we both have shit relationship habits that’ll surface when we’re married?”

Sam blinked a few times, brows knit together as Bucky voiced his concerns.

“Or what if we get married, then she meets someone younger, someone smarter, someone better fit for her. Someone without decades of emotional trauma and baggage, someone that won’t wake her up in the middle of the night panicking over something that happened forty years ago?” 

Bucky ran a hand through his hair as he spoke, shaking his head a few times, trying to ground himself, but it was as if he was falling, deeper and deeper into a hole that he couldn’t get himself out of. 

Then Sam’s phone started ringing, his brows knitting together at the unknown number calling. He quickly answered, raising a single brow at the frantic voice on the other end. “Okay…slow down Kate. Jesus Christ? Her too? Okay I’m on the way.” 

Sam sighed. “Listen Buck, you love the girl, you want to spend the rest of your life with her, don’t let some insecurities or fears get in the way of that. She loves you for you, she wants to spend the rest of your life with her and vice versa. I’ve gotta go check in on her as well.” 

Then he was grabbing his things, tucking his phone into his pocket before leaving the room. He knew that there wasn’t a single thing that he could say to Bucky to get the man to relax. This was something that Buck would have to figure out, and unfortunately Sam couldn’t tell him what to think, or give him some best case scenario about today.

Weddings had a way of stressing people out.

When Sam rounded the large stairwell, he spotted Joaquin with a handful of blue flowers. Which gave him an idea.

“Joaquin, I need you to go talk to Buck. Give him one of your classic pep talks, and between me and you—he’s getting cold feet. Go remind him that he’s in love.” Joaquin nodded at Sam, handing him the flowers in hand.

“Give those to Bridezilla, and fair warning Sam, she’s not the sweetest right now.”

They both exchanged a knowing look, one descending the steps, the other ascending.

Joaquin got to the Groom’s suite. He hesitated before opening the door, swallowing, anticipating the possibility of Bucky literally throwing him out of the room. What shocked Joaquin was the sight of Bucky seated on the edge of an ottoman, hunched over slightly, running his hand through his hair while he stared at the handwritten note you’d given him two days ago, telling him he wasn’t allowed to open it up until the day of the wedding.

“Uh—are you alright Bucky?” He grimaced as he watched Bucky sit up a bit straighter, now looking over his shoulder at Joaquin.

“I’ve had better days. Thinking your best friend might regret marrying me one day.” He sounded so defeated as he spoke, now looking back at the sealed envelope, your messy writing reading ‘To my Bucky, Everything that I wanted to say in my vows, but can’t because I’d probably ugly cry’.

Joaquin scoffed, his genuine reaction ruining the pity party that Bucky was throwing for himself. The older man now stood up, letter still in his vibranium hand as he stared at Joaquin who was quick to let himself into the room fully, then shut the door behind him.

“Listen, I know I might be annoying as hell, and I know I’m probably the last person you want to talk to about this right now, but Y/N loves you. Like, pathetically so, and I would know because I’m also pathetically in love with my girlfriend. There isn’t a single other person on this planet, or in this universe, or galaxy, hell even in the multiverse that she would rather marry than you.”

He paused for a second, now crossing his arms over his chest and shaking his head. “She used to text me about how angry it made her anytime you’d even smile at another person when you two were ‘strictly professional’ or whatever bullshit you both told yourselves. She would literally pause whatever she was doing to spam me with angry texts because of how jealous she was that you were giving other people your attention.” Joaquin sighed, shaking his head.

“She literally hates Mel. Like, hates her—like, even after you two are husband and wife she’s never going to like that woman. All because she was there when you answered the phone the first time she’d ever called you about the shady shit Valentina was doing. Y’know she ranted to me for half an hour about the fact that your voice supposedly got softer when talking to Mel? There’s a reason Valentina got an invite today and Mel didn’t.”

Bucky slowly nodded his head, processing Joaquin’s words, stifling a laugh at your undying jealousy. 

“Now, do me a favor and stop getting cold feet before she kills everyone here. She’s terrifying right now, Yelena told me that she yelled at Kate over Kate talking to the makeup artist. Then, she was apologizing profusely for yelling at Kate. It’s like she’s hot then she’s cold and she practically chewed me out this morning because I couldn’t find the florist to find the right flowers for her hair.”

“You really think we’ll last, Torres?” Bucky sounded so vulnerable, and in that moment, Joaquin shook his head, walking right over and pulling him into a bear hug—or rather what would’ve been a bear hug if Joaquin was the same size as Bucky.

When he pulled back, he nodded his head, “I don’t think I’ve ever met two people more perfect for one another. Read her letter. Trust me, it’ll give you every ounce of reassurance you need. I cried when I read it, and it’s not even about me!”

Joaquin sighed, running his hands over his light grey suit jacket. Then he was fiddling with the icy-blue tie. “If you’ll excuse me, I’ve gotta go make sure she’s not actively murdering anyone.”

When Joaquin left the room, Bucky took a seat closer to the windows, looking outside at the thin layer of snow covering the valley, small pops of color from the winter blooms peaking through.

Then he opened the envelope, pulling out the note, smiling at the pastel pink paper.

James Buchanan Barnes, your name is a goddamn mouthful. 

But when I’m saying my actual vows, I’ll say it and hopefully I won’t start sobbing. Knowing myself though? I will. I know we’ve only been together for a year, and some people have said it’s stupid to get married this early. But you’re genuinely it for me. I don’t think I’ve ever felt the way you make me feel. You’ve shown me bits and pieces of myself that I didn’t even know about. Sure, you piss me the hell off with your lack of punctuality, and terrible media training, but everything else about you makes up for it.

I love you. I’ve loved you since the moment you smiled at me on that truck in Germany, after I totally whooped your ass, with your bloody smile and terrible timing. You called me ‘Doll’ and I think that moment made me realize that maybe, just maybe, life could be more than just running and surviving. 

Every second of every day I think about you, which I know is a little creepy to say out loud, good thing I’m writing it, huh? You’ve taught me that loving someone doesn’t need to be difficult, and though we have our jagged edges, I love each and every piece and part of you. I love you on your best and worst days, I love you when you wake me up in the middle of the night and ask me to just hold you. I love the way you smile at me during someone else's long winded speech. I love the way you say my name and the way you call me Sweetheart. 

You always tell me I’m obnoxious, and I know I am, but I’m so thankful that I get to be obnoxious around you, that I get to be myself with you. I’m not afraid of your judgement because I know you’d never actually judge me. Thank you for that by the way. Shit I’m crying now. Okay, I have to focus. This is the edge of the page so make sure you flip it over! I’m not done!

Okay good, you flipped it. Back to what I was saying before. You’re the love of my life.

When I first started working for you, I wanted nothing more than to kick your ass. Some days, I still feel the same way, but it’s not the same. I’ve never wanted to be around someone so often, I’ve never felt the kind of emotions you make me feel. You honestly make me crazy.

Thank you for letting me in. Thank you for letting me past your walls, thank you for letting me love you and care for you, and thank you for loving me. Not to be a total sap, especially because I’m not even thirty yet, and technically you’re not even forty in terms of physical age, but I hope when we’re both old and wrinkly, everyday you make me feel the same happiness I feel now. God forbid I ever get something like dementia, but if it happens, I hope you’re the only person I consistently remember time and time again. Or at the very least, we can fall in love, each and every day, over and over again.

When our time comes, I hope I find you in the next lifetime, and the next one after that. 

I love you James Buchanan Barnes. I can’t wait to marry you.

He sniffled, shaking his head, a wide smile on his face as a few tears streamed along his cheeks. Bucky took a minute to wipe his tears away, licking his lips as he reread the last two lines of the letter. He carefully folded the paper again, slipping it right back into the envelope, then into his pocket. 

Then he started getting ready, and he let all of his doubts wash away at the thought of you smiling at him as you walked down the aisle.

You had finally finished getting your makeup and hair done, Sam helping the stylist slip the flowers into your hair, opening bobby pins with his teeth as he secured them. He had a sister, it only made sense that he’d know how to do things like this.

“Y’know Bucky loves you, right?” 

You nodded your head at Sam, gaze focused on your reflection, the woman staring back at you looked so ethereal, so beautiful. Like a genuine princess, straight out of a fairytale, waiting on her prince charming.“You think he’s gonna ditch me at the altar?”

Sam sighed, pinching his nose bridge as he took a deep breath. “What is with you two? I’ve never met two people more in love! Do you both have anxiety or something? Is it the super soldier serum running through your veins?”

You sighed, shrugging. “Last night, he didn’t tell me ‘I love you’ and since then I’ve been literally spiraling, Sam. I feel like an idiot. I’ve been mean and grouchy and rude all day, I can’t get comfortable, and I’m so overwhelmed. I don’t doubt that he loves me, I doubt that he wants to marry my psychotic ass.”

Sam now faced you, both hands on your shoulders. “I’m only saying this once, okay kid? That man is utterly in love with you, he wants to spend everyday with you, he wants to be the father of your kids. He has an entire domestic fantasy in his head about the both of you. James Barnes wants nothing more than for you to be his wife. Forever. Now, stop sulking in self doubt, get your happy ass up, and put on your wedding dress.”

It was the tough love you needed, it had you sniffling slightly, bottom lip quivering a bit as you nodded. 

By the time you were in your wedding dress, your nerves had settled, and you were now looking down at the folded piece of paper Joaquin had brought to you, he was out of breath as he said ‘it's from Bucky—shit.’

You recognized his handwriting anywhere, and you didn’t hesitate to unfold the note.

Beautiful, where do I even start. I wanna keep this short and simple because I already cried reading your note to me. Also, I’m gonna cry watching you walk down the aisle, just so we have it out there. We’re both gonna cry today. I just want you to know that I love you, I can’t wait to marry you today, I can’t wait for us to be Mr. and Mrs. Barnes. I’ll see you on the other side.

With Love, Your Bucky.

You smiled, laughing at the letter, shaking your head a bit.

You really loved Bucky, and he really loved you.

After you’d spent an hour or so taking photos with your wedding party, it was time for the ceremony to begin, and you were nauseous, feeling as if you were about to keel over and vomit. The nerves came back tenfold. You didn’t have cold feet, but you weren’t exactly alright.

Then it was time for you to walk down the aisle, the opening chords to ‘Here comes the bride’ playing loudly, the large wooden doors opening, and your grip tightened around your bouquet. Taking a deep breath, glancing to your right, Alexei giving you a reassuring smile.

You weren’t really sure how he ended up being the one to walk you down the aisle, all you knew was that you’d grown pretty close over the past six months, and when Yelena suggested it, you didn’t even think twice.

“You look beautiful, are you ready?” 

You nodded at him. He linked his arm with yours, the both of you walking in tune to the song, everyone’s gaze on you as you smiled, eyes trailing your wedding party.

On your side, Joaquin stood with a wide smile, Peter beside him, and finally Kate. 

On Bucky’s side, Sam stood, wiping a single tear away, then Yelena, then Shuri who smiled at you, shooting you a wink. You were glad she was able to make it in, the Wakandans were family to Bucky.

Then there was your husband to be, in his black tux, white shirt below, with an icy blue tie and a singular blue cornflower pinned to his jacket. He smiled as he looked at you, a red flush to his skin as he bit his bottom lip, teary eyes focused on you. 

When you finally made it to the altar his gaze hadn’t left yours. You faced him, handing the bouquet to Joaquin. Then your hands were in Bucky’s and he rubbed his thumbs against your hands, offering silent reassurance.

Sam’s sister Sarah was officiating the wedding, you thought it was a nice touch. One of his nephews was even the ring bearer. 

You knew it was time for your vows, and you’d known you were up first. Joaquin handed you the slip of paper, while you looked up at Bucky, bottom lip quivering slightly as you tried not to cry.

“James Buchanan Barnes, you are the love of my life. It took me a few weeks to write these vows, mostly because I didn’t know where to start. I promise to always be there for you, to always be present, to always show how much I truly care for you. I promise to keep you on your toes, to continue being my obnoxious self. You’ve taught me so much about myself, and I’ll forever be grateful for our love—” your voice cracked slightly. “You make me a better person, even on my worst days, and I promise to never stop trying. You’re my person, and I love you so much, even if you are technically my boss, and this is highly unprofessional.”

Your joke had the crowd laughing, smiles on their teary faces as they focused on you.

Bucky nodded his head, and as Sarah gave him the queue to start, he pulled a piece of paper from his pocket, swallowing as he looked down at it.

He said your full name. “I’ve been alive for a long time, longer than almost everyone in this room. Before meeting you, I was positive I’d never find ‘the one’. I remember Steve used to talk about finding ‘the one’ all the time, and I thought maybe it just wasn’t something I’d experience. Then I met you. You’re the biggest know-it-all I’ve ever met, but I love the sound of your voice. I promise to always be there with you and for you. You’re my everything and more, and I’ll forever be grateful that Sam dragged me halfway across the world to be a hero because it let me to you. You inspire me every single day to keep going, and I love you, Sweetheart.”

You were both crying now.

Then Sarah had Bucky start.

“Will you, James Buchanan Barnes, have this woman from this day forward, to be your wedded wife, to live and love together, in this sacred state of matrimony? Do you promise to love her, comfort her, honor, and cherish her. For rich or for poor, in sickness and health, in trying times and smooth, all the days of your life?” 

He didn’t hesitate, grasping your hands again. “I do.”

She smiled, looking at you.

“Will you, Y/n Y/l/n, have this man from this day forward, to be your wedded husband, to live and love together, in this sacred state of matrimony? Do you promise to love him, comfort him, honor, and cherish him. For rich or for poor, in sickness and health, in trying times and smooth, all the days of your life?” 

You nodded, “I do.”

“By the power vested in me, you may now kiss the bride.”

Bucky pulled you into him, lips against yours in an instant, the both of you smiling into the kiss as he dipped you, your lips moving in sync while the room filled with cheers, claps, and even a few whistles.

The day was full of emotion, you cried over and over again. During Sam and Joaquin’s speeches you found yourself laughing, crying, and leaning into Bucky, head against his shoulder while you both whispered amongst each other.

The two of you danced to A Thousand Years by Christina Perri. You’d chosen the song, teasing Bucky about it over the span of three weeks prior to the wedding date, constantly making jokes that you’d chosen it because he was ‘like a thousand years old anyways’. But truthfully, you’d chosen the song because it managed to describe every single emotion that he made you feel.

That and one night four months ago you’d drunkenly waltzed to the song in your shared living room. 

He spun you around, the both of you laughing as you stumbled through the front door, wide smiles mirroring one another. Then you started dancing, he was humming, and you were giggling. Bucky’s hands on your waist, practically guiding you through before he intertwined his right hand with your left.

Then you got an idea, gasping as you shoved him slightly before grabbing your phone, a playlist on shuffle that Kate had sent titled ‘love songs that you might enjoy?’. 

The two of you spent two hours smiling, laughing, and dancing in the dimly lit living room, bumping into pieces of furniture every now and then, cycling through different songs from different eras, all of which shared the common thread of love. Then A Thousand Years started playing, and as you looked into his eyes, you knew at that moment, it would be your wedding song.

The rest of the night felt truly magical.

You felt like a princess getting to marry Prince Charming. 

All of the stress from before had finally faded away, you were finally happy, and you were finally Mrs. Barnes.

Bucky was practically insatiable throughout the entire night. The knowledge that you were his wife was chemistry altering for him, you were his in every sense of the word, and he was yours. His domestic fantasy about you with a ring on your finger was finally real, and you were finally his wife. 

He almost pulled an Irish goodbye at his own wedding. Of course you shushed him, forcing him to stay a bit longer, then you both made your dramatic exit as everyone threw flower petals above the two of you, the photographers perfectly capturing the moment, an image that you’d leave framed in your home for decades. 

Once you finally made it back to the large cabin, you smiled at the sight of it being fully decorated, trails of rose petals from the entrance, leading to the bedroom, different sized faux candles lit along the walkway, creating a welcoming ambiance. Then Bucky grasped your hand, a smile on his face as he looked at you.

“Finally don’t have to worry about that professionalism issue huh?”

You laughed at him, biting your bottom lip and nodding. “Guess your idea made sense after all huh? Now, Mr. Barnes, would you do me the honor of taking me to bed and getting me out of this dress?” 

Bucky didn’t need to be told twice, he was scooping you up bridal style and walking down the hallway, smiling as you laughed at him, shaking your head at the flowers all over the house, vases full of roses, rose petals all over the floor, Kate and Yelena had gone all out for you.

He gently put you down, taking a moment to truly admire you, the glow of the candlelight reflecting against your skin, you truly looked beautiful in every sense.

“Can you unzip me?” You turned away from him, moving the mixture of your hair and extensions out of the way, shivering at the feeling of his hands against your shoulders, then he was slowly tugging the long ivory zipper down, the dress cascading down your body onto the floor.

Bucky’s eyes widened at the sight of the matching white lacy lingerie, which also included a thigh garter that made his head fuzzy. Then you spun to face him, stepping out of your heels, looking up at him with a smirk.

You were silent as you unbuttoned his shirt, moving slowly, one by one, all the while he watched you with a lust-filled gaze. Once the shirt was fully open, you gently slid your hands along his torso, stopping at his belt before making eye contact with him.

“Go ahead Mrs. Barnes.” 

The name made you smile, rolling your eyes playfully as you undid his belt. You paused to push his shirt off of his shoulders, he shrugged it the rest of the way off. It was clear he was running out of patience as you toyed with the button of his pants.

Then suddenly he was picking you up and tossing you right onto the bed, a loud creak as your back hit the mattress, the noise had both of you laughing. He raised both brows as he looked at you in a pile of rose petals, biting his bottom lip while unbuttoning his pants and kicking off his own shoes. 

As you spread your legs for him, he easily slotted himself between them, vibranium hand on your throat, pulling you closer to him as he pressed his lips to yours. 

Bucky kissed you like a man starved, all teeth and tongue, moaning against your lips, holding you in place with a firm grip around your throat that had your head spinning. He poured every ounce of love and adoration into the kiss, with a smidge of frustration. 

You bit his bottom lip, giving yourself the chance to pull back slightly, catching your breath, already feeling light headed as you rested your forehead against his. 

His voice was strained as he spoke, as if he was holding back, “Am I wrong if I don’t wanna go slow with you tonight?”

You smiled, laughing a bit, “I never asked for you to go slow with me, James. I’m your wife, so fuck me like it.”Your seductive tone was all he needed to hear, lips back on yours for a brief moment before he was moving his hand away from your neck, trailing wet opened mouthed kissed down your jaw. 

Usually he wouldn’t leave marks, tonight was different though. He was nipping and sucking marks into your skin, listening to the way you whimpered at the feeling of his teeth against your soft skin. He took a moment to bite into your shoulder, lapping his tongue over the inflamed skin. Bucky was staking his claim onto you, he was practically feral.

You moaned as he cupped your tits, squeezing and massaging them before practically ripping the lingerie off of you—earning a loud gasp. He shushed you, his mouth back on your chest, kissing along the swell of your breasts, biting against them slightly before taking a nipple into his mouth.

Your hands were in his hair while his tongue lapped at your hardened peak, then he moved to the other one, using his free hand to lightly tug on your nipple before smacking your breast. 

He moaned against your skin, smacking your tits a few more times, listening to your loud whines and whimpers, smirking at the feeling of you arching into his touch, hips bucking against him slightly.

Eventually he let up, kissing down your stomach, looking up at you as he situated himself between your thighs. 

“Tonights all about you Mrs. Barnes,” he spoke as he ripped off your panties, literally grasping the material at your hip, then tearing it and pushing it out of his way. “I’ll buy you more—fuck keep you dressed up like this for me all the time.”

You nodded, biting your bottom lip as he peppered kisses along your hips, both hands pushing your thighs even further apart. Bucky trailed wet open mouthed kisses to your inner thighs, biting into the supple flesh a few times, coaxing moans out of you. He also tugged on the thigh garter with his teeth, moaning against your skin.

Then he placed a soft kiss to the mound above your cunt before licking a singular flat stripe from your sopping hole to your clit. The motion had you rocking your hips forward.

He used his vibranium arm to keep you still, pinning your lower half to the bed, hand practically bruising as he held onto one of your hips, his other hand steady on your thigh, offering a few smacks while he teased you with his tongue.

Bucky moaned against your cunt several times, letting himself get lost in the taste of you as he licked along your slit, back and forth, over and over again until you were whimpering.

“Baby please—I need more” 

He looked up at you, your hooded eyes staring right back at him. “Anything for you Sweetheart.”

He wrapped his lips around your swollen clit, sucking against it, your moans only motivated him to keep going. He swirled his tongue around your pearl, even lightly grinding his teeth against it. That had your eyes crossed as you tugged on his hair.

The sting against his scalp had him moaning, the vibrations made your toes curl. You were already so close.

Then he pulled back slightly, a ‘pop’ leaving his lips as Bucky let go of your clit, opting to swiftly flick his tongue against it—the way he knew you loved. Then he was tracing his name against it, taking his time with each and every letter, applying just enough pressure to make you scream his name, a rush of euphoria overtaking you.

He laughed at you, biting his bottom lip, “Already cumming for me baby? You didn’t even ask nicely.” 

You whimpered, shaking your head.“Don’t start with me, Bucky.” your voice was strained, words a bit frantic as you tried to catch your breath. However, he didn’t give you a break, his tongue was back on your clit and one of his fingers was sliding into your entrance, the feeling had you whining his name, not Bucky—James.

Then he slid a second finger into you, still lapping at your clit while your walls fluttered around the thick digits, moaning against you as he closed his eyes, getting lost in the taste of your cunt. Bucky slid his tongue to the edge of your sopping hole, gathering your juices, groaning, before moving back to your clit, fingers rapidly fucking into you, hitting the spongy spot inside of you that nearly had you screaming.

He’d be lying if he said he wasn’t bucking his hips into the mattress.

You were biting your bottom lip, brows knit together, back arched as you tried to rock your hips against him. Still he held you down.

“Take what I give you, baby.” 

You nodded at his words.

“Can I cum—fuck please—let me cum baby—” your moans were getting louder and louder as you tried not to cum.

“C’mon baby, wanna taste more of you—cum for me” 

His voice sent you over the edge, you were creaming along his fingers, cunt squeezing against them as he kept his motions up, prolonging your orgasm in the best way. Then he was slipping his fingers out of you, and usually he’d put them in his own mouth, but you watched as he moved up a bit, raising his arm, then he tugged on your bottom lip with them.

“Know you want a taste—” his voice was deeper than usual, a bit strained as he watched you take his fingers into your mouth, tongue swirling around them, moaning at the taste while holding eye contact with him.

It wasn’t long before his pants were off and he was between your thighs, lips back on yours, relishing in the taste of your cunt contrasting with your usual lip balm. 

Your hands were on either side of his face, kissing him with your all as he struggled to keep up with you. Then you pulled away for a brief moment, whispering, “Need you to fuck me,” against his lips. One of your hands now between your legs, grasping his cock, sliding along the thickness of it for a few seconds as you kissed him.

Then you were angling him towards your cunt, teasing him, running the head of his cock through your dripping slit, even tapping it against your clit a few times, whimpering against his lips. 

He smiled into the kiss, bucking his hips slightly before you angled him perfectly against your entrance. “You sure you don’t want it slow baby?” his voice was low as he spoke, pulling away from the kiss, looking down at you, then glancing between your bodies, groaning at the sight of your smaller hand wrapped around his cock.

“We have a lifetime to go slow James—” you couldn’t even finish your sentence, not when he was bottoming out inside of you, a deep moan leaving him as he filled you to the brim. Your eyes were squeezed shut, hands now on his back, nails digging into his skin while you tried to remember how to breathe.

Bucky rested his head in the crook of your neck, shallow breaths against your skin while he gave you a moment to adjust to his size. “You’re gonna kill me one day,” his voice was strained as he spoke, earning a laugh from you.

“You can move baby,” you were already breathless, then he slowly pulled out of you, taking his time as he thrusted back in. You knew he was trying to go easy on you, giving you the chance to fully adjust to him—but that’s not what you wanted right now. 

“Bucky I need you to fuck me like you mean it.”

He blinked a few times, and it was as if all of his restraint suddenly snapped. Hips pistoning in and out of you as he sat up a bit straighter, two hands making their way to your thighs, pushing them back, practically folding you in half as he fucked into you with no remorse.

Your eyes rolled back at the feeling, pleasure overtaking all of your senses. The world around you faded to dust, all you could focus on was Bucky.

“Take it so fuckin good-fuck look at you baby—so pretty—my pretty fuckin wife.” 

You nodded at him, biting your bottom lip, whimpering as you struggled to keep your eyes open. His hands dug into your thighs as he held you in place, fucking into you like a man possessed.

You started rocking your hips into him, trying your best to meet his thrusts, chasing your own high—moaning his name in a chant as he pounded into you.

His gaze moved from your perfect face down to your cunt, biting his bottom lip as he watched his cock disappear into you, “Cunt’s practically swallowing me whole—fuck always so tight for me—keep taking it baby—just like that.” Bucky smirked at the sight of his cock coated in your cream, your cunt soaking him over and over again.

“Love this little pussy—might even fill ‘er up—you’d like that wouldn’t you baby?” he looked back at you, watching as you stared at him through hooded lust-filled eyes. Lips spread as uncontrollable moans slipped through, brows knit together while you focused on him.

“Yeah, gonna fill this cunt, make it all mine—forever—just like you. Fuck might keep filling you up until it sticks—have you all round with my kid.” he paused, eyes trailing your figure again, biting his bottom lip for a few seconds “—gonna give you my kids baby, make you into my perfect little housewife.” He moved one hand, leaning forward, vibranium hand wrapped around your throat, giving it a gentle squeeze-apply just enough pressure to make you forget anything and everything that wasn’t Bucky.

He also had your hips angled a bit more, the new angle giving him room to fuck you deeper, cock stretching you out and filling you sinfully.

“Gonna make you the mother to my kids—keep fuckin filling you all night.” 

You nodded at that.“Please—fuck—need it so bad-” You didn’t even know what you were begging for, part of you needed to cum again, the other part of you wanted nothing more than for Bucky to cum inside of you, fucking you full of himself.

“Don’t worry baby, I’ll always take care of you.” He let go of your other thigh, hand now between your legs, thumb rubbing harsh half-moons against your clit. “C’mon Sweetheart, know you wanna cum—so cum for me,” 

A white heat flooded your body, your eyes squeezing just as you moaned “James—fuck—” orgasm flooding through your entire body, you felt like you were on fire and the only thing that could extinguish it was Bucky.

He moaned at the sight of you gushing around his cock, coating your inner thighs and his cock in your juices as he kept fucking into you. Then he was tensing up, jaw clenched as he shuddered, cumming deep inside of you, moving his hips to fuck it all into you.

It took a few seconds for the both of you to finally relax. You laughed as he practically plopped on top of you, his head against your chest while he groaned. Then your hands were in his hair, toying with the strands as you giggled.

“Consummating the marriage went well I think?” Your voice was a bit hoarse, and he nodded against you, mumbling an ‘mhmmm’, clearly tired from the day.

“I was serious by the way—want you to be the mother to my kids,” he spoke quietly, arms wrapped around your body, holding you even closer to him. 

You knew the topic of kids had always been touchy for Bucky, it wasn’t like he never wanted them, prior to Hydra, he constantly imagined settling down with the right woman, having his own family, two kids running around the house and raising hell. It was a domestic fantasy that he kept to himself, something that he was afraid of talking about because there were too many ‘what-ifs’ involved.

James Buchanan Barnes was a sergeant in the military during one of the largest historical wars, his life was constantly on the line at that point. Then he spent seventy years brainwashed, used as an assassin, and traumatized. He’d done the work, he’d faced his traumas and he was a better person in the end. But in the back of his mind he was always afraid of hurting his loved ones, always afraid that one day something might go wrong, that he might turn back into the monster they’d made him.

You were the one to finally convince him that it wouldn’t happen. That he’d never hurt you or anyone else he cared about, that he wasn’t a monster. You always told him, “Bucky, just because you’ve done bad things, doesn’t make you a bad person.”

You’d even promised to keep reiterating that to him for the rest of his life. 

Four months following the wedding you’d been feeling sick for two weeks straight. 

So sick in fact that you couldn’t keep anything down and would wake up at random hours throughout the night and early morning to vomit, mumbling that you were ‘praying to the porcelain gods’ anytime he asked if you were alright. 

Bucky was always up with you, kneeling beside you in the bathroom, holding your hair back, making sure you were alright as he rubbed reassuring circles into your back. Half the time he was still partially asleep, rubbing his eyes while asking you the same question multiple times between yawns.

It wasn’t until Kate and Joaquin showed up to your Brooklyn apartment with concerned expressions and a CVS bag in hand that you’d even considered the possibility of being pregnant.

“I need you to piss on these sticks.” 

You scoffed at Joaquin, throwing a pillow at him while you sat up in your bedroom. You’d been laying down in a pile of blankets and pillows that you’d sprayed with Bucky’s cologne. He had to be in D.C. for a few hearings and given your ongoing illness, you weren’t fit to travel.

So instead you hunkered down, with a basket full of saltines and ginger ale for four days, constantly reheating a pot of soup Yelena had made for you with the help of Alexei. She’d mumbled several words in Russian that you didn’t understand when she was cooking it, arguing with her father on the phone as he told her she was adding too much or too little of something.

Joaquin and Kate stood side-by-side in your bedroom, he held up two boxes of pregnancy tests, each a different brand, while Kate held the CVS bag and a new bottle of ginger ale. 

It had taken an hour of convincing before you were in the bathroom, taking multiple pregnancy tests while Kate leaned against the sink and Joaquin stood outside of the door, doing his best to be ‘encouraging’.

“If I strangle him, will you help me hide his body? Actually, Bucky’s coming back tonight, maybe he’ll help me.” 

Kate shook her head at you, glancing down at the four tests sitting on the countertop, then at her phone with a timer set. You were seated on top of the closed toilet, one leg rapidly bouncing up and down.

“Y’know how excited Joaquin is at the potential to be an uncle? Y’know I was sparring at the tower with Walker when he randomly stormed in and said we needed to go to CVS as soon as possible.” She then motioned to her clothes.

“I assumed you were just into the athleisure look. It’s fine Kate! It looks good on you. I think maybe we should let him in now, he’s probably pacing outside looking insane.” She nodded, then opened the door, the two of you watching Joaquin suddenly stop in his steps, eyes wide as he walked into the doorframe, leaning against it as he looked at you two.

“Well?! What do they say?” you shrugged, glancing at Kate.

“Timers not up yet, we don’t know.” Kate looked back at her phone as she spoke, then at the tests on the counter, her eyes widening before doing a double take. “Uh…well…we’ve got like two minutes left but I don’t think we’ll need them.”

You shot up from your seat, grabbing one of the tests, eyes wide as you stared at it, the positive sign staring right back. Then you looked at the other three—all positives.

“Oh shit!” 

Joaquin practically shoved you out of the way to see them, then he turned around and pulled you and Kate into a group hug “This is so exciting! I’m gonna be an uncle! Oh my god how are you gonna tell your husband?! Shit, I need to call my girlfriend!” 

You immediately shushed him, shoving him away while shaking your head, one test still in hand as you pointed it at him. “No—you’re not telling anyone! Not until I tell Bucky! We’re not having a repeat of my engagement!” Then you turned to Kate, pointing the test at her too “That goes for you too! Don’t tell a soul!”

Joaquin slowly nodded, “What about Peter?” You raised a single brow and he cracked, “Okay, I told Peter that Buck might’ve knocked you up! But to be fair! To be fair! It was because I wanted him to go to CVS with me and Kate—but he’s with his girlfriend.”

You smacked Joaquin with a bottle of hand soap. 

Then you heard the door open. Blinking a few times, the sound caught you off guard. Your shocked expression met Kate and Joaquin’s who ushered you out of the bathroom before slamming the ensuite door shut.

By the time that Bucky walked into your shared bedroom, you were already back in bed, tucked under your layers. He relaxed at the sight of you, a smile on his face while he shrugged off his suit jacket.

“Missed you baby, you feeling better?” He spoke as he approached you, pulling off his tie and unbuttoning the first few buttons of his white dress shirt. Then he was leaning into your space, one hand on the bed to brace himself as he kissed you. 

You couldn’t hold it in, and you were shoving him off of you as you sat up. He blinked a few times, and you knew he was worried he’d done something wrong. But you immediately shushed him the second his mouth opened to say something.

“I’m pregnant and Joaquin and Kate are in the bathroom hiding and I didn’t think you’d be home until tonight and holy fucking shit I’m gonna have a baby—your baby.” You spoke so fast you hardly even registered what you were saying.

He blinked a few times, brows knit together as he tried to process what you’d just said, all he’d gotten was ‘Joaquin and Kate…bathroom…baby’. He then sat down beside you, grabbing your hand, giving it a reassuring squeeze. “Sweetheart, I need you to slow down and say it again.”

You sighed, nodding your head, eyes watering for some reason as you looked into his eyes. “James, I’m pregnant, and Joaquin and Kate are hiding in the bathroom because I thought you’d be home later tonight and they had me take the tests, and they’re all positive.”

Bucky nodded slowly, shock evident on his features while he stared at you.

“So we’re gonna have a baby?” 

You nodded “We’re gonna have a baby.” Then your tears started falling while he pulled you into a hug, planting a kiss to the top of your head.

“You’re gonna look so good pregnant.” 

You knew he was joking, trying to make you feel better, and truthfully it worked. You moved to kiss him, a soft, tender kiss. Then you leaned your forehead against his, “We’re gonna have a baby.”

Joaquin practically fell through the bathroom door with Kate on top of him, both of them had clearly been eavesdropping, and whoever used the doorknob for leverage was an idiot (newsflash, it was Joaquin). They both groaned in pain at the impact, blinking a few times while you and Bucky stared at them.

“Get the hell out, both of you.” Bucky’s voice had their eyes widening, both shooting up and mumbling awkward goodbyes. Once they were out, you started laughing, lightly swatting his arm.

“You’ve gotta stop intimidating everyone like that! They’re just excited for us. But just so you know, we’re gonna be getting a lot of calls soon about the whole baby situation.” 

He nodded. “Is now a bad time to say that Sam’s in the living room?”

-

As always thanks for reading sexies <3 feedback is appreciated!!!

[coolwyous]

┈─★ 𝘪'𝘮 𝘯𝘰𝘵 𝘨𝘰𝘯𝘯𝘢 𝘣𝘦 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘰𝘯𝘦 𝘵𝘰 𝘨𝘦𝘵 𝙝𝙪𝙧𝙩 .

   ⊹ ࣪ ˖ everyone has warned you about the less than shining reputation of women's hockey team captain daniela avanzini. arrogant, hot-headed, so, so bad for you, and extremely off-limits. so why is it that you can't get the blonde out of your head?

         ˎˊ˗  ❄️  ⊹ ࣪ ˖  🔓୭˚.  ⠀ ᵎᵎ ⠀ 🗝️

   ➴ pairing: hockey captain! daniela avanzini x coach's daughter! f!reader

   ➴ genre + wc: 23k, college au, forbidden/off-limits romance, friends w benefits to lovers?, sneaking around, slow burn, angst, bad communication, they start off toxic sorry not sorry, fuckboy/fratboy jock dani, reader's "i can fix him" energy is much too strong, however "you fall first she falls harder."

   ➴ you might want to tune in...: hurt (250 remix) - newjeans

┈─★ a/n: and we are all now officially full circle in the ditto verse to welcome home our fav fuckboy daddy dani <3 let me know what you think. i know it was a ton but i had so much fun exploring this dynamic i just couldn't stop adding to it. i'm gonna miss u hockeyverse!wigline but they were genuinely so much fun to write. hit me up with any ideas for anyone, i'd love to write a few shorter things/imagines and get more creative! thank you again for your time and all the love everyone has given this series! <3

cw:// mentions of recreational drug use, suggestive themes, mild violence but it's a hockey fic so that was to be expected i think....

[*set one year following the events of ditto/hlbwfil!]

“and another thing, your location stays on at all times.” your dad’s rambling to making sure you know exactly how little freedom you have. “you go to class, you come to practice, you go to the library maybe, and you go home.”

you cross your arms. “dining hall?”

“fine, dining hall.” he huffs. “i want permission before you step foot off this campus.”

“not happening,” you tell him simply. the vein in his forehead looks like it’s about to burst. 

“oh, are you paying for your own lawyer? after all the shit you pulled, you’re lucky you were even able to transfer.” he glares you down, his brow twitching. “i’m trying to keep you from ruining your life, y/n.”

“y/n,” your mom adds sternly, as a warning. “you have no idea how lucky you are that you get to start fresh after this.”

“yeah, no cheer, no friends, basically under house arrest, finishing college in the stupid boring city i grew up in instead of literally anywhere else. i feel like a real winner,” you roll your eyes, disappearing upstairs to go find your laptop before they can keep lecturing you.

you can talk back all you want, but they’ve never listened anyways. 

the last thing you want for your junior year of college is to have to start over, but here you are, trying to memorize the layout of this confusing campus before classes start tomorrow. you slip your earphones in and close your eyes, trying to get some rest. you have a feeling this semester is going to be a hard one.

-

you’ve always hated growing up in this city. he drives you to campus together and you hate the fact that you’re a year away from graduating and getting a ride from your dad still. you find your way around your first few classes and end sitting next to a gorgeous bobbed girl in your world literature class. 

“do you care about this stuff?” you ask, figuring you might as well make friends if you’re going to have to start over.

“i do,” she nods.

“would you be down to study with someone who doesn’t?”

she laughs and gives you a quick once-over. “you give trustworthy vibes.”

your dad was extremely clear. classes, practice, then straight home. you make your way to the stadium to get to their practice, under your dad’s direction after you get lost twice. you hate feeling the eyes on you as you walk into the training area, clearly a new face amongst people who’ve been training together since the summer time.

“new prospect?” someone asks. 

your dad clears his throat and motions to you. “this is y/n, my daughter, she’ll be shadowing for the season.”

“i didn’t know you had a girl, coach,” a blue-haired girl says curiously, waving up at you as you set your stuff down on a bench.

you’re not surprised. he usually only talks about the boys, your two older brothers, and how one is currently a commentator for the nhl and the other runs a hockey training camp on the east coast. 

“she’ll be stats manager,” he tells them, and it catches you by surprise— it’s the first you’re hearing of it. 

“isn’t that the assistant coach’s job?” you question.

“always good to have an extra pair of eyes,” he says, glaring over at you, almost threateningly, and the double meaning isn’t lost on you.

“welcome to the team,” a tall brunette says to you as she gets on the ice, and you smile appreciatively at everyone who acknowledges you, even if it’s just kissing your ass to get better with your dad. 

you hate starting new. you watch a red-haired girl, a ginger, and a blonde coming down the rafters, gear in hand, the blonde laughing as the red-haired girl tries grabbing her by the shoulder. they’re approaching you quickly, and maybe you should move out of the way of the player box, but by the time the thought occurs, they’re in front of you. 

“off limits,” you hear the red-haired girl say quickly.

“what is?” you ask, but you’re cut off by a rush of someone in your bubble. 

“hi,” the blonde girl, now just inches out of your face, greets breathlessly, a giant smile on her face. “you are absolutely gorgeous.”

oh god. it’s a strong first impression, but the way her dimple creases in the corner of her cheek makes your heart thud. you feel your cheeks turning red and already abandoning you.

“thank you,” you manage, before the taller ginger yanks her back.

“are you sure you’re related to our coach?” the red-haired one laughs. “the big bald dude who looks like he’ll shit himself at minor inconveniences?”

“dna test says i’m his,” you joke weakly. 

you can hear them mumbling amongst themselves as they get on the ice and skate away.

“god damn,” the blonde shakes her head. 

“off limits,” another girl echoes, shoving into her shoulder. 

your dad hands you a clipboard, and the assistant coaches comes up to you to break down your new job. you look up and spot the blonde on the ice. the assistant coach’s words get lost in your ear. maybe you’ll let yourself enjoy the view.

practice is long and tedious. you’ve never been a hockey girl, much to your dad’s frustration, so watching this is like torture for the past two hours. 

you hear a sharp whistle, the one that someone blows from between their teeth. your eyes snap up to meet those sharp mischievous ones, staring you down from the ice. 

“dani, don’t fucking start–” you hear the goalie warn, but the blonde is already blasting past her, building up a dangerous amount of speed. 

realizing her pleas are on deaf ears, the goalie cheers instead, hollering at the top of her lungs. you laugh. what a girl– if you can’t stop her, might as well cheer her on.

without a single ounce of hesitation, this “dani” girl pivots to skate backwards, braces down, and leaps up to land a recklessly tossed backflip. you almost wish she’d crash, just to wipe that shit-eating grin off her face– but no, she wobbles but sticks the landing, and you get the hint that this isn’t the first time she’s done something like this.

“avanzini, we said no more with the fucking backflips! stop showing off,” the assistant coach grunts. “ten laps since you want to be such a smart ass.”

she looks over at you one last time and flashes a grin at the assistant coach. “i’ll do eleven as an apology.”

she’s still doing laps when your dad gives a quick reminder about tomorrow’s practice and waves the girls off. they trickle off the ice and towards their gear one by one. you’re waiting for your dad before you hear a tap on the plexiglass, turning to spot the blonde waving at you from the other side.

“hey, don’t forget about me when you leave here today, alright?” she grins.

“already forgot your name,” you tell her, and you won’t mention having picked up on it from the goalie.

“it’s dani.” she breathes up against the plexiglass and traces the letters in. she grins charmingly, pointing to the word written in the fog of her breath against the glass. “d-a-n-i. now you won’t forget it, promise?”

you shake your head laughing as she skates past you. your dad is on another lecture as the two of you drive home, him rambling something about who knows what. you’re not listening, anyways.

you don’t want to give her the satisfaction, but her stupid antics worked. you can’t get the blonde out of your head. 

-

chaewon, the girl from your literature class, adopts you and somehow you’re always 2 degrees of separation from that stupid team. chaewon is dating one of the defenders, the blue-haired girl named yunjin, but luckily chae’s other friends don’t care for hockey quite as much. 

going to practice is still a pain, but the girls are never mean to you. you start to pick up on the names, the dynamics of the girls, and how your dad sees them. he mentioned last names to you before, but the names never stuck. you’re way better with faces anyways. 

there’s a clear star on that ice, an insanely fast ginger who pushes so hard, she’s dripping sweat within minutes of each practice starting. 

your dad never critiques one of the goalies, simply nodding at everything she does the way he used to approve of your brothers. you pick up on her likelihood of being your dad’s favorite and make a mental note of it. she’ll be the one you hunt down when you need to get out from under his radar. 

and that damn blonde. you see the way his head gets progressively redder and redder each time he screams at her. but what you like about her is she bites right back— for every call your dad makes that someone else swallows and takes on the chin, daniela is pausing practice entirely and challenging him on it. 

“i’m not arguing with you again, avanzini,” he growls at practice during week 2 of school. his face reddens as he blows the whistle. as much as you expect for the whistle to resume play, daniela holds her hand up to the rest of the team. they stay frozen on the ice. 

listening to this girl, instead of the head coach? when you did cheer, your coach’s word was like god. to see just how much influence the blonde has on the group is terrifying. 

“give me one good reason why kazuha should sweep left if she’s right dominant instead of passing,” dani questions.

“throws off incoming offense,” your dad responds.

“no, it throws off our outgoing offense,” daniela pushes back, nearly a growl. “if zuha passes backwards to yunjin, megan’s fast enough to catch whatever she sends up and i can block off anyone incoming.”

“megan’s fast but not—“

“i can be faster,” megan chirps up, nervous eyes on your dad as she hides behind the shorter blonde. “dani always knows where to put the puck. if we fake it and send it back to yunjin, dani can make a hole, and i can be there.”

“do you hear how insane you guys sound, intentionally losing ground?” your dad balks.

“kazuha’s strongest doing what she does best: covering right. yunjin’s powerful enough to get the pass up, and megan is fast enough to receive it.” daniela skates right up to your dad, where he stands in the player box, and gives a confident smirk. “and i’m damn smart enough to see who’s gonna try to intercept it.”

you can tell this is the girl that has cost him many sleepless nights. “the shit-head” as he used to refer to her when he’d rant about work. 

-

the team has a friendly scrimmage against a neighboring team later that week before the season starts, you see the team’s synergy on full display. your dad runs them like a well oiled machine, working like a pack of lions to take down a kill with your dad orchestrating all of it.

and daniela, with that damn smirk as she blasts past everyone on the ice with expert precision.

“she’s not exactly the biggest, but she’s smart on that ice,” your dad tells you in the car after their scrimmage win, shaking his head. “smart as all hell. kills me that our team captain is such a shit-head, but damn can she can perform.”

“and left wing, that position with that ego?” he keeps rambling. “when i met her before her freshman year, when she had first signed with the university, i was shitting myself thinking she’d be a puck hog, but she’s such a team fucking player. her and kazuha set megan up like clockwork. that little megan is shaky off the ice but such a force when she’s got the right set up.”

“and daniela is the right setup?” you question curiously.

“daniela and kazuha. they work together.” your dad explains, gesturing with two fingers side by side. “the defensemen keep to the back to support the goalie, and the wings work together up front to support the center.”

“okay,” you breathe, but your mind is still on that damn captain for reasons you can’t explain. maybe hockey has some redeeming qualities.

“you know, kiddo, it’s nice to see you so interested,” he smiles as you guys pull into the driveway.

you choke back the laugh. maybe you’ll spare your poor dad from your inner thoughts.

-

the hockey girls are nice to you, but almost too nice. you can tell they’re tip-toeing as they assess how delicate you are. it sucks, because you’d love to make friends with them if you have to spend every day seeing them, but at least you have chaewon, and she’s exactly who you seek out when you decide to do a little digging.

“what do you know about daniela avanzini?” you ask her one day out of the blue, as you’re in line together for coffee. 

“oh, she plays hockey with my girlfriend,” chaewon says, but you can tell there’s more she’s not telling you just by how she stiffened at the name.

“and?” you press.

“she’s the captain of their team.”

“and?”

“y/n, what are you trying to find out?”

“i’m just curious,” you shrug. “my dad can’t stop talking shit about her but she’s nothing but nice to me.”

“i’m sure she’s nice to you, just like all the girls are, so your dad doesn’t kill them,” chaewon laughs. she pauses, then shakes her head, letting out a sigh. “yunjin has her thoughts. dani’s… somethin’. i’m not a fan, personally.”

“you’re the first person that’s been honest with me,” you thank her. you hold onto her words for the rest of the day, even at the end of the night when you’re curled up in bed scrolling through your powerpoints for the next day.

chaewon doesn’t forget, and sends you a link. you open it and it sends you to a tik tok. 

“who on the team would you not let your kid date?” the girl behind the camera asks, before cutting to several other girls on the team.

“dani.”

“oh, definitely daniela.”

“daniela avanzini.”

the final scene of the tik tok is the blonde herself, a big toothy grin, clearly not in on the joke.

“my name is daniela and i’m a left wing.”

you stare at the comments. 

oh i get it

HI DANIELA (louder than the rest)

raw, in reverse, on my knees, whenever she wants it, til the bed breaks, til the neighbors call the cops-

you feel your curiosity multiply at the next related video, one of her giving a few press statements following last year’s championship win. 

“we played smart and worked together. the only thing you can ask for is unity, and this year proves what a good unit can do.” she seems so serious in the clip, yet equally playful as you’ve seen her. an interesting balance for the face of their team.

“you were able to focus on all his despite losing player of the year?” the interviewer asks.

“i’m player of the year in many people’s hearts, and that’s good enough for me. gotta keep a good head game up if i want to rep that C,” she responds.

you roll your eyes at the way she smirks at the camera. the comments all go crazy over her suggestive double meaning, but it’s the most viewed video on the account, so you kinda get it. dani is infuriatingly charming, and that makes for a great face for the team. 

you feel your pulse race. god, what is it with you and the intrigue of this girl who everyone is telling you to run far, far away from?

-

“hey!” lara greets you the next day after the girls all finish up with physical therapy. she’s always been particularly passionate about making sure you feel included, and recently, you’ve let yourself believe it’s a sincere attempt at forging a friendship.

“what’s up?”

“a few of us are going back to my place to watch tapes on the tv, prepping for the game.” she hands you her phone, opened to the dial pad. “you’re welcome to join us.”

“you sure i won’t be intruding?” you ask before giving her your contact info.

“not at all. we’ll be up late. it’ll be like a fun hockey sleepover.” lara smiles, before motioning over to the ginger. “don’t let the puppy dog scare you off, we fed her once and now we can’t seem to get rid of her.”

“if i knew being your housemate meant you’d keep making that stupid stray dog joke, i would have just stayed living in the dorms,” megan glares at the older girl. 

you laugh and nod in appreciation. “i’d love that. i think chaewon is getting tired of me interrupting her study time. i’ll be there.”

your dad is actually quite pleased to hear you’ll be reviewing tapes, and drops you off at lara and megan’s place just a few minutes off campus. you figured lara’s name would be the key to getting out of house arrest, and you were right. 

the house is huge and slightly messy, littered with clothes and meal prep boxes, the clear home to some very serious student athletes. 

you’re getting comfortable on the couch as megan runs to get you a water bottle, when a bedroom door opens and you’re staring directly into the dark mischievous eyes that have been stuck in your head for the past two weeks.

“what are you doing here?” she asks quickly, narrowing her eyes in confusion. 

“reviewing tapes.” you blink as you realize whatever room she came out of, she came out in only some shorts and a sports bra. you try not to objectify her, but damn is she making it hard. “same as you?”

“i live here,” daniela responds quickly, and you come to the realization that lara didn’t specify megan as her only roommate.

“put some clothes on,” lara rolls her eyes, throwing a hoodie in dani’s direction. “we have company, you animal.”

“sorry you’re jealous of my insanely hot bod. if you looked like this you’d be half naked everywhere too,” the blonde pushes back, and you try to ignore the way you feel your heartbeat in every vein as she hops over the back of the couch and gets comfy next to you on the couch as lara turns on the first video.

you begrudgingly share with lara that your dad is extremely protective, and she’s the only one he trusts you to hang out with. she beams proudly and promises to not get you into any trouble with curfews or whatever.

lara’s girlfriend joins you guys just a few minutes later, as do a few other girls from the team. being alone with them away from your dad helps them loosen up a little, and it’s actually really fun to see their actual dynamic instead of the fake niceties you see as they try to be on their best behavior at practice. 

11pm rolls around, and your dad shoots you a text letting you know he expects you back before midnight. you want to scream at how little freedom you have even at your grown age, but the girls are all extremely understanding and offer their own solutions to helping you get home without having to rely on your dad to come pick you up.

“i can uber,” you wave them off, not wanting to inconvenience anyone.

“no, dani’ll drive you home,” lara states firmly, pulling out her phone. “i’ll vouch to your dad for you since i’m your designated guardian angel.”

you don’t want to be a burden, but the thought of getting to finally talk 1 on 1 with the girl stuck in your head sends your pulse racing.

“is that okay with you?” you ask, turning towards the captain in question.

“yeah,” she nods, getting off the couch and slipping on her sneakers. “lar, give me the keys.”

“no stops, no detours, no nothing,” lara warns, tossing her the keychain. “it takes 15 minutes to get there so i’m gonna watch your location. if i don’t see you driving back home in 16, i’m calling the police on you.”

“fine,” the blonde responds curtly, motioning for you to follow her outside. 

“daniela, i’m so serious,” lara threatens. “be decent.”

dani rolls her eyes and waves her off as you two make your way to the car. 

“thanks for being willing to take me,” you tell her, trying to be loud enough over the heater blasting. you don’t know how she’s able to just be out in the fall-time weather in a hoodie, shorts, and some socks.

“no worries.” she shakes her head, eyes locked on the road. “coach doesn’t want you out of his sight or what?”

“he thinks being on high alert keeps me out of trouble,” you roll your eyes.

“what kind of trouble did you get into?” she asks curiously.

you freeze. ugh. and this was supposed to be your fresh start. 

“i just really, really like doing things i’m not supposed to,” you answer after a moment, hoping it’s enough.

“ah,” she says simply, her jaw hardening, but there’s a smirk threatening to come out. “that’s my bad habit too.”

you admire the way the red lights illuminate her skin, the roundness of her features, the contrast against the sharpness of those mischievous eyes. 

“kind of embarrassing that you know my dad like that,” you wrinkle your nose.

“he’s not that bad, as far as coaches go, obviously can’t speak about him as a dad.” she snorts. “i’d kill to have a dad that passionate about hockey.”

“have your parents ever seen you play?” you ask, hoping to get to know more about this girl.

she looks at you in surprise. you wonder if she’s ever been asked this question or what.

 “when i was a kid, they were at every game. not so much for collegiate.”

“live too far or what?” you ask curiously.

she smiles, but it’s a smile of hesitation. you try to read what she’s debating within herself.

“they cut me off when i was 18.” 

“why?”

“tried to bring a girl home for my birthday.” she clicks her tongue. “big mistake.”

“you’re serious?” you ask, half-shocked at the answer.

“they cut me off, and the girl dumped me. double whammy. luckily, lara’s family took me in for the summer.”

“how far back do you guys go?” you ask, curious about their dynamic. of course they’re also close with megan, but lara has always seemed particularly protective of dani, weird considering dani is technically in a position of power over her friend.

“we met at a hockey camp in the 5th grade,” daniela smiles. “every time her parents see us play, they cheer for me too.”

she’s so sweet, sharing this piece of herself with you, you figure she deserves a piece of your puzzle too. 

“i got kicked out of school because they caught me with drugs.” you confess, and you don’t know what it is about daniela’s sincerity that makes you feel like you can trust her. “they weren’t mine. they were my friend’s, and she needs to be there, getting a cheer scholarship, going to school.”

“you took the fall?” she asks, and her voice is full of surprise without being full of judgement.

“i have a family, a house,” you explain, “she had literally nothing.”

she arches a brow and smiles at you through the corner of her eye, still looking at the road.

“i just thought you had a bad attitude,” she teases.

you laugh. “i have that too.”

“as someone who could have easily been in your friend’s shoes, she’s lucky to have someone like you,” daniela tells you, and the sincerity in her voice makes your whole body go warm. you can’t help but dive into a deeper question, something that’s been clawing at you.

“dani,” you start, your voice dropping quietly. “can i ask you something?”

“as long as you’re prepared to not like my answer,” she laughs, and you catch yourself in the shimmer of her tooth gem. 

you breathe out softly, trying to connect the dots. 

“how come everyone is telling me not to be friends with you?”

daniela’s smile falls ever so slightly, her hands tightening around the steering wheel.

“are they?” she wrinkles her nose. 

“kazuha said i’m off limits, lara’s whole ‘be decent,’ thing,” you remind her, trying to think back to other times the team has been weird about dani being around you. “have you bullied people off the team before or what?”

“something like that,” she shakes her head, staring off at the street. 

“you’re the only person who doesn’t treat me weird because of my dad,” you tell her, “you’re not delicate or super nice to me like i’m going to snitch on you.”

“i’m an asshole to everyone,” she laughs.

“but you’re not an asshole,” you push. “you’re actually very, very decent.”

“is that a compliment? i’ll take it as a compliment.” she beams. “i thrive off attention, in case you haven’t noticed.”

“you’re hard to not notice,” you poke back.

you both laugh together as the car pulls into park. you half think about asking her to kiss you, those insanely beautiful lips achingly close, but your eyes dart to the time and you realize it’s 30 seconds until lara threatened to call. you hate this stupid house arrest shit. 

“hope you don’t get your ass beat,” she says simply, and you laugh again. 

“thank you for driving me.”

“don’t get used to it,” she reaches over your lap to unlock your car door, and the proximity of her body sends your brain into overdrive. she swing the door open and pulls back into her own seat. “you won’t get the princess treatment here.”

“wouldn’t want it anyways.” you give her a quick once-over before leaving the car, taking the moment in one last time. she waves as she watches you disappear back inside.

maybe the team thinks they know her, but the version you saw tonight of the blonde makes you feel like you’re going crazy. daniela checks off all the boxes. authentic, unfiltered, and infuriatingly hot. you fall back onto your bed once you get upstairs and let your mind roam into fantasy world, and you finally admit to yourself what it seems your body has known for much, much longer.

you have a crush on daniela avanzini. 

-

the first game throws you straight into the deep end of college hockey. you didn’t realize how serious women’s hockey was to the university until you see the jam-packed crowd, nearly every single seat in the arena filled with screaming fans for the team’s season-opener game. 

“good luck,” you tell the girls, nerves fluttering in your chest as you take to the coach’s bench next to your dad and the assistant coaches.

you spot megan press a quick kiss to her girlfriend’s lips and raise a thumbs up at you. a few other girls nod at your well-wishes, but that blonde is pushing past them all without an ounce of fear. 

“don’t need it,” dani tells you simply, grinning before hitting the ice. 

the game is insanely fast paced, and you never realized just how fun keeping up with hockey can be when you’re actually invested. the scrimmage was interesting but the actual game is addicting, violent and coordinated all at once, making it impossible to tear your eyes away. the girls dominate the first period, keeping an early lead on the other team. the second period is a strong play for defense to keep their lead up. it’s in the third and final period where they get a little shaky, the rookies starting to stand out from the veterans as a missed play accidentally gives up a shot to the other team, tying them back up 1-1.

your dad, infuriated by this misstep, calls a timeout and the girls all come zooming to the player box, dripping in sweat and drinking hurriedly from their water bottles. 

“who cost us that fucking shot?” your dad roars angrily from the time out. 

you know the only reason the other team got the puck was because of that new little freshman eunchae, who was losing steam in this last period and ended up too far back in her zone to catch the pass back from yunjin, giving it up by accident to allow the other team to score. 

“me,” daniela immediately speaks up, and you feel your face twist in confusion. “it was me. i wasn’t open for eunchae to make it to me.”

before you can call her out for the lie, she shoots you a glare, and you realize what she’s trying to tell you. 

“you’ll feel it in practice,” your dad threatens.

“i’ll get us up by two,” daniela bites back immediately.

“big talk for someone who just let us get tied in the bottom of final period.”

daniela leaps over the wall and takes back to the ice before the timeout is even called over. she’s skating hard enough to look like she’ll smash through the ice with each stride.

you analyze it. lara and yunjin sharing a look, eunchae looking both panicked and relieved as she sits on the bench and lets the other defenseman swap her in, megan skating up to dani and trying to say something to her. but daniela waves her off, pointing to a few spots on the ice, before the timeout ends, kazuha regains her position, and the faceoff starts once more.

you hate to admit it, lest it feed your crush any more, but holy shit, is daniela good. 

the debate with your dad ramps her up into 6th gear. she was good before, but she’s insane now, her movements sharper, her skating harder. every time the puck ends up in her control, if she’s not taking a shot, then she’s making sure megan can. she’s absolutely relentless in her pursuit of catching up.

“she’s freaking their goalie out,” the assistant coach says, realizing what daniela’s intention is. the blitz at every opportunity has clearly exhausted the goalie on the other team, meanwhile lara in the goalie box has barely gotten a chance to see the puck due to dani’s aggressive offense. kazuha passes to dani, who makes a shot to bring them up a lead 2-1, but it doesn’t seem to be enough for daniela.

true to her word, the buzzer hits with dani sending a pass to a waiting megan, who scores them a final point.

ending score: 3-1.

“i better see you a half hour early tomorrow for that extra point you cost us,” your dad huffs at dani as the girls are barely coming off the ice. 

“bring me a donut, big guy,” she bites back dryly, her chest heaving. you’re amazed she can manage to get the words out after how tired she seems.

you wait in the car as your dad does the post-game debrief, but when he gets in the driver’s seat, you have some pressing questions based off what you saw.

“she got the team up to the win. why are you so hard on her?” you ask as your dad drives you guys home. 

“avanzini? that’s what a captain is for,” he responds in confusion.

“to be a punching bag?”

“to be responsible,” he corrects. “it was her call to start eunchae instead of letting her watch from the bench. i’m not blind, i know it was hong’s fault she lost that pass.”

“so then why did you let dani take the fall if it wasn’t her fault?”

“because it was her call.”

“but this is eunchae’s first game. i’m sure it gave her tons of confidence to see playtime and know her mistakes won’t cost her.”

“then hopefully avanzini finds it worth it.”

you won’t pretend to understand. you finally decide to commit and follow each of the team members on instagram. they all follow you back within the hour– all except for daniela.

-

your crush only grows, and yet, you feel like since that night in the car, something shifted for her. she’s less attentive to you, less eager for your attention, almost intentionally cold. she avoids your eyes during group meetings, stops sitting next to you during tape reviews, and she still hasn’t fucking followed you back on instagram. you don’t know what her deal is, but your intuition tells you to push deeper.

that’s why, when you spot the blonde curls peeking out from under a beanie at the coffee shop near your house your dad gave you permission to walk to, you tug her by the sleeve and smile as she turns around, pulling her headphones off her head. 

“hi, did you drive here?” you ask curiously, noting that she’s breathing heavily and covered in sweat.

“i always stop here when i finish my runs,” she answers, but the way she’s eyeing the door makes you wonder what exactly she’s so eager to escape.

“perfect,” you sing song, reaching out to her with your hand outstretched.  “walk me home?”

“bad idea,” she says quickly. 

“good idea,” you push back. “plus, i owe lara her textbook back.”

it’s true, lara’s girlfriend had let you borrow a book for your class, and it’s sitting on the corner of your nightstand. maybe you just need an excuse to talk to her again, to figure out why she’s playing this game of hot and cold with you, and you figure she’ll respond best to directness.

“you’re avoiding me,” you tell her, less of a question than an observation. 

“not true.” she shakes her head, taking a sip from her drink.  “just been busy.”

“yeah, busy avoiding me,” you push.

“maybe you’re just annoying as shit,” she bites back, but there’s a slight grin at the corners of her lips that make it feel more teasing than hurtful.

“you wouldn’t know if i’m annoying or not, ‘cause you’re avoiding me, remember?” you answer.

“fine,” she gives in, wrapping her headphones around her neck and reaching for your arm. “ i’ll walk you home, just to prove my point.”

you can’t deny the satisfaction of knowing she’s giving in, and the way she guides you out of the door of the coffee shop by your arm makes you relish in the closeness. you’ve only had one real conversation with her, but it was enough to crave another one, and walking side by side up the sidewalk gives you a warm sense of victory in your chest.

“i know you covered for eunchae,” you start, feeling the breeze nip at your nose.  

“don’t know what you’re talking about,” she smiles playfully, eyes focused on the concrete. “you know me, i just like making coach mad.”

“if you want a dad to yell at you ‘cause yours doesn’t, feel free to keep him.”

“you make me sound super fucked up when you put it that way,” she shakes her head. “like it’s a daddy issues thing.”

“the way you try to push his buttons on purpose makes it seem like a daddy issues thing,” you laugh.

“i just like getting under people’s skin,” she shrugs, and you feel your heart thud at that stupid damn dimple.

“you’re good at that,” you admit, and you almost forget what exactly you two are talking about.  “too good.”

before you know it, you’re in front of the house, a cozy two story with a giant tree in front of your window that you and your brothers had planted when you were just kids. 

“this is where coach lives?” daniela asks, looking up and down in surprise.

“i grew up here. i’d rather live alone in a dorm than with my parents, but that’s consequences or whatever,” you roll your eyes. “let me give you lara’s book. it’s upstairs.”

you push past the front door and realize dani is still lingering on the porch, staring hesitantly at the entrance.

“you can come in,” you reassure her, before noting, “nobody’s home.”

you see her eyes flicker up to you, assessing the lack of cars in the driveway, before she kicks off her shoes and follows you in. 

daniela avanzini is in your room. you try not to make a huge deal out of it, but your mind is absolutely racing. 

“don’t mind the boxes, i still haven’t unpacked all the stuff i brought back from school,” you warn. motioning to the piles in your otherwise tidy room. 

“cute,” she smiles, pointing to the framed picture of you with your former cheer team. “do you miss them?”

“all the time,” you admit. “but we talk a ton, so it’s easier.”

“this one’s hot,” she says, pointing to the picture. 

“don’t piss me off,” you warn, laughing. 

you see something return to those mischievous dark eyes of hers as they flicker up to meet yours, her tongue pressing against her teeth.

“what if i like pissing you off?”

“you’d be admitting to liking me,” you answer quickly, and she grins back at you.

“you’ve got a smart fuckin’ mouth on you,” she says, wagging a finger in your face. 

“yeah?” you challenge, feeling your pulse race as you push her finger away. “you’re pretty cocky yourself.”

“i like the attention,” she reiterates.

“but not from me?” you question playfully, taking a step closer into her bubble. “why were you avoiding me?”

“i was avoiding you,” she finally admits, reaching up to rub her jaw as she avoids your eyes. “i know you’ve done your research.”

“i want to get to know you, and you’re not letting me get to know you,” you push back, reaching out softly to link your fingers. the touch sends sparks through every nerve in your limb. 

“i need to stay away from you,” dani groans, but the way her eyes come to fixate on you abandons what her words try to convey. you realize what’s happening– she’s cracking.

“says who?” you ask, reaching down so your fingers playing with the hem of her shirt. your fingertips brush lightly against the dip of her abs and you feel your mind go numb.

“says literally everyone,” she laughs lowly.

“everyone also says you have a mind of your own,” you push back, tilting your head to look at her.

“that i do,” she breathes, and her tongue darts out to wet her lips as her gaze flickers across your features. you feel drunk under the dizziness her gaze alone has.

“so are you going to think for yourself?” you challenge.

“i’m not a decision to take lightly,” she mumbles, bringing her fingers to trace up your arm and across your collarbone. “i think you’ll hate me if you get to know me.”

“i want to make that decision for myself,” you experiment with your fingers running along the elastic of her shorts. your hands are both starting to seek more and more skin along the other’s body.

“they made it crystal clear how off limits you are,” she groans. “you set me up to fail, and i fucking hate losing.”

“i think you should kiss me, like, now,” you breathe anxiously. you feel your pulse in your ears as she watches as she leans closer and closer.

but before she can close the gap between you two, you hear the loud shut of the front door, and the click of your mom’s heels against the floor. dani’s eyes flash to the open door, and she cooly moves away from you to sit easily on your bed, pushing you away ever so gently.

“y/n? d’you get back from your walk yet?”

“hi mom,” you call out. “ran into dad’s captain and she walked me home.”

“hi, mrs. y/ln,” dani grits through her teeth, eyes still locked on you, as your mom comes upstairs and greets you both. you hope the flush of your skin isn’t enough to sell you out.

“daniela, nice to see you again. thanks for keeping an eye on y/n for us.” your mom smiles sincerely, and you figure you’re in the clear. “i didn’t know you and y/n were friends, you’re welcome to come around more often.”

“i think coach y/ln would flip if he saw me here,” dani smiles knowingly, flashing you a quick look. “but i’ll be around.”

dani excuses herself, and your mom starts going on about the lawyers calling and how your case is going to get argued down to something that’ll easily come off your record. it’s a relief, but she’s still clearly irritated with the whole situation, and you ask to go to bed early to end the conversation there.

you look down at your phone as you make it back into your bed. dani has finally followed you back, and you see a private story posted.

a picture of the top of her head, simply captioned “tryna get up to something.”

you feel a pit in the bottom of your stomach and decide to just go to sleep. at the very least, you know you didn’t make it up.

-

“coach, can y/n come out with a few of us tonight?” lara asks at the next practice. you look up at her in surprise. they had just gotten back from an away game and lara had mentioned something about a greek life party she was eager to hit up. you knew there was no chance, but lara gave you a confident shake of her head and insisted she’d figure something out to get you there. you didn’t think this meant being so confident as to ask your dad directly.

“something small?” he raises an eyebrow at her. 

“i’ll share my location if it makes you feel better,” she smiles.

“i trust you. stay with lara,” he waves you off, and you stare at the red-haired girl in disbelief. you won’t test your luck. she gives you a time to be ready to get picked up, and you thank god that your dad has favorites.

your history with college parties has been iffy at best. your cheer coach was notoriously strict. you’re jealous that the hockey girls have a different standard, but you try to push that thought away and focus on the positive: at least now, you can party without fear of punishment. 

there’s another thought you want to push away: the thought of daniela in your room. lara, megan, and their respective partners are all in the car when they stop by to pick you up, but dani is nowhere to be seen. you make up your mind that tonight, you’re going to get over this stupid fucking crush, and you’re going to do so at all costs.

you’re only a few minutes in to the less-than-tiny house party and lara has already disappeared somewhere to go be alone with her girlfriend. megan is outside in the backyard laughing insanely loudly on the swingset with her own girlfriend. you start to regret not inviting chaewon or someone else outside of the hockey team, leaving you there alone on your own.

but then blue haired yunjin is popping up in your peripheral, offering you a shot, and you take it, deciding you have nothing to lose. 

“no girlfriend tonight?” you ask.

“chae’s studying for her comps,” she wrinkles her nose. “i’d give anything to be making out with her right now.”

you laugh. “i’ll kiss a few strangers in honor of chae.”

“she’d hate that,” yunjin cackles, before serving you another drink. “but i love your intentions, so let’s pick your victim.”

“no, i get too picky,” you shake your head. “give me a criteria and that’ll be my victim.

“oh fuck yeah,” yunjin laughs, and you love how down she is. “hmm. next person to offer you a drink?

“you better put that fucking bottle down then or your girlfriend will kill you.”

yunjin shrieks with laughter and sprints off to leave the bottle back at the bar. she finds you once more and you two dive into the mosh pit of bodies all dancing together. she dances stupidly alongside you, and for a split second, you’re grateful that despite all you’ve been through this year, you can still find decent people you enjoy being around. 

a pair of hands snake around your waist, and you see a bottle of tequila get presented to you from behind you. you feel the sweat and the faint musk of a familiar clean cologne from the stranger behind you. you nod at the bottle, looking up at yunjin as you realize your victim has been selected. 

but yunjin simply stares back at you with wide eyes, shaking her head as if to warn you, before you turn and realize just what has her in such a panic. 

or rather, who. 

the stranger grabs your waist and pulls you closer, and you turn to come face to face with that mess of blonde curls. dani’s skin is flushed from what you assume is both adrenaline and drinks in her system. the two of you lock eyes and you feel the room slow down.

“hi,” you greet, wrapping your arms around her neck. 

“hi,” she breathes back. those damn eyes scan over you, searching for something. 

“we should find somewhere quiet,” you tell her simply. she eyes you, something dangerous in that dark gaze, but within moments she’s leading you upstairs, grasp tight around your wrist. you can see the shimmer of someone else’s lip gloss smeared on her mouth already, and part of it infuriates you. 

but you’re finally alone, the back of your legs hitting the bed and leading you to sit down. she’s quickly invading your space, stepping in and planting an arm on either side of you to lock you in beneath her. 

“i don’t make good decisions,” she warns you, and you let your hands untuck the front of the jersey she’s wearing, exploring the skin of her torso experimentally. she doesn’t stop you, and it makes your whole body tense.

“that’s fine,” you breathe quickly, the proximity dizzying you.  “the bad choices are always more fun.”

you see her jaw clench as your fingers trace along her back, your nails pressing into her strong shoulders as an experimental test. 

“last warning,” she breathes into your ear, her head falling to press her temple against yours. your heart feels like it’s about to leap out of your chest with how her guard falls. 

“you’re finally going to let us be friends?” you grin, watching as she pulls away to go lock the door.

she glares back at you, something dangerous in those eyes, and reaches back to pull her shirt off in one smooth motion before a devilish grin takes to her lips. 

“we’re not going to be friends,” she says simply, before leaping forward to finally claim you.

-

“you look like you’re in a good mood,” chaewon chirps as you race into the seat next to her in the early morning literature lecture.

you mention nothing of the fact that you’re on 2 hours of sleep, waking up late, ready to fall asleep at the table. 

“did i miss anything?” you huff, trying to get a grip.

“colonization, racial undertones, empiricism, the usual good stuff,” she smiles, before eyeing you in concern. “i’m serious, everything okay?”

it’s one thing to hook up at the party, but when lara called you to let you know it’s time to go, it’s another thing to be pushing daniela off you so she doesn’t make you sound suspicious over the phone. 

the ride back was spent in complete silence, lara not at all suspicious as to where you both disappeared for the few hours, but by the time you get back to their place, dani is covering your mouth with her hand to slip you into her room instead of letting you sleep on the couch where lara had initially offered.

you shudder as you fight off the flashbacks and try to focus on the lecture. “i’m totally good.”

“yunjin said she had fun hanging out with you last night,” chaewon goes on, showing you a picture the two of you had taken together that yunjin had sent her. “you guys went to that party together?”

“we ran into each other there,” you smile, loving how yunjin was so immersed in the party and still found a way to include her girlfriend. “we missed you. we both would have killed to have you there with us.”

“next time, maybe i’ll join,” chaewon smiles, and you drop your head into your hand. 

class ends, and you’re almost disappointed to not see anything from daniela. no texts checking in on how you got home (an uber to your house before your dad woke up) or dm’s letting you know she’s even alive. you’ve never been clingy before, and you don’t intend to start now, but just being acknowledged would be nice.

your head is pounding as you walk to practice. as soon as you get home, you’re going to sleep as long as physically possible, and try not to think about how incredible daniela’s hands are at–

you push the thought away, but you spot the flash of blonde curls approaching the stadium at the same time. you swear she spots you out of the corner of her eye, but she keeps walking, bag slung over her shoulder.

you’re no stranger to one night stands, but at the very least an acknowledgement would be nice? you have to work together for the rest of the season. the least she can do is not be a giant fucking jerk.

you speed up to catch her and shove into her to get her attention.

“hi, i’m alive or what the fuck ever, if that matters to you,” you push into her shoulder.

“i warned you, and you found me.” she gives you a disinterested glare, and you almost can’t believe this is the same girl you had played such a fun cat and mouse game with. she keeps walking, and you speed up to keep up with her as you guys head to the locker room. “if you’re pissed that i didn’t call you, just call me first.”

“you are really fucking full of yourself,” you spit angrily. 

“you can’t say you weren’t warned,” she shrugs, entering the empty locker room to put her bag into a locker. she takes off her jacket and hangs it up, reaching for her helmet out of her bag. “i’m not stupid. i know every single person on this team warned you about me. if you didn’t listen, that’s on you.”

“are you proud of that reputation?” you ask in disbelief. 

“i know your type,” she smirks smugly. “you play hard to get and then you’re pissed when you give in ‘cause there’s no more mystery.” 

“you don’t know shit about me,” you growl back, and something about having shared so much with her stings. you’re not mad about the hookup, you’re mad about buying all her vulnerable bullshit and thinking she wasn’t going to be every bit as shitty as everyone warned you she’d be.

“i know what you sound like screaming my name and you can’t take that shit back,” she laughs, and you want to absolutely fucking murder her. 

“i don’t know why the fuck you’re being such an asshole, but you’re a piece of shit, and i hope you choke on that ice today,” you blurt, storming off towards the player box.

“you good?” yunjin asks, noting your expression as you two cross into each other.

“i’m fine,” you wave her off, and you have to bite back a scream as daniela hops on the ice, laughing her head off with megan and lara as if your interaction had never happened.

you try to hide your disappointment. a crush you had believed in so wholeheartedly, only to see that everyone else was right to warn you.

- 

you’re relieved that your dad makes you stay home for the away games, and a break from having to see dani’s stupid face is exactly what you needed. the team leaves that weekend for a game and your mom takes over the hawk-eyed supervision, but it gives you a chance to introduce her to some of your new friends. chaewon comes over to do homework with you and brings along a friend from her english class named sophia, and you find out sophia is friends with megan’s girlfriend. 

you desperately need someone to open up to about your entire experience with daniela, but knowing chaewon is less than her biggest fan, and sophia does her best to avoid hockey drama, you realize you’re probably shit out of luck. plus, you were fairly warned by literally everyone, and you still were stupid enough to get yourself involved with her, so really, it’s a fitting punishment that you deal with the consequences.

halfway through the study session, megan (sweet, angelic megan,) reaches out to you that night to ask you to run her stats from the game. the assistant coach took from the game, and you start running the numbers while sophia and chae bicker about where the best study spot on campus is. you feel your heart sink as you realize you’ll have to do this all over again for the rest of the semester: run the numbers from every game and inform the players, and you let out a loud groan.

“i fucking hate hockey,” you tell them, interrupting their debate.

“oh, do you know how beat up my girlfriend is when she comes home to me?” chaewon shrieks. “she’s like a zombie half the time. i can’t wait for her to be done with this stupid sport.”

“all the players are massive-ego’d idiots,” sophia echoes. “well, maybe not yunjinnie–”

“no, i’m not offended, yunjin can be so loud,” chaewon butts in, wrinkling her nose. “but that megan is really sweet.”

the three of you laugh. the ginger may be single handedly balancing the reputation of the team on her shoulders. 

“well, they have an idiot for a leader,” you say, and they both chirp in agreement.

“i just have to hear about them, but you’re up close and personal,” chaewon gapes, shaking her head. “you’re a saint for dealing with all of them.”

you feel your ears get red. your closeness with daniela would probably be categorized as anything but holy, but that’s something you’ll end up taking to the grave, it turns out. 

you guys end the night with a quick goofy round of youtube karaoke, sophia and chaewon trying to out-do each other so loudly your mom drops by in concern, and you can’t help but feel a little better at the idea of facing the team tomorrow. 

“it’s like what, three more months left in their season, and then you’re free?” sophia reminds you as her and chaewon get into the car. “so easy.”

you’d like to believe her, but unfortunately, daniela wants to make it anything but easy for you.

you go player by player before practice starts, pulling them aside to show them their graphs. lara smiles at her current save rate, megan nods as you show her how fast she’s improving on her shot ratio, kazuha mumbles something to herself about more strength training when you give her the statistics on her pushbacks.

you suck in a deep breath and approach the blonde last, out of all the girls, to try and get it over with the fastest. 

“your numbers are dropping.” you tell daniela simply, dropping the clipboard in her lap as she laces up her skates.

she shoots you a glare, biting the tip of her glove to pull it off her hand and flip through your pages, and you have to physically remind yourself to stop thinking about what those teeth felt like on your skin…

“what?” she questions, brows furrowing. you’re almost surprised by how shocked she sounds. clearly, you’re telling her something she isn’t expecting.

“your average. compared to this time last season, you had this many assists under your belt.” you point to the comparison curves on the graphs. “this season, you’re hitting numbers almost a third lower. harder time keeping up?”

“check your math, there’s no way,” she huffs, standing up and tossing the clipboard off her lap. you feel your blood boil at her attitude, but there’s something giving you a power trip about seeing how angry she’s getting.

ugh. you don’t want to admit the high it gives you to get under her skin.

“ouch, that struck a nerve.” you observe, fighting the grin that wants to take over your features. “you’re underperforming, avanzini.”

“i’m competitive,” she says curtly, eyes darkening, and skates off without another look in your direction. you hear her mutter something with a curse word in spanish, and somehow, it feels like a win in your book. 

it’s not that you want to give daniela a hard time, especially if you’re going to have to be stuck together for the rest of the season, but by the time practice starts, she’s looking over at you every time she makes another pass or takes another shot. you won’t admit how much you like the attention she’s giving you, even if it’s just to prove that she’s every bit as good as her ego claims, but you hold onto the feeling of irritating her and how satisfied it makes you feel. 

lara invites you out to dinner with them again, but dani stays back on the ice after everyone else leaves, and you consider yourself the winner that day. 

dani calms down the rest of the week at practice, and is right back to ignoring you as you do your best to ignore her. you know there’s a chance you two can coexist peacefully– your friendship with lara and megan is actually quite enjoyable, even if dani makes a big deal of disappearing every time you come over or join the red-haired girl and her ginger sidekick. you kind of like the ability to not have to worry about daniela being around, but something in your stomach lurches every time you realize you’re still on her close friends story and she’s posting another shirtless photo surrounded by gorgeous random strangers. 

you know she’s probably not even thinking about you, but she’s so fucking aggravating, you need to get back at her somehow to regain your sense of control. 

so at the next evening practice, you decide to test another theory.

usually it’s just your dad who gives feedback to the girls, but he’s busy chatting with the assistant coaches and the trainee physical therapist, so you decide to put your clipboard down and lean against the half-wall to call out to the girls as they continue through their drills.

“nice shot, kazuha.”

as if they’re surprised to hear your voice, nearly half the team looks up at you, kazuha herself looking confused before breaking into a giant grin. 

“oh, ah, thank you, y/n,” she beams, and the pure joy in her face makes you wonder what the fuck your dad puts these poor girls through if the slightest affirmation is enough to excite them this much.

“me next, me next!” lara calls out to you, and the two of you laugh as you wave her off. these poor, compliment-deprived jocks.

“you gotta do something worth cheering on, first,” you yell back to her, and all the girls scramble on the ice to push further. your original plan was to compliment every single player and leave out the captain, but as you look up, dani is glaring daggers at kazuha, who is still smiling from your call out.

maybe this will be a little easier than you thought. if dani is the attention seeking type, what easier way to piss her off than showing her how easily she can be ignored? and if you can find someone specific to make it feel personal, even better.

you try remembering the dynamics you observed among the team. your dad mentioned kazuha and daniela being partners on the ice, you know she’s protective of megan so that probably won’t make a difference, lara is too goofy to take the compliment anyways–

it clicks. you remember the way chaewon doesn’t like daniela. yunjin and dani might have some kind of rivalry between them.

you pray yunjin won’t make things weird. but as if perfectly on cue, yunjin practices a spinning check on daniela and sends the captain flying backwards, slamming into the plexiglass as easily as pushing a child.

“good shit, huh,” you call out loudly as the defender skates off. yunjin’s head snaps up from the ice, and she shoots you a bright grin and a thumbs up. a few of the girls even go so far as to laugh, and you send her a matching thumbs up to emphasize your point.

you look over at the blonde, and you see dani’s jaw twitch. something about yunjin specifically strikes a nerve. bingo.

your dad takes over practice again, and daniela skates like she’s trying to smash through the ice with each stride. she’s ignoring you fully this time, taking all her passes and shots as if she’s trying to break her stick each time she hits the puck, and you’re absolutely relishing in the fact that you got the upper hand. you write down a few notes in your binder and lose yourself in thought, before a whistle from your dad catches your attention.

“huh was wide open, avanzini,” your dad glares.

“i had a clear shot,” dani shrugs. you look over at yunjin, who is shrugging confusedly at lara and rolling her eyes.

“it was your idea to pass back to her,” he reminds her.

“an idea,” dani bites back, before skating off. “not a promise.”

your dad gives some quick recap speech about the upcoming home game, and the girls break. a majority of them head straight to the showers, and you’re there waiting for your dad to finish touching base with the assistant coaches, but you notice a small handful stay on the ice. all the starters, actually. you figure it’s what gets them their starting position– extra effort, extra talent.

kazuha is the first to leave after an extra 15 minutes on the ice. then lara follows, and yunjin. your dad is back out 45 minutes later, hand on your shoulder.  you wave him off as he asks about taking you home. 

“i’ll get a ride with lara or stay at her place. is that okay?”

“you want to watch these two? i knew there was a hockey girl inside there all along,” he smiles proudly.

“i want to finish my notes,” you tell him, pointing down to your clipboard.

“go home,” the assistant coach tells the girls still on the ice. it’s just dani and megan left taking shots, passing between the two of them, now almost an hour after practice has ended. you have no idea how the two have the energy to make it through practice, much less show up early and stay behind this late, and not be collapsing the next day. finally, an hour after practice, megan leaves to go to her girlfriend’s, and that leaves you alone with daniela. 

she glares over at you, cold stare as she heads into the locker room. you follow, like a moth to a flame, not even sure what you’re planning on getting out of this conversation besides hopefully irritating her even further.

“i thought you weren’t a puck hog?” you taunt her, in reference to the reprimand from your dad for dani not passing to yunjin.

she shrugs, avoiding your gaze, as she pulls her helmet off her head and drops her gloves into her bag. “what can i say? i like the eyes on me.” 

“hm, i can tell.” you say back. 

“did you have fun watching huh today?” she asks, her tone dripping with sarcasm as she peels her jersey off her back. the black compression shirt she wears underneath is clinging to her, drenched in sweat, and it takes everything in you to peel your eyes away.

“yunjin is my friend, and i’m allowed to fucking cheer her on,” you remind her. “i thought you guys were friends?”

“we are friends.” before reminding you, “you and i aren’t.”

“you seem really weirdly jealous of someone you call a friend,” 

“i don’t want to talk about yunjin,” she nearly growls, and you can’t wait to keep exploiting this soft spot of hers.

“why not? she’s improving, like a lot, and it didn’t sound like she had a lot to work on–”

in seconds, she’s grabbing you and pressing you against the locker, her hand against the bottom of your jaw.

“y/n,” she seethes, “if you want my attention that bad, you fucking have it.”

“tell me you’ve been thinking about me,” you press, and it feels almost obsessive. her full weight is pressing against you into the lockers and it makes your pulse race att the memory of her touch. “there’s no way you’re that fucking good at pretending.”

“of course i haven’t stopped fucking thinking about you,” she breathes, and it feels like a confession. “i’ve been trying to ignore you but you’re annoying as shit. are you pissed, or do you want me? you’re sending mixed signals.”

“i thought you could think for yourself?” you challenge back.

“i can,” her eyes are trailing off to scan up your body, her grip still firm against your jaw. “if it were up to me, i know exactly what i’d want from you. but coach’s daughter is extremely off-limits, in case you didn’t remember.”

“i know what i’m getting into,” you push back.

“i warned you the first time too,” she reminds you.

 “just don’t play games with me,” you growl. “do what you want, and i will too.”

“it sounds like you want me,” she grins, leaning in so that your foreheads are almost touching.

“you think everyone wants you,” you roll your eyes, but your hands are already pulling at her waistband to pull her close. something about the fresh layer of sweat slicking her baby hairs to her neck and forehead is infuriatingly attractive to you.

“that’s ‘cause they do,” she hums back easily.

“you look at every reflective surface you walk past.” you shake your head. “you’re obsessed with yourself.”

“you’ve seen what i can do, i think you get it.” she leans down, experimentally letting her lips brush against your neck. “i’m pretty easy to be obsessed with.”

you don’t want to give her the satisfaction of a single word more, but the proximity between you two and the craving inside your bones takes over. she’s sweeping you up in one easy motion, your lips colliding with bruising force, and you lose sight of whatever it was you two were fighting about. when dani’s hands take over, everything you hated her for disappears from your mind, and all you focus on is losing your fingers in those curls as she pulls you into the showers with her.

-

you told yourself you wouldn’t get involved with anything dangerous at this new university– no bad influences, no friends that did illegal things, no risky behavior that can make things worse for you when you’re trying to start over. but when you made this list, you never considered that you’d get addicted to hooking up with the very hot, very irritating, very bad-for-you hockey team captain that already makes your dad’s life a living hell. 

and it’s confusing, to say the least. she ignores and avoids you through the day, and then stays fixated watching you throughout an entire practice. she can go hours without texting you back but as soon as you post that you’re out with yunjin and chaewon, she’s climbing up the stupid tree in your yard to tap on your window and sneak in as if she hadn’t been radio silent the whole day. 

you know it’s just a hookup, and nothing more, but something about how she overdoes it with ignoring you makes it even weirder when you two are rushing to see each other, desperately making up for the time spent apart. you won’t complain: between school, practice, friends, and now daniela keeping you busy, you don’t even have a chance to think about getting into anything else.

“i know what you’re doing,” she warns you one night after sneaking into your room again. she pushes you off her lap when you’ve spent a little too much time with your lips on one spot on her neck.

“feeling possessive,” you hum, running your fingers through her curls, admiring your work against her soft skin.

“you’re fucking crazy,” dani groans, but you catch the way she grins looking at herself in her phone. “it’s getting late, i should go.”

some would even call it romantic the way she steals lara’s car to come park it up the street and sneak into your room on the nights you can’t spend with her at her place. you guys are quiet enough to make sure nobody else hears, and you’ll admit that the sneaking around part makes things so, so much more fun.

“just leave before my dad wakes up,” you tell her, pulling her down by the neck to plant another kiss against her jaw. 

“i’m only gonna spend the night in your room once you specifically ask me to,” she pushes you away and smirks at you playfully. “i’ll be around if you need me.”

“whatever.” you roll your eyes and turn to pull up your phone. “not gonna beg.”

“someone else will,” she says back, but not before jumping on the bed to plant a forceful, dizzying kiss on your lips. “bye, y/n.”

you want to rip your hair out, but it doesn’t make your heart thud any less watching her climb down and out of your bedroom window. you roll your eyes as she stops, looks up at you, and does another one of her stupid backflips right on your front lawn before disappearing into the night.

dani shows up to practice the next day wearing every single hickey you gave her on full display. she didn’t even try to cover them up. you guys lock eyes briefly and you can’t tell if she’s playing a mind game with you, or is just trying to play with fire and test your limits. you won’t give her the satisfaction though– part of you likes knowing the secret stays between you two.

“ah, heartbreaker dani strikes again. another sorority girl?” kazuha arches a brow, shoving playfully into daniela’s shoulder. lara shakes her head laughing and follows onto the ice. 

nevermind. you feel your blood boil. maybe next time you should leave your initials. 

your dad makes dani get off the ice and go put on a neck guard to stop distracting everyone. dani rolls her eyes but does so begrudgingly. your eyes meet as she hops off the ice and towards her bag. 

“are they really a distraction?” she asks you casually.

“extremely.” you say, trying to match her non-chalance. “tell your girl toy to stop trying so hard next time.”

“she’s got a mind of her own,” she shakes her head, eyes lighting up with something unholy. “but i’ll do my best.” 

-

the weeks pass and you guys don’t discuss the nature of your arrangement, but you both know it’s critical to keep it under wraps. your dad is thrilled that you’re spending so much time at lara’s, and lara and megan are too busy with their own things to notice dani either disappearing all night or letting you in. 

your phone buzzes in the middle of homework and you spot the number, saved simply as “captain.”

come over

say please

i don’t beg but i’ll make sure you do so, again, come over

you roll your eyes at how easily you’re convinced. 

“taking the car and going to lara’s,” you call out to your house, and your dad calls back in approval from the other room.

your stomach hasn’t quite stopped flipping when you pull into the trio’s driveway. daniela is already in the doorway, looking stupidly attractive in her oversized hoodie and baggy shorts, and you two nearly don’t make it to her room before she already has her hands on you, pulling you in.

you two fall back onto the bed and you’re straddling her much too quickly to call it casual. she pulls at your top and you try to regain some of your dignity by poking fun at her. 

“wasn’t i just here this morning? so eager to have me back so soon,” you tease.

“you can stop showing up whenever, you know,” she bites back, putting her hands over yours to guide them to her hoodie. you take the hint and pull her hoodie off over her head, biting your lip in eager anticipation.

“you’d miss me too much,” you clip back easily. she smirks and reaches up from beneath you to capture your lips with hers, her fingers hooking into your waistband to start sliding your pants down your thighs. you know the motions by now and start to lean up to let her get them off from your ankles.

that is, until you hear the door swing open.

“have you seen my bite guard? i left it in the–” megan starts, but immediately pivots into a half- scream, hands flying up to cover her eyes. “oh, bro, jesus christ–”

oh fuck. 

you and dani move equally fast to push off each other. you truly had convinced yourself that you two had mastered the whole sneaking around thing, so you’re not exactly prepared for whatever may come next. the dread sets in immediately. you can trust daniela, and you can trust yourself, but the last thing you need is someone else involved.

“you can’t tell my dad,” you blurt out immediately. 

“oh my fucking god, not coach,” megan panics. “he’s going to kill me if he finds out.”

“why would he kill you?” dani squints at the younger girl.

“bro, i’m letting this happen.” megan brings an open palm to her forehead, beginning to pace around daniela’s room. “i’m complexit, or whatever.”

“complicit,” dani corrects quickly

megan ignores the correction and keeps rambling. “no, this is so bad. i’m basically putting the strap in your hand.”

“okay, meg, please, too far,” you groan, and daniela lets out a loud hollering laugh.

“i’m going to die and i literally just barely beat the virgin allegations,” she gasps.

you shake your head and give a look to daniela. is she always this neurotic? 

“meg, please, go like, take some deep breaths over there. we’ll stop if it’s freaking you out that bad,” daniela tries to soothe her, pointing out the door.

“how long?” the ginger asks.

“oh my god bro, we’ve only fucked like, the past month.”

megan’s dark puppy eyes go wide, honing in on you. “a month is more than zero. i was hoping you would say zero.” 

“are you asking for an apology?” you try to ask, desperate to make sense of why exactly she’s panicking. 

daniela groans and finally gets out of the bed, tossing a hoodie over herself and handing you your pants back. she grabs megan by the back of her neck and waves over to you. “we’re gonna go.”

“where?” you question. it’s nearly 10pm and the tail end of a freezing october. 

“where else? the lake, duh. she needs to hit the ice to calm down. we’ll be back.” she groans and grabs a few sticks tucked away in the corner of her room, before she drags the ginger out the door and shuts it behind them.

you let your head fall backwards onto dani’s pillow and stare at the ceiling, the dread sinking in. 

-

you’re not quite sure when you dozed off, but you’re woken up to the sound of the door creaking back open. the familiar curls enter the room and dani comes to kneel in front of the bed, eye to eye with you. the gesture is sweet, almost tender, as if she’s trying to be close without waking you.

“i didn’t think you’d still be here.” she tells you quietly, before gently poking at your cheek. “awake?”

“i told my dad i was sleeping over at lara’s and he has my location. i can’t just leave my phone here,” you groan groggily at her. “meg okay?”

“she’ll be fine. she won’t say anything. believe it or not, we can keep secrets surprisingly well. ask lara what we pulled for her girlfriend last year.” she sits on the edge of the bed. “you stayed?”

“does me being here ruin your plans somehow?” you ask, confused about what she expected.

“i mean, no, i’m going to a party anyways.” she shrugs, her demeanor hardening. “might bring someone back. if you don’t want the couch, then you might want to room with lar.”

“you’re a fucking joke,” you blurt at her, sitting up to meet her eye-level. “always so irritating.”

“what happened to feeling possessive?” she arches a brow playfully.

“no, shut up dani. tell me something– why were you so much nicer to me before we started hooking up?” you question, narrowing your eyes at her. “you weren’t this big of a dick until the first time. i didn’t even think you were capable of being this big of a piece of shit.”

“i didn’t know you noticed how i treated you before,” she says simply, crossing her arms over her chest and giving you a curious look. “you cared about that?”

you take a second before ripping her a new one and read into her implication. it really does make sense in her head that if you only wanted her for sex, there was no need to keep up the dynamic from before. 

is this the root of all this confusion? is daniela just playing a role she thinks you assigned to her?

“tell me something about you,” you blurt out. 

she un-crosses her arms and arches a brow in confusion. “like?”

“anything. what’s your favorite color?”

“blue.” she pauses for a second. “yours?”

“blue,” you repeat, and she smiles at the coincidence. 

“do you miss cheer?” she asks quickly, as if to not let the silence take over.

“you remember that i did that?”

“yeah,” she says simply, before fishing in the pocket of her hoodie for a protein bar she had clearly just been eating. “do you want a bite? did you eat while i was gone?”

you feel rattled by her sudden change in demeanor. where did the fuckboy from 5 minutes ago disappear to?

“where is all this coming from?” you ask.

“if you wanted to be friends, you just had to say so.” she seems so casual about it, the flip, but you won’t question it further. this feels like the dani you met in the car, that first time alone. the sincere, unabashed one you got so inexplicably hooked on, and you want to make the most of it while she’s still showing you that girl still exists.

you take the protein bar as a peace offering and take a bite. “i do miss cheer, if that matters to you.”

“try out for our team,” she says quickly, like the solution is obvious.

“it’s not that easy. it’d be like you trying to play for a new team right now in the middle of your season.”

“so then cheer just for me,” she grins.

“i’d rather die than be an ice girl.” you roll your eyes. “i can’t even skate.”

“seriously? with your dad?”

you pinch the bridge of your nose, closing your eyes. “dani, please don’t talk about my dad while i’m debating getting naked for you again.”

“yeah?” the way she grins at your confession makes your heart thud. 

“but you said you had a party to get to, so…” you trail off, eyeing her. 

you almost let out a scream as daniela leaps and tackles you back into a laying position, biting playfully at your jaw. 

“you’re going to get me in so much trouble,” she sighs, pressing feverish kisses against your neck.

“good thing he won’t find out.” you lift her chin to face you and press a finger to her lips, admiring her pretty, pretty face. “don’t tell me you’ve never kept something a secret before?”

“i’m gonna have to,” she breathes, her arms snaking under your back, “‘cause i’m having a hard time keeping my hands to myself.”

“do something about it,” you grin, and dani doesn’t make you wait.

-

there’s no point in lying to yourself. you can fool the world, maybe, between the stolen glances and rushed kisses in the empty locker room or in the secrecy of your bedroom, but you can feel the way dani’s eyes never quite leave your head. you find yourself thinking about her at every turn, remembering new things as she keeps opening up to you about her past, her hopes for the future, her experiences as captain. you want to think that of course, if she’s the best hook up you’ve ever had, it’d be obvious why she’s on your mind, but you know it’d be a lie to pretend your feelings weren’t getting involved, despite your better judgement.

each time you watch her wink at you from the ice, or order your coffee perfectly as if she’s memorized it, or see her leave a stupid cute note on your clipboard, you can’t help but wonder if she’s this damn charming with all her other hookups too. 

you try not to overthink it and instead focus on the newfound freedoms your dad is slowly loosening up to allow you, with each passing week that you stay out of trouble (at least, trouble that he’s aware of.)

can i go to a party if i stay w lara and megan the entire time?

You’ve got some nerve asking If I call you need to pick up at any point

i’ll leave with her and text you each step of the way

you text to the group chat that you’re good to go and they all send a variety of cheering gifs or stupid memes about how fucked up they’re going to get you.

(at least, all of them except for dani, who never acknowledges your texts in the group chat.)

you appreciate that they’ve finally stopped treating you just as coach’s daughter, finally brave enough to stop babying you. you’re especially grateful when you get to the party and yunjin is feeding you shots much to chaewon’s disapproval, the defenseman screaming laughing as lara and kazuha try to race to take down their drinks before megan even manages to take a single, nervous sip from her cup. you’re grateful to have made so many stupid fun friends who are so so nice to you, but you can’t help but feel like the shenanigans would feel complete with the presence of one particular frat-boy-like captain who thrives in these environments. 

you try to not be obvious about looking around to seek her out, but you can feel the eyes on you from the other side of the room. like two magnets finding the opposite ends of each other, always pulling to touch.

unfortunately, when you do spot her, looking painfully attractive in an oversized university polo and a backwards hat, she’s standing way too close to a random girl for your liking. you guys had never discussed the parameters of what was and wasn’t allowed, and a part of you had always known she wasn’t likely the type you could lock down if you were just friends with benefits. 

fine. you don’t owe her anything. you turn back around and reach for chaewon’s hand, inviting your friend to dance with you as lara’s girlfriend hands you another drink. you’re over trying to push dani. if she wants anything from you. she knows exactly where to find you.

you’re almost able to push her out of your head until chaewon trades to be dance partners with kazuha, landing you with yunjin holding you by the waist. you think nothing of it– her super secure girlfriend is literally two feet away from you, doing the same with kazuha, and yunjin has always been nothing but platonic with you, doting on how much she loves chaewon.

“i’m sure these moves have your girl so, so happy,” you laugh, motioning to how she can manage to both lead you so smoothly and also trip up over her own feet at the same time.

yunjin grins back at you in response. “i always step on her feet, and she’ll still kiss me. i think she pretends it doesn’t even happen.”

“now that’s true love,” you coo, motioning over to the bobbed girl in question, who blows you both a kiss as kazuha dips her over and over.

“i like to think she’s into me,” yunjin smiles.

“y/n isn’t drunk enough to be able to keep up with your whack ass moves, huh.”

the hair on the back of your neck tingles. you’ve gotten too good at picking up daniela’s husky voice absolutely anywhere. 

“funny. if anyone knows about getting shit-face wasted, it’s you, cap.” yunjin raises her cup to the blonde, words teetering dangerously on the edge of disdain. she motions to you and shoos you two off irritatedly. “take it away.”

before you can protest, dani is pulling you into the hallway, secluded from the bustle of the party centered in the living room.

her hands are all over you, her teeth in your neck painfully fast with no warning, as if to assert herself. you shove her away. 

“what the fuck, dani?” you hiss, wincing at the sting of your skin.

“missed you,” she says simply, pressing you back up against the wall, and you���re in shock about hearing her blatant confession. you think back and realize it might be the first time she’s ever admitted something like that. 

“you’re sending me mixed signals,” you call her out, putting a hand on her chest to keep some space between you two. “you don’t want me to get mad at you but you go crazy when you see me complimenting someone else.”

“fine then,” she growls, though you knew she’d avoid taking accountability for the whiplash she’s putting you through. “so should we just fucking quit while we’re ahead?”

you see the way her eyes change, something pressing beneath that calloused exterior, you know dani, deep down, and you know what it means when she acts out. so you decide to take a chance. 

“i want to know more about you,” you breathe gently, looking around quickly to make sure there’s no prying eyes, before cupping a hand to her cheek. “and i want to keep seeing you. please stop trying to fuck with my head.”

her eyes soften, and your heart melts. your bet pays off– her guard is dropping.

“you won’t like what you find,” she warns, and the way her voice hardens makes you wonder what she’s possibly been through to think so low of herself. 

“let me decide that on my own,” you tell her, tilting your head. “why do you keep pushing me away?”

“i thought i was fine with it, but i kept thinking about it. and i don’t want to hook up with someone who’s just using me to get back at someone else.”

“me liking you had nothing to do with my dad. it’d be easier to like you if my dad wasn’t terrified of you,” you shake your head, realizing how fucked up the reality of the situation is.

you don’t realize what’s slipped out of your mouth until daniela’s eyes are lighting up, even in the dim lighting. her voice is so, so eager, you want to risk it all and kiss her right there and then.

“y/n, you like me?” she questions.

“duh,” you wrinkle your nose, embarrassed but unable to find a way to take it back. “are you blind? is it seriously news to you?”

“i thought yunjin was fucking with me.”

“god, yunjin could see it,” you want to shrivel up and die– you had never mentioned dani to her, but yunjin is dating chaewon, the super genius, and is clearly no idiot herself.  “but why would she lie to you?”

dani bites back a guilty smile. “i’ve been kind of shitty to her before.”

you remember the first time watching their rivalry at practice, the smoothness with which they play but the very obvious tension off the ice. you even remember how dani didn’t bother you until it was yunjin who started dancing with you. 

“why are you so fucking weird about yunjin?”

you expect an excuse, but dani simply grits her teeth and lets out a breath. “yunjin is like, what i could be if i wasn’t so fucked up. she’s confident and stupid but people really like her.”

“people really like you,” you press back.

“people put up with me,” she corrects, smiling painfully. “you and i both know i’m bad news.”

“that’s not true.”

“you know it is,” she insists “coach only tolerates me because i’m lara’s best friend, and because i got captain.”

“you’re a star player, that’s why you’re captain.” 

“megan is a star player,” she corrects you again. this is new territory for you– daniela’s always been so infuriatingly cocky, you almost don’t know what to make about the overload of sincerity she’s sharing with you. you regret every time you’ve talked shit about her ego, realizing it was probably the only thing protecting her from this terrible notion she has of herself.

“you almost won player of the year last season,” you remind her, the party now lost behind you both. “that’s nothing small.”

“your dad got so mad when i got nominated that year and not lara,” she laughs, but you can hear something painful in her voice. the pain of being constantly compared.

“you earned it for a reason,” you answer quickly, and you see something click in her.

“you’re the only person who’s never sized me up to lara,” she tells you. “or yunjin.”

“no comparison,” you answer quickly. “you’re so one-of-a-kind, dani. it’s mesmerizing.”

“i love lara, but even she puts me in this box, like i can’t be trusted. i know she means well but it’s hard sometimes. she’s so perfect, yunjin’s so likeable, and i’m too much,” dani breathes. 

“you’re not too much,” you disagree. “you’re so human. you’re like the most authentic person i know.”

“i feel like my feelings are too big for my body sometimes,” she admits, and you can’t believe she’s sharing all this at a frat party at like 1 in the morning. “like they control me instead of the other way around.”

“that makes you so special. you’re not hiding away like everyone else. you’re not scared to treat people like human beings.”

“nobody cares about that,” she snorts.

“i care about that. my dad always treats me like i’m some breakable doll.” nobody has ever made you feel safe or seen enough to confess the frustrations of being the youngest in your family comes with. “my brothers were always the ones allowed to get away with everything but i had to be under his thumb.”

“i wish we would have met any other way,” she says simply, and you feel the weight of her words resonating from inside of you. she leans in before adding a quiet whisper, “y/n, you like me?”

“i should have never said something,” you roll your eyes, but she reaches for your hand.

“you guys okay?” 

your eyes both snap up at the voice. you breathe out a sigh of relief as you realize it’s those big brown puppy eyes looking back at you. 

megan.

“i was going to steal lara’s keys so we could go–”

“kiss, a lot,” her girlfriend chimes in, cheeks flushed from clearly one too many drinks.

“no, she’s too tipsy for that, ignore her.” megan wrinkles her nose, holding the girl tightly by the waist to help hold her up. “i was going to let her sleep it off in the car but i’ll just get us an uber to take her home. take the keys, and go talk. that way, nobody interrupts.”

“i’m gonna teach her how to rock your shit once you’re all sobered up,” dani promises, pointing a finger at the both of them.

“dani, i am so serious, please shut the fuck up,” megan begs, and you can see her ears flushing red from beneath her beanie.

her girlfriend grins mischievously. “nooo, you should hear what she can do when–”

megan interrupts by simply turning them around and walking away with the girl in tow, throwing the keys at your feet as her eyes go wide. you hear her tone soften as she walks off in search of somewhere to let her clearly drunk girlfriend sober up. “okay, baby, not now, but especially not ever with dani…” 

-

you’re a little nervous that you’re being driven home without lara present, but you figure being home is better than staying out in your dad’s book. dani admits she hadn’t actually been drinking that night, which is a surprise to you, but you’re absolutely counting it as a win that she confessed all these thoughts sober.

you don’t remember who reaches out first, but her hand is holding yours as she drives down the familiar streets to your house, and you feel like you can picture it forever. 

“how did you get captain after lara turned it down?” you ask, after she had opened up about so many other issues in her life, answering each of your questions more honestly than the last.

“it was our old coach, she was training your dad before she transitioned to a new team.” you remember this. your dad had been assistant coach for years, and when the old head coach announced her retirement, your mom threw the biggest celebration to cheer him on for his promotion. “coach misty looked me in the eyes and told me that even if the athletics department wanted lara, i was always her first pick.”

“really?”

“she said i needed the responsibility so i wouldn’t do more stupid things.”

“that worked out,” you deadpan.

“i was worse, when i first joined the program. i’d skip practice, i had a shit attitude, i’d show up to games hungover. i threw up once offsides because i had been partying the night before too hard. at least now i stop before i get sick.”

“really?” you can’t imagine it. as destructive as dani is off the ice, her commitment to her sport is sacred. sure dani can be a goof during practice, but never during the drills themselves, or the games. you’d never once seen her show up with less than 110% when it comes down to it, laser-focused on whatever she’s doing.

“she saw the worst in me, and still believed i could be good,” dani shrugs. “good enough to announce me captain. i cleaned up my act a little once that happened. wanted to make her proud.”

“someone believed in you, once upon a time.” you tell her softly. “maybe you should remember that when you feel reckless.”

“fine.” she lets out a sigh and taps the steering wheel as if she’s thinking. you’re about to make a dumb comment about how good she looks in that hat, but she catches you off guard with her next statement: 

“i think we should stop hooking up with other people.”

“what?” you question, as if you heard her wrong.

“just make it easy.” she shrugs again, avoiding your gaze. “plus finals are coming up, we’ll be able to stay focused and blow off steam with less time in between.”

you’re too caught off guard to give a straight answer. instead, you want answers to your pressing questions. “when we first met, why did you get weird when i told you everyone was warning me about you?”

she hums for a moment, her thumb running across your knuckles. “i let myself start to like you, then i remembered who i am and what i do.”

“you’re not a bad person, dani,” you shake your head.

“you can’t even claim me,” she pushes back, pulling up in front of your house. 

“you’re not exactly showing me off either,” you point out.

“your dad would kill me,” she laughs, pointing to your house with all the lights off, “and i have one more year before i go pro.”

“fine.” you turn in the seat to face her, bringing your interlaced hands up to examine her knuckles. “we keep it secret for one more year, and once we graduate, if we’re still together, we say something.”

“so, we’re not gonna sneak around forever?” she asks, eyes lighting up.

“i’m private, but i want to make it very clear that i’m not ashamed of you.” 

“you’ll hate me in a year,” she pushes you teasingly. 

“i hated you for a little bit, but you grew on me.” you reach over to plant a soft kiss on her lips, feeling much too bold considering your dad is asleep just inside the house. “maybe you’ll hate me in a year.”

“guess you’ll just have to stick around a year and find out,” daniela smirks, before reaching across your seat to let you out of the car door once more.

you make it upstairs to your room, and she sends you a screenshot of her lockscreen.

look at what time i made it home. 

the time is irrelevant. all you see is that her background has been changed to a team photo, where you and her are sharing a glance. your heart thuds as you hunt down the same photo and change yours too. 

“this fucking stupid ass crush,” you mumble to yourself, before letting yourself fall asleep. you don’t have to have a name for it. whatever it is with dani, at least as of tonight, is perfect.

-

there’s two semifinal home games left until the championships, and you’ve never felt more anxious to be through a game in your life. between finals coming up, your dad extra on edge, and now trying to make time to see dani outside of just when the sun is gone, you feel like something is dangerously close to bursting, and yet you’re not sure which part of your life is bound to burst first.

the semi-final game, however, gives a hint that hockey is probably going to be a huge stressor for the next two weeks.

the game is absolute insanity. the girls are playing like maniacs, both intense and borderline sloppy as they barely manage to keep a lead up above the attacking team. your dad is beyond himself, screaming so hard he ends up snapping a clipboard over his knee out of frustration when the team lands another foul and gets away with it.

dani, however, is not one to let things slide, and makes sure the team knows she won’t tolerate a dirty play against megan under any circumstance.

daniela takes the other team’s center down, gripping her by the back of her jersey, and slams her into the ice. she drops on top of her, swinging two fast blows in succession against her helmet before the ref can swing over. yunjin jumps in quickly, dogpiling onto the other girl as her teammates come to her rescue. kazuha, freakishly strong, reaches down to yank a girl off dani’s back. 

the referee finally makes his way over and calls a 2 minute penalty for daniela. it’s the first time you’ve ever seen her in the box. she storms over and slams the half-door shut, watching anxiously as her team tries to play without her for the next 120 seconds.

“never seen you fight before,” you tell her through the glass, trying to distract her as her eyes stay laser focused on the ice.

“this team fractured my eye socket last year.” she tells you back sharply, and she seems genuinely pissed. “and now trying a high-stick on meg? they had it coming.”

they barely scrape by with the win, and you have to sit through your dad’s lecture about how playing sloppy is almost worse than losing.

you, the golden trio, and their girlfriends are all leaving the stadium towards the parking lot, ready to go to their place and go straight to sleep after such a heavy game. but there’s an unfamiliar voice calling out from the dimly lit lot.

“you had to try and play dirty to win?” the girls call out, and you recognize them as some of the players from the other team. you look around and realize it’s just the few of you in the parking lot, last to leave. you get a sinking feeling in your stomach.

dani, fearless as always, is the first to step in front of your team and snap back against the attempts at intimidating her team. 

“i was gonna apologize for beating your ass bare in front of thousands of people, but it sounds like you deserved it,” she bites back.

“you call a dirty dogpile beating my ass?” the girl scoffs. “try again alone and you won’t come out as easily.”

“not worth it,” lara rolls her eyes, unlocking the car door to load her stuff into.

“easy to say when you can only win on home turf,” the girl responds.

“home court advantage? are you serious? look at our fucking record. you talk a lot of shit for a team that just got their asses whipped,” dani bites back, chest puffing as lara reaches out to hold her back. you feel frozen at the exchange.

megan is stepping backwards with nervous eyes, tutor girl pulling her by the wrist to try and distract her.

“oh come on, come step up like a fucking grown up.” the other team’s player points at the ginger in question and how tutor girl is trying to redirect her. “or does your little loser girl do all the hard shit for you?”

you see something twitch in megan’s jaw, her eyes blowing dark. 

holy shit. 

within seconds, megan is launching forwards, both hands pressing into the other girl’s shoulders and sending her slamming into the ground with one harsh push. she stands over her as you all bolt to grab her.

“next one ends as you with no teeth,” megan says, voice cold and even. you have never once heard megan talk like that, much less think she was capable of it.

ugh. to be her girlfriend, having someone claim you that hard. 

“she gets it, baby,” tutor girl pulls her back.

you can tell this was the catalyst to something terrible.

“you wanna start something then not finish it?” the other girl snaps angrily, lifting herself up off the ground with the help of the two other girls.

“your girlfriend says that’s a pattern of your’s,” dani snips. 

oh, this idiot and her big mouth.

“try it again, blondie,” she challenges, gesturing for her to approach.

“walk away, daniela,” lara pushes her, but dani’s too fucking stubborn to back down. 

in seconds, dani’s shoving into the other girl, despite the height difference, pressing her face into the other girls’ fearlessly. you’re in awe of how she seems completely unphased.

“they might not fight, but i do,” she bites, “and i’m not known to fucking lose.”

the other girl shoves back and before you know it, they’re at blows, even scarier now without all the padding from the game. you’re seconds from running in to try and pull them off of each other when you see a flash of another girl coming up behind her. you realize her intentions look less than a friendly way to blow off steam.

megan’s scream is the loudest. “dani!” 

the girl lifts her foot to land a kick straight into the side of dani’s knee, and you see the sickening bend of a joint that shouldn’t go in that direction. 

daniela screams and drops to the ground face-first, and the other team’s girls freeze as they realize what just happened of their teammate taking it too far. they sprint in the opposite direction, disappearing into the night, and you feel your heart start to race as dani stays on the ground. you’re waiting for her to make some stupid joke, to pop up and do a backflip or something, but once you see her swollen cheek and bloodied lip dripping with silent tears as she grips her knee, you realize something is horribly wrong.

“dani?” you whisper.

“i think we need a doctor,” lara utters, starting the car.

“dani, can you get up?” megan asks worriedly, and daniela keeps ignoring everyone to clutch her leg.

“this is not good,” you whimper, feeling your body go numb.

you immediately direct megan to help dani to her feet, and lara is racing to pull her car around. megan and her girlfriend help dani limp into the car, and the blonde is ignoring all of you with wide eyes. 

“i think she’s in shock,” lara says worriedly, and you bring a hand to dani’s face. the gash above her eye from where she hit the ground is bleeding profusely, and she looks pale.

“hey, you’re okay,” you reassure her, trying to bring her back to earth.

“y/n, i felt two pops. both my ligaments.” she says it solemnly, eyes still wide, as if she’s processing it over and over. “that’s my knee. that’s my career.”

“you also hit your head which i’m sure didn’t help,” you push back, knowing dani always manages to get out of things with the craziest of luck. you press a kiss to her knuckles, forgetting the world around you. “you’ll be okay.”

“that’s it for me,” she says quickly, before her face pales again and her head slumps forward, the shock clearly wearing off.

the ER nurse takes one look at daniela, bloodied, bruised, and her limp body only held up by megan’s sheer strength at this point, and hurriedly gets her in a wheelchair and out of the lobby.

your group waits anxiously in the lobby, intentionally leaving out mentioning this your dad yet. you can already hear what he’s going to say to her, and you figure the last thing she needs is to hear his lecture right about now. hours pass by, megan and her girlfriend curled up in one chair, lara falling asleep on your shoulder, as you fidget with your phone waiting to hear literally anything back.

they allow one person back to go see her, and lara wakes up and volunteers immediately. part of you wishes you could go back with them, but you figure if only megan knows, you shouldn’t be spilling to just anyone especially when dani can’t stand up for herself.

lara comes back a few minutes later, shaking her head. the disappointment is written clearly on her features.

you realize now, why it had to be dani as captain. yes, lara is lovely and easy to like and responsible, but as soon as the pressure hits, you can read the distress all over her features. she’s shutting down, clearly bearing bad news.

dani would be frustrated, maybe, but her energy would stay up and she’d find some way to make even the biggest problems seem like no sweat. that’s what coach misty had seen in dani, all that time ago, to appoint her captain. an undying tenacity and a willpower of steel– the kind that inspires people.

“the forehead needed three stitches, which they did.” she lets out a sigh. “um, but they’re putting her in for a cat scan right now to see what’s going on with the knee and how bad it is.”

“they’re going to go straight into surgery to see what they can repair in her knee. the acl and the mcl both ripped from the impact. they said we should look into pressing charges.”

your heart drops.

“the good news is my girlfriend has seen plenty of acl rips that can heal fast enough to finish a season. we might not have her for championships but she’ll be with us next year.”

you look over at megan, who is teary eyed at the thought of all of this. “can we see her?”

lara nods. “she has a room, they’ll let us know when we can go in.”

lara decides to be the responsible one and steps outside to call her girlfriend first, and then face your dad. once a nurse comes down to say she’s accepting visitors (albeit, sleepily due to the pain meds,) megan is leaving you guys in the dust to race upstairs towards the room. 

dani’s peaceful snores from her bed bring you some source of comfort. megan curls up in the chair next to the bed and pulls out her phone, mumbling something about calling out from class the next day. 

lara’s girlfriend arrives and the other girlfriends wait outside the door, peeking in through the crack in case dani stirs.

“poor lar is still on the phone with coach y/ln. you can imagine how it’s going,” she wrinkles her nose. tutor girl grimaces.

“hate to be her right about now.”

“check it out. your puppy dog doesn’t want to leave her side,” you laugh. 

“you haven’t either,” tutor girl points out playfully. 

“someone sane has gotta keep an eye on our captain,” you shrug. 

“dani is like a big sister to her,” tutor girl says worriedly, watching from the window as megan lays her head on dani’s bed. “she loves her.”

lara’s girlfriend turns to you, and with zero judgement in her voice, asks simply: “what’s she to you?” 

“loaded question,” is all you say, and they both laugh in response. 

megan bursts out the door with an eager smile. “she’s awake!”

you let the other girls go in first and say their pieces. at this point, it’s nearly 2am after all the waiting, and the adrenaline doesn’t balance out how tired they all must be from the game and being up this late. you let them trickle out of the room as they finish up, last out being megan, before you nod to her and promise you’ll keep an eye on her best friend through the night.

they leave, and you step into the room, feeling a small breath escape you at the sight of her.

she’s sitting up in the bed, beaming that stupidly gorgeous smile at you, but the stitches on her forehead and the scrapes and bruises on her face make your heart ache. she looks so small in the hospital gown, your otherwise larger than life daniela, but all you can think about is how grateful you are that she’s in one piece.

“will i sound too familiar if i start screaming about your dumb fucking choices tonight?” you start, but your voice can’t hide the fact that you’re not actually angry at her, as stern as you’re trying to be.

“sorry i’m such a shit-head,” she apologizes simply, the smile never dropping. 

“how’d you know my dad’s nickname for you?” you tease.

“‘cause he calls me it like it’s my government name,” she winkles her nose back at you, looking around before reaching out a hand to you.

“i don’t think you’re all that bad, daniela avanzini.” you smile gently and take her hand in yours as you stand next to the bed.

“you haven’t known me long enough,” she snorts. “you’ll find something.”

“shockingly, i’ve liked what i’ve seen.” you press playfully into her chin. “i hope i get to know you long enough to prove you wrong, but you’re gonna have to stop doing stupid shit like this.”

“careful,” she clicks her tongue. “people might think you’re soft for me.”

“you got under my skin at some point.” you shrug, the smile on your lips only growing. “unfortunately, i think i like you there.”

she pauses for a moment, and you wonder if she’s going to say something stupid, but instead, she simply looks up at you with those sharp gorgeous dark eyes. 

“will you stay, please?”

“you know,” you tell her, relenting instantly and cuddling into the bed with her, “i had this sick fantasy of finally hearing you beg, but now that you’re begging, i feel like a horrible person because it doesn’t actually turn me on.”

“you’re so evil,” she laughs. “maybe we are meant to be.”

“slow down, playboy,” you tease, before letting out a quiet nervous breath. “what’d the doctor say?”

“good thing i’m still insanely hot,” she says, flexing her biceps beside you, “cause it sounds like i’m never playing hockey again.”

your heart drops. “what? but lara said–”

“recovery for all the ripped joints is well over a year. that’s this and next season.” she holds up two fingers. “there’s no chance i’m going pro missing my rest of my junior and then my senior season, and that’s if my knee even heals right.”

“dani…” you feel your heart ache at the implication.

“that’s what, almost 15 years? just down the drain.” she shakes her head, dropping back against the pillow with wide eyes. “everyone is asking me what the fuck i’m going to do next and all i can do is stare back like an idiot.”

“you don’t have to know that yet,” you tell her gently, resting your head on her shoulder. “i think you should give yourself a chance to rest.”

she scoffs and runs a hand through her hair, sarcasm dripping in her voice. “still want to sneak around with me? broken knee, no more games, useless ass captain with her career down the drain? at least i can smoke so much more weed while i rot on the couch.”

you blink once, twice, as you realize the warmth in your chest has overflowed in a way that never had anything to do with daniela’s status. you like her for her, and you’re hurt she couldn’t see that from the start.

you cup her face gently in your palm and turn it to face you.

“dani,” you say quietly, trying to take in every inch of her features, her poor cut up face. “i don’t think i want to sneak any more.”

your heart pounds at the way her eyes light up.

“even like this?” she questions.

“especially like this.” you nod. “just give me some time to find the right chance to talk to my dad. maybe you can tell lara. we can figure it out from there.”

you’re mentally prepared for an excuse, from the pushback of wanting to still be single. you’re prepared for her to flip that switch and slap you with some stupid fuckboy ecxcuse, as she does whenever feelings start to get too heavily involved, but you know that’s a risk you run wih her anyways.

instead, she just stares back at you with those beautiful eyes, her smile threatening to split her face in two. 

“okay,” she says simply, and it’s enough for you.

“you’re going to be okay,” you reassure her, carefully leaning into her chest to not disturb her bad leg. she wraps and arm around your shoulder and plays mindlessly with your hair. “you’re so one of a kind. things always work out for you.”

the night finally catches up to you, and you fall asleep in her arms. at this point, you don’t care who sees you. all that matters is dani needs you, and you want to be there for her, and there’s nothing your heart wants more than to make her feel cared for. 

-

the championship game finally arrives two weeks later, and your heart breaks as the teams make it a special point to roll out a carpet on the ice to celebrate dani, who limps out in her leg brace and blows kisses all around her at the roaring fans. 

the collegiate sports world was rocked by the news after your dad helped file the police report last week. the headlines hit immediately after: 

“hockey champion’s career cut short due to violent assault from opposing team.” 

you know it breaks her heart to have to watch the game from the bench, but dani’s calling out and making suggestions to your dad, screaming at the girls from the box to make sure they know she’s down but not out for the count. you can tell it does wonders for their morale, their leader still pushing as hard as she can from the constraints she has. 

they’re wobblier on the ice than usual– like a creature on four legs that just lost it’s front foot. megan is compensating for the new left wing, who doesn’t match up with kazuha quite as gracefully as dani did, but they’re making it work. the game stays at a tense 0-0 even down to the bottom of the final period, and that’s equally lara’s job as goalie as well as yunjin’s work as defenseman to keep the puck away from their net.

it’s the offence that is feeling dani’s absence the most. it had always been kazhua to dani, zuha making a hole as dani runs the puck up, and then both of them clearing a clear pass to megan to make the final score. megan is overcompensating, somehow in multiple places at once, and by some miracle, makes a buzzer-beating shot that brings them up to their second championship victory.

1-0, and no easy feat.

the girls all swarm megan on the ice, but you quickly realize megan is crying her poor little eyes out as she races out of the swam and instead runs straight to the player box, crushing daniela in a hug as she tosses her helmet to the side.

dani furrows her brows and gives megan back the tightest hug she can manage with all the padding still on her. the other girls come to quickly trickle in and follow suit, and you can hear megan’s loud sobs heard over the hums and sniffles of the other girls. the reality sets in. their  beloved captain is done for.

“we’re going to announce the next captain tomorrow after the championship recap press release,” your dad tells them, after a few pictures with the trophy and a debrief about the game. “get some rest, you all played your best tonight.”

he points to yunjin and daniela and motions for them to follow into his office. you figure you’ll give them some space and wait outside with lara and her girlfriend, but once you see yunjin step out and hurry away, you hear the volume increase. lara and the physical trainer both exchange concerned glances and walk away to offer them more privacy. you try to focus on other things, but you hear a thud of something hitting the desk, and walk into the office.

you catch the tail end of their argument. daniela’s jaw is hard and her face is red, almost as red as your dad’s, and you can tell the two have probably been screaming at each other a fair amount of time before you got there. 

“captain goes to yunjin.” he presses firmly, slamming his fist down again into the table. “you thank the program for their time, you make the announcement that it’s huh, and you train her until the season starts. you can still see your scholarship out as long as you’re training with us since the injury wasn’t your fault.”

“i don’t give a fuck about my scholarship. yunjin is the wrong call for captain,” daniela bites back fearlessly. 

“if you wouldn’t have gone looking for trouble, we wouldn’t have to be making this call.” he growls, shooing the both of you out of his door.  “you don’t get to call shots any more, avanzini, you are done for. do what i say. announce huh at the press conference and stop causing issues.”

daniela storms out of the office, and you follow behind her, your dad slamming the door shut behind the two of you.

“if i wasn’t stuck in this fucking brace, i’d beat his ass too,” she rants, waving lara over. “let’s get the fuck out of here.”

“enough with fighting people,” you growl, following them to the car.

you spend the night, and daniela doesn’t want to say a single word more about it, instead simply laying in the bed and letting you play with her hair until she falls asleep. you want to leave it there, but something inside you is pressing to dig a little deeper, so you slip out of the bed as gently as you can without waking her, and ask lara if you can borrow the car to make a quick trip. your dad is clearly too stressed out about the conference tomorrow to be checking where you are, so you figure maybe you can dig a little deeper into this as you give chaewon a quick phone call. 

you make it to chaewon’s apartment complex and just as you had the hunch, yunjin is pulling up at the exact same time, looking like a zombie as she tries punching in the access code to the front door. you park and race up behind her before she can leave you behind.

“hi yunjin,” you greet, making your presence known.

“y/n.” she forces a smile, spinning on her heel. caught. “good to see you.”

“i thought we were cool, but you don’t seem that thrilled to see me,” you wrinkle your nose. “did chae tell you i was asking about you?”

“unfortunately, yes,” she wrinkles her nose back at you. yunjin straddles the line between being confident and cocky, just barely able to rein it in that you’re never quite that annoyed with her. 

“sorry for you, but i need answers,” you press.

“all for a girl who won’t claim you?” she arches a brow.

you bite back a grimace, not wanting to admit how deep that cuts. “this isn’t about dani.”

“when it comes to this team, everything is about dani.” she shakes her head.

“when it comes to dani, everything is about the team,” you insist, and you see yunjin’s eyebrow twitch slightly.

“i hate admitting when daniela is right, but i also disagree with the call to make me captain.”

“so don’t accept,” you state simply.

“i have to,” yunjin sighs. “it’s not that easy.”

“why don’t you think it should go to you?”

“i love hockey, but i don’t live and breathe it. coach y/ln just wants an incoming senior who can say the right polite things, keep the sponsors happy, and then graduate and be out of there. i’m the closest she could get to lara raj. dani, as much trouble as she caused, also got us the right kind of attention. it was supposed to be her keeping captain until she graduated. someone like that isn’t going to pop up again. lightning doesn’t strike twice.”

you marinade on her words. that might explain why dani is so irritated about the call– yunjin seems ready to be a puppet for the next year, and daniela would rather die than let captain go to someone who doesn’t see the sport as their whole life.

“i’ve never seen her like that before, so reasonable. she’s crazy about you,” yunjin adds as an afterthought. “she met her match in you.”

“crazy knows crazy,” you laugh.

“i think you believing in her changed her.” yunjin corrects you, offering a small smile as a peace offering. “she’s a pain in the ass, but she’s our favorite pain in the ass, so thank you for taking care of her.”

suddenly the door swings open, revealing a sleepy-eyed chaewon.

“oh hi, y/n,” she blinks, looking between the both of you. “i wasn’t expecting you to actually come over.”

“not crashing, just needed to find yunjin. thanks, chae. see you tomorrow.” you nod to them both and head off. you don’t have a plan, but you at least have a better idea of what’s going through daniela’s head, and maybe that can be enough for now. you drive back to her place and squeeze right back into bed with her, wondering what this new chapter could possibly have in store for you.

-

the press conference finally comes the next day, and you’ve never seen so many bodies packed in the conference room before. photographers, reporters, even what looks like scouts and coaches invited from other teams. yunjin is seated next to you in the front row by the coaches, and megan and lara are right outside the door watching on the screen outside the room with the rest of the team. 

dani limps her way onto the stage, unreadable expression on her face. they offer her a roaring round of applause, their university’s mini-celebrity, before quieting down as she takes to the microphone to start the speech.

“hockey has given me the most beautiful past 15 years of my life. i’d like to thank the program, for giving me a home to call my own, and the coaches, for pushing me to be my best. i’d like to thank the girls, most of all, for trusting my decisions, following me into the dark, and picking me up every single time i’ve fallen in pursuit of perfection.”

“as we celebrate this win,” she continues, “i know my time as captain has come to a beautiful end. i will mourn the season i never got to share, but i know the next captain is going to set the most incredible example for the team moving froward. being captain changed me. it gave me something to be responsible for, and a reason to believe in myself, even on the hardest days, when nothing felt redeemable. this is not a decision the program has taken lightly, as the job of team captain is only for those strong enough to lead by example, and believe in themselves to do it with a clear focus on the team.” 

she presses her lips into a fine line, clearly trying to fake a smile. your heart aches as you know she’s being forced to do this against her better hopes.

“i am proud to announce my successor,” she starts, her face cold. 

theres a pause, and you see her eyes change. she looks up at you and that glint of mischief shines as your eyes meet. you whisper a scolding to yourself but the grin on her face tells you that her mind is made up. she leans into the microphone and takes measures into her own hands.

“the women’s hockey team is in no better hands next year than incoming junior megan skiendiel. thank you,” she nods and stands up, and the conference room bursts into a roar of flashing cameras, overlapping questions, and a few whistled cheers.

you know your dad is going to fucking kill her but she walks off the stage with no fear and heads backstage. 

tutor girl texts you immediately. 

holy shit

daniela’s too smart. the university is in too tight of a position to retract her statement. dani is adored by thousands, and the sob story of her early retirement locks in her legacy as a hero– if your dad retracts her statement, he’s as good as dead.

you all rush to find her backstage as your dad scrambles to the mic, announcing “no further questions.”

megan is the first to spot her, and you can already see the color drained from her face in shock as her lip quivers. “dani–”

“listen, megs.” daniela grabs the taller girl by the shoulders, pulling her in to look her deep in the eyes. “you are our top scorer. you are first to practice every time and always the last to leave. you live, breathe, and die by this sport. everything i know, i’ve taught you, and you’ve surpassed me. you are a better, younger version of myself and you are the heart of this team.” 

you didn’t know where dani’s head was at with yunjin, but you can see it now. experience and composure vs talent and dedication. yunjin is perfect on paper, but megan is obsessed with the sport down to her very core. and when daniela needed a reminder she was more than just a stupid little problem child, she recognizes that megan needs the same push to see she’s not just some nervous idiot little kid. 

“i can’t do what you do,” megan hiccups, and you can see how hard she’s biting down on her lip to stop herself from bursting into tears. “i can’t do any of this without you.”

“you won’t have to.” dani pulls her into a crushing hug, and you feel your heart warm. “i’ve got your back, and you’ve got all of ours. believe in yourself, or at least remember that at least one person believes in you, and the rest will come naturally.”

your dad’s voice booms over all of you, interrupting the otherwise tender moment. 

“avanzini, my fucking office, now.”

he’s stanced menacingly in front of the group, finger pointed in the direction of the coach’s offices. you all fall silent, clearly terrified of what comes next from him.

well, all except for daniela, who steps right up to him and points a finger just an inch from his face. 

“yeah, keep swearing at me ‘cause i got more to say to you, you bald-headed bitch,” she pushes back fearlessly. 

“oh, don’t start, avanzini,” he groans, backing down and walking towards the office. 

you want to die of laughter as you watch her limp after him. daniela and her incessant need to run her mouth.

you give megan a quick squeeze of reassurance and leave her in the arms of the girls. whatever is about to go down between daniela and your dad should probably involve a witness, so you chase them down and follow into his office. they don’t even notice you entering, right back into a screaming match they’re all too good at. 

“do you know the shit you just got us into? i have a whole department losing their minds over their top spokesperson having to transition off and now you’re going off script picking your own fucking captain! do you know the position that puts us in?” he’s seething so hard, you see the spit flying from his lips as he can barely contain himself. “do you ever fucking think about anything besides yourself?”

“yes, actually.” daniela’s face is hard, she’s standing tall, taking the verbal beating but snapping back just as forcefully to make sure he knows it won’t be an easy fight. “i think about a lot of other people, actually.”

“forgive me for finding that hard to believe, between the partying, the disrespect, and the self-centered attitude.” he holds up a finger for each vice he lists. “you carry yourself like some cocky frat boy and i’ve enabled you for way too fucking long. sometimes i wonder what the fuck goes on up there in that brain of yours besides thinking about yourself.”

you see daniela’s fists clench, and she lets out a sharp breath. 

“you wonder what i think about?” she snaps, before taking a step back and laughing bitterly. “this is a great time to tell you that i’m in love with your daughter.”

you freeze. oh christ.

“don’t joke like that, avanzini.” he waves her off, immediately attempting to call her bluff.  “you’ve already put my blood pressure high enough. don’t pick the low fucking blows.”

“coach,” dani says simply, and her eyes flicker to you. 

you look back at her, and realize your dad is staring between the two of you. his face falls instantly as he sees the look you share.

“y/n, if she’s roped you into some prank, it’s not fucking funny, and this is not the time. this is serious, kiddo, you can’t let her use you to make a joke at my expense–”

your eyes meet dani’s once more, and you realize you have a choice. be stuck under his thumb forever, or choose to be impulsive and brave. 

and something about those eyes makes you feel like maybe, it wouldn’t kill you to be your own person. 

“i know daniela is a pain in your ass, but she’s also passionate, and brave, and she loves hard.” you start, and your dad groans in exasperation as he buries his face in his hands.

“not you, y/n, i literally told them the only rule was not you,” he sighs, before pointing back at daniela. “i should have known i couldn’t fucking trust you.”

“you don’t see the good side of her because you’re too busy wishing she was lara, or yunjin.”

you see dani and your dad tense simultaneously. 

“i’d be pretty annoying too if i couldn’t exist by myself,” you continue. “you’re always comparing her and she never gets a chance to just be celebrated for everything she does right.”

“no. not being trusted is a consequence of your own decisions,” he tells her.

“you don’t know everything about me,” daniela growls. 

“no, avanzini, i do know you,” he snaps back quickly, an accusing finger in her face. “i know you’re arrogant and hot-headed. i know you act first and think later, and that’s if you even think at all.”

“and all of those things make her someone you can depend on to give 110%,” you jump in to her defense. “do you know how many times she’s shown up to cheer someone up after a hard game? how she teaches others how to show up first to every practice? how she’s there the moment anyone needs someone? every time the girls start to beat themselves up because you’ve been a dick, she’s the first one helping them feel better about themselves.”

“it’s not just about being composed,” you go on, “it’s about being connected, and daniela cares about everyone equally. doesn’t pick favorites, unlike you.”

“y/n, are you trying to kill me?” he runs a hand over his bald head, his skin redder than you’ve ever seen it before. he glares once more over at daniela. “and you, shit-head, you are to stay away from my daughter or i kick you from the team.”

“i’m not approved to play anyways,” dani snaps back immediately. “you can’t stop me from shit.”

“kicking her isn’t your call,” you push back.

“she’s going to ruin your future,” he warns, but it feels like the weak final attempt of someone losing to try and get the upper hand.

“you not listening to anyone else is going to ruin yours. watch how your team falls apart without dani to guide them,” you snap back, grabbing daniela’s hand to yank her out of the office with you. “she’s not some fucking monster.”

you pause for a second in the doorway, before adding a final thought.

“and for the record, dad, dani did everything possible to ignore me. i sought her out, over and over, because she was the only person who treated me like a human being and not like your little puppet.”

your hands are shaking as you two simply keep walking, making your way out of the building. you’ve never once pushed back against him like that.

“holy shit,” daniela says simply, slumping up against the giant oak tree by the athletics building. 

it’s not enough for you, you’re all adrenaline, and if there was ever a time to claim and be claimed, it’s now.

“you could say it to my dad, right in his fucking face, and yet you can’t look me in the eyes and say it to me?” you tell her hurriedly, grabbing her hands and holding them in your own shaky ones. “you can look him in the eyes, tell him off, tell him you’re in love with me, and still not be able to look me in the eyes to say it here?”

“i didn’t think the chance would ever hit me again,” she admits. “i did it, but i was fucking scared.”

“big bad avanzini, scared?” you laugh, throwing your head back. “never thought i’d see the day.”

“i want to be a different person for you,” she tells you, her tone dropping into a more serious one, as she brushes a few strands of hair from your face. “a good one.”

“you are a good person,” you press, taking her face into your hand. “i wanted you then, before you knew you were good, and i want you now.”

“it’ll kill me if i hurt you,” she clenches her jaw.

“dani, we’ve already hurt each other and we weren’t even together.” you shake your head at all the time you two had wasted being stupid and playing games. “and you forgive me, and i still forgive you, and i still know you’re good at your core.”

“i want you bad, y/n,” she breathes shakily. “but things i’ve loved in my life never really end up working out.”

“because you sabotage them, thinking you’re not worth it.” you hold her perfect face in both of your hands, forcing her to look at you. “you are perfect for me.”

“it’s risky,” she warns you, but you can see her guard falling one last time. “being in love can be really fucking painful. it’s a huge risk.”

“luckily for me, i fell in love with the most reckless, relentless daredevil i’ve ever met,” you grin, and she matches your smile with her own. “i trust you, daniela avanzini. with my whole heart, actually.”

she pulls you into a searing kiss, and you realize it’s the first time you’ve ever kissed in the fresh air, not hidden in someone’s room or in a dark hallway. you relish it, her soft, warm lips against yours in the brisk winter time air, the way she pulls you in to press your bodies flush together. your heard thuds at the realization. 

it’ll be the first of many.  

-

megan taps the microphone nervously, pulling at her tie to loosen it. 

“uh, hi.”

tutor girl is recording next to you, looking like a proud soccer mom. she told you just moments before how hard megan had worked on this speech. the summertime pre-season press conference is no joke, usually it’s how the program will set the tone for the upcoming season, and the team is eagerly waiting in the front row of the conference seating to cheer on the ginger on stage.

“i take the torch of leadership from a mentor who is extremely dear to me.” she starts slowly, and you notice that she has no notes in front of her, having memorized the speech itself.  “i’m excited to work to bring out the best in this team, the way our former captain brought out the best in me, and in every one of us. i will aim high not to achieve, but to improve. all i will seek is that we improve upon ourselves, and the rest we’ll take as it comes for the love of this beautiful sport. thank you for believing in me, and i hope this season gives everyone something to be proud of. my name is megan skiendiel, and i am extremely honored to be named the women’s hockey team captain.”

she nods, bowing slightly, and stands up once the photos have all been taken.

dani watches on the other side of you, arms crossed. her lips are pressed into a grin. 

“you did this,” you tell her, motioning to the packed conference and the roars of cheering fans from outside the conference room. “your stubborn self made this all happen.”

“someone once described me as relentless,” she smiles, poking you in the hip.

“no, i said you’re annoying,” you correct, as the two of you make your way back towards the coach’s area.

“i’ll be honest, i probably wasn’t listening either way.” she teases, and you roll your eyes. “you start yapping and i get lost in those eyes.”

“okay, alright loverboy,” you push her face away, but she presses back twice as strong to plant a kiss on your cheek. you squeeze her cheek in response. “ugh, you’re so fucking cute it makes me aggressive.”

“you’re always aggressive,” she laughs. 

“don’t let anyone look at you during the faculty meeting,” you warn. “if someone smiles at you, you say–”

“‘i have a girlfriend, i love her with my whole heart, and she’ll kill you,’” dani nods, remembering the lines you two playfully ran the night before.

“you’re so good.” you hum happily.

“if anyone looks my way, i’ll call you and then punch them in the head,” she reassures you, laughing.

“no violence.” you warn her. “you’re not a frat boy any more.”

“i love you,” she says simply, but the firmness in her tone and the way she reaches for your hand speaks volumes. 

you grab her by the chin and stare deep into those beautiful dark eyes. her tooth gem sparkles as she smiles widely back at you. 

“be good, and have fun. i’ll wait for you at home.”

“naked, hopefully,” dani quips back quickly.

“we can’t keep traumatizing poor megan,” you laugh, shaking your head.

“you are the best thing that ever happened to me,” she tells you earnestly, eyes looking over you as if seeking something.

“if someone discovers how to quit you, i hope they let me know,” you wrap your arms around her neck and plant one last kiss on her forehead.

“hope that never fucking happens.” she says easily. “you’re stuck with my ass.”

“ugh.” you push her away with one last kiss to her cheek. “go be charming and stupid somewhere else before i drag you into a bathroom.”

she looks so fucking cute in the university polo. a popped collar and a red cup in her hands and she’d look much too comfortable throwing back to her frat boy days. she runs off and joins the familiar figure of your dad as the hockey program faculty head into a meeting room.

your dad shoves her, and she grins twice as big up at him as she jumps up to slap the back of his big, bald head and then sprints off. he grumbles something and you watch as the two disappear into the room with the rest of the staff. you couldn’t be more proud of the way dani has found a way to keep chasing her dreams.

daniela avanzini. incoming senior, and new assistant coach in training.

and, her title for you and you alone, daniela avanzini. the most passionate, caring, insanely brave girlfriend anyone could have ever imagined.

[shoeistars]

no photos ! pt 1

incl. isagi, bachira, chigiri, kunigami, nagi

ʚଓ outline. where the boys keep their slutty polas of you <3

ʚଓ w. pro!players, 18+ content, minors dni, photos/polas, fem!reader, read at your own discretion as I don’t do individual tagging for element of surprise <3

ʚଓ pt 2 (reo, barou, rin, sae, shidou)

isagi : on the back of his phone

Oh, he’s obsessed with this one polaroid you let him take, his cock slotted between your pretty tits. Your nails sparkled in the photo due to the flash, acrylics all shiny as you held your breasts together to keep him nice and snug

That night was one where he had earned himself a big win, the celebration you gave him was timeless. Your face was all sticky, smeared in pearly cum and runny spit, little bubbles all around the corner of your mouth

Clear case and all, everyone can get a good look at his favorite girl, see just how much of a cockslut she was with a fat dick between her tits and a pearly smile on her face

bachira : shoebox

As deranged as Bachira is, he likes to keep you for his eyes only. That being said, the Nike shoebox that’s stored under his bed is full of filth, softcore porn, downright sin

Pictures of your leaking cunt just pumping cream all over the base of his thick cock, pictures of your fucked out face all flushed and dazed. Constant memories that he happens to keep ahold of for lonely nights

There’s enough to nearly fill up the big black box that once held his soccer cleats, so full that the lid can’t even fit on properly to do its job. It’s a tradition for him to snap a shot of you when he’s got you cockdrunk, after all

chigiri : trendy altoids box

Did we expect anything else from our artsy princess? He follows trends and those metal altoid mint boxes aren’t an exception, he carries it around with him at all times, decorated to perfection

He’s got tons of miscellaneous shit in there, ranging from a mini bottle of fragrance, a roll of tums, a fortune slip from the fortune cookies the two of you got at the local chinese restaurant in your area

Oh, but his favorite item is taped at the top of the box, sealed in place with a hello kitty sticker. A polaroid of you with his cock down your throat, taking it so deep that you can see the outline in your esophagus. He just so happens to be pressing a palm flat against, Chigiri was real proud of you that night

kunigami : scrapbook

A man of class, really. He’d hate to see all of those precious photos of his princess getting damaged or scratched, his best bet was getting a plain book to store each pola in their own plastic slots

They’re even organized, ranging from you sucking his cock, to your back turned to him as he’s plowing your guts from behind, to you on your knees with glossy nut covering every goddamn inch of your body

It’s his prized possession, stuffed in his bookshelf next to all of his old soccer books and manga. A good flip through is enough to make him chub up in his joggers

nagi : playstation

That playstation was damn expensive, he’d be a fucking fool to not add a breathtaking picture of you bouncing on his dick like it’s your lifeline. It’s taped with washi tape, front and center for him to look at anytime he’s within reach of his console

You’re purely glowing in the photo, the sheen of sweat he got you worked up in making your skin glisten like a goddess. The flash managed to catch the details of his veined up arm as he wrapped a huge hand around your throat

He’s obsessed with the expression on your face too, brows furrowed and jaw slacked with a fat glob of spit dripping past your lips like a hungry dog. His girl was a whore for big dick, a fact that made him smirk lazily when it crossed his mind

[reasonsforhope]

The World's Forests Are Doing Much Better Than We Think

You might be surprised to discover... that many of the world’s woodlands are in a surprisingly good condition. The destruction of tropical forests gets so much (justified) attention that we’re at risk of missing how much progress we’re making in cooler climates.

That’s a mistake. The slow recovery of temperate and polar forests won’t be enough to offset global warming, without radical reductions in carbon emissions. Even so, it’s evidence that we’re capable of reversing the damage from the oldest form of human-induced climate change — and can do the same again.

Take England. Forest coverage now is greater than at any time since the Black Death nearly 700 years ago, with some 1.33 million hectares of the country covered in woodlands. The UK as a whole has nearly three times as much forest as it did at the start of the 20th century.

That’s not by a long way the most impressive performance. China’s forests have increased by about 607,000 square kilometers since 1992, a region the size of Ukraine. The European Union has added an area equivalent to Cambodia to its woodlands, while the US and India have together planted forests that would cover Bangladesh in an unbroken canopy of leaves.

Logging in the tropics means that the world as a whole is still losing trees. Brazil alone removed enough woodland since 1992 to counteract all the growth in China, the EU and US put together. Even so, the planet’s forests as a whole may no longer be contributing to the warming of the planet. On net, they probably sucked about 200 million metric tons of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere each year between 2011 and 2020, according to a 2021 study. The CO2 taken up by trees narrowly exceeded the amount released by deforestation. That’s a drop in the ocean next to the 53.8 billion tons of greenhouse gases emitted in 2022 — but it’s a sign that not every climate indicator is pointing toward doom...

More than a quarter of Japan is covered with planted forests that in many cases are so old they’re barely recognized as such. Forest cover reached its lowest extent during World War II, when trees were felled by the million to provide fuel for a resource-poor nation’s war machine. Akita prefecture in the north of Honshu island was so denuded in the early 19th century that it needed to import firewood. These days, its lush woodlands are a major draw for tourists.

It’s a similar picture in Scandinavia and Central Europe, where the spread of forests onto unproductive agricultural land, combined with the decline of wood-based industries and better management of remaining stands, has resulted in extensive regrowth since the mid-20th century. Forests cover about 15% of Denmark, compared to 2% to 3% at the start of the 19th century.

Even tropical deforestation has slowed drastically since the 1990s, possibly because the rise of plantation timber is cutting the need to clear primary forests. Still, political incentives to turn a blind eye to logging, combined with historically high prices for products grown and mined on cleared tropical woodlands such as soybeans, palm oil and nickel, mean that recent gains are fragile.

There’s no cause for complacency in any of this. The carbon benefits from forests aren’t sufficient to offset more than a sliver of our greenhouse pollution. The idea that they’ll be sufficient to cancel out gross emissions and get the world to net zero by the middle of this century depends on extraordinarily optimistic assumptions on both sides of the equation.

Still, we should celebrate our success in slowing a pattern of human deforestation that’s been going on for nearly 100,000 years. Nothing about the damage we do to our planet is inevitable. With effort, it may even be reversible.

-via Bloomburg, January 28, 2024

[loganbcrnes]

Mine

Logan Howlett/Wolverine x female!reader

Tags/Warnings: Smut, Fluff and Smut, Rough Sex, Dom/sub, Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics, Alpha/Omega, Alpha Logan (X-Men), Feral Behavior, Rut Sex, mention of frank castle, Explicit Sexual Content, Breeding, Impregnation, Marking, Blow Jobs, Logan has a big cock, and hes very hairy yes, Reader-Insert Authors note: originally posted this on my ao3, but decided to just upload the full one-shot here as well. link. Not beta'ed and no description of reader Summary: Logan unexpectedly goes into rut and you're there to help him through it.

You had no idea what you were anticipating when Logan came home from work. Before he left in the morning, he was acting stranger than normal. His temper was short, his motions were labored, and he wasn’t himself. His scent was also stronger than normal. It didn’t take you long to realize something was wrong, the bond felt stronger between you two like it was during the war and before you even began to make lunch, you received a text from your Logan.

Logan: I don’t want you to be alarmed, but I think I’m in rut.

This caught you by surprise. Most alphas these days didn’t get ruts and omegas didn’t get heats either. Just like they’re becoming rarer as time goes by. it’s sad really, back before the war, before Hydra - you were able to go into heat. You always spent it alone back in the 30s, you even got time off from your part-time job as a nurse when you were temporarily staying in Ireland. Logan could go into ruts too before Project X. during the war you both would help each other out, which led to you both bonding until the train mission fucked all of that up.

But now it’s 2021, over 70 years have gone by and 3 years since The Snap. You are forever thankful that both you and Logan survived it. You don’t know what you would have done if your beloved alpha was taken away from you once again. Since then you both decided to get a nice cabin in the mountains to get away from everything. You both were done fighting, tired of constantly losing people you loved. 

Logan got a job in construction in town about an hour away. So he didn’t usually come home until around 6 pm. You were thankful when you got the news that Frank Castle and his pack of alphas were moving a few miles away from your cabin a few months ago. You know it can get isolated in this area, so to have friends that you consider family to come and visit was nice.

There was no time to think about the next course of action though, it was clear what you had to do and something you thought you wouldn’t ever do again. Logan would be back in about half an hour, which gave you time to set up the room and go for a nice shower. 

You immediately went into one of the cupboards in your walk-in wardrobe for blankets. Logan didn’t necessarily like making nests, he always said and his quote: “ya’ don’t need to make those things no more lady, you use your alpha.” in his deep gruff tone. So you resorted to cuddling at least 2 times a day instead and he would fuck you into the mattress just how like it every time. 

Once you got a mattress onto the floor with a ton of blankets and pillows littered onto it, you went into the bathroom and stripped down. You cleaned up and once you were done, you slipped on a white silky nightie that reached down to your thighs. After that you got some nice cold water bottles to put beside the nest. As you were done you heard the door click open.

Logan could smell you before he even got out of his truck. His heightened senses were even more sensitive and he could smell just how wet you already were. All he could think about was knot, breed, mate- over and over as he got closer to the door.

It was rather embarrassing when he started to sweat and get a hard-on on his lunch break. He didn’t understand at first, but then recognized the symptoms to be a rut. Thankfully Frank was there to get him to leave, but damn did that hurt his ego a little.

Once he entered he was hit again with your strong scent. It was so sweet, sweeter than usual that he was beginning to think that maybe his rut could trigger your heat. He sure hoped so. Your scent was a mixture of roses and strawberries, he used to hate strawberries before he met you, but now it’s one of his favourite fruits.

You looked up from your iPad as Logan walked in and put down his backpack. “Hey,” you said as you got up, but were cut off by a squeak when he immediately jumped you. He picked you up by your thighs, making his way to your bedroom, his lips never leaving your neck. He nipped and sucked little bruises into your soft flesh. He put you down gently onto the mattress and started groping your breasts. 

“Fuck, I’ve been thinkin’ about this all day, Darlin’”. Logan growls as he starts kissing down the valley between your breasts. He pulled back and slipped off your nightie, revealing your breasts and wet cunt. You blushed and looked away, but your alpha immediately notices. “Hey, no looking away from your alpha now,” Logan says as he grips your jaw to look back at him. 

“Sorry, Alpha” you shyly say. Logan only grunts back in reply as he stares down at you. You grip at his clothes, “off, please” you whine at him. Logan immediately starts to strip down, you stare at his glorious beefy body as he takes off his pleated shirt and jeans. Your eyes traveled the trail of hair down to his already hard cock. You lick your lips wanting to taste so badly. 

Logan notices as smirks, he leans back down to press his lips against yours, just as a whimper escapes through your lips, giving you a smoldering kiss which leaves you breathless within seconds, distracting you as he continues to run his hand up and down the curves of your body, getting closer to your sensitive parts.

You are gasping for breath when he pulls away, and in your complete haze, you watch him as he slowly climbs down your body, his lips never leaving your skin as he trails his hot kisses on you all the way down. He parts your legs further so he could get more comfortable between them, then when he presses a kiss at your nether lips, his fingers parting your folds so he could find your slick entrance and give a long, hungry lick right at where your desire is centered until you cry out. “Taste so fucking sweet ‘mega”. Logan growls as he licks your clit. You hear him moan and you open your eyes to look down at him, to see that his eyes are closed, totally blissed out as he sucks on your cunt, licking your entrance. You feel the hard tips of Logan’s fingers right at your opening, you moan when you feel two fingers parting your hot pussy, your walls instantly begin spasming around them, sucking them inside your depth.

“So hot, baby,” Logan growls, his warm breath falling on your sensitive folds as he whispers between the kisses he is giving you right at your heated core. “I’ve wanted to taste you since I could smell your sweet scent before I even got outta my car.”

You can’t think straight, you’re totally blissed out and your mind is filled with alphalphabreedmatealphabreed constantly, you reckon he has triggered your heat, but you don’t even realize and neither does he. His cock is stiff and swollen, you notice the center of his length has a bulge, showing that his knot is starting to form.  Your cheeks begin to heat up realizing that you’re doing this to your alpha. 

You go deeper and deeper into submission, surrendering yourself to your alpha, letting him know he can use you however he wants. Logan feels everything you feel, your bond is so strong that it’s overwhelming for the both of you. 

He continues to tease you with his fingers for a few more seconds and then the warm rasp of his tongue sends a series of shivers trembling through your body. He licks across your sensitive bud leisurely, biding his time with his eyes on you to take in every single reaction you are giving him through every lick, every swirl of his tongue. He has never seen anything so beautiful. He flicks his tongue from around your clit, down to your slit, moving back and forth as he continues to plunge his fingers into you. You begin to shake as you are nearing the edge.

He must have felt it, because he continues to lick at your cunt, slick pouring out as he slurps it all up, growls deeply against your pussy. “Come for me, little mate.”

You let out a whimper at his command but feel helpless to resist him. You can’t hold it in anymore as you come to your release. “Alpha!”. You moan out as you arch your back, Logan continues to milk through your orgasm and makes sure to gather every drop of cum.

Once you come down from your high, Logan pulls back and climbs up the bed kneeling right beside your head. Keeping one hand at your chin, he raises your head up as he uses the other hand to pump his cock, aiming the crown tip on your swollen lips. “Go and put your pretty mouth to use, Darlin’,” Logan says. A drop of pre-cum leaks from the slit, making you drool at the taste, while the heady scent of his cock fills your senses as you breathe him in.

You eagerly nod, barely catching a breath from your strong orgasm, he slips his cock through your open mouth, wanting to satisfy your alpha.

Groaning, Logan reaches down and squeezes your nipple as he thrust in and out of your mouth with almost the same force he would use if he is deep inside your pussy. 

“Love these tits of yours baby, love to see them jiggle when I fuck your tight cunt” Logan continues to grope your tits as he dirty talks. He thrusts into your mouth hard and you moan at his words, cheeks reddened at how dirty he’s making you feel.

You suck the entire length of him each time, loving the feel of the head of his cock at the back of your throat. Using his other hand, Logan grabs onto your hair, keeping you steady as he plunges deeper inside your mouth, pummelling deep into your throat each time he reaches to the brim.

His heavy balls filled with seed, slaps against your chin, loving the sensation and feeling dirty all at the same time. You dig your nails into his thigh with one hand and into the sheets with the other, holding on tightly as your lover uses your mouth for his pleasure. “So fucking good, baby. Always taking my fat cock so well. Look at you choking on it” Logan rambles as he thrusts into your mouth. He groans as you suck hard. You continue to choke as his knot is forming. 

Logan’s cock falls out of your mouth with a pop. The spasms of your climax remain. You close your eyes trying to catch your breath. You feel movement and blankets being moved on the mattress. After a few minutes, you feel a hand caress your cheek, tucking your hair behind your ears. You open your eyes to see Logan, his pupils are dilated to the point you only almost only see black. “You okay, Honey?” Logan asked. He leans down to press soft kisses to your cheeks and down to your neck. You hum as you lean into his touch, “Want you now Lo”. you said, “please knot me, need it so bad”. 

You’re a whimpering mess now, grinding your clit against Logan’s muscular thigh. Logan growls as he pulls back, he grabs a hold of your hips, flipping you over so that you're laying with your chest pushed flush against the mattress, legs bent, and the knees with your ass and pussy on full display. Your smell consumes him; all that he can think about is the taste of your arousal on his lips and how badly he needs to be inside you now.

His long fingers trace your slit as arousal floods from your entrance, coating your slick on his fingertips. Anticipation pangs at your chest as you wait for his next move. Everything in him wants to drive his hardened cock into you and knot you full of his seed.

Logan’s eyes screwed shut as he brings a finger up to his mouth, basking in the taste of you. A wanton moan erupts from his lips at the taste – so perfectly sweet he would never be able to get enough.

Dire thoughts rush through your mind as you rest on your elbows, face turned to the side to try and see Logan out of your peripheral vision. His pupils are completely blown, eyes focused only on your center as his chest heaves in anticipation. “Please Alpha, breed me, I’m ready,” you say to him. 

Logan is always less talkative during sex and now that he’s in his rut and possibly gone feral, his mind is screaming to him to knot and breed your tight cunt, to the point he can’t form words.

His hand is quick to line himself up with your entrance, grasping onto your hips with such pressure that it is sure to leave bruises tomorrow, even with your fast healing. Sharp fingernails dig into your skin as his tip meets your entrance. It’s fiery and red, inflamed and veins popping out alongside his length from how hard he is. The precum that leaks from his tip coat your slit, combining with the wetness dripping down your thighs to create a delicious mixture.

One last reassuring squeeze of your side is all he gives before pushing into you ruggedly. A sharp gasp leaves your lips as he makes his way into your core, feeling the familiar sensation you felt back during the war. His size is bigger, so much thicker and longer than his normal length when he is not in rut. It’s a lot to take in at once, and he’s trying his best to let you relax as your body adjusts to his size. 

“You can move,” you say, lip caught between your teeth as your walls stretch further around him.

With your fists grasping for the sheets, Logan begins thrusting his hips slowly into you– holding out a second each time he bottoms out to let you breathe. His nails only dig into your sides further, barely giving him a grip onto reality to hold back his animalistic instincts.

Deep grunts leave his mouth as he tries to hold himself back, but he can feel his humanity slipping further and further away with each clench of your pussy. His heavy balls slap against your clit.

“Can’t hold back much longer,” he bares his teeth, “need to breed you now.”

You moan out loud “please, please alpha, need you to fill me up with your pups” you continue to beg him. 

Quickly, his hips snap into yours, his thick muscles flexing as he holds your body steady, fucking into you deeply. Breath is sucked out of you as his pace increases; stars forming at the back of your eyelids as you squeeze them shut, mouth salivating at the increasing pleasure bestowing upon you. His length is a lot to get used to again, even though Logan tried to avoid knotting you back then because you both didn’t have enough time, there were times when he would sneak into your sleeping quarters to knot you in the middle of the night, his hand pressed against your mouth to reduce your loud moans as he thrusts his large cock into you; but the everlasting pressure against your g-spot was making the pain melt away.

Logan thrusts in and out of your pussy effortlessly, your slick coating his cock and making it easy for him to slide in and out of your velvety walls. With each thrust, he bottoms out, and it becomes difficult for you to remain upright. Limbs shaking from pleasure, your elbows begin to give way, landing you flat against the mattress.

Your mouth opens, but the only thing able to escape is a silent scream, too immersed in the feeling of him battering your walls and hitting your cervix to make a sound. A loud moan leaves your lips as he pulls you back up, his arms wrapping around your waist to use all his strength to hold you in position. His sweaty hairy chest is pressed flush against your back, the heat radiating off his body soothing you as his mouth meets your ear. A quick nip is placed on your earlobe as he catches it between his teeth.

“Taking me so well.”

He says in his deep voice. The praise quickly soothes your nerves, helping you relax into him as he holds your body close, closer than you had ever felt to him before. His tip is repeatedly hitting against the sensitive spot deep inside of you, you know he’s not ready to let up just yet, but you’re too on edge to hold on.

“Logan I-I’m gonna–”

“I can smell it,” he groans, mouth meeting your bond mark as he sucks harshly on it. 

A string of cuss words falls from your lips as your eyes clamp shut, relishing in your release as your pussy spasms around his cock. His movements don’t slow either – his pace is still erratic, plummeting into you at an ungodly rate.

Feeling your release over him only makes him thrust harder, deeper. It sends him into a full-blown frenzy, unable to keep himself from chasing his high. “Smells so sweet, gonna breed you, Baby, have you pumped up with my pups. Gonna look so sexy with your tits filled with milk and your pregnant belly.” he rambles, the more he talks dirty the closer you get to the edge. 

And you knew what this meant. You both finally have a chance to have children. Something you have always wanted when you first got together with Logan. Before meeting him, you never had high hopes to find a man and have a child or two. You were insecure and no one wanted a 26-year-old virgin omega. Especially since omegas were looked down upon back then.

But that time is over now, you're with the love of your life 70+ years into the future and everything you have ever wanted is here right now.

“God, do it, Logan, please knot me,” the words slip between cries, still shaking in the aftermath of your orgasm, “Breed me.”

So he does.

His eyes slam shut as his mouth finds the crook of your neck, breaking the flesh as his sharp teeth sink into your skin, reclaiming you once again. Screams blow past your lips as blood begins to trickle from the wound on your shoulder. Your chest tightens in pain, loving and hating the sensation all at once. Relief takes over once his tongue meets the small incisions made on your skin, his saliva filling the holes and alleviating the wounds as he licks up the blood.

“That’s it ‘mega. Doing so good for me. So perfect.”

Your heart flutters at his claim, have never felt as close to him as you do right now. Firecrackers lit through your veins, the connection between you and Logan binding stronger than ever and you couldn’t be happier. It felt like you were floating in thin air. Your body is unable to focus on any pain right now, you’re too blissed out from the shock of him reclaiming you to notice how his cock is beginning to swell inside of you.

Cum shoots out of his member, filling you up to the brim until your abdomen begins to feel heavy and swell. That floating feeling quickly begins to fade as his orgasm keeps coming and coming, no inch of your insides gone untouched by his seed. It seems like it's never going to end, and you can feel the pressure from his release building and building inside of you. Your sensitive walls stretch as his cock expands, your body doing the job it’s supposed to; knotting to plug you up and make sure none of his cum drips out.

“Logan,” you whine, tears spilling from your eyes as his cock continues to inflate inside of you, “Logan it kinda hurts.”

“Shhh It’s almost over, baby,” he comforts you, stroking your hair before guiding you onto your side, laying behind you. After such a rough round, his familiar touch eases your pain. The light kisses he places along your spine let you sink back into him, focusing on the feeling of his soft lips instead of the balloon-sized cock stretching your vagina. Gentle hands trace circles up and down your arms as you listen to the sound of his calming breath. His chest heaves as he tries to come down from the adrenaline rush.

Soft kisses soon turn into small licks running over the length of your back as you lay there, still speared on his cock. Now that his animalistic needs were met, it was all about you.

“What are you doing?” you frown slightly.

“Cleaning you up,” he answers calmly, his even more heightened senses finding nothing strange with this new method of aftercare. You’re too immersed in your thoughts to question him any further; if this is what his alpha side was telling him to do then so be it.

As Logan’s knot begins to subdue he doesn’t let go. His tongue soothes over the spot of his mark, all red, but could see the bond mark more visible than it was before. 

“Do you really think this will work?” you ask Logan. You don’t know what you will do with yourself if you aren’t able to get pregnant by this. “It will trust me, Darlin’. And if it doesn’t, we’ll try again and again until it does,” he says as he kisses your shoulder.

“You’re so beautiful, I’m so happy you’re mine after all these years.”

Butterflies flutter in your tummy as a smile stretches across your face. All you want to do right now is to turn around and kiss him, so you do. His face is just as bright as yours when you meet his eyes. His hair is messy and his skin is shining with perspiration, but he looks handsome as ever. He welcomes your kiss like he’s been waiting for it all day. Mouth chasing after your lips, capturing them in a quick kiss before pulling away.

It's the first time he’s seen your eyes since you’ve gotten home, and even then he couldn’t appreciate them as he could now. There's a different glow that he didn’t notice before. Maybe it's because he’s reclaimed you and knotted you after all these years, but he is willing to do anything and everything for you.

“I love you,” you sigh, pressing your palm to his cheek. He looks so innocent now, the blackness in his eyes now faded back to the hazel color you love so much. All the years and pain he’s been through, disappeared. 

“And I love that you’re mine.”

[silasours]

ৎ⸝⸝⠀FAV POSITIONS ! —

#pairing : lucifer, alastor, vox, valentino, gn reader. #cw : 18+ content, mdni. unprotected sex. different intercourse positions. praise kink. edging. creampie. overstimulation. sub reader. really soft luci!! usage of 'doll' on alastor's part. #summary : their favorite positions to fuck you in bed !! or something. #note : if you're wondering where the male version of giving/receiving head is, it'll take longer to be posted than you might think :3 I currently do not have the spark to write for that idea.

ʚ LUCIFER .

spooning / missionary position. lucifer prefers to hold you whole while fucking, it provides a sense of security and satisfaction to him at the very least. he would have his arms around your body almost throughout the whole session.

the bright, blinding sun peeps through the small gap between the curtains that covers the windows in your shared room. your fingers claw into the soft bed sheets, droopy eyes fighting to lift open considering how you woke up to lazy thrust of lucifer's hips.

it seems that the both of you almost instantly fell asleep after last night's intercourse while having him remain buried deep in you. it wasn't until when he woke up earlier than you did and felt a warm sensation he normally wouldn't feel that he realized that he slept through the night with his length nestled inside of you.

for some odd reason, that thought alone riled him up. he grunted after feeling his cock twitch inside of you, a shaky breath leaving his lips and hitting your skin. feeling his gaze falling onto your back that faced him, he slowly moved his hips, lips leaning in to press sloppy kisses from your shoulder to the back of your neck. he wanted to wake you up, to have you feel good along with him.

and that brings you to where you are now; body held closely against his, his lean arm wrapped around your waist as his forehead leans against your shoulder. he thrusts at a quicker pace compared to before, soft whines and groans spilling from his lips and so does yours.

every time your skin comes in contact with one another, a throaty moan would be drawn from you with your eyes closed tight. the fog in your head has yet to subside completely, and lucifer is already working to add in more haze to your mind. you feel him dragging deliciously along your walls, body still unable to adjust to the burning sensation at this time of the day.

"morning, baby," he whispers against your now flushed skin, a grin growing on his face when he hears you moan. you grasp onto the soft sheets tighter; him spooning you while fucking into you allows him to reach areas that he normally isn't able to. the feeling made your vision grow blurry, unable to focus on anything other than pleasure.

you moan his name weakly, words incomprehensive as they leave your mouth without giving them another thought. you hear lucifer mumbling about him reaching close to his climax, his grip on your hips tightens significantly as well as the pace of his trust. it merely took a couple more thrusts of his hips before he spilled his warm release inside of you, your body shaking as you climaxed along with him.

your breath is hot against the bed sheet, a strong wave of exhaustion hitting you like a ton of bricks. lucifer feels the same thing as you do, his upper body falling onto the bed with a soft thud as his elbow gives out. you feel him pull you in closer into his embrace, soft murmurs of sweet nothings into your neck as the both of you drift into yet another slumber for the day.

ʚ ALASTOR .

doggy style / leapfrog position. he likes watching you from above as he fucks you into a mindless, moaning mess. having a clear view of the effect he has on you is exactly what he aims for especially under activities like this, and this positions provides him just the thing he wants. i used doggy style here :3

you feel cold tentacles wrap around your thighs and push them further apart, legs threatening to give out with the hold of his tentacles being the sole support for your body. today is a day when alastor returns home frustrated; his red locks were slightly messed with splinters of hair poking out, brows furrowed on his forehead and his usual grin didn't seem as bright as they usually do.

you did not have much time to register his situation and ask him before getting lifted up by his tentacles, sharp coldness stings your skin where they wrap around. darkness surrounds the both of you before disappearing when you both appear in the bedroom that you share, your body being tossed onto the bed as the hold of his tentacles on your body remains.

despite being harsh and all, there's always a hint of softness in alastor's actions like vocally asking to make sure you're alright and not hurt occasionally. his clawed hands have a firm hold on your hips, his own snapping onto yours brutally to the point where the bed would creak ever so often. your eyes roll back until it's almost completely white, mouth hanging open as uncontrollable babbles roll off your tongue.

his eye twitches in excitement at the sight displayed below him, the sight of you taking him in so nicely drawing out a groan from his throat. slowly, another one of his many tentacles snakes from his back and plunges itself into your mouth through your parted lips, the dampness of your mouth already coating a layer onto it.

"look at you. such great performance from you, doll." praise falls through his gritted teeth while he thrusts into you, doing his best to contain his noises, avoiding being overly vocal. being less vocal makes him feel like he's more of the one in control, despite wanting to let them out so badly because of how good you feel.

you return with a muffled moan in response, walls clamping down on him while you choke on the tentacle that reaches the back of your throat. alastor's grin widens, allowing his tentacles to grip tighter around your thighs, and the other one curls in your mouth. hot tears slide down your face as you feel a strong release approach closer with each of his hard thrusts, a buzzing sound filling your ears along with a few words that he speaks.

the coil in your stomach snapped suddenly without allowing you to vocally warn him about it, your upper body giving out while your lower remains upright solely from the support of his hold. your body shakes intensely, face pressed far into the bed sheet; a spasming mess is what alastor would describe you as currently.

your consciousness was about to fade before your eyes snapped wide open once again, feeling a sudden stretch with a loud slap of your skin. he has not reached climax yet, so of course he's not done.

"will you be so obedient and allow me another round, hm? i have not achieved my goal yet, you see."

ʚ VOX .

mating press position. what can i say, he's absolutely smitten over how you look when he presses you down while fucking deep inside of you. he gets to hear you moan and ramble about how deep he's in, feeling your muscle tense in his hold whenever the tip of his cock kisses the spot inside of you. he's drunk on the feeling and view, always wanting more of it which results in multiple rounds until the both of you are overstimulated.

"doin' so good f' me," vox's voice is shaky along with a slight glitch, heavily hinting at the pleasure he's receiving. a streak of pink line connects from the corner of his mouth down to the frame of his screen, a wobbly grin plastered on his face.

his clawed fingers hold a firm grip on the back of your knees, pressing them onto your chest while simultaneously rocking his hips against yours. his gaze locks with the thick liquid that oozes out from you every time his cock fully pushes in, forcing the liquid out and rolling down your clammy skin. the demon moans at the sight, significantly increasing his pace and making you yelp in surprise.

you're fuzzy from overstimulation, barely able to comprehend simple sentences as they're all just a blur in your mind. your hands are folded onto your face, tears and saliva sprawled everywhere messily on your face with your knee occasionally hitting your cheeks. every time you'd mumble about how it's 'too much' or 'you can't go for any more rounds', vox would shut you up with a harsh slap on your thigh before resuming on fucking your pretty hole with a chuckle.

he's tired, too, from round after round of ejaculation. it feels like he has nothing more to offer, but god are you unresistible. he craves more of his name spilling out as pretty noises from your lips, craves for the warmth of your velvet walls engulfing his sore erection, craves for another satisfying sight of him filling you up with his seed all the way to the brim.

his eyes light up as an idea pops into him, his fingers gripping tighter onto your legs. the tip of them light up a bright color of blue before vanishing suddenly, a sudden shock of small electricity piercing through your skin from his fingers. your body jolts at the sudden unfamiliar sensation, a different kind of noise slipping from your tongue. your eyes are wide, gaze that met his in confusion and pleasure.

vox grins at your reaction; he loves it. it's obvious that you did, too, feeling how tight you squeezed around him when you felt the sudden electricity shock send through your veins. he leans forward, only increasing his thrusts as he readies to send yet another wave of electricity through his fingers. he found a brand new way to toy with you, to draw out pretty noises that he always get drunk on.

"you like that, huh? squeezing around me like that, s' like you're begging for more my love."

ʚ VALENTINO .

lotus / heatwave position. he either likes to see you struggle to pleasure him properly or fuck you over the kitchen counter or any high tables he has in his office. he finds it hot to limit your movements, watching you helplessly take in anything and everything he has to offer. i used heatwave pos. here :3

“fuck, val, c-can’t we do this in- hngh, bed?” you groan in frustration before getting cut off by a moan, a hand gripping tightly onto his arm and another on the corner of the countertop. your leg was thrown over valentino’s shoulder when he lifted you onto the counter top, giving him a perfect display of you for himself. he gave you a breathy laugh before he replied teasingly. “this is fun, no? It feels better than the bed.”

out of all places, he chose to do it at the countertop, the place where you can barely move around to avoid falling off. he only chuckled everytime you complained and whined, shutting you up with a thrust of his fingers inside of you. 

toying with you like this has always been his favorite. he knows exactly what and where to reach in you just to make your legs tremble and body shudder in pleasure, soft moans of his name that spills as you plead for more. he carries on providing pleasure to you until he feels the gummy walls around his fingers tighten, signaling a close approach of climax; he remove his fingers completely from you and deny your orgasm.

he watches you whine, trying to pull his hand back as you tighten around nothing out of desperation. valentino watches with a shit-eating grin on his face, leaning forward to bite on your earlobe while whispering. “hm, why don’t you tell me exactly why i should give you what you want?” he pauses for a moment before continuing, his voice sweet like honey cooing into your ear. “I’m waiting, carino~” 

you grunt, hating the cheekiness of his behavior yet desperate for a sweet release. giving in slightly, you glare at him with glistening eyes while running your mouth with sweet words in hopes of them being enough to convince him knowing how playful this man could get. he gazes down at you while holding your leg over his shoulder, lips grazing over your ankle as a ghosting kiss. he shows no response to your words, just doing whatever he was with half-lidded eyes.

just as you thought your attempt failed, you feel his sudden thrust into you, a spark of pain and pleasure shoots all the way to your head. your breath gets caught in your throat, a loud gasp leaving your lips, body freezing in place to adjust to the sudden stretch. valentino drinks in your reaction with a hungry gaze, earning a low grunt from him as he pulled his hips back slowly before thrusting forward again. excitement bubbles in his chest, his upper row of sharp teeth biting down on his lower lips.

he doesn’t waste another second on waiting and starts rolling his hips at a steady pace. he moans in great pleasure, both pairs of his arms hold you firmly to avoid you falling off. your face burns more than usual because of how exposed you feel being in this position, yet it also riles you up a whole lot. you already feel the coil in your stomach start to tighten, begging to snap after multiple denies from your partner. 

valentino feels it, of course. instead of slowing down or completely moving himself, he increases the pace to the point where the tip of his cock is able to press on the sensitive spot inside of you. your chest heaves heavily with yet another gasp, gritting your teeth because of how much it triggers the coil in your stomach. your knuckles gradually turn white from how hard you’re gripping the demon, moaning at how close you are to your sweet release. 

everything came to a halt when he suddenly stopped his movements. he has denied your orgasm, again. you groan in frustration, hitting his chest with your fisted hands with a frown on your face. valentino snickers at your reaction, completely unfazed by your annoyance. he has all the time he needs to play with you, after all.

© silas ( @silasours ). all rights reserved. every work posted on this account belongs to me, and only me. please refrain from reposting, plagiarizing, translating, or reproducing my work in any form possible.