The Right Moment

Sam Wilson/Beth The Waitress

Sambeth

Theme song:

Walk The Moon – Shut Up And Dance

"She's pretty. You should ask her out."

Steve glanced sideways at Sam, snorted quietly. "Who, Beth? She's not my type."

Sam looked again at the blonde waitress who had greeted Steve with cheerful "Hi, Steve!" as they took their seats in the busy sidewalk café. "Are you blind? She's stunning, she's everybody's type!"

Steve grinned at that. "I won't deny the visual appeal, and Beth's a sweetheart, too. But – I think she's the picket-fence kinda girl, and – that's not who I am. Not any more."

Sam looked at his friend, at his noble chin held high – and he shook his head. "You are out of your tiny mind."

Steve laughed. "Why don't you go for it then, Sam? I'll put in a good word for you."

Eyeing Beth as she bent over to clear dirty coffee cups from another table, Sam hesitated. "Is she single?"

"As far as I know," Steve shrugged.

"Well in that case, hell yeah. Introduce me when she comes to take our order, would ya?"

Only, it seemed that Beth wasn't going to take their order. Another waitress came over instead. And delivered their coffee. And brought their check. The café was busy, both waitresses rushing about, and Beth never got close to their table.

"I could go and say you'd like to ask her out?" Steve offered.

"I am not twelve, Rogers," Sam said witheringly, "I can ask a girl out by my own self, thanks very much."

Steve grinned. "Now you know how I feel when Nat's trying to matchmake for me."

Sam laughed at that. He had a loud, cheerful laugh, and Beth glanced over as she delivered coffee to another table and smiled at him. Before dashing off again to take another order.

"Are you gonna…?" Steve nudged Sam as they got up to leave.

Sam glanced inside the café. Saw Beth leaning on the counter having a moment's respite. She looked flushed and tired, running the back of her hand over her forehead. He hesitated, but then shook his head. "Not today. It's only a couple blocks from the Tower, I'll come another day, when she's not run off her feet. I get the feeling I might get my head bitten off if I try to hit on her today."

Steve made a noise – was he clucking? Sam aimed a punch which the super-soldier dodged, chuckling.

"Asshole. You gotta pick the right moment, Rogers."

"You pick your moment, then, Falcon. Let me know if it ever comes."

Sam growled and grabbed. Steve ran, laughing, easily evading his friend.

Over the next week, Sam went back to the café no less than four times.

And the moment never came.

The first time, Beth wasn't there. He asked and was told it was her day off.

Just my luck, Sam thought, and took his coffee to go.

The second time she was there, but just finishing her shift as he arrived, walking out of the café with her bag over her shoulder, chattering on her phone. She gave Sam a bright smile and walked away. He turned to watch her go regretfully.

Shitty timing, Wilson.

The third time, he was with Stark, who talked so much Sam never even got to say a word to Beth. There was no question of his asking her out with Stark there anyway, the billionaire was the world's worst gossip. If Beth turned him down Sam's ego would probably never recover from the razzing he'd get from the other Avengers. He looked regretfully back at her as he and Stark walked away.

Next time, beautiful.

On the fourth occasion, he was just entering the café, about to take a seat at one of the outside tables, when he saw Beth at a neighbouring table, talking to a good-looking white dude dressed in a very expensive suit. Tall, blond and blue-eyed, the guy could have given Steve Rogers a run for his money in the looks department. Sam hated him instantly.

"That's very sweet," Beth said, laughing at something Mr Overly Handsome had said.

"How about your phone number then, sweetheart?" Mr Smarmy Git gave her a winning smile.

"Oh no. I'm sorry." Beth smiled sweetly. "I don't date people I meet at work."

Sam froze, hand on the back of the chair he'd been just about to pull out to seat himself. Making like his phone had just vibrated in his pocket, he pulled it out. "Hi? Oh, yeah, I was just about to get coffee – no, sure, I can come now!" He walked hastily away.

Shit, shit, shit!

Despondent, Sam trudged back to the Tower. How the hell was he ever going to ask Beth out now? He wasn't going to make like a creepy stalker and follow her around so that he could 'conveniently' bump into her at the grocery store or something. She seemed pretty sharp, anyway, he'd heard her remember several customers by name and their coffee order, she might well recognise him from the café and guess what he was up to. At which point he'd be lucky if he didn't get slapped with a restraining order.

With a glum sigh, Sam leaned back against the wall of the elevator as it zoomed upwards. It let him off on the common floor and he headed over to the fridge, took out a carton of orange juice and poured himself a glass.

"Why the long face?" Barton asked from his perch on top of the fridge as Sam returned the carton.

Sam absolutely did not shriek like a girl. "Goddammit Barton!"

The archer leapt agilely down, grinning. "You know, for a guy who flies, you don't look up all that much."

"Oh fuck off." Sam picked up his glass and took a long slug of his juice. Turning around he did not shriek again as he came face to face with Romanoff.

Natasha grinned at him, her eyes dancing with amusement. "He's just failed, again, to get up the courage to ask the girl he fancies out on a date."

"How did you… no, scratch that, I don't want to know the answer," Sam grumped, "and it wasn't about courage. It's about picking the right moment."

"Suuuure," Clint said.

Sam growled and was about to storm out when Natasha touched his arm lightly. "Don't mind us, Sam. You coming tonight?"

He frowned. "To what?"

"Stark's Team Bonding thing," Clint leaned on the counter, arms folded, showing off his thick biceps. "It's mandatory – but hey, he's hosting it in this fancy club, so, could be worse. At least we can get drunk and par-tay."

"Oh, yeah," Sam remembered now. "Sure. Yeah. What the hell. Ain't like I've got a date or anything."

It was a very fancy club indeed, and Sam was glad he'd taken Clint's words to heart and dressed up nice. He looked doubtfully at the queue outside the club – and then Maria Hill got out of a cab with Banner and saw him.

"Hey, Sam. You don't have to queue, we're on the list."

"Of course," Sam shook his head with a wry smile, followed them to the front of the line. Stark had booked out the VIP section of the club, which was even swankier than the rest of it. As soon as they walked in waiters were pressed glasses full of Cristal on them.

"Nice," Sam took a sip, looking around. Romanoff was draped over a white leather couch, her red hair looking like blood spilled on its pristine surface in the weird club lighting, Barton perched on the back of the couch behind her as usual. "So what's the team bonding thing?" Sam asked them, walking over.

"Drink, dance, have a good time," Natasha replied with a grin. "Stark knows how to do things right."

"Oh," Sam blinked. "Well – yeah. That does sound pretty good." He took another sip of champagne. "Where is Stark?"

"Dancing, of course," Natasha waved across the balcony rail to the dance floor below.

"Of course," Sam echoed, headed over to the rail and leaned on it to look down. It was a seething mass of humanity down there, he'd never pick anyone out, but he spent a moment looking anyway, until someone tapped him on the shoulder.

Turning around, he nodded and grinned as he saw Steve – and almost dropped his glass as he saw the stunning blonde on Steve's arm, her slender curves caressed by a stunning crimson dress, high, strappy sandals on her feet.

Steve smirked at him. "Sam Wilson, allow me to introduce Beth Jackson. Beth, may I present Sam as a much better dancing partner than me? Man's got rhythm."

Beth smiled shyly.

"You ass," Sam said to Steve, "you totally set this up."

"Me?" Steve put a hand to his heart and did his best to look innocent, but Sam had known him far too long to buy that.

"Seriously, man, I told you, it's about picking the right moment…"

"Oh, shut up and come dance with me," Beth interrupted, laughing as Sam obviously got quite flustered. She'd thought he was really attractive that first time he'd come in with Steve, and then just a couple of days later her co-worker had told her he'd come in and asked for her, and seemed disappointed when she was off duty. She'd seen him a couple of times since, and then yesterday Steve had mentioned that Sam had asked for him to 'put in a good word'.

Beth had been incredibly flattered. She knew who Sam was, of course – the newest Avenger's face had been all over the media for a while – and had cursed her rotten luck when some stuffed-shirt twit tried to hit on her just as Sam arrived at the café today. By the time she'd deflected the self-absorbed moron Sam had gone.

Miserable, Beth had texted Steve when she finished work. I think I fucked up.

Less than an hour later, Natasha had rocked up on her doorstep with a bag full of expensive makeup and the most beautiful dress and shoes Beth had ever seen. And now here she was, having basically just demanded an Avenger shut up and dance with her – no wonder he was staring at her open-mouthed, she'd behaved outrageously, it must have been that ridiculously expensive champagne…

"Sam, you all right?" Steve said, puzzled.

"Yeah. Yeah, thanks, man, I'm fine." As though in a dream, Sam reached out to take Beth's hand. She gave him a shy smile, long lashes sweeping down to hide her cornflower-blue eyes.

Steve slid away, giving them at least the illusion of privacy. Sam couldn't think of anything to say that didn't sound stupidly trite, though, so he just kind of stood staring at Beth.

"You don't have to come dance with me if you don't want to," Beth blurted out when he'd been silent for a few seconds too long.

"I can't think of anything I'd enjoy more," Sam said with utter sincerity, and his smile grew as Beth's eyes flew up to meet his again, wide and shocked.

"Did you just – did I just…" Beth sputtered, astonished.

"Yeah. I'd show you, but," Sam gestured, tapping his right hip just behind the hipbone, "I might get arrested for indecent exposure."

Beth blushed. If he would, she certainly would, because her mark was in a corresponding spot – on her inner left thigh. She'd have to have her legs wrapped around his lean waist...

"Yes, um, no," she said hurriedly, trying to push the mental image away.

Regaining a little of his composure – though not much, because he could see Steve cracking up in the background and suspected the super-soldier's hearing had picked up far too much – Sam smiled at Beth.

"We can check out each others' marks later. Right now, I believe you invited me to dance?"

Beth's smile was like being bathed in sunlight. "Come on then, Falcon. Steve's been talkin' you up, you know. Says you got the moves."

He tightened his hold on her hand, tucked it into the crook of his arm and led her towards the stairs. "Oh, I'm gonna show you the moves."

In case you missed it – I've started writing some one-shot smut sequels to the original Shorts. They are, in a word, porny. Extremely explicit. So if you don't like that sort of thing, don't read.

On the other hand, if you do like that sort of thing, the first 5 chapters feature Skye/Bruce, Skye/Gambit, Skye/Deadpool/Logan, Bucky/Beth and Pyro/Iceman/Skye. The fic is called Crackship Armada Sexytimes.