Out Of The Woods P.7 | Peter Parker

Out of the Woods P.7 | Peter Parker

Part 7 | We Found Wonderland

P.1 | P.2 | P.3 | P.4 | P.5 | P.6 | P.7 | P.8

Pairing: TASM!Peter Parker x Stark!Reader

Words: ~6k

Summary: Like a fox running from a hunter, you raced against time and magic to cross the universe to find Peter. It's a shame the universe seemed to be pitted against you,

Note: So I was gonna post this on Friday, but I got too excited so here it is a day early! Let me know what you think!

Your heart was racing against your chest, the hours seeming to drag on. After what seemed like a million lifetimes, you finally touched ground in Sokovia. Then, another lifetime passed by, and you found yourself standing in Wanda’s home, Peter and Bucky scurrying around you to set things up. Peter was yelling commands that Bucky did his best to follow. But he didn’t have a clue about what was happening and was just doing his best.

Beep.

Beep.

Beep.

In your pocket, your phone began to buzz, alerting you of a new notification. You pulled it out, not really paying attention. You looked at the screen, seeing a notification from your home alarm system that someone had entered your apartment.

A frown appeared on your face as you unlocked your phone to see the footage. It took a few seconds longer to load than normal, the reception in the area not that great. But once it loaded, your heart dropped to your stomach. Standing in your room, at the desk where you’d accidentally kept your journal was Doctor Stephen fucking Strange. And after maneuvering the camera to get a better angle of his face, he did not appear very happy. After a second, he grabbed the journal, stuffed it in a pocket, and turned around, his cape billowing around him. With a wave of his hands, a golden-orange portal appeared and he stepped into it.

“Fuck,” you whispered. You looked around the room, more panic beginning to settle inside you. “Fuck fuck fuck fuck,” you repeated, getting louder with every word.

Bucky stopped what he was doing, and rushed towards you. Wanda and Peter looked at you with concern as they paused their previous actions as well.

“What what, what is it?” Bucky asked, hands on your shoulders as he lowered himself to your level.

“Strange,” you simply said.

“What about him?” Wanda asked.

You took deep breaths, attempting to ease the panicked beating of your heart.

“He was in my apartment. He found a journal I’d been keeping,” you said in between breaths.

Wanda’s face twisted into irritation, not at you, but at Strange. Though you could see hints of panic shining in her eyes. Peter on the other hand was not hiding his panic. It was written all over his face and he immediately began pacing around the room. And if you weren’t so terrified yourself, you might make a joke about him pacing a hole into the ground. But it didn’t seem appropriate at the time, nor did the joke even cross your mind.

“So what do we do?” Bucky asked, looking at Wanda, Peter too lost in his mind to be of help at the moment.

“We hurry this up before he stops us,” Wanda said.

“And what, we all cross the universe?” Bucky asked.

Peter began to shake his head, circling back to join the group.

“No, someone has to stay back and keep the portal steady and to also pull Y/N back if needed,” Peter said.

“Oh, I intend to come back, don’t worry,” you said. Bucky looked at you with a single eyebrow raised. “What, I have dinner with Pep, Morgan, and Happy,” you mutter, a defensive tinge in your voice.

Wanda gives you a look of exasperation, snapping you back to the current circumstance. “Right, wizard coming to ruin our plans.”

“There’s no point in running, he could just track us down,” you said. “So, let's just do as Wanda suggested, get this thing going, and then deal with Strange later.”

Everyone in the group nodded, getting to work while Wanda moved to go outside.

“Where are you going?” you asked.

“To put up some protection,” she said, walking out the door. Your eyes followed her figure, moving your position to get a better look. She raised her arms, a red glow emanating from them. She began to float in the air and all was quiet. Then, after a few seconds, a thundering boom echoed in the clearing. You watched as a red aura that shimmered in the light surrounded the property and what looked like giant runes glowing in the invisible walls.

“What the fuck,” you muttered. You were still in a state of awe when Wanda re-entered the property, Bucky and Peter staring at her as well. Wanda simply shrugged, beginning to busy herself with helping Peter.

“What? It’s a protection ward, it’ll buy us time when Strange arrives. But not much, now let's go.”

And just like that, everyone quickly began to work, anticipation and anxiety rising with every second that passed. It was like you were a kid again, sleeping in the dark and imagining every shape and sound to be a monster coming to devour you. Except you weren’t a kid, and there wasn’t a monster, just a royally pissed-off wizard.

Your phone buzzed again. You looked down, seeing Pepper’s name popping up on the screen. Without hesitation you answered the call, pressing the phone to your ear. But before you could utter a word, she began to speak.

“What the hell are you doing?” she asked, her voice a whisper-shout. You knew that tone, you’d heard it a million times. It was the same one she used when she was about five seconds away from losing her shit.

“What nothing, why would I do anything?” you asked, panicking, and Pepper could hear it in your voice. You could be a convincing liar sometimes, just not to her.

“Then why did a wizard just show up to my house, asking about when I’d seen you last?” she asked, the hysterics in her voice growing as well as the volume.

“I don’t know!” you exclaimed.

“He said you're trying to mess with the multiverse. He showed me your journal where you literally wrote “I’m going to open the multiverse.” I don’t fully know what that is but it sounds bad. Are you crazy!?” she exclaimed, voice no longer the whisper it was when the call first started.

“Well yes, but no. Look Pep, I’ll explain this all later, but right now I need to go--”

“No! You explain this right now!”

There was a loud bang followed by a shockwave that made your whole body vibrate. Wanda lifted one of her curtains, peering through the window.

“Strange is here,” she said.

“I don’t have time, I promise I’ll tell you all about it at dinner on Sunday,” you said.

“Don’t you dare hang up on me Y/N Stark, do you hear--”

You pressed the End Call button, tossing your phone in your pocket as you stood up.

“Peter, how we doing?” you asked. He was tinkering with a few parts, running around a few of the items you’d stolen from your dad’s old lab that Peter deemed necessary.

“Almost got it,” he said.

“Like five seconds or five minutes,” you asked, eyes darting to the front door.

“I don’t know!” he exclaimed, sounding as frazzled as you felt.

Boom.

Another shockwave followed the sound, and this time, the earth shook. Glass fell to the floor, shattering with a piercing sound. You feel to your knees, crawling to one of the walls for protection. Bucky huddled beside you, trying to shield your body from any debris that might fall. Wanda crouched to the ground, using her magic to keep herself protected.

“Peter!” you yelled.

“I'm trying!” he called back.

Boom.

The sound ricocheted off the walls, the ground shaking worse than before. Peter tried to take a step and ended up falling to the ground. He scurried to wrap his arms around the machine he was working with to keep it steady. The air was buzzing, leaving you feeling electrocuted. The hairs on your body stood up, your heart pounding against your chest.

“What is that?” you yelled, trying to hear yourself over the throbbing in your head. All you could hear was radio static.

“Strange is trying to break through my wards,” Wanda said, seemingly unphased by the whole situation.

Another shockwave rippled through the house, more glass shattering on the ground. She muttered a foreign curse word as she began to stand. “That was my favorite cup.”

“Where are you going?” you asked.

“To stall him. Now hurry,” she said. She began to walk across the room. A red light washed over her body, and no longer was Wanda dressed in the casual, comfortable clothes you’d only seen her wear.

Her red hair was wild and wavy, kept away from her face by a scarlet red crown that rested on her forehead. On either side it hugged her cheekbones, coming to a sharp point. The top came up to two points, almost resembling two small devil horns. Cozy sweaters and soft jeans were replaced with a red corset and sturdy black pants that had a stripe of red going down the front. She wore matching red boots that reached just below her knees and scarlet fingerless gloves that went up to her elbows.

You simply stared at her, mouth agape as she strutted across the room, using her magic to fling the door open.

“Let's go, kid,” Bucky said, helping you stand from the ground and pulling you back to reality. The two of you rushed to Peter, helping him stand on his two feet.

Like rabid animals, the two of you began to work. You were terrified, more so than before. Because if this failed, it could turn catastrophic. But not only that, if it didn’t work, you’d have no way to escape Strange’s wrath, and you doubted he’d be merciful.

You glanced out the window, the curtain rods long since falling from their hinges. You watched Wanda, in all her Scarlet Witch glory with a red glow surrounding her body, fly into the sky with her hands at her sides. In the distance you could see Strange, his cloak billowing in the wind.

A flash of light left his hands, crashing into the invisible barrier. The ground shook, another boom echoing, and a shockwave rippling through the house, far stronger than before. The red encasing the property had little cracks forming in it, breaking under the pressure of Strange’s magic.

Then it shattered like glass but it dissipated before reaching the ground. Strange simply walked through where the barrier used to be, almost strutting. His hands formed into two fists that he tapped together two times then held his hands with the palms facing Wanda. Golden-orange circles that were encased with moving runes formed an inch from his hands as he got himself ready for battle. You didn’t know if they exchanged words, you wouldn’t have heard them even if they did.

But you did see the blast of red energy that smacked into Strange, sending him back a few feet. He gained his footing back relatively quickly, waving his hands and sending a spell right back to Wanda. He flew into the air using his cape, flying closer to the house.

They continued like that, tossing spells back and forth at each other. It was earth-shattering, leaving the ground too unstable to safely stand straight upon. The air tasted like ozone, magic filling the air and leaving you feeling electrified. Neither side seemed to have the upper hand, dealing just as harsh blows to their opponent as they were receiving.

You and Peter ran around different machines, adjusting things as necessary. Bucky had moved to stand near the door, opting to be somewhere he would be more usual. If Wanda failed, and Strange managed to get past her, he wanted to be there to give you and Peter any extra time. He wouldn’t last long against Strange, he knew that. But he’d be damned if he didn’t try.

There was another loud boom. You spared a glance outside, seeing a massive crater in the ground where Strange and Wanda had been, but she was nowhere to be seen. You could only assume Strange finally got the upper hand.

He lowered to the ground at the halfway mark and began to almost strut across the field.

“He’s coming,” you muttered. Peter looked up, staring out the window, seeing Strange quickly closing the distance separating them. As he got closer, you could clearly see his facial expression and it was just as you expected. He was not happy.

Your hands fumbled as you and Peter continued to work. Bucky cracked his neck and knuckles, preparing himself as best as he could.

You clicked a button, and a faint buzzing sound filled the room. And then you pressed another, the buzz getting louder as a faint glow filled the room. The seconds ticked by, the buzzing getting louder and the light brighter. Waves of electric pulses filled your body and you couldn’t help the shivers that ran down your spine.

Strange approached the door, waving it open with his hands. Bucky went to block his entry, but Strange waved his hand again. Bucky’s body was pushed against the wall furthest from Strange, his magic holding him in place.

He took one step into the house and flicked his cloak behind him.

“It’s over. Turn that thing off and let's finish this,” Strange said in a stern tone. He sounded commanding and authoritative, but you didn’t care. It was only a matter of seconds before the portal opened up then you could jump through it. You just hoped he wouldn’t be too hard on Peter.

“Sorry Strange, no can do,” you said, taking a single step back. Your back pressed against the cool metal of the machine as it began to vibrate from the contact.

“Stark I’m serious, you don’t realize what you’re doing,” he said, taking two steps into the room.

You opened your mouth to speak, but the very air around you rippled and it looked just like that night two years ago, when the sky was tearing itself open. It didn’t feel as sinister as it had that night, nor were the rips as large. And just as quickly as they would rip, they would come back together and it almost looked like the air was dancing.

“Parker, turn the--” he began to yell but was quickly cut off when a blast of red energy hit him from behind. It pushed him forward, causing him to crash into the wall. The place his body made impact was marked with a human-shaped indent in the wall. Wanda walked into the house after him, fingers pulsing with red energy.

He quickly stood up, a flash of energy leaving his hands as Wanda did the same. They collided with one another, gold meeting red. It appeared to be a standstill, both magic users straining to overpower the other.

“Now, now, now!” you turned to Peter, waving wildly at him with your hands. He nodded and began to fiddle with the machine.

You were close, so close. The light was as bright as the sun, growing wide with each second. It was nearly large enough to step through.

And at that moment, everything moved in slow motion.

“Go go go!” Peter yelled.

You nodded and began to step towards the now open portal.

“No!” Strange yelled. He lowered his hands, the golden magic he was conjuring disappearing for only a split second. He threw up a quick barrier, managing to block the majority of the blast Wanda sent his way. He moved out of the way, eyes locked on you.

You took two more steps. Just one more and you would be in the portal.

Your heart raced and your head was throbbing as your body filled with anticipation. Everything you’d worked for, everything you’d been missing would be in the palm of your hands in just a few moments. All you needed to do was take one more step.

But you didn’t get the chance, a blast of white light hit your side, the force sending you flying across the room. With a scream, you landed on the wood floor, skidding across the surface. Broken shards of glass cut your skin, leaving blood on the floor.

Wanda yelled in frustration and it sounded like it had a deeper, more sinister scream echoing with it. Her eyes glowed bright red, as her crown turned into energy. She took a deep breath, shut her eyes, and waved her hands in a downward motion.

For a moment it was still. You couldn't hear anything at all. Then a shockwave ricocheted, a powerful gust of wind blowing against your form. In an instant, the room was enveloped in a red glow as your vision turned black.

You heard Peter scream, the sound quickly cut off as you fell into a deep sleep.

OoO

When you came back to consciousness, the first thing you heard were cars honking. Then the sound of people shouting. You stirred, and it felt like you were lying on concrete. After a moment you opened your eyes, to find yourself lying on the floor, in the middle of Times Square in New York City.

Your head was throbbing, mouth as dry as the Sahara. Your eyes scanned the building, hoping for something that would indicate if you were in your universe or another. Shining wide eyes landed on Stark Towers and the small hope that had built inside of you quickly died.

It didn’t work. Well, it probably would’ve, if Strange didn’t intervene.

You looked at the ground around you, trying to spot any familiar faces. You saw Wanda and Bucky, passed out on the ground. Surprisingly, none of them looked as bad as you. Apparently, broken glassware packs quite the punch.

You turned around, coming face to face with Doctor Stephen Strange. You stumbled backward, startled by his sudden presence. His arms were crossed over his chest, a scowl resting on his mouth with eyes like ice.

“Hey there Strange,” you said, a weak grin on your face. You took another step back, desperate to create as much distance between you and the angry wizard.

He didn’t say anything. You took another step back, the heel of your foot hitting Bucky's sleeping form. This caused him to groan as he stirred from his sleep.

“What are you up to?” you asked. His scowl deepened as his eyes narrowed into an even sharper glare.

“What you tried to pull was stupid. Actually, it was beyond stupid. It was so stupid there’s not even a word in the English language that could describe what you did,” he said, voice low and dangerous.

“Have you tried German? It has a reputation of being very angry,” you said.

Bucky groaned again, one of his hands wiping his eyes. They opened slowly, but he quickly rid himself of any remaining lethargy when he saw the position you were in. He stood, faster than he should’ve, trying to put himself between you and Strange, but he couldn’t quite get up all the way.

“No, I haven’t. And don’t try to make light of the situation. You just nearly ripped open the multiverse. Do you know how bad that could’ve been?” he asked.

You opened your mouth to respond, but he cut you off.

“Don’t actually answer that, it was rhetorical.”

You promptly shut your mouth.

“I mean of all of the things to do, this is what you decide to achieve,” Strange said, mumbling more to himself than speaking to you. As he began to pace, Wanda woke up as well, moving into a sitting position as she tried to make sense of her surroundings.

Bucky stood up, walking over to Wanda to help her up, but kept a close eye on Strange, just in case things went sour.

“You just better be glad we’re still in our world. Who knows what could’ve happened,” Strange said, standing still.

“Oh, will you just shut it? Everything was going just fine until you ruined it,” you said, rolling your eyes. The frustration and aggravation began to get stronger the longer he talked. Everything you had worked so hard for, he came by and just messed it up in an instant.

“This is my fault?” he said, fury burning in his eyes.

“Yes! None of this would’ve happened if you had just minded your business,” you yelled, tears of frustration beginning to well up in your eyes.

You’d worked so hard for fucking nothing.

“I wasn’t the one trying to tear open the Multiverse!” he yelled back. You scoffed, rolling your eyes before meeting Strange’s sharp gaze.

“So what, you can cast world-altering spells that go wrong and fuck up the multiverse in the first place for a 17-year-old boy who didn’t get into college, but I can’t travel universes?” you asked.

“Yes, because unlike you, I understand what I’m doing,” he said.

“And I don’t?” you argued. You were slowly losing it. Your voice was wavering and your vision blurry. It was overwhelming, everything was happening all at once and it was too much.

“No! Do you not understand the gravity of what you almost pulled? And for what, a boy you knew for two days?” he said, an incredulous look in his eyes. It only further infuriated you.

“It was two and a half days, actually,” you said.

You swore you could see a vein burst on Strange’s forehead.

“Strange, leave it,” Wanda spoke up, slowly standing from the ground.

“I don’t want to hear it from you Maximoff, you have no room to talk after Westview,” he snapped, not bothering to remove his eyes from you. He began to walk towards you, closing the gap that separated you, pointing his finger at you like a child that needed scolding.

“You could’ve destroyed the fabric of reality, all for a boy you barely know. You nearly caused universal catastrophe for a man who probably doesn’t even remember your name. Do you not realize how stupid that is?” he said.

You opened your mouth to speak, but he cut you off.

“No, I don’t want to hear it, because no one else will tell you how absolutely insane you seem. He probably doesn’t remember you, he’s probably already moved on. Because that’s what a normal person would do. It was two days Stark, I don’t care how lost or lonely you felt because tearing open the multiverse is not the answer,” he said.

You grit your teeth blinking away any tears that tried to fall. It was like he plunged a dagger into your chest, digging it deeper and deeper every time he spoke. Like he’d reached into your mind and pulled out your darkest fears. Every time you’d lay awake at night, staring at your ceiling, terrified you’d find Peter, only to see he moved on. Stephen Strange brought it all to the surface with every word said.

“Guess I’m just a Leo like that,” you whispered, your lips tugging into a smirk that didn’t match your bloodshot eyes.

Strange shook his head, letting out a sigh as he clenched his jaw.

“If your dad was here right now, he’d be so disappointed. Disappointed that he died to give you a better life only for you to throw it all away,” he said.

Bucky stood up, pushing you behind him. You couldn’t move, couldn’t breathe at the mention of your dad. The lights were on, but no one was home. That was a low blow, a wound that never healed, and he knew it. Yet he continued to poke and prod at it, holding it over your head.

“Too far, Strange,” he said, leveling the wizard with a steely glare.

“No, I’m just the one fixing all of your mistakes. I don’t want to catch wind of any more attempts to open the multiverse, you hear me Stark,” he said, turning his gaze to you. But you were still lost in your head.

With a wave of his hands he disappeared, leaving you there with Bucky and Wanda. After a moment of silence, you looked at Bucky and Wanda and opened your mouth.

“Where’s Peter?”

OoO

It was early morning. The sun was still slowly rising above the horizon and the birds chirped as they welcomed a new day. You were never up this early unless you’d simply never gone to sleep that day. But today you were awake, the clock in the kitchen reading 7:00 AM.

You should be in bed, dreaming about things only possible in your subconscious, but you weren’t. You were sitting on your couch, absentmindedly watching a cartoon on the TV as your mind wandered a million miles away.

You'd been close, so close to getting the only thing you’d wanted. But that had to get taken from you too. And while you didn’t want to admit it, Strange was right. You were just too stubborn to accept it until now. It'd been three days since the events that transpired, and it still left you reeling. It’d also been three days since any of you saw Peter. Wanda had gone back home to Sokovia, promising to keep an eye out for him. Bucky still hung around, keeping you from being driven mad by the stifling silence.

Your front door opened then shut, a new set of footsteps entering your home. They were heavy, too bulky to belong to anyone other than Bucky. You looked up at him, seeing bags under his eyes that were heavier than normal. He had a five o’clock shadow and mussed hair.

He looked like a mess.

“Good morning,” you said.

He didn’t respond. His gaze leveled on you, a scowl on his lips.

“You want something to eat?” you asked.

Again, no response.

With a sigh, you stood from the couch, walking to your kitchen. Hand wrapped around your favorite mug, you filled it with black coffee. A single brow raised and pursed your lips as you looked at Bucky. You slid the mug to him.

“Coffee?” you asked.

He didn’t touch it. Instead, he continued to stare at you, his bright blue eyes piercing your soul. It would’ve made you uncomfortable if you weren’t so used to it by now.

“Why?” he asked.

“Well it's 7 in the morning, coffee always--”

“Not the coffee, Stark. Why are you just giving up?” he asked, hand forming a fist that he hit against your countertop.

Your jaw clenched.

“I’m not. I wanted to solve Multiversal travel, and I did,” you said, grabbing a hold of a random dish towel, wiping away invisible dust on your counter.

“But you’re forgetting about your end goal: to get back to Peter,” he said.

You shrugged your shoulders, not meeting his gaze.

“People change their minds.”

“People change their minds, but not you Stark. You’re the only person more stubborn than your father was,” he said, eyebrows raised. “So what’s with the change of heart?”

“There hasn’t been a change of heart,” you said.

“Really? Because that’s not what I’m seeing,” Bucky said, rolling his eyes.

“Oh come off it Barnes. This was stupid from the get go,” you said, finally looking up and meeting his eyes. Despite your best efforts to make your tone hard and unfeeling, there was a break in your voice towards the end. You sounded like a small child stuck in a world too large for them.

He could read every thought in your mind, seeing every one of your tells. He’d spent a year with you, seen every angle of you there was to see. Took note of your thoughts, the way you acted under duress, and how you were the first one in the room to shut down whenever met with emotional turmoil. You couldn’t hide anything from him even if you wanted to.

“Maybe it was, but that didn’t stop you for a year straight, so what changed?” he asked, and you knew from the steel in his eyes he wasn’t planning on dropping the subject anytime soon.

“I’m telling you nothing changed!” you said, voice raising about two octaves.

“And I’m calling bullshit!” he yelled back, matching the ferocity in your words. “Why are you giving up when we were so close?”

“Because!” you yelled, your voice cracking. “I don’t want to do this. I don’t want to be 30 something still stuck on a guy I knew for two days Buck, I just can’t,” you said. Your voice wasn’t angry, it was sad, the claws of fear stuck in you so tightly.

“Then don’t be. We figured out how to get to him didn't we?” Bucky asked, taking a softer approach with his tone. You shook your head, refusing to look him in the eye.

“You just don’t get it,” you said.

“Then explain it,” Bucky responded.

You sighed, shoulders slumping.

“It took me a year to figure out the secret to traveling through the multiverse, Buck, a year. He’s had two years. If he wanted me, he would be here by now. I just have to face the facts, Buck. Peter’s not coming because he doesn’t want to. He’s probably met someone else or just forgot all about me,” you said.

Bucky was at a loss for words. Your take was pessimistic, a shade of gray so different from the normal vivid hues you’d paint the world in. While you had a point, it was a logical assumption. But he was stubborn.

“He didn’t have Wanda,” Bucky said.

You chuckled, the sound low and hoarse.

“But it wasn’t her that cracked the code. It’s not a lack of ability, it’s a lack of wanting.”

He paused, taking a second to gather his words before he spoke again.

“This is about what Strange said,” Bucky said. “Y/N he was out of line with that.”

“You know, it’s like you aren’t even hearing what I’m saying,” you said, a laugh that lacked the usual warmth and humor it usually held.

“And it’s not like you to be this pathetic, but here we are,” he said. He was goading you, trying to knock down the ice wall you've encased yourself in.

“What’s pathetic was trying to break the universe for a guy I barely knew. This is just being realistic,” you said. “It was just a waste of time and a way to distract myself, that’s it,” you said.

“Distract yourself from what?” he asked. You laughed, a look of disbelief crossing your face.

“Everything that’s been happening! I mean first half the universe gets dusted, then, when I’m still trying to pick up the pieces from that, the remaining Avengers crack a plan to get it back to normal. Okay great, except Natasha’s dead, and before I can process that, my dad's dead too. Great. Then Steve goes back to the past, and everything seems normal but it’s so different. I just-- I was still reeling from everything when I met Peter. This whole multiverse thing was a distraction, simple as that.”

Bucky didn’t speak as he fully absorbed your small speech. You swallowed thickly, your mouth suddenly dry.

“It was stupid. You and I both know that,” you said.

“But you can’t give up,” Bucky said.

“Oh why do you care so much?” you exclaimed, the scowl returning to your face. “Is this some sort of guilt thing?”

“What?” Bucky asked, face contorting into confusion.

“This some kind of way to make yourself feel better for what you did. Well, congratulations Barnes, consider my name crossed out on your list of people you made amends with,” you said, sighing in frustration and rolling your eyes.

“Don’t do that,” Bucky said, creases forming on his forehead.

“Do what?” you asked.

“Try and shut me out. Because it’s not gonna work you punk!” Bucky exclaimed.

“It’s not gonna work because I’m not doing anything! Why can’t you just let this go!?” you yelled back.

“Because you’re lying!”

“Bullshit! This has nothing to do with me Barnes, and you know it. This is all about you needing to feel better about yourself. Because if you put all your attention on something else, you won’t have to focus on just how fucking hollow you are. You won’t have to actually deal with your issues and can just skip off into the sunset thinking that because you helped some random girl find her boyfriend you can’t be accountable for all the shit you did,” you were seething with anger that hid the hysterics in your eyes.

You didn’t have time to think about your words, not until it was too late. Bucky recoiled, stepping back, a neutral mask covering his shock riddle face. But he stood his ground.

"Just because you killed my grandparents doesn't mean you have to follow me like a lost puppy."

It was the final nail in the coffin. You could see the exact second Bucky began to shut down and it was devastating.

The room suddenly felt so much smaller, your heart beating against your chest.

“If that’s the way you feel, I’ll just go then,” he said, voice hardly above a whisper.

“Buck I--”

But it was too late. Just as quickly as he came, Bucky left your apartment. The door nearly fell off its hinges from how much force he shut it with.

And once again, you found yourself left alone, tears streaming down your face. On the kitchen floor, you fell apart, unable to hold it in any longer. The past seven years hit you like a train, unraveling the pieces you meticulously put back together.

OoO

The walls were cooling against your warm back. So many things had changed, yet you’d found yourself right back in the exact same position from a year ago. Only this time you weren’t trying to make sense of memory gaps and unknown melancholy. There were no journals and loose papers sprawled all around you.

The floor around you was empty, sans the cup of hot coffee that sat untouched next to you. You stared at the wall across from you, not a single thought in your mind. You weren’t trying to rationalize your feelings or gaslight yourself into feeling nothing. You simply sunk into them, hoping that if you embraced the loneliness, it would dissipate. That’s what all the therapists said, the only way to push through emotions is to feel them.

You just weren’t sure if this pain would ever go away.

And unlike last year, you didn’t do anything and everything to avoid silence. Instead, you basked in it, welcoming it as if it were an old friend. Because every song you heard always led back to Peter. His smile, his laugh, the way his eyes crinkled like moons, and the way he animatedly spoke with his whole body. You didn’t want to remember it all. What would be the point?

There was a universe separating the two of you, the knowledge that he’d probably moved on eating away at you.

There you were sitting in your high rise apartment, unable to move past someone you knew for two days. You had everything you could ever want at the touch of your fingertips. But you didn’t want anything other than him. But you had to face the truth. And the truth was he didn’t care, his thoughts didn’t linger on you, he didn’t work day in and day out just to see your smile again.

That was all you. And you’d deluded yourself into thinking he was doing the same.

That hurtful revelation didn't magically fix you though, you were frozen in time; right where he’d left you. You were still twenty-three, stuck inside a fantasy about how things were supposed to be. Because time was meaningless if you never left. You were 25 now, you'd be 26 next year, but you'd never actually move, cursed to never escape the haven you made in your daydreams.

Tap.

Tap.

Tap.

The sound echoed in the quiet apartment. You leaned your head back, not wanting to move from your spot. Maybe if you ignored them, they’d go away. That was proven false exactly five seconds later when the mystery visitor rapped the door again.

With a loud groan, you stood from the ground, careful to not knock over your coffee. Lethargically you walked towards the door that at the moment seemed miles away.

Tap.

Tap.

You cut off the knocks, swinging the front door open, expecting Barnes or perhaps a neighbor there to chat your ear off about one thing or another. And you hoped it was Barnes. You didn't mean what you'd said, and you wanted to tell him as much. Though you doubted he would ignore all your calls and texts just to show up unannounced.

But that wasn’t what you were met with at all.

The monsters clouding your vision were just trees, the sun burning away any lingering demons. Because there he was. Dingy light shined behind him like some sort of ethereal creation. A halo of white marked him angelic and his brown eyes were bright. Your heart raced, the palms of your hands shaking. It didn’t seem real, it couldn’t be, and you pinched yourself to check. Faint pain pulsed in your hand, confirming that you weren’t dreaming.

He was looking at you. His face was outlined with elation, and he was oh so warm and welcoming. The lines were filled in with pure awe and ecstasy. Like he’d been waiting a thousand years for this moment. In his hands was a bouquet of flowers, a mixture of daisies, lilies, and baby breath. They were slightly damaged, but to you, they were the most beautiful flowers in the universe.

Butterflies fluttered through your stomach, shivers running up your spine. You weren’t the only one who felt it, it seemed he did too.

Otherwise why else would he be here, standing at your apartment door, looking like the sun in the midst of a storm?

“Peter?”

OoO

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Reading “The Princess Bride” for the first time! Excited to explore this story in more depth and see the differences from the film.

I feel very attacked right now

this feels targeted

#Your Friendly Neighbourhood Therapist

Thank goodness it's not just me. Sometimes I just need some wholesome fluffy Steve Rogers lovin'.

It feels like every other Steve fic these days is a dark!steve fic :/ like I don’t mind one from time to time but not right now lmao

Can I get some fluffy Steve fics ?? Maybe some good ole love confession recs :D

Surprisingly accurate