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Here’s the thing: living in an apartment with four other people is both frustrating and exhausting, especially when those four other people are as weird as Peter’s roommates are.
Drax is constantly clogging the toilet. Rocket keeps “improving” things in their apartment by taking them apart and then putting them back together in weird, complicated ways that Peter’s pretty sure don’t follow the guidelines of their rental agreement. Groot is actually an ideal roommate on his own, but he enables Rocket to the point where Peter wonders if he should stage an intervention, and also, he never takes out the trash. And Gamora —
Well. Gamora is Gamora.
Still, it’s not so bad. They’re a weird little group, but they’re also his best friends, even if they sometimes make his life more difficult than it should be.
That being said – having to put up with Gamora’s frightening sister regularly is a difficulty he could definitely live without.
Peter doesn’t actually live with Nebula - thank God. As far as Peter knows, Nebula lives in an apartment on the other side of town. But she visits Gamora in their apartment often enough that she’s become a difficulty in Peter’s life regardless of wherever the hell she actually lives.
Things used to be easier. Nebula used to hardly visit at all, and when she did, it was only a couple of times a month, and she only stopped by long enough to pick Gamora up and not-so-subtly spare her sister’s roommates and their apartment as a whole a dirty look, before the two of them would leave to grab lunch, or whatever. But now, Nebula lingers. Now, she visits the apartment at least once a week, and when she does, she comes inside and stays.
Peter is mildly terrified by this turn of events. This is because he’s mildly terrified of Nebula in general, for reasons including but not limited to the fact that every time he even glances in her direction, she looks like she wants to stab him. And yes, sure, the same could be said for Gamora or any of his other roommates, save probably Groot. But none of them would ever actually stab him. Probably. Nebula he isn’t so sure about. In fact, Nebula radiates “perfectly willing to stab just about anyone” energy. And this energy only intensifies whenever she interacts with one of Peter’s roommates, so for the life of him, he can’t figure out why she’d want to start hanging around their apartment at all.
That is – until Peter is startled by the realization that Nebula’s lingering around in their apartment happens to coincide with Peter’s sister’s apartment complex flooding.
It took him a while to connect the dots. For a while, he was mainly concentrating on making sure Mantis felt comfortable in his home for however long her apartment’s repairs would take. At first, he’d been reluctant to let her stay with him at all — he knew how territorial his roommates were, especially Rocket — but when Mantis pouted at him with her gigantic eyes, Peter had been defenseless. And it turned out he didn’t have a reason to worry, because Mantis got along with his roommates just fine. She and Drax became thick as thieves, and Gamora seemed to enjoy just having another woman in the apartment. Even Rocket, normally the most irritated by the presence of strangers, started teaching Mantis some sign language so she could better understand Groot. Still, the first time Peter noticed Mantis interacting with Nebula, he’d been surprised. It wasn’t like she and Mantis had anything in common. Mantis was like sunshine personified and Nebula was…well. Whatever the opposite of that was. But Peter wrote off Mantis and Nebula’s increased interaction as proof of his sister being the most likable person to ever exist, and thought nothing of it.
That is, until after Mantis’ apartment complex finished repairs, when Nebula walked into Peter’s living room, stood there for a second, and then demanded, “Where’s Mantis?”
Peter, who’d been in the process of unloading the dishwasher, paused with a plate still in his hands. “Uh…right this very second? Or just, like, in general?”
Nebula stared at him like he was the dirt on the bottom of her shoe.
Quickly, Peter said, “They finished fixing the water damage from the flooding in Mantis’ apartment and she moved back a few days ago.”
Nebula blinked.
Rocket, playing video games on the couch, set down his controller and turned to raise his eyebrows at Nebula. “You do realize she didn’t actually live here,” he drawled. “Right?”
Nebula’s fists clenched. “Of course I do, idiot,” she said. “I just thought — ”
Then she faltered. In fact, if Peter didn’t know better, he’d swear she looked embarrassed.
“Nevermind,” Nebula finally said, and then spun on her heel and headed towards Gamora’s room without another word.
And that was about the moment when Peter felt a metaphorical lightbulb flash over his head.
“We have to get them together,” Peter says when he barges into Gamora’s room the second after Nebula leaves the apartment.
Gamora looks up from the book she’s reading in bed, blinking. “Who?”
“Mantis and Nebula.”
Gamora gives Peter a blank look. “What are you talking about?”
“Uh, obviously, I’m talking about how your sister has it monumentally, embarrassingly, and horrendously bad for my sister.”
Gamora looks at Peter for a moment, then shifts her gaze back to her book, lips pursed as she says, “My sister’s love life is none of my business,” which feels a lot like an admission.
“Listen,” Peter says. “I know it sounds crazy, but…I really think they could be good for each other.”
Gamora looks away from her book to arch her eyebrows. “Nebula and Mantis?”
“I know, I know, but hear me out. It’s an opposites attract thing, right? Mantis could help mellow Nebula out, and Nebula…maybe she could keep Mantis grounded, just a little. Plus, Mantis has been super lonely since she and Carina broke up last year. She needs to move on, so, why shouldn’t she do it with my roommate’s sister?”
Gamora purses her lip again, but she's set her book aside to sit up straight, which Peter personally thinks is progress. “You really want to set them up?”
“Yeah,” Peter says. “I mean, c'mon. Don’t they both deserve to be happy, or whatever?”
Gamora regards Peter silently for a moment. “Since when is Nebula’s happiness your priority?” She asks finally.
“Well, it’s not, generally speaking,” Peter admits, and Gamora rolls her eyes. “But…I don’t know. I mean, she’s your sister. Right?”
Gamora blinks, and suddenly, this, too, feels like an admission.
Which is stupid, because it shouldn’t. Gamora is Peter’s roommate – Gamora is Peter’s friend. She's seen him at his worst – throwing up on the kitchen floor after getting too shit-faced with Rocket one night, that one time Drax registered him as a sex offender because he went too far with a prank, or that other time he panicked because a cop was inspecting their apartment and Peter thought he’d been keeping a bag of meth in his closet but it turned out it'd just been a bag of aquarium rocks the whole time – and after all that, he still hasn’t scared her off. So of course he cares about Gamora’s sister’s well-being, because he cares about Gamora. After everything they’ve been through, that shouldn’t be an admission at all.
And yet, under the weight of her stare, Peter glances away, feeling strangely caught regardless.
“If we were to set them up,” Gamora finally begins. “And notice that I said if… how exactly would you propose we do it?”
Peter looks back at her, blinking, too. Then, at last, he grins.
“The game,” Peter announces to the living room two nights later, “Is True American.”
“Yes, Quill,” Rocket says with an eye-roll. “We know.”
For some reason, Rocket puts a lot of effort into pretending to be uninterested in True American. This, of course, is because Rocket pretends to be uninterested in a lot of things. Still, no amount of pretending can make Peter forget that the last time they played, Rocket nearly took Drax’s eye out trying to win.
Drax, who is unabashed about his intense passion for the game, demands, “Why can we not just start playing?”
“Because Nebula needs to know the rules,” Peter explains, gesturing to his potential sister-in-law, who stands next to Mantis with her arms crossed.
Nebula rolls her eyes. “I think I can figure my way around a drinking game, thanks.”
“This one’s different,” says Mantis, who was still living with Peter when he created the game nearly ten years ago. She knows the game better than nearly anyone, though she rarely wins – she’s kinda the embodiment of the I’m just happy to be here meme. “There are rules.”
“Exactly,” Peter says. “Rule number one: the floor is lava.”
Groot grins and signs, “The rule Drax always forgets about.”
Drax scowls, and Rocket snickers.
“These beers are the pawns,” Gamora continues, gesturing to their revamped coffee table, which has beer cans lined up in an X shape and a giant bottle of whiskey sitting dead center. “The whiskey is the king of the castle.”
“Yeah, the game’s pretty much half Candy Land, half drinking game,” Rocket pipes up.
“I like to think of it as a drinking game with a loose, Candy Land-like structure,” Drax counters.
“Whatever,” Rocket rolls his eyes. “The point is – this shit’s intense.”
“Correct,” Peter agrees, then turns to Nebula, clapping his hands together. “So – any questions?”
Nebula just stares at the group in front of her, then declares, “This sounds like the most idiotic game I’ve ever heard of.”
“Aw, c’mon, it’s fun,” Mantis says, and there’s those big puppy-dog eyes again. “I’ll even let you be on my team.”
Nebula turns so red that Peter doesn’t even have the heart to tell her that being on Mantis’ team isn’t all it’s cracked up to be, and then says with a huff, “Fine, I’ll play.”
Peter cheers, and when Nebula’s not paying attention, he gives Gamora a pointed look, as if to say, Your sister totally has the hots for my sister and they’re totally gonna hook up by the end of the night and I can’t believe you ever questioned my wisdom on these matters.
Gamora rolls her eyes, so he thinks the look was effectively communicated.
“Well, if we’re all ready…” Then Peter counts, “One, two, three, four! JFK!”
“FDR!” Everyone else shouts.
After that is chaos.
Mantis and Nebula make up the first team, Groot and Rocket make up the second, and Peter, Gamora, and Drax are on team number three. Admittedly, Groot and Rocket’s team usually wins, but Peter has a pretty good feeling about tonight; that is, if Drax doesn’t step into the lava ten minutes in again.
That being said, tonight isn’t about winning. Tonight, the ultimate goal is to set Nebula and Mantis up, and so far, Peter has a good feeling about that, too. Mantis isn’t the best player, but her saint-like levels of patience evidently make her a decent teacher, because Nebula is getting a hang of the game pretty quickly. In fact, Nebula is actually shaping up to be a good player, or at least a competitive one. And she and Mantis seem to be a good team if the way they quickly and efficiently work together is any indication. There are even a few occasions where Mantis tells a joke and Nebula smiles, which was not a thing Peter thought Nebula knew how to do. It’s all going surprisingly well, so Peter decides to up the ante.
“Oh no, Nebula!” Peter shouts when Nebula moves to stand on an armchair near the TV, really playing up the dramatics. “You’re in the amber waves of grain!”
Nebula stares at him. “The what? What does that mean?”
“It means…”
Shit. What did they decide it meant again?
“It means you have to lose your jacket,” Gamora says, quickly and expertly, without even breaking character or glancing in Peter’s direction, and Peter feels a wave of gratitude. We make a great team, he thinks to himself, and then feels abruptly embarrassed for thinking it, and then, embarrassed by feeling embarrassed. He decides to blame it on the beer.
Nebula’s brow furrows. “My jacket?”
“Yeah,” Peter says. “You heard her.”
“I don’t remember this rule,” Mantis says with a frown.
Peter waves a hand. “It’s a new one. Amendment 28.”
“Oh my God,” Nebula groans. “You know, if I could just see a rulebook for this stupid game – ”
“There’s no rulebook,” Peter guffaws. “What am I, a loser?”
Nebula lifts her eyebrows. “You really want me to answer that one?”
“Hey!” Peter shouts, pointing at her. “Jacket off, now!”
“Ugh,” Nebula groans, but she obediently shoves her leather jacket off and into the lava, leaving her wearing only a white tank top. “Fine. Happy?”
Peter glances at Mantis, who is not-so-subtly giving Nebula a slow once-over, her eyes lingering especially on the muscles of Nebula’s arms – which are surprisingly large, actually, holy shit, how much does Nebula even lift?
“Just peachy,” he tells Nebula with a grin.
The rest of the game proceeds in a similar fashion. At one point, Nebula and Mantis are forced to stand together on the same tiny ottoman, and Mantis blushes so hard at the sight of Nebula towering over her that it's a wonder her face doesn’t set aflame. Later, Mantis nearly steps into the lava, and Nebula has to grab her by the waist to pull her back onto the couch before her feet can touch the ground. And later, after that, Mantis has to tug Nebula by the hand to prevent her from falling off the couch, and when Nebula grabs onto Mantis to steady herself, she accidentally puts a hand on her ass, and then they both blush, stepping apart from one another so abruptly that they nearly fall off the couch again.
Honestly, it’s actually astounding how much sexual tension they have. It’d be exhausting if it wasn’t proof that Peter’s plan was working perfectly. Every time he glances at Gamora with a smirk, she just rolls her eyes and glances away, but not quickly enough for Peter to miss the amusement on her face.
About an hour later, all three games are tied with the same amount of points, and everything hinges on which team gets to advance first.
“And the only way we can break the tie,” Peter explains. “Is through the Iron Curtain.”
“What?” Groot signs, looking confused.
“Two people have to go behind the Iron Curtain,” Peter says, pointing at the metal sliding door that leads into his bedroom. “And kiss.” And then as an afterthought, he adds, “With tongue.”
“ What? ” Rocket demands.
“I’m not kissing any of you,” Drax says with disgust.
“Shut up, Drax,” Gamora says coolly.
“Yeah, no fucking way,” Rocket says. “I ain’t kissing – ”
Peter kicks him hard, shooting him a look, and Rocket glowers but shuts his mouth.
“This isn’t usually part of the game,” Mantis says uncertainly, and then her eyes travel over to Peter, her gaze pointed and scrutinizing.
“Hey!” Peter shouts quickly, then he bangs a fist on the coffee table. “Order! Order in the court!”
Mantis lifts her eyebrows.
“Now listen,” Peter says. “On the count of three, everyone is going to pick a number inside their head without saying it out loud,” He says, pointedly looking at Drax. “Then they’re going to hold up that same amount of fingers to their forehead.”
“What number do we pick?” Drax says.
“Any number,” Peter says. “Except Nebula, who should definitely pick two.”
Nebula frowns. “What?”
“I mean, you can pick any number you want,” Peter says casually. “But you should pick two.”
“Why would I pick two?” Nebula demands.
“Eh, don’t think too hard about it.”
“What the hell — ”
“Okay, on the count of three,” Peter cuts in. “One, two, three — ”
They all raise their hands to their foreheads in quick succession. Rocket holds up a five, and next to him, Drax holds up a four, and both let out identical sighs of relief when they realize they have different numbers. Across from them, and according to plan and despite all protesting, Nebula holds up two fingers to her forehead, to Peter’s smug satisfaction.
When Peter turns to Mantis, he knows she’ll be holding up a two. Deep in his very bones, he knows it. Two is Mantis’ favorite number – this is the thing that the entire plan hinges on.
But when Peter turns to Mantis, she’s only holding up one finger to her forehead.
“What the hell, Mantis?” Peter demands.
Mantis frowns. “What?”
“What do you mean, what?” Peter says in frustration. “You were supposed to — ”
But then Peter is cut off by the sound of Drax bursting into laughter, his shoulders shaking as he points at Peter.
“What?” Peter says, confused.
And then he turns to Gamora to see she has three fingers raised to her forehead, the exact number of fingers that Peter has raised to his.
So that’s how Peter and Gamora end up locked in Peter’s room, with Drax, Rocket, Mantis, and Nebula gathered on the other side, loudly chanting, “KISS! KISS! KISS!”
“This is your fault, you know,” Gamora says.
She sounds even-keeled, but her knees are pulled up to her chest in a way that looks very defensive, and she keeps tugging at a loose thread in the top she’s wearing. They’re sitting on the floor with their backs against Peter’s door, with a suitable, safe three inches between them.
Needless to say, they absolutely have not kissed.
Peter turns to her, offended. “What? How is it my fault?”
“Hm, let’s see,” Gamora says, irritation creeping into her tone. “One, this entire thing was your idea.”
“You helped!”
“Two,” Gamora continues as if she hadn’t heard him, “You hinged this entire idea on an ill-thought-out and baseless plan involving Nebula and Mantis picking the same number, which didn’t even happen.”
“Well, I didn’t know they weren’t gonna pick the same number!”
“Yes, but you didn’t know they would pick the same number, either, hence the ill-thought-out and baseless plan.”
“Well, maybe it wouldn’t be so ill-thought-out and baseless if you’d at least helped me out a little bit back there!”
Gamora turns to him, eyes blazing. “Me?”
“Yes! I’ve been the one carrying all the weight all night!”
“Oh, please. I’m the one who came up with the idea for Nebula to take off her jacket. Which is more success than you’ve had thus far, by the way.”
“Well, that was just luck.”
Gamora laughs humorlessly. “Oh my God. This is so stupid! I didn’t even want to be part of your idiotic plan in the first place!”
“Then why did you say yes?!”
“Because you waltzed into my room waxing poetic about making our sisters happy with that stupid puppy-dog look in your eyes and I — ” Abruptly, Gamora cuts off, then looks pointedly away from him. “Whatever. My point is, this is completely your fault.”
“Says the one who picked the same number as me,” Peter mutters.
“Excuse me? You picked the same number as me.”
“Hmm, you know, I really don’t I don’t think I did – ”
Gamora lets out a scream of frustration. “Ugh, stop it! Look, let’s just – fake it and send a picture to them and hope they buy it.”
“I HEARD THAT!” Rocket shouts from the other side of the door. “If you two don’t do anything less than a totally authentic make-out session, I’ll know, alright?”
“Fine!” Gamora shouts, rolling her eyes, and then she stands to her feet.
Peter watches her, alarmed. “What are you doing?”
Gamora lets out a huff. “Getting this over with, what does it look like?”
“What?” Peter says sharply, standing up, too.
Gamora looks away from him. “Look, Rocket is clearly never going to let us live this down either way. We might as well just do it and get it over with.”
Panic, sharp and unreasonable, flares in Peter’s gut. “Whoa, whoa, wait. This is – I’m not kissing you.”
Gamora looks back at him, arching her eyebrows. “Hey, I’m not exactly thrilled about kissing you, either.”
“That’s not what I – ” Peter starts, then stops, his mouth snapping shut with an audible click. Gamora’s eyebrows arch higher, and suddenly, his face feels warm. “Look, I just don’t want – ”
“Quill,” Gamora says, her tone steady and even. “It doesn’t have to be a big deal. I mean – ” she scoffs. “We both know you’ve kissed plenty of other people before, so I know you know how this works – ”
“That’s not – ”
“Look, all it has to be is a peck, and then we can both gladly forget this ever even happened – ”
“Gamora, no, alright?” Peter says, feeling frustrated and possibly, mildly, sick. “I’m just – I’m not doing it.”
“God, Peter,” Gamora exhales. “Just kiss me already.”
“No, not like this!” Peter bursts out.
For a moment, it feels like the world has stopped spinning.
“What?” Gamora says in a quiet voice.
Shit.
“What?” Peter repeats, and almost on instinct, he takes a step back from her. “Nothing.”
“What does…” Gamora’s voice is slow, quiet, and careful. Her eyes are wide. “What does that mean?”
“Nothing,” Peter says quickly, his heart hammering in his chest, his thoughts empty of everything but static and a chanting chorus of Shit, shit, shit. “Nothing, I just – I mean, I obviously didn’t mean it like that, I just meant that we can’t like that because that’s not – you know? Like, that’s very – it’s not – I mean – ”
But the words won’t come, or if they are, they aren’t coming out right, and Gamora is still staring at him, and holy shit, this is his nightmare.
“Actually, you know what?” Peter says suddenly. “I’m just gonna – ”
And then he turns on his heel, marches toward his window, and flings it open before stepping out onto the ledge.
“Peter,” Gamora says, her voice strained. “What are you doing?”
“I’m getting the hell out of here, what does it look like?” Peter shouts back.
“Peter - ”
“It’s fine, I’ve got this!”
“You do not- ”
In fairness, he thought he did. In his mind, this was the easiest and quickest way to get away from Gamora, and once he was out the window, it wouldn’t be hard to shimmy his way across the ledge to the living room window and let himself in that way. What he failed to account for, however, was just how narrow the ledge would be, and how the living room window would most certainly be locked from the outside.
“Oh my God!” Mantis screams when she spots Peter through the living room window.
“Oh, shit,” Rocket says, leaping to his feet as he and the others move away from the “Iron Curtain” and toward the window.
“I’m fine!” Peter says, even as he’s plastered to the window and one strong wind away from falling to his death. “This is fine!”
“Quill, no!” Drax shouts. “You have so much to live for!”
In the end, Gamora nearly busts down Peter’s door in an attempt to break out of his room, and after Rocket remembers she’s in there and ever so graciously lets her out, she retrieves the key to unlatch the window, because of course only she knows where it is, and Peter stumbles into the living room and collapses onto the floor with a sigh of relief.
By the time he looks up, Gamora’s gone, marching off to her bedroom without another word.
“Listen, I don’t blame ya, buddy,” Rocket says, crouching next to Peter on the floor and patting his shoulder. “If I had to kiss Gamora, I’d probably jump outta a window, too.”
Peter lets out a groan, then buries his face back into the carpet.
The game is pretty much over after that. Rocket goes back to his room, muttering something under his breath that sounds suspiciously like, “What the hell is wrong with you people,” which is rich, coming from him, and Groot follows him not long after. Then, when Mantis and Nebula leave the apartment, Peter is so off-kilter from everything that's happened he doesn’t even take the time to congratulate himself on the fact that they’re leaving together, at the same time. That just leaves Drax, who just settles on the couch amid the mess of beers and turns on the TV without bothering to move the mess aside or attempt to even clean it up.
“What, did you want to watch something?” Drax asks when he notices Peter staring at him.
Peter sighs. “No, it’s fine.” Then he mutters under his breath, “Every time we watch TV you always hit the info button on the remote by mistake.”
“It’s not a mistake, Quill,” Drax says. “I want to learn more about the cast and crew.”
“Jesus,” Peter mutters, shaking his head, and then, at last, he turns and retreats to his bedroom, where he collapses onto his bed, stares up at the ceiling, and contemplates just what, exactly, the hell is wrong with him.
He hadn’t meant to say that. Of course he hadn’t. To say not like this, to imply there is a moment he’d want to kiss her and that he’d already thought and planned it all out, and that locked in his bedroom wasn’t the moment he’d planned…of course he hadn’t meant to say that to her. He hadn’t even known he was saying it, in the moment. He’d just…blurted it out. And he has absolutely no idea where it even came from.
Because if he did know where it came from, if it came from somewhere true and honest, if it came from some part of him that he’s desperately tried to ignore – if it came from Gamora’s quiet hidden smiles after Peter’s stupid jokes, Gamora’s tolerance bordering on occasional genuine support of his far-fetched plans, Gamora’s memorization of the exact way he takes his coffee that he’s never been brave enough to acknowledge, Gamora’s bedhead when she’s running late in the mornings and her loose laughter during movie nights when she’s had a few drinks and the furrow she gets in her brow when she’s trying to help with the appliance he’s DIY repairing…
Well, it can’t come from any of that. Because Gamora is his roommate and his friend – she is one of the most important people in his life, someone he couldn’t possibly risk losing. And if it came from that, then Peter would absolutely be in deep shit.
It's fine, Peter tells himself. What he said was an obvious slip of the tongue. Tensions and emotions were high. Gamora probably won’t even remember it in the morning, and if she does, she won’t think it was a big deal. This will be something they’ll bring up again in a few years when they’re all at the bar, and Peter will say, “Hey, remember that time…?” And Gamora will say she does remember, and she’ll laugh, and Peter will laugh, and they’ll all move on. By then, Gamora will probably be dating someone else – someone normal and not as funny as Peter who she met at work, someone who is safe and good for her and definitely not her roommate. Peter will probably be dating someone else, too. There are plenty of fish in the sea, after all. Sure, he's in a months-long dry spell right now, but there isn't a reason for that, obviously. In no time, he'll be back to cycling through girlfriends and boyfriends and one-night stands like it's his job. It's what Peter's always done; probably, it's what he'll keep doing.
And yet, Peter was the one who said Not like this. Peter, who's never had a serious relationship, who laughs and jokes and flirts without ever having to show anyone an ounce of emotional vulnerability, looked at Gamora when she asked him to kiss her for a simple, harmless bit, and said, No, not like this.
Jesus. Peter hopes Drax doesn’t find out. If he does, he’ll never live it down.
Sighing, Peter climbs out of bed and exits his room. As he heads to the bathroom to brush his teeth before bed, he notices Drax has vacated the living room, and the entire apartment feels quiet and empty.
That is, until Peter returns to his bedroom and runs right into Gamora. Because of course he does.
“Hey,” Peter says. He sounds surprised even to his own ears, which is dumb. They live in the same apartment, and Gamora’s bedroom is right across from his.
“Hi,” Gamora says after a pause. She’s wearing flannel pajama pants and a large t-shirt that Peter thinks she might’ve borrowed from Drax and never gave back. Then, even though Peter hadn’t asked, she says, “I was heading to the bathroom.”
“Oh, I was just there,” Peter says, like an idiot.
“Oh,” Gamora says. She rubs at a spot on her arm, then pushes a strand of hair behind her ear. “So. I take it you’re okay?”
Peter feels his mouth go dry. “What?”
Gamora raises an eyebrow. “You know. After nearly plunging to your death in an attempt to avoid kissing me?”
Peter laughs. The sound comes out forced. “Yeah,” he says, scratching the back of his neck. “Not my finest moment.”
“No,” Gamora agrees. “It wasn’t.”
But as she says it, the corner of her mouth curls up in the barest hint of a smile. Briefly, it feels like something turns over in Peter’s chest.
Peter ignores this feeling and says, “Hey, the plan must’ve worked, though.”
Gamora lifts her eyebrows. “Is that so?”
“Well, Mantis and Nebula did leave the apartment together.”
Gamora snorts. “And that’s your proof of success?”
“I mean...it’s not not a proof of success.”
Gamora shakes her head, but both sides of her mouth are upturned now, and something is thrumming in Peter's chest.
“Goodnight, Peter,” she says, beginning to turn away.
“Night,” Peter echoes.
And then he wraps a hand around Gamora’s elbow to tug her back, and when she turns around, he steps forward and kisses her.
The kiss is both heavy and rushed. Peter’s hands fumble in the empty air, then run through Gamora's hair, wrapping around her back and waist before settling at her hips. Gamora's hands clutch his shoulders like she might push him away, then her mouth falls open beneath his as she kisses him back, hurried and quick and almost instinctual as Peter lets out a sharp exhale into the kiss. When Peter pulls back to catch his breath, Gamora’s eyes are still fluttered closed, her chest heaving, her face flushed, and abruptly, Peter dives forward, kissing her again because it suddenly feels impossible not to.
It’s a shorter kiss this time – slower, softer, sweeter, their noses bumping together as Gamora’s hair tickles his face. And then, finally, Peter pulls back a second time. Gamora’s eyes open, her gaze following his as he stares down at her, the hand he’d cupped around her face now brushing against her jaw.
“I meant something like that,” Peter says hoarsely, his voice quiet in the stillness of the hallway.
Gamora blinks, and Peter steps away, turning at last toward his room and shutting the door behind him.
It isn’t until he’s in bed, flat on his back and staring at the ceiling again, that he thinks with absolute certainty: God, I am in such deep shit.