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You were standing in the long lines and smiled nervously to the happy people in front of you. Why was this line so incredibly long? You’d been waiting for nearly thirty minutes already and every minute seemed to add to your nerves. You were feeling worse with every passing moment; your stomach was flipping and your hands were getting sweaty. It was a complete mystery to you why that was happening. Over the past few years you had certainly done scarier things that this. So why on earth were you this agitated?
The line shuffled forward slowly and you quietly blew out the breath you had unintentionally been holding. The end of the line was getting closer by the second and before long it would be your turn. You looked at your friends and grimaced as their smirking faces met yours. They were enjoying your nerves a little too much for your liking. Sam’s shoulders were silently shaking with laughter, while Bucky placed an arm around your shoulders, suppressing a chuckle. Unsuccessfully, you might add.
“You’ve done far wilder things, haven’t you?” He mumbled and rubbed your arm. The smirk the was still on his face told you that he was less compassionate than his words were feigning. You shrugged off his arm and gently shoved him, causing both men to laugh loudly.
“Come on, it’ll be fun,” Sam said, still laughing as he softly padded your shoulder.
You offered them both an obviously fake smile and a less than gracious hand-gesture, before turning back towards the front of the line. The line had shuffled forward once more and you took a few steps to catch up again. Closer to your doom, you thought to yourself dramatically. Why on earth did people wait in line to kickstart their adrenaline? Why were you?
During missions you got your fair share of adrenaline, many times over. Some missions were done on pure adrenaline. Those times where your body was so exhausted and you were ready to pass out, but shots were fired and you had to keep going.
A huge part of you liked those kind of missions. It wasn’t necessarily the danger, or that initial rush. It was the feeling of victory, the satisfaction of managing to put a mission to a successful ending. Where you’d come home exhausted and slept in until noon. Those were the nights where your mind would finally quiet down. You’d be too tired to overthink every single word or move you had made.
This however? Getting on a rollercoaster that is supposedly the scariest in the world, had no real purpose and you didn’t why you had let them talk you into this.
The line shuffled again and you had finally reached the end. You were up next. Taking another deep breath you told the lady up front that there were three of you and to your surprise, and horror, she directed you to the two front rows. You only nodded in reply to her happy words, apparently those were the most coveted places.
“One of you better sit with me,” you grumbled and the two men barked out their laughter.
“Scared?” Sam teased and you punched him, hard. It only made him laugh harder, while he rubbed his arm.
“I’m doing this for you, don’t you forget that,” you said, your voice low and menacing. You deserved more kindness for your great sacrifice, you thought to yourself.
“And I appreciate it,” Sam chuckled, leaning in to kiss your cheek. You smiled at him, unable to really be angry at either of these man, even if you were regretting coming here.
Today was Sam’s birthday. He hadn’t thought he’d be able to celebrate, since the three of you had been sent on a mission. However, you and Bucky had discussed it and you had promised your teammate that if you got done in time, you’d indulge him and his love for theme parks.
The mission had taken you to Jackson, New Jersey and that meant he could’ve also chosen to go home immediately. It had been his choice. You should’ve known that he’d pick Six Flags over the drive home. He’d pick Six Flags over almost anything, little adrenaline junkie.
And that was how you ended up here, in line for the second rollercoaster of the day. You were seriously regretting your generous offer.
It wasn’t the loops that got to you, or the speed. It was the several feet drop, which every rollercoaster had these days. And it was usually at the very beginning of the ride. And the one you were about to step onto was huge. A drop of 45 stories, the internet had told you this morning and it was just too high a number for you to be able to relax.
Sam and Bucky didn’t understand, they’d jump headfirst into anything remotely dangerous. They had no fear. Or very little of it at least. You on the other hand had a lot of fears, which you controlled by careful research and planning. You’d take risks like any other avenger, they were just most often calculated risks. This wasn’t something you could plan for though and there was little control to be had in those flaky looking cars.
Still, you toughened up and stood in line for every single ride this park had to offer, including the rollercoasters. And these man better be appreciative of that. Enough at least to split up the duo for this one ride. Sam stepped up to the front car, telling that this was his birthday and he wanted to experience it front row. He did, graciously, offer up Bucky with a big sweet innocent smile.
Bucky shook his head with a smile and placed his hands on your shoulders, gently squeezing them. You took another deep breath and leaned into him a little, allowing his calm to wash over you for a single moment. When the gates opened, he placed a kiss on your hair and gave a gentle push forward. It was time to step on board.
Sitting down you quickly strapped yourself in and clenched your hands on the brackets, assuring yourself that it was sturdy enough. It was silly of course, but you couldn’t help yourself.
“Hey Buck, think you could hold on with just your arm?” Sam challenged, turning in his seat to wink at you.
“Don’t you dare,” you grumbled and Bucky laughed, promising not to test you any more than absolutely necessary. Though you weren’t quite sure how comforting that statement was supposed to be. Still, he was safely strapped in soon after and you allowed yourself to relax your shoulders a little.
“Party Pooper,” Sam joked and you wished that he was close enough to hurt. He was having too good a time teasing you.
That was the moment you vowed to yourself that you’d find something he was scared off and then you’d get back at him. Revenge would be sweet. Sweeter even if you could get some teammates to help you with it. Bucky surely would, he liked teasing Sam even more than he liked teasing you.
You were brought back from your pondering as the countdown started and on impulse you reached to your right, grasping Bucky’s hand. You hadn’t thought about doing it. If you had, you wouldn’t have done it. Placing a sweaty hand on his wasn’t exactly a seductive move. Not that you had seduction on your mind during these fearful moments. Still, Bucky had been on your mind for quite some time now and it scared you to think that he would ever figure that out.
Bucky gently squeezed your hand his thumb rubbing slow circles on the back of it. You turned your head to look at him and found his smiling gaze already directed at you. It was a kind smile, bright and gentle. One he had graced you with several times before, and every time it made your heart stutter. It was the kind of smile that could melt a heart of ice, you thought. It surely melted yours.
Before you could say or do anything else, you were propelled forward, travelling up towards the highest point of the ride. Your stomach was doing somersaults again and your hands began to shake. Bucky hadn’t let go of you yet and kept rubbing soothing circles, though you barely noticed. You were too focussed on the oncoming drop.
Sam’s elated shouting reached your ears a second before the drop came into view and your own screaming joined his, though yours was decidedly less elated and more frightened. Bucky chuckled, remaining otherwise silent as you were dropped.
It felt liked you were free falling those agonising 45 stories and you realised that nothing, absolutely nothing that Sam or Bucky could say would get you into one more rollercoaster today. You were done. Completely done. You’d take the mission driven adrenaline over this kind any day!