A Lost Man In a Lost World
by CapriceAnn Hedican-Kocur
Summary
A misunderstanding on both Steve's and Darcy's parts causes a rift that drives Darcy to a bar on Valentine's Day.
Notes
Written for the 2015 Steve/Darcy Valentine's Fic Exchange over on AO3.
Your assignment: glynnisi
Prompts:
Friends to lovers/Misunderstanding... Steve has been in & out of Avengers Tower ever since the fall of SHIELD. He and Darcy have made friends and both want more, but neither thinks the other is interested.
Blind date on Valentine's Day- Thor & Jane set up their friends for dinner at a fancy restaurant, dancing, and a suite in a fancy NYC hotel... just in case things work out. They do, though neither Steve nor Darcy are very experienced at that sort of thing.
Dark Cupid. Darcy meets a dark and sad stranger named James Barnes in a bar the day before Valentine's. They flirt awkwardly, exchanges bad jokes, and sad stories... and have no chemistry with each other at all and find it funny. She tells him all about her hopeless crush on a great guy at her office, Steve Rogers. Her stories about Steve cause Bucky to remember him and surrender himself to his friend for help. He tells Steve what did it and Steve is thrilled to hear that the girl he crushes on would like to be his Valentine.
Squicks and elements to avoid: No OT3, no non-con/abuse, Not interested in heavy kinks... I'm pretty vanilla (M/F Het monogamy is my pref) and look forward to something fun and sweet and flirty.
A/N: Okay, this may have started out as a completely different fic. I had it started, and then I stalled, quite a few times actually….but hopefully this one works….it may have significantly less fun & sweet….but I'm a sucker for a happy ending, so it is almost 100% guaranteed to have that….okay, it ended up being sweeter than I imagined it would be. I took elements of prompts 1 & 3. I hope you enjoy it! VERY Special Thanks to my beta Aenaria who took time out of packing for a family vacation to help me go through this tonight! {{{{{{{huggles}}}}}}}
A Lost Man In a Lost World
"I never saw no miracle of science that didn't go from a blessing to a curse. I never saw no military solution that didn't always end up as something worse" ~ Sting
Steve watched her run from the room. With his enhanced hearing he heard the door down the hall slam shut followed shortly by sobbing. He still had no clue why Darcy had reacted that way. He had heard her come into the room where he was talking to Sam on the phone. Steve had just told Sam that he felt lost, like he had nothing to hold on to, when he heard her gasp behind him. She was gone before he had even turned around.
Steve wanted to follow her, but was unsure if he should. He never was any good when it came to beautiful women. He could hear his conscience tell him to go after her, punk. Apparently his conscience sounded an awful lot like Bucky. Steve went toward the bathroom that Darcy had disappeared into. His hand braced to open the door, but he paused, just standing there. He could hear her crying inside.
Darcy knew that he was just outside the door. She wasn't stupid by any means. Even if she was little more than a glorified gopher, she had gotten both her undergraduate and graduate degrees. She knew that she didn't have a chance. She was just kidding herself into believing that there was hope for her to be with Steve.
She desperately wanted him to come in. She wanted Steve to grab her and kiss all of her tears away, to tell her that this fear she had was unfounded. But she knew when she was licked. She knew that she had to let go of this last naïve dream. Darcy took a few deep, steadying breaths, before getting up to wash her face. Once she had gotten control of both her breathing and her tears, she braced herself and left the bathroom, only to find the hallway empty.
Tears threatened to fall once more, but Darcy pushed past them. Grabbing her phone she sent a quick text off to Jane telling her she was heading out early. She deserved a drink. No, she needed a drink. It was Valentine's Day, and dammit she was gonna get drunk!
Her phone alerted her to a response from Jane. You want me to come with? Are you okay? Jarvis said you were upset.
Darcy replied no, I'm fine. Just needed a bit of a break.
Jane responded okay, if you need me, call. If you need Thor, call.
thank you, Jane was Darcy's reply.
Rather than catching a cab, Darcy decided that a walk might be what she needed to help clear her head. Hell, maybe it would help her gain some perspective. She still wasn't sure where or when she had started thinking and dreaming about Steve. All she knew, was that it seemed like her feelings had always been there. Steve acted friendly around her; there were even days when he would actively search her out.
But the way he sounded on the phone, it broke her heart. He sounded like a lost little boy with no one to call his friend. She thought that they had been getting closer, that maybe he would turn to her if he was upset about something. But she realized now that there was no hope. It was time to give up that dream.
With that decision made, and she stamped down the traitorous part of her brain protesting that decision. She opened the door to the bar she had walked up to. She smiled at the name emblazoned above the door as she entered the building, The Old Haunt.
She went to the only open barstool, nodded at the bartender, and waited for him to get to her. When he did ask for her order, Darcy smiled and responded, "a Snow White, please."
She had been quietly drinking her cocktail for a while when she felt someone sit down on the newly vacated barstool on her left. She ignored them in favor of her continued perusal of the other patrons. She noticed several cops on the far side of the bar, near the piano. She had seen their badges when they walked in. She also thought that she recognized another man sitting with the cops.
It was at this point that Darcy heard a soft cough next to her followed by a quiet, "You're Steve's dame, aren't you?"
Her eyes darted toward the man on her left. She noticed he was well built, had close-cropped dark brown hair, and a quiet smile. When he lifted his beer to take a drink, Darcy also noticed a hint of silver peeking out of the glove on his left hand. "Bucky?"
"Yes, doll," he continued to smile at her.
"I'm not Steve's anything. He doesn't see me that way." Darcy, took a calming breath lest she fall back into the fucking Valentine's pity party she was in earlier. "He doesn't see me as anything more than a simple annoyance."
"Are you sure about that?" Bucky asked her. "I've been watching out for him, while I got my head on straight. I've seen the two of you out and about together. I may not remember everything in my life, but I know the look that Steve wears when he's with you. It is not a look of annoyance."
"I heard him. I don't know who he was talking to, but I know what I heard." Darcy's voice trembled as she fought back the tears that were once again threatening to fall.
Bucky gently placed his arm around her shoulders, as he leaned in and asked, "Just what do you think you heard?"
"I heard him say that he felt lost, with nothing to hold onto." Darcy barely contained the sob that escaped as she felt her hastily constructed barriers crumble.
"Why do you think that means he thinks you're an annoyance?" Bucky asked her as he handed Darcy his handkerchief to dry her eyes with.
Darcy quickly dried her eyes before handing the handkerchief back to him. "Because for the last several weeks it seems like he's been avoiding me. Ever since I gave him his Christmas gift, he has been acting weird. But I finally realized it today when he didn't seem to care that I was crying. I know he heard me, but he didn't say anything. He just walked away."
"Oh, doll. Steve has never been good with dames, but he is especially stupid with the dames he really likes." James told her as he rubbed her arm. "You should really just suck it up and confront the idiot."
"Only if you come back with me," Darcy begged him. "I'm a bit of a chicken shit, even with the liquid courage."
"It's about time that I faced my own demons, too, doll." Bucky smiled down at her as Darcy hugged him. It was the first time, in a long time that someone had voluntarily reached out to him. It felt nice to feel a human touch again. "Let's go."
"Thanks, it means the world that I won't have to face this humiliating defeat alone." Darcy smirked up at him as she continued hugging him. She broke the hug off and then kissed his cheek.
You know how Murphy's Law states that anything that can go wrong, will go wrong? Well, Steve Rogers realized the moment that he walked away from the bathroom door that he was all kinds of stupid. By the time he turned around to go back, Darcy was gone. It took him a few hours to track her down, mainly because he didn't want to admit to Thor, or anyone else really, that he was the reason Darcy had left the Tower earlier, practically still in tears.
So, at 7 pm he found himself standing outside of the bar he had managed to track her to. Well, that Jarvis had tracked her to. He could see her from outside. She was laughing with the man next to her. The man who was rubbing her arm, and handing her a handkerchief. A man that probably wouldn't put her in danger his traitorous brain grumbled at him. Just go inside and apologize, tell her how you really feel, punk his conscience, once again sounding like Bucky, yelled back.
Let it be said that Steve Rogers never backed away from a challenge. This time was no different. His mind made up, he was going to go in there and try and explain his earlier stupidity to her. Let the chips fall, come what may. Maybe she would forgive him. Just as he got close enough to her, Darcy kissed the other man. He felt a momentary panic before his conscience was once again speaking.
"Oh, there you are, punk. Wondered when you'd manage to drag yourself here."
"Jerk." Steve replied automatically when he realized that it wasn't his conscience speaking, it was Bucky.
Upon noticing Darcy starting to withdraw, and possibly try to sneak away, Bucky asked Steve, "What brings you here?"
Looking directly at Darcy, not Bucky, Steve answered, "I came to apologize for my earlier behavior, and to beg your forgiveness, Darcy."
"Why?" she whispered.
"I was trying to work out an issue with Sam. I feel more comfortable talking to him instead of a doctor, and even though what I said was NOT about you, I know that it caused you pain. And I would never want that."
"Steve, you don't have to..." Darcy left off when Steve interrupted her.
"I'm gonna kiss you now." Steve looked directly into her eyes, at her little nod he leaned in and gently kissed Darcy's lips. He felt her wrap her arms around his shoulders and hold on to him as he deepened the kiss.
A wolf whistle startled them apart. Bucky laughed, "Thought you two weren't ever gonna come up for air, punk."
"Shut up, jerk." Steve laughed as Darcy pulled him back down for another kiss. As they broke apart, Steve asked, "You coming back to the Tower, Buck?"
"I figured it was time to face the music. And at least by helping out your dame, I'm coming in with a mark in the good column. Maybe I won't be shot on sight." Bucky muttered as they left The Old Haunt.
"Bucky, no one is gonna hurt you. They'd have to go through me." Steve smiled at him.
"Unless," Darcy continued, "you really did cause the accident that killed Tony's parents."
At Bucky's sudden silence they both turned to him. "Buck, tell me now, just so I can be prepared to head Tony off. Did you have anything to do with Howard's death?"
"I may have, Steve. I may have killed one of our friends," Bucky murmured. At his strangled admission both Darcy and Steve hugged him.
As they stepped out of the hug, Darcy uttered, "This has been one hell of a Valentine's Day!"
"Doll, I forgot that was today," Steve said as he grabbed her hand to hold as they walked back to the Tower. "I didn't get you anything."
"That's okay. We kinda had a comedy of errors today after all. But I do like where this is heading," Darcy suggested, glancing down at their entwined hands.
"You two are straight out of a Shakespeare play alright," Bucky prattled, shaking his head, realizing just how lucky he was to have his brother by his side once again.