Despite her best hopes, Summer quickly learned that what she was referring to in her head as the "stupid bruise incident" was, indeed, not going away any time soon, and it was also having a direct and unpleasant effect on Bucky and her's day to day life.
It had been a week, and the bruises were nearly gone, but as Bucky had predicted, they had bloomed an ugly-looking purple the morning after he accidentally gave them to her. She had cringed when she looked at them in the mirror, not because they really bothered her, but because of how she knew Bucky would react when he inevitably asked to check on them. And he did, as soon as he had seen her that morning, and when she showed him, he said nothing and spent breakfast physically next to her but mentally million miles away.
She then began to hope that it was just a passing phase and that he'd get over it, as she already had, and that things would go back to normal. She also hoped that the little things she had begun to notice were figments of her imagination, things like his kisses not lasting as long, his embraces almost nonexistent, and his sudden tendency to fall asleep early. These things didn't happen every day, but when they didn't, she still found things to worry over, like the two times she did manage to end the night in his bed since the "incident". He had always been cautious to the point of her being able to notice, but now, he'd taken to acting like she was made of the world's thinnest glass and would shatter if he merely breathed the wrong way.
She still walked away those nights with no complaints, but she had to wonder how he could enjoy himself at all when he spent the whole time thinking so hard that she could feel it. He was also noticeably less flirtatious by day, and that might have been the single most jarring change of all.
Seven days of this had led Summer from being initially nervous to fearful, then to slightly irritated, and now she might have been a little bit angry. If the mildly harsh way that she was flipping pancakes in Clint's kitchen was any indication, she was definitely getting mad now.
She was cooking six at once on a giant griddle, leaning on the counter and glaring out the little window above the sink next to the stove between flipping. Outside, Bucky was helping Clint build a new pin for his animals, and she didn't want to watch, because he was doing this in the sun and a stupid white tank top, and he was going to come back inside all sweaty and flushed and, if the last week was any indication, she was going to have better luck turning her pancake into a Krabby Patty than of getting anywhere with him.
She flipped the pancakes again, more angrily this time. Sure, she could point out that David was still soundly asleep upstairs and that she'd made enough pancakes by now to take a break and go take a "quick" shower with him, but he'd still figure out a way to say no and she'd still end up standing here, her only company a spatula and a bottle of cooking spray. All because of a few unintentional bruises that didn't even hurt anymore.
As she ungently flung the pancakes on top of the others, on a huge plate, a familiar feminine rasp from behind her said, "What did those pancakes ever do to you?"
She looked behind her to find Natasha looking amused as she grabbed a glass out of the cabinet, and Summer faintly smiled back and shook her head. "Probably make me gain five pounds, since I make everything as high-calorie as possible for the supermen."
"I've noticed," Natasha said over her shoulder, opening the refrigerator behind Summer. "I blame you for Steve's energy. It's been even higher than usual and it's getting kind of ridiculous."
"That must be nice," Summer muttered, more bitterly than she intended.
"Really?" Natasha asked, glass of orange juice in hand as she came up to lean against the counter in sudden interest. "Trouble in paradise?"
Rather than try to refute her words, Summer simply shook her head again and said, "It's... not trouble, exactly, but..." She then looked up at Natasha and asked almost a little desperately, "Can I talk to you about it? Not now, but later? Because if I don't talk to someone about it I'm gonna end up flinging this spatula through the window."
"Sure," Nat replied, still amused. "And I'm not surprised. The two of you are usually almost sickening together, but every time I've seen you together in the last week, he acts like you've got cooties."
"More like he has cooties and he's gonna give me a fatal case of them any minute," Summer said, tone back to a mutter.
Natasha didn't ask for elaboration, but instead said, "All right, well... after breakfast we can take a walk and you can tell me about the cootie problem."
"Thank you," Summer said sincerely, and Natasha shrugged in response. But who else could she talk to about something like this? Paul would just cringe and demand over the phone that she wear a full body suit made entirely out of bubble wrap if she insisted on continuing to date Bucky, and she didn't want to lay her issues on anyone else. She was grateful to have Natasha around - it had been a long time since she'd had a good female friend, and she never would have thought in a million years that she'd be able to call this particular woman such a thing, but here she was.
A little bit later, as she predicted, Bucky walked back into the house looking exactly as she had expected him to, and she smiled forcibly brightly when his eyes met hers as he closed the front door behind him. "Morning!"
"Morning," he said back, glancing at the giant griddle she was still working on. "I thought you were still asleep."
"Nope. Got up a little early, actually, to look for you, but you were busy with Clint, I guess," she said, waving the spatula to the window for emphasis.
"Oh... yeah," he muttered quietly. "I was up and he said he could use the help, so..."
"Mmhmm," Summer hummed, refocusing on the pancakes in front of her.
Bucky then glanced at Natasha, who was quietly sipping her juice and observing the whole exchange. He glared at her softly and then glanced at Summer one more time before silently heading off, Summer assumed, towards the upstairs bathroom.
Once he was gone, she set down the spatula and let out a frustrated sigh. "Actually, screw this."
She then turned off the stovetop and turned around, glancing at Natasha before taking a breath and marching after him. She wanted a freaking shower. He couldn't actually turn down a shower with his girlfriend, could he? Who would do that?
She caught up to him right as he was closing the bathroom door, and she quickly reached out and pushed it open. She flashed him a smile, amused by the surprised look on his face and how he actually backed up a step after the unexpected intrusion. "Hi again."
"... Hi," he said a little dumbly as she walked inside and shut the door behind her.
"You usually, you know, invite me," she said, trying not to be too affected by the sight before her. The longer but not too-long hair really completed his farm look, she thought, and yet she hadn't been able to properly enjoy any of it, at least not for the last week, which felt like an eternity.
"You seemed busy," he shrugged.
"Since when has that ever stopped you?" she asked with a smile. He smiled back a little weakly, and she stifled a sigh, deciding to switch tactics. Rather than taking off her own clothes, which he usually did for her and she kind of hoped he'd still do now, she stepped closer to him and reached for the bottom of his shirt. He stayed silent and let her peel it up and off of him, and he continued to not move or speak when she tossed it to the floor and then leaned up to kiss him.
He stayed still but he kissed her back as her hands went to his damp hair, placing the front pieces behind his ear, though they weren't quite long enough to stay there, and she hoped that she was doing this well enough. She'd never had to coax him into anything, so this was new and not entirely pleasant territory. But he responded as she had hoped he would, deepening the kisses and bringing his hands to her waist and then her back, and she could feel her hopes rising as he began to act like his normal self. Soon his kisses were growing harder and his hands were firm on her hips as he backed her up against the sink, taking over, to her utter delight and relief, and yanking up her shirt.
Her shirt tossed to the floor on top of his own, he started kissing her neck and then grabbed her and set her on top of the sink, making her smile to herself and lock her legs around him as his hips ground against hers. Everything was perfect and a rousing success until his hand curled around her hip, the bruised one, and squeezed her against him, and her responding quiet moan against the shell of his ear made his hand suddenly loosen and fall away, and his entire body went a bit stiff. It was as if he had lost himself until that moment, and that he had just realized that he needed to be careful.
He pulled away, though her legs stayed wound around him and his other hand was still buried in her hair, and Summer was panting a little as she asked, "What's wrong?"
Bucky looked in her eyes, then at her lips, and shook his head. "Nothing."
She nodded, though she didn't believe him. "Good." Then she pulled him back to her, kissed him deeply, and moved her hands down to start fighting with his belt. He didn't pull away again, but she could tell that he was being more cautious and not holding her as tightly as he was a moment before. She knew why he wasn't, she really did, but she also wished with everything within her that he would just let go. She didn't mind the bruises. The fun of getting them was more than worth the pain of having them.
She was on the brink of becoming deeply mired in a mental debate of whether to say something, beg him to not hold back with her this time, or simply just jump in the shower and keep her mouth shut, until the creak of some floorboards a room away made Summer stop abruptly so that she could listen more closely. She already could distinguish the sounds of her room's floor creaking apart from the others, and had learned to do so on purpose so that she'd always know when David was awake when she wasn't in the room with him. He didn't like waking up alone, and would rarely venture out to find her, so she would have to go to him to get his day started right.
Another creak confirmed that David was indeed awake and out of bed, and she dropped her shoulders a little bit in frustration as she looked up at Bucky and let out a breath. He knew what the sounds meant too, and he looked just as instantly frustrated as she was, but also like he was possibly about to burst a vein in his neck from his deep concentrated effort to keep himself and his actions under control. He looked utterly conflicted, like he wanted nothing more than to take her as he pleased, but maybe also, on a much more subtle level, like he was relieved that now he didn't have to spend the next fifteen to twenty minutes exerting even more of that strained self control.
"Sorry," she said quietly, taking her hands off of him and trying to shake off the urge to start overthinking and make this worse. "I'll just... I've gotta go, so..."
He nodded, then used the hand still on her waist to pull her in for another kiss. Then he helped her down from the sink, and she grabbed her shirt from the floor and put it back on as he watched her in silence. After, she turned back to him and asked, "Rain check, right?"
He nodded, smiling that same oddly weak smile from when she'd first barged in here, and she tried not to let it bother her too much as she then went to the door and gave him one last look over her shoulder as she left.
She hurried to her room, even more ready now for her talk with Natasha. Meanwhile, Bucky stared at the door after she left, frowning for several different reasons and planning his own talk about the same issues with someone else. Apparently, the last people they wanted to speak of it to was each other.
"So, this is how you bait the hook," Steve said, holding up a fishing line and the bait in front of him, where Bucky could see it clearly. "This is the easy part. You just go... like that, and now it's ready." Bucky nodded, and Steve paused and then asked, "Ringing any bells?"
"Not really," Bucky said quietly, mimicking Steve's actions. "Are you sure I taught you to fish?"
Steve nodded, glancing out at the small creek they were sitting on the edge of as he replied, "Yeah, when we were seven or eight. My dad wasn't around much to teach me, so you decided to do it yourself. We never caught much, but we still had fun."
Unfortunately, nothing of the story felt familiar, and neither did holding a fishing pole. He was used to that feeling, though, and the act of fishing itself wasn't the main reason why they were here, away from the rest of the farm.
"So," Steve changed the subject as he cast his line out into the water, "let's hear it."
Bucky watched him, then continued to copy his movements and cast his own line. Then he muttered, "I'm not sure where to start."
"Beginning's always good."
He let out a breath, staring at the clear blue water in front of them as he gathered his words. "You know how me and Summer waited... a long time... because I was afraid I'd hurt her or lose control of my arm. There were other reasons too, but a lot of it was that."
"Right."
"Once we stopped waiting, everything seemed okay and I thought I was okay. I was... careful, but it wasn't as scary as I thought it would be."
Steve turned a concerned gaze on his friend and asked, "What happened?"
"Couple of bruises," Bucky replied, still staring at the water.
A few seconds of silence passed, and then Steve said quietly, "I don't want to ask if that's all, but... is that all?"
"I know it doesn't sound like much," Bucky shook his head, "and I know I'm overreacting, but next time it might be more, and it was with this hand." He held up his right hand and then dropped it, while his left one held the fishing pole. "I spent so long worrying about the other hand, and instead it was the normal one. But it's not normal. I'm not normal, and she is, and... she acted like it was nothing and no big deal, and I've tried to stop thinking about it, but all I can think is what if I really hurt her or worse. I can see it in my head, I've even dreamed it the last couple of nights. I already worry, constantly, about her safety, but I'm the biggest danger in her life, and I... hate it."
Next to him, Steve sighed and took a few seconds before replying, "Well, this was bound to happen eventually, you know, and it's because you're right - you're not normal, and this kind of thing can just sort of... happen. I know because I've done it too."
Bucky looked over at him, a little surprised. "You have?"
"The bruises thing, yeah, more than once. And the first time I was as horrified as you are. I still am whenever it happens, but Nat just shakes it off and reminds me that she's had worse."
"She's different though," Bucky pointed out. "Summer's not like her. She's more... fragile."
"I'm not sure that's the right word," Steve said. "She's never struck me as being very fragile."
"I mean physically," Bucky clarified. "Natasha could throw you across the room if you started actually hurting her. Summer couldn't do that with me."
"But I'm sure Summer would tell you if you were hurting her, and then you could stop," Steve pointed out. "Look, I know it's scary, and I know how easy it is to think and fear the worst, but the thing is, neither of us are ever going to be normal. We're always going to be stronger than everyone else. The only difference is that I chose it and you didn't. But we can't change it. And obviously Summer knows the risks and thinks it's worth it."
Mulling over the words he was hearing, Bucky continued to stare ahead and muttered, "I've been avoiding her. Well, not her, but..."
"Right," Steve said, needing no further elaboration.
"And I know she's not stupid and she knows what I'm doing and why, but..."
"... Wait. Have you not talked to her about this at all?"
He shook his head. "Not since the night it happened."
"Well, there's your problem, then. You've gotta talk about it."
"But I know what she'll say. She'll say I'm thinking too much and that she's fine and that I should trust myself."
After a few moments, Steve adjusted his grip on his pole, then said, "... She might be right."
"It's not that simple."
"Maybe it is," Steve replied. "You have to think about it logically. Bruises are easy to give accidentally, even without super-strength. You love her. She trusts you, obviously. You won't hurt her the way you're afraid you will."
Bucky clenched his jaw a bit, wishing he had half the confidence everybody else apparently had in him. But, sitting here now and just saying the words out loud made him feel a little bit better already. Maybe holding it all in really had only made it all that much worse.
"But what you really need to do is talk to her about it. I bet the two of you can get it all figured out in a lot less time than you've spent stressing about it."
He hoped that Steve was right, but he wasn't looking forward to that particular conversation. "Yeah, I guess you're right," Bucky conceded, moving his fishing pole from one hand to the other, vaguely wondering if one of them should have caught something by now. "I think I was hoping that I'd just stop thinking about it and get over it."
"Best way to do that is get it out in the open," Steve said. "It's not so easy to just 'get over' things when you bottle it all up inside." When Bucky nodded absently at that, Steve glanced at him and asked curiously, "Did you talk to Connor about it at therapy yesterday?"
Bucky shook his head. "Already knew what he'd say. I wanted to talk to you instead."
Bucky was still too caught up in his own head to notice much, so he didn't see the way Steve's expression softened slightly and how he almost smiled a little before he quickly hid it, almost as if he was afraid to let it show how happy one simple sentence could make him.
By the time Bucky's attention wandered back to the present, he gave the fishing pole in his hand a slight shake and said, "Why haven't we caught anything yet?"
"Well," Steve sighed, leaning back a little, "I said we used to fish a lot when we were kids, not that we were actually any good at it."
"... And then I just left like an idiot, without saying a word about anything," Summer concluded her story, letting out a long breath when she did and keeping her eyes fixed on David as he walked in front of her, quite oblivious to the story she had just laid on Natasha. While the men had their conversation at the creek, the women had theirs as they walked along the crops and David helped fill a basket with tomatoes that would be used for that night's dinner. I was a warm morning, and Summer had put on her only sundress that she owned to take the walk, a pretty white and coral number that she'd been waiting to wear once it got warmer. Natasha listened silently to every word she said, absorbing the rather energetic and self-abusing way that Summer told the story of her and Bucky's current issue, not offering a single word until she knew for sure that Summer was done.
"Well... yes, you don't come away from that story sounding very smart, but it's not as if you have much experience to bring to this kind of situation," Natasha pointed out. "Unless you've dated unnaturally strong men with exceptionally dark pasts before."
"Yeah... not so much," Summer replied.
"Well, the solution is pretty simple. You need to talk to him about it."
Summer let out a burdened sigh and muttered, "I know, but I know what he'll say, and..."
"It doesn't matter. You need to talk to him, and you need to assert yourself."
"Assert... myself?"
"Yes. Don't just let him go and drown in his broody self-hating thing that he does. Tell him how you feel and don't let him go anywhere until he understands. It might not change how he's acting, but you're not getting anywhere until he understands. And you hold more power over him than you know. I don't mean that in the sense of you controlling him. More in how easily the smallest thing you do or say can influence him."
"Really?" Summer asked with wide eyes. "It doesn't feel that way."
"Well," Natasha said, "I've watched him go from what he was when Steve first picked him up from your house to what he is now, and you're a pretty big part of his recovery. Put yourself in his shoes. You're not just an important part of his world, you basically are his world. The thought of losing that is probably the scariest thing he can imagine. And he knows that what he does best is kill. He has more memories of the Winter Soldier than he does of his real life. You can't forget that."
Summer felt extremely conflicted about what she had just heard, and instantly extremely guiltily for feeling angry at him earlier. The thing was, she didn't want to be his whole world. He deserved a world much bigger than just her, a life he could enjoy and goals and successes that he could work towards and claim, but, hearing it all laid out the way Natasha had just said it, she could see now that he was quite far from that. He was in an odd in-between state in his recovery, so much better than he used to be but still not exactly independent. He still had very little that was truly his, whether in the personal sense or material sense. If he did well in the mission coming up, hopefully that would all start to change, but if he didn't, it would be another setback the way his last failure was.
"But he's being irrational," Natasha added. "He's not going to kill you. He might leave bruises accidentally sometimes, but Steve does that too. I don't think it's something they can always help, but there's a big difference between a couple of bruises and whatever he's afraid he'll do to you."
A little relieved to hear that even Steve had done the same thing before, Summer nodded and continued letting her mind wander though everything weighing on it. They had come to a stop while David resumed picking tomatoes after a brief interlude spent observing a caterpillar on one of the plants. "I'm a jerk," she sighed. "I got mad at him for no reason and tried to push him into stuff when it's freaking him out. I suck."
Natasha snickered and said, "You're in a long term relationship with the Winter Soldier, and he's what, your second or third boyfriend?"
"Second," Summer admitted.
"Right. So if there's one thing you can depend on, it's that you're both going to act like idiots and hurt each other sometimes. Accepting that will make it easier to get over when it happens."
After a moment, Summer grinned and looked at Natasha and remarked, "You're good with this advice stuff. You get a show like Dr. Phil. 'Love & Relationship Advice with Black Widow'."
Natasha rolled her eyes in good nature. "The ironic thing is, I don't think I've had much more in the way of serious relationships than you have."
"Really? Well... I guess that's not too surprising, being a spy and all. Can I ask a question?" Summer asked, not waiting for an answer before she asked, "You and Clint... you were a thing, right? Because some of the comments he makes around you and Steve are like whoa. Like I can feel the awkwardness there."
"It's awkward for Steve," Natasha shrugged. "He's still new to all of this."
"All of what?"
"... Relationships," she smiled slightly. "And this century. But I like that about him. He's different."
"He's kind of perfect," Summer replied. "I say that in an completely non-creepy way. But he is."
"Sometimes I think the same thing," Natasha replied, but in a slightly sad way, as if such a concept was a bad thing that would eventually spell some sort of doom. But Summer let that go, not wanting to let the conversation get too dark or try to pry too much out of a very private woman.
Their talk shifted to lighter things after that, and Summer spent the entire time hiding her inner glee of being so friendly now with someone she'd once been utterly terrified of. David still refused to warm up to her, and she was pretty sure that he was waiting for the right moment to launch a tomato at Natasha, but at this point, his long-suffering distrust and dislike of the woman was more hilarious than anything.
They circled back to the house around the same time that Bucky and Steve returned from the creek empty-handed. Clint was busy sitting on top of a tree overlooking the new pin that he had been working on that morning, chainsawing off branches that were apparently blocking sunlight he desired the space to have, and Summer lingered outside and told David to stay at her side while she waited for Bucky to get close enough for her to quickly apologize and ask if they could talk later.
By the time he was within earshot, still looking too perfect for his own good and compulsively tucking his hair behind his ear every five seconds while carrying his fishing pole in the other, she called out lightly, "Catch anything?"
Both Bucky and Steve shook their heads, and Steve replied, "Wouldn't be us if we did, apparently."
She smiled, and Bucky's gaze met hers as he came closer, then left briefly when Steve pointedly snatched his pole and then headed back into the house with Natasha. Now alone aside from David and the happily sawing-away Clint who was too far up to count, Summer took a breath and walked a little closer to Bucky as she said quietly, "So..."
"So?" he repeated after she trailed off, looking as uneasy as she felt. His hands were in his pockets of his jeans and she suddenly found herself at a loss for what to say. It was possible that they were both idiots.
The few moments of unease also created a very effective distraction, and Summer didn't notice David starting to wander off from her side to get a closer look at the fallen tree branches.
"I, uh... well, I think I've kind of been an idiot lately, and I'm sorry," she began.
"Sorry for what?" he asked, genuinely confused.
"For... being an idiot," she repeated. "Because I know that since the... incident... things have been kind of off, but..."
"Where's David?"
Summer blinked at Bucky's unexpected interruption, and a cold shot of fear gripped her spine as she processed his question - hearing someone ask where your child was when they were supposed to be right next to you was one of the single most terrifying things ever. She whipped her head around, finding him indeed no longer at her side, and as she began looking around for him wildly and calling his name, her heart started pounding and her breath was nonexistent until she finally spotted him. When she did, it was like a cheesy slow-motion scene from a movie, only genuinely horrifying.
Right in the path of a large, heavy-looking branch that was dangling only inches away from falling was David, picking up smaller branches that had fallen and inspecting them, probably for potential use as a toy weapon. But all Summer saw was the giant branch about to fall and crack David's head open, and she knew yelling at Clint to stop was useless, because the chainsaw was too loud and she was too far away. So, before she could so much as think, she simply acted, running at her son with the sudden adrenaline-created speed of an Olympic sprinter.
She tuned everything else out - Bucky, Clint, the very world itself - and she was running, ignoring Bucky's voice yelling behind her. She quickly got to David, grabbed him and got him out of the way of the branch just in time, placing herself directly in the path of the falling lumber. But then the ground was gone from under her feet and there was a very hard and inhuman arm locked around her middle, picking her up and moving her so that the branch barely touched her. Instead, it hit Bucky, catching his flesh shoulder and part of his head, but for him it was nothing, and the branch actually partially snapped on impact.
It all happened very quickly, and as soon as it was over, Summer's brain started to catch up and process what had happened. David was okay, and she was okay, just grazed more than anything by the branch on the back of one of her shoulders. The sound of the chainsaw ceased, but now someone was yelling. Hands grabbed her shoulders and turned her around ungently, and Summer looked up and froze a little when she realized it was Bucky, who was suddenly inches away from her face as he shouted at her, all while David watched in great confusion and concern.
"Why did you do that?" Bucky demanded, his suddenly angry eyes leaving hers to stare at her shoulder for a moment before moving back to glare at her. The anger was the most jarring thing about his current expression, but she could see clear terror and panic in his eyes as well.
"I... David was about to get hurt," she replied, confused by the question.
"But why didn't you let me get him? I'm right here, and I could have gotten to him faster. I'm stronger than you - why did you do that?"
A little - or a lot - thrown by his apparent furor over what she thought had been a very no-brainer split second decision, she sputtered, "Why are you mad at me? He was about to get hurt, what else was I supposed to do?"
"But I am here," he repeated. "That thing could have hit you on the head, you could have gotten hurt - actually hurt, Summer. I could have gotten him - "
"But it's not your job," she blurted out before she could think of a way to better phrase her reply. "You're not his father. I wasn't even thinking when it happened, I just did it, because that's my job."
When Bucky suddenly shut up and stared blankly at her, rather than keep asking her why in the world she hadn't just let him take care of it, she knew that she'd either said the wrong thing or said it in a very poor way. She realized too late what her tone had sounded like, and as her brain scrambled to catch up with it all and try to fix what she'd just done, Bucky simply let his mask of indifference fall over his face and tugged her forward. "Inside, so I can look at your shoulder."
"Bucky, I didn't mean -"
He shook his head, instantly shutting her up. "Please get inside."
"But - you're the one it hit! You need to have someone check you out," she argued, but he simply frowned and grabbed her arm to haul her away.
Grabbing David's hand while Bucky half-toted her inside the house, Summer closed her eyes in frustration and wondered why she was so good lately at doing and saying the wrong thing.
As the day went on, Summer realized two things: first, that Bucky was indeed quite angry with her, and second, that she fully believed that he had no legitimate reason to be.
After he had looked at her shoulder and muttered that she probably wouldn't even get a bruise, he had disappeared from the room, and then a revolving door of Avengers asking her what the heck had happened followed. Clint was horrified that he'd almost accidentally caused an injury in either her or David, and just as confused as Summer as to why Bucky was stomping around the house in full brood-mode. Natasha had just sighed when she heard the story, and Steve assured Summer that she had done the right thing - aside from blurring out the whole "not his father" thing in a tone that made it sound more like a belittlement rather than a reasoning for her reluctance to ask him to do certain things for David.
So, dinner looked like breakfast had, with Summer standing over the stove and this time stirring homemade tomato sauce, once again stewing over Bucky and, to an equal extent, herself. Yes, she mentally told herself, she was an idiot and needed to express herself better, but Bucky being angry with her for saving her own kid from a giant tree branch to the head was utterly ridiculous. It was the closest he had ever come to yelling at her, and over that?
"Ridiculous," she murmured to herself, stirring the sauce with more force than was necessary. "So I saved my kid, freaking sue me."
She kept mumbling off and on, then turned around and almost yelled out in surprise to see Bucky standing there, watching her a little uneasily but still wearing the same stony expression he'd worn when he had declared her shoulder fine and then retreated into solitude.
"Um..." he said quietly, gesturing to the silverware drawer that she'd been inadvertently blocking. "I need a... fork."
Dinner wasn't ready yet, so she wasn't sure why he needed one, but she didn't ask. Instead, she decided that she absolutely couldn't stand the look on his face and said, "Well, I'd hand you one, but you probably don't want me that close to sharp objects."
One side of her cheered at the pointless jab, if she could even call it a jab, and the other side smacked its imaginary palm against its imaginary face. Bucky, however, merely looked surprised for a split second before his glower came back in full force. Not saying a word, he simply turned and left the kitchen. She heard the front door open and close right after, and she couldn't decide what would be smarter - begin the mental self-flagellation now or wait until later.
Ultimately, she opted for the former option, and once dinner was finished, she was halfway through with her plate thanks to nervous eating before Steve finally asked where the heck Bucky was.
"He, uh... went outside, I think," she replied, shifting a bit in her seat. "I kind of... pissed him off again."
"Oh boy," Natasha muttered before taking a sip of red wine that would have been tempting to Summer any other day but today. "What's he doing?"
Summer shrugged, having no clue, but Clint piped up, "Probably in the barn. I put a bunch of new wood in there."
Oh, right, she thought. Anger management in the form of chopping logs into firewood. She took a sip of water and muttered, "I've really outdone myself today."
"But have you asserted yourself yet?" Natasha asked, and both Steve and Clint looked at her with puzzled expressions. She ignored them both, raising her eyebrow to Summer.
"Uh... no?" she said a bit unsurely. Then she took a moment and sighed, "No."
"Maybe you should," Natasha suggested before taking another sip of wine. "I'm sure Steve wouldn't mind watching the kid for awhile."
The aforementioned kid then looked up from his own plate and smiled brightly at Steve, confirming Natasha's words. Summer blinked at Nat and then said, "Oh, uh... right. Okay. Now?"
"For God's sake, Summer, go," Natasha deadpanned, and Summer nodded and got up so fast that she almost knocked her chair over.
After Steve listened to the front door open and close, signaling Summer's departure, he glanced at Natasha and asked, "Is 'assert yourself' code for something?"
"Not all all," she shook her head. "I don't even think she knows what it means. But she needed some kind of push. This place is much more pleasant when they're acting like their usual sickening... lovey selves."
"This place is more pleasant in general when it's not a hotel for annoying couples," Clint pointed out. "I'm just saying."
She heard the familiar sound of an ax's blade slicing through wood before she reached the door of the barn, and once she did, she paused in a moment of uncertainty, fingers fidgeting with the skirt of the sundress she was still wearing as she briefly considered bolting and going back inside.
The Black fricking Widow told you to assert yourself, she reminded herself. Do it.
Right when she was about to push the door open, she suddenly froze. Wait. What does that even mean for this situation?
What was she supposed to do, barge in there and demand that he stop being overly protective, despite the fact that he was inhumanly strong and she was, well, not? Natasha's words to her from earlier that day, the ones about how she was Bucky's world and how understandably terrified he must have been of losing her, came rushing back, and Summer very nearly lost her nerve.
Then she heard another log meet an early end, and with a short intake of breath, she salvaged what courage she had and decided that enough was enough. Whatever happened, they just needed to get it out in the open, and talk through it, regardless of the outcome. So, keeping that thought at the forefront of her mind, she pushed open the barn door and very nearly instantly lost all train of thought.
She walked inside just as he had swung the ax again, and after the log split, he looked up at her through the slight curtain of sweat-soaked hair as it tickled his eyes. His blue button down shirt was all the way undone, revealing the slick, toned skin beneath, and it took her a moment or two of useless staring before she remembered herself and met his gaze. He looked angry still, his features still a little blank and hardened as they coolly regarded her, and it made her snap back into focus as she closed the door behind her.
"You're missing dinner," she stated quietly, and as soon as she spoke, he looked away and grabbed another log to prepare it for the ax, like he hadn't heard her. She stepped a little closer and said, "I know you're mad at me, but -"
"I'm not mad at you," he muttered, but the way he demolished the next log seemed to beg to differ.
"Well... I'm mad at you," she admitted. "And you're sure acting like you're mad at me, so we need to talk it out."
Setting down the ax for a moment, he straightened and then looked at her a bit wearily as he replied, "There's nothing to talk about. Talking doesn't change anything."
"If you mean that talking won't take away your super-strength, then yeah," she said, "you're right, I guess, but there's more to it than that and you know it. And before we get into any of that, first I want to say that I'm sorry for the whole 'you're not his father' thing. I was just trying to say how I feel and how I try to do everything for him myself because I feel like that's my job. I wasn't trying to say that you're nothing to him."
"What am I to him?" Bucky asked, not angrily or viciously, but rather quietly and honestly. "I'm not his father. I'm just... there."
Summer smiled a little sadly and replied, "And that's already a whole lot more than he's ever gotten from his real father."
Bucky didn't argue that, looking down and pausing for a moment before he muttered, "What you said wasn't the problem."
"Then if it was the saving him thing, then I'm sorry but I'm not apologizing for it. I'd do it again in a heartbeat. I'd step in front of a car for him. I'd go to hell and back for him, and you know that, so I don't why all of a sudden -"
"It's not all of a sudden."
"Fine, but I still don't know why you're acting like this when you know that sometimes things just happen. I can't wrap myself in bubble wrap and never leave the house for fear of getting hurt. I get that you're protective and I get why, but..."
"You don't," he said simply.
"I do," she argued.
"No, you don't."
"Fine, then tell me." When he said nothing, she threw up her hands in frustration and said, "See? This is our problem. We're not talking about what's bothering us."
"What's bothering you?" he asked quietly, but a little begrudgingly.
She paused for a moment, crossing her arms and shifting slightly on her feet as she gathered her courage again. "Okay. Today when I was trying to start something with you in the bathroom, everything was perfect until you stopped and started holding back. And when I had to leave, I knew you didn't want me to, but you almost looked relieved at the same time. And I know it's stupid, but that kind of... hurt."
She watched as confusion and then surprise flickered across his features. He seemed at a loss to answer, so she kept going. "The thing is, I get why you're being like this, but it's a step backwards for us, and it's all because of a few stupid little bruises that you know I don't care about. I'm trying to trust you - I do trust you, with everything I have - but you don't trust yourself, so then this crap ends up happening."
"What do you want me to do?" he asked, furrowing his brows. "Pretend everything's fine, that I'm normal, that I can't hurt you just from holding you?"
"No, I don't want you to pretend, I want you to believe that you won't hurt me, just like I do."
"I can't do that," he replied simply, in a very resigned tone.
"You can," she insisted.
A look of irritation crossed his face and Bucky said, "You don't know what you're talking about. You've gotta let his go."
"Let it go?" she asked, eyes widening and voice getting a bit louder. "Seriously?"
"Yes, because you have no idea what it's like," he replied, gaze leaving hers at the last word, like it was painful to look at her in that moment.
She stepped closer to him then, close enough to reach out and touch him, which she did as she said, "Then tell me what it's like! My God, Bucky, this is why I'm here, because I love you and I care and I want to understand and help make it better!"
He reached down and gently brushed her hand away from his shoulder, then took a step back. "But that's why you can't."
"Why?" she furrowed her brows. "Because I love you? How does that make any sense?" When he said nothing, just clenched his jaw and continued to avoid eye contact, Summer felt her anger blooming once more as she added, "And by the way, I'm getting really sick of you acting like I'm this fragile thing, like if you look at me the wrong way I'll shatter. I've shot a HYDRA agent in the shoulder and tasered another, and carried kids out of a burning skyscraper in five inch freaking heels - don't you think I'm pretty tough for some girl from Virginia?"
He chuckled then - actually chuckled, and her anger teetered dangerously close to full-blown rage. "Oh, okay, is that what it is, then?" she asked, taking a step forward, vaguely aware that she was bordering on ridiculous at this point and not caring. "I'm just me, with no superpowers and no real skills unless it involves a pen or a kitchen, so of course then I'm some weak, stupid girl."
His scoff of the moment prior faded as he stared at her, and she couldn't quite call it a glare, but the longer it lasted, the heavier it burned and the more determined she became to face him despite the inner urge to shrink under his gaze.
"I'm not that weak, you know," she continued to rant. "And if you keep treating me like I am, I'm gonna freak out."
"I never said you were weak," he said through gritted teeth, his gaze becoming even more intense somehow as he stared right through her.
"No, it's not what you're saying, it's what you're doing!" she yelled in exasperation, and the simple act of raising her voice to that degree seemed to do the trick of making him snap.
Suddenly there was a new log in his hands, and Summer stared at it very briefly, unsure of what he was going to do with it, and then he was yelling right back at her, making her jump at the change in volume. "I think sometimes you forget what I am!"
And then, in an image that would be forever seared into Summer's often-replayed memory, Bucky then literally tore the log in half with his bare hands, the sound of the wood violently splitting ripping through the air between them as her jaw dropped. Bucky then dropped the two halves, and after she watched them plunk to the floor, she looked up at him in a wide-eyed stupor and said, "That was... incredibly hot. Can you do it again?"
He had clearly not been aiming for or anticipating that reaction. He looked away and shook his head, pushing his hair away from his face, while she continued to be in awe, rather than fear, of the sheer, raw strength of him.
"This isn't a joke, Summer."
"I wasn't joking."
She stared at him then, undeterred and stubborn, much like himself. She waited for him to crack, to break, to finally see things from her perspective and just stop being this way and fearing himself to deeply, but he appeared utterly unwilling to budge.
And that left her with very few options.
"Well," she sighed eventually, after a long silence, "fine. If this is how it's gonna be, I guess we're just going to have to go back to being celibate."
She then turned and started to walk away, hoping her new strategy would work. It did.
"Wait. What?"
Stopping short of the door, she turned to find him staring at her in disbelief and confusion. She took a deep breath and said, "It's an all or nothing thing, Bucky. The only thing I hate more than not being in your bed is being in it but being able to tell how far away you are. I can feel you thinking and feel you paying attention to everything except what you should be. I mean, there's a difference between being careful and thinking so much that you make yourself miserable."
"All or nothing?" he repeated, still bewildered and apparently utterly opposed to the very suggestion of what she was saying.
"Yes!" she nodded. "Maybe it would be different if we had started out like this, but we didn't, and I can't enjoy it the same way if I know you're not enjoying it like you should."
"Summer, I can't," he said through gritted teeth.
She met his gaze then, more fearlessly than she had all night, and shrugged. "Fine."
Anger returning and nearly making her hands shake, she turned around, fully ready to head out the door.
"Summer."
She ignored him and kept walking. But before her hand could touch the door, both of his hands were on her shoulders and he was turning her around a little roughly. She looked up him, her mouth dropping open a bit at the anger and utter pain on his face as he half-yelled and half-growled, "Why is it so hard for you to get that I can't lose you?"
She was suddenly speechless, barely able to do more than gape uselessly at him as his tight grip on her shoulders didn't let up. Any tighter and she would bruise, and she really hoped she wouldn't.
"Nothing," he said more quietly but just as roughly, through his teeth, "scares me more than the thought of losing you." She only noticed that he had turned her again and was backing her up slowly, towards somewhere, as he added, "Nothing."
She felt her back hit something, but she wasn't sure what it was, and she didn't really care, because now she was pinned between him and whatever it was. His anger and previous physical exertion was rolling off of him in waves of heat, and being pressed against him, held in this position by his hands that still hadn't let up, left her nearly gasping for air already.
In the silence of the moment, filled only by the sounds of their growing-heavier breaths, she looked down from his eyes just long enough to see her hands grasping at his open shirt, on each side just under the collar, and she wasn't sure how long she had been doing that. She swallowed, moved her hands from the shirt to his chest, his skin almost burning under her palms, and then met his gaze one more time.
She was still mad. She was mad that he'd laughed at her. She was mad that he had been avoiding her for a week. She was mad about everything from earlier. None of her anger had dissipated.
His eyes told the same story. The clench of his jaw confirmed it. His stare was desperate, but determined, and she knew he wasn't going to back down.
But there was something else in his eyes too, something that she wasn't sure about, but it made her think of how he'd ripped that poor log in half with just his hands and how instant and almost overwhelming her reaction had been to seeing that...
And then, something in the air between them snapped, and she had no idea who moved first. His lips crashed to hers, or maybe hers to his, she wasn't sure, and it didn't matter, because it was all fire and anger and the exhilaration of letting go and releasing it all in a way that felt almost beyond control. She couldn't think and she couldn't stop, because it was all instinct and something more primal than what she had felt before.
The first kiss was hard and unrelenting, with his hands leaving her arms to move into her hair, while her fingers curled unintentionally hard against his chest, making her nails bite down into his skin. He made a noise into her mouth, whether of pain or pleasure she didn't know, and then his tongue was utterly plundering her mouth while she tore her hands away and then used them to quickly yank his shirt from his shoulders. His mouth didn't leave hers as it hit the floor, and then his hands took hers and briefly pinned them on either side of her head as his entire body moved against hers. She couldn't breathe except to moan, and when he let go of her wrists to grab her hips and pull them even tighter into his, she grabbed his hair and pulled sharply on two fistfuls of it, making him break away and let out a rough gasp of a moan before opening his eyes. She panted through her open mouth and only stared back for a second before he picked her up, her legs winding around his waist with the skirt of her dress bunched at her hips as he spun them around and started walking them somewhere else.
He kissed her as they went, and she bit his lip as he pulled away, thoroughly enjoying the lack of thinking and the dominion of instinct and need in this moment, but her head wasn't completely gone. She looked down when he came to a stop, and she realized he'd taken her over to where the hay was. Most of the stacks went to the ceiling, but two were next to each other and low enough - perfect height, actually - for him to sit her down on and resume ravaging one another.
But before she let him kiss her again, Summer looked up at him and said with a lingering spark of defiance, "I'm still pissed at you."
He stared back at her, a bit blankly at first, but then his eyes went to her chest as it heaved up and down under her dress with her heavy breaths, and then he looked back up and growled, "Shut up."
Then she let out a gasp of surprise as he all but tossed her down on her back, and then his hands were taking the front of her dress in his fists, and before she could even process what was coming, he ripped it in half with zero effort. The cool air hit her unbelievably flushed skin as she gasped yet again, this time in pure surprise that he had actually ripped her dress in half, but he missed her outraged (and even more aroused) expression due to his eyes focusing on her apparently surprising lack of a bra under her dress.
"You," she breathed, picking up one end of the ruined fabric with one hand, "you ripped my dress... this cost me like thirty dollars, and you..."
He glanced up at her eyes then at last, then was on top of her as he silenced her with another barrage of searing kisses. In the midst of the assault, he growled against her lips, "So make me pay for it."
She knew he wasn't talking about money, and her last shred of control tore as quickly as the dress had as she sat up, forcing him to stand up straight as her mind went utterly blank at his words. Her chest pressed tightly against his and her hands tugged at his hair again as she kissed him before they dropped down to start undoing his belt, while his hands caused enough knots in her hair to last a week.
She was still angry, even more so now, and the air was becoming stiflingly hot and it felt utterly filthy doing this on top of a stack of hay in a barn, but she knew it was also going on her top five list of favorite memories ever. But she had no time to think on it or comprehend anything, because as soon as her hands had successfully shoved his jeans down a few inches, he had bitten her neck and then grabbed her arms to push her back down and have his way with her.
If all their arguments ended like this, she could live with that.
He was well aware that his actions seemed to be in direct contradiction to the words he had spent their argument throwing at her, but somewhere in his mind, he was also aware that it was a test of sorts.
She didn't want him to hold back. He understood why, and he couldn't blame her. Her words and Steve's words had been like tiny, annoying little pricks of needles nagging at his mind and making him even angrier for some reason, perhaps because it was easier to avoid her out of fear rather than face it and find out if they were right and that he really could trust himself.
And in the end, he was glad for it, because he gave Summer what she wanted, and what he wanted desperately, and even though he had not been particularly gentle compared to his normal fare, he had still been careful, and Summer ended up fine.
Relief, of several kinds, washed over him as he breathed against her neck, still panting a little, still holding her and still entwined with her as he tried to gather the strength to rise from his place collapsed on top of her. She was as limp as he was, drenched in sweat from them both and holding him with one hand on his back and the other loosely in his hair. It had been a first for several things, mostly of doing this while they were both angry at the other, and he had not anticipated how intense it could be. He had barely needed to touch her to see her completely fall apart, so high she was from the mixture of anger and arousal. Now he was simply dazed and more tired than usual, and not to mention still trying to wrap head around it all.
They enjoyed the calm after the storm in silence, which was broken only when Bucky finally raised himself up and risked a more sober look at her. She opened her eyes and looked at him a bit dreamily, anger apparently gone for now, and she smiled as he took stock of how he had wrecked her appearance. The amount of hay sticking out from her hair was ridiculous, and her neck bore the marks of his lips and teeth, but he was okay with that, because he had meant to put those marks there. There were others, too, on the swell of her breasts, on her stomach, one on her inner thigh that he remembered her screaming at a little bit when he had given it to her...
But she wasn't hurt.
Unable to find any decent words to say that seemed right in that moment, he leaned down and gave her a gentle kiss that served to wipe away the angry atmosphere of before and remind her that regardless of what happened between them or how angry she might make him, he loved her, and nothing would ever be more important than that.
"I'm sorry," he half-whispered after drawing away a few inches and brushing her sweat-dampened hair from her face. His own hair was in his eyes to the point of driving him crazy, but he didn't care at the moment.
"What for?" she asked softly, her voice a little hoarse perhaps from how she had been using it a few moments ago.
"Trying to run away from the problem," he said. "And hurting your feelings this morning."
She smiled, reaching up and moving the longer, disobedient pieces of hair behind his ears for him. "I'm sorry too. Mostly for not talking to you about it when that was really all we needed to do. And for being a jerk when you asked me for a fork."
He laughed, and she did too, and he kissed her one more time. "Yeah, but you're cute when you're mad."
She rolled her eyes a little but replied, "And you are apparently even more of a sex god when you're mad." He grinned despite himself and was coming up with a retort when she added, "Except, the problem is, we have to go back inside the house, and you ripped my dress in half."
He stared at her for a moment, and she stared at him, and then they started laughing again.
He ended up finally moving up and off of her, helping her sit up and first working on picking out the biggest and most obvious pieces of hay from her hair. Afterwards, he helped her tie what was left of the dress into a makeshift-skirt. Then he got his shirt from the floor and put it on her, buttoning it up for her while she sighed, "This is so obvious. Everybody's gonna know we were banging in the barn."
"They always know everything," he shrugged. "It doesn't matter."
"Yeah, except David's in there, and he's about to see his mother walk inside the house wearing your shirt and a really weird skirt made out of a dress, while you're shirtless and kind of filthy looking."
He nodded and kept a straight face as long as he could before he laughed at that too. She slapped his shoulder in mock-anger, then pulled him closer for a kiss as she mirrored his smile and murmured, "I've missed you smiling. You've barely smiled this week and it sucks."
He nodded, having not enjoyed the ordeal anymore than she had. But this night had been a great step in the right direction, and with help from both her and Steve, maybe everything would be all right, at least in this area. So he kissed her, and they laughed together a few more times about the absurdity of everything before mutually deciding to venture back towards the house.
Summer fidgeted at his side the whole walk there, and once he got to the front door and opened it, he could nearly feel her trying to shrink into the background, but Natasha was the first to spot them, being in the kitchen when when they first walked inside.
Natasha raised an eyebrow, taking in their overall appearance before smirking and saying, "I take it someone must have asserted themselves rather well."
Bucky glanced at Summer, who smiled uneasily and blushed brightly before shrugging. "Yeah, I uh... yep. Where's David?"
"Living room with Steve, so you can go change first if you want," Natasha replied.
"Oh, thank God," Summer replied gratefully before taking Bucky's hand and dashing up the stairs with him.
On their way up, between a few more hushed chuckles and his attempts to pluck out a bit more hay from her hair, they passed Clint, who was going downstairs. He gave them a look once he was close enough, spent about two seconds deducting what had occurred, and then looked at Bucky before deadpanning, "Clean up your mess in my barn or I'll burn it and make you build me a new one."
Bucky stared back at him just as blankly, and Summer looked momentarily concerned before Clint grinned and then walked past them. Bucky glanced at Summer and grinned too, and the next thing that Clint called out to them over his shoulder as he descended the stairs made them both laugh yet again.
"And use bleach."
It felt good to laugh, and even better to smile and really mean it. Maybe, he decided as he followed Summer into her room to get his shirt back, everything might actually turn out okay.
A/N: First things first: inspiration for the log-ripping thing gets credited to the leaked AOU teaser where Steve talks about his dark side to Tony and then angrily rips a log in half. I am still not recovered from that particular sight. *takes deep breath* Second, I have to thank midnightwings96 even more than usual this week, because this particular chapter was quite tricky, and it required a decent amount of revision that her input was crucial to. Suffice it to say, plausibly writing this particular couple fighting and arguing is not easy, and I needed a lot of help getting it right lol, and as always, she was incredibly helpful and I love her bunches. Anyway, next thing - I am still way behind on PMs here but I'm not ignoring anybody, I've just been without Internet until now and trying to conserve what little Internet I get on my phone, but now everything is back to normal, so yay lol :p Also, my usual heaps of thanks and love to you wonderful readers, reviewers, followers, lurkers, etc., I love you all and continue to be super happy that you're all sticking with this story. The best of it is yet to come, and I've got some extremely good stuff planned here for the rest of it (and beyond, since once it's over I plan on writing a series of extremely long oneshots continuing it), so keep reading :D See you all next week :)))