This Is The Softest Thing - Tumblr Posts
this is absolutely gorgeous
I just finished dbh a few days ago. I love these two! 💙
collecting time, collecting sun…
🪐 — james barnes ;
inevitably, she becomes the most delightful interlude, seems to beckon summer through the clouds and set a comforting warmth in hollowed out bones. in so short a time, she has taken his ribs and split them open, set up a home for herself inside of his emptiness, and demanded that she stay, that he knit up cartilage around her until the space is accommodating. he finds he doesn’t mind the intrusion, that there’s a strange comfort in the way her voice lilts through phrases, the way she fills silence with a musicality that he hasn’t found before. she’s singular in the way she clouds his senses, forces air into his limbs until he finds he’s breathing easier, that for all the time he was with her, he didn’t feel the same leaden sense of shame piling in the pit of his stomach. somehow, she pulls smiles from his lips like she’s owed them, slips fingers into his chest and ensures his heart resumes beating. and he finds himself hooked, not willing to risk a moment of their friendship for fear it might end.
her hand in his is a reprieve from his thoughts, a warmth that spreads out through his bones and leaves him baffled. he watches as @musecraft traces across his fingers, mapping out the lines as if they were not blood - soaked only days before. she doesn’t know the horrors, and perhaps he should tell her the truth of it, give her a chance to run screaming from the monster he’s become, but he cannot bring the words to form. it’s selfish to want her there, to play the ruse for the warmth of her body by his side; admittedly, it’s not the worst thing he’s done. so he smiles and allows her the moment, resists the new urge that builds to house her hand in his and doesn’t allow himself to stick on why it builds. he cannot ruin a good thing by hoping, cannot make a memory from the feeling that shakes through him at the contact. friendship is more light than he ever could have imagined. ❛ careful, or i’ll think you’re studying me for your next drawing. ❜
IF SHE EVER TOOK PAUSE TO CONSIDER IT, she would likely regard that day that she sat down to sketch beside the handsome stranger at her favorite park bench a pivotal moment in her life. how quickly after that james had become one of her most treasured companions; how faithfully he seemed to keep returning to her regardless of how many times his mysterious military work called him away. & in spite of the short duration of their friendship, birdie already found herself missing him when he was gone, his absence in her home & at her side something she had already grown to find rather unpleasant. which is why upon his return, birdie finds herself scooting close to him, tucking under his arm ( the one of flesh & bone ) as though it is shelter from rain, protection from cold. but even that level of closeness does not entirely shake the sense of loneliness that has come to set in when he is away, & so she tenderly reaches out to take his hand into her own.
gently, birdie let her graceful fingers trace over the curvature of his larger ones, the pad of her thumb smoothing a crease of his knuckle before carefully flipping his hand over, so it’s opening upward instead, & presses her palm to his. their hands could not be more different — hers slender & small with paint flecks stuck under her nails, his strong & wide & well trained to hold a weapon. but while she knows he is capable of violence, birdie also knows james to be capable so much more than war. the moment itself is proof, his touch always gentle ( at least where she is concerned ). their fingers almost entwine, but birdie slips hars back at the last moment, tracing the lines that crisscross his palm to commit them to her memory.
his words shake her from her focus, however, & she glances up at him with a sparkle in her eyes, leaning just a degree closer as she speaks. ❝ well, maybe i am, ❞ she replies, an eyebrow arching inquisitively. ❝ would that be ok with you ? ❞