"You come back," she warned Bucky, grabbing hold of his lapel and bringing him down to her level. "You hear me? Or I'm goin' in after you, and I'll drag you out by your goddamn ear. You hear me, Barnes?"

"Yes, ma'am." he said, amused, and scooped her to his chest.

Steve pretended not to see that as soon as she had her chin tucked over his shoulder, her expression fell, and lip trembled. By the time she withdrew, she had an eyebrow cocked, composure in place.

"And don't get no dame pregnant, or you deal with me." she said, and punched his arm for good measure.

"Jesus, ruin all my fun." he rolled his eyes, bought Steve in for a quick hug, with many a manly back pat. "Look after her."

"I think she can look after herself." Steve muttered, but it only made Darcy grin at him. "But I'll keep an eye on her anyways."

"Good." he fixed his cap into a lopsided tilt, looking at them both with a shit-eating grin, then saluted and hopped aboard the train. He squeezed his way to a window, sticking his arm out to wave, the watch Darcy had given him for his birthday flashing on his wrist.

Darcy just rolled her eyes when he blew them a kiss, pretending to catch it and tuck it in her pocket. They saw him laugh, the wave becoming more and more frenzied as the train pulled away with a loud groan of heavy wheels.

Darcy waved and waved, right until the train was swallowed up by the shadows of a tunnel. Steve didn't know what happened, because one second she was fine, smiling, then wrapped around him with her face against his neck, and hot tears spilling into his shirt.

"Darcy?" he said, arms already winding around her waist.

She trembled all over, but didn't make a sound.

"Baby?" he held the back of her head, feeling her full body flinch as he accidentally found the lump on her skull where the guy had hit her the day prior.

It took her a minute, but she relaxed against him, pressing an apologetic kiss against his throat before standing, and wiping under her eyes. She dug around in her pocket and pulled out a hanky, blotting at her face, before she said, very quietly:

"I love you." her eyes were very green, ringed in red as they were. "Steve, I really love you."

He swallowed.

"I love you too, baby. Let's go home."

"Steve?" He looked up from the drawing pad that he'd yet to mark with a single line. God, even in her overalls and smeared with grease, she was pretty. Her hair was getting so long, in barrel curls at the small of her back, the front smoothed out of the way behind her ears. "Everything alright?"

"Yeah." he smiled quickly. "Yeah, it's fine. Just... y'know. Thinking."

"Wanna tell me about it?"

"No, no. It's okay, just, you know. Homework. Actually-" he shut the book, rubbed his knees. "I'm gonna go for a walk. Clear my head. I just need to think."

"You got it." she said, though she was frowning slightly. "Take your time."

He bent to press a kiss on her hairline, only meaning for it to be a quick goodbye, but he lingered longer than expected and it made her touch his cheek and keep him anchored.

"Hey." she said, roughly. "Don't be sad. He's gonna come back soon, isn't he?"

"Sure." he said, and leaned away. "Be back in a bit, baby. Need anything?"

"Just you." she said warmly, and kissed him again.

"I'm in the army!" She stared at him, smile going slack. "They accepted me, Darcy! I can go, I can fight!" he was nearly jumping, hands on her shoulders.

She just stared at him, blinking stupidly.

"Say something!" he said brightly.

"Congratulations." but it was so dull, so blank.

"Darcy," he said, and shook her a little, beaming. "They accepted me. I can go and fight."

She swallowed, a small, wobbly smile on her mouth.

Then she framed his face with both hands, and pulled him in for a kiss.

At first, he didn't know what she was doing. When her mouth sucked at his lower lip, he let a breath go, eyes fluttering shut. His hands automatically slid from shoulders to the small of her back, and she sighed, changing the angle of the kiss.

She dragged her hands over his chest, slipping them under his arms to brace against his back, pulling him closer. His head was spinning from lack of air, and even if he would've kept kissing her until he passed out, she broke it, leaning her forehead down on his shoulder.

He couldn't stop from kissing her cheek, then the side of her neck.

"Show me the transcript?" she said, and he dug it out of his pocket, showing it to her with a grin. She scanned it, then looked up at him with arched brows. "You're twenty six?"

"Yeah. Didn't you know that?" he tipped his head at her, watched her blink slowly at him, then the page, reading. "Darcy?"

"I didn't know you were twenty six." she sounded strangled. "I- thought you were younger."

"Yeah," he scrubbed the back of his neck. "I get that a lot. Say, that reminds me - how old are you?"

"Well," her voice pitched. "I'm not twenty six, that's for damn sure." she handed back the paper, stepped around him, and went to the door, yanking it open.

"Darce?" he charged out of there so fast he didn't even shut the door. "Baby-?"

"Two of my brothers were killed in action." she said, turning with pitched brows. "And a week ago, my ma wrote me to tell me that one of my other brothers is put up in a hospital in the middle of some windy shit-hole we ain't never heard of, with no legs from the knee down. Stood on a goddamn land mine. He's gonna die too. His blood's infected."

He went pale, reached for her, but she shook her head and wrenched back.

"Why didn't you tell me?" he said softly.

She shrugged, but it was more an aggravated twitch than anything.

"Got the KIA notice a month after we started goin' together. It was too heavy to put on you. And then when I got ma's letter, and I was gonna say somethin' but then Bucky was goin' and I didn't want to think about it, didn't want to put those two things together. I as good as lost three brothers to this war, and I just sent another one off. I don't want -..." she swallowed. "I thought you were safe to fall in love with, but now you're gonna leave me too."

He recoiled.

"'Safe to fall in love with'." he repeated slowly. "Because you didn't think they'd accept me in the army, cuz I'm a little guy?"

She froze, and he knew it to be truth.

They stared at each other for a long second.

"I love you." she said thickly, and he was startled to realize that that was true as well. He opened his arms and only managed a step forward before she crashed into him, nearly sending him to the floor. "I love you, I love you."

"I love you too." he hugged her as tightly as he could. "I love you, sweetheart."

"Please don't go." she said, very small, against his shoulder.

"I gotta, honey." he said, and petted her soft, springy curls.

"You don't." she muttered, but tucked her face against him and let him hold her still, for the longest moment. Then she sighed, exhaled, and kissed the hinge of his jaw. "I'll be back. I need time."

He swallowed.

"Okay." he said, very muted.

"I'm coming back." she informed him, squeezing his hands. "I'm coming back to you. And I'm staying the night."

"Okay." because he wasn't going to tell her 'no'.

Steve saw the look on her face, and knew that something bad was probably about to happen. She would confess her love for Bucky and he'd get his heart broken and go to war and never see her again. His hands bracketed her face, lifted her eyes to his.

"What's wrong?"

"I-... I want you to know-" she put her hand on his. "I'm not proving a point, and I'm not... I'm not doing this to hurt you. I just-..." she lifted her hand.

"Please try not to be angry with me, Steve."

Then she took out a neatly folded piece of paper from her pocket, slid it onto the counter, and walked into his room.

He opened it with shaking hands, wiping it flat against the counter top. It was Darcy's transcript papers - she was accepted into the war by the same office that took in Steve. That's what she'd been looking for, when she took his papers. While he was there, he read her real name.

"Darcy Rose Lewis," he muttered, and frowned at the birth year. Didn't she say she wasn't twenty six? "Rose." he tasted the name on his tongue, but it didn't suit her, not like Moxie, or Darcy did. He folded it up, took in several deep breaths to try and slow his heartbeat, and knocked on his own door before entering.

"I'm not angry." he said calmly, and came to sit beside her. "I'm... Scared."

"Join the club."

"Is this what you felt when Bucky joined?"

"Just about." she turned her head to look at him. "Worse when you did."

"Huh." he bumped her shoulder with his. "I get it now."

She swallowed, reached out for the hand he instantly took, pressed to his mouth.

"And you're not angry?"

"A little confused." he sighed. "How did they let you in?"

She flushed.

"Dr. Erskine recognized me from what Mr. Stark had said. He wants to try."

"So you're in this special program too." he nodded, and swallowed, rubbing the back of his neck. "I know you're built tough, baby, I know that. And I know you're smart - don't know any one smarter - but it's war." he looked at her, blue eyes wide.

"People die everyday, and it don't have to be fair or right, and it doesn't matter if you're fast or strong, coz bullets are faster and stronger."

"You're telling me." she said with a weak smile. "I made 'em for a living, remember?"

"I know." he reached out, touched her cheek. "I know."

It might've been him. It might've been her. But they crashed together and he had just reached down to cup her chest when he remembered the age on her form, wishing he could just think about the way she was under him. He lifted his hand to her face, much to her disappointment.

"On the form," he said, panting heavily. "You said you were twenty six. Is that true?"

She had been flushed before, but now she went impossibly red, and shut her eyes, reaching up to pull one of his pillows over her face. With a reaction like that, he wouldn't stop pestering until she was peeking out from behind it, a big grin on his face.

"If you're older than me, it's okay." he mused, and chased her mouth with kisses until she was giggling and squirming. "I don't mind dating an older lady... ma'am."

She smacked his side, so he rolled off her and propped up on his elbow, tracing the shape of her face with his fingertips.

"I-... Don't want you to... I don't want it to change, anything." she said, and gulped, looking at him with big eyes. "I'm not older, lemme tell you."

"You're twenty... four?" he guessed. She shook her head. "Twenty two? Twenty?... Nineteen? Eighteen...?" he blinked at her, sat up.

"Seventeen?"

"It's not a big deal."

"Darcy-" his mouth was open. "You're seventeen?!"

"It's not a big deal," she said, and blinked. "Is it?"

"You're - not even legal to go to war!"

"So?"

"S-! So!" he just gaped. "You moved from some farm in the South to Brooklyn and got a job and lived by yourself?!"

"Yeah." she shrugged, propping up on her elbows. She still seemed sheepish, smoothing back her hair. "Well, uh, Buck asked me if I was new to the area. I'd only been here for about three weeks when we met."

Steve covered his face with both hands.

"I-... I can't believe I didn't know that."

"Does that change something?" she said, voice pitching.

He took a moment to think about it.

"I'm not gonna tell on you to the army." he said slowly. "You'll get in a lotta trouble for lyin' on your papers. I don't even wanna know how you forged that."

She was staring at him.

"Never mind the damn army. I'm talking about between us, Steve. Does my age change anything between us?"

The answer, in honesty, was yes. Yes, it changed something. He was suddenly very eager to have her in her own apartment, off his bed. Was it any wonder she'd stuck to him and Bucky?

She was so young.

And on her own.

"How did your mother let you go?"

"My mother has never had a handle on me." she scoffed. "I told her I was gonna leave and I did and there was nothin' she could've done to stop me. The only one who I ever listened to was my daddy, and he decided to go to war, so. Here I am."

"Jesus, Darcy..." he looked at his hands.

"Do-... Do you hate me?"

"What? No. No, I don't hate you."

"But this changes something, doesn't it?"

"I just-" he looked at her, reached out and took her hand. "I've been takin' advantage."

"Steve, you really haven't. If anything, I took advantage of you - I mean, I thought you were more my age than twenty six."

"Don't say it like I'm old." he scowled half heartedly.

"Well don't say seventeen like I'm a baby. And besides, you couldn't take advantage of me if I didn't want you to." she reached out and cupped her hand around his face. "But you don't want me any more, do you?"

"Of course I still love you-"

"Want me, Steve." she took his hand and put it on her chest. "Do you want me?"

"I-" unfortunately, he'd wanted her for months. That didn't change, the longer he looked at her trussed hair, the swollen sweetheart shape of her mouth, the pull of buttons across the ample chest, he realized that hadn't changed not one bit. "When's your birthday?"

"Coupla months." she leaned into his hand and he stopped thinking for a second, his brain totally shutting down to how soft and willing she was. Then he shook his head, removed his hand, and thought: Of course she was soft and willing, she's seventeen.

"Coupla months." he muttered, and rubbed both hands on his jeans, over his knees, trying not to think about her skin. He tried to rub the feeling of her body away from his palms. "Well, we're just gonna wait a coupla months, then."

"What? Why?"

"Because-..." Eighteen sounded better, somehow. There was nine years between them, good god. "God, I was nine years old when you were born."

"Yeah, and I was handling guns when you were getting your first job." she grumbled, folding her arms over her chest. "I'm not a child."

"I know that."

"Well stop acting like I'm a child. You haven't - been putting your hands on a child, okay?" she got off the bed. "I knew this was bad. I knew I shouldn't have told you. I didn't - Steve, I just couldn't..."

He caught her hand, looking up at her from under his eyelashes.

"I still love you, sweetheart." he murmured. "This only changes things a little. I still love you, honey, but I'm not gonna - we're not gonna -"

"Have sex." she said, and he flushed, but nodded, linking their fingers. "Well, what if I wanna?"

"Not until your birthday." he said firmly. "I still wanna kiss you, Darcy. I still wanna hold you to me and touch you and I want you, don't get me wrong. I just... wanna wait, a little bit."

She took timid steps forward, standing between his knees. She was smiling a little, as she reached out to touch his face.

"I don't think I'm ready, anyway." she said quietly. "I-...was kinda distant, recently. That was why."

"Oh." that made sense. "I thought - well. I thought it had more to do with... you not wanting me."

"I do, though." she said, eagerly putting her hands on his hair, pushing back his flop of bangs. She bent and pressed a kiss to his forehead, lingering with a sigh by his ear. "I want you, Steve. I only want you, for my first. Only. Whatever."

He chuckled, buried his face in her shoulder, inhaling her particular smell.

"But we're gonna wait." he said. "Until your birthday. When is that, again?"

"Tomorrow?"

When she woke up Steve had pulled on long sleeves and was sitting on the free couch, elbows on his knees, head turned to look at her. She guessed, by the dawn light outside, that if he'd slept at all, it hadn't been for long.

"Wassamatter?" she lifted her head, arm reaching for him. He patted the back of her hand, running a soft thumb over her knuckles. "Cold?"

"I don't want you to go." he said evenly. She saw her papers in his other hand. "Don't go."

"Huh?" she lifted up onto her elbow, making the covers fall over her shoulder. She was decent, but barely, with Steve's eyes trained on her face.

"Don't go through this with me." he said softly. "I know it's unfair. I know I shouldn't say it. But you're my girl. And I don't want you to go."

She blinked away the sleep.

"You don't go." she replied, every inch fair and reasonable. "And I won't."

His smile was very small, very sad.

"I thought you'd say that." he looked at the paper in his hand, and put it down on the table beside the bed, and turned to face her more fully, putting her hand on his leg, eclipsing it with both of his. "I thought about it. Runnin' off with you. I can forge papers. You know the works of a farm - we could get a little place together where no one'll come lookin'. Some chickens and a horse."

"The hay would make your allergies play up." she said, almost immediately.

"Yeah." he ducked his head, smiling. "You thought about it too, huh?"

"I think about it all the time." she admitted quietly. "I never thought about, I dunno, husbands, or kids, or a family of my own. But I think about it with you."

"Do you wanna get married?" he pitched his brows. "Before we go? We can get married."

"My mama would kill me if I got married without her bein' there. She's got one daughter outta seven kids..."

"Yeah." he put his eyes back down. "Yeah, you're right. And I should probably wait, a lil', to ask your daddy, huh?"

"If you think so." she said, very amused, fluffing up her cushion to lean heavily against it. She dragged the covers up to her chin, and Steve patted them down over her arm. "My daddy would probably think you're pullin' his leg. He's spent my whole life tryna make sure I'm undesirable as possible."

"Well he failed." he said, and looked her in the eye. "I know there isn't anything that I can say that'll make you not go."

"So don't try." she said evenly, and opened the front of the blankets. "Get in here with me, would ya? S'cold in here."

For a second - a split second - he hesitated.

"Just for a cuddle." he said, blushing.

"Just a cuddle." she agreed, very seriously.

He sighed and climbed onto the sofa with her, fitting their legs together and wrapping his arm over her waist, trailing his nails over her back. They were nose-to-nose, breathing in each other's air, almost instantly warmer. He kissed her cheek.

"Are you okay?" she whispered.

He barely brushed his mouth against her mouth for a reply. Her hand rubbed his bony chest, ran up to his collar bone.

"Thinkin'." he said softly.

"What about?"

"Just... how I ended up with you... And then I get selected for this program and... now I gotta go. You're perfect, Darcy Rose Lewis." she blushed heavily at the use of her real name, and attempted to bury her face under his neck. "I don't understand what you want with me. You should be with someone like Bucky, some one who can take care of you, can make you happy-"

"I take care of myself." she told him softly. "And you make me happy. You make me giddy, I'm so happy. And I'm so lucky to have you all to myself. Call me greedy."

"You're greedy." he murmured, and she felt his fingers, so gentle and hesitant, tip her face upwards, draw her out from her hiding place. "You're my greedy girl."

"And don't you forget it." she muttered.