Chapter 12: Letters
Steve and Bucky sat outside of the movie theater, a mostly-empty bucket of popcorn sitting on the bench between them. Steve was picking out the bits in the bottom, tossing them on the ground and slowly accumulating a pigeon army.
Bucky couldn't have cared less. He was totally absorbed in the piece of paper held in his hands.
Bucky,
I hope you're enjoying being home, I know I would be. I'm a bit jealous, to be honest. I haven't been home in almost a year.
Thankfully life here has been a little bit better. I'm no longer getting invited to someone's barracks for a 'chat' every couple of days. I blame you for that entirely, and bless you for doing it. I don't know if it was that stunt right before you left or if people are afraid you'll pop out of nowhere and beat them blue if they make a pass at me.
You got into a lot more fights than I ever knew, didn't you? I wish you hadn't, but I'm touched all the same.
Not to say that everything is better. Worth is still Worth and Campbell is still Campbell, meaning they're still looking down their noses at me every chance they get and telling me to get their coffee. I'm half-tempted to do it just so I can toss it in his face. I swear, I'd have decked that man by now if I didn't have so much self-control. It makes it better though, knowing I have you in my corner along with Erskine and Peggy. Worth and Campbell can't hold a candle to you all.
Did I tell you about their latest attempt to get rid of me? They took one of my notebooks and were going to give an idea of mine to Erskine as their own. It backfired quite a bit – I write my notes in German. Not only is it easier on Erskine, but it prevents that exact thing from happening, because I'm the only one in the lab who's truly fluent. The look on their faces was wonderful, I wish you could have seen it.
Give Steve my best.
He'd read the letter through three times since he'd gotten it that morning. The closing was Bucky's favorite part. Jo was written, only to be crossed out and replaced with Belle. It made him smile every time he saw it.
He found the letter itself funny as well. It was written on stationary bordered in roses in pink and green pastel. He very much suspected that the stationary had been a gift, because he couldn't imagine Josie buying something like that for herself. She'd be more likely to pick something practical and pretty than floral and floaty. That was just her style – pretty but practical.
"Who's the letter from?" Steve asked, unable to stand the curiosity anymore.
"Belle," Bucky said, smiling at the signature once more. Steve stared at him blankly.
"Belle… Belle Taylor, from three blocks over?"
Bucky shook his head. "No, Josie."
Steve's eyes widened in understanding. "From the base! Yeah, I met her a couple weeks ago."
"I know, she told me." Bucky smirked at him knowingly. "Still getting in fights, huh? She said she had to fix your nose for you."
"Yeah, she did a good job," Steve said, touching the bridge of his nose. It was still straight, with no sign that it had ever been broken. He looked at Bucky pointedly. "She said you'd been in your fair share of fights, too."
"Yeah," Bucky admitted sheepishly, running a hand through his hair. "Mostly shutting up the bastards that kept shooting their mouths off about Belle."
"Why do you call her that, anyway?" Steve asked curiously, tossing a handful of popcorn bits out. His pigeon army grew by two members.
Normally Bucky didn't have a problem talking to Steve about the girls in his life. But with Belle, it was different. He wanted to keep the little things between them. It made him feel a little guilty about keeping things from Steve – he'd never done it before – but at the same time, he liked having that private thing between them.
"No reason," Bucky said with a shrug.
"You know it's French for beauty, right?" Steve asked wryly. Bucky laughed and nodded.
"Yeah, I know. Maybe that's why I do it, because she gives me this little shy smile and bites her lip every time I call her that. Don't even think she realizes she does it."
Steve stared at him, shaking his head in amusement. "You really are smitten, aren't you?"
Bucky smiled. "Steve, I'm gonna marry that girl."
Steve stared at him in surprise. "What?"
"I mean it!" Bucky insisted, throwing out an arm and catching Steve by the shoulders, pulling him slightly off balance. Steve's floundering foot sent the pigeons flying into the air in a rush of feathers. "I'm gonna marry Josie Ealum one day."
Belle,
Steve says hello, and thanks again for the patch job. He's glad you kept him from having a bump in his nose. I told him it might have improved his face a little. The little punk took a swing at me for that one. Can't be mad, I deserved it.
You caught me, I was in a couple more fights that you didn't know about. Always defending your honor though Belle, always.
I've told you not to worry about Worth and Campbell. They're just jealous that you can do their jobs better than they can when you're half their age and twice as pretty. One day they'll be coming to you, asking you to explain those theories of yours. You can have the last laugh then.
Far be it from me to stop you from tossing coffee in their faces though. Just make sure you've got a camera ready. You're right, I'd like to see their faces.
They should have known better than to try and pull something on you. You're the smartest person I've ever met; I'm not surprised you write your notes in another language. One of these days you're gonna have to teach me some German. I like the idea of writing to you in a way no one can understand. It'd keep Steve from teasing me about it.
Hope to see you soon, Belle.
Bucky
P.S. Who gave you the stationary?
I smiled at the post script. I wasn't surprised that Bucky had figured out the stationary was a gift. It was from my step-mother. I wasn't a fan of the pastel roses, but I figured I might as well use it instead of wasting it. Thankfully, I'd almost run through the whole set on letters to Bucky and my family.
I was pleased that Steve's nose healed alright, and I was glad Bucky was enjoying himself. Giving the letter one last scan, I tug into my shoulder bag, pulling out a piece of stationary and a pen to compose a response.
My hand snapped up, catching Howard's before he could swipe Bucky's latest letter. He had developed a bad habit of stealing my correspondence. I looked up at Howard, smiling sweetly. He blinked down at me.
"You got some reflexes Josie," he whistled, impressed. I let his hand go and tucked Bucky's letter inside my bag along with the stationary. If Howard was here, then it was time to get down to business.
"Are you seeing other men, Josie?" Howard pouted as I stood up. "Does this mean we have to end our torrid affair?"
I scoffed. Howard's flirting didn't bother me so much because I knew he wasn't serious. It was all in good fun. Really, that was a great description of Howard in general - all in good fun. Now that Bucky was gone, I enjoyed my time in the Brooklyn lab far more than my time at Camp Lehigh, if only because Howard made things so much more entertaining. It was fascinating listening to his stream of consciousness as he tried to figure out a mechanical issue or work out some other problem.
"Regretfully so," I replied drily. "Come on, Erskine wants your opinion on these figures by tonight."
"I know, I know," Howard sighed, flopping into the chair next to me and leaning it back, propping his feet up on the table. I seized the file and propped it open on his stomach, starting to read. "Where are we with the exploding problem?"
I winced. We were having much the same problem with the serum as expected – the body wasn't shifting all at once. Muscles and bones grew faster than skin, damaging it and occasionally ripping the test subject apart.
Since we'd started testing on rats, there had been more than one lab assistant who spent his evening clearing rat organs from inside a tank.
"Nothing so far," I sighed. "If we could regulate the muscle growth while stimulating skin renewal, then we'd be golden. The only problem is-"
"How to do it," Howard nodded, scowling at the figures in front of him.
We'd had some success. A few of the rats who came through the procedure seemed faster or stronger than before. Unfortunately, most of them were also so deformed that they didn't last more than a day or two after being injected with the serum sample. Our projections for the subject surviving were somewhere hovering at about thirty-three percent. We needed at least eighty before we could move on to human testing.
I kept it to myself that I had a few ideas on how to solve 'the exploding problem' as it had come to be known. The problem was it wasn't my secret to share, or at least, not just my own. I wasn't looking forward to the day when I'd have to decide whether or not to start spilling some of my secrets to Erskine and Howard.
"We're not as far along as we hoped, but we're not as far behind as we worried we would be," Howard said, tossing the file aside as he finished it. He rubbed his eyes wearily. "All in all it could be worse."
"But it could be better," I said, summing up the general feeling of everyone involved in the project.
"Exactly," he sighed. "Well, we could try using Vita-Rays? That might speed up the cell replication in the skin just enough to get us some wiggle room."
I nodded thoughtfully. "That could work. We'd have to find a way to contain it though…"
Howard lunged for a notepad and a pencil and started scribbling. Curious, I stood up and moved to crouch behind his shoulder, watching as he began to rough out a basic blueprint for a containment capsule.
"And here, an air-tight seal," he said, gesturing to a point near the top of the capsule. "If we line it with lead, that should contain the Vita-Rays."
"If we do that, how much power would we need? Can we even generate that kind of energy?"
Howard started scribbling in the margin of his drawing, figuring out power inputs. When he was done, the circled number at the bottom of the page was alarmingly large. I frowned.
"Even with the power from Brooklyn, can we manage that?" I asked curiously.
"Barely!" Howard said triumphantly. "It may dim the lights, but we can. The only problem is we'd need something strong enough to handle that kind of power. There's nothing like that right now. I'd have to…" He flipped the page over and began feverishly sketching, mumbling about percentages and insulators under his breath.
I stepped back, smiling. Howard had officially slipped into what I called 'mad scientist mode.' He was lost to the world inside his head, swimming in data and designs. He wouldn't be coming out of it for a while, it history was anything to go by.
"Howard, I'm going to go," I called. He didn't flinch, just mumbled something about capacitors and flipped the page so vigorously he nearly ripped it off.
Smiling slightly and shaking my head I gathered my bag and tossed it over my shoulder, leaving Howard to his work. I nodded to the MPs who were on hand to guard the lab. With a quick password entered on the keypad, the bookcase slid open and I entered the antique shop.
"Evening, Mary," I called politely as I left. Mary nodded at me from behind the counter, the jingling overhead as I left.
I started down the sidewalk, taking my time. I'd taken the train into the city this time, so I didn't have a car to meet. It was nice to have time to peer around and see what there was near the lab. A shoe-shiner, a hair dresser, a second-hand clothing store, a diner…
"Belle."
I jerked, whipping around in surprise. Bucky was there, stepping out of the recessed entry to the diner and beaming at me like he'd just won the lottery. Steve poked his head out from behind Bucky, grinning too.
"Bucky," I said in surprise. "Steve."
"Didn't even see me?" Bucky pouted, stepping out of the diner door and approaching. "I'm hurt, Josie."
I smiled back. "Somehow I think you'll survive."
"I dunno, his pride might not be able to take it," Steve said drily, moving to Bucky's side. "He's delicate, you know."
"Yeah, right, I'm the delicate one, you punk," Bucky said, looping his arm around Steve and pulling him into a loose headlock, ruffling his hair.
"Jerk," Steve said fondly, shoving him off. I watched the two of them. It was easy to tell they were best friends. They seemed so close, it was really heartwarming. It was also heart-wrenching, in a way. It made me miss my own best friend.
"What's with the sad-eye Josie?" Bucky asked, looking at me with concern. "Things not going well on your top secret project?"
I shook my head. "No it's not that, it's actually going well. Just, seeing you two… Well, I miss my best friend," I explained with a self-conscious shrug.
Steve tilted his head. "Doesn't your project give you time off? Couldn't you pop by a visit, even if it's just for a day?"
I laughed darkly. "Steve, my best friend's name is Yori Tsukuda. She's not in the country." My throat tightening, I admitted, "I don't even know if she's still alive."
"Don't think like that, Belle," Bucky said, placing his hands on my shoulders. I tilted my head back to look at him. "Anybody who's friends with you had to be pretty resilient. I bet your friend's doing just fine."
I refused to allow myself to sulk, not when I was with company. I was lowering the tone. I smiled up at Bucky. "I'm trying to decide if that was a compliment or not."
Bucky grinned. "Compliment, definitely compliment."
His hands were large and warm on my shoulders, holding tightly but tenderly. I could smell the scent of a storm coming off of him. It was comforting and electrifying all at once. I wanted to tuck my face into his wrist and breathe deeply. It was entirely too tempting a prospect.
"Steve," Bucky announced suddenly. "It's almost lunch time. What do you say we give Josie the grand tour of Brooklyn cuisine?"
Steve grinned. "Sounds good. Annette's?"
Bucky nodded. "Annette's."
Bucky kept one hand on my shoulder, tucking me against his side as he turned and walked towards the diner he'd just popped out of. Steve followed. Out of the corner of my eye I could see him stifling laughter at Bucky. I couldn't bring myself to mind though. I was too busy basking in Bucky's scent. It was making my head a little dizzy.
Bucky guided me to a booth near the back and sat down, sliding in next to me and leaving Steve to sit across from us. His arm stayed draped across the back of the bench behind my shoulders. I smiled slightly. Normally I would have seen the gesture as possessive, but on Bucky, he just looked relaxed and content.
A waitress approached us in a mint-green uniform.
"You boys are back," she drawled, popping her gum. "The usual for you both?"
Bucky and Steve were apparently regulars, because they nodded. The waitress scribbled down an order on her notepad and then nodded to me. "And for you, miss?"
I opened my mouth, but Bucky caught me up. "Give her the same thing I get," he said. The waitress nodded, scribbled down a note, and moved off. I turned to Bucky, raising an eyebrow pointedly and shooting him the stink eye.
"I can order for myself," I said tartly. Bucky held up his hands innocently.
"I know, Josie, I know. But this place has the best burgers in Brooklyn, you haven't lived until you've had one."
I continued to give him a stern look, but I knew it wasn't doing much good as my lips started to curl into a smile against my will. Bucky nudged me teasingly.
"Am I forgiven, Miss Ealum?"
I gave in and let myself smile at him. "You are, Sergeant Barnes."
Bucky blinked in surprise. "You've heard?"
I nodded. "I'm still on base, remember?"
I didn't add that I'd only heard because Colonel Phillips had not-so-subtly mentioned it in front of me one day and then looked at me like he was waiting for a show to start.
"Yeah, Bucky mentioned you were working on some top-secret project," Steve recalled. "What are you doing?"
I gave Bucky another look. "People aren't supposed to know," I said sternly.
"I just told Steve," he defended himself.
Shaking my head and sighing, I explained, "I signed a confidentiality agreement. You shouldn't even know I'm involved."
"Here you go," the waitress said, appearing suddenly with our meals. She placed the plates in front of us accompanied by a couple of sodas and chirped, "Enjoy your meal!" before moving off to take the order of a couple of men in suits who had walked in.
"Well?" Bucky said, nodding encouragingly towards the large burger in front of me. It was thick, and I wondered if I'd even be able to get it in my mouth. Even Steve was watching in interest, like he wasn't quite sure if I'd go for it or not.
I was never one to back down from a challenge.
"Here goes nothing," I announced, and picked up the burger. I had to stretch my jaw to fit it in my mouth, but I managed, taking a larger bite than was strictly lady-like. I chewed, my cheeks puffing out like a chipmunk. Bucky was right, it was delicious.
I swallowed and agreed, "It's good!"
"Told you," Bucky said smugly, and started on his own.
Let me know what you think about incorporating other perspectives into this story! I think I'm going to do it more often, I feel like it makes the story a little more cohesive.
