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Darcy prides herself on a skill not one of the Avengers has; finding the best coffee. When it comes to finding the best coffee her skillset is clearly unparalleled. Especially looking at Clint, with his ‘Five Below’ brew and Tony who flavors his coffee with a generous helping of motor oil.
Just now sitting in an old diner, she feels like she’s found heaven in Manhattan. The place is tucked in between 10th and 9th avenue on 48th street, tiny, something the hipsters in Brooklyn would call a hole-in-the-wall place, except even the hipsters wouldn’t set foot into it.
It smells like the grease is as old as Captain America and even the most hipster aesthetic isn’t going to get them come inside.
Besides, the only vegan thing Darcy can see in this whole establishment is the rubber fig by the door. And there are certainly no chia-seeds in her coffee.
The place is ugly as fuck and the patrons all match the original fifties interior. Darcy’s definitely the youngest person in the room and that even includes that fig.
But the coffee, the coffee is what makes this place the most amazing find. All those Yelp reviews have absolutely been talking shit.
You see, Darcy has made it her mission to try out any and all places that have more than a two star review on Yelp in Manhattan to find the perfect place with the perfect coffee. This place just so happened to have a two and a half star rating. And the best fucking coffee in town.
Darcy sips her coffee happily and slowly, her lunch time is longer than usual because Jane’s somewhere in Kazakhstan and she isn’t because Pepper had given her the puppy eyes - well not puppy eyes, this is the Pepper Potts, she is well above that - so that she would stay and watch Tony, except Tony’s somewhere in California at a convention for clean energy.
So all she has to do is make tea for Bruce, who is otherwise pretty self sustainable. So two hour long lunch breaks are just fine. Darcy personally believes there is no better way to waste time than to spend her hard earned money on overpriced coffee and do some sightseeing at the same time. She hasn’t been in New York all too long and between assisting Jane with all things pop tarts and science and running after Dum-E with a fire extinguisher she hasn’t had the time to do anything touristy.
And even the longest lunch hours wouldn’t be long enough to stand in the queue at the Rockefeller Center, so finding obscure coffee places it is.
As she surveys the room she gets caught on a man sitting in one of the booths at the far end of the diner, he’s so hunched over that his hair is almost on his plate. He somehow still looks alert though, stiff like he is painfully aware of his surroundings.
He looks homeless, like an Army vet, and Darcy thinks he would benefit from a cup of coffee as well. He’s got water and a plate of scrambled eggs, which is the saddest thing Darcy has ever seen. Perhaps it’s the spirit of Christmas but she waves down a waitress.
“Can you draw another one in the dark for me?” The elderly waitress, whose nametag reads Doris, quirks an eyebrow, because Darcy’s already on her third coffee and probably because her diner slang is so on point. “Sure thing, honey, anything else I can get you?”
“Can you get me another mug?”
“Are you gonna use both your hands now?” She asks, drolly.
Darcy shrugs and grins. “I’m thinking good deed.” She explains pointing to the her soon to be new friend.
“Ah.” Doris nods and goes to get the coffee. She returns seconds later and hands it to her with a quirk of her lips. “Go get ‘em tiger.” She chuckles, eyes glinting.
He startles when she slides into the booth, clutching his fork tightly, absolutely ready to stab her. Leave it to her to find the one murderous hobo in this diner. She slides the mug over to him.
“This is the best thing that has ever happened to me. Like, Odin himself send it to me. My soulmate, so to speak.” He stares at it, then stares at her. His eyes are an icy blue, he looks confused but not nearly as murdery as she expected judging by the hold on his utensils.
“It’s not poisoned.” She adds when his gaze flickers to her coffee suspiciously. He quirks an eyebrow, looking just the tiniest bit amused. She feels a blush rise to her cheeks.
“That’s something a person who poisoned the coffee definitely would say. Sorry. It’s totally not poisoned, poison is probably expensive, I can’t afford poison.” She really needs to stop talking before she gets stabbed with a blunt knife. “Merry Christmas.” She blurts and hustles back to her table, hastily getting the necessary change out of her pockets and then high-tailing it out of the diner towards the subway not looking back once.
*
She thinks a lot about him, whether it is because under all that hair she suspects is actually a handsome person or because she felt there was something familiar about him, she doesn’t know.
She just knows she has too much time to think about sad hobos. Whenever she goes back to the diner there is a little bit of hope in her that he will show up again. Sadly, he never shows up, it’s like he is a figment of her imagination.
It’s weeks before she catches a glimpse of him again, it’s not in the diner or any of the other places in the area she’s been testing. Though, she has been faithful to Doris. None of the abominations that dare to call themselves coffee lives up to her miracle on 48th street.
On the thursday before Christmas, she sees her coffee hobo friend outside of the tower, staring again. He can’t see her since she’s like thirty stories up but she knows it’s him because his long hair is so distinctive. Also she’s using her phone camera’s zoom.
She knows it’s sort of creepy that she is watching him but he is definitely creepier following her like that. Maybe Doris’ coffee did have magical properties? Magic would explain why the place was still up and running.
He looks sad, standing there all by himself with his baseball cap and his backpack.
Darcy makes a split second decision, she hurries to the kitchen and grabs her ‘Hello Kitty’ thermos and fills it to the brim with coffee from the pot. She clutches the thermos to her chest as she pushes the button to the elevator with more force than strictly necessary.
“Hurryyy.” She whines.
She hops from one foot to the other, adrenaline pumping. When the elevator finally dings to announce it’s arrival, the doors open to reveal Tony and Captain America standing in it. Tony grins at her.
“Lookit Lewis! I brought you some beans!” Tony says waving a bag of expensive looking coffee. It’s tempting but the urge to have another conversation with the mysterious stalking hobo is overwhelming. She smiles distractedly.
“Thanks, Tony but I gotta scram!”
“I’m hurt, shortstack! I brought you a present the least I deserve is a little love.”
“That’s what they have brothels for!” Darcy yells as she pulls open the doors to the stairs.
Which is weird in itself because Darcy is a firm believer that stairs shouldn’t be taken if the elevator is available but she’s sure he will vanish if she doesn’t get down there soon.
Darcy takes the stairs two at a time at a speed that would break her neck if she falls.
The insanity of it all catches up with her when she is in lobby. Sweating like a pig and out of breath. All for a guy she hasn’t even had conversation with and who was also kind of stalking her. Magic coffee or not. She is gonna have words with Doris about this.
The streets are busy, tourists have doubled in numbers now that it’s close to Christmas and everyone is here to see Park Avenue and the tree.
Coffee-hobo is still on the other side of the street watching the tower. Darcy sighs in relief.
“Hey! Stalker!” She yells over the crowds but he doesn’t react. Which makes sense, this is New York after all if everyone turned at ‘hey’ nothing would ever get done anymore. Everything would be easier if she just had his name. Or an even more obnoxious voice.
He finally notices her when she is a few feet away from him, just as she is about to punch a particularly slow tourist out of the way. Panic is evident on his face and he looks ready to bolt the closer she gets. His hands move to the back of his pants, she knows he’s probably hiding another weapon there but she goes on undeterred.
“No! Wait!” She yells holding up her thermos as a peace offering. Miraculously, he does. He looks skeptically down at her when she is finally in front of him.
“Coffee.” She says holding her thermos out to him. He doesn’t move to take it.
“I know,” She huffs, bracing herself with one arm on her knee still trying to catch her breath. “It’s not Doris’ coffee. Clint made it but it’ll keep you warm at night.”
Not that he needed it, the weather reminded her of summers down in Virginia, warm and so muggy that it felt like going for a bath every time she went outside. This year Christmas didn’t feel like Christmas at all. And he was wearing at least three layers. He didn’t need the coffee but she wanted to give it to him anyway.
He nods slowly, reaching out for the thermos tentatively like he expects her to pull away. Darcy stands up fully when he’s got the thermos safely in his hand.
“So..” She says, realizing the awkwardness of the situation.
“Are you stalking me?” His mouth turns into a thin line and he shakes his head vehemently.
“Well...are you a fan of Stark then?” He looks at her with so much disgruntled disgust that she wishes she had brought him the thermos Tony had given her for her birthday. In true Tony style it had his actual face on it.
“The big green?” He shrugs.
“Hawkeye?” He gives her look that she’s glad Clint isn’t here to see.
“It’s gotta be Natasha then.” He remains passive.
“Oh no. Captain America, really?” Not that Steve was a bad choice, she was sure he was a sweet kid, they hadn’t exactly had a chance to talk because Steve had been on missions almost constantly for the past six months. He gives her an odd look and shrugs. “That’s alright, is he your childhood hero?” He shook his head, the corner of his mouth twitching like it’s a private joke. Darcy flashes him a smile.
“My first crush was Gomez Addams, I would stand outside of his home too if I could.” He raises an eyebrow but stays quiet and she begins to wonder if maybe he can’t talk. Maybe her first assessment of Army vet wasn’t too far off, maybe it’s PTSD.
Overall, he doesn’t look too bad when he isn’t sitting under the fluorescent lights of the diner. He doesn’t look like he gets a regular hot meal but he isn’t starving either, his hair is unwashed but not dirty. Like she suspected there is handsome face hiding under all that scruff. Beneath the surface, far, far beneath it. But definitely there. He’s still stubbornly looking up at the tower, the Hello Kitty thermos nestled in the crook of his arm.
She turns to look up the tower as well, the Avengers sign gleams in the December sun. When she turns back to him, to ask if he wants anything else, he has already vanished. “Very Copperfield.” She mumbles, pleased to see her thermos gone.
*
Christmas Eve comes and Darcy finds herself alone in the tower. Jane is still in Kazakhstan and Thor’s joined her, they’d skyped earlier but Thor’s booming voice had been so bad that they had to cut it short because Darcy was sure her laptop’s speakers were going to burst.
Tony had invited her to join him and Pepper in Malibu but Darcy would feel like she was intruding. All the others were on missions that are so classified that Darcy isn’t even supposed to know that there even is a mission.
Alone on Christmas Eve in Manhattan. There isn’t even any snow that could’ve made her feel festive, outside it was raining heavily. And it’s warm. Darcy wants her cozy blanket, peppermint hot chocolate and snow outside. And someone to cuddle with maybe. In lieu of a person a cat would be okay too.
But Darcy feels too buzzed to just sit and wallow. She wants the comfort of a nice hot beverage and a walk to clear her head. So she puts on her raincoat and some boots and heads out.
It’s unsurprising when she ends up at the diner again. The holiday decoration bright and blinding but Darcy loves it. Doris is already there with a cup of coffee when she gets in the door.
“Merry Christmas.” Doris smiles, eyes twinkling, she points to the booth in the corner.
“Your friend is already there.”
Darcy scowls but follows the direction of Doris’ finger and sure enough there he is watching her. He’s dressed nicer than usually, he has ditched the layers for a simple henley and his hair is pulled back. She takes her coffee from Doris and walks up to the table.
“So you are stalking me.” She says as she shrugs her wet coat off. He grins at her shamelessly. “I ain’t stalking you, I was here first.”
“So you can talk.” She quips, sliding into the booth.
“I can talk alright.” She takes a sip of her coffee. He rummages through his backpack and produces her Hello Kitty thermos.
“Thanks for the coffee, doll.” She nods and accepts it.
“So what’s your name?” She asks, stealing a fry off of his plate. It feels a little wrong to steal something from a homeless person but it’s fries and she can’t help herself.
He hesitates for a long moment before he answers slowly, eyes intense as he gauges her reaction. “James Barnes,” Darcy’s eyes bug. “People used to call me Bucky.”
Figures that she would befriend the one hobo in this establishment that was not only murderous but also nearly a hundred years old.
A Christmas miracle. That is what this is.
“Oh,” She says dumbly. “Doris’ coffee is magical.”