The part that I mentioned that I moved from part iii into part iv? Yeah, I lied. It's moved but I'm not even going to tell anyone where since, knowing me, I'll probably end up moving it again if I do. Blame me for thinking about this story when I should've been sleeping.
As always, a big thank you to everyone who's reading this and enjoying it. Your comments are seriously amazing!
This part references PTSD.
you came back as the underdog
part iv
Wanda rests her cheek against warm muscle. Her neck hurts a little and her shoulder's pressed against a harder surface, but she twines her leg through another pair. The wooden panels of her living room floor are warm like they've been sitting beneath the sun for hours despite how dark it remains outside.
She fans out her fingers against skin and shifts against the body she's curled around. His hand's on top of one of hers, Vibranium fingers a little cool to the touch this morning. Although her thoughts flit to Vision, she knows it's not him. He always gripped her hand gently in hers, pads curled into her palm as if to count her lifelines. He always held her like he was still learning how to hold hands.
It's easy to ignore how uncomfortable it is to be lying on the floor with her head almost off a thick pillow when all she feels is an intoxicating bubbling warmth flutter around in her chest. Then she kicks him—by accident.
"Morning," Bucky says, voice deep with sleep. He doesn't move in front of her. "You are a creepily light sleeper."
Her brows furrow as she curls her fingers in against the skin of his belly. All she feels is hot muscle and skin beneath her fingertips, buzzing like his Vibranium arm. She glides her nails against him as he sucks in his belly, making a noise in the back of his throat that she thinks is akin to a constrained chuckle.
"I'm not a light sleeper," she says against his upper back. She looks at the bone of his shoulder and traces her gaze down the slope of his fleshy arm. His skin's slightly red and warm and she can easily count some of his smaller freckles from how she's perched behind him.
"So, you admit that you're creepy."
She doesn't consider taking his offered tangent. Feeling he's trying to sidestep away from the elephant in the room, she tugs it into view. Remaining pressed against him to ensure she can feel if he's lying—a contract of a muscle in his stomach, him rolling away from her, him even shifting against the floor—Wanda only hums. "Did you dream?"
Bucky's quiet for a moment. He doesn't still uncomfortably against her; his body doesn't react at all. His back warms her front a little too much. She's tightly curled against him, moulding easily to his spine.
"I didn't," he says. When he shifts to glance at her from over his shoulder, she instinctively tucks her face into his bare back to hide away from him. Now that he's moved—and it being towards her—she's starting to feel hot all over. "Thanks to you."
"I'm glad." Clearing her throat a little forcefully, she begins to slowly slide her hands away from him. She feels some reluctance of his Vibranium hand as he lets her steal her hand away. Shuffling away from him, she pushes up to sit on her heels and tugs at her camisole to straighten it over her chest.
She determinedly ignores him as he pushes up onto his hands, a mirror to how she had found him last night. The sheets are loose around his hips as he sits up. She spies he's wearing black briefs over his hips.
Carding her hand through her hair, she sweeps it over her shoulder and busies herself with looking down at it to try and brush out some of the knots. Bucky watches her before he roughly rubs his hand over his face.
Resting both hands against the wooden floor, he doesn't move to fix himself up or to tug the sheets up his hips or over his chest. He leans back like he's not embarrassed at all by her glancing at him and looking away.
"Thank you for what you did for me last night," he says, glancing up at her uncertainly. "I'm sorry that I scared you."
She shakes her head and looks up at him with a furrowed brow. "You didn't scare me," she says. "I wasn't scared of you."
Bucky looks down at her knees on the wood. Wanda rubs her upper thighs, studying him. His hair's a little messy from sleep and his left cheek's a little red from the pillow—and his chest is red, too, and a little shiny with sweat and light white marks from her nails.
"I'm glad," he says, looking up at her. His brows pinch as he regards her earnestly. "I don't want you to be afraid of me because if that. I'll sleep out in the garage tonight. You're not woken up when I'm there."
Her brows furrow, her nervousness and sheepishness slipping away from her quickly. She stills her hands. "You have them every night?"
He looks away from her and sighs heavily. "Most nights." He lifts a shoulder as if he's trying to protect himself against what that might mean. "It's not always that. The train." Something inside of her wilts and gives way to guilt blooming inside of her chest. She'd kept him in the garage to protect herself, leaving him alone with his nightmares. She'd turned her back on the residents of Westview, and now she's realising she's done it all over again to him.
Running her tongue over her teeth, she nods. "You'll sleep here for as long as you want." He regards her with furrowed brows, lips parting in an attempt to begin rebuffing her. She lifts her hand, swiping her fingers lengthways to discourage him. "I'm not afraid of your nightmares. I'm not afraid of you."
Bucky exhales heavily, his shoulders slumping. He opens his mouth as if he's about to protest again, but she can feel him fight with himself. There's no use. She's too stubborn—that's one thought that circles around her head so loudly, his voice affectionate as it echos in her mind before it slips away.
Instead, he gives her a small grateful smile. "I can make us some breakfast."
Relieved that he remains unguarded and touchable to her, she smiles. "I'm going to get dressed."
Pushing up onto her feet, she rubs a hand against her belly. When she looks down at him, he's watching her hand. His face is expressionless until he realises she's peering down at him, and then it breaks into a lopsided cheeky smile. "You could always just wear that."
Wanda laughs, chest and cheeks heating. She shakes her head and flicks her fingers, sending a wave of red tendrils to knock him back onto the ground. He laughs loudly, the sound echoing warmly around them.
She's quick to pin him down with a playful glare. "I would like my breakfast today." Not wanting to think about what she's implied, it's with quick steps she makes her way up the stairs to pull a dark grey hoodie over her chest and wash her face with cold water. Her bed remains unmade; looking at it in that state makes something in her stomach somersault.
Wearing his crumpled shirt from yesterday, he makes her bacon and eggs and attempts a poached egg. It ends up disastrously, but it makes her feel good when he laughs and makes us excuses for his poor attempts at being a breakfast chef.
"Not all of us can just whip up eggs like you, Witchy Pants," he says, smile beaming. She cuts into her poached egg and sighs heavily, shaking her head despite her smile. "In my defence, I wasn't Sergeant Barnes of the Poached Egg Infantry."
"You missed your calling," she offers, cutting up her bacon and dipping it into her oozing egg.
It makes her relieved to know that he hadn't felt uncomfortable finding her tucked up against him.
.
.
.
Wanda quickly gets to work with drying out the grass around her house. Bucky watches from the porch as she stands within the damp grass, feet bare. She lifts her hands up and watches as she pulls droplets of dew from the tips of the blades. A collection of them appears above her head like a sheet of the shiniest bubblewrap. With a sweep of her hands, the dew disperses into small red fireworks before transforming into a whirlwind of bright red and dry leaves. She sends it up into the sky, knowing where it'll fall.
Bucky seems to know its destination, too. She follows him to the garage where he easily pulls the ladder out from where he'd left it outside by its rear. He holds it easily under his left armpit and lugs it around as if it's made of feathers with his left hand.
"How many leaves did you put in the gutters today?" He looks at her pointedly as he lines the ladder with the side of the house. Gazing up at it, he gently rests it against the second level's gutter.
With her hands behind her back, Wanda shrugs. "A few."
He laughs. "So, a lot." He clears his throat and begins to ascend the ladder, slowly moving up the rungs. "What about newspapers?"
"There may be a special one up there," she says with a smile, watching him as he travels further from her. Despite feeling anxious about that newspaper, she eyes his legs and lets her gaze settle on his ass, his dark denim jeans hugging him tightly. She doesn't look to spy his phone; Wanda simply looks because she wants to.
Waiting until he's safely on the roof, she reluctantly leaves him be so she can tend to her garden. It's not as fun without him hovering or following her with a watering can or a spade, but she sneaks a few glances at the roof to see how he's doing clearing out her gutters. Still up there. He hasn't found the newspaper yet.
The sun pelts down; she ignores how the back of her neck burns as best she can. She doesn't feel any desire to try and correct it, not after the storm that had raged on last night. While the Darkhold hadn't explained that her magical corrections and manipulations could lead to a negative reaction bottling up, she can hear Agatha's voice in her head. Every action has a positive or negative reaction, and messing with weather is just waiting for disaster. It's a different beast, one that her mother used to tell her lived by its own rulebook. Wanda briefly wonders if that's what Agatha had meant when she had declared Wanda a monster—a harbinger of chaos to the weather's natural order.
Sweaty, she leaves her gardening tools by the side of her vegetable garden. Glancing up at the roof, she's disappointed when she can't see Bucky pulling leaves and twigs out of the gutter. He's on another side working diligently. She thinks to circle her house to find him, but she chooses to leave him be. Even Bucky might want his time alone with the leaves, twigs, newspaper and perhaps even the birds if they've chosen to visit him.
Wanda makes her way to her lake, glancing every so often back at her house in the hopes of seeing him, but Bucky's tucked away at the back or the side that she can't see. She doesn't know why she wants him to see her. Wanda has only one plan in mind, and it's one based in her mother's stories of how she believed the Lady of the Lake had been birthed. All she has to do is offer it something—a weapon, usually, but a coin would do just as well—and it'll give her anything she wants.
At the water's edge, she toes off her sneakers and her socks. With one last glance at her house to find he's nowhere in sight, Wanda's quick to pull off her t-shirt and her shorts. It's just one quick dip in the lake—a swim that she's only snuck in during the hot nights when Bucky had been seemingly tucked away in the garage doing his own thing. That had been during the times where she had been hoping that if she continued to ignore him, he'd leave.
In her underwear, she wades into the water and disappears beneath it. When she surfaces again, she's swum out a little further from the water's edge. Her feet barely brush against the stones of the lakebed as she treads water. No fish swim by her feet—there are none to bother her.
Wanda isn't sure how long she spends out in the lake trying to create an assortment of friendly fish with her hands beneath the water. There's a few unnaturally bright yellow fish and a few clownfish she'd felt inspired to create from watching Finding Nemo. They nip and tickle at her feet, some biting at her toes before swimming off. They remain clustered together in a school, almost afraid to be without one another. She'd made an even amount of fish so each fish would have a twin.
"Good to know witches don't melt when they touch water," Bucky says. Wanda startles, the water's surface rippling violently as red magic sweeps across it. She turns to face him, hand against her collarbones as her heart races. "Sorry," he says, giving her a toothy grin. His dark long-sleeve shirt is drenched in sweat. "I didn't mean to startle you."
Clearing her throat, she shakes her head. "You didn't startle me. One of the fish did."
His brow lifts and he glances at the surface of the moving water as if he can see inside of it. "There's fish in there?"
She nods, feeling a small surge of pride as a fish nips at her heel. "Newly created."
He grins lopsidedly, peering down at the water once more. He can't spy any of the fish from the shallow water lapping at the dirt. All the fish swim around her, nipping gently at her toes and brushing against her thighs.
"I wanted to tell you that I appreciated the newspaper," he says, his left hand disappearing behind his back. He plucks a thin rolled up and worn newspaper from his back pocket. Unwrapping it, he shows her the front page. "You made me look good."
Wanda doesn't need to swim closer to him to know what's on the front page. It's a discoloured greyscale photograph of him in his uniform from the 1940s. His face is thinner and younger, his smile unburdened and as warm as the one he wears now. His military uniform is sharp. He wears it attractively. She hadn't found any photographs or done any research since he arrived in Sokovia; she'd simply plucked it from the surface of his mind while he slept.
"It's a little hard not to," she says, bobbing slightly in the water. "You are a very ugly man."
Bucky barks out a laugh. He looks down at the newspaper, inhaling a little too deeply for her liking. She studies his face as he takes another look at the photograph, his name—James Buchanan Barnes—clearly printed as the headline along with staple words such as "hero" and "legacy". He doesn't look upset; he looks nostalgic, like he's looking through a photo album of family photos. She wonders if he recognises that man; she thinks she sees the Bucky who had once taken pride in his uniform standing before her.
"I'll read the article over lunch," he says, rolling the newspaper up tightly. He holds it against his side, looking at her. His lips part as if he's just realised she's in the water with her shoulders bare save for her dark red bra straps. "I was actually wondering if you wanted lunch, but this seems like a better idea."
Bucky glances at the pile of clothes she's left on the dry grass. His body twists as if he's about to turn on his heel and leave, but he tosses the newspaper gently towards her shirt.
"Mind if I join you?" He glances up at the sunny sky, his blue eyes bright. "It's fucking hot today."
Chin sitting against the water, she continues to move her arms, hoping that those movements are why the water ripples and not her heavily beating heart. She shakes her head, feigning nonchalance. "If you sink, I will not save you."
He smiles toothily, shaking his head. Hooking his fingers into the hem of his shirt, he tugs it up and over his head. The skin of his chest is tinged a light pink from working beneath the sun. She can see how he glistens a little with sweat, his Vibranium arm almost blinding. After he toes off his shoes and socks and begins to work at the button of his jeans, Wanda abruptly turns away to wade a little further into the lake.
She does her best to busy herself with watching and feeling the fish swimming circles around her, but it's difficult to focus on their small energies when he bursts hotly behind her.
The water feels warmer when he steps in. Rippling around them, Wanda chances turning around to look at him as he treads water in the deeper part of the lake. His shoulders are visible above the water, his Vibranium arm appearing light.
"How does it feel?" She looks at his arm and ignores how his shoulder's bare.
He looks down to his left side and lifts his hand out of the water, his metal fingers glittering in the sun. "Good," he says. "Light." He observes the way the water slides along his metal fingers and wrist as if it's skin. She doesn't quite know if either of them had expected his arm to react differently.
Compelled to reach out and touch his forearm, she tucks her hands tightly between her thighs, chin disappearing beneath the water.
He drops his arm easily, the water rippling a little intensely from the weight of his arm. "It's been decades since I've been in water. I was half-convinced I'd sink."
"There's still time," Wanda smiles.
Bucky lopsidedly grins at her, shaking his head appreciatively at her. She thinks he likes the fact that she teases him. He favours looking at his left side, moving his arm in the water as if he's never truly been in it since the 1940s. Wanda can't help but watch him as he glides his Vibranium arm along the surface and cups water in the palm of his hand. To her, it looks like the water's behaving like it would in any palm, flesh or Vibranium.
When he drops his hand back into the water, Bucky wades a little closer, no longer entertained by his arm. It seems as though he's finally accepted that it's normal—lightweight and a piece of him, and accepted by Sokovian waters. There's a weight to the corners of his lips she doesn't like, especially on a bright, hot day that's painted his cheeks pink and made his blue eyes appear endless like how she's always pictured the ocean.
Quickly, she pulls her hands away from her thighs and angles them beneath the water. Waiting until he's a little closer—two long arm lengths away—she blasts him with red balls of water.
Laughing, he wipes his dripping face, some of his dark hair sticking to his forehead. He lifts his Vibranium hand out and points at her. "Oh, you have no idea what you've done, Wanda."
She arches her brow, slowly pushing herself away with a sweep of her arms. "Is that so? You know they call me the Water Witch, too?"
"Huh." He grins lopsidedly, biting his bottom lip for a moment. There's a curious furrow to his brow, a question bobbing around in his head that she tries to swat away. He doesn't know what else she's called. "That's funny. They call me the Water Wolf in Wakanda." He's quick to use his height and strength to his advantage, pushing against the lake bed to try and propel himself towards her.
She kicks away from him as quickly as she can, blasting red power from her feet to try and propel her away from him. She's not the best swimmer, so she uses her magic to her advantage, trying to make herself appear like a mermaid in water when she feels like she's a sack of bricks trying to float.
When she can't hear him behind her, she stops swimming, panting as she looks around and finds the lake is empty. Not once does she consider he's abandoned her. Knowing that he's near, somewhere hidden beneath the surface, she spins on the spot, trying to spy him from above the surface. All she can see is the fish of bright colours swim around her and off into the rocks at the lake's bed.
She jumps when his metal hand brushes against her ankle. Twisting to her left, she doesn't see him beneath the water. Before she can kick away, he quickly surfaces and wraps his arms around her waist, pulling her back to his chest.
"How—"
"Told you," he says, pulling her close against him. His skin's warm against her back, his hands big and possessive in their grip against her chest and belly. His mouth momentarily bumps against her shoulder. "Water Wolf."
She pants, a little angry that he's bested her and a little excited by the feel of his bare chest against her back. Cupping his hand that sits against her collarbones, she curls her fingers beneath his bones and thinks to pull them away. She settles with holding his hand to her chest.
"I can blast you," she says, breathing hard and looking ahead at the rippling water. He rests his chin against her shoulder arrogantly and comfortably. He's stronger than her physically, but she knows that she's no competition for him magically.
"You can," he says, nodding against her shoulder. "But you won't. Your ego won't let you."
Pressing her lips together, Wanda tries to wriggle against him. His grip only tightens around her, his Vibranium hand palming her belly firmly as he pulls her even closer to him. Bucky hugs her to his front. She pushes her hips back against his, finding her heart's beating a little too rapidly. Wanda's a little surprised he can't see the beats ripple against the water's surface. He's breathing a little heavily against her shoulder.
Not one to ever lose, Wanda tries to push against him so she can jump out of his arms. It sends something warm and hot through her when she presses back against him, his hands gripping her tightly—not painfully—and his hips seem to push back into hers.
Despite how strangely good it feels to be trapped in his arms, she knows it's fruitless to try and wiggle free; he's stronger and easily holds her against him. She thinks he's using a quarter of his strength as he presses the tips of his toes against the rocks of the lake bed. She wiggles against him before she stills and he chuckles in amusement against her shoulder, mouth brushing against her bra strap.
Concentrating hard, she feels her magic buzz warmly against her shoulders as it wraps around the straps of her bra. His grip doesn't slacken, although his fingers flex in surprise against her stomach. Red magic colours the band and cups before she makes it disappear. Bucky's hands slacken enough for her to push against him to jump away, and she cheats—ego be damned—to propel herself with a blast of red magic from her feet to get away from him.
"That's cheating," he says, chuckling incredulously. The sound seems weighted to her. She continues to swim away from him. With a glance over her shoulder, she spies him fishing her bra out of the water, looking at it in some confusion. His lips are curved upward and slope lopsidedly.
Once her feet easily hit the lake bed, she begins to climb out of the lake along its small muddied slope. Some fish slip and nip at her ankles before speeding away from her. Wrapping her arms around her breasts, she turns around to face him, slowly walking backwards. He's swum a little closer, although he remains a good distance away. She thinks she can spy his chest is a little pink. He still holds her bra, his lopsided grin still in place even if he's looking at her oddly.
Ignoring it, she shrugs and smirks, "I take losing very hard."
When Wanda turns around, she drops her hands from her chest to try and appear arrogantly victorious. She knows he's watching her as she takes the last few steps out of the lake.
She doesn't turn around to glance at him, knowing that her chest and face are bright red at the idea of him watching her still. Too nervous to dry herself off with a click of her fingers, she skips picking up her clothes in fear of spying his face again and ruining his newspaper. Pulling her hair away from sticking to her back, it's with a laugh that she runs away along the stone steps leading to her house, feeling like she's gliding as he remains in the lake.
Disappearing inside of her house, she dries off with her towel in her bathroom and ignores the way her heart pounds heavily and loudly in her ears when she hears the downstairs backdoor open and close. Slipping into denim shorts, she doesn't replace her bra with another one; sliding her arms into a deep red hoodie and zipping it up her chest, she leaves her collarbones where he'd touched her exposed. Her skin still feels hot.
When she comes downstairs, he's at her kitchen counter, opening the pizza boxes she'd conjured up and peeling his slice out. He's dressed, his shirt damp and sticking to his chest. He doesn't drip water everywhere, although his feet are bare and he's dressed in the black briefs he'd swum in.
Her clothes sit in a pile at the corner of her kitchen table. Shoving his hands away from the pizza boxes, she gathers them up and spells the plates to hover in the air and follow her as she walks to the kitchen table. Wanda finds she doesn't care that his gaze lingers on her bare legs or, when he's sitting across from her, on her collarbones.
He sits with his newspaper rolled out in front of him, and with her help, it remains flat like it hadn't been folded at all. Despite his best efforts to keep his gaze down and eyes on the newspaper, she knows he doesn't read it at all. She thinks he's too busy trying to read the lines of her neck and shoulders.
.
.
.
Wanda keeps to herself for most of the afternoon, taking to watching him from the windows as she had during the first few weeks he'd arrived and stayed in Sokovia. He busies himself with cleaning out the gutters of her first level, tossing twigs and leaves to the ground. She watches as he rakes a small portion of her lawn. Bucky doesn't stop, keeping his hands and mind busy. A silly part of her wonders if he's thinking of her.
A part of her understands that, the need to escape. Without a task at hand, she finds her mind goes for a wander towards Westview, and when it leaves New Jersey, it ventures into a darker, more magical place. The Scarlet Witch lingers in her private room, paging through the Darkhold to find the chapter she'd been reading a couple of days ago. The words flitter inside of Wanda's mind as her astral projection reads the page slowly, unravelling the language she's slowly coming to understand.
She knows he doesn't see the astral projection. She's spelled that window to only ever show anyone who peeps in the interior of the room a brightly lit, sparsely decorated and cleanly kept version of it.
Her mind tears in two. She feels the magic of her astral projection and the warmth of him even though he's outside. If Bucky can sense her watching him, he doesn't look up.
When they have dinner—a small, quiet affair where she conjures up too much Chinese—he doesn't speak of the lake or of any of his findings. She catches him looking at her oddly only once before he seems too preoccupied with eating.
"I really liked that newspaper," he says, gaze downcast and his smile shy. She thinks she can spy pink to his cheeks.
"I made the story up myself," she says proudly. Feeling very pleased that he enjoyed what she had created for him, she scrapes her fork against her plate and looks away from him with a small smile. She hadn't done any research, not wanting to pry into his past when he hadn't handed it to her like he does his childhood stories of Steve.
He laughs. "I figured," he says, tapping the prongs of his fork against the plate. "You did manage to call me ugly there, too."
She smiles, looking up at him. "You're very ugly," she says earnestly.
Bucky only laughs louder, shaking his head. She relaxes at the sound.
He doesn't take the newspaper as an invitation to speak of the army or the war, but she thinks from how he feels—a fluttering, walking on air kind of feeling—that he feels pleased with what she's done. Nostalgic, a little sad, but pleased to see himself reflected back. He must recognise the man in that photograph. To Wanda, the photograph looks exactly like the man who's smiling across from her and telling her a story about how Steve had once stolen Chinese for him and his family and had ended up banned from the restaurant.
.
.
.
After they wash and dry the dishes—him washing, her drying, and all by hand with no hint of magic—she showers upstairs and he follows suit in the shower downstairs. Not once does he mention venturing into the garage, even though she can feel his anxiety march off of him.
Grabbing his Vibranium hand tightly, she pulls him from the kitchen to the living room. Clicking her fingers, she points to the couch. "Sit."
He laughs incredulously and a little sheepishly, and reluctantly takes a seat on the couch. Knowing what's good for him, he remains on the couch as she flutters around and prepares the house for sleep. Only once does he try and stand up, the act fruitless as he's pulled back down with gentle red magical vines. She doesn't need his help tucking her house in for the night.
He's watching her as she fusses around the living room. He sits on the edge of the couch, hands casually resting between his legs despite not feeling casual at all. Sometimes she thinks that if he was anyone else, he'd find her fluttering around like a chaotic butterfly to be incredibly boring, but Bucky chuckles when she can't reach the top of the window and makes a comment about how this is the fourth time she's checked whether it's locked.
"Are all Sokovians paranoid?"
Wanda's brows furrow as she mulls it over, brushing her fingers against the television. He still hasn't turned it on. Despite mentioning that the remote is on the coffee table—still in the centre, right where it was last night—he still doesn't lean forward and turn it on. It bothers her that he won't. She doesn't know why she wants him to be distracted from watching her.
"Yes," she says, turning around. Crossing her arms against her chest, she blows out air from the right side of her mouth to try and push away a loose and rebellious strand of long hair. "We are. Very paranoid. It's because Americans are very annoying."
Wanda narrows her eyes as the corner of his lips curve upward. His blue eyes are too bright. She really does wish he'd turn the television on.
"Are you saying I'm annoying because I'm not doing what you want me to do? You've been pretty bossy about me turning on the television, Miss Maximoff," he says, brows lifting up. He keeps his hands between his legs and leans forward against his thighs, looking awfully casual and comfortable.
"I'm making sure you're comfortable," she says, pulling her shoulders back. "And you're not."
His brows lift higher at that and he laughs lightly—something short and warm. "I'm not?"
"Nope," she says, shaking her head. She narrows her eyes and purses her lips and tries to intimidate him into taking the remote. It doesn't work—it's not very unsurprising, in truth. Bucky is stubborn and irritating, and she wishes he would stop smiling and watching her.
"I don't need to turn on the television to be comfortable, Wanda," he says, still so amused. His voice is too warm and he makes the room feel like the sun has chosen to set inside of it rather than behind the mountains. His gaze drops down to her legs, bare from above the knee. She's wearing her plaid pyjama shorts, a nice red and blue with silver lines.
She lifts her hands and touches her cheeks, feeling them cool beneath her cold fingertips. She hates that she's blushing. When he looks up at her, she tries to play it off as if she's cupping her face out of stress.
"Go to bed," she says, waving her hand dismissively. Bucky's laughter is a loud bark. "Now."
"Yes, boss," he laughs. He pulls his hands from between his legs and moves as if he's about to lie down on the couch… and tugs at the pillows, plopping them onto the floor. Wanda watches him with a furrowed brow as he pulls the sheets she'd folded so carefully and neatly from the arm of the couch and drops them onto the floor.
When he glances at her before lowering himself to the floor, she rolls her eyes. It's hardly malicious; his nervousness wants to drown her, and all she wants to do is offer him a buoy in the form of a normal and nonjudgemental reaction. He sits on the floor once more before his hands disappear to his waist and he's tugging his shirt up and over his head.
Wanda knows she should look away. She thinks to, wanting to give Bucky his privacy still, but she doesn't turn her head. She thinks he wants her to see him tug his shirt up and over this head and drop it onto the couch where he should be lying. Confidence, or perhaps it's arrogance, falls off of him in waves as his fingers hook into his jeans and he begins to tug them down his thighs and legs.
With his jeans now on the couch, he moves around to make his bed—a rough pile of the sheets beneath and over him and two pillows, stacked on top of one another for his head—before he lies back on them, an arm above his head.
He sighs a little heavily. "All right, boss. I'm ready for my story." He tilts his head to the side and smiles at her. It's definitely arrogance.
Not one to ignore a gauntlet at her feet, Wanda glares at him before she comes to sit down by his upper body. She rests on her heels before she lets them slide out from underneath her and to the side. She ignores how her fingers almost brush against his arm. He's wrapped his sheets around his waist and left his chest bare. Her gaze lingers where his skin transforms into Vibranium. Bucky doesn't seem to mind.
With her eyes lingering on his dog tags resting haphazardly on his chest, she watches as it lifts up and down—a calming sign that he's breathing. Still alive. Still here.
Bucky's gaze is warm as he waits patiently for her to become comfortable. She rests a hand against her leg and lifts her other hand up from the floor to brush her fingers against the base of her neck. His gaze follows and lingers even when she puts her hand back down to the ground.
"Once upon a time," she begins, regarding him with a tight and forced smile, purposefully feigning annoyance. "There was a very annoying American man who did not listen to the very nice and kind and hospitable Sokovian." Her chest floods with a warm fluttery sensation as Bucky grins, watching her. He rests his Vibranium hand against his stomach. "And when he refused to do as he was told, the very kind and hospitable Sokovian grabbed a pillow and put it over his face. Then she lived happily ever after."
He chuckles, incredulous. "Wow," he says, smiling toothily at her. "That's a really comforting bedtime story."
She tilts her head up, smiling haughtily. "I'm glad you agree."
"But I have a few questions," he says, drumming his Vibranium fingers against his stomach. Her gaze can't help but wander towards it, his fingers shiny and gold. "Or things I'd like to amend, really. Firstly, you mentioned twice that the Sokovian was kind and hospitable."
She hums in the affirmative, nodding. "Because she was."
"And you didn't describe this American man," he says, clearing his throat. His brows furrow as he playfully continues, "He could've been anyone—"
"He was ugly," she says, tilting her chin upward as she peers down at him pointedly. "Very ugly. Hideous to look at."
He smiles and doesn't try to correct her—that he's not ugly at all, that he hardly fits that description. Wanda kind of wishes he would; it'd leave her comments less exposed. "You incorrectly described the Sokovian," he says.
Her brow arches. "Oh?"
Biting his bottom lip, he nods. His gaze lingers on her face before it drops to her hands. "She's kind of pretty."
She tilts her head to the side, brows furrowed slightly. "Kind of?"
"Kind of," he nods. "And you forgot to mention she's a redhead, so she's naturally fiery."
"That's a horrible stereotype," she says, feeling herself smile. "I'm not really a redhead." His gaze lifts up and his brow arches. "I dyed it when we were on the run. I didn't want to be recognisable."
"So you're a brunette," he says. Something familiar floods him, like a memory he's pulling from somewhere. She nods. "Like me." She rolls her eyes. He lifts his hand to his hair and brushes his fingers through it, annoyingly mussing it up. He preens and says, "I think I wear it really nicely."
"Please sleep," she says. She rubs a hand against her upper thigh as she teases, "The pillow is very tempting."
He laughs, but she notes the strain of his mouth. When his gaze lingers this time, she can sense the fear coming off of him. Swallowing thickly, he looks down at her feet before he peers up at her once more. "You're going to stay, right?"
Without any hesitation, Wanda nods. "I'll make sure you don't have any nightmares."
Bucky lets out a breath. As quickly as it comes, he furrows his brows and looks worried. "Are you sure—"
"Yes," she says, nodding. Holding up her hand to quietly gesture he stop, she smiles reassuringly at him. "I am very sure."
Wanda watches as he gets comfortable, pulling his arm away from resting above his head. He's slow and a little cautious, the uncertainty coming off of him in waves. He's reluctant to roll onto his side, giving her his back. He tugs at the sheets to pull them a little higher, but Wanda knows they'll be wrapped around his legs later. Sokovia's a little warm tonight.
He glances over his shoulder at her, brows lifted. "Do you need any blankets? A pillow?"
"I'm fine," she says, smiling. "I'll go up to my room when you're asleep."
Once he's settled, he exhales roughly. A little too fearful for her liking. Tentatively, she lies down behind him. Wanda curls to his back gently, hesitantly resting her hand against his naked side. His skin's warm, feeling like a comforting hearth. He seems nervous.
Red blossoms beneath her fingers and kisses his skin, slowly sliding up the length of him. She watches as it brushes into his hair before her fingers follow. Lightly dragging her fingers along his side, she glides them into his hair. Resting her head in the palm of her hand and elbow against the hard floor, she brushes her fingers through his hair, wanting him to relax. Red begins to thread gently through the strands before disappearing, sinking into his skin.
She can feel the nightmares linger on the surface. This one tastes fresh, one that's metallic like blood. She can see remnants of it: the old, methodical way he used to walk; the heaviness of his arm; the way blood stained his skin and never bothered him. She pulls it away from him as he closes his eyes, his breathing a little too shallow for her liking. But it deepens shortly.
Wanda doesn't make good on her promise, remaining behind him as she keeps her fingers in his hair until she's merely brushing it with no other purpose. She remembers doing this to Pietro in Sokovia, brushing her fingers through his thick and soft hair as he promised he'd sleep peacefully and dream of all the girls in Sokovia fawning over him when he was paralysed by nightmares of rubble and a beeping Stark bomb. The tension in Bucky's shoulders remains for a few moments longer before his entire body seems to relax.
She waits until he's asleep—deep asleep, stuck somewhere hopefully painless—when she chooses to make herself comfortable.
Resting her hand against the centre of his back, she waits, wondering if another nightmare might climb the ladder of his spine to replace the one she's taken. She doesn't know how long she stays like that, her head resting in her palm as she watches the back of his head and shoulder, but she knows she must've been in the same position for a long time, the crook of her elbow aching when she conjures herself a fluffy pillow so she can rest her head. She remains curled around him, a little fearful she hasn't fully tugged his nightmares away.
She slides her hand to rest against his belly and curls up against him. She doesn't mean to fall asleep.
He dreams of nothing. All she feels is darkness—much like her own—but this one is less full. Wanda's packed her dreams with nothing but a void as a cushion, nice and thick and almost impenetrable to the nightmares and dreams that linger on her peripherals. But something uncharacteristically slips inside.
At first, she thinks it's her own dream.
Bucky sits at her kitchen table, his face red with sweat. His shirt clings to him as he watches her mill about the kitchen. She doesn't know what she's looking for—there's a strange disconnect between herself and the Wanda she can see. Her movements are a little jarred, suffering from any smooth flow.
She's in her kitchen, a glass of water in her hand, and then she's in front of Bucky, standing a little too close. She wears the deep red summer dress she'd been wearing a couple of weeks ago, the fabric a little dirtied from her kneeling in her garden. She can see the dirt kiss her knees still.
She places the water in front of him and he looks up at her, bright eyes big and warm.
"You have a bit of dirt on your nose," he says. She lifts her fingers up to brush the tip and he shakes his head, laughing. She remembers this—he'd spent minutes trying to mirror her and show her which side of her face—the left, no her left—that she had dirt on before he'd pushed his chair gently back, stood in front of her, and licked his thumb and rubbed it from the side of her nose. Butterflies had remained in her chest until he'd left to go outside.
But she doesn't see him do that. Remaining in his chair, he shakes his head. "No, not there. Sit down." His hands help her as she sits on his lap, legs on either side of him. Her feet barely touch the ground. His fingers are gentle against her face as he licks his thumb and brushes it against her dirtied cheek.
Wanda watches as she bends down—or he pushes up—and her mouth slopes against his. His hands are big against her back as they pull her towards him. She doesn't know how long she kisses him for—it feels like a century before anything else happens.
His hands slide down her dress, his Vibranium hand disappearing beneath her ass and encouraging her to lift up. He rips her panties off with a laugh that sounds like both of theirs intermingled together. She thinks she hears him murmur against her collarbones that he's always wanted to do that after seeing it in a movie, but she doesn't hear him properly. Finds it almost impossible to with how loud the quiet is save for their panting. The Wanda in his lap doesn't know how he gets his pants loose, but then his hands are on her thighs, warm and big as he licks at her neck.
Her hands grasp his hair tightly at the back of his head as she watches him lift her up—and then he's inside of her, gasping. Red magic—warm, strange feeling, not at all real—seems to surge from her and sit against her skin.
Wanda feels her own skin grow warm and clammy, feeling weight against her front that reminds her that this isn't real—she's in her own body on the floor of her living room, but she's not in her own head—and all she can hear isn't real: her speaking in Sokovian, her telling him to finally fuck her, Bucky laughing as she rocks against him.
His blue eyes are bright as he peers up at her, his Vibranium hand gentle against her face. His other hand rests against her back, gripping the fabric of her red dress. She rocks against him, her feet barely touching the ground but being able to push herself against and on him and forward nonetheless.
Her vision bursts in a bright red. She wakes up, still wrapped around Bucky, his body slightly tense but his breathing laboured and still so slow. Still sleeping, still dreaming.
Keeping her hand against his belly, she pulls the hand stuck between them to rest against the floor so she can peer over his shoulder. He's still asleep, hasn't woken up despite her pressing against his back and belly. She doesn't wake him up. Wanda lies back down, keeping her hand on his belly, her palm feeling clammy and hot. Her cheeks and chest burn.
Bucky remains quiet in front of her, making the smallest of noises—the usual noises she thinks he makes while he sleeps. His chest feels warm, his back still solid and comforting for her to curl around. His legs are wrapped with hers—sometime during her drifting off, she must've slid them between his—and she thinks he's so close to subconsciously reaching for her hand that she doesn't have the heart to pull away. Selfishly, she doesn't want to.
She's fearful that if she runs away from him, he'll be swarmed with the nightmares she's kept at bay. They tickle her mind sharply, strangely, feeling nothing like the dream she'd come out of. That had been warm and hot. She doesn't want him to lose that.
She does a quick scan of him, ignoring the way her chest and cheeks burn as she focuses solely on him. He feels warm—scorching like he's the sun himself—and feels heavy with something she doesn't understand. Relaxing against him, she keeps her gaze on the back of his head. He's still dreaming. She can't help but wonder if he's still dreaming of her, if he's still seeing her intimately and thrusting inside of her.
Butterflies burst in her ribcage and gut. Too fearful to even try and slip into his mind, Wanda instead focuses on her racing heart. She's surprised it hasn't woken him up yet. It's beating ferociously like an unwavering and persistently annoying knock.
Out of all the things she doesn't know, Wanda does know one thing: she hadn't planted that in his head.
notes.
I wanted to be a little tropey. I hope you enjoy it! 😌