Mr. Roger's Neighborhood
This will be a series of stand alone vignettes about Steve's team post Civil War just doing mundane day to day stuff. This story is a companion piece to my story Daybreak, though you can read this alone. The team is living in a safehouse in Baltimore. Bucky joins them a year in, but some of these stories will take place prior to that. There is no over arcing plot and they can be read in any order.
This chapter takes place about 4 months after Civil War. Steve and his team are on the run and living with Sharon Carter. Steve and Sharon are dating. The information about Sharon's family is limited so a good deal of this is speculation or made up for convenience. Enjoy!
Meet the Parents
Steve, Sam and Scott looked helplessly at the backyard of Sharon's house. It had been almost three months since he and the team had moved into the safe house in Baltimore. The house had been empty for years before they moved in, and while the inside had been periodically maintained, the outside looked like something out of a horror movie. When they weren't on a mission, Sharon had kept them busy fixing the place up. Steve had been putting off this particular job, but Sharon had insisted he start today.
"Anyone know anything about lawn maintenance?" he asked.
"Not really," Scott said. "My ex and I had an apartment and I worked in electrical in prison."
"Sam, you had a house."
"I also had an HOA," Sam said.
"Well I grew up in Brooklyn, so it might be time to consult the internet." Steve went back inside to get the laptop. Sharon was in the kitchen talking on the phone.
"No, I won't be home for Thanksgiving this year," Sharon said. She sounded frustrated. "No please don't wire me money. It's not about the cost, I just can't get the time. No, don't come here, my place isn't set up, and it's- it's tiny, I don't even have a kitchen table and the oven is broken."
Steve looked Sharon curiously.
"No, i'll see if I can get away for Christmas. Ok, I'll talk to you later, bye," she said quickly, pressing end call on her phone.
"Who was that?" Steve asked.
"My mother," Sharon said shortly. "It's only September and she wants to know what my plans for Thanksgiving are."
Steve opened up the laptop and turned it on. "I agree that inviting them here is a bad idea, but why did you lie about the house?"
"If she thinks I live in a shoebox, she won't come verbally rip it to shreds," Sharon told him.
"Well why don't we go?" Steve suggested, typing 'lawn maintenance' into Google. "I should probably meet them at some point."
Sharon turned away from him and started to empty the dishwasher. "You did, at Aunt Peggy's funeral. Besides, with it being the first Thanksgiving on the run, I thought it would be nice to spend it together."
Steve shook his head, scanning through several results. "Nat's Russian and Wanda's Sokovian, I don't think they care too much, and Sam and Scott are probably just going to watch Football all day and drink beer until they pass out. It'll be ok if we go away for one day."
"What if we get a mission?"she said. Steve thought he heard a note of distress in her voice.
"Your parents live in Alexandria, that's only an hour away," he pointed out. "Let's go."
"You weren't invited," Sharon blurted out.
"What?" Steve asked in surprise. "They do know you're living with me, right?"
Sharon smirked. "I think you have that backwards. You're living with me."
Steve frowned. Sharon was going out of her way to answer his questions as vaguely as possible. A thought dawned on him. "Sharon, your parents know about us, right?"
"It hasn't really come up," she said, avoiding his gaze.
"It hasn't come up?" he asked in disbelief. She had never told them. "We've been dating for almost three months."
"I wanted to wait until it was serious."
"I thought it was pretty serious when I moved in with you," Steve said exasperated. Admittedly their relationship had moved a bit quickly, but he had no intention of ending things. He had thought she felt the same.
"Well we still haven't slept together," Sharon countered.
"Don't change the subject," Steve said. She was deflecting and he was going to get to the bottom of this. "Why don't your parents know we're dating."
"Because they hate you," Sharon squeaked out.
Steve stared at her, bewildered by the revelation. "They hate me?" He barely knew them. How could they hate him?
"I'm sorry," she said. "I was going to tell them, but it was right after I got arrested for helping you escape My father kept going on and on about how you ruined my career and my mother never really approved of me enlisting in the first place. She just kept saying she knew something like this was going to happen. How was I supposed to tell them?"
"Really? They hate me?" Steve asked, still in shock. Sharon stood behind him and put her arms around him.
"I'm sorry. They're really kind of unpleasant. My mother and I fight all the time and my dad is kind of overbearing. I just didn't see any reason to make our lives more difficult by dragging them into it."
Steve leaned back. "Even so, they're your parents, I don't like lying to them."
"You're not lying to them," she said.
Steve cleared his throat loudly. Sometimes Sharon's instincts as a spy irritated him. The small technicality that she was the one lying did nothing to ease his conscience.
Sharon release him and went over to the refrigerator to get the bottle of wine out. "They're my parents and if I don't want to tell them, I'm not going to," she told him firmly.
"Fine," Steve said, picking up the laptop. "When you feel like talking about this like reasonable adults, I'll be outside."
Steve handed out another round of beers from the cooler. A quick search had told them that they didn't have the proper equipment to handle the lawn today. They would have to take a trip to the hardware store, but right now, Steve was upset with Sharon so he was going to put off the lawn for another day to annoy her.
"So she never told her parents," Sam said, popping the tab on the can. "So what? If that's how they feel, it might be a good idea to keep them in the dark. I dated a girl in high school, her mom hated me. Told me every time I picked her up for a date and we ended breaking up over it."
"If it doesn't bother her, what's the problem. My girlfriend's dad doesn't like me either," Scott said. "Well, he likes me, he just not thrilled that we're dating."
"You have a girlfriend?" Sam asked.
Steve took a sip of his beer, wondering exactly how well Sam had vetted Scott before enlisting his help.
"Well, I did. Not really sure anymore," Scott said. "My ex-wife's parents hated me too, though looking back, I can sort of understand why. People don't really like their children winding up with criminals."
"Great," Steve muttered. "That's exactly what we are now, criminals. Ever since those damned Accords." He chugged his beer. It wouldn't affect him, but the action was calming.
Sam patted him on the shoulder. "I get that this upsets you, but if it doesn't bother her, I wouldn't worry about it. She doesn't care what they think, she just cares about you."
"Well if that's the case she could at least tell them," Steve said. He crushed the empty can between his hands and tossed in the recycling bin. "What if we end up getting married, or having kids, is she going to keep that from them too?"
Sam reached in the cooler and handed him another beer. "Slow down there, you've only been dating three months. Just give her time. They're her parents, let her decide when she tells them."
Steve popped the tab on the can. "I feel like we're sneaking around. I at least want to look them in the eye and tell them that I'm dating their daughter."
"That whole 'meet the parents' thing is totally overrated," Scott said. "Trust me."
Steve sighed. "It's just, I never got to bring a girl home to my mom, and Bucky isn't here for me to tell. I just feel like she's ashamed of me or something."
"It's not you," Scott assured him. "Some people just don't get along with their parents. Hope and her dad have this ridiculously complicated relationship and they barely talked for twenty years after her mom died."
Steve and Sam looked at him.
"Hope is my girlfriend," he explained. "Was my girlfriend. Anyway, just let her work it out on her own time."
Steve nodded, looking out at the overgrown yard. "So what kind of lawn mower do we need to get?"
"I don't suppose they have something like a Roomba that just does it for you," Sam said hopefully.
"Am I being unfair?" Sharon asked. Wanda and Natasha sipped their wine. They traded an uncomfortable glance.
"We may not be the best people to talk to about this," Wanda admitted.
"Right," Sharon said, topping off everyone's wine. Natasha had never had a family and Wanda had lost hers. Both of them would probably give anything to be in her situation.
"You should probably tell them though," Natasha said. "Just for Steve's sake. He doesn't like lying to people."
"He's not lying. I'm lying. And technically I never lied, I just never told the truth."
Natasha shook her head. "Steve's mind doesn't work that way. You and are used to twisting the truth a bit, but he likes to confront things head on." Natasha said.
Sharon huffed. Natasha had known Steve longer than she had. It annoyed her that Natasha could read Steve better than she could, but it also made Natasha the best person to come to for advice.
"Yeah well, I don't want to deal with it," Sharon grumbled. "My mother alway spends half of dinner criticizing my hair and how I dress and my dad never likes my boyfriends. I once dated a college professor and he kept asking him how he planned to support me without a real job."
"Just go ahead and have dinner." Wanda suggested. "Steve will realize you're right, and he'll never ask you to do it again."
"Huh," Sharon said pensively. "That could work."
"Ok," Natasha said. "Now that that's settled, let's go organize the armory. I'm tired of not being able to find anything in there."
The next day, Steve found Sharon in the basement doing laundry. "Hey, I need a couple hundred bucks."
Sharon scoffed. "For what?"
"A lawn mower."
"We don't have one?" Sharon asked. Steve shook his head. Sharon sighed and went over to the safe.
"Nothing too big, we don't have that much of a yard." She counted out an extra hundred. "Get a few other garden tools while you're there. If we don't have a lawn mower, I'm pretty sure we don't have a rake either."
"Have we thought about moving to the city?" Steve asked.
Sharon laughed. "Oh, I talked to my parents again. I told them we were dating."
"I'm sorry about what I said yesterday, but thank you. It means a lot to me." Steve said. He was relieved to have this out in the open, but he also felt a slight flutter in his stomach.
"Don't thank me yet," Sharon said ominously. "My dad made reservations for tomorrow night. We're having dinner with them so they can tell me in person what a horrible mistake I'm making."
Steve felt his chest constrict. For a moment he thought he was having an asthma attack, but he hadn't had one of those since before the serum. "Are you sure we should be going out in public?"
"It's a secluded place," Sharon said, handing him a basket of laundry to fold. "Just wear a pair of glasses and we should be fine.
"You know, I never knew Peggy had a brother," Steve said. They had never talked much about their families. There had been too much else going on.
"I don't know anything about your family either," Sharon pointed out. "At least not from you."
"Fair enough," Steve conceded. "My father's name was Joseph. He was in the 107th during the Great War."
"We call it World War I now," Sharon teased.
Steve chuckled as he took a T-shirt out of the basket. "He died from mustard gas in 1918, a month before I was born. My mother, Sarah, was a nurse in a TB ward, she caught it and died in 1936 right after I graduated. Neither of them had any brothers or sister and I'm an only child so I don't really have any family except Bucky. Your turn."
Sharon sighed. "My dad's name is Michael, but you should probably call him Mr. Carter. My grandfather, Aunt Peggy's brother, was killed in 1940 in the war, before he was born, and his mother died in childbirth so he was raised by my great grandparents. He moved to America after college and worked for SHIELD for a while. My mother was born in 1959, so we won't be getting any age gap jokes."
"I don't know, I think we have them beat," Steve joked.
"Don't get me wrong, she's going to tear you apart, but biologically were about the same, so that's one thing she can't touch. She's never approved of anything I do," Sharon said, angrily folding a bedsheet.
Steve stepped in and kissed her. "Look, I don't care if they like me, as long as you do. I just don't want to feel like we're lying to them."
"Well, you've got your wish," Sharon told him. "Now prepare for the consequences."
Sharon and Steve worked their way through the crowded restaurant. Sharon's parents had at least had the sense to request a secluded table in the corner. Finally, they found the table. The man and woman looked up at them with a scrutinizing stare.
"Mother, Daddy," Sharon greeted them.
"Sharon dear, you're late," her mother said. The woman looked like an older version of Sharon, but with a haughty air about her.
"We had trouble finding a parking spot," Steve told them.
"You remember Steve," Sharon said.
Steve reached out to shake Sharon's father's hand but the man just looked at him. His hair was white with age but he had Peggy's piercing brown eyes.
"Yes we met," he reminded Sharon. "At my Aunt's funeral," he said, looking pointedly at Steve.
"It's nice to see you both again," Steve said pleasantly.
Sharon nudge him toward the table. They both sat down. Sharon's father kept glaring at him.
"Sharon tells us you two are dating," Mr. Carter said in a gruff, serious tone that reminded Steve a bit of Col. Phillips.
"Yes sir," Steve answered, unconsciously sitting up straighter. "Almost three months."
"And she tells us you're already living together," Sharon's mother interjected. Her father's glare darkened. "Don't you think that's a little soon?"
"Well I moved in with my last boyfriend after two weeks," Sharon said stiffly. She grabbed a passing waiter. "Can you bring a bottle of the Chardonnay. Quickly."
"And a scotch, neat." Steve said. He turned back to Mrs. Carter "I usually wouldn't, but I was between places."
"You mean you were running from the law," Sharon's father said.
"Yeah. Because the law was wrong," Steve said firmly. Mr. Carter was starting to irritate him. He wasn't going to let himself be bullied into submission by this man, even if he was Sharon's father.
"Maybe we could postpone this discussion until we've ordered," Sharon's mother suggested. "Sharon, have you thought about what you're going to do now that you're done with the CIA."
The waiter returned and brought the wine and four glasses. "Oh no, I only need one glass, thank you," Sharon said taking a glass and the bottle. He set a glass of scotch down in front of Steve.
"There's ice in this. I said neat, right?" Steve asked Sharon quietly.
Sharon nodded and poured a large glass of wine from the bottle. "I'm actually back with SHIELD, Mother" she said.
"SHIELD?" her father asked. "I thought he destroyed it."
"Well it had been taken over by HYRDA, so yeah, I did," Steve said. He took a sip of his drink. It was times like this he really hated the serum, but at the slight burn was a distraction.
"They restructured and they wanted me back," Sharon told them. "I can't share the details but I'm not unemployed."
"Darling, you need to start thinking about your future. It's time for you to quit all this spy nonsense and get a real job," Sharon's mother said.
Sharon leaned back in her chair and downed the glass of wine. She held it out and Steve refilled it.
"Your father never should have indulged that little infatuation of yours," Mrs. Carter continued. "All of your friends had posters of the Backstreet Boys. You had a poster of him,"she gestured toward Steve.
"At least I never dressed like a whore or begged you for $500 concert tickets," Sharon muttered into her glass.
"No, but while all your friends were taking ballet you wanted karate lesson, of all things." Mrs Carter said with a scandalized tone.
"I actually use those. How many of my friends are ballerinas?"
"It just wasn't ladylike," Mrs. Carter said.
"You're right," Sharon said sarcastically. "I would have been much better off with a leotard and an eating disorder."
"I think I'm getting the lamb," Steve said, trying to steer the conversation toward a less volatile topic.
"And how were you planning to pay for that," Mr. Carter asked. "Or support my daughter without a job."
"She supports herself," Steve said flatly. "And she does a damn fine job of it. You should be proud."
"I am," Mr. Carter replied. "That doesn't mean I can't be upset with her when she makes stupid choices."
"Is that what you're doing with your hair these days," Mrs Carter asked. " I thought at least Peggy's sense of style might rub off on you."
"Would anyone like to try the spinach dip as an appetizer?" Steve asked. He was trying to be civil, but he couldn't help adding, "I think I can afford that one."
Mr. Carter looked at him sternly. "Were you going to borrow $10 from my daughter?"
"Not that it's any of your business," Steve said as Sharon refilled her glass, "but I got a fairly decent payout from the Army after being MIA for 70 years."
"I would have expected them to freeze your assets."
"Cash," Steve said shortly.
Mr. Carter took a piece of bread from the basket on the table. "I'm surprised you have anything left after helping that terrorist friend of yours escape."
Sharon froze. Steve's hand clenched around the glass. Finally it gave way, shattering with a sharp crackle. Whiskey and glass slipped through his fingers and onto the table. He stood up and shoved in his chair.
"Thank you for the drink," he said curtly. "I think I'll be going now."
Sharon stood up to follow.
"Just a minute young lady!" Mr. Carter bellowed. "You are not going anywhere with him!"
Steve clenched his fist but Sharon grabbed his hand.
"I'm an adult and I can make my own decisions, Daddy!" She grabbed her purse. "We'll send you a postcard when we elope!" she yelled, quickly leading Steve out of the restaurant.
They walked a block in silence before Sharon pulled back on his arm to slow him down.
"Let me see your hand," she said.
Steve stopped and let her examine it. There was one scratch, but otherwise he was unhurt.
"I am so sorry about that," she said, wrapping a white cloth around it. Steve realized she had accidentally walked out with a napkin. "He was completely out of line talking about Bucky like that."
"No I'm sorry. I'm the one who insisted you tell them. Thanks for stepping in there."
"Well he is still my father," Sharon said. " I didn't want you to have to apologize for breaking his nose."
"He's going to have to apologize to me first," Steve said.
"Don't hold your breath." Sharon said with a pained look.
"I should have just left well enough alone."
Sharon stroked his arm. "No you were right. I probably should have told them sooner, but Steve, we don't need them, ok?" She took his hand. "I'm happy with you and if you're happy with me, that's all that matters."
Steve kissed her gently. "So, we're all dressed up and I'm starving. What should we do?"
Sharon took out her phone. "Siri, I'm hungry and I need a drink." She scrolled through a list of options. "Irish pub three blocks over?"
"Didn't you just drink a bottle of Chardonnay?" Steve asked.
"I only drank half of it and now I'm going to drink whiskey until I forget what my mother said about my hair."
"I love your hair," Steve said, brushing a curl off her shoulder. He took her hand as they walked through the city. "Um, what you said back there about eloping," he began.
"Oh I was just trying to annoy them," she told him quickly. "We're a long way off from that conversation."
"Good," Steve said. "Because we have to wait until Bucky gets back. He would probably kill me if I let Sam be my best man."
Sharon paused. "Wait, now you're joking right?"
Steve grinned. "Were you going to ask Wanda or Natasha to be your maid of honor? I was thinking I could call Coulson and see if he wanted to officiate. Or may he could walk you down the aisle. Or Clint. And his kids could be the ring bearer and flower girl."
"Ok, seriously. Stop it," Sharon said, slapping him on the arm.
"I was thinking June," he continued, barely keeping a straight face. "But it'll be a small group, so maybe we could do the Caribbean in February."
Sharon pressed her chest suggestively against Steve's arm. "What if we just skip the wedding and go straight to the honeymoon."
"Oh no," Steve teased. "If you want me to put out I had better see a ring on this finger, Miss Carter!"
Sharon tickled his sides. "Well I'm not buying the car until I take a test drive, Mr. Rogers!"
Sharon threw back a second whiskey shot and slammed the glass down on the table.
"I've never seen you drink this much," Steve said, amused by this new side of her.
"Yeah, my mother kind of does that to me," she mumbled into a cheese steak sandwich. "All joking aside, if we do get married, we can't invite her or I'll be too drunk for our first dance."
"Deal," he said, digging into his shepherd's pie.
"What was your mother like?" Sharon asked.
Steve smiled sadly. "She was sweet. She had it rough, raising me alone, but she always did the best she could. I was always sick and she could barely afford to feed us, let alone all the doctors bills, but she managed somehow. She was always smiling, even after she got sick."
"I'm sorry I never got to meet her," Sharon said. "She sounds great."
"She would have liked you," Steve told her.
Sharon pushed the empty shot glass around the table with her finger. "You know, Daddy really isn't as much of an asshole as he was tonight. He's just kind of pighead, and he's used to people doing what he says."
Steve laughed. "I was wondering where you got that from."
"I think he always wanted a son and he wasn't quite sure what to do with a girl, so he just let me do what I wanted. But he was a lot more supportive than my mom when I enlisted. He actually gave me my Grandfather's old service revolver. He's just kind of disappointed that I screwed it up."
"He's just trying to look out for you," Steve said.
"Well he was out of line calling Bucky a terrorist," Sharon said. "If Aunt Peggy were here she would have laid into him."
"You know, I didn't have a dad growing up," Steve said. "Bucky taught me how to do all that stuff that dad's are supposed to teach you. And Mr. Barnes looked out for me too, but mostly Bucky. He was like my big brother. Taught me how to shave, how to tie a tie. Tried to teach me how to talk to girls. I never quite got the hang of it."
"Could you even grow facial hair?" Sharon asked skeptically.
Steve shook his head. "Barely. It looked awful. So one day, when I was about 15 Bucky sat me down and taught me how to use a razor," he sighed. "I wish you'd had a chance to get to know him."
Sharon took his hand. "I will. Someday."
"Someday," Steve said with a faint smile.
Sharon laughed. "I'm trying to picture skinny you with facial hair and it just looks ridiculous."
"Did you really have a poster of me when you were a kid?" Steve asked.
Sharon turned red. "It was a birthday gift from Aunt Peggy," she said quickly, taking an enormous bite of her cheese steak sandwich.
Steve grinned. "You still have it, don't you?"
"It's vintage!" Sharon mumbled around a mouthful of cheese steak. "You don't just throw something like that away!" She swallowed. "Do you really have money hidden away somewhere."
Steve nodded, chewing a mouthful of food. "Not so much I want to blow it on frivolous things, but enough for an emergency.
"But not enough for a lawn mower," Sharon teased.
"It's in a bank in Switzerland. Natasha convinced me to hide some of my assets after the whole thing with HYDRA. I thought she was being paranoid, but I'm glad I listened."
"Well," Sharon said. "I don't mind being your sugar momma," Sharon said giving him a playful shoulder nudge. "You're cute when you need me."
"What fella could say no to that?" Steve said, leaning in for a kiss.
Steve and Sharon arrived home late that night. Sharon stumbled a bit as they walked in the door, still feeling drunk. Steve picked her up and carried her into the kitchen. The rest of the team was in the kitchen playing a game.
"I never truly understood _, until I encountered _." Natasha read off a black card. "You're back," she said. "How was dinner?"
"It went about how we expected." Steve said, setting Sharon down. She stumbled to the table and slid into a chair.
"Total disaster. We left before the appetizer," she told them.
"Want to join us?" Scott asked. "We just started."
Steve went to get Sharon a glass of water. "What's game is this?" he asked.
"Cards Against Humanity. You'll love it," Natasha said with an unsettling smile.
Steve doubted that very much, but he sat down and let her deal them in. He didn't care if Sharon's parents approved of them. The people who mattered to them were sitting around this table. He looked at his cards, happy to be home with his real family.
-End-