Disclaimer: I own nothing belonging to Marvel.

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Author's Note

Thank you so much to the 8 lovely people who left a review on the first chapter, I really appreciate it! 😊 And thank you to those who have followed and fav'd already, you're awesome!

On with the next chapter, lets meet Dolores!

xoxo

Chapter Two

Monday the 2nd of December 1940

Kathleen was slowly making her way back to her apartment trying to stretch out the time before she walked through her apartment door when she saw James and the leggy redhead about to enter Steve's apartment. She quickly put her head down expecting to blend into the wall as usual, but when she heard her name being called it caused her pace to falter.

"Hi Kathleen." Bucky gave her a nod of acknowledgment as his girlfriend's head whipped around to eye the petite fair brunette. "Coming from somewhere fun?" Bucky grinned at her. Kathleen dropped her gaze from his handsome face afraid he would see the little crush she harboured for him shining there.

"Oh no, just coming from work," she muttered before putting her hands into her coat pockets feeling awkward.

"Hi, I'm Dolores Hart, nice to meet you." She nodded to Kathleen with a smile and Kathleen returned it with a hesitant one. "We should have introduced ourselves earlier, I apologise for that. We would love to get to know Steve's neighbor, right James?"

"Sure," Bucky responded hesitantly as he didn't know what Dot was up to. But Kathleen took his hesitant response as him not really caring if he got to know her one way or the other and she felt her stomach twist in shame.

"Why don't you come into Steve's for some tea and we can get to know one another." Dot smiled down at her and Kathleen looked up at her face and blinked in awe at her perfect skin and big green eyes.

"I don't…" Kathleen glanced at her apartment door half in longing and half in fear that her aunt would hear her voice and appear before proceeding to drag her in by her ear for talking to one of 'those boys'.

"Oh come on, we don't bite." Dolores laughed making Bucky look at his girlfriend with a devilish grin. He clearly really liked her, and Kathleen thought she seemed nice.

And she wouldn't mind having some company her own age before having to cook for and eat dinner with her grumpy aunt.

"O-Okay," she stammered, and Dolores beamed before guiding her into Steve's with a well-manicured hand on her shoulder. A shoulder – Kathleen was ashamed to realize – that was covered with her shabby brown coat that needed mending, again. Kathleen mentally sighed at the thought, her poor fingertips had just recovered from her last sewing incident.

They sat down on a sofa in the little living room, the window behind them shining its last rays of the day onto Bucky who sat in a chair across from them, looking at her. Kathleen self-consciously fixed her hair and adjusted her loose navy skirt while hoping there was no muck on her boots and stockings. She glanced to her left at Dot as she removed her emerald green wool coat to reveal a pearl colored silk shirt tucked into a lovely brown skirt.

Kathleen gave up trying to make herself look presentable, instead she sat silently looking down at her fidgeting hands before calming them by lacing her fingers tightly together in her lap.

She wondered why she was here. What did they want? Was James' girlfriend going to make fun of her? Was James? She mentally shook her head, Steve wouldn't be best friends with someone who would do that, so why was she here?

After cups of tea had been placed on the table by Steve and everyone had thanked him Dolores began to question her.

"So your name is Kathleen yes?"

Kathleen nodded her affirmation, she looked up catching Steve's eye as he sat in an armchair next to Bucky and he smiled gently at her making the tenseness of her muscles relax a little.

"That's a lovely name," Dolores said.

"Thank you," she murmured. No one had ever complimented her name before, she didn't even know that was a thing to be complimented for, but what did she know?

"You're welcome. So, what do you do for work Kathleen?"

"I'm a secretary at Stark Industries." Everyone's reaction was the same, shock.

"Wow, that sounds exciting! What is Mr. Stark like?" Dot looked the most excited of them all.

"It's not really that exciting, I just do normal office work, and make coffee," she said before shifting in her seat, "I've never met Mr. Stark, I just see him in passing, he has a lot of secretaries and personal assistants. He's a very busy man, always travelling," Kathleen spoke to the cup of hot tea on the little coffee table in front of them. She found it hard to look at their faces for more than a few seconds, she was completely unused to this amount of attention, it made her uncomfortable.

"Oh." Kathleen could hear the disappointment in Dot's voice and so she didn't dare look up to see Steve and James' disappointed faces. Everyone always wanted exciting gossip when she told them she worked for Mr. Howard Stark. She was used to the disappointment in people when they realised you had nothing juicy to tell them, but a part of her wished she could make something up right then, but she was a terrible liar.

"So Kathleen, do you have a steady?"

Kathleen's head whipped around to look at Dolores in shock, they had just met each other, and she was asking if she had a boyfriend? "Um… I… I don't…"

"Dot don't embarrass the girl." Bucky frowned at his girlfriend but she just laughed and patted Kathleen's clenched hands.

"I'll take that as a no then. How about you come out with James, Steve and I this Saturday. We'll go dancing, it'll be fun – maybe you can teach Steve to dance." She laughed softly before knocking her shoulder into Kathleen's playfully.

Kathleen glanced over at Steve to see him blushing as well, his eyes focused on his hands.

"I… I don't know how to dance," Kathleen told Dolores embarrassingly.

"I'm sure you're being humble," Dolores spoke kindly.

"No, I… I've never danced before." The room was silent making Kathleen want to curl into herself, she kept her eyes focused on her hands.

"You must have been taken dancing on a date?" Dolores looked over to see James frowning at her in warning, but she ignored him.

Kathleen shook her head before biting her lip.

"Have you ever been on a date?" Dot asked her in a tone of surprise.

Kathleen didn't respond, in that moment all she wanted was the sofa cushions to swallow her whole and remove her from existence completely. She didn't think she had ever felt so embarrassed in her whole life and they all would know from the heat she could feel blazing in her cheeks.

Please Lord, kill me now.

"Dot, leave her alone." Bucky glared, not liking how Dot was talking down to the shy girl, embarrassing her. Kathleen could hardly meet his eyes during a normal greeting and now she was being asked private questions in front of strangers – he was afraid she would run out of the apartment mortified, never to speak to them again.

"Every girl should be taken out to dance by a boy, James." Dot frowned, she felt pity for the girl. "It's decided, we're taking you dancing," Dot proclaimed excitedly. She loved setting up couples and in her eyes Kathleen and Steve seemed perfect for each other, they were so similar after all.

"Do you have something to wear? A nice dress, some heels? Lipstick?"

"I'm not allowed lipstick, aunt Gertrude says it's for women that are…," her eyes widened after she stopped talking, and she blushed some more when she realised Dot was wearing bright red lipstick.

Bucky chuckled at the look gracing Dot's face, Kathleen didn't need to finish the sentence for them all to understand what her strict aunt thought about lipstick, and what she would think about Dot for wearing it.

"I'm sorry," Kathleen rushed out, she was afraid Dot would be mad at her.

"Don't worry about it, you can have some of mine and I may have an old dress you can wear."

"Thank you," Kathleen replied hesitantly, she didn't know whether she should be thankful or not, this was the oddest situation she had ever been in.

Bucky felt a little sorry for the girl, it didn't seem like she had much of a say in her own life, he couldn't imagine it; being controlled like that. Maybe going out with them would be good for her, he knew it wouldn't be a bad thing for her to get away from her aunt for a while.

"I better go, my aunt will be wondering where I am, thank you for the tea Steve." Kathleen stood to signal her leaving and the rest followed as she made her way to the door.

"Steve will walk you over, right Steve?" Dot smiled at him before tipping her head in Kathleen's direction.

"Uh… sure," he mumbled before opening his apartment door.

"I'll come by on Friday with some dresses for you to try on," Dot told Kathleen with a squeeze to her shoulder.

Kathleen's eyes widened in fear. "Oh no! My aunt won't like that at all," she rushed out while shaking her head.

None of them liked seeing the fear grow in the shy girl's eyes.

"Maybe Steve could let us use his place?" Dot smiled sweetly at Steve in question and Kathleen instantly knew that this woman always got what she wanted, she had probably never been told no in her life. Kathleen tried to imagine what that would be like but couldn't, she wished she was more like Dolores.

"Sure, if it helps Kathleen." Nobody missed his pointed answer and it surprised Kathleen for a moment, maybe there was one person that would say no to Dolores, and she wondered why.

After an awkward second the pair left, and Bucky looked over to his beautiful girl with an inquiring eye. "What are you up to Dot?"

"Nothing." She tried to act innocent, but Bucky didn't buy it for a second, he kept his gaze on her and raised his brow questioningly. "Her and Steve would make a cute couple, that's all."

"Dot," Bucky spoke with a warning lacing his tone.

"What? You're always trying to set him up, but you pick the wrong girls sweetheart, Kathleen is perfect for him."

Bucky wasn't too sure, he doubted they could have a conversation if they both thought they were on a date. To him, it seemed they both needed someone to bring them out of their shells not push them further inside it, but he kept his mouth shut because there was no stopping his girl when she got that look in her eyes.

As Kathleen lay in her bed that night she thought back on her day and could not believe the strange turn it had taken. Dolores was so nice and beautiful, she couldn't believe she had invited her to go dancing with them.

She wondered what Dolores would bring over for her to try on, she wondered how silly she was going to look wearing the beautiful woman's clothes. Dolores was much taller than her and had a bigger bust than her, the only thing that Kathleen had that was bigger than Dolores' was her hips. She wondered how in the name of God she was going to fit into anything; she better bring over some of her dresses to Steve's as back-ups.

Kathleen bit her lip and tried to fluff her flat bumpy pillow into some form of comfortable when she realized she would have to lie to her aunt; there was absolutely no way her aunt would ever let her go dancing – especially with boy's, especially with Steve and James.

How would she explain going out at night to her aunt? Saturday night was the night aunt Gertrude went to bingo, so maybe she could sneak out and try to sneak back in when she was asleep, it wasn't like she checked on her or tucked her in, that wasn't her way. Though if she got caught she knew she would get a beating, but to get to dress up and go out dancing may just be worth it. After all, she had gotten a couple beatings before; she knew what to expect now, and her aunt wasn't as strong as she used to be, although she was still able to hit you good and hard enough to split skin, but hopefully the night would be worth it. She figured getting to spend a night out with a girl her age and two men she knew were gentlemen would be worth it no matter what happened on the night.

And then there was James.

Kathleen knew it was wrong to crush on another woman's man, but she figured it was harmless as she had absolutely no chance of stealing James from Dolores even if she tried really hard or even wanted to, but she didn't, not even a little. Dolores took the time to be nice to her, and James would only ever see her as Steve's neighbor and she was perfectly happy with that because James knew her name and that was all that mattered to her right then.

She went to sleep that night with a nervous excitement bubbling in her belly and a real smile gracing her lips for the first time in a long time – she couldn't wait for Saturday night to arrive.