November passed quietly by. Rosie submitted a few more pages of the book and it looked like in a couple weeks they would be ready for printing. Steve got over his cold and looked much better, and nobody mentioned the incident again. Or the date that he had asked Rosie on in his delirious state.

But on December 7th they were all together anyway, sitting in Rosie's apartment as she and Steve painted portraits of Bucky, her pointing out tips and tricks.

"Here Steve, you wanna block out his features like this, use a dark colour, not too dark now-"

"Like this?"

"Yeah! That's a good umber, make sure to be broad with your strokes at first, and use all the space on your canvas, his head and upper shoulders should take up all of it, I usually like to center the eyes,"

"I have no worries about filling the canvas, Buck's fat head probably needs more canvas then there is in Brooklyn. We might run out of paint,"

"Oh ha ha, I should be getting ready for a date right now!"

"Bucky it's 12pm," Rosie dipped her brush in a new colour and swirled it onto the canvas. Her canvas was larger than Steve's and she was only painting on the right side. The rest was covered over and she wasn't letting Steve see it.

"Lunch dates are a think Ro!" He protested, crossing his arms, then uncrossing them as Steve shot him a look for moving.

"I wouldn't know I suppose, been so long since I've been on a date. One of the girls at the Zoo has been dying to set me up with some cousin of her's, he's a scientist, works on animal behaviours apparently," Rosie sighed in a light tone, using all of her willpower not to look at Steve. "Maybe I should let her,"

"This guy good looking?" Bucky asked, wiggling his eyebrows.

"Apparently so tall, dark and handsome if I am to believe what I hear, but I dunno, he isn't much my type." She admitted. Since meeting Steve her 'type' had changed radically.

"What is your type?" Steve asked quietly, continuing to paint.

Rosie looked up in surprise, then bit her lip and turned back to her canvas, slyly smiling as she painted. She had him right where she wanted him. Bucky sent her a wink when Steve focused on mixing his colour, looking to all the world as if he wasn't interested in the conversation at all, except from the rather aggressive way he was mixing paint, and the pink on the tips of his ears.

"Oh you know, I like blond guys for one," Rosie layed down a few strokes, "And I'm not much for scientists, they tend to think they're better than everyone else, I like boys who are creative. Thinkers in a different way you know? I'd like to get recommended a book rather than being told about one,"

"You'd like a tall guy?" Bucky asked, grinning as he remembered Steve lending Rosie his prized copy of Grimm's fairy tales one day, she read it in a night and gave it back to him with a drawing inside of the little red riding hood. He used that drawing as a bookmark, and occasionally referenced how pretty it was.

"Not particularly," Rosie said "I like a guy with a real moral code, sticks up for what he believes in, nice smile. I want one who's not into himself, a heart of gold. A good heart's what really matters."

"Sound's like you already know who you want," Steve said, but instead of looking more sure of himself as Rosie had planned, he looked almost defeated.

"I do-"

"WE INTERRUPT THIS AFTERNOONS BROADCAST FOR IMPORTANT BREAKING NEWS! AMERICA HAS JUST JOINED THE WAR, AND WILL BE FIGHTING ALONGSIDE THE ALLIED FORCES TO BRING DOWN THE AXIS POWERS ONCE AND FOR ALL-" The radio interrupted their quiet afternoon with that broadcast, and just like that their lives were thrown into chaos.

Steve and Bucky immediately started talking, they spoke in hushed tones about what would happen, Steve vowed immediately to enlist, and when Bucky looked at him sideways he got that determined set to his brows he always did. Rosie almost cried right then and there as she watched them, knowing that even though America won the war they could die, they probably would die, and there was nothing she could say to stop it. Maybe she could! Maybe what they would do wasn't that important to the future, she could change things that were minor, but not fate. She couldn't. She had to try.

"Steve! Bucky! Please promise me you wont-" Rosie choked on her words. She felt the vice like grip on her throat. She felt the tears threaten to fall and wished she knew what would happen to the two of them. She had no idea what history had in store for Steve Rogers or James Barnes, but whatever it was it was important. God, she hoped, please let them have to live. Please let this imperative be for good.

Steve and Bucky looked over at her with soft eyes, expectant and waiting. She made a promise then and there that she would stay with them. Until she couldn't any longer. She would love those boys and look after them, and make the time they had left together as good as she could. And if Steve came through this alive, by god she'd make him go on that date with her and she'd marry him if it killed her. She knew, looking at the two men in front of her, that she had found her family.

"Promise you what Rosie?" Steve asked softly, the panicked news reporter still whirring away in the background as he looked at her.

"Promise me, we will still have Christmas together right?" She quickly asked, her eyes cloudy with tears but her lips in a small smile.

"Of course! We wouldn't leave our best girl alone for christmas!" Bucky exclaimed, pulling her into a hug. "And you know I would never pass up an opportunity to et your cooking,"

"You too Steve? You promise?"

"Rosie, I couldn't ever say no to you," Steve said quietly. Walking over and hugging her too, Bucky grabbed Steve's shoulders and pulled him into the hug, and they all stood there quietly for a few minutes. Thinking about what was going to happen next.

They finished painting that afternoon. Bucky never did leave for his date and the atmosphere, while jovial and upbeat, was overhung with a certain melancholy.

Christmas was in the air for the next few weeks. Steve and Rosie went for hot cocoa and drew the patrons in the shop, Steve showed her the best places to see untouched snow, and they both danced around each other like two falling snowflakes. Delicate and beautiful. After one too many almost dates however, Rosie had finally had enough.

"Steve?" Rosie asked, sitting in her spot by the fire she always kept burning in her apartment nowadays. For someone who ran warm she always needed to be near the heat. She hated winter, as she always told Steve, she needed the sun on her skin and the heat in her bones. Steve laughed and called her a lizard more times than not.

"Hm?" He acknowledged, thumbing to the next page in his book. They had taken a trip to the library the other day and Rosie had given him a few recommendations. He had hardly put the thing down since.

"You are finally going to take me on that date. Saturday, 1pm, meet me outside my apartment and wear something warm," She said, not looking up from her book either, a sly smile on her face.

"I- what- date?" Steve asked, bewildered. He looked up from his book and stared at the woman by the hearth, bathed in firelight and she looked like a star. Or his very own sun.

"Yes Steve, it's what two adults do when they like each other,"

"You like me?" Steve asked, his voice almost dreamy as he looked at her. He broke his trancelike state when he pinched his arm, almost jumping out of his skin.

"No, I spend this much time with every man I despise," Rosie laughed, then looked over at him. "I take it you really did forget then?"

"Forgett?" Steve asked, feeling dumber and dumber by the minute.

"When you were ill, you told me you wanted to take me on a date. I agreed," Rosie said, knowing full well what was about to happen.

"Rosie that was- that was at least a month ago,"

"I know, you've kept me waiting long enough. Unless you don't want to go? Did I read the situation wrong?" She asked, biting her lip.

"What about the man you were on about? The kind, smart, artist friend?" Steve asked, almost petulantly.

"Steve,"

"Yes?"

"How did you not understand that I was talking about you?" She said, laughing fondly at him. Steve rocked back in his seat, looking for all the world that he could be knocked over by a feather at that moment. He felt weightless. "Steve, you are the kindest, sweetest, most handsome man I've ever met. You stick up for what you believe in, you are stubborn as all hell, and I can't think of someone i'd rather go on a date with then you,"

"Rosie, are you sure? I'm not much to look at, really, you'd be better off with a man that could look after you, provide for you," Steve said, looking at her painfully, wanting with all his heart to just say yes but unable to. He couldn't make her his, he didn't deserve to have her. Being her friend was more than he could have ever hoped for.

"Steve, if you keep insulting yourself I am going to get very upset. And stop insulting me too. I know beauty when I see it, I'm an artist for pete's sake, So I only want a one word answer. No excuses, no explanations. I want a one word answer and then we will say more about it. Will you step out with me tomorrow?"

"Yes," Steve answered before Rosie even properly finished her sentence.

Rosie grinned at him like he had just given her the moon for her to wear as a necklace, and walked over to him putting her hand on his chest and bending down to press a soft, rose scented kiss to his cheek.

"Good. Now get out and get some rest. I don't want you oversleeping for our first real date."

Steve arrived home and went to sleep that night with an air of disbelief around him. And when he woke up at 7am sharp, he knew he had six hours to worry himself sick over it.

"What did she say exactly?" Bucky asked, pacing the living room for a second before sitting down on the sofa, looking at Steve who had his head in his hands, sitting in the armchair.

"Dress warmly,"

"Warmly? What does that mean! It's winter! In New York! Of course you're gonna dress warm! Do you need to be fancy?" Bucky started pacing again.

"I dunno Buck,"

"And it's winter! We can't steal Mrs B's roses anymore, they're all dead!"

"That's true,"

"You can't turn up without a flower Stevie!"

"I mean I could,"

"I don't think you're freaking out about this as much as you should be Steve, this is your first date! With Rosie Hill! The girl you've been pining for for the last four months!"

"I've not been pining,"

"You've been pining,"

"Ok maybe i've been pining,"

"Why aren't you more freaked out?"

"Trust me, I'm nervous. So nervous. I feel like I'm on that coney island ride all over again," Steve sat up and wiped his face, looking at Bucky with wide eyes. "What am I gonna do?"

"Here's what you're gonna do!"

Steve arrived at 1pm on the dot in front of Rosie's house. Dressed in his best slacks and pressed shirt with suspenders (The brass on them shined till it shone by Steve himself). He clutched at a fake rose he bought from the party store in town and patted at his hair, Bucky had fixed it with some of his wax and it felt like he had just walked through a wind tunnel.

"You're here!"

"I couldn't make my best girl wait," Steve replied before he even saw her. Dressed in red like she was the day that they met, she was bundled up in a sweet white dress and red coat, a red hat over her brown curls and a little side bag swinging about her hips.

"Is that for me?" She asked, taking the rose gently from his grasp and laughing, pretending to smell it before tucking it into her bag.

"All the real ones are dead, but-"

"You never show up without a flower," Rosie finished, her eyes twinkling. "You look great Steve,"

"Hey, aren't I meant to say that? You do, by the way. Look great I mean,"

"Aren't you a peach? Now come on, I want us to get where we're going before we die of old age,"

Rosie and Steve walked through the town arm in arm, and Steve for a second, felt like he was six foot tall. Walking in Brooklyn with a dame on his arm prettier than a moviestar he felt like nothing in the world could be better than this. He felt a quick pang of guilt when he thought of the enlistment papers he had sat on his dresser at home, neatly filled in and squared away to be sent the very day after christmas, but squashed it down. He had no right to stay longer, he'd promised Rosie, but he couldn't put his life above those of the other men on the front.

They slowed to a gradual stop in front of an ice rink, Rosie looking at him with excitement as he laughed.

"You really want to see me fall over for a half hour?" Steve asked, looking at her bouncing with excitement as she paid the man too quickly for him to object and grabbing skates for them both.

"Please?" She asked, holding her hand out for his shoes, which he sighed and gave her, without the giddy grin ever leaving his face.

"You know I can never say no to you,"

They stepped on the ice carefully, Rosie assured him she'd never been ice skating before, she mentioned something about being better at swordplay then blades on her feet but he brushed it off as he was spending far too much concentration on standing. After a minute, Rosie managed to get her balance (Mostly due to a fair amount of telicentic help, not that Steve or anyone else noticed that) and began skating in smooth circles, looping around and back, even copying a few spins she saw other girls attempting. She was beautiful, and Steve simply gripped onto the side of the rink for dear life and watched her.

"Come on Steve! I won't let you fall!" She promised, skating up to him and outstretching her hand.

"I don't want to take you down with me," He laughed, as she tucked her arm into his and held him up, slowly pushing them away from the side.

"You? Never!" She said, the smiles and laughs never stopping as they slowly made their way around the rink. True to her word Steve never fell (it came close a few times but some well placed telekinetic pushes had him balanced in no time. Rosie thought for a minute that this was indeed good practice for her ability and that she should come more often).

After an hour's worth of skating they got off the ice and back into their shoes, Rosie took Steve to a hot dog cart and this time he insisted on paying. They sat on a bench in the park and looked at the beauty of the scenery, and talked until the sun set. Steve walked her home and smiled at her.

"I had a great time,"

"I'm glad, I told you I'd make sure you didn't fall didn't I?" Rosie giggled, looking at him with adoration.

"You did indeed,"

Steve trailed off and bit his lip, reaching to put his hand on her cheek as he leaned in nervously. He let himself get close to her, so close that he could feel her soft breath on his nose, and waited for her to close the gap. He's rather she rejected him then he kissed her without her wanting to. With barely a half second of hesitation their lips met in a chaste kiss, a meeting of lips that was so short and sweet he could have sworn his heart did not beat for the duration.