Chapter Text
You wake up in a comfortable bed that you don’t recognize, and for a moment your stomach feels like an anxious ball of tangled thread, but when you see Loki laying in front of you, her eyes closed and breathing steady, your anxiety unravels and fades away. The memories of last night come back to your mind and a soft smile spreads across your face as you think about your newly found soulmates. A night of movies and warm cuddles wasn’t a bad first night together.
The bed is warm, and your soulmate’s arms are wrapped tightly around you, and you are content to stay in this bliss with the two of them forever. As you close your eyes to fall asleep again, happy to lay with the two of them for as long as they will let you, you hear your phone alarm going off.
It blares in your ears as you untangle yourself from their arms and get on all fours to reach over Loki to grab your phone off the nightstand. One of your soulmates groans quietly and you feel the mattress shift under you. Sitting back on the bed, you kneel between the two of them as you turn off the alarm and look through your notifications from the night before. There’s a text from an hour ago, and the name immediately wakes you as you see it. Your boss texted you.
She's telling you that you missed an emergency call from her last night about needing you to do some last-minute overtime work on a project you had been working on for months. A memory of quickly turning off a call in favour of snuggling further into Bucky’s arms on the couch comes to mind. It’s not like you to ignore the caller ID on nights when you might get called in. You brush it off as best you can and reply with a quick apology, telling her you were busy with something in your personal life and were unable to respond to calls.
The text from her reminded you that you need to make it to work. You check the clock on your phone again and a surge of panic rushes through your veins. Ten minutes. You need to be at work in ten minutes. Loki and Bucky both look up as you stand, and you’ve barely taken a step towards the door before there’s a green flash of light and Loki is standing in front of you.
“What the fuck?” You speak before you think, staring at the woman in front of you.
“Did we forget to tell you?” Loki glances at Bucky behind you before turning her attention to you again.
“If it’s about that--” you wave your hand at Loki “weird green thing, then yes, you forgot to tell me.”
“Do you remember that… kinda crazy, kinda under mind control god that attacked New York City a while back?” There’s an anxious expression on Loki’s face that you’ve never seen on her before. It makes you anxious as well, a ball of dread forming in your stomach.
You nod. “Yeah. The invasion killed a few people I knew.” You feel your heart sink at the mention of them. It’s been years but their deaths still hit close to home whenever you spoke about them.
“And you remember how that guy’s name was Loki?” There’s still an anxious tone to her voice, but this time it is slightly masked, a cold shroud surrounding it and sending a shiver down your spine. You’re not sure if you like the way her voice sounds like this or if it scares you.
“Yeah--” you pause for a moment, your mind going a million miles a minute as what Loki’s saying finally clicks in your mind. “That was you?”
She opens her mouth to speak but nothing comes out as she closes her mouth and nods dejectedly. You don’t know what to say, so instead, you say nothing. You brush past Loki and leave the bedroom, walking through the hallway, too many thoughts running through your mind. The gray sweater you had on earlier lays across the back of the couch in the living room, and you pick it up, putting it on as you walk to the doorway.
Once you pick up your bag and put on your shoes, you open the door, looking back for a moment only to be met with the broken looks on Loki and Bucky’s faces. You regret looking at them and immediately turn your head away. The door clicks behind you with an eerie sense of finality, and you walk away in the direction of the coffee shop where you first met the silver-armed girl.
***
The moment you walk into your apartment, you put your bag down by the front door and don’t even bother with taking off your shoes. Autopilot takes over as you run through your home, rushing through the motions of changing into your work uniform. Your boss texts you as you walk out of the door. I know you’re not going through an easy time right now. Don’t worry about coming in late, as long as you make it before one.
A rush of relief flows through your veins as you check the time on your phone, seeing that it’s only 11:58. An extra hour. You turn around, walk back into your apartment and take some time to fix your hair to make it look better. The original plan was to fix it in your office’s bathroom before you sat down to work, but this was preferable.
As you leave your apartment for the second time today, you keep your pace to a casual walk instead of half-running, allowing yourself to enjoy the route to your work. When you walk through the door, your boss greets you with a smile on her face. She calls out your name and tells you that you’ll be working in a different part of the office than usual.
Nodding, you walk over to her, and the two of you have a short conversation about what your responsibilities will be for the day. As you begin working, you’re grateful for the fact that it’s in a new department, the focus it requires not allowing your mind to wander onto your soulmates. That says nothing for the things you think of during your break-- wondering who Bucky was if Loki was the one who terrified the world years ago. Your mind flashes to her metal arm as you think about the news your friends mentioned occasionally, wondering if your reliance on friends telling you important news was impairing you now.
Hours later, you leave work and walk to the small coffee shop, nearly entering before you see Loki and Bucky sitting at a table, glancing at each other and at the entrance. You walk by the cafe, glancing at their table as you pass by and make eye contact with Loki. A rush of fear runs through your veins as she looks at you, and you turn away, speeding up. For once in your life, you’re grateful for the crowd of people that surrounds every intersection in this part of the city as you hide in it, walking across the street.
The route you’re walking on now is long, but it’s worth it if it means you can avoid the two women you were infatuated with last night. You ignore the part of your mind that pipes up and tells you that you still are. That is until you turn the corner and see your soulmates walking in front of you, an unreadable expression on both of their faces. They stop as they see you, their expressions blank as they glance at each other, then back to you.
“Hi.” Bucky speaks first, taking a small step towards you.
You steel your nerves and take a step back, heart pounding in your chest as you look at the two. “Hi.” Bucky’s face drops as she sees you move and it makes your heart sink.
Loki looks around, eyes flying from thing to thing, never staying in one spot for long. For a moment, you can see the anxiety on her face in a small frown before she hides it again, expression blank. “Can we talk, please?” She looks at you, her green eyes glowing for a moment before it fades and they’re back to normal. “In our apartment?”
For a moment, you consider saying yes. It would be so easy to go back home with them and allow the two of your soulmates to explain it all away. But thoughts flood your mind of what the battle Loki led did to your home, your friends-- thoughts of who Bucky might be and what secrets her metal arm may hide. You shook your head.
It takes a second for you to force the words out as you look up at the two of them, but you manage, “No. I won’t be coming back with you.”
Immediately, you can see both of their faces drop, and you hear Loki’s voice for a moment as she begins to speak, but you aren’t listening.
“No.” Your voice isn’t loud, but it is firm. Loki immediately stops talking and looks at you, her hurt clear on her face. “I know the three of us all want some happy ending where we’re all together, but I don’t think that can happen right now. I’m sorry.”
Turning around, you walk away. Remembering this morning, you don’t turn back to look at their faces, knowing that they’re likely just as hurt, if not worse. The temptation to turn around to look at them was strong, but you knew if you turned around you might go running back into their arms. Thoughts about the people you lost during the battle Loki led filled your mind and your blood began to boil as you turned the corner.
You can't believe the woman who led that horrific battle is the same woman who held you so gently last night.