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i.
They were at the Hamptons for... something. Apparently, the facility was too stuffy and the air there was too dry for Stark so he proposed they spent a weekend at his beach house while they try to "recuperate from the last mission". What mission he was talking about, Bucky didn't know, since they all had different things they were dealing with. He was convinced the man just wanted to take a vacation. Why he took all of them with him was anyone's guess. Perhaps it was Pepper's idea, like most of the ideas that came from him apparently. Bucky's grown to like the woman. She asked him if he had allergies the first time he joined them for dinner. Allergies. He was a genetically enhanced super soldier and she was worried he'd have an allergic reaction to the food.
Apparently, not everyone was there yet. Steve and Sam were off somewhere on a SHIELD mission, Carol was out of the planet, and he and Bobbi just arrived from Siberia. In the past twenty-four hours, he's experienced both a blizzard and a heatwave. No one else seemed to be enjoying the heat that fine morning except for the redhead who was lounging by the pool under a beach umbrella. He'd been staring at her from inside the kitchen, peering through the blinds. She had sunglasses on and the most ridiculous red bikini he's ever seen.
"Can you pick up your jaw from the floor, Barnes, you're embarrassing me."
He was startled, which wasn't something common for him, but he'd been distracted. Bobbi stood beside him in a white one-piece and a towel slung over her shoulders. She was carrying a small basket with sunscreen and a water bottle.
Bucky wasn't able to reply because she was already out the door, making her way over to the lounge chair beside Natasha's. Bobbi's blonde hair was free from the braid it had been in during the mission. It was fucking cold in Siberia. She hated every second of it. This was nice. The sun was up and no one particularly loud was in the house. Yet.
"Do you know that your boyfriend's been staring at you from the kitchen?" She asked the redhead. Now that she was closer, she realized she hadn't been napping. She should have known better, to be honest. The Black Widow didn't do naps.
"Why do you think I'm putting my back into it," Natasha smirked and made a show of sitting up, crossing her legs, and flipping her hair over her shoulder so that her neck was in Barnes' view. "How was Siberia?"
"Cold." Bobbi made a face and whipped out her sunscreen, applying it generously. "How is he such an idiot when he's off duty?"
"You mean you've never seen him be an idiot when he's at work?"
"Maybe he's only an idiot when he's around you. That's dangerous."
Natasha laughed and took a sip of the water she's had with her. "Yeah," she turned her head to the direction of the kitchen where she knew James was. "I'm aware."
ii.
"Auntie Carol, how far can you fly?" Morgan was sitting with Carol by the shore. She wanted to play in the sand but Pepper was busy trying to make dinner work and Tony was busy doing something else with the guys. Men. So Carol was there instead. She didn't mind. She loved kids.
"Super far." She explained. There weren't a lot of people on their part of the beach, thankfully. No immediate threats or anything. Upper-middle class rich people weren't really that dangerous, not physically.
"Farther than Daddy can?"
"Definitely." Carol grinned. "Later, I'll show you the star I passed by on my way here."
Morgan seemed delighted at the thought of it and continued scraping sand into her little bucket. From a distance, she could see Rhodes making his way over to them. He was carrying what seemed to be popsicles.
"Pepper said Morgan might want one. It's also almost time for dinner." He announced. Morgan immediately beamed up at him and ran to cling onto his legs. "Hey, little girl."
"Careful, Morgan. The old man might topple over with your super strength."
"Captain," he gave her a nod before lifting Morgan up onto his arm. He was also super strong.
"Colonel." Carol smiled at him and stood, the tide was rolling in and in a matter of minutes, the sandcastle would be gone.
"I want the strawberry one," Morgan said, reaching for it. Rhodey gave her the strawberry one and offered Carol the other flavors. She plucked the grape one from his hand, unwrapping Morgan's first before unwrapping the pineapple in his hand and then her own.
"How's the universe doing?"
"Pretty good, actually." She put the popsicle in her mouth and started picking up Morgan's buckets. "No one's revealed to have plans of mass destruction yet, which is always good."
Rhodes smiled then and offered to help her but she shook her head. She could handle it. They started making their way back to the house, Morgan perfectly content with her strawberry pop. "Planning on sticking around this time?"
"Maybe. I've been away for so long."
"Exactly. It's good to stay put every now and then."
"Maybe you should take your own advice."
"Oh, I would love to stay put. It's just this job won't let me."
Carol understood that. What they were doing wasn't just a simple 9-5 that you can take a day off from. Maybe he was right, that she needed to ground herself every once in a while. Walking into the living area where the Avengers - here friends - were lounging around, she considered that maybe staying on earth for a bit wasn't a bad idea.
iii.
"Barton I swear to god if you touch anything I will blast you." Tony was busy tinkering with his suit in the basement because apparently the man never stopped working even when he was the one who suggested they come to the beach house in the first place. Clint was assigned the task of calling him up for dinner.
"Can you relax? I'm not going to touch anything. Why do you have a tech dungeon under your beach house?"
"Just in case." The man shrugged.
"Listen, dinner's about ready and Pepper said she'll personally kill you if you don't show up in five minutes."
Tony focused on the thingamajig he was working on in the suit. "Saw Bobbi earlier. Y'all good? Do I need to reinforce the walls?"
Clint rolled his eyes, crossing his arms over his chest. "Tony." He didn't really know what to say. He and Bobbi had had their time together but they were rocky. They were okay, they were friends, but it was weird.
"I know it's a bad joke. The walls are already reinforced anyway. Do you think I'd let Danvers and Natasha's bionic boyfriend stay here without reinforcing everything?"
"It's the right call, I'll give you that."
"You know that you can just, like, talk to her, right?" Tony put down the little whatsit he had in his hand and took off his power goggles - he knew they were called something else, it's just that words were hard for him. "She won't kill you on the spot if you said 'hi'."
"I said 'hi'," Clint muttered.
"You ducked when you saw her by the pool and volunteered to go grocery shopping with me and Pepper. You didn't say 'hi'."
"What is keeping you two?" Speak of the devil. Clint wanted to melt into the floor. He hasn't seen Bobbi in years. "Steve and Sam just got in."
"Hawkeye needed a pep talk before dinner," Tony said immediately, moving around Bobbi so that he could leave them alone. "I'll go ahead before Pepper starts a war."
Clint stood there awkwardly, shifting his weight between his feet.
"Hey, Hawk." Bobbi greeted, staying where she was by the doorway.
"Hey, Birdie. Heard you were in Siberia with Barnes." They started up the stairs back to the main house, Clint following close behind her.
"It was cold and I hated it."
"How was Barnes? Stable?"
"Excellent. I didn't even have to do anything, just watch him. It was like watching a simulation with all the cheats turned on."
Clint nodded. When Natasha told him that Bobbi was the one supervising the Winter Soldier's latest mission, he didn't feel very comfortable. By now he knew that Barnes wasn't an evil robot, and Natasha vouched for him endlessly, but it was Bobbi they were talking about here. As estranged as they were, he still wanted her to be safe.
"Don't worry too much about me, Hawk. I'm a big girl. I can handle myself." What? Did she read minds now?
They stopped short of the lounge that led to the outside patio where laughter was emerging from. Clint could hear Sam's loud-ass voice telling a story about how Steve tripped on the sidewalk during their mission. "I know that much Bobbi, I just... I'm an old man who worries."
Bobbi turned to face him and gave his hand a light squeeze. "Don't. I'm here, aren't I?"
Clint nodded and she let go, going out to the patio with a big smile on her face. He just watched them for a bit, trying to figure out where to sit. The long table had benches on either side. Tony and Pepper sandwiched Morgan in between them on one side, beside them Steve and Sam. Bobbi placed herself in between Rhodes and Danvers across the Starks, grinning at the Colonel before turning to say something to Carol. The only available place was beside Barnes at the end of the table across Sam, if only Natasha would sit properly and remove her legs from the man's lap.
"Get your ass in here Barton the food isn't going to wait for you," Sam called out. Natasha turned and smiled at him, waving him over.
Barnes made room beside him by squeezing closer to Natasha. How they were going to manage to eat, he didn't know. But they were literally attached to the hip. "You people are disgusting." He commented when he sat, making a face at them.
Natasha laughed and finally took her legs off of Barnes' lap, sitting straight and taking a swig of her drink. Morgan mimicked her, but with her juice bottle. It was cute. She would literally die for that little girl.
"Okay, everyone," Tony announced, pulling his phone out of his pocket and turning on the front camera. Everyone tried to squeeze themselves into the frame. "Everybody say Avengers Assemble in three." He snapped the photo "accidentally" on one, but they eventually managed to get a decent group picture. It was nice. If they were framed-photos-on-the-wall types of people, they'd put the photo up there. But they settled for having it in their phones.