Chapter Text
Dating Nebula was an experience that Peter Quill often found himself feeling unprepared for.
It surprised him. He'd dated enough people in the past to feel like he could deal with whatever challenges came their way. But he never quite knew how Nebula was going to respond to anything he did.
A couple of days ago when he arrived on Knowhere, disembarking the ship Groot had taken to Earth to pick him up in, Nebula had been there in the docking bay to greet him, along with the rest of Rocket’s Guardians and Drax. He'd been ecstatic to see her, a month's worth of longing bubbling up within him. The moment he saw her, he'd wanted to pull her into an embrace and breathe in her scent; wanted to feel those surprisingly soft blue lips against his like he'd been craving since the last lingering kiss they'd shared at the end of her previous visit to him.
Instead she'd gone for a handshake. A slightly stiff outstretch of her arm that made even Rocket roll his eyes at how restrained she was being. It wasn't like it was a secret that she and Peter were an item now. As a matter of fact, when they'd told their friends they were a couple, they hadn’t even been that surprised.
He’d compromised by foregoing the handshake and the kiss in favor of simply giving her the same kind of hug he gives to the rest of his friends. It didn’t bother him; he wasn’t surprised in the slightest that Nebula didn't like public displays of affection.
Private ones on the other hand…
They'd returned to her apartment at the end of the day, and practically the millisecond the door closed behind them, Nebula's stoic mask lifted and she was on him, gripping the collar of his jacket tight and attacking his lips. She'd kissed him like she’d been holding herself back from doing so all day. Like she was starving. So hard that it bruised. Not that Peter cared in the slightest as he kissed back, just as ravenous.
She frequently managed to catch him off-guard with how affectionate she could be when he wasn’t expecting it.
But the opposite was also true.
That night as they lay in Nebula’s bed, he’d fallen asleep with the blue woman in his arms, her back against his chest and their legs entwined, the cool metal that covered parts of her bare legs feeling soothing against his skin in the heat of the city. But when he'd woken up a few hours later, he found that she'd put distance between them and was now sleeping on the other side of the bed, as far away from him as she could get. He didn’t know why.
So every new intimate action he tried with Nebula felt a lot like a coin toss. It seemed to make no sense which stuff she responded well to and which she didn't. He expected her to snap at him when he gave her a love tap on her ass for the first time, but she’d actually laughed. But then when he called her pretty one time, her face fell as if she’d just been slapped. It made no sense to him, and he wished she’d be more open with him about how she felt when he did this sort of stuff.
In the four months since they’d gotten together, Nebula had become far more comfortable with different acts of intimacy. But she still had obstacles to overcome, as he had learned the hard way last time they were together. Nebula wanted him just as much as he wanted her (and they'd apparently both been having steamy fantasies about each other for well over a year), but when they'd actually tried to have sex, it hadn't exactly gone according to plan.
It was one thing to kiss him, and cuddle with him, and share dirty secrets with him. It was another thing entirely to put all her trust in him and allow him control over the wellbeing of her body when all she'd known her whole life was people hurting that body in unforgivable ways- twisting and mutilating and altering her biological makeup until she was more steel than flesh.
So when they were in the middle of making out and their kisses became more heated, or when the casual touches Peter gave her ended up a little too handsy, and Nebula suddenly put a stop to it, he had to remind himself that she wasn't doing it to frustrate him. He got the impression she knew exactly what she was doing to him and felt guilty about it.
He told her that he was okay with waiting as long as she needed until she was ready to try having sex again, and he meant it, but he couldn’t help but wonder if there was something he could do to help her. He couldn’t make her trauma go away, but surely there was a way he could make it a little easier for her to deal with?
The perfect idea fell into his lap on the third day of his visit…
Peter had kept himself busy that day while Nebula was taking care of her leaderly duties around the city. Rocket and the other Guardians had been called away on a mission to take care of some migrating carnivorous space antelope that were causing problems for a village, so he'd gone to see what Drax had been up to.
The Kylosian was almost always followed by a gaggle of children now, and although he loved them, they were a lot for one person to handle. Thankfully, Peter was good with kids and was more than happy to help entertain them to give Drax a bit of a break.
He'd tried to be a responsible and cool role model at first, but the kids' playfulness was infectious, and soon he found himself roped into a city-wide game of hide and seek with them. This led to hours of running all over the place, and combined with the warm temperature, Peter had ended the day very sweaty and kinda smelly.
His game with the kids had lasted so long that he actually arrived back at Nebula's apartment after she did.
“Good to see you getting out more,” she teased. She was sitting cross-legged on her bed, clad in grey cargo pants that didn't quite go with the black business casual button-up shirt she had on, with several sheets of paper spread out in front of her. She hardly looked up from them as Peter walked in.
“I get out plenty,” he insisted. It wasn't untrue. He'd started going for morning jogs around his grandpa's neighborhood, and he chatted with some of the old folks that had started to recognise him. He'd also signed up for guitar lessons a few months ago. And he was pretty sure that seeing his therapist counted as socialising, right?
Peter walked over to the bed and bent down, giving Nebula a kiss on her temple. He then leaned over the papers, not noticing when Nebula flinched away from him a little, scrunching her nose.
“Whatcha reading?” he asked, picking up one of the sheets only for Nebula to swiftly snatch it back.
“Don't fuck up my organization,” she snapped, and Peter couldn't help but grin. He never would have imagined when he first encountered Nebula on Ronan's ship all those years ago that one day she'd be scolding him for messing with her paperwork system (or that he'd be kissing her hello in the evenings for that matter), but here they were. “These are just all the records of correspondence between me and this water company that-”
Peter let out a long, exaggerated yawn. “God, that's boring. I think you've had enough of that for one day,” he sat beside her on the bed, ignoring her unamused glare. He wrapped his arms around her middle, playfully rubbing his cheek against hers so that his beard tickled her face. He lowered his voice, breath hot against her ear. “I've been waiting to spend some time with you all day.”
To his disappointment, Nebula wrinkled her nose and shoved him away.
“I'm not ‘spending time’ with you reeking like that,” she looked him up and down. Peter examined himself, suddenly feeling gross. His shirt was sticking to his sweat-covered back, his hair was damp, and he was rocking some embarrassing pit stains.
He scooted to the edge of the bed, putting some distance between Nebula and his stench. “Right. I'll just go shower then,” he excused himself, then turned around when he was halfway to the washroom. “But when I get back, I'd better not see you working. Or no smooches for you,” he threatened with a wink.
She rolled her eyes at him. “Sorry that my job is such a mood killer,” she said as if she wasn't taking him seriously, only to immediately start picking up the papers and setting them aside. Peter held back a laugh. “And can you not take forever in there for once?”
Oh boy. She'd bugged him about this before. “I don't take forever.”
“Peter, we've been together long enough for me to know that when you say you're gonna take a shower, I'm not gonna see you for an hour,” she gave him a stern stare. He felt a little guilty then. Nebula was busy a lot these days. She got up early and was preoccupied with all sorts of jobs around the city all day. When she returned home it was already late, so the time she could spend with him was already minimal without him wasting even more of it.
It wasn't like he meant to take so long in the shower. He'd always been that way though, even as a kid. Showers were relaxing and soothing, and it was easy for him to zone out with no way to occupy himself or entertain his brain in there. He'd tried wearing Airpods in the shower not too long ago to try and combat this and ended up losing one of them down the drain, so the jury was still out on how he was supposed to overcome that.
He leaned against the doorframe, crossing his arms and raising an eyebrow at his girlfriend. “Have you considered that maybe you just take really short showers?” Nebula narrowed her eyes. “You're in and out of there in like five minutes tops. How do you even get anything clean? Maybe you're the weirdo here?”
Her face fell, and Peter’s stomach sank. Shit. He'd only wanted to tease her a little bit. Had she taken his words seriously?
“I’m only kidding around, Nebs. I don't really think you’re-”
“I know,” her voice was harsher, “do you think I'm that thin-skinned?” she shifted on the bed, stretching her legs out and letting them hang a little over the edge of the mattress. “I just don't like being in the shower, so I get them over with as quick as possible. Simple as that.”
This sounded crazy to Peter, and he was about to tell her so, when he started to connect the dots together.
“Oh! You don't want the water to get into your cybernetics. Makes perfect sense.”
Nebula looked at him like he'd just spoken in a language she'd never heard before. “No? I'm fine with water. Don't you remember that mission on Am-Sera when we were stuck wading through those fucking lagoons for like an hour? I was fine then.”
Peter thought back to that mission. It had sucked and they were all miserable and muddy by the end of it, but now he could at least explain why he was able to perfectly recall the way Nebula had looked during that time. Her clothes had been soaked through and clung to her body, showing just how well-toned she was. And he specifically recalled one moment where he'd spoken to her and she turned to him, slightly out of breath with beads of water trickling down the side of her face and along her jaw, and his breath had caught in his throat.
“Oh yeah…” said Peter, levelly, before shooting her a smirk. “Yeah, I've totally seen you wet before.”
At this, Nebula lowered her eyes. Peter had noticed that during this visit she hadn't been nearly as receptive to his dirty jokes as usual. Normally she would have some kind of reaction, be it pretending to be offended or (his preferred response) making one right back at him. He got the feeling that their failed attempt at lovemaking last month was the cause of this. The experience (though painful as hell for him) had ultimately brought the two of them closer; she was more comfortable than ever acting romantic with him when they were alone, but when anything sexual in nature came up she retreated. Maybe she was afraid of getting carried away and something going wrong again?
“So… what's the deal with showers then?” he asked.
Nebula looked at him like the answer should be obvious. “How would you like getting undressed and seeing this?” she gestured down her body.
The Terran man's eyes drank her in, slowly, to make it obvious to her that he was checking her out. “Sounds pretty great to me,” he grinned.
Peter saw Nebula’s cheeks turn darker but her frown persisted. He thought this was going to just be another silly thing they bickered about; and hadn't expected her to react so seriously to any of this.
“Look, some days it's hard enough just looking in a mirror and seeing what I look like,” Nebula clenched and unclenched her metal fist as she spoke. “Being naked and seeing everything at once is even worse…” she tried to look Peter in the eye then but found it too difficult, her sight instead shifting to the wall just to the side of his head. Her voice lowered until it was barely a mumble. “I'm hideous.”
For a long moment, Peter didn't say a word, simply staring dumbfounded at Nebula. Hideous?
He looked the woman over again, taking in her features. Her eyes, black like the deepest voids; some people found them scary but Peter thought they were mesmerizing. It was so easy to get lost in them as he tried to uncover the emotions hidden behind them like little mysteries just for him. Her arms, one made up of deadly nanotech, the other made of finely sculpted muscle, both capable of literally sweeping him off his feet. Her long, shapely legs and her hips that swung in such a hypnotic way when she walked. The pretty blueberry colored stripe that ran down the middle of her face and throat, tantalizingly framing her lips and disappearing beneath the collar of her shirt. He wondered how far down that stripe travelled…
In short, he found Nebula incredibly attractive. He thought she was well aware of that.
“You are not hideous,” he told her, and he watched her expression change. A lowering of her head; those black eyes staring at him bluntly beneath long lashes. He could practically hear her inner voice snapping at him to not take pity on her. “You're gorgeous, Nebs. I mean it.”
Beautiful. Stunning. Handsome. Sexy. He wanted to say all those words and more but was worried she'd think he was laying it on too thick.
Her glare faltered. She never seemed to know how to react when receiving a compliment. Knowing what he did about her past, he wouldn't be that surprised if her only experiences with them before joining the Guardians of the Galaxy were with the manipulative sort spewed by Thanos. That would explain why receiving compliments or praise made her look so conflicted all the time.
“Come on, I'd never lie-”
“You lie all the time.” Nebula cut him off.
Peter looked sheepish. He couldn't argue with that.
Moving to sit down beside her on the bed, Peter's fingers moved to Nebula's chin and he gently turned her face towards him. “About specifically you being gorgeous, I would never lie.”
His thumb moved up to trace beneath Nebula's bottom lip, causing a light blush to dust her cheeks. He wanted to kiss her but felt like she wouldn't appreciate it with him still smelling like a pile of gym towels.
“You haven't seen all of me yet…” she muttered, staring down at her hands clasped in her lap- metal one over organic one.
He hadn't. Their attempt at sex hadn't quite progressed that far when Nebula's panic attack put an end to it.
Peter chewed thoughtfully on his lip. He wished she could see herself the way he did, but he understood why that was hard for her. If he could, he would make all of her pain and trauma go away in an instant.
Of course, he couldn't do that. Nobody could.
That's when an idea hit him.
His hand moved from her chin to her cheek, cupping it and caressing it with the pad of his thumb.
“Take a shower with me.”
Typical of him, the words burst forth from his mouth before he could think them through. Nebula jerked away from his touch, and Peter felt moronic. Of course he shouldn't have said that out of nowhere.
He tried to justify himself. “I mean, so I can wash you and you wouldn't have to look at yourself.”
Nebula bit back. “But then you'd see me, dumbshit.”
“...don't you want me to see you naked eventually?” he asked, holding back a smirk.
She got that look in her eyes again. The one that made her look like a trapped animal searching for an escape route.
“...yes.” she muttered.
Peter was starting to become more confident in his plan. “Then now's as good a time as any, right? You can wash me and make sure I don't spend forever in the shower. And I can wash you so you don't have to look at your body,” he then winked at her, “all you'd have to do is enjoy the view.”
Nebula hesitated a moment, her eyes darting to Peter's right bicep, half-visible beneath the short sleeve of the dark blue baseball shirt he had on, and then away from it just as swiftly. He really wanted to tease her for being so blatantly thirsty for him, but didn't want to squander this chance to help Nebula get out of her comfort zone.
“You're not gonna like what you see,” she warned him.
“Yes I will,” replied Peter without hesitation. Of this, he was certain.
He could see the walls Nebula constantly had up around her begin to crack. She'd already lowered them for him more than he thought she would be capable of, but a part still remained, just high enough to prevent him from being able to jump over and reach her. Peter swore he would help her knock it down for good if it was the last thing he did.
Nebula's face was stone-still for a while, but Peter could tell that internally, she was having a battle with herself.
“You can say no,” he enveloped her more organic hand in his. His fingertips ran over the two callouses she had at the base of her pinkie and ring fingers; she liked to get on his case for stroking them like this but he liked their texture so he didn’t plan on stopping. “I'd love it if you said yes, but I'm not gonna hold it against you if you're not ready for this. I'm a patient man.”
His girlfriend gave him a look that practically screamed “bullshit” in response to that last part, but he saw some of the tension leave her shoulders.
At last, after a short eternity, she sighed, nodding slightly.
“Fine. Let's get this over with.”
She snatched her hand away from him and got up from the bed, stalking towards the bathroom. Her movement was so sudden that it took Peter a moment to register it. When he did, he hurried to stand up, a little clumsily, hitting his ankle against the leg of the bed and swearing under his breath in the process.
“O-okay!” he quickly shook off the pain in his foot and half-limped-half-speed-walked after her, trying not to look too eager.