"Seriously? This is the house we're going to live in? It's a total ghost house," Darcy said looking at the little two-story white house. It was really shabby looking, paint peeling, a shutter just barely hanging on to a window, the screen door was practically falling off, the list when on and on. She looked over at Coulson. "If the house doesn't kill us from caving in, we'll die at the hand of the ghost that haunts the place."

Phil's lip curled up in a tiny smile. "...It's not that bad."

Darcy laughed. "Uh-huh, you just keep telling yourself that, Phil." It was still weird calling him by his first name. Darcy glanced in the rearview mirror as she watched the doors of the moving van open up and undercover agents 1 and 2 hopped out and walked up to Phil's side of the car.

"Mr. Coulson, should we start unloading the van?" Mover-Agent Two asked.

Time to jump into character. It seemed weird considering no civilians were around. Darcy grabbed her purse off the floor and opened up the car door. It really was a hot car, she thought as she ran her hand over the door. Did Phil buy it brand new right off the lot? No way, he couldn't be that old. Darcy tried to do that math in her head and came to the conclusion that there was no way that Phil was over fifty. She glanced at him again. Well ... shit, maybe he was. He looked over at her and then down to her hand which was still stroking his car. She suddenly felt really dirty and immediately stopped what she was doing. Okay, so he really liked his car. Maybe he had a car kink? Oh god, where was Barton when you needed him?

Phil looked back at mover-agent and nodded. "Yes, thank you, let's start unloading. I'll go open the door," he said as he got out of the car and looked over at Darcy again. "Shall we go peek inside our new home? Let the ghosts know we're moving in?" His lips curled up into a smile.

Darcy rolled her eyes. "Might as well, but you're going to be disappointed when you find out there is no plumbing or high-speed internet connections." She followed Coulson up the rickety steps onto the front porch.

"I think no internet would be the least of our worries," he said as he stuck the key in the keyhole. He had to jiggle it and turn it a few times before the door knob turned. He smirked at Darcy as he slowly pushed the creaking door open. "Want me to carry you over the threshold?"

"You do and you're a dead man," Darcy whispered, giving him a smirk. She pushed the door open the rest of the way and took a step inside. Okay, so it wasn't as bad as she thought it was going to be. The living room was small but had big windows that let the sunlight fill the room. "Kinda...cozy."

"Aww, I knew you'd love it, baby," Phil grinned as he stepped inside, looking around at the house he'd be living in with Agent Lewis for possibly the next two months.

Baby? She wanted to hit him, but she had to remind herself that they were playing a part. Darcy wandered into the kitchen, and she smiled. "So adorable-"

"...thanks..." Phil said from behind her.

Darcy shook her head, looking at him. "The kitchen." He looked a little disappointed. Darcy grinned and turned back to check out the kitchen. White tile floors; oak cabinets; white countertops with a little flower pattern dotting some of the tiles; big picture window above the sink. What Darcy loved the most were pink the old-timey appliances that looked like they were from the 1950's. "Oh my god, I hope these work!" she said, walking over to the stove and opening the door to take a peek inside. She smiled and turned to look at Phil. "We have fucking pink retro appliances!"

Phil couldn't help but smirk over Darcy's enthusiasm. "I guess you're warming up to the house?" he asked walking over to the cupboard and opening it up. A spider dropped out onto the counter, and he flicked it into the sink. The cupboards could use a good scrub to get all the dust and cobwebs out. Phil hated dirt and grim; he liked everything to be neat and orderly. Somehow he doubted that Darcy cared one way or the other. He saw that as a potential future living together problem. "The house needs a top to bottom cleaning, but so far it's kinda homey."

"Eh, a little dirt never killed anyone," Darcy said with a shrug, as she opened the broom cupboard. She knew Phil was a complete neat freak; his office looked like a museum, she could only imagine what his apartment looked like. He'd probably follow her around here with a broom and dustpan. She turned back around quickly, her sundress twirling with her. "I can't wait to cook in here!"

"And I can't wait for my woman to make me a sandwich." He only said it to set her on edge. He knew that no way in hell, Darcy, would be the doting housewife. Truthfully, he wouldn't want her that way.

"Hell to the no! Uh-uh, I ain't that kinda woman," she shook her head and wagged her finger at Coulson as she walked out of the kitchen. "Make your own goddamn sandwich..." She threw him a little smirk, walking back into the living room. Mover-agents were hauling boxes in the room and piling them on the floor. Darcy couldn't wait to see what S.H.I.E.L.D packed for them. It would be like a Christmas surprise. Darcy headed up the creaky wooden stairs to the second floor with Phil following closely behind her.

There wasn't much up here except for three rooms; two bedrooms and a tiny bathroom. "So do you want the small bedroom or the smaller bedroom?" Darcy asked Phil as she poked her head into each room.

"Excuse us. Which room do you want the bed in?" Mover-Agent One said as he and the other Mover-Agent stood at the bottom on the stairs with a mattress, ready to haul it up to the stairs.

"You can put the bed in the room on the left," Phil said as he and Darcy went into the other room while they brought the mattress up the stairs.

Bed? Was there not 'Beds'? Surely they wouldn't actually-

"There's one bed," Phil said as if he read Darcy's mind. "I'll be sleeping on the futon. The other bedroom will be used as my writing office, there'll be a futon in there. I'll sleep on that." He made sure Darcy understood what he was saying.

A weight was lifted off Darcy's shoulder. "Oh, thank god for that!..." she laughed nervously. There was an awkward pause between them. "Okay, the bathroom is teeny-tiny but damn...look at the clawed foot bathtub!" Darcy said trying to break away from weirdness that just transpired between them. What was all that about anyway?

Phil pushed the shower curtain open, and Darcy looked down into the tub. "Oh my god!" She shrieked and jumped, stumbling, falling backwards. Two strong arms caught her just before she hit the floor. Okay, Agent Coulson had some really strong arms. Darcy could feel the muscles ripple as he hoisted her back up onto her feet. Who would have thought? She never envisioned him as one of the 'muscle agents'. Phil Coulson was a little less than average height; slender build; sometimes he wore black framed glasses, sometimes not. He was definitely a 'suit agent.'

Or so she thought.

So Darcy Lewis didn't like snakes. Phil chuckled silently to himself as he made sure she was steady on her feet again. "Afraid?" he asked with his eyebrow arching up. He was trying really hard not to laugh, but his lip was twitching. He glanced back to the curled up Milk snake. "It's completely non-venomous. Also, it's like four inches long," he chuckled as he reached down into the tub and carefully picked the baby snake up. Darcy scooted back a bit, she really didn't like snakes.

"I-I'm not afraid... Are you laughing at me?" Darcy placed her hands on her hips. Phil grinned, showing his shockingly perfect teeth again. He shook his head and carried the snake to the hallway, handing it to Mover-Agent One as he passed by.

"Get rid of this," he said with a nod.

"Yessir."

"Do you happen to have a spider phobia as well?" he smirked looking at Darcy.

She glared at him. "I do not-"

"Knock-knock!" a woman's voice called from the living room.

Darcy's eyes widened as she looked at Phil. Crap. People.

Phil had been actually been enjoying joking around with Agent Lewis, but now it was time to shift from that and slide into S.H.I.E.L.D agents working an undercover assignment. "Agent Lewis-" he whispered.

"I know. Darcy Coulson. Got it." Her stomach twisted up in knots as she thought about saying something that would blow their cover. No, she could do this. She was a damn good agent, she wouldn't fuck this up. She gave Coulson a confident smile and nod. He nodded back and then started to head down the stairs; Darcy followed closely behind.

Phil smiled at the woman and man who were waiting at the bottom of the stairs. "I hope you don't mind us barging in to your place!" the man laughed a deep hearty laugh. He was a short, balding man with a thin mustache. "Ken Cedar. Nice to meet you!" he said sticking his hand out.

"Phil Coulson." He said as shook the man's hand.

Ken grinned and looked over at the woman standing next to him. "This is my wife, Barbara."

"I made you brownies! Welcome to Shady Oaks!" Barbara said a bit too enthusiastically. She shoved the plate of chocolate brownies at Phil. He smiled and took them into his hands.

"Hi, I'm Darcy." Darcy smiled, and waved slightly.

"Ohhh, lovely!" Barbara smiled, then she looked back at Phil. "And is there a Mrs. Coulson here?"

Not good.

Phil smiled. "Actually," he put his arm around Darcy's waist and pulled her close to him. "This is Mrs. Coulson."

Barbara opened her mouth. "I-I'm so..." Her cheeks were burning red.

"It's perfectly alright," Phil chuckled.

Ken cleared his throat, clearly he was a bit embarrassed by his wife's mistake. He did wonder though how Phil snagged a pretty young thing, like Darcy. "We own the grocery store in town. It's small, but we stock everything you could possibly want to eat."

There was actual stores in Shady Oaks? Darcy was happy to hear that. Though, she was already imagining it to be like the lame ass general store in the old western shows. One stop shop for everything. She glanced down at her side, Phil's arm was still wrapped around her waist; his hand on her hip; thumb stroking slowly and gently over her hipbone. Her pulse quickened. "So.. what else in town besides the grocery store?" Darcy asked, trying to take her mind off Phil's amazing thumb work.

"Well," Barbara smiled, her blonde hair bouncing. "Let's see, there's Branson's. It's a great place to get a bite to eat or a drink. A lot of us hang out there almost every night. Oh!, and Al's, he's sells everything we don't! That's about it! Mostly we're just a small town. Most of the men here work in the woods. Logging, that's our big commodity here!"

Great. So ... two stores and a diner/bar. And lots of logs.

Ken nodded. "We're a small town, but a great town! So why did you folks decide to come to Shady Oaks?"

"I'm an author from Seattle. Working on my first novel about a small town. So Darce and I decided the best way for me to really get into the small town mindset was to move into one for a couple of months." Phil replied. Darcy could tell that he was taking in every little detail of the Cedars. He'd probably have them all figured out by the time they left.

"Excellent! We hardly ever get any out-of-towners. If we do, it's just because they've taken a wrong turn somewhere!" Ken laughed. He had a really annoying laugh. "Wow, an author! And what is it that you do?" he asked, smiling at Darcy.

"I'm a kindergarten teacher," Darcy said. Shit, or was she a first grade teacher?

"Oh lovely! We have some kids camps going on during the summer since school is out. You know how the kiddies get if they don't have anything to do. Maybe you can give us a hand since your husband will be busy working on his book! We'd apprieciate it. To tell you the truth, we're a little short-handed on help." Barbara said.

Oh Fuckety Fuck Fuck...

That was the last thing Darcy wanted to do. Work with actual kids... Fuck! "Oh, I don't-" she started to decline but felt Phil's hand squeeze her hip. "I...I would love to help you out. I love kids!" she lied.

"Do you have any?" Barbara asked, clasping her hands together.

Darcy shook her head. "No, not yet-"

"We're trying. A lot." Phil replied then gave Darcy gentle smile, looking intently into her eyes. Darcy could feel the heat rising to her cheeks and she quickly had to remind herself that this was all an act.

Ken looked from Phil to Darcy and then back to Phil. A big doofy grin spread across face. Barbara nudged him and her snapped back into reality. "Well, that's just great! Listen, the two of you should come down to Branson's tonight. Meet some of the other folks..that is if, you're not too tired," he said.

"We'd love too," Darcy replied looking up at Phil and then over to Ken.

"Wonderful! We'll see you there tonight, then!" Ken smiled, then looked at Barbara. His eyes shifted over to the 'movers' who were coming through with a desk. "Well, we'll get out of your way, so that you can get settled in! Nice to meet you and Welcome to Shady Oaks!"

"Thank you, see you at Branson's" Phil said with a wave of his hand.

"It was nice to meet-" Darcy started to say to Barbara.

"Oh, I'm so happy you're here!" Barbara said as she grabbed Darcy and gave her a hug. "You'll love it!"

Shit, this woman was squeezing her to death. Darcy tried to politely smile and push, Barbara off of her. "I know...I'm just sooo...happy!" Darcy faked her enthusiasm.

Barbara nodded, then grabbed Ken's hand. "Buh-bye!" They waved one last time and then headed out the door and down the driveway.

Phil shut the front door and then leaned up against it, exhaling deeply. "Well, that was interesting," he said looking at Darcy and then to the plate of brownies.

Darcy laughed. "Those two were the happiest fuckers I've ever seen in my entire life."

Phil chuckled.

"But, ewww. Ken was totally imagining us having sex, when you said we were trying to have kids. A lot. You, dirty old man...Get some curtains on these windows, otherwise, he might be hiding in the bushes at night hoping to see a free live action porno starring us." Soon as Darcy said it, the mental image of her and Phil 'getting it on' popped into her head. That was something she didn't need to think about. Ever. Not that it was horrible image or anything. Shit, she could feel herself getting warm. Time to change the subject.

"I wonder if the whole town is like that? Crazy," she said looking up at Coulson. He was staring back at her; faint pink spread across his cheeks. He wasn't thinking about he and her-

No. Not cool and calm Coulson. He didn't think about stuff like that, did he?

He quickly broke his gaze from Darcy, and looked down at the plate. "At least we got brownies out of it," he said with a thin smile, holding the plate out towards Darcy. His cheeks returned to their normal color. Hopefully, he'd never have another inappropriate thought of junior Agent Lewis like that again. He couldn't. He wouldn't.

"God, I hope they're weed brownies," Darcy said with a sigh, picking one of them up and taking a bite. Twenty minutes in Shady Oaks and it was already proving to be difficult.

This mission was going to kick her ass by the time it was over.