marauders smuts/imagines

mr handy man - james potter

summary: there's just something about seeing james assembling furniture

warnings: daddy kink, fingering and smut, implied cockwarming??, oh useless!reader (yeah, it's a thing. don't hate me cause reader is basically me okay?), kinda pillow princess!reader? (sue me)

word count: 2.7k

a/n: james potter take care of me challenge 😩

The floor is full of papers and tools, three big boxes of furniture open and multiple bags of screws and nails splayed all over the area.

You are sitting on the floor, reading the instructions carefully and trying to see if the screwdriver you hold in your hand is the right one. What the hell is a torx screwdriver, anyway?

The instructions offer you no help. It's full of words and barely any pictures. How are you supposed to know, then? You had never assembled anything, your dad did it for you all the time when you lived with your parents, and during university you made sure to buy or thrift pieces already assembled.

Now you are on your own. Well, not exactly on your own, you could hear James grunting as he pushed the mattress through the front door. You can see a creamy glob coming into the room you're in, followed by your panting boyfriend.

He quickly pushes it against the wall, sagging against it and exhales, exhausted from moving a mattress from the ground floor to the sixth. Up the stairs. "I can't believe you didn't want to hire movers," he complains.

You shrug, still looking at the paper in your hands. "I didn't want to spend so much money."

James walks towards you, kneeling down and kissing your forehead. "I would've paid for it, I told you that," he says, petting your hair lovingly.

You nuzzle into him, his touch like a drug to you. If you had it close to you, it was impossible to walk away from it. "I know. I just didn't want you to spend extra money."

This is a talk you've had countless times already. James has money, a lot of it, and he likes to spend it. On you and anything you may need, not really on him. And you let him; you know that's one of the many ways he expresses his love, but you try to keep mindless spending to a minimum. Both of you have working arms and legs, James has a lot of strength and a car; hiring movers was not really necessary.

James's eyes scan the instructions quickly, then he looks at the screwdriver you're holding. "That's not the right one, baby," he says.

He doesn't mean to sound condescending, he's just informing you, but you still deflate a little. "Oh," you mumble, your cheeks burning a little in shame.

Unaware of what you're feeling, James kisses your cheek. "Don't worry y'r pretty little head about it, I'll do it."

And then he's turning into work mode, hands lifting the heavy wood pieces and dexterous fingers counting screws and nails.

He starts with the bed frame. Long wood panels form a perfect rectangle, and you can only watch in something akin to admiration as his biceps strain as he holds the pieces up. His tongue sticks out in concentration, his eyes narrowed to make sure everything is perfectly aligned before he places the screws.

It barely takes him fifteen minutes to assemble it, and you can't help but feel useless as you sit on the sidelines offering him your moral support. If it had been you the one to do it, it would've probably taken you half an hour. Yet underneath that feeling of uselessness, something in your tummy flutters as you watch James work.

Still, when he looks at you with that proud smile, you can't help but reciprocate it, your little worries fading away for a moment. "Good job, Jamie!" you praise, crawling over to where he's taking out one of the nightstands so you can kiss his sweaty cheek.