Five's a Crowd | Stucky / Marvel Polyamorous LGBT Romance

Chapter 8: Nicky

July slowly bled into late August and their house began to hum with a thrumming energy, like the beating of a hummingbird's wings.

They had reached a glorious equilibriem in their relationships now that they were all four engaging in romantic and sexual intimacies. Days would spin into loving conversations and nights would be set ablaze by their various pairings and experimentations. Nicky and Steve really dug in to explore dom-sub play. They even bought some new toys that only they used together, including a riding crop that made even Nicky blush.

Outside of their relationships, however, the pandemic charged on with no real end in sight. The case numbers in their area were still low, so they felt relatively safe maintaining their outdoor only protocols, even attending some socially distanced and masked BBQs with friends.

They were all incredibly fortunate to still have jobs, even if the nature of their work had changed. Nicky had actually been promoted to a supervisory role for site visits, meaning he would be traveling less, whenever they could travel again, but doing more substantial work when he did.

He was actually working on planning a trip to meet other supervisors for an outdoor socially distanced meeting. Nicky had made it explicitly clear he would only go under very strict conditions and he was currently waiting to see if they would be met. Steve was investing serious time in his personal art, scoping out new galleries online with Ayo over zoom, and Bucky was doing a lot of work volunteering for his charity.

Besides that though, there really wasn't a lot going on in their lives and it felt like there was very little to look forward to. Slowly that thrumming energy began to shift and morph into anxiety and depression.

Nicky found himself pacing aimlessly around the house, flipping between podcasts, audiobooks, and music. Bucky and Steve were also getting twitchy and Charlie began to shut himself away for long hours, desperately trying to get work done away from all of their anxious energy.

Finally, right at the end of August, Bucky casually asked Steve if he wanted to do anything for their anniversary. Nicky nearly lept off of the couch in excitement.

"We should celebrate the day we all met! That's coming up really soon isn't it? It was the first full weekend in September?" Everyone looked at him with various expressions of surprise and intrigue.

"Nicholas, do you think maybe we shouldn't detract from them celebrating their relationship anniversary...?" Charlie asked cooly from the kitchen table where he was typing away at his laptop.

Nicky was about to scowl at him when Steve chimed in. "I...actually think that's a great idea! I wasn't thinking of doing anything much for our anniversary, maybe just...dinner and sex?"

Bucky laughed affectionately and nodded his agreement. "What are you thinking Nicky?" Bucky asked, already looking excited by the idea.

"Uhhhh..." Nicky hadn't been thinking anything, except how badly he wanted to get out of the house and how amazing it would be to do that as a quad with the intent to celebrate something. The last thing they had celebrated was Steve's art exhibit, which had been mind blowing, but also over a month ago. "Oh! What if we do one of those luxury picnics? I've seen them online. It's a service where they set up this gorgeous picnic and they provide the food, the alcohol, and it's usually somewhere really pretty and romantic?"

"That sounds lovely Nicholas," Steve said brightly. Nicky glanced towards Charlie who was still typing away on his laptop, but now with a small smile on his face.

"Bucky?" Nicky asked just to double check.

"Absolutely 100% yes! That sounds amazing!"

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