December 1940
SSR Base in upstate New York
Anya sat by her bedside, looking through the small trinket of photographs she had of her sister and family. Her thumb rested over a photograph of her parents and grandmother, sitting at a table outside of the doorway of their house in Champagne with vines trailing down the cobbled-walls behind them. Around them were bushes of flowers, she remembered as a light pink and yellow that her mother had planted the spring before. For a brief moment, she felt she was back there as the young girl in the photograph, holding onto her mother's linen skirt as she peered up to see her little sister in her father's arms. Anya closed her eyes, inhaling deeply as if trying to imagine the smell of those flowers, the smell of fresh bread coming from the kitchen window and the smell of baked tomatoes with garlic and herbs from the table as well as the acid but fragrant smell of red wine. Her ears tried to remember the chirps of the birds, the symphony of cicadas echoing from the nearby creek, and the laughs of her family. She opened her eyes again, flipping to the next photograph of herself in Paris as a student, proud with her diploma as she hugged Christiane tightly as they sat in front of the steps of La Sorbonne in the 6th district of Paris, studying their faces. It was just before the invasion; the weight of the war had not set in on their faces. Christiane looked more carefree, her long hair then swirling in the wind, her eyes light and bright as she held a garnet of flowers she had taken from Jardin de Luxembourg for her sister's ceremony. Anya looked at herself, her hair was tucked away with a braid as a crown, a hairstyle her grandmother insisted both girls wore for formal occasions. Her reflection in the photograph stared back smiling, almost young and liberated.
An Anya that could have been, she thought to herself, before looking up at the mirror fixated on the wall across the room. The dark circles under her eyes were imminent, her blue-grey eyes stared back, almost the color of a storm with dark clouds brewing over an Arctic sea. She chuckled to herself, reminding herself of the family legend her mother told her and Christiane for the reasons of their eye colors. Closing her eyes again, she tried to remember her mother's eyes, a mix of Anya's blue-grey and Christiane's green, with all of them having a small streak of a golden-orange to it.
"Settle in, mes trésors." As their mother, Maria, smoothed their hair, lifting the duvet up closer to the girl's chins.
Their mother brushed her thumb over Anya's forehead then Christiane's smiling gently, "There is a family legend, that we had our eye colors given to us by the guardian of Bifrost in Asgard, Heimdal and Odin, the king of Asgard. Heimdall is said to have golden-orange eyes, and Odin had blue-grey eyes."
"What's Asgard, maman?" Christiane tried to scoot up her pillow to better see her mother.
"It's the home of the gods. Up there," she pointed up, "is a big world, full of different lands. Asgard is where the gods live, and Heimdall is the gatekeeper to the road that connects all these lands."
"What does he do, maman?" Anya sat up, looking at her mother questioningly.
"He sees all and hears all."
Christiane sat up abruptly, "Comme le Papa Noël?"
Maria laughed, nodding, "Almost like Papa Noël, Christiane".
"Does he give presents?" Anya interjected, her eyes and smile widening.
"Not like Papa Noël, but the king of Asgard, Odin, and him gave my side of the family a gift. Your great great grand-father, Harald Vilisson, was the son of an Asgardian prince, Prince Vili, the brother to Odin. Vili was a great warrior and chose to use his final years on Earth after a severe battle wound that took away many years of his life."
"But how does that work, maman?" Anya scratched her head, her eyebrows furrowing together.
"Asgardians live much longer lives than we do as humans. They can live thousands of years longer than we do."
"And then what happened to Prince Vili?" Christiane mumbled.
"He came to Earth to seek some peace and quiet finally and well," she smiled, "He fell in love and met a woman who was your great great great grandmother, Ingrid." The girls erupted in giggles, smiling at their mother.
"And then what, maman? What did Odin and Heimdall do?" Anya asked.
"Because Vili had suddenly disappeared from Asgard, Odin asked Heimdall to find him with his sight. He found him on Earth and saw he was with Ingrid. Heimdall tried to convince Vili to come back but he refused, making Odin have to come down to Earth to visit him. When that happened, Vili still wouldn't return to Asgard because he insisted to his brother that he was finally happy. Vili then introduced Odin and Heimdall to Ingrid and baby Harald. Seeing how happy they were together, Heimdall decided to give Harald a gift because of his half-Asgardian blood."
"What was the gift?" Christiane's asked, her face in awe and eyes wide.
"Heimdall can see all and hear all in all the lands. Our gift was to see all and hear all to Asgard and to those that we love. Odin and Heimdall wanted Harald to be able to have a part of Asgard with him always. The brothers understood the true meaning of family. From then on, every generation has had a bit of Heimdall's sight in their eyes."
"Maman?" Anya held onto their mother's hand, "Do we have the gift?"
She nodded, "It's in your eyes," she placed her palm on Anya's cheek, "You have the Asgardian blue eyes, just like your grandfather Olav with a streak of Heimdall's golden-orange" as Anya stared back in awe.
"But what about me, maman? My eyes are green! That's not like you and Anya's eyes!", quietly mumbled Christiane.
Maria put her palm on her youngest daughter's cheek, taking in the bright emerald green of her eyes mixed with a tiny flair of grey-blue at the bottom and a streak of golden-orange, "You do have some bits of our eyes too, but you have the green eyes of Harald's eyes."
Anya squinted her eyes questioningly, "But how do you know this maman? Do you see and hear everything?"
"Like I said, it is just a legend passed down through the family. Bonne nuit, mes trésors. Je t'aime.", as she kissed her daughter's goodnight, blowing out the candles and closing the door. (Goodnight my treasures. I love you)
"Anya?", Peggy's voice came, cutting through her daydream.
"Hmm?" turning around to face her.
"I'm afraid we can't be there for Christiane's birthday, or Christmas. Orders have come in for us to go on a special operation till April in Europe. They want us to look for locations to set up SSR outposts throughout the European theater."
Anya sat there, looking down briefly before looking back up at Peggy. Peggy saw that she was disappointed, almost exasperated, "I suppose this weekend will be an early Christmas then for us. Do you think you can leave base and join us for the weekend?"
"I don't think so, there's a handful of paperwork administration has just sent me again that I need to get done before Philips returns on Monday." As Peggy sat down on her bed, undoing the pins in her hair, setting each one by one on the trinket bowl on her bedside table. She turned to Anya, exhaling and now looking exasperated, "Give my love to our little one?" Anya nodded, coming to sit beside Peggy as they stretched their legs out.
"I can't believe the last time I saw her was…"
Anya replied with something between a chuckle and a sign, "When you got us out of Paris."
Both women smiled, chuckling softly. Peggy turned to Anya, her face semi-serious, "But, how is she?"
Monotonously, Anya replied, "School is great, she's at the top of her class right now. Her shifts at the car-shop are teaching her a lot it seems and I think she likes a boy." Anya's face immediately broke into smile.
Peggy's expression followed suite as she smiled, her face in excitement, "A boy!"
Anya nodded, her lips pursed and amusement written on her face, "And I've met him. Quite the handsome one and very polite."
Peggy leaned in closer, "Is he tall?"
"Taller than the giraffe that she is!" Anya burst into laughter.
"Good lord!", as Peggy in imitating looked up to the ceiling with a sudden hope in her eyes, "Finally, thank you.", before she burst into laughter with Anya.
Finally, Anya sighed, "Well, I should go call her and tell her the news then."
That Saturday, early-morning:
Christiane heard a rustling from the foot of her bed before a hand rested to smooth her hair, "Wake up, poulette". She turned around sleepily to see Anya smiling down at her. Christiane smiled back, before realizing the darkness of her bedroom.
"What time is it?", she squinted her eyes at Anya.
"It's half past four in the morning." Anya replied coolly.
"Why in the world are you waking me up at this time of hour?" Christiane groaned as she struggled to sit up and find her lamp.
"Be ready in 15 minutes, and wrap up warmly.", as her sister got up from the bed and walked out the door to the kitchen. Already, Christiane could smell coffee and hot chocolate as well as some sort of pastry cooking in the oven.
"Where are we going!", she shouted after Anya.
Anya ducked her head round the doorframe smiling cheeringly, "It's a surprise! And Steve and Bucky will be here any minute."
"Quoi! (What!)", as Christiane hurled herself off the bed onto the floor with a thud, scurrying to get her clothes from the drawers and rush to the bathroom.
Christiane splashed her face with the icy cold water from the tap, furiously brushing her teeth and combing her hair out. She didn't have time to even put it up before she could hear Steve's half-awaken voice outside the bathroom door.
Anya tapped on the door, "Hurry up!" just as she opened the bathroom door.
Immediately, she saw Bucky with ruffled messy hair looking at her suspiciously with a smirk, blanket in one arm and the other holding the front door open for Steve and Anya with the picnic basket and more blankets, walking out.
She grabbed her coat from the hook, draping it around her before walking past Bucky as he shut the door behind. They walked down the stairs together, carefully in the dark. As they reached the last steps onto the street where Steve waited in a car with Anya behind the wheel beside him, Bucky leaned closer to Christiane.
His breath warm against her cool skin, "You look beautiful with your hair down.", as he smiled to himself before standing back up taller and striding forwards to open the passenger car door for Christiane.
Christiane's eyes widened, the warmth of his breath still on her skin as her cheeks flushed bright red and her eyes darted down to the ground away from Bucky, avoiding his smile of amusement that was creeping onto his face.
As soon as they were all seated, Anya leapt the car forwards onto the main road. "You can all go back to sleep, we'll be there in two hours."
Christiane leaned forwards to the center of the front two seats, "Anya, will you please tell us where we are going!"
"It's a surprise!", Anya smiled proudly to herself.
"Mais – (But)" Christiane's eyebrows were raised, about to go on a full-on interrogation in French to her sister.
"No buts! Now go back to sleep!", her sister now raised her eyebrows at her, one hand up with her finger pointed.
Christiane muttered back, semi-content with the prospect of falling back to sleep, "Oui Anya", before she closed her eyes, resting her head on the headrest of her seat.
Beside her, Bucky looked at Anya and then Steve, making sure they weren't looking before glancing at Christiane sleeping. Her lips were parted slightly and her cheeks a rosy pink from the cold. His eyes seemed to linger longer on her lips, as he felt his heart quickened imagining a place and time in the future where he could just –
"Buck?", Steve asked with an eyebrow raised and a smile of amusement.
"Huh?" Bucky snapping out of his daydream looking to his friend.
"Try to get some sleep.", he grinned back.
By the time they had arrived to the location, it was still dark outside. Anya turned around to see that somehow Christiane and Bucky had moved closer together, with Christiane's head rested against Bucky's shoulder and his against the top of her head. Anya smiled to herself, making a mental image of the sight before lightly tapping Steve to wake up.
"Steve", she whispered. Steve rubbed the sleep out of his eyes before realizing where they were parked, "Look behind." Anya giggled quietly.
Steve turned around, a smile growing on his face as he took a deep breath in, his smile widening. Quietly, the two of them got out of the car, making sure to make the sound of the car door closing prominent.
Christiane awoke to the sound of the car door closing, her eyes flustering to see Anya and Steve walk away from the car. Slowly, she turned to see what (who) she was leaning on only to suddenly pull away, wide-eyed in shock causing her to hit her head on the roof of the car.
"Aie! (Ow!)"
Suddenly Bucky also awoke abruptly, causing him to hit his head on the roof of the car with a loud thump, "Ow!", before looking at Christiane, rubbing his head.
"What happened?"
"I fell asleep on you.", Christiane replied, her gaze averted.
"Oh, come on, it mustn't' have been bad?", he looked to her waiting for her response. Instead all she could do was hide the smile appearing on her face, her hair covering the grin appearing. Bucky ducked his head lower to try to look at her, his lips forming into a smile when she finally looked up at him, her cheeks a more intense pink now.
Christiane looked at Bucky, his hand rubbing his head, she laughed quietly before biting on her lower lip, "What happened?"
"I bumped my head on the roof.", he shrugged.
"I'm sorry.", she whispered but her smile getting bigger.
Bucky's eyebrows rose, suddenly breaking out into laughter as he tried to lean towards her to tickle her, "No you're not!", as Christiane tried to move away bursting into a fit of giggles before she grabbed for the door handle and ran out into the cold wind with Bucky following behind.
The two of them laughing and running on the wooden-planked track of the surrounding sand hills finally reached the end, out of breath, only to see where Anya had taken them. In one direction was a stretch of wet sand with the ocean, and the other with sand dunes that seemed to go for miles. In the dark, the edges of the dunes seemed to cast shadows against each other, with the ocean-side casting the waters as dark and riffs of white cutting against the wind.
"Over here!", called out Steve as he helped Anya set blankets on the border between the two stretches.
As Anya set the picnic basket down, she took out two cannisters of coffee and hot chocolate, passing the cups around. "When did you have the time to do all of this?" Christiane asked.
"Last night actually, I borrowed a car and came down to see you."
Christiane squinted back, her smile suspicious, "Who's car?"
Anya straightened up, her eyes averted upwards but her smile obvious, "Someone from work."
"This is delicious!", Steve exclaimed from a sip of hot chocolate!
"The best hot chocolate I've ever had.", Bucky looked at Steve nodding.
"Someone gave me some Swiss chocolate so I thought I'd put it to good use.", Anya replied as she took a sip of hers.
Christiane smirked, her tone sarcastically teasing, "From someone from work also?" as Anya spurted her drink laughing.
Anya gave Christiane a look that could only mean revenge with a grin as she stood up, "I'm going to go take a walk down by the beach. Steve?"
Midway through his drink, "Mmmhmm.", getting up with an extra blanket around him as they went down the dune to the beach.
All Christiane could do was shake her head, laughing softly to herself before standing up as she took in the sound of the wind and the soft crash of the waves. For a moment, she felt at peace closing her eyes, missing the way the cold wind brushed against her face and her hair flying with the breeze. Their breaths formed icy smokes as they watched the darkness fight against the seep of light from the horizon.
"What are you thinking about?", Bucky whispered, getting up to stand beside her. He looked to her, moving closer to her. He placed his hand closely to hers, feeling the way a sudden charge of electricity like a current was between them. His heart quickened again, leaping and tossing around.
"This moment.", she whispered, her eyes still closed, a smile forming at her lips. He felt the urge to move closer, their hands millimeters apart. Christiane opened her eyes, looking forwards to the horizon. Slowly, her eyes moved to look to Bucky who was also looking to the horizon. She felt a prickle of electricity between their hands, moving closer and closer to each other. Each inch and millimeter quickening her heart.
"Are you happy?", he whispered back.
She nodded, "Yes."
His hand moving closer, their hands almost touching by a millimeter. She could feel his hand slightly shaking, at times touching with hers.
She could hear him breathing, taking a deep breath, his eyes still set on the horizon, "Christiane."
Her heart only quickened, her breath hitching, as she finally made herself look at him, his hair still tossed from sleep, his eyes a bright and clear cerulean blue. He turned to see her glancing at him through her lashes, her lips parted again anticipating what he would say, her eyes green but with the grey in it more prominent in the dark blue of dawn. He could feel his heart squeeze tighter in his chest.
He tried to find the words, his voice croaked, "I.."
Christiane reached out to grab Bucky's shirt to her, feeling the fabric on her fingers. Taking a step forwards, he was closer than he had ever been. He bent his head slightly down, gently kissing the corner of her lips slowly, before she kissed him back, her hand moving to his cheek. He tasted like chocolate as Christiane felt a pressure to her lips, his hand intertwining with hers as his other free hand slid into her hair, pulling her closer to him. He moved her hands from his shirt to his shoulder, as he wrapped his arm around her waist tightly. Christiane opened her mouth to his. Bucky couldn't hear anything anymore except for what he thought was the sound of the wind coursing past his ears. He never felt so light-headed, almost tipsy. Christiane pulled back, gasping for air, taking a step back for balance only to have Bucky hold her closer to him, bringing his forehead against hers.
When they both regained their normal breathing, Bucky whispered, "That was…"
"Finally!", came a voice and a holler from Anya as she waved her hands from down at the beach, causing the two of them to pull away from each other as they squinted down to where she was, the first light of a sunrise emerging.
Bucky was the first to laugh, ducking his head down to smile to himself before he leaned his cheek into her palm. Christiane lifted his face to look at her, his pulse rushing seeing her cheeks a darker rose.
Before Bucky could say anything, Christiane put a finger to his lips, as she now tried to hide her smile. Bucky lifted her chin up, making her look at him.
"I've wanted to do that for a long time", his cheeks now flushed pink.
"Bucky," Christiane hesitated, a smile still on her lips, but her eyes in confusion, "We've only known each other 5 months, is this too soon?"
He shook his head, "No, because I like you Christiane. You are stubborn and incredibly smart, and unlike any other person I have ever met and I want to know everything about you."
"But what about what…" her eyes darted around their surroundings, even though they were the only ones there, "what will everyone else think?"
"I don't care what they think. Do you?" he looked at her intently with hope.
"No..", she whispered, "It's just, I'm not very good at this."
He could hear Anya and Steve walking and voices up the dune's path coming towards them, "Then we'll do this together then."
She smiled to him, before resting her head on his shoulder and wrapping a blanket around them, their hands intertwined together.