"How come Peter can't come riding with us?"

Barnes smiled, thinking it was good that the boy's new friends were outraged on his behalf when they'd returned from breakfast that morning to find their cabin activity that morning was horseback riding. And had then been told that Peter wouldn't be able to go. Now they were all crowded around their counselors, clearly ready to wheedle an invitation for Peter to go with them, as well.

"Because I'm allergic," Peter said, shrugging.

"What does that mean?"

"It means he'll throw up and maybe die," Morgan said. "My sister is allergic to crab and she ill die if she eats one."

"You'd die if you rode a horse?" Carlos asked, eyes wide.

"No." Peter shook his head. "I rode one, once, and didn't die. But I got pretty itchy and my eyes swelled up and I didn't feel really good. I had to get a shot."

"Yuck. I don't like shots."

"Maybe they can give you a shot so you can come riding with us," Carlos suggested.

Peter shook his head.

"I don't want a shot, and it might not work, and I'd just get a shot for nothing. I'm going to go swimming, instead."

"Want me to come with you?" Ned asked, loyally.

Which earned him a smile and another shake of the head. Peter knew Ned was looking forward to riding. He'd mentioned it a lot, after all, in their conversation leading up to camp.

"No, it's okay. I'll be hanging out with Katie."

He was already dressed in swimming trunks and had flip flops on rather than the closed toe shoes the boys who were riding had been told was mandatory to go horseback riding.

"She's nice," Brian said.

"And pretty," Carlos agreed.

"Yeah."

Barnes couldn't force down his smile. They were too young to really be crushing on women, yet, but it was adorable to see – and proof that they had good taste. He thought Katie was pretty, too – if not too young for him. Of course, when you're over a hundred most women are, he thought wryly.

"I'll walk you down to the water," he told Peter. Then he looked at the other boys. "I'll meet you guys in the paddock."

"Yay!"

There was a mad rush to the door and Peter smiled at how excited his friends were. Barnes didn't see any indication that he was upset about being left out of horseback riding. Only a grin and those happy eyes looking up at him.

"You don't have to walk me there," Peter said. "I know the way. I'm not going to get lost or anything."

"And tell Natasha Romanoff that I let you walk down there alone? Only to have some crazy squirrel or something try to eat you?"

The grin only widened. Peter was well aware that squirrels didn't eat people. They had them at home, after all, and he and Pepper left peanuts out for them, sometimes, so he knew they weren't interested in little kids.

"That's not really going to happen…"

"It might." Barnes smirked. "Go get your towel and let's go."

Peter skipped over to his bunk and grabbed his towel, which was a beach towel that had a cartoonish picture of the Avengers on one side and Steve's Captain America shield on the other. Bucky wondered if Steve got the towel for Peter and if he had if he'd done it more to annoy Tony Stark than anything. Sure an Ironman towel would have been more acceptable to the man.

Of course, Barnes also knew that Peter liked all of the Avengers (he liked Bucky, too, which made the Winter Soldier feel like the Winter Marshmallow, sometimes) so it was possible that Peter had chosen it, himself, and Tony Stark had been forced to just deal with it. Something that made Bucky's smirk even wider.

"What's so funny?" Peter asked, joining him again and not missing the smile.

"I was wondering if you picked out your towel, yourself, or if Steve got it for you?"

Peter slung the towel over his bony shoulders.

"Mom got it for me. It's neat, huh?"

"I love it," Barnes agreed, honestly. They headed for the hill and the path that led around the main building and down to the lake, rather than cutting through like they might have a different time. "Has Steve seen it?"

"Yeah, I-"

They were interrupted by Coulson joining them, walking into their path from the side of the building. He was dressed casually in jeans and a t-shirt, and like all good SHIELD agents, he was able to act as if this was perfectly normal for him. He smiled at Peter, and then looked over at Barnes.

"I've got him," he said, putting a hand on Peter's shoulder. "Go ahead and get up to the barns so they don't get too delayed waiting for you."

Bucky nodded, said a quick goodbye to Peter and turned back the way they'd come from. Peter grinned up at Phil.

"What are you going to do, today?"

"We're taking care of some landscaping by the waterfront."

"Neat. Can I help?"

Coulson shook his head with a smile.

"Nope. You're supposed to be having fun. Not working."

"Working can be fun," the boy told him as they passed by the picnic tables and then made it to the water.

There were several kids already there; it was the cabin activity for one of the boys' cabins and one of the girls', so it wasn't that big of a deal to add one little guy who as allergic to horses to the group that were swimming and playing in the water and lining up to use the water slide at the end of the dock. All under the careful watch of three different lifeguards. Two who were walking around with floatation devices at the ready – just in case – and one who was in the shallower water clearing giving a swimming lesson to one of the boys.

Katie walked over to join them when they reached the spot where the dock met the gravel of the lake shore. She nodded to Phil but then smiled down at Peter.

"Hey, Peter. Ready for a good time?"

Obviously she was checking for any kind of disappointment that came with being forced to go to the water rather than going horseback riding, but she didn't see any – and she wouldn't. Peter liked swimming and didn't care enough to ride that he'd feel left out because he couldn't do it.

"Yeah." He did hesitate, then, however. "They won't care?" he asked, looking at the kids swimming.

They were the oldest of the campers, ranging from 11- to 12-year-olds.

"Nah." She took his towel from him. "Go have fun. Stay out of trouble."

He did as he was told and ran out onto the dock, slowing immediately when the other lifeguard barked an order for him to walk, instead, and Katie looked over at Coulson.

"Going ghost hunting, again, this morning?" she asked, looking at the small contingent of handymen that were gathered to one side.

Four total groundskeepers and Jack-of-all-trades who were the ones that kept everything in the camp running smoothly. So smoothly, in fact, that they'd already started working on the brush and vines that were always threatening to overgrow the small beach area around the lake. They definitely didn't need to be told by a SHIELD agent, after all.

He smirked.

"Working on the shrubbery."

She already knew that, though. They weren't really that concerned that someone was going to break into the camp and try to do something to Peter, but they were there to make sure he had a fun time, and that meant making sure the area was safe – whether he knew they were doing that or not.

"Watch out for wasps."

Phil rolled his eyes and turned to get to work, as Katie turned her attention back to the kids in the water and around it. Both of them continually let their gazes go back to the little guy who headed for the slide, eager to have a go since it wasn't something that they had at the pool in his backyard.

None of them noticed when the cloak – still bearing Strange's invisibility spell – soared into the area to join them. The two SHIELD agents, however, didn't miss when the substitute camp doctor wandered down to the waterfront a short while later, looking for all the world as if he was just watching the kids and waiting for someone to need a band-aid.

He wasn't focused on any one kid – even Peter – but every now and then he did look up in the sky, or over at the water's edge, frowning in annoyance to himself.