Archive of Our Own

Chapter Text

You had been working at Funhaus for a little over 3 months now and had decided to invite your coworkers over for a “Thank You” dinner of sorts. You had gotten along great with Elyse and the guys and really appreciated the opportunity they had given you to help them with more live action videos. You had been starting to worry that your theatre studies degree was going to go to waste after college. James and Elyse had been kind enough to let you stay with them when you first moved to L.A. Even after you moved into your own apartment you would spend many nights over at the Willems’ after work; helping them cook dinner and feed and walk Benson. Those nights would usually end in a few levels of Mario Maker and some slightly drunk conversations. It was one of those nights a few weeks ago that led to a common topic that would come up in your drunken ramblings.

“Why don’t you just invite Bruce over to your place for dinner, (Y/N)?” Elyse asked after you had told another story of a funny conversation the two of you had had a couple of days ago. Her eyes were focused on the screen as she awkwardly hit the buttons on the controller in her hands. “Damn eht!” she slurred as she jerked the controller down quickly in frustration before nudging James in the arm with it, drawing his attention away from playing with Benson’s ears. “If you think you like him, it won’t kill you to try and woo him with a homemade meal. Right, James?”

“Especially with your cooking,” James mumbled as he started the level over from the beginning. “I could be biased since you make some of the best southern food I’ve ever had, but it’s Bruce,” he huffed with a bemused smirk on his face as he finished the level and nonchalantly threw the controller on the couch next to him.

You leaned against the front of the couch as you folded your legs underneath you, your fingers running through the soft carpet.

“See, that sounds like a really good idea, Elyse, but I would make the biggest idiot of myself. Plus, knowing me I’d get so nervous I would burn the food and cry my way through the rest of the night.” You reached behind you and grabbed the controller trying your hand at the next level in the playlist, hearing James return to showering Benson with belly rubs and ear scratches.

“... Invite everybody!” Elyse stuttered as her eyes grew wide with excitement. “Just invite us and the rest of the guys over, or you could have it here, and just say you wanted to hang out with everybody outside of work or something! Oh god I’m a genius. Good jahb, ‘lyse…” she trailed off as she high-fived herself.

                                             ----------------

So that’s what ended up happening. You invited everyone over to thank them for being so welcoming and to have an excuse to cook a big meal, but only the three of you knew that you were just trying to charm your way into Bruce’s heart. James had tried to tell you numerous times that Bruce would love to go on a date with you if you just asked him, but you never believed him. You could only feel your fear of rejection creeping up your spine.

You had spent the night before making the chicken and dumplings, remembering your grandmother telling you that they always tasted better if you let them sit in the fridge overnight. You had gone into work this morning pretty tired due to the short amount of time you had after leaving work the night before to start prepping everything to make sure everything was perfect. But you had prepared yourself for it and decided to bring your lunch that day and snack on it throughout the workday, using your lunch break to take a nap at your desk.

Everyone had told you that they were looking forward to tonight and you were genuinely really happy to have everyone over. As much as this was more about having some time outside of work with Bruce, you were a lot happier than nervous to take the time to do something special for your friends/co-workers. Matt had stopped by your desk to talk to you about a video that you had directed that he was editing when he had brought up his interest in the dinner.

“So what exactly are we having tonight?” he asked with a curious smile on his face. You had only told everyone that you would fix them a home cooked southern meal and both Matt and James had been curious as to what that meal was exactly.

“I’m not telling you, Matt. It’s a surprise for everyone else just as much as it is for you,” you laughed.

Adam had apparently wandered over when he overheard your conversation. “Elyse and James probably know already,” he chimed in.

“No, we don’t,” Elyse pouted. “And I’m a little upset about it.”

“She’s taking it real serious,” James added. “But as curious as I am, I know it’s going to be reeeaaalll fucking good so I’m not stressing over it.”

“I’m always real jealous when you two bring in leftovers for lunch after you have (Y/N) over for dinner. It always smells really good,” Bruce added.

You tried not to blush at the compliment, immediately hoping you hadn’t managed to fuck up anything.

“Just calm down guys,” you smiled. “It’s just going to be a regular dinner. I am happy that I finally got to make one of my bigger recipes though. I can’t really make two pots full of food just for myself on a regular basis.”

Everyone chuckled and went back to their work. As Bruce walked past you, you decided to catch up with him to try and build up your courage of talking to him. You opened the door to the breakroom a moment after Bruce and walked over to the coffee pot before saying anything.

“Oh, hey Bruce?” you asked, trying to seem somewhat normal. You turned around to see him closing the fridge while responding with a “yeah?”

“I was wondering if you could possibly come over a bit earlier to help me with some stuff? I’ve got most of the food ready, but I have to set everything up as well as finish a couple of things. I would ask Elyse and James but they help me out so much already that I thought I’d let them just relax tonight.”

“Yeah! Of course,” he smiled. “You know, I’m really excited about tonight. Not just because of the food like everyone else seems to be,” he snorted as he popped the top on the redbull in his hand. “But we don’t get to do stuff like this often. Just all of us hanging out together. I’m actually surprised you got Adam to come since he’s been in Austin so much lately.”

“I am too,” you laughed after finally pouring yourself a cup of coffee. “I’m really glad I get to do something for all of you guys. You’ve all been so kind and helpful, and I’m glad I can kind of give that back to all of you.” You blushed a little at the end of your sentence, hearing how utterly cheesy you sounded. “I don’t know, my mom always tells me that the thing I want most is to care for everyone, so maybe it’s just my inner mom seeing your daily trips to chipotle and freaking out.”

He laughed with you as he leaned against the counter. “You pretty much are like the office mother. I’m pretty sure last week Lawrence skinned his knee and you pulled an entire first aid kit out of your purse and gave him a CapriSun and lollipop after you bandaged him up and kissed his boo-boo.”

“Well sorry for caring,” you both laughed. You grabbed your mug in both hands before starting to walk back to your desk but were stopped by Bruce touching your shoulder. His hand feeling strong against you even though his touch was gentle. Your mind started racing as you imagined his hand sliding it's way from your shoulder to the back of your neck, tangling his fingers into your hair as he turns you to him and forces his lips against yours. You moved your gaze from your mug as you turned towards him, eyes resting on his hand before moving to his face.

“Oh, is it okay if I just head over with you to your place after work? In case you need help with anything else.” His words were so casual compared to the scenario you were trying to force to the back of your mind.

“Yeah, that’d be great! I’d really appreciate that,” you smiled and nod before exiting the room and walking back to your desk with the biggest smile on your face and a warm feeling pooling in the pit of your stomach.

The day had seemed to drag on longer than usual. You had caught yourself looking at the clock every ten minutes, your leg bouncing faster than it usually did. Now that Bruce would be following you home after work and the two of you would be alone together for a few hours, you were much more nervous. Extremely giddy, but also very nervous. You closed your computer down after triple saving everything you had been working on that day. You started packing up your water bottle into your purse and tidied up your desk to give your fidgeting hands something to do. Lawrence and Matt had already headed out, waving and smiling a “see you later” before they left. You could see James standing by Elyse’s desk as she packed up for the day. She looked up at you and smiled when you made eye contact, but she was quickly cut off as she looked behind you and then gave you a quick wink.

“Hey, you ready to head out?” Bruce asked as he leaned against the side of your desk.

“Uh,” you stammered out. Real smooth (Y/N). “Yeah. How about you?”

“Yup,” he smiled with a quick nod.

You and Bruce talked about some of the upcoming skits that you had been working on recently as you walked out to your cars. Even for being your boss, Bruce always showed a lot of interest in your work. Of course he would work with you a lot with creating new ideas and working on them, but he would always ask about the work that you had done before you worked there. What shows you were in in college, what production aspects you worked on and so on and so forth.

As you arrived at your car, Bruce turned around to lean against the side of it.

“So, I hope you know I’m not that good at cooking so if you need any help with the food, I might ruin it,” he laughed.

“Trust me, all of the hard stuff is done.” He chuckled with you as you unlocked your door and tossed your purse into the passenger seat.

“I’ll see you in a bit,” Bruce smiled as you climbed behind the wheel. He gently closed the door behind you before hurrying over to his car. You let out a huge sigh as you tried to calm yourself before starting your car.

You backed out of your parking spot and then headed for the exit before you stopped to wait for Bruce. You rolled your window down before leaning out the window to yell back, “Try not to get lost” as you pulled out onto the road.

To try and calm yourself more you decided to plug your phone in and listen to some 90’s boyband music. You pulled up your Backstreet Boys albums and turned it up just loud enough to not be able to hear yourself worry. By the time you made it to your apartment complex’s parking garage, you had made it into the older songs of your Best Of BSB CD.

“ You’re the one for me, you’re my ecstasy, you’re the one I neeeeed… ” You hadn’t realized that you had been singing along so enthusiastically until after you had parked, picked up your phone to check your messages, and heard Bruce approach your window laughing as you had started dancing and singing along to the chorus. “ Get down, get down, and move it all around, get down, get down, and move it all arou-ound | Oh baby you’re so fine, I’m going to make you mine, your lips they taste so sweee- ”

“Ha-HA!”

“Jesus fucking christ!” you shouted as you dropped your phone and clutched your chest.

“What on earth are you listening to?” he tried to ask through his laughter. His eyes squinting from his huge toothy grin.

“It’s the Backstreet Boys, now shut up and move so I can get out,” you huffed with a blush creeping up your face. You picked your phone up off the floor and grabbed your purse. Bruce had moved to stand by the trunk of your car as he kept chuckling to himself. After you closed  your door and locked it you looked over to see Bruce finally calming his laughter and looking over to you with an amused smile on his face.You couldn’t help but smile back at him and laugh at yourself now that your heart had settled down.

“So do you listen to cheesy 90’s boy bands often?” he teased as you both headed for the elevator.

“I will admit that they are cheesy, but they have some pretty incredible harmonies. And I do usually listen to them on my way home from work. It calms me down,” you shrugged as the doors opened. You pressed your floor button as Bruce entered behind you and you could feel the heat of the two of you radiating through the small space as the doors closed.

After a brief moment of silence, Bruce leaned back against the railing of the elevator. “So what exactly do you have left to get done?”

“Well, I have all of the chicken and dumplings and the potato salad made, so I need to make the dressing and put the chicken and dumplings on to heat up. Oh, and I need to make some more sweet tea!”

“Dressing? Are we having turkey too?”

“No, it just goes really well with the chicken and dumplings. I’m pretty sure you’ll love it,” you promised as the doors opened and you headed down the hall to your apartment. As you opened the door you could still faintly smell chicken from your long night of cooking. You walked in and set your purse down on the table next to the door before turning around to see Bruce closing the door behind you.

You turned towards the kitchen so he wouldn't be able to see the blush on your cheeks as you imagined him closing the door and locking it as he stared in your eyes and closed the distance between you. “Uhm…” you cleared your throat. “There's beer in the fridge if you want one. I just need to go grab my apron out of the dryer really quick.” You quickly headed towards the hallway, not wanting to waste too much time away from the man standing in the kitchen.

“Do you want me to grab you one too?” Bruce offered as he opened the fridge.

“No thanks,” you called over your shoulder as you closed the dryer. You shook the apron out before holding it up to your body and tying the strings around your neck. You headed back to the kitchen as you finished tying the strings around your waist.

“So what are we starting with?” Bruce asked as he subtly eyed you up and down as you looked down on the floor, focusing on the bow you were tying behind your back.

“You first job is taste testing.”

“Sweet! I can do that” he chuckled after taking a swig from his beer and setting it on the table beside him.

You opened the fridge and pulled out the first large pot of chicken and dumplings and heaved it onto one of the back stove eyes.

“Jesus! Do you think you made enough?” he laughed as you pulled out the second pot and tried not to drop it as you sat it on the eye next to it.

“Maybe. And if it's too much someone is bound to take some home.” You pulled out a large blue bowl with Saran Wrap covering the top and set it on the counter. “So this is the chicken and dumplings,” you explained as you gestured to the large pots. “It's just shredded chicken, cream of chicken soup, and chicken broth for the base. The dumplings are chicken broth, shortening, flour, and butter. You mix it into a dough and cut it into squares, then dump it in while the rest of it’s boiling and it cooks the dough. It's probably the easiest, most delicious thing my grandmother ever made.”

“... That actually sounds really good,” he smiled.

“Are you okay with tasting them cold? I’ve got to heat them up, but if I need to add something I want it to have enough time to mix in well with everything.”

“Of course, food is food” he joked.

You grabbed a fork from a drawer next to the sink then turned back to the stove, struggling with the lid as you opened it, and fished out a good sized bite with everything in it. You started to hand it to him as he leaned forward with his mouth open. A single strand of chicken fell from the fork and managed to land on his chin. He chuckled and quickly picked it up and placed it in his mouth, licking the liquid off of his thumb.

“Real smooth,” he laughed around his bite of food. “... This is really good,” he mumbled after swallowing his bite.

“I told you you’d like it,” you giggled as you sat they fork down and reached to turn the stove eye on. “Now the potato salad.”

You took the lid off the other pot and turned both of the eyes on. Bruce moved to your other side and uncovered the large blue bowl, quickly using his fork to take a large bite.

“Damn!” he groaned. “That’s the best potato salad I’ve ever had,” he stated with his eyes widened in disbelief.

“I’m really glad you like the food so far. I was kind of worried it would be too different for most of you guys.”

“This is actually heaven,” he smiled as he took another bite.

“Yeah, that’s enough for now.” You sealed the Saran Wrap around the bowl and sat it back in the fridge. “Can you stir stuff? I’m pretty sure you can’t ruin something just from stirring it.”

“You’d be surprised, (Y/N).” That damn smile of his spread across his face again.

“For right now, just keep an eye on the dumplings. Sometimes they bubble over and they can get scorched on the bottom very easily.”

“I think I can do that…” he joked.

“I believe in you.”

After about twenty minutes of small talk passed without any food being ruined, Bruce asked you a somewhat personal question.

“So how are you so good with all of this domestic stuff?” He had just finished his beer off as he stirred the pot of food with a wooden spoon that you had handed him. “Erm… not to say that just because you’re a girl and you can cook makes you domestic or anything bu-”

“I know what you mean,” you laughed, stopping him from thinking he had stuck his foot in his mouth. “I just really like cooking and my grandmother and my mom taught me how to cook really amazing food really well.”

“It’s not just that though. Your apartment is pretty much spotless, you’re actually wearing a fucking apron to cook in,” he laughed. “And you pretty much take care of everyone without even trying. That stuff isn’t that easy to do. I mean I clean my house like once a week, but it still looks and smells like shit. And I mean,” he started as he sat his spoon down on the stove and turned to look at you while you worked on the stuffing at the counter behind him. “You work your ass off at work. Every week you have like 3 different skits pretty much completely outlined to talk to me about, and I’m pretty sure you actually hand made a Halo energy sword we needed last month. It just seems like you can do everything…” he trailed off at the end.

“Seems like you had that question pent up for a while,” you laughed. “But I don’t know. I just love to work and I love my job.” You wiped your hands off on the bottom of your apron and turned around to face him. “And I umm… I did make that sword. I was really good at set building and prop making in my college theatre department. I actually learned how to weld a little too. But I just used this hard plastic I had found online and cut it out and painted it to look like the energy sword.”

“You hand painted that?!” his mouth hanging open a bit in shock.

“Yeah. My minor is in Visual Art, remember?” You smiled at him and tried night to blush too much. “Hopefully you actually looked at my resume when you hired me.”

“I did, I guess I just forgot.” He looked down sheepishly before shaking his head. “Jesus, you really can do everything.” His face didn’t seem surprised but his voice sounded shocked.

“I actually can’t,” you corrected him. “I’m really not good at talking to people.”

“You don’t seem to have a problem talking to anyone at the office, especially Elyse and James.”

“I’m really not good at talking to most people. And Elyse is obviously a Muppet, so she doesn’t count.” Bruce turned around to stir the pots again as the oven beeped letting you know it had finished preheating. You grabbed the pan of stuffing you had finished a few minutes earlier. “I’m not that good at talking to you, for example.” You weren’t completely sure Bruce had heard you as you realized the words had come out as more of a mumble than you had hoped they would.

He moved out of your way as you moved to open the oven and place the stuffing inside. You set the timer on the stove and could feel his eyes looking at you. “What do you mean ‘you’re not good’ at talking to me?” he chuckled.

“I uh-” you swallowed hard before you continued. “I don’t know. I get really nervous when I talk to you for some reason.”

“You don’t seem nervous when we’re at work.”

“That’s because I’m working and I know exactly what I’m doing and talking about when it comes to my job.”

“Is it because I’m your boss?” he pried as you wiped your hands on your apron again before undoing the knots behind your neck and waist and throwing it over your chair.

You really started to regret bringing this up. “I don’t think so,” you sighed as you flipped the switch to turn on the ceiling fan in your kitchen since it was starting to get hot. You turned down the heat for both of the pots of dumplings before you pulled out another, smaller pot to make tea.

“... I don’t scare you, do I?” Bruce seemed kind of hurt as he turned to ask you.

“Oh god no!” You had to laugh because you knew the handsome bearded man in front of you was the farthest thing from scary. “You're one of the sweetest men I’ve ever met.”

“Good,” he smiled, his face full of relief. “I must just be too good looking for you to stay calm around me.” He laughed but he had hit the nail right on the head.

“It must be that,” you agreed and tried not to blush. You filled the pot with water and dropped in some iced tea bags after you set it on an open stove eye to boil.

“... Do you not have a kettle?” Bruce giggled at your makeshift way of making tea.

“I don't, but my family has always made tea this way so it doesn't really matter to me.”

You turned your attention back to the stove as the tea was boiling. You turned the stove off and turned to situate the tea pitcher in the sink, then opened the cabinet next to the sink and tried reaching up to grab the strainer from one of the higher shelves. Bruce gently stepped in and grabbed it for you. “Thank you,” you smiled at him before situating the strainer over the pitcher. You poured the tea through the strainer and grabbed a wooden spoon to press more water out of the bags, then threw away the bags and got rid of the strainer to pour in the sugar and stir it all together. Finally, you were able to fill the pitcher up the rest of the way with cold water.

“Do you want to taste it?” you asked Bruce as you reached up to grab a small cup from another cabinet. You dipped the cup in the tea then handed it to him. “You should probably put some ice in it since it’s still warm.” You gestured towards the freezer door as he took the cup from your hand. The tea sloshed around as you moved it from the sink to the counter. Bruce sudden let out a surprised, “What?!”

You turned to look at him to see him lift out one of your many bottles of liquor from your freezer. “You have three bottles of vodka and three bottles of rum in here?!”

“Uhh… yeah,” you admitted. “I know that makes me seem like an alcoholic, but only one of each of those bottles is open and I bought those the week I moved here. I really hate beer with a passion, so I’ll have a little rum or vodka after a long day of work.”

“Okay, rum I can understand because you can actually sip on that, but vodka ?”

“It’s my favorite…” you shrugged meekly and looked to the ground before pulling your eyes back up to his face.

Bruce placed the bottle back in the freezer shaking his head. “Out of everything I’ve learned about you, that is the most shocking,” he laughed as he reached into the container of ice and plopped a couple of ice cubes in his tea.

“Just taste the damn tea already and let me know if I need to add more sugar or water instead of judging me,” you laughed.

He swirled the liquid around to cool it down and then took a sip, pretending to critique it like a connoisseur. He somehow managed to get you to giggle at him with his stupid joke, and the smile you got in return made it seem a lot less stupid.

“So… this is pretty delicious. It tastes completely different from iced tea. That’s ridiculous!” He beamed at you as he shook his head again. “I feel like I’m eating food from a different country. This is blowing my mind.”

“I’m glad I could introduce you to a new culture of food.” You let out another giggle at the dumbfounded look on his face and he smiled back at you with the gentlest look in his eyes. As you picked the pitcher of tea up off the counter and opened the door to the fridge, you asked Bruce if he wanted another beer.

“Wait, if you hate beer, why do you have beer in your fridge?”

“I’m a good hostess. I know you guys like beer so I picked some up for everyone.”

“You are way too nice to all of us,” Bruce chuckled as he shook his head and grabbed the beer from your hand.

“You should think more of you and your employees,” you countered. “Everything is just about done. We can relax now and just wait for everybody to show up.” You looked over to the small navy blue clock that hung on the wall in your kitchen. “... Which will be in about forty-five minutes. Wow, I thought this would have taken a lot longer. Thanks for helping me.”

“Hey, no problem. I’ve been told things go a lot quicker with me.” Your face was on fire and the hairs on the back of your neck stood up as he winked at you. You giggled in response as you brought your hand up to your face to cover your mouth. Is he flirting with me?! Your head was swimming and your thoughts seemed to be shouting at you through the thick fog that his huge grin was placing over you.

Do I try and flirt back to be sure that he was flirting with me? Am I just over examining what he’s saying to me? You divert your attention to stirring the large pots so you can actually decide what you should do instead of being stuck staring in his eyes with a blank and probably creepy expression. Once you’ve made your decision you turn off both of the stove eyes and secure the lids on top to seal in the heat.

“Well, probably not some things,” you smirk as you turn to look at him. Wow, (Y/N), that was actually smooth as fuck.

His eyebrow raises as he smirks back. “Well,” he chuckles and his eyes scan your face before he drops his gaze to the floor; a blush flooding his face. “Not everything .”

Your eyes were stuck to his. Barely noticing how Bruce had leaned in closer.

“You should start giving yourself more credit, too.” How you managed to rip your eyes away from his and turn to face the fridge behind you is a miracle. You open the freezer and pull the bottle of whipped cream vodka from your admittedly questionable collection of alcohol stacked one on top of the other. If there is going to be more flirting throughout the night, especially with the inevitability of Elyse’s drunk looks of encouragement along with her not-so-subtle quips at the expense of you and Bruce, you are definitely going to need to have something handy to keep you calm.

“I guess the party is starting,” he commented as you turned and grabbed a coffee mug from the cabinet.

“If I don’t get it now, I’ll have to get it later and I’m not risking Lawrence seeing my stash.”

Bruce let’s out a high-pitched wheeze as you pour yourself more than you think you’ll need.

“He’s probably bringing his own, so you shouldn’t have to worry unless things get out of hand.”

“Knowing him, this night is going to be an adventure,” you chuckled as you turned around. You took a large sip from your mug, your brow furrowing for a second before letting out a sigh as the vodka warmed its way down your throat. The oven beeped as the stuffing had finished cooking. You grabbed your oven mitts and carefully pulled the pan out and sat it down on the stove, as to not burn anything as it cooled down. “So… you wanna watch Netflix or something while we wait? I saw some movie that looked pretty interesting last night.”

“Sounds great,” he nodded and gestured for you to lead the way.

You took off the oven mitts and hung them up on the side of the refrigerator then grabbed your drink before you scooted past him and headed towards the living room. You sat down your drink before plopping down on the couch and picking up the remote from the coffee table in front of you. You pressed the power button then exchanged your remote for your Xbox controller that had been sitting next to it.

“Do you like scary movies?” You turned to look at Bruce as you scrolled up to the search bar.

“I don't hate them,” he answered reluctantly, making you chuckle.

“What about…” you pause as you type in “Creep” and hit search. “‘Independent thrillers’ that are ‘suspenseful and scary’?”

Bruce reads the description and shrugs. “That doesn’t sound that bad.”

“Good,” your smile is probably over enthusiastic based off the way that Bruce smirks at you with a glint of sincerity in his eyes. “Because horror movies are my favorite, and I’m sometimes too big of a baby to watch them by myself.” You take note of the runtime - 1 hour and 17 minutes - and start the movie.

As the movie starts, you grab your mug and lean back against the couch, bringing your legs up to sit Indian style. The main character starts to give the exposition while multiple shots of landscapes filmed from a car are shown. You look over as you see Bruce start to relax into his seat, still not ready to let his back press against the cushion behind him. He goes to take a sip of his beer as he looks at you. When he sees you already watching him, he smiles. A lopsided grin that makes your heart warm.

“What?” he asks.

“Nothing, I was just thinking about how we never really hang out outside of work.” You somehow managed to actually lie instead of blurting out about how you were thinking of pressing your lips to his as his strong arm slid around you.

“Huh, you're right. I'm pretty sure this is the first time it's been just you and I.”

“Well, it seems to be going pretty well for it being our first time together.”

After a brief moment you realized how your words sounded. Your hand flung up to clamp your mouth shut as Bruce was wheezing next to you.

“Oh god!” You had never felt your face be this hot before. “That sounds bad!” Bruce was still laughing next to you as he braced his hand on his knee while his torso shook.

“I know what you meant,” he managed. “The look on your face,” he stopped to let out another laugh. “Was hilarious though!”

“Sure, laugh it up!” You turned back towards the movie, your face still red. “Just drink your beer and watch the movie,” you finally managed to tame the redness and let out a laugh as you reached a hand out to shove Bruce’s arm.

Big mistake. All of those times that you had stared at his muscular arms and fantasized about grasping onto his biceps as he forced you against the wall next to your desk after everyone else had left for the day had not prepared you for this. The warmth of his skin, the firmness as you shoved against him. Your hand slid off of his arm, grazing down to his elbow before losing contact. Your eyes darted to him in your peripheral and his eyes looked at you as your hand returned to your mug, a small smirk on his lips, brows knit together. You finally focus back on the movie, trying your hardest not to think about the man sitting next to you. Forcing yourself to focus on every individual word that was being said on screen.

After about 30 minutes in, the title was making itself more and more prominent. The movie itself had only been focusing on the two characters as the main character filmed the other to supposedly show to his son after he had died of cancer. Nothing scary had happened aside from a few jump scares, which, as cheesy and as big of a cop-out as they are, they were building the tone very nicely. They weren't that often, but the anticipation of another looming over you was creating an unsettling feeling.

“How are you liking the movie?” you asked as you turned to look at him. His beer in his hand as the fingers of his other hand lightly traced up and down his knuckles.

“It's okay so far,” he nodded as he kept looking at the screen. “Nothing scary has happened yet,” he laughed at himself a bit as he took the final sip of his beer.

“I know, but somehow I'm still creeped out.”

“I guess it's doing its job then.” He smiled as he stood up to grab another beer and you took the opportunity to stare at his ass as he turned away from you. Damn! You pulled your bottom lip between your teeth as you stared a little longer. You shook your head and snapped out of the trance his ass put you in.

“Uhm,” you sat your mug down and grabbed the controller. “I'm going to go to the bathroom. I'll be right back,” you called as you paused the movie.

You made it down the hallway and into the bathroom as quickly as you could. You looked at yourself in the mirror and wiped at the eyeliner that had smudged it's way too far under your eyes. You glanced over your hair and shirt and decided to pull the hair tie out of your hair and run your fingers through the front to let it relax a bit from being pulled up in a ponytail all day. Then you moved to your shirt and started pulling at it to try and magically make it look better by adjusting the way it fell on you. You went with moving the shoulders closer to one side since the neck of the shirt was pretty big. Once you checked yourself over you figured it wasn’t going to get any better. You started to leave but decided you should probably empty your bladder since this might be the only chance you get. As you dried your hands you heard voices coming from the living room.

“You better not have unpaused the movie without me, Bruce.” Your chuckle was cut off by Elyse, James, and Matt turning to look at you. You couldn’t miss Elyse’s giddy expression as she shifted her eyes between the two of you or James’ wink he gave as he clapped Bruce on the shoulder.

“You two done fucking so we can eat?” The shit eating grin that James gave you was basically his death sentence.

“Really, Ja-”

“Come on, James! We finished hours ago. You know about my problem…” Bruce’s interruption somehow saved you from the huge blush that was threatening to flood your skin.

“Silly me,” James giggled and you shot him the most unamused look you could muster.

“We were just watching a movie till you guys got here.” You moved to the coffee table to exit the movie and turn off the tv.

“Does she have you watching a scary movie?” James was just looking for trouble at this point.

“Yeah, actually,” Bruce chuckled as he took a small sip from his new beer.

“I’m surprised,” Elyse interjected. “It took us a month to find out how much she loves scary movies.”

“Okay, enough about my movie preference. Do you guys want something to drink?”

“I’ll take a beer,” Matt answered quietly.

“Me too,” James smiled, forgetting the embarrassment he just put you through.

“I would like to take a look at your stash,” Elyse said in a loud whisper as she covered the side of her mouth facing everyone else.

“Matt, I would love to get you a beer.” You walked to Matt and gave him a small pat on the shoulder. “You are being an outstanding guest so far, so please have a seat and let me get one for you.” Bruce started laughing as he looked over at James and Elyse. “James, Elyse,” you called over your shoulder. “You know where everything is.”

“... I deserve that,” James admitted with a chuckle after a few moments. “So what exactly are you doing over here so early, Bruce?”

“(Y/N) asked me to help her with some stuff while she finished cooking, so I just came here straight from work.”

“I wondered why you never came home,” Matt gave you a smile as you handed him his beer.

“I didn't ask you guys because I wanted to be nice and let you relax for once instead of asking you to help me out,” you gave Elyse and James an innocent look to mess with them.

“Alright! Jeez!” Elyse was always easy to give up on being mean to you. “Sorry for trying to be funny.”

Everyone laughed and each started dispersing to different areas of the kitchen while you went to grab your drink from the coffee table. Elyse stopped at the freezer and pulled out your bottle of rum then turned to grab a glass while James followed behind her to grab himself a beer. Matt took a seat at the table that fit between the entry way and the kitchen and started chatting with Bruce about something that didn't sound like work for once.

“Oh, Elyse, I made some more sweet tea. It's in the fridge if you want it,” she looked at you with a huge grin as she poured some rum into her glass. She quickly exchanged the alcohol for the pitcher and finished filling up her glass.

“I guess I'm going to have to be the responsible one tonight,” James sighed as Elyse took a rather large sip from her glass.

“I just can't control myself with sweet tea,” she admitted.

You checked the clock on the wall to see the time. Almost 7:30. Time had gone by a lot faster than it had seemed.

“So when do we get to eat?” Bruce asked.

“Whenever Lawrence and Kovic decide to show up,” you walked towards the kitchen and patted Bruce on the shoulder lightly as you let your hand drag across him instead of simply pulling away. The look he gave you when you had done the same thing earlier seemed like he didn't mind the touch or the prolonged contact, so why not give it another shot.

The others in the room had already started chatting as you saw Bruce look down at you as you walked past him. You quickly glanced over his face as you gave him a lopsided smile in return. God, the look in his eyes! You could only describe it as fire. His gaze over your face was slowly setting your skin ablaze and you quickly hid it with a large gulp of vodka.

You stood leaning against the counter as you joined into the chatter of James, Matt, and Elyse’s conversation. You took almost every opportunity that you weren't speaking or listening intently to take another sip and sneak a look at Bruce who was standing opposite you, leaning against his own counter as he seemed to flex his arm as he gripped onto the edge of the surface supporting him.

Lawrence and Adam showed up not even five minutes later, while you were finishing pouring yourself your own glass of rum and tea. Not only were you happy to see them as Adam walked over to you and gave you a hug, but now that they were here you could distract yourself with something to keep your nerves under control.

“Sorry to shove food at you almost as soon as you get here, but I'm starving and I'm pretty sure everyone else is too.”

There's laughter mixed with multiple “Finally!”s as you sit down your drink and turn to the food beside you. You stir the dumplings and grab a ladle to use to serve them and then grab a spatula for the stuffing. You pull the potato salad from the fridge and remove its Saran Wrap cover before adding its own serving spoon to its bowl. You grab a stack of plates from your cabinet that fit into the dark blue and white theme of the space and sit them next to the food. You turn to grab a handful of forks from their drawer and see Elyse standing there already with a handful of silverware.

“I've got you,” she enthused. As she leaned to set the silverware next to the plates she whispered a happy, “You are crushing it with him!” before she pulled away.

“Thanks Elyse,” you responded as you smiled from ear to ear. “In the words of my grandmother,” you started. “ This shit’s done! Get in here and eat! If you don't get enough, it's not my fault!”

“She sounds like one hell of a woman!” Lawrence laughed as him and James headed towards the food. You stepped back and chatted with Adam a bit as you both waited for the line to die down.

“Sorry I was a little late, the cats made the biggest mess I think I've ever seen.”

“It's okay, Adam.” You chuckled as you patted his upper arm. Bruce started moving closer to the two of you as he followed behind Peake who was heading for the food. “I've had cats my entire life, I know the kind of messes they can make. One time, I was using the bathroom and one of our older cats somehow got in the bathroom with me and lifted her tail and peed all over my legs.”

You turn to look at Bruce while Adam has closed his eyes in a fit of laughter. Bruce's head is cocked to the side as he looks at you confused.

“What did I just walk into?” he snorts.

“Oh, I was just telling Adam about the time one of my cats peed on me while I was using the bathroom.”

His shoulders started to shake as he tried holding in his laughter. You couldn’t help but laugh along with the two of them. Between the look on Adam’s face and the high pitched laugh from Bruce that made your heart warm, there was no way you couldn’t join their fits of giggles.

“Good job, (Y/N)! Keep ‘em occupied so the rest of us can actually get some food!” Elyse poked her head over Bruce’s shoulder just before she moved closer in the small line that had formed in your kitchen.

Adam’s laughter had died down enough that he could hear Elyse and quickly pushed passed Bruce, moving him in closer to you in the process. “Hey! No fair!” Adam was surprisingly animated as he practically leaped forward.

You looked up at Bruce as he was letting out his last few giggles while he almost had you completely pinned against the counter from Adam’s shove. He looked down at you with his eyes crinkled from his smile. You smiled back at him with a final chuckle as your eyes flickered from his eyes to his mouth.

After the longest two seconds in the world, he apologized quietly with a small “sorry” and took a step back from you and checked over his shoulder at the line.

He gestured to the food with his beer and you shook your head, afraid that any words that came out of your mouth would break. You swallowed quickly and told him to go ahead.

You looked around the room and saw everyone delving into their plates as they gathered around your table. Elyse looked up at you as she was chewing her first bite of food. “Mhmm!” was all she could manage with a mouth full of food.

“ This ,” she motioned to her plate with her fork. “Is amazing!”

“Oh my god !” Adam looked up at you with disbelief on his face.

The room was filled with mostly the sound of forks quickly scraping plates and hums of enjoyment. A large smile filled your face as you looked around the room of your co-workers, the group of people who not only gave you a job, but had also become some of your closest friends.

“Seriously, this is better than alcohol,” Lawrence finally looked up at you and smiled.

“Wow,” you chuckled. “That’s the best compliment I’ve ever gotten. Thank you.” You followed behind Bruce and fixed your own plate of food. Elyse patted at the seat next to her and you lifted your plate above your head as you scooted between Lawrence’s chair and the counter.

“He keeps looking over at you,” Elyse leans in to whisper in your ear quickly while James and the rest of the table were asking Matt something about his bag of oats that he had recently bought.

You meet his eyes as you look up to see if Elyse was telling the truth. He seemed frozen for a moment, but met your gaze with a smirk before returning his attention to Lawrence and James’ taunting of Matt. Elyse kicked you a little harder than she intended and you looked to her to see the smile on her face.

“Told you so,” she whispered before taking a sip of her drink.

Once the meal was over, James took it upon himself to help you clear the plates from the table. He walked to the sink while you scraped excess food from the plate in your hand into the garbage. You turned back to the sink as James was rinsing his dishes off.

“So, seems to be going well so far.” You look over to see Bruce sitting at the table talking to everyone as he sips from his beer.

“I might be a nervous, bumbling mess pretty much all of the time, but I know how to flirt,” you look back to James before anyone noticed you staring at Bruce.

“You know, you really didn’t have to go to all of this trouble to get close to him. I told you you could have just asked him over for a small dinner and games and he would have said yes in a heartbeat.”

“Maybe you’re right,” you sighed. “I can just get so nervous sometimes that it’s hard to think that I wouldn’t fuck it all up.”

“It’s not like he’s a stranger or anything, it’s Bruce. The guy you work with that farts a lot.”

“You mean ‘my boss ’ that farts a lot. Sure he’s not a stranger,” you looked up to James as you sat the last plate into the sink to be properly washed later. “But if something happens and it messes up the friendship that we have or messes with work, then not only have I messed up a possible relationship, but my career too.” You kept your voice at a whisper as you finally opened up a bit about some of the things that kept you from making a move for so long.

You hadn’t even realized yourself just how big of a deal your feelings for Bruce were. Maybe you had realized, but didn’t want to acknowledge it. It was more than a worry about whether he would reject you or not. Your feelings could easily mess up this new part of your life if you acted upon them. So for the longest time it was easier to try and wait them out and keep your job than ask him over to your place to hang out after work. There was no turning back now, though. You had flirted with him for most of the night, and with the way he had been looking at you, you knew that he wouldn’t leave here without talking to you about it. You had already started this, so now you had to see it through. However, your nerves were already starting to get the best of you just from thinking about the rest of the night.

You wiped your hands off on the towel that hung on the oven door handle before you moved to the table. Bruce looked away from the table and up at you as you reached for your drink. You gave him a quick smile before turning your attention to the conversation the others were having and took a large sip from your drink and started hoping that the alcohol would calm your nerves quick.

You weren’t sure how long it had been since you started actively seeking some form of tipsy, but by the way most of your friends seemed to be acting, it was just long enough for them to catch up with you. Even though Elyse had originally pestered you as soon as she stepped foot into your apartment, you were now partners in crime just like most other nights. The two of you giggled as she pulled you onto the couch insisting that you watch the scary movie you never got to finish. She somehow managed to rope in an obviously intoxicated Adam with promises of “I’ll protect you, little man” and “you can sit beside me” that she had tried to whisper.

“Br uce ?!” Dear god, you were so drunk.

James was laughing in the kitchen as you called out to the one person you wanted beside you.

“Brucey!” He chuckled and gave James a quick amused look before he made eye contact with you.

“C’mere! We gotta finish this movie!” James kept laughing as you approached Bruce and grabbed his hand, pulling him over to the couch that was already almost too full.

Elyse scooted closer to Adam to make room and you plopped onto the couch, Bruce’s hand still in yours. He looked hesitant as he looked at the small space, but you pulled him down with a laugh and he smiled back as he situated himself in the small space. He casually placed his arm along the back of the couch to allow more room and you couldn't have been happier as you leaned back with the controller in your hand.

Bruce was definitely not as drunk as you, but he was at least six beers in so he was feeling something. Elyse grabbed the controller from your hand while you struggled with highlighting the correct movie. She pulled the movie up in record time and you threw your arm around her and placed a drunken kiss to her hair.

“You ‘da best,” you slurred as you sunk back into your seat. “From the beginnin’! Nothin’ had really happened before we stopped it.” Elyse fidgeted with the controller before she sat it on the coffee table and relaxed against the back of the couch. The title screen started rolling as you felt Bruce’s fingers lightly touch your shoulder. You leaned into his touch subconsciously and felt his hand move to rest on top of the small expanse of skin your purposefully off-kilter shirt revealed. Even though your eyes were focused on the screen, your mind couldn't stray from the feeling of his skin in contact with yours. The sloshing of beer against glass broke your drunken reverie, forcing you to turn your head and meet Bruce's gaze as he took a swig. As soon as your eyes met, his thumb was massaging a small circle into the skin of your shoulder. He flashed you a smile then gestured toward the tv with his head.

As soon as you focused your attention on the movie, one of the characters jumped into frame suddenly. You jumped and felt your shoulder connect with something solid. A wet trail started moving down your back as you turned to see what had happened. Bruce held his beer bottle away from him as he looked down at his shirt.

“Oh my god!” You quickly stood up and froze. “Bruce, I'm so sorry!”

Bruce rose to his feet and pulled at his shirt, trying to lose contact between the drenched fabric and his skin. “It's okay,” he laughed.

It wasn't until then that you realized that most of the others were laughing, too.

“Shit,” you mumbled as you looked over at your soaked shoulder.

“Here, I'll clean the couch off,” James was chuckling as he stepped in. “You guys just go clean up.”

You slurred some kind of “okay” to James as you gestured towards the hall to Bruce as you headed towards your bathroom. You grabbed a hand towel from the cabinet on the wall in your bathroom and sat it on the edge of the sink.

“I'm really sorry,” you apologized again as you saw how big the wet spot actually was now that you were in the light.

“It's okay, it's not like you set me on fire.” He chuckled as he started to pull his shirt off, but you quickly turned, knowing all you would do was stare if you looked at him shirtless for a second. You grabbed the towel and wet it with warm water before you forced yourself to turn back to him.

Jesus fucking christ . It's not like you hadn't seen Bruce shirtless before - you had seen all of your male co-workers shirtless before, you'd even seen Elyse shirtless - but you'd never been this close to his bare torso. You could see the pattern his chest hair laid in more clearly, the outline of his muscles more defined. In complete honesty, if you died right now, you would die happy.

You lightly wiped at his chest with the towel and apologized again, your words still slurred though you could feel yourself sobering up the tiniest bit. Even with the courage the alcohol had given you, there wasn't enough courage or alcohol in the world for you to look at Bruce's face right now.

Bruce let out another airy chuckle as you apologized and tried to clean the beer off of his chest. “(Y/N), it's okay.” He laughed again quietly, but when you didn't acknowledge his response his tone turned serious. “(Y/N)?”

Your face flushed pink as you ignored him saying your name, embarrassment overpowering the liquor in your system.

“(Y/N).” His voice was more insistent as you turned away from him to rinse the towel off. He grabbed your wrist gently as your turned off the water, his grip still too tight for you to escape it.

His eyes moved to meet yours as you turned to look at him. His tongue moved to lick his lips as you stayed silent, and you couldn't help but let your eyes wander his face, focusing on his lips far longer than anything else. His hand that wasn't holding your wrist moved to the hem of your shirt, tugging at it as he let go of your wrist to pull it over your head.

It started to feel like the liquor was taking over again as he dropped your shirt to the ground and took the towel out of your hand. He turned you gently to wipe away the beer on your shoulder, his other hand bracing against your upper arm.

The way his fingers pressed firmly into your skin as he moved in closer caused chills to run up your spine. You could faintly feel his breath on the back of your neck as he gently wiped at your skin.

“I never knew you had a tattoo,” he whispered as his eyes explored the black lines and faint color on your skin.

Your breath came out shakily as you tried to respond. “It's of my favorite band.” All you could think about was how amazing and strong his hands felt against you, and you were surprised you could respond intelligently as your mind was swimming in inappropriate thoughts.

He wiped one last time at your skin before he replaced the towel with his fingertips, tracing the outline of the caged elephant in front of a watercolor style lotus flower.

He didn't speak for the longest time, so long that you would have thought he had left if it weren't for his hands roaming around the skin of your shoulders and arms. It wasn't until his hand gently rested against your waist and carefully bunched up the tank top under his hand that you slowly turned to look at him over your shoulder.

His eyes were already focused on your face, smirking at the flush on your cheeks. “Hey,” he said quietly. His voice had dropped so low that you could feel it rumble through your body, like the bass flooding from the speakers at a concert. Your breath caught in your throat as he leaned in closer to you.

You hadn't noticed yourself turning to face him until your hand rose to his face and you could feel his beard under your fingertips. His smirk turned to a smile as you rubbed at his facial hair while he moved his other hand to your lower back.

“God,” his voice was so quiet you almost couldn't hear him. His eyes flicked back and forth from each of your eyes to your mouth. “This should have happened months ago,” he murmured just before he leaned in further.

His lips landed gently against yours as he pulled you in closer. You both broke away slightly, eyes closed, as you savored the moment. Your hand on his cheek moved to grip onto his jaw as you pulled him in to kiss him again. His lips felt soft and strong against yours, so sure of his movements like he had imagined this moment many times before.

You kissed him back with all of the tension that you had pent up over the past couple of months. You wanted to savor every moment of his lips moving with yours, but as soon as he pulled your body in close to his, you were biting at his bottom lip and deepening the kiss as quickly as you could. His tongue moved its way into your mouth, gently grazing yours before moving in time with it. The feeling of his arms pulling you in close to his bare chest caused your head to swim so much that you had to grab ahold of his bicep to steady yourself. As soon as your hand grasped onto his arm you could feel his grip on your waist tighten, causing you to gasp into his mouth from the wave of pleasure that ran up your spine.

Bruce pulled away with a huge smirk on his face. God, that look was going to play a major role in your dreams for at least the next month. He moved his hand from your back to grab onto the other side of your waist, quickly lifting you up onto the edge of your sink and then moving his hands down to grab onto your bare thighs. His lips made contact with the skin of your neck, causing you to sigh out an “oh god” a little louder than you probably should have. You could feel his breath fan across your skin as he chuckled at your reaction before diving back in to leave a trail of sloppy, open mouthed kisses on your neck.

In the back of your mind, you kept hoping that this wasn’t a dream. Hoping that his hands wouldn’t leave your body, his warm skin would stay against yours. But there was a part of you that was terrified that this was real, but that it was only fueled by the alcohol running through his system and as soon as he left and tomorrow rolled around, it would just be a mistake that he made. Afraid that he would be ashamed of his actions, ashamed of the way he was making you feel right now.

You forced yourself to stop worrying, just wanting to be completely in the moment of his nails digging into the skin of your thighs while he trails kisses from your neck up to your jaw and back down. Even if this did end up being a mistake that he made, you were going to remember every moment of it. This was not a mistake to you. This was months in the making and everything that you wanted and needed right now.

He pulled you back out of your thoughts as he left a harsh bite against your neck. You shoved your face into the crook of his neck and moaned into his ear. He gently traced over the bite with his tongue before placing a kiss over it, then pulling back to look into your eyes.

His pupils were blown wide, his breath coming out heavy as he gripped your thighs tighter before sliding his hands behind your knees and pulling you flush against him. You moved your hands to his face, lightly dragging your nails through his beard as you wrapped your legs around his hips. He smiled at you quickly before the smile turned into that absolutely perfect smirk and he lifted you off of the sink and turned around to press your back against the wall. Your hands latched into his hair and pulled his lips back to yours roughly.

There were goosebumps making their way up your legs as Bruce’s hand trailed along the skin of your thigh before grabbing your hip roughly, using his grip to keep you as close to him as possible. His other hand was latched into your hair at the back of your neck, tugging your head back to allow him access to fully explore your mouth. Every time his fingers tightened in your hair, you couldn’t help but let out little moans into Bruce’s mouth. You loved how rough he was being, like he couldn’t control himself with his lips pressed against yours and your legs wrapped around his hips. Well, you couldn’t blame him since there was no way you could quit leaving red scratch marks along his chest and shoulder blades.

“F- fuck! ” he groaned from your hand moving to latch into his hair and your hips subconsciously grinding against him, searching for some sort of friction.

“God,” you gasped as you pulled away from him to catch your breath. “Your mouth is perfect.” You brought your hand up to cup his face and gently run your thumb over his bottom lip.

He let out a chuckle in a quick exhale, feeling his breath hit your thumb before fanning across your face. The short break you both had taken to catch your breath was quickly interrupted by the sound of his phone vibrating in his pocket.

“Damnit,” he muttered as he reached behind him to pull his phone out of his back pocket. He turned the screen on to see the message from James displayed on the unlock screen. “‘We all headed out since it seemed like you guys were a little busy. Be safe! See you two Monday ;)’” Bruce read the message aloud, making your face flush for a moment from embarrassment at the thought of all of your guests leaving for you to make out with your boss in your bathroom.

He let out a chuckle as he locked his phone and shoved it back into his pocket, then turned to face you again. His eyes were still dark, and his breath was still fast and heavy. That brief moment of embarrassment was gone as soon as his eyes locked back onto yours.

“Fuck me,” you groaned as you pulled his mouth back to yours and tightened your legs around him. The chuckle he gave as his response was deep and filled with lust as your kiss turned sloppy and somehow more needy than before. You reached out towards the door, fumbling to find the doorknob. Once your hand made contact with the metal knob, you turned it and pulled it open a bit before Bruce stepped back and opened it the rest of the way. He headed for the door across the hall, you still wrapped around him placing kisses and small bites to his neck. The door to your bedroom flew open and his hand moved to the back of your head as he pulled your lips back to his.

You felt his arm snake around your waist while his other hand moved to untangle your legs from his body, setting you down on your feet.

His hand grabbed the hem of your tank top, pulling it over your head quickly. His hands gently rubbed at your sides as he reached in to kiss you gently.

“It’s not embarrassing for me to admit to how many times I’ve imagined this, is it?” He pulled you in closer as he laughed sheepishly and dipped his head down to kiss your jaw.

“Only if it’s embarrassing for me to admit the same thing,” you smiled up at him and wrapped your arms around his neck.

He raised an eyebrow with his perfect smirk on his face. “How exactly did you imagine this going down?”

You reached up to kiss him, pressing your body as close to his as you could. The feeling of his skin against yours was sending shockwaves through you. You moved to place a kiss under his ear before whispering, “Rough.”

You could hear him groan a little in the back of his throat before he pulled you back to look into your eyes. “Perfect,” he smirked. His hands moved to undo the button of your shorts, quickly turning you around and moving till your thighs touched the edge of your mattress. “Take your bra off,” his voice was low and demanding, causing wetness to pool between your thighs. Your hands quickly undid the clasp and tossed your bra off to some side of the room, you stopped paying attention to anything but Bruce’s thumbs as they hooked themselves into your underwear, pulling your shorts down with them in one fluid motion.

“Fuck, your ass is perfect.” His hands roughly grabbed at your cheeks, surprising you and causing you to catch yourself on the mattress as you fell forward. His hand smacked down hard on your ass and you let out a loud groan of pleasure. You pulled your bottom lip between your teeth and turned to look at him as his hand massaged at the red cheek roughly. “I’m going to make you feel so good,” his voice was in your ear suddenly, low and almost menacing. “Fuck, I want to hear you scream my name with my cock buried deep inside of you.” His hand slipped around your front to lightly run his fingers up the inside of your thigh. Stopping right before he gave you some of that precious friction and attention that you were so desperately needing at this point.

“You want me to touch you?” You hadn’t realized that you had whimpered loudly until he spoke again. “Is that what that little noise means? You need my hands on you?” His other hand wrapped around to massage your breast. You leaned back against his chest, feeling the little groans coming from his throat as you moved your hand to rest on his thigh, searching for his hardened cock.

“The only thing I need right now is your cock in my mouth.”

“Fuck, (Y/N). There’s no way I could say no to that. Watching your sexy lips wrap around my dick while your head bobs up and down.”

He took a step back from you to give you room to turn around. His eyes carefully roamed your body as he reached out for your hips. You leaned in and kissed him hard, biting at his bottom lip roughly. Before he could respond to your kiss you had gotten down on your knees in front of him, unbuckling his belt and shorts deftly and giving a quick tug to his boxers and shorts. His hands shot down and helped you finish sliding his clothes off. He quickly kicked his shoes off to the side and then his shorts in the same direction. His hands quickly came back to stroke your face and pull your hair out of the way.

For a second you couldn't stop staring at his cock, focusing on the large head before taking in how thick and perfect it looked. You could feel your mouth gaping open at the sight of it; twitching slightly and leaking with pre-cum.

Bruce let out an airy chuckle, drawing your attention to his face.

“What's that look for?” his voice was still so deep and beautiful it made you ache to hear all of the dirty things that he could whisper in your ear.

“Your cock is perfect,” you smirked as you wrapped your fingers around his base before licking a long stripe from base to tip on the underside of him.

You watched as his head fell back slightly, his eyes closed in pleasure. There was a quiet “fuck” that left his lips once you closed your lips around him, your tongue licking the pre-cum from the tip before swirling around the straining head.

His hands in your hair, pulling tight at your scalp, was a signal that he was enjoying what your mouth could do. Looking into his eyes, you slowly took him into your mouth until your nose touched his pelvis, flattening your tongue as you began to suck and swallow around him. His jaw clenched as he moaned at the feeling.

“Shit,” his eyes were glazed over as they locked with yours. “You look so good sucking my cock. So good pleasing me.” His voice trailed off as you started to bob your head, feeling his fingers tense in your hair.

You stopped for a moment to deepthroat him and watched as he stuttered around the words he started to say. You gave him a questioning hum, bracing his thighs as his knees shook a bit.

“God, I would not have thought you were as big of a cockslut as you apparently are.” His voice wavered a bit as he spoke, feeling your mouth pull away. You sucked at the head briefly before taking him all in again and gently bobbing as his cock hit the back of your throat.

“Want me to fuck your face?” His eyes were dominant and playful as he looked down at you. You hummed around him again and he laughed carefully as he reached to cup both sides of your face.

“Goddamn,” he sighed as you braced yourself and stared into his eyes, begging for him to use your throat to please him.

He started off gentle, testing how far and how fast he could go as he moved in and out of your mouth. He started thrusting deep and fast and you couldn't look away from the lust in his eyes.

“Ohh-ho-ho,” he smiled as he pulled out of your mouth after you moved your tongue in just the right way to press against the sensitive underside of his head. “Fuck that was amazing,” his hands grabbed yours and pulled you up from the floor.

The feeling of his hands as they moved across your skin was sending a fire through you. His lips were on yours again, so desperate and firm like he couldn't get enough. Every so often his hands would run over your breasts lightly, causing little moans that he consumed with his lips.

Pulling back slightly, his hand resting against the side of your face, you could see his disheveled appearance. His hair sticking out in all different directions, lips swollen from the brutally delicious way he kissed you. He moved to place more kisses to your neck, biting at your skin roughly and causing your knees to buckle. He pulled you in closer and moved to nip at your earlobe, his hand running down your back to grab at your ass. “Your turn.” His voice was so low you actually shuddered from the sound.

Your back fell against the sheets as soon as his hands had shoved you back. His eyes were hungry as they swept over your body; running down your breasts, lingering over the curve of your waist. His hands were trailing up your thighs, making you rock your pelvis up at the teasing feeling. That look. His jaw was set clenched, biting back words or some sound as you quietly begged him to touch you.

“You have no idea how good you look like this,” his words were quiet as he traced a line from your hip to the outside of your knee, his eyes following his motion.

“Tell me,” your words were soft and breathless. As playful and rough as you usually liked to be in return, Bruce was perfect like this.

The way his hands were so strong as he searched every part of you, that demanding tone to his voice. He wasn't thinking about what he was doing, it was escaping him like it was waiting under the surface for so long before it could break free. Just like everything that he was pulling from you was so natural. So effortless. His fingers tighten, you melt into the touch and moan in pleasure. He tells you the dirty thoughts he is thinking, you shudder at every word, every sound because they hit you in your core. They send shivers down your spine, make your brain swim. It's the most perfect, pure cause and effect.

“The way you move into my touch, the look on your face every time I speak like you’re hanging onto my every word.” You chewed your bottom lip, eyes fluttering closed, as you nodded your head affirmatively, receiving a light chuckle in return. “The look in your eyes when you beg for me, the way your body moves and your chest heaves with every noise you make. So beautiful.” His voice is quieter as he moves onto the bed with you, lazily planting kisses to your stomach up to your jaw.

“You look like you were meant for me to please you; meant for me to touch you.”

He kissed you softly, but with so much passion. As your lips interlocked, they lingered there for a long moment before moving to meet again. When he pulled away, you moved to try and kiss him once more but only came in contact with the air.

He held onto your waist and moved to scoot you up further onto the bed. You moved with him as he guided you and laid back to watch his next movements. His short nails dragging roughly down your thighs before he situated himself to pull your legs over his shoulders.

His fingers trailed lightly along the inside of your thighs before he moved to touch your wet folds. As soon as contact was made you arched and moaned into him. He gently ran his finger over your entrance before barely touching your clit.

“Jesus,” his breath fanned across you and made you shiver. “You're so wet. So sensitive.”

Before you could even let out a sound, his tongue gave you one long languid lick. Your shoulder blades shoved deep into the mattress as you arched into his tongue, feeling his beard scratch against the soft skin of your thigh.

“Look at me.” His voice was dark and demanding and it took everything in you to calm down enough to open your eyes. Once you locked eyes, his mouth closed around your bundle of nerves and sucked and licked until you almost had tears in your eyes.

Your hands flung to his hair and kept him in place, afraid that he would stop to tease you or just stop in general. After one hard tug to his locks pulled a moan from him, his hands gripped hard to your hips as they rocked against him.

His eyes were still focused on you when he pulled away to slowly slide his finger inside you. You threw your head back for just a moment before returning to his gaze, moaning as he pressed against your walls. He added another and you could feel yourself starting to tighten, heading towards your climax.

“Mmm…” his eyes were glazed over now as he scanned your body, his bottom lip pulled between his teeth. “Do I make you cum, or do I get you right to the edge and leave you there?” He reached up to trail kisses along your jaw, thrusting his fingers faster inside of you.

“It's y-your choice,” you moaned out as he started hitting your sweet spot.

“God I'd love to tease you,” his head moved to your chest, kissing down to your breasts. “Watch you come completely undone as you begged for me.” His other hand came up to massage your breast while he swirled his tongue around the nipple of the other. Your hand tangled in his hair as you moaned at the feeling of his teeth grazing the sensitive bud. He had you shaking underneath him, letting out a constant stream of hums and groans as his words and his fingers were driving you crazy.

“But I need to see you cum. Need to see your legs shake, hear the noises you make, see how desperate your face is just before it finally hits you.” His hand had a strong grip on your face, looking you dead in the eyes as you grind up against his hand for more friction. “I need you to cum for me.”

The desperation in his voice was enough to set you off. As soon as you tightened your legs around him, he sat up to watch your entire body react. His fingers kept moving inside of you relentlessly, raising the intensity of your orgasm as much as he could as it was happening. His eyes were all you could see while you started to convulse around him.

“Fuck, Bru-uuce!” His name sat strangled in your throat for a moment as you started to scream it. Your hand connected with his forearm as you hit your peak, straining around the muscles of his arm.

He groaned at the sight of you going limp underneath him, panting and moaning as he slid his fingers out of you.

“God you're perfect.” His voice was a whisper and you could barely make out what he was saying, the sound of your heart pounding in your ears drowning out almost everything.

He quickly pulled away from you and started to stand before you grabbed his arm.

“Where are you going?”

“I need to fuck you,” his smile was urgent as he tried to pull against you to reach the condom in his wallet.

“I'm on the pill, we don't exactly need a condom unless there's something else.”

“Fuck no,” he growled as he came back down to kiss you roughly. You could feel his erection against your thigh and ground against him to hear him moan. “You might actually kill me tonight,” he smiled as he pulled back to settle between your legs again.

He pressed against your entrance before sliding in slowly, taking his time to let you adjust around him and to savor the sounds you kept making.

“Fucking Christ!” He threw his head up for a moment before groaning as he started pulling out. “You have such a perfect pussy. So tight and warm… Fuck!” His hips were moving slowly as he tried to draw out as many little mewls and moans as possible. After a few more thrusts he started picking up the pace and grabbing your thigh as he pushed your knee up against your chest.

He started kissing you sloppily and he thrust into you wildly, earning strangled moans from you. Quickly, he pushed your other leg against you and leaned back as he thrust to hit that same spot over and over.

His cock fit so perfect inside you. Making you feel full with each thrust of his hips. It didn't take long for you to feel another orgasm in the pit of your stomach from the way he was fucking into you. Fast and deep, and the angle that he had found was perfect.

“I'm going to cum,” you cried out quickly as you could feel it approaching faster than before. He thrust in a few more times before you tensed around him and moaned out a wavering “fuck” just as it hit. The groan escaping you was deafening, leaving your throat feeling scratchy and raw. Your tight walls around him made it hard for him to keep his rhythm, but he couldn't stop thrusting into you.

“Fuck, Bruce! I need yo-” you whimpered as he slammed into you rather deep. “I need you to fuck me from behind. Need you to smack my ass, pull my h-hair,” he had abandoned pinning your knees to your chest and opted to lift your hips off the bed slightly and the feeling was almost what you needed. “Need you to choke me while you tell me how good I am to fuck!”

“No ‘please Bruce’? Just demanding me? I don't think that's going to work, (Y/N).” He slowed his pace to teasingly slow, allowing only his swollen head to enter into you as he pulled right back out. If this ever happens again, he's going to have to do that more often.

“Please, Bruce! Please!” You had moved your hands to his chest to feel the hair that grew there and to scratch at his skin lightly. “I need to be on all fours for you. Need you to be brutal with me, make me so sore I can't walk for a week! Please, Bruce, I need you to wreck me!” You pleaded with him and could hear just how frantic and needy you sounded.

“If you want me to wreck you, sweetheart, then I'll wreck you.” He placed such a caringly, rough kiss to your lips. Your heart pounded from the protective way he called you “sweetheart”, like he wanted to be the one to give you everything you wanted and needed. The look in his eyes made you believe that he knew exactly what you felt. The need to have him so bad that it hurts. Now that you have him like this, you have to have him as hard as possible; afraid that you won't have him again. You need the relief of finally being with him, with the desperation of it being the last time you could ever touch another person.

He flipped you over quickly, positioning your legs where they needed to be. Before you could bend over to push your ass in the air, Bruce pulled you flush against him. His hand was light over your throat as his other traced along your hip.

“I need this, too.” He whispered in your ear with his dark voice shaking slightly. “I need you hard . I want you so much like this that…” He trailed off as he rested his forehead against your shoulder. “Soft and slow won't cut it. If it's too much…” His words were cautious now, filled with worry as he caressed your face.

“I'll say ‘red’. Please don't hold back,” you could somewhat see his face over your shoulder as he gave you a small grin.

“No holding back,” he nodded in agreement. “Same goes for you.” You both laughed with the slightest bit of hesitation in your voice before he kissed you slow and deep.

He pulled away from you abruptly and shoved your chest against the mattress in one motion. His hands grabbed onto your ass as he pressed small kisses down your back. There was a sharp pain as Bruce quickly bit into the flesh of your ass, massaging the area before placing a hard smack to your other cheek. You groaned and rocked back into the feeling.

He braced against your lower back as he lined himself up to your entrance. There was a tug to your hair as he slammed into you quick and hard. Once he was inside you, the tug at your hair became a pull as he started fucking into you relentlessly. The feel of his fingers digging into your hip was deep and harsh, and it made you excited to see the bruises that you knew would show later.

With every thrust, your screams were wavering more and more while his grunts and groans became harsher and more urgent.

“Fuck, you take my cock so well.” His words were strained as you could feel every muscle in his body tense. “Look so good every way I fuck you,” his hand moved from your hip to reach around your throat.

“Just want… to… please you,” your words were needy and loud as they came out between shouted moans. “Want to feel… you cum… on me. All over my ch-... chest and stomach. Watch you cum from fu-fucking me!” His hand tightened around your throat and the pressure against you shot straight to your core.

His relentless thrusts kept hitting deep inside you, feeling his head slam against the bundle of nerves inside of you at every thrust was pushing you closer to release. There was a feeling of loss as his hands left your hair and throat to latch onto your hips, but was quickly forgotten as he slid a hand around to rub at your clit desperately.

You were cumming as soon as his fingers touched the swollen bud, legs shaking and throat searing in pain from the harsh noises you made. “Fuck yes, Bruce! Oh g- Bru uce .” Your voice was quickly cut off as your orgasm shot through you so rough and so fast that it stopped your breathing.

Bruce's hand on your hip was the only thing holding you up as you shuddered and shaked, tightening around him and screaming his name. Your orgasm was still coursing through you as he quickly pulled out and flipped you over onto your back. He wrapped one hand around your throat, applying the perfect amount of pressure, while he stroked himself twice with his other hand, fulfilling your groaned out cries from a few moments before and cumming across your torso. Your eyes were locked with his as you saw the hunger in him just before he came.

“Sh iit ,(Y/N)!” his voice was much quieter than yours as he hit his peak. He moved his hand to prop himself up, one hand to either side of you. His eyes were closed as he reveled in the feeling washing over him, humming quietly to himself. You couldn't find it in you to move, content with staying exactly where Bruce had quickly shoved you. His eyes opened and washed over you as he sat back against his heels.

“I can’t tell which look is better. My cock in your mouth, in your pussy, or you completely wrecked and out of it covered in my cum,” he shook his head lightly and gently rested his hand against your knee as he thought for a moment. “I think this is the best one.” His eyes stayed focused on you as he chewed at his lip for a second.

“Could I…” his words stopped quick and you could see the apprehension fall over him. “Could I take a picture of you like this? Just for me,” his eyes fell a bit as he finished speaking, worried about your reaction.

“I don't mind,” you whispered after a moment. He flashed his smirk at you as he gracefully climbed off the bed backwards to retrieve his phone. You closed your eyes and smiled at his excitement, so blissed out of your mind you could hardly breathe. You hadn't even noticed he had made it back onto the bed until he muttered “fucking beautiful” and then leaned in to kiss you softly as he placed his phone on the nightstand next to the bed.

“I'll be right back,” his voice was quiet as he pulled away, heading for the bathroom. He came back with the towel from earlier, re-wet, to clean you off. He tossed it onto the floor once you were clean and fell back beside you with a huff.

“That was…” Bruce started and paused to let out a sigh.

“Incredible? Amazing? Perfect?” You turned your head to look at him, his arm thrown over his head, forearm against forehead, chest heaving to catch his breath.

“All of the above.” He chuckled and turned to look back at you and immediately you could feel a large wave of happiness crash over you as his smile reached his eyes.

“So how long did you know?” Your face flushed in embarrassment and you had to look away from his face as you asked. He had to have known how you felt about him. Didn't he say, “ This should have happened months ago ”? Were you that obvious from the start? You knew you fell head-over-heels hard and easily, but you thought you had kept your composure pretty well.

“Did I know what?” You stopped playing with the piece of hair you had moved your attention to to look at him. His smile was still there, but his face was confused and his eyes were searching yours to find something he had missed.

“You know,” you looked away from him again as you tried to force yourself to say the words. “How long did you know that I had… feelings ... for you.” When you looked back his smile was all teeth and filled with happiness.

“Well, I didn't really know that till tonight. To be honest, I didn't think you wanted to be anything more than friends till earlier tonight, and even then I thought you just wanted to have sex with me.” He laughed and reached out to pull you against him. You finally had a bit of control over your body again and could move with him instead of him just having to drag you limply to him. “So, I've known for about… 45 seconds? Maybe a minute now?”

“Oh god,” you hid your face in your hands and leaned against his chest.

“What? Are you actually embarrassed?” He started laughing as he pulled your hand away from your face. “You're embarrassed because you told me you have feelings for me, but not because you asked me to wreck you? If I were you I'd be more embarrassed by the last one. Not that there's anything wrong with it…”

“You know, easier to deal with having sex with someone than sharing emotions.” He laughed with you as you shrugged in his arms. “Plus, you probably don't feel the same and now it's just me over here with the emotions and you over there trying not to hurt my feelings, but my feelings are going to get hurt anyway because emotions are rough and complicated so they’r-” he stopped your rambling with a kiss and his hand gently pushed your hair away from your face.

“Shut up, you idiot.” He shook his head and pulled you in closer to him. “Of course I like you. Now stop rambling, because I worked up an appetite and you definitely need to get some water in you. You were pretty drunk earlier.”

“I told you you made me nervous, and I needed to chill out a bit.” He giggled his high pitched laugh and kissed you quick on the lips. “Want to actually finish that damn movie and have some more dinner?”

“That sounds fine with me,” he laughed as he sat up. “Fuck, I was right.” He stretched as he stood up and let out a large yawn. “You did kill me.”

“Ugh! I guess this means I have to move now.” Bruce chuckled and found his boxers, sliding them on quickly. You stared at his ass as he bent over, pulling your lip between your teeth. “Nice ass, boss!”

He turned towards you smiling with blood rushing to his face. “I'm not an object ya’ know.”

“Of course you're not,” you muttered, making him laugh. You carefully sat up, gauging how well your body could move and hold its own. Everything seemed fine so you moved to the edge of the bed, legs hanging over the side. You gripped the mattress as you stood and tested the shape Bruce left your legs in. Almost immediately you lost your balance and started to fall, but Bruce rushed to you just as you caught yourself on the mattress.

“Wow, I actually wrecked you.” Bruce’s laugh seemed shocked but he had that hauntingly attractive smirk stretched on his face and you could see the pride he took in being the one to leave you like this.

“Just gotta stretch it out,” you sat on the bed with both legs stretched out in front of you as you reached forward to grasp the arch of both of your feet. The only resistance was the slightly dizzy feeling in your head, but you pushed through it as you switched to bring both of your legs in, feet touching sole to sole, and reaching forward again. “Much better,” you sighed as Bruce reached out for you to try and stand again.

This time you could stand and your legs held your weight, but they still felt like they were shaking with each step. You grabbed a shirt you had laid on your dresser earlier that morning to sleep in that night and pulled your underwear from your shorts where Bruce had left them on the floor before slipping them on and quickly pulling the shirt over your head.

“Let's see what state they left my apartment in,” you sighed as you both headed out into the hall.

It was a pleasant surprise to see that everything was pretty much exactly where it was supposed to be. A few beer bottles on the table, the roll of paper towels from the kitchen were sitting on the coffee table, but that was it. Bruce grabbed the bottles and put them in the trash while you followed behind to put the paper towels back.

The kitchen was a bit of a different story. You walked to the fridge to see a sloppy note left on the whiteboard on the side of it. “ Grabbed some food for all of us. Sorry ‘bout mess, was in hurry. -(heart) E”

“Nothing is worse than drunk Elyse’s hand-eye coordination,” Bruce chuckled and shook his head as he looked at the large trail of broth and dumplings that started from the stove and made its way to the middle of the counter.

“She tried… I guess.” You both chuckled and started to fix your own bowls of food. You quickly heated your food in the microwave and cleaned up the mess Elyse left for you as you waited. As Bruce heated up his food, you put away the rest of the leftovers and poured drink for both you and Bruce. The two of you took your food and the drinks into the living room to finally finish Creep .

As you sat your you stuff onto the coffee table, you shivered, rather violently, from the cool air of your apartment.

“I'll be right back,” you quickly walked off to grab a blanket and headed back to the couch.

Now that your apartment was quiet, with no promise of visitors, there was finally some quiet alone time between you and Bruce. You started the movie from where everyone else left off, which seemed to be somewhere between the beginning and the point you first paused it.

Bruce devoured his bowl of food and leaned back against the couch once he had sat his bowl onto the table in front of him. You finished yours not long after and followed his movements to feel his arm wrap around your shoulder as you leaned against the couch cushion.

You smiled up at him and started scooting in closer to him as his arm tightened around you, keeping you as close to him as possible. You quickly caught back up to where you left off and could feel how tense the scene was on screen. The tone shifted to unsettling very quickly and you could feel yourself trying to lean into the couch and Bruce more.

“Are you going to share that blanket?” Bruce whispered while he took his eyes off the screen for a brief moment. You smiled and shifted the blanket to cover him too.

As the movie finally ended you felt extremely uncomfortable. Not from the couch or Bruce, but the movie had messed with you so much that it had actually creeped you out. You sat there for a moment as you watched the credits and the little extras that popped up during them and didn't look to Bruce until the credits had ended.

“That was too good,” you shuddered as you sunk into Bruce more.

“Yeah, it was really disturbing. You okay?”

“Just creeped out,” you shook your head to dismiss his worry. “Let's just watch something funny really quick so I can get my mind off of it.”

You pulled up Bob’s Burgers and watched a few episodes from the newest season. Both of you quietly laughing at the show as you unknowingly started to cuddle closer to him.

You startled awake quietly as some phantom pain shot across your skull and you saw that stupid wolf mask in your dream. Bruce woke up as he felt you shove against him quickly to sit up. You had apparently fallen asleep with your head on Bruce's chest while watching cartoons. The tv reading a faint Are you still watching?

“Hey, what is it?” Bruce's voice was dark, raspy, and groggy and hot as hell. He wrapped one hand around your waist and rubbed at his eye with the other.

“Stupid nightmare. Ugh!” Your hand raised to your throat as you felt how raw and raspy your words were. “You made me lose my voice.” You looked at Bruce accusingly and he gave you back a sleepy, smirk.

“Fuck yeah I did.” He grinned at you and pulled you closer to him, giving you a light kiss on the head. “I'm sorry you had a nightmare though. That movie must have really stuck with you.” He tucked your hair behind your ear and gently stroked at your face in the dimly lit room.

You took a moment to look at him, shirtless torso, bed head, squinting eyes that could barely stay open. This is what you wanted. You wanted to see him like this, out of the act he puts on at work. Even though he was caring at work and made sure everyone was doing well and didn't need anything, you wanted to see the side of him that holds you close to him in the night and shares soft touches of comfort. You gave him a lopsided smile and held your hand against his as you leaned into his touch.

“Wh-” you started to say something, but quickly closed your mouth. You continued to stare at his chest, reaching up to run your fingers through his chest hair. You took a deep breath and tried again.

“What happens now?” His thumb gently rubbed your cheek as you felt him start to gain some consciousness.

“I don't know,” his voice was quiet and his eye were deeply focused on you when you made eye contact. “I'd like to have some kind of relationship with you, if that's okay with you?”

You smiled and kissed his jaw. “That is definitely okay with me, but what kind of relationship?”

“I have no idea. Just see where it goes?”

“If that means that I can cuddle up next to you and also have sex with you, then I'm down.” He leaned down to kiss you sweetly on the lips, chuckling as he pulled away.

“So just us, doing whatever, and seeing how it feels?”

“Yes.”

“Good.” He smiled and kissed you again. “Now let's stop having important conversations and go to bed.”

You stood up and guided Bruce by the hand back to your bed, letting him continue into your room to fall against the sheets as you stopped at the bathroom. You emptied your bladder, washed your hands, and quickly took your medicine before turning out the light, walking into your room, and closing the door behind you.

Bruce was still lying on top of the sheets, feet dangling off the bed and his head almost making it to a pillow. Once he felt you crawling into bed next to him, he moved to get under the covers and pull you against him. He kissed your forehead and nose and gave you a quiet “goodnight” as he started to close his eyes. You rolled over in his arms, him spooning you so you could breathe better.

As Bruce was drifting back to sleep you could hear him sighing quietly, the sounds of content helping you fall asleep yourself.