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Pietro looks a lot younger asleep like this. Looks peaceful: the seemingly eternal furrow between his brows has relaxed, and his nose isn’t wrinkled, either. Like this, he cannot click his tongue or roll his eyes or run circles around someone to antagonize them.
Wanda smiles, brushes a strand of hair out of his forehead. Almost makes her nostalgic, all of this.
Doesn’t help that they’re lounging on her bed right now; her on her stomach, him on his back, head fallen to the side into her pillow, sound asleep. One hand on his stomach, the other loose on the mattress, on the sheets. She can’t help it, she presses a kiss to the bridge of his nose, stains him scarlet with her lipstick.
The light falling in from the window, filtered through the sheer drapery around her canopy bed, paints his hair golden instead of silver. Cuts his face into gentle, soft planes instead of his usual sharpness. His skin—golden olive—shines under it so beautifully she aches; so beautifully she presses another two kisses to his skin, one to his stubbled jaw, one to his brow bone.
“Crystal,” he says, under his breath, slurred in the way people get when they’re dreaming. Wanda pauses.
It’s no calamity, in the end.
Many things are true: he is, technically, still married, even if his wife and him have been separated for quite the long while already, and haven’t really talked since. Wanda likes Crystal, actually; what happened with her and her brother aside—though she’s still a bit sour over that—she’s always been a good friend to her. She used to be married, too, and though it ended in much more dramatic tragedy, it was—though she might be biased—much more harmonious, much more filled with love than Pietro’s marriage. Pietro likes her—Wanda, always Wanda—most in the world.
She does still feel a sting right now, however, that is true, too. She has never… competed with Crystal, even when she and Pietro were still together, not like Pietro has with Vision, but…
(Ah, maybe she has wounded him much more over the years than she’s cared to look at for her own comfort’s sake; ah, perhaps he doesn’t know he’s wounding her, too, she certainly doesn’t care to show it. It’s a very infrequent emotion, this jealousy, after all.)
She pokes at his cheek, purses her lips to a pout. “Well, that’s not my name.”
Of course, there is no response. It’s important that he gets his rest; Pietro is so fast, so jittery, so far away, it’s far and in-between when he actually gets a good night of sleep. There’s restless energy radiating off him always—something that ranges from endearing to irritating—but right now, right here, he is serene. She’s happy about that. She is.
I’ve known you longer, she thinks, childishly. I’ve loved you deeper.
He’s a beautiful boy, she’s always known that; but what most people don’t know is that he’s also courageous and witty and fiercely loyal; that he’s kind and dependable and thoughtful. He’s abrasive to a fault, but in this case, in her case, it might be a blessing.
She cups his face in her hand. His skin is warm, and when she brushes up, once more just a little bit stubbly with a missed shave.
It’s a beautiful day. Languid and slow—no catastrophe on the horizon; or, well, not yet, with how things go in their business—and neither of them has any current responsibilities but each other; no teams, no appointments, no plans. Yesterday, they went on a shopping trip through Europe, her in his arms, in search for fresh produce; then they cooked a comical amount of food, Wanda poring over recipe books and Pietro zipping around the kitchen doing some of this and some of that. They still have enough leftovers—frozen in time by one of her spells—to last perhaps the rest of the week. It’s as peaceful as a life such as theirs can get.
And oh, how she adores him. It’s so much, sometimes. Sometimes, it feels like so much.
With a breath, she lies down her head beside him again. Her thighs are getting just a little cold, even with how nice a day it is, and her brother has ever been a human furnace. She curls around him with her nose tickled by his hair, her breath fanning over his throat; slings an arm around him, then retreats just a little to rest her hand flat on his chest. He’s warm, and she can feel the faint thrum of his heartbeat, the slight prickle of chest hair under her palm. She wonders what he’s dreaming about.
She could, of course, see. There are spells to read minds, spells to enter dreams, even spells to warp his dreams; to make her star in them. She could also just wake him up. She doubts he’d mind.
Instead, she trails her fingertips up his throat, watches it bob ever so slightly under her touch. His lashes are silver, almost white against his skin, and like this, they flutter just a little, eyes flickering back and forth behind closed lids. Her dreamy boy.
With a groan, he turns onto his side, shifts to get comfortable. There’s his arm around her waist now, a wave of heat rolling over her with the sudden closeness, her breathing room cramped. A strand of hair falls into his face, curling just so. His lips press together in an expression that looks almost thoughtful, and she laughs under her breath, just a little.
But, well, it kind of hurts to crane her neck to look at him with how she put her head at shoulder level when she lied back down; and when she tilts her head down, her face nudges his chest until she can’t quite breathe the way she wants to. So she turns around, too—Pietro grunts in what sounds like sleepy displeasure—until he’s spooning her. She thinks she got her hair into his face like this, but, well, it’s his own fault for dreaming about his not-exactly-ex-wife.
Apropos. “Wanda,” he murmurs, nuzzling into her hair. His breath is so hot, so hot, so hot on her scalp; so hot that it makes her shiver, that it makes thrills rush down her spine and into her limbs.
Hmm. Maybe forgiveness is in order. Just maybe, though!
Wanda is just about to settle in and perhaps take another nap, too—she deserves a honey-sweet and sticky day, after all, she thinks; they both do—when there’s suddenly a hand squeezing at her stomach. Shifting under the satin of her nightgown to get another squeeze in, this time skin-on-skin, electric. He presses a kiss to her ear.
“Well, good morning,” she says to the room in front of her; bookshelves barely concealed by canopy drapery; the nightstand with the potted plant; the chest with a few handy magic artifacts for emergencies; the rug. Pietro grunts in response.
He’s not even hard when she presses back against him. Still, he squeezes her again.
“You smell so good,” he says into her hair. She can feel his breath everywhere. And she does smell good; all perfume and incense. Though this pervert is probably talking about just general body scent, too.
(Not that she doesn’t like his.)
She considers telling him about his sleep talking for a moment. About Crystal; about herself; ask him playfully teasing what the hell he was dreaming that involved both of them. Playfully tug as his hair just a little, caress the nape of his neck, make him squirm against her. But, well, he isn’t even hard.
And also, she doesn’t really want to make him feel bad by bringing up Crystal and all the baggage that comes with that. It’s not like it matters, in the end, because this, right here, is what counts. Is what’s real.
“You should have woken me,” he says, almost scolding. “I slept for way too long.”
“Do you want to get up?”
He seems to think this over for a moment; her brother, always in movement. Then he squeezes himself closer. “No, I’m good.”
And he is, is he not? Both of them are.