The next morning Peggy's waiting for her downstairs with a spot across from her saved. She's worried, as she's sitting down, that Peggy's gonna be nicer than usual. Throwing aside that prickly coat of see ya next Tuesday she normally wears to—she doesn't know—ingratiate herself.

"We're making this a bad habit," she says, her eyes on her newspaper.

"Real easy to break this habit," Angie fires back.

Peggy's painted lips purse. She looks around and Angie does too. They're alone for the moment, but a group of girls are incoming and their little bit of table paradise is about to go up in a gale of girlish glee.

"I don't do friends easily," Peggy says urgently. "And I appreciate your patience, but—"

"But you're about as talkative as an OSS agent."

Peggy jokes, "Hopefully less."

"See!" She catches her rising voice and glances guiltily around the room before hunching over the table and whispering, "See that's what I mean. You'd rather joke than talk."

"I talk. We've talked Angie."

"Where was I born?"

"South Brooklyn," she says quickly.

Angie nods, "Yeah? Now ask me the same question. Guess what my answer would be?"

"Leeds," she ventures.

"Or London. Or Aberdeen. How would I know?"

"Aberdeen is in Scotland."

She glares.

Peggy looks down at her tea and spins the cup on its saucer. The group of girls sit beside them and talk a mile a minute. Angie butters her toasts and listens lazily. Peggy takes too big a bite of a biscuit and stares at Angie while she chews.

Even though Peggy's been at the table longer Angie's the first one to leave. There really was an audition she could have spent her Sunday working on and now it's after work and she hasn't prepped and she hopes if she clocks in early maybe the boss'll let her go early too.

The click of heels on the tile tell her Peggy's followed her out of the dining room and into the foyer. "It is London," she says. She's being serious again and Angie has to stop walking or she might trip. "And I've got a family that cares for me and I even have friends—spread across four continents, but I lost too much in that blasted war."

She means she lost someone.

Angie can see Peggy's reflection in the glass of the front door. So serious and urgent and looking at the back of Angie's head with the kind of intensity that could melt a girl.

She turns carefully. "A friend? Or boyfriend."

Peggy winces.

Angie's soft spoken—which is a chore for her. "How'd they go?"

Peggy swallows and it looks like she's on a razor's edge between her status quo and what the rest of the world calls feelings. "Plane crash."

"I'm sorry."

One side of her mouth crooks up, "I believe that's my line. Angie…I told you I'm not very good at being a friend."

"Yeah, you're pretty lousy at it."

"But I want to change." She starts to reach for Angie's hand and stops herself. Smiles in that friendly way that she really is lousy at. "I happen to have a bottle of brandy that needs to be drunk."

"Yeah?"

"And I'd very much like to share it with you."

"That all you're sharing?" It comes right out of Angie. A reflex like kicking the doctor when he taps you on the knee. She can't believe she said it and holds her breath waiting for Peggy to say something back.

Peggy, when she wants to be, is a damn cipher that even the Germans couldn't crack. "Tonight," she says, and Angie can't tell if she's being set up or sated or if the one standing so close she can smell her perfume wants to kiss her.

She nods. "See you after work."

####

She doesn't get around to making the call she's gotta make until after the post-lunch rush. The boss steps out for a smoke and that leaves the broom closet he's christened his "office" empty.

The dial on his phone sticks on the three but she finally manages to get a call out to her cousin. He is, as one would expect after what the newspaper recounted, still in the hospital, but his wife seems to think he'll be okay.

"His skull got nearly cracked in half, but the doctors are saying he'll be talking real soon!" Her cousin's wife is the exact kind of optimistic idiot a fella like her cousin needs.

Then she tells Angie to hold and doesn't bother covering the mouth piece as she shouts across the room to Angie's uncle that his niece is on the line and did he want to talk to her.

Angie does not want to talk to her uncle, but if she hangs up she'll wind up with a little bald Italian man on her doorstep and her date that night'll be ruined.

If it is a date.

She doesn't—"Angie, babydoll, it's been too long." Her uncle's got a voice that's smooth like coffee. And he's the only man that she's never wanted to punch when they compare her to a toy selling at Macys.

"Hi," she says. 'Round him she always has trouble finding more than three words to put together.

"You're calling after your cousin?"

"I saw his name in the paper."

He hems and haws about his son and then invites her to come visit him. He misses her. He'd like to see her.

She's gotta go.

Only you don't turn down a fella like Vince Martinelli. Ever.

She starts, "Well I got an audition tonight…"

"So tomorrow." It sounds like happy uncle speak, but Vince Martinelli doesn't make requests. He says something and it happens. He'd tell the moon to rise at noon and there it'd be shining in the sky.

"I—"

"You can come after work can't you?"

She can. She doesn't really want to, but she can. Phone still pressed to her ear she thumps her head against the wall and wonders, again, why she thinks she needs to save Peggy Carter.

"Yeah," she finally says, "I'll see you tomorrow."

The back door of the diner slams open and she hangs up fast, slipping out of the closet before the cloud of pomade and cigarette smoke can see her.

####

The audition, from Angie's view, does not go well. Something about staying up all night thinking about her family and next door neighbor left Angie so distracted that she started by reading the other person's lines.

Twice.

Her head and feet and everything in between are aching and near dead by the time she clomps up the stairs to her room. Girls say hello and Sarah Trellis tries to talk to her like they're friends and she's proud of herself for not shoving her over the bannister.

The lights are out in Peggy's apartment. She sees that even though she has to stand back and look to do it. Hayseed (her real name's Dottie something but she's not keen to remember what because if she makes it more than a month Angie will be a monkey's aunt and uncle) is coming out of her room on the opposite side of Peggy's and smiles all big and wide like only people who've never seen the Atlantic before can.

Angie plasters on her biggest and broadest smile and nods and says yeah a lot as the girl talks about how "BIG" and "EXCITING" everything in New York City is.

"Have you seen Peggy," she asks and that snaps Angie out of her "yeah" phase.

"Not since breakfast."

Dottie looks sad and Angie wonders what the hell Hayseed thinks Angie does all day that she'd have time to just go and see Peggy.

"I just…I had a question for her."

Angie raises an eyebrow because most girls avoid Peggy with a ten foot pole outside of breakfast. "She's all right for conversations but you wouldn't want her for a bridesmaid," Angie's heard.

She wouldn't want Peggy for a bridesmaid either.

"If I see her I'll tell her you're looking?"

Dottie nods and thanks Angie "soooo much," and by the time Angie's pushed her way into her room she's ready for bed—brandy and babe be damned.

"Is she gone?"

Never mind. Sleep is for idiots.

Peggy's at her table, drink already poured, and she's poured into that black and red silk robe and those red lips of hers are poised to smile.

"So you say we're friends and then you just sneak into my place?"

"To avoid that," glass in hand she points at the door.

"Way to jump on the grenade soldier."

"Oh Angie, I'd always jump on a grenade for you. Unfortunately she's more like an atom bomb."

She pops her shoes off and groans in relief because it's her own damn apartment. "A real cheerful one."

"How does she smile so much?"

"Right?" She starts unbuttoning her dress as she hip checks her closet open. "You'd think her cheeks would hurt."

Peggy goes quiet as she sips her brandy and after Angie's out of her uniform and into her dressing gown she turns and finds Peggy staring straight ahead with her jaw rigid like a president's cut into a mountain.

"So you gonna tell me how you dodged that atom bomb? Because I'm pretty sure my door was locked."

Peggy flushes and drinks her brandy.

"You didn't climb through the window did you?"

"She knocked. Multiple times."

"So you figured a four story drop was worth the chance to escape." Normal people don't do that.

Peggy shakes the brandy bottle. "The promised company helped."

She drops into the chair opposite her and takes the proffered drink. She's always been a sucker for sincere flattery. Even when it's meant to distract her. "That's about the nicest thing anyone's said to me."

Peggy brightens.

"This week."

The way Peggy deflates makes Angie feel a little better. She knows it isn't Peggy's fault she's a high class prostitute getting banged around by guys with more money than goodness in 'em, but her day's been rotten and teasing Peggy helps a little.

She's not proud of it.

She drinks too much in a gulp.

Really not proud of it.

Some of the brandy hits the wrong pipe and she coughs and Peggy leans forward like she's gonna pat her on the back and Angie has to hold up her hand to ward her off.

Then Peggy smirks, "Thought you Americans could handle your liquor."

"You try routing it down the wrong pipe," she wheezes.

"No, I'm fine sending it down the right one thanks." To illustrate Peggy sips her brandy and then Angie has to try not to watch the way her throat undulates when she does.

She drinks a little more and then some more and then it's only after she's had a couple more than she should that she notices the newspapers still laid out on her coffee table.

####

Peggy doesn't ask about the papers. Thank God.

Instead she talks about work and tries not to scowl and she speaks fondly of a war Angie never hears people speak fondly of and she sips her brandy and leans on the table and a lot of the mystique that props her up is gone.

And it should knock the bloom right out of whatever rose Angie's carrying for her, but it doesn't.

So she gives them some space by flopping onto the bed.

"You didn't spill a drop," Peggy observes. She's twisted in the chair so she's facing Angie and Angie's mouth is dry and other parts of her are wet and brandy with Peggy Carter after a long day was a bad idea.

"That's nothing. Give me six plates and a pot of coffee and then you'll really see a show."

Peggy goes cipher on her again. "This one's good enough."

She wonders if maybe that isn't Peggy's cipher face. Maybe its another kind of face. Maybe she's schooling bad thoughts too.

She chews on her lip.

Peggy's eyes are quick but Angie still sees the way they dart to her mouth and back again.

She scoots over on the bed.

####

Peggy makes it onto the bed eventually. Angie doesn't know how long it takes because she's not about to glance at the clock. That's how spells are broken. And whatever's happening between them is a spell. Like one some crazy Hydra fanatic would make.

The brandy makes it to the bed too and Angie sets it on her bed side table. "Never get liquor on the sheets," she explains, "Miriam's got a nose like a bloodhound."

"Just for liquor?"

She ticks them off with her fingers, "Liquor, cigarettes, reefer, hot dogs, cats, dogs, a ferret which I'm still not clear on how it got in, and m—"

"Men." Peggy finishes Angie's sentence with a grin and the closest she's ever seen her to a giggle.

"She can smell a guy even when he's on the street. One time a girl wore her boyfriend's coat up the stairs and Miriam came this close to tackling her." She makes a tiny space between her thumb and finger and holds it up for Peggy's amused inspection.

Peggy touches her wrist to push her hand down. She's still laughing. "And the ferret? How on earth did she smell it?"

"No one knows! My theory is she's got a robot nose. Left over from the war."

"Oh they just issue those do they?"

She grabs Peggy's nose because she's had too many and moves it back and forth. "You tell me."

That gets another laugh and a playful hand slap. Then Peggy's reaching over her to pour more brandy and Angie's catching a glimpse of all those bits that you only get to see after you buy 'em dinner. She looks away just as Peggy's try to sit back down.

And then time stops.

It doesn't really. She's pretty sure she can hear the tick tick tick of her clock and cars on the streets and Hayseed warbling down the hall in her room.

But on the bed. In the precise confines of that mattress and frame. Time stops.

She doesn't breathe because that'll kick time back into gear. Peggy doesn't either.

They're just inches from each other. Face wise. Otherwise Peggy's knee is pressed to the outside of Angie's thigh and her elbow is brushing Angie's other knee. She's warm like standing in the sun after years being in the shade.

Peggy's the cipher this close too. This huge and gorgeous cipher within kissing distance.

Angie can't focus on any part of her. Not those lips red like half her dressing gown or eyes dark like rocks in the of the river or that nose that could softly brush her's with no effort at all. She's just too close. Too there. Too much.

Peggy's no cipher when she kisses though. She's gentle. She's hungry. She's lonely. She's all the pieces she keeps locked up and Angie has to close her eyes to hide from her.

A hand slips into her hair and catches on a pin and stills.

Peggy's ardent.

Peggy Carter kisses her and words she barely remembers reading in high school are flooding through her head. Screw being an actor and screw being good. She could be a writer like Hemingway if Peggy's gonna keep kissing her.

Nails scrape against her scalp like the ecstasy priests tell her to avoid and when she gasps a tongue slips into her mouth. She tilts her head and her hand finds a swell of a woman who moans at the touch.

Just like that time starts back up again. Grinding forward with a pained gasp. She pulls back and is pretty sure she'll never get the image of Peggy's smudged lipstick and bruised lips out of her head.

Peggy's not a cipher anymore. She's confused. Her breath is hot and sour with brandy and intimate. "Angie."

She squeezes Peggy's hip, because it isn't the kiss and it isn't Peggy and it isn't that they've got no future being like they are. It's bandages still tight around Peggy's ribs and the shadow of the cut behind her ear Angie can still see. It's her own cousin with a cracked skull.

She swallows. "When you came to the automat half passed out where were you coming from?"

Peggy's not quite as breathless anymore. "Work."

She wants to rub small circles with her thumb and never forget how Peggy's hard and soft. "What kind of work?"

Now. Now, Peggy's just terrifying. She's a wolf with teeth too close. "Why are you so determined to find out?"

"Why are you so determined to hide?"

"Don't." She says it like a command. Like she's said it before and people listened.

"Peggy I like you, but any way you look at us this is gonna hurt and right now," Peggy's up and off the bed. "Right now, I'm thinkin' you're gonna kill me."

Her back is to Angie but she can still see how her whole body sinks when she sighs. "I never wanted to kill you, Angie." Then she's out the door. It doesn't even slam. Just clicks shut like they were in there playing bridge.

She cleans up the glasses and hides the brandy away.

She doesn't think about what Peggy said. Not because it hurt. As soon as Peggy kissed her she knew it was all gonna hurt.

It was the way she said it. That she never wanted to kill her. She said it like she was sorry. Not for what she'd done, but what she was going to do.